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21 " Here.' Miles unzipped the backpack and pulled out the container of IcyHot. 'Go to the dresser. Should be one of the top drawers--smear this in the crotch of every pair of underwear you find.''I--what?' I took the container. 'That's disgusting.''I'm paying you fifty dollars for this,' Miles hissed, turning toward the bed.I went to the dresser and yanked open the top drawer on the left. Empty. Crisp white underwear and boxers filled the one on the right.Well... at least they were clean. "
― Francesca Zappia , Made You Up
22 " I can empathize with characters. Real people are harder. Real people don’t have concise character arcs. "
― Francesca Zappia , Eliza and Her Monsters
23 " No, you're not a bad person," he said. "And Richter isn't a bad person, and I'm not a bad person. We're just people, and people sometimes do stupid things. "
24 " Dear Asshole: Thank you for keeping your word and believing me. It was more than I expected. Also, I'm sorry you were inconvenienced by my gluing your locker shut at the beginning of this year. However, I am not sorry that I did it, because it was a lot of fun. Love, Alex. "
25 " In a weird way, it felt like he belonged here. He belonged in the land of phoenixes and witches, the place where things were too fantastic to be real. "
26 " Mile's fingers pressed into the small of my back. "Basorexia," he mumbled."Gesundheit."He laughed. "It's an overwhelming desire to kiss.""I thought you weren't good at figuring out what you felt.""I'm probably using the word in the wrong context. But I'm pretty sure that's what this is. "
27 " Our neighbors turned to stare at us, because Miles Richter laughing was one of those things that the Mayans had predicted would signal the end of the world. He wasn't particularly loud about it, but it was Miles laughing, a sound no mortal had ever heard before. "
28 " The only thing missing was Miles. But he was probably circling somewhere, destroying villages and hoarding gold in his mountain lair. "
29 " I think you're an improvement on my imagination," I said, flipping back through the pages. "You, too," he said. "My imagination—well, what little imagination I have—doesn't quite live up to the real thing.""Agreed," I said. "The real thing is much better. "
30 " I wished I had put more cherries on that slice. The whole jar of cherries. I could watch him eat a whole jar of cherries. Jesus Christ on a pogo stick, what was happening to me? "
31 " I work at the deli counter. Have to give people their succulent, chemical-ridden salami and whatnot.'I pictured Miles in a dark room, standing at a butcher's block with a large knife in one hand, a blood cow's leg steadied under the other, a huge Cheshire grin spreading over his face--'I bet the customers love you,' I said. "
32 " Do you do this all the time?' he asked.'No,' I said. 'Just today.'He smiled. "
― Francesca Zappia
33 " Was there some kind of law about drop-kicking assholes in the face? Probably. They always had laws against things that needed to be done. "
34 " My parents didn't grow up here or anything. They chose to live in this nowhere town. Why? Because it was named after Hannibal of Carthage. Their basic train of thought was this: Hannibal's Rest? And we're naming our child after Alexander the Great? MARVELOUS. Ah, the history, it tickles.Sometimes I wanted to beat my parents over the head with a frying pan. "
35 " There is no force in high school more powerful than one person's blunt disagreement. "
36 " Yeah. I told you he was crazy, right? I heard he does some weird stuff at home, too.' He said it with a conspiratorial stage whisper. 'Like mowing his lawn, and trimming his peonies.''Peonies?' I balked. 'God, he really is a freak. "
37 " Are you French?' I asked instead.'Oui!'Foreign. Foreign spy. French Communist Party acted on Stalin's instructions during part of World War II. French Communist spy.Stop it stop it stop itI turned to Art, a black kid who was a foot and a half taller than me and whose pecs were about to burst of his shirt and eat someone. I gave him a two on the delusion detector. I didn't trust those pecs.'Hi,' he rumbled.I waved weakly. "
38 " You know a school is run by stuck-up sons of bitches when it doesn't even have a bike rack. "
39 " I was diagnosed a thirteen. Paranoid got tacked on about a year later, after I verbally attacked a librarian for trying to hand me propaganda pamphlets for an underground communist force operating out of the basement of the public library. (She'd always been a very suspect type of librarian--I refuse to believe donning rubber gloves to handle books is a normal and accepted practice, and I don't care what anyone says.) "
40 " It kind of felt like she was kicking me in the gut, and every kick said I don't want you.I don't need you.I don't love you. "