26
" I hate him.” She repeats it louder. “I hate him!” She shouts it at the sky, even though it’s hard to shout lying down: “I! Hate! Luke! Willis!”
Rachel asks, “But what did he do?”
Hallelujah can hear Jonah waiting for her answer. She knows he’s waiting because he’s stopped making fire-building noises. He’s silent. Completely.
She takes a deep breath. “He told a lie about me. Actually, a lot of lies. And people believed him. The grown-ups, because he’s the preacher’s son and he’d never do something bad. And everyone our age—because he’s popular and you don’t question the popular guy, because if you do, you’ll stop being popular yourself. Or you’ll never get the chance. And because of what he said, my parents stopped trusting me. I lost friends. I was just this loser who—”
She breaks off. Now she’s talking to Jonah. Even though he’s behind her and she can’t see him. “It doesn’t matter what you saw that night, or what he told you happened. Luke treated me like I was nothing, and you let him do it.”
Jonah doesn’t answer.
“But that’s not what makes me the maddest,” Hallelujah continues, pushing up to sit. “What makes me the maddest is that I let it happen too. I didn’t stand up for myself. And when someone did tell me to stand up for myself, I got so mad—”
Sarah. She feels the emotion of their argument wash over her, fresh.
“I pushed her away. I told her she didn’t understand anything. But she was right. I became this girl who wouldn’t stand up for herself. The quiet girl. The nothing girl. I just wanted it all to stop, but from the outside, without me having to make it stop. And I wanted to get away, but I figured, hey, college will get here eventually and then I’ll be away, I just have to get there, and all the while I’m miserable, and I’m letting you guys make me miserable, letting you make me think I’m supposed to be miserable, that I’m supposed to be quiet, and I’m shutting people out, people who maybe actually care, and I hate myself for it.” An abrupt stop. The train of thought hits a wall.
She’s never said that before. Never thought it before. Not consciously.
But she knows, deeper than she’s ever known anything, that it’s true.
Hallelujah has spent six months hating herself for being weak and silent and for letting bad things happen and for not fighting. "
― Kathryn Holmes
28
" When someone says " I Love You," it is imperative that you know if you are loved for " WHAT you are" or " WHO you are." When the academic qualifications, professionals, positions, possessions, good look, fat bank accounts and all that has been acquired over the years are taken away, all that is left is " Who you are" - Your Personality (character, values, perceptions.)" We are never truly loved, until we are loved for WHO and not WHAT we are "
32
" Look, Jordan, you’re not alone any more. It’s my job to protect you while I’m here and I can’t do that if you keep pushing me away.”
“That’s the problem, Michael,” I shot back. “You have more responsibilities to your boss than you do to me. You taught me how to defend myself, how to heal myself, and that should be good enough. You can’t keep babysitting one little human when you have an entire cosmos to worry about.”
He faced me again, those green eyes boring into mine as if he could see straight through me. “Are you saying you want me to leave?”
My chest tightened. I hadn’t expected him to say that. I bit my bottom lip, glancing away. “That’s not what I mean.”
“Then what do you mean?”
“Since when have I ever known what the hell I mean?”
He touched my right cheek, making me face him. “You do when it counts.”
Staring up at him, shirtless, vulnerable, and wounded, I felt like I couldn’t breathe. He had a knack for picking my walls apart brick by brick. It bothered me.
He took a step closer, casting a shadow over me.
“Stop,” I mumbled, fixing my eyes on the floor. He brushed a lock of hair behind my ear, sliding his warm hand to lift my chin so I’d have to look at him.
“Stop what?” he murmured.
“Looking at me.”
“Why?”
“That’s how Terrell used to look at me before we kissed.”
His lips parted to say something but I pushed past him, gathering up my duster from where it lay on the bed next to the dress.
“Get dressed. We have more ghosts to help. "
― Kyoko M. , The Black Parade (The Black Parade, #1)
35
" People? They usually ask only stupid questions, forcing you to reply with equally stupid answers. For instance, they ask you what you do, not what you would have liked to do. They ask you what you own, not what you’ve lost. They ask about the woman you married, not about the one you love. About your name, but not if it suits you. They ask your age, but not how well you’ve lived those years. They ask about the city you live in, not about the city that lives in you. And they ask if you pray, not if you fear God.So I’ve gotten used to answering these questions with silence. You know, when we shut up, we force others to reconsider their mistakes. "
