Home > Work > Get a Life, Chloe Brown (The Brown Sisters, #1)
1 " You always say such lovely things to me, Red. Do you say them to yourself? "
― Talia Hibbert , Get a Life, Chloe Brown (The Brown Sisters, #1)
2 " And now she was mortified. She wrapped her blanket tighter around herself, as if she could disappear inside it. This was what came of liking men: rampant idiocy. She opened her mouth and searched for a way to digherself out of that particular hole. "
3 " She’d been hunting for an indescribable thrill, a feeling she remembered from nights out with her friends, but she’d misunderstood where the feeling came from. It wasn’t about drinking and partying in some dingy club. It had been about the people. The constant laughter they shared, too high on each other to care that they were being obnoxious. Group trips to the bathroom like a small army unit, where the mission objective was helping each other squat over filthy toilets without their dresses touching the seat. Belonging. "
4 " Shut up. Come here." Her stomach dipped as he lifted her, then put her between his spread thighs. Her back was against his chest. He leaned against the stone pillar of the monument they were absolutely not about to defile. "
5 " Some people (like singularly unhelpful and clearly underqualified physical therapists, unsympathetic GPs, and that supremely irritating second cousin who ate all the stuffing at Christmas) assumed that a lack of feeling in certain body parts shouldn’t affect sleep at all. Her insomnia in such situations, they said, was something she could easily overcome. Chloe liked to remind those people that the human brain tended to keep track of all body parts, and was prone to panic when one of those parts went offline. Actually, what Chloe liked to do was imagine hitting those people with a brick. "
6 " Disturbing things always seemed to happen on Tuesdays. "
7 " Apparently, this climb was wearing her out—but she’d been taking irregular walks for years, damn it. Surely she should be a semipro athlete by now? Apparently not. The human body was an inconvenient and unreasonable thing. "
8 " The thing is, Red...some of us have so many marginalizations, we might drown if we let all the little hurts flood in. So there are those, like me, who filter. I think you've noticed that I filter a lot. It's not some inbuilt shield made of money. It's just something I'm forced to do...And that's not to discount the differences between us that fall in my favor. It's just an explanation. "
9 " Like being unwell was a crime or a scam or a self-indulgence. "
10 " So I’m doing it for you because that’s how people should behave; they should fill in each other’s gaps. "
11 " Love is certainly never safe, but it’s absolutely worth it. "
12 " Bravery wasn't an identity, so much as a choice. "
13 " Life hurts,” he said fiercely. “It’s unavoidable. But I know the difference between torture and growing pains. "
14 " You think this is a big deal because, no offense, you've had a lot of people in your life who claimed to care about you but didn't act like it. That's not me. I can cook, and right now, you can't. So I'm doing it for you because that's how people should behave; they should fill in each other's gaps. Don't think about it too hard. "
15 " You were hurt, and you reacted. You were in an unhealthy situation in more ways than one, and you panicked and cleansed everything with fire. Don’t dismiss your emotions and your self-protection as just a fucked-up decision. Don’t reduce something so complex and real and important to nothing. "
16 " Red,' she whispered. 'You don't always have to be okay.' She leaned closer and pressed a kiss to his cheek. He was still for a moment. But then he looked at her, and smiled, and murmured, "I know. But I am okay, with you. "
17 " I started feeling afraid of my own body, like it was a torture chamber I’d been trapped inside. "
18 " She was the woman who’d come here to ask about love. She was the woman who’d decided to change her entire life with nothing but a list. She was the woman who survived, every single day. She was Chloe fucking Brown, and she was starting to wonder if she’d been brave from the beginning. If she’d just needed to love herself enough to realize it. "
19 " Whether something bad is coming from your body or your brain, it makes no difference. Still feels like shit, right? Still hurts. Still needs fixing. They shouldn’t have dismissed you, even if it was in your head. When it comes down to it, everything we feel is in our heads. "
20 " You are a woman who, in a life filled with pain, came here to ask about love. "
