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21 " At last, her mother and sisters exited the station and came to stand next to her. “Mama,” Hattie said. “I’ll never go back. Never. "
― Ayana Mathis , The Twelve Tribes of Hattie
22 " One of these days you gon’ have to turn around and look at whatever it is you running from. "
23 " I know all of her moods and the way they play across her features, but I am still awed at the configuration of lips and eyes and cheeks that make up that face that I love. Out of all of the others I could have loved. My Sissy. "
24 " Some things you can’t apologize for, you just have to try to get around them,” Hattie replied. “For your own sake too, so you can have a little peace. "
25 " Hattie was like a lake of smooth, silvered ice, under which nothing could be seen or known. "
26 " I go above deck to watch the sky darken into twilight. It helps me remember that this strange place is still the earth, and I am still on it. "
27 " I wonder if the brass understands that people are getting killed. "
28 " I couldn't stand to be a fool a second time,' Hattie said. 'I couldn't stand it. "
29 " Hattie’s children died in the order in which they were born: first Philadelphia, then Jubilee. "
30 " She wished the man outside really were Thomas, so she and Billups could again have the same enemy and the same fear.O "
31 " She didn’t know what to make of this sporadic urgency with him. It had confounded and humiliated her for the thirty years of their marriage. These endless pregnancies. And worse, her body’s insistence on a man who was the greatest mistake of her life. "
32 " Eudine did not reply. She was indecipherable, so ageless and immaculate. Her eyes were the same caramel shade as her skin. Her face was a placid lake, such depths. A woman with a face like that could be a confessor, could be told anything, no matter how awful, and remain steady as granite. "
33 " It was important to do what needed doing, no matter the day or the circumstance. "
34 " All of them -- Hattie and Willie and Evelyn and even ruined, crazy Walter -- were little lights; sparks flying upward in dark places, trying to stay alight though they were compelled toward ash. They were nearly extinguished one moment, then orange and luminous the next. "
35 " It had been easy to be comfortable with each other when there was a glass wall between them. "
36 " She had been with her share of schemers and men who were forever building castles in the sky. All of those dreams made out of clouds; when it rained - and it always did - they were left with nothing but the soggy shirts on their backs. "
37 " Bell lifted her hand to her chest. Her heart beat so quickly. She was floating out on a tide of agony, and soon she would be carried so far she'd never come back. "
38 " I take in great lungfuls of air. Atom by atom, the oxygen enters my blood and pumps in waves through my veins; it is tidal, this pumping blood. My heart beats mightily. If I ran any faster, gravity would loose its claims on my ankles, and my feet would pedal into the air. "
39 " The butterflies were still alive in the Mason jar. August turned to her and said, “We gon’ make it through, Hattie.” She snatched the jar from the table and hurled it at the wall behind August. The two of them watched the butterflies, stunned and struggling in the broken glass.O "
40 " Six wasn't sure religion was any more than a lot of people caught up in a collective delirium that disappeared the minute they stepped out of the church doors and onto the street. "