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1 " What was dark but the absence of light? "
― Josh Malerman , A House at the Bottom of a Lake
2 " As long as nobody knew what it was, nobody could take it from her. "
3 " Sometimes things just got too complicated. Something unwanted was added to something wanted and blew the whole thing apart. "
4 " For the first time in either of their lives, they were falling in love. "
5 " Something unwanted was added to something wanted and blew the whole thing apart. "
6 " Yet, there was nothing. No images, no stories, no rumors. And with every dead-end she met, she experienced a little relief. If nobody else had a story about the house … didn’t that mean that, in a way, it still belonged to Amelia and James? And if they never talked about it with anybody else, if they forever kept their secret, wouldn’t it always remain theirs and theirs alone? "
7 " She flipped once more and her flippers struck the wall and the wall opened and Amelia gasped, within her mask, "
8 " And the androgynous laughter continued, too. Thick globules of sexless cheer. "
9 " She’d heard of people, adults usually, intentionally turning a good thing into a bad thing. When things were going good, adults liked to ruin them. Her own mom called it a ‘self-fulfilling prophecy.’ And you did it to prove to yourself that it wasn’t so good to begin with. "
10 " He looked at her. “That’s possible, right?” he asked. “I mean … underwater … people can do that?” “I think so.” Both seventeen. Both virgins. But both saying yes. "
11 " Other feelings, outside forces, fears. These were the enemies of a good thing. These were the problems people faced. "
12 " Curiosity killed the cat and the snooping seventeen-year-old girl. "
13 " Amelia crouched and set the cereal on the ground beside the box of rice. She thought of James’s sperm, fanning out, a slow-mo explosion, how cool it looked, "
14 " She liked that. Taking turns in a crazy place. Sounded like … like love. "
15 " Se você parar para pensar, fazer reparos é bem simples. As coisas têm partes definidas, sabe? Então basta começar descobrindo qual delas está quebrada. "
16 " Ela não queria pensar essas palavras. Queria dizê-las. Porque ninguém falaria em voz alta se estivesse com medo. Se Amelia estivesse com medo, ela não ia querer fazer som algum, "
17 " Às vezes as coisas ficavam complicadas demais. Algo indesejado juntava-se a algo desejado e destruía tudo. Medo. "