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1 " Loving someone the way they need to be loved is hard. People can be really bad at it. All we can do is keep trying. "
― Misa Sugiura , Love & Other Natural Disasters
2 " I guess you're right. I can't promise anything. Life doesn't always turn out the way we want it to, and love doesn't always conquer all. You know that better than I do. But you can acknowledge that things are bad, and still find a way through. And maybe sometimes that means you stop loving each other, or maybe you have to find a new way to love each other. I know that. So, okay. It'll be hard, but I'm still hopeful. I want us to be together and I'm choosing to believe that it's worth trying. Because I'm really, truly, head over heels for you. "
3 " It's our lives" I say into the dark. "We should get to choose what we do with them."I hear her sigh, and she says "Yeah, but here's the thing. My mom grew up really poor. Like, her parents almost gave her away to another family. That kind of poor. And now I have all this opportunity, so of course she wants me to use it to become like, financially secure. Okay, open your eyes a sec.""Wow." I open my eyes."Right? How do you go against that without feeling guilty?"She snaps the palette shut, takes the wrapping off the primer, and begins applying it to my lashes."Do you think I'm being a spoiled little rich girl? Like, First World Problems, and all that?"I think about kids who've lost entire families to war and famine. Kids who don't know where their next meal is coming from. Willow's own mom. Even Dela, whose mom is dead."Um. I guess?" I say. On the other hard, that doesn't make her problems any less real, and that's what I tell her as she brushes on my mascara. "
4 " We are all connected by our aspirations toward happiness-by our wishes on stars. "
5 " Love isn't always easy. "
6 " I know, honey. But I've learned that if she can't accept the truth, then we have to accept that truth and work with it. It doesn't mean we give up trying. It just means we do what we can with what we've got. It's just the way love works sometimes.""Is it, though?" I persist. "I thought love was about accepting each other. I thought it was about facing hard facts together.""Are you saying that Baba doesn't really love you? Or me?" asks Stephan.That's the million-dollar question, isn't it?"And if you're unwilling to accept Baba the way she is-or Mom the way she is-do you really love them?" says Dad.My mouth drops open. "That's not fair.""I know," he says. "Love rarely is. "
