What was about this that made us feel we deserved it?
I try not to think too much. Like other things now, thought must be rationed.
I intend to get out of here. It can’t last forever. Others have thought such things, in bad times before this, and they were always right, they did get out one way or another, and it didn’t last forever. Although for them it may have lasted all the forever they had.
Live in the present, make the most of it, it’s all you’ve got.
Modesty is invisibility, said Aunt Lydia. Never forget it. To be seen-to be seen-is to be-her voice trembled-penetrated. What you must be, girls, is impenetrable.
Now that she’s the carrier of life, she is closer to death, and needs special security.
She who weeps when the sun’s in sky, Will never pile the platter high.
I almost gasp: he’s said a forbidden word. Sterile. There is no such thing as a sterile man anymore, not officially. There are only women who are fruitful and women who are barren, that’s the law.
Murderess, murderess, he whispers to himself. It has an allure, a scent almost. Hothouse gardenias. Lurid, but also furtive. He imagines himself breathing it as he draws Grace towards him, pressing his mouth against her. Murderess. He applies it to her throat like a brand.
Now I wanted to be acknowledged, but I feared it.
She was an infallible prophetess, and these powers came from her ability to look into the patterns of the universe.
Within each of these categories, the principle was the same: rarity and beauty increased value.
I will bend, I will touch the ground, or as close to it as I can get without rupture. I will lay a wreath of invisible money on her grave.
A Sister, dipped in blood.
Roz added sheep to Heaven. They would be outside the window, naturally.
If you can’t stop the waves, go sailing.
And so I step up, into the darkness within; or else the light.
But remember that forgiveness too is a power. To beg for it is a power, and to withhold or bestow it is a power, perhaps the greatest.
There is more than one kind of freedom, said Aunt Lydia. Freedom to and freedom from. In the days of anarchy, it was freedom now. Now you are being given freedom from. Don’t underrate it.
Men and women tried each other on, casually, like suits, rejecting whatever did not fit.