If love is easy, you’re not doing it right.
I can do this, I tell myself firmly. I can be attracted to him. It’s just a matter of self control and possibly also getting very drunk. So I lift my glass and take several huge gulps. I can feel the bubbles surging into my head, singing happily “I’m going to be a millionaire’s wife! I’m going to be a millionaire’s wife!” And when I look back at Tarquin, he already looks a bit more attractive. Alcohol is obviously going to be the key to our marital status.
It’s funny how life works like a seesaw: Some things go up while others plunge down.
I learned that failing doesn’t mean you are a failure; it just means you’re a human being.
Other people’s eyes are limitless and that’s what scares me.
But I’m sick of this bloody jagged graph. You know, two steps up, one step down. It’s so painful. It’s so slow. It’s like this endless game of snakes and ladders.” And Mum just looked at me as if she wanted to laugh or maybe cry, and said, “But Audrey, that’s what life is. We’re all on a jagged graph. I know I am. Up a bit, down a bit. That’s life.
The parents are in charge of all the stuff like technology in the house and time on screens and hours on social media, but then their computer goes wrong and they’re like a baby, going, “What happened to my document?” “I can’t get Facebook.” “How do I load a picture? Double-click what? What does that mean?” And we have to sort it out for them.
Commuting in London is basically warfare. It’s a constant campaign of claiming territory; inching forward; never relaxing for a moment. Because if you do, someone will step past you. Or step on you.
You get self-obsessed when you’re ill. You can’t see anything around you.
I feel like I’ve been on this massive long, lonely journey, and none of my friends could ever understand it, even Natalie. I think I kind of hated them for that.
We’re just looking and looking at each other. And I can feel something new between us, something even more intimate than anything we’ve done. Eye to eye. It’s the most powerful connection in the world.
But what can you do about mistakes except think, Won’t do that again, and move forward?
For God’s sake. In movies, they fix the note to a dog’s collar and it trots off obediently, no nonsense.
The moment happens, and you make your crucial mistake, and then it’s gone and the chance to do anything about it is blown away.
Every time you see someone’s bright-and-shiny, remember: They have their own crappy truths too.
I’m your husband. If you’re lost, it’s up to me to come and find you.
You keep saying ‘I’m fine’ to people when you’re not fine. You think you should be fine. You keep saying to yourself: ‘Why aren’t I fine?
If you want to get ahead, you have to create your own chances. You have to carve out your own opportunities.
It was about how you have to be strong to break free from abuse and not constantly measure yourself against toxic people but stand strong and distinct like a healthy tree. Not some stunted, falling-over, co-dependent victim tree. Or whatever.
She’s not talking to me. She’s talking to the Imaginary Daily Mail Judge, who constantly watches her life and gives it marks out of ten.