I watch her blond head until it disappears around the bend, and I feel bare, like there’s nothing left to protect me against pain. Her absence stings worst of all.
We believe in shouting for those who can only whisper, in defending those who cannot defend themselves.
I feel acutely aware of how young I am. In a way that is good. It’s productive. It makes me realise that I should be growing as a writer and a person.
It’s strange how a word, a phrase, a sentence, can feel like a blow to the head.
It’s strange how time can make a place shrink, make its strangeness ordinary.
My mother told me once that we can’t survive alone, but even if we could, we wouldn’t want to. Without a faction we have no purpose and no reason to live.
It reminds me that no embrace will ever feel the same again, because no one will ever be like her again, because she’s gone. She’s gone, and crying feels so useless, so stupid, but it’s all I can do.
I’ll say it one last time: Be brave.
Human reason can excuse any evil.
I wonder if fears ever really go away, or if they just lose their power over us.
Pride is what killed Al, and it is the flaw in every Dauntless heart. It is in mine.
I think you’re still the only person sharp enough to sharpen someone like me.
No matter how long you train someone to be brave, you never know if they are or not until something real happens.
I slowly realized that perfectionism just not that important. What’s more important is to try to love the people around you. Whatever that means at a particular time is the best you can do.
It reminds me why I chose Dauntless in the first place: not because they are perfect, but because they are alive. Because they are free.
I am collecting the lessons each faction has to teach me, and storing them in my mind like a guidebook for moving through the world. There is always somthing to learn, always somthing that is important to understand.
Grief is not as heavy as guilt, but it takes more away from you.
Reading is such a huge part of my life.
We are not people who touch each other carelessly; every point of contact between us feels important, a rush of energy and relief.
We believe in ordinary acts of bravery, in the courage that drives one person to stand up for another.