Lisa Jewell

She felt like a creature born to reside on the bottom of the ocean floor, dark and flat and half-blind, slowly rising through the icy water to the glittering light above.

There was no beginning, middle and end to destiny, it wasn't neat and manageable. It was random and scary and if it wanted to it would.

It's the people who seem weak who are always suprisingly strong, and the ones who seem strong who are unexpectledly weak.

They say that your powers of memory are at their peak when you're 26, and it's all downhill after that.

you are the only woman I have ever met who I would want to be in a little house with, do you see? Other women make me want to get on boats and run away. You, you make me want to stay somewhere, so that I can see your face everyday. So that I can hold you everyday and watch you grow older. You make me want to be an adult man. You make me want to settle down.

She remembered the intensity of her desire to undress him, to be naked with him, the way she felt like she could say whatever she wanted and be fully understood and do whatever she wanted and be totally accepted. She remembered how easy it had all been, how open and bright, like being in a whitewashed room with all the windows wide open.