10 Quotes by Nathan Harris

These were just inventions, of course, and she [Isabelle] lived knowing, quite well, that such things were not promised to her. She might hope for more but had long ago learned to live with whatever came to pass. Yet sometimes--just sometimes--hope was enough.

Caleb made for the stairs and did not slow down as the boy called out to him. There was an undeniable rush to the way he climbed to the second floor. He had no idea what he might find there, but knew that August, if he still had any care for him at all, would welcome the imposition. How else might he respond to someone so willing to fight for a friendship, someone who might put all social boundaries aside to risk the chance to say hello?

...it dawned on him [Landry] that there was less to fear than he'd once imagined, which was maybe a truth he'd long wished to believe--that all danger carried the faint trace of comfort, all wrongs the hint of what may be right.

What if my name was Daniel, Lucas, Noah. Lucas Harris, That doesn't sound right. I think I'll stick with Nate.

They sat in silence, and George found their aversion to speaking welcome. Other than his wife [Isabelle], they seemed like the only individuals he'd come upon in some time who would rather leave a moment naked than tar it with wasted words.

...perhaps that was the great ill of the world, that those prone to evil were left untouched by guilt to a degree so vast that they might sleep through a storm, while better men, conscience-stained men, lay awake as though that very storm persisted unyieldingly in the furthest reaches of their soul.

Having returned from the war in one piece, Caleb apparently didn't realize how these situations so often ended. No reunion. No resolution. Instead, the spark of life that connects you to the other you cherish simply dims and then goes black entirely. The present thunders on while the past is a wound untended, unstitched, felt but never healed.

...each day of each year, a man might imagine a tree in his mind. The tree, upon doing good in the world, could grow strong and thick, but with each poor decision, rot would start to sprout -- gnarled roots at its base, limp branches that snapped with the lightest touch. At the end of any given period -- a month, a year -- it was wise to consider the growth of one's tree, and the decisions you had made that led it there. It was yours to let grow or die.

Early on, this inactivity was a pulsing shame. She sensed her old self, the dutiful and productive self, knocking at her conscience, begging to be let back into her life. But this feeling passed, and what took its place was something akin to bliss.