The things we remember are not necessarily the most permanent or even the most meaningful, but they are often the brightest, and maybe that is why in the end they matter most.

Hers was a small and lonely life, a rigorous servitude in preparation for a bigger life, as she tried to see it; yet now, just beneath the thinning fabric of her existence, she sensed an invisible roiling of vast, terrifying, dangerous things – things that would play with you if you pleased them, things that would kill you if you proved a disappointment.

Perhaps, she thought, in some parallel dimension, infinitely close and infinitely far away, another house existed alongside theirs, and in that other house lived fascinating people who did fascinating things and held fascinating talks over their dinner table – and though there was no doorway between the two places, one could occasionally stumble upon glimpses and echos of that other, brighter place, and for one single moment of miraculous serendipity, one could feel almost complete.

Bad things happen wherever they get a mind to, but good things don’t happen at all unless you go looking for them.

And don’t start thinking about that boy’s shirt again, or one day you may find yourself laundering it.

For what, after all, is the difference between a memory and a fantasy? Are not both a succession of imprecisely rendered images further obscured by imprecisely chosen words and animated only by the wistful effort of one’s imagination? And who is to say that a vividly imagined moment of happiness is not, in the end, more enriching to the spirit than a hazy semi-recollection of some pallid pastime?

Oh and finding happiness in the small things, my dear, that’s really nothing to brag about – it’s the last consolation of those whose imaginations have failed them.

Whenever you come to a fork in the road, always choose the harder path, otherwise the path of least resistance will be chosen for you.

Perhaps, she thought, in some parallel dimension, infinitely close and infinitely far away, another house existed alongside theirs, and in that other house lived fascinating people who did fascinating things and held fascinating talks over their dinner table—and though there was no doorway between the two places, one could occasionally stumble upon glimpses and echos of that other, brighter place, and for one single moment of miraculous serendipity, one could feel almost complete.

A dream house unfolding at some magical juncture of the past and the future, bypassing the dull, heartbroken, trivial present, born equally out of memory and promise . . .