2025-01-07 20:35:24
In fact, wanting something was usually a sign that you did not deserve it and would not be getting it, for example: moving to New York City and going to a fancy college like NYU. Conversely, the less you wanted to do something, the more likely it was that you should, like going to the dentist or doing your taxes.
2025-01-11 19:49:22
was overwhelming how oddly similar Elizabeth’s and Mark’s mannerisms were
2025-01-11 20:01:09
seemed terribly likely that this was going to continue in a direction that would make her uncomfortable, yet his line of reasoning was not anything she disagreed with exactly
2025-01-12 21:31:48
“When I was little, I would masturbate to SpongeBob,” Suzie said. The abruptness of this gave Margo a little zing. She always kind of liked that, when things suddenly went sideways with another person.
2025-01-18 22:43:00
But I had no clue how to narrativize any of that for Shyanne, how to put together all the puzzle pieces in her mind the way I had been putting them together in mine.
2025-01-20 22:31:54
He was a righteous man.
2025-01-21 23:28:54
One look and Margo loved her again, and she could see that Becca loved her too.
2025-01-22 14:32:32
“The point here,” Mark said, “is that it is possible to form sentences that make sense syntactically but still don’t make meaning. Words can be made hollow, and once they are hollow, anything can be done with them.”
2025-01-22 22:45:53
elated
2025-01-22 23:06:54
“It also strikes me as strange,” Margo put in, “that you would be willing to leave Bodhi in my care while you were at work, if you believe I am an unfit mother and my home a dangerous environment.”
2025-01-22 23:19:32
What she liked most about sex was that feeling of all the normal posturing and social rules falling away, the giddy panic of realizing you’ve lost control and you’re not getting it back. Instead, you’re just helplessly writhing, victim of an ancient itch.
2025-01-23 23:33:21
chasm
2025-01-24 22:36:17
tell me about Mark, how you two met, the whole narrative arc.”
2025-01-24 22:37:40
“What were you thinking about?” Dr. Sharp asked. “I mean, I think I thought I was being a good person. There’s a lot of cultural messaging about what the ‘right’ thing to do is when you find yourself with an unwanted pregnancy. And I thought if I did the right thing and was a good person, then it would all turn out okay.”
2025-01-25 23:34:02
Margo read the email numbly later that day as she sat with Jinx on the pink velvet couch, Bodhi asleep on her chest.
2025-01-25 23:33:54
numbly
2025-01-27 23:24:29
People are all so lonely. Even when they do horrible things, it often comes down to that, if only you take the time to understand them. It seemed like that should mean the world could be better, that people could help each other, like Jesus said. And yet that’s not what happens. That hardly ever seems to happen at all.
2025-01-28 23:22:35
“So you told Sarah,” I prompted. This was a chain of causality I had not anticipated.
2025-01-28 23:25:17
There was no changing Mark. Or Jinx, or Shyanne, or how the world worked. They were like chess pieces: they moved how they moved. If you wanted to win, you couldn’t dwell on how you wished they’d move or how it’d be fairer if they moved a different way. You had to adapt.
2025-01-28 23:26:08
m trying to decide exactly what I’m going to do, which is why I’m asking. To me, it seems absurd that a man I slept with over a year ago gets to decide how I make a living, but that’s the position I find myself in.”
2025-01-28 23:27:27
“Will you do me a favor, Mark? I get you being worried about Bodhi, or about decisions I’m making professionally, but can you try reaching out to me directly? Because I think the things we make up in our heads, the assumptions we make, wind up being much worse than what’s really going on. Like, just call me! You never needed to file papers in the first place, come talk to me.”
2025-01-28 23:36:14
had always thought that love was supposed to come from other people, and somehow, I was failing to catch the crumbs of it, failing to eat them, and I went around belly empty and desperate. I didn’t know the love was supposed to come from within me, and that as long as I loved others, the strength and warmth of that love would fill me, make me strong
2025-01-28 23:53:35
in Chapter Twenty-Six
2025-01-29 23:39:19
say I look at your Instagram followers. And I write a program that will analyze all of their Instagram accounts and find common features, patterns they share, people or brands they follow, usage patterns, words in their bios, basic demographics like gender, age, location. And I make, like, a perfect profile of the average Ghost subscriber.” “Cool,” I said. “And then I use that profile to buy ads and show those ads exclusively to people who are perfect Ghost subscriber material.”
2025-01-30 14:12:12
nodded. “And presumably if we’re doing our job right, their earnings should increase enough that it pays for our ten percent and then some. I think that’s how we sell it to them, that there’s no risk, that they won’t see any earnings decrease because we’ll be earning our own keep
2025-01-30 14:15:26
“You harvested these Runts for me yourself?!” I crowed with happiness. “From the dark fertile soil of American capitalism,” JB affirmed.