Emma Mills Quotes & Sayings

I pulled out my phone and thought about calling someone, but who was there to call? And what would I even say? It was just the kind of unpleasant surprise you had to share with someone, but I didn't have anybody to share it with. — Emma Mills

You did so, two evers.Twice the ever is, like, the obnoxiousness squared. — Emma Mills

So I just open up my arms and Vera leans against me, and Gabe steps closer, putting one hand on her hair and petting it absently. None of us say anything. The city pulses on around us, and I'm not sure which one of us is anchoring the others, but I've never felt less adrift. — Emma Mills

Labor Day is really the last sweet taste of summer. One final pardon before all your Mondays become Mondays again. — Emma Mills

Tragic deaths aren't avoidable. That's what Ezra said outside Sam's wake, and even though--to use Foster's phrasing--I didn't know anything about anything, I felt in this moment that Ezra was wrong. What often makes something tragic is that it can be avoided. — Emma Mills

I like you,' I say. 'I lustful-sun like you, I meteorite like you, you are the fucking pink Starburst to me. — Emma Mills

Wait," he said, and he had his hand outstretched toward me, fingertips just brushing the sleeve of my sweatshirt, gently rooting me to the spot. I wanted to shrug him off, but at the same time, I wanted to fall against him and bury my face in his shoulder. I wanted to commiserate about what had just happened, and make sure he was okay, and discuss how Stanton really is psychotic. I did none of the above. — Emma Mills

As far as I was concerned, physical education was evil. You take a bunch of teenagers, make them strip down in front of each other in a locker room, have them don hideous matching uniforms, and then measure their worth based on their ability to chuck balls at a net, into a hoop, or at each other. It was just. Evil. — Emma Mills

You said no, though," he says, slightly muffled. "When I asked you out. That one time."

"Wait, what?"

"That time at work? I asked you to the movies, and you said you would invite Vera?"

I pull back a bit. "That wasn't - you weren't asking me out. You said I could come, too, if I wanted. That's not asking someone out."

"It was to me," he says, sheepish, and I want to poke him, but I also kind of want to hug him forever.

"Next time you want to ask someone out, maybe be less subtle. Maybe try to use the word date or together. Maybe phrase it as an actual question, you know, get some upward inflection going at the end of the sentence?"

He just looks at me, a little bit like he wants to poke me, but maybe also hug me forever. Instead he just kisses me, and it's a long time before we break apart again. — Emma Mills

The thing about fic is that is comes from love. Characters you love so much, that you feel so deeply for, you'll watch them fall in love a thousand different ways, over and over. — Emma Mills

I glance over at Gabe. Maybe I was wrong about me. About being for no one. I don't know what the future holds. My dad is right - there are no guarantees. None. But I pick up Gabe's hand and lace our fingers together, and that's enough in this moment.

We look out at the water, and that is more than enough for now. — Emma Mills

Close your eyes, real tight, and then count to three hundred. That's all you have to do. You just count to three hundred, and when you open your eyes, five minutes will have passed. And even if it hurts or things are shitty or you don't know what to do, you just made it through five whole minutes. And when it feels like you can't go on, you just close your eyes and do it again. That's all you need. Just five minutes at a time. — Emma Mills

A cute nickname was the first mile marker on Gag Highway, heading straight to Relationshipville. And making up the names of fake roads and cities to express your unhappiness was probably the first step to insanity. — Emma Mills

The idea that it doesn't matter what over people think about you gets thrown around a lot in high school, and in many instances it's true. But I do care what certain people think of me. — Emma Mills

What are you going to do for school?"
"Go to FSU with Tash."
"What if there was no Tash? What would you do then?"
"I don't know," she murmurs. "Maybe go wherever Gabe goes. Or come to New York with you."
It fills me with warmth, running liquid through me, but it won't thaw my mind. "Why does it have to be, like, based off someone else? Why can't you just do what you want?"
"What I want is to be around people I care about."
"Oh." I blink at the ceiling once, twice, eyelids getting heavy, eyes getting fuzzy. It makes sense when she says it like that. — Emma Mills

Coordinates," I say. "Right?"

He wrinkles his brow but then follows my gaze to the string of numbers below his palm.

"Yeah," he says. "For the beach at Grayson. It's, uh, it's where we scattered our mom's ashes."

"Gabe's a sap," Vera says.

"It's not sappy," I reply automatically, but Vera just smiles.
"I know. I'm just making fun. It's my job because I'm older."

"Are you?"

"Yup. I existed in the world without him for nine whole minutes." It starts light, joking, but her voice is soft by the end: "I never want to go through that again. — Emma Mills

When you love something, you can't be happy all the time, can you? Like, that's why you love it. It makes you feel all kinds of things, not just happy. It can hurt, it can make you fucking mad, but... it makes you feel something, you know? — Emma Mills

A thousand electric cars could run on how you feel when you know that the person you like likes you back. It feels incredible. Like it shouldn't be possible. Of all the happy coincidences to ever exist, it's one of the happiest. — Emma Mills

We should've looked before," Vera says, her voice soft. "We could've saved you the trouble."

"Are you kidding? The trouble was the best part. — Emma Mills

I had also never realized before that I loved him, but I did. And his pain was my pain, and it hurt, but it also felt good in a strange way, knowing that we could share in it together. — Emma Mills

But there was something in his eyes at times that I would almost swear said something more. Some deeper sort of regard. — Emma Mills

The only other complaint I had about Jane's books, cousin-loving aside, was the getting-together part. They were stories of such unconquerable love, such strong feelings. You follow these characters through the ups and downs of an emotional roller coaster, this breathtaking will-they-or-won't -they, and is it too much to ask for a little more time spent on the I-love-you-and-want-to-be-with-you part? It was the very best part, and I wanted to draw it out. I wanted kisses--good, long, passionate ones. Jane never wrote about those."
-Devon
First & Then — Emma Mills

They dated," Frank says, with just a little too much relish. "For two years. They were the shiniest golden couple of our class. What a match, you know? Both gorgeous. She's super smart--does student government, debate, choir, all that business. He does the sports and volunteers with his dad's church, has those puppy eyes that make you want to buy him a boat--"
"Do they?"
"Yes, gaze deeply into his eyes next time--you'll feel it." He takes a long draw from his drink and then continues. "Anyway, they were the kind of couple where it's like, separate--they're great. But together, it's . . . star magic."
"Star magic?"
"From the universe. Celestial bodies aligning and shit. That kind of magic. — Emma Mills

I would've liked to think I looked a little more mature than the rest of the girls in the class. Then again, with the majority of them being PTs, I probably looked the most like a fourteen-year-old."
-Devon
First & Then — Emma Mills

I should've been better. But sometimes all you can really stand to do is think about yourself. Sometimes it's the only way to cope. The only way to make sense of something as colossal and and intimidating as the world is to make it about you. — Emma Mills