Downham Quotes & Sayings

She wishes she was old. She'd swap her life to be in a life that was nearly over, so long as she didn't have to be here. — Jenny Downham

If I learnt anything at all about terminal illness in my research, it's that the experience is different for everyone. I do believe that life becomes concentrated when it's boundaried and that death is the biggest boundary of all. — Jenny Downham

Her skin tasted expensive. — Jenny Downham

I don't give a shit, Dad!"
"Well I do! I absolutely give a shit! This will completely exhaust you."
"It's my body. I can do what I like!"
"So you don't care about your body now?"
"No, I'm sick of it! I'm sick of doctors and needles and blood tests and transfusions. I'm sick of being stuck in a bed day after day while the rest of you get on with your lives. I hate it! I hate all of you! Adam's gone for a university interview, did you know that? He's going to be here for years doing whatever he likes and I'm going to be under the ground in a couple of weeks! — Jenny Downham

We said we'd be friends.'
He looks confused. 'Yeah.'
I don't want to be.'
There's space between us, and in that space there's darkness. I take another step, so close that we share a breath. The same one. In and out.
Tess,' he says. I know it's a warning, but I don't care.
What's the worst thing that can happen?'
It'll hurt,' he says.
It already hurts.'
He nods very slowly. And it's like there's a hole in time, as if everything stops and in this one minute, where we look at each other so close, is spread out between us. As he leans towards me, I feel a strange warmth filtering through me. I forget that my brain is full of every sad face at every window I've ever passed. — Jenny Downham

Afterwards, go to a pub for lunch. I've got $260 in my savings account and I really want you to use it for that. Really, I mean it
lunch is on me. Make sure you have pudding
sticky toffee, chocolate fudge cake, ice-cream sundae, something really bad for you. Get drunk too if you like (but don't scare Cal). Spend all the money.
And after that, when days have gone by, keep an eye out for me. I might write on the steam in the mirror when you're having a bath, or play with the leaves on the apple tree when you're out in the garden. I might slip into a dream.
Visit my grave when you can, but don't kick yourself if you can't, or if you move house and it's suddenly too far away. It looks pretty there in the summer (check out the website). You could bring a picnic and sit with me. I'd like that. — Jenny Downham

Statement: A girl and a boy jump into a river. The boy swims over to the girl and says, "God, it's cold."
Question: What's the probability they will kiss? — Jenny Downham

If I could buck, I would. If I could howl at the moon, then I would. To feel this, when I'd thought it was
over, when my body's closing down and I thought I'd have no pleasure from it again.
I am blessed. — Jenny Downham

Nurses never tell you what they know. They're hired for their cheeriness and the thickness of their hair. They need to look alive and healthy, to give the patients something to aim for. — Jenny Downham

Number two on my list is simple. I must say yes to everything for one whole day. Whatever it is and whoever asks it of me. — Jenny Downham

I feel something very small growing inside me as I look at her, and I realize in one absolutely clear moment that I don't like her at all.
'You know what?' I say. 'Forget it. I'll do the list by myself.'
She stands up, swings her stupid hair about and tries to look offended. It's a trick that works with guys, but it makes no difference to the way I feel about her. — Jenny Downham

Help me, Mikey, she wanted to say. I'm afraid. More afraid than you'd ever believe.' And he'd take her hand and they'd fly across the rooftops and up into space and sit on some planet and watch a double sunrise or maybe a star being born or some other event that no human had ever seen, her head on his shoulder, his arm around her. And she'd tell him everything. — Jenny Downham

Was this love? Because it hurt. It felt like a bit of glass stuck somewhere important - his heart or his head. And it was throbbing.
Novel You Against Me — Jenny Downham

Every seven years our bodies change, every cell. Every seven years, we disappear. — Jenny Downham

There's a terrible stillness. I notice a small tear in the wallpaper above her shoulder. I notice finger marks grimed on the light switch. Somewhere down in the house, a door opens and shuts. As Zoey turns to face me, I realize that life is made up of a series of moments, each one a journey to the end. — Jenny Downham

I never plan a structure. I like surprises. I'm quite disciplined and sit at my desk every day and just write. — Jenny Downham

When he thought about her, he remembered her at the cottage, her eyes fiery, daring to love him. But standing here in front of him , she looked defeated and sad. — Jenny Downham

It's as if a child with a brush and too much enthusiasm has been set free with a tin of black paint inside me. — Jenny Downham

Her face crashes. She hasn't dealt with a single transfusion or lumbar puncture. She wasn't allowed near me for the bone-marrow transplant, but she could have been there for any number of diagnoses, and wasn't. Even her promises to visit more often have faded away with Christmas. It's her turn to taste some reality. — Jenny Downham

Bye, Tess. haunt me if you like. I don't mind. — Jenny Downham

I made a fatal error thinking he could save me. — Jenny Downham

I said I wouldn't leave her. — Jenny Downham

If you want a girl to like you, you have to listen like a woman and love like a man. — Jenny Downham

I want the people I love to get up and speak about me, and even if you cry it'll be OK. I want you to say honest things. — Jenny Downham

I don't think words reach people. Maybe nothing does — Jenny Downham

That slow smile again. I love that smile! DId I think he was ugly just now? No, his face is transformed. — Jenny Downham

We make patterns, we share moments. Sometimes, I think I'm the only one to see it. — Jenny Downham

I don't want to be dead. I haven't been loved this way for long enough. — Jenny Downham

We make patterns, we share moments. — Jenny Downham

There's a gang of boys on bikes blocking the road ahead. They've got their hoods up, cigarettes shielded. The sky's a really strange colour and there's hardly anyone else about. I slow right down.
"What shall I do?"
"Reverse," Zoey says. "They're not going to move."
I wind down the window. "Oi!" I yell "Move your arses!"
They turn languid, shift lazily to the edge of the road and grin as I blow kisses at them.
Zoey looks stunned, "What's got into you?"
"Nothing- I just haven't learned reversing yet. — Jenny Downham

It was strange how words meant something when they came out of your mouth. Inside your head they were safe and silent, but once they were outside, people grabbed hold of them. — Jenny Downham

She'd never in her whole life bunked school, smoked dope, or kissed a boy whose name she didn't know, and yet in the last few days, she'd done all these things. — Jenny Downham

He falls asleep quickly. I lie awake and listen to lights being switched off all over the town. Whispered
goodnights. The drowsy creak of bedsprings.
I find Adam's hand and hold it tight.
I'm glad that night porters and nurses and long-distance lorry drivers exist. It comforts me to know that
in other countries with different time zones, women are washing clothes in rivers and children are filing to
school. Somewhere in the world right now, a boy is listening to the merry chink of a goat's bell as he
walks up a mountain. I'm very glad about that. — Jenny Downham

Day after day it was as if someone had taken my life apart and polished every bit of it really carefully before putting it all back together. — Jenny Downham

My thoughts are so clear that I wouldn't be surprised if he could see them blazing above my head like a neon sign outside a fish and chip shop. I fancy you. — Jenny Downham

Like a tree losing its leaves. I forget even the thing I was thinking. — Jenny Downham

Spring is a powerful spell.
The blue. The clouds high up and puffy. The air warmer than it's been for weeks. — Jenny Downham

I want you to be with me in the dark. To hold me. To keep loving me. To help me when I get scared. To come right to the edge and see what's there. — Jenny Downham

This mad psycho tells everyone to get into a field and says I'm going to pick one of you just one of you
out of all of you to die and everyone's looking around thinking it's so unlikely to be me because there's
thousands of us so statistically it's completely unlikely and the psycho walks up and down looking at
everyone and when he gets near me he hesitates and he smiles and then he points right at me and says
you're the one and the shock that it's me and yet of course it's me why wouldn't it be I knew all along — Jenny Downham

I shrug him off. 'Can't you just go away?
There's a moment. It has a sound in it, as if something very small got broken. — Jenny Downham

The shops in High Street still have their metal grilles down, blank-eyed and sleeping. My name is scrawled across them all. I'm outside Ajay's newsagent's. I'm on the expensive shutters of the health food store. I'm massive on Handie's furniture shop, King's Chicken Joint and the Barbecue Cafe. I thread the pavement outside the bank and all the way to Mothercare. I've possessed the road and am a glistening circle at the roundabout. — Jenny Downham

Dust Glitter Rain — Jenny Downham

Death straps me to the hospital bed, claws its way onto my chest and sits there.I didn't know it would hurt this much. I didn't know that everything good that's ever happened in my life would be emptied out by it. — Jenny Downham

You changed the rules of the universe when you fell in love with the enemy. — Jenny Downham

Parents don't know their children at all.
No one knows anyone, in fact. — Jenny Downham

Instructions for Adam
Look after no one except yourself. Go to university and make lots of friends and get drunk. Forget your door keyes. Laugh. Eat pot-noodles for breakfast. Miss lectures. Be irresponsible. — Jenny Downham

Is this how it is for everyone?' she whispered.
'No.'
'How do you know?'
'I just do. I've never felt this with anyone before.'
'Serious?'
'Serious. That isn't a line.'
'Kiss me,' she said.
He did. Everywhere. — Jenny Downham

The light is heart-breaking. — Jenny Downham

Every few years we disappear, Zoey. All our cells are replaced by others. Not a single bit of me is the same as when I was last in this room. — Jenny Downham

What happens if anger takes you over, Tessa? Who will you be then? What will be left of you? — Jenny Downham

I like you," he said.
He made it sound as if she was bound to disagree with him. She nodded. His face said he was telling her something very important.
He said, "I mean it. Whatever happens, you have to believe that. — Jenny Downham

No, really. I free you.'
I don't want to be free. — Jenny Downham

I miss him as soon as he goes. When he isn't with me, I think I made him up. — Jenny Downham

I love you. It hurts more than anything ever has, but I do. So don't you dare tell me I don't. Don't you ever say it again! — Jenny Downham

I'd like to go home now,' she said softly. She hoped someone would show her the way. — Jenny Downham

Every breath, every heartbeat, was one less until maybe things stopped hurting this much. — Jenny Downham

Was this love? Because it hurt. It was like a bit of glass stuck somewhere important - his heart or his head, and it was throbbing. — Jenny Downham

She needed food. Diets didn't count in a crisis. — Jenny Downham

Humans are made from nuclear ash of dead stars — Jenny Downham

Don't pretend to care. I don't need you as an anesthetic. — Jenny Downham

She'll understand what I already know - that death surrounds us all. And it tastes like metal between your teeth. — Jenny Downham

Hold my hand. Don't let go. — Jenny Downham

We'll kill him on the green with a five iron. — Jenny Downham

A glimpse of light reflected in his eyes. Stars shining there perhaps. Or the moon. — Jenny Downham

Don't think you have to be good because you're the only one left. Be as bad as you like. — Jenny Downham

When he isn't with me, I think ive made him up. — Jenny Downham

I'm here, Tess. I'm right here, holding your hand. Adam's here, too, he's sitting on the other side of the bed. And Cal. Mum's on her way, she'll be just a minute. We all love you, Tessa. We're all right here with you. — Jenny Downham

I'm going because my life was crap until I met you. I'm going because I don't want to be here when you're not, still living with my mum and nothing being any different. I wouldn't even be thinking about going if it hadn't been for you. — Jenny Downham

It was only one man who had gone, but it felt like forever, something so permanent and unstoppable that it blasted her. If she were a tree, she would drop all her leaves. — Jenny Downham

And in the space he left behind, in the loss of him, she felt an actual physical pain in her belly. She'd lost a friend and she didn't have many of those. — Jenny Downham

It's all right, Tessa, you can go. We love you. You can go now.'
'Why are you saying that?'
'She might need permission to die, Cal.'
'I don't want her to. She doesn't have my permission. — Jenny Downham

Why do I feel like you're not on my side anymore? Please don't give up on me. — Jenny Downham

And in bed, deep inside the building, are all the headaches that won't go away. The failed kidneys, the rashes, the ragged-edged moles, the lumps on the breast, the coughs that have turned nasty. In the Marie Curie Ward on the fourth floor are the kids with cancer. Their bodies secretly and slowly being consumed.
And then there's the mortuary, where the dead lie in refrigerated drawers with name tags on their feet. — Jenny Downham

It comes and goes. People think if you're sick you become fearless and brave, but you don't. Most of the time it's like being stalked by a psycho, like I might get shot any second. But sometimes I forget for hours.'
'What makes you forget?'
'People. Doing stuff. When I was with you in the wood, I forgot for a whole afternoon. — Jenny Downham

She shrugs, goes over to the window and looks down at the garden. She circles a finger on the glass, then she says, "Maybe you should try an believe in God."
"Should I?"
"Yeah, maybe we all should. The entire human race. — Jenny Downham

If she planted a seed, she'd have to dig it back up and look at it every day to see if it was growing yet. — Jenny Downham

Adam blows smoke at the town below. Says, 'Anything could be happening down there, but up here you just wouldn't know it. — Jenny Downham

I lean back on the pillows and look at the corners of the room. When I was a kid, I always wanted to live on the ceiling - it looked so clean and uncluttered, like the top of a cake. — Jenny Downham

I can see inside planes!' he yells. 'Come and look!'
It's difficult climbing in a mini dress ... I haul myself up even though my arms ache. I want to see inside planes too. I want to watch the wind and catch birds in my fist. — Jenny Downham

I want a big dark room you can barely move in, with bodies grinding close together. I want to hear a thousand songs played incredibly loud. I want to dance so fast that my hair grows long enough to trample on. I want my voice to be thunderous above the throb of bass. I want to get so hot that I have to crunch ice in my mouth. — Jenny Downham

I want to die in my own way. It's my illness, my death, my choice. This is what saying yes means. — Jenny Downham

It hurts and hurts to have him this close. I feel sick with it. — Jenny Downham

Humans are made from the nuclear ash of dead stars. He says that when I die, I'll return to dust, glitter, rain. — Jenny Downham

And now he's down this for me. He's made me famous. He's put my name on the world. — Jenny Downham

I get a lot of letters, mostly from family members who have been affected by cancer rather than young people themselves. I reply to them all. — Jenny Downham

A little bird moves a mountain of sand one grain at a time it picks up one grain every million years and when the mountain has been moved the bird puts it all back again and that's how long eternity is and that's a very long time to be dead — Jenny Downham

Ill haunt you,' I tell him. 'But from inside. Every time you cough you'll think of me. — Jenny Downham

Tell me how would be..
You don't want to eat much from now on, you'll be thirst. And.. sometimes have fever. You want to sleep a lot. You have a little or no energy.
Will it hurt?
No. The morphine would make sure you don't feel any pain. And then give you some beautiful dreams.
Do you think i'll be scared?
i think you got the worst luck in the world, and if i would be in your shoes, i will be scared. But i also believe the how of you handle this last few days would be exactly like them should be done.
i hate you when you say days..
Come soon you'll start to drifting on consciousness. Sometimes you wont be respond, but you know people are they, you hear them talk.
And eventually, Tess, you just drift away.. — Jenny Downham

. . . my bones they'll burn or bury. It'll be my death. — Jenny Downham

Three points for the dead slowly prising open the lids of their coffins. They want to hunt the living. They can't stop. Their throats have turned to liquid and their fingers glint under the weak autumn sun. — Jenny Downham

Keep breathing. Just keep doing it. It's easy. In and out. — Jenny Downham

Are you afraid, Tessa? — Jenny Downham

When I first saw Ellie, I knew it was her
she was my fantasy. I didn't want it to be true, but every time I met her it was obvious, and the funny thing was that she was better than the fantasy, like I got more stuff than I'd imagined. — Jenny Downham

It's utterly beautiful not to know my own edges. — Jenny Downham

Maybe I'll come back as somebody else.
I'll be the wild-haired girl Adam meets in his first week at university. 'Hi, are you on the horticultural
course as well? — Jenny Downham

I've always wanted to be a cat. Warm and domesticated when you want to be, wild when you don't. — Jenny Downham

He says, 'Anything could be happening down there, but up here you just wouldn't know it.'
I know what he means. It could be pandemonium in all those little houses, everyone's dreams in a mess. But up here feels peaceful. Clean. — Jenny Downham

Then she says, 'I love you.' Like three drops of blood falling onto snow. — Jenny Downham

Simona: Truth doesn't exist?
Katie: ...because everyone's got their own side of a story
...If there's no real truth, then all we can do is offer up our own stories and listen to other people's and try and make sense of it all — Jenny Downham

I don't want to go into a fridge at an undertaker's. I want you to keep me at home until the funeral. Please can someone sit with me in case I get lonely? I promise not to scare you. — Jenny Downham