Regret What I Said Quotes & Sayings

Arrr, shiver me timbers," he said in an exaggerated pirate twang. He winked his uncovered eye and hooked his thumbs in his pants. "This is the nicest your mom's been to a poor old bloke like me-self in days."
Sandra poked a finger in his chest, but grinned. "Don't make me regret it, or you'll walk the plank."
He grinned back and, with that eye patch, turned knee-meltingly rakish in under ten seconds flat. "Aye, I won't be asking you to make me Roger jolly, if that's what has you worrying. — Jennifer Shirk

I owed the greater apology, but at the same time I knew that was done was done, that no matter what I said now I would never be able to make it right. — Jhumpa Lahiri

Dear Tully
I know you won't be able to stand my fucking funeral. You're not the star. I hope you at least had the photos of me airbrushed. There are so many things I should say to you, but in our lifetime we've said them all.
Take care of Johnny and the kids for me, okay? Teach the boys how to be gentlemen and Marah how to be strong. When they're ready, give them my journal and tell them about me when they ask. The truth, too. I want them to know it all.
It's going to be hard on you, now. That's one of the things I regret the most. So, here's what I have to say in my beyond-the-grave letter (very dramatic, don't you think?):
I know you'll be thinking that I left you, but it's not true. All you have to do is remember Firefly Lane, and you'll find me.
There will always be a TullyandKate.
BFF <3
Kate — Kristin Hannah

It would be nice if the story ended differently - if he had burst into tears and professed his love for me; if he had said the same three words back and hugged me; if he had given it thought and then asked if we could try a relationship.

But you know what? I said those three words to a boy who didn't love me back, at least not in that way. He casually dropped a "love you" later on, and in a platonic 'you have impacted my life' way, he was telling the truth. But I knew. He had given it thought, and we were not on the same page. I built up all this courage to say "I love you" for the very first time, and I said those words to a person that couldn't reciprocate them.

But guess what?

I don't regret any of it. — Stephen Lovegrove

Do you ever think about him?" Elise asks. "The baby?"
I nod slowly. "I wonder how much would have been different, if he'd-"
"Don't say it." There are tears in her eyes. "Let's do it this way, Charlie, all right? Let's just pick one sentence out of all of the ones we should have said
the best, most important sentence
and let's say just that."
This is my old Elise
whimsical, loopy
the one I couldn't help but fall for. And because I know she is sinking in the quicksand of regret just like me, I nod. "Okay. But I go first." I try to remember what it was like to be loved by someone who did not know limits, and had not yet been ruined by that. "I forgive you," I whisper; a gift.
"Oh, Charlie," Elise says, and she gives me one right back. "She turned out absolutely perfect. — Jodi Picoult

In New York, he tried in vain to forget her. The first few days were tinged with melancholy and regret and JT thought he would never recover. Anyway: recover why? And yet, with the passage of time, in his heart he understood that he'd gained much more than he'd lost. At least, he said to himself, I've met the woman of my dreams. Other people, most people, glimpse something in films, the shadow of great actresses, the gaze of true love. But I saw her in the flesh, heard her voice, saw her silhouetted against the endless pampa. I talked to her and she talked back. What do I have to complain about? — Roberto Bolano

Many years ago a very wise man named Bernard Baruch took me aside and put his arm around my shoulder. "Harpo my boy," he said, "I'm going to give you three pieces of advice, three things you should always remember." My heart jumped and I glowed with expectation. I was going to hear the magic password to a rich, full life from the master himself. "Yes sir?" I said. And he told me the three things. I regret that I've forgotten what they were. — Harpo Marx

To experience joy on a daily basis, learn what it means to live in the moment. Notice I said in, not for. To live for the moment is irresponsible and leads to decisions you may regret. You may already have a testimony of what it meant for you to live for the moment. Living in the moment helps us recognize that God can be found in this moment, whether it contains joy or sorrow. As a perfectionist, I'm always waiting for a perfect moment before I enjoy it. But nothing is ever perfect! That's why the Bible encourages us to "make the most of every opportunity" for doing good (Eph. 5:16 — Kay Warren

He seemed genuinely astonished. "You admire me?"
"Yes," she said gravely. "All of us do things we regret
that's part of being human. And sometimes, I think, moral quality reveals itself not so much in what we do, but in what we later say about what we have done ... — Alexander McCall Smith

But as they walked home together through the leaf-plastered streets, under that eerie refulgence, her father seemed to have divined her plans. This was in his manner, not his words: they were halfway home before he spoke. "Amanda," he said. He paused. "I want you to realize the consequences before you do something youll be sorry for." He did not look at her, and she too kept her eyes to the front. "You know that when I say a thing I mean it - I mean it to the hilt. So tell your young man this, Amanda. Tell him that the day you marry without my consent I'll cut you off without a dime. Without so much as one thin dime, Amanda. I'll cut you off, disown you, and what is more I'll never regret it. I'll never so much as think your name again." Up to now he had spoken slowly, pausing between phrases. But now the words came fast, like fencing thrusts. "Tell your young man that, Amanda, and see what he says." Major — Shelby Foote

Death turned to leave the room, but stopped when Hex began to write furiously. He went back and looked at the emerging paper.
+++ Dear Hogfather, For Hogswatch I Want
OH, NO. YOU CAN'T WRITE LETT ... Death paused, and then said, YOU CAN, CAN'T YOU.
+++ Yes. I Am Entitled +++
Death waited until the pen had stopped, and picked up the paper.
BUT YOU ARE A MACHINE. THINGS HAVE NO DESIRES. A DOORKNOB WANTS NOTHING, EVEN THOUGH IT IS A COMPLEX MACHINE.
+++ All Things Strive +++
YOU HAVE A POINT, said Death. He thought of tiny red petals in the black depths, and read to the end of the list.
I DON'T KNOW WHAT MOST OF THESE THINGS ARE. I DON'T THINK THE SACK WILL, EITHER.
+++ I Regret This +++
BUT WE WILL DO THE BEST WE CAN, said Death.
FRANKLY, I SHALL BE CLAD WHEN TONIGHT'S OVER. IT'S MUCH HARDER TO GIVE THAN TO RECEIVE. He rummaged in his sack. LET ME SEE ... HOW OLD ARE YOU? — Terry Pratchett

It doesn't matter to me. I'm just worried. It's the first time I've see Teach like that. He said he had two regrets ... Once, 20 years ago. And once when you hurt your wrist. He said he didn't ever want to regret again. I wonder what that means. — Kim Su-mi

I think it's a mistake to work on success in career. I've worked on my passions obsessively. How can I say what I want to say more precisely than the last time I said it? Success is such an elusive concept. When you work for it, I think you get it in a way you might regret it. — K'naan

For, like desire, regret seeks not to be analysed but to be satisfied. When one begins to love, one spends one's time, not in getting to know what one's love really is, but in making it possible to meet next day. When one abandons love one seeks not to know one's grief but to offer to her who is causing it that expression of it which seems to one the most moving. One says the things which one feels the need of saying, and which the other will not understand, one speaks for oneself alone. I wrote: 'I had thought that it would not be possible. Alas, I see now that it is not so difficult.' I said also: 'I shall probably not see you again;' I said it while I continued to avoid shewing a coldness which she might think affected, and the words, as I wrote them, made me weep because I felt that they expressed not what I should have liked to believe but what was probably going to happen. — Marcel Proust

Don't be scared," Willa Mae said.
I looked at her. "Aren't you scared?"
Willa Mae looked at me and said, "Shoot. Only thing I'm afraid of is that I'm going to do something I'll regret."
"Being scared is just one more thing to turn into what you want it to be," Willa Mae said. "The thing with fear is, it's like anger. You've got to change it into something else. Make it your weapon. Some can just turn it into smarts. The best of 'em can turn fear and anger into love." She looked out toward our neighborhood. "I'm not there yet. — Margaret McMullan

I don't regret anything I do, ever, whether articles I've done or things I've said. And as far as what's happened in the past, I wouldn't take anything back. — Eva Longoria

I wonder now, with everything said and done, if things would have been different had I remembered what the Tree had told me. Would I have made the same decisions, the same mistakes? Where would I be, had I remembered? Had I listened? I have learned in my short time here on this world that we as humans are all capable of a great many things, our minds able to process so much. Too much, really.
But our greatest curse, our greatest folly, if you will, is our ability of hindsight.
Of regret.
Oh, Seven. How I wish I would have known. — T.J. Klune

What happened?" I asked quietly.
"I lost some people," [Rogan] said. There was an awful finality in his voice.
I hadn't thought he cared. I'd thought he viewed his people as tools and took care of them because tools had to be kept in good repair, but this sounded like genuine grief - that complicated cocktail of guilt, regret, and overwhelming sadness you felt when someone close to you died. It broke you and made you feel helpess. Helpless wasn't even in Rogan's vocabulary. — Ilona Andrews

Do not regret the things you didn't do," Tamika said. "If you're going to regret something, it has to be the things you have done. We are not made up of the inverse of our experiences. If we were what we didn't do, I would be a ballerina. — Rose Christo

Somebody asked me what do you regret. I said, well I was offered the role of Maverick in 'Top Gun' and I turned it down. — Scott Baio

I regret that I must so continually use the word genius, as if that should apply only to a caste as well defined from those below as income-tax payers are from the untaxed. The word genius was very probably invented by a man who had small claims on it himself; greater men would have understood better what to be a genius really was, and probably they would have come to see that the word could be applied to most people. Goethe said that perhaps only a genius is able to understand a genius. — Otto Weininger

Sacrifice," The Captain said. "You made one. I made one. We all make them. But you were angry over yours. You kept thinking about what you lost.
You didn't get it. Sacrifice is a part of life. It's supposed to be. It's not something to regret. It's something to aspire to. Little sacrifices. Big sacrifices. A mother works so her son can go to school. A daughter moves home to take care of her sick father. — Mitch Albom

I regret always writing, writing. I gave
my kid the whole plastic bag of marshmallows,
so i could have 20 minutes to write.
I sat at my mother's deathbed, writing.
I did swab her mouth with water, and feel
her pliant tongue enjoy water, then harden
and die. Before I had language,
before I had stories, I wanted to write.
That desire is going away.
I've said what I have to say.
I'll stop and look at things I called
distractions. Become a reader of the world,
no more writer of it. — Maxine Hong Kingston

I don't have any regrets," a famous movie actor said in an interview I recently witnessed. "I'd live everything over exactly the same way."
"That's really pathetic," the talk show host said. "Are you seeking help?"
"Yeah. My shrink says we're making progress. Before, I wouldn't even admit that I would live it all over," the actor said, starting to choke up. "I thought one life was satisfying enough."
"My God," the host said, cupping his hand to his mouth.
"The first breakthrough was when I said I would live it over, but only in my dreams. Nocturnal recurrence."
"You're like the character in that one movie of yours. What's it called? You know, the one where you eat yourself."
"The Silence of Sam."
"That's it. Can you do the scene?"
The actor lifts up his foot to stick it in his mouth. I reach over from my seat and help him to fit it into his bulging cheeks. The audience goes wild. — Benson Bruno

Why?" I asked him tiredly. "What would it have changed? What could you possibly have said that would have made a difference?"
"That I was your brother, Harry," he said. "That I loved you. That I knew a few things about denying the dark parts of your nature. And that we would get through it." He put his elblows on his knees and rested his forehead on his hands. "That we'd figure it out. That you weren't alone."
Stab.
Twist.
He was right. It was just that simple. — Jim Butcher

I said
"I love you so much it's killing me"
and you kept saying sorry
so I stopped explaining
for it never made sense to you
what always did to me
to let what you love
kill you
and never regret.
As Romeo is dying Juliet says
"I am willing to die to remain by your side"
and love was never a static place of rest
but the last second of euphoria
while throwing yourself out from a 20 store window
to be able to say
"I flew before I hit the ground",
and it was glorious.
Don't be sorry.
The fall was beautiful, dear.
The crash was beautiful. — Charlotte Eriksson

They say, the sun brings life to the world. The sun will rise and look is it not a corpse? Everything is dead and there are corpses everywhere. Just people and around them silencethat is the world! "Love one another"who said that? Whose command is that? The pendulum swings unfeelingly, antagonistically. It's two o'clock at night. Her slippers are standing by her bed, as if waiting for her ... No, seriously, when they take her away tomorrow, what shall I do? — Fyodor Dostoyevsky

In the past, I've been reluctant to share any bits of truth about myself or to really let people in on my reality. So I have said some things to throw people off the scent of what's really going on in my life. So I have sort of aided the media in printing these misconceptions, which I regret. — Megan Fox

It wasn't a hard kiss, but it wasn't particularly soft either. It was just perfect. The perfect amount of sweet and hot, and...
She put her hands on his chest, shoving him backward. "Please don't mess with me. Please. Just talk to me."
Jackson's eyes shadowed with regret as he slowly released her wrist, lifting a hand to her face. The back of his fingers stroked her cheek softly. "Talk to you?"
She nodded.
"What shall I talk about?" he whispered.
"How about the fact that you're supposed to be in Houston right now? It's the only reason I came over."
"I was in Houston," he said.
"For what, an hour?" she asked.
"Probably about that, yeah." He was watching her mouth as his thumb brushed softly over her lips.
Her breath caught at the tenderness in his touch - in his eyes.
"What happened?"
His eyes flicked up to hers. "You want the full story, or the important part?"
"The important part," she whispered.
"I love you. — Lauren Layne

I'm Edward Clark. Born Edward Delacey. Now, apparently, Viscount Claridge." He shut his eyes. "You can address me by my preferred title: 'you idiot'."
Marshall's eyes were narrowing on this. "What have you done to my daughter, you idiot?"
"To my great regret, I ... " Edward's hands were clammy. "It's ... " God, it would be better if lightning could just strike him now. "I can't - that is, I seem to have married your daughter."
Marshall looked about the yard, as if searching for Free. When he didn't find her, he turned back to Edward.
"You regret marrying my daughter." His voice sounded calm, if one could call the cold, black embers after a fire had burnt out calm.
"No," Edward said. "Never that. She regrets marrying me. — Courtney Milan

So what are you doing next Friday night?"
"What have you got in mind?"
"We could try hitting each other with cars," she suggested cheerfully.
"Did that last weekend with Jase," he said with mock regret.
"Go to the zoo and throw ourselves to the lions?" she fired back quickly, desperate to keep him focused on her rather than his caved-in chest.
"The Romans sort of wore that one out. Got anything original?"
"I'll think of something," she warned him.
"Can't wait! — Josephine Angelini

I really fucked up with you. I said some hurtful words To you, but you didn't deserve that. What the hell was I thinking? From the look on your face I knew it was over. My words were very hurtful Although they were true. But still, I had no right to go there. I regret what I said, but I question, Was I really wrong? — Stephanie Lahart

If you have ever, sir, been through a breakup of a romantic relationship that involved great love, you will perhaps understand what I experienced. There is in such situations usually a moment of passion during which the unthinkable is said; this is followed by a sense of euphoria at finally being liberated; the world seems fresh as if seen for the first time then comes the inevitable period of doubt, the desperate and doomed backpedaling of regret; and only later, once emotions have receded, is one able to view with equanimity the journey through which one has passed. — Mohsin Hamid

That's always been my philosophy: I try to just be as straightforward as possible, and then I don't really have to question what I said or regret anything ... — Amy Adams

You know what? Forget what I just said. You're already a part of this. You will eat, you will laugh at stupid things, you will stay up all night just to see what it feels like, you will fall painfully in love, you will have babies of your own, you will doubt and regret and yearn and keep a secret. You will get old and decrepit, and you will die, exhausted from all that living. That is when you get to die. Not now. — Miranda July

Only one marriage I regret. I remember after I got that marriage license I went across from the license bureau to a bar for a drink. The bartender said, "What will you have, sir?" And I said, "A glass of hemlock." — Ernest Hemingway,

Why didn't you ask me out?" Layla blurted, suddenly needing to know. She bit the inside of her lip, cursing her impulsive tongue. Her heart beat erratically, thumping hard against her ribs. "Two summers ago when we volunteered at the theater? I kept thinking you might." His hands paused on a spool of twine as he looked at her, his eyes somber. "I wanted to. But I was coming off a difficult relationship - I needed some time." Regret laced his voice. "Chloe Peterson." He nodded. She'd seen them around town for about a year. The grapevine claimed she'd cheated on him with Chris Geiger, but who knew? "I was about to ask you out," he said. "But before I could ... " "Jack." His eyes skimmed over her face. "You have no idea how many times I've regretted waiting." Her face warmed under his perusal. Her pulse skittered. "Wonder what would've happened." One corner of his lips tipped up as a look of serenity passed over his face, displacing the regret. "Who knows. Maybe we'd be engaged for real. — Denise Hunter

I lost my dad back in the fall, and my dad said something to me a long time ago. He said, 'Are you happy with who you are now?' because we just had a real serious talk. And I said, 'Yeah.' He said, 'Then you can't regret what got you to where you are. So whatever you do and whatever mistakes you make, learn from them and grow. And just always treat people with kindness,' which I've tried to do. — Dennis Haskins

Okay," I said, "what's your biggest fear?" As always, he took a second to think about the answer. "Clowns," he said. "Clowns." "Yup." I just looked at him. "What?" he said, glancing over at me. "That is not a real answer," I told him. "Says who?" "Says me. I meant a real fear, like of failure, of death, of regret. Like that. Something that keeps you awake nights, questioning your very existence." He thought for a second. "Clowns. — Sarah Dessen

If I'd thought I would regret it," he said calmly, "I never would have made that oath. I knew what becoming a knight would mean. And if you asked me again, the answer would still be the same." He sighed, framing my face with his hands. "My life ... everything I am ... belongs to you. — Julie Kagawa

Until I met you," she said, "I never realized how precious each day could be. When I was working, each day was over before I knew it, and then a week just flew by, and then a whole year ... What have I been doing all this time? Why didn't I meet you before? If I had to choose a whole year in the past, or a day with you-I'd choose a day with you ... — Shuichi Yoshida

Don't worry. I can teach you every word that you need to know right now. One of them is 'fiesta.'" Ragnor scowled. "What does that mean?" Magnus raised his eyebrows. "It means 'party.' Another important word is 'juerga.'" "What does that word mean?" Magnus was silent. "Magnus," said Ragnor, his voice stern. "Does that word also mean 'party'?" Magnus could not help the sly grin that spread across his face. "I would apologize," he said. "Except that I feel no regret at all. — Cassandra Clare

Am I making myself clear, Orrin? I don't regret how I've lived these past few years. I move where I will. I set no appointments. I guard no borders. What landbound king has the freedom of a ship's captain? The Sea of Brass provides. When I need haste, it gives me winds. When I need gold, it gives me galleons." Thieves prosper, thought Locke. The rich remember. He made his decision, and gripped the rail to avoid shaking.
"Only gods-damned fools die for lines drawn on maps," said Zamira. "But nobody can draw lines around my ship. If they try, all I need to do to slip away is set more sail. — Scott Lynch

I was desperate, baby. I wasn't lying when I said I couldn't live if you died. I needed to know you were alive. I needed to see you, and now that you're safe. I can't regret it. It sucks, and I know it's not what any of us wanted, but seeing you here, I know it was worth it. — J.M. Darhower

My father gave me a ruined boy to compensate for the fact that he does not love me.
The boy is fragile, broken - broke himself - broke everything.
I asked him why he did it. He said because the world was unlivable. He said it was unlovable, but I think he meant himself. I think he meant that loneliness is sometimes painful.
I curl against him, tuck my head beneath his chin and listen to his heart. It says stay and wait. It says regret. He knows what it is to want love, a love so fierce you grow roots. I hear his heart say please.
He went looking for angels and found me instead, girl of the sorrows, sad but not sorry. I waited for a sign, a star to fall. He reached for a knife and drew branches. — Brenna Yovanoff

It's unfair."
As a rule, life is unfair," I said.
Yeah, but I think I did say some awful things."
To Dick?"
Yeah."
I pulled the car over to the shoulder of the road and turned off the ignition. "That's just stupid, that kind of thinking," I said, nailing her with my eyes. "Instead of regretting what you did, you could have treated him decently from the beginning. You could've tried to be fair. But you didn't. You don't even have the right to be sorry. — Haruki Murakami

Many were the tears shed by them in their last adieus to a place so much beloved. "Dear, dear Norland!" said Marianne, as she wandered alone before the house, on the last evening of their being there; "when shall I cease to regret you! - when learn to feel a home elsewhere! - Oh! happy house, could you know what I suffer in now viewing you from this spot, from whence perhaps I may view you no more! - And you, ye well-known trees! - but you will continue the same. - No leaf will decay because we are removed, nor any branch become motionless although we can observe you no longer! - No; you will continue the same; unconscious of the pleasure or the regret you occasion, and insensible of any change in those who walk under your shade! - But who will remain to enjoy you? — Jane Austen

She was at a cash register, screaming at a customer. She was, in fact, calling this customer a bitch. I touched her arm and said, "I have to go now." She laid her hand on my shoulder, squeezed it gently, and continued her conversation, saying, "Don't tell the store president I called you a bitch. Tell him I called you a fucking bitch, because that's exactly what you are. Now get out of my sight before I do something we both regret. — David Sedaris

Do you regret it, amira?"
"Regret . . . what?"
"Meeting me. Knowing me." He searched my face. "Loving me."
Everything seemed to stop at the word; it hung in the air between us, tangible and real. "No," I said at last. "No."
"But you fear you will someday. That's why you hold back. That's why you want to know you can change things before you commit." He let go of my hand and stood. The distance between us ached like the cold of a winter sea. "You watched your father chase your mother for years, and you wished he didn't love her. What will you do to my memory when I'm gone? Will you chase it like a dragon? Or will you banish it like smoke? — Heidi Heilig

I wish I could have fought him for you," he said abruptly, looking back at me. His blue eyes were dark and earnest.
I smiled at him, touched.
"It wasn't your fight, it was mine. But you won it anyway." I reached out a hand, and he squeezed it.
"Aye, but that's not what I meant. If I'd fought him man to man and won, ye'd not need to feel any regret over it." He hesitated. "If ever - "
"There aren't any more ifs," I said firmly. "I thought of every one of them yesterday, and here I still am."
"Thank God," he said, smiling, "and God help you." Then he added, "Though I'll never understand why."
I put my arms around his waist and held on as the horse slithered down the last steep slope.
"Because," I said, "I bloody well can't do without you, Jamie Fraser, and that's all about it. — Diana Gabaldon

I don't regret it, you know. I would do it all again. Children are our hope for the future."
THERE IS NO HOPE FOR THE FUTURE, said Death.
"What does it contain, then?"
ME. — Terry Pratchett

So what should I call you now?" he said when we had our breath back. "Savior of Thorvaldor? Soon-to-Be-Master Wizard? Chief Councillor of Wise Words? My own love?"
"Sinda," I said, without the slightest twinge of old memories, or something lost, or regret. "Just Sinda. Though I like that last one almost as much."
Kiernan reached out and tucked a strand of escaping hair behind my ear. "I think I like Sinda best myself," he said. — Eilis O'Neal

American men," said Nancy gravely, "don't know how to drink."
"What?" Jim was startled.
"In fact," she went on carelessly, "they don't know how to do anything very well. The one thing I regret in my life is that I wasn't born in England."
"In England?"
"Yes. It's the one regret of my life that I wasn't. — F Scott Fitzgerald

Anderson!" he snapped murderously, "if you can tear your attention from Miss Danner's bust, the rest of us will be able to finish this meeting." Lauren flushed a vivid pink, but the elderly Anderson turned a purple hue that might be indicative of an impending stroke.
As soon as the last staff member had filed out of the conference room, Lauren ignored Mary's warning look and turned furiously on Nick. "I hope you're satisfied!" she hissed furiously. "You not only humiliated me, you nearly gave that poor old man a heart attack.What do you plan to do for an encore?"
"Fire the first woman who opens her mouth," Nick retorted coldly. He walked around her and strode out of the conference room.
Outraged past all reason, Lauren started after him, but Mary stopped her. "Don't argue with him," she said, gazing after Nick with a beatific smile on her face. She looked as if she had just witnessed a miracle. "In his present mood he'd fire you, and he'd regret that for the rest of his life. — Judith McNaught

Feyre," he said
softly enough that I faced him again. "Why?" He tilted his head to the side. "You dislike our kind on a good day. And after Andras ... " Even in the darkened hallway, his usual bright eyes were shadowed. "So why?"
I took a step closer to him, my blood-covered feet sticking to the rug. I glanced down the stairs to where I could still see the prone form of the faerie and the stumps of his wings.
"Because I wouldn't want to die alone," I said, and my voice wobbled as I looked at Tamlin again, forcing myself to meet his stare. "Because I'd want someone to hold my hand until the end, and awhile after that. That's something everyone deserves, human or faerie." I swallowed hard, my throat painfully tight. "I regret what I did to Andras," I said, the words so strangled they were no more than a whisper. "I regret that there was ... such hate in my heart. I wish I could undo it
and ... I'm sorry. So very sorry. — Sarah J. Maas

She doesn't understand what she's asking, Jean-Claude said.
No, but she asks, and if we do not do it, we will always wonder. I would rather thy and fail than regret having never tried at all. — Laurell K. Hamilton

The only thing I regret about age are the wrinkles. But I have high hopes
for this new almond cream! Do you know, that Italian apothecary promises the cream will make one's
skin as soft as a baby's cheek? Once your child arrives, we'll have a viable comparison. Not having seen
a baby in years, how would I know what its skin looks like?"
"I'm glad my condition will prove to be of use," Esme said rather tartly. — Eloisa James

We regret because we fail to listen to an inner voice that says "I Can" and we watch as that pledge is hushed by our doubts and fears. We regret because we listened to someone else's voice rather than our own or because we knew what was right and didn't do it. Imagine a life where we trusted ourselves more, believed what others said less and committed to do what was noble. There would be no regret in that. — Jason Versey

Yes, and words are not deeds, Solanka allowed, moving off fretfully. Though words can become deeds. If said in the right place and at the right time, they can move mountains and change the world. Also, uh-huh, not knowing what you're doing - separating deeds from the words that define them - was apparently becoming an acceptable excuse. To say "I didn't mean it" was to erase meaning from your misdeeds, at least in the opinion of the Beloved ALis of the world. Could that be so? Obviously, no. No, it simply could not. Many people would say that even a genuine act of repentance could not atone for a crime, much less this unexplained blankness - an infinitely lesser excuse, a mere assertion of ignorance that wouldn't even register on any scale of regret. — Salman Rushdie

Heck, everything we decide will be wrong," said Step, "because no matter what we do, something bad will happen later. So I refuse to regret any of it. — Orson Scott Card

I would much rather have regrets about not doing what people said, than regretting not doing what my heart led me to and wondering what life had been like if I'd just been myself. — Brittany Finamore

I lost nothing I regret losing," Witch said softly. "I am what I want to be. — Anne Bishop

My heart seemed to stop. Garret paused, as if gathering his thoughts, or his courage, then took a deep breath. "I know I've made mistakes," he continued, shaking his head. "But there's still the chance for me to fix them. I shouldn't have walked out that night." His brow creased, a flicker of pain and regret going through his eyes. "Ember, I know you can't feel what I do," he said. "I get that. But ... I want to be with you. And if that's not possible, I'll be content just to be close. Fighting Talon with you and Riley, helping people, saving other dragons from the Order-there is nothing I want more. And nowhere else I want to be. — Julie Kagawa

And in the silence what followed, I reckon our eyes had some long conversation our mouths could've never talked through. Some long, looking talk about things gone and long since said. About cries out in the night and some long ago tangling of limbs. And about them betrayals done time and time again - by both of us - what led to me pointing the Green Man's rifle at the man what once loved me under the Green Man's stars. — J.D. Jordan

You want to know what the saddest part is Tess?" I said, sounding choked up.
"What's that Josh?"
I felt my heart constricting as the brutal truth flowed from my lips. "You say she's mine ... but honestly, I don't think she was ever mine to begin with. — Angela Richardson