You Leave Me Behind Quotes & Sayings

Look at the way you and I have ended up. I renounced and abandoned the world in order to be here and devote myself entirely to the service of Christ far away from people. And now you return to me after embracing Islam, clad in nothing but tunic and waist-cloth, and with nothing to your name but a staff to walk on. Tell me, for Heaven's sake: What is the difference between us? Is not your renunciation of the world the same as mine? And, my dear: Is it not the same rejection of the state of the world and its inhabitants that has impelled both of us to leave everything behind, realizing as we do that there is no hope to be found in this world and that there is nothing left for us but the love of God? — Salwa Bakr

This is what I get very upset at ... ' Temple, who was driving suddenly faltered and wept. 'I've read that libraries are where immortality lies ... I don't want my thoughts to die with me ... I want to have done something ... I'm not interested in power, or piles of money. I want to leave something behind. I want to make a positive contribution - know that my life has meaning, Right now, I'm talking about things at the very core of my experience.' I was stunned. As I stepped out of the car to say goodbye, I said, 'I'm going to hug you. I hope you don't mind.' I hugged her - and (I think) she hugged me back. — Oliver Sacks

Ryodan finished filling the gas tank, opens the door, and gets back in.
"Ow! If you sit on me one more time." I growl at him, "I'm going to kill you."
"Good luck with that. Don't fucking move every time I get out. You're on my side of the seat again."
"Watch out for my indent," I say crossly.
"Hummer, Mac. Nothing causes indents. Except grenades."
"I have several of those," Jada says. "Persist with your pointless bickering, I'll share one. Pin out."
I ignore her. "I'm cramped. I need to stretch."
"So, get out when I do."
"I'm afraid you'll leave me behind since you can't see me."
"I'd leave you behind if I could see you."
"Christ, would the two of you just shut up?" Dageus growls. You've been at it for hours. I think I have a headache. — Karen Marie Moning

Quiet, you say.
I hardly hear you.
You're already that far.
Don't leave me behind like this.


I stop talking.
Immediately I'm so dizzy
I have to hold on to myself.
Quiet, you say.


I miss your laugh so much
I copy it,
louder and louder.
That's as quiet as I can be. — Nachoem M. Wijnberg

Well, you devious little woman you. Do you know what I do to wily women?
"You ... leave them panting and oneless after a world-class orgasm?" she guessed.
"Why yes. Yes, ma'am, I do." Picking her up, I carried her back to my room and kicked the door shut behind me. — Linda Kage

Dream a Little Dream of Me

Stars shining bright above you;
Night breezes seem to whisper i love you,
Birds singing in the sycamore tree.
Dream a little dream of me.
Say nighty-night and kiss me;
Just hold me tight and tell me you'll miss me.
While I'm alone, blue as can be,
Dream a little dream of me.
Stars fading but I linger on, dear---
Still craving your kiss.
I'm longing to linger till dawn, dear,
Just saying this...
Sweet dreams till sunbeams find you---
Sweet dreams that leave all worries behind you.
But in your dreams, whatever they be,
Dream a little dream of me.
Stars fading but I linger on, dear---
Still craving your kiss.
I'm longing to linger till dawn, dear,
Just saying this...
Sweet dreams till sunbeams find you---
Sweet dreams that leave all worries far behind you.
But in your dreams, whatever they be,
Dream a little dream of me. — The Mamas And The Papas

Ah, the dear earth! The beautiful earth! She wants all that we have--the touch of our hands, the song of our hearts.
She wants to draw out from us all that is within, hidden even from ourselves.
This is her sorrow, that she finds out some things only to know that she has not found all. She loses before she attains.
Ah, the dear earth! We shall never deceive you.

(They sing.)
I shall crown you with my garland, before I take leave.
You ever spoke to me in all my joys and sorrows.
And now, at the end of the day, my own heart will break in speech.
Words came to me, but not the tune, and the song that I never sang to you remains hidden behind my tears. — Rabindranath Tagore

The marks humans leave are too often scars. You build a hideous minimall or start a coup or try to become a rockstar and you think, "They'll remember me now," but (a) they don't remember you, and (b) all you leave behind are more scars. Your coup becomes a dictatorship. Your minimall becomes a lesion. — John Green

Never leave me behind; you are the only path I can walk without hesitations. — M.F. Moonzajer

You know, I tried not to think of this place. I tried to let it go. To leave it behind. But it always came back to me, in my dreams. I'd dream about these details, these objects and people and places I'd left behind, and I'd wake up crying. — Danzy Senna

Presently, he looked at the people standing round and said, "You have leave to go."
They bowed out. When the lads behind him started to follow, he reached out and caught one by the arm, saying, "No, you stay, Hephaistion." The tall boy came back with a lightening of all his face, and stood close beside him. He said to me, "The others are the Companions of the Prince; but we two are just Hephaistion and Alexander."
"So it was" I said, smiling at them, "in the tent of Achilles".
He nodded; it was a thought he was used to. — Mary Renault

I'm of the mind that life is a risk, every time you leave your house it's a risk, and I see no reason to go through life with my hands tied behind my back for any reason. I'd be foolish to let something stop me from doing what I love to do. — Thomas Jane

Patricia embraces me on the station platform. 'The past is what you leave behind in life, Ruby,' she says with the smile of a reincarnated lama. 'Nonsense, Patricia,' I tell her as I climb on board my train. 'The past's what you take with you. — Kate Atkinson

You have got me walking up and down all day under those trees, saying to me over and over again, "Solitude, solitude." And You have turned around and thrown the world in my lap. You have told me, "Leave all things and follow me," and then You have tied half of New York to my foot like a ball and chain. You have got me kneeling behind that pillar with my mind making a noise like a bank. Is that contemplation? — Thomas Merton

Then why did you return to England if not to get the diary?"
"I returned because you asked me to."
She looked at him, too startled to even speak for a moment. [She said,] "That's all it would have taken."
"Yes."
"Oh!" She stomped her foot, tugging even harder on her hand. "I hate that!"
Max's brow lowered. "You hate what?"
"How you've made it all my fault! Not only did you leave because of me, but now, you return because of me! Maxwell, you are - you are -" She snapped her mouth together, took a deep breath, then burst out, "You are a beast!" She yanked her hand free, jumped up, and marched from the room, slamming the door behind her. — Karen Hawkins

What captivated me about you was that you opened the door to another world for me. The values that dominated my childhood had no place there. That world enchanted me. I could leave the real world behind and be someone else, without any ties or obligations. With you, I was elsewhere, in a foreign place, foreign to myself. You gave me access to another dimension when I'd always rejected any fixed identity and just worn different identities on top of each other, though none of them were mine.
By speaking to you in English, I made your language mine. I've continued to talk to you in English right up to this day, even when you answered me in French. For me, English, which I knew mainly through you and through books, was from the start like a private language that preserved our intimacy against the intrusion of the real world, and its prevailing social normals. I felt like I was building a protected and protective world with you. — Andre Gorz

How could you leave me behind to explode?"
"Er," Alice said, "I'm not sure how to--"
"Oh--you have a clockwork cat. This is very nice. I will forgive you if I may pet the cat. — Steven Harper Piziks

One kid said to me, he said, Mr. Lloyd, we really owe you. And I explained to him, man, you owe me absolutely nothing. I said, whatever kind of career I had, it has served me well, but you do owe some people. And the people you owe are the folks who are going to come behind you. It's incumbent upon each watch - when you play your 10, 11 years and you're in your group - when you leave, I truly hope that you've done all you can possibly do to leave it a better place for the folks who come behind you. — Earl Lloyd

Do you know how you caught me, Will?'
'Good-bye, Dr. Lecter. You can leave messages for me at the number on the file.' Graham walked away.
'Do you know how you caught me?'
Graham was out of Lecter's sight now, and he walked faster toward the far steel door.
'The reason you caught me is that we're just alike' was the last thing Graham heard as the steel door closed behind him. — Thomas Harris

She surprised him by agreeing. "Yes, I was simply curious, and no, I would never criticize you in front of your followers. Do you have the patience to endure one more question, husband?"
"What is it?"
"When do you suppose you'll leave me behind? — Julie Garwood

Get your hands off me," she commanded faintly, grimacing. "People don't order Billy Bonnet around," he snapped at her. "What's you name?" he demanded forcefully. "You arrogant brute! Leave me alone. Can't you see I'm hurt and sick?" she panted breathlessly. "Don't pain me none," Billy retorted as if utterly insensitive. "Please, Mister Bonnet," Cal entreated softly. "Please, what?" Billy taunted, his mood becoming larkish. "Please take your filthy hands off my wife before I put a slug in your miserable hide," Lynx warned icily from behind him.

-Calinda, Billy, & Lynx — Janelle Taylor

If we lived for ever, what you say would be true. But we have to die, we have to leave life presently. Injustice and greed would be the real thing if we lived for ever. As it is, we must hold to other things, because Death is coming. I love death - not morbidly, but because He explains. He shows me the emptiness of Money. Death and Money are the eternal foes. Not Death and Life. . . . Death destroys a man: the idea of Death saves him. Behind the coffins and the skeletons that stay the vulgar mind lies something so immense that all that is great in us responds to it. Men of the world may recoil from the charnel-house that they will one day enter, but Love knows better. Death is his foe, but his peer, and in their age-long struggle the thews of Love have been strengthened, and his vision cleared, until there is no one who can stand against him. — E. M. Forster

It's not fair!" Sunny wailed. "Why do you get to stay? Why can't I stay, if you can?"
I had to swallow hard. "That wouldn't be fair, would it? But I don't get to stay, Sunny. I have to go, too. And soon. Maybe we'll leave together." Perhaps she'd be happier if she thought I was going to the Dolphins with her. By the time she knew otherwise, Sunny would have a different host with different emotions and no tie to this human beside me. Maybe. Anyway, it would be too late. "I have to go, Sunny, just like you. I have to give my body back, too."
And then, flat and hard from right behind us, Ian's voice broke through the quiet like the crack of a whip.
"What? — Stephenie Meyer

You reach a certain age, and you realize, 'Wow: there are younger people doing this better than I can, and don't leave me out - I don't want to be left behind. I want to do it, too. Where are you going? I want to be part of it.' — Ted Danson

Lord, you call me to live in the world without embracing the ways of the world. Help me to live in a way that preserves my freedom to follow you wherever and however you lead. If I should leave behind a monument, may it be a reminder to others of faith and not foolishness. — Ann Spangler

Now you've gone too fast. Now, you've made me leave me behind. — Pleasefindthis

I love you."
The words come out almost in a panic, as if there's no time. As if he's about to walk into Eden again, and I've got to say it before he disappears behind the door.
"I love you too."
Jimmy' response startles me back to the room, the tobacco tin forgotten in my hand. I close it and set it on the counter, afraid of whatever drug it is inside that has me hallucinating.
"I must be losing my mind," I say, shaking my head. "I thought I just heard you say that you loved me."
"I did," Jimmy replies.
"You did?"
"Of course. You said it to me first. It woulda been rude to leave ya hangin' there, wouldn't it? — Ryan Winfield

Meet me where the interstate ends, and the road takes turns trying to figure out which way to go. If you take the right way don't leave me behind, because all I can remember is the persistence in your eyes. You won't come back home again. If you take the left way don't look too far ahead, and never look behind you, because I'll always be right here beside you. — Jennifer Megan Varnadore

Somewhere, in the great expanse of space,
There is a home where souls reside,
Yours and mine were joined together
I have not moved from that place,
God help me, I'll never move from that place
But there was a poison in my heart,
And a darkness in my mind
I wasn't there when you were drowning
Though I'd give my soul to take it back
You had to leave me behind — R.K. Lilley

The other day Father Prior was telling me about a French writer, Jean-Paul Sartre. An existentialist. ... One phrase of his particularly struck me: 'L'enfer c'est les autres.' Do you think he meant that as a joke?"

"I don't think humor's a strong point with existentialists."

"I think it's p-p-poppycock. How can Hell be others? God is manifested in others. God is the Other. That's why the self must lose itself in love for the other. It's the self we must leave behind. Better to say Hell is the Self. L'enfer c'est moi. — Tony Hendra

Look around you. Look back. This is what I want to tell my daughters, the message I wish to leave behind. Be grateful, but not too grateful for fragments of the rights due all persons. Remember, justice and change comes hard and slow. Remember, you will have many mothers in this life besides me, all of them flawed. Judge them, judge me, but not too harshly. Carry on, my girls, but guard yourself against the irrational defeats that may yet come. — Mary Volmer

Television happens very quickly. It was like a shot of adrenaline into me, as a filmmaker, and my career. You can hit town, do the show, and leave with this incredible energy behind you. — Michael J. Bassett

He shook me, and despite it being one-handed, it made my teeth rattle. "If anything like that ever happens again. You. Leave. Me. Behind. Do you understand?"
I would have argued, but I was feeling a little shocky for some reason. "I'm not good at abandoning people," I finally said.
A front-desk person scurried over, first-aid kit in hand, but Pritkin snarled at the poor guy and he quickly backed up a step. "Then get good at it!"
He stomped off, limping, one shoulder hanging at an odd angle. "You're welcome," I murmured. — Karen Chance

In the pages of a good book, you can be anyone, travel anywhere, even transcend time and space. Leave the mundane behind and join me between the pages. — Brandy Golden

It's not that simple."
"It's as simple as dry toast."
"You're encouraging me to knowingly hurt him."
Cletus grunted impatiently and threw his hands up. "We're talking in circles. Here's reality: People get hurt and they move on or they don't. You can't have it both ways. You either get to be famous, and deal with the hassle that comes with it, or you leave it all behind. Own your shit, Sienna. And let Jethro own his. And then get married and own that shit together."
Cletus stood, clearly frustrated, and stomped away from me to the back door. He disappeared into the house only to appear three seconds later to add, "And while you're at it, beget me some nieces and nephews. — Penny Reid

You ready to leave now? I don't find the idea of fucking you against that wall behind you even slightly unpleasant. Exhibitionism has never been a problem for me. Is that something you'd like to try? — R.K. Lilley

You relate to a character and you find that character within yourself. It's all parts of me. I don't leave characters behind. I just let them go. — Sissy Spacek

Thoughts of You
There were times when I was with him and it was too much. Does that make sense? When someone stirs a world of emotion in you and it's so intense you can barely stand to be with him.
During those moments, I wanted so desperately to leave - to go home, walk into my bedroom, and shut the door behind me. Crawl into bed and lay there in the dark, tracing the outline of my lips with my fingers - replaying everything he said, everything we did. I wanted to be left alone - with nothing other than my thought of him. — Lang Leav

He lowered his voice and leaned in so his breath caressed her face. "I'll give you everything I am. I swear it. If you trust me you'll never have any reason to regret it. Start a life with me, Mary. Let's leave the past behind and create a new future together." Fingers twined in the wet hair at her nape so that she had to tilt her chin to maintain eye contact. "Let me love you, angel eyes. — Aline Hunter

Give me your past, all your pain, all your anger, all your guilt. Release it to me, and I will be a safe harbor for the life you need to leave behind. — Jewel E. Ann

Lonesome tears
I can't cry them anymore
I can't think of what they're for
Oh they ruin me every time

But I'll try to leave behind some days
These tears just can't erase
I don't need them anymore

How could this love
Ever turning
Never turn its eye on me
How could this love
Ever changing
Never change the way I feel

Lazy sun your eyes catch the light
With the promises that might
Come true for awhile

Oh I'll ride farther than I should
Harder than I could
Just to meet you there

How could this love
Ever turning
Never turn its eye on me
How could this love
Ever changing
Never change the way I feel — Beck

I must try to enjoy all the graces that God has given me today. Grace cannot be hoarded. There are no banks where it can be deposited to be used when I feel more at peace with myself. If I do not make full use of these blessings, I will lose them forever.
God knows that we are all artists of life. One day, he gives us a hammer with which to make sculptures, another day he gives us brushes and paints with which to make a picture, or paper and a pencil to write with. But you cannot make a painting with a hammer, or a sculpture with a paintbrush. Therefore, however difficult it may be, I must accept today's small blessings, even if they seem like curses because I am suffering and it's a beautiful day, the sun is shining, and the children are singing in the street. This is the only way I will manage to leave my pain behind and rebuild my life. — Paulo Coelho

You are your own worst enemy, young lady. And you are a coward. It is senseless to mistake fear for bravery." Her warm breath is yeasty on my face. "I feel sorry for you. But that's it. We are done trying to help you. It's your life, as your poor father said." AFTER THIS, WHEN I wake in the morning, I spread my fingers, working out the stiffness that creeps in overnight. I point my toes, feeling the crimp in my ankles, my calves, the dull sore ache behind my knees. The pain in my joints is like a needy pet that won't leave me alone. But I can't complain. I've forfeited that right. — Christina Baker Kline

She looked at him then, but his image blurred behind tears that swelled into her eyes. She must leave. She must leave this room, because she wanted to hit him, as she had sworn she never would do. She wanted to cause him pain for taking a place in her heart that she wouldn't have given him if she'd known the truth.
"You lied to me," she said.
She turned and ran from the room. — Kristin Cashore

There's a purity to the struggle to reach a peak. You leave your world behind and take only what you need. For a creature like me there is nothing closer to redemption. — Mark Lawrence

[When I die] if I leave behind me ten pounds ... you and all mankind [may] bear witness against me, that I have lived and died a thief and a robber. — John Wesley

It's January and I'm kicking snow off the ground. I just threw out the flower you made me promise to water, handle with care, because I was too careless, you said. Careless with things and people, around me and behind
and I remember being still for just a second or two, thinking that it's so much easier to leave and start anew, than take care of what's already here. — Charlotte Eriksson

I have had a fairly long life, above all a very happy one, and I think that I shall be remembered with some regrets and perhaps leave some reputation behind me. What more could I ask? The events in which I am involved will probably save me from the troubles of old age. I shall die in full possession of my faculties, and that is another advantage that I should count among those that I have enjoyed. If I have any distressing thoughts, it is of not having done more for my family; to be unable to give either to them or to you any token of my affection and my gratitude is to be poor indeed. — Antoine Lavoisier

Kiss me!" I pleaded. "Please, Pigeon! I told him no!"
Abby shoved me away. "Leave me alone, Travis!"
She shouldered passed me, but I grabbed her wrist. She kept her arm straight, outstretched behind her, but she didn't turn around.
"I am begging you." I fell to my knees, her hand still in mine. My breath puffed out in white steam as I spoke, reminding me of the cold. "I'm begging you, Abby. Don't do this."
Abby glanced back, and then her eyes drifted down her arm to mine, seeing the tattoo on my wrist. The tattoo that bared her name.
She looked away, toward the cafeteria. "Let me go, Travis."
The air knocked out of me, and with all hope obliterated, I relaxed my hand, and let her slip out of my fingers.
Abby didn't look back as she walked away from me, and my palms fell flat on the sidewalk. She wasn't coming back. She didn't want me anymore, and there was nothing I could do or say to change it. — Jamie McGuire

If you dare try to leave me behind, I'll follow on foot, and when I die in the snow, Ill come back and haunt you. I'll make your life a complete misery. No ghost will ever have been as inventive in its nastiness as I'll be: I'll turn your food rancid; I'll transform your drink into blood; I'll howl and moan throughout the night; there'll be no place safe from me. And don't think I couldn't do it, Thirrin, Queen of Icemark, because I can assure you, I could. — Stuart Hill

Mac- "I'm afraid you'll leave me behind since you can't see me."
Ryodan- "I'd leave you behind if I could see you. — Karen Marie Moning

I will never be through with you, ever. I don't know what I have to do to get you to realize that you're my
everything. I exist to love you, you're my meaning of life, my reason to be, you were made for me and I was made to make you mine. What we have
is too important to me to just throw away because of a picture and an incorrect quote. But you have got to have some faith in me Layla. I would
never hurt you, you have to know that. I may get angry, lose my temper and storm away but I will always calm down and I will always come back. I
could never leave you behind. I'd be lost without you. — Marie Coulson

Since you made it clear you didn't want to hear anything about [your son], I was obliged to act behind your back.'
'I understand. You had no choice.'
'And I should not distress you now, if I were not obliged to do something that you might never forgive.'
He swallowed nausea and pride in one gulp. 'Jess, the only unforgivable thing you can do is leave me,' he said. 'Se mi lasci mi uccido. If you leave me, I'll kill myself.'
'Don't be ridiculous,' she said. 'I should never leave you. Really, Dain, I cannot think where you get such addled ideas.'
Then, as though this explained and settled everything, she promptly returned to the main subject, and told him what had happened that day — Loretta Chase

And you, behind the footlight's lure,
Kissing an actress on the stage,
Will leave her presence there, I'm sure,
As I my people on the page.
And yet - I love you, darling, yet
I sat with someone at a table
And gloried in our minds that met
As sometimes strangers' minds are able
To leap the bounds of times and spaces
And find, in sharing wine and bread
And light in one another's faces
And in the words that each has said
An intercourse so intimate
It shook me deeply, to the core.
I said good-night, for it was late;
We parted at my hotel door
And I went in, turned down the bed
And took my bath and thought of you ... — Madeleine L'Engle

I can't leave you behind. You're with me all the time. — Ellen Sussman

Actually, the real game of Bigger and Better that Jesus is playing with us usually isn't about money or possessions or even our hopes. It's about our pride. He asks if we'll give up that thing we're so proud of, that thing we believe causes us to matter in the eyes of the world, and give it up to follow Him. He's asking us, Will you take what you think defines you, leave it behind, and let Me define who you are instead? — Bob Goff

Beware the man who beguiles you, Lori-Angel. Those are the ones who won't commit to you. Oh, they'll show you wonders, to be sure, and they'll spin your head with their pleasurable ways. But in the end, they always leave you and your broken heart far behind. Believe me, 'tis better to have the simple hound than to follow the fox. Though the fox is fairer to behold, the hound knows where his home is and dutifully he stays, while the handsome fox is ever off to find new game. (Anne Bonny) — Kinley MacGregor

Don't cry. Carry what you love about me with you; leave the pain behind. — Lauren Kate

She saw Derek and without so much as a hello, leaned to look behind him. "Where's Simon?"
"He's - "
"Is he okay? Why isn't he here?" She glared up at Derek. "Where'd you leave him?"
"Passed out in an alley." Derek frowned in thought. "Not sure where, though ... "
"He's kidding," I said as Tori sputtered.
"We need to get moving." Derek hooked a thumb as Tori while looking at me. " She's your responsibility."
"Excuse me?" Tori said.
Derek didn't even glance her way. "Make sure she keeps up. And shuts up." — Kelley Armstrong

I won't leave you but you need to go on up and say your goodbyes. I'll stand right here behind you, Beau whispered from beside me — Abbi Glines

I turned to leave and was exiting the gates when I heard the sound of feet running quickly along the gravel behind me. I turned and saw Alexei, who showed no sign of slowing down, so I opened my arms and he ran into them, embracing me tightly, his arms wrapped around my neck as I lifted him off the ground.
"I wanted you to know," he said, his voice choked up as if he was trying to stop himself from crying, "I wanted you to know that you can be my brother if you like. As long as you let me be yours. — John Boyne

When you love someone, you have the ability not only to harm their body, but to cut their soul to pieces. And though those cuts may heal, they leave scars behind. With enough scars, you stop feeling anything at all. The skin's too thick. — Tara Sue Me

The animals will stop moving when I stop breathing. But if I write to you with all my heart, I'll leave a little of myself behind on this paper, in these words. Then, if you think of me on Qingming, when the spirits of the departed are allowed to visit their families, you'll make the parts of myself I leave behind come alive too. The creatures I made for you will again leap and run and pounce, and maybe you'll get to see these words then. — Ken Liu

That's right, I am the unenthusiastic girl people avoid making eye contact with when they buy their spank mags and twelve-inch rubber cocks. I'm the one in full HAZMAT gear cleaning up the "accidental" shot spots they leave behind in one of our twenty-five cent porn booths. For what it's worth, there's a reason I don't fill in the glory holes, they all think they're so sneaky, getting their dick sucked by some anonymous stranger on the other side. I see it as less clean up, let the cock sucking stranger slurp up their spunk. It saves me running a disinfectant wipe along the wall, hoping that none of it touches any part of me. So keep up the good work anonymous strangers, keep gobbling cock and making my life easier. If you want, leave your address at the store and I'll add you to my fucking Christmas card list. — Jaden Wilkes

You can't live with the idea that someone might leave. So instead of being happy for me, like any normal person, you're pissed off because ooh, oh no, Hassan doesn't like me anymore. You're such a sitzpinkler. You're so goddamned scared of the idea that someone might dump you that your whole fugging life is built around not gettting left behind. Well, it doesn't work, kafir. I just - it's not just dumb, it's ineffective. Because then you're not being a good friend or a good boyfriend or whatever, because you're only thinking they-might-not-like-me-they-might-not-like-me, and guess what? When you act like that, no one likes you. There's your goddamned Theorem. — John Green

I've been doing this a long time- manipulating people to get my way. That's why you think you love me. Because I've broken you down and built you back up to believe it. It wasn't an accident. Once you leave this behind ... you'll see that. -Caleb — C.J. Roberts

Why won't you leave me alone?" I whispered one night as he hovered behind me while I tried to work at my desk.
Long minutes passed. I didn't think he would answer. I even had time to hope he might have gone, until I felt his hand on my shoulder.
"Then I'd be alone, too," he said, and he stayed the whole night through, till the lamps burned down to nothing. — Leigh Bardugo

Harley told me that you guys were having a bit of trouble, but he seemed to think it was all his fault. So maybe I could bring him over and give him a chance to apologize? I know he loves you, Shawn. If there's anything I can do to get you guys back together, then I'll do it."
"He doesn't need to apologize," I burst out. "I'm the doofus in our relationship. I need to get on my knees and say I'm sorry by sucking him off until his brain comes out his dick. Not that I keep a strict count or anything, but I owe him about twenty-three."
There was a little pause in the conversation as we looked at each other, and I realized I had overshared. With my lover's father. I winced.
"TMI?" I asked tentatively.
He swallowed visibly. "Just a bit."
"Sorry."
"No. Don't sweat it. I'll just focus on the fact that my boy has a healthy sexual relationship and leave the other images behind." I couldn't be sure, but I think he was trying not to laugh. I get that a lot. — Renae Kaye

Nabokov calls every great novel a fairy tale, I said. Well, I would agree. First, let me remind you that fairy tales abound with frightening witches who eat children and wicked stepmothers who poison their beautiful stepdaughters and weak fathers who leave their children behind in forests. But the magic comes from the power of good, that force which tells us we need not give in to the limitations and restrictions imposed on us by McFate, as Nabokov called it.
Every fairy tale offers the potential to surpass present limits, so in a sense the fairy tale offers you freedoms that reality denies. In all great works of fiction, regardless of the grim reality they present, there is an affirmation of life against the transience of that life, an essential defiance. — Azar Nafisi

The important thing is to be honest with yourself. And to have the will and determination. My emotions are not me, but mine. My memories are not me, they're mine. I am the master of my emotions and my memories. So now, all you have to do is make up your mind firmly to leave those things behind without attachment or regret, and go through with it. — Ilchi Lee

I'm writing this in part to tell you that if you ever wonder what you've done in your life, and everyone does wonder sooner or later, you have been God's grace to me, a miracle, something more than a miracle. You may not remember me very well at all, and it may seem to you to be no great thing to have been the good child of an old man in a shabby little town you will no doubt leave behind. If only I had the words to tell you. — Marilynne Robinson

A boy told me if he roller-skated fast enough his loneliness couldn't catch up to him, the best reason I ever heard for trying to be a champion. What I wonder tonight pedaling hard down King William Street is if it translates to bicycles. A victory! To leave your loneliness panting behind you on some street corner while you float free into a cloud of sudden azaleas, pink petals that have never felt loneliness, no matter how slowly they fell. — Naomi Shihab Nye

Travis walked in and shut the door behind him. "I was mad. I heard you spitting out everything that's wrong with me to America and it pissed me off. I just meant to go out and have a few drinks and try to figure some things out, but before I knew it, I was piss drunk and those girls ... ," he paused. "I woke up this morning and you weren't in bed, and when I found you on the recliner and saw the wrappers on the floor, I felt sick."
"You could have just asked me instead of spending all that money at the grocery store just to bribe me to stay."
"I don't care about the money, Pidge. I was afraid you'd leave and never speak to me again. — Jamie McGuire

I just want to be able to sit on grass as long as I want to, without anybody telling me to leave. Everything is so restricted, here, in that you actually have to stand behind a line, you can't go up the Canyon and enjoy the view. — Franka Potente

being asked by Criton how he would be buried, "I have taken a great deal of pains," saith he, "my friends, to no purpose, for I have not convinced our Criton that I shall fly from hence, and leave no part of me behind. Notwithstanding, Criton, if you can overtake me, wheresoever you get hold of me, bury me as you please: but — Marcus Tullius Cicero

Farewell My Friend

It was beautiful as long as it lasted
The journey of my life.
I have no regrets whatsoever
save the pain I'll leave behind.
Those dear hearts who love and care...
And the strings pulling at the heart and soul...
The strong arms that held me up
When my own strength let me down.
At every turning of my life
I came across good friends,
Friends who stood by me,
Even when the time raced me by.
Farewell, farewell my friends
I smile and bid you goodbye.
No, shed no tears for I need them not
All I need is your smile.
If you feel sad do think of me
for that's what I'll like
when you live in the hearts
of those you love, remember then
you never die. — Gitanjali Ghei

Bree stared down at Bernardo's still form. The monitor was the only sound in the room apart from his deep breathing. Alessandro had gone down to the cafeteria with Will and Gianni to grab something to eat before they left for home. Bree lied and told him that she wanted to check in with Tina and her mother Roxanna for a few minutes before they left. Even unconscious, the son of a bitch was formidable and Bree felt nervous around him. "Why don't you do everyone a favour and just die already?" Bree said. No response. Bree sneered and shook her head, turning to leave. "You could always smother me with a pillow," a groggy voice said behind her, making her heart nearly stop. Bree whirled around wide-eyed and met Bernardo's dark gaze. She forced herself to shrug and crossed her arms. "Do you think Alessandro would forgive you for murdering his father?" Bernardo asked. They both knew the answer to that. — E. Jamie

I was looking for some way to put my music to some service on a nightly basis. You go into a town, you play a little music, you leave something behind. That idea connected us to the local community. It was a very simple idea, but it really resonated with me. — Bruce Springsteen

It's like I am inside this ethereal sphere wherein exists no logic, no reasoning, no typicality, no explanations, no realism, no comparisons, nothing ordinary, and no normalcy. And then if you are to understand me, you have to step into my realm and leave all of those things behind. I'm not typical. I'm not ordinary. And I'm not normal. And I never will be . So I don't see the point of waking up in the morning and wishing to be so. — C. JoyBell C.

You're right." He cut me off. "I never understood this country. I never understood why he chose to leave everything else behind and stay for this. Not until I met you."
I felt like he'd pushed me, like I was falling and I needed him to reel those words back in to keep me standing straight.
"You /are/ this country, Amani." He spoke more quietly now. "More alive than anything ought to be in this place. All fire and gunpowder, with one finger always on the trigger. — Alwyn Hamilton

I can't leave you," he says hoarsely.
"I can't leave you either," I say, shaking my head. "I can't."
"Then don't," he says, and grabs me behind the neck and kisses me again, and the world is tilting, and everything goes black. — Cynthia Hand

That day, watching that episode with Rylee, I said to her, "That is what I need. Drugs." And, much to my surprise, she responded, "Oh, well I have some right here." Apparently, her then-boyfriend had asked to leave a little unopened vial of pot behind with her after visiting one weekend, because he was taking an airplane back home and couldn't fly with it. For five minutes I chastised her for temporarily allowing illicit substances in our home, sullying our apartment's good name. But then she said to me, "I think what we need to do, for you to feel better, is to get high and play Dream Phone." And there wasn't really much to think about, right then. I told her, "That is a really good idea. — Katie Heaney

We simply can't drop everything and run away, can we?'
A warm wind kicked up, ruffling through his thick, dark hair. Very softly, he said, 'I see. Is this where you preach to me of how English civilization will save the savages?'
She hated this, *hated* the way he was suddenly looking at her - as though she were some unfamiliar specimen whose novelty was rapidly losing interest. 'Be fair, sir! All I meant was that we've created a society here. Laws, a justice system, a - postal service ... ' The argument sounded weak even to her own ears. 'I simply mean that to leave those things behind would hardly be simple. — Meredith Duran

Some days I didn't eat. I confused the gnawing in my belly for hunger and fed it, but it only made me sick. Strange how much missing someone feels like hunger. How the hole they leave behind is so much larger than they were. How it grows even bigger, feeding on you. — Leah Raeder

To Eden with me you will not leave
To live in a cottage of crazy, crooked eaves.
In your own happy home you take care these nights;
When you let your little cat in, please turn on the lights!
Something scurries behind and finds a cozy place to stare,
Something sent to you from paradise, with serpents to spare:
Tongues flowering; they leap out laughing, lapping. Dissapear — Thomas Ligotti

In my country, families are raised as though they are one. Although I am from the Dinka tribe, my parents didn't raise us as the Dinka tribe. They raised us as the Wek family, in the way they believed their children should grow up. So when you leave, the first thing you think is the ones you left behind. It's natural to help them in any way you can. I found a way to support myself rather than asking my Mum to give me money. I would work before school and send money back to pay for their rent and food. — Alek Wek

Coco?" I whispered, standing still, hardly able to believe it. "Oh - Coco?" "It is impossible to imagine," a voice behind seemed to be saying from a great distance away, "how the dog could have reached this spot. For three days he has been immovable in his kennel." I dropped on my knees, and took his paw in my hand. He gave the faintest wag of his tail, and tried to raise his head; but it fell back again, and he could only look at me. For an instant, for the briefest instant, we looked at each other, and while we looked his eyes glazed. "Coco - I've come back. Darling - I'll never leave you any more - - " I don't know why I said these things. I knew he was dead, and that no calls, no lamentations, no love could ever reach him again. Sliding down on to the stone flags beside him, I laid my head on his and wept in an agony of bitter grief. Now indeed I was left alone in the world. Even my dog was gone. — Elizabeth Von Arnim

We all die, Damian. Before I do, I want to love with all my heart. Give all I have, experience all I can, and leave behind some piece of me that will never be forgotten. I want to enjoy the time I have left. I'm choosing life. Moments. Memories. For you. — D. Nichole King

He saw the towel in her hands. "I've got this."
"Let me help."
"I think you've helped enough." She thought he was going to leave it at that, but Will told her, "It's been worse today than usual."
"Stress is a contributing factor-when you get tired or if something emotional happens."
He scrubbed hard at the plate in his hands. Sara saw that he hadn't bothered to roll up his sleeves. The cuffs of his sweater were soaked. He said, "I've been trying to dig a new sewer line to my house. That's why my laundry is behind."
Sara had been expecting a non sequitur, but she'd hoped he could hold off for a few moments longer. "My father built this house with money from people who try to do their own plumbing. — Karin Slaughter

I feel you. Inside. In the parts of me I crushed the night my mother died. No matter how I tried to keep you out, you got in and I couldn't let you leave me behind. So listen to me when I say this. My life is yours. You're the reason I'll stay alive. The only goddamn reason. — Dee Tenorio

Two thoughts walked into my place. The first thought said that we hadn't slept together because sex would have closed an entrance behind us and opened an exit ahead of us. The second thought told me quite clearly what to do. Maybe Takeshi's wife was right - maybe it is unsafe to base an important decision on your feelings for a person. Takeshi says the same thing often enough. Every bonk, he says, quadruples in price by the morning after. But who are Takeshi or his wife to lecture anybody? If not love, then what? I looked at the time. Three o'clock. She was how many thousand kilometers and one time zone away. I could leave some money to cover the cost of the call. "Good timing," Tomoyo answered, like I was calling from the cigarette machine around the corner. "I'm unpacking." "Missing me?" "A tiny little bit, maybe." "Liar! You don't sound surprised to hear me." I could hear the smile in her voice. "I'm not. When are you coming? — David Mitchell

Some Things, Say the Wise Ones Some things, say the wise ones who know everything, are not living. I say, you live your life your way and leave me alone. I have talked with the faint clouds in the sky when they are afraid of being left behind; I have said, Hurry, hurry! and they have said: thank you, we are hurrying. About cows, and starfish, and roses, there is no argument. They die, after all. But water is a question, so many living things in it, but what is it, itself, living or not? Oh, gleaming generosity, how can they write you out? As I think this I am sitting on the sand beside the harbor. I am holding in my hand small pieces of granite, pyrite, schist. Each one, just now, so thoroughly asleep. — Mary Oliver

Before the dawn I leave the night behind me
and before my heart I let you leave me behind.
- from the poem 'Behind — Munia Khan

When you die, trust me, the most difficult person to leave behind is yourself. — Chuck Palahniuk

There is so much beauty in the world that I wonder how we get around to marshalling so much hatred within ourselves. I hope, one day, you will feel the same way seeing this sight of the heavens that I see, that mu forefathers and their forefathers have seen since time began, and think of me, and marvel that in this beauty time stands still for us all, making us all immortal on the lips of those we leave behind.
Just remember me kindly, my son. — Anirban Bose

Children, only animals live entirely in the Here and Now. Only nature knows neither memory nor history. But man - let me offer you a definition - is the storytelling animal. Wherever he goes he wants to leave behind not a chaotic wake, not an empty space, but the comforting marker-buoys and trail-signs of stories. He has to go on telling stories. He has to keep on making them up. As long as there's a story, it's all right. Even in his last moments, it's said, in the split second of a fatal fall - or when he's about to drown - he sees, passing rapidly before him, the story of his whole life. — Graham Swift

Rares claps his hands. "When you're finished, dear heart, feel free to leave the books on the table, as disorganized as you possibly can." He motions to a table behind me, situated in a break in the rows of books. "The librarian in residence in charge of the Library of Clarisse is an offensively irritable man, and I would like nothing better than to make unnecessary work for him. — Sara Raasch

We've all led raucous lives, some of them inside, some of them out. But only the poem you leave behind is what's important. Everyone knows this. The voyage into the interior is all that matters, Whatever your ride. Sometimes I can't sit still for all the asininities I read. Give me the hummingbird, who has to eat sixty times His own weight a day just to stay alive. Now that's a life on the edge. — Charles Wright

I wish I could leave a trail of gratefulness behind me that you could see, glowing thanks. I would pay to see stars, but I never have to. This to me is one of those miracles. — Elizabeth Berg

When you love someone you tend to tell them so much about your past because you're trying to catch up to the present moment. You're trying to say, my past has been bloody. My past has been as painful and pounding as an ear ache, but I am still here. I survived it. You're trying to say, here I am before you. I can be brutal. I can be as harsh and unforgiving as sun burn, but this is how I got to this moment. This is who I am. I am not always kind and lovely, I am so often fierce and cutting and unforgiving. I have made some mistakes I'm still trying to forgive myself for. Please accept it. Please try to love me for it. Here is the muscle and bone of me. It's frightening. It's a roller coaster. Here is the meat of me, after I've shed my skin, after I've left the cicada shell behind. It's manic. It's a monster, but it will try to love you well. It will try to leave fingerprints all over you. — Jessica Therese