I also knew I had inherited the name of the world's most famous philosopher. I hated that. Everyone expected something from me. Something I just couldn't give. So I renamed myself Ari. If I switched the letter, my name was Air. I thought it might be a great thing to be the air. I could be something and nothing at the same time. Furthermore, I could be necessary and also invisible. Everyone would need me and no one would be able to see me.

— Benjamin Alire Sáenz

I always thought of men as being hard—maybe because I was hard. But there was a softness in Tom that betrayed his large masculine hands and his deep baritone voice. He knew something about love that I didn’t. I don’t know where he’d learned it, but it wasn’t something you got from a book, not something you could learn in an online class, not something you could borrow. Maybe it was something you were born with. Some people knew how to love, and some people didn’t. Tom was the former. I was the latter. I didn’t know which one of us had it worse

— Benjamin Alire Sáenz

I bet you could sometimes find all the mysteries of the universe in someone's hand.

— Benjamin Alire Sáenz

I couldn't exactly storm away in anger. I'd just have to close my eyes and shut out the universe.

— Benjamin Alire Sáenz

I decided that maybe we left each other alone too much. Leaving each other alone was killing us.

— Benjamin Alire Sáenz

I didn’t think it was my job to accept what everyone said I was and who I should be.

— Benjamin Alire Sáenz

I don't know what the exact shape of my life will take--and what the days to come will bring--except I know that I am happy, and my heart is still. I know that I have fallen in love with the word surrender and know that I can no longer live in disappointment

— Benjamin Alire Sáenz

I’d rather have a cup of coffee and a cigarette than live in all that honesty.

— Benjamin Alire Sáenz

I guess I did miss Dante-even though I tried hard to not think about him. The problem with trying hard not to think about something was that you thought about it even more.

— Benjamin Alire Sáenz

I guess I didn't have it so bad. Maybe everybody didn't love me, but I wasn't one of those kids that everyone hated, either. I was good in a fight. So people left me alone.I was almost invisible.I think I liked it that way. And then Dante came along.

— Benjamin Alire Sáenz