Isabel had entrusted the note to Gwen just before Baltimore. And the small scrap of paper still remained her only tangible evidence that Learn had loved her. Expect...he didn't anymore.

— Kelly Creagh

Isabel moved farther into the kitchen, not knowing whether to be relieved that her mother hadn't had an atomic meltdown, or mortified that she'd taken it upon herself to play head chef with the nearest thing Trenton High had to a Dark Lord.

— Kelly Creagh

It is naught but pain and regret when we think of the things and people we will never have, the opportunities we may never get. But to pine for those we have had and loved and once held but will never clasp again, it is torture of an unbearable degree. It is the worst pain possible. Enough to drive you away from yourself...

— Kelly Creagh

Just because I wear black and keep a private journal, that doesn't mean I'm going to blow up the school. Or terrorize mindless cheerleaders, for that matter.

— Kelly Creagh

Lady Legal," he began again, "is a woman in the literature who returns from the dead, taking over another woman's body to be with her true love."" Oh, yes. Lovely" Isabel blanched. "I guess the other chick didn't mind at all?

— Kelly Creagh

Not anymore, though," he said. "And I guess that's the one perk of loving a dead girl. She never changes.

— Kelly Creagh

Painted faces laughed. It was like a mad carnival where everyone was oblivious, lost in the bliss of chaos, a throng unaware of a bomb planted beneath the floorboards.

— Kelly Creagh

She never answered. She couldn’t. All she could do was stare, reaching toward him with her gaze alone, pulling him to drown in the sorrow of those depthless black pools.

— Kelly Creagh

She wanted to touch him, to throw her arms around him — but something held her back. Maybe it was the fear that her arms would pass right through him, that she would have come all this way only to find a ghost after all. As though he’d been able to read her thoughts, he slowly angled toward her. He raised his hands and held his palms out to her. Isabel lifted her own hands to mirror his. He pressed their palms together, his fingers folding down to lace through hers. She felt a rush of warmth course through her, a relief as pure and sweet as spring rain. He was real. This was real. She had found him. She could touch him. Furthermore, she could feel him. Finally, they were together. Finally, finally, they could forget this wasted world and go home." I knew it wasn’t true," she whispered. "I knew you wouldn’t stop believing." He drew her close. Leaning into him, she felt him press his lips to her forehead in a kiss. As he spoke, the cool metal of his lip ring grazed her skin, causing a shudder to ripple through her." You..." His voice, low and breathy, reverberated through her, down to the thin soles of her slippers. "You think you’re different," he said. She felt his hands tighten around hers, gripping hard, too hard. A streak of violet lightning split the sky, striking close behind them. The house, Isabel thought. It had been struck. She could hear it cracking apart. She looked for only a brief moment, long enough to watch it split open." But you’re not," Learn said, calling her attention back to him. Isabel winced, her own hands surrendering under the suddenly crushing pressure of his hold. A face she did not recognize stared down at her, one twisted with anger — with hate." You," he scarcely more than breathed, "are just like every. Body. Else." He moved so fast. Before she could register his words or the fact that she had once spoken them to him herself, he jerked her to one side. Isabel felt her feet part from the rocks. Weightlessness took hold of her as she swung out and over the ledge of the cliff. As he let her go. The wind whistled its high and lonely song in her ears. She fell away into the oblivion of the storm until she could no longer see the cliff — could no longer see him. Only the slip of the pink ribbon as it unraveled from her wrist, floating up and away from her and out of sight forever.

— Kelly Creagh

Side by side we'll fight the tide, That sweeps in to take us down. Hand in hand we'll both withstand, Even as we drown.

— Kelly Creagh