Flawless

The boxes aren't clutter—they're a diary you're afraid to open.

Sometimes, it was just easier for me to live under the piles rather than face what might be in them. It wasn’t logical, but my brain didn’t really work normally.

Done and Dusted · Lyla Sage

The compliment that sounds like an insult until it isn’t.

I think you live in a world that’s more interesting than the one most people live in,” he says, and just as my heart starts to sink with disappointment, with a kind of loneliness, he adds, “and I wish I could live in it too.” I feel myself beaming. “I’ll take you sometime.” “I’d like that,” he says.

Great Big Beautiful Life · Emily Henry

The person whose description of you becomes the way you see yourself.

After school we used to lie in her room listening to music and talking about why we liked each other. These were long and intense conversations, and felt so momentous to me that I secretly transcribed parts of them from memory in the evenings. When Bobbi talked about me it felt like seeing myself in a mirror for the first time. I also looked in actual mirrors more often. I started taking a close interest in my face and body, which I’d never done before. I asked Bobbi questions like: do I have long legs? Or short?

Conversations with Friends · Sally Rooney