The Perfect Marriage

When the details become a way of not looking.

I understand that urge for more information, that longing for details. But in this case, I’m fine without them. I know what happened at Pine Cottage. I don’t need to remember exactly how it happened. Because here’s the thing about details-they can also be a distraction. Add too many and it obscures the brutal truth about a situation. They become the gaudy necklace that hides the tracheotomy scar.

Final Girls · Riley Sager

How one photograph can make a man look guilty before he speaks.

Terry frowned at Ramage. He understood the words, they were simple English words forming a simple declarative sentence, he knew who Frankie Peterson was and what had happened to him, but the meaning of the words eluded him. All he could say was “What? Are you kidding?” and that was when the sports photographer from the Flint City Call snapped his picture, the one that appeared on the front page the next day. His mouth was open, his eyes were wide, his hair was sticking out around the edges of his Golden Dragons cap. In that photo he looked both enfeebled and guilty.

The Outsider · Stephen King

Some people keep a darker world on hand so the real one stays bearable.

I needed for the imaginary version of my world to be darker than my real world. Otherwise, I would have wanted to leave them both.

Verity · Colleen Hoover