Maureen Johnson Quotes

I knew it was beautiful, but knowing something is beautiful and caring about it are two very different things, and I didn't care. ~ Maureen Johnson

I may have been a complete lunatic, but I was a complete lunatic with manners. ~ Maureen Johnson

It was almost funny. Life seemed downright accidental in its brevity, and death a punch line to a lousy joke. ~ Maureen Johnson

Hot tea," he said, holding the cups. "It's just wrong. ~ Maureen Johnson

because talent alone doesn't make an artist ~ Maureen Johnson

Pumpkins were the watermelons of fall. ~ Maureen Johnson

I take my best lessons from nature, and nature says 'When something flies at your head- move. ~ Maureen Johnson

Which is both gross and breathtakingly romantic. He could always have just gone upstairs and brushed his teeth, but he stayed and lurked by the fish for me. ~ Maureen Johnson

I remember how, at first, I had felt the tension in his lips, as if he was trying to make a barrier between us - then they had relaxed, parted slightly. And that's when I had known he wanted to kiss me, wanted to give in. That little parting of the lips, the little sigh that came out ... I would hear that sigh forever. That little, little sound when the whole world seemed to open up. ~ Maureen Johnson

Then I noticed his rising blush, and I realized something.
Tobin and Angie ... their togetherness was new. New enough that being touched by her still came as a
glorious, blush-worthy surprise. ~ Maureen Johnson

When something happens to me - good, bad, boring it doesn't matter - I have to tell someone to make it count. There's no point in anything happening if you can't talk about it. ~ Maureen Johnson

A strange thing happened to me as I walked away from Jane's house
I was finally thinking clearly. I could see what Charlotte meant. Jane knew how to fix people. Now that I'd talked through some of my issues, I'd blown out the dust and garbage out of my brain and I could think for once. I could smell the rain, heavy with iron. The cold woke me, but it didn't sting. My breath puffed out in front of me in a great white plume, and I laughed. It was like I was breathing ghosts. I wasn't in the land of long highways and big box stores and humid, endless summers. I was in London, a city of stone and rain and magic. I understood, for instance, why they liked red so much. The red buses, telephone booths, and postboxes were a violent shock against the grays of the sky and stone. Red was blood and beating hearts.
And I was strong. ~ Maureen Johnson

I sleep better knowing that a naked cork-eater is not sneaking around at night, stealing my underwear. ~ Maureen Johnson

Don't follow someone into the dark, Stevie. I've seen it happen too many times. ~ Maureen Johnson

One thing," I said, when we had broken apart and the swirling feeling in my head subsided. "Maybe ... don't tell your mom too much about this. I think she has ideas." "What?" he asked, all innocence, as he put an arm around my shoulders and led me back toward his house. "Don't your parents cheer and stare when you make out with someone? Is that weird where you come from? I guess they don't get to see it much, though. From jail, I mean." "Shut it, Weintraub. If I knock you down in the snow, these kids will swarm and eat you. ~ Maureen Johnson

When they separated, the freckleless spot between Pete's eyes was bright red. Before anything else could be said or done, May grabbed her bike and hopped on. She waited until she was six houses down to turn and see if he was still standing in the driveway watching her. He was. She stopped for just a moment, and they caught each other's eyes. Then he slowly started walking backward toward the house. May couldn't see that well, considering that her eyes were still a little blurry and he was far away, but it looked like he was smiling. ~ Maureen Johnson

In our lifetime those who kill the newsworld hands them stardom and these are the ways on which I was raised. - Morrissey, The Last of the Famous International Playboys ~ Maureen Johnson

Gators are just something you have to accept where I come from. Most don't go anywhere near the houses, even though there are lots of delicious children and dogs there. Every once in a while, though, an alligator has a lightbulb moment and decides to take a stroll and see the world a bit. ~ Maureen Johnson

We heard her come halfway up the stairs, where she must have seen the bedroom light on.
Again, the normal parent reaction would have been to say something like, "You had better come out this moment or I am releasing the tiger!" But Debbie was not a normal parent, so we heard her gigle and creep away, saying, "Shhh! Rachel! Come with Mommy! Stuart is busy! ~ Maureen Johnson

There is something about early mornings that changes your perceptions subtly. The light is new; no one has put on the defences of the day. All is reset and not quite real yet. ~ Maureen Johnson

Every time you try to flirt with her, a puppy dies. ~ Maureen Johnson

Were you playing with Stuart? she asked.
The question was loaded. I was a filthy, filthy woman, and even the five-year-old knew it. ~ Maureen Johnson

Some nutter's gone and pulled a Jack the Ripper. ~ Maureen Johnson

It was fine," I said stiffly. "We played Mouse Trap." "Is that what they're calling it these days?" she asked, throwing me a terrible grin. "I have to go give Rachel a quick bath. Feel free to make yourself some cocoa or whatever you like!" She stopped short of adding " ... future child-bride of my only son. ~ Maureen Johnson

People were freaked out, but they showed it in weird ways. Back home, people would have been weeping and doing a lot of very public group hugs. At Wexford people just aggressively pretended nothing had happened. ~ Maureen Johnson

After that, I felt like I had two lives. There was the me I had been before the attack, the one people knew and wanted to relate to. The one people wanted to comfort and fix. And there was another me, a hidden me that no one ever saw. There was a me who had tasted death. That me knew things others people didn't know. ~ Maureen Johnson

The whole "weak in the knees" thing,which she always thought was just some idiotic expression back from the golden age of idiotic expressions,was real.
-Suite Scarlett ~ Maureen Johnson

It's funny when you smile," she said. "It's like a rainbow on a cloudy day."
"Don't ever say that to me again. ~ Maureen Johnson

Anxiety does not ask your permission. Anxiety does not come when expected. It's very rude. It barges in at the strangest moments, stopping all activity, focusing everything on itself It sucks the air our of your lungs and scrambles the world. ~ Maureen Johnson

What tinfoil?" he asked. ~ Maureen Johnson

It's us," Stephen said. "Oh, thank God," said a voice. Callum emerged from behind the Dumpster. Even with all that was going on, it was hard not to take notice of this: he wore only his underpants and his socks and shoes ... I don't think I hid my staring very well either. "Go ahead and change," Stephen said, handing me the bag. "I'll go and get the car." "Please be quick," Callum added. "This is not as fun as it appears. ~ Maureen Johnson

These houses had been plunked down with an alarming randomness
unevenly spaced, on crooked lines, like whoever had designed the place had said, We'll just follow this cat, and wherever he sits down, we'll build something. ~ Maureen Johnson

Tell me what you want, what you really, really want," he said.
"Braiiinnnnssss," we said in unison. ~ Maureen Johnson

It could have been like a fairy tale. But fairy tales aren't real. Things don't work like that. There's a price for everything. ~ Maureen Johnson

Can I tell you something you really don't want to hear? He's going to break up with you. - Stuart ~ Maureen Johnson

And if we get caught, I will claim I made you go. At gunpoint. I am American. People will assume I'm armed. ~ Maureen Johnson

What she didn't display, I noticed, was a boxful of swimming medals.
"Holy crap," I said, when she set them on the desk. "You're like a fish."
"Oh. Um. Well, I swim, you see."
I saw. ~ Maureen Johnson

You'd been petting a stuffed dog?' she said 'A dead one?'
'It was a really well stuffed dog' I clarified. 'I have seen some bad taxidermy. This was top-notch work. It would have fooled anyone. ~ Maureen Johnson

The whole thing smelled like a thrift shop that had been baked in a low oven and felt like a too-tight and too-long hug by a rejected Muppet. ~ Maureen Johnson

It was very pretty. It also made Marlene look very demure, which she probably hated. Ideally, Marlene probably wanted an outfit that had a special holder for a gun. ~ Maureen Johnson

I did it," she said.
"Yup."
"You made fun of me when i first got here," she said. "But I did it."
"I was being friendly."
"You were being a dick," she said.
"Why do you think we like each other?" Stevie asked.
"Does it matter?"
"I don't know," she said. "I don't know how these things work."
"Neither do I. Neither does anybody."
"Some people seem to. I thin Janelle does."
"Janelle," he said, "may know everything, but she doesn't know that. And I like you because . . ."
He rolled up to his side and onto one elbow, gazing down into her face. He traced her jawline with one finger, sending such shivers down her body that she struggled not to squirm.
". . because you came to do something impossible and you did it. And you're smart. And you're really, really attractive."
There, on the floor that had been scuffed by a thousand dance shoes, under the eyes of the masks on the wall that had seen decades go by, they kissed, over and over, each one renewing the last. ~ Maureen Johnson

Maybe your resistance is to live. Live big and loud and joyously and fiercely. Live authentic to who you are. Refuse to be silent. Refuse to go away. Refuse stereotypes and limits.
Because you being you is the most powerful kind of resistance of all. (Rebecca Roanhorse) ~ Maureen Johnson

My final word: don't follow your dreams ... chase them. With a stick, or a shovel, or whatever you have handy. Get that [bleep]ing dream! ~ Maureen Johnson

She means," Nate said, turning away from the books, "That David has gone full weird."
"He was always that way<' Janelle said in a low voice.
"Yeah, but now he's completed his journey. Our little caterpillar has turned into a freaky butterfly."
"Tell her about the screaming," Janelle said. "Because I can't."
"The screaming? Stevie repeated.
"The other morning he started something called 'screaming meditation'," Nate said. "Guess what happens in screaming meditation? Did you guess screaming? For fifteen minutes? Because that's what happens in screaming meditation. Fifteen. Minutes. Outside. At five in the morning. Do you know what happens when someone screams outside for fifteen minutes at five in the morning at a remote location in the mountains, especially after a . . ."
The implied dot dot dot was "student dies in a terrible accident or maybe murder and another one goes missing."
"When security got to him he claimed it was his new religion and that it is something he needs to do every morning now as a way to talk to the sun."
So this is what Edward King had been referring to.
"Sometimes," Nate went on, tapping the books into place so that the spines lined up perfectly, "he sleeps on the roof. Or somewhere else. Sometimes the green."
"Naked," Janelle added. "He sleeps on the green naked."
"Or in classrooms," Nate said. "Someone said they went into differential equations and he was asleep in the corner of the room under ~ Maureen Johnson

You could wear the same outfit every single day and no guy - who isn't gay - will notice. ~ Maureen Johnson

There was a bowl of tuna salad. She grabbed two slices of the closest bread and smacked on a gob, squashing it flat. She sliced it with one long cut and dropped down into a chair at the far end of the table.
David sat at the other end, one of the old tablets next to him, facedown.
"I don't eat tuna salad," he said, grabbing a piece of bread. "It's too mysterious. People sneak things into it. It's a sneak food."
"I like it," Hunter said. "We make it at home with sliced-up dill pickle and Old Bay Seasoning."
"Good to know," David said. "Nate, where do you come down on tuna salad?:
Nate was trying to read and eat some cold mac and cheese in peace.
"I don't eat fish," he said. "Fish freak me out. ~ Maureen Johnson

Oh my God," he said. "What are you, a saint or something?" "I stole this mug," she said. "So, no. Besides, if the school closed down, you'd have to go home and finish your book or something. I did it for you. I'm not even telling anyone else. I mean, aside from my friends. Like you." "Are you trying to make me have an emotion?" Nate said, his eyes reddening a bit. "Because I've spent my whole life learning how to repress and deflect and you're kind of ruining my thing. ~ Maureen Johnson

Claim whatever you want. Say you only want a happy family or a successful career or a big house. I say: no, that's not what you want. You'll settle for those things, but you really want a monkey that does your evil bidding. Pullman is a genius just for this. ~ Maureen Johnson

People can't really sympathize with you properly when you've woken them up ~ Maureen Johnson

I know no one is perfect, that behind every facade of perfection is a writhing mess of subterfuge and secret sorrows ... but even taking that into account, Noah was pretty much perfect. ~ Maureen Johnson

Stevie, how many stories -"

"It's all one story," Stevie said, and the confidence in her voice surprised her. "It was about money then, and it's about money now. ~ Maureen Johnson

Sometimes artist like to catch themselves looking out, let the world see them for once. It's a signature. This one is a very bold one. But this is also a witnessing. We want to remember, and we want to be remembered. That's why we paint. ~ Maureen Johnson

Maybe it was that I was broken. Maybe it was just that I was out of my mind. But it occurred to me that I was going to kiss him. The thought just arrived, certain knowledge, delivered from some greater, more knowledgeable place. I was going to kiss him. Stephen would not want to kiss me. He would back up in horror. And yet, I was still going to do it. I reached over, and I put my hand against his chest, then I moved closer. I could feel just the very tips of the gentle stubble on his cheek brushing against my skin.

"Rory," he said. But it was a quiet protest, and it went nowhere.

For the first few seconds, he didn't move - he accepted the kiss like you might accept a spoonful of medicine. Then I heard it, a sigh, like he had finally set down a heavy weight.

"I was pretty sure we were both kind of terrified, but I was completely sure that we were both doing this. We kissed slowly, very deliberately, coming together and then pulling apart and looking at each other. Then each kiss got longer, and then it didn't stop. Stephen put his hand just under the edge of my shirt, holding it on the spot where the scar was. Sometimes the skin around the scar got cold - now it was warm. Now it was alive. ~ Maureen Johnson

When the darkness came for Dottie, it was quick and it was total. ~ Maureen Johnson

Fear can't hurt you," she said. "When it washes over you, give it no power. It's a snake with no venom. Remember that. That knowledge can save you. ~ Maureen Johnson

Money is for doing things, my love. Don't sit on it like a hen sits on an egg. It doesn't hatch. I should know. I've made enough of it. ~ Maureen Johnson

Go talk to her," Boo said.
"About what?"
"Anything."
"You want me to walk up to her and say, 'Are you a ghost?'"
"I do that," she replied.
"I love it when you get it wrong," Callum said.
"Once. It happened once."
"It happened twice," Stephen said, looking over. ~ Maureen Johnson

Rory, do you want to go live in the sky? On a Pegasus? ~ Maureen Johnson

I looked at the stained-glass image of the lamb in the window above me, but that only reminded me that lambs are famous for being led to slaughter, or sometimes hanging out with lions in ill-advised relationships. ~ Maureen Johnson

I realize Jubilee is a bit of a stripper name. You probably think I have heard the call of the pole. ~ Maureen Johnson

The questions that creep around at four thirty in the morning are not the kind that can be easily dismissed. You can beat them with a shovel, and they'll just keep getting back up. ~ Maureen Johnson

Vampires took offense SO easily - and Parisian vampires were the worst of all.' - The Runaway Queen (The Bane Chronicles, 2) by Cassandra Clare and Maureen Johnson ~ Cassandra Clare

Being sixteen means you have to be a genius conversational editor. ~ Maureen Johnson

The chalkboard menu really seemed to emphasize that everything was local and that everything had maple syrup in it. The BBQ beef was in maple syrup BBQ sauce. The mac and cheese was made with smoked maple cheese. There was maple tofu and maple-syrup dressing for the salads.
"Did you forget you were in Vermont for a second?" Stevie said to Janelle as they took their trays. "Look down. You are standing in maple syrup."
"Yeah," Janelle replied, a bit dispiritedly, as she took some tofu and vegetables. "It's not my favorite."
Nate stared down the sneeze guard at the mapleized meats.
"I'll drink the living blood of trees," he said. "Hit me. ~ Maureen Johnson

Keep calm and carry on.
Also, stay in and hide because the Ripper is coming. ~ Maureen Johnson

Did I just kill someone?"
"You can't kill a dead person," Callum said. "Makes no sense. ~ Maureen Johnson

, I don't think you would just be treated like a member ofan agency. You'd be treated like an asset. And assets don't get to have lives. ~ Maureen Johnson

Sometimes you have to see the bathroom to know the hard reality of things. ~ Maureen Johnson

Also, when on a campaign to convince a stranger that you aren't a few fries short of a Happy Meal, throwing around phrases like "tangentially Swedish" is not the best way to go. ~ Maureen Johnson

There were night sounds that Stevie had still not come to grips with - the rustling on the ground and above, the hooting of owls - things that suggested that far more happened here at night than during the day. (And yet, Stevie had yet to see the one creature that had been promised in sign after sign along the highway, the ones that read MOOSE. One moose. That's all she wanted. Was that too much to ask? Instead, there were these suggestions of owls, and all Stevie ever heard about the owls was that they liked shiny things and would eat your eyes given half the chance.) ~ Maureen Johnson

Some other facts I picked up:
Welsh is an actual, currently used language and our next-door neighbours Angela and Gaenor spoke it. It sounds like Wizard.
Baked beans are very popular in England. For breakfast. On toast. On baked potatoes. They can't get enough.
"American History" is not a subject everywhere.
England and Britain and the United Kingdom are not the same thing. England is the country. Britain is the island containing England, Scotland, and Wales. The United Kingdom is the formal designation of England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland as a political entity.
If you mess this up, you will be corrected. Repeatedly. ~ Maureen Johnson

It's everyone's dream... Come to Ellingham Academy, move a ramp out of a hole in the dark. - Nate ~ Maureen Johnson

If you want," he said with a shrug. "It's up to you. If you want to be lifted, I'll lift you.'
"Oh yes," Elsa said, refilling all the glasses. "There will be lifting."
Clio realized that she hadn't spoken through any of this. It was all Elsa lifting and carrying the conversation, twirling around with it.
"Sure," Clio said. "Pick up me up."
Aidan tipped his head in concession, his green eyes lit up for once.
"You want me to pick you up, I guess I can't refuse. ~ Maureen Johnson

(Oh, the ongoing love affair between hair and mouths. Hair always goes for the mouth. The mouth opens, and hair says, "I'm going in! I'm going in!" like a manic cave diver.) ~ Maureen Johnson

Idea meets execution. Feeling becomes action.
I don't know why people find this idea so hard to get. I mean, you can throw any two people together, it doesn't mean they'll fall in love. Everyone knows this. No one quite understands how it works. It's just those people, where they are in their lives, how circumstance throws them together. Sure, it's happened before, but never quite in that way. Maybe they seem to come together all wrong. Maybe they've loved others. Maybe they don't always do right by each other ... but it's still there, the love. The event. And no one would dare criticize it just because it's common, it's a little asymmetrical, and anyone can do it. It is unique. It is theirs. It is beautiful. They have made something that has been made a million times before and has also never existed before that moment. ~ Maureen Johnson

Stevie always tried to be truthful, but she didn't want to make her first acquaintance in her new house and say, "Your show was mediocre and overrated but I see why you are valued: for your looks and deep voice." People tended not to warm to that kind of thing. ~ Maureen Johnson

We learn that many great thinkers were convinced that the Bible contained the Ancient Mysteries, but not in the literal words - that the words on the pages were codes, and that the Bible is comprised of heavy-handed and useless story covering up something much more important and interesting. I get the feeling that [Dan Brown] is trying to tell me something, but I am not biting, reader. ~ Maureen Johnson

I miss you so much it's giving me a pain in my pancreas. ~ Maureen Johnson

I never shut up'
Yes, you do'
Not much'
I could make you shut up'
Oh, yeah? ... How? ~ Maureen Johnson

Something in the room had changed. My hand was on the floor, next to Stephen, but he wasn't as close to my hand as he had been. He had moved several inches over, toward the table. Just as I realized this, his arm shot out for the knife. In the next moment, he had rolled up on his knees and had Sadie caught in the crook of his arm. His face was pale, and he looked a bit shaken by the sudden movement. He was alive. ~ Maureen Johnson

There is nothing about a bad situation that fourteen hyper cheerleaders can't worsen. ~ Maureen Johnson

Fear can't hurt you. When it washes over you, give it no power. it's a snake with no venom. ~ Maureen Johnson

Good stuff!" [Knud] said. "All organic, of course! All fresh! We take care of the earth here! You like smoked herring? You will. Of course you will! I work in iron, though I have also done some of these wood carvings. All of my work is based on traditional Danish art. I am a Viking! Eat! ~ Maureen Johnson

A pause while my mother made high-pitched sisterly devotions of gratitude. ~ Maureen Johnson

Lecturing Brooks was as useful as lecturing a cat. ~ Maureen Johnson

Oh my God!" said one of the Ambers. "Is this not the worst trip ever? Did you see the snow?"
She was a sharp one, this Amber. What would she notice next? The train? The moon? The hilarious vagaries of human existence? Her own head? ~ Maureen Johnson

I live alone," Knud said, "and I work alone, but I am never truly alone. I do my ancestor's work. I live the entire history of my country and people. ~ Maureen Johnson

All right. Normal rules apply."
"Right."
The man walked off, leaving us.
"What are the normal rules?" I asked.
"He walks away and has a tea break and doesn't ask any questions. ~ Maureen Johnson

Running away is pretty pathetic, but it's even worse getting caught. ~ Maureen Johnson

Many large corporations are actually modeled on hell,' Brother Frank added. 'The policies and organization are almost idential. Hell, of course, is much worse. ~ Maureen Johnson

Maybe you've never fallen into a frozen stream. Here's what happens.
1. It is cold. So cold that the Department of Temperature Acknowledgment and Regulation in you brain gets the readings and says, "I can't deal with this. I'm out of here." It puts up the OUT TO LUNCH sign and passes all responsibility to the ...
2. Department of Pain and the Processing Thereof, which gets all this gobbledygook from the temperature department that it can't understand. "This is so not our job," it says. So it just starts hitting random buttons, filling you with strange and unpleasant sensations, and calls the ...
3. Office of Confusion and Panic, where there is always someone ready to hop on the phone the moment it rings. This office is at least willing to take some action. The Office of Confusion and Panic loves hitting buttons. ~ Maureen Johnson

Rise and shine, porcupines! ~ Maureen Johnson

She introduced herself to my parents with one of her mighty, bunny-crushing handshakes. (I'd never seen Claudia crush a bunny, to be fair, but that's the approximate level of pressure.) ~ Maureen Johnson

I feel warm and reassured," I whispered. "He's like Santa. ~ Maureen Johnson

It took a lot of women like that, a lot of women who said "I'm not going to do what you expect me to do, because you have no idea what I'm capable of. I'm going to get dirty and use tools and live the way I want" to move the world forward. ~ Maureen Johnson

(It was also helpful that the hotel's owner tended to turn a blind eye to room sharing. A room filled with too many guests was better than one with no guests at all.) ~ Maureen Johnson

These wires run a current through it. When we press the one and the nine at the same time, the current runs through the diamond and it emits a pulse that we can't hear or feel, but it..."
"Explodes ghosts."
"I prefer to think that it disperses the vestigial energy that an individual leaves behind after death."
"Or that," I said. ~ Maureen Johnson

He was the closest thing she had to a pony. ~ Maureen Johnson

Games are not fun when you don't know you're playing. ~ Maureen Johnson

I try to shake it loose-but these ideas, they cling. It's like I'm shackled to them with an iron chain. They rattle along behind me, dragging against the ground, always reminding me of their presence. ~ Maureen Johnson