84 Quotes & Sayings By Laura Anderson Kurk

Laura Kurk is a Contemporary Romance author. Her novels have been dubbed "charming and oh-so-sassy" by Booklist, and she writes humorous and sweet romances with steamy and heartwarming love stories. She believes that two people who love each other should be crazy about each other – and that's exactly what's on the pages of her books. Laura is a graduate of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, where she earned a degree in history and political science Read more

She currently lives in Champaign with her husband and two children. Her first novel won the 2015 Golden Heart Award for Best First Novel, and she is represented by Pam Van Atta of Van Atta & Associates.

1
I reached down and picked up a baseball bat at my feet and I flung it as hard as it could. It circled and arced high in the air until it slammed against the side of the dining hall with a crack and fell. I sat down in the dirt. Then I lay down in the dirt. Because not only was there no trail to follow, there was no evidence he’d ever been here. There was no evidence any of them had been here. Laura Anderson Kurk
2
I really want to believe that when our Quiet Waters kids wake up in the middle of the night, scared, they’ll remember being in their bunks with John and Kate and Whit and me right there protecting them, ” he said. “I hope we gave them that sense of belonging because I know there’ll be times in their lives when grasping at those bonds could mean the difference between making it and not. Laura Anderson Kurk
3
He was taking a leap here, negotiating with a crackhead, under the table, in a dark cantina. The courage etched on his face came from loving Aidia so much he’d close his eyes and walk through fire to see her safe. Laura Anderson Kurk
4
I’d stumbled upon the inner sanctuary of a woman who loved the world. Loved the faces of people she saw. Loved the way a hand looked when it was relaxed. Loved the way a woman looked when she touched her own face. The way a man looked when he opened himself to her. Loved the way wind changed a tree or a field or a child’s hair. The beauty of a neck meeting a shoulder. The softness of a smile that wasn’t forced. Laura Anderson Kurk
5
My mom told me once that Wyatt loved her the way a boy will love his mother, but I loved her the way an artist loves another. Jo taught me what that meant. Laura Anderson Kurk
6
Look at this one.” I picked up a small painting of a man with dark hair and a short, dark beard. He wore a loose shirt, cobalt blue, unbuttoned at the top, showing a prominent, knobby collarbone. He looked…complicated and hungry. She’d captured him focused intensely on a book, his face pressed against a wall like he was resting. Or waiting. Laura Anderson Kurk
7
I worried I would miss it, and I knew, from losing Wyatt, that things happen the moment the soul is released. Wyatt had been there in the school, watching me, making sure I survived. Souls linger…they do. They linger a bit before they turn toward eternity. It could be that no matter how perfect their future will be, the past still tugs for a moment. Laura Anderson Kurk
8
Jo told me once that she was an old woman everywhere but in her studio. “There I’m only myself, ” she’d said. Standing in the middle of masterpieces that only Jo had ever seen and touched, I knew what she meant. Laura Anderson Kurk
9
I’d felt this before, when my granddad was in the hospital before he died. We all camped out in the waiting room, eating our meals together, most of us sleeping in the chairs every night. Family from far-flung places would arrive at odd hours and we’d all stand and stretch, hug, get reacquainted, and pass the babies around. A faint, pale stream of beauty and joy flowed through the heavy sludge of fear and grief. It was kind of like those puddles of oil you see in parking lots that look ugly until the sun hits them and you see rainbows pulling together in the middle of the mess. And wasn’t that just how life usually felt–a confusing swirl of ugly and rainbow? . Laura Anderson Kurk
10
Uncommon anxiety came to us in common hours when other people were doing mundane things like taking out the trash or checking their phones. But there was nothing to be done for this. We couldn’t change who we were or what had happened. Laura Anderson Kurk
11
Sometimes, in the stillness of my room, my mom’s voice came to me, repeating things she’d said for months. Like, “My skin is melting off my face, isn’t it?” And, “My whole body feels dead from the crap they’re pouring into me. Do I look green to you?” And, “When I’m naked, I can see my heart beating. Laura Anderson Kurk
12
It was an oddly satisfying idea to feel bereft as I left my mother this time. We only feel bereft when we’re deprived of something meaningful. Laura Anderson Kurk
13
My mom was sitting at the kitchen table. She’d set her coffee down, making a noise that made me look her way. I’d begun to notice her less and less often, like her colors were fading and blending in with walls. She was shrinking. Or maybe her sphere of influence in the family was shrinking. My dad glanced at her, too, and then wrote something on a napkin. He slid it across the counter to me– Don’t worry. Come home in one piece. Have fun and act like a sixteen-year-old for a change. Laura Anderson Kurk
14
With a damp palm, I turned the knob and cracked open the door. She was asleep in her freshly made bed. I can’t explain how relieved I felt for this simple mercy. She was here and safe on clean sheets. Laura Anderson Kurk
15
When Dad was in the middle of a description of the hotel’s laundry facility, I interrupted. “Why haven’t you told me today, like you do every day, that Mom’s going to be better soon?” He looked up then. His gaze locked with mine and held a promise that no matter what he said or didn’t say, he and I would ride this out together. “I haven’t told you that today, Meg, because I don’t know. . Laura Anderson Kurk
16
We formed an impromptu circle just so we could look at each other and memorize faces. We hardly noticed the waiting officials. We hardly noticed anything but our little family whose ties weren’t loosening at all. In fact, this impending separation only seemed to be binding us together with a double overhand knot, hard to untie and unfailing. Laura Anderson Kurk
17
I couldn’t stop crying because it was so intimate, in that way I always thought being physical with him would feel. If someone had walked in they might have thought Henry was barely touching me. I knew the truth of it. He was laying me open and bare to him and to God.There wasn’t a more intimate act. I would never recover from this. Laura Anderson Kurk
18
New rules–we needed new rules. No one opens the main doors but me. No one leaves the property without me. No one goes outside without letting me know. I had these horrible images in my head of kids being restrained against their wills, of kids crying my name out, begging me to help them when I was powerless. Desperate times… Lord, my soul called out. Lord…somehow that’s as far as I could get. I didn’t have the words. Laura Anderson Kurk
19
I get that. For you, it’s more than following a bunch of rules–no sex, no booze, no swear words, pray every night and twice on Sunday. Laura Anderson Kurk
20
Camus and Henry waved to me from that muddy truck. They both wanted me to get over myself. So, this was me, getting over myself. And it was about time. Laura Anderson Kurk
21
What I know about you, Henry, ” he said. “Is that you, as big as you are, know how to walk gently on this earth. Laura Anderson Kurk
22
But with her eyes closed, she began to whisper. “If you have someone to love, then love. If you have someone to forgive, then forgive. You think, when you’re seventeen, there’s time enough for that, but there’s not. There’s no time at all.” I squeezed her hand, trying to think of how to respond. But she took the burden from me and kept whispering. “You want to know why God gave us people to love? Because that’s the only way we can understand how he feels about us. Desperate and jealous. Laura Anderson Kurk
23
I’m not sure about all the particulars that led to this moment. Do I believe life is a series of dots to be connected…or that no one can outrun destiny…or that all roads lead to truth and coincidence is a lie to distract us? The reason I was in this place no longer mattered. The harsh reality stared me in the face and demanded an immediate decision. Walk away and blame it on my age. Or stay and try to help a woman who had slowly become my friend over the last few weeks. Laura Anderson Kurk
24
But I understood, now, that we don’t live only for ourselves. We’re connected by millions of shared experiences and dreams and nightmares, all tied together with compassion. I learned that even when we’re going through our darkest winter, spring is waiting to appear. Laura Anderson Kurk
25
We all think when we’re young that we want excitement and highs and passion. To hell with ordinary.” I smiled and she chuckled. “But when we find ourselves in these adult bodies, ” she said. “When we wise up a little, or get slapped in the face by life, we realize we just want all things to be equal.” She put the heels of her hands together near her heart like the Yoga prayer position. “And we want to understand them better. Laura Anderson Kurk
26
Most kids grow sullen and angry when they’re working through issues, but Thanet mustered up another kind of bull-headed strength. The kind that sees beyond circumstances to what really matters. How could anyone hurt a soul that lovely? Laura Anderson Kurk
27
Every moment of our lives we make choices. Most we don’t even know we’re making, they’re so dull or routine or automatic. Some are beyond explanation–like my mom choosing Wyatt’s memory over Dad and me. Laura Anderson Kurk
28
Wyatt told me once that if tenderness were a disease, I’d be terminal. Laura Anderson Kurk
29
Hearing my brother’s words coming out of Henry, this stranger in a strange town, made me feel wild with all the loss–wild and wired with no place to put those feelings. Laura Anderson Kurk
30
The ice cold fear I’d felt, not knowing if Wyatt was alive, pressed into the wall with other girls and surrounded by guys who were unspeakably brave, hit my body again in a wave. This was trauma–the gift that keeps on giving. Laura Anderson Kurk
31
We bumped into other silent lines of kids going in the same direction. We looked like we were much younger and our lines were headed to the cafeteria or recess or the carpool line. Or it could’ve been a fire drill. Except for the stone-faced police officers weaving between us with rifles. Laura Anderson Kurk
32
It was the first time I discovered that some girls actually sneak out of the house during slumber parties and meet up with boys. I would’ve never known if I hadn’t gone to the bathroom at midnight and caught Macy and Adrienne climbing through the bathroom window. They had on eyeliner, perfume, and cut-off shorts. Their only goodbye a glare that promised retribution if I didn’t keep my mouth shut. . Laura Anderson Kurk
33
Do you know how hard it is to paint kindness?” She leaned her hip against a desk in the corner of the room, still watching me. “It’s the only part of a person I really want to capture. Everything else seems to get lost in layers of deception or defensiveness. But not kindness. You can’t hide it. And people either are or they aren’t. Laura Anderson Kurk
34
Meg, ” he whispered. “It wouldn’t be real love if there weren’t the possibility for another response to him. If we couldn’t choose not to love him, then our love would be empty. That’s why there’s evil in this world, because there’s free choice in this world. He allows the one to prove the other. Laura Anderson Kurk
35
It was about how men walk into a forest afraid because they know all the things that can happen. They might wake the noisy birds and cause chaos. But kids come into the trees and see the magic. They climb them and see stars that the men were too afraid to see. Laura Anderson Kurk
36
I won’t forget it, ” I said. “I hope you meet someone perfect one day.”“ Ha…yeah, that’s just it. I think I already did.” As we opened our doors to step out, he touched my arm. “Just to be clear, if I, like, leaned over and whispered your name in your ear, still nothing? Laura Anderson Kurk
37
You look incredible, Kavanagh, ” Quinn whispered close to my ear. “Are you trying to kill me?”“ Ssshhh, ” I hissed. “They’re going to hear you.”“ I can’t tell my date she’s beautiful?” I turned my head. “No. No, you can’t. Laura Anderson Kurk
38
For a second, I stared at the map of her veins just under the surface of her thin skin. It was like her body was trying to become diaphanous. Instead of getting harder and stronger and full of life as we age, we disappear slowly. Our skin thins and evaporates. Our nails barely coat our fingertips. Our hair falls out. We are never more see-through. Laura Anderson Kurk
39
Okay, news flash. Jealousy is not something I enjoy. I hadn’t felt it much before. But I’d also never been in love. And I’d never been 3, 300 miles away from the girl I loved while some punk sat next to her on a couch. A punk who had designs on her, according to Dylan. I needed to lay eyes on this guy. Laura Anderson Kurk
40
Quinn spoke their language–all mystery and inside jokes, scarred souls and statement shirts. It was a beautiful moment for him–in his element and completely happy. When they started playing, he leaned over and whispered in my ear. “See that guitar?” I nodded.“ That’s a 1969 Martin D28. Hear me when I say if I had to choose between a beautiful girl and that guitar, I’d choose the guitar. Natch.” He took a huge gulp of water, clearly affected.“ Naturally, ” I whispered. “It could be why you’re still single. . Laura Anderson Kurk
41
The first thing I needed, possibly the only thing, was to kiss her and I did, for as long as I could. I let us both breathe for a minute, and I perched her on a counter so I could touch the face I’d missed so much. I poured every bit of frustration, anger, sadness, and worry into that kiss. Meg understood and received it all, pushing her fingers into my hair and giggling against my lips. I didn’t care that anybody passing by could be watching us through the window, or that I could fall right there and sleep for a week. Laura Anderson Kurk
42
Wait, ” Quinn said. “There’s one more thing.” I turned around and raised an eyebrow. His eyes were wary and he lacked his usual confidence.“ Go to the Winter Dance with me. Laura Anderson Kurk
43
I thought back to Meg’s advice about Hemingway sentences–simple declarative statements that showed the truth and distilled the meaning. My first attempt at that had been cynical and messed up. I gave it a go again. Find one lost sheep. The angels rejoice. Laura Anderson Kurk
44
I needed out. The Jeep wasn’t fast enough. I shut it down, grabbed the keys and started running like a bear was at my heels. I couldn’t even see Henry anymore through my tears so it surprised me when he caught me in his arms halfway. The first thing I did was pound on his chest and ask him why he hadn’t called. The second thing I did was kiss him so hard he couldn’t answer me. Laura Anderson Kurk
45
Her problem is with pretty, ” Tennyson said. "She thinks I’ll need all these dresses in college. Like I would ever in a billion years pledge a sorority. I’ll pack a few of these to be ironic, though. I can wear them to, like, truck stops at night with mascara running down my cheeks and stuff. Laura Anderson Kurk
46
My dad used to say, ‘This is what your right arm’s for, son, ’” John said. “This is the time and these are the people and I’d give my right arm to be a light, a comfort, to them. I know you would, too. In whatever form it takes. Use these materials and make something great. Do it on faith, knowing you probably won’t be around to see how the story ends. Laura Anderson Kurk
47
Thanet is having a moment, ” I said, leaning forward so Quinn could see him.“ What’s wrong, man?” Quinn said. “Were you not aware high school dances suck? That they always have sucked and they will continue sucking as long as the world turns? Laura Anderson Kurk
48
He smiled and squinted at me again, tilting his head up and to the right as he stared. “Maybe what I’m attracted to in you is more than your looks and your brain and your humor.” He leaned closer like he had a secret. “It could be your soul, ” he whispered. I pushed his cheek until he was squinting at the door to the kitchen instead. “Is this when you tell me I’m your soul mate, O’Neill? . Laura Anderson Kurk
49
Quit worrying so much about the boards and nails of your life. Focus on the stuff that lasts.” He glanced through the window toward the glowing light of the kitchen where Meg and my mom were laughing about something. Laura Anderson Kurk
50
Let’s go to town, ” Jo said. “Take me to eat dinner at the hotel.” I sucked in a breath and stared at her for a minute. Here she sat, her hair still wet although neatly braided, wearing an old Kiss sweatshirt, the one with the red mouth and tongue, red sweatpants, and ridiculous red pumps with black scuffs on the toes and heels. And she wanted me to take her to the Hotel Wyoming, where the rich tourists hung out. I smiled. Because it was possibly the greatest thing I’d ever heard. “Yeah, let’s go to the hotel. Grab your purse and I’ll find your coat. Laura Anderson Kurk
51
I didn’t look at Thanet. I couldn’t because he would see the hurt on my face.“ He loves you, ” Thanet said. “He’s hurting and it’s not just the Quinn thing. It’s being away from you and wondering if you’re hurting, too. Or if you’re having too much fun to hurt. What he really needed was to laugh, though. So we laughed…until he cried.” That undid me. I looked at Thanet with so many questions on my lips. Laura Anderson Kurk
52
Hold still, Meg, you’re dripping blood on my car seats.” I reached behind the passenger seat of Tennyson’s car looking for the white sheet she’d thrown in for mopping up bodily fluids. Quinn, sitting in the back seat, read my mind and handed it to me. “Thank you.”“ No problem.” He leaned forward, pulling a corner of the sheet up to wipe off a small stream of blood on my neck. “You okay?. Laura Anderson Kurk
53
But Quinn held the fuzzy handcuffs in his hands, looking them over closely, and he smiled. “Oh, hey, did you want to keep these for when your invisible boyfriend returns from his fake vacation? Laura Anderson Kurk
54
I recognized Meg’s swirly handwriting and crooked my index finger into the side of the envelope to rip it open. There was no letter. Just a picture. A picture of Meg holding a picture of me. The word HOME echoed through my body like a rifle shot. Laura Anderson Kurk
55
You’re kidding, right? The whole town will know where we are just by the idle on that thing.” He feigned a look of shock. “That thing is a 1966 GTO. It has a name, okay? It’s Mack–as in ‘to mack on women.’ I rebuilt it last year, and I was told the engine makes girls hot.”“ Someone actually used those words? Is it true?”“ T B D, ” he said.“ You’re goofy. Let’s ride in my Jeep. Its name is Jeep.” Quinn chuckled. “Kavanagh has a smart mouth. Laura Anderson Kurk
56
I turned my ear toward the door because I heard him breathing. When you’re alone and afraid, the simple sound of the steady in and out of air being drawn by another person is good medicine. Laura Anderson Kurk
57
All of the emotions that hit people at times like these, all of them, were coursing through us both like a secret we couldn’t tell. Because if we said everything we were thinking and feeling right then…if we laid it all out for one another…we might not like the way the words strung together. Or the way fear and hope and bitterness and love mashed up into one big mess in the pits of our stomachs. Laura Anderson Kurk
58
In my mind, I saw a string stretching from Henry’s heart at Quiet Waters to my heart. It was taut and it vibrated with Henry’s worries and fears and I felt them all. Deeply. I felt them all. Laura Anderson Kurk
59
And what do you want?” I almost choked. “How could you even ask me that, Henry?”He sighed. “Because I’m thousands of miles away. Because I Skyped into your living room late one night and there’s a dude sitting next to you in the dark. Because Thanet tells me things. And Tennyson sent me a picture of you in a dress that looks like lingerie.”“ It’s not that bad, ” I said.“ I didn’t say it was bad, Meg. It’s about a million miles from bad.” His voice was breaking with exasperation. “Things are crazy here, and I’m questioning everything. Laura Anderson Kurk
60
Henry drew a shaky breath. “Do me a favor, Meg.”“Anything, ” I whispered.“ Don’t fall for Quinn O’Neill. If you’re going to do this thing with him…go to this dance, don’t fall for him.”“ Never, ” I said. “I promise.”“ Because I’m all filled up on sad right now.” He sniffed again and I could tell he was more in control. “And you can’t ask me to sit by and watch you get all caught up in this guy. I can’t handle that–thinking he swept you off your feet because he bathed in body spray and dressed up.” His voice sounded rough. “I know you think I’m being funny right now, but I’m completely serious. Don’t make me watch that happen.”“ You know my heart, ” I said. “It’s yours. Laura Anderson Kurk
61
She didn’t see me because of the reflection on the store windows, and she wouldn’t know me in this car anyway. In fact, she probably wouldn’t know me with shaggy hair and the beginnings of a beard. So I sat for a minute, watching her dusting bookshelves, either talking to herself or singing. Her feather duster had become a prop in whatever scene she had going. She looked heart-stoppingly, breathtakingly beautiful, my Meg. Laura Anderson Kurk
62
Here’s what I learned about life when we were going through that. We’re all human and mortal. We’re all going to suffer and die. But it’s how we are with each other during those times that proves God’s here with us.” He turned his hand over in mine and entwined our fingers. “He comes in through people. People who love us anyway. They jump right into the chaos with us and try to help us make sense of it. That’s what mercy is…it’s choosing to help, or forgive, or love even when it goes against all logic. Laura Anderson Kurk
63
I found I could only glance at him for tiny moments and then I had to look away. He was perfect enough to hurt my feelings for a long time, and I wanted to let him. Laura Anderson Kurk
64
Then let me be your mercy, ” he said. “I’ll never be able to give you smart answers about why we suffer, but I can come into your world and try to be some kind of help to you. Laura Anderson Kurk
65
He ran his hand from my wrist up to the crook of my elbow and then to my shoulder. “When I was a little kid, my dad would come to my room at night to say a prayer with me. He used to say, ‘Lord, We know there’s a little girl out there who’s meant for Henry. Please protect her and raise her up right.’” His voice changed to something slower and more country when he mimicked his dad. He smiled at the memory, and then he put his mouth near my ear and whispered. “You were that little girl. Laura Anderson Kurk
66
He’d had to fold his long legs into his desk. His boots had seen better days, and his jeans unraveled in a curiously irresistible way at the bottom. He didn’t look like anyone I’d ever seen before. He reminded me of an actor in an old Western–Rock Hudson in Giant–all dark intensity. Laura Anderson Kurk
67
I finally understood why so much monkey business happened in the backs of buses. Put us in close proximity, with wheels spinning under us, and nothing to do but wait, we’re going to start thinking of lovely uses for our bodies. I don’t care who you are. Laura Anderson Kurk
68
Is there one in particular, Tennyson?” Henry said, ducking out from under her arm. “I could arrange a meeting.” “Yeah, the one from Texas…what’s his name?”“ That would be Dylan. But he’s a nice guy and you’d break his heart. He dropped out of Texas A&M to come up here and saddle bum around with my horses year-round. Knowing your dad, I think you’d better be looking for a pre-med honors student.”“ Leave my dad out of this. Laura Anderson Kurk
69
Next to the first Henry and Meg, Henry had written, “Promise?” Well, that genie’s out of the bottle and there’s no stuffing her back in. Laura Anderson Kurk
70
His room was dark until he switched on his desk lamp. I sat on the floor next to his bed and watched him counting clothes and considering shoes. He seemed so boyish right then–like he wished his mom would just come in and pack for him. I couldn’t possibly love him any more than I did at that moment. Laura Anderson Kurk
71
I pretended to be a Cheyenne guide. I pretended to be a prairie woman. I pretended Henry was my old-timey husband taking me to our new homestead. I leaned down and patted Trouble’s neck. “Good boy, ” I said. “Trusty steed. Laura Anderson Kurk
72
On the best nights, he’d appear outside the bookstore window and wait for me to unlock the door. He usually hadn’t had time to shower between doing things with cattle and horses and coming to find me, and he looked older than us and stronger than us. Laura Anderson Kurk
73
I’d never seen him bare-chested. For the first time, he seemed vulnerable to me. His smooth, tight skin wrapped around the long muscles he’d developed over a lifetime of hard work. He found a shallow spot and sat, settling me onto his lap, holding my back to his chest. I couldn’t stop shaking and it had nothing to do with the water or with being half dressed in a cave with a boy.“ Nothing else matters, ” Henry said in my ear. “I’m here. Start at the beginning. . Laura Anderson Kurk
74
I smiled at him. Not even Wyatt would have known how to be this honorable when talking about a girl that had hurt him. Laura Anderson Kurk
75
Hmmm. What you’re saying is that you’ve never been kissed?” He picked at a string on the blanket under us. Laura Anderson Kurk
76
He leaned toward me and said his name like he was sharing a secret and it made me think he probably kept a lot of secrets. His smile was sweet and his teeth the tiniest bit crooked. Laura Anderson Kurk
77
He carried her over the Owl Creek mountain range without stopping, ” he said, quietly this time. “He carried her until he reached one of the hot springs around what became Chapin, and then he walked into the water with her and held her there for three days. He had about given up when she opened her eyes and whispered his name. Laura Anderson Kurk
78
I meant that the hatred of that July day in Nashville was alive and well on that horrible day in Pittsburgh. People hate others so they strike like snakes. It’s all connected–we’re all connected, bumping around into each other, some of us good, some bad, most a mixture. Every thought acted upon has consequences. Every one. Laura Anderson Kurk
79
I could’ve gone on and on but the truth was all that mattered. “My brother died because someone was jealous. Laura Anderson Kurk
80
Here was what I wanted to happen when I walked through the door after my first real date and my first ever kiss. I wanted my mom to say, “Dear God, Meg, you’re glowing. Sit and tell me about this boy. He let you borrow his jacket? That’s so adorable.” Instead, I came off the high of that day by writing a letter to my dead brother and doing yoga between my twin beds, trying to forget my absent mother. . Laura Anderson Kurk
81
I’ve known her long enough to know that this was purely intentional.” He peered sideways at me, judging my reaction. “I like her just fine, but you should watch yourself around her. Tennyson is given to obsession, and her obsessions tend to run toward trouble. It’s kind of a Wyoming thing to push the whole ‘Wild West’ routine to its limits. Laura Anderson Kurk
82
I’d known cruelty in a school–cruelty that would keep these amateurs up all night. But this kind of scene–crowds batting around a person because they thought he was weak–happened to be my personal trigger. Laura Anderson Kurk
83
Grayson noticed me next to the lockers. He pointed at me then held his arms out magnanimously. “You’re welcome, new girl, ” he said. “I just saved you from having to find a nice way to say no to the leg dragger. Laura Anderson Kurk