Janet Fitch

Her beauty was like the edge of a very sharp knife.

I had seen girls clamor for new clothes and complain about what their mothers made for dinner. I was always mortified. Didn’t they know they were tying their mothers to the ground? Weren’t chains ashamed of their prisoners?

“Men,” she said. “No matter how unappealing, each of them imagines he is somehow worthy.”

“How can I shed tears for a man I should never have allowed to touch me in any way?”

“Isn’t it funny. I’m enjoying my hatred so much more than I ever enjoyed love. Love is temperamental. Tiring. It makes demands. Love uses you. Changes its mind.”

“But hatred, now. That’s something you can use. Sculpt. Wield. It’s hard or soft, however you need it. Love humiliates you, but hatred cradles you. It’s so soothing. I feel infinitely better now.”

I thought how tenuous the links were between mother and children, between friends, family, things you think are eternal. Everything could be lost, more easily than anyone could imagine.

I couldn’t imagine owning beauty like my mother’s. I wouldn’t dare. It would be too scary.

“We strive for beauty and balance, the sensual over the sentimental.”

She was a beautiful woman dragging a crippled foot and I was that foot. I was bricks sewn into the hem of her clothes, I was a steel dress