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The Goodbye Song

Book by Karl Kristian Flores · 11 quotes · The Goodbye Song, Sadness, Loneliness

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The Goodbye Song Quotes

“Do you know what I do sometimes? I look at buildings or up at the sky and because their plain features look like they could be from anywhere, I imagine I’m in your city. That we’re next to each other. That I’m somewhere different. If I want, I can be in New York at any time of the day and really believe it. It only lasts for a few seconds before I get dizzy.”

“Meet your partner. You think you’ve never seen them before, but you knew them. They were in your first breakup, your worst heartbreak, your old marriage, the honeymoon sex, in the alcohol swishes of finding out your spouse cheated, and in the times she leaned over the grass to kiss your cheek at picnics. Love was dancing in the same candidate who kissed you, the same nominee who hated you, and the plenty of people who tricked you. Love was dancing to the tango of your agreement to try. Love grows bigger and bigger, shaping itself more correctly to your happy heart.”

“I won’t lie to you—I’ve walked around entire cities looking for Diana. It wasn’t my purpose for traveling, but it was my intention whenever I asked my pals if they wanted to walk around. She’s the reason my eyes scan crowds, why I buy certain show tickets, or attend daily mass. It has been hard. She left. And hell went out of business.”

“There are two types of kindnesses in the world. The first type of kindness is what some people are born with: an innocent, inherent joy to be alive. It’s nurtured with the right family. It laughs and it dances, on playgrounds and nightclubs, girlish and boyish. The second type of kindness is realized. It is born after countless heartbreaks, traumas, and molded by the darkest thoughts the brain can juggle. Add some life experience and a few good people gone, and you’ve got yourself a person who decides to be kind. Margo was the second. And you could tell by the way she spoke—an attentive politeness, a pain in between her blinks, and a tranquil surrender to how pathetic and beautiful we all are. You could feel all the people she carried with her. It was as if you were somehow meeting them all. And if we want to talk instincts, I could sense there was a quiet battle inside her. She wasn’t a saint. Her kindness wasn’t wholly pure, but it tried. It can be like a veil of effort to almost convince ourselves a person can be good, and I think “almost” is as far as we get. In some way, the same as completely good.”

“We are in the indie age of “don’t love ideas of people,” but ideas of people are all we have when they’re old and gray and forgetful and smelly," said Miguel. "It isn’t fair to punish someone for loving an idea when everything around us is an idea, the only difference is people change ideas, and I, quite frankly, am excited to see what certain people could change to. I love their intervals and their points.”

“I fell in love with the girl who fell in line for one serving of strawberries," he admitted. A series of thoughts swirl around Miguel’s head of the girl waiting in line with one medium-sized tub of strawberries. The image of it. He asked: “Was it her persistence of wanting the fruit? Was it the youthfulness of the fruit? Was it the mystery of wondering how she’d eat them—on the grass outside or at home or in the car? Why? Was it wanting to know if she felt stupid herself for waiting in such a long line? Or wanting to know if she at any point felt like abandoning the line? Was it the simplicity of someone who knows what they want? The pleasantness of going to the market and not being seduced by other treats? Was it her patience?” Charm is so dissatisfying.”

“She threw her head back and released her breath. Her series of chuckles was like a fragmented moan dribbling freely into the climate of a now happier milieu. It had been a while since Mickey’s Pub had heard a noise that could penetrate through buzzing without force, that dominated loud men with earned grace. The first drop of her pearl laughter seeped into Maxwell’s ears and dyed his eardrums pink. For a long time, the maintenance of this color would be his heartfelt mission.”

“Claire continued. "There's a complexity of... looking forward to something. Being scared it doesn’t live up to your hope... like second dates... or returning to Cancun... or being in love with a stranger, hoping they never love you. It’s not that you prefer the concept or the excitement of the beginning. It’s the fear that a future with someone won’t be as nice as you hoped it would be. I would hate that, Brit. It'd crush me. It's like when you tell a person you like them—it always dips. It gets awkward. The expectation of it. I feel some things are best left at 'Hello.' Like, I write about living in a forest away from everyone, but I can’t tell if that’s the future I want or only enjoy writing about.”