Holly Black Hurt Quotations

She didn't know how much she'd been hoping that he still loved her, until she felt how much it hurt to realize he didn't.

I wonder if he really could rationalize what I did to him, really treat betrayal like the slight transgression of a recalcitrant business partner. I wonder if I hurt him. If he can rationalize what I did to him, it’s easy to imagine how he rationalized what he did to me.

I consider kissing her right there on the dirty couch, but self-preservation stops me. Once someone hurts you, it’s harder to relax around them, harder to think of them as safe to love. But it doesn’t stop you wanting them. Sometimes I actually think it makes the wanting worse

Once someone's hurt you, it's harder to relax around them, harder to think of them as safe to love. But it doesn't stop you from wanting them.

I thought you needed to be tougher. But I've been thinking that protecting somebody by hurting them before someone else gets the chance isn't the kind of protecting that anybody wants.

Telling Sam and Daneca feels like peeling off my own skin to expose everything underneath. It hurts.

Isn't every hero aware of all the terrible reason they did those good deeds?" Aware of every mistake they ever made and how good people got hurt because of their decisions? Don't they recall the moments they weren't heroic at all? The moments where their heroism led to more deaths than deliberate villainy ever could?

I'm afraid my voice is going to break. I am afraid she is going to hear how much this hurts.

I can't trust the people I care about not to hurt me. And I'm not sure I can trust myself not to hurt them, either.

Those who really love you don't mean to hurt you and if they do, you can't see it in their eyes but it hurts them too.