“I called her two days later, never having believed more firmly in love at first sight, in destiny. When she laughed on the other end of the line, something inside of me cracked open, and I let her step inside.” — Carmen Maria Machado Copy Share Image
“She was a stranger because something essential was shielded, released in tiny bursts until it became a flood---a flood of what I realized I… — Carmen Maria Machado Copy Share
“Beyond the table, there is an altar, with candles lit for Billie Holiday and Willa Carter and Hypatia and Patsy Cline. Next to it,… — Carmen Maria Machado Copy Share
“Many people live and die without ever confronting themselves in the darkness.” — Carmen Maria Machado Copy Share
“What I say: “Why did you leave her with me?” What I want to say: “This almost broke me, but it didn’t. It made… — Carmen Maria Machado Copy Share
“And there was nothing in my eyes. Or even worse -- nothingness. Not the presence of a thing but the presence of a non-thing.” — Carmen Maria Machado Copy Share
“You never live with a woman, you live inside of her, I overheard my father say to my brother once, and it was, indeed,… — Carmen Maria Machado Copy Share
“I once heard a story about a girl who requested something so vile from her paramour that he told her family and they had… — Carmen Maria Machado Copy Share
“That night, I wash myself. The silky suds between my legs are the color and scent of rust, but I am newer than I… — Carmen Maria Machado Copy Share
“A feeling settles over me—a one-beer-deep feeling, a no-more-skittering-feet-after-the-trap-snaps feeling.” — Carmen Maria Machado Copy Share
“Will I ever be done, transformed in the past tense, or will I always be transforming, better and better until I die?” — Carmen Maria Machado Copy Share
“She’s like dough, how the give of it beneath kneading hands disguises its sturdiness, its potential.” — Carmen Maria Machado Copy Share
“Mara, remember how you kicked sand into that neighbor child’s eyes? I yelled at you and made you apologize in your best dress, and… — Carmen Maria Machado Copy Share
“(If you read this story out loud, please use the following voices: ME: as a child, high-pitched, forgettable; as a woman, the same. THE… — Carmen Maria Machado Copy Share
“When you think about it, stories have this way of running together like raindrops in a pond. Each is borne from the clouds separate,… — Carmen Maria Machado Copy Share
“I have always been a teller of stories. When I was a young girl, my mother carried me out of a grocery store as… — Carmen Maria Machado Copy Share
