How we cite our quotes: (Part.Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #1
Is it okay to hate a dead kid? Even if I loved him once? Even if he was my best friend? Is it okay to hate him for being dead? (1.1.3)
By the time Charlie dies, it's hard for Vera to even consider him a friend. After all, he doesn't act like one; he barely talks to her and when he does, he's mocking or threatening her. It's no wonder she hates him.
Quote #2
I could hear our friendship dying right there. Hit by a truck so big, going so fast, there was nothing left. Not a shred of our childhood, not a splinter of our tree house, not a bit of our New Year's Eve kiss. Nothing. (1.15.28)
Poor Vera. Once Charlie believes Jenny Flick's word over hers, she knows that she's lost him. Their friendship is essentially over from that point on, and nothing that Vera can do will save it if Charlie doesn't want to be her friend anymore.
Quote #3
Even though I knew Charlie wanted to do it himself, he called it our project and our tree house. I think it was his way of trying to help me through a hard time. (1.17.1)
Charlie may just be a pubescent boy when Vera's mom leaves, but that doesn't mean that he doesn't recognize that she needs support and love. Even though he's building the new tree house, he tries to give Vera some ownership of it as well. That's a true friend.
Quote #4
Plus the tree house had always been more his than mine, and that summer, though I still considered Charlie my best friend in the whole world, I kind of wanted to have a bit of individuality or something. I wanted the bumper sticker for myself. (2.13.32)
Charlie and Vera have been best friends forever, but they're starting to follow their own paths and forge their own identities. Because of this, Vera kind of wants to keep her animal-loving ways to herself; it's her own special thing that she doesn't have to share with anyone.
Quote #5
Charlie and I still shared a seat on the bus. We'd press our earbuds into our ears and read or daydream or, in Charlie's case, occasionally scribble things on tissues or napkins and then eat them. (3.5.2)
Charlie and Vera are the kinds of friends who don't necessarily need to talk all the time in order to enjoy being together. Even if they're just sitting next to each other on the bus, they still feel connected.
Quote #6
We had a movie night every Friday that winter. Dad would make popcorn and then leave us alone. Our friendship hadn't suffered from the gaps of high school, like many did. Charlie and I were able to come back to where it began—just the two of us. (3.9.6)
Things are heating up in the Charlie/Vera relationship—and whether it's still a friendship or turning into something more remains to be seen.
Quote #7
Altruism. The night Charlie hit me, every ounce of altruism I had for him as a lost soul on a bad path dissolved. (4.6.5)
When Charlie hits Vera, that's it: She doesn't want to help him out anymore, or to talk him into seeing sense—she just wants him gone from her life. He's not worth the effort anymore.
Quote #8
Until last year, when the shitstorm began, I sat with Charlie in the back booth on the east side of the cafeteria. Sometimes we let other outcasts squeeze in with us, but for the most part we ate alone, just the two of us. (4.8.20)
It used to be that Charlie and Vera were a team, that it was just the two of them and they didn't need anyone else to feel validated or whole because they met each other's needs. But when Charlie starts hanging out with other friends, everything falls apart.
Quote #9
"But I thought you were my friend," he said, his voice quivering.
I thought about May Day, when he hit me. "I was your friend, Charlie. But I'm not anymore." (5.2.25-26)
When Charlie comes to Vera at the end of his life looking for help, she denies him. After all, he hasn't been the greatest friend to her, and she doesn't feel like she owes him anything anymore. In fact, he owes her a lot in return for his betrayal and the horrible way that he's treated her.
Quote #10
I had no idea how to be a friend or companion to Sindy. I never asked her how she was, because I didn't really think about how she was. (5.3.26)
Friendship is the foundation of a successful relationship, and Ken and Sindy didn't have that anymore. Even though he'd turned his life around and stopped drinking, he couldn't save their marriage from disintegrating because they couldn't connect anymore.