How we cite our quotes: (Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #1
"This is a great picture of you. This is what you look like," I tell her. And it's true. That's the problem: so many things are true. It's true that I want to smother her with compliments and true that I want to keep my distance. True that I want her to like me and true that I don't. The stupid, endless truth speaking out of both sides of its big, stupid mouth. It's what keeps me, stupidly, talking. "Like, you can't know what you look like, right? Whenever you see yourself in the mirror, you know you're looking at you, so you can't help but pose a little. So you never really know. But this—that's what you look like." (3.111)
Will is so on the fence about Jane, it's crazy. At least he admits the truth—he does like her—but he's afraid to go any further with it.
Quote #2
i figure this would be a bad time to point out that i've never actually said i wasn't gay. i just told her to f*** off. (4.32)
This is actually a pretty deft lie by will. He spends an entire conversation hiding the truth from Maura, but he doesn't lie to himself. He knows he's gay, he's just not ready for the truth to come out yet.
Quote #3
this is a game we play. most of the time we're not serious. like, there are different ways it could go. the first is we basically make fun of people who have IM sex by inventing our own ridiculous scornographic dialogue.
grayscale: i want you to lick my clavicle.
boundbydad: i am licking your clavicle.
grayscale: ooh my clavicle feels so good.
boundbydad: naughty, naughty clavicle.
grayscale: mmmmmm
boundbydad: wwwwwwww
grayscale: rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr
boundbydad: ttttttttttttttttttttother times we go for the romance novel approach. corn porn.
boundbydad: thrust your fierce quavering manpole at me, stud
grayscale: your dastardly appendage engorges me with hellfire
boundbydad: my search party is creeping into your no man's land
grayscale: baste me like a thanksgiving turkey!!!and then there are nights like tonight, when the truth is what comes out, because it's what we need the most. or maybe just one of us needs it the most, but the other knows the right time to give it. (4.59-63)
Underneath all this snarkiness about sex and love is the truth: Isaac and will really need each other. They might pretend otherwise, but occasionally it just slips out.
Quote #4
yes, the synapses are conveying the information now. newsflash: isaac never existed. it was only your friend posing. it was all a lie.
all a lie. (8.34-35)
Wow. And this is one doozy of a lie. Can you imagine having to process such a thing? Not only does the person you love not exist, but that person was just your friend the entire time. This is some awful truth right here.
Quote #5
me: you know what sucks about love?
o.w.g.: what?
me: that it's so tied to truth. (8.63)
Both Wills think about this line a whole bunch throughout the novel. So what does it mean? In order to truly love someone you have to be honest with them and get honesty from them in turn. You can't form any kind of actual relationship without putting yourself out there and being real. will can't truly love Isaac because he's not real—and Will can't get things going with Jane until he's honest about how he feels.
Quote #6
Jane's standing on the curb on her tiptoes now, almost leaning out into a street choked thick with cabs. A group of college guys walk past and look at her, one raising his eyebrows to another. I'm still thinking about the tying of love and truth—and it makes me want to tell her the truth—the whole, contradictory truth—because otherwise, on some level, am I not that girl? Am I not that girl pretending to be Isaac? (9.9)
So this might not make Jane like him, but Will just has to let his feelings out. Because he's waited so long, though, by the time he tells her the truth, it's too late.
Quote #7
Even though these are the minutes of truth, I don't tell her about the song. I can't. It's too embarrassing. The thing is, coming from your ex-boyfriend, it's sweet. And coming from the guy who wouldn't kiss you in your orange Volvo, it's just weird and maybe even mean. She's right that she deserves someone consistent, and maybe I can't be that. Nonetheless, I shred the guy. "I f***ing hate guys who quote poetry to girls. Since we are being honest. Also, wisdom is a better fate than the vast majority of kisses. Wisdom is certainly a better fate than kissing douches who only read poetry so they can use it to get in girls' pants."
"Oh, my," she says. "Honest Will and Regular Will are so fascinatingly different!" (9.44-45)
Will's minutes of honesty are actually pretty funny. But the one thing he holds back on is the one thing that will sway Jane to his side. Silly Willy.
Quote #8
i have no idea what truth has to do with love, and vice versa. i'm not even thinking in terms of love here. it's way, way, way early for that. but i guess i am thinking in terms of truth. i want this to be truthful. and even as i protest to tiny and i protest to myself, the truth is becoming increasingly clear.
it's time for us to figure out how the hell this is ever going to work. (10.89-90)
After the Isaac burn, will knows that he needs to be honest in order for his relationship with Tiny to blossom. will is having his doubts, but he's willing to look for the truth and see if he can find something there.
Quote #9
i call, he answers. i need him, he answers. i go over to his house and tell him what's happened, and he answers. it's not like it was with maura, who always wanted to take the dark road. it's not like it was with tiny, because with him i was feeling all these expectations to be a good boyfriend, whatever that is. no, gideon's ready to believe both the best and the worst in me. in other words: the truth. (16.123)
This is all anyone is looking for, right? Maybe this is what love is after all. Finding that one person who sees you for who you really are and loves you anyway, warts and all.
Quote #10
maura: you didn't mind me when i was isaac. when we would chat every night.
me: but that was a lie! a complete lie!now maura looked me right in the eye.
maura: c'mon, will—you know there's no such thing as a complete lie. there's always some truth in there. (18.61-63)
Maura may be a despicable she-devil, but she does have a point. She really and truly liked will, so the things she said as Isaac were real. And will did respond to something about her. So there was something real there, it just wasn't real enough to ever work out.