Laila

"It always does pass. That's what you do."

"There is no honorable way out of this."

"You are my sister now. In every way that matters."

"I didn't ask for this, Miriam. I was just a girl."

"Water can quench thirst. Stories can quench other kinds of thirst."

"I have become someone I don't recognize."

"Books are a refuge when the world is cruel."

"We are bound together now, forever."

"Tomorrow is uncertain, but today we are alive."

"I will be the faithful wife. I will bear his children and cook his meals and clean his house."

"The Taliban took everything from us, but they could not take our memories."

"We are prisoners in our own homes."

"A child born of violence is still innocent."

"Children aren't coloring books. You don't get to fill them with your own colors."

"I will always find you."

"In the end, we are all just looking for someone to hold our hand."

"Forgiveness is a luxury we cannot always afford."

"In this land, a woman's voice is like an echo in a canyon."

"To love is to be vulnerable to infinite suffering."

"Education is the only path to liberation."

"Cruelty disguises itself as tradition."

"Fear is the jailer of the soul."

"Destiny is not written, it is lived."

"The truth is often too painful to speak aloud."

"Kindness is a rebellion in a world of cruelty."

"There is no need for blood."

"I will have to be clever about this."

"There is dignity in work."

"When you love someone, you do not sit around wishing you could be classier, or pretty."

"She would die here if she had to."