When you chopped logs with the ax and they split open they smelled beautiful, like Christmas. But when you split someone's head open it smelled like … - Kate Atkinson

It wasn't that [he] believed in religion, or a God, or an afterlife. He just knew it was impossible to feel this much love and for it to end.

It was the kind of summer evening that made Ursula want to be alone. 'Oh,' Izzie said, 'You're at an age when a girl is simply consumed by the sublime.' Ursula wasn't sure what she meant ('No one is ever sure what she means,' Sylvie said) but she thought she understood a little. There was a strangeness in the shimmering air, a sense of imminence that made Ursula's chest feel full, as if her heart was growing. It was a kind of high holiness - she could think of no other way of describing it. Perhaps it was the future, she thought, coming nearer all the time.

Later, when she understood that it was the last time they would all be together, she wished she had paid more attention.