Top Jenny Downham Quotes - Quotesmemo.com

Jenny Downham Biography

Jenny Downham (born 1964) is a British novelist and an ex-actress. She has published three books. The first, Before I Die, is the fictional account of the last few months of a sixteen-year-old girl who has been dying of leukaemia for four years. The book is told in the first person.

Read about Jenny Downham in Wikipedia

Random Authors

Jenny Downham Quotes

Instructions for Adam Look after no one except yourself. Go to university and make lots of friends and get drunk. Forget your door keyes. Laugh. Eat pot-noodles for breakfast. Miss lectures. Be irresponsible.

Breakfast, Doors, Drunk, Except, Laughing, University

The shops in High Street still have their metal grilles down, blank-eyed and sleeping. My name is scrawled across them all. I'm outside Ajay's newsagent's. I'm on the expensive shutters of the health food store. I'm massive on Handie's furniture shop, King's Chicken Joint and the Barbecue Cafe. I thread the pavement outside the bank and all the way to Mothercare. I've possessed the road and am a glistening circle at the roundabout.

Chicken, Circle, Circles, Kings, Possessed, Sleep

Don't pretend to care. I don't need you as an anesthetic.

Anesthetic, Care, I Don'T Need You, Needs, Pretend

I'm here, Tess. I'm right here, holding your hand. Adam's here, too, he's sitting on the other side of the bed. And Cal. Mum's on her way, she'll be just a minute. We all love you, Tessa. We're all right here with you.

Bed, Hands, Love, Love You, Minute, Side

Dad, you played rounders with me, even though you hated it and wished I'd take up cricket. You learned how to keep a stamp collecion because I wanted to know. For hours you sat in hospitals and never, not once, complained. You brushed my hair like a mother should. You gave up work for me, friends for me, four years of your life for me. You never moaned. Hardly ever. You let me have Adam. You let me have my list. I was outrageous. Wanting, wanting so much. And you never said, 'That's enough. Stop now.

Complained, Dad, Friends, Hair, Like, Mother

Her face crashes. She hasn't dealt with a single transfusion or lumbar puncture. She wasn't allowed near me for the bone-marrow transplant, but she could have been there for any number of diagnoses, and wasn't. Even her promises to visit more often have faded away with Christmas. It's her turn to taste some reality.

Christmas, Face, Numbers, Promise, Reality, Single

It's a shame i can't be there myself - i like parties. Text me if you think of any good hymns!

Hymns, Party, Text, Think, Thinking

All I know is that I have two choices – stay wrapped in blankets and get on with dying, or get the list back together and get on with living.

Back, Choices, Dying, List, Two

I mean it. Whatever happens, you have to believe that.

Believe, Happens, Mean, Whatever Happens

Every breath, every heartbeat, was one less until maybe things stopped hurting this much.

Breath, Breaths, Heartbeat, Hurt, Hurting, Stopped

If you want a girl to like you, you have to listen like a woman and love like a man.

And Love, Girl, Like, Love, Men

It's all right, Tessa, you can go. We love you. You can go now. ' 'Why are you saying that?' 'She might need permission to die, Cal. ' 'I don't want her to. She doesn't have my permission.

Cal, Love You, Needs, Permission, Saying, Want

The light is heart-breaking.

Heart, Light, Heart Breaking

The inside of the door is glossy white. A total re-paint. I touch it with my fingers, but it stays the same. It's so bright it makes the room waver at the edges. Every few years we disappear.

Door, Doors, Fingers, Waver, White, Years

When I first saw Ellie, I knew it was her-- she was my fantasy. I didn't want it to be true, but every time I met her it was obvious, and the funny thing was that she was better than the fantasy, like I got more stuff than I'd imagined.

Fantasy, Funny Things, Saw, Stuff, Time, Want

I imagine horses in the engine, their manes flying, their breaths steaming, their nostrils flaring as they gallop.

Engine, Flaring, Flying, Horse, Imagine, Nostrils

I didn't understand that when you make love, you actually do MAKE love. Stir things. Affect each other. The breath that escapes from me is dazzled. He breathes it in with a gasp.

Breathe, Breathes, Love You, Making Love, Stir, Things

Nurses never tell you what they know. They're hired for their cheeriness and the thickness of their hair. They need to look alive and healthy, to give the patients something to aim for.

Cheeriness, Give, Giving, Hair, Hired, Nurse

Perhaps I'm dead. Perhaps this is all it will be. The living will carry on in their world – touching, walking. And I'll continue in this empty world, tapping soundlessly on the glass between us.

Carry, Empty, Glass, Glasses, Touching, World

We make patterns, we share moments.

Make, Moments, Patterns, Share

1