I keep meeting incredible people in this city who leave me behind and go on to lead better lives.
-- Ben (chapter 17)

Importance: This quote gets to the heart of Ben’s feeling of stagnation in this novel. In the first novel he meets Arthur, who is not from New York, and that distance is what keeps them apart. After Ben builds walls around his heart to keep from being hurt once more, he starts to take them down for Mario. Only as he is becoming more serious with Mario does it manifest that he is moving to Los Angeles. This feeling of being left behind to stagnate while those around him progress leads to him agreeing to move with Mario. He is not rash about it, but it is a decision that he knows will have lasting consequences on his closeness with his family.

I’m tired of not being able to own...
-- Ben (chapter 19)