Leslie Burke Quotes

″‘Leslie, I swear – I’d go in there if I could.’ He really thought he would, too. ‘You ain’t scared of her, are you, Leslie?’ He didn’t mean it in a daring way, he was just dumbfounded by the idea of Leslie being scared.”

“They had never been there in the dark. But there was enough moon for them to find their way into the castle, and he could tell her about his day in Washington. And apologize. It had been so dumb of him not to ask if Leslie could go, too.”

“The reaction didn’t seem to bother her. She stood there in front, her eyes saying, ‘OK, friends, here I am,’ in answer to their open-mouthed stares while Mrs. Myers fluttered about trying to figure where to put the extra desk.”

“For the first time in his life he got up every morning with something to look forward to. Leslie was more than his friend. She was his other, more exciting self – his way to Terabithia and all the worlds beyond.”

″‘He believed her because here in the shadowy light of the stronghold everything seemed possible. Between the two of them they owned the world and no enemy, Gary Fulcher, Wanda Kay Moore, Janice Avery, Jess’s own fears and insufficiencies, nor any of the foes whom Leslie imagined attacking Terabithia, could ever really defeat them.‘”

“There in their secret place, his feelings bubbled inside him like a stew on the back of the stove--some sad for her in her lonesomeness, but chunks of happiness, too. To be able to be Leslie’s one whole friend in the world as she was his – he couldn’t help being satisfied about that.”

″‘She loved you, you know.’ He could tell from Bill’s voice that he was crying. ‘She told me once that if it weren’t for you…’ His voice broke completely. ‘Thank you,’ he said a moment later. ‘Thank you for being such a wonderful friend to her.‘”

“She had tricked him. She had made him leave his old self behind and come into her world, and then before he was really at home in it but too late to go back, she had left him stranded there – like an astronaut wandering about on the moon. Alone.”

“Now it was time for him to move out. She wasn’t there, so he must go for both of them. It was up to him to pay back to the world in beauty and caring what Leslie had loaned him in vision and strength. ‘As for the terrors ahead—for he did not fool himself that they were all behind him—well, you just have to stand up to your fear and not let it squeeze you white. Right, Leslie?’ ‘Right.‘”

“It was Leslie who had taken him from the cow pasture into Terabithia and turned him into a king. He had thought that was it. Wasn’t king the best you could be? Now it occurred to him that perhaps Terabithia was like a castle where you came to be knighted. After you stayed for a while and grew strong you had to move on.”

“It wasn’t so much that he minded telling Leslie that he was afraid to go; it was that he minded being afraid. It was as though he had been made with a great piece missing… Lord, it would be better to be born without an arm than to go through life with no guts.”