The Illustrated Mum Quotes

″‘You love Star more than you love me,’ I said. ‘I love you both,’ said Marigold. She hesitated. ‘But Star is Micky’s child.’ ‘Yes, and she’s with him now,’ I said, ‘She’s gone to him. I’ve stayed with you. Why can’t you love me best?‘”

“I can be your best friend. I’d like that.”

″‘I love you,’ I whispered. I wanted her to say it back. I wanted her to put her painted arms round me and hug me tight. I wanted her to step out of her sickness and tell them I’d never so much as set eyes on my father. I wanted her to tell them that she couldn’t leave me all on my own.”

“I had to cope with her right from when I was little, I looked after her and you. You said yourself she’s better with you.”

“It was so odd walking down the road without Star. It felt as if part of me was missing.”

“Star always did stuff, cleaned her up and looked after her when she was really bad. I don’t know how to do it. I don’t know how to do anything without Star. She’s not just like my sister. She’s like my mum too. And my best friend. And now she’s walked out on me and I haven’t got anyone.”

“What sort of example are you to your little girls? No wonder one seems to have scarpered. Who would want a mother like you?”

“I couldn’t believe what I saw. She was white all over. Even part of her hair. Her neck, her arms, her bare body, her legs. She’d painted herself white with gloss paint. There were frantic white splotches all over her body, covering each and every tattoo...”

“I punched the pillow, harder and harder. Then I missed and punched the wall instead.”

“Marigold started going weird again on her birthday. Star remembered that birthdays were often bad times so we’d tried really hard.”

″‘You! That row last night! Screaming, shouting, bang bang banging. I’m going to get you all evicted, you see if I dont’”

“I was acting like the crazy person now, smashing everything. Maybe I was going to go mad like Marigold. We’d both end up in the loony bin. While Star had her shiny new life with her father.”