How we cite our quotes: (Part.Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #7
"Ed?" Ritchie says later. We're still standing in the water. "There's only one thing I want."
"What's that, Ritchie?"
His answer is simple. "To want." (4.5.101-103)
Ouch. Most of us know what we want to be when we grow up, or at least have some dreams for where we want to go to college, but not Ritchie. He has no desires in life, which makes it super hard to help him.
Quote #8
I'm alive, I think. I won. I feel freedom for the first time in months, and an air of contentedness wanders next to me all the way home. It even remains as I walk through the front door, kiss the Doorman, and make us some coffee in the kitchen. (5.the end.7)
After all the messages have been delivered, Ed thinks back on the whole experience. But why doesn't he know if he's alive? It's a head scratcher to be sure, because that's not the first place our minds would jump to after our mission was complete. Yet it's fitting for Ed, whose life is so pathetic that even he questions it.
Quote #9
Eventually, I manage to speak again. "Am I real?"
He barely even thinks about it. He doesn't need to. "Look in the folder," he says. "At the end. See it?" In large scrawled letters on the blank side of a cardboard beer coaster, it's written. His answer is written there in black ink. It says, Of course you're real— like any thought or any story. It's real when you're in it. (5.the folder.19-20)
Ed begins to question whether he truly exists if his entire life can be contained in one folder by some random guy, which seems like a pretty legit concern to us. What do you think? Is Ed real? Is his story really his, or is he just a pawn in a much larger game that he doesn't control?