Jack (the Narrator)

That old thing, how you always hurt the one you love. Well, it works both ways.

We used to read pornography. Now it was the Horchow Collection.

— Now promise me.
— Ok.
— You promise?
— Yeah, I promise.
— Promise.
— I just said, I promise! What...
— That's three times you promised.

— Hey, come on. I'm in pain.
— You wanna see pain? Swing by First Methodist Tuesday nights. See the guys with testicular cancer. That's pain.

If I didn't say anything, people assumed the worst. They cried harder. I cried harder.

— I got this dress at a thrift store for one dollar.
— It was worth every penny.
— It's a bridesmaid's dress. Someone loved it intensely for one day, then tossed it. Like a Christmas tree — so special, then, bam, it's on the side of the road with tinsel still clinging to it. Like a sex crime victim, underwear inside out, bound with electrical tape.

[the narrator pulls a loose tooth out of his mouth]
— Fuck.
— Hey, even the Mona Lisa's falling apart.

— We are gonna split up the week, ok? You take lymphoma and tuberculosis.
— You take tuberculosis. My smoking doesn't go over at all.
— Ok. Good. Fine. Testicular cancer should be no contest, ok.
— Technically, I have more right to be there than you. You still have your balls.
— You are kidding?
— I don't know. Am I?

Single-serving sugar and cream. Single pat of butter. The microwave cordon bleu hobby Kit. Shampoo-conditioner combos. Sample-package mouthwash. Tiny bars of soap. The people I meet on each flight... They're single-serving friends. Between takeoff and landing, we have our time together. That's all we get.

If I did have a tumor, I'd name it Marla. Marla. The scratch on the roof of your mouth that would heal if you could stop tonguing it. But you can't.

The walls were solid concrete. A foot of concrete is important... When your next-door neighbor has to watch game shows at full volume.

You wake up at Seatac, SFO, LAX. You wake up at O'Hare, Dallas-Fort Worth, BWI. Pacific, mountain, central. Lose an hour, gain an hour. This is your life, and it's ending one minute at a time.

— You are a faker. You are not dying.
— Sorry?

But Fight Club only exists in the hours between when Fight Club starts and when Fight Club ends. Even if I could tell someone they had a good fight, I would not be talking to the same man. Who you were in Fight Club is not who you were in the rest of the world.

We all started seeing things differently. Everywhere we went, we were sizing things up.

I'm six years old again, passing messages between my parents.