One to Watch Quotes

“Everyone wanted so many things from her—to believe in herself and see her own true beauty, but not to be conceited, to know her place. Be more than your looks, but never speak out of turn. Don't be defined by love, but remember, you're nothing without it. Be a princess. Find your prince. You don't need a man to complete you. Stand on your own two feet.”
― Kate Stayman-London, One to Watch

“I'm afraid that you're looking for your next chapter, and I'm looking for the whole rest of the book.”
― Kate Stayman-London, One to Watch

“Some part of me that still feels like I should be grateful for any attention you show me, even if it’s nothing close to the way I want to be loved.”
― Kate Stayman-London, One to Watch

“No, Beatrice, it's the hardest thing in the world. To have been that hurt, to feel that afraid, and to know that the only way you can be really, fully happy is to risk going through it all again.”
― Kate Stayman-London, One to Watch

“You can live a long life never being hurt—and never quite being happy. If that’s what you want.”
― Kate Stayman-London, One to Watch

“You don't have a boyfriend?"
"And spend my fifteen seconds of free time every week handling some man's emotions because he's not capable of dealing with them himself? Um, no.”
― Kate Stayman-London, One to Watch

“To have been that hurt, to feel that afraid, and to know that the only way you can be really, fully happy is to risk going through it all again? It’s a terrifying choice to make.”
― Kate Stayman-London, One to Watch

“Bea felt a pang in her gut: Yes, she wanted to scream, I want this more than you could possibly imagine. But the idea of saying that out loud [...] felt terrifying. Like giving voice to this secret piece of herself would allow everyone in the world to tell her just how foolish she was for wanting something so laughably out of reach.”
― Kate Stayman-London, One to Watch

“Do you really see our bodies as so unworthy of wearing your clothes? But the hard truth is that a lot of people in the fashion world would really prefer that I weren’t in it. And I think a lot of plus-size women feel that way in our day-to-day lives. For us, something as simple as posting an outfit-of-the-day selfie is a political action, and we have to live with all”
― Kate Stayman-London, One to Watch

“I’ve spent a lot of time falling for people who weren’t really available,” she said carefully. “Which means, sad as it sounds, that a lot of my romantic life has taken place in my own imagination. Picturing what it would be like if we were together, extrapolating meaning from subtext, from things left unspoken.”
― Kate Stayman-London, One to Watch

“Whenever Bea stepped into a patisserie to order something for herself, there were ripples of sideward glances, even occasional bald stares, the accusation always implied: It’s your own fault you look like this.”
― Kate Stayman-London, One to Watch

“it’s the hardest thing in the world. To have been that hurt, to feel that afraid, and to know that the only way you can be really, fully happy is to risk going through it all again? It’s a terrifying choice to make. But if you want to let someone be that close to you, it’s the only way.”
― Kate Stayman-London, One to Watch

“Of course, I know that none of that is true. That I can’t change my body type (and don’t even want to!), that thin women are no more happy than I am, that these insecurities are seeded and tended in my brain by the weight-loss industry, which profits from our collective self-loathing to the tune of $70 billion every year—despite”
― Kate Stayman-London, One to Watch

“do other people actually live this way? They just fall in love, and they tell each other, and they never have to be ashamed, or embarrassed, or certain the other person doesn’t feel the same? And then—if you’re in love with me, and if I could really fall in love with you, does that mean I have to learn how to need you? To depend on you? What happens when you disappear on me like everyone else always has?”
― Kate Stayman-London, One to Watch

“But when I come here, and I see all of you together—I want this so much. And it just feels impossible. Like you’re all living on this island, this place where people know how to love each other, and no matter what I do, I can’t figure out how to get there.”
― Kate Stayman-London, One to Watch

“I feel like you're a pit I can't climb out of. The clawing and craning skyway to try and find some shred of light is so exhausting, and it's so much easier to let the ghost of your arms pull me down and down and down. If I let myself remember how you taste, my breath gets hard, my body heaves. If I let myself consider you inside me, I can't function.

I don't know how I handed you this power, it makes me so insane that you have it. And I fucking know, I know it's probably just me and my own shit, that you don't have a damn thing to do with it. You're just some vessel holding all my sadness, glowing with the nuclear energy of my loneliness. If I try to imagine you letting me go, I don't feel free. I feel untethered, unbound. Like I'm nothing and nowhere. But if I imagine you holding me, I crumple.

I'm running out of ways to exist.”
― Kate Stayman-London, One to Watch

“Listen, was I born gay, or did Julia Stiles in '10 Things I Hate About You' make me gay? It's literally impossible to know.”
― Kate Stayman-London, One to Watch

“You don’t have to stand in your own way anymore. You can let yourself be happy.”
― Kate Stayman-London, One to Watch

“As though if I could make my body fit on one of these tiny barstools, I'd be in a perfect, fulfilling relationship instead of forcing myself to get through this date, wishing I could just disappear. Of course I know that none of that is true. That I can't change my body type (and don't even want to!), that thin women are no more happy than I am, that these insecurities are seeded and tended in my brain by the weight-loss industry, which profits from our collective self-loathing to the tune of $70 billion each year-despite the fact the 97% of diets fail. (Side note: What if we put all that money towards solving actual health problems instead? Could we cure ovarian cancer, like, tomorrow?) I know all these things, but tonight, I just can't feel them”
― Kate Stayman-London, One to Watch

“You don’t have a boyfriend?” “And spend my fifteen seconds of free time every week handling some man’s emotions because he’s not capable of dealing with them himself? Um, no.”
― Kate Stayman-London, One to Watch

“It's exhilarating to wake up every morning and know that there's not a single man whose emotional turmoil is my responsibility.”
― Kate Stayman-London, One to Watch

“Ruby: Oh, that's interesting! Do you even call men "plus-size," is that a thing?
Cat: Technically, you do, but it's not a phrase you hear a lot – society doesn't really feel the need to divide men according to their body size the way we do with women.”
― Kate Stayman-London, One to Watch

“What if I hurt you?” “We are only human,” he urged. “We hurt each other all the time.”
― Kate Stayman-London, One to Watch

“What about you, Bop?" Bea asked softly. "Do you think I'm nuts to do this?"
"Bean, you've been charting your own course the whole time I've known you, and that's since you're four years old. Your mother about had a panic attack when you announced you were going to college in Los Angeles, and then a semester in France. You wanted a big life for yourself, and you're making one. That's not an easy thing to do either."
"So you think America is going to hate me?"
Bob laughed. "America makes all kinds of bad decisions - there's no accounting for taste. But no, I think they'll love you just as much as we do."
"All the way up the beanstalk?"
"And all the way home, my magic Bean. You're gonna knock 'em dead.”
― Kate Stayman-London, One to Watch

“I guess there's something about men who look like him - who look like you, who look like all the men here, if I'm honest. Some part of me that still feels like I should be grateful for any attention you show me, even if it's nothing close to the way I want to be loved.”
― Kate Stayman-London, One to Watch

“On this show, you’re the one in charge. For three weeks, we’ve watched you freaking out that these men might not want you, when the entire show is structured around your decision of whether you want them. All this misery and self-effacement, I’m sorry, Bea, but it’s this version of you that Duncan and I don’t even recognize. You’re so poised, and self-possessed, and completely wonderful – how is it possible that these men you don’t even know are able to unmoor you in this way?”
― Kate Stayman-London, One to Watch

“So your happy ending is getting over your feelings for Ray?"

"That's part of it." Bea considered. "But it's more than that. I've told myself for so many years that I'm afraid of men rejecting me for the way I look, of them refusing to look past my size. But I was wrong - I don't need someone who'll see me and love me exactly as I am. For all its flaws, this show made me believe that that's possible.”
― Kate Stayman-London, One to Watch

“I was reeling. I was so hurt by Luc and Asher, and there you were, showing up to declare your love for me like I'd always dreamed you would. I wanted to believe that maybe after everything, we could be each other's happy ending. Except you were still the same person who spent all those years hurting me. The same person who wasn't brave enough to date me when you could have, when you wanted to, because you couldn't picture getting serious with someone who looked like me."

"But I got over that!" Ray protested. "I went on television to tell the whole world I love you - doesn't that count for something?"

"My body isn't something you 'get over'." Bea said coolly. "I have no intention of devoting the rest of my life to a man who's ashamed of me."

"I know I've given you reason not to trust me," Ray pleaded. "But Bea, I promise, I won't hurt you again."

"I know you won't," Bea's tone was sad but resolute. "Because I'm not going to let you. All these years, you put your needs above mine - which is exactly what you did when you showed up in Paris, by the way - and I couldn't see it, because I idealized you as the perfect man. But I see who you are now, Ray. And I know that I deserve better.”
― Kate Stayman-London, One to Watch

“I kept hearing that word in my head, 'reliable' - thinking, is this who I am? Is my character defined by my capacity to be used and punished again and again by someone who thinks so little of other people's feelings?”
― Kate Stayman-London, One to Watch