Drip Clothes Quotes

You should have Hugo throw you in the pool." The golem turned his head toward Seth, who shrugged. "Sure, that would be fun." Hugo nodded, grabbed Seth, and, with a motion like a hook shot, flung him skyward. Kendra gasped. They were still thirty or forty feet away from the edge of the pool. She had pictured the golem carrying Seth much closer before tossing him. Her brother sailed nearly as high as the roof of the house before plummeting down and landing in the center of the deep end with an impressive splash. Kendra ran to the side of the pool. By the time she arrived, Seth was boosting himself out of the waster, hair and clothes dripping. "That was the freakiest, awesomest moment in my life!" Seth declared. "But next time, let me take off my shoes.

Card five hundred and thirty-four," repeated Artemis. "Of a series of six hundred standard inkblot cards. I memorized them during our sessions. You don't even shuffle." Argon checked the number on the back of the card: 534. Of course. "Knowing the number doesn't answer the question. What do you see?" Artemis allowed his lip to wobble. "I see an ax dripping with blood. Also a scared child, and an elf clothed in the skin of a troll." "Really?" Argon was interested now. "No. Not really. I see a secure building, perhaps a family home, with four windows. A trustworthy pet, and a pathway leading from the door into the distance. I think, if you check your manual, you will find that these answers fall inside healthy parameters." Argon did not need to check. The Mud Boy was right, as usual.

One minute it was Ohio winter, with doors closed, windows locked, the panes blind with frost, icicles fringing every roof, children skiing on slopes, housewives lumbering like great black bears in their furs along the icy streets. And then a long wave of warmth crossed the small town. A flooding sea of hot air; it seemed as if someone had left a bakery door open. The heat pulsed among the cottages and bushes and children. The icicles dropped, shattering, to melt. The doors flew open. The windows flew up. The children worked off their wool clothes. The housewives shed their bear disguises. The snow dissolved and showed last summer's ancient green lawns. Rocket summer. The words passed among the people in the open, airing houses. Rocket summer. The warm desert air changing the frost patterns on the windows, erasing the art work. The skis and sleds suddenly useless. The snow, falling from the cold sky upon the town, turned to a hot rain before it touched the ground. Rocket summer. People leaned from their dripping porches and watched the reddening sky. The rocket lay on the launching field, blowing out pink clouds of fire and oven heat. The rocket stood in the cold winter morning, making summer with every breath of its mighty exhausts. The rocket made climates, and summer lay for a brief moment upon the land....

As he rose to his feet he noticed that he was neither dripping nor panting for breath as anyone would expect after being under water. His clothes were perfectly dry. He was standing by the edge of a small pool—not more than ten feet from side to side in a wood. The trees grew close together and were so leafy that he could get no glimpse of the sky. All the light was green light that came through the leaves: but there must have been a very strong sun overhead, for this green daylight was bright and warm. It was the quietest wood you could possibly imagine. There were no birds, no insects, no animals, and no wind. You could almost feel the trees growing. The pool he had just got out of was not the only pool. There were dozens of others—a pool every few yards as far as his eyes could reach. You could almost feel the trees drinking the water up with their roots. This wood was very much alive.

She was tipping her head back to inquire, when two men entered the great hall and the question flew right out of her head. They were simply two of the most gorgeous men she'd ever seen. Twins, though different. They were both tall and powerfully built. One was taller by a few inches, with dark hair that swept just past his shoulders and eyes like shard of silver and ice while the other had long black hair falling in a single braid to his waist, and eyes as gold as Adam's torque. They were elegantly dressed in tailored clothing of dark hues, with magnificent bodies that dripped with raw sex appeal. Oh, my, she marveled, they don't amek men like these in the States. Were these typical Scotsmen? If so, she was going to have to get Elizabeth over here somehow. A connoisseur of romance novels, Elizabeth's favorites were the Scottish ones, and these two men looked as if they'd just stepped straight off one of those covers. "Try not to gape, ka-lyrra. They're only human. Mortal. Puny. And married. Both of them. Happily.

A few weeks, maybe a month,” he said as he ran the wet cloth under his arms and the hard planes of his chest, water trickling down his torso. For Saints’ sake, Inej thought as her cheeks heated. She’d lost most of her modesty during her time with the Menagerie, but really, there were limits. What would Kaz say if she suddenly stripped down and started washing herself in front of him? He’d probably tell me not to drip on the desk, she thought with a scowl.

I push my body off the ground, blood seeping between my toes. For the first time in over a century I stand on my own two feet. The gown I wear drapes off my shoulders, and my drenched skirts stick to my legs. I am a thing made of lace and blood. Swathed in silk and dripping with the dark deeds of men. I suppose I’m finally clothed accordingly.

Swallowing hard, she looked at him. He raised his eyes from the frothy concoction on his spoon at the precise moment she looked up, and their gazes locked over the length of the polished wood table. Where would you drip whipped cream on him, Lisa? The answer came with frightening swiftness and conviction: Everywhere. She wanted to explore his body, the hard ripples, the smooth skin. The candlelight bathed his olive skin with a golden hue, and his dark good looks were set off perfectly by his linen shirt and the splash of black and crimson draped across his chest. He was mesmerizing. "Are you hungry, lass?" He licked his spoon languidly. She couldn't tear her gaze away. "No. I've eaten quite enough," she managed. "You seem to be watching my dessert most intently. Are you certain there isn't something else you wish to sate your appetite?" Besides you to remove your clothing, lie on the table, and let me finger paint you with whipped cream, you mean? "Nope," she said casually. "Not a thing." She watched him for a moment; he still had a great deal of dessert left. How was she going to get through this?

You get everything you need?” She squealed like an idiot and whirled around to see him smirking at her. “JeSUS!” She glared at him and brushed past him, ignoring the sparks that shot down her arm where their bodies met. Thumping down on to the sofa, she grabbed at the food tray and began digging in, glaring at him the whole time as he took the seat opposite her. She swallowed when he refused to look away. “You know this is all just a little too Virginia Andrews for my liking.” He raised an eyebrow. “Meaning?” “The clothes, the accessories, the shampoo!” Avery shook her head in disbelief. “It’s creepy, Brennus.

I asked of every thing if it had something more, something more than shape and form, and I learned that way that nothing is empty-- everything is a box, a train, a boat loaded with implications, every foot that walked along a path left a telegram written in the stone, and clothes in the washing water dripped out their whole existence." -from "Investigations

Running in the rain steals my breath. Ruins it. Smashes it. Nearly eradicates it. When I arrive home, my soaked clothes are stuck to my skin. My shoes are slouching. My toes are cold and stiff. Erratic strands of my hair stick to my temples and forehead, dripping all over me. I stand in our small garden, catching my breath, and press a shaky palm to my chest. My heart’s palpitations grow uneven and out of beat as if protesting. I close my eyes and tip my head back, letting the rain beat down on me. Soak me. Rinse me. The droplets pound on my closed lids almost like a soothing caress. I’ve always loved the rain. The rain camouflaged everything. No one saw the tears. No one noticed the shame or the humiliation. It was just me, the clouds, and the pouring water. But that’s the thing about the rain, isn’t it? It’s only a camouflage, a temporary solution. It can only rinse the outside. It can’t seep under my skin and wash away my shaky insides. Wiping away my memories isn’t an option either. It’s been barely an hour since Aiden had his hands on me – all over me. I can still feel it. His breath. His nearness. His psychotic eyes.

Herbs carried in special baskets, bread wrapped in knotted, muslin cloths, thick stews soured with unripe grape juice, carrots boiled with sugar and rosewater, yoghurt hung from dripping bags, its whey dried in sheets on trays in the sun.

I turn just as Aithinne leaps from a rock that juts out under the cliff. She lands with a soft thud, looking very pleased with herself. Her clothes are sopping wet, hair dripping, every inch of her covered in sand. And she doesn’t seem to mind one bit. Aithinne makes her way across the larger beach rocks toward us, her movements graceful. “You both look miserable.” “I’m cold and wet,” I say. “I feel wretched, and my blunderbuss is probably destroyed from the swim. No need to state the obvious.” She glances at her brother. “And I suppose your face is just stuck that way?” Kiaran pushes to his feet and I do the same. “What you see is the incessant, grave look of someone in possession of a sibling.” “Ha ha.” Aithinne focuses her attention on me, tilting her head. “You know, I had a kyloe look at me exactly like that once. His hair was a similar color and everything.” I glare at her. “You did not just compare me to a cow.” “No, no. I compared your expression to one. Cows truly are majestic creatures, aren’t they

Imagine,” Tyler said, "stalking elk past department store windows and stinking racks of beautiful rotting dresses and tuxedos on hangers; you’ll wear leather clothes that will last you the rest of your life, and you’ll climb the wrist-thick kudzu vines that wrap the Sears Tower. Jack and the beanstalk, you’ll climb up through the dripping forest canopy and the air will be so clean you’ll see tiny figures pounding corn and laying strips of venison to dry in the empty car pool lane of an abandoned superhighway stretching eight-lanes-wide and August-hot for a thousand miles.

The icy water hit hard as earth. She thrashed on instinct, but Jacks held her tightly. His arms were unyielding, dragging her up through the crashing waves. Salt water snaked up her nose, and the cold filled her veins. She was coughing and sputtering, barely able to take down air as Jacks swam to shore with her in tow. He held her close and carried her from the ocean as if his life depended on it instead of hers. 'I will not let you die.' A single bead of water dripped from Jacks' lashes on to her lips. It was raindrop soft, but the look in his eyes held the force of a storm. It should have been too dark to his expression, but the crescent moon burned brighter with each second, lining edges of Jacks' cheekbones as he looked at her with too much intensity. The crashing ocean felt suddenly quiet in contrast to her pounding heart, or maybe it was his heart. Jacks' chest was heaving, his clothes were soaked, his hair was a mess across his face- yet in that moment, Evangeline knew he would carry her through fire if he had to, haul her from the clutches of war, from falling cities and breaking worlds. And for one brittle heartbeat, Evangeline understood why so many girls died from his lips. If Jacks hadn't betrayed her, if he hadn't set her up for murder, she might have been a little bewitched by him.

The ship's surgeon was a spotty unshaven little man whose clothes, arrayed with smudges, drippings, and cigarette burns, were held about him by an extensive network of knotted string, The buttons down the front of those duck trousers had originally been made, with all of false economy's ingenious drear deception, of coated cardboard. After many launderings they persisted as a row of gray stumps posted along the gaping portals of his fly. Though a boutoniere sometimes appeared through some vacancy in his shirt-front, its petals, too, proved to be of paper, and he looked like the kind of man who scrapes foam from the top of a glass of beer with the spine of a dirty pocket comb, and cleans his nails at table with the tines of his salad fork, which things, indeed, he did. He diagnosed Camilla's difficulty as indigestion, and locked himself in his cabin. that was the morning.

Standing on your own feet, naturally, is as tiresome and dangerous as standing your ground; and when the wild dogs begin to circle grinning round you with their dripping tongues hanging out and you know that with mock servility they like to go for your toes first, why, then, you should stand on someone else’s feet, or head if necessary. It is a point of faith for me never to be Hitler; he stood his ground in his own two shoes in his own little hole almost to the end, the fool. But I may disguise myself as any other animate or inanimate object in what follows. I can be eight lame women with falsies, eight cracked chamber pots, or -- let’s get right to the point -- a gladiator who is actually constructed of old clothes, brooms, and a paper plate with a face daubed on in finger-paints, not to mention two vagrants inside each shirt-sleeve and pant-leg, moving Goliath’s limbs at my say-so; but as long as you believe in the gladiator, you are whipped, and the Museum people will set out on your track, and then once they catch you, don’t think I won’t come study your exhibit until I can convince your own sweetheart that I am you come back from the dead. For I am Big George, the eternal winner.

We all clean a lot of things as we go through life. We clean our clothes and wear them over our unclean hearts. We wash our hands and leave our souls untouched. We pour water on our heads and as it drips down to our feet, it cleans the dirt off our skin. But we leave our thoughts and words out of this cleanliness.

Gloire de Dijon When she rises in the morning I linger to watch her; She spreads the bath-cloth underneath the window And the sunbeams catch her Glistening white on the shoulders, While down her sides the mellow Golden shadow glows as She stoops to the sponge, and her swung breasts Sway like full-blown yellow Gloire de Dijon roses. She drips herself with water, and her shoulders Glisten as silver, they crumple up Like wet and falling roses, and I listen For the sluicing of their rain-dishevelled petals. In the window full of sunlight Concentrates her golden shadow Fold on fold, until it glows as Mellow as the glory roses.

was calling for us like a madman. When we reached him he was dripping with perspiration, and trembling like a startled horse. We had great difficulty in soothing him. He complained that he was in civilian kit, and wanted to tear my clothes off his body. I ordered him to strip, and we made a second exchange as quickly as possible.

Please, I know you understand heartbreak. Stop Luc from marrying Marisol. Save my heart from breaking again.” “Now, that was a pathetic speech.” Two slow claps followed the indolent voice, which sounded just a few feet away. Evangeline spun around, all the blood draining from her face. She didn’t expect to see him—the young man who’d been tearing his clothes in the back of the church. Although it was difficult to believe this was the same person. She had thought that boy was in agony, but he must have ripped away his pain along with the sleeves of his jacket, which now hung in tatters over a striped black-and-white shirt that was only halfway tucked into his breeches. He sat on the dais steps, lazily leaning against one of the pillars with his long, lean legs stretched out before him. His hair was golden and messy, his too-bright blue eyes were bloodshot, and his mouth twitched at the corner as if he didn’t enjoy much, but he found pleasure in the brief bit of pain he’d just inflicted upon her. He looked bored and rich and cruel. “Would you like me to stand up and turn around so that you can take in the rest of me?” he taunted. The color instantly returned to Evangeline’s cheeks. “We’re in a church.” “What does that have to do with anything?” In one elegant move, the young man reached into the inner pocket of his ripped burgundy coat, pulled out a pure white apple, and took one bite. Dark red juice dripped from the fruit to his long, pale fingers and then onto the pristine marble steps. “Don’t do that!” Evangeline hadn’t meant to yell. Although she wasn’t shy with strangers, she generally avoided quarrelling with them. But she couldn’t seem to help it with this crass young man. “You’re being disrespectful.” “And you’re praying to an immortal who kills every girl he kisses. You really think he deserves any reverence?” The awful young man punctuated his words with another wide bite of his apple.

Everything!” I said, snapping at her. “She won’t be alone all the time, she won’t spend all of her time in this apartment, she’ll dress in pretty clothes, she’ll travel, she’ll have a job that she likes, she’ll host dinner parties.” This last comment must have sounded silly, but I had always wanted to host dinner parties, with candles stuck into empty wine bottles, the orange and red wax dripping down

Nobody in Faha could remember when it started. Rain there on the western seaboard was a condition of living. It came straight-down and sideways, frontwards, backwards and any other wards God could think of. It came in sweeps, in waves, sometimes in veils. It came dressed as drizzle, as mizzle, as mist, as showers, frequent and widespread, as a wet fog, as a damp day, a drop, a dripping, and an out-and-out downpour. It came the fine day, the bright day, and the day promised dry. It came at any time of the day and night, and in all seasons, regardless of calendar and forecast, until in Faha your clothes were rain and your skin was rain and your house was rain with a fireplace. It came off the grey vastness of an Atlantic that threw itself against the land like a lover once spurned and resolved not to be so again. It came accompanied by seagulls and smells of salt and seaweed. It came with cold air and curtained light. It came like a judgment, or, in benign version, like a blessing God had forgotten he had left on. It came for a handkerchief of blue sky, came on westerlies, sometimes—why not?—on easterlies, came in clouds that broke their backs on the mountains in Kerry and fell into Clare, making mud the ground and blind the air. It came disguised as hail, as sleet, but never as snow. It came softly sometimes, tenderly sometimes, its spears turned to kisses, in rain that pretended it was not rain, that had come down to be closer to the fields whose green it loved and fostered, until it drowned them.

Rain comes from the east one night We watch it come To hang like beaded curtains Till the morning sun Water dripping from our clothes You with raindrops on your nose Ask me sadly "Please don't go away now" Till the rain is done, I say "I'll stay now" Rain outside but inside we don't mind at all Shadows by the fire slowly climb and fall Kisses fade and leave no trace Whispers vanish into space The dawn will send me on a chase to nowhere Why cry as if I were the first to go there And I know I shouldn't be here Yes, I know I should go home But that eastern rain drones in my brain And I'm so all alone, so all alone Morning comes up from the east We watch it come And far away now rolls the ancient rain God's drum You with daybreak in your eyes Afraid to speak for telling lies I watch you search for some reply to lend me But when the rain is done There's no pretending "Eastern Rain" from Second Fret Sets

We can't ask our mothers. It's hard to imagine them without clothes, to think of them as having bodies at all, under their dresses. There's a great deal they don't say. Between us and them is a gulf, an abyss, that goes down and down. It's filled with wordlessness. They wrap up the garbage in several layers of newspaper and tie it with string, and even so it drips onto the freshly waxed floor. Their clotheslines are strung with underpants, nighties, socks, a display of soiled intimacy, which they have washed and rinsed, plunging their hands into the gray curdled water. They know about toilet brushes, about toilet seats, about germs. The world is dirty, no matter how much they clean, and we know they will not welcome our grubby little questions. So instead a long whisper runs among us, from child to child, gathering horror.

replied. “Back to that first moment I knew I loved you, the first time you beat me during our sword fighting lessons.” “It was raining,” she remembered. “You stood there, hair wet, water dripping everywhere, staring at me, confused and triumphant... You were an avalanche.” After five years they had grown used to kissing with the cloth mask in the way. He smelled the sweat of her busy afternoon on it. “I remember those old days...” His fingers were in her hair now. “I, bored and frustrated in the countryside, and you, proud and eager, but rough around the edges...” “I

Florida was plenty hot, certainly, and humid, too. Hot enough that your clothes stuck to you like Scotch tape, and sweat dripped like tears from your forehead into your eyes. But it was only hot outside, and generally I only went outside to walk from on air-conditioned location to another.

Contemplating while barefoot on the grounds my father and grandfather walked, I saw my life clearly. With African sun nibbling on my dark skin and gentle winds soothing my foreboding, my past life and current responsibilities overwhelmed me occasionally. Abundant tears flowed freely. Dripping on my face and clothes. Travelling through the ancient roads created by my forefathers, grasslands, trees and anthills kept me company. A lonely journey. I knew that nothing remains the same, but ones past never changes. Even in the loneliness of my past, I accepted that you cannot effectively go forward without knowing how and where you started your journey. Even in that state of near dejection I was aware that my sojourn in foreign lands is not forever, but my lording of this beautiful land, my own Africa, where my spent body will finally rest someday, is for eternity. Nothing remains the same, but nothing ever changes. It depends on how you look at your life.

Inej kept her eyes averted, shuffling a stack of papers into a pile on the desk as Kaz stripped out of his vest and shirt. She wasn’t sure if she was flattered or insulted that he didn’t seem to give a second thought to her presence. “How long will we be gone?” she asked, darting a glance at him through the open doorway. He was corded muscle, scars, but only two tattoos—the Dregs’ crow and cup on his forearm and, above it, a black R on his bicep. She’d never asked him what it meant. It was his hands that drew her attention as he shucked off his leather gloves and dipped a cloth in the washbasin. He only ever removed them in these chambers, and as far as she knew, only in front of her. Whatever affliction he might be hiding, she could see no sign of it, only slender lockpick’s fingers, and a shiny rope of scar tissue from some long ago street fight. “A few weeks, maybe a month,” he said as he ran the wet cloth under his arms and the hard planes of his chest, water trickling down his torso. For Saints’ sake, Inej thought as her cheeks heated. She’d lost most of her modesty during her time with the Menagerie, but really, there were limits. What would Kaz say if she suddenly stripped down and started washing herself in front of him? He’d probably tell me not to drip on the desk, she thought with a scowl.

While I was washing my face, I began to cry. The tears mingled easily with the cold water, in the luminous, dripping crimson of my cupped fingers, and at first I wasn't aware that I was crying at all. The sobs were regular and emotionless, as mechanical as the dry heaves which had stopped only a moment earlier; there was no reason for them, they had nothing to do with me. I brought my head up and looked at my weeping reflection in the mirror with a kind of detached interest. What does this mean? I thought. I looked terrible. Nobody else was falling apart; yet here I was, shaking all over and seeing bats like Ray Milland in The Lost Weekend. A cold draft was blowing in the window. I felt shaky but oddly refreshed. I ran myself a hot bath, throwing in a good handful of Judy's bath salts, and when I got out and put on my clothes I felt quite myself again. Nihil sub sole novum, I thought as I walked back down the hail to my room. Any action, in the fullness of time, sinks to nothingness...

Many different kinds of sprouts lay torn. Green, purple and orange leaves lay scattered across the dark soil, and the thorn fence surrounding the bed had a fist-sized hole in it. Teacher eased himself into a squat, poked at the inside of the hole. Whatever made the hole had left blood on the thorns. The sprouts looked like wispy ghosts, pale and broken. Their delicate leaves and stems were riddled with bites. Life drained out of them like water dripping from a hanging cloth, and a breeze made them dance sadly. It felt like a funeral. Teacher picked up a gnawed berry and gently squeezed it until purple juice dripped down his thumb. He placed the berry by the plant’s roots. Chandi’s small face bunched up. “Are they dead?” “They’re dying, yes.” Yuvali took her hand. “But their bodies will help other plants grow.

They look so tired, so hot!” everyone kept saying, but not one of them thought to open their doors, to invite one of these wretches inside, to welcome them into the shady bits of heaven that the refugees could glimpse behind the houses, where wooden benches nestled in arbours amid redcurrant bushes and roses. There were just too many of them. Too many weary, pale faces, dripping with sweat, too many wailing children, too many trembling lips asking, “Do you know where we could get a room? A bed?” … “Would you tell us where we could find a restaurant, please, Madame?” It prevented the townspeople from being charitable. There was nothing human left in this miserable mob; they were like a herd of frightened animals. Their crumpled clothes, crazed faces, hoarse voices, everything about them made them look peculiarly alike, so you couldn't tell them apart.

Eat a lot of ham & retain a lot of water, Swell until your clothes tear; Go on like this and swell some more, Till you split out the seams of your skin, Itself & don't stop there; But pop all the buttons on your inner self, As well, then for the hard part, Swell & burst out of whatever comes next; Whatever final metaphysical envelope or dark, Is left so you can emerge at last wriggling, & dripping like a shrimp on a fork. --Traditional Sea Chanty

There was a knock on the bedroom door and Romeo stiffened. “What!” he yelled. “I hope no one’s naked, ‘cause I’m coming in!” Braeden hollered. A few seconds later, the door opened and he stepped inside. One of his hands covered his eyes. “Is it safe?” he asked. I giggled. “Is that a no for tacos?” Romeo shook his head and rolled his eyes. “We’re dressed, man.” Braeden dropped the hand over his eyes and he zeroed in on me. It took everything in me not to shrink back from embarrassment. He came across the carpeting and held out my glasses. “Here,” he said. “I figured you might need these.” Ah, that explained why everything still looked so blurry. I slid them on and smiled as my sight adjusted back to normal. I noticed Braeden was soaking wet. “Oh!” I exclaimed. “You have to be freezing!” I rushed around the room, pulling out clothes and socks and tossing them at Braeden’s feet. “Here! Put this stuff on.” “She’s giving away your clothes, man,” Braeden said to Romeo. “Chicks.” He sighed. Braeden shook his head. “You’re dripping on the carpet!” I reminded him. He laughed and went in the bathroom to get dressed. “Just leave your clothes with ours. I’ll wash them for you,” I yelled through the door. He laughed. “Laundry service? Damn! I’m moving in.” Romeo shook his head. I yawned. This entire day was catching up to me. Romeo frowned. “I’ll make everyone leave…” He began. “No!” I exclaimed. “This is your victory party! Go enjoy it. I’ll stay here.” He seemed torn on what to do. Braeden came out wearing Romeo’s clothes (they fit him pretty well) and ran his eyes over me in concern. “You okay?” I nodded. “Did you jump in the pool to get my glasses?” He nodded. “Actually, he jumped in the pool right after I did. In case I needed help towing you out.” Romeo corrected. I glanced at Braeden for confirmation. He shrugged. “What kind of brother would I be if I let you drown?” Without thought, I walked over and wrapped my arms around him. He seemed a little taken aback by my display of affection, but after a minute, he hugged me back. “Thank you,” I whispered. “Anytime, tutor girl.” His voice was soft and his arms tightened around me just slightly. For all his witty humor, sarcastic one-liners, and jokes, Braeden was a really good guy. “We need to teach you to swim.” He observed. I shuddered. “I know how to swim.” “Well, you sank to the bottom like an anchor,” he grumbled.

Epitaph. Not next year, not the next one, Not the year after that. But ages From here, Clad in love stained sleeping bags, Dying with feet wrapped in endless Shirts and pillow cases, Crumbling with 99 flakes clutched Between thumb and palm, dripping Yellow cream from twig fingers, Basking our white haired chests on Green grassed parks under purple Skies. Laughing over coffee after Bath tubs of coffee have passed Through our guts. Huddled, lonely, Under heaped clothes, here lay us...

Seems safe enough,” Cal said, and Aislinn shrugged. “Well, there you go,” she said. Without so much as a “Hey, try not to get killed,” she turned back for the stone hut. I wouldn’t let my eyes follow Aislinn. If I looked back, I was afraid I’d go running after her. Instead I walked out to stand next to Cal. Underfoot, the surface gave slightly. Gingerly, we made our way down the watery road. “Brannicks and magic and hell, oh my,” I joked, and Cal gave a snort of what might have been laughter. I hit a particularly slipper spot and wobbled for a second before Cal grabbed my elbow. I didn’t want it to be awkward, and I really didn’t want my entire face to go red, but that’s exactly what happened. I glanced up. Our eyes met, and Cal jerked his hand back so fast that he overbalanced. As he started to fall, I went to grab him, and the next thing I knew, we both went down. I hit the wall of water to my right, just as Cal slid to the left. I fell into the water, completely immersed, only to have it spit me back out onto the path. I sat there, arms and legs akimbo, hair dripping water into my eyes. Cal sat opposite me, every bit as drenched, looking totally bewildered. Once again, we locked eyes. And this time, we both burst out laughing. “Oh God,” I spluttered. “Your face!” “My face?” he said, his laughter dwindling to a chuckle. “You should see your hair.” He rose to his feet, leaning down to offer me a hand. I took it gratefully. Once I was upright again, I ran my hand in front of my body, magic fluttering out of my fingertips to dry my hair and clothes. Cal did the same to himself, and then we studied each other. “All right, now that the weirdness between us has caused actual physical damage, I think it’s time we talked it out, don’t you?

There were noises coming from the spare bedroom. It sounded like ripping cardboard. There was low muttering. Maddy walked forwards quietly, hearing every footstep against the carpet. She stopped in the doorway and looked into the room. There was a pale, gaunt man sitting cross-legged on the floor, rifling through the boxes. His clothes and skin were wet and dripping. There was sand everywhere. His skin looked waxy, almost blue in places, and she knew immediately that he was a ghost by the strange restlessness he'd brought with him into the room, a restlessness and a clamouring, as if he had just disturbed a colony of nesting seabirds.

What the fuck is this?” he roared, striding into the centre of the room, water dripping from his beard, down through the grizzled white hairs on his chest, off his slapping fruits. It was a strange sight to see. A naked old man confronting three armed Practicals of the Inquisition. Ridiculous, and yet no one was laughing. There was something strangely terrifying about him, even without his clothes and running with wet. It was the Practicals who shifted backwards, confused, scared even. “You’re coming with us,” the woman repeated, though a certain doubt seemed to have entered her voice. One of her companions stepped warily towards Bayaz. Jezal felt a strange sensation in his stomach. A tugging, a sucking, an empty, sick feeling. It was like being back on the bridge, in the shadow of the Maker’s House. Only worse. The wizard’s face had turned terribly hard. “My patience is at an end.” Like a bottle dropped from a great height, the nearest Practical burst apart. There was no thunderclap, only a gentle squelching. One moment he was moving towards the old man, sword raised, entirely whole. The next he was a thousand fragments. Some unknown part of him thudded wetly against the plaster next to Jezal’s head. His sword dropped and rattled on the boards. “You were saying?” growled the First of the Magi.

Make a List (or lists) • Make a list of all the things that you can look at and think: Why did we even bother to move that the last time? Now will be your last and best chance to give or throw away unwanted items until your next move (5-7 years on average). Give unwanted clothes, furniture, kitchen items, etc. to a charity that allows you to use your donation as a tax write-off. Yard sales are another option. • Make a list (and/or get one online) of household hazardous materials. These are common items in your home that are not or might not be safe to transport: flammables like propane tanks (even empty ones), gasoline or kerosene, aerosols or compressed gases (hair spray, spray paint), cleaning fluids in plastic containers (bleach, ammonia) and pesticides (bug spray) and herbicides (weed killer) and caustics like lye or pool acid. There is more likely to be damage caused by leakage of cleaning fluids-- like bleach--than there is by damage caused by a violent explosion or fire in your truck. The problem lies in the fact that any leaking fluid is going to drip its way to the floor and spread out--even in the short time span of your move and more so if you are going up and down hills. Aerosols can explode in the summer heat as can propane BBQ tanks. Gasoline from lawnmowers and pesticide vapors expand in the heat and can permeate everything in the truck. Plastic containers that have been opened can expand and contract with a change in temperature and altitude and crack.

Behind us lay rainy weeks—grey sky, grey fluid earth, grey dying. If we go out, the rain at once soaks through our overcoat and clothing;—and we remain wet all the time we are in the line. We never get dry. Those who will wear high boots tie sand bags round the tops so that the mud does not pour in so fast. The rifles are caked, the uniforms caked, everything is fluid and dissolved, the earth one dripping, soaked, oily mass in which lie yellow pools with red spiral streams of blood and into which the dead, wounded, and survivors slowly sink down. The storm lashes us, out of the confusion of grey and yellow the hail of splinters whips forth the child-like cries of the wounded, and in the night shattered life groans painfully into silence.

Cannery Row in Monterey in California is a poem, a stink, a grating noise, a quality of light, a tone, a habit, a nostalgia, a dream. Cannery Row is the gathered and scattered, tin and iron and rust and splintered wood, chipped pavement and weedy lots and junk heaps, sardine canneries of corrugated iron, honky-tonks, restaurants and whore-houses, and little crowded groceries, and laboratories and flop-houses. Its inhabitants are, as the man once said, "whores, pimps, gamblers, and sons of bitches," by which he meant Everybody. Had the man looked through another peep-hole he might have said: "Saints and angels and martyrs and holy men," and he would have meant the same thing. In the morning when the sardine fleet has made a catch, the purse-seiners waddle heavily into the bay blowing their whistles. The deep-laden boats pull in against the coast where the canneries dip their tails into the bay. The figure is advisedly chosen, for if the canneries dipped their mouths into the bay the canned sardines which emerge from the other end would be metaphorically, at least, even more horrifying. Then cannery whistles scream and all over the town men and women scramble into their clothes and come running down to the Row to go to work. Then shining cars bring the upper classes down: superintendents, accountants, owners who disappear into offices. Then from the town pour Wops and Chinamen and Polaks, men and women in trousers and rubber coats and oilcloth aprons. They come running to clean and cut and pack and cook and can the fish. The whole street rumbles and groans and screams and rattles while the silver rivers of fish pour in out of the boats and the boats rise higher and higher in the water until they are empty. The canneries rumble and rattle and squeak until the last fish is cleaned and cut and cooked and canned and then the whistles scream again and the dripping, smelly, tired Wops and Chinamen and Polaks, men and women, straggle out and droop their ways up the hill into the town and Cannery Row becomes itself again-quiet and magical. Its normal life returns. The bums who retired in disgust under the black cypress-tree come out to sit on the rusty pipes in the vacant lot. The girls from Dora's emerge for a bit of sun if there is any. Doc strolls from the Western Biological Laboratory and crosses the street to Lee Chong's grocery for two quarts of beer. Henri the painter noses like an Airedale through the junk in the grass-grown lot for some pan or piece of wood or metal he needs for the boat he is building. Then the darkness edges in and the street light comes on in front of Dora's-- the lamp which makes perpetual moonlight in Cannery Row. Callers arrive at Western Biological to see Doc, and he crosses the street to Lee Chong's for five quarts of beer. How can the poem and the stink and the grating noise-- the quality of light, the tone, the habit and the dream-- be set down alive? When you collect marine animals there are certain flat worms so delicate that they are almost impossible to capture whole, for they break and tatter under the touch. You must let them ooze and crawl of their own will on to a knife blade and then lift them gently into your bottle of sea water. And perhaps that might be the way to write this book-- to open the page and to let the stories crawl in by themselves.

You can buy some more clothes, by and by, and another stereo and alll that. That’s all right, That’s not the worst. The worst thing is that you slowly begin to hate, to despise this person, this person that you loved. You hate him because he hates himself. And that’s horrible, I swear to feel your love drip out of you, drop by drop, until you empty of it and there’s just a big, hurting hole. It’s terrible, but you wish your friend had died. That way, you could have wept for him and out him away and by and by it would be all right, everything would be clean. You wouldn’t have that filthy taste of contempt and hatred on your tongue, and you wouldn’t have that hurting, empty hole. That hole I got in me right now, that hole which sends burning water and ice-cold water all up and down my spine, every time I think of Red.” He stubbed out his cigarette. “My heart”.

Is this then a touch? . . . . quivering me to a new identity, Flames and ether making a rush for my veins, Treacherous tip of me reaching and crowding to help them, My flesh and blood playing out lightning, to strike what is hardly different from myself, On all sides prurient provokers stiffening my limbs, Straining the udder of my heart for its withheld drip, Behaving licentious toward me, taking no denial, Depriving me of my best as for a purpose, Unbuttoning my clothes and holding me by the bare waist, Deluding my confusion with the calm of the sunlight and pasture fields, Immodestly sliding the fellow-senses away, They bribed to swap off with touch, and go and graze at the edges of me, No consideration, no regard for my draining strength or mu anger, Fetching the rest of the herd around to enjoy them awhile, Then all uniting to stand of a headland and worry me.

Body parts really don’t like to be cut, stabbed or hacked into sections, and they express their anger by leaking all over the fuck. Jesus, we’re, like, seventy percent water or something? And you learn that’s so fucking true when you go to a fresh scene. Pools of it. Drips of it. Speckles of it. Then you got the stained clothes, rugs, bedsheets, walls, flooring—or if it’s outside, the ground cover, the concrete, the asphalt. And then there’s the smell. Blood, sweat, urine, other shit. That juicy bouquet will get in your sinuses and stay there for hours afterward.” He shook his head again. “The older cases . . . the smell is worse than the mess. Water deaths, with the bloating, are just ugly—and if that gas that’s built up gets out? The stench will knock you on your ass. And I don’t know, I wasn’t too crazy for the burn deaths either. I mean, you’d think we’d realize we’re not different than any other mammal—cooked meat is cooked meat, period. But I’ve never seen a grown man puke up his coffee and donuts over a medium rare T-bone.

The rain began the next morning and showed no signs of letting up. Mud sucked at Arin’s boots as he helped Kestrel ready her horse. The rain intensified, dropping down like little stones. Arin squinted up at it. “Terrible day to ride.” He hated to see her go. She wiped water from her face, glancing over at Risha, whose head was tipped back under the rain, eyes closed. “Not for everyone,” Kestrel said, “and the rain will make it less likely a Valorian scout will notice that a small band is riding from camp.” True. The middle distance was a gray fog. Arin raked dripping hair off his brow. He tried to be all right. His nerves sparked the way a blade does against the grinder. Kestrel touched his cheek. “The rain is good for us.” “Come here.” She tasted like the rain: cool and fresh and sweet. Her mouth warmed as he kissed her. He felt the way her clothes stuck to her skin. He forgot himself. She murmured, “I have something for you.” “You needn’t give me anything.” “It’s not a gift. It’s for you to keep safe until I return.” She placed a speckled yellow feather on his palm. The rain fell in a veil behind her.

Separated from everyone, in the fifteenth dungeon, was a small man with fiery brown eyes and wet towels wrapped around his head. For several days his legs had been black, and his gums were bleeding. Fifty-nine years old and exhausted beyond measure, he paced silently up and down, always the same five steps, back and forth. One, two, three, four, five, and turn . . . an interminable shuffle between the wall and door of his cell. He had no work, no books, nothing to write on. And so he walked. One, two, three, four, five, and turn . . . His dungeon was next door to La Fortaleza, the governor’s mansion in Old San Juan, less than two hundred feet away. The governor had been his friend and had even voted for him for the Puerto Rican legislature in 1932. This didn’t help much now. The governor had ordered his arrest. One, two, three, four, five, and turn . . . Life had turned him into a pendulum; it had all been mathematically worked out. This shuttle back and forth in his cell comprised his entire universe. He had no other choice. His transformation into a living corpse suited his captors perfectly. One, two, three, four, five, and turn . . . Fourteen hours of walking: to master this art of endless movement, he’d learned to keep his head down, hands behind his back, stepping neither too fast nor too slow, every stride the same length. He’d also learned to chew tobacco and smear the nicotined saliva on his face and neck to keep the mosquitoes away. One, two, three, four, five, and turn . . . The heat was so stifling, he needed to take off his clothes, but he couldn’t. He wrapped even more towels around his head and looked up as the guard’s shadow hit the wall. He felt like an animal in a pit, watched by the hunter who had just ensnared him. One, two, three, four, five, and turn . . . Far away, he could hear the ocean breaking on the rocks of San Juan’s harbor and the screams of demented inmates as they cried and howled in the quarantine gallery. A tropical rain splashed the iron roof nearly every day. The dungeons dripped with a stifling humidity that saturated everything, and mosquitoes invaded during every rainfall. Green mold crept along the cracks of his cell, and scarab beetles marched single file, along the mold lines, and into his bathroom bucket. The murderer started screaming. The lunatic in dungeon seven had flung his own feces over the ceiling rail. It landed in dungeon five and frightened the Puerto Rico Upland gecko. The murderer, of course, was threatening to kill the lunatic. One, two, three, four, five, and turn . . . The man started walking again. It was his only world. The grass had grown thick over the grave of his youth. He was no longer a human being, no longer a man. Prison had entered him, and he had become the prison. He fought this feeling every day. One, two, three, four, five, and turn . . . He was a lawyer, journalist, chemical engineer, and president of the Nationalist Party. He was the first Puerto Rican to graduate from Harvard College and Harvard Law School and spoke six languages. He had served as a first lieutenant in World War I and led a company of two hundred men. He had served as president of the Cosmopolitan Club at Harvard and helped Éamon de Valera draft the constitution of the Free State of Ireland.5 One, two, three, four, five, and turn . . . He would spend twenty-five years in prison—many of them in this dungeon, in the belly of La Princesa. He walked back and forth for decades, with wet towels wrapped around his head. The guards all laughed, declared him insane, and called him El Rey de las Toallas. The King of the Towels. His name was Pedro Albizu Campos.

Cornwell’s painting is set at Fort Crawford, in Michigan Territory, during St. Martin’s second stint in Beaumont’s employ, around 1830. At this stage in his digestive explorations, Beaumont had been trying to determine whether the gastric juice would work outside of the stomach, removed from the body’s “vital force.” (It does.) He filled vial after vial with St. Martin’s secretions and dropped in all manner of foods. The cabin became a kind of gastric-juice dairy. Beaumont, in the painting, holds one end of a length of gum elastic tubing in St. Martin’s stomach; the other end drips into a bottle in Beaumont’s lap. I spent a good deal of time staring at this painting, trying to parse the relationship between the two. The gulf between their stations is clear. St. Martin wears dungarees worn through at the knees. Beaumont appears in full military dress—brass-buttoned jacket with gold epaulettes, piping-trimmed breeches tucked into knee-high leather boots. “True,” Cornwell seems to be saying, “it’s an unsavory situation for our man St. Martin, but look, just look, at the splendorous man he has the honor of serving.” (Presumably Cornwell took some liberties with the costuming in order to glorify his subject. Anyone who works with hydrochloric acid knows you don’t wear your dress clothes in the lab.)

She stared in horror at the pie table. Each of Nick’s hands had landed in a pie. His gray shirt was splattered with crust and whipped cream and berries. Even worse, his face was completely covered. The pie ladies and the other judges rushed to help, trying to right the remaining pies while keeping Nick from dripping berry juice all over the table. At one time Maddie might have done something as impulsive as push Ashby back. But now she took a step away. When she looked at Ashby, she was holding a pie. Actually, she was a second away from launching it. “Just put down the pie and walk away, and we’ll let bygones be bygones.” Maddie felt like she should be wearing a police uniform and holding a stun gun instead of contemplating arming herself with pies. Ashby tossed her a defiant look and cranked up the pie. “Let’s just talk like civilized—” Too late. Ashby tossed the pie, a direct hit to Maddie’s face. The pie splattered all over—her hair, her clothes, blinding her and covering her nose so she couldn’t breathe. This was war. Maddie scooped enough pie off her face so she could see. “Okay, I guess we’re past talking.” Something devilish came over her, that feeling of pure kicking-someone’s-butt that she hadn’t felt since she was nine and Derrick ambushed her Barbies with his GI Joes and held them for ransom money. Maddie picked up a certain pie from the table. One of Ashby’s. It hovered in Maddie’s hands like a Frisbee. Clearing both her pie eyes for good aim, she let it rip. Fluffs of whipped cream spread everywhere, in Ashby’s perfect hair and all over her designer sundress.

Drat. Daisy pulled back with a frown. She felt guilty that she had enjoyed the kiss so little. And it made her feel even worse when it appeared Llandrindon had enjoyed it quite a lot. “My dear Miss Bowman,” Llandrindon murmured flirtatiously. “You didn’t tell me you tasted so sweet.” He reached for her again, and Daisy danced backward with a little yelp. “My lord, control yourself!” “I cannot.” He pursued her slowly around the fountain until they resembled a pair of circling cats. Suddenly he made a dash for her, catching at the sleeve of her gown. Daisy pushed hard at him and twisted away, feeling the soft white muslin rip an inch or two at the shoulder seam. There was a loud splash and a splatter of water drops. Daisy stood blinking at the empty spot where Llandrindon had been, and then covered her eyes with her hands as if that would somehow make the entire situation go away. “My lord?” she asked gingerly. “Did you… did you just fall into the fountain?” “No,” came his sour reply. “You pushed me into the fountain.” “It was entirely unintentional, I assure you.” Daisy forced herself to look at him. Llandrindon rose to his feet, water streaming from his hair and clothes, his coat pockets filled to the brim. It appeared the dip in the fountain had cooled his passions considerably. He glowered at her in affronted silence. Suddenly his eyes widened, and he reached into one of his water-laden coat pockets. A tiny frog leaped from the pocket and returned to the fountain with a quiet plunk. Daisy tried to choke back her amusement, but the harder she tried the worse it became, until she finally burst out laughing. “I’m sorry,” she gasped, clapping her hands over her mouth, while irrepressible giggles slipped out. “I’m so— oh dear—” And she bent over laughing until tears came to her eyes. The tension between them disappeared as Llandrin don began to smile reluctantly. He stepped from the fountain, dripping from every surface. “I believe when you kiss the toad,” he said dryly, “he is supposed to turn into a prince. Unfortunately in my case it doesn’t seem to have worked.” Daisy felt a rush of sympathy and kindness, even as she snorted with a few last giggles. Approaching him carefully, she placed her small hands on either side of his wet face and pressed a friendly, fleeting kiss on his lips. His eyes widened at the gesture. “You are someone’s handsome prince,” Daisy said, smiling at him apologetically. “Just not mine. But when the right woman finds you… how lucky she’ll be.

Had she witnessed his swim? He didn’t see how she could have missed it if she’d indeed been lunching by the water. The more intriguing question was, had she liked what she’d seen? Ever the scientist, Darius couldn’t let the hypothesis go unchallenged. Ignoring his boots where they lay in the grass at the edge of the landing, he strode barefoot toward his quarry. “So I’m to understand that you lunch by the pond every day, Miss Greyson?” he asked as he stalked her through the shin-high grass. Her chin wobbled just a bit, and she took a nearly imperceptible step back. He’d probably not have noticed it if he hadn’t been observing her so closely. But what kind of scientist would he be if he didn’t attend to the tiniest of details? “Every day,” she confirmed, her voice impressively free of tremors. The lady knew how to put up a strong front. “After working indoors for several hours, it’s nice to have the benefits of fresh air and a change of scenery. The pond offers both.” He halted his advance about a foot away from her. “I imagine the scenery changed a little more than you were expecting today.” His lighthearted tone surprised him nearly as much as it did her. Her brow puckered as if he were an equation she couldn’t quite decipher. Well, that was only fair, since he didn’t have a clue about what he was trying to do, either. Surely not flirt with the woman. He didn’t have time for such vain endeavors. He needed to extricate himself from this situation. At once. Not knowing what else to do, Darius sketched a short bow and begged her pardon as if he were a gentleman in his mother’s drawing room instead of a soggy scientist dripping all over the vegetation. “I apologize for intruding on your solitude, Miss Greyson, and I hope I have not offended you with my . . . ah . . .” He glanced helplessly down at his wet clothing. “Dampness?” The amusement in his secretary’s voice brought his head up. “My father used to be a seaman, Mr. Thornton, and I grew up swimming in the Gulf. You aren’t the first man I’ve seen take a swim.” Though the way her gaze dipped again to his chest and the slow swallowing motion of her throat that followed seemed to indicate that she hadn’t been as unmoved by the sight as she would have him believe. That thought pleased him far more than it should have. “Be that as it may, I’ll take special care not to avail myself of the pond during the midday hours in the future.” He expected her to murmur some polite form of thanks for his consideration, but she didn’t. No, she stared at him instead. Long enough that he had to fight the urge to squirm under her perusal. “You know, Mr. Thornton,” she said with a cock of her head that gave him the distinct impression she was testing her own hypothesis. “I believe your . . . dampness has restored your ability to converse with genteel manners.” Her lips curved in a saucy grin that had his pulse leaping in response. “Perhaps you should swim more often.

Don’t provoke Cheat,” Arin said as they stepped out of the carriage and onto the dusky path that led to the governor’s palace, which looked eerie to Kestrel because its impressive façade was the same as the night before, but the lights burning in the windows were now few. “Kestrel, do you hear me? You can’t toy with him.” “He started it.” “That’s not the point.” Gravel crunched under Arin’s heavy boots as he stalked up the path. “Don’t you understand that he wants you dead? He’d leap at the chance,” Arin said, hands in pockets, head down, almost talking to himself. He strode ahead, his long legs quicker than hers. “I can’t--Kestrel, you must understand that I would never claim you. Calling you a prize--my prize--it was only words. But it worked. Cheat won’t harm you, I swear that he won’t, but you must…hide yourself a little. Help a little. Just tell us how much time we have before the battle. Give him a reason to decide you’re not better off dead. Swallow your pride.” “Maybe that’s not as easy for me as it is for you.” He wheeled on her. “It’s not easy for me,” he said through his teeth. “You know that it’s not. What do you think I have had to swallow, these past ten years? What do you think I have had to do to survive?” They stood before the palace door. “Truly,” she said, “I haven’t the faintest interest. You may tell your sad story to someone else.” He flinched as if slapped. His voice came low: “You can make people feel so small.” Kestrel went hot with shame--then was ashamed of her own shame. Who was he, that she should apologize? He had used her. He had lied. Nothing he said meant anything. If she was to feel shame, it should be for having been so easily fooled. He ran fingers through his cropped hair, but slowly, anger gone, replaced by something heavier. He didn’t look at her. His breath smoked the chill air. “Do what you want to me. Say anything. But it frightens me how you refuse to see the danger you risk with others. Maybe now you’ll see.” He opened the door to the governor’s home. The smell struck her first. Blood and decaying flesh. It pushed at Kestrel’s gut. She fought not to gag. Bodies were piled in the reception hall. Lady Neril was lying facedown, almost in the same place where she had stood the night of the ball, greeting guests. Kestrel recognized her by the scarf in her fist, fabric bright in the guttering torchlight. There were hundreds of dead. She saw Captain Wensan, Lady Faris, Senator Nicon’s whole family, Benix… Kestrel knelt next to him. His large hand felt like cold clay. She could hear her tears drip to his clothes. They beaded on his skin. Quietly, Arin said, “He’ll be buried today, with the others.” “He should be burned. We burn our dead.” She couldn’t look at Benix anymore, but neither could she get to her feet. Arin helped her, his touch gentle. “I’ll make certain it’s done right.” Kestrel forced her legs to move, to walk past bodies heaped like rubble. She thought that she must have fallen asleep after all, and that this was an evil dream. She paused at the sight of Irex. His mouth was the stained purple of the poisoned, but he had sticky gashes in his side, and one final cut to the neck. Even poisoned, he had fought. Tears came again. Arin’s hold tightened. He pushed her past Irex. “Don’t you dare weep for him. If he weren’t dead, I would kill him myself.

A long time ago, I collected the flower petals stained with my first blood; I thought there was something significant about that, there was importance in all the little moments of experience, because when you live forever, the first times matter. The first time you bleed, first time you cry — I don’t remember that — first time you see your wings, because new things defile you, purity chips away. your purity. nestled flowers in your belly, waiting to be picked. do you want innocence back? small and young smiles that make your eyes squint and cheeks flare the feeling of your face dripping down onto the grass, the painted walls you tore down, the roads you chipped away, they’ll eat away at you, the lingering feelings of a warm hand on your waist, the taps of your feet as you dance, the beats of your timbrel.’ ‘and now you are like Gods, sparkling brilliant with jewelry that worships you, and you’re splitting in order to create.’ ‘The tosses of your wet hair, the rushes of chariots speeding past, the holy, holy, holy lord god of hosts, the sweetness of a strawberry, knocks against the window by your head, the little tunes of your pipes, the cuts sliced into your fingers by uptight cacti fruits, the brisk scent of a sea crashing into the rocks, the sweat of wrestling, onions, cumin, parsley in a metal jug, mud clinging to your skin, a friendly mouth on your cheeks and forehead, chimes, chirps of chatter in the bazaar, amen, amen, amen, the plump fish rushing to take the bread you toss, scraping of a carpenter, the hiss of chalk, the wisps of clouds cradling you as you nap, the splashes of water in a hot pool, the picnic in a meadow, the pounding of feet that are chasing you, the velvet of petals rustling you awake, a giant water lily beneath you, the innocent kiss, the sprawl of the universe reflected in your eyes for the first time, the bloody wings that shred out of your back, the apples in orchards, a basket of stained flowers, excited chants of a colosseum audience, the heat of spinning and bouncing to drums and claps, the love braided into your hair, the trickles of a piano, smell of myrrh, the scratches of a spoon in a cup, the coarseness of a carpet, the stringed instruments and trumpets, the serene smile of not knowing, the sleeping angel, the delight of a creator, the amusement of gossip and rumors, the rumbling laughter between shy singing, the tangling of legs, squash, celery, carrot, and chayote, the swirled face paint, the warmth of honey in your tea, the timid face in the mirror, mahogany beams, the embrace of a bed of flowers, the taste of a grape as its fed to you, the lip smacks of an angel as you feed him a raspberry, the first dizziness of alcohol, the cool water and scent of natron and the scratch of the rock you beat your dirty clothes against, the strain of your arms, the columns of an entrance, the high ceilings of a dark cathedral, the boiling surface of bubbling stew, the burn of stained-glass, the little joyous jump you do seeing bread rise, the silky taste of olive oil, the lap of an angel humming as he embroiders a little fox into his tunic, the softness of browned feathers lulling you to sleep, the weight of a dozen blankets and pillows on your small bed, the proud smile on the other side of a window in a newly-finished building, the myrtle trees only you two know about, the palm of god as he fashions you from threads of copper, his praises, his love, his kiss to your hair, your father.

SCENE 24 “Tiens, Ti Jean, donne ce plat la a Shammy,” my father is saying to me, turning from the open storage room door with a white tin pan. “Here, Ti Jean, give this pan to Shammy.” My father is standing with a peculiar French Canadian bowleggedness half up from a crouch with the pan outheld, waiting for me to take it, anxious till I do so, almost saying with his big frowning amazed face “Well my little son what are we doing in the penigillar, this strange abode, this house of life without roof be-hung on a Friday evening with a tin pan in my hand in the gloom and you in your raincoats—” “II commence a tombez de la neige” someone is shouting in the background, coming in from the door (“Snow’s startin to fall”)—my father and I stand in that immobile instant communicating telepathic thought-paralysis, suspended in the void together, understanding something that’s always already happened, wondering where we were now, joint reveries in a dumb stun in the cellar of men and smoke … as profound as Hell … as red as Hell.—I take the pan; behind him, the clutter and tragedy of old cellars and storage with its dank message of despair–mops, dolorous mops, clattering tear-stricken pails, fancy sprawfs to suck soap suds from a glass, garden drip cans–rakes leaning on meaty rock–and piles of paper and official Club equipments– It now occurs to me my father spent most of his time when I was 13 the winter of 1936, thinking about a hundred details to be done in the Club alone not to mention home and business shop–the energy of our fathers, they raised us to sit on nails– While I sat around all the time with my little diary, my Turf, my hockey games, Sunday afternoon tragic football games on the toy pooltable white chalkmarked … father and son on separate toys, the toys get less friendly when you grow up–my football games occupied me with the same seriousness of the angels–we had little time to talk to each other. In the fall of 1934 we took a grim voyage south in the rain to Rhode Island to see Time Supply win the Narragansett Special–with Old Daslin we was … a grim voyage, through exciting cities of great neons, Providence, the mist at the dim walls of great hotels, no Turkeys in the raw fog, no Roger Williams, just a trolley track gleaming in the gray rain– We drove, auguring solemnly over past performance charts, past deserted shell-like Ice Cream Dutchland Farms stands in the dank of rainy Nov.—bloop, it was the time on the road, black tar glisten-road of thirties, over foggy trees and distances, suddenly a crossroads, or just a side-in road, a house, or bam, a vista gray tearful mists over some half-in cornfield with distances of Rhode Island in the marshy ways across and the secret scent of oysters from the sea–but something dark and rog-like.— J had seen it before … Ah weary flesh, burdened with a light … that gray dark Inn on the Narragansett Road … this is the vision in my brain as I take the pan from my father and take it to Shammy, moving out of the way for LeNoire and Leo Martin to pass on the way to the office to see the book my father had (a health book with syphilitic backs)— SCENE 25 Someone ripped the pooltable cloth that night, tore it with a cue, I ran back and got my mother and she lay on it half-on-floor like a great poolshark about to take a shot under a hundred eyes only she’s got a thread in her mouth and’s sewing with the same sweet grave face you first saw in the window over my shoulder in that rain of a late Lowell afternoon. God bless the children of this picture, this bookmovie. I’m going on into the Shade.

SCENE 24 “Tiens, Ti Jean, donne ce plat la a Shammy,” my father is saying to me, turning from the open storage room door with a white tin pan. “Here, Ti Jean, give this pan to Shammy.” My father is standing with a peculiar French Canadian bowleggedness half up from a crouch with the pan outheld, waiting for me to take it, anxious till I do so, almost saying with his big frowning amazed face “Well my little son what are we doing in the penigillar, this strange abode, this house of life without roof be-hung on a Friday evening with a tin pan in my hand in the gloom and you in your raincoats—” “II commence a tombez de la neige” someone is shouting in the background, coming in from the door (“Snow’s startin to fall”)—my father and I stand in that immobile instant communicating telepathic thought-paralysis, suspended in the void together, understanding something that’s always already happened, wondering where we were now, joint reveries in a dumb stun in the cellar of men and smoke … as profound as Hell … as red as Hell.—I take the pan; behind him, the clutter and tragedy of old cellars and storage with its dank message of despair–mops, dolorous mops, clattering tear-stricken pails, fancy sprawfs to suck soap suds from a glass, garden drip cans–rakes leaning on meaty rock–and piles of paper and official Club equipments– It now occurs to me my father spent most of his time when I was 13 the winter of 1936, thinking about a hundred details to be done in the Club alone not to mention home and business shop–the energy of our fathers, they raised us to sit on nails– While I sat around all the time with my little diary, my Turf, my hockey games, Sunday afternoon tragic football games on the toy pooltable white chalkmarked … father and son on separate toys, the toys get less friendly when you grow up–my football games occupied me with the same seriousness of the angels–we had little time to talk to each other. In the fall of 1934 we took a grim voyage south in the rain to Rhode Island to see Time Supply win the Narragansett Special–with Old Daslin we was … a grim voyage, through exciting cities of great neons, Providence, the mist at the dim walls of great hotels, no Turkeys in the raw fog, no Roger Williams, just a trolley track gleaming in the gray rain– We drove, auguring solemnly over past performance charts, past deserted shell-like Ice Cream Dutchland Farms stands in the dank of rainy Nov.—bloop, it was the time on the road, black tar glisten-road of thirties, over foggy trees and distances, suddenly a crossroads, or just a side-in road, a house, or bam, a vista gray tearful mists over some half-in cornfield with distances of Rhode Island in the marshy ways across and the secret scent of oysters from the sea–but something dark and rog-like.— J had seen it before … Ah weary flesh, burdened with a light … that gray dark Inn on the Narragansett Road … this is the vision in my brain as I take the pan from my father and take it to Shammy, moving out of the way for LeNoire and Leo Martin to pass on the way to the office to see the book my father had (a health book with syphilitic backs)— SCENE 25 Someone ripped the pooltable cloth that night, tore it with a cue, I ran back and got my mother and she lay on it half-on-floor like a great poolshark about to take a shot under a hundred eyes only she’s got a thread in her mouth and’s sewing with the same sweet grave face you first saw in the window over my shoulder in that rain of a late Lowell afternoon. God bless the children of this picture, this bookmovie. I’m going on into the Shade.

He loves you,’ I said, and smoothed the tumbled hair off her flushed face. ‘He won’t stop.’ I got up, brushing yellow leaves from my skirt. ‘We’ll have a bit of time, then, but none to waste. Jamie can send word downriver, to keep an eye out for Roger. Speaking of Roger …’ I hesitated, picking a bit of dried fern from my sleeve. ‘I don’t suppose he knows about this, does he?’ Brianna took a deep breath, and her fist closed tight on the leaf in her hand, crushing it. ‘Well, see, there’s a problem about that,’ she said. She looked up at me, and suddenly she was my little girl again. ‘It isn’t Roger’s.’ ‘What?’ I said stupidly. ‘It. Isn’t. Roger’s. Baby,’ she said, between clenched teeth. I sank down beside her once more. Her worry over Roger suddenly took on new dimensions. ‘Who?’ I said. ‘Here, or there?’ Even as I spoke, I was calculating – it had to be someone here, in the past. If it had been a man in her own time, she’d be farther along than two months. Not only in the past, then, but here, in the Colonies. I wasn’t planning to have sex, she’d said. No, of course not. She hadn’t told Roger, for fear he would follow her – he was her anchor, her key to the future. But in that case – ‘Here,’ she said, confirming my calculations. She dug in the pocket of her skirt, and came out with something. She reached toward me, and I held out my hand automatically. ‘Jesus H. Roosevelt Christ.’ The worn gold wedding band sparked in the sun, and my hand closed reflexively over it. It was warm from being carried next to her skin, but I felt a deep coldness seep into my fingers. ‘Bonnet?’ I said. ‘Stephen Bonnet?’ Her throat moved convulsively, and she swallowed, head jerking in a brief nod. ‘I wasn’t going to tell you – I couldn’t; not after Ian told me about what happened on the river. At first I didn’t know what Da would do; I was afraid he’d blame me. And then when I knew him a little better – I knew he’d try to find Bonnet – that’s what Daddy would have done. I couldn’t let him do that. You met that man, you know what he’s like.’ She was sitting in the sun, but a shudder passed over her, and she rubbed her arms as though she was cold. ‘I do,’ I said. My lips were stiff. Her words were ringing in my ears. I wasn’t planning to have sex. I couldn’t tell … I was afraid he’d blame me. ‘What did he do to you?’ I asked, and was surprised that my voice sounded calm. ‘Did he hurt you, baby?’ She grimaced, and pulled her knees up to her chest, hugging them against herself. ‘Don’t call me that, okay? Not right now.’ I reached to touch her, but she huddled closer into herself, and I dropped my hand. ‘Do you want to tell me?’ I didn’t want to know; I wanted to pretend it hadn’t happened, too. She looked up at me, lips tightened to a straight white line. ‘No,’ she said. ‘No, I don’t want to. But I think I’d better.’ She had stepped aboard the Gloriana in broad daylight, cautious, but feeling safe by reason of the number of people around; loaders, seamen, merchants, servants – the docks bustled with life. She had told a seaman on the deck what she wanted; he had vanished into the recesses of the ship, and a moment later, Stephen Bonnet had appeared. He had on the same clothes as the night before; in the daylight, she could see that they were of fine quality, but stained and badly crumpled. Greasy candle wax had dripped on the silk cuff of his coat, and his jabot had crumbs in it. Bonnet himself showed fewer marks of wear than did his clothes; he was fresh-shaven, and his green eyes were pale and alert. They passed over her quickly, lighting with interest. ‘I did think ye comely last night by candlelight,’ he said, taking her hand and raising it to his lips. ‘But a-many seem so when the drink is flowin’. It’s a good deal more rare to find a woman fairer in the sun than she is by the moon.

As he sat up, he heard soft dripping sounds from the bathroom, little plips like water slipping over the edges of the tub and into the floor. The hairs on the back of his neck rose as he realized where he‟d last heard that sound. His muscles tight with strain from his earlier exertions, he stood and walked warily toward the half open bathroom door and the tub beyond it. Slipping quietly past the door, he saw that the curtain was drawn, and again the shadowed figure lay behind it. One long, slim, leg dangled from the end of the tub, beads of water gliding down its length and off the polished toes. At the other end he saw a mass of auburn curls, matted deep red near the porcelain of the tub. It was the dream and the vision again, more real now, too strong to deny. Shaking, he moved toward the curtain, gagging on the sickly smell of rust and roses, feeling the thin nylon glide between thumb and palm as he pulled it back to reveal his darkest nightmare and deepest regret. He could see the crimson water now, blood bubbles gliding over its surface and clinging to the legs dangling over the tub‟s edge. When he‟d pulled the curtain completely away from the tub and around to its opposite side, he saw her face. Her eyes were closed and he saw that her lids were bruised and purple against the translucent paleness of her face, drained completely dead white under the makeup she‟d brushed on before she‟d died. Staggering by the sight of her, he knelt by the tub and extended one shaking hand to touch her cheek. It all seemed as if he‟d walked into a horror film and once again he needed to prove to his mind that this wasn‟t real. His hand shook as he lifted it nearer to her flesh, waiting for the corpse, the supposedly dead and buried to move. He touched his quivering fingers to her face, feeling its claylike reality. The sensation caused an immediate shudder of revulsion and he fought not to vomit. Even as the moment came, the sight of her moving in the water startled him and he jumped away from the tub. It wasn‟t an obvious movement at first, only soft breaths moving in and out of her nostrils, but then her chest rose and fell with it and he quaked, feeling unstable where he knelt on the floor. Her eyes opened next and he felt the blood fall out of his face, wanting to scream but too afraid he would cause her to take some action, to reach out and touch him, proving well and forever that he was indeed insane. Scream and you might as well slit your own throat. He swallowed the scream like a rock and stared as her eyes moved slowly in their sockets, locking on him. Slowly, as if she‟d lost control of her muscles, she rose from the tub and looked down at him, smiling. Blood water slid down her bare body, over her neck, down her back and the smooth ridges of her breasts, to slip slowly down her thighs and down over her calves. A puddle spread on the floor, and as it extended toward him he struggled to his feet, skittering away from it. As he watched it spread, he shivered, weak as he started to cry frantic, horrified tears. Breaking down, he looked back up at her face and slipped to the floor once more, his knees incapable of sustaining his own weight. The smile grew wider as she strode to his shivering form, thrown on his side and struggling to rise. The blood water seeped into his clothes, making him sick, a drop of it trickling along the lobe of his ear and into it. And then she leaned down, holding those dim, stained curls of auburn out of her face and tucking them behind her ear. Her lips parted, blue beneath the strong crimson red of her lipstick, and she spoke into his ear with the chill breath of the dead. His eyes grew wide and horrified as she spoke, the hair on his neck rising, sending a maddening shiver of fear through him. “I‟ve returned, Raven.” She whispered “And I want what is mine.” The last thing he saw before his mind, finally, thankfully, shut down was her face in front of his. They were pursed for a kiss.

He saw a few wooly beasts gnawing at the final slivers of flesh on an armless carcass that was still twitching. The sight he beheld was more ghastly than anything he had ever experienced. This side of the plane was in a state of unbridled chaos and bloodlust with body parts, intermingled with shreds of internal organs, matted hair, and blood-encrusted clothing strewn up and down the aisle. Eyeballs, noses, fingers, toes, teeth, pieces of tongues torn out by the roots, and parts of ears were scattered in heaps like trail mix upon the carpet. Blood, gore, and brains dripped from the ceiling and pooled into grisly puddles on the floor.

He doesn’t let me argue further as he returns to his room. I pray for my sanity that he clothes himself, because the last thing I need is the image of Blake’s naked torso dripping in sweat.

Aaarrgghheeee….” There was a pounding of feet and a yell that would make a ninja master proud. I spun around just as Shawn dashed past me in a mindless panic. Before I could understand the reason behind his mad dash for freedom, I felt the brush of feathers. A black swan was madly flapping his wings and chasing after my boyfriend, reaching his long neck to peck at his butt. Shawn ran for his life, darting across the lawn and running in a circle before making his way back toward me. “Shawn!” I gasped in shock and panic. He attempted to jump over a small tree in the garden, but caught his foot and went sprawling on the lakeside path, knocking me off balance as he fell. I took a step backward with the impact of his body against mine, but there was nothing behind me apart from lake. The water was knee deep, and I fell, spread eagle on my back, and splashed into it without hurting myself. But it was cold, wet, and dirty. Birds scattered in fright as I picked myself up with disgust. Ow, help, ow, help, ow, get off, ow.” Shawn was still yelling, and I looked up to see a swan attacking his prone body, pecking at his arms, legs, and face. His mother came to the rescue, using her handbag like a battle-ax, knocking the bird away from Shawn, then swinging the bag in front of the swan’s face until he gave up the fight and retreated to the water. I climbed out of the lake, dripping and stinking like a sewer. “Shawn?” There was blood on his clothes, and my heart stopped. “Shawn? Baby? You’re bleeding.” He sat up gingerly and inspected a couple of peck marks on his arms before touching his chin. “Oh, fiddlesticks,” he exclaimed. “I hit my chin when I fell. How bad is it, Harley?” Still soaking wet, I drove him to the hospital, where Christine exclaimed with delight over his injuries before the doctor slipped in three stitches under his chin. Christine patched up his peck marks and cleaned his grazed palms before we went home.

In the other method, the potro, a type of waterboarding (the Inquisition considered waterboarding a form of torture), the victim was tied lying down on a trellis with the head in a depression lower than the feet. The head was bound with an iron band, while tight cords tied the victim’s arms and legs to the trellis. The toca, a linen strip, was stuffed into the mouth. A jar holding about a quart of water dripped onto the toca, slowly saturating it, and thereby giving the victim the impression of drowning. The victim would flail about, but the movements of the limbs only made the restraints, sometimes tightened by tourniquets twisted into the cords, dig into the victim’s flesh. The intensity of the torture session could be measured by the amount of water consumed. A lengthy session would require six or eight jars. The victim, male or female, wore no or minimal clothing during the torture session. Nudity induced shame, but the primary reason for nudity was that clothes interfered with the torture restraints.

Hair Spells #2 – To Make Your Hair Grow Items needed to perform this spell: 1 candle (any color).  A cloth.  Dirt. Water.   Light the candle and allow the wax to drip into the water while saying the following:   Colored wax infest this water, And from the flame make it grow hotter, And from the mixture soon to be, Grow some hair for all to see.   Then mix in the dirt while chanting:   From within this dirt small seeds do be, Way to small for thee to see, Yet from the life force in the seeds, Hair shall grow like nasty weeds.   Once you have a thick mixture, stop and use the cloth to strain the muddy water. It is this muddy water which contains the hair growing magic. This water should then be mixed with shampoo and applied to your head to help your hair grow.           Diet

She didn’t look at me even once, Sean thought, feeling an icy chill of disappointment, far colder than the pool water. Abruptly aware that he was still standing in the pool, fully dressed, looking like an idiot, he hauled himself out. Hal’s obvious concern had transmuted into narrow-eyed disapproval. Sean pretended not to notice. He was too preoccupied to deal with Hal right now, too busy trying to figure out what might be going on in Lily’s head. Damn it, why couldn’t things ever be simple between Lily and him? With a grimace, he emptied his dripping pockets, dumping his wallet and ruined cell phone onto the deck. He grabbed his sodden towel and made a halfhearted attempt to blot his dripping clothes. Thank God his drenched clothing hid the evidence of his arousal. Fierce need still clawed, its talons deep. If Sean hadn’t been damned sure Hal would hurl himself in a flying tackle if he tried it, he would have marched right into the ladies’ locker room and dragged Lily back where she belonged: in his arms. Arms that ached from the loss of her.

The tide surged, carving a crescent in the sand. Water collapsed against my knees, tearing the beach out from under my legs. But when the wave receded, the foam clung to something dark. Something long and still. I saw his face, lashes tangled over blue lids, his lips parted against the sand. The breeze rippled off his clothes, ocean peeling from his face and dripping onto my hands. I was steeled there, not sure if he was real, until I saw his eyes, a flash of his dark pupils. My

The single eye of his machine collects the event: this fragile body, which, shed of clothes, is now like a dark sapling whipped about in the wind. The tire is flung around the boy. He is losing consciousness but revives with sudden panic when he is doused with petrol. From the distance, two traffic officers, the ones they call Yellow Fever, watch. The splashing liquid is lighter than water, it is fragrant, it drips off him, beads in his woolly hair. He glistens. The begging stops. He stops begging and he is not yet lit. The whites of his eyes are bright as lamps. And then only the last thing, which is soon supplied. The fire catches with a loud gust, and the crowd gasps and inches back. The boy dances furiously but, hemmed down by the tire, quickly goes prone, and still. The most vivid moment in the fire’s life passes, and its color dulls and fizzes out. The crowd, chattering and sighing, momentarily sated, melts away. The man with the digicam lowers his machine. He, too, disappears. Traffic quickly reconstitutes around the charred pile. The air smells of rubber, meat, and exhaust.

After Jonathan, wearing only his pajamas, jumped out of his bedroom window in the middle of the night & met with Leopold, who awaited him in the garden, the two went to the stable and put a three-meter-long hemp rope in a bricklayer's bag splattered with quicklime. On a September night, under the light of the moon, they walked with the rope up the village street, passing the calvary, not noticing the devil's red wings, which were stretched to the point of tearing—Lucifer was sweating blood—and then up the hill of the parish house into the barn. In the empty barn full of dusty cobwebs—the parish house was unoccupied at the time—they climbed a wooden ladder to the crossbeam. The two boys tied the two ends of rope behind their ears and jumped into the emptiness, weeping and embracing, a few meters from the armless Christ who had once been rescued from a stream bed by the priest and painter of prayer cards and who now stood in the entranceway of the parish house, gasping and smelling the blood sweated out by the devil in the calvary. With their tongues out, their sexes stiff, their semen-flecked pants dripping urine, Jonathan in pajamas and Leopold in his quicklime-splattered bricklayer's clothes, they hung in the barn of the parish house until they were found by Jonathan's sixteen-year-old cousin, who shined the beam of his flashlight across their four dangling legs twenty-four hours later, and were cut down with a butcher's knife by Adam the Third.

Until this night, this awful night, he’d had a little joke about himself. He didn’t know who he was, or where he’d come from, but he knew what he liked. And what he liked was all around him-the flower stands on the corners, the big steel and glass buildings filled with milky evening light, the trees, of course, the grass beneath his feet. And the telephones-it didn’t matter. He liked to figure them out, master them, then crush them into tiny hard multicolored balls which he could then juggle or toss through plate glass windows when nobody was about. He liked piano music, the motion pictures, and the poems he found in books. He also liked the automobiles that burnt oil from the earth like lamps. And the great jet planes that flew on the same scientific principles, above the clouds. He always stopped and listened to the people laughing and talking up there when one of the people laughing and talking up there when one of the planes flew overhead. Driving was an extraordinary pleasure. In a silver Mercedes-Benz, he had sped on smooth empty roads from Rome to Florence to Venice in one night. He also liked television-the entire electric process of it, with tiny bits of lights. How soothing it was to have the company of the television, the intimacy with so many artfully painted faces speaking to you in friendship from the glowing screen. The rock and roll, he liked that too. He liked the music. He liked the Vampire Lestat singing “Requiem for the Marquise”. He didn’t pay attention to the words much. It was the melancholy and the dark undertone of drums and cymbals. Made him want to dance. He liked the giant yellow machines that dug into the earth late at night in the big cities with men in uniforms, crawling all over them; he liked the double-decker buses of London, and the people-the clever mortals everywhere-he liked, too, of course. He liked walking in Damascus during the evening, and seeing in sudden flashes of disconnected memory the city of the ancients. Romans, Greeks, Persians, Egyptians in these streets. He liked the libraries where he could find photographs of ancient monuments in big smooth good-smelling books. He took his own photographs of the new cities around him and sometimes he could put images on those pictures which came from his thoughts. For example, in his photograph of Rome there were Roman people in tunics and sandals superimposed upon the modern versions in their thick ungraceful clothes. Oh, yes, much to like around him always-the violin music of Bartók, little girls in snow white dresses coming out of the church at midnight having sung at the Christmas mass. He liked the blood of his victims too, of course. That went without saying. It was no part of his little joke. Death was not funny to him. He stalked his prey in silence; he didn’t want to know his victims. All a mortal had to do was speak to him and he was turned away. Not proper, as he saw it, to talk to these sweet, soft-eyed things and then gobble their blood, break their bones and lick the marrow, squeeze their limbs to dripping pulp. And that was the way he feasted now, so violently. He felt no great need for blood anymore; but he wanted it. And the desire overpowered him in all its ravening purity, quite apart from the thirst. He could have feasted upon three or four mortals a night.

Charlotte stood, her gaze instantly connecting with Rothbury's. A zing of awareness tingled down her spine. Dripping with sensuality, the earl stood with his back to the wall, his stance, as always, exuding a lazy confidence. The damp spring air in the crowded room caused his dark-blond locks to curl slightly where wisps had escaped the velvet queue secured behind his neck. He wore no costume, no mask, which of course wasn't required, therefore catching the eye of every warm-blooded female within a two-hundred-foot radius. It wasn't an exaggeration. The sighs of feminine appreciation surrounded Charlotte. Though she found it slightly ridiculous, she could not find it in herself to blame them. He was simply that fetching. His expertly cut dark gray coat hugged his broad shoulders, and his stark white cravat, frothy with elegant folds, emphasized his chiseled chin, gold with faint bristles. And his mouth- oh, that glorious mouth- both haughty and wicked, curving with his ever-present sagacious grin. Lord, what it must feel like to have those lips touch one's own. Charlotte gave an appreciative sigh, drinking up the sight of him. For a masquerade, his plain evening clothes on any other man would have lent him to fade into the background. But not Rothbury. Dear heavens, no. It only added to his sinful, blush-inducing appeal.

It was like somebody had pulled a plug somewhere. The '50s chicks being brought up all very jolly hockey sticks, and then somewhere there seemed to be a moment when they just decided they wanted to let themselves go. The opportunity arose for them to do that, and who's going to stop them? It was all dripping with sexual lust, though they didn't know what to do about it. But suddenly you're on the end of it. It's a frenzy. Once it's let out, it's an incredible force. You stood as much chance in a fucking river full of piranhas. They were beyond what they wanted to be. They'd lost themselves. These chicks were coming out there, bleeding, clothes torn off, pissed panties, and you took that for granted every night. That was the gig.

Illusions, illusions, he interrupted. You are a tomb, not a church. Faith is dead. No one believes anymore, no one bows his head. You are so cold. There is no life in you. You are all marble and dead metal. You have transformed everything into dead matter. You have denied life. You have preached mortification and asceticism. You have terrified the world with the gaunt faces of martyrs, instead of delighting it with a smile and cheerful faith. How chilling are your crucifixes, chalices, and reliquaries! The roses of your altar drip blood from their leaves. Your altar cloths have the pallor of a corpse’s vesture. Your chapels resemble jail cells. And what darkness in your depths!

Yes, sir,” the butler agreed as he handed me my boots and a fresh set of clothes. “Lunch is ready in the dining hall.” I nodded shakily before I followed the man down the hall, and I could already tell by the delicious smell that he’d nailed the burger endeavor. The scent of grilled onions and melted cheese wafted through the mansion like a beacon of hope, and I took deep, mouthwatering breaths until I made it to the table. Then I clutched my clothes against my chest as I took in the sight of over a dozen burgers with glistening, buttered buns, two-inch thick patties, and all the fixings packed in so tight, they dripped down the sides. Extra toppings were neatly lined on platters while little bowls of what looked a lot like ketchup and mustard dotted the table, and there was even a frothing mug of ale waiting beside my place setting. “Alfred, how much do I pay you?” I asked. “An exorbitant amount, sir,” the butler assured me. I clapped him on the shoulder. “Double it.” “Certainly, sir.

than she was deep. Her shallow draft let her go up rivers or right onto beaches without damage, but her passage over deeper water left a lot to be desired. She sidled along, with here a dip and there a curtsy, like a bundle-laden farm wife making her way through a crowded market. We seemed to be the sole cargo. A deckhand gave me a couple of apples to share with the horses, but little talk. So after I had parceled out the fruit, I settled myself near them on their straw and took Chade’s advice about resting. The winds were kind to us, and the captain took us in closer to the looming cliffs than I’d have thought possible, but unloading the horses from the vessel was still an unpleasant task. All of Chade’s lecturing and warnings had not prepared me for the blackness of night on the water. The lanterns on the deck seemed pathetic efforts, confusing me more with the shadows they threw than aiding me with their feeble light. In the end, a deckhand rowed Chade to shore in the ship’s dory. I went overboard with the reluctant horses, for I knew Sooty would fight a lead rope and probably swamp the dory. I clung to Sooty and encouraged her, trusting her common sense to take us toward the dim lantern on shore. I had a long line on Chade’s horse, for I didn’t want his thrashing too close to us in the water. The sea was cold, the night was black, and if I’d had any sense, I’d have wished myself elsewhere, but there is something in a boy that takes the mundanely difficult and unpleasant and turns it into a personal challenge and an adventure. I came out of the water dripping, chilled, and completely exhilarated. I kept Sooty’s reins and coaxed Chade’s horse in. By the time I had them both under control, Chade was beside me, lantern in hand, laughing exultantly. The dory man was already away and pulling for the ship. Chade gave me my dry things, but they did little good pulled on over my dripping clothes. “Where’s the path?” I asked, my voice shaking with my shivering. Chade gave a derisive snort. “Path? I had a quick look while you were pulling in my horse. It’s no path, it’s no more than the course the water takes when it runs off down the cliffs. But it will have to do.” It was a little better than he had reported, but not much. It was narrow and steep and the gravel on it was loose underfoot. Chade went before with the lantern. I followed, with the horses in tandem.

To the right the reptilian bodies flew up and aside, as if bulldozed. Someone strong and very motivate was tearing down the battlefield. "What the hell is that?" Alix said. "That's my honey-bunny." Curran burst into the open, a seven-and-a-half-foot-tall monster clothed in steel muscle and gray fur. Faint stripes crossed his limbs like dark whip marks. Blood dripped from his clawed hands. On the left side, a patch of his skin was missing, muscle exposed and raw. He grabbed the nearest lizard, twisted it with a loud snap, and tossed it aside. "Hey, baby." "Hi." I beheaded a lizard. "Where are the kids?" "With the MSDU." He disemboweled a beast with a quick swipe of his claws. "You're having all this fun without me." "I'm not doing much. Just having tea and cookies." I cut at another lizard. "Thinking deep thoughts." I love you. "Then I'll join you." He loved me, too.

Caleb rode up just as she was trying to submerge herself in an ice-cold creek no more than six inches deep. Calmly he hung his hat on the horn of his saddle, then he put his hands on his hips, an infuriating grin spreading across his face. “Ants?” he inquired cordially. He was at once the first and last person Lily would have wanted to see. She sat up in the creek, her hair dripping, her arms covering her breasts, ants banished at last. Her legs and bottom were so numb from the cold that she couldn’t even feel them. Teeth chattering, she made a strangled sound of rage and shouted, “G-give me my clothes!” Caleb picked up the trousers and the shirt and the stockings, which were scattered about with abandon, and assessed them with mischief twinkling in his eyes. “These can’t be your things, Lily—they look like they’d belong to a half-grown boy.” Lily struggled to her feet. She didn’t want to show herself to Caleb, but if she stayed in the water any longer she wouldn’t be able to walk. Furiously, shivering with cold, she struggled to the shore. “You know very well they belong to me!” she raged, tearing the clothes from Caleb’s hand and starting to put them on. It

I set out for my first overnight training hike that I have been on since I was on the PCT in May, 2016. Starting at the Roby Lake, Missouri area, I made my way down an unfamiliar trail, with an intentionally overloaded pack. Two tents, two sleeping bags, and just about every piece of gear and trail clothing I own. I didn’t bother to weigh the pack, but it was the heaviest I have ever carried. Some distance into the trail I found a trail register – I stopped to register and was curious to see if I might come across any kindred souls. Nope, not a soul on the trail register for the past 12 days, I would very likely be totally alone. The trail meandered uphill and down, by ponds, and eventually to a nice creek with a small waterfall. Along the way I came to a pine grove atop a ridge and what a mess that was – we recently had freezing rain here in Missouri and it looks like it took out several dozen along the trail – they literally look like they just exploded – with the trail being impassable for about ¼ mile – resulting in some bushwhacking and hopefully me not getting lost. Unlike the PCT where I have Halfmile, Guthooks, and other apps that can tell you that you are 400’ west of the trail, and which direction you need to go to get back on trail, here you just need to pay more attention. When finally done tramping around the blow downs I continued down the trail, and back up on top of another ridge and into some pines. I set up camp about 4:30 PM which would usually be early, but it was dark, cloudy and wet – I wanted to find a decent campsite and took the 2nd one that I thought looked nice. As I set up camp I found I was just above a nice running creek, which made for a nice setting. There was no rain in the forecast but heavy fog came in, which collected on the trees and might as well have been rain. Of course I packed everything, except my rain fly it turned out. Yes I had another tent, but that is my PCT tent and I am not going to chance damaging it before I even get there. I decide it’s not too bad, occasional drips would splatter through the netting but all would be well – and I did have my bivy sack so I put my sleeping bag in there, inside the tent, and made sure most things were covered. There were signs of bear throughout, and I could not locate my paracord rope for hanging my food, so I put the food in my pack, put the pack a ways up a tree, and strapped it on to hope for the best. I had a time getting a campfire going, with everything being wet, but eventually enjoyed a nice campfire until bed time. Unlike being on the PCT where you never really feel alone because there are so many other hikers out there, I knew I was truly alone out here, there were no other footprints in the mud – see the pictures of the trail/river – and this was a bit unusual, really feeling alone and way out there. I enjoyed that. It was one of those nights when every noise piques your curiosity, and every drop falling from the trees landing in leaves sounds like a footstep of some kind – I did hear some animal grunt, possibly a ferel hog, bear, or deer even – couldn’t really tell. Nothing bothered my pack, and all was well in the morning – but much of my gear was wet. I set off back down to the trail head, surprised at how little muscle or back pain I was in considering the workout provided by the trail and the heavy weight I was carrying. I would feel it a bit later however, but that’s a good thing, that’s why I am training – trying to get some sense of trail legs before I hit the PCT exactly 60 days from now! I received my permission to enter Canada, I have my plane tickets, and in 3 more days I will apply for and get my PCT permit for March 21, 2017 – time is flying by… Morgan

After all, he was afraid in his inmost heart of this mighty thing called passion. This storm-wind sweeping away everything settled and authorized and acquired in humanity as if it were dead leaves. He did not like it! This roaring flame squandering itself in its own smoke — no, he wanted to burn slowly. And yet this living on at half speed in quiet waters, always in sight of land, seemed so paltry. Would that the storm and waves would come! If he only knew how, his sails should fly to the yards for a merry run over the Spanish Main of life! Farewell to the slowly dripping days, farewell to the pleasant little hours! Peace be with you, you dull moods that have to be furbished with poetry before you can shine, you lukewarm emotions that have to be clothed in warm dreams and yet freeze to death! May you go to your own place! I am headed for a coast where sentiments twine themselves like luxuriant vines around every fibre of the heart—a rank forest; for every vine that withers, twenty are in blossom; for each one that blossoms, a hundred are in bud. Oh, that I were there!

Howard Schultz, the man who built Starbucks into a colossus, isn’t so different from Travis in some ways.5.22 He grew up in a public housing project in Brooklyn, sharing a two-bedroom apartment with his parents and two siblings. When he was seven years old, Schultz’s father broke his ankle and lost his job driving a diaper truck. That was all it took to throw the family into crisis. His father, after his ankle healed, began cycling through a series of lower-paying jobs. “My dad never found his way,” Schultz told me. “I saw his self-esteem get battered. I felt like there was so much more he could have accomplished.” Schultz’s school was a wild, overcrowded place with asphalt playgrounds and kids playing football, basketball, softball, punch ball, slap ball, and any other game they could devise. If your team lost, it could take an hour to get another turn. So Schultz made sure his team always won, no matter the cost. He would come home with bloody scrapes on his elbows and knees, which his mother would gently rinse with a wet cloth. “You don’t quit,” she told him. His competitiveness earned him a college football scholarship (he broke his jaw and never played a game), a communications degree, and eventually a job as a Xerox salesman in New York City. He’d wake up every morning, go to a new midtown office building, take the elevator to the top floor, and go door-to-door, politely inquiring if anyone was interested in toner or copy machines. Then he’d ride the elevator down one floor and start all over again. By the early 1980s, Schultz was working for a plastics manufacturer when he noticed that a little-known retailer in Seattle was ordering an inordinate number of coffee drip cones. Schultz flew out and fell in love with the company. Two years later, when he heard that Starbucks, then just six stores, was for sale, he asked everyone he knew for money and bought it. That was 1987. Within three years, there were eighty-four stores; within six years, more than a thousand. Today, there are seventeen thousand stores in more than fifty countries.

When afternoon came to Vidyasagar Road, wet clothes ... hung from a clothesline which stretched from one side to another on the veranda of the first floor. The line, which had not been tightly drawn anyway, sagged with the pressure of the heavy wet clothes that dripped, from sleeves and trouser-ends, a curious grey water on to the floor, and, especially in the middle, one noticed the line curved downwards, as if a smile were forming.

Now, how about we have some fun? Want to go jump in the pool? I bet you could make the best cannonballs!” Hugo crossed and uncrossed his hands, indicating that he did not like the idea. “He’s made of dirt,” Kendra said. “Use your brain.” “And rock and clay . . . I thought it would just make him sort of muddy.” “And clog up the filter. You should have Hugo throw you in the pool.” The golem turned his head toward Seth, who shrugged. “Sure, that would be fun.” Hugo nodded, grabbed Seth, and, with a motion like a hook shot, flung him skyward. Kendra gasped. They were still thirty or forty feet away from the edge of the pool. She had pictured the golem carrying Seth much closer before tossing him. Her brother sailed nearly as high as the roof of the house before plummeting down and landing in the center of the deep end with an impressive splash. Kendra ran to the side of the pool. By the time she arrived, Seth was boosting himself out of the water, hair and clothes dripping. “That was the freakiest, awesomest moment of my life!” Seth declared. “But next time, let me take off my shoes.

If you stay in there any longer, the water will be cold, and so will you, Husband. I am not inclined to share a bed with a block of ice.” He remained leaning back against the rim, eyes closed. “Maybe cold water is a good idea, Louisa. Next week isn’t here yet.” “Next week…?” She paused in the middle of folding his clothes into a tidy pile. “What does next week…? Oh.” He rose from the water, climbed out, and stood dripping on the bricks before the hearth. “Next week, when I swive you until we’re neither of us able to walk.” He faced the fire, so Louisa had a marvelous opportunity to admire the wet musculature of his back, legs, and yes, of his taut male fundament. She would not be able to walk? “Surely, you exaggerate.” Or did he? He glanced over his shoulder, as if to make sure he had her attention, then turned to face her. He had not exaggerated. With firelight limning his wet skin in rosy gold, Joseph stood six feet away from Louisa in a condition clearly conducive to procreation. She’d read about this, but nothing in any language could have prepared her for the sudden galloping of her heart at the sight of her unclad, aroused husband. “You need to see what you married, Louisa. The flesh is willing but far from perfect.” He

Our attempts to remain focused on our cards were feverishly diminishing with each ticking second. Gabrielli, the alpha male took charge to dismiss the game. Soon our palpable hands and mouths were on our sensual opponents who were standing next to us. A discarded heap of clothing lay scattered on the floor amidst a sea of entangled bodies, intertwined in pulsating positions on the carpeted floor. Sensual tongues like polished blades pried open voluptuous lips, darting into the inner recesses of our longing souls. Hungry mouths suckled bulbous lengths, savoring dripping emissions before proceeding to lap on globes of quivering balls. Our erections were in readiness to penetrate cruppers of youthful openings, our bodily heat turned full volume, sending shivers through our wrestling spines. The room was electrified with sublime vicissitudes of sexual postulations. We merged as a unified body casting us into the Aleph of timelessness. We were infinite Gods in motion.

At the unexpected sight of Spence, Colbie startled hard. How was it that he was the one who needed glasses and yet she’d not seen him standing against the window? “No, I don’t kill a lot of people,” she said cautiously because she was wearing only a towelin front of a strange man. “But I’m happy to make an exception.” He laughed, a rough rumble that was more than a little contagious but she controlled herself because, hello, she was once again dripping wet before the man who seemed to make her knees forget to hold her up. “I didn’t mean to scare you,” he said and pushed off the wall to come close. She froze, but he held up his hands like, I come in peace, and crouched at her feet to scoop up the clothes she hadn’t realized she’d dropped. Leggings, a long forgiving tee, and the peach silk bra-and-panty set that hadn’t gotten so much as a blink from the TSA guy. But it got one out of Spence. He also swallowed hard as she snatched them back from him. “Hold on,” he said and caught her arm, pulling it toward him to look at her bleeding elbow. “Sit,” he said and gently pushed her down to a weight bench. He vanished into the bathroom and came back out with a first aid kit. It took him less than two minutes to clean and bandage the scrape. Then, easily balanced at her side on the balls of his feet, he did the same for both her knees, which she hadn’t noticed were also scraped up. “You must’ve hit the brick coping as you fell in the fountain,” he said and let his thumb slide over the skin just above one bandaged knee. She shivered, and not from the cold either. “Not going to kiss it better?” she heard herself ask before biting her tongue for running away with her good sense. She’d raised her younger twin brothers. Scrappy, roughhouse wild animals, the both of them, so there’d been plenty of injuries she’d kissed over the years. But no one had ever kissed hers. Not surprising, since most of her injuries tended to be on the inside, where they didn’t show. Still, she was horrified she’d said anything at all. “I didn’t mean—” She broke off, frozen like a deer in the headlights as Spence slowly lowered his head, brushing his lips over the Band-Aid on her elbow, then her knees. When he lifted his head, he pushed his glasses higher on his nose, those whiskey eyes warm and amused behind his lenses. “Better?” Shockingly better. Since she didn’t quite trust her voice at the moment, she gave a jerky nod and took her clothes back into the bathroom. She shut the door and then leaned against it, letting out a slow, deliberate breath. Holy cow, she was out of her league. He was somehow both cute and hot, and those glasses .

I suppose you must feel some bitterness against the historians," Roger ventured. "All the writers who got it wrong--made him out to be a hero. I mean, you can't go anywhere in the Highlands without seeing the Bonnie Prince on toffee tins and souvenir tourist mugs." Claire shook her head, gazing off in the distance. The evening mist was growing heavier, the bushes beginning to drip again from the tips of their leaves. "Not the historians. No, not them. Their greatest crime is that they presume to know what happened, how things come about, when they only have what the past chose to leave them behind--for the most part, they think what they were meant to think, and it's a rare one that sees what really happened, behind the smokescreen of artifacts and paper." There was a faint rumble in the distance. The evening passenger train from London, Roger knew. You could hear the whistle from the manse on clear nights. "No, the fault lies with the artists," Claire went on. The writers, the singers, the tellers of tales. It's them that take the past and re-create it to their liking. Them that could take a fool and give you back a hero, take a sot and make him a king." "Are they all liars, then?" Roger asked. Claire shrugged. In spite of the chilly air, she had taken off the jacket to her suit; the damp molded the cotton shirt to show the fineness of collarbone and shoulder blades. "Liars?" she asked. "Or sorcerers? Do they see the bones in the dust of the earth, see the essence of a thing that was, and clothe it in new flesh, so the plodding beast reemerges as a fabulous monster?

We put our shoes away. I had already purchased the necessary accouterments at the convenience store across the street—shampoo, soap, scrubbing cloth, and towels—and handed Tatsu what he needed as we went in. We paid the proprietor the government-mandated and subsidized four hundred yen apiece, walked up the wide wooden stairs to the changing area, undressed in the unadorned locker room, then went through the sliding glass door to the bath beyond. The bathing area was empty—peak time would be in the evening—and, like the locker room, spartan in its unpretentiousness: nothing more than a large square space, a high ceiling, white tile walls dripping with condensation, bright fluorescent lighting, and an exhaust fan on one wall that seemed to have given up on its long battle with the steam within. The only concession to an aesthetic not strictly utilitarian was a large, brightly colored mosaic of Ginza 4-chome on the wall above the bath itself.

Our philosophy is that home decor shouldn’t be taken too seriously, because we want our homes to reflect who we are, no one else. We want things to be fun and interesting, but we want things we can really live with and around. We want a place where you can use Play-Doh or prop up crusty old cowboy boots on the coffee table. We’re not afraid of candle drippings or drink rings. We believe all these things help our homes tell a tale of love and family. A tale of history and future. A tale of the American experience. Our homes spin the story we want to live in every day. We firmly believe your home should be your sanctuary, where you surround yourself with every sensible and nonsensible thing you love, a place that speaks of where you’ve been and where you’re going. Make no mistake: Our homes are far from perfect! Just beyond the frame of every camera angle is a pile of dirty clothes, three half-unpacked suitcases, and a room still waiting to be decorated. Because that, my friends, is real. C’mon in anyway and stay awhile. Our hope is that you’ll find an idea—a project, a picture, a spark of divine fire—that will inspire you. Because just like the wild woods or the glorious road, like fingerprints or feathers, your home is unique—and it should be uniquely you.

We go back to our silent fishing, but I'm smiling the whole time. The tension has dimmed. Well, until Blake shoves Graham into the river. A gasp leaves me, my mouth hanging open as I watch my roommate sputter to the surface of the dirty water. I drop my fishing pole, frozen in place. My dad mutters, “What the hell?” Blake throws his head back and laughs like I have never seen nor heard him laugh before. The loud and hearty sound is cut off short when Graham comes barreling out of the water, his body aimed straight for him, his eyes daggers of retribution. He lunges for his brother, wrapping his arms around his stomach and heaving him toward the water. Blake stumbles back, landing on his rear just inside the water. The sound of jeans smacking into water is sharp. He swipes water out of his eyes as Graham smirks at him. “What is wrong with you two?” I demand, more annoyed than worried. They seem to be getting along, even if they are being brutish about it. Suddenly I have the attention of two wet men, twin calculating gleams in their eyes. Graham is closest, his steps slow and purposeful as he approaches me. “Don't even think about it.” I put my hands out in front of me to ward him off. His grin deepens as he reaches me. Water drips from his hair down his face to become one with his soggy clothes. “Don't think about what?” A glance over my shoulder tells me a tree, the first form of cover I think of, is too far away. Not one to give up, I move for it anyway, but a wet, strong hand grabs the back of my shirt and pulls me away from where I want to go until I am flush with a cold chest. Cold clothes; warm body, I should say. His skin is burning through the dampness of his shirt. “Graham, I swear, if you throw me in that water, I will never speak to you again.” His voice is low and close as he says, “You make it sound like that wouldn't be a good thing.” I haven't even finished my sound of incredulity before I am gathered into his arms, my arms unconsciously going around his neck to anchor me to him. His touch is gentle, his eyes are smiling. “I mean it. This won't be good for you.” “Oh, I don't know about that.” His arms swing out, and I tighten my hold on him, threatening him even as he is laughing at me. He does it again as we move closer to the water and I glare all my irk at him. “If I go, you go.” He tilts his head as he studies me. His voice is unnaturally sober as he tells me, “That's fine with me.” I don't have time to process that before he lets go of me. I hit the water, refusing to let go of his neck, and we both go under. Lucky for me, the water is only a couple feet deep. Unlucky for Graham, I twist around until I am straddling him, keeping him down with my weight so the only thing above water is his head. I give him a sweet smile. He doesn't return it. “Hi,” I purr. He grunts in response. “Fancy meeting you here.” “What can I say? Where you go, I follow.” I pat his cheek. “That's so sweet.” “I'm a sweet guy.” “So sweet,” I agree. “Hey! You're scaring the fish away.” This from Blake, who is now standing near my father. “The fish love me!” I declare, sweeping my arms out wide and losing my balance. I splash into the water, first laughing, and then choking as water goes down my throat. Graham lifts me out of the water by my shirt. “The weight of your arrogance obviously tipped you over.” “It was more like the air couldn't handle all my splendor.” Half of his mouth lifts. “Something like that.” “Fishing with the three of you is impossible,” Dad grumbles and stomps to the cooler, opening a can of soda and gulping it down

He grunted, then he howled. I guess vinaigrette burns. Ha! I controlled the urge to grin. I leaped atop the dark, glossy table surface—and almost toppled to the floor when my foot caught the hem of my skirt. My amusement faded as I righted myself. I pitched three more platters at him in quick succession. As he rubbed his eyes, he tried to dodge each missile. He only managed to bump into his chair and trip on the edge of the carpet. While he lay there, unable to see, I paused to admire my handiwork. Noodles and vegetables dripped from his saturated clothing. My alien salad, I thought smugly.

Her supple body draped in wet clothes, water dripping from the ends of her lush golden hair, a single water droplet hovering over her thin pink lips. There’s wasn’t anything great about her eyes, but they had a unique penetrating brown gaze. A challenging gaze. Gaze which melted my stone heart when I saw her today after years of distance. Gaze which compelled me to believe I still had that burning desire for her.

I like that word compassion. It’s being aware that all of us fear the imperfections deeply carved into our naked selves. We all cover up. And then we all get stripped bare when the wins become losses. Who do you want standing near you in those moments dripping with disappointment and saturated with sorrow? I can assure you it isn’t people who don’t know the whole story, draped in gold-plated pride with mouths eager to spill out commentary like, “Here’s what you did wrong. I would never have allowed myself to get in this position. If only you would have . . .” Nope. It’s those clothed with garments of understanding. They have personally experienced that this life between two gardens can sometimes make it excruciatingly painful to simply be human. They keep in mind the Bible’s instructions, as we rub shoulders human to human. “Therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience” (Colossians 3:12).

Take a soft tipped brush Dip, and trace my nakedness; Viscous dripping rainbow streams Clothe me here within our dreams.

I stare at the woman in question and wonder what happened to the concept of sisterhood. If women stopped doing this kind of thing to other women, there would be a lot less pain in this world. Men, I'll admit, are probably a lost cause, but we could stop cheating on other women with their husbands, boyfriends, fiancés. Jo props herself up on her elbows and gives me a defiant look which, frankly, I'd like to wipe off her face---preferably with a cricket bat. "Who'd have thought that I'd be seeing so much of you," I say. "And so soon." Marcus's breakfast dish looks rather rattled. "I can explain," Marcus says as he tries to dismount from the table with some dignity. Difficult to pull off. "I'm all ears." "This was the last time," he says earnestly. There are raspberries crushed on his knees. "The last time ever. I was having one last fling before settling down. As soon as you moved in, I was going to be completely and utterly faithful." Jo doesn't look as if she knows about this particular part of the arrangement and she glares darkly at my fiancé. Perhaps she'll be sneaking into his flat and filling his clothes and his shoes with leftovers and leaving stinking prawns in his soft furnishings. Because, for sure, I won't be troubling myself to do it again. "You called to tell me you love me while she was here?" Jo clearly doesn't know about that bit either. Marcus chews his lip. I stare at Marcus as if I'm seeing him for the first time. He looks ridiculous---yogurt on his knob, smears of berry juice all over his chest and legs, breakfast cereal in his hair. I burst out laughing. Marcus laughs too---nervously. "Oh, Marcus," I say, clutching at my sides. "I can't believe you've done this again." I double over and belly laugh right the way up from my boots. "I love you," he says bleakly, and then he continues to laugh along with me, although it sounds forced. When I finally wrest control of my voice once more, I say softly, "I'm not laughing with you, Marcus. I'm laughing at you." Slipping my engagement ring from my finger, I put it delicately into the bowl of yogurt that's lying by Jo's feet. Then, picking it up, I tip the bowl upside down on Marcus's head. Yogurt drips slowly down his face. He licks it from his lips. Perhaps he can get Jo to do it for him when I'm gone. "This really is the very last time you do this to me, Marcus.

Don’t worry—we don’t blame you,” Livvy said when she noticed Amy’s frown. “No one should be held accountable for their ancestors’ mistakes, so long as they learn from them. And now that I’ve thoroughly overwhelmed you with difficult information, let me show you the best part of this room.” She crossed to the ornate silver wardrobe and pulled the doors open, shoving aside the fancy clothes hanging from the rack and knocking on the back. “It has a secret wardrobe passage?” Sophie asked as Livvy twisted a hidden knob and revealed a narrow doorway that led to a lush, airy conservatory lit with twinkling lights. Flowering vines draped across the crystal ceiling, and the walls dripped with blue papery flowers that smelled like vanilla and honeysuckle. Tendrils of jade-green grass covered the floor, and graceful trees had been scattered around the space, growing in giant crystal urns. “I thought your furry friends would love having their own private garden,” Livvy explained. “But like I said, you’re welcome to pick any room you—” “Are you kidding?” Amy interrupted. “I’m totally taking the Narnia room!

He turned to his side, with the kind of creepily glazed look our eyeballs make when we’re alone in a room, brushing our teeth, chewing, or wiping our ass. His blanket was still wet with warm semen. He thought about his father. Then he remembered he needed to wash the clothes in the laundromat. His semen dripped and he thought about bird feeding. There was one bird who loved his safflower seeds. He ground his teeth and imagined what it was like to be born in Africa. He reflected on his most recent online English tutor lesson learning from a native speaker. He was fluent, but it paid to feel like you had a friend somewhere. Then he thought of peanut butter. The thoughts of the human mind transition so quickly that it only ever seems strange when we say it aloud to someone else. Otherwise, we’re all secretly freaks with our mouths shut. He laid there ugly.

He would handcuff me to the one murky lone bed in that room; spread out naked as the day I was born. As you could imagine looking just like a starfish stuck on the side of a rock, yet strapped down with his belts, ropes, and his dirty underwear in my mouth so that I would not scream for help, up until then there was no one around for miles, to hear me anyway, as I would scream bloody murder. My voice would echo back through the trees at me, as it seemed, and he would cackle ruthlessly. All that was on my face! Just like his offensive nasty hot sweat from his brow, that would land on my chest and drip down my belly down me, as I got ever more repulsed, by his actions, that he was doing to me. Yet, I was seeing, feeling, and tasting it all. At all those moments in time, I felt it all. At night, he would chain me to a tree outside, with only a doghouse to sleep in and yes, I was completely nude, while he slept inside the cabin on that same filthy bed I was on, and no he did not see the need in cleaning up at all. I could not sleep from what he did, and also the fear I would not wake up the next day, and also my skin was crawling because of all the fire ants, centipedes, and worms engulfing me. Affirmatively, I had bugs in places, which a girl never wants any bug to go into, or scuttle around. I remember that I would sketch the days in the wood of the rusty red doghouse with a rock. I was there for three or more weeks, without a bath, clothing, and real food, without anyone knowing, that I was being used as nothing more than a plaything, just like a dog’s chew toy. I found myself wanting and longing to eat the bugs, which were on me, just to stay alive.

Terek and Irena stood awkwardly to one side in the polished marble foyer, their hair soaked and their clothing leaving drips on the floor. It was pouring cats and dogs and chickens and every other animal out there.

Instantly, all the glimmering eyes returned to him. Ah, yes, they seemed to say. The mortal man still plays for us. They listened and softened once more as Jack crooned at them. All of the spirits in their manifest forms adored him. Save for one. It was the one spirit out of the dripping horde whose form most resembled a human woman. She stood thin and reedy on two legs in the heart of the gathering, the water lapping at her barnacled knees. Her skin was pale with a sheen of pearl, and her hair, like kelp, fell long and thick to clothe her body. Her face was angular, but she had an upturned nose, a mouth like a hook, and two eyes that were as iridescent as oyster shells. She held a fishing spear in one hand, and her fingernails were long and black. She could almost pass for a human. But there were elements of her that exposed her as a spirit. Gills fluttered in her neck, and patches of golden scales adorned her skin. Traces of her magic that she couldn’t disguise. It was Lady Ream of the Sea. The one who had threatened to sink the fisherman’s boat, who had darted past Jack and laughed with the tide when he had swum to the shore.

A beautiful woman with shiny brown hair pulled back in a high ponytail, designer clothes dripping from her body. “That’s Dorothy Westerly, Farrell’s kid.

The end of the room dripped and glowed an eerie vampire-cavern red. Blood dripped onto the body below, thickly, silently, the drops absorbed by its clothes.

A breeze announced his arrival- and I turned from the table toward the long hall, to the open glass doors to the garden. I'd forgotten how huge he was in this form- forgotten the curled horns and lupine face, the bearlike body that moved with feline fluidity. His green eyes glowed in the darkness, fixing on me, and as the doors snicked shut behind him, the clicking of claws on marble filled the hall. I stood still- not daring to flinch, to move a muscle. He limped slightly. And in the moonlight, dark, shining stains were left in his wake. He continued toward me, stealing the air from the entire hell. He was so big that the space felt cramped, like a cage. The scrape of claw, a huff of uneven breathing, the dripping of blood. Between one step and the next, he changed forms, and I squeezed my eyes shut at the blinding flash. When at last my eyes adjusted to the returning darkness, he was standing in front of me. Standing, but- not quite there. No sign of the baldric, or his knives. His clothes were in shreds- long, vicious slashes that made me wonder how he wasn't gutted and dead. BUt the muscled skin peered out beneath his shirt was smooth, unharmed.

She couldn’t look, and yet the image was already seared into her mind. Mina’s face wasn’t the pleasant visage that Ten remembered. Because they’d blinded her. Those big, dark, beseeching eyes were gone, instead replaced with angry, red scars and folded flesh. It was horrific how the ruined skin was set in slightly, speaking of something missing there, and how crimson veins of angry skin spread up onto her forehead and down onto her cheeks. “Who else would have?” Mina asked softly, more resigned than anything else, but Ten couldn’t be resigned. Not even remotely. Her mind was rushing in a thousand different directions, and all of them were awful. Had they held her down while pressing a burning poker to her beautiful eyes? Stuffed a cotton cloth in her mouth as she screamed? Ten vomited again, feeling like she couldn’t breathe. “Why?” she gasped, her head spinning enough that she might fall over right then and there. “You already know why.” Mina’s hands stretched out, feeling for her. Ten practically collapsed onto the dais, letting her friend cup her face. “I don’t understand. I don’t understand. I don’t understand,” she chanted over and over again, eyes squeezed shut. But then that just reminded her that Mina would never see again, so she opened her eyes, only to find herself face to ruined face with the girl. Snot was dripping from her nose and tears were starting to fall from Ten’s eyes. She felt like she was locked in the worst nightmare she’d ever had, but she couldn’t wake up. “How could they do this to you?” “Oh, Ten, your heart is so pure.” Mina leaned in, resting her forehead against Ten’s. “You know the reason.” “No, I don’t. I really don’t.” But then Mina’s lips were near her ear, whispering words that made Ten’s entire body run cold. “No savage can ever see the Light.

I can’t stop cleaning and I have a monster inside my brain and I miss you and Sloan is falling apart and his parents won’t take him off life support, so his organs are rotting. I can’t get all the lines right on the carpet with the vacuum and Stuntman is in a kennel and I haven’t seen him in days, and I just need you to let me clean this fucking apartment!” I’m not sure how much of it he heard, if any. I was crying so hard I could barely understand myself. He just held me and caressed my hair, and for the first time in weeks the velociraptor hunted other prey. Josh made me weak. Or strong. It was hard to tell anymore what I was without my coping mechanism. At least when I rode the beast, I got shit done. And now I was nothing but an emotional mess. But at least the mess was mine. Why did he have this effect on me? He had this way of waking up dormant parts of my soul. He ripped through me and let everything in with him like a storm surge. I took on water. And at the same time, something told me if I let him, he’d keep me afloat. He wouldn’t let me sink. I’d never felt this vulnerable and safe with anyone. I felt hot and shaky. I gasped and clutched his shirt until the crying spasms stopped. He held me so tight my knees could have given out and I wouldn’t have fallen an inch. “I can’t be the only one who has their shit together,” I whispered. His chest rumbled as he spoke. “It doesn’t look like you have your shit together…” I snorted. “Josh, please.” I looked up at him, my hands trembling on his collarbone. “I need you to insert yourself here. Go talk to his parents. They’ll listen to you.” He looked at me like seeing me cry was agony. The longing on his face was razor blades to my heart. His sad eyes, the set of his mouth, his knit brows. He loved me almost as much as I loved him, and I knew I was hurting him. I knew he thought I was enough. But I wasn’t enough. How could one of me be any kind of substitute for the half dozen kids he’d always wanted? It just couldn’t. The math didn’t work. The logic wasn’t sound. He wiped a tear off my cheek with his thumb. “Okay,” he whispered. “I’ll go. Just, sit down or something. Stop cleaning.” He dipped his head to catch my eyes. “Are you okay? You’re shaking.” He put a hand over mine to still the tremor against his chest, and the closeness of him made me whole for the first time in weeks. “I’m fine,” I said, swallowing. “Just hurry, okay?” He looked at me for a long moment, like he was trying to memorize my face or steal an extra second to hold me. Then he turned for the bathroom. When he walked away from me, the absence of his body pressed into mine felt like I’d lost my clothes and I stood naked and exposed to the elements. I missed him. No amount of time lessened it. It made it worse. My heart was a neglected building, and every day I weathered a fierce storm that dripped through my roof, flooded my floors, and broke my windows, and the disrepair just made me weaker and closer to collapse. The water turned on in the bathroom and I looked around the apartment, my compulsion raging back with a fury now that he was gone. At least I could do this for him. I could take care of his space, give it order. Wash his clothes and his blankets. Make things smell clean, turn his home into someplace he wanted to be. Do this thing that he obviously couldn’t do for himself at the moment.