Blond Hair Blue Eyes Quotes

They're still looking at him," she said to Magnus under her breath. "At Will, I mean." "Of course they are," said Magnus. His eyes reflected light like a cat's as they surveyed the room. "Look at him. The face of a bad angel and eyes like the night sky in Hell. He's very pretty, and vampires like that. I can't say I mind either." Magnus grinned. "Black hair and blue eyes are my favorite combination." Tessa reached up to pat Camille's pale blond curls. Magnus shrugged. "Nobody's perfect.

His eyes are somewhere between gray and blue, and his hair is somewhere between brown and blond, and I am somewhere between hostile and attracted.

Surface beauty: blond hair, blue eyes" - she was looking at me - "is always easy to recognize. But if someone is braver, stronger, smarter, that's harder to see." - Kendra Hilferty

Her name is Mackenzie. She’s got long blond hair and the biggest blue eyes you’ll ever see. She’s almost four. See her there? On the other end of the seesaw I’m currently riding.

They play in the Meadow. The dancing girl with the dark hair and blue eyes. The boy with blond curls and gray eyes, struggling to keep up with her on his chubby toddler legs. It took five, ten, fifteen years for me to agree. But Peeta wanted them so badly. When I first felt her stirring inside of me, I was consumed with a terror that felt as old as life itself. Only the joy of holding her in my arms could tame it.

Son, you can't go around painting yourself black, you hear?" "Why not, Papa?" "Because they'll take you away." "Why?" "Because you shouldn't want to be like black people or Jewish people or anyone who is...not us." "Who are Jewish people?" "You know my oldest customer, Mr. Kaufmann? Where we bought your shoes?" "Yes." "Well, he's Jewish." "I didn't know that. Do you have to pay to be Jewish? Do you need a license?" ..... "...you've got beautiful blond hair and big safe blue eyes. You should be happy with that; is that clear?

The very first thing I saw was his eyes, bluer and brighter than the sea itself. They gazed at me, so dazzling, and for an instant I couldn't even feel the pain. I was too overcome by the handsomeness of this sandy haired boy

He found himself looking down at Laurent, his eyes passing slowly over the delicate skin, the lamp-darkened blue eyes, the elegant curve of cheekbone, interrupted by a stray strand of blond hair.

Her name is Denise, and she has green eyes and red hair. Well, this week. Last week her hair was dyed blonde, and she had blue eyes. Or maybe that was a different woman. I don’t know. All I know is that she is my soul mate.

A moment later, Helen had returned; she was walking slowly now, and carefully, her hand on the back of a thin boy with a mop of wavy brown hair. He couldn’t have been older than twelve, and Clary recognized him immediately. Helen, her hand firmly clamped around the wrist of a younger boy whose hands were covered with blue wax. He must have been playing with the tapers in the huge candelabras that decorated the sides of the nave. He looked about twelve, with an impish grin and the same wavy, bitter-chocolate hair as his sister. Jules, Helen had called him. Her little brother. The impish grin was gone now. He looked tired and dirty and frightened. Skinny wrists stuck out of the cuffs of a white mourning jacket whose sleeves were too long for him. In his arms he was carrying a little boy, probably not more than two years old, with the same wavy brown hair that he had; it seemed to be a family trait. The rest of his family wore the same borrowed mourning clothes: following Julian was a brunette girl about ten, her hand firmly clasped in the hold of a boy the same age: the boy had a sheet of tangled black hair that nearly obscured his face. Fraternal twins, Clary guessed. After them came a girl who might have been eight or nine, her face round and very pale between brown braids. The misery on their faces cut at Clary’s heart. She thought of her power with runes, wishing that she could create one that would soften the blow of loss. Mourning runes existed, but only to honor the dead, in the same way that love runes existed, like wedding rings, to symbolize the bond of love. You couldn’t make someone love you with a rune, and you couldn’t assuage grief with it, either. So much magic, Clary thought, and nothing to mend a broken heart. “Julian Blackthorn,” said Jia Penhallow, and her voice was gentle. “Step forward, please.” Julian swallowed and handed the little boy he was holding over to his sister. He stepped forward, his eyes darting around the room. He was clearly scouring the crowd for someone. His shoulders had just begun to slump when another figure darted out onto the stage. A girl, also about twelve, with a tangle of blond hair that hung down around her shoulders: she wore jeans and a t-shirt that didn’t quite fit, and her head was down, as if she couldn’t bear so many people looking at her. It was clear that she didn’t want to be there — on the stage or perhaps even in Idris — but the moment he saw her, Julian seemed to relax. The terrified look vanished from his expression as she moved to stand next to him, her face ducked down and away from the crowd. “Julian,” said Jia, in the same gentle voice, “would you do something for us? Would you take up the Mortal Sword?

Boys next door were supposed to be fresh-faced with fair skin, butterscotch-blond hair they brushed out of clear blue eyes, and a smattering of freckles. They were also supposed to be friendly. We’d moved in a week ago and this kid had avoided us like we were a family of spitting cobras on crack.

I haven’t had the chance to look at too many men’s faces up close. And I noticed how his skin was thicker than mine, and a gorgeous shade of toast. The stiff blond hairs on his cheeks and chin seemed to be growing before my eyes. He smelled like starch. Like pine. His nose wasn’t so pointy afterall. …And out of the blue, he kissed me. Right in the middle of the Robert E. Lee Hotel Restaurant, he kissed me so slowly with an open mouth and every single thing in my body-my skin, my collarbone, the hollow backs of my knees, everything inside of me filled up with light.

And there rests him—the Mesmerizer, frozen in one of his rarest smiles, right beside Mee-Hae. His hair is a darker shade of blond in the photos, as it was back then, and his eyes blue like the clearest sky.

What is was, was that we complemented each other. We just fit in this way that made strangers ask us if we were sisters, even though her hair was blond and curly and mine was straight and dark. Even though her eyes were blue and mine were brown. Maybe it was the way we acted, or spoke, just moved. The way we would look at something and both have the same thought at the same moment, and turn to each other at the same time and start to say the same thing.

They play in the Meadow. The dancing girl with the dark hair and blue eyes. The boy with blond curls and gray eyes, struggling to keep up with her on his chubby toddler legs. It took five, ten, fifteen years for me to agree. But Peeta wanted them so badly. When I first felt her stiring inside of me, I was consumed with a terror that felt as old as life itself. Only the joy of holding her in my arms could tame it. Carrying him was easier, but not much. The questions are just beginning. The arenas have been completely destroyed, the memorials have been built, there are no more Hunger Games. But they still teach about them at school, and the girl knows we played a role in them. The boy will know in a few years. how can I tell them about that world without frightning them to death? My children, who take the words of the song for granted: Deep in the meadow, under the willow A bed of grass, a soft green pillow Lay down your head, and close your eyes And when again they open, the sun will rise Here it's safe, here it's warm Here the daisies guard you from every harm Here your dreams are sweet snd tomorrow brings them true Here is the place where I love you.

Why don't you write a story for me?” “Really?” I squeaked. “Um, what about?” “Well, something with a good guy and a bad guy and a hot chick.” …”Okay, anything else?” “The hot chick has to have pretty blonde hair and kickass blue eyes,” ….”And the good guy is a musically talented man who is incredibly sexy...?” He grinned and kissed me. “Not at all – that's the bad guy. And I don't care if he wins or loses – that doesn't make a difference.” He shifted and hovered over me, kissing me again – and again and again and again...His lips lingered over mine as he whispered: “I just want the bad guy to get the girl.

The God of Imagination lived in fairytales. And the best fairytales made you fall in love. It was while flicking through "Sleeping Beauty" that I met my first love, Ivar. He was a six-year-old bello ragazzo with blond hair and eyebrows. He had bomb-blue eyes and his two front teeth were missing. The road to Happily Ever After, however, was paved with political barbed wire. Three things stood in my way. 1. The object of my affection didn't know he was the object of my affection. 2. The object of my affection preferred Action Man to Princess Aurora. 3. The object of my affection was a boy and I wasn't allowed to love a boy.

I gazed around the room and my eyes stopped dead on a little boy standing in the corner. This was a particularly eerie doll. Life-sized and blond-haired and blue-eyed. I saw a little Nazi boy, pockets probably stuffed with scissors and retractable blades. My grandfather on my mother's side was rumored to be half Jewish, which practically makes me Jerry Seinfeld's brother, and thus wary of blond German boys with their hands out of sight.

With her curling blond hair and her slender limbs and her beautiful clothes, Inez was alluring in an obvious way, and yet it was easy enough to see that her slightly protruding blue eyes were blank screens of self-love on which a small selection of fake emotions was allowed to flicker.

This story was written many moons ago under an apple tree in an orchard in Kent, which is one of England's prettiest counties . . . I had read at least twenty of the [fairy tales] when I noticed something that had never struck me before--I suppose because I had always taken it for granted. All the princesses, apart from such rare exceptions as Snow White, were blond, blue-eyed, and beautiful, with lovely figures and complexions and extravagantly long hair. This struck me as most unfair, and suddenly I began to wonder just how many handsome young princes would have asked a king for the hand of his daughter if that daughter had happened to be gawky, snub-nosed, and freckled, with shortish mouse-colored hair? None, I suspected. They would all have been of chasing after some lissome Royal Highness with large blue eyes and yards of golden hair and probably nothing whatever between her ears! It was in that moment that a story about a princess who turned out to be ordinary jumped into my mind, and the very next morning I took my pencil box and a large rough-notebook down to the orchard and, having settled myself under an apple tree in full bloom, began to write . . . the day was warm and windless and without a cloud in the sky. A perfect day and a perfect place to write a fairy story.

You need to look hot now that you've got three guys giving you the eye."" Three?" "Sweet blue-eyed blond trapper... Muscled blond trapper number two, who buys you cards... And that gorgeous, 'Where have you been all my life' dude with the raven-black hair and dark eyes.

The last time Sean found trouble, she arrived in a package of blonde hair and blue eyes.” ~ Giles on Jem

Tess,” I said. For a moment, Emilia and I studied each other. She was tall, with strawberry-blond hair and eyes that walked the line between green and blue. She wore almost no makeup, except for a light gloss on her lips. “So you’re Ivy Kendrick’s sister,” she said finally. “I thought you’d be taller.” “I’ll get right to work on that.” Emilia cracked a very small smile.

It’s like every identity I have . . . the more different I am from everyone else . . . the less interested people are. The less . . . lovable I feel, I guess. The love interests in books, or in movies or TV shows, are always white, cis, straight, blond hair, blue eyes. Chris Evans, Jennifer Lawrence. It becomes a little hard, I guess, to convince myself I deserve the kind of love you see on movie screens.

Jane was wearing a charcoal shift dress. The black dipped into a love V accented with a large black chiffon bow. A layer of delicate black lace peeked out from the bottom of her dress. Her long blond hair was pulled back tightly into a straight ironed ponytail. Her makeup was simple: coral blush on her cheeks and gunmetal shadow brushed under her blue eyes.

Charlotte: Giordano is terribly afraid Gwyneth will get everything wrong tomorrow that she can get wrong. Gideon: Pass the olive oil, please. Charlotte: Politics and history are a closed book to Gwyneth. She can’t even remember names—they go in at one ear and straight out of the other. She can’t help it, her brain doesn’t have the capacity. It’s stuffed with the names of boy bands and long, long cast lists of actors in soppy romantic films. Raphael: Gwyneth is your time-traveling cousin, right? I saw her yesterday in school. Isn’t she the one with long dark hair and blue eyes? Charlotte: Yes, and that birthmark on her temple, the one that looks like a little banana. Gideon: Like a little crescent moon. Raphael: What’s that friend of hers called? The blonde with freckles? Lily? Charlotte: Lesley Hay. Rather brighter than Gwyneth, but she’s a wonderful example of the way people get to look like their dogs. Hers is a shaggy golden retriever crossbreed called Bertie. Raphael: That’s cute! Charlotte: You like dogs? Raphael: Especially golden retriever crossbreeds with freckles. Charlotte: I see. Well, you can try your luck. You won’t find it particularly difficult. Lesley gets through even more boys than Gwyneth. Gideon: Really? How many . . . er, boyfriends has Gwyneth had? Charlotte: Oh, my God! This is kind of embarrassing. I don’t want to speak ill of her, it’s just that she’s not very discriminating. Particularly when she’s had a drink. She’s done the rounds of almost all the boys in our class and the class above us . . . I guess I lost track at some point. I’d rather not repeat what they call her. Raphael: The school mattress? Gideon: Pass the salt, please.

He had fallen head over heels for a devil with blue eyes and waist-length blonde hair and a body that would tempt a man into sin and death.

For crissakes, you're the frickin' poster boy for DarkRiver with your 'Gee, shucks, I'm harmless' act." Dorian was used to being ribbed about his looks. With his blond hair and blue eyes, he looked more like a surfer hanging out for the right wave than blooded DarkRiver sentinel. "Look who's talking, Miss Bikini Babe 2067.

She tried to break from his hold, and he tightened his grip. “You’re safe. I killed the rogues.” The woman stilled and searched his face, the wildness still heavy in her blue eyes. “You’re a wolf.” He smiled and nodded. “And you’re a tiger.” “A white tiger.” To match her white-blond hair. “And a beautiful one.

I WANT to be a saint. I want to save souls by the millions. I want to do good far and wide. I want to fight evil! I want my life-sized statue in every church. I'm talking six feet tall, blond hair, blue eyes-. Wait a second. Do you know who I am?

She was confronted by seven heads of platinum blonde hair and intense blue eyes. Hitler would be proud.

Channing was incredibly easy on the eyes. Lanky but muscled, with crystal-clear blue eyes and pale blond hair. He was like some winter god, Jack Frost perhaps. If only he didn't also shoot first in the firing squad of premier pompous twats.

Although eugenics flourished in Nazi Germany, the ideal of a blond-haired, blue-eyed master race wasn’t Adolf Hitler’s. It may surprise many to know that, in Mein Kampf, Hitler credited America with helping formulate his ideas on eugenics, and he admitted he’d studied the laws of US states to familiarize himself with selective reproduction and other eugenics issues.

But what of Lenore, of Lenore’s hair? Here is hair that is clearly within and of itself every color—blond and red and jet-black-blue and honeynut—but which effects an outward optical compromise with possibility that consists of appearing simply dull brown, save for brief teasing glimpses out of the corner of one’s eye.

Let me guess. Dark hair, brown eyes, great abs, white teeth, Abercrombie & Fitch.” “Close,” I say. “Light brown hair, correct on the eyes, abs, and teeth, but American Eagle Outfitters all the way.” “Impressive,” she says. “My turn,” I say. “Thick blonde hair, big blue eyes, an adorable little white dress with a matching hat, royal blue skin, and you’re about two feet tall.” She laughs loudly. “You have a thing for Smurfette?

Pigpen earned his name as a joke because the girls fall over themselves to gain his attention. Blonde hair, blue eyes...a late twentysomething version of what I hope to be.

She had a thick aura of battle around her, and her face was almost doll-like, it was so pleasant to look at. Vacant blue eyes, blond hair tinged dark gray.

He’s here! That’s Damon over there!” Because of his height, Noah had a clear shot of the man she was pointing to. But he still couldn’t believe what he was seeing. “Oh, come on,” he groaned. “A blond haired, blue-eyed demon?” He glanced at Willow just in time to catch her impish grin. “He’s adorable, isn’t he?” “Yeah, he’s friggin’ precious,” he muttered...

And did the book have any adventures for people who had brown eyes and brown hair? No, no, no... it was the blond people with blue eyes and the redheads with the green eyes who got the stories. If you had brown hair you were probably ... a woodcutter or something.

The blood ran in tiny rivulets down his white face, as if from Christ’s Crown of Thorns, his long blond hair flying out as he turned full circle, his hand ripping at his shirt, tearing it open down his chest, the black tie loose and falling. His pale crystalline blue eyes were glazed and shot with blood as he screamed the unimportant lyrics.

Xavier said...[he] was making a list of dark-skinned saints to correct the western historical record that acknowledged only fair saints with blond hair and blue eyes. Many saints were dark-complexioned, swarthy, or negroid, with unwashed hair and poor nutrition. Like Jesus. He hoped to compile a book of chocolate saints, a directory in which there would be no pale faces, only dark and darker, as a counterbalance against the many books in the world that had no black or brown or yellow faces….

Alana has a daughter. A five-year-old daughter with dirty blond hair and big blue eyes eerily like mine. With me sitting down, we’re nearly the same height, although she has a couple of extra inches on me from this angle.

Even now, at just three years old, it is obvious that Luke longs to fly. It is like seeing Anakin all over again. The mop of unruly blond hair, the bright blue eyes, the hands permanently tinkering. Luke isn't content to just play with his toys. He's constantly at work modifying them, making improvements.

I love you. You are my heart beating outside of my chest. I don’t care who you are mated to, or whether they have blond hair or black hair, blue or green eyes, male or female parts—as long as you are happy, that’s all I worry about. I want for you what you want for yourself. I love you, Blaylock—I love you.

She curled her fingers into his chest instead of complying. “You’re an incredibly handsome male,” she said. “Perfect bone structure, pure blond hair, eyes so blue they should be impossible. Your only ‘flaw’ is this tattoo.” She traced the three jagged lines on his right biceps. “It’s an echo of the markings on your alpha’s face.” He gave a short nod. “A symbol of absolute loyalty.” Her lips parted. “Knowing that just makes you even more dangerously beautiful.

I met Rob in Austin, Texas. He was hitchhiking to California and I was driving to California, so it seemed like a perfect match. He had long blond hair and blue eyes and golden skin and so did I. It was like falling in love with myself.

I figured if I was tired enough, I wouldn’t miss Travis. Which kind of worked, until after the three o’clock fussing-wombat feed and I got back into bed and his side of the bed was cold. Or until I tripped over his laundry that he’d left on the bathroom floor. That he always left on the bathroom floor. Or until I sat at the table at breakfast time and his chair was too damn empty. There was no smartarse comments, no bursts of laughter. His blue eyes didn’t spark with humour and his sandy-blond hair didn't spike out just so. There was no foot-holding under the table.

Is Obama Anything but Black? So lots of folk—mostly non-black—say Obama’s not black, he’s biracial, multiracial, black-and-white, anything but just black. Because his mother was white. But race is not biology; race is sociology. Race is not genotype; race is phenotype. Race matters because of racism. And racism is absurd because it’s about how you look. Not about the blood you have. It’s about the shade of your skin and the shape of your nose and the kink of your hair. Booker T. Washington and Frederick Douglass had white fathers. Imagine them saying they were not black. Imagine Obama, skin the color of a toasted almond, hair kinky, saying to a census worker—I’m kind of white. Sure you are, she’ll say. Many American Blacks have a white person in their ancestry, because white slave owners liked to go a-raping in the slave quarters at night. But if you come out looking dark, that’s it. (So if you are that blond, blue-eyed woman who says “My grandfather was Native American and I get discrimination too” when black folk are talking about shit, please stop it already.) In America, you don’t get to decide what race you are. It is decided for you. Barack Obama, looking as he does, would have had to sit in the back of the bus fifty years ago. If a random black guy commits a crime today, Barack Obama could be stopped and questioned for fitting the profile. And what would that profile be? “Black Man.

Now that I know he’s Ezra’s new maybe-special friend, I pay a little more attention to him than I would have before. He kind of reminds me of a golden retriever, with his floppy blond hair and blue eyes. The first time I saw him in acrylics class, I kind of immediately hated the guy. He’s the sort of person the world adores, just based on the way he looks, a little like the way people obsess over men like Chris Hemsworth and Chris Evans and Chris Pine and all the other famous Chrises, plus Ryan Gosling, claiming that they’re liberal and that they aren’t racist and that they’re feminists, but not really thinking about why they’re so obsessed with white men, and why they don’t love any people of color the same way.

Be happy, Max. Grab it with both hands and run like hell. That’s what we’re here for. A smile touched my lips as I turned to look at Silas again. When you jumped off a cliff, the flight was awesome, but a fall could leave you smashed into a thousand pieces. Was it worth it? He opened his blue eyes, a lock of metal blond hair falling over his brow. Silas Marsh is worth it.

By the end of the war, I could pick out Jewish people almost as if I had a sixth sense about it, even if they had blue eyes and blond hair. I would have been a very valuable Gestapo person.

Morning. I didn't wake you, did I?' God, he looks gorgeous, even at this early hour. 'No. I've been awake a while. Couldn't sleep.' 'Me eighter. I've has this girl on my mind all night' 'Anyone I know?' 'You might know her. Blond hair, blue eyes ... beautiful. We went out on a date last night as it happens.' ' Really? So how was the date?' 'Well, that's the thing... The date was amazing, and I haven't been able to stop thinking about her... or her gorgeous mouth ever since...And the thing is, I really need to kiss her again.' ' I think she needs you to kiss her too.' 'You do?' 'Mmm

There were pictures on the walls, all of them dime-store prints of Jesus. In all of them Jesus had blue eyes and wore pale blue robes and had long blond hair and a neat blond beard. He looked more like a Malibu surfer than a Jew from two thousand years ago.

Gemma had blond hair and blue eyes. I did not. Gemma was always an A student. I was more of a B-all-you-can-be kind of gal. When Gemma was into science, I was into skipping. When Gemma was into foreign languages, I was into the hot Italian guy down the street.

Her cheeks are flushed, but her eyes are steady on me. She doesn’t look drunk. Why did I let Trey bait me like that? Ryen wouldn’t do something as reckless as get wasted and follow someone upstairs. I was just looking for a reason to hit him. And then I look at the guy standing behind her and notice that it’s Ten. It takes a moment, but I finally make the connection. Blond hair, blue shirt… He’s the guy from the video. Dammit. So I charged over here to beat up a guy who’s probably more attracted to me than Ryen. Great.

Jesus, would you look at him. Hair too long and too blond. Eyes too sexy and too blue. Body too buff, ego in danger of liftoff. Standing there in his tight fitted jeans, painted-on T-shirt, and snakeskin boots, he looked like God’s guilty gift. Trouble was, he knew it.

(…) met the owner of this cozy book-and-candle Apt. G, a tall, leggy, striking girl named Bea or maybe just the letter B or maybe the insect Bee, not sure, her long blond hair pulled in a ponytail, her no-doubt banging body effortlessly buried beneath a pile of tights and sweaters and scarves – she is a walking coat rack – and as we shook hands, Bea fixed me with the most alarming blue-eyed stare of my life, the kind of stare in which you think some potent subliminal message is being passed along (Run away with me or maybe just Run away), (…)

Guys, you really don’t have to do that.” The Head Alchemist, Erik, has white blonde hair and wildly mismatched eyes of dark brown and ice blue. “But that’s a proper greeting for the Great Scala.” “Well, honestly, it’s creeping me out. As the Great Scala, I hereby order you to call me Myla and not hop around when I enter the room.” “As you command, Great Scala.” I shoot him a dry look. “I mean, that’s cool, Myla.

Before she knew it the afternoon was done, and the trainees were taking their new mounts to the stables for grooming. Daine, Onua, Buri, and Sarge helped then too, though Daine couldn't see how she could ever be comfortable telling a twenty-year-old man he was missing spots on the pony he was grooming. She did try it: "Excuse me, trainee what did you say your name was?" Blue gray eyes twinkled at her over his cream-colored mare's back. "I didn't. It's Farant. " His blond hair curled thickly over his head, almost matching the pony's in color. "Thank you. Trainee Farant, you're missing spots. " "Not at all, sweetheart. I'm just combing too fast for you to see. " "Trainee Farant, you're missing spots!" Sarge boomed just behind Daine. She thought later she actually might have levitated at that moment certainly Farant had. Next time the assistant horsemistress tells you something, don't flirt correct it!" He moved on, and Daine pressed her hands against her burning cheeks. Farant leaned on his mare and sighed. "Yes, Assistant Horsemistress. Right away. " He winked at her and went back to work. Daine went to Sarge as the trainees were finishing up. "Sarge, I-" He shook his head. Daine thought if he leaned against the stable wall any harder, it would collapse. How did a human, without bear blood in him, get to be so large? "Not your fault. These city boys see you, you're young, sweet-lookin'",he winked at her,"they're gonna try to take advantage. If they can't keep their minds on the job after I've had them two weeks already in my patty-paws, then I ain't been doing my job right. " His grin was wolfish. "But that can be fixed. " Seeing her open mouthed stare, he asked, "Something the matter, my lamb?" She closed her jaw. "No, sir. I just never met nobody like you. " "And if you're lucky, you won't again, " muttered Buri, passing by.

I couldn’t compete with Honesty, With her dark blonde hair streaked with auburn, With her captivating blue eyes, With her legs that stretched into forever. She had the brains, The body, The perfect resume for girlfriend. And me? I had the perfect resume for Best friend. All the boys said so.

They play in the Meadow. The dancing girl with the dark hair and blue eyes. The boy with blond curls and gray eyes, struggling to keep up with her on his chubby toddler legs. It took five, ten, fifteen years for me to agree. But Peeta wanted them so badly. When I first felt her stirring inside of me, I was consumed with a terror that felt as old as life itself. Only the joy of holding her in my arms could tame it. Carrying him was a little easier, but not much.

Maybe, if I looked like a girl from Phoenix should, I could work this to my advantage. But physically, I’d never fit in anywhere. I should be tan, sporty, blonde—a volleyball player, or a cheerleader, perhaps—all the things that go with living in the valley of the sun. Instead, I was ivory-skinned, without even the excuse of blue eyes or red hair, despite the constant sunshine. I had always been slender, but soft somehow, obviously not an athlete; I didn’t have the necessary hand-

It wasn't just the way he always looked at her- with a mix of genuine joy and longing rolled into one- or his appearance, although he wasn't hard on the eyes with those rippling pectorals. She found herself drawn to those kind blue eyes and the hard line of his jaw, which moved when he was thinking. It was the dimples in his cheeks when he flashed her that magnetic smile, and the way his reddish blond hair had a single curl that was always falling in front of his eyes. But mostly it was that earnest nature of his, and his need to find the good in every situation, which was so different from how she viewed life, and gave her hope that the world could be more than she imagined it to be.

Do you know the only time I felt beautiful?” Hanne asked, her eyes still closed. “When?” “When I tailored myself to look like a soldier. When we cut off all my hair.” Nina exchanged the shimmer for a pot of rose balm. “But you didn’t look like you.” Hanne’s eyes opened. “But I did. For the first time. The only time.” Nina dipped her thumb into the pot of balm and dabbed it onto Hanne’s lower lip, spreading it in a slow sweep across the soft cushion of her mouth. “I can grow my hair, you know,” Hanne said, and moved her hand over one side of her scalp. Sure enough, a reddish-brown curl twined over Hanne’s ear. Nina stared. “That’s powerful tailoring, Hanne.” “I’ve been practicing.” She drew small scissors from a drawer and snipped away the curl. “But I like it the way it is.” “Then leave it.” Nina took the scissors from her hand, brushed her thumb over Hanne’s knuckles. “In trousers. In gowns. With your hair shorn or in braids or down your back. You have never not been beautiful.” “Do you mean that?” “I do.” “I’ve never seen your real face,” Hanne said, eyes scanning Nina’s features. “Do you miss it?” Nina wasn’t sure how to answer. For a long while she’d startled every time she glimpsed herself in the mirror, when she caught sight of the pale blue eyes, the silky fall of straight blond hair. But the longer she played Mila, the easier it became, and sometimes that scared her. Who will I be when I return to Ravka? Who am I now? “I’m beginning to forget what I looked like,” she said. “But trust me, I was gorgeous.” Hanne took her hand. “You still are.

Polly was the same age as Alma, but daintier and startlingly beautiful. She looked like a perfect figurine carved out of fine French soap, into which someone had inlaid a pair of glittering peacock-blue eyes. But it was the tiny pink pillow of her mouth that made this girl more than simply pretty; it made her an unsettling little voluptuary, a Bathsheba wrought in miniature.

The front door of the Flippant Witch gave a series of loud clicks and swung inward. Renard Lambert, his blue-and-purple finery resembling a plum in the twitching lanterns, practically hurled himself through the open doorway “Widdershins!” he called loudly, cape flowing behind him, “I—gaaack!” He ducked, barely in time to avoid the carafe that shattered loudly against the wall just behind his head. The tinkling of broken glass, a dangerous entry chime indeed, sounded around him. “Oh,” Genevieve said, her tone only vaguely contrite. “It's just your friend. Sorry, Renard.” “Sorry? Sorry?! What the hell were you—ah. Um, hello, ah, Widdershins." Widdershins, who had lurched to her feet as the door opened, was suddenly and forcibly reminded by Renard's stunned stare that Genevieve had disrobed her in order to get at the rapier wound. Blushing as furiously as a nun in a brothel, she ducked behind her blonde-haired friend and groped desperately for her shirt. “Didn't mean to take your head off, Renard,” Genevieve said, mainly to distract him. “But you rather startled us.” “Quite understandable,” the popinjay responded absently, his eyes flickering madly as he fought to locate some safe place to put them.

The faces of the others looked like aggregates of interchangeable features, every face oozing to blend into the anonymity of resembling all, and all looking as if they were melting. Rearden’s face, with the sharp planes, the pale blue eyes, the ash-blond hair, had the firmness of ice; the uncompromising clarity of its lines made it look, among the others, as if he were moving through a fog, hit by a ray of light.

Slender and lissome, Zilia had skin of the purest white and features the very emblem of candor and modesty; her large dark blue eyes, more tender than lively, seemed to express love at the height of delicacy, sentiment at its most voluptuous. Her mouth was deliciously formed, her teeth white and beautiful; she seemed a little pale until one's gaze fell upon her and then she burst to life, fresh as a rose. Her brow was noble, her hair, so nicely patterned, ashen blonde in great quantity, elegantly matched by the gracious contours of her veil, streaming across alabaster breasts, always exposed in accord with the fashion of the country—all finally lent this pretty woman the air of a goddess of youth. She had just reached her 16th year, still growing despite all, her arms lithe and fingers to our eyes so very supple and slender.

the others he wore simple work clothes—flannels and jeans with work boots. He was tall and handsome, with blue eyes and dirty-blond hair and a Donegal-style beard running along his broad jaw. He was athletically built with a charismatic, compelling look—like some rustic fashion model. And he had a vaguely familiar appearance. Grady felt certain he’d seen him somewhere before. Grady eyed the man warily. “Are you the foreman

Cassidy is the best girlfriend ever. I’ve dated her for a full two months longer than anyone else. She’s smart and witty and original and can chug a beer faster than most guys I know. On top of that, she is absolutely beautiful. I mean spanktacular. Talk about pure colors. She’s high-definition. Scandinavian blond hair, eyes as blue as fiords, skin like vanilla ice cream or flower petals or sugar frosting—or really not like anything else but just her skin. It makes my hair ache. Of course, she does believe in astrology, but I don’t even care about that. It’s a girl thing. I think of it like she has constellations and fortunes whirling around inside her.

She hovered, her fine-boned face and slender form revealed in the low light of the fire. Her hair was the pale blond hue of moon glow, her eyes the soft, silvery blue of a mist-shrouded lake. Dusted pink as new blush roses, the color of her lips and cheeks gleamed against the creamy whiteness of her skin. For a second he wondered if she was a phantom brought on by too much drink, her ethereal beauty more in keeping with a faerie story than reality.

Zane Hollander stood in profile a few feet away. Sophie's breath caught. Up close, he looked like he'd been carved from the most glorious, most gorgeous stone on the planet. His blond hair was straight, on the longer side and sticking up in GQ messiness. Square jaw, high cheekbones, perfect nose. Then he turned and pierced her with ice-blue eyes that knocked her off-balance. Literally. She tripped over her own feet and face-planted right into the sand.

The Ptolemies were Macedonians, with an admixture of a little Greek and via marriage with the Seleucids a small element of Syrian blood…Cleopatra may have had black, brown, blonde, or even red hair, and her eyes could have been brown, grey, green or blue. Almost any combination of these is possible. Similarly, she may have been very light skinned or had a darker more Mediterranean complexion. Fairer skin is probably marginally more likely given her ancestry.

When I lift my eyes to the mirror, my lips part. It’s me. The witchy, white-blonde hair. The baby blue eyes. But at the same time, it isn’t. There’s a void in there. A… numbness. I’m about to move to the shower when something else stops me. My scar. Several angry red marks surround it. Did the psycho leave freaking hickeys around my scar? What in the ever living hell was going on in his defective brain? I rip my gaze away from the mirror and take the longest, most scalding shower in history. When I step back into the room, the song has changed to Good Grief by Bastille. I let the music drift around me as I climb into bed, still in a towel, and close my eyes. I fight the tears and lose.

She had streaked blonde hair, long and straight, parted in the middle framing high cheek bones, an aquiline nose and beautiful deep blue eyes. She was young, around 30, tall and lithe with a good body, athletic, not skinny. She wore a sleeveless black dress that exposed her toned arms and shoulders, indicating regular workouts or yoga. There was a hint of vein running the length of her lean muscle. This girl stood out like an arabian in a corral full of draft horses.

Joe and Carter and Kelly were coming out of the woods, finishing up their run as I came back from the garden. They were laughing and shoving each other the way brothers do. I loved all three of them. Except. Except. Joe wore a pair of low-slung shorts. Just the smallest things. And that was it. He was almost as big as I was now. We were eye level, or so close that it didn’t matter, which put him a couple of inches over six feet. There was a sheen of sweat over his torso. A spattering of wet blond hairs curling on his chest that looked to be cut out of granite. The soft definition of muscles on his stomach. A line of sweat that hit his happy trail and soaked into the waistband of his shorts. He turned, saying something back to Carter, and I saw the dimples above his ass. The way his legs flexed and shifted as he hopped from one foot to the other. He pointed wildly at something back in the woods and there was a blue vein that stuck out along his bicep and I wanted to trace with my fingers because when had that happened? And those hands. Those big fucking hands and I— Joe had grown up. And somehow, I hadn’t really seen it until it was on full display. Right in front of me. He

Evan saw a man across the kitchen, butt leaning against the counter, muscular arms folded over his broad chest. His blond hair was cut very short, and his eyes were bright blue sparks. Evan’s gaze locked with Paul’s, and a sudden sense of vertigo swam through his head. The conversation in the other room, the back and forth between John and Alden, the startling brilliance of Bill’s teeth -- all of that faded away as Paul stared back at him. Evan found himself inside a strange bubble that blocked all outside stimuli. He had never experienced a connection this intense before, especially with an initial look, and even though it terrified him in a thrillingly sexual way, he didn’t dare pull his gaze away from Paul’s for fear of breaking the timeless moment between them.

Obara, rusted nails and boiled leather, with her angry, close-set eyes and rat-brown hair. Nymeria, languid, elegant, olive-skinned, her long black braid bound up in red-gold wire. Tyene, blue-eyed and blond, a child-woman with her soft hands and little giggles

The Nazis, he had written in his latest, "are wedded to a sort of aesthetico-moral fallacy, which is that if a man has blond hair, blue eyes and strong features, then he will also be brave, loyal, intelligent and so on. They truly believe that goodness has some causal relationship with beauty. Which is idiotic, yes, but no more idiotic than you are, Egon. When you see a girl like Adele Hitler with an innocent, pretty face, can you honestly tell me you don't assume she must be an angelic person? Even though it makes about as much sense as astrology.

She was wearing a sleeveless smock, blue with little pale red flowers on it. Her shoulder-length, ash-blond hair was fastened with a clip at the back of her neck. Her bare arms were pale. Her gestures of lifting the iron, using it, setting it down again, and then folding and putting away the laundry were an exercise in slow concentration, as were her movements as she bent over and then straightened up again. Her face as it was then has been overlaid in my memory by the faces she had later. If I see her in my mind’s eye as she was then, she doesn’t have a face at all, and I have to reconstruct it. High forehead, high cheekbones, pale blue eyes, full lips that formed a perfect curve without any indentation, square chin. A broad-planed, strong, womanly face. I know that I found it beautiful. But I cannot recapture its beauty.

Tim and Andy stood there in head-to-toe leather motocross outfits, covered in road dust, behind me in a dark corner of the hotel’s dining room. Tim has penetrating pale blue eyes with tiny pupils, and the accent of an Englishman from the north – Newcastle, or Leeds maybe. Andy is an American with blond hair and the wholesome, well-fed good looks and accent of the Midwest. Behind them, two high-performance dirt bikes leaned on kickstands in the Hang Meas’ parking lot.      Tim owns a bar/restaurant in Siemreap. Andy is his chef. Go to the end of the world and apparently there will be an American chef there waiting for you.

Dougal eyed the breakfast repast. In addition to burnt toast, there was poorly trimmed ham, eggs that looked rubbery enough to bounce off the floor, pathetically dry scones, and small, smoking pieces of something he suspected had once been kippers. Sophia noted Dougal's disgusted expression, and her heart lifted. He looked amazingly handsome this morning, dressed in a pale blue riding coat and white shirt, his dark blond hair curling over his collar, his green eyes glinting as he began to fill his plate. Two scones, a scoop of eggs, and a large piece of blackened ham all went onto his plate. Sophia had eaten earlier in the kitchen with Mary, who had served warm muffins with cream and marmalade, some lovely bacon, and crusty toast, complemented by a pot of hot tea. Sophia hid a smile as Dougal attempted to cut his ham. Too tough for his blade, it tore into uneven pieces under his knife. He lifted a piece and regarded it on the tines of his fork.

But as she looked over toward the doors, her breath caught. Her eyes locked on the deep blue ones of a man just entering. He was tall and muscular, his hair blonde and well cut. And he was dressed impeccably in a dark grey suit and a deep blue tie. But it was his eyes that drew her focus and made her heart beat faster.

And why can't I have an ignore button like my phone? As I hit it, his calls disappear from the screen and the ringing stops. But the tingles are still at my fingertips, as if he sent them through the phone to grab me. Shoving it in my purse-the pockets on skinny jeans must just be for show 'cause nothing else is fitting in there-I smile at Mark. Ah, Mark. The blue-eyed, blond-haired, all-American quarterback. Who knew he had a crush on me all these years? Not Emma McIntosh, that's for dang sure. And not Chloe. Which is weird, because Chloe was a collector of this kind of information. Maybe it's not true. Maybe Mark's only interested in me because Galen was-who wouldn't want to date the girl who dated the hottest guy in school? But that's just fine with me. Mark is...well, Mark isn't as fantabulous as I always imagined he would be. Still, he's good-looking, a star quarterback, and he's not trying to hook me up with his brother. So why am I not excited? The question must be all over my face because Mark's got his eyebrow raised. Not in a judgmental arch, more like an arch of expectation. If he's waiting for an explanation, his puny human lungs can't hold their breath long enough for an answer. Aside from not being his business, I can't exactly explain the details of my relationship with Galen-fake or otherwise. The truth is, I don't know where we can go from here. He ripped holes in my pride like buckshot. And did I mention he broke my heart? He's not just a crush. Not just a physical attraction, someone who can make me forget my own name by pretending to kiss me. Not just a teacher or a snobby fish with Royal blood. Sure, he's all of those things. But he's more than that. He's who I want. Possibly forever.

What’s your favorite book?” Doubt colors my voice. “If you have a favorite, I don’t trust you. Any book lover has at least five they can name off the top of their head.” His blue eyes hold mine. Oh, wow. This guy actually likes reading. He grins when I roll my eyes with little effort, not putting much sass behind it. “All right. Name your top author then since you’re such a scholar.” My voice rasps. I imagine him in bed, blonde hair ruffled while he rocks reading glasses and a thick paperback because he’d rather be practical than carry a heavy hardcover. Sigh. Damn him and his nerdy secret. “Brandon Sanderson. No questions asked.” His voice drops. “A man who prefers to live in a fantasy. How cute.” “I’d be your best fantasy, no book needed.

I kiss him like the fairytale prince that every girl wants. His horse might be black instead of white and he isn't blonde haired and blue eyed, but damn, he has butterflies inked into his skin and birds on his back, an eyebrow and a lip ring and words of wisdom peppered with the foulest fucking language known to man. I would take Ty McCabe over a knight in shining armor any day.

Unfortunately for him he looked more like an innocent man on America’s terror watch-list rather than a gallant Viking possessing all the benefits of modernity. More like a villain in a Western fairy tale with his slicked-bouffant obsidian hair rather than the long sun-like curls that all great saviors of the poor have been obliged to possess. I squinted to the side towards him for a second and he caught my gaze almost immediately; his inky irises were comfortable enough to hold my stare indefinitely, his pupils seemed entirely ravenous as opposed to the feminist preferred oceanic turquoise, which for them is a physical demarcation of emotional sensitivity. He seemed like an uncanny bad guy any which way I looked at him, except of course, by his actions thus far…

continued. “The solution to almost every problem imaginable can be found in the outcome of a fairy tale. Fairy tales are life lessons disguised with colorful characters and situations. “‘The Boy Who Cried Wolf ’ teaches us the value of a good reputation and the power of honesty. ‘Cinderella’ shows us the rewards of having a good heart. ‘The Ugly Duckling’ teaches us the meaning of inner beauty.” Alex’s eyes were wide, and she nodded in agreement. She was a pretty girl with bright blue eyes and short strawberry-blonde hair that was always kept neatly out of her face with a headband. The way the other students stared at their teacher, as if the lesson being taught were in another language, was something Mrs. Peters had never grown accustomed to. So, Mrs. Peters would often direct entire lessons to the front row, where Alex sat. Mrs. Peters was a tall, thin woman who always wore dresses that resembled old, patterned sofas. Her hair was dark and curly and sat perfectly on the top of her head like a hat (and her students often thought it was). Through a pair of thick glasses, her eyes were permanently squinted from all the judgmental looks she had given her classes over the years. “Sadly, these timeless tales are no longer relevant in our society,” Mrs. Peters said. “We have traded their brilliant teachings for small-minded entertainment like television and video games. Parents now let obnoxious cartoons and violent movies influence their children. “The only exposure to the tales some children acquire are versions bastardized by film companies. Fairy

Merritt stared in bemusement at the big, wrathful Scotsman. He was an extraordinary sight, more than six feet of muscle and brawn dressed in a thin wet shirt and trousers that clung as if they'd been glued to his skin. An irritable shiver, almost certainly from the chill of evaporating alcohol, ran over him. Scowling, he reached up to remove his flat cap, revealing a shaggy mop of hair, several months past a good cut. The thick locks were a beautiful cool shade of amber shot with streaks of light gold. He was handsome despite his unkempt state. Very handsome. His blue eyes were alert with the devil's own intelligence, the cheekbones high, the nose straight and strong. A tawny beard obscured the line of his jaw- perhaps concealing a weak chin?- she couldn't tell. Regardless, he was a stunner.

It was the real loose-sausage-eating, brown-liquor-drinking Southern face of a white athlete turned forty and covered with a smooth well-fed layer of flesh. His neck, which seemed a foot wide, rose up out of a yellow polo shirt and a blue blazer as if it were unit-welded to his trapezius muscles and his shoulders. He was like a single solid slab of meat clear up to his hair, which was a head of hair and a half, a strange silvery blond color, coiffed with bouncy fullness and little flips that screamed $65 male hairdo. Not a single cilium was out of place. Amid the vast smooth meat of his head and neck, his eyes and his mouth seemed terribly tiny, but they were both going all out to register pleasure at the sight of Counselor Roger White, this black man who had arrived at the door at 7:42 on Freaknic Saturday night.

“Esa chica esta bien caliente.” Hector laughed as Rider shook his head. Ainsley stiffened across from me. She was pretty fluent in Spanish and even though Hector was Puerto Rican, I had a feeling she was getting the general gist of whatever he was saying and she was not happy about it. “Me gustaria a llevarla a mi casa y comermela.” Ainsley cocked her head to the side as she brushed her long, blond hair over her shoulder. “Gracias! Pero no hay ni una parte de mi que tu te vas a comer.” Hector’s eyes widened. Rider threw his head back and burst into laughter. “Oh, shit. Priceless.” “What?” Ainsley blinked big eyes at the stunned Hector. “You think some white chick can’t possibly understand another language so you’re going to sit in front of me and talk about me like I’m not here?” Her smile was brittle and fake. “Bitch, please.” “Man...” Hector sat back, slowly shaking his head as he stared at her. “You’re...brutal.” “Damn straight,” she replied, her eyes like chips of blue ice. Whatever yumminess she’d seen in Hector was completely out the window now. “And you’re a mal criado.” Hector’s eyes narrowed. “I really like your friend, Mouse.” Still chuckling, Rider winked at me. “She basically called him a classless ass, and I agree.

She moved to push past him. When he did not move, she stopped, unwilling to touch him. A pity. The memory of the warmth of her gloved hand on his cold cheek flashed. Apparently her behavior outside had been the product of surprise. And pleasure. He wondered what else he might do instinctively in response to pleasure. An image flashed- blond hair spread wide across dark, silken sheets, ice blue eyes alight with surprise as he gave prim, proper Penelope a glimpse of dark and heady pleasure. He'd nearly kissed her in the darkness. It had started out as a way to intimidate her, to begin the systematic compromising of quiet, unassuming, Penelope Marbury. But he did not deny that as they stood in his barren kitchen, he wondered what she would taste like. How her breath would sound fluttering across his skin. How she would feel against him. Around him.

She held a scarlet sequin dress to her chest and posed in front of a mirror. Too hot. She put it back and took a black mini. Too dreary. Then a blue as pale as a whisper caught her eye. She took the dress. The material was silky and clinging. Perfect for a goddess. On the floor below the dress sat scrappy wraparound high-heeled sandals that matched the blue. She didn't understand why she needed to dress up to meet Stanton but the impulse to steal into the storage room had been rising in her since the sun set. She took the dress and sandals back to her room, then sat on the floor and painted her toenails and fingernails pale blue. She drew waves of eternal flames and spiral hearts in silver and blue around her ankles and up her legs with body paints. When she was done, she pressed a Q-tip into glitter eye shadow and spread sparkles on her lid and below her eye. With a sudden impulse she swirled the lines over her temple and into her hairline. She liked the look. She rolled blue mascara on her lashes, then brushed her hair and snapped crystals in the long blond strands. She squeezed glitter lotion into her palms and rubbed it on her shoulders and arms. Last she took the dress and stepped into it. She turned to the mirror on the closet door. A thrill ran through her. Her reflection astonished her. She looked otherworldly, a mystical creature... eyes large, skin glowing, eyelashes longer, thicker. Everything about her was more powerful and sleek and fairy tale. Surely this wasn't really happening. Maybe she would wake up and run to school and tell Catty about her crazy dreams. But another part of her knew this was real. She leaned to one side. The dress exposed too much thigh. "Good." Her audacity surprised her. Another time she would have changed her dress. But why should she?

Hannah was his, too, yes, except that she had Rachel’s straight blond hair and narrow blue eyes and sharp nose—her whole face an accusation, just like her mother’s. But she had a specific kind of sarcasm that was a characteristic of the Fleishman side. At least she once did. Her parents’ separation seemed to ignite in her a humorlessness and a fury that had already been coming either because her parents fought too often and too viciously, or because she was becoming a teenager and her hormones created a rage in her. Or because she didn’t have a phone and Lexi Leffer had a phone. Or because she had a Facebook account she was only allowed to use on the computer in the living room and she didn’t even want that Facebook account because Facebook was for old people. Or because Toby suggested that the sneakers that looked just like Keds but were $12 less were preferable to the Keds since again they were exactly the same just without the blue tag on the back and what about being too-overt victims of consumerism?

I felt the stupidity rising in my throat and bit down harder, staring at his collarbone and the small piece of blue sea glass he wore on a leather cord around his neck, rising and falling. Rising. Falling. Seconds? Hours? I didn’t know. He’d made the necklace the year before from a triangular piece of glass he’d found during their family vacation to Zanzibar Bay, right behind the California beach house they rented for three weeks every summer. According to Matt, red glass was the rarest, followed by purple, then dark blue. To date he’d found only one red piece, which he’d made into a bracelet for Frankie a few months earlier. She never took it off. I loved all the colors – dark greens, baby blues, aquas, and whites. Frankie and Matt brought them back for me in mason jars every summer. They lived silently on my bookshelf, like frozen pieces of the ocean I had never seen. “Come here,” he whispered, his hand still stuck in my wild curls, blond hair winding around his fingers. “I still can’t believe you made that,” I said, not for the first time. “It’s so – cool.” Matt looked down at the glass, his hair falling in front of his eyes. “Maybe I’ll give it to you,” he said. “If you’re lucky.

The insidious reasons for a brown girl’s self-loathing won’t be surprising to any woman of color. I cannot rightly compare my own struggles to those of another minority, as each ethnicity comes with its own baggage and the South Asian experience is just one variation on the experience of dark-skinned people everywhere. As parents and grandparents often do in Asian countries, my extended family urged me to avoid the sun, not out of fear that heatstroke would sicken me or that UV rays would lead to cancer, but more, I think, out of fear that my skin would darken to the shade of an Untouchable, a person from the lowest caste in Indian society, someone who toils in the fields. The judgments implicit in these exhortations—and what they mean about your worth—might not dawn on you while you’re playing cricket in the sand. What’s at stake might not dawn on you while, as a girl, you clutch fast to yourself your blonde-haired, blue-eyed doll named Helen. But all along, the message that lighter skin is equivalent to a more attractive, worthier self is getting beamed deep into your subconscious. Western ideals of beauty do not stop at ocean shores. They pervade the world and mingle with those of your own country to create mutant, unachievable standards.

In Cootamundra the station was quiet. Tina looked around but before she could see anyone she saw the poster on the wall. Lockie saw it too. It stopped him mid-stride. It was surrounded by For Sale notices and babysitting flyers.Over the months it could have become covered over as hope was lost but it hadn’t been. Right in the middle, with some clear space around it, was the colour poster of a blue-eyed boy. His head was covered in golden curls and he had a deep dimple on his right cheek. His face had been enlarged so that every freckle could be counted. He was Lachlan Williams and in this town they were still looking for him. He looked nothing like the pale, skinny boy Tina was with. Underneath the picture were the words - Missing:Lachlan Williams Aged 8 Disappeared from the Easter Show April 2010. If you have any information please contact...There were a whole lot of numbers and a website address. Lockie stared at the poster for a minute. He pushed his hood back down and ran his hand over his brush-cut blond hair. ‘What—’ Tina began. ‘He shaved it,’ said Lockie before she could complete the question. ‘Every few weeks, when it got longer, he would shave it again.’ His voice was two hundred years old.Tina saw her hand on the poker and felt a surge of triumph at what she had done. Some people just deserved to die. It wasn’t a nice thought but it was true. You couldn’t change someone who was fundamentally evil. Of everything Lockie must have suffered, and Tina could not even wrap her mind around what he must have gone through, the shaving of his head seemed somehow the worst. The uniform had changed who Lockie was. He was a golden boy with golden curls and the uniform had taken the gold from him. Lockie looked nothing like the poster. His face was all angles and his smile was lost. He hadn’t needed to conceal himself beneath a hood. No one would have recognised him anyway.

When I burst into the terminal, my eyes swept around, bouncing from person to person in the crowded, bustling space. My stomach fell a little when I didn’t see him, but I knew he probably couldn’t come this far. He was probably at baggage claim. I looked around for a sign to point me in the right direction and finally saw one labeled Baggage Claim with an arrow pointing off to the left. But I didn’t follow the arrow. My eyes fixed on someone standing beneath the sign. His hands were jammed into the pockets of his well-worn slouchy jeans. The relaxed action pulled the waistband low, highlighting his flat, narrow waist his Henley tee molded to. As usual, he was wearing his varsity jacket and his blond hair was a mess. My gaze locked on his sapphire-blue eyes and didn’t let go. His eyes, ohmigod, his eyes. The blue was so intense it served as an emergency brake on everything in my life. The second I looked at him, everything else came to a screeching halt. I no longer noticed the huge crowd rushing around. The anxiety-causing flight was just a distant memory, and the two weeks I spent longing for his touch became something I would live through ten times over just to be in this moment with him again. His lips pulled into a smile and the charm that oozed from every pore in his body made me almost lightheaded. Romeo pulled his hands out of his pockets and straightened, motioning for me. I rushed across the space separating us, my bag slapping against my side as I, for once, gracefully maneuvered around the people in my path. His chuckle brushed over me when I was just steps away, and I threw myself at him with a little sigh of relief. My legs wrapped around his waist and his arms locked around my back. I burrowed my head into his shoulder and inhaled deep, taking in his distinctive scent. “Rim,” he murmured, his voice low. I pulled back and his lips were on mine instantly. The moment our lips touched, he stilled, his body and mouth pausing against mine. Before I could wonder why, he muttered a garbled curse against my mouth and then his lips began to move. He kissed me softly but fiercely. There was so much possession in the way he kissed me, in the way his arms locked around me that my heart stuttered. I parted my lips so his tongue could sweep inside, and when my tongue met his, desire, hot and heavy, unfurled within me. Someone chuckled as they walked by, and Romeo retreated slightly, still letting his mouth linger on mine before completely pulling away. He rested his forehead against mine and he smiled. “I really fucking missed you.” “Me too,” I whispered. -Romeo & Rimmel

It's hard to form a lasting connection when your permanent address is an eight-inch mailbox in the UPS store. Still,as I inch my way closer, I can't help the way my breath hitches, the way my insides thrum and swirl. And when he turns,flashing me that slow, languorous smile that's about to make him world famous,his eyes meeting mine when he says, "Hey,Daire-Happy Sweet Sixteen," I can't help but think of the millions of girls who would do just about anything to stand in my pointy blue babouches. I return the smile, flick a little wave of my hand, then bury it in the side pocket of the olive-green army jacket I always wear. Pretending not to notice the way his gaze roams over me, straying from my waist-length brown hair peeking out from my scarf, to the tie-dyed tank top that clings under my jacket,to the skinny dark denim jeans,all the way down to the brand-new slippers I wear on my feet. "Nice." He places his foot beside mine, providing me with a view of the his-and-hers version of the very same shoe. Laughing when he adds, "Maybe we can start a trend when we head back to the States.What do you think?" We. There is no we. I know it.He knows it.And it bugs me that he tries to pretend otherwise. The cameras stopped rolling hours ago, and yet here he is,still playing a role. Acting as though our brief, on-location hookup means something more. Acting like we won't really end long before our passports are stamped RETURN. And that's all it takes for those annoyingly soft girly feelings to vanish as quickly as a flame in the rain. Allowing the Daire I know,the Daire I've honed myself to be, to stand in her palce. "Doubtful." I smirk,kicking his shoe with mine.A little harder then necessary, but then again,he deserves it for thinking I'm lame enough to fall for his act. "So,what do you say-food? I'm dying for one of those beef brochettes,maybe even a sausage one too.Oh-and some fries would be good!" I make for the food stalls,but Vane has another idea. His hand reaches for mine,fingers entwining until they're laced nice and tight. "In a minute," he says,pulling me so close my hip bumps against his. "I thought we might do something special-in honor of your birthday and all.What do you think about matching tattoos?" I gape.Surely he's joking. "Yeah,you know,mehndi. Nothing permanent.Still,I thought it could be kinda cool." He arcs his left brow in his trademark Vane Wick wau,and I have to fight not to frown in return. Nothing permanent. That's my theme song-my mission statement,if you will. Still,mehndi's not quite the same as a press-on. It has its own life span. One that will linger long after Vane's studio-financed, private jet lifts him high into the sky and right out of my life. Though I don't mention any of that, instead I just say, "You know the director will kill you if you show up on set tomorrow covered in henna." Vane shrugs. Shrugs in a way I've seen too many times, on too many young actors before him.He's in full-on star-power mode.Think he's indispensable. That he's the only seventeen-year-old guy with a hint of talent,golden skin, wavy blond hair, and piercing blue eyes that can light up a screen and make the girls (and most of their moms) swoon. It's a dangerous way to see yourself-especially when you make your living in Hollywood. It's the kind of thinking that leads straight to multiple rehab stints, trashy reality TV shows, desperate ghostwritten memoirs, and low-budget movies that go straight to DVD.

Before he could explain further, however, Rhys happened to catch sight of a slim, dark shape walking past the doorway. It was only a fleeting glimpse... but it was enough to send a jolt of awareness through him. "You," he said in a voice that carried out into the hallway. "Whoever just passed by the door. Come here." In the riveting silence, a young woman appeared at the threshold. Her features were delicately angular, her silver blue eyes round and wide-set. As she stood at the edge of the lamplight, her fair skin and pale blond hair seemed to hold their own radiance, an effect he'd seen in paintings of Old Testament angels. "There's a grain about it," Rhys's father had always said when he'd wanted to describe something fine and polished and perfect, something of the highest quality. Oh, there was a grain about this woman. She was only medium height, but her extreme slenderness gave her the illusion of being taller. Her breasts were high and gently rounded beneath the high-necked dress, and for a pleasurable, disorienting moment Rhys remembered resting his head there as she had given him sips of orchid tea. "Say something," he commanded gruffly. The shy glow of her smile gilded the air. "I'm glad to see you in better health, Mr. Winterborne." Helen's voice. She was more beautiful than starlight, and just as unattainable. As he stared at her, Rhys was bitterly reminded of the upper-class ladies who had looked at him with contempt when he was a shop boy, holding their skirts back if he passed near them on the street, the way they would seek to avoid a filthy stray dog. "Is there something I can do for you?" she asked. Rhys shook his head, still unable to take his gaze from her. "I only wanted a face to go with the voice.