Confused Girl Quotes

Girls are always talking about electricity in their romance, but none are too happy to actually be electrocuted, apparently. Bloody confusing, is what it is.

The girl is infectious human waste, and she's confused and afraid to commit to the wrong thing and so she won't commit to anything.

In spite of everything I still believe that people are really good at heart. I simply can’t build up my hopes on a foundation consisting of confusion, misery, and death. I see the world gradually being turned into a wilderness, I hear the ever approaching thunder, which will destroy us too, I can feel the sufferings of millions and yet, if I look up into the heavens, I think that it will all come right, that this cruelty too will end, and that peace and tranquility will return again.

Have you ever confused a dream with life? Or stolen something when you have the cash? Have you ever been blue? Or thought your train moving while sitting still? Maybe I was just crazy. Maybe it was the 60's. Or maybe I was just a girl... interrupted.

In spite of everything I still believe that people are really good at heart. I simply can't build up my hopes on a foundation consisting of confusion, misery and death.

Feeling in love (or lust) and fear feel a lot alike. They both give you that anxious butterfly feeling in your stomach, a sense of excitement, and a general unease physically and mentally. It's easy to confuse love with fear.

Later,” I said to the room at large as I didn’t want to appear rude. For some reason this was met by Shirleen saying, "I’ll put money down that she’s living with him in four days.” My confused gaze swung to Shirleen but she was looking at the movie star glamour girl who was looking at me. “Three days,” Glamour girl said, smiling at me and I thought, in other circumstances, I would have liked to meet her. “A week, she’s got spirit,” The other black lady said. She was smiling at me too, not like I was the butt of some joke, but in a kind way. I opened the outer door. Before it closed behind me, I heard Luke say strangely, “Tonight.” Then everyone laughed.

sometime hate is just confused love!

Why was it that boys said girls were so hard to understand when she hadn't known a single guy who hadn't confused her to the point of screaming?

The girl who lives in 8G used to be a lovely charming girl, but the girl is a monster bitch monster. The girl is infectious human waste, and she's confused and afraid to commit to the wrong thing so she won't commit to anything.

So tonight I reach for my journal again. This is the first time I’ve done this since I came to Italy. What I write in my journal is that I am weak and full of fear. I explain that Depression and Loneliness have shown up, and I’m scared they will never leave. I say that I don’t want to take the drugs anymore, but I’m frightened I will have to. I am terrified that I will never really pull my life together. In response, somewhere from within me, rises a now-familiar presence, offering me all the certainties I have always wished another person would say to me when I was troubled. This is what I find myself writing on the page: I’m here. I love you. I don’t care if you need to stay up crying all night long. I will stay with you. If you need the medication again, go ahead and take it—I will love you through that, as well. If you don’t need the medication, I will love you, too. There’s nothing you can ever do to lose my love. I will protect you until you die, and after your death I will still protect you. I am stronger than Depression and Braver than Loneliness and nothing will ever exhaust me. Tonight, this strange interior gesture of friendship—the lending of a hand from me to myself when nobody else is around to offer solace—reminds me of something that happened to me once in New York City. I walked into an office building one afternoon in a hurry, dashed into the waiting elevator. As I rushed in, I caught an unexpected glance of myself in a security mirror’s reflection. In that moment, my brain did an odd thing—it fired off this split-second message: “Hey! You know her! That’s a friend of yours!” And I actually ran forward toward my own reflection with a smile, ready to welcome that girl whose name I had lost but whose face was so familiar. In a flash instant of course, I realized my mistake and laughed in embarrassment at my almost doglike confusion over how a mirror works. But for some reason that incident comes to mind again tonight during my sadness in Rome, and I find myself writing this comforting reminder at the bottom of the page. Never forget that once upon a time, in an unguarded moment, you recognized yourself as a FRIEND… I fell asleep holding my notebook pressed against my chest, open to this most recent assurance. In the morning when I wake up, I can still smell a faint trace of depression’s lingering smoke, but he himself is nowhere to be seen. Somewhere during the night, he got up and left. And his buddy loneliness beat it, too.

Be careful what you’re doing, because no one is ever who you want them to be. And the less you really know them, the more likely you are to confuse them with the girl or boy in your head

...I was confusing familiarity with happiness. Because that was there even when love wasn't...

Look, some people prefer they,” Alex said. “They’re non-binary or mid-spectrum or whatever. If they want you to use they, then that’s what you should do. But for me, personally, I don’t want to use the same pronouns all the time, because that’s not me. I change a lot. That’s sort of the point. When I’m she, I’m she. When I’m he, I’m he. I’m not they. Get it?” “If I say no, will you hurt me?” “No.” “Then no, not really.” She shrugged. “You don’t have to get it. Just, you know, a little respect.” “For the girl with the very sharp wire? No problem.” She must have liked that answer. There was nothing confusing about the smile she gave me. It warmed the office about five degrees.

If I was gay, I wouldn't need an asterisk beside my name. I could stop worrying if the girl I like will bounce when she finds out I also like dick. I could have a coming-out party without people thinking I just want attention. I wouldn't have to explain that I fall in love with minds, not genders or body parts. People wouldn't say I'm 'just a slut' or 'faking it' or 'undecided' or 'confused.' I'm not confused. I don't categorize people by who I'm allowed to like and who I'm allowed to love. Love doesn't fit into boxes like that. It's blurry, slippery, quantum. It's only limited by our perceptions and before we slap a label on it and cram it into some category, everything is possible.

You walked in, laughing, tears welling confused, mingling in your throat. How can you be so many women to so many people, oh you strange girl?

You know,” Cole said. “My mom once told me a boy would know he’d become a man when he stopped putting himself first. She said a girl would come along and I wouldn’t be able to get her out of my mind. She said this girl would frustrate me, confuse me, and challenge me, but she would also make me do whatever was necessary to be a better man–the man she needed. With you, I want to be better. I want to be what you need. Tell me what you need.

Who are you anyway? What are you even doing here?” “Haven,” she said quietly, peeking at him. He gazed at her peculiarly. “Heaven? No, this definitely isn't Heaven. But I get why you’re confused, since I'm standing in front of you.” She stared at him, and he cracked a smile. “I'm kidding. Well, kinda… I have been told I've taken a girl to Heaven a time or two.” “Haven, not Heaven,” she said, louder than before. Nothing about the conversation made sense to her. “My name’s Haven.

I didn’t want Ben. Plain and simple. I wasn’t going to be one of those silly girls in a love triangle romance novel who couldn’t choose. Not that I was in a love triangle, but I never understood how a girl can’t know whether or not she wants a guy. We can be confused about what is good for us but not about what we truly want.

Peeta,” I say lightly. “You said at the interview you’d had a crush on me forever. When did forever start?” “Oh, let’s see. I guess the first day of school. We were five. You had on a red plaid dress and your hair... it was in two braids instead of one. My father pointed you out when we were waiting to line up,” Peeta says. “Your father? Why?” I ask. “He said, ‘See that little girl? I wanted to marry her mother, but she ran off with a coal miner,’” Peeta says. “What? You’re making that up!” I exclaim. “No, true story,” Peeta says. “And I said, ‘A coal miner? Why did she want a coal miner if she could’ve had you?’ And he said, ‘Because when he sings... even the birds stop to listen.’” “That’s true. They do. I mean, they did,” I say. I’m stunned and surprisingly moved, thinking of the baker telling this to Peeta. It strikes me that my own reluctance to sing, my own dismissal of music might not really be that I think it’s a waste of time. It might be because it reminds me too much of my father. “So that day, in music assembly, the teacher asked who knew the valley song. Your hand shot right up in the air. She stood you up on a stool and had you sing it for us. And I swear, every bird outside the windows fell silent,” Peeta says. “Oh, please,” I say, laughing. “No, it happened. And right when your song ended, I knew—just like your mother—I was a goner,” Peeta says. “Then for the next eleven years, I tried to work up the nerve to talk to you.” “Without success,” I add. “Without success. So, in a way, my name being drawn in the reaping was a real piece of luck,” says Peeta. For a moment, I’m almost foolishly happy and then confusion sweeps over me. Because we’re supposed to be making up this stuff, playing at being in love not actually being in love. But Peeta’s story has a ring of truth to it. That part about my father and the birds. And I did sing the first day of school, although I don’t remember the song. And that red plaid dress... there was one, a hand-me-down to Prim that got washed to rags after my father’s death. It would explain another thing, too. Why Peeta took a beating to give me the bread on that awful hollow day. So, if those details are true... could it all be true? “You have a... remarkable memory,” I say haltingly. “I remember everything about you,” says Peeta, tucking a loose strand of hair behind my ear. “You’re the one who wasn’t paying attention.” “I am now,” I say. “Well, I don’t have much competition here,” he says. I want to draw away, to close those shutters again, but I know I can’t. It’s as if I can hear Haymitch whispering in my ear, “Say it! Say it!” I swallow hard and get the words out. “You don’t have much competition anywhere.” And this time, it’s me who leans in.

asexual” and “aromantic” were different things. She liked holding hands and trading kisses. She’d had several boyfriends in elementary school, just like most of the other girls, and she had always found those practice relationships completely satisfying. It wasn’t until puberty had come along and changed the rules that she’d started pulling away in confusion and disinterest.

When he didn't answer, she didn't know if it was because he couldn't or if he was back to not talking to her. Back to pushing her out of his life. Men! Why was it that boys said girls were so hard to understand, when she hadn't known a single guy who hadn't confused her to the point of screaming?

Oh my. He's English. "Er. Does Mer live here?" Seriously, I don't know any American girl who can resist an English accent. The boy clears his throat. "Meredith Chevalier? Tall girl? Big, curly hair?" Then he looks at me like I'm crazy or half deaf, like my Nana Oliphant. Nanna just smiles and shakes her head whenever I ask, "What kind of salad dressing would you like?" or "Where did you put Granddad's false teeth?" "I'm sorry." He takes the smallest step away from me. "You were going to bed." "Yes! Meredith lives here. I've just spent two hours with her." I announce this proudly like my little brother, Seany, whenever he finds something disgusting in the yard. "I'm Anna! I'm new here!" Oh, [Gosh]. What. Is with. The scary enthusiasm? My cheeks catch fire, and it's all so humiliating. The beautiful boy gives an amused grin. His teeth are lovely - straight on top and crooked on the bottom, with a touch of overbite. I'm a sucker for smiles like this, due to my own lack of orthodontia. I have a gap between my front teeth the size of a raisin. "Étienne," he says. "I live one floor up." "I live here." I point dumbly at my room while my mind whirs: French name, English accent, American school. Anna confused. He raps twice on Meredith's door. "Well. I'll see you around then, Anna." Eh-t-yen says my name like this: Ah-na.

In school, they would tell you that life wouldn’t come to you; you had to go out and make it your own. But when it came to love, the message for girls seemed to be this: Don’t. Don’t go after what you want. Wait. Wait to be chosen, as if only in the eye of another could one truly find value. The message was confusing and infuriating. It was a shell game with no actual pea under the rapidly moving cups.

So many bleeding, stupid questions. Do girls think like this all the time? No wonder they’re so confusing.

It was frankly sort of confusing, the way everyone stared at our bodies exactly as they tried to erase the ideas of our bodies from our minds. We were supposed to get over ourselves but no one was supposed to get over us. The female body was our worst handicap and our best advantage -- the surest means to success, the surest course to failure. (p. 72)

What you are is an inteligent, sassy, sarcastic, cynical, neurotic, loyal, compassionate girl. That's what you are, OK? You're not a slut or a whore or anything remotely similar. Just because you have some secrets and some screwups...You're just confused...like the rest of us.

A little girl shouldn’t have to worry about her entire family,’ Grandpa says to me one afternoon…. ‘What?’ I ask, not because I didn’t hear what he said, but because I’m confused. Of course a little girl should worry about her entire family. That’s what little girls do. ‘I just…’ He steps closer to me. ‘I just think…you deserve to be a kid.

No wonder the regulators decided on segregation of boys and girls: Otherwise, it would have been a nightmare, this feeling angry and self-conscious and confused and annoyed all the time.

NO!" She shouted through my lips. Jared caught her hands, then caught me against the wall before I could fall. I sagged, my body confused by the conflicting directions it was receiving. "Mel? Mel!" "What are you doing?" He groaned in relief. "I knew you could do it! Ah Mel!" He kissed her again, kissed the lips that she controlled, and we could both taste the tears that ran down his face. She bit him. Jared jumped back from both of us, and I slid to the floor, landing in a wilted heap. He started laughing, "That's my girl. You still got her, Wanda?" "Yes," I gasped. What the hell, Wanda? She screeched at me. Where have you been? Do you have any idea what I've been going through trying to find you? Yeah, I can see that you were really suffering.

Here: an exercise in choice. Your choice. One of these tales is true. She lived through the war. In 1959 she came to America. She now lives in a condo in Miami, a tiny French woman with white hair, with a daughter and a grand-daughter. She keeps herself to herself and smiles rarely, as if the weight of memory keeps her from finding joy. Or that's a lie. Actually the Gestapo picked her up during a border crossing in 1943, and they left her in a meadow. First she dug her own grave, then a single bullet to the back of the skull. Her last thought, before that bullet, was that she was four months' pregnant, and that if we do not fight to create a future there will be no future for any of us. There is an old woman in Miami who wakes, confused, from a dream of the wind blowing the wildflowers in a meadow. There are bones untouched beneath the warm French earth which dream of a daughter's wedding. Good wine is drunk. The only tears shed are happy ones.

She’s so confusing. She’s so frustrating. She’s so damn unpredictable. She’s nothing I’ve ever wanted in a girl. And absolutely everything I need.

That’s my girl,” she said, her eyes holding a shared pain as she saw my confusion. “Al, where are you going to put her? Not in your room. She’d pull a line through you and kill you when you hog the blankets. I’ll take the waif in. I promise I’ll bring this one up properly.

Confuse was the nurses' word for abuse.

Oh." He sat in confused silence for a few seconds. "Can I ask you a very serious question?" "I rather you didn't," I said. He stared straight into my eyes. "If you were an animal, what animal would you be?" WAIT, WHAT? "Wait, what?" "It's a classic icebreaker." "If I were an ANIMAL...?" He faked a sigh and checked an imaginary watch. "Your inability to answer the question doesn't bode well for-" "I refuse to answer that," I said. "On the grounds that it's probably the stupidest thing I've ever been asked." He stared at me, frowning. "I hear your subconscious saying MONKEY.

Sound doesn't carry as well through gills. You have to use a different level of your vocal chords." I point to the spot just above his Adam's apple. "Higher." He just stares at me, looking confused——but breathing like he was born to it. "Pretend you're talking like a girl." No way, he mouths, shaking his head. Stupid male ego.

I’m sure I’ve confused him with my request, but I want him to kiss me. And I want a real kiss, not a friend kiss. I’m still committed to the friends-only agreement, but sometimes a girl just wants a damn kiss. Is that so wrong?

I like the memories because they remind me I haven't always been this girl, constantly mad or scared or confused.

I'm a strange girl, hopelessly lost and terribly confused. What's worse, I think I may have fallen madly in love with you.

Accept the fact that girls squeal when they're happy or confused or excited or scared or because they just saw a certain boy in line.

clad not exactly as a boy but, rather confusingly, as the boy I would have been, had I been more of a girl

I guess what I'm sayin' is, if you want to give Jules a job, be very careful.” “Why be careful?” Marnes asked. Marck gazed up at the confusion of pipes and wires overhead. “'Cause she'll damn well do it. Even if you don't really expect her to.

Love is so confusing - you tell a girl she looks great and what's the first thing you do? Turn out the lights!

The point is, the brain talks to itself, and by talking to itself changes its perceptions. To make a new version of the not-entirely-false model, imagine the first interpreter as a foreign correspondent, reporting from the world. The world in this case means everything out- or inside our bodies, including serotonin levels in the brain. The second interpreter is a news analyst, who writes op-ed pieces. They read each other's work. One needs data, the other needs an overview; they influence each other. They get dialogues going. INTERPRETER ONE: Pain in the left foot, back of heel. INTERPRETER TWO: I believe that's because the shoe is too tight. INTERPRETER ONE: Checked that. Took off the shoe. Foot still hurts. INTERPRETER TWO: Did you look at it? INTERPRETER ONE: Looking. It's red. INTERPRETER TWO: No blood? INTERPRETER ONE: Nope. INTERPRETER TWO: Forget about it. INTERPRETER ONE: Okay. Mental illness seems to be a communication problem between interpreters one and two. An exemplary piece of confusion. INTERPRETER ONE: There's a tiger in the corner. INTERPRETER TWO: No, that's not a tiger- that's a bureau. INTERPRETER ONE: It's a tiger, it's a tiger! INTERPRETER TWO: Don't be ridiculous. Let's go look at it. Then all the dendrites and neurons and serotonin levels and interpreters collect themselves and trot over to the corner. If you are not crazy, the second interpreter's assertion, that this is a bureau, will be acceptable to the first interpreter. If you are crazy, the first interpreter's viewpoint, the tiger theory, will prevail. The trouble here is that the first interpreter actually sees a tiger. The messages sent between neurons are incorrect somehow. The chemicals triggered are the wrong chemicals, or the impulses are going to the wrong connections. Apparently, this happens often, but the second interpreter jumps in to straighten things out.

I didn't deserve this. Even the most confused and lost girl, even the most screwed up of us all, doesn't deserve this. Death isn't the consequence for making a mistake; it's the punishment we force on girls because they couldn't be good. Only girls have to die for wanting.

On rainy afternoons, embroidering with a group of friends on the begonia porch, she would lose the thread of the conversation and a tear of nostalgia would salt her palate when she saw the strips of damp earth and the piles of mud that the earthworms had pushed up in the garden. Those secret tastes, defeated in the past by oranges and rhubarb, broke out into an irrepressible urge when she began to weep. She went back to eating earth. The first time she did it almost out of curiosity, sure that the bad taste would be the best cure for the temptation. And, in fact, she could not bear the earth in her mouth. But she persevered, overcome by the growing anxiety, and little by little she was getting back her ancestral appetite, the taste of primary minerals, the unbridled satisfaction of what was the original food. She would put handfuls of earth in her pockets, and ate them in small bits without being seen, with a confused feeling of pleasure and rage, as she instructed her girl friends in the most difficult needlepoint and spoke about other men, who did not deserve the sacrifice of having one eat the whitewash on the walls because of them. The handfuls of earth made the only man who deserved that show of degradation less remote and more certain, as if the ground that he walked on with his fine patent leather boots in another part of the world were transmitting to her the weight and the temperature of his blood in a mineral savor that left a harsh aftertaste in her mouth and a sediment of peace in her heart.

I wondered what my father had looked like that day, how he had felt, marrying the lively and beautiful girl who was my mother. I wondered what his life was like now. Did he ever think of us? I wanted to hate him, but I couldn't; I didn't know him well enough. Instead, I wondered about him occasionally, with a confused kind of longing. There was a place inside me carved out for him; I didn't want it to be there, but it was. Once, at the hardware store, Brooks had shown me how to use a drill. I'd made a tiny hole that went deep. The place for my father was like that.

The bottle is where everything sad or mean or confusing can go. And the blues--it's like that bottle. But in the bottle there's a seed that you let grow. Even in the bottle it can grow big and green. It's full of all those feelings that are in there, but beautiful and growing too.

Don’t confuse love with romance, young lady. Romance is beautiful, it’s a gesture, it’s a walk in a park with a pretty girl. Love is ugly sometimes. It’s a crawl into a war zone to save a friend. Romance whispers sweet nothings. Love tells painful truths. Romance gives an engagement ring. Love takes a bullet.

I see how it is,” I snapped. “You were all in favor of me breaking the tattoo and thinking on my own—but that’s only okay if it’s convenient for you, huh? Just like your ‘loving from afar’ only works if you don’t have an opportunity to get your hands all over me. And your lips. And . . . stuff.” Adrian rarely got mad, and I wouldn’t quite say he was now. But he was definitely exasperated. “Are you seriously in this much self-denial, Sydney? Like do you actually believe yourself when you say you don’t feel anything? Especially after what’s been happening between us?” “Nothing’s happening between us,” I said automatically. “Physical attraction isn’t the same as love. You of all people should know that.” “Ouch,” he said. His expression hadn’t changed, but I saw hurt in his eyes. I’d wounded him. “Is that what bothers you? My past? That maybe I’m an expert in an area you aren’t?” “One I’m sure you’d just love to educate me in. One more girl to add to your list of conquests.” He was speechless for a few moments and then held up one finger. “First, I don’t have a list.” Another finger, “Second, if I did have a list, I could find someone a hell of lot less frustrating to add to it.” For the third finger, he leaned toward me. “And finally, I know that you know you’re no conquest, so don’t act like you seriously think that. You and I have been through too much together. We’re too close, too connected. I wasn’t that crazy on spirit when I said you’re my flame in the dark. We chase away the shadows around each other. Our backgrounds don’t matter. What we have is bigger than that. I love you, and beneath all that logic, calculation, and superstition, I know you love me too. Running away and fleeing all your problems isn’t going to change that. You’re just going to end up scared and confused.” “I already feel that way,” I said quietly. Adrian moved back and leaned into his seat, looking tired. “Well, that’s the most accurate thing you’ve said so far.” I grabbed the basket and jerked open the car door. Without another word, I stormed off, refusing to look back in case he saw the tears that had inexplicably appeared in my eyes. Only, I wasn’t sure exactly which part of our conversation I was most upset about.

All I need is backup. He’s the little angel that sits on my shoulder whispering in my ear, “You can do it!” It’s funny. I’m thirty years old now and I still feel like a little girl. I’m still looking around to check and see what other people are doing to make sure I’m not completely different; I’m still looking around for help, hoping for a quick nudge and a whisper of advice. But I can’t seem to be able to catch anybody’s eye. Nobody else around me seems to be looking around and wondering what to do. Why is it that I feel like I’m the only person who is confused and concerned about the choices I’ve made and where I’m headed? Everywhere I look, I see people just getting on with it. Maybe I should just follow suit and get on with it.

Oh, we had a lot of sex back then in Montreal; it wasn’t just me. Blame it on the cold. The roses in everyone’s cheeks made them seem way more appealing than they actually were. We confused the indoors with intimacy and electric heating with connection.

The girl says "Oh uh-uh, wait a minute! Wait a minute! Just because I'm dressed this way does not make me a whore!" Which is true, Gentlemen, that is true. Just because they dress a certain way doesn't mean they are a certain way. Don't even forget it. But ladies, you must understand that is fucking confusing. It just is. Now that would be like me, Dave Chappelle, the comedian, walking down the street in a cop uniform. Somebody might run up on me saying, "Oh, thank God. Officer, help us! Come on. They're over here. Help us!" "Oh-hoh! Just because I'm dressed this way does not make me a police officer!" See what I mean? All right, ladies, fine. You are not a whore. But you are wearing a whore's uniform.

Indeed, girls can be so in need of social approval that they confuse harassment for acceptance--thinking that any attention is better than none. Since many girls as well as boys buy the idea that sexual aggression and exploitation is normal masculine behavior, it may not even occur to them to demand to be treated as equals.

Look.” The others seemed confused. Then the glow became brighter: a holographic golden sickle with a few sheaves of wheat, rotating just above Meg McCaffrey. A boy in the crowd gasped. “She’s a communist!” A girl who’d been sitting at Cabin Four’s table gave him a disgusted sneer. “No, Damien, that’s my mom’s symbol.” Her face went slack as the truth sank in. “Uh, which means…it’s her mom’s symbol.

A lot is being said today about the influence that the myths and images of women have on all of us who are products of culture. I think it has been a peculiar confusion to the girl or woman who tries to write because she is peculiarly susceptible to language. She goes to poetry or fiction looking for her way of being in the world, since she too has been putting words and images together; she is looking eagerly for guides, maps, possibilities; and over and over in the ‘words’ masculine persuasive force’ of literature she comes up against something that negates everything she is about: she meets the image of Woman in books written by men.

Everyone on every road that crossed beneath the point of my pen was always going to do the same things over and over and over. I was confused. How could I be in love with a girl and a boy, at the same time? I was trapped forever. You know what I mean.

James dropped Cordelia’s hands. They were no longer dancing. James turned away from Cordelia without a word and strode across the room toward the newcomers. She stood, frozen in confusion, as James bent to kiss the hand of the stunningly beautiful girl who had just walked into the room. Titters rose on the dance floor. Lucie had stepped back from Matthew, her eyes wide. Alastair and Thomas both turned to look at Cordelia with expressions of surprise. At any moment, Cordelia knew, her mother would notice that she was drifting in the middle of the dance floor like an abandoned tugboat and charge toward her, and then Cordelia would die. She would die of the humiliation. Cordelia was scanning the room for the nearest exit, ready to flee, when a hand grasped her arm. She was spun around and into an expert grip: a moment later she was dancing again, her feet automatically following her partner’s. “That’s right.” It was Matthew Fairchild. Fair hair, spicy cologne, a blur of a smile. His hands were gentle as he swept her back into the waltz. “Just—try to smile, and no one will notice anything happened. James and I are practically interchangeable in the public consciousness anyway.” “James—left,” Cordelia said, in shock. “I know,” said Matthew. “Very bad form. One should not leave a lady on the dance floor unless something is actually on fire. I’ll have a word.” “A word,” Cordelia echoed. She was beginning to feel less stunned and more angry. “A word?” “Several words, if it will make you feel better?

He squinted, as if he could shut out my damned, unreasonable request, then relaxed and opened his eyes again. "I'm an Aeolus, okay?" "A what?" Kat asked. "Like on a breast?" Scott looked at him in confusion. Kat buried her face in one of her hands. "Like a windkeeper, you jackass.

I want to love somebody because I want to be loved. In a rabbit-fear I may hurl myself under the wheels of the car because the lights terrify me, and under the dark blind death of the wheels I will be safe. I am very tired, very banal, very confused. I do not know who I am tonight. I wanted to walk until I dropped and not complete the inevitable circle of coming home. I have lived in boxes above, below, and down the hall from girls who think hard, feel similarly, and long companionably, and I have not bothered to cultivate them because I did not want to, could not, sacrifice the time. People know who I am, and the harder I try to know who they are, the more I forget their names - I want to be alone, and yet there are times when the liquid eye and the cognizant grin of a small monkey would send me into a crying fit of brotherly love. I work and think alone. I live with people, and act. I love and cherish both. If I knew now what I wanted I would know when I saw it, who he was.

You see, Dash -- I was never the girl in your head. And you were never the boy in my head. I think we both knew that. It's only when we try to make the girl or boy in our head real that the true trouble comes. I did that with Carlos, and it was a bad failure. Be careful what you're doing, because no one is ever who you want them to be. And the less you really know them, the more likely you are to confuse them with the girl or boy in your head.

It’s like, it’s like I have a different heart. The other girls have one kind of heart, and I have a different kind.” My mom was understandably confused. “Are you saying they’re mean?” “No . . . I don’t know.” Saying other kids were mean felt like I was saying I was more kind, which definitely wasn’t it—more anxious maybe, more sensitive. I guess all I was feeling was that I was different. Sometimes I’ll be at work or a party and get that same feeling. I am not like these people. I don’t know what I’m doing here. And it comforts me to know that I felt that way as a child, too. Maybe that should make me feel worse, but it makes me calm and resolved. I’ve been prepared to be an outsider most of my life.

Are you enjoying your company so far?" "Yes! It's been a pleasure getting to know these ladies." "Are they all the sweet, gentle ladies they appear to be?" Gavril asked. Before Maxon replied, the answer brought a smile to my face. Because I knew that it was yes...sort of. "Umm..." Maxon looked past Gavril at me. "Almost." "Almost?" Gavril asked, surprised. He turned to us. "Is someone over there being naughty?" Mercifully, all the girls let out light giggles, so I blended in. The little traitor! "What exactly did these girls do that isn't so sweet?" Gavril asked Maxon. "Oh, well, let me tell you." Maxon crossed his legs and got very comfortable in his chair. It was probably the most relaxed I'd ever seen him, sitting there poking fun at me. I liked this side of him. I wished it would come out more often. "One of them had the nerve to yell at me rather forcefully the first time we met. I was given a very severe scolding." Above Maxon's head, the king and queen exchanged a glance. It seemed they were hearing this story for the first time, too. Beside me the girls were looking at one another, confused. I didn't get it until Marlee said something. "I don't remember anyone yelling at him in the Great Room. Do you?" Maxon seemed to have forgotten that our first meeting was meant to be a secret. "I think he's talking it up to make it funnier. I did say some serious things to him. I think he might mean me." "A scolding, you say? Whatever for?" Gavril continued. "Honestly, I wasn't really sure. I think it was a bout of homesickness. Which is why I forgave her, of course." Maxon was loose and easy now, talking to Gavril as if he were the only person in the room. I'd have to tell him later how wonderful he did. "So she's still with us, then?" Gavril looked over at the collection of girls, grinning widely, and then returned to face his prince. "Oh, yes. She's still here," Maxon said, not letting his eyes wander from Gavril's face. "And I plan on keeping her here for quite a while.

Love was something I would not have to worry about - the whole mystery of love, heartbreak songs, and family legends. Women who pined, men who went mad, people who forgot who they were and shamed themselves with need, wanting only to be loved by the one they loved. Love was a mystery. Love was a calamity. Love was a curse that had somehow skipped me, which was no doubt why I was so good at multiple-choice tests and memorizing poetry. Sex was a country I been dragged into as an unwilling girl - sex, and the madness of the body. For all that it could terrify and confuse me, sex was something I had assimilated. Sex was a game or a weapon or an addiction. Sex was familiar. But love - love was another country.

Gus and I talk about girls a lot, but we can't figure them out. They are so confusing. Like, if you look at them, they get mad. And if you don't look at them, they get mad. And if you're nice to them, they think you like them. And if you're mean to them, they think you like them. And if you do like them, they think you hate them.

It is convenient for the old men to blame Eve. To insist we are damned because a country girl talked to the snake one afternoon long ago. Children must starve in Somalia for that, and old women be abandoned in our greatest cities. It’s why we will finally be thrown into the lakes of molten lead. Because she was confused by happiness that first time anyone said she was beautiful. Nevertheless, she must be the issue, so people won’t notice that rocks and galaxies, mathematics and rust are also created in His image.

Once upon a time there was a king who had three beautiful daughters. No, no, wait. Once upon a time there were three bears who lived in a wee house in the woods. Once upon a time there were three soldiers, tramping together down the road after the war. Once upon a time there were three little pigs. Once upon a time there were three brothers. No, this is it. This is the variation I want. Once upon a time there were three Beautiful children, two boys and a girl. When each baby was born, the parents rejoiced, the heavens rejoiced, even the fairies rejoiced. The fairies came to christening parties and gave the babies magical gifts. Bounce, effort, and snark. Contemplation and enthusiasm. Ambition and strong coffee. Sugar, curiosity, and rain. And yet, there was a witch. There's always a witch. This which was the same age as the beautiful children, and as she and they grew, she was jealous of the girl, and jealous of the boys, too. They were blessed with all these fairy gifts, gifts the witch had been denied at her own christening. The eldest boy was strong and fast, capable and handsome. Though it's true, he was exceptionally short. The next boy was studious and open hearted. Though it's true, he was an outsider. And the girl was witty, Generous, and ethical. Though it's true, she felt powerless. The witch, she was none of these things, for her parents had angered the fairies. No gifts were ever bestowed upon her. She was lonely. Her only strength was her dark and ugly magic. She confuse being spartan with being charitable, and gave away her possessions without truly doing good with them. She confuse being sick with being brave, and suffered agonies while imagining she merited praise for it. She confused wit with intelligence, and made people laugh rather than lightening their hearts are making them think. Hey magic was all she had, and she used it to destroy what she most admired. She visited each young person in turn in their tenth birthday, but did not harm them out right. The protection of some kind fairy - the lilac fairy, perhaps - prevented her from doing so. What she did instead was cursed them. "When you are sixteen," proclaimed the witch in a rage of jealousy, "you shall prick your finger on a spindle - no, you shall strike a match - yes, you will strike a match and did in its flame." The parents of the beautiful children were frightened of the curse, and tried, as people will do, to avoid it. They moved themselves and the children far away, to a castle on a windswept Island. A castle where there were no matches. There, surely, they would be safe. There, Surely, the witch would never find them. But find them she did. And when they were fifteen, these beautiful children, just before their sixteenth birthdays and when they're nervous parents not yet expecting it, the jealous which toxic, hateful self into their lives in the shape of a blonde meeting. The maiden befriended the beautiful children. She kissed him and took them on the boat rides and brought them fudge and told them stories. Then she gave them a box of matches. The children were entranced, for nearly sixteen they have never seen fire. Go on, strike, said the witch, smiling. Fire is beautiful. Nothing bad will happen. Go on, she said, the flames will cleanse your souls. Go on, she said, for you are independent thinkers. Go on, she said. What is this life we lead, if you did not take action? And they listened. They took the matches from her and they struck them. The witch watched their beauty burn, Their bounce, Their intelligence, Their wit, Their open hearts, Their charm, Their dreams for the future. She watched it all disappear in smoke.

Everything changed when I met the girl. She penetrated a corner of my soul that had been kept sealed and even I didn't know was there. With her gestures, the scent of her skin, her sudden, intense glances that filled me with overwhelming tenderness, with her dependence that was a kind of unthinking, absolute acceptance, she could rescue me instantly from my confusions and obsessions, my discouragement and failure, or my simple daily routine, and leave me inside a radiant circle made of throbbing energy and powerful certainty, like the effects of an unknown drug that produces unconditional happiness.

You might come up with a solution to the problem that doesn't involve destruction." Drave scoffed. "Doesn't involve destruction? That's like me asking you not to be a mealy-mouthed poltroon." Lazlo's eyebrows shot up. "Poltroon?" "Look it up," snapped Drave. Lazlo turned to Ruza. "Do you think I'm a poltroon?" he asked, the way a young girl might ask whether her dress was unflattering. "I don't know what that is." "I think it's a kind of mushroom," said Lazlo, who knew very well was poltroon meant. Really, he was surprised that Drave did. "You are absolutely a mushroom," said Ruza. "It means 'coward,'" said Drave. "Oh." Lazlo turned to Ruza. "Do you think I'm a coward?" Ruza considered the matter. "More of a mushroom," he decided. To Drave: "I think you were closer the first time." "I never said he was a mushroom." "Then I'm confused.

When Pidge wakes up, let me know, okay?” he said in a soft voice. “I got spaghetti, and pancakes, and strawberries, and that oatmeal shit with the chocolate packets, and she likes Fruity Pebbles cereal, right, Mare?” he asked, turning. When he saw me, he froze. After an awkward pause, his expression melted, and his voice was smooth and sweet.“Hey, Pigeon.” I couldn’t have been more confused if I had woken up in a foreign country. Nothing made sense. At first I thought I had been evicted, and then Travis comes home with bags full of my favorite foods. He took a few steps into the living room, nervously shoving his hands in his pockets. “You hungry, Pidge? I’ll make you some pancakes. Or there’s uh…there’s some oatmeal. And I got you some of that pink foamy shit that girl’s shave with, and a hairdryer, and a… a….just a sec, it’s in here,” he said, rushing to the bedroom. The door opened, shut, and then he rounded the corner, the color gone from his face. He took a deep breath and his eyebrows pulled in. “Your stuff’s packed.” “I know,” I said. “You’re leaving,” he said, defeated.

It's really a wonder that I haven't dropped all my ideals, because they seem so absurd and impossible to carry out. Yet I keep them, because inspite of everything I still believe that people are really good at heart. I simply can't build up my hopes on a foundation consisting of confusion, misery, and death. I see the world gradually being turned into a wilderness, I hear the ever approaching thunder, which will distroy us too, I can feel the sufferings of millions and yet, if i look up into the heavans, I think that it will all come right, that this cruelty too will end, and that peace and tranquility will return again. In the mean time, I must uphold my ideals, for perhaps the day will come when I shall be able to carry them out." ~Anne Frank

Miranda was nineteen. Her experience with men consisted of Winston and himself. Both of whom had heretofore been brotherly figures. The poor girl must be confused as hell. Winston had suddenly decided that she was Venus, Queen Elizabeth, and the Virgin Mary all rolled into one,and Turner had all but forced himself on her. Not exactly an average day in the life of a young country miss

Their [girls] sexual energy, their evaluation of adolescent boys and other girls goes thwarted, deflected back upon the girls, unspoken, and their searching hungry gazed returned to their own bodies. The questions, Whom do I desire? Why? What will I do about it? are turned around: Would I desire myself? Why?...Why not? What can I do about it? The books and films they see survey from the young boy's point of view his first touch of a girl's thighs, his first glimpse of her breasts. The girls sit listening, absorbing, their familiar breasts estranged as if they were not part of their bodies, their thighs crossed self-consciously, learning how to leave their bodies and watch them from the outside. Since their bodies are seen from the point of view of strangeness and desire, it is no wonder that what should be familiar, felt to be whole, become estranged and divided into parts. What little girls learn is not the desire for the other, but the desire to be desired. Girls learn to watch their sex along with the boys; that takes up the space that should be devoted to finding out about what they are wanting, and reading and writing about it, seeking it and getting it. Sex is held hostage by beauty and its ransom terms are engraved in girls' minds early and deeply with instruments more beautiful that those which advertisers or pornographers know how to use: literature, poetry, painting, and film. This outside-in perspective on their own sexuality leads to the confusion that is at the heart of the myth. Women come to confuse sexual looking with being looked at sexually ("Clairol...it's the look you want"); many confuse sexually feeling with being sexually felt ("Gillete razors...the way a woman wants to feel"); many confuse desiring with being desirable. "My first sexual memory," a woman tells me, "was when I first shaved my legs, and when I ran my hand down the smooth skin I felt how it would feel to someone else's hand." Women say that when they lost weight they "feel sexier" but the nerve endings in the clitoris and nipples don't multiply with weight loss. Women tell me they're jealous of the men who get so much pleasure out of the female body that they imagine being inside the male body that is inside their own so that they can vicariously experience desire. Could it be then that women's famous slowness of arousal to men's, complex fantasy life, the lack of pleasure many experience in intercourse, is related to this cultural negation of sexual imagery that affirms the female point of view, the culture prohibition against seeing men's bodies as instruments of pleasure? Could it be related to the taboo against representing intercourse as an opportunity for a straight woman actively to pursue, grasp, savor, and consume the male body for her satisfaction, as much as she is pursued, grasped, savored, and consumed for his?

We want you to tell us about vampires." Simon grinned. "What do you want to know? Scariest is Eli in Let the Right One In, cheesiest is late-era Lestat, most underrated is David Bowie in The Hunger. Sexiest is definitely Drusilla, though if you ask a girl, she'll probably say Damon Salvatore or Edward Cullen. But..." he shrugged, "You know girls." Julie's and Beatriz's eyes were wide. "I didn't think you'd know so many!" Beatriz exclaimed. "Are they... are they your friends?" "Oh, sure, Count Dracula and I are like this," Simon said, crossing his fingers to demonstrate. "Also Count Chocula. Oh, and my BFF Count Blintzula. He's a real charmer...." He trailed off as he realized no one else was laughing. In fact, no one seemed to realize he was joking. "They're from TV," he prompted them. "Or, uh, cereal." "What's he talking about?" Julie asked Jon, perfect nose wrinkling up in confusion. "Who cares?" Jon said.

America," he begged. I turned to Maxon. "They're fine. The rebels were slow, and everyone here knows what to do in an emergency." I nodded. We stood there quietly for a minute, and I could tell he was about to move on. "Maxon," I whispered. He turned back, a little surprised to be addressed so casually. "About last night. Let me explain. When they came to prep us, to get us ready to come here, there was a man who told me that I was never to turn you down. No matter what you asked for. Not ever." He was dumbfounded. "What?" "He made it sound like you might ask for certain things. And you said yourself that you hadn't been around many women. After eighteen years...and then you sent the cameras away. I just got scared when you got that close to me." Maxon shook his head, trying to process all this. Humiliation, rage, and disbelief all played across his typically even-tempered face. "Was everyone told this?" he asked, sounding appalled at the idea. "I don't know. I can't imagine many girls would need such a warning. They're probably waiting to pounce on you," I noted, nodding my head toward the rest of the room. He gave a dark chuckle. "But you're not, so you had absolutely no qualms about kneeing me in the groin, right?" "I hit your thigh!" "Oh, please. A man doesn't need that long to recover from a knee to the thigh," he replied, his voice full of skepticism. A laugh escaped me. Thankfully, Maxon join in. Just then another mass hit the windows, and we stopped in unison. For a moment I had forgotten where I was. "So how are you handling a roomful of crying women?" I asked. There was a comical bewilderment in his expression. "Nothing in the world is more confusing!" he whispered urgently. "I haven't the faintest clue how to stop it." This was the man who was going to lead our country: the guy rendered useless by tears. It was too funny.

You’re important to me, you know,” I said, squeezing him. “I don’t understand you, Pigeon. I thought I knew women, but you’re so fucking confusing I don’t know which way is up.” “I don’t understand you, either. You’re supposed to be Eastern’s ladies’ man. I’m not getting the full freshmen experience they promised in the brochure,” I teased. “Well, that’s a first. I’ve never had a girl sleep with me to get me to leave her alone,” he said, keeping his back to me.

I’d felt this before, when my granddad was in the hospital before he died. We all camped out in the waiting room, eating our meals together, most of us sleeping in the chairs every night. Family from far-flung places would arrive at odd hours and we’d all stand and stretch, hug, get reacquainted, and pass the babies around. A faint, pale stream of beauty and joy flowed through the heavy sludge of fear and grief. It was kind of like those puddles of oil you see in parking lots that look ugly until the sun hits them and you see rainbows pulling together in the middle of the mess. And wasn’t that just how life usually felt—a confusing swirl of ugly and rainbow?

Nobody is going to open their mouth about it." Realizing my tone was bordering on angry, I brought it down a notch and tried again. "Not the team, Coach, or anyone else. I won't let them." She blinked her confusion. "You won't let them?" "That's right," I confirmed with a nod. "I won't let them." "You promise?" she whispered, a tiny smile pulling at her swollen lips. "Yeah," I replied gruffly, feeling like I would promise all the fucking promises in the world just to make this girl feel better. "I've got your back.

Footsteps approach the kitchen. Garrett wanders in, wiping sweat off his brow. When he notices Sabrina, he brightens. “Oh good. You’re here. Hold on—gotta grab something.” She turns to me as if to say, Is he talking to me? He’s already gone, though, his footsteps thumping up the stairs. At the table, Hannah runs a hand through her hair and gives me a pleading look. “Just remember he’s your best friend, okay?” That doesn’t sound ominous. When Garrett returns, he’s holding a notepad and a ballpoint pen, which he sets on the table as he sits across from Sabrina. “Tuck,” he says. “Sit. This is important.” I’m so baffled right now. Hannah’s resigned expression doesn’t help in lessening the confusion. Once I’m seated next to Sabrina, Garrett flips open the notepad, all business. “Okay. So let’s go over the names.” Sabrina raises an eyebrow at me. I shrug, because I legitimately don’t know what the fuck he’s talking about. “I’ve put together a solid list. I really think you’re going to like these.” But when he glances down at the page, his face falls. “Ah crap. We can’t use any of the boy names.” “Wait.” Sabrina holds up a hand, her brow furrowed. “You’re picking names for our baby?” He nods, busy flipping the page. My baby mama gapes at me. I shrug again. “Just out of curiosity, what were the boy names?” Grace hedges, clearly fighting a smile. He cheers up again. “Well, the top contender was Garrett.” I snicker loud enough to rattle Sabrina’s water glass. “Uh-huh,” I say, playing along. “And what was the runner-up?” “Graham.” Hannah sighs. “But it’s okay. I have some kickass girl names too.” He taps his pen on the pad, meets our eyes, and utters two syllables. “Gigi.” My jaw drops. “Are you kidding me? I’m not naming my daughter Gigi.” Sabrina is mystified. “Why Gigi?” she asks slowly. Hannah sighs again. The name suddenly clicks in my head. Oh for fuck’s sake. “G.G.,” I mutter to Sabrina. “As in Garrett Graham.” She’s silent for a beat. Then she bursts out laughing, triggering giggles from Grace and eventually Hannah, who keeps shaking her head at her boyfriend. “What?” Garrett says defensively. “The godfather should have a say in the name. It’s in the rule book.” “What rule book?” Hannah bursts out. “You make up the rules as you go along!” “So?

...sometimes they almost made me feel glad that I had a few extra years to play my depression out with therapy and other means, because I think its useful in youth- unless suicide or drug abuse are the alternatives- to have some faith in the mind to cure itself, to not rush to doctors or diagnosis's...I sometimes worry that part of what creates depression in young people is their own, and their parents, and the whole worlds impatience with allowing the phases of life to run their course. We will very likely soon be living in a society that confuses disease with normal life if the panic and rush to judgment and labeling do not slow down a bit. Somewhere between the unbelievable tardiness that the medical profession was guilty of in administering proper treatment to me and the eagerness to with which practitioners prescribe Ritalin for 8 year old boys and Paxil for 14 year old girls, there is a sane course of action.

To join the company of women, to be adults, we go through a period of proudly boasting of having survived our own mother's indifference, anger, overpowering love, the burden of her pain, her tendency to drink or teetotal, her warmth or coldness, praise or criticism, sexual confusions or embarrassing clarity. It isn't enough that she sweat, labored, bore her daughters howling or under total anesthesia or both. No. She must be responsible for our psychic weaknesses the rest of her life. It is alright to feel kinship with your father, to forgive. We all know that. But your mother is held to a standard so exacting that it has no principles. She simply must be to blame.

I’ll teach you how to decipher all the confused faces by closing your eyes & how to cringe when someone says the words ‘your generation’. I will teach you how not to demonise your enemies & how to make yourself unappetising when the hordes turn up to eat you. I’ll teach you how to yell with your mouth closed & how to steal happiness & how the only real joy is singing yourself hoarse & nude girls & how never to eat in an empty restaurant & how not to leave the windows of your heart open when it looks like rain & how everyone has a stump where something necessary was amputated. I’ll teach you how to know what’s missing.

Plus, I can't look at him the same since I ran into Mrs. Marino at our family reunion. It's not comforting to learn you've made out with your cousin." "Third cousin once removed," I argued. "It's hardly incest." "Life is like a box of chocolates, Lisa," Katie noted around a half-chewed carrot stick. "You never know what you're going to get." Lisa narrowed her eyes, confused. "Did she just quote Forrest Gump at me?" "It's Matt's fault," I said. "She lost a bet and now anytime his name gets mentioned, she has sixty seconds to drop a relevant movie quote." "That's insane." "Yup," Katie piped in, "insanity tuns in my family. Its practically gallops." "Classic." I high-fived her.

We believe in the wrong things. That's what frustrates me the most. Not the lack of belief, but the belief in the wrong things. You want meaning? Well, the meanings are out there. We're just so damn good at reading them wrong. I don't think meaning is something that can be explained. You have to understand it on your own. It's like when you're starting to read. First, you learn the letters. Then, once you know what sounds the letters make, you use them to sound out words. You know that c-a-t leads to cat and d-o-g leads to dog. But then you have to make that extra leap, to understand that the word, the sound, the "cat" is connected to an actual cat , and that "dog" is connected to an actual dog. It's that leap, that understanding, that leads to meaning. And a lot of the time in life, we're still just sounding things out. We know the sentences and how to say them. We know the ideas and how to present them. We know the prayers and which words to say in what order. But that's only spelling" It's much harder to lie to someone's face. But. It is also much harder to tell the truth to someone's face. The indefatigable pursuit of an unattainable perfection, even though it consist in nothing more than in the pounding of an old piano, is what alone gives a meaning to our life on this unavailing star. (Logan Pearsall Smith) Being alone has nothing to do with how many people are around. (J.R. Moehringer) You could be standing a few feet away...I could have sat next to you on the subway, or brushed beside you as we went through the turnstiles. But whether or not you are here, you are here- because these words are for you, and they wouldn't exist is you weren't here in some way. At last I had it--the Christmas present I'd wanted all along, but hadn't realized. His words. The dream was obviously a sign: he was too enticing to resist. Wow. You must have a lot of faith in me. Which I appreciate. Even if I'm not sure I share it. I could do this on my own, and not freak out that I had no idea what waited for me on the other side of this night. Hope and belief. I'd always wanted hope, but never believed that I could have such an adventure on my own. That I could own it. And love it. But it happened. Because I'm So uncool and so afraid. If there was a clue, that meant the mystery was still intact I fear you may have outmatched me, because not I find these words have nowhere to go. It's hard to answer a question you haven't been asked. It's hard to show that you tried unless you end up succeeding. This was not a haystack. We were people, and people had ways of finding eachother. It was one of those moments when you feel the future so much that is humbles the present. Don't worry. It's your embarrassment at not having the thought that counts. You think fairy tales are only for girls? Here's ahint- ask yourself who wrote them. I assure you, it wasn't just the women. It's the great male fantasy- all it takes is one dance to know that she's the one. All it takes is the sound of her song from the tower, or a look at her sleeping face. And right away you know--this is the girl in your head, sleeping or dancing or singing in front of you. Yes, girls want their princes, but boys want their princesses just as much. And they don't want a very long courtship. They want to know immediately. Be careful what you;re doing, because no one is ever who you want them to be. And the less you really know them, the more likely you are to confuse them with the girl or boy in your head You should never wish for wishful thinking

It was a story to tell myself, a promise. Saying out loud, "You're never going to touch me again" - that was a piece of magic, magic in the belly, the domed kingdom of sex, the terror place inside where rage and power live. Whiskey rush without whiskey, bravado and determination, this place where for the first time I knew no confusion, only outrage and pride. In the worst moments of my life, I have told myself that story, the story about a girl who stood up to a monster. Doing that, I make a piece of magic inside myself, magic to use against the meanness of the world.

Boys’ aggressiveness is increasingly being treated as a medical problem, particularly in schools, a trend that has led to the diagnosing and medicating of boys whose problem may really be that they have been traumatized and influenced by exposure to violence and abuse at home. Treating these boys as though they have a chemical problem not only overlooks the distress they are in but also reinforces their belief that they are “out of control” or “sick,” rather than helping them to recognize that they are making bad choices based on destructive values. I have sometimes heard adults telling girls that they should be flattered by boys’ invasive or aggressive behavior “because it means they really like you,” an approach that prepares both boys and girls to confuse love with abuse and socializes girls to feel helpless.

As I brush my teeth, I scroll through my phone to see if Sabrina texted when my phone was on silent last night. She didn’t. Damn. I was hoping my speech—and that amazing fucking kiss—might’ve changed her mind about going out with me, but I guess it didn’t. I do, however, find the most mind-boggling conversation in the group chat I have with my roommates. All the messages are from last night, and they’re bizarre as fuck. Garrett: The hells, D?! Dean: It’s not what you think!! Logan: It’s hard to mistake ur romantic bath with that giant pink thing! In ur ass! Dean: It wasn’t in my ass! Garrett: I’m not even going to ask where it was Dean: I had a girl over! Garrett: Suuuuuuuuure Logan: Suuuuuuuuure Dean: I hate you guys Garrett: <3 Logan: <3 I rinse my mouth out, spit, and drop the toothbrush into the little cup on the sink. Then I quickly type out a text. Me: Wait… what did I miss? Since we have practice in twenty minutes, the guys are already awake and clearly on their phones. Two photos pop up simultaneously. Garrett and Logan have both sent me pics of pink dildos. I’m even more confused now. Dean messages immediately with, Why do you guys have dildo pics handy? Logan: ALINIMB Dean: ?? Me: ?? Garrett: At Least It’s Not In My Butt. I snort to myself, because I’m starting to piece it together. Logan: Nice, G! U got that on the first try! Garrett: We spend too much time 2gether. Me: PLEASE tell me u caught D playing w/ dildos. Logan: Sure did. Dean is quick to object again. I HAD A GIRL OVER! The guys and I rag on him for a couple more minutes, but I have to stop when Fitzy stumbles into the bathroom and shoves me aside. He’s got crazy bedhead and he’s buck-naked. “Gotta piss,” he mumbles. “Mornin’, sunshine,” I say cheerfully. “Want me to make you some coffee?” “God. Yes. Please.” Chuckling, I duck out of the bathroom and walk the four or so steps into his kitchenette. When he finally emerges, I shove a cup of coffee in his hand, sip my own, and say, “Dean shoved a dildo up his ass last night.” Fitzy nods. “Makes sense.” I snicker mid-sip. Coffee spills over the rim of my cup. “It really does, huh?

when she was 7, a boy pushed her on the playground she fell headfirst into the dirt and came up with a mouthful of gravel and lines of blood chasing each other down her legs when she told her teacher what happened, she laughed and said ‘boys will be boys honey don’t let it bother you he probably just thinks you’re cute’ but the thing is, when you tell a little girl who has rocks in her teeth and scabs on her knees that hurt and attention are the same you teach her that boys show their affection through aggression and she grows into a young woman who constantly mistakes the two because no one ever taught her the difference ‘boys will be boys’ turns into ‘that’s how he shows his love’ and bruises start to feel like the imprint of lips she goes to school with a busted mouth in high school and says she was hit with a basketball instead of his fist the one adult she tells scolds her ‘you know he loses his temper easily why the hell did you have to provoke him?’ so she shrinks folds into herself, flinches every time a man raises his voice by the time she’s 16 she’s learned her job well be quiet, be soft, be easy don’t give him a reason but for all her efforts, he still finds one ‘boys will be boys’ rings in her head ‘boys will be boys he doesn’t mean it he can’t help it’ she’s 7 years old on the playground again with a mouth full of rocks and blood that tastes like copper love because boys will be boys baby don’t you know that’s just how he shows he cares she’s 18 now and they’re drunk in the split second it takes for her words to enter his ears they’re ruined like a glass heirloom being dropped between the hands of generations she meant them to open his arms but they curl his fists and suddenly his hands are on her and her head hits the wall and all of the goddamn words in the world couldn’t save them in this moment she touches the bruise the next day boys will be boys aggression, affection, violence, love how does she separate them when she learned so early that they’re inextricably bound, tangled in a constant tug-of-war she draws tally marks on her walls ratios of kisses to bruises one entire side of her bedroom turns purple, one entire side of her body boys will be boys will be boys will be boys when she’s 20, a boy touches her hips and she jumps he asks her who the hell taught her to be scared like that and she wants to laugh doesn’t he know that boys will be boys? it took her 13 years to unlearn that lesson from the playground so I guess what I’m trying to say is i will talk until my voice is hoarse so that my little sister understands that aggression and affection are two entirely separate things baby they exist in different universes my niece can’t even speak yet but I think I’ll start with her now don’t ever accept the excuse that boys will be boys don’t ever let him put his hands on you like that if you see hate blazing in his eyes don’t you ever confuse it with love baby love won’t hurt when it comes you won’t have to hide it under long sleeves during the summer and the only reason he should ever reach out his hand is to hold yours

Marked.” My face was on fire, my limbs shaking. “All of you. I will take all of you out with my own bare hands!” There was laughter building in Bram’s voice as he responded. “As cute as I’m sure that would be, your attempt…if we thought the people who might try to trace that chip could make you absolutely, one hundred percent safe, I would carry you to them and hand you over myself.” I gingerly rested my fingertips against my forehead, breathing deeply, trying to calm myself down. “There are some very bad men out to get you, Miss Dearly.” “You have got to be kidding me.” “By the way, you have quite the vocabulary, for a princess.” He still sounded amused. This statement was random enough to get my attention. “Princess?” I asked, confused. “You know, a princess. A New Victorian girl.” My lips parted to fire off another question before it clicked. “You’re a Punk.” “Born and bred.” “Fantastic.

I always wondered what your type was, but I never imagined it would be a hard-core rocker!” Here we go. I had been hoping he'd be too sleepy for this conversation. “He's not my type. If I had a type it would be...nice. Not some hotheaded, egocentric male slut.” “Did you just call him a male slut?” Jay laughed. “Dang, that's, like, the worst language I've ever heard you use.” I glowered at him, feeling ashamed, and he laughed even harder. “Oh, hey, I've got a joke for you. What do you call someone who hangs out with musicians?” He raised his eyebrows and I shrugged. “I don't know. What?” “A drummer!” I shook my head while he cracked up at his joke for another minute before hounding me again about Kaidan. “All right, so you talked about my CDs, you had some cultural confusion with some of his lingo, then you talked about hot dogs? That can't be everything. You looked seriously intense.” “That's because he was intense, even though we weren't really talking about anything. He made me nervous.” “You thought he was hot, didn't you?” I stared out my window at the passing trees and houses. We were almost to school. “I knew it!” He smacked the steering wheel, loving every second of my discomfort. “This is so weird. Anna Whitt has a crush.” “Fine, yes. He was hot. But it doesn't matter, because there's something about him I don't like. I can't explain it. He's...scary.” “He's not the boy next door, if that's what you mean. Just don't get the good-girl syndrome.” “What's that?” “You know. When a good girl falls for a bad boy and hopes the boy will fall in love and magically want to change his ways. But the only one who ends up changing is the girl.

Yeah, that's not what you call her. You call her Jennifer… or baby… or smart ass, and even once I think you called her a mouthy little thing." Jacque waved her hand as she said, "Moving on. Okay. So, Jen, Decebel's been cursed." Jacque waited for Decebel to pass it on. The girls watched as Decebel bowed his head and started shaking it from side to side. They looked at each other, confused by his behavior. Then his shoulders began to shake. "Are you laughing?" Sally asked, bewildered. Decebel finally composed himself and looked up. "She said, 'So someone else has cursed him. What's the big deal? I curse him all the time'." They all started laughing; not only Jen's words, but at the puzzled tone with which Decebel relayed Jen's words. Jacque rolled her eyes. "No, you dimwit. Cursed as in its 'Leviosa' not 'Leviosa'. Not curse as in dumb ass." "She's asking why the hell you're quoting Harry Potter… again?" Decebel was getting more and more confused by the conversation the two girls were having--through his thoughts.

They walked him into the cane and then turned him around. He tried to stand bravely... They looked at Oscar and he looked at them and then he started to speak. The words coming out like they belonged to someone else, his Spanish good for once. He told them that what they were doing was wrong, that they were going to take a great love out of the world. Love was a rare thing, easily confused with a million other things, and if anybody knew this to be true it was him. He told them about Ybón and the way he loved her and how much they had risked and that they'd started to dream the same dreams and say the same words. He told them that it was only because of her love that he'd been able to do the thing that he had done, the thing they could no longer stop, told them if they killed him they would probably feel nothing and their children would probably feel nothing either, not until they were old and weak or about to be struck by a car and then they would sense him waiting for them on the other side and over there he wouldn't b no fatboy or dork or kid no girl had ever loved; over there he'd be a hero, an avenger. Because anything you can dream (he put his hand up) you can be. They waited respectfully for him to finish and then they said, their faces slowly disappearing in the gloom, Listen, we'll let you go if you tell us what "fuego" means in English. Fire, he blurted out, unable to help himself. Oscar—

Holding up an oil-paper umbrella, I loiter aimlessly in the long, long And lonely rainy alley, I hope to encounter A lilac-like girl Nursing her resentment A lilac-like color she has A lilac-like fragrance, A lilac-like sadness, Melancholy in the rain, Sorrowful and uncertain; She loiters aimlessly in this lonely rainy alley Holding up an oil-paper umbrella Just like me And just like me Walks silently, Apathetic, sad and disconsolate Silently she moves closer Moves closer and casts A sigh-like glance She glides by Like a dream Hazy and confused like a dream As in a dream she glides past Like a lilac spray, This girl glides past beside me; She silently moves away, moves away Up to the broken-down bamboo fence, To the end of the rainy alley. In the rains sad song, Her color vanishes Her fragrance diffuses, Even her Sigh-like glance, Lilac-like discontent Vanish. Holding up an oil-paper umbrella, alone Aimlessly walking in the long, long And lonely rainy alley, I wish for A lilac-like girl Nursing her resentment glide by.

Will father be there?" she asked. John turned to her in astonishment. Your father is dead," he replied somberly. "Why should he go to Hades? You have it confused with another place that was abolished long ago." After supper they folded up the table-cloth and spread their blankets for the night. What a dream it was," Kismine sighed, gazing up at the stars. "How strange it seems to be here with one dress and a penniless fianc_! Under the stars," she repeated. "I never noticed the stars before. I always thought of them as great big diamonds that belonged to some one. Now they frighten me. They make me feel that it was all a dream, all my youth." It was a dream," said John quietly. "Everybody's youth is a dream, a form of chemical madness." How pleasant then to be insane!" So I'm told," said John gloomily. "I don't know any longer. At any rate, let us love for a while, for a year or so, you and me. That's a form of divine drunkenness that we can all try. There are only diamonds in the whole world, diamonds and perhaps the shabby gift of disillusion. Well, I have that last and I will make the usual nothing of it." He shivered. "Turn up your coat collar, little girl, the night's full of chill and you'll get pneumonia. His was a great sin who first invented consciousness. Let us lose it for a few hours." So wrapping himself in his blanket he fell off to sleep.

So, there was this beautiful princess. She was locked in a high tower, one whose smart walls had cleaver holes in them that could give her anything: food, a clique of fantastic friends, wonderful clothes. And, best of all, there was this mirror on the wall, so that the princess could look at her beautiful self all day long. The only problem with the tower was that there way no way out. The builders had forgotten to put in an elevator, or even a set of stairs. She was stuck up there. One day, the princess realized that she was bored. The view from the tower--gentle hills, fields of white flowers, and a deep, dark forest--fascinated her. She started spending more time looking out the window than at her own reflection, as is often the case with troublesome girls. And it was pretty clear that no prince was showing up, or at least that he was really late. So the only thing was to jump. The hole in the wall gave her a lovely parasol to catch her when she fell, and a wonderful new dress to wear in the fields and forest, and a brass key to make sure she could get back into the tower if she needed to. But the princess, laughing pridefully, tossed the key into the fireplace, convinced she would never need to return to the tower. Without another glance in the mirror, she strolled out onto the balcony and stepped off into midair. The thing was, it was a long way down, a lot farther than the princess had expected, and the parasol turned out to be total crap. As she fell, the princess realized she should have asked for a bungee jacket or a parachute or something better than a parasol, you know? She struck the ground hard, and lay there in a crumpled heap, smarting and confused, wondering how things had worked out this way. There was no prince around to pick her up, her new dress was ruined, and thanks to her pride, she had no way back into the tower. And the worst thing was, there were no mirrors out there in the wild, so the princess was left wondering whether she in fact was still beautiful . . . or if the fall had changed the story completely.

My apologies, see, I forgot my manners. I get on the mic ’cause it’s my life. You show off for girls and cameras. You a pop star, not a rapper. A Vanilla Ice or a Hammer. Y’all hear this crap he dumping out? Somebody get him a Pamper. And a crown for me. The best have heard about me. You can only spell “brilliant” by first spelling Bri. You see, naturally, I do my shit with perfection. Better call a bodyguard ’cause you gon’ need some protection, And on this here election, the people crown a new leader. You didn’t see this coming, and your ghostwriters didn’t either. I came here to ether. I’m sorry to do this to you. This is no longer a battle, it’s your funeral, boo. I’m murdering you. On my corner they call me coroner, I’m warning ya. Tell the truth, this dude is borin’ ya. You confused like a foreigner. I’ll explain with ease: You’re just a casualty in the reality of the madness of Bri. No fallacies, I spit maladies, causin’ fatalities, And do it casually, damaging rappers without bandaging. Imagining managing my own label, my own salary. And actually, factually, there’s no MC that’s as bad as me. Milez? That’s cute. But it don’t make me cower. I move at light speed, you stuck at per hour. You spit like a lisp. I spit like a high power. Bri’s the future, and you Today like Matt Lauer. You coward. But you’re a G? It ain’t convincing to me. You talk about your clothes, about your shopping sprees. You talk about your Glock, about your i-c-e. But in this here ring, they all talking ’bout me, Bri!

Raw emotions and the need to hold him close overwhelmed me. Every part of ached for him-my mind, my soul and my body. Without hesitation, i closed the gap between us and pressed my lips eagerly to his. Noah's hands were everywhere, my hair, my face, my back, and for the love of all things holy, my breasts. My hands roamed his glorious body just as greedily. After drugging me with delicious kisses for not nearly long enough, his warm lips skimmed my throat and kissed down the center of my breasts, causing me to arch my back and lose my ever loving mind. Without meaning to, i moaned and whispered his name when his hands wandered to my thighs and set my world and blood on fire. Noah eased me back into the bed and my hair sprawled all around me. "I love how you smell," he whispered as he suckled my earlobe. "I love how beautiful you are." I reclaimed his lips and hooked a leg around his as we moved in rhythm with each other. In between frantic kisses, i whispered the words, "I love you". Because i did. Noah listened to me. He made me laugh and he made me feel special. He was strong and warm and caring and...everything. I loved him. I loved him more than i'd ever loved another person in my life. Every muscle in my body froze when Noah stopped kissing and stare down at me with wide eyes. He caressed my cheek twice over and tilted his head. "Make love to me, Echo. I've never made love." No way. Noah's experienced reputation walked down the hallway before he did. "But..." Noah cut me off with a kiss. "Yes, but never love. Just girls who didn't mean anything" You..." His tongue teased my bottom lip, thawing my body. "Are everything. I got tested over winter break and i'm clean and i've got protection." He reached to the side of the bed and magically produced a small orange square. I froze again. Sensing my hesitation, Noah kissed my lips slowly while stroking my cheek. "And since break?" I asked. "There's been no one," he whispered against my lips. "I met you soon after and i could never think of touching anyone else." I loved him and we were together. I entwined my fingers in his hair and pulled his head back to mine, but the second his hand touched the waist of my jeans, my heart shook and my hands snapped out to stop him. "Please. Wait. Noah..." Oh, God, i was actually going to say it. "I'm a virgin." Now Noah froze. "But you were with Luke." A faint smile grew on my lips. I was typically the tongue-tied one and found it amusing to see him confused for once. "That's why we broke up. I wasn't ready." He shifted his body off of mine and tuckled me close against his warmth. I laid my head on his chest and listened to the comforting sound of his beating heart. Noah ran his hand through my hair. "I'm glad you told me. This needs to be right for you and i'll wait, for as long as you need.

I'll be right here. Good luck, or break a leg, or something.” As Jay and Gregory turned and headed into the crowd, my traitorous eyes returned to the corner and found another pair or eyes staring darkly back. I dropped my gaze for three full seconds, and then lifted my eyes again, hesitant. The drummer was still staring at me, oblivious to the three girls trying to win back his attention. He put up one finger at the girls and said something that looked like, “Excuse me.” Oh, my goodness. Was he...? Oh, no. Yes, he was walking this way. My nerves shot into high alert. I looked around, but nobody else was near. When I looked back up, there he was, standing right in front of me. Good gracious, he was sexy-a word that had not existed in my personal vocabulary until that moment. This guy was sexy like it was his job or something. He looked straight into my eyes, which threw me off guard, because nobody ever looked me in the eye like that. Maybe Patti and Jay, but they didn't hold my stare like he was doing now. He didn't look away, and I found that I couldn't take my gaze off those blue eyes. “Who are you?” he asked in a blunt, almost confrontational way. I blinked. It was the strangest greeting I'd ever received. “I'm...Anna.” “Right. Anna. How very nice.” I tried to focus on his words and not his luxuriously accented voice, which made everything sound lovely. He leaned in closer. “But who are you?” What did that mean? Did I need to have some sort of title or social standing to enter his presence? “I just came with my friend Jay?” Oh, I hated when I got nervous and started talking in questions. I pointed in the general direction of the guys, but he didn't take his eyes off me. I began rambling. “They just wrote some songs. Jay and Gregory. That they wanted you to hear. Your band, I mean. They're really...good?” His eyes roamed all around my body, stopping to evaluate my sad, meager chest. I crossed my arms. When his gaze landed on that stupid freckle above my lip, I was hit by the scent of oranges and limes and something earthy, like the forest floor. It was pleasant in a masculine way. “Uh-huh.” He was closer to my face now, growling in that deep voice, but looking into my eyes again. “Very cute. And where is your angel?” My what? Was that some kind of British slang for boyfriend? I didn't know how to answer without continuing to sound pitiful. He lifted his dark eyebrows, waiting. “If you mean Jay, he's over there talking to some man in a suit. But he's not my boyfriend or my angel or whatever.” My face flushed with heat and I tightened my arms over my chest. I'd never met anyone with an accent like his, and I was ashamed of the effect it had on me. He was obviously rude, and yet I wanted him to keep talking to me. It didn't make any sense. His stance softened and he took a step back, seeming confused, although I still couldn't read his emotions. Why didn't he show any colors? He didn't seem drunk or high. And that red thing...what was that? It was hard not to stare at it. He finally looked over at Jay, who was deep in conversation with the manager-type man. “Not your boyfriend, eh?” He was smirking at me now. I looked away, refusing to answer. “Are you certain he doesn't fancy you?” Kaidan asked. I looked at him again. His smirk was now a naughty smile. “Yes,” I assured him with confidence. “I am.” “How do you know?” I couldn't very well tell him that the only time Jay's color had shown mild attraction to me was when I accidentally flashed him one day as I was taking off my sweatshirt, and my undershirt got pulled up too high. And even then it lasted only a few seconds before our embarrassment set in.

When I close my eyes to see, to hear, to smell, to touch a country I have known, I feel my body shake and fill with joy as if a beloved person had come near me. A rabbi was once asked the following question: ‘When you say that the Jews should return to Palestine, you mean, surely, the heavenly, the immaterial, the spiritual Palestine, our true homeland?’ The rabbi jabbed his staff into the ground in wrath and shouted, ‘No! I want the Palestine down here, the one you can touch with your hands, with its stones, its thorns and its mud!’ Neither am I nourished by fleshless, abstract memories. If I expected my mind to distill from a turbid host of bodily joys and bitternesses an immaterial, crystal-clear thought, I would die of hunger. When I close my eyes in order to enjoy a country again, my five senses, the five mouth-filled tentacles of my body, pounce upon it and bring it to me. Colors, fruits, women. The smells of orchards, of filthy narrow alleys, of armpits. Endless snows with blue, glittering reflections. Scorching, wavy deserts of sand shimmering under the hot sun. Tears, cries, songs, distant bells of mules, camels or troikas. The acrid, nauseating stench of some Mongolian cities will never leave my nostrils. And I will eternally hold in my hands – eternally, that is, until my hands rot – the melons of Bukhara, the watermelons of the Volga, the cool, dainty hand of a Japanese girl… For a time, in my early youth, I struggled to nourish my famished soul by feeding it with abstract concepts. I said that my body was a slave and that its duty was to gather raw material and bring it to the orchard of the mind to flower and bear fruit and become ideas. The more fleshless, odorless, soundless the world was that filtered into me, the more I felt I was ascending the highest peak of human endeavor. And I rejoiced. And Buddha came to be my greatest god, whom I loved and revered as an example. Deny your five senses. Empty your guts. Love nothing, hate nothing, desire nothing, hope for nothing. Breathe out and the world will be extinguished. But one night I had a dream. A hunger, a thirst, the influence of a barbarous race that had not yet become tired of the world had been secretly working within me. My mind pretended to be tired. You felt it had known everything, had become satiated, and was now smiling ironically at the cries of my peasant heart. But my guts – praised be God! – were full of blood and mud and craving. And one night I had a dream. I saw two lips without a face – large, scimitar-shaped woman’s lips. They moved. I heard a voice ask, ‘Who if your God?’ Unhesitatingly I answered, ‘Buddha!’ But the lips moved again and said: ‘No, Epaphus.’ I sprang up out of my sleep. Suddenly a great sense of joy and certainty flooded my heart. What I had been unable to find in the noisy, temptation-filled, confused world of wakefulness I had found now in the primeval, motherly embrace of the night. Since that night I have not strayed. I follow my own path and try to make up for the years of my youth that were lost in the worship of fleshless gods, alien to me and my race. Now I transubstantiate the abstract concepts into flesh and am nourished. I have learned that Epaphus, the god of touch, is my god. All the countries I have known since then I have known with my sense of touch. I feel my memories tingling, not in my head but in my fingertips and my whole skin. And as I bring back Japan to my mind, my hands tremble as if they were touching the breast of a beloved woman.

Mr. Kadam bowed and said, “Miss Kelsey, I will leave you to your dining companion. Enjoy your dinner.” Then he walked out of the restaurant. “Mr. Kadam, wait. I don’t understand.” Dining companion? What is he talking about? Maybe he’s confused. Just then, a deep, all-too-familiar voice behind me said, “Hello, Kells.” I froze, and my heart dropped into my stomach, stirring up about a billion butterflies. A few seconds passed. Or was it a few minutes? I couldn’t tell. I heard a sigh of frustration. “Are you still not talking to me? Turn around, please.” A warm hand slid under my elbow and gently turned me around. I raised my eyes and gasped softly. He was breathtaking! So handsome, I wanted to cry. “Ren.” He smiled. “Who else?” He was dressed in an elegant black suit and he’d had his hair cut. Glossy black hair was swept back away from his face in tousled layers that tapered to a slight curl at the nape of his neck. The white shirt he wore was unbuttoned at the collar. It set off his golden-bronze skin and his brilliant white smile, making him positively lethal to any woman who might cross his path. I groaned inwardly. He’s like…like James Bond, Antonio Banderas, and Brad Pitt all rolled into one. I decided the safest thing to do would be to look at his shoes. Shoes were boring, right? Not attractive at all. Ah. Much better. His shoes were nice, of course-polished and black, just like I would expect. I smiled wryly when I realized that this was the first time I’d ever seen Ren in shoes. He cupped my chin and made me look at his face. The jerk. Then it was his turn to appraise me. He looked me up and down. And not a quick look. He took it all in slowly. The kind of slow that made a girl’s face feel hot. I got mad at myself for blushing and glared at him. Nervous and impatient, I asked, “Are you finished?” “Almost.” He was now staring at my strappy shoes. “Well, hurry up!” His eyes drifted leisurely back up to my face and he smiled at me appreciatively, “Kelsey, when a man spends time with a beautiful woman, he needs to pace himself.” I quirked an eyebrow at him and laughed. “Yeah, I’m a regular marathon alright.” He kissed my fingers. “Exactly. A wise man never sprints…in a marathon.” “I was being sarcastic, Ren.” He ignored me and tucked my hand under his arm then led me over to a beautifully lit table. Pulling the chair out for me, he invited me to sit. I stood there wondering if I could sprint for the nearest exit. Stupid strappy shoes, I’d never make it. He leaned in close and whispered in my ear. “I know what you’re thinking, and I’m not going to let you escape again. You can either take a seat and have dinner with me like a normal date,” he grinned at his word choice, “or,” he paused thoughtfully then threatened, “you can sit on my lap while I force-feed you.” I hissed, “You wouldn’t dare. You’re too much of a gentleman to force me to do anything. It’s an empty bluff, Mr. Asks-For-Permission.” “Even a gentleman has his limits. One way or another, we’re going to have a civil conversation. I’m hoping I get to feed you from my lap, but it’s your choice.” He straightened up again and waited. I unceremoniously plunked down in my chair and scooted in noisily to the table. He laughed softly and took the chair across from me. I felt guilty because of the dress and readjusted my skirt so it wouldn’t wrinkle.