Couch Cleaning Quotes

Leave the dishes. Let the celery rot in the bottom drawer of the refrigerator and an earthen scum harden on the kitchen floor. Leave the black crumbs in the bottom of the toaster. Throw the cracked bowl out and don't patch the cup. Don't patch anything. Don't mend. Buy safety pins. Don't even sew on a button. Let the wind have its way, then the earth that invades as dust and then the dead foaming up in gray rolls underneath the couch. Talk to them. Tell them they are welcome. Don't keep all the pieces of the puzzles or the doll's tiny shoes in pairs, don't worry who uses whose toothbrush or if anything matches, at all. Except one word to another. Or a thought. Pursue the authentic-decide first what is authentic, then go after it with all your heart. Your heart, that place you don't even think of cleaning out. That closet stuffed with savage mementos. Don't sort the paper clips from screws from saved baby teeth or worry if we're all eating cereal for dinner again. Don't answer the telephone, ever, or weep over anything at all that breaks. Pink molds will grow within those sealed cartons in the refrigerator. Accept new forms of life and talk to the dead who drift in though the screened windows, who collect patiently on the tops of food jars and books. Recycle the mail, don't read it, don't read anything except what destroys the insulation between yourself and your experience or what pulls down or what strikes at or what shatters this ruse you call necessity.

Shepley walked out of his bedroom pulling a T-shirt over his head. His eyebrows pushed together. “Did they just leave?” “Yeah,” I said absently, rinsing my cereal bowl and dumping Abby’s leftover oatmeal in the sink. She’d barely touched it. “Well, what the hell? Mare didn’t even say goodbye.” “You knew she was going to class. Quit being a cry baby.” Shepley pointed to his chest. “I’m the cry baby? Do you remember last night?” “Shut up.” “That’s what I thought.” He sat on the couch and slipped on his sneakers. “Did you ask Abby about her birthday?” “She didn’t say much, except that she’s not into birthdays.” “So what are we doing?” “Throwing her a party.” Shepley nodded, waiting for me to explain. “I thought we’d surprise her. Invite some of our friends over and have America take her out for a while.” Shepley put on his white ball cap, pulling it down so low over his brows I couldn’t see his eyes. “She can manage that. Anything else?” “How do you feel about a puppy?” Shepley laughed once. “It’s not my birthday, bro.” I walked around the breakfast bar and leaned my hip against the stool. “I know, but she lives in the dorms. She can’t have a puppy.” “Keep it here? Seriously? What are we going to do with a dog?” “I found a Cairn Terrier online. It’s perfect.” “A what?” “Pidge is from Kansas. It’s the same kind of dog Dorothy had in the Wizard of Oz.” Shepley’s face was blank. “The Wizard of Oz.” “What? I liked the scarecrow when I was a little kid, shut the fuck up.” “It’s going to crap every where, Travis. It’ll bark and whine and … I don’t know.” “So does America … minus the crapping.” Shepley wasn’t amused. “I’ll take it out and clean up after it. I’ll keep it in my room. You won’t even know it’s here.” “You can’t keep it from barking.” “Think about it. You gotta admit it’ll win her over.” Shepley smiled. “Is that what this is all about? You’re trying to win over Abby?” My brows pulled together. “Quit it.” His smile widened. “You can get the damn dog…” I grinned with victory. “…if you admit you have feelings for Abby.” I frowned in defeat. “C’mon, man!” “Admit it,” Shepley said, crossing his arms. What a tool. He was actually going to make me say it. I looked to the floor, and everywhere else except Shepley’s smug ass smile. I fought it for a while, but the puppy was fucking brilliant. Abby would flip out (in a good way for once), and I could keep it at the apartment. She’d want to be there every day. “I like her,” I said through my teeth. Shepley held his hand to his ear. “What? I couldn’t quite hear you.” “You’re an asshole! Did you hear that?” Shepley crossed his arms. “Say it.” “I like her, okay?” “Not good enough.” “I have feelings for her. I care about her. A lot. I can’t stand it when she’s not around. Happy?” “For now,” he said, grabbing his backpack off the floor.

Guilt and fear are a kind of rot. It spreads unless it's cleaned. And there's only one way to do that.

My couch has never looked so inviting. My television is way better than the one we had in the suite. My bed is fluffy and clean, and I can’t wait until it’s dark enough to justify taking a running leap into my pillows. I am a homebody, through and through, and there’s nothing like being home.

When I arrived, he was in the kitchen, in the middle of his Sunday morning ritual of cleaning his cleaning supplies.

clean later." After brewing a fresh pot of coffee and taking the guys their cups, I curled up on the couch next to Ash and dove into Emerge and followed Laney Walker in her search for love.

A broom that was almost never used was leaned up against the wall. He took it and started to sweep. Dust flew up his nose. When he had been sweeping for a while he realised he had no dustpan. He swept the pile of dust under the couch. Better to have a little shit in the corners than a clean hell. He flipped through the pages of a porno, put it back. Wound his scarf around his neck until his head felt like it was about to explode, released it. Got up and took a few steps on the rug. Sank to his knees, prayed to god.

Your lock is fixed. Your apartment is clean. Get some sleep, baby. You’re going to need it for what I have planned for you. And you don’t deserve to sleep on somebody’s couch.

That’s when I notice Cheryl and Mickey cuddled up on the couch. She’s leaning on his shoulder, his arm around her, her leg across his lap. Cheryl throws glances at Kerry that say, “Look at me!” while Kerry shoots a “You go, girl!” smirk right back. I think of CK, how he and I often sat like that. Not because we were seconds from making out or wanted to look like a couple, but just out of a deep, platonic connection. My heart hits a higher notch on the ache-o-meter, my teeth sear into my bottom lip, and then something inside me snaps as cleanly as a crayon.

None of the guns we found at Charlie’s house fit those parameters. He had a couple twenty-twos under the couch cushion, a rifle, and two sawed-off shotguns. We have no idea if Joe owned any firearms since the house had been cleaned out.” Jack looked around the table. “Any comments?

A cell phone rang from the end table to my right and Kristen bolted up straight. She put her beer on the coffee table and dove across my lap for her phone, sprawling over me. My eyes flew wide. I’d never been that close to her before. I’d only ever touched her hand. If I pushed her down across my knees, I could spank her ass. She grabbed her phone and whirled off my lap. “It’s Sloan. I’ve been waiting for this call all day.” She put a finger to her lips for me to be quiet, hit the Talk button, and put her on speaker. “Hey, Sloan, what’s up?” “Did you send me a potato?” Kristen covered her mouth with her hand and I had to stifle a snort. “Why? Did you get an anonymous potato in the mail?” “Something is seriously wrong with you,” Sloan said. “Congratulations, he put a ring on it. PotatoParcel.com.” She seemed to be reading a message. “You found a company that mails potatoes with messages on them? Where do you find this stuff?” Kristen’s eyes danced. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. Do you have the other thing though?” “Yeeeess. The note says to call you before I open it. Why am I afraid?” Kristen giggled. “Open it now. Is Brandon with you?” “Yes, he’s with me. He’s shaking his head.” I could picture his face, that easy smile on his lips. “Okay, I’m opening it. It looks like a paper towel tube. There’s tape on the—AHHHHHH! Are you kidding me, Kristen?! What the hell!” Kristen rolled forward, putting her forehead to my shoulder in laughter. “I’m covered in glitter! You sent me a glitter bomb? Brandon has it all over him! It’s all over the sofa!” Now I was dying. I covered my mouth, trying to keep quiet, and I leaned into Kristen, who was howling, our bodies shaking with laughter. I must not have been quiet enough though. “Wait, who’s with you?” Sloan asked. Kristen wiped at her eyes. “Josh is here.” “Didn’t he have a date tonight? Brandon told me he had a date.” “He did, but he came back over after.” “He came back over?” Her voice changed instantly. “And what are you two doing? Remember what we talked about, Kristen…” Her tone was taunting. Kristen glanced at me. Sloan didn’t seem to realize she was on speaker. Kristen hit the Talk button and pressed the phone to her ear. “I’ll call you tomorrow. I love you!” She hung up on her and set her phone down on the coffee table, still tittering. “And what did you two talk about?” I asked, arching an eyebrow. I liked that she’d talked about me. Liked it a lot. “Just sexually objectifying you. The usual,” she said, shrugging. “Nothing a hot fireman like you can’t handle.” A hot fireman like you.I did my best to hide my smirk. “So do you do this to Sloan a lot?” I asked. “All the time. I love messing with her. She’s so easily worked up.” She reached for her beer. I chuckled. “How do you sleep at night knowing she’ll be finding glitter in her couch for the next month?” She took a swig of her beer. “With the fan on medium.” My laugh came so hard Stuntman Mike looked up and cocked his head at me. She changed the channel and stopped on HBO. Some show. There was a scene with rose petals down a hallway into a bedroom full of candles. She shook her head at the TV. “See, I just don’t get why that’s romantic. You want flower petals stuck to your ass? And who’s gonna clean all that shit up? Me? Like, thanks for the flower sex, let’s spend the next half an hour sweeping?” “Those candles are a huge fire hazard.” I tipped my beer toward the screen. “Right? And try getting wax out of the carpet. Good luck with that.” I looked at the side of her face. “So what do you think is romantic?” “Common sense,” she answered without thinking about it. “My wedding wouldn’t be romantic. It would be entertaining. You know what I want at my wedding?” she said, looking at me. “I want the priest from The Princess Bride. The mawage guy.

It kind of freaked me out. Because I don’t know if I’m ready for that kind of thing yet.” Or maybe the problem was that I wasn’t prepared for how ready I was… “Ready for-?” He broke off, and then frowned as if it had all become clear. “Wait.” He dropped his arms from around my waist and took a step away from me. “You think I spent the night wit you?” “Didn’t you?” I blinked back at him. “There’s only the one bed. And…well, you were in it when I woke up.” Thunder boomed overhead. It wasn’t as loud as the violent cracks that had occurred in my dream. Although the rumbles were long enough-and intense enough-that the silverware on the table began to make an eerie tinkling sound. And my bird, who’d been calmly cleaning herself on the back of my chair, suddenly took off, seeing shelter on the highest bookshelf against the far wall. I realized I’d just insulted my host, and no joke was going to get me out of it this time. “For your information, Pierce,” John said, his tone almost disturbingly calm-but his eyes flashed the same shade as the stone around my neck, which had gone the color of the metal studs at his wrists-“I spent most of last night on the couch. Until one point early this morning, when I heard you call my name. You were crying in your sleep.” The salt water I’d tasted on my lips. Not due to rain from a violent hurricane, but from the tears I’d shed, watching him die in front of me. “Oh,” I said uncomfortably. “John, I’m so-“ It turned out he wasn’t finished. “I put my arms around you to try to comfort you, because I know what this place can be like, at least at first. It’s not exactly hell, but it’s the next closest place to it. You wouldn’t let go of me. You held on to me like you were drowning, and I was your only lifeline.” I swallowed, astonished at how close he’d come to describing my dream…except it had been the other way around. I’d been his lifeline; only he’d let go of me, sacrificing himself so that I could live. “Right,” I said. “Of course. I’m sorry.” I couldn’t believe how stupid I’d been, especially since my mother had always worried so much about my talking in my sleep. On the other hand, I had been upfront with him about my lack of experience when it came to men. “But this is good, see?” I reached out to take his hand. “I told you I could never hate you-“ He pulled his hand away, exactly like in my dream. Well, not exactly, because he wasn’t being sucked from my grasp by a giant ocean swell. Instead, he’d dropped my fingers because he was leaving to go sort the souls of the dead. “You will,” he assured me, bitterly. “You’re already regretting your decision to-what was it you called it? Oh, right-cohabitate with me.” “No,” I insisted. “I’m not. All I said was that I want to take things more slowly-“ That had nothing to do with him-it had to do with me and my fear of not being able to control myself when he was kissing me. It was too humiliating to admit that out loud, however.

She’d mopped the floors that morning; they were shiny and everything smelled like lemons and clean house. The phone was ringing in the kitchen, she came running in to answer it, and she slipped. She hit her head on the floor, and she was unconscious, but then she woke up and she was fine. That was her lucid interval. That’s what they call it. A little while later she said she had a headache, she went to lie down on the couch, and then she didn’t wake up.

The dopamine desire circuit is powerful. It focuses attention, motivates, and thrills. It has a profound influence over the choices we make. Yet it isn’t all-powerful. Addicts get clean. Dieters lose weight. Sometimes we switch off the TV, get off the couch, and go for a run. What kind of circuit in the brain is powerful enough to oppose dopamine? Dopamine is. Dopamine opposing dopamine. The circuit that opposes the desire circuit might be called the dopamine control circuit.

The story-high house of hewn logs is clean and neat, with many rooms,” he wrote, “so that one can be alone if one wishes to.” The central room featured a massive stone hearth with trophy heads gazing down from the walls and buffalo robes covering the couches. His own chamber held a rubber tub for bathing and rough shelves for his favorite books—“Parkman and Irving and Hawthorne and Cooper and Lowell”—along with a growing assortment of volumes sent from New York by his devoted sister.

Accomplish one small thing a day. Maybe it’s cleaning that counter, maybe it’s writing one thank-you note. Don’t make the task too difficult. For the rest, you’re healing a uterus; adding millions of cells to your baby’s brain (though it might sometimes feel as if they are being siphoned off from your own); developing his liver, heart, and lungs; boosting his immune system; and maintaining the integrity of his intestines … you’re a busy lady! All while sprawled comfortably on the couch. Multi-tasking raised to an art form!

I thought about every mundane moment that makes up that gray area of a person’s life. It’s the hour or two a day that you clean your kitchen or watch TV or do the laundry. All my gray moments with Mia were colored in: chasing her around the Laundromat, spraying water on her from the kitchen sink, or messing around with her on the couch while we spent whole days watching reruns of The Office. I looked forward to the rest of my life, even if the rest of my life only consisted of the humdrum day-in, day-out bullshit, it didn’t matter because Mia turned the most unremarkable moments into moments I cherished.

The Drunken Fisherman" Wallowing in this bloody sty, I cast for fish that pleased my eye (Truly Jehovah's bow suspends No pots of gold to weight its ends); Only the blood-mouthed rainbow trout Rose to my bait. They flopped about My canvas creel until the moth Corrupted its unstable cloth. A calendar to tell the day; A handkerchief to wave away The gnats; a couch unstuffed with storm Pouching a bottle in one arm; A whiskey bottle full of worms; And bedroom slacks: are these fit terms To mete the worm whose molten rage Boils in the belly of old age? Once fishing was a rabbit's foot-- O wind blow cold, O wind blow hot, Let suns stay in or suns step out: Life danced a jig on the sperm-whale's spout-- The fisher's fluent and obscene Catches kept his conscience clean. Children, the raging memory drools Over the glory of past pools. Now the hot river, ebbing, hauls Its bloody waters into holes; A grain of sand inside my shoe Mimics the moon that might undo Man and Creation too; remorse, Stinking, has puddled up its source; Here tantrums thrash to a whale's rage. This is the pot-hole of old age. Is there no way to cast my hook Out of this dynamited brook? The Fisher's sons must cast about When shallow waters peter out. I will catch Christ with a greased worm, And when the Prince of Darkness stalks My bloodstream to its Stygian term . . . On water the Man-Fisher walks.

She imagines its walls white. She imagines everything in it painted white. Even the holes in the floor, through the white broken boards, are painted white inside. The house’s windows look out on to high privet hedge. Elisabeth goes outside to paint that high hedge white too. Inside, sitting on a white-painted old couch, the stuffing coming out of it also stiff with white emulsion, Daniel laughs at what she’s doing. He laughs silently but like a child with his feet in his hands as she paints one tiny green leaf white after another. He catches her eye. He winks. That does it. They’re both standing in pure clean white space. Yes, she says. Now we can sell this space for a fortune. Only the very rich can afford to be this minimalist these days.

I pulled Slayer from its sheath and pushed the door open with my fingertips. It swung soundlessly on well-greased hinges. Through the hallway, I saw the living room lamp glowing with soothing yellow light. I smelled coffee. Who breaks into a house, turns on the lights, and makes coffee? I padded into the living room on soft feet, Slayer ready. “Loud and clumsy, like a baby rhino,” said a familiar voice. I stepped into the living room. Curran sat on my couch, reading my favorite paperback. His hair was back to its normal short length. His face was clean shaven. He looked nothing like the dark, demonic figure who shook a would-be god’s head on a field a month ago. I thought he had forgotten about me. I had been quite happy to stay forgotten. “The Princess Bride?” he said, flipping the book over. “What are you doing in my house?” Let himself in, had he? Made himself comfortable, as if he owned the place. “Did everything go well with Julie?” “Yes. She didn’t want to stay, but she’ll make friends quickly, and the staff seems sensible.” I watched him, not quite sure where we stood. “I meant to tell you but haven’t gotten a chance. Sorry about Bran. I didn’t like him, but he died well.” “Yes, he did. I’m sorry about your people. Many losses?” A shadow darkened his face. “A third.” He had taken a hundred with him. At least thirty people had never come back. The weight of their deaths pressed on both of us. Curran turned the book over in his hands. “You own words of power.” He knew what a word of power was. Lovely. I shrugged. “Picked up a couple here and there. What happened in the Gap was a one shot deal. I won’t be that powerful again.” At least not until the next flare. “You’re an interesting woman,” he said. “Your interest has been duly noted.” I pointed to the door. He put the book down. “As you wish.” He rose and walked past me. I lowered my sword, expecting him to pass, but suddenly he stepped in dangerously close. “Welcome home. I’m glad you made it. There is coffee in the kitchen for you.” My mouth gaped open. He inhaled my scent, bent close, about to kiss me . . . I just stood there like an idiot. Curran smirked and whispered in my ear instead. “Psych.” And just like that, he was out the door and gone. Oh boy.

She had a collection of matchbooks from extravagant places, dropped here and there on tables in the dingy apartment she still shared with Gregg. They made it look as if she lived a gay, mad life. What a typical picture for anyone from out of New York: career girl's apartment, stockings drying over the shower rod, clothes flung helter-skelter in the rush to get to the office on time, to a date on time, a bottle of wine there too, wads of dust lying under the studio couch because you couldn't clean except weekends and sometimes not even then, and all those brightly colored matchbooks with names of well-known eating places, so that even if one managed only two good and sufficient meals a week one could still light one's cigarettes for the rest of the week with the memory.

Katarina wasn’t afraid of Baden. Not anymore. He took a step to the side, intending to move around her. Oh, no. She flattened her hands on his shoulders, keeping him in place. “I want to know what’s wrong with you.” She said. “Tell me.” He snapped his teeth at her in a show of dominance. “You think you want to know my problem. You’re wrong.” Her tone dry, she said, “I’m so glad you know my mind better than I do.” “Very well. I need sex.” He threw the words at her as if they were weapons. “Badly.” Whoa. Blindside! Heart pounding, she jerked her hands away from him. “Sex...from me?” “Yesss.” A hiss. “Only from you.” Only. Amazing how one little word could send pleasure soaring through her, warming her. “You told me never to touch you.” Which she’d just done, she realized. My bad. “I’ve changed my mind.” His gaze dropped, lingered on her lips. Burning her... “But you and I...we’re a different species.” As if that mattered to her body. Gimme!
 He took a step closer, invading her personal space. “We’ll fit, I promise you.”
 Tristo hrmenych! The raspy quality of his voice, all smoke and gravel...she shivered with longing. Must resist his allure. But...but...why? Before she’d committed to Peter, she’d dated around, had made out in movie theaters, cars and on couches. She’d liked kissing and touching and “riding the belt buckle,” as her friends had called it. Then, after committing to Peter, she’d gifted him with her virginity. At first, he hadn’t known what to do with her—he’d been just as inexperienced—and she’d left each encounter disappointed. When finally she’d gathered the courage to tell him what she wanted, he’d satisfied her well. She missed sex. But connection...intimacy...she thought she missed those more. The dogs barked, jolting her from her thoughts. They’d cleaned their food bowls, and now wanted to play. She clasped Baden’s hand to lead him out of the kennel. He jerked away, severing contact. One action. Tons of hurt. “I’m allowed to touch you and you want to have sex with me, but you’re still disgusted by me.” She stomped outside the kennel, done with him. “Well, I’m leaving. Good riddance! Your do-what-I-say-or-else attitude was annoying, anyway.” He darted in front of her, stopping her. Breath caught in her throat as sunlight streamed over him, paying his chiseled features absolute tribute, making his bronzed skin glimmer. So beautiful. Too beautiful. “I’m not disgusted by you. You need me. I’ve come to accept it,” he admitted, looking away from her. “But being skin-to-skin with another is painful for me. We’ll have to proceed carefully. And you’ll get over your annoyance.” Another order! She would show him the error of his ways.

Slave, my hands are sticky. Come, wash them. Bring the perfumed water." Passia waved at me with a finger slick with honey. She was radiant, lying on the couch next to Helene. Both were dressed in new stolae that Aelia had gifted them for the holiday. I grinned and rushed forward with the basin and a towel. "Permission to speak," I asked her as I took her sticky hand in mine. She smirked. "Permission granted." I slowly ran the damp towel across each slender finger. I kept my voice low so only she could hear. "Later, my dear Domina, I would be delighted to wash you in private." She raised an eyebrow at me. "I think you will have to prove yourself first, boy." I bowed in front of her, my head on the tiles. "I will do anything you require, Domina." "Good. Now fetch me some more honey fritters. And you will clean my hands again, when I call for you." I winked at her. "Yes, Domina. Anything for you." That night our lovemaking tasted sweeter than all the honey in Iberia.

Do you always wake up so sweet?” I ask. She’s like cotton candy in my arms. She smells soft and clean, and she’s not shoving me away. “I’m not awake yet,” she says. She spins over in my arms, facing away from me. My forearm is under her head and her bottom is tucked against my groin. Her head is beneath my chin, and I can’t see her face anymore. But I doubt she’s talking. She’s soft in my arms, and her breath rushes out of her open mouth with every exhale, searing my forearm with every breath. The bottoms of her feet are cold against the tops of mine, so I pull the blanket over us both, tucking it around her and throwing it over our feet. I don’t want to let her go, but I know I need to get up. I need to go back to the couch. I close my eyes and brush her hair down between us. She lets me wrap around her, and I’m willing to pretend she’s still asleep. Will it hurt to stay there? I keep holding her. I’ve never had a girl sleep the whole night in my bed before. Ever. I’ve never woken up with someone. I’ve never wanted to. Until now. I settle my arm around her waist. I’ll just stay a few more minutes.

We took the kids to see Chris’s body the next day. He’d been cleaned up a lot. Leanne had suggested that we have a photo book with pictures of Chris; it was a brilliant idea, a way of putting their good-byes in a better, if not exactly happy, context. Before going in, I told them they were going to see their father’s body without his soul. Their dad was now in heaven; all they were going to see was the body God had loaned him for this world. How much comfort that was, I don’t know. Bubba stood near him for a bit, then decided he was done. At some point he told me he didn’t like to cry. “It hurts too much when I cry.” Instead, he would run hard, play hard. The thing about grief is, we all do it in our own way, in our own time, kids included. He went out with V and they sat together on a couch, looking at the book. Within a few moments I heard V’s deep voice boom; laughter echoed in the hall. Bubba was telling him stories about his father, reminding him and all of us who Chris really was. Angel and I stayed with Chris. “Can I touch his hand?” she asked. “Yes.” There was a flower in the room. She put it on him.

So Dad was a tedious, well-connected workaholic. But the other thing you need to understand is that Mom was a living wet dream. A former Guess model and Miller Lite girl, she was tall, curvy and gorgeous. At thirty-eight, she had somehow managed to remain ageless and maintained her killer body. She’s five-foot-nine with never-ending legs, generous breasts and full hips that scoop dramatically into her slim waist. People who say Barbie’s proportions are unrealistic obviously never met my stepmother. Her face is pretty too, with long eyelashes, sculpted cheekbones and big, blue eyes that tease and smile at the same time. Her long brown hair rests on her shoulders in thick, tousled layers like in one of those Pantene Pro-V commercials. One memory seared in to my brain from my early teenage years is of Mom parading around the house one evening in nothing but her heels and underwear. I was sitting on the couch in the living room watching TV when a flurry of long limbs and blow-dried hair burst in front of the screen. “Teddy-bear. Do you know where Silvia left the dry cleaning? I’m running late for dinner with the Blackwells and I can’t find my red cocktail dress.” Mom stood before me in matching off-white, La Perla bra and panties and Manolo Blahnik stilettos. Some subtle gold hoop earrings hung from her ears and a tiny bit of mascara on her eye lashes highlighted her sparkling, blue eyes. Aside from the missing dress, she was otherwise ready to go. “I think she left them hanging on the chair next to the other sofa,” I said, trying my best not to gape at Mom’s perfect body. Mom trotted across the room, her heels tocking on the hard wood floor. I watched her slim, sexy back as she lifted the dry cleaning onto the sofa and then bent over to sort through the garments. My eyes followed her long mane of brown hair down to her heart-shaped ass. Her panties stretched tightly across each cheek as she bent further down. “Found it!” She cried, springing back upright, causing her 35Cs to bounce up and down from the sudden motion. They were thrusting proudly off her ribcage and bulging out over the fabric of the balconette bra like two titanic eggs. Her supple skin pushed out over the silk edges. And then she was gone as quickly as she had arrived, her long legs striding back down the hallway.

The walls were lined with books from floor to ceiling. Stacks of books stood neatly arranged on every horizontal surface—tables, windowsills, even the top of an unplugged television. Since Sophie had been forbidden to explore the library at home, her only real experience with books had come at school and from the few children's books that lay on the bottom shelf of a cabinet in the nursery. She sensed immediately that this was something altogether different. It was a library, yes, but she knew these books had been read. They weren't arranged in long lines of matching bindings like the ones in Bayfield House, and almost every volume had slips of paper protruding from the top. she wondered if Uncle Bertram had marked all the best bits. "Shall we have a story?" said her uncle, when he had hung up their coats. "Yes, please," said Sophie. "What would you like?" he asked. "You pick." And so he did. They settled onto the couch, Bertram with a cup of tea and Sophie with a mug of cocoa. He began to read and Sophie's world was transformed—this was not like the insubstantial children's stories her mother read to her at bedtime. This was ever so much more. "The Wind in the Willows," read Uncle Bertram. "Chapter One, The River Bank. The Mole had been working very hard all the morning, spring-cleaning his little home." Sophie closed her eyes and fell into the story.

Last night I decided that it is totally nuts to believe in Christ, that it is every bit as crazy as being a Scientologist or a Jehovah’s Witness. But a priest friend said solemnly, “Scientologists and Mormons and Jehovah’s Witnesses are crazier than they have to be.” Then something truly amazing happened. A man from church showed up at our front door, smiling and waving to me and Sam, and I went to let him in. He is a white man named Gordon, fiftyish, married to our associate pastor, and after exchanging pleasantries he said, “Margaret and I wanted to do something for you and the baby. So what I want to ask is, What if a fairy appeared on your doorstep and said that he or she would do any favor for you at all, anything you wanted around the house that you felt too exhausted to do by yourself and too ashamed to ask anyone else to help you with?” “I can’t even say,” I said. “It’s too horrible.” But he finally convinced me to tell him, and I said it would be to clean the bathroom, and he ended up spending an hour scrubbing the bathtub and toilet and sink with Ajax and lots of hot water. I sat on the couch while he worked, watching TV, feeling vaguely guilty and nursing Sam to sleep. But it made me feel sure of Christ again, of that kind of love. This, a man scrubbing a new mother’s bathtub, is what Jesus means to me. As Bill Rankin, my priest friend, once said, spare me the earnest Christians.

I opened the door with a smile on my face that soon melted when I saw his messy appearance. The doorframe held him up as he leaned all of his weight against it. Expressionless, bloodshot eyes stared back at me as he lifted his hand and ran it roughly down his unshaved face. His hair was disheveled and there was blood on the front of his shirt. Panic rose up as I took him in. I rushed to him and ran my fingers down his body, as I checked for injuries. “You’re bleeding! Oh my God, Devin! What happened? Are you OK?” “It’s not my blood,” he slurred. I took a better look at his gorgeous face. His unfocused eyes attempted to meet mine and it was then that the smell of liquor reached me. “You’re drunk?” “Abso-fucking-lutely.” He attempted to move toward me and almost fell over. I wrapped my arms around him and helped him into my apartment. Once we made it to the couch I let him collapse onto the cushion before I went straight to work on his clothes. I removed his blood-stained shirt first and threw it to the side. Quickly checked him over again just to be sure that he wasn’t injured somewhere. His skin felt cold and clammy against my fingertips. His knuckles were busted open, so I went to the bathroom and got a wet towel and the first aid kit. I cleaned his fingers then wrapped them up. I felt fingers in my hair and looked up to see a very drunk Devin staring back at me. “You’re so fucking beautiful,” he whispered as his heavy head fell against the back of my couch again. Shaking my head, I dropped onto my knees on the floor and removed his boots. Once I was done getting Devin out of his shoes, I went to the hallway closet and pulled out a blanket for him. When I got back to the couch, he was standing there looking back at me in all his tattooed, muscled glory. He was still leaning a bit to the side when his eyes locked on mine. “Come here,” he rasped. He looked as if he was about to crumble and I couldn’t tell if it was the alcohol or if something was really breaking him down. “Are you OK, baby?” I asked. He closed his eyes and sighed. “I love it when you call me baby.” I went to him and he groaned as I softly ran my hands up his chest and put my arms around his neck. On my tiptoes, I softly kissed the line of his neck and his chin. “Tell me what happened, Devin.” When he finally opened his eyes, he looked at me differently. The calm and collected Devin was gone and an anxiety-ridden shell of a man stood before me. His shoulders felt tense beneath my fingers and his eyes held a crazed demeanor. “I need you, Lilly.” He captured my face softly in his hands as he slurred the words. “Please tell me what happened?” “Make it go away, baby,” he whispered as he leaned in and started to kiss me. I let him as I melted against his body. He collapsed against the couch once more, but this time he took me with him. Not once did he break our kiss, and soon, I felt his velvet tongue against mine. I kissed him back and let my fingers play in the hair at the back of his neck. He broke the kiss and started down the side of my neck. “I need you, Lilly,” he repeated against my skin. “I’m here.” I bit at my bottom lip to stop myself from moaning. “Please, just make it all go away,” he drunkenly begged. “I don’t know what’s going on, but tell me what to do to make it better. I want to make it better, Devin.” I stopped him and stared into his eyes as I waited for his response. “Don’t leave me,” he said desperately. “I’m not going anywhere. I’m here. I’ll do whatever it takes to make it better.” I wanted to cry. He looked so hurt and afraid. It was strange to see such a strong, confident man so lost and unsure. He flipped me onto my back on the couch and crawled on top of me. His movements were less calculated—slower than usual. “I want you. I need to be inside you,” he said aggressively.

I half expected her to be gone by the time I came out of the shower. She ran. That’s what she did with me. The half of me that expected her to still be here would have put money on her cleaning the place. But when I came out, she was on the couch. I knew immediately something was wrong. I flew to her side. “Kristen, what is it?” She panted. “I can’t see. My…my eyes are blurry.” She was covered in sweat. Shaking, breathing hard. I pulled back her eyelid and she swatted at me. Combative. Hypoglycemic. I ran to the kitchen, praying that she hadn’t tossed all the trash. I spotted an old In-N-Out cup with Coke in it from yesterday and grabbed it, running back to the couch. “Kristen, I need you to drink this. You’re not going to like it, but I need you to do it.” It was flat, old, and room temp, but it was all I had in the apartment. I put the straw to her lips. She shook her head violently and clenched her teeth. “No.” “Listen, your glucose levels are low. You need sugar. Drink this. You’ll feel better. Come on.” She tried to knock the cup from my hands, and I protected it like it was the cure for cancer. If she didn’t get her blood sugar up, she could have a seizure next. Slip into unconsciousness. And her symptoms were already advanced. Panic overcame me. My heart pounded in my ears. What’s wrong with her? “A few swallows, please,” I begged. She took the straw in her lips and drank, and my relief was palpable. It took a few minutes and a few more sips, but she stopped shaking. I got a wet washcloth and wiped her face as she came back around. I peeled her sweatshirt off her—my sweatshirt. “When’s the last time you ate?” I asked. She was still a little disoriented. When she looked at me, her eyes didn’t really focus. “I don’t know. I didn’t.” I checked my watch. Jesus, it was almost 2:00 p.m. “Come on—I’m taking you to get some food.” I helped her up, putting an arm around her waist. She was so frail. The sides of her stomach were hard. Something is wrong.

Someday, she would stand from the couch, step away from the window sill, leave the fire escape, put away the black backpack, take the rings off her neck. Someday when the music played, she would not feel him waltzing with her through the clearing under the crimson moon on their wedding night. Oh, how we danced on the night we were wed… Someday. But today with every breath of the past she colored her breath of the future, with every blink of her eye, Alexander bore himself deeper and deeper inside her until the whole of what they were together blinded her from seeing what else might be in the world for her. All she thought about was what he had loved in her, what he had needed from her, what he had wanted from her. Memory—that fiend, that cruel enemy of comfort. There was no forgetting; worse, the bloodletting that went on every minute became more intense as time went on. It was as if his lips, his hands, his crown, his heart, the things that seemed almost normal, almost right in Lazarevo acquired a prescient, otherworldly sense; it was as if in their totality they took on a life they had not had before. How did they fish, or sleep, or clean? How did she go to her sewing circle? She hated herself now, flagellated herself for doing anything else, how could she have tried to live a normal life in Lazarevo with him, knowing even then that time and they were as fleeting as snowflakes? Knowing what was at stake, could he have lowered his head and walked by her, if he had known what he would lose for the hour of rapture, for the minute of bliss? How he loved to touch her. And she would sit quietly, with her legs not too close together, so that anytime he wanted to, he could: and he did. Anytime. Yes, he said, it was what a soldier on furlough wanted. Anytime wasn’t often enough. He would touch her with his fingers as she sat quietly on the bench, and then he would touch her with his mouth as she sat less quietly on the bench, there was no other time for him but now, there was no later, there was only insanity now. I will make you insane, her memory screamed at her near the winter window sill as Tatiana smelled the brine of eternity. On the outside you will walk and smile as if indeed you are a normal woman, but on the inside you will twist and burn on the stake, I will never free you, you will never be free.

For God’s sake, Anders, your pacing is driving me wild,” Leigh said with exasperation. “Sit down.” Anders paused with surprise and turned to peer at the brunette curled up in the corner of the couch with a book in her hands. “I’m not pacing, I’m . . .” She arched her eyebrows, waiting, and he sighed. “Pacing,” he acknowledged and sank onto the nearest chair. He rested his elbows on his spread knees, allowing his hands to dangle between them, and stared out the window. After several minutes, he dropped back in the chair with a heavy sigh, then straightened and asked impatiently, “What the devil is she doing up there?” “She’s checking with her academic advisor to ensure that missing the first two weeks of classes won’t bugger her up for the term,” Leigh reminded him patiently. “Yeah, but that should have been a five-minute conversation. She’s been up there over an hour,” he complained. Valerie had helped clean up the kitchen after breakfast, then had taken Roxy with her and escaped upstairs on the pretext of calling the veterinary college to be sure she was still welcome after missing the first two weeks of the semester. “Yes, well, perhaps whoever she needs to speak to wasn’t available and she’s waiting for a call back,” Leigh suggested. “Or maybe they had work for her to do to keep from falling behind and she’s up their reading her textbooks and studying.” “Or maybe she’s hiding,” Anders said unhappily. Leigh tsked with irritation. “Why would she be hiding?” Anders didn’t respond, but in his mind he was remembering their kiss that morning . . . well, kisses. Or maybe one kiss. He wasn’t sure how to classify it. Did you have to come up for air to classify it as more than one kiss? Or was it counted in minutes or seconds? Because it had been a constant devouring of each other’s mouths for several minutes. “Oh my, yes. I see,” Leigh murmured. Anders glanced up at her murmur and noted her narrowed concentration on him. She’d read his damn mind. “Yes, that might have made her want to hide out,” she said sympathetically. “It wasn’t that long ago when I had my first encounter with life mate passion. It was pretty terrifying. And she didn’t have any idea what was happening. I mean, as an immortal you had heard about it, had some idea of what to expect, and yet you were still overwhelmed by it. Imagine how she must feel. She got hit by a nuclear explosion of passion out of nowhere.” Anders sighed and ran one hand wearily over his closely cropped hair. Leigh wasn’t saying a damned thing he hadn’t already thought of. Which was why he suspected Valerie was hiding out. The question was, how long would she hide? And how was he supposed to get her to know and trust him if she wouldn’t come out of her room?

Billy sipped the last of his coffee from the mug and shut down his laptop. 1,000 words wasn’t great but it also wasn’t as bad as no words at all. It hadn’t exactly been a great couple of years and the royalties from his first few books were only going to hold out so much longer. Even if he didn’t have anything else to worry about there was always Sara to consider. Sara with her big blue eyes so like her mother’s. He sat for a moment longer thinking about his daughter and all they’d been through since Wendy had passed. Then he picked up his mug with a long sigh and carried it to the kitchen to rinse it in the sink. When he came back into his little living room and the quiet of 1 AM he wasn’t surprised to find her there over to the side of the bookshelf hovering close to the floor just beyond the couch. Wendy. Her eyes were cold and intense in death, angry and spiteful in a way he’d never seen them when she was alive. What once had been beautiful was now a horror and a threat, one that he’d known far too well in the years since she’d died. He and Sara both. He stood where he was looking at her as she glared up at him. Part of her smaller vantage point was caused by kneeling next to the shelf but he knew from the many times she’d walked or run through a room that death had also reduced her, made her no higher than 4 or 4 and half feet when she’d been 6 in life. She was like a child trapped there on the cusp between youth and coming adulthood. Crushed and broken down into a husk, an entity with no more love for them than a snake. Familiar tears stung his eyes but he blinked them away letting his anger and frustration rise in place of his grief. “Fuck you! What right do you have to be here? Why won’t you let Sara and I be? We loved you! We still love you!” She doesn’t respond, she never does. It’s as if she used up all of her words before she died and now all that’s left is the pain and the anger of her death. The empty lack of true life in her eyes leaves him cold. He doesn’t say anything else to her. It’s all a waste and he knows it. She frightens him as much as she makes him angry. Spite lives in every corner of her body and he’s reached his limit on how long he can see this perversion, this nightmare of what once meant so much to him. He walks past the bookshelf and through the doorway there. He and Sara’s rooms are up above. With an effort he resists the urge to look back down the hall to see if she’s followed. He refuses to treat his wife like a boogeyman no matter how much she has come to fit that mold. He can feel her eyes burning into him from somewhere back at the edge of the living room. The sensation leaves a cold trail of fear up his back as he walks the last four feet to the stairs and then up. He can hear her feet rush across the floor behind him and the rustle of fabric as she darts up the stairs after him. His pulse and his feet speed up as she grows closer but he’s never as fast as she is. Soon she slips up the steps under his foot shoving him aside as she crawls on her hands and feet through his legs and up the last few stairs above. As she passes through his legs, her presence never more clear than when it’s shoving right against him, he smells the clean and medicinal smells of the operating room and the cloying stench of blood. For a moment he’s back in that room with her, listening to her grunt and keen as she works so hard at pushing Sara into the world and then he’s back looking up at her as she slowly considers the landing and where to go from there. His voice is a whisper, one that pleads. “Wendy?

Wishbone Half-eaten chicken lying on white serving plate quartered potatoes chunks of carrots celery too we tell stories and laugh about the day your little finger is locked around the wishbone so is mine I pretend to make a wish close my eyes mumbling my lips that’s the way I faked out the nuns pretending to say the rosary so they would leave me alone your face is so determined you win the wrestling match lifting your piece of chicken bone above your head in victory I know better than to ask what did you wish for secret desires of the heart are not to be shared or they won’t come true everyone knows that you clean the dishes I turn on the TV lying on the couch listening to you make music with running water and closing cupboard doors.

Another afternoon: I'm unshaven, dishes are fermenting in the kitchen sink and my shirt smells like a teenage boy's bedroom. There were no clean spoons around the house so I ate cottage cheese with a plastic tortoiseshell shoehorn that was lying next to the couch — so I guess I've hit a new personal low.

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Farfar had the Wii already fired up when I stepped out of the bathroom from my shower, the menu music from Mario Kart blaring from the living room TV. Koopa---the cat, not the character---was curled up on Farfar's lap in his spot at the end of the couch. One hand held his beer on top of his stomach, the other ran through Koopa's gray fur, both of their eyes closed in bliss. I sank into the other end of the couch and grabbed my controller. "All cleaned up and ready for your whooping?" he asked, pronouncing it, like always, with long OOs, like the crane. He raised his beer to his lips with his eyes still closed. This was probably number two already. "Not tonight, old man. I'm in the zone, and you're looking tired." His eyes were open then, a smirk on his face, and he produced his special blue remote---the best Lillajul gifts I'd ever gotten him---from the cushion beside him. "Do you need to ease in with Mushroom Gorge, or are you ready to play for real?" "I'm ready for any course you want," I said, smirking back. He just chuckled---without the jollity he gave the guys outside C of C, I noticed---went straight to Rainbow Road, and promptly destroyed me. Afterward, sinking back into the couch with a third beer and a number of victories under his belt, he let out a long sigh. "You did good today, Gubben." I smiled. "I'm picking a new character.

Try a little experiment. Sit on the couch and tell yourself you deserve to do absolutely nothing for ten minutes. Put your feet up and exhale. Then listen as your home bursts into life like an animated movie. You’ll begin to hear demands from different tasks around your home. The gutters say clean me. The dishes say wash me. The closet says, Marie Kondo me. This rising chorus becomes louder until it yanks you up two-fisted by your collar and you begin to do. And that’s just the voices of the inanimate objects! When flesh-and-blood humans join in the cacophony of requests, you’ll be running in six directions before you realize it. You don’t believe in the basic permission to stop. I wish I had the power to grant this permission to you. If there was an incantation or potion that I could bequeath to you, I’d crawl on my knees to get it. The best I can do is tell you, “I, Juliet Funt, imperfect mother and businesswoman, give you permission to stop.

When we are influenced by the nameless Maiden, we can feel as if we are still waiting to receive our gift of the eternal wisdom of adulthood. Patiently waiting for the day where we will feel like a real adult, worthy of sitting at the grown-up’s side of the table. At times, we can still feel like a child, uncertain, and floundering. An ‘imposter’ grown-up. There comes a time where we ultimately arrive at the moment in our adult lives that we realise no one is coming. No one is coming to parent us, to tell us to clean up after ourselves, to tell us to get off the couch, and get our butts to work or to the gym. No one is going to admonish us if we eat too many chocolate biscuits, drink too much wine, or stay out all night

I’ll have to throw these jeans away and get new ones,” Luca said. “Unless you want these to make a pair of cut-offs?” “Your jeans would be way too big on me,” she said, not looking up from the bowl of ingredients she was mixing. “But there’s something in them for you.” She chuckled. “I bet there is.” “Naughty girl,” he said. “I mean there’s something in the pocket for you. Do you want it?” She walked over to him and held out her hand. “Sure. Whatever.” He placed a tiny charm in the palm of her hand. A heart. “It’s all yours now,” he said. “Even if you drop it, and step on it, and bend it out of shape, it’s still yours. I don’t want it back.” “You had this in your pocket?” “I’ve had it in my pocket every day for the last three months. Except one day when I thought I lost it in the washing machine, but then I found it in the filter. Don’t worry. It’s clean.” She stared at the heart and thought about all the times she’d taken the alley to work, or ducked into a store to avoid seeing Luca on the street. All the times she’d missed her chance to get Luca’s heart back. “I can understand if you don’t want my stupid heart,” he said. “If I were you, I wouldn’t take me back either, because I’m not always a fan of Luca Lowell. He doesn’t always do the right thing.” “Don’t say that.” “It’s true. If I hadn’t gotten backed into by a truck last night and hadn’t gone to the hospital, I don’t know if you ever would have brought me back to your house. Back into your life.” “My tiny house, and my tiny life.” He shrugged. “It’s big enough for me.” He stretched out on the sectional. “You’ll have a hard time kicking me out again.” “Luca, I can’t make you any promises.” “Yes, you can. You can promise to give me a second chance the next time I screw up.” “You didn’t screw up. I did. I’m the one who kicked you out.” “Then I’ll give you a second chance. I won’t be a chicken and take the alley to work so I don’t run into you.” “You did that?” “Only for about a week, until your sister busted me sneaking through the alley like a burglar, and tore me a new one.” He rubbed his beard. “You know, now that I’m thinking over my conversations with her, it’s all making sense. She must have thought Chris’s wife was my girlfriend. The two of them stop by the garage a lot, but not always together. I thought your sister was being—well, you know how she is—but now I think I understand what was really going on.” Tina looked down at the heart in her palm then at Luca. She closed her fingers around the charm. “Don’t worry,” she said. “I’m not going to drop it again.” There was a scratch at the door. Luca rolled himself along the couch, reached out with one long arm, and opened the door. Muffins strolled in like he owned the place. Luca exclaimed, “Kitty!” Muffins jumped up on the couch and started sniffing Luca’s cast. Then he meowed about dinner. Luca picked the cat up gently and held him like a baby. “You are a cutie patootie,” he said, then he cleared his throat and said gruffly, “Yes, uh. This is a healthy cat specimen. A strong hunter. I can tell by his, uh, ample midsection.” Tina said, “That’s some pretty impressive baby talk for a big, tough guy like you.” “Big, tough guys have feelings, too,” Luca said. “And they like cats.

We found the guest bedroom and I sat on the edge of the queen-size bed, bouncing up and down a little to test the comfort level. Definitely better than Shay’s couch. The room had been decorated in a mixture of blues and grays that I found soothing. I could easily live in this room. My aunt was saying something about hand-scraped hardwoods and Italian marble, but I ran over to check out the large walk-in closet. I practically wept with joy at the thought of not having to live out of my suitcases any longer. It was in that moment that I realized I would do whatever I had to do to become Tyler’s roommate. He wanted me to take care of his dog? I’d turn into Dr. Dolittle. He needed a clean home? Then I’d be . . . Marie Kondo? No, that was organizational stuff. Mary Poppins? She was the kid expert. Martha Stewart? More on the entertaining side of things. An image and a name flashed in my mind. Mr. Clean! I would be Mr. / Dr. Clean-Dolittle. Practically perfect in every way.

All spiritual traditions regard our ordinary human condition as somehow flawed or corrupt, as falling short of the unsurpassable perfection or wholeness of Reality. As a process of transformation, Yoga endeavors to re-form or, in the words of the Christian mystic Meister Eckhart, even “super-form” the spiritual practitioner. The old Adam has to die before the new super-formed being can emerge—the being who is reintegrated with the Whole. Not surprisingly, this transmutation of the human personality is also often couched in terms of self-sacrifice. In gnostic language, the “lower” reality must be surrendered, so that the “higher” or divine Reality can become manifest in our lives. For this to be possible, the spiritual practitioner must somehow locate and emulate that higher Reality. He or she must find the “Heaven” within, whether by experiential communion or mystical union with the Divine or by an act of faith in which a connection with the Divine is simply assumed until this becomes an actual experience. Spiritual discipline (sādhana), then, is a matter of constantly “remembering” the Divine, the transcendental Self, or Buddha nature. There can be no such transformation without catharsis, without shedding all those aspects of one’s being that block our immediate apperception of Reality. Traditions like Yoga and Vedānta can be understood as programs of progressive “detoxification” of the body-mind, which clears the inner eye so that we can see what is always in front of us—the omnipresent Reality, the Divine. So long as our emotional and cognitive system is toxic or impure, that inner eye remains veiled, and all we see is the world of multiplicity devoid of unity. The modern gnostic teacher Mikhaёl Aїvanhov remarked about this: Not so many years ago, when people’s homes were still lit by oil lamps, the glass chimneys had to be cleaned every evening. All combustion produces wastes, and the oil in these lamps deposited a film of soot on the inside of the glass, so that, even if the flame was lit, the lamp gave no light unless the glass was cleaned. The same phenomenon occurs in each one of us, for life is combustion. All our thoughts, feelings and acts, all our manifestations, are the result of combustion. Now it is obvious that in order to produce the flame, the energy which animates us, something has to burn and that burning necessarily entails waste products which then have to be eliminated. Just as the lamp fails to light up the house if its glass is coated with soot . . . similarly, if a man fails to purify himself he will sink deeper and deeper into the cold and dark and end by losing life itself.

Finally, it’s worth noting something else that’s seldom mentioned: if you’re avoiding a task you’ve told yourself you want to do or should do, take a closer look. You might discover that you don’t in fact want to do it or that your motivations are external and superficial. In this case your avoidance is really a sign that the task is not something you’re truly aligned with. You don’t care, you’re apathetic, and you would rather clean the bathroom for the fifth time than devote your time to this thing. While this isn’t always helpful information, don’t ignore this warning sign about what you care or are passionate about.

Bottomless I took a deep breath. Olivia would be back. I suddenly felt so much better. I had plenty to do to keep myself busy while I waited. A shower was first on the agenda. I sniffed my shoulders as I undressed, but I couldn't smell anything but the brine and seaweed scent of the ocean. I wondered what Olivia had meant about me smelling bad. When I was cleaned up, I went back to the kitchen. I couldn't see any signs that Mr. Anderson’s child was eaten recently, and he would be hungry when he got back. I hummed tunelessly to myself as I moved around the kitchen. While Thursday's casserole rotated in the microwave, I made up the couch with sheets and an old pillow. Olivia wouldn't need it, but Mr. Anderson would need to see it. I was careful not to watch the clock. There was no reason to start myself panicking; Olivia had promised. I hurried through my dinner, not tasting it-just feeling the ache as it slid down my raw throat. Mostly I was thirsty; I must have drunk a half-gallon of water by the time I was finished. All the salt in my system had dehydrated me. I went to go try to watch TV while I waited. Olivia was already there, sitting on her improvised bed. Her eyes were liquid butterscotch. She smiled and patted the pillow. ‘Thanks.’ ‘You're early,’ I said, elated. I sat down next to her and leaned my head on her shoulder. She put her cold arms around me and sighed. ‘Bell. What are we going to do with you?’ ‘I don't know,’ I admitted. ‘I have been trying my hardest.’ ‘I believe you.’ It was silent. ‘Does-does he…’ I took a deep breath. It was harder to say his name out loud, even though I was able to think about it now. ‘Does Marcel know you're here?’ I couldn't help asking. It was my pain. I'd deal with it when she was gone, I promised myself, and felt sick at the thought. ‘No…’ There was only one way that could be true. ‘He's not with Chiaz and Esme?’ ‘He checks in every few months.’ ‘Oh.’ He must still be out enjoying his distractions. I focused my curiosity on a safer topic. ‘You said you flew here… Where did you come from?’ ‘I was in Denali. Visiting Tanya's family.’ ‘Is he here? Did he come with you?’ She shook her head. ‘He didn't approve of my interfering. We promised…’ she trailed off, and then her tone changed. ‘And you think Mr. Anderson won't mind my being here?’ she asked, sounding worried.

The crowd were cheering and Geraldine led the Ass squad in that annoying as fuck song about princesses as they all celebrated her win, but I ignore them as I moved forward to offer Roxy a hand up. “I’ll toss Mildred back in her room, heal her and cast a sleeping spell on her so that she can properly recover,” Cal announced as he moved around us and I couldn’t help but smile at him. It might have annoyed the fuck out of me that he’d been with my girl, but he really was a good friend. A true brother. He threw Mildred over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes and shot out of the room as Seth howled in excitement. “Come on,” I said to Roxy. “I’ll clean you up and heal those wounds.” “Okay.” Roxy followed me back to the couch and I sat her down in my spot before throwing a ring of fire and a silencing bubble up around us to give us some pretence of privacy. “Doesn’t this count as us being alone?” Roxy asked as I dropped to my knees in front of her and she pulled her busted bottom lip between her teeth. That shouldn’t have been hot, but it really fucking was. “I’m going with no,” I replied, but as the ground trembled beneath my knees I had to admit it did. “Maybe you should just-” “I’m going to look after you,” I growled, leaving no room for negotiation. “So just let me.” Her lips parted, eyes flared, fingers gripped the edge of the couch and I was sure she was about to tell me no, but instead she just nodded. I reached out and curled my fingers wound around her waist as I pressed healing magic from my skin into hers, closing my eyes so that I could concentrate. She had cracked ribs and healing bones was more difficult than damaged tissue. (Darius POV)

The crowd were cheering and Geraldine led the Ass squad in that annoying as fuck song about princesses as they all celebrated her win, but I ignore them as I moved forward to offer Roxy a hand up. “I’ll toss Mildred back in her room, heal her and cast a sleeping spell on her so that she can properly recover,” Cal announced as he moved around us and I couldn’t help but smile at him. It might have annoyed the fuck out of me that he’d been with my girl, but he really was a good friend. A true brother. He threw Mildred over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes and shot out of the room as Seth howled in excitement. “Come on,” I said to Roxy. “I’ll clean you up and heal those wounds.” “Okay.” Roxy followed me back to the couch and I sat her down in my spot before throwing a ring of fire and a silencing bubble up around us to give us some pretence of privacy. “Doesn’t this count as us being alone?” Roxy asked as I dropped to my knees in front of her and she pulled her busted bottom lip between her teeth. That shouldn’t have been hot, but it really fucking was. “I’m going with no,” I replied, but as the ground trembled beneath my knees I had to admit it did. “Maybe you should just-” “I’m going to look after you,” I growled, leaving no room for negotiation. “So just let me.” Her lips parted, eyes flared, fingers gripped the edge of the couch and I was sure she was about to tell me no, but instead she just nodded. I reached out and curled my fingers wound around her waist as I pressed healing magic from my skin into hers, closing my eyes so that I could concentrate. She had cracked ribs and healing bones was more difficult than damaged tissue. She fell still as I shifted my hands over her flesh and I tried to ignore the way the floor quaked beneath me. We couldn’t stay in this bubble for long, but I wished that we could. I wished we could just build a bubble where the stars couldn’t see us and stay in it forever. Although I guessed if I offered her that she’d just say no again. I sighed as my magic depleted, using the last drops of it to heal her and clean the blood from her skin after burning through so much in the game. A soft touch against my hair made me open my eyes and I looked up at her as she pushed the crown onto my head. “Mildred knocked me off of the couch first,” she explained in answer to the question in my eyes. “So you win. Besides, you need a big head like yours to pull off a crown like this.” I snorted a laugh as the ground trembled so violently that I was almost knocked back onto my ass. Roxy quickly pulled the rings and bracelets from her hands and offered them to me too and I pushed them into my pockets wordlessly. But as she reached up to unclasp the blood ruby pendant from around her neck I caught her wrist to stop her. “Keep it,” I said, my gaze slipping to the priceless heart where it lay against her flesh. Dragons didn’t give treasure away. Ever. It was inherited through the family or we bought more of it, but we never gifted it to anyone. It went against everything we stood for and the fierce possessiveness of our natures. But for some reason that I couldn’t fully comprehend, I wanted her to keep that necklace. “It looks better on you anyway.” Her eyes widened but before she could reply, I dropped the wall of fire and stepped away from her. Darcy hurried forward with wild eyes, looking between me and her sister for a long moment like she’d expected us to be arguing or something. But the last thing I was going to do was call Roxy out for beating Mildred’s ass for me. She’d absolutely been working in my interests and I wasn’t even going to pretend to be pissed about it. “Darius fixed me up like new. Did you see the bit when I kneed her in the vag?” Roxy asked as she grinned and Darcy started laughing. “It was classic, you’ve gotta come see Tyler’s slow motion footage of you punching her in the throat too!” (Darius POV)

A Tidy and Organized Home… Makes you feel calm. You can relax and unwind in a tidy home. There is space to do things, and you know where everything is. When you walk into a hotel room, you immediately feel a sense of peace because the environment is tidy and organized. Makes you feel healthy. Dust and mold accumulate in messes. Are you always coughing and sneezing? Do you suffer from allergies? It’s probably because you are breathing in all the dirt in your home. Give your home a spring clean and your health issues will improve. Makes you feel in control. How does it feel when you know where everything is? Clutter prevents positive energy from flowing through your home. Remember, energy attaches itself to objects, and negative energy is attracted to mess, which creates exhaustion, stagnation, and exasperation. What does it feel like when negative energy is stuck in your body? You want to lie in bed and shut the world away because everything becomes more difficult and you can’t explain why. Here is how decluttering your house will unlock blocked streams of positive energy: You will become more vibrant. Once you create harmony and order in your home, you will feel more radiant and present. Like acupuncture, which removes imbalances and blockages from the body to create more wellness and dynamism, clearing clutter removes imbalances and blockages from your personal space. When you venture through spaces that have been set ablaze with fresh energy, you are captured by inspiration, and the most attractive parts of your personality come to life. You will get rid of bad habits and introduce good ones. All bad habits have triggers. Do you lie on your bed to watch TV instead of sitting on the couch because you can’t be bothered to fold the laundry that has piled up over the past six months? Or because the bed represents sleep, and when you come home from work and get into bed, you are going to fall asleep instead of doing those important tasks on your to-do list. Once you tidy the couch, coming home from work will allow you to sit on it to watch your favorite TV program but get up once it’s finished and do what you need to do. You will improve your problem-solving skills. When your home has been opened up with a clear space, it’s easier to focus, which provides you with a fresh perspective on your problems. You will sleep better. Are you always tired no matter how much sleep you get? That’s because negative energy is stuck under your bed amongst all that junk you’ve stuffed under there. Once you tidy up your bedroom, you will find that positive energy can flow freely around your room making it easier for you to have a deep and restful sleep. You will have more time. Mess delays you. An untidy house means you are always losing things. You can’t find a shoe, a sock, or your keys, so you waste time searching for them, which makes you late for work or social gatherings. When you declutter your home, you could save about an hour a day because you will no longer need to dig through a stack of items to find things. Your intuition will be stronger. A clear space creates a sense of certainty and clarity. You know where everything is, so you have peace of mind. When you have peace of mind, you can focus on being in the present moment. When you need to make important decisions, you will find it easier to do so. It might take some time to give your home a deep clean, but you won’t be sorry for it once it’s done. Chapter 5: How To Become an Assertive Empath The word assertive means “having or showing a confident and forceful personality.

I would’ve licked them clean,” he whispers into my ear, before backing into his position on the couch again. “Fuck him,” he mumbles.

It’s something that always felt like a myth media showed to make people feel shitty about their relationships. When you’re surrounded by women all living the same reality as yours—the husband going out to make the money while you stay home with the kids and parent and cook and clean, then he sits on the couch after a long day at the office while your day continues—you think that’s just the way it is. It’s easy to tell yourself any other reality is a fantasy.

You’re going to have to lighten up a little if this is going to work.” She raised a brow expectantly, like she thought I couldn’t lighten up. “And I don’t mean showering at nine a.m., instead of seven. I mean, I like to eat ice cream on the couch, drink too much wine, and change into my pajamas as soon as I get home. My cleaning style could be best described as laissez-faire. In fact, I have no domestic skills.” “Is that it? You think you’re going to chase me out of this house, don’t you?” I asked quietly. “You think you’ll be so wild that I’ll give up and run back to New York? You’d love that, wouldn’t you?

The kind who mostly uses weed when he needs to deep-clean the apartment, de-pill the couch, or watch Prehistoric Planet.

Besides, maybe I wanted you guys to come over, trash my place, and give me a good reason to clean up. Someone spilled queso on the counter. The floors need vacuuming. If someone could pee on the couch, we’d have a real party.” Russell lowered his voice and whisper-yells behind his hand, “Someone got their man-period. Does anyone have my Midol?

Graham went to the gym to work out, as he does almost every day. There's a pile of unfolded clothes on the couch beside me and a bag of cheese puffs in my lap. I love it when he goes to the gym, if only because I can be the massive sloth I naturally am in peace. If he were here, he'd be eyeing up my laundry and staring at the edible garbage in my lap and on my fingers, internally freaking out over the possibility of powdery cheese getting on the furniture. One hand in the bag, one hand wrapped around the stem of my wine glass—this is my idea of perfection. 'Girls Chase Boys' by Ingrid Michaelson is presently keeping me company from the stereo system. When my phone rings from where it resides on the back of the couch, I jump and send the bag flying. Orange confetti falls to the floor and I swallow, knowing I am so dead if Graham walks in the door right now. “What?” is my less than friendly greeting. “What'd you do?” How does he know me so well? I guess because he made me. “I just let off a bomb of cheese puffs. Although, technically, I'm blaming it on you since it was your phone call that scared me into dumping the bag over.” “Your mother is knitting again.” Eyes glued to the orange blobs on the pale carpet, I reply, “Oh? I'm sure it's marvelous, whatever it is.” Are they seeping into the carpet as I watch, even now becoming an irremovable part of it? Graham is going to majorly freak out over this. “Looks like a yellow condom.” I choke on nothing. “I have to go, Dad.” He grunts a goodbye. I fling the phone away and dive to my knees, hurriedly scooping up the abused deliciousness into my hands. Of course this is when Graham decides to come home—when my ass is in the air facing the door and I look like I'm eating processed food off the floor. I groan and let my head fall forward, smashing a cheese puff with my forehead. He doesn't say anything for a really, really long time, and I refuse to move or look at him, so it gets sort of awkward. “Never thought I'd come home to this scene. Ever.” Just to rile him up, I shove a cheese puff in my mouth and chomp away. “I can't believe you just ate that!” I get to my feet as I pop another into my mouth. “Mmm.” Graham's face is twisted with horror, his backpack dropping to the floor. Sweat clings to him in a delicious way, his hair damp with it. “Do you know how dirty the carpet is?” “You clean it almost every day. It can't be that dirty.” “I don't get everything out of it!” he exclaims, slapping the remaining puffs from my hands. “Go brush your teeth. No. Wait. Induce vomiting. Immediately.” I look at him and laugh. “You're crazy.” “Just...go drink water or something. I'll clean this up.” “I am perfectly capable of cleaning up my own messes.” He just looks at me. “Okay, so not as well as you, but still.” He remains mute. “Fine.” I toss my hands in the air and carefully walk over the splotches of orange beneath me. As I leave the living room, I pause by a framed photograph of a lemon tree, sliding it off-center on the wall. “I saw that,” he calls after me. “Just giving you something to do!” I smirk as I saunter into the bathroom. “I'll give you something to do.” I cock my head at that, wondering if that was meant to be sexual or not. I'm thinking not. I flip the light switch up in the bathroom and scream. Even with the distance between us, I can hear him laughing. The mirror is covered in what looks like blood, spelling out R – E – D. I put my face close to it and sniff. Ketchup. What a waste of a good condiment. “Not funny!” “So funny!

Lindsay strode to the door and picked up his overcoat from the back of the couch, where he'd tossed it when they came in. She wheeled around to hand him his coat; once again, as expected, Fred was standing right behind her. But this time he wasn't looking at her. He was looking up. At the mistletoe, directly over their heads. He met her eyes with a look that glimmered with promise. Then he took the overcoat from her hand and tossed it, lightly, onto the back of the sofa once again. Everything seemed to slow. His intentions were clear, and she had plenty of time to step back. Yet Lindsay did nothing to stop him when he took her chin in his hand, tipped it upward, and brought his lips down to hers, as purposefully as if he'd meant to do it all along. Lindsay could have sworn she heard bells.... Still dazed, she followed his eyes upward. "And what's the penalty for ignoring mistletoe?" "Struck by lightning, I think.

Mom, I want something.” Lora grinned at her daughter, knowing that at some point she would have to curb the ‘I-wants’, but not just yet. “What’s that, honey?” “I want Chad to stay here with us. All the time.” Chad went still beside her, but when she looked up, he was grinning at Mercy. He glanced at her, brows raised, to check her response. Lora sucked in a breath, knowing that she was on uncharted, sandy ground. In her deepest heart, she wanted the same thing, but did she dare say it? As she looked into the gentle reassurance in his expression, she knew it would just take a tiny leap of courage. “Chad, would you like to stay here with us?” Lora forgot how to breathe as she waited for some kind of response. Chad seemed to be dragging out the anticipation though. After several long seconds, he nodded his head. But he held up a cautioning finger. “I would love to be a kept man, but it kind of goes three ways.” Moving from the couch, he went down on one knee in front of Mercy, sitting on the floor. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a tiny gold ring. “Mercy O’Neil, will you marry me and be my awesome daughter? To have and to hold, in muddy times and clean? And help me keep your mother happy and safe?” Mercy nodded her head as hard as she could, laughing and crying at the same time. She flung her arms around Chad’s neck and sobbed. Lora’s eyes were leaking as well, so overcome with love that he had thought to include Mercy. But then he turned his damp eyes to her and she was rocked with the deep-in-her-heart knowledge of what was coming next. Levering to his feet, still holding Mercy against him, he circled the table to kneel in front of her. Then he reached into that pocket again and pulled out a shining white gold solitaire ring. His eyes incredibly kind, he held it out. “Lora O’Neil, would you do me the honor of wearing my ring? I promise to protect you and love you as long as I’m allowed, in whatever way I’m allowed, and I promise to always have Starlight mints at the ready.” Lora wept with fear and joy and laughter, knowing that she would never find another man like him. Nodding, she held her shaking hand out and allowed him to slip the ring onto her finger. Then she whipped her arms around his neck, and the three of them rocked back and forth. He pulled back enough to capture her lips with his own, sealing the love between them. “No rush,” he murmured in her ear. “We’ll take it a day at a time. Just know that I love you with all my heart.” “And I love you,” she whispered. “More than I ever dared dream I could.” Mercy

He went for a clean, dry T-shirt and towels and came back to her, kneeling in front of her. “Come on, Mel. Let’s get you dry.” She lifted her head and looked at him with eyes that were both terribly sad and exhausted. She was listless. Spent. And her lips were blue with cold. He peeled off her jacket, tossing it on the floor. Then her blouse. He was undressing her like one might a baby, and she didn’t resist. He wrapped a towel around her and keeping her covered, reached beneath and undid her bra, slipping it off without exposing her. He pulled the T-shirt over her head, holding it for her arms, and once it covered her to her thighs, he yanked out the towel. “Come on,” he said, pulling her upright. She stood on shaky legs and he unbuttoned and pulled down her trousers before sitting her back down. He removed her boots, socks and pants; he dried her legs and feet with the towel. Though still drenched himself, he used the towel to attempt to dry her curling hair, blotting the locks between folds of the towel. He wrapped the throw from the couch around her shoulders, then went to his bureau and found a pair of clean, warm socks. He rubbed her cold feet vigorously, warming them, and put on the socks. When she looked up at him, some sanity had seeped into her eyes, and this made him smile a small smile. “Better,” he said softly. He

Oh, would you look at this, now,” she said, pointing at a hole in her sage-green velvet couch. Never mind the brain and hair on it, she could clean those off with a stiff brush. And never mind the point-blank gunshot to the face she’d absorbed. It was the bullet hole in her couch that pissed her off.

We go back into the living room, and I sit at her feet while she sits on the couch. Emily picks up her guitar again after Reagan gets herself all cleaned up. Or after Pete cleans Reagan up, which takes way longer than it should. Emily starts to play, and I feel Sky’s fingers tickle across the back of my neck. I reach up to pull the rubber band from my hair and lean closer to her. She takes the hint and starts to draw her fingers down the length of my hair. I really need a haircut, but after having been bald for so long, I don’t want to cut it off. I feel like Samson, who took his strength from his hair. I know it’s stupid, but it’s how I feel. My hair being as long as it is means I’m healthy. I’m not going through chemo. I’m not taking lots of meds. I’m just me. Sky doesn’t stop stroking me, not even when the song changes. I have my family around me, and nothing has ever felt quite so right.

You took a good whack to the thigh,” he pointed out while she filled a couple of frosted mugs with water. She twisted around so she could see the bruises. “Yeah. It’s a little tender to the touch but nothing major.” “You should let me check the rest of you over.” She gave him a cold glass of water and an arched eyebrow. “For bruises, I mean, though you do look sexy as hell with a dirty face, wearing nothing but a T-shirt.” Putting a hand on her hip, which drew the hem of her T-shirt up a tantalizing half-inch, she scowled at him. “When I made you my fake fiancé, I had no idea you had this weird dirty-face fetish.” “I didn’t have it before I became your fake fiancé.” He took a long drink of water. “And it’s not a fetish. I told you, it turns me on that you work hard and you play hard. The dirt’s just a visual representation of that, I guess.” “That’s very deep of you.” “Plus, it means you’ll be showering soon and I like you all soaped up and slippery, too.” A slow flush burned up her neck. “Dirty. Clean. Doesn’t matter to you, does it?” He was going to tell her no, it didn’t matter—that he’d take her any way he could get her—but he kept his mouth shut. It was true, of course, but nothing good would come of her knowing that. She didn’t need to know that sometimes when they were curled up on the couch watching television or arguing about white versus wheat bread at the store, he would sometimes forget they were pretending to be a couple. And she really didn’t need to know it sometimes bummed him out when he remembered.

How did you know where I live?” Deanna asked when he turned onto her street. “I run by here on my way to the gym. I’ve seen you a few times.” That was the absolute truth. He did run by on his way to the gym. And he’d seen her a few times. He’d also asked around and known where to look. “Oh, okay.” She narrowed her eyes at him. “I don’t think that’s the whole story.” Normally, being caught in a partial truth wouldn’t have been high up on the list of things Lucky liked, but the fact that she knew, or at least had a feeling, that he wasn’t being totally forthright made him happy. He liked that she had called him out. “I may have asked Sue Ann, Nikki, and then finally Lauren, who hooked me up with my rental, if anyone knew where you were staying.” He smiled the smile that usually got him out of the stickiest of spots. He called it “old faithful.” And it didn’t let him down. A smile spread across Deanna’s face even as she was shaking her head. “Jessie’s right. You’re not as cute as you think you are.” “Does that mean you think I’m cute?” “I think you’re trouble.” She blushed as her hand reached for the door. “Goodnight.” “What?” he asked, purposely sounding offended. “You’re not even going to ask if I want to come in for coffee?” She stared at the door handle and licked her lips, which made his solider stand at attention. With only the moonlight streaming in through the window, he could tell by her hesitancy that she was battling an internal war of whether or not she should. He waited. Though he wanted to use his charms to give her a gentle, or not so gentle, shove in the direction of green-light-go, he didn’t want her to do anything she didn’t want to. So, as much as it killed him to know that, within a few sentences, he could have her laughing and inviting him in, he remained quiet. After inhaling deeply through her nose, she opened the door, and his heart sank as his balls turned bluer than a Smurf. He smiled up at her to hide his discomfort and disappointment. He would walk her to the door, but he didn’t trust himself to be that close to her and not touch her or kiss her or do a lot of other things he’d been dying to do to her. Things he knew she wanted and, with a little encouragement, would be begging for. But that’s not how he wanted this to be. Not with her. She was too special. This was too special. “Goodnight. Thank you for coming with me today. You were great with the kids. They loved you. I…” He stopped himself. Had he been about to say that he loved her? No. Maybe? Shit. He didn’t have time to think about that. Trying to play it off, he finished his thought, “I really loved having you there.” A small grin pulled at her lips. “Fine. You can come in for coffee.” He didn’t need to be asked twice. He was out of the SUV and beside her so fast that it made her laugh. “Okay,” he agreed. “I’ll come in, but only because you asked so nicely.” She was still chuckling and shaking her head at him—which she did a lot—as they made their way up to the door. Once she’d opened it, he stepped inside. Small and cozy, it smelled like clean and fresh, just like Deanna. A small couch rested against the far wall, and a longer one, with a knit blanket thrown over it, was near the window. A flat screen television was on the wall opposite the larger couch, and a small fireplace took up one corner. Lucky could picture Deanna curled up on the couch, in sweats with her hair pulled up, showcasing her sexy neck, the fire roaring as she watched television. At the thought, the same word that continued to pop up in his mind made an appearance. Mine. “Do you want decaf or…” she asked over her shoulder as she closed the door. “Oh, I don’t want coffee, but thanks.” He grinned and took a step closer to her. Stepping back, she was flat against the door. Then she pointed accusatorily at him. “You said you wanted coffee.” “No. I didn’t.

Sky pulls her arm back, right as I turn back to walk to the couch, and suddenly the controller flies out of her hand and smacks directly into my nose. “Ugh!” I grunt out. Sky puts her hand over her mouth and gasps. But then she runs toward me when she sees the blood dripping down my face. I walk into the kitchen because I don’t want to get blood on the carpet. “Oh thit,” I swear, when I see that the kids didn’t follow us. She sits me down in a chair and puts a towel under my nose. “That hurts wike a mudder fudder.” I sound like I’m all stopped up with a cold, but the blood is still dripping, so I pinch my nose closed. “I’m so sorry,” she says as she drops down in front of me. She rests her forearms on my thighs. I can smell the pizza she just ate on her breath, and I really, really want to kiss her, but I have blood all over my face and hands. “I’m so sorry,” she says again. “I didn’t know it would fly out of my hand like that.” “You hab ta wap it awound your wist,” I say. “I have to wrap it around my wrist?” she repeats. “To keep it fwom fwying.” “Crap,” she says again. “I am so sorry.” She already said that. She gets up and goes to get a wet towel. She cleans my hands and wipes gently beneath my nose. My nose hurts like a son of a bitch. I jerk my head back, but she just follows, probing and prodding. “I think the bleeding has stopped,” she says. But I let her continue to fuss over me, just because I like it. “Do you want some ice?” she asks. Yeah, but I need it for my dick and not for my nose. “Pwease,” I say. Her face is only inches from mine. But then she goes to the fridge. She comes back with a small bag of ice. She’d probably get offended if I shoved it in my pants, so I lay it against my nose, instead. I brace my chin with one hand and hold the ice with the other. “I really didn’t mean to hit you,” she says. She looks so worried that I have to let her off the hook. Hell, I lived with four brothers. I have had more nosebleeds than I could ever begin to count. “I’ll wiv,” I say. She leans close and kisses my cheek. I want to turn my head and press my lips to hers, but I don’t. “You in lub wif me yet?” I ask. She laughs and turns her head away, closing her eyes. Her giggle is so damn cute. She winces. “I gwess dats a no,” I say. I lift my shirt and wipe the edge of my nose, since she took my wet towel. When I do, her eyes go to my frog prince, and she leans forward and presses her lips to him. She looks up at me, her blue eyes wide, as she holds her lips there for a second. Then she makes a loud smacking noise and pops back up, grinning. “There. All better?” Fuck no. We’re just getting started. Seth sticks his head into the room. He smirks at me and shakes his head. “Dude,” he says. He laughs. “That’s the saddest thing I’ve ever seen.” I throw down the ice. “Dat’s it. I’m going to kick your ath at bow’ing, Seth. You are going down.” I follow him into the other room, take a controller, and try to pretend like she didn’t just rock my world.

What You Pray Toward “The orgasm has replaced the cross as the focus of longing and the image of fulfillment.” —Malcolm Muggeridge, 1966 I. Hubbie 1 used to get wholly pissed when I made myself come. I’m right here!, he’d sputter, blood popping to the surface of his fuzzed cheeks, goddamn it, I’m right here! By that time, I was in no mood to discuss the myriad merits of my pointer, or to jam the brakes on the express train slicing through my blood, It was easier to suffer the practiced professorial huff, the hissed invectives and the cold old shoulder, liver-dotted, quaking with rage. Shall we pause to bless professors and codgers and their bellowed, unquestioned ownership of things? I was sneaking time with my own body. I know I signed something over, but it wasn’t that. II. No matter how I angle this history, it’s weird, so let’s just say Bringing Up Baby was on the telly and suddenly my lips pressing against the couch cushions felt spectacular and I thought wow this is strange, what the hell, I’m 30 years old, am I dying down there is this the feel, does the cunt go to heaven first, ooh, snapped river, ooh shimmy I had never had it never knew, oh i clamored and lurched beneath my little succession of boys I cried writhed hissed, ooh wee, suffered their flat lapping and machine-gun diddling their insistent c’mon girl c’mon until I memorized the blueprint for drawing blood from their shoulders, until there was nothing left but the self-satisfied liquidy snore of he who has rocked she, he who has made she weep with script. But this, oh Cary, gee Katherine, hallelujah Baby, the fur do fly, all gush and kaboom on the wind. III. Don’t hate me because I am multiple, hurtling. As long as there is still skin on the pad of my finger, as long as I’m awake, as long as my (new) husband’s mouth holds out, I am the spinner, the unbridled, the bellowing freak. When I have emptied him, he leans back, coos, edges me along, keeps wondering count. He falls to his knees in front of it, marvels at my yelps and carousing spine, stares unflinching as I bleed spittle unto the pillows. He has married a witness. My body bucks, slave to its selfish engine, and love is the dim miracle of these little deaths, fracturing, speeding for the surface. IV. We know the record. As it taunts us, we have giggled, considered stopwatches, little laboratories. Somewhere beneath the suffering clean, swathed in eyes and silver, she came 134 times in one hour. I imagine wires holding her tight, her throat a rattling window. Searching scrubbed places for her name, I find only reams of numbers. I ask the quietest of them: V. Are we God?

He leans down next to my head from behind the couch like he’s going to whisper in my ear. But I put up my hand and push against his nose with the flat of my palm. “Oh!” Pete cries. He jumps to his feet. “That counts! That so counts!” He points at me and then to Paul’s nose. “She just hit you in the fucking nose, man,” he shouts. He high-fives Sam, who’s grinning like an idiot. He rubs his nose. “She didn’t hit me in the nose.” “Trust me,” I say, “if I hit him, he would know it.” He shoots me a glare. Paul leans toward me again. “You could tell me what I did wrong,” he says quietly, while his brothers are still placing bets and catcalling about my little shove to his nose. I lean closer to him and sniff. I expect to smell sex on him, but I just smell fresh, clean male. Fresh, clean, hot-as-hell man. Hmm. “What did I do?” he asks. He leans his elbows on the couch, hanging over my shoulder. I can feel his warm breath on the side of my neck, and a shiver runs up my spine. “Nothing,” I say. “Nothing is always something in girl code,” he says. He smells like Michelob Light and Paul. “What girl code is this of which you speak?” I ask. “The one where you’re right and I’m wrong no matter how we look at it.” He grins. “Talk to me, Friday.” He leans closer, and his lips touch the shell of my ear. “What did I do wrong?” I grunt and cross my arms. “That’s it, then,” he says. “You forced me to do it.” He stands up, stretches, and cracks his knuckles. “Forced you to do what?” I ask. “To take matters into my own hands,” he says. He reaches down and scoops me up in his arms. “Paul!” I screech. “Put me down! Right now!” But all I can really do is grab his neck because he’s moving faster than I thought possible. “The drawer!” his brothers all cry at once. They’re laughing like hell and high-fiving one another. “Fuck the drawer,” he says. “What drawer?” I ask. I am so confused. “The drawer!” they yell, all pointing toward it. He stops and looks back at them. “We’re just going to talk. Where the fuck do you think I’m going to put it?” he asks. “On my tongue?” Pete looks at Sam and shrugs. “I’ve heard dumber ideas,” he says. “Seems like overkill to me,” Sam replies. He shrugs, too. Paul shakes his head and bumps his door open with his shoulder. “That’s what they all say,” Matt calls. “Get a condom out of the drawer!” “You have a condom drawer?” I ask. “In the kitchen, yes.” I must look dumbfounded because he goes on to explain. “I raised four teenaged boys. I had to be creative about getting condoms in their hands. And on their dicks.” Paul sets me down gently on his bed. Then he turns around and closes and locks his door behind us. “Let me out of here,” I grit out. I scurry across the bed like a crab. “Not until you talk to me.

Lie down on your back on a firm surface using a yoga mat or something similar. Being on a bed or couch fosters sleep rather than yoga nidra, so lying on a clean floor is better. Align yourself so there is a straight line from the center of your head, through your neck, and down to your navel. Position your head so that your forehead and chin are level. Then slightly tuck your chin toward your throat. Make sure to keep the natural arch behind your neck. Move your shoulders down from your ears and snuggle your shoulder blades comfortably beneath you. Place your arms along, but not touching, the sides of your body. This is the preferred position to reduce physical distractions, enhancing relaxation. Have your palms up with fingers at ease and relaxed. This lowers sensory input from the fingertips. Shift your hips and buttocks around until you feel nice and even and supported under there. Place your feet about twelve to twenty-four inches apart so that the insides of your legs do not touch. Doing so relaxes the hips and back as well as cuts down on physical distractions. Let your feet rest out to each side. Close your eyes or keep them slightly open. Notice how all this feels and make adjustments until you feel safe and comfortable—until there is no need to move at all.

Someone should politely explain to antifa [that] the most violent Americans, the most violent and willing Americans, haven’t even left the couch yet. The most violent and ready to go, the most tactically trained, haven’t even got off the couch yet. So you better pray to God, and I mean this literally—or whoever the fuck it is you pray to—that Donald J. Trump, President of the United States, and Attorney General Barr clean this up lawfully. If for any reason the president of the United States feels that it’s not getting done the way it should and decides to put out the tweet that says, ‘My fellow Americans, my fellow 2A-loving Americans, it’s time to take up arms against these assholes,’ you are all fucked in under an hour,” he continued. “[We’re] waiting for that one tweet, that one emergency text message from the fucking president of the United States that gives us the green light to finish this entire thing in under an hour. It will not be law enforcement. It will not be one of these slow, bureaucratic, justice system wheels of justice turning. It’ll be a group of people you didn’t even know fucking existed because we were at our houses, we got off work, we were with our families, but we were ready for that call. And if that call ever does come, you will be fucked seven ways from Sunday. So I suggest you back down.

He savoured the direct contact with customers, and above all, discovered a natural talent for interior design. He thought the store should be attractive, clean, and should display the products effectively. He took advantage of the evenings, when there were fewer customers, to reorganize the shelves.

Bucket: You can learn from home • You don’t have to shower before going to school. (You can take the class in the shower.) • You don’t have to wear pants. • Your desk could be the couch, or your bed, or the toilet. • You’ll be the smartest person at school. • You are technically being homeschooled. • Another excuse to avoid cleaning the bathroom. • When you fall asleep in this class, it’s in an actual bed. • If there’s gum under the desk, it’s probably yours. • The teacher’s in your house. Or wherever you are in your house. • Your cat/dog will be happy you’re staying home. If you have twenty buckets and ten ideas under each one, you’ll have two hundred starting points. They won’t all lead to great headlines, and several will be dead ends, but that’s not the point. The point is you’re not starting with a blank page and a blank brain. And if at any point you start to miss the sweet sounds of that self-doubting voice, just go back to winging the creative process.

A run-on sentence is when we fuse two or more sentences together without using any punctuation to separate them. For example: I had the strangest dream last night on my couch Johnny Depp was whispering sweet nothings in my ear my mom was telling me to clean my room.

Landon reappeared, wearing a shirt, and pointed to the trash bag. “All done with that? I’m taking them to the garage.” Colby did a quick scan of the kitchen. “Yeah, looks like we got it all.” “Cool.” He knotted the top together then lifted the bag. Glass bottles rattled inside. “This shit stinks. Our friends are pigs.” Matt pretended to clear his throat. “Says the beer pong champ.” He lifted his hands, his face masked in innocence. “Didn’t say a thing.” “Ha-ha, okay, okay. Yeah, so maybe I contributed.” Landon shouldered the weighted bag. “A lot. But I also kicked your ass.” “We,” I chimed in. “Considering how drunk you were, we should probably respect the solid seventy/thirty split of the win.” Landon opened the garage door and paused. “Hold that thought.” “Uh-oh, you got him all fired up now.” Matt laughed and plopped down on the couch in the now clean living room. “You got anything for a headache?” Colby nodded, reached into the kitchen cabinet where he stored the ibuprofen, then tossed him the bottle. The garage door reopened and Landon stepped through already talking. “Okay, so if I’m not mistaken, you’re saying you did seventy percent of the winning?” “Seems about right.” I grinned, just to egg him on. “What I’m thinking is we should just call it fifty/fifty because my drunkenness just took my superior beer pong skills down to average-guy range.” “Oh? So that’s what we want to call it? Hmm…Okay, if this helps keep your ego nice and inflated, I guess I can get on board with that.” “Hey now…” He forced back a smile. “Kidding. We all know I suck at beer pong. If it hadn’t been for my champion of a partner and Matt’s extreme inebriation, I wouldn’t have stood a chance. It was a team effort and we…how did you say it? Mopped the floors with the blood of our enemies?” “Damn girl, you’re feisty. This isn’t no red wedding. I just said we kicked some ass.” “Oh, you didn’t say something like that? Wow, now I see how the inflated ego comes about. That kind of win just really goes straight to the head. I’m like crazy with power.” “I’d say.” He laughed. “And remind me to never play against you.

I’m sorry, but you didn’t make me promise not to worry.” With a big sigh, Jenna said, “Okay, but after this, you have to promise that, too.” “Deal,” Sara said, smirking. After seeing how much and how violently Jenna had been sick not all that many hours ago, Easy was sympathetic to Sara’s worrying.“I’ll clean up this stuff and give you all some privacy,” he said, reaching for the tray. “Thanks for getting dinner for us, Easy,” Jenna said. She looked at him with such gratitude and affection that it both set off a warm pressure in his chest and made him self-conscious—because he was acutely aware that Sara was observing them. She had to know that something was going on. Given how little he thought of himself sometimes, it wasn’t a big leap to imagine others would think the same. Just because Sara had seemed appreciative that he’d helped Jenna didn’t mean she’d approve of anything more. “You know, you set off a milk-shake-making party,” Becca said. Sara laughed. “Yeah. Shane made us shakes, then we took them over to the gym, and Nick was all jealous he didn’t have one.” Grinning, Becca rolled her eyes. “Which was hilarious because he didn’t even know they owned a blender.” Easy stood. “Well, I guess I’m glad I could provide such a valuable service.” He winked and looked at Jenna. “Need anything else while I’m downstairs?” Smiling, she shook her head. “Don’t think so, but thanks.” Easy made his way out of the room and back down to the Rixeys’, where he found all the guys in front of the big flat-screen TV—Nick and Marz kicking back in the recliners, Beckett and Shane sprawled on one couch, and Jeremy and Charlie on the other, with Eileen between them. It was dark in the room except for the flickering light of the screen. A round of greetings rose to meet him. “Sexual Chocolate!” Marz yelled over the others. Easy couldn’t help but smile as his gaze settled on the television, where the classic Eddie Murphy movie Coming to America was playing. One of Easy’s all-time favorites. He placed the tray on the counter, then turned and held his hands out. “Good morning, my neighbors!” he said, mimicking one of the prince’s lines. Right on cue, Marz said in a thick New York accent, “Hey, fuck you!” Easy could quote this movie all day. “Yes, yes! Fuck you, too!” The guys all chuckled, and Easy leaned his butt against the arm of the couch next to Jeremy and got sucked into the movie. Jeremy and Charlie made room for him, and it felt damn good to be with the guys. Not working, not stressed, not under fire. Just kicking back and shooting the shit.

Writing, for me, is the equivalent of laying on the Psychologist Couch. I must write or I become disoriented by the deluge of data I take in each day. Writing is a REBOOT. A cleaning of my old files to make room for new information. I get it out of my system the things i cant say correctly to others. I express the darkness and the light of my mind and soul. Once i'm done, there is a sort of HEALING that i didn't have before. I become just a little more BALANCED. I am able to function better and with more precision. Writing becomes my Virus Protection.

Suddenly energized, she jumped to her feet and bounced up and down on the couch. Clean clothes went flying off the pile. Maybe she should feel bad because she'd just seen what a huge flaw she'd uncovered in herself. But she didn't. She felt free and alive. Up to now, she hadn't really been living. Not fully and completely. That had to change. Immediately. "What are you doing? I'm hearing weird sounds." "I'm pulling a Tom Cruise. And I;m also waving a bra around. HUnter, this is amazing? YOu've changed everything. We should have talked like this long ago." "You're freaking me out, sis. Do I need to call someone?

And at that moment, on a nondescript tan couch in an impeccably clean living room at Twelfth and Seward, Nora fell in love with the wrong man.

Alcohol is a great aggregator: when you are drinking to excess, every problem seems to fall under that umbrella. When you stop drinking, all those little problems scatter, like knocking a container of your sister’s tiny glass beads off the arm of the couch. You can clean up that big clump of them pretty quickly but for the rest of your life, you will be finding them between the seat cushions, under the couch, stuck to your feet, sometimes even carrying them in to bed with you.