Flush After Use Quotes

I used to think Romeo and Juliet was the greatest love story ever written. But now that I’m middle-aged, I know better. Oh, Romeo certainly thinks he loves his Juliet. Driven by hormones, he unquestionably lusts for her. But if he loves her, it’s a shallow love. You want proof?” Cagney didn’t wait for Dr. Victor to say yay or nay. “Soon after meeting her for the first time, he realizes he forgot to ask her for her name. Can true love be founded upon such shallow acquaintance? I don’t think so. And at the end, when he thinks she’s dead, he finds no comfort in living out the remainder of his life within the paradigm of his love, at least keeping alive the memory of what they had briefly shared, even if it was no more than illusion, or more accurately, hormonal. “Those of us watching events unfold from the darkness know she merely lies in slumber. But does he seek the reason for her life-like appearance? No. Instead he accuses Death of amorousness, convinced that the ‘lean abhorred monster’ endeavors to keep Juliet in her present state, her cheeks flushed, so that she might cater to his own dissolute desires. But does Romeo hold her in his arms one last time and feel the warmth of her blood still coursing through her veins? Does he pinch her to see if she might awaken? Hold a mirror to her nose to see if her breath fogs it? Once, twice, three times a ‘no.’” Cagney sighed, listened to the leather creak as he shifted his weight in his chair. “No,” he repeated. “His alleged love is so superficial and selfish that he seeks to escape the pain of loss by taking his own life. That’s not love, but obsessive infatuation. Had they wed—Juliet bearing many children, bonding, growing together, the masks of the star-struck teens they once were long ago cast away, basking in the comforting campfire of a love born of a lifetime together, not devoured by the raging forest fire of youth that consumes everything and leaves behind nothing—and she died of natural causes, would Romeo have been so moved to take his own life, or would he have grieved properly, for her loss and not just his own?

Well, after all, this is the age of the disposable tissue. Blow your nose on a person, wad them, flush them away, reach for another, blow, wad, flush. Everyone using everyone else's coattails. How are you supposed to root for the home team when you don't even have a program or know the names? For that matter, what color jersey's are they reading as they trot out to the feild?

Have you ever wondered What happens to all the poems people write? The poems they never let anyone else read? Perhaps they are Too private and personal Perhaps they are just not good enough. Perhaps the prospect of such a heartfelt expression being seen as clumsy shallow silly pretentious saccharine unoriginal sentimental trite boring overwrought obscure stupid pointless or simply embarrassing is enough to give any aspiring poet good reason to hide their work from public view. forever. Naturally many poems are IMMEDIATELY DESTROYED. Burnt shredded flushed away Occasionally they are folded Into little squares And wedged under the corner of An unstable piece of furniture (So actually quite useful) Others are hidden behind a loose brick or drainpipe or sealed into the back of an old alarm clock or put between the pages of AN OBSCURE BOOK that is unlikely to ever be opened. someone might find them one day, BUT PROBABLY NOT The truth is that unread poetry Will almost always be just that. DOOMED to join a vast invisible river of waste that flows out of suburbia. well Almost always. On rare occasions, Some especially insistent pieces of writing will escape into a backyard or a laneway be blown along a roadside embankment and finally come to rest in a shopping center parking lot as so many things do It is here that something quite Remarkable takes place two or more pieces of poetry drift toward each other through a strange force of attraction unknown to science and ever so slowly cling together to form a tiny, shapeless ball. Left undisturbed, this ball gradually becomes larger and rounder as other free verses confessions secrets stray musings wishes and unsent love letters attach themselves one by one. Such a ball creeps through the streets Like a tumbleweed for months even years If it comes out only at night it has a good Chance of surviving traffic and children and through a slow rolling motion AVOIDS SNAILS (its number one predator) At a certain size, it instinctively shelters from bad weather, unnoticed but otherwise roams the streets searching for scraps of forgotten thought and feeling. Given time and luck the poetry ball becomes large HUGE ENORMOUS: A vast accumulation of papery bits That ultimately takes to the air, levitating by The sheer force of so much unspoken emotion. It floats gently above suburban rooftops when everybody is asleep inspiring lonely dogs to bark in the middle of the night. Sadly a big ball of paper no matter how large and buoyant, is still a fragile thing. Sooner or LATER it will be surprised by a sudden gust of wind Beaten by driving rain and REDUCED in a matter of minutes to a billion soggy shreds. One morning everyone will wake up to find a pulpy mess covering front lawns clogging up gutters and plastering car windscreens. Traffic will be delayed children delighted adults baffled unable to figure out where it all came from Stranger still Will be the Discovery that Every lump of Wet paper Contains various faded words pressed into accidental verse. Barely visible but undeniably present To each reader they will whisper something different something joyful something sad truthful absurd hilarious profound and perfect No one will be able to explain the Strange feeling of weightlessness or the private smile that remains Long after the street sweepers have come and gone.

Moths fly toward burning bulbs not because they’re drunk with love or exhausted from flight, wanting to wait out the pain in their wings, as if waiting was something warm they could wrap themselves around. They fly and die simply because they cannot see what we see. Instead they see stars off in the distance, the same stars we long ago used to navigate the darkness we still know nothing about. It’s hard to imagine what we once needed to know to know where we were. Without depth, with color, the moths look to the light until it calls to them. We are good at thinking we can stay. We are good at finding hurt. I live in a mapped city that keeps expanding like regret. When I look out the window I see a house so close I can hear a toilet flush. At night we take black lights and hunt scorpions stuck to our stucco walls. I walk around darkening rooms not in use, but I cannot stop the sun or streetlights from shining in. We are all aglow. I don’t want to think about the sun burning out or the billion small deaths I continue to cause. Even in the desert, a place whose name I learned to spell by the sweet treat of its opposite, the extra s demanding more, even after all these years of genetics, of rock slides, of canyons cut deep and persistent as a heart, moths spin in circles toward their stars.

He laughed. “I’m never forgettin’, so….” “So what you’re saying is we’re doing this?” “Yeah, because I’m not forgettin’ you used to like me—” “Oh hell no.” I rolled onto my hip and freaking went for him. Not for his head but for his ribs. His weak spot. “What the fuck, Bianca!” Zac literally fucking shouted as he threw his body and head back against the headboard, his arms slamming down into place against his ribs… and my fingers. I cackled, digging my fingers even deeper into his sides. “You remember now? Who’s your daddy, huh?” Those big, strong arms jerked up and down along his sides, trying to disengage me as he tried to melt into the headboard to get away from me. “You said you were gonna noogie me! What the hell are you doing? Stop it!” “Duh. Ouch!” He instantly stopped moving, and so did I in surprise that he’d actually stopped after his elbow clipped one of the bones on my wrist. Zac’s face was flushed red, eyes bright, and I decided to take pity on him. So I smiled, keeping my fingers where they were but not digging in anymore. “You thought I didn’t remember?” I asked him before dipping my face in even closer. Then I whispered, like a psycho, “I remember everything.” I tapped my fingers lightly along his sides, feeling him flinch. “Especially you being ticklish.” Those blue eyes bore into mine, and his mouth went damn near flat. Zac’s voice was almost a whisper too as he said, “Did you ask me who my daddy is?” I nodded gravely. His voice was still a whisper when he went on with, “You’re my daddy now, I guess.” Pulling my fingers away, I sat back on my knees and laughed. “Deal. I promise not to use that against you unless I have to.” His nostrils flared, and he stared at me right in the eyes as he said, still quietly, “Bianca.” “Yes?” “I remember things too.” What? Before I could process who this man was, what he did for a living, and what talents he’d polished over the years, he came at me with one of those hands that were lightning fast and accurate. Zac licked the tip of his index finger and shoved that turd into my ear just as I started yelling, “Don’t you dare!” He dared.

It’s our bad luck to have teachers in this world, but since we’re stuck with them, the best we can do is hope to get a brand-new one instead of a mean old fart. New teachers don’t know the rules, so you can get away with things the old-timers would squash you for. That was my theory. So I was feeling pretty excited to start fifth grade, since I was getting a rookie teacher—a guy named Mr. Terupt. Right away, I put him to the test. If the bathroom pass is free, all you have to do is take it and go. This year, the bathrooms were right across the hall. It’s always been an easy way to get out of doing work. I can be really sneaky like that. I take the pass all the time and the teachers never notice. And like I said, Mr. Terupt was a rookie, so I knew he wasn’t going to catch me. Once you’re in the bathroom, it’s mess-around time. All the other teachers on our floor were women, so you didn’t have to worry about them barging in on you. Grab the bars to the stalls and swing. Try to touch your feet to the ceiling. Swing hard. If someone’s in the stall, it’s really funny to swing and kick his door in, especially if he’s a younger kid. If you scare him bad enough, he might pee on himself a little. That’s funny. Or if your buddy’s using the urinal, you can push him from behind and flush it at the same time. Then he might get a little wet. That’s pretty funny, too. Some kids like to plug the toilets with big wads of toilet paper, but I don’t suggest you try doing that. You can get in big trouble. My older brother told me his friend got caught and he had to scrub the toilets with a toothbrush. He said the principal made him brush his teeth with that toothbrush afterward, too. Mrs. Williams is pretty tough, but I don’t think she’d give out that kind of punishment. I don’t want to find out, either. When I came back into the classroom after my fourth or fifth trip, Mr. Terupt looked at me and said, “Boy, Peter, I’m gonna have to call you Mr. Peebody, or better yet, Peter the Pee-er. You do more peein’ than a dog walking by a mile of fire hydrants.

That thought gives rise to a wish. Surely, I find myself daydreaming, there is something, some substance already in common use, that women could drink after sex or at the end of the month, that would keep them unpregnant with no one the wiser. Something you could buy at the supermarket, or maybe several things you could mix together, items so safe and so ordinary they could never be banned, that you could prepare in your own home, that would flush your uterus and leave it pink and shiny and empty without you ever needing to know if you were pregnant or about to be.

Do you have a piece of paper I could write on?” I jump up too fast. “Sure. Just one? Do you—of course you need something to write with. Sorry. Here.” I grab him a paper from my deskdrawer and one of my myriad pencils, and he uses the first Children of Hypnos book as a flat surface to write on. When I’m sure he’s writing something for me to read right now, I say, “I thought you only needed to do that when other people were around?” He etches one careful line after the next. He frowns, shakes his head. “Sometimes it’s . . . tough to say things. Certain things.” His voice is hardly a whisper. I sit down beside him again, but his big hand blocks my view of the words. He stops writing, leaves the paper there, and stares. Then he hands it to me and looks the other direction. Can I kiss you? “Um,” is a delightfully complex word. “Um” means “I want to say something but don’t know what it is,” and also “You have caught me off guard,” and also “Am I dreaming right now? Someone please slap me.” I say “um,” then. Wallace’s entire head-neck region is already flushed with color, but the “um” darkens it a few shades, and goddammit, he was nervous about asking me and I made it worse. What good is “um” when I should say “YES PLEASE NOW”? Except there’s no way I’m going to say “YES PLEASE NOW” because I feel like my body is one big wired time bomb of organs and if Wallace so much as brushes my hand, I’m going to jump out of my own skin and run screaming from the house. I’ll like it too much. Out of control. No good. I say, “Can I borrow that pencil?” He hands me the pencil, again without looking. Yes, but not right now. I know it sounds weird. Sorry. I don’t think it’ll go well if I know it’s coming. I will definitely freak out and punch you in the face or scream bloody murder or something like that. Surprising me with it would probably work better. I am giving you permission to surprise me with a kiss. This is a formal invitation for surprise kisses. I don’t like writing the word “kiss.” It makes my skin crawl. Sorry. It’s weird. I’m weird. Sorry. I hope that doesn’t make you regret asking. I hand the paper and pencil back. He reads it over, then writes: No regret. I can do surprises. That’s it. That’s it? Shit. Now he’s going to try to surprise me with a kiss. At some point. Later today? Tomorrow? A week from now? What if he never does it and I spend the rest of the time we hang out wondering if he will? What have I done? This was a terrible idea. I’m going to vomit. “Be right back,” I say, and run to the bathroom to curl up on the floor. Just for like five minutes. Then I go back to my room and sit down beside Wallace. As I’m moving myself into position, his hand falls over mine, and I don’t actually jump out of my skin. My control shakes for a moment, but I turn in to it, and everything smooths out. I flip my hand over. He flexes his fingers so I can fit mine in the spaces between. And we sit there, shoulder to shoulder, with our hands resting on the bed between us. It’s not so bad

This work is the link between my Dear Natalie piece and my upcoming Agatha work. It bridges that lapse in time and shows how my thinking has changed. It shows me telling a story through the surreal and trying to use thought fragments alone to show a tortured existence. This piece was written after the Dear Natalies and before the Agatha mystery, but it is meant to be read after you’ve already read both. This book is a bridge between two books, which would make it a bridge between two bridges. That’s strange, but I’ve seen stranger. Like the time I woke up in a fish tank, having morphed into a goldfish during my sleep. I still fear the sound of a flushing toilet, and since then I refuse to let myself fall asleep while wearing flippers. This book is 3,088 words of pure nonsense, strung together like pearls hurled at bacon. Yum!

You were just trying to figure out if I'm one of you?" Of course, stupid. When has anyone like Galen ever paid you any attention? When has there ever been anyone like Galen? Still, I'm surprised how much it hurts when he nods. I'm his little science project. All the time I thought he was flirting with me, he was really just trying to lure me out here to test his theory. If stupid were a disease, I'd have died from it by now. But at least I know where he really stands-about his feelings for me anyway. But what his intentions for me in general are, I have no idea. What happens if I can turn into a fish? Does he think I'll just kiss my mom good-bye, flush all my good grades-all those scholarships-down the toilet so I can go swim with the dolphins? he called himself a Royal. Of course, I don't know exactly what that means, but I can sure guess-that I'm another subject to him, someone to order around. He did say I had to obey him, after all. But if he's a Royal, why come out here himself? Why not send someone less important? I'm betting the U.S. President doesn't personally go to foreign countries looking for missing Americans who might not even be American. But can I trust him enough to answer my questions? He already deceived me once, faking interest in me to get me out here. He lied to my face about having a mother. He even lied to my mom. What else would he lie about to get what he wants? No, I can't trust him. Still, I want to know the truth, if only for myself. I'm not moving into some big seashell off the Jersey seashore or anything-but I can't deny that I'm different. What could it hurt to spend a little more time with Galen so he can help me figure this out? So what if he thinks I'm some sort of pheasant fish who has to obey him? Why shouldn't I use him the way he used me-to get what I want? It's just that what I want is holding me in his arms, acting like he's concerned that I'm not talking anymore.

He concluded the speech with an irritated motion of his hands. Unfortunately, Evie had been conditioned by too many encounters with Uncle Peregrine to discern between angry gestures and the beginnings of a physical attack. She flinched instinctively, her own arms flying up to shield her head. When the expected pain of a blow did not come, she let out a breath and tentatively lowered her arms to find Sebastian staring at her with blank astonishment. Then his face went dark. “Evie,” he said, his voice containing a bladelike ferocity that frightened her. “Did you think I was about to…Christ. Someone hit you. Someone hit you in the past—who the hell was it?” He reached for her suddenly—too suddenly—and she stumbled backward, coming up hard against the wall. Sebastian went very still. “Goddamn,” he whispered. Appearing to struggle with some powerful emotion, he stared at her intently. After a long moment, he spoke softly. “I would never strike a woman. I would never harm you. You know that, don’t you?” Transfixed by the light, glittering eyes that held hers with such intensity, Evie couldn’t move or make a sound. She started as he approached her slowly. “It’s all right,” he murmured. “Let me come to you. It’s all right. Easy.” One of his arms slid around her, while he used his free hand to smooth her hair, and then she was breathing, sighing, as relief flowed through her. Sebastian brought her closer against him, his mouth brushing her temple. “Who was it?” he asked. “M-my uncle,” she managed to say. The motion of his hand on her back paused as he heard her stammer. “Maybrick?” he asked patiently. “No, th-the other one.” “Stubbins.” “Yes.” Evie closed her eyes in pleasure as his other arm slid around her. Clasped against Sebastian’s hard chest, with her cheek tucked against his shoulder, she inhaled the scent of clean male skin, and the subtle touch of sandalwood cologne. “How often?” she heard him ask. “More than once?” “I…i-it’s not important now.” “How often, Evie?” Realizing that he was going to persist until she answered, Evie muttered, “Not t-terribly often, but…sometimes when I displeased him, or Aunt Fl-Florence, he would lose his temper. The l-last time I tr-tried to run away, he blackened my eye and spl-split my lip.” “Did he?” Sebastian was silent for a long moment, and then he spoke with chilling softness. “I’m going to tear him limb from limb.” “I don’t want that,” Evie said earnestly. “I-I just want to be safe from him. From all of them.” Sebastian drew his head back to look down into her flushed face. “You are safe,” he said in a low voice. He lifted one of his hands to her face, caressing the plane of her cheekbone, letting his fingertip follow the trail of pale golden freckles across the bridge of her nose. As her lashes fluttered downward, he stroked the slender arcs of her brows, and cradled the side of her face in his palm. “Evie,” he murmured. “I swear on my life, you will never feel pain from my hands. I may prove a devil of a husband in every other regard…but I wouldn’t hurt you that way. You must believe that.

As for me, I went inside, walked up to my bedroom, and fell on the floor. What…just happened? Staring at the ceiling, I tried to take it all in. My mind began to race, trying to figure out what it all meant. Do I need to learn how to whittle? Cook fried chicken? Ride a horse? Use a scythe? My face began to feel flushed. And children? Oh, Lord. That means we might have children! What will we name them? Travis and Dolly? Oh my gosh. I have children in my future. I could see it plainly in front of me. They’ll be little redheaded children with green eyes just like mine, and they’ll have lots of freckles, too. I’ll have ten of them, maybe eleven. I’ll have to squat in the garden and give birth while picking my okra. Every stereotype of domestic country life came rushing to the surface. A lot of them involved bearing children. Then my whole body relaxed in a mushy, contended heap as I remembered all the times I’d walked back into that very room after being with Marlboro Man, my cowboy, my savior. I remembered all the times I’d fallen onto my bed in a fizzy state of euphoria, sighing and smelling my shirt to try to get one last whiff. All the times I’d picked up the phone early in the morning and heard his sexy voice on the other end. All the times I’d longed to see him again, two minutes after he’d dropped me off. This was right, this was oh, so right. If I couldn’t go a day without seeing him, I certainly couldn’t go a lifetime…

The most celebrated germ expert in the world is almost certainly Dr. Charles P. Gerba of the University of Arizona, who is so devoted to the field that he gave one of his children the middle name Escherichia, after the bacterium Escherichia coli. Dr. Gerba established some years ago that household germs are not always most numerous where you would expect them to be. In one famous survey he measured bacterial content in different rooms in various houses and found that typically the cleanest surface of all in the average house was the toilet seat. That is because it is wiped down with disinfectant more often than any other surface. By contrast the average desktop has five times more bacteria living on it than the average toilet seat. The dirtiest area of all was the kitchen sink, closely followed by the kitchen counter, and the filthiest object was the kitchen washcloth. Most kitchen cloths are drenched in bacteria, and using them to wipe counters (or plates or breadboards or greasy chins or any other surface) merely transfers microbes from one place to another, affording them new chances to breed and proliferate. The second most efficient way of spreading germs, Gerba found, is to flush a toilet with the lid up. That spews billions of microbes into the air. Many stay in the air, floating like tiny soap bubbles, waiting to be inhaled, for up to two hours; others settle on things like your toothbrush. That is, of course, yet another good reason for putting the lid down.

The school regime refused to make it easy for us on the dress side of things, and it dictated that even if we wanted to walk into the neighboring town of Windsor, then we had to wear a blazer and tie. This made us prime targets for the many locals who seemed to enjoy an afternoon of beating up the Eton “toffs.” On one occasion, I was having a pee in the loos of the Windsor McDonald’s, which were tucked away downstairs at the back of the fast-food joint. I was just leaving the Gents when the door swung open, and in walked three aggressive-looking lads. They looked as if they had struck gold on discovering this weedy, blazer-wearing Eton squirt, and I knew deep down that I was in trouble and alone. (Meanwhile, my friends were waiting for me upstairs. Some use they were being.) I tried to squeeze past these hoodies, but they threw me back against the wall and laughed. They then proceeded to debate what they were going to do to me. “Flush his head down the toilet,” was an early suggestion. (Well, I had had that done to me many times already at Eton, I thought to myself.) I was okay so far. Then they suggested defecating in the loo first. Now I was getting worried. Then came the killer blow: “Let’s shave his pubes!” Now, there is no greater embarrassment for a young teenager than being discovered to not have any pubes. And I didn’t. That was it. I charged at them, threw one of them against the wall, barged the other aside, squeezed through the door, and bolted. They chased after me, but once I reached the main floor of the McDonald’s I knew I was safe. I waited with my friends inside until we were sure the thugs had all left, then cautiously slunk back across the bridge to school. (I think we actually waited more than two hours, to be safe. Fear teaches great patience.)

No,” she croaked, trying to shrink away from him. “You’re not supposed to be here. Don’t come near me; you’ll catch it. Please go—” “Quiet,” Kev said, sitting on the edge of the mattress. He caught Win as she tried to roll away, and settled his hand on her forehead. He felt the burning pulse beneath her fragile skin, the veins lit with raging fever. As Win struggled to push him away, Kev was alarmed by how feeble she had grown. Already. “Don’t,” she sobbed, writhing. Weak tears slid from her eyes. “Please don’t touch me. I don’t want you here. I don’t want you to get sick. Oh, please go. … ” Kev pulled her up against him, her body living flame beneath the thin layer of her nightgown, the pale silk of her hair streaming over both of them. And he cradled her head in one of his hands, the powerful battered hand of a bare-knuckle fighter. “You’re mad,” he said in a low voice, “if you think I would leave you now. I’ll see you safe and well no matter what it takes.” “I won’t live through this,” she whispered. Kev was shocked by the words, and even more by his own reaction to them. “I’m going to die,” she said, “and I won’t take you with me.” Kev gripped her more closely, letting her fitful breaths blow against his face. No matter how she writhed, he wouldn’t let go. He breathed the air from her, taking it deep into his own lungs. “Stop,” she cried, trying desperately to twist away from him. The exertion caused her flush to darken. “This is madness. … Oh, you stubborn wretch, let me go!” “Never.” Kev smoothed her wild, fine hair, the strands darkening where her tears had tracked. “Easy,” he murmured. “Don’t exhaust yourself. Rest.” Win’s struggles slowed as she recognized the futility of resisting him. “You’re so strong,” she said faintly, the words born not of praise, but damnation. “You’re so strong. … ” “Yes,” Kev said, gently using a corner of the bed linens to dry her face. “I’m a brute, and you’ve always known it, haven’t you?” “Yes,” she whispered. “And you’re going to do as I say.” He cradled her against his chest and gave her some water. She took a few painful sips. “Can’t,” she managed, turning her face away. “More,” he insisted, bringing the cup back to her lips. “Let me sleep, please—” “After you drink more.

Perhaps we could practice together at Marsbury House sometime,” he said. “I would enjoy that.” She ignored the niggle that said encouraging the duke’s suit was wrong when she wasn’t sure she wanted to marry him. “Yes, Lady Celia always enjoys showing a man how to use his gun,” Mr. Pinter put in. “You couldn’t ask for a better tutor, Your Grace.” When the duke stiffened understandably, she glared at Mr. Pinter. “His Grace needs no tutoring. He shoots quite well. And manages to remain civil at the same time, which is more than I can say for you, sir.” Why was Mr. Pinter being so difficult? Bad enough that he’d goaded her into this competition-must he also make her suitors resent her? So far they’d taken her participation in this competition in stride, but if he kept provoking them… Mr. Pinter scowled as they all halted to reload. “Civility is for you aristocrats.” His voice was sullen. “We mere mortals have no sense of it.” “Then it’s a miracle anyone ever hires you to do anything,” she retorted. “Civility is the bedrock of a polite society, no matter what a man’s station.” “I thought money was the bedrock,” eh countered. “Why else does your grandmother’s ultimatum have all of you dashing about trying to find spouses?” It was a nasty thing to say and he knew it, for he cast her a belligerent look as soon as the words left her mouth. “I don’t know why you should complain about that,” she said archly. “Our predicament has afforded you quite a good chance to plump your own pockets.” “Celia,” Oliver said in a low voice, “sheathe your claws.” “Why? He’s being rude.” The beater’s flushed the grouse. Mr. Pinter brought down another bird, a muscle ticking in his jaw as they all fired. “I beg your pardon, my lady. Sometimes my tongue runs away with my good sense.” “I’ve noticed.” She caught the gentlemen watching them with interest and forced a smile. “But since you were good enough to apologize, let us forget the matter, shall we?” With a taut nod, he acknowledged her request for a truce. After that, they both concentrated on shooting. She was determined to beat him, and he seemed equally determined to beat the other gentlemen. She tried not to dwell on why, but the possibility of another kiss from him made her nervous and excited.

Their eyes met. For a split second she caught a glimpse of heat in his eyes. Then Jake banked the flame and broke out of her embrace. Marnie felt a hot blush rise from her toes to her nose. It took a moment for her eyes to focus and her brain to function. Bewildered, she looked up to find him watching her. His heavy-lidded eyes held a strange desperation as he reached back and unhooked the vice of her ankles from around his wiast. Her legs dropped. Her heels thumped against the cabinet. Beneath his hawklike gaze she felt stripped bare and vulnerable. He studied her face, seeming to see more than her features. He seemed to delve into her mind, to touch things deep and frightening—parts of herself Marnie was still exploring. The muscles in his jaw knotted and unknotted. After a moment he stepped back and casually, but with difficulty, adjusted his jeans Heat flooded her cheeks. Legs splayed, nipples peaked to his clinical gaze, she’d never experienced such acute embarrassment in her life. Her breath hitched as she jumped off the counter, tugging her top down and her pants up. At a loss for hers, she half laughed. “I have absolutely no idea what to say.” Which was a reasonable start, she guessed. It was rare for her to be speechless. But then, this was a day of firsts. “I told you you weren’t my type.” The brass button on his jeans closed like the clasp of a miser’s purse. Other than a faint flush on the ridge of his cheekbones and what looked like a painful erection, he seemed totally unaffected by what had just happened. She stared at him. “Not your t—What do you call what just happened?” Marnie was confused. It was out of character for her to be sexually aggressive. But now that she’d done it, she wasn’t sorry. “What part of ‘I don’t want you’ didn’t you understand?” He’d wanted her. He might lie about it, but his body had been honest. He was as hard as petrified wood. “Then what”—she pointed—“is that?” He ignored the bulge in his jeans. “Just because I have it doesn’t mean I intend to use it.” Marnie stepped forward and touched his arm. He jerked away from her as if she’d used a cattle prod. “Was it something I said?” she asked quietly, dropping her hand to her side. “Look, I have a tendency to sort of speak without running the words through my brain first. But I know I didn’t give out mixed signals just now. I wanted to make love with you. It was very good. No, darn it, it was excellent. So if you have some sort of medical condition, let’s talk about i—” He moved backward, almost tripping over Duchess sprawled on the floor. The dog rose to hover anxiously between them. Jake’s eyes turned as he said, “I do not have a medical condition.” Marnie backed up—mentally as well as physically. Her hip bumped the counter. “Good.” He scowled and swore under his breath. “That is good, isn’t it?” she asked tentatively.

When a little of his strength returned he moved onto his side, taking her with him, still a part of her. Her hair spilled over his naked chest like a rumpled satin waterfall, and he lifted a shaking hand to smooth it off her face, feeling humbled and blessed by her sweetness and unselfish ardor. Several minutes later Elizabeth stirred in his arms, and he tipped her chin up so that he could gaze into her eyes. “Have I ever told you that you are magnificent? She started to shake her head, then suddenly remembered that he had told her she was magnificent once before, and the recollection brought poignant tears to her eyes. “You did say that to me,” she amended, brushing her fingers over his smooth shoulder because she couldn’t seem to stop touching him. “You told me that when we were together-“ “In the woodcutter’s cottage,” he finished for her, recalling the occasion as well. In reply she had chided him for acting as if he also thought Charise Dumont was magnificent, Ian remembered, regretting all the time they had lost since then…the days and nights she could have been in his arms as she was now. “Do you know how I spent the rest of the afternoon after you left the cottage?” he asked softly. When she shook her head, he said with a wry smile, “I spent it pleasurably contemplating tonight. At the time, of course, I didn’t realize tonight was years away.” He paused to draw the sheet up over her back so she wouldn’t be chilled, then he continued in the same quiet voice, “I wanted you so badly that day that I actually ached while I watched you fasten that shirt you were wearing. Although,” he added dryly, “that particular condition, brought on by that particular cause, has become my normal state for the last four weeks, so I’m quite used to it now. I wonder if I’ll miss it,” he teased. “What do you mean?” Elizabeth asked, realizing that he was perfectly serious despite his light tone. “The agony of unfulfilled desire,” he explained, brushing a kiss on her forehead, “brought on by wanting you.” “Wanting me?” she burst out, rearing up so abruptly that she nearly overturned him as she leaned up on an elbow, absently clutching the sheet to her breasts. “Is this-what we’ve just done, I mean-“ “The Scots think of it as making love,” he interrupted gently. “Unlike most English,” he added with flat scorn, “who prefer to regard it as ‘performing one’s marital duty.’” “Yes,” Elizabeth said absently, her mind on his earlier remark about wanting her until it caused him physical pain, “but is this what you meant all those times you’ve said you wanted me?” His sensual lips quirked in a half smile. “Yes.” A rosy blush stained her smooth cheeks, and despite her effort to sound severe, her eyes were lit with laughter. “And the day we bargained about the betrothal, and you told me I had something you wanted very badly, what you wanted to do with me…was this?” “Among other things,” he agreed, tenderly brushing his knuckles over her flushed cheek. “If I had known all this,” she said with a rueful smile, “I’m certain I would have asked for additional concessions.” That startled him-the thought that she would have tried to drive a harder bargain if she’d realized exactly how much and what sort of power she really held. “What kind of additional concessions?” he asked, his face carefully expressionless. She put her cheek against his shoulder, her arms curving around him. “A shorter betrothal,” she whispered. “A shorter courtship, and a shorter ceremony.

He concluded the speech with an irritated motion of his hands. Unfortunately, Evie had been conditioned by too many encounters with Uncle Peregrine to discern between angry gestures and the beginnings of a physical attack. She flinched instinctively, her own arms flying up to shield her head. When the expected pain of a blow did not come, she let out a breath and tentatively lowered her arms to find Sebastian staring at her with blank astonishment. Then his face went dark. "Evie," he said, his voice containing a bladelike ferocity that frightened her. "Did you think I was about to... Christ. Someone hit you. Someone hit you in the past---who the hell was it?" He reached for her suddenly---too suddenly---and she stumbled backward, coming up hard against the wall. Sebastian went very still. "Goddamn," he whispered. Appearing to struggle with some powerful emotion, he stared at her intently. After a long moment, he spoke softly. "I would never strike a woman. I would never harm you. You know that, don't you?" Transfixed by the light, glittering eyes that held hers with such intensity, Evie couldn't move or make a sound. She started as he approached her slowly. "It's all right," he murmured. "Let me come to you. It's all right. Easy." One of his arms slid around her, while he used his free hand to smooth her hair, and then she was breathing, sighing, as relief flowed through her. Sebastian brought her closer against him, his mouth brushing her temple. "Who was it?" he asked. "M-my uncle," she managed to say. The motion of his hand on her back paused as he heard her stammer. "Maybrick?" he asked patiently. "No, th-the other one." "Stubbins." "Yes." Evie closed her eyes in pleasure as his other arm slid around her. Clasped against Sebastian's hard chest, with her cheek tucked against his shoulder, she inhaled the scent of clean male skin, and the subtle touch of sandalwood cologne. "How often?" she heard him ask. "More than once?" "I... i-it's not important now." "How often, Evie?" Realizing that he was going to persist until she answered, Evie muttered, "Not t-terribly often, but... sometimes when I displeased him, or Aunt Fl-Florence, he would lose his temper. The l-last time I tr-tried to run away, he blackened my eye and spl-split my lip." "Did he?" Sebastian was silent for a long moment, and then he spoke with chilling softness. "I'm going to tear him limb from limb." "I don't want that," Evie said earnestly. "I-I just want to be safe from him. From all of them." Sebastian drew his head back to look down into her flushed face. "You are safe," he said in a low voice. He lifted one of his hands to her face, caressing the plane of her cheekbone, letting his fingertip follow the trail of pale golden freckles across the bridge of her nose. As her lashes fluttered downward, he stroked the slender arcs of her brows, and cradled the side of her face with his palm. "Evie," he murmured. "I swear on my life, you will never feel pain from my hands. I may prove a devil of a husband in every other regard... but I wouldn't hurt you that way. You must believe that." The delicate nerves of her skin drank in sensations thirstily... his touch, the erotic waft of his breath against her lips. Evie was afraid to open her eyes, or to do anything that might interrupt the moment. "Yes," she managed to whisper. "Yes... I---" There was the sweet shock of a probing kiss against her lips... another... She opened to him with a slight gasp. His mouth was hot silk and tender fire, invading her with gently questing pressure. His fingertips traced over her face, tenderly adjusting the angle between them.

I remember when you were a child. You used to have a nickname for all the flowers. You called the marigolds ‘fireflies,’ I recall, and lilies were ‘ladies’ purses.’” “I can’t believe you remember that,” Cass said. “You hardly even played out here with me.” “Remember how I used to hide things for you?” Cass remembered. Before they were engaged, Luca would bring her little treasures, things he found when he was out wandering around. Once it was a string of green ceramic beads. Another time he left her a smooth stone shaped like a heart. He used to mark the hiding places with lilies stolen from Agnese’s own plants. Cass had forgotten about the game until Luca mentioned it. “I liked that game,” Cass said. “I was sad when you got older and stop playing it. You practically quit talking to me.” “I got nervous around you after our arrangement became official,” Luca said. “I used to watch you sometimes, though.” “That’s kind of creepy, don’t you think?” Cass raised an eyebrow, and couldn’t help but crack a small smile. “You stopped being just a little girl.” A red flush crept across Luca’s high cheekbones. “I wasn’t very good at talking to women. I’m still not.

I got nervous around you after our arrangement became official,” Luca said. “I used to watch you sometimes, though.” “That’s kind of creepy, don’t you think?” Cass raised an eyebrow, and couldn’t help but crack a small smile. “You stopped being just a little girl.” A red flush crept across Luca’s high cheekbones. “I wasn’t very good at talking to women. I’m still not.” His shyness surprised her. Luca, the man, was proving to be so different from the boy she remembered. She thought of what Mada had said about growing to love somebody. She looked down at her hands and said haltingly, “My behavior has been inexcusable these last few days, so I won’t try to excuse it. I can only imagine what you must think of me.” Luca finally dared to sit on the bench across from Cass. “It’s all right,” he said, still twirling the rosebud in his big hands. “I guess your aunt sprang it on you, announcing our engagement so suddenly.” He smiled, but Cass could tell it was forced. Hurt still lingered in his eyes. “You know, most girls wouldn’t mind being Signora da Peraga.” “I know,” Cass said. She could think of nothing else to say. Luca said, this time with a warm smile, “But you are different from most girls, aren’t you, Cassandra?” Her hands tightened around her journal. Somehow Luca managed to see something good in her, even where there was nothing good to see. And yet, his words reminded her of Falco’s. “I’d prefer it if the idea of our engagement didn’t make you miserable,” Luca continued. “Does it?” he asked softly. “Make you miserable?” A few days ago, all Cass had wanted was to escape from her obligation to marry, and now she felt Luca loosening the band around her neck, unlocking the door to her cage. But Cass couldn’t tell him the truth. She had already hurt Falco. She wouldn’t hurt Luca and Agnese too. Being with Luca made sense. Being with Falco was madness. “I hate seeing you so sad,” Luca said after a pause. “I hate to think I may be the cause of your unhappiness.

I got nervous around you after our arrangement became official,” Luca said. “I used to watch you sometimes, though.” “That’s kind of creepy, don’t you think?” Cass raised an eyebrow, and couldn’t help but crack a small smile. “You stopped being just a little girl.” A red flush crept across Luca’s high cheekbones. “I wasn’t very good at talking to women. I’m still not.

Where to?” Max asked as she climbed in. “I assume that you had some destination in mind when you cooked up that nonsense about needing your bags.” “I want to join Dom.” She stared him down, daring him to gainsay her. She’d take a hackney if she had to. “He’s probably still at Manton’s Investigations, so let’s start there.” Though a smile tugged at the duke’s lips, he merely gave the order to the coachman. As soon as they set off, however, he said, “You do realize that Dom is going to throttle me for helping you.” “I don’t see why,” she said lightly. “You are head of the Duke’s Men, aren’t you? Surely you can go wherever you please and involve yourself as much as you like.” As Lisette burst into laughter, Max shook his head. “My brother-in-law doesn’t exactly like having his agency called ‘the Duke’s Men.’ I’d keep that appellation under your hat, if I were you.” “Oh, that sounds so much like Dom,” Jane muttered, “not to appreciate a fellow who showed faith in him and was willing to use him to find his own cousin, not to mention invest in his business concern.” Lisette laughed even harder now, which only made Max wince. “What?” Jane asked. “What is it?” A flush spread over Max’s face. “Let’s just say that my part in…er…’the Duke’s Men’ has been greatly exaggerated by the papers. Rather tangential, really.” “In other words,” Lisette teased, “he pretty much did nothing. He didn’t even come up with the name, and he certainly didn’t hire Dom to find Victor. Tristan stumbled across Victor himself, and then…” Lisette spun out the story of how she had met Max and how Dom had become involved. How Max had made a grand gesture for the press to protect Tristan from George. “Oh, Lord,” Jane breathed. “That’s why you were all at George’s house that day.” The day she’d first seen Dom after nearly eleven years apart. “Exactly. I mean, Max does what he can to recommend the agency, and certainly Dom benefits from the excellent press he received as a result of Tristan’s finding Victor. But beyond that, Max has nothing to do with it. He has tried to invest in it, but Dom gets all hot under the collar every time he suggests it.” “What a shock,” Jane said sarcastically. She thought of Dom the Almighty, having his hard work and keen investigative sense attributed to some duke who’d simply taken up with his sister, and began to laugh. Then Lisette joined her, and eventually, Max. They laughed until tears rolled down Jane’s cheeks and Lisette was holding her sides. “Poor Dom,” Jane gasped, when she’d finally gained control of herself. “No matter how carefully he plans, someone always comes along to muck things up. We must all be quite a trial to him.” “Oh, indeed, we are,” Lisette said, sobering. “But honestly, he takes himself far too seriously, so it’s good for him.” She smiled at Jane. “You’re good for him. He needs a woman who stands firm when he tries to dictate how the world must be, a woman who will teach him that it’s all right if plans go awry. He needs to learn that he can pick up the pieces and still be happy, as long as he does it with the right person.” “I only hope he agrees with you,” Jane said. “I really do.” Because if she could be that woman for Dom--if he could let her be that woman for him--then they might have a chance, after all.

You do realize that Dom is going to throttle me for helping you.” “I don’t see why,” she said lightly. “You are head of the Duke’s Men, aren’t you? Surely you can go wherever you please and involve yourself as much as you like.” As Lisette burst into laughter, Max shook his head. “My brother-in-law doesn’t exactly like having his agency called ‘the Duke’s Men.’ I’d keep that appellation under your hat, if I were you.” “Oh, that sounds so much like Dom,” Jane muttered, “not to appreciate a fellow who showed faith in him and was willing to use him to find his own cousin, not to mention invest in his business concern.” Lisette laughed even harder now, which only made Max wince. “What?” Jane asked. “What is it?” A flush spread over Max’s face. “Let’s just say that my part in…er…’the Duke’s Men’ has been greatly exaggerated by the papers. Rather tangential, really.” “In other words,” Lisette teased, “he pretty much did nothing. He didn’t even come up with the name, and he certainly didn’t hire Dom to find Victor. Tristan stumbled across Victor himself, and then…” Lisette spun out the story of how she had met Max and how Dom had become involved. How Max had made a grand gesture for the press to protect Tristan from George. “Oh, Lord,” Jane breathed. “That’s why you were all at George’s house that day.” The day she’d first seen Dom after nearly eleven years apart. “Exactly. I mean, Max does what he can to recommend the agency, and certainly Dom benefits from the excellent press he received as a result of Tristan’s finding Victor. But beyond that, Max has nothing to do with it. He has tried to invest in it, but Dom gets all hot under the collar every time he suggests it.” “What a shock,” Jane said sarcastically. She thought of Dom the Almighty, having his hard work and keen investigative sense attributed to some duke who’d simply taken up with his sister, and began to laugh. Then Lisette joined her, and eventually, Max. They laughed until tears rolled down Jane’s cheeks and Lisette was holding her sides. “Poor Dom,” Jane gasped, when she’d finally gained control of herself. “No matter how carefully he plans, someone always comes along to muck things up. We must all be quite a trial to him.” “Oh, indeed, we are,” Lisette said, sobering. “But honestly, he takes himself far too seriously, so it’s good for him.

First, let's be clear what I mean by “ask for the cash” and “ride the float.” I mean the following: After (courageously) asking for and getting payment from your customers as early as possible (ideally before you make or deliver what they've agreed to buy) and after convincing your key suppliers to take payment from you as late as possible (perhaps 30 or 60 or 90 days after they've shipped you what you ordered), you'll find your bank account flush with cash, at least until you have to pay your suppliers. While you have that cash in hand—the “float” before you have to pay it to your suppliers—you can use it to grow your business. Buy inventory. Hire people. Buy more Google AdWords. And so on. As your business grows, you then use your future revenue to pay your suppliers and your people, just in time when their bills come due. That's exactly what 19‐year‐old Michael Dell did in 1984 to start Dell Computer. And it's mostly how he grew Dell, too.

Darius hesitated right beside us and reached out to run his fingers along the side of my face. “You were right you know,” he breathed as if the others weren’t surrounding us and as I looked into his eyes, it almost felt like they weren’t. “I’m not good enough for you.” ... “I don’t wanna sleep here,” I muttered as Darius’s scent enveloped me and a whole host of regrets came whispering in my ears. But I was so exhausted from using my gifts that I just couldn’t stop my eyes from fluttering shut. Caleb laughed softly. “I’ll lock the door and push the key back under it so you can escape in the morning.” “Asshole,” I murmured. “Always,” he agreed, flicking the lights off and the door clicked shut before the sound of the key turning in the lock followed. I was too tired to argue further but before I gave in to sleep, I snagged my Atlas from the nightstand and forwarded the photograph I’d taken of Xavier and Catalina flying together in their Order forms to Darius. He deserved to see evidence of his mother’slove after all of these years and the knowledge that they’d all been denied that bond for so long made my heart ache for them. A moment later, a message came through from him and I smiled to myself as I read it. Darius: Thank you, Roxy. This means more to me than words can convey. My cheeks flushed at his reply and I bit my lip as exhaustion pulled at me. I sighed to myself as I nestled down in his bed, trying not to linger in the memories of sleeping here with his arms wrapped around me, feeling like nothing and no one in the world could ever hurt me so long as I just stayed right there. Maybe I should have listened to those instincts. Because his bed didn’t feel the same without him in it. And for the first time that I would admit to myself, I had to wonder if I’d made a terrible mistake when I said no. (Tory POV)

Any memories of other women were banished permanently from his mind... there was only Evie, her red hair streaming and curling over his stomach and thighs, her playful fingers and frolicsome mouth causing him an agony of pleasure like nothing he had ever felt before. When he could no longer hold back his groans, she climbed over him carefully, straddling him, crawling up his body slowly like a sun-warmed lioness. He had one glimpse of her flushed face before she sought his mouth with teasing, sucking kisses. The rosy tips of her breasts dragged through the hair on his chest... she rubbed herself against him, purring with satisfaction at the hard warmth of the male body beneath her. His breath snagged in his throat as he felt her hand slip between their hips. He was so aroused that she had to gently pull his sex away from his stomach before she could fit it between her thighs. The crisp red curls of her mound tickled his exquisitely sensitive skin as she guided him between the hot folds of her body. "No," Sebastian managed, recalling the bet. "Not now. Evie, no---" "Oh, stop protesting. I didn't make nearly this much of a fuss after our wedding, and I was a virgin." "But I don't want---oh God. Holy Mother of God---" She had pushed the head of his sex into her entrance, the sweet flesh so snug and soft that it took his breath away. Evie writhed a little, her hand still grasping the length of his organ as she tried to guide him deeper. Seeing the difficulty she was having in accommodating him caused him to swell even harder, his entire body flushed with prickling excitement. And then came the slow, miraculous slide, hardness within softness. Sebastian's head fell back to the pillow, his eyes drowsy with intense desire as he stared up into her face. Evie made a little satisfied hum in her throat, her eyes tightly closed as she concentrated on taking him deeper. She moved carefully, too inexperienced to find or sustain a rhythm. Sebastian had always been relatively quiet in his passion, but as her lush body lifted and settled, deepening his penetration, and his cock was gripped and stroked by her wet depths, he heard himself muttering endearments, pleas, sex words, love words. Somehow he coaxed her to lean farther over him, resting more of her body against his, adjusting the angle between them. Evie resisted briefly, fearing she would hurt him, but he took her head in his hands. "Yes," he whispered shakily. "Do it this way. Sweetheart. Move on me... yes..." As Evie felt the difference in their position, the increased friction against the tingling peak of her sex, her eyes widened. "Oh," she breathed, and then inhaled sharply. "Oh, that's so---" She broke off as he set a rhythm, nudging deeper, filling her with steady strokes. The entire world dwindled to the place where he invaded her, their most sensitive flesh joined. Evie's long auburn lashes lowered to her cheeks, concealing her unfocused gaze. Sebastian watched a pink flush creep over her face. He was suspended in wonder, suffused with vehement tenderness as he used his body to pleasure hers. "Kiss me," he said in a guttural whisper, and guided her swollen lips to his, slowly ravishing her mouth with his tongue. She sobbed and shuddered with release, her hips bearing greedily against his as she took his full length. The rim of her sex clamped tightly around him, and Sebastian gave himself up to the squeezing, enticing, pulsing flesh, letting her pull the ecstasy from him in great voluptuous surges. As she relaxed over him, trying to catch her breath, he drew his hands over her damp back, his fingertips gently inquiring as they traveled to the plump curve of her bottom. To his delight, she squirmed and tightened around him in helpless response. If he had his usual strength... oh, the things he would have done to her...

Having type 2 diabetes raises a person’s risk of dying, in some cases to a small degree, in other cases substantially, but it is treatable using drugs, diet, and exercise. Although drugs help, they aren’t always necessary. Diet and exercise can sometimes allow the body to heal itself. In one dramatic test of this concept, ten overweight Australian aborigines with type 2 diabetes reversed their disease after just seven weeks of returning to an active hunting and gathering lifestyle.20 The mechanisms by which physical activity helps prevent and treat type 2 diabetes are well studied. Most basically, exercise (in conjunction with diet) can ameliorate every characteristic of metabolic syndrome including excess organ fat, high blood pressure, and high levels of blood sugar, fat, and cholesterol. In addition, exercise lowers inflammation and counteracts many of the damaging effects of stress. And most remarkably, exercise can reverse insulin resistance by restoring blocked insulin receptors and causing muscle cells to produce more of the transporter molecules that shuttle sugar out of the bloodstream.21 The effect is akin to unclogging a drain and flushing out the pipes. Altogether, by simultaneously improving the delivery, transport, and use of blood sugar, exercise can resuscitate a once resistant muscle cell to suck up as much as fiftyfold more molecules of blood sugar. No drug is so potent.

Norman slid down a 30 cm (12 inches) wide bench of snow beside the creek on his hip until he reached a rock bowl. At the far side, the stream emptied over an icy waterfall on to sharp rocks 15 m (50 ft) below. Somehow he used cracks to worm his way down from rocky crease to icy blister. The slope wasn’t steep here, but Norman had to traverse giant shale boulders. His stomach was chewing itself and exhaustion tore at him like an animal. He staggered woozily on until looked up and saw the meadow of snow 180 m (600 ft) down slope. But the mountain still wasn’t done with him. Now the enemy was a snarling mass of buckthorn, which lurked below a thin layer of snow. He dropped into it and stuck deep in the well formed by the jagged branches, unable to climb out. A plane passed high above. He yelled and waved. It circled. It had seen him. No. It sailed over the massive ridgeline. ‘I never gave up. My dad taught me to never give up.’ From Crazy for the Storm by Norman Ollestad. With the last ounces of his strength, Norman scrabbled and slithered out of the nest of buckthorn. With a flush of euphoria he found he had made it to the oasis of the snow meadow. It was tempting to sit down and celebrate, but he knew he might never get up again. He had to push on. But how would he get out? The vines wove a dense forest on the other side of the meadow. Then, he found some footprints. They were fresh. Norman followed them. After a few minutes, he realized the boot tracks made a circle. Was he delirious? Panic flooded his system. Then: ‘Hello! Anybody there?’ Norman screamed his lungs out. A teenage boy and his dog appeared out of the thickening gloom. ‘You from the crash?’ ‘Yes.’ ‘Anyone else?

Ugh!” exclaimed the cow with a little shiver. “I know how that is! Nothing makes me more nervous than to have something watching me and not saying anything. I remember, when the rats used to live in our barn, that old Simon used to sit in his hole and just watch me without moving a whisker. Just did it to make me nervous. But excuse me, Freddy; I didn’t mean to mention the rats.” “Oh, that’s all right,” said the pig. “I don’t mind. Though I must confess I don’t know just what to do about them. It’s the only case so far that has given me much trouble.” “Nasty creatures!” exclaimed the cow. “If I could just get up in that loft, I’d show ’em!” “I wish you could,” said Freddy. “You could just pick the train up on one horn and walk off with it. But the stairs are too narrow. No, I’ve got to think out something else. Oh, I’ll get an idea sooner or later.” “That’s it,” said Mrs. Wiggins. “Ideas! You’ve got to have ’em to be a detective. And I can’t remember when I had my last one. But land sakes, there must be some way of getting the train. Couldn’t you tie a rope on it and pull it out?” “H’m,” said Freddy thoughtfully, “that’s an idea.” “An idea!” exclaimed the cow. “Gracious, Freddy, that isn’t an idea; it’s just something I thought of.” “It’s an idea all the same,” said the pig, “and a good one. But we’d have to do it quick, or they’d gnaw the rope in two. Come on, walk back to the barn with me and talk it over. I’d like to get at it tonight if I can.” So they strolled back, talking so earnestly that they never noticed that they were being rather clumsily shadowed by half a dozen animals of assorted sizes who dodged behind trees and darted across open places like Indians on the war-path. Mrs. Wiggins was so excited to find that she had really had an idea after all, and so flattered that Freddy was actually asking for her advice, that she hardly looked where she was going, and Alice remarked to Emma as they passed: “I’ve rarely seen Mrs. Wiggins so animated. She looks quite flushed.” “Humph!” replied Emma, who was a little upset that day because her Uncle Wesley had scolded her for eating minnows—“Humph! It always goes to her head when she gets a little attention!” Jinx was up in the loft where he spent much of his time now, though there was very little he could do there but watch the train make its periodic trips to the grain-box and back and listen to the insults and ribald songs that the rats shouted at him. He came down at once when Freddy called him, and went into conference with the pig and the cow. And when they finally separated to go to supper, they had decided on a plan. There was a door in the loft through which Mr.

The second time wearing the suit was a little less nerve-racking.  I didn’t stare nervously in the mirror and eye all the pale skin glaring back at me.  Instead, I appreciated the vivid coloring on the suit.  Rachel had good taste. Intent on finding the beach towels Rachel had used, I opened the door and stopped short at the sight of Clay.  His huge dog head moved up, then down, as his eyes traveled the length of my body.  I flushed, slammed the door, and changed back into shorts and a tank top.  I opted to cut the grass, instead. Clay sat on the porch and watched me push the mower back and forth.  When I moved to the front, he followed.  He was never in the way, just always there.  After I went back inside to read, he did disappear for a bit.  He had apparently taken my complaint about his hygiene seriously and had chosen to shower again.  I hoped he would make it a daily routine. Since he’d bathed and given me privacy as I’d asked, I had no reason to complain when I went to my room that night and saw him lying on the foot of the bed.  However, when I woke Wednesday morning with him lying next to me, I did complain.  Lividly. “Now, just hold on,” I whispered with a scowl.  “You’re a dog.  Act like one.  Fur stays at the foot of the bed.” He grudgingly moved to his place at the foot of the bed, watching me the whole time. “Don’t give me your doleful eyes.  This is your choice, not mine.”  As soon as I said that, I recalled his talent for misinterpretation which had caused this co-ed housing in the first place.  “Not that you’d get to sleep next to me in your skin either.  So, don’t even think about it.  If you don’t like the end of the bed, you can always sleep on the floor.” *

During NASA’s first fifty years the agency’s accomplishments were admired globally. Democratic and Republican leaders were generally bipartisan on the future of American spaceflight. The blueprint for the twenty-first century called for sustaining the International Space Station and its fifteen-nation partnership until at least 2020, and for building the space shuttle’s heavy-lift rocket and deep spacecraft successor to enable astronauts to fly beyond the friendly confines of low earth orbit for the first time since Apollo. That deep space ship would fly them again around the moon, then farther out to our solar system’s LaGrange points, and then deeper into space for rendezvous with asteroids and comets, learning how to deal with radiation and other deep space hazards before reaching for Mars or landings on Saturn’s moons. It was the clearest, most reasonable and best cost-achievable goal that NASA had been given since President John F. Kennedy’s historic decision to land astronauts on the lunar surface. Then Barack Obama was elected president. The promising new chief executive gave NASA short shrift, turning the agency’s future over to middle-level bureaucrats with no dreams or vision, bent on slashing existing human spaceflight plans that had their genesis in the Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon, Ford, Carter, Reagan, Bush, Clinton, and Bush White Houses. From the starting gate, Mr. Obama’s uncaring space team rolled the dice. First they set up a presidential commission designed to find without question we couldn’t afford the already-established spaceflight plans. Thirty to sixty thousand highly skilled jobs went on the chopping block with space towns coast to coast facing 12 percent unemployment. $9.4 billion already spent on heavy-lift rockets and deep space ships was unashamedly flushed down America’s toilet. The fifty-year dream of new frontiers was replaced with the shortsighted obligations of party politics. As 2011 dawned, NASA, one of America’s great science agencies, was effectively defunct. While Congress has so far prohibited the total cancellation of the space agency’s plans to once again fly astronauts beyond low earth orbit, Obama space operatives have systematically used bureaucratic tricks to slow roll them to a crawl. Congress holds the purse strings and spent most of 2010 saying, “Wait just a minute.” Thousands of highly skilled jobs across the economic spectrum have been lost while hundreds of billions in “stimulus” have been spent. As of this writing only Congress can stop the NASA killing. Florida’s senior U.S. Senator Bill Nelson, a Democrat, a former spaceflyer himself, is leading the fight to keep Obama space advisors from walking away from fifty years of national investment, from throwing the final spade of dirt on the memory of some of America’s most admired heroes. Congressional committees have heard from expert after expert that Mr. Obama’s proposal would be devastating. Placing America’s future in space in the hands of the Russians and inexperienced commercial operatives is foolhardy. Space legend John Glenn, a retired Democratic Senator from Ohio, told president Obama that “Retiring the space shuttles before the country has another space ship is folly. It could leave Americans stranded on the International Space Station with only a Russian spacecraft, if working, to get them off.” And Neil Armstrong testified before the Senate’s Commerce, Science & Transportation Committee that “With regard to President Obama’s 2010 plan, I have yet to find a person in NASA, the Defense Department, the Air Force, the National Academies, industry, or academia that had any knowledge of the plan prior to its announcement. Rumors abound that neither the NASA Administrator nor the President’s Science and Technology Advisor were knowledgeable about the plan. Lack of review normally guarantees that there will be overlooked requirements and unwelcome consequences. How could such a chain of events happen?

Is there a problem, ma’am?” Mitch slanted a glance in her direction. She stood military straight, vehemently shaking her head. “Everything’s fine, Officer.” “Sheriff. You sure about that?” Charlie said, sounding like a complete hard-ass. “Looked to me like you were being accosted.” “N-no—” Mitch cut her off. “Would you get the hell out of here?” “Mitch,” Maddie said, with a low hiss. Evidently in a devious mood, Charlie stalked forward, placing a hand menacingly over his baton. “What did you say?” “Fuck. Off.” Mitch fired each word like a bullet. “Mitch, please,” Maddie said, tone pleading. “Do I have to take you in?” Charlie’s attention shifted in Maddie’s direction and his mouth twisted into a smile that Mitch had seen him use on hundreds of women during their fifteen-year friendship. “I’ll be happy to look after her for you, Mitch.” A stab of something suspiciously close to possessiveness jabbed at his rib cage. Mitch shot Charlie a droll glare. “Over my dead body.” One black brow rose over his sunglasses. “That can be arranged.” “Please, don’t take him to jail,” Maddie said, sounding alarmed. Both Charlie’s and Mitch’s attention snapped to her. “Now, why would you be thinking that?” Charlie asked, in an amused voice. Maddie’s gaze darted back and forth. “He threatened you.” Mitch laughed and Charlie scoffed. “Honey, he’s nothing but a pesky little fly I’d have to bat away.” Comprehension dawned and her worried expression cleared. “Oh, I see. You know, you should tell someone this is some macho-guy act before you get rolling.” “And what fun would that be?” Charlie rocked back on his heels. Even with his eyes hidden behind the mirrored frames, it was damn clear he was scoping Maddie out from head to toe. Under his scrutiny, she started to fidget. She pressed closer to Mitch, almost as if by instinct, pleasing him immensely. “Don’t mind him, Princess.” He slid his arm around her waist, pulling her tighter against him. “He likes to abuse his power over unsuspecting women.” “Um,” Maddie said, fitting under the crook his arm as though she were made for him, which was odd considering he towered over her by a foot. “I bet it’s quite effective.” Charlie laughed. “Maddie Donovan, you’re everything I’ve heard and then some.” Maddie stiffened, pulling out of Mitch’s embrace and cocking her head to the side. “How do you know my name?” “Honey,” Charlie drawled, the endearment scraping a dull blade over Mitch’s nerves. “This is a small town. People don’t have anything else to do but talk. Give me time and I’ll know your whole life story.” That strawberry-stained mouth pulled into a frown, and two little lines formed between auburn brows. She studied the cracked concrete at her feet. Suddenly, she looked up, her cheeks flushing when she realized they were watching her. She smiled brightly. “Oh well, I guess this is what I get for making an entrance.” Charlie

If you’re wanting to stand up, I could help you balance.” Her expression turned wary. “I’ve been trying to stand up for the past month. It hasn’t worked thus far.” “Would you like to try again?” he asked. She shook her head, as if she’d already given up. “My legs haven’t the strength.” “That isn’t what I asked.” She hesitated a moment but then nodded. Slowly, Iain lowered her, holding her by the waist as he brought her feet to stand upon the earthen floor. Her knees wouldn’t bear her weight and buckled beneath her, so he held her steady, using his strength to hold her upright. “Keep your legs straight, if you can. I’ll help support you until you’ve got your balance.” With both arms around her waist, he kept her upright, being careful not to let her slip. Once again, her legs crumpled beneath her, and he saw her emotions falter. She was afraid to trust herself. “I can’t do this.” “Look at me, Lady Rose,” he said. He held her waist, staring into her eyes. “Try again.” Gently, he eased his hands until she was standing on her own. For the barest second, she held her legs straight, until her knees gave out again and he caught her. “I won’t let you fall.” He pressed his hands against her waist until she regained her stability. This time, she stood for two seconds before her legs buckled. Tears rimmed her eyes, and he wondered for a moment if she was upset with herself. But then, she started to laugh through her tears. “I did it. I know it was only for a moment, but—” Her words broke off in a half sob before her laughter intruded again. The look of utter joy on her face was like a fist to his gut. Never before had he seen such elation, and he continued holding her upright. “I stood,” she managed to whisper, her smile incredulous. “After all these months, I did it. Yes, it was only for a second or two . . . but it was real, wasn’t it?” “It was, aye.” He suspected that it had drained a great deal of her strength away. He was supporting all her weight now, and she made no attempt to stand again. “In time, you’ll get stronger.” He lifted her back into his arms and brought her over to the bench. He eased her down into a seated position. “Do you know how long I’ve been trying to stand?” Rose rested her hands in his, holding both of his palms for a moment. The gentle pressure of her grip was a welcome affection, and he squeezed them in return. Her face flushed, as if she suddenly realized how inappropriate it was for them to hold hands. Her smile faded slightly, and she pulled back, folding her hands in her lap. She behaved as if nothing had happened and said, “If I can stand, I may learn to walk again.” “You’ll need to strengthen your legs.” She would have to keep practicing until they could bear her weight again. “Thank you for this, Lord Ashton. You cannot know how much this means to me.” He

Coming to his rescue? That’s what you think I’m doing?” Her face flushed crimson. “If that’s what you’re thinking, then apparently you’ve never loved someone. You’ve never cared for someone so deeply that you would give your very life if you could—” She swiped at the tears on her cheeks as if angry they’d fallen. “If you could just keep them from going through any more pain. If you could give them what they should’ve been given from the very start. I was nine years old when Robert was born. I gained a baby brother and lost a mother in the very same day. My father left everything about raising Robert to me. Do you have any idea how frightening that was? He not only didn’t hold Robert, after she died . . .” She took a halting breath. “He never held me again either. Never touched me. I used to stand close and pass him tools in the livery, just so our fingers would brush. I just wanted to touch him.” She licked her lips, and Wyatt could almost taste the salt of her tears on his own tongue. His throat ached with emotion. He stepped closer, but she retreated.

Father? Mother?” Jonas asked tentatively after the evening meal. “I have a question I want to ask you.” “What is it, Jonas?” his father asked. He made himself say the words, though he felt flushed with embarrassment. He had rehearsed them in his mind all the way home from the Annex. “Do you love me?” There was an awkward silence for a moment. Then Father gave a little chuckle. “Jonas. You, of all people. Precision of language, please!” “What do you mean?” Jonas asked. Amusement was not at all what he had anticipated. “Your father means that you used a very generalized word, so meaningless that it’s become almost obsolete,” his mother explained carefully. Jonas stared at them. Meaningless? He had never before felt anything as meaningful as the memory. “And of course our community can’t function smoothly if people don’t use precise language. You could ask, ‘Do you enjoy me?’ The answer is ‘Yes,’” his mother said. “Or,” his father suggested, “‘Do you take pride in my accomplishments?’ And the answer is wholeheartedly ‘Yes.’” “Do you understand why it’s inappropriate to use a word like ‘love’?” Mother asked. Jonas nodded. “Yes, thank you, I do,” he replied slowly. It was his first lie to his parents.

Girls’ Night Out Two female friends had gone out drinking, just the girls, and had made excessively close friends with a large but uncertain number of cocktails. Walking home feeling no pain at all, they suddenly both realized they needed to pee. There was no toilet in sight and no open restaurants or anything, but they were passing by a graveyard and one of them suggested they flush their systems there, so they did, fertilizing some unknown person’s final resting place. Of course they had no toilet paper, this fact having slipped their minds in their inebriation. The first woman took off her panties, used them to wipe herself, and tossed them aside. Her friend didn’t want to do the same because she was wearing some fancy underwear and didn’t want to ruin it, but she was lucky enough to find a wreath on a grave with a big ribbon attached and wiped herself with that (after all, the intended recipient had no use for it, or for anything else). After finishing, they made their unsteady way home. The next day one woman’s husband phoned the other husband and said, “You know, we have to talk to our wives about these damned girls’ nights out. When my wife came home last night her panties were missing. I have no idea what she was up to, but it can’t be anything good!” “You think that’s bad,” said the other husband. “My wife came back with a card stuck between the cheeks of her butt that said, ‘From all of the firemen at the fire station, in heartfelt appreciation.

I picked up the earthen cup and went to take a sip. “Not like that,” Miyamoto said. “Let it cool a little. Give yourself a moment to appreciate the aroma, the feel of the bowl in your hands.” I was a little surprised and didn’t respond, though nor did I drink any tea. Miyamoto flushed. “I’m sorry,” he said. “This is why my children prefer to avoid me. Only…it seems a shame, not to pause to appreciate the small things. So often they’re more important than what we think are the big ones.” Somehow, being corrected by Miyamoto didn’t sting. “It’s fine,” I said. “Do you know a lot about tea?” He shook his head quickly as though embarrassed. “Very little.” I sensed he was being modest. “You’ve done sadō, I think,” I said, referring to the Japanese tea ceremony—literally, “the way of tea.” “Perhaps I was exposed to it somewhat, when I was younger. But still it’s really not right for me to suggest to others how they should comport themselves.” “No, I don’t mind,” I said, setting my bowl down. “Show me the way you would do it.” He beamed. “All right, since you ask. What’s important is not much more than what I said. The purpose is to appreciate, to pay careful attention…to be mindful. Not to overlook what seems small but that is in fact significant. The rest is commentary, no?” The word he used for “mindful” was nen, which typically means “sense” or “feeling.” If he hadn’t offered the additional context, I wouldn’t have quite understood his meaning. I nodded and followed his lead, holding the bowl, appreciating the aroma, savoring the taste. At first I was just being polite, but after a few moments, I started to wonder if he might have a point. I knew there were tradecraft things I’d been missing. Why wouldn’t there be everyday things, as well? What would it cost to become more heedful of those things…and would the practice of becoming more heedful of one naturally cause me to become more heedful of the other? I thought this nen was an attitude worth cultivating. Not just to appreciate the things that make life worth living. But to be attuned to the things that can keep you alive.

Steven unplugged the tub with a motion of his toe. “You’d better turn your back, Emma, because I’m about to stand up if I can manage it.” Emma complied quickly, praying Steven would be able to execute the feat on his own, that he wouldn’t fall and crack his skull open. She held her breath. “Can’t do it,” he said on a frustrated sigh, and there was a splash as he settled back into the water, which was steadily draining down the pipes. “You’ll have to help me again.” “Oh, dear,” Emma fussed. Then she went to the end of the tub and, keeping her eyes carefully closed, put her arms under Steven’s and tried to hoist him to his feet. This required both of them to give their utmost, but they succeeded, and Emma hastened to hold the robe out to Steven, keeping her head averted. They were just beginning the arduous trip back up the stairs when Doc Waverly himself knocked at the glass in the back door, an affable smile on his face. Emma had never been gladder to see anyone in all her life. Doc opened the door and came inside at her nod. “Afternoon,” he said cheerfully. “Giving our patient a bath?” Emma flushed. “Actually, he gave himself a bath. I just helped him downstairs.” “Liar,” Steven whispered, his warm breath caressing her ear. “His wrapping is wet, though,” Emma went on, speaking in an unnaturally loud voice, as though to drown out anything more Steven might say. “I’ll change that,” Doc Waverly said. He took Emma’s place under Steven’s arm, and she bolted immediately for the stairs. “I’ll put fresh sheets on his bed while you’re bringing him up,” she called back. She had managed the entire task by the time Steven and the doctor arrived at the doorway of the guest room, so slow was their advance. Steven was ashen with pain, but he smiled at Emma when he saw her step back from his freshly made bed. “Thank you,” he said. “I think you could use a shot of whiskey,” said the doctor, “and so could I.” After

She stiffened in relief and shock when the door opened and Steven walked in. He actually had the audacity to grin at her as he swept off his hat. “Hello, Miss Emma,” he said. Emma felt heat surge from her breasts to her cheeks. A full sixty minutes had passed since she’d seen him go up Chloe’s stairs, and it was plain enough what he’d been doing. When she didn’t speak, Steven walked over to the counter she was standing behind and laid his hat down on it. “Aren’t you going to say hello?” She glared at him. “I think ‘good-bye’ would be more suitable to the situation, don’t you?” He reached out, bold as could be, and grasped her braid lightly in one hand. “It’s like spun fire,” he mused. “You’re a very beautiful woman, Miss Emma.” “Am I?” Emma countered sweetly. “Tell me, Mr. Fairfax—how do I measure up against the girls over at the Stardust?” His grin was maddening. “If what we did a week ago was any indication, you can definitely hold your own.” Emma flushed at the reminder and turned her head away, but Steven caught her chin in one hand and forced her to look at him again. “Is that why you’ve been avoiding me, Emma? Because of what happened?” All her life Emma had wanted to be decent and respectable. And what had she done? She’d let the first gunslinger who rode into town make her act like a strumpet within a matter of days. “Yes, damn you!” she blurted out, her eyes filling with angry tears. Still holding her chin in his hand, Steven rounded the counter. “You’d better get used to seeing me,” he said huskily. “Because I’m going to be around a while.” Emma swallowed hard. “You said someone was after you—” “Maybe it’s time I let him find me,” Steven said, his lips only a fraction of an inch from hers. His kiss jolted Emma through and through, and she wasn’t able to push him away, no matter how badly she wanted to.

Eating raw fish while lecturing on Science is illegal. 10. Failure to flush a public toilet after use may result in hefty fines. Penalty: $150

It is against the law to not flush the toilet after using it. Special police randomly check on public restrooms and violators are publicly caned.

Stop," she cried, trying desperately to twist away from him. The exertion caused her flush to darken. "This is madness… Oh, you stubborn wretch, let me go!" "Never." Kev smoothed her wild, fine hair, the strands darkening where her tears had tracked. "Easy," he murmured. "Don't exhaust yourself. Rest." Win's struggles slowed as she recognized the futility of resisting him. "You're so strong," she said faintly, the words born not of praise, but damnation. "You're so strong…" "Yes," Kev said, gently using a corner of the bed linens to dry her face. "I'm a brute, and you've always known it, haven't you?" "Yes," she whispered. "And you're going to do as I say." He cradled her against his chest and gave her some water. She took a few painful sips. "Can't," she managed, turning her face away. "More," he insisted, bringing the cup back to her lips. "Let me sleep, please-" "After you drink more." Kev wouldn't relent until she obeyed with a moan. Settling her back into the pillows, he let her drowse for a few minutes, then returned with some toast softened in broth. He bullied her into taking a few spoonfuls. By that time Amelia had awakened, and she came into Win's room. A quick double blink was Amelia's only reaction to the sight of Win leaning back against Kev's arm while he fed her. "Get rid of him," Win told her sister hoarsely, her head resting on Kev's shoulder. "He's torturing me." "Well, we've always known he was a fiend," Amelia said in a reasonable tone, coming to stand at the bedside. "How dare you, Merripen?… Coming into an unsuspecting girl's room and feeding her toast.

EFFECTS The effects can be categorized into three parts: Inner connection For the rest of our life, an inward link to Reiki is created. With regular use, it will deepen. But if you haven't used Reiki for a while, don't worry. Even if you haven't been practicing it for many years and then suddenly feel it might be handy, just think about it, and it's going to be there. It may lay unconscious, so it can always be invoked. Healing hands and intuition Shortly after the tuning, we seem to have a feeling in our hands. It is experienced as intense warmth for many, tingling, or pulsating for others. Many people feel nothing about themselves and only understand they have soothing hands through the support they get when they position them on another human. Occasionally, after a tuning, Reiki can' turn on' itself. You may be seated on the underground and suddenly feel an intense heat settling on your lap with your paws. There's nothing to think about just enjoy what's happening. At that point, you definitely need Reiki. Many students are surprised by the increase in their intuitive skills. They become more aware of the feelings of other people and may even feel the events of the future. They tap into the universe's interconnectedness. A 21-day clearing process An attunement ends an inner cleansing process that is often most evident in the first three weeks (and thus called the 21-day clearing process). It can last as long as a few months in some cases, in many others, just a week. It's a good inner declutter, but the severity can vary. Some students have to use the bathroom more often (flushing out toxins); others have to relive their lives completely, encounter emotions, personality habits, visions, and experiences that are often as toxic as chemicals. But they can handle them now.

So the day after the Series ended, as players flushed out a season’s accumulation of balls and bats and gloves from their lockers, he met with his coaches to constructively delineate what had happened, why the bats had gone silent, why the pitchers couldn’t find the black of the plate. They mused over the edge that had been lost in the fast-forward rush to the World Series. They wondered if the euphoria of winning the pennant, beating no less a force than Clemens, had been too euphoric. La Russa himself wondered if maybe the team had over-prepared, affected by a comment ESPN announcer and Hall-of-Famer Joe Morgan made to him afterward that in his own World Series experience, he didn’t want a lot of information, just the bare bones of how hard a particular pitcher threw and how he used his off-speed.

AMANDA: Do you realize that we're living in sin? ELYOT: Not according to the Catholics; Catholics don't recognize divorce. We're married as much as ever we were. AMANDA: Yes, dear, but we're not Catholics. ELYOT: Never mind, it's nice to think they'd sort of back us up. We were married in the eyes of heaven, and we still are. AMANDA: We may be alright in the eyes of Heaven, but we look like being in the hell of a mess socially. ELYOT: Who cares? AMANDA: Are we going to marry again, after Victor and Sibyl divorce us? ELYOT: I suppose so. What do you think? AMANDA: I feel rather scared of marriage really. ELYOT: It is a frowsy business. AMANDA: I believe it was just the fact of our being married, and clamped together publicly, that wrecked us before. ELYOT: That, and not knowing bow to manage each other. AMANDA: Do you think we know how to manage each other now? ELYOT: This week's been very successful. We've hardly used Solomon Isaacs at all. AMANDA: Solomon Isaacs is so long, let's shorten it to Sollocks. ELYOT: All right. AMANDA: Darling, you do look awfully sweet in your little dressing-gown. ELYOT: Yes, it's pretty ravishing, isn't it? AMANDA: Do you mind if I come round and kiss you? [...] AMANDA: We're tormenting one another. Sit down, sweet, I'm scared. ELYOT [Slowly]: Very well. [He sits down thoughtfully.] AMANDA: We should have said Sollocks ages ago. ELYOT: We're in love all right. [...] AMANDA: [Victor] had a positive mania for looking after me, and protecting me. ELYOT: That would have died down in time, dear. AMANDA: You mustn't be rude; there's no necessity to be rude. ELYOT: I wasn't in the least rude; I merely made a perfectly rational statement. AMANDA: Your voice was decidedly bitter. ELYOT: Victor bad glorious legs, hadn't he? And fascinating ears. AMANDA: Don't be silly. ELYOT: He probably looked radiant in the morning, all flushed and tumbled on the pillow. AMANDA: I never saw him on the pillow. ELYOT: I'm surprised to hear it. AMANDA [angrily]: Elyot! ELYOT: There's no need to be cross. AMANDA: What did you mean by that? ELYOT: I'm sick of listening to you yap, yap, yap, yap, yap, yapping about Victor. AMANDA: Now listen Elyot, once and for all --, ELYOT: Oh my dear, Sollocks! Sollocks! -- two minutes -- Sollocks. AMANDA: But -- ELYOT [firmly]: Sollocks! [They sit in dead silence, looking at each other. AMANDA makes a sign that she wants a cigarette. ELYOT gets up, hands her the box, and lights one for her and himself. AMANDA rises and walks over to the window, and stands there, looking out for a moment. Presently ELYOT joins her. She slips her arm through his, and they kiss lightly. They draw the curtains and then come down and sit side by side on the sofa. ELYOT looks at his watch. AMANDA raises her eyebrows at him and he nods, then they both sigh, audibly] That was a near thing. AMANDA: It was my fault. I'm terribly sorry, darling. ELYOT: I was very irritating, I know I was. I'm sure Victor was awfully nice, and you're perfectly right to be sweet about him. AMANDA: That's downright handsome of you. Sweetheart! [She kisses him.] ELYOT [leaning back with her on the sofa]: I think I love you more than ever before. Isn't it ridiculous? Put your feet up. [She puts her legs across his, and they snuggle back together in the corner of the sofa, his head resting on her shoulder.]

Also, why do Mexicans wipe after a No. 2 and then throw the crappy toilet paper into the trash can rather than flushing it away? So gross! Let’s try to put an end to that madness. ANÓMINO Dear Gabacho: ¡Felicidades! You have just stumbled upon the most surefire way to tell if a Mexican is fresh from the border—or, as Mexicans who have lived in this country for years like to describe them, si tienen un nopal en la frente (if they have a cactus growing from their forehead)! See, flushing toilets remain a novelty in rural Mexico, so Mexicans new to this country treat public restrooms with the same anticipatory awe Japanese tourists save for Disneyland’s Matterhorn—hence, the long lines. Regarding the popó-gunked Charmin: those precious few ranchos that do have indoor plumbing suffer from inferior pipes installed on the cheap by Mexico’s government. Anything heavier than last night’s menudo would rupture the sewage system and ruin the rancho’s water supply, so used toilet paper must go in the waste-basket. Nopal-wearing Mexicans keep this tradition long after emigrating here, though…can you do me a favor, gabacho, and tell nopaleros that here in los Estados Unidos, we’re much more sophisticated with our No. 2—we flush it into the ocean.

1. After dark, stars glisten like ice, and the distance they span Hides something elemental. Not God, exactly. More like Some thin-hipped glittering Bowie-being—a Starman Or cosmic ace hovering, swaying, aching to make us see. And what would we do, you and I, if we could know for sure That someone was there squinting through the dust, Saying nothing is lost, that everything lives on waiting only To be wanted back badly enough? Would you go then, Even for a few nights, into that other life where you And that first she loved, blind to the future once, and happy? Would I put on my coat and return to the kitchen where my Mother and father sit waiting, dinner keeping warm on the stove? Bowie will never die. Nothing will come for him in his sleep Or charging through his veins. And he’ll never grow old, Just like the woman you lost, who will always be dark-haired And flush-faced, running toward an electronic screen That clocks the minutes, the miles left to go. Just like the life In which I’m forever a child looking out my window at the night sky Thinking one day I’ll touch the world with bare hands Even if it burns. 2. He leaves no tracks. Slips past, quick as a cat. That’s Bowie For you: the Pope of Pop, coy as Christ. Like a play Within a play, he’s trademarked twice. The hours Plink past like water from a window A/C. We sweat it out, Teach ourselves to wait. Silently, lazily, collapse happens. But not for Bowie. He cocks his head, grins that wicked grin. Time never stops, but does it end? And how many lives Before take-off, before we find ourselves Beyond ourselves, all glam-glow, all twinkle and gold? The future isn’t what it used to be. Even Bowie thirsts For something good and cold. Jets blink across the sky Like migratory souls. 3. Bowie is among us. Right here In New York City. In a baseball cap And expensive jeans. Ducking into A deli. Flashing all those teeth At the doorman on his way back up. Or he’s hailing a taxi on Lafayette As the sky clouds over at dusk. He’s in no rush. Doesn’t feel The way you’d think he feels. Doesn’t strut or gloat. Tells jokes. I’ve lived here all these years And never seen him. Like not knowing A comet from a shooting star. But I’ll bet he burns bright, Dragging a tail of white-hot matter The way some of us track tissue Back from the toilet stall. He’s got The whole world under his foot, And we are small alongside, Though there are occasions When a man his size can meet Your eyes for just a blip of time And send a thought like SHINE SHINE SHINE SHINE SHINE Straight to your mind. Bowie, I want to believe you. Want to feel Your will like the wind before rain. The kind everything simply obeys, Swept up in that hypnotic dance As if something with the power to do so Had looked its way and said: Go ahead.

It’s because of this functionality that Google Now has passed what Page refers to as the “toothbrush test.”32 If it is something you’d use once or twice a day and it makes your life better—like a toothbrush—it wins approval. Google Now is revolutionary in many ways, but it alone won’t change how we live on this planet. How does it factor in to the bigger picture? Think about all of the invisible infrastructure you take for granted today. You wake up in the morning and flip a switch to turn on your lights. A knob in your bathroom brings you clean, hot water within seconds. After you finish using the toilet, a lever creates enough force and pressure to flush your excretions through a massive underground sewer system. All of this infrastructure passes the toothbrush test, and you don’t even notice.

They turn on short-range telemetry kits, and we approach through the clear-cut. The black soil is deformed into thigh-high welts from earth-moving equipment. Pings from the radio collars tell them that the male is south of the female, who is farther up the wood line. Because the male wolf and the yearlings will often sit the pups while the female goes off to hunt or rest elsewhere, the biologists must choose which wolf’s signal to focus upon. This morning, they can’t decide which wolf might be with the pups. Chris whispers a game plan to Ryan. “I’m going to walk up on the male,” Chris says. “You walk farther up and get a bead on the female. Wait a few minutes before you go in - give me some time to find him first because the wind will wash your scent south right back on top of him, okay? If the pups aren’t with him, I’ll just keep moving north toward her and find you.” Ryan nods his agreement, and Chris slips into the woods. The density of the vegetation encloses around him within a few feet from the tree line. Chris, having spent twenty-five years using telemetry to track wolves, can interpret the pings like most people read road signs. His body melts behind thick vines, woody growth, and an abundance of wax myrtle bushes that crowd the understory. Ryan and I walk north along the clear-cut. He listens for the female, holding his telemetry antennae high. He waves the unit this way and that, searching the radio wave for the best strength. It begins raining. He paces up and down a fifty-foot stretch of the tree line. Where the female wolf’s signal is the strongest, he scratches a large X in the dark muck with his boot heel. We wait in the light drizzle. Minutes tick by. Finally, Ryan motions for me to follow him into the woods. We creep deliberately, slowly, and I plant each step where he does. After about ten yards, he drops onto his hands and knees and crawls beneath a cluster of thorny devil’s walking sticks. I trail him as if playing a silent game of follow the leader. We pause here and there to let the wolf confuse our sounds with a foraging squirrel. He uses vine clippers to snip through several large branches obscuring our way. Soon, Ryan pulls the cable from his antennae and shows me that he can hear her with just the receiver box. We are close. I try not to breathe. She is within thirty feet. Then the pinging in his headphones tells him she is running. We don’t hear or even see her flush. It is like tracking a ghost.

I am your doctor. You are my patient. This…” She waved a hand, searching for the right words. “This sort of thing is unethical. And another thing. I am in charge here. You follow my orders, not the other way around. Absolutely never, under any circumstances, do that again.” Involuntarily she touched her fingers to her lower lip. “It wouldn’t have happened at all if you hadn’t infected me with some sort of, I don’t know, rabies strain.” She glared at him. He simply watched her with his disconcertingly steady gaze. Shea inhaled, wrinkled her nose, desperate to change the subject to something safe. He was supposed to be half-dead. He should have been dead. No one should be able to kiss like that after the agony he had been through. She had never, ever responded to anyone the way she had to him. Never. It was shocking, the effect he had on her. There was a sudden glint in his eyes, somewhere between a flame dancing and amusement. No other man must ever make you respond to him. I would not be pleased. “Quit reading my mind!” Her cheeks flushed a bright red; she glared at him. “This is a totally improper conversation between a doctor and a patient.” Perhaps, but not between us. She clenched her teeth, her green eyes smoldering. “Shut up,” she said rudely, a little desperately. She had to find a way to get control back, and he wasn’t cooperating. She took a deep, calming breath to restore her dignity. “You need a bath. And your hair could use a good wash.” Shea stood up and gingerly touched his thick ebony hair, unaware that the gesture was curiously intimate.

I- Karly takes their fingers in me when I masturbate, just thought you would like to know. Jenny and boy, we-we’s she takes them all, sometimes she has two going in the same whole, two boys in there rubbing their crap seem guy to me even if it’s a three-way. Maybe… all of this is not what I wanted to be remembered for. I guess what I am saying is, I wanted to be remembered for how I have- ‘Fallen to You!’ However, before I kicked the bucket… I did think of Ray, or anyone- or another boy. No one is other than my selfish self. The clueless girl I was, living for the now, and not the happily ever after! Hell no…! I did not think about that. I did not think about all the dangerous, shocking, and even offensive things I have done with my friends. I did not even think about my family, like if they would even care about me being or not being around. Nope, I was too busy sucking off chill dogs and running around silly doing honorable things. I did not even think about my adorable girly bedroom, and how the sun shined silky waves of light, in the window. Besides, how it woke me up as my days started. I did not think about the soft and cozy things in that room either, or the selfie photograph of me, and Ray kissing sitting on my night table. I did not think about how you can smell the rain rolling in on a spring day, as the window was open, or feel the chill in the air as I stood by it in the middle of December. ‘Oh, let the sun beat down on my face, and let the sounds caress my ears, I have been blind!’ I do not think about all the smells and feelings of food and family coming from down the steps or in the home at all. I completely ignored everything and it all just to be the cool girl. Instead, I thought of Jenny and Maddie back in the third grade how we used to play kickball and miss in our gym class. I also thought about that girl that no one liked too that no one wanted on the team including me. I think her name was Madilyn, I remember this because I was the last one to pick, and she looked so sad and I did not say anything as she sat crying in the grass picking yellow dandelions the whole class. I was such an ass for my friends. I guess that guilt gets you at some point. I member how they and I said she was too weird and disgusting to play with us, and that she could not see what she was doing, because of her blue-eyed four- eyes. Meaning her glass on the fragile flushed face. I guess I get to be friends with these girls because they were what I wanted to be. I was not always friends with them I remember from second grade and back. Yes, I was just like her before, I joined their team. I would have done anything to be one of them, which is what I did. ‘Look at the little freak over there sitting’ Jenny said, and we all giggled. ‘Let’s kick our balls in her face, so she runs off crying for her mommy again like before.’ And that is what we all did; the goal was to break her glass of her face. ‘Like she is not even going to try to move said Maddie.’ BAM smack one! BAM smack two…! Me- direct hit- BAM! Furthermore, she goes running away just the way we wanted! Jenny always found a way of making us snicker at the dumbest crap, like that. I- we- never forget that girl’s face! Red with pain, and dripping with her tears, dandelions in hand that she picked for us. Just so, we would like her! That all faded away from me. Just like the furry white ball of seeds that blows away as she rains inside. I can’t believe that is what, I remembered! This was more my beforehand death instant when I was theoretic Madilyn meant to be having some kind of vast revelation about my past. My moment froze like in time to the recollections of the slight of nail polish, and the squeak of my white dollar store flats as I walked on the waxed high school floor. The tightness of my skinny blue jeans, with one of my lacey junior’s nine-dollar Walmart thongs.

Free! The most piteous thing amid all the black ruin of war-time, amid the broken fortune of the masters, the blighted hopes of mothers and maidens, and the fall of an empire, - the most piteous thing amid all this was the black freedman who threw down his hoe because the world called him free. What did such a mockery of freedom mean? Not a cent of money, not an inch of land, not a mouthful of victuals, - not even ownership of the rags on his back. Free! On Saturday, once or twice a month, the old master, before the war, used to dole out bacon and meal to his Negroes. And after the first flush of freedom wore off, and his true helplessness dawned on the freedman, he came back and picked up his hoe, and the old master still doled out his bacon and meal. The legal form of service was theoretically far different; in practice, task-work or "cropping" was substituted for daily toil in gangs; and the slave gradually became a metayer, or a tenant on shares, in name, but a labouror with indeterminate wages in fact.

Devon,” she said breathlessly, when they were both naked and he had lowered beside her, “I…I should confess to a small prevarication.” She wanted complete honesty between them. No secrets, nothing held back. “Yes?” he asked with his lips against her throat, one of his thighs pressing between hers. “Until recently, I hadn’t really checked my calendar to make certain I was--” She broke off as he used the edge of his teeth to delicately score her throat. “--counting days properly. And I had already resolved to take full responsibility for…” His tongue was playing in the hollow at the base of her neck. “…what happened that morning. After breakfast. You remember.” “I remember,” he said, kissing his way down to her breasts. Kathleen grasped his head in her hands, urging him to look at her and pay attention. “Devon. What I’m trying to say is that I may have misled you last night…” She swallowed hard and forced herself to finish. “…when I said that my monthly courses had started.” He went very still. His face was wiped clean of all expression as he stared down at her. “They haven’t?” She shook her head, her anxious gaze searching his. “In fact, I’m quite late.” One of his hands came to her face, a tremor running through his long fingers. “You might be pregnant?” he asked huskily. “I’m almost certain of it.” Devon stared down at her dazedly, a flush covering his face. “My sweet, beautiful love, my angel--” He began to look over her intently, pressing kisses along her body, caressing her stomach. “My God. This settles it: I am the luckiest sod in England.

I hope you’ll consider marrying me sooner rather than later.” Another kiss, slow and devastating. “Because I long for you, Kathleen, my dearest love. I want to sleep with you every night, and wake with you every morning.” His mouth caressed her with deepening pressure until her arms curled around his neck. “And I want children with you. Soon.” The truth was there, in his voice, his eyes, on his lips. She could taste it. She realized in wonder that somehow, in the past months, his heart had indeed changed. He was becoming the man fate had intended for him to be…his true self…a man who could make commitments and meet his responsibilities, and most of all, love without holding anything back. Sixty years? A man like that shouldn’t have to wait even sixty seconds. Fumbling a little with the watch chain, she lifted it and slipped it over her head. The glimmering gold timepiece settled over her heart. She looked up at him with swimming eyes. “I love you, Devon. Yes, I’ll marry you, yes--” He hauled her against him and kissed her without reserve. And he continued to kiss her hungrily as he undressed her, his mouth tender and hot as he ravished every exposed inch of skin. He removed everything but the little gold watch, which Kathleen insisted on keeping. “Devon,” she said breathlessly, when they were both naked and he had lowered beside her, “I…I should confess to a small prevarication.” She wanted complete honesty between them. No secrets, nothing held back. “Yes?” he asked with his lips against her throat, one of his thighs pressing between hers. “Until recently, I hadn’t really checked my calendar to make certain I was--” She broke off as he used the edge of his teeth to delicately score her throat. “--counting days properly. And I had already resolved to take full responsibility for…” His tongue was playing in the hollow at the base of her neck. “…what happened that morning. After breakfast. You remember.” “I remember,” he said, kissing his way down to her breasts. Kathleen grasped his head in her hands, urging him to look at her and pay attention. “Devon. What I’m trying to say is that I may have misled you last night…” She swallowed hard and forced herself to finish. “…when I said that my monthly courses had started.” He went very still. His face was wiped clean of all expression as he stared down at her. “They haven’t?” She shook her head, her anxious gaze searching his. “In fact, I’m quite late.” One of his hands came to her face, a tremor running through his long fingers. “You might be pregnant?” he asked huskily. “I’m almost certain of it.” Devon stared down at her dazedly, a flush covering his face. “My sweet, beautiful love, my angel--” He began to look over her intently, pressing kisses along her body, caressing her stomach. “My God. This settles it: I am the luckiest sod in England.

and a hat and sunglasses.” “None of this information is new.” He eyed her knowingly. “There’s more, isn’t there?” “His hair was brown. His cheeks very pink. Either flushed or chapped. He was clean-shaven. She’s very certain of those facts. His clothing was inexpensive, but his gloves were furlined leather and she believes the scarf around his neck was silk.” “He wore a combination of his own expensive clothes and cheaper apparel.” “He was quite fair, his face round and full, his nose large, rather prominent. Not handsome, but not ugly.” “Anything else?” Griffin asked, knowing that even with an artist’s sketch, it was unlikely anyone could ID the suspect from this description. But it was far more than they’d ever had. And there was always the off chance that even a sketch showing a guy in sunglasses and wearing a hat might be of some use. After all, they now had a partial description. “Does Barbara Jean have any idea that you were—?” “No. When we spoke, she simply repeated what she had already told you in the past,” Yvette said. “The rest, I gained by invading her private thoughts.” Griff took Yvette’s small, slender hands into his, lifted them to his lips and kissed first one and then the other. “Don’t feel guilty for using your special talent. You did it for the right reason, for a good cause.” “The end always justifies the means.” Her voice held a tone of self-condemnation. “Not always,” he told her. “But sometimes.

Dahmer continued. He purchased a ten-gallon soup kettle that could easily hold a human skull. He boiled the heads in a solution of Soilex and water for about an hour. This effectively boiled off the flesh and hair, leaving slurry in the kettle that could be flushed down the toilet. After that, he used a large serving spoon to dig out the brain matter, which became a mushy substance during the boiling process. He explained that if you severed the head correctly at the base of the neck, you could easily fit a serving spoon in the inner cavity, like cleaning out a cantaloupe. Then he placed the skull in another solution of Soilex and boiled it an hour or so, finishing it off in the oven on low heat for about twenty minutes, leaving it bone dry. He also used the kettle to boil flesh and sinew from other body parts he had decided to keep with him. He described the process almost mechanically, studying our faces as he spoke. He seemed to be looking for some sign of disdain or horror from us, but he found none.

I will not be told what to do by a notorious- and now proven- rake and libertine." He lost his temper then, capturing her hand, wagging finger and all, in his own and using it to pull her flush against him. "If I am to be labeled as such, I may as well stop resisting the part." And, with that, he kissed her. She fought him, wriggling under the strength of his kiss, but no matter which direction she turned, he was there, all strong arms and firm muscle and hard, unyielding mouth. Her fists pounded on his shoulders fleetingly before he grasped her waist with both hands and lifted her from the ground- leaving her with no choice but to cling to him as he pressed her against the wall. She gasped in surprise at the sudden movement, and he took the opportunity to plunder her mouth, both hands cupping her face, stealing her breath. She matched his movements with lips and tongue and teeth, refusing to allow him the upper hand, even in this. Stroke for stroke, where he went, she followed. He captured her sighs with his mouth; she reveled in his low hum of pleasure. After several intense moments of the sensual battle, his lips gentled, caressing hers as his tongue stroked along the soft, sensitive skin of her lower lip, ending the kiss infinitely more gently than it had begun. The caress wrung a little cry from Callie, and Ralston smiled at the sound, pressing a final, soft kiss at the corner of her mouth.