Knocked Up Movie Quotes

I think I’m under control, that I’ve stripped away all weaknesses. That committing to my mission has made me impervious. I’m wrong. The thought of Barrons smiling brings other thoughts. Barrons naked. Dancing. Dark head thrown back. Laughing. The image doesn’t “gently swim up in my mind” in a dreamy sort of way, like I’ve seen in movies. No, this one slams into my head like a nuclear missile, exploding in my brain in graphic detail. I suffocate in a mushroom cloud of pain. I can’t breathe. I squeeze my eyes shut. White teeth flashing in his dark face: I get knocked down but I get up again. You’re never gonna keep me down. I stagger. But he didn’t get up, the bastard. He stayed down.

This was no peck on the lips. This was a real first kiss, a movie-star-knock-her-socks-off-fireworks-light-up-the-sky kind of kiss. A girl could live to be a hundred and never forget that kiss.

I hate a song that makes you think that you are not any good. I hate a song that makes you think that you are just born to lose. Bound to lose. No good to nobody. No good for nothing. Because you are too old or too young or too fat or too slim or too ugly or too this or too that. Songs that run you down or poke fun at you on account of your bad luck or hard travelling. I am out to fight those songs to my very last breath of air and my last drop of blood. I am out to sing songs that will prove to you that this is your world and that if it has hit you pretty hard and knocked you for a dozen loops, no matter what color, what size you are, how you are built, I am out to sing the songs that make you take pride in yourself and in your work. And the songs that I sing are made up for the most part by all sorts of folks just about like you. I could hire out to the other side, the big money side, and get several dollars every week just to quit singing my own kind of songs and to sing the kind that knock you down still farther and the ones that poke fun at you even more and the ones that make you think that you've not got any sense at all. But I decided a long time ago that I'd starve to death before I'd sing any such songs as that. The radio waves and your movies and your jukeboxes and your songbooks are already loaded down and running over with such no good songs as that anyhow.

Possibilities I prefer movies. I prefer cats. I prefer the oaks along the Warta. I prefer Dickens to Dostoyevsky. I prefer myself liking people to myself loving mankind. I prefer keeping a needle and thread on hand, just in case. I prefer the color green. I prefer not to maintain that reason is to blame for everything. I prefer exceptions. I prefer to leave early. I prefer talking to doctors about something else. I prefer the old fine-lined illustrations. I prefer the absurdity of writing poems to the absurdity of not writing poems. I prefer, where love's concerned, nonspecific anniversaries that can be celebrated every day. I prefer moralists who promise me nothing. I prefer cunning kindness to the over-trustful kind. I prefer the earth in civvies. I prefer conquered to conquering countries. I prefer having some reservations. I prefer the hell of chaos to the hell of order. I prefer Grimms' fairy tales to the newspapers' front pages. I prefer leaves without flowers to flowers without leaves. I prefer dogs with uncropped tails. I prefer light eyes, since mine are dark. I prefer desk drawers. I prefer many things that I haven't mentioned here to many things I've also left unsaid. I prefer zeroes on the loose to those lined up behind a cipher. I prefer the time of insects to the time of stars. I prefer to knock on wood. I prefer not to ask how much longer and when. I prefer keeping in mind even the possibility that existence has its own reason for being.

I saw the paper.” Wes looked like he was trying not to laugh as his entire face smiled. “I saw the paper, so it’s pointless to deny it. It was sitting on your planner this morning and it said ‘The Soundtrack of M&L.’ Oh my God, Buxbaum, that is freaking adorable.” I laughed even though I was mortified. “Shut up, Wes.” “What songs are on it?” “Seriously.” “Seriously, I want to know. Is it all boot-knocking songs, like Ginuwine and Nine Inch Nails, or is it cheesy romance? Was Taylor Swift on the list?

A loud, purposeful knock on the front door froze him in place with his fist over the fabric. “Hey, dude, it’s me. I brought you all four Bloodsport movies. Open up!” Jason’s voice filtered past the front door, and he and Violet flew apart like teenagers at a party raid. No way. This wasn’t happening. He had not just gotten cock-blocked by his best friend and partner, AKA the only living relative of the woman he’d very nearly stripped naked in his front hallway.

Our eyes finally meet—he’s still staring at me, lips parted. And I can’t get a read on his expression. As the moments stretch on, a bud of nervousness blooms in my stomach, its vine wrapping around my vocal chords. “I…I wasn’t sure what you had planned for tonight. You didn’t tell me.” Those long lashes blink, but he doesn’t say anything. I raise my hand toward the kitchen. “I can go change if this isn’t—” “No.” Nicholas steps forward, his hand up. “No, don’t change a thing. You’re…absolutely perfect.” And he’s looking at me like he never wants to stop. “I didn’t expect…I mean, you’re lovely…b-but…” “Wasn’t there a movie about a king who stuttered?” I tease him. “Was he a relative of yours?” He chuckles. And call me crazy, but I swear Nicholas’s cheeks go slightly pink. “No, stuttering doesn’t run in my family.” He shakes his head. “You just knocked me on my arse.” And now I’m beaming. “Thank you. You look pretty great too, Prince Charming.” “I actually know a Prince Charming. He’s first-class prick.” “Well. Now that you’ve tarnished a precious piece of my childhood, this better be some date,” I tease. “It will be.” He holds out his hand to me. “Shall we?

Gustavo Tiberius speaking." “It’s so weird you do that, man,” Casey said, sounding amused. “Every time I call.” “It’s polite,” Gus said. “Just because you kids these days don’t have proper phone etiquette.” “Oh boy, there’s the Grumpy Gus I know. You miss me?” Gus was well aware the others could hear the conversation loud and clear. He was also aware he had a reputation to maintain. “Hadn’t really thought about it.” “Really.” “Yes.” “Gus.” “Casey.” “I miss you.” “I miss you too,” Gus mumbled into the phone, blushing fiercely. “Yeah? How much?” Gus was in hell. “A lot,” he said truthfully. “There have been allegations made against my person of pining and moping. False allegations, mind you, but allegations nonetheless.” “I know what you mean,” Casey said. “The guys were saying the same thing about me.” Gus smiled. “How embarrassing for you.” “Completely. You have no idea.” “They’re going to get you packed up this week?” “Ah, yeah. Sure. Something like that.” “Casey.” “Yes, Gustavo.” “You’re being cagey.” “I have no idea what you mean. Hey, that’s a nice Hawaiian shirt you’ve got on. Pink? I don’t think I’ve seen you in that color before.” Gus shrugged. “Pastor Tommy had a shitload of them. I think I could wear one every day for the rest of the year and not repeat. I think he may have had a bit of a….” Gus trailed off when his hand started shaking. Then, “How did you know what I was wearing?” There was a knock on the window to the Emporium. Gus looked up. Standing on the sidewalk was Casey. He was wearing bright green skinny jeans and a white and red shirt that proclaimed him to be a member of the 1987 Pasadena Bulldogs Women’s Softball team. He looked ridiculous. And like the greatest thing Gus had ever seen. Casey wiggled his eyebrows at Gus. “Hey, man.” “Hi,” Gus croaked. “Come over here, but stay on the phone, okay?” Gus didn’t even argue, unable to take his eyes off Casey. He hadn’t expected him for another week, but here he was on a pretty Saturday afternoon, standing outside the Emporium like it was no big deal. Gus went to the window, and Casey smiled that lazy smile. He said, “Hi.” Gus said, “Hi.” “So, I’ve spent the last two days driving back,” Casey said. “Tried to make it a surprise, you know?” “I’m very surprised,” Gus managed to say, about ten seconds away from busting through the glass just so he could hug Casey close. The smile widened. “Good. I’ve had some time to think about things, man. About a lot of things. And I came to this realization as I drove past Weed, California. Gus. It was called Weed, California. It was a sign.” Gus didn’t even try to stop the eye roll. “Oh my god.” “Right? Kismet. Because right when I entered Weed, California, I was thinking about you and it hit me. Gus, it hit me.” “What did?” Casey put his hand up against the glass. Gus did the same on his side. “Hey, Gus?” “Yeah?” “I’m going to ask you a question, okay?” Gustavo’s throat felt very dry. “Okay.” “What was the Oscar winner for Best Song in 1984?” Automatically, Gus answered, “Stevie Wonder for the movie The Woman in Red. The song was ‘I Just Called to Say I Love You.’” It was fine, of course. Because he knew answers to all those things. He didn’t know why Casey wanted to— And then he could barely breathe. Casey’s smile wobbled a little bit. “Okay?” Gus blinked the burn away. He nodded as best he could. And Casey said, “Yeah, man. I love you too.” Gus didn’t even care that he dropped his phone then. All that mattered was getting as close to Casey as humanely possible. He threw open the door to the Emporium and suddenly found himself with an armful of hipster. Casey laughed wetly into his neck and Gus just held on as hard as he could. He thought that it was possible that he might never be in a position to let go. For some reason, that didn’t bother him in the slightest.

The rain is colder than I expect—which is ridiculous, since it’s March. My cheeks are freezing by the time we go two blocks, my hair has a sodden weight on my shoulder. My glasses are so wet I need to shove them in a pocket. I threw Mom’s pullover windbreaker over my sweatshirt before leaving the house, thinking it would be waterproof, but I am so wrong. By the time I make the final turn for the church, I wonder if I’m stupid for being out here. It’s pouring so hard that a haze has formed around the streetlight, and I can barely see anything through the darkness. My sneakers squish in the grass. I get to the spot where we sat for the last two nights. And of course he’s not there. I sigh. Only a complete moron would go meet in the rain. Then Texy woofs and bounces on her front paws. I turn, and it’s like I’m in a chick flick. His shadowed figure lopes across the grass. Okay, maybe the dark and rain make it more like a horror movie than a romantic comedy, BUT STILL. He draws to a stop in front of me. He had the sense to wear a heavy, waterproof coat over his hoodie, but the hood is soaked and rain drips down his cheeks. “Hey,” he says, his voice a little loud over the rain. I’m blushing. I tell my cheeks to knock it off. “Hey.” “I wasn’t sure you’d show up, but I didn’t have a way to text you …” “I had the same thought process.

Another time, I was at the bar getting a drink and this geezer is stood at the bar with a ciggie in his mouth, trying his best to look rock hard. He takes a drag and points his finger in my face and drawls, ‘Don't I know you?’ He was looking snake-eyed at me like a typical big screen gangster. I stood in front of him and drawled back, ‘I don’t know, but they call me Richy Horsley,’ and then bang, I batter him with a left hook that landed with a strange dull thud. Mr Movie Gangster was stood there leaning against the bar and staring out in to space, knocked out standing up.

But Emma resists all of Galen's reasonings, based on the fact that it doesn't "feel right." Speaking of things that don't feel right... He pulls his new SUV into her driveway, the excitement sloshing in his stomach like high tide. As he steps out, he notices how much he likes sliding down instead of hoisting himself up from a little compact death trap. He's almost glad Rayna tied the red car around a tree-except that she and Emma could have gotten hurt. He shakes his head, crunching across the gravel of Emma's driveway in his suede Timberlands. Even over that, he hears the thud of his heart. Is it faster than usual? He's never noticed it before, so he can't tell. Shrugging it off as paranoia, he knocks on the door then folds his hands in front of him. I shouldn't be doing this. This is wrong. She could still belong to Grom. But when Emma answers the door, everything seems right again. Her little purple dress makes the violet in her eyes jump out at him. "Sorry," she says. "Mom threw a fit when I tried to leave the house in jeans. She's old-school I guess. You know. 'Thou must dress up for the movies,' says the woman who doesn't even own a dress." "She did me a favor," he says, then shoves his hands in his pockets. More like she did me in.

something's knocking at the door     a great white light dawns across the continent as we fawn over our failed traditions, often kill to preserve them or sometimes kill just to kill. it doesn’t seem to matter: the answers dangle just out of reach, out of hand, out of mind.     the leaders of the past were insufficient, the leaders of the present are unprepared. we curl up tightly in our beds at night and wait. it is a waiting without hope, more like a prayer for unmerited grace.     it all looks more and more like the same old movie. the actors are different but the plot’s the same: senseless.     we should have known, watching our fathers. we should have known, watching our mothers. they did not know, they too were not prepared to teach. we were too naive to ignore their counsel and now we have embraced their ignorance as our own. we are them, multiplied. we are their unpaid debts. we are bankrupt in money and in spirit.     there are a few exceptions, of course, but these teeter on the edge and will at any moment tumble down to join the rest of us, the raving, the battered, the blind and the sadly corrupt.     a great white light dawns across the continent, the flowers open blindly in the stinking wind, as grotesque and ultimately unlivable our 21st century struggles to be born.

In heist movies, there's always a montage of scenes where the caper crew rehearses for the big day. The greaser person practices maneuvering through a mock laser beam field made up of string. The driver races through obstacle courses, back alleys, and dark city streets. The hacker pounds on her keyboard, staring at screens full of code. The gadget person demonstrates all their clever toys. The key master practices opening a safe. The muscle finds a few security guards to knock unconscious and wrestles guard dogs to the ground. The inside person seduces or befriends the target and gets them to spill their secrets. And the leader organizes it all with the help of her second-in-command. At least, that's the way it works in the movies. In real life, with a bunch of newbs who are scraping by with low-paying jobs, inflexible hours, difficult bosses, and a bunch of side gigs to make ends meet, just organizing a rehearsal heist was one hell of a task.

You have something to say to me, Cassidy, say it. Or shut the fuck up.” “All right,” Jules said. “I will.” He took a deep breath. Exhaled. “Okay, see, I, well, I love you. Very, very much, and . . .” Where to go from here . . .? Except, his plain-spoken words earned him not just a glance but Max’s sudden full and complete attention. Which was a little alarming. But it was the genuine concern in Max’s eyes that truly caught Jules off-guard. Max actually thought . . . Jules laughed his surprise. “Oh! No, not like that. I meant it, you know, in a totally platonic, non-gay way.” Jules saw comprehension and relief on Max’s face. The man was tired if he was letting such basic emotions show. “Sorry.” Max even smiled. “I just . . .” He let out a burst of air. “I mean, talk about making things even more complicated . . .” It was amazing. Max hadn’t recoiled in horror at the idea. His concern had been for Jules, about potentially hurting his tender feelings. And even now, he wasn’t trying to turn it all into a bad joke. And he claimed they weren’t friends. Jules felt his throat tighten. “You can’t know,” he told his friend quietly, “how much I appreciate your acceptance and respect.” “My father was born in India,” Max told him, “in 1930. His mother was white—American. His father was not just Indian, but lower caste. The intolerance he experienced both there and later, even in America, made him a . . . very bitter, very hard, very, very unhappy man.” He glanced at Jules again. “I know personality plays into it, and maybe you’re just stronger than he was, but . . . People get knocked down all the time. They can either stay there, wallow in it, or . . . Do what you’ve done—what you do. So yeah. I respect you more than you know.” Holy shit. Weeping was probably a bad idea, so Jules grabbed onto the alternative. He made a joke. “I wasn’t aware that you even had a father. I mean, rumors going around the office have you arriving via flying saucer—” “I would prefer not to listen to aimless chatter all night long,” Max interrupted him. “So if you’ve made your point . . .?” Ouch. “Okay,” Jules said. “I’m so not going to wallow in that. Because I do have a point. See, I said what I said because I thought I’d take the talk-to-an-eight-year-old approach with you. You know, tell you how much I love you and how great you are in part one of the speech—” “Speech.” Max echoed. “Because part two is heavily loaded with the silent-but-implied ‘you are such a freaking idiot.’” “Ah, Christ,” Max muttered. “So, I love you,” Jules said again, “in a totally buddy-movie way, and I just want to say that I also really love working for you, and I hope to God you’ll come back so I can work for you again. See, I love the fact that you’re my leader not because you were appointed by some suit, but because you earned very square inch of that gorgeous corner office. I love you because you’re not just smart, you’re open-minded—you’re willing to talk to people who have a different point of view, and when they speak, you’re willing to listen. Like right now, for instance. You’re listening, right?” “No.” “Liar.” Jules kept going. “You know, the fact that so many people would sell their grandmother to become a part of your team is not an accident. Sir, you’re beyond special—and your little speech to me before just clinched it. You scare us to death because we’re afraid we won’t be able to live up to your high standards. But your back is strong, you always somehow manage to carry us with you even when we falter. “Some people don’t see that; they don’t really get you—all they know is they would charge into hell without hesitation if you gave the order to go. But see, what I know is that you’d be right there, out in front—they’d have to run to keep up with you. You never flinch. You never hesitate. You never rest.

Did you ever bring girls back here?” I ask, broaching dangerous territory. I’m thinking dangerous thoughts. Having dangerous fantasies. Wanting dangerous things. “Never,” he says earnestly. “Yeah, I don’t believe you.” I cross over to his DVD case by the door, pretending to be curious about what he liked to watch when he was a teenager—and I am—but really, I just need to have some space from him before I let this crazy twitterpated feeling get the best of me. But Chase follows me. “I’m dead serious. Pop has a shotgun. He was always threatening to shoot my dick off if I knocked a girl up. Scared the shit out of me.” I laugh nervously, keeping my eyes on the movies. “And here you are trying to knock a girl up now. You must have gotten over your fear.” “Pop has arthritis. He’d have too much trouble loading the gun.” There’s a soft thud of a door closing, and I look up to see that he has shut us in. “And I have always regretted the lack of action this room has seen.

Are you chuckling yet? Because then along came you. A big, broad meat eater with brash blond hair and ruddy skin that burns at the beach. A bundle of appetites. A full, boisterous guffaw; a man who tells knock know jokes. Hot dogs - not even East 86th Street bratwurst but mealy, greasy big guts that terrifying pink. Baseball. Gimme caps. Puns and blockbuster movies, raw tap water and six-packs. A fearless, trusting consumer who only reads labels to make sure there are plenty of additives. A fan of the open road with a passion for his pickup who thinks bicycles are for nerds. Fucks hard and talks dirty; a private though unapologetic taste for porn. Mysteries, thrillers, and science fiction; a subscription to National Geographic. Barbecues on the Fourth of July and intentions, in the fullness of time, to take up golf. Delights in crappy snack foods of ever description: Burgles. Curlies. Cheesies. Squigglies - you're laughing - but I don't eat them - anything that looks less like food than packing material and at least six degrees of separation from the farm. Bruce Springsteen, the early albums, cranked up high with the truck window down and your hair flying. Sings along, off-key - how is it possible that I should be endeared by such a tin ear?Beach Boys. Elvis - never lose your roots, did you, loved plain old rock and roll. Bombast. Though not impossibly stodgy; I remember, you took a shine to Pearl Jam, which was exactly when Kevin went off them...(sorry). It just had to be noisy; you hadn't any time for my Elgar, my Leo Kottke, though you made an exception for Aaron Copeland. You wiped your eyes brusquely at Tanglewood, as if to clear gnats, hoping I didn't notice that "Quiet City" made you cry. And ordinary, obvious pleasure: the Bronx Zoo and the botanical gardens, the Coney Island roller coaster, the Staten Island ferry, the Empire State Building. You were the only New Yorker I'd ever met who'd actually taken the ferry to the Statue of Liberty. You dragged me along once, and we were the only tourists on the boat who spoke English. Representational art - Edward Hopper. And my lord, Franklin, a Republican. A belief in a strong defense but otherwise small government and low taxes. Physically, too, you were such a surprise - yourself a strong defense. There were times you were worried that I thought you too heavy, I made so much of your size, though you weighed in a t a pretty standard 165, 170, always battling those five pounds' worth of cheddar widgets that would settle over your belt. But to me you were enormous. So sturdy and solid, so wide, so thick, none of that delicate wristy business of my imaginings. Built like an oak tree, against which I could pitch my pillow and read; mornings, I could curl into the crook of your branches. How luck we are, when we've spared what we think we want! How weary I might have grown of all those silly pots and fussy diets, and how I detest the whine of sitar music!

I wasn’t sure what to do. I knew that the main house was about a quarter mile up the drive. I could leave my car here and walk it. See what’s what. But what would be the point? I hadn’t been up here in six years. The retreat probably sold the land, and the new owner probably craved privacy. That might explain all this. Still it didn’t feel right. What would be the harm, I thought, in going up and knocking on the door of the main house? Then again, the thick chain and no trespassing signs were not exactly welcome mats. I was still trying to decide what to do when a Kraftboro police cruiser pulled up next to me. Two officers got out. One was short and stocky with bloated gym muscles. The other was tall and thin with slicked-back hair and the small mustache of a guy in a silent movie. Both wore aviator sunglasses, so you couldn’t see their eyes. Short and Stocky hitched up his pants a bit and said, “Can I help you?” They both gave me hard stares. Or at least I think they were hard stares. I mean, I couldn’t see their eyes. “I

The tornadic bundle of legs and arms and feet and hands push farther into the kitchen until only the occasional flailing limb is visible from the living room, where I can’t believe I’m still standing. A spectator in my own life, I watch the supernova of my two worlds colliding: Mom and Galen. Human and Syrena. Poseidon and Triton. But what can I do? Who should I help? Mom, who lied to me for eighteen years, then tried to shank my boyfriend? Galen, who forgot this little thing called “tact” when he accused my mom of being a runaway fish-princess? Toraf, who…what the heck is Toraf doing, anyway? And did he really just sack my mom like an opposing quarterback? The urgency level for a quick decision elevates to right-freaking-now. I decide that screaming is still best for everyone-it’s nonviolent, distracting, and one of the things I’m very, very good at. I open my mouth, but Rayna beats me to it-only, her scream is much more valuable than mine would have been, because she includes words with it. “Stop it right now, or I’ll kill you all!” She pushed past me with a decrepit, rusty harpoon from God-knows-what century, probably pillaged from one of her shipwreck excursions. She waves it at the three of them like a crazed fisherman in a Jaws movie. I hope they don’t notice she’s got it pointed backward and that if she fires it, she’ll skewer our couch and Grandma’s first attempt at quilting. It works. The bare feet and tennis shoes stop scuffling-out of fear or shock, I’m not sure-and Toraf’s head appears at the top of the counter. “Princess,” he says, breathless. “I told you to stay outside.” “Emma, run!” Mom yells. Toraf disappears again, followed by a symphony of scraping and knocking and thumping and cussing. Rayna rolls her eyes at me, grumbling to herself as she stomps into the kitchen. She adjusts the harpoon to a more deadly position, scraping the popcorn ceiling and sending rust and Sheetrock and tetanus flaking onto the floor like dirty snow. Aiming it at the mound of struggling limbs, she says, “One of you is about to die, and right now I don’t really care who it is.” Thank God for Rayna. People like Rayna get things done. People like me watch people like Rayna get things done. Then people like me round the corner of the counter as if they helped, as if they didn’t stand there and let everyone they love beat the shizzle out of one another. I peer down at the three of them all tangled up. Crossing my arms, I try to mimic Rayna’s impressive rage, but I’m pretty sure my face is only capable of what-the-crap-was-that. Mom looks up at me, nostrils flaring like moth wings. “Emma, I told you to run,” she grinds out before elbowing Toraf in the mouth so hard I think he might swallow a tooth. Then she kicks Galen in the ribs. He groans, but catches her foot before she can re-up. Toraf spits blood on the linoleum beside him and grabs Mom’s arms. She writhes and wriggles, bristling like a trapped badger and cussing like sailor on crack. Mom has never been girlie. Finally she stops, her arms and legs slumping to the floor in defeat. Tears puddle in her eyes. “Let her go,” she sobs. “She’s got nothing to do with this. She doesn’t even know about us. Take me and leave her out of this. I’ll do anything.” Which reinforces, right here and now, that my mom is Nalia. Nalia is my mom. Also, holy crap.

Among the people who asked about them was Bradley Cooper, thanks to Jason, who’d championed Chris and the book. Cooper was already a huge star, one who had a reputation for taking big risks and trying a variety of roles (including one in the TV series Alias the connection I promised earlier). None of that was important to Chris. If there was a movie, he wanted the actor who portrayed him to be a true American. He couldn’t stand actors who would make unpatriotic statements against the war and then turn around and do war films. He’d told Jim he didn’t want a hypocrite playing him. I think he would have chosen not to let a movie be done rather than agree to let people proceed with it whom he didn’t consider patriotic. And so for Chris, the most impressive thing about Bradley Cooper was not his acting ability or the enormous research he put into his roles, but the work he’d done helping veterans. He was a supporter of Got Your 6, an organization that helps veterans reintegrate into family life and their communities. He had also done some USO tours. I couldn’t imagine a better match. Still, Chris didn’t just say okay. He talked to Bradley before deciding to let him option the book and his life rights. I remember Chris coming out of his home office after the final conversation. He was smiling; Bradley had a great sense of humor, which was probably the first thing they bonded over. “How’d it go?” I asked. “Went good. I told him, ‘My only concern with you, Bradley--I might have to tie you up with a rope and pull you behind my truck to knock some of the pretty off you.” Bradley laughed. Still, he did just about everything short of that to prepare for the movie. He grew a beard, studied photos and videos, and worked out like a madman, getting himself into the proper shape to play a SEAL in the movie.

Too anxious to sit still, she stood in the stirrups to stretch her legs, then moved her bottom back and forth in the saddle until she found a comfortable spot to settle. She dallied her reins loosely around the saddle horn and reached up to unbutton the top two buttons of her blouse, then leaned over and shook the cotton cloth back and forth to cool herself. Her Stetson hat came off next. She settled it on the saddle horn, so what little breeze there was could reach the sweat on her nape. “What the hell kind of strip show are you putting on?” Bay nearly fell out of the saddle at Owen’s angry outburst. She jerked upright, knocking her hat off the horn and onto the ground. Her horse saw the shadow when it fell, figured it for a dangerous, horse-eating jackrabbit, and shied violently toward Owen’s mount. His horse took exception to being bumped and kicked out with both hooves, striking Bay’s horse in the rump, which grabbed for the reins, but they fell loose from the horn, and she was helpless to restrain her mount when he began to run helter-skelter down the canyon, sunfishing and crowhopping. Bay was thrown up onto her mount’s neck, where she held on for dear life. She heard Owen galloping behind her and knew it was only a matter of time before he caught up to her. But a narrow passage was coming up, and there wasn’t room for both her and her horse. She was going to be scraped off. Unless she jumped first. From her precious perch, Bay stared down at the rocky soil racing past her nose and thought of all the movies she’d seen where cowboys leaped from their horses and got up and walked away. Surely it couldn’t be that difficult. In a moment, when they reached that narrow passage, the choice was going to be taken from her. Bay closed her eyes and launched herself as far as she could from her horse’s flashing hooves. And landed like a sack of wet cement. She skidded for maybe two feet along the rocky bed of the canyon. On her face. And her right hip. And her left hand. When she stopped, she lay there stunned for a moment, then gave a shaky laugh. “Oh, that was not at all like it is in the movies.

One question.” I managed to gather the two words as his struggling breath entangled in my hair. “This isn’t fair. There is so much I want to know.” He laced his fingers into mine as he dipped his head down to my ear. “I want to know how you like your coffee, and what your favorite song is. I want to know what annoys you, and the worst thing you’ve ever done. I want to know your greatest fear, and whether or not you talk in your sleep. If you prefer chocolate over vanilla, and if you cried watching The Notebook … if you’ve ever seen The Notebook, or like movies at all. What gives you the greatest high, and what can take all the pain away …” Ollie drew in a deep breath, and at the same time, my heart skipped in my chest. “But what I need to know is … are you willing to open yourself up to me so I can find out?” “Is that your question?” I stammered, lost in all his words. “Yes.” He exhaled. “That’s my final question.” Turning to face him, his eyes filled with hope and wonder, but his absent smile expected the inescapable truth. We both knew there wasn’t anything inside me to open up, an empty shell. So, what exactly did I have to lose? And, so, it was there, in the middle of the romance section of the maze-like library at Dolor University outside of Guildford in the United Kingdom where I decided I was willing to show him I was nothing more than a hollow soul. “I will only disappoint you.” “I doubt it.” “And I’m difficult,” I warned. “Good.” Ollie grinned. “I wasn’t expecting anything less, Mia. I’m only asking you to knock down a wall. Not even a wall—fuck, carve me out a door. I only want to know you.” He grabbed my hand, and a calmness washed over me. I didn’t have the tools to destroy a wall, let alone carve out a door. The barriers had endured ten years. Tough and sturdy and placed for a reason. Each one had a purpose, and even though I’d forgotten why they stood there in the first place, I was scared what would happen if I started carving out holes. The walls became my friends—they were safe. But I nodded, anyway, because the small glimmer of hope in his eyes spread like an infection. “And to clarify, no, I’ve never seen The Notebook, and I don’t plan on it, either.” Ollie threw his head back and a raspy laugh echoed in our maze. A laugh I had quickly grown to adore.

It was awful. It was three in the morning. And I finally said, “Chip, I’m not sleeping in this house.” We were broke. We couldn’t go to a hotel. There was no way we were gonna go knock on one of our parents’ doors at that time of night. That’s when I got an idea. We happened to have Chip’s parents’ old RV parked in a vacant lot a few blocks down. We had some of our things in there and had been using it basically as a storage unit until we moved in. “Let’s get in the RV. We’ll go find somewhere to plug it in, and we’ll have AC,” I said. As we stepped outside, the skies opened up. It started pouring rain. When we finally got into the RV, soaking wet, we pulled down the road a ways and Chip said, “I know where we can go.” It was raining so hard we could barely see through the windshield, and all of a sudden Chip turned the RV into a cemetery. “Why are you pulling in to a cemetery?” I asked him. “We’re not going to the cemetery,” Chip said. “It’s just next to a cemetery. There’s an RV park back here.” “Are you kidding me? Could this get any worse?” “Oh, quit it. You’re going to love it once I get this AC fired up.” Chip decided to go flying through the median between the two rows of RV parking, not realizing it was set up like a culvert for drainage and rain runoff. That RV bounced so hard that, had it not been for our seat belts, we would’ve both been catapulted through the roof of that vehicle. “What was that?!” “I don’t know,” Chip said. I tried to put it in reverse, and then forward, and then reverse again, and the thing just wouldn’t move. I hopped out to take a look and couldn’t believe it. There was a movie a few years ago where the main character gets his RV caught on this fulcrum and it’s sitting there teetering with both sets of wheels up in the air. Well, we sort of did the opposite. We went across this valley, and because the RV was so long, the butt end of it got stuck on the little hill behind us, and the front end got stuck on the little hill in front of us, and the wheels were just sort of hanging there in between. I crawled back into the RV soaking wet and gave Jo the bad news. We had no place to go, no place to plug in so we could run the AC; it was pouring rain so we couldn’t really walk anywhere to get help. And at that point I was just done. We wound up toughing it out and spending the first night after our honeymoon in a hot, old RV packed full of our belongings, suspended between two bumps in the road.

I got your flowers. They’re beautiful, thank you.” A gorgeous riot of Gerber daisies and lilies in a rainbow of reds, pinks, yellows and oranges. “Welcome. Bet Duncan loved sending one of his guys out to pick them up for me.” She could hear the smile in his voice, imagined the devilish twinkle in his eyes. “Oh, he did. Said it’s probably the first time in the history of WITSEC that a U.S. Marshal delivered flowers to one of their witnesses.” A low chuckle. “Well, this was a special circumstance, so they helped me out.” “I loved the card you sent with them the best though.” Proud of you. Give ‘em hell tomorrow. He’d signed it Nathan rather than Nate, which had made her smile. “I had no idea you were romantic,” she continued. “All these interesting things I’m learning about you.” She hadn’t been able to wipe the silly smile off her face after one of the security team members had knocked on her door and handed them to her with a goofy smile and a, “special delivery”. “Baby, you haven’t seen anything yet. When the trial’s done you’re gonna get all the romance you can handle, and then some.” “Really?” Now that was something for a girl to look forward to, and it sure as hell did the trick in taking her mind off her worries. “Well I’m all intrigued, because it’s been forever since I was romanced. What do you have in mind? Candlelit dinners? Going to the movies? Long walks? Lazy afternoon picnics?” “Not gonna give away my hand this early on, but I’ll take those into consideration.” “And what’s the key to your heart, by the way? I mean, other than the thing I did to you this morning.” “What thing is that? Refresh my memory,” he said, a teasing note in his voice. She smiled, enjoying the light banter. It felt good to let her worry about tomorrow go and focus on what she had to look forward to when this was all done. Being with him again, seeing her family, getting back to her life. A life that would hopefully include Nathan in a romantic capacity. “Waking you up with my mouth.” He gave a low groan. “I loved every second of it. But think simpler.” Simpler than sex? For a guy like him? “Food, then. I bet you’re a sucker for a home-cooked meal. Am I right?” He chuckled. “That works too, but it’s still not the key.” “Then what?” “You.” She blinked, her heart squeezing at the conviction behind his answer. “Me?” “Yeah, just you. And maybe bacon,” he added, a smile in his voice. He was so freaking adorable. “So you’re saying if I made and served you a BLT, you’d be putty in my hands?” Seemed hard to imagine, but okay. A masculine rumble filled her ears. “God, yeah.” She couldn’t help the sappy smile that spread across her face. “Wow, you are easy. And I can definitely arrange that.” “I can hardly wait. Will you serve it to me naked? Or maybe wearing just a frilly little apron and heels?” She smothered a laugh, but a clear image of her doing just that popped into her head, serving him the sandwich in that sexy outfit while watching his eyes go all heated. “Depends on how good you are.” “Oh, baby, I’ll be so good to you, you have no idea.

Wanita Young vs. Free Cookies Cookies will brighten up anybody’s day—especially if they’re being given away for free. At least, that’s what two teenage girls thought when they surprised their neighbor with a plate of homemade cookies. But they were in for a surprise. The two girls, Lindsey Zellitti and Taylor Ostergaard, wanted to do something nice for their neighbors. So they went around their neighborhood, knocking on doors and leaving a small package of cookies in front of every door. When they got to 49-year-old Wanita Young’s house, the sound of the girls knocking on the door apparently drove her into an anxiety attack, causing her to call the police who eventually took her to the hospital. After the girls apologized, and after they offered to pay her hospital bills, Young still decided to take them to court and sue them for $900—and she actually won the case.

He shouldn’t have walked out, because now the awkwardness was going to fester until she felt a need to talk about the incident in the bathroom. He could have laughed it off as morning wood, making it clear the pronounced lump had nothing to do with her. That would have been a lie, of course. He’d been up for several hours and it most definitely had something to do with her. But she might have bought the story and not had to talk about it. The kitchen felt claustrophobic all of a sudden, what with the two women he barely knew and the elephant in the room, so he took his coffee and muttered about catching the morning news. He turned on the TV in the living room and sank onto the couch with a sigh of relief. It would take a few minutes to make the French toast, so he had a few minutes of normal. “Can I talk to you for a second?” It was Emma, of course, and there went his normal. He sighed and moved over on the couch. “Knock yourself out.” She sat down, far enough away so none of their body parts touched. “I get the whole guy thing. Morning…you know, and I don’t want this to be weird.” “It’s no big deal.” “Okay.” She took a sip of her coffee, then wrapped both hands around the mug. “We’ll probably have more moments like this if we’re going to live together for a month. Probably best to just laugh them off.” He raised an eyebrow at her. “Actually, when a guy’s standing in front of you, fully hard and wearing nothing but a towel, laughing might not be the best way to handle it.” “True.” Her cheeks turned a pretty shade of pink and she laughed softly. “If we were in a movie, the towel would have fallen off. Could’ve been worse.” “With my luck, I’m surprised it didn’t.

As for sick people, patients, I had no illusions … In another neighborhood they’d be no less grasping or jugheaded or weak-kneed than the ones here. The same wine, the same movies, the same sports talk, the same enthusiastic submission to the natural needs of the gullet and the ass would produce the same crude, filthy horde, staggering from lie to lie, bragging, scheming, vicious … brutal between two fits of panic. But just as a sick man changes sides in bed and in life, so we too are entitled to move from side to side, it’s the only thing we can do, the only defense that’s ever been found against Fate. No good hoping to drop off your misery somewhere on the way. Misery is like some horrible woman you’ve married. Maybe it’s better to end up loving her a little than to knock yourself out beating her all your life. Since obviously you won’t be able to bump her off.

Unfortunately, I knew exactly what I was suffering from. LIPID (Last Idiot Person I Dated) syndrome: a largely undiagnosed but pervasive disease that afflicts single women. My roommates and I had come up with the term in college, to explain the baffling phenomenon of nostalgia for one’s most recent ex. No matter how absolutely awful that person had been at the time, after a few weeks, the relationship would take on a rosy tint, and wistful little phrases would begin to creep into conversation, like, “I know he cheated on me with three people at the same time, but he was such a fabulous dancer,” or “All right, so he was a raging alcoholic, but when he was sober he did such sweet things! Remember those flowers he bought for me that one time?” Inexplicable, but inevitable. A few weeks of singledom render even the most inexcusable ex charming in retrospect. Hence, LIPID syndrome. As everyone knows, lipids are fats, and fats are bad for you, and therefore ex-boyfriends must be avoided at all costs. This is what comes of having a bio major as a roommate for four years. The one sure way to fight off LIPID syndrome was to distract oneself. True, the only foolproof cure is a new relationship, thus knocking the LIPID back down the dating chain into harmless obscurity, but there are other, temporary diversions. Reading a novel, watching a movie, or delving into the private lives of historical characters. With an anticipatory

I’m just saying, whipped cream wars are not as fun as they portray them in books or movies. They’re usually all sexy and whatnot. Ours? Not so much. I got whipped cream up my nose, I was running away from him and fell over Trip and hit the hardwood really hard. Like, I think my hip and elbow are going to bruise from it because Kash was on top of me when I went down. When I knocked the can out of his hand it somehow hurt me more than anything, my hand is throbbing. Then when I’m about to get one good hit in, nothing comes out of the can! I’m all sticky and gross, it was just one massive fail.” Candice was laughing so hard she was snorting, and I couldn’t help but laugh with her. “I would have paid to see that!” “I’m pretty sure I looked like the abominable snowman on crack. You didn’t miss anything too thrilling.

Excerpted From Chapter One “Rock of Ages” floated lightly down the first floor corridor of the Hollywood Hotel’s west wing. It was Sunday morning, and Hattie Mae couldn’t go to church because she had to work, so she praised the Lord in her own way, but she praised Him softly out of consideration for the “Do Not Disturb” placards hanging from the doors she passed with her wooden cart full of fresh linens and towels. Actually Sundays were Hattie Mae’s favorite of the six days she worked each week. For one thing, her shift ended at noon on Sundays. For another, this was the day Miss Lillian always left a “little something” in her room to thank Hattie Mae for such good maid service. Most of the hotel’s long-term guests left a little change for their room maids, but in Miss Lillian’s case, the tip was usually three crinkly new one dollar bills. It seemed like an awful lot of money to Hattie Mae, whose weekly pay was only nineteen dollars. Still, Miss Lillian Lawrence could afford to be generous because she was a famous actress in the movies. She was also, Hattie Mae thought, a very fine lady. When Hattie Mae reached the end of the corridor, she knocked quietly on Miss Lillian’s door. It was still too early for most guests to be out of their rooms, but Miss Lillian was always up with the sun, not like some lazy folks who laid around in their beds ‘til noon, often making Hattie Mae late for Sunday dinner because she couldn’t leave until all the rooms along her corridor were made up. After knocking twice, Hattie Mae tried Miss Lillian’s door. It opened, so after selecting the softest towels from the stacks on her cart, she walked in. With the curtains drawn the room was dark, but Hattie Mae didn’t stop to switch on the overheard light because her arms were full of towels. The maid’s eyes were on the chest of drawers to her right where Miss Lillian always left her tip, so she didn’t see the handbag on the floor just inside the door. Hattie Mae tripped over the bag and fell headlong to the floor, landing inches from the dead body of Lillian Lawrence. In the dim light Hattie Mae stared into a pale face with a gaping mouth and a trickle of blood from a small red dot above one vacant green eye. Hattie Mae screamed at the top of her lungs and kept on screaming.

But first a description: Clara Bowden was beautiful in all senses except maybe, by virtue of being black, the classical. Clara Bowden was magnificently tall, black as ebony and crushed sable, with hair plaited in a horseshoe which pointed up when she felt lucky, down when she didn’t. At this moment it was up. It is hard to know whether that was significant. She needed no bra – she was independent, even of gravity – she wore a red halterneck which stopped below her bust, underneath which she wore her belly button (beautifully) and underneath that some very tight yellow jeans. At the end of it all were some strappy heels of a light brown suede, and she came striding down the stairs on them like some kind of vision or, as it seemed to Archie as he turned to observe her, like a reared-up thoroughbred. Now, as Archie understood it, in movies and the like it is common for someone to be so striking that when they walk down the stairs the crowd goes silent. In life he had never seen it. But it happened with Clara Bowden. She walked down the stairs in slow motion, surrounded by afterglow and fuzzy lighting. And not only was she the most beautiful thing he had ever seen, she was also the most comforting woman he had ever met. Her beauty was not a sharp, cold commodity. She smelt musty, womanly, like a bundle of your favorite clothes. Though she was disorganized physically – legs and arms speaking a slightly different dialect from her central nervous system – even her gangly demeanour seemed to Archie exceptionally elegant. She wore her sexuality with an older woman’s ease, and not (as with most of the girls Archie had run with in the past) like an awkward purse, never knowing how to hold it, where to hang it or when to just put it down. ‘Cheer up, bwoy,’ she said in a lilting Caribbean accent that reminded Archie of That Jamaican Cricketer, ‘it might never happen.’ ‘I think it already has.’ Archie, who had just dropped a fag from his mouth which has been burning itself to death anyway, saw Clara quickly tread it underfoot. She gave him a wide grin that revealed possibly her one imperfection. A complete lack of teeth in the top of her mouth. ‘Man…dey get knock out,’ she lisped, seeing his surprise. ‘But I tink to myself: come de end of de world, d’Lord won’t mind if I have no toofs.’ She laughed softly.

out between us, when we’d given it a try one tentative time, after I, too, learned what it was like for a marriage to implode. Lydia had been empathetic and understanding, and knew how to make great popcorn and buy ice cream and pour shots of tequila, and for sure she had a god-tier movie collection. It could’ve been a rom-com from the eighties: geeky late bloomer grows up and finally gets his chance with the dream girl who was out of his league when they met, because she was nine years his senior. By the time we took our short-lived tumble, the age gap didn’t seem nearly as prominent, but the dynamic still wasn’t quite right, and maybe never could be. There was no shaking free of the worry over what Lydia saw when she looked at me. She would always remember the bruises, the confessions. She would always remember how back then my dad kept insisting he was only trying to knock the fag out of me, and I’d thank him someday. She would always remember why I got into schlocky videos in the first place: I thought if he came through and saw I was watching something with lots of boobs, he’d leave me alone. Only it didn’t work that way. The world is full of carnivores intent on devouring their young, and if one rationale gets invalidated, they find another.

Murnau now inserts scenes with little direct connection to the story, except symbolically. One involves a scientist who gives a lecture on the Venus flytrap, the “vampire of the vegetable kingdom.” Then Knock, in a jail cell, watches in close-up as a spider devours its prey. Why cannot man likewise be a vampire? Knock senses his Master has arrived, escapes, and scurries about the town with a coffin on his back. As fear of the plague spreads, “the town was looking for a scapegoat,” the titles say, and Knock creeps about on rooftops and is stoned, while the street is filled with dark processions of the coffins of the newly dead. Ellen Hutter learns that the only way to stop a vampire is for a good woman to distract him so that he stays out past the first cock’s crow. Her sacrifice not only saves the city but also reminds us of the buried sexuality in the Dracula story. Bram Stoker wrote with ironclad nineteenth-century Victorian values, inspiring no end of analysis from readers who wonder if the buried message of Dracula might be that unlicensed sex is dangerous to society. The Victorians feared venereal disease the way we fear AIDS, and vampirism may be a metaphor: The predator vampire lives without a mate, stalking his victims or seducing them with promises of bliss—like a rapist or a pickup artist. The cure for vampirism is obviously not a stake through the heart, but nuclear families and bourgeois values. Is Murnau’s Nosferatu scary in the modern sense? Not for me. I admire it more for its artistry and ideas, its atmosphere and images, than for its ability to manipulate my emotions like a skillful modern horror film. It knows none of the later tricks of the trade, like sudden threats that pop in from the side of the screen. But Nosferatu remains effective: It doesn’t scare us, but it haunts us. It shows not that vampires can jump out of shadows, but that evil can grow there, nourished on death. In a sense, Murnau’s film is about all of the things we worry about at three in the morning—cancer, war, disease, madness. It suggests these dark fears in the very style of its visuals. Much of the film is shot in shadow. The corners of the screen are used more than is ordinary; characters lurk or cower there, and it’s a rule of composition that tension is created when the subject of a shot is removed from the center of the frame. Murnau’s special effects add to the disquieting atmosphere: the fast motion of Orlok’s servant,

FINALLY—YOU ARE A SWEEPSTAKES WINNER! I don’t know about you, but I enter all those darned magazine company sweepstakes. I go for the Reader’s Digest sweepstakes and I buy my weekly lottery tickets—after all, as a character in the movie Let It Ride said, “You could be walking around lucky and not know it.” In a lot of years, though, I have gone winless. The guys with the balloons and the giant-sized check have not shown up at my door. So the headline FINALLY—YOU ARE A SWEEPSTAKES WINNER! got me. I read that letter. And if you send a letter to every one of your customers with that headline on it, every one of them will read it. What should the letter say? Here’s an example, courtesy of the late, great copywriter, my friend Gary Halbert: Dear Valued Customer:    I am writing to tell you that your name was entered into a drawing here at my store and you have won a valuable prize.    As you know, my store, ABC Jewelry, specializes in low-cost, top-quality diamond rings and diamond earrings. Well, guess what? The other day we got in a small shipment of fake diamonds that are made with a new process that makes them look so real they almost fooled me!    Anyway, I don’t want to sell these fakes because they could cause a lot of trouble for the pawnbrokers around town. So I’ve decided to give them away to some of my good customers whose names were selected at random by having my wife, Janet, put all the names in a jar and pull out the winners.    So, you’re one of the winners—and all you’ve got to do is drop in sometime before 5:00 P.M. Friday and you’ll have a 1-karat “diamond” that looks so good it’ll knock your eyes out! Sincerely, John Jones P.S.: After 5:00 P.M. Friday, I reserve the right to give your prize to someone else. Thank you.

Jenna, you are halfway to freedom from Wayne. A few more months and you can hand him back to us, and not have to deal with him anymore. If you launch this business with him, you are locked in, day in and day out, for a minimum of four or five years. And really, can you imagine him really helping at these events? I just see him knocking over ice sculptures, and tipping over cakes, and generally being a bull in the china shop everywhere he goes. A bull on steroids. With an inner ear imbalance. On roller skates." "Enough, lawdouche, she gets it." "I know. But again, Wayne is pretty clear that his area here would be identifying and helping land clients, and consulting on thematic details and event brainstorming, and keeping up with all industry aspects of the target market." "You mean going to movies, reading comics, and playing video games." "Yep, something like that." "You can't really be thinking you are going to do this." "I can be thinking that. And I'm pretty sure that the only opinion I asked you for on this was legal ramifications and financial obligations. I don't really care about your personal opinions." "Well, that hurts my feelings, because I still care about you on a personal level, and I think this is a huge mistake for you personally." I wait for my heart to race, for the sweats to start, for my colon to twist itself into a pretzel. And when none of that happens, I look at Brian. "I think, that being the case, that perhaps you ought to speak to your partners about who might be the best attorney to work with me moving forward." "You're firing me? Because I care about you?" "I'm firing you because I need an attorney who is less personally interested in the decisions I make. I'm a big girl, and I have a dad. And clearly, this is no longer a good fit. I'll appreciate a call from the other partners by the end of the week with a plan that I can review." "Seriously, I feel like you've completely lost your mind!" "Careful, Brian. At the moment, I'm asking you be removed from my account. However uncomfortable that may be for you with your partners, I assume you would rather that, than having to explain why I'm leaving the firm entirely. And I will be advising Wayne to shift to the same person I am with, obviously, for convenience." His chiseled jaw snaps shut, and while I can see a dozen retorts on the tip of his tongue, he doesn't speak. "Thank you. I'll review this further, and will discuss my decision with my new attorney. You'll get formal word from Wayne on his choice soon, I'm sure.

This is what she becomes because of me… what do you think of here… do you like her or heat? Are you going to hate her for this? ~*~ ‘They don't leave. They bring in their food from the outside, from quite far away sometimes. It gives their guard something to do when they're not out annihilating mavericks. Or protecting Volterra from exposure…’ ‘From situations like this one, like Marcel,’ I finished her sentence. It was amazingly easy to say his name now. I wasn't sure what the difference was. Maybe because- I wasn't planning on living much longer without seeing him. Or at all, if we were too late. It was comforting to know that I would have an easy out. ‘I doubt they've ever had a situation quite like this,’ she muttered, disgusted. ‘You don't get a lot of suicidal angels.’ The sound that escaped out of my mouth was very quiet, but Olivia seemed to understand that it was a cry of pain. She wrapped her thin, strong arm around my shoulders. ‘We'll do what we can, Bell. It's not over yet.’ ‘Not yet.’ I let her comfort me, though I knew she thought our chances were poor. ‘And the Ministry will get us if we mess up.’ Olivia stiffened. ‘You say that like it's a good thing.’ I shrugged. ‘Knock it off, Bell, or we're turning around in New York and going back to Pittsburgh.’ ‘What?’ ‘You know what. If we're too late for Marcel, I'm going to do me damnedest to get you back to Mr. Anderson, and I don't want any trouble from you. Do you understand that?’ ‘Sure, Olivia.’ She pulled back slightly so that she would glare at me. ‘No trouble.’ ‘Scout's honor,’ I muttered. She rolled her eyes. ‘Let me concentrate, now. I'm trying to see what he's planning.’ She left her arm around me, but let her head fall back against the seat and closed her eyes. She pressed her free hand to the side of her face, rubbing her fingertips against her temple. I watched her in fascination for a long time. Eventually, she became utterly motionless, her face like a stone sculpture. The minutes passed, and if I didn't know better, I would have thought she'd fallen asleep. I didn't dare interrupt her to ask what was going on. I wished there was something safe for me to think about. I couldn't allow myself to consider the horrors we were headed toward, or, more horrific yet, the chance that we might fail-not if I wanted to keep from screaming aloud. I couldn't anticipate anything, either. If I were very, very, very lucky, I would somehow be able to save Marcel. But I wasn't so stupid as to think that saving him would mean that I could stay with him. I was no different, no more special than I'd been before. There would be no new reason for him to want me now. Seeing him and losing him again… I fought back against the pain. This was the price I had to pay to save his life. I would pay for it. They showed a movie, and my neighbor got headphones. Sometimes, I watched the figures moving across the little screen, but I couldn't even tell if the movie was supposed to be a romance or a horror film. After an eternity, the plane began to descend toward New York City. Olivia remained in her trance. I dithered, reaching out to touch her, only to pull my hand back again. This happened a dozen times before the plane touched down with a jarring impact. ‘Olivia,’ I finally said. ‘Olivia, we have to go.’ I touched her arm. Her eyes came open very slowly. She shook her head from side to side for a moment.

Examining myself in the restroom mirrors, I decide I’ve achieved a look that fits my new image of myself. Mrs. Steven Gwinn, movie star. Ready to knock Steve’s socks off, I exit the ladies room and head toward our booth. I’m disappointed to discover that he’s not there. I look around for him as I settle back in my seat, wondering if he’s headed back to the car or might be picking up something for us in the convenience store that fills the other half of this building. In the middle of our table sits a neat pile of money topped by our tab and held in place with a salt shaker. I finger my purse sitting beside me, slightly irked that Steve would leave it sitting here unattended, but realizing there’s so little cash in it that it wouldn’t really matter if it were stolen. I wonder what his other little present might be.

My threshold for being respectful to this lucky, absent bastard was evaporating. I was going to make a move on her. If I didn’t, I’d never forgive myself for not trying. If there was even the slightest chance she might be into me, I had to try. But how? Should I just try to kiss her? Would she tell me to go to hell? Probably. What if I slid my hand over hers? Would she yank it away? She would. I knew she would. I needed something else. Something less. More subtle. Something that could go either way to test the waters. Something that could lead to something else. “Hey, I give a decent foot massage if your feet hurt.” I nodded to the center console where her heels still sat after being dropped through the sunroof. To my surprise, she pivoted until her back was against the door, and she swung her legs over into my lap. She put an arm behind her head and leaned back. “Go for it. Those heels were killing me today.” I grinned inwardly that my strategy worked and put my back to the door while I took her tiny foot in my hand. “I’m a foot massage master. ‘I don’t be tickling or nothing,’” I said, giving her a Pulp Fiction line. She snorted. “I’m exfoliated and pedicured. Someone should touch them.” I thought about what Vincent Vega says in the movie, that foot massages mean something. That men act like they don’t, but they do and that’s why they’re so cool. This meant something, and I knew she knew it. She was as familiar with that movie as I was. She had to be making the connection. And she’d allowed it. I reveled in the chance to touch her and at the unspoken meaning behind her letting me do it. “So, Foot Massage Master, what other tricks do you have in your bag?” she asked, giving me a sideways smile. I pressed a thumb into her arch and circled it around with a smirk. “I’m not giving you my trade secrets.” What if I need them? She scoffed. “Your gender doesn’t have any secrets that every woman hasn’t already seen by the time they’re twenty.” I arched an eyebrow. “Ever heard of the naked man?” She rolled her eyes. “Oh God, the naked man. That one’s the worst.” I laughed. “Why? Because it works?” She scrunched up her face. “I have to admit it has worked on me in the past. I mean, the guy’s naked. Half the work is done for you already. It’s kind of hard to say no. But when it doesn’t work, it’s so cringey.” I tipped my head from side to side. “It’s risky. I’ll give you that. You have to know your audience. But big risks can reap big rewards.” “Waiting for your girlfriend to leave the room and then stripping naked to surprise her when she gets back is so unoriginal though. You men have no new material. I swear you could go back twenty thousand years and peek into a cave and find cavemen drawing penises on everything and doing the naked man and the helicopter.” I pulled her foot closer and laughed. “Hey, don’t knock the helicopter. It’s the first move we learn. It can be a good icebreaker.” “The helicopter should be banned over the age of eight. I’m just going to spare you the illusion right now. No woman is sitting around with her girlfriends going, ‘Gurl, it was the sexiest helicopter I’ve ever seen. Totally broke the ice.’” I chuckled and ran my hand up her smooth calf, rubbing the muscle. I pictured that delicate ankle on my shoulder where I could kiss it, run my palm down the outside of her thigh, pull down those light-blue lace panties…

If you hadn’t been there, I’m not entirely sure I would’ve been able to stop myself from hurting the guy worse. That’s why I need to get to the lake house and be alone.” She sniffed. There was so much in that one little derisive sound that he had to look her way. “What?” Her expression went deadpan. “You realize that is a completely ridiculous plan, right?” He frowned. “Come on, Finn.” She pursed those red-glossed lips like she could barely tolerate his foolishness. “That is such a man plan.” “A man plan.” “Yes. You don’t know how to be among the living anymore so you’re going to…go live alone in a cave. Right. Good thinking. That will pop your how-to-be-human skills right back into place.” He made a frustrated sound and pulled into the lot of the hotel to park so he could face her, make her understand. “You saw what happened today. I’m not fit to be around other people right now. I beat a guy down for taking a picture. And I was…aggressive with you last night.” “Aggressive?” Her mouth flattened, and she put a finger to her chest. “I kissed you. I was the aggressor. You were just…complicit in the aggressiveness. And you’re lucky I haven’t gone two years’ celibate, because had I been in your shoes, I would’ve convinced you to go up to my room and used you eight ways to Sunday and back again by now. You’d be limping.” His libido gave a hard kick and knocked the logical thoughts out of his head for a moment. “I—” “You need to be around people.” That snapped his attention back to where it needed to be—mostly. “No.” “You promised your boss you’d be around friends. You made me promise your boss that I’d make sure you did that. You made me lie to the FBI. That’s got to be a federal offense or something.” “Made is a strong word.” “Finn.” He groaned. “What would you have me do? You want to babysit me, Livvy? Come stay at my lake house and make sure I don’t turn into a deviant?” She stared at him, her gaze way too sharp, and then tipped her chin up in challenge. “Is that an invitation? Because you know you shouldn’t test me. I could babysit the hell out of you, Finn Dorsey. I know who you used to be. You don’t get to become a bad guy. I will make you do slumber-party things like play charades or watch crappy nineties movies or incessant reruns of Friends. You won’t be able to fight your old goofy side. It will emerge like a freaking butterfly and smother scary Finn.” He blinked and stared, and then he couldn’t help it—he laughed. “A freaking butterfly?” She smiled triumphantly. “A goofy freaking butterfly.” He let out a long breath, some of the tension from the morning draining out of him. “You’re weird.” “So are you.

I’m at the airport. I’m waiting for the plane to take me home to my sister and my mother. I bought cream at Lush to rub onto Elf’s body. She has a surprisingly beautiful body for a woman in her late forties. Her legs are slim and firm. She has muscular thighs. Her smile is an event. She laughs so hard. She makes me laugh so hard. She gets surprised. Her eyes open wide, comically, she can’t believe it. Her skin is pristine, smooth and pale. Her hair is so black and her eyes so green like they’re saying go, go, go! She doesn’t have horrible freckles and moles and facial hair like me and big bones poking out like twisted rebar at the dump. She’s petite and feminine. She’s glamorous and dark and jazzy like a French movie star. She loves me. She mocks sentimentality. She helps me stay calm. Her hands aren’t ravaged by time and her breasts don’t sag. They’re small, pert, like a girl’s. Her eyes are wet emeralds. Her eyelashes are too long. The snow weighs them down in the winter and she makes me cut them shorter with our mother’s sewing scissors so they don’t obscure her vision. I knocked over a tray of bath bombs the size of tennis balls, bright yellow, onto the floor and I couldn’t figure out how to pick them up. The woman said it was okay. I can’t remember now if I paid for the cream. I’m going home. NINE When Elf went away to Europe my mother decided to emancipate herself as well and enrolled in university classes in the city to become a social worker and then a therapist.

Annie was trying to listen but she was unable to shake the image of herself dressed in a knock-off Lady Lightning outfit, sitting alone at a table at a mid-level comic book convention, drinking a diet soda and staring at her cell phone, which did not ring. “Annie?” Daniel said. “I want to talk to you about the movie.” Annie imagined herself in Japan, shilling caffeinated tapioca pearls, living in a closet-size apartment, dating a washed-up sumo wrestler. “Annie?” Daniel said again. Annie imagined herself doing dinner theater in a converted barn, playing Myra Marlowe in A Bad Year for Tomatoes, getting fat on carved roast beef and macaroni and cheese from the buffet during intermission. “I want to help you, Annie,” Daniel continued, undeterred by Annie’s blank-faced analysis of her future. “And I think I can.