Lights Out Josh Quotes

There is one kind of laugh that I always did recommend; it looks out of the eye first with a merry twinkle, then it creeps down on its hands and knees and plays around the mouth like a pretty moth around the blaze of a candle, then it steals over into the dimples of the cheeks and rides around in those whirlpools for a while, then it lights up the whole face like the mellow bloom on a damask rose, then it swims up on the air, with a peal as clear and as happy as a dinner-bell, then it goes back again on gold tiptoes like an angel out for an airing, and it lies down on its little bed of violets in the heart where it came from.

What I like about cooking is that, so long as you follow the recipe exactly, everything always turns out perfect. It’s too bad there’s no recipe for happiness. Happiness is more like pastry—which is to say that you can take pains to keep cool and not overwork the dough, but if you don’t have that certain light touch, your best efforts still fall flat. The work-around is to buy what you need. I’m talking about pastry, not happiness, although money does make things easier all around.

Let's go over the facts one more time," Josh says. "This is your first weekend away from home?" "Yes." "Your first weekend without parental supervision?" "Yes." "Your first weekend without parental supervision in Paris? And you want to spend it in your bedroom? Alone?" He and Rashmi exchange pitying glances. I look at St. Clair for help, but find him staring at me with his head tilted to the side. "What?" I ask,irritated. "Soup on my chin? Green bean between my teeth?" St. Clair smiles to himself. "I like your stripe," he finally says. He reaches out and touches it lightly. "You have perfect hair.

And then I sagged forward, utterly spent, emptied…light as air. I felt like I could have floated up and out…slipping through the open window and drifting away across the rooftops and satellite dishes and telephone wires…sailing away into the faintly smiling stars.

You never gave me an answer,” Josh said, snapping me out of my dark thoughts. “About what?” “Whether or not you’re my girlfriend.

You owe him a favor, remember? His payment for all this is dinner once a month with the family.” I turned to Josh, wide-eyed. “Am I being Gilmored right now?” He nodded. “Yup. He’s going full Emily on you.

Josh is the kind of ride-or-die you could go to with a body, and he’d help you hide it.

Just so we know where we stand, darling." "I'll tell you just where we stand, darling.I don't need your insulting offer.I'm running my life my way." "And that's been such a rousing success so far." "I know what I'm doing.Take that ridiculous smirk off your face." "I can't.It sticks there every time you say you know what you're doing." But he tucked all the papers back in his briefcase, closed it. "I'll say this,I don't think it's an entirely moronic idea-this place." "Well,I'll sleep easy now, knowing I have your approval." "Approval's a little strong.It's more like hopeful resignation." He gave the banister a last wiggle. "But I believe in you,Margo." Temper died into confusion. "Damn you, Josh.I can't keep up with you." "Good." He strolled over, flicked a finger down her cheek. "I think you're going to make something out of this shop that'll surprise everyone. Especially you." He leaned down,and when he kissed her this time it was light and friendly. "Got cab fare?" "Excuse me?" Grinning, he pulled keys out of his pocket. "Fortunately, I had a spare set to the Jag. Don't work too late, duchess." She didn't smile until he was well out of sight.

Josh turned toward it and yelled, Batman-style, “Have you no respect for our alone time?” Yowl. “I’m not having this argument with you, young man!” Josh called back. Yowl. “Excuse you, sir. You better not talk to your mother like that when I’m not around.

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.

Does he have his quirks? Yes. Will you get annoyed at the way he turns everything into a joke? Sooner than you expect. But Josh is the kind of ride-or-die you could go to with a body, and he’d help you hide it.” I choked on my coffee. If only Tyler knew how true that statement was.

Nathan kept trying to reassure him. “It doesn’t have to mean anything. Not to you. You can forget it, if you’d rather.” Matt listened to Nathan’s heartbeat, fast and light like a deer flashing through sunshine and shadow. “Listen, Nathan…” Nathan was silent, but Matt could feel the immediate tension down his spine. “I loved Rachel with all my heart. You’re right, nothing changes that. But—I never wanted her the way I want you.” Nathan slid out from under him, rolled over. His face was different, grave but sort of lit from within in a way that gave Matt a funny pain in his chest.

This was happening. I was about to ride a knife handle while blindfolded and handcuffed. I should have been petrified, but all I felt was anticipation of what was to come. Fingers still inside me, Josh let go of my hip and guided my leg off his shoulder. I felt steadier back on two feet. Right until he crooked his fingers again, and my knees wobbled. He took advantage of my unbalance by putting his shoulder into my pelvis. Caught off guard, I tipped forward. His fingers slid out of me, and he wrapped his arm around the back of my thighs and stood with me sprawled over him like a sack of potatoes.

Oh,” Junior said. “I almost forgot. Dad wants you to come over for dinner.” I stiffened in my seat. “Um…no thank you?” Junior shook his head. “You don’t have a choice, kid.” “I absolutely do,” I told him. “And I’m not a kid.” His expression turned to pity. “You owe him a favor, remember? His payment for all this is dinner once a month with the family.” I turned to Josh, wide-eyed. “Am I being Gilmored right now?” He nodded. “Yup. He’s going full Emily on you.

Josh and Rashmi are making out-I can actually see tongue-so I turn to my bread and grapes.How biblical of me. The grapes are smaller than I'm used to, and the skin is slightly textured. Is that dirt? I dip my napkin in water and dab at the tiny purple globes. It helps, but they're still sort of rough. Hmm. St. Clair and Meredith stop talking. I glance up to find them staring at me in matching bemusement. "What?" "Nothing," he says. "Continue your grape bath." "They were dirty." "Have you tried one?" she asks. "No,they've still got these little mud flecks." I hold one up to show them. St. Clair plucks it from my fingers and pops it into his mouth.I'm hypnotized by his lips, his throat, as he swallows. I hesitate. Would I rather have clean food or his good opinion? He picks up another and smiles. "Open up." I open up. The grape brushes my lower lip as he slides it in. It explodes in my mouth, and I'm so startled by the juice that I nearly spit it out. The flavor is intense, more like grape candy than actual fruit. To say I've tasted nothing like it before is an understatement. Meredith and St. Clair laugh. "Wait until you try them as wine," she says. St. Clair twirls a forkful of pasta. "So. How was French class?" The abrupt subject change makes me shudder. "Professeur Gillet is scary. She's all frown lines." I tear off a piece of baguette. The crust crackles, and the inside is light and springy. Oh,man. I shove another hunk into my mouth.

I’m just getting to the good stuff (Cressida must seduce Nigel to gain access to the spy codes!) when Josh walks out of his house to get the mail. He sees me too; he lifts his hand like he’s just going to wave and not come over, but then he does. “Hey, nice onesie,” he says as he makes his way across the driveway. It’s faded light blue with sunflowers and it ties around the neck. I got it from the vintage store, 75 percent off. And it’s not a onesie. “This is a sunsuit,” I tell him, going back to my book. I try to subtly hide the cover with my hand. The last thing I need is Josh giving me a hard time for reading a trashy book when I’m just trying to enjoy a relaxing afternoon. I can feel him looking at me, his arms crossed, waiting. I look up. “What?” “Wanna see a movie tonight at the Bess? There’s a Pixar movie playing. We can take Kitty.” “Sure, text me when you want to head over,” I say, turning the page of my book. Nigel is unbuttoning Cressida’s blouse and she’s wondering when the sleeping pill she slipped in his Merlot will kick in, while simultaneously hoping it won’t kick in too soon, because Nigel is actually quite a good kisser. Josh reaches down and tries to get a closer look at my book. I slap his hand away, but not before he reads out loud, “Cressida’s heart raced as Nigel moved his hand along her stockinged thigh.” Josh cracks up. “What the heck are you reading?” My cheeks are burning. “Oh, be quiet.” Chuckling, Josh backs away. “I’ll leave you to Cressida and Noel then.” To his back, I call out, “For your information, it’s Nigel!

Suddenly, the wind got colder for a moment. Colder and fiercer. I had to hold my hair down, the blonde locks thick with mousse and hairspray, as they were being whipped around my face. Something caught my eye. Out in the dark yard, behind the huge maple tree, I saw movement—a dark figure shifting as if to hide behind the tree. A Peeping Tom? Creepy. And you always think in the city you’ll see the weirdos, and there I was in a small town, blatantly staring at a man watching me. Maybe it was Josh. But wouldn’t he just say hi and be my Romeo to his Juliet? Holding my hair to my face, I tried to focus my eyes. But with so little light behind the shape, it was hard to see clearly, and I lost it completely when it stopped moving. I squinted in disbelief at two red slits glowing mid-trunk on the tree. I would’ve thought they were cat’s eyes catching the light, but they seemed much too large and far too high up the trunk of the tree. Not to mention, they were red. If I didn’t know better, I would’ve thought they belonged to the dark figure hiding behind the tree trunk, but that had clearly been a man spying on me. What man had red eyes? I blinked several times, assuming it was a hallucination. When the red eyes didn’t leave and the figure didn’t move from the tree, my stomach sank and my heart raced, but I didn’t move. I was frozen in fear, no—terror. After

Close to midnight, I gather up Kitty and the puppy and the sparklers. We put on heavy coats and I make Kitty wear a hat. “Should we put a hat on Jamie too?” she asks me. “He doesn’t need one,” I tell her. “He’s already got on a fur coat.” The stars are out by the dozen; they look like faraway gems. We’re so lucky to live by the mountains the way we do. You just feel closer to the stars. To heaven. I light up sparklers for each of us, and Kitty starts dancing around the snow making a ring of fire with hers. She’s trying to coax Jamie to jump through but he isn’t having it. Al he wants to do is pee around the yard. It’s lucky we have a fence, or I bet he’d pee his way down this whole block. Josh’s bedroom light is on. I see him in the window just as he opens it and calls out, “Song girls!” Kitty hollers, “Wanna light a sparkler?” “Maybe next year,” Josh calls back. I look up at him and wave my sparkler, and he smiles, and there’s just this feeling of all rightness between us. One way or another, Josh will be in our lives. And I’m certain, I’m so suddenly certain that everything is exactly the way it’s supposed to be, that I don’t have to be so afraid of good-bye, because good-bye doesn’t have to be forever. When I’m back in my room in my flannel nightgown, I get out my special flowy pen and my good thick stationery, and I start to write. Not a good-bye letter. Just a plain old love letter. Dear Peter…

He opened the door after letting me pound on it for almost five minutes. His truck was in the carport. I knew he was here. He pulled the door open and walked back inside without looking at me or saying a word. I followed him in, and he dropped onto a sofa I’d never seen before. His face was scruffy. I’d never seen him anything but clean-shaven. Not even in pictures. He had bags under his eyes. He’d aged ten years in three days. The apartment was a mess. The boxes were gone. It looked like he had finally unpacked. But laundry was piled up in a basket so full it spilled out onto the floor. Empty food containers littered the kitchen countertops. The coffee table was full of empty beer bottles. His bed was unmade. The place smelled stagnant and dank. A vicious urge to take care of him took hold. The velociraptor tapped its talon on the floor. Josh wasn’t okay. Nobody was okay. And that was what made me not okay. “Hey,” I said, standing in front of him. He didn’t look at me. “Oh, so you’re talking to me now,” he said bitterly, taking a long pull on a beer. “Great. What do you want?” The coldness of his tone took me aback, but I kept my face still. “You haven’t been to the hospital.” His bloodshot eyes dragged up to mine. “Why would I? He’s not there. He’s fucking gone.” I stared at him. He shook his head and looked away from me. “So what do you want? You wanted to see if I’m okay? I’m not fucking okay. My best friend is brain-dead. The woman I love won’t even fucking speak to me.” He picked up a beer cap from the coffee table and threw it hard across the room. My OCD winced. “I’m doing this for you,” I whispered. “Well, don’t,” he snapped. “None of this is for me. Not any of it. I need you, and you abandoned me. Just go. Get out.” I wanted to climb into his lap. Tell him how much I missed him and that I wouldn’t leave him again. I wanted to make love to him and never be away from him ever again in my life—and clean his fucking apartment. But instead, I just stood there. “No. I’m not leaving. We need to talk about what’s happening at the hospital.” He glared up at me. “There’s only one thing I want to talk about. I want to talk about how you and I can be in love with each other and you won’t be with me. Or how you can stand not seeing me or speaking to me for weeks. That’s what I want to talk about, Kristen.” My chin quivered. I turned and went to the kitchen and grabbed a trash bag from under the sink. I started tossing take-out containers and beer bottles. I spoke over my shoulder. “Get up. Go take a shower. Shave. Or don’t if that’s the look you’re going for. But I need you to get your shit together.” My hands were shaking. I wasn’t feeling well. I’d been light-headed and slightly overheated since I went to Josh’s fire station looking for him. But I focused on my task, shoving trash into my bag. “If Brandon is going to be able to donate his organs, he needs to come off life support within the next few days. His parents won’t do it, and Sloan doesn’t get a say. You need to go talk to them.” Hands came up under my elbows, and his touch radiated through me. “Kristen, stop.” I spun on him. “Fuck you, Josh! You need help, and I need to help you!” And then as fast as the anger surged, the sorrow took over. The chains on my mood swing snapped, and feelings broke through my walls like water breaching a crevice in a dam. I began to cry. I didn’t know what was wrong with me. The strength that drove me through my days just wasn’t available to me when it came to Josh. I dropped the trash bag at his feet and put my hands over my face and sobbed. He wrapped his arms around me, and I completely lost it.

Back in bed I listen to every sound. The plastic tarp over the table on the balcony crunching in the cold wind. the two short clicks in the walls before the heat comes on with a low whoosh. I hear a constant base hum all around, the nervous system of the building, carrying electricity and gas and phone conversations to all our respective little boxes. I listen to it all, the constant, the rhythmic, and the random. It's hard to measure the night by sound, but it can be done. I know that when the traffic noise is quietest, it's about 4:30 in the morning. I know that when the 'Times' hits the door, it's around 5. Now the clock says it's morning, 5:45, but the November sky still says midnight. I hear the elevator ding twenty yards down the hall outside our door. Seven seconds later, I hear his keys in our lock, then his heavy backpack hitting the floor. I hear the refrigerator door open, the unsealing vacuum wheezing as the cold inside air meets the dry heat in the apartment. The cupboard door. A glass. The crescendoing fizz of a new two-liter Diet Coke bottle opening. It's a one-sided conversation with no one actually talking. I lie in the dark, close my eyes, and try not to listen to his movements around apartment. these are the sounds of our life together before it got so messy. I want to say something back. Anything, anything that sounds like things sounded last summer. Even just to myself. Just something out loud. The inside of my eyelids turn pink. My door has been opened and the light from the hallway shines through them. I won't open them. There is no noise. Like an eclipse, the world behind my closed eyes goes dark again. For just one second, before I feel a kiss on my right eye. I keep them closed. A kiss on the left one. I open them. Jack looks down at me and closes his eyes. He leans forward and puts his forehead on my chest and goes limp. ''Blues Clues' is on,' he says softly into my tee shirt. His muffled voice vibrating only a half inch away from my heart.

His nostrils filled with the scents of the room, the scents of that night when his mother had summoned him. She’d been wearing nothing, her skin glistening in the night light, her femininity bared. William gripped the phone trying to crush it in his hand. “Look at your mother’s ….” Josh slammed his hands into the side of his head and scrunched his eyes shut, just as William had done that night. He doubled over, screaming into the empty house. No. He wouldn’t see it; he wouldn’t listen to those words or do as he was told. He stood himself up, eyes piercing the ones in the reflection. “I fucking hate you. It was all you. All you. Why did you do what?” He’d cut William out. He’d make him fucking leave. He’d kill him if he had to. He was no longer William. William was dead. Josh

None of them could afford to go back and think about that tragedy right now. Amy needed to believe in him. And he had to stay focused on this mom and this boy. He refused to consider the possibility that this was anything more than a missing child. Anything else took him down a road he couldn’t bring himself to travel. That didn’t mean that he didn’t understand the urgency of finding Josh before his mom freaked out completely or before the situation turned into something worse. Any location that attracted a lot of children also had the potential to draw those who preyed on them. With the security staff fanning out, he turned back to Amy. “Let me take the baby, okay? Then we can leave the stroller here with Trish,” he said lightly. The little sweetheart with her blond curls and pink bow in her hair immediately beamed at him in a way that made his heart ache. “Who’s this angel?” he asked, responding to that smile with one of his own. “Her name’s Emma,” Amy said. “She’s eleven months old. Are you sure you want to hold her? I can keep her.” “I don’t mind. I have a niece who’s not much older,” he told her. He gently patted the baby’s back till she settled

Josh Miller, 22 years old. He is co-founder of Branch, a “platform for chatting online as if you were sitting around the table after dinner.” Miller works at Betaworks, a hybrid company encapsulating a co-working space, an incubator and a venture capital fund, headquartered on 13th Street in the heart of the Meatpacking District. This kid in T-shirt and Bermuda shorts, and a potential star of the 2.0 version of Sex and the City, is super-excited by his new life as a digital neo-entrepreneur. He dropped out of Princeton in the summer of 2011 a year before getting his degree—heresy for the almost 30,000 students who annually apply to the prestigious Ivy League school in the hope of being among the 9% of applicants accepted. What made him decide to take such a big step? An internship in the summer of 2011 at Meetup, the community site for those who organize meetings in the flesh for like-minded people. His leader, Scott Heiferman, took him to one of the monthly meetings of New York Tech Meetup and it was there that Miller saw the light. “It was the coolest thing that ever happened to me,” he remembers. “All those people with such incredible energy. It was nothing like the sheltered atmosphere of Princeton.” The next step was to take part in a seminar on startups where the idea for Branch came to him. He found two partners –students at NYU who could design a website. Heartened by having won a contest for Internet projects, Miller dropped out of Princeton. “My parents told me I was crazy but I think they understood because they had also made unconventional choices when they were kids,” says Miller. “My father, who is now a lawyer, played drums when he was at college, and he and my mother, who left home at 16, traveled around Europe for a year. I want to be a part of the new creative class that is pushing the boundaries farther. I want to contribute to making online discussion important again. Today there is nothing but the soliloquy of bloggers or rude anonymous comments.” The idea, something like a public group email exchange where one can contribute by invitation only, interested Twitter cofounder Biz Stone and other California investors who invited Miller and his team to move to San Francisco, financing them with a two million dollar investment. After only four months in California, Branch returned to New York, where it now employs a dozen or so people. “San Francisco was beautiful and I learned a lot from Biz and my other mentors, but there’s much more adrenaline here,” explains Miller, who is from California, born and raised in Santa Monica. “Life is more varied here and creating a technological startup is something new, unlike in San Francisco or Silicon Valley where everyone’s doing it: it grabs you like a drug. Besides New York is the media capital and we’re an online publishing organization so it’s only right to be here.”[52]

Night had fallen, and I was in the kitchen making a yummy peanut butter and jelly sandwich when I heard the doorbell. I jumped and my heart gave a little kick. This was so a horror-movie scene--bad weather, and a girl cut off from the outside world. Only killers didn’t usually ring the doorbell. Still, I opened a drawer and took out the meat cleaver Mom used for cutting chicken. The doorbell rang again and kept ringing. “All right already,” I muttered as I hurried down the hallway. I hesitated when I saw a large shadowy form behind the etched-glass window of the door. I’d turned on the porch light, and whoever was there blocked most of it. “Ashleigh!” The figure banged on the door and I nearly dropped the cleaver. Josh. My beating heart should have returned to a normal speed, but it didn’t. I wasn’t ready to face him yet. I jerked open the door. “What?” Covered in frost and snow, he edged past me. “Geez, it’s cold out there.” “And you just brought the cold inside.” I shut the door. “What are you doing here?” “My dad called and--what the hell is that?” He pointed to the cleaver. I angled my chin. “I was in the middle of cutting my peanut butter and jelly sandwich.” “With a meat cleaver?” “It’s quick and makes a perfectly straight cut.” He grinned. “Yeah, right. You’ve obviously watched too many movies. Who’d you think I was? Freddy Krueger?” “What are you doing here?” I repeated, not in the mood for his sarcasm or teasing. Plus I was feeling a little silly holding my weapon of choice.

significant that with the exception of animals and humans (Gen. 1:21, 26–27), Genesis 1 does not use the word “create” (bara ') but “make” ( ' asah). God fashions things out of preexisting material. This observation fits well with the view that Genesis 1 and 2 are talking about the restoration of the world, not its original creation from nothing. Finally, certain otherwise puzzling features of the Genesis narrative become clear in light of the restoration interpretation. For example, God’s command to humankind to “have dominion” seems to suggest that humankind would be met with resistance. The Hebrew term kabash (“dominion”) usually suggests suppression, conquering, or enslaving hostile forces (e.g., Num. 32:22, 29; Josh. 18:1; Neh. 5:5; Jer. 34:16; Mic. 7:19; Zech. 9:15). Along the same lines, God’s command to Adam to “keep” (shamar) the Garden (Gen. 2:15) conveys a sense of “guarding” it from something hostile. It is the same term used to describe the role of the cherubim in keeping Adam and Eve from reentering the Garden of Eden (Gen. 3:24). But

Hey, come here,” Josh said. He was sitting on the love seat looking out the window. “What is it?” I asked, walking over. “The lights are out. You can’t see anything out there.” “I know.” He wrapped his hand around my arm and pulled me down until I was nestled between his thighs, my back to his chest. “I just wanted to hold you.

Josh was so hot that if he pulled up next to someone and told them to get in his van, he wouldn’t even need candy to lure them. They’d take one look at him and decide that the risk of being serial murdered was worth the potential reward of getting fucked instead.

Tyler snorted soft laughter against Josh’s shoulder. “We’re all insane,” he finally said. “Run, Marek, while you still can. Save yourself. It's too late for Josh and Rachel. They’re doomed, but you could still make it out.” Tyler’s tone was light, but his eyes were sharp and assessing. Josh whispered something in his ear and Tyler made a face back at him before pinning Marek with his gaze again. The grip Ryan had on Marek’s fingers tightened painfully. “I think,” Marek said, “that it's too late for me, too.” “‘Oh, God, that's too bad,’” Tyler intoned, shaking his head sadly.

other about what would happen next. Was Josh going to punch his lights out? Was he going to make Stanley eat his rainbow unicorn T-shirt? Was he going to deliver

Sure. But you’re cool, and I know I’m dumb. Jimmy’s so dumb he doesn’t know he’s stupid.” She hated when he said things like that. “You’re not dumb.” “Then I’m lazy. Did you ask your dad about the monkey?” “We talked about other stuff.” “Like what?” He picked at one of the rug loops with fingernails still dirty from the truck. “What happens after you die.” “Easy,” he said. “You go to Heaven or Hell. Unless you’re Jewish. Josh Ast said Jews don’t believe in Heaven or Hell. I bet they’re super surprised when they wind up there. Think how pissed off you’d be, being dead and finding out you’re totally wrong.

Keep these words that I am commanding you today in your heart” (Deut. 6:6). “Serve the Lord your God with all your heart” (Deut. 10:12). “Incline your hearts to the Lord, the God of Israel” (Josh. 24:23). “Return to the Lord with all your heart” (1 Sam. 7:3). “The Lord looks on the heart” (1 Sam. 16:7). “I will give thanks to the Lord with my whole heart” (Ps. 9:1). “Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable to you” (Ps. 19:14). “In God my heart trusts” (Ps. 28:7). “Your law is within my heart” (Ps. 40:8). “Create in me a clean heart, O God” (Ps. 51:10). “So teach us to count our days that we may gain a wise heart” (Ps. 90:12). “Search me, O God, and know my heart” (Ps. 139:23). “Incline your heart to understanding” (Prov. 2:2). “Trust in the Lord with all your heart” (Prov. 3:5). “My child, give me your heart” (Prov. 23:26). “The heart is devious above all else” (Jer. 17:9). “I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts” (Jer. 31:33). “Where your treasure is, there your heart will be also” (Matt. 6:21). “Out of the heart come evil intentions” (Matt. 15:19). “Mary treasured all these words and pondered them in her heart” (Luke 2:19). “God searches the heart” (Rom. 8:27). “The God who said, ‘Let light shine out of darkness,’ has shone in our hearts” (2 Cor. 4:6). “God has sent the Spirit of God’s Son into our hearts, crying, ‘Abba! Father!’” (Gal. 4:6). “May you be strengthened in your inner being with power through God’s Spirit, that Christ may dwell in your hearts” (Eph. 3:16–17). The heart is an image for the self at a deep level, deeper than our perception, intellect, emotion, and volition. As the spiritual center of the total self, it affects all of these: our sight, thought, feelings, and will.

Brad's death was too anticlimactic." "Anticlimactic," Josh repeated. "yeah. I mean, a piece of shit like him? His demise should have been more violent and, ideally, included getting lit on fire at the end." That surprised a snort out of him. "Bonfire o' Brad." "Barbecue o' Bluhm," I said, grinning. Josh groaned. "We're going straight to hell.

clapped a hand over my mouth and took a disbelieving step toward him. It was a ring. Josh was holding a ring. A stunning ring with a center ruby that looked like a large drop of blood framed by tiny diamonds. It was perfect. “Alyssa Cappellucci,” he said. “Will you marry me so I can spend the rest of my life chasing you?” I lowered my hand, grinning, joy replacing panic. “I thought people got married because they wanted to stop chasing someone?

before, never loved someone like I loved him. “Marry me,” I said. Josh stiffened. “What?” Panic punched into me, chasing away the afterglow of sex hormones and dumping me straight back into reality. Oh, fuck. Oh, fuck, fuck, fuck.

It wasn’t that I didn’t think I was worthy of love; I just couldn’t believe I’d gotten so lucky that she was the one who loved me." - Josh Hammond

I turned to Josh, wide-eyed. “Am I being Gilmored right now?” He nodded. “Yup. He’s going full Emily on you.