Nice Cold Point Quotes

The ones who are not soul-mated – the ones who have settled – are even more dismissive of my singleness: It’s not that hard to find someone to marry, they say. No relationship is perfect, they say – they, who make do with dutiful sex and gassy bedtime rituals, who settle for TV as conversation, who believe that husbandly capitulation – yes, honey, okay, honey – is the same as concord. He’s doing what you tell him to do because he doesn’t care enough to argue, I think. Your petty demands simply make him feel superior, or resentful, and someday he will fuck his pretty, young coworker who asks nothing of him, and you will actually be shocked. Give me a man with a little fight in him, a man who calls me on my bullshit. (But who also kind of likes my bullshit.) And yet: Don’t land me in one of those relationships where we’re always pecking at each other, disguising insults as jokes, rolling our eyes and ‘playfully’ scrapping in front of our friends, hoping to lure them to our side of an argument they could not care less about. Those awful if only relationships: This marriage would be great if only… and you sense the if only list is a lot longer than either of them realizes. So I know I am right not to settle, but it doesn’t make me feel better as my friends pair off and I stay home on Friday night with a bottle of wine and make myself an extravagant meal and tell myself, This is perfect, as if I’m the one dating me. As I go to endless rounds of parties and bar nights, perfumed and sprayed and hopeful, rotating myself around the room like some dubious dessert. I go on dates with men who are nice and good-looking and smart – perfect-on-paper men who make me feel like I’m in a foreign land, trying to explain myself, trying to make myself known. Because isn’t that the point of every relationship: to be known by someone else, to be understood? He gets me. She gets me. Isn’t that the simple magic phrase? So you suffer through the night with the perfect-on-paper man – the stutter of jokes misunderstood, the witty remarks lobbed and missed. Or maybe he understands that you’ve made a witty remark but, unsure of what to do with it, he holds it in his hand like some bit of conversational phlegm he will wipe away later. You spend another hour trying to find each other, to recognise each other, and you drink a little too much and try a little too hard. And you go home to a cold bed and think, That was fine. And your life is a long line of fine.

He said, “I know somebody you could kiss.” “Who?” She realized his eyes were amused. “Oh, wait.” He shrugged. He was maybe the only person Blue knew who could preserve the integrity of a shrug while lying down. “It’s not like you’re going to kill me. I mean, if you were curious.” She hadn’t thought she was curious. It hadn’t been an option, after all. Not being able to kiss someone was a lot like being poor. She tried not to dwell on the things she couldn’t have. But now— “Okay,” she said. “What?” “I said okay.” He blushed. Or rather, because he was dead, he became normal colored. “Uh.” He propped himself on an elbow. “Well.” She unburied her face from the pillow. “Just, like—” He leaned toward her. Blue felt a thrill for a half a second. No, more like a quarter second. Because after that she felt the too-firm pucker of his tense lips. His mouth mashed her lips until it met teeth. The entire thing was at once slimy and ticklish and hilarious. They both gasped an embarrassed laugh. Noah said, “Bah!” Blue considered wiping her mouth, but felt that would be rude. It was all fairly underwhelming. She said, “Well.” “Wait,” Noah replied, “waitwaitwait.” He pulled one of Blue’s hairs out of his mouth. “I wasn’t ready.” He shook out his hands as if Blue’s lips were a sporting event and cramping was a very real possibility. “Go,” Blue said. This time they only got within a breath of each other’s lips when they both began to laugh. She closed the distance and was rewarded with another kiss that felt a lot like kissing a dishwasher. “I’m doing something wrong?” she suggested. “Sometimes it’s better with tongue,” he replied dubiously. They regarded each other. Blue squinted, “Are you sure you’ve done this before?” “Hey!” he protested. “It’s weird for me, ‘cause it’s you.” “Well, it’s weird for me because it’s you.” “We can stop.” “Maybe we should.” Noah pushed himself up farther on his elbow and gazed at the ceiling vaguely. Finally, he dropped his eyes back to her. “You’ve seen, like, movies. Of kisses, right? Your lips need to be, like, wanting to be kissed.” Blue touched her mouth. “What are they doing now?” “Like, bracing themselves.” She pursed and unpursed her lips. She saw his point. “So imagine one of those,” Noah suggested. She sighed and sifted through her memories until she found one that would do. It wasn’t a movie kiss, however. It was the kiss the dreaming tree had showed her in Cabeswater. Her first and only kiss with Gansey, right before he died. She thought about his nice mouth when he smiled. About his pleasant eyes when he laughed. She closed her eyes. Placing an elbow on the other side of her head, Noah leaned close and kissed her once more. This time, it was more of a thought than a feeling, a soft heat that began at her mouth and unfurled through the rest of her. One of his cold hands slid behind her neck and he kissed her again, lips parted. It was not just a touch, an action. It was a simplification of both of them: They were no longer Noah Czerny and Blue Sargent. They were now just him and her. Not even that. They were only the time that they held between them.

She was looking at him steadily; he however, found it difficult to look back at her; it was like gazing into a brilliant light. Nice view, he said feebly, pointing toward with window. She ignored this. He could not blame her. I couldn't think what to get you, she said. You didn't have to get me anything. She disregarded this too. I didn't know what would be useful. Nothing too big, because you wouldn't be able to take it with you. He chanced a glance at her. She was not tearful; that was one of the many wonderful things about Ginny, she was rarely weepy. He had sometimes thought that having six brothers must have toughened her up. She took a step closer to him. So then I thought, I'd like you to have something to remember me by, you know, if you meet some Veela when you're off doing whatever you're doing. I think dating opportunities are going to be pretty thin on the ground, to be honest. There's the silver lining I've been looking for, she whispered, and then she was kissing him as she had never kissed him before, and Harry was kissing her back, and it was blissful oblivion better than firewhiskey; she was the only real thing in the world, Ginny, the feel of her, one hand at her back and one in her long, sweet-smelling hair- The door banged open behind them and they jumped apart. Oh, said Ron pointedly. Sorry. Ron! Hermione was just behind him, slight out of breath. There was a strained silence, then Ginny had said in a flat little voice, Well, happy birthday anyway, Harry. Ron's ears were scarlet; Hermione looked nervous. Harry wanted to slam the door in their faces, but it felt as though a cold draft had entered the room when the door opened, and his shining moment had popped like a soap bubble. All the reasons for ending his relationship with Ginny, for staying well away from her, seemed to have slunk inside the room with Ron, and all happy forgetfulness was gone. He looked at Ginny, wanting to say something, though he hardly knew what, but she had turned her back on him. He thought that she might have succumbed, for once, to tears. He could not do anything to comfort her in front of Ron. I'll see you later, he said, and followed the other two out of the bedroom.

Do I get to choose what she commands you to do? Come on, let me, it’ll be fun.” Jai laughed humorlessly. “I said I don’t want her commanding me to do something asinine, kid.” Charlie’s grin disappeared as quickly as it had surfaced. “I told you not to call me, kid, Jinn boy. I’m what… two years younger than you, douchebag?” “Try five. And that’s only in physical years.” “What, you trying to say I’m not mature?” “Oh those socks you’re wearing definitely are. Have you heard of detergent? A shower? Hygiene?” “I shower, you militant, glorified fucking babysitter.” “Watch it, kid.” “Kid? I am this close to taking a swing at you, you overblown piece of-” “Oh for the love of God!” Ari cried, throwing her hands up, her head pounding. So much for their strained peace treaty. “Shut up. Shut up. Shut up!”Despite their matching glowers, both of them slammed their lips closed and glared at one another. Ari heaved a sigh of relief as she pulled a chilled can of soda out of the refrigerator. At least the soda still felt nice sliding down her throat. Not the same as an ice cold Coke on a blazing summer day but still nice. She took a refreshing swig and turned towards her male companions once again. Blasts of frost shot out from Jai’s eyes only to be met by the simmering black heat of Charlie’s angry gaze. Rolling her eyes and biting back the guilt that she was somehow responsible for the animosity between the only two people she could count on right now, Ari spilled into the chair between them and Jai slowly sunk back down into his. “So what will I command you?” she asked quietly, ignoring the way her fingers trembled as she played with the tab on her soda can. When she got no answer, she glanced up to see Jai’s face going red, the veins in his head throbbing. “Dude, what’s wrong?” Charlie asked quietly, looking at Ari in alarm. “Is he choking?” Ari’s heart flipped in her chest at the thought and she reached across the table to grab his arm. “Jai?” His eyes widened and he waved a large hand at his throat and mouth and then pointed at her. What the hell?! “Jesus Christ, he can’t talk?” Charlie asked incredulously. “Is this a joke?

Gee, Mr. Davis, I can’t remember much about that time. I think it was about Italian writers and about Mr. Ford. Mr. Joyce couldn’t stand Mr. Ford. Mr. Pound had gotten on his nerves, too. ‘Ezra’s mad, Hudson,’ he said to papa. I can remember that because I thought mad meant mad like a mad dog and I remember sitting there and watching Mr. Joyce’s face, it was sort of red with awfully smooth skin, cold weather skin, and his glasses that had one lens even thicker than the other, and thinking of Mr. Pound with his red hair and his pointed beard and his nice eyes, with white stuff sort of like lather dripping out of his mouth. I thought it was terrible Mr. Pound was mad and I hoped we wouldn’t run into him. Then Mr. Joyce said, ‘Of course Ford’s been mad for years,’ and I saw Mr. Ford with his big, pale, funny face and his pale eyes and his mouth with the teeth loose in it and always about half open and that awful lather dripping down his jaws too.

Daniel." He looked up. "El-la.I was wondering if you'd catch me." He offered me a cigarette. I gave him a shame-on-you look;he grinned. "This is your band?" I asked. Visible piercings aside, no one looked like that went by the name Ax. "Nope,but I go to school with the lead's sister. Regular guy got food poisoning at a Christmas party last night.I've played with them before." "Weddings?" It wasn't quite how I'd pictured him performing. "Usually clubs, but the last one was a bar mitzvah. Musicians have to eat, too," he added, a little sharply. "Sorry." I wanted to wave the smoke away, but figured that might be adding insult to inury. "I thought you played the guitar." "Guitar, piano, a little violin, but badly, and I'll have to garrote you ith one of the strings if you tell anyone." That's the thing about Daniel. Obviously-the violin being a case in point-I don't know him very well,but he seems to hold a grudge for even less time than Frankie. "Secret's safe with me." He shrugged, telling me he didn't really care. Then, "Nice dress." "Just when I start liking you a litte.." He made his vampire-boy face. I could see why it usually worked. "You like me,Ella. Wanna do something when this is over?" "Tempting," I said. "No, I mean that. But no,thanks. I'm not at my best these days." "You're good," he said quietly, blowing out a stream of smoke. "You'll be fine." "Yeah." I shivered. It was bitter outside. "I should go in." "You should." The cold didn't seem to be bothering him at all, and he wasn't even wearing a jacket over his white dress shirt. I turned to go. "Oh, I think I figured it out, by the way." "Figured out what?" "The question.The one everyone should ask before getting involved with someone. Not 'Will he-slash-she make me happy?' but 'Does it bring out the best in me,being with him?'" "Him-slash-her," Daniel corrected, clearly amused. Then, "Nope. No way. Wasn't me who posed the question to you, Marino.I would never be so Emo." "Of course not.But it was one smart boy." I waved. "Hug Frankie for me." "Will do. Hey.Any requests for the band?" "'Don't Stop Believin'," I shot back. He rolled his eyes. "I'm curious, in that last song-are the words really 'I cut my chest wide open'?" "Yup.Followed by, "They come and watch us bleed.Is it art like I was hoping now?" Avett Brothers. Too gruesome for you?" "You have no idea," I told him. How much I get it.

How did you find me?" "I've followed you for a long time." He must have mistaken the look on my face for alarm or fear, and said, "Not literally. I just mean I never lost track." But it wasn't fear, or anything like that. It was an instant of realization I'd have a lot in the coming days: I'd been thinking of him as coming back from the dead, but the fact was he'd been there all along. He'd been alive when I cried in my room over him being gone. He'd been alive when I started a new school without him, the day I made my first friend a Jones Hall, the time I ran into Ethan at the library. Cameron Quick and I had existed simultaneously on the planet during all of those moments. It didn't seem possible that we could have been leading separate lives, not after everything we'd been through together. "...then I looked you up online," he was saying, "and found your mom's wedding announcement from before you changed your name. I didn't even need to do that. It's easy to find someone you never lost." I struggled to understand what he was saying. "You mean...you could have written to me, or seen me, sooner?" "I wanted to. Almost did, a bunch of times." "Why didn't you? I wish you had." And I did, I wished it so much, imagined how it would have been to know all those years that he was there, thinking of me. "Things seemed different for you," he said, matter-of-fact. "Better. I could tell that from the bits of information I found...like an interview with the parents who were putting their kids in your school when it first started. Or an article about that essay contest you won a couple years ago." "You knew about that?" He nodded. "That one had a picture. I could see just from looking at you that you had a good thing going. Didn't need me coming along and messing it up." "Don't say that," I said quickly. Then: "You were never part of what I wanted to forget." "Nice of you to say, but I know it's not true." I knew what he was thinking, could see that he'd been carrying around the same burden all those years as me. "You didn't do anything wrong." It was getting cold on the porch, and late, and the looming topic scared me. I got up. "Let's go in. I can make coffee or hot chocolate or something?" "I have to go." "No! Already?" I didn't want to let him out of my sight. "Don't worry," he said. "Just have to go to work. I'll be around." "Give me your number. I'll call you." "I don't have a phone right now." "Find me at school," I said, "or anytime. Eat lunch with us tomorrow." He didn't answer. "Really," I continued, "you should meet my friends and stuff." "You have a boyfriend," he finally said. "I saw you guys holding hands." I nodded. "Ethan." "For how long?" "Three months, almost." I couldn't picture Cameron Quick dating anyone, though he must have at some point. If I'd found Ethan, I was sure Cameron had some Ashley or Becca or Caitlin along the way. I didn't ask. "He's nice," I added. "He's..." I don't know what I'd planned to say, but whatever it was it seemed insignificant so I finished that sentence with a shrug. "You lost your lisp." And about twenty-five pounds, I thought. "I guess speech therapy worked for both of us." He smiled. "I always liked that, you know. Your lisp. It was...you." He started down the porch steps. "See you tomorrow, okay?" "Yeah," I said, unable to take my eyes off of him. "Tomorrow.

at the moment—and looking for other boats. Kelly advanced the port throttle a notch farther as he turned the wheel, allowing Springer to pivot all the more quickly in the narrow channel, and then he was pointed straight out. He advanced the starboard throttle next, bringing his cruiser to a mannerly five knots as he headed past the ranks of motor and sail yachts. Pam was looking around at the boats, too, mainly aft, and her eyes fixed on the parking lot for a long couple of seconds before she looked forward again, her body relaxing more as she did so. “You know anything about boats?” Kelly asked. “Not much,” she admitted, and for the first time he noticed her accent. “Where you from?” “Texas. How about you?” “Indianapolis, originally, but it’s been a while.” “What’s this?” she asked. Her hands reached out to touch the tattoo on his forearm. “It’s from one of the places I’ve been,” he said. “Not a very nice place.” “Oh, over there.” She understood. “That’s the place.” Kelly nodded matter-of-factly. They were out of the yacht basin now, and he advanced the throttles yet again. “What did you do there?” “Nothing to talk to a lady about,” Kelly replied, looking around from a half-standing position. “What makes you think I’m a lady?” she asked. It caught him short, but he was getting used to it by now. He’d also found that talking to a girl, no matter what the subject, was something that he needed to do. For the first time he answered her smile with one of his own. “Well, it wouldn’t be very nice of me if I assumed that you weren’t.” “I wondered how long it would be before you smiled.” You have a very nice smile, her tone told him. How’s six months grab you? he almost said. Instead he laughed, mainly at himself. That was something else he needed to do. “I’m sorry. Guess I haven’t been very good company.” He turned to look at her again and saw understanding in her eyes. Just a quiet look, very human and feminine, but it shook Kelly. He could feel it happen, and ignored the part of his consciousness that told him that it was something he’d needed badly for months. That was something he didn’t need to hear, especially from himself. Loneliness was bad enough without reflection on its misery. Her hand reached out yet again, ostensibly to stroke the tattoo, but that wasn’t what it was all about. It was amazing how warm her touch was, even under a hot afternoon sun. Perhaps it was a measure of just how cold his life had become. But he had a boat to navigate. There was

So I know I am right not to settle, but it doesn't make me feel better as my friends pair off and I stay home on Friday night with a bottle of wine and make myself an extravagant meal and tell myself, This is perfect, as if I'm the one dating me. As I go to endless rounds of parties and bar nights, perfumed and sprayed and hopeful, rotating myself around the room like some dubious dessert. I go on dates with men who are nice and good-looking and smart - perfect-on-paper men who make me feel like I'm in a foreign land, trying to explain myself, trying to make myself known. Because isn't that the point of every relationship: to be known by someone else, to be understood? He gets me. She gets me. Isn't that the simple magic phrase? So you suffer through the night with the perfect-on-paper man - the stutter of jokes misunderstood, the witty remarks lobbed and missed. Or maybe he understands that you've made a witty remark but, unsure of what to do with it, he holds it in his hand like some bit of conversational phlegm he will wipe away later. You spend another hour trying to find each other, to recognise each other, and you drink a little too much and try a little too hard. And you go home to a cold bed and think, That was fine. And your life is a long line of fine. And then you run into Nick Dunne on Seventh Avenue as you're buying diced cantaloupe, and pow, you are known, you are recognised, the both of you. You both find the exact same things worth remembering. (Just one olive, though). You have the same rhythm. Click. You just know each other. All of a sudden you see reading in bed and waffles on Sunday and laughing at nothing and his mouth on yours. And it's so far beyond fine that you know you can never go back to fine. That fast. You think: Oh, here is the rest of my life. It's finally arrived.

Blood pressure check!” The doorknob rattled, as if the nurse were intending just to walk in, but the lock held, thank God. The nurse knocked again. “Oh, shit,” Gina breathed, laughing as she scrambled off of him. She reached to remove the condom they’d just used, encountered . . . him, and met his eyes. But then she scooped her clothes off the floor and ran into the bathroom. “Mr. Bhagat?” The nurse knocked on the door again. Even louder this time. “Are you all right?” Oh, shit, indeed. “Come in,” Max called as he pulled up the blanket and leaned on the button that put his bed back up into a sitting position. The same control device had a “call nurse” button as well as the clearly marked one that would unlock the door. “It’s locked,” the nurse called back, as well he knew. “Oh, I’m sorry,” he said, as he wiped off his face with the edge of the sheet. Sweat much in bed, all alone, Mr. Bhagat? “I must’ve . . . Here, let me figure out how to . . .” He took an extra second to smooth his hair, his pajama top, and then, praying that the nurse had a cold and couldn’t smell the scent of sex that lingered in the air, he hit the release. “Please don’t lock your door during the day,” the woman scolded him as she came into the room, around to the side of his bed. It was Debra Forsythe, a woman around his age, whom Max had met briefly at his check-in. She had been on her way home to deal with some crisis with her kids, and hadn’t been happy then, either. “And not at night either,” she added, “until you’ve been here a few days.” “Sorry.” He gave her an apologetic smile, hanging on to it as the woman gazed at him through narrowed eyes. She didn’t say anything, she just wrapped the blood pressure cuff around his arm, and pumped it a little too full of air—ow—as Gina opened the bathroom door. “Did I hear someone at the door?” she asked brightly. “Oh, hi. Debbie, right?” “Debra.” She glanced at Gina, and then back, her disgust for Max apparent in the tightness of her lips. But then she focused on the gauge, stethoscope to his arm. Gina came out into the room, crossing around behind the nurse, making a face at him that meant . . .? Max sent her a questioning look, and she flashed him. She just lifted her skirt and gave him a quick but total eyeful. Which meant . . . Ah, Christ. The nurse turned to glare at Gina, who quickly straightened up from searching the floor. What was it with him and missing underwear? Gina smiled sweetly. “His blood pressure should be nice and low. He’s very relaxed—he just had a massage.” “You know, I didn’t peg you for a troublemaker when you checked in yesterday,” Debra said to Max, as she wrote his numbers on the chart. Gina was back to scanning the floor, but again, she straightened up innocently when the nurse turned toward her. “I think you’re probably looking for this.” Debra leaned over and . . . Gina’s panties dangled off the edge of her pen. They’d been on the floor, right at the woman’s sensibly clad feet. “Oops,” Gina said. Max could tell that she was mortified, but only because he knew her so well. She forced an even sunnier smile, and attempted to explain. “It was just . . . he was in the hospital for so long and . . .” “And men have needs,” Debra droned, clearly unmoved. “Believe me, I’ve heard it all before.” “No, actually,” Gina said, still trying to turn this into something they could all laugh about, “I have needs.” But it was obvious that this nurse hadn’t laughed since 1985. “Then maybe you should find someone your own age to play with. A professional hockey player just arrived. He’s in the east wing. Second floor.” She lowered her voice conspiratorially. “Lots of money. Just your type, I’m sure.” “Excuse me?” Gina wasn’t going to let one go past. She may not have been wearing any panties, but her Long Island attitude now waved around her like a superhero’s cape. She even assumed the battle position, hands on her hips.

A fierce battle was taking place at Tobruk, and nothing thrilled him more than spirited warfare and the prospect of military glory. He stayed up until three-thirty, in high spirits, “laughing, chaffing and alternating business with conversation,” wrote Colville. One by one his official guests, including Anthony Eden, gave up and went to bed. Churchill, however, continued to hold forth, his audience reduced to only Colville and Mary’s potential suitor, Eric Duncannon. Mary by this point had retired to the Prison Room, aware that the next day held the potential to change her life forever. — IN BERLIN, MEANWHILE, HITLER and Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels joked about a newly published English biography of Churchill that revealed many of his idiosyncrasies, including his penchant for wearing pink silk underwear, working in the bathtub, and drinking throughout the day. “He dictates messages in the bath or in his underpants; a startling image which the Führer finds hugely amusing,” Goebbels wrote in his diary on Saturday. “He sees the English Empire as slowly disintegrating. Not much will be salvageable.” — ON SUNDAY MORNING, a low-grade anxiety colored the Cromwellian reaches of Chequers. Today, it seemed, would be the day Eric Duncannon proposed to Mary, and no one other than Mary was happy about it. Even she, however, was not wholly at ease with the idea. She was eighteen years old and had never had a romantic relationship, let alone been seriously courted. The prospect of betrothal left her feeling emotionally roiled, though it did add a certain piquancy to the day. New guests arrived: Sarah Churchill, the Prof, and Churchill’s twenty-year-old niece, Clarissa Spencer-Churchill—“looking quite beautiful,” Colville noted. She was accompanied by Captain Alan Hillgarth, a raffishly handsome novelist and self-styled adventurer now serving as naval attaché in Madrid, where he ran intelligence operations; some of these were engineered with the help of a lieutenant on his staff, Ian Fleming, who later credited Captain Hillgarth as being one of the inspirations for James Bond. “It was obvious,” Colville wrote, “that Eric was expected to make advances to Mary and that the prospect was viewed with nervous pleasure by Mary, with approbation by Moyra, with dislike by Mrs. C. and with amusement by Clarissa.” Churchill expressed little interest. After lunch, Mary and the others walked into the rose garden, while Colville showed Churchill telegrams about the situation in Iraq. The day was sunny and warm, a nice change from the recent stretch of cold. Soon, to Colville’s mystification, Eric and Clarissa set off on a long walk over the grounds by themselves, leaving Mary behind. “His motives,” Colville wrote, “were either Clarissa’s attraction, which she did not attempt to keep in the background, or else the belief that it was good policy to arouse Mary’s jealousy.” After the walk, and after Clarissa and Captain Hillgarth had left, Eric took a nap, with the apparent intention (as Colville

Dear, What’s the Point of it All? What is the point of being nice? When you do not know what you are going to get from it? Knowing eventually sooner rather than later someone and maybe that person you are being nice to will turn their back on you. I always have to stay grounded and focused. When I am there for people, I feel like I am always punished for it. I am always treated as if I committed a crime. I was there for my mom; however, she was killing me slowly but surely. Like my mom, I noticed that when people get themselves in some shit, they get stuck in their own mess. They are confident that they do not have to deal with the consequences—because they know the ‘kind’ person will bail them out. What’s the point of being kind? Like my mom and the officer, there are so many people in the world who are judgmental and tainted because of their selfish needs. What’s the point of my life? Here I am in a library filled with many books. I can read them and go anywhere I want to in my mind, but after I close the book, I will have to snap out of my fantasy world and welcome the cruel cold world, which is reality. If I was a book, I would be better off left on the shelf. There is no excitement in my life—only struggles. What’s the point of living and loving life when the only thing I do is read between the lines and tread carefully? Come to think about it, I am a book that nobody can understand or read. They think they know what is best for me, but if they only take the time to listen, I would be so happy to tell them about me and my needs and wants. My actions scream for attention, but time after time, I am ignored. Sadly, without a care, they were quick to rip out the pages. Yet, once again, nobody noticed me. What’s the point of it all when I never had an opportunity to make a mistake? If I did one thing wrong, they would give up on me and send me to one home after another. I’ve always been fully exposed and had to walk in a line filled with sharp curves from disappointment to disappointment. Sorrow is my aura, and sadness hugs me tightly. It is hard to cry when my eyes are closed shut by the barbed wire fence of my eyelashes as they prohibit tears from falling. What’s the point of complicating my life? I am always back to where I started, and then ... I relive the same patterns, but on a more difficult journey. I believe when you put yourself in your own mess that you should clean it up and start over. What’s wrong with that? Nothing. However, when someone else puts you in their mess, you do not know how to clean up the mess they’ve made. You do not know how to start over because you do not know where to begin. I look at it this way; it is like telling a dead person he/she can start over. How so, when that person’s life no longer exists? I know my life isn’t over. However, I am lost in a maze my mom set up for herself—and she too is lost in her own maze. When a person gets lost in their own maze, they are really fucked up. However, this maze shouldn’t be left for me to figure out. Unfortunately, I am in it, and I have to find my way out one way or another. What’s the point of taking Kace from me? He was safe and in good hands. Now he is worse off with people who are abusing him. He didn’t ask for this—I didn’t either. He deserves so much better. Again, what is the point of it all? What’s the point of making me suffer? Do you get a kick out of it? What are you trying to accomplish? I am trying to understand; what is the point of it all? What is the point? I don’t know why I am here.

You want me to fuck you?” I leaned down, bringing her face to mine so our noses crushed together. I grabbed the front of her dress, twisting, tightening it against her skin until the fabric began pulling apart and tearing. “You want me to knock you up?” “Yes,” she breathed out. “Yes.” I dropped to the marble, resting my back against the vanity. “Ask nicely.” “Please.” “Nicer.” She crawled toward me on all fours, straddled my lap, and grabbed my hand, bringing it between her legs. Her fingers guided mine into her slick pussy, two of hers joining mine inside her warmth. My lips found her nipple, biting down through her dress. Together, we fucked her cunt down to our knuckles, curling until her walls pulsed. I watched our fingers disappear inside her. She arched her back, trying to accommodate as much of us as she could. Her lips drifted to the shell of my ear. “Please, please, please.” I tore my fingers out of her, ripped her dress down the middle, and captured both sides of her waist, sinking her onto my cock, down to the hilt. Her head fell forward. She bit my shoulder, drawing blood, her hips bucking. She was so tight it felt like I was fucking her ass. Her walls squeezed around me, milking my dick for cum. I let her ride my length until my impatience won over, and I pulled her off me, flipped her over, and lowered her on all fours. The marble was cold and hard against her knees. I love seeing that spoiled little brat take all of my cock, feeling the discomfort of it. My silver-spooned nymph. I entered her from behind. She drove back, meeting each of my thrusts. My fingers curled around her neck and steered her upward until her back plastered against my front. She craned her head around and captured my lips, slipping her tongue past my teeth. Her back arched, fingers dipping between her legs, searching for her clit. I smacked them away, then landed a palm on her ass. “Rom,” she whined. “I need to come.” “What you need is to be fucking grateful.” My blood brought my point home, covering every inch of her back, arms, and tits, matting her hair in clumps. I released her throat and pet the crown of her head, whispering praises into her ear. “Such a good girl.” Words I never thought I’d say. Especially to this particular girl, who was anything but good two hundred percent of the time. “If only you took directions so well when you’re not filled with my cock.” I reached around her and found her clit, rewarding her with a single flick. She cried out and fell forward, on her hands and knees again, pushing onto my cock. More crimson drops splattered onto her back. I’d reopened my wound, and fresh red painted her spine. I dipped a finger into it, then spelled my name across her back dimples. “Who owns your ass?” I growled. “You.” “Louder.” “You.” “Now crawl forward and show me your cunt from behind. I want to see if it’s worth my cum.” With a reluctant moan, she inched away from my cock, writhing about two feet away. She started to turn when I hissed, “I don’t want to see your face, Mrs. Costa. Just the cunt I stole from my enemy.” She spread her thighs apart, exposing her pussy. It dripped on my floor, her juices mixing with my blood, creating a pink puddle at her feet. I stroked my cock, coated with her wetness, scented by the wife I couldn’t get enough of. I grinned, the release tickling my shaft. “Embarrassed?” “No. Empty.” Fuck me sideways. How this woman would ever end up with a wuss like Madison, I had no idea. She would make meatballs out of him before the reception. (Chapter 55)

The Quiche Lorraine Pie Shell: You can mix up your favorite piecrust recipe and line a 10-inch pie plate. Or…you can buy frozen shells at the grocery store. (If you decide to go the grocery store frozen pie shell route, buy 9-inch deep-dish pie shells.)   Hannah’s 1stNote: There’s no need to feel guilty if you choose to use the frozen pie shells. They’re good and it’s a real time saver. I happen to know that Edna Ferguson, the head cook at Jordan High, has been known to remove frozen pie shells from their telltale disposable pans and put them in her own pie tins to bake! (Sorry Edna—I just had to tell them.) Stack your pie shells in the refrigerator, or leave them in the freezer until two hours before you’re ready to use them.   Prepare your piecrust by separating one egg. Throw away the white and whip up the yolk with a fork. Brush the bottom and inside of your piecrust. Prick it all over with a fork and bake it in a 350 F. degree oven for 5 minutes. Take it out and let it cool on a wire rack or a cold stovetop while you mix up the custard. If “bubbles” have formed in the crust, immediately prick them with a fork to let out the steam. The Quiche Lorraine Custard: 5 eggs 1½ cups heavy whipping cream *** Hannah’s 2ndNote: You can do this by hand with a whisk, or use an electric mixer, your choice.   Combine the eggs with the cream and whisk them (or beat them with an electric mixer) until they’re a uniform color. When they’re thoroughly mixed, pour them into a pitcher and set it in the refrigerator until you’re ready to assemble the rest of your quiche. You may notice that you’re not adding any salt, pepper, or other seasoning at this point. You’ll do that when you assemble the quiche.   Hannah’s 3rdNote: You can mix up the custard ahead of time and store it in the refrigerator for up to 24 hours. When you’re ready to assemble your quiches, all you have to do is whisk it smooth and pour it out from the pitcher. The Quiche Lorraine Filling: 2 cups grated Gruyere cheese (approximately 7 ounces)*** 1 cup diced, well-cooked and drained bacon ½ teaspoon salt ½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper ¼ teaspoon ground cayenne pepper (optional—use if you like it a bit spicy) ¼ teaspoon ground nutmeg (freshly grated is best, of course)   Sprinkle the grated cheese in the bottom of your cooled pie shell.   Spread the cup of diced bacon on top of the cheese.   Sprinkle on the salt, and grind the pepper over the top of the bacon.   Sprinkle on the cayenne pepper (if you decided to use it).   Grate the nutmeg over the top. Put a drip pan under your pie plate. (I line a jellyroll pan with foil and use that.) This will catch any spills that might occur when you fill your quiche with the custard mixture.   Take your custard mixture out of the refrigerator and give it a good whisk. Then pour it over the top of your Quiche Lorraine, filling it about half way.   Open your oven, pull out the rack, and set your pie plate and drip pan on it. Pour in more custard mixture, stopping a quarter-inch short of the rim. Carefully push in the rack, and shut the oven door.   Bake your Quiche Lorraine at 350 degrees F., for 60 minutes, or until the top is nicely browned and a knife inserted one-inch from the center comes out clean.   Let your quiche cool for 15 to 30 minutes on a cold stovetop or a wire rack, and then cut and serve to rave reviews.   This quiche is good warm, but it’s also good at room temperature. (I’ve even eaten it straight out of the refrigerator for breakfast!)

Night, Brinley.” Goodnight? How was I supposed to sleep now? “ ’Night,” I whispered back. I tucked into his chest and he kissed my head. “Hey, Ryder?” My words were muffled by his chest. “Yeah.” “Wanna have sex?” He chuckled. “Yeah. But you have to ask when you’re sober.” I yawned. “How long you think it will take until I’m sober?” He rubbed the top of my head. “Oh, I think we’ll both know the second you are.” ... The blanket tangled around my feet at some point during the night, leaving my legs cold though my body was nice and warm. With my eyes sealed shut, I fumbled for the blanket. My hand came down hard on something. “Son of a bitch.” Ryder groaned and curled in on himself. I shot upright and grabbed my head. “Crap.” Still clinging to his crotch, he moaned. “Geez, I know you’re pissed about the no-sex thing but don’t take it out on the boys.” My body went rigid, but my jaw slacked as I stared down at Ryder. I buried my face in my hands. “Ohmigod. Ohmigod.” I shook my head and prayed I could wake up from this nightmare. Ryder chuckled. “She’s sober.” My head pounded and my stomach soured. Bits and pieces of the previous night replayed. I desperately tried to suppress them. “Anything you want to ask me?” Ryder’s amused tone made me feel angry and humiliated all at once. “I’m game for it now…well, at least, I was. You may have broken something. Should we check to see if everything’s working?” I bolted from the bed. “Shut up. Please. Shut up.” My face burned and I couldn’t even begin to make eye contact with him. “I need…I’m going…” I glanced at him as he tucked his hands behind his head and grinned. “Ugh, I’ll be right back.

Do you want to meet Katherine?” he asked. She lived in Cambridge, her husband a wealthy man. Apparently my father was still chasing the dream of marrying rich, even while being very much married. They’d met at school. Sound familiar? I remember thinking how cruel my grandparents were to judge my father so harshly. But now that I’m an adult, well—I can see that they had their points. Back then, all I knew was that Katherine smelled nice and that she wasn’t crying, and that she gave me Oreos and cold milk and played basketball with me. Her house was big, and there were no bugs in it, at least not that I saw. She showed me her new child, a baby, and I held him.

He stared at me for a long moment as if he was trying to figure me out and I dropped my eyes before he could. I didn’t want Darius Acrux in my head. My attention snagged on a deep red stain on the sleeve of his pristine white shirt and I pointed it out. “Are you bleeding?” I asked. “No,” he replied forcefully before looking down at the offending stain and waving his hand to clear it away with his water magic. “Well that was obviously blood so-” “I said no, just drop it,” he snarled. I flinched back but he didn’t release me and my heart started beating faster. He sighed heavily and shook his head before letting me go. “Sorry, I just... I’m not bleeding now. It’s not an issue.” “Okay...” I took a step back, wondering why I was even talking to him. This was the guy who had tormented me for weeks and he was clearly going to snap right back into asshole mode after tonight. But something about this nice version of Darius kept drawing me in despite my reservations. “Come on, let’s catch up with the others and get back to the Academy,” he urged, offering me his arm again. The anger which had risen in him a moment ago seemed to have gone so I tentatively accepted his arm and we started walking down the driveway and away from his family. “Careful,” I teased. “Someone might think we don’t even hate each other if you don’t release me soon.” We made it to the edge of the pooling light which lit up the front of his house and he drew me into the darkness beyond it. “I never said I hated you,” he murmured, his voice deep as he tugged me around to face him. I looked up at his striking face, the moonlight highlighting his strong jaw and pulling my attention to his mouth for a moment. “Well I really feel sorry for anyone you do hate,” I muttered, pulling my arm out of his grip. He resisted for a moment like he wanted to keep hold of me but gave in when I tugged a little harder. “The things I’ve done to you... you know it isn’t personal, right?” he asked. I looked up at him for several long seconds, wondering if he seriously bought into that horse shit or if it was just what he was trying to sell me. I wasn’t really sure what I saw there but I definitely didn’t buy his excuses. “Is that how you justify it to yourself?” I asked bitterly, our little bubble of peace well and truly burst now that we were standing in the cold air of the night. Darius hesitated and I gave him an eye roll dramatic enough to fell a small tree. I turned away from him, looking for Orion and the stardust which would take us back to the Academy but his fingers curled around my wrist before I could escape. “Do you hate me, then?” he asked quietly and for some strange reason it sounded like the idea of that didn’t sit well with him. I forced myself to reply in a steady tone, holding his eye as I spoke. “No,” I said and a glimmer of relief spilled through his eyes, almost halting me there but I wasn’t quite so blinded by him as to give him a free pass for all his bullshit. “To hate you, I’d have to care about you. And I don’t give one shit about you,” I said coldly. I shook his hand off of me for the second time and stalked away towards Darcy and Orion. He didn’t follow me and I was glad. Because I had the horrible feeling that that might just have been a lie.(toy)

She was an ogre, clad only in a short, ragged tunic in spite of the damp. “Are you cold?” Daine asked. “We have a horse blanket somewhere.” She found one and offered it to the immortal. “I said Daine would welcome her,” Maura informed Tkaa. To Daine she added, “Iakoju’s our friend. She wants to help us get rid of Yolane and Tristan.” Iakoju stared at the blanket, pointed ears twitching back and forth. At last she took it. “Thank you,” she said quietly, and bowed from the waist. Maura helped the ogre drape the blanket around her shoulders. “She’s running away,” the ten-year-old explained. Placid eyes met Daine’s without blinking. Despite skinniness and poor clothes Iakoju was clean, and smelled of soap, earth, and something vaguely spicy. Daine sniffed, trying to identify the spice odor. “Are you eating something?” Iakoju smiled. “Maura give me candy.” Maura blushed. “Well, she looked so scared when I found her, and I remembered what you said, about people being mean to them and maybe if somebody was nice…

I've thought about that often since. I mean, about the word nice. Perhaps I mean good. Of course they mean nothing, when you start to think about them. A good man, one says; a good woman; a nice man, a nice woman. Only in talk of course, these are not words you'd use in a novel. I'd be careful not to use them. Yet of that group, I will say simply, without further analysis, that George was a good person, and that Willi was not. That Maryrose and Jimmy and Ted and Johnnie the pianist were good people, and that Paul and Stanley Lett were not. And furthermore, I'd bet that ten people picked at random off the street to meet them, or invited to sit in that party under the eucalyptus trees that night, would instantly agree with this classification-would, if I used the word good, simply like that, know what I meant. And thinking about this, which I have done so much, I discover that I come around, by a back door, to another of the things that obsess me. I mean, of course, this question of 'personality.' Heaven knows we are never allowed to forget that the 'personality' doesn't exist any more. It's the theme of half the novels written, the theme of the sociologists and all the other -ologists. We're told so often that human personality has disintegrated into nothing under pressure of all our knowledge that I've even been believing it. Yet when I look back to that group under the trees, and re-create them in my memory,suddenly I know it's nonsense. Suppose I were to meet Maryrose now, all these years later,she'd make some gesture, or turn her eyes in such a way, and there she'd be, Maryrose, and indestructible. Or suppose she 'broke down,' or became mad. She would break down into her components, and the gesture, the movement of the eyes would remain, even though some connection had gone. And so all this talk, this antihumanist bullying, about the evaporation of the personality becomes meaningless for me at that point when I manufacture enough emotional energy inside myself to create in memory some human being I've known. I sit down, and remember the smell of the dust and the moonlight, and see Ted handing a glass of wine to George, and George's over-grateful response to the gesture. Or I see, as in a slow-motion film, Maryrose turn her head, with her terrifyingly patient smile... I've written the word film. Yes. The moments I remember all have the absolute assurance of a smile, a look, a gesture, in a painting or a film. Am I saying then that the certainty I'm clinging to belongs to the visual arts, and not to the novel, not to the novel at all, which has been claimed by the disintegration and the collapse? What business has a novelist to cling to the memory of a smile or a look, knowing I so well the complexities behind them? Yet if I did not, I'd never be able to set a word down on paper; just as I used to keep myself from going crazy in this cold northern city by deliberately making myself remember the quality of hot sunlight on my skin. And so I'll write again that George was a good man.

There are many types of teachers out there from many traditions. Some are very ordinary and some seem to radiate spirituality from every pore. Some are nice, some are indifferent, and some may seem like sergeants in boot camp. Some stress reliance on one’s own efforts, others stress reliance on the grace of the guru. Some are very available and accessible, and some may live far away, grant few interviews, or have so many students vying for their time that you may rarely get a chance to talk with them. Some seem to embody the highest ideals of the perfected spiritual life in their every waking moment, while others may have many noticeable quirks, faults and failings. Some live by rigid moral codes, while others may push the boundaries of social conventions and mores. Some may be very old, and some may be very young. Some may require strict commitments and obedience, while others may hardly seem to care what we do at all. Some may advocate very specific practices, stating that their way is the only way or the best way, while others may draw from many traditions or be open to your doing so. Some may point out our successes, while others may dwell on our failures. Some may stress renunciation or even ordination into a monastic order, while others seem relentlessly engaged with “the world.” Some charge a bundle for their teachings, while others give theirs freely. Some like scholarship and the lingo of meditation, while others may never use or even openly despise these formal terms and conceptual frameworks. Some teachers may be more like friends or equals that just want to help us learn something they happened to be good at, while others may be all into the hierarchy, status and role of being a teacher. Some teachers will speak openly about attainments, and some may not. Some teachers are remarkably predictable in their manner and teaching style, while others swing wide in strange and unpredictable ways. Some may seem very tranquil and mild mannered, while others may seem outrageous or rambunctious. Some may seem extremely humble and unimposing, while others may seem particularly arrogant and presumptuous. Some are charismatic, while others may be distinctly lacking in social skills. Some may readily give us extensive advice, and some just listen and nod. Some seem the living embodiment of love, and others may piss us off on a regular basis. Some teachers may instantly click with us, while others just leave us cold. Some teachers may be willing to teach us, and some may not. So far as I can tell, none of these are related in any way to their meditation ability or the depths of their understanding. That is, don’t judge a meditation teacher by their cover. What is important is that their style and personality inspire us to practice well, to live the life we want to live, to find what it is we wish to find, to understand what we wish to understand. Some of us may wander for a long time before we find a good fit. Some of us will turn to books for guidance, reading and practicing without the advantages or hassles of teachers. Some of us may seem to click with a practice or teacher, try to follow it for years and yet get nowhere. Others seem to fly regardless. One of the most interesting things about reality is that we get to test it out. One way or another, we will get to see what works for us and what doesn’t, what happens when we do certain practices or follow the advice of certain teachers, as well as what happens when we don’t.

Katie Carlton, how many times do I have to tell you to stop twisting that hair?” Mrs. Carlton sighed as she got up and went to the refrigerator. Timing, Matt was thinking. It’s all a matter of timing. Quickly he reached over and took the lid off the sugar bowl, then dropped in all the peas from his dish. He placed the lid back on a second before his mother returned to the table. Then he glanced back at Katie, whose mouth had dropped open as she stared at the sugar bowl. “Oh, great,” Matt moaned to himself, giving her a hard cold stare, but Katie had begun to giggle. Mr. Carlton got off the phone and returned to the table. He picked up his glass of iced tea. “Honey, did you want more sugar for that?” Mrs. Carlton asked, passing the sugar bowl to her husband. Mr. Carlton took the sugar bowl and placed it beside his plate. “Um, no, I think I’m fine,” he said. Katie was unable to suppress herself, and before too long was doubled over in her seat, giggling. “And just what is all that about, Katherine?” Mrs. Carlton asked, looking over at Katie. “Nothing, Mom,” Matt reassured her. “You know how silly she gets when she starts to play with her food. She was just making the noodles wiggle on her plate like worms. Weren’t you, Katie?” Matt pinched her arm from under the table. “Ow!” Katie said, lifting her arm and pointing to the sugar bowl. “How would you like to come camping with our club tonight, Katie?” Matt blurted out. He was desperate. He couldn’t risk his parents handing out any punishments tonight. He could just imagine having to explain to the guys that their president couldn’t make the first adventure of their club because his parents were punishing him for filling the sugar bowl with peas! Katie quickly put down her arm and beamed with delight. “Oh, boy, I’m going camping with Matt!” “That’s good of you to include your sister.” Mr. Carlton smiled at Matt. “Yes, it’s very nice of you.” Mrs. Carlton smiled. In fact everyone was smiling, everyone except Matt. Great, he thought to himself. My first adventure with the club and I have to drag along a girl! A seven-year-old baby girl! He glared at Katie, who grinned back, giving one of her curls a twist.

BACK AT THE railway station, Ivan Grigoryevich began to feel that there was no point in wandering about Leningrad any longer. He stood inside the cold, high building and pondered. And it is possible that one or two of the people who passed the gloomy old man looking up at the black departures board may have thought, ‘There – a Russian from the camps, a man at a crossroads, contemplating, choosing which path to follow.’ But he was not choosing a path; he was thinking. During the course of his life dozens of interrogators had understood that he was neither a monarchist, nor a Social Revolutionary, nor a Social Democrat; that he had never been part of either the Trotskyist or the Bukharinist opposition. He had never been an Orthodox Christian or an Old Believer; nor was he a Seventh Day Adventist. There in the station, thinking about the painful days he had just spent in Moscow and Leningrad, he remembered a conversation with a tsarist artillery general who had at one time slept next to him on the bed boards of a camp barrack. The old man had said, ‘I’m not leaving the camp to go anywhere else. It’s warm in here. There are people I know. Now and again someone gives me a lump of sugar, or a bit of pie from a food parcel.’ He had met such old men more than once. They had lost all desire to leave the camp. It was their home. They were fed at regular hours. Kind comrades sometimes gave them little scraps. There was the warmth of the stove. Where indeed were they to go? In the calcified depths of their hearts some of them stored memories of the brilliance of the chandeliers in the palaces of Tsarskoye Selo,37 or of the winter sun in Nice. Others remembered their neighbour, Mendeleyev, coming round to drink tea with them; or they remembered Scriabin, Repin or the young Blok. Others preserved, beneath ash that was still warm, the memories of Plekhanov, Gershuni and Trigoni, of friends of the great Zhelyabov. There had been instances of old men being released from a camp and asking to be readmitted. The whirl of life outside had knocked them off their feet. Their legs were weak and trembling, and they had been terrified by the cold and the solitude of the vast cities. Now Ivan Grigoryevich felt like going back again behind the barbed wire himself. He wanted to seek out those who had grown so accustomed to their barrack stoves, so at home with their warm rags and their bowls of thin gruel. He wanted to say to them, ‘Yes, freedom really is terrifying.’ And he would have told these frail old men how he had visited a close relative, how he had stood outside the home of the woman he loved, how he had bumped into a comrade from his student days who had offered to help him. And then he would have gone on to say to these old men of the camps that there is no higher happiness than to leave the camp, even blind and legless, to creep out of the camp on one’s stomach and die – even only ten yards from that accursed barbed w

windfalls in the orchard; the boy told you he’d had the Sandersons’ permission, but you went on . . . well, you know what happened better than meself.’ By now they had reached the road and Scotty gave a bark of laughter. ‘They’ve fooled you nicely, I can see,’ he said derisively. ‘They’d say anything to keep Millie and me apart.’ ‘Shut up,’ Martin said brusquely. ‘You’ve told me a grosh o’ lies . . . just shut your mouth, d’you hear me?’ The journey back to Rhyl was largely conducted in silence, but when they were in the train once more Martin spoke, though coldly. ‘When we get home, you can find yourself different lodgings because there’s no point in even pretending that I want to be in your

Death hit people differently. She was getting by. He had all but given up. There was no middle ground as woman. She was used to it, but it still pissed her off. Frigid, or a slag. Girly, or one of the boys. Hrad, or emotionally unstable. When USA sneezed , the UK caught the cold. Her face was often difficult to read, but at that moment it told him whatever McEvoy found Margie Knight o not, she'd tear every dodgy sauna, massage parlour and tin-pot knocking shop in the city apart trying. It might have been a few minutes, it might have been an hour, when he heard Holland's voice... The mood she is in right now, Holland, if you're so much as suggest that it might be her time of the month, I'm guessing she'll kill you on the spot. I think the poison inside me has eaten away every ounce of courage there might ever have been. I need to find just a little more. "Look, I'm getting tired of saying sorry" "Well I'm not tired of hearing you say it, OK?" Maybe they bred them somewhere, taught then how to put their hair in a bun and look down their pointed noses, before sending them out into the world with a pair of bug glasses, a fondness for tweed and something uncomfortable up their backside. "I'm going to kill Holland. No, I'm going to make him listen to some proper country music and then I'm going to kill him." "Actually, fuck that, the music would be wasted on him anyway. I'll just kill him." "fuckfuckbullocksfuck..." "What? I make you sick? I make you want to hurt me?" "You knock, you wait, you get asked to come in, you come in. It's pretty bloody straightforward." ...sat at home like Tom Throne, trying to keep the rest of the world well away. Police officer and prison staff are old enemies. The finders and the keepers resenting each other. 'Everybody says it switches around when you get old and they have to look after you. The parent becomes the child...It's non sense though., it really is. Even when they're cooking for you and getting your shopping in, you know? Even when they're doing up the buttons on your pyjamas and pretending to listen to your stupid stories, even when they're wiping your arse, you're still the father--It never stops, never. You're still the father and he's still the son. Still the son...' A thin layer across the top of the cistern in the ladies, invisible unless used in some of the more drugs-conscious clubs. ...Depending on how it looks, thy either do nothing, or break it again, re-set it.' 'Do they need volunteers?' "Don't talk to me. Not like that, do you understand? Not 'are you all right?' Not 'sorry'..." "I don't..." "Talk to me like a murdered." Holland couldn't believe what he was hearing. Palmer? 'Sorry?' Throne shouted. 'Fucking sorry...?' 'Shut your fucking stupid cunt's mouth. I will kill you, is that clear? I'm not afraid, certainly not of you. I don't care what happens. He can shoot the pair of us, I don't give a fuck. But if I hear so much as a breath coming out of you before this is finished, a single poisonous whisper, I'll rip your face off with my bare hands. I'll take it clean off, Nicklin, I'll make you another nice, new identity...