Scrub Dress Quotes

Because the purpose of feminism isn’t to make a particular type of woman. The idea that there are inherently wrong and inherently right “types” of women is what’s screwed feminism for so long — this belief that “we” wouldn’t accept slaggy birds, dim birds, birds that bitch, birds that hire cleaners, birds that stay at home with their kids, birds that have pink Mini Metros with POWERED BY FAIRY DUST! bumper stickers, birds in burkas or birds that like to pretend, in their heads, that they’re married to Zach Braff from Scrubs and that you sometimes have sex in an ambulance while the rest of the cast watch and, latterly, clap. You know what? Feminism will have all of you. What is feminism? Simply the belief that women should be as free as men, however nuts, dim, deluded, badly dressed, fat, receding, lazy and smug they might be. Are you a feminist? Hahaha. Of course you are.

In his rearview mirror, I saw something flash in his eyes. "You want to know?" he sneered. "Let me imagine, Agha sahib. You probably lived in a big two- or three-story house with a nice backyard that your gardener filled with flowers and fruit trees. All gated, of course. Your father drove an American car. You had servants, probably Hazaras. Your parents hired workers to decorate the house for the fancy mehmanis they threw, so their friends would come over to drink and boast about their travels to Europe or America. And I would bet my first son's eyes that this is the first time you've ever worn a pakol." He grinned at me, revealing a mouthful of prematurely rotting teeth. "Am I close?" Why are you saying these things?" I said. Because you wanted to know," he spat. He pointed to an old man dressed in ragged clothes trudging down a dirt path, a large burlap pack filled with scrub grass tied to his back. "That's the real Afghanistan, Agha sahib. That's the Afghanistan I know. You? You've always been a tourist here, you just didn't know it.

From across the dark bedroom, Lassiter stood in the corner next to the highboy, feeling like crap while Tohr whispered to the dress. Scrubbing his face, he wondered why … why in the hell, of all the ways he could have gotten free of the In Between, did it have to be this one. The shit was starting to get to him.

A young woman stood in the hallway, a suitcase at her feet, a cardboard carton in her hands. She wore a yellow cotton dress with a white flower print. The silver dragonfly on her necklace hung in the hollow of her collarbone and her thick red hair cascaded past her sunburned shoulders. She will tell you that she hadn't chosen that dress with any care, or the necklace, that she hadn't washed her hair or scrubbed her face, put a little red on her lips. Don't believe it. No one looks that good by accident.

There was music from my neighbor's house through the summer nights. In his blue gardens men and girls came and went like moths among the whisperings and the champagne and the stars. At high tide in the afternoon I watched his guests diving from the tower of his raft, or taking the sun on the hot sand of his beach while his two motor-boats slit the waters of the Sound, drawing aquaplanes over cataracts of foam. On week-ends his Rolls-Royce became an omnibus, bearing parties to and from the city between nine in the morning and long past midnight, while his station wagon scampered like a brisk yellow bug to meet all trains. And on Mondays eight servants, including an extra gardener, toiled all day with mops and scrubbing-brushes and hammers and garden-shears, repairing the ravages of the night before. Every Friday five crates of oranges and lemons arrived from a fruiterer in New York--every Monday these same oranges and lemons left his back door in a pyramid of pulpless halves. There was a machine in the kitchen which could extract the juice of two hundred oranges in half an hour if a little button was pressed two hundred times by a butler's thumb. At least once a fortnight a corps of caterers came down with several hundred feet of canvas and enough colored lights to make a Christmas tree of Gatsby's enormous garden. On buffet tables, garnished with glistening hors-d'oeuvre, spiced baked hams crowded against salads of harlequin designs and pastry pigs and turkeys bewitched to a dark gold. In the main hall a bar with a real brass rail was set up, and stocked with gins and liquors and with cordials so long forgotten that most of his female guests were too young to know one from another. By seven o'clock the orchestra has arrived, no thin five-piece affair, but a whole pitful of oboes and trombones and saxophones and viols and cornets and piccolos, and low and high drums. The last swimmers have come in from the beach now and are dressing up-stairs; the cars from New York are parked five deep in the drive, and already the halls and salons and verandas are gaudy with primary colors, and hair shorn in strange new ways, and shawls beyond the dreams of Castile. The bar is in full swing, and floating rounds of cocktails permeate the garden outside, until the air is alive with chatter and laughter, and casual innuendo and introductions forgotten on the spot, and enthusiastic meetings between women who never knew each other's names. The lights grow brighter as the earth lurches away from the sun, and now the orchestra is playing yellow cocktail music, and the opera of voices pitches a key higher. Laughter is easier minute by minute, spilled with prodigality, tipped out at a cheerful word. The groups change more swiftly, swell with new arrivals, dissolve and form in the same breath; already there are wanderers, confident girls who weave here and there among the stouter and more stable, become for a sharp, joyous moment the centre of a group, and then, excited with triumph, glide on through the sea-change of faces and voices and color under the constantly changing light. Suddenly one of the gypsies, in trembling opal, seizes a cocktail out of the air, dumps it down for courage and, moving her hands like Frisco, dances out alone on the canvas platform. A momentary hush; the orchestra leader varies his rhythm obligingly for her, and there is a burst of chatter as the erroneous news goes around that she is Gilda Gray's understudy from the FOLLIES. The party has begun.

A BRAVE AND STARTLING TRUTH We, this people, on a small and lonely planet Traveling through casual space Past aloof stars, across the way of indifferent suns To a destination where all signs tell us It is possible and imperative that we learn A brave and startling truth And when we come to it To the day of peacemaking When we release our fingers From fists of hostility And allow the pure air to cool our palms When we come to it When the curtain falls on the minstrel show of hate And faces sooted with scorn are scrubbed clean When battlefields and coliseum No longer rake our unique and particular sons and daughters Up with the bruised and bloody grass To lie in identical plots in foreign soil When the rapacious storming of the churches The screaming racket in the temples have ceased When the pennants are waving gaily When the banners of the world tremble Stoutly in the good, clean breeze When we come to it When we let the rifles fall from our shoulders And children dress their dolls in flags of truce When land mines of death have been removed And the aged can walk into evenings of peace When religious ritual is not perfumed By the incense of burning flesh And childhood dreams are not kicked awake By nightmares of abuse When we come to it Then we will confess that not the Pyramids With their stones set in mysterious perfection Nor the Gardens of Babylon Hanging as eternal beauty In our collective memory Not the Grand Canyon Kindled into delicious color By Western sunsets Nor the Danube, flowing its blue soul into Europe Not the sacred peak of Mount Fuji Stretching to the Rising Sun Neither Father Amazon nor Mother Mississippi who, without favor, Nurture all creatures in the depths and on the shores These are not the only wonders of the world When we come to it We, this people, on this minuscule and kithless globe Who reach daily for the bomb, the blade and the dagger Yet who petition in the dark for tokens of peace We, this people on this mote of matter In whose mouths abide cankerous words Which challenge our very existence Yet out of those same mouths Come songs of such exquisite sweetness That the heart falters in its labor And the body is quieted into awe We, this people, on this small and drifting planet Whose hands can strike with such abandon That in a twinkling, life is sapped from the living Yet those same hands can touch with such healing, irresistible tenderness That the haughty neck is happy to bow And the proud back is glad to bend Out of such chaos, of such contradiction We learn that we are neither devils nor divines When we come to it We, this people, on this wayward, floating body Created on this earth, of this earth Have the power to fashion for this earth A climate where every man and every woman Can live freely without sanctimonious piety Without crippling fear When we come to it We must confess that we are the possible We are the miraculous, the true wonder of this world That is when, and only when We come to it.

She laughed, and I noted how different she was from the first night I'd met her. It was almost as though her uniform had the ability to transform her personality. But then I realized that the same was true about me. In a lab coat or scrubs, I was one person; dressed like a yachtsman, I was someone different. (p. 97, Trevor Benson)

I’ve learned to make really quick decisions that shape the future in a positive way. One talent that I bring to the table is my ability to insult the clothing. For example, “the colors of those pants look like hospital scrubs” or “the shape of that dress is for a toddler.” This ability has served me well and has probably saved the customer from some questionable choices.

It was Southern, therefore, to put it brutally, because of the history of America—the United States of America: and small black boys and girls were now paying for this holocaust. They were attempting to go to school. They were attempting to get an education, in a country in which education is a synonym for indoctrination, if you are white, and subjugation, if you are black. It was rather as though small Jewish boys and girls, in Hitler’s Germany, insisted on getting a German education in order to overthrow the Third Reich. Here they were, nevertheless, scrubbed and shining, in their never-to-be-forgotten stiff little dresses, in their never-to-be-forgotten little blue suits, facing an army, facing a citizenry, facing white fathers, facing white mothers, facing the progeny of these co-citizens, facing the white past, to say nothing of the white present: small soldiers, armed with stiff, white dresses, and long or short dark blue pants, entering a leper colony, and young enough to believe that the colony could be healed, and saved. They paid a dreadful price, those children, for their missionary work among the heathen.

I headed to the church at five-thirty, wearing jeans, flip-flops, and brick red lipstick. My mom, calm and cool as a mountain lake, carried my white dress--plain and romantic, with a bodice that laced up corset-style in the back and delicate sheer sleeves. I carted in my shoes…my earrings…my makeup…and my exfoliating scrub, in case my face decided to pull a last-minute sloughing. I wasn’t about to roll over and take a last-minute sloughing without a fight. Not on my wedding day.

We could scrub the floor for a tired friend, or dress a wound for a patient in a hospital, or lay the table and wash up for the family; but we shall not do it in martyr spirit or with that worse spirit of self-congratulation, of feeling that we are making ourselves more perfect, more unselfish, more positively kind. We shall do it just for one thing, that our hands make Christ's hands in our life, that our service may let Christ serve through us, that our patience may bring Christ's patience back to the world.

Then she dove into the morning cleaning. There weren't many rooms in the tower, which made it easy, but she liked to be thorough. Sweep, mop, polish. The garderobe and her mirror got sparkly from scrubbing with a bit of vinegar (a trick she learned from Book #14: Useful Recipes for Master Servants). She transferred a day dress that was soaking in a soapy bucket to a clean water bucket, scrubbing out the bit of lingonberry juice stain from breakfast on Monday. 7:00: Personal ablutions. She washed her face and nails and applied cream to her cuticles and everywhere on her face but the T-zone, which was, despite her fairy-tale beauty, just a tad prone to breaking out. 8:00: Reading. She (re)read Book #26, Sidereus Nuncius by Galileo. More a pamphlet than a book, but it counted. 8:30: Art! Lacking a proper canvas (or piece of wall space) she chose to spend her painting time decorating the mop handle. It might not be dry enough to actually use the next day, but that was all right. Birthday weeks meant the occasional break from routine-- that was part of the fun!

When the music stopped, the curtains to their booth flew open. Jax, the devastatingly handsome Nordic wolf, leered down on the lovers, who smiled up at him in amusement. “I said pretend to be her mate. At any point, did you hear me say, ‘Come up to New York and fuck my sister in public…during one of my company events?’ Did I say that? I really don’t recall saying that.” Jax scrubbed his fingers over his tightly cropped hair. He moved to the balcony, overlooking the patrons who were shuffling into the lobby for the intermission. “Sorry.” Dimitri laughed. He knew that they should have been slightly less conspicuous but the draw of his mate had been too much to resist. “Sorry? Really? That’s all you’ve got?” He turned to Gillian, who scrambled up to her feet, adjusting her dress. “And you? What’s your excuse, little sister? Seriously, every shifter in the room could hear you.” “Um, well, yeah, sorry about that. But technically this is your fault. I mean, what did you expect? You asked Dimitri to come here…to pretend to be my mate.” Gillian reasoned that her comeback sounded solid, inexperienced in dealing with her Alpha brother.

Mary Atkins pruned herselves in the mirrage, running her hand wantanly through her large blond hair. Her tight dress was cut low revealingly three or four blackheads, carefully scrubbed on her chess. She addled the final touches to her makeup and fixed her teeth firmly in her head. “He's going to want me tonight” she thought and pictured his hamsome black curly face and jaundice. She looked at her clocks impatiently and went to the window, then leapt into her favorite armchurch, picking up the paper she glassed at the headlines. Мери Аткинс се офглеждаше в отлетялото, като съблажнинително прокарваше ръка през огромната си руса коса. Прилепналата й рокля имаше дълбоко изрязано голямо доколкоте, разкройвающо три или четири бенки, наместени внимателно по гърдите й. Тя положи последните краски от грима си и много внимателно намести зъбите в главата си. «Той ще ме пожелава тази нощ!» — замисли се Мери Аткинс и си представи неговото прасиво черно къдресто лице и мезествеността му. Погледна нетърпеливо към своите стенни чиновници и отиде до прозореца, След това склокочи в любимия си бутьойл, грабна врестника и прегледа заглавията.

Curiously enough, though, it was Jeanette who came home one day with a C on a test. Prior to that, B was the lowest grade any of us had gotten, and even a B caused Mommy to shake her head and ask, 'Did anyone in the class get an A? Then you can get an A, too. You just have to study harder.' But this time she looked at the C on Jeanette's paper and said nothing. Wasn't she going to lay into Jeanette? Was Doc so special that she could get away with anything? The rest of us were stunned. I, for one, resolved that if that's the way it was going to be, I was darned if I was going to work so hard at studying from then on. Then Saturday came. Mommy roused Jeanette at 6:00 A.M., told her to dress in old clothes, and ordered her to the kitchen, where she handed Jeanette a bucket and scrub clothes. 'You and I are going to clean the kitchen from top to bottom,' Mommy announced. 'I'm going to teach you how to do it and do every bit of it right because that's what you're going to be doing for a living when you grow up'. Jeanette was outraged. 'I'm going to be a doctor'! 'Anybody who gets a C on a test is either too dumb or too lazy to be a doctor. You're going to end up working in somebody's kitchen, so you'd better know how to do it. Now, start by scouring the oven. And I want it spotless'.

Without electricity or gas, the kitchen became a twilight mausoleum of dead appliances. One day, Natasha had an idea. Wearing latex gloves she found in Sonja’s room, she scrubbed the innards of the oven and refrigerator with steel wool and bleach. She cut a broomstick to the width of the refrigerator compartment, jammed it in below the thermostat control, and pulled out the plastic shelves. In her bedroom, she gathered clothes from the floor in sweeping armfuls and deposited them before the refrigerator and the oven. Ever since she had begun working for the shuttle trader, her wardrobe exceeded her closet space. She hung silk evening dresses and cashmere sweaters on the broomstick bar, set folded jeans and blouses on the oven rack. When finished, she opened the doors to her new closet and bureau and felt pleased with her ingenuity. This is how you will survive, she told herself. You will turn the holes in your life into storage space.

Consider the average worker in almost any urban industrialized city. The alarm rings at six forty-five and our workingman or -woman is up and at it. Check the phone. Shower. Dress in the professional uniform—suits for some, coveralls for others, scrubs for the medical professionals, jeans and T-shirts for construction workers. Breakfast, if there’s time. Grab commuter mug and briefcase (or lunch box). Hop in the car for the daily punishment called rush hour or get on a bus or train packed crushingly tight. On the job from nine to five (or longer). Deal with the boss. Deal with the coworker sent by the devil to rub you the wrong way. Deal with suppliers. Deal with clients/customers/patients. E-mails pile up. Act busy. Scroll through social media feeds. Hide mistakes. Smile when handed impossible deadlines. Give a sigh of relief when the ax known as “restructuring” or “downsizing”—or just plain getting laid off—falls on other heads. Shoulder the added workload. Watch the clock. Argue with your conscience but agree with the boss. Smile again. Five o’clock. Back in the car or on the bus or train for the evening commute. Home. Act human with your partner, kids, or roommates. Cook. Post a picture of your dinner online. Eat. Watch an episode of your favorite show. Answer one last e-mail. Bed. Eight hours of blessed oblivion—if we’re lucky.

I ran into him at the library one other time, with my mother, as he was coming out and we were walking past on our way to the post office. He tipped his hat to her, and she nodded, and though I wanted to tell my mother who he was, my stomach went cold, and all I managed was a meek hello. For the rest of the afternoon I felt like crying without knowing why. It wasn’t until later that I realized that I couldn’t picture Dr. Young walking into Mr. Awad’s store—how could I, when Mr. Awad warns us to always check for the back of a cloche hat or a curl of yellow hair before we step out to dress a mannequin, so that the American women won’t see our dirty hands? The white Americans might be ajanib, but my parents say we’re white, too, or we must be something close to it if we are both Christians, and I think they really believe that if we keep our noses in our work, a day will come when we’ll earn more than their disdain. In the meantime, my mother whispers about the widow Haddad and scrubs my face with turmeric, and my father warns me against dating like the American girls, saying, Do you know how hard we worked to get you here? Neither of them know what Mrs. Theodore taught me about my color in the back of that Rolls-Royce. In that moment with my mother and Dr. Young, little wing, when I felt the cold drip of fear in my stomach, I realized that an infinite number of moments had instilled in me a reflex as potent and inescapable as a sneeze. It was like seeing the shape of something large coming toward you in the dark.

I picked her up and carried her down the hall to the bathroom, just a pitiful skeleton with skin stretched over the top and a great red scar across her chest. She sank onto the plastic seat we had got from the hospital and closed her eyes as I washed her, leaning her poor bald head back exhaustedly against the back of the shower cubicle. "I'll just change the sheets," I said, "I won't be a minute - would you rather sit under the water, or shall I turn it off and wrap you up in a towel ?" "Under the water," she whispered. I had to strip the bed entirely, and two of the pillows were saturated. I replaced them with pillows from my bed, and while I was at it my duvet as well. Then I propped the poor woman up against the bathroom sink to dry and dress her, picked her up and carried her back to bed. Never have I been so grateful to be, after all, a strapping wench rather than a delicate wisp of a girl. As I pulled the covers up under her chin she opened her eyes, looked at me sternly and said with nearly her old decision, "This is not the way I wish to be remembered, Josephine." "I know," I whispered, the tears spilling unchecked down my cheeks. Nurses are supposed to be bright and matter-of-fact about these things: my bracing professional manner left a lot to be desired. "I'll get you some dinner." "No," she said. "Just my pills, love." Back in the kitchen I stood for a moment in a trance of indecision, wondering where the hell to start. It didn't really matter - when you're overcome with lethargy you just have to do something. And then the next thing, and then the next, and eventually, although you'd have sworn you were far too tired and depressed to accomplish anything, you're finished. I turned on the tap about the big concrete sink by the back door and began to scrub sheets and blankets.

Ella.” The sound was so quiet, I barely heard it through the blood-rush in my ears. I turned to look down the hallway. A man was coming toward me, his lean form clad in a pair of baggy scrub pants and a loose T-shirt. His arm was bandaged with silver-gray burn wrap. I knew the set of those shoulders, the way he moved. Jack. My eyes blurred, and I felt my pulse escalate to a painful throbbing. I began to shake from the effects of trying to encompass too much feeling, too fast. “Is it you?” I choked. “Yes. Yes. God, Ella . . .” I was breaking down, every breath shattering. I gripped my elbows with my hands, crying harder as Jack drew closer. I couldn’t move. I was terrified that I was hallucinating, conjuring an image of what I wanted most, that if I reached out I would find nothing but empty space. But Jack was there, solid and real, reaching around me with hard, strong arms. The contact with him was electrifying. I flattened against him, unable to get close enough. He murmured as I sobbed against his chest. “Ella . . . sweetheart, it’s all right. Don’t cry. Don’t . . .” But the relief of touching him, being close to him, had caused me to unravel. Not too late. The thought spurred a rush of euphoria. Jack was alive, and whole, and I would take nothing for granted ever again. I fumbled beneath the hem of his T-shirt and found the warm skin of his back. My fingertips encountered the edge of another bandage. He kept his arms firmly around me as if he understood that I needed the confining pressure, the feel of him surrounding me as our bodies relayed silent messages. Don’t let go. I’m right here. Tremors kept running along my entire frame. My teeth chattered, making it hard to talk. “I th-thought you might not come back.” Jack’s mouth, usually so soft, was rough and chapped against my cheek, his jaw scratchy with bristle. “I’ll always come back to you.” His voice was hoarse. I hid my face against his neck, breathing him in. His familiar scent had been obliterated by the antiseptic pungency of antiseptic burn dressings, and heavy saltwater brine. “Where are you hurt?” Sniffling, I reached farther over his back, investigating the extent of the bandage. His fingers tangled in the smooth, soft locks of my hair. “Just a few burns and scrapes. Nothing to worry about.” I felt his cheek tauten with a smile. “All your favorite parts are still there.” We were both quiet for a moment. I realized he was trembling, too. “I love you, Jack,” I said, and that started a whole new rush of tears, because I was so unholy glad to be able to say it to him. “I thought it was too late . . . I thought you’d never know, because I was a coward, and I’m so—” “I knew.” Jack sounded shaken. He drew back to look down at me with glittering bloodshot eyes. “You did?” I sniffled. He nodded. “I figured I couldn’t love you as much as I do, without you feeling something for me, too.” He kissed me roughly, the contact between our mouths too hard for pleasure. I put my fingers to Jack’s bristled jaw and eased his face away to look at him. He was battered and scraped and sun-scorched. I couldn’t begin to imagine how dehydrated he was. I pointed an unsteady finger at the waiting room. “Your family’s in there. Why are you in the hallway?” My bewildered gaze swept down his body to his bare feet. “They’re . . . they’re letting you walk around like this?” Jack shook his head. “They parked me in a room around the corner to wait for a couple more tests. I asked if anyone had told you I was okay, and nobody knew for sure. So I came to find you.” “You just left when you’re supposed to be having more tests?” “I had to find you.” His voice was quiet but unyielding.

Activities to Develop the Auditory System Simplify your language. Speak slowly, shorten your comments, abbreviate instructions, and repeat what you have said. Reinforce verbal messages with gestural communication: facial expressions, hand movements, and body language. Talk to your child while she dresses, eats, or bathes, to teach her words and concepts, such as nouns (sunglasses, casserole), body parts (thumb, buttocks), prepositions (around, through), adjectives (juicy, soapy), time (yesterday, later), categories (vegetables/fruits), actions (zip, scrub), and emotions (pleased, sorry). Share your own thoughts. Model good speech and communication skills. Even if the child has trouble responding verbally, she may understand what you say. Take the time to let your child respond to your words and express his thoughts. Don’t interrupt, rush, or pressure him to talk. Be an active listener. Pay attention. Look your child in the eye when she speaks. Show her that her thoughts interest you. Help your child communicate more clearly. If you catch one word, say, “Tell me more about the truck.” If you can’t catch his meaning, have him show you by gesturing. Reward her comments with smiles, hugs, and verbal praise, such as, “That’s a great idea!” Your positive feedback will encourage her to strive to communicate. (Don’t say, “Good talking,” which means little to the child and implies that all you care about is words, rather than the message the child is trying to get across.) Use rhythm and beat to improve the child’s memory. Give directions or teach facts with a “piggyback song,” substituting your words to a familiar tune. Example: To the tune of “Mary Had a Little Lamb,” sing, “Now it’s time to wash your face, Brush your teeth, comb your hair, Now it’s time to put on clothes, So start with underwear!” Encourage your child to pantomime while listening to stories and poems, or to music without words. Read to your child every day!

glory.” “Use me?” The memory returned to him of thinking that, but about Rand, that the Aes Sedai meant to use Rand, not him. They’ve no bloody use for me. Light, they can’t have! “What do you mean? I’m no one important. I am no use to anyone but myself. What kind of glory?” “I knew that would pull you. You, above all.” Her smile made his head spin. He scrubbed a hand through his hair. The blanket slipped, and he caught it hastily before it could fall. “Now listen, they are not interested in me.” What about me sounding the Horn? “I am just a farmer.” Maybe they think I’m tied to Rand in some way. No, Verin said. . . . He was not sure what Verin had said, or Moiraine, but he thought most Aes Sedai knew nothing at all about Rand. He wanted to keep it that way, at least until he was a long way gone. “Just a simple country man. I only want to see a little of the world and go back to my da’s farm.” What does she mean, glory? Selene shook her head as if she had heard his thoughts. “You are more important than you yet know. Certainly more important than these so-called Aes Sedai know. You can have glory, if you know enough not to trust them.” “You certainly sound as if you don’t trust them.” So-called? A thought came to him, but he could not manage to say it. “Are you a . . . ? Are you . . . ?” It was not the kind of thing you accused someone of. “A Darkfriend?” Selene said mockingly. She sounded amused, not angered. She sounded contemptuous. “One of those pathetic followers of Ba’alzamon who think he will give them immortality and power? I follow no one. There is one man I could stand beside, but I do not follow.” Mat laughed nervously. “Of course not.” Blood and ashes, a Darkfriend wouldn’t name herself Darkfriend. Probably has a poisoned knife, if she is. He had a vague memory of a woman dressed as one nobly born, a Darkfriend with a deadly dagger in her slender hand. “That wasn’t what I meant at all. You look. . . . You look like a queen. That’s what I meant. Are you a Lady?” “Mat, Mat, you must learn to trust me. Oh, I will use you, too—you have too suspicious a nature, especially since carrying that dagger, for me to deny it—but my use will gain you wealth, and power, and glory. I will not compel you. I have always believed men perform better if convinced rather than forced.

It was a secret thing from the first. After what he’d done to her, inside of her, deep and up inside her, using his fingers snatching, digging, clawing. You bitch! Cunt! Don’t tell me you don’t want it, cunt! Pushing her down into the seat of the Corvette, the new-smelling leather upholstery, the cold fabric and his furious pale face leaning close, shoving her legs apart, her thighs, the dress ripping and she was too weak, too terrified to resist, even to utter no! And after, brought to the LaPortes’, slipping in quietly in stealth and shame and guilt and in the sparkling hot water, scrubbing herself, sobbing and murmuring to herself and even laughing, giggling, biting her lip to keep from making too much noise, waking Trisha and her parents. A secret and a revelation.

In the parchment-colored light from the front window, she appeared disconcertingly young despite her presence of manner. She was as clean and well-scrubbed as a schoolgirl, her maple-brown hair pinned in a neatly controlled chignon. Her slim form was clad in a severe unadorned dress of forest green that verged upon black.

Atiye — that was her name — was delivered of another son as big as a yearling sheep. And so she continued to bear children bu she gave them no peace. The village children roamed about wearing nothing but a greasy bib, but she clothed her own in a very odd manner. Young Nuğber gambolled about in the village dust and dirt dressed in nylon garments, with a ribbon in her hair and a dummy in her mouth. The boys climbed into the topmost branches of the walnut trees wearing dungarees held up with braces, and they chased the oxen and donkeys with colored whirligigs in their hands. ... On top of all that, their mother had invented something called 'soap,' and once every two days she nearly flayed them alive scrubbing them with it.

Right at that moment, a girl walks into the club. I see a hundred gorgeous women every night, dolled up in their tight dresses and heels, faces painted, hair freshly coiffed, skin dusted with glitter. This girl catches my eye because she’s the opposite of that. Young, fresh-faced. So cleanly scrubbed that she almost glows. Her light-brown hair is pulled back in a simple ponytail. Her eyes are wide and innocent. She hasn’t tried to cover up the spattering of freckles across her nose.

Ella.” The sound was so quiet, I barely heard it through the blood-rush in my ears. I turned to look down the hallway. A man was coming toward me, his lean form clad in a pair of baggy scrub pants and a loose T-shirt. His arm was bandaged with silver-gray burn wrap. I knew the set of those shoulders, the way he moved. Jack. My eyes blurred, and I felt my pulse escalate to a painful throbbing. I began to shake from the effects of trying to encompass too much feeling, too fast. “Is it you?” I choked. “Yes. Yes. God, Ella . . .” I was breaking down, every breath shattering. I gripped my elbows with my hands, crying harder as Jack drew closer. I couldn’t move. I was terrified that I was hallucinating, conjuring an image of what I wanted most, that if I reached out I would find nothing but empty space. But Jack was there, solid and real, reaching around me with hard, strong arms. The contact with him was electrifying. I flattened against him, unable to get close enough. He murmured as I sobbed against his chest. “Ella . . . sweetheart, it’s all right. Don’t cry. Don’t . . .” But the relief of touching him, being close to him, had caused me to unravel. Not too late. The thought spurred a rush of euphoria. Jack was alive, and whole, and I would take nothing for granted ever again. I fumbled beneath the hem of his T-shirt and found the warm skin of his back. My fingertips encountered the edge of another bandage. He kept his arms firmly around me as if he understood that I needed the confining pressure, the feel of him surrounding me as our bodies relayed silent messages. Don’t let go. I’m right here. Tremors kept running along my entire frame. My teeth chattered, making it hard to talk. “I th-thought you might not come back.” Jack’s mouth, usually so soft, was rough and chapped against my cheek, his jaw scratchy with bristle. “I’ll always come back to you.” His voice was hoarse. I hid my face against his neck, breathing him in. His familiar scent had been obliterated by the antiseptic pungency of antiseptic burn dressings, and heavy saltwater brine. “Where are you hurt?” Sniffling, I reached farther over his back, investigating the extent of the bandage. His fingers tangled in the smooth, soft locks of my hair. “Just a few burns and scrapes. Nothing to worry about.” I felt his cheek tauten with a smile. “All your favorite parts are still there.” We were both quiet for a moment. I realized he was trembling, too. “I love you, Jack,” I said, and that started a whole new rush of tears, because I was so unholy glad to be able to say it to him. “I thought it was too late . . . I thought you’d never know, because I was a coward, and I’m so—” “I knew.” Jack sounded shaken. He drew back to look down at me with glittering bloodshot eyes. “You did?” I sniffled. He nodded. “I figured I couldn’t love you as much as I do, without you feeling something for me, too.” He kissed me roughly, the contact between our mouths too hard for pleasure. I put my fingers to Jack’s bristled jaw and eased his face away to look at him. He was battered and scraped and sun-scorched. I couldn’t begin to imagine how dehydrated he was. I pointed an unsteady finger at the waiting room. “Your family’s in there. Why are you in the hallway?” My bewildered gaze swept down his body to his bare feet. “They’re . . . they’re letting you walk around like this?” Jack shook his head. “They parked me in a room around the corner to wait for a couple more tests. I asked if anyone had told you I was okay, and nobody knew for sure. So I came to find you.” “You just left when you’re supposed to be having more tests?” “I had to find you.” His voice was quiet but unyielding

She’d do whatever Rylan asked. And if her collar strangled her, or if it was awkward scrubbing floors in a dress, then she’d remember Jesus on the cross and how He’d suffered. Then she’d compare her own meager pain and endure it quietly. A trace of peace crept through her as she prayed…

You must have found it hard at school as well, everyone complaining about homework and not having a car or being able to afford a dress from ASOS that they'll probably only wear once. Stupid shit I used to complain about as well that doesn't matter anymore. Oh boo hoo your cat died. Poor you. My mother was run down in the street by a drunk driver. Someone from the council had to scrub her blood off the pavement.

A team of doctors came through the door still dressed in scrubs from head to toe. Each entered, holding the door for the one behind them. Robert was nowhere to be seen. Autumn stood first, and Kane rose at a slower pace, his eyes staying trained on the doctors. They wouldn't make eye contact with either of them. What did that mean? Kane's breath hitched, he tripped, stumbling when he tried to get to his feet. Robert had been the last physician to enter the waiting room. He was tugging the cap off his head when his red-rimmed eyes connected with Kane's.

Do you need me to take your temperature?” “What?” What the hell was he talking about? “What are you—” The words died on his lips, and his jaw dropped when Dex stepped into the doorway. “I said, do you need me to check your temperature, Mr. Brodie?” “Sweet Jesus.” It took some effort for Sloane to close his mouth, but eventually he managed it. Dex strutted into the room dressed in nurse’s scrubs made of white latex so tight it was all but painted on his body. The V-neck top exposed his collarbone and emphasized the curve of every muscle, from his lean sculpted torso, to his muscular legs, and the prominent outline of his hard dick. The white was a stark contrast against his tanned skin. Holy hell, his partner looked like something out of a porn magazine. Wait.

He looked over the counter to see Christopher standing at the bottom of the stairs, stark naked, book under one arm, Bear under the other. Preacher lifted one bushy brow. “Forget something there, pardner?” he asked. Chris picked at his left butt cheek while hanging on to the bear. “You read to me now?” “Um... Have you had your bath?” Preacher asked. The boy shook his head. “You look like you’re ready for your bath.” He listened upward to the running water. Chris nodded, then said again, “You read it?” “C’mere,” Preacher said. Chris ran around the counter, happy, raising his arms to be lifted up. “Wait a second,” Preacher said. “I don’t want little boy butt on my clean counter. Just a sec.” He pulled a clean dish towel out of the drawer, spread it on the counter, then lifted him up, sitting him on it. He looked down at the little boy, frowned slightly, then pulled another dish towel out of the drawer. He shook it out and draped it across Chris’s naked lap. “There. Better. Now, what you got here?” “Horton,” he said, presenting the book. “There’s a good chance your mother isn’t going to go for this idea,” he said. But he opened the book and began to read. They hadn’t gotten far when he heard the water stop, heard heavy footfalls racing around the upstairs bedroom, heard Paige yell, “Christopher!” “We better get our story straight,” Preacher said to him. “Our story,” Chris said, pointing at the page in front of him. Momentarily there were feet coming down the stairs, fast. When she got to the bottom, she stopped suddenly. “He got away from me while I was running the tub,” she said. “Yeah. In fact, he’s dressed like he barely escaped.” “I’m sorry, John. Christopher, get over here. We’ll read after your bath.” He started to whine and wiggle. “I want John!” Paige came impatiently around the counter and plucked him, squirming, into her arms. “I want John,” he complained. “John’s busy, Chris. Now, you behave.” “Uh—Paige? I’m not all that busy. If you’ll tell Jack I’m not in the kitchen for a bit, I could do the bath. Tell Jack, so he knows to lock up if everyone leaves.” She turned around at the foot of the stairs. “You know how to give a child a bath?” she asked. “Well, no. But is it hard? Harder than scrubbing up a broiler?” She chuckled in spite of herself. She put Chris down on his feet. “You might want to go a little easier than that. No Brillo pads, no scraping. No soap in the eyes, if you can help it.” “I can do that,” Preacher said, coming around the counter. “How many times you dunk him?” She gasped and Preacher showed her a smile. “Kidding. I know you only dunk him twice.” She smirked.

A gentleman doesn’t go down to dine unless he’s properly bathed, and you, I fear, will take a deal of bathing.” “I am not a gentleman,” the child said, the truculence back in full force. The earl glanced down at his own naked chest and recalled that grown men were not necessarily an easy thing for not-so-grown men to compare themselves to. He shrugged into a dressing gown and tossed his shirt to the child. “For your modesty. Now let’s be about it, shall we? The sooner we’re clean, the sooner we eat.” He eyed the child’s hair and suspected getting clean might involve a quantity of shampoo, but merely held out his hand again. “Come along, child.” “I am not a gentleman,” the child said again, scooting back against the sofa. “We can remedy that,” the earl said with what he hoped was a reassuring tone. “A little scrubbing, some decent attire, small refinements of speech.” He slipped the child’s shirt off in a single motion. “If I can master it in not quite thirty-two years, there is certainly hope for you.” “I am not a gentleman,” the child ground out, standing on the sofa cushions and swatting at the earl’s hands, “and I do not want to be a gentleman.” “Then you can be a pirate,” the earl reasoned. “But if you are eating my food, you shall do so with clean fingers.” He made a deft grab for the scruffy britches, yanking them down over narrow hips and bony knees with a swift jerk. The child stood up on the sofa, naked and indignant. “I am not a gentleman. I do not want to be a gentleman!” “Jesus, God, and the Apostles!” The earl swiftly wrapped the child in his shirt and stood panting in shock. “You are a benighted damned female!” “Do I still have to take a bath?

Tony: Listen... I need to... Um... Say... I mean... I know we only met earlier... And I know I nearly set you on fire... And we're both going out with other people. Obviously that's quite tricky. But... Well... You are the most beautiful woman I have ever laid eyes on in my entire life. I saw you and my heart leapt. You make me want to change my life. To... participate. I know it's not possible and that you have a boyfriend and we're not compatible or whatever but... I just... I know it's stupid... But maybe just hear me out for a second and the. You can tell me I'm an idiot and we'll both go back in and pretend this never happened but... I want to travel the world with you. I want to bring the ice cold Amstel to your Greek shore. And sit in silence and sip with you. I want to go to Tesco's with you of a Sunday. Watch you sleep, scrub your back, suck your toes. I want to write crap poetry about you, lay my coat over puddles for you. I want to get drunk and bore my friends about you, I want them to phone up and moan about how little they see me because I'm spending so much time with you. I want to feel the tingle of our lips meeting, the lock of our eyes joining, the fizz of our fingertips touching. I want to touch your fat tummy and tell you you look gorgeous in maternity dresses, I want to stand next to you wide-eyed and hold my nose as we open that first used nappy, I want to watch you grow old and love you more and more each day. I want to fall in love with you. I think I could. And I think it would be good. And I want you to say yes. You might feel the same. Could you? Maybe?

Shaking his head at his own skittishness, he let out a sigh and dropped down beside his little girl. Immediately, she scrambled over to him as fast as her hands and knees could take her and climbed happily up into his lap. He picked her up. Her very presence was a balm to his nerves, a reassurance that purity and innocence still shone in a world that had, of late, seemed dominated by wickedness and evil. But it soon became obvious that Charlotte wanted more than just a cuddle. Eventually, she began to get restless, and Gareth had learned enough about her to recognize immediately what she wanted. "Hungry, Charlie-girl?" Raising himself to his knees, he picked up the bowl he'd excitedly prepared a few minutes ago and sat down, anticipation lighting up his face. Charlotte was beginning to eat solid food now, which delighted him beyond words because that meant he could have a hand in feeding her. Still, Juliet had looked dubious when she'd left him with the baby an hour before. Mash up her food carefully, she had instructed him, explaining the procedure with as much care as if she'd been advising an overeager two-year-old, going on and on while he'd stood there and nodded and nodded and nodded. Make sure there are no lumps in it, and don't make her eat it all if she doesn't want it. He realized his first mistake as he dug the spoon into the bowl and eagerly began to feed the baby. "Hmmm … perhaps I should have mashed up the peas or even the carrots, instead of these red beets left over from supper last night," he mused, aloud. Indeed, it soon became difficult to know who was faring worse in this new venture — his daughter, now smeared from head to toe in red beet pulp, or her papa, who had it all over his fingers and in his lap. Charlotte looked up at him and smiled through the mess. Gareth guffawed. Ah, hell. They were both laughing and having fun. They were half-way through the bowl when a loud hammering at the door nearly caused Gareth to jump out of his skin. Lucien. Scooping up the baby and holding her easily in one arm, he went to open it — and found Perry and the rest of the Den of Debauchery standing just outside. "Bloody hell!"  Perry's jaw nearly hit the floor. "What on earth have you done to her?!" Gareth looked at Charlotte and fully comprehended just what a mess the two of them had made. Huge red blotches stained the delicate skin of the baby's face. Her hands were bright red, her dress was ruined, and bits of crimson pulp clung to her chin. Oh, hell, he thought wildly, Juliet's going to kill me! He grabbed up a napkin from the table and began scrubbing at Charlotte's face, to no avail. "Damnation!" he cried, much to Perry's amusement and the guffaws of the others. "Playing papa to the hilt, are you, Gareth?" "So much for your days of debauchery!" "I say, next thing you know, he'll be changing napkins — ha, ha, ha!" "Sod off," Gareth said, realizing how much he had not missed their immaturity.

Abrams voice cut in over the comm. “My God, this place is breath-taking!” “It is a palace for the gods,” added Brock. The group stood gawking at the magnificence of the hall surrounding them. Delanda went to the table, placed her helmet and pack on it, and began pulling tablets, scanners, and other accessories out. She wrestled off her gloves, but had trouble with the suit torso so Wilson had to intervene and help. Without a thought to the revealing fit of the white stretch suit liner, she escaped the spacesuit bottom and placed it on the table. Then, with still no self-consciousness at all, she stripped the suit liner off down to athletic bra and slim panties and pulled her pink, rolled up vacuum-packed flight coveralls and cloth boots from the suit pack. After excitedly dressing, she hurriedly grabbed a scanner from her pack and began investigating the hall. Show over, one by one we all removed our suits and became visitors in white suit liners. Wilson gave his fatherly warning. “Everyone be very careful removing and folding those liners. If you tear or damage the thermal control system in any way you could have an unpleasant trip back to the ship. Also, be careful to tuck in your suit communicator since we’ll all be using wrist coms from now on. That is if they actually work here.” Delanda ignored his comments and headed for the far end of the hall. Wilson pulled on black coveralls, R.J.’s were farmhouse blue, Brock and Wen light green, Abrams in hospital scrubs green, and Sharma’s and Ansara’s in tan. Mine were captain’s blue. As we studied our celestial surroundings, Delanda returned and spoke in a commanding voice. “Gentlemen, if you would grab your tablets and gather around me here at this magnificent table we should get started.” For the first time there was a unanimous look of annoyance, although everyone quickly complied. R.J. and I stood opposite her feeling like two school kids being ushered around on a field trip. Delanda checked to be sure everyone was paying attention. “Okay, I’m assuming our intranet will work in here even though we’re out of contact with the ship. Let’s try it. All of you use your tablets to access mine and copy the file titled: Translations. Let me know if anyone has trouble.” Delanda’s tablet appeared on our screens. As she had guessed, there were no problems getting in. Once copied, I opened the file and found dozens of Altair symbols, some highlighted, most grayed-out. “Okay, everyone got in? Right? Okay, the symbols you see highlighted are the ones I believe I have a rudimentary translation for. Those that are in gray, your guess is as good as mine.” “How do you propose we proceed?” asked Brock. “Speaking as an experienced field researcher, I would suggest one of us photographs and documents this first chamber thoroughly while the rest of us split up and do the same with other chambers, periodically reporting back here after each excursion. We should have one central person remain here to monitor the progress of everyone in the event they get into trouble. I would think that would be you, Commander Mirtos, since you are the best at rescue. Does anyone have any objections?” R.J. leaned over. “I believe this is a non-hostile takeover. Are you going to step in?” “Not until she says something I disagree with.” Delanda continued. “So, if no one has any objections the first order of business will be to photograph every wall symbol we find along with any artifacts possibly associated

You came back. Guess I didn’t totally wreck your day.” He smiled. As if that face could ruin anything. “You didn’t look like you wanted to kill me or anything when you walked in, so I’m hoping we’re all good?” Okay, so technically he was thinking about how he possibly screwed up my life, not so much me, but, whatever, I’d take it. “It’s all good. I was on time and considering the dress code here is apparently anything five times your normal size”—I gestured to my scrubs—“no one seemed to notice or care I had on your shirt.

I’ve only seen Nessa in dance attire or school clothes, hair pulled back and face freshly scrubbed. When dressed to impress, Nessa Griffin is fucking stunning.

I scrub both hands over my face, dressed in a pair of BlackCraft Cult sweats with a Ouija board pattern and a tank top that says I Have Witchcraft on my Lips. Being in love is its own kind of magic, so I figure it’s not a total lie.

Ryan in scrubs is handsome -- Ryan dressed up is almost painfully handsome. I feel like I should shield my eyes.

The day before I'm supposed to be meeting Caroline for a drink, I develop all the text-book symptons of a crush: nervous stomach, long periods spent daydreaming, an inability to remember what she looks like. I can bring back the dress and the boots, and I can see a fringe, but her face is a blank, and I fill it in with some anonymous rent-a-cracker details - pouty red lips, even though it wax her well-scrubbed english clever-girl look that attracted me to her in the first place; almond-shaped eyes, even though she was wearing sunglasses most of the time; pale, perfect skin, even though I know there'll be an initial twinge of disappointment - this is what all that internal fuss is about? - and then I'll find something to get excited about again: the fact that she's turned up at all, a sexy voice, intelligence, wit, something. And between the second and the third meeting a whole new set of myths will be born. This time, something different happens, though. It's the daydreaming that does it. I'm doing the usual thing - imagining in tiny detail the entire course of the relationship, from first kiss, to bed, to moving in together, to getting married (in the past I have even organized the track listing of the party tapes), to how pretty she'll look when she's pregnant, to names of children - until suddenly I realize that there's nothing left to actually, like, happen. I've done it all, lived through the whole relationship in my head. I've watched the film on fast-forward; I know the whole plot, the ending, all the good bits. Now I've got to rewind and watch it all over again in real time, and where's the fun in that? And fucking... when it's all going to fucking stop? I'm going to jump from rock to rock for the rest of my life until there aren't any rocks left? I'm going to run each time I get itchy feet? Because I get them about once a quarter, along with the utilities bills... I've been thinking with my guts since I was fourteen years old, and frankly speaking, between you and me, I have come to the conclusion that my guts have shit for brains.

she saw the store through new eyes: a place where you could find cocktail dresses from the sixties for Homecoming, surgical scrubs for lounging on sleepy days, a wide assortment of old concert tees, and, if you were lucky, bells, real bell-bottoms, not the back-again retro ones from the Delia’s catalog but the actual thing, with wide flares, the denim tissue-thin at the knees from decades of wear.

If I knew you were going to take forever to get dressed, I would’ve spent more time in the shower.” “Oh yeah, doing what?” He raises a brow, and that’s all he has to say. “Ah, I see. The old scrub and tug, huh?

Click. The front door shut behind his dad, and immediately, Rory shot out of bed. He dressed in a flash and, holding his breath, sped towards the kitchen, knowing he had a short window of time before Ranger Adia arrived. Guzzling down his breakfast, Rory bristled nervously as he walked through his secret plan for the day in his mind. 5.45 a.m. Wake up! - tick. 6.01 a.m. Wait for Dad to leave - tick. 6.05 a.m. Get dressed - er, tick. Rory chuckled to himself as he caught his reflection in the mirror. His favourite T-shirt was on back to front! 6.07 a.m. Breakfast – tick. 6.10 a.m. Bathroom. 6.15 a.m. Get supplies and put in backpack. 6.20 a.m. Put on coat and exit cabin for secret adventure. Leaving a trail of destruction (and breakfast cereal) in his wake, he rushed to the bathroom and proceeded to brush his teeth like he was scrubbing the

way. As usual, Conny was dressed in baggy pink scrubs and his gray dreadlocks swung with every step, sort of like the alien in Predator.

Back in Hollywood Hospital, there were no scrubs. The doctors were very well dressed, and the patients were in pajamas. The doctor in charge of the whole place wore baby-blue alligator shoes, drove a light blue ’59 Cadillac convertible, and wore what I was sure was the button to end the world as a tie clip.

Stanwin’s wearing a rich man’s approximation of a stable hand’s livery, which is to say the white cotton shirt is pressed and the black trousers are spotless. Looking at him now, dressed plainly, scrubbing his own boots, and squatting in a crumbling corner of a once-grand house, I fail to see what nineteen years of blackmail have bought him. Burst blood vessels riddle his cheeks and nose, while sunken eyes, red raw and hungry for sleep, keep watch for the monsters at his door. Monsters he invited there. Behind all his bluster is a cowering soul, the fire that once drove him long extinguished. These are the ragged edges of a man defeated, his secrets the only warmth left to him. At this point, he’s as much afraid of his victims as they are of him. Pity pricks me. Something about Stanwin’s situation feels terribly familiar, and deep down, beneath my hosts, where the real Aiden Bishop resides, I can feel a memory stirring. I came here because of a woman. I wanted to save her, and I couldn’t. Blackheath was my chance to... What? Try again?

It was a secret thing from the first. After what he'd done to her, inside her, deep and up inside her, using his fingers snatching, digging, clawing. "You bitch! Cunt!" "Don't tell me you don't want it, cunt!" Pushing her down into the seat of the Corvette, the new-smelling leather uphoistery, the cold fabric, and his furious pale face leaning close, shoving her legs apart, her thighs, the dress ripping, and she too weak too terrified to resist, even to utter "No!" And after, brought to the LaPortes', slipping in quietly in stealth and shame and guilt and in the sparkling hot water scrubbing herself, sobbing and murmuring to herself and even laughing, giggling, biting her lip to keep from making too much noise, waking Trisha and her parents. A secret and a revelation.

The scattered bloodstains across the front of the dress were light as freckles, but the darker stains on the back, a half dozen stains as long as six or seven inches, had turned a sour yellowish shade, unmistakable. Like the stained crotches of certain of her panties which Marianne scrubbed, scrubbed by hand to rid them of traces of menstrual blood before drying them in her closet and dropping them into the laundry chute.

He pointed to an old man dressed in ragged clothes trudging down a dirt path, a large burlap pack filled with scrub grass tied to his back. “That’s the real Afghanistan, Agha sahib. That’s the Afghanistan I know. You? You’ve always been a tourist here, you just didn’t know it.

Once irrigation has been accomplished, eyewear is typically not necessary, but the rescuer should still be wearing protective gloves. Remember to wash your hands before and after donning the gloves. Soap, water, and gloves are a tough trio on germs. In the absence of protective gloves, the rescuer may improvise with clean plastic bags over her or his hands. With relatively minor wounds, to prevent sharing germs, the patient may be directed in the management of his or her own wound (including control of blood loss). Contusion Bruises seldom require emergency care, but large bruises benefit from cold, compression, and/or elevation. Substantial bruises should cause you to assess the patient for damage to underlying structures, such as bones and organs. Large bruises should be protected from freezing in extremes of cold because a bruised area will freeze sooner than normal skin. Abrasions Abrasions are the exception to the rule of wound cleaning: You need to scrub within the wound to achieve adequate cleaning. A sterile gauze pad is adequate for scrubbing. Scrubbing may be enhanced by using any soap, but all soap should be carefully rinsed and then irrigated from the wound after scrubbing. Green Soap Sponges are packaged with soap and water already in the sponge, making them useful additions to first-aid kits. It is important to remove all embedded debris not only to reduce the risk of infection but also to prevent subsequent “tattooing” (scarring) of the skin. With a deep abrasion, self-scrubbing is seldom successful due to the high level of pain associated with the exposed nerves. After cleansing, abrasions can be kept moist to avoid desiccation and speed healing with microthin film dressings that can be left in place until healing occurs. Without microthin film dressings, a topical agent, such as an antibiotic ointment, can be applied, followed by a dressing of a sterile gauze pad or a roll of sterile gauze to keep the ointment in place. Tape, an elastic wrap, or some other holder may be used to hold a sterile gauze pad in place. Ideally, gauze dressings should be changed twice a day, or at least once a day, as well as any time the gauze gets wet.

I feel like a tourist in my own country,” I said, taking in a goatherd leading a half-dozen emaciated goats along the side of the road. Farid snickered. Tossed his cigarette. “You still think of this place as your country?” “I think a part of me always will,” I said, more defensively than I had intended. “After twenty years of living in America,” he said, swerving the truck to avoid a pothole the size of a beach ball. I nodded. “I grew up in Afghanistan.” Farid snickered again. “Why do you do that?" “Never mind,” he murmured. “No, I want to know. Why do you do that?” In his rearview mirror, I saw something flash in his eyes. “You want to know?” he sneered. “Let me imagine, Agha sahib. You probably lived in a big two- or three-story house with a nice backyard that your gardener filled with flowers and fruit trees. All gated, of course. Your father drove an American car. You had servants, probably Hazaras. Your parents hired workers to decorate the house for the fancy mehmanis they threw, so their friends would come over to drink and boast about their travels to Europe or America. And I would bet my first son’s eyes that this is the first time you’ve ever worn a pakol.” He grinned at me, revealing a mouthful of prematurely rotting teeth. “Am I close?” “Why are you saying these things?” I said. “Because you wanted to know,” he spat. He pointed to an old man dressed in ragged clothes trudging down a dirt path, a large burlap pack filled with scrub grass tied to his back. “That’s the real Afghanistan, Agha sahib. That’s the Afghanistan I know. You? You’ve always been a tourist here, you just didn’t know it.

Following his gaze, Poppy saw Medusa pushing her way through the rose arbor, waddling innocently across the path. The little brown and white hedgehog looked like a walking scrub brush. To Poppy’s surprise, Harry lowered to his haunches to retrieve the creature. “Don’t touch her,” Poppy warned. “She’ll roll into a ball and sink her quills into you.” But Harry settled his hands on the ground, palms up, on either side of the inquisitive hedgehog. “Hello, Medusa.” Gently he worked his hands beneath her. “Sorry to interrupt your exercise. But believe me, you don’t want to run into any of my gardeners.” Poppy watched incredulously as Medusa relaxed and settled willingly into the warm masculine hands. Her spines flattened, and she let him lift and turn her so she was tummy upward. Harry stroked the soft white fur of her underbelly while Medusa’s delicate snout lifted and she regarded him with her perpetual smile. “I’ve never seen anyone except Beatrix handle her like that,” Poppy said, standing beside him. “You have experience with hedgehogs?” “No.” He slanted a smile at her. “But I have some experience with prickly females.” “Excuse me,” Beatrix’s voice interrupted them, and she came into the tunnel of roses. She was disheveled, bits of leaves clinging to her dress, her hair straggling over her face. “I seem to have lost track of . . . oh, there you are, Medusa!” She broke into a grin as she saw Harry cradling the hedgehog in his hands. “Always trust a man who can handle a hedgehog, that’s what I always say.” “Do you?” Poppy asked dryly. “I’ve never heard you say that.” “I only say it to Medusa.

The old Hoover Building had housed the Federal Bureau of Investigation before the Split, but the FBI was long gone. The People’s Bureau of Investigation now occupied that building and several others in the area, forming a huge complex dedicated to the dark work of internal security. The name “Hoover” had been scrubbed from the building and whitewashed from history when the People’s Republic had first arisen, but later came back when J. Edgar had been embraced as a pioneering example of resistance and the face of the toll oppression had taken upon gender-fluid individuals in the hateful old United States. His statue, in a flattering cocktail dress and a pair of strappy heels, graced the central foyer of the recently added annex.

Medusa the hedgehog was wandering casually along the hallway. She paused as Christopher approached. A faint smile touched his lips. He bent to pick her up as Beatrix had showed him, inserting his hands beneath her. The hedgehog's quills flattened naturally as he turned her up to look at him. Relaxed and curious, she viewed him with her perpetual hedgehog smile. "Medusa," he said softly, "I wouldn't advise climbing out of your pen at night. One of the maids might find you, and then what? You might find yourself taken to the scullery and used to scrub a pot." Taking her to the private upstairs receiving room, he lowered her into her pen. Continuing on to Beatrix's room, he reflected that his wife viewed poor Bennett as yet another wounded creature. She had shown no hesitation in welcoming him into their home. One would expect no less of Beatrix. Entering the room quietly, he saw his wife at her dressing table, carefully filing the claws of Lucky's remaining paw. The cat regarded her with a bored expression, tail flicking lazily. "... you must stay away from the settee cushions," Beatrix was lecturing, "or Mrs. Clocker will have both our heads." Christopher's gaze traveled over the long, elegant lines of her figure, her silhouette revealed in the lamp glow that shone through her muslin nightgown.

As Ross entered the kitchen, he saw Ernest sitting at the scrubbed wooden table. The boy wolfed down a plate of breakfast as if it were the first decent meal he'd had in months. Sophia stood at the range with the scrawny cook-maid, apparently showing her how to prepare the morning's fare. "Turn them like this," Sophia was saying, expertly flipping a row of little cakes on a griddle pan. The kitchen atmosphere was especially fragrant today, spiced with frying bacon, coffee, and sizzling batter. Sophia looked fresh and wholesome, the trim curves of her figure outlined by a white apron that covered her charcoal-gray dress. Her gleaming hair was pinned in a coil at the top of her head and tied with a blue ribbon. As she saw him standing in the doorway, a smile lit her sapphire eyes, and she was so dazzlingly pretty that Ross felt a painful jab low in his stomach. "Good morning, Sir Ross," she said. "Will you have some breakfast?" "No, thank you," he replied automatically. "Only a jug of coffee. I never..." He paused as the cook set a platter on the table. It was piled with steaming batter cakes sitting in a pool of blackberry sauce. He had a special fondness for blackberries. "Just one or two?" Sophia coaxed. Abruptly it became less important that he adhere to his usual habits. Perhaps he could make time for a little breakfast, Ross reasoned. A five-minute delay would make no difference in his schedule. He found himself seated at the table facing a plate heaped with cakes, crisp bacon, and coddled eggs. Sophia filled a mug with steaming black coffee, and smiled at him once more before resuming her place at the range with Eliza. Ross picked up his fork and stared at it as if he didn't quite know what to do with it. "They're good, sir," Ernest ventured, stuffing his mouth so greedily that it seemed likely he would choke. Ross took a bite of the fruit-soaked cake and washed it down with a swallow of hot coffee. As he continued to eat, he felt an unfamiliar sense of well-being. Good God, it had been a long time since he'd had anything other than Eliza's wretched concoctions. For the next few minutes Ross ate until the platter of cakes was demolished. Sophia came now and then to refill his cup or offer more bacon. The cozy warmth of the kitchen and the sight of Sophia as she moved about the room caused a tide of unwilling pleasure inside him.

One woman’s recipe for laundry day included this 11-step routine that’s exhausting even to read: bild fire in back yard to het kettle of rain water. set tubs so smoke won’t blow in eyes if wind is peart. shave 1 hole cake lie sope in bilin water. sort things. make 3 piles. 1 pile white, 1 pile cullord, 1 pile work briches and rags. stur flour in cold water to smooth then thin down with bilin water [for starch]. rub dirty spots on board. scrub hard. then bile. rub cullord but don’t bile just rench [rinse] and starch. take white things out of kettle with broom stick handle then rench, blew [whitener] and starch. pore rench water in flower bed. scrub porch with hot sopy water turn tubs upside down go put on a cleen dress, smooth hair with side combs, brew cup of tee, set and rest and rock a spell and count blessings.

I read his rather prosaic-sounding name for the first time in that moment, but some years ago I vowed to stop using it. This is no symbolic abstinence on my part- his name has been said enough and ours forgotten, yada yada. I mean, sure, fine, that can be part of it, but who I want you to remember, every time I say The Defendant, not him but the twenty-two-year-old court reporter dressed for success in a pussy-bow blouse. She was the one who recorded him in the official transcripts not by his government name, like the licensed attorney on the case, but by the two most honest letter combinations her sensitive ear and flying fingers could produce: The Defendant. What people forget, or rather what the media decided muddied the narrative, is that although The Defendant would go on to represent himself at is murder trial, he was never a lawyer. Any Joe off the stree can fly pro se, litigate their own case, without graduating from law school or passing the bar. But it made for a more salable story if he was portrayed as someone who did not have to kill to get his kicks, who had prospects in his romantic life and his career. To this day, I revere that scrubbed-face court reporter, younger than me by only a year, because she is one of the sacred few who did her job without so much as a sliver of an agenda. The truth of what happened lies in those transcripts, where he is The Defendant and he is full of bullshit. On the Wanted poster I held in my hands that ding afternoon in Tina’s rental car, The Defendant peered back at me with black vacant eyes. They are scary eyes, don’t get me wrong, but what frightens me, what infuriates me, is that there isn’t anything exceptionally clever going on behind them. A series of national ineptitudes and a parsimonious attitude toward crimes against women created a kind of secret tunnel through which a college dropout with severe emotional disturbances moved with impunity for the better part of the seventies. Law enforcement would rather we remember a dull man as brilliant than take a good hard look at the role they played in this absolute sideshow, and I am sick to death of watching them in their pressed shirts, and cowboy boots, in their comfortable leather interview chairs, in hugely successful and critically acclaimed crime documentaries, talking about the intelligence and charm and wiliness of an ordinary misogynist. This story is not that. The story is not that.

During surgery you hand the surgeon everything. All the instruments and supplies are on your back table, or on your mayo stand over the patient, where you have arranged them. If you do the procedure often you are a few steps ahead, always ready. When the surgeon starts closing the wound, you and your nurse count. When he closes skin, you count again. You put on dressings. You move all your supplies away from the bed and take the drapes off the patient. The patient gets wheeled to recovery, the surgeon dictates, you clean up.