“
I'm the one that's got to die when it's time for me to die, so let me live my life the way I want to.
”
”
Jimi Hendrix (The Jimi Hendrix Experience - Axis: Bold as Love | Guitar TAB Sheet Music Collection | Note-for-Note Transcriptions for Electric Guitar Players | Classic Psychedelic Rock Solos)
“
You’ve got to sing like you don’t need the money,
Love like you’ll never get hurt.
You’ve got to dance like nobody’s watchin’.
”
”
Richard Leigh (Come from the Heart Sheet Music)
“
I've got a war in my mind
”
”
Lana Del Rey (Lana Del Rey - Born to Die Paradise Edition | Piano Vocal Guitar Sheet Music & Songbook for Singers and Musicians | 23 Iconic Pop Ballads Transcribed for Piano Players and Vocalists |Artist Collection)
“
Turn and face the strange changes.
”
”
David Bowie (Changes Sheet Music)
“
You're a brand-new piece of sheet music,' she said slowly, 'for a song which, once played, I'd swear I'd always known.
”
”
Julie Berry (Lovely War)
“
Mary praise the rosary for my broken mind.
”
”
Lana Del Rey (Lana Del Rey - Born to Die Paradise Edition | Piano Vocal Guitar Sheet Music & Songbook for Singers and Musicians | 23 Iconic Pop Ballads Transcribed for Piano Players and Vocalists |Artist Collection)
“
Right now there’s a man on the street outside my door
with outstretched hands full of heartbeats no one can hear.
He has cheeks like torn sheet music
every tear-broken crescendo falling on deaf ears.
At his side there’s a boy with eyes like an anthem
no one stands up for.
”
”
Andrea Gibson (Pole Dancing to Gospel Hymns)
“
In the end, that was the problem with romance. It was so easy to romanticise romance because it was everywhere. It was in music and on TV and in filtered Instagram photos. It was in the air, crisp and alive with fresh possibility. It was in falling leaves, crumbling wooden doorways, scuffed cobblestones and fields of dandelions. It was in the touch of hands, scrawled letters, crumpled sheets and the golden hour. A soft yawn, early morning laugher, shoes lined up together dy the door. Eyes across a dance floor. I could see it all, all the time, all around, but when I got closer, I found nothing was there.
”
”
Alice Oseman (Loveless)
“
Springsteen is the king, don't you think? I was like, hell yeah, that guy can sing.
”
”
Lana Del Rey (Lana Del Rey - Born to Die Paradise Edition | Piano Vocal Guitar Sheet Music & Songbook for Singers and Musicians | 23 Iconic Pop Ballads Transcribed for Piano Players and Vocalists |Artist Collection)
“
You're divine.
Didn't anyone ever tell you
It's OK to shine?
”
”
Lana Del Rey (Lana Del Rey - Born to Die Paradise Edition | Piano Vocal Guitar Sheet Music & Songbook for Singers and Musicians | 23 Iconic Pop Ballads Transcribed for Piano Players and Vocalists |Artist Collection)
“
It's like picking up an unfamiliar piece of sheet music & starting to stumble through it, only to realize it is a melody you'd once learned by heart, one you can play without even trying.
”
”
Jodi Picoult (My Sister’s Keeper)
“
I feel free when I see no one and nobody knows my name
”
”
Lana Del Rey (Lana Del Rey - Honeymoon: Sheet Music Songbook Piano, Vocal Guitar Music Book for Pop Singers and Pianists | Includes 14 Songs from 2015 Album | Modern Pop Sheet Music for Intermediate Musicians)
“
Without a human voice to read them aloud, or a pair of wide eyes following them by flashlight beneath a blanket, books had no real existence in our world. Like seeds in the beak of a bird waiting to fall to earth, or the notes of a song laid out on a sheet, yearning for an instrument to bring their music into being. they lie dormant hoping for the chance to emerge.They want us to give them life.
”
”
John Connolly (The Book of Lost Things (The Book of Lost Things, #1))
“
All that is really going in your mouth is texture and chemicals. It is your brain that reads these scentless, flavorless molecules and vivifies them for your pleasure. Your brownie is sheet music. It is your brain that makes it a symphony.
”
”
Bill Bryson (The Body: A Guide for Occupants)
“
Emancipate yourselves from mental slavery.
None but ourselves can free our minds
”
”
Bob Marley (Redemption Song Sheet Music)
“
I am the one thing in life I can control.
I am inimitable.
I am an original
”
”
Lin-Manuel Miranda (Hamilton Vocal Selections | Piano Vocal Sheet Music Songbook with 17 Broadway Musical Hits Including My Shot and You'll Be Back | Music Book for Singers and Theater Fans)
“
Summer's in the air and baby, heaven's in your eyes
”
”
Lana Del Rey (Lana Del Rey - Born to Die Paradise Edition | Piano Vocal Guitar Sheet Music & Songbook for Singers and Musicians | 23 Iconic Pop Ballads Transcribed for Piano Players and Vocalists |Artist Collection)
“
Come on, baby, let's ride. We can escape to the great sunshine
”
”
Lana Del Rey (Lana Del Rey - Born to Die Paradise Edition | Piano Vocal Guitar Sheet Music & Songbook for Singers and Musicians | 23 Iconic Pop Ballads Transcribed for Piano Players and Vocalists |Artist Collection)
“
I'd never heard of them, but at that moment, it was the best song I'd ever heard. I went out and bought Ten and listened to it on repeat. When I listened to track five, "Black," it was like I was there, in that moment all over again.
After the summer was over, when I got back home, I went to the music store and bought the sheet music and learned to play it on the piano. I thought one day I could accompany Conrad and we could be, like, a band.
”
”
Jenny Han (The Summer I Turned Pretty (Summer, #1))
“
God, you're so handsome
”
”
Lana Del Rey (Lana Del Rey - Born to Die Paradise Edition | Piano Vocal Guitar Sheet Music & Songbook for Singers and Musicians | 23 Iconic Pop Ballads Transcribed for Piano Players and Vocalists |Artist Collection)
“
If there is chemistry, and the mind and body are working as one, it's nirvana. It's like a well-written symphony or, better yet, perfect... sheet music."
"Sheet music?"
"Yeah, music between the sheets.
”
”
Ann Lister (Sheet Music: A Rock 'N' Roll Love Story (Sheet Music, #1))
“
After a hurricane comes a rainbow.
”
”
Katy Perry (Firework: Piano/vocal/guitar, Original Sheet Music Edition)
“
Maybe the reason why all the doors are closed so you could open one that leads you to the perfect road.
”
”
Katy Perry (Firework: Piano/vocal/guitar, Original Sheet Music Edition)
“
Trust I seek and I find in you
”
”
Metallica (Metallica: Black Album - Guitar Songbook with Tablature | Play It Like It Is Sheet Music Collection | Heavy Metal Guitar Book for Intermediate Players | Full Tablature and Notation for 12 Songs)
“
The Frays had never been a religiously observant family, but Clary loved Fifth Avenue at Christmas time. The air smelled like sweet roasted chestnuts, and the window displays sparkled with silver and blue, green and red. This year there were fat round crystal snowflakes attached to each lamppost, sending back the winter sunlight in shafts of gold. Not to mention the huge tree at Rockefeller Center. It threw its shadow across them as she and Simon draped themselves over the gate at the side of the skating rink, watching tourists fall down as they tried to navigate the ice.
Clary had a hot chocolate wrapped in her hands, the warmth spreading through her body. She felt almost normal—this, coming to Fifth to see the window displays and the tree, had been a winter tradition for her and Simon for as long as she could remember.
“Feels like old times, doesn’t it?” he said, echoing her thoughts as he propped his chin on his folded arms.
She chanced a sideways look at him. He was wearing a black topcoat and scarf that emphasized the winter pallor of his skin. His eyes were shadowed, indicating that he hadn’t fed on blood recently. He looked like what he was—a hungry, tired vampire.
Well, she thought. Almost like old times. “More people to buy presents for,” she said. “Plus, the always traumatic what-to-buy-someone-for-the-first-Christmas-after-you’ve-started-dating question.”
“What to get the Shadowhunter who has everything,” Simon said with a grin.
“Jace mostly likes weapons,” Clary sighed. “He likes books, but they have a huge library at the Institute. He likes classical music …” She brightened. Simon was a musician; even though his band was terrible, and was always changing their name—currently they were Lethal Soufflé—he did have training. “What would you give someone who likes to play the piano?”
“A piano.”
“Simon.”
“A really huge metronome that could also double as a weapon?”
Clary sighed, exasperated.
“Sheet music. Rachmaninoff is tough stuff, but he likes a challenge.”
“Now you’re talking. I’m going to see if there’s a music store around here.” Clary, done with her hot chocolate, tossed the cup into a nearby trash can and pulled her phone out. “What about you? What are you giving Isabelle?”
“I have absolutely no idea,” Simon said. They had started heading toward the avenue, where a steady stream of pedestrians gawking at the windows clogged the streets.
“Oh, come on. Isabelle’s easy.”
“That’s my girlfriend you’re talking about.” Simon’s brows drew together. “I think. I’m not sure. We haven’t discussed it. The relationship, I mean.”
“You really have to DTR, Simon.”
“What?”
“Define the relationship. What it is, where it’s going. Are you boyfriend and girlfriend, just having fun, ‘it’s complicated,’ or what? When’s she going to tell her parents? Are you allowed to see other people?”
Simon blanched. “What? Seriously?”
“Seriously. In the meantime—perfume!” Clary grabbed Simon by the back of his coat and hauled him into a cosmetics store that had once been a bank. It was massive on the inside, with rows of gleaming bottles everywhere. “And something unusual,” she said, heading for the fragrance area. “Isabelle isn’t going to want to smell like everyone else. She’s going to want to smell like figs, or vetiver, or—”
“Figs? Figs have a smell?” Simon looked horrified; Clary was about to laugh at him when her phone buzzed. It was her mother.
where are you? It’s an emergency.
”
”
Cassandra Clare (City of Heavenly Fire (The Mortal Instruments, #6))
“
Stories come alive in the telling. Without a human voice to read them aloud, or a pair of wide eyes following them by flashlight beneath a blanket, they had no existence in our world. They were like seeds in the beak of a bird, waiting to fall to earth. Or the notes of a song laid out on a sheet, yearning for an instrument to bring their music into being. They lay dormant, hoping for the chance to emerge. Once someone started to read them, they could begin to change. They could take root in the imagination and transform the reader. Stories wanted to be read. They needed it. It was the reason they forced themselves from their world into ours. They wanted us to give them life.
”
”
John Connolly (The Book of Lost Things (The Book of Lost Things, #1))
“
A floorboard cracked; knuckles tapped once on the open door. Adam looked up to see Niall Lynch standing in the doorway. No, it was Ronan, face lit bright on one side, in stark shadow on the other, looking powerful and at ease with his thumbs tucked in the pockets of his jeans, leather bracelets looped over his wrist, feet bare.
He wordlessly crossed the floor and sat beside Adam on the mattress. When he held out his hand, Adam put the model into it.
“This old thing,” Ronan said. He turned the front tyre, and again the music played out of it. They sat like that for a few minutes, as Ronan examined the car and turned each wheel to play a different tune. Adam watched how intently Ronan studied the seams, his eyelashes low over his light eyes. Ronan let out a breath, put the model down on the bed beside him, and kissed Adam.
Once, when Adam had still lived in the trailer park, he had been pushing the lawn mower around the scraggly side yard when he realized that it was raining a mile away. He could smell it, the earthy scent of rain on dirt, but also the electric, restless smell of ozone. And he could see it: a hazy gray sheet of water blocking his view of the mountains. He could track the line of rain travelling across the vast dry field towards him. It was heavy and dark, and he knew he would get drenched if he stayed outside. It was coming from so far away that he had plenty of time to put the mower away and get under cover. Instead, though, he just stood there and watched it approach. Even at the last minute, as he heard the rain pounding the grass flat, he just stood there. He closed his eyes and let the storm soak him.
That was this kiss.
They kissed again. Adam felt it in more than his lips.
Ronan sat back, his eyes closed, swallowing. Adam watched his chest rise and fall, his eyebrows furrow. He felt as bright and dreamy and imaginary as the light through the window.
He did not understand anything.
It was a long moment before Ronan opened his eyes, and when he did, his expression was complicated. He stood up. He was still looking at Adam, and Adam was looking back, but neither said anything. Probably Ronan wanted something from him, but Adam didn’t know what to say. He was a magician, Persephone had said, and his magic was making connections between disparate things. Only now he was too full of white, fuzzy light to make any sort of logical connections. He knew that of all the options in the world, Ronan Lynch was the most difficult version of any of them. He knew that Ronan was not a thing to be experimented with. He knew his mouth still felt warm. He knew he had started his entire time at Aglionby certain that all he wanted to do was get as far away from this state and everything in it as possible.
He was pretty sure he had just been Ronan’s first kiss.
“I’m gonna go downstairs,” Ronan said.
”
”
Maggie Stiefvater (The Raven King (The Raven Cycle, #4))
“
One does not play memories of music; one plays music itself. And lifetimes, from beginning to end, are as sheets of music, ready to be played.
”
”
Ryka Aoki (Light from Uncommon Stars)
“
nerves
twitching in the sheets --
to face the sunlight again,
that's clearly
trouble.
I like the city better when the
neon lights are going and
the nudies dance on top of the
bar
to the mauling music.
I'm under this sheet
thinking.
me nerves are hampered by
history --
the most memorable concern of mankind
is the guys it takes to
face the sunlight again.
love begins at the meeting of two
strangers. love for the world is
impossible. I'd rather stay in bed
and sleep.
dizzied by the days and the streets and the years
I pull the sheets to my neck.
I turn my ass to the wall.
I hate the mornings more than
any man.
”
”
Charles Bukowski (Burning in Water, Drowning in Flame)
“
Hey, dick head," he yelled with hands on his hips. "Don't even think of coming back here and telling me you shook anything more than her hand!
”
”
Ann Lister (Sheet Music: A Rock 'N' Roll Love Story (Sheet Music, #1))
“
context and memory play powerful roles in all the truly great meals in one's life. I mean, lets face it:when you're eating simple barbecue under a palm tree, and you feel sand between your toes, samba music is playing softly in the backgroud, waves are lapping at the shore a few yards off, a gentle breeze is cooling the sweat on the back of your neck at the hairline, and looking across the table, past the column of empty Red Stripes at the dreamy expression on your companion's face, you realize that in half an hour you're proably going to be having sex on clean white hotel sheets, that grilled chicken leg suddenly tastes a hell of a lot better
”
”
Anthony Bourdain (A Cook's Tour: Global Adventures in Extreme Cuisines)
“
Blood still stains when the sheets are washed
Sex don't sleep when the lights are off
Kids are still depressed when you dress them up
And syrup is still syrup in a sippy cup
He's still dead when you're done with the bottle
Of course it's a corpse that you keep in the cradle
Kids are still depressed when you dress them up
Syrup is still syrup in a sippy cup
”
”
Melanie Martinez
“
Cause' baby you're a firework!
”
”
Katy Perry (Firework: Piano/vocal/guitar, Original Sheet Music Edition)
“
Nothing good is ever easy, Annie. Remember that.
”
”
Ann Lister (Sheet Music: A Rock 'N' Roll Love Story (Sheet Music, #1))
“
all these memories make me want to go back there
”
”
Weezer (Weezer – The Blue Album Guitar TAB Sheet Music Songbook | Authentic Transcriptions for Electric Guitar | Alternative Rock Music Book for Intermediate and Advanced Players (Guitar Recorded Versions))
“
Just start by creating your day. Then create your life.
”
”
Prince (The Beautiful Ones Sheet Music)
“
It is easier to understand if you think of it in terms of music. Sometimes a man enjoys a symphony. Elsetimes he finds a jig more suited to his taste.
The same holds true for lovemaking. One type is suited to the deep cushions of a twilight forest glade. Another comes quite naturally tangled in the sheets of narrow beds upstairs in inns. Each woman is like an instrument, waiting to be learned, loved, and finely played, to have at last her own true music made.
Some might take offense at this way of seeing things, not understanding how a trouper views his music. They might think I degrade women. They might consider me callous, or boorish, or crude.
But those people do not understand love, or music, or me.
”
”
Patrick Rothfuss (The Wise Man's Fear (The Kingkiller Chronicle, #2))
“
Once you do something, you never forget. Even if you can't remember.
”
”
Spirited Away (Reprise . . . Sheet Music)
“
Ascend, may you find so resistance
Just know that you made such a difference
All you leave behind will live to the end
The cycle of suffering goes on
But memories of you stay strong
Some day I too will fly and find you again
”
”
Alter Bridge (Alter Bridge - One Day Remains Guitar Recorded Versions | Hard Rock and Metal Sheet Music | 11 Songs from the Debut Album | Guitar Tablature and Standard Notation | Music for Intermediate Guitarists)
“
you're not the opinion of someone who doesn't know you
”
”
Taylor Swift (Taylor Swift Piano Vocal Guitar Songbook | Country Pop Sheet Music Arranged for Voice Piano Guitar | 11 Songs with Full Lyrics and Chords | Easy Pop Music Book for Beginners)
“
And when the night is cloudy, there is still a light that shines on me. Shine until tomorrow, let it be.
”
”
Paul McCartney (Let It Be Sheet Music)
“
You’re a brand-new piece of sheet music,” she said slowly, “for a song which, once played, I’d swear I’d always known.
”
”
Julie Berry (Lovely War)
“
The butcher bird makes its noise
And asks you to agree
With its brutal nesting habits
And its pointless savagery
Now, the nightingale sings to you
And raises up the ante
I put one hand on your round ripe heart
And the other down your panties
”
”
Nick Cave (The Lyre Of Orpheus Sheet Music)
“
All the lonely people. Where do they all belong
”
”
Paul McCartney (Eleanor Rigby Sheet Music)
“
As God is my witness, I thought turkeys could fly.
”
”
Hugh Wilson (WKRP In Cincinnati Sheet Music)
“
I'm not sure I can explain it. I have all this raw emotion inside for you and sometimes I'm not sure what to do with it. I'm afraid if I let it out it will be too overwhelming for you and for me.
”
”
Ann Lister (Sheet Music: A Rock 'N' Roll Love Story (Sheet Music, #1))
“
A girl like me?”
“Yeah, a girl like you.” Cash’s lids drop down part way over his eyes, making them look like heavy, bedroom eyes, and his voice is like the silk sheets I can imagine him sleeping on. “Feisty, sexy, gorgeous as hell. I bet you’ve never met a man you couldn’t wind around your little finger.”
He’s watching me like he wants to undress me right where we are—in an empty bar with low light and soft music. And there’s a tiny part of me that would love for him to do exactly that.
”
”
M. Leighton (Down to You (The Bad Boys, #1))
“
It's Britney, bitch.
”
”
Britney Spears (Gimme More Sheet Music)
“
Everybody wants me to be what they want me to be but I’m not happy when I try to fake it.
”
”
Lionel Richie (Easy Sheet Music)
“
You can't fire me because I quit.
”
”
Kurt Cobain (Nirvana In Utero: Guitar TAB Songbook | Guitar Recorded Versions Sheet Music for Electric Guitar | Grunge Rock Album Transcriptions for Intermediate and Advanced Players | 12 Iconic Tracks Included)
“
You can’t learn to play soccer by reading the rulebook, you can’t learn to play the piano by studying sheets of music, and you can’t learn to cook by reading recipes.
”
”
Tina Seelig (What I Wish I Knew When I Was 20)
“
Cold silence has a tendency to atrophy any sense of compassion between supposed lovers, between supposed brothers.
”
”
Maynard James Keenan (Schism Sheet Music)
“
i was so ahead of the curve, the curve became a sphere. fell behind all my classmates, and I ended up here
”
”
Taylor Swift (Taylor Swift Folklore: Easy Piano Songbook with Lyrics | Beginner and Intermediate Sheet Music for Piano Players and Fans | Simplified Arrangements for Piano Students and Music Fans)
“
Raise a glass to freedom something they can never take away, no matter what they tell you.
”
”
Lin-Manuel Miranda (Hamilton: An American Musical by Lin-Manuel Miranda | Piano Solo Songbook for Piano Players | 10 Iconic Broadway Hits | Sheet Music for Piano Solo | Best Songs Book)
“
Nothing comes to sleepers but dreams.
”
”
Prince (The Beautiful Ones Sheet Music)
“
I bite my lip.
I buy what I'm told:
From the latest hit,
To the wisdom of old.
But I'm always alone.
And my heart is like ice.
And it's crowded and cold
In my secret life.
”
”
Leonard Cohen (In My Secret Life Sheet Music)
“
Supposing you hear a cry for help from a man in danger. You will probably feel two desires - one a desire to give help (due to your herd instinct), the other a desire to keep out of danger (due to the instinct for self-preservation). But you will find inside you, in addition to these two impulses, a third thing which tells you that you ought to follow the impulse to help, and suppress the impulse to run away. Now this thing that judges between two instincts, that decides which should be encouraged, cannot itself be either of them. You might as well say that the sheet of music which tells you, at a given moment, to play one note on the piano and not another, is itself one of the notes on the keyboard. The Moral Law tells us the tune we have to play: our instincts are merely the keys.
”
”
C.S. Lewis (Mere Christianity)
“
It really does look like musical sheets, frayed at the edges, constantly played, coming to you in tidal scores, in bars of canals with innumerable obbligati of bridges, mullioned windows, or curved crownings of Coducci cathedrals, not to mention the violin necks of gondolas. In fact, the whole city, especially at night, resembles a gigantic orchestra, with dimly lit music stands of palazzi, with a restless chorus of waves, with the falsetto of a star in the winter sky.
”
”
Joseph Brodsky (Watermark)
“
A lover of comfort might shrug after looking at the whole apparent jumble of furniture, old paintings, statues with missing arms and legs, engravings that were sometimes bad but precious in memory, and bric-a-brac. Only the eye of a connoisseur would have blazed with eagerness at the sight of this painting or that, some book yellowed with age, a piece of old porcelain, or stones and coins.
But the furniture and paintings of different ages, the bric-a-brac that meant nothing to anyone but had been marked for them both by a happy hour or memorable moment, and the ocean of books and sheet music breathed a warm life that oddly stimulated the mind and aesthetic sense. Present everywhere was vigilant thought. The beauty of human effort shone here, just as the eternal beauty of nature shone all around.
pp. 492-493
”
”
Ivan Goncharov (Oblomov)
“
And what exactly is a dream?
And what exactly is a joke?
”
”
Syd Barrett (Jugband Blues Sheet Music)
“
You drew stars around my scars
But now I'm bleedin
”
”
Taylor Swift (Taylor Swift Folklore: Easy Piano Songbook with Lyrics | Beginner and Intermediate Sheet Music for Piano Players and Fans | Simplified Arrangements for Piano Students and Music Fans)
“
I would rather hurt, than feel nothing at all.
”
”
Lady Antebellum (Need You Now Sheet Music)
“
It isn't easy being green.
”
”
Kermit the Frog (Bein' Green Sheet Music)
“
Wear a black bra under your white blouse, like two notes on a sheet of music.
”
”
Caroline de Maigret (How to Be Parisian Wherever You Are: Love, Style, and Bad Habits)
“
Half my life
Is books, written pages
Live and learn from fools and
From sages
You know it's true, oh
All these feelings come back to you
”
”
Aerosmith (Dream On Sheet Music)
“
Fall in light, grow in light.
”
”
Jeff Buckley (Grace Sheet Music)
“
hi lisen to the sound of music
”
”
Frank Ocean (Frank Ocean - Channel Orange | Piano Vocal Guitar Songbook | 12 Tracks from Grammy Award-Winning Album | R&B Sheet Music for Piano Players | Must-Have Music Collection for Pianists)
“
Life has few guarantees, Annie. But one thing I know for certain, I will never stop loving you as long as I can still draw breathe into my lungs.
”
”
Ann Lister (Sheet Music: A Rock 'N' Roll Love Story (Sheet Music, #1))
“
The ladders of life that we scale merrily
Move mysteriously around
So that when you think you're climbing up, man
In fact you're climbing down
”
”
Nick Cave (And No More Shall We Part Sheet Music)
“
And I need you more than want you
And I want you for all time
”
”
Glen Campbell (Wichita Lineman Sheet Music)
“
songwriters should make their statements and move on, maintaining a dignified silence.
”
”
Don McLean (The Don McLean Songbook: 13 of His Greatest Songs | Guitar Tablature with Lyrics | Acoustic Guitar Sheet Music | Includes "American Pie" and "Vincent" | Classic Pop and Rock Hits for Guitar)
“
Our consciousness is programmed. We see things a certain way from a young age - we're programmed to keep doing them that way. Then you have to spend adulthood learning how to overcome it, to read out the programs. Try to create. I want to tell people to create. Just start by creating your day. Then create your life.
”
”
Prince (The Beautiful Ones Sheet Music)
“
In the end, that was the problem with romance. It was so easy to romanticize romance because it was everywhere. It was in music and on TV and in filtered Instagram photos. It was in the air, crisp and alive with fresh possibility. It was in falling leaves, crumbling wooden doorways, scuffed cobblestones, and fields of dandelions. It was in the touch of hands, scrawled letters, crumpled sheets, and the golden hour. A soft yawn, early morning laughter, shoes lined up together by the door. Eyes across a dance floor. I could see it all, all the time, all around, but when I got closer, I found that nothing was there. A mirage.
”
”
Alice Oseman (Loveless)
“
The light in that room was a glow; I seem to remember the color green, or perhaps flowers. A pale green sheet covered his inert body but not his head, which lay (eyes closed, mouth set in a tense and terrible grimace) unmoving. Gianluca. Barely able to see, barely able to stand - my knees kept buckling – and breathing so quietly I thought that I, too, might die; that out of shock, I would just drift away, the shell of my body cracking open. No longer anchored by my brother’s love, I would be reabsorbed by sky. Gianluca. If there was never another sound in the world, I would understand – yes, that would be appropriate, it would be fitting. This was the antithesis of music, the antithesis of noise. My brother’s death seemed to demand silence of all the world. Gianluca.
”
”
Antonella Gambotto-Burke (The Eclipse: A Memoir of Suicide)
“
We don't tell anyone the darker side of things. We've been through all the breakups and addictions and all that. But we have a chemistry that no one else in the world has. So we don't mess with it." - Chris Martin
”
”
Chris Martin (See You Soon Sheet Music)
“
The fact is that odors and flavors are created entirely inside our heads. Think of something delicious—a moist, gooey, warm chocolate brownie fresh from the oven, say. Take a bite and savor the velvety smoothness, the rich heady waft of chocolate that fills your head. Now consider the fact that none of those flavors or aromas actually exist. All that is really going in your mouth is texture and chemicals. It is your brain that reads these scentless, flavorless molecules and vivifies them for your pleasure. Your brownie is sheet music. It is your brain that makes it a symphony.
”
”
Bill Bryson (The Body: A Guide for Occupants)
“
m such a nihilistic jerk half the time. I’m so fucking sarcastic at times and then at other times I’m still vulnerable and so sincere. That’s pretty much how every song comes out — it’s like a mixture of both of them, and that’s pretty much how people my age are. I’m just as pissed off about the things that made me pissed off a few years ago. I’m pissed off about everything in general so all these songs are pretty much about my battle with the things that piss me off.
”
”
Kurt Cobain (Come As You Are Sheet Music)
“
My body turns and yearns for a sleep
That won't ever come
It's never over,
My kingdom for a kiss upon her shoulder
It's never over, all my riches for her smiles
When I slept so soft against her
It's never over,
All my blood for the sweetness of her laughter
It's never over,
She is the tear that hangs inside my soul forever
”
”
Jeff Buckley (Lover, You Should've Come Over Sheet Music)
“
Early, I indentured myself to the five horizontal lines where black notes were written on a sheet of music. It is a place of world of signs and notations that speaks to me with perfect clarity. It is a place of time signatures, fermatas, ledger lines, grace notes, and demisemiquavers that are the common tongue and heritage of musicians all over the world. . . . It is something I cannot imagine being without. For without music, life is a journey through a desert that has not ever heard the rumor of God. In music’s sweet harmony, I had all the proof I needed of a God who held the earth together between the staffs, where the heavens lay. Here, he marked all the lines and spaces with notes so perfect that they praised all of his creation with their beauty.
”
”
Pat Conroy (Beach Music)
“
Where, then, is any particular gene—say, the gene for long legs in humans? This is a little like asking where is Beethoven’s Piano Sonata in E minor. Is it in the original handwritten score? The printed sheet music? Any one performance—or perhaps the sum of all performances, historical and potential, real and imagined? The quavers and crotchets inked on paper are not the music. Music is not a series of pressure waves sounding through the air; nor grooves etched in vinyl or pits burned in CDs; nor even the neuronal symphonies stirred up in the brain of the listener. The music is the information. Likewise, the base pairs of DNA are not genes. They encode genes. Genes themselves are made of bits.
”
”
James Gleick (The Information: A History, a Theory, a Flood)
“
Durga is the strength and protective power in nature, Lakshmi is its beauty. As Kali is the darkness of night and the great dissolve into nirvana, Lakshmi is the brightness of day and the expansiveness of teeming life. She can be found in rich soil and flowing waters, in streams and lakes that teem with fish. She is one of those goddesses whose signature energy is most accessible through the senses. You can detect her in the fragrance of flowers or of healthy soil. You can see her in the leafed-out trees of June and hear her voice in morning birdsong. If Durga is military band music and Kali heavy metal, Lakshmi is Mozart. She’s chocolate mousse, satiny sheets, the soft feeling of water slipping through your fingers. Lakshmi is growth, renewal, sweetness.
”
”
Sally Kempton (Awakening Shakti: The Transformative Power of the Goddesses of Yoga)
“
Evening Concert, Sainte-Chapelle"
The celebrated windows flamed with light
directly pouring north across the Seine;
we rustled into place. Then violins
vaunting Vivaldi's strident strength, then Brahms,
seemed to suck with their passionate sweetness,
bit by bit, the vigor from the red,
the blazing blue, so that the listening eye
saw suddenly the thick black lines, in shapes
of shield and cross and strut and brace, that held
the holy glowing fantasy together.
The music surged; the glow became a milk,
a whisper to the eye, a glimmer ebbed
until our beating hearts, our violins
were cased in thin but solid sheets of lead.
”
”
John Updike
“
He wordlessly crossed the floor and sat beside Adam on the mattress. When he held out his hand, Adam put the model into it.
“This old thing,” Ronan said. He turned the front tyre, and again the music played out of it. They sat like that for a few minutes, as Ronan examined the car and turned each wheel to play a different tune. Adam watched how intently Ronan studied the seams, his eyelashes low over his light eyes. Ronan let out a breath, put the model down on the bed beside him, and kissed Adam.
Once, when Adam had still lived in the trailer park, he had been pushing the lawn mower around the scraggly side yard when he realized that it was raining a mile away. He could smell it, the earthy scent of rain on dirt, but also the electric, restless smell of ozone. And he could see it: a hazy gray sheet of water blocking his view of the mountains. He could track the line of rain travelling across the vast dry field towards him. It was heavy and dark, and he knew he would get drenched if he stayed outside. It was coming from so far away that he had plenty of time to put the mower away and get under cover. Instead, though, he just stood there and watched it approach. Even at the last minute, as he heard the rain pounding the grass flat, he just stood there. He closed his eyes and let the storm soak him.
That was this kiss.
They kissed again. Adam felt it in more than his lips.
Ronan sat back, his eyes closed, swallowing. Adam watched his chest rise and fall, his eyebrows furrow. He felt as bright and dreamy and imaginary as the light through the window.
He did not understand anything.
It was a long moment before Ronan opened his eyes, and when he did, his expression was complicated. He stood up. He was still looking at Adam, and Adam was looking back, but neither said anything. Probably Ronan wanted something from him, but Adam didn’t know what to say. He was a magician, Persephone had said, and his magic was making connections between disparate things. Only now he was too full of white, fuzzy light to make any sort of logical connections. He knew that of all the options in the world, Ronan Lynch was the most difficult version of any of them. He knew that Ronan was not a thing to be experimented with. He knew his mouth still felt warm. He knew he had started his entire time at Aglionby certain that all he wanted to do was get as far away from this state and everything in it as possible.
He was pretty sure he had just been Ronan’s first kiss.
”
”
Maggie Stiefvater (The Raven King (The Raven Cycle, #4))
“
A murmur ran through the crowd, and I looked around to see what all the fuss was about. Then I saw him, walking past table after table as if everybody weren't stopping to stare at him.
Loki had ventured down from where he'd been hiding in the servants' quarters. Since I'd granted him amnesty, he was no longer being guarded and was free to roman as he pleased, but I hadn't exactly invited him to the wedding.
As Tove and I danced, I didn't take my eyes off Loki. He walked around the dance floor toward the refreshments, but he kept watching me. He got a glass of champagne from the table, and even as he drank his eyes never left me.
Another Markis came over and cut in to dance with me, but I barely noticed when I switched partners. I tried to focus on the person I was dancing with. But there was something about the way Loki looked at me, and I couldn't shake it.
The song had switched to something contemporary, probably the sheet music that Willa had slipped the orchestra. She'd insisted the whole thing would be far too dull if they only played classical.
The murmur died down, and people returned to dancing and talking. Loki took another swig of his champagne, then set the glass down and walked across the dance floor. Everyone parted around him, and I wasn't sure if it was out of fear or respect.
He wore all black, even his shirt. I had no idea where he'd gotten the clothes, but he did look debonair.
"May I have this dance?" Loki asked my dance partner, but his eyes were on me.
"Um, I don't know if you should," the Markis fumbled, but I was already moving away from him.
"No, it's all right," I said.
Uncertainly, the Markis stepped back, and Loki took my hand. When he placed his hand on my back, a shiver ran up my spine, but I tried to hide it and put my hand on his shoulder.
"You know, you weren't invited to this," I told him, but he merely smirked as we began dancing.
"So throw me out."
"I might." I raised my head defiantly, and that only made him laugh.
"If it's as the Princess wishes," he said, but he made no move to step away, and for some odd reason, I felt relieved.
”
”
Amanda Hocking (Ascend (Trylle, #3))
“
I’m such a nihilistic jerk half the time. I’m so fucking sarcastic at times and then at other times I’m still vulnerable and so sincere. That’s pretty much how every song comes out — it’s like a mixture of both of them, and that’s pretty much how people my age are. I’m just as pissed off about the things that made me pissed off a few years ago. I’m pissed off about everything in general so all these songs are pretty much about my battle with the things that piss me off.
”
”
Kurt Cobain (Come As You Are Sheet Music)
“
Black. The song is about letting go. It's very rare for a relationship to withstand the Earth's gravitational pull and where it's going to take people and how they're going to grow. I've heard it said that you can't really have a true love unless it was a love unrequited. It's a harsh one, because then your truest one is the one you can't have forever.[6]
”
”
Eddie Vedder (Peace and Love Sheet Music)
“
At some time all cities have this feel: in London it's at five or six on a winer evening. Paris has it too, late, when the cafes are closing up. In New York it can happen anytime: early in the morning as the light climbs over the canyon streets and the avenues stretch so far into the distance that it seems the whole world is city; or now, as the chimes of midnight hang in the rain and all the city's longings acquire the clarity and certainty of sudden understanding. The day coming to an end and people unable to evade any longer the nagging sense of futility that has been growing stronger through the day, knowing that they will feel better when they wake up and it is daylight again but knowing also that each day leads to this sense of quiet isolation. Whether the plates have been stacked neatly away or the sink is cluttered with unwashed dishes makes no difference because all these details--the clothes hanging in the closet, the sheets on the bed--tell the same story--a story in which they walk to the window and look out at the rain-lit streets, wondering how many other people are looking out like this, people who look forward to Monday because the weekdays have a purpose which vanishes at the weekend when there is only the laundry and the papers. And knowing also that these thoughts do not represent any kind of revelation because by now they have themselves become part of the same routine of bearable despair, a summing up that is all the time dissolving into everyday. A time in the day when it is possible to regret everything and nothing in the same breath, when the only wish of all bachelors is that there was someone who loved them, who was thinking of them even if she was on the other side of the world. When a woman, feeling the city falling damp around her, hearing music from a radio somewhere, looks up and imagines the lives being led behind the yellow-lighted windows: a man at his sink, a family crowded together around a television, lovers drawing curtains, someone at his desk, hearing the same tune on the radio, writing these words.
”
”
Geoff Dyer (But Beautiful: A Book About Jazz)
“
something that will make the hairs of your head stand on end! The function of music is to liberate in the soul those feelings that normally we keep locked up in the heart. The great composers of the past were able to do this, but the musicians of today are satisfied with four notes in a line you can sell on a song-sheet at the street corner. Genius does not find its recognition quite as easily as that, my dear Madame Azaire!
”
”
Sebastian Faulks (Birdsong)
“
I love you, Levi.”
“Thank God for it because I love you too.”
Her laugh was back in his house again. Her scent on his sheets.
Her crap on his bathroom counter and her stuff in the drawers in his armoire.
She lived in him and he had no plans to ever let that change.
It didn’t matter that she was younger than he was. All that mattered was that she loved him and he loved her. The rest they could work out as time passed. She’d keep him in line. Decorate their house and fill it with music and love. And one day with children.
They had time, he realized. Time to be in love and be engaged. Time for her art and his job, time for weddings and honeymoons and nesting. She was his, forever. As deeply as he was hers.
Made the groveling worth it.
~~Sway
”
”
Lauren Dane (Cherished (Delicious, #1))
“
.... romance is so much bigger than just a love story. Romance has to do with making things lovely because of love. Romance means absorbing the beauty of life, conversation, atmosphere, places, and surroundings. It means increasing our awareness of the fragrance of pine trees, freshly ground coffee, and sheets drying on the line; hearing the music of waves, children's laughter, and he rain drumming on the roof: seeing the signature of God on His creation. It means drinking the gift of life to the dregs. All to be enjoyed, all to be taken in." p. 17
”
”
Dee Brestin (Falling In Love With Jesus Abandoning Yourself To The Greatest Romance Of Your Life)
“
I want to wash your hair with a shampoo that smells like fruit - mango, or strawberries. I want to walk on a beach with you, dragging a big stick behind us, making a message in the sand that we try to believe an airplane will really see. I want to kiss saltwater from your lips. I want us to listen to music with our eyes closed; I want to read musty books while lying next to you - books about fascinating things like mummies and eccentric artists and old shipwrecks in the Pacific. I want to have picnics on our bed and crawl into cotton sheets that smell like summer because we left the windows open when we were gone. I want to wake in the night with you and marvel at the stars and try to find the moon through the trees. I want all the sweet things in life. But only by your side.
”
”
Deb Caletti (The Six Rules of Maybe)
“
Lake Michigan, impossibly blue, the morning light bouncing toward the city.
Lake Michigan frozen in sheets you could walk on but wouldn't dare.
Lake Michigan, gray out a high-rise window, indistinguishable from the sky.
Bread, hot from the oven. Or even stale in the restaurant basket, rescued by salty butter.
The Cubs winning the pendant someday. The Cubs winning the Series. The Cubs continuing to lose.
His favorite song, not yet written. His favorite movie, not yet made.
The depth of an oil brushstroke. Chagall's blue window. Picasso's blue man and his guitar.
...
The sound of an old door creaking open. The sound of garlic cooking. The sound of typing. The sound of commercials from the next room, when you were in the kitchen getting a drink. The sound of someone else finishing a shower.
...
Dancing till the floor was an optional landing place. Dancing elbows out, dancing with arms up, dancing in a pool of sweat.
All the books he hadn't started.
The man at Wax Trax! Records with the beautiful eyelashes. The man who sat every Saturday at Nookies, reading the Economist and eating eggs, his ears always strangely red. The ways his own life might have intersected with theirs, given enough time, enough energy, a better universe.
The love of his life. Wasn't there supposed to be a love of his life?
...
His body, his own stupid, slow, hairy body, its ridiculous desires, its aversions, its fears. The way his left knee cracked in the cold.
The sun, the moon, the sky, the stars.
The end of every story.
Oak trees.
Music.
Breath.
...
”
”
Rebecca Makkai (The Great Believers)
“
Don’t be afraid of aging. As the saying goes, don’t be afraid of anything but fear itself. Find “your” perfume before you turn thirty. Wear it for the next thirty years. No one should ever see your gums when you talk or laugh. If you own only one sweater, make sure it’s cashmere. Wear a black bra under your white blouse, like two notes on a sheet of music. One must live with the opposite sex, not against them. Except when making love. Be unfaithful: cheat on your perfume, but only on cold days. Go to the theater, to museums, and to concerts as often as possible: it gives you a healthy glow. Be aware of your qualities and your faults. Cultivate them in private but don’t obsess. Make it look easy. Everything you do should seem effortless and graceful. Not too much makeup, too many colors, too many accessories … Take a deep breath and keep it simple. Your look should always have one thing left undone—the devil is in the details. Be your own knight in shining armor. Cut your own hair or ask your sister to do it for you. Of course you know celebrity hairdressers, but only as friends. Always be fuckable: when standing in line at the bakery on a Sunday morning, buying champagne in the middle of the night, or even picking the kids up from school. You never know. Either go all gray or no gray hair. Salt and pepper is for the table.
”
”
Anne Berest (How to Be Parisian Wherever You Are: Love, Style, and Bad Habits)
“
Often when he was not working he had come here and sat an entire afternoon, lulled by the din and music from the other rooms into a state of vague ecstasy, while he contemplated the small sheet of water outside the window. It was that happy frame of mind into which his people could project themselves so easily - the mere absence of immediate unpleasant preoccupation could start it off, and a landscape which included the sea, a river, a fountain, or anything that occupied the eye without engaging the mind, was of use in sustaining it. It was the world behind the world, where reflection precludes the necessity for action, and the calm which all things seek in death appears briefly in the guise of contentment, the spirit at last persuaded that the still waters of perfection are reachable.
”
”
Paul Bowles (The Spider's House)
“
The Three-Decker
"The three-volume novel is extinct."
Full thirty foot she towered from waterline to rail.
It cost a watch to steer her, and a week to shorten sail;
But, spite all modern notions, I found her first and best—
The only certain packet for the Islands of the Blest.
Fair held the breeze behind us—’twas warm with lovers’ prayers.
We’d stolen wills for ballast and a crew of missing heirs.
They shipped as Able Bastards till the Wicked Nurse confessed,
And they worked the old three-decker to the Islands of the Blest.
By ways no gaze could follow, a course unspoiled of Cook,
Per Fancy, fleetest in man, our titled berths we took
With maids of matchless beauty and parentage unguessed,
And a Church of England parson for the Islands of the Blest.
We asked no social questions—we pumped no hidden shame—
We never talked obstetrics when the Little Stranger came:
We left the Lord in Heaven, we left the fiends in Hell.
We weren’t exactly Yussufs, but—Zuleika didn’t tell.
No moral doubt assailed us, so when the port we neared,
The villain had his flogging at the gangway, and we cheered.
’Twas fiddle in the forc’s’le—’twas garlands on the mast,
For every one got married, and I went ashore at last.
I left ’em all in couples a-kissing on the decks.
I left the lovers loving and the parents signing cheques.
In endless English comfort by county-folk caressed,
I left the old three-decker at the Islands of the Blest!
That route is barred to steamers: you’ll never lift again
Our purple-painted headlands or the lordly keeps of Spain.
They’re just beyond your skyline, howe’er so far you cruise
In a ram-you-damn-you liner with a brace of bucking screws.
Swing round your aching search-light—’twill show no haven’s peace.
Ay, blow your shrieking sirens to the deaf, gray-bearded seas!
Boom out the dripping oil-bags to skin the deep’s unrest—
And you aren’t one knot the nearer to the Islands of the Blest!
But when you’re threshing, crippled, with broken bridge and rail,
At a drogue of dead convictions to hold you head to gale,
Calm as the Flying Dutchman, from truck to taffrail dressed,
You’ll see the old three-decker for the Islands of the Blest.
You’ll see her tiering canvas in sheeted silver spread;
You’ll hear the long-drawn thunder ’neath her leaping figure-head;
While far, so far above you, her tall poop-lanterns shine
Unvexed by wind or weather like the candles round a shrine!
Hull down—hull down and under—she dwindles to a speck,
With noise of pleasant music and dancing on her deck.
All’s well—all’s well aboard her—she’s left you far behind,
With a scent of old-world roses through the fog that ties you blind.
Her crew are babes or madmen? Her port is all to make?
You’re manned by Truth and Science, and you steam for steaming’s sake?
Well, tinker up your engines—you know your business best—
She’s taking tired people to the Islands of the Blest!
”
”
Rudyard Kipling
“
Before she became ill, David’s mother would often tell him that stories were alive. They weren’t alive in the way that people were alive, or even dogs or cats. People were alive whether you chose to notice them or not, while dogs tended to make you notice them if they decided that you weren’t paying them enough attention. Cats, meanwhile, were very good at pretending people didn’t exist at all when it suited them, but that was another matter entirely.
Stories were different, though: they came alive in the telling. Without a human voice to read them aloud, or a pair of wide eyes following them by flashlight beneath a blanket, they had no real existence in our world. They were like seeds in the beak of a bird, waiting to fall to earth, or the notes of a song laid out on a sheet, yearning for an instrument to bring their music into being. They lay dormant, hoping for the chance to emerge. Once someone started to read them, they could begin to change. They could take root in the imagination, and transform the reader. Stories wanted to be read, David’s mother would whisper. They needed it. It was the reason they forced themselves from their world into ours. They wanted us to give them life.
”
”
John Connolly (The Book of Lost Things (The Book of Lost Things, #1))
“
Every Pirate Wants to Be an Admiral IT’S NOT AS though this is the first time we’ve had to rethink what copyright is, what it should do, and whom it should serve. The activities that copyright regulates—copying, transmission, display, performance—are technological activities, so when technology changes, it’s usually the case that copyright has to change, too. And it’s rarely pretty. When piano rolls were invented, the composers, whose income came from sheet music, were aghast. They couldn’t believe that player-piano companies had the audacity to record and sell performances of their work. They tried—unsuccessfully—to have such recordings classified as copyright violations. Then (thanks in part to the institution of a compulsory license) the piano-roll pirates and their compatriots in the wax-cylinder business got legit, and became the record industry. Then the radio came along, and broadcasters had the audacity to argue that they should be able to play records over the air. The record industry was furious, and tried (unsuccessfully) to block radio broadcasts without explicit permission from recording artists. Their argument was “When we used technology to appropriate and further commercialize the works of composers, that was progress. When these upstart broadcasters do it to our records, that’s piracy.” A few decades later, with the dust settled around radio transmission, along came cable TV, which appropriated broadcasts sent over the air and retransmitted them over cables. The broadcasters argued (unsuccessfully) that this was a form of piracy, and that the law should put an immediate halt to it. Their argument? The familiar one: “When we did it, it was progress. When they do it to us, that’s piracy.” Then came the VCR, which instigated a landmark lawsuit by the cable operators and the studios, a legal battle that was waged for eight years, finishing up in the 1984 Supreme Court “Betamax” ruling. You can look up the briefs if you’d like, but fundamentally, they went like this: “When we took the broadcasts without permission, that was progress. Now that someone’s recording our cable signals without permission, that’s piracy.” Sony won, and fifteen years later it was one of the first companies to get in line to sue Internet companies that were making it easier to copy music and videos online. I have a name for the principle at work here: “Every pirate wants to be an admiral.
”
”
Cory Doctorow (Information Doesn't Want to Be Free: Laws for the Internet Age)
“
He closed his eyes. This bed was a wedding gift from friends he had not seen in years. He tried to remember their names, but they were gone. In it, or on it, his marriage had begun and, six years later, ended. He recognized a musical creak when he moved his legs, he smelled Julie on the sheets and banked-up pillows, her perfume and the close, soapy essence that characterized her newly washed linen. Here he had taken part in the longest, most revealing, and, later, most desolate conversations of his life. He had had the best sex ever here, and the worst wakeful nights. He had done more reading here than in any other single place - he remembered Anna Karenina and Daniel Deronda in one week of illness. He had never lost his temper so thoroughly anywhere else, nor had been so tender, protective, comforting, nor, since early childhood, been so cared for himself. Here his daughter had been conceived and born. On this side of the bed. Deep in the mattress were the traces of pee from her early-morning visits. She used to climb between then, sleep a little, then wake them with her chatter, her insistence on the day beginning. As they clung to their last fragments of dreams, she demanded the impossible: stories, poems, songs, invented catechisms, physical combat, tickling. Nearly all evidence of her existence, apart from photographs, they had destroyed or given away. All the worst and the best things that had ever happened to him had happened here. This was where he belonged. Beyond all immediate considerations, like the fact that his marriage was more or less finished, there was his right to lie here now in the marriage bed.
”
”
Ian McEwan (The Child in Time)
“
Subject: Some boat
Alex,
I know Fox Mulder. My mom watched The X-Files. She says it was because she liked the creepy store lines. I think she liked David Duchovny. She tried Californication, but I don't think her heart was in it. I think she was just sticking it to my grandmother, who has decided it's the work of the devil. She says that about most current music,too, but God help anyone who gets between her and American Idol.
The fuzzy whale was very nice, it a little hard to identify. The profile of the guy between you and the whale in the third pic was very familiar, if a little fuzzy. I won't ask. No,no. I have to ask.
I won't ask.
My mother loves his wife's suits.
I Googled. There are sharks off the coast of the Vineyard. Great big white ones. I believe you about the turtle. Did I mention that there are sharks there? I go to Surf City for a week every summer with my cousins. I eat too much ice cream. I play miniature golf-badly. I don't complain about sand in my hot dog buns or sheets. I even spend enough time on the beach to get sand in more uncomfortable places. I do not swim. I mean, I could if I wanted to but I figure that if we were meant to share the water with sharks, we would have a few extra rows of teeth, too.
I'll save you some cannoli.
-Ella
Subject: Shh
Fiorella,
Yes,Fiorella. I looked it up. It means Flower. Which, when paired with MArino, means Flower of the Sea. What shark would dare to touch you?
I won't touch the uncomfortable sand mention, hard as it is to resist. I also will not think of you in a bikini (Note to self: Do not think of Ella in a bikini under any circumstanes. Note from self: Are you f-ing kidding me?).
Okay.
Two pieces of info for you. One: Our host has an excellent wine cellar and my mother is European. Meaning she doesn't begrudge me the occasional glass. Or four.
Two: Our hostess says to thank yur mother very much. Most people say nasty things about her suits.
Three: We have a house kinda near Surf City. Maybe I'll be there when your there.
You'd better burn this after reading.
-Alexai
Subect: Happy Thanksgiving
Alexei,
Consider it burned. Don't worry. I'm not showing your e-mails to anybody. Matter of national security, of course.
Well,I got to sit at the adult table. In between my great-great-aunt Jo, who is ninety-three and deaf, and her daughter, JoJo, who had to repeat everyone's conversations across me. Loudly. The food was great,even my uncle Ricky's cranberry lasagna. In fact, it would have been a perfectly good TG if the Eagles han't been playing the Jets.My cousin Joey (other side of the family) lives in Hoboken. His sister married a Philly guy. It started out as a lively across-the-table debate: Jets v. Iggles. It ended up with Joey flinging himself across the table at his brother-in-law and my grandmother saying loud prayers to Saint Bridget. At least I think it was Saint Bridget. Hard to tell. She was speaking Italian.
She caught me trying to freeze a half-dozen cannoli. She yelled at me. Apparently, the shells get really soggy when they defrost. I guess you'll have to come have a fresh one when you get back.
-F/E
”
”
Melissa Jensen (The Fine Art of Truth or Dare)
“
I prop my guitar up against the nightstand. Then I turn toward the bed and fall into it face first. The mattress is soft but firm, like a sheet of steel wrapped in a cloud. I roll around, moaning loud and long.
“Oh, that’s good. Really, really good. What a grand bed!”
Sarah clears her throat. “Well. We should probably get to sleep, then. Big day tomorrow.”
The pillow smells sweet, like candy. I can only imagine it’s from her. I wonder if I pressed my nose to the crook of her neck, would her skin smell as delicious?
I brush away the thought as I watch her stiffly gather a pillow and blanket from the other side of the bed, dragging them to . . . the nook.
“What are you doing?”
She looks up, her doe eyes widening. “Getting ready for bed.”
“You’re going to sleep there?”
“Of course. The sofa’s very uncomfortable.”
“Why can’t we share the bed?”
She chokes . . . stutters. “I . . . I can’t sleep with you. I don’t even know you.”
I throw my arms out wide. “What do you want to know? Ask me anything—I’m an open book.”
“That’s not what I mean.”
“You’re being ridiculous! It’s a huge bed. You could let one rip and I wouldn’t hear it.”
And the blush is back. With a vengeance.
“I’m not . . . I don’t . . .”
“You don’t fart?” I scoff. “Really? Are you not human?”
She curses under her breath, but I’d love to hear it out loud. I bet uninhibited Sarah Von Titebottum would be a stunning sight. And very entertaining.
She shakes her head, pinning me with her eyes.
“There’s something wrong with you.”
“No.” I explain calmly, “I’m just free. Honest with myself and others. You should try it sometime.”
She folds her arms, all tight, trembling indignation. It’s adorable.
“I’m sleeping in the nook, Your Highness. And that’s that.”
I sit up, pinning her gaze right back at her.
“Henry.”
“What?”
“My name is not Highness, it’s fucking Henry, and I’d prefer you use it.”
And she snaps.
“Fine! Fucking Henry—happy?”
I smile.
“Yes. Yes, I am.” I flop back on the magnificent bed. “Sleep tight, Titebottum.”
I think she growls at me, but it’s muffled by the sound of rustling bed linens and pillows. And then . . . there’s silence. Beautiful, blessed silence.
I wiggle around, getting comfy.
I turn on my side and fluff the pillow.
I squeeze my eyes tight . . . but it’s hopeless.
“Fucking hell!” I sit up.
And Sarah springs to her feet. “What? What’s wrong?”
It’s the guilt. I’ve barged into this poor girl’s room, confiscated her bed, and have forced her to sleep in a cranny in the wall. I may not be the man my father was or the gentleman my brother is, but I’m not that much of a prick.
I stand up, rip my shirt over my head. and march toward the window seat. I feel Sarah’s eyes graze my bare chest, arms. and stomach, but she circles around me, keeping her distance.
“You take the bloody bed,” I tell her. “I’ll sleep in the bloody nook.”
“You don’t have to do that.”
I push my hand through my hair. “Yes, I do.” Then I stand up straight and proper, an impersonation of Hugh Grant in one of his classic royal roles. “Please, Lady Sarah.”
She blinks, her little mouth pursed. “Okay.”
Then she climbs onto the bed, under the covers. And I squeeze onto the window bench, knees bent, my elbow jammed against the icy windowpane, and my neck bent at an odd angle that I’m going to be feeling tomorrow.
The light is turned down to a very low dim, and for several moments all I hear is Sarah’s soft breaths.
But then, in the near darkness, her delicate voice floats out on a sigh.
“All right, we can sleep in the bed together.”
Music to my ears. I don’t make her tell me twice—I’ve fulfilled my noble quota for the evening. I stumble from the nook and crash onto the bed.
That’s better.
”
”
Emma Chase (Royally Matched (Royally, #2))