Shorter Hair Quotes

Everybody wants to be fancy and new. Nobody wants to be themselves. I mean, maybe people want to be themselves, but they want to be different, with different clothes or shorter hair or less fat. It's a fact. If there was a guy who just liked being himself and didn't want to be anybody else, that guy would be the most different guy in the world and everybody would want to be him.

The satyr gave me a sympathetic glance. She was shorter than me by a foot, with large hazel eyes that matched her curly hair. I tried to keep my eyes away from her furry lower half, but it was difficult, especially when she smelled faintly like a petting zoo.

Everyone has always said I look like Bailey, but I don't. I have grey eyes to her green, an oval face to her heart-shaped one, I'm shorter, scrawnier, paler, flatter, plainer, tamer. All we shared is a madhouse of curls that I imprison in a ponytail while she let hers rave like madness around her head. I don't sing in my sleep or eat the petals off flowers or run into the rain instead of out of it. I'm the unplugged-in one, the side-kick sister, tucked into a corner of her shadow. Boys followed her everywhere; they filled the booths at the restaurant where she waitressed, herded around her at the river. One day, I saw a boy come up behind her and pull a strand of her long hair I understood this- I felt the same way. In photographs of us together, she is always looking at the camera, and I am always looking at her.

I don't know if I've ever really touched him. Maybe once or twice when passing papers back. You know, even shorter, his hair looks so soft. Maybe it's time I rub it a little. So I can give more concrete details. I stretch my hand across my desk, but stop when I realize the horror of what I was about to do. Pet Sean. Have I lost my mind?

This was not Newt's fault; in his younger days he would go every couple of months to the barber's shop on the corner, clutching a photograph he's carefully torn from a magazine which showed someone with an impressively cool haircut grinning at the camera and he would show the picture to the barber, and ask to be made to look like that, please. And the barber, who knew his job, would take one look and then give Newt the basic, all-purpose, short-back-and-sides. After a year of this, Newt realized that he obviously didn't have the face for haircuts. The best Newton Pulsifer could hope for after a haircut was shorter hair.

Sabrina fair Listen where thou art sitting Under the glassie, cool, translucent wave, In twisted braids of Lillies knitting The loose train of thy amber-dropping hair, Listen for dear honour's sake, Goddess of the silver lake, Listen and save.

Celaena peered in the mirror—and stopped dead. The somewhat shorter hair was the least of the changes. She was now flushed with color, her eyes bright and clear, and though she'd regained the weight she'd lost during that winter, her face was leaner. A woman—a woman was smiling back at her, beautiful for every scar and imperfection and mark of survival, beautiful for the fact that the smile was real, and she felt it kindle the long-slumbering joy in her heart.

The hair hierarchy rates worth by length and texture of hair. The longer, the silkier and more European your hair, the higher your worth. The shorter, kinkier, and more African your hair? Kill thyself.

Shadow always had high hopes for haircuts, but they never lived up to his expectations. After every haircut he looked more or less the same, only with shorter hair.

If there is a war, then all of the things most of us do won't matter any more. I have a feeling that one has to work all day and all night and live too, and swim and get the sun one's hair and laugh and love as many people as one can find around and do this all terribly fast, because the time getting shorter and shorter every day.

Princeton isn't actually part of New Jersey. It's a small island of wealth and intellectual eccentricity floating in the Sea of Central Megalopolis. It's an honest-to-god town awash in the land of the strip mall. Hair is smaller, heels are shorter, asses are tighter in Princeton.

Oh- hey, there," he said. He was shorter than me, pudgy with salt-and-pepper hair that always seemed to be in need of a good conditioning. And he always wore sweatpants and T-shirts that had seen more abuse than narcotics. But he was a good landlord. When my heater stopped working in mid-December, it took him only two weeks to get it fixed. Of course, it took me knocking on his door in need of a warm place to sleep to get it that way, but one night on his sofa, where I'd suddenly developed night terrors and epilepsy, and that puppy was running like a Mercedes the next day. It was awesome.

At a mere five feet seven inches, Dan was a head shorter than most of the boys. His body sagged slightly where their muscles rippled, his teeth were crooked where theirs gleamed, and his brown hair was thick and unruly where theirs shone. To judge solely from appearances, it was difficult to believe he’d been accepted into this prestigious little clique. But to judge from appearances was to ignore Dan’s quick wit and effortless charm. These were the characteristics that each of the boys aspired to, and the fact that Dan possessed them in such abundance was a constant source of fascination to them. No matter that he looked so freakishly average. His sense of humour and charisma were the benchmarks toward which the entire group was working, and few within the circle were held in higher esteem.

In these days of physical fitness, hair dye, and plastic surgery, you can live much of your life without feeling or even looking old. But then one day, your knee goes, or your shoulder, or your back, or your hip. Your hot flashes come to an end; things droop. Spots appear. Your cleavage looks like a peach pit. If your elbows faced forward, you would kill yourself. You’re two inches shorter than you used to be. You’re ten pounds fatter and you cannot lose a pound of it to save your soul. Your hands don’t work as well as they once did and you can’t open bottles, jars, wrappers, and especially those gadgets that are encased tightly in what seems to be molded Mylar. If you were stranded on a desert island and your food were sealed in plastic packaging, you would starve to death. You take so many pills in the morning you don’t have room for breakfast. You lose close friends and discover one of the worst truths of old age: they’re irreplaceable. People who run four miles a day and eat only nuts and berries drop dead. People who drink a quart of whiskey and smoke two packs of cigarettes a day drop dead. You are suddenly in a lottery, the ultimate game of chance, and someday your luck will run out. Everybody dies. There’s nothing you can do about it. Whether or not you eat six almonds a day. Whether or not you believe in God.

His hair was shorter than I remembered, tawny in this half-light, the tousled edges casually framing the clean, commanding lines of his face. His mouth, normally so stern was relaxed now and as I stared a slight sweet smile touched his lips, its curve softening the straight strong lines of his nose and brow. Finally, inevitably, I met his eyes and felt a connection that seared straight through me, down through my soles and away. Those eyes, darker than mine, the darkest blue, dark and as impenetrable as glaciers. Tonight he was real, so very real that my heart thumped, my blood sang, my legs shook.

Newt realized that he obviously didn’t have the face that went with haircuts. The best Newton Pulsifer could hope for after a haircut was shorter hair.

The best Newton Pulsifer could hope for after a haircut was shorter hair.

Shadow always had high hopes for haircuts, but they never lived up to his expectations. After every haircut he looked more or less the same, only with shorter hair.

But as soon as we touched, I felt magic crackle over and through me, so strong that I tried to jerk my hand back. But he held tight until, finally, the crackling sensation stopped. My hand slid out of his, and I leaped up from the fountain."What the hell was-" Then I looked down and realized I was completely dry. Not only that, but my demure black dress had been replaced with...well, another black dress, but this one was a lot shorter, sparklier, and also rocking a very low neckline. Even my hair was different, transformed from a soggy braid to silky brown waves. Nick winked at me. "That's better. Now you look more like the Demon Who Would be Queen." He heaved himself out of the water and grabbed Jenna's hand. Within seconds, she went from drowned rat to hottie, her soaked clothes replaced with-what else?-a pink sundress. Of course it showed a lot more skin than anything Jenna would have picked out for herself. "Oh,lovely,Nick," Daisy said, rolling her eyes as he wrapped an arm around her waist. "What?" he asked once he laid a smacking kiss on her cheek. "They look better like that." Without thinking,I reached out and grabbed Nick's free arm. His wet white T-shirt and jeans rippled, and suddenly he was wearing a Day-Glo yellow tank top and acid-washed jeans. "And you look better like this." I wasn't sure if it was the ridiculous sight of Nick in those clothes, or the fact that I'd done a spell so easily-with absolutely no explosions-but I could feel my lips curving upward in a smile. As Daisy hooted with laughter, Nick narrowed his eyes at me. "Okay, now you're in for it." He waved his hand, and suddenly I was sweltering. When I glanced down, I saw that it was because I was now dressed like the Easter Bunny.But with the flick of one fuzzy paw,I'd transformed Nick's jeans and tank top into a snowsuit. Then I was in a bikini. So Nick was wearing a particularly poofy purple prom dress. By the time he'd turned my clothes into a showgirl's costume, complete with a feathery headdress, and I'd put him in a scuba suit, we were both completely magic drunk and giggling.

She’d chopped it too. It was longer than Matt’s, shorter than Kellan’s, somewhere in between like…Denny. Fuck. I looked like Denny now. Anna was gonna flip when she saw this. After my hair was completely fucked, Harold took me to meet the rest of the cast.

What Jessica said—hair much shorter, wearing a darker mouth of different outline, harder lipstick, her typewriter banking in a phalanx of letters between them—was: "We're going to be married. We're trying very hard to have a baby." All at once there is nothing but his asshole between Gravity and Roger. "I don't care. Have his baby. I'll love you both—just come with me Jess, please... I need you...." She flips a red lever on her intercom. Far away a buzzer goes off. "Security." Her voice is perfectly hard, the word still clap-echoing in the air as in through the screen door of the Quonset office wth a smell of tide flats come the coppers, looking grim. Security. Her magic word, her spell against demons.

Jodi in tactical gear was something to behold. Pert, a lot shorter than I am, blond hair tucked under a helmet, cinched into body armor never intended to mold to the body of a curvy woman. Ugly but efficient attire. Someone needs to talk to armor designers about female body shapes and style.

Her eyebrows furrowed. "What are you doing?" "What do you mean?" "Are you being a dick about my hair? Because I know you're not complimenting me." "Lizzie," I said, pouring on the tease, even though I fucking loved her new hair. It was shorter and cute as hell, but no way could I give her a genuine compliment. We didn't do that. So I said, "Your hair is the stuff of cheerleader fantasy. Of main character daydreams. Your hair runs so that young gingers' hair can walk." She bit down on the inside of her cheek and-holy shit-looked like she wanted to laugh. "Are you high, Wes Bennett?

Women do not simply have faces, as men do; they are identified with their faces. Men have a naturalistic relation to their faces. Certainly they care whether they are good-looking or not. They suffer over acne, protruding ears, tiny eyes; they hate getting bald. But there is a much wider latitude in what is esthetically acceptable in a man’s face than what is in a woman’s. A man’s face is defined as something he basically doesn’t need to tamper with; all he has to do is keep it clean. He can avail himself of the options for ornament supplied by nature: a beard, a mustache, longer or shorter hair. But he is not supposed to disguise himself. What he is “really” like is supposed to show. A man lives through his face; it records the progressive stages of his life. And since he doesn’t tamper with his face, it is not separate from but is completed by his body – which is judged attractive by the impression it gives of virility and energy. By contrast, a woman’s face is potentially separate from her body. She does not treat it naturalistically. A woman’s face is the canvas upon which she paints a revised, corrected portrait of herself. One of the rules of this creation is that the face not show what she doesn’t want it to show. Her face is an emblem, an icon, a flag. How she arranges her hair, the type of make-up she uses, the quality of her complexion – all these are signs, not of what she is “really” like, but of how she asks to be treated by others, especially men. They establish her status as an “object.

Disco bowling? Seriously? Is there such a thing?" He laughed. "I've never been,but you mentioned bowling a few weeks ago,and I figured tonight of all nights I could go ahead and impress you with my mad lack of bowling skills.Besides which, you look way too hot to waste on trick-or-treaters.They have a costume competition-you're a shoo-in." I laughed,giddy,and grabbed his hand to kiss his knuckles.I knew he'd rather stay at home,but he planned tonight around making me happy. And he wanted to show me off,which appealed to my vanity more than I cared to admit. Best. Boyfriend. Ever. "Pictures,please?And if we're going disco bowling,you have to dress up." He pretended to sigh,but his glamour hair grew out into a massive 'fro and I squealed with delight. Then it shifted into shorter hair with a yellow-blond side part. "I figure with an ascot and blue pants I can do a mean Fred to your Daphne,right?" Tonight was perfect.

Word of my arrival spread as soon as I walked out of the ocean. Our beach is on the North Shore of Long Island, and it’s enchanted so most people can’t even see it. People don’t just appear on the beach unless they’re demigods or gods or really, really lost pizza delivery guys. (It’s happened—but that’s another story.) Anyway, that afternoon the lookout on duty was Connor Stoll from the Hermes cabin. When he spotted me, he got so excited he fell out of his tree. Then he blew the conch horn to signal the camp and ran to greet me. Connor had a crooked smile that matched his crooked sense of humor. He’s a pretty nice guy, but you should always keep one hand on your wallet when he’s around, and do not, under any circumstances, give him access to shaving cream unless you want to find your sleeping bag full of it. He’s got curly brown hair and is a little shorter than his brother, Travis, which is the only way I can tell them apart. They are both so unlike my old enemy Luke it’s hard to believe they’re all sons of Hermes. “Percy!” he yelled. “What happened? Where’s Beckendorf ?

Her hair was shorter and more fashionable, he guessed,

And with age he has become shorter and broader, he’s got more face to wash and less hair to comb, and finds

Kali's breath came shorter as her heartbeat quickened and her gaze was drawn to the stubble on his cheeks and chin, the curve of his mouth, the dark, fine fringe of his hair...

I can tell that much even from this distance. This man’s hair is darker and cut shorter, his frame a little more broad. It’s not the same man.

If skirts get any shorter, said the flapper with a sob, I'll have two more cheeks to powder and a lot more hair to bob!

Maxi Taxi, you’ve got him now, you’ve got him, Jew boy, you’ve got him, you’ve got him!” A small kid with soft tufts of hair, a beaten nose, and swampy eyes, Max was a good head shorter

There are sparkles of rain on the bright Hair over your forehead; Your eyes are wet and your lips Wet and cold, your cheek rigid with cold. Why have you stayed Away so long, why have you only Come to me late at night After walking for hours in wind and rain? Take off your dress and stockings; Sit in the deep chair before the fire. I will warm your feet in my hands; I will warm your breasts and thighs with kisses. I wish I could build a fire In you that would never go out. I wish I could be sure that deep in you Was a magnet to draw you always home. from "Runaway

The only institution in the Sicilian conscience that really counts is the family; counts, that is to say, more as a dramatic juridical contract or bond than as a natural association based on affection. The family is the Sicilians’ State. The State, as it is for us, is extraneous to them, merely a de facto entity based on force; an entity imposing taxes, military service, war, police. Within the family institution the Sicilian can cross the frontier of his own natural tragic solitude and fit into a communal life where relationships are governed by hair-splitting contractual ties. To ask him to cross the frontier between family and State would be too much. In imagination he may be carried away by the idea of the State and may even rise to being Prime Minister; but the precise and definite code of his rights and duties will remain within the family, whence the step towards victorious solitude is shorter.

I’m opinionated, obstinate, and obsessive. I am quick to anger, quick to cry, quick-witted and a slow runner. A very slow runner. I don’t know if you can really call it running, really. I don’t know what I want. Some heavy making out? Someone to text me for no reason? A person who is absolutely, positively in love with me? It varies, day by day. I know that I want you to play with my hair while we lay on the couch and listen to records. I want you to hold my hand while we’re driving and take out the trash before you’re ever asked. I want you to want me, but not need me. To be there for me without my asking, and to go away without being told. I want you to keep me company and keep your promises. PS: Please, don’t be shorter than me. Chapter Seven Finders Keepers

Spenser Reynolds was a bit shorter than Web average, but far handsomer. His hair was curled but cropped short, his skin appeared bronzed by a benevolent sun and slightly gilded with subtle body paint, his clothes and ARNistry were expensively flamboyant without being outré, and his demeanor proclaimed a relaxed confidence that all men dreamed of and precious few obtained. His wit was obvious, his attention to others sincere, and his sense of humor legendary. I found myself disliking the son of a bitch at once.

Even though I had always sexualized Thom Wright everyone else now realized he was built, the jawline seemed more pronounced, the hair was now shorter—somewhat ubiquitous among the guys at Buckley (mostly because of haircut regulations) but Thom’s was now something stylish, a moment, a cue to manliness

SHE CAME ALONG THE ALLEY AND UP THE BACK STEPS THE WAY she always used to. Doc hadn’t seen her for over a year. Nobody had. Back then it was always sandals, bottom half of a flower-print bikini, faded Country Joe & the Fish T-shirt. Tonight she was all in flatland gear, hair a lot shorter than he remembered,

I had been thinking you were going to stay out on the farm through the whole Festival,” Perrin Aybara shouted at Rand over the clamor. Half a head shorter than Rand, the curly-haired blacksmith’s apprentice was so stocky as to seem a man and a half wide, with arms and shoulders thick enough to rival those of Master Luhhan himself. He could easily have pushed through the throng, but that was not his way. He picked his path carefully, offering apologies to people who had only half a mind to notice anything but the peddler. He made the apologies anyway, and tried not to jostle anyone as he worked through the crowd to Rand and Mat.

She had grown tired of the pouffy floating hair of zero gravity and, after a few weeks of clamping it down with baseball caps, had figured out how to make this shorter cut work for her. The haircut had spawned terabytes of Internet commentary from men, and a few women, who apparently had nothing else to do with their time.

He wore a white girdle that pulled in his waist just above the hips. He was, of necessity, slender. She believed men should take up as little space as possible. He wore his black hair long over his shoulders, tied once with a white ribbon. The men allowed to live were, of course, beautiful, far more beautiful than any of the women Zezili knew. Anavha was clean-shaven, as she wanted him, lightly powdered in gold, his eyes lined in kohl, eyes a stormy grey, set a bit too wide in a broad face whose jaw she has initially found almost vulgar in its squareness. He stood a hand shorter than she; she easily outweighed him by fifty pounds. She liked him just this way.

Edward Lasco was on the screened porch of his rented house in a comfortable but not elegant older section of the town where he'd lived for the past fifteen years when his wife, Elise, who six months before had left him and moved to a nearby city to work in a psychiatric hospital, came around the side of the house and stood beside the screen looking in. She had on a business outfit—natural linen suit, knee-high boots, dark glasses with at least three distinguishable colors tiered top to bottom in the lenses—and she carried a slick briefcase, thin and shiny. Her hair was shorter than he'd seen it, styled in a peculiar way so that it seemed it spots to jerk away from her head, to say, "I'm hair, boy, and you'd better believe it." Edward had come outside with a one-pint carton of skim milk and a ninety-nine-cookie package of Oreos and a just-received issue of InfoWorld, and he was entirely content with the prospect of eating his cookies and drinking his milk and reading his magazine, but when he saw Elise he was filled with a sudden, very unpleasant sense that he didn't want to see her. It'd been a good two and a half months since he'd talked to her, and there she was looking like an earnest TV art director's version of the modern businesswoman; it made him feel that his life was fucked, and this was before she'd said a word.

This leads me to the Higher Editing. Take of well-ground Indian Ink as much as suffices and a camel-hair brush proportionate to the inter-spaces of your lines. In an auspicious hour, read your final draft and consider faithfully every paragraph, sentence and word, blacking out where requisite. Let it lie by to drain as long as possible. At the end of that time, re-read and you should find that it will bear a second shortening. Finally, read it aloud alone and at leisure. Maybe a shade more brushwork will then indicate or impose itself. If not, praise Allah and let it go, and ‘when thou hast done, repent not.’ The shorter the tale, the longer the brushwork and, normally, the shorter the lie-by, and vice versa. The longer the tale, the less brush but the longer lie-by. I have had tales by me for three or five years which shortened themselves almost yearly. The magic lies in the Brush and the Ink. For the Pen, when it is writing, can only scratch; and bottled ink is not to compare with the ground Chinese stick. Experto crede.

She came along the alley and up the back steps the way she always used to. Doc hadn't seen her for over a year. Nobody had. Back then it was always sandals, bottom half of a flower-print bikini, faded Country Joe & the Fish T-shirt. Tonight she was all in flatland gear, hair a lot shorter than he remembered, looking just like she swore she'd never look.

Adrian was a man who, in certain respects, could be seen as slightly less than average. He was slightly shorter than the average man. He was slightly thinner than the average man. But his face… There was nothing average about his face. He was gorgeous. Dreamy blue eyes that were so light they were almost translucent and those blue eyes were only further accentuated by his short, dark hair. However, it was not those eyes that got women caught in his talons. No. It was his smile. His smile served as bait to the unsuspecting. It was a Brad Pitt sort of smile—naughty and sexy at the same time. The type of smile that warned you of the heartbreak to come, but left you powerless to protect yourself against its charms.

There’s a photo of him onstage accepting the plaque, a big grin on his face, white teeth shining through black beard. I don’t recognize his shoes and his hair is shorter than I’ve ever seen it. Embarrassment creeps up my spine as I realize he probably wasn’t thinking about me at all in that moment. There isn’t a single moment when I’m not thinking about him.

Well?” Jules asks when Joseph and Billy are safely out of range. “What do you think of him?” Arsinoe squints. Billy Chatworth wears the clothes of an islander, but he does not wear them well. He is only an inch or two shorter than Joseph, and his sandy hair is short, almost pressed flat against his head. “He’s not nearly as handsome as Joseph is,” Arsinoe teases, and Jules blushes scarlet. “I knew he would grow into that Sandrin jawline. And those eyes.” She prods Jules in the side until she laughs and swats her away. “Anyhow, what do you think of the mainlander?” “I don’t know,” Jules says. “He said he had a cat that looked like me when he was younger. With one blue eye and one green. He said it was born deaf.” “Charming,” says Arsinoe.

My school is filled with kids who do not look like me. Kids with pale freckled skin, kids with hair the color of summertime corn. And kids with skin darker than mine, kids shorter than me, and kids taller than me. I have never seen so many different types of people in one place. I write to Fatima and tell her that sometimes it feels like the whole world lives at my new school.

Your hair! You cut it all off!” She pulled off her own hood as she crossed the distance between them. Indeed, the long silver-white hair was now cropped short. It made him look younger, made his tattoo stand out more, and … fine, it made him more handsome, too. Or maybe that was just her missing him. “Since you seemed to think that we would be doing a good amount of fighting here, shorter hair is more useful. Though I can’t say that your hair might be considered the same. You might as well have dyed it blue.” “Hush. Your hair was so pretty. I was hoping you’d let me braid it one day. I suppose I’ll have to buy a pony instead.” She cocked her head. “When you shift, will your hawk form be plucked, then?” His nostrils flared, and she clamped her lips together to keep from laughing.

had my hair permed down the center but cut shorter on the sides, in a recent fit of enthusiasm for the artist who was still then known as Prince and also for the look of a singer named Adam Ant. Despite my stylist’s valiant efforts, my hair looked nothing like theirs. But I did look like someone trying very hard not to look like everyone else; I was elaborately disguised as someone who didn’t care what other people thought of me.

We pair off on the metal bridge in the hydra. Victra taking the right, me the left. My Praetorian is shorter than I. Her helmet off, hair in a tight bun, ready to proclaim the grand laurels of her family. “My name is Felicia au…” I feint a whip at her face. She brings her blade up, and Victra goes diagonal and impales her at the belly button. I finish her off with a neat decapitation. “Bye, Felicia,” Victra spits, turning to the last Praetorian.

The room was small, lit by two naked bulbs in wall recesses, and bare of anything except for two solid wooden posts the height of a man and four feet apart. In each post, at just below shoulder height, was set a large iron ring. There were two other men already waiting, both leathermen. Len indicated each in turn. 'Rick and Sam.' The two men regarded Mike with arms folded. Rick was in his late twenties, a tall, blond biker, his hair hanging down well past his shoulders. Under his leather waistcoat he was bare-chested, his spare, pale flesh covered with tattoos of skulls, burning angels and other biker motifs, the twining reds, blues and blacks extending along both arms as well. He was wearing black leather gloves and impenetrable black shades. Shaven-headed Sam was older, shorter and stockier, built like a rugby player. A leather harness stretched across the barrel of his chest, its steel circlet buried in wiry hair. Through his leather chaps Mike could see a sizeable pouch, heavy with its contents.

She was a beauty queen!'' ''Holy shit.'' Harrison dissolved into a fit of laughter. ''No way is Redding pulling that one off. Look at her. Her hair's shorter than mine. ''My hair is convenient for my job,'' I said, running a hand over inch-long, blond locks that had been trapped under a hot wig the day before, ''and besides, I thought short hair was fashionable.'' ''Short, yes,'' Harrison said, ''but you're sporting the Britney Spears Nervous Breakdown style. Not a hit among men or the beauty pageant circuit

The Wheel Revolves You were a girl of satin and gauze Now you are my mountain and waterfall companion. Long ago I read those lines of Po Chu I Written in his middle age. Young as I was they touched me. I never thought in my own middle age I would have a beautiful young dancer To wander with me by falling crystal waters, Among mountains of snow and granite, Least of all that unlike Po’s girl She would be my very daughter. The earth turns towards the sun. Summer comes to the mountains. Blue grouse drum in the red fir woods All the bright long days. You put blue jay and flicker feathers In your hair. Two and two violet green swallows Play over the lake. The blue birds have come back To nest on the little island. The swallows sip water on the wing And play at love and dodge and swoop Just like the swallows that swirl Under and over the Ponte Vecchio. Light rain crosses the lake Hissing faintly. After the rain There are giant puffballs with tortoise shell backs At the edge of the meadow. Snows of a thousand winters Melt in the sun of one summer. Wild cyclamen bloom by the stream. Trout veer in the transparent current. In the evening marmots bark in the rocks. The Scorpion curls over the glimmering ice field. A white crowned night sparrow sings as the moon sets. Thunder growls far off. Our campfire is a single light Amongst a hundred peaks and waterfalls. The manifold voices of falling water Talk all night. Wrapped in your down bag Starlight on your cheeks and eyelids Your breath comes and goes In a tiny cloud in the frosty night. Ten thousand birds sing in the sunrise. Ten thousand years revolve without change. All this will never be again.

Lady Merritt Sterling was a vibrantly attractive woman with large, dark eyes, a wealth of lustrous sable hair, and a flawless porcelain complexion. Unlike her two sisters, she had inherited the shorter, stockier frame of the Marsden side instead of the slender build of her mother. Similarly, she had her father's square-shaped face and determined jaw instead of her mother's delicate oval one. However, Merritt possessed a charm so compelling that she eclipsed every other woman in the vicinity, no matter how beautiful. Merritt focused on whomever she was talking to with a wealth of sincere interest, as if she or he were the only person in the world. She asked questions and listened without ever seeming to wait for her turn to talk. She was the guest everyone invited when they needed to blend a group of disparate personalities, just as a roux would bind soap or sauce into velvety smoothness. It was no exaggeration to say that every man who met Merritt fell at least a little in love with her. When she had entered society, countless suitors had pursued her before she'd finally consented to marry Joshua Sterling, an American-born shipping magnate who had taken up residence in London.

Mott glanced back to nod a hello at me. He and Cregan couldn’t have been designed to look more different from each other. Mott was tall, dark-skinned, and nearly bald. What little hair he did have was black and shaved to his scalp. He was the one by the tavern who’d tripped me when I was trying to escape the butcher. In contrast, Cregan was short — not much taller than I was, and shorter than the tanned boy near me. He was surprisingly pale for a man who likely spent much of his day outdoors, and he had a thick crop of blond hair that he tied back at the nape of his neck. Mott was lean and muscular while Cregan looked softer than I knew him to be, judging by the way he’d clubbed me at the orphanage.

Do you know where the dictionary is?” Fang looked at the girl who had spoken. “What?” “Our reference materials are over here,” the girl said, pointing. “When we have free study time, you can walk around and do homework. If you need to look up stuff, the computers and other references are over here.” “Oh. Okay. Thanks.” “No problem.” The girl swallowed and stepped closer. She was shorter than Max and had long, dark red hair. Her eyes were bright green, and her nose had freckles. “I’m Lissa,” she said. “And you’re Nick, right?” What did she want? He looked at her. “Uh-huh,” he said warily. “I’m glad you’re in our class.” “What? Why?” She stepped still closer, and he could smell the lavender scent of soap. Giving him a flirtatious smile, she said, “Why do you think?

Well, well, do we have a new girl?’ I looked up to see three girls standing behind Tak. The one in the middle was tall and slim with bronzed skin and long shiny black hair and she had that air about her that the popular girls at school back home did. I was instantly wary. Those girls had never been nice to me. ‘Don’t be shy, what’s your name?’ the girl on her left said. Curly red hair framed her perfect face and she put her hands on her ample, curvy hips, waiting for me to answer. ‘Pandora,’ I said quietly. ‘I’m Arketa,’ said the slim girl. ‘And this is Filis and Kiko.’ The red-head, Kiko, cocked her head and gave me an over-the-top smile. ‘We’re Aphrodite descendants.’ That explained why they were so attractive, I thought. ‘You know, you’re not pretty enough to hang out with us but you’re better than these losers,’ Filis said. She was shorter than the other two, with rich brown hair and an exotic looking face with full pouty lips.

She tasted disgusting, worse than Gurdyroots! Okay, Ron, come here so I can do you…” “Right, but remember, I don’t like the beard too long--” “Oh, for heaven’s sake, this isn’t about looking handsome--” “It’s not that, it gets in the way! But I liked my nose a bit shorter, try and do it the way you did last time.” Hermione sighed and set to work, muttering under her breath as she transformed various aspects of Ron’s appearance. He was to be given a completely fake identity, and they were trusting to the malevolent aura cast by Bellatrix to protect him. Meanwhile Harry and Griphook were to be concealed under the Indivisibility Cloak. “There,” said Hermione, “how does he look, Harry?” It was just possible to discern Ron under his disguise, but only, Harry thought, because he knew him so well. Ron’s hair was now long and wavy; he had a thick brown beard and mustache, no freckles, a short, broad nose, and heavy eyebrows. “Well, he’s not my type, but he’ll do,” said Harry.

pull Harry to his feet. “Yeah,” said Harry, straightening up. “What was it?” “Ton-Tongue Toffee,” said Fred brightly. “George and I invented them, and we’ve been looking for someone to test them on all summer. . . .” The tiny kitchen exploded with laughter; Harry looked around and saw that Ron and George were sitting at the scrubbed wooden table with two red-haired people Harry had never seen before, though he knew immediately who they must be: Bill and Charlie, the two eldest Weasley brothers. “How’re you doing, Harry?” said the nearer of the two, grinning at him and holding out a large hand, which Harry shook, feeling calluses and blisters under his fingers. This had to be Charlie, who worked with dragons in Romania. Charlie was built like the twins, shorter and stockier than Percy and Ron, who were both long and lanky. He had a broad, good-natured face, which was weather-beaten and so freckly that he looked almost tanned; his arms were muscular, and one of them had a large, shiny burn on it. Bill got to his feet, smiling, and also shook Harry’s hand. Bill came as something of a surprise. Harry knew that he worked for the Wizarding bank, Gringotts, and that Bill had been Head Boy at Hogwarts; Harry had always imagined Bill to

Two sailors hauled on ropes, hoisting the jolly boat up to the ship’s side, revealing two apocryphal figures standing in the center of the small craft. At first glance, Sophia only saw clearly the shorter of the two, a gruesome creature with long tangled hair and a painted face, wearing a tight-fitting burlap skirt and a makeshift corset fashioned from fishnet and mollusk shells. The Sea Queen, Sophia reckoned, a smile warming her cheeks as the crew erupted into raucous cheers. A bearded Sea Queen, no less, who bore a striking resemblance to the Aphrodite’s own grizzled steward. Stubb. Sophia craned her neck to spy Stubb’s consort, as the foremast blocked her view of Triton’s visage. She caught only a glimpse of a white toga draped over a bronzed, bare shoulder. She took a jostling step to the side, nearly tripping on a coil of rope. “Foolish mortals! Kneel before your king!” The assembled sailors knelt on cue, giving Sophia a direct view of the Sea King. And even if the blue paint smeared across his forehead or the strands of seaweed dangling from his belt might have disguised him, there was no mistaking that persuasive baritone. Mr. Grayson. There he stood, tall and proud, some twenty feet away from her. Bare-chested, save for a swath of white linen draped from hip to shoulder. Wet locks of hair slicked back from his tanned face, sunlight embossing every contour of his sculpted arms and chest. A pagan god come swaggering down to earth. He caught her eye, and his smile widened to a wolfish grin. Sophia could not for the life of her look away. He hadn’t looked at her like this since…since that night. He’d scarcely looked in her direction at all, and certainly never wearing a smile. The boldness of his gaze made her feel thoroughly unnerved, and virtually undressed. Until the very act of maintaining eye contact became an intimate, verging on indecent, experience. If she kept looking at him, she felt certain he knees would give out. If she looked away, she gave him the victory. There was only one suitable alternative, given the circumstances. With a cheeky wink to acknowledge the joke, Sophia dropped her eyes and curtsied to the King. Mr. Grayson laughed his approval. Her curtsy, the crew’s gesture of fealty-he accepted their obeisance as his due. And why should he not? There was a rightness about it somehow, an unspoken understanding. Here at last was their true leader: the man they would obey without question, the man to whom they’d pledge loyalty, even kneel. This was his ship. “Where’s the owner of this craft?” he called. “Oh, right. Someone told me he’s no fun anymore.” As the men laughed, the Sea King swung over the rail, hoisting what looked to be a mop handle with vague aspirations to become a trident. “Bring forth the virgin voyager!

Gene looked at me, and smiled kindly. “You never learn how to write a novel,” he told me. “You only learn to write the novel you’re on.” He was right. I’d learned to write the novel I was writing, and nothing more. Still, it was a fine, strange novel to have learned how to write. I was always aware of how very far short it fell of the beautiful, golden, gleaming, perfect book I had in my head, but even so, it made me happy. I grew a beard and I did not cut my hair while I was writing this book, and many people thought I was a trifle odd (although not the Swedes, who approved and told me that a king of theirs had done something very similar, only not with a novel). I shaved the beard off at the end of the first draft, and disposed of the unfeasibly long hair shortly after that. The second draft was mostly a process of excavation and clarification. Moments that needed to grow grew and moments that needed to be shorter were trimmed. I wanted it to be a number of things. I wanted to write a book that was big and odd and meandering, and I did and it was. I wanted to write a book that included all the parts of America that obsessed and delighted me, which tended to be the bits that never showed up in the films and television shows. I finished it, eventually, and I handed it in, taking a certain amount of comfort in the old saying that a novel can best be defined as a long piece of prose with something wrong with it, and I was fairly sure that I’d written one of those.

Toward an Organic Philosophy SPRING, COAST RANGE The glow of my campfire is dark red and flameless, The circle of white ash widens around it. I get up and walk off in the moonlight and each time I look back the red is deeper and the light smaller. Scorpio rises late with Mars caught in his claw; The moon has come before them, the light Like a choir of children in the young laurel trees. It is April; the shad, the hot headed fish, Climbs the rivers; there is trillium in the damp canyons; The foetid adder’s tongue lolls by the waterfall. There was a farm at this campsite once, it is almost gone now. There were sheep here after the farm, and fire Long ago burned the redwoods out of the gulch, The Douglas fir off the ridge; today the soil Is stony and incoherent, the small stones lie flat And plate the surface like scales. Twenty years ago the spreading gully Toppled the big oak over onto the house. Now there is nothing left but the foundations Hidden in poison oak, and above on the ridge, Six lonely, ominous fenceposts; The redwood beams of the barn make a footbridge Over the deep waterless creek bed; The hills are covered with wild oats Dry and white by midsummer. I walk in the random survivals of the orchard. In a patch of moonlight a mole Shakes his tunnel like an angry vein; Orion walks waist deep in the fog coming in from the ocean; Leo crouches under the zenith. There are tiny hard fruits already on the plum trees. The purity of the apple blossoms is incredible. As the wind dies down their fragrance Clusters around them like thick smoke. All the day they roared with bees, in the moonlight They are silent and immaculate. SPRING, SIERRA NEVADA Once more golden Scorpio glows over the col Above Deadman Canyon, orderly and brilliant, Like an inspiration in the brain of Archimedes. I have seen its light over the warm sea, Over the coconut beaches, phosphorescent and pulsing; And the living light in the water Shivering away from the swimming hand, Creeping against the lips, filling the floating hair. Here where the glaciers have been and the snow stays late, The stone is clean as light, the light steady as stone. The relationship of stone, ice and stars is systematic and enduring: Novelty emerges after centuries, a rock spalls from the cliffs, The glacier contracts and turns grayer, The stream cuts new sinuosities in the meadow, The sun moves through space and the earth with it, The stars change places. The snow has lasted longer this year, Than anyone can remember. The lowest meadow is a lake, The next two are snowfields, the pass is covered with snow, Only the steepest rocks are bare. Between the pass And the last meadow the snowfield gapes for a hundred feet, In a narrow blue chasm through which a waterfall drops, Spangled with sunset at the top, black and muscular Where it disappears again in the snow. The world is filled with hidden running water That pounds in the ears like ether; The granite needles rise from the snow, pale as steel; Above the copper mine the cliff is blood red, The white snow breaks at the edge of it; The sky comes close to my eyes like the blue eyes Of someone kissed in sleep. I descend to camp, To the young, sticky, wrinkled aspen leaves, To the first violets and wild cyclamen, And cook supper in the blue twilight. All night deer pass over the snow on sharp hooves, In the darkness their cold muzzles find the new grass At the edge of the snow.

This was my first rebirth into a body of the same species. I found the transfer much more difficult than changing planets because I had so many expectations about being human already in place. Also, I’d inherited a lot of things from Petals Open to the Moon, and not all of them were pleasant. I’d inherited a great deal of grief for Cloud Spinner. I missed the mother I’d never known and mourned for her suffering now. Perhaps there could be no joy on this planet without an equal weight of pain to balance it out on some unknown scale. I’d inherited unexpected limitations. I was used to a body that was strong and fast and tall—a body that could run for miles, go without food and water, lift heavy weights, and reach high shelves. This body was weak—and not just physically. This body seized up with crippling shyness every time I was unsure of myself, which seemed to be often these days. I’d inherited a different role in the human community. People carried things for me now and let me pass first into a room. They gave me the easiest chores and then, half the time, took the work right out of my hands anyway. Worse than that, I needed the help. My muscles were soft and not used to labor. I tired easily, and my attempts to hide that fooled no one. I probably couldn’t have run a mile without stopping. There was more to this easy treatment than just my physical weakness, though. I was used to a pretty face, but one that people were able to look at with fear, mistrust, even hatred. My new face defied such emotions. People touched my cheeks often, or put their fingers under my chin, holding my face up to see it better. I was frequently patted on my head (which was in easy reach, since I was shorter than everyone but the children), and my hair was stroked so regularly that I stopped noticing when it happened. Those who had never accepted me before did this as often as my friends.

When a little of his strength returned he moved onto his side, taking her with him, still a part of her. Her hair spilled over his naked chest like a rumpled satin waterfall, and he lifted a shaking hand to smooth it off her face, feeling humbled and blessed by her sweetness and unselfish ardor. Several minutes later Elizabeth stirred in his arms, and he tipped her chin up so that he could gaze into her eyes. “Have I ever told you that you are magnificent? She started to shake her head, then suddenly remembered that he had told her she was magnificent once before, and the recollection brought poignant tears to her eyes. “You did say that to me,” she amended, brushing her fingers over his smooth shoulder because she couldn’t seem to stop touching him. “You told me that when we were together-“ “In the woodcutter’s cottage,” he finished for her, recalling the occasion as well. In reply she had chided him for acting as if he also thought Charise Dumont was magnificent, Ian remembered, regretting all the time they had lost since then…the days and nights she could have been in his arms as she was now. “Do you know how I spent the rest of the afternoon after you left the cottage?” he asked softly. When she shook her head, he said with a wry smile, “I spent it pleasurably contemplating tonight. At the time, of course, I didn’t realize tonight was years away.” He paused to draw the sheet up over her back so she wouldn’t be chilled, then he continued in the same quiet voice, “I wanted you so badly that day that I actually ached while I watched you fasten that shirt you were wearing. Although,” he added dryly, “that particular condition, brought on by that particular cause, has become my normal state for the last four weeks, so I’m quite used to it now. I wonder if I’ll miss it,” he teased. “What do you mean?” Elizabeth asked, realizing that he was perfectly serious despite his light tone. “The agony of unfulfilled desire,” he explained, brushing a kiss on her forehead, “brought on by wanting you.” “Wanting me?” she burst out, rearing up so abruptly that she nearly overturned him as she leaned up on an elbow, absently clutching the sheet to her breasts. “Is this-what we’ve just done, I mean-“ “The Scots think of it as making love,” he interrupted gently. “Unlike most English,” he added with flat scorn, “who prefer to regard it as ‘performing one’s marital duty.’” “Yes,” Elizabeth said absently, her mind on his earlier remark about wanting her until it caused him physical pain, “but is this what you meant all those times you’ve said you wanted me?” His sensual lips quirked in a half smile. “Yes.” A rosy blush stained her smooth cheeks, and despite her effort to sound severe, her eyes were lit with laughter. “And the day we bargained about the betrothal, and you told me I had something you wanted very badly, what you wanted to do with me…was this?” “Among other things,” he agreed, tenderly brushing his knuckles over her flushed cheek. “If I had known all this,” she said with a rueful smile, “I’m certain I would have asked for additional concessions.” That startled him-the thought that she would have tried to drive a harder bargain if she’d realized exactly how much and what sort of power she really held. “What kind of additional concessions?” he asked, his face carefully expressionless. She put her cheek against his shoulder, her arms curving around him. “A shorter betrothal,” she whispered. “A shorter courtship, and a shorter ceremony.

Christine's heart is thumping wildly. She lets herself be led (her aunt means her nothing but good) into a tiled and mirrored room full of warmth and sweetly scented with mild floral soap and sprayed perfumes; an electrical apparatus roars like a mountain storm in the adjoining room. The hairdresser, a brisk, snub-nosed Frenchwoman, is given all sorts of instructions, little of which Christine understands or cares to. A new desire has come over her to give herself up, to submit and let herself be surprised. She allows herself to be seated in the comfortable barber's chair and her aunt disappears. She leans back gently, and, eyes closed in a luxurious stupor, senses a mechanical clattering, cold steel on her neck, and the easy incomprehensible chatter of the cheerful hairdresser; she breathes in clouds of fragrance and lets aromatic balms and clever fingers run over her hair and neck. Just don't open your eyes, she thinks. If you do, it might go away. Don't question anything, just savor this Sundayish feeling of sitting back for once, of being waited on instead of waiting on other people. Just let our hands fall into your lap, let good things happen to you, let it come, savor it, this rare swoon of lying back and being ministered to, this strange voluptuous feeling you haven't experienced in years, in decades. Eyes closed, feeling the fragrant warmth enveloping her, she remembers the last time: she's a child, in bed, she had a fever for days, but now it's over and her mother brings some sweet white almond milk, her father and her brother are sitting by her bed, everyone's taking care of her, everyone's doing things for her, they're all gentle and nice. In the next room the canary is singing mischievously, the bed is soft and warm, there's no need to go to school, everything's being done for her, there are toys on the bed, though she's too pleasantly lulled to play with them; no, it's better to close her eyes and really feel, deep down, the idleness, the being waited on. It's been decades since she thought of this lovely languor from her childhood, but suddenly it's back: her skin, her temples bathed in warmth are doing the remembering. A few times the brisk salonist asks some question like, 'Would you like it shorter?' But she answers only, 'Whatever you think,' and deliberately avoids the mirror held up to her. Best not to disturb the wonderful irresponsibility of letting things happen to you, this detachment from doing or wanting anything. Though it would be tempting to give someone an order just once, for the first time in your life, to make some imperious demand, to call for such and such. Now fragrance from a shiny bottle streams over her hair, a razor blade tickles her gently and delicately, her head feels suddenly strangely light and the skin of her neck cool and bare. She wants to look in the mirror, but keeping her eyes closed in prolonging the numb dreamy feeling so pleasantly. Meanwhile a second young woman has slipped beside her like a sylph to do her nails while the other is waving her hair. She submits to it all without resistance, almost without surprise, and makes no protest when, after an introductory 'Vous etes un peu pale, Mademoiselle,' the busy salonist, employing all manner of pencils and crayons, reddens her lips, reinforces the arches of her eyebrows, and touches up the color of her cheeks. She's aware of it all and, in her pleasant detached stupor, unaware of it too: drugged by the humid, fragrance-laden air, she hardly knows if all this happening to her or to some other, brand-new self. It's all dreamily disjointed, not quite real, and she's a little afraid of suddenly falling out of the dream.

Inside, the tent was sectioned off by cloth walls. In the main area where they entered, there was a table with four chairs and an arming stand that held the knight’s chain mail, helm, and sword. “Ioan?” Christian called. No one answered. As they turned to leave, they were confronted by what appeared to be a young archer who was surely no older than the boy who had led them here. Several inches shorter than Adara, he was gangly and thin, with raven-black hair and brown eyes that watched them warily. He held his bow at the ready with an arrow already nocked. “Who are you and what business have you with Lord Ioan?” he asked in a gruff, low tone. “We are old friends,” Christian said calmly. Phantom moved toward him. The archer turned quickly and let fly the arrow. Phantom caught it midflight, but before he could take another step, the archer swung the bow and caught him upside his head with it. Phantom staggered back from the force of the blow. The archer struck again and knocked him to the ground. Christian moved toward them. Before Adara could blink, the archer had another arrow nocked and ready to fly into Christian’s chest. “Corryn, cease!” The Welsh-accented voice rang through the room like thunder. Adara looked at the entrance to see a tall, well-muscled man there who bore a striking resemblance to the archer. His wavy black hair fell to his shoulders and a full beard covered his cheeks. He looked wild and untamed as he put himself between the archer and Christian. “What has gotten into your head, Spider?” he asked the archer in his thick, rolling accent. “They came here looking for you,” the archer said brashly, as if the larger man’s anger didn’t concern him at all. He finally unnocked the arrow. “After the message from Stryder saying there were assassins out to kill you, I thought I was protecting you, brawd.” The man she assumed must be Ioan made a disgusted noise at him. “God save me from your protection. Did it never occur to you that an assassin wouldn’t bother to come into my tent and announce himself?” He said something in a language Adara didn’t understand, but by Corryn’s reaction, it must have been a curse or reprimand of some kind. “Now apologize. You almost took the head off the Abbot, and it’s the Phantom who you’ve knocked to the ground.” The archer’s face went pale at that. Ioan stepped away from the boy to offer his hand to Phantom, who took it. He helped him back up to his feet. “You’ll have to forgive my brother, Phantom. He’s a damned fool.” “Are you the Abbot?” Corryn asked Christian. “Aye.” The boy’s lips quivered before he threw himself into Christian’s arms. “May the saints guard your blessed soul throughout all eternity!” Christian looked awkward as he frowned at Ioan. “Brother?” Ioan’s gaze turned dark, dangerous as he pulled Corryn back. Still Corryn stared at Christian with hero worship. “Thank you, Abbot, for bringing my brother back to me.” “Get out of here, scamp,” Ioan said gruffly, “before I skin you.” Corryn curled his lip at Ioan. “I spoke too soon, Abbott. Curses to you, that you brought his surly hide home. Methinks you should have left him there to rot.” He turned to Phantom. “My apologies to you, sir. I hope you’ll forgive me.” Phantom shook the boy’s arm. “I admire anyone who can get the better of me. It doesn’t happen often.” “Corryn!” “I’m leaving,” he snapped. “To the devil with your hoary hide.” -Christian, Corryn, Ioan, & Phantom

Lissa, sweetheart, Charles will come tomorrow evening and drive you into London so you can get your hair done," Merrill touched fingers lightly to my strawberry blonde curls. If my hair is shorter, it curls. It only straightens out if I keep it longer and it had been long—past my shoulders long—before I'd attempted to kill myself in the sun last February. "That sounds like so much fun for him," I grumped. There wasn't any way, though, that Merrill or any of the others would let me out of their sight without an escort. "He finds it quite enjoyable; he has asked every other day if he could take you for an outing." "Poor Charles. He needs to get a life," I said. "Have you ever wanted a brother, sweetheart? Charles wants that role, I think." I blinked up at Merrill as he spoke those words. "Really?" I'd never had anything like that. My face fell immediately. A brother was someone who would keep your secrets. I would never have that luxury with Charles. "Lissa, most things you could tell Charles. He does not carry everything he hears directly to Wlodek, you know. Charles has an insatiable curiosity, but he also knows how to keep secrets." He knew I wouldn't consider confiding in Charles from my expression. "My poor baby." Merrill gently touched my cheek.

Some of these kids are just plain trouble.” Grant glanced over at the boys sitting in the glass-walled box. Mac had been like that, all anger and confusion. He’d been in juvie too, arrested for possession after falling into a gang. Grant was gone. Mom was sick. Dad was a mess. Looking back, Grant wondered if dementia was beginning to take hold back then and no one recognized the symptoms. Lee had been the one who’d coped with Mac’s drug and delinquency problems, and Mom’s deathbed talk had snapped her youngest out of it. A program like this might have helped his brother. “Who knows what those boys have had to deal with in their lives.” Corey’s eyes turned somber. “We’re all sorry about Kate.” Reminded of Kate’s death, Grant’s chest deflated. “And thanks for the help,” Corey said. “These boys can be a handful.” “Is your son on the team?” “No.” Corey nodded toward the rink. A pretty blond teenager executed a spinning jump on the ice. Corey beamed. “That’s my daughter, Regan. She’s on the junior figure skating team with Josh’s daughter, the one in black. The hockey team has the next slot of ice time.” “The girls look very talented.” Even with an ex-skater for a sister-in-law, Grant knew next to nothing about figure skating. He should have paid attention. He should have known Kate better. Josh stood taller. “They are. The team went to the sectional championships last fall. Next year, they’ll make nationals, right, Victor?” Josh gestured toward the coach in the black parka, who had deposited the offenders in the penalty box and was walking back to them. “Victor coaches our daughters.” Joining them, Victor offered a hand. He was a head shorter than Grant, maybe fifty years old or so, with a fit body and salt-and-pepper hair cut as short and sharp as his black eyes. “Victor Church.

Tatiana really wanted an ice cream. Biting her lip, she let the bus pass. It’s all right, she thought. The next one will come soon, and in the meantime I’ll sit at the bus stop and have an ice cream. Walking up to the kiosk man, she said eagerly, “Ice cream, yes?” “It says ice cream, doesn’t it? I’m sitting here, aren’t I? What do you want?” He lifted his eyes from the newspaper to her, and his hard expression softened. “What can I get you, dearie?” “Have you got…” She trembled a little. “Have you got crème brûlée?” “Yes.” He opened the freezer door. “A cone or a cup?” “A cone, please,” Tatiana replied, jumping up and down once. She paid him gladly; she would have paid him double. In anticipation of the pleasure she was about to receive, Tatiana ran across the road in her heels, hurrying to the bench under the trees so she could eat her ice cream in peace, while she waited for the bus to take her to buy caviar because war had started. There was no one else waiting for the bus, and she was glad for the fine moment to feast on her delight in seclusion. She took off the white paper wrapping, threw it in the trash can next to the bench, smelled the ice cream, and took a lick of the sweet, creamy, cold caramel. Closing her eyes in happiness, Tatiana smiled and rolled the ice cream in her mouth, waiting for it to melt on her tongue. Too good, Tatiana thought. Just too good. The wind blew her hair, and she held it back with one hand as she licked the ice cream in circles around the smooth ball. She crossed and uncrossed her legs, swung her head back, lolled the ice cream in her throat, and hummed the song everyone was singing these days: “Someday we’ll meet in Lvov, my love and I.” It was a perfect day. For five minutes there was no war, and it was just a glorious Sunday in a Leningrad June. When Tatiana looked up from her ice cream, she saw a soldier staring at her from across the street. It was unremarkable in a garrison city like Leningrad to see a soldier. Leningrad was full of soldiers. Seeing soldiers on the street was like seeing old ladies with shopping bags, or lines, or beer bars. Tatiana normally would have glanced past him down the street and moved on, except that this soldier was standing across the street and staring at her with an expression Tatiana had never seen before. She stopped eating her ice cream. Her side of the street was already in the shade, but the side where he stood swam in the northern afternoon light. Tatiana stared back at him for just a moment, and in the moment of looking into his face, something moved inside her; moved she would have liked to say imperceptibly, but that wasn’t quite the case. It was as if her heart started pumping blood through all four chambers at once, pouring it into her lungs and flooding it through her body. She blinked and felt her breath become shorter. The soldier was melting into the pavement under the pale yellow sun.

A weathered black and silver Dodge pickup towing a small motorboat pulled up behind us, and Alex circled back to greet the driver. I couldn’t see who sat behind the crusted and dirty windshield, but Alex stood at the driver’s window and pointed down the block where the boulevard disappeared into floodwater. The truck pulled ahead, maneuvered a deft U-turn, and backed toward the water. Alex motioned for me to follow. By the time I lurched my way to the truck, he and the pickup driver were sliding the boat down the trailer ramp. Sweat trickled down my neck, and if I hadn’t been afraid of being poisoned by toxic sludge, I’d have made like a pig and wallowed in the mud to cool off. I kicked at a fire hydrant, trying to jolt some of the heaviest sludge off my boots, and heard a soft laugh behind me. With a final kick that sent a spray of brown gunk flying, I turned to see what was so funny. I needed a laugh. A man leaned against the side of the pickup with his arms crossed. He was a few inches shorter than Alex, maybe just shy of six feet, with sun-streaked blond hair that reached his collar and a sleeveless blue T-shirt and khaki shorts. His tanned legs between the bottom of the shorts and the top of sturdy black shrimp boots were scored with scars, bad ones, as if whatever made them meant to do serious damage. He’d been grinning when I turned around, flashing a heart-stopping set of dimples, but when he saw my eyes linger on his legs, the grin eased into something more wary.

But none of them look like the police officers on television, so I’m worried that none of them are as smart. The real-world policemen are all a little shorter, a little fatter, and a little hairier than the ones on TV. One even has hair in his ears.

The monster was shorter than her, like Ion, with a beak-like nose and stringy hair the colour of a sewer rat. The top of his head was bald and pocked with scars. He had the pallor of a man who never sees sunlight and his skin was always coated with grime. His teeth were yellow and gappy and his tongue was covered with a white layer.

February 15: Marilyn appears on the cover of Votre Sante (France) in a close-up. Her hair is somewhat shorter than in earlier 1940s poses, but not yet perfected as the lighter, more subtly curled style featured in the 1950s.

And then it actually becomes the most interesting thing in the world. A single word is embossed in fancy calligraphy letters. A single word that makes it feel like the whole room is spinning. Harksbury. What in God’s name? “What is this?” I point at it and shout in Mindy’s ear. She scrunches her eyebrows. “A coaster?” I groan. “No, I mean, the name. Harksbury.” “Oh. It’s the name of the club. I don’t know what it means, though.” I do. It’s the name of a dukedom. I wonder if that means some relative of Alex’s invested in this place or something. Or if someone borrowed their name. Or what. But it has to mean Harksbury is real, that it existed. I stare down at the word again. If the shoes weren’t enough…It has to be real. And seeing it like this reminds me of how I felt there. How it felt to be Rebecca. I tuck the coaster into my back pocket and try to ignore the stare Angela is giving me. She probably thinks I’m totally nuts, stealing a paper coaster. But it’s the closest I’ll get to a souvenir of my time-bending trip. And having it on me makes me feel stronger, somehow, like I can always be that girl at the ball. I look up when the boys file in and sit down on a bright orange couch shaped like a slug. “Ladies. This is Grant, Tim, and Alex,” door-boy says. He doesn’t even introduce himself. I guess I’m supposed to know who he is. I smile at Grant and nod at Tim, but when I get to Alex, I only stare. Alex. The Alex. No, no it can’t be. His hair is shorter, his skin smooth and shaven. He’s got on a green button-up, left open at the collar, which brings out the intense emerald shade of his eyes. There’s something different. The contour of his lips, the line of his nose. It’s almost him, but not quite. And he’s staring back at me. Does he know who I am? No, that’s silly. It’s not really him. Not Alex Thorton-Hawke, the Duke of Harksbury. Just Alex, the twenty-first-century guy standing in front of me. In a nightclub. In real life. Mindy jabs me with her elbow. “This is--” “Callie,” I say, standing and reaching my hand out. “My name is Callie.” It feels so good to say that. To be me. I grin involuntarily at the realization. He smiles and shakes it. “Hey.” For a second neither of us says anything else. We just keep shaking hands and staring at each other. My heart hammers out of control. I feel sweaty already. But it’s adrenaline. Excitement. I’m not terrified anymore. Not of Angela, not of Alex. I can do this. “Do you want to dance?” I ask. Did I really just say that out loud? That couldn’t have been me. That was someone else. “Huh?” He can’t hear me over the music. “Do you want to dance?” I say, louder this time, with a little more conviction. For emphasis, I nod my head toward the floor. I’m really doing this. “Yeah.” I’m not sure I’ve heard him correctly, but then he grabs my hand and leads me away, and I risk a glance back at the group. They’re just staring. For once in my life, I’ve upstaged them. I grin back and then turn my attention to Alex. I’ve thought about getting close to him for a month. I’m about to get my chance.

Joe Acosta sat at a massive glass-and-steel-frame desk in front of a tinted glass wall that framed Biscayne Bay as if it was a photo of Joe’s personal cottage in the woods. In spite of the tint, the late-afternoon light came up off the water and filled the room with a supernatural glow. Acosta stood up as we entered, and the light from the window behind him surrounded him in a bright aura, making it hard to look at him without squinting. But I looked at him anyway, and even without the halo he was impressive. Not physically; Acosta was a thin and aristocratic-looking man with dark hair and eyes, and he wore what looked like a very expensive suit. He was not tall, and I was sure his wife would tower over him in her spike heels. But perhaps he felt that the power of his personality was strong enough to overcome a little thing like being a foot shorter than her. Or maybe it was the power of his money. Whatever it was, he had it. He looked at us from behind his desk, and I felt a sudden urge to kneel, or at least knuckle my forehead. “Sorry to keep you waiting, Sergeant,” he said. “My wife wanted to be here for this.” He waved an arm at the conversation area. “Let’s sit where we can talk,” he said, and he walked around the desk and sat down in the big club chair opposite Alana. Deborah hesitated for a moment, and I saw that she looked a little bit uncertain, as if it had really hit her for the first time that she was confronting somebody who was only a few steps down the chain of command from God. But she took a breath, squared her shoulders, and marched over to the couch. She sat down, and I sat beside her. The

Wheeler was the kind of guy I’d be wary to have in my section. His arms were covered with tattoos, and he wore a sleeveless shirt to show them off. No smile touched his face behind the facial hair that surrounded his mouth but didn’t extend up to his ears in a full beard. His scruffy brown hair was styled shorter on the sides and fell all over the place on top. He had a morose expression as he leaned on the table and sipped his whiskey, sliding his bright eyes up to mine without saying a word. Dark, Dannika (2014-07-27). Five Weeks (Seven Series #3) (p. 63). . Kindle Edition.

I watched as masculine girl children like myself - referred to as tomboys - and feminine boys - branded as sissies and pansies - were shamed, threatened, beaten, and terrorized into conforming to a pinker or bluer tint of gender. Many of the accommodations they adapted as teenagers - longer or shorter hair, a practiced swagger or sway, or an exaggerated public exhibition of heterosexuality - did little to conceal their forbidden gender expression, but instead twisted their whole beings into a countenance of self-loathing and defeat.

It was her. Younger—still a baby, really—her hair shorter; but the furrow in her forehead, the unsettling sense that she was watching you and thinking something surprisingly adult—that was unmistakably Charlotte. MISSING, the flyer read. EMMA GONZALEZ.

While the orc was still certainly nearly seven feet tall, if not more, he was noticeably shorter than his father and siblings. His features seemed somehow softer, his tusks less pronounced—while the sides of his head were shaved and the remaining jet-black hair pulled back into a short ponytail, he did not have any of the visible tattoos Hrul had.

Does this mean I think you should stubbornly refuse to give any guy a chance who doesn’t look like Channing Tatum? Or that you should dismiss every guy who’s a little shorter than you had hoped or blonder than you had visualized or older or younger than you had planned? No. There certainly should and needs to be flexibility and openness to the idea that the person you choose to spend your life with might not fit some preconceived mold or check every single box you have for him. There does have to be a willingness to compromise when it comes to the fine print. But the big things—Is he loyal and honest and kind? Does he have goals and dreams and ambition? Does he do what he says he’ll do and follow through and keep commitments and show up for you? and so on and so forth—those are areas in which you have a right to stand tall and firm on your standards and not back down. Because here’s the thing: yes, singleness can be a little lonely. It can be a little sad. It can be difficult and awkward, and let’s be real: it just plain sucks at times. But nothing . . . and I mean nothing . . . is lonelier or sadder or more challenging than waking up one morning to find yourself trapped in a relationship with someone who is wrong for you, simply because you compromised your standards to avoid winding up alone. (Or because you chose him simply because he has hair.) It’s time to tell the world that, yes, we are single; yes, we have standards; and, no . . . we won’t apologize for it. Because high standards don’t signify a diva. They signify a woman who knows what she’s worth.

The overlord was at least a head shorter than Ty’s father and well built, with a hint of grey in his beard and hair. Ty assumed this was Lyessa’s doing. He smiled, then noticed the grey in his own father’s hair.

Adolf Hitler was a few inches shorter than all of his guards. The first thing you noticed about him was his pale face and his long, ratlike nose with that bushy little mustache under it. His dark brown hair swept down across his forehead to just above his eyes, which were baggy and tired-looking.

You're a liar, and worse-- you broke my heart. You're not a mother. You're a villain." Gothel's eyes went wide. Her mouth opened and hung there as though even she was a little curious as to what she would say, what words would come and bring the situation back under her control. "I would rather take my chances with an honest villain like Bathory!" Rapunzel hissed. "Get out of my sight and never let me see you again!" "Or what?" Gothel asked, a knowing, nasty tone in her voice: her real voice. "What could you do to me, Rapunzel? I am your mother, and besides that I control all of these sword-playing idiots." "Did you forget that I'm a crown princess? And a powerful witch who can control her hair now. Or did you think the castle just fell on its own today? "Either way, your time with me is over, if you know what is good for you." The two women glared at each other. And after a minute, Rapunzel realized that's what they were: two women. Despite being younger and shorter than Gothel, she wasn't a girl anymore. She had power and will and a stubborn disposition. "Go. Now," she ordered. "Never approach me again." Her mother started to growl something-- "What's that? I can't hear you. All that mumbling," Rapunzel said airily, and walked away, turning her back on the woman forever.

As usual, Roman’s dark brown hair – shorter at the sides but longer on top – hung into his eyes, his shirt was half untucked, his tie was loose, and he carried his skateboard in one hand, his other hand a fist.

A man in a white lab coat appeared in the doorway, and when he saw me, he smiled. Ty Feld was two inches shorter than me, with curly, grizzled black hair, bushy sideburns, and a mustache more befitting a saloon owner. The GPA had kept Feld in its sights for years. We’d never gone after him, even though we knew he lived in the penthouse of Tower of Babel and operated out of a handful of old buildings in the abandoned sprawl of Las Vegas. Officially, we’d never been told why he was off-limits, but we all knew. He was a back-alley contractor for DARPA. He sold them illicit biotech and occasionally coughed up legit intel on bioterrorists and competitors to the GPA. So all things being equal, he was allowed to run his business of exotic synthetic creatures as long as he justified the freedom he was allowed.

Gwaldus tugged at her collar again. She looked nothing like Hereswith. She was at least two years older, half a hand shorter. Her eyes were grey-green, and her hair would be paler when washed. Her whole body would be paler. Her nipples were more pink than red.

His dark blond hair is shorter on the sides and longer on top, styled perfectly, making it look as though he came from a photoshoot at Gucci or something. Just enough scruff to give him an edge despite his otherwise clean-cut appearance.

Becca and Danielle looked at each other joyously. What a pair they made: Becca, dark-skinned, shorter and chunkier than Danielle, wearing a flashy pair of jams, her thick hair arranged in ponytails; and Danielle, still pale, with the shape of a bean pole, wearing droopy jeans and her even droopier "BALD IS BEAUTIFUL" T-shirt, a blue-and-green scarf not really hiding her almost bald head.

These things were almost my height, standing upright on skinny legs with bony, L-shaped knees—if they were knees at all—and up on their toes like spastic ballerinas. Their torsos were too long for their legs and emaciated as if they had never eaten. They had these round protruding bellies, almost like the kind you see on those starving kids in Africa, and the chest was angular as if looking down on a pointed roof, the skin—patchy with thin hair and scaled with mange—sucked in between the rib bones. Their arms weren’t much different than the legs, elbows bony like the knees, only sticking out to the sides like chicken wings so that the forearms and paws—they definitely looked more paw than hand—were forced in towards the body and outward like kangaroo arms. There was no neck to speak of, as if their heads had been nestled haphazardly between the tapering shoulders, except they were jutting forward as if the things were craning to get a better look. Their muzzles were much shorter and weirder looking than you’d expect from canines, as if

Snip. Snip. Snip. I stand perfectly still while he works (chin tucked down so the ends will blend better), then braid my much shorter hair and weapon up.

While those eating plant-based diets appear to enjoy lower risk of cardiovascular disease and longer lives,3719 those eating low-carb diets suffer significantly higher rates of cardiovascular disease and shorter lives—a 22 percent increase in overall mortality risk.3720 So, the side effects of low-carb ketogenic diets may not only include, as a recent review recited, “chronic fatigue, nausea, headaches, hair loss, reduced tolerance to alcohol, reduced physical performance, heart palpitations, leg cramps, dry mouth, bad taste, bad breath, gout, or constipation,”3721 but premature death as well.3722

It’s a guy maybe an inch or two shorter than my six one frame with dirty-blond hair, warm hazel eyes, and a cute smile. He looks too thin to be a hockey player.

Dead leaves scatter, caught and swirling in smoky exhaust. Now the hiss of hydraulic brakes, the ticking blinker, the whine of straining gears as the bus disappears down the city hill like some mechanical land-whale sounding in a concrete sea. A young soldier stands alone on the curb. She thumbs her earbuds in, cranks her music up, slings her service pack on and walks the empty morning sidewalk toward home. Passing a pawnshop, she spots her reflection in the glass and stops to look—Taller, broader, her hair shorter than before—she isn’t sure who she is, who she has become. All she knows for sure is she isn’t who she was when she left. Nobody is, and nobody ever will be. The streets are quiet, even for the early hour. A digital clock on an unfinished bank building behind her blinks mindlessly, the red numbers reversed in the glass. She’s turning to read the time when she’s caught by the flash. A bright magnesium burn in the corner of the gray sky. Bright and then brighter. Then the heat hits. She stiffens, her skin crawling with searing pain. Weightless now, she’s floating above the blinding street, a garbage can suspended beside her, its contents already aflame. When she hits

My Praetorian is shorter than I. Her helmet off, hair in a tight bun, ready to proclaim the grand laurels of her family. “My name is Felicia au…” I feint a whip at her face. She brings her blade up, and Victra goes diagonal and impales her at the belly button. I finish her off with a neat decapitation. “Bye, Felicia,

Wasn't my hair shorter than when they last saw me?

Diana’s gorgeous, with wide-set eyes, platinum-blond hair, and a sassy mouth. She’s a little shorter than I usually like, barely over five feet, five-two if we’re being generous. A pint-sized hottie with a big personality. Although it seems like a major part of that personality involves busting the balls of yours truly.

Since you seemed to think that we would be doing a good amount of fighting here, shorter hair is more useful. Though I can’t say that your hair might be considered the same. You might as well have dyed it blue.” “Hush. Your hair was so pretty. I was hoping you’d let me braid it one day. I suppose I’ll have to buy a pony instead.” She cocked her head. “When you shift, will your hawk form be plucked, then?” His nostrils flared, and she clamped her lips together to keep from laughing.

She was several inches shorter than me, her chin-length black hair glossy and straight, her skin tan and smooth, and her face—pretty, bordering on plain—was bored, if not mildly irritated. But Amren’s eyes … Her silver eyes were unlike anything I’d ever seen; a glimpse into the creature that I knew in my bones wasn’t High Fae. Or hadn’t been born that way. The silver in Amren’s eyes seemed to swirl like smoke under glass. She wore pants and a top like those I’d worn at the other mountain-palace, both in shades of pewter and storm cloud, and pearls—white and gray and black—adorned her ears, fingers, and wrists. Even the High Lord at my side felt like a wisp of shadow compared to the power thrumming from her.

With a snarl of pain, she forced herself to sit up, her head spinning with the sudden movement. One hand touched her temple, sticky with dried blood. She winced, feeling a gash along her eyebrow. It was long but shallow, and already scabbing over. She clenched her jaw, teeth grinding, as she surveyed the beach with squinting eyes. The ocean stared back at her, empty and endless, a wall of iron blue. Then she noticed shapes along the beach, some half-buried in the sand, others caught in the rhythmic pull of the tide. She narrowed her eyes and the shapes solidified. A torn length of sail floated, tangled up with rope. A shattered piece of the mast angled out of the sand like a pike. Smashed crates littered the beach, along with other debris from the ship. Bits of hull. Rigging. Oars snapped in half. The bodies moved with the waves. Her steady breathing lost its rhythm, coming in shorter and shorter gasps until she feared her throat might close. Her thoughts scattered, impossible to grasp. All thoughts but one. “DOMACRIDHAN!” Her shout echoed, desperate and ragged. “DOMACRIDHAN!” Only the waves answered, crashing endless against the shore. She forgot her training and forced herself to stand, nearly falling over with dizziness. Her limbs aches but she ignored it, lunging toward the waterline. Her lips moved, her voice shouting his name again, though she couldn’t hear it above the pummel of her own heart. Sorasa Sarn was no stranger to corpses. She splashed into the waves with abandon, even as her head spun. Sailor, sailor, sailor, she noted, her desperation rising with every Tyri uniform and head of black hair. One of them looked ripped in half, missing everything from the waist down. His entrails floated with the rear of him, like a length of bleached rope. She suspected a shark got the best of him. Then her memories returned with a crash like the waves. The Tyri ship. Nightfall. The sea serpent slithering up out of the deep. The breaking of a lantern. Fire across the deck, slick scales running over my hands. The swing of a greatsword, Elder-made. Dom silhouetted against a sky awash with lightning. And then the cold, drowning darkness of the ocean. A wave splashed up against her and Sorasa stumbled back to the shore, shivering. She had not waded more than waist deep, but her face felt wet, water she could not understand streaking her cheeks. Her knees buckled and she fell, exhausted. She heaved a breath, then two. And screamed. Somehow the pain in her head paled in comparison to the pain in her heart. It dismayed and destroyed her in equal measure. The wind blew, stirring salt-crusted hair across her face, sending a chill down to her soul. It was like the wilderness all over again, the bodies of her Amhara kin splayed around her. No, she realized, her throat raw. This is worse. There is not even a body to mourn. She contemplated the emptiness for awhile, the beach and the waves, and the bodies gently pressing into the shore. If she squinted, they could only be debris from the ship, bits of wood instead of bloated flesh and bone. The sun glimmered on the water. Sorasa hated it. Nothing but clouds since Orisi, and now you choose to shine.