Slack Off Quotes

Take wrong turns. Talk to strangers. Open unmarked doors. And if you see a group of people in a field, go find out what they are doing. Do things without always knowing how they'll turn out. You're curious and smart and bored, and all you see is the choice between working hard and slacking off. There are so many adventures that you miss because you're waiting to think of a plan. To find them, look for tiny interesting choices. And remember that you are always making up the future as you go.

No rest for the wicked, Bob, and that means that we can't slack off either, or they'll outwork us.

We stood silent. After a moment I said, "Real Geniuses never think they're geniuses." "Who says?" "Me." "Because why?" "Because genius is nine-tenths perspiration. Haven't you ever heard that? As soon as you think you're a genius, you slack off. You think everything you do is so great and everything.

The web is a dangerous place for a mind begging to slack off and be distracted by nonsense.

He watches Harry making intricate patterns, using the last of the glitter. “Are you making it so we can never be found?” Louis laughs, and the bucket dangles from his slack fingers. Harry’s smile falters immediately as he sprinkles the last of his handful. “Something like that.” He brushes his hands off on his trousers, and just like that, he’s back to his stoic poetry. “You can be found, if you like. But I don’t want to be.

You must be blind." "Why?" he asked, coming over to her. "Well, I feel like such an ass for saying this." She smoothed the front of her off-the-rack-and-then-some slacks. "But I wish I had better clothes. Then I'd be beautiful." Rehvenge paused. And then he shocked the crap out of her by kneeling before her. As he looked up, he had a slight smile on his lips. "Don't you get it Ehlena." With gentle hands, he stroked down her calf and brought her foot forward, balancing it on his thigh. As he undid the laces of her cheapo Keds sneaker, he whispered, "No matter what you wear... to me, you will always have diamonds on the soles of your shoes.

So are you comin' back with me or what?" Megan lifted her head and sighed. "I have a few conditions." "Shoulda known," Doug said, rolling his eyes. "First of all, I did not sign up for a truck stop bathroom," Megan said. "You guys need to start cleaning up after yourselves in there. No more blood, no more hair, no more stains that I don't even want to identify." "All right, all right," Doug said. "That it?" "Hardly," Megan said. "I want a hands-off rule on all my stuff. Including my bike." "Okay..." "And I want everyone to stop calling me Megan C Cups behind my back." Doug's jaw went slack as he flushed. "How did you know about that?" Megan raised her eyebrows. "All right, fine.

Because of self-doubt, the fear of failure, or laziness, most people usually bite off way less than they can chew.

you can’t let your employees work from home out of fear they’ll slack off without your supervision, you’re a babysitter, not a manager. Remote work is very likely the least of your problems.

I leave her to chemically combust and find Wren in the student council office, filling out extremely interesting paperwork. He’s buried behind piles of the stuff. I can barely see tufts of his blonde hair poking out. I reach into the paperwork pile and shove the two halves aside. Hundreds of them fall off the desk and to the floor. Papers drift through the air like snowflakes. Fat, boring-ass snowflakes. Wren looks up, face slack with shock. “Whatcha doing?” I ask. “Dividing up funding for the other clubs,” He whispers, clearly distraught. A paper plops onto his head and slides off dejectedly. I’m respectful for three seconds. “So anyway, I had this nightmare in which Jack was sexy and Kayla died.

The scary thing is, the more I slack off, the more it piles up and the more it piles up, the more I slack off.

Thomas was still outside, so I knocked once and opened the door without waiting for a response. Loki was in the middle of changing clothes as I came in. He'd already traded his worn slacks for a pair of pajama pants, and he was holding a white T-shirt, preparing to put it on. He had his back to me, and it was even worse than I'd thought. "Oh, my god, Loki," I gasped. "I didn't know you were coming." He turned around to face me, smirking. "Shall I leave the shirt off, then?" "No, put the shirt on," I said, and I closed the door behind me so nobody could see or overhear us talking. "You're no fun." He wrinkled his nose and pulled the shirt over his head. "Your back is horrific." "And I was just going to tell you how beautiful you look today, but I'm not going to bother now if you're going to talk that way." Loki sat back down on his bed, more lying than sitting.

I've sort of been slacking off in my voodoo studies.I've trigonometry, you know?

I know. And when I wake up I’m here. It’s okay; I’m okay, because I’m here. I don’t want you to worry about me. I’ll just feel guilty.” “I’ll try to worry only a little so you’ll only feel a little guilty.” “I guess that’ll have to do.” She shifted so they were nose-to-nose and heart-to-heart. “Don’t change your routine because of this. That’ll get me wired and worried. Besides, if you don’t keep up with your predawn quest for world financial domination, how are you going to keep me in coffee? If you slack off, I’ll have to find another Irish gazillion-aire with coffee bean connections.

Franklin, I was absolutely terrified of having a child. Before I got pregnant, my visions of child rearing- reading stories about cabooses with smiley faces at bedtime, feeding glop into slack mouths- all seemed like pictures of someone else. I dreaded confrontation with what could prove a closed, stony nature, my own selfishness and lack of generosity, the thick tarry powers of my own resentment. However intrigued by a “turn of the page,” I was mortified by the prospect of becoming hopelessly trapped in someone else’s story. And I believe that this terror is precisely what must have snagged me, the way a ledge will tempt one to jump off. The very surmountability of the task, its very unattractiveness , was in the end what attracted me to it. (32)

If I end up being an office lady who wears slacks and changes into white sneakers to walk home from the train, I'll just jump off a skyscraper.

when you slack off, what you’re really doing is choosing to fail because you didn’t try hard enough. It was a rational choice, his father had said, for people who would rather fail on purpose than risk finding out they’re not good enough, but if you made that choice you should at least be honest with yourself about what you were doing.

I realize that the English language is sadly devoid of names for people like me. I try to cut the world some slack for this every day. All day. And the day after that, too. But the truth is that every time I am misgendered, a tiny little sliver of me disappears, A tiny little sliver of me is reminded that I do not fit ... I remember that the truth of me is invisible, and a tiny little sliver of me disappears. Just a sliver, razored from the surface of my very thick skin most days, but other times right from my soul, sometimes felt so deep and other days simply shrugged off, but still. All those slivers add up to something much harder to pretend around.

What’s flattery?” “Flattery,” Wendy told him, “is when your daddy says he likes my new yellow slacks even if he doesn’t or when he says I don’t need to take off five pounds.” “Oh. Is it lying for fun?” “Something very like that.” He had been looking at her closely and now said: “You’re pretty, Mommy.” He frowned in confusion when they exchanged a glance and then burst into laughter.

With an easy grin he peered up at me. It took every ounce of self-control I had not to stare slack-jawed into his eyes. They gleamed like freshly polished emeralds, speckled with tiny flecks of gold. They were so pretty. Almost hypnotic... That's right about the time when I realized he had said something. I missed it because I was too busy gawking at him. Oh, crap! Did he order? Introduce himself? Ask me to marry him? Request a restraining order? I have no idea! How do I fix this and not come off like a total loser? "Huh?" Yeah, no. That wasn't it.

She gets to the bottom of the stairs, and I lift her off the ground and kiss her. As I lower her back to her feet she says, ‘Mmm, nice. That’s gonna score you some points with the parents.’ I look into the stands and see her parents standing there, slack-jawed, Dad with a camera perched, forgotten, in his hand. And Grandpa is laughing. ‘So what’s the plan?’ ‘I’m working on it. But I’m pretty sure it doesn’t include molesting me in front of them.

His bike was lying against the curb, and he righted it, holding the handlebars. “What I do, I do out of hate, not humanity. Because punishing assholes gets me off—not saving victims. And actually all this . . .” He cast his gaze around us. “This isn’t doing a fucking thing for me. So if you’re not going to jump, I’d just as soon be home in bed.” Home. Well, there was one question answered. Face burning, I shook my head. “No, I’m not jumping.” “Great.” He slung a leg over his crossbar. Face utterly unchanged, the Badger drew his infamous Glock from inside his hoodie, took aim, and shot me in the thigh from five feet. “Ow, Jesus!” White paint exploded across my favorite jeans, and a bolt of exquisite pain promised a welt. “That’s for wasting my time,” he said, replacing the pistol. “I’m too fucking tired for false alarms, so next time have the decency to jump.” My slack mouth produced no words. I watched him glide away, silent and passive once more. As ever. I glanced at my palm, streaked with white from where I’d grabbed my leg. Looked and felt just like when a bird shits on your hair. You pray it’s a raindrop, but it never is. Fuck you too, Badger.

Thank you," he said. Allison waved his thanks off with an airiness that didn't match her tense expression. "No, thank you. You just closed three outstanding bets and made me five hundred bucks," she said when Nathaniel glanced at her. "I'd rather find out exactly why and when you two hooked up than think about this awfulness any longer, so let's talk about that on the ride back instead." Aaron's gaze bounced from Allison to Nathaniel to Andrew. He was waiting for them to shoot her down, Nathaniel thought, and his expression went slack when neither one of them did. Nicky opened his mouth, then closed it again without a word and stared at Nathaniel. Kevin, surprisingly, didn't react at all.

I'd have to, if on Sunday I wanted to run off with some "slack-jawed Suzy," some "invertebrate," a "post-pubescent wasteoid who imagines the Khmer Rouge to be makeup and Guerrilla Warfare to be that rivalry which occurs between apes.

Activity was always to Inspector Slack’s taste. To rush off in a car, to silence rudely those people who were anxious to tell him things, to cut short conversations on the plea of urgent necessity. All this was the breath of life to Slack.

People talk a lot about midlife crisis, the momentary stress that arises when you finally slack off. The sublime flash of greenish light as the curtain of the sanctuary rips, when poets start reviewing books and programmers take jobs in quality control.

But there was something at once chilling and off-putting in the sudden distance that crept between us in the most unexpected moments. It was almost as though he were doing it on purpose; feeding me slack, and more slack, and then yanking away any semblance of fellowship.

you get a good story about three times a year. It comes in the shower on a day you have time. Couple hours to crank out, couple more to edit and there you have it. But you aren’t responsible. It’s from some antenna you put out and it happens to pick up a signal. Ideas sit for years before the way to crack them hits you. You can’t force it. All you can do is try not to fuck it up. Stay out of its way. Don’t slack off and erase your mind reading about rape on Twitter.

Stop!” she screamed. “Don’t hurt him.” “Back off!” Billy shouted. She yanked harder on Billy’s arm. “He isn’t a vampire anymore, idiot. Look! Do you see that big, yellow thing up in the sky? That’s called the sun. It’s shining down on him, and he isn’t exploding. His fangs are gone. He’s as human as we are. Case closed.” Billy stared up at the sky, his jaw slack. “Not possible.” Jack mumbled, “They don’t call me Jackpot for nothing.” “What?” Billy blinked at him. “Private joke.

When Seymour and I were five and three, Les and Bessie played on the same bill for a couple of weeks with Joe Jackson -- the redoubtable Joe Jackson of the nickel-plated trick bicycle that shone like something better than platinum to the very last row of the theater. A good many years later, not long after the outbreak of the Second World War, when Seymour and I had just recently moved into a small New York apartment of our own, our father -- Les, as he'll be called hereafter -- dropped in on us one evening on his way home from a pinochle game. He quite apparently had held very bad cards all afternoon. He came in, at any rate, rigidly predisposed to keep his overcoat on. He sat. He scowled at the furnishings. He turned my hand over to check for cigarette-tar stains on my fingers, then asked Seymour how many cigarettes he smoked a day. He thought he found a fly in his highball. At length, when the conversation -- in my view, at least -- was going straight to hell, he got up abruptly and went over to look at a photograph of himself and Bessie that had been newly tacked up on the wall. He glowered at it for a full minute, or more, then turned around, with a brusqueness no one in the family would have found unusual, and asked Seymour if he remembered the time Joe Jackson had given him, Seymour, a ride on the handle bars of his bicycle, all over the stage, around and around. Seymour, sitting in an old corduroy armchair across the room, a cigarette going, wearing a blue shirt, gray slacks, moccasins with the counters broken down, a shaving cut on the side of his face that I could see, replied gravely and at once, and in the special way he always answered questions from Les -- as if they were the questions, above all others, he preferred to be asked in his life. He said he wasn't sure he had ever got off Joe Jackson's beautiful bicycle.

I make Coach Noises while I sleep. If my yelling wakes you up, you need to sleep harder and stop slacking off.

The problem is that many entrepreneurs start with good intentions to create a new mindset system but then slack off. The solution is to make that system part of your daily routine.

A quiet but indomitable voice behind me said, “I believe this is my dance.” It was Ren. I could feel his presence. The warmth of him seeped into my back, and I quivered all over like spring leaves in a warm breeze. Kishan narrowed his eyes and said, “I believe it is the lady’s choice.” Kishan looked down at me. I didn’t want to cause a scene, so I simply nodded and removed my arms from his neck. Kishan glared at his replacement and stalked angrily off the dance floor. Ren stepped in front of me, took my hands gently in his, and placed them around his neck, bringing my face achingly close to his. Then he slid his hands slowly and deliberately over my bare arms and down my sides, until they encircled my waist. He traced little circles on my exposes lower back with his fingers, squeezed my waist, and drew my body up tightly against him. He guided me expertly through the slow dance. He didn’t say anything, at least not with words, but he was still sending lots of signals. He pressed his forehead against mine and leaned down to nuzzle my ear. He buried his face in my hair and lifted his hand to stroke down the length of it. His fingers played along my bare arm and at my waist. When the song ended, it took both of us a min to recover our senses and remember where we were. He traced the curve of my bottom lip with his finger then reached up to take my hand from around his neck and led me outside to the porch. I thought he would stop there, but he headed down the stairs and guided me to a wooded area with stone benches. The moon made his skin glow. He was wearing a white shirt with dark slacks. The white made me think of him as the tiger. He pulled me under the shadow of a tree. I stood very still and quiet, afraid that if I spoke I’d say something I’d regret. He cupped my chin and tilted my face up so he could look in my eyes. “Kelsey, there’s something I need to say to you, and I want you to be silent and listen.” I nodded my head hesitantly. “First, I want to let you know that I heard everything you said to me the other night, and I’ve been giving your words some very serious thought. It’s important for you to understand that.” He shifted and picked up a lock of hair, tucked it behind my ear, and trailed his fingers down my cheek to my lips. He smiled sweetly at me, and I felt the little love plant bask in his smile and turn toward it as if it contained the nourishing rays of the sun. “Kelsey,” he brushed a hand through his hair, and his smile turned into a lopsided grin, “the fact is…I’m in love with you, and I have been for some time.” I sucked in a deep breath. He picked up my hand and played with my fingers. “I don’t want you to leave.” He began kissing my fingers while looking directly into my eyes. It was hypnotic. He took something out of his pocket. “I want to give you something.” He held out a golden chain covered with small tinkling bell charms. “It’s an anklet. They’re very popular here, and I got this one so we’d never have to search for a bell again.” He crouched down, wrapping his hand around the back of my calf, and then slid his palm down to my ankle and attached the clasp. I swayed and barely stopped myself from falling over. He trailed his warm fingers lightly over the bells before standing up. Putting his hands on my shoulders, he squeezed, and pulled me closer. “Kells . . . please.” He kissed my temple, my forehead, and my cheek. Between each kiss, he sweetly begged, “Please. Please. Please. Tell me you’ll stay with me.” When his lips brushed lightly against mine, he said, “I need you,” then crushed his lips against mine.

Flattery,” Wendy told him, “is when your daddy says he likes my new yellow slacks even if he doesn’t or when he says I don’t need to take off five pounds.” “Oh. Is it lying for fun?

The Big Nurse is able to set the wall clock at whatever speed she wants by just turning one of those dials in the steel door; she takes a notion to hurry things up, she turns the speed up, and those hands whip around that disk like spokes in a wheel. The scene in the picture-screen windows goes through rapid changes of light to show morning, noon, and night - throb off and on furiously with day and dark, and everybody is driven like mad to keep up with that passing of fake time; awful scramble of shaves and breakfasts and appointments and lunches and medications and ten minutes of night so you barely get your eyes closed before the dorm light's screaming at you to get up and start the scramble again, go like a sonofabitch this way, going through the full schedule of a day maybe twenty times an hour, till the Big Nurse sees everybody is right up to the breaking point, and she slacks off on the throttle, eases off the pace on that clock-dial, like some kid been fooling with the moving-picture projection machine and finally got tired watching the film run at ten times its natural speed, got bored with all that silly scampering and insect squeak of talk and turned it back to normal.

My time on the financial desk had become a slow ordeal of waiting for my superiors to discover more and more of how little I knew about what I was doing; and now however pathetically willing I might be to learn all the things I was supposed to know, it had become much too ludicrously late to ask.

When employees are unable to slack off using the Internet, they find other ways to mentally escape. They “waste” time making cups of tea, sharpening pencils, or popping into coworkers’ offices to say hello.

It has been said that all the stories have already been told, that there is nothing left to say. At best, a writer’s job is to pour new wine in old bottles, to retell in a new way the same emotional predicaments that humans have felt since the beginnings of time. Yet many authors find this a worthwhile challenge; they think of themselves as gardeners whose task is to cultivate perennial ideas generation after generation. The same flowers will bloom each spring, but if the gardener slacks off, weeds will take over.

Flattery,” Wendy told him, “is when your daddy says he likes my new yellow slacks even if he doesn’t or when he says I don’t need to take off five pounds.” “Oh. Is it lying for fun?” “Something very like that.

She was a wonder junkie. In her mind, she was a hill tribesman standing slack-jawed before the real Ishtar Gate of ancient Babylon; Dorothy catching her first glimpse of the vaulted spires of the Emerald City of Oz; a small boy from darkest Brooklyn plunked down in the Corridor of Nations of the 1939 World’s Fair, the Trylon and Perisphere beckoning in the distance; she was Pocahontas sailing up the Thames estuary with London spread out before her from horizon to horizon. been voyaging between the stars when the ancestors of humans were still brachiating from branch to branch in the dappled sunlight of the forest canopy. Drumlin, like many others she had known over the years, had called her an incurable romantic; and she found herself wondering again why so many people thought it some embarrassing disability. Her romanticism had been a driving force in her life and a fount of delights. Advocate and practitioner of romance, she was off to see the Wizard.

Tossing out ideas itself was good. Stimulating the conference was something that should be welcomed. I didn’t mind if a formal brainstorm was chosen for the sake of presenting many ideas. But in the brainstorm and conference we were holding where nobody’s ideas were rejected, there was no foreseeable conclusion in sight. The conference I thought was proceeding on smoothly was beginning to look nonsensical. When I noticed, my hands recording the minutes had stopped. I loosely let my hands hang under the desk and sat there in silence watching the conference. The expression that I had was completely different from those who were energetically involved in the discussion. They had vivid and bright smiles floating on their faces. That was when I noticed. They were all enjoying this moment. That’s to say, they were enjoying this exchange between each other. What they wanted wasn’t the very idea of volunteer service, but the self­-acknowledgement of them doing these activities. It’s not that they wanted to do work. They just wanted to be immersed with the feeling of working. They just wanted to feel like they were actually doing it. And then, they would feel like they did everything that they could, where ultimately, everything had turned into nothing.

Here’s something else—if no one says to you, “Oh Sam (or Amy)! This is wonderful!,” you are a lot less apt to slack off or to start concentrating on the wrong thing… being wonderful, for instance, instead of telling the goddam story.

For answer, he threw off the covers, swung his legs over the edge of the high bed, reached for the floor with his bare feet, and stood up tottering. Then he fell forward onto his knees, his head swinging loose, slack as a killed buck.

I raised the muzzle and flexed my wrist to the right, but it didn’t help.” “I was watching you shoot in there. You need to relax. If that doesn’t work, you probably aren’t taking the slack off the trigger before pressing it.” She frowned.

But the truth is that I don’t know what the villagers thought or talked about, I was so shut off from them. The older ones occasionally crossed themselves when we passed, possibly because my mother was wearing slacks, but even that was never explained.

I need to ask, are you afraid of spiders?" Nicholas blinked, suddenly caught off guard, "Yes, I'm afraid of spiders." "Were you always?" "What are you, a psychiatrist?" Pritam took a breath. He could feel Laine's eyes on him, appraising his line of questioning. "Is it possible that the trauma of losing your best friend as a child and the trauma of losing your wife as an adult and the trauma of seeing Laine's husband take his life in front of you just recently..." Pritam shrugged and raised his palms, "You see where I'm going?" Nicholas looked at Laine. She watched back. Her gray eyes missed nothing. "Sure," agreed Nicholas, standing. "And my sister's nuts, too, and we both like imagining that little white dogs are big nasty spiders because our daddy died and we never got enough cuddles." "Your father died?" asked Laine. "When?" "Who cares?" Pritam sighed. "You must see this from our point of - " "I'd love to!" snapped Nicholas. "I'd love to see it from your point of view, because mine is not that much fun! It's insane! It's insane that I see dead people, Pritam! It's insane that this," he flicked out the sardonyx necklace,"stopped me from kidnapping a little girl!" "That's what you believe," Pritam said carefully. "That's what I fucking believe!" Nicholas stabbed his finger through the air at the dead bird talisman lying slack on the coffee table.

For years i had been resolved - unconsciously at first, but consciously later on - that when once my scholarship was won i would 'slack off' and cram no longer. This resolve, by the way, was so fully carried out that between the ages of thirteen and twenty-two or three i hardly ever did a stroke of avoidable work.

If you slacked off your attention for even a moment, you could stall the entire line—forcing workers into an unnatural combination of boredom and constant attentiveness.

I don’t think a muscle would dare show up on my body. What would be the purpose? I’d have them slacking off in no time.

A heat wave crashes into my body and I tug at the collar of my winter coat. I could take this thing off and probably still sweat. The memories of his mouth moving against mine and how his hands pressed into my body flood my brain. I lick my lips in anticipation. I crave for him to kiss me again, but... “Are you going to call me after?” A small grin plays on his lips. “You aren’t going to cut me any slack, are you?” It’s like he’s begging me to tease him, and without thought, I slide back to the braver girl at the bar. “Is that a problem?” He shakes his head. “Not from you.”

His mouth claimed hers again, hotly and hungrily. It drew breath from her. As he kissed her, his hand moved to the front of her slacks. He fumbled with the button and zipper until they were undone. When his hand slid into the elastic waistband of her panties, Rusty gasped. She had thought there would be a sensual buildup, a flirtatious progression, extended foreplay. She didn't regret that there wouldn't be. His boldness, his impatience, was a powerful aphrodisiac. It set off explosions of desire deep within her. She tilted her hips forward and filled his palm with her softness. He muttered swearwords that were in themselves arousing because they explicitly expressed the height of his arousal. Like a Rod Stewart song, they were viscerally sexy, one couldn't hear them without thinking of a male and a female mating.

Iris was interrupted by a resounding crash. Or not exactly a crash. More like a splintering sound. With a few pops. And twangs. “What was that?” Iris asked. “I don’t know.” Honoria craned her neck. “It sounded like—” “Oh, Honoria!” they heard Daisy shriek. “Your violin!” “What?” Honoria walked slowly toward the commotion, not quite able to put two and two together. “Oh, my heavens,” Iris said abruptly, her hand coming to her mouth. She lay a restraining hand on Honoria, as if to say—It’s better if you don’t look. “What is going on? I—” Honoria’s jaw went slack. “Lady Honoria!” Lady Danbury barked. “So sorry about your violin.” Honoria only blinked, staring down at the mangled remains of her instrument. “What? How . . . ?” Lady Danbury shook her head with what Honoria suspected was exaggerated regret. “I have no idea. The cane, you know. I must have knocked it off the table.” Honoria felt her mouth opening and closing, but no sound was emerging. Her violin didn’t look as if it had been knocked off a table. Honestly, Honoria was at a loss as to how it could have got into such a state. It was absolutely wrecked. Every string had snapped, pieces of wood were completely detached, and the chin rest was nowhere to be seen. Clearly, it had been trampled by an elephant.

From a very early age, the message is drilled into our heads: Failure is bad; failure means you didn’t study or prepare; failure means you slacked off or—worse!—aren’t smart enough to begin with. Thus, failure is something to be ashamed of.

Love isn't enough so you have to work your tail off to make up that last twenty percent. Don't rely on love, rely on your head and your heart and the knowledge that working and being in love is way better than slacking off and having it all fall apart later.

The children observe this too: his ability to acknowledge futility yet have a go anyway. To set off optimistically even if you soon find yourself back at the start. They are accustomed to all their attempts at anything being marked with a definite cross or a tick, but Taras does not appear to mind a cross. He even gives them to himself. It is a topsy-turvy way of thinking, but there is an intriguing ease to it, a widening of space. It seems a good way to do things, especially now, in this summer of laxity, this time of slack water.

In the final episode, you’ll see that I’m wearing a white shirt, and tan slacks, and both look at least three sizes too big for me. (Compare this to the difference in how I look between the final episode of season six and the first of season seven—the Chandler-Monica proposal episodes. I’m wearing the same clothes in the final episode of six and the first of seven [it’s supposed to be the same night], but I must have lost fifty pounds in the off-season. My weight varied between 128 pounds and 225 pounds during the years of Friends.)

You are so beautiful,” he said as he stared at her, “standing there in the light like that.” She glanced at her Gap black pants and her two-year-old knit turtleneck. “You must be blind.” “Why?” he asked, coming over to her. “Well, I feel like such an ass for saying this.” She smoothed the front of her off-the-rack-and-then-some slacks. “But I wish I had better clothes. Then I’d be beautiful.” Rehvenge paused. And then shocked the crap out of her by kneeling before her. As he looked up, he had a slight smile on his lips. “Don’t you get it, Ehlena.” With gentle hands, he stroked down her calf and brought her foot forward, balancing it on his thigh. As he undid the laces on her cheapo Keds sneaker, he whispered, “No matter what you wear…to me, you will always have diamonds on the soles of your shoes.” -Rehv & Ehlena

Being busy helping customers meant that I had no time to train the way I was used to, with an intense four-or five-hour workout each day. So I adopted the idea of training twice a day, two hours before work and two hours from seven to nine in the evening, when business slacked off and only the serious lifters were left. Split workouts seemed like an annoyance at first, but I realized I was onto something when I saw the results: I was concentrating better and recovering faster while grinding out longer and harder sets. On many days I would add a third training session at lunchtime. I'd isolate a body part that I thought was weak and give it thirty or forty minutes of my full attention, blasting twenty sets of calf raises, say, or one hundred triceps extensions. I did the same thing some nights after dinner, coming back to train for an hour at eleven o'clock. As I went to sleep in my snug little room, I'd often feel one or another muscle that I'd traumatized that day jumping and twitching-just a side effect of a successful workout and every pleasing, because I knew those fibers would now recover and grow.

Here is what I do: I get up every day by six A.M. and meditate and pray—for spiritual energy. Then, I exercise and eat—for physical energy. Afterward, I hug, kiss, and laugh with my family—for emotional energy— and try to do it so that I get to spend time with all of them and still get to the office between eight A.M. and nine A.M. (Most people plan for emotional energy time only in the evenings or on weekends, when it can do little for their daily pursuit of big goals.) I then plan and calendar my day—for mental energy—and spend my first, most energized hours in the office working hard on lead generation and recruiting talent—for business energy. I never slack off before eleven A.M.

So what do your parents do?" "Think up creative ways to kill each other." Vane cringed as that flew out of his mouth. He was so used to saying it that he didn't think about it until he'd heard himself say it. "No, really." Vane looked away uncomfortably. Bride's jaw went slack as she realized he wasn't kidding. "Why would they do that?" Vane actually squirmed a bit before he answered. "It's a long story. My mother ran off not long after I was born and my father wants me dead, so here I am with you." She didn't know what to think of that. "This um this family insanity, it's not hereditary, is it?" "It doesn't appear to be," he said seriously. "But if it creeps up on me, feel free to shoot me.

He sits back on the couch, nonchalantly adjusting the suit jacket around his narrow hips as if his cock isn’t straining the shiny fabric of his slacks. “If you’re here strictly on business…” I lurch off the coffee table and stand on the opposite side. “Explain that.” I point at his erection. “Making money gets my dick hard.” Where did this heartless douche in a tin can come from?

You’re unhappy and you feel like a failure. PERFECT! Use that sad/angry/disappointed energy. Channel it into what you know, deep down in your heart, you love. Spend the next six months in a state of total obsession. Get up two hours earlier than usual and write before you go to work. Come home and exercise (not optional, sorry), then write for another hour. Read or watch the kind of comedy you love before bed. Don’t waste all your time socializing. Do a little socializing on weekends, but focus. Focus! Save your money. Research part-time work you could do for your company; use your slackness as a way to sell a new position where your boss would get your best from you every hour that you’re there. Pitch it as a win-win. Or pitch working from home half the time to cure your blahs and jack up your productivity. Then overproduce at work, but fit all of your work into a part-time schedule, and fill your prime working hours with writing/comedy. Almost any capable human with a not-that-taxing job can pull this off if they put their mind to it. If you’re a manager, investigate other roles or sell your boss on the fact that you’re managing via e-mail most of the time anyway.

Holding the Long Sword Grip the long sword with a rather floating feeling in your thumb and forefinger, with the middle finger neither tight nor slack, and with the last two fingers tight. It is bad to have play in your hands. When you take up a sword, you must feel intent on cutting the enemy. As you cut an enemy you must not change your grip, and your hands must not "cower". When you dash the enemy's sword aside, or ward it off, or force it down, you must slightly change the feeling in your thumb and forefinger. Above all, you must be intent on cutting the enemy in the way you grip the sword. The grip for combat and for sword-testing is the same. There is no such thing as a "man-cutting grip". Generally, I dislike fixedness in both long swords and hands. Fixedness means a dead hand. Pliability is a living hand. You must bear this in mind.

Wary, my jaw still slack, I turn back toward Titos. Slowly, like he doesn’t want to startle me, Poseidon’s Drakon slithers toward me. He lays his head across my boot and stares at me with those lidless eyes. Still sprawled on my backside, I cringe and tense to kick him off me, but his tongue shoots out and curls around my calf. Adrenaline spikes in my blood. I think the snake just hugged me. I’m disturbed. Very disturbed.

The monstrous versions of himself and Hermione were gone: There was only Ron, standing there with the sword held slackly in his hand, looking down at the shattered remains of the locket on the flat rock. Slowly, Harry walked back to him, hardly knowing what to say or do. Ron was breathing heavily: His eyes were no longer red at all, but their normal blue; they were also wet. Harry stooped, pretending he had not seen, and picked up the broken Horcrux. Ron had pierced the glass in both windows: Riddle’s eyes were gone, and the stained silk lining of the locket was smoking slightly. The thing that had lived in the Horcrux had vanished; torturing Ron had been its final act. The sword clanged as Ron dropped it. He had sunk to his knees, his head in his arms. He was shaking, but not, Harry realized, from cold. Harry crammed the broken locket into his pocket, knelt down beside Ron, and placed a hand cautiously on his shoulder. He took it as a good sign that Ron did not throw it off. “After you left,” he said in a low voice, grateful for the fact that Ron’s face was hidden, “she cried for a week. Probably longer, only she didn’t want me to see. There were loads of nights when we never even spoke to each other. With you gone…” He could not finish; it was only now that Ron was here again that Harry fully realized how much his absence had cost them. “She’s like my sister,” he went on. “I love her like a sister and I reckon she feels the same way about me. It’s always been like that. I thought you knew.” Ron did not respond, but turned his face away from Harry and wiped his nose noisily on his sleeve. Harry got to his feet again and walked to where Ron’s enormous rucksack lay yards away, discarded as Ron had run toward the pool to save Harry from drowning. He hoisted it onto his own back and walked back to Ron, who clambered to his feet as Harry approached, eyes bloodshot but otherwise composed. “I’m sorry,” he said in a thick voice. “I’m sorry I left. I know I was a--a--” He looked around at the darkness, as if hoping a bad enough word would swoop down upon him and claim him. “You’ve sort of made up for it tonight,” said Harry. “Getting the sword. Finishing off the Horcrux. Saving my life.” “That makes me sound a lot cooler than I was,” Ron mumbled. “Stuff like that always sounds cooler than it really was,” said Harry. “I’ve been trying to tell you that for years.” Simultaneously they walked forward and hugged, Harry gripping the still-sopping back of Ron’s jacket. “And now,” said Harry as they broke apart, “all we’ve got to do is find the tent again.

But just understand the difference between a man like Reardon and a man like me. He is the old type of unpractical artist; I am the literary man of 1882. He won't make concessions, or rather, he can't make them; he can't supply the market. I--well, you may say that at present, I do nothing; but that's a great mistake, I am learning my business. Literature nowadays is a trade. Putting aside men of genius, who may succeed by mere cosmic force, your successful man of letters is your skilful tradesman. He thinks first and foremost of the markets; when one kind of goods begins to go off slackly, he is ready with something new and appetising. He knows perfectly all the possible sources of income. Whatever he has to sell, he'll get payment for it from all sorts of various quarters; none of your unpractical selling for a lump sum to a middleman who will make six distinct profits.

What the hell was that?!" Tom asked, fighting his way to his feet. "That..was not normal," Bram said, gripping the wheel like he was afraid to let go. "I modified the engine somewhat," Renfield confessed. That grin started sneaking back onto his face. "Modifications?" Gram asked. He slowly released his death grip on the steering wheel and turned around to look at Ren. "What modifications?" "Modification." Ren really stressed the shun at the end of the word. "I just removed the governor. I told you some parts needed to come out. You were there when I did it!" "The what?" I asked. Bram stared at Renfield, his expression going completely slack. "You did what? I didn't see you...You did what?" "What's a governor?" "You didn't," Tom said, voice filled with awe. "You are not telling me that you left a piece of the engine behind on the ground. " Renfield sighed and turned to address me, waving a hand casually. "The governor, on an airship engine, caps the maximum speed the engine can achieve. So,by taking the governor off, I've allowed us to go much faster." "And then we'll blow up!" Bram yelled. "Because you took a safety valve off!" "You've turned the ship into a freaking death trap!" Tom shouted. "It isn't critical. We just have to be mindful of the engine pressure ourselves, that's all! Trust me, she can take it!

Ha!’ cackled the fiend, ‘I expect you’d like revenge on that husband of yours. Murder shouldn’t go unpunished, and no creature enjoys delivering chastisement as much as I. What about giving him a taste of his own medicine? If you’d be so kind as to lend me your body, I’ll set him dancing to my tune.’ The wife’s spectre grimaced and nodded, at which the wicked Likho stripped off the nightgown, then the dead woman’s pliant skin, peeling back the flaccid folds. These it left in a slack heap. It gobbled her flesh and sucked the bones clean. These it hid behind the stove, before inserting itself inside the empty, wrinkled carcass, taking the former position of the corpse. Its fat tongue swiped the last juices from around its lips. When the husband returned home, all was as it had been; there was not a speck of blood to be seen, although the strangest smell of rotten eggs lingered

FOR MOST OF us, failure comes with baggage—a lot of baggage—that I believe is traced directly back to our days in school. From a very early age, the message is drilled into our heads: Failure is bad; failure means you didn’t study or prepare; failure means you slacked off or—worse!—aren’t smart enough to begin with. Thus, failure is something to be ashamed of. This perception lives on long into adulthood, even in people who have learned to parrot the oft-repeated arguments about the upside of failure. How many articles have you read on that topic alone? And yet, even as they nod their heads in agreement, many readers of those articles still have the emotional reaction that they had as children. They just can’t help it: That early experience of shame is too deep-seated to erase. All the time in my work, I see people resist and reject failure and try mightily to avoid it, because regardless of what we say, mistakes feel embarrassing. There is a visceral reaction to failure: It hurts.

Next to my own skin, her pearls. My mistress bids me wear them, warm them, until evening when I'll brush her hair. At six, I place them round her cool, white throat. All day I think of her, resting in the Yellow Room, contemplating silk or taffeta, which gown tonight? She fans herself whilst I work willingly, my slow heat entering each pearl. Slack on my neck, her rope. She's beautiful. I dream about her in my attic bed; picture her dancing with tall men, puzzled by my faint, persistent scent beneath her French perfume, her milky stones. I dust her shoulders with a rabbit's foot, watch the soft blush seep through her skin like an indolent sigh. In her looking-glass my red lips part as though I want to speak. Full moon. Her carriage brings her home. I see her every movement in my head.... Undressing, taking off her jewels, her slim hand reaching for the case, slipping naked into bed, the way she always does.... And I lie here awake, knowing the pearls are cooling even now in the room where my mistress sleeps. All night I feel their absence and I burn.

Although my road to writing seems like it may have come easily, there were a few bumps in that road. I didn’t get a lot of encouragement from friends, although my family were great supporters. I also had many…what you would call “mind-boggling” moments, when I would doubt myself and what I was writing. It has been said that we, ourselves, are our own worst critics. All the hard work had payed off though, and I created a children’s book that I am proud of, and an unforgettable little girl that will touch the hearts of many.”-Nina Jean Slack

At length, when the conversation-in my view, at least -was going straight to hell, he got up abruptly and went over to look at a photograph of himself and Bessie that had been newly tacked up on the wall. He glowered at it for a full minute, or more, then turned around, with a brusqueness no one in the family would have found unusual, and asked Seymour if he remembered the time Joe Jackson had given him, Seymour, a ride on the handle bars of his bicycle, all over the stage, around and around. Seymour, sitting in an old corduroy armchair across the room, a cigarette going, wearing a blue shirt, gray slacks, moccasins with the counters broken down, a shaving cut on the side of his face that I could see, replied gravely and at on cc, and in the special way he always answered questions from Les - as if they were the questions, above all others, he preferred to be asked in his life. He said he wasn't sure he had ever got off Joe Jackson's beautiful bicycle. And aside from its enormous sentimental value to my father personally, this answer, in a great many ways, was true, true, true.

Now that you’re old, cut yourself some slack, would you? Let yourself off the hook. Give yourself a break. You don’t have to do it all anymore. Take it easy for a change. It’s OK with the rest of the world. So why not you? For the first time in your life, do what you want. Not what everyone else thinks you should. Not what you think everyone else thinks you should. Do what you want. Excuse yourself. Say no. Back out. Beg off. Stay home. Take a rain check. Take a nap. Watch the ball game on TV. Anything but what you’d rather not do but feel you have to for everyone else's sake but your own. And then feel bad about having done it. That's plain wrong. And ask for some help when you need it: 'It’s too heavy.' 'It's too far.' Too near. Too cold. Too hot. Too bright. Too dark. Whatever. It's OK because there's always going to be something you need help with anymore. And be grateful for the helping hand. You'll find more and more people extend one to you these days. Whatever the reason for accepting you’ve got the best excuse in the world. The only one you’ll ever need: 'Hey, I’m old.

Excerpt from page 113 [On Malaysia's Prime Minster's anti-capitalism and anti-globalization policies in September 1997] "Ah, excuse me, Mahathir, but what planet are you living on? You talk about participating in globalization as if it were a choice you had. Globalization isn't a choice. It's a reality. There is just one global market today, and the only way you can grown at the speed your people want to grow is by tapping into the global stock and bond markets, by seeking out multinationals to invest in your country and by selling into the global trading systems what your factories produce. And the most basic truth about globalization is: No one is in charge. You keep looking for someone to complain to, someone to take the heat off your markets, someone to blame. Well, guess what, Mahathir, there's no one on the other end of the phone!" "The Electronic Heard cuts no one any slack... The herd is not infallible. It makes mistakes too. It overreacts and it overshoots. But if your fundamentals are basically sound, the herd will eventually recognize this and come back. They herd is never stupid for too long. In the end, it always responds to good governance and good economic management.

It couldn't have been because I'd told the Lilin I'd rip his head off. Yeah, I was a little less violent on most days, but in the past week or so, I'd thought I was the Lilin, had been kissed by Zayne and nearly took his soul, was subsequently chained and held in captivity by the very clan that had raised me, was almost killed by that same clan-deep breath- was then healed thanks to Roth and a mystery brew provided by a coven of withes who worshiped Lilith, and now I'd just discovered that my best friend was dead, his soul was in Hell, and the Lilin had taken his place. You'd think a girl could be cut a little slack.

We need a soul, my lord. You said so yourself. If I do as you ask, the sadhvi must take his place. A soul for a soul.” Amar wasn’t laughing anymore. The muscles in his neck tightened. His jaw clenched. But he didn’t say anything. Nritti’s grip on the noose turned her knuckles white. She was controlling him. I bit back a snarl. Nritti turned back to me and her face was triumphant. “No soul, no bargain.” Kamala shinnied, pulling against Gupta. I dropped my gaze to the ground, my heart frantic when I saw my sandals--mud crusted, tearing at the seams. I grinned. Don’t worry, Kamala, I thought, I’m not dying. “I have one.” When I spoke, my gaze was for Amar alone. “Here,” I said, tearing off the sandal and throwing it at Nritti’s feet, “a sole for a soul.” Kamala began to laugh and the deranged sound pitched off the walls, scattering between the bodies of the dark Otherworld beings. They stood slack-jawed and still. Only their eyes moved--bounding between me and Nritti and back. Before Nritti could speak, a creaking sound clattered through the room. Amar scooped the dirtied sandal in one hand before pulling me away from Nritti. His grip crushed into my arm, strong as iron. But there was something else…he was trembling. I could feel it through my skin. “I accept her barter.

But it wasn't all bad. Sometimes things wasn't all bad. He used to come home easing into bed sometimes, not too drunk. I make out like I'm asleep, 'casue it's late, and he taken three dollars out of my pocketbook that morning or something. I hear him breathing, but I don't look around. I can see in my mind's eye his black arms thrown back behind his head, the muscles like a great big peach stones sanded down, with veins running like little swollen rivers down his arms. Without touching him I be feeling those ridges on the tips of my fingers. I sees the palms of his hands calloused to granite, and the long fingers curled up and still. I think about the thick, knotty hair on his chest, and the two big swells his breast muscles make. I want to rub my face hard in his chest and feel the hair cut my skin. I know just where the hair growth slacks out-just above his navel- and how it picks up again and spreads out. Maybe he'll shift a little, and his leg will touch me, or I feel his flank just graze my behind. I don't move even yet. Then he lift his head, turn over, and put his hand on my waist. If I don't move, he'll move his hand over to pull and knead my stomach. Soft and slow-like. I still don't move, because I don't want him to stop. I want to pretend sleep and have him keep rubbing my stomach. Then he will lean his head down and bite my tit. Then I don't want him to rub my stomach anymore. I want him to put his hand between my legs. I pretend to wake up, and turn to him, but not opening my legs. I want him to open them for me. He does, and I be soft and wet where his fingers are strong and hard. I be softer than I ever been before. All my strength in his hand. My brain curls up like wilted leaves. A funny, empty feeling is in my hands. I want to grab holt of something, so I hold his head. His mouth is under my chin. Then I don't want his hands between my legs no more, because I think I am softening away. I stretch my legs open, and he is on top of me. Too heavy to hold, too light not to. He puts his thing in me. In me. In me. I wrap my feet around his back so he can't get away. His face is next to mine. The bed springs sounds like them crickets used to back home. He puts his fingers in mine, and we stretches our arms outwise like Jesus on the cross. I hold tight. My fingers and my feet hold on tight, because everything else is going, going. I know he wants me to come first. But I can't. Not until he does. Not until I feel him loving me. Just me. Sinking into me. Not until I know that my flesh is all that be on his mind. That he couldnt stop if he had to. That he would die rather than take his thing our of me. Of me. Not until he has let go of all he has, and give it to me. To me. To me. When he does, I feel a power. I be strong, I be pretty, I be young. And then I wait. He shivers and tosses his head. Now I be strong enough, pretty enough, and young enough to let him make me come. I take my fingers out of his and put my hands on his behind. My legs drop back onto the bed. I don't make a noise, because the chil'ren might hear. I begin to feel those little bits of color floating up into me-deep in me. That streak of green from the june-bug light, the purple from the berries trickling along my thighs, Mama's lemonade yellow runs sweet in me. Then I feel like I'm laughing between my legs, and the laughing gets all mixed up with the colors, and I'm afraid I'll come, and afraid I won't. But I know I will. And I do. And it be rainbow all inside. And it lasts ad lasts and lasts. I want to thank him, but dont know how, so I pat him like you do a baby. He asks me if I'm all right. I say yes. He gets off me and lies down to sleep. I want to say something, but I don't. I don't want to take my mind offen the rainbow. I should get up and go to the toilet, but I don't. Besides Cholly is asleep with his leg thrown over me. I can't move and I don't want to.

Take your hands off my sister!" The lieutenant's head swiveled toward the owner of the surly voice, and met with a hard fist. He stumbled and bumped into another brawling twosome, slacking his grip on Willie's legs. Seizing the advantage, she aimed a well-placed kick, and this time connected with her intended target. Rider grabbed his crotch and lurched forward in pain, dropping the little hellion on top of her brother. Like cats, the girl and her sibling were on their feet, weaving a zigzag escape through the mayhem. Rider quickly regained his balance and swore, "Damn, I should have known the little rebel had a brother." Still cupping his privates and cursing the air blue, he watched brother and sister disappear. "Someday, freckle face, someday.

Why are you making that face, Fern?” Bailey asked. “What face?” “That face that looks like you can't figure something out. Your eyebrows are pushed down and your forehead is wrinkled. And you're frowning.” Fern smoothed out her face, realizing she was doing exactly what Bailey said she was doing. “I was thinking about a story I've been writing. I can't figure out how to end it. What do you think this face means?” Fern gave herself an underbite and crossed her eyes. “You look like a brain-dead cartoon character,” Bailey answered, snickering. “What about this one?” Fern pursed her lips and raised her eyebrows while wincing. “You're eating something super sour!” Bailey cried. “Let me try one.” Bailey thought for a minute and then he made his mouth go slack and opened his eyes as wide as they could go. His tongue lolled out the side of his mouth like a big dog. “You're looking at something delicious,” Fern guessed. “Be more specific,” Bailey said and made the face once more. “Hmm. You're looking at a huge ice cream sundae,” Fern tried again. Bailey pulled his tongue back into his mouth and grinned cheekily. “Nope. That's the face you make every time you see Ambrose Young.” Fern swatted Bailey with the cheap stuffed bear she'd won at the school carnival in fourth grade. The arm flew off and ratty stuffing flew in all directions. Fern tossed it aside. “Oh yeah? What about you? This is the face you make whenever Rita comes over.” Fern lowered one eyebrow and smirked, trying to replicate Rhett Butler's smolder in Gone with the Wind. “I look constipated whenever I see Rita?” Bailey asked, dumbfounded.

We always thought it was cool that my mom only had boys, you know? Doug said, for once dropping his gangsta accent. “Who knew that we actually needed a sister?” Megan looked down at her hands. “Oh, man! Are you gonna go all blubbery on my ass?” Doug asked. Megan laughed. “No.” “So are you comin’ back with me or what?” Megan lifted her head and sighed. “I have a few conditions.” “Shoulda known,” Doug said, rolling his eyes. “First of all, I did not sign up for a truck stop bathroom,” Megan said. “You guys need to start cleaning up after yourselves in there. No more blood, no more hair, no more random stains that I don’t even want identified.” “All right, all right,” Doug said. “That it?” “Hardly,” Megan said. “I want a hands-off rule on all my stuff. Including my bike.” “Okay…” “And I want everyone to stop calling me Megan C Cups behind my back.” Doug’s jaw went slack as he flushed. “How did you know about that?” Megan raised her eyebrows. “All right, fine. Is that all?” Doug said. “You think you can do these things for me?” Megan asked. “Well, I may have to put the beatdown on a few people, but yeah. No problem,” Doug said casually. “Don’t beat down anybody,” Megan said. “Don’t tell me how to do my job,” Doug said, cracking his knuckles comically. “Okay,” Megan said, standing. For the first time all day, she felt calm--certain. “I’ll come back.” “Thank God!” Doug said. “Let’s get the hell outta this place.” “Oh, wait! One more thing,” Megan said, stopping Doug in his tracks. His shoulders slumped and he turned around. “What? You want my kidney?” “I want in on the next ultimate Frisbee game,” Megan said. Doug grinned. “You’re playin’ skins.” Megan grinned back. “We’ll see about that.

Lyre advanced. “Aphrodesia isn’t just blasting an enemy and leaving them frozen and slack-jawed. That’s like saying you can only use your magic to blow shit up and nothing in between.” “I don’t know what …” Ash trailed off as he withdrew another step. His back bumped into the wall. “Aphrodesia works best in low, subtle doses,” Lyre crooned. “It can be used to charm, to placate, to confuse, to disarm … or even to make you very … very … suggestible.” He leaned in, bringing his face within inches of Ash’s. “What do you think, Ash?” he whispered. “Do you want me to touch you?” The draconian’s eyes widened but he didn’t move. Lyre pressed both hands to Ash’s stomach and he jumped at the contact. But, trapped against the wall, he had nowhere to retreat. Lyre slid his hands slowly upward, dragging Ash’s shirt up. “What do you think?” he purred softly. “Do you want me to kiss you?” Ash’s breath caught.

It’s not only working parents who are looking for more hours in the day; people without children are also overworked, maybe to an even greater extent. When I was in business school, I attended a Women in Consulting panel with three speakers: two married women with children and one single woman without children. After the married women spoke about how hard it was to balance their lives, the single woman interjected that she was tired of people not taking her need to have a life seriously. She felt that her colleagues were always rushing off to be with their families, leaving her to pick up the slack. She argued, “My coworkers should understand that I need to go to a party tonight—and this is just as legitimate as their kids’ soccer game—because going to a party is the only way I might actually meet someone and start a family so I can have a soccer game to go to one day!” I often quote this story to make sure single employees know that they, too, have every right to a full life.

Hey cupcake!” he says, like he just had a great idea. “I’m so glad you’re here.” “Me too,” I say. “I thought you were ready to kick me to the curb.” I was. But when I found out he was hurt, it nearly gutted me. “Would if I could,” I say. “Do you think you could fall in love with me, cupcake?” he blurts out. I’m startled. I know he’s medicated, so I shouldn’t put any stock into his words, but I can’t help it. “You should get some rest,” I say. Tap. Tap. “So, that would be a no.” He whistles. Then he scrunches up his face when it makes his head hurt. “I’m in trouble,” he whispers quietly. “What?” He squeezes my hand. “I’m pretty sure I’m in love with you, cupcake,” he says. “I just wish you could love me back.” “You’ve had a lot of pain meds,” I say. Suddenly, he grabs the neck of my shirt and jerks me so that I fall over his chest. His lips are right next to mine. “Listen to me,” he says. “Okay,” I whisper. “I don’t have much going for me, but I know what love feels like.” “How?” “It just is, cupcake. You don’t get to pick who you fall in love with. And God knows, if my head could pick, it wouldn’t be you.” I push back to get off his chest, because I’m offended. But he holds me tight. “You’re not easy to love, because you can’t love me back. But you might one day. I’ll wait. But you got to start taking my calls.” He cups the back of my head and brings my face toward his. A cough from the doorway startles us apart. I stand up and pull my shirt down where he rucked it up. “Visiting hours are over,” a nurse says. “She’s not a visitor,” he says. She comes and inserts a needle into his IV, and his eyes close. He doesn’t open them when he says, “She’s going to marry me one day. She just doesn’t know it yet.” His head falls to the side and he starts to softly snore. His hand goes slack around mine. I pull back, my heart skipping like mad. “They say some of the most ridiculous things when they’re medicated.” The nurse shakes her head. “He probably won’t remember any of this tomorrow.” Pete

I have to remember as well that I am in a race. Oh, people will say that I’m not competing against anyone. That’s not true. I am competing against time and I will lose. We all lose. In the time that I have, what will I accomplish? Will I give up and say the race is too long or too fast, too hard? Will I tire out early? I am in a race to do my work, the best work I can possibly do. It is important to keep my standards high while others are slacking off saying it’s too hard. It’s supposed to be hard; otherwise, everyone would do it. It’s supposed to make us whine and carp about the pace or the failures we encounter or the simple fact that some days I suck at this work that I have chosen. We all of us feel this way at some time. Then we sleep on it or go for a walk, sit with a friend, or stare out at the mountain. This work is also what makes us feel right. The race is with myself, making myself better each time I go to the bench or the easel or the drawing board. Making sure that I am improving my skills, and staying curious, and getting better at my work each day.

Steven’s words slush together as he gets to his feet. “Crossing this one off the bucket list.” Then he unbuckles his belt and grabs the waist of his pants—yanking the suckers down to his ankles—tighty whities and all. Every guy in the car holds up his hands to try to block the spectacle. We groan and complain. “My eyes! They burn!” “Put the boa constrictor back in his cage, man.” “This is not the ass I planned on seeing tonight.” Our protests fall on deaf ears. Steven is a man on a mission. Wordlessly, he squats and shoves his lilywhite ass out the window—mooning the gaggle of grannies in the car next to us. I bet you thought this kind of stuff only happened in movies. He grins while his ass blows in the wind for a good ninety seconds, ensuring optimal viewage. Then he pulls his slacks up, turns around, and leans out the window, laughing. “Enjoying the full moon, ladies?” Wow. Steven usually isn’t the type to visually assault the elderly. Without warning, his crazy cackling is cut off. He’s silent for a beat, then I hear him choke out a single strangled word. “Grandma?” Then he’s diving back into the limo, his face grayish, dazed, and totally sober. He stares at the floor. “No way that just happened.” Matthew and I look at each other hopefully, then we scramble to the window. Sure enough, in the driver’s seat of that big old Town Car is none other than Loretta P. Reinhart. Mom to George; Grandma to Steven. What are the fucking odds, huh? Loretta was always a cranky old bitch. No sense of humor. Even when I was a kid she hated me. Thought I was a bad influence on her precious grandchild. Don’t know where she got that idea from. She moved out to Arizona years ago. Like a lot of women her age, she still enjoys a good tug on the slot machine—hence her frequent trips to Sin City. Apparently this is one such trip. Matthew and I wave and smile and in fourth-grader-like, singsong harmony call out, “Hi, Mrs. Reinhart.” She shakes one wrinkled fist in our direction. Then her poofy-haired companion in the backseat flips us the bird. I’m pretty sure it’s the funniest goddamn thing I’ve ever seen. The two of us collapse back into our seats, laughing hysterically.

KNEE SURGERY I’D FIRST HURT MY KNEES IN FALLUJAH WHEN THE WALL FELL on me. Cortisone shots helped for a while, but the pain kept coming back and getting worse. The docs told me I needed to have my legs operated on, but doing that would have meant I would have to take time off and miss the war. So I kept putting it off. I settled into a routine where I’d go to the doc, get a shot, go back to work. The time between shots became shorter and shorter. It got down to every two months, then every month. I made it through Ramadi, but just barely. My knees started locking and it was difficult to get down the stairs. I no longer had a choice, so, soon after I got home in 2007, I went under the knife. The surgeons cut my tendons to relieve pressure so my kneecaps would slide back over. They had to shave down my kneecaps because I had worn grooves in them. They injected synthetic cartilage material and shaved the meniscus. Somewhere along the way they also repaired an ACL. I was like a racing car, being repaired from the ground up. When they were done, they sent me to see Jason, a physical therapist who specializes in working with SEALs. He’d been a trainer for the Pittsburgh Pirates. After 9/11, he decided to devote himself to helping the country. He chose to do that by working with the military. He took a massive pay cut to help put us back together. I DIDN’T KNOW ALL THAT THE FIRST DAY WE MET. ALL I WANTED to hear was how long it was going to take to rehab. He gave me a pensive look. “This surgery—civilians need a year to get back,” he said finally. “Football players, they’re out eight months. SEALs—it’s hard to say. You hate being out of action and will punish yourselves to get back.” He finally predicted six months. I think we did it in five. But I thought I would surely die along the way. JASON PUT ME INTO A MACHINE THAT WOULD STRETCH MY knee. Every day I had to see how much further I could adjust it. I would sweat up a storm as it bent my knee. I finally got it to ninety degrees. “That’s outstanding,” he told me. “Now get more.” “More?” “More!” He also had a machine that sent a shock to my muscle through electrodes. Depending on the muscle, I would have to stretch and point my toes up and down. It doesn’t sound like much, but it is clearly a form of torture that should be outlawed by the Geneva Convention, even for use on SEALs. Naturally, Jason kept upping the voltage. But the worst of all was the simplest: the exercise. I had to do more, more, more. I remember calling Taya many times and telling her I was sure I was going to puke if not die before the day was out. She seemed sympathetic but, come to think of it in retrospect, she and Jason may have been in on it together. There was a stretch where Jason had me doing crazy amounts of ab exercises and other things to my core muscles. “Do you understand it’s my knees that were operated on?” I asked him one day when I thought I’d reached my limit. He just laughed. He had a scientific explanation about how everything in the body depends on strong core muscles, but I think he just liked kicking my ass around the gym. I swear I heard a bullwhip crack over my head any time I started to slack. I always thought the best shape I was ever in was straight out of BUD/S. But I was in far better shape after spending five months with him. Not only were my knees okay, the rest of me was in top condition. When I came back to my platoon, they all asked if I had been taking steroids.

Here are some of the qualities you should possess or should try to acquire if you wish to become a fiction writer: 1. You should have a lively imagination. 2. You should be able to write well. By that I mean you should be able to make a scene some alive in a readers mind. Not everybody has this ability. Its a gift, and you either have it or you don't. 3. You must have stamina. In other words, you must be able to to stick to what your doing and never give up, for hour after hour, day after day, week after week and month after month. 4. You must be a perfectionist. That means you must never be satisfied with what you have written until you have rewritten it again and again, making it as good as you possibly can. 5. You must have strong self discipline. You are working alone. No one is employing you. No one is around to give you the sack if you don't turn up for work, or to tick you off if you start slacking. 6. It helps a lot if you have a keen sense of humor. This is not essential when writing for grown-ups but for children, its vital. 7. You must have a degree of humility. The writer who thinks that his work is marvelous is heading for trouble.

I landed on my side, my hip taking the brunt of the fall. It burned and stung from the hit, but I ignored it and struggled to sit up quickly. There really was no point in hurrying so no one would see. Everyone already saw A pair of jean-clad legs appeared before me, and my suitcase and all my other stuff was dropped nearby. "Whatcha doing down there?" Romeo drawled, his hands on his hips as he stared down at me with dancing blue eyes. "Making a snow angel," I quipped. I glanced down at my hands, which were covered with wet snow and bits of salt (to keep the pavement from getting icy). Clearly, ice wasn't required for me to fall. A small group of girls just "happened by", and by that I mean they'd been staring at Romeo with puppy dog eyes and giving me the stink eye. When I fell, they took it as an opportunity to descend like buzzards stalking the dead. Their leader was the girl who approached me the very first day I'd worn Romeo's hoodie around campus and told me he'd get bored. As they stalked closer, looking like clones from the movie Mean Girls, I caught the calculating look in her eyes. This wasn't going to be good. I pushed up off the ground so I wouldn't feel so vulnerable, but the new snow was slick and my hand slid right out from under me and I fell back again. Romeo was there immediately, the teasing light in his eyes gone as he slid his hand around my back and started to pull me up. "Careful, babe." he said gently. The girls were behind him so I knew he hadn't seen them approach. They stopped as one unit, and I braced myself for whatever their leader was about to say. She was wearing painted-on skinny jeans (I mean, really, how did she sit down and still breathe?) and some designer coat with a monogrammed scarf draped fashionably around her neck. Her boots were high-heeled, made of suede and laced up the back with contrasting ribbon. "Wow," she said, opening her perfectly painted pink lips. "I saw that from way over there. That sure looked like it hurt." She said it fairly amicably, but anyone who could see the twist to her mouth as she said it would know better. Romeo paused in lifting me to my feet. I felt his eyes on me. Then his lips thinned as he turned and looked over his shoulder. "Ladies," he said like he was greeting a group of welcomed friends. Annoyance prickled my stomach like tiny needles stabbing me. It's not that I wanted him to be rude, but did he have to sound so welcoming? "Romeo," Cruella DeBarbie (I don't know her real name, but this one fit) purred. "Haven't you grown bored of this clumsy mule yet?" Unable to stop myself, I gasped and jumped up to my feet. If she wanted to call me a mule, I'd show her just how much of an ass I could be. Romeo brought his arm out and stopped me from marching past. I collided into him, and if his fingers hadn't knowingly grabbed hold to steady me, I'd have fallen again. "Actually," Romeo said, his voice calm, "I am pretty bored." Three smirks were sent my way. What a bunch of idiots. "The view from where I'm standing sure leaves a lot to be desired." One by one, their eyes rounded when they realized the view he referenced was them. Without another word, he pivoted around and looked down at me, his gaze going soft. "No need to make snow angels, baby," he said loud enough for the slack-jawed buzzards to hear. "You already look like one standing here with all that snow in your hair." Before I could say a word, he picked me up and fastened his mouth to mine. My legs wound around his waist without thought, and I kissed him back as gentle snow fell against our faces.

The question,” Rupert stated, “is, do I rend you limb from limb, physically?  Or do I rend you cell by cell, magically?”  Rupert certainly couldn’t do the latter, and he really didn’t want to do the former; however, the demon had really made him mad.  He deserved to suffer a little fear.  If Rupert had been a human, he’d be dead by now, he was sure. “Limb by limb, if you please.”  The demon begged. “I’ll be forever regenerating with the cell-by-cell thing.  Please...”  The demon almost seemed to whine.  “Please lord, if I have to regenerate cell by cell, my master will really be angry with me.  He doesn’t like his people slacking off, taking up his time to regenerate from their own stupidity, as he’d say.  Just rend me limb from limb, I promise I won’t bother you anymore.  Please?”  Rupert just continued to glare.  He was taken by surprise. The little fellow acted as if it were standard procedure in this circumstance.  He was actually begging for one method over the other.  “Please? Limb by limb?”  the demon begged. Rupert shrugged.  He’d never rent anyone limb from limb before.  He wasn’t sure how it was supposed to be done, but he could use his imagination.  Rupert waded in.  It was all rather messy, he’d decided afterward.

This is a friendly forty winks, Mrs. FitzEngle.” He snagged her wrist. “Join me.” She regarded him where he lay. “Ellen.” The teasing tone in Val’s voice faded. “I will not ravish you in broad daylight unless you ask it of me, though I would hold you.” She nodded uncertainly and gingerly lowered herself beside him, flat on her back. “You’re out of practice,” Val observed, rolling to his side. “We must correct this state of affairs if we’re to get our winks.” Before she could protest, he arranged her so she was on her side as well, his body curved around hers, her head resting on his bicep, his arm tucking her back against him. “The benefit of this position,” his said, speaking very close to her ear, “is that I cannot behold your lovely face if you want to confide secrets, you see? I am close enough to hear you whisper, but you have a little privacy, as well. So confide away, and I’ll just cuddle up and perhaps even drift off.” “You would drift off while I’m confiding?” “I would allow you the fiction. It’s one of the rules of gentlemanly conduct owed on summer days to napping companions.” His arm was loosely draped over her middle so he could sense the tension in her. “I can hear your thoughts turning like a mill wheel. Let your mind rest too, Ellen.” “I am unused to this friendly napping.” “You and your baron never stole off for an afternoon nap?” Val asked, his fingers tracing the length of her arm. “Never kidnapped each other for a picnic on a pretty day?” “We did not.” Ellen sighed as his fingers stroked over her arm again. “He occasionally took tea with me, though, and we often visited at the end of the day.” But, Val concluded with some satisfaction, they did not visit in bed or on blankets or with their clothes off. Ellen had much to learn about napping. His right hand drifted up to her shoulder, where he experimentally squeezed at the muscles joining her neck to her back. “Blazes,” he whispered, “you are strong. Relax, Ellen.” His right hand was more than competent to knead at her tense muscles, and when he heard her sigh and felt her relax, he realized he’d found the way to stop her mill wheel from spinning so relentlessly. “Close your eyes, Ellen,” he instructed softly. “Close your eyes and rest.” In minutes, her breathing evened out, her body went slack, and sleep claimed her. Gathering her a little more closely, he planted a kiss on her nape and closed his eyes. His hand wasn’t throbbing anymore, his belly was full, and he was stealing a few private moments with a pretty lady on a pretty day. God

Then I heard it--the voice over the CB radio. “You’re on fire! You’re on fire!” The voice repeated, this time with more urgency, “Charlie! Get out! You’re on fire!” I sat there, frozen, unable to process the reality of what I’d just heard. “Oh, shit!” sweet little Charlie yelled, grabbing his door handle. “We’ve got to get out, darlin’--get outta here!” He opened his door, swung his feeble knees around, and let gravity pull him out of the pickup; I, in turn, did the same. Covering my head instinctively as I ditched, I darted away from the vehicle, running smack-dab into Marlboro Man’s brother, Tim, in the process. He was spraying the side of Charlie’s pickup, which, by now, was engulfed in flames. I kept running until I was sure I was out of the path of danger. “Ree! Where’d you come from?!?” Tim yelled, barely taking his eyes off the fire on the truck, which, by then, was almost extinguished. Tim hadn’t known I was on the scene. “You okay?” he yelled, glancing over to make sure I wasn’t on fire, too. A cowboy rushed to Charlie’s aid on the other side of the truck. He was fine, too, bless his heart. By now Marlboro Man had become aware of the commotion, not because he’d seen it happen through the smoke, but because his hose had reached the end of its slack and Charlie’s truck was no longer following behind. Another spray truck had already rushed over to Marlboro Man’s spot and resumed chasing the fire--the same fire that might have gobbled up a rickety, old spray truck, an equally rickety man named Charlie, and me. Luckily Tim had been nearby when a wind gust blew the flames over Charlie’s truck, and had acted quickly. The fire on the truck was out by now, and Marlboro Man rushed over, grabbed my shoulders, and looked me over--trying, in all the confusion, to make sure I was in one piece. And I was. Physically, I was perfectly fine. My nervous system, on the other hand, was a shambles. “You okay?” he shouted over the crackling sounds of the fire. All I could do was nod and bite my lip to keep from losing it. Can I go home now? was the only thing going through my mind. That, and I want my mommy. The fire was farther away by now, but it seemed to be growing in intensity. Even I could tell the wind had picked up. Marlboro Man and Tim looked at each other…and burst out in nervous laughter--the kind of laugh you laugh when you almost fall but don’t; when your car almost goes off a cliff but comes to a stop right at the edge; when your winning team almost misses the winning pass but doesn’t; or when your fiancée and a local cowboy are almost burned alive…but aren’t. I might have laughed, too, if I could muster any breath.

Muriah approached him with a new pair of khakis and a couple of T-shirts. “I guessed at the size so you might want to go try these on first.” He took the clothes and slid his arm around her waist, maneuvering her toward the fitting room. “Hey, I didn’t sign on to be your dresser.” She grumbled, but didn’t struggle. He pulled the door closed and turned to meet her eyes. “It’s light in here and full of people. Apep will not be able to surprise us, and his serpents cannot spy. We need to talk.” *** He stripped off the wet shirt, exposing his chiseled torso. She did her best not to choke on her tongue. His tanned skin and taut muscles tempted her, luring her to touch him. Turning around to give him privacy seemed like the right thing to do, but there wasn’t a hint of modesty in this Mayan god, and if he could handle getting this personal, then she could, too. When he unzipped the wet pants, she held her breath. Would an ancient guy wear underwear? She was about to find out. He bent over to lower the wet slacks. When he straightened up, she realized he’d been talking, but she didn’t have a clue what he had said. Instead, all her attention was focused on a fine trail of dark hair leading from just below his navel and disappearing under the low-slung elastic band of his boxer briefs. “Muriah?” Her gaze snapped up to meet his. Thank the universe he couldn’t read her thoughts. “Yeah?” “Did you hear my question?” He stood two feet from her in only his underwear, and he thought she was listening? He was either completely unaware of his sex appeal, or he was way too accustomed to being obeyed. Probably both. She cleared her throat. “I must’ve missed it.” A spark lit his eyes that told her he might have more than a clue to his sex appeal. He picked up the T-shirt and pulled it on. “I asked if you knew of another hotel closer to the airport so we can get out of New York as soon as the sun sets tomorrow.” “I’m sure I can find one.” She pulled out her phone, grateful to have something to pretend to focus on besides him tucking his package into the new khakis she pulled off the rack for him. “I probably should’ve grabbed some dry underwear, too.” “They are nearly dry now. I will be fine.” He popped the tags off, and she glanced up from her hotel search. “They’re not going to like you taking the tags off before you pay.” The corner of his mouth curved up. “They will be honored to take my money.” She groaned and rolled her eyes. “Do you ever not get your way?” He stepped closer to her, his chest an inch from hers until her back pressed against the modular wall of the fitting room. “Rarely.” His dark gaze held hers, and the deep rumble of his voice sent heat through her body. “But some things are worth the extra effort.

Rider cursed, ducked another blow, threw one of his own, and then bent down, hoisting the scrappy little female, none too gently, over his shoulder. "This is no place for you, girl, even if this whole mess is your fault." "My fault!" screamed Willie, dangling upside down. "You're the one who had to go and open his big mouth!" She beat on his back as he dodged brawlers, and headed for safe ground. "Dammit, put me down, you overgrown ox. You're gonna make me miss the fight!" As she screeched and kicked in a most unladylike manner,her small feet barely missed his vunerable groin. Raising his hand to smack her bottom, Rider found it suddenly immobilized by a fierce grip. "Take your hands off my sister!" The lieutenant's head swiveled toward the owner of the surly voice, and met with a hard fist. He stumbled and bumped into another brawling twosome, slacking his grip on Willie's legs. Seizing the advantage,she aimed a well-placed kick,and this time connected with her intended target. Rider grabbed his crotch and lurched forward in pain, dropping the little hellion on top of her brother. Like cats, the girl and her sibling were on their feet,weaving a zigzag escape through the mayhem. Rider quickly regained his balance and swore, "Damn,I should have known the little rebel had a brother." Still cupping his privates and cursing the air blue, he watched brother and sister disappear. "Someday, freckle face, someday.

Suddenly Dean stared into the darkness of a corner beyond the bandstand and said, "Sal, God has arrived." I looked. George Shearing. And as always he leaned his blind head on his pale hand, all ears opened like the ears of an elephant, listening to the American sounds and mastering them for his own English summer's-night use. Then they urged him to get up and play. He did. He played innumerable choruses with amazing chords that mounted higher and higher till the sweat splashed all over the piano and everybody listened in awe and fright. They led him off the stand after an hour. He went back to his dark corner, old God Shearing, and the boys said, "There ain't nothin left after that." But the slender leader frowned. "Let's blow anyway." Something would come of it yet. There's always more, a little further - it never ends. They sought to find new phrases after Shearing's explorations; they tried hard. They writhed and twisted and blew. Every now and then a clear harmonic cry gave new suggestions of a tune that would someday be the only tune in the world and would raise men's souls to joy. They found it, they lost, they wrestled for it, they found it again, they laughed, they moaned - and Dean sweated at the table and told them to go, go, go. At nine o'clock in the morning everybody - musicians, girls in slacks, bartenders, and the one little skinny, unhappy trombonist - staggered out of the club into the great roar of Chicago day to sleep until the wild bop night again.

That man,” she announced huffily, referring to their host, “can’t put two words together without losing his meaning!” Obviously she’d expected better of the quality during the time she was allowed to mix with them. “He’s afraid of us, I think,” Elizabeth replied, climbing out of bed. “Do you know the time? He desired me to accompany him fishing this morning at seven.” “Half past ten,” Berta replied, opening drawers and turning toward Elizabeth for her decision as to which gown to wear. “He waited until a few minutes ago, then went of without you. He was carrying two poles. Said you could join him when you arose.” “In that case, I think I’ll wear the pink muslin,” she decided with a mischievous smile. The Earl of Marchman could scarcely believe his eyes when he finally saw his intended making her way toward him. Decked out in a frothy pink gown with an equally frothy pink parasol and a delicate pink bonnet, she came tripping across the bank. Amazed at the vagaries of the female mind, he quickly turned his attention back to the grandfather trout he’d been trying to catch for five years. Ever so gently he jiggled his pole, trying to entice or else annoy the wily old fish into taking his fly. The giant fish swam around his hook as if he knew it might be a trick and then he suddenly charged it, nearly jerking the pole out of John’s hands. The fish hurtled out of the water, breaking the surface in a tremendous, thrilling arch at the same moment John’s intended bride deliberately chose to let out a piercing shriek: “Snake!” Startled, John jerked his head in her direction and saw her charging at him as if Lucifer himself was on her heels, screaming, “Snake! Snake! Snnnaaaake!” And in that instant his connection was broken; he let his line go slack, and the fish dislodged the hook, exactly as Elizabeth had hoped. “I saw a snake,” she lied, panting and stopping just short of the arms he’d stretched out to catch her-or strangle her, Elizabeth thought, smothering a smile. She stole a quick searching glance at the water, hoping for a glimpse of the magnificent trout he’d nearly caught, her hands itching to hold the pole and try her own luck. Lord Marchman’s disgruntled question snapped her attention back to him. “Would you like to fish, or would you rather sit and watch for a bit, until you recover from your flight from the serpent?” Elizabeth looked around in feigned shock. “Goodness, sir, I don’t fish!” “Do you sit?” he asked with what might have been sarcasm. Elizabeth lowered her lashes to hide her smile at the mounting impatience in his voice. “Of course I sit,” she proudly told him. “Sitting is an excessively ladylike occupation, but fishing, in my opinion, is not. I shall adore watching you do it, however.” For the next two hours she sat on the boulder beside him, complaining about its hardness, the brightness of the sun and the dampness of the air, and when she ran out of matters to complain about she proceeded to completely spoil his morning by chattering his ears off about every inane topic she could think of while occasionally tossing rocks into the stream to scare off his fish.

I awake with a start, shaking the cobwebs of sleep from my mind. It’s pitch-dark out, the wind howling. It takes a couple seconds to get my bearings, to realize I’m in my parents’ bed, Ryder beside me, on his side, facing me. Our hands are still joined, though our fingers are slack now. “Hey, you,” he says sleepily. “That one was loud, huh?” “What was?” “Thunder. Rattled the windows pretty bad.” “What time is it?” “Middle of the night, I’d say.” I could check my phone, but that would require sitting up and letting go of his hand. Right now, I don’t want to do that. I’m too comfortable. “Have you gotten any sleep at all?” I ask him, my mouth dry and cottony. “I think I drifted off for a little bit. Till…you know…the thunder started up again.” “Oh. Sorry.” “It should calm down some when the eye moves through.” “If there’s still an eye by the time it gets here. The center of circulation usually starts breaking up once it goes inland.” Yeah, all those hours watching the Weather Channel occasionally come in handy. He gives my hand a gentle squeeze. “Wow, maybe you should consider studying meteorology. You know, if the whole film-school thing doesn’t work out for you.” “I could double major,” I shoot back. “I bet you could.” “What are you going to study?” I ask, curious now. “I mean, besides football. You’ve got to major in something, don’t you?” He doesn’t answer right away. I wonder what’s going through his head--why he’s hesitating. “Astrophysics,” he says at last. “Yeah, right.” I roll my eyes. “Fine, if you don’t want to tell me…” “I’m serious. Astrophysics for undergrad. And then maybe…astronomy.” “What, you mean in graduate school?” He just nods. “You’re serious? You’re going to major in something that tough? I mean, most football players major in something like phys ed or underwater basket weaving, don’t they?” “Greg McElroy majored in business marketing,” he says with a shrug, ignoring my jab. “Yeah, but…astrophysics? What’s the point, if you’re just going to play pro football after you graduate anyway?” “Who says I want to play pro football?” he asks, releasing my hand. “Are you kidding me?” I sit up, staring at him in disbelief. He’s the best quarterback in the state of Mississippi. I mean, football is what he does…It’s his life. Why wouldn’t he play pro ball? He rolls over onto his back, staring at the ceiling, his arms folded behind his head. “Right, I’m just some dumb jock.” “Oh, please. Everyone knows you’re the smartest kid in our class. You always have been. I’d give anything for it to come as easily to me as it does to you.” He sits up abruptly, facing me. “You think it’s easy for me? I work my ass off. You have no idea what I’m working toward. Or what I’m up against,” he adds, shaking his head. “Probably not,” I concede. “Anyway, if anyone can major in astrophysics and play SEC ball at the same time, you can. But you might want to lose the attitude.” He drops his head into his hands. “I’m sorry, Jem. It’s just…everyone has all these expectations. My parents, the football coach--” “You think I don’t get that? Trust me. I get it better than just about anyone.” He lets out a sigh. “I guess our families have pretty much planned out our lives for us, haven’t they?” “They think they have, that’s for sure,” I say.

Guilt. Torment. Sorrow. Shock. Which?” she asked against his chest. “I’m trying,” he murmured on a weary chuckle. “But all I can manage is pride,” he added softly. “I satisfied you completely, didn’t I?” “More than completely,” she murmured against his damp shoulder. Her hand traced his chest, feeling the coolness of his skin, the ripple of muscle. “Hold me close.” He wrapped both arms around her and drew her on top of him, holding her hungrily to him, their legs lazily entwined. “I seduced you.” She pressed a soft kiss to his collarbone. “Mmm-hmm.” He caught his breath as the tiny, insignificant movement produced a sudden, raging arousal. She lifted her head. “Did I do something wrong?” He lifted an eyebrow and nodded toward his flat stomach. She followed his amused glance and caught her breath. He drew her mouth down over his and kissed her ferociously before he sat up and moved off the bed. “Where are you going?” she asked, startled. He drew on his briefs and his slacks, glancing down at her with amused delight. “One of us has to be sensible,” he told her. “Colby’s probably on his way back right now.” “But he just left…” “Almost an hour ago,” he finished for her, nodding toward the clock on the bedside table. She sat up, her eyes wide with surprise. “I took a long time with you,” he said gently. “Didn’t you notice?” She laughed self-consciously. “Well, yes, but I didn’t realize it was that long.” He drew her off the bed and bent to kiss her tenderly, nuzzling her face with his. “Was I worth waiting for?” he asked. She smiled. “What a silly question.” He kissed her again, but when he lifted his head he wasn’t smiling. “I loved what we did together,” he said quietly. “But I should have been more responsible.” She knew what he was thinking. He hadn’t used anything, and he surely knew that she wasn’t. She flattened her hand against his bare chest. “There’s a morning-after pill. I’ll drive into the city tomorrow and get one,” she said, lying like a sailor. She had no intention of doing that, but it would comfort him. He found that he didn’t like that idea. It hurt something deeply primitive in him. He scowled. “That could be dangerous.” “No, it’s not. He traced her fingernails while he tried to think. It seemed like a fantasy, a dream. He’d never had such an experience with a woman in his life. She closed her eyes and moved closer to him. “I could never have done that with anyone else,” she whispered. “It was more beautiful than my dreams.” His heart jumped. That was how it felt to him, too. He tilted her face so that he could search her soft eyes. She was radiant; she almost glowed. “Kiss me,” he murmured softly. She did. But he wasn’t smiling. She could almost see the thoughts in his face. “You didn’t force me, Tate,” she said gently. “I made a conscious decision. I made a choice. I needed to know if what had happened to me had destroyed me as a woman. I found out in the most wonderful way that it hadn’t. I’m not ashamed of what we did together.” “Neither am I.” He turned, his face still tormented. “But it wasn’t my right.” “To be the first?” She smiled gently. “It would have been you eight years ago or eight years from now. I don’t want anyone else-not that way. I never did.” He actually winced. “Cecily…” “I’m not asking for declarations of undying love. I won’t cling. I’m not the type.

Steven’s words slush together as he gets to his feet. “Crossing this one off the bucket list.” Then he unbuckles his belt and grabs the waist of his pants—yanking the suckers down to his ankles—tighty whities and all. Every guy in the car holds up his hands to try to block the spectacle. We groan and complain. “My eyes! They burn!” “Put the boa constrictor back in his cage, man.” “This is not the ass I planned on seeing tonight.” Our protests fall on deaf ears. Steven is a man on a mission. Wordlessly, he squats and shoves his lilywhite ass out the window—mooning the gaggle of grannies in the car next to us. I bet you thought this kind of stuff only happened in movies. He grins while his ass blows in the wind for a good ninety seconds, ensuring optimal viewage. Then he pulls his slacks up, turns around, and leans out the window, laughing. “Enjoying the full moon, ladies?” Wow. Steven usually isn’t the type to visually assault the elderly. Without warning, his crazy cackling is cut off. He’s silent for a beat, then I hear him choke out a single strangled word. “Grandma?” Then he’s diving back into the limo, his face grayish, dazed, and totally sober. He stares at the floor. “No way that just happened.” Matthew and I look at each other hopefully, then we scramble to the window. Sure enough, in the driver’s seat of that big old Town Car is none other than Loretta P. Reinhart. Mom to George; Grandma to Steven. What are the fucking odds, huh? .... Matthew and I wave and smile and in fourth-grader-like, singsong harmony call out, “Hi, Mrs. Reinhart.” She shakes one wrinkled fist in our direction. Then her poofy-haired companion in the backseat flips us the bird. I’m pretty sure it’s the funniest goddamn thing I’ve ever seen. The two of us collapse back into our seats, laughing hysterically.

The United States over the last thirty years has seen a growing gap - indeed, a deepening gulf - between rich and poor. The gap is significantly greater than in any other developed nation. Moreover, the growing gulf between rich and poor is the result of social and economic policy, not because some classes of people worked harder and others slacked off over the last thirty years (all of us, according to most studies, are working harder). The differences among countries generate the same conclusion: social policy, not simply individual effort, is responsible for the distribution of wealth. Our recent social policy may not have been intended to produce this result, but it has. The consequence is increased suffering and desperation among the poor and potentially grave consequences for the society as a whole. Moreover, many people in the middle, who are most often struggling financially, support the individualistic ideology underlying our social policy - namely, the notions that we each have worked hard for what we have and ought to be able to keep all of it, that government is bad (or at least inefficient and wasteful - and hungry for our tax dollars), and that things will be better for all of us if we let the wealthiest people in our country make and keep as much money as possible. Many of us seem not to realize that the people who benefit the most from our politics and economics of individualism are the wealthiest 10 percent, especially the top 1 percent. People will support a tax cut that saves them $300 a year, without considering that the same tax cut will save the very wealthy tens of thousands or even hundreds of thousands a year, with significant damage to the social fabric, including not only decreased help for the poor and disadvantaged but also cuts in services such as public schools, road repairs, parks, libraries, and so forth.

Something I can help you find?” he asks. Because to be fair, I’m digging through his drawer. “Nope,” I tell him. “Found it.” “Everly, what in the hell are you doing?” He’s finished buttoning his shirt and is staring at me, hands on hips, the corners of his eyes creased as he frowns. “I’m putting on your underwear,” I tell him, stepping into a pair of his briefs. I was digging around for a black pair. Why the hell do they even sell them in white? Just, no. “Why?” He still looks bewildered, but he’s stopped staring at me to tuck in his shirt. “You got me all worked up and horny in there.” I point a thumb in the direction of the bathroom. “I gave you an orgasm.” He seems confused by my accusation. I snort. “Right. Which you know only makes me want your dick more.” I glance over at the clothing I brought, contemplating what will work with this underwear. I’ve been chatting with his assistant Sandra all week about what people wear to this party. Sawyer was zero help on that front. “Wear whatever you want,” he’d said. As if I can pick an outfit with that kind of direction. “I hope you’re wearing your new cufflinks with that shirt,” I tell him, eyeing his outfit of black slacks and grey dress shirt. He holds up the cat cufflinks I gave him at Christmas and fastens his left sleeve. “I still don’t understand what my underwear has to do with anything.” “Oh!” I pull a solid black sleeveless dress with a full skirt and a wide waistband off the hanger and step into it. “Because you’re obviously planning on having your way with me at this party. Probably gonna shove me into a coat closet and fuck me with your hand over my mouth so no one hears us. And if anyone’s panties are getting left behind at this party, it’s gonna be yours.” He nods slowly and fastens his right sleeve. “Do women your age still use the phrase ‘having your way with me?’” “I just did. Anyway, yours are more absorbent. Can you zip me?” I turn my back to him and swipe my hair over one shoulder, waiting. I feel his fingers on the zipper, the fabric gathering slowly up my back. He finishes and rests his thumbs on the back of my neck, rubbing small circles into my skin as he kisses the nape of my neck. I shudder, feeling his touch all the way to the black briefs. “That’s a pretty elaborate plan I came up with,” he murmurs. I turn and nod, sadly. “I know. You’re kind of a menace.” “It’s good of you to put up with me.” I shrug. “Someone’s got to.” “I’m not going to be able to rip those underwear off of you.” “Haha!” I point at him with one hand and slip a heel on with my other. “I knew it!