Stairs To Happiness Quotes

I sat, a solitary man, In a crowded London shop, An open book and empty cup On the marble table-top. While on the shop and street I gazed My body of a sudden blazed; And twenty minutes more or less It seemed, so great my happiness, That I was blessed and could bless.

And Olvos said to them: “Why have you done this, my children? Why is the sky wreathed with smoke? Why have you made war in far places, and shed blood in strange lands? And they said to Her: “You blessed us as Your people, and we rejoiced, and were happy. But we found those who were not Your people, and they would not become Your people, and they were willful and ignorant of You. They would not open their ears to Your songs, or lay Your words upon their tongues. So we dashed them upon the rocks and threw down their houses and shed their blood and scattered them to the winds, and we were right to do so. For we are Your people. We carry Your blessings. We are Yours, and so we are right. Is this not what You said?” And Olvos was silent.

But it was a happy and beautiful bride who came down the old, homespun- carpeted stairs that September noon - the first bride of Green Gables, slender and shining-eyed, in the mist of her maiden veil, with her arms full of roses. Gilbert, waiting for her in the hall below, looked up at her with adoring eyes. She was his at last, this evasive, long-sought Anne, won after years of patient waiting. It was to him she was coming in the sweet surrender of the bride. Was he worthy of her? Could he make her as happy as he hoped? If he failed her - if he could not measure up to her standard of manhood - then, as she held out her hand, their eyes met and all doubt was swept away in a glad certainty. They belonged to each other; and, no matter what life might hold for them, it could never alter that. Their happiness was in each other’s keeping and both were unafraid.

Envy the fire, for it is either going or not. Fires do not feel happy, sad, angry. They burn, or they do not burn.

I wonder if when birds are new they ever try to land on clouds? And if so is it like when you think you’ve gone down the last stair but there’s still another one and you step off and make that weird “oof” noise and everyone looks at you? That would suck. But at least birds are hidden when they fuck up and fall through clouds.

You will never find it," his ghost says. "What?" "What you are looking for. You want to go back to the start. You want to go back to where you began. You want to find the happiness you once had. But you can never get there, because even if you somehow found it, you yourself would be different. You would have changed, from your journey alone, from the passing of time, if nothing else. You can never make it back to where you began, you can only ever climb another turn of the spiral stair. Forever.

I used to think that those essentially happy and romantic novels that ended with a wedding were all wrong, that they had left out the most interesting part of the story.

Bigger questions, questions with more than one answer, questions without an answer are the hardest to cope with in silence. Once asked they do not evaporate and leave the mind to its serener musings. Once asked they gain dimension and texture, trip you on the stairs, wake you at night-time. A black hole sucks up its surroundings and even light never escapes. Better then to ask no questions? Better then to be a contented pig than an unhappy Socrates? Since factory farming is tougher on pigs than it is on philosophers I'll take a chance.

And, Legolas, when the torches are kindled and men walk on the sandy floors under the echoing domes, ah! Then, Legolas, gems and crystals and veins of precious ore glint in the polished walls; and the light glows through folded marbles, shell-like, translucent as the living hands of Queen Galadriel. There are columns of white and saffron and dawn-rose, Legolas, fluted and twisted into dreamlike forms; they spring up from many-coloured floors to meet the glistening pendants of the roof: wings, ropes, curtains fine as frozen clouds; spears, banners, pinnacles of suspended palaces! Still lakes mirror them: a glimmering world looks up from dark pools covered with clear glass; cities, such as the mind of Durin could scarce have imagined in his sleep, stretch on through avenues and pillared courts, on into the dark recesses where no light can come, And plink! A silver drop falls, and the round wrinkles in the glass make all the towers bend and waver like weeds and corals in a grotto of the sea. Then evening comes:” they fade and twinkle out; the torches pass on into another chamber and another dream. There is chamber after chamber, Legolas; hall opening out of hall, dome after dome, stair beyond stair; and still the winding paths lead on into the mountains’ heart. Caves! The Caverns of Helm’s Deep! Happy was the chance that drove me there! It makes me weep to leave them.

When he heard light, rushing footfalls, he turned his head. Someone was racing along the second-floor balcony. Then laughter drifted down from above. Glorious feminine laughter. He leaned out the archway and glanced at the grand staircase. Bella appeared on the landing above, breathless, smiling, a black satin robe gathered in her hands. As she slowed at the head of the stairs, she looked over her shoulder, her thick dark hair swinging like a mane. The pounding that came next was heavy and distant, growing louder until it was like boulders hitting the ground. Obviously, it was what she was waiting for. She let out a laugh, yanked her robe up even higher, and started down the stairs, bare feet skirting the steps as if she were floating. At the bottom, she hit the mosaic floor of the foyer and wheeled around just as Zsadist appeared in second-story hallway. The Brother spotted her and went straight for the balcony, pegging his hands into the rail, swinging his legs up and pushing himself straight off into thin air. He flew outward, body in a perfect swan dive--except he wasn't over water, he was two floors up over hard stone. John's cry for help came out as a mute, sustained rush of air-- Which was cut off as Zsadist dematerialized at the height of the dive. He took form twenty feet in front of Bella, who watched the show with glowing happiness. Meanwhile, John's heart pounded from shock...then pumped fast for a different reason. Bella smiled up at her mate, her breath still hard, her hands still gripping the robe, her eyes heavy with invitation. And Zsadist came forward to answer her call, seeming to get even bigger as he stalked over to her. The Brother's bonding scent filled the foyer, just as his low, lionlike growl did. The male was all animal at the moment....a very sexual animal. "You like to be chased, nalla, " Z said in a voice so deep it distorted. Bella's smile got even wider as she backed up into a corner. "Maybe." "So run some more, why don't you." The words were dark and even John caught the erotic threat in them. Bella took off, darting around her mate, going for the billiards room. Z tracked her like prey, pivoting around, his eyes leveled on the female's streaming hair and graceful body. As his lips peeled off his fangs, the white canines elongated, protruding from his mouth. And they weren't the only response he had to his shellan. At his hips, pressing into the front of his leathers, was an erection the size of a tree trunk. Z shot John a quick glance and then went back to his hunt, disappearing into the room, the pumping growl getting louder. From out of the open doors, there was a delighted squeal, a scramble, a female's gasp, and then....nothing. He'd caught her. ......When Zsadist came out a moment later, he had Bella in his arms, her dark hair trailing down his shoulder as she lounged in the strength that held her. Her eyes locked on Z's face while he looked where he was going, her hand stroking his chest, her lips curved in a private smile. There was a bite mark on her neck, one that had very definitely not been there before, and Bella's satisfaction as she stared at the hunger in her hellren's face was utterly compelling. John knew instinctively that Zsadist was going to finish two things upstairs: the mating and the feeding. The Brother was going to be at her throat and in between her legs. Probably at the same time. God, John wanted that kind of connection.

I see you and St. John have been quarrelling, Jane,' said Diana, 'during your walk on the moor. But go after him; he is now lingering in the passage expecting you - he will make it up.' I have not much pride under such circumstances: I would always rather be happy than dignified; and I ran after him - he stood at the foot of the stairs.

When I became convinced that the Universe is natural – that all the ghosts and gods are myths, there entered into my brain, into my soul, into every drop of my blood, the sense, the feeling, the joy of freedom. The walls of my prison crumbled and fell, the dungeon was flooded with light and all the bolts, and bars, and manacles became dust. I was no longer a servant, a serf or a slave. There was for me no master in all the wide world -- not even in infinite space. I was free -- free to think, to express my thoughts -- free to live to my own ideal -- free to live for myself and those I loved -- free to use all my faculties, all my senses -- free to spread imagination's wings -- free to investigate, to guess and dream and hope -- free to judge and determine for myself -- free to reject all ignorant and cruel creeds, all the "inspired" books that savages have produced, and all the barbarous legends of the past -- free from popes and priests -- free from all the "called" and "set apart" -- free from sanctified mistakes and holy lies -- free from the fear of eternal pain -- free from the winged monsters of the night -- free from devils, ghosts and gods. For the first time I was free. There were no prohibited places in all the realms of thought -- no air, no space, where fancy could not spread her painted wings -- no chains for my limbs -- no lashes for my back -- no fires for my flesh -- no master's frown or threat – no following another's steps -- no need to bow, or cringe, or crawl, or utter lying words. I was free. I stood erect and fearlessly, joyously, faced all worlds. And then my heart was filled with gratitude, with thankfulness, and went out in love to all the heroes, the thinkers who gave their lives for the liberty of hand and brain -- for the freedom of labor and thought -- to those who fell on the fierce fields of war, to those who died in dungeons bound with chains -- to those who proudly mounted scaffold's stairs -- to those whose bones were crushed, whose flesh was scarred and torn -- to those by fire consumed -- to all the wise, the good, the brave of every land, whose thoughts and deeds have given freedom to the sons of men. And then I vowed to grasp the torch that they had held, and hold it high, that light might conquer darkness still.

In a room as big as loneliness my heart which is as big as love looks at the simple pretexts of its happiness at the beautiful decay of flowers in the vase at the saplings you planted in our garden and the song of canaries which sing to the size of a window. Ah…this is my lot this is my lot my lot is a sky that is taken away at the drop of a curtain my lot is going down a flight of disused stairs to regain something amid putrefaction and nostalgia my lot is a sad promenade in the garden of memories and dying in the grief of a voice which tells me I love your hands.

It's like we're all going up a flight of stairs together and at a certain point I say 'this is as far as I go'. And on that step, higher up, they're all happy and I watch them from below. Had he always been like that? It wasn't shyness or reserve or adolescence, as other people thought. He wasn't going to get over it. He could dance when he was alone, he could get emotional in his room with a book, but when the party started he disconnected, the others turned into a movie that he could watch but not participate in. So he acted like he was invisible, which wasn't hard when everyone was drunk. And he withdrew into his room, where he felt the purest kind of relief.

Exercise has a direct brain connection, when you consider what it actually does. What we tend to overlook are the feedback loops that connect the brain to every cell in the body. Therefore when you throw a ball, run on a treadmill, or jog along the shore, billions of cells are "seeing" the outside world. The chemicals transmitted form the brain are acting the way sense organs do, making contact with the outside world and offering stimulation from that world. This is why the jump from being sedentary to doing a minimal amount of exercise - such as walking, light gardening, and climbing the stairs instead of taking the elevator - is so healthy. Your cells want to be part of the world.

We turned onto the last landing. Going out with this guy, I thought, would involve a lot of silly laughter, some wit--the buzz of his whispered wisecracks in my ear. But there would be as well his willingness to reveal, or more his inability to conceal, that he had been silently rehearsing my name as he climbed the stairs behind me. There would be his willingness to bestow upon me the power to reassure him. He would trust me with his happiness.

The best way to make an abandoned staircase happy is to walk on its steps!

Ink runs from the corners of my mouth. There is no happiness like mine. I have been eating poetry. The librarian does not believe what she sees. Her eyes are sad and she walks with her hands in her dress. The poems are gone. The light is dim. The dogs are on the basement stairs and coming up. Their eyeballs roll, their blond legs burn like brush. The poor librarian begins to stamp her feet and weep. She does not understand. When I get on my knees and lick her hand, she screams. I am a new man. I snarl at her and bark. I romp with joy in the bookish dark.

In his frenzied thoughts, he couldn’t help thinking of Cinder at the ball. How happy he’d been to see her descending the stairs into the ball room. How innocently amused he’d been at her rain-drenched hair and wrinkled dress, thinking it was a fitting look for the city’s most renowned mechanic. He’d thought she must be immune to society’s whims of fashion and decorum. So comfortable in her own skin that she could come to a royal ball as the emperor’s own guest with messy hair and oil stains on her gloves and keep her head high as she did so.

It didn’t look like a house they’d just moved into. There were LEGO robots on the stairs and two cats sleeping on the sofa in the living room. The coffee table was stacked with magazines, and a little kid’s winter coat was spread on the floor. The whole house smelled like fresh-baked chocolate-chip cookies. There was jazz music coming from the kitchen. It seemed like a messy, happy kind of home—the kind of place that had been lived in forever.

The library was my only blessing. Every time I climbed the stairs, my heart lifted. All day, I looked forward to the happy hours I spent in that beautiful room. My guilt over appa's fate was too heavy to carry up there, and I learned to leave it below, somewhere on the ground floor. I left the house far behind as I walked on the path paved by the books, and every evening, baby Mangalam slept soundly on the bed I made for her on the window seat.

At home, the puppy Rose played with balls, struggled with the stairs, and slept behind my knees while we watched in adoration. It’s not that I was unhappy in what I now think of as “the dogless years,” but I suspected things could be better. What I never could have imagined was how much better they would be. Whatever holes I had in my life, in my character, were suddenly filled. I had entered into my first adult relationship of mutual, unconditional love.

First day of your teaching you are to stand at your classroom door and let your students know how happy you are to see them. Stand, I say. Any playwright will tell you that when the actor sits down the play sits down. The best move of all is to establish yourself as a presence and to do it outside in the hallway. Outside, I say. That’s your territory and when you’re out there you’ll be seen as a strong teacher, fearless, ready to face the swarm. That’s what a class is, a swarm. And you’re a warrior teacher. It’s something people don’t think about. Your territory is like your aura, it goes with you everywhere, in the hallways, on the stairs and, assuredly, in the classroom.

I have not much pride under such circumstances: I would always rather be happy than dignified; and I ran after him: he stood at the foot of the stairs.

Do you ever wonder whether God envies our happiness, and has to destroy it?

Thirty morning gowns!" whispered Sarah, as they went down stairs. "The idea of a new gown every day for a month. Now I call that real happiness.

Watch the Film You Paid to See" In my bedroom my weight is three times more than what I’d weigh on Jupiter. If your kitchen was on Mercury I’d be heavier by half of you while sitting at your table. On Uranus, a quarter of my weight is meat, or an awareness of myself as flesh. On Venus the light would produce a real volume around me that would make me look happy in photographs. This is how it is with quantity in any life. It’s a fact that on certain planets I’d actually be able to mount the stairs four at a time. Think of the most beautiful horse in the world: a ridiculously beautiful golden horse, with a shimmering coat; it would weigh no more than an empty handbag on Mars. You need to get real about these things.

It's like we're all going up a flight of stairs together and at a certain point I say "this is as far as I go." And on that step, higher up, they're all happy and I watch them from below.

- So what do we do? - She asked. I reached for the doorknob and looked at the BBC. - Forward to a normal life. - Do you think that happens? - She asked, and I started down through the power of the stairs to the exit: "Be happy, the boss"   - And we'll try

- So what do we do? - She asked. I reached for the doorknob and looked at the Bi. - Forward to a normal life. - Do you think that happens? - She asked, and I became spuskatsya through the power of the stairs to the exit: "Be happy, the boss"   - And we'll try

Miss Mitford was slowly, was heavily, was reluctantly descending the stairs. And as she went, as he heard her footsteps fade, panic seized upon him. Door after door shut in his face as Miss Mitford went downstairs; they shut on freedom; on fields; on hares; on grass; on his adored, his venerated mistress—on the dear old woman who had washed him and beaten him and fed him from her own plate when she had none too much to eat herself—on all he had known of happiness and love and human goodness! There! The front door slammed. He was alone. She had deserted him.

There.You're officially Canadian. Try not to abuse your new power." "Whatever.I'm totally going out tonight." "Good." He slows down. "You should." We're both standing still. He's so close to me.His gaze is locked on mine, and my heart pounds painfully in my chest. I step back and look away. Toph. I like Toph,not St. Clair. Why do I have to keep reminding myself of this? St. Clair is taken. "Did you paint these?" I'm desperate to change the mood. "These above your bed?" I glance back,and he's still staring at me. He bites his thumbnail before replying. His voice is odd. "No.My mum did." "Really? Wow,they're good. Really, really...good." "Anna..." "Is this here in Paris?" "No,it's the street I grew up on. In London." "Oh." "Anna..." "Hmm?" I stand with my back to him, trying to examine the paintings. They really are great. I just can't seem to focus. Of course it's not Paris. I should've known- "That guy.Sideburns.You like him?" My back squirms. "You've asked me that before." "What I meant was," he says, flustered. "Your feelings haven't changed? Since you've been here?" It takes a moment to consider the question. "It's not a matter of how I feel," I say at last. "I'm interested,but...I don't know if he's still interested in me." St. Clair edges closer. "Does he still call?" "Yeah.I mean,not often. But yes." "Right.Right,well," he says, blinking. "There's your answer." I look away. "I should go.I'm sure you have plans with Ellie." "Yes.I mean,no. I mean, I don't know. If you aren't doing any-" I open his door. "So I'll see you later. Thank you for the Canadian citizenship." I tap the patch on my bag. St. Clair looks strangely hurt. "No problem. Happy to be of service." I take the stairs two at a time to my floor. What just happened? One minute we were fine,and the next it was like I couldn't leave fast enough. I need to get out of here.I need to leave the dorm. Maybe I'm not a brave American,but I think I can be a brave Canadian.I grab the Pariscope from inside my room and jog downstairs. I'm going to see Paris.Alone.

She was soon ready, and they kissed tenderly in their hallway, between lift and stairs, before separating for a few minutes. ‘Tower,’ she murmured in reply to his questioning glance, just as she used to do on those honeyed mornings in the past, when checking up on happiness: ‘And you?’ ‘A regular ziggurat.

Then, while the other members of my family were waiting in the living room, my mom pulled me aside at the top of the stairs. "Before it gets too crazy, I need to tell you something," she said... "Elizabeth, what this man has done is terrible. There aren't any words that are strong enough to describe how wicked and evil he is! He has taken nine months of your life that you will never get back again. But the best punishment you could ever give him is to be happy. To move forward with your life. To do exactly what you want. Because, yes, this will probably go to trial and some kind of sentencing will be given to him and that wicked woman. But even if that's true, you may never feel like justice has been served or that true restitution has been made. "But you don't need to worry about that. At the end of the day, God is our ultimate judge. He will make up to you every pain and loss that you have suffered. And if it turns out that these wicked people are not punished here on Earth, it doesn't matter. His punishments are just. You don't ever have to worry. You don't ever have to even think about them again. ... “You be happy, Elizabeth. Just be happy. If you go and feel sorry for yourself, or if you dwell on what has happened, if you hold on to your pain, that is allowing him to steal more of your life away. So don't you do that! Don't you let him! There is no way he deserves that. Not one more second of your life. You keep every second for yourself. You keep them and be happy. God will take care of the rest.” It's been ten years since my mother said those words. The years have proved she was right.

Hello?' Horus spoke in my mind. 'Any intention of calling for help, or are you happy to die on your own?' 'Yeah,' I snapped back at him. 'The sarcasm is real helpful.' Truthfully, I didn't think I had enough energy left to summon my avatar, even with Horus's help. My fight with the Apis Bull had nearly tapped me out, and that was before I got chased by an axe demon and kicked out of a window. I could hear Bloodstained Blade stomping his way back down the stairs. I tried to rise and almost blacked out from the pain. 'A weapon,' I told Horus. 'I need a weapon.' I reached into the Duat and pulled out an ostrich feather. "Really?" I yelled Horus didn't answer.

We are thankful to come here for rest, sir," said Jenny. "You see, you don't know what the rest of this place is to us; does he, Lizzie? It's the quiet, and the air." "The quiet!" repeated Fledgeby, with a contemptuous turn of his head towards the City's roar. "And the air!" with a "Poof!" at the smoke. "Ah!" said Jenny. "But it's so high. And you see the clouds rushing on above the narrow streets, not minding them, and you see the golden arrows pointing at the mountains in the sky from which the wind comes, and you feel as if you were dead." The little creature looked above her, holding up her slight transparent hand. "How do you feel when you are dead?" asked Fledgeby, much perplexed. "Oh, so tranquil!" cried the little creature, smiling. "Oh, so peaceful and so thankful! And you hear the people who are alive, crying, and working, and calling to one another down in the close dark streets, and you seem to pity them so! And such a chain has fallen from you, and such a strange good sorrowful happiness comes upon you!" Her eyes fell on the old man, who, with his hands folded, quietly looked on. "Why it was only just now," said the little creature, pointing at him, "that I fancied I saw him come out of his grave! He toiled out at that low door so bent and worn, and then he took his breath and stood upright, and looked all round him at the sky, and the wind blew upon him, and his life down in the dark was over!—Till he was called back to life," she added, looking round at Fledgeby with that lower look of sharpness. "Why did you call him back?" "He was long enough coming, anyhow," grumbled Fledgeby. "But you are not dead, you know," said Jenny Wren. "Get down to life!" Mr Fledgeby seemed to think it rather a good suggestion, and with a nod turned round. As Riah followed to attend him down the stairs, the little creature called out to the Jew in a silvery tone, "Don't be long gone. Come back, and be dead!" And still as they went down they heard the little sweet voice, more and more faintly, half calling and half singing, "Come back and be dead, Come back and be dead!

Other people's houses are right on top of this one," he said. "I think they could take one step and be in our living room." "You haven't seen the courtyard yet, Gregori. The house opens up to a courtyard in the back, and it's immense and in quite good shape." Savannah began heading up the stairs, ignoring his grousing. "I hate to think what you would call bad shape," he muttered as he followed her upstairs. "I wonder why everything is so dusty," Savannah said. "I had the real estate people come in and clean and get things ready for our arrival." "Do not touch anything," Gregori hissed softly, and very gently caught her shoulders to put her behind him. "What is it?" Instinctively she lowered her voice and looked around, trying to see if there was some danger she had been unable to sense. "If people came and made up the bed and prepared the house for your arrival, then they would have removed the dust too." "Maybe they're incredibly incompetent," she suggested hopefully. Gregori glanced at her and found the hard edge of his mouth softening. She was making him want to smile all the time, even in the most serious of situations. "I am certain any company would work overtime trying to make you happy, ma petite. I know I do." She blushed at the memory of how he did so. "So why all the dust?" she asked, deliberately distracting him. "I think Julian left us a message. You have remained with humans so long, you see only with your eyes." Savannah rolled her eyes at the reprimand. "And you've lived in the hills so long,you've forgotten how to have fun." The pale eyes slid over her, wrapping her in heat. "I have my own ideas of fun, cherie. I would be willing to show you if you like," he offered wickedly. Her chin lifted, blue eyes challenging. "If you think you're scaring me with your big-bad-wolf routine,you're not," she said. He could hear her heart beat. Smell her scent calling to him. "Perhaps I will think of something to change that," he cautioned her.

And Olvos said to them: “Why have you done this, my children? Why is the sky wreathed with smoke? Why have you made war in far places, and shed blood in strange lands?” And they said to Her: “You blessed us as Your people, and we rejoiced, and were happy. But we found those who were not Your people, and they would not become Your people, and they were willful and ignorant of You. They would not open their ears to Your songs, or lay Your words upon their tongues. So we dashed them upon the rocks and threw down their houses and shed their blood and scattered them to the winds, and we were right to do so. For we are Your people. We carry Your blessings. We are Yours, and so we are right. Is this not what You said?” And Olvos was silent. —BOOK OF THE RED LOTUS, PART IV, 13.51–13.59 SOMEONE

Papa cut his business trip short when he heard how ill you were. He’ll be home on the afternoon train. Won’t he be happy to see you looking so well!” Hannah came running up the stairs. “Dr. Fulton’s on his way, Mama.” “He’s in for a surprise, isn’t he?” Mrs. Tyler smiled at me. “Dr. Fulton didn’t think you’d live till morning, Andrew. The very idea--Hannah told him it would take more than diphtheria to kill you.

I walk down the stairs to lean against her. “I’m sorry,” I say vaguely. I’m not entirely sure what for. Being a weirdo, being a skank. Being the happy-saddest person who ever lived. “Don’t be, darling,” she says. “Life is messy. I certainly don’t expect tidiness from yours or anybody else’s.” She kisses the side of my head. Then she wraps her arms around me because I’m crying. Honey’s got an arm draped over Belle’s shoulder, but he uses his other hand to tuck my hair behind my ear. Everything is unspooling inside me now. If I were a ball of yarn, I’d be just a stringy tangle on the floor. If I were a reservoir, I’d be overflowing my banks. Who I really need to talk to about all of this, of course, is Edi. “She’s going to miss everything now,” I sob. “And you’re going to miss her,” my mother says. “Such lucky girls, both of you.

I'd bet dollars to doughnuts, someone needs someone exactly like you and they're preparing to welcome you into their life. I suspect someone misses you and listens for your footsteps on the stairs. Someone remembers the corner of your smile and laughs out loud when they think of that time y'all two were at the whatchamacallit. Someone knows you exist and cares that you're happy, and all those someones connect you to the great everyone.

I am happy to see him on the couch, his huge feet on the arm, dirtying the cloth. I am happy to hear him stomping upstairs across the floorboards and whipping towels at his sisters after he has showered. I am happy to hear him screaming for no reason, bounding down the stairs, reaching the bottom and wildly petting Nelly, shaking her head back and forth, and calling her a good girl. I think how it doesn’t matter who shot my son. My son is back.

My dear girl, would you care to explain how all of this came about?” King Garron asked, with a concerned tone. “The usual way Father. Is that not what you said to me when I asked how you and Lady Ellos came to be involved? I am happy for you Father, I wish you to be happy for me as well. Goodnight, I am glad to be home,” Laurel said in a quiet but resolute voice, as she kissed her father and Phineas goodnight and walked up the stairs. “I honestly do not know what to say Phineas,” King Garron spoke in a defeated tone, as he watched Laurel walk out of sight. “There is nothing to say Sire. Your daughter has grown up, and captured the heart of her Prince,” Phineas replied with a warm smile, putting his hand on King Garron’s shoulder. “She will hold the Heart of Heathwin. I will be damned, Milna was right,” King Garron said in a whisper, his eyes filling with tears, at remembering something his beloved late wife had told him.

Katie stood alone... 'They think this is so good,' he thought. 'They think it's good- the tree they got for nothing and their father playing up to them and the singing and the way the neighbors are happy. They think they're mighty lucky that they're living and it's Christmas again. They can't see that we live on a dirty street in a dirty house among people who aren't much good. Johnny and the children can't see how pitiful it is that our neighbors have to make happiness out of this filth and dirt. My children must get out of this. They must come to more than Johnnny or me or all thse people around us. But how is this to come about? Reading a page from those books every day and saving pennies in the tin-can bank isn't enough. Money! Would that make it better for them? Yes, it would make it easy. But no, the money wouldn't be enough. McGarrity owns the saloon standing on the corner and he has a lot of money. His wife wears diamond earrings. But her children are not as good and smart as my children. They are mean and greedy towards others...Ah no, it isn't the money alone... That means there must be something bigger than money. Miss Jackson teaches... and she has no money. She works for charity. She lives in a little room there on the top floor. She only has the one dress but she keeps it clean and pressed. Her eyes look straight into yours when you talk to her... She understands about things. She can live in the middle of a dirty neighborhood and be fine and clean like an actress in a play; someone you can look at but is too fine to touch... So what is this difference between her and this Miss Jackson who has no money?... Education! That was it!...Education would pull them out of the grime and dirt. Proof? Miss Jackson was educated, the McGarrity wasn't. Ah! That's what Mary Rommely, her mother, had been telling her all those years. Only her mother did not have the one clear word: education!... 'Francie is smart...She's a learner and she'll be somebody someday. But when she gets educated, she will grow away from me. Why, she's growing away from me now. She does not love me the way the boy loves me. I feel her turn away from me now. She does not understand me. All she understands is that I don't understand her. Maybe when she gets education, she will be ashamed of me- the way I talk. but she will have too much character to show it. Instead she will try to make me different. She will come to see me and try to make me live in a better way and I will be mean to her because I'll know she's above me. She will figure out too much about things as she grows older; she'll get to know too much for her own happiness. She'll find out that I don't love her as much as I love the boy. I cannot help that this is so. But she won't understand that. Somethimes I think she knows that now. Already she is growing away from me; she will fight to get away soon. Changing over to that far-away school was the first step in her getting away from me. But Neeley will never leave me, that is why I love him best. He will cling to me and understand me... There is music in him. He got that from his father. He has gone further on the piano than Francie or me. Yes, his father has the music in him but it does him no good. It is ruining him... With the boy, it will be different. He'll be educated. I must think out ways. We'll not have Johnnny with us long. Dear God, I loved him so much once- and sometimes I still do. But he's worthless...worthless. And God forgive me for ever finding out.' Thus Katie figured out everything in the moments it took them to climb the stairs. People looking up at her- at her smooth pretty vivacious face- had no way of knowing about the painfully articulated resolves formulating hin her mind.

It's a parallel world. It's a gothic forest. It's a bluish valley. It's a deep gorge. It's a déjà vu. It's a sleeping town. It's an old neighborhood. It's a familiar house. You go up the stairs of your future. You discover the source of your past. Your present is hidden behind a secret door. Your space is reflected in the windows. You find a chess game in the attic. The formula of your happiness is decrypted. A voice whispers your name: you recreate your identity.

Herdsmen, I say, but they call themselves the good and just. Herdsmen, I say, but they call themselves the believers in the orthodox belief. Behold the good and just! Whom do they hate most? Him who breaketh up their tables of values, the breaker, the lawbreaker:--he, however, is the creator. Behold the believers of all beliefs! Whom do they hate most? Him who breaketh up their tables of values, the breaker, the law-breaker--he, however, is the creator. Companions, the creator seeketh, not corpses--and not herds or believers either. Fellow-creators the creator seeketh--those who grave new values on new tables. Companions, the creator seeketh, and fellow-reapers: for everything is ripe for the harvest with him. But he lacketh the hundred sickles: so he plucketh the ears of corn and is vexed. Companions, the creator seeketh, and such as know how to whet their sickles. Destroyers, will they be called, and despisers of good and evil. But they are the reapers and rejoicers. Fellow-creators, Zarathustra seeketh; fellow-reapers and fellow-rejoicers, Zarathustra seeketh: what hath he to do with herds and herdsmen and corpses! And thou, my first companion, rest in peace! Well have I buried thee in thy hollow tree; well have I hid thee from the wolves. But I part from thee; the time hath arrived. 'Twixt rosy dawn and rosy dawn there came unto me a new truth. I am not to be a herdsman, I am not to be a grave-digger. Not any more will I discourse unto the people; for the last time have I spoken unto the dead. With the creators, the reapers, and the rejoicers will I associate: the rainbow will I show them, and all the stairs to the Superman. To the lone-dwellers will I sing my song, and to the twain-dwellers; and unto him who hath still ears for the unheard, will I make the heart heavy with my happiness. I make for my goal, I follow my course; over the loitering and tardy will I leap. Thus let my on-going be their down-going!

Hello!" he called, sitting on the stairs. "Are you getting up?" "Yes," her voice called, faintly. "Merry Christmas!" he shouted to her. Her laugh, pretty and tinkling, was heard in the bedroom. ... He waited a while, then went to the stairs again. "Happy New Year!" he called. "Thank you Chubby Dear!" came the laughing voice, far away. ... The family had breakfast, all but William. He went to the foot of the stairs. "Shall I have to send you an Easter Egg up there?" he called, rather crossly. She only laughed.

He's blessedly de-quipped with ideas having to do with the subconscious mind or the id, but has already begun to think in metaphor, and the answer comes to him in a divine, happy flash. He races up the stairs as fast as his small legs will carry him, hair flying back from his tanned and grimy forehead. He goes to his bed in the room he shares with Paul, looks beneath his pillow, and sure enough, there is his bottle of RC Cola - a tall one! - along with a final slip of paper. The message on it is the same as always:

The little Swallow is fond. It belongs, of course, to her life that some one should come here, take her in his arms, and then go away again. Then the sewing machine hums, another comes, the Swallow laughs, the Swallow weeps, and sews away for ever. —She casts a gay coverlet over the sewing machine, thereby transforming it from a nickel and steel creature of toil into a hillock of red and blue silk flowers. She does not want to be reminded now of the day. In her light, soft dress she nestles down in my arms; she chatters, she whispers and murmurs and sings. So slender and pale—half-starved she is too—and so light that one can easily carry her to the bed, the iron camp bed. Such a sweet air of surrender as she clings about one’s neck! She sighs and she smiles—a child with closed eyes—sighs and trembles and stammers a little bit. She breathes deep and she utters small cries. I look at her. I look again and again. I too would be so. Silently I ask, Is this it? Is this it? And the Swallow names me with all kinds of fair names and is embarrassed and tender and nestles close to me. And as I leave her, I ask, “Are you happy, little Swallow?” Then she kisses me many times and makes faces and waves and nods and nods. But I go down the stairs and am full of wonder. She is happy! How easily! —I can not understand. For is she not still another being, a life unto herself, wherein I can never come? Would she not still be so, though I came with all the fires of love? Ach, love—it is a torch falling into an abyss, revealing nothing but only how deep it is? I set off down the street to the station. This is not it; no, this is not it, either. One is only more alone there than ever. 3

It’s a lonely business, and then sometimes strangely claustrophobic, but this is it. This is what I wanted and what Liz was pulled away from, against her every fiber. This abstract performance art called Family Life is our one run at the ultimate improv. Our chance to be great for someone, to give another person enough of what they need to be happy. Ours to overlook or lose track of or bemoan, ours to recommit to, to apologize for, to try again for. Ours to watch disappear into their next self—toddler to tyke, tween to teen—ours to drop off somewhere and miss forever. It’s happening right now, whether we attend to it or not. Like after preparing a nutritious meal that no one really liked and a lot of blame-gaming over who forgot to take out the compost, your peevish, greasy “young adult” tramps off to take the shower she should have taken two days ago and the evening is shot to shit and not one minute of it looked like the thing you prayed for so long ago, but then you hear something. You head up the stairs, hover outside the bathroom door. “All the single ladies, all the single ladies…” — The kid is singing in the shower. Your profoundly ordinary kid is singing in the shower and you get to be here to hear it.

Good night, Grandma!” I called as I was skipping out of the kitchen with Adria on my heels. Grandma, who was at the sink rinsing dishes to stack in the dishwasher, stopped and looked at us. She had a funny expression on her face, which made Adria and me pause in the doorway and look back at her, waiting. Grandma wiped her hands on a dishtowel and said, “Simone, Adria, come here.” There was something different in her tone. I didn’t know what to expect “You know, girls,” she said as we stood in front of her, “we adopted you both today. So I’m your mother now, and he”—she pointed at my grandpa, who was wiping the table mats—“he’s your father.” Grandpa paused what he was doing, stood up straight, and smiled. I just glanced from one to the other, my eyes big and round. What had happened in court that day suddenly became clear. “Does that mean I can call you Mom and Dad?” I asked. “It’s up to you,” my grandma said, one hand cupping my cheek, the other one smoothing Adria’s hair. “Call us whatever you want to. Now go to bed.” The two of us scampered upstairs without another word. But when Adria went into the bathroom to brush her teeth, I stood in the middle of our bedroom, my hands pressed against my temples. I was hopping from one foot to the other and jumping up and down, so much excitement was flowing through me. Mom. Dad. Mom. Dad. I kept whispering the words, getting used to the sound of them. Finally, feeling as if I would burst, I ran back downstairs to the kitchen. “Mom?” I said, standing in the doorway. She looked across at me, her lips twitching like she was trying not to smile. “Yes, Simone?” I turned to where Grandpa was putting away the table mats. “Dad?” “What is it, Simone?” “Nothing!” I said, squealing and bouncing up and down gleefully. I had done it—I’d called them Mom and Dad! I turned without another word and raced back up the stairs. In my room, I flopped backward onto my bed and let out a happy sigh. Adria and I were finally and forever home.

It was this: Gansey starting down the stairs to the kitchen, Blue starting up, meeting in the middle. It was Gansey stepping aside to let her pass, but changing his mind. He caught her arm and then the rest of her. She was warm, alive, vibrant beneath the thin cotton; he was warm, alive vibrant beneath his. Blue slid her hand over his bare shoulder and then onto his chest, her palm spread out flat on his breastbone, her fingers pressed curiously into his skin. "I thought you would be hairier," she whispered. "Sorry to disappoint. The legs have a bit more going on." "Mine too." It was this: laughing senselessly into each other's skin, playing, until it was abruptly no longer play, and Gansey stopped himself with his mouth perilously close to hers, and Blue stopped herself with her belly pressed close to his. It was this: Gansey saying, "I like you an awful lot, Blue Sargent." It was this: Blue's smile--crooked, wry, ridiculous, flustered. There was a lot of happiness tucked into the corner of that smile, and even though her face was several inches from Gansey, some of it still spilled out and got on him. She put her finger on his cheek where he knew his own smile was dimpling it, and then they took each other's hands, and they climbed back up together. It was this: this moment and no other moment, and for the first time that Gansey could remember, he knew what it would feel like to be present in his own life.

A startlingly clear memory jolted through Ronan, as fresh as the moment he'd lived it. It was the day Ronan had first come to Harvard to surprise Adam, back when he still thought he was moving to Cambridge. He'd been so full of anticipation for how the reveal would go and then, in the end, they'd walked right past each other. At the time, Ronan had thought it was because Adam looked so different after his time away. He was dressed differently. He held himself differently. He'd even lost his accent. And he'd assumed it had felt the same to Adam; Ronan had gotten older, lonelier, sharper. But now they were in this strange sea, and neither of them looked anything like the Adam Parrish and Ronan Lynch the other had known. Adam was a collection of thoughts barely masquerading as a human form. Ronan Lynch was raw dark energy, alien and enormous. And yet when Adam's consciousness touched his, Ronan recognized him. It was Adam's footsteps on the stairs. His surprised whoop as he catapulted into the pond they'd dug. The irritation in his voice; the impatience of his kiss; his ruthless, dry sense of humor; his biting pride; his ferocious loyalty. It was all caught up in this essential form that had nothing to do with how his physical body looked. The difference between this reunion and the one at Harvard was that there in Cambridge they had been false. They'd both been wearing masks upon masks, hiding the truth of themselves from everyone, including themselves. Here, there was no way to hide. They were only their thoughts. Only the truth. "Ronan, Ronan, it is you. I did it. I found you. With just a sweetmetal, I found you." Ronan didn't know if Adam had thought it or said it, but it didn't matter. The joy was unmistakable. "Tamquam," said Ronan, and Adam said, "Alter idem." Cicero had written the phrase about Atticus, his dearest friend. Qui est tamquam alter idem. Like a second self. Ronan and Adam could not hug, because they had no real arms, but it didn't matter. Their energy darted and mingled and circled, the brilliant bright of the sweetmetals and the absolute dark of the Lace. They didn't speak, but they didn't have to. Audible words were redundant when their thoughts were tangled together as one. Without any of the clumsiness of language, they shared their euphoria and their lurking fears. They rehashed what they had done to each other and apologized. They showed everything they had done and that had been done to them in the time since they'd last seen each other--the good and the bad, the horrid and the wonderful. Everything had felt so murky for so long, but when they were like this, all that was left was clarity. Again and again they spiraled around and through one another, not Ronan-and-Adam but rather one entity that held both of them. They were happy and sad, angry and forgiven, they were wanted, they were wanted, they were wanted.

Ezra asked me to bring you this,' I said and handed him the jar. 'He said you would know what it was.' He took the jar and looked at it. Then he threw it at me. It struck me on the chest or the shoulder and rolled down the stairs. 'You son of a bitch,' he said. 'You bastard.' 'Ezra said you might need it,' I said. He countered that by throwing a milk bottle. 'You are sure you don't need it?' I asked. He threw another milk bottle. I retreated and he hit me with yet another milk bottle in the back. Then he shut the door. I picked up the jar which was only slightly cracked and put it in my pocket. 'He did not seem to want the gift of Monsieur Pound," I said to the concierge. 'Perhaps he will be tranquil now,' she said. 'Perhaps he has some of his own,' I said. 'Poor Monsieur Dunning,' she said. The lovers of poetry that Ezra organized rallied to Dunning's aid again eventually. My own intervention and that of the concierge had been unsuccessful. The jar of alleged opium which had been cracked I stored wrapped in waxed paper and carefully tied in one of an old pair of riding boots. When Evan Shipman and I were removing my personal effects from that apartment some years later the boots were still there but the jar was gone. I do not know why Dunning threw the milk bottles at me unless he remembered my lack of credulity the night of his first dying, or whether it was only an innate dislike of my personality. But I remember the happiness that the phrase 'Monsieur Dunning est monté sur le toit et refuse catégoriquement de descendre' gave to Evan Shipman. He believed there was something symbolic about it. I would not know. Perhaps Dunning took me for an agent of evil or of the police. I only know that Ezra tried to be kind to Dunning as he was kind to so many people and I always hoped Dunning was as fine a poet as Ezra believed him to be. For a poet he threw a very accurate milk bottle. But Ezra, who was a very good poet, played a good game of tennis too. Evan Shipman, who was a very fine poet and who truly did not care if his poems were ever published, felt that it should remain a mystery. 'We need more true mystery in our lives, Hem,' he once said to me. 'The completely unambitious writer and the really good unpublished poem are the things we lack most at this time. There is, of course, the problem of sustenance.

But can you truly say that you are one of us? Was your childhood darkened by the shadow of a murder? No, more likely you were a quiet little boy with happy, trustful eyes, the pride of your adoptive father. Naturally you could trust people—they always had a smile for you—just as you could trust the solid friendly things around you: tables, beds, and stairs. And because you were rich, and always nicely dressed, and had lots of toys, you must have often thought the world was quite a nice world to live in, like a big warm bath in which one can splash and loll contentedly. My childhood was quite different. When I was six I was a drudge, and I mistrusted everything and everyone. [A short pause.] So go away, my noble-souled brother. I have no use for noble souls; what I need is an accomplice.

Vi greeted Stevie mush as Janelle had, with an incomprehensible string of affection. "I can't believe it," they said. They turned to Janelle. There were greeting kisses at breakfast now, like a couple from TV. Nate tore his waffle slowly as the pair leaned cozily into one another. "You know we're cute," Janelle said to him. "Cuteness is my favorite," he said. "It's good for when you write romances in your book, right?" Stevie said. "I don;'t write romance. I write about finding dragons and breaking magic rocks in half." "The real magic rocks are the friends we make along the way," Stevie replied. "Right?" "He's happy for us," Janelle said. "This is how he shows it." Nate looked up at all of them, dark shadows under his eyes. "This is why I prefer books to people." "We love you too," Janelle said.

The Farmer's Bride Three Summers since I chose a maid, Too young maybe - but more's to do At harvest-time than bide and woo. When us was wed she turned afraid Of love and me and all things human; Like the shut of a winter's day Her smile went out, and 'twasn't a woman - More like a little frightened fay. One night, in the Fall, she runned away. 'Out 'mong the sheep, her be,' they said, Should properly have been abed; But sure enough she wasn't there Lying awake with her wide brown stare. So over seven-acre field and up-along across the down We chased her, flying like a hare Before our lanterns. To Church-Town All in a shiver and a scare We caught her, fetched her home at last And turned the key upon her, fast. She does the work about the house As well as most, but like a mouse: Happy enough to chat and play With birds and rabbits and such as they, So long as men-folk keep away. 'Not near, not near!' her eyes beseech When one of us comes within reach. The women say that beasts in stall Look round like children at her call. I've hardly heard her speak at all. Shy as a leveret, swift as he, Straight and slight as a young larch tree, Sweet as the first wild violets, she, To her wild self. But what to me? The short days shorten and the oaks are brown, The blue smoke rises to the low grey sky, One leaf in the still air falls slowly down, A magpie's spotted feathers lie On the black earth spread white with rime, The berries redden up to Christmas-time. What's Christmas-time without there be Some other in the house than we! She sleeps up in the attic there Alone, poor maid. 'Tis but a stair Betwixt us. Oh! my God! the down, The soft young down of her; the brown, The brown of her - her eyes, her hair, her hair!

Maybe I’m not cut out for monogamy,” G. had said to me early on. “Maybe I should just live in a room by myself and have girlfriends.” Another woman might have said, “Now, where did I put my coat?” Being a madly infatuated rationalist who had read her Simone de Beauvoir, I took a deep breath and carefully and calmly explained that of course he had to make up his own mind about how he wanted to live, and that I understood fidelity wasn’t for everyone, that some people could be perfectly happy without it, but I wanted to give my whole self in love and I couldn’t do that if I was being compared to other women on a daily basis (which I was) or if our relationship was only tentative and provisional (which it was). “Sweetie!” he said when I finished. “I love it that you can say how you feel without getting angry at me.” That other woman would have slammed the door behind her before he’d finished speaking. They say philanderers are attractive to women because of the thrill of the chase—you want to be the one to capture and tame that wild quarry. But what if a deeper truth is that women fall for such men because they want to be those men? Autonomous, in charge, making their own rules. Imagine that room G. spoke of, in which the women would come and go—is there not something attractive about it? Rain tapping softly on the tin ceiling, a desk, a lamp, a bed. A woman dashes up the narrow stairs, her raincoat flaring, her wet face lifted up like a flower. And then, the next day—maybe even the same day—different footsteps, another expectant face. I had to admit, it was an exciting scenario. You wouldn’t want to be one of the women trooping up and down the staircase, but you might want to be the man who lived in the room.

Destiny rarely follows the pattern we would choose for it and the legacy of death often shapes our lives in ways we could not imagine. Death comes to everyone in their time - to some a parting, to some a release. We who are nearest go with them up the long golden stairs - up, up. A trumpet shrills - a gate clangs and we are left standing without. Then down the long stairs we retrace our steps to earth - an earth that is all numb and still - so still that one hears strange sounds - catches strange vagrant notes on one's heightened senses. But small hands are tugging and voices are insistent. "Will he ever come back from that other place?" "Oh no, he doesn't want to come back!" "Does he like it there?" "Oh yes, he loves it." "Well then, that's good." And happy laughter rings through the tall green pines and along the rocks and sandy beaches by the sea. No one grudges him his place in the sun.

Half inebriated, he vaulted up the stairs to find them lolling in chairs in the hall outside Maria’s door. Gabe clasped a bunch of violets in his hand while Jarret held a rolled-up piece of parchment in his. “What are you two louts doing here in the middle of the night?” he growled. “It’s nearly dawn,” Gabe said coolly. “Hardly the middle of the night. Not that you would have noticed, in your drunken state.” Scowling, Oliver took a step toward them. “It’s still earlier than you, at least, every rise.” Gabe glanced at Jarret. “Clearly, the old boy doesn’t remember what today is.” “I believe you’re right,” Jarret returned, a hint of condemnation in his tone. Oliver glared at them both as he sifted through his soggy brain for what they menat. When it came to him, he groaned. St. Valentine’s Day. That sobered him right up. “That doesn’t explain why you’re lurking outside Maria’s door.” Jarret cast him a scathing glance as he got to his feet. “Why do you care? You ran off to town to find your entertainment. Seems to me that you’re relinquishing the field.” “So you two intend to step in?” he snapped. “Why not?” Gabe rose to glower at him. “Since your plan to thwart Gran isn’t working, and it’s looking as if we’ll have to marry someone, we might as well have a go at Miss Butterfield. She’s an heiress and a very nice girl, too, in case you hadn’t noticed If you’re stupid enough to throw her over for a bunch of whores and opera dancers, we’re more than happy to take your place. We at least appreciate her finer qualities.” The very idea of his brothers appreciating anything of Maria’s made his blood boil. “In the first place, I didn’t throw her over for anyone. In the second, I am damned well not relinquishing the field. And I’m certainly not giving it over to a couple of fortune hunters like you.” The sound of footsteps coming down the hall from the servants’ stairs made them whirl in that direction. Betty walked slowly toward them, one hand shading her eyes. That’s when it hit him. His brothers were here because of that silly superstition about a maiden’s heart being joined to that of whoever was the first man she spotted on St. Valentine’s Day. “Good morning, gentlemen,” Betty murmured as she approached, carefully avoiding looking at any of them. A devilish grin lit Gabe’s face. “Betty, catch!” he cried and tossed a violet at her. She didn’t even move a finger to stop it from bouncing off her and falling to the floor. “If your lordships will excuse me,” she said in a decidedly snippy tone, “my mistress rang the bell for me.” With a sniff that conveyed her contempt for them, she slipped inside Maria’s rom and shut the door firmly behind her. “That was shameful,” Jarret told Gabe. “You know bloody well that Betty and John are sweethearts.” “It’s not my fault that John didn’t show up this morning so she could see him first,” Gabe said with a shrug.

And thank God, because the world needed changing. I grew up in fifties Britain and, before Elvis, before rock and roll, fifties Britain was a pretty grim place. I didn’t mind living in Pinner – I’ve never been one of those rock stars who was motivated by a burning desire to escape the suburbs, I quite liked it there – but the whole country was in a bad place. It was furtive and fearful and judgemental. It was a world of people peeping around their curtains with sour expressions, of girls being sent away because they’d Got Into Trouble. When I think of fifties Britain, I think of sitting on the stairs of our house, listening to my mum’s brother, Uncle Reg, trying to talk her out of getting divorced from my dad: ‘You can’t get divorced! What will people think?’ At one point, I distinctly remember him using the phrase ‘what will the neighbours say?’ It wasn’t Uncle Reg’s fault. That was just the mindset of the times: that happiness was somehow less important than keeping up appearances.

You know what I don’t get?” “What?” Josh stares at me, his cheeks a dull red. “Why you never said anything. If all that time you felt like that about me, why didn’t you say anything?” My whole body goes stiff. I wasn’t expecting that. I’m not prepared. I swallow hard and say, “You were with Margot.” “I wasn’t always with Margot. The stuff you wrote--you liked me before I ever liked her. Why didn’t you just tell me?” I let out a breath. “What does that even matter now?” “It matters. You should have told me. You should have at least given me a chance.” “It wouldn’t have made a difference, Josh!” “And I’m telling you it would have!” He steps toward me. Jerkily I rise to my feet. Why is he bringing this up now, just when things are back to normal again? “You’re so full of it. You’ve never thought of me that way, not ever, so don’t go trying to reinvent history now when I have somebody.” “Don’t tell me what I think,” he snaps. “You don’t know my every thought, Lara Jean.” “Yes I do. I know you better than anyone. You know why? You’re predictable. Everything you do. It’s so predictable. The only reason you’re even saying this now is because you’re jealous. And it’s not even because of me. You don’t care about who I’m with. You’re just jealous that Peter took your spot. Kitty likes him better than you now too.” His face darkens. He glares at me and I glare back. “Fine!” he yells. “I’m jealous! Are you happy now?” And then he jerks his head toward mine, and he kisses me. On the lips. His eyes are closed, mine are wide open. And then mine close too, and for a second, just for a second, I kiss him back. Then I break away. I push him off. Triumphantly he says, “Did you predict that, Lara Jean?” My mouth opens and closes, but no words come out. I drop the broom and run up the stairs, as fast as I can. I run all the way to my room and lock my door behind me. Josh just kissed me. In my living room. My sister is coming back in a few weeks. And I have a fake boyfriend I just cheated on.

As soon as Devon left his room, he was overwhelmed by a surplus of unwanted attention. Not one but two footmen accompanied him down the stairs, eagerly pointing out dangers such as the edge of a particular step that wasn’t quite smooth, or a section of the curved balustrade that might be slippery from a recent polishing. After negotiating the apparent perils of the staircase, Devon continued through the main hall and was obligated to stop along the way as a row of housemaids curtsied and uttered a chorus of “Happy Christmas” and “God bless you, milord,” and offered abundant wishes for his good health. Abashed by the role he seemed to have been cast in, Devon smiled and thanked them. He made his painstaking way to the dining room, which was filled with lavish arrangements of Christmas flowers, and hung with evergreen garlands twined with gold ribbon. Kathleen, West and the twins were all seated, laughing and chatting with relaxed good humor. “We knew you were approaching,” Pandora said to Devon, “from all the happy voices we could hear in the entrance hall.” “He’s not accustomed to people exclaiming happily when he arrives,” West said gravely. “Usually they do it when he leaves.

have you ever felt the love so close, did you sense the cool wind it blows, when the happiness is all around, and the sync of beats of the heart become a beautiful sound, when you don't fear the heights and the depth, and you feel on cloud nine even on your heart's theft, when the mystery and known become one, and the face of him becomes next to the rising sun, when you hold his hands and cross the bridges, the lakes, the plateaus and the ridges, you feel the world and yourself at the same time, when the silence between you becomes a beautiful mime. when you become the wicked child and he the teacher, and then the love flows without any measure, you feel his protection in the freedom, you enjoy being the queen of his kingdom, you fly in the sky, you run up the stairs, you dive into the sea, you head to towns and cities with glee, head on his shoulders and mind in his dreams, oh, the soul becomes the swan of the love sea and swims, what more you can ask from God in this lifetime, when your love is synonymous to god's hymn?! maybe it is more than what i said, because it has all in it that never fades, love truly and feel its beauty, it is not just the pleasure or pain but a lifetime duty.....

Hey, Buddy,” he said to me. I got a close-up view of his strange, light blue eyes and golden skin as he threw his arms around me and kept walking right over me. I had to throw my arms around him, too, to keep from thudding flat on my back on the dock. “Oh, pardon me!” he said, pulling me out from under him and setting me on my feet again. “I didn’t even see you there.” “That’s quite all right,” I managed in the same fake-formal tone. His warm hands still held my waist. This was the first time a boy had ever touched my bare tummy. My happy skin sent shocked messages to my brain that went something like, He’s touching me! Are you getting this? He’s touching me! Eeeeeeee! My brain got it, all right, and put the rest of my body on high alert. My heart thumped painfully, just like in my dream. But as I looked into his eyes, I saw he was already gone, glancing up the stairs to the marina. If I didn’t know better, I’d say he’d been flirting with me. I knew better. He treated all girls this way. He slid out of my grasp. He may have had to shake one hand violently to extricate it from my friendly vise-like grip. “See you later, Junior,” he threw over his shoulder at me as he climbed the steps to the marina.

He leaned down and kissed me, warm and soft. "I do have a trick to get you to relax though." And I knew exactly what his idea of "relaxing" was. "We're at work!" "We're alone at work," he teased, lifting me off my feet and walking away with me in his arms. "You're insatiable!" I laughed as he bound up the stairs. "Only when it comes to you, love." In his office, he kicked the door shut behind him before setting me on the small couch by the bookshelves. He caged me in his arms and leaned down to kiss my neck. "What do you think you're doing?" My lips protested, but my head moved to the side, giving him more room to kiss me. "Are we still trying for a faeling?" he asked. "These things can take quite a bit of time, you know." "It could take decades!" "A sacrifice I'm willing to make," he teased. Wrapping my fingers around his tie, I gently tugged his face down to mine so I could kiss him, reminiscent of our first kiss that had cemented the bond between us half a year ago. "Whatever happens, happens. I'm not as impatient as you, Lord of Winter." "Only for you," Devin answered. "Only ever for you, love." He kissed me again, deeper and hungrier than before, and I wrapped my arms around his neck and melted into him.

I’ll forgive you for ignoring us if you tell me one thing.” She grinned when Sophie nodded. “So all that one-on-one time with Fitz in the Healing Center—anything happen?” Sophie’s face burned, and she looked away, mumbling the only answer she could truthfully give. “We’re friends.” “Still in denial—got it,” Marella said. “You guys seriously need to make it official. It’s getting kind of ridiculous. Plus, you’re not the only one who’d be happy to snatch that up, you know? So unless there’s someone else . . .” Sophie turned to head down the stairs, done with this conversation. Marella blocked her. “Just promise me you’re not going to get all ‘I don’t know who I love’ and spend months angsting about it, ’kay? ’Cause I might have to smack you.” Sophie rolled her eyes. “We’d better get down there before Bo gives Linh the same speech he gave me the first time I met him. I don’t think Tam would take it as well as I did.” “There’s a Bo and a Ro?” Marella clarified. “Yep—and if you’re looking for gossip, you should focus on them. They have some sort of weird history, but neither of them will tell us what it is. Keefe even made a bet with Ro about it—that’s why he’s not here. If he comes to Havenfield before I find out the story, Ro gets one unlimited dare.

In the early 1990s, before Japan’s bubble economy burst, a leading newspaper in the U.S. published a large photo taken on a winter’s morning of rush-hour commuters in Shinjuku Station (or possibly Tokyo Station—the same applies to both) heading down the stairs. As if by agreement, all the commuters were gazing downward, their expressions strained and unhappy, looking more like lifeless fish packed in a can than people. The article said, “Japan may be affluent, but most Japanese look like this, heads downcast and unhappy-looking.” The photo became famous. Tsukuru had no idea if most Japanese were, as the article claimed, unhappy. But the real reason that most passengers descending the stairs at Shinjuku Station during their packed morning commute were looking down was less that they were unhappy than that they were concerned about their footing. Don’t slip on the stairs, don’t lose a shoe—these are the major issues on the minds of the commuters in the mammoth station during rush hour. There was no explanation of this, no context for the photograph. Certainly it was hard to view this mass of people, clad in dark overcoats, their heads down, as happy. And of course it’s logical to see a country where people can’t commute in the morning without fear of losing their shoes as an unhappy society.

In spite of all these concerns, in the morning when I left my hotel I went joyfully down the stairs, whistling all the while, and emerged into the street at ten or eleven, whenever I wanted. It was fun, I felt happy, and then I realized that it wasn’t all much fun and I wasn’t all that happy. Had a weight been lifted from my back? The weight of living? I had been born bowed down with grief. The universe seemed to me a kind of enormous cage, or rather a big prison, with the sky a ceiling, and the horizon walls beyond which there had to be something else. But what? I was in a vast space, and yet it was locked. Or rather, I had the feeling I was in a huge ship, and the sky above was an enormous cover. There was a crowd of prisoners, and as far as I could tell most of them were unaware of their condition. What was there beyond the walls? Well, when you really thought about it, there was a positive side to the picture: the daily prison, the little jail inside the big one, had opened its doors to me. Now I was able to stroll at will along the main thoroughfares, the broad avenues of the big jail. It was a world comparable to a zoo in which the animals enjoyed a kind of semi-freedom, with man-made mountains, artificial woods, and imitation lakes, but at the far reaches there were still the same old fences.

So, about your classes,” said Doug. “I put in the requirements already. History of Woodsmen and Pirates, Safety Rules for the Internet, and”—he cleared his throat—“Remedial Goodness 101.” “Let me guess...” said Mal. She popped a piece of candy into her mouth. “New class?” Doug nodded sheepishly. “Come on, guys,” Mal said, dropping the wrapper on the floor. “Let’s go find our dorms.” She started up a flight of stairs. Carlos, Jay, and Evie followed her. “Oh! Uh, yeah, your dorms are that way, guys,” said Doug, pointing in the opposite direction. As Mal and her friends came back down the stairs and headed in the direction he indicated, Doug hung back, counting through the dwarves again. “Dopey, Doc, Bashful, Happy, Grumpy, Sleepy, and...” “Sneezy,” said Carlos, passing him and ascending the opposite staircase. Doug sighed and looked at the ceiling. Upstairs, Mal and Evie opened the door to their dorm room. It was light and airy and dappled in sunlight. The white canopy beds were covered with pink pillows, and flowery curtains fluttered gently in the fresh breeze from the open windows. Evie’s eyes widened with delight as Mal’s narrowed in horror. “Wow,” said Evie. “This place is so amazing—” “Gross,” said Mal. “I know, right?” said Evie, changing her tune. “Amazingly gross. Ew!” When Mal wasn’t looking, Evie couldn’t help giving a silent gasp of joy at her new crib. “I am going to need some serious sunscreen,” said Mal, arms crossed. “Yeah,” said Evie. “E,” said Mal, pointing to the windows. She closed the curtains as Evie moved to other windows in the room and did the same, plunging the dorm into darkness. “Whoa!” said Mal. “That is much better.

Missy I was sixteen and Jason (known on TV as Jase) was eighteen when we started dating. One of my friends--we’ll call her Christy--was actually interested in him, and the two of them had started seeing each other. Jase did not know Christy was already dating someone else and had been for quite some time. He found this out at her house one Sunday afternoon when she ran down the stairs telling him he had to leave immediately. About that time, he heard the screeching of tires from the front of her house. Her boyfriend had arrived. The boyfriend (we’ll call him Greg) was obviously not happy with the current arrangement and was there to set things straight with Jason. He told Jason eh wanted to talk inside his truck. Jase ended up getting into Greg’s vehicle, which he quickly regretted, and Greg proceeded to drive to an undisclosed location to fight it out. Quickly, Jase realized the situation and told Greg that if all of this was over Christy, he could have her. She was not worth it to him. Since Greg did not seem to respond to this direction in the conversation, Jase switched gears and started preaching to him. He proceeded to tell Greg that Jesus died for him and for all the rotten things he had done in his life. He told him God would forgive him if he would turn his life over to Jesus, be baptized for his sins, and start living a life that reflected Jesus’ love for him. Since Greg did not seem to respond to this dialogue either, Jase told him simply, “Just don’t hit me in the face.” Greg stopped the truck, dragged Jase out, roughed him up a bit, and left him at the end of a dead-end road. Jason never threw one punch. Obviously, the relationship between Jason and Christy was officially over.

January 30, 1944 I stood at the top of the stairs while German planes flew back and forth, and I knew I was on my own, that I couldn't count on others for support. My fear vanished. I looked up at the sky and trusted in God. ... Who knows, perhaps a day will come when I'm left alone more than I'd like! February 3, 1944 I've reached the point where I hardly care whether I live or die. The world will keep on turning without me, and I can't do anything to change events anyway. I'll just let matters take their course and concentrate on studying and hope that everything will be all right in the end. February 12, 1944 (entire entry) February 23, 1944 The best remedy for those who are frightened, lonely or unhappy is to go outside, somewhere they can be alone, alone with the sky, nature and God. For then and only then can you feel that everything is as it should be and that God wants people to be happy amid nature's beauty and simplicity. As long as this exists, and that should be forever, I know that there will be a solace for every sorrow, whatever the circumstances. I firmly believe that nature can bring comfort to all who suffer. ... This morning, when I was sitting in front of the window and taking a long, deep look outside at God and nature, I was happy, just plain happy. Peter, as long as people feel that kind of happiness within themselves, the joy of nature, health and much more besides, they'll always be able to recapture that happiness. Riches, prestige, everything can be lost. But the happiness in your own heart can only be dimmed; it will always be there, as long as you live, to make you happy again. Whenever you're feeling lonely or sad, try going to the loft on a beautiful day and looking outside. Not at the houses and the rooftops, but at the sky. As long as you can look fearlessly at the sky, you'll know that you are pure within and will find happiness once more.

Get dressed. We’re going hunting,” he says randomly. In my half-woke state, I feel like I’ve missed something crucial, because I don’t understand how those words are supposed to make sense. “I’m sorry, but what?” I ask, sipping the coffee like the lack of caffeine is the reason I heard him wrong. “We’re going hunting. Emit has some rogue, unregistered wolves who’ve just done something heinous and stupid, and we’re taking you with us, apparently.” “I don’t want to hunt wolves,” I point out, taking a step back, since he’s acting very un-Vance-like. “I don’t want you to hunt wolves, but apparently you’re going with us, or you’re going with him,” he says bitterly, glancing over his shoulder to where there’s a large SUV. Emit’s behind the wheel, smirking like he’s proud of all this. “Yeah, no. Thanks for the offer,” I say as I shut the door…and lock it. I sip my coffee again, as Lemon drinks hers in the kitchen. Her phone rings, and she stands and answers it, while I go to the fridge in search of something to eat. I hear the door unlocking, and look over my shoulder, as Lemon gives me a very unapologetic grin. “Sorry,” she says, confusing me. “But he’s still my alpha.” Emit walks in, filling up my doorway, before he grins over at me in a way that’s sort of…scary. “It’s not really optional,” he says before he stalks to me so fast I don’t have time to react, and I’m unceremoniously slung over his shoulder. My breath comes out in a surprised rush, and I bounce against him as my mind comes to terms with why the world has tipped upside down. Ingrid comes down the stairs with a small bag, giving me a shitty excuse for a contrite smile. “I’ll remember this,” I tell the traitorous omegas dryly, as they give me a little wave and send me on my way like this is a planned vacation. I don’t really put up a fight. I’ve never seen Emit actually determined to do anything, but clearly I’m outnumbered and out wolfed on this one... I allow a small smile as I’m dropped to my feet, and then wipe the smile away because I’m supposed to be annoyed... I climb in as my backpack and small duffel finish flopping to a stop, and close my robe a little more before digging for my boots. “We’ve got everything here under control! Don’t worry about deliveries or the store,” Leiza calls very excitedly, bouncing on her feet. “This is a hunting trip to kill things, right?” I ask Vance directly, though my eyes are on the very happy omegas, who are animatedly waving from the porch now. “Yes,” he states in a tone that assures me he’s not one bit happy I’m here. “Why are they treating it like I’m going on spring break?” I ask, genuinely concerned about their level of enthusiasm. I thought they were a little saner than this. Emit snorts, but clears his expression quickly. “Do I want to know what spring break is a euphemism for?” Vance asks Emit. “You’re really that old?” I groan. “Do you know how long a century is?” Vance asks me dryly. “I averaged a C on vocab tests, so yeah,” I retort, matching his condescension. Emit releases a rumble of laughter, as his body shakes with the force. Then he pulls out and begins to drive us off on our hunt. I’m so not adjusting this fast, but it seems I have no choice in the matter. It’s like a snowball rolling downhill, gaining size and momentum. Either I’ll boulder through anything when I reach the bottom, or I’ll simply go splat into a mountainside. “Do you know how quickly the vernacular shifts and accents devolve, evolve, or simply cease to exist?” Vance asks me. Now I feel a little talked down to. “No.” “I swear he used to be fun,” Emit tells me, smiling at me through the rearview

Before their chaise drew to a complete halt in front of the house a door was already being flung open, and a tall, stocky man was bouncing down the steps. “It would appear that our greeting here is going to be far more enthusiastic than the one we received at our last stop,” Elizabeth said in a resolute voice that still shook with nerves as she drew on her gloves, bravely preparing to meet and defy the next obstacle to her happiness and independence. The door of their chaise was wrenched open with enough force to pull it from its hinges, and a masculine face poked inside. “Lady Elizabeth!” boomed Lord Marchman, his face flushed with eagerness-or drink; Elizabeth wasn’t certain. “This is indeed a long-awaited surprise,” and then, as if dumbstruck by his inane remark, he shook his large head and hastily said, “A long-awaited pleasure, that is! The surprise is that you’ve arrived early.” Elizabeth firmly repressed a surge of compassion for his obvious embarrassment, along with the thought that he might be rather likeable. “I hope we haven’t inconvenienced you overmuch,” she said. “Not overmuch. That is,” he corrected, gazing into her wide eyes and feeling himself drowning, “not at all.” Elizabeth smiled and introduced “Aunt Berta,” then allowed their exuberant host to escort them up the steps. Beside her Berta whispered with some satisfaction, “I think he’s as nervous as I am.” The interior of the house seemed drab and rather gloomy after the sunny splendor outside. As their host led her forward Elizabeth glimpsed the furnishings in the salon and drawing room-all of which were upholstered in dark leathers that appeared to have once been maroon and brown. Lord Marchman, who was watching her closely and hopefully, glanced about and suddenly saw his home as she must be seeing it. Trying to explain away the inadequacies of his furnishings, he said hastily, “This home is in need of a woman’s touch. I’m an old bachelor, you see, as was my father.” Berta’s eyes snapped to his face. “Well, I never!” she exclaimed in outraged reaction to his apparent admission of being a bastard.” “I didn’t mean,” Lord Marchman hastily assured, “that my father was never married. I meant”-he paused to nervously tug on his neckcloth, as if trying to loosen it-“that my mother died when I was very young, and my father never remarried. We lived here together.” At the juncture of two hallways and the stairs Lord Marchman turned and looked at Berta and Elizabeth. “Would you care for refreshment, or would you rather go straight to bed?” Elizabeth wanted a rest, and she particularly wanted to spend as little time in his company as was possible. “The latter, if you please.” “In that case,” he said with a sweeping gesture of his arm toward the staircase, “let’s go.” Berta let out a gasp of indignant outrage at what she perceived to be a clear indication that he was no better than Sir Francis. “Now see here, milord! I’ve been putting her in bed for nigh onto two score, and I don’t need help from the likes of you!” And then, as if she realized her true station, she ruined the whole magnificent effect by curtsying and adding in a servile whisper, “if you don’t mind, sir.” “Mind? No, I-“ It finally occurred to John Marchmen what she thought, and he colored up clear to the roots of his hair. “I-I only meant to show you how,” he began, and then he leaned his head back and briefly closed his eyes as if praying for deliverance from his own tongue. “How to find the way,” he finished with a gusty sigh of relief. Elizabeth was secretly touched by his sincerity and his awkwardness, and were the situation less threatening, she would have gone out of her way to put him at his ease.

I know every day is a battle for thousands of people out there. For too many, just walking down the stairs, taking a bath, getting public transport or being alone among strangers takes real courage. And the only thing that makes you want to cry about how hard this can be is all the other people out there who do all that without even having to think about it. To them all that stuff is trivial, the reflex of life – the nothing on which you layer your everything. The upsetting bit is not that others take it for granted. They should. I would. You never wish that other people should suffer to make you feel better. This is not about wanting other people to struggle or feel worse. You don’t need someone else to be suffering more… (And if you do then you need to go and sit in a corner and have a bloody word with yourself.) Everyone should take walking down the stairs or having a bath for granted. My kids do, and I couldn’t be gladder for them. The thing that gnaws away at you is the fact that you can’t, and that these ordinary things take up so much head space. So much of what you might usefully apply to exciting stuff, or profitable stuff, or happy stuff is used up with nonsense. You go to bed hoping the night won’t be too dreadful, that you won’t have a major fit, that you will wake up with your arms in their sockets and with a tongue that hasn’t been bitten into such a bloody pulp that you sound like a deaf person when you speak.

If you have to Elevate your Happiness, or your position in life on the backs of others that are less fortunate or having a hard time . . .get off the elevator . . .take the stairs

. . .really, he didn’t want to be a nuisance to anyone, nor would he, he decided, be a nuisance, then sat down on the bed, got up again, went over to the window, then sat back down on the bed once more, before getting up again, and so it went on for several minutes, since the feeling of joy continued welling up in him, overwhelming him, so time and again he had to sit down or stand up and eventually achieved complete happiness by pulling the table ever so gently over to the window, turning it so the light should fall fully on it, drew up the chair, then sat on the bed and stared at the table, at the arrangement of it, stared and stared, gauging whether the light was falling on it in the best possible way, then turning the chair a little so that it was at a different angle to the table, so it should fit better, staring at that now, and it was plain that the happiness was almost too much for him, for he now had somewhere to live, a place with a table and a chair, because he was happy that Mr. Sárváry existed in the first place, and that he should have this apartment on the top floor of 547 West 159th Street, right next to the stairs to the attic, and without the resident’s name on the door.

She says, enough, enough, just enough. It's too much already, I've never-- thank God-- had a problem with any of my children, but now all of a sudden it's like you are three different people and I don't ever know which one I'm going to get. It's exhausting, you hear me, you are exhausting me. Can we not just have some real, genuine peace in this house? Between you and your father everyone here is always walking around like someone has died or is about to die. Or people are shouting or sulking or whatever it is you men do. You see my hair. You people are making me old! For once can someone not fucking shout at me for something, I say, I can't wait until I'm out of this stupid fucking place and no one can yell at me. My mother's mouth falls open and her eyes lock on my face. She has heard me swear before. on the phone when joking with some friends but never have I said any such thing to either one of my parents. Never. I have always assumed that such an event would result in my being beaten within an inch of my unborn grandchild's life, but she just stands there like a malfunctioning robot. Is anyone keeping you here, she says finally. If you are unhappy, please go. Go and find the place where you feel happy. I'm sorry, I say, but it's too late. I've fucked up. The less I've said the better things have been, the less likely my father has seemed ready to pounce on me for the smallest mistake. If she tells him what has happened, this might be the end. I'm really sorry. My hands smell of cucumber as I wipe my nose. She tosses the vegetable peeler in her hand to the counter between us. Its protected blades glint in the sunlight streaming through the large bay windows. Do what you like, she says. Mommy, wait please, I say. Get out of here, I don't want to talk to you. Not like this, in my house, my mother says. Her voice is flat and hard, her eyes fixed directly to mine. Ypu should go and find whatever it is you want to find. Me, sef, I'm tired, I'm going upstairs, she says. I listen to her reach the top stair, enter her bedroom, and shut the door. It's just me now.

She says, enough, enough, just enough. It's too much already, I've never-- thank God-- had a problem with any of my children, but now all of a sudden it's like you are three different people and I don't ever know which one I'm going to get. It's exhausting, you hear me, you are exhausting me. Can we not just have some real, genuine peace in this house? Between you and your father everyone here is always walking around like someone has died or is about to die. Or people are shouting or sulking or whatever it is you men do. You see my hair. You people are making me old! For once can someone not fucking shout at me for something, I say, I can't wait until I'm out of this stupid fucking place and no one can yell at me. My mother's mouth falls open and her eyes lock on my face. She has heard me swear before, on the phone when joking with some friends but never have I said any such thing to either one of my parents. Never. I have always assumed that such an event would result in my being beaten within an inch of my unborn grandchild's life, but she just stands there like a malfunctioning robot. Is anyone keeping you here, she says finally. If you are unhappy, please go. Go and find the place where you feel happy. I'm sorry, I say, but it's too late. I've fucked up. The less I've said the better things have been, the less likely my father has seemed ready to pounce on me for the smallest mistake. If she tells him what has happened, this might be the end. I'm really sorry. My hands smell of cucumber as I wipe my nose. She tosses the vegetable peeler in her hand to the counter between us. Its protected blades glint in the sunlight streaming through the large bay windows. Do what you like, she says. Mommy, wait please, I say. Get out of here, I don't want to talk to you. Not like this, in my house, my mother says. Her voice is flat and hard, her eyes fixed directly to mine. Ypu should go and find whatever it is you want to find. Me, sef, I'm tired, I'm going upstairs, she says. I listen to her reach the top stair, enter her bedroom, and shut the door. It's just me now.

Are you sure about this?” I wring my hands. “I was a homeless druggie, a beggar and an escort. I’m prone to breakdowns and poor decisions. Have you picked up strays before and let them into your house?” He laughs, not taking me seriously at all. “I don’t give a flying fuck as long as you’re here.” He rubs my abs to soothe me. “Liam. You make me happy. Life’s too short not to grab hold of happiness when it comes knocking at my door.” Fuck. He has done it again. Tears surge in my eyes. “And you just seem to make me cry like a fucking twat!” He smiles, comes closer and kisses me. Before I know it, he wraps his arms around my waist and thighs and tries to lift me up and carry me. I am pretty lithe but I’m still too tall and heavy for him. He manages to half-lug, half-drag me up the stairs and into the bedroom while laughing his head off.

RULES TO TEACH YOUR SON 1. Never shake a man’s hand sitting down. 2. Don’t enter a pool by the stairs. 3. The man at the BBQ Grill is the closest thing to a king. 4. In a negotiation, never make the first offer. 5. Request the late check-out. 6. When entrusted with a secret, keep it. 7. Hold your heroes to a higher standard. 8. Return a borrowed car with a full tank of gas. 9. Play with passion or don’t play at all… 10. When shaking hands, grip firmly and look them in the eye. 11. Don’t let a wishbone grow where a backbone should be. 12. If you need music on the beach, you’re missing the point. 13. Carry two handkerchiefs. The one in your back pocket is for you. The one in your breast pocket is for her. 14. You marry the girl, you marry her family. 15. Be like a duck. Remain calm on the surface and paddle like crazy underneath. 16. Experience the serenity of traveling alone. 17. Never be afraid to ask out the best looking girl in the room. 18. Never turn down a breath mint. 19. A sport coat is worth 1000 words. 20. Try writing your own eulogy. Never stop revising. 21. Thank a veteran. Then make it up to him. 22. Eat lunch with the new kid. 23. After writing an angry email, read it carefully. Then delete it. 24. Ask your mom to play. She won’t let you win. 25. Manners maketh the man. 26. Give credit. Take the blame. 27. Stand up to Bullies. Protect those bullied. 28. Write down your dreams. 29. Take time to snuggle your pets, they love you so much and are always happy to see you. 30. Be confident and humble at the same time. 31. If ever in doubt, remember whose son you are and REFUSE to just be ordinary! 32. In all things, give glory to God.

When he turned around, Dagger was already on his way up the stairs to the bedroom – their bedroom. Ryan smiled to himself, thinking for a moment how far they had come together, how much they had grown, and how happy he was with his life. He truly was where he wanted to be.

How’s the patient? I know you said she’s asleep, but I need to see how she’s healing. Would now be all right?” “Of course.” Thomas motioned for Nathaniel to lead the way. “She’s improving all the time, I’m happy to say.” Nathaniel let out a slight chuckle. “I bet you are happy.” “What do you mean by that?” Thomas protested, grabbing his arm and stopping him mid-stride on the stairs. “Nothing.” Nathaniel painted a look of bewilderment on his face. “But, I’ve been meaning to ask you, how would you feel about me, say, taking her around town once she’s feeling up to it?” A sudden fire burned inside Thomas. The muscles in his face began to twitch as he shot Nathaniel a glowering look. How dare his friend make such a comment? Nathaniel tried to suppress a large grin. “That’s what I thought.” He laughed under his breath. Thomas relaxed a bit and attempted a small grin of his own as his pulse cooled. “You’re asking for trouble.” Nathaniel slapped him on the back with a loud smack, then whispered into his face. “It’s too easy to ruffle your feathers, Thomas.” His eyes lit with mischief. “Don’t worry, I know you saw her first.” If

But then his tongue moved over me and started to lick the whipped cream over my sex, making my legs fall open, swiping the creamy coolness down and over my cleft, making a long, ragged moan escape me, dragging a rumbling sound from his chest that made another rush of wet pool as his mouth closed over my clit and sucked hard. Then he devoured me, drove me up fast and unrelenting until the orgasm started to crest, seeming to start at the base of my spine and exploding outward until it took over whole body, making me cry out his name as he took possession of my clit and sucked it in pulses as the waves washed over me, dragging it out, intensifying everything. As soon as the waves lessened, he released me and licked a line back upward, taking the whipped cream off my breasts then pressing up to balance over me, wicked look in his eyes. "Tell me." "Tell you what?" I asked, brain nothing but sparking misfirings right then. He smiled at that, either delighted with his prowess or glad to torture me more. Or, more likely, both. I grabbed the can of whipped cream as I moved to straddle him, watching as his eyes went knowing just a second before I started making a line down his stomach with the cream, then down the little happy trail, over his balls, and then up the underside of his cock until there was a large amount on the swollen head. Then I tossed the can to the side and gave him a smile before ducking my head and starting my path down, deciding that while foreplay was always good, it was infinitely better with food involved as my tongue licked the cream off his balls then his shaft before closing my lips around the head and licking it off from there as well, making Brant let out a deep, primal groan that spurred me on, made me work him faster, deeper. "Maddy..." he warned, but I didn't need a warning. I wanted to make him come. I wanted to give him the selfless orgasm he gave me. "Fuck," he growled, his hand crushing into the back of my head as he came down my throat. I worked him for a long moment before letting him slide away, looking up at him to find an intense weight in his gaze. "From now on, we only ever eat dessert off of each other," he said a second later, his hand going under my chin and pulling me until I moved to straddle him, bringing my face close to his. "I can get behind that plan," I agreed with a smile before he yanked me forward and our lips crashed together. It wasn't a slow, sweet, post-orgasm kiss. It was still wild, hungry, primal. It said we weren't done. "Come on," he said when he pulled away, a little out of breath. "Let's go take a shower. That was hot as fuck but we're both sticky now." Thank God. I didn't want to complain, but every time I moved, my skin got stuck to his skin and it was weird and decidedly unsexy. I went to move off him, but his arms went to slip around my lower back, holding me to him as he stood and started walking around the house. Then up the stairs. I was generally not the kind of girl who got carried around. I was fit, sure, but I was tall and leggy and most guys wanted to carry around the short, lithe little women. But since Brant was a huge wall of muscle, he didn't seem bothered by my height and less than dainty limbs. He set me on my feet outside the shower and reached in to put the water on, water I knew would take a couple of minutes to warm up. But he stepped in regardless, cursing at the cold spray. "Yeah, I think not," I said when he looked at me expectantly. I should have known to step away. I really should have. But I didn't and the next thing I knew, he was yanking me in with him, making me let out a string of incredibly unladylike curses before I felt the water get warmer against my back.

I laughed. I laughed while his lips hovered over my mouth and the gun pressed into his body. It was the laughter, not the gun, that made him draw back. Hannah collapsed to her knees. The Traveler had gone. Someone needed to help her to the stairs. I thought of Willie and he came. He helped her to her feet without looking at me. I kept my eyes on the bad guys. One problem at a time. “Why are you laughing?” Fernando asked. “Because you are too fucking stupid to survive.” I drew back from them, the gun still pointed at him. “Is he your only son?” I asked. “My only child,” Padma said. “My condolences,” I said. No, I didn’t shoot him. But staring into Fernando’s angry eyes, I knew there’d be other opportunities. Some people seek death through desperation. Some people fall into it out of stupidity. If Fernando wanted to fall, I was more than happy to catch him.

P lanning a wedding can be murder. Planning weddings for a living is nothing short of suicide. “Is there a patron saint for wedding consultants? Because I think after this wedding, I just might meet the requirements.” I stood near the top of the wide marble staircase that swept down the middle of the Corcoran Gallery of Art’s central foyer. Below me, dozens of tuxedo-clad waiters scurried around the enormous hall filled end to end with tables and gold ladder-backed chairs. After having draped ivory chiffon into swags on all forty tables, I massaged the red indentations left on my fingers by the heavy pins. “Annabelle, darling, I may be a lapsed Catholic, but I’m pretty sure you have to be dead to qualify for sainthood.” Richard Gerard has been one of my closest friends since I arrived in Washington, D.C. three years ago and started “Wedding Belles.” At the time he’d been the only top caterer who’d bother talking to a new wedding planner. Now I worked with him almost exclusively. “The wedding isn’t over yet.”“At least your suffering hasn’t been in vain.” Richard motioned at the room below us. “It’s divine.” The museum’s enormous hall did look magical. The side railings of the staircase were draped with a floral garland, leading to a pair of enormous white rose topiaries flanking the bottom of the stairs. Amber light washed each of the three-story limestone columns bordering the room, and white organza hung from the ceiling, creating sheer curtains that were tied back at each column with clusters of ivory roses. “I just hope the MOB is happy.” My smile disappeared as I thought

I trotted down all three flights of stairs feeling weirdly happy. My sister was back. And at least I had one sort-of friend. You have to have gotten down pretty low before something as small as that starts to look like happy to you.

It was no mere fancy. Fancy does not remold a man in a moment. Fancy has its ups and downs, its hot minutes and-its cold. This was a steady inspiration; an enlarge¬ ment of the soul such as I had hitherto been a stranger to, and which I knew then, as plainly as I do now, would serve to make my happiness or my misery as Fortune lent her aid or passed me coldly by.

stepped from the pavement into the tiny lobby and turned immediately left to climb the stairs to the first floor. There was one reasonably sized bedroom, a living room about the same size with a kitchen area in one corner, and a small shower room. It was newly redecorated, the kitchen well equipped, despite the lack of space, and it was light and airy. There was just enough room for her books. It wasn’t perfect for guests though, and Daniel couldn’t stay long. Lauren had made it very clear this was a temporary arrangement. She was happy to help, but she’d chosen not to have flatmates, so he knew it wouldn’t be long-term. During his time there, she expected him to find something to do, somewhere to go, and then she’d maybe let him stay until he could move. As long as she knew he would be going. Lauren had always been like this. Fiercely independent, fiercely territorial. As a child she’d put large notices on her bedroom door: Keep Out Or Else! And later, Enter At Your Peril, All Who Approach. Even their mum wasn’t allowed in. Lauren cleaned the room herself, changed her own bed and kept the door shut. Once, Daniel had ventured in while his sister was at her music lesson. He only wanted to see what was in there, what was so important that nobody was allowed in.

She didn’t care if her muscles ached, her back groaned, and her legs wobbled from running up and down the stairs with buckets of water. She thought only about the happiness that awaited her once she finished her task.

Maybe it was the aftermath of a dream that he couldn’t remember – so he told me – but Theophilus Baxter woke up one morning in the middle of October 1658, with an unpleasant sensation of trouble. The second session of the General Court of Sagadac Bay would begin its final meeting later in the day. Although the discussions had been uproarious, Theophilus believed that his presentiment related to matters beyond the court’s jurisdiction He shook his head vigorously and walked barefoot across the cold floor to a water basin on a small table in the corner. A splash of water on his face drove away tiny fragments of sleep. While still in his nightshirt, he took his leather-bound Bible – one Elizabeth gave when they were married – from its shelf next to the door and brought it to the edge of his bed, where he sat down to say a short prayer and to read a passage from Paul’s writings. He then dressed and went down the narrow pine stairs to the kitchen, where Elizabeth was setting the table for breakfast. During a pause in their talk about the needs of the day, his premonition of eventfulness returned. Elizabeth noticed the look in his eyes, a look of happiness cut short. (You’ll find scholarly summaries of our controversy in other places. I want to tell the personal side now, so I’ll add and subtract, embroider and elaborate. I’ll invent conversations. Some will complain about the liberties I’m taking, but our colony, an experiment in living, invites adventures that work to create understanding.) “What is it now?” Elizabeth brought a tray of biscuits from the hearth to the table. “We’ve had too much talk lately about God and the Bible,” Theophilus said. “I don’t understand much of the chatter, and I doubt anyone else does either. It’s bad for the country. I had a dream last night about Lydia Bowstreet.” “What would you want to dream about that troublemaker for?” “Things stick in our minds sometimes in the strangest way.

Where the hell is everybody,” he bitched as he glared up the stairs. “You just called them about two seconds ago—” People came at a dead run, a traffic jam forming at the top of the stairs in spite of the fact that the thing was huge, the sound of big feet thundering down to the foyer as the Brothers came with their mates in tow. “Here,” she said, taking out a flimsy slip of paper. “Show them this—it’s a picture from the ultrasound.” Wrath shifted her around so he was holding her with one arm—and he took that pic and thrust it out like it was billboard size and made of gold. “Look!” he barked. “Look! My son! My son!” Beth had to laugh even as her tears ran harder. “Look!” His Brothers formed a circle around what he was holding out, and she was astonished . . . every one of them had a sheen across their eyes, their manly, tight smiles proof they were holding their emotions in check. And then she looked at Tohr. He was hanging back, with Autumn close to his side. As his mate glanced up in concern, he seemed to brace himself to come forward. “I’m so happy for you,” the Brother said roughly to both of them. “Oh, Tohr,” she blurted, reaching out her hands. As the Brother clasped them, Wrath dropped his arm as if hiding the picture. “No,” Tohr cut in. “You keep that up, you feel that pride. I have a good feeling about this, and I’m rejoicing with you—all the way.” “Ah, fuck,” Wrath said, yanking the Brother in for a hard embrace. “Thanks, my man.” -Wrath, Beth, Tohr, & the others

She marched up to the door, banged it open with a satisfying crash, brandished her scythe, and announced herself to any and all therein. “Get your heathen, trespassing backsides out of this carriage house immediately, lest I inform your papas of your criminal conduct—and your mamas.” “Good lord,” a cultured and ominously adult male voice said softly from Ellen’s right, “we’re about to be taken prisoner. Prepare to defend your borders, my friend. Sleeping Beauty has awakened in a state.” Ellen’s gaze flew to the shadows, where a tall, dark-haired man was regarding her with patient humor. The calm amusement in his eyes suggested he posed no threat to her, while his dress confirmed he was a person of some means. Ellen had no time to further inventory that stranger, because the sound of a pair of boots slowly descending the steps drew her gaze across the room. Whoever was coming down those stairs was in no hurry and was certainly no boy. Long, long legs became visible, then muscles that looked as if they’d been made lean and elegant from hours in the saddle showed off custom riding boots and excellent tailoring. A trim, flat torso came next, then a wide muscular chest and impressive shoulders. Good lord, he was taller than the fellow in the corner, and that one was a good half a foot taller than she. Ellen swallowed nervously and tightened her grip on the scythe. “Careful,” the man in the shadows said softly, “she’s armed and ready to engage the enemy.” Those dusty boots descended the last two steps, and Ellen forced herself to meet the second man’s face. She’d been prepared for the kind of teasing censorship coming from the one in the corner, a polite hauteur, or outright anger, but not a slow, gentle smile that melted her from the inside out. “Mrs. FitzEngle.” Valentine Windham bowed very correctly from the waist. “It has been too long, and you must forgive us for startling you. Lindsey, I’ve had the pleasure, so dredge up your manners.” “Mr. Windham?” Ellen lowered her scythe, feeling foolish and ambushed, and worst of all—happy. So

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

When the last of the dishes were put up, the floor swept, the Open sign turned off and the door latched, Preacher trudged slowly up the stairs to his old room. When he got there he found Christopher was jumping on the bed while beside it Paige stood holding his pajama top, trying to get him to settle down after his bath. She threw a look over her shoulder with a wan smile that said she was coming to the end of her rope. After all, she’d been trapped in the plane and car with him much of the day. “Okay, cowboy,” Preacher said, coming forward. He took the top out of Paige’s hands and held it for the boy. Christopher slipped his arms in and turned around so that Preacher could snap it up the back. “That a boy,” he said. Paige put a hand on Preacher’s forearm and said, “Please tuck in the cowboy and I’ll meet you downstairs.” Christopher lunged at Preacher, jumping on him, arms around his neck and legs around his waist, hugging him tight. “Wanna kiss Mommy good-night?” Preacher asked. Christopher leaned around Preacher a little, puckering, but didn’t let go. He got his kiss and Paige left them alone. “In you go,” Preacher said. “Read,” he said. “Aw, c’mon. It’s been a long day.” “Read,” he said. “One page.” “Okay, one page.” Preacher sat on the bed beside him and accepted the book. He read three pages. “Now you have to settle down.” He started whining and wiggling around. “Did someone give you sugar?” Preacher asked him. “Get into bed. Enough of this.” He tucked the covers around him and kissed his head. “See you happy in the morning.” “G’night,” Christopher said, snuggling down in the bed. When

Surprised at Kaye’s belated display of maternal instincts, Sean relented, promising he’d get in touch with Lily. Besides, he knew his own mother would never forgive him if he refused such a simple request. As he made his way down the narrow streets to the pensione opposite the Pantheon, where Lily and her roommate were staying, Sean steadfastly refused to acknowledge any other reason for agreeing to take Lily out. It had been three years since they’d left for college, not once had she come home to visit. But Sean still couldn’t look at a blonde without comparing her to Lily. He’d mounted the four flights of narrow, winding stairs, the sound of his steps muffled by red, threadbare carpet. At number seventeen, he’d stopped and stood, giving his racing heart a chance to quiet before he knocked. Calm down, he’d instructed himself. It’s only Lily. His knock echoed loudly in the empty hall. Through the door he heard the sound of approaching footsteps. Then it opened and there she was. She stood with her mouth agape. Her eyes, like beacons of light in the obscurity of the drab hallway, blinked at him with astonishment. “What are you doing here?” The question ended on a squeak. As if annoyed with the sound, she shut her mouth with an audible snap. Was it possible Kaye hadn’t bothered to tell Lily he’d be coming? “I heard you were spending a few days in Rome.” Sean realized he was staring like a dolt, but couldn’t help himself. It rattled him, seeing Lily again. A barrage of emotions and impressions mixed and churned inside him: how good she looked, different somehow, more self-confident than in high school, how maybe this time they might get along for more than 3.5 seconds. He became aware of a happy buzz of anticipation zinging through him. He was already picturing the two of them at a really nice trattoria. They’d be sitting at an intimate corner table. A waiter would come and take their order and Sean would impress her with his flawless Italian, his casual sophistication, his sprezzatura. By the time the waiter had served them their dessert and espresso, she’d be smiling at him across the soft candlelight. He’d reach out and take her hand. . . . Then Lily spoke again and Sean’s neat fantasy evaporated like a puff of smoke. “But how did you know I was here?” she’d asked, with what he’d conceitedly assumed was genuine confusion—that is, until a guy their age appeared. Standing just behind Lily, he had stared back at Sean through the aperture of the open door with a knowing smirk upon his face. And suddenly Sean understood. Lily wasn’t frowning from confusion. She was annoyed. Annoyed because he’d barged in on her and Lover Boy. Lily didn’t give a damn about him. At the realization, his jumbled thoughts at seeing her again, all those newborn hopes inside him, faded to black. His brain must have shorted after that. Suave, sophisticated guy that he was, Sean had blurted out, “Hey, this wasn’t my idea. I only came because Kaye begged me to—” Stupendously dumb. He knew better, had known since he was eight years old. If you wanted to push Lily Banyon into the red zone, all it took was a whispered, “Kaye.” The door to her hotel room had come at his face faster than a bullet train. He guessed he should be grateful she hadn’t been using a more lethal weapon, like the volleyball she’d smashed in his face during gym class back in eleventh grade. Even so, he’d been forced to jump back or have the number seventeen imprinted on his forehead. Their last skirmish, the one back in Rome, he’d definitely lost. He’d stood outside her room like a fool, Lover Boy’s laughter his only reply. Finally, the pensione’s night clerk had appeared, insisting he leave la bella americana in peace. He’d gone away, humiliated and oddly deflated.

Later that night Meridith was in her room working on Ben’s scrapbook when she heard a burst of laughter. Ben’s belly laughs drew her from her room, toward the steps. What she saw brought a bittersweet smile. Meridith lowered herself on an upper stair and peered through the oak spindles. Ben had Jake pinned to the rug and was tickling him. Jake moaned like he was in torture, which only made Ben laugh harder. She’d never seen the child so happy. He was small next to Jake’s mass, his wiry arms moving furiously, digging his fingers into Jake’s side. He twisted, straddling Jake. Jake groaned. “Help! Someone help!” Ben laughed. “You’re doomed! If I had my ropes, I’d tie you up and toss you off a cliff!” “No! Not that!” Meridith smiled around the tears that gathered in her eyes. She wondered if her father had tussled with Ben. He surely missed the interaction. And while she was grateful for Jake’s willingness to play with the boy . . . What would happen when the repairs were finished and Jake left? She saw how attached Ben had become to him. Her mind flashed back over the previous weeks to other occasions. Jake helping Noelle fix her bike chain, Jake and Max working on Max’s new boat model. Jake, Jake, Jake. He’d become a fixture around the house right under her nose. Worse, he’d become a friend. A friend the children would lose. The

Shrieking Brooke’s name as loudly as I could, out in the corridor, I brought her running quickly to my room. ‘What’s happened, what’s wrong?’ she immediately cried concerned, legging it up the stairs two at a time. She appeared breathless outside the kitchen door. Brian appeared sleepily at his door too, awoken by the noise, and watched us. ‘She’s moving,’ I cried. ‘What? Flutters like before?’ ‘No more, here feel.’ I grabbed her hand and pushed it down onto my exposed belly. Brian averted his eyes as I stood, belly out and top up over my bra, in the middle of the corridor. ‘I can’t push you that hard,’ she exclaimed, pulling back her fingers surprised. ‘It will hurt you, or her, I can’t do that.’ ‘Yes, you can,’ I insisted. ‘You won’t hurt us.’ I pulled her hand back and pushed her long fingers into my belly and we stood waiting, hardly daring to breathe. You kicked again, hard into my side, under Brooke’s long pink fingernails. Brooke jumped away from me in shock and then burst out laughing. She clapped her hands together delighted. ‘Well?’ I asked her. ‘She kicked me,’ Brooke shrieked still jumping up and down clapping. ‘She kicked me. That was amazing, let me do it again.’ She came back over towards me slowly. Cautiously she pushed her fingers into the same spot on my side. We waited again in silence and I saw her face slightly drop as the seconds ticked by. ‘Ah it works,’ she yelled, as again she jumped back shocked as the tiny little feet thudded from my insides at her hand. ‘I love it. Do it again.’ I laughed and then Brian stepped forward. ‘Can I have a go?’ he asked quietly, fiddling with his hands and stepping out of his room towards us. ‘Of course you can, come here.’ And that is how we spent the next few minutes out in the corridor by the kitchen, shrieking, whooping, and jumping around. If anyone had been in the house, I know they would probably have thought we were all mad. Mad, no. Thrilled and excited, most definitely. Baby girl, you did that to us. Thank you.

I am pleased to say I find nothing funny, sir,” Bent replied as they reached the bottom of the stairs. “I have no sense of humor whatsoever. None at all. It has been proven by phrenology. I have Nichtlachen-Keinwortz syndrome, which for some curious reason is considered a lamentable affliction. I, on the other hand, consider it a gift. I am happy to say that I regard the sight of a fat man slipping on a banana skin as nothing more than an unfortunate accident that highlights the need for care in the disposal of household waste.” “Have you tried—” Moist began, but Bent held up a hand. “Please! I repeat, I do not regard it as a burden! And may I say it annoys me when people assume it is such! Do not feel impelled to try to make me laugh, sir! If I had no legs, would you try to make me run? I am quite happy, thank you!” He

Cat sat in a rocking recliner, her foot pushing the chair into motion steadily. She looked up when he came down the stairs but didn’t say anything. Harper felt like a royal ass when he saw her tear-stained cheeks and the tissues clutched in her hand. Cat was a strong woman. It took a lot to see her cry. The fact that she was crying now made him feel like the lowest kind of scum. Crossing the room, he knelt down in front of her, stopping the chair. “I’m sorry I didn’t respond to you. I’m kind of in shock. When I fell in love with you I just always thought it was forever. Even though my lifestyle didn’t create stability, you did, Cat. You were always my stability. Walking away was the hardest thing I ever had to do. But I did it in the hopes that I could make myself better. It’s not like a damned driving test where if I mark a wrong answer I get to take the test over again. I’m a trained killer. If I had screwed up in our house you or the kids were going to pay for it, possibly with your lives. I couldn’t chance that.” Fresh tears rolled down her face and her expression crumpled. “I know. I knew that was why you left. Or at least that was what I had hoped. But it’s been eighteen damn months—a year and a half—with you not letting us have any contact. If you had talked to us, or wrote…just something to let us know that we weren’t all alone.” Cat sobbed and it broke his heart. Pulling her into his arms then down onto his lap, he held her as she let all her emotions out. Tears choked his own throat as he cradled her to him. “If I had called I would not have been able to stay away.” And that was the gist of his angst. God, yes, he wanted to be with them, but he was willing to give up his own happiness if it kept them safe. Cat’s arms wrapped around his neck and she looked up at him. “I have always had more faith in you than you have yourself. Always.” Nuzzling his face into her damp hair, he nodded. “I know that. Without a doubt. And whether you were with me or not your faith kept me going.” Relaxing into his hold, Cat’s tears began to slow. “I love you, Cat.” Her arms tightened around his neck till he thought something was going to pop. “I love you too, damn it.