Tuck Shop Quotes

People who say that money can't buy happiness just don't know where to shop.

Liam cleared his throat again and turned to fully face me. “So, it’s the summer and you’re in Salem, suffering through another boring, hot July, and working part-time at an ice cream parlor. Naturally, you’re completely oblivious to the fact that all of the boys from your high school who visit daily are more interested in you than the thirty-one flavors. You’re focused on school and all your dozens of clubs, because you want to go to a good college and save the world. And just when you think you’re going to die if you have to take another practice SAT, your dad asks if you want to go visit your grandmother in Virginia Beach.” “Yeah?” I leaned my forehead against his chest. “What about you?” “Me?” Liam said, tucking a strand of hair behind my ear. “I’m in Wilmington, suffering through another boring, hot summer, working one last time in Harry’s repair shop before going off to some fancy university—where, I might add, my roommate will be a stuck-up-know-it-all-with-a-heart-of-gold named Charles Carrington Meriwether IV—but he’s not part of this story, not yet.” His fingers curled around my hip, and I could feel him trembling, even as his voice was steady. “To celebrate, Mom decides to take us up to Virginia Beach for a week. We’re only there for a day when I start catching glimpses of this girl with dark hair walking around town, her nose stuck in a book, earbuds in and blasting music. But no matter how hard I try, I never get to talk to her. “Then, as our friend Fate would have it, on our very last day at the beach I spot her. You. I’m in the middle of playing a volleyball game with Harry, but it feels like everyone else disappears. You’re walking toward me, big sunglasses on, wearing this light green dress, and I somehow know that it matches your eyes. And then, because, let’s face it, I’m basically an Olympic god when it comes to sports, I manage to volley the ball right into your face.” “Ouch,” I said with a light laugh. “Sounds painful.” “Well, you can probably guess how I’d react to that situation. I offer to carry you to the lifeguard station, but you look like you want to murder me at just the suggestion. Eventually, thanks to my sparkling charm and wit—and because I’m so pathetic you take pity on me—you let me buy you ice cream. And then you start telling me how you work in an ice cream shop in Salem, and how frustrated you feel that you still have two years before college. And somehow, somehow, I get your e-mail or screen name or maybe, if I’m really lucky, your phone number. Then we talk. I go to college and you go back to Salem, but we talk all the time, about everything, and sometimes we do that stupid thing where we run out of things to say and just stop talking and listen to one another breathing until one of us falls asleep—” “—and Chubs makes fun of you for it,” I added. “Oh, ruthlessly,” he agreed. “And your dad hates me because he thinks I’m corrupting his beautiful, sweet daughter, but still lets me visit from time to time. That’s when you tell me about tutoring a girl named Suzume, who lives a few cities away—” “—but who’s the coolest little girl on the planet,” I manage to squeeze out.

Usually, she’s tucked in the corner of a coffee shop, dreaming up stories.

Astrid," Linda called, her feet tucked under herself on the flower-print couch. "If you had a choice between two weeks in Paris France, all expenses paid, or a car —" "Shitty Buick," Debby interjected. "What's wrong with a Buick?" Marvel said. "—which would you take?" Linda picked something out of the corner of her eye with a long press-on nail. I brought their drinks, suppressing the desire to limp theatrically, the deformed servant, and fit all the glasses into hands without spilling. They couldn't be serious. Paris? My Paris? Elegant fruit shops and filterless Gitanes, dark woolen coats, the Bois de Boulogne? "Take the car," I said. "Definitely.

Ryan couldn't believe his eyes. Gran wearing leather chaps in a Harley shop, talking about her ass. It was a living nightmare. "What am I doing here?" he asked Gran. Before he could read her the riot act on safety, Liz stepped in front of him. Her pink shirt was buttoned all the way to the top and tucked into ironed white pants. Her hair was straight and perfect. He had the strangest urge to muss her up.

This was how it would be now. People would apologize for the presence of their children, tuck away their happiness from her, become self-conscious of their joy. This was her new destiny.

[Soho] is all things to all men, catering comprehensively for those needs which money can buy. You see it as you wish. An agreeable place to dine; a cosmopolitan village tucked away behind Piccadilly with its own mysterious village life, one of the best shopping centres for food in London, the nastiest and most sordid nursery of crime in Europe. Even the travel journalists, obsessed by its ambiguities, can't make up their minds.

Just so we know where we stand, darling." "I'll tell you just where we stand, darling.I don't need your insulting offer.I'm running my life my way." "And that's been such a rousing success so far." "I know what I'm doing.Take that ridiculous smirk off your face." "I can't.It sticks there every time you say you know what you're doing." But he tucked all the papers back in his briefcase, closed it. "I'll say this,I don't think it's an entirely moronic idea-this place." "Well,I'll sleep easy now, knowing I have your approval." "Approval's a little strong.It's more like hopeful resignation." He gave the banister a last wiggle. "But I believe in you,Margo." Temper died into confusion. "Damn you, Josh.I can't keep up with you." "Good." He strolled over, flicked a finger down her cheek. "I think you're going to make something out of this shop that'll surprise everyone. Especially you." He leaned down,and when he kissed her this time it was light and friendly. "Got cab fare?" "Excuse me?" Grinning, he pulled keys out of his pocket. "Fortunately, I had a spare set to the Jag. Don't work too late, duchess." She didn't smile until he was well out of sight.

A clatter of metal against the concrete made me look back. Liam had moved on from the car to a nearby pile of bikes that were tangled together like brambles. He picked through the frames and spokes and wheels, working carefully, trying to get down to whatever he'd seen under them.... "Do you actually know how to ride?" "Do I know how to ride?" Liam scoffed, leaning over the bike's seat so his face was inches from mine. His pale blue eyes were electric with his excitement; they sent a charge through me, sizzling the rest of the world into peaceful, quiet static. That last bit of distance must have been as unbearable to him as it was to me, because his fingers came down over where my hands rested on the busted leather seat. I felt his touch spread over my skin like late afternoon sunshine. His lips skimmed my cheek, his breath warm against my ear as he said in low, honeyed tones, "Not only can I ride, darlin', but I can give you a few pointers– "Hey, Hell's Angels!" Cole barked. "I didn't bring you in here to shop around for yourselves! Get your assess over here!" Liam expression clouded over as he pulled back, the fluttering excitement vanishing like a candle blown out. with a single breath. I must have looked as disappointed as I felt, letting out a small sound of irritation, because just like that he was smiling again as he tucked a loose strand of hair back over my ear. A softer, smaller smile than before, but one meant for me. It warmed me down to my bones.

I would love, though, to be able to forage---to pick the rosemary that grows near my mum's house, the dandelion flowers and their leaves that I've seen on the little patch of grass outside the studios---and to be able to eat the foods the artists in this building are growing, the mushrooms, tomatoes, herbs... I'd love, also, to be able to just go to a normal shop and buy my food, to peel back an aluminum and plastic lid on a polystyrene box and tuck into my dinner in the way a human can with instant ramen.

167 It’s one of those days when the monotony of everything oppresses me like being thrown into jail. The monotony of everything is merely the monotony of myself, however. Each face, even if seen just yesterday, is different today, because today isn’t yesterday. Each day is the day it is, and there was never another one like it in the world. Only our soul makes the identification – a genuinely felt but erroneous identification – by which everything becomes similar and simplified. The world is a set of distinct things with varied edges, but if we’re near-sighted, it’s a continual and indecipherable fog. I feel like fleeing. Like fleeing from what I know, fleeing from what’s mine, fleeing from what I love. I want to depart, not for impossible Indias or for the great islands south of everything, but for any place at all – village or wilderness – that isn’t this place. I want to stop seeing these unchanging faces, this routine, these days. I want to rest, far removed, from my inveterate feigning. I want to feel sleep come to me as life, not as rest. A cabin on the seashore or even a cave in a rocky mountainside could give me this, but my will, unfortunately, cannot. Slavery is the law of life, and it is the only law, for it must be observed: there is no revolt possible, no way to escape it. Some are born slaves, others become slaves, and still others are forced to accept slavery. Our faint-hearted love of freedom – which, if we had it, we would all reject, unable to get used to it – is proof of how ingrained our slavery is. I myself, having just said that I’d like a cabin or a cave where I could be free from the monotony of everything, which is the monotony of me – would I dare set out for this cabin or cave, knowing from experience that the monotony, since it stems from me, will always be with me? I myself, suffocating from where I am and because I am – where would I breathe easier, if the sickness is in my lungs rather than in the things that surround me? I myself, who long for pure sunlight and open country, for the ocean in plain view and the unbroken horizon – could I get used to my new bed, the food, not having to descend eight flights of stairs to the street, not entering the tobacco shop on the corner, not saying good-morning to the barber standing outside his shop? Everything that surrounds us becomes part of us, infiltrating our physical sensations and our feeling of life, and like spittle of the great Spider it subtly binds us to whatever is close, tucking us into a soft bed of slow death which is rocked by the wind. Everything is us, and we are everything, but what good is this, if everything is nothing? A ray of sunlight, a cloud whose shadow tells us it is passing, a breeze that rises, the silence that follows when it ceases, one or another face, a few voices, the incidental laughter of the girls who are talking, and then night with the meaningless, fractured hieroglyphs of the stars.

You’re a grumpy gills this morning,” she chirps, tucking into the fruit salad she paid about fifteen bucks for in the airport shop. “Early. Tired,” I grunt. “Poor baby,” she says sarcastically, giggling and pinching my cheek. “Want to sleep on my boobs on the plane?” “I obviously wanna sleep on your boobs,

Thought I saw you on the beach this morning...Thought I saw you standing on the white strand, your back to the wind. The rain had stopped and there was a brisk clarity in the air. You watched me over your left shoulder, head tucked in coyly. Seabirds flying low in the sky, and the grey-green waves at your foot. A whole panorama thrown up behind you. I was on the coast road coming back from the shops. I stopped walking once I caught sight of you. You were wearing a reefer jacket with the collar turned up against the weather. It might have been navy, but it looked black in the distance. As did your trousers. As did your shoes. All of you was black except your face and hair. You wore no hat...Never once saw you in Winter clothes, yet there you were as clear as day for a whole moment. Only your eyes were visible above the upturned collar. Your hair was in your eyes. You watched me through those pale strands. And I watched you. Intently. The man from down the road drove by in his faded red car. He was going the other way, so he didn't offer a lift. He just waved. I waved back. And then I turned to you again, and we looked at each other a little longer. Very calm. Heart barely shifted. Too far away to see your features. No matter. There was salt on your face. Sea salt. It was in your hair. It was on your mouth. It was all over you, as though you gazed at me through ice. And it was all over me. It tingled on my skin. After a time I moved off, and you broke into two. You realigned yourself into driftwood and stone. I came inside and lit a fire. Sat in front of it and watched it burn. The window fogged up as my clothes and hair dried out. That was hours ago. The fire is nearly gone. But I can still taste the salt on my lips. It is a dry and stinging substance and it is everywhere now. It has touched everything that is left. Coated every surface with its sparkling silt. I will always be thirsty.

481 I went into the barbershop as usual, with the pleasant sensation of entering a familiar place, easily and naturally. New things are distressing to my sensibility; I’m at ease only in places where I’ve already been. After I’d sat down in the chair, I happened to ask the young barber, occupied in fastening a clean, cool cloth around my neck, about his older colleague from the chair to the right, a spry fellow who had been sick. I didn’t ask this because I felt obliged to ask something; it was the place and my memory that sparked the question. ‘He passed away yesterday,’ flatly answered the barber’s voice behind me and the linen cloth as his fingers withdrew from the final tuck of the cloth in between my shirt collar and my neck. The whole of my irrational good mood abruptly died, like the eternally missing barber from the adjacent chair. A chill swept over all my thoughts. I said nothing. Nostalgia! I even feel it for people and things that were nothing to me, because time’s fleeing is for me an anguish, and life’s mystery is a torture. Faces I habitually see on my habitual streets – if I stop seeing them I become sad. And they were nothing to me, except perhaps the symbol of all of life. The nondescript old man with dirty gaiters who often crossed my path at nine-thirty in the morning… The crippled seller of lottery tickets who would pester me in vain… The round and ruddy old man smoking a cigar at the door of the tobacco shop… The pale tobacco shop owner… What has happened to them all, who because I regularly saw them were a part of my life? Tomorrow I too will vanish from the Rua da Prata, the Rua dos Douradores, the Rua dos Fanqueiros. Tomorrow I too – I this soul that feels and thinks, this universe I am for myself – yes, tomorrow I too will be the one who no longer walks these streets, whom others will vaguely evoke with a ‘What’s become of him?’. And everything I’ve done, everything I’ve felt and everything I’ve lived will amount merely to one less passer-by on the everyday streets of some city or other.

The twins, who were clearly having a splendid time, had adorned themselves outlandishly. Cassandra was dressed in a green opera cloak with a jeweled feather ornament affixed to her hair. Pandora had tucked a light blue lace parasol beneath one arm, and a pair of lawn tennis rackets in the other, and was wearing a flowery diadem headdress that had slipped partially over one eye.

Is anyone else coming?” I asked him when he didn’t say anything after setting his glass back down on the table. I’d overheard a couple of the guys talking about Rip’s half-hearted invitation when I had taken a bathroom break, but I hadn’t heard more than that. His gaze hadn’t left mine from the moment he had spotted me, and it didn’t go anywhere as he shrugged and said, “Doubt it.” I must have made a face because he added, casually, “I’m not exactly anybody’s favorite, Luna.” The smile fell right off my mouth, and I couldn’t help but frown at him. At the harshness of his words. At the… fact-like nature of them. That wasn’t very nice for him to assume. That wasn’t very nice to assume at all, and it bothered me… even if it was true that Mr. Cooper was my favorite person at the shop. And I was his. And Miguel’s— Crap. “I’m sure—“ I started before getting cut off. “I’m not,” he told me, tapping his short fingernails against the glass. Rip tipped his chin up a millimeter, giving me a slightly better view of the shading tucked up against his jawline. He swallowed, everything about his body language saying that he was telling me these words in this way because it wasn’t a big deal to him. He didn’t care. Why should he? His body said. His next words confirmed it. “I’m not around to be anybody’s friend.” All righty then. I wanted to tell him something that would make it seem that it wasn’t like anyone hated him or disliked him. Most of the guys were just… wary. Even I was wary, and he didn’t scare or intimidate me… unless I screwed up. But I didn’t know what to say to that comment. I hated liars as much as I hated aggressive drunk people and cooked carrots. So I did the only thing I could think of: I smiled at him and shrugged. He didn’t look even a little put out or hurt by what he’d been saying. Who was I to make it a big deal if he claimed he didn’t care? “Did you like your cake?

There was a little optometrist shop on south Broadway tucked in between a pizza joint and what amounted to a head shop where you could buy glow-in-the-dark posters, bongs, and whatever else the hippies began marketing after they went commercial in the '70s... I had never visited the optometrist shop. The entrance had a 1930s look that I liked—art deco molded-tin awning over the doorway, and Bakelite tiles on the foyer walls. It looked like the kind of business that would be owned by an elderly optometrist who had serviced families for generations and personally ground lenses in his back room. I liked the look of the shop, but I drove right past it on my way to Sight City!!! where you could buy Two Pair for the Price of One!!! according to the billboards plastered all over Denver blocking every decent view of the Rocky Mountains.

Gordon wished he would come in. Sell him a copy of Women in Love. How it would disappoint him! But no! The Welsh solicitor had funked it. He tucked his umbrella under his arm and moved off with righteously turned backside. But doubtless tonight, when darkness hid his blushes, he'd slink into one of the rubber–shops and buy High Jinks in a Parisian Convent, by Sadie Blackeyes. Gordon turned away from the door and back to the book–shelves.

Sometimes the people who’ve owned the books in this shop leave little clues between the pages, and not just love notes or pressed flowers. You might come upon an unused Amtrak ticket tucked between the pages of The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes or a sprinkling of crumbs along the gutter inside The Complete Engravings, Etchings, and Drypoints of Albrecht Dürer. Makes you wonder what kind of person noshes on a salami sandwich over The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse.

I love the way the rain melts the colors together, like a chalk drawing on the sidewalk. There is a moment, just after sunset, when the shops turn on their lights and steam starts to fog up the windows of the cafés. In French, this twilight time implies a hint of danger. It's called entre chien et loup, between the dog and the wolf. It was just beginning to get dark as we walked through the small garden of Palais Royal. We watched as carefully dressed children in toggled peacoats and striped woolen mittens finished the same game of improvised soccer we had seen in the Place Sainte Marthe. Behind the Palais Royal the wide avenues around the Louvre gave way to narrow streets, small boutiques, and bistros. It started to drizzle. Gwendal turned a corner, and tucked in between two storefronts, barely wider than a set of double doors, I found myself staring down a corridor of fairy lights. A series of arches stretched into the distance, topped with panes of glass, like a greenhouse, that echoed the plip-plop of the rain. It was as if we'd stepped through the witch's wardrobe, the phantom tollbooth, what have you, into another era. The Passage Vivienne was nineteenth-century Paris's answer to a shopping mall, a small interior street lined with boutiques and tearooms where ladies could browse at their leisure without wetting the bustles of their long dresses or the plumes of their new hats. It was certainly a far cry from the shopping malls of my youth, with their piped-in Muzak and neon food courts. Plaster reliefs of Greek goddesses in diaphanous tunics lined the walls. Three-pronged brass lamps hung from the ceiling on long chains. About halfway down, there was an antique store selling nothing but old kitchenware- ridged ceramic bowls for hot chocolate, burnished copper molds in the shape of fish, and a pewter mold for madeleines, so worn around the edges it might have belonged to Proust himself. At the end of the gallery, underneath a clock held aloft by two busty angels, was a bookstore. There were gold stencils on the glass door. Maison fondée en 1826.

Coming out of the forest was much harder than coming in. Marian had always found coming out difficult- generally, she arrived at a graveyard unencumbered and left with pockets or satchels full of coin and jewels, which made concealment much more difficult. It was of course also tremendously easy to walk into a shop with the intent of stealing, but immensely more of a problem to come out of one with a loaf of bread tucked under her arm. Perhaps most difficult of all had been coming out to her family the day she told them she was their daughter and their sister, as opposed to the son and brother they had previously been lead to believe she was. That had been an odd sort of day. At the time, her

Glenskehy is outside Dublin, tucked away in the Wicklow mountains near nothing very much. I'd lived half my life in Wicklow without getting any closer to it than the odd signpost. It turned out to be that kind of place: a scatter of houses getting old around a once-a-month church and a pub and a sell-everything shop, small and isolated enough to have been overlooked even by the desperate generation trawling the countryside for homes they can afford. Eight o'clock on a Thursday morning, and the main street - to use both words loosely - was postcard-perfect and empty, just one old woman pulling a shopping trolley past a worn granite monument to something or other, little sugared-almond houses lined up crookedly behind her, and the hills rising green and brown and indifferent over it all. I could imagine someone getting killed there, but a farmer in a generations-old fight over a boundary fence, a woman whose man had turned savage with drink and cabin fever, a man sharing a house with his brother forty years too long: deep-rooted, familiar crimes old as Ireland, nothing to make a detective as experienced as Sam sound like that.

Mindy runs to the DVD player and delicately places the disk in the holder and presses play. “Will you sit in this chair, please, Princess Mindy?” I ask, bowing deeply at the waist. Mindy giggles as she replies, ”I guess so.” After Mindy sits down, I take a wide-tooth comb and start gently combing out her tangles. Mindy starts vibrating with excitement as she blurts, “Mr. Jeff, you’re gonna fix my hair fancy, ain’t you?” “We’ll see if a certain Princess can hold still long enough for me to finish,” I tease. Immediately, Mindy becomes as still as a stone statue. After a couple of minutes, I have to say, “Mindy, sweetheart, it’s okay to breathe. I just can’t have you bouncing, because I’m afraid it will cause me to pull your hair.” Mindy slumps down in her chair just slightly. “Okay Mr. Jeff, I was ascared you was gonna stop,” she whispers, her chin quivering. I adopt a very fake, very over-the-top French accent and say, “Oh no, Monsieur Jeff must complete Princess Mindy’s look to make the Kingdom happy. Mindy erupts with the first belly laugh I’ve heard all day as she responds, “Okay, I’ll try to be still, but it’s hard ‘cause I have the wiggles real bad.” I pat her on the shoulder and chuckle as I say, “Just try your best, sweetheart. That’s all anyone can ask.” Kiera comes screeching around the corner in a blur, plunks her purse on the table, and says breathlessly, “Geez-O-Pete, I can’t believe I’m late for the makeover. I love makeovers.” Kiera digs through her purse and produces two bottles of nail polish and nail kit. “It’s time for your mani/pedi ma’am. Would you prefer Pink Pearl or Frosted Creamsicle? Mindy raises her hand like a schoolchild and Kiera calls on her like a pupil, “I want Frosted Cream toes please,” Mindy answers. “Your wish is my command, my dear,” Kiera responds with a grin. For the next few minutes, Mindy gets the spa treatment of her life as I carefully French braid her hair into pigtails. As a special treat, I purchased some ribbons from the gift shop and I’m weaving them into her hair. I tuck a yellow rose behind her ear. I don my French accent as I declare, “Monsieur Jeffery pronounces Princess Mindy finished and fit to rule the kingdom.” Kiera hands Mindy a new tube of grape ChapStick from her purse, “Hold on, a true princess never reigns with chapped lips,” she says. Mindy giggles as she responds, “You’re silly, Miss Kiera. Nobody in my kingdom is going to care if my lips are shiny.” Kiera’s laugh sounds like wind chimes as she covers her face with her hands as she confesses, “Okay, you busted me. I just like to use it because it tastes yummy.” “Okay, I want some, please,” Mindy decides. Kiera is putting the last minute touches on her as Mindy is scrambling to stand on Kiera’s thighs so she can get a better look in the mirror. When I reach out to steady her, she grabs my hand in a death grip. I glance down at her. Her eyes are wide and her mouth is opening and closing like a fish. I shoot Kiera a worried glance, but she merely shrugs. “Holy Sh — !” Mindy stops short when she sees Kiera’s expression. “Mr. Jeff is an angel for reals because he turned me into one. Look at my hair Miss Kiera, there are magic ribbons in it! I’m perfect. I can be anything I want to be.” Spontaneously, we all join together in a group hug. I kiss the top of her head as I agree, “Yes, Mindy, you are amazing and the sky is the limit for you.

Okay.” The leader stood on the bed of his truck and clapped his hands over his head. “Listen up, everyone.” No one was really listening, though they had dressed right. Everyone was all in black. A few guys wore ski masks, and others had black marks on their cheeks like football players. Personally, I didn’t understand the need for the black camouflage. Caden had explained that the cops had already been looped in on the operation. A few of the lawns getting flocked tonight actually belonged to cops, and anyway the whole blending-with-the-night effect didn’t work when you were carrying a bright neon-pink flamingo. Still, I couldn’t deny the little spark of excitement building in my stomach. We were all standing in some guy’s driveway, and as I looked around, I seemed to be the only girl. These guys meant business. I was in the middle of a real life Call of Duty operation. The leader began speaking, his voice booming. “This is going to happen with precision and professionalism. No lingering, loitering, acting like stupid shits, and definitely no joking around. We’re not ladies. This isn’t going to be run like a bunch of pansy-shopping, pink-nail-polish pussies. You got that?!” I frowned, tucking my nails inside my jacket. “Every vehicle’s been filled with birds. The driver should have a text with all the locations, and the number of birds for each target. Pull up, find the group of birds labeled for that house, and work together. Take one bird a trip, two if you can manage, and ram those suckers down in the grass. Hurry back to the truck and keep going until all the birds for that location are in the ground. Shotgun Sally is in charge of hanging the sign on the bird closest to the street. Once the sign is hung, get back in the truck, and move to the next target. NO TALKING! This mission is all radio silent. Communicate with signals, and if you don’t know the appropriate signals, just SHUT THE HELL UP! Okay? Now, go flock some fuckers!

We need more baskets,” Pandora said triumphantly, entering the hall. The twins, who were clearly having a splendid time, had adorned themselves outlandishly. Cassandra was dressed in a green opera cloak with a jeweled feather ornament affixed to her hair. Pandora had tucked a light blue lace parasol beneath one arm, and a pair of lawn tennis rackets beneath the other, and was wearing a flowery diadem headdress that had slipped partially over one eye. “From the looks of it,” Kathleen said, “you’ve done enough shopping already.” Cassandra looked concerned. “Oh, no, we still have at least eighty departments to visit.” Kathleen couldn’t help glancing at Devon, who was trying, without success, to stifle a grin. It was the first time she had seen him truly smile in days. Enthusiastically the girls lugged the baskets to her and began to set objects on the counter in an unwieldy pile…perfumed soaps, powders, pomades, stockings, books, new corset laces and racks of hairpins, artificial flowers, tins of biscuits, licorice pastilles and barley sweets, a metal mesh tea infuser, hosiery tucked in little netted bags, a set of drawing pencils, and a tiny glass bottle filled with bright red liquid. “What is this?” Kathleen asked, picking up the bottle and viewing it suspiciously. “It’s a beautifier,” Pandora said. “Bloom of Rose,” Cassandra chimed in. Kathleen gasped as she realized what it was. “It’s rouge.” She had never even held a container of rouge before. Setting it on the counter, she said firmly, “No.” “But Kathleen--” “No to rouge,” she said, “now and for all time.” “We need to enhance our complexions,” Pandora protested. “It won’t do any harm,” Cassandra chimed in. “The bottle says that Bloom of Rose is ‘delicate and inoffensive’…It’s written right there, you see?” “The comments you would receive if you wore rouge in public would assuredly not be delicate or inoffensive. People would assume you were a fallen woman. Or worse, an actress.” Pandora turned to Devon. “Lord Trenear, what do you think?” “This is one of those times when it’s best for a man to avoid thinking altogether,” he said hastily.

Editing is the most obvious way of manipulating vision. And yet, the camera sometimes sees what you don’t - a person in the background, for example, or an object moving in the wind. I like these accidents. My first full-length film, Esperanza, was about a woman I befriended on the Lower East Side when I was a film student at NYU. Esperanza had hoarded nearly all the portable objects she had touched every day for thirty years: the Chock Full O’Nuts paper coffee cups, copies of the Daily News, magazines, gum wrappers, price tags, receipts, rubber bands, plastic bags from the 99-cent store where she did most of her shopping, piles of clothes, torn towels, and bric-a-brac she had found in the street. Esperanza’s apartment consisted of floor-to-ceiling stacks of stuff. At first sight, the crowded apartment appeared to be pure chaos, but Esperanza explained to me that her piles were not random. Her paper cups had their own corner. These crenellated towers of yellowing, disintegrating waxed cardboard stood next to piles of newspapers … One evening, however, while I was watching the footage from a day’s filming, I found myself scrutinizing a pile of rags beside Esperanza’s mattress. I noticed that there were objects carefully tucked in among the fraying bits of coloured cloth: rows of pencils, stones, matchbooks, business cards. It was this sighting that led to the “explanation.” She was keenly aware that the world at large disapproved of her “lifestyle,” and that there was little room left for her in the apartment, but when I asked her about the objects among the rags, she said that she wanted to “keep them safe and sound.” The rags were beds for the things. “Both the beds and the ones that lay down on them,” she told me, “are nice and comfy.” It turned out that Esperanza felt for each and every thing she saved, as if the tags and town sweaters and dishes and postcards and newspapers and toys and rags were imbued with thoughts and feelings. After she saw the film, my mother said that Esperanza appeared to believe in a form of “panpsychism.” Mother said that this meant that mind is a fundamental feature of the universe and exists in everything, from stones to people. She said Spinoza subscribed to this view, and “it was a perfectly legitimate philosophical position.” Esperanza didn’t know anything about Spinoza … My mother believed and I believe in really looking hard at things because, after a while, what you see isn’t at all what you thought you were seeing just a short time before. looking at any person or object carefully means that it will become increasingly strange, and you will see more and more. I wanted my film about this lonely woman to break down visual and cultural cliches, to be an intimate portrait, not a piece of leering voyeurism about woman’s horrible accumulations.

Hey, Emma, do you think Thor is a hunk?” Emma looked up from the orders to gaze at Georgie quizzically. “Are you talking about the mythological Norse god or the guy who played him in the movie?” “Either, both-- whatever.” Georgie returned to gazing out the shop window at the quiet main street of Scottsbluff. “The movie Thor is playing at the Midwest Theater this weekend. Looks like they’re having an Avenger movies marathon; must be getting ready for another sequel to come out soon. Anyway, it got me to thinking about how hunky Thor is. Actually it got me to thinking about hunky men, period.” “Oh yeah, it would. It doesn’t take much to send your mind in that direction. As for Thor, I think we can reasonably presume he’s a hunk. After all, he’d have to be to swing that giant hammer of his. That would take a lot of muscle and all of it in the right places. The actor in the movie definitely qualifies as a hunk and I choose to believe his portrayal is based on fact.” She grinned. “We should go see the movie so we can check out his hammer.” “That’s a deal.” Georgie also grinned, turning back to the window and giving a soft wolf whistle. “Hold on. Who’s this gorgeous specimen of manhood I see?” Emma joined Georgie at the window. “Whoa, I don’t know who he is, but he looks like he probably has a pretty big hammer of his own, even if he isn’t a Norse god.” “Down, girl. I saw him first so I’m calling dibs.” Georgie gave Emma a playful punch on the shoulder, eliciting a good natured chuckle. “Besides, how do you know he isn’t a Norse god?” “Would a Norse god wear a faded tee shirt tucked into tight jeans? And, what do you mean you’re calling dibs? I thought you’d given up on bad boys. He definitely looks like a bad boy.” “Yeah,” Georgie said sadly, “no more bad boys for me. Seriously though, Emma, aren’t all mythological gods known for their vanity? If they’d had tight jeans back in the days of the gods, that’s what they’d have worn for the sake of their godly vanity. I’m sure of it.

Diffuse light holding your curves in a delicate chiaroscuro. The tender valley just below your hip bone, my fingers just tucked below lace. Your neck as it dovetails into the shoulder, the pool between it and your collar bone. Above your heart, my heart, gleaming bright in the glow of morning. The slope rising from your lower back down to where it disappears into your leg, beckoning me with your smooth warm silk skin. A smile breaking across your cheeks, eyes, glorious mouth. Dark spun satin smoke framing deep soulful eyes that crackle with mischief, promise. But, if I had to pick a favorite thing on you... It would be my hands.

I’M SITTING at the counter in my favorite New York diner, tucking into eggs over easy with hash browns—very English, the breakfast fry-up, but very American, too. I’m washing it down with cranberry juice—caffeine is probably the only vice I don’t have—and someone turns on the radio. Most of the time, I don’t hear music. My brain just tunes it out. We’re all bombarded with some sort of music on a daily basis—in shops, TV commercials, restaurants, lifts—most of it simply noise pollution, deadening us to the real joy of music. So I only listen when I really want to. But the Puerto Rican waitress has turned on a Spanish channel, and a seductive salsa rhythm seeps into the room. It’s a charanga band—a traditional group that uses flute and violin over the standard latin rhythm section of congas, bongos, and timbales—and now I’m half-listening. Then the violinist takes a solo, and I’m hooked. He’s a great, inspired player. The band is playing a simple three-chord vamp, and he follows the chords closely, and yet still manages to come up with witty, ingenious, melodic twists. And the way he plays with the time! Dragging a phrase, and then ending it right on the beat. Setting up syncopations—accents that go against the beat—and then turning them around, playing them backwards. Then he hits an unexpected high note, and it’s like a shaft of light going right through my body, filling me with warmth. Without even thinking, I cry out—“Yeah!” or “All right!” or something—and I marvel at the way that music, after all these years, can still surprise me. The guy next to me just goes on munching his cheeseburger. But something special has happened, even if I’m the only one who knows it. The band on the radio are most likely second- or third-generation Puerto Ricans who were raised uptown, way uptown—in the Bronx—in a different world from me. But through the music, they’ve connected with an Englishman way downtown, in a way that would otherwise never happen.

Getting It Right" Your ankles make me want to party, want to sit and beg and roll over under a pair of riding boots with your ankles hidden inside, sweating beneath the black tooled leather; they make me wish it was my birthday so I could blow out their candles, have them hung over my shoulders like two bags full of money. Your ankles are two monster-truck engines but smaller and lighter and sexier than a saucer with warm milk licking the outside edge; they make me want to sing, make me want to take them home and feed them pasta, I want to punish them for being bad and then hold them all night long and say I’m sorry, sugar, darling, it will never happen again, not in a million years. Your thighs make me quiet. Make me want to be hurled into the air like a cannonball and pulled down again like someone being pulled into a van. Your thighs are two boats burned out of redwood trees. I want to go sailing. Your thighs, the long breath of them under the blue denim of your high-end jeans, could starve me to death, could make me cry and cry. Your ass is a shopping mall at Christmas, a holy place, a hill I fell in love with once when I was falling in love with hills. Your ass is a string quartet, the northern lights tucked tightly into bed between a high-count-of-cotton sheets. Your back is the back of a river full of fish; I have my tackle and tackle box. You only have to say the word. Your back, a letter I have been writing for fifteen years, a smooth stone, a moan someone makes when his hair is pulled, your back like a warm tongue at rest, a tongue with a tab of acid on top; your spine is an alphabet, a ladder of celestial proportions. I am navigating the North and South of it. Your armpits are beehives, they make me want to spin wool, want to pour a glass of whiskey, your armpits dripping their honey, their heat, their inexhaustible love-making dark. I am bright yellow for them. I am always thinking about them, resting at your side or high in the air when I’m pulling off your shirt. Your arms of blue and ice with the blood running to make them believe in God. Your shoulders make me want to raise an arm and burn down the Capitol. They sing to each other underneath your turquoise slope-neck blouse. Each is a separate bowl of rice steaming and covered in soy sauce. Your neck is a skyscraper of erotic adult videos, a swan and a ballet and a throaty elevator made of light. Your neck is a scrim of wet silk that guides the dead into the hours of Heaven. It makes me want to die, your mouth, which is the mouth of everything worth saying. It’s abalone and coral reef. Your mouth, which opens like the legs of astronauts who disconnect their safety lines and ride their stars into the billion and one voting districts of the Milky Way. Darling, you’re my President; I want to get this right! Matthew Dickman, The New Yorker: Poems | August 29, 2011 Issue

MY LORD, when you ask me to tell the court in my own words, this is what I shall say. I am kept locked up here like some exotic animal, last survivor of a species they had thought extinct. They should let in people to view me, the girl-eater, svelte and dangerous, padding to and fro in my cage, my terrible green glance flickering past the bars, give them something to dream about, tucked up cosy in their beds of a night. After my capture they clawed at each other to get a look at me. They would have paid money for the privilege, I believe. They shouted abuse, and shook their fists at me, showing their teeth. It was unreal, somehow, frightening yet comic, the sight of them there, milling on the pavement like film extras, young men in cheap raincoats, and women with shopping bags, and one or two silent, grizzled characters who just stood, fixed on me hungrily, haggard with envy. Then a guard threw a blanket over my head and bundled me into a squad car. I laughed. There was something irresistibly funny in the way reality, banal as ever, was fulfilling my worst fantasies.

The stores Mallory passed were closed, the late hour keeping everyone tucked in their beds. The windows to the shops were barred, and the cracked pavement and garbage-littered sidewalk matched the broken streetlights above. The lights that did work flickered, and despite their guidance, the path she walked was still darker than she would have liked.

about the woods. Nobody understood why he chose to live alone tucked in the forest instead of in the free wheeling dorms near the fly shop, but at

Her eyes flashed up at him, then back down at the box. She opened it eagerly. Inside lay the cameo necklace he had seen the new housemaid pawn at a shop in Weavering Street. “You bought it back for me,” she breathed, eyes shining. “You have no idea what this means—it was a gift from my father.” He nodded. “There is more.” She looked inside the box again. Under the cameo lay a piece of thick paper. She extracted it and handed him the box to hold. She turned the paper over, revealing the small watercolor of Lime Tree Lodge. Her brow puckered. “Thank you, but you might have kept it. I wouldn’t have minded.” He tucked his chin as though offended, and insisted, “I spent a great deal of money on it.” “On this?” She raised her fair brows, incredulous. “Not on the painting. On Lime Tree Lodge itself.” She stared at him, stunned. “You didn’t . . .” “I did.” “But . . . my solicitor told me some vicar was very keen on buying it.” “He was. But I was keener.” “How did you . . . Forgive me, but I know you needed every shilling for Fairbourne Hall and to repair your ship.” “True.” “Then, how?” “I sold my ship. The damage did not lower its value as much as I had feared, and it brought a good price. Besides, I have no need of it any longer.

There was an infinite, empty place her mother’s love used to fill when she held her, tucked her into bed, packed her lunch, let her push the shopping cart, her mother squeezing her hand as they walked—bum-bum, bum-bum—like a heartbeat, a secret way to say, “I love you,” her mother saying, “My beautiful girl, how’d I get so lucky that you’re mine?” Even these little things had been turned immense in loss, memories that made her tuck her knees to her chest under the covers and fold around her newly hollowed center.

After completing her work for Monsieur, she made some of the specialties she'd developed at her shop in Amalfi, including her gianduiotto, raspberry truffles, and lemon-shaped sfusato amalfitano truffles dusted with sea salt. She tucked these into gold paper-covered boxes, along with her delicately flavored violet truffles, the blood orange and roasted pistachio truffles, and the basil, mint, and limoncello in dark chocolate. On the top layer, she nestled her chocolate stars.

if there was a business in their neighborhood that didn’t make any sense, which had no customers, then it was a front for a drugs business. Always. No real customers needed, no real profit needed, just a way of washing money. Every town had one, tucked away somewhere in a little row of shops or in the railway arches, or sat next to a Carpet Right.

I smile at Margaret as she picks up the small jar from the counter and tucks it discreetly into her handbag. Not that she has any need to hide the innocuous-looking lotion. It’s labelled ‘Vanilla Moisturiser’ and the ingredients listed on it are all organic. It’s the spell that’s been cast over it that makes it something more. Okay, I’ll be honest. It’s a love potion. But not the kind that takes away the object’s free will. That would be unethical. No, this is a concoction that makes observers see the wearer’s good qualities in stark relief. Like turning up the volume on your best physical features and most endearing personality traits. If the object of your desire falls in love with you because of it, then all the better, but there are no guarantees, as I tell all of my customers.

There was a biography of J. S. Bach in the box, and when I opened it up I found a piece of greaseproof paper, carefully folded to enclose a rose. The paper crackled as I unbent it, but didn’t break; the rose seemed more brittle than the wrapping, and I held my breath over it, not wanting to touch it with anything at all, in case I broke it apart. The petals might have been pink, once, but they had become a dusty grey, tucked away from air and light. I refolded it in the paper and pinned it on the ‘Found in a Book’ noticeboard at the front of the shop, wondering who had saved it, and why; whether it had been pressed on an impulse and forgotten, or whether it was a symbol of something more significant. I find the fact that I’ll never know quite comforting. It’s good to be reminded that the world is full of stories that are, potentially, at least as painful as yours.

We can also press reset on our expectation buttons. If you expect to buy takeaway for your midday meal everyday, you may be calibrated to feel that lunch is only worth looking forward to if it comes from a shop. Expect instead to always bring a packed lunch, and you’ll gradually forget about the greasy displays in the shop windows, and will look forward to tucking into your roast-dinner leftovers lunchbox enormously.

view, returning from the corner shop. He hadn’t shaved or combed his hair. His shirt wasn’t tucked in. He carried

The Beginning Sergeant Smelly was a normal man. He lived in a normal village, full of normal people and had a normal address. He lived at 1 Normall Street in the village of Normall Normall. The village was so normal they named it twice. His first name was eighty-three percent normal—Norman. Most people knew him as Normal Norman from Normall Normall; a rotund and jolly man who lived an exceedingly normal life. Well, normal, if appearing in court on exploding fart charges was normal. Normal, if producing fire from your butt was normal. All of his body parts were normal. Apart from one: his butt. His butt was abnormal. It used to be a normal butt, but everything changed in the blink of a fart. Sergeant Smelly's face glistened with sweat and his heartbeats quickened as the judge read out the charge. "Sergeant Smelly, you are here today because you could not control your soldiers, not to mention your bottom. You are hereby charged with the crime of producing exploding fire-farts. How do you plead?" asked Army Judge Mental. The stout sergeant considered the question and his thoughts transported him back to the day it all went smelly. One fateful morning, Sergeant Smelly lay in bed suffering from a horrible cold. Empty boxes lay scattered across the floor, and the bin overflowed with used tissues. He groaned as he pulled the last tissue from the box. A passer-by in the street below jumped as he heard the foghorn sound. He inspected the contents of the tissue (Sergeant Smelly, not the passer-by) and wished he had not. It was time for action. The suffering soldier dragged himself out of bed and got dressed. He wore a waterproof jacket on top of his uniform, as his army blazer was not snot-proof. Not that any of his other clothes were snot-proof. He trudged downstairs and made himself a hot lemon with honey, then switched on his laptop. After an extensive internet search, he found the best remedy to fix the cold was to feed it, so he plodded into town and searched for a place to eat. The first eatery he found had a ridiculous name, but the café was almost full. He watched the customers from the window as they tucked into their food. The plain wooden tables and basic white tablecloths oozed simplicity, but the gorgeous grub eclipsed the plain interior. Silence filled the air as customers tucked into delectable dishes and drifted off to food heaven.  But an odorous pong emanated from the café, and it was not the food. Sergeant Smelly did not smell the malodorous stench due to his blocked nose and cold. The cold was so bad it came alive. Colin the Cold smelled the awful pong and begged his owner to reconsider. He tried in vain to turn his attention to the sandwich shop, but Sergeant Smelly did not hear him. Colin the Cold saw disaster around the corner. Major Disaster walked around the corner and greeted him in a bright and cheery fashion. "Morning, Smelly," said Major Disaster in a bright and cheery fashion. Colin the Cold was correct and sensed nothing good would come of Sergeant Smelly eating at Café McPoo. It had Disaster Area written all over it, but the police apprehended the graffiti artist, and he was hard at work wiping the words ‘Disaster Area’ from the front of the café. Colin the Cold frowned and prepared himself for the worst. And so it began.

Miranda laughed. She missed her friend. She missed New York, the sheer wattage of the place, its mighty abundance, its chaos, its kinetic energy a comfort somehow. How long ago was it, those idyllic years, set free in the city to explore as she liked, to discover some cheap noodle shop or boho boutique or obscure sculpture garden tucked away somewhere in Queens?

It happens the same way every time. The woman usually stands in front of the mirror for a while, turning this way and that, checking to be certain it isn't an illusion. And, when she is at last sure it's real, a blissful smile spreads into her cheeks and flushes through her whole body. In the mirror she sees herself as she truly is: beautiful, powerful, able to do anything. And she sees that the thing she wants most of all, the thing that seemed so impossible when she first stepped into the little dress shop, is really so possible, so close, that she could reach out and touch it. "Yes," Etta says then, "as easy as pie. Speaking of which, the bookshop on the corner does the most delicious cherry pie. You really should try some." The woman nods then, still slightly stunned, and agrees, saying that pie sounds like a perfect idea. So she stumbles out of the shop in a daze, new dress tucked tightly in her arms, and wanders down All Saints' Passage to the bookshop. There, she has the best piece of cherry pie she's ever eaten and leaves with a stack of books that will make the transformation complete.

Across the water, there’s La Cabaña, the infamous prison Che Guevara ran after the revolution. The sight of it sends a chill down my spine when I think about the blood shed there, the lives lost. There’s a violence to our history that gets lost somewhere in the telling, buried beneath the beautiful scenery, the deceptively blue sea and sky, the palm trees swaying placidly in the breeze. It’s the sound of firing squads that echo in the wind. “They’ve built shops there now, a restaurant,” Luis murmurs, his body tucked away from the tourists, his mouth hidden in the curve of my neck. “You can gawk at the world’s largest cigar in the site where we bled.

There’s no shortcut to becoming a good father. It takes showing sincere interest in our children’s lives. It involves tucking them in at night, praying with them at mealtimes, and sharing our difficulties and successes with them. It means taking our daughters on dates, or taking our sons on adventures. To be a good father, we need to wrestle, read, fish, tickle, shop, camp, and play games with our children. Fatherhood requires time.

The good news was that he wasn't sixteen anymore and he had this, his art. His food. And if this dinner continued to go the way it was going, if Mrs. Raje stood by her word and gave DJ the contract for her son's fund-raising dinner next month based on tonight's success... well, then they'd be fine. Mrs. Raje had been more impressed thus far. Everything from the steamed momos to the dum biryani had turned out just so. The mayor of San Francisco had even asked to speak to DJ after tasting the California blue crab with bitter coconut cream and tucked DJ's card into his wallet. Only dessert remained, and dessert was DJ's crowning glory, his true love. With sugar he could make love to taste buds, make adult humans sob. The reason Mina Raje had given him, a foreigner and a newbie, a shot at tonight was his Arabica bean gelato with dark caramel. DJ had created the dessert for her after spending a week researching her. Not just her favorite restaurants, but where she shopped, how she wore her clothes, what made her laugh, even the perfume she wore and how much. The taste buds drew from who you were. How you reacted to taste as a sense was a culmination of how you processed the world, the most primal form of how you interacted with your environment. It was DJ's greatest strength and weakness, needing to know what exact note of flavor unfurled a person. His need to find that chord and strum it was bone deep.