Z Movie Quotes

So I hear we get to go to town this weekend. Want to catch a movie or something? --Z P.S. That is, if Jimmy doesn't mind. Translation: This weekend might be a good chance for us to see each other outside our school in a social environment, free of competetiton. I do not view other boys as threats, and I enjoy making them seem insignificant by calling them the wrong names. (Translation by Macey McHenry)

The staircase that was revealed was lit with a soft red glow. I feel like I'm walking down into a porn movie," V muttered as they took the steps with care. Wouldn't that require more black candles for you," Zsadist cracked. At the bottom of the landing, they looked left and right down a corridor carved out of stone, seeing row after row of...black candles with ruby color flames. I take that back," Z said, eyeing the display. We start hearing chick-a-wow-wow shit," V cut in, "can I start calling you Z-packed?" Not if you want to keep breathing.

So let me help you out. My favorite color is-hell, I don't know. I've never cared enough to think about it. My favorite movie is-what else-ZOMBIELAND. But not because the good guys win in the end, though that's a plus, but because Emma Stone is hot." I snorted. He was SUCH a guy. "My favorite band is-" "Let me guess," I interjected. "White Zombie? Slayer?" "Red. And no, not just because I want zombies to bleed.What about you? Who do you like? Because honestly, I'm surprised you know White Z and Slayer." "I like Red,too, but I'm partial to Skillet. Used to listen to them with my sister. But why wouldn't I know the other bands?" "You look so angelic." "And do you think angels are hot?" I asked primly, trying to play it cool so that I wouldn't reveal what a mess I was on the inside. All this time, he'd wanted to get to know me and date me. What craziness! "The hottest.

We give violent movies a pass but come down hard on a rapper like Scarface, who is ultimately a storyteller just like Brian de Palma. And neither of them is responsible for the poverty and violence that really do shape people's lives--not to mention their individual choices.

Christy said. "It's just weird, your seeing him like that. What are you going to do?" "Nothing. What can I do?" "Maybe he'll call you to see if you're okay," Katie said. "No," Christy said, "in the movies he would have told his friend to stop the car, and he would have run back to you with an umbrella and walked you the rest of the way hoe, and you would have made him a pot of tea." Sierra laughed. "I am drinking tea right now," she said. "Maybe my life is a low budget 'B' movie, and all I get is the tea. No hero. No umbrella." "Yeah, well then my life is a class 'Z' movie," Katie said. "No tea. No hero. No umbrella. No plot--" "Yours is more of a mystery," Christy interrupted cheerfully. "The ending will surprise all of us.

Uh, do you want a job?" "I got one." "Oh." I wasn't sure why I had assumed he was unemployed. "Okay." "Sure." "Sure, what?" "I want a job." "You just said you already had a job." "I do. I got two. But if you're hirin', I'll quit one off 'em. It hella sucks anyway." I didn't know what "helasux" was, but i wasn't about to ask. "Can you organize all these movies?" "Easy." "When can you start?" He smiled at me. "Now.

Human Millipede 6 was the highest-grossing movie of the summer and returned Nicholas Cage to Oscar-winning status.

The books must be read, not seen in a movie.

For now, the Simple Daily Practice means doing ONE thing every day. Try any one of these things each day: A) Sleep eight hours. B) Eat two meals instead of three. C) No TV. D) No junk food. E) No complaining for one whole day. F) No gossip. G) Return an e-mail from five years ago. H) Express thanks to a friend. I) Watch a funny movie or a stand-up comic. J) Write down a list of ideas. The ideas can be about anything. K) Read a spiritual text. Any one that is inspirational to you. The Bible, The Tao te Ching, anything you want. L) Say to yourself when you wake up, “I’m going to save a life today.” Keep an eye out for that life you can save. M) Take up a hobby. Don’t say you don’t have time. Learn the piano. Take chess lessons. Do stand-up comedy. Write a novel. Do something that takes you out of your current rhythm. N) Write down your entire schedule. The schedule you do every day. Cross out one item and don’t do that anymore. O) Surprise someone. P) Think of ten people you are grateful for. Q) Forgive someone. You don’t have to tell them. Just write it down on a piece of paper and burn the paper. It turns out this has the same effect in terms of releasing oxytocin in the brain as actually forgiving them in person. R) Take the stairs instead of the elevator. S) I’m going to steal this next one from the 1970s pop psychology book Don’t Say Yes When You Want to Say No: when you find yourself thinking of that special someone who is causing you grief, think very quietly, “No.” If you think of him and (or?) her again, think loudly, “No!” Again? Whisper, “No!” Again, say it. Louder. Yell it. Louder. And so on. T) Tell someone every day that you love them. U) Don’t have sex with someone you don’t love. V) Shower. Scrub. Clean the toxins off your body. W) Read a chapter in a biography about someone who is an inspiration to you. X) Make plans to spend time with a friend. Y) If you think, “Everything would be better off if I were dead,” then think, “That’s really cool. Now I can do anything I want and I can postpone this thought for a while, maybe even a few months.” Because what does it matter now? The planet might not even be around in a few months. Who knows what could happen with all these solar flares. You know the ones I’m talking about. Z) Deep breathing. When the vagus nerve is inflamed, your breathing becomes shallower. Your breath becomes quick. It’s fight-or-flight time! You are panicking. Stop it! Breathe deep. Let me tell you something: most people think “yoga” is all those exercises where people are standing upside down and doing weird things. In the Yoga Sutras, written in 300 B.C., there are 196 lines divided into four chapters. In all those lines, ONLY THREE OF THEM refer to physical exercise. It basically reads, “Be able to sit up straight.” That’s it. That’s the only reference in the Yoga Sutras to physical exercise. Claudia always tells me that yogis measure their lives in breaths, not years. Deep breathing is what keeps those breaths going.

THE SOUNDTRACK OF WES AND LIZ Someone Like You | Van Morrison Paper Rings | Taylor Swift Lovers | Anna of the North ocean eyes | Billie Eilish Bad Liar | Selena Gomez Public Service Announcement (Interlude) | Jay-Z Up All Night | Mac Miller How Would You Feel (Paean) | Ed Sheeran Hello Operator | The White Stripes Paradise | Bazzi Sabotage | Beastie Boys Feelin’ Alright | Joe Cocker Someone Like You | Adele Monkey Wrench | Foo Fighters Bella Luna | Jason Mraz Forrest Gump | Frank Ocean Electric (feat. Khalid) | Alina Baraz Kiss | Tom Jones Enter Sandman | Metallica Death with Dignity | Sufjan Stevens We Are Young | fun. feat. Janelle Monáe New Year’s Day | Taylor Swift River | Joni Mitchell

Kanye lied when he said diamonds are forever When the heat is high, it’s the same as lead on paper We gradually recreate the movie World War Z Our worst disease becomes our best form of remedy Moving sands, no firm ground, we live in fear We join hands, bottle down, pop the Belvedere Now the question is have we all punched our clocks? Social media, we fit in a damn box

Kanye lied when he said diamonds are forever When the heat is high, it’s the same as lead on paper We gradually recreate the movie World War Z Our worst disease becomes our best form of remedy Moving sands, no firm ground, we live in fear We join hands, bottle down, pop the Belvedere Now the question is have we all punched our clocks? Social media, we fit in a damn box

What's your pick?" "Jesus Camp" "Never heard of it, Is it a slasher flick?" 'It's a documentary." We all laughed but he didn't seem to be joking. "I'm telling you, if that movie doesn't scare you, nothing will." Jared looked at hi in astonishment. "A documentary about religion?" "It's not about religion. It's about fanaticism. Not the same thing." Angelo was looking thoughtful, and I knew we'd have a copy by the end of the month.

I know that gen Z has it tough—they’re losing their proms and graduations to the quarantine, they’re on deck to bear the full brunt of climate catastrophe, and they’re inheriting a carcass of a society that’s been fattened up and picked clean by the billionaire class, leaving them with virtually no shot at a life without crushing financial and existential anxiety, let alone any fantasy of retiring from their thankless toil or leaving anything of value to their own children. That’s bad. BUT, counterpoint! Millennials have to deal with a bunch of that same stuff, kind of, PLUS we had to be teenagers when American Pie came out!... American Pie absolutely captivated a generation because my generation is tacky as hell. “I have a hot girlfriend but she doesn’t want to have sex” was an entire genre of movies in the ’90s. In the ’90s, people loved it when things were “raunchy” (ew!). Every guy at my high school wanted to be Stifler! Can you imagine what that kind of an environment does to a person? To be of the demographic that has a Ron Burgundy quote for every occasion, without the understanding that Ron Burgundy is a satire? This is why we have Jenny McCarthy, I’m pretty sure, and, by extension, the great whooping cough revival of 2014. Thanks a lot, jocks!

Alex Honnold, free solo climbing phenom: The Last of the Mohicans soundtrack Rolf Potts, author of Vagabonding and others: ambitones like The Zen Effect in the key of C for 30 minutes, made by Rolfe Kent, the composer of music for movies like Sideways, Wedding Crashers, and Legally Blonde Matt Mullenweg, lead developer of WordPress, CEO of Automattic: “Everyday” by A$AP Rocky and “One Dance” by Drake Amelia Boone, the world’s most successful female obstacle course racer: “Tonight Tonight” by the Smashing Pumpkins and “Keep Your Eyes Open” by NEEDTOBREATHE Chris Young, mathematician and experimental chef: Paul Oakenfold’s “Live at the Rojan in Shanghai,” Pete Tong’s Essential Mix Jason Silva, TV and YouTube philosopher: “Time” from the Inception soundtrack by Hans Zimmer Chris Sacca: “Harlem Shake” by Baauer and “Lift Off” by Jay Z and Kanye West, featuring Beyoncé. “I can bang through an amazing amount of email with the Harlem Shake going on in the background.” Tim Ferriss: Currently I’m listening to “Circulation” by Beats Antique and “Black Out the Sun” by Sevendust, depending on whether I need flow or a jumpstart.

Walking back through the mall to the exit nearest our part of the parking lot, we passed one shop which sold computers, printers, software, and games. It was packed with teenagers, the kind who wear wire rims and know what the new world is about. The clerks were indulgent, letting them program the computers. Two hundred yards away, near the six movie houses, a different kind of teenager shoved quarters into the space-war games, tensing over the triggers, releasing the eerie sounds of extraterrestrial combat. Any kid back in the computer store could have told the combatants that because there is no atmosphere in space, there is absolutely no sound at all. Perfect distribution: the future managers and the future managed ones. Twenty in the computer store, two hundred in the arcade. The future managers have run on past us into the thickets of CP/M, M-Basic, Cobal, Fortran, Z-80, Apples, and Worms. Soon the bosses of the microcomputer revolution will sell us preprogrammed units for each household which will provide entertainment, print out news, purvey mail-order goods, pay bills, balance accounts, keep track of expenses, and compute taxes. But by then the future managers will be over on the far side of the thickets, dealing with bubble memories, machines that design machines, projects so esoteric our pedestrian minds cannot comprehend them. It will be the biggest revolution of all, bigger than the wheel, bigger than Franklin’s kite, bigger than paper towels.

Olo-keZ G-- a tc There is an appointed time for everything. And there is a time for every event under heaven. -ECCLESIASTES 3:1 What would we do without our day planners? I have a large one for my desk and a carry-all that goes with me. I don't know how a person functions without some type of organizer. I just love it; it truly has become my daily-calendar bible. I take it with me everywhere. My whole life is in that book. Each evening I peek in to see what tomorrow has to bring. I just love to see a busy calendar; it makes me feel so alive. I've got this to do and that to do. Then I come upon a day that has all white space. Not one thing to do. What, oh what, will I do to fill the space and time? That's the way I used to think and plan. All my spaces had appointments written down, and many times they even overlapped. I now plan for white spaces. I even plan ahead weeks or months and black out "saved for me or my family" days. I have begun to realize that there are precious times for myself and my loved ones. Bob and I really try to protect these saved spaces just for us. We may not go anywhere or do anything out of the ordinary, but it's our special time. We can do anything we want: sleep in, stay out late, go to lunch, read a book, go to a movie, or take a nap. I really look forward with great anticipation to when these white spaces appear on my calendar. I've been so impressed when I've read biographies of famous people. Many of them are controllers of their own time. They don't let outsiders dictate their schedules. Sure, there are times when things have to be done on special days, but generally that isn't the case. When we begin to control our calendars, we will find that our lives are more enjoyable and that the tensions of life are more manageable. Make those white spaces your friend, not your enemy.

My sisters and I giggled at “Dance: Ten; Looks: Three” (“Tits and ass / bought myself a fancy pair / tightened up the derriere”) while our parents sat in the front of the car—my father at the wheel, my mom in the passenger seat—both distracted and nonplussed. We flipped through the Jacqueline Susann and Harold Robbins hardbacks in my grandmother’s bookshelf and watched The Exorcist on the Z Channel (the country’s first pay-cable network that premiered in LA in the mid-’70s) after our parents sternly told us not to watch it, but of course we did anyway and got properly freaked out. We saw skits about people doing cocaine on Saturday Night Live, and we were drawn to the allure of disco culture and unironic horror movies. We consumed all of this and none of it ever triggered us—we were never wounded because the darkness and the bad mood of the era was everywhere, and when pessimism was the national language, a badge of hipness and cool. Everything was a scam and everybody was corrupt and we were all being raised on a diet of grit. One could argue that this fucked us all up, or maybe, from another angle, it made us stronger. Looking back almost forty years later, it probably made each of us less of a wuss. Yes, we were sixth and seventh graders dealing with a society where no parental filters existed. Tube8.com was not within our reach, fisting videos were not available on our phones, nor were Fifty Shades of Grey or gangster rap or violent video games, and terrorism hadn’t yet reached our shores, but we were children wandering through a world made almost solely for adults. No one cared what we watched or didn’t, how we felt or what we wanted, and we hadn’t yet become enthralled by the cult of victimization. It was, by comparison to what’s now acceptable when children are coddled into helplessness, an age of innocence.

Try any one of these things each day: A) Sleep eight hours. B) Eat two meals instead of three. C) No TV. D) No junk food. E) No complaining for one whole day. F) No gossip. G) Return an e-mail from five years ago. H) Express thanks to a friend. I) Watch a funny movie or a stand-up comic. J) Write down a list of ideas. The ideas can be about anything. K) Read a spiritual text. Any one that is inspirational to you. The Bible, The Tao te Ching, anything you want. L) Say to yourself when you wake up, “I’m going to save a life today.” Keep an eye out for that life you can save. M) Take up a hobby. Don’t say you don’t have time. Learn the piano. Take chess lessons. Do stand-up comedy. Write a novel. Do something that takes you out of your current rhythm. N) Write down your entire schedule. The schedule you do every day. Cross out one item and don’t do that anymore. O) Surprise someone. P) Think of ten people you are grateful for. Q) Forgive someone. You don’t have to tell them. Just write it down on a piece of paper and burn the paper. It turns out this has the same effect in terms of releasing oxytocin in the brain as actually forgiving them in person. R) Take the stairs instead of the elevator. S) I’m going to steal this next one from the 1970s pop psychology book Don’t Say Yes When You Want to Say No: when you find yourself thinking of that special someone who is causing you grief, think very quietly, “No.” If you think of him and (or?) her again, think loudly, “No!” Again? Whisper, “No!” Again, say it. Louder. Yell it. Louder. And so on. T) Tell someone every day that you love them. U) Don’t have sex with someone you don’t love. V) Shower. Scrub. Clean the toxins off your body. W) Read a chapter in a biography about someone who is an inspiration to you. X) Make plans to spend time with a friend. Y) If you think, “Everything would be better off if I were dead,” then think, “That’s really cool. Now I can do anything I want and I can postpone this thought for a while, maybe even a few months.” Because what does it matter now? The planet might not even be around in a few months. Who knows what could happen with all these solar flares. You know the ones I’m talking about. Z) Deep breathing. When the vagus nerve is inflamed, your breathing becomes shallower. Your breath becomes quick. It’s fight-or-flight time! You are panicking. Stop it! Breathe deep. Let me tell you something: most people think “yoga” is all those exercises where people are standing upside down and doing weird things. In the Yoga Sutras, written in 300 B.C., there are 196 lines divided into four chapters. In all those lines, ONLY THREE OF THEM refer to physical exercise. It basically reads, “Be able to sit up straight.” That’s it. That’s the only reference in the Yoga Sutras to physical exercise. Claudia always tells me that yogis measure their lives in breaths, not years. Deep breathing is what keeps those breaths going.

I remember an interesting example of how flexibility in these rules was offered to loyal munims who had to remain away from their families for months. Once, when a munimji returned, I was asked to take a report on the expenditure from him and submit it to my grandfather. This particular munimji was very meticulous. He started dictating the list of expenses for about two months of his travel. I was dutifully noting these down and tallying the figures. One of the items he listed was Rs 15 for ‘change of oil’. This was a bit perplexing for me, as he did not use any vehicle. So I asked him, ‘Munimji, ye kiska tel badalwaya tha? Koi truck tha kya?’ (What was the oil change for? Was it for some truck?) He looked away and did not reply. But my grandfather heard. He gently but firmly told me to write it down but not question the munimji. The matter ended there for the moment. But the question remained with me. I couldn’t understand why a meticulous person like my grandfather would allow a suspicious-looking expense without questioning. The answer came to me some days later. The munimji had been away from his home and family for more than two months. So this sum of Rs 15 had been spent as entertainment. But this was not the cost of some movie or mela. He had probably visited a kothewali, a lady of the night. Such expenses were allowed as Dadaji was pragmatic about it. The only issue was that such expenses had to be listed under other categories.

I enjoyed the movies but did not like the restrictions on watching them. A relative and I devised a clever way to watch movies. If we were away from the shop or home for three hours, there were questions to be answered. How could we stay away and still watch a movie? I collaborated with Satya Narain. He was my age, even though he was my father’s cousin. We would buy one movie ticket and watch one half at a time. I would watch the first half and return home after oneand-a-half hours. He would watch the second half. The next day we would swap the roles and watch the other halves. This way we would not be away long enough to attract suspicion. There were only two cinema halls and both were less than ten minutes’ cycle-ride away. We could return to work quickly since the halls were so close.

My legs are still shaking. I was gone for less than twenty minutes and only went about half a mile, but I feel like I’m back from a tour in Vietnam. This is really fucked up. I thought I’d feel like the hero of an action movie. Truth is, I feel like prey who doesn’t know where the hunters are.

Another challenge to mindful listening is that the average person speaks at a rate of 125 words per minute, yet we can process up to 500 words per minute. During that lag time, you can think about your to-do list or you can listen mindfully by using that time to summarize what the speaker has said so far or see the possibilities in what the speaker is proposing. You can also note the emphasis in his voice or the degree of concern in his gestures and facial expressions. When you are in the speaker’s movie, you use your resources to be a competent, intelligent listener.

Hugh Liedtke had a simple rule of thumb: Pick a name that started with either A or Z, so you would be first or last in the telephone listings. With that in mind, the team chose Zapata Petroleum Corporation, after the Marlon Brando movie Viva Zapata!, which was playing in Midland.

Kanye lied when he said diamonds are forever When the heat is high, it’s the same as lead on paper We gradually recreate the movie World War Z Our worst disease becomes our best form of remedy Moving sands, no firm ground, we live in fear We join hands, bottle down, pop the Belvedere Now the question is have we all punched our clocks Social media, we fit in a damn box

We have all manner of music glorifying the degradation of women, and damnit, that music is catchy so I often find myself singing along as my very being is diminished. Singers like Robin Thicke know “we want it.” Rappers like Jay-Z use the word “bitch” like punctuation. Movies, more often than not, tell the stories of men as if men’s stories are the only stories that matter. When women are involved, they are sidekicks, the romantic interests, the afterthoughts. Rarely do women get to be the center of attention. Rarely do our stories get to matter.

I’d also toyed with calling him Caverat before that ‒ which I’ll explain in a minute. Anyway, Twitch was the nickname of the kid that took Zero's place and who I named Z after when he ran away in Holes ‒ which is still my favorite book ever. Now that I think about it, it's probably my favorite movie too. Not only that but my other cat’s name was X-Ray. He was mostly black but had several white markings that looked sorta like fuzzy bones ‒ with one in particular running down his left hind leg about where his tibia would show up in an actual x-ray. So I probably would've called him X-Ray no matter what but it sure didn't hurt that it's the name of the leader of the kids at Camp Green Lake. I even considered Stanley before that ‒ who's the book’s main character and of course, the star of its’ movie. Before that that, I’d actually debated calling him Bob ‒ if you can believe it. But cats shouldn't have regular old people names as far as I'm concerned ‒ with maybe just a few exceptions. I decided that neither Bob ‒ which only came up in the first place because I like palindromes ‒ nor Stanley were one of 'em. Even besides the bone-like birthmarks making X-Ray the obvious choice. To be honest, it was Nat's suggestion anyway. Back to Stanley though, even though his nickname at Camp Green Lake was Caveman, I decided against Cave-cat right away. But it did seem to fit Twitch since he was hiding under the china cabinet and all. Another name I’d thought about before she brought up X-Ray was Yelnats ‒ which is Stanley's last name and the emordnilap of his first ‒ and plenty un-regular-old-people-like enough but as I pointed out at the time, we already had a Nat in the house who yells. That made her laugh but it wasn't exactly true plus on top of it, I ended up having to admit that her idea was better all along. By the way, if you didn’t know it, an emordnilap is the reverse of a word or phrase that isn't a nonsense string but also isn’t a palindrome ‒ which spells the same thing forwards and backwards. Other palindromes besides ‘Bob’ are 'refer'; ‘bird rib’; 'a nut for a jar of tuna’; ‘borrow or rob?’; ‘racecar’; ‘Yo banana boy!’; 'deified'; ‘Go Hang a Salami, I'm a Lasagna Hog’ ‒ or like I already half mentioned… Stanley Yelnats. Emordnilaps make a new one instead ‒ such as ‘live’ and ‘evil’; ‘lived’ and ‘devil’; ‘dog’ and ‘god’; ‘stressed’ and ‘desserts’; ‘stops’ and ‘spots’; or ‘keep reward’ and ‘drawer peek’. As you’ve probably figured out already, ‘emordnilap’ is the emordnilap of ‘palindrome’ so therefore ‘palindrome’ is not a palindrome.

was going to play Star Wars, Dragonball Z, Sky landers, watch movies, catch up on all my fav cartoons and TV shows, overdose on Minecraft and eat chocolate and ice-cream straight from the container. Man it was going to be an insanely cool holiday.

First, I was going to put my bean bag in front of the TV and superglue my big fat bum to it from the moment the sun came up until the moment it went down. I was going to play Star Wars, Dragonball Z, Sky landers, watch movies, catch up on all my fav cartoons and TV shows, overdose on Minecraft and eat chocolate and ice-cream straight from the container. Man it was going to be an insanely cool holiday.

for Dunaway, constantly kneeling or sprawling to take photographs, her legs, especially her thighs, are far more important to her performance than her eyes; her flesh gives off heat. Tommy Lee Jones is the police lieutenant who represents old-fashioned morality, and when the neurotically vulnerable Laura, who has become telepathic about violence, falls in love with him, they’re a very creepy pair. With the help of the editor, Michael Kahn, Kershner glides over the gaps in the very uneven script (by John Carpenter and David Z. Goodman, with an assist from Julian Barry). The cast includes Raul Julia, Rose Gregorio, Meg Mundy, and Bill Boggs (as himself). Columbia. color (See When the Lights Go Down.)

It was about how one time there was this guy who took his dog to the movies, right in, and sat the dog down in the next seat, and the movie was one called War and Peace. Anyhow, the dog sat up in the seat and kept awake, and it wasn’t long before the people near to him began to realize that this dog was paying attention to the screen. And the people realized that the dog seemed to understand everything and to be having a good time. It nodded when something good happened, and growled when there was something bad, and it even wagged its tail at the jokes and whimpered when things were sad, all like the things the people nearby were feeling. Well, this went on through the whole movie and when it was over, a big crowd gathered around the man and his dog and everybody said, “That’s amazing.” “What’s amazing?” the guy asked. “Your dog,” the people said. “Your dog wagged his tail at the jokes and growled at the danger and he really seemed to enjoy the movie.” “Yeah, he did enjoy it, didn’t he?” the man said. “And I agree, that is amazing. Because he didn’t like the book at all.

The books must be read, not seen in a movie.

Dan has what amounts to my entire life in the palm of his hand. He’ll see our chats. He’ll see the texts I sent to Beth about him and my plan. And what did I think was going to happen? Did I really think I could pull off some only-works-in-movies shit? “Do you think it could be possible that Dan didn’t mean to hit me with that basketball?” The question flies out of my mouth, and I don’t remember thinking about asking it. She scowls, looking me up and down. “Are you okay? I mean, I can tell you’re not. Was he that big of a jerk last night?” I shake my head and pick at my nail polish. It’s not chipping yet, but it’s inevitable, so why not just go ahead and get it over with? “No, I’m fine. He was fine. I just… I don’t know.” She puts a worried hand on my shoulder. “What happened, Z? Tell me.” I let my forehead hit the surface of my desk. It hurts. “He has my phone.” A bit of time passes where she doesn’t say anything. I just wait for the moment of realization to explode from her. “Holy shit! Don’t tell me your chat is on there!” There it is. I nod my head, which probably just looks like I’m rubbing it up and down on my desk. “Please tell me it’s password protected or something.” I shake my head, again seemingly nuzzling my desk. “Zelda, do you have your homework?” Mr. Drew asks from above me. I pull out my five hundred words on the importance of James Dean in cinema from my backpack without even looking and hand it to him. Mr. Drew has a big thing for James Dean. “Are you…okay, Zelda?” he asks a bit uncomfortably. Good old Mr. Drew. Concerned about his students but very much not well versed in actually dealing with them. I raise a hand and wave him off. “I’m good. As you were, Drew.” “Right. Okay then.” He moves on. Beth rubs my back. “It’s going to be all good in the hood, babe. Don’t worry. Dan won’t be interested in your phone. How did he get it, by the way?” I turn my head just enough to let her see my face fully. I’m not sure if she sees a woman at the end of her rope or a girl who has no idea what to do next, but she pulls her hand back like she just touched a disguised snake. I’m so not in the mood to describe the sequence of events that led up to the worst moment of my life, and she knows it.

She was now entangled in something larger than herself. When she'd watched horror movies, it seemed easy enough to know when the victim should leave, run, hide. There were always shrieking violins and threatening, sawing cellos to alert you to danger. But here there were none, and she banged her head against the dash, as if trying to beat sense into it.

Would not write you a diary of life on board because it is only this: Oatmeal for breakfast. Swimming in the pool. Invitation for cocktail. Walk with So and So. Lunch with Mr. & Mrs. Nobody. Movies with Mr. Connecticut Yankee. Tea with Count Z. Cocktails with rich Jewish merchant. Dinner with X. Dancing until midnight.