But he also knew that, as much as he wanted to aid and console the soldier, he wanted to be alone in his room with the night coming down and a book close by and pen and paper and the knowledge that the door would remain shut until the morning came an...
Something about this made Reynie uneasy. Had he done so badly? Was this meant to test his courage? He did as he was told, closing his eyes and bracing himself as best he could. "Why are you flinching?" the pencil woman asked. "I don't know. I thought...
I really am the world's shittiest boyfriend. Holding onto something for the sake of having it, for nothing other than to keep what is familiar and safe close to me because the alternative is so fucking terrifying I can't begin to wrap my head around ...
She closed her eyes, silently continuing the pleas that she be given words that might soothe, words that would begin the healing of bereaved parents. She had seen, when she entered the kitchen, the chasm of sorrow that divided man and wife already, e...
In almost every detail, when one examines it closely, it is not Democracy which makes the system work, but the Individual democrats who, in it, use their powers correctly and in the way that they were intended to be used. If those in power were not e...
What he wanted was not just to hear about Hailsham, but to remember Hailsham, just like it had been his own childhood. He knew he was close to completing and so that's what he was doing: getting me to describe things to him, so they'd really sink in,...
When feeling came back, in a storm of color and force and sensation, the most you could do was hold on to the person beside you and hope you could weather it. Alex closed her eyes and expected the worst-but it wasn't a bad thing; it was just a differ...
Everyone gets killed in the shower. Don't you go to the movies? Psycho. Dead in shower. The MExican in No country for Old Men. Dead in shower. Michelle Pfeiffer in What Lies Beneath. Almost dead in shower, or in the bath, anyway. But she did that thi...
Ramon looked closely at the little guy as he ate. "Maybe he's Jewish. I mean, if Sammy Davis Jr. could convert to Judaism, why not a chupacabra? We should name him Harry Mendelbaum." I held up my arms in protest. "You're all racist. Now shut up. We'l...
Winder's mind felt even fuzzier than it had done over the past few years, but he was certain about cake. He'd been eating cake, and now there wasn't any. Through the mists he saw it, apparently close but, when he tried to reach it, a long way away. A...
If you're so into badsides, you should have become a doctor, so you could see a new one every day." "I don't want to see everybody's," he said from behind her, so close his breath brushed her neck. "I have standards, and let me tell you, in those tig...
If you're so into backsides, you should have become a doctor, so you could see a new one every day." "I don't want to see everybody's," he said from behind her, so close his breath brushed her neck. "I have standards, and let me tell you, in those ti...
Darren played with the ice cream before raising a spoonful to his mouth. I watched him lick it before he wrapped his lips around the spoon, closing his eyelids and savoring the flavor on his tongue. He slowly withdrew the spoon from his mouth and ope...
exemplar, n. It's always something we have to negotiate- the face that my parents are happy, and yours have never been. I have something to live up to, and if I fail, I still have a family to welcome me home. You have a storyline to rewrite, and a la...
He kept one eye on Matt as he talked. He could tell Matt was close to orgasm by the way he title his head to the side and bit his lower lip. "And what about your partner, Mr. Tucker?" Troy asked. Chris raised his eyebrows in surprise and Mr. Waters g...
At the end of this journey, it seems to me that reconciling the long shadows cast by the uneasy past may ultimately depend on elements so basic that they bring to mind a simple Slav proverb I once came across and never forgot: Eat bread and salt and ...
I never thought Greek philosophy could make a damn bit of sense to me. And most of it didn't, but those words just seemed right. 'Love is composed of a single soul, inhabiting two bodies.'" He took her by the shoulders drawing her close. "It rang tru...
I love to watch the fine mist of the night come on, The windows and the stars illumined, one by one, The rivers of dark smoke pour upward lazily, And the moon rise and turn them silver. I shall see The springs, the summers, and the autumns slowly pas...
You know what you are to me? ... You are the most important thing in my life. You are my friend... my lover... my family... the one I trust, the one I fight with, the one I laugh with, the one I trust to enter my body the one I can fall back against ...
Beckendorf closed eyes tight and brought his hand up to his watch. from that distance, the explosion shook the world. Heat seared the back of my head. The Princess Andromeda blew up from both sides, a massive fireball of green flame roiling into the ...
If we look more closely, we see that any violent display of power, whether political or religious, produces an outburst of folly in a large part of mankind; indeed, this seems actually to be a psychological and sociological law: the power of some nee...
