Then one morning she’d begun to feel her sorrow easing, like something jagged that had cut into her so long it had finally dulled its edges, worn itself down. That same day Rachel couldn’t remember which side her father had parted his hair on, an...
I have these secret pangs of shame about being single, like I wasn't good enough to get a husband. Rita reminded me of something I'd told her once, about the five rules of the world as arrived at by this Catholic priest named Tom Weston. The first ru...
They were all fitting into place, the jig-saw pieces. The odd strained shapes that I had tried to piece together with my fumbling fingers and they had never fitted. Frank's odd manner when I spoke about Rebecca. Beatrice and her rather diffident nega...
It is hard to bring paedophile rings to justice. Thankfully it does happen. Perhaps the most horrific recent case came before the High Court in Edinburgh in June 2007. It involved a mother who stood by and watched as her daughter of nine was gang-rap...
Chapter One of My Life. I walk down the street. There's a deep hole in the sidewalk. I fall in. I am lost. I am helpless. It isn't my fault. It still takes forever to find a way out. Chapter Two. I walk down the same street. There's a deep hole in th...
Have you kissed many boys before?" he asked quietly. His question brought my mind back into focus. I raised an eyebrow. "Boys? That's an assumption." Noah laughed, the sound low and husky. "Girls, then?" "No." "Not many girls? Or not many boys?" "Nei...
Her parents, she said, has put a pinball machine inside her head when she was five years old. The red balls told her when she should laugh, the blue ones when she should be silent and keep away from other people; the green balls told her that she sho...
She dared to cry? On this day of all days? I was the one who would be married at sunset, and I hadn't let myself cry in five years. There was ice in my lungs and in my heart. I was floating. I was swept away, and out of the cold I spoke to her in a v...
Jesus waited three days to come back to life. It was perfect! If he had only waited one day, a lot of people wouldn't have even heard he died. They'd be all, "Hey Jesus, what up?" and Jesus would probably be like, "What up? I died yesterday!" and the...
Capt. T.G. Culpeper: [answering phone] : Hello, Ginger? What's the matter now? Ginger Culpeper: It's Billie Sue. Her new boyfriend, Oscar, was supposed to come down here from Pomona just to meet us. So now, she called him and told him we were goin' a...
Natasha Romanoff: I know who killed Fury. Most of the intelligence community doesn't believe he exists. The ones that do call him the Winter Soldier. He's credited over two dozen assassinations in the last 50 years. Steve Rogers: So he's a ghost stor...
The Jackal: What about the French documents? The Forger: French identity card's all right. The other one, I don't think I've ever seen what they look like, let alone copy it. I'll have to get a colleague of mine in France to pick someone's pocket so ...
Gen. Yevgraf Zhivago: I told myself it was beneath my dignity to arrest a man for pilfering firewood. But nothing ordered by the party is beneath the dignity of any man, and the party was right: One man desperate for a bit of fuel is pathetic. Five m...
State Police Capt. Dave Kern: Why didn't you leave the kid alone in the first place? Teasle: Dammit, Dave, you think this kid just waltzed into town, announced he was a Medal Of Honor winner, and then I just leaned on him for the hell of it? I tried ...
[at midnight, Don Corleone walks into his office and finds Tom Hagen taking a drink] Don Corleone: Give me a drop. [Hagen hands the Don his glass of anisette] Don Corleone: My wife is crying upstairs. I hear cars coming to the house. Consigliore of m...
Government advocate: General Dyer, is it correct that you ordered your troops to fire at the thickest part of the crowd? Gen. Dyer: [righteous tone] That is so. Government advocate: One thousand five hundred and sixteen casualties with one thousand s...
[last lines] Bennett Marco: Poor Raymond. Poor friendless, friendless Raymond. He was wearing his medal when he died. [reads from a book of U.S Army citations] Bennett Marco: You should read some of the citations sometime. Just read them. Taken, eigh...
Bob Slydell: Milton Waddams. Dom Portwood: Who's he? Bob Porter: You know, squirrely looking guy, mumbles a lot. Dom Portwood: Oh, yeah. Bob Slydell: Yeah, we can't actually find a record of him being a current employee here. Bob Porter: I looked int...
Count Rugen: [admiring his torture contraption] Beautiful isn't it? It took me half a lifetime to invent it. I'm sure you've discovered my deep and abiding interest in pain. Presently I'm writing the definitive work on the subject, so I want you to b...
[first lines] Charlie: [voice-over] Dear Friend. I am writing to you because she said you listen and understand and didn't try to sleep with that person at that party even though you could have. Please don't try to figure out who I am. I don't want y...
Gossie McKee: What the hell's Ray doin' up there? Marlene: Auditionin' for you Gossie. Gossie McKee: He ain't no good without me. Marlene: How'd you and the 'Bama like to do a week here at the Chair. I know a good bass player. Nice jazz trio can scor...
