Ah! I wish I had the courage to work for the debasement of my contemporaries. What good work it would be to defile their daughters: to insinuate something obscene into the infantile hands which caress each paternal beard and cheek; to poison them, ev...
I know perfectly well that it is impossible, according to arithmetic and scholarly books, to live in a far valley off a handful of ewes and two low yield cows. But we live, I say. You children all lived; your sisters now have sturdy children in far-o...
I like cigarettes, Miss Taggart. I like to think of fire held in a man’s hand. Fire, a dangerous force, tamed at his fingertips. I often wonder about the hours when a man sits alone, watching the smoke of a cigarette, thinking. I wonder what great ...
It's a sweet setup, I'll admit. For all that the maids STILL show up each day with jumbo crucifixes, jumpy movements, and red eyes from crying over the short straw that drew them vampire duty.' Yesterday, she'd just stopped herself from raising her c...
His hand closed automatically around the fake Horcrux, but in spite of everything, in spite of the dark and twisting path he saw stretching ahead for himself, in spite of the final meeting with Voldemort he knew must come, whether in a month, in a ye...
Did you see me disarm Hermione, Harry?" "Only once" said Hermione stung. "I got you loads more then you got me—" "I did not only get you once, I got you at least three times—" "Well if you're counting the one where you tripped over your own feet ...
With a gentle touch, she brushed the hair off his forehead. "I was sort of hoping you'd be a little more relaxed today." He took her hand and kissed it. "I'm very relaxed." "Finally?" She raised her eyebrows and snuggled closer. "You feel a little st...
You’ll soon find out some wizarding families are much better than others, Potter. You don’t want to go making friends with the wrong sort. I can help you there.” He held out his hand to shake Harry’s, but Harry didn’t take it. “I think I ...
It doesn’t work,” she continues, unclasping her hands, smoothing her skirt. “What you’re feeling right now doesn’t work. You can’t wander around and think the wandering will call them back. Believe me. I know you don’t want to hear the ...
If she were here I wouldn't be able to keep my hands off her. I would hold her so close she'd beg me to let her breathe. I'd kiss her so hard she'd plead for mercy. I'd unfasten her clothing and lie with her onthat hard bed, and what was between us w...
She sits down and puts her hand to her chest and rocks. Thinks of all she has lost and will lose. All she has had and will have. It seems to her that life is like gathering berries into an apron with a hole. Why do we keep on? Because the berries are...
We made a successful, last-minute effort to get the French Open many years ago, when the USA network bailed on it. I remember, four of us jumped on a plane on the spur of the moment to cover it. I think we had someone draw up a sign (by hand) that we...
Without you, without your onslaughts, without your uprootings of us, we should remain all our lives inert, stagnant, puerile, ignorant both of ourselves and of God. You who batter us and then dress our wounds, you who resist us and yield to us, you w...
Then it's settled. Once I have taken my last breath - and by the sound and feel of that last cough, it could be just about the time I finish this sentence - possession of the company will be given to Cindy, at which time she has one year to turn a pr...
When I left Merle was wearing a bungalow apron and rolling pie crust. She came to the door wiping her hands on the apron and kissed me on the mouth and began to cry and ran back into the house, leaving the doorway empty [...] I had a funny feeling as...
The gentle reader will never, never know what a consummate ass he can become until he goes abroad. I speak now, of course, in the supposition that the gentle reader has not been abroad, and therefore is not already a consummate ass. If the case be ot...
I’d spend hours in HMVs, Virgin Megastores and second-hand record shops staffed by greasy-haired 40-year-olds dressed as 20-year-olds, listening to contemporary music of every genre – Britrock, heavy maiden, gang rap, brakebeat. And I came to a s...
There's so many kids," he said low enough so only Jessica could hear. "We're going to walk right into them in two more steps." If it gave Jessica pause, he didn't sense it. Instead she seemed to pull him faster. A frigid hand closed around his heart,...
Gabe taps Michi on the shoulder. “I can understand any hesitation on your part, Michika. If you wish, you can stay behind with your family …” “Nuh-uh, not a chance!” She brushes Gabe’s hand off of her shoulder. “If my best friend’s go...
As the kids dance around the front yard under the night sky and the lights, I see something. Lua and Marie are holding hands. They look like they're so happy, just inside this moment, watching the kids and the lights on their old fibro house. Lua kis...
The authors of the gospels, like all writers in all time periods, either reference information they have at hand – including things they’ve heard or read – or they make things up. . . For reference material, the author of Mark relied not on Jes...
