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61 " He locked the doors and windows and sat in the middle of a room afraid of going out there in the storm and rain, in the darkest night he had ever seen. All of a sudden there were knocks everywhere and the walls turned into the glass so that he could helplessly witness his fears approach him like the ghosts. He saw them crawling on the wall and climbing the roof staring into his eyes, in no time the walls disappeared and they stood around him laughing and consuming him one by one at a time. all he saw, in the end, was the ugly and scary faces of himself. "
― Akshay Vasu
62 " After many years the woman died, of natural causes. And a few years after that, the ogre died. Eventually, his mistresses died, down on the ground, in the people village, over decades. The war men and women died. The human girl who had escaped her early death died, across the land, over by the ocean, in her shack of blue bowls and rocking chairs. The witch, who had originally made the cake and made up up the spell and given it as a gift to her beloved ogre friend, died. The cake went on and on. Time passed...And the cake, always wanting to please, the cake who had found a way to survive its endlessness by recreating its role over and over again, tried to figure out, in its cake way, what this light-dappled object might want to eat. So it became darkness, a cake of darkness. It did not have to be human food. It did not have to be digestible through a familiar tract. It lay there on the dirt, waiting, a simmering cake of darkness. Through time, and wind, and earthquakes, and chance. At last the cloak fell out of the tree and blew across the land and happened upon the cake where it ate its darkness and extinguished its own dappled light. The cloak disappeared into night and was not seen again, as it was only a piece of coat shaped darkness now and could not be spotted so easily, had there been any eyes left to see it. It floated and joined with nowhere. Darkness was overtaking everything, anyway, pouring over the land and sky. The cake itself, still in the shape of darkness, sat on the hillside. 'What's left?' said the cake. It thought in blocks of feeling. It felt the thick darkness all around it. 'What is left to eat me, to take me in?'Darkness did not want to eat more darkness, not especially. Darkness did not care for carrot cake, or apple pie. Darkness did not seem interested in a water cake or a cake of money. Only when the cake filled with light did it come over. The darkness circling around the light, devouring the light. But the cake kept refilling, as we know. This is the spell of the cake. And the darkness eating light, and again, light, and again, light, lifted. "
― Aimee Bender , The Color Master: Stories
63 " And God said: Let there be light, and there was light." Lena opened her eyes, feeling as if someone had been reading this verse out loud in the room. She looked around. Another morning dawned, and the sky glowed. Why did God say the word light out loud? Wasn’t it enough for him just to think of light for there to be light? And did he summon the light to one specific place? Or only to some places? Perhaps he summoned the light everywhere. Her eyes followed the sun’s beams that poured through the shutter slats, creating luminous flecks of gold that sparkled against the cabinet across from her. Tiny motes floated in the light and disappeared in the dark. Who did God created the light for? "
64 " You stand alone upon a height," he said, dreamily, " like one in a dreary land. Behind you all is darkness, before you all is darkness; there is but one small space of light. In that one space is a day. They come, one at a time, from the night of To-morrow, and vanish into the night of Yesterday." I have thought of the days as men and women, for a woman's day is not at all like a man's. For you, I think, they first were children, with laughing eyes and little, dimpled hands. One at a time, they came out of the darkness, and disappeared into the darkness on the other side. Some brought you flowers or new toys and some brought you childish griefs, but none came empty-handed. Each day laid its gift at your feet and went on." Some brought their gifts wrapped up, that you might have the surprise of opening them. Many a gift in a bright-hued covering turned out to be far from what you expected when you were opening it. Some of the happiest gifts were hidden in dull coverings you took off slowly, dreading to see the contents. Some days brought many gifts, others only one." As the days grew older, some brought you laughter; some gave you light and love. Others came with music and pleasure--and some of them brought pain." " Yes," sighed Evelina, " some brought pain." " It is of that," went on the Piper, " that I wished to be speaking. It was one day, was it not, that brought you a long sorrow?" " Yes." " Not more than one? Was it only one day?" " Yes, only one day," " See," said The Piper, gently, " the day came with her gift. You would not let her lay it at your feet and pass on into the darkness of Yesterday. You held her by her grey garments and would not let her go. You kept searching her sad eyes to see whether she did not have further pain for you. Why keep her back from her appointed way? Why not let your days go by?" " The other days," murmured Evelina, " have all been sad." " Yes, and why? You were holding fast to one day--the one that brought you pain. So, with downcast eyes they passed you, and carried their appointed gifts on into Yesterday, where you can never find them again. Even now, the one day you have been holding is struggling to free herself from the chains you have put upon her. You have no right to keep a day." " Should I not keep the gifts?" she asked. His fancy pleased her." The gifts, yes--even the gifts of tears, but never a day. You cannot hold a happy day, for it goes too quickly. This one sad day that marched so slowly by you is the one you chose to hold. Lady," he pleaded, " let her go! "
65 " Riley's sway as he disappeared down the alley, I recognized it. It wasn't booze. It was the thing that happened when a little too much got a little too messed up. They sway, it's what creeps over a person when they've begun to empty out and don't care enough to put anything back, to replace what has been lost. "
― Kathleen Glasgow , Girl in Pieces
66 " The missing remained missing and the portraits couldn't change that. But when Akhmed slid the finished portrait across the desk and the family saw the shape of that beloved nose, the air would flee the room, replaced by the miracle of recognition as mother, father, sister, brother, aunt, and cousin found in that nose the son, brother, nephew, and cousin that had been, would have been, could have been, and they might race after the possibility like cartoon characters dashing off a cliff, held by the certainty of the road until they looked down -- and plummeted is the word used by the youngest brother who, at the age of sixteen, is tired of being the youngest and hopes his older brother will return for many reasons, not least so he will marry and have a child and the youngest brother will no longer be youngest; that youngest brother, the one who has nothing to say about the nose because he remembers his older brother's nose and doesn't need the nose to mean what his parents need it to mean, is the one who six months later would be disappeared in the back of a truck, as his older brother was, who would know the Landfill through his blindfold and gag by the rich scent of clay, as his older brother had known, whose fingers would be wound with the electrical wires that had welded to his older brother's bones, who would stand above a mass grave his brother had dug and would fall in it as his older brother had, though taking six more minutes and four more bullets to die, would be buried an arm's length of dirt above his brother and whose bones would find over time those of his older brother, and so, at that indeterminate point in the future, answer his mother's prayer that her boys find each other, wherever they go; that younger brother would have a smile on his face and the silliest thought in his skull a minute before the first bullet would break it, thinking of how that day six months earlier, when they all went to have his older brother's portrait made, he should have had his made, too, because now his parents would have to make another trip, and he hoped they would, hoped they would because even if he knew his older brother's nose, he hadn't been prepared to see it, and seeing that nose, there, on the page, the density of loss it engendered, the unbelievable ache of loving and not having surrounded him, strong enough to toss him, as his brother had, into the summer lake, but there was nothing but air, and he'd believed that plummet was as close as they would ever come again, and with the first gunshot one brother fell within arms' reach of the other, and with the fifth shot the blindfold dissolved and the light it blocked became forever, and on the kitchen wall of his parents' house his portrait hangs within arm's reach of his older brother's, and his mother spends whole afternoons staring at them, praying that they find each other, wherever they go. "
― Anthony Marra , A Constellation of Vital Phenomena
67 " I believe that sometimes, the moment you say goodbye could be as painful as a lifetime worth of pain that you can experience while living with the memories of your loved ones. I couldn’t stop myself from hallucinating about all those things that could have happened, while you were walking away from me today. I stopped walking and turned my head, expecting for you to do the same. I stayed there, motionless, and waited – for you to turn once, to smile, or wave. But you didn’t. You just continued walking away from me, while I stayed there watching your silhouette becoming smaller, and smaller with time, until it disappeared completely. There was nothing else to wait. “What happened?” she asked me when I turned my head again towards the platform.“She let me go, finally,” was all I could say. "
― Bhavya Kaushik
68 " Mark Spitz didn't ask about Harry. You never asked about the characters that disappeared from a Last Night story. You knew the answer. The plague had a knack for narrative closure. "
― Colson Whitehead , Zone One
69 " Happiness found me alone one day and took me by the hand.He showed me how the sun gave out its warmth across the land.Sadness found me content and smiling upward at the sun.He talked of droughts and blindness and what burning rays had done.Happiness found me alone again and pointed to the sky.He showed me how the storms created rainbows way up high.Sadness found me intrigued and took me to the rainbow’s end.He showed me how it disappeared to ne’er return again.Happiness found me alone and taught me how to sing a song.He sang a dozen melodies as I chirped right along.Sadness found me singing out and covered up his ears.He said the noise was deafening, and wished he couldn’t hear.Happiness found me alone and gave me seven coins of gold.He showed me many fancy things that merchants often sold.Sadness found me admiring the pretty things I’d bought.He pointed out my empty purse and money I had not.Happiness found me alone and helped me talk to someone new.He called the boy my friend and said that I was his friend too.Sadness found me together with my kind, attentive friend.He whispered of betrayal and how broken hearts don’t mend.Happiness found me alone and held me tight in his embrace.He whispered kindness in my ear and kissed me on the face.Sadness found me with Happiness but before he spoke at all,I told him he’d have better luck at talking to the wall. "
― Richelle E. Goodrich , Making Wishes: Quotes, Thoughts, & a Little Poetry for Every Day of the Year
70 " If you don’t do anything to capture and draw your memories—no matter whether you choose words, pencil, photography, or filming—the only place where they have a chance to exist is in your head, which can’t be called the most reliable place to store them; soon, they’d be lost forever… leaving no trace, like they never existed… like YOU never existed… same as those billions and billions of lives that had already disappeared from the world. "
― Sahara Sanders , INDIGO DIARIES: A Series of Novels
71 " He had seen how the spirit, the reserves in [Bond], could pull him out of badly damaged conditions that would have broken the normal human being. He knew how a desperate situation would bring out those reserves again, how the will to live would spring up again in a real emergency. He remembered how countless neurotic patients had disappeared for ever from his consulting rooms when the last war had broken out. The big worry had driven out the smaller ones, the greater fear the lesser. He made up his mind. He turned back to M. " Give him one more chance. "
72 " Gregory?” I called. I couldn’t help myself. It was irrational, but I was scared to see him run from me. He turned my direction, his feet pivoting in the dirt. Warily, I crossed into the light for a moment. “Do you, um…” I inhaled deeply. “Do you think you’ll still want to be my friend tomorrow?” I held my breath and waited for his answer. Although I could feel the sunshine perceptibly tingle every inch of exposed skin, the way Gregory smiled at me produced a swell of warmth unmatchable even for the sun. “I’ll always want to be your friend, Annabelle. Do you want to be mine?” My head nodded like mad, ecstatic, all on its own. I disappeared among the shadows again and watched my new friend until he stepped around the Hopkins’ house. Then I waited until his car drove off -- Gregory and his mother headed for home. I was on a high like no other, but I’d not lost my grasp on reality entirely. I knew that the real test would come Monday. It was one thing to befriend an outcast in the privacy of the woods, but quite another to risk ridicule and reputation when surrounded by peers. This was true even for those with the biggest of hearts, which I now believed Gregory Hill to have. "
― Richelle E. Goodrich , Dandelions: The Disappearance of Annabelle Fancher
73 " Men got two guns, you know. One for now," he tapped the barrel of his gun against her nose. " And one for later." When his free hand went to his zipper, she twisted underneath him, bringing her knee into his groin and pulling her knife from her boot." Mother taught me to carry a knife for always." She left him holding his intestines in disbelief as she disappeared down the hill, his gun tucked securely in her waistband. "
74 " I was deep in a dream about photography-walking through a strange city with buildings that stretched so high they disappeared into the clouds. And every time I took a picture of one, it shivered and changed into something else. A sound came from a building behind me-a soft song. I started to walk toward it's open doors, but they closed. I would have to climb in a window-and then I woke up. "
― Katie Alender , As Dead As It Gets (Bad Girls Don't Die, #3)
75 " Uh...are we going to talk about what just happened?" Victoria asked as Drake stepped over to Finn's desk to look at the map layout of the cemetery, seemingly calm about the fact that Bo and Nyx had just disappeared into thin air. "
76 " The blade was sharp enough that she didn't feel the initial prick, but it didn't matter. The earth beside her opened up and the knife slid from her attacker's suddenly nerveless hand, thudding to the ground about the same time she did. His grip on her hand disappeared the instant that something else emerged in a blast of stone and magic. Wynn's cavalry had arrived, in the form of one very large and very angry Guardian, a Guardian that was supposed to be nothing but the teeny-tiny pieces still scattered around her. Huh. How about that? "
― Christine Warren , Hard as a Rock (Gargoyles, #3)
77 " He pulled back, but only enough to lock his eyes onto mine as he held my face in his hands. “It will always be you, Cassandra,” he whispered against my lips. Then he kissed me again, much softer this time, as if gently transferring every ounce of love he had for me onto my lips. I didn’t need any words, this was all I ever needed to know that he loved me.Everything around me faded. All my worries, all my fears disappeared when he touched me. We weren’t stuck in this Hell, we weren’t even in its realm. We were in our own world, no one around to save, or to slay. God, if only we could stay here. I didn’t want to face reality, not when I had him here with me now, not after thinking I’d lost him. "
― , Seeker of Fate (Fate, #2)
78 " You grieve at first. And then slowly, with the yawning of the years, the disappeared gets scraped from your memory, the way your flesh can be peeled from your limbs. It's very harsh and extremely painful. But it gets done, square inch-by-square inch. Until, the skin that is your memory gets completely scarred and numbed. You live. The disappeared is detached from the dermis of remembering. And that is what is known as moving on. "
― Psyche Roxas-Mendoza The Unlamented
79 " If she’d had any doubts he was a real deal country boy, they disappeared when he unabashedly stripped down to nothing—the sun had kissed his arms to mid-bicep, although his torso wasn’t without a faint tan. She’d thought lazily that maybe he had a pond. She’d like to go skinny dipping with him. Leap onto his back and wrap her legs around his lean hips. Hold on to his broad shoulders and press her naked breasts into his back and drift into the cool water together.As he opened his button-fly jeans, revealing snug briefs underneath, she’d whispered for him to stop. He was hard and sinewy in all the right places, with shadows and valleys she wanted to explore with her mouth and hands and eyes, but her touch first went to the line where dark faded to light on his arm, neatly following the curve of his muscles. “Nice farmer’s tan. "
80 " My body felt heavy. It grew harder to thrash around, to move at all. I opened my mouth to scream again but no sound came from my blood-soaked lips. My eyelids fluttered closed and the world disappeared around me as I took the last few breath of my life. "
