82
" Day pushed God out of his space and turned to walk away without another word.“Oh no you don’t,” God snarled before grabbing Day around his waist and pulling him back into the darkness of the alley. He pushed Day up against the brick wall and pressed his forehead hard against his. “You think I’m just going to let you walk off?”“Yep. Just like you did this morning,” Day replied without a second thought.He’d be damned if that response didn’t hurt like hell. He kept their foreheads touching but lost some of his anger. “I apologized for that.”“You sent me a goddamn text message, coward. Now get off me. I’m going home…alone now, thanks to you,” Day hissed.“You were really going to fuck that guy?” God asked incredulously.“You’re goddamn right I was,” Day retorted.“Even though you’re in love with me?”Why did God say that? He watched his partner’s face go from mad to stark-raving livid. Before he could process what was happing, Day had caught him with a right punch twice to his rib cage making him cry out in pain at his already tender ribs.“Fuck!” God yelled as he was shoved backward hard enough to almost knock him off balance since he was already doubled over.“Can’t believe you just said that, asshole,” Day said while moving in on him again. “Think I’m going to let you string me along?”God held his ribs and put one hand up to stop Day’s approach but it was useless. Day dropped like a martial arts master and did a backward spin kick, effectively knocking both God’s legs from under him and sending him crashing to the ground—and two-hundred and fifty pounds hitting the asphalt really hurt.“The bigger they are, the harder they fucking fall,” Day snarled, and began to move in again.What the fuck?God knew Day was quick, he’d seen him in action too many times. God’s only defense was his muscle, but he had to get his hands on Day first, which wouldn’t be easy. God rolled and came up off the ground, quicker than Day expected, and he caught Day’s left punch in mid-throw and spun him around. He yanked Day into his chest but took a hard elbow to his right cheek with Day’s right arm before he was able to secure it with the other one.“Enough,” God growled in his ear. Day’s back was pressed hard against God’s chest, while God held both hand’s tightly in front of him. “Stop fighting me.”“No,” Day snapped.“Stop fighting me, Leo. Because I love you too,” God said, his lips pressed firmly against Day’s ear. “You can’t fuck that other guy because you’re mine,” he whispered.God felt Day’s body go limp in his tight hold and he took the opportunity to spin him around to face him. He looked into soft hazel eyes and lost himself. “I do, sweetheart. I think I may always have. I just didn’t know it until after you walked out of my apartment this morning.” God took a deep breath and shook his head, his eyes squeezed shut at the vision that popped up. “After I hurt you.”Day didn’t pull away, but God could see the hurt was still there. Man, how he wished he could take it all back. He swore he would have done it all differently. “Leo. Please forgive me. I’m so sorry, and I promise I’ll never put my hands on you in anger again.” God watched Day for any signs of forgiveness. Day’s head was down, he was still as a rock, and he still hadn’t spoken.God released Day’s arms, took one hand and slowly lifted Day’s chin so he could look into those beautiful eyes again. Day’s eyes were moist but focused.“Say something, sweetheart. Tell me you forgive me. Tell me you love me, or tell me to go to hell, just say something,” God begged, the silence driving him mad.God was beginning to think he’d really lost his best friend until Day finally spoke. “I usually don’t like endearments but I think I like you calling me sweetheart. "
84
" I knew exactly when the fever had struck. I had been reading Hamlet in an English class at school. Everyone else stumbled, puzzling over the strange words. Then it had been my turn, and the language had suddenly woken in me, so that my heart and lungs and tongue and throat were on fire. Later, I understood that this was why people spoke of Shakespeare as a god. At the time, I felt like weeping. Somebody had released me from dumbness, from utter isolation. I knew that I could live inside these words, that they would give me a a shape, a shell. I had no idea, then, that I would never play Hamlet…. I’m an actor, and in a good year I earn eleven thousand pounds for dressing up as a carrot. "
― Amanda Craig , In a Dark Wood
87
" In these days of physical fitness, hair dye, and plastic surgery, you can live much of your life without feeling or even looking old. But then one day, your knee goes, or your shoulder, or your back, or your hip. Your hot flashes come to an end; things droop. Spots appear. Your cleavage looks like a peach pit. If your elbows faced forward, you would kill yourself. You’re two inches shorter than you used to be. You’re ten pounds fatter and you cannot lose a pound of it to save your soul. Your hands don’t work as well as they once did and you can’t open bottles, jars, wrappers, and especially those gadgets that are encased tightly in what seems to be molded Mylar. If you were stranded on a desert island and your food were sealed in plastic packaging, you would starve to death. You take so many pills in the morning you don’t have room for breakfast.
You lose close friends and discover one of the worst truths of old age: they’re irreplaceable. People who run four miles a day and eat only nuts and berries drop dead. People who drink a quart of whiskey and smoke two packs of cigarettes a day drop dead. You are suddenly in a lottery, the ultimate game of chance, and someday your luck will run out. Everybody dies. There’s nothing you can do about it. Whether or not you eat six almonds a day. Whether or not you believe in God. "
― Nora Ephron , I Remember Nothing: and Other Reflections
90
" Daddy?”
“I’m right here, baby.”
Lumps form in my throat, going all the way down into the core of me.
It’s his voice. His. Right there. I reach toward the doorknob but I don’t get to turn it.
Nick smashes at me with his head, pushing against my lower jaw and cheek, like a blow. His muzzle moves my head away from the door. He presses his face in between me and the wood. Fur gets in my mouth. I spit it out and push at him.
“That’s my dad. My dad.” I slap the door. “He’s on the other side. The pixies will get him.”
Nick shows me his teeth.
“I can’t lose him again, Nick.”
The wolf snarls like he’s ready to bite. My head jerks back and away, but then I steady myself.
“Get . . . out . . . of . . . the . . . way.”
Pushing against his thick neck, I slam my hands against him over and over again, pummeling him. He doesn’t budge.
“Move!” I order. “Move.”
“Zara, is there a wolf in there with you? Do not trust him,” my dad’s voice says, calmly, really calmly.
I grab a fistful of fur and freeze. All at once it hits me that something is not right. My dad would never be calm if I was in my bedroom with a wolf. He’d be stressed and screaming, breaking the door down, kicking it in like he did once when I was really little and had accidentally locked myself in the bathroom and couldn’t get the lock out of the bolt because it was so old. He’d kicked that door down, splintering the wood, clutching me to him. He’d kissed my forehead over and over again.
“I’d never let anything happen to you, princess,” he’d said. “You’re my baby.”
My dad would be kicking the door in. My dad would be saving me.
“Let me in,” he says. “Zara . . .”
Letting go of Nick, I stagger backward. My hands fly up to my mouth, covering it.
Nick stops snarling at me and wags his fluffy tail.
How would my dad know that it is a wolf in here and not a dog? How would he know that it isn’t pixies?
I shudder. Nick pounds next to me, pressing his side against my legs. I drop my hands and plunge my fingers into his fur, burying them there, looking for something. Maybe comfort. Maybe warmth. Maybe strength. Maybe all three. "
― Carrie Jones , Need (Need, #1)
93
" An equation: 40,000 dead young men = 3,000 tons of bone and flesh, 124,000 pounds of brain matter, 50,000 gallons of blood, 1,840,000 years of life that will never be lived, 100,000 children that will never be born (the last we can afford: there are too many starving children in the world already). "
― Dalton Trumbo , Johnny Got His Gun
96
" I felt that it was unfair that my lack of a few pounds of flesh should deprive me of a chance at a good job but I had long ago emotionally rejected the world in which I lived and my reaction was: Well, this is the system by which people want the world to run whether it helps them or not. To me, my losing was only another manifestation of that queer, material way of American living that computed everything in terms of the concrete: weight, color, race, fur coats, radios, electric refrigerators, cars, money ... It seemed that I simply could not fit into a materialistic life. "
― Richard Wright , Black Boy
