You Always Had My Back Quotes & Sayings

Oh," said Alex quietly, remembering her manners and falling into a curtsy, "apologies, my lord, your new title slipped my mind." Gavin turned back toward Alex, surprised. "No need to stand on ceremony, Alex. I forget that I'm the earl myself most of the time. I cannot seem to get comfortable with the idea that I carry the title now. Besides, I don't see how it would change much. Nick has been an earl your whole life and that doesn't seem to change the way you treat him." He shot her an odd smile and nodded in the direction of Alex's middle brother. Nick, as always, was quick to chime in. "That's right! You lot have never respected my title," he said, puffing out his chest in a false air of pompousness. He added a thickly arrogant tenor to his blustering. "Why should Blackmoor get any respect? I've been the Earl of Farrow since before you were born and it doesn't earn me an ounce of esteem!" Everyone laughed and, with that, the awkwardness of the situation had disappeared. — Sarah MacLean

You know when you read that someone has to leave a show or a tour because they had 'nervous exhaustion'? Well, I had one of those and discovered that I was quite close to death. I always assumed that my lifestyle was going to take me at an early age, but when it was actually occurring I was, 'Not yet!' I pulled back. — David Johansen

I never thought people actually woke up the way I did that morning. I always figured it was hyperbole and massive overcompensation to say that you woke up grinning, woke up in a state of contentment and excitement for the smallest things. Even while I was in love formerly, it seemed more like a comfortable thing rather than a giddy, overwhelming happiness. Realize, then, that I had never been joined in a mutual state of infatuation with someone else. My infatuations tended to be unrequited, accompanied by a sense of muted sadness. I sat up at 7:00a.m. without even waiting for the alarm, and kept still there, smiling, looking at nothing and going over yesterday's conversations, the fevered symphony of emotion ringing forever in my ears.
I fell back and actually laughed to myself, reaching for my glasses to slide them on as I stretched out my back comfortably in a lazy, half-waking state.
You are in love. — Vee Hoffman

When he pulled back, Blay frowned. "You're shaking."
Was it possible he wasn't imagining this? "Am I?"
"Yes."
"I don't care. I love you. I love you so damned much, and I"m sorry that I wasn't male enough to admit
"
Blay stopped him with a kiss. "You're plenty male enough now
the rest of it's in the past."
"I just ... God, I really am shaking, aren't I?
Yeah. But it's okay
I've got you."
Qhuinn turned his face into one of the male's palms. "You always have. You've always had me ... and my heart. My soul. Everything. — J.R. Ward

I suppose in the back of my mind I was always one of those guys who had a disdain for money. It had a value if you wanted to buy something, but if you didn't want to buy something, you didn't need it. — Chuck Feeney

Alec?" Magnus was staring at him. He had dispatched the remaining Iblis demons, and the square was empty but for the two of them. "Did you just- did you just save my life?"
Alec knew he ought to say something like, Of course, because I'm a Shadowhunter and that's what we do, or That's my job. Jace would have said something like that. Jace always knew the right thing to say. But the words that actually came out of Alec's mouth where quite different- and sounded petulant, even to his own ears. "You never called me back," he said. "I called you so many times and you never called me back."
Magnus looked at Alec as if he'd lost his mind. "Your city is under attack," he said. "The wards have broken, and the streets are full of demons. And you want to know why I haven't called you? — Cassandra Clare

He held out his elbow in a disingenuously gentlymanly gesture.
"How about we go and have some real fun?"
"What,shattering my one remaining fantasy wasn't enough?" Faeries didn't have wings and bordered on evil; pixies were dirty,feral, and tended to bite' and mermaids had neither glorious hair nor seashell bras. Now this about unicorns. Sometimes reality sucked.
"You can always chase the unicorn, if you want.Take it for a ride."
I shuddered at the thought and sat down, leaning my back against the tree and unzipping my coat. "No,thanks. — Kiersten White

"I always read everything when I was a kid-and I do mean everything, from Nancy Drew to Dickens to my dad's John D. MacDonald-but then I went to regular school and the English teachers started telling me to read 'real' books, so I tried. And you know, I kinda went off reading for a while. I had already been reading literary novels and the classics mixed in with whatever else, but-" She waved a hand. "So I went back to reading whatever I wanted, whenever I wanted to-reading had been my greatest pleasure in all the world. I mean I never really watched all that much television, because we were moving around, never really had solid digs until I was thirteen, so reading was everything. — Barbara O'Neal

When you've had a psychotic breakdown it's always so difficult making that decision. You meet someone new and you wonder how much you should tell them? You wonder what that person's threshold of 'strange' is, and at what point in my story would I end up driving them away. That fear it's always there in the back of your mind. Those details you never really even admitted to yourself, but that somehow have to be told just as much as they have to be buried deep down. — Cyma Rizwaan Khan

Hazael rose from his knees. It had to take extraordinary effort, yet somehow he managed a version of his lazy smile when he said, "You know, I've always wanted to be a bath attendant. You should take me instead. I'm nicer than my sister."
Jael returned the lazy smile. "You're not my type."
"Well, you're not anybody's type," said Hazael. "No, wait. I take it back. My sword says she'd like to know you better."
"I'm afraid I must deny her the pleasure. I've been kissed by swords before, you see."
"I may have noticed. — Laini Taylor

Unfortunately, once I did learn to smoke, I couldn't stop. I escalated to two packs a day very quickly, and stayed that way for about ten years. When I decided to stop, I adopted the method that my father had used when he quit. He would carry a cigarette in his shirt pocket, and every time he felt like smoking, he would pull out the cigarette and confront it: "Who stronger? You? Me?" Always the answer was the same: "I stronger." Back the cigarette would go, until the next craving. It worked for him, and it worked for me. — Kirk Douglas

And Belen?"
"Yes, Your Majesty?"
Maybe I do want to talk about him. A little. "Humberto would be proud of you, too. He always believed you'd come back to us." Saying his name aloud doesn't hurt as much as I thought it would. Humberto, I practice silently. Humberto.
A soft catch of breath. Then: "He had a way of believing in people long before they believed in themselves, didn't he?"
The entrance to my tent flaps closes, and he is gone. — Rae Carson

I had a lot of ups and downs. I always said that if I were in a position to give back, I would and I have. As my name became bigger, I started giving. You want to make that connection with people who are less fortunate. It keeps you in touch with reality. When you become a successful individual, and have a thousand tasks going on, you forget that there are people in need. It keeps me grounded. — Shawne Merriman

All of a sudden, life became too much to bear. Just like that, for no particular reason. Because there was a child's corpse in the fridge on rue Parthenais. Because I had to start all over again from scratch, one more time. Because I had rolled my rock to the top of the hill and now it was rolling back down again. The times before, I'd always managed to put on a brave face. But there comes a time when you just don't feel strong enough to look for another place to live and go shopping again for clothes and dishes and cutlery and scouring pads and toilet paper. This was one of those times. When I got back to the hotel, I asked the Barbie at reception for the key to the minibar. It burned in the palm of my hand. I slapped it back down on the counter and ran out. I had to find a meeting. — Bernard Emond

I love you, Bayler, and I know that's really scary for you to hear. I know you don't open your heart easily, and you're worried about getting hurt, but...Do you remember what you said to me after you pushed me out of the plane?"
"How could I forget?" I laughed blinking back tears. "I told you that you had nothing to worry about because you had a parachute."
"Let me be your parachute." His hands cupped my face as he stared down at me intensely. "Let me be your parachute, and I promise you'll never have to worry about getting hurt. Sure, we're going to fight and disagree, and there are going to be days where we hate each other, but I will always be there for you because I love you. — Steph Nuss

Many years later after the sell-outs, betrayals, and hatred which would tear us apart, when our brotherhood had been destroyed, I'd always look back and remember that night. That fucking wild night at the KeyClub, when the smoke stung my eyes but my world was full of nothing but blind hope. When life was not a mockery, but a very real fire which flamed through my veins like the most incredible drug... the night when Kelly-Lee Obann, drunk, high and barely 20 the time, looked out through his hair with a terrible nakedness and said to me;
"We're not gonna make it out of this alive. You know that, right? — H. Alazhar

Lounging on his side, he tipped his head back. "So, you slept like a little baby Apollyon last night. I wonder why."

I glared at him. Seth had stayed the night again. "I loathe you."

He chuckled. "You reluctantly like me."

"Whatever. So are you going to tell me why you're always with Lucian? Is he a part of your little fan club now?"

"My fans love to hear my war stories." He jumped to his feet, swinging at me. "They're obsessed with me. What can I say? I'm that cool. And I'm not always with Lucian. — Jennifer L. Armentrout

How did you make Shade into your shadow?" I asked. "Do you remember?"
The question broke the mood; in a moment Ignifex was back on his feet, all grace and half smiles and narrowed eyes.
"I didn't make him. I've always had a shadow, like everyone else. And I hate him because he's a fool and a coward and he tries to steal my wives."
Those last words were so unexpected that I laughed. Then Ignifex raised an eyebrow and I realized that he was serious, at least as much as he ever was. — Rosamund Hodge

Who's a girl?"
"You're mine." His hands glided down her back, around and up to her breasts. "You're my girl."
"Sap," she said, but in a little sigh as she gave him her lips again.
She'd never been anybody's girl, had never wanted to be. It had always seemed a weak term to her, one of submission and vulnerability. But with him, it was sweet and foolish, and just exactly right. — J.D. Robb

In all my life I'd never been approached this way, the car pulling up, the Where you going? It was something I wish had happened hundreds of times. I was a looker - someone who looked over at every car at every traffic light, hoping something would happen, and almost never finding anyone looking back - always everyone looking forwards, and every time I felt stupid. Why should people look at you? Why should they care? — Dave Eggers

The day you left, it felt like I lost a diary in which I had been writing for so long. Now all that memories flashes in bits and pieces inside my head always and makes me wish that I could sit back and read it all over again. — Akshay Vasu

Evie." He brushed her hair back from her temple. "Time to wake up, love. We must greet our staff." She straightened and peered out the window. "So many of them, and this is not even your family seat." Our family seat. He did not emphasize the point. "Let me pin you up." She turned on the seat while he fashioned something approximating a bun at her nape. The moment was somehow marital, and to Deene, imbued with significance as a result. Deene had laced up, dressed, and undressed any number of ladies, but there was nothing flirtatious in the way Eve presented to him the pale, downy nape of her neck. He kissed her there and felt a shiver go through her. "You are going to be the sort of husband who is indiscriminate with the placement of his lips on my person, aren't you?" She did not sound pleased. "When we are private, probably. You always smell luscious, and I am only a man." His — Grace Burrowes

He watched her drink the soup. "You're getting bored with me, aren't you?"
She smiled slyly. "No. I have never found you boring, Mirar. In fact, I've always found you a little too interesting for my own good."
He chuckled. So. There it was. The invitation. He had noted the way she sometimes looked at him. Thoughtful. Curious. Admiring. The spark of attraction was still there for her. Was it for him?
He thought back to other times circumstances had brought them to each other's beds and felt an old but familiar interest flare. Yes, he thought. It's still there. — Trudi Canavan

Oh, trust me Sydney Tar Ponds, you aren't the first Personification to be forgotten by somebody ordinary," Mearth sighed with a falsely-reassuring smile. Alecto stepped back from her, glaring hatefully. "Sydney Tar Ponds," Mearth added, "I've had so many ordinary people as friends in my life that by now I've forgotten all their names. At first it was difficult ... very sad ... to see them always leaving, dying, disappearing, ignoring, but after a while I realized that they weren't worth the trouble. I'd rather be in the company of other Personifications. At least they aren't always dropping dead like houseflies or sailing away to parts unknown. Nil sa saol seo ach ceo, i ni bheimid beo, ach seal beag gearr. Wouldn't you agree?"
"No," Alecto told her. "I think you're insane. — Rebecca McNutt

On the 11th of every month my friend elizabeth would say, "well we made it through another month. so do we get her back now?" we always giggled, but we really did expect to get her back. its not human to let go of love, even when it's dead.
we expected one of these monthly anniversaries to be the Final Goodbye. we figured that we'd said all our goodbyes, and given up all the tears we had to give. we'd passed the test and would get back what we'd lost. but instead, every anniversary hurt more, and every anniversary felt like she was further away from coming back. the idea that there wouldn't be a final goodbye- that was a hard goodbye in itself and, at that point, still an impossible goodbye. no private eye has to tell you it's a long goodbye.
... the loss just doesn't go away- it gets bigger the longer you look at it. — Rob Sheffield

Ambushed by my emotions, I now found myself caught up in an unexpected whirlwind of confusion, embarrassment, hope, and excitement ... Was this love? Is this how it felt when you loved someone? A thousand thoughts and impressions a second, with no time or ability to focus on a single one, because the only thing I could see was her.
Cassie.
Whatever else I knew or wanted, would now
and always
be overshadowed by her. In my head, this sounded extreme, but at the same time, I knew it was true. The center of my world had shifted in what felt like a single second and I realized it was too late for me. There was no way back from here. — Melanie Cusick-Jones

Only, this was the thing: you'd provided me with the possibility of getting away from myself and making myself at home in another world. You were like a messenger from that world. With you, I could give my real self a rest. You were part and parcel of that dissolving of reality - myself included - that I'd been working on for seven or eight years through writing. For me, you were the herald out in front who showed me how to put the menacing world on hold. In that world I was a refugee whose existence was not legitimate, whose future never went beyond the three months of a temporary visa. I had no desire to come back to earth. I'd found a refuge in a magical experience and I wasn't about to let it get dragged down into reality. As far back as I can remember, I'd always sought not to exist. You've had to work for years on end to get me to accept the fact that I do exist. And I really don't think your work is over yet. — Andre Gorz

There came an awful day when I picked up the phone and knew at once, as one does with some old friends even before they speak, that it was Edward. He sounded as if he were calling from the bottom of a well. I still thank my stars that I didn't say what I nearly said, because the good professor's phone pals were used to cheering or teasing him out of bouts of pessimism and insecurity when he would sometimes say ridiculous things like: 'I hope you don't mind being disturbed by some mere wog and upstart.' The remedy for this was not to indulge it but to reply with bracing and satirical stuff which would soon get the gurgling laugh back into his throat. But I'm glad I didn't say, 'What, Edward, splashing about again in the waters of self-pity?' because this time he was calling to tell me that he had contracted a rare strain of leukemia. Not at all untypically, he used the occasion to remind me that it was very important always to make and keep regular appointments with one's physician. — Christopher Hitchens

When you wait all your life for something and then you find it, it's like a miracle. All the parts inside you that've been on hold, they open up and start beating. You were okay before, you were good. You had purpose and direction and everything was just fine. But now it's more. You can't explain what the more is, but you know, if you lose it, you'll never be able to fill those empty spaces in just the same way again. Not ever. That's terrifying. I'm afraid that what's inside me is just a trick. That I'll wake up tomorrow and what's beating in here will have stopped. It'll be quiet again. I won't feel this way. I won't feel the way I've waited all my life to feel.
I can stand you not loving me back. There's always hope that you will. But I don't know if I can stand not loving you. It would be like ... like having something stolen from inside of me. I don't know if I can handle going back to the way I was. — Nora Roberts

This isn't over. I won't give up on you."
"I've given up on you," he said back, voice also soft. "Love fades. Mine has."
I stared at him in disbelief. All this time, he'd never phrased it like that. His protests had always been about some greater good, about the remorse he felt over being a monster of how it had scarred him from love. I've given up on you. Love fades. Mine has.
I backed up, the sting of those words hitting me as hard as if he'd slapped me. Something shifted in his features, like maybe he knew how much he'd hurt me. I didn't stick around to see. Instead, I pushed my way out of the aisle and ran out the doors in the back, afraid that if I stayed any longer, everyone in the church would see me cry. — Richelle Mead

I wasn't trying to reach England. or Paris. I thought that if I made the broadcast powerful enough, my brother would hear me. That I could bring him some peace, protect him as he had always protected me."

You'd play your brother's own voice to him? After he died?"

"And Debussy."

Did he ever talk back?"

The attic ticks. What ghosts sidle along the walls right now, trying to overhear? She can almost taste her great-uncle's fright in the air.

"No," he says. "He never did. — Anthony Doerr

The fan was spinning and as the shadows passed over the white ceiling I let my eyes unfocus until all of it looked like a universe being born or a planet unraveling, some creation or catastrophe depending on which way gravity was going and where you were standing. So instead of Elizabeth Taylor I thought about stars and how little I knew about them, and how if I was an explorer and I had to sail a boat across the ocean without rador or an electronic compass I'd be screwed because the only constellations I knew were the Big Dipper and Little Dipper and I always got them confused. And even though I knew I'd never have to sail that boat I still wished I knew more about stars and other things. And I wished I could remember lying in the back yard as a kid with my hands locked behind my head, looking up at the night sky and dreaming. But I couldn't, because it wasn't something I ever did. It would have been a nice memory though — Paul Neilan

Never woke, at first, without recalling, chilled, all those other waking times, those similar stark views from similarly lighted precipices: dizzying precipices from which the distant, glittering world revealed itself as a brooding and separated scene - and so let slip a queer implication, that I myself was both observer and observable, and so a possible object of my own humming awareness. Whenever I stepped into the porcelain bathtub, the bath's hot water sent a shock traveling up my bones. The skin on my arms pricked up, and the hair rose on the back of my skull. I saw my own firm foot press the tub, and the pale shadows waver over it, as if I were looking down from the sky and remembering this scene forever. The skin on my face tightened, as it had always done whenever I stepped into the tub, and remembering it all drew a swinging line, loops connecting the dots, all the way back. You again. — Annie Dillard

I sighed again, tipping my head back. My skin was still flushed, whether from anger or adrenaline or both, and my dragon crackled and snapped in myriad different directions. I needed to calm down. I wished I had my board. It was impossible to stay tense while floating on the surface of the ocean, its cold, dark depths lulling you to sleep. The sea was fascinating. It always amazed me how calm and peaceful it was one moment, only to bear down on you a moment later with the power and savagery of a hurricane. — Julie Kagawa

If there was a way to bring someone back, would you do it, no matter what the consequences might be? I know that for me, my logical mind says, 'Of course not!' But the truth is, when you lose someone who is so close to you, it's as if they are a part of you; there's always one more thing to say, one more moment you wish you'd had. — Jennifer McMahon

When I was a kid I used to drink from the tap all the time. I'd run back into the flat all hot and sweaty from playing and didn't even bother putting it in a glass, just turned the tap on and stuck my mouth underneath it. If my mom caught me doing it she used to scold me, but my dad just said that I had to be careful. 'What if a fish jumped out?' he used to say. 'You'd swallow it before you knew it was there.' Dad was always saying stuff like that and it wasn't until I was seventeen that I realised it was because he was stoned all the time. — Ben Aaronovitch

There would be many that would take back the experience of falling in love if it meant also carrying the pain associated with losing them, but I couldn't agree less. To feel the pain of loss is to know you once had something worth losing and I would always carry the memory of how the world was once right, when I laid on a couch, holding the woman I loved in my arms while she slept. — Georgia Cates

No," he muttered, running a hand through his copper hair. "No. No. There are dozens."
"Kell?" she asked, moving to touch his arm.
He shook her off. "Dozens of ships, Lila! And you had to climb aboard his."
"I'm sorry," she shot back, bristling, "I was under the impression that I was free to do as I pleased."
"To be fair," added Alucard, "I think she was planning to steal it and slit my throat."
"Then why didn't you?" snarled Kell, spinning on her. "You're always so eager to slash and stab, why couldn't you have stabbed him? — V.E Schwab

There's an old poem by Neruda that I've always been captivated by, and one of the lines in it has stuck with me ever since the first time I read it. It says "love is so short, forgetting is so long." It's a line I've related to in my saddest moments, when I needed to know someone else had felt that exact same way. And when we're trying to move on, the moments we always go back to aren't the mundane ones. They are the moments you saw sparks that weren't really there, felt stars aligning without having any proof, saw your future before it happened, and then saw it slip away without any warning. — Taylor Swift

I grinned. "So you are human after all." I touched his chest, feeling him breathe hard in and out. "I always thought you were made of steel, you know," I said.
"Superman?" Nat arched his eyebrows.
"No, the Tin Man," I answered back. I settled my head against his chest, turning my ear to listen to his heartbeat. "I sometimes wondered if you had a heart." - Summer, Perfect Summer — Kailin Gow

Kettle, you're not embracing my awesome. Embrace the awesome."
"So are you going to tell me how you knew?" I pulled back to look at him, and his gaze flicked to mine. "Well, I'd always had a feeling of awesome, even as a young boy."
"My God. You're infuriating."
"Kettle, I'm touched, but you don't need to call me 'God. — Teresa Mummert

most viable path toward the North Pole, Petermann insisted. "Perhaps I am wrong," he told the Herald reporter, "but the way to show that is to give me the evidence. My idea is that if one door will not open, try another. If one route is marked with failures, try a new one. I have no ill will to any plan or expedition that means honest work in the Arctic regions." But make no mistake, Petermann said, an Arctic voyage was dangerous work. He always underscored that point. "A great task must be greatly conceived," he had written before one of the German polar expeditions. "For such tasks, one must be a great man, a great character. If you have doubts or scruples, back out now." Petermann pledged to give Bennett's expedition a full set of charts and maps of the Arctic and to help the expedition any other way he could. But beneath his enthusiasm for Bennett's new — Hampton Sides

I had no idea the Monkey Bar meat loaf was going to have my name on it, but when the restaurant opened, there it was, on the menu, Nora's Meat Loaf. I felt that I had to order it, out of loyalty to myself, and it was exactly as good as it had been at the tasting. I was delighted. What's more, I had the oddest sense of accomplishment. I somehow felt I'd created this meat loaf, even though I'd had nothing to do with it. I'd always envied Nellie Melba for her peach, Princess Margherita for her pizza, and Reuben for his sandwich, and now I was sort of one of them. Nora's Meat Loaf. It was something to remember me by. It wasn't exactly what I was thinking of back in the day when we used to play a game called "If you could have something named after you, what would it be?" In that period, I'd hoped for a dance step, or a pair of pants. But I was older now, and I was willing to settle for a meat loaf. — Nora Ephron

Where are we going?" Desandra asked.
"We're going to Blue Ribbon Stables," I said. "It's the closest place to rent a horse.
"Why?" Desandra asked.
"Because I can't keep up with you on foot," I said.
"And she runs like a rhino." Derek added. "You can hear her a mile away."
Traitor. "I thought you had my back?"
"I do," Derek said. "The rhino running is nice. Makes it easy to keep track of you. If I ever lose you, I just have to listen and there you are."
"Yes," Desandra agreed. "It's convenient."
I laughed.
"Are you always this casual?" Robert asked.
"Derek and I worked together for a long time," I told him. "He's allowed some leeway."
"What about Desandra?"
"She only bothers with protocol when she wants something. The rest of the time it's lewd jokes and descriptions of plums."
Desandra snickered.
Robert's eyebrows crept up. "Plums?"
I waved my hand. "Don't ask. — Ilona Andrews

Neythen looked perplexed. 'My mum always said I'm named after a saint, not an illness.'
'Which one?'
'Well he had his head chopped off, see? And then he picked it up and carried it down the road a time. All the way back home, I think.'
'Messy,' Piers said. 'Not to mention unlikely, though one has to think of chickens and their post-mortal abilities. Did she think that you would inherit the same gift?'
Neythen blinked. 'No, my lord.'
'Perhaps she was just hopeful. It behooves mothers to look ahead to this sort of possibility, after all. I'm tempted to behead you just to see if she was right.Sometimes the most unlikely superstitions turn out to have a basis in fact. — Eloisa James

The thank-you thing had been drummed into us intensely when we were growing up. We had three great-aunts, on my mother's side, who believed that when they dropped a present in the mail, your thank-you note should essentially bounce right back out of the mailbox at them. If it didn't, the whole family, cousins and second cousins and all, knew about your lack of gratitude (and, come to think of it, common sense, as the threat was always that no more presents would be forthcoming, ever), and you heard about it from multiple sources. The notes couldn't be perfunctory, either - you had to put real elbow grease into them, writing something specific and convincing about each gift. So Christmas afternoon meant laboring over thank-you notes. As children, we hated this task, but when I saw Mom beam as she thanked people in the hospital, I realized something she had been trying to tell us all along. That there's great joy in thanking. — Will Schwalbe

Guess life is really a road marked by crossroads. It's not the long and winding stretches that will hurt you the most. It's the crossroads. You make a bad choice and it's a tumble and a rumble before you get back on your feet again. But you'll get back on your feet. You'll find yourself. And then you'll be off to your next adventure (crossroads, I mean). In my case, I always had a safety net - my faith in God. But then, I'm more like the millions of simple folk who travel this world. — Psyche Roxas-Mendoza

Long ago," he said, "I thought like you that my mother would always keep the window open for me; so I stayed away for moons and moons and moons, and then flew back; but the window was barred, for mother had forgotten all about me, and there was another little boy sleeping in my bed."
I am not sure that this was true, but Peter thought it was true; and it scared them.
"Are you sure mothers are like that?"
"Yes."
So this was the truth about mothers. The toads! — J.M. Barrie

You and me," he echoed, tilting my face up to his.
I stared back into his eyes. They were clear of sleep and nightmares now.
"Always." I told him, my lips curving into a smile. That had been his line once, now it was mine.
"Always," Balik murmured against my jawbone the words grazing my skin as I arched my neck backwards. "You and me, always." His whisper mingled with the kisses he brushed along my throat. I closed my eyes and drifted away with him. — Melanie Cusick-Jones

What is it, Lord?" What am I holding back? What am I using as an excuse for not serving You in whatever You want me to do?" And then, there by the canal, I finally had my answer. My "yes" to God had always been a "yes, but." Yes, but I'm not educated. Yes, but I'm lame. With the next breath, I did say "Yes." I said it in a brand-new way, without qualification. "I'll go, Lord, — Brother Andrew

The days I'd passed with my mom before she died were still there, it seemed, seared into the corners of my heart.
The atmosphere of the station brought it all back. I could see myself running to the hospital, glad to be seeing my mother again. You never know you're happy until later. Because physical sensations like smells and exhaustion don't figure into our memories, I guess. Only the good bits bob up into view.
I was always startled by the snatches of memory that I saw as happy, how they came.
This time, it was the feeling I got when I stepped out onto the platform. The sense of what it had been like to be on my way to see my mom, for her still to be alive, if only for the time being, if only for that day. The happiness of that knowledge had come back to life inside me.
And the loneliness of that moment. The helplessness. — Banana Yoshimoto

Name me or be eaten!" Shezmu bellowed.
"I name you!" I shouted back. "Shezmu, Slaughterer of Souls, Fierce of Face!"
"GAAAAHHHHH!" He writhed in pain. "How do they always know?"
"Let us pass!" I commanded. "Oh, and one more thing ... my brother wants a free sample."
I just had time to step away, and Carter just had time to look confused before the demon blew yellow
dust all over him. Then Shezmu sank under the waves.
"What a nice fellow," I said.
"Pah!" Carter spit perfume. He looked like a piece of breaded fish. "What was that for?"
"You smell lovely," I assured him. — Rick Riordan

My first record wasn't even with the Fugees. I was signed to Big Beat Records, so I was signed back in 1989 to the label that the Knocks are on now. You can always tell which generation had the pulse based on how they see things. — Wyclef Jean

Strap on one of the weapons you're not supposed to carry.
"Darling Eve." He leaned over, kissed her. "I always have one of the weapons I'm not supposed to carry. You're not to worry about me."
"That's the same bullshit as me telling you not to worry about me."
"Fair enough. So you'll take care of my cop, and I'll take care of your criminal. Reformed."
"Semi-reformed. Since you break the law every time you go out packing." She hissed out a breath. "Take a clutch piece, too."
He patted her hand, went back to his eggs.
He always had a clutch piece. — J.D. Robb

All this is flashy rhetoric about loving you.
I never had a selfless thought since I was born.
I am mercenary and self-seeking through and through:
I want God, you, all friends, merely to serve my turn.
Peace, re-assurance, pleasure, are the goals I seek,
I cannot crawl one inch outside my proper skin:
I talk of love
a scholar's parrot may talk Greek
But, self-imprisoned, always end where I begin.
Only that now you have taught me (but how late) my lack.
I see the chasm. And everything you are was making
My heart into a bridge by which I might get back
From exile, and grow man. And now the bridge is breaking.
For this I bless you as the ruin falls. The pains
You give me are more precious than all other gains. — C.S. Lewis

You're cute in the morning," he told me.
"I am?" I asked.
"Cute and sweet."
"Mm," I mumbled, glad he thought that but I'd always been a morning person. I was a night person too. I was an anytime person when I wasn't stressy and in a bad mood.
One of his hands left my back and I watched his eyes get heated and intense as they studied my face.
Then he did something beautiful, something amazing, something that, if I'd had any doubts as to my certainty, they would have disintegrated.
He tenderly slid the backs of his knuckles against the skin of my cheek while he muttered, "A year and a half. Totally fuckin' missed out. — Kristen Ashley

I wish you wouldn't have given the sundial bracelet to Terease"

"Why?" I question and press my head onto his chest, pushing my arms back into his open jacket and around his back.

"If I had it to lead me to my deepest desire, I know it would always be a direct path to you. — Michelle Warren

Both the five-year-olds looked at me with bewilderment and a bit of fearful uncertainty. I had a sudden horrifying image of the woman I might become if I'm not careful: Crazy Aunt Liz. The divorcee in the muumuu with the dyed orange hair who doesn't eat dairy but smokes menthols, who's always just coming back from her astrology cruise or breaking up with her aroma-therapist boyfriend, who reads the Tarot cards of kindergarteners and says things like, Bring Aunty Liz another wine cooler, baby, and I'll let you wear my mood ring ... — Elizabeth Gilbert

I have only known you for a few months but I cannot realize that there was ever a time when I did not know you. . .when you had not come into my life to bless and hallow it. I will always look back to this year as the most wonderful in my life because it brought you to me... My love for you has made my life very rich and it has kept me from much of harm and evil. I owe this all to you, my sweetest teacher. — L.M. Montgomery

He bent over Farid and wiped some soot from his cold forehead. "Roxanne knows it," he said. "She'll tell it to you. Just go to her and ... and tell her I've had to go away. Tell her I'm going to find out if the story is true."
He spoke with a strange kind of hesitation, as if it were infinitely difficult to find the right words. "And remind her of my promise - that I'll always find a way back to her, wherever I am. Will you tell her that? — Cornelia Funke

I follow the baseball team on the Internet more than I do the football team. Generally you can get a Nebraska game anywhere. Before I started doing big arenas and stuff and had a tour bus when I was just working comedy clubs way back when I would always listen to the games in my hotel room on the Internet. — Larry The Cable Guy

You're the one getting ready to bolt, Jesper. You just want me to run with you so you don't have to feel so bad about it. For all your love of a fight, you're always the first to talk about running for cover."
"I made a mistake. I let my bad get the best of my good, but for Saints' sake, Kaz, how long are you going to make me pay for a little forgiveness? [...] How many times have I had your back in a fight? How many times have I gotten it right? Doesn't that count for anything?" Jesper threw up his hands. "I can't win with you. No one can. — Leigh Bardugo

Humming a little, she presses another electrode to my forehead and explains, "In some parts of the ancient world, the hawk symbolized the sun. Back when I got this, I figured if I always had the sun on me, I wouldn't be afraid of the dark." I try to stop myself from asking another question, but I can't help it. "You're afraid of the dark?" "I was afraid of the dark," she corrects me. She presses the next electrode to her own forehead, and attaches a wire to it. She shrugs. "Now it reminds me of the fear I've overcome. — Veronica Roth

You're not ... jealous?" He eyed me warily.
I shrugged. "I'll always be jealous of any girl who's had that part of you, but I'm not worried about it. If you wanted her, you'd be with her. But you're not. You're with me. A sound choice, I might add. "I smirked suggestively."
Jake threw his head back in laughter. "God, my girl is cocky"
"Pot, meet kettle."
"Good thing we're both attracted to cocky, then, huh?"
"Good thing. — Samantha Young

harbinger, n.
When I was in third grade, we would play that game at recess where you'd twist an apple while holding on to its stem, reciting the alphabet, one letter for each turn. When the stem broke, the name of your true love would be revealed. Whenever I played, I always made sure that the apple broke at K. At the time I was doing this because no one in my grade had a name that began with K. Then, in college, it seemed like everyone I fell for was a K. It was enough to make me give up on the letter, and I didn't even associate it with you until later on, when I saw your signature on a credit card receipt, and the only legible letter was that first K. I will admit: When I got home that night, I went to the refrigerator and took out another apple. But I stopped twisting at J and put the apple back. You see, I didn't trust myself. I knew that even if the apple wasn't ready, I was going to pull that stem — David Levithan

Do you need me?" she said. She could scout as well as Roar and Brooke, who had already disappeared into the darkness.
Perry looked up. His hair was tied back with a leather strip, but a piece fell forward, a blond wave coming to rest at his eyebrow. "You want the truth?"
Aria braced herself for a comment about her arm. "Always."
"That's my answer. — Veronica Rossi

While I was at the funeral home, seeing my father for the final time, one of Darby's daughters gave me a box my dad left for me. When I opened it, it contained a silver bracelet, presumably a gift he'd gotten me for the wedding. Inscribed on the front were my initials, and as I looked at the back of the bracelet, I started crying even harder. My dad had inscribed, "To the man that you've become, and the son you'll always be. — Daniel Bryan

I had achieved so much success in my career and then had this spectacular fall from grace that left me unemployed and living in a town, Los Angeles, that is built on envy. Once you fall, people don't really root for you to come back again. I'd go to restaurants where I always had the best table and half the time they wouldn't even let me pay. And then when I stopped making movies, the same places wouldn't even give me a lousy table, never mind the best one! — Mickey Rourke

Alai saw the tears but had the grace not to say so. "They're fartheads, Ender, they won't even let you take anything you own."
Ender grinned and didn't cry after all. "Think I should strip and go naked?"
Alai laughed, too.
On impulse Ender hugged him, tight, almost as if he were Valentine. He even thought of Valentine then and wanted to go home. "I don't want to go," he said.
Alai hugged him back. "I understand them, Ender. You are the best of us. Maybe they in a hurry to teach you everything."
"They don't want to teach me everything," Ender said. "I wanted to learn what it was like to have a friend."
Alai nodded soberly. "Always my friend, always the best of my friends," he said. Then he grinned. "Go slice up the buggers."
"Yeah," Ender smiled back.
Alai suddenly kissed Ender on the cheek and whispered in his ear, "Salaam. — Orson Scott Card

I shook my head, just as I had back then. "Let the one you've just had take effect," I said. "You'll feel better then." "There's no better for me." He put his fingers on my wrist, his grip surprisingly tight. "Please. Have mercy." But the pill was already beginning its work, or maybe it was the effort of making the request, of taking my arm, of saying such words. His eyelids began to droop. "You're a clever girl, always were," he whispered. "You know what to do." His eyes closed on the first compliment he ever gave me. — Orna Ross

I knew by then that I would never have my mother back, not in the way I had known her all my life. When you have seen your mother shattered, there's no putting her back together. There will always be seams, chipped edges, and clumps of dried glue. Even if you could get her to where she looks the same, she will never be stronger than a cracked plate. — Tayari Jones

Yes,but only if we employ careful strategy,as in rock-paper-scissors," I said.
"My 720 totally beats Nick falling down, like paper covers rock. Unless the rock is a boy,in which case the boy always wins."
"Hayden-"Liz began.
"I am getting sick of your attitude, Hayden," Chloe talked over Liz. "We've been up here all day with you.All we have left is to get you off this jump. Every time you try, you have some excuse: wind in your face, bug in your ear, panties up your butt-"
"I was not making that up," I broke in. "Imagine trying a trick with umcomfortable underwear." I squirmed, rocking back and forth on my board to make a point.
"Or you make some stupid joke!" Chloe hollered at me.Her voice echoed against the rocky slope of the mountain overhead.i stealthily looked around in my goggles to see if any boarders I knew had heard,but it was getting late,and the slopes were empty except for us. — Jennifer Echols

I have never thought you weren't good enough for me. The fear I always had, deep down in my heart, is that I'm not good enough for you."
Murmurs of astonishment rippled through the room but he didn't seem to notice.
"You see, I was never the one who could make you laugh." He glanced at Lawrence, then back at her.
"I was never the one who made coronets of rosebuds for your hair and told you that you were pretty."
He swallowed hard, and his chin lifted a notch, telling her as clearly as any word how difficult it was for him to reveal himself this way.
"I always wanted to say those things, do those things, but I couldn't, for a gentleman is not supposed to behave that way. A gentleman is not supposed to fall in love with the chef's daughter. But right now, today, I don't give a damn what gentlemen do. I'm just a man, and the only thing I care about is you. — Laura Lee Guhrke

My mom believed that you make your own luck. Over the stove she had hung these old, maroon painted letters that spell out, "MANIFEST." The idea being if you thought and dreamed about the way you wanted your life to be
if you just envisioned it long enough, it would come into being.
But as hard as I had manifested Astrid Heyman with her hand in mine, her blue eyes gazing into mine, her lips whispering something wild and funny and outrageous in my ear, she had remained totally unaware of my existence. Truly, to even dream of dreaming about Astrid, for a guy like me, in my relatively low position on the social ladder of Cheyenne Mountain High, was idiotic. And with her a senior and me a junior? Forget it.
Astrid was just lit up with beauty: shining blonde ringlets, June sky blue eyes, slightly furrowed brow, always biting back a smile, champion diver on the swim team. Olympic level.
Hell, Astrid was Olympic level in every possible way. — Emmy Laybourne

Each person is made of five different elements, she told me.
Too much fire and you had a bad temper. That was like my father, whom my mother always critized for his cigarette habit and who always shouted back that she should feel guilty that he didn't let my mother speak her mind.
Too little wood and you bent too quickly to listen to other people's ideas, unable to stand on your own. This was like my Auntie An-mei.
Too much water and you flowed in too many different directions. like myself. — Amy Tan

I keep thinking it's going to come back when I least expect it. When I'm at my happiest. So I'm always afraid to be happy."
Zane looks out at the horizon. "You know, there are so many things that can go wrong in this world, you could spend your whole life worrying about them and forget to appreciate every moment you have with someone. Then, you're like, 'God, why wasn't I thankful for what I had when I had it?'" He glances over at me. "You know what the secret to a happy life is?" I shake my head, silent tears falling down my cheeks.
He squeezes my hand. "No regrets. Just live in the moment. — Nicole Christie

Always will be, but you know that your best friend has to play both sides. Protect you even when you won't. It's in the fucking book of best friends, right under the part that says pat them on the back and make them feel better when they've had a one night stand and can't remember the name of the guy they fucked, totally making them a whore. It's my job to make sure that even when you're being a whore, you don't feel like a whore. — Audrey Carlan

It's over for me, isn't it?" The old man glanced across the room mid-chew. "What do you mean?" "I'm not getting my body back." He shrugged. "Probably not." My head swam. It didn't matter that at some level I had suspected the truth; hearing the words spoken out loud felt like a kick in the teeth. "Why didn't you tell me before?" "You're a smart guy, Alexander, and we both know you had already figured it out. That's always the way with people - truth staring them in the face but unwilling to accept it." He ate another cookie quietly. "But," he added, "even if I had spelled it out you wouldn't have believed me. You weren't ready or willing to accept it yet. You'd just have gotten all worked up. — Linda Francis Lee

You are always here with me when I do so, at least in my heart, and it is impossible for me to remember a time when you were not a part of me. I do not know who I would have become had you never come back.
I love you, Allie. I am who I am because of you. You are every reason, every hope and every dream I've ever had, and no matter what happens to us in the future, every day we are together is the greatest day of my life. I will always be yours.
And, my darling, you will always be mine.
Noah — Nicholas Sparks

Walt had a way of communicating that was just magical," composer Richard Sherman told me. "Simple, but magical. He would give you a challenge and say, 'I know you can do this.' He made you believe anything was possible. He made you proud to be on his team. And it really was a team effort - Walt would roll up his sleeves and go to work alongside the rest of us. "He saw potential in people who had never really done anything great. My brother Robert and I really had no track record in the music industry, but Walt heard a few of our songs and he gave us an opportunity and inspired us to keep topping ourselves. Without Walt to inspire us, I don't know where we'd be today. "Walt always wanted you to find something wonderful in yourself, to believe in it and consider it God's gift to you. God gives you the gift, and the rest is up to you. Walt taught me that what you do with that gift is your gift back to God. — Pat Williams

I wanted to get in the car and drive, just drive. Just get to you. That's all I could think of, was
getting to you. But I knew I had to sober up first. So I went out, to the beach. I thought if I
walked awhile that might help. And it was cold, you know? The water was cold. I thought if I
splashed some on my face ... well, if I took a swim. That would help. I thought I'd only jump in, get wet. I thought it would only take a few minutes and I could be on my way. To you."
His voice snagged like a burr on silk. Heat leaked from the corners of Bess's eyes and slipped between her lips. Salt water. Always salt water.
I was stupid," Nick whispered.
You didn't know," she whispered back.
It took my feet out from under me. And all I could think of was how you were waiting, and I was going to fuck it all up again. How I was going to let you down. — Megan Hart

Giving her a slight smile, he whispered, "I'm putting my hand to your cheek right now."
The stubborn strength that had kept her knees locked threatened to give way. Closing her eyes, she whispered back, "I'm putting my arms around you, and leaning my head on your shoulder."
"And I'm stroking your hair, and kissing you." He took a deep breath. "And I am always, always going to hold on to you with all of my strength. Always, Pia. — Thea Harrison

Because the truth is, nobody knows what's best for you better than you do. You have to really sit still and ask yourself: What do I want? Does this feel right? What should I do? I realized I had to go back and do what I had always done. Listening to my gut was just as important as listening to the advice of others, and only I knew what was best for me. — Jennifer Lopez

I actually study boxing - my dad was a Golden Gloves champion so I learned how to fight at a very young age. Growing up in Brooklyn you always had to watch your back, so I pretty much learned to protect myself. — Lana Parrilla

We were lucky to get Sam Jackson and Jeremy Irons and John McTiernan back. Long movie and hard movie to make and difficult for me because instead of working, my biggest concern was not repeating things I had done it in the previous films. And it rang notes in my head of episodic TV. A sequel is not a new movie; it's a chapter in a movie that you have already seen. Thank god Sam was there and thank god Jeremy was there. Again, it went outside the template of that series of films but it did well and made a ton of dough and the third chapter of a lot of sequels is always the one that falls down. — Bruce Willis

She went back to Shane and settles in on his lap again, arm around his neck. His circled her waist. "I thought you had to go," he said. "And don't think i didn't see you kissing on my best friend."
"He deserved it."
"Yeah. Maybe i ought to kiss him, too."
Michael, on his way out, didn't bother to turn around for that one. "Oh sure, you always promise. — Rachel Caine

You always have to give back to the fans. I remember being a fan of television and film when I was growing up and if I would've had the opportunity to meet somebody that I watched on television, it would've made my day, it would've made my life. — Jon Huertas

I had what you could call a chaotic childhood. My parents divorced when I was 2; I went back and forth between my mom's and dad's houses for years. But, you know, my parents tried to do the right thing. As crazy as everything was, and as much fighting and everything, there was always a feeling of support from them. — Crystal Bowersox

He took his hands off the oars and pulled in the mooring rope. If I make a couple of loops, he thought, I can strap the axe on to my back.
He had a mental picture of what could happen to a man who plunged into the cauldron below a waterfall with a sharp piece of metal attached to his body.
GOOD MORNING.
Vimes blinked. A tall dark robed figure was now sitting in the boat.
'Are you Death?'
IT'S THE SCYTHE, ISN'T IT? PEOPLE ALWAYS NOTICE THE SCYTHE.
'I'm going to die?'
POSSIBLY.
'Possibly? You turn up when people are possibly going to die?'
OH, YES. IT'S QUITE THE NEW THING. IT'S BECAUSE OF THE UNCERTAINTY PRINCIPLE.
'What's that?'
I'M NOT SURE.
'That's very helpful. — Terry Pratchett

Blindly, I ran to Archer, who was sitting on one of the thick mats we'd used in Defense. His elbows rested on his raised knees, and he had his head in his hands. I knelt in front of him, awkwardly wrapping my arms around his neck. He uncurled himself, pulling me to him. For a long time, we held each other, my hands fisted in his hair; his, stroking my back.
"I'm okay," he said at last. "I know that's hard to believe, but nothing hurts. I mean, except for my mind and soul, but those were always a little broken." Gently, we disentangled ourselves and rose to our feet. "Your magic is awesome, man," he said to Cal, who I just realized was standing at the edge of the mat, next to Jenna. "Although I have to say, now that you've brought me back from the edge of death-what, like, hundreds of times?-I'm starting to feel like our relationship is a little unbalanced."
"You can buy me a burger when we get out of here," Cal said, and as usual, I had no idea if he was joking or not. — Rachel Hawkins

In my tradition, God revealed Himself in words and lives in stories and, no, you cannot touch or even see Him. The Word, in Judaism, was never made flesh. The closest God came to embodiment was in the Temple in Jerusalem ... But the Temple was destroyed. In Judaism, the flesh became words. Words were the traditional refuge of the Jewish people - Yochanan ben Zakkai led a yeshiva, my father became a professor. And little boys, in the Middle Ages, ate cakes with verses inscribed on them, an image I find deeply moving and, somehow, deeply depressing. This might help explain a certain melancholy quality books in general, for all their bright allure, have always had for me. As many times as I went down to my parents' library for comfort, I would find myself standing in front of the books and could almost feel them turning back into trees, failing me somehow. — Jonathan Rosen

My older brother always tells me I changed as a person when I saw 'Ace Ventura.' Because when I saw 'Ace Ventura', I became obsessed. I watched the movie as many times as I had to - back then, you couldn't go on the Internet and find the script - so I watched it as many times as I could to write my own script of 'Ace Ventura.' — Eliza Coupe

I remember once, I read in a horoscope, because I'm an Aries, I read this terrible thing, which really affected me, which said, "You will never be original. You will always be an interpreter." (Laughs) I thought, "Oh my God." You know, I had to live with that on my back for [all my life]. — Andy Serkis

Whenever I think of all the people we've baptized over the years, I always recall a conversation Jep had with on of his buddies in the backseat of our car when he was really young. Jep's friend Harvey asked him what it meant to be a christian.
"Well, when you get to be about thirteen or fourteen years old, my daddy will sit you down and study the Bible with you," Jep told him. "He'll make sure you know what he's talking about. And then he'll tell you that Jesus is going to be your Lord and when that happens, you can't act bad anymore. If you say yes, we're all going down to the river. We'll be so excited that we'll be skipping down there. My daddy will put you under the water, but he won't drown you. He'll bring you back up and everybody will be clapping and smiling. That's what he'll do. — Phil Robertson

I have always had a weakness for footnotes. For me a clever or a wicked footnote has redeemed many a text. And I see that I am now using a long footnote to open a serious subject - shifting in a quick move to Paris, to a penthouse in the Hotel Crillon. Early June. Breakfast time. The host is my good friend Professor Ravelstein, Abe Ravelstein. My wife and I, also staying at the Crillon, have a room below, on the sixth floor. She is still asleep. The entire floor below ours (this is not absolutely relevant but somehow I can't avoid mentioning it) is occupied just now by Michael Jackson and his entourage. He performs nightly in some vast Parisian auditorium. Very soon his French fans will arrive and a crowd of faces will be turned upward, shouting in unison, 'Miekell Jack-sown'. A police barrier holds the fans back. Inside, from the sixth floor, when you look down the marble stairwell you see Michael's bodyguards. One of them is doing the crossword puzzle in the 'Paris Herald'. — Saul Bellow

As his gaze rose to her face - he bit back a gasp. "Your hair, it's - "
"Red." ...
"You look stunning." ...
"Did I ever tell you that when I was growing up, my favorite cartoon characters was Jessica Rabbit?" ...
"You always had the curves, but now, with the hair..." He blew out an exaggerated Roger Rabbit whistle. "You're a spittin' image. — Kristin Miller

After everything I've done," he whispered harshly, "not only today, or eight years ago, when I left, letting you believe I was dead, but since the first day we met, Mouse. Ever since then, since the very beginning, you've stayed with me. You've always had my back." - Kellan
"I always will," she replied. Her voice was quiet, but her eyes were resolute. "When you love someone, that's what you do." - Mira — Lara Adrian

I lost my dad back in the fall, and my dad said something to me a long time ago. He said, 'Are you happy with who you are now?' because we just had a real serious talk. And I said, 'Yeah.' He said, 'Then you can't regret what got you to where you are. So whatever you do and whatever mistakes you make, learn from them and grow. And just always treat people with kindness,' which I've tried to do. — Dennis Haskins

He froze. "I . . ." Then, as he searched my face with wonder, he slid from his seat and down to one knee. "My sweet, lovely Anna. I love you . . . and I want to marry you. But only if you want to. Do you? I mean, will you? Marry me?"
Be still my heart. His proposal was so adorably awkward that I had to laugh, sliding out of my chair so I could face him on my knees, too. I grabbed his face and kissed him for saying exactly what I needed to hear. We kissed once, twice, three times before he pulled back.
"Does it always take this long for someone to answer? It's making me bloody nervous."
I looked into his eyes. "Yes, Kai. I'll marry you. — Wendy Higgins

No doubt Richard's father, like my mother, had once held his infant son in his arms, looked into the eyes of his child's mother, and believed they would move into the future together with love. The fact that they didn't was a weight each of us carried, as every child does, probably, whose parents no longer live under the same roof. Wherever it is you make your home, there is always this other place, this other person, calling to you. Come to me. Come back. — Joyce Maynard