Front Desk Quotes

Ben's dead," he says not moving or breaking his stare.

"And?"

"Just thought you should know," he says, looking at me in the eyes like he's waiting for me to confess.

"Thanks for waking me up to share the information," I tell him. "Where's Venessa?"

"At home," he says. "Needed to see you first, alone."

"Quit looking at me like that, partner," I tell him. "I ain't left this floor all night." Which isn't a lie. Ben's room is on this floor, but he doesn't know I know that.

"Even if you did, you know I wouldn't - "

"Partner," I tell him straight, letting him figure it out. "I didn't shut off his life support."

After he blinks several times he gives me that smirk. He looks around me to my sleeping wife and then back at me and tells me straight, too. "Go back to sleep partner. You look like shit."

With that he gets up and walks out.

Staring at the door he walks out of, I smile. He gets it. Turns out the staff at that front desk got it, too. They didn't stop my wife from doing what she needed to do; seems like they had other shit going at that time. Heard through the grapevine one of the women taken and held by Ben happened to work on this very floor. It also turns out the coffee pot wasn't working and it was an all hands on deck kinda thing to get it fixed. I get it, the women need their coffee. They also didn't run to his aid until I had my wife safe back in her bed. Those ~ K.S. Adkins

Even funnier, the guy at the front desk thinks I am either a hooker or having an affair with a married man. He was more than discrete."
"I would have guessed affair," I joked. ~ Andrea Heltsley

He was breathing, which is always a good sign.
As gently as I could I picked him up, placed him on the towel, wrapped it around him, and put him in my car. I drove to the emergency clinic, the cat purring on the seat beside me.
"What's his name?" the young man at the front desk asked as my towel and cat were whisked to a back room.
"Uh ... John Tomkins," I said.
"That's different," the receptionist said, writing it down.
"He was a pirate," I said. "I mean Tomkins. I don't know about the cat. ~ Josh Lanyon

There's already a marriage clock, a career clock, a biological clock. Sometimes being a woman feels like standing in the lobby of a hotel, looking at the dials depicting every time zone in the world behind the front desk - except they all apply to you, and all at once. ~ Sloane Crosley

I hate normal studios, because you have to say "hi" to the person at the front desk. And then you go into the studio, and there's a second engineer in there that you don't know, and then you're stuck in a glass box with someone talking to you through a walkie-talkie. ~ Marilyn Manson

It was Rogelio, Chutsky's friend from the front desk, who was going to tell us when Weiss checked in. But it certainly didn't look like he was going to tell us much of anything, unless we listened to him with a Ouija board. Because if appearances were any guide at all, judging by the belt so tightly wrapped around his neck and the way his tongue and eyes bulged out, Rogelio was extremely dead. ~ Jeff Lindsay

In the morning a new man was behind the front desk. "And how did you enjoy your stay, Sir?" he asked smoothly.
"It was singularly execrable," I replied.
"Oh, excellent," he purred, taking my card
"In fact, I would go so far as to say that the principal value of a stay in this establishment is that it is bound to make all subsequent service-related experiences seem, in comparison, refreshing."
He made a deeply appreciative expression as if to say, "Praise indeed," and presnted my bill for signature. "Well, we hope you'll come again."
"I would sooner have bowel surgery in the woods with a a stick."
His expression wavered, then held there for a long moment. "Excellent," he said again, but without a great show of conviction. ~ Bill Bryson

I couldn't miss the irony, not as a forty-two-year-old native of the segregated South, still fighting to earn respect in the color-conscious world of American business. How often had my parents and grandparents, other family members and friends, and I myself been directed to the back door of a bus, a restaurant, or a theater because we were considered second class, even after paying a first-class price for service! But that night we were treated to courtesies that even President Nixon could not enjoy: entering through the lobby, approaching the front desk, quietly registering, and being assisted to our room by the highly trained wait staff. A familiar portion of a Bible verse came to mind. The last shall be first and the first last (Matt. 20:16). ~ John Barfield

While in high school, I worked part time at Subway, then at the front desk of the local YMCA, then at a tennis club, until I landed an unpaid internship at 'The Mountain View Voice,' my hometown newspaper. ~ Jose Antonio Vargas

Mrs. Indianapolis was in town again. She looked like a can of Sprite in her green and yellow outfit. She always likes to come down to the front desk just to chat. It was 4:04 am and thankfully I was awake and at the front desk when she got off the elevator and walked towards me. 

"Good morning, Jacob," she said.

"My name is Jarod," I replied.

"When did you change your name?"
"I was born Jarod, and I'll probably die. Maybe."

"You must be new here. You look like a guy named Jacob that used to work at the front desk."

"Nope, I'm not new. And there's no Jacob that's worked the front desk, nor anybody who looks or looked like me. How can I assist you, Mrs. Indianapolis?"

"I'd like to inform you that the pool is emitting a certain odor."

"What sort of odor?"

"Bleach."

"Ah, that's what we like to call chlorine. It's the latest craze in the sanitation of public pools. Between you and me, though, I think it's just a fad."

"Don't get sassy with me, young man. I know what chlorine is. I expect a clean pool when I go swimming. But what I don't expect is enough bleach to get the grass stain out of a shirt the size of Kentucky."

"That's not our policy, ma'am. We only use about as much chlorine as it would take to remove a coffee stain the size of Seattle from a light gray shirt the size of Washington."
"Jerry, I don't usually give advice to underlings, but I'm feeling charitable tonight. So I'll tell you that if yo ~ Jarod Kintz

And now, the waitress standing in front of them. She was beaming, as if Ian had just handed her a puppy with a Visa Black card in its mouth.
"Can I get you anything else?" she asked as she cleared their untouched plates. "It doesn't look like enjoyed your breakfast very much!"
"Just the bill, please."
She smiled. "Are you going sightseeing today? The first stop on the Freedom Trail is just around the corner. If you go ask Bob over there at the front desk, he can–"
"We have other plans," Ian interrupted.
"That's great! Anything fun?"
Natalie looked up at the waitress and gave her a fake smile. Except that on Natalie, it looked more demonic than cheerful. "Our mum's on trial for murder. Today's the verdict. But if it ends early, we'll be sure to pop by the Freedom Trail." The waitress's smile vanished. ~ Rick Riordan

And on the subject of burning books: I want to congratulate librarians, not famous for their physical strength or their powerful political connections or their great wealth, who, all over this country, have staunchly resisted anti-democratic bullies who have tried to remove certain books from their shelves, and have refused to reveal to thought police the names of persons who have checked out those titles.
So the America I loved still exists, if not in the White House or the Supreme Court or the Senate or the House of Representatives or the media. The America I love still exists at the front desks of our public libraries. ~ Kurt Vonnegut

Someone's gotta determine whether you guys are destined for superstardom," I said, my mind catching up somewhat. A light bulb popped over my head. "Hey, I could be your momager! Get you gigs, do your wardrobe. Ride your coattails all the way to the Grammys." I was mentally calculating my cut.
"Mom, we're a high school band who haven't even properly rehearsed yet. Don't write the acceptance speech just yet," she chided.
"Mmhmm," I said distractedly, thinking of the Porsche I'd buy with my income.
Brad the front desk receptionist wandered past. "Brad!" I called, stopping him. "Lexie's band is going to be world famous. Want her autograph now so you can sell it on eBay in five years and retire a rich man?" I asked him.
He grinned. "You bet. I'll also be doing a TMZ interview telling all about how I knew her before she was gobbled up by the fame monster," he responded without missing a beat.
I gave him a thumbs up and turned to Lexie, grinning. She had her head in her hands. ~ Anne Malcom

The handyman who'd helped rescue them was sitting at the front desk, his arm propped on his toolbox as he listened to a handheld radio, and he waved when he saw them. "How were the stairs?"
Better than the elevator," Owen said. "Any news?"
"No power until tomorrow at the earliest," he reported, his mustache twitching. "They're saying it goes all the way up into Canada." He paused for a moment, then shook his head. "It must be quite a sight from up in space. ~ Jennifer E. Smith

Tonight when she came down to the front desk she was wearing neon green hot pants and a pink leopard print jacket. But the best part was that her boots almost matched her jacket. I think she's on to something. Why let the fact that you're 65-years-old interfere with your ability to dress like a colorblind fourteen-year-old? ~ Jarod Kintz

Squatting' in a Smith machine is an oxymoron. A Smith machine is not a squat rack, no matter what the girls at the front desk tell you. A squat cannot be performed on a Smith machine any more than it can be performed in a small closet with a hamster. Sorry. There is a gigantic difference between a machine that makes the bar path vertical for you and a squat that is executed correctly enough to have a vertical bar path. The job of keeping the bar path vertical should be done by the muscles, skeleton, and nervous system, not by grease fittings, rails, and floor bolts. ~ Mark Rippetoe

At this point two elderly security guards in parkas, the guys who normally work the front desk at the plant, asked John to step behind the tape. John claims that here he told the guards that he could not speak English and when that failed to persuade them, he fa ... ked a violent seizure. I am unclear as to the purpose of this part of his plan. John flung himself down and began rolling around in the snow, thrashing his limbs about and screaming "EL SEIZURE!!! NO ES BUENO!!!" in a Mexican accent. ~ David Wong

automated voices and the bells from the row of testing machines in the back. The walls were white cinder block, the floors speckled linoleum. At the front desk were four large black ladies. Leigh Anne handed all the documents over to one of them, who took one look at them and said in a slow drawl, "Uh-uh. This school ~ Michael Lewis

In the interview I was told that I'd be replacing Robert, who was a robot. The company thought they could save some money and automate the front desk position, because they didn't have to pay Robert, there was no fear of legal action being brought against the company in the form of a frivolous lawsuit, and Robert's operating cost was only about a nickel a day, give or take four pennies. ~ Jarod Kintz

I met the girl who works at the Doubletree front desk, she gave me her number. It's ZERO. I tried to call from here, some other woman answered. "You sound older!" ~ Mitch Hedberg

One Chief Astronaut used to make a point of phoning the front desk at the clinic where applicants are sent for medical testing, to find out which ones treated the staff well - and which ones stood out in a bad way. The nurses and clinic staff have seen a whole lot of astronauts over the years, and they know what the wrong stuff looks like. A person with a superiority complex might unwittingly, right there in the waiting room, quash his or her chances of ever going to space. ~ Chris Hadfield

Nevertheless, Blecharczyk came through with a new version of a site on March 3, a week before the annual conference in Austin, Texas. The new slogan was "A friend, not a front desk. ~ Brad Stone

I have noticed that in plays where the characters on stage laugh a great deal, the people out front laugh very little. ~ Jean Kerr

In one Starbucks, I spotted a young Frenchman wearing blue Converse sneakers, baggy Levi's jeans, and a red T-shirt with a giant Abercrombie & Fitch logo splashed across the front. As I watched him wash down his cheesecake with gulps of venti hot chocolate, I had to wonder: can't they revoke your French citizenship for this sort of thing? ~ Taylor Clark

If you could arrange to avoid that routine job-world, you were an intellectual or an artist. Too restless, tremorous, agitated, too mad to sit at a desk eight hours a day, you needed an institution - a higher institution. ~ Saul Bellow

He feels as if he is floating, and she is weighting him to earth; he would like to put his arms around her and his face in her apron, and rest there listening to her heartbeat. But he doesn't want to mess her up, get blood all down the front of her. ~ Hilary Mantel

Grabbing Jeremy's lapels, Nick pulled him closer, grasping him not with fingers but with claws. His face inches away from Jeremy's, his eyes burning red, his fangs sharp and gleaming, he screamed, "BECAUSE YOU'RE MINE! NO ONE THREATENS WHAT'S MINE AND WALKS AWAY!" His growl rumbled through the room, ratcheting down into the subsonic. "I WILL BURN DOWN WHOLE ARMIES BEFORE I LET THEM TAKE YOU FROM ME!"...

"Jesus, big brother," said Toby. "I know vampires are territorial when it comes to their mates, but you're way out in front for the possessive macho bullshit award."

Nick sighed. "I know. I've got to work on that. ~ Arshad Ahsanuddin

We're all creatures of complex needs
and desires. The only certain thing in a romantic relationship is that you will both change, and one morning you will wake up, go the mirror, and see a stranger. You
will have what you wanted, and discover
you want something different. You think
you know who you are, and then you'll
surprise yourself. In all the choices in front of you, Restless, one thing is clear: love is not
something to be thrown away lightly.
There was something about this man, beyond
coincidences of timing and opportunity,
that drew you to him. Before you give
up on the marriage . . . give him a chance.
Be honest with him about the needs that
aren't being met, the dreams you want to
pursue. Let him find out who you really
are. Let him help you in the work of opening
that door, so the two of you can finally
meet after all these years.
How do you know he can't satisfy your
emotional needs? How can you be sure he
doesn't long for magic and passion just as
you do? Can you state with absolute certainty
that you know everything there is to
know about him?
There are rewards to be gained from the
effort, even if it fails. And it will take courage
as well as patience, Restless. Try
everything you can . . . fight to stay with a
man who loves you. Just for now, put
aside the question of what you might have
had with someone else, and fo ~ Lisa Kleypas

At Least I Am Free

At last I am free
I can hardly see in front of me
I can hardly see in front of me

And now love please listen
To what I say
I can't go on living life this way
I've tried and I've tried
To make you see
You call this love
All this lying, my friend, it just can't be

At last I am free
I can hardly see in front of me
I can hardly see in front of me

And now love, please hold me
Come closer, my dear
It feels so good, just having you near
But who am I fooling
When I know it's not real?
I can't hide
All this hurt and pain inside I feel ~ Elisabeth Fraser

A mirror hung between the shelves.
Clara stepped in front of it and let her fingers run over the silver roses that covered the frame. She had never seen anything so beautiful. The glass they surrounded was dark, as if the night had spilled onto it. It was misted up, and right where she saw the reflection of her face was the imprint of a hand. ~ Cornelia Funke

Whatever task you're set, find some way to love it. Sunny wondered if Josiah's words applied to standing with a face of stone so the person in front of her wouldn't know how much she wanted to scream. ~ Megan Hart

Only a fool of a scientist would dismiss the evidence and reports
in front of him and substitute his own beliefs in their place. ~ Paul Kurtz

I'd been stuck in one gender my whole life. It never bothered me. Now I wondered how that would feel for Alex. The only analogy I could come up with wasn't a very good one. My second grade teacher, Miss Mengler (aka Miss Mangler), had forced me to write with my right hand even though I was left-handed. She'd actually taped my left hand to the desk. My mom had exploded when she found out, but I still remembered the panicky feeling of being restrained, forced to write in such an unnatural way because Miss Mengler had insisted, 'This is the normal way, Magnus. Stop complaining. You'll get used to it. ~ Rick Riordan

He knows only what is right in front of him; she is aware of every incoming sensation that glances obliquely against her soft, fragile core ~ Steve Martin

So he stopped at the first of them, a frigid hothouse whose front tipped forward over the street in defiance of gravity, taste, and ordinance; inside, the tender daytime flowers could be seen huddling in family groups beneath a constant, unseen sun, and behind them was the hermetic door to the dark Cactus Room where the shy nocturnal plants, genus cereus, could bloom in privacy at any hour. Vivien, once out of the car, appeared less constrained. She did not have that stiffness so many have on first entering bars, that air of waiting stubbornly for alcohol to loosen them, which so often presages their manner when it comes' time for bed. She was already excited when the martinis came. ~ Douglas Woolf

What I'm doing is a dream come true but at the same time its work. It's like anything else. The only time it doesn't really feel like work to me is when I'm on stage and doing what I've prepared myself for my whole life which is to stand out in front of a crowd and sing. ~ Gretchen Wilson

Everything in New Orleans is a good idea. Bijou temple-type cottages and lyric cathedrals side by side. Houses and mansions, structures of wild grace. Italianate, Gothic, Romanesque, Greek Revival standing in a long line in the rain. Roman Catholic art. Sweeping front porches, turrets, cast-iron balconies, colonnades- 30-foot columns, gloriously beautiful- double pitched roofs, all the architecture of the whole wide world and it doesn't move. ~ Bob Dylan

The only fundamental truth is greed, and the only question is who is up front about this. That's the new authenticity. ~ Nathan Hill

Attend your children's athletic events. There's nothing better than watching your child succeed while absolutely loving the opportunity to play in front of you. ~ Robert Cheeke

eat, baby.
eat.
chew.
please.
I know it hurts. I know it doesn't feel good.
please.
I know your hunger is different than mine.
I know it doesn't taste the same as mine.
imagine you could grow up all over again
and pinpoint the millisecond that you started
counting calories like casualties of war,
mourning each one like it had a family.
would you?
sometimes I wonder that.
sometimes I wonder if you would go back
and watch yourself reappear and disappear right in front of your own eyes.
and I love you so much.
I am going to hold your little hand through the night.
just please eat. just a little.
you wrote a poem once,
about a city of walking skeletons.
the teacher called home because you
told her you wished it could be like that
here.
let me tell you something about bones, baby.
they are not warm or soft.
the wind whistles through them like they are
holes in a tree.
and they break, too. they break right in half.
they bruise and splinter like wood.
are you hungry?
I know. I know how much you hate that question.
I will find another way to ask it, someday.
please.
the voices.
I know they are all yelling at you to stretch yourself thinner.
l hear them counting, always counting.
I wish I had been there when the world made you
snap yourself in half.
I would have told you that your body is not ~ Caitlyn Siehl

I find it quite intriguing that the one observing me as different, immediately assumes that there's something wrong with me, but never, not even for one instant, questions the possibility of the opposite. It's truly amazing that the ones with more certainties, the most arrogant and the most selfish, are indeed the most stupid inside society. They are so dumb and ignorant that they can't see a writer in front of their nose. And the more the writer types, talks and thinks, the more they think that this separation, this difference, grants them some form of superiority. Indeed, the light pushes demons into hell. The brighter your light, the faster you differentiate others. The way of the light was never meant for the weak, which are a majority. And this majority will always ignore the light, as demons fearing and hating angels. And so, it's interesting that without artists God would not have a way to reach the world. And yet, without the ignorant, Satan wouldn't have a way to stop God. ~ Robin Sacredfire

I see a human form coming toward me, arms outstretched. Assuming that form to be naked, I duck and back up so as not to get groped by one of my zombie friends,only to back my bare heinie into someone else.
"Ahh!" Mackenzie screams.
"Ahh!" I scream right back.
Ohmygosh, ohmygosh, ohmygosh. My eyes are adjusting, and I see that all five of us are jumping up and down and screaming. We would usually hug or fall into some kind of laughing pileup in this kind of situation,but in our current state, we insteadt sort of cover our chests with one forearm and slap at the air in front of us with the other. Then we all start shushing one another, terribly afraid of waking up anyone else in the house.
Kimi opens the door to the family room and we peek out. No sign of human life in the kitchen. I spooked myself in there only a few minutes ago, and now I'm about to run headlong into this very same nightmare naked. What is wrong with me? ~ Alecia Whitaker

Nathaniel, who has failed as a writer, decides to commit suicide. He loads his revolver, places it at his side on his desk, and starts to write his letter of farewell. The letter lengthens, brightens, breathes, lives. It is the Masterpiece, the yearned-for Masterpiece! In order to publish it, Nathaniel does not commit suicide. ~ Enrique Anderson Imbert

I've got to get Brittany alone if I'm gonna have any chance of saving face and saving my Honda. Does her freakout session mean she really doesn't hate me? I've never seen that girl do anything not scripted or 100 percent intentional. She's a robot. Or so I thought. She's always looked and acted like a princess on camera every time I've seen her. Who knew it'd be my bloody arm that would crack her.
I look over at Brittany. She's focused on my arm and Miss Koto's ministrations. I wish we were back in the library. I could swear back there she was thinking about getting it on with me.
I'm sporting la tengo dura right here in front of Miss Koto just thinking about it. Gracias a Dios the nurse walks over to the medicine cabinet. Where's a large chem book when you need one? ~ Simone Elkeles

Correlationism is like a mixing desk in a music recording studio. It has two faders: the correlator and the correlatee. ~ Timothy Morton

J.K. Rowling said Bellatrix's role was going to be significant in the last one, when I showed some reluctance in playing a tiny bit part. Up front, they said, 'You're very significant in the last one.' But significant could mean a lot of things. That could just mean a significant plot point. Doesn't necessarily equal big part. ~ Helena Bonham Carter

The walls in front of us are not there to keep us from achieving our desire. They are there to see how bad we want what we desire. ~ Bruce Alan Jensen

As I walked toward the front door, a little motion to the left caught my eye. Jenny Sells stood in the hallway, a silent wraith. She regarded me with luminous green eyes, like her mother's, like the dead aunt whose namesake she was. I stopped and faced her. I'm not sure why.
"You're the wizard," she said, quietly. "You're Harry Dresden. I saw your picture in the newspaper, once. The Arcane."
I nodded.
She studied my face for a long minute. "Are you going to help my mom?"
It was a simple question. But how do you tell a child that things just aren't that simple, that some questions don't have simple answers - or any answer at all?
I looked back into her too-knowing eyes, and then quickly away. I didn't want her to see what sort of person I was, the things I had done. She didn't need that. "I'm going to do everything I can to help your mom."
She nodded. "Do you promise?"
I promised her.
She thought that over for a moment, studying me. Then she nodded. "My daddy used to be one of the good guys, Mr. Dresden. But I don't think that he is anymore." Her face looked sad. It was a sweet, unaffected expression. "Are you going to kill him?"
Another simple question.
"I don't want to," I told her. "But he's trying to kill me. I might not have any choice."
She swallowed and lifted her chin. "I loved my Aunt Jenny," she said. Her eyes brightened with tears. "Momma won't say, and Billy's too little to figure it out, but I know what happen ~ Jim Butcher

Proper school nutrition must be complemented by activities outside of the cafeteria. The decisions parents make to keep their kids healthy are critical in fighting this battle on the home front. ~ Tom Vilsack

Confession is like really, really healthy vomit. It may smell and get all over the front of your shirt, but you feel better - you feel cleansed - when you're done. ~ Rob Bell

A thousand times today I've started to open my mouth, started to squeak out, Can you tell me ... ? But then I'd look into the front seat, at my mother's silent shaking, my father's grim profile, the mournful bags under his eyes, and all the questions I might ask seemed abusive. Assault and battery, a question mark used like a club. My parents are old and fragile. I'd have to heartless to want to hurt them. ~ Margaret Peterson Haddix

A king fortifies himself with a castle," observed the Count, "a gentleman with a desk." As ~ Amor Towles

I cannot see myself sitting at a desk from nine to five! ~ Reggie Lee

The point of theatre is transformation: to make an extraordinary event out of ordinary material right in front of an audience's eyes. Where the germ of the idea came from is pretty much irrelevant. What matters to every theatre maker I know is speaking clearly to the audience 'right now.' ~ Lee Hall

I want a different system entirely. One not seen on this earth for thousands of years. If ever. Democratic Womanism. Notice how this word has "man" right in the middle of it? That's one reason I like it. He is right there, front and center. But he is surrounded. I want to vote and work for a way of life that honors the feminine. ~ Alice Walker

Someone once asked Mother Teresa how she dealt with world poverty. Do you know what she said? 'You do the thing that's in front of you. ~ Corban Addison

Like most people with no grasp whatsoever of real economics, Mustrum Ridcully equated "proper financial control" with the counting of paper clips. Even senior wizards had to produce a pencil stub to him before they were allowed a new one out of the locked cupboard below his desk. ~ Terry Pratchett

What do you know about me, Isabeau?"

He leaned forward, and I forced myself to stay still instead of shying away. He was so close that I could smell the subtle notes of his cologne: musk and wood with a hint of leather.

What did he want me to say? That everyone said he was an ogre? Or that they all wanted to sleep with him anyway?

"I..."

"Go on. You won't hurt my feelings."

He was still smiling, slight dimples visible in both cheeks. The sight was destracting, to say the least.

"I know that you're the youngest CEO and partner in the company's history, and I know that you earned the spot by working your way up after graduate school instead of using your inheritance as a crutch."

"Everyone knows that. What do you know about me? The real stuff. None of this press release bullshit."

I looked down at my hands, anything not to have to look up at his face so close to me.

"Um. People say... they say that you're scary. And that your assistants don't last long."

He laughed, a deep, warm sound that seemed to fill up the office. I glanced up to see him smirking at me. I relaxed my grip on the desk a little. Maybe I wasn't being fired after all.

"What else do they say?"

Oh, God. He can't possibly want me to tell him everything. Does he? The look on his face confirmed that he did. It was clear by the way he looked at me that I wasn't leaving this office un ~ Delilah Fawkes

I conquered my stage fright a long time ago. In my line of work, it's kind of a pre-requisite that you not feel bad about looking stupid in front of a lot of people. ~ Buzz Osborne

Whether it's physically having a visual of what you want to accomplish in front of you, like a running list or a vision board, or mentally visualizing and taking time to meditate, having a vision of what you are running for keeps you from running for the sake of running. ~ Ian Somerhalder

You've passed like three stores that sell batteries," she says. "We need to get one now in case it's too late on our way back."

"You don't need a battery. Your battery is fine," I say.
I avoid looking over at her but I can see her watching me, waiting for more explanation.

I don't immediately respond. I flick the blinker on and turn onto my grandparent's street. When I pull into their driveway, I turn the car off and tell her the truth. What harm could it do at this point?

"I unhooked your battery cable before you tried to leave today." I don't wait for her reaction as I get out of the car and slam the door. I'm not sure why I slam the car door. I'm not mad at her, I'm just frustrated. Frustrated that she doubts me after all this time.

"You what!?" she yells. When she gets out of the car, she slams her door intentionally.

I keep walking, shielding the wind and snow with my jacket until I reach the front door. She rushes after me. I almost walk inside without knocking but remember how it feels, so I knock.

"I said I unhooked your battery cable. How else was I going to convince you to ride with me?"

"That's real mature, Will. ~ Colleen Hoover

She dug through the clothes packed in the trunk until she found the blue halter top and black jeans she had been wearing the night Veto died. She wasn't sure why she had saved them, but she was glad she had, now. She was going to wear them tonight in honor of Veto.
She carried them back to her room, stood in front of the mirror over her dresser, and slipped on the gold earrings that had been a gift from Veto. Then she started to dress. She rubbed glitter lotion over her arms and painted black lines on her eyelids. She rolled on her mascara, then stood back. ~ Lynne Ewing

Leading from the front: It's what built America. But these days, the federal government isn't at the front - it's cowering in the back corner of the room, ducking responsibility and hoping no one notices. ~ Michael Bloomberg

We went into a small, windowless office crowded between two others that appeared empty. A middle-aged American woman was seated behind a metal desk. She appeared normal and reasonably attractive until she spoke; then her scarred gums showed that she had once had two or three times the proper number of teeth - forty or fifty, I suppose, in each jaw - and that the dental surgeon who had extracted the supernumerary ones had not always, perhaps, selected those he suffered to remain as wisely as he might. ~ Gene Wolfe

The man bobbed toylike in front of him, meanwhile digging into his pocket as if scratching at a familiar micro-organism that possessed parasitic proclivities that had survived the test of time. ~ Philip K. Dick

If I seem to be over-interested in junk, it is because I am, and I have a lot of it, too - half a garage full of bits and broken pieces. I use these things for repairing other things. Recently I stopped my car in front of the display yard of a junk dealer near Sag Harbor. As I was looking courteously at the stock, it suddenly occurred to me that I had more than he had. But it can be seen that I do have a genuine and almost miserly interest in worthless objects. My excuse is that in this era of planned obsolescence, when a thing breaks down I can usually find something in my collection to repair it - a toilet, or a motor, or a lawn mower. But I guess the truth is that I simply like junk. ~ John Steinbeck