As in 'The Three Billy Goats Gruff'?" The skull howled with laughter. "You just got your ass handed to you by a nursery tale?""I wouldn't say they handed me my ass," I said.Bob was nearly strangling on his laughter, and given that he had no lungs it seemed gratuitous somehow. "That's because you can't see yourself," he choked out. "Your nose is all swollen up and you've got two black eyes. You look like a raccoon. Holding a dislocated ass.

Pain is to be endured. It ends or it does not.

Bob wasn't precisely a friend to me but... I was used to him. In a way he was family, the mouthy, annoying, irritable cousin who was always insulting you but who was definitely at Thanksgiving dinner. I had never considered the possibility that one day he might be something else.

At the moment I was mad enough to chew up nails and spit out paper clips.

Molly was committing dinner. . .

Many things are not as they seem: The worst things in life never are.

I believe that there's a cloud for every silver lining,' I said.