She smiled with the warmth of a penguin.

I wish I could say I write 9-5. It's usually more like 8-6, every day but the weekends.

I staggered backward-her one hand gripping my shoulder, the other still holding my wrists behind her-and she followed until my back hit the wall.

Relief spilled into me. He wanted to live. He just didn't know how.

I got it this time, Daddy Warbucks," I said.

I never considered I might make a career out of writing as I was going to school, so when I did turn my attentions that way, I was very ill prepared, having only what I read as a guide, and no formal training whatsoever. I credit that very ignorance with a great deal of my success.

No," she said firmly. "I want you to stay when I go. Break tradition again, my love, and burn me alone in the home we built. I don't want you with me. You aren't done. You see too far ahead. You need to make the world in your thoughts a real one that our children can fly in." - Matalina to Jenks