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“If you can’t depend on your family interfering in your personal life, what can you depend on?”

“Cookie cutters don’t work with chocolate chips, and you can’t frost them.”

“Yum, frosted chocolate chip cookies. I think you’re on to something.”

“How do you know it’s plastic?”

“I’m five. All my toys are plastic.”

mud wampum

“W-what’s that?” Danny asked through a cough.

“It’s when we go out in the dirt after it rains and splash the truck in the mud puddles. In Texas, mud puddles get really big.”

“His temperature is still high, 102.5. I’m going to give him some ibuprofen.”

“Is that OK after he had the Tylenol?”

“It’s perfectly fine. Both medications have the same goal, but they work differently. Lots of kids have high fevers, and we bring them down with both medications all the time.”

“It’s not cruel to strip a burning kid down to his underwear. It’s much worse to let the fever stay high and keep all that heat in.”

“You’re a serious cocoa die-hard.”

“I have a five-year-old. Marshmallows are a must.”

“You’re a good friend, Jack. You were ready to accept her regardless, and you’re there for him when it fell apart.”

She just told him she couldn’t do it. They were too different. Shouldn’t she have figured that out before she said yes?

I think that’s what an engagement is all about. You have to spend time with each other, figure out if you work together outside of the physical.

Being pissed on a motorcycle never ended well.

~~~~~

“It’s December. Mammoth is covered in snow.”

“In Texas, a man never lets a lady walk to her door alone. Especially at night.”

We’re going to Disneyland and we’re staying at Jack’s Place. Then again, We’re going to Sea World and we’re staying at More for Less. Do you see what I mean? The one sounds like a great time, the other sounds like a budget vacation with hard beds and leaky roofs.

“Nothing with limos and caviar?”

“That wouldn’t be cost-effective, but minivans and car seats would work. I want to cater to the middle class, but give them some of the same perks The Morrison does.”

“Room service with food geared for the family. Babysitting, dog sitting, even a spa priced right. I’d place every hotel around airports, major family vacation destinations.”

Days like this made her happy with her choice about working graveyard. She didn’t miss out on her son’s day-to-day life so long as she worked during his sleeping hours.

A late November bite in the air was what Jessie referred to as a sweater-without-a-coat day.

Jessie had learned early on that talking about her sitter was a good way of telling a prospective date that she was a mother without the awkward “Do you want to date a single mom” conversation.

What did that make Jessie? Here she was looking for love with a pocketbook, and the cougar-lady was looking for loving using her pocketbook.

surgery-stabilized woman.

a little thick around the middle.

calorically challenged,

This wasn’t a little black dress, this was the little black dress that every woman wanted but seldom had.

“Hazel eyes spark with a little color,” she told him. She displayed an emerald green off-the-shoulder dress with sequins down the neck.

“Not that one.” It reminded him of a Christmas tree without a star.

“Have some faith. Most people care for other people’s property better than their own. We’ll deal with individual issues as they come up.”

A part-time dad who didn’t care was worse than none at all.

Jack sometimes stopped by to crash when he wanted a break from the hotel. The Morrison was a five-star luxury hotel filled with champagne and caviar. Sometimes Jack just wanted pizza, beer, and a ball game on the tube with a friend.

Ontario International Airport took some of the burden off LAX and Burbank, but the land around those airports was built out, without any ability to grow. Ontario provided plenty of room for new hotels.

He would love to burn the image of every Heather he ever knew out of his mind once and for all. Plastic “What can you do for me baby” women who flirted with his wallet more than him.

“I’ll bet Mr. Cowboy mooches off one of his friends for the bill.”

“Oh, come on, he can’t be that bad.”

“He’s flirting with a waitress at Denny’s, Leanne. His ambitions can’t be all that high.”

why waste my time on someone dreaming of the future instead of living it? You know my mom isn’t the wisest woman in the bunch, but she told me once that it is just as easy to fall in love with a rich man as it is to fall in love with a poor one.

Jessie knew she wasn’t ugly, but she didn’t see all that much when she looked into the mirror. Her light brown hair sat twisted into a knot at the base of her neck; her dull hazel eyes had dark smudges beneath them indicating a lack of sleep, and it was hard to be fat when all her money went to bills and care for her son, Danny.