Daniel > Recent Status Updates

The original ...
the one that started it all ...
written by the one that started it all.
May the Force be with me! 😁

"Learning who you are is what you’re here to do.”
“I thought we were here to learn English,” Jack cracked, which made everyone laugh.
“And that, too!” Mr. Browne answered, which I thought was very cool of him. He turned around and wrote in big huge block letters that spread all the way across the chalkboard: MR. BROWNE’S SEPTEMBER PRECEPT: WHEN GIVEN THE CHOICE BETWEEN BEING RIGHT OR BEING KIND, CHOOSE KIND.

Via doesn’t see me as ordinary. She says she does, but if I were ordinary, she wouldn’t feel like she needs to protect me as much. And Mom and Dad don’t see me as ordinary, either. They see me as extraordinary. I think the only person in the world who realizes how ordinary I am is me. My name is August, by the way. I won’t describe what I look like. Whatever you’re thinking, it’s probably worse.

‘We sleep in clothes. Is too cold for nightshirt.’
‘I will be alright, Mr Andrej,’ Jasper replied, trying to stop his teeth from chattering.
‘Nyet. We are in Carpathian Mountains.’
Andrej wrapped him in his arms in the way Billy did after they made love. ‘Is only for being warm,’ the man said. ‘I not do fuck.’
‘Well, I am very pleased to hear that,’ Jasper said. ‘Thank you for looking after me.’
‘Shut up.’

“Enough.” As he came forward, I planted my hands on his chest, gave him a good push, and almost sent him into the bathroom door. We stared at each other from opposite corners of the bathroom, like boxers waiting for the bell. I gave him a pointed stare. “I’m going to take my shower. I’ll leave you hot water.”

His jaw looked tight enough to break, and it worked for a moment. “Don’t bother. I need the cold.”

Kevin sent me some strange hand signal. I’d never been any good at charades. It could’ve been “who’s on third,” “I gotta pee,” or—I squinted…. American sign language for “hairbrush.”
Kevin threw up yet another gang symbol for me to interpret, and I threw up my hands in exasperation. “What?”
“They might be coming out this way.”
“How is this”—I threw up the strange hand signal—“they might be coming this way?”

“So what do you want to know about my father?”
“All those weekends when you said you had ‘family business.’ Why didn’t you just tell me? It’s not like I don’t deal with criminals all the time.” From the safety of my desk. But still.
“I didn’t want it to change the way you looked at me. Knowing that I was the son of a criminal.”
“It would’ve changed where we kept the knives. But nothing else.”
“You’re a riot.”

Jasper's mouth opened and closed. He wiped his cheek with his hand. ‘Really?’
‘Yes, Jasper. His Lordship reasons if we men can live together, yet apart, why can't you? I will find you a suitable piano, because we know that, after Billy, music is your reason for living.’
‘Happy with the arrangement, Billy?’
‘Fucking hell.’
‘I shall take that as a yes.’
Billy said, ‘I could kiss you, Mr. Payne.’
‘Please don’t.’

Jasper stammered. ‘I have questions.’
‘You and me both.’ Silas slapped him on the shoulder.
'We all do,’ the viscount said. ‘We shall address them at the table. There is much to organise. I can't do it on an empty stomach. Refresh your minds and prepare your questions. There is a long way to go before we can secure our livelihoods and our home. We will resume at seven thirty.’

Oh, this is gonna be delicious!

'We've come to know each other through intense times. You've shown me what loyal men you are and how each of you, in his own way, brings strength to us as a team. We will inevitably clash and fall out and keep things from each other. No one has lied. We're victims of unfortunate circumstance. Knowing this only makes me love each one of you more.'

‘Oh, shut up, you romantic eejit.’ Silas kissed Archer’s hand.

“You call yourself Ethan now?”
“It’s my middle name.”
“You don’t have a middle name.”
I did not. Rainstorm only went with so much. My parents had offered to amend the oversight, but I declined. Mostly because my mother was overly fond of the name Moonbeam, and two wrongs do not make a right. They just make one very irritated Dr. Rainstorm Moonbeam Christiansen marching to the courthouse with name-change forms.

“Can I ask you something?”
He sighed. “I knew you’d ruin it.”
“You can say no.”
“If I were capable of saying no to you, we wouldn’t have had a cream couch, Diet Coke in the fridge, or three annoying wind chimes.”
As though to underscore his point, the offending wind chimes tinkled in agreement. I beamed. “You kept the wind chimes?”
He sounded a bit resigned when he continued. “What is it?”

“Any hopes for chicken?”
“Does chicken have a face?” she asked.
“Of course. What kind of scaryass chicken have you been eating?”
I don’t know exactly when she went to the dark side, but she’d been a vegetarian since we were kids. She’d stormed into my room, ranting about some PETA video, and then proceeded to use tongs, gloves, and a garbage bag to rid the house of “anything with a face.”

L❤️VIN' THIS!

Archer didn't care about money. He cared about Billy, with little education, a florid tongue and refreshing honesty, raised in the lowest level of service, now standing in Larkspur Hall, able to speak honestly to a viscount. He showed potential that would otherwise have gone unnurtured, doing good for the Hall. He was the kind of young man Archer wanted to nurture in his newest venture, the Larkspur Academy.

Yes ... I can confirm ...
Hamish Long is an excellent narrator 👍👍

Can already tell this is gonna be a slooooow read. Gotta savor/re-read every word, paragraph, and yes, that means many updates! Been seeing this author in my feed for as long as I've been lurking here. My first read by her. LOVIN' the writing style. For me, HOW you tell a story is as important as the story itself. I'm also LOVIN' Rain ... I, too, speak SSL! (*Sarcasm as a Second Language*). He's my soulmate, I think!

“Why don’t we just chalk up our ‘relationship’ to a one-night stand that happened to last four years,” he continued. “That way I can solve my case and you can get the fuck over yourself.”

I tamped down the flare of anger that was trying to catch wind of some oxygen. “Well, I guess that’ll keep me busy. Here I was, wishing I’d brought my Kindle.”

Which was a complete lie. I always brought my Kindle.

“Haven’t heard of it.”

“You haven’t heard of anything on TV.”

No, I wasn’t an expert on pop culture, but I had a TV. Apparently when you flubbed one game of Charades, you were blackballed for life. “We lost fair and square.”

“We had that game in the bag.” He shook his head at the misery of it all. “It was Harry freaking Potter. How do you miss something like that?”

“You drew a flower pot with hair on it.”

Graycie was pissed. At that moment, I was first draft pick for the Ultimate Fuckup League. “Thanks for agreeing to meet with me this morning. I’m not going to beat around the bush.”
“Sir?”
“I spoke with Mr. and Mrs. Paul. They had quite a bit to say about you.”
“All good, I hope.” Probably not a good idea to get smart with him. But I’m pretty sure I’m 70 percent blueberries and blackberries. Sarcasm is my jam.

“You’re a medium. I’m a ghost. I tell you my unfinished business. You fix it. Then I get out of here. That’s the way these things go.”

Tell that to Shawna Paul’s parents. She was the first ghost I tried to deliver a message for. Her dad pulled a shotgun on me. Her mom reported me to the bureau. I got quiet time in the departmental psychologist’s office to think about what I’d done.

This is gonna be fun!