Lady Darcie

“Eyes narrowing, she whispered, “Are you accusing me of PMS?”
― Lori Foster, Dash of Peril

“Van Houten,
I’m a good person but a shitty writer. You’re a shitty person but a good writer. We’d make a good team. I don’t want to ask you any favors, but if you have time – and from what I saw, you have plenty – I was wondering if you could write a eulogy for Hazel. I’ve got notes and everything, but if you could just make it into a coherent whole or whatever? Or even just tell me what I should say differently.
Here’s the thing about Hazel: Almost everyone is obsessed with leaving a mark upon the world. Bequeathing a legacy. Outlasting death. We all want to be remembered. I do, too. That’s what bothers me most, is being another unremembered casualty in the ancient and inglorious war against disease.
I want to leave a mark.
But Van Houten: The marks humans leave are too often scars. You build a hideous minimall or start a coup or try to become a rock star and you think, “They’ll remember me now,” but (a) they don’t remember you, and (b) all you leave behind are more scars. Your coup becomes a dictatorship. Your minimall becomes a lesion.
(Okay, maybe I’m not such a shitty writer. But I can’t pull my ideas together, Van Houten. My thoughts are stars I can’t fathom into constellations.)
We are like a bunch of dogs squirting on fire hydrants. We poison the groundwater with our toxic piss, marking everything MINE in a ridiculous attempt to survive our deaths. I can’t stop pissing on fire hydrants. I know it’s silly and useless – epically useless in my current state – but I am an animal like any other.
Hazel is different. She walks lightly, old man. She walks lightly upon the earth. Hazel knows the truth: We’re as likely to hurt the universe as we are to help it, and we’re not likely to do either.
People will say it’s sad that she leaves a lesser scar, that fewer remember her, that she was loved deeply but not widely. But it’s not sad, Van Houten. It’s triumphant. It’s heroic. Isn’t that the real heroism? Like the doctors say: First, do no harm.
The real heroes anyway aren’t the people doing things; the real heroes are the people NOTICING things, paying attention. The guy who invented the smallpox vaccine didn’t actually invented anything. He just noticed that people with cowpox didn’t get smallpox.
After my PET scan lit up, I snuck into the ICU and saw her while she was unconscious. I just walked in behind a nurse with a badge and I got to sit next to her for like ten minutes before I got caught. I really thought she was going to die, too. It was brutal: the incessant mechanized haranguing of intensive care. She had this dark cancer water dripping out of her chest. Eyes closed. Intubated. But her hand was still her hand, still warm and the nails painted this almost black dark blue and I just held her hand and tried to imagine the world without us and for about one second I was a good enough person to hope she died so she would never know that I was going, too. But then I wanted more time so we could fall in love. I got my wish, I suppose. I left my scar.
A nurse guy came in and told me I had to leave, that visitors weren’t allowed, and I asked if she was doing okay, and the guy said, “She’s still taking on water.” A desert blessing, an ocean curse.
What else? She is so beautiful. You don’t get tired of looking at her. You never worry if she is smarter than you: You know she is. She is funny without ever being mean. I love her. I am so lucky to love her, Van Houten. You don’t get to choose if you get hurt in this world, old man, but you do have some say in who hurts you. I like my choices. I hope she likes hers.”
― John Green, The Fault in Our Stars

“Jackson stood quietly as Alani came into the house. Unlike the other women, she didn’t wear a swimsuit. Shame. He’d love to see her in one. Everyone had duly celebrated Trace’s engagement, and Alani seemed taken with Priss—but then, who wouldn’t be? Priss was funny, smart, cute and—luckily for Trace—stacked.
Unaware of Jackson, Alani stopped to look out the patio doors. She looked . . . wistful. Like maybe she wanted to take part, but couldn’t.
In so many ways, despite being kidnapped by flesh peddlers, or maybe because of that, she was still an innocent. At just-barely twenty-three, she acted much older.
Like a virgin spinster.
Every night, in his dreams, they burned up the sheets.
Here, in reality, she avoided him. She avoided involvement.
But he’d get her over that. Somehow.
Suddenly Priss came in, wet hair sleek down her back, rivulets of water trailing between her breasts. She spotted Jackson right off and, after smiling at Alani, asked them both, “Why aren’t you guys coming down to swim?”
Alani jerked around to stare at Jackson with big eyes.
His crooked smile told her that he had her in his sights. “I was just about to ask Alani that.”
Priss laughed. “You’re still dressed.”
“I can undress fast enough.” He looked at Alani. “What about you?”
Her lips parted. “No, I . . . didn’t bring a suit.”
“Pity. Maybe we could move up to the cove and skinny-dip in private?”
Pointing a finger at him, Priss said, “Behave, you reprobate!” And then to Alani, “Beware of that one.”
Still watching him, Alani nodded.”
― Lori Foster, Trace of Fever

“I’m not a person who does well with idle time.”
“Seriously? I never would have guessed.”
His teasing didn’t bother her, especially when she looked at her ring again. Smaller diamonds surrounded the impressive princess-cut stone, making it glint brightly in the sunlight. “It is so perfect.”
“If it’s not, we can exchange it—”
She snatched the ring up close to her chest. “Never.”
Trace gave a slow, sexy grin. “So, Priscilla Patterson, since you approve of my job, my home, my friends and my ring, will you try another new experience—and marry me?”
Joy bubbled up, but she didn’t want to shout just yet. “When you go off to—” She glanced at Matt “—work, will you at least tell me what’s going on?”
“Yes. As much as I can.”
“Will you be honest about the danger involved?”
“I’ll be honest with you about everything.”
“Okay.” She peeked at him, and winced in dread. “Did you want a big wedding?”
Trace frowned at the continued line of questioning. “I want whatever you want.”
That almost made her cry, too. “Another first,” she whispered, because before now, what she wanted hadn’t really mattered. She kept smoothing her hands over his chest, as always drawn by his physique. “You should enter a wet T-shirt contest. You’d win.”
Chris snorted, but Matt agreed.”
― Lori Foster, Trace of Fever