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The Boy with Big, Big Feelings, by Brittany Nguyen Le. There once was a boy with feathery hair and a heart that was bursting with feeling. His emotions seemed bigger than everyone else's, and sometimes they made him go reeling. When playing outside, on the yellowest days, a loud truck might rumble on by. And wouldn't you know it, that big heart of his would push feelings right out of his eyes. At night, when the shadows would form on the walls and fear would steal all of his rest, those feelings of his made it so hard to breathe as they jumped up and down on his chest. Sometimes when his play had to come to an end, or when things didn't go as he'd planned, the feelings would run down the length of his arms and clench when they got to his hands.
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An excerpt from Book Lovers by Emily Henry. Well, if it isn't young Charlie Lastra! An old woman with a pile of silvery gray hair on top of her head in a dress whose neckline tops her chin comes towards us. And you've brought a date? How lovely! Her hazel eyes twinkle as she gives Charlie and me both squeezes on the arm. He looks downright adoring by Charlie's standards. Even Amaya didn't get this smile. How are you, Mrs. Struthers? She holds out her hands, gesturing to the bustling dining room. Can't complain! Just the two of you? When he nods, she takes us to a white-clothed table tucked against the window lined with candles dripping wax down wicker-wrapped wine bottles. You two enjoy! Charlie's red is thick and intoxicating, and within 30 seconds a bottle of red wine appears at the table. Oh, we didn't order that, I tell the server. But he tips his head in Mrs. Struthers' direction and hurries away.
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Empire of Storms by Sarah J Maas Tears stung Elid's eyes as they slipped free, but then the grass crunched behind them. She saw the white hair first, then the golden eyes, and Elid sobbed as Manon Blackbeak emerged, smiling faintly. As Manon Blackbeak saw her and Aelin knee-to-knee in the grass and mouthed one word, hope. Not dead. None of them were dead. Adian said hoarsely, is your arm? Aelin grabbed it, gently, inspecting the shallow cut, the new pink skin that revealed what had been missing mere moments before. Aelin twisted on her knees, snarling at the wolf warrior. The golden-haired male averted his eyes as the Queen glared her displeasure. It wasn't his fault, Elid managed to say. The bite, Aelin said dryly, turquoise eyes, livid, would suggest otherwise.
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I was told there'd be cake. Essays by Sloane Crosley The Pony Problem As most New Yorkers have done, I have given serious and generous thought to the state of my apartment should I get killed during the day. Say, someone pushes me into the subway tracks, or I get accidentally blown up, or a woman with a headset and a baby carriage wheels over my big toe, backing me into the scaffolding, or shakes loose a lead pipe which lands on my skull. What then? After the ambulance, the hospital, the funeral, the trays of cheese cubes on foil toothpicks, back in the apartment I never should have left, the bed has gone unmade and the dishes unwashed. The day I get shot in a bodega, buying cigarettes, naturally, will in all likelihood be the day before Laundry Sunday and the day after I decided to clean out my closet, got bored halfway through, and opted to watch sitcoms in my prom dress instead.
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Guess How Much I Love You, written by Sam McBratney. Little Nut Brown Hare, who was going to bed, held on tight to Big Nut Brown Hare's very long ears. He wanted to be sure that Big Nut Brown Hare was listening. Guess how much I love you, he said. Oh, I don't think I could guess that, said Big Nut Brown Hare. This much, said Little Nut Brown Hare, stretching out his arms as wide as they could go. Big Nut Brown Hare had even longer arms. But I love you this much, he said. Hmm, that's a lot, thought Little Nut Brown Hare. I love you as high as I can reach, said Little Nut Brown Hare. I love you as high as I can reach, said Big Nut Brown Hare. That is quite high, thought Little Nut Brown Hare. I wish I had arms like that.
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The Second Mountain, written by David Brooks. What commitments give us? Though commitments are made in a spirit of giving, they produce many benefits. Let me spell out a few. Our commitments give us our identity. They're how we introduce ourselves to strangers. They're the subjects that make our eyes shine in conversation. They're what give our lives constancy and coherence. As Hannah Arendt put it, without being bound to the fulfillment of promises, we would never be able to achieve the amount of identity and continuity, which together produce a person about whom a story can be told. Each of us would be condemned to wander helplessly and without direction in the darkness of his own lonely heart, caught in its ever-changing moods, contradictions, and equivocalities. Identity is not formed alone. Identity is always formed by joining a dyad with something else.
