Another Blog award- Sunshine Award

Yes Indeed, I have gotten ANOTHER blog award from my good friend Willa. I take that as a good thing. O.o So go check her blog out, because she has AMAZING STUFF, including writing, poems, and some incredible photography.



Yay! A pretty flower! :-) So any way... Here's how it goes-

1. Thank the blogger who nominated you and link to his/her blog. 

Easy enough. You should all know Willa. She's been here before. Go to www.willafivecents.blogspot.com and check out her awesome stuff.

2.Nominate other bloggers and let them know on their blog.

SIGH. Do I haveta? Fine. Let's do...

Arianna- http://thewarmfireplace.blogspot.com/

Nichole- http://theravenquill.blogspot.com/

Moriah- http://symptomsofwritesanity.blogspot.com/

3.Answer the list of ten questions given. 

4.The sunshine award must be posted on your blog.

Let's do this, then. :-D

1. What is your favorite Bible verse?
Well, I don't have a "Favorite" as such, but I really like Psalms 4:8-

       "I will lie both lie down and sleep;

            For you alone O LORD, make me dwell in safety."

2. Would you sacrifice your life if it would save that of a strangers?
I like to think I would, but only God knows. I think that would be the right choice to make, but when it got down to it, I can only hope that I would.

3. Given the chance to swim with dolphins...would you accept?
Hmmm.... I don't know...

4. Are you more "Fascinated" by light or darkness? Why?
Darkness. Darkness everyday of my light. Because the trick is to see the light in the darkness, but I also am a writer, so I enjoy shadows and walking in and out of them. (I hope that makes sense. O.o)

5. Can you speak in a different accent?
Can I do it? Or can I do it well?

6. Would you rather be disliked or forgotten?
I would rather be disliked, because if I've said what I want to say and people don't like it, at least I said it.


7. Has the ocean ever filled your dreams?
Actually, no. My dreams always happen in the ground Never in the air, never in the water. Always on solid ground. (THat probably says something deep about me, but whatever...)

8. Assuming you have one, how often is your journal put to use?
I used to not that often, but now I have a goal journal that I write in every week.

9. What is your favorite fictional character of all time?
N/A. Sorry, I can't. But I'll tell you some characters I think are really awesome if you like. Tris Prior (Divergent), Katniss Everdeen (Hunger Games), Annabeth Chase (Percy Jackson), Princess Elizibitta (The Princess of Cortova)

10. What is your favorite hymn?
I love Trust and Obey. It has good childhood memories and it's really pretty. 

Well...This was fun, thanks once more Willa for nominating me. Really check out her stuff. She's super awesome. And hopefully you know a little more about me now. :-)

Stuff Saturday- Mirror Snippet

Hi all! I don't have any songs or short stories on hand right now, so I thought I'd post a snippet of the novel I'm working on this month. This is the last scene I wrote, and I just finished it up now.This takes place in the garden of Princess Crystal's (My Main Character) father's garden. (If you want to see some more snippets of my book and find out what my characters look like, seeing as this snippet has no descriptions, you can follow my pinterest board for it here.)

 I turn around, picking a rose from a bush carefully, pressing one of the petals between my fingers, feeling the water drain from it. I sigh a little wistfully and look at my fingers. They’re clean, except for a little bit or water on them. They say if the color of the rose leaks out onto ones skin when you press the petal between your fingers like that, you’ll find love. Or course it’s just a story, something they tell little girls who are waiting for their prince. But I already have my prince. I just don’t want him. King Saber stands, holding a hand out to me, palm up.

“Will you walk with me?” I nod, taking his hand and standing, trying to ignore the wobbling in my knees. I put my hand gently in the crook of the King’s elbow and walk slowly along with him, admiring the spring flowers that we pass. I open my mouth several times, but then close it again, not sure what to say. Saber seems to be deep in thought. Finally, he stops and looks to me, a look that I think may be sorrow in his eyes.

“Crystal.” I look at him, frowning. “Last night, I spoke to your father about the...closeness of our…Kingdoms.”  I feel my heart pounding my chest, because I think I know what he’s going to say next. It’s all I can do to just nod and keep my eyes on his, every word he says weighing on the words I know I have to say next. “And I've started to enjoy my time with you.” My head feels like it’s going to explode, because I don’t want to say this. I don’t want to marry him. But Saber plunges on, getting on one knee and taking a betrothal necklace out of his jacket pocket. My neck tenses up, and I try not to start making gasping noises, clutching the folds of my skirt into a fist. “Princess Crystal Amile Claral Marie of the house of Murrine, eldest child of King Durand Peter Francis Onne the 3^rd, and heir to the throne of Murrine,” He say my formal title, and I don’t feel any love behind the words. “Will you…” My eyes feel like they’re bulging out of my head, and I don’t know what to do. “Be my wife?” The world blurs and spins. The green and purples and reds and blues of the garden blurring together, and the voices scream words loudly, but I can’t understand them, and I hear King Saber saying my name, clutching my arms to hold me upright, But I can’t do anything, I’m just screaming and clutching my head, and then- everything goes black. I don’t know if I live or die, don’t know I I’ll see anyone ever again. I can’t see anything. Nothing but the back of my eyelids, a dark grey, with just black shards of glass, floating around in front of my vision.

Writing Wednesday- Chapter 7- Love Blood.

Hi all! I'm gonna post the new chapter for Titanium, but first I'd like to give a warning. This chapter is very gory and intense. So it's not for any of the fainthearted. :-) So enjoy. (Those who aren't white faced scardey cats like me.) 

Chapter 7- Tara

Love blood

I fall asleep on the floor of the room, and wake up to sounds. Scary sounds that I always hated, but coming from someone I don’t know. Crying. I look up and see a horrific image. A girl, bloody and dying, is lying on the floor. I run over to her, gasping and crying, both of us. She grabs my face, and her hands are so cold I almost wrench my hands away. But I stay strong, and tense my muscles to keep me in place.

“They’ll kill you, t-they will.” She stammers, her face strewn with tears, blood and sweat. I’ve been like this so many times before, it seems. Maybe not as bloody as her, but I’ve seen pain, and I understand the pain she feels. I look at this woman, only a few years older than me, probably. She could have had such a life. Once again, for the millionth time in my life, I’m reminded how painful death is. Almost as painful as life. So when she tells me I’m going to die it’s all I can say to tell her;

“Not if I can help it.” I get down close to her face and whisper a lie. “I have a plan.” I feel my heartbeat quicken, telling someone dying a big lie, a painful lie. Her face relaxes and she takes her very last breath, her spirit leaving with it. I reach and take the corpses hand, crying and sobbing. “I don’t have one. Don’t have a plan.” A voice in my head, not my Brain Monkey, says,

Why would you lie?

I wanted her to die happy. If there was a way to do that, that was it.

But you can’t change what happened. Never.

I can’t change anything, ever, someone dying doesn’t change that. I nod, agreeing with myself.

If you do something wrong, and no one is there to see it, does that still make it wrong?

How does that matter? And who are you anyway? The voice continues to drone on. Droning on, until I realize whose voice it is. I stand up, letting the body drop onto the floor.

“You sleazy-” The door opens. “How are you in my head?” Joseph walks in.

“Like that? It’s a new trick we’ve been working on; most people don’t notice b that’s my voice. It’s too garbled for them. They say that’s a sign of weakness.” He almost smiles. “I guess you’re not weak.” I nod.

“Did you think I was? I just saw someone die. I’m still standing, aren’t I?” He sneers and sits on my mattresses bed frame, glancing at the mattress acctorss the room where I threw it last night.

“I suppose. But that’s nothing compared to what your father has done. Getting him to talk is quite hard.” Suddenly, I become a monster, not thinking, just trying to get into the sagging parts of his soul and make them bigger, and sinking my claws into him. I’m surprised when I don’t move. I just smile and say,

“Well, I just get it from him, I guess.” He smiles.

“Not from your mother?” I look down, struck down by how well he knows my dark spots. But then again, he is my father.

“I wouldn’t know.” I say. “She’s not able to tell me what she’s like.” Joseph raises his eyebrows, pleased to have struck a blow.

“Oh? And where is she?” I shrug.

“You tell me.” He smiles.

“Oh no, no, my dear. My Pearl died two years ago. I was wondering about your father’s Pearl.” I look at him, using all my willpower and energy to meet his eyes.

“She’s in a coma.” I say, by voice breaking at the end. He mock pouts.

“What. A. Shame. If she was dead, I would be able to help you. But alas, she’s not. How sad. But of course, you could always have my Pearl.” I frown.

“You said she was dead.” Joseph shakes his head and clicks his tongue.

“Ah, ah. But the bad guys lie, don’t they? Yes, they do.” He says. He grins with his, gets up, and leaves me alone, silenced. He won, and I lost.

As the days, hours, and even minutes, wear on, and I am tested constantly, but still telling him nothing about how I got here. I hear news of my father, but never see him. One day, Joseph shows me a picture of my father being tortured. I flip.

“How dare you! You can lie to me, torture me, and hurt my father, but do not, DO NOT! Dare to throw it back in my face. You are a disgraceful human being.” Then I turn around and refuse to talk him until he leaves. I’m not sure what his “Testing” Is for, maybe the human breaking point, but I do not cooperate whenever possible. He gets inside my head. I yell for him to go away, or don’t even talk to him. When I see someone die, I pray over their body and bury them in my food. They give me food, but I don’t take it. One day, I smudge the cameras with Mayo and stuff a piece of bread into my mouth before cleaning them off. When blood gets on my floor, I clean it up. When someone in my head, I show them the door. I have no breaking point. Until one day. They give me dreams. Horrible dreams. Thumping. Gasping. Crying. Bleeding. I never see much, but the images are horrible. My father eating a beating heart while my mother lies bloody and dead beside him. my mother breaking my head open, laughing as she does so. My father grinning at the graves of all my loved ones. James sticking a knife into someone’s throat. I wake up sweaty and crying. I grab my chair and throw it at the camera, screaming.

“HOW CAN YOU BE SO HORRIBLE? I GAVE WHAT I HAD FOR EVERYTHING! EVERYONE! NOTHING EVER CAME BACK TO ME! NOTHING!!!!I WAS LEFT, BROKEN AND BLOODY, IN ALLEYS AND GRAVEYARDS, LEFT TO BURY MY OWN! TO BURY MY SELF! YOU CAN’T GIVE ME WHAT I NEED? WHAT I TRUELY DESERVE? YOU-” I break off to sob. “YOU GIVE ME BACK MY FATHER!!! AND THEN YOU CAN SEE WHEN MY BREAKING POINT IS! BECAUSE GUESS WHAT? YOU HAVEN'T FOUND IT!” I drop to the ground. “You haven’t found it.” I whisper. I don’t look up, I refuse to look up. I hear screaming and crying, my mother back from the dead, everything I want and everything I hate. I don’t look at anything, I just let tears come down, down, making the ground around me wet. I don’t look up. Until I hear one tired, dry, loving voice. I look up and see him, He smiles at me.

“Tara.” Is all he says. I sob, but don’t have any tears left. Nothing comes out when I try to tell him how glad I am to see. Him. Finally I choke out one word. The word I have wanted to say for the longest time.

“Father.”

Writing Wednesday- Titanium, Chapter 6

Chapter 6- Tara

Scared out of my mind

Is life supposed to be so scary? Are we all supposed to live in fear of another horrible thing happening to you? I used to lived in fear that my father would lose his job, the only thing that seemed to work for us. He is and was an amazing scientist. I learned from him, and we bonded. My father used to be only thing in my life that wasn’t tainted. The only thing that made sense. My father, who always knew what to do, my father, who was always able to laugh in the face of death. I hope that his talent for that carried as well as I think it did. Anyway, James and J convinced me that I should get some sleep before I have to be taken. So I lie down on J’s thin pillow and cover myself with James’s jacket. They promised they would wake me and wouldn’t go instead of me. So, I sleep. And I dream. I dream of my parents.

We all sit outside on the hill beside My Aunt’s house, just me, my father, and my mother. For some reason I can’t quite identify, I feel like I need to be somewhere. But we have a picnic lunch with us, so we all get our sandwiches out and eat, my father telling jokes and my mother laughing so hard I should worry. But I don’t. instead I say,

“Mom? You’re okay, right?” She looks at me, frowning.

“Of course I am, dear. Why wouldn’t I be?” Her voice is just the way it should be. Caring, happy, and safe. I shake my head.

“I don’t know. Of course you're fine. I love you mom.” My mother laughs and takes my hand, my father taking my other. They join hands together and we just sit there, smiling. Suddenly, a dark light passes over us, red so bright, I’m almost blinded, and a black so dark, I want to curl up into a ball and hide myself from it. I am crying, screaming, yelling, and I don’t even know what’s going on. Then, my father grows up to a huge size and crushes my mother in his hands. I continue to scream until I hear James’s voice calling my name,

“Tara? It’s James. Wake up!” I open my eyes and see James and J standing over me.

“It’s time.” J says, pointing at the sky. It’s starting to turn red, and there's an unsettling purple in the background. I stand up, drinking in the wonderful moment on the ground.Then, I shake away the image of my father grabbing up my mother’s body and crushing it and replace it with an image of all of us together. Me, James, My parents, and I’m surprised to see J in that image too. I preserve the image, smile at my friends, and run towards the high mountain where I am most likely to be chosen to for the Taking. I dare to take a look behind me. It doesn’t help. I see James and J embrace for a single second then watch me walk away, trying not to make me come back. I don't know what’s going to happen to them, or to me, but it occurs to me that I have as way to get away from danger. With my phone. They don’t have anything. You should have left it with them. I nod, not in the mood to have an argument with myself. I curse under my breath, Then close my eyes to clear the tears that plague them and continue running up the hill. The sky took longer to change this time, and I’m not sure what that means. Maybe that their power is going towards something bigger? Something that might be able to hurt my father. I see a beam of light coming closer to me and stop. I know that I’m the one that will be chosen. It’s not stoppable. I close my eyes, and pray for the safety of my friends, my father, and the earth in general, and let the beam take me.

-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-

I feel the pressure on my body release, and feel the ground underneath my feet. I sigh and drop to the ground, exhausted. I sit halfway up, one foot on the ground, both my hands out to steady myself. I look around. I’m in a ship, I know because I can see the sky turning back to its wonderful blue outside the window. I look behind me and see that I’m being watched. There’s a camera in the corner, and on the bed beside a window. A projector screen comes down and I see My father there, reading off a script.

“I am Joseph Lexton. You know me as your ruler. I am now your fellow scientist, and then, If you live, your executioner.” I look at his face, exactly the same face I saw one day ago. I stare at him as he drones on about my death, my testing, and the like. I think, look up. See me. Remember who you are. Finally he looks up from his paper and drops his pen. I gasp. This is not my father. He has a scar down the left side of his face, making his un-fatherly sneer look more evil.

“You...” He stammers. “You’re dead.” I stumble over to the bed.

“No... I’m not. Who are you? What have you done with my father?” He frowns.

“You are my daughter. You died 3 year ago, when your mother did.”He looks horrified and on the verge of tears, and he has another look in his eyes that I can’t quite place, but I know it scares me. I shake my head.

“This is impossible. “ I whisper breathlessly. The man who is and isn’t my father nods. Then sudden realization dawns on his face.

You’re Tara Pearl Lexton?” I nod. He narrows his eyes. “Do you have a childhood scar in your right eyebrow?” I shake my head.

“It’s on my left eyebrow.” The man shakes his head and swears loudly.

“You’re my daughter! No...” He nods. “You’re my alternate dimension daughter. I frown.

“You’re...” I begin. He swears again. I raise my eyebrows, then let them drop again, not understanding. “You... Have my father! You... took him!” I scream. “You’re the him from here!” I say, realizing what’s going on and hating it. I open my mouth, letting my jaw hung there, suspended in the air.

What’re you going to do now, Genius? I try and push my stupid Brain Monkey’s comments away and look at the retrieving screen. I look around the room and see a table rising from the ground with sandwich fixings on it. I walk over to it and take out some bread. I lay it on the napkin and spin the top off of the mayo. I dip a spoon deep into it and scrape it across the bread. I lay the ham and turkey on the bread and put another piece on top of that. Then, I take up the sandwich and throw it on the ground.

“I refuse to eat this. I don’t care what you want with me, I won’t do a thing until I get my father back and leave.” I walk over to the bed and tip it over, sitting where it used to be. I wait for what feels like forever, but I probably closer to five minutes, then the door closest to me opens. I don’t look up to see who it is, because I know. It’s him.

“You’re quite the rebel.” I look up and see that his face is not quite at scary when it’s normally sized. I meet his eye with what I hope is a defiant glare. He frowns. “Since you know your father as Dad, if you wish you may call me that as well.” I shake my head.

“You’re nothing like my father.” I sneer. He laughs bitterly.

“I would think quite the opposite, my dear. I am your father. I have the same mind and body. However, who are you? Why would you be here?” He’s challenging me, but I don’t have time for this. I take it.

“I am Tara. I am the only Tara, apparently, who had the guts to live.” Now it’s his turn to be challenged. He opens his mouth and closes it several times before settling on just sneering at me. After a moment, He roars at me;

“She was full of life, you swine!” I gasp. “She had more life than you even could! The worst thing that ever happened to me was losing her.” I stand up, feeling taller than I ever have.

“First of all, I am as full of life as her. I do recall you saying, ‘I have the same mind and body’, but I could be wrong. And second of all, the worst mistake you ever made was bringing me here!” I say, my voice rising with every word I say. He scoffs again and looks at me with hard eyes.

“I was going to offer you a place, a chance for life, even with your father, but you have shown yourself to be unworthy. I thought you would remind me of my daughter, but you don’t. You are a despicable person, Tara. You don’t deserve to own a name.” He stands up slowly, brushing off the dust in his lap that doesn’t exist, and walks out the door while I scream horrible, horrible, awful things at him. And then, after I’m sure he’s out of hearing range, I drop down to the floor and cry. Sobbing, crying, thinking of nothing. Because I know. I know that what I did was stupid and rash, and I am a despicable human being.

Stuff Satuday- Scared green eyes

Grassy plains

Over and over

All the same

Without you

Teary eyes

Once again

Must disguise

They can’t know

It used to be

You and me

Facing the world together

It used to be

I could see

Something good whenever

I was scared

Unprepared

I’d look to the side

And see your scared green eyes

Your sacred green eyes

Now I’m gone

Forever

Doesn’t matter

You’re not here

Dusty room

All alone

Come here soon

But you’re gone

It used to be

You and me

Facing the world together

It used to be

I could see

Something good whenever

I was scared

Unprepared

I’d look to the side

And see your scared green eyes

Your sacred green eyes

Scared

But strong

Unprepared

Still go on...

It used to be

You and me

Facing the world together

It used to be

I could see

Something good whenever

I was scared

Unprepared

I’d look to the side

And see your scared green eyes

Your sacred green eyes

But I miss you

And I love you

And I love

Your Scared...

Green...

Eyes.

(I don't own the picture, I got it from Pinterest.)

Writing Wednesday- An update and a chapter.

Hey hey all! Elsie here! Thanks for reading this week! :-) First, I'm gonna update you on what's going on with writing this week, and this month. 
This month, I'm starting a novel called Mirror. I really like this one, and I'm gonna post the synopsis in a minute. I may even take a break from Titanium for a while to post, but not yet. I need to keep up with this. 

Crystal has a secret. One she's ben hiding all her life. But when her father, the king, becomes fatally ill, and she needs to take over the throne, everything goes wrong, and all she wants is to be free.When the only person she's ever told her secret is gone She runs away, killing all in her wake, and lives alone for too long. But you can't be alone forever. She finds some friends, and learns to control the feeling of darkness she has inside.

So I might mention this now and again on Wednesdays, because that's what Im working on. but now, without furthur ado, I present, Titanium, Chapter 5.

Chapter 5-J

Decisions

At this point, the only feeling I could conjure up was confusion. Tara’s father? Gone. Then… find out he’s on the top of your most hated list, which by the way, right underneath that, is your parents’ names. So… I feel sad. And confused. And not much else.

“J?” Tara asks me, her eyes empty but trying hard to care. “Are you okay?” I nod and shake my head at the same time. Tara nods, her dark, chapped lips pursed in a thin, concentrated line. I look down at her, seeing how upset she is. My Brain Monkey decides to tell me what he thinks of this.

How can you care so much about this girl you barely know? She’s just a random girl from another place.

A random girl that cares about me. Me.  not who my parents are, or whether I live in a house or on the street in an alley. So, Brian Monkey, that is why. That is why I care.

“How ‘bout you, Tara? Are you okay?” I ask. She shakes her head, glances at James, and looks to the ground. James and I both step forward at the same time and give her a hug, sandwiching her between us. Remember, I tell myself. The two of us are the only ones who know about all this. Her only friends right now. Only. Keep her safe, dummy. These people are the chance you have for a life. I nod in agreement with myself.

“I’ll keep you safe, Tara. We’ll figure this out.” I say, and James nods.

“You can tell us anything. We boys don’t know anything, except that you’re basically the only thing in life that’s worth it.” James says, and Tara nods, takes a deep breath and pushes all of us apart.

“Alright.” She grins, trying to lighten the heavy air.“You guys are extremely poetic all of a sudden.” I shrug, and James just shakes his head, making an odd face. Then, all of us get our game faces on, and put our arms up for a huddle. James has a few tears on his face, complimenting his set jaw and determined eyes. From the moment I saw him, he became the person I had wanted to be when I was 13. And it’s amazing. These people who haven’t gotten along in years, or barely know each other, are uniting to save someone. I wipe my first tear away and face my new team.

“Joseph lives in a ship in the sky, high in security. He conducts all his experiments and has all his meetings up there. Let’s just say he never leaves. What’s the plan?” James looks at me then over at Tara. Tara looks back at him then over to me.

“Okay. No plan, then. Want to just jump in, then?” I say, trying for a laugh. But apparently, it’s not time for that, because Tara hides her face and James purses his lips. “Apparently not.” I mutter. “We have to do something.” Tara and James nod.

“Is there any way we can get in? Any way at all?”I start to shake my head, then stop short. “Well…” I say. “It’s…” James leans forward on his heels, anticipating something. “It won’t be easy to pull off, and if we can, it won’t be fun.” James nods, and Tara looks like she knows where this is going. “What needs to happen is one of us needs to be taken.” Tara looks faint.

“You mean the sky… and…” I nod. She swallows hard. “When is the next one?” I shake my head.

“You can never know.” James frowns.

“Um, hi. I kind of need to know what’s going on…” He says, looking a bit terrified. He has a right to it, of course. Given the situation, I think we can all be a bit terrified.

“James, I’m going to tell you what a Taking is, and you need to promise not to freak out.” ,James nods. I decide not to waste time. “Three times a week, our lovely ruler abducts someone and experiments on them. If they don’t survive that, and the chances are less than none he kills them afterward. That is the only way someone he doesn’t know gets on that ship.” Tara reaches over and takes James’s hand, both of them looking completely frightened.. I look at them both square in the eye.

“I’ll go.” I say flatly. Tara shakes her head.

“You can’t! You might get hurt!” I look at her.

“Then who should go? You? James?” I yell. I can’t take this anymore, feeling useless. ”What did you do to deserve that? I don’t have anything or anyone to go back to! The least I can do is give you the family I never had!” Tara looks at me, her eyes hollow and full of so many emotions, as if deciding whether I’m a monster or a saint. Finally, after a painful question and a heavy breath from James, Tara sits up tall.

“Who do you think you are? Some kind of knight in shining armor come to save me? I can do things myself!” She stands up and walks up to me, looking into my eyes. “All my life, I’ve made it alone!” Tara continues. “My mother- In a hospital since I was just a little kid, my father, never the same since! I don’t think that I need you, of all people to save me!” Then, I pop. A scoff breaks out of me, and I feel like it doesn’t belong.

“Of all people? Me? So, after telling me that even know you don’t know me, AT ALL! You say that I’m so evil! No one would want to know Jahleel Clark! He’s-” I let a sob break out, just this once. “He’s no one.” Tara narrows her eyes at me. She’s in no mood to sympathize.

“No.” She says simply, her eyes empty and begging for me to hurt her, begging for me to throw a punch, but knowing I never will. “You’re not anyone. You have nothing.” Tara walks backwards, looking right at me. “And I don’t need you. Not any-” James steps in between us, interrupting Tara.

“I’ll do it.” He turns around, begging Tara to challenge him. “I’ll do it.” Tara shakes her head, not meeting anyone’s eyes. No one says anything. I really don’t know what to do. I am really willing to do this. Tara looks at me, over to James, and stands up, looking more composed than she should be.

“No.” She looks back and forth between the two of us. “I know you want to do something for me, but he’s my father. It’s very important that I do this on my own.” I don’t know what to say.

“I-” James starts. “I just... I just got to be your friend again. How can you just leave?” Tara takes her cousins hand and looks at him sadly.

“That’s exactly why. Because I love you. You need to be there for your brothers. Your sisters. You got a whole lot more life to live. I have no idea what I’m going to find up there, but know, that I wouldn’t change this. I have my best friend back, even if it’s only for a little while.” James nods, a new respect in his eyes. They hug, and I feel like I’m reading a novel, her words so poetic. She breaks away, they tap their thumbs against each other, and she walks over to me.

“Jahleel, huh?” I nod.

“The secrets out, I guess.” I say feebly, knowing this joking is only to forget for a simple second. She smiles at me.

“It’s a nice name, J.” I manage to smile. “Just so you know J, you are someone. I was in trouble, and you saved me. It was amazing. You’ve been a good friend. Just promise me you’ll be a good friend to James while I’m gone.”

“Why wouldn’t I?” He’s a great kid, from what I see.” Tara nods, and then looks deeply into my eyes. I look at hers, a browning green, and seething with rage. With their wonderful green middle, and a brown ring mingling together in a beautiful gradient, with a dark, thin, navy ring around it all, framing them in wonder. I smile at her, and she back at me. I hear James groan and I grin. Tara grins back at me and kisses me on the cheek. James steps in between us, pushing our hands apart. I hadn’t noticed that she had intertwined her fingers with mine, but now my hand feels cold and tingles from her touch.

“Enough affection for now, alright?” James looks at me with eyebrows raised. I nod.

“Yes, Sir.” We all laugh, knowing that there might be little time to so later.

Memory Monday- My dog.

Hi! After an online outburst in a forum where I took a joke the wrong way and pushed words at said person that had been bottled up inside of me for all my life, words about my dog, I decided I would write about my him today.
Maybe you may not know, but my dog is hairless. He was born without hair, so it's totally normal. He's got no hair except for the top of his head, his feet, and the tip of his tail. His name is Einstein. he's been the family dog since around when I was born. And he's getting old.

I've actually been thinking about it a lot, but our dog probably won't be with us much longer. He's a part of our family, and it hurts to think of living without him, but maybe even by the end of the year he'll be gone. I'll miss every single little quirk about hi when he's gone. Since that's what Memory Monday is about, sharing little pieces of my life with you, I'll tell you.

• I love the way he used to hate people who wore hats. Even if it was just daddy coming home from work, if he was wearing his baseball cap, he would bark his heart out. He doesn't do that anymore, but I love to think about it.
• The way he hated pretty much everyone, including other dogs. 
• The way he thought he owned the street.
• The way he dealt with the little kids pinching his funny looking skin, and trying to ride on him. I don't think he ever bit them.
• When he got so exited when we went to drop him off to stay with his only friend, a dog one of my dads coworkers had, and he would run around excitedly the entire time there. Sadly, that dog has passed on.
• When we got home after a trip and he would run around the house like "Look at all of you, I missed you! Look at the house, I remember this house! I love it!"
• Whenever my mother went to use the bathroom, or shut him out of her room to do something, he would stand right outside, ready and guarding for when she came back out. 

Anyway, now that I've told you some of my favorite memories about my doggie-boy, I'm going to talk about his looks. I'm going to guess you think that he's ugly. If I told you I thought he was cute, you'd probably say, "But he looks like a huge rat!" Don't bother. I've heard that too many times. You can think he's ugly, just like I can think a movie isn't good. But don't tell me I can not think he's cute. Because I do. I do just like you think you cat or dog or bird is cute. And I will think he's cute until the day he dies.

I would like all Chinese-crested haters to know a few things. Einstein can't help who he is. That's what he looks like, it's how he was born. I don't say your dog is ugly, do I? No. I don't. Because it doesn't matter what he looks like. It doesn't matter one single bit. It matters who he is. And who he is is a loving, loyal, sweet dog who wouldn't let anyone hurt us if he could do anything about it. I would also like you to know that he doesn't look like a rat. Not at all. Rats have this thing called hair. The top of their heads is not covered in hair. So, if you think about it, dogs with hair look more like rats then my dog does. 

I love my dog, because he's a part of my family. He's loved me and taken care of me, and always listens to me cry is I need it. Someday, I may wake up and find him gone to this world. Someday it may happen. But I'm trying to be happy that he's here with us. now. 

It makes me tear up to think about how my little siblings, who are aged 4, 2, and 1, won't remember him like I do. They won't understand when he dies, either. Jubilee and EJ, (My two youngest siblings) may not even remember him at all. That's one of the things that hurts the most about when he leaves.

I'll miss him when he's gone. Everyone in our family will. I wrote this post so I could go back when he's gone and remember him, so I could have these pieces of the past forever, so I can come and tell my little siblings about him without having to forget. Because I love him. Because I love them, Because I want them to remember. And I don't want to ever forget.