CJ Roberts

“A million dollars? A bit much don't you think?""Fuck you." Caleb smiled, the self indulgent little shit. "My apologies," he mocked with a slight forward bow, "What I meant to say is: no pussy's that good. Though yours does come close.”

“Safety - like light - is a façade. Underneath, the whole world is drenched in darkness.”

“James never met anyone named Livvie. He never hurt her.”

“Like any author worth a shit - she parted with a piece of her soul.”

“And if you can believe it…she slapped me again. “What the hell is wrong with you? Stop hitting me!” I finally looked up at her, but she was a blur. She hit me so hard my damn eyes were watering (I was not crying – eyes water. I think we all know I’m a badass and I don’t cry).”

“When the man you love asks you to go with him - you go.”

“I cried for a while, taking solace in the comforting lie of his embrace. The illusion, the fantasy, it helped. I never wanted to leave. I wanted to stay here forever, held tight to his chest, his fingers stroking my hair, his heart beating against my ear: you’re-safe, trust-me, love-you. Love. Did I want him to love me? Yes. I wanted someone to love me. And what was love if not someone risking their lives to save you? Caleb had saved me. Did it mean he loved me? A part of me wanted to think so. To believe in a romantic ideal that didn’t exist. I wanted to believe the lie. But more than that – I wanted it not to be a lie”

“I’ll show you a fag, you little bitch. I’ll fuck-start your head!”

“Everything is in the process of becoming something else. It’s the law of change.” I briefly kissed Livvie’s eyelids before she could open them. “I’m in the process of becoming something else, Livvie. I hope it’s something good, something far removed from the monster you knew.”

“His embrace said all the things his lips could not or would not, they said you're safe and I will protect you maybe even some semblance of caring about me, however fucked up, but everything was fucked up. Through it all his lips only repeated, 'I made them pay'.”

“I wanted to cry for wanting to cry.”

“I love you, Caleb. I love you! If you care for me at all... please, don't do this! Please, don't leave me. I don't know how to live without you. Don't make me go back to trying to be someone I don't know how to be anymore. - Livvie”

“That you could fix me? What's more, that I could fix you? Well, Sorry, pet, I don't want to be fixed. - Caleb”

“I've been doing this a long time- manipulating people to get my way. That's why you think you love me. Because I've broken you down and built you back up to believe it. It wasn't an accident. Once you leave this behind..... you'll see that. -Caleb”

“My name is Kitten and my master is gone. What could possibly be more important?”

“Pepper spray? I’ve tracked you all over the world and that’s what’s going to stop me—pepper spray.”

“Why couldn't he just keep being an evil, soulless bastard so I knew what his role was and I knew mine?”

“She comes off as very empathetic, and even a little vulnerable herself, but she wouldn't be where she is today if she weren't a wolf under that wool suit.”

“Let a bitch enjoy her mental breakdown in peace.”

“You'll always be Kitten to me...Livvie.”

“For what it's worth Livvie, I never thought of you as a whore. And you are...the most beautiful thing I've ever seen.”

“I’m writing this because you begged. You know how I love the begging”

“Explain it to me, then. You’re about to die. Unburden your soul,”

“Asshole FBI agents that want to shoot Girl Scouts.”

“I'm yours," she said, but then added, "only yours. And you're mine, only mine.”

“It was worse--knowing he knew the difference between kindness and cruelty and chose the baser of the two.”

“It's an ember forever burning in my heart. It's a reminder Caleb will live forever.”

“My heart, independent of my logic, had reserved a place for my tormentor and my solace.”

“I'm telling you, monsters aren't born, they're made.”

“I'm envious of the pigeon. It doesn't have a care in the world beyond eating, sleeping, and defecating on park statues. That's the life.”

“He would forever be her captor and she would forever be his prisoner.”

“When I'm really frustrated with things," she giggles "...I like to get online and change things in Wikipedia!"This, bitch...is weird.”

“He couldn’t say it. He couldn’t tell her how much she had come to mean to him. She could destroy him with her rejection. If she had feigned her feelings for him – if he’d bought into her lies and her quest for freedom…. He wasn’t sure what he would do. He could hurt her." Caleb.”

“He was the monster that no one thought to look for in the light of day. It was a common mistake. People often believed they were safer in the light, thinking monsters only came out at night. But safety - like light - is a facade. Underneath, the whole world is drenched in darkness.”

“Live for me, Kitten. Be all those things you'd never be with me. Go to school. Meet a normal boy and fall in love. Forgive me. It's time for you to go, Kitten. Time for us both, to go.”

“...monsters aren't born, they're made...”

“It was tempting to fall back on reliable tactics and pretend things were…perfect. To pretend he was only a boy and I was only a girl and we desired each other. I wanted him to hold and kiss me and pretend he would do anything to protect me. I wanted to pretend he felt a fraction of the things I couldn’t seem to stop myself from feeling for him. My heart hurt. As much as my shoulder and ribs screamed with pain, they were eclipsed by the sorrow in my heart. I couldn’t pretend anymore. The time for it had passed; there was only the reality of things left to deal with. ”

“Thank you,” Livvie muttered from the passenger seat. “For what?” Caleb was still irritated. “For saving my life. Even if you’re just going to put it in danger again,” she whispered.”

“Her words, her presence, and her pain, affected him. He hated it. His memories, the ones he worked so hard to push deep into forgotten recesses of his mind, banged on the door of his consciousness. They connected with Livvie, they connected to her suffering, and together, they threatened to undo him.”

“Each day I was more vulnerable than the last. Each day he stripped away more of my sense of self. And now he'd taken the last of it, the last of me. But who did that make me? An extension of him? Someone new? I didn't know. Didn't want to know.”

“Like it or not, fight it or don't, your old life is over.”

“If it be thus to dream, still let me sleep.”

“You're going to pay for that Pet,' he panted. The right side of his face sported an angry red hand print.I shook out my hand, 'I already have. That was my change.”

“I wrapped my arms around him and held on as hard as I could. He was my tormentor and my solace: the creator of the dark and the light within. I didn’t care that he would undoubtedly hurt me at any moment, right now; I just needed somebody to hold me… To tell me these exact words. Its going to be okay. It wasn’t of course, I knew that. But I didn’t care, I needed the lie.”

“they say I tried to hurt my nurse. I tell them they tried to hurt me first.”

“He'd learned the hard way that there was no future when all he could see was revenge. The only thing revenge had ever given him was a brief moment of satisfaction, followed by an empty abyss. He was through with revenge. He wanted to feel full instead of empty, loved, instead of feared.”

“Above all else, I had learned the one thing every person has to learn to make it through life: the only person you can truly count on is yourself.”

“I wanted to stay here forever, held tight to his chest, his fingers stroking my hair, his heart beating against my ear: you're-safe, trust-me, love-you. Love. Did I want him to love me? Yes. I wanted someone to love me.”

“Caleb was a strange person, cruel and inhuman; a monster, and yet, at other times, he seemed so capable of something like caring. He made me cry and scream and shake with fear and nearly a split second later he could make me almost believe he wasn't responsible for any of it. He could hold me and make me feel safe. How was that possible?”

“I don’t want revenge, Caleb. I don’t want to end up like you, letting some fucking vendetta run my life. I just want my freedom. I want to be free, Caleb. Not someone’s whore…not even yours.”