“I scan the room. Catherine is writing quickly, her light brown hair falling over her face. She is left-handed, and because she writes in pencil her left arm is silver from wrist to elbow.”

“She slammed her right fist into her left palm. A thick blinding ray of light shot out from between her hands. It looked like liquid fire. One end quickly coiled itself around Bastet’s palm and wrist. The other end danced in front of her as if mimicking a swaying cobra.”

“And then Finley seized the spindly metal arm attached to her throat. A normal human would have no hope against such strength, but Finley was not normal. She snapped the arm at the elbow joint and then ripped the offending hand from her neck.Holding the arm by the hand and wrist, she used it to beat the automaton....”

“I run my hands down her bare arms. Shoulders to elbows to wrists. She has goose bumps, even in the muggy Florida night. Maybe that’s because of me.Sometimes I forget she likes me the same way I like her.”

“She stood in quiet excitement when the boat sailed back and she saw the city growing again to meet her. She stretched her arms wide. The city expanded, to her elbows, to her wrists, beyond her fingertips. Then the skyscrapers rose over her head, and she was back…---Dominique.”

“I’ve come by, she says, to tell youthat this is it. I’m not kidding, it’s over. this is it.I sit on the couch watching her arrangeher long red hair before my bedroommirror.She pulls her hair up andpiles it on top of her head-she lets her eyes look atmy eyes-then she drops her hair andlets it fall down in front of her face.We go to bed and I hold herspeechlessly from the backmy arm around her neckI touch her wrists and her handsfeel up to her elbowsno further.”