Every Other Day

Sometimes, there aren't any good choices. Sometimes, making the right one is hard... It's funny, but when you think about it, we're all broken. That's what life does. It knocks you down and breaks you and you either get back up again, or you don't. You either do things on your terms, or you don't. You let the bad things win, or you don't." "You either let it break you, or you don't.

Bethany blinked. "Did you just hit me?" she asked, disbelief coloring her every feature. Skylar raised both hands, palms outward. "I come in peace!" "You do not come in peace. You hit me." "I hit in peace!

Little Sisters' Survival Guide, rule number thirty-seven," Skylar said. "Scream before they hit you.

I'm not telling you what to do, I'm just telling you what you're going to do. There's a difference.

Sometimes make-believe is just another word for rare.

My little sister snuck out of the house carrying a circular-saw blade and a can of Mace. I couldn't exactly let her come alone.

It figured--the almost invincible girl gets hurt, and they call a vet.

This was our language: half-truths, obvious lies, accusations neither one of us would ever make. It was a system eery bit as complicated as Morse code or the dancing of bees. Don't ask, don't tell, stay civil.

Well," a female voice said. "What have we here?" "Here," Bethany said, responding to the woman's rhetorical question, "we have a teenager. And she's pissed.

Most of the time, it felt like my father and I were completely different species. Possibly literally, depending on the day and whether or not I actually qualified as human at the time.

Darryl likes codes," Skylar explained. "A few weeks ago, I asked him what someone might hypothetically need to break into a supercomputer. He hypothetically made me this.

Right. You're Kali. Of course you're planning a rescue mission. Stupid self-sacrifice is kind of your thing.

Sometimes, I felt like if I could just fold up into a small enough ball, my body would collapse on itself like a star, and I could supernova myself into a new existence.

Don't think this means I'm giving up. There's more than one way to decapitate a hellhound, and as it so happens, I know them all.

Left with nothing but my own bloody fingertips, I let out a war cry of my own, raked my nails over its face, and fought like a girl.

What I really needed wasn't a dose of school spirit; it was a glass of water, an aspirin the size of my fist, and the answers to the history exam that I hadn't studied for the night before. "As long as I'm dreaming," I muttered, my words lost to the cacophony of the gym, "I'd also like a pony, a convertible, and a couple of friends." "That's a tall order." I'd known that there were people sitting next to me, but I couldn't begin to imagine how one of them had heard me. I hadn't even heard me. "Would you settle for a piece of gum, an orange Tic Tac, and an introduction the the school slut?

Darryl does talk," Skylar said. "If you listen. And FYI, I have a really strong feeling that he's going to be the next Bill Gates, so you might want to be a little nicer to him." "I have a really strong feeling," Bethany deadpanned, "that if you don't tell me what's on that USB drive, I will end you.

All's fair in love and war--and black ops.

I sense that the chocolate chips have hit the fan.

Blend in. don't make waves. Don't look up.' That was the mantra I lived by. But not today.

If I had a nickel for every time I almost died, I would have been driving to school in a Ferrari and flying off to Bora-Bora on the weekends.

If one thing was perfectly, crystalline clear, it was that I could take care of myself. I just kept coming and coming and coming. I was what I was.

I had my knife in hand before I realized I'd reached for it and had kicked open the...front door before it ever occurred to me that it might have already been unlocked.

I wasn't built for running away from monsters. I wanted desperately to run toward them--track them down, kill them. Luckily, I was used to restraining myself, used to acting human even when I wasn't, and the human part of my brain reminded me that right now, preternatural beasties weren't exactly my primary concern. Someone had made a strong attempt at killing me this morning....

The problem was that there was no treatment. No cure. There was nothing that...any medical professional could do. If I'd been fully human, I would have been a dead girl walking....

Skylar todl you to come here?" I asked dumbly. "No," Bethany said. "Skylar told me not to come here. Same dif.

I had no weapons. No plan. Nothing but my blood and my hands. They were coming, and there were more of them than I'd realized.

You're a very pretty girl...Did you know? Once upon a time, I had a pretty, pretty boy.' She reached forward and touched my cheek with one manicured hand.

I heard the telltale sound of scales scraping against metal--a light swoosh, a tongue flickering out to taste the stale and humid air. Whatever it was, my prey was tasting for me.