Tracy Winegar

Ellis,_ he said. __ou__e watchin_ a miracle right under your nose._ He gave a few of the seeds to Ellis and let him drop them into the hole he had already made. __n each of them little things, God put life. Now you take care with it, and you feed it with water and sunlight. And, most important of all of __m, put it in good ground, and that life is gonna sprout right out.

Just __ause a body says somethin_ don__ make it so. You know who you are, and they can__ change that no matter what them cacklin_ hens is to say._ He tapped him on the chest. __hat matters is what__ in here, son. Not a soul can take that away from you.

She remembered the day vividly, for how can you forget the day your heart is broken? The funny thing about a broken heart is that it's not fatal. Though you wish in vain that it were, life continues on and you have no choice but to continue on with it. You take the hand that fate has dealt you and you press forward because there is nothing else that can be done.

Clairey knew well that it was one thing to occupy his bed, quite another to occupy his heart.

In the back of his mind, he had always wondered why____hy they harbored such resentment for him. Now he had the answer, and he felt sick. He felt the bottom dropping out.

There was a moment of hesitation in which Joe looked into her eyes, and she looked back without flinching. Many a time, he had been at the same game with her, and she had always crumbled, bowing to his will. Now, he must have realized he was looking into the eyes of a stranger. She was someone he could not recognize, a foreigner inhabiting the body of that old Clairey, the girl he had abused, intimidated, and broken. Clairey decided then and there she would no longer cower before him. It was almost as if she were daring him to strike her in their unspoken exchange.

Ain__ I your man?_ he persisted.__eah, Ellis, you__e my man._ Her lips quaked as she said it.