Fear

Passages

Every passage tagged with this emotion in the Vela corpus. Search the body text, narrow by source or register, click through to a book’s profile to see how the passage sits with the rest of the work.

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• From The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian (2007)

  One year, these scientists came with a mini-submarine and tried to find the bottom, but the lake was so silty and muddy that they couldn’t see. And the nearby uranium mine made their radar/sonar machines go nuts, so they couldn’t see that way, either, so they never made it to the bottom. The lake is round. Perfectly round. So the scientists said it was probably an ancient and dormant volcano crater. Yeah, a volcano on the rez! The lake was so deep because the volcano crater and tunnels and lava chutes and all that plumbing went all the way down to the center of the earth. That lake was, like, forever deep. There were all sorts of myths and legends surrounding the lake. I mean, we’re Indians, and we like to make up shit about lakes, you know? Some people said the lake is named Turtle because it’s round and green like a turtle’s shell. Some people said it’s named Turtle because it used to be filled with regular turtles. Some people said it’s named Turtle because it used to be home to this giant snapping turtle that ate Indians. A Jurassic turtle. A Steven Spielberg turtle. A King Kong versus the Giant Reservation Turtle turtle. I didn’t exactly believe in the giant turtle myth. I was too old and smart for that. But I’m still an Indian, and we like to be scared. I don’t know what it is about us. But we love ghosts. We love monsters. But I was really scared of this other story about Turtle Lake. My dad told me the story. When he was a kid he watched a horse drown in Turtle Lake and disappear. “Some of the others say it was a giant turtle that grabbed the horse,” Dad said. “But they’re lying. They were just being silly. That horse was just stupid. It was so stupid we named it Stupid Horse.” Well, Stupid Horse sank into the endless depths of Turtle Lake and everybody figured that was the end of that story. But a few weeks later, Stupid Horse’s body washed up on the shores of Benjamin Lake, ten miles away from Turtle Lake. “Everybody just figured some joker had found the body and moved it,” Dad said. “To scare people.” People laughed at the practical joke. Then a bunch of guys threw the dead horse into the back of a truck, drove it to the dump, and burned it. Simple story, right? No, it doesn’t end there. “Well, a few weeks after they burned the body, a bunch of kids were swimming in Turtle Lake when it caught fire.” YES, THE WHOLE LAKE CAUGHT ON FIRE! The kids were swimming close to the dock. Because the lake was so deep, most kids swam close to shore. And the fire started out in the middle of the lake, so the kids were able to safely climb out of the water before it all went up like a big bowl of gasoline.

• From The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian (2007)

  For me, it seemed as real as saying, “I want to fly to the moon.” “Are you sure?” my parents asked. “Yes,” I said. “When do you want to go?” my parents asked. “Right now,” I said. “Tomorrow.” “Are you sure?” my parents asked. “You could maybe wait until the semester break. Or until next year. Get a fresh start.” “No, if I don’t go now, I never will. I have to do it now.” “Okay,” they said. Yep, it was that easy with my parents. It was almost like they’d been waiting for me to ask them if I could go to Reardan, like they were psychics or something. I mean, they’ve always known that I’m weird and ambitious, so maybe they expect me to do the weirdest things possible. And going to Reardan is truly a strange idea. But it isn’t weird that my parents so quickly agreed with my plans. They want a better life for my sister and me. My sister is running away to get lost, but I am running away because I want to find something. And my parents love me so much that they want to help me. Yeah, Dad is a drunk and Mom is an ex-drunk, but they don’t want their kids to be drunks. “It’s going to be hard to get you to Reardan,” Dad said. “We can’t afford to move there. And there ain’t no school bus going to come out here.” “You’ll be the first one to ever leave the rez this way,” Mom said. “The Indians around here are going to be angry with you.” Shoot, I figure that my fellow tribal members are going to torture me. How to Fight Monsters The next morning, Dad drove me the twenty-two miles to Reardan. “I’m scared,” I said. “I’m scared, too,” Dad said. He hugged me close. His breath smelled like mouthwash and lime vodka. “You don’t have to do this,” he said. “You can always go back to the rez school.” “No,” I said. “I have to do this.” Can you imagine what would have happened to me if I’d turned around and gone back to the rez school? I would have been pummeled. Mutilated. Crucified. You can’t just betray your tribe and then change your mind ten minutes later. I was on a one-way bridge. There was no way to turn around, even if I wanted to. “Just remember this,” my father said. “Those white people aren’t better than you.” But he was so wrong. And he knew he was wrong. He was the loser Indian father of a loser Indian son living in a world built for winners. But he loved me so much. He hugged me even closer. “This is a great thing,” he said. “You’re so brave. You’re a warrior.” It was the best thing he could have said. “Hey, here’s some lunch money,” he said and handed me a dollar.

• From The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian (2007)

  [image "An illustration of the writer’s grandmother wearing a house dress and basketball sneakers, with a dish of salmon and mush, and keychain charms. The text includes personal details about her life." file=image_rsrc4S9.jpg] “Yeah, but you punched the alpha dog in the face,” she said. “They’re going to respect you now.” “I love you, Grandma,” I said. “But you’re crazy.” I couldn’t sleep that night because I kept thinking about my impending doom. I knew Roger would be waiting for me in the morning at school. I knew he’d punch me in the head and shoulder area about two hundred times. I knew I’d soon be in a hospital drinking soup through a straw. So, exhausted and terrified, I went to school. My day began as it usually did. I got out of bed at dark-thirty, and rummaged around the kitchen for anything to eat. All I could find was a package of orange fruit drink mix, so I made a gallon of that, and drank it all down. Then I went into the bedroom and asked Mom and Dad if they were driving me to school. “Don’t have enough gas,” Dad said and went back to sleep. Great, I’d have to walk. So I put on my shoes and coat, and started down the highway. I got lucky because my dad’s best friend Eugene just happened to be heading to Spokane. Eugene was a good guy, and like an uncle to me, but he was drunk all the time. Not stinky drunk, just drunk enough to be drunk. He was a funny and kind drunk, always wanting to laugh and hug you and sing songs and dance. Funny how the saddest guys can be happy drunks. “Hey, Junior,” he said. “Hop on my pony, man.” So I hopped onto the back of Eugene’s bike, and off we went, barely in control. I just closed my eyes and held on. And pretty soon, Eugene got me to school. We pulled up in front and a lot of my classmates just stared. I mean, Eugene had braids down to his butt, for one, and neither of us wore helmets, for the other. [image "An illustration of a person sitting on a 1946 Indian Chief Roadmaster motorcycle, with text reading ‘Dad’s best friend, EUGENE.’" file=image_rsrc4SA.jpg] I suppose we looked dangerous. “Man,” he said. “There’s a lot of white people here.” “Yeah.” “You doing all right with them?” “I don’t know. I guess.” “It’s pretty cool, you doing this,” he said. “You think?” “Yeah, man, I could never do it. I’m a wuss.” Wow, I felt proud. “Thanks for the ride,” I said. “You bet,” Eugene said. He laughed and buzzed away. I walked up to the school and tried to ignore the stares of my classmates. And then I saw Roger walk out the front door. Man, I was going to have to fight. Shit, my whole life is a fight. “Hey,” Roger said. “Hey,” I said.

• From Going Clear (2013)

  “I felt as though he had given so much to our country and I couldn’t even bring him peace of mind. I believed thoroughly that he was a man of great honor, had sacrificed his well being to the country.… It just never occurred to me he was a liar.” Ron finally explained his dilemma: he didn’t want to be married—“ I do not want to be an American husband for I can buy my friends whenever I want them”—but divorce would hurt his reputation. The solution: if Sara really loved him, she should kill herself. Sara took little “Alexi,” as she called their daughter, and moved into the Los Angeles Dianetics Research Foundation, in a former governor’s mansion near the University of Southern California campus. Soon after that, Sara began an affair with another man, Miles Hollister. Hubbard furiously told his own lover, Barbara Klowden, that Sara and Miles were plotting to have him committed to a mental institution. Indeed, Sara had consulted a psychiatrist about Hubbard’s condition. She told him that Ron had said he would rather kill her than let her leave him. The psychiatrist said that Hubbard probably needed to be institutionalized, and he warned Sara that her life was in danger. Nonetheless, Sara went directly to Ron and told him what the doctor had said. If he got treatment, she said, she would stay with him; otherwise, she was going to leave. Ron responded by threatening to kill their child. “ He didn’t want her to be brought up by me because I was in league with the doctors,” Sara recalled, in her deathbed tape. “He thought I had thrown in with the psychiatrists, with the devils.” On the night of February 24, 1951, Sara went to the movies and left her baby in the care of a young man named John Sanborne, who was studying at the foundation. Alexis had become a kind of celebrity, or at least a curiosity. Hubbard had been touting her as the world’s first “ dianetic baby”—shielded since birth against any engram-forming disruptions or parental conflict. As a result, Hubbard boasted, Alexis talked at three months, crawled at four, and had no phobias. At about ten o’clock, eleven-month-old Alexis began crying in her crib, so Sanborne picked her up to comfort her. Suddenly, the infant said in a hoarse whisper, “ Don’t sleep.” Sanborne was startled. He didn’t think a baby could talk like that. “It went through me in a funny way,” he later said. “The hair raising on the back of the neck type of feeling.” At eleven p.m. there was a knock on the door. One of Hubbard’s aides appeared, wearing a topcoat, with his hand in his pocket. Sanborne believed he was carrying a gun. The man said that Hubbard was here to take his daughter. Hubbard himself then came through the door, also wearing a topcoat, with his hand in his right pocket. They took the child and disappeared.

• From Going Clear (2013)

  The crew were thrilled that they would be returning to the States, only to be crestfallen when a message arrived from the Guardian’s Office, just as the ship was approaching port, alerting Mary Sue that agents from US Customs, Immigration, Coast Guard, DEA, and US Marshals were waiting for them to dock, plus 180 IRS agents waiting to impound the ship. The federal agents had a subpoena to depose Hubbard in a civil tax case in Hawaii. A Scientologist on shore realized what was happening when he was blocked from entering the dock area. He sent a pizza to a radio operator with a message inside to send to the ship. Hubbard was just five miles offshore, but he suddenly broadcasted a new course over the radio—due north for Halifax, Nova Scotia—then turned sharply south and headed to the Bahamas. Hubbard was sixty-four years old in 1975, as the Apollo began its circumnavigation of the Caribbean. He weighed 260 pounds. He was still meticulously groomed, but his teeth and fingers were darkly stained from constant smoking. He was on the run from the courts, fearful of being discovered, marked by age, and visibly in decline. In Curaçao, he suffered a small stroke and spent several weeks in a local hospital. It was becoming clear that life at sea posed a real danger for a man in such frail health. His crew rationalized his obvious decline by saying that his body was battered by the research he was undertaking and the volumes of suppression aimed at him. “ He’s risking his life for us,” they told one another. By now the rumor about the CIA spy ship had spread all over the Caribbean, making the Scientologists unwelcome or at least under suspicion everywhere they went. They were kicked out of Barbados, Curaçao, and Jamaica. Moreover, the Arab oil embargo had sent the price of fuel skyrocketing, so the roving life was getting too expensive to support. It was time to come ashore. FROM THE APOLLO , Hubbard sent a couple of delegations to locate a land base for Scientology—specifically, a town that the church could take over. One team arrived in the Florida retirement community of Clearwater—a resonant name for Scientologists—to look over a dowdy downtown hotel called the Fort Harrison, which had earned a place in popular history when Mick Jagger wrote the lyrics for “Satisfaction” beside the swimming pool in 1965. Hubbard purchased the Fort Harrison and a bank building across the street using a false front called the United Churches of Florida, which he calculated would not disturb the staid moral climate of the conservative community. When the mayor of Clearwater, Gabriel Cazares, raised questions about the extraordinary security that suddenly appeared around the church buildings, Guardian’s Office operatives tried to frame him in a staged hit-and-run accident and planted false marriage documents in Tijuana, Mexico, to make it appear that Cazares was a bigamist.

• From Best Erotica & Sexual Deviance Narratives Ever Written (2024)

  Then he took my hand, which he guided, not unwillingly on my side, between the twist of his closed thighs, which were extremely warm; there he lodged and pressed it, till raising it by degrees, he made me feel the proud distinction of his sex from mine. I was frightened at the novelty, and drew back my hand; yet, pressed and spurred on by sensations of a strange pleasure, I could not help asking him what that was for? He told me he would shew me if I would let him; and without waiting for my answer, which he prevented by stopping my mouth with kisses I was far from disrelishing, he got upon me, and inserting one of his thighs between mine, opened them so as to make way for himself, and fixed me to his purpose; whilst I was so much out of my usual sense, so subdued by the present power of a new one, that, between far and desire, I lay utter passive, till the piercing pain rouzed and made me cry out. But it was too late: he was too firm fixed in the saddle for me to compass flinging him, with all the struggles I could use, some of which only served to further his point, and at length an irresistible thrust murdered at once my maidenhead, and almost me. I now lay a bleeding witness of the necessity imposed on our sex, to gather the first honey off the thorns. “But the pleasure rising as the pain subsided, I was soon reconciled to fresh trials, and before morning, nothing on earth could be dearer to me than this rifler of my virgin sweets: he was every thing to me now. “How we agreed to join fortunes: how we came up to town together, where we lived some time, till necessity-parted us, and drove me into this course of life, to which I had been long ago bettered and torn to pieces before I came to this age, as much through my easiness, as through inclination, had it not been for my finding refuge in this house: these are all circumstances which pass the mark I proposed, so that here my narrative ends.” In the order of our sitting, it was Harriet’s turn to go on. Amongst all the beauties of our sex, that I had before, or have since seen, few indeed were the forms that could dispute excellence with her’s; it was not delicate, but delicacy itself incarnate, such was the symmetry of her small but exactly fashioned limbs. Her complexion, fair as it was, appeared yet more fair, from the effect of two black eyes, the brilliancy of which gave her face more vivacity than belonged to the colour of it, which was only defended from paleness, by a sweetly pleasing blush in her cheeks, that grew fainter and fainter, till at length it died away insensibly into the overbearing white.

• From Best Erotica & Sexual Deviance Narratives Ever Written (2024)

  I had then just life enough to reach the green borders of the waterpiece, where wildly looking round for the young man, and missing him still, my fright and concern sunk me down in a deep swoon, which must have lasted me some time; for I did not come to myself, till I was roused out of it by a sense of pain that pierced me to the vitals, and awaked me to the the most surprising circumstance of finding myself not only in the arms of this very young gentleman I had been so solicitous to save; but taken at such an advantage in my unresisting condition, that he had actually completed his entrance into me so far, that weakened as I was by all the preceding conflicts of mind I had suffered, and struck dumb by the violence of my surprise, I had neither the power to cry out, nor the strength to disengage myself from his strenuous embraces, before, urging his point, he had forced his way and completely triumphed over my virginity, as he might now as well see by the streams of blood that followed his drawing out, as he had felt by the difficulties he had met with consummating his penetration. But the sight of the blood, and the sense of my condition, had (as he told me afterwards), since the ungovernable rage of his passion was somewhat appeased, now wrought so far on him, that at all risks, even of the worst consequences, he could not find in his heart to leave me, and make off, which he might easily have done. I still lay all discomposed in bleeding ruin, palpitating, speechless, unable to get off, and frightened, and fluttering like a poor wounded partridge, and ready to faint away again at the sense of what had befallen me. The young gentleman was by me, kneeling, kissing my hand, and with tears in his eyes, beseeching me to forgive him, and offering all the reparation in his power.

• From Best Erotica & Sexual Deviance Narratives Ever Written (2024)

  "Take the bitch," said Severino in a rage, "seize her, Clement, let her be naked in a minute, and let her learn that it is not in persons like ourselves that compassion stifles Nature." My resistance had animated Clement, he was foaming at the mouth: he took hold of me, his arm shook nervously; interspersing his actions with appalling blasphemies, he had my clothing torn away in a trice. "A lovely creature," came from the superior, who ran his fingers over my flanks, "may God blast me if I've ever seen one better made; friends," the monk pursued, "let's put order into our procedures; you know our formula for welcoming newcomers: she might be exposed to the entire ceremony, don't you think? Let's omit nothing; and let's have the eight other women stand around us to supply our wants and to excite them." A circle is formed immediately, I am placed in its center and there, for more than two hours, I am inspected, considered, handled by those four monks, who, one after the other, pronounce either encomiums or criticisms. You will permit me, Madame, our lovely prisoner said with a blush, to conceal a part of the obscene details of this odious ritual; allow your imagination to figure all that debauch can dictate to villains in such instances; allow it to see them move to and fro between my companions and me, comparing, confronting, contrasting, airing opinions, and indeed it still will not have but a faint idea of what was done in those initial orgies, very mild, to be sure, when matched against all the horrors I was soon to experience. "Let's to it," says Severino, whose prodigiously exalted desires will brook no further restraint and who in this dreadful state gives the impression of a tiger about to devour its prey, "let each of us advance to take his favorite pleasure." And placing me upon a couch in the posture expected by his execrable projects and causing me to be held by two of his monks, the infamous man attempts to satisfy himself in that criminal and perverse fashion which makes us to resemble none but the sex we do not possess while degrading the one we have; but either the shameless creature is too strongly proportioned, or Nature revolts in me at the mere suspicion of these pleasures; Severino cannot overcome the obstacles; he presents himself, and he is repulsed immediately....

• From Best Erotica & Sexual Deviance Narratives Ever Written (2024)

  "Finally her legs relaxed, her dress was up, and she burst into tears—tears of fear, shame, and vexation! "My finger then stopped; and as I withdrew it I felt that it was also wet with tears—tears which were by no means briny ones. "'Come, don't be frightened!' said I, taking her head between my hands, and kissing her repeatedly. 'I was only joking. I do not mean to harm you. There, you can get up! You can go, if you like. I surely will not detain you against your free will.' "And thereupon I thrust my hand within her breasts, and began to pinch the tiny nipple, in size no bigger than a luscious wild strawberry, of which she seemed to have all the fragrance. She shook with excitement and delight as I did so. "'No,' said she, without attempting to get up, 'I am in your power. You can do with me what you like. I can't help myself any longer. Only remember, if you ruin me I shall kill myself.' "There was such an earnestness in her eyes as she said this that I shivered, and let her go. Could I ever forgive myself, if I were the cause of her committing self-murder? "And still the poor girl looked at me with such loving, longing eyes, that it was plain she was unable to bear the scathing fire that consumed her. Was it not my duty, then, to make her feel that soothing ecstacy of bliss she evidently longed to taste? "'I swear to you,' said I, 'that I shall do you no harm; so do not be afraid, only keep quiet.' "I pulled up her thick linen chemise, and I perceived the tiniest slit that could be seen, with two lips of a coralline hue, shaded by a soft, silky, black down. They had the colour, the gloss, the freshness of those pink shells so plentiful on Eastern strands. "Leda's charms, which made Jupiter turn into a swan, or Danæ's, when she opened her thighs to receive far into her womb the burning golden shower, could not have been more tempting than the lips of this young girl. "They parted of their own inward life, displaying, as they did so, a tiny berry, fresh with healthy life—a drop of dew incarnadined within the crimson petals of a budding rose. "My tongue pressed it closely for a second, and the girl was madly convulsed with that burning pleasure she had never dreamt of before. A moment afterwards we were again in each other's arms. "'Oh, Camille,' said she, 'you do not know how I love you!' "She waited for an answer. I closed her mouth with a kiss. "'But tell me. Do you love me? Can you love me only a little?' "'Yes,' said I, faintly; for even in such a moment I could not bring myself to tell a lie. "She looked at me for a second. "'No, you don't.' "'Why not?' "'I don't know.

• From Best Erotica & Sexual Deviance Narratives Ever Written (2024)

  All men are born isolated, envious, cruel and despotic; wishing to have everything and surrender nothing, incessantly struggling to maintain either their rights or achieve their ambition, the legislator comes up and says to them: Cease thus to fight; if each were to retreat a little, calm would be restored. I find no fault with the position implicit in the agreement, but I maintain that two species of individuals cannot and ought not submit to it, ever; those who feel they are the stronger have no need to give up anything in order to be happy, and those who find themselves the weaker also find themselves giving up infinitely more than what is assured them. However, society is only composed of weak persons and strong; well, if the pact must perforce displease both weak and strong, there is great cause to suppose it will fail to suit society, and the previously existing state of warfare must appear infinitely preferable, since it permitted everyone the free exercise of his strength and his industry, whereof he would discover himself deprived by a society's unjust pact which takes too much from the one and never accords enough to the other; hence, the truly intelligent person is he who, indifferent to the risk of renewing the state of war that reigned prior to the contract, lashes out in irrevocable violation of that contract, violates it as much and often as he is able, full certain that what he will gain from these ruptures will always be more important than what he will lose if he happens to be a member of the weaker class; for such he was when he respected the treaty; by breaking it he may become one of the stronger; and if the laws return him to the class whence he wished to emerge, the worst that can befall him is the loss of his life, which is a misfortune infinitely less great than that of existing in opprobrium and wretchedness. There are then two positions available to us: either crime, which renders us happy, or the noose, which prevents us from being unhappy.

• From Going Clear (2013)

  Rathbun signed the billion-year contract in January 1978.6 A few months later, Rathbun was sent to work in LA. One night, he was assigned to escort Diane Colletto, the twenty-five-year-old editor of Scientology’s Auditor magazine, from the publications building to the Scientology complex in Hollywood where they both lived. It was late at night on August 19, 1978. Diane was a petite and mousy intellectual, with thick glasses. A diligent worker, she was often the last to leave the office. On this night, she was frightened. Diane’s husband, John Colletto, a highly trained auditor, had recently been declared a Suppressive Person. John had gotten into an argument with church officials over a matter of policy. After being declared, he went to visit a Scientology chaplain, who could see that he was having a breakdown. He kept crying and grabbing his head in despair. At that point, he was forcibly detained in the RPF. He spent several weeks there, but managed to escape. Diane was ordered to disconnect from him. She told the chaplain that John had threatened her, saying that if he couldn’t have Scientology, then neither could she. Rathbun—a big man, a former college basketball player—knew nothing of this as he rode back to the berthing with Diane in her Fiat. She was uncommunicative. She drove north on Rampart Boulevard, where the Pubs Org was located, to Sunset, and then left on Santa Monica Boulevard. It was mid-August, but there was a breeze from the ocean and the night air was unseasonably cool. As soon as Diane turned the corner from North Edgemont Street onto Fountain Avenue, in front of the Scientology complex, a pair of headlights on high beam blinded them, then a car rammed into them, pinning Diane’s vehicle against the curb. Rathbun was in shock, but he managed to get out of the passenger side of the car. They had come to a stop in front of a small house with a picket fence. He saw the man in the other car get out and run toward Diane, who was still in the driver’s seat. Rathbun came around the front of the car, just in time to hear a popping noise and the sound of glass shattering. It was the first time in his life he had ever heard a gunshot. Jesse Prince, who was in RPF on the seventh floor, heard the sound and rushed to the windows. People were shouting, “ John Colletto!” Everyone knew immediately what was happening. Rathbun grabbed Colletto, and they spun around in the street. He got Colletto in a headlock, but Colletto pistol-whipped him and Rathbun momentarily lost consciousness. Both of them tumbled to the ground. When Rathbun recovered, he saw Diane on all fours, crawling on the sidewalk, and Colletto running toward her with the gun. Rathbun says he got up and tackled John. They crashed through the picket fence and wrestled on the lawn. More shots were fired.

• From The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian (2007)

  What kind of idiot was I? I was the kind of idiot that got punched hard in the face by his best friend. Bang! Rowdy punched me. Bang! I hit the ground. Bang! My nose bled like a firework. I stayed on the ground for a long time after Rowdy walked away. I stupidly hoped that time would stand still if I stayed still. But I had to stand eventually, and when I did, I knew that my best friend had become my worst enemy. How to Fight Monsters The next morning, Dad drove me the twenty-two miles to Reardan. “I’m scared,” I said. “I’m scared, too,” Dad said. He hugged me close. His breath smelled like mouthwash and lime vodka. “You don’t have to do this,” he said. “You can always go back to the rez school.” “No,” I said. “I have to do this.” Can you imagine what would have happened to me if I’d turned around and gone back to the rez school? I would have been pummeled. Mutilated. Crucified. You can’t just betray your tribe and then change your mind ten minutes later. I was on a one-way bridge. There was no way to turn around, even if I wanted to. “Just remember this,” my father said. “Those white people aren’t better than you.” But he was so wrong. And he knew he was wrong. He was the loser Indian father of a loser Indian son living in a world built for winners. But he loved me so much. He hugged me even closer. “This is a great thing,” he said. “You’re so brave. You’re a warrior.” It was the best thing he could have said. “Hey, here’s some lunch money,” he said and handed me a dollar. We were poor enough to get free lunch, but I didn’t want to be the only Indian and a sad sack who needed charity. “Thanks, Dad,” I said. “I love you,” he said. “I love you, too.” I felt stronger so I stepped out of the car and walked to the front door. It was locked. So I stood alone on the sidewalk and watched my father drive away. I hoped he’d drive right home and not stop in a bar and spend whatever money he had left. I hoped he’d remember to come back and pick me up after school. I stood alone at the front door for a few very long minutes. It was still early and I had a black eye from Rowdy’s good-bye punch. No, I had a purple, blue, yellow, and black eye. It looked like modern art. Then the white kids began arriving for school. They surrounded me. Those kids weren’t just white. They were translucent. I could see the blue veins running through their skin like rivers. Most of the kids were my size or smaller, but there were ten or twelve monster dudes.

• From The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian (2007)

  He lived only fifteen miles away from my house. But he went to school in Springdale. And I had never met him. The world was a different place back then. It was bigger and smaller at the same time. You could belong to the same tribe, and live on the same reservation only fifteen miles apart, and be the same age, but you could still be strangers to each other. So I didn’t know Randy on his first day of school in Wellpinit. He was small. But he looked mean and tough. Like he was a fighter. You all remember how much we used to punch one another? Boys fighting boys. Girls fighting girls. Girls fighting boys. And almost everybody beating me up. It seemed like that, anyway. I know a lot of you were good kids. I know a lot of you were just as scared and hurting as I was. But you don’t notice that stuff when you’re a kid. Your own life feels so huge that it’s hard to see anybody else’s life. So Randy walks into the classroom. He struts on his little Peone legs. He looks like he will fight anybody. Like he will fight the weather. And I think, “Oh, great, somebody else to bully me.” So I avoid him all day. I even hide in the speech therapy room so I don’t have to go outside at recess and maybe get punched. But it turns out that Randy was getting bullied, instead of the other way around. And Stevie was the worst. You all remember how mean Stevie could be? He went after Randy, the new kid, the new Indian. So Stevie pushes and pushes and pushes Randy, and then Randy pushes back and says, “We’re fighting after school.” So, after school, everybody runs up to the old playground to watch the fight. But I run home because I know somebody will get all pumped up by the first fight and will get me into the second fight. I can see the old playground from my front window, so I sit there and watch it all happen. Everybody stands in a circle around Stevie and Randy. And I can see Stevie talking. I can’t hear what he’s saying, but I know he’s probably telling Randy to throw the first punch. Remember how we did that? We’d always tell the other person to throw the first punch. Why did we do that? If you’re going to fight, then you should want to throw the first punch, right? Anyway, Stevie says, “Throw the first punch,” and Randy doesn’t even hesitate. He says, “Okay,” and punches Stevie in the face and knocks him out. Knocks him unconscious. What twelve-year-old kid has knockout power like that? Only Randy. At first, I was excited because Randy had just defeated the meanest bully.

• From Best Erotica & Sexual Deviance Narratives Ever Written (2024)

  He scarce even obtained a kiss but what he ravished; I put his hand away twenty times from my breasts, where he had satisfied himself of their hardness and consistence, with passing for hitherto unhandled goods. But when grown impatient upon the main point, he now threw himself upon me, and first trying to examine me with his finger, sought to make himself further way, I complained of his usage bitterly: “I thought he would not have served a body so... I was ruined... I did not know what I had done..., I would get up, so I would...;” and at the same time kept my thighs so fast locked, that it was not for strength like his to force them open, or do any good. Finding thus my advantages, and that I had both my own and his motions at command, the deceiving him came so easy, that it was perfectly playing upon velvet. In the mean time his machine, which was one of those sizes that slip in and out without being minded, kept pretty stiffly bearing against that part, which the shutting my thighs barred access to; but finding, at length he could do no good by mere dint of bodily strength, he resorted to entreaties and arguments: to which I only answered, with a tone of shame and timidity, “that I was afraid he would kill me... Lord!..., would not be served so... I was never so used in all my born days..., I wondered he was not ashamed of himself, so I did...,” with such silly infantine moods of repulse and complaint as I judged best adapted to express the character of innocence, and affright.

• From The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian (2007)

  Tears rolled down my cheeks. I felt so weak. “I’m sorry,” I said. “You don’t have to be sorry for anything,” he said. “Well, you better be sorry for hitting me, but you don’t have to feel bad about crying.” “I don’t like to cry,” I said. “Other kids, they beat me up when I cry. Sometimes they make me cry so they can beat me up for crying.” “I know,” he said. “And we let it happen. We let them pick on you.” “Rowdy protects me.” “I know Rowdy is your best friend, but he’s, he’s, he’s, he’s—,” Mr. P stuttered. He wasn’t sure what to say or do. “You know that Rowdy’s dad hits him, don’t you?” “Yeah,” I said. Whenever he came to school with a black eye, Rowdy made sure to give black eyes to two kids picked at random. “Rowdy is just going to get meaner and meaner,” Mr. P said. “I know Rowdy has a temper and stuff, and he doesn’t get good grades or anything, but he’s been nice to me since we were kids. Since we were babies. I don’t even know why he’s been nice.” “I know, I know,” Mr. P said. “But, listen, I want to tell you something else. And you have to promise me you’ll never repeat it.” “Okay,” I said. “Promise me.” “Okay, okay, I promise I won’t repeat it.” “Not to anyone. Not even your parents.” “Nobody.” “Okay, then,” he said and leaned closer to me because he didn’t even want the trees to hear what he was going to say. “You have to leave this reservation.” “I’m going to Spokane with my dad later.” “No, I mean you have to leave the rez forever.” “What do you mean?” “You were right to throw that book at me. I deserved to get smashed in the face for what I’ve done to Indians. Every white person on this rez should get smashed in the face. But, let me tell you this. All the Indians should get smashed in the face, too.” I was shocked. Mr. P was furious. “The only thing you kids are being taught is how to give up. Your friend Rowdy, he’s given up. That’s why he likes to hurt people. He wants them to feel as bad as he does.” “He doesn’t hurt me.” “He doesn’t hurt you because you’re the only good thing in his life. He doesn’t want to give that up. It’s the only thing he hasn’t given up.” Mr. P grabbed me by the shoulders and leaned so close to me that I could smell his breath. Onions and garlic and hamburger and shame and pain. “All these kids have given up,” he said. “All your friends. All the bullies. And their mothers and fathers have given up, too. And their grandparents gave up and their grandparents before them. And me and every other teacher here. We’re all defeated.” Mr. P was crying. I couldn’t believe it.

• From Best Erotica & Sexual Deviance Narratives Ever Written (2024)

  Then I plainly perceived, on the cushion, the marks of a plenteous effusion, and already had his sluggard member run up to its old nestling-place, and enforced itself again, as if ashamed to shew its head; which nothing, it seems, could raise but stripes inflicted on its opposite neighbours, who were thus constantly obliged to suffer for his caprice. My gentleman had now put on his clothes and recomposed himself, when giving me a kiss, and placing me by him, he sat himself down as gingerly as possible, with one side off the cushion, which was too sore for him to bear resting any part of his weight on. Here he thanked me for the extreme pleasure I had procured him, and seeing, perhaps, some marks in my countenance of terror and apprehension of retaliation on my own skin, for what I had been the instrument of his suffering in his, he assured me, “he was ready to give up to me any engagement I might deem myself under to stand him, as he had done me, but that if I proceeding in my consent to it, he would consider the difference of my sex, its greater delicacy and incapacity to undergo pain.” Reheartened at which, and piqued in honour, as I thought, not to flinch so near the trial, especially as I well knew Mrs. Cole was an eye-witness, from her stand of espial, to the whole of our transaction, I was now less afraid of my skin, than of his not furnishing me with an opportunity of signalizing my resolution. Consonant to this disposition was my answer, but my courage was still more in my head, than in my heart; and as cowards rush into danger they fear, in order to be the sooner rid of the pain of that sensation, I was entirely pleased with his hastening matters into execution. He had then little to do, but to unloose the strings of my petticoats, and lift them, together with my shift, navel-high, where he just tucked them up loosely, and might be slipt up higher at pleasure. Then viewing me round with great seeming delight, he laid me at length on my face upon the bench, and when I expected he would tie me, as I had done him, and held out my hands, not without fear and a little trembling, he told me, “he would by no means terrify me unnecessarily with such a confinement; for that though he meant to put my constancy to a trial, the standing it was to be completely voluntary on my side, and therefore I might be at full liberty to get up whenever I found the pain too much for me.”

• From Best Erotica & Sexual Deviance Narratives Ever Written (2024)

  Further screams are heard. "Praise be to God," quoth the indecent man, "I thought I was alone; and would have doubted of my success without a groan or two from the victim; but my triumph is sealed. Do you observe? Blood and tears." "In truth," says Clement, who steps up with whip in hand, "I'll not disturb her sweet posture either, it is too favorable to my desires." Jerome's Girl of the Watch and the twenty-year-old girl hold Octavie: Clement considers, fingers; terrified, the little girl beseeches him, and is not listened to. "Ah, my friends!" says the exalted monk, "how are we to avoid flogging a schoolgirl who exhibits an ass of such splendor !" The air immediately resounds to the whistle of lashes and the thud of stripes sinking into lovely flesh; Octavie's screams mingle with the sounds of leather, the monk's curses reply: what a scene for these libertines surrendering themselves to a thousand obscenities in the midst of us all I They applaud him, they cheer him on; however, Octavie's skin changes color, the brightest tints incarnadine join the lily sparkle; but what might perhaps divert Love for an instant, were moderation to have direction of the sacrifice, becomes, thanks to severity, a frightful crime against Love's laws; nothing stops or slows the perfidious monk, the more the young student complains, the more the professor's harshness explodes; from the back to the knee, everything is treated in the same way, and it is at last upon his barbaric pleasures' blooddrenched vestiges the savage quenches his flames. "I shall be less impolite, I think," says Jerome, laying hands upon the lovely thing and adjusting himself between her coral lips; "where is the temple where I would sacrifice? Why, in this enchanting mouth...." I fall silent.... 'Tis the impure reptile withering the rose Ä my figure of speech relates it all.

• From History of the Christian Church: The Complete Set of Eight Volumes (1858)

  On the last day of August the Little Council received answer from Vienne. The commandant of the royal palace in that city arrived in Geneva, communicated to them a copy of the sentence of death pronounced against Villeneuve, and begged them to send him back to France that the sentence might be executed on the living man as it had been already executed on his effigy and books. The Council refused to surrender Servetus, in accordance with analogous cases, but promised to do full justice. The prisoner himself, who could see only a burning funeral pile for him in Vienne, preferred to be tried in Geneva, where he had some chance of acquittal or lighter punishment. He incidentally justified his habit of attending mass at Vienne by the example of Paul, who went to the temple, like the Jews; yet he confessed that in doing so he had sinned through fear of death.1181 The communication from Vienne had probably the influence of stimulating the zeal of the Council for orthodoxy. They wished not to be behind the Roman Church in that respect. But the issue was still uncertain. The Council again confronted Servetus with Calvin on the first day of September. On the same day it granted, in spite of the strong protest of Calvin, permission to Philibert Berthelier to approach the communion table. It thus annulled the act of excommunication by the Consistory, and arrogated to itself the power of ecclesiastical discipline. A few hours afterwards the investigation was resumed in the prison. Perrin and Berthelier were present as judges, and came to the aid of Servetus in the oral debate with Calvin, but, it seems, without success; for they resorted to a written discussion in which Servetus could better defend himself, and in which Calvin might complicate his already critical position. They wished, moreover, to refer the affair to the Churches of Switzerland which, in the case of Bolsec, had shown themselves much more tolerant than Calvin. Servetus demanded such reference. Calvin did not like it, but did not openly oppose it. The Council, without entering on the discussion, decided that Calvin should extract in Latin, from the books of Servetus, the objectionable articles, word for word, contained therein; that Servetus should write his answers and vindications, also in Latin; that Calvin should in his turn furnish his replies; and that these documents be forwarded to the Swiss Churches as a basis of judgment. All this was fair and impartial.1182 On the same day Calvin extracted thirty-eight propositions from the books of Servetus with references, but without comments.

• From Best Erotica & Sexual Deviance Narratives Ever Written (2024)

  But if Antonin perceives what you are up to, beware of his wrath; the safest way is to smother whatever might be the natural impression by striving to unhinge the imagination, which with monsters like these is not difficult. "We have here as well," my instructress continued, "certain dependencies and alliances of which you probably know very little and of which it were well you had some idea; although this has more to do with the fourth article Ä with, that is to say, the one that treats of our recruitings, our retrenchments, and our exchanges Ä I am going to anticipate for a moment in order to insert the following details. "You are not unaware, Therese, that the four monks composing this brotherhood stand at the head of their Order; all belong to distinguished families, all four are themselves very rich: independently of the considerable funds allocated by the Benedictines for the maintenance of this bower of bliss into which everyone hopes to enter in his turn, they who do arrive here contribute a large proportion of their property and possessions to the foundation already established. These two sources combined yield more than a hundred thousand crowns annually which is devoted solely to finding recruits and meeting the house's expenses; they have a dozen discreet and reliable women whose sole task is to bring them every month a new subject, no younger than twelve nor older than thirty. The conscriptee must be free of all defects and endowed with the greatest possible number of qualities, but principally with that of eminent birth. These abductions, well paid for and always effected a great distance from here, bring no consequent discomfitures; I have never heard of any that resulted in legal action; their extreme caution protects them against everything. They do not absolutely confine themselves to virgins: a girl who has been seduced already or a married woman may prove equally pleasing, but a forcible abduction has got to take place, rape must be involved, and it must be definitely verified; this circumstance arouses them; they wish to be certain their crimes cost tears; they would send away any girl who was to come here voluntarily; had you not made a prodigious defense, had they not recognized a veritable fund of virtue in you, and, consequently, the possibility of crime, they would not have kept you twenty-four hours. Everyone here, Therese, comes of a distinguished line; my dear friend, you see before you the only daughter of the Comte de * * *, carried off from Paris at the age of twelve and destined one day to have a dowry of a hundred thousand crowns: I was ravished from the arms of my governess who was taking me by carriage, unoccupied save for ourselves, from my father's country seat to the Abbey of Panthemont where I was brought up; my guardian disappeared; she was in all likelihood bought; I was fetched hither by post chaise.

• From Best Erotica & Sexual Deviance Narratives Ever Written (2024)

  The apartment into which I was made to pass was lit with equal sumptuousness and magnificence; at the further end, reclining upon an ottoman, was a man of about forty, wearing a billowing taffeta dressing robe. "Monseigneur," said Dubois, presenting me to him, "here is the young lady you wanted, she in whom all Grenoble has become interested... the celebrated Therese, to be brief, condemned to hang with the counterfeiters, then delivered thanks to her innocence and her virtue. Acknowledge that I serve you with skill, Monseigneur; not four days ago you evinced your extreme desire to immolate her to your passions; and today I put her into your hands; you will perhaps prefer her to that pretty little pensionnaire from the Benedictine convent at Lyon you also desired and who should be arriving any minute: the latter has her physical and moral integrity this one here has nothing but a sentimental chastity; but it is deep-grained in her being and nowhere will you find a creature more heavily ballasted with candor and honesty. They are both at your disposition, Monseigneur: you'll either dispatch each this evening, or one today and the other tomorrow. As for myself, I am leaving you: your kindnesses in my regard engaged me to make you privy to my Grenoble adventure. One man dead, Monseigneur, one dead man; I must fly Ä" "Ah no, no, charming woman!" cried the master of the place; "no, stay, and fear nothing while you have my protection! You are as a soul unto my pleasures; you alone possess the art of exciting and satisfying them, and the more you multiply your crimes, the more the thought of you inflames my mind.... But this Therese is a pretty thing...." and addressing himself to me: "what is your age, my child?" "Twenty-six, Monseigneur," I replied, "and much grief." "Ha, yes, grief indeed, lots of distress, excellent, I'm familiar with all that, hugely amusing, just what I like; we're going to straighten everything out, we'll put a stop to these tumbles; I guarantee you that in twenty-four hours you'll be unhappy no longer, ha!..." and, with that, dreadful flights of laughter... " 'tis true, eh, Dubois? I've a sure method for ending a young girl's misfortunes, haven't I?"