CrissCrossed: A Dark High School

Bully Romance Sasha Rc

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 CrissCrossed
Copyright © 2023 Sasha R.C.
All rights reserved.
First edition

Published in the United States

Book cover, book design, formatting:

Books4Movies/Order of the Bookish

Awakened Craving is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, incidents are the product of the
author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events etc. are entirely a
work of fiction and completely coincidental. There are no real events or people in this book.

NOTICE:
SEE FULL AUTHOR NOTE and
TRIGGER/CONTENT WARNING
BEFORE READING
THIS BOOK.

authorsashachristophersen.org
 Author Note
Hello, my fellow readers,
This is A Dark High School Bully Taboo Romance. This book dives right in from the start, things
happen pretty quickly within these pages. There are things within this book that might be triggering
and uncomfortable for some readers. Please be AWARE there is sexual assault done by the main
female characters Uncle, bullying done by the main male characters, and mind games that happen
within this book. Some of the main characters are minors aged 17 years old. But there are flashback
memories starting when the main female character was 13 years old, this does include sexual assault.
And flashbacks when the main male characters are 10 and 12 years old.
Also please be AWARE that there is sexual grooming, and sexual assault that takes place by the uncle
of the Main female character. Sexual abuse includes: sexual pictures taken of MFC, fondling of
private parts, and forced hand job.
This is dark “why choose” romance; in other words, polygamy. There is no choosing. Please
remember that this book is a work of fiction and there are no true events that take place inside these
pages. Please read the trigger/ content warning.
 Trigger/Content Warning
This is A Dark “Why Choose” High School Bully Romance. There are dark sexual elements and
themes in this book which include: sexual scenes that have bondage, breath play, anal, dominant
sexual behaviors, and submissive sexual behaviors.

Other dark elements and themes in this book include psychological abuse, mental abuse, sexual
assault, stalking, foul language, violence including murder, and tortured and possessive controlling
Main Male Characters. This is a bully romance; some language and situations between the main
characters may be uncomfortable for some readers. Two of the main characters are underage- 17
years old for the bulk of this book.

Also please be aware that there is sexual grooming, and sexual assault that takes place by the uncle of
the Main female character. Sexual abuse includes Sexual pictures taken of MFC, fondling of private
parts, and forced hand job.

This book is fiction. There are no real events or people inside this book. This book is all fantasy. I
want to make it clear that I do not condone anything that happens in this book. Please use caution.
You know yourself best. It is advised that this book is for mature adults over 18.

YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED

 A Special Dedication

Nicole Meacham-
I know that you said Dark High School Bully Romance is one of your favorites.
This is for you. Thank you for being such a good person.
I appreciate you and all of your support.

Kaylea Fink-
This is the book that started our friendship,
Thank you for all of your support. For taking the time to read my books.
I appreciate you. I hope you enjoy my friend.

To my ARC team and STREET team-

All of you are so amazing, thank you for being a part of my journey.

ORDER OF THE BOOKISH-

You know who you are, thank you for everything.
I look forward to the future with you guys.

Bretnie Shepherd-
Thank you for all of your support, staying up with me at all hours of the night. Keeping me on track and being my friend. Thank you
for being you.
 Contents
Author Note
Trigger/Content Warning
A Special Dedication
Contents
Playlist
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Chapter 49
Chapter 50
Chapter 51
Chapter 52
Chapter 53
Chapter 54
Chapter 55
Chapter 56
Chapter 57
Chapter 58
Chapter 59
Chapter 60
Chapter 61
Chapter 62
Chapter 63
Chapter 64
Chapter 65
Chapter 66
Chapter 67
Chapter 66
Chapter 69
Chapter 70
Chapter 71
Other Books by Sasha R.C.
Acknowledgements
About the Author:
 Playlist

Changes are Coming by Daughtry

Light On by David Cook
Get Up by Shinedown
Dearly Beloved by Daughtry
Broken by Seethe
Home by Daughtry
If You Could Only See by Tonic
Whatever It Takes by Lifehouse
Chances by Five for Fighting
Wicked game by Theory of a Deadman
Let Me Go by 3 Doors Down
Heaven by Theory of a Deadman
Apologize by OneRepublic
Cry for Help by Daughtry
If You’re Gone by Matchbox Twenty
Everything You Want by Vertical Horizon
Over You by Daughtry
I Don’t Wanna Believe by Hinder
Never Say Never by The Fray
Hanging by a Moment by Lifehouse
Collide by Howie Day

Find the complete CrissCrossed playlist on Spotify

 Prologue
Raiden & Ryker
To those that don’t understand…

Hate is not that far from love.

Hate is just another way of expressing our deepest desires.
Love, though…well, love is wanting and needing that one person.
Love is wanting and needing that one person to the point of feeling as if you’re going to die without
them.
Hate and love are like salt and pepper.
They might not always agree on everything, but when you put them together, they make a perfect
mixture that takes you to a completely different level.
We all have demons within ourselves that we try to hide, that we try to run from.
We, the Keller brothers, have never tried to run or hide. We have always embraced what we are, and
who we are.
You are the one that says we need to change. You are the one that says what we want is wrong.
There is no escaping our demons and darkness, but with her, we don’t want to escape. We have
accepted that the darkness and demons are a part of us, just like how they are a part of her.
But when we give in to those demons, we need to have that one person that can help us come back to
the light.
She is our light. She is the candle within the darkness. She doesn’t know how much we love and need
her, but she will.
We will never let her go, and we will never apologize for what we have done to keep her.
You might not agree with what we do, but we have never given a fuck anyway, so why start now?
This is our story. This is her story.
 Chapter 1
Ryker
10 years old

Dad has been pacing back and forth, his screams have filled up the hallways. Raiden has been
making sure to keep me by him. I don’t know what is going on, but I can tell that something is wrong
with dad again.
Dad has been so angry. Mom says that it’s our family curse, whatever that means. It is our family’s
curse for the men to be violent and angry. Raiden tightens his hold on me as we both wiggle deeper
into the closet. Mom warned us. She said it was probably best for us to stay out of sight. So, Raiden
took me in here and we have just been listening. Mom told us both to be quiet, so that’s what we have
been doing.
I used to love this closet, but now it scares me. There are a lot of things that I used to love that
scare me now. We have been spending more time in this closet than we do outside or in our actual
rooms. Raiden says it’s because this closet is safer. Kids my age shouldn’t know any of this, but I’m
not stupid. I know that our family is different, that dad is different.
Everyone thinks that I’m just some little kid that doesn’t know, but I know. I hear and see
everything. Even the things they don’t want me to see or hear.
“Raiden what is going on?” I whisper to my brother, hating the silence.
“I don’t know Ryker, but we need to stay here, okay?” Raiden says. His voice is low as he tightens
his arms around me.
“What about mom?” I ask. My heart is starting to race thinking about her being out there instead of
in here with us. She used to come in here with us, but lately she has been telling us to hide in here by
ourselves. I don’t like her being out there. I don’t like not knowing what’s going on.
“She will be okay,” Raiden tries to tell me, but I don’t believe him. He doesn’t know that. And I
can tell he doesn’t even believe his own words. We are both scared, but my brother would never
admit it unless I push him too, and right now is not the time to do that.
He cries in his room at night when he thinks I can’t hear him. Raiden and I both are becoming more
and more quiet. The laughter and joking around has gone down this last year, and I have a feeling it
will continue to go down. It makes me sad.
“He’s yelling again,” I whisper. Raiden tightens his arm around me. Mom says we need to do
whatever dad says to make him happy, and we try, we really do try. But nothing seems to make him
happy lately. Nothing except for when he isn’t here with us.
We both hold our breath as we hear dad breaking things.
Mom is screaming.
I hear her scream “please don’t”.
We can’t just sit here.
I quickly wiggle out of Raiden’s tight grip and push open the closet door. I get up and take off
running.
 “Ryker come back,” Raiden screams behind me.
But I can’t go back in there, I hate the dark, I hate feeling confined.
Mom needs us. She screamed. When she screams that means that she needs us.
I run out of Raiden’s bedroom and down the hallway toward father’s office… the place that the
yelling is always coming from.
I push open the doors and run inside, stopping when I see mom on the ground. She is covering her
head with her hands and father he is standing over her with a belt.
“No, dad stop,” I scream as I run over to mom and cover her head with my body. I look up at my
dad - his eyes are angry; his breathing is crazy.
I have only seen him like this a few times, and it has never ended good for the furniture or the
walls.
“Dad, you’re hurting mom,” I yell at him.
“Ryker move,” he snaps at me.
I shake my head as my heart starts to race. He lifts up his hand with the belt and I tighten my grip
on mom and lower my head. I might only be ten years old, but I’m not stupid. I’m not moving just so
that he can hurt her more.
“If you don’t move, son, I will hit you,” he warns me in that tone that I don’t like. It’s the tone that
is starting to scare me.
I shake my head and tighten my grip on mom.
“Dad, no,” Raiden screams. I can hear his footsteps coming closer and closer, and then his body
covers mine as I cover mom.
“Raiden, you know better than this shit. Move son, both of you,” Dad yells at Raiden.
“Dad stop,” Raiden says in a calm voice. I don’t know how he’s calm right now. I’m scared.
“Raiden! Fucking move,” Dad yells louder.
“No,” he screams back.
“You’re going to take the punishment for them?” Dad asks in a low voice, making chills go down
my spine.
“Yes,” Raiden says as he tightens his arms around me, and I tighten my arms around mom. She is
crying and her body is starting to shake, making me and Raiden both shake with her.
My heart continues to race as I keep my eyes closed. The next thing I hear is the belt hitting
Raiden. At first, he doesn’t make a sound, but that doesn’t last long. After three hits, the room, the
entire house, becomes filled with my brother’s screams.
Tears escape my eyes and roll down my face.
I don’t know how long it lasts. All I know is that dad held nothing back while he was punishing
Raiden. Raiden has always protected me, and he has always made sure that I was okay. But now it’s
my turn to make sure that he’s okay.
Dad drops the belt. I keep my eyes shut as he leaves the room. Raiden is sobbing, but he quickly
stops and heaves his body off mine. I open my eyes and look over at him as he slowly makes his way
out of dad’s office.
There is blood on his shirt.
My heart sinks as I keep a hold on mom. My brother is the strongest person that I know, and I owe
him everything. Even at ten years old, I know that my brother is my protector, my best friend.
We will never forget this day…the day our dad showed us who he really is. I will never forget it.
 Chapter 2
Raiden
12 years old

I make my way into my room and every step I take sends pain shooting up through my back. I can’t
even tell which part of my back hurts worse. The pain is all-consuming. As I was making my way
down the hallway, I heard the front door open and close, and the sounds of my mother crying left with
her. Mom can never stay after a fight with dad. I don’t know why I thought that this time would be
different.
The first time I asked her why she left us alone with dad after a fight, she just simply said that she
needed air. I think it’s because she doesn’t want to see what dad has done to her, or the house. This
time, I know she left because she didn’t want to see what dad did to my back. But it wasn’t a choice
for me. I just reacted. It was either me or them, and I wasn’t going to let him hit Ryker or mom again. I
did what I had to do.
I would do it again if I had to. I might be young, and I might not understand everything that’s going
on, but one thing is for sure: I will take the beating if it means my mom and Ryker don’t have to suffer
at the hands of my dad.
My back strains as I reach to turn on the shower. I turn and grab tightly onto the counter. My back
stings and I know that the water is going to hurt so bad, I just know it. The blood from the belt wounds
is rolling down my back. It’s warm, but for some reason, a chill covers my skin. A twelve-year-old
shouldn’t feel like this. But I am not a normal twelve-year-old kid, and our family is not a normal
family.
I used to think our family was just like any other family, just like mine and Ryker’s friends. But I
learned really quick that we were different, it has never gotten to this point before. But now that my
dad has done this, I have a feeling it will not be the last time. Which scares me the most, it means I
can’t leave Ryker alone with dad. I would feel so bad if I left to go somewhere and came back and
found out my dad did something like this to my brother.
I might be young, but I know what I need to do. I need to protect Ryker and my mom. It means I
can’t go and play with my friends or waste time watching T.V. or playing video games. It means that I
need to be strong for them. And I can do that, I know I can do that.
My dad is violent and mean and will lash out when he feels that people are going against him. I
have no idea what mom did, or said, but whatever it was really set him off, and this is the end result
of his anger.
Dad has told me several times that everything he does is helping to prepare me for my future. I
have no idea what that means but I do know that I am terrified for me, my brother, and for mom. It
seems like all she does is cry or stay in a room that doesn’t belong to her and dad.
I close my eyes and allow the tears to roll down my face. My dad didn’t like that I screamed, but I
couldn’t help it. Now I know what will happen when I scream. I will know next time what not to do,
and I know there will be a next time.
 “Raiden,” my little brother whispers behind me.
I open my eyes and look at Ryker in the mirror. He makes his way into my bathroom and stops at
my side. I wrap my arm around him and pull him against me.
“I’m sorry Raiden,” he says to me, making my heart sink into my stomach. He has nothing to be
sorry for. If he didn’t try to protect mom, I would have.
“You have nothing to be sorry for,” I whisper reassuringly, hearing the sadness in my own voice.
Why does it have to be like this? Why can’t we be like every other family?
“Dad hurt you,” Ryker says through his own tears.
“I’d rather it be me than you,” I say softly. I will always allow dad to hurt me instead of Ryker. I
will take this on for both of us.
“I love you Raiden,” he says resting his face against my chest and wrapping his arms around my
waist. He is gentle, but the touch of his arm against one of the cuts sends an intense throbbing up my
back.
“I love you too Ryker. Go get ready for bed, you can sleep with me,” I whisper, trying to hide that
my back hurts. He is only ten years old. He doesn’t need to worry about me. I will be okay.
“Okay,” Ryker says in a sad voice. He’s confused, I’m confused, all of this is confusing and scary,
and I have no idea what’s going to happen now.
I release my hold on him, and he leaves me alone. With the space and quiet, I can try to process
what just happened. Dad has gotten mad before, but he’s never hit me until today. He has never hit
Ryker either, and I’m pretty sure that he’s never laid his hands, or a belt, on mom.
Dad is not who I thought he was, and I’m scared. I’m scared for me, for Ryker and for mom. I will
protect them from him. That, I can do. If him hitting me means he doesn’t hit them, then I will take it
every time, because that’s what you do when you love someone.
Slowly, I remove my t-shirt. The blood sticks to my back and it hurts when the fabric pulls against
the cuts.
I look into the mirror and see Ryker staring at my back, making my heart race. I thought he left me
alone in the bathroom. He shouldn’t have seen this.
I protected Ryker from the beating, but I can’t protect him from his feelings right now. No matter
what I say, I know that this has changed my brother, just like it has changed me, and now we will go
through this together.
Always together.
 Chapter 3
Hartley

The rain is coming down hard. It’s soaking my clothes as I walk up the dirt trail toward the forest.
This is the only place where I can go to get away from everything. My father normally comes up with
me, but he’s busy at the shop, so I’m on my own for now.
He should be coming soon, though. I couldn’t wait any longer, I had to get away from my uncle.
Even with my father being there, it doesn’t stop him from placing his hand on my shoulders or my
lower back. My father doesn’t notice, nobody fucking notices. Leaving was the best thing right now.
The weather today is colder than normal, but the weather is always changing here. It’s like the
weather doesn’t even know what it wants to do, which I can relate to. My mind can never settle on
anything lately. My mind is a messed up twisted ball - the more I try and untangle it, the more tangled
it seems to become.
My father must be noticing that my mind is not all there. He doesn’t even ask me what I want for
dinner anymore, he just makes it and I eat whatever he cooks or orders.
The run-down shack is just up ahead, looking creepy in this chilly and overcast weather, but no
one else comes up here. Most people don’t even know that this place exists. My father found it and
has been using it for when he gets ready to steal cars, restore them, and then sell them again. It’s a
business that makes him a lot of money, but it can be dangerous, which is why I chose to help. Being
able to keep an eye on him makes me feel better, even if there isn’t much that I can do.
Even with my help, though, he is still at risk of getting caught and put in prison. I risk getting
locked up in JDH again, which is not fun at all. But JDH does give me some time to myself, which is
nice, but the other girls in there are fucking nuts, and I always seem to get in a fight and have to stay
longer.
There is a figure leaning up against the shack. This is the first time I’ve ever seen anyone up here.
It isn’t my father or his current business partner. My father goes through partners to help him like I go
through fucking underwear. I haven’t trusted a single one of them.
Can’t any place just be private in this fucking town? Guess not…
Even though part of me wants to run, I continue to force myself to walk up to the figure, and the
closer I get, the more my heart races. It’s not just some random person - it’s Raiden Keller. He has
been working with my father on the stolen cars, off and on. Their entire family is made up of
criminals. Both our families are. His brother, though, is just a pain in my ass, and the older we get, the
crueler we both become to each other.
The community seems to look the other way at the Keller family of criminals. My family… not so
much. But I guess anyone can be bought. The Keller’s have this whole town underneath their thumb,
and they are able to get away with anything and everything.
Raiden turns as I come to a stop in front of him. I wrap my arms tightly around my shaking body
and scan every inch of him, from top to bottom. He is covered in tattoos, his hair is falling into his
eyes, he is holding a smoke, and he is wearing all black. He has bad-boy vibes radiating off of him in
waves. …
 “What the hell are you doing here?” I ask in a curious and annoyed voice. It’s none of my business,
since he works with my father, not me. But I have a claim to this place and he doesn’t. I just want one
place that is fucking mine. No Raiden, no Ryker, no uncle…just mine.
“Your father asked me to come,” Raiden replies in a bored voice.
“Why?” I ask, tilting my head to the side.
Over the years, Raiden and I have spoken a little, but the conversations are short. He talks more to
my father than anyone else, but my father is just that kind of man - the type that draws you in and
makes you feel welcome and accepted.
“To check on you,” Raiden confirms, still sounding bored. Of course, my father has to make sure
that I’m okay. He needs to start worrying about himself, and less about me. I’m not the one stealing
cars, and then reselling them. I’m not the one in constant danger of being caught.
“I’m good, thanks,” I snap at him.
I’m comfortable being on my own. Even when my uncle and my father are around, I feel like I’m
on my own, doing my own thing, watching over everyone. Most of the time, I prefer it that way. It
makes life a lot less complicated when you keep people at a distance. My mother taught me that
lesson.
His eyes look over me as my body continues to shake both from the weather and this awkward
situation.
“Yeah, I can see that,” he says in an amused voice.
He pushes his body off the shack and removes his jacket, which he then hands over to me.
Normally, I would tell him to fuck off, but today, the chill in the air is getting the best of me. My hand
reaches out to grab it and I quickly put it on. It smells like him. I can’t quite pinpoint the scent, but it
feels familiar.
“Thank you,” I say as nicely as I can as the warmth from the jacket starts to seep into my skin.
He smirks and nods, “No problem, Hart.”
I look around Raiden. Normally, where there’s Raiden, there is also Ryker.
“Where’s your brother?” I ask, looking back at his eyes, which haven’t looked away from me since
I first walked up.
“Football practice,” he confirms.
I don’t know what to say to that, so I simply nod my head. I don’t care where his brother is, as long
as he’s far away from me. Most of the time I can hold my own with Ryker, but sometimes, his words
and actions do hurt.
I would never admit that to him, though.
Raiden is different from Ryker. You can tell that they are brothers, but Raiden is quiet, and Ryker is
very vocal. Raiden is harder in his general appearance but has soft and welcoming eyes. Ryker is
softer looking, but his eyes are hard, like he has walls up and won’t let anyone cross them.
We live in a small town, and I have also known the Keller brothers since we were all babies, so I
know a lot about them. Raiden is two years older than me and Ryker, and he seems to be the brother
that their father is training to take over the family business. Their family is well-known all over town,
and I’ve noticed that most people look the other way at their criminal activities and just choose to
focus on what they do for the community.
Like I said before, anyone can be bought, and Mr. Keller seems to have bought everyone that is
important in this town.
The silence grows between us and my heart races along with my thoughts. My father should be
here any minute, and that will be my cue to leave. The less I see between these two, the better.
 “Can I ask you to promise me something, Raiden?” I ask softly.
His eyes lock with mine. “Depends,” he says in an amused voice.
“On what?” I ask, a little scared by his answer. Riddles… riddles with both of the Keller brothers.
They like to play mind games and make you guess what they mean. It has driven me nuts for years, but
now I think it’s just their personality. They’re both careful about what they say and how they say it.
“What the promise is,” he clarifies.
I continue to look at him as I fill my lungs with air. “Can you please promise to watch over my
father?” I ask, looking straight into his eyes.
Raiden and Ryker both have one big thing in common - their stares are intense as all hell.
He nods and says, “I’ll do my best.”
“Thank you,” I whisper. My voice is quiet but hopeful.
Do I trust Raiden? No.
Do I believe that he will do his best? Yes.
Raiden seems to like my father, and, for some reason, my father seems to like him too. So I hope
that he’s telling the truth about watching over him.
“Harty,” my father yells from the trail behind me.
“We’re over here dad,” I yell back.
Raiden keeps his eyes on me as I remove his jacket and hand it back to him. His eyes go down to
the piece of clothing and he takes a deep breath. Our fingers touch as he grabs it from me. Part of me
wants to yank my hand away and the other part, the confusing part, wants me to stay right where I am.
His skin is warm, while mine is fucking freezing.
“Don’t get into too much trouble, okay?” I whisper in an amused voice.
Raiden smiles and replies, “No promises with that.”
I nod, allowing a small smile to form across my lips. “Fair enough,” I say.
I lower my hand to my side as my father’s footsteps grow louder. I turn around and he waves at me
and gives me a big grin. Part of me wants to turn back and get one more glance at Raiden, but there’s
no good reason to, so I force myself to start walking toward my father, closing the distance between
us. I pat my dad on the shoulders as I walk by him. The less I know about what they’re doing, the
better. Or at least, that’s what I tell myself.
“Hart,” my dad yells after me.
He is always worrying about me, and for good reason. I get into trouble more than I should. But
getting in trouble means I don’t have to stay home as much. I was hoping my father would catch on,
but so far, he hasn’t, and I’m not just going to freely tell him what’s been going on.
I already feel ashamed as it is. Talking about it, admitting it out loud… I think that would just make
things worse. I will deal with it myself, just like I have been for the past few years.
“I’m going home dad,” I yell back, not turning around to face him.
“Stay there,” he says loud enough for me to hear as I put more and more distance between us.
“Okay,” I confirm loud enough for him to not have to chase me down the dirt road.
My hope is that he and Raiden will not take that long, and my father will be back home, safe and
sound, and then I can leave again. When he’s doing a job, I do my best to listen and do what he asks of
me, which usually just means that I must stay home.
I know that my father is doing this because we need the money. I wish there was something I could
do to help more than what I’m already doing. He says that I help enough at the shop and by going to
school, but he can’t hide his anxiety from me.
 But for now, I will do as I’m told and go home, and I will just pray that my uncle is somewhere
else when I get there.
 Chapter 4
Raiden

I lean against the tree and cross my arms over my chest, breathing deeply as I watch the shop.
Hartley told her father that she was coming back home. She agreed to his request, which I was a little
surprised by. I don’t know her too well, but I know that she tends to get into trouble. He tries to make
her stay home, it’s his simple way of trying to protect her from his criminal behaviors. I wish my
father were more like him. My father doesn’t want to shield me and Ryker from his crimes, he wants
us to be involved.
I have never been good at doing what I’m told. I want nothing to do with his type of crimes, which
is why I stick to stealing cars and dealing dope every now and again. My father is a fucked-up man
and is pissed that I’m out here doing the shit I do, but he has no problem training me to do the shit that
he wants me to do.
It took longer to steal the cars and hide them than what her father and I thought. We made sure to be
careful, though. I was surprised when she asked me to watch over her father, because she doesn’t trust
me or my family. She must believe in me enough to watch her father’s back. That has to mean
something, right?
Maybe my brain is looking too much into her simple gesture, but maybe, just fucking maybe, she is
starting to see that I’m not the guy that everyone assumes I am. Her eyes looked deep into mine, and I
know she saw something- something that made her trust me enough to ask me to watch over her father.
I wish I could see into her head. Not knowing her thoughts or understanding her emotions is driving
me fucking crazy.
Ryker and I are the same in that regard - we both need and want control, but we go about it in
different ways.
Ryker and her have been going at it for years. At first, I thought it was because they liked each
other, but after what was in her eyes today, I think I’m starting to understand. She is in just as much
pain as we are. Ryker doesn’t show his feelings very well, and Hartley runs away from them. As for
me, well, booze and dope do just fine for now. We all have our trauma, if you want to call it that, and
most of the town knows hers, but no one knows the real story.
What’s sad is that no one has asked her for the truth, everyone has just believed the lie. I guess
because it’s easier that way.
It seems to always be easier for people to believe lies. People fear the truth because it makes them
have to see things for what they are - that this world is fucked up and fucked up things happen every
day. Life is not filled with rainbows and butterflies, no matter how much we want it to be. My brother
and I both learned that from our father – he taught us that life is a dark place, and it just gets darker.
People don’t want to hear that; they don’t want to know that the world is actually more darkness than
light. So, instead of accepting the truth, they continue to live in the lie.
People like me and my brother prefer the darkness. In the dark, we can hide. People leave us the
fuck alone because of it. They don’t understand us. They wouldn’t understand what’s really inside me
and my brother, just like I know for a fucking fact that they don’t understand what is inside Hartley.
 No one would understand unless they’ve experienced the pain and suffering that we have. I know
our stories are different from hers and her life is different from ours, but trauma is fucking trauma, and
I can tell that her trauma has caused her to isolate and keep people at a distance. It has made her not
trust anything people say. She’s the type of woman that needs to see behaviors and the result of what
someone says. If they don’t add up, she has no problem writing that person off.
Ryker and I both respect her for that and, even though her trauma has caused her to do all of these
things, she is still the type of woman that fucking cares about other people. She tries to hide it most of
the time, but she can’t hide it from us. We see her. Which is why my brother bullies her…he needs her
to bully him back. It’s just how Ryker is wired. It’s practically his love language.
People judge and talk, but from what I can tell, she doesn’t seem to care about them. But she is in
pain, and she suffers in silence, and no one around her appears to see it. But me and my brother do.
That’s why he treats her the way he does - he fears her for some reason. Maybe because she
challenges him, makes him think, makes him question shit?
I see her differently than I did yesterday. Before, she was just Mr. Bailey’s daughter, but now she’s
more than that. Her voice, her touch, the look in her eyes as she watched me… she is drawing me in
like a fucking moth to a flame. She draws me in with her darkness because it matches mine. She
would never accept me right now, that much I know. So, for now, I’ll watch her from the darkness. I’ll
watch over her father because she asked me to. After today, I have a feeling that I would do anything
that she asks me to do, without question.
The memory of her voice fills my head, and the feeling of her touch makes my dick hard. I can’t
help imagining what it would feel like to have her pussy wrapped tightly around my dick. I imagine
what it would be like to hear her moan and scream my name.
I want to get closer to her.
I want to understand her.
In due time, I will, because she doesn’t realize it, but I am now obsessed with her. It only took that
one touch, that one look, and now I am fucking hooked. I always get what I fucking want, and now I
want her. My brother will see that we need her, and over time, she will see that she needs us.
 Chapter 5
Raiden
14 years old

I follow behind my father as he makes his way into his office. As soon as we get inside, a man
behind me closes the door. I stop and look around. The room contains four men sitting down, waiting
for my father. They all get up as he makes his way around his desk and takes a seat.
He looks at me. He looks at me with that face that tells me that whatever he’s doing, he wants me
to see firsthand.
I quickly make my way over to his desk and take my place behind him. He nods at the man that
closed the door when I entered, which is his signal to bring over the black briefcase in his hands.
This is the first time my father has asked me to sit in on one of his meetings. The man sets the
briefcase on in front of the four men sitting on the other side of the desk. The one closest to the middle
lifts his own briefcase, which is also black, and sets it on the desk as well. My father grabs it and
pulls it in front of him. I watch closely as he opens the briefcase and that is when I see a shit ton of
fucking money.
I look over at the four men. The guy on the right end opens the briefcase that my father’s man set
down. Even from here, I can see what it is - a briefcase full of drugs.
My heart races as I look at my father leaning back in his chair.
“It’s the best coke you’ll find in this town,” my father says with pride.
“We have no doubt, Mr. Keller. We will need another shipment in two weeks. Do you think you
can do that?” The on the far-left asks.
“Yes, I can, as long as you have the money to pay for it,” my father replies in a stern voice.
“Money will not be a problem on our end,” the man says with confidence, making my stomach
twist into knots.
“Good, then we have a deal,” my father confirms with the same amount of confidence.
My heart sinks as all of them nod and stand. The man on the far left closes the briefcase of drugs
and carries it away. My father’s man is already back at the door, opening it for them to walk out. A
soon as they leave, my father’s man follows behind and shuts the door. It’s just me and my father now.
“You sell drugs?” I ask.
“Correction, son, our family sells drugs,” my father says, watching me closely.
“Why?” I ask, but I’m actually kind of scared to know the answer.
“Do you like this house? Do you like the new car I’m getting you?” My father asks.
I nod, because honestly, I don’t know what else to do.
“Well, the drugs pay for what our community business can’t,” he says simply. as if selling drugs is
the most normal thing in the world. I guess, in our family, it is.
“But it is wrong,” I say, as if that means shit to him.
 My father chuckles and shakes his head. “Son, it’s only wrong if you get caught, and I have
everyone in my fucking pocket. We are building an empire, one that I want you to take over once it’s
time,” he explains.
“Why?” I ask.
“Because you are the oldest, the strongest. I will continue to train you, and before you know it,
you’ll be ready to take over for me,” my father once again answers with pride.
I don’t want to be like him.
I don’t want this.
I honestly don’t know what I want for my life, but it is not sitting in that chair, acting like my father.
Fuck that.
I nod, because once again I don’t know what else to do. I make my way around the desk and to the
door.
“Son,” my father says in a calm voice.
“Yes father,” I respond without turning around. I can’t look him in the eyes right now.
“Don’t fucking disappointment me” he warns. Too fucking late. I will do whatever I have to do to
make sure that I do not take over that fucking chair or whatever empire he thinks he’s making.
“Yes father,” I whisper as I open the door and walk out.
I run right into Ryker. He puts down his phone and looks at me with a raised eyebrow, and all I can
do is roll my eyes at him.
I turn and make my way down the hallway and walk into my room. Ryker is right on my heels,
closing the door behind me. I take a seat on my bed and lean forward, placing my face into my hands.
Ryker takes a seat next to me and grabs onto my shoulders.
“What’s wrong, Raiden”? My brother asks in a concerned voice.
“Dad is a fucking drug dealer,” I say with no emotion.
“What?” he asks in an amused voice.
“That is what just happened. A drug deal…. Coke” I confess. I don’t keep anything from my
brother, not after what we have been through together. We are all in all this together. Him and I
forever.
I lift my head and look at my brother. His eyes are not wide and his breathing is steady. He isn’t
surprised, and I think, deep down inside, I’m not either. Our family is fucked up and now I know for
sure that my father plans on turning me into a criminal, just like he is.
But I want no fucking part of it.
“I think I know what would make you feel better,” Ryker says with a smile.
I shake my head and roll my eyes. He always has some crazy ass idea.
“What?” I ask with amusement.
“Let’s get out of here,” he says, his smile getter bigger.
Ryker stands up and grabs onto my arm, forcing me to stand. I know whatever he has planned will
get us both in trouble, but then again, we have always been drawn to doing the wrong thing.
 Chapter 6
Ryker
12 years old

I wish I could say that me and Raiden were surprised about the Coke, but we aren’t. Raiden
seemed shocked that our father did it right in front of him, in this house. We have always known that
father was doing illegal stuff. It has been a few months since the drug deal went down in father’s
office, and Raiden and I have both been becoming more and more distant from our parents. But it’s
brought us closer together.
Father and mother made it clear that I need to be the golden football star. They believe that
statement so much that they have already signed me up. Do I even want to play football? I don’t know,
but now that they want me to, a big part of me wants to fuck off and go do something else. But after
they forced me to go to practice this morning, I’m starting to think that what I want doesn’t matter. My
father is going to get his way, just like he always does.
This is just another thing to add to the list of stuff that makes us look like the perfect family in the
eyes of our town. But on the inside, we are as broken and pained as you can get, and it seems like
every day it just gets worse.
I walk down the hallway, hearing the screams and moans coming from my father’s room. It doesn’t
sound like mom, but you never know. They have never been shy about their sex life. It’s just one of
those things that I grew up with that I’m pretty sure other twelve-year-old kids don’t go through.
After what happened with Raiden and the beating a couple of years ago, father and mother both
stopped trying to hide things from either of us. Father still keeps secrets, but I have a feeling it has to
do with the drugs that Raiden told me about.
I wish I could say I’m surprised that our father sells drugs, but I’m not. I stopped being surprised
that day when I looked at Raiden’s back and saw the blood and the result of what happens when father
feels that he is betrayed. That day he felt betrayed by me, mom and Raiden. But we still wouldn’t
have changed what happened that day.
I think it opened our eyes to the truth about our father and our family. Since that day, we have heard
and seen things that we never should have at our age or, at any age for that matter.
I stop at my father’s door and lean against the wall, looking through the cracked door. Father never
closes his door - he doesn’t care who sees or hears him. I look over toward the bed and see my father
at the end. There is a woman that is not my mother holding tightly onto the blanket as my father takes
her from behind. She is moaning and screaming his name.
So, this is what men do when they need to be wanted and loved. He screws whoever he wants?
I continue to watch my father pick up his pace. I look at the woman that is not my mother - she
continues to breath hard and moan and make all kind of noises. The bathroom door opens, and I watch
another woman walk out and come up behind my father. Also, not my mother. So not only do men take
a woman that is not his wife, but he has two.
 I slowly back away from the door and turn around. Raiden is a few feet away from me, leaning
against the wall. He looks tired and run down. He has been doing more and more drug deals that
father doesn’t know about.
It’s not normal for a fourteen-year-old to go off and sell Coke, just like it’s not normal for a
twelve-year-old to see his father have sex, especially with two strange women.
“You good?” I ask as I make my way over to him. His clothes are dirty and sweaty.
“Yeah, you?” he asks quietly, as we both hear my father moan from his room.
I nod and shrug. This is all so crazy, but crazy is becoming the new normal.
 Chapter 7
Hartley

When my mother left, me and my father took it really hard. My father’s brother, Devon, came to
stay with us. He’s been helping with the shop and seems to want things from me that are not right or
natural. Devon says things, odd things, that make me feel weird and uncomfortable.
Devon doesn’t seem to mind saying any of it, or watching me, looking over me like I’m some kind
of fucking meat. A few times, I’ve caught him watching me in the shower or watching me in the
doorway as I get dressed, even though I know for a fucking fact that I locked the door. He always
seems to be able to find his way in when he shouldn’t.
The more attention he gives me, the more withdrawn and isolated I become. No one seems to
notice what he’s doing, and I am not the kind to go and tell either. That is the last thing my family
needs - more rumors to fucking spread about us. People still haven’t gotten over the fact that my
mother left, and the entire town has come up with their reasons for why they think she did it. None of
it is true, but that doesn’t stop them from spreading the rumors like a fucking deadly virus.
Me telling on Devon would just make more people talk, and make my family the center of attention
again, and that would not be fucking good. Especially not with the kind of business my father is doing
on the side. So, I’ll keep my mouth shut and just hope and pray that he loses interest, or it doesn’t go
where I know he wants it to go. Plus, I am the girl that has been to JDH. I’m the girl that gets into
trouble and has a criminal father. Even if I did tell on my uncle, I don’t think anyone would believe
me, so why put myself through that?
I make my way down the hallway and into the kitchen, where Devon is sitting on the edge of a
chair. He watches me closely as I grab a water from the fridge. I don’t need to look at him to know
that he is staring at me, something that he has been doing a lot lately. His eyes always seem to fill with
desire as he looks over my body, making my stomach twist and turn.
“Hart, those jeans look good on you,” Devon says in a dark, desire-filled voice. Chills go down
my spine at his words. I hate the way he says my nickname. I hate the way he says anything to me.
There is always this dark and needy undertone to his voice that makes me want to throw up.
Are all uncles like this? Or it is just my fucking luck that my father’s brother is a pervert?
I don’t respond to his comment. I’m learning that he just wants a reaction from me. I do my best to
focus on the water going down my throat, and not his inappropriate comment. He only seems to do
this when my father isn’t home, which seems to be more and more lately. It makes me want to stay out
of this house as much as I can.
I turn back around and leave the kitchen, heading back down the hallway toward my room. I slam
the door as I throw the bottle of water on my bed and head into my bathroom, stripping off my clothes.
The sooner I take a shower, the sooner I can leave and go anywhere but here.
I lean over and turn on the water, stepping into the shower and shutting the see-through door. I need
to get a fucking shower door that would make it hard for Devon to fucking watch me or take his damn
pictures. He doesn’t even try and hide that he takes pictures of me anymore. It makes my skin crawl to
think about what he’s doing when he’s alone with them.
 Devon must have always been this way, but I only started to notice a few months ago. He wasn’t
like this when he first came to stay with us, and honestly, I don’t know what has fucking changed
except for the fact that I’m getting older, and it seems like I have caught his attention. The attention I
never wanted or asked for, but he doesn’t seem to need permission. He does whatever the fuck he
wants. After all, he is the adult, and I am the child.
I wish I could figure out what in the hell is drawing him to me. If I knew what I was doing to make
him do these things, I would stop. Do I need to change my hair? My clothes? For the life of me I have
no idea what I’m doing to make him do these things.
The water runs over my head and body and then I hear my bedroom door open and close. This
motherfucker has big balls, but I guess he knows that I won’t say anything. If I was going to say
something, I would have done it a long time ago. He knows that I wouldn’t do anything to hurt my
father. And my father finding out that his brother has a thing for his daughter would fucking kill him. I
don’t turn around as I hear him lean against the door frame. I know where he is because this shop is
old, and the floors creek, the doorframe creeks, everything fucking creeks.
I hear him taking pictures with his phone, and if I turn around, he’ll be able to take more pictures
of me. So he will only get the back of me today. At least I can fucking control that. At least I can try
and control what fucking pictures he probably jacks off to. Devon makes me feel that I have no
control at all, he has somehow taken all of mine away. So I’m hanging on to these tiny things that I can
control for dear life.
“You know Hart, you like the attention that I’m giving you, even if you say you don’t, you can’t lie
to me you slut” he whispers as he takes more pictures. My heart races with his words.
I don’t respond. I know he’s just trying to get me to feed into his sick fucking game, and I am not
going to give him what he wants. I used to respond to his comments, but I saw how the desire and
weirdness in his eyes grew when I did. So, I shut the fuck up really quick. Now, unless he completely
crosses over the line, I try and stay quiet, even though I want to fucking scream at him. I want to hit
him in the damn balls.
But just like with not telling on him, he knows that I won’t hurt him. I won’t fight him, but one of
these days I will surprise him and myself. And I have a feeling that day is coming, or at least I hope
and pray it is. This can’t be my life.
“One day Hart, one day I will get what I want,” he says as the sound of his footsteps fades into the
distance. The air in my lungs holds as he opens and closes my bedroom door, and then I release my
breath. He’s getting bolder, and it’s starting to fucking scare me.
Maybe this is what happens to girls like me, girls that don’t have a lot, girls that have mothers that
just leave a note with no reasoning behind why she left. Maybe this is the world’s way of reminding
me that I am not meant to be happy and free, that I am meant to feel broken, used, gross and
completely alone.
 Chapter 8
Ryker

Erika opens the doors to the school while clutching onto my right arm. We have been off and on for
so fucking long that I honestly don’t know what we are right now. As long as my dick gets wet, I don’t
really care what our title is.
All the students stop and stare as we continue to make our way down the hallway.
Hartley is at her locker, bending down and putting something into her bag.
We’ve been fighting and bullying each other for so fucking long that I honestly don’t think we have
ever had a real conversation. She’s not the kind of girl that I hang with, and I know for a fucking fact
that I am not the kind of guy she rolls with either.
Now that I think about it, I haven’t seen her with any guys. She’s sort of a loner.
The rumors about her mother continue to spread and change with each passing year. It’s a small
town, so there isn’t much else for people to talk about. A small part of me wants to ask her if they’re
true, but I really don’t care enough.
Erika removes her hand from my arm as I slow my pace and stop behind Hartley. This is the first
time I’ve seen her today, so I haven’t had a chance to fuck with her yet. I didn’t fuck with her
yesterday, either. I guess I need to make up for lost time.
I place my hand on the top of her locker and slam it shut. She jumps and quickly stands up and
turns around to face me.
As soon as her eyes lock on mine, the surprise and confusion disappear and is replaced with rage
and irritation. It’s the same look she’s given me for years now.
Her eyes are narrow as she looks from me to Erika a few steps behind, then back to me.
“What the fuck Ryker?” she asks, keeping her gaze set on me.
Since we were kids, she’s had this weird ability to look into my eyes and see things that she isn’t
supposed to notice. But she’s never said anything about what she finds, and I’m not going to ask her. I
don’t think I could handle whatever her answer would be.
My brother says that I’m good at hiding the shit inside of me, but when she looks at me, even now,
when she is pissed and irritated, I feel naked and uncomfortable. Maybe that’s why we bully each
other - because we both feel uncomfortable.
I keep my hand planted firmly against her locker and lean in, forcing her to back up. Her shoulders
hit the locker and she keeps her hands at her sides, which are now balled into little fists. She has fire
in her, that’s for sure. She’s a little rocket.
“I can do whatever the fuck I want, Hartley Bailey. You know who I am - I am fucking Ryker
Keller,” I whisper in a dark voice.
She laughs in my face and shakes her head. “You don’t fucking scare me, dickhead, and I don’t
fucking care who you are,” she snaps at me. There is distance and coldness in her tone.
I love pissing her off.
I lean in more, forcing her whole body to press up against the locker. “You should be afraid
Hartley, very fucking afraid,” I whisper.
 Her eyes narrow even more, and her breathing starts to increase. I love getting this reaction from
her. But I know her, and I know that she isn’t just going to take it. That’s why I keep fucking with her –
her reactions are exactly what keeps me going.
It’s fun as hell to see her get pissed off.
Erika’s phone starts going off. I don’t pay attention to Erika’s damn phone, all of my attention is on
Hartley. Hartley shakes her head, lifts her hand, and slaps me across the face.
The slap is hard enough that it echoes in the hallway, getting everyone’s attention. That doesn’t
bother me - I like being the center of attention. I thrive off of it, actually. Always have and always
will. My head leans in, stopping when my lips almost touch hers. She smells like wild fucking roses.
My body is close enough to her now that the coldness radiating off of her skin is now mixing with
the heat from mine.
“That wasn’t very nice,” I growl softly.
My heart races with the anticipation of what she might do next. That is the question I always ask
myself when I fuck with her. Sometimes, like just now, she still surprises me. She’s never slapped me
in front of the whole school before.
“Go fuck yourself, Ryker,” she says so quietly that I can barely hear her.
The laugh leaves me as I shake my head. “No, I don’t think I will,” I argue in an amused voice.
“Go fucking bug someone else,” she begs. My dick jerks in my jeans. I like the sound of her
begging. I like her attitude. Even when others would back down from me, she refuses to do so.
“But I like bugging you, Hartley Bailey,” I whisper seductively. Do I want to fuck her right now?
No. Will I want to fuck her later on? Yeah, probably. There aren’t many chicks that I haven’t fucked at
this school, but we aren’t at that level right now. Her hate is overpowering any sexual desire that she
might have for me. It’s partly my fault. I go out of my way to mess with her and piss her off. But she
always gives it all right back to me.
I pull my head back a little so that I can look at her whole face. I’m a little curious as to why she
looks so full of rage and pain. But I don’t care enough to ask. Her life is none of my business… at
least, not right now.
Erika grabs onto the back of my shirt, pulling me back to her. “Come on, baby. I’m bored and I
want to fool around,” Erika whines, making me roll my eyes. Her begging is not as attractive, that’s
for sure. She’s too fucking needy and the whining is just an act for attention. It’s a fucking turn-off.
Hartley keeps her eyes on me as I move closer to Erika. She wraps her arms around my waist and
rests her face against my back. “I’ll be seeing you around, Bailey,” I warn with a smile.
“Fucking yay for you,” Hartley snaps back.
Erika starts to lead me away. I finally look away from Hartley as Erika and I continue to walk
down the hallway to class. I don’t give a fuck about any of these stupid classes, but I endure them so
that they’ll let me play football.
This is going to be fucking fun year.
 Chapter 9
Hartley

Ryker Keller is a motherfucking asshole…acting like he can do whatever he wants, thinking he can
touch me, and whisper into my ear. He’s just a fucking jock that thinks that everyone around him wants
him and his dick. It pisses me off that he affects me the way he does. He shouldn’t affect me at all, but
my body betrays me.
Part of me wonders what it would be like to kiss him, touch him, and have his dick deep inside me.
It makes me fucking hate him even more.
I hate when he does the shit that he did in the hallway today. He always has to fuck with me in front
of everybody just to make a point. The way he treats me, and the way I respond, doesn’t make sense.
He acts like this when other people are around, but when it’s just us two, he acts mostly normal.
It doesn’t fucking make sense.
He doesn’t fucking make sense.
Everything about the Keller brothers is confusing. Raiden is confusing because he is gentle - his
voice is gentle, he gave me his jacket when I was cold, and he watches over my father. Raiden and
Ryker cannot be anymore fucking opposite. Why can’t things be simple? Everything just seems to be
getting more and more out of control with me and Ryker.
It might have something to do with how we’re getting older. When we were kids, we got along
better than we do now. Now that we’re older, it seems like the tension between us has gotten worse
and worse. He got popular, I didn’t. He sleeps around with everyone he can. I don’t. When we were
kids, we played games, laughed, and had fun, and now we don’t seem to have anything in common
except for pissing each other off. I don’t fucking know why, but we are both pushing each other to the
point of breaking.
I continue to make my way toward the parking lot. I should go to class. I should sit at my desk and
try to pay attention and try and act like whatever they are trying to teach us is important. But right
now, all I can think about is getting back at Ryker for what he did to me in the fucking hallway, and
there is one thing that I know will set him off.
He loves his car just as much as I think he loves to fuck women. He has a new fucking woman on
his arm every week, and he always seems to keep Erika in the rotation. She is rude and cocky, but
maybe that’s why he likes her. She isn’t afraid to go after what she wants.
The Keller brothers have been in my life for as long as I can remember. I don’t know what
happened to change the way that we used to be. Now we are distant and cruel to each other. Or at
least, Ryker and I are. Raiden and I… well, I don’t know. We have never really bullied each other,
but we also keep our distance from each other as well.
Raiden is different from his brother, though- he is quiet and calm. Ryker is a loud-mouth and is
angry all the fucking time. They are like salt and pepper. Opposite, but they complement one another
well. Both of them are hot as hell, and I would be lying if I said I haven’t dreamt of them. Part of me
wonders what it would be like to have them both, but that’s a stupid thought to have.
 I’m going crazy. Or maybe I always have been. They both make me feel fucking crazy, but in a
different way. It’s confusing as shit.
I stop at the side of Ryker’s Corvette. The parking lot doesn’t have that many people, but it will
soon enough. I see Ryker with Erika heading this way, which makes me nervous and smile at the same
time. He wants to play … we can fucking play.
I pull the keys out from my pocket. I am ready to go. It’s time to do some fucking damage. Ryker is
still making his way toward me, and as soon as he looks my way, I place one of my keys against the
side of his car.
A smile forms across my lips as I start to run the key into the red metal, making a line of
destruction on his beautiful fucking car. Honestly, it does pain me a little. This is a really nice ride.
But sometimes there are casualties in war.
“Hartley,” he screams my name across the parking lot.
No words come out of my mouth as I look down at what I’ve done. There is now a line that starts
at the front and goes all the way to the back of his car. It looks a little deeper than what I wanted, but
he doesn’t need to know that. I turn and start to walk toward my own car, hearing footsteps behind me.
But it’s too late, the damage has been done. I’m too quick for him, and there is no way in hell I’m
going to stop now. He’s pissed and he has never been good at controlling his temper.
I quickly pull on the door handle to my 1969 black Mustang. My hands are shaking from the
adrenaline of what I just did to Ryker’s car. I get in and slam it shut. I quickly start the car and put it in
reverse before he can get to me. Ryker screams my name again as I press down on the gas pedal and
take off out of the school parking lot.
This isn’t exactly how I planned to spend my day, but it will have to do.
The message has been sent. I’m not going to just sit back and take his fucking shit. We have been
doing this for years and he should know by now that I wouldn’t just sit back and let him do that to me
in front of everyone. I don’t fucking care what they think of me, but he still took it too far. So in return,
his car will now be a reminder of why he shouldn’t mess with me anymore.
The smile on my face widens as I think of what Ryker is doing right now.
Another random document with
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the Turks perpetrated on their wretched subjects wrongs that would
blast the memory of Attila.
We do not wish to be misunderstood. We have no feeling against
England. On the contrary, we regard her as being well in advance of
the great powers of Continental Europe, and we have more
sympathy with her. In general, her success tells for the success of
civilization, and we wish her well. But where her interests enlist her
against the progress of civilization and in favor of the oppression of
other nationalities who are struggling upward, our sympathies are
immediately forfeited.
It is a matter of serious concern to every college man, and, indeed,
to every man who believes in the good effects of a liberal education,
to see the false views which seem to obtain among so many of the
leaders of educated thought, not only upon the Monroe Doctrine, but
upon every question which involves the existence of a feeling of
robust Americanism. Every educated man who puts himself out of
touch with the current of American thought, and who on conspicuous
occasions assumes an attitude hostile to the interest of America, is
doing what he can to weaken the influence of educated men in
American life. The crude, ill-conditioned jealousy of education, which
is so often and so lamentably shown by large bodies of our people,
is immensely stimulated by the action of those prominent educated
men in whom education seems to have destroyed the strong, virile
virtues and especially the spirit of Americanism.
No nation can achieve real greatness if its people are not both
essentially moral and essentially manly; both sets of qualities are
necessary. It is an admirable thing to possess refinement and
cultivation, but the price is too dear if they must be paid for at the
cost of the rugged fighting qualities which make a man able to do a
man’s work in the world, and which make his heart beat with that
kind of love of country which is shown not only in readiness to try to
make her civic life better, but also to stand up manfully for her when
her honor and influence are at stake in a dispute with a foreign
power. A heavy responsibility rests on the educated man. It is a
double discredit to him to go wrong, whether his shortcomings take
the form of shirking his every-day civic duties, or of abandonment of
the nation’s rights in a foreign quarrel. He must no more be misled
by the sneers of those who always write “patriotism” between
inverted commas than by the coarser, but equally dangerous, ridicule
of the politicians who jeer at “reform.” It is as unmanly to be taunted
by one set of critics into cowardice as it is to be taunted by the other
set into dishonesty.
There are many upright and honorable men who take the wrong
side, that is, the anti-American side, of the Monroe Doctrine because
they are too short-sighted or too unimaginative to realize the hurt to
the nation that would be caused by the adoption of their views. There
are other men who take the wrong view simply because they have
not thought much of the matter, or are in unfortunate surroundings,
by which they have been influenced to their own moral hurt. There
are yet other men in whom the mainspring of the opposition to that
branch of American policy known as the Monroe Doctrine is sheer
timidity. This is sometimes the ordinary timidity of wealth.
Sometimes, however, it is peculiarly developed among educated
men whose education has tended to make them over-cultivated and
over-sensitive to foreign opinion. They are generally men who
undervalue the great fighting qualities, without which no nation can
ever rise to the first rank.
The timidity of wealth is proverbial, and it was well illustrated by
the attitude taken by too many people of means at the time of the
Venezuela trouble. Many of them, including bankers, merchants, and
railway magnates, criticised the action of the President and the
Senate, on the ground that it had caused business disturbance.
Such a position is essentially ignoble. When a question of national
honor or of national right or wrong, is at stake, no question of
financial interest should be considered for a moment. Those wealthy
men who wish the abandonment of the Monroe Doctrine because its
assertion may damage their business, bring discredit to themselves,
and, so far as they are able, discredit to the nation of which they are
a part.
It is an evil thing for any man of education to forget that education
should intensify patriotism, and that patriotism must not only be
shown by striving to do good to the country from within, but by
readiness to uphold its interests and honor, at any cost, when
menaced from without. Educated men owe to the community the
serious performance of this duty. We need not concern ourselves
with the emigré educated man, the American who deliberately takes
up his permanent abode abroad, whether in London or Paris; he is
usually a man of weak character, unfitted to do good work either
abroad or at home, who does what he can for his country by
relieving it of his presence. But the case is otherwise with the
American who stays at home, and tries to teach the youth of his
country to disbelieve in the country’s rights, as against other
countries, and to regard it as the sign of an enlightened spirit to
decry the assertion of those rights by force of arms. This man may
be inefficient for good; but he is capable at times of doing harm,
because he tends to make other people inefficient likewise. In our
municipal politics there has long been evident a tendency to gather
in one group the people who have no scruples, but who are very
efficient, and in another group the amiable people who are not
efficient at all. This is but one manifestation of the general and very
unwholesome tendency among certain educated people to lose the
power of doing efficient work as they acquire refinement. Of course
in the long run a really good education will give not only refinement,
but also an increase of power, and of capacity for efficient work. But
the man who forgets that a real education must include the
cultivation of the fighting virtues is sure to manifest this tendency to
inefficiency. It is exhibited on a national scale by the educated men
who take the anti-American side of international questions. There are
exceptions to the rule; but as a rule the healthy man, resolute to do
the rough work of the world, and capable of feeling his veins tingle
with pride over the great deeds of the men of his own nation, will
naturally take the American side of such a question as the Monroe
Doctrine. Similarly, the anæmic man of refinement and cultivation,
whose intellect has been educated at the expense of his character,
and who shrinks from all these struggles through which alone the
world moves on to greatness, is inclined to consider any expression
of the Monroe Doctrine as truculent and ill advised.
Of course, many strong men who are good citizens on ordinary
occasions take the latter view simply because they have been
misled. The colonial habit of thought dies hard. It is to be wished that
those who are cursed with it would, in endeavoring to emulate the
ways of the old world, endeavor to emulate one characteristic which
has been shared by every old-world nation, and which is possessed
to a marked degree by England. Every decent Englishman is
devoted to his country, first, last, and all the time. An Englishman
may or may not dislike America, but he is invariably for England and
against America when any question arises between them; and I
heartily respect him for so being. Let our own people of the partially
colonial type copy this peculiarity and it will be much to their credit.
The finest speech that for many years has been delivered by a
college man to other college men was that made last spring by
Judge Holmes, himself a gallant soldier of the Civil War, in that hall
which Harvard has erected to commemorate those of her sons who
perished when the North strove with the South. It should be graven
on the heart of every college man, for it has in it that lift of the soul
toward things heroic that makes the eyes burn and the veins thrill. It
must be read in its entirety, for no quotation could do justice to its
fine scorn of the mere money-maker, its lofty fealty to a noble ideal,
and, above all, its splendid love of country and splendid praise of the
valor of those who strive on stricken fields that the honor of their
nation may be upheld.
It is strange, indeed, that in a country where words like those of
Judge Holmes can be spoken, there should exist men who actually
oppose the building of a navy by the United States, nay, even more,
actually oppose so much as the strengthening of the coast defences,
on the ground that they prefer to have this country too feeble to
resent any insult, in order that it may owe its safety to the
contemptuous forbearance which it is hoped this feebleness will
inspire in foreign powers. No Tammany alderman, no venal
legislator, no demagogue or corrupt politician, ever strove more
effectively than these men are striving to degrade the nation and to
make one ashamed of the name of America. When we remember
that among them there are college graduates, it is a relief to
remember that the leaders on the side of manliness and of love of
country are also college graduates. Every believer in scholarship and
in a liberal education, every believer in the robust qualities of heart,
mind, and body without which cultivation and refinement are of no
avail, must rejoice to think that, in the present crisis, college men
have been prominent among the leaders whose far-sighted
statesmanship and resolute love of country have made those of us
who are really Americans proud of the nation. Secretary Olney is a
graduate of Brown; Senator Lodge, who took the lead in the Senate
on this matter, is a graduate of Harvard; and no less than three
members of the Boundary Commission are graduates of Yale.

FOOTNOTES:
[19] The Bachelor of Arts, March, 1896.
 XII
WASHINGTON’S FORGOTTEN MAXIM[20]

A century has passed since Washington wrote “To be prepared for

war is the most effectual means to promote peace.” We pay to this
maxim the lip loyalty we so often pay to Washington’s words; but it
has never sunk deep into our hearts. Indeed of late years many
persons have refused it even the poor tribute of lip loyalty, and prate
about the iniquity of war as if somehow that was a justification for
refusing to take the steps which can alone in the long run prevent
war or avert the dreadful disasters it brings in its train. The truth of
the maxim is so obvious to every man of really far-sighted patriotism
that its mere statement seems trite and useless; and it is not over-
creditable to either our intelligence or our love of country that there
should be, as there is, need to dwell upon and amplify such a truism.
In this country there is not the slightest danger of an over-
development of warlike spirit, and there never has been any such
danger. In all our history there has never been a time when
preparedness for war was any menace to peace. On the contrary,
again and again we have owed peace to the fact that we were
prepared for war; and in the only contest which we have had with a
European power since the Revolution, the war of 1812, the struggle
and all its attendant disasters, were due solely to the fact that we
were not prepared to face, and were not ready instantly to resent, an
attack upon our honor and interest; while the glorious triumphs at
sea which redeemed that war were due to the few preparations
which we had actually made. We are a great peaceful nation; a
nation of merchants and manufacturers, of farmers and mechanics;
a nation of workingmen, who labor incessantly with head or hand. It
is idle to talk of such a nation ever being led into a course of wanton
aggression or conflict with military powers by the possession of a
sufficient navy.
The danger is of precisely the opposite character. If we forget that
in the last resort we can only secure peace by being ready and
willing to fight for it, we may some day have bitter cause to realize
that a rich nation which is slothful, timid, or unwieldy is an easy prey
for any people which still retains those most valuable of all qualities,
the soldierly virtues. We but keep to the traditions of Washington, to
the traditions of all the great Americans who struggled for the real
greatness of America, when we strive to build up those fighting
qualities for the lack of which in a nation, as in an individual, no
refinement, no culture, no wealth, no material prosperity, can atone.
Preparation for war is the surest guaranty for peace. Arbitration is
an excellent thing, but ultimately those who wish to see this country
at peace with foreign nations will be wise if they place reliance upon
a first-class fleet of first-class battle-ships rather than on any
arbitration treaty which the wit of man can devise. Nelson said that
the British fleet was the best negotiator in Europe, and there was
much truth in the saying. Moreover, while we are sincere and earnest
in our advocacy of peace, we must not forget that an ignoble peace
is worse than any war. We should engrave in our legislative halls
those splendid lines of Lowell:

“Come, Peace! not like a mourner bowed

For honor lost and dear ones wasted,
But proud, to meet a people proud,
With eyes that tell of triumph tasted!”

Peace is a goddess only when she comes with sword girt on thigh.
The ship of state can be steered safely only when it is always
possible to bring her against any foe with “her leashed thunders
gathering for the leap.” A really great people, proud and high-
spirited, would face all the disasters of war rather than purchase that
base prosperity which is bought at the price of national honor. All the
great masterful races have been fighting races, and the minute that a
race loses the hard fighting virtues, then, no matter what else it may
retain, no matter how skilled in commerce and finance, in science or
art, it has lost its proud right to stand as the equal of the best.
Cowardice in a race, as in an individual, is the unpardonable sin, and
a wilful failure to prepare for danger may in its effects be as bad as
cowardice. The timid man who cannot fight, and the selfish, short-
sighted, or foolish man who will not take the steps that will enable
him to fight, stand on almost the same plane.
It is not only true that a peace may be so ignoble and degrading as
to be worse than any war; it is also true that it may be fraught with
more bloodshed than most wars. Of this there has been melancholy
proof during the last two years. Thanks largely to the very unhealthy
influence of the men whose business it is to speculate in the money
market, and who approach every subject from the financial
standpoint, purely; and thanks quite as much to the cold-blooded
brutality and calculating timidity of many European rulers and
statesmen, the peace of Europe has been preserved, while the Turk
has been allowed to butcher the Armenians with hideous and
unmentionable barbarity, and has actually been helped to keep Crete
in slavery. War has been averted at the cost of more bloodshed and
infinitely more suffering and degradation to wretched women and
children than have occurred in any European struggle since the days
of Waterloo. No war of recent years, no matter how wanton, has
been so productive of horrible misery as the peace which the powers
have maintained during the continuance of the Armenian butcheries.
The men who would preach this peace, and indeed the men who
have preached universal peace in terms that have prepared the way
for such a peace as this, have inflicted a wrong on humanity greater
than could be inflicted by the most reckless and war-loving despot.
Better a thousand times err on the side of over-readiness to fight,
than to err on the side of tame submission to injury, or cold-blooded
indifference to the misery of the oppressed.
 Popular sentiment is just when it selects as popular heroes the
men who have led in the struggle against malice domestic or foreign
levy. No triumph of peace is quite so great as the supreme triumphs
of war. The courage of the soldier, the courage of the statesman who
has to meet storms which can be quelled only by soldierly qualities—
this stands higher than any quality called out merely in time of
peace. It is by no means necessary that we should have war to
develop soldierly attributes and soldierly qualities; but if the peace
we enjoy is of such a kind that it causes their loss, then it is far too
dearly purchased, no matter what may be its attendant benefits. It
may be that some time in the dim future of the race the need for war
will vanish; but that time is yet ages distant. As yet no nation can
hold its place in the world, or can do any work really worth doing,
unless it stands ready to guard its rights with an armed hand. That
orderly liberty which is both the foundation and the capstone of our
civilization can be gained and kept only by men who are willing to
fight for an ideal; who hold high the love of honor, love of faith, love
of flag, and love of country. It is true that no nation can be really
great unless it is great in peace; in industry, integrity, honesty. Skilled
intelligence in civic affairs and industrial enterprises alike; the special
ability of the artist, the man of letters, the man of science, and the
man of business; the rigid determination to wrong no man, and to
stand for righteousness—all these are necessary in a great nation.
But it is also necessary that the nation should have physical no less
than moral courage; the capacity to do and dare and die at need,
and that grim and steadfast resolution which alone will carry a great
people through a great peril. The occasion may come at any instant
when

“’Tis man’s perdition to be safe

When for the truth he ought to die.”

All great nations have shown these qualities. The Dutch held but a
little corner of Europe. Their industry, thrift, and enterprise in the
pursuits of peace and their cultivation of the arts helped to render
them great; but these qualities would have been barren had they not
been backed by those sterner qualities which rendered them able to
wrest their freedom from the cruel strength of Spain, and to guard it
against the banded might of England and of France. The merchants
and the artists of Holland did much for her; but even more was done
by the famished burghers who fought to the death on the walls of
Harlem and Leyden, and the great admirals who led their fleets to
victory on the broad and narrow seas.
England’s history is rich in splendid names and splendid deeds.
Her literature is even greater than that of Greece. In commerce she
has stood in the modern world as more than ever Carthage was
when civilization clustered in a fringe around the Mediterranean. But
she has risen far higher than ever Greece or Carthage rose,
because she possesses also the great, masterful qualities which
were possessed by the Romans who overthrew them both. England
has been fertile in soldiers and administrators; in men who triumphed
by sea and by land; in adventurers and explorers who won for her
the world’s waste spaces; and it is because of this that the English-
speaking race now shares with the Slav the fate of the coming years.
We of the United States have passed most of our few years of
national life in peace. We honor the architects of our wonderful
material prosperity; we appreciate the necessity of thrift, energy, and
business enterprise, and we know that even these are of no avail
without the civic and social virtues. But we feel, after all, that the men
who have dared greatly in war, or the work which is akin to war, are
those who deserve best of the country. The men of Bunker Hill and
Trenton, Saratoga and Yorktown, the men of New Orleans and
Mobile Bay, Gettysburg and Appomattox are those to whom we owe
most. None of our heroes of peace, save a few great constructive
statesmen, can rank with our heroes of war. The Americans who
stand highest on the list of the world’s worthies are Washington, who
fought to found the country which he afterward governed, and
Lincoln, who saved it through the blood of the best and bravest in the
land; Washington, the soldier and statesman, the man of cool head,
dauntless heart, and iron will, the greatest of good men and the best
of great men; and Lincoln, sad, patient, kindly Lincoln, who for four
years toiled and suffered for the people, and when his work was
done laid down his life that the flag which had been rent in sunder
might once more be made whole and without a seam.
It is on men such as these, and not on the advocates of peace at
any price, or upon those so short-sighted that they refuse to take into
account the possibility of war, that we must rely in every crisis which
deeply touches the true greatness and true honor of the Republic.
The United States has never once in the course of its history
suffered harm because of preparation for war, or because of entering
into war. But we have suffered incalculable harm, again and again,
from a foolish failure to prepare for war or from reluctance to fight
when to fight was proper. The men who to-day protest against a
navy, and protest also against every movement to carry out the
traditional policy of the country in foreign affairs, and to uphold the
honor of the flag, are themselves but following in the course of those
who protested against the acquisition of the great West, and who
failed to make proper preparations for the war of 1812, or refused to
support it after it had been made. They are own brothers to the men
whose short-sightedness and supine indifference prevented any
reorganization of the personnel of the Navy during the middle of the
century, so that we entered upon the Civil War with captains seventy
years old. They are close kin to the men who, when the Southern
States seceded, wished to let the Union be disrupted in peace rather
than restored through the grim agony of armed conflict.
I do not believe that any considerable number of our citizens are
stamped with this timid lack of patriotism. There are some
doctrinaires whose eyes are so firmly fixed on the golden vision of
universal peace that they cannot see the grim facts of real life until
they stumble over them, to their own hurt, and, what is much worse,
to the possible undoing of their fellows. There are some educated
men in whom education merely serves to soften the fibre and to
eliminate the higher, sterner qualities which tell for national
greatness; and these men prate about love for mankind, or for
another country, as being in some hidden way a substitute for love of
their own country. What is of more weight, there are not a few men of
means who have made the till their fatherland, and who are always
ready to balance a temporary interruption of money-making, or a
temporary financial and commercial disaster, against the self-
sacrifice necessary in upholding the honor of the nation and the glory
of the flag.
But after all these people, though often noisy, form but a small
minority of the whole. They would be swept like chaff before the gust
of popular fury which would surely come if ever the nation really saw
and felt a danger or an insult. The real trouble is that in such a case
this gust of popular fury would come too late. Unreadiness for war is
merely rendered more disastrous by readiness to bluster; to talk
defiance and advocate a vigorous policy in words, while refusing to
back up these words by deeds, is cause for humiliation. It has
always been true, and in this age it is more than ever true, that it is
too late to prepare for war when the time for peace has passed. The
short-sightedness of many people, the good-humored indifference to
facts of others, the sheer ignorance of a vast number, and the selfish
reluctance to insure against future danger by present sacrifice
among yet others—these are the chief obstacles to building up a
proper navy and carrying out a proper foreign policy.
The men who opposed the war of 1812, and preferred to have the
nation humiliated by unresented insult from a foreign power rather
than see her suffer the losses of an honorable conflict, occupied a
position little short of contemptible; but it was not much worse than
that of the men who brought on the war and yet deliberately refused
to make the preparations necessary to carry it to a successful
conclusion. The visionary schemes for defending the country by
gunboats, instead of by a fleet of seagoing battle-ships; the refusal to
increase the Navy to a proper size; the determination to place
reliance upon militia instead of upon regularly trained troops; and the
disasters which followed upon each and every one of these
determinations should be studied in every school-book in the land so
as to enforce in the minds of all our citizens the truth of Washington’s
adage, that in time of peace it is necessary to prepare for war.
All this applied in 1812; but it applies with tenfold greater force
now. Then, as now, it was the Navy upon which the country had to
depend in the event of war with a foreign power; and then, as now,
one of the chief tasks of a wise and far-seeing statesmanship should
have been the upbuilding of a formidable fighting navy. In 1812
untold evils followed from the failure to provide such a fighting navy;
for the splendid feats of our few cruisers merely showed what could
have been done if we had had a great fleet of battle-ships. But ships,
guns, and men were much more easily provided in time of
emergency at the beginning of this century than at the end. It takes
months to build guns and ships now, where it then took days, or at
the most, weeks; and it takes far longer now to train men to the
management of the vast and complicated engines with which war is
waged. Therefore preparation is much more difficult, and requires a
much longer time; and yet wars are so much quicker, they last so
comparatively short a period, and can be begun so instantaneously
that there is very much less time than formerly in which to make
preparations.
No battle-ship can be built inside of two years under no matter
what stress of circumstances, for we have not in this country the
plant to enable us to work faster. Cruisers would take almost as long.
Even torpedo boats, the smallest of all, could not be put in first-class
form under ninety days. Guns available for use against a hostile
invader would require two or three months; and in the case of the
larger guns, the only ones really available for the actual shock of
battle, could not be made under eight months. Rifles and military
munitions of every kind would require a corresponding length of time
for preparation; in most cases we should have to build, not merely
the weapons we need, but the plant with which to make them in any
large quantity. Even if the enemy did not interfere with our efforts,
which they undoubtedly would, it would, therefore, take from three to
six months after the outbreak of a war, for which we were
unprepared, before we could in the slightest degree remedy our
unreadiness. During this six months it would be impossible to
overestimate the damage that could be done by a resolute and
powerful antagonist. Even at the end of that time we would only be
beginning to prepare to parry his attack, for it would be two years
before we could attempt to return it. Since the change in military
conditions in modern times there has never been an instance in
which a war between any two nations has lasted more than about
two years. In most recent wars the operations of the first ninety days
have decided the result of the conflict. All that followed has been a
mere vain effort to strive against the stars in their courses by doing
at the twelfth hour what it was useless to do after the eleventh.
We must therefore make up our minds once for all to the fact that
it is too late to make ready for war when the fight has once begun.
The preparation must come before that. In the case of the Civil War
none of these conditions applied. In 1861 we had a good fleet, and
the Southern Confederacy had not a ship. We were able to blockade
the Southern ports at once, and we could improvise engines of war
more than sufficient to put against those of an enemy who also had
to improvise them, and who labored under even more serious
disadvantages. The Monitor was got ready in the nick of time to meet
the Merrimac, because the Confederates had to plan and build the
latter while we were planning and building the former; but if ever we
have to go to war with a modern military power we shall find its
Merrimacs already built, and it will then be altogether too late to try to
build Monitors to meet them.
If this point needs any emphasis surely the history of the war of
1812 applies to it. For twelve years before that war broke out even
the blindest could see that we were almost certain to be drawn into
hostilities with one or the other of the pair of combatants whose
battle royal ended at Waterloo. Yet we made not the slightest
preparation for war. The authorities at Washington contented
themselves with trying to build a flotilla of gunboats which could
defend our own harbors without making it necessary to take the
offensive ourselves. We already possessed a dozen first-class
cruisers, but not a battle-ship of any kind. With almost incredible folly
the very Congress that declared war voted down the bill to increase
the Navy by twenty battle-ships; though it was probably too late then,
anyhow, for even under the simpler conditions of that day such a
fleet could not have been built and put into first-class order in less
than a couple of years. Bitterly did the nation pay for its want of
foresight and forethought. Our cruisers won a number of striking
victories, heartening and giving hope to the nation in the face of
disaster; but they were powerless to do material harm to the gigantic
naval strength of Great Britain. Efforts were made to increase our
little Navy, but in the face of a hostile enemy already possessing
command of the seas this was impossible. Two or three small
cruisers were built; but practically almost all the fighting on the ocean
was done by the handful of frigates and sloops which we possessed
when the war broke out. Not a battle-ship was able to put to sea until
after peace was restored. Meanwhile our coast was blockaded from
one end to the other and was harried at will by the hostile squadrons.
Our capital city was burned, and the ceaseless pressure of the
blockade produced such suffering and irritation as nearly to bring
about a civil war among ourselves. If in the first decade of the
present century the American people and their rulers had possessed
the wisdom to provide an efficient fleet of powerful battle-ships there
would probably have been no war of 1812; and even if war had
come, the immense loss to, and destruction of, trade and commerce
by the blockade would have been prevented. Merely from the
monetary standpoint the saving would have been incalculable; and
yet this would have been the smallest part of the gain.
It can therefore be taken for granted that there must be adequate
preparation for conflict, if conflict is not to mean disaster.
Furthermore, this preparation must take the shape of an efficient
fighting navy. We have no foe able to conquer or overrun our
territory. Our small army should always be kept in first-class
condition, and every attention should be paid to the National Guard;
but neither on the North nor the South have we neighbors capable of
menacing us with invasion or long resisting a serious effort on our
part to invade them. The enemies we may have to face will come
from over sea; they may come from Europe, or they may come from
Asia. Events move fast in the West; but this generation has been
forced to see that they move even faster in the oldest East. Our
interests are as great in the Pacific as in the Atlantic, in the Hawaiian
Islands as in the West Indies. Merely for the protection of our own
shores we need a great navy; and what is more, we need it to
protect our interests in the islands from which it is possible to
command our shores and to protect our commerce on the high seas.
In building this navy, we must remember two things: First, that our
ships and guns should be the very best of their kind; and second,
that no matter how good they are, they will be useless unless the
man in the conning tower and the man behind the guns are also the
best of their kind. It is mere folly to send men to perish because they
have arms with which they cannot win. With poor ships, were an
Admiral Nelson and Farragut rolled in one, he might be beaten by
any first-class fleet; and he surely would be beaten if his opponents
were in any degree his equals in skill and courage; but without this
skill and courage no perfection of material can avail, and with them
very grave shortcomings in equipment may be overcome. The men
who command our ships must have as perfect weapons ready to
their hands as can be found in the civilized world, and they must be
trained to the highest point in using them. They must have skill in
handling the ships, skill in tactics, skill in strategy, for ignorant
courage can not avail; but without courage neither will skill avail.
They must have in them the dogged ability to bear punishment, the
power and desire to inflict it, the daring, the resolution, the
willingness to take risks and incur responsibility which have been
possessed by the great captains of all ages, and without which no
man can ever hope to stand in the front rank of fighting men.
Tame submission to foreign aggression of any kind is a mean and
unworthy thing; but it is even meaner and more unworthy to bluster
first, and then either submit or else refuse to make those
preparations which can alone obviate the necessity for submission. I
believe with all my heart in the Monroe Doctrine, and, I believe also
that the great mass of the American people are loyal to it; but it is
worse than idle to announce our adherence to this doctrine and yet
to decline to take measures to show that ours is not mere lip loyalty.
We had far better submit to interference by foreign powers with the
affairs of this continent than to announce that we will not tolerate
such interference, and yet refuse to make ready the means by which
alone we can prevent it. In public as in private life, a bold front tends
to insure peace and not strife. If we possess a formidable navy, small
is the chance indeed that we shall ever be dragged into a war to
uphold the Monroe Doctrine. If we do not possess such a navy, war
may be forced on us at any time.
 It is certain, then, that we need a first-class navy. It is equally
certain that this should not be merely a navy for defense. Our chief
harbors should, of course, be fortified and put in condition to resist
the attack of an enemy’s fleet; and one of our prime needs is an
ample force of torpedo boats to use primarily for coast defense. But
in war the mere defensive never pays, and can never result in
anything but disaster. It is not enough to parry a blow. The surest
way to prevent its repetition is to return it. No master of the prize ring
ever fought his way to supremacy by mere dexterity in avoiding
punishment. He had to win by inflicting punishment. If the enemy is
given the choice of time and place to attack, sooner or later he will
do irreparable damage, and if he is at any point beaten back, why,
after all, it is merely a repulse, and there are no means of following it
up and making it a rout. We cannot rely upon coast protection alone.
Forts and heavy land guns and torpedo boats are indispensable, and
the last, on occasion, may be used for offensive purposes also. But
in the present state of naval and military knowledge we must rely
mainly, as all great nations always have relied, on the battle-ship, the
fighting ship of the line. Gunboats and light cruisers serve an
excellent purpose, and we could not do without them. In time of
peace they are the police of the seas; in time of war they would do
some harrying of commerce, and a great deal of scouting and
skirmishing; but our main reliance must be on the great armored
battle-ships with their heavy guns and shot-proof vitals. In the last
resort we most trust to the ships whose business it is to fight and not
to run, and who can themselves go to sea and strike at the enemy
when they choose, instead of waiting peacefully to receive his blow
when and where he deems it best to deliver it. If in the event of war
our fleet of battle-ships can destroy the hostile fleet, then our coasts
are safe from the menace of serious attack; even a fight that ruined
our fleet would probably so shatter the hostile fleet as to do away
with all chance of invasion; but if we have no fleet wherewith to meet
the enemy on the high seas, or to anticipate his stroke by our own,
then every city within reach of the tides must spend men and money
in preparation for an attack that may not come, but which would
cause crushing and irredeemable disaster if it did come.
 Still more is it necessary to have a fleet of great battle-ships if we
intend to live up to the Monroe Doctrine, and to insist upon its
observance in the two Americas and the islands on either side of
them. If a foreign power, whether in Europe or Asia, should
determine to assert its position in those lands wherein we feel that
our influence should be supreme, there is but one way in which we
can effectively interfere. Diplomacy is utterly useless where there is
no force behind it; the diplomat is the servant, not the master, of the
soldier. The prosperity of peace, commercial and material prosperity,
gives no weight whatever when the clash of arms comes. Even great
naked strength is useless if there is no immediate means through
which that strength can manifest itself. If we mean to protect the
people of the lands who look to us for protection from tyranny and
aggression; if we mean to uphold our interests in the teeth of the
formidable Old World powers, we can only do it by being ready at
any time, if the provocation, is sufficient, to meet them on the seas,
where the battle for supremacy must be fought. Unless we are
prepared so to meet them, let us abandon all talk of devotion to the
Monroe Doctrine or to the honor of the American name.
This nation cannot stand still if it is to retain its self-respect, and to
keep undimmed the honorable traditions inherited from the men who
with the sword founded it and by the sword preserved it. We ask that
the work of upbuilding the Navy, and of putting the United States
where it should be put among maritime powers, go forward without a
break. We ask this not in the interest of war, but in the interest of
peace. No nation should ever wage war wantonly, but no nation
should ever avoid it at the cost of the loss of national honor. A nation
should never fight unless forced to; but it should always be ready to
fight. The mere fact that it is ready will generally spare it the
necessity of fighting. If this country now had a fleet of twenty battle-
ships their existence would make it all the more likely that we should
not have war. It is very important that we should, as a race, keep the
virile fighting qualities and should be ready to use them at need; but
it is not at all important to use them unless there is need. One of the
surest ways to attain these qualities is to keep our Navy in first-class
trim. There never is, and never has been, on our part a desire to use
a weapon because of its being well-tempered. There is not the least
danger that the possession of a good navy will render this country
overbearing toward its neighbors. The direct contrary is the truth.
An unmanly desire to avoid a quarrel is often the surest way to
precipitate one; and utter unreadiness to fight is even surer. If at the
time of our trouble with Chili, six years ago, we had not already
possessed the nucleus of the new navy we should almost certainly
have been forced into fighting, and even as it was trouble was only
averted because of the resolute stand then taken by the President
and by the officers of the Navy who were on the spot. If at that time
the Chilians had been able to get ready the battle-ship which was
building for them, a war would almost certainly have followed, for we
had no battle-ship to put against it.
If in the future we have war, it will almost certainly come because
of some action, or lack of action, on our part in the way of refusing to
accept responsibilities at the proper time, or failing to prepare for war
when war does not threaten. An ignoble peace is even worse than
an unsuccessful war; but an unsuccessful war would leave behind it
a legacy of bitter memories which would hurt our national
development for a generation to come. It is true that no nation could
actually conquer us, owing to our isolated position; but we would be
seriously harmed, even materially, by disasters that stopped far short
of conquest; and in these matters, which are far more important than
things material, we could readily be damaged beyond repair. No
material loss can begin to compensate for the loss of national self-
respect. The damage to our commercial interests by the destruction
of one of our coast cities would be as nothing compared to the
humiliation which would be felt by every American worthy of the
name if we had to submit to such an injury without amply avenging it.
It has been finely said that “a gentleman is one who is willing to lay
down his life for little things”; that is for those things which seem little
to the man who cares only whether shares rise or fall in value, and to
the timid doctrinaire who preaches timid peace from his cloistered
study.
Much of that which is best and highest in national character is
made up of glorious memories and traditions. The fight well fought,
the life honorably lived, the death bravely met—those count for more
in building a high and fine type of temper in a nation than any
possible success in the stock market, than any possible prosperity in
commerce or manufactures. A rich banker may be a valuable and
useful citizen, but not a thousand rich bankers can leave to the
country such a heritage as Farragut left, when, lashed in the rigging
of the Hartford, he forged past the forts and over the unseen death
below, to try his wooden stem against the ironclad hull of the great
Confederate ram. The people of some given section of our country
may be better off because a shrewd and wealthy man has built up
therein a great manufacturing business, or has extended a line of
railroad past its doors; but the whole nation is better, the whole
nation is braver, because Cushing pushed his little torpedo-boat
through the darkness to sink beside the sinking Albemarle.
Every feat of heroism makes us forever indebted to the man who
performed it. All daring and courage, all iron endurance of
misfortune, all devotion to the ideal of honor and the glory of the flag,
make for a finer and nobler type of manhood. It is not only those who
do and dare and endure that are benefited; but also the countless
thousands who are not themselves called upon to face the peril, to
show the strength, or to win the reward. All of us lift our heads higher
because those of our countrymen whose trade it is to meet danger
have met it well and bravely. All of us are poorer for every base or
ignoble deed done by an American, for every instance of selfishness
or weakness or folly on the part of the people as a whole. We are all
worse off when any of us fails at any point in his duty toward the
State in time of peace, or his duty toward the State in time of war. If
ever we had to meet defeat at the hands of a foreign foe, or had to
submit tamely to wrong or insult, every man among us worthy of the
name of American would feel dishonored and debased. On the other
hand, the memory of every triumph won by Americans, by just so
much helps to make each American nobler and better. Every man
among us is more fit to meet the duties and responsibilities of
citizenship because of the perils over which, in the past, the nation
has triumphed; because of the blood and sweat and tears, the labor
and the anguish, through which, in the days that have gone, our
forefathers moved on to triumph. There are higher things in this life
than the soft and easy enjoyment of material comfort. It is through