Lil heard, “I’ll have another Beetle Juice Bomb” come from her boyfriends’ lips for the fifth time in an hour. The cicada behind the stick bar poured another glass full, reluctantly. Beeter took the shot in an instant. His gazed turned, but a foggy look had come over his face. He grinned into the blurriness; his mind was blank of thought and Lil could tell. “Why do you have to get like this every time we go out?” she asked angrily. She moaned in angst because Beeter had no valid response....

Chapter one: In search of Identity

My eyes opened and I realized that I was resting on a soft bed. I was covered with a soft baby blue blanket. The birds outside chirped rhythmically and the sunlight reflected from the window adjacent from the bed was hurting my eyes. I could easily tell the time of day was morning....

“You’re the love of my life,” I say, the words rushing out of me. “If anything happened to you, I would drop everything, I would take care of you.” I hear her breath draw in through the phone. “I worry about you out there.”

There’s an empty silence on the phone, and I imagine the open plains...

Chapter 1

10 Years Later

“Okay Lisa, here you are. Don’t be late to school”, Sara says as she watches Lisa walk towards the school.

“I don’t know how you do it, sweetie”, her husband Eric says as he tries to stare Sara’s way to find the image that she sees of Lisa.

“Is she still there”, he asked Sara....

I tried the YMCA and the youth hostel near Oxford Street, but both were full up. At least the larger, cheaper dormitories were full. I didn’t have enough money for the private rooms. I called on my lover, but her mother was spending the night. She told me I had to kip elsewhere and shooed me away. I considered imposing myself on friends or relatives, but it was getting on for the middle of the night and so I had to abandon the idea....