CHAPTER ONE
I closed the door after the final member of the church who had finished granting me well-wishes as well as her condolences. It had been a long day of settling my late step-father and late step-brother’s affairs and a long week of my graduation from North Taylor High School as well as burying my emotionally and mentally abusive stepfather Eric Chambers and his equally abrasive son Tyson, who had recently died from a freak car accident while drunk-driving and killing yet another family in the process. I never really liked them, but I never had wanted them to be killed or anything like that. But then again, one should always expect the worst fate from someone who had treated others very poorly.
Sitting down in one of the couches in the living room of the now barely-decorated apartment I had to share with them, I pondered about my future plans for the summer before heading off to TCU in August. I knew that aside from my fellow Sunday School-member and fellow loser Jasmyn Colfax, I had no friends to call on for vacation. I was laid off from Clown Burger when they had went out of business the day before Eric and Tyson’s death. And aside from my weekly appointments with my therapist, I was devoid of any invitations to any gatherings or parties. In short, I knew that I was going to be bored to my own death.
Then I heard my late mother’s thick Creole/Cajun voice scold in my head. “Clinton Dylan Ryland, you get up off your skinny butt and find yourself something to do. Just because it’s summer and that Eric and Tyson are gone to judgment don’t mean that you can sit around and mope. You’re nearly eighteen now, boy. It’s time to stand up on your own two feet.”
I smiled, knowing that she would tell me the same thing if she was alive right now. “Yes, mama,” I said as I got up, grabbed my light jacket hanging up from the coat rack, and left the apartment and into the streets of downtown Cedar Point, Maine. It was relatively warm, yet still had that familiar brisk chill coming from the ocean. Everyone walking was still wearing jeans and light sweaters, savoring the last of spring before summer started. I had decided to make a beeline for Suffolk Café of Wyndham Avenue in the historic district of downtown.
Just as I was turning off into Delaware Boulevard, a young man stepped into my path. He looked around my age, looking handsome and fit in his athletic wear: gray, fitted shirt, black gym shorts, and black running shoes. His hair was spiked by copious amounts of hair gel, which complimented his lean body with his skin the color of toasted caramel.
His grey eyes lit up in Surprise as he caught me staring. “I’m sorry for your lost, Clinton,” he said in what sounded like a Cuban accent.
Wait, how did he know me?
Don’t get involved, my inner conscious warned me. Just walk away! He looks like trouble and you shouldn’t be seen with somebody of his caliber.
I should’ve listened to my conscious.
I should’ve walked around this guy and ran far away from him as fast I could without looking back.
If only I had known from the start in what I would be getting into.
But I didn’t. Like a moth to a flame, I was slowly getting drawn into his company. I snapped out of my thoughts and said the first sentence that had started my downfall. “Can I help you?”
