Prologue
“I never meant for this to become what it has. I never meant for all of this to happen!” Riley shouted, seemingly at nothing, in her parent’s living room. “THEY NEVER MEAN IT. THEY NEVER WANT THE SITUATION TO BECOME WHAT IT SUPPOSEDLY HAS. UNFORTUNATELY, FOR THEM, AND FOR YOU, IT ALWAYS ENDS IN WAYS WHICH IS NOT INTENDED.” a disembodied voice responded, guttural and deep. The source then let out a hearty laugh, as if amused by Riley’s current situation.
Several hours earlier, in the attic of her parent’s house, Riley was sorting through her late uncle’s belongings at the behest of her father. He still hadn’t gotten over the loss of his brother, untimely as it was. Everyone, including Riley’s mother, thought that he should be over it already, as it had been little over a year and a half. As the situation stood, however, Riley’s father had not been able to cope with his brother’s death, and because of such had sent his daughter to root through her uncle’s earthly attachments. Riley’s brother, Ryan, had been out of town at the time of this decision, so he hadn’t been given the task or a part of it.
Ryan, Riley, and their parents had lived in a small town in northern Wisconsin most of their lives, having to drive near forty five minutes to reach larger cities and corporations. They’d all lived simple lives away from the speed and bustle of huge metropolises, and none of them had had any issues with the idea or the execution. That changed when big name universities came and visited the local high school, hoping to reign in a new crop of freshmen for the upcoming fall semester. Ryan, who was a senior at said high school and always an astute learner, immediately took to the idea of further schooling, and begged his parents to allow him to go. “If I go all the way through, I can become a doctor or a technician!” he would exclaim to his parents. Eventually they crumbled and dug into their vast savings from the years of small spending; and come August, Ryan was sent off to learn the difficulties and rewards of city life. Soon after his leaving, Riley, a mere two years his junior, began to conceptualize city life. She made pen pals in cities and soon enough tested into driving and received her first car from her parents as a seventeenth birthday gift. She began making trips to the nearest city and making friends, seeing movies, and meeting boys. Living the seemingly normal late teenage life.
