to be quite, or to be alone. This time, though, I came to think.

Last year my ex-boyfriend was arrested; hand cuffed right in our front room. Today was the anniversary of that event, and I couldn't think about anything else. It was like a movie playing over and over in my head from start to finish; starting with the day we met. I was fourteen; he was twenty-four. He was the son of my father’s football coach. My father had asked him to show me some tips, because I was starting freshmen football that summer. Yeah, he'd showed me some tips but they had nothing to do with football. From day one I was completely in love with Rick. He'd been so manly, and so kind; he didn't treat me like a kid just because I was younger, and he talked to me like I was his equal.

When I turned eighteen, I told my father that I was gay and that I was moving in with Rick, who lived on the other side of town. I still have scars from that day, from when he beat me so badly I couldn't move for a week. Of course that week was extended to three weeks when Rick got hold of me.

He'd been wonderful from day one, and I had been so happy with him. I had thought we would stay together forever. But when he learned that I told my dad about us he knew that his dad would be the next to find out, so he put me in the hospital to prove to his father he wasn't a fag. Rick had been sorry afterwards, begging me to come home to his house; that he wouldn't do anything like that again. For four years he'd been perfect; I had trusted him and I wanted to trust him still, so I went.

Over the next six years I went in and out of the hospital more times then I can remember. He had lied, and it did happen again, and I was a fool for trusting him and for staying with him. But I loved him and I thought, deep down, he loved me, but I was wrong. The night he was arrested was the same night I put his 12 gauge shotgun to his forehead and told him I was going to kill him. One of the neighbors must have heard us yelling and called the cops; something none of them had done before, and by the time they'd got there he had me flat on my back with the shotgun in my mouth.

He was charged with attempted murder and he got a life sentence. I haven't seen him since the day I was put on the witness stand, and I pray to God I never do again. But it's hard for me to forget all that happened, and even harder to forget about the first four year when I was so happy, so content, so loved.

The incident between Mac and I earlier that day kind of opened my eyes. I hadn't been in a fight since Rick was carted off to jail, and I couldn't bring myself to fight back. I needed to do something about that, and my life. It needed to get better, and I was the only one that could do that.

*******

Wes had said that Seth must have had a lot on his mind, and that he only forgot to ask me that