Mark Arbour

I'm glad you enjoyed riding on the teen-aged roller coaster from hell. :-) Unlike a real roller coaster, the big hills are still to come.

Will is being a total diva, but as others have pointed out, that's part of the 14 year old psyche, or at least Will's 14 year old psyche.

The key word there is "eventually". :-)

I'll bet he's loving the extra drama, and at having his arch-rival acquire a wardrobe malfunction.

Uh, nope.

That's the beauty of writing in figure skating...the drama is almost built in. On the rough patch being over....guess again. It gets much worse. The tournaments thing is probably my glitch. I think competitions is probably more accurate. And on behalf of my editing team, I'll say thanks. They are top notch!

May take a few more chapters than that! Thanks mm.

You nailed this one Jeremy. Can't you just visualize this guy being bitchy?

October 6, 2000 El Segundo, CA Will I called Pat’s phone and it rang, but he didn’t answer. No machine picked up either. I was worried about him, worried about how he’d handle this, and when he didn’t answer the phone, it made me worry even more. I caught up with Jeff and pulled him aside to check the number, but it was right. I didn’t want to go up in the stands and see my dad, I was too mad for that, so I used JJ as an excuse, and went looking for him. I walked down to wh

He tends to inspire either love or hate. I'm glad you're one of the former.

Why does that matter?

Well said, although to be fair to Brad and Robbie, that kind of balance isn't easy.

I think that the whole concept of molestation caused Brad to freak out. I'll bet he was guiltily thinking back to Paris, and was probably desperate to protect Will from more shit like that.

You think I wrote this stuff from my imagination? I raised one of these creatures. :-)

I wanted to share a couple of thoughts about this discussion. I'm really enjoying it, and it's very encouraging. I was kind of worried that I'd get people jumping on a bandwagon to either hate Brad and Robbie or to hate Will. I don't think it's an issue of bad parenting or a spoiled child, I think it's an issue, as many of you noted, of a strong-willed teenager clashing with parents over an issue he can't really externalize, much less internalize. You used the "C" word (Control), and I think that's a huge part of teen angst, of wanting to be able to make their own decisions and engineer their own environment, yet finding that they aren't allowed to (or aren't capable of) doing that. I think that Will is largely capable of making his own decisions, and I think he is basically able to judge what's best for him, and remember that in this world, money isn't an issue. Who pays for the guard is irrelevant, because he'd just as soon not even have one, or so he says. Never listen to Jeremy. This is another key factor, and one that's burning up in Will's psyche. He and Brad used to be so close, but now he feels like they're not, and that the whole relationship has changed. I didn't spell out why Stef picked up Will, but since someone had to, and since Michael wouldn't have worked, it made sense for Stef to show up, since he and Will are tight. He probably found out about this whole situation, rolled his eyes, and figured he'd spend some time with Will and enlighten him. Wow. That is spot-on. So is this one. Here's the basic conflict. You have a parent who feels the need to protect his son and to try and set some tighter boundaries, more to protect him from himself than anything else. You have the teen, to whom this is directed, feeling like the parent who wants to impose those controls doesn't give a shit about him. Add to that his feeling of isolation, and you have a recipe for a nasty battle. It's not going to resolve itself until the two of them come to some meeting of the minds. I think the big piece that's missing from the equation in Brad's mind is that he doesn't realize just how fucked up Will is about losing Brad (to his other commitments) and Pat, and he doesn't realize how horrible it is for Will when he reaches out to other guys (like Robbie) and gets blown off as well. Will's trying to tell them that, but they're not getting the severity of the situation. I think to put it into context, ask yourself this. If Will came home from school and had a problem, who would he talk to about it? Now, being a typical teen, he probably wouldn't want to talk to anyone, but he needs to know that if he does, someone will listen. Who would that be?

I suspect Brad and Robbie will pay for their error with some significant discomfort over the weekend.

I think the next couple of chapters will do a better job of spelling out Brad's motives, but that really isn't the big issue here. The big issue is that Will is feeling pretty isolated, and as I said in one of the reviews, when a 14 year old guy like Will is feeling embattled, his reaction is going to be to lash out. The stronger he fights, the more upset he is. There's an imbalance in his life, and he's trying to get his father to notice him. Brad, in his defense, is trying to balance a bunch of different things as well. Until they figure out how to find a harmonious convergence, it's not going to go very well.

I agree with everything you said, but I think that the equation gets a little murky when molestation is involved.

Well, they're all being selfish here, but they're all ignoring the issues beneath the core. The blame for that usually lands on adults.

You get that teen mentality, the way when a kid is hurting, feeling lonely and rejected, his primary response is to lash out.

You hate him now? It gets worse.

Yep. ;-)

October 4, 2000 Westwood, CA Will “Dude, you want to come over and study?” I asked Grafton. “I have to go home tonight,” he said morosely. “My mom is pissed off that I haven’t been around. She has to tell her shrink that we have dinner together at least a couple of times a week.” I laughed at that, since it seemed like he wanted me to. We’d spent most of the week hanging out. On Monday and Wednesday, we’d gone to see JJ practice, and the rest of the time we’d do

Well that was good work. He has a better look for Josh.

I'm glad you are enjoying this series! I'm thinking of a name change for the next story. I'll let you know.