Stories

An athletic high-school senior and a studious freshman form an unusual friendship.

Love takes off the masks that we fear that we cannot live without and know that we cannot live within. -James Baldwin

At sixteen, James has an almost perfect life. Then two boys enter his life and turn it upside down. Dion is a shy boy who James can't understand. Donovan is the star basketball player who James admires. Read how an incident with one boy will bring him closer to the other as masks are slowly removed.

After a challenging week at work, a night out drinking at The Humpback sounded perfect to Banner Hoyt. The following morning, at the Coast Guard station’s barracks, Banner feels energized but fuzzy on the previous evening’s events. It takes some time to recall everything and even longer to realize that night had changed his life forever.

A short novel in ten chapters.

As Ravello slumbers under the grey skies of winter, Gianni and Angelo try to come to terms with looking after their new foster son Sami. Gianni is trying his best, but Sami seems more attached to two local boys who took care of him in the summer.

Meanwhile, teenager Marco’s carefully controlled home life unravels when his father uncovers a truth he has been trying desperately to conceal.

In Newport for a wedding, CJ’s confronted from the right by a Donald Trump acolyte and from the left by an Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez fan. In both instances, he deftly refutes their arguments, impressing the groom’s father sufficiently he offers CJ a job.

César asks for family time as a birthday present, so Brett charters the sailing mega yacht Flying Circus for a vacation. Cruising the Balearic Islands off the coast of Spain, César celebrates his 50th, and Owen his 35th. While the adults enjoy the white-glove service, Liebe, Roosevelt, and Jefferson Abelló keep them on their toes.

The plan was simple: survive high school and get the hell out of his hometown.

Alec Kennedy failed miserably.

He fell in love. Unfortunately, he still carried out his plan and left town. Leaving his first love behind.

Years later, Alec's forced to return home to deal with an unexpected family emergency.

There was a new plan: desperately try to avoid his former partner.

He failed miserably again.

There seems to be a pattern here.

After years of resistance, Loren is ready to start a family. On the eve of their embryo transfer, he gets information that threatens to unravel everything.

Parker Frazier attends Somerset High School, a suburban white school. Over the weekend, a fight breaks out during a basketball game against an inner-city school. Tempers flared, and racial epithets were shouted. On Monday, protesters appeared outside the school. One young man caught Parker's attention. While driving home after school, he witnessed a police officer brutally arrest the young man he saw earlier that morning. Parker videotaped it with his phone and posted it on Facebook. He was not prepared for what happened next.

Jonathan Hamilton transfers to Sunny Hill starting junior year to run away from his past and keep promises on which to build an uneventful, safe future. The biggest promise he makes to himself is to stay clear forever, by all means necessary, of straight bad boys and their unhealthy appeal.

But promises are only made to be broken, Jonathan discovers the truth of the old adage, as junior year barely starts, and he has a run-in with the ridiculously attractive Maddox Kingsley, the resident BMOC, and carrier of the frightful nickname of ‘Mad Dawg’. (Full description inside.)