Stories

The Agean Resort in Las Vegas has finished a major remodeling and upgrade. As part of the grand re-opening, they plan a week of celebration events. Chipper headlines the festivities with his 30^th birthday pool party and a concert. The entire Squad attends, and some cause a stir of their own.

A week’s trip to New York City has Owen and CJ mixing business and pleasure. Meetings with high-powered attorneys and financial high-rollers combine with Broadway, Sag Harbor, and Fire Island for a memorable vacation. The couple’s efforts to increase CJ’s name recognition moves forward with TV appearances on multiple networks.

Brett Davenport and César Abelló convince their Georgetown neighbors to combine their 4^th of July celebrations into a block party. With their segment of Prospect Street closed off, children play on the street and adults cross from one house to another undisturbed by traffic. CJ and Owen ensure Carson Sawyer, part of the group being assembled to propel CJ to public office, meets one of the block’s wealthy and connected residents. Liebe has a flashback to the park shooting and a friend from Mexico City visits.

When Owen Liston is invited to join a Nature Conservancy delegation traveling to Havana, his husband, CJ Abelló, tags along. He claims there was no chance he would pass up the opportunity to visit Cuba. He may be planning on spending his time sightseeing and day-drinking, but changes are coming to the land of his grandparents. and he will find himself in the middle of events. CJ and Owen will be popular with American and Cuban government officials by the time the dust settles..

Geoff and Pam Liston, Owen’s parents, fly to Washington for a visit. It’s the first time they see their son and granddaughter since the fiasco in December 2020 when Pam wanted to baptize Liebe behind CJ’s back. Although therapy and drugs have helped her deal with anxiety and depression, the girl’s kidnapping in Mexico has negatively affected her behavior.

Obviously, this is a continuation of The Root Beer Boys and picks up where that story ended. Same characters, other relationships begin to develop among the boys.

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.

Thiago Zeca Baravento, the son of an American woman and a first generation Brazilian father, rises above the expectations of many for a black man born and raised in the predominantly minority Washington, D.C. neighborhood of Anacostia. After graduating from Howard University with a doctorate in pharmacology, and looking to provide his son Fabricio with a good life, Thiago leaves the District of Columbia, promising to one day return to his hometown.