Title: Lily of the Valley
This
isn’t a sweet and innocent coming of age story. If dirty talk, bedroom toys,
and threesomes offend you… this is not your book. There are also no
billionaires, strippers, or virgins. This is just the story of typical college
kids trying to connect to each other.
“No one
tells you about pain. They tell you that it hurts, that sometimes it’s
consuming. What they don’t tell you is that it’s not the pain that can kill
you. It’s the uncomfortable numbness that follows, the weakness in your body
when you realize your lungs may stop taking in air and you just can’t exert
enough energy to care. It’s the way taste and color and smell fade from the
world and all you’re left with is a sepia print of misery. That’s when the
shift starts – the movement from passive to active. I fall asleep, hoping that
the morning will bring back the pain. At least the pain is a thing.”
Plagued by
a dark past, Jack sees college as a way out. Desperate to escape the area where
he grew up, the people who know his secrets, and his own family, he deals with
his problems through alcohol and meaningless sex.
When he
first sees Lily, she’s the epitome of everything he hates. Yet something about
her makes Jack rethink everything he knows and assumes about other people. Now,
with the help of his best friend and lover, Jack has to decide if he wants to
pursue something that he knows will only end ba
Can Lily
be one of the few people who can see Jack for who he really is – or will his
darkness be too much for her to handle? And even if
she can, can Jack overcome what the darkness does to him when he's pushed too
far into it?
dly.
My grandmother is so happy that I agreed to visit with my father
on my way back to school that I almost feel okay with the decision. Until we
reach the prison and the familiar sickness returns. I can’t turn around now and
say I don’t want to go in, but the sky is steel grey and I wonder why it’s
never sunny when I come here. Even the weather hates me.
She has a hat on, because it’s a prison day, and I don’t have the
heart to tell her that she tries to look nice for a group of lowlifes. I feel
like somewhere in her head she convinces herself that she looks like she’s
going to church or something and that people will think that’s what she’s
doing. She seems to believe that if other people assume she’s not the
mother-in-law of a killer, then she’s not the mother-in-law of a killer.
The security check is backed up today because some guy is arguing
with the guard about his belt. They want him to leave it at the entrance, since
it keeps setting off the metal detectors, but he’s apparently really attached
to the stupid thing and doesn’t want to give it up. They argue back and forth
and it’s the dumbest conversation I’ve ever heard. And I go to college with
frat boys.
“Buddy, you have to take off the belt and leave it, or you can’t
get in,” the guard explains. “Unless you can pass through here without setting
off the machines, you aren’t going to see anyone.”
“You’re just trying to rob me. You’re all part of the system, man,
and I ain’t giving you shit.”
“You’ll get the thing back,” the guard tries to reason.
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