Intro

Jake Powell had set down his last box of junk in one of the spare rooms in his new house that he had bought from his uncle. His uncle had gotten the house from Jake’s great-great-grandfather who had built the entire thing. Around the property is fourteen acres owned with the house, and a little lake at the bottom of the hill it’s on. It’s surrounded by tall redwood trees that circle around the house, giving the house sunlight only in the noon time when the sun hits straight up in the sky. The whole house had nine rooms, with a kitchen, four bathrooms, two living rooms, a bonus room (giant room with carpet), attic and a basement.

Jake and his best friend Tristen, had bought the house for only 100, because Jake’s uncle thought it would be healthy for them to feel the experience of buying property, but since they were family, it had to be at a low price. Since the house had been built and only sold to those in the Powell family line, the only things that needed to be paid for was electricity and plumbing, and the two boys had summer jobs to pay for the house.

Jake had just graduated from high school a couple months ago, and the first day of college was the next day. Jake had been somewhat tall, lanky, and looked a little big like a nerd. His messy, yet slick black hair that had sometimes covered his eyes, he had coke-bottled glasses, and extra skinniness had given him that title of nerd.

Tristen had been given the title of nerd through personality, not looks. He was fully Japanese (no, he can’t speak it), but his real name had disgraced him, and he was always given the name Tristen. Nobody, but Tristen’s family members, knew his real name. Jake had once known it, and teased him because he knew Tristen had hated it so much, but he hadn’t used it such a long time, he hadn’t remembered. Tristen was a video game freak. When he wasn’t trying to get good grades, you’d see him playing Halo 2 on Xbox Live. That was almost all he talked about.

Jake had been a little bit of a poet/writer, although most of his books had been tied in with ever exciting thing he had ever watched, read, or seen in his life. Whether it was a cool line from some movie, to a cool battle seen in an anime, he had always used it again. But sometimes he made up his own stuff. Although he wasn’t the game freak Tristen was, he still played a couple of games.

Jake had walked into the living room, where he had seen Tristen playing Halo 2, again. He had heard random noises, such as explosions, death cries, the announcer telling Tristen he had lost the lead, and Tristen grunting in anger. Jake had watched the screen for a while, and after a minute, Tristen was back in the lead, and Jake could imagine the grin on Tristen’s face whenever he got what he wanted.

“Hey,” Jake finally called out. “You unpacked?”

“Yep.”

Jake looked around Tristen to see bags full of clothes lying around. He had raised a brow and asked, “Really?”

“Yeah. TV, TV cables, Xbox, Xbox Live cables, and snacks. What else do I need?”

“Well, I don’t know, maybe clothes, toiletries, real food, computers, the whole American civilization thing you need to live.”

“ ‘Leave the unimportant stuff to Jake’. That’s my motto.”

“Well, I think your motto needs some work.”

“I don’t see a problem with it.”

“Do you ever see a problem with anything?”

Tristen had just shrugged his shoulders, and went back to his game. Jake had walked back into his room, and set his gaze upon the box that he had set down a couple of minutes earlier. Something had caught his eyes. He had bent down, and he had picked up his Senior yearbook. He smiled, thinking of his past times in High school.

Freshmen year had probably been the worst of them all. He was a loner, a nerd who nobody wanted to be part of. His teachers didn’t like him very much, even though he never did anything, and his grades had been slipping, so his parents were hard on him. His usual day had been this: he woke up, ate breakfast as his parents yelled at him, get ready for school, get lectured about trying in school as his dad drove him to school, got yelled at in class, puked as he ran laps for PE, got yelled at by the teacher for puking, got home, did homework, watched TV, got yelled at for being “lazy”, and went to bed. Most students didn’t find that very fun.

But one thing had made his day. Her name was Stacy Johnson. Her outer appearance hadn’t stuck into his mind, but who needed outer appearance when your joy and kindness had warmed somebody’s day. They had met a couple weeks after second semester. They had almost all the same classes that semester, except for one.

Stacy was a girl who was in charge. She hadn’t let anybody say anything bad about her, or Jake. She stuck up for him. Not only was she a personal verbal body guard, but she had been a great friend. She actually listened to his problems, and tried to fix them with him. She had laughed at his jokes, she stood on the sidelines with him as he puked, even if it had lowered her grade, and she ate with him at lunch.

Towards Valentines, Jake had developed a little crush on her. He wanted to tell her, because he had felt she had felt the same way as him. But this Valentines Day was not something of joy. He had summoned up the courage to tell her, right at lunch, before their only period they didn’t share. But when he found her, she sat him down and told him some news of her own: she was moving. Not to some place not that far away, like San Francisco, but somewhere far, far away: New Jersey. She was leaving right after their only period they didn’t share.

The reason she didn’t tell him until she did, was because she thought she was going to be forgotten. She thought that Jake would find some new friends, just like all her other “friends” in the past had. But Jake had been different, and she needed to tell him before she left. Before Jake could throw in a word, the bell had rung, and she took off running.

When school had ended, he had looked for her frantically, and ran through the school, but she was nowhere to be found. Until, when he thought all hope was lost, he saw her. Only, he didn’t see her in a position he found positive. She was in the back seat of her father’s red truck, facing toward the rear window, waving. And from a distance, Jake still swore there had been tears strolling down her face. There had been tears on his face as he had waved back at her, and yelled the words: “Stacy, I love you!” But who knows if she heard? Traffic had been heavy and loud, and there had been a window in between them, and he hadn’t been that loud. But maybe, just maybe, she had read the lips of his mouth.

But it didn’t matter. He never saw or talked to her ever since then. But he had always said a little thanks to her every time he thought of her. Because of her, he knew he could meet some friends out there in the world.

Jake’s sophomore year had been quiet. Nobody had really talked to him, his teachers had left him alone, his PE teacher had been more sympathetic, and his grades improved, leaving his parents with nothing to complain about.

His Junior year, however, had been great. Jake had been playing a classic game that nobody really knew about that had taken 75 hours of his life to beat. When he went to his first club, the Video Gamers Club, he had asked somebody if they had played the game. There, Tristen had entered Jake’s life. After replying that he had played, Tristen had kept on talking to Jake about how hard it was, which bosses he hated, and Jake had mostly listened. Jake never liked talking much, and Tristen hadn’t liked listening. Tristen had just come back from Japan, visiting his grandfather who was ill, and eventually died. He had seen Jake somewhere in Elementary School though.

Their Senior year had been the greatest. Their grades had rocketed to perfect A’s, they had made laughs and memories, they had learned how to make 2-D games, like Pong, that had a lot to be desired, but it was still kind of fun just watching them screw around with it.

That’s when they decided they wanted to go to the big University down in the town: University of Artistic Views. Jake wanted to be a writer, Tristen had wanted to design games, they could both go to the same college, and they could make more memories. It was perfect. They had sent in test scores, and Tristen had gotten a letter back saying he was a genius and would be proud to have him in their school, but Jake was a little less than satisfactory. Jake thought he would die, until a week later when a letter came saying he was a genius, a bigger one then Tristen. When they had looked at both envelopes that were addressed to Jake, they realized that the reject letter was meant for some kid in Virginia.

So, that’s where they had been now. In a city a couple miles from their school, one a loud, obnoxious game freak, the other a quiet writer, just trying to get by in life…