Prologue

In a small village in Manhattan that pretty much everyone passes over and never thinks about, race-mixing is a very big issue. And one boy takes crap for it all the time. "Pribaj" is the name that the self-renamed Sage uses to describe himself. It stands for his Puerto Rican, Italian, Black, Arab, and Japanese heritage. In his younger years, it was never really a problem.

The Black and Puerto Rican people in the neighborhood called him "that light-skinned nigga with the good hair". The White people just called him "the oreo nigger down the street" amongst themselves and "that boy" around anyone else. The Arabs and Japanese really had no association with him (aside from his father), but the Italians could care less. They just wanted to have a good time with whoever happened to be around. That's what Sage liked.

Sage never forgot how Antonio was his only true friend through elementary and middle school and half of high school. He knew that his friend would be there during his upperclassman years too. Just the day before school in fact, they were both sitting in Sage's room surfing the web looking at pictures of their younger years posted by classmates and other stuff.

Antonio had been fidgeting so much since he arrived that Sage put iTunes music on in an attempt to soothe his friend. Sage finally asked him what the matter was, and the Italian boy with the pale brown (no lie!) eyes and slicked-back hair slumped down in his chair. It was evident that he had been sweating, for the gel on his hairline was running down his forehead, but stopped for the most part by his eyebrows (which began sticking out at odd angles.

"Well, I er..." he stammered off and took a long swig of the can of Dr. Pepper on the table. "I can trust you with anything, right?"

"Yeah, totally," Sage agreed. It was true. He'd been trusted with Antonio's dog, his baby sister, his life (as far as life and death went in middle school bullying cases), and countless other things. "How come?"

Now Antonio was never one to beat around the bush. He was a Sagaterius and had Sage sitting on the receiving end of his bluntness on more than one occassion. However, he took more than five seconds. Then on the sixth, he said, "I'm gay." He lowered his head in shame and his eyes darted to the left side of the floor. Only once did his eyes glance to see Sage's face. They quickly went back down.

Sage rolled his eyes. "So what?" he asked. Antonio perked up instantly. "Many people are gay. In fact, thirty percent of our friends are gay." Sage and Antonio had issues using the pronouns "I" and "my" and "myself" as most of what they had was shared. It was only internal things and thoughts that were referred to as "my". First person was simply one of those things sacrificed for the friendship.

"So you don't care?" he asked. "At all?" he sounded slightly offended that Sage hadn't yelled at him.

"Not that I don't care. It's just that I don't have any hostility toward it. I'm a modern dude, dude. Remember?" It was true. Sage held no hostility against most things controversial. As a multi-racial person, he grew up learning that prejudiced was based on ignorance, and once you learned about what you were prejudiced against in the first place, you find that you'll come to accept it. He decieded to change up the conversation a bit.

"So are you crushing on anyone?" Antonio went red instantly. "Shut up!" he said, wiping the sweat from his forehead.

"Oh mah gawd!" Sage yelled, grinning, his eyes becoming slits as his cheeks invaded their space. "Oh! Mah! Gawd!" He jumped from his chair in front of the computer and onto his bed. He pulled Antonio up with him to jump in syncronised movement. They had been doing this during their deeper talks since second grade when Sage got a new king-sized bed that was "child-proof". "Who is it?"

"Details, details," Antonio waved the words away as he grabbed his friend's forearms and vice-versa for pepetual jumpage.

"Who? Who?" Sage sounded like a nosy owl as he stabalized himself in the air and stomped down hard to jump Antonio up higher.

"You don't want to know," Antonio did the same for Sage and it went back and forth until they talked.

"It's not Michael is it?" asked Sage, knowing full well that Antonio's bully would be a way too far-fetched.

"Hell no!" Antonio aggressively jumped Sage. "I'm insulted!"

"The who?!"

"You really want to know?!"

"Yes!" Sage jumped Antonio as high into the air as his entire body density (which wasn't much at all) would allow.

"Yoooh!" Antonio said as he jumped Sage the same way he had been. Sage had went blank for the moment though, so he wound up being flown up and off the bed, tugging Antonio along and landing flat on the floor with the Italian boy's leg on his throat. When Antonio pulled his forearms free of his friend he checked on Sage. Sage's eyes were so blank that he was sure he could stick a floppy disk into his mouth and upload a full record of memories into his head.

Antonio made a slightly nervous laugh. It was a laugh that was rare since nothing really made the Italian nervous. "Too much?" he asked. Sage nodded. "Baby steps, Tony, baby steps."