Preview

Prologue

September 22, current year

I walked into what used to be my local bar and once again took a seat in front of Phoebe, the little pink-haired bartender who was really one of the Wyrd Sisters. Who the Greeks and the Romans called “The Three Fates.”

She smiled at me and set an unopened bottle of Samuel Adams in front of me. “Welcome back, Harrison. I didn’t know if you’d come back or not after refusing another chance last night.”

I opened the bottle and smiled. “Rule number eight Phoebe. ‘Never make a promise you aren’t willing to keep. Promises are sacred. If you make one, then you keep it, otherwise you are just a slimy liar.’ I promised to return tonight and continue telling you about the second chance you and your sisters gave me, so here I am.”

The girl smiled at me. “I knew we’d made the right choice when we offered you ‘spilt milk’. If I remember correctly, you stopped last night on the night before your first day of ninth grade.”

I nodded. “I did, and I would love to tell you that everything was smooth sailing from there. That the gang of five had learned their lesson. That I was able to help all the girls they hurt and that my girlfriends and I lived happily ever after. Because after all, that’s what happens in fairy tales and movies. While the gift you gave me seems like a fairy tale it wasn’t, and real life seldom goes the way you think it should. My tale is definitely not a fairy tale. It’s the story of my life and those of my friends and family and that’s not a neat little story that sails smoothly to the ‘and they lived happily ever after’.

Instead, I got to go back and start over before my biggest regret. I made the change and still nothing was pie in the sky can’t we all just get along? No, instead things went in a different direction, but that direction called for other hard choices.” I took a swallow of my drink and recalled my freshman year.