Chapter 1

Mom and Dad had already gone to bed. We were tired. Actually, tired doesn’t even begin to cover it. We were exhausted.

We had spent the last 10 days in the Dodola region of Ethiopia, installing wells for the locals there. It was excruciating work, but the look on the peoples faces when the well we installed started to bring up clear, clean water was worth every back-breaking moment of it.

We had completed a service project for our church, and the days of labor had finally caught up to us, once the excitement, or perhaps “spirit” had worn off.

We had gotten some sleep on the plane, but no amount of sleep can prepare you for that amount of jet-lag.

So Mom and Dad had stayed up as long as they could hold their heads up, then went to bed. I could hear Dad’s snoring from across the house.

Originally my sister was intending to go with us, but there had been some kind of kerfuffle regarding her paperwork. My parents had adopted her when they didn’t think they could have children. A couple months after the adoption went through, Mom started getting morning sickness. Then I showed up on the scene.

Anyway, it was a shame. I know Laurie would have liked seeing the difference our family had made. But we had been warned that if we took her out of the country without her passport being in order, she wouldn’t be allowed back in.

Well, we couldn’t risk that. We almost canceled the entire trip, but Laurie talked reason into Mom and Dad. She told them there was no use losing the money for all the tickets.

So she got to watch the house and eat junk food while we sweated under the harsh sun.

Several times during the trip I jokingly wondered if she had engineered the passport mix-up to get out of digging the wells.

Before I went to bed, I wanted to unpack. Just so I wouldn’t have to worry about doing it later. It was during my unpacking I ran across the bracelet of beads that I had purchased for Laurie in Ethiopia. Actually, I had traded with a local for them, my solar powered radio for the bracelet. It seemed like a fair deal, we both thought.

So I left my room and went toward hers. I saw that the door was cracked open. I was about to put my hand on the knob and swing the door inward when I looked into the room and froze.

My 15 year old sister, Laurie, was laying naked on her bed. Her face was turned toward me, but her eyes were closed.

And I could see that there was an equally naked boy laying on top of her.

Creeping up to the door, I was able to see the entirety of the scene.

Her legs were spread wide, and he was between them. Her arms were by her sides, hands balled into fists. I could see his hips moving up and down between her thighs.

I glanced at the boy’s face. Yes, it was one of her friends. Adam? Eric? What was the other one’s name? I suddenly couldn’t remember. My brain was starving, it felt like all the blood in my body had rushed below my belt-line.

I knew I should walk away, but I was frozen to the spot. I’d never seen two people have sex before, not counting some light stuff I saw in some of the movies we were allowed to watch.

But here it was. Right on the other side of my sister’s door.