They had changed enormously in the time I’d been gone. They’d endured an enormous loss without me. They had mourned without me. They had come together to heal - memorials, tributes, fundraisers, vigils, community service drives - all without me.
I was so innocent that my first thought was he didn’t know he was exposed. But the way he was staring at me so fixedly soon made me realize it was on purpose.
The ending to my story in Orlando flickers. I thought I knew how the story would end when I first set out to write this series. The scene would be framed at the Orlando International Airport...
If I like her and she likes me, we run the gauntlet: Wally’s, Lil Indies, Tako Cheena, and then a fifty percent chance of never seeing each other again...
At Lil Indies, a hipster bar, it doesn’t seem like many people are getting into the music. People pause conversation and look at the empty dance floor like someone left on the TV. So I decide to get wasted out of my mind until I believe in myself...
I’m too lazy to walk the 1.5 miles to Publix, so I hail a Lyft and sit on the apartment complex stairs with my chin in my palm, thinking about a Buddhist koan...