The Fiery Boys (A Sample)

And Jo approved, too. But she was worried about me. She wanted me to stop using him as my silent advisor, living for his imagined good graces. And she wanted me to open up to love. I couldn't keep pushing men away just because the best one had died and the others couldn't compare.

She even pointed out that I had issues with abandonment. Besides Zed dying at the end of senior year, my parents had also abandoned me, at the start of that year. They moved, like they always did, but for the first time in my life, I didn't follow them. Jo claimed that this abandonment by key people in my life was what kept driving me to choose bad boyfriends. If I could let go of these issues, she was certain I'd find love again.

But so far, that hadn't happened. So I stuck to my main priorities, like my writing. And the good news was that I'd just aced this assignment. Maybe all of my reading was paying off.

The class ended, and we started to file out of the room. My new admirer stopped at the professor's desk and pointed to me. "How come you let her write about a rock song? Can we all do that?" Curious, I stopped to hear the answer.

Norbert grunted and leaned back in his chair. "I hate pop music, and I hate song lyrics. They're certainly not what I would call creative writing. But Ms. Ricci did much more than analyze a mediocre poem. She wrote a compelling story that tied in with the lyrics and gave them depth." He nodded at me. "I was moved by your tale. A very inventive story."

My tale? Did he think I'd made it up? I'd be much happier if my paper really was creative writing. But things weren't that way, and I let the professor know it. "I didn't make that story up, sir. It's really about me."

The professor gave me an astonished look. "Very interesting. I'm sorry about your boyfriend."

I returned a weak smile. "That was eight years ago. I'm over it."

But obviously, I wasn't. I was far from over it. Palmer was a typical example of the uninspiring men who filled my life these days. Pale shades of Zed, I tolerated these men but never loved them. Besides, I had better things to do. My job kept me going all day and even on occasional evenings and weekends; I went to writing class two nights a week, did kickboxing on another, and still took time to unwind with my friends on Thursdays. That didn't leave much time for boyfriends.