Chapter 1

(Note: The book will consist of shorter chapters, switching in time frames. This is the currently forseeable beginning. It could change)

We all create our own saviors.

A personal Jesus can be found anywhere if you're looking hard enough.

These television messiahs, with their dimples, tan skin and designer suits, come at you live every Sunday from stadiums packed with Bible-thumping souls that want to be saved. They are what people want them to be.

Everyone wants to be God.

Most often, they'll settle for being next to a made-up one.

My savior, he's dead.

Where I was when it happened I'm not sure, but I can tell you where I was when I got the phone call.

Something seemed amiss before anything even happened. Two days ago it was ninety degrees out and out of nowhere -- snow. That's the Midwest for you. The shifting weather and the thought of upcoming midterms had everyone stirring, brewing with a fervor that couldn't go unnoticed.

Some would call it an omen. I call it college.

That really doesn't matter though. What matters is that phone call.

It was early in the morning. Well, early for college, so that meant it was around ten in the morning when I was startled awake.

Rrrrr.

My debilitating hangover made the phone's vibration against the coffee table seem like a jackhammer as the noise bounced off the walls of the living room. I was so inebriated I hadn't even made it to my bed.

Rrrrr.

Grudgingly, I rolled off the couch to grab the buzzing phone just to make it shut up.

Rrrrr.

Fumbling to open the thing, I muttered something into the phone. I didn't even sit up.

A panting voice shot back. I recognized it from somewhere, but I'm not sure from how long ago.

The frantic pace of her words told me it wasn't good.

"Oh my God! Are you there?"

Smacking my lips together to loosen the white stickiness from the corners of my mouth, I asked who it was.

He's gone! Oh my God! He's gone! She was screaming, her voice more distancing with every breath.

Who? What? Slow down.

"Ethan. Ethan's gone," she yelled.

It was his mom, I had pieced together at that point. Me, and my keen powers of detection.

"Where did he go?" That was my response.

"He shot himself!" She screamed at me, obviously through tears.

She hung up. Now I know why.

Her reaction was appropriate considering the circumstances. She had just found her son with a hole in the side of his head. He had swallowed the better part of a deer slug. Then, to top it all off, his best friend failed to grasp the gravity of the situation.

It wasn't until later that I found out I was the first person she called after finding him.

She called me before the cops.

Before 911.

Before his dad.

She knew Ethan trusted me more than anyone.

She thought I could save him.

I couldn't.

Please leave your thoughts on this.