~~

Three days later, Jared's parents invited me to stay. Just to make it sound right, I refused at first, then about a week after I first met Jared, I actually moved in. Jared's parents were really nice. They saw the old clothes I had from New Orleans, which had been nice at one time, and went and bought me more. I ended up sharing a room with Jared, but it didn't matter because he was such a heavy sleeper that I could probably put a cherry bomb next to his head and he would sleep through it.

Jared and I were almost the same age. Since I didn't know my exact birth date, I made one up. I decided on March 17, 2000. When I told them that was my birthday, they said it was once a holiday called Saint Patrick's Day, before the Pulse.

We became quite close. Jared's parents insisted that we all have dinner together each evening, and since extra-curricular activities were almost nil since the Pulse, it was an easy rule to follow.

Jared's family was the longest I ever stayed in one place. I stayed for almost two years. It was Christmas time when I left. Actually Christmas Eve, three months from my thirteenth birthday.

That day, we went as a family upstate to Jared's grandparent's house. Altogether, there were over twenty uncles, aunts and cousins. Since I had been with then the previous Christmas, as well as Easter and Thanksgiving, I sort of knew the family. On Christmas Eve, all the cousins and an uncle set out to get the tree, at about ten o'clock we set out. It was one of the happiest days of my life, but also the saddest.

~~