Chapter three

April stood outside Bam's bedroom door and knocked.

"Bam I want to see how you look."

"Jeeze Ape. Hold your horses."

Bam opened the door and walked out where April could see him. His newly blonde hair was messily pulled down around his face and looked straighter. He wore a brown suede jacket with matching brown bellbottoms and a tie-die Grateful Dead long sleeved shirt. The bottoms of his pants covered his then bare feet so where just his toes barely poked out. On his face he had make up that carefully concealed his mole. Make up covered the tattoos on his knuckles as well. Bam peeked through some strands of blonde hair at April and exhaled deeply.

"Well?"

She let out a little grin "You look very, very… hippie-ish."

"Gee thanks… I feel like such a dork like this."

"No you actually look cute, Bam. Going to take a while to get used to you with blonde hair, but you look cute."

Bam rolled his eyes "Great my mom thinks I look cute. I'm not trying to look "cute". I'm trying to disguise myself. Now tell me, if you saw me walking down the street like this, would you recognize me?"

"From far away, no."

"What about close up?"

"Um… not if you kept your eyes down. Or wore sunglasses."

"So my eyes would be a dead giveaway. I'll work on that then."

"You go out like this, Bam, and you'll do just fine."

"Think so?"

"Yeah. But um… you planning on going barefoot everywhere?"

"No. I can get shoes when I get more clothes. But until them I'll just wear my regular shoes."

Bam walked away and looked for his backpack. He stuffed it with a few more articles of clothing, the make up he used and a few other things he would need. Once he was ready he put on his shoes and a pair of dark sunglasses. He then picked up his backpack and slung it over his shoulder and said goodbye to Phil and April.

"Good luck Bam." Said April

"Yeah… if I need anything I'll come back. But it'll probably be during the night so leave the door unlocked for me, alright?"

"Yes of course." Replied Phil

With that said Bam took a deep breath and headed out the door. He had no idea where he was going or what he was going to do once he got there, but he didn't care. He was just going out on his own to put his new identity to the test.

Bam had been walking through the streets of West Chester for most of the afternoon. He walked around nonchalantly seeing if anyone would recognize him. He was a little surprised over some of the reactions he got. A lot of people ignored him like he was just another face in the crowd, while some people stared at him strangely as he passed them by. He wasn't sure if the strange looks were because he looked familiar to them or if they were because of his general appearance. At one point he had got himself something to eat and then sat down on the sidewalk in front of Fairman's Skate Shop to eat it. As he sat there eating a few people passing him by mistook him for a bum and threw money at him. He started to protest, wanting to tell then that he didn't need their money but then he grinned and pocketed the money instead. He shook his head and laughed to himself, thinking about how funny it was that people thought he was just some random bum sitting there on the sidewalk. He had no idea that his disguise would fool people quite that much.

Once he was finished eating he stood up and began to dust himself off. With his head down he took a step forward and accidentally ran into someone who was walking into Fairman's. Bam looked up at the guy.

"Oh I' so sorry. I didn't see you there."

"It's ok. I wasn't paying much attention either." The guy said before walking into the store

Bam began to walk away. He stopped and turned around to look at the store. This store was once a big part of his life; his old life. He began to walk back to the store and froze in his spot. In the window was something that he didn't notice while he sat there. There was a sign next to a cardboard cut out of Bam's image. The sign and cut out was a special memorial for Bam. There were even a few roses placed in front of the sign that were left there by mourning fans. Seeing this gave him chills. He hated what he had put everyone through by faking his death, and he was beginning to regret it. But at the time when he did it, it made a world of sense to him.

He turned away from the store once again and started walking away. The bells above the door chimed as the door opened. The guy Bam had bumped into poked his head out the door.

"Hey you!" Bam turned around and pointed to himself "Yeah, come here I want to talk to you."

Bam walked up to the guy "Ok what do you want?"

"You looking for work?"

"I uh… not really but I guess I could use a job."

"Well would you like to hand out these fliers? I'll pay you."

"Uh… sure I guess I could do that. How much you paying me for this?"

"Um… 10 bucks?"

"Alright I'll take it."

The guy handed him a big stack of fliers "There you hand these out. And if you do a good job maybe I can talk my boss into giving you a better job here."

"Ok thanks."

He held his hand out "I'm Luke Bailey."

Bam shook his hand and quickly came up with a name "Aaron Lewis."

"I haven't seen you around here before. Where are you from?"

"Uh, well… I sort of roam around. Just wandered into town here and thought it was a pretty nice looking place."

"You don't actually live any where?"

"Yeah, no."

"Yeah, no?'

"I sort of live everywhere. Where ever I can find a place to stay I'll stay there. But usually not for very long." He grinned

"So you're like a nomad then?"

"Yeah pretty much." Bam snickered

He didn't think that his story would be that believable, having just made it up on the spot, but he sold it well. The two of them stood there talking for a few minutes. After a little bit Bam noticed that Luke was focusing quite a bit on his face, especially when he smiled or laughed. Bam had made sure to try to disguise his voice a little by sounding more laid back and dragging out his speech a little, hoping that it wouldn't give him away. He was in the middle of a sentence when Luke stopped him.

"I'm sorry I keep staring at you. It's just that… you seem so familiar to me. Almost like we've met before."

Bam swallowed, starting to feel like he had been caught "Well maybe you have seen me before. I'm always on the move. I'm bound to run into the same people here and there."

"Yeah that's true." Luke paused "Oh shit I better be getting to work. And you should as well. You've got a lot of fliers to hand out there."

Bam snickered "Yeah."

Luke went back inside the store and Bam walked away to hand out the fliers. As bam was passing them out he grinned to himself a little. His first day out he had already met someone he could be friends with, and no one recognized him. He even got a small job and there was a possibility that he was going to be able to have a better one. Not that he was hurting for money, but he thought it would be a nice change to actually work for a living, especially since he was trying to be someone else. Just walking around the town passing the fliers out for the skate shop made him feel good; like he was going to be able to pull off this new identity without any trouble.