this chapter is similar to others in some ways, but its just what came to me when I sat down to write today. its prolly one of my lesser chapters, but hey, I never said I was a professional, or even close to a good writer so, on with the garbage! lol
anyhow, its 1974, Luke is 18, Daisy 17, and Bo 16.

It'd been a long day at school, and Luke was waiting at the truck for Bo and Daisy. They had even more work to do when they got home so, they were all looking forward to the ride home.

Daisy showed up after Luke had been waiting for quite some time.

"Where ya been?" Luke asked her.

"I'm sorry, Luke. I was talkin' with my friends and I lost track of time."

"Alright, that's okay. Ya seen anything of Bo?"

"Yeah. He was talkin' with some fellas."

"Was he gonna fight 'em?"

"I didn't see who they were, but it looked friendly enough to me." Daisy shrugged.

...

Friendly wasn't exactly the word I'd use to describe it.

"I dare you."

"Nah."

"Why not? 'Cause your baby sitter'd get mad?" Ezra teased, waving around the cigarette that he was trying to get Bo to smoke.

"Luke ain't my baby sitter, Ezra! I jus' ain't gonna smoke cause I have asthma." Bo said, even though that was only one of the reasons: Jesse'd always told the cousins not to smoke or do drugs.

"What's one little bit gonna hurt ya?" Ezra asked.

Bo was already having enough trouble with the fumes that were coming from Ezra's cigarette. "I don't even wanna smoke. Y'all ain't worth my time so, I'll see ya later."

Ezra grabbed Bo's arm "You ain't leaving!" he announced.

"You gonna try und stop me? Go ahead, good luck!" Bo laughed as he ripped his arm away.

Ezra's and his two friends Ethan and Alex surrounded Bo. "We ain't worth your time, huh?"

"Yeah, that's right. I've got much better things to do than to waste my time with the likes of y'all." Bo shoved his way out of their circle. "Good riddance." He huffed as he turned to walk away.

"You gonna go cry to mommy?" Ezra called.

Bo stopped in his tracks and turned on his heel. "What'd you jus' say?"

"I said, are you gonna go cry to yer mommy?"

The sudden fire in Bo's eyes slightly scared Ezra.

"I ain't even got one!" Bo grunted as he charged Ezra and dropped him to the ground.

"Help me out, boys!" Ezra shouted after failing to get out from under Bo.

Ezra's two friends grabbed Bo and hauled him to his feet, holding him for Ezra to hit. Bo managed to break free from their grips and elbow one of them in the gut. He thought to call for Luke, because a 3 on 1 simply wasn't fair, especially when the 1 was starting to have an asthma attack. But he decided against it, they'd just make fun of him for calling on his 'baby sitter'. And he could handle them right? They threw sloppy un-coordinated punches and were terrible at dodging, but dang it was getting harder and harder to breathe. Before long it was near impossible to breathe, and Ezra and his two friends were beginning to get the upper hand.

"Alright, alright! Wait a minute!" Bo called as loud as he could. To his pleasant surprise they actually did.

"What?" Ezra asked.

"W-we gotta talk about this..." Bo said as he kicked one in the leg and backhanded the other. Then he took off running, stopping to pick up a rock and throw it in the direction of the only one who'd gotten up to chase him: Ezra.

"I bet your mother died so that she wouldn't have to live with you!" Ezra shouted, knowing that he'd have to run no longer: Bo'd come charging back at him after he said that.

Bo walked slowly back around the corner with a baseball bat. "You wanna say that again? Or ya wanna run like the yellow loser that'cha are?"

Ezra stood silent for a minute, then he spoke up. "You wouldn't touch me with that, an' you know it. You're too chicken."

"Try me." Bo continued slowly advancing towards Ezra.

"Maybe some other time..." Ezra's voice trailed off as he ran like the yellow loser that he was.

Bo gave the baseball bat back to the freshman around the corner that he'd borrowed it from. Then he got to his knees to catch his breath. He sighed in relief, realizing how close he'd just come to being beaten. Then he pulled out his inhaler. After he got himself together, he started walking back to the truck.

"Hey, y'all. Sorry to be so late." Bo apologized when he got there.

"Bo, your face! Who were ya fightin' this time?" Luke asked.

"Ezra, Ethan, an' Alex..." Bo sighed.

"Alright what'd they do to you?" Luke asked, becoming angry with them now, rather than Bo.

"They was smokin' in my face an' tryna get me ta smoke too. Then he started sayin' things that I jus' couldn't let him say so, I tackled him."

"You beat all three of them?" Luke asked, doubting that Bo could beat three people that were all older than him.

"I more tricked 'em than beat 'em." Bo sighed. "Now can we go home?"

"Yeah." Luke got in the truck. "You okay, though?" he asked once they were on the road.

"I knew that was comin'. Yeah, I'm fine." Bo laughed a little.

"Then hows come you're breathin' so hard?" Daisy asked.

"I had a little attack, but I'm over it." Bo assured them, although it wasn't very assuring: his labored wheezy breathing was evidence enough that he wasn't okay.

"You really don't sound okay, Bo." Luke told him.

"I'm fine, really. Lets jus' get on home." The truth was, his lungs were on fire and he hadn't had a good breath since his last class at school, but he figured he'd be alright if he used his inhaler some more when they got home.

"Your lungs sound awful, I can hear them from up here." Luke sighed. "You say they smoked in yer face?"

"Yeah, but..."

"We're goin' over to docs 'fore we go home. Smoke can do nasty things to ya." Luke decided.

Bo sighed and rolled his eyes: he knew there was no way of talking Luke out of it now.

"I'll CB uncle Jesse." Daisy reached up into the front and grabbed the CB:

"Uncle Jesse, this heres Daisy, ya got yer ears on?"

"Yeah, I's listenin'."

"Bo's havin' trouble breathing so we're gonna take him on down to docs real quick 'fore we come home."

"s'he okay?" Jesse asked.

Daisy glanced at Bo, "Yeah, he'll make it there."

"Alright, I'll meet y'all there."

"Okay, bye."

"W-will ya come with me Luke?" Bo asked, looking at the floor.

"Of course I will, cousin." Luke promised.

"Jus' take it easy, Bo. We'll be there soon." Daisy assured as she patted his arm.

An uncountable number of coughs later, the cousins'd arrived at doc's place.

Bo was having to much trouble breathing to complain by this time so, it was easy for Luke and Daisy to convince him to go in.

"Why don't you take a seat on the exam table, okay?" Doc requested gently.

Bo got up on the table and took his shirt off.

"What happened?" Doc asked Luke as he starting looking Bo over.

"He was in a fight. Some kids was smokin' in his face an tryna make him smoke as well. I think he got a fair amount of the smoke in his lungs."

"Alright. Would you lie down for me, Bo?"

"y-yeah..." Bo reluctantly laid down.

Seeing that Bo was starting to shake and perspire, Luke stepped forward and took his hand, "You're okay." he assured him.

"Which one would you like?" Doc asked as he held up a mask and a nasal cannula. Bo pointed to the mask, and doc put it over his nose and mouth.

Luke cocked his head at Daisy, motioning for her to come over. She walked to the other side of the table and started running her fingers through Bo's hair.

"While we're here we may as well clean your face up, okay?" Doc suggested, showing Bo the gauze and antiseptic.

Bo nodded slowly and shut his eyes.

Once doc was finished cleaning Bo's face up, Bo looked to Luke, communicating that he still couldn't breathe.

"He says he still can't breathe." Luke told doc.

"Alright then. I'll get some intravenous breathing meds for him."

Bo shook his head no and gripped Luke's hand tighter.

"Bo, you can't breathe, cuz." Luke reminded him. "It'll be okay, I'm right here."

"An' me too, sugar." Daisy added.

Bo saw the needle in doc's hand and his entire body went ridged, his breathing, or lack there of quickened and shallowed. He looked to Luke to beg him not to allow doc to give him an IV: not being able to breathe was bad enough.

"Calm down, it'll be fine." Luke promised.

Bo started shaking more fiercely as images of being restrained in the hospital on a ventilator raced through his brain.

"Aw, Bo, you're gonna be okay..." Luke soothed as he began stroking Bo's arm with his free hand.

"Close your eyes, honey." Daisy suggested, and Bo took her advice.

Doc looked to Luke, and he nodded that Bo was ready. He did the deed as quickly as possible, then he hung the IV bag up.

"s'over now, Bo." Luke reported to his terrified cousin.

Bo slowly opened his eyes and looked down at the IV line that ran into the back of his hand, where a needle was inside of him and... Bo shut his eyes again, but when he did what he saw was far from the relief he'd hoped for: he felt that he was in the hospital, connected to beeping machines, alone at the mercy of cold doctors' hands that smelled like rubbing alcohol mixed with latex gloves, and the-

"...Bo, listen to me," Luke said for the third time.

Bo dared to slowly open his eyes, and was slightly relieved by the fact that he wasn't in the hospital, only at docs. But best of all, Luke was there with him.

"You're safe, Bo. Ya don't gotta be so scared. I'm right here, an' I ain't goin' no wheres, okay?"

Bo leaned his head towards Luke and shut his eyes, no longer seeing images of the hospital, but of his eye lids. Finally able to relax, Bo's breathing got much better within the next few minutes.

"That's much better. I was thinkin' for a minute there that he'd have to stay the night, but I think he'll be alright to go home in 45 minutes or so." Doc smiled.

Jesse arrived 15 minutes later and within another 15, Bo was all set to go home. Luke and Daisy took him out to the truck while Jesse paid doc. Remember right now they ain't been 'caught runnin' shine yet so, they ain't rich, but they ain't as poor as they will be in two years or so.

"You don't have to pay me, Jesse. I didn't cost me more than $40 to take care of him." Doc handed Jesse's money back.

"No, I couldn't let ya do that. Ya more than likely saved my boys life." Jesse insisted.

"Oh, Jesse." Doc sighed and accepted the money. "You take good care of that boy, ya hear? He hates comin' here an' I'd sure hate for him to have to come back soon."

"Don't you worry. 'Tween me an' his cousins, he ain't gonna be left alone fer a minute." Jesse smiled as he shook doc's hand.

When they got home, Bo was arrested to the couch for the rest of the day, and by the next morning, he was back to normal like nothing'd ever happened. But he and Luke did have some ideas about beating some sense into Ezra and his friends, nothing that they talked about of course: just a little idea that they both knew was in the others' head.

thats all. i'm done for now. see yall next update, which will be very soon i hope.