1. And where did he serve his mission?
2. A warm October day down by the Provo River
3. Orem's not so bad when you give it a chance
4. I can rely on myself
5. Jared gets drunk and gets laid
6. Forget about her, Jared
7. A story I never tell anyone

• (character chart)
• Warning/Disclaimer

1. Young Women's
2. Youth Conference
3. Saturday's Warrior
4. Brigham Young University
• Gratuitous Love Scene
5. Polygamist
6. Temple Wedding
7. Orem High
8. Bordeaux Mission
9. Exmo Conference

Actually it was kind of funny that Sam liked to hang out with Joe. Sam was a popular guy. Being on the football team, he had lots of jock friends, and of course he had plenty of pretty girls interested in him. You would normally expect a guy like Sam to just ignore Joe and pretend he didn't exist the way the rest of the Hobbs family did. But it seemed that Sam was just a genuinely nice guy.

After we'd spent a long time hanging out on the wall, Joe said that he really needed to get back and get started on his homework. So I dropped them off at their house, and then went home to listen to my new album.

On Monday at school Joe told me that he had a surprise he wanted to show me and that he'd show it to me if I gave him a ride home. After school, Joe met me out by my car. As soon as I arrived, he started getting into the car and said "Let's go."

"Shouldn't we wait for Sam?" I asked.

"Not today," said Joe. "We're not going back to the house."

He directed me to an unfamiliar part of town and had me stop in front of a kind of run-down looking house. We got out of the car and walked up to the house. Then instead of ringing the bell, Joe put a key in the keyhole and opened the door himself. I came in with him, and he led me upstairs to a grungy room with peeling wallpaper and stained carpeting.

"What do you think of my new home?" he asked.

"You're renting this whole house?"

"No, just this room. I share the kitchen and bathrooms with a bunch of college students attending UVCC. The living room too, actually, although I don't think I'll use it much. The other guys who live here are mostly returned-missionaries, wandering around the house in their garments. Yuck! I'll think I'll probably spend most of my time in my room."

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"What happened?" I asked. "Why did you move out of the Hobbs' house?"

"What happened was that I did a lot of thinking about what Andrea said about how it wasn't very brave of me to keep the truth from my aunt and uncle."

"But that's not what she said," I told him. "And besides, she took it back and said you were right not to tell them."

"Yeah, but after thinking about it I realized she was right the first time. I don't need them and I don't need to cower and live a lie in order to have their help. I can rely on myself."

"Wow," I said. "So you're just going to live here by yourself now?"

"Yep."

"So that's why you got that new job!" I said.

"Exactly. My friend Tom's mom is a manager of a Mexican restaurant. I figured restaurant work would be a good choice for me because it's something that I can do in the evenings after school. So I convinced Tom's mom to give me a job. I'm not sure it's one hundred percent legal given my age, but she gave me the job anyway because she sympathized with my situation. It's mostly cleaning up, but there's some simple cooking and prep. Distasteful grunt work really, but it'll pay the rent," he said.

"But how will you do your homework if you have to work all evening?"

"I've already talked to some of my teachers about it. I explained that I might not be able to turn in all of my assignments on time during the week, but that I would do my best to catch up on weekends. They were pretty sympathetic because they know I'm a good student."

"So you just left Sam's house just like that? Sam's dad didn't throw you out or anything?"

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