Two days after Jake died I decide  had had enough. I leave the orphanage, and try to make my own way on the streets of Italy. But I am grieving, and in no condition to take care I myself, I begin to starve. It is one night, similar to the night my parents died, when they approach me.

     They wear uniforms and hold badges and flashlights so bright I can't  see. One man is tall, tan, and has a scruffy beard but his eyes are kind, his companion is shorter than him and imideately I have a sense of profound distaste. He looks like a sewer rat, and I'm plenty familiar with those. "Come on kid," the taller of the two approaches me slowly like a startled animal and I consider running, I wouldn't go back to the orphanage, I had promised myself, and I had promised Jake. "Come on kid, let's go" several more steps, I tense, preparing to bolt, "we don't want to hurt you kid, we want to get you help. Come on. Let's take you someplace warm, let's get you some food." His hand streatches towards mine and perhaps it's his smile, his face, his blue eyes and the earnest way they sparkle at me. But whatever it is, I take his hand. He pulls me up and I wobble on my feet like a newborn colt, the world spins and I blink black spots from my eyes. I cling to the man's jacket, my pale hands twisting in the deep blue fabric like a lifeline.

     "What's your name kid?" His chest vibrates in a soothing way and I blink at him, uncomprhending, any words that might have lay in my brain were covered with a think fog of exhaustion. I must have said something, I dont remember, evidently it was the wrong thing because the man I was clinging to suddenly frowns and looks around worridly. He speaks to me, quickly and quietly and I only catch a few words.
   
     "Take you.....foster.....good.....know..
be alright..."

     Then I blinked again, and darkness settled over my vision once more.

      When I wake I don't know where I am. The ceiling is made of a dark brown wood, stained so many times the natural color is completely hidden. The sheets are soft. The bed is warm. The house is dry. It smells like...it smells like home. 

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     The next few years of my life were a whirlwind. I would speak more about them but I don't have the time. In a general overview, I was adopted into foster care by an elderly couple in the United States. They took care of me until I was hospitalized my freshman year of college. Those years of my life weren't easy, but they were good. They were smiles and trying to forget the past. They were zoo trips and museums and until I got sick again they were the best years of my life. I wanted to skip some parts because my time is running out, and before I die, I want to write about Aden. About the absolute best years of my life even though both of us were slowly knocking on deaths door. I want to document some of my happiest moments, and some of my saddest. I want to, for all of you, for myself, and for Aden.