Nowhere USA: Book 1 of the Nowhere Trilogy

6. Ask the Lonely

When you're lost in deep despair, you just ask the lonely - Journey

5:58 p.m. Friday, September 24, 2021

The line to get into the football stadium wraps around the parking lot. Granted, it's not a large parking lot, but still there must be hundreds of people. Harry gazes around at the crowd, unsure of himself, his hands in his pockets. This must be what it's like to be alone. No one for him to talk to. No one to check up on him.

It's been a little less than 50 hours since arriving in Nowhere, which means only....He calculates the math in his head. Only 454 hours remaining in his self-imposed prison sentence. Not even the teenaged girls are fawning over him. It shouldn't bother him. Yet it does.

In Los Angeles, there would be people following his movement no matter where he went. The gym. The grocery. Coffee shops. Nothing was off limits to fans. Same in London. In Holmes Chapel, he could hide which was good, but his friends and family were often around to keep him company during those days and nights. Here? He'd made exactly one friend.

Oh. He'd made a friend! Looking around excitedly, he seeks the larger frame of a former Marine with a prosthetic leg. Surely Lee is attending the game. Alison had said everyone is going to be out tonight.

It's cold with the first flurries falling, and he has no gloves. Before leaving the hotel, he'd pulled on his winter coat, buttoning it up over his Rolling Stones shirt and yanked a pink beanie over his head. Even now it keeps his ears warm. The cold causes him to shake as he wonders what the hell he's gotten himself into with this little test. Not the game. The whole "Nowhere Experiment".

Hunching his shoulders, he hands over his $5 to the cheerleader at the gate so he can enter.

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6:02 p.m. Friday, September 24, 2021

The cold from the metal bleachers seeps through her jeans, and Michele shivers, wrapping her scarf more tightly around her throat as she buttons her coat and draws the plaid flannel blanket over her lap. She stretches it over Paige, too, who is seated beside her.

"Do you want some hot cocoa?" Michele asks her niece. Upon receiving no response, she wraps her arm around the child, pressing a kiss to the top of her head. Liz arrives, sandwiching the child between the two women. Paige looks up at her aunt's face and then over to Liz before refocusing her attention on the football field where the players are milling about, stretching and warming up.

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6:12 p.m. Friday, September 24, 2021

Paige's tiny hands are in her mittens. Aunt Chele had made her put on leggings under her pants, and they are itchy. But at least she's not super cold. Some hot cocoa would have been nice, but it's so much effort to speak. Eventually someone will pour her a cup, and she will drink it. It will not taste right though. Nothing has tasted right since Mom and Dad left.

The bag in Miss Liz's hands smells good, and Paige hopes Mr. Spencer made her a cheeseburger. She loves his cooking. Maybe it will taste the same as before.... So when the wrapping opens to reveal exactly what she wanted, Paige smiles at the steaming sandwich in her hand. Lifting it to her mouth, she sinks her teeth into the meat, the melting cheese, and the bun. Even though the bread is made by Aunt Chele, it still tastes a bit like grandma's. That's good enough for Paige, and she chews on the treat, her stomach performing a happy dance.

"She's eating," Michele whispers to Liz.

"Hush. You'll scare her, and she'll stop," her best friend responds.

The little girl's eyes widen when she spots the man from the bookstore at the bottom of the bleachers. She liked him. He was funny. A little silly, but he'd made her smile on the inside. Maybe after she eats her burger, she'll go sit with him. He seems sad. Alone. Paige knows how that feels.