There werepictures and wall hangings covering most of the surfaces. A fire burnedin the fireplace and it cast a warm glow throughout the room."Cynthia... this is my wife Marge," he said."Hello, I'm very pleased to meet you," I said."Welcome to our home Cynthia," she said, and extended her hand towardmine. Her hand felt warm and loving. "Let me introduce you to the restof the family." Mom, this is Cynthia, she'll be joining us for dinner tonight," Margesaid."Are you a friend of Darren's'," she. Actually, we were dirt poor and because of this, we were often the butt of jokes and bullying. My brothers had run this gauntlet but after Bella’s first two years, there were always siblings to support them. Bella had Tom and James, and they had each other, and then when David joined the school Tom and James were still there and by the time Mary went, David was there to watch her as her older brother.By the time I went to school, David had left and although Mary was there, as a girl, she didn’t. I had left Friday at noon and it was now noon on Tuesday. Mom was supposed to move onto Greenville tonight but things could have changed. The distances looked so short on the maps in the bus stations but were so far even on the bus.The secret compartment was opened and I took out the twenty dollars. I would have difficulty spending it in its current form. I had to ask a lot of questions and in a half hour I found a bank that would do it for me. The teller looked at the money as if it weren't. Nothing came immediately to his mind as he made his way to the bedroom door. The pounding on the door only served to highlight his current fatigue.“Alexander! Open this God damn door,” she screamed, loud enough to wake Samantha.“Who?” she said groggily.“Shh, just the boogie man, although I was really hoping for Bonhomme(1) this morning,” he said as he pulled his pants on, buttoning them up as he walked into the great room, closing the door to the bedroom behind him. He was amazed at the.