It's 1986, and what should have been the greatest summer of Nate Bradford's life goes sour when his parents suddenly divorce. Now, instead of spending his senior year in his hometown of Austin, Texas, he's living with his father in Warren, Wyoming, population 2,833 (and Nate thinks that might be a generous estimate). There's no swimming pool, no tennis team, no mall-not even any MTV. The entire school's smaller than his graduating class back home, and in a town where the top teen pastimes are sex and drugs, Nate just doesn't fit in.
Then Nate meets Cody Lawrence. Cody's dirt-poor, from a broken family, and definitely lives on the wrong side of the tracks. Nate's dad says Cody's bad news. The other kids say he's trash. But Nate knows Cody's a good kid who's been dealt a lousy hand. In fact, he's beginning to think his feelings for Cody go beyond friendship.
Admitting he might be gay is hard enough, but between small-town prejudices and the growing AIDS epidemic dominating the headlines, a town like Warren, Wyoming, is no place for two young men to fall in love.
Summer, 2003. An easygoing teen skateboarder and his insensitive best friend must navigate their changing friendship when a flirty boy comes between them.
*****
Sixteen-year-old Matteo is a simple dude. It's 2003, his brother is fighting in Afghanistan, and his best friend Logan is obsessed with gay jokes, but Matt doesn't like to worry. He just wants to film his skateboard video.
Then cute emo boy Quinn applies to work at the skate shop with Matt. Being friends with clever, flirty Quinn is like learning a new skateboard trick: a little bit intimidating but totally (probably) worth the challenge. Now Logan hates Quinn, there's money going missing at the shop, and Matt can't seem to figure out if Quinn might possibly, maybe, want to kiss him back. This summer just got a lot more complicated.
*****
*featured in LGBTQ+'s "BxB Teen Fiction", LY's "Love Your Identity", and WattpadNaNoWriMo's "2019 Top Picks" lists*
Complete at 59k words.