The Cupid War

Woodbury, Minnesota

Copyright Information

The Cupid War
© 2011 by the Timothy Carter.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any matter whatsoever, including Internet usage, without written permission from Flux, except in the form of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

As the purchaser of this ebook, you are granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this ebook on screen. The text may not be otherwise reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, or recorded on any other storage device in any form or by any means.

Any unauthorized usage of the text without express written permission of the publisher is a violation of the author's copyright and is illegal and punishable by law.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Cover models used for illustrative purposes only and may not endorse or represent the book's subject.

First e-book edition © 2011

E-book ISBN: 9780738729954

Book design by Steffani Sawyer

Cover design by Ellen Dawson

Heart image on cover and part pages © iStockphoto.com/Adrian Niederh
ä
user

Flux is an imprint of Llewellyn Worldwide Ltd.

Flux does not participate in, endorse, or have any authority or responsibility concerning private business arrangements between our authors and the public.

Any Internet references contained in this work are current at publication time, but the publisher cannot guarantee that a specific reference will continue or be maintained. Please refer to the publisher's website for links to current author websites.

Flux

Llewellyn Worldwide Ltd.

2143 Wooddale Drive

Woodbury, MN 55125

www.fluxnow.com

Manufactured in the United States of America

Acknowledgments

There are always many people in need of thanking for bringing a book to life. Here are the biggies. I'd like to start off by thanking my wife, Violet, for her support, encouragement, and love. Next, I'd like to thank Acquisitions Editor Brian Farrey, for seeing this book's potential; Robert Brown, for being an excellent agent; Sandy Sullivan, for her fantastic editing; and Indigo Spirit manager Lori MacDougall, for having me in to do so many signings.

I would also like to thank the Mood Disorders Association of Ontario (MDAO) for their wonderful staff, programs, group meetings, and facilitators (like Catherine, Barb, James & Fey, to name a few). They continue to help many people coping with a mood disorder, myself among them.

And finally, in no particular order, my thanks to the organizers and volunteers of Polaris, Ad Astra, Anime North, Con-Cept, and other fantastic SF/Fantasy conventions; Tim Hortons, for their life-giving steeped tea; Stephen Moffat, Matt Smith et al, for another terrific series of Doctor Who; and the Source, for the never-ending flow of fun ideas.

For my sister Claire, who helps me navigate the dark.

prologue

R
icky Fallon sat on the bridge railing, preparing to jump. It seemed like the least painful way to die, while ensuring the best chance for success.

He also wanted to cause the least amount of trouble for the city; his father believed a jumper was involved every time there was a delay on the subway. Fallon didn't want his dad to think he was inconsiderate. At least, no more than he already did.

That left bridges, and the only ones high enough were the two that spanned the Don Valley. The bridge of choice for most jumpers had been the Prince Edward Viaduct, but city planners had finally made good on their promise to build a safety fence along both sides. It was an eyesore for people driving by on the parkway below, but as a suicide stopper, it was most effective.

The Pape Street Bridge, however, had no such fence. Fallon had left his house at midnight, taken a bus to the bridge, and prepared himself for the final solution to his troubled life. For Fallon, there wasn't one specific reason for wanting to die. At least, he reflected, it wasn't
entirely
one specific reason.

Yes, he was upset over losing Becky. He took out his cell phone and looked at the only decent picture he had of her, the one he'd taken on their third date. That had been a good day. One of my last, Fallon thought, as he set the phone aside on the ledge.

Yes, he hated getting yelled at by his father because he was too sloppy, he wasn't doing well enough at school, he didn't show enough initiative, he wasn't like his big sister, or he'd turn out just like his mother.

Yes, he hated his mother. She'd named him Ricky shortly before she'd run out on him and his father and sister. And then she had to go and get killed by a drunk driver before she could apologize and make things right.

All that had made him hate his life, but Susan had driven him to the point of death.

Susan Sides was his closest, dearest, bestest friend. At least, she liked to think so. Their French teacher had paired them for a
dict
é
e
over a year ago, and Susan took that to mean they should be friends forever.

And Susan needed a friend. Her family hated her, boys thought she was ugly, and none of the girls would hang out with her. That was what she'd told Fallon, every single day, for the last year. And during that year, Fallon's own life had fallen down the crapper.

Boy, did it ever, Fallon thought. Even now, as he stood ready to end it all, he couldn't believe things had gone as badly as they had.

It had started in small ways. He'd found it hard to get to sleep, and even harder to get out of bed. His appetite went down, and so did his grades. He stopped finding joy in things, and every endeavor seemed a huge effort. Problems with his father began in earnest, and the school bullies came out of the woodwork to hammer him with everything they had. Fallon felt like he had a heavy wet blanket wrapped around his heart, and it grew heavier whenever Susan was near.

He'd tried to get her to make other friends. No one else wanted to befriend her, and Susan herself didn't want to try.

“I don't need a whole bunch of friends,” she'd told him. “I just need one friend. You!”

He'd tried to get her some counseling. Susan refused to get any kind of help. Why would she need professional help, she said, when all she really needed was one good friend to listen? It never occurred to him that he might need counseling himself; all his efforts had been for her.

Fallon had tried reasoning with her. He'd asked her to only unload her problems on him if it was an emergency.

“But when I have a problem,” she'd replied, “it is an emergency!”

He'd said he needed more free time.

“But the time you spend with your friends is your free time!”

“I need to spend more time with Becky,” he'd tried. “She's my girlfriend, after all.”

“But you're my only friend!” Susan had said. “If I didn't get to spend time with you, I'd … ”

She hadn't needed to finish. Fallon knew what she would say.

“If I didn't have you,” she'd told him once, “I'd kill myself.”

Of course Becky had dumped him. He was spending all his time with another girl. Besides, he'd changed since they'd started seeing each other. Now he was moody and tired all the time, and no fun at all. She had, however, given him one chance.

“Drop the loser,” she'd said, “or we're done.”

Fallon hadn't wanted to break up with Becky, but he didn't want Susan to kill herself, either. He knew she would; after all, she told him she'd tried before.

He had to choose between his relationship and her life.

“Don't you run out on your friend,” his father told him. “That's what yo
ur mother would do.”

“I'm not like Mom,” he'd said.

“Prove it,” his father replied.

Fallon proved it, Becky
broke up with him, and Susan clung to him for another three months. She would cling to him forever if he gave her the chance. Fallon didn't want to give her that chance. He wanted out. He wanted freedom.

However, as he sat on the edge looking down at the barely visible Don River below, Fallon changed his mind. It wasn't because of a ray of light from Heaven, or an angel appearing to tell him there was a better way. Instead, Fallon changed his mind due to a very simple realization. On Monday morning at school, there would be shock. By the afternoon, however, there would be jokes. He called himself Fallon. The word “fall” was right there in the name. Sure, it was pronounced differently, but he knew his classmates would make the connection.

“A guy named Fallon falls to his death. What're the odds of that?”

“Fall-on really lived up to his name, huh?”

“I guess swallowing a bottle of pills just wouldn't have been appropriate.”

In the latter part of his life, he'd been a joke. Did he really want to be a joke in death? Sure, he'd get a page of the yearbook all to himself, but did he really want to be remembered as a punch line?

And so, with a heavy heart and a loud sigh, he swung his legs back onto the ledge. He had no idea how he would get through the next day or the next week—he didn't even know how he was going to get home—but he'd manage somehow, he supposed.

Fallon stood up to hop down from the concrete railing. As he did so, he slipped on the cell phone he'd left there, and fell backward off the brid
ge.

p
AR
t 1