Storiesonline.net ------- Annie Gets Another Chance by Openbook Copyright© 2005 by Openbook ------- Description: Story number thirteen in the Caddymaster Saga. Jackie gets asked to help smooth things over with his parents when Annie jumps the gun on starting her family. Codes: MF ------- Chapter 1 It was sometime in 1963 that my sister Annie started making some big changes in her life. Ever since her problems with Kevin Hartigan five years before, she had avoided relationships that were anything more than casual sexual encounters. I don't know how many short term affairs she may have had, but the number was larger than most girls at that time. She liked sex, and wasn't too shy about letting someone know if she found him attractive. She avoided married guys, or men who were in serious relationships, but anyone else was fair game as far as she was concerned. Sexually speaking, she acted just like the guys of that era, getting laid whenever a good opportunity presented itself. The first time I knew that anything different was going on was when my brother Ray came over to see me on a Saturday sometime in early February. He asked me if I had heard anything going on concerning Annie, and I told him that I hadn't. "Something's definitely going on Jackie, I've heard a few guys complaining that Annie has stopped being "friendly" all of a sudden. She hasn't been showing up much at most of her usual places, and when she does, she's leaving by herself. I thought she might have said something about it to either you or Ellen." I told him that Annie was old enough to decide for herself about things like that, but that I'd check with her soon just to make sure that things were going Ok with her. Ray asked me if he could borrow my Impala for the evening since he had a big date and wanted to show her a good time. He promised to give it a good wash and a wax and to not use up too much gas while he had it. When I told him all right, he then proceeded to borrowed ten bucks from me too. I really admired the way he worked me to get what he wanted. He was so good at it, after he left, I felt like he'd done me a favor by doing the borrowing from me, rather then going to someone else. I went into the house and asked Ellen if she'd spoken with Annie lately. When she told me it had been a couple weeks since she'd heard from Annie, I told her about my conversation with Ray. Ellen seemed upset with me that I hadn't asked Ray more questions about it. Women think differently then men about stuff like that. I told her that it might be better if she checked in with Annie, rather than me, because the two of them were comfortable talking about anything. She told me that she would call Annie as soon as her baking was finished. Ellen was after me to put an extension phone in the kitchen, so that she could chat on the phone when she was waiting around for things to be cooked, and couldn't leave them alone for long. Everytime she got a chance to show me how much easier her life would be if she had a phone in the kitchen, she'd get in a little commercial in favor of the extension. "Call the phone company on Monday and get extensions installed in the bedroom and in the kitchen, Ellen. Maybe you also think that you need another one in the crapper too, but you just tell them to give you a long cord in the bedroom that will allow you to take the phone into the bathroom." "You're the best, Jackie, mom will be so pissed that I've got three phones and she only has two. Can I get a second line for the kitchen too, so I can call out even when you're on the other line? It won't be that much more money, and I'd stop asking for anything else about phones from then on, promise." I knew she was only saying that she'd stop asking, but even that, her saying it, was a big improvement, so I nodded my yes to her, and got myself a nice smooch as a reward. It always amazed me how friendly women can be when you just let them have their way with things. I forgot all about my conversation with Ray after that, and was only half listening a couple weeks later when Ellen started talking about some dinner engagement we were going to the next Saturday evening with someone named Yanoush or something like that. "Wait a minute, who or what is a Yanoush?" He's Annie's new boyfriend, haven't you been listening to a single word I've been telling you?" The answer to that question is always 'yes, of course I have', but suddenly, I really wanted to know just what important information I'd missed out on getting. "Sorry, hon, I'm afraid I was looking at your ass and thinking about something else entirely. I'll try to pay better attention from now on, please repeat it for me." Well, it worked, so I got to hear the whole thing right from the beginning. "Good recovery, Jackie. All right, I was telling you that Annie and I had a nice long talk, on my new kitchen phone, not the extension in the bedroom, because I was in the kitchen and that long cord you had me get them to put in doesn't quite reach all the way to the kitchen., plus I was leaving the other line open in case you needed to call me for something." "If you don't hurry up and get to the good part, I'm going back to thinking about your gorgeous ass some more." "Aren't you being sweet! Anyway, Annie has a new boyfriend, he's a Hungarian man from Hungary, over in Europe? You remember that country that the Russians attacked with their soldiers and tanks a few years back? Anyway, his name is Janos, spelled J-A-N-O-S, even though it sounds different than it's spelled. That means John here, isn't that funny? He works at the Sunoco station over by your parent's house. He's thirty years old, and was a school teacher in Hungary before the Revolution or uprising, whatever they call it. Annie seems quite taken by him. She hasn't been out with anyone else in almost two months now. We're all going out to dinner, Saturday night, so we can meet him. Annie doesn't want to take him to meet your parents just yet. Isn't that exciting news? I'm so happy for her, and she sounds like a young girl again." "I'll just wait a bit and hold off on celebrating until after we get to see this guy. I'm not that sure I like my sister being with some foreigner. What's he doing working in a gas station if he's a teacher anyway? Something doesn't smell right here if you ask me." "Well, when we meet them Saturday, we'll find out all about him. Annie wants us to go someplace where there's dancing. She says Janos is a real good dancer, and we haven't been dancing in a real long time." After that, I kind of tuned her out again and went back to thinking my own private thoughts. Annie didn't have too good a record with picking out guys. I figured I better go check this guy out myself before Saturday. The next morning I went over to the Sunoco station and got my tires rotated and my oil changed and had a new fan belt put on. While I was waiting for them to finish up with everything on the car, I had myself a little talk with Doug Myers, the guy who owned the garage and the Sunoco dealership. He told me that this Janos guy had been there for two years and had pretty much kept to himself until he and Annie started going out. He said the guy was taking night classes up in New Haven two nights a week to get his Connecticut teacher's certificate or something so he could teach in the schools around here. He also told me the guy was dependable and helpful although he didn't know shit about automobiles other than where the gas and oil went and how to check oil and water levels and tire pressure. I found out the guy only made forty bucks a week too. When I got back home and told Ellen all this useful information, she wasn't at all impressed with me. Women don't value the direct approach for gathering information, they like to trick it out of the guy themselves, without him ever being the wiser. By Saturday afternoon the two ladies had picked a place for dinner and another for dancing and we all had agreed to meet at the restaurant at five thirty. Just the excitement of going out dancing had Ellen so worked up that we had ourselves a little 'nooner' which we didn't then do as often as we had in the past. Never one to look a gift horse in the mouth, I accepted my good fortune and did my best to ring her chimes a time or two. Ellen was always very responsive to my tongue work, and I could get her up there and keep her there for quite awhile. I figured if I spent a little extra time and effort before the evening got started, then she wouldn'y be so likely to start up with her games when we were out with Annie and Janos. Well, it was worth taking a shot. Cleaned up, Janos looked better than he had over at his work. He was only about five seven, or so and had light brown hair that was thinning a little bit on top. He talked with an accent, but a person could understand him Ok. He kept mixing up his "V's" and his "W's". He would say vorked instead of worked and wery good instead of very good. Other than that, his English was as good as a lot of people who'd been in this country a lot longer than him. He claimed that he spoke five languages, but since I only spoke the one, I just had to accept that on faith. He told Ellen the name of the place he came from, some little village over near Romania, but I couldn't pronounce it if my life depended on it. He was excited about being able to teach again very soon and had lined up a job over in Niantic for after he finished getting his papers from the state. He would start the new job in August if everything worked out all right. He was a math and science teacher and was going to be teaching at the high school level. We had just finished a nice dinner and things had gone pretty well I thought, up until that point. We wrestled a little for the check, but Annie and Ellen both convinced him that it was Ok to let me pay for dinner. He insisted that I let him leave the tip though. We were getting up to go over to the night club and do some dancing, when Ellen dropped the bombshell news on me. "Jackie, Annie and Janos want the two of us to stand up for them as witnesses when they get married next Wednesday at the courthouse over in New London. I told them that we'd be happy to. Isn't that right?" She kept walking towards the restaurant exit, assuming that I'd just follow her. I turned to Annie and Janos. "She's kidding right? You two aren't thinking about marriage already. Jesus, Annie, don't you think you need to run this by mom and pop before you go running off to do this? Janos, have you even met my parent's yet?" Annie got that deer in the headlights look on her face, and I saw her turn to look at Ellen as she was heading back our way again. I wanted to sit back down at our table there and talk about this crazy thing they were contemplating doing. "Are you pregnant or something?" "Not here Jackie. Let's go Annie, hurry up Janos we want to get a good table near the dance floor. Jackie, we'll talk over there, come on sweetie, nothing's going to happen tonight anyway." I found myself being led away and out into the parking area walking towards the night club seventy five feet or so from our restaurant. My mind was racing, getting glimpses and images of how my folks would react to this harebrained scheme. He seemed like a nice guy and all, but two months? You can't even break in a new pair of work boots in two months. I needed to slow this whole thing way the hell down, if there was any chance at all of having this not blow up in all our faces. We got over to the dance place and got seated at a small booth that was close enough to the dance floor but still a place where we could talk until the band got started up. After we were all seated, Ellen put her hand on top of mine and gave it a squeeze. "Nothing here to get all upset over, Jackie. Annie has known Janos since last September. They didn't start dating right away, but when they did start up, Annie was with Janos exclusively, no one else, although she still went out to see her friends from time to time before they started getting serious. To answer your other question, yes, they are expecting a baby some time in September. More importantly, they love each other. Annie's afraid that your mother and father, especially your father might go off the deep end before either one has a chance to think about what this all means to Annie. She prefers to present Janos, the marriage and the coming baby to them all at once, after the wedding. I think Annie's right. She wants you to give her your approval and blessing before the wedding. She values your love and the closeness that the two of you have. I love you too, Jackie, and I know you don't want to be seen as taking sides against your parents, but it is probably better to do it Annie's way." This whole dinner and dancing had just been another set up orchestrated by Ellen in order to manipulate me into doing what she and Annie had cooked up together. I wondered if she'd ever learn that this was the worst way in the world to get my cooperation? "Janos, I hope you haven't been part of all this planning and plotting, because these two are leading you down a path that can only end in a multitude of bad ways. You don't know my parents yet, but let me assure you that if you go along with this plan, they'll never forgive you and you might find yourself in deep trouble because of that. We need to take our time here and come up with a better plan than the one they've chosen." "Jackie, I'm not liking to sneak around either. Annie says we must. I vant to go see your papa man to man and tell him vhat I feel for Annie. Other vay is wery bad I think too. In my country if man love woman, when comes baby not so important as here I think." The guy was looking a little pissed now himself. Enough that I was now starting to think that they'd bamboozled him too. "Janos, you and I will go see my father tomorrow together. I give you my word that he'll at least hear you out before anything bad happens between the two of you." As soon as I finished talking, I realized that Ellen had once again managed to get me to do exactly what she wanted me to do in the first place, but knew I'd never do if she had just approached me with the idea directly. It was maddening to me. I also understood that the 'nooner' had been part of her plan as well. She softens me up and makes me mellower with the good sex, to give her plan a better chance to work, and, if it doesn't work, and backfires on her someway, well she's gotten several good orgasms already and won't be missing it too much if we have a fight and both go without for a spell. With everything settled to Ellen and Annie's complete satisfaction, the rest of the evening went very well and Ellen was so loving and sexy with me out on the dance floor that I almost forgot how she'd just put another on over on me. Almost. I called my father the next morning and asked him if he would meet me over at Billy's farm in an hour and help me out with a problem I was having. I drove over to the Sunoco station and told Doug Myers that my father wanted to know if he could borrow Janos for the rest of the day to help him out with some family business. Doug knew my father, by reputation at least, and decided that he could spare Janos Ok for that day. I told him my father would really appreciate his willing cooperation and that Doug could probably expect some more gas business from the taxi company. Dad had a small interest in the cab company that serviced Groton and Poquonnock Bridge. He'd gotten it as payment for a favor to Mr. Bennett a long time ago. I grabbed Janos and off we went. I had called Billy earlier and filled him in on what I was planning and asked him to help me with it. "Hey pop, thanks for coming. This is Janos, a friend of mine. He works for Doug Myers over at the Sunoco. Janos, this is my dad, John. Pop, Janos means John in Hungarian, can you believe it?" The two men greeted each other with a handshake. Pop, Janos needs a favor. He's just about to get his teaching certificate and he's got a good job set up teaching over to Niantic come August. the problem is that he's fallen in love with a local girl and the two of them want to get married." "Yutch, you're not trying to shit a shitter are you? You don't think I know who my own daughter is keeping company with? Why this whole song and dance? Is Annie pregnant or something? So, what's this favor that he's needing? It wouldn't be that he wants my help in keeping your mother from stabbing him with a kitchen knife would it?" He looked from my face to Janos and back. "Oh shit, she is pregnant isn't she? Tell me quick 'Yanni' you planning on marrying her and making an honest woman of her?" "Of course, I'm not some kind of Gypsy that makes babies and runs from my responsibilities. I love Annie. I would marry her baby or not." "Good enough for me. When's the wedding? Yutch, I'm delegating to you the task of breaking all of this to your mother. I hope you don't try to pull the same kind of bullshit on her that you did with me. She'll see through it in a heartbeat and she isn't as understanding about things like that as I am." He shook hands with Janos and Billy and gave me a pat on the shoulder before heading back to his Studebaker and driving off. A man could go broke betting that he knew which way my father was going to jump. I would bet a lot that he had found out that Annie was pregnant even before the doctor told her the news. Leaving it up to me to tell my mother was some kind of punishment for me trying to trick him. I was getting more and more convinced that I was the dolt of my family. I figured I would wait another day to break things to mom. ------- Chapter 2 I went over to see my mother early the next afternoon. I followed my father's sage advice and didn't even try to pull the wool over her eyes. It was good that I approached her that way because she was already suspicious that Annie was pregnant and was relieved to find out that there was a man who accepted responsibility and wanted to marry her. After I told her that my father already knew about it and had asked me to break the news to her, she questioned me about how he had taken the news when I had told him. She laughed when I told her about my attempted deceit. "Jackie, you've got to get up pretty early in the morning to put anything over on that man. I suppose Annie and her fella want to have a nice, quiet wedding or else run off somewhere to get married?" I told her about Annie and Janos wanting a civil ceremony at the courthouse, but when her face started clouding over, I had enough sense to stop talking and let her tell me exactly what was going to happen.When I left, an hour later, I had enough work to do to take me three months to do it and only three weeks to get it all done. My mother was pulling out all the stops on this wedding. I think the main reason was that she felt that Annie had endured enough disappointments in her past relationships with men, and my mother thought a big church wedding would somehow, miraculously, make all those earlier memories fade to nothingness. Three weeks to the day later, Annie and Janos were married. They were married up in Lyme, with a bishop of the Church officiating. Every relative in the family that my mother was able to contact was there for the wedding. Even my grandfather rode in from New Haven to watch his granddaughter get married. It was surreal watching him enter the church and be ushered over to sit next to my grandmother, his estranged wife. I was seated one row up and listened with trepidation, half expecting a big ugly scene to unfold. "Good morning Mary Catherine." "John Francis." That was it. They had last spoken at the funerals for two of their grandsons seven or eight years previous to the wedding. When the wedding was over, my grandfather stood aside as my Uncle Donald led my grandmother away from the church. Other than my mother, Annie, myself and one or two cousins of mine, no one spoke a single word to him at the reception either. I guess leaving a woman alone to care for ten of your children, all still living at home, to traipse off in search of peace and quiet and some degree of happiness for yourself was considered a no no by the great majority of the family. Having had to listen to my grandmother when she was in one of her full tirades, I felt like I might understand why he felt like he had to get away. I couldn't excuse it, but I did understand it. My mother thought the sun rose and set on her father's ass, and she always loved him no matter what he did or failed to do. When he was up in New Haven years later, with cancer eating away at a host of his organs, she went up there and nursed him night and day for the final three weeks before he died, and then took care of all his funeral arrangements. He left everything he had to my grandmother, including his railroad pension. After his death, she was financially comfortable for the first time in her life. Of course, by then she was eighty one years old and wasn't able to enjoy the money due to her own declining health. A few of us had pooled our money and put together a nice honeymoon for the newlyweds in Niagara Falls. Annie looked so happy walking down the aisle. She was in a beautiful light blue wedding gown, having refused to wear anything white, walking arm in arm with my father, who was wearing his dress blue Navy chief's uniform with four rows of ribbons and decorations. The reception went pretty well until one of my uncles, drunk and feeling morose, braced my father about some ancient slight he'd felt he'd suffered at my father's hands. When my Uncle Donald, his brother, tried to pull him away, telling him it wasn't the time or the place for that sort of thing, Uncle Jimmy took a swing at him and caught Donald behind the ear, making him stumble into one of my aunts. It all ended when there was a brief set to with two of my other uncles and both of their wives subduing Uncle Jimmy and dragging him away from my father. My father. all during this was, of course, grinning and enjoying the whole fracas immensely. I loaned Annie and Janos my Impala for their honeymoon trip and off they went for two weeks of honeymooning. While they were gone, we were busy renting them a one bedroom furnished apartment and moving their personal things into it. Janos passed his classes and was issued a license to teach in Connecticut. After their baby was born on September twenty first, and while Annie was still in the hospital, Janos moved over to Niantic to be closer to his school. Annie quit her job at Electric Boat and became a full time housewife and mother. In all, they had five children, all boys, Zoltan, Laurant, Josef, Imre and Georgy. I assume those are all Hungarian names, because they sure didn't come from our side of the family. Janos worked until 1997 and then took retirement and he and Annie moved down to Key West, Florida. The last I heard, they have eleven grandkids, all girls, and were standing by with their fingers crossed, since two of their daughters in law were pregnant again with their hoped for grandsons. I talk to Annie on the phone most weeks now, since I have one of those phone plans where you can make unlimited long distance calls for almost nothing. She is still happy in her marriage and with the way her life turned out. I actually saw her last at my father's funeral in 2000. She looked matronly then, having put on a lot of weight and had let her hair go completely grey. When I talk with her now, her only major worry in life seems to be getting Janos to quit his smoking. We had a chance to reminisce after the funeral for our father, and she told me several interesting stories about things that had happened in our family before I was born. "Did you ever know Jackie, that dad wasn't my real father?" I almost fell over in shock when she said it. My parents had been married in 1937, but I had never given much thought to Annie's birthday being in May and their wedding being in November of that same year. Nothing either of my parents had ever said gave me any indication that he wasn't her father. "It was Uncle Bill. He got mom and Aunt Margaret both pregnant at almost the same time. Mom didn't even know about him and Margaret until Margaret turned up pregnant. Dale is my half brother, but I'm pretty sure he doesn't know that." "Jesus Annie, are you sure about this? Hell, you don't look anything like Uncle Bill. You look more like dad than I do." "He's on my birth certificate listed as my father. Daddy adopted me and changed my last name to his when I was one years old. Mom and Aunt Margaret didn't even speak to each other for three or four years after mom found out about Bill and Margaret. It was when Margaret was pregnant with Billy, and Uncle Bill and Dad were in the service and away from home a lot. The two of them started talking again and Aunt Margaret was able to finally tell mom about how jealous of her she had been, and how she had wanted to get back at her in some way after mom had graduated and Margaret had failed out of the nursing school they both went to. She didn't plan on getting pregnant, just stealing Bill away from mom was all she was after. Mom told her that she was glad it happened in most ways because she never would have met and married dad if she and Uncle Bill had stayed together or gotten married." "How come no one ever knew about any of this? How could they manage to keep something like that quiet from me and the rest of us?" "Jackie, most of the family did know. Not you, or Joan, or Ray though. It wasn't something anybody was so proud of that they'd want to bring it up. Another thing I've wanted to tell you for a long time, but I promised mom that I wouldn't, was that dad told us that it was you who did that thing that night in New London with Kevin. He told us because he was afraid that you might try to do the same thing I did, you know, try to kill yourself. I guess you heard me talking to him on the phone that day? I never told you this Jackie, but if he hadn't died when he did, I was probably going to try it again. After it happened though, and dad told us that it was you, I knew I had to stop thinking about that, killing myself, and instead, try to make sure that you would be Ok. I'm sorry you had to do that, but I'm glad that it was done. I hope that makes sense to you. I've always loved you more because you loved me so much that you'd do something as hard as that. I used to listen to you crying at night, but dad would never let any of us say anything to you about it. He said you'd get through it just like he had from the war." "Annie, we all loved you, and still do. Any of us would have done the same thing, given the chance. It doesn't make any difference about Uncle Bill and all. To me, you'll always be my whole sister, and in my mind, and in dad's too I bet, you were his whole daughter. Do you have anymore surprises for me?" "Just one more, but I bet this one will shock you more than my first one did... This is one that dad asked me to tell you after he was gone. He told me after mom passed away, but I don't think he thought then that he'd live another eight years after her. Cousin Billy, is your half brother. Mom was so pissed off at Aunt Margaret and Uncle Bill that she had dad seduce Margaret and have an affair with her just to try to get her pregnant again and to pay her and Uncle Bill back. Dad always said that mom could carry a grudge harder and longer than anyone he'd ever known. In all the years after, mom never let on to Margaret that she had sent him over to put the horns on Uncle Bill. Aunt Margaret never confessed to mom that she'd had an affair with dad either. Dad told me that mom got a big kick out of Margaret thinking that she'd put another one over on her. It was too good a joke to her to ever let Margaret in on it. When Margaret died, mom lost her sister, her best friend and her nemesis all in one. So what do you think of that, Jackie?" "I kind of had an idea; as Billy got older, he favored dad in appearance a lot. Billy has the same eyes and skin color as dad, and the same temper too. It's no secret that dad had a lot of little dalliances, why should Margaret be exempt? Billy and dad were pretty close too, after Uncle Bill died. I'll bet Billy knows already. I won't say anything to him though, in case he doesn't know, because he and Aunt Margaret were awfully close." It was about a month later that Billy and I were sitting out, late in the afternoon, on my front porch. This was a much bigger house from my first one. I'd had it built in 1984, after the first big land and housing boom in our neck of the woods. We'd both been drinking Southern Comfort and Seven-Up all afternoon, and were both feeling no pain at all. Theresa and Ellen were inside, staying out of our way for once and letting us act like fools if we wanted to. "I sure do miss your pop Jackie, he was a one of a kind type of guy. I learned a lot from him. He treated me better than my own father ever did. When he wasn't either kicking my ass or threatening to kick it." "I do too, cuz. He lived a long and full life though, and he was sure ready to go at the end." "He was like a dad to me, too, always trying to give me advice and warning me about things if he thought I was making a mistake." "Billy, I'm sure he thought of you like you were another son of his. He was always paying attention to what you were getting up to since the time you were little." "Funny you should say that Jackie, because we were having a couple drinks together, him and I, a few years ago, and he told me a story you'd never believe. I'm not sure that I believe it myself." "Is it the story where it starts out that we're cousins and ends up and we're brothers? Because, if it does, I've heard a story just like it before." "So, what do you think, could it be true?" "Hell yes it's true. You look a hell of a lot more like him than me or Ray ever did. He told Annie not to tell me about it until after he was safely buried." "So, how do you feel about it?" "Can't really see where it makes too much difference, we were practically raised together anyway. I guess it proves what Minnie was always saying back when we were young anyway." "What's that?" "That Dale got all his brains from her side of the family and not from ours." "Fuck you, Jackie!" Billy wasn't about to abandon his Blackwell heritage entirely. He still felt strong kinship with Uncle Bill and his Grandmother Minnie. His tone of voice made that clear enough. He wanted me to accept and acknowledge that kinship too. "Ok, sorry bro." Billy looked over and smiled at me, acknowledging for the first time that we both knew who we were and where we now stood with that knowledge. It didn't make any real difference either, none of what Annie told me that day after the funeral. I would have still gone over to New London after Kevin Hartigan if I'd known about who Annie's real father was. Billy and I still treat each other the same way as we did before. I kind of feel bad for Aunt Margaret though. I never thought she loved Uncle Bill, and with what Annie told me, I could see better what her life had really been like. Ellen got a little excited when I told her the stories that Annie had told me, and I know she and Theresa feel closer because of it. I don't understand why, but they do. I have taken to going fishing quite a bit with Little Billy, who is now almost fifty years old. He has always called me Uncle Jackie, ever since he could talk, even before Billy and Theresa got back together again. Except for my sister Joan, my brothers and sisters have led pretty good lives once they got married and settled down. The same could be said for me. As I get older, I spend a lot of my time sifting back through a lifetime of memories. I can see times where my father threw me together with Billy for no good reason that I could ever see. He didn't encourage me to spend time with Dale, but he'd do little things to make sure that Ray and I spent time being around Billy. Even when Billy was being his meanest, when being around him was physically painful for Ray and I, my father saw to it that circumstances conspired to keep bringing us together with him. In the end, I think he was pleased that Ray, Billy and I had managed to weave the fabric of our lives so closely together. ------- The End ------- Posted: 2005-09-13 Last Modified: 2005-09-15 / 02:28:06 pm ------- http://storiesonline.net/ -------