I didn't know where I was, but I was at peace. Totally relaxed. My sight was impaired, but I felt a warm glow on my skin. I knew it was golden by the way the hairs on every inch of my body stood at attention.

I tried to speak, but my voice was gone. No matter how I bat my blind eyes or grunted, I couldn't hear or see a thing.

Despite the peace and tranquility, it felt like hell. I reached out my arms, stretching my fingers, trying to come into contact with something, some thing, anything.

Any. Thing.

But to no avail.

Surprisingly, the sudden smell of lavender and peach blossoms stopped in my tracks.

My body went into convulsions and I felt my spirit redirect itself, zapping towards the light.

I knew I was headed in that direction because the warm glow was hotter than the sun.

Frightened, I started to scream, slamming into something, whatever it was.

My nerves were shot.

And there it was.

Light. Blurs. Motion. But not enough to form a picture my mind could comprehend. At least I had my eyesight back. Well, partially I supposed.

I felt a prick in my upper arm and my spasmodic body met its demise via immobility.

All I could do was fall into a deep sleep.

Harry grunted, just a bit and his mother jumped up to her feet, the blanket she brought from home falling on the floor.

"Baby? Harry?"

Tears fell from her eyes. Lovingly, she cupped his hand. Maybe she imagined her comatose son grunting. She already had to deal with the seizure he had a few hours before.

He used to grunt in his sleep when he was growing up deep in the heart of the inner city in New Orleans. But his father divorced her after a nasty fight, moved to Miami and raised him into the boy next door.

Her ex-husband viciously took him away from her. And she was too weak, too self-absorbed to try to locate him.

Harry was book savvy, made great grades and treated the ladies like Queens.

Until he wanted to be one himself.

It was during a homecoming football game that Dime, Harry's father, ex-dope-dealer-turned-Sgt.-of-the-police-department, was caught off guard by his ranked number one in the nation football playing son.

It was half time, and Northwestern High School was up three touchdowns against Carol City High, one of the biggest games in Miami Dade County. It sold out in record time. There were even rivaling schools in attendance.

A special program was put together for the half time show. Football players from both teams set their helmets on the bleachers designated especially for them and lined up, one behind the other, and taking their female dates, members of the cheer leading squad, by the hand after handing them roses.

The football players ushered them to the middle of the field.

There was cheers and thunderous praise from the crowd.

Handsomely dressed in uniform, Dime's eyes sparkled when he saw his son, wide receiver, with his cheerleader date. Harry made the national newspapers five times his senior year.

Reporters were snapping photos, flashes nearly blinding everyone.

Harry released his date's hand and stepped to the microphone, staring at his father.

"This was supposed to be a special half time show, where we take our girlfriends to the mic and recite half written poems, pushing One Man, One Woman bullshit."

His team mates were thrown off guard.

"I want you all to meet that special someone in my life."

Reluctantly, Harry held up his hand, gazing into the quarterback's eyes.

Hesitantly, the star quarterback of the rivaling team, Carol City High School, Lou Jackson, took Harry's hand and wrapped his arms around him.

Collective gasps filled the stadium. The cheerleaders dropped their roses on the ground and looked at their dates in a suspecting way...

Harry and Lou, six feet four, as masculine as they wanted to be, stood together. In unity.

"Sorry, dad. I can't be who you want me to be. You don't think I know or remember that you took me away from my mother, father?"

Deeply hurt and publicly embarrassed, Dime lowered his head, his hands on his hips.

"Since you took her away from me, I'm taking me away from you. Lou and I love each other and there's nothing you can do to stop me!"

There was a gun shot.

POW!

A bullet went through Lou's knee cap.

Protectively, Harry covered Lou's body when the second gunshot sent everyone in a screaming panic.

Four of Harry's team mates (on the down low), stomped Lou and Harry into unconsciousness.

A sea of police officers has to use tear gas to break up the huge riot that ended in five deaths.

And now, years later, Harry's mother, Lady, burst into sobs when Harry slowly opened his eyes.

"Harry? Oh my God! Nurse! Nurse! My son has returned to me!"

After seven days of a comatose sleep, Harry gripped his mother's hand, trying to remember who she was.

"Baby" Lady showered his face with warm kisses.

"Do you know who I am?"

As a few nurses and a doctor thundered into the room after hearing the marvelous news, Harry said, barely above a whisper. "John... Jonathan..."

Who was Jonathan? he wondered, too exhausted to remember.

Why was that the only name he cared to think about?