Excerpt: The Bittersweet Collision

Prologue
How To Ride A Rollercoaster

When one boards a rollercoaster, they are usually looking for one thing and one thing only: an adrenaline rush. The sheer thrill of shooting through the air, jutting left and right, whirling upside down, is enough to make anyone go vertigo. Unfortunately, if that is the type of frenzy you are looking for, it would be best to search elsewhere. The Bauer family is one mysterious case. Seeming so bright, so… normal on the outside. Yet such a fragile and crumbling pile of ruins inside the outer shell. However, if what you are looking for differs from that of the average rollercoaster rider, the story of the Bauer family is still overflowing with twists and turns and ups and downs… in essence, a figurative rollercoaster.
However, before one can truly enjoy the full throttle speed this “figurative rollercoaster” will offer, one needs to know how to ride such a thing. In this case, that will require several facts that need to given before we set off. Right now, your body is strapped inside the spacious cart and you are just setting off, bumpily rushing up the very large hill, knowing that in just a short period of time, you will be hurled downwards into a spiraling frenzy of chaos. But before we reach that breaching point, you will just have to hold on with every ounce of patience left inside, and consider these facts:

*Fact #1*
The Bauer family is NOT dysfunctional. Of course, they most certainly are not normal… but their problems extend so much more beyond dysfunctional, that we simply just use words such as broken. Wounded. Weak. The truth is, the main problem with the Bauer family, is that they don’t know how to show love. When they are thrust into situations to rely on each other for support… they just can’t find that virtue of love. It is there… it’s just hidden deep down, covered so that their eyes can’t see. Their alternative? Yelling, arguing, slamming doors… everything the exact opposite of love.

*Fact #2*
Despite these overly alarming and unsettling facts… nothing is impossible. An overused phrase such as that one still holds meaning today. Just because the Bauer family may be broken… may be wounded or weak, doesn’t mean that they can’t fix that. Can’t sew back together the tearing thread holding apart the limbs of the family. Can’t find a trace of Sun in their darkness. A glint of hope in the doubt. A shred of light bursting through the cracks of the night. And so, once again, I will enlighten myself with the phrase that has been used so many times today, yet still holds complete truth today and forevermore. Nothing is impossible.

*Fact #3*
The story you are about to read will not be an easy one. Think of it as a trek down a gravel path filled with loose stones, with a prize fit for kings waiting at the end. The long walk there may be difficult, bruising and scarring you up, but the reward at the end will be worth it. Worth the scars to prove what you had to overcome to reach the prize. The treasure. Although this journey will rip at your heart, trying to tear it up into shreds… a sewing machine will be waiting at the end of the journey. The end of the path.

The facts have been stated. The explanations given. We have now reached the top of the hill, the coaster cart just beginning to bend over the arching track. Now, we prepare for our sudden descent down into spiraling chaos, where we will be met with fury, hate, dread, doubt, darkness, tears, wounds and scars. Yet where we will also be met with hope, love, light, and goodness. And isn’t that, my friend, the main reason to experience this bittersweet collision?