Excerpt: LA Connection

Rich dropped a tray with hamburgers and fries down in front of Charlie. He'd hoped to go somewhere a bit more special than McDonald's as an apology of sort to Charlie for bringing up Maddie, but McDonald's is what had happened.

"This is exactly what I've been wanting," Charlie breathed, a look of ecstasy on his face.

Rich paused for a moment, stunned. "Woah, really?" he said, finally.

Charlie nodded, taking a bite out of his hamburger.

Rich heaved a sigh of relief, shoving a french fry in his mouth. "Well, I'm glad to be of service to you."

"You always are." Charlie smiled, then looked down at his food. "Hey, Rich?"

"Yeah?"

"How come no one goes and looks for people like they say they're gonna? They say they'll travel across the world for someone, but no one ever really does that."

Rich swallowed his dinner, trying to figure out what other threads of thought had lead to what Charlie was pondering. He did that sometimes. He'd mull things over in his head and then blurt out seemingly random questions, but they always made sense to him. "Wait... huh?"

"You know... all the blues guys. And rock guys, too. And just musicians and bands in general. They all write theses songs about how they're gonna hitchhike across the country for some chick or guy or whatever, but they never do. They just talk about it. But none of them actually do it."

Rich paused, mulling that one over. "Well... is someone really worth that? Like, a lot of relationships like that are one-sided. Maybe. I dunno."

"True love is always worth it," Charlie said, rather matter-of-factly.

"You understand women more than you think you do, Charlie."

Charlie cocked his head to the side, a confused expression on his face. "Huh?"

"Never mind," Rich chuckled, stretching. "Yeah, I dunno why they don't do all that stuff. I mean... yeah. Sure. If you're madly in love with some chick and want to travel across the country to find her, sure. Whatever makes people happy, I guess."

Charlie looked up at Rich, eyes sparkling, looking like Christmas had just come early. "Really? You really think that?!"

"Yeah, well..." Rich stared at Charlie, apprehensive. "Wait... what?"

Charlie started wolfing down his food with a vengeance, still looking excited out of his socks, as if there was something he absolutely had to get to right now.

"Charlie?"

Charlie looked up, heart pounding, eyes wide.

"Woah, man!" Rich chuckled, ruffling Charlie's hair. "Swallow and breathe there!"

Charlie did so. "What is it?"

"Dude. What got into you? You look like someone just lit a fire under you or something."

He nodded. "Yeah! We're going on a trip!"

"A... a trip?"

"Yeah!"

"To... where?" Rich asked, a little nervous about what this might mean. "Charlie, you're scaring me."

Charlie shook his head. "No, no! It's all good! We're going to California!"