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Lying on his bed as a cold, pelting rain pounded the tin roof of his "new" house, Gerry began to cry softly in the late afternoon semi-darkness. He had been doing that more days than not. At least, the sound of the rain drowned out any sounds as he made himself stop. He dried his face with a quick swipe of his shirt sleeve and turned on his iPod. Music was the one comfort he had, the connection to his dad. The strains of his daddy's favorite performer, Mark Broussard, filled his headphones with the heartfelt songs of "Carencro".

Downstairs, as Mandy prepared for dinner, she and Eli were arguing, as they had been for the past month. "There you go again," said Mandy, "Always whinin' and complainin'!"

"Well. what do you expect?," demanded Eli, " I work my whole life on this farm, then the one year when rice prices are up, Bam!, we get slammed with a hurricane and the crop is ruined. Useless. But the bills, they come anyway. And instead of being helpful or supportive, all you can do is gripe and nag at me." Eli was sitting at the kitchen bar in the remodeled kitchen of his family's Acadian-style home. His family, the Carrillioux''s, had passed the house and rice farm down for four generations.

"Watch it," snapped Mandy, "I do have a knife in my hands." She glared at him from across the kitchen island where she was working. "And another thing - the kids- they have been a handful lately or haven't you noticed with all your mopin' around?"

"Mais yeah, but it's because of your big idea of taking in Gerry as a foster child," Eli returned, lowering his voice. "I feel bad that his dad was drowned on his shrimp boat during the hurricane but the kids feel like he's an intruder. All of their fighting and bickering, I don't know if I can take it much more, no."

"Take it? How about takin' losing your mom when you're 3 and then, your only other relative, your daddy, as a 10 year old? Now talk to me 'bout takin' it!," Mandy said as she automatically moved her right hand on her hip and leaned forward. Eli knew better than to argue with her then.

"Me, I'm out of here," said Eli as he rose from barstool and put on his jacket. "I'll be back later."

Ryan Carrillioux and his two sisters, Maggie and Betsy, were in the family room listening to this argument. Ryan and Gerry were best friends and in the same class in school. Gerald, as he was called in school, was a common fixture in the Carrillioux household before his father died. "Maggie, why do they fight all the time?", asked Ryan. No answer,

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