My phone vibrates as I'm closing up the office. I look at my watch and notice it's already seven o'clock. Letting out a big sigh, I grind my teeth a l...ittle as I check my messages.There are four unread texts and two missed calls. I pull them up. My buddies wanted me to come out to the bar for a few rounds. My wife also texted me, asking when I was coming home, saying she was feeling lonely. We haven't been really intimate lately, this being my busiest work season. She hasn't been all that. “Mom, Daddy, I’d like you to meet”... Nallen stepped forward, “Ma’am, Sir, I’m Nallen t’Laptrour.”“Heh, no need to be so stiff. I know the grief Lin would give me if I tried running you off. Not to mention Martha. ‘Sides, not like she’s still in high school ... or even college. I’m David Piance. Come in, come in, don’t stand out there like a Jehovah’s Witness or Amway salesman.”I tugged at Nallen’s hand, he finally entered their apartment. He shook my father’s hand first, then just like Mern. Alex, full of rum and dread, yet void of lust and passion, responded tothe outrage by vomiting in his teacher's face. As she recoiled inhorror, Alex rolled off the living room sofa, retrieved his jeans andbriefs from the rug, and then, leaving his sneakers and socks behind,ran half-naked from the house. Barefoot and disheveled, his cheeksmarred with cheap lipstick, Alex held nothing back (other than hishomosexuality) from his parents when they chanced upon him as he wassneaking home via the. “Are you talking to me?” he asked,”How can you see me?”“I can’t really see you,” she said, smiling,”But I can sense you, andwhen you replied I knew I was right – what are you doing here – has WillRiker become a voyeur in his maturity?”“No,” he said, smiling,”I’m trapped here, I walked into a timepocketand when I stepped out I found myself on this ship.”“On this ship? have you left the Enterprise then?”“No – but this is a different ship…..it’s difficult to explain – Idon’t even know how I could.