Another relaxing friday night in front of the computer thought James Settling into his well-padded swiveling chair he turned on the power switch His terminal loaded immediately He had set it to since it was almost all he used his computer for anymore He had forsaken what he had left of a social life in his town for the modem as when he called boards his personality was changed almost magically from the shy inverted James into the violent outspoken Bovaline What board to call James thought He knew so many Purple Reign Digital Inferno Schweppetek Eternal Insanity yes that was the one He had not called Eternal Insanity for a few days and was already missing it He missed the full-blown configuration the sysop MindCrime had set up He missed all the messages where he could be himself No not himself He was a great actor but while he never got on a stage in his life he did act - Whenever he called this board he became the great Bovaline and he felt as though he could do anything Could he Sometimes he wondered Sometimes he wanted to try things but something held him back He wanted to fly like a bird most of all He just wanted to know how it would be the wind rushing by his face propelled by nothing but Bovaline s powerful muscles He knew he could never do this but still a part of him wanted to try wanted to just jump into the air and fly off into the sky He was startled out of his thoughts when the modem screeched He recognised the connect as a 14 400 connect before it even showed up on the screen as he had memorized all the sounds a modem can make from his extensive use of them The opening screen showed up Wow he changed the welcome screen again! It seemed as though every time he called something changed something that made it even more real for him drew him further into the guise of Bovaline He immediately entered the messages menu - That was where his friends were and he was anxious to talk to them The first message he saw was one telling him he was a pathetic little fuck His veins in his forehead were close to popping out No one but NO ONE treats Bovaline that way He wrote back another flame message and continued The next message told him to please keep his posts on topic or he would lose access This was too much He quickly pressed Alt-H and exited the terminal program and turned off the computer Damn it why couldn t people see how great I can be Why can t they all love me DAMN IT WHY Something had to be done He was too tense First he grabbed his squeeze-man his mother had bought for him after he throw a chair at his door so he would have something to take out his anger on He ripped it in half and threw it at his back wall He knew what he had to do He must fly Bovaline must fly today He walked out onto the back wall knowing he could not do it knowing that the great Bovaline would guide him through the air As he stepped out onto the foot-wide ledge he looked down and his mind raced with second thoughts But the thoughts were banished with one look up at the sky he saw that the sky was his domain and he must control it be one with it The people below screamed One ran for a phone For a while he just sat there high up above the city on his ledge After a while he decided it was time He got up gathered a breath and flew He went up for a brief second but quickly plummeted towards the ground What had gone wrong so wrong that he could not fly He knew He was having doubts and that was wrong He tried to believe he DID believe with all his heart that he could fly His mind flew to the clouds he bounced on the rubbery surface of a cloud and lay down to take a nap He felt something on his wrist but was too tired to stay awake He woke up in a dark room Getting up he felt around and discovered it was a room made of clouds This won t be so bad he decided ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Mrs Jacobson we have some bad news for you Your son has a rare genetic disorder which is what caused him to jump off your apartment building He still believes he can fly in fact he believes his padded room is a cloud at this very moment But don t worry we ll take great care of him we re very experienced with patients of this sort Is there ever any hope for him Mrs Jacobson said between tears I m sorry Mrs Jacobson I m afraid your son has no hope his disease has given him a case of Eternal Insanity