Jerry Hooten

Friends and Others Jerry Hooten

"My name is Ben Walters. I was an only child. I was born with a deformed foot that curled in at the ankle. My father left my mother shortly after I was born. I suppose he was disgusted with the ugly child with a clubfoot. My mother and I lived in a two-bedroom apartment above a small drug store. Mom worked in the pharmacy as a clerk, and I was left with the old lady that lived in the apartment next door while she worked. As I was growing up, I didn't have any real friends. Besides the clubfoot, I was good at my studies, and that made me a pariah with the other kids. I couldn't play sports, didn't care for them anyway, and I was more happy reading or studying. It was a lonely childhood, I guess, my mother was my only real friend, and she was generally too tired after working all day to spend much time talking with me. That's when the trouble started. I got an imaginary friend." Then things get weird. Theo, the imaginary friend comes back to visit Ben in college. Problem is, he is now a real person. Another problem is, Theo is still an imaginary identity. Ben and his friend, Theo, have to get him a real identity and fabricate a past. Theo, understandably, is a little lost and confused. Ben is confused and lost. As Theo's life gets real, Ben's life gets interesting.