Title – Clean
Author – Mia Kerick
Cover By Louis C.
Harris
Genre – Gay, Young
Adult (14+), Romance, Contemporary Fiction
Published By – Cool Dudes
Publishing
Release Date – December 1,
2015
Word Count – 64,162 words
Tag line – Only by
coming clean do they learn they were always clean
High
school senior Lanny Keating has it all. A three-sport athlete at Lauserville
High School looking at a college football scholarship, with a supportive
family, stellar grades, boy band good looks… until the fateful day when it all
falls apart.
Seventeen-year-old
Trevor Ladd has always been a publicly declared zero and the high school
bad-boy. Abandoned by his mother and sexually abused by his legal guardian,
Trevor sets his sights on mere survival.
Lanny
seeks out Trevor’s companionship to avoid his shattered home life. Unwilling to
share their personal experiences of pain, the boys explore ways to escape,
leading them into sexual experimentation, and the abuse of illegal drugs and
alcohol. Their mutual suffering creates a lasting bond of friendship and love.
When
the time finally comes to get clean and sober, or flunk out of high school,
only one of the boys will graduate, while the other spirals downward into
addiction.
Will
Lanny and Trevor find the strength to battle their demons of mind-altering
substances as well as emotional vulnerability?
Clean
takes the reader on a gritty trip into the real and raw world of teenage
substance abuse.
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We are completely smashed, to the point of slurred speech and drooling. For some reason, Trevor finds something about this situation incredibly entertaining. “Can’t believe I’m gonna do this…and you aren’t making me….” I’m confused by his words, but then, I’m pretty shitfaced.
“Do what, Trev? What are you gonna do?”
He pushes me down in the backseat of his fancy car where we’ve been doing shots for the better part of an hour. It doesn’t take much effort to get me underneath him because it’s where I want to be. “This, Keating.” Trevor reaches up underneath my T-shirt and he drags his fingers up my stomach until they reach my neck. “And don’t think it means something cuz it don’t.”
That’s when I get the picture. I’m slow because of my major buzz, but I’m gradually getting clued in to what’s coming next. My heart starts beating wildly. My throat tightens and threatens to close. I stammer, “O- okay…uh…g-go for it.”
Once more he reminds me. “This don’t mean anything.” And then his face closes in on mine. I’ve never kissed a girl or been kissed by one before, let alone by a guy. But I know I want this. Right before our mouths come together I reach up to touch his face with one hand, and his cheek is rough and scraggly and perfect. By the time his lips find mine, my hand is shaking worse than a crispy brown leaf in the fall breeze, and Trevor pushes it off his face like it’s annoying him. We kiss for no more than thirty seconds when I feel his fingers on the button of my fly.
Mia Kerick is the mother of four exceptional children—all
named after saints—and five nonpedigreed cats—all named after the next best
thing to saints, Boston Red Sox players. Her husband of twenty years has been
told by many that he has the patience of Job, but don’t ask Mia about that, as
it is a sensitive subject.
Mia focuses her stories on the emotional growth of troubled
young men and their relationships, and she believes that sex has a place in a
love story, but not until it is firmly established as a love story. As a teen,
Mia filled spiral-bound notebooks with romantic tales of tortured heroes (most
of whom happened to strongly resemble lead vocalists of 1980s big-hair bands)
and stuffed them under her mattress for safekeeping. She is thankful to CoolDudes
Publishing, Dreamspinner Press, Harmony Ink Press for providing her with an
alternate place to stash her stories.
Mia is proud of her involvement with the Human Rights
Campaign and cheers for each and every victory made in the name of marital
equality. Her only major regret: never having taken typing or computer class in
school, destining her to a life consumed with two-fingered pecking and constant
prayer to the Gods of Technology.
Website (& Blog): www.miakerick.com
Twitter: https://twitter.com/MiaKerick
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/mia.kerick
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