When Billy Constable was eight years old he was a good-looking kid. Unfortunately, he wasn’t nearly as good-looking when he grew up. For one thing, Billy’s chin stopped growing. Also his freckles disappeared and he began losing his mop of dusty brown hair. He didn’t gain any weight. He just grew. Billy became tall and skinny and almost bald and chinless and bony and shy and introverted and I don’t know what else.

One day in late December 2011, Billy Constable turned nineteen and decided to leave his home in Bowling Green, Kentucky. “I’m gonna seek my fortune in New York City,” he told his parents the night before he left. Billy’s mother said just about the same thing his father had said, which was basically, “That’s nice.”

Billy couldn’t explain why he picked New York City or why he decided to leave home so close to Christmas. He just did. Billy’s folks didn’t care where he went or what he did when he got there. Ma and Pa Constable never gave a good goddamn what any of their nine kids did. They weren’t what you’d call loving or caring parents. They never beat their kids but they never hugged them, either. They just never paid them any attention.

So Billy Constable grabbed a Greyhound bus heading north. It was raining when Billy boarded the bus. It rained all that day and well into the night. The constant rain would have driven Billy crazy and the ride would have bored him to death if he wasn’t sitting next to a young stranger who seemed friendly.

Billy Constable was seated by the window. The stranger, who was one of the last to board the bus, sat next to him on the aisle.

They didn’t know it yet, but the stranger and Billy Constable were the same age, easygoing, and fun to be around. They were skinny as sticks with maybe a total of two hundred and fifty pounds between them. Both were from the South, heading north to start anew. Both were young and hadn’t done much with their lives so far. And neither one of the boys was afraid to risk some of his loose change on various wagers. This last trait quickly endeared them to each other.

But that’s where the similarities ended.

The stranger was outgoing and extroverted. Billy Constable was shy and mostly kept to himself. The stranger had lots of red hair. Billy was going bald. The stranger was dressed like a country bumpkin. He wore a leather porkpie hat and a torn denim jacket and jeans. His T-shirt advertised the John Deere Company. His jeans were cut so high above his ankles you could see his skin over the tops of his socks. Billy had on his best (and only) sport coat, tie, and dress shirt. Stuff he wore to church.

“You from Bowling Green?” asked the young stranger shortly after they were seated.

“Yep. You too?” asked Billy, looking out his window even though the bus was still in the terminal.