Cres: "'The boyish little scream escaped his lips before he could stop it.' I had to wonder if Joey would have heard his own yelp that way." I hate it when someone points out a flaw right at a place I remember anguishing over (grin). I added "boyish" after reading the original sentence over. "Once or twice you step back from Joey's point of view, and it's a bit jarring to me." I think I know what you mean. If you come back to the thread, pick out a glaring example for me so I'm sure. And thanks for reading and commenting. dialyn: "but I'd rather like to know what he thinks he'd be going to since he seems so confident it will solve his problem. All was "going as planned"...but what is the plan?" From the perspective of an 8-year-old, and assuming readers of the story realize he is an abused child, it hadn't been thought out. To me, he was just eight. I tried to show his inability to understand the full scope of what running away really meant by revealing some of the contents of his backpack--snacks. "does he have any money? (I don't know that he has anything in his bagpack but peanuts.)" Well, the chips are certainly gone...hehe. At one point, though, I did list a few contents of the backpack. Besides running short of words to expend, I thought I could get by with the "short list" of contents. Giving the reader the idea that he had taken just about the same thing any 8-year-old would have taken. As to money? Maybe I should have sqeezed in a remark about emptying his piggybank. "Is he going to a relative? Where is the somewhere where people aren't mean? I guess I want some rassurance he'll be okay." Yes, the story does leave one wondering about his safety. As I wrote the story, I glimpsed a somewhat happy ending that involved spending one night in a park with his dog, the police finding him, and a return to his home where the person abusing Joey listens to Joey's pleas to keep the dog because someone had been mistreating the poor thing. This then resulted in an epiphiny for this person. Thanks for reading and responding. PS: I'm sure I must have stretched it to the limits of literary tolerance, but do I get extra points for working the word, "cacaphony" in there?