conversations.from: human
conversations.value: a description for a book titled Abide with Me about Raymond's, Invisible, Am</a with the genre: Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual & Transgender Books, Literature & Fiction
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conversations.value: The third volume of the Invisible Life trilogy picks up the characters' lives a few years after the conclusion of <a href="/exec/obidos/ASIN/0385469705/${0}">Just As I Am</a>. Raymond Tyler and his partner, Trent, are living together comfortably in Seattle, until Raymond's nomination for a position as a federal judge brings to light some troubling incidents from their past. Meanwhile, Raymond's former lover, Nicole (now happily married to his best friend, Jared) is starring in a touring company of Dreamgirls , although a sinister understudy is willing to stop at nothing to take the role for herself. And former pro football player Basil Henderson, who's proved himself over the years to be perhaps the author's most compelling fictional creation, is regularly attending therapy (although it doesn't seem to be helping him deal with either his denial of his bisexuality or his emotionally abusive behavior towards others). While readers unfamiliar with the author's previous stories will be able to follow the latest plot developments without much trouble, having the first two volumes of the trilogy under your belt is a definite advantage towards knowing where the characters are coming from.
conversations.from: human
conversations.value: Delete the last sentence.
conversations.from: assistant
conversations.value: The third volume of the Invisible Life trilogy picks up the characters' lives a few years after the conclusion of <a href="/exec/obidos/ASIN/0385469705/${0}">Just As I Am</a>. Raymond Tyler and his partner, Trent, are living together comfortably in Seattle, until Raymond's nomination for a position as a federal judge brings to light some troubling incidents from their past. Meanwhile, Raymond's former lover, Nicole (now happily married to his best friend, Jared) is starring in a touring company of Dreamgirls , although a sinister understudy is willing to stop at nothing to take the role for herself. And former pro football player Basil Henderson, who's proved himself over the years to be perhaps the author's most compelling fictional creation, is regularly attending therapy (although it doesn't seem to be helping him deal with either his denial of his bisexuality or his emotionally abusive behavior towards others).
conversations.from: human
conversations.value: the first five paragraphs for this book
conversations.from: assistant
conversations.value: Abide with Me
  The offie's up the end of the Mile End Road, near Stepney Green Station. Keith reckons we can get the job done in five minutes, hop on a train, and be back in bed for cocoa and crumpets before you can say Jack fuckin Robinson.
  Couple weeks beforehand, me and Keith goes in to case the joint, check out the lay of the land. We get out at Stepney Green, and the gaff's right on top of us.
  It's just your normal offie. Stacks of beer in pyramids, wall to wall bottles, couple of birds, mid-fifties, behind the counter, till apiece. One of em looks a bit rough, like she'd stripe you soon as look at you, but the other one looks all right. There's a back room through a curtain, but it's shut and we can't see in. Probably just a little tea-room or something. No wonder the gaff's been done over so fuckin much. Fuckin askin for it with this set-up.
  We don't wanna hurt no one, specially not a couple of birds old enough to be our mums, but if push comes to shove, you know, job's gotta get done proper. You can't be too fuckin careful in this game.
  So, Friday night comes round, and it's fuckin pissin down. A couple of minutes out of Stepney Green, we're soaked to the fuckin skin. Turns out to be a bit of a touch though, the rain sheetin down like this, cos there ain't no bastard about. We come to the row of shops where the offie is. I look at me watch. Five minutes to closin. Bang on the dot. Everything other than the kebab shop and the offie are shuttered up. Wind's gettin up and the rain's comin right into our faces. Fuckin weather.
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conversations.value: four more paragraphs
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conversations.value: I go home past The Barmy, jump the fence, and go and sit on the swings for a while. Don't seem like yesterday since we was all playin football up there on the slope with Dad and all me mates. And that time when Kenny goes in goal and makes a tit of himself and Robbie Jenkins scrapes his leg cross the tree in a tackle and has to go home with his jumper tied round his knee to stop the blood pissin out. Don't seem like fuckin yesterday.
  And no one ever tells you stuff like that's gonna end. Not your mum, not your dad, not your teachers. Fuckin no one. I mean, you know nothin lasts forever, you know that, but that's sort of different, that's sort of in your head. But you don't know it inside, you know, deep down. And when it happens, when it all goes to fuck, that's when you know you don't get none of it back. That's when you know you're on your fuckin own.
  It's early hours when I'm comin down our street. Passed Thommo's gaff on the way. Front garden's all grown over and the windows are boarded up and the front door's got graffiti all over it. Old man's done a runner or banged up, that's fuckin obvious. And poor old Thommo, cos he got sectioned, he ain't even got a fuckin lettin out date. Just another poor cunt, like the rest of us.
  Cos there's holes in this world, see. Holes. And the likes of Thommo, and Keith, and me, and Kenny, we just sort of fall through em. We weren't never bad kids, we just didn't have nothing to hold on to, that's all.
conversations.from: human
conversations.value: the last five paragraphs
conversations.from: assistant
conversations.value: Really fucked him up when Kenny sorted him out in the canteen all them years back. Even went to visit him in the nut-house. When Harry saw Kenny goin down the bins when he got out, he felt right bad, thinkin it was him that done it to the poor bastard. Wanted to make it up and thought he could get even with Terry at the same time. See, Terry'd beat the shit out of Harry from the day he was born. All body stuff, you know, like the old man taught him. No wonder the poor fucker got like he did with Kenny. Had to take it out somewhere.
  Harry sorted Kenny out with the house and his mum's funeral, and stuff. Was really good to him, you know. His Governor was after Swordfish, but it was Terry what Harry was after. In the end, what with Kenny's diaries and all the other monkeys on the Firm grassin each other up left, right and fuckin centre, not a one of em got away with less than a fifteen stretch. And Swordfish, he won't see the light of day the rest of his fuckin life.
  They buried Kenny with his mum in Barking Cemetery. Place was packed. People said they never see nothing like it.
  I see him sometimes. In me dreams, or if I close me eyes real tight. And he's lookin at me. Just lookin. And his eyes, they're big and they're bright and they're shinin, and it's like he talks to me with em. And when I squeeze me eyes even tighter and look really close, his eyes shine even more. And they're just like what he said about Becky's all them years back in his diary.
  And that's when it really gets me, that's what makes me really fuckin sad. Cos behind that glue, underneath all that shit what ended up bein his life, those eyes of his, they never stopped shinin.