No more "Later Days" is a historical, psychological and sci-fi (time traveling themes) trilogy about Jeremy Wade Delle which I wrote between May 2020 and April 2023. It is a no-profit piece of work which aims at being the most serious, realistic, respectful and accurate possible.
The three books count 1200 (1800 in book format) in total and follow the events of Jeremy’s life from January 8, 1990 to January 7, 1991, but with a difference: the story is narrated by a 21st century time-traveler who is sent back to try to change the course of events and prevent the boy from taking his life.
Synopsis
Disclaimer and aim
Sources
Methodology
Differences from real events and limits
Contents of the three books
Acknowledgements
Will the whole trilogy ever be published?
Year 2020. Nicole cannot get over a story she read a few months prior: the suicide of American fifteen-year-old Jeremy Wade Delle in early 1991. Empathizing with his struggles, she finds herself feeling depressed, angry and powerless about what happened to him and keeps telling herself that if only she had been around, she would have certainly known how to help him.
It is this strong belief that brings a visitor to her home one night - something similar to a god, or a spirit, who says their name is Time. Time offers Nick the chance to prove herself and go back to one year before the boy's death to try to help him and prevent him from taking his life. Nick cannot believe what is happening, but accepts. And when she lands in a house she has never seen before and reads the date January 8, 1990 in a newspaper, she understands she is far from being in a dream.
Living in the shoes of a seventeen-year-old who just moved to Richardson, TX, and without anyone to count on except for herself, she will try to change the course of the events in Jeremy’s life while struggling with a completely different world. While at first it may seem easy to be a good and empathetic source of support, Nick will soon learn that no matter the effort, similarities and good intentions, some situations are more complicated than others and sometimes being a really good friend - or at least trying to - is not enough, and that what you actually need is a team, together with a great dose of patience, empathy and planning.
The main disclaimer is that the trilogy is in no way intended to serve as an example of how things ‘should’ have been done. The actions my supporting character takes in the trilogy respond to my personal wish of going back and managing to help Jeremy, it is an imaginary consolation to the feeling of powerlessness I feel - It is as honest as I could put it.
The main aim of the trilogy is using a great dose of empathy and psychology to try to humanize not only Jeremy but the people close to him. It means nobody is demonized and nobody is glorified, and the same goes for my own character: my character is seen taking choices that some would not approve and sometimes does not act like a very nice person, because even if you have the best of intentions, that does not mean you are not going to make mistakes or be hurtful to other people.
As we all know, because of the song Jeremy became just a story, something that is told when someone talks about it and says "Did you know the inspiration behind this song?", and the narrative is always the same: the poor kid abandoned by everybody who was bullied and committed suicide in front of his classroom as a consequence. That is it. There is nothing else, no counter-narrative - Jeremy becomes just a one-sided character in a short and one-sided story, and everyone else around him is subjected to the same fate: Nancy is just his first love, Michelle is the second girlfriend who did him wrong, the parents were blind and careless and his friends are just nameless ghosts with no identity. Everyone has a role, but nobody is ever seen as a three hundred and sixty degree person.
What I tried to do with this trilogy is to build a counter-narrative. I tried to materialize Wanda's words into a project: "That day that he died did not define his life" and I tried to extend that concept to those close to Jeremy using empathy, psychology and the information I could find.
My main sources were jeremywadedelle.com and its admin Ash; ssheps.com, thejeremystory and the police report. I also used screenshots of statements of reliable people who really knew Jeremy which were passed to me from friends who researched about Jeremy long before me and who also told me what they could remember learning about.
For what concerns the time period and the geographical area where the story is set, I used a multitude of sources: from hundreds of web searches to asking Americans online, my own parents and people who lived in the Dallas area in those years (the members of the facebook group “You know you're from Texas when...”).
For parts concerning psychology (e.g. therapies, Borderline Personality Disorder and Bipolar Disorder) I consulted a multitude of scientific journals and the DSM (sources will be posted in the dedicated chapter). I also used my notes from the psychology courses I attended at university.
I used both jeremywadedelle.com and thejeremystory's timelines to trace a set of major events happening in the real life of Jeremy from January 1990 to January 1991 and I built the new events around those.
I used a calendar of the year 1990 to navigate between dates, events, national holidays and whatnot and carefully calculated how long it would realistically take for a certain event to start and finish (e.g. a couple of hours, an entire week...).
The first thing I did was tracing a general line of behavior and thought by considering the character's role (parent, headmaster, policeman...), age (teenager, baby boomer), time period, culture and the current situation going on in the story. This means that I am expecting a headmaster to be serious and authoritarian when disciplining a student, or given the time period and place/culture (Texas) I am expecting baby boomers to be particularly dismissive of certain topics (mental health, civil rights…) and claim they “know best because they are older”; or I am expecting teenagers to do impulsive and stupid things because of their age.
I based the behavior of real people (Jeremy, Nancy, Wanda etc.) and their way of talking/thinking on the information I found in the sources I previously mentioned. I also built their reactions/responses by always asking myself the question: "How would this person realistically react?" or “What would be more likely to happen?”. For example: if my character says something disrespectful, I am certainly not expecting Jeremy's parents to stay calm and tell her how nice of a friend she is - I am expecting them to get irritated and put her in her place. When I was not sure about the realism of something, I asked for advice around, namely to Ash, Epiphany and my real-life friends.
Personal opinions (e.g. politics, ideas about friendship, religion, personal taste like in music...) of real people were always either omitted or kept vague (e.g. "Mr. Crane talked about the politicians he did not like") in case I had little or no information to support those. In case I did have some hints here and there, I only made people express beliefs that were aligned with their character. This means that I never, for example, made Jeremy say he was for or against George H. W. Bush’s government if I did not have any evidence supporting either statement.
Real people, especially if I did not have enough information about them (which was practically everyone's case except for Jeremy) were always described in either neutral or positive tones. If they turned rude or questionable (e.g. the cold blood between Nick and Mr. Delle throughout the story) I always made it clear that it was a reaction to my character being out of line. However, there are instances in which Jeremy's family is indeed described with a negative connotation by Jeremy himself: I based those comments off of the things I read on my sources and I made sure to include my own thoughts in the narration, justifying Jeremy's statements by his momentary altered state of mind; or by the fact that it is common among teenagers to hyper generalize (saying that something ‘always’ happens when in fact it only happens from time to time) or describe things bigger than they are (like saying “nobody likes me” when in fact it is only a couple individuals).
I also read a lot about psychology and used what I learned from the previously mentioned courses I attended at university.
Regarding Jeremy, in addition to all of the above, I based part of his behavior (especially during bad/difficult times) on symptoms of both Borderline Personality Disorder (since he was believed by some friends to suffer from it) and Bipolar Disorder (for mood swings or manic episodes). Thanks to Ash, I was also able to consult a private letter that Jeremy himself wrote to a close friend in late 1990, which provided a lot of insight into what Jeremy was really like.
The first major difference is that, in the trilogy, Jeremy lives alone with his father, while in reality he also lived with someone who was either his dad’s new girlfriend or wife (I could not figure out which one of the two). However, one thing that confused me is that some sources stated they lived together, but then other sources explained that Jeremy found the gun most likely at his dad’s new girlfriend/wife house. I could not understand who she was or where she lived so I decided to just include her in the story as an external character.
The second major difference and without a doubt the most important one, is that in real life Jeremy changed three different schools in a single year: from September 1989 to March 1990 he was at Bryan Adams High School in Dallas (Grade 9) and he was living with his mother and sister in Dallas. His father bought a house in Richardson in late September 1989. Then in late March 1990 Jeremy went to live with his father (and his father's girlfriend/wife?) in Richardson, continuing Grade 9 at Richardson Jr High School. Finally, in October 1990 he started grade 10 at Richardson High School, still living in the same house with his father.
In the US, Grade 9 is considered by some schools as the final year of middle school, while others consider it as the first year of high school. Both Bryan Adams High School and Richardson High School comprised grades 9-12 (ages 14-17), while Richardson Jr High School comprised grades 7-9 only (ages 12-14/15): that was why Jeremy had to change school again to start Grade 10. Now, it is clear that most people in their early 20s would not pass for fourteen-year-olds, so they would not fit in Richardson Jr High School. However, most of them would pass as seventeen/eighteen-year-olds and could therefore attend either BAHS or RHS as seniors: that was my supporting character’s case.
The trilogy begins on January 8, 1990, exactly one year before Jeremy’s suicide. On that date Jeremy was still at Bryan Adams. There, he seemed to be doing relatively fine and had several friends, so I found that the introduction of my character and her help would not have been of any use, and frankly the idea of following him around by changing two schools was too complicated for me to narrate (I dare not imagine what it was like for him to actually live that...).
So in the trilogy, and this is the major change, I made Jeremy move in with his father in Richardson and therefore attend RHS in early January 1990, thus setting the story in one place, as it was easier for me to narrate. However, in order to keep the ‘substance’ the same, I made him already be friends with Shelly etc. and be somewhat of a loner throughout the year, including some bullying episodes; but since I know he did have some friends at RHS as well, I made sure to mention his other friends or depict scenes in which he is seen hanging out with them. In short, the setting is slightly different, but what Jeremy was experiencing and going through was kept the same.
I also changed the fact that Jeremy became an outpatient in Timberlawn in July 1990 and started the new school year in October, while in the trilogy these events happen respectively in late June and early September.
Another difference is of course the presence of sci-fi themes in the story, like Nick being a time-traveler, the presence of Time and the fact that nobody else can see him (except for some instances), the funny and absurd presence of the “FBI men” in PART 1 and some of PART 2 and the influence of the Watch on Nick. These themes are only a frame to keep everything together and make it easier and quicker for my character to navigate around school stuff (e.g. Nick does all by herself in the story, but there are a few occasions in which she has to rely on Time impersonating her father in order to get out of trouble, for example when she risks being suspended after the school fight). Everything else is of course the most realistic, scientific and accurate possible.
Finally, the major limit is that I never met Jeremy, nor have I managed to talk directly to anyone who actually knew him, sadly. I also was not living in the States at the time; however I spent three years researching in order to make the trilogy the most accurate possible, but of course, for the reasons I specified, some inaccuracies are to be expected.
PLEASE NOTE: it is vital for me to state that all of the above and the whole trilogy was written when the discoveries contained in this article hadn't been made yet. I couldn't go back and correct everything, because that would have meant to just throw the whole trilogy away and re-write it from scratch. Therefore, please keep in mind that there are indeed a few (more) historical differences from real life, but rest assured I did everything in my power to make everything else the most accurate I could, citing every bit of info I found and wrote about.
PART 1: it narrates the events from January 8, 1990 to June 24, 1990. It is the most lighthearted of all three books, both because I had just started writing it and I was yet to realize its full potential, and because in this part we mostly get to see Jeremy’s outer shell, or as Shelly called it, the “macho cloud”.
Nick’s objective here is to befriend Jeremy and gain his trust so that she can be considered as a source of support. This book - but actually the whole trilogy - is also interesting because it is narrated from the perspective of someone who has to learn how to live in a completely different world, where the internet as we know it does not even exist, where people use vinyls and cassettes to listen to music and drivers need to consult physical maps to move around… it is 1990, after all!
This part also contains events from Jeremy’s real-life like meeting Nancy, the suicide attempt of April 1990 and getting admitted into Timberlawn - events which make Nick understand that either she takes action, or history is going to repeat itself.
PART 2: it narrates the events from June 25, 1990 to October 12, 1990. This book has very late 80s/early 90s vibes and it is filled with activities and fun times, like going to the swimming pool, skating, playing drums, movie nights, nights out down in Dallas with friends, Jeremy being a comedian and telling a lot of funny jokes etc. It therefore starts out pretty lightheartedly and we get to see a more complete picture of Jeremy.
But as the book progresses and as we meet other people from his real life (Wanda, Jeremy’s sister, Shea and Shelly…), we also start seeing his behavior during bad times. This manifests itself through BPD symptoms such as sudden and excessive anger outbursts, identity crisis, neediness, fear of abandonment, black and white thinking, impulsivity, substance abuse etc. The book becomes darker and heavier the more it progresses and it ends with Nick understanding that she was wrong in thinking she could help Jeremy by just being a very caring friend, and that she will need to work with a team if she really plans on changing the course of events.
PART 3: it narrates the events from October 13, 1990 to January 7, 1991 and the epilogue. This is the most serious of all three books and it sees Nick tirelessly researching through scientific journals and books in order to try to find a new, more effective type of therapy for Jeremy. But she needs to cooperate with his family in order to get something out of it.
Because of her taking part in the events, often taking the fall for Jeremy, Nick’s behavior in this part of the story is also extremely different from the one she had at the beginning: she is far more serious, determined and hostile (towards the people at school). There are also a lot of anxious thoughts going through her mind, constantly wondering if Jeremy’s going to make it or not and how she is going to live with herself in case he does not.
There are real events from Jeremy’s life narrated in this part, for example ISS, the money stolen from the basketball game and the animal leg from the locker incident… but they do not happen in the same way they did in the first 1990.
First of all, I would like to thank my close friend T. for supporting me in the writing of my trilogy for the past three years, for her enthusiasm and for actually sitting down and listening to me reading several chapters. You were my only reader but believe me when I say that without you, I do not think I would have come this far.
Secondly, I would like to thank Ash, not only for creating jeremywadedelle.com (without which none of this would have happened), but also being so kind and supportive towards me and my work, but also for helping me figuring things out when I was stuck and for sharing what he knew about Jeremy and the people close to him.
The third most special thank you goes to Epiphany, who shared with me what she knew about Jeremy and the super useful screenshots she had, supported me emotionally when things went south in the “community” and gave me lots and lots of advice when I was stuck with writing. You were such a precious help, thank you.
Then I would like to thank the members of the facebook group “You know you're from Texas when…” who helped me tremendously in learning about the 80s/90s, about Dallas and Texas in general and their traditions. Your kindness was really overwhelming.
Special thanks also go to the late Steele Shepherd and his ssheps.com and to the admin of thejeremystory for creating their websites which, together with Ash’ one, were my main points of references.
I would also like to thank Onalise for her (frankly unexpected) kindness and availability in sharing what she knew or had about Jeremy; Geoff for the times he gave me his opinions about what to do in the story and of course my other real-life friends who supported me throughout this journey.
And finally, but not less important, special thanks goes also to Lisa Moore who was able to give me a little more insight on ISS and what she could remember about Jeremy.
The short answer is no. I may decide to publish short extracts online in the future, but I’ll have to see about that. I have other projects in mind at the moment.
Hope I managed to explain all of this thoroughly.
Thank you for reading!
Waterfall