Description:
The tile of the Story says reflections. It does as it says on the tin.

Digital Is Better (Reflections)

Is it now, at the time of writing this, just shy of a year since I printed out the initial manuscript.
For all intents and purposes, I do consider that version the first edition (limited to three copies, one red cover I kept for myself, and two blue ones I gave away - there's no meaning behind these colours - they're merely the folders I had at hand at the time).
Back then I had no idea what I wanted (or was supposed) to do with the script - other than needing to rework various bits - which is what I had been doing perpetually since then - with an improved version being self-published, for lack of a better word, online.
Until, and that comes with a big IF, there's printed version, meaning book, there's no definitive version of the novel. 
There's merely a first version and a work-in-progress 'as is' version.

The intention was to write a book I would have enjoyed as a young adult, and would have reread over the subsequent years to get something beyond enjoyment out of it - stimulation so to speak. 
There are several books written by other people, living and dead, that filled that same role for me. 
To mention them here would be akin to putting my work in the same league as theirs - that's not something I can do. That is, at most, something others can do - because no matter what - I can't go back in time and read my novel at the age of, say, twenty - all I could do is write it, and read it, and see what I can learn from it. Oh, and hope that maybe someone else gets the pleasure out of it that was, in
a manner of speaking, withheld from me. 

Having said that - reading it in my head (as opposed to off the page) there were, and still are, many things I could learn from it.
This may sound like I had no idea what I was writing at the time - and in a way that is true. 
Granted I was well aware of the story - I made part up. But on the other hand, often there was no conscious awareness of what was between the lines, the hidden secrets as it were.
And truth be told, I doubt I uncovered all of them. Understood all of it. 
And if I did? 
Would that mean the work is transparent because it only took me about a year to unearth what's hidden in the pages, or would it merely be confirmation that I clearly had a head start considering that whatever is there came in some way or form from inside me? 

Many times when reading books and/or lyrics my initial reaction was something like "what does the writer mean by this or that?"
When I read it again after x-amount of time the response was usually more along the lines of "does the writer mean this or that by writing xyz?"
Later still I might conclude it was neither. Or both. At the same time. Or at different times.
These are precious moments. These are precious works. 

I am inclined to call these generally isolated instances "catching a glimpse of truth". 

Truth is never simple. It is never straight-forward. It is never obvious and easily digested. 
Make no mistake here - there's a vast difference between truth and fact. 
And in a world where even facts are increasingly disputable that gap has only widened. 

It was once said, by I don't know whom, nor why that ultimately mattered, that truth is perception - colour blindness is proof that this assessment is both true and false. The same concept applies to any other form of blindness. Such is deception.
If one is deceived the resulting perception, while essentially true in its intended result, is at the same time false in its inherent nature.

It gets worse still:
Whatever I may perceive from someone else's writing, and this doubly true for my own writing, may be nothing more than the self-deception stemming from the brain seeing what it wants to see, and thus me perceiving what may brain wants me to. 
One of my favourite novels, and I am paraphrasing here, describes this as people looking for reaffirmation of their innate belief rather than the search for some kind of universal, possibly contradictory truth. 
In other words this juxtaposes the human capacity to see what we want to see, and how we "choose" to ignore what we don't want to see.
I parenthesise the word choose because there is not really a choice, a decision involved. Much rather it is the factory setting we come. 
The only actual choice we have is choosing to go against it. Which is, in itself, against the nature of our brain.
One could here argue that constitutes the ultimate form of free will; the liberty to challenge and overcome our default disposition.

And with this we have arrived at the crux of the matter, i.e. what in particularly in retrospect, I have come to believe was the intent of writing, or maybe more accurately presenting, Digital Is Better in the manner I did:
To offer a story that is more or less coherent (yes, there are gaps and contradictions and other flaws - that is deliberately so) but do it in a way that it feels natural and human.
If a person goes back to their memory there is always falsehood and discrepancies. Whether it is because of forgetting minor details or even major aspects, improving or omitting unfavourable elements, that list goes on... I cannot, at least at this point say...
What is certain, however, is the fact that the narrator, Franklin, or more precisely his brain, is no more or less reliable than anyone else's.

Thus he does what anyone would do in his situation: he tries to make his case. His aim is to extricate himself from any involvement in Julie's disappearance. Hence his initial reaction was "how could she do this to me again?" 
While he does no outright say so in the novel, it is reasonable to assume that her blamed her for leaving him to have breakfast with his kid brother at a hotel in a city away from home. 
This incident has no bearing on the story and is therefore not addressed or explored any further.
It does however serve as the setup for Franklin to emphasise the again part of his question/accusation. 
Possibly because when he was later questioned on her whereabouts the prominent thought on his mind was along the lines of "fool me once..."
He then goes over his side, or sides, of the their shared history, looking for clues on why she left yet again. 

With his tales weighing down one scale pan, he proceeds to put whatever he has available from her on the other side, as if to balance things out.
Over time he realises this is not the order of his world, the two sides of the coin are not always equal, the double-edged sword often has two distinct edges. 
He looks for discrepancies between the two sides and for one reason or another decides to take Julie's side as the correct/right/good one, putting himself in the wrong and thereby forces himself to doubt everything he held dear and true in their lifelong friendship.

Make no mistake, or should I say: Don't get your hopes up! Neither the novel nor this piece here are going to reveal the outcome or conclusion of that endeavour. That was never the point. Rest assured, though, that is something to be explored in subsequent works.
I was chiefly interested in Franklin putting forth his case towards any accusers (who are not in any way mentioned or addressed, it could be instead considered a plea to the reader "you tell them - it wasn't my fault") of which there were plenty, friends, family, and not least of all, officers of the law and the like, all of whom convinced he knows more Julie's location and intentions than he lets on. 
Spoiler: he doesn't have a clue. 
But with everyone telling him he must know, he started to reconsider everything and took upon his journey to (self-)discovery. 

It is possible that Franklin was left in the dark because of the plausible deniability that comes with the territory. 
It is equally possible that Julie had entirely different reasons for that. 
Until that chapter is written, no one can say for sure. 
What is certain however is that there are always multiple sides to everything - it really only matters from where you look at it.
Franklin, being, for all intents and purposes, a human being, a mere mortal, is constrained to his side only. 

It is for that reason I created the character of Arthur, or rather I should say, gave them role he fills:
his uncanny ability to see past one side, and explore what is beyond. For him it's natural to separate the objective perspective from the subjective one. 
He isn't one to judge, though, that would be, in a manner of speaking, unnatural to him. 
He merely acknowledges there are multiple angles and emphasises the importance of that awareness. 
This might make him, for a lack of a better word, inhuman. 

In my first novel I withdrew myself from taking any credit for the stories the characters tell the reader (but I assume full responsibility for it - I could not deny I was the one typing it all out). 

For my second one I decided that Arthur should be the editor in chief - whereas I am not all was certain of what I am doing, or what he is doing, I am positive that he knows what he is doing.
Over the last few years we developed that kind of trust.