* The short story ”Be Here Now” written by Miguel Syjuco, was published in 2012. The short story is from Miguel Syjuco’ anthology “Elsewhere”. We meet a journalist who is struggling with PTSD, and his girlfriend Jenna. The story is about a mixed race man, his grandfather was Asian. He is a photographer, and he has previously been taking war pictures in an Arabic country.
“I browse through some of my photos that made front pages. A soldier on his knees defusing an IED on the roadside […] A group of boys hiding behind mothers and sisters dressed in niqabs”.
This quote shows that he has been in a warzone in an Arabic country.

The short story takes place in their house, and follow them through there first days after moving in. The journalist recently came back from the Arabic land where he took war pictures and is now having a difficult time coming back from reality. Jenna is his fiancé and she is the one keeping the relationship going, planning the weeding and the setting up the apartment. After he came back from the war, he has been neglecting his relationship with Jenna, and he is just realizing how important the present and his future.

The journalist is having a hard time getting over the things that happened in the war, and he is struggling coming back to the reality. In the short story he has been described as if his life is about checking his email, Facebook and being mentally everywhere else then where he physically is. The story covers about 2 day because we hear about him going to bed twice. He tells his girlfriend that he is jetlagged, and he has a hard time getting comfortable with Jenna again. He is trying reconnect with the real life again, but it’s not so easy because he can’t find the meaning of life in the where he is now. We see his character develop, from being in his own world, to come out in the present world: “two days ago, the email