Hi everyone, I'm finally back with another story and the first part is actually the first full story I ever wrote so be gentle. As always feedback is appreciated and don't forget to go to this address http://donate.nifty.org/ and donate to keep the site running.
Chapter 1
I always thought moving house around Easter time was a strange idea when you have kids but that's exactly what my parents decided we should do. Now don't get me wrong, the weather's starting to get better but it really sucks when you start a new school after Easter and only have a couple of months to get settled in, meet new people and generally find out you're not going to catch up with all the work before the year ends. Then you've also got to make friends, figure out who all the twats are and find your way around because not only did your parents decide to move you to a nice new school, but it's in a whole new town in the middle of fucking nowhere. Do I sound like I'm mad at my parents? Well ok, maybe a little but to be honest I needed to get away as the bullying was pretty rough where we were before and I think we all needed a change of scene.
So why did I get bullied? Well when people say "kids can be so cruel," some arseholes in my old town took that as an invitation rather than an observation. I wasn't what you'd call a popular kid back there. Not only was I bit shorter, only an inch or so but it seemed to make all the difference, but I'm also pretty puny and absolutely useless at any sports. Whether I have to throw, catch, dodge or kick any sort of ball that's in my vicinity then you can pretty much assume hilarity will ensue for anyone around me. Couple that with being pretty smart and having a mouth that opens before my brain gets into gear, you can see why I was rewarded with a few knuckle sandwiches.
Anyway, we moved in on a rather sunny, Wednesday afternoon but I wasn't due to start school until the following Monday so I had a few days to unpack, sort my room out and generally check out what the local area had to offer. Turns out I lived within walking distance of what would be my new school so at least I wouldn't have to get a bus as I always hated those. There's always something about name calling, sarcastic comments and fists flying in a confined space which put me off them since my last school. Our house was pretty nice as well. There were only a few decent sized houses on our side of the road and in front was a small patch of grass which I suppose you could call a park. Further down the road turned into a dirt track that led off towards some fields and woodland, which actually seemed to surround most of the area so it was pretty tranquil for this former city boy. I was actually rather pleased with where we'd moved to but I wasn't going to tell my parents that. I'd keep the general moody and sullenness up for a few days just to get some guilty treats out of them then I'd brighten up.
Monday rolled around quite quickly and I was ready for my first day of school. Mum gave me a lift as she wanted to make sure I knew where I needed to go and probably give the place the once over. By the time we were done I was ready for my first lesson. Now when I said ready, nothing can really prepare you for standing in front of your new history class to be introduced as the new kid.
"So Alex," Miss Freeman started, "Would you like to tell us a bit about yourself? What do you like to do outside of school?"
"Anything that doesn't get me a dry slap." I replied to a few chuckles and a withering look from the teacher. "Sorry, erm... I like reading, going to the cinema and pretty much anything else that doesn't require a lot of physical exertion."
"Ok, well go and find a seat, and don't be afraid to ask if you're not sure where we're up to." She said before I could say anything else that could meet with her disapproval. I made my way towards the back of the class where I saw a boy sitting on his own. He looked about my height but maybe a bit bigger than me as I had less meat on me than a chicken's lip. As I got closer he started to turn towards me but I heard a coughnerdcough from my side as I walked past what I assumed was a knuckle dragger who was probably a lot tougher than me. I was tempted to give him a good whack on the back to help clear his throat but I was pretty sure that would get me a nice pasting later in the day.
I turned towards the back of the class again and the boy there had a kind of deer in the headlights look as I approached. He seemed a little smaller than when I was further away but I just put that down to the angle I was looking at him from now.
"I think I made a friend," I said to him, nodding towards the latest escapee from the zoo, "Mind if I sit here? I'm Alex." He shook his head and just said, "Josh." Then turned back to the front of the class. Ok then, so the newest kid here isn't the strangest, that's good to know. There was something about Josh that seemed familiar though, like I'd seen him somewhere before. I tried to put it out of my mind but it bugged me for the rest of the day. The first couple of lessons were uneventful, and I only saw Josh in the history lesson so far. Besides him, nobody else really spoke to me in the other lessons. When lunch rolled around I went to the cafeteria to see what treats were on offer and was surprised to see the food here was actually edible and the servers were nice people. I didn't think that was actually possible after the mono-browed trolls who slopped out the gruel at my old school.
As expected there were tables full of people who'd obviously known each other for at least the whole ear so far. I was tempted to plonk myself down at a random table and hope that the people on there would be intrigued by the new boy, but instead I chickened out and found an empty table instead.
"Ah!! I see we have a newbie waiting for someone to join him. Well look no further cos we've come to keep you company." I was so busy looking around that I never noticed anyone approaching. I suddenly found myself going from being alone to having a pair of clones join me, "I'm Luke and this is Sam." Beamed one of the clones. Ok that's being a bit mean, they're obviously twins but they're definitely identical. Pretty cute too. Both have brown hair, brown eyes and nice smiles and obviously as we were all dressed in the same uniforms it would be even more difficult to tell them apart.
"Uh...Hi, I'm Alex." I replied looking for any differences in them. "Don't take this the wrong way but could one of you change your hair or something so I can tell you apart?"
"What do you mean tell us apart? He wears glasses and I don't!" Luke said pointing at Sam who clearly wasn't wearing glasses.
"I've got contacts in." He said with a chuckle.
"Great," I replied, "So as long as I'm about six inches away from you and staring into your eyes I'll be sure it's you."
"We've got a sarcastic one here bro; I think we're gonna like him." Luke said with a smile. "The easier way to tell is he's more into comics and I'm more into sports hence why I've got this awesome Man United bag and his is just plain as everyone took the piss out of him in our first year for his Superman bag."
"Right, so Luke sporty, Sam cool, got it." I said with a smile. Sam had a little chuckle at that.
"Oh God you're not another comic geek are you?" Luke groaned, "Here I was, hoping to have some proper footie banter but instead I'm saddled with two nerds. Anyway, how's your first day been up to now?"
"Not bad so far, I don't think that guy likes me though." I replied while discretely pointing to the Neanderthal from history. The clones (I've got to stop calling them that) looked over then smiled with a look of recognition.
"That would be Brandon Heeley, the wannabe star athlete in a school with very little sporting success." Sam said, "I wouldn't worry about him, he talks big but he's got nothing to back it up. The school only takes part in a few regional athletic meets and he's about the best we've got to send along, unless I decide to go of course. Anyway, let's see your timetable and see if you'll encounter him anywhere else." I handed it over and they both scanned over it, "Looks like you'll only have to deal with him in history and CDT."
"Yeah I saw that on there but what the hell is CDT anyway?" I asked.
"It stands for Craft, Design and Technology." Luke replied. I think he could tell by the blank look on my face that I was still none the wiser. "It's where you'll be doing woodworking and stuff like that, you know, crafting things."
"Are you taking the piss?!?!" I gasped seizing the paper back from them, "Fucking parents!! I think my dad signed me up for that to `make a man out of me.' I'm a fucking klutz; I'll probably end up sawing my own fucking hand off!!"
The twins had a good laugh at my expense and kept making jokes at my expense until the end of lunch. I wasn't going to be in any of their lessons unfortunately as they were a year above me, even though they were only a few months older than me. It also turns out we didn't live too far apart so we'd be able to hang out a bit outside school. Then again, this town's quite small so I doubt anyone lives too far from me. The one thing I did notice after we were leaving the cafeteria was that I hadn't seen Josh at all in there. I don't know why I thought about him but I still had that niggling feeling that I'd seen him somewhere and I wanted to get another look at him to see if it would jog my memory.
The rest of the day flew by with some easy lessons and thankfully I wasn't behind in any of them enough to worry me. I walked with the twins as they lived on my route home and parted ways when they got to their street, then I carried on home to get started on the small mountain of homework I'd need to slog through to get me on the same level as everyone else. I grabbed a drink and went up to my room and after throwing my bag onto the bed I saw a familiar figure out the window. Josh was walking past on his way home from school and that was when I realised I'd probably seen him walking to and from school last week. I watched to see which house he went into but he kept walking past all the houses and up the dirt track at the end of our road. Curious about this I dashed downstairs to look at one of the maps my parents had bought of the area to see where our road went. From what I could see there looked to be a sizeable farm down there but not much else.
Over the next couple of days I settled into the school routine and got used to finding my way around the buildings. The twins met me at lunch every day and even though they introduced me to new people I never really felt like I had anything in common so eventually they gave up and it was just the three of us. I still hadn't seen Josh in any other lessons since history which made me a little sad for reasons I couldn't figure out. We'd barely spoken to each other in that lesson and I'd only seen him a few times walking past my house as he hurried home. I hadn't even passed him in the halls or seen him at a locker so it was almost like he didn't come here anymore.
"Do you know a guy called Josh?" I asked the twins as they joined me for lunch.
"Of course we know Josh, everyone knows Josh." Luke replied and then turned to Sam and asked, "Who the fuck is Josh?" Sam just shrugged his shoulders as I started banging my head on the table out of exasperation.
"A simple `no' would have been fine." I said, rubbing my forehead, "He lives at one of the farms near me I think, and he was in history on Monday but I haven't seen him anywhere else this week."
"Ah, I think you mean Josh Draper." Sam said, "We don't really know him, no one does to be honest. He's kinda quiet and avoids people for some reason but he seems pretty harmless. I think he might be in your CDT lesson though." Ok, so now I had a reason to look forward to that, even if I was worried about cutting off something that had been attached to my body all these years. I could live with one hand, right? I mean, it'd make clapping harder but I might get a new friend out of it so it wouldn't be all bad.
CDT was actually next and started with the usual `this is the new kid' introduction which was thankfully short as I'd been in lessons with most of these people earlier in the week. Obviously with me joining the lessons rather late in the term there wasn't much for me to do. Everyone else had been working on a project to make a little bird house and most of them were in the final stages of finishing them off.
Mr Lomax was our guide to making our little avian friends a summer residence. He was a short, skinny, balding man of about 40 going on 60. He looked a bit like Milhouse's dad from the Simpsons and commanded about the same amount of respect. As there was no time for me to start, let alone finish, a birdhouse before the next project (or my death of old age due to the amount of time it would take me to complete it) he said I could just draw how I'd want it to look for the next couple of lessons. Thankfully I'm pretty good with a pencil and have a fairly robust imagination so I'm sure I could make this work.
I saw Josh at the back of the room, seemingly alone again and I made my way over to him. He saw me approaching and again had a rather concerned look on his face as he seemed to hunch down a bit.
"Mind if I sit here?" I asked. Just like in history he shook his head and turned away to continue with his bird house. I was actually rather impressed with what he'd built. If I was a bird I'd definitely want to raise my young there. The level of skill and craftsmanship in his was far better than anyone else's. "Wow, that looks really good." I said as he was painting individual roof tiles on it. He smiled a bit but before he could say anything a familiar voice rang out.
"Yeah, nice work Draper, you going to put curtains and furniture in like a little dolls house?" Brandon teased with his buddies grunting their approval.
"What's the matter Brandon, afraid it'll look nicer than that shithole you live in?" Remember how I said my mouth ran off on its own before my brain could engage? Well this was one of those times. "He needs to put an alarm on it to stop you trying to move in you fucking tramp!" I'm sure I'll regret that later. Brandon started to get up and fixed me with an evil death stare. Did I say I'd regret that later? I think I'm regretting it now. Thankfully Kirk Van Houton, sorry, Mr Lomax, came over to assert his authority.
"Mr Heeley, get back to work unless you want to stay after school to finish your bird house." He said with as much conviction as a sock puppet at a 4 year old's birthday party. Brandon gave one final grunt and went back to creating a house of misery for any bird unfortunate enough to land in his garden.
I sat back down to start on my drawings then suddenly heard "Thanks" in a small voice. I looked up and realised it had come from Josh so I just smiled and said "No problem."
I think this teacher is a bad influence on me. I'd started to draw a simple little bird house but then just took the piss. I drew little watch towers around it and barbed wire fences, then I drew a little Robin in the watchtower with a helmet and machine gun, going mental as he was firing warning shots at the cats below.
As I was getting into it more and getting more absurd, I heard a little chuckle from the other side of the table. I glanced up and suddenly saw Josh's head drop back down and his face was bright red. He'd obviously been looking and I couldn't help but smile at him being amused. When it was time to pack away I slid the drawing across the table to Josh,
"Here, you can have this. I don't think he'd approve of my design." I said pointing to the teacher. Josh just smiled and carefully placed it in a folder in his bag then dashed off. I was left there rather bemused but soon brought back to earth as Brandon barged past, purposely knocking my shoulder.
As I left the school to walk home I saw Brandon heading the opposite direction to my house which gave me a sense of relief as I wouldn't have to meet him at some neighbourhood get together or something. I decided to wait a while to see if Josh wanted to walk home and see if maybe I could get some more conversation out of him. I don't know why but I seemed to be getting a bit obsessed with making him my friend, maybe I just felt a bit sorry for him being alone all the time.
After about ten minutes virtually everyone had left so I assumed he'd already dashed home before I'd even left the school. I had no idea what lesson he had last so it may have been one nearer to the main doors than mine was. When I got home I again had a quick look out my bedroom window as saw Josh walking past on his way home. As he approached my house I saw him turn to look at it and we made eye contact. I shot him a little wave and he just turned away blushing and seemed to hunch down again as he picked up the pace to get home.
This was getting strange now; I was beginning to think he'd deliberately waited at school to see where I lived. He must have been following me at a distance as I was making my way home and he'd obviously seen me come into this house as he never looked at any of the others, then the way he behaved made me wonder even more about what he thought of me.
"Alright spill it." I said the next day as I sat down next to the twins with my tray of food. Sam pushed my drink over. "For fuck's sake!!!" I exclaimed a bit too loud as I tried to catch it.
"Well you said spill it." He whined with a grin while Luke was choking on his own drink. "What's up with you anyway?"
"You guys seem to know everything that's going on around here, so what do you know about Josh?" I asked while Luke was still spluttering and trying to clean his drink out of his nose.
"Why?" Sam asked, "You seem to be developing an unhealthy obsession young Alex, are you trying to trade us in for an easier to remember model?"
"Yeah, twins are so last year. "I replied, rolling my eyes. "No it's the other way round, I think he wants to get to know me but doesn't seem to know how."
"Dunno why, you're an arsehole." Luke interjected with a cheeky smile. "Want us to go talk to him?"
"NO!!!" I shouted just a little too loud, causing people to look over.
"Will you stop making a scene! First you spill your drink and now this." Sam said.
"You know what, fuck you both." I said as I started to get up. Luke grabbed my arm, pulling me back down and got a bit more serious.
"Ok fine, here's what we know." He started, "You already know he lives up the road from you right? His grandparents own the farm but he lives in one of their smaller cottages with his mum. As far as we know they've got horses up there and I think he helps take care of them and that's all we really know."
"He seems pretty good with his hands though," Sam added, "I've seen some of the stuff he's made in his lessons and they look pretty good. He also used to go to the little model shop in town a lot when he was younger until the owner died and it closed down."
"Sounds like he's a bit of a loner." I said, "Any idea why he doesn't seem to have any friends?"
"He seems very shy and withdrawn," Luke replied, "He tries to avoid people as much as possible and tries to fly under the radar at school."
"Yeah, it's almost like he doesn't want anyone to pay attention to him and it's worked well so far. At least until you arrived." Sam added.
"Do you think I should try to approach him? I could go up to his house over the weekend." I mused.
"Sure, why not?" Replied Luke, "I can't imagine why a guy who barely knows you wouldn't want you turning up on his doorstep out of the blue."
"Point taken." I said while feeling defeated.
"I think you might just need to take your time with this one." Said Sam, "So have we spilt enough or do I need to push your drink over again?" He added trying to lighten the mood. I was beginning to really like these guys.