That Time of The Year - Prologue

A crime, a girl and guess what? She's in the wrong place at the wrong time!!!

*** Thursday, 26th September, 2013 - England, Norfolk, Norwich, Costessey***

"Yesterday, 25th September, a 13 year old boy by the name of Terry Bloomfield has been kidnapped! Police say this case is similar to a kidnapping EXACTLY a year ago, when  the  15 year old Aster Kimpston went missing and also of 12 year old Sybill Lacey. There was no trace of violence or a struggle, with neighbours not hearing or seeing anything suspicious. Although reports say there was a camper van outside the house for quite a while, no one was seen getting out. It's likely whoever was in that camper was waiting for the boy to leave his house. This is the third year running and police suspect all three cases are related." the TV rumbled and worry seeped into my thoughts. 

I started fretting about those missing kids. Luckily it was raining, and I find the pitter-patter of rain pretty comforting.

...This is the third year running, I thought with disappointment. This same report had been on the same day every year for the last three years. Almost. Except the first one didn't mention nothing about it being a similar case to nothing else.

I furrowed my brows. Kidnapping and crimes ain't that uncommon, so I weren't that bothered. I weren't silly enough to be kidnapped, although I did feel mighty sorry for those kids...None of 'em were ever found. Which kind of means they might still be alive...which could be good...But why would a man collect kids? A tall man. With blue eyes. Who has a camper full o’ kids. I laughed at the thought.

That's all anyone knew of ‘im so I guess that means he's a pretty good kidnapper! Or kidnappers...Because one year, the first time, there were reports of two kidnappers, the other reportedly looked smaller than the average 10 year old.

Oh cod...I felt the guilt of what I had just been thinking kicking in...They were BAD things and it made me feel bad...I'd better prepare for something bad to happen to me because I believe in karma...

But it didn't matter. It won't matter, until next year when it's on TV again and I re-remember everything. It's hard to remember these particular cases because it's always just before Halloween and Christmas and The New Year!

I won't remember it 'till another child is kidnapped.

***Thursday, 25th September, 2014***

I pressed on the doorbell repeatedly, which, even though it winds everyone up, I cannot help but do! My Mum opened the door whilst looking down at her phone.

"Hey Squirt." She said looking at her phone. She always calls me squirt - something about me being quite short, I guess?

"Hey Mum," My casual, daydreamer voice mumbled. 

I walked in, opened the toilet door, hung my blazer and bag on the pegs and put my coat back on. I love my coat. I closed the door, switched off the light and walked over to the lounge like the dwarf I was.

Mum was brushing my sister my sister's golden brown hair and looked to be doing some unintentional damage to her skull, too...

"How was your day, then?" Mum asked sweetly. I knew this was a rhetorical question, but I proceeded to answer.

I sat down on a chair nearby, unsure of what to do. I smiled at my sister in an effort to troll her. She looked very upset with the way Mum were scraping her scalp, but when I smiled, she smiled back - much making it an epic FAIL! Her eyes a hazel through the thick framed glasses we both wore - Me and my sister are crazy close, and I guess that's why I don't half feel the need for friends that come to my house all the time - my friends are a very school thing. I began rocking on my chair awkwardly. 

"Weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeelll....!

"I walked over to the bus stop and and waited for the bus. MY bus. Not the nice No.5. After a few minutes of the No.5 already leaving, I got a bit worried - thinking my bus would be late. Again." I looked disapproving, but my Mum just smiled down at Izy's hair. "So I was worried I' be late to school. Luckily, the bus wasn't late and neither was I, although I was late enough for my friends to have given up on me and made their way up the hill already. I think they prefer just to be by themselves. I'm not sure they like me that much. Maybe it's because I say things that make sense like "If you listened first time you wouldn't find it difficult", "Look, come on, If you don't learn it now, you'll still act like this later" are the things I'd say when I was trying to help. I could tell they thought I was just being...I don't know but my friend rolled her eyes. I could say a lot of crude things about them right now, but I'm not gonna, because I'll just sound like I'm moaning. I love my friends, but they are nothing like me."

"Oh, Ana!" My Mum exclaimed at me with humour. "Don't be silly." I nodded and carried on.

"I walked at my normal pace up the hill - which is pretty fast! - and eventually caught up with them when I arrived at school. Then I said to them what I always say!

" "Heya!" I'd say gently

" They'd just say "Hey" really moody-like, because they, unlike me, are grumpy teenagers!" I said with annoyance.

"I don't know, you can be grumpy sometimes, Ana." Mum corrected me. I scoffed in disbelief.

"Whhhhhhaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa??? Never!" I replied.

" "So how were your yesterdays?" I asked them. They replied with rude words that I'm never gonna say. It's BAD. Swearing is VERY BAD! They do it all the time though. I didn't say what mine was because they weren't interested.

"We walked into the hall and stood by the stairs. They spoke to each other but were speaking in a hushed voice and I couldn't hear anything. It didn't help that they were leaning into each other and I was outside their area of speech.

" "What?" I'd interrupt, to which they quite predictably told me it didn't matter, it was none of my business and I shouldn't worry. Fair enough. I still wanted to know, though!"

"Ana. You're friends hate you." Izy said - monotoned. I smiled at this as I knew she was joking - I'd have said something worse to be fair...

"Izy!!!" Mum cried.

"What?" Izy said back with laughter. I rolled my eyes with a smile and continued.

"Then the bell rang and we had to go to form. Form was alright on Thursdays. We listened to music and I didn't have to awkwardly try and make conversation with Megan. I'm what I call a company friend. I don't need to flap my lips to avoid feeling awkward - others seem to think not talking is awkward though, so when they're obviously a person who needs to talk to know they aren't being ignored, I make conversation. My trademark conversation starter is to ask what someone's favourite colour is. I've had answers like "all", "red", "purple", I never forget what people tell me when I'm the one who asked - If they tell me on their own it's most likely I'd forget a conversation later.

Soon the bell rang again and I went to maths. I was in set 3 for maths, so there were quite a few numpties who would thankfully make the class a lot more fun, but I wrote the date - 25th September - , 'coz I kinda wanna learn, because I kinda wanna have a life. If ya know what I mean. We learnt about algebraic fractions - they were surprisingly easy to understand!

The day kind of flew by, with art - which is always great! -, the P.E - what we have quite a cool teacher for and it always go fast, it do -, English - which is OK, no one likes the teacher for some reason, though. - and then D.T - which I enjoy. Kinda. Not really, but still.”

"Cool! Sounds like a good day!" Mum replied. "Oooh, erm, could you go out the front quickly to get the milk? I thought you'd bring it in anyway, but obviously you didn't see them." She told me.

"K!" I said as I hopped up and out of the door.

I got to the bottom of the front garden and grabbed the bottles, but when I lifted one up, there was a leaflet that flew away in the wind. I quickly placed the milk down to go after it - I know I sound like a goody two shoes, but I dislike litter, too! I smiled at how much of a "goon" I sounded - but it kept getting away from me. I ran past quite a few houses and at least 100 or so meters away from my house. The wind was calming and the leaflet slowed down, eventually stopped skidding across the damp pavement and finally came to a halt. I ducked down and my chubby hands picked it up. I lifted my head.

Suddenly, it got cold...There was a large white van 2-3 meters in front of me parked along the side of the road. It wouldn't usually seem so odd. The van had black out windows and I wasn't at the angle where I could see through the windscreen. It was quite still and I turned around. It felt like someone was watching me.

Instead of shrugging it off like most silly victims do, I shook it off my head! 

Nothing bad will happen to me...

As long as I scurry quickly away back home...

Author's Note

I know that this isn't that fantastic but I had to start somewhere. If you get desperately bored, though, I beg you to skip this one and go to the next. It isn't needed and has little to do with the actual story. I just thought it might lay out this story's world to you. ^U^