Chapter 1 - A love story.

Read on as David's life starts to fall...

Alone with hell

 

Chapter 1 - A love story.

 

By now I already know this is a dream, a nightmare to be more precise, it unfolds in the same way every time I relive the tragic moment. Me, my mum and my Brother, Craig, are all going to the shops out of town, in Craig’s car, with Craig driving of course. I would say I was quite nervous at the time being driven by my brother in his own car, but he had been driving for well over 3 years now. So I am pretty confident about his driving being safe now.

We make it too the shops with no family arguments, thankfully. I and my mum are the first out and therefore closer to the shop’s two enormous double doors before my brother is. “I am just going to turn the car around, so just wait there”. He informs us, so since he drove us here, me and my mum patiently wait and watch him turn his car around. Then suddenly his car makes a bang and the car hits stand still as if some one had shot the car. Me and my mum rush over to see what has happened, then that is when the real horror happened, and the only horror that I hope can only be relived in my deep dark sleep.

“BEEP, BEEP, BEEEEEP!” My alarm suddenly gets through to me and I jolt awake, great, I do not have to deal with that nightmare again, I thought. Not so great though, is the time as I look at the clock on my wall like a disappointed teacher’s face staring down at me.

“S**T, it’s 25 past eight!” I curse aloud as I run down stairs after almost tripping over my clean clothes left by my door by my mother. I get into the kitchen and my mother is sitting at the table calmly sipping tea as if nothing in the world is wrong, better apologize for being late anyway. “I am sorr-”

“School is not open today, remember” She states rather casually.

“Oh yeah, I remember, why was it closed again, mum?”

‘Dead teacher’ she says with as much sympathy toward the dead teacher as an elephant has to an ant when it steps on it. Mum has always been a bit disregarding toward death ever since my Brother died in the tragic accident, it is as if she accepts that it just happens, and that is all you can say, it just does. It never thinks. Never talks. Never shows signs. Just ‘does’.

I get out my cereal and a bowl and fill the bowl to the brim.

“So what are you doing today then David?” My mum asks.

“Probably just going out with mates again, like I always do in my spare time” I start to add the milk to my cereal.

“Alright then, just do not get into trouble”

I laugh at that “No need to get suspicious, me and my mates are respectful youths of the law” After that joke I head back to my room with my breakfast in hand.

Twenty minutes later some one is at the door, thank the lord I am already dressed and guessing it is for me, since mum is not expecting any one, I run straight to the front door.

“Hello, is David there- oh, hey Dave” Says a familiar and rather sweet girl’s voice, it’s Bonnie my first time love, and my only love, never told her though, probably never will, but I like to act as if I will tell her some time. “Hey Bonnie, I will just get my trainers and jacket, one sec…”

 

At the park. Bonnie has treated herself to the swings, or at least one of them, as she always does. It is against the park rules to be here when you are over 12, the two of us being 15 break that easily, but no one minds, as long as we keep to ourselves on the swings we should be fine. As usual, I am pushing Bonnie on the swings as she admires the view of the city buildings standing hundreds of metres into the sky, yet only mere centimetres from this distance.

“We should go there some day David” Bonnie always says my full name when some thing remotely serious is on her mind.

“Go where some day?” I say acting completely oblivious to the fact that she means the city, as she always does, but she stuns me this time because, she explains something different next.

“To the world outside this village.” We live in a village at the edges of a big city, we never go to the city, too busy and loud for us country side people, plus it would be around a one hour car ride. I have only ever been there because I ran away from home, on a bus, over something so stupid that I can not remember what it was.

“Maybe some one special can take you there, is something bothering you about this village?”

“Not really, just you.” Although she laughs to reassure me that she only means to have fun and not insult me, I still feel the need to questions that comment, but she answers before I get to ask.

“You are the only one who is my friend, sure I have met people, but they are just like leaves growing in my life and falling after a few months, yet you have always been there for me. Even my family do not like me, yes, they sad it again, ‘you do nothing for us, why are you even here’. I know it is just my dad who says it and my mum is fine to me, but she never sticks up, scared my dad might leave her if she disagrees.”

“I would never leave, not for all the people in the world, not even my family, you have no reason to feel that you have no friends, I should be enough for you” I laugh at the end of that and she turns to face me, I smile at her, then wink, she smiles back and faces the view again, silence enfolds us again.

She has always had social problems, mostly just staying in touch with people who she has met. People find it hard to talk to her because she is quiet, and when they do get the chance to talk to her, they never seem to want to talk to her for very long after they meet her. Probably because she never feels she needs them in her life and accidently gives them the sign that she does not like them. ‘You do not miss what you never had’ she always says. Then there is me, I met her when I was 11, first year at secondary school, and I knew no one since I went to a school that none of my friends attended, but when I saw Bonnie with all of her beauty and loneliness, I had to talk to her. From that day, I never let her lose me, since I always feel the need to be there for her as protection and company.

“I have always thought, the further your destination lies, the more paths there are in which to get there” I whisper. “And with the school being so far, every one is sparsely spread out on these different paths, so do not feel too down at not having many friends, they just live too far away.”

“You always say that, yet I have never understood it, be sure to explain it to me some time. I mean the first part about the destinations and amount of paths thingy”

“Not to worry, I will tell you sometime.” I reassure her.

She sighs and I know that she thinks about this a lot, she always wishes of being some where that can promise her some friends and some confidence. I am not sure why, but her dad always seems to get her down, I think he is just a very sexist person, plus being very opinionated makes him number one enemy for girls. Her mum on the other hand is nice, never too in Bonnie’s face or never too far to hear her cry, she seems to have a good balance of not too good and too bad parenting. At that very moment I catch a hooded man in the corner of my eye, I go to focus on him when…

Bonnie suddenly leaps of the swing as soon as she reaches the largest height of her swing, much against me cautiously reminding her to always be careful, fortunately she lands nice and lightly on the ground with no difficulty with balance, as always. She has always had a slight skill in gymnastics, but she lacks the ability of being flexible.

Then I turn to where the man was, and he had gone, not sure where too, I always see him around staring at me, his stare is neutral, not making me feel uncomfortable or cautious, just strangely curious.

“I’m hungry’ she says with a growling stomach to second that remark.

“Alright we shall buy some chips from the chip shop down the road, hopefully Misses Yang will be expecting us today and greet us with a fortune cookie each, do you mind if I hold your hand to the shop, as mine are a little cold” To my amazement she allows me to hold her hand and the soothing warmth of her skin radiates upon my body like a cloak of silk.

 

Outside the chip shop, we have brought our chips and we are both just eating our chips outside the chip shop and leaning against the building’s decaying wall. This may seem quite chilled out but there is one problem, a group of kids from our school are standing close to us and they are not exactly the nicest of people.

“Perhaps we should leave”, Says Bonnie with a slightly trembling voice, it does not take a genius to tell that she is scared, even Bonnie knows that, so she is whispering. Unfortunately for her fear, I know that if we leave we will just make them think they are above us and they will certainly use that against us in the future.

“We can not leave”, I whisper, “If we do then we will just make them think they are above us, just think about it, they are in the year blow so we should be fine”. And as if some one is watching and they want to see some trouble, the group start shuffling towards us.

“HEY!” One of them shouts in a gruff voice. “Give me your chips you fatherless runt.”

My plan was not to retaliate, I never had retaliated before in my life, but that insult burnt me right to the heart like a forge has been lit within me. Out of all this anger I lash out at the one who demanded the chips, I only meant to warn him off but I had not known that I also lunged toward him, therefore my fist hit true into the side of his face with all my weight behind it. Any normal person could take that, but these guys are younger than me and I had a lot of adrenaline pumping through me like a train due to the harsh insult, so he went down. Hard. I go to check if he is alright out of instinct, but then I come to my senses and grab Bonnie’s shaking arm.

“C’mon, we have to leave. Now!” I make towards the empty road with Bonnie trailing behind, one of the kids obviously does not know when to quit and shouts,

“Hey you, don’t you run off you p***y your gonna pay for this” I ignore him, but that is not enough, he makes a run for me, but as I am safely across the road and onto the pavement, it gets worse. The boy who challenged me is foolish enough not to look if the road is clear or not before he ran after me, unfortunately for him the road was not as clear as it was for me. A red four seated car collides with the boy at around 30 miles per hour, he bounces comically over the bonnet of the car and then over the roof, landing around 15 metres from the collision. I look from the car to the evidently injured victim then back to the car again which has taken speed and driven off, I think I have seen my first hit and run. But as I ran, was I seeing things? Because the hooded man was there in the corner of my eye, and was he crying with a smile due to my outburst? Never mind that, I feel this day just can not stop getting worse for me and every one else around me. 

Reviews

[Chaselyn]

“I have always thought, the further your destination lies, the more paths there are in which to get there," how beautiful. Are those your actual words? This is nice in the aspect that you are introducing a couple of varying plot lines, coherently introducing characters, and not being too distant and narrative. I wonder if this or fiction/non-fiction/ what parts resemble your life and mind? One thing I am left wanting in reading this is... maybe more insight to your mind, feelings, how you perceive things... Theres a glimpse of it in the scene where the boy hits the bully out of nowhere and it's exquisite. If it were constant throughout the writing it might perhaps be more enthralling. Keep writing!:)

[Bradley Davies]

Thank you, your review has encouraged me a lot to continue writing, I believe if you read the next few chapters you will find out if the story is fiction or non fiction. Yes the 'Further your destination lies, the more paths there are in which to get there' are my own words, I have believed in that saying ever since I came up with it while pondering on trivial matters haha The character that is David will have some more situation thrown at him throughout the story and I will make sure they do show his morals, feelings and his mind. Referring to the mind and feelings of David actually reminds that I am intending to make this book focus on the psychology of David and be as romantic (Romance between Bonnie and David) as a guy can possibly be through writing haha But the romance and psychology side of the story come later on in the story and thicken toward the end, so be patient ;)

[Chaselyn]

Lovely to hear! I will continue to read on.... I like the psychology aspect a lot. Damn your mysteriousness! hahahaa I suppose i have no choice but to read the rest:)

[Bradley Davies]

I like to think of myself and be mysterious, even in my work :P

[Eternal Devotion]

I want to buy a fedora just so I can tip it to you. Bravo sir! :3 loving it so far

[Bradley Davies]

Why thank you, I am afraid to inform you that the story as a whole has a 'Woody's round up' ending for now but I shall continue writing in due time
P.S if you do get hold of a fedora I would appreciate a video, of you tipping the fedora to me, a lot :)

[Kain Delo]

Before I dive into the technicalities of your writing skill, let me cite what I think I got from the story:

The main character's name is David. He has a friend (who he has a crush on) named Bonnie. Bonnie's father doesn't particularly like her. David's brother died and his father is gone. David is philosophical. Bonnie is shy. There are bullies.

On to the technicalities:

I read your profile bio, and I can totally understand how constricting it must feel to be told that you aren't a good enough writer. And before I really dig deep and nitpick your work, I'm going to say that the heart and the dedication and the aspects of a good writer are in you. It's just that you need to improve on the way you write.

Honestly, your writing was great and the problems I saw where technicalities. There is only one remedy to the problems, Bradley! It's called re-reading and editing. And it's super easy!

One of them is a problem all new writers experience. Shifts from past tense to present tense. Super easy to change.

Another one is the fact that some of your words just don't work for a sentence. Like, how about from " I and my mum are the first out" to "My mum and I are the first out" for a less awkward sentence.

Another thing that really bugged me was the spacing. It took a lot of effort to find out where the start of the next paragraph was and whatnot. But this one, I see in a lot of stories here. Mostly, when I see something like that, I instantly decide not to read it. Try double spacing between paragraphs maybe?

And I guess I also have to include the way the narration was written? I'm not exactly sure if you wanted David to sound like a serious-sounding dude who didn't use any other tone but monotone but yeah, that was how he sounded to me. Maybe it's the use of *really* somber words. I'm not sure. If that was what you were aiming for, feel free to ignore this one.

I think that's about it. I'm sorry if this may have offended you in any way. I didn't mean to be offensive. Just merely constructive...

[Bradley Davies]

I took no offence by this, thank you for the long and informative review, can we message each other about this because for me to comment on everyone of your points will take forever, I would rather we just discus your review :)

[Kain Delo]

Sure! I'd love to help. :)

[A. Amos]

Writing is not a joke and if you can write this long you're a writer, keep reading and master your craft if you are really serious about it. The concept is simple if you enjoy writing your story, the readers will enjoy reading it...keep writing.

[Bradley Davies]

Thank you, your review may not have included anything to help me improve my writing, but what you wrote helped me to find a reason in which to carry on writing, so thank you :)

[A. Amos]

You're most welcome

[Maggie]

First novel? Don't be discouraged by thinking you aren't good at things; you've got to be s**t before you become good s**t, and the only way to do that is to work your a*s off for years and to learn, learn, learn your craft. You can be successful, just discover what you really love and don't stop.

[Bradley Davies]

Thanks, may I ask for a rating but be honest, if I did not want you to write a bad rating, I would not have risked asking for a rating at all so yeah, do not worry about insulting me at all haha

[Brittany]

omg i love this book i really do i love your choice of words and everything it is a dark story and love at the same time:)

[Bradley Davies]

Woo someone noticed my love and darkness contrast xD

[Brittany]

:) hehe yea lol