I N T R O D U C T I O N
-Darren's P.O.V-
I'VE ALWAYS been fascinated by spiders. I used to collect them when I was younger. I'd spend hours rooting through the dusty old shed at the bottom of our garden, hunting the cobwebs for lurking eight-legged predators. When I found one, I'd bring it in and let it loose in my bedroom.
It used to drive my mum mad!
Usually, the spider would slip away after a day or two, never to be seen again, but sometimes they hung around longer. I had one who made a cobweb above my bed and stood sentry for almost a month. Going to sleep, I used to imagine the spider creeping down, crawling into my mouth, sliding down my throat and laying loads of eggs in my belly. The baby spiders would hatch after a while and eat me alive, from the inside out.
I loved being scared when I was little.
When I was nine, my mum and dad gave me a small tarantula. It wasn't poisonous or very big, but it was the greatest gift I'd ever received. I played with that spider almost every waking hour of the day. Gave it all sorts of treats: flies and cockroaches and tiny worms. Spoilt it rotten.
Then, one day, I did something stupid. I'd been watching a cartoon in which one of the characters was sucked up by a vacuum cleaner. No harm came to him. He squeezed out of the bag, dusty and dirty and mad as hell. It was very funny.
So funny, I tried it myself. With the tarantula.
Needless to say, things didn't happen quite like they did in the cartoon. The spider was ripped to pieces. I cried a lot, but it was too late for tears. My pet was dead, it was my fault , and there was nothing I could do about it.
My parents nearly hollered the roof down when they found out what I'd done – the tarantula had cost quite a bit of money. They said I was an irresponsible fool, and from that day on they never again let me have a pet, not even an ordinary garden spider.
The thing about real life is, when you do something stupid, it normally costs you . In books, the heroes can make as many mistakes as they like. It doesn't matter what they do, because everything comes good in the end. They'll beat the bad guys and put things right and everything ends up hunky-dory.
In real life, vacuum cleaners kill spiders. If you cross a busy road without looking, you get whacked by a car. If you fall out of a tree, you break some bones.
Real life's nasty. It's cruel. It doesn't care about heroes and happy endings and the way things should be. In real life, bad things happen. People die. Fights are lost. Evil often wins.
I just wanted to make that clear before I began.
Anyway, that's enough of an introduction. If you're ready, let's begin.
C H A P T E R 1
-My P.O.V-
ENGLISH CLASS was almost ever, until Darren had put his hand up, claiming to be ill. Our teacher Mr Dalton nodded his head and told him to 'make for the toilet'.
"Throw up whatever's bugging you, Darren," he said, "then get your behind back in here."
Darren stood up and 'made for the toilet'. I looked over to Steve, who was sitting on the table in front of me. We had been exchanging notes since we found out that we were going to be studying Shakespeare... AGAIN!
He sneakily slid a note to me over the table, disguising it as some sort of dramatised yawn. It read:
You watching the footie later?
I looked at him, nodded and passed the paper back to him. He scribbled something down and was about to pass it to me when Mr Dalton walked up behind him. Steve sighed and bowed his head at the shame of getting caught before handing over the note at his teachers request. Mr Dalton opened the note and quickly scanned it, he let out a small smile when he had finished and then put it into the top drawer of his desk. He whispered something to Steve before turning to me and winking.
After that Mr Dalton returned to the lesson as if nothing had happened apart, but every time he saw us that same smile would reappear on his face.
I tore a page out of my book, scrunched it up and threw it at Steve's head. When it hit he immediately span around in his chair and glared at me, I let out a small laugh into the palm of my hand. He could be such a drama queen.
I leant forwards, hid my mouth with my right hand and mouthed,
"What was that about?" His glare eased, as he shrugged.
"What did the note say?" I mouthed, still hiding my mouth so that Mr Dalton couldn't see what I was saying. He whispered back that he would tell me after his football match, I nodded in agreement and we both pay attention to the lesson again before we got into too much trouble, not that Steve would, given that he's Mr Dalton's golden boy, so to speak. I mean, I couldn't say half of the things he had said in his essays without getting suspended or even expelled!
After that the time flew by, it felt like only a matter of minutes before the school bell hand rang for the lunch break. Everyone suddenly broke into a mad frenzy to get out of the class room and into the fresh air, or at least outside. At the pitch the game started pretty slow, and by the time everyone wanted a break Steve's team was losing 5-1. I looked around to find my best friends, Steve and Darren, I saw Steve straight away. He had his hands on his head during the half-time when he came over.
I grabbed his arm and pulled for him to sit next to me, He was pulling a sad face, with his bottom lip sticking out.
"I'm not playing!" I joked and I nudged him gently, He smiled and then sighed,
"Awe Come on!" He moaned,
"No! Go and fetch Darren!" I laughed at him as I ruffled his hair. He sighed again and ran off to get him. It was only a few minutes until Darren returned, as cocky as ever,
"Never fear, Hotshot Shan is here!" He shouted as he made an extended entrance onto the football pitch. Most of the players were either laughing at his remark or groaning at it, but his team mates were beginning to look much more motived than before and his opponents were growing worried. Within the first minute he had already scored 2 goal, each one causing a lot of speculation and cheering on his part. At one point I thought they may have even won or at least tied with the other team, but, alas, the fates were not that kind, Darren's team had lost 9-7 when the bell had finally decided to ring.
I ran to catch up with Steve to see what the note had been about, it was probably just some joke he had heard, that could've been why Mr Dalton smiled! Just one of Steve's not-so-good jokes, not that he doesn't have good ones because he does. Steve tends to have his funny moments and his not-so-funny moments.
Anyway when I had got to him he was already with Alan, Tommy and Darren. A red-faced Alan had began yelling, about some piece of paper that he had in his hand when he was interrupted by Mr Dalton,
"You five! Inside!" He roared.
"We're coming, Mr Dalton!" The golden boy roared back. Steve should consider himself lucky that Mr Dalton has a soft for him, He had that soft spot because Steve was special. Sometimes he's brilliant in class and gets everything right, while other times he can't even spell his own name. Mr Dalton says Steve's a bit of an idiot savant, which means he's a stupid genius! But even although Steve was Mr Dalton's golden boy, not even he can get away with turning up late for class. So whatever Alan had, it would have to wait. The boys trudged over to class, tired from the game, while I just walked slowly to stay with them and we began our next lesson.
Little did Me, Steve and Darren know that Alan's mysterious piece of paper was to change our lives forever. Whether it was for better or for worse is up to you!