Okay so I read some of my summer reading book today, and it's one of those books that are super smart. I'm talking big words and high society airs. Anyways I guess my writing took a little bit after it in that sense. It's like back in eighth grade when I overloaded on Doctor Who and my voice gained a slight British accent for a few weeks. Yeah this is definitely the written version of that. Ignore it or embrace it, I seriously don't care. You do you. I'll just be in the corner high-fiving myself for my longest chapter yet. Yes that's right. It beat chapter five. Disclaimer: Guess what? I don't own Danny Phantom. What? You figured that out cause this is written on a sight called ? And here I thought I sounded legit.
Chapter 10: Of Dreams, Changes, and Revelations
The sheer extent of this change is something Danny could never have seen coming. After his… interesting talk with Mr. Masters, Danny decides to seek refuge in his room. He paces for a while in an attempt to wrap his head around all that Mr. Masters had been going on about. I've always gathered that this man holds only resent for me, but hate? What have I ever done to earn that? It couldn't have been something recent… he has always looked at me like I did something horribly wrong. For someone he hates, isn't it odd he has allowed me to live with him for so long? Danny freezes at this thought. Why do I live here? Who am I to Mr. Masters that he lets me stay in his house. Heck! He even hired me a tutor! And what was it that he said I am now? An heir? What does that mean exactly? Danny frowns at this set back, and decides to make a mental note to ask his tutor tomorrow. He sighs in defeat before retreating to his bed. He lays there for several minutes, but sleep evades him. He can't get rid of this nagging feeling that he has forgotten something important that Mr. Masters said. He glares at the ceiling in frustration. An hour passes before his exhausted body manages to overpower his restless mind.
His dreams that night are of the odd variety, and that's saying something for someone as imaginative as Danny. It begins with the very thing he forgot. He sees Mr. Masters' face. His eyes are pinched, and his mouth is twisted in disgust. There's a dark cloud under his eyes cast by his angrily arched eyebrows. All of the hatred in this expression is being spit at Danny as Mr. Masters speaks two simple words: "My son". Than everything turns black and Danny begins to fall. He drops farther and farther into this abyss of nothingness. Time seems to drag together and race at impossible speeds until he lands on the ground. Hard. He sits there in a daze until he hears a voice.
"Danny boy are you okay?" Suddenly a light flicks on revealing a very large man clad in a bright orange jumpsuit. His face is oddly contorted. Danny can't quite make out his features, but can clearly see the concern written all over them. "Did you fall off the bed again?" Danny nods. Fresh hot tears drip down his cheeks. The man kneels down and brings Danny into a bear hug. Danny clutches the man as if his life depends on it. "There, there. It's okay. Daddy's here. Everything is going to be okay. Shhhhh." The man coos Danny until he begins to drift off. The world gets darker and darker as his eyes begin to droop shut. "Goodnight my son." With that, the world once again becomes black. But now instead of feeling as if he's falling, he feels like someone is shaking him.
"Get up, kid!" Danny's eyes spring open, and he sits up abruptly. His dreams dissipate from memory as he takes in the sight of a very well dressed man. He looks as if he is about to head straight into a business meeting. The man huffs in impatience. "I said get up. You know what that means? You get the hell up!" These words feel like a slap in the face to young Danny. No one has ever spoken to him this cruelly… other than Mr. Masters of course. He jumps out of bed and rushes over to his closet to grab some clothes. Once finished, he returns to the angry man. He looks Danny over in distaste before going over to the closet himself. Danny waits by his bed in confusion. "None of these will do," the angry man grumbles. He whips out his cell phone, and calls Mr. Masters' tailor. Minutes pass until another man stumbles into the room. He struts up to Danny, and begins to tut.
"I see what you mean. How is this boy supposed to run a company in these rags?" Danny can't help but be a little offended at the tailor's words.
"There's nothing wrong with my clothes!" He cries indignantly. The tailor dutifully ignores him, instead choosing to face the angry man.
"Toss them all. I'll have a new wardrobe finished by this time tomorrow." The man nods in agreement.
"No! I like my clothes!" Danny's protests are quickly shut down by the angry man.
"And I honestly don't care what you have to say. Go to breakfast. You'll be eating with Miss Spines in the dining hall." The dining hall? I've never been allowed in there before. Who's Miss Spines anyway? Then again, who is this man, and why is he telling me what to do? The man turns away from Danny while simultaneously shooing him with his right hand. Danny silently sticks his tongue at the man before making his leave. He begins running down the halls in another round of the Ghost Game. What if Mr. Masters catches me doing this again? He reluctantly slows to a walk, and continues on his way to the dining hall.
Miss Spines turns out to be a nasty lady in her mid-sixties. Like both the tailor and the angry man, her first impression of Danny is not a kind one. Upon entering the dining hall, Danny immediately sees her standing behind a chair at the far end of the table. He coughs out a greeting, and sits down.
"Wrong." Miss Spines informs him tartly. "You must apologize for being late, and ask me to please take a seat. Only after I have been seated may you sit yourself."
"Oh! Um… Sorry? Sit down?" Miss Spines' glare tells him he messed up somehow. He tries again. "I'm really sorry I'm late. There was this guy in my room who didn't like how I dress, so he called a tailor, and…"
"Enough!" Miss Spines cuts him off in a bout of irritation. "Please just sit, and we'll move on." Danny mumbles another apology. His mind then drifts to the spectacular spread on the table. His eyes glaze over as he takes sight of a particularly well-frosted cinnamon roll. Is this for me to eat? I've never seen such delicious looking food before. Without a second thought, he reaches forward and grasps the treat in question. "EHEM" Miss Spines eyes blaze in fury, causing Danny to drop the cinnamon role as if it were a white hot coal. "Were you raised by apes?" Only for about a week, but then my tutor yelled at me for skipping class. He didn't dare say this out loud. Not with Miss Spines' glare looking as if it could cut diamonds.
"No…" Danny murmured.
"What was that?" If he thought she looked furious before, than she is murderous now.
"I said no." This time he manages to make his voice a bit above a whisper.
"Speak up!"
"No, I was not raised by apes!" The look on Miss Spines face by this point would have scared even a man as frightening as Mr. Masters.
"That's no, ma'am to you boy." If I have to endure this to eat my breakfast, than I'd rather wait for lunch. The meal continues in this manner, of Danny being himself and Miss Spines desperately trying to teach him manners, until its conclusion. By then Danny finds himself exhausted from trying to both choke down food and the million rules of being polite. The angry man meets him outside of the dining hall door. He raises an eyebrow at Danny's disheveled state, but says nothing. He ends up taking Danny to his tutoring room where Danny is surprised to find a new tutor.
"Who are you, and what have you done to Mrs. Danby?" The new tutor is a grouchy looking man in his early fifties who turns out to be called Mr. Rich.
"I am but one of several different mentors that you will take on starting today. I specialize in business, and thus will be educating you in that area."
"Why am I getting new teachers?" To this Mr. Rich raises a condescending eyebrow.
"My boy, you do realize that your entire purpose of existing is to one day inherit one of the biggest companies on the planet? You think you can do that on the back of a single instructor?" Is this what Mr. Masters was talking about last night? Maybe this is why he lets me stay with him. But why me? "And to think that someone as naïve as you is the son of the great Vlad Masters."
"Son?" Danny can't move, can't think. He can hardly breathe. I'm his son? Mr. Masters is my father? But he said he hates me! I… I don't understand. He doesn't even talk to me. How can I be his son?!
"Yes you simpleton! Please do try to keep up." At this point, Mr. Rich cannot stop laughing. Danny doesn't hear it. His mind seems to be somewhere far away, but his body remains present. He goes through the rest of the day in this cloud. Many different teachers introduce themselves to him. There is Miss Monroe who teaches French, Chinese, Italian, Spanish, and Japanese; Mr. Murphy who teaches history; Mr. Geo who teaches mathematics; Miss Pathos who teaches English; Miss Hearth who teaches finance; Mr. Bunsen who teaches the sciences; and also the angry man himself. The angry man says his name is Rush. He will be teaching Danny the art of communication. Unlike the other teachers, he won't be providing a class-type setting for Danny. He is just going to direct Danny through his day to day life. Of course Danny is too preoccupied to care about all of that right now. He's a little bit stuck on the whole not-being-an-orphan thing. Whatever those teachers tried to teach him that day, he didn't learn. By the time all his classes, and meals with Miss Spines, were over, Danny is just about ready to collapse. He crawls into bed at nine o'clock without a single trace of the previous night's insomnia.
In the chaos of the day, Danny forgot to deliver his note to Sam. While he may not be aware of it, this moment strikes the end of the Everest Game. Just like the hundreds of other lesser games he has played over the years, it simply becomes part of the collection of happy memories that will forever dwell in the space that is his childhood.
SAM'S POV
Sam is confused to find no note left by the wall when she arrives. Her 'fellow adventurer' has been rather consistent since they began corresponding five years ago. She waits for an hour or so, but no longer. Her mom told her to be home by four, and she cannot afford to be tardy again. Sam begrudgingly flings her own note over the wall before leaving empty handed.
A day passes by as it tends to do. Sam eagerly returns to the wall only to be disappointed once again. She doesn't wait like she had yesterday. She just leaves her message and goes home.
Angry at being ignored, Sam doesn't return for another three days. By then she comes back with her chin held up high, and with a haughty letter in hand. The ground next to the wall remains empty. Has he finally gotten bored of me? Did he find a new friend? Has he forgotten me? Tears roll down Sam's face. She wipes them away quickly. If that's true, than two can play at this game! Sam heads straight for Tucker's.
Weeks pass by before she returns. This time she only goes for a confirmation of a truth she has already come to terms with. Whoever that boy was, we are no longer friends. She leaves a note bearing only one word.
Goodbye
I think the only reason I find the will to keep writing is when the occasional review just holds someone so caught up in whatever emotion they can't handle expressing that they just write some gibberish. To them I tip my very nonexistent hat and say a fond sjnfjhsebrchbcfhjbdhjfb hr uf rhjfjdhfbdhbfjdcfhrbchj x.