[This is chapter one of my NaNovel. It was based on a recurring dream I once had. I stopped having it because of this novel. Thrilling, eh? The first chapter will be boring because I'm introducing the characters, but all subsequent chapters will be exciting. I promise.]
CHAPTER ONE
Lazy Days of Summer
The sun rose over the hills of Ashton Valley, a small town in the Midwest. The children would be sleeping late, for school wouldn’t start for another two weeks. The children would take advantage of all the sleep they could get. The working class would be waking soon to get ready for the day. The paper would be coming soon, with nothing really important to say. The children would tear it apart simply to be the first to get to the comics section. Soon, the streets would be deserted until noon, when the working class would break for lunch.
The clock rolled over to quarter after eleven. Isaiah Banks woke suddenly, and rolled out of bed to go downstairs. Freshly eighteen, he was both rejoicing and lamenting the fact that he was entering his senior year of high school. He was admired by the upperclassmen and faculty for his ability and willingness to stand up for things that weren’t the thoughts of the norm. The underclassmen feared him, as his confrontations usually ended in verbal violence. Groggily, Isaiah pulled on a shirt, and went downstairs. He jumped the last few steps, and went to the kitchen for a bottle of water. Sitting at the counter was Isaiah’s brother, David, watching cartoons, finishing his fourth bowl of Lucky Charms.
“When are you going to grow up?” asked Isaiah, more to himself than David.
“What? Is it wrong to want to watch cartoons?”
“You’re starting high school in two weeks. You’ll have to get over it soon.”
“Whatever.” David turned back to his program. Isaiah shook his head and left to watch TV elsewhere.
***************************************
Ted Rian had been awake for two hours, checking his email and playing a game on the Internet. His character in the game had to bob and weave through many obstacles and enemies, and every time his character was injured, Ted would cringe a little. After a long fought battle with just a sliver of life left, the character was killed by the final boss. In frustration, Ted closed all of his Internet windows, and went to get something to eat.
Ted was entering his senior year of high school as well. Many in his high school consider him to be the “voice of reason” compared with Isaiah’s impulsive and violent attitude. Maybe that’s why they’re such good friends, people would say. They balance each other out, like yin and yang, good cop and bad cop. Whatever it was that attracted these two to each other on that first day of kindergarten, the attraction never wavered; Ted and Isaiah were friends through it all, and it seemed that nothing could get between them.
Ted had just taken a seat in front of the overstuffed easy chair when the phone rang. Ted sighed, and then answered it.
“Hey, Ted. This is Isaiah.”
Ted grinned. Anytime Isaiah called him during the summer, they would go out and cause some sort of mischief. The other day, Isaiah called up Ted, and they went to the park to throw BB gun pellets at the children on the swings. It was never anything intentionally harmful or illegal, but it was fun all the same.
“Hey, Isaiah, what’s up?”
“I’ll tell you what’s up. I’m bored as hell. How about you call up some friends, and we’ll go wander around town. Maybe we’ll find some sticks to throw in the spokes of some passing bikers. What do you say?”
“I say I’m there. Just let me get dressed, and I’ll meet you at the park.”
“Sweet, see you there.”
Ted hung up the phone, finished his glass of milk and toast, and headed upstairs to get ready.
***************************************
Lisa Smith was the epitome of all things sexy. She wore tight fitting clothes that both showed off her figure, yet was modest enough to not draw stares from every creep wandering the halls. Her beautiful golden hair spilled down to the middle of her back, her eyes a brilliant shade of blue, always looking as if she were about to tell a joke, her perfect white teeth accentuated by her choice of a subtle, yet daring, shade of red. The girls hated her; the guys wanted her. Lisa had the looks of a goddess, yet the personality of Mother Theresa.
But for now, Lisa was tangled in the web that was her bed sheets. She lay with one arm flopped over the side of the bed, the other underneath her pillow, both legs sticking out of the bed sheets, and hair in her face and mouth. Deep in sleep, she didn’t notice her cell phone buzzing on the pillow next to her hand, until the vibrations caused it to fall against her arm. She was startled awake, heaved a great sigh, and flipped open the phone.
“What do you want?” she demanded.
“Uh, hey, Lisa, this is Ted.”
“Oh, I’m sorry, Ted,” Lisa yawned. “I just woke up, so I’m not in the best of moods.”
“Well, sorry for waking you. I guess I can call back later—“
“No, no, I’m up now, so I might as well start the day.”
“Well, Isaiah and I were going to meet at the park to wander around town and stuff, and we thought it’d be cool if you came along.”
Lisa sighed and looked at her calendar. Summer was usually busy, especially in mid-August, when the summer activities are at their peak, and the preparation for school was soon to begin. But this day was one of Lisa’s rare “open days”, where she was free to sleep in as late as she wanted, and not have to rush to be anywhere.
“Give me thirty minutes, and I’ll be there.”
“Okay, I’ll see you then. Bye.”
Lisa snapped her phone shut and rolled over to go back to sleep. After tossing and turning for ten minutes, she slammed her fists onto the mattress, crawled out of bed, and went into the bathroom to take a shower.
***************************************
Brian Morgan was on the treadmill, doing his morning run. Normally he went out early to run around the lake while it was still cool, but he missed his alarm, and by the time he checked the weather at ten o’clock, it was far too hot to run outside. The treadmill was commonly used in the wintertime, so it took Brian a while to get back into the groove. Soon he was there, and fifteen minutes later, he turned off the treadmill and went to take a shower.
Brian stepped out of the bathroom, dried off, got dressed, and checked his phone. He saw that he had two missed calls from Ted. He flipped his phone open, and listened to the first voice mail message he had left:
“Hey, Brian, this is Ted. Uh, just calling to let you know that Isaiah and I were going to be hanging out today and wanted to see if you wanted to tag along. We’ll be at the park for a little while, but then we’re going to wander around a little bit. I called Lisa, and she said she’d be there, so, you know, you have that to look forward to. It should be fun. I don’t know exactly what we’re doing, but there’s always something to do, right? If you can’t find it, make it up, I always say. Maybe we’ll push some kids off of their bikes, maybe we’ll throw rocks at the fishes, I’m just not sure. Maybe if you could bring along your—“
Brian deleted the first message, and played the second:
“Hey, Brian, this is Ted. Sorry for rambling on that last message. It cut me off because I’m talking too much, and I don’t want to risk that again, so here’s the scoop: Isaiah, Lisa, and I are going to be at the park later today, and we wanted you to come along. Meet us there if you can, and if we aren’t there, just wander around town and you’re bound to find us. Okay? Sweet. See you later, if you come.”
Brian deleted the second message. He slipped his phone into his pocket, grabbed his house keys, and walked out the door.
***************************************
Trina Nayali was entering her junior year of high school. It felt odd to be the only junior in a group of all seniors, but Isaiah, Ted, Lisa, and Brian accepted her just the same. While it was nice to have such a tight circle of friends, Trina still tried to keep herself distant. She enjoyed any time she spent with the group, but she felt just as satisfied when she was alone, and she often preferred to be alone.
Trina was sitting in her room, writing down lyrics to a new song, trying out different chord progressions on her guitar. Secretly, she wanted to be a famous musician, but knew she wouldn’t get very far by just plunking chords on an acoustic guitar. Her lyrics were imaginative and unique, but she was always put off by the fact that she only knew chords. She always joked that she would make an excellent camp counselor, but outside of that realm, she felt she didn’t have a chance. Her cell phone sat next to her. People rarely called her, but she still felt it was necessary for her to have a cell phone, in case she had an emergency, or someone needed to talk to her about something. Trina lived a cautious life, so she rarely had any emergencies that needed her to use her cell phone, and she was too standoffish for anyone to call her with personal problems, so her phone was most often silent, sitting next to her or in her pocket.
Trina was in the middle of figuring out where to place a key change when her phone rang. Trina was initially startled, but soon she calmed down and answered it.
“Yeah?”
“Hey, Trina, it’s Ted. Are you doing anything today?”
“You know I don’t do anything ever.”
A slight pause, then: “Yeah, sure. Listen, Isaiah and I were going to hang out today, and we wanted you to come along.”
“Who else is going to be there?”
“Well, I called Lisa, and she said she’s coming, but I haven’t heard back from Brian yet.”
Trina looked around her room for a distraction, and finding none, said, “Yeah, sure I’ll come. Just give me a couple of minutes to get there.”
“Awesome. I’ll see you later, then.”
“Yeah, whatever.”
Trina hung up her phone, plunked around a little more, returned the guitar back to its case, and left the house.
***************************************
Isaiah, Ted, Lisa, and Trina all stood by the now empty swing set. When they arrived, there were two young children on the swings, trying to see if they could get over the bar. Isaiah noticed the children becoming airborne, and told them that if they kept trying to get over the bar, their brains would explode from the air pressure. The children laughed at such a preposterous story, but Lisa joined in, saying that her little brother got over the bar, and blood poured out of his ears until he died. The first child began to cry and ran away, while the second child saw through the lies.
“That’s not true!” he shouted at Lisa. “You don’t even have a little brother.”
“And why do you think that is?” answered Lisa with a straight face.
The little boy looked into Lisa’s eyes, and saw that she was starting to cry. This was enough to convince the little boy, and he, too, ran off crying to his mother. The rest of the group laughed, except for Ted.
“You guys!” he whined. “You’re going to make those kids afraid to do anything because their brains might explode.”
Trina scoffed and said, “It’s good to scare the kiddies every so often. It keeps them on their toes and prepares them for the real world.”
At that moment, Brian arrived, out of breath from running, and miffed about something. Without so much as a greeting, he said, “So, you guys will never guess who followed me out here.”
Isaiah cursed under his breath as he saw his younger brother David running across the park. David was about to enter his freshman year of high school, and had every quality of it: the attachment to an upperclassman for a false sense of security, the nervous look in the eyes, ever wary of some unsuspecting prank, everything. David’s upperclassman of choice just happened to be his brother, Isaiah, much to Isaiah’s disappointment.
“Hey, David, how about you go back and watch cartoons or something,” said Isaiah.
“But you told me I should grow up and stop watching cartoons.”
“Well, I still think you’re an idiot, and only idiots watch cartoons, so off you go.”
“No, I’m not going.”
“Listen you piece of crap, I don’t want you hanging around me, now go away.”
The argument went on for several minutes before Lisa broke it up.
“Now,” said Lisa, “if David wants to come along, let him come along. It’s not like we have anything better to do, and one more person, who happens to be younger than us, can probably think of a few things to do when we’re straining for something to entertain us.”
Isaiah was about to retaliate, but Lisa shushed him, and told David he was welcome to tag along today. The rest of the group groaned, and eventually allowed David to walk with them. Isaiah kicked a rock as hard as he could. This is going to be a long day, he thought.
