Realms: To Catch a Dragon: Chapter One

It was dark and rainy the morning that started my adventures.

It was a Saturday morning, almost eleven o' clock, and I was still exhausted. I had been up until one in the morning, hand-writing the rough draft to a report that would be due next Monday. I had procrastinated for two weeks, until my mother had finally threatened to ground me, if my laziness earned me less than a C+. So I'd buckled down, determined to get it done.

Not that I was under any illusions that the work would be anything great; I hated writing book reports. I was more a creative fiction writer-type person, still am, and anyway, a two-part assignment like this one is never best done under the pressure of "finish in two days or else."

And now I couldn't even sleep in.

"David!" my mother yelled outside my door. "Get your ass up!"

I yawned and rolled over. Maybe I could go back to sleep...

But judging by the banging on my door, maybe not.

I sat up, fuming. It was Saturday! This was the day I slept in til noon, because the night before I would have been up late writing whatever came to mind, putting the finishing touches on the book that I would be sending in to be published. Back home, I hadn't been restricted to Friday and Saturday nights, either, so it was bad enough that I was suffering through this...this...injustice! But now, with little time to write, to work on my career, she wouldn't even allow me the right to sleep in!

Moving to California hadn't been fun, but it wouldn't have been so bad if I'd been continuing with home-schooling, like what my dad had had me in since fourth grade. But then my mother had decided the three months of summer weren't enough time with me, and rather than fight her and put me through all that stress, Dad had agreed. So I was supposed to live with her for six months a year. And Mother had decided that while I was in California, I would go to St. Peter's Catholic School. Yippee.

Maybe that was what started my fascination of writing about the unnatural, the government-created demonic things that populated my first book, The Blink of an Eye. See, it was about this group of humanoid creatures that slipped through a gateway and ended up in the government's hands. They were going to be used in the military, but before they could find out how, they escaped while being transported to a different base. It did start out kind of sci-fi-ish, but it started to take on more religious qualities when Kelsey, my best friend, suggested they should have a less cliche motive. I agreed, and changed things up a bit, deciding they should quest to find their goddess. My publisher certainly liked it better, even though the change was last minute and all.

I made a lot from that book, but Dad had set up an account for all the money to go into, so I would have something for college. For the next two years, until I turned eighteen, only Dad could access it, something that ticked my mother's boyfriend off endlessly. He never let on while she could hear him, but if he could have access to that cash, he would have been gone a long time ago; he told me so repeatedly, not that Mother believed me. She actually thought I was lying because I didn't like him. Go figure.

I mean, I don't like him, but he makes her happy, so I'm not about to chase him off; he takes too much of her attention up for me to do so willingly. Besides, I think I could be a little more creative about getting rid of the creep.

So I put up with the hinting and torture of a school whose faith I don't share, and did my best to pass my classes, something that shocked most of my teachers.

But I wouldn't have to put up with any of that today; no school saturdays, and the Creep was off hanging out with his other creepy friends, probably in a bar.

So while Mother was pounding on my door, I dressed as quickly and quietly as I could. Then, while she yelled about how I was just like my father--"that lazy, no good idiot!"--I opened my window, climbed onto the roof, and clambered down the oak tree just outside my window.

I had made one friend out here, named Leslie Candon. He was almost as easy to talk to as Kelsey, and definetly not someone Mother would approve of. He went to the public high school, two blocks away from where I lived with Mother and the Creep. I would have preferred going there (apparently, it isn't traditional to stick new students' heads down toilets like it is at St. Peters), but Grandmother insisted, and Mother was putty in her hands.

And this is where it starts; walking to Leslie's house. Minding my own business. Crossing the street. Getting hit by a car.

Yep. Getting hit by a car.