"Josh!! Wake up for school!"
As Mrs Barnett's cry echoed through the narrow corridor of 138 Aberforth Gardens, Joshua groaned and turned over as he threw one leg out of his untidy cerulean blue covers and attempted to ignore the roaring sound that had awoken him.
Today was an ordinary day in the life of Joshua Barnett, as the dull cascading grey clouds blanketed the sky and winters chilling breath spread across his window slowly drowning the view of Aberforth Gardens and the beautiful detached houses with their perfectly trimmed lawns and bushes all lined up in a row of satisfying symmetry. A normal day of mundane British weather by all standards.
"IF NEITHER OF YOU WAKE UP, NO ONES GETTING ANY BREAKFAST!" Yelled Mrs Barnett as her voice rose both in tone and tenacity.
Joshua immediately leapt out of bed, haphazardly putting on whatever clothes that were scrawled on his messy bedroom floor. Before dashing downstairs to meet his family at the table for breakfast, he looked once into the standing mirror which sat next to his oak wardrobe. He gazed into the mirror and his expression distorted from childish joy into a look of complete indifference. The corner of his room was encapsulated by a petrifying darkness and a slender pulsating human-like silhouette similar to Joshua's scrawny appearance stood unmoving. Its body consisted of rotating strings of eerie darkness and blood-red energy rotating like an all-consuming blackhole whilst its blood-red pupils were surrounded by a shadow blanketing the white sclera giving it a demonic and unnerving appearance.
The Crimson Creature.
It simply stood unmoving. An angel of death, towering over Joshua, witnessing every moment of his life ever since the incident with Dr March, like a starved wolf circling his prey restraining its predatory urges. The scariest part for Joshua wasn't his appearance nor the chilling colour of his eyes, instead it was his own desire. Desire for pure unbridled violence. The exhilarating feeling of death as the blood coursed faster and the iron scent of broken bone electrified his perverted primitive nature. It felt like he was whole, completed by the destruction and cries for mercy from the dilapidated jaw of Dr March. Now however, he felt unnatural, out of place, as if ignoring the Crimson Creature went against his most basic instinct like a child not crying for his mother or a fish refusing to swim. Since the day of the Incident and the fearful expressions of his parents at the butchered body of Dr March who lay limp a breath away from death, he hid his nature. The pain he felt in his heart was overwhelming as the sadness he caused the two people who had nurtured him, loved him and protected him despite him being a fostered child they had taken in was enough to resist his innate savagery and go against his very primitive instinct. Taking one last look at his demonic stalker he bounded down the stairs else he would see something even more terrifying... Mrs Barnett angry.
As he sat down on the leathery seat he looked across at the three people bickering back and forth and smiled warmly. To Joshua his picturesque family who almost glowed in an iridescent light were all that mattered to him. From his over-protective father to his bold mother and even bolder little sister all his concerns and qualms washed away like the seashells taken in by the rising shore.
"I won't go to school without a note!" yelled Missy stubbornly, her auburn hair rising with each huff and puff.
"Why would you skip P.E. your neither injured nor sick, physical activity is good for you" said Mr Barnett calmly, pausing mid sentence to cut a piece of buttered bread with his knife and fork before enjoying the perfect combination of bread, beans and scrambled egg with spicy sausage. A British classic.
"It's because she's terrible at volley ball" added Joshua smiling slyly to himself and chuckling lightly.
"First of all its not like i don't get any physical activity, i just hate P.E and hark whose talking lanky, its not like you're any better than me!" scoffed Missy laughing internally at the thought of Joshua playing football with his scrawny body.
"Hey!!" shouted Joshua not offering any rebuttal.
"Okay, okay no more fighting you two eat your food before it gets cold!" interceded Mrs Barnett before the argument could escalate any further.
The rest of the meal passed quickly without any complaints as the array of food was slowly devoured by the family from the piles of buttery bread to the crunchy on the outside yet perfectly tender on the inside hash brown. Then both Missy and Joshua raced upstairs pushing and shoving each other as they went resulting in Joshua lording his victory over the crestfallen Missy.
As Joshua entered his room shoving open the door that dragged on the floor releasing a unbearable screeching sound resulting from the loose top hinge, he looked at the tumultuous pile of clothes that sat on his floor and contemplated where his uniform was. After throwing on his baggy shirt, short tie and blazer he rushed down stairs grabbing his backpack roughly as he left. As he bounded towards the door aware that his first class started in twenty minutes and Aberforth secondary school was twenty-five minutes from his house he began to run even faster. Afterall, he couldn't be late for his first day of year 7 and then also be seen as sloppily dressed as he was. Just as he began opening the door Mrs Barnett shouted.
"Make sure you take your jacket!! It's freezing out there!"
"Yes mum!" he replied proceeding to look at his grey jacket on the banister and leave it behind with a slam of the door.
As he pedalled down the cobbled pavements of Aberforth Gardens on his ruby red Trek bike, his surroundings a blur of cascading colours from a natural green to a cement brick with frequent splashes of blue from the uniforms of walking students. Reaching the end of the road, he swerved to the left into Eastwood avenue as a concrete brutalist building wrapped in a ring of green crisscrossing fences tall enough to prevent any students escaping could be seen rising from the horizon and the schools shield insignia , a shield separated into four quarters each with a golden lion, eagle, snake and badger respectively came into view. As he quickened his pace, and approached the school he noticed a large expanse of towering dark birch trees bathing in its own shadow towards the back of the school. Pausing to have a glance at the dark forest, an eerie anxiousness crawled down his back as he stared into the abyss of nature which called out to him. Ignoring the temptation Joshua sped past the forest and into the school, casting any memory of the forest out of his mind not noticing a bone thin red and black pulsating hand pointing towards the forest behind him.
His first day at secondary school was about as enjoyable and exciting as one could expect, as he was forced into awkward and mostly fickle conversations with classmates and was introduced to the teachers who would govern his life for the next four years. He sat alone at lunch ,which was to his preference and proceeded to count the hours till the end of the school day. Then he left school and went home as per his usual mundane day, little did he know that it would be the last mundane day of school he would have...
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Still haven't set up any form of social media btw but will get to that in between rushing to lectures and writing a chapter a day i am doing my best with my first ever book and will try to release as many chapters as i physically can so support me as much as you possibly can please . Todays chapter was a bit short but as per i would appreciate any feedback or help you could give to my first novel. Make sure to subscribe and use power stone and see you tomorrow unless i release something else today:)
Listen you guys whilst i hope you did enjoy reading i want to reassure you that i will be attempting to explore my writing style more so bare with me. The more you interact with my chapter the increased likelihood of me being contracted and moving out from my parents house and you guys get a chapter or more a day in that case so help a brother out. Anyways hope your all doing well and that you and your families are okay and as previously mentioned I hope you keep reading. (this section of the chapter will not be checked for grammar as its not part of the chapter so forgive me if its terrible to read).
Each chapter will aim to have at least 1500-5000 words in order to avoid boring you and also because people really only bother reading a web novel with 50+ chapters so i have to increase engagement innit. Alr ill see you guys tomorrow.