DEEP IN THE VALLEY

CHAPTER FIVE

THE ALLEY

I wake on my bed fully clothed. It's raining again and I've got one hell of a headache which isn't helped by mother wafting into the room and throwing the curtains open.

'I know you're a big girl now, but you could at least dress yourself for bed' she says while shoving the thermometer into my mouth.

'How did I get home?' I mumble.

'From where?' she says as she goes next door to get Winter ready.

'Who brought me home?' I shout.

'When?' she hollers from the bathroom.

'Yesterday, I think?' I say but am quite unsure what day it is? What is going on with me? I'm now blacking out, things are really beginning to freak me out.  

Mother comes back into the room and looks at the thermometer and then at me with a quizzical smile.

'Well your temperature is back to normal but you may be a bit delirious? You didn't leave the house yesterday, spent most of it playing that stupid computer with Winter. I'm not falling for any of your games, you're going to school today whether you like it or not!'. She leaves the room with a bundle of my laundry in her arms.

OK this is now getting really weird. I don't remember playing with Winter yesterday, all I remember is a bright light...and a trapdoor...that's right I went down into a mine and the old man was there, with a boy.

Did I dream all that? Did my high temperature yesterday make me imagine it all? I saw everything so vividly; it all seemed so real. I sink my head into my hands and rub my eyes in an effort to clear my confused head and when I take them away again I notice there are thin scratches on my palms, and then I have a flashback to when they scraped against the coal wall in the mine. I did see everything. There was a mine, and a boy and I think there was a light that came from the old man's hands?

Mother pops her head back into my room. "Come on, up you get, I'll give you a lift to school". The idea of school actually appeals to me today, it may just be the island of normality that I need in the strange sea that I currently seem to be navigating. 

Penrith Comprehensive School is by far the worst school I have every attended and I stand out like a sore thumb. Growing up on army bases gives you a disciplined insight into how to live your life, it teaches you to respect life and others. 'The Comp', however,  is full of kids who have little respect for anything. Everything is treated with a disregard due to the knowledge that there are few jobs for them to go to once they leave this place. Most of the school hate me because I'm an outsider, I dress weird and because I refuse to engage with them they just think I'm weirdo. Oh and the fact that my father was killed last year has also created an aura of darkness around me that some of the worst kids taunt me with. 

I am completely spaced out as I walk through the crowd towards the hall for assembly. What is going on with my head? Maybe it's time to tell mother, if I am going crazy it's probably better to catch it early.

'Why the slouch?' asks a voice behind me. I turn and see Shelly carrying her large school bag in her arms; the straps hang in shreds by its side.

'Hey' I say. 'What happened your bag?'

'Kevin McMorrow and the rest of the brain dead grabbed it on my way in and very kindly decided to make it strapless for me'.

'How kind of them' I say and she nods in agreement.