The School Of Oddities

Chapter 3: Hitchhikers

"We've been walking for hours," a boy in turtle shell glasses and oversized hoodie complained. He has his large duffel bag slung over both shoulders, reducing a few inches of his already small height.

"Blame Laurie it was his idea to go this way," another says. He has curly black hair and walks in perfect posture, an overly large duffel bag only hung on one shoulder. He's the only one in the group who doesn't walk with a flashlight.

Laurie, the tallest of the bunch who has a pink shirt on that says 'I love WiFi' in white letters and an orange and gray jacket slapped his curly haired friend across the back of his head causing the other guy to stumble forward and gain his balance quickly.

"You agreed to it," Laurie defends. "You all did."

"I didn't," the last boy says. He has scruffy long black hair and wears baggy clothing. He only has a backpack on and a rolled rope tied to his waist.

"Shut up Mark you're not part of the conversation," Laurie snaps. Mark shoots him a glare but Laurie doesn't mind. Laurie and Mark are cousins, but they don't get along very much often.

"Hey guys look!" Turtle-shell glasses guy exclaims and ran to the edge of a dandelion field they came across. "A river!"

He drops to his knees and looks up, his hands outstretched like he's thanking the heavens for the river. Without warning he bent his head and drank straight off the gushing river. Mark silently crept up to him and pushed his head forward, a loud gurgling sound emitted from the waters. As suddenly as he dipped his friend's head in the water Mark let go.

"Damnit Mark! Why'd you do that! I could've drowned!"

"Chill Raye," Mark says, putting his hand up in a defending manner. Raye fixes his glasses and lunges at Mark, screaming.

"Chill! I am chill! Chilled!" Raye screams as he throws punches at Mark, Laurie egging Raye to punch harder and to 'kick Mark on the balls' which Raye did.

"Yo! Jay I bet you five dollars Raye is going to win!" He shouts at the curly haired one who busied himself looking through the binoculars he brought with them for their hike.

"Would you three stop and take a look at this?" He says, lowering the binoculars. Mark pushes Raye off him and scrambles up, Laurie pulls on Mark's leg and races to Jay's side, Raye runs beside Laurie and Mark grumbles something under his breath as he gets up and slowly makes his way to where his friends are.

When Jay finds something, its always interesting.

When Raye finds something, it'll always be an animal or a new video game. Or an update to a video game, on other times a cheat to a game. Other times its a new YouTuber.

When Mark finds something, it'd always be an illegal downloading site, a new movie or the sandwich Laurie hid under his pillow three weeks ago.

When Laurie finds something, the others won't be able to see it because its too high and the bastard wouldn't bring it down.

Each of them took turns looking through the binoculars. After what seemed like an eternity of pointing wherever the thing they found is to Laurie, Jay got the binoculars and placed it carefully to a smaller bag strapped to his duffle bag.

"So how do we get across this river?" Raye asks.

"We swim!" Jay announces and prepares to dive in when Mark cut him off.

"There's a bridge over there." he points to a wooden bridge not far from them. Jay whines and groans in frustration.

"Crossing bridges is boring," he complains.

"Says the person who was screaming to death and holding on to the railings of the glass bridge in China," Laurie whispers. This became followed by everyone's laughter, everyone aside from Jay who glared at him. If glares could kill.

"I was screaming because I was having fun," Jay defends.

"Oh really? You were screaming 'get me out of this bridge' and everyone turned their heads to your direction. Someone even took a video of it and posted it on Twitter and Facebook. Not to mention YouTube." Raye laughs while rubbing his palms together. "You went viral." And in a hushed tone he adds, "and that someone is me."

Jay rolls his eyes and fixes his bag. "Whatever at least I went viral. Let's go cross that old wooden bridge that will collapse any moment now then," he says and walks to the bridge. He checks the strength of the first plank by planting a foot on it. He counts to ten and when he became certain that it wouldn't break, Jay ran as fast as a cheetah across the bridge he almost became a blur. Once he got across he held his arms up and cheered.

"I made it! I'm alive! I'm al—" a bag suddenly went over his head and a rope tied around his body. In a matter of seconds Jay got dragged away from his friends who were screaming and yelling his name in total panic.

"Jay!"

"Holy smokes what was that?"

"That was sudden man."

"Well. He's gone. Let's go home."

Everyone shot Laurie an angry glare. He held his hands up in a questioning manner and sighed.

"I didn't mean to," he apologizes. "Let's go. Follow him."

"To where?" Raye asks, trembling in his shoes.

"To wherever that thing brought him." Laurie points to where their friend got dragged off. "Let's go!" He says and walks to the bridge.

"What if it'll come back?" Raye asks. Mark huffs and wraps an arm around Raye.

"It won't. Trust me," he assures.

"It won't trust you?" Laurie asks. "Obviously no one will trust you cuz."

"Shut up and walk," Mark snaps and pushes his cousin who took the lead. Laurie stumbles a little forward and almost catches his foot on an open gap. Lucky him he jumped. Unlucky him the plank broke and he fell in the water. "Are you dead?"

Laurie glared up at his friends as he floats in the water. He jumps up and reaches out to the edge of the bridge. His weight caused the bridge to break. Raye and Mark fell in the water with a loud yelp and Raye almost drowned. The bridge collapsed over them and the three hastily swam away from the debris.

On shore, the three lamented over the wet bags and shook the waters off them. Raye removed his jacket and laid it out on the grass. Mark keeps on ruffling his hair to dry it and Laurie wraps his shirt around a wound on his arm.

"That bridge is a demon," Laurie complains. "Who's idea was it to cross the bridge?"

Raye points at Mark faster than a lightning bolt. Laurie grumbles and goes near his cousin. Laurie glares at Mark before walking away, picking his bag up and ushering his companions to follow him. Raye grabs his jacket and bag and sprints beside Laurie, Mark followed his cousin after picking up his belongings.

An hour and a half later, the three boys are standing in front of an almost dilapidated house with a pole at the left side, a tattered flag still attached to it. On the right side is an oak tree tall enough to reach the attic window.

"Should we go in?" Raye asks.

Laurie scoffs at his question with an eyeroll. "No, we knock."

"Knocking on the door of the house of whoever took our friend? Are you crazy!"

"Like going in the house with no weapon whatsoever!"

"Will you two stop arguing!" Mark screams, causing his cousin and Raye to stop. But his scream wasn't the one that stopped them.

A bag going over everyone and a rope tying around the opening of the bag tightens.

Siberian walks out the house and grabs the bag, hoists it over his shoulder and carries it in the house.