Matthew and the Chimney Sweeps: Book One (Completed, Editing)

Chapter Sixteen: For the Children

  To a loud wave of cheering, Matthew took his foot off the brake pedal.

  At first, things were going according to plan. He was going straight and keeping up with his family, albeit slightly behind, but as he crossed the halfway point of the grassy clearing something hard hit the back of his cart, making him swerve lose and lose speed.

 Matthew looked to see what it was and saw Dirty Pete was right behind him, his mess of a cart now moving along with only three whole wheels. The fourth wheel had a huge chunk missing. The chunk was what had hit him.

  'Sorry,' Dirty Pete shouted.

  With the loss of speed, most of the racers were now ahead of Matthew, with his family well in front of him. He was very eager to catch up, his heart pounding with adrenaline.

  'You all right?' Matthew heard Chloe yell over the noise of the spectators, including howls of laughter, aimed at him, from both the Westies and the Mongraw Gang.

  As Dirty Pete passed him, Matthew held up his arm, gesturing to Chloe that he was all right.

  'What was that, Dirty Pete?' bellowed John. 'You shouldn't be riding that thing you call a cart. It's a disgrace.' This brought more laughter.

  Matthew watched as a mishmash of carts formed before the first corner. There was a lot bumping and crashing into one another but nothing too violent to send anyone out of the race. It didn't take long before there was a crash, though. On the second stretch of the race, the section the bump, a boy from the Free Territory got t-boned by Leech. The boy's cart, which was a barrel with wheels, exploded in a ball of splinters. Leech's cart carried on as if nothing happened.

  Matthew was glad the boy, who had been flung several feet because of the crash, was fine, standing up on his own, but soon became enraged after seeing how proud Leech looked at what he had just done.

  Suddenly, he saw children pop up at the side of the track in front of him. The spectators had begun to make their way down the hill and to the finish line, watching the race as they go. 

  The next stretches of the race, which included the cave and the steep decline, saw many more race-ending crashes. Fortunately, none of them involved his family, but sadly, the Westies or the Mongraw Gang weren't involved either. He did see Dirty Pete crash. His front wheel had disintegrated entirely after hitting a slight dip and his cart veered off the track, hitting a tree with a loud crack.

  Those stretches of the race also saw Matthew lose even more ground to the carts ahead of him. Slowing down at the start was the reason, for they just had more speed. And everyone who had been in front of him and who hadn't crashed, Leech included, eventually disappeared from sight. He didn't lose any hope, for he felt good, alive, and he was riding Blue Blizzard to near perfection.

  Even when he saw Norman in trouble on the sixth stretch of the race, a stretch with so many ups and downs, his positivity didn't wane.

  'What's wrong?' he shouted at Norman, his cart moving at half of what it should be.

  Norman looked around. 'Ah, there you are. Punctured tire. I'm done. What happened to you?'

  'Dirty Pete.  Slowed me down.  How the others doing?'

  'Leading pack I think.'

  'Am I close?' asked Matthew, as he sped passed Norman.

  'A few corners ahead,' Norman called out. 'Plenty of time to catch up .' He finished loudly, giving Matthew a boost to his already high spirits, with, 'Go get 'em.'