A way around

Hi.

Looks like I don't have a problem after all. Y'see, I decided, 'who needs Amazon and Kobo?', so, I decided, that, while I scream a few naughty words, I'll keep Mean, Median, Mode and Murder. Oh, and here it is:

Mean, Median, Mode and Murder

Short Story Written By A. B. Coates

I dragged myself lazily towards Mrs Anderson’s class, sleep filling my eyes. I was a bit of a daydreamer and I sometimes fell asleep in lessons. OK, maybe not sometimes. More like I couldn’t remember a single lesson I could stay awake for the whole time in. I didn’t know why.             Slowly, I pushed the door open and threw myself into my seat. Mrs Anderson sat at the front of the room next to the blackboard.

            “Welcome students, to today’s lesson: Mean, Median, Mode and Range. Now who would like to explain the definition of the first word: ‘mean’?” she began. As usual, her long, bony finger moved randomly around the class and it ended up pointing at me. “So, Maximillian, what is the definition of the word ‘mean’?” she asked.

            I shrugged. “Ugh, Miss, ‘mean’ means cruel or horrible to something,” I blurted out, knowing it was wrong but not knowing anything else. I didn’t remember being awake for our lesson on maths vocab, I didn’t remember us having it. My mate told me about it at lunch that day.

            “Correct in English, however this is Mathematics…” I didn’t hear the rest, my eyes and ears shut for ages. If the world had ended, I wouldn’t have known. Luckily, well not very luckily, actually, it did not end. That’s sort of how I’m telling you this.

            Finally I woke up again, just in time to hear this: “Mean, Median, Mode and Range. I shall drill those words into your heads!” Everyone laughed. “I’m serious!” she yelled back. Everyone laughed again. Little did they know, she truly meant it.

***

After the lesson, Mrs Anderson asked me to remain seated.             “Maximillian, you slept quite a bit of the lesson; therefore you must stay behind after school. Be here tomorrow at 3:15pm sharp,” she told me.

            “OK, Miss,” I replied with a nervous, shaky voice.

            “Good, so get out of here. It’s lunch period, remember?” she snapped. I left my seat and hurried to the canteen.

            I ate lunch with my best friend, Will. We both had the same thing: pasta salad and oranges. “You are so doomed,” Will teased for the hundredth time.

            “So what? I fell asleep. She’s not going to kill me or anything,” I replied.

            “Oh yes she will. You slept through an entire lesson, you didn’t do any of the work,” Will jeered, “Oh, and you missed the homework. Write ten different maths problems using mean, median, mode and range.”

            I cursed, “Any other homework?” I pulled out my diary and began to scribble.

            “For French, you need to conjugate dormir and choisir in present and past tense, for History you have to research a type of gladiator and create a model …”

            We went through the list of homework and due dates. There was a lot of homework.

***

The next day went like a blur. I shifted through Art, Religion, French and PE, forever thinking about my upcoming detention. My sleepy-headed nature wasn’t helping, and I got another strike for falling asleep in Religion and French. For both subjects I was one strike away from staying after school. I wish Mrs Anderson hadn’t added a day between me sleeping and the detention. Dread and foreboding feelings haunted me all day and all night. It wasn’t any fun having something to dread for ages.

            At lunch, Will ribbed me again. “You are sooo dead,” Will jeered.

            “Enough!” It was the second day of torture, and I lost my marbles. I lifted up my plate, with half a pizza still there plus the dessert of the day, and slammed it against the table. Craack! The plate split in half. Custard leapt out of the paper bowl that all desserts came in and splashed Will’s own pizza, and he stared at me in shock. He wasn’t the only one; every living creature with eyes was pointing them at me. All over the canteen, people dropped their food and gave me shocked stares. For once, the canteen was utterly silent.

            Five seconds later, the world recovered. People didn’t touch their food, they simply joined the chorus of muttering to each other and gossiping, which, at this rate, was going up in a steady crescendo.

            I was dead. The caretakers would make me clean up and I’d be suspended. And before all that happened, my school’s umpteen bullies would turn any part of school into nightmare-land.

            Callum Smith was the main bully. Big, beefy and downright stupid, Callum was your average cliché delinquent, with eleven suspensions under his belt. He didn’t wear school uniform, because nobody, not even Mr Jones, the PE teacher with a black belt in Karate, would dare prosecute him. He’d once nearly killed a teacher for complaining about his gung-ho attitude. After returning from several months in hospital, it was agreed that the teacher should take early retirement at forty-eight. And guess what? He bumped into me on the way out.

            Now I was face-to-face with the meanest, toughest kid on the planet. You never knew what nasty surprise he had in store for you. Would he hang me from one of the basketball posts? Or tie me to a tree and beat my guts with a baseball bat till I puked up my breakfast? As school psychopaths go, Callum was the number one.

            I could tell he was here to bring terror to me after I broke the plate and spilled gooey yellow custard everywhere. As Year Elevens went, Callum was the only one that scared me one bit.

            “Yo, turd!” Callum greeted everyone like this.

            “Callum, I’m not in the mood. I’ve a detention with Mrs Anderson and now the caretakers are giving me a two-day suspension, for God’s sake!” I realised I shouldn’t have told Callum this.

            “Vell zen, it ish time dat I varmed you up for zat, turd,” this was Callum’s evil voice. I think it was meant to sound like Hitler or somebody, but it just sounded dorky. Not that I’d tell him.

            I expected a punch, so I ducked. Big mistake. Instead, Callum kicked me. He got my head, arms and legs at once. At least he didn’t hit anything painful, like my broken ribs. Callum lifted me up and dragged me away.

            “Y’know, Maxine, I’ve always wanted to do this to you,” I hated it when people called me Maxie or Maxine.

            ‘What was wrong with calling me a turd?’ I asked, deciding on the lesser of two evils. Callum didn’t hear me.

            Callum dragged me to the wildlife area. He thrust me against the gate. At first I thought this is what he had ‘always wanted to do’, but I realised he had something millions of times worse planned when the door swung open. The ridiculous thing about the wildlife area was that the gate was locked by a chain. The chain could be shaken out with very little force. In fact, I don’t remember the last time I saw a junior caretaker use a key. Callum’s Physics level being anywhere between G+ and E-, I dared myself not to think how he worked that out. Come to think of it, he would have done it by experimentation.

            Callum shoved me inside. He then dragged me to a tree leaning over a pond. I now realised why Callum was wearing wellies. He slung my feet onto the tree and waded in, dragging me along. After a few steps, he simply tied me up and pushed me along. He stuck a sponge in my mouth and gagged me. Then he left, locking the door behind him.

***

I knew getting out would be the hard bit. I was gagged, and if I did get the filthy sponge out of my mouth, the caretakers wouldn’t come after me. They would have lost their marbles all the way on Mars, and wouldn’t care if I was going to end up with at least one detention for messy uniform and maybe another in Geography for being late. Mr Stevens, my Geography teacher, wouldn’t take any excuses for being late. Unless you couldn’t get to school because of something severe, you landed yourself in a tough detention. So I wasn’t looking forward to that.

            Then I realised something. Callum had been able to slide me along while tied. There must have been enough slack in the rope for it to be possible to move me along. Without doing it so hard as to break the rope or branch, I jerked myself sideways. I kept doing this until I could do it no more.

Now came the hard bit. There was a foot or so of water left, so I couldn’t free myself easily. Instead, I flipped myself on top of the branch and spat out the sponge. I laid into the knot with my teeth, and, after some thorough biting, destroyed it and slid away.

            If he thought I would just lie there and not outfox his lazy strategy, then Callum was wrong about me in every single way. Apart from me lying to sleep in the bushes, where he’d left some thumbtacks. Damn, those hurt.

***

After school, I headed towards Mrs Anderson’s class. It was difficult. My last class of the day was Science in E-Block. Mrs Anderson’s classroom was in A-Block and getting from one to the other was always a challenge, especially after school. First, you had to pass through the tennis court without disturbing the after-school Tennis Club. Then, you had to pass through C-Block out via the correct door, then go past the running track. This was no easy task, because it was the place children went to while they waited for clubs to start, or because they wanted to loiter. Then it was easy because Mrs Anderson’s class was the first on left from the A-Block door onto the running field.

            Mrs Anderson was waiting for me at the A-Block door. She led me to her classroom. On her desk I saw something covered by a tea-towel. She silenced me before I could ask about it.

            “It’s time,” she said. She motioned for me to go to my seat as she strode towards her desk. Mrs Anderson’s detentions were notoriously long and dull, in fact so long and dull. In fact, their longness and dullness was the rumoured reason for several odd deaths over the years. I pulled out my water bottle should I near the lethal limit of boredom.

            She picked up the object I’d noticed. Now I could see what was. It was a drill. I swore. That was new. I hadn’t sworn before. It felt weird.

            All the hairs on my body stood up on end. My muscles tensed instantly. My hands became tight fists. My eyes flew around the room, searching for a way to escape but I couldn’t find a single route. I was trapped.

            I should have listened in class, and now I was paying the price. My pessimistic thoughts were backed up by the evil smile on Mrs Anderson’s face.

            There was something strange about the smile. So strange my blood boiled. I couldn’t put my finger on it. Then I worked it out. The smile was moving, like a singer at a concert failing to lip-sync. Strangely, no words were coming out. Then I heard it. In my mind an evil laugh so evil it couldn’t exist in even the devil’s mouth. I began to drift into insanity.

***

After five seconds or so, I exited the daze and snapped back to reality. Mrs Anderson moved closer, getting ready to spray my brains all over the place. Her finger twitched and suddenly the drill started spinning, the tip aimed for my skull. I cried out as I recoiled in my chair, throwing it backwards. The teachers were wrong. Every once in a while, it is good to rock in your chair, so you don’t get hit by a big cordless drill.

            The table came with me. The drill fell from Mrs Anderson’s hand and flew straight at the back wall. It hit it side-on and merely fell, not a scratch in sight. I dived past the chairs and desks dominating the ground, heading straight for the drill with Mrs Anderson hot on my heels.

            Her foot flew forwards, straight into my back, sending me flying straight for the wall. I crashed into it, my eyes flashed shut, as my hand tried to reach the drill. I merely touched the deadly weapon, I couldn’t grip it. I flew backwards as the force of the impact sent my body recoiling.

            By the time I managed to re-open my eyes, Mrs Anderson already had the drill. She loomed over me, the drill floating towards my head like a pendulum.

            Then, my eye caught something – my water bottle. I’d put it on the desk. When my feet hit the table, it must have rolled off. If I could reach it, I could squirt the water at the drill and damage it. My hand flew out faster than a lightning bolt. It gripped the bottle and shot back in.

The drill was now centimetres from my head; I realized I had to act fast. I ripped off the lid and aimed. My hand crushed the bottle. Water flew out in all directions. Then I heard two noises – the whine of a wet mechanism shutting down – and another – Mrs Anderson screaming with fury. Good and bad news at once.

***

I leapt for my bag, grabbed it and charged out of the room. I raced out of A-Block and charged straight for the Reception Block. I raced through the halls and corridors and made it to the bicycle rack. I snatched my bike off the rack and leapt on top of it. I momentarily praised my expensive racing bike.

            I pedalled faster than I ever had, powering toward the open gates. I shot onto the road; it was faster home along the road than the pedestrian way.

            But, to my horror, blocking the road was Mrs Anderson’s car!

            I turned on to the walkway and shot past at maximum speed. I knew I was being chased but I thought I knew what I was doing. I pedalled hard, constantly moving left and right. I went off the path home and headed in another direction – towards Scratchwood, and in particular, a service station.

            First though, I had a call to make.

***

The race was a mad run. I jumped fences, twisted around corners, doubled back to trick Mrs Anderson … Every trick in the book was being played out at once. It was the scariest moment of my life.

            My front tyre hit a small mound, throwing me over the handlebars. I crashed head-first, and for a few dire seconds I was seeing stars. I heard brakes whine behind me, and adrenaline brough me back into the zone. I leapt back on my bike as Mrs Anderson’s car slowed to a halt. I was off.

***

It must have been an hour before I got to Scratchwood. But I hadn’t felt a bead of sweat on my skin. 100 metres away was my target. It was a risky plan, I knew, but I was ready for anything. I headed straight for the service station.

            Suddenly I heard firing and tipped my bike over, narrowly missing the rain of lethal ammunition from the guns of HMS Belfast. Mrs Anderson’s car, though, had no escape. I watched the torrent of bullets hit the car. Windows shattered, leather seats were torn, sparks flew from the engine …

            The sight made me wonder what it’s like for soldiers in the armed forces.

            Barely a minute later, the firing stopped. I stared through the cracked windscreen. But I didn’t see Mrs Anderson. All I saw was the lifeless, mutilated body of Callum Smith and the remains of some cash.

            I still don’t know Callum’s part of the operation, but I think she might have paid him to block my escape. I snuck back the way I had come and rode home, happy and safe.

***

One hour earlier

“Hi mum,” I panted, struggling to keep my mobile to my ear.

          “Max, I’m still at work,” Mum snapped, “why can’t you call Dad?”

          “Because I need help from you in particular,” I said.

          “What can I possibly do Dad can’t?” Mum almost growled down the line.

          “When do you clean the Belfast’s guns next?” I asked.

          “Forty-five minutes, why’s that important?” Mum asked.

          “Good,” I panted, “Listen, Mum, I’m being chased. I’ll be in Scratchwood in an hour, can you fire off the guns?”

          “I don’t get what you need them for, and you’ll owe your whole life, but I’ll try,” Mum hung up.

          I looked behind me. Mrs Anderson was closing. I quickened my pace, outmanoeuvring her.

***

That was how I cheated death. Unfortunately I had Maths the next day and everything went downhill from there. I’ll leave that for later. That was just a bit gory…

I'll also be a adding a copy to my site, but I need to scream a naughty words at Google Docs first, so hang in there, OK? Amazon and Kobo are next.