Hard To Get To A novel by Antony Hammond
Chapter 2: Am I Dreaming?
‘Kaboom!’
Danny’s eyes open suddenly as a massive explosion fills his eardrums with a loud, deafening thud. From outside his window, what sounds like gunshots can be heard. Danny takes a moment to gain his senses realizing that his imagination is probably getting the better of him.
He lives in possibly the safest, or should I say most boring, neighbourhood in America and the notion of all out gang warfare on his doorstep is unlikely. The closest thing to a disturbance is Mrs Henderson’s operatic singing on a Sunday morning which she practices before church. Danny hears what sounds like car doors being slammed and the murmur of hushed voices.
His hair tousled and his eyes half open, Danny rubs his eyes deep into his head with his fists and tries to focus. He looks over at his bedside clock, 1:15am. Damn. Who was making such a noise at this time? Slowly rising from his once comfy mattress he sits upright on the bed rotating his head around and round to free and crack the knots out of his neck. He almost forgets why he is awake for a moment but once again there are noises that can be heard from outside Danny's window that alert his senses again and jog his memory.
Who on Earth has woken him up and caused him to leave his restful, much needed slumber?
What kind of inconsiderate wretch would awaken someone from their sleep,preparing for the first day of the rest of their future?
Don't they understand that Danny needs every second of his precious sleep to ensure that his brain is working at optimum capability to ensure success over his future failings?
Curious to find out what is happening he sleepily gets out of bed and ambles across to the open window. Quite accurately he manages to locate an upturned plug on which he places his bare foot . Of all the floor he could have chosen to safely walk through, it is the precise coordinates of the rogue plug that he instead, deftly picked out. Instantly, he grabs his foot with both hands, letting out a silent scream skywards, as if asking the question, 'WHY??!!'. What makes it even more annoying is that he knows that if he where not awake and out of his bed due to the disturbance, his foot would not currently be clutched in agony from a searing, unrivaled pain. He gingerly places his foot back down, taking the time to kick the plug to one side, and completes the short walk to his bedroom window. Standing at the window and moving the curtains partially to one side, Danny peers through the gap and looks out across the quiet, abandoned suburban street.
Across the road from Danny’s vantage point is a very old looking saloon car parked up against the empty grass verge in front of the large white house opposite. The house has been for sale since the Korzienowski family moved out in March. With smoky clouds of steam rising out from the hood, a man steps from around the driver's side of the motor and walks directly to the front of the vehicle and to the source of the once billowing fumes emanating from the engine. Looking slightly perturbed the man takes a handkerchief from out of his pocket and lifts the hood and starts to inspect the engine. After a matter of seconds his head emerges from under the hood visibly shaking. The man is quite tall and awkward looking and seems to have to bend quite severely to fit his head and shoulders underneath the car’s hood. Standing by the passenger side of the car is an equally awkward and strange looking woman with neat black hair unflatteringly scraped back, almost painfully into a French plait. She seems frustrated and tired as she waits with her arms folded and her right foot tapping feverishly on top of the densely concreted street. Her anger is obvious towards the tall man who she is ushering to hurry up whatever it is he is supposed to be fixing. It seems to Danny as though the woman is tapping her watch face repeatedly whilst shouting something in a hushed voice at the man. The man ignores the woman, similar to the way his Dad does with his Mom, and continues with his task.
Danny’s attention however is distracted away from the front of the car as the rear passenger window unhurriedly slides opens. From inside the car the outline of a face can be made out. It is a girl’s face. Inside the dimly lit carriage, the face moves closer to the opening and nearer to the light shining down from the nearby street lamp as she tries to peer to the front of the car to see what is happening.
As her face emerges, Danny can see that the girl seems quite young, perhaps no older than Danny himself. The door opens and the girl steps out of the car and into full view as she closes the door behind her. Although it is dark, from the light of the street lamp Danny can see that the girl is somewhat differently dressed than most of the people he knows. She is wearing black ripped jeans which gather around a scruffy pair of Doctor Martin boots. Her face is daubed with lots of very heavy, dark make-up. The whole ensemble is finished off with a black Alice Cooper T-shirt. Both her wrists are accessorized with black leather strapped style bracelets and her fingernails are lacquered in dark nail varnish. She has jet-black dyed hair with streaks of purple flirting carelessly in her fringe.
Although it’s clear in his head that this girl is definitely not what he would call his usual ‘type’, there is something strangely attractive about her and he is somehow drawn to her. He can’t put his finger on it but the girl definitely appears to hold some sense of alluring beauty about her, and almost like a Medusa he feels drawn to her. Even in the dark, even though Danny is half awake and half dead to the world there is definitely something that he can’t take his eyes off. That certain something holds Danny’s attention for several minutes as he gazes, mesmerized through the now wide open curtains .
He is totally unaware that he is completely noticeable wearing just his shorts standing in full view at the window without any sort of cover.
At that exact moment the girl, feeling unexplainably uncomfortable, somehow senses someone’s eyes burning deeply into the back of her head. Quickly, the girl around and looks up towards Danny’s bedroom window where he is standing, oblivious to his new found attention, still in a hypnotic daze.
‘Why is she looking at me?’ These inquisitive thoughts last for approximately four seconds.
‘Oh Shit!’ Danny exclaims as the realization suddenly hits him.
In one continuous movement, Danny’s bare feet leave the floor completely and his whole torso spins around as he drops to the ground and out of sight from the open window. His heart is pounding through his chest, his breathing is heavy and the sweat feels like it’s covering his whole body, partially due to the heat, partially from anxiety.
Danny takes a few minutes to catch his breath and gain his composure. ‘What the hell was I thinking?
He turns back around and places his hands on the window sill and pulls himself up very slowly, inch by inch, until his face is level with the bottom of the window. His eyes creep over the cusp of the sill. Peering past the woodwork he casts his sights to the street below where the car was parked.
Nothing.
No car, no people, no one. Not a soul. The car and the family are no longer there. The street seems eerily quiet and empty once more. Danny looks around with a puzzled look on his face, but there is no sign of anything at all. Danny begins to wonder if he has dreamt up the last five minutes. He wonders if he has just experienced something akin to sleepwalking?
Maybe that is why he is kneeling on the floor at a ridiculous time in the morning hallucinating about fictitious families with make-believe noisy motor cars?Or was it all just a dream and he had fallen out of bed? I mean what else could it be? What other explanation could there be to it all?
There one minute and gone the next. It just didn't make sense. Then, out of the corner of his eye ,just as he was about to give up, Danny see's the lights turning on in the previously unoccupied house opposite. Next to the house he spots the car in the garage that had previously rested on the verge below.
Who was that girl?
It is too late to start thinking deeply or he'll never get back to sleep. Besides, how can he think about girls, or anything for that matter, when he has so many thoughts filling his mind about his pending inadequacies as he approaches adult life outside of high school.
Great, now that was all he was thinking about. God how he hated his life. He dragged himself into bed and forced himself to sleep. He needed sleep. Come on Danny, get it together.
It takes a while but eventually he drifts back into a deep sleep and no doubt into fear filled dreams about failure.
His failure.
Copyright Antony Hammond 2012
Chapter 3 Tuesday 07th August 2012
Danny’s eyes open suddenly as a massive explosion fills his eardrums with a loud, deafening thud. From outside his window, what sounds like gunshots can be heard. Danny takes a moment to gain his senses realizing that his imagination is probably getting the better of him.
He lives in possibly the safest, or should I say most boring, neighbourhood in America and the notion of all out gang warfare on his doorstep is unlikely. The closest thing to a disturbance is Mrs Henderson’s operatic singing on a Sunday morning which she practices before church. Danny hears what sounds like car doors being slammed and the murmur of hushed voices.
His hair tousled and his eyes half open, Danny rubs his eyes deep into his head with his fists and tries to focus. He looks over at his bedside clock, 1:15am. Damn. Who was making such a noise at this time? Slowly rising from his once comfy mattress he sits upright on the bed rotating his head around and round to free and crack the knots out of his neck. He almost forgets why he is awake for a moment but once again there are noises that can be heard from outside Danny's window that alert his senses again and jog his memory.
Who on Earth has woken him up and caused him to leave his restful, much needed slumber?
What kind of inconsiderate wretch would awaken someone from their sleep,preparing for the first day of the rest of their future?
Don't they understand that Danny needs every second of his precious sleep to ensure that his brain is working at optimum capability to ensure success over his future failings?
Curious to find out what is happening he sleepily gets out of bed and ambles across to the open window. Quite accurately he manages to locate an upturned plug on which he places his bare foot . Of all the floor he could have chosen to safely walk through, it is the precise coordinates of the rogue plug that he instead, deftly picked out. Instantly, he grabs his foot with both hands, letting out a silent scream skywards, as if asking the question, 'WHY??!!'. What makes it even more annoying is that he knows that if he where not awake and out of his bed due to the disturbance, his foot would not currently be clutched in agony from a searing, unrivaled pain. He gingerly places his foot back down, taking the time to kick the plug to one side, and completes the short walk to his bedroom window. Standing at the window and moving the curtains partially to one side, Danny peers through the gap and looks out across the quiet, abandoned suburban street.
Across the road from Danny’s vantage point is a very old looking saloon car parked up against the empty grass verge in front of the large white house opposite. The house has been for sale since the Korzienowski family moved out in March. With smoky clouds of steam rising out from the hood, a man steps from around the driver's side of the motor and walks directly to the front of the vehicle and to the source of the once billowing fumes emanating from the engine. Looking slightly perturbed the man takes a handkerchief from out of his pocket and lifts the hood and starts to inspect the engine. After a matter of seconds his head emerges from under the hood visibly shaking. The man is quite tall and awkward looking and seems to have to bend quite severely to fit his head and shoulders underneath the car’s hood. Standing by the passenger side of the car is an equally awkward and strange looking woman with neat black hair unflatteringly scraped back, almost painfully into a French plait. She seems frustrated and tired as she waits with her arms folded and her right foot tapping feverishly on top of the densely concreted street. Her anger is obvious towards the tall man who she is ushering to hurry up whatever it is he is supposed to be fixing. It seems to Danny as though the woman is tapping her watch face repeatedly whilst shouting something in a hushed voice at the man. The man ignores the woman, similar to the way his Dad does with his Mom, and continues with his task.
Danny’s attention however is distracted away from the front of the car as the rear passenger window unhurriedly slides opens. From inside the car the outline of a face can be made out. It is a girl’s face. Inside the dimly lit carriage, the face moves closer to the opening and nearer to the light shining down from the nearby street lamp as she tries to peer to the front of the car to see what is happening.
As her face emerges, Danny can see that the girl seems quite young, perhaps no older than Danny himself. The door opens and the girl steps out of the car and into full view as she closes the door behind her. Although it is dark, from the light of the street lamp Danny can see that the girl is somewhat differently dressed than most of the people he knows. She is wearing black ripped jeans which gather around a scruffy pair of Doctor Martin boots. Her face is daubed with lots of very heavy, dark make-up. The whole ensemble is finished off with a black Alice Cooper T-shirt. Both her wrists are accessorized with black leather strapped style bracelets and her fingernails are lacquered in dark nail varnish. She has jet-black dyed hair with streaks of purple flirting carelessly in her fringe.
Although it’s clear in his head that this girl is definitely not what he would call his usual ‘type’, there is something strangely attractive about her and he is somehow drawn to her. He can’t put his finger on it but the girl definitely appears to hold some sense of alluring beauty about her, and almost like a Medusa he feels drawn to her. Even in the dark, even though Danny is half awake and half dead to the world there is definitely something that he can’t take his eyes off. That certain something holds Danny’s attention for several minutes as he gazes, mesmerized through the now wide open curtains .
He is totally unaware that he is completely noticeable wearing just his shorts standing in full view at the window without any sort of cover.
At that exact moment the girl, feeling unexplainably uncomfortable, somehow senses someone’s eyes burning deeply into the back of her head. Quickly, the girl around and looks up towards Danny’s bedroom window where he is standing, oblivious to his new found attention, still in a hypnotic daze.
‘Why is she looking at me?’ These inquisitive thoughts last for approximately four seconds.
‘Oh Shit!’ Danny exclaims as the realization suddenly hits him.
In one continuous movement, Danny’s bare feet leave the floor completely and his whole torso spins around as he drops to the ground and out of sight from the open window. His heart is pounding through his chest, his breathing is heavy and the sweat feels like it’s covering his whole body, partially due to the heat, partially from anxiety.
Danny takes a few minutes to catch his breath and gain his composure. ‘What the hell was I thinking?
He turns back around and places his hands on the window sill and pulls himself up very slowly, inch by inch, until his face is level with the bottom of the window. His eyes creep over the cusp of the sill. Peering past the woodwork he casts his sights to the street below where the car was parked.
Nothing.
No car, no people, no one. Not a soul. The car and the family are no longer there. The street seems eerily quiet and empty once more. Danny looks around with a puzzled look on his face, but there is no sign of anything at all. Danny begins to wonder if he has dreamt up the last five minutes. He wonders if he has just experienced something akin to sleepwalking?
Maybe that is why he is kneeling on the floor at a ridiculous time in the morning hallucinating about fictitious families with make-believe noisy motor cars?Or was it all just a dream and he had fallen out of bed? I mean what else could it be? What other explanation could there be to it all?
There one minute and gone the next. It just didn't make sense. Then, out of the corner of his eye ,just as he was about to give up, Danny see's the lights turning on in the previously unoccupied house opposite. Next to the house he spots the car in the garage that had previously rested on the verge below.
Who was that girl?
It is too late to start thinking deeply or he'll never get back to sleep. Besides, how can he think about girls, or anything for that matter, when he has so many thoughts filling his mind about his pending inadequacies as he approaches adult life outside of high school.
Great, now that was all he was thinking about. God how he hated his life. He dragged himself into bed and forced himself to sleep. He needed sleep. Come on Danny, get it together.
It takes a while but eventually he drifts back into a deep sleep and no doubt into fear filled dreams about failure.
His failure.
Copyright Antony Hammond 2012
Chapter 3 Tuesday 07th August 2012