Wyrd Girl

By Jon Jacks

She’s in an Otherworld.

I’m the weird girl.
You know; the one every kid in class avoids, just in case what I’ve got is catching.
Not that I care.
See, there are worlds other than this one.
Worlds we pass on to when we die.
Worlds, even, where we exist before we’re even born.
They’re the worlds of the Nyxt.
And, if I don’t handle things right, they’re about to declare war on the living.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Jon Jacks
• Release date: May 7, 2013
• ISBN: 9781301866502

Jon Jacks

While working in London as, first, an advertising Creative Director (the title in the U.S. is wildly different; the role involves both creating and overseeing all the creative work in an agency, meaning you’re second only to the Chairman/President) and then a screenwriter for Hollywood and TV, I moved out to an incredibly ancient house in the countryside.On the day we moved out, my then three-year-old daughter (my son was yet to be born) was entranced by the new house, but also upset that we had left behind all that was familiar to her.So, very quickly, my wife Julie and I laid out rugs and comfortable chairs around the huge fireplace so that it looked and felt more like our London home. We then left my daughter quietly reading a book while we went to the kitchen to prepare something to eat.Around fifteen minutes later, my daughter came into the kitchen, saying that she felt much better now ‘after talking to the boy’.‘Boy?’ we asked. ‘What boy?’‘The little boy; he’s been talking to me on the sofa while you were in here.’We rushed into the room, looking around.There wasn’t any boy there of course.‘There isn’t any little boy here,’ we said.‘Of course,’ my daughter replied. ‘He told me he wasn’t alive anymore. He lived here a long time ago.’A child’s wild imagination?Well, that’s what we thought at the time; but there were other strange things, other strange presences (but not really frightening ones) that happened over the years that made me think otherwise.And so I began to write the kind of stories that, well, are just a little unbelievable.

Book preview

Chapter 1

I’m the weird girl.

You know; the one everyone avoids being seen with.

Even those who whisper it to me that they’ve got nothing against me actually, but…

See, they act like what I’ve got is catching.

So what is it I’ve got?

What I’ve got, basically, is that I don’t care that the most popular girls in school have got it into their empty little heads that there’s something weird about me.

See the irony here?

I’m weird because I don’t care that they think I’m weird.

But I don’t care, see, because I know that there’s somebody, somewhere, looking out for me.

If I feel down, if I feel I need a sign that that special someone is still looking down on me (that’s in the caring, not the stuck-up sense), well, all I have to do is take a walk outside.

And whaddya know, there it is; a small, brilliantly white feather.

An angel’s feather, some people call it.

Only it isn’t, is it?

*

The thing about the feather, see, is that we can all conjure one up if we really want to.

No?

You don’t believe me?

Well okay, so try this, little miss full-of-doubts.

Think hard, really hard, about that small, brilliantly white feather.

Think of how it glows in the light.

Just like an angel’s feather, right?

Picture it.

Hold it.

Feel it.

That’s right; reach out.

Touch it, softly. (You don’t want to crush it!)

It might tickle, yeah?

Now sometime today – provided you actually manage to get outside, lazy! – when you’re out for a walk, you’re going to find one lying on the ground directly in front of you.

Take a look around; where did it come from?

Take it from me; there’ll be nothing round abouts from where it could’ve naturally come from.

Now how weird is that, eh?

See, you’re weird; just like me,

*

Chapter 2

I’ve been passed from foster home to foster home.

I never really seem to fit in, truth be told.

Yeah, I blame myself, see?

Quiet.

Moody.

‘Always in her own little world, that’s our Tracey.’

For the moment, I’m at a ‘home’.

That’s what they call it anyway, even though they mean an institution.

Nicer, though, to call it a home, isn’t it?

Me, I prefer the darkness of the alleys.

Places where no one else likes to go.

No one ’cept me and Chris.

Chris’s the boyfriend that no one at school believes exists.

He likes school even less than I do, see?

That’s why they never see him with me.

Not unless they’re prepared to come down the alleys.

Which they’re not.

So it’s hardly my fault that I can’t prove I have a boyfriend, is it?

*

I like the alleys because Chris likes the alleys.

He lives in them; lives in dumpsters he decks out with coverings to turn them into relatively smart little homes.

Like me, he used to live in a ‘home’.

Only he ran away.

He couldn’t stand it.

Like me.

Only I haven’t run away.

Yet.

I’m sorta more slowly drifting away, rather than running.

Staying away longer and longer.

Sleeping in the dumpsters.

Using the school washrooms to tidy up.

(Chris, he walks into hotel washrooms like he’s meant to be there. He’s clean, oh yes, he’s very clean.)

We laugh.

We joke.

We steal. (It’s a laugh, a joke.)

We rarely fight.

We like our own company, thank you very much.

‘Shhussshh!’ Chris says, putting a finger up to his mouth.

He’s heard someone outside.

Someone who’s come into the alley.

Into our alley.

It’s hard not to hear them.

They’re breathing real hard.

Like they’ve been running.

Like they’re frightened.

Like they’re hiding from someone, and trying desperately to control their breathing so they won’t be found.

(How do I know all this just from hearing someone’s breathing? I dunno. Perhaps I’ve been there plenty of times myself, yeah?)

‘No, no! Please no!’ the girl pleads.

‘Chris; she’s in danger,’ I mouth quietly.

Chris shakes his head, like he doubts it. Like we should wait and see what happens before risking revealing ourselves.

In the dumpster, no one can see us.

‘Please, please…I help the dead!’

I give Chris a puzzled frown, mouthing the weird word, ‘Dead?’

‘No no…oh God no! You’re…you’re not the dead, are you?’

‘Not dead?’ I mouth silently at Chris with another frown.

Chris puts his finger up to his mouth once more. He leans back against the dumpster’s side, trying to hear better.

‘You’re…you’re nothing more than…than bits of junk!’

Junk? I don’t bother mouthing this to Chris this time. He’s straining to hear.

‘No, no…please, I…’

I can’t stand it anymore.

That girls in danger, and I’m just sitting here, all safe and cosy.

I don’t care who’s out there.

I’ve got to help.

I stretch up towards the trapdoor Chris has made in the dumpster’s false ceiling.

Chris reaches for me, trying to pull me back. But he’s trying to do it quietly, so he’s at a disadvantage.

I push open the trapdoor and swiftly clamber out, standing up amongst the rubbish Chris has deliberately scattered across his roof.

‘Leave her!’ I yell, even before I’ve figured out where they are, let alone who they are.

‘I know who you are!’ I add, hoping they see this as a threat to their safety.

Dark coated guys who look like they’ve stepped out of a fifties film noir have cornered the cowering girl against the wall.

They all ignore me, apart from the one nearest to the dumpster.

He looks up at me, his face hidden in the shadows of his wide brimmed fedora.

‘Stay out of this.’

He says it calmly but gruffly, like he’s a dog struggling to talk.

‘You don’t know what you’re dealing with!’

He lifts and swings out a massively long arm, making a grab for my ankle.

I hop onto the other foot, but he’s too quick for me, like he was expecting this. He grabs my other ankle. –

As I’d urgently scrambled up through the trapdoor, my long, bushy hair had picked up a thick coating of the dust that lies everywhere around here.

I can’t think of anything better to do so, bending down towards his upturned face, I envelop it in my dusty hair as I give my head a fierce shake.

He steps back slightly, coughing, spluttering, choking, bringing up phlegm from his mouth.

And suddenly, his gripping hand vanishes.

He’s gone.

His hat, his coat, it all just drops to the floor. Like there had never been anything inside them in the first place.

Nothing, that is, apart from rotting cabbages, banana skins, crushed cans and mouldy packs. All of which fall to the ground along with the clothes.

The other guys are calmly walking away, like they haven’t seen what’s happened.

They’re not bothering to look back, like they don’t care or don’t notice that they’re a man short.

The girl is still by the wall, lying in a still heap amongst the sodden, filthy litter that’s gathered there.

I jump down, shout out, ‘Chris, get out here,’ and rush over to her.

I’m tempted to shout out after the guys too, but think better of it.

The girl’s completely still, silent.

It doesn’t look good.

But I never heard a shot. And there’s no blood. Nothing I can see, either, that looks like a knife wound.

Her face, though; it’s warped, frightened, frozen.

Like she’s just seen Death himself.

*

Chapter 3

‘How is she?’

Chris has crouched down alongside me, studying the girl.

‘Dead, huh? Wow; what a face! What made her face go like that, huh?’

‘I dunno,’ I answer. ‘Poor thing; she looks like she was absolutely horrified.’

‘Who were they, those guys?’ Chris had just caught a glimpse of the guys leaving as they had turned the corner. ‘What did they have to kill her for?’

‘They didn’t look like any muggers I’ve seen. More like some cops from an old movie. Or gangsters.’

Chris rises to his feet, gently pulling on my shoulder in an attempt to make me stand up with him

‘Come on; let’s leave it for the cops to figure out.’

‘Yeah, we’d better call them and–’

‘Call them? You kidding? Who’re they gonna suspect first if we report it, eh Twice?’

(Those who really know me, my real friends, call me Twice, not Trace or Tracey. Twice Hadday, get it? But there’s another reason I’m called Twice; the real reason.)

‘Us, that’s who they’re gonna suspect,’ Chris continues. ‘No no, let’s leave her here, Twice.’

He suddenly bends down alongside me once more.

‘On second thoughts…’

He starts rifling through the dead girl’s handbag.

‘Chris!’

I grab him hard on his arm, trying to pull him away. But he shrugs me off, griming hugely when he finds and withdraws her purse.

‘Look, she’s not going to need it now is she? Anyway, I’ve left her everything else. And we’re gonna need it twice – we’re going to have to leave for a while.’

He despondently nods back towards our dumpster. Our home.

‘The cops; they’ll find it, won’t they?’ I realise now that Chris was right; we would be prime suspects. ‘They’ll come looking for us!’

Chris shakes his head.

‘Nuh-uh; cos I’m gonna destroy it. Move everything out, let the roof and all that trash fall down on it, fill it in.’

I stand up, glance back down at the dead girl.

It seems odd; worrying about our trashy little house when she’s lying here dead.

But as Chris