Please find enclosed the first chapter of my first EVER fan-fiction. I intend to write three parts staggered covering the first year after "the swimming pool events," the next few years and then finally jump them about ten years ahead.
Feedback is welcome and I will upload it chapter at a time as I write it. The title is working and seemed like a logical choice but open to different suggestions.
*************************************Chapter One******************************************
We are best to start in Copenhagen, the capital of Demark and a country that had recently been voted as the happiest in the world. More specifically we start at a top floor flat in an unremarkable building on an unremarkable drive in a small village surrounded by fields. Village or hamlet – Oscar could never remember the difference between them. It was a place that made Blackeberg back in Sweden look like New York in its magnificence. A place that could be found just ten miles east from the eventfully exciting aforementioned capital, yet a lot of native Danes were unaware of. After all there was nothing here to demand their attention or to lure people through those fields. Eighteen almost identical homes, mostly flats - two or three stories in height, and a few more traditional detached dwellings. Oscar had counted them all his first day here and noted both the differences and similarities between Danish and Swedish architecture. Most buildings looked the same with pressed gray concrete and white bricks around the window frames. He noted one home had been painted a pale shade of blue, maybe to standout from his neighbours...or maybe just because he felt cold.
“At least there is a shop,” he reassured himself that first day noting the complete lack of anything else.
The reality that both he and Eli were in a foreign country was hard to comprehend; weeks ago the notion of such would have seemed like a dream – or a nightmare. Things had happened, so much so that he had no time to process everything and was still in the mammoth task of doing so. Leaving Sweden – his country and not just his hometown was absolutely necessary. After all at best he was a “missing” person and at worst possibly a suspect in the bloodbath at the swimming pool. His photograph would be in every single newspaper throughout the country. Oscar had spent enough years reading those newspapers, reading about crimes and murders – reading about those who get caught and those who do. The golden rule for the latter seemed to be that you don’t hang around; you can’t hide so you should run.
Denmark seemed a reasonably smart choice. Danish and Swedish are very similar in vocabulary just with some differences with pronunciation. One of Oscar’s favourite television programs when he was younger was broadcast in Danish with subtitles for those who needed it. Then there was the travel – it was easy to get here the way they needed to get here. A few big bags and a truck that would contain Eli during the day. Changing trains a number a times was needed but this could be done without having to leave a station and travelling far on foot – providing you were willing to take a slightly less direct route.
Eli had done her part – she got them the flat. An advertisement in the newsagent’s window when they arrived in Copenhagen station. She spotted the ad, he did not – almost as if she knew it would be there. Oscar knew that was not possible, just his head overflowing because of recent events. After that, all it took was a phone call by Eli to the landlady to secure renting.
“You are sure that you don’t want to see it first?” the owner enquired strangely.
“Not at all, no need. It is exactly what we require” she had replied in her most adult voice.
Oscar had smiled at watching her on the phone. Even when she was concentrating, even when she was being serious – she was still beautiful.
He looked at the piece of paper in his hand detailing what would be their new home.
Top floor with laminate throughout. Very clean with good windows. One bedroom but good space and storage. Rent is eleven-hundred per month. A few pieces of furniture left by previous tenant.
Using his fingers, Oscar worked out that was about fifteen-hundred in his own money. That seemed reasonable to him. At the same time, he wondered if money would become an issue. Exactly how much did Eli have? He doubted that he could find a job to support them, maybe something similar to what he had back in Blackeberg? Surely businesses here would need someone to distribute flyers. That would bring in some money, maybe enough to pay half of the rent each month. He glanced at Eli and made eye contact with her – those bluest of eyes bright even in this light but both pupil and iris narrowed slightly. At that point he wondered once again how she amassed such income – the old guy robbing his victims as well as taking their blood was the most pleasing answer. Yet he doubted the old guy could have been killing frequently enough (and that all he selected had full wallets) to account for it. There was another more disturbing answer that Oscar did not allow himself to entertain at this time. He knew what the old guy was – what he used to be and what he liked. He knew there were others like that man who – Oscar shook his head violently to stop is mind exploring this path. For all he knew maybe Eli would be a surprise guest at rich people’s parties. People who knew what she was and wanted to impress their friends by having her perform tricks. Like a magician but a vampire magician, she could see in the dark, move really fast, climb up the walls – yes that was a more pleasant thought. Nothing sinister in people wanting to hang around with her just for that.
Oscar suddenly felt very sick and dizzy. He thought about his mother, he thought about her going door to door looking for him. Putting up posters with his face on every tree, wall and corner. She would wonder if one of his customers that he would normally deliver leaflets too had abducted him or was in some way responsible. He tried not to imagine what she was feeling and what she would do in despair. Most likely she would keep phoning his dad, shouting at him and demanding to know where her Oscar was. When the police get involved she would likely try and blame his dad – somehow.
Eli was looking directly into him, still continuing her conversation on the phone but actually giving him more attention, almost as if she could sense his sudden change. Just her looking at him reassured Oscar that he had done the right thing. She reached out and softly squeezed his hand – yes, they had done the right thing – she was all that mattered to him.
Getting the flat was easy given Eli’s apparent experience in doing so. She even arranged to “post” the first month’s rent to the landlord and have the landlord leave the keys to the flat in the bushes outside for them.
“We will be arriving very late. We would not want to keep you up.”
The first night in the flat was the first chance that Oscar had to gather his thoughts.
The night was deadly silent with the view from his new front room window showing totally nothing in the darkness...it was strange to be somewhere so quiet. In the distance an alarm was sounding sharply – maybe an unseen car alarm. A bit closer the merry cries of a drunk perhaps trying to find his way home through the fields. That was not the point, as whatever noise present on the other side of the glass was like a different world. His head was numb, his thoughts were both focused and absent. Oscar was still coming to terms with what had happened in the last few days.
They had tried to kill him. His classmates and Johnny’s older friend had tried to drown him in the swimming pool. He remembered his head being held underwater for two minutes...three minutes, it did not matter. Oscar’s memory was a bit damp at exactly what had happened at that point. He remembered everything leading up to that moment. Firstly going to his weight-training class, having a shower and then heading into the pool to practice treading water. Then the deal that he had been offered at knife-point. They kill him, or if he can hold his breath for so long they would let him live. That was where his memory got strange.
At the point of blacking out, he felt that he was floating. Not in the water but up into the air. He thought he had died. After all he could just about make-out the shape of a hand dropping below him. There was no longer anyone with a grip on his head. If he was still in the water then how would that have been possible? He was suspended in motion, floating for a few seconds before someone, or something pulled him out. That first breath he took when being pulled out of the water was like the first breath of his life. Pins and needles covered every inch of his body while his chest felt heavy from the inside. Then briefly he saw a pair of eyes looking into him with love. The most beautiful pair of eyes one could imagine.
He must have died as he was being carried away. Someone was carrying him away effortlessly from the scene and to somewhere else. His memory still fragmentised from the lack of oxygen, Oscar remembered seeing his classmates dead and in pieces with almost as much blood as water around the pool. It was of course Eli who had saved him and her who had ripped his tormenters to pieces. Oscar laughed a silent laugh inside his head – they must have thought a vengeful Angel had descended on them. He could hear Tommy sat sobbing on the steps as he was carried out. At least he was alright; at least he had stayed out the way. No more piggy from now on.
Back in his flat he carefully touched his own reflection in the glass of the window and smiled at what he saw. Oscar had changed his physical appearance – both something he wanted to do but also on the advice of Eli in case he was recognised somehow by someone. He had cut his hair shorter than short and then coloured it – tried to dye it but somewhat unsuccessfully. Somehow it had gone an angry shade of red – his fault he felt for not reading the instructions. Eli had been laughing at it since she first saw it but in a playful way and wanted to keep touching it.
“Is it, is it a wig?” she reputably asked.
Personally while the result was unintended Oscar had quickly grown to like it. He felt that he looked like a cool punk rocker and he could not wait until it grew a bit so he could get some gel in it. With that slightly more contented thought he turned about and sat on an old green leather sofa.
“Wonder where I can get a TV?” he asked himself as Eli was out to explore the area...whatever that meant.
