Radiance by Alana Curran (best english books to read for beginners TXT) 📕

“Are you ok, you look quite sick?” Trevor asked me when we were going home.

“I’m just a bit tired,” I yawned.

That was half right. I was absolutely EXHAUSTED. I didn’t understand how people could cope with six and a half hours in school.

My worst subject was maths. I had no idea what was going on, the teacher wasn’t in half the time and when I asked Radiance for help she just stared at me blankly.

I wanted to smack Radiance across the face and yell at her until she finally said something.

Who calls their child Radiance anyway? It’s so tacky! It’s like having a child called Sunshine or Moondance. It’s just cheesy.

“I’m sure you are, I bet it’s tiring moving to a new school and getting used to all these different things,” he agreed.

I nodded, just as I did this, I bumped into Radiance’s taller sister who glared at me on the bus and she stared down at me fiercely. I looked up at her and after one second, I ran round her squealing.

“That’s Cymbeline, I hear she files her nails with bricks,” he whispered.

“She’s real scary,” I frowned.

“Everyone’s scared of her,” he added.

We both got onto the bus and sat down at the back. I wanted to sit there so I could see the blue haired family come in, I just loved to observe them. There was just something weird about them all.

After one week, I was getting into a whole routine. Waking up at eight o’clock; going to the bus stop; staying in school for six and a half hours; going home to see grandma and the dogs; going to the town with Trevor and his siblings, Dwayne and Karen; going back home again to do my homework while watching ‘Live Spelt Backwards is Die’ (a program with a title I never understood); and then going to bed at eleven o’clock.

Weekends were such a relief and we got out early on a Friday at about half past two, so Friday was my favourite day of the week.

On Saturday, I ran into the cafe with a rainbow umbrella over my head, being sure not to splash into any puddles in case my pink ugg boots got all soggy. Once your ugg boots get all wet, then that’s them done out. They get all matted and fluffy. It’s just not nice at all.

I shook the umbrella when I jumped through the cafe doors and approached Trevor, Dwayne and Karen who were sitting by the window.

“Sorry I’m late,” I sighed, “I would’ve been quicker if Grandma would have drove me down, but she was away with some of her bingo buddies.”

“Love your coat,” Trevor smiled, referring to the brown, military disaster I was wearing.

“Thanks.”

“I’ll get you some coffee,” he told me.

“Aw, thanks,” I remarked.

“No probs,” I said as he walked to the counter.

Karen turned to me with a broad smile on her face.

“So guess what, the weather forecast for tomorrow says it’s supposed to be dry tomorrow night, so we’re definitely going to be having a bonfire party down at the town centre,” she explained.

“Why, what’s happening tomorrow?” I asked.

“Hello? Do you live under a rock?” Dwayne joked.

I thought for a moment, nothing particularly special was happening that Sunday which I could think of.

“It’s Halloween, you silly bean,” Karen giggled.

“Halloween? We never really celebrated Halloween where I came from,” I informed.

“Just out of curiosity, where do you come from?”

“Costa Lapris.”

I felt as though I had said it for the millionth time, it had become so annoying.

“Never heard of it,” Dwayne lisped, mouth full of pancakes which reminded me of that time I was in the cafe with my mum.

“Well, Halloween’s great,” Karen began. “You can get all dressed up and usually we have a Halloween party down at the town hall, but since it’s going to be dry tomorrow, like I said, we’ll be able to have it outside. With a proper bonfire and fireworks!”

“Sounds fun,” I admitted. Trevor came back with my coffee. “Thanks, Trevor.”

“It is fun, some of our friends are coming round to our house to get their costumes ready before we all go trick or treating,” Karen babbled, not even stopping for breath.

“I thought trick or treating was for children,” I told them.

“And I thought you didn’t celebrate Halloween in Crossda Moona,” Dwayne said rudely.

“First of all, it’s not called that! And second, I have heard of Halloween and trick or treating was usually for the children,” I explained. “At least that is what we were taught.

“Yeah, but it’s a good time passer while we’re waiting for the party at the town centre to begin,” Karen smiled. “Some people are extremely generous and give us a couple of pounds.”

“And others throw apples at us as soon as they see us coming,” Trevor added.

“So are you coming or what?” Karen asked eagerly.

“Yeah, I suppose,” I replied, sipping at my coffee.

“Great, what are you dressing up as?” she enquired. I shrugged. “I’ll probably just cut out two eye holes from a white bed sheet and then through it over my head.”

“Oh, come on, at least put a little more effort into it,” she begged.

“Fine, I’ll think up something,” I promised.

“Great, it’s going to be so fun, even little Tegan has an outfit,” she squealed.

“Who’s Tegan?”

“She’s our baby sister,” Dwayne told me. “She’s about ten months old now.”

“So she was born in February?”

“Yep.”

“Aw, I love little babies,” I cooed. “They’re so cute.”

“Until they open their mouths and start screaming,” Dwayne mumbled.

I rolled my eyes.

It was obvious that Karen was the type of girl who liked every event in her life to be absolutely perfect.

After finishing our coffee, we all headed out to the cinema to see the new thriller movie called ‘Bellybutton Dynamite’. It had so many good ratings from critics and good reviews from all types of magazines and newspapers.

Karen and I bought lots of stuff at the snack stand. We got an extra large popcorn, a huge packet of jelly babies, a jumbo cup of fizzy orange, two hot dogs and a packet of nuts.

I’m greedy and I admit it.

We all went through a couple of doors and sat at the very top. We all got settled in and as soon as everything was in a comfy position, I needed to go to the toilet, so I had to get up, go to the loo, come back and then get comfortable again, which took ages to do.

I always needed to go to the bathroom when I got into the screening room of a cinema, I don’t know why. I just do.

The music which always played in the background before the movie started faded away and a loud, thundering sound surrounded the room, while the picture on the screen brightened up.

It was at the main part in the movie. The part when the serial killer murders all the girls at the sleepover. The killer burst out of the wardrobe and began to stab at one of the characters repeatedly, while all the others tried to escape by going out the door, but it was mysteriously locked.

The lights went off and everything stayed in silence for a couple of minutes until a loud, piercing scream blasted out of the cinema speakers. I screamed, jumping a little, startled by the sudden shriek.

Unfortunately I was holding the extra large popcorn in my arms and threw it up in the air in surprise. The popcorn fell all over me and Karen, while the boys laughed at me.

“Shut up!” I hissed angrily, my heart still pounding from the shock.

“Here, have my popcorn,” Karen smiled. “I don’t like salted.”

This was a big mistake.

Two minutes later, another killer came out from the slide door wardrobe and stuck the knife right through another poor girl’s stomach.

I jumped again, but this time, I dropped my popcorn all over the guy in front of me.

I gasped and he turned round, looking seriously ticked off. I didn’t want him to know it was me, so I pointed at Karen mouthing, ‘It was her’.

He glared at her, red with anger.

No one even noticed I had spilt the popcorn over him and Karen didn’t notice him glaring at her, but at least now he didn’t know it was me.

I wanted to burst out laughing and I even sniggered a little, but then the man would’ve knew I had done it. Let’s be honest, it’s not the smartest thing someone could do.

Coming out of the cinema, Dwayne and Trevor were blabbing about how it wasn’t really a thriller and there were no shocking bits in it, while Karen giggled about my dropping the popcorn everywhere.

“I mean, my god, you could see clearly that the guts were just a couple of strings of sausages and the brains was just mince meat,” she laughed.

“It wasn’t the pathetic gore effects, the murderers just took me by surprise,” I insisted.

“Whatever,” Dwayne sniggered, doing an impression of what I looked like when I saw it.

I tried to be humorous about it, but at one point I just had enough and smacked him across the face.

“Shall we go to the circus tonight?” Karen asked.

The boys groaned in unison, while I ate a candyfloss which seemed to be melting away in the rain, even under my umbrella.

“Circus’s are evil,” I grunted. “All they do are abuse poor elephants to stand upside down on a tiny chair. An elephant is too heavy to be doing a handstand on top of a small, wooden seat. They’re supposed to be walking along the open plains and throwing their weight around when they want. It’s common sense, surely.”

“Then you’ll help me form a protest!” Karen smiled. “I’ve made some signs at home and we can go collect them on our way.”

“Protest?” I repeated.

“Karen tends to protest against circus’s, animal shows, zoos and dog racing,” Trevor explained. “And it’s not our job to protest against these things, it’s the media’s job to put it on TV for us to scowl at it while we buy music on the internet; for us to eat iced donuts while we sit in a chair and not to leave that chair for the whole summer! It’s not our problem.”

“Elephants are bigger than us and one day they are going to break free and whip us to stand on a doornail on our hands!” Karen yelled.

“You’re looking for praise from elephants!”

“Yes!”

“Fine! We’ll stage the flipping protest!” I shrieked, tired of the argument.

“I knew you guys would agree,” she grinned.

We all went to their house so Karen could get her signs. She brought a little foldaway gazebo and a big blanket so we could set up a little shelter to stay under until the circus arrived.

“We’re going to need a lot more than that!” Dwayne exclaimed. “We’re going to be freezing and hungry.”

“Ok, then,” Karen began. “We’ll each carry a bag full of blankets and snacks, Alessia, you go into the kitchen with Trevor and look for something to eat. Dwayne, go upstairs and take all the blankets you can find.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Dwayne said huffily.

“Why do we need all this?” I asked Trevor as we went into the kitchen.

“Knowing Karen, we’ll be there when the circus starts and we’ll be waiting until it ends so we can get