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

It had all happened so fast, I didn’t even realise what I was doing. I expected her to fight back aggressively like all the bitches in Costa Stalluna, but instead she began to cry and I gasped.

I knew she was faking, sure her face crumpled up like a piece of chewed gum, but there were no tears. She wasn’t crying properly, but she managed to fool everyone around her, even the music stopped as everyone stared at me like I was a piece of dirt.

I looked round and saw them glaring at me, their faces dripping with condescension. Some of them tutted at me and I was so embarrassed that soon, I found myself running off. People cleared a path, as I drew closer to them, because they obviously didn’t want to get anywhere near me.

When I reached the playground, which was almost deserted and completely dark, I sat on the swings and began to cry.

How could I have been so foolish? Why did I let Melody get to me? Everyone hated me now, but she wasn’t even hurt. Why did she hate me so much? Why did she want to make me suffer?

These were the questions swirling round in my head. I began to understand what Mrs. Dickens had told me: The Swirls of the Waves is a wondrous thing that tricks the eye of the unwary traveller.

Melody planned this!

The swirl of the waves is a wondrous thing:

Melody was the waves who was winding me up and I believed her!

Tricks the eye of the unwary traveller:

I WAS THE UNWARY TRAVELLER!!! I let my guards down, didn’t think, punched her in the face, she began to cry and now everyone thought I was a bully.

I wanted to cry but I knew crying wasn’t going to make anything better. I never knew until that moment what it was like to be hated by everyone.

Something soon distracted me from my misery as I saw someone with blue hair running passed me and up the hill behind the swings.

I spun round to see Radiance heading up the hill to the top. She had been following me all day. This time, I wasn’t going to lose her.

I quickly got up and sped after her, making sure to be quiet so she couldn’t hear me and run faster.

In P.E she was the fastest runner, we didn’t know how she did it.

She was a fair distance ahead of me, but the only reason I could see her was because there was a light coming from her. I didn’t know what it was, but I assumed she was holding a lantern.

I was beginning to grow tired, my legs getting weaker and my breath getting shorter, until I FINALLY reached the top. I hoped she wasn’t going to disappear again, I was desperate for an explanation.

At the top of the hill, I took a couple of minutes to catch my breath, but when I did, I looked up to see her standing right in the middle of the top, her back to me.

Her hands were by her side so I knew she definitely wasn’t holding a lantern, but there was still some sort of light coming from her. Her hair was blowing gently in the mild wind, and her feet were planted firmly on the ground.

I crept up behind her, took a deep (but quiet) breath and quickly grabbed her wrist.

“Nowhere to run now, Radiance!” I yelled. “I’ve got you.”

She spun round, hissing at me and I screamed at the horrifying girl looking at me.

I wasn’t sure whether it was Radiance or not. Her face was much paler and her eye had no colour or irises, just a black dot in the middle of a white eyeball, also there were strange markings on her face which seemed to glow in luminous yellow, green, pink and blue colours.

Her incisors had been replaced with sharp fangs and suddenly a pair of tattered, leathery, bat-like wings shot out of our back.

I shrieked and cried in fear, while the terrifying beast stared at me blankly.

A devilish grin grew upon her face.

“Ok,” she said in a dark, monstrous voice. “You’ve got me, what are you going to do?”

I turned round and ran halfway down the hill, hoping that I was in the middle of the worst nightmare ever, but she seemed to drop down in front of me.

“Where are you going, Ali?!” she bellowed.

I screamed again, my heart pounding and my whole body in the sweats. My face was wet and I could barely see because of all the tears. I honestly thought I was having a heart attack.

I tried to run in the opposite direction, but wherever I went, she was faster. Things got worse when I tripped over my own foot clumsily and as I struggled to get up, she slammed my arms down on the grass.

She hissed at me again and then grabbed my neck, I couldn’t believe how strong she was. She bent my head down and just at the corner of my eye, I saw her opening her mouth, ready to bite me.

I screamed and screamed, trying my best to struggle and make it hard for her, but she was much stronger and dealt with my awkwardness in no time and I felt two light, but sharp things touching my neck.

She wasn’t properly biting me yet, her teeth were just set on my neck, but I could feel that she was going to sink her fangs into my flesh anytime soon.

I was so confused! What was going on? Was I really going to be killed by a vampire? I would’ve rather killed myself than die this way. I closed my eyes and got ready for the kill.

“Alessia!” I heard a familiar voice shout.

I opened my eyes and saw Trevor standing in the middle of the park, suddenly my soul filled with hope. I don’t even know why. Radiance seemed to be much stronger and more powerful than anyone I knew, so how could Trevor, a simple teenager, save me?

Radiance squealed and hissed and chucked me to the side. I tumbled down the grass, but when I stopped I saw the silhouette of something flying away into the night, frightened.

rubbed my eyes to make sure that I wasn’t dreaming, but I was too light headed to know if I would be able to see it right.

Trevor spotted my lying down in the grass and ran to help me up.

“Alessia, what happened?” he asked worriedly, grabbing my waist and pulling me to my feet.

“I don’t know,” I sighed, shaking my head and rubbing my eyes some more.

“I’m really sorry about Mel, everyone knows she was faking,” he insisted.

“They were all glaring at me,” I reminded him.

“No, they were glaring at Melody, it’s not the first time she’s pulled something like this,” he informed.

Normally, I would’ve felt a whole lot better, but it was the last thing on my mind that needed sorting out.

I walked slowly to the swing and sat back down, still not sure what I had just experienced.

“Here,” I heard him say, I looked up and he looked through his bag for something. He eventually pulled out a teddy bear dressed in a pumpkin costume and an orange, toy cat with little pumpkins printed all over it. “I bought them for you.”

I took them, blushing and couldn’t help smiling.

“Thank you,” I squealed, giving him a hug.

“Oh, I also bought you a cuddly donut,” he told me, pulling out a toy donut with pink icing and a smiley face.

“Aw, you didn’t need to get me so many things.”

“I know, but I wanted to,” he grinned.

I suddenly felt a whole lot better and my mind was distracted from the whole Radiance thing, in fact I was surprised something had managed to make me feel better after it.

“Karen felt bad that you missed half of the party, so she brought you some more cookies, a bucket of cotton candy, a tub of ice cream and a cuddly toy ghost,” he explained.

“Most of the party?” I repeated. “I’ve only been a couple of minutes.”

“Alessia, you’ve been gone for hours, Melody told me you’d be fine and that I shouldn’t worry, but I couldn’t help worrying, I didn’t know where you’d went,” he told me.

“How could I have missed hours?” I murmured, just loud enough for him to hear, but he was too confused to understand what I meant, so he didn’t respond. “That was sweet of you for worrying about me.”

I gave him another hug and we got up to go home.

“Next Saturday is bonfire night,” he smiled. “There’s going to be a party for that.”

“Oh good, it’ll be like I never missed it,” I giggled.

“Listen, my mum has already taken Hattie and Melody home, so...”

“It’s fine, I’ll just walk,” I insisted.

“I’ll go with you, just in case,” he sighed. “It’s Halloween and there’s a full moon, the weirdoes are out and stuff.”

I laughed, but allowed him to walk along with me.

The park wasn’t too far away from my house, but on the walk back, I began to think about Radiance, when I saw her dopey brother, Blake, and her nicer sister, Tulip, walking by. They both looked pretty normal, like they had no idea their sister was a psychopath.

Before the incident, Radiance looked like an ordinary, sulky teenager, despite the blue hair and weirdly close relationship with her family. I thought about all those times we worked together in art class, she even talked a couple of times to me. I began to wonder whether I had dreamed the whole thing, but it seemed so real.

When we came to the bottom of my hill, I was afraid in case Trevor left me to walk up the hill on my own and Radiance decided to appear and take me down. I spun round and grasped his wrist quickly.

“Will you walk up with me?” I asked.

“Ok, but why?”

I swallowed, ready to say something which I really didn’t want to say.

“I’m scared,” I replied.

He laughed at me, but took into account that it was my first Halloween celebration and it the whole atmosphere was kind of creepy. Full of burglars, murderers, rapists and tiny children in fruity costumes wetting themselves every time they’re given a lollipop.

A couple of trick or treaters were at the house when we got to the top of the hill and I saw Karen and Hattie sitting out on the garden bench with Arthur and Daisy.

They jumped up as soon as they saw me and ran to give me a hug.

“Oh, Alessia, I am so sorry about what happened,” Karen gasped, squeezing me surprisingly tight since she was such a skinny girl.

“It’s alright, I have more to worry about than what Melody thinks of me,” I smiled.

“See, that’s the spirit,” Hattie cheered, happy with my upbeat attitude. “Karen and I bought you a couple of things and your Gran invited us to sleepover, I mean, if you want us to stay over.”

“Yeah, that’d be great,” I insisted. “And thanks for buying me things, you really didn’t have to.”

“Yes we did, you missed half the party, so we were going to ask Trevor to look for you but before we even got to say anything he suggested it,”