After soaring high above Birmingham for about 45 minutes, I look for a suitable place to land, and I know just the place. I angle myself slightly to the North-East and begin a slow descent. The large Alexander Stadium spreads out below me and I see a few families out enjoying a nice stroll before the harsh cold of November seeps in. Below me, I can make out the destroyed house on the corner of our road. I circle it slowly, wondering how to land, before just deciding to wing it. I may be a freak, but I’m a comedian as well.

I bend my wings in slightly and angle myself headfirst toward the ground, diving straight toward the destroyed house at the end of my road. I begin rocketing toward the ground at speeds just shy of 150 mph. I tuck my wings in tight against my body and almost reach 200 mph before snapping them out again sharply, to catch myself before hitting the ground. I fail, however.

I didn’t catch myself fast enough, so my feet hit the ground with a hard thud. I yelp in shock and pain as my legs give way beneath me. In all the confusion, I beat my wings again, which sends me into the air again. Goddammit. If only I practised more often, then I would have been able to land easier. I slowly lower myself to the ground, expertly, with no more injuries whatsoever.

I begin to walk through the rubble of the destroyed house, that strange feeling stirring up inside of me yet again. This house, I feel as if I’ve been here before, or at least should be here now. But why? This house has always been destroyed. Nobody knows how it got this way, and I can’t remember it being a full, erect house.

I begin to slowly walk back to my own place of residence, the coldness of the night beginning to settle over Birmingham.

I quickly jog up the drive and quietly open the door. Silence.

I shut the door quieter than a mouse. Slowly walking down the short corridor, I peek into the living room. Rob is sleeping soundly in his chair, a plate of crumbs lying on the table in front of him. I smile to myself. At least he had some toast. I kinda expected him to stay up worrying.

In the kitchen, I find two pieces of bread and butter sitting next to a post-it note reading:

I hope you had a lovely time at Ethan’s, but make yourself some toast if I’m asleep when you get back

Love, Rob

After eating, I jog upstairs to grab a spare blanket but find Maxie lying on my bed. He leaps up and whimpers excitedly upon seeing me, his tail whipping from left to right rapidly. I sit next to him on the bed, ruffling his ears a bit and smiling down at him.

‘You’re a good boy,’ I whisper. ‘The best boy.’

I slowly stand up and grab my Maths book from my bag, silently groaning at all the algebra questions I’ll have to answer. Maths is fun, and I’m good at it, sure, but any work at home is dreadful work.

***

After getting roughly 5 hours of sleep due to waking up many times during the night, I wordlessly step outside the front door the next day, letting the soft rain fall down my face. Rob kisses my cheek softly.

‘See you soon, son,’ he says.

‘See ya,’ I say rather quickly as Rob shuts the door and waves at me from the window. I can see Maxie leaping up and down excitedly at the window. I can literally see the whimpers leaving his mouth.

As I’m walking past the corner shop, Asbel rolls up to me on his scooter.

‘Oh!’ I exclaim as he almost knocks me over. ‘Didn’t expect to see you here.’

His curly black hair is ruffled by the wind and he rubs his hand through it.

‘Thought I’d just come see you, walk the rest of the way with you,’ he says nonchalantly.

‘Did you manage to get the Maths homework done?’

‘We had Maths homework?’ he says in his usual tone; where nobody can tell if he’s serious or not.

I roll my eyes, sighing mentally. ‘When we get to school you can copy mine, you lazy sod.’

Asbel smiles toothily. ‘This is why we’re friends.’

The rest of the walk held nothing of importance. We talked about everything from TV shows to school and other casual things. When we arrive at school, the headteacher, Mr Taylor, is there at the front gate.

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He is a short man with a composed posture, some stubble and a big nose. His hair is white, possibly from the stress of maintaining the monkey house that is my school. He looks down his pointed nose at Asbel and me with his warm blue eyes.

‘Mornin’ gents,’ he says kindly, the sides of his mouth lifting slightly into a warm smile.

‘Morning,’ Asbel and I reply glumly in unison.

Working our way up the concrete path to the front doors, Ethan catches up with us. I notice that he wasn’t with Jay, which was unusual since the two of them usually walked to school together.

‘Where’s Jay at?’ Asbel asked.

‘Oh, he said he had to talk to a teacher, so he’s already inside. Dunno what about, but it seemed important.’

‘Might as well head inside,’ I say. ‘It’s cold. We’re gonna get ill if we stay out here too long.’

‘Yeah, I agree,’ Ethan says. ‘Let’s go.’

We step through the huge double doors and are greeted by the Atrium. A huge triangular area littered with tables and chairs, situated right at the entrance. The three of us take a left, and then another left and begin to head up the stairs. Some kids are leaning against the wall, but they weren’t even paying attention to us. As we begin to head up the second half of the stairs, whilst I am looking at my feet, Asbel grabs me quickly and pulls me towards him, but not quick enough. My shoulder collides with someone else’s. I quickly look up, about to apologise, and then I see who it is.

Cold blue eyes stare down at me. The boy I bumped into is short, possibly even shorter than Jay, and he has very short blond hair, and the buttons on his blazer are undone. Not even the top button on his shirt is done up. Our eyes meet, and I feel a cold sweat break out on my forehead.

‘Sorry, Maltor, I wasn’t looking where I was going,’ I say hurriedly.

His harsh eyes continue to stare down at me. His friend, Annas, a plump brown boy with dark brown eyes, keeps looking between the two of us, as though he were watching a tennis match.

‘It’s fine,’ Maltor murmurs coldly. ‘Everyone makes mistakes. Just watch where you’re going next time, ‘K?’

‘Watc-’ Asbel begins, but I prodded him in the back.

‘Yeah, I will. I’ll keep that in mind next time I’m walking up the stairs.’ I say, not breaking eye contact with Maltor.

We continue to walk up the stairs, and Maltor and Annas continue their descent. But then Maltor says, ‘No, always keep your head up. Nothing good comes from staring at your feet.’

‘Yeah, same to you.’

‘What was that about?’ Ethan asks incredulously. ‘You spoke as though you were both best friends and worst enemies.’

‘I dunno,’ I say. ‘Guess I was tryna match his coldness.’

Once at the top of the stairs, we all take two lefts, but Ethan and I enter the first door on the right: Room 139. Asbel carries on down the corridor, after wishing us goodbye, to Room 141.

We throw our bags to the floor, and I sit on a table across from Ethan, and we begin casual chatter, waiting for Mrs Khatri to arrive and tell me off for sitting on a table. Then three people come through the door: Anton, Annas, and Maltor. Now, Anton is in the same form as me, so he was supposed to be in here, but Maltor and Annas, whilst being his friends, were not.

I glance briefly at Maltor before continuing to talk to Ethan. But, of course, my life just cannot let me have any normality whatsoever. Maltor and his friends walk over and stop about a foot away from me and Ethan.

Maltor puts his hand on my back and my vision tunnels. There is a faint yellow tinge all around my peripherals. I appear to become someone else. I am taller, and when I speak, my voice is deep and hoarse.

‘Well, isn’t this a sight to behold?’ I say, turning to the person on my right. It’s a short man with greying brown hair and warm green eyes. He’s wearing a dark blue trench coat, with a white shirt and grey trousers.

‘Yeah, Amy really did this place over,’ he says, in a voice that sounds as though he has lost all hope.

I turn back to the house. It’s caved in entirely on one side. All of the remaining windows are smashed, and the front door has been blown off of its hinges. The car on the drive looks as though it had been set on fire, it was charred and destroyed, and you could barely tell that it had been blue before.

The moon suddenly appeared through a parting in the clouds, glistening softly on my face. It illuminates the house slightly, and it’s then that I notice about half a dozen doctors on the first floor of the house. They are all huddling around something on the floor that I cannot see.

‘Even after transforming, we didn’t get here in time,’ I say in that same hoarse voice.

The man next to me sighs. ‘Alfonso, we’ve lost.’

‘We’d lost before it had begun,’ I say quietly, ‘There were too many things we were unprepared for. Even the child posed a problem, we didn’t even realise how valuable he was; how powerful he was.’

‘Was?’ the man next to me says, sounding almost offended. ‘The boy has lived, I’m sure of it. If we stick around long enough, we might see the doctors drag him out of that sorry place.’

‘Whatever you say, mate,’ I say sorrily. That was when a faint crying sound reached me. It was coming from the house.

Within an instant, I was back in my classroom, staring blankly at the ceiling, Maltor’s hand recoiling quickly from my back. It appears as though no time has passed; that whole thing was within half a second. I turn to Maltor, confused. His face wears a mask of fear and confusion, similar to what I imagine mine was. He appears to be hurriedly covering up his heavy breathing, and his eyes are wild with terror.

‘Alfonso?’ I murmur. The name is annoyingly familiar yet vague. ‘Alfonso.’ I feel as though I have met Alfonso before, but the name doesn’t match a face in my mind.

Maltor stares into my eyes, worried and afraid. That house, I think, that’s the house! The one on the corner of the road! The more I think about it, the more I cannot deny it. The caved-in section and the layout of the inside seemed the exact same. The drive with the wonky slabs, and the brick wall outlining the property, to separate that house from the rest.

My eyes widen with a horrible realisation. I turn slowly turn to meet Maltor’s eyes, unable to shake the horrific truth. Alfonso was there. He knew what had happened that night.