A Step into the Unknown: A Teenager's Journey of Self-Discovery.

By Paul A. Mendel

What made Dylan's life so difficult to cope with? Like so many other insecure, sensitive fourteen-year-olds, Dylan confronts the usual series of problems, but his seem more stressful than most. Firstly, he needs to adapt to a new, large city school in Perth after moving from a small rural community down south; then he suffers being victimised by a remorseless school bully, not to mention by his inconsiderate siblings, who allow him little personal space; and, finally, he faces a tyrannical teacher who makes his schooling seem like hell. So, when a weird alien visitor – Orf – enters his life, he scarcely believes that everything begins to change for the better.

Orf teaches him how to tap into his latent powers and listen to his intuitive voice. Despite some embarrassing failures, Dylan not only learns to manage his own troubles but ends up assisting some of his classmates with their challenging dilemmas. But where does all this learning lead him? Why did this teacher appear? Could this mentor have his own, secret agenda?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Tellwell Talent
• Release date: Jun 10, 2021
• ISBN: 9780228841333

Book preview

A Step Into the Unknown

A Teenager’s Journey of Self-discovery.

Paul A. Mendel

A Step Into the Unknown

Copyright © 2021 by Paul A. Mendel

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the author, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other non-commercial uses permitted by copyright law.

Tellwell Talent

www.tellwell.ca

ISBN

978-0-2288-4132-6 (Hardcover)

978-0-2288-4131-9 (Paperback)

978-0-2288-4133-3 (eBook)

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements

Prologue

Chapter 1: Orford’s Arrival

Chapter 2: Baby of the Family

Chapter 3: Lauren

Chapter 4: Michael

Chapter 5: Parents’ Paranoia

Chapter 6: Telepathy

Chapter 7: Independence

Chapter 8: The Same Old Trap

Chapter 9: Power

Chapter 10: The Mission

Chapter 11: Initiation

Chapter 12: Mastery

Interview

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank my wife, Julie, who has been with me at every step of the novel, encouraging me, and offering constructive suggestions. I would also like to acknowledge Daisy McCauley for the extensive time she has devoted to demonstrating weaknesses in the plot; pace; characterisation; and assisting me with the use of imagery. I am also deeply indebted to Annie Girard. This novel would be very different without her careful editorial skills and I am indebted to the love and care she has given me in the process.

Sparkling white iceberg floating on ocean.

I think I know you, oh so well.

But most of you is completely concealed

In the darkness, beneath normal perceptions.

Prologue

The three Golden Orbs revolved in perfect harmony in the cool air. Light and energy flowed freely from them in circular currents, spreading out into the skies over the land of Sartan, energising the whole land, keeping the four elements of fire, air, earth and water harmoniously together to protect the fully-balanced environment. Thus had been the pattern for thousands and thousands of years. It was the perfect shield to protect this planet from nefarious forces which possessed the ability to steal the precious way of life that the people of Sartan took for granted as their natural inheritance. But in any area where light radiates, there always appears the presence of the dark elements, those beings that perceive the forces of light as their implacable enemy, and something to be demolished by them.

The three figures, shrouded in black cloaks, formed a tight circle. They focussed all their attention on a hidden apparatus. Their skinny, dark, yellow hands, with large pointed fingers encircled with a number of strangely-shaped rings, locked on to each other. In unison, they all uttered incomprehensible words, as if singing some sort of song. Then, in complete accord, they raised their hands, placing one of them on their hearts and the other on the centre of their foreheads. The emission of a scream followed, a scream so piercing that it would have shattered any glass object if there had been one in the vicinity.

Something very dark and sinister slowly emerged from the ground inside their circle. It hovered silently for a few moments and then suddenly flashed upwards at breath-taking speed, igniting all the air around it. Faster and faster it surged upwards, the scream increasing in intensity. It possessed only one focus and one purpose – the Golden Orbs that had rotated so purposefully for millennia. They circulated for one last time, then slowly fell towards the land of Sartan, smashing into tiny fragments. The sound of the scream rang throughout the planet. It seemed as though the planet itself shrieked in agony.

Chapter One

Orford’s Arrival

It was silent and dark. Dylan found himself walking down the corridor to the bathroom when he felt it – a cold prickling, starting at the base of his skull and beginning to creep progressively down his neck. He told himself he must be imagining it, but then he felt it skulking down his spine, becoming frosty and moist. He shook himself vigorously, but the piercing cold began to permeate his whole body, sucking away all his warmth and all his energy. It seemed as if a series of icy tentacles snaked around his body and started to take control of it. His movements felt sluggish. Each step seemed like ripping his feet from quicksand that threatened at any moment to suck him down into some dark depths below. He started to feel his thoughts becoming fuzzy and indistinct. They seemed to belong to those of another person and he felt like a balloon, gently floating upwards into the sky. He fought back with every ounce of his will. He caught images: a flash of golden light, and then he heard a scream. He felt the scream this time. It wasn’t just sound now. He opened his mouth and he heard himself shriek.

Dylan woke up. He found himself in a pool of sweat. His eyes began to focus on the green curtains, gently swirling as the early-morning sun started to filter through the gaps. He sat up and felt so fatigued that it took an effort to raise himself to his knees from feeling the soft sheets and the light, soft-weight blanket cocooning his body. He took in a few deep breaths and allowed his fears and anxiety to evaporate. Did I really scream?

He had never experienced a nightmare quite like that before. He found it difficult to separate it from reality and, as he focussed on his dream, his body involuntarily shivered and he became aware of small tremours flooding through his chest. Why had he had this experience? Perhaps he worried about facing his teacher, the notorious Mrs Blackston, after such a relaxing weekend. Possibly he felt anxious about having to confront the fiendish Ethan who had been making his life a misery, especially during those past four weeks? Maybe the answer lay in his difficulty in adapting to a new urban life and his problem of making friends in the new school? He stared at the huge poster of the West Coast Eagles’ football team, resplendent in their bright blues and yellows, adorning his bedroom wall. On his other wall, another favourite of his stared down at him – Roger Federer holding up a golden trophy with a triumphant glow lighting up his countenance. In between lay the painting of the Rotorua mud pools in New Zealand. A smile played on Dylan’s face and he began to let the trauma of his nightmare slip away.

He made his way to the bathroom, but stopped half-way when he realised that he had repeated the first stages of his dream. His shoulders grew tense until he heard the melodious voice of his mother singing as she prepared breakfast. She was singing her favourite song, the one whose name he had difficulty remembering but always reminded him of their last home. The sound gave him comfort, even in this new house.

Soon, he sat dressed at the kitchen table as his mother placed a steaming plate of eggs and tomatoes on toast in front of him. It was all only a dream. I have nothing to be scared of, he reassured himself as his teeth sank into his breakfast. As the food hit his taste buds, he felt all traces of the nightmare begin to fade away.

‘You look a bit pale, Dylan. Did you sleep okay?’ his mother asked, looking at him tenderly with a slight frown on her face.

‘Oh, just fine.’ He didn’t want to worry his mum over his stupid dream. He loved his mum, but she could be a worry guts at times. Sometimes she asked him some embarrassing questions that he felt reluctant to answer.

This was the one day of the week that his parents had insisted they all have breakfast together. Soon all the family seated themselves at the table and his mother served their breakfasts with a smile on her face. He observed his father’s gaze cast down over the newspaper and only his thick, black beard peeped out. His older brother, Liam, slurped a large glass of orange juice as he stared at Dylan with a mischievous smirk on his face. Dylan listened to his two older sisters, Jasmine and Amy, discussing a movie they had seen the previous night. Unexpectedly, despite the humdrum normality, the image of Ethan, his arch-enemy at school, flashed through his mind and he immediately tried to blot out the vision, with little success.

*     *     *

Ethan tried to do up his school shirt. Three buttons were missing. He looked down in horror as a few dark hairs untidily gaped through his shirt. He snatched the material so that it closed over them and then the hole in the shoulder seam began to widen. He listened warily, in case his father awoke, and breathed in a deep sigh of relief when he made out the sounds of snores reverberating through the house, like rusty nails being scraped across the wooden floor. A cockroach scuttled across the threadbare carpet as Ethan plodded towards the kitchen cupboards to search for some breakfast. His stomach rumbled noisily and he halted momentarily, every sense alert in case he awoke his father. The snores continued unabated.

He opened door after door of the kitchen cupboards, but managed only to find a few pieces of very stale bread, two Weet-Bix, which he observed going blue with mould, and the remains of a tomato, also looking very sorry for itself as dry and wrinkled as a desiccated leaf. Oh well, beggars can’t be choosers, Ethan thought to himself as he found a chipped dish and threw the motley fragments of food into it and turned on the tap to moisten them. At first no water at all flowed out, and then, with protesting gurgles, liquid of a decidedly brown nature reluctantly spurted out at irregular intervals. Ethan shut his eyes and began to cram the distasteful mess into his mouth, pretending it was a fresh Hungry Jack’s burger that he had just bought. The illusion failed to help him force the unpalatable mess down his protesting gullet.

He hoped that that day was dole day when his father managed to get money for food supplies, and that he would buy them before he spent the money on his favourite beer, and more beer! It was there now. He smelt the rank odour of stale beer and cigarette smoke swirling through the untidy apartment, making it difficult for him to keep his breakfast down, and he wished his mother could assert herself more strongly and possessed the ability to assist him with his nasty, aggressive father.

He sighed and thought about the new boy. What was his name? David? Duggan? Yes, Dylan. The image of the boy’s intense, blue eyes and mop of blond hair filled his mind. How he envied him. He’d regarded Dylan as he rode out of the school bike sheds on his bright new red bike. If only his dad had bought him a bike, any bike. He’d watched as Dylan’s father parked his car outside the tennis courts and called encouraging words as he sat down to watch him. Ethan listened to Dylan’s father’s affirmative words from the sidelines when Dylan experienced a hard time. Ethan sighed again. If only his parents spent the time and effort to drive him to tennis instead of him having to wait interminably for buses and trains. If only dad would come with me to tennis and cheer me on. Not likely. He’d never think of giving up his precious drinking time for me.

Ethan resentfully fingered the bruises on his backside and under his shirt and channelled all his anger into thinking how to make Dylan’s life an absolute misery. He had kicked him many times, but to his disappointment, the spoilt brat failed to respond in a way that gave his attacker any pleasure. He needed to think of some other way to hurt and provoke him. Physical pain was only one type of pain, as he very much knew from his experiences with his own father. His mind began to plot various, devious scenarios that would really upset Dylan. He smiled to himself as these scenes filtered through his over-active mind. He glanced down at his watch and realised he needed to hurry to ensure he didn’t miss the bus and arrive late, because he certainly didn’t want to upset Mrs Blackston. Let that new boy do that.

He grabbed his old school bag, careful to avoid its contents slipping through the several holes in it. He gave a last, hasty scrutiny of the kitchen in the faint hope that he could find something to serve as his lunch for the day, but, deep down, he knew his efforts would prove fruitless. Then he remembered the grubby five-dollar note that his mother had surreptitiously pushed into his hand as he went to bed the night before, and a flicker of a smile flashed over his face.

The bus stop occupied a space only a hundred metres from his apartment and, as he slouched moodily down the road with his hands in his pockets, he managed to make out a group of fellow students already lined up at the bus shelter. When he found himself in proximity to the other chatting uniformed bodies he stopped, keeping a wary distance between himself and the others and gazed down disconsolately at his faded shoes with laces that looked as if they would fall to pieces if one applied any pressure to them. No one seemed to notice the solitary figure as he sneaked a few furtive glances around, careful not to meet the gaze of anyone in the group. When the bus finally arrived, he was the last to climb the steps and search for a seat to sit by himself. All around him he heard the noisy chatter of students discussing their weekends. Ethan sat in his seat occupied with his own thoughts and his mind once more gravitated to strategies to torment and cause anguish and pain to the new boy.

He began to daydream, drifting back to himself as a six-year-old, when his dad worked at the local Independent Grocer of Australia, IGA he called it. After work he often brought back with him chocolate treats and even the occasional toy from the toy shop opposite to the store. He remembered his dad giving his mum a tender embrace and a kiss when he returned. They used to go out regularly on picnics to picturesque waterfalls in the country, where his dad hoisted him up on his shoulders while he strode ahead over the beautiful terrain. He loved being held aloft where he enjoyed such a good view of the trees. He liked that, at this height, he seemed as high as the birds flying through the air. He felt so safe and powerful and valued. His mother had used to smile then. And sometimes she’d stroke his face. He had felt loved and protected.

As the bus hummed along for a moment his heart began to feel lighter. He felt his clenched hands hidden in his pockets start to loosen and a smile began to open his taut lips. There even appeared the beginning of a twinkle in his eye. He began to question his animosity towards Dylan. Why am I treating him so badly? What’s he ever done to me to cause me such misery?

Abruptly, recent events in his house started to crawl into his mind, obliterating the peaceful scenes of family harmony and balance. It all began to change for the worse when his father lost his job at the IGA store. He was retrenched. Ethan didn’t even know what that meant. He wondered if it was another word for ‘disaster?’ Because that was what it had caused: the retrenchment had caused disaster.

Things had never been the same after his father had lost his job. The changes came thick and fast. His father’s smile transformed into a grimace. He became a moody, surly man who exploded into a temper over the smallest matter. He and his mum felt as if they walked on eggshells as they racked their brains to avoid another burst of anger, wrecking the harmony of the household.

To make matters worse, his father began to spend more and more time down at the hotel and, when he returned to the house, Ethan made himself scarce so that his father would not notice him. Unfortunately for him, he did not always succeed in this strategy. In his mind he heard the raucous, strident tone of his father as he raged at his wife and son. Then things got worse. His dad began to drink more and more. For the first time, his dad started to become violent. In the beginning, the violent episodes were few and far between, but later they became more frequent. The cries of his mother reverberated through his mind as he recalled the sounds of flesh smashing flesh. Once more, he fingered the bruises on his own body, careful to ensure no one caught sight of his actions.

His thoughts began to darken like a great storm-cloud slowly covering the sky, stealing every bit of light. They robbed him of all the charitable thoughts he had begun to feel towards Dylan. When he saw Dylan with his dad at tennis, he felt green with envy. It rubbed salt into his mental and emotional wounds. Yeh, I’m gunna make that intruder’s life hell and I’m gunna enjoy every minute of it. He got a dogeared notebook out of his bag and began to pencil some notes in it. He became so engrossed with his thoughts that he began to chuckle and failed to notice that some of his classmates were watching him with some questioning looks. The image of Dylan filled his mind, blotting out the landscape slipping by.

*     *     *

An hour later after a vigorous bike ride downhill with the blustery, morning, easterly wind behind him, Dylan sat in his classroom. How he hated that room. As soon as he entered it, all his exuberance from his bike ride faded away. He thought back to the happy memories of his country primary school, where he had enjoyed so many friends and he had loved all his teachers who had been thoughtful and caring and a lot of fun, and now he faced a multitude of problems. There seemed nothing to which he could cling to find fun and enjoyment any longer.

The large gum trees outside had been preserved when the school was first built and provided much-needed shade and a restful atmosphere for most of the year. It was a very new school that had started with Year Sevens three years before. The desks and chairs still looked clean and bright. Dylan gazed around the Year Nine classroom. A classmate – Lauren – sat by herself in the back corner. She stood out because of her huge bulk. She rarely smiled and the hint of a frown always shadowed her face. Directly behind Dylan sat his archenemy, Ethan, in his scruffy, uncared for uniform. He failed to figure out why this tall, thin, olive-skinned boy resented him, and why every opportunity Ethan had, he used it to make Dylan’s life painful and distressing. To Dylan’s right sat the closely-bonded quartet of boys who played Four Square during nearly every recess and lunch times. Waru, a tall, muscular boy, with frizzy black, hair and dark sparkling eyes, seemed to be the leader of the group. Raffal, his shining black hair and dark good looks, seemed typical of Indian boys. He laughed a great deal and his giggling seemed so infectious that Dylan wanted to smile whenever he heard it. Alex was a much smaller boy, plastered with large freckles. John, a tall thin blond boy who had just moved to Perth from the United Kingdom with his broad English accent, completed the group. Dylan gazed behind him on the left and focussed on Michael, a very small boy, very pale, who seemed to withdraw further into himself if one as much as looked at him. At the front sat Mrs Blackston’s blue-eyed girls: Mary, Diane and Jocelyn. These were the teacher’s pets. They always behaved impeccably and received constant praise from their teacher. On the far right in the front sat Salena, Mrs Blackston’s daughter. She seemed to be always smiling and good natured with her glossy, brown hair and hazel-brown eyes that twinkled when they looked at you. She always became one of the first chosen if groups were being formed. Dylan secretly had a crush on her, but he had never told a soul about this and, anyway, she was Mrs Blackston’s daughter.

Dylan’s depressed mood remained, despite his attempts to fight it off, with the residue of his nightmare still haunting his thoughts. He feared that any moment Mrs Blackston would ask him to read aloud in front of the class. He sensed Ethan leering at him. His stomach transformed into one huge knot as his heart raced. He heard Ethan muttering something nasty,