Tom awoke to a loud knocking at the door and, for a slight second, forgot whereabouts he was.
“Just a minute!” he shouted.
“Oh that’s quite alright!”
As Tom got up and changed into his normal daytime clothes,
he heard whistling from the person on the other side of the door.
“Sorry to be rude and all, but could you stop whistling? It
hurts my ears and it kind of makes this seem like a race.” Tom shouted
unhappily.
The person on the other side of the door didn’t reply.
“You still there?” Tom said loudly.
Tom heard footsteps in the house and turned to see William.
“Are you okay, Tom?” William asked thoughtfully.
“Yes. Just someone at the door. I awoke to him or her
knocking.” Tom replied.
“Good, good. You know, I just awoke to you shouting about
and got scared just a tiny bit.
“Could you answer the door? “Tom asked.
William said nothing at all but just wandered to the door.
He then proceeded to open it.
“Oh! Hi Zach.” William said.
“Hi, can you come outside and bike?”
Tom shouted from the other room, a rather loud, ‘YES!”.
“Guess so.”, said William.
With that, they both went outside to Mrs. Fletcher's house
to ask if they could borrow a bike, because they actually didn’t have one,
well, William didn’t anyway.
“I don’t really know how ride a bike. I hope you do.”, said
William.
“Why do you think I knocked on your door?”, asked Zach.
“Hey, just saying, I don’t know how to ride a bike.”
“Don’t worry. I’ll try to teach you. You a good listener?
“I suppose so.”
“Good.”
They arrived at Mrs. Fletcher's house and asked her if they
could borrow a couple of her boys bikes.
“Sure. They’ve outgrown them anyway.”, Mrs. Fletcher said.
“Oh. Well, do they use them?”, Zach asked.
“No. I told you. They’ve outgrown them.”
“Oh, I forgot. Good bikes.”
“Yes. I know. There’s plenty more bikes in the garage.”
“Right, good talk. I’ll bring them back later.”
Footsteps bounded down the stairs in the background. It was
one of Mrs. Fletcher's boys. She indicated for William and Zach to, quote, ‘MOVE!’.
William and Zach did as they were told and just managed to
get the back wheel out before the boy got round the corner. He was looking for
his bike.
“Where is my bike?”, he asked.
“Look in the garage.”, Mrs. Fletcher said.
“I did.”
“Fine. I’ll tell you. I lent it to William.”
“William?”
He circled his hands repeatedly.
“Beech. William Beech.
He let out a blood-curdling scream.
“YOU DEVIL! NO! NO!”
