William King

Time looks like it might be running out for Alex and Matty and their little runaway adventure, they will as we say, have to face the music!

Monday morning it was freezing cold downstairs. The fire had gone out overnight, Gareth probably forgot. I set about emptying the ash and lighting a new fire. Matty helped me get some logs in, then put the kettle on. It took me several tries to get the fire to light, I was definitely no boy scout. Matty came over with two mugs of coffee and we huddled on the sofa waiting for some heat to be given out. It was just then the phone rang, I thought it must be Gareth's. I followed the ringing and

Nobody got up early on Sunday morning, it must have been eleven o'clock or there about when Matty and me came downstairs. Gareth was at the table drinking tea and eating toast, Aled was awake, but still lying on the sofa. "Great party," I said, crossing to the kitchen to put the kettle on. "I'm out this afternoon, someone to see," Gareth looked up over his mug of tea. "Okay, we'll cook something later for when you get back." We joined him at the table, with coffee and toast,

Good question... Great insight... Things can't stay calm for too much longer, it's just not possible, and you all seem to get that something will happen! They are about to get a little lesson in life...

Do you want to share the disturbing vibes and I could comment?

Gareth and Aled left to go into town the next morning after breakfast. Presumably to sell some dope, I didn't ask about it. The place had got to be a real mess so Matty and I spent the morning cleaning. I don't mind untidiness, but you need to clean up and take the rubbish out. It was dark by the time Gareth arrived back. We'd prepared another meal, so we sat down to eat it together. "I love your stew." Gareth smiled. He was in a good mood, maybe a little stoned. He must have smoked a bit w

Aled stayed overnight. He was sitting at the table drinking tea with Gareth when I came downstairs. The first thing that crossed my mind was where did he sleep? We greeted each other. Gareth offered a cup of tea, but I said I preferred coffee. After boiling the kettle I poured a mug and joined them at the table. I had left Matty sleeping. "I'm going over to see Steve later on," Gareth said. "Should be back in the evening sometime. Aled's staying here." I nodded and gave a weak smile.

All is not lost to the immaterial world: ‘We need to go places and touch things’: the people turning away from smartphones Disquiet over social media addiction is leading to a growing enthusiasm for Polaroids, postcards and the physical and analogue world. This article was published over a year ago in the Guardian: https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/article/2024/jun/12/young-people-turning-away-from-phones-social-media-addiction Nothing to do with site stats, but an interesting trend.

Probably nothing legal... How much trouble can one boy get into and drag his best friend with him? Maybe quite a lot!

It had completely gone out of my head to recharge my phone. It had been dead since when? Sometime Sunday night I think, two, no three days ago, counting today. I plugged it in and switched it on as Matty came down to join me. He had a blanket over his shoulders and wore a T shirt and pants. I could've picked him up and taken him straight back to bed. How did I suddenly become so obsessed? I finished laying the table and poured him a coffee. Luckily I had managed to find a jar of instant in

That's about right.

"What the fuck are you doing?" I screamed, not moving, still crouched on the floor half covering Matty and shaking. Shaking uncontrollably. A torch pierced the shadows, the beam of light crossing my head and stopping. "How many of you are up there?" The man asked. "I'm calling the police." "Don't do that," I pleaded, trying to recover. "There's just the two of us." "You better get down here boyo, where I can see you." Did I detect a hint of nervousness. We both got up s

It's going to be an exciting (or is that really the right word) weekend?

Stepping from the train the cold, damp air, hit you immediately. It stung me in the face and as we left the station my nose started dripping. I looked around with only a vague idea of where we were. In the middle of nowhere, is what it seemed like. "Where do we go now?" Matty looked at me with an expression that told me perhaps this was all a terrible idea. I remembered the town was not too far, but in the opposite direction to the main road that we needed to take to reach the old cot

Train wrecks, breaking up, and the wild cards. It's all about to blow up, but maybe not how you expect, I don't know, or can't say!

"Oh fuck it!" I was talking out loud to myself. It had started to rain, the drops of water sliding down and obscuring the windscreen. "No luck?" Jonathan asked looking across at me holding the phone. "Maybe he needs to charge it?" He hadn't waited for a reply, I think he wanted to diffuse the tension. "No, it was charged enough and anyway he just would have to plug it in. No. Bet she never gave it to him. He'll never even know I was here." "You don't know that. Send a

Jonathan is a nice guy and seems like he's gone out of his way to help Alex, but Alex hasn't told him what he plans on doing. Then there is Sean and that is a twist which is totally unforseen and pretty incredible, then again life can sometimes be filled with weird coincidences.

I wonder if all teenagers aren't impulsive, or at least don't always consider the possible consequences of their actions?

Saturday, I went shopping for a phone. Nothing special just a cheap Pay As You Go. I told the salesgirl it was a present for someone and got her to wrap it up. All I needed was the address from Edmund and I was all set, Jonathan would drive me there on Sunday. After the Vodafone shop I went to the cash machine and more or less emptied my savings account. On the way back home I got a call from Edmund. "Edmund," I was hoping he'd come through with the address. "Did you get it?" "Yeah, n

@zakynthos you make some very good points. If we take the Dickensian analysis of banishing the boy from the family home, I agree, it's pretty extreme. On the other hand, I've read stories where the parents are so understanding they let the teenagers sleep together, as in the same bed, equally hard to believe. Let's see how things work out, but I do also agree

When looking at the page views/clicks @W_L, you really do need a little circumspection about what's being collected, I like to apply the 80/20 rule, 80% of clicks are readers, 20% not (and I don't think I'm alone in this). To get an approximation of reader numbers you take the lowest chapter page clicks, after all, if there are 100 clicks on any one chapter it stands to reason whatever other numbers you have, no more than 100 readers are possible for the whole story. Apply the 80/20 rule and you've got 80 readers, because some of those clicks are simply not for reading, and I'm being generous stating 80 readers, it could easily be less. So let's get real, take the last entry by @Jeff Burton for Encrypted (I'm not picking on you Jeff, rest assured it's just an example, the lowest chapter clicks was 809, 80% gives an average readership for the entire story as 647. Sure it's an approximation, but in any event you could not have more readers of the whole story, from beginning to end, than 809, the lowest chapter clicks, less than half the numbers you quote. This applies to everyone, myself included, the number of readers who pick up a story and read it from start to finish is very, very, low. Online reading of stories does not attract more than a miniscule number of people if you compare to say YouTube videos, blogs, podcasts. When authors say they are writing for themselves, that's a good thing, you can see why. Personally, I write for myself and for the handful of readers, even if it's only 50. I like the comments, reviews, and I like that 50 people read the story, but I ain't kidding myself that I have a following, that would be thousands of readers which doesn't happen!

Have you seen: Skam season 3 (English subtitles). Imo it's an excellent series, season 3 is about a high school teenage gay encounter.

Wednesday lunchtime I met up with John Boy who told me he'd had a talk with Mr Mathews, the rugby coach. Mr Mathews wanted to find out about Ryan and me which is understandable as we are both on the team. John Boy explained he couldn't tell him much, except that I was only involved in trying to settle things and calm everything. It was Ryan who had acted stupidly. Apparently, Mr Mathews agreed and told John Boy that Ryan had been sent home suspended for the rest of the week, until the whole matt

Of course we identify with Alex and the situation he's in, forcing him to come out to his parents. The other side of the coin is the parents and how they react and deal with their own feelings. We have a contrast here, Alex's parents are supportive yet sensible (love that word, sensible) so they can't promise to sort everything out. Matty's parents look kind of panicked, maybe in denial, looking to blame someone, but we will see how things develop.