Heroes of Inordinatio: The Ghost King by Fantastic4Ever!!

Chapter 1: School is out!

Students of Grand Oak High* hurriedly stuffed their things into their bags and stampeded outside the classrooms, each one shouting and chatting loudly. Excitement filled the air. Students called out to one another, asking each other to sign their yearbooks. Kids of all ages crowded the hallways,

blocking the paths of passing teachers. It was the final day of school. "Please gather around the main gate for the end-of-the-year photos. Happy summer break students!" exclaimed the principal over the PA. Everyone pushed and shoved their way to the main gate. "Hey, guys! Everyone will get a chance to get a photo!" shouted Caroline Jones,  the school paper photographer, over the students' noisy voices. "Smile!"

After all the students had their photos taken and several more yearbook pages were signed, the excitement finally died down and students started to leave. Among the crowd of dispersing students were Dana Carter and Amara Averette, 2 of Caroline's best friends. "Hey, Carol! Over here!" shouted Dana. It was hard for Caroline to find them in the dense crowd since both were fairly short. But she could just make out the top of Dana's hazelnut hair at the back of the crowd. "Hey, guys!" Caroline said as she pushed through the crowd to where they were.  "Hi, Carol! Your photos in the yearbook are amazing!" said Amara, who was carefully flipping through her yearbook pages. "Thanks," replied Caroline. "Have you seen Astrid? I haven't seen her since this morning," Amara looked up from her book. "We haven't either, but you know she is always looking for new ideas for her art projects. She might be by the school garden." Astrid Garcia, their artistic best friend always was out in nature looking for inspiration for her next 'masterpiece'. "We should go find her, we need to leave the campus before 5:00. She might forget about the time," said Carol (Let's just call her Carol for short. I am not a close friend of Caroline but it will make reading this story much easier...am I a right dear reader?). The friends ran to the school garden weaving through all the passing students. "Astrid!" Amara shouted out of breath. After a few minutes, they finally found her sitting on a bench beside the duck pond. She was skillfully sketching out a small family of ducks swimming around the edge

of the pond. "It's just not right," she muttered to herself. Suddenly noticing her friends she jumped up. "Oh! Hey guys...sorry I didn't notice you there. I was trying to sketch a family of ducks but I kinda lost interest."  Amara* knelt and took a closer look at the little family. "What's wrong with drawing something so cute?"

"They are cute...but it's just not what I'm looking for. I've just been so tired lately because of the school workload and I'm lacking creativity right now, " replied Astrid with a sigh.

"We can all relate to that. The school has been extremely stressful, with so many assignments and due dates that we can never take a break," Dana said.

Caroline remained silent. She suddenly had an idea.

"Then shouldn't we get one?" she finally said.

The girls shared quizzical looks.

"I'll explain on the way home...let's get out of here! School is closing any second now!"

Once they got to Caroline's house, her mom warmly greeted them.

"Hey girls!" Carol's mom said, hugging her.

"Hi, mom!" Carol said smiling.

"Good afternoon Mrs. Jones. I hope it isn't too much trouble that we are here," said Astrid shyly.

"It's quite alright! You guys are like family. Make yourselves at home and help yourself to some cookies." "Thank you, Mrs. Jones!" Amara shouted following the others through the hallway.

After grabbing some milk and the cookies Carol's mom made, they headed upstairs to her room. Once they settled down Astrid finally asked: " Continuing the discussion, what are you suggesting Carol?" taking a bite out of her cookie.

"Okay so, you guys know that we have worked extremely hard for the past months."

                                    "Tell me about it," said Amara, yawning.

   "And, it's been a long time since we just spent time together," Caroline continued

     I'm suggesting a cross-country road trip! Just the 4 of us, to start the summer."

                                              The girls shared excited glances.

"What do you say?" said Carol.

"Oh, I don't see why not! "Amara said with a smile.

"Yes! Road trip!!" exclaimed Astrid, ecstatic.

"Hooray! I haven't been on one for ages!" said Dana.

"Great! this requires a lot of preparation though...especially since we don't have a car...but I'm sure we can figure it out! Meet you guys tomorrow at Mary's bakery."

They nodded in agreement, said their goodbyes, and headed home.

So...this is the end of the first chapter! We started this book about 2 years ago as a fun activity...and then it kind of developed into a very long novel. This first chapter is giving supposed to give an insight into who our main characters are and their personalities. I hope you enjoyed it so far!