Curse of the Werebottom

Chapter 9

Eddie's mum chose that exact moment to enter through the glazed door from the hallway and flounce through the kitchen. She was a very bright and bubbly person with a large expanse of red hair on her perfectly rounded and perfectly made-up face. "Enjoying your lunch children? Can I get you anything else my lovelies?" she asked in a voice so high she was practically singing to them. Before she received a reply from any of them she sang over her shoulder as she continued on her journey to the back garden without breaking her stride, "Alright then my little cherubs, just call if you need anything."

She was followed closely by Miss Cherrydale, the very prim and proper head teacher of their school, Orange Grove, who smiled at the children as she too trotted past them without pausing. Both ladies were wearing very large and flowing floral dresses that matched both their bright personalities and also their passion for gardening. Mrs Cherrydale had worked hard through her role in school and had organised many school projects in order to get all the parents in the town involved in various horticultural activities. It was a remarkable success that was partially driven by her desire to be accepted by the small community after her recent mid-term appointment and also by her burning enthusiasm for gardening.

Hedge pruning, basket arranging, tree cultivating and of course flower bed growing and weeding had increased in popularity ten times over, and through Miss Cherrydale's orchestration and leadership, the town had successfully made it to the finals of the Flowers in Bloom competition as a result.

Eddies house was a very fine example of a beautifully kept garden and there was no doubt that Eddies mum had invited Mrs Cherrydale over to seek her advice and also, Eddie guessed, her approval. Both ladies exited the kitchen and closed the door to the garden behind them. They could still be seen through the glass as they pointed to this plant and that before separately examining the entire garden, no doubt ensuring that everything was as near perfect as it could be.

The children took the opportunity to retreat upstairs to Eddie's room to discuss their dilemma fully with Max. She took charge and applied order to their haphazard thoughts through deciding to make a written mind map of everything that they knew so far. They jotted down the word 'monster' on the centre of a large piece of paper and circled it. In turn they began to list the things they knew about the beast and began to add them to the mind map, linking them to the word, monster with drawn lines. Separate pieces of information were collected and jotted down until they had a list of words that seemed so random and yet so relevant all at the same time. Finally they were left with the words:

Flying

Leaping

Smelling

Poisonous

Brave

Angry

Deadly

Threatening

Large

Bottom shaped.

In addition there were also some words added that had question marks after them to indicate that these things must also be considered. They were:

Clawed feet?

Size?

Height?

Arms?

Legs?

Wings?

Lives?

Sightings?

How many?

Every word was connected to the word 'monster', and when they felt that there were no more words to add, they stood back from the page and began to consider their findings.

"I can honestly state for the record," said Max, with a hint of resignation in her voice. "That there is no beast, monster, ogre, phantom, spook or spectre that I am aware of that even remotely meets all these comments. To be honest, I'm not even sure that such a thing exists!"

She grabbed Eddies I-pad and began to trawl the internet for anything that could be a likely candidate for whatever entity it was that they were facing.

They spent the entire afternoon reading up on ghosts, trolls, goblins, vampires, werewolves, giants, zombies and Egyptian mummies but to name a few, all three of the children fell back and rubbed their eyes in weariness and exhaustion.

"It's getting late," puffed Max as she stifled a yawn, "and we're getting nowhere. The best thing we can do is call it a day and attack this in the morning with fresh eyes and minds." Larry and Eddie agreed and all arranged to meet at Larry's house the following morning after breakfast. No-one actually said anything out loud about their complete lack of success but the mood amongst them all was pretty grim.

Although it was not discussed, it definitely appeared that the adventure was over before it had even begun.