Journey

Journey - Chapter 1

 

Chapter 1

Peter Hale and Amy Thomas lived together in a small flat, in north Hereford, its grey exterior was an eye sore to passer's by, black guttering lay cracked from the side walls of the roof and broken doors stood openly as if abandoned. A misused playground, meant for the children in the area, was now usually occupied by teenagers, some older than others.  Peter and Amy would usually keep to themselves, except acknowledging a few neighbours that they spoke to from time to time. They had been planning to move as soon as they both had saved up enough, but she was pregnant now, so she wanted to get away as soon as possible so that her son or daughter would be brought up in a  decent world.

"Peter...are you listening to me? See, this place looks just perfect for us three. Oh...our little girl is kicking again! Peter, come quick!" Amy was a twenty-four year old woman, medium length blonde hair, blue eyes, a bit of a hippie some would say. She shouted ever so excitably across to the next room, this was the third time for the baby to kick, nearly always  she would feel anxious about the day that she would have to give birth; mothers' stories of the excruciating ordeal that awaited frightened her somewhat,  but most of what she felt inside was being complete, after spending her life of dreaming to have a little girl, it was now going to happen for real, they sat quietly with one another until the ringing phone resonated throughout the room, Peter jumped up quickly before it had time to finish, it was most likely work, or the doctors.

"Hello, Peter here."

"Hi mate, Ron here from work, can you come in as soon as possible, Jen's pulled another sickie." a quick sigh escaped his breath afterwards.

"Okay...will be there as quick as I can then." He glanced over to Amy who had now drifted off to sleep; she hadn't been getting much recently with all the new baby stress. Peter quickly jotted a note down and left it beside her, telling her he loved her with all his heart and that he was sorry he had to go to work.

The street was busy with gangs, large groups of rebellious, hooded teenagers stood around lazily, girls; not even at the age of maturity pushing their father-less children in cheap prams, it wasn't the friendliest place to live. Only a few more minutes down the street you would come to a group of shops, just the typical one-stop-shop, a small hairdressers, and yet, another newsagents. This area in the city of Herefordshire was not for the elitists', it consisted of people with low moral value, families with young children, the benefit thieves made their mark on the map here. However, things were not all that grim, only would you find on the other side of the river a select number of areas of houses and people that were the middle class, this was an area of Hereford that Peter and Amy would have wanted to live, they still yet had the opportunity to do so. They had wanted to wait for the baby to come first, so that would give them the chance then to save up more money, hopefully then having a grander chance of finding a better place to live. Both of them wanted to live in an area that would be safer for their child as he or she would be growing up, a better area that had a primary school that would educate children to come out into the world showing better grades.

Now, to discuss the more exclusive side, the land of snobs. They tend to mostly live among the middle class people; probably only to blend in and make a simple, yet blindingly obvious  disguise for themselves. They would never really make a fuss of their whereabouts, however they clearly made themselves oblivious to outsiders with flash cars and debonair appearances.

Peter had just made his way to work, he worked at The Reader's Retreat, only a fair few minutes away. Even after five years, he still hadn't yet been promoted, the man in charge of this quiet, little book shop was Matthew Smith. "Thanks for coming in mate, not sure what I'm gonna do with Jen." He never felt like a manager to Peter, he wouldn't dictate to the employees what they should and shouldn't do, he mostly left them to go about their business, he trusted Pete to run the shop as he wanted it. They had introduced a small area on the shop floor to start serving fresh coffee and pastries for the customers who liked to sit and read in a relax, it was a chance to get away from all the chained ones in town. They were making more profit than ever before now, it was Peter's idea at first, and once they had had their monthly meeting in the upstairs office, he decide to mention that it was something that they should introduce to make more profit.