The Super Enrichment Programme

We think we've found a way to stop Emma

I showed him the photos and drawings of the day we designed our super-hero costumes and tried to make them out of stuff we found around my house.

Mine was supposed to be a bubble-gum pink leotard with gold ¾ length leggings and matching elbow length gloves. I even drew on a gold belt with ‘Gem Gem Hinstood’ written along the front.

In the photo however I was wearing a black leotard with white leggings and a pink hat. I hadn’t had the right clothes to actually make my dream costume.

Emma had drawn herself wearing a lilac tutu skirt over a blue leotard. She’d even drawn tiny logos of her name all over the top of the leotard.

I remember that she’s always loved designing clothes, she still does but this was the first outfit she ever designed.

I flicked through the book until I found the page about kid-napping people. We’d done this bit of research at Emma’s house. She has a sister who is 4 years younger than us, who we ‘Kid-napped’ on that day. We locked her in the shed for half an hour until her parents started looking for her.

The next day, after our super hero themed sleepover, we told Emma’s parents that she was going to play with us before locking her inside the shed, alongside us, for the second time.

This time no one looked for us because they thought we were all safe and being normal kids.

I continued to stare at the page long after I’d finished reading until my eyes began to blur with tears.

I brought my hand up to my face to catch the tears before they ruined the perfect pages of my Hero Journal. I felt Hale put his hand around my shoulder as I cried as quietly as possible.

When I quietened down I heard Hale whisper: ‘What’s up Midget Gem?’

‘She’s making most of my best memories into things I don’t want to remember,’ I muttered, a small smile breaking through the tears when he called me Midget Gem.

‘Well how about this: We call Nolan to come round and show him all this and try to figure out what pages she’s already used…’ He trailed off as I grabbed my phone, already dialling Nolan’s number.

‘So we know how she’ll get around the rules next time,’ I finished as I waited for Nolan to answer his phone.

‘H-hello?’ A sleepy voice asked from the other end of the line.

‘Nolan this is no time to be sleeping!’ I scolded, ‘Come to my house now, we think we’ve found a way to stop Emma,’

‘Okay…’ he muttered confusedly before I hung up the phone. I hurriedly grabbed a navy playsuit from my wardrobe and ran to the bathroom to get changed.

‘Why’d you change?’ Hale asked when I came rushing back into my room.

‘Coz I wasn’t planning on anyone seeing me in depression mode,’ I whisper as I tidy my room in record time.

‘But I’m here…’ He muttered, staring down into his lap, ‘Am I no one?’

I stopped dead when he said that. I couldn’t quite put my finger on the emotion he was feeling. I turned around slowly to face him, putting my hands on his arms.

‘No Hale, I don’t know what I’d do without you, but I didn’t care when you saw me like that coz you came round to cheer me up….’ I explained and he nodded but I got the feeling he was hurting for some reason I didn’t know.

I pulled him up from the floor and down the stairs to the kitchen to wait for Nolan.

I rummaged through the cupboards and pulled out a bag of Doritos. I poured some into a bowl and pulled a salsa dip from the fridge.

I placed them on the kitchen table in front of Hale, who absent-mindedly took a chip and dipped it before shoving it into his mouth.

I started to talk to him, before realising that he wasn’t paying any attention because he was reading my Hero Journal.

‘Good book?’ I asked, leaning on my hands looking at him from across the table.

He looked up slowly, his eyes looking worried until they picked out my teasing smile.

‘It’s a strange feeling reading this…’ He started, his smile falling from his face.

I frowned as I watched him turn the page, I hope the book hasn’t made him think different of me.

‘It’s like I’m meeting the young you after knowing the old you, it’s a strange feeling…’ He trailed off as I stuck my hands on my hips.

‘Excuse me young man but I am definitely not old,’ I mock scolded which earned me a few Doritos chucked in my direction.

‘How mature…’ I mocked, sticking my tongue out at him like a 6 year old.

I watched as Hale quietly walked to the sink and filled a glass with water, a mischievous glint in his eyes.

‘Oh you wouldn’t dare…’ I warned, slowly standing up and backing away from him.

‘Oh but I would,’ He whispered as he started to chase me around the kitchen.

‘HALE!...’ I squealed as he slopped half of the glass onto the floor. ‘AAAAAAAHHHHHHH!’ I yelled when he chucked the water across the kitchen table and right over my head.

I stopped and smiled, as I turned to Hale and innocently asked, ‘Can I have a hug?’

And just like that I was chasing him around the kitchen until the doorbell rang.

Hale stopped running when he heard the doorbell, which gave me enough time to give him a huge hug and wipe most of the water he’d thrown over me onto his shirt.

‘Get the door Hale,’ I called as I ran upstairs to change for the 3rd time that afternoon. This time I pulled on a cream lace skirt and a burgundy floral blouse.

When I returned to the kitchen Nolan and Hale were bent over the table in deep conversation.

‘What’re you two up to?’ I asked as I took a seat across from them.

‘Hale’s showing me your Hero Journal,’ Nolan muttered, lifting his eyes from the book for a couple of seconds.

‘We both had one…’ I said to try and fill him in on what Hale and I had already discussed.

‘I guessed seeing as inside the front cover you wrote ‘Copy 1 of 2. 2nd copy is property of Emma Marland,’ Nolan said as he turned the page.