Excerpt
Jake Schofield lay on his bed looking up at the darkened ceiling that hung above his head. He looked over at the luminescent dial on his alarm clock that sits on his nightstand. 4:33 a.m. Jake had now been staring at the same darkened ceiling for about six and one half hours. For when that alarm clock goes off at 7:00 a.m., Jake would be beginning his new life.
Jake’s parents had bought the spot of land that his new house sits on a mere two months ago. At that time, this ‘spot of land’ was the only vacant lot left on the main road in the little commu-nity of Mt. Lookout. His parents were in a hurry to move. They wanted a new house in a hurry, but they did not want to settle for any cheap housing like a trailer or doublewide.
“Those are for people with less money than us,” his dad, Carl, had told him when they were on the modular home lot. “No son, we can buy one of these normal looking homes that the salesman says can be built from start to finish in about a month and a half. That way, if we have to move again, it won’t be at a great loss.”
Jake looked at the one and two story model homes around him and did not think that what his dad had just told him would be possible.
Jake turned into a believer over the next several weeks.
A little, less than two months after Jake and his family stood on that model home site, his fa-ther received the keys to their complete home. Even though it had taken just a short time to build it, his parents thought that the house looked incredible. Jake did not have an opinion of his new home.
Jake looked at his alarm clock for what must have been the one hundredth time this night: 4:47. The reason that Jake was restless on this particular night was because he would have his first day of school at his new high school and he was very nervous.
Jake and his mom and dad, Cherie and Carl, went up to the Nicholas County high school one week ago to enroll Jake in school. He met the Principal, Mrs. Penninger, and the football coach, Coach Dunlap, on that day.
It was a one-story brown brick school just off the main road. It seemed like a nice little school. It was a smaller school than Jake was used to attending in a few of the larger cities that he lived in. He had attended some very large schools in the past.
Coach Dunlap seemed excited about Jake attending class at Nicholas County High School due to the fact that Jake started at defensive back for the couple of months of football that he played at this previous school, and he would be able to join the football team and help out right away. The school was small, and had a small budget to go with it, therefore Coach Dunlap not only was the head football coach, he was also the Vice-Principal, and he taught a History class during the mornings. He was a very busy man, and his manic personality reflected on that.
Mrs. Penninger was not as excited to have Jake attending her school. She came from the old school style of teaching and disciplining. If she had her say, would require all students to wear drab, gray, depressing uniforms, and would allow teachers do discipline their students with the sharp rap of a yardstick. She was also concerned about what brought the Schofield family to Nicholas County, but there was not any legal reason as to why she could not admit Jake to her school.
He looked over at the clock one last time. 5:01 a.m. He supposed that he would try to close his eyes for a few hours, so with any luck he could get an hour of sleep before the dreaded alarm went off.