Sample

A part of the first chapter of Austin Jones and the Planet behind the Sun can be read below. I hope you enjoy it. :)

 1

The Men in Red

I had no other choice but to tell you my story. I'm
doing it in order to keep myself sane. Keeping secrets makes me feel bad and
since I have nobody to express all of my feelings to, I've decided to tell it to
you.  Hopefully, you'll understand me and
the things you're about to hear. I really wish people could feel the way I
felt, see the things I saw and live my past experiences so they could fully
understand what is like to be... well... you'll soon find out.

My name is Austin Jones (I was pretty sure about it)
and my story began on a sunny school day at Eton College, Berkshire. It was a
warm day with no clouds in the sky; it was perfect to take a walk. The classes
were over for the day and I had decided to lay against an old oak tree near the
school’s golf course to reflect on my life while the wind gently caressed my
pale face and blond hair. The time had come to make an important decision about
my future. I needed an answer to the most talked about question at school:

What are you going to study?

I was seventeen years old and instead of loving to be
surrounded by friends I preferred to be alone so my classmates could not ask me
that question. I just hated so much when they did. The ones who knew I didn’t
know what to do loved to bother me all the time. I had started hating school
for that fact. They didn't have my problem because they knew what they wanted
to do with their lives. They knew exactly what they wanted to become, what they
wanted to study after school, and even the university they were going to attend
next.

Sadly, I could not say that I had answers for those
questions. To be really honest, I had never thought about my life after
finishing my last year at Eton. I would like to blame my parents for it because
I was expected to get perfect grades; after all, what else could I guy like me
do in school? Nothing, from my parents’ perspective, nothing but to study hard
and get good grades, so I acted how they wanted me to behave.

I had lived my whole life with a single thought in my
head… getting good grades. I’ll say that I did a great job focusing on it
because I never got to think about what would come after Eton until the end was
literally around the corner. The emotional shock after realizing that there was
so much more in life other than getting A+ 
all the time hit me so hard that my head had blocked itself and became
something like a blank space.

Jason Ash (my best friend back then) wanted to become
a doctor. I knew he was going to achieve it because he was a really good
student and a very intelligent person. Jason Martin on the other hand, wanted
to become a doctor as well but he was more like a party person without the good
grades that my friend Jason Ash had. The point is that in spite of their
situations they knew without a doubt what they were going to do. They had a
goal, they were being guided in the right direction and they were happy about
it. But I was not in their situation. I was in a complete state of despair
while my friends were having the time of their lives enjoying the last month of
school. Yes, you heard right; the last month of school.

That was my situation. That was the big deal I thought
about all the time, day in and day out. That was the issue that I simply
couldn’t get out of my head. I was unable to think clearly and feared that I
would not be able to make a choice. But the truth is that I had a secret, a
secret so secret and private that I have never confessed it to anyone. Nobody
in the entire universe knew it except me, his jealous creator. My secret was
that I did know what I wanted to do for the rest of my life. I did know what I
liked. I did know what made my juices flow. I wanted to become a
singer-songwriter, make amazing music and tour the entire world.

If I had told my friends about it their heads would have
blown up. “A singer? Seriously? No way!” I’d imagine them say. I was the shyest
guy in the entire school and the less likely to choose such career that demands
to have an incredible outgoing personality. But my friends and classmates’
possible reaction to my secret was a minor concern in my head because a much
bigger obstacle laid on my way… my parents.

I was more than convinced that they would never agree
to support me if I decided to enter the music industry. Songwriting, music and
travel were not what my parents were expecting to hear. Not that I knew it
because I had told them about my secret (I wasn’t that dumb to have my dreams
killed by mom’s evil look) but because I knew already what my parents wanted
for me.

I knew that my mom, Lilian, wanted me to follow my
father’s footsteps. She wanted me to become a teacher, just like my father,
Albert. He was the chancellor at Oxford University but before he became the
chancellor he was the English Language and Literature teacher. He had always
had a passion for books, but my mom had a very different opinion about my
father's liking. Books were an obsession, an insane and out of control
obsession that had no cure. Books were responsible for much of my mom's
madness. She hated all of my father's books. She hated them with all of her
being. I couldn't do anything about it, of course. I just couldn't tell my mom
to not get angry because it was simply not going to work.

My parent’s house, which was is west London, was full
with books. There were books everywhere. Not really, there were only books in
the library (which was huge) but in my mom’s head books had taken over the
house. That's probably why I started liking them since I was a kid. Instead of
playing with toys, I devoured most of my father’s books. It was really
fascinating for me to discover the world through the books’ pages. I have to
admit it, images were my favorite part about books; pictures of amazing places,
beautiful buildings and exotic animals. I learned most I can remember thanks to
the books my father had at home. I even had my little collection of books about
my favorite subjects when I was a kid (Architecture, Biology and Paleontology)
and didn't like anybody to touch them. They were sacred and I was really
obsessed about them too. What a surprised, right?

I was at a crossroads, caught right in the middle,
trying to decide whether I should do what my parents wanted me to do or if I
should try to find my happiness somewhere else. Glastonbury sounded like a
better option than Oxford but I doubted my parents thought the same. I
certainly didn’t want to damage my relationship with my parents, but I also
didn’t want to do something that I knew wasn’t meant to be for me and regret it
for the rest of my life.

It was hard to understand, even for me. I… Austin…
singer? I didn’t know where it had come from but I knew music was simply the
answer. I knew in my heart that it was what I wanted to do. I wanted to write
songs and let my heart out.

Sometimes, my friends would ask me "What are the
things you like?" in hopes of helping me find my perfect career. It seemed
as if they wanted to get the credit for it. I'd reply with the same lie every
time: "I don't know". I didn't like my friends to know about the
things I liked. I'd never been an outgoing guy and preferred to keep my things
to myself. I was the weird guy in my class. In fact, I had always been the
weird one in every grade of my life. Being treated in a different way by my
classmates made me confirm what I had felt since I was a little kid; that I was
different than the rest of the people out there and that my family was
different than the other families. I was probably crazy but my feelings were
real and they were telling me something that I couldn’t fully comprehend.

"Hey Austin," said Jason Ash while
approaching the tree that I was leaning on sounding relieved that he had found
me at last (I was good at hiding). "There you are. I was looking for you.
Come on, let’s go to the house."

I kept silent for a moment. I didn’t want to get back
to the house. Jason put his notebooks and folders on the ground (backpacks are
not part of the official uniform of an Etonian) and made me company by sitting
next to me.

“Come on, Austin,” said Jason. “You don’t have to be
like this anymore. Forget about it.”

“I can’t,” I said seriously. “I can’t”

“I don’t know what to do to make you feel better,” he
mumbled. “I don’t want you to be like this. You always seem so serious. I still
can't believe you don't know what you are going to study."

"I know," I lied followed by a sigh.
"Trust me. I am the one who wants this crisis over once and for all. But I
just can't decide for a particular career. I truly have no idea what I am going
to do and what I will tell my parents.”

"But you have to," He said firmly.
"Keep in mind that we only have this month of school left and you'll soon
have to come up with something. You have waited long enough, Austin. Come on.
Get up. Let’s go to the house. I want my lunch.”

I was so stressed out that I decided to get a
chocolate out of my suit pocket to distract my mind from the subject. I ate
when stressed out and walked in circles when thinking in my room. My crisis was
getting bigger and bigger in my head, bigger and bigger every day. I was going
through a genuine hell and the worst part was that I didn't have anybody I
trusted enough to talk about my feelings. I didn’t want to share my personal
issues with our headmaster or with the dame, which was the only female figure
at the house. I even didn’t talk about my problems with my own parents and my
best friend, forget everyone else.

“I noticed you were distracted back in class,” said
Jason really concerned as we got up, took our things from the floor and started
walking back to the house.

“I know,” I said still thinking about my worries. I'd
been lost in my own thoughts instead of paying attention. Not good because I
had to study harder than ever before in order for my tests results to be the
highest possible. Oxford was waiting for me but not as much as my parents were
(specially my father). Their son going to Oxford… it couldn't be more perfect
than that!

I was getting crazy in the meantime. My head couldn't
handle stress anymore, and all the tests were getting me really stressed out
beyond my normal limit. I wanted to quit and leave school to never return. I
couldn't do that, obviously, because I had to study at least until I was 18
years old.

Even though it was a beautiful day in Eton, I was so
immersed in my thoughts to actually enjoy it. We lived at the Manor House which
was right next to the school’s library. Walking helped me remember what my mom
had told me a couple of times. She would tell me that even though I would see
my problems as being big they were small compared to other people's problems so
I shouldn't worry about them that much. She wasn't with me at that moment but I
doubt that it could have helped me to not feel depressed.

I wished I could have been able to stop thinking. But
I couldn't. I was sick and tired of having to deal with that issue. Nothing but
confusion was coming to my head and the time for me to choose was getting
closer with every passing day.

"I hope you find what you are looking for,"
said Jason walking by my side across the lively Eton streets full with teachers
and students in their well-known uniforms sporting black tailcoats and big
smiles on their faces that made me remember how miserable I was.

“I’m afraid that if I make I decision, I will make the
wrong one,” I confessed after I had finished eating my delicious chocolate. “I
would like if somebody could tell me what I am destined to do, so I don’t have
to waste my time and energy trying to figure it out myself.”

"What?" said Jason looking at me as if I had
lost my mind. He was definitely surprised by what I had just said. A guy like
me could certainly have said something smarter than that.

I wasn’t a confident guy though. I had doubts about
everything I did. Perfection was always out of my reach and was tired of trying
to find the answer that eluded me day after day.

There it was across the street, in the corner of High
Street and Common Lane, the school’s library with its magnificent gray dome and
superb ornamentation in the middle of town. And right next to it, the Manor
House, the four-story building that I had been calling home for all of my
school years at Eton.

I didn’t understand the reason why my parents had
decided that the best for me was to attend a boarding school. My father had a
job, yes, an important one, but not my mom. She stayed at home all the time and
I wondered what she did there. My two younger brothers, Ronald, 16, and
Maurice, 8, were already attending school. Ronald was at Eton, like me, and
Maurice was attending a smaller boarding school in Surrey. He was however going
to be transferred to Eton the moment he moment he turned 14. I doubted my mom
cleaned the house because my brothers and I weren’t there to make a mess. My
mom liked cleanliness and I’m sure the house was kept in perfect condition all
the time. I really wanted to know what my mom did while my father, my brothers
and I were not home. It was another mystery I wanted to solve.

Jason and I crossed High Street and approached home.
Common Lane looked as normal as usual, with a couple of very tall trees in its
vicinity and surrounded by red brick buildings. As I was about to turn towards
the house entrance, I managed to notice a man dressed all in red clothes walk
away towards the end of the street and lost sight of him when he turn right
(Common Lane wasn’t a straight street, it was 
like a snake moving across town). I paid no special attention to the way
the man was dressed, but in a town where everyone wore black uniforms it was
hard to ignore anyone dressing differently.

When the man got out of my sight I made my entrance to
the house. Jason was waiting for me and he seemed excited about what we would
eat... pizza… again. I wasn’t feeling like eating tons of fat and I didn’t like
meat on the pizza anyway, so I left the dining room heading to my dormitory.

Jason knew when I didn’t want to be interrogated by
the rest of our housemates so he followed me as I went up the stairs to my
room, which was nothing more than another place where I could get bored and
stress out. Boarding school life hadn’t been easy for me.

As I was about to open my dorm’s door, Jason
approached me and asked sounding worried if I’d planned to stay in my room for
the rest of the day.

“No,” I said trying to sound as if Jason had not
guessed my thoughts that time.

“Really?” He asked unconvinced by my response.

“Yes. I actually have plans for the evening,” I said
with pride. “I want to take a peaceful walk around Windsor. I should stay and
study but I think a walk will make me a greater good now.”

“Can I go with you?” he asked.

“Of course, Jason. Just bring your best coat. It might
get chill.”

"Ok, just let me finish my pizza," He said taking
a few steps backwards hoping the other housemates hadn’t eaten his part of the
pizza. “I won’t take long.”

"Hurry,” I said with a faked laugh so he could
just go and let me in my room.

Jason went down the stairs screaming they better
hadn’t touched his loved pizza. I got into my room which was on the top floor
and hoped it wouldn’t rain that day. The weather had been weird that lately.

I had decorated the walls of my room with pictures of
beautiful places around the world like the Eiffel Tower, the Taj Mahal and
Angkor Wat. The truth is that in spite of my family having the means to go on
vacation around the world, we had never been out of the United Kingdom. I had
no idea what was the reason behind it. Even when I could have gone to other
countries to play for my school soccer team, my parents always stepped in and
forbade me to go. I didn’t like soccer that much and the only reason why I had
decided to become part of the team was to get to travel abroad but my strategy
didn’t work. The farthest I had been from home was Edinburgh and I really
wanted to visit many places. I had as well pictures of Marilyn Monroe, Princess
Diana and Kurt Cobain hanging around the walls. They were my company and I
liked them because they didn’t judge me (God, I was really crazy). I kept my
laptop on my desk under a world map which had pins indicating the places I
desired to visit (Imagine the map full with pins).

“I’m going to visit Windsor, Diana,” I said sadly as I
put my school papers on my bed. “I hope I can find something nice for my room
in London.”

I wished so much I could add some excitement to my
life. I felt like a prisoner in Eton and all I wanted was to escape and be free
to do whatever I wanted. I am not saying that going to school was bad, of
course not, what I mean is that I craved to explore the world and have fun. I
wanted to discover the things that gave me happiness and find my own paradise
here on Earth.

Someone knocked at the door.

"Is that you Jason?" I said hoping it was
Jason and not someone else who had heard me talk with my posters.

"Yeah, Austin. It's me."

Relieved, I grabbed by favorite black coat and left my
neatly organized room.

"Where do you want to go first?" Said Jason
wearing a thick gray sweater and holding a piece of pizza that he enjoyed as if
it was the last one in the whole world.

"Where the wind takes us." I replied
confidently walking across the hall towards the stairs.

We got out of the Manor House, which was empty; all of
our housemates had left home and a strange silence had taken over the place. As
we walked along the School Library I noticed that the day had definitely gotten
colder. I could feel the chilling air on my cheeks and gray clouds had appeared
in the once clear sky all of a sudden. High Street wasn’t as crowded and noisy
as usual. It seemed as if most of the people had left town. The stores along it
were lonely and silent; no customers to be seen.

“Strange,” I said while looking around waiting for Jason
to tell me if I didn’t know about an event or something that was going to be
attended by everyone. He said nothing; he was busy finishing his pizza.

We got to the bridge at the end of the street that
connected Eton to Windsor. We admired the mighty Windsor Castle on the other
side of the River Thames which was flowing as calmed as usual.  The largest inhabited castle in the world,
with its superb architecture and powerful looking Round Tower looked as
commanding and strong as it have been for centuries.

An odd chill in the air (I don’t know what it was)
gave me the impression that there was something peculiar going on. Since I had
gotten used to the changing weather, I stopped paying attention to the
atmosphere in the city and right after Jason and I crossed the bridge I turned
my attention to finding a cool souvenir to add to my collection in London.

It seemed as if everyone had all of a sudden decided
to visit Windsor because we immediately noticed that the town was crowded with
locals and visitors having a nice afternoon.

“This is not what I was expecting,” I said a bit angry
because I had planned a nice and silent walk around a peaceful town and not a
touristic landmark overflowing with people.

The streets were really crowded. There were people
buying food, clothes and souvenirs and tourists taking pictures of everything
and everyone. The streets next to the castle were not ideal to meditate about
my life. There was too much noise and too many people. We visited a couple of
shops but I didn’t find something good enough for me to buy so we walked away
from the center of town right after Jason got himself some chips.

"Let's go to the Long Walk," I said hoping
there weren’t any people there. "I think it’s more peaceful and quiet than
here."

"Whatever you want," said Jason ignoring me
to pay attention to his recently bought potato chips.

We passed by the Cambridge Gate (one of Windsor
Castle’s gates) and entered the Long Walk, a more than two miles long tree
lined straight road that runs from the gate to the equestrian statue of King
George III known as the Copper Horse up on a hill. It was just what I was
looking for... a very, very, very long walk to clear my mind. It was empty to
my surprise; not a single person was walking along it.

"We aren't going to walk all the way to the top,
aren't we?" Said Jason expecting me to turn around and get back to Eton.

"I have nothing else to do," I said.
"I'm going all the way to the top of Snow Hill."

“Austin, no,” cried Jason rolling his eyes at me.
“That's really far away. Do you really want to get there and then walk all the
way back to Eton? It's going to get late.”

"I don't mind,” I said as I started walking. “You
can go back if you want. I won't force you to do anything you don't want.”

"It's fine," said Jason keeping up with me.
"I'll go with you. I haven't been in the Copper Horse before and I doubt I
will visit it once we're out of Eton. Have you thought about... you know
what?"

I was looking down to the floor while walking to the
Copper Horse. I had something but didn't know what it was because I wasn't
feeling anything. It wasn't sadness. It wasn't depression. I felt nothing in
me. No emotions at all. Probably just worry but I was so used to it that I can
say I didn’t feel it anymore.

"I haven't," I said with my usual sad tone.

Jason was a good friend but he couldn't do anything to
end my suffering. I was the one responsible to find the answer to my prayers.
Happiness was after all a decision I had to take on my own.

"I just know that I have to get out of here and
go somewhere else," I said looking up to the sky. "I want to leave
this place and find my happiness, but I don't know what exactly I should do or
where I should go."

"I knew I was going to become a doctor since I
was a little kid," said Jason really confident and happy about it.

"Please... don't make me feel worse."

"Ooops... sorry."

I saw the short green grass on both sides of the
avenue and felt like lying down on the grass, look at the sky, close my eyes,
listen to the birds and stay like that until the answer to my problems decided
to show up in my head. Sadly, that was not going to happen.

I really needed peace and a quiet place where to
think, but even when I had found it I could only think of my inability to make
a decision and would simply start thinking about my classmates lives and how
happy they were with all their friends. They all seemed to get along with each
other really well and all that made me fall into a deeper sense of
dissatisfaction. I felt disconnected to the rest of the world. I really thought
my place was probably somewhere else in the vast galaxy, but that could simply
not be true, right?

"I beg you for an apology, Jason," I said
looking at him with a sad face.

"Why do you say that? You have nothing to
apologize for."

"It's just that I don't think I'm a good friend.
I wish I could be more like the other guys."

"Crazy?" He said.

"Not that crazy," I replied. "I'm
crazy. They are crazy fun. I wish I could have some of it. They all look so
happy."

"You're good, Austin. You're just confused.
That's all. No big deal. You'll find what your heart is looking for someday.
Trust me."

"Thanks, Jason. I really hope that as well. I
really hope that."

A deer herd crossed the avenue. They were right in
front of us. A baby deer appeared and made me smile for the first time since...
since... I don't know since when but it’d made me smile which had been
something good for me. Jason and I were just looking at them and how they were
in tune with nature. I liked animals. I've always liked animals but didn’t have
pets at home because my mom didn’t like them and I didn’t want to become a
biologist because I had a very sensitive nose.

"I wish I could talk to them," I said with
the same depressed tone.

"Do you want to talk to the deer?” exclaimed
Jason shocked for what I had just said.

"I would like to ask them what they think of
life. I think it'll be interesting."

Jason was silent. He was probably seeing that weird
side of me for the first time and he definitely didn't want to find out what
other crazy stuff I could start saying or doing. He took another bag of chips
out of his sweater pockets, opened it and started eating them. I had meant
every word I had said to him; it wasn’t his fault if he thought that I was
crazy. We are all different and I was simply going through an emotional hard
time.

I don't know what was wrong with me. I was just a
normal guy going to a nice school, but I was unhappy. But why? I really wanted
to know why. I was really confused and wished more than anything else to not be
like that anymore.

A tall man wearing a red coat, red pants, a red hat
and black sunglasses was coming our way from Snow Hill. He was in his way back
to wherever he had to go next. I didn't look at him. I was lost in my own
thoughts and was pretty sure that he was the same person I had seen earlier
that day. I just saw him passed by our side and his peculiar choice of color
didn’t disturb me at all. I could have had an opinion about wearing sunglasses
during a cloudy day but he was certainly free to do whatever he wished.

We were getting closer to Snow Hill; the place was
empty. The man in red, Jason and I were the only people there. I could say that
it was a perfect walk except by the fact that I could hear Jason chew his
chips. It was really annoying.

"Austin..." whispered Jason after a while.
“Austin..."

"What?" I replied a bit angry.

"That man… he was looking at us," he
whispered with an even lower voice tone.

I stopped walking and turned around. The man in red
was walking normally back to Windsor Castle. He was as busy walking as we were
and didn’t seem a bit interested on us.

"Why do you say that?" I asked Jason.

"Well... he was looking at us but right after I
looked back he turned and continued walking. Why is he wearing only red
clothes?"

"Let him be, Jason. Who cares about him? Not me.
He might just be tourist; I saw him today when we had gotten back from the golf
course."

“What?” said Jason surprised that I had not tell him
about him. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Well, because he’s just a man. It doesn’t matter.”

We got to the end of the Long Walk. It was time to go
up Snow Hill to get to the Copper Horse.

"Damn, Austin," exclaimed Jason looking back
at the castle. "Eton is really far away. I definitely don't like walking
this much."

"We have all the evening to return. What's the
hurry? I told you to go back but you're now going to stick with me until the end."

We went up Snow Hill and reached the Copper House at
last. I walked around it to enjoy the views from such a beautiful vantage
point.

"Look, Austin! I can see Wembley!” said Jason
excited.

"I can see the skyscrapers of London,” I said
wishing I could soon be there.

"Let me see!" he exclaimed.

"I like the castle," I added.

After a couple of minutes enjoying the panoramic views
from up there a cold wind made us shiver and we agreed that it was time to go
back to Eton. We came down Snow Hill and were able to admire Windsor Castle as
we slowly approached it. I loved castles, palaces and royalty. I loved
architecture in general but didn’t want to become an architect because I didn’t
like math.

"He's gone," said Jason.

"Who's gone?" I asked.

"The man in red," said Jason lowering his
voice as if he didn't want the man to hear his words from wherever place he
could have been hiding.

"Forget that, Jason. Enjoy the walk."

"I'm trying but I..."

I was admiring the castle while Jason was looking
around to every direction to make sure that nobody was after us.

"What are you doing, Jason? Are you worried that
the evil baby deer could come and get you?"

~

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