Tom's Secret

A story I started a while back that needs continuing, I think!
 

Tom was in the kitchen. On tiptoes with hands resting on the sink he was just able to see out into the garden. Or at least he could see out if it wasn’t pouring with rain. He sighed a great big sigh and looked round to see if anyone had noticed. Manda, his younger sister, was sitting at the table completely covered in plastic bags, not her head and face of course, painting with her hands, nose and even her tongue. Mum was stirring some soup, tomato, he hated tomato. Why couldn’t it be a fish finger sandwich with loads of brown sauce for lunch? His mouth watered at the very thought. He gave an even louder sigh.

‘Tom,’ his mother had at last stopped stirring, and talking to his Aunt Lucy on the phone, ‘Tom, why don’t you go and read a book, or there’s that game you started?’ she looked at him hopefully.

‘I hate school holidays,’ he moaned ‘there’s never anything to do. And it’s raining again.’

‘Come and help your sister then.’

‘I don’t want to play with girls!’

‘I don’t want a boy to help me.’ Manda looked up, her face a lovely shade of purple. Tom’s mother picked up the dish cloth and advanced on her daughter.

Manda was struggling and squirming, trying to get away from the water. ‘Anyone would think she’d got rabies.’ Tom thought. He’d recently seen a nature programme about vampire bats and that had been one of the symptoms of the disease. Suddenly he had a brilliant idea. His mother’s attention was almost completely on Manda so she wouldn’t notice.

‘I’m going to get my box of trains from the shed. They need sorting out. Is that OK mum?’ The purple paint seemed now to have transferred itself to the chair legs and to his mother’s nose and she hardly heard him.

‘What a good idea. But don’t go touching any of your father’s things.’

The shed was Tom’s favourite place. Dad kept all his tools there, but the sharp ones were locked away and kept on a high shelf. Sometimes dad let him hammer nails into bits of wood, but only when he was there. One shelf had loads and loads of boxes, each one with a label so dad could find whatever he needed.

 Mum kept things in there that she didn’t want to throw away; she said they might come in useful one day. There was a big old trunk and that had really old clothes in it. Some of them had even belonged to his granny and she was really, really old. She was so old she even had whiskers growing out of her chin. He smiled when he thought about his gran. If she’d been here today she would have played a game with him and then told him one of her great stories. She was even better at telling stories than his teacher Mrs Clarke.

He took out one of the hats; it was covered in flowers and feathers, and tried it on. It reached down to his nose and for a moment everything in the shed went black. So black that he didn’t notice a pair of bright green eyes staring at him. They were in the darkest, deepest corner of the shed and seemed to have absorbed every bit of light there was.

He pushed the hat to the back of his head, the eyes disappearing as he did so, and began looking for his box of trains. Moving boxes his attention was taken by a pair of drum sticks. One of his mother’s ‘keeps’ he realised as he looked for the drums. None were found so he began to tap his father’s tins and boxes. ‘I’m going to ask for a set of drums for my birthday. If I practice I could be really good. I might be famous one day.’ He was so taken up with the noise he was making that he failed to notice the low, sly chuckle that came from the deepest, darkest corner of the shed.

Remembering his quest, ‘Maybe I could be an explorer or a discoverer of things. I might even find something really valuable like a big lump of gold or a giant diamond.’ This was the thought he had as he discovered a box full of sparkly beads, another useful save by his mother. But not in the corner of the shed that was deepest and darkest.

Beginning to get bored and hungry, and even tomato soup sounded inviting, he speeded up his search and began to approach the deepest, darkest corner. It seemed darker and deeper than ever before. He spotted the box he wanted and was about to lift it out when he heard a soft, gentle cough. Staring hard and trying to discover where the sound had come from he became aware of two eyes staring at him from the darkness. Eyes like this he had never seen before, there were bright lights twinkling in their depths and for a moment he could see himself and the whole shed reflected.

‘Hello Tom. I’ve been waiting so long to meet you!’

The voice was pleasant with a sort of gravelly sound you get when walking on pebbles. Tom didn’t feel frightened. This was dad’s shed and he wouldn’t let anything dangerous live there.

He tried to make out to whom or what the eyes belonged but that corner was getting darker by the second.

‘What’s your name? Tom asked.

‘I’m Samoth,’ it replied ‘and I’d like to be your friend.’

Now Tom knew that he should never talk to strangers but then a stranger wouldn’t live in dad’s shed would it?

‘Tom, Tom! What are you doing? Come on lunch is ready.’

Looking back at the deep, dark corner Tom could see the eyes and a finger resting over brown lips with a shushing sound coming from between them.

‘Our secret,’ Samoth said. ‘Adults wouldn’t understand.’

Tom nodded as he went towards the door, ‘Will I see you again?’

‘Tom! Do you want me to come and fetch you?’

The bright, green eyes sparkled from the deep, dark corner and Tom felt a thrill of excitement.