Untitled IV

Captain Billy Byron looked out across the cool, clear water. The sun was falling through the clouds as another day was near its end. He smiled; it had been another adventurous but satisfying day. Gilbert, Billy's trusted parrot, hopped along the wheel of the towering ship, jumped onto Billy's shoulder and slowly nodded off into a deep sleep. Billy stood up, his cloak rippled in the light wind, the gold around his neck clanked and clinked as he picked up his silvery sword, and his wooden leg thumped, thumped across the slippery deck. It was time for him to retreat to his sleeping quarters; Billy knew he had a big day ahead to prepare for. After all, every pirate needs his beauty sleep.

It had been eight months since the accident and Billy was a shadow of his former self. He spent his days cooped up in the small bedroom of his mum's terraced house. He hadn't been to school or spoke to his friends for just under a year. It was 9.04am, Billy's alarm was humming to the sound of the local radio station, and he was ignoring it. He was hiding underneath his duvet and cursing to himself, he hated the morning. He hated waking up and remembering what had happened to him.

He could hear his mum downstairs preparing breakfast and moving from room to room, picking up magazines and polishing dirty surfaces. She had tried to tempt Billy from his room with freshly baked double chocolate chip cookies, extra creamy porridge with sticky honey and homemade cheeseburgers with the curliest of curly fries, but nothing had worked. He wanted to be alone.