Keeping it Real Read Online Free PDF

Scared they’d be taken into care, Kelsey and his younger brothers did a runner. Weeks later, they were found living in a car. I was gutted for him. Kelsey would have made a brilliant Danny Zucco yet he never got a chance to show what he could do. All humans have problems obviously, including my mates, but we’d had it cushy compared to kids like Kelsey, I thought remembering.
    The school science block was in a new annexe along with the gym and computer labs. For reasons that probably makes sense to architects, the annexe was on the other side of the dual carriageway to the main school, connected by an ugly concrete bridge.
    You know those motorway cafe bridges that sway in high winds? Exactly the same, except it wasn’t glassed in, so it was permanently draughty. And even though it was a bridge, and obviously above ground, it always had that icky subway vibe. It didn’t help that the light bulbs were constantly being vandalised, so on winter afternoons, like this one, it was like walking down a long, windy and very nearly dark tunnel. I’d always hated walking over that bridge, but I didn’t hate it nearly so much as Helix did.
    “I’m getting a really disgusting vibe,” she announced unhappily when we were like, a third of the way across.
    “And you’re telling me this because?” I’d got it into my head that Helix was criticising my school, so of course I felt like I had to be Park Hall High School’s number one fan. But Helix was right. The vibe was hideous.
    All along the bridge someone had repeatedly daubed the same threatening message: YOU’RE GOING TO GET YOURS SHAY. In my day graffiti was usually nuked by the school cleaners the same day it appeared.
    I didn’t want to admit it, but I was increasingly freaked. It wasn’t just the vibes, it was the smell . Our science block was never exactly fragrant, but today the air was quite repulsively whiffy.
    “What’s that?” Helix asked abruptly. “I heard something.”
    “You’re doing my head in, Helix!” I snapped. “It’s the wind, OK?”
    “It’s something like footsteps,” she insisted. “And a weird whining.”
    “Just take a chill pill, will you! It’s probably one of the cleaning ladies singing!”
    “There it is again!” Helix said unnecessarily.
    This time I’d heard something too. I peered nervously into the dusky gloom at the end of the tunnel, and caught a tiny movement. At the same time I heard a stealthy pad-padding, so soft and furtive that all the tiny hairs stood to attention on the back of my neck.
    All at once I almost gagged. “Urgh!” I clamped my hand over my nose. “That is SO rank!”
    “We should get off this bridge,” Helix said urgently. “This is not a good place for angels.”
    “We can’t,” I gulped. “We haven’t checked the lab.”
    I felt my knees totally give way, like I’d been kicked from behind. Next minute I was grovelling on my hands and knees.
    I just exploded. “Are you mad!! Did you just trip me up?”
    “And I’d do it again if had to. I want you to look down NOW.”
    My inner angel seemed so frantic that I obeyed.
    Then l saw the horrible thing she’d been trying to warn me about and screamed.
     

Chapter Five
    M y face was inches from a pile of glistening supernatural turds.
    This is probably way too much information, but in the semi-twilight of the bridge, the pallid green Hell poo did actually seem to glow.
    For a moment I was hypnotised with horror.
    What if I’d touched it ?
    The thought made me want to beam home to Heaven and shower with rose-scented angel shower gel for like, a year.
    “This isn’t right,” I whispered. I suddenly unfroze, scrambling to my feet. If there was green hell poo, then there had to be hellhounds too!
    Omigosh, the kids! Humans very rarely register cosmic phenomena, but if a pack of hellhounds gatecrashed their rehearsal, it could still seriously damage their wellbeing.
    I hurtled back along the bridge.
    “Sorry I decked you, babe,” Helix