THE WOODEN SWORDS CHAPTER 7. - WE HAVE AN ENEMY

- It was them! It was them!

- I hate those beggars!

- Wow! Do you think that was all of them?

- Did you see the fat one?

- What?

- Did you see that fat one? He was just like you Ralph!

- No he wasn’t!

- Yes he was.

- I’m no fat! I may love chocolate cake, but I am not fat. Did you see the way he ate his cake? He had no respect for it.

- Sorry Ralph. You aren't fat compared to that other kid.

- And the girl!

- What about the girl?

- She was wearing boys’ clothes!

- He had no respect for that chocolate cake!

We were sitting in Adam’s backyard. We should have gone home, but we were too excited. Things were happening quickly. One day we decided to find out about these kids in Elm Street and the next day we are face to face with them.

- I wonder how many there are.

- One hundred, at least!

- Don’t be silly!

- Yes, Anne! There could be one hundred.

- Yes, Perry, there ‘could be’ one hundred!

- We have to make peace with them.

-I refuse to make peace with this animal that shows no respect for chocolate!

- Oh Ralph! Please!

A hundred cowboys could be bad. How could the eight of us fight one hundred? It is impossible!

- There were only 300 Spartans and they beat an army of a million!

- Who and what is a Spartan, Timmy?

- Don’t you remember history? Last month? The Spartans?

- What about them?

- There were 300 and they beat an enemy of millions. They won!

- They didn’t win!

- They did! They were the Spartans! The others were the Barbarians!

- They died!

- Yes, but they won!

- I don’t want to die!

- I'd die if I couldn’t eat chocolate again!

- We are not the Spartans. We are the Kings Road Knights!

My encouragement didn’t make anybody feel better and I was grateful when Adam’s mother came outside and told us our parents were looking for us.

- James, your mother called looking for you! It’s time for all of you to go home. Adam, go and wash your hands; dinner’s ready!

Apart from the unfortunate meeting with some of the hundred cowboys from Elm Street, I had a good day. The teacher decided that it was the right time for us to have a surprise math test and she asked all the questions my dad had been testing me with the night before.

I knew all the answers. I even knew the really difficult one the teacher put in for fun because my dad had asked the same one about pies, or was it pi; it must be an adult math joke. I had got an ‘A’ this time and the teacher was really amazed when I gave the answer to the pi question. I couldn’t wait to tell my dad when he got home from work.

- Where are you been? You are late!

My mum was serving soup to my little sister. Why does Monday always have to mean soup?

- Mum! We always have soup at school on Mondays and at home. It isn’t fair!

- You are welcome to start cooking, Alex. How was school today?

My little sister started to sing the word ‘soup’ again and again, until my mum told her to be quiet.

-We had a surprise math test today! I came first and got an ‘A’! It was the same things I practiced with Dad yesterday!

- He will be happy to hear that.

- Happy to hear what?

I don’t how my dad manages to walk in on the end of so many conversations making me tell everything again, but at least he was home from work earlier this evening. While we were eating our soup, I told him how well I did in the math test.

- I’m very proud of you, Alex! Very proud! You see how much good it did for you and good you feel about doing well? I guess we will just have to do the same thing every night with different subjects. Tonight we can start with a few hours of geography.

I didn’t understand why my mum started laughing because that was the worst news I had heard since the arrival of the Elm Street Cowboys. Why did Dad have to spoil everything?

- Don’t look so sad, Alex! I was only joking. You have to admit that it did help you! We can keep it to just Sunday.

I didn’t want to see the funny side of my Dad’s joke and I finished my soup in silence, apart from hearing my parent’s laughter and Maria’s cries of ‘soup’ occasionally.

I felt better once I got to my room and had almost finished my homework. My mind had been distracted by images of the hundreds of cowboys we were supposed to fight and I was thinking about sending Timmy to negotiate, or whatever it was the Swiss were supposed to do. My mind couldn’t stop thinking about the Elm Street kids. How could there be hundreds? That couldn’t be true, could it? How could we beat all these kids?

We needed more than shields, we need new weapons.

We needed new swords!

After all, we are the Knights of the Kings Road and we need the best swords we can find.

We have an enemy to fight!