Funk’s the Chocolate Loving Vamp
By Jamie Ott
Special thanks to the real Layton Funk.
opyright.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used without written
permission, except for where credit duly given.
Golden Books: an imprint of Passionate Prose Industries
ISBN-13: 978-0615544908
ISBN-10: 0615544908
For all inquiries, please contact passionateprose@mail.com.
Sting of Betrayal
Chapter 1
Saturday at three ‘o’clock his dad was supposed to pick him and his sister up so they could spend some time together. It was, now, four ‘o’ clock and Layton lay on his belly in the grass as he rolled marbles over the ants that scurried about in his mother’s flowerbed. The ants were franticly running about with little specks of white on their backs. He was vaguely amused and quickly tired of the ants. Layton rolled onto his back, looked up at the blue sky and sighed aloud.
What a boring day he thought to himself.
Finally, sick of lying alone in the grass, Layton left his empty backyard. His dad was supposed to take them out for pizza and miniature golf but, as usual, he canceled. He was actually looking forward to spending time with his dad, plus he was tired of spending every day bored and alone. Now his sister was off with her friends, his mom was at work, and he was home alone again. School had been out nearly two weeks, and all he’d done is sit and sigh. No fun days at the water park, backyard barbeques or crafts at camp, like they used to do. Now that his parents had split, finances were tighter, or so his mother explained to him.
Despite the promise to his mom that he wouldn’t leave the house that day – in case his father showed -, he left the backyard and headed down to Priddy street where his best friend, Rick, lived.
As Layton walked to Rick’s, he wrestled with feelings of anger, pride, and loneliness. On one hand, he never wanted to talk to Rick again, but on the other hand it sucked not having any friends. He felt like a real desperate dummy, going to Rick’s house, but he was such a dork at school and Rick was the only one that ever liked him. Maybe he didn’t want to be seen with him at school, but maybe Rick would hang out with him now that school was over.
Layton tried to forget that last week’s incident, at school, when Rick’s new friends threw handfuls of mashed potatoes at him as he walked past their table in the cafeteria, and Rick laughed the loudest. Ah hahahaaaaa was all Layton could see and hear. It was humiliating to be picked on but it was worse to feel his only friend in the world turn on him.
School sucked big time but things would be better if his parents would let him throw away his stupid glasses and put some gel in his frizzy blond hair. Maybe he wasn’t as cute as Jeff Barley, the one who seemed to like making fun of him the most, but he had a girlfriend once. Cindy was a cute little brunette who always wore pretty barrettes in her hair and had the shiniest lips. All the boys at school wanted her, and she was his until Jeff shorted him, humiliating them in front of the entire school. Cindy was too embarrassed to be seen with Layton and she never talked to him ever again.
“Hey, Funk! Show us your under pants!” he recalled.
Ugh! He hated that memory and tried not to think about it, but it was too late. The look on everyone’s faces when Jeff pulled his shorts down and everyone saw the superman underwear, was unforgettable. It was bad enough to have kids pick on him because of his name, Funk, which he already hated and was a daily source of agony for him, but everyone knowing the kind of underwear he wore was beyond humiliation.
Fortunately, that joke had died down and Jeff, eventually, moved on to bigger, better insults as well as methods of torture, like ripping up his homework so he couldn’t turn it in or stabbing him in the buttocks with a pen.
Layton wasn’t a total wuss, though, and he did try to stand up for himself once. Unfortunately, it didn’t work out too well. He was standing next to Rick, waiting in line for lunch when Jeff decided it’d be funny to pour the contents of his plastic Kool Aid into his curly frizzy hair. Layton pushed him hard onto the ground, but his buddies (and fraternal twins), John and Brad Miller caught him and pushed him up onto his feet.
As soon as Jeff was standing again, he sent a nasty right hook at Layton’s face. The teachers took them both to the principal’s office and sent them home for the day, but his hair retained a reddish glow because he didn’t rinse out the Kool Aid immediately and, the next day, everyone had something new to laugh at him about. But that was when his daily school torture really picked up – that was the day Rick turned on him.
The next day, Rick did everything to avoid Layton. Normally, in the mornings, they walked together; Layton would catch up to him right as he was leaving his house. This time, Rick opened the door and ran ahead. “Hey Rick!” Layton called, but he kept running. Layton ran after him, but he only ran faster to get away; the next day, it was the same thing all over again. It didn’t take long for Layton to get the message. He hung back and watched Rick’s back, and they walked back and forth to school like that for weeks until Rick’s new buddies – John and Brad - began giving him rides.
He walked with his head down to avoid the hot glare of the 100 degree sun. Layton continued past a half dozen houses, looked up momentarily and froze in his tracks. Rick lived in a yellow house at the end of the block, and he already had company. There was Rick, Jeff, and the two twin brothers, John and Brad, all splashing and laughing as they took turns belly sliding on a water mat on Rick’s front lawn; his dad stood over a charcoal grill and the fumes of smoke and meat could be smelled even where Layton stood.
More hurt than angry, Layton turned around and walked fast hoping they wouldn’t see him. The sadness and humiliation was overwhelming. His scalp felt like it would melt away under the heat and pressure of his emotion. His eyes burned and he could feel the sting of tears tempting his eyes.
Yet, at the same instant he felt sadness, pure rage made him want to hurt Rick. Layton wanted to make Rick feel pain the way he did at that moment. He would have liked to have punched Rick in the face a million times.
With his head hung down, he stared at his feet and walked back to his plain white house. Inside, he threw himself on the bed in his room and stared at his Harry Potter posters on the walls and ceilings for an hour until he fell asleep.
“Layton! Dinner is ready!” his sister called from the living room.
Feeling even worse than when he laid down for his nap, he entered the living room where a large pizza sat on the coffee table.
“We rented the Boy Who Cried Wolf,” said his mother who went over and ruffed up his curly fro. Looking down into the darkness of his eyes, she asked “Is anything wrong? How was your last week of the fourth grade?”
“School sucks – and we’ve been out nearly two weeks. What makes you ask now?”
“She doesn’t care about you, geek-dweeby,” said his sister Heather.
“Shut up, hoe.”
“Watch your mouth,” his mother slapped the side of his face.
Layton looked at his mother, and then ran out of the room. He slammed, as hard as he could, the door to his bedroom. Why did everyone always treat him like crap, but then he was never allowed to treat them like crap back - it wasn’t fair.
Moments later, his mother knocked on the door and entered with a plate of pizza and a soda.
“I’m sorry baby,” she said as she set the food on the nightstand next to his bed. “You know I hate that word. Do not say it anymore, and I don’t care what your sister says.”
She leaned over and kissed and hugged him. “Now I want you to eat your dinner, and then I want you to brush your teeth and go to bed.”
After Layton washed up and was lying in bed, he thought about Rick and wondered why he turned on him. Was he that awful of a person? Was he such a pathetic human? A waste of space?
Unable to sleep, Layton turned on the television his mother put in his room. Layton was prone to fits of insomnia. The doctor said it was stress and prescribed pills, but his mother was against medication, except for when legitimately sick, so she put an old television for him to watch when he couldn’t sleep. It was an old thirteen inch television and it didn’t have any cable – not that it was compatible with digital signals. The only channels it got was 3, 6, and 9. That was okay, though, because cartoons were on 3 in the mornings, and there were always movies on 9, albeit black and white.
Layton hated black and white, and he thought they were lame and should all be taken off the television – they were so boring. But they did help him get back to sleep sometimes. In fact, it was already working, and his eyes lids became heavier and heavier.
In between heavy blinks, some ugly old face came into view. His nose and eyes were most disturbing to Layton’s vision. The ugly old guy attacked the man he’d brought to his home, but Layton didn’t understand why. He thought the women wanted to kiss the frightened man, but then the ugly guy in the big black cape sent the women away.
His eyes closed for a while but Layton hadn’t realized he’d fallen asleep. They opened again and there was a lady in white who was giving kids chocolate bars - she bit him on the neck and Layton tried to pull away from her! At first, he was scared about being turned into a vampire, but, then, Layton rose and he was a powerful man like the one with the weird face and eyes. He could fly and it was amazing; everyone feared him, including Rick. They all called him Dracula, just like the man in the movie.
Next morning was Sunday. Layton got up and groggily walked into the kitchen to get some cereal.
“Layton,” his mother said. “I need you to go to the store today.”
“Oh mom! Why do I always have to go to the store? Why can’t you send Heather?”
“Heather’s going to her friend’s house today. I don’t want you in the house all day alone. You need to get some fresh air and a walk.”
She opened her wallet.
“Now here’s twenty dollars. I want you to get cereal, ravioli and paper towels, and then you can get something sweet for yourself.”
Later that day, he set out for the store. He put off walking to the store for as long as he could because he couldn’t stand the heat, but it was nearly 5 ‘o’ clock and his mother would be mad if he didn’t go.