NOVEL WEB Chapter 1: Prologue:
Prologue:
…..
Adam was 8 years old, almost nine years old, with a youthful and delicate face, and soft features that denote innocence. His skin is pale and smooth, with a slight natural blush on his cheeks. His cheekbones are slightly marked, standing out more due to his childlike facial structure. Her nose is small and straight. His hair is a noticeably curly light brown, with defined locks that fall haphazardly around his head, reaching a little below his ears.
And his eyes are large and expressive, with a color that is a mix between light blue and gray. Lastly his eyebrows, a similar shade of brown to his hair, are defined but not too thick, and have a slightly arched shape that perfectly frames his gaze.
And like many kids his age, Adam thought adults argued about things that were unbearably boring and pointless. This was especially true during Christmas vacations, when his mother's entire family gathered in an old but cozy house in the south of England.
This year was no exception.
The house belonged to his maternal grandmother, Alice, a woman with white hair and eyes as sharp and lively as those of a clever fox.
His grandmother owned a small publishing house specializing in poetry.
Yeah… For Adam, this meant two things: the house was filled with books he didn't understand, and his grandmother had a special talent for talking about boring topics…
Well, just like most adults.
Although, to her credit, she was one of the few who always paid attention to him.
Adam's family was so large it felt like an endless parade.
His mother had five siblings, and his father had six. Each one had generously contributed to the general chaos with cousins and more cousins ranging from eighteen to thirty years old.
And yup, Adam was, without a doubt, the youngest of them all.
Adam had no one to play with, and whenever he tried to join his older cousins' conversations, they would always brush him off with a "Go bother someone your own size…"
Which was a problem… there was no one "his size"
"..."
Oh and he was the youngest of seven siblings. His closest sibling in age, Mia, was already eighteen, meaning there was a like nine-year age gap between them.
And his oldest brother, Alan, was already twenty-seven…
Adam didn't even want to do the math on the number of years he was older than him, although he had already heard that Alan was looking to have a child with his girlfriend, which was crazy cause Adam would be an uncle at only 9 or 10 years, no, no, he was too young to be an uncle.
To make matters worse, Adam was the only one who had been born and raised in New Jersey, USA, while the whole rest of his family were yup… all British through and through. That made him feel like an outsider, even among his own relatives. They sometimes jokingly called him "the American," which Adam thought was a pretty boring nickname. Yet not so far from the truth since, despite having dual citizenship, he spent his complete childhood there and would only travel to Britain for the holidays.
Now… His grandmother's house was big, but not big enough to escape the boredom that consumed him whenever all the adults started talking about dull things like taxes, cars, or who would be the designated driver since not everyone could stay at the house.
Yeah, It was big, but not big enough for that many people.
It was during one of those endless afternoons that Adam, desperate for something to do, wandered into his grandmother's office.
The office was on the second floor, at the end of a hallway that creaked under his feet.
When he opened the door, Adam felt like he'd stepped into a forbidden place. The room was lined with tall bookshelves stuffed with books and manuscripts stacked haphazardly, with loose papers sticking out as if trying to escape. The air smelled of old ink and dusty paper, and a desk lamp cast a warm yellow glow over the room.
"Huh? What are you doing here, young man?" Alice, his grandmother, asked, sitting behind her desk and reviewing a manuscript with her glasses perched on the tip of her nose.
Adam shrugged.
"I'm bored"
His grandmother looked at him over her glasses and smiled.
"Well, there's plenty here to keep you entertained for a while. Do you like poetry?"
"No" Adam replied immediately, with blunt honesty. But he knew if he said anything else, he risked having to listen to his grandmother talk about very boring things. And that was a NO, NO.
His grandmother let out a hearty laugh.
"At least you're honest. Well, how about you check out the fiction section? I don't look at it very often, but you might find something interesting there"
Adam wasn't entirely convinced, but since he had nothing better to do, he asked where it was and began browsing through the manuscripts in the fiction section.
There were stories about pirates, detectives, and strange things he didn't quite understand.
Eventually, he came across a manuscript titled Harry Potter…
He flipped through it, and although it didn't seem very exciting at first, he gradually became interested in the dialogue and magical elements.
Yup, the magic part of the story had caught his interest.
He didn't read everything, of course, because long descriptions bored him, but he skipped from one exciting part to another, trying to follow the storyline.
Over the next few days, Adam spent hours in his grandmother's office, reading parts of Harry Potter and other manuscripts. Though he wouldn't admit it out loud, he was starting to understand why some adults were so into books.
Even so, he didn't consider himself a "reader." He only did it because he was bored and had nothing else to do.
…
...
On January 1st, 1996, his family celebrated his ninth birthday with cake, presents, and more noise than Adam cared to admit he actually enjoyed.
It was a fantastic day, but the next day, everything went back to normal: his cousins ignored him, his siblings were too busy with their "adult" lives, and once again, he had no one to play with.
That evening, after dinner, Adam complained openly to his grandmother, Alice, the only person in the house who seemed to care about his presence.
Even his parents were content just knowing he was safe, leaving him in the "care" of his siblings… Of course, that really meant fending for himself, since none of his siblings bothered with him unless it was absolutely necessary.
Sometimes he just hated being the youngest out of seven.
"I'm bored again," Adam said, dramatically throwing his arms down. "I already finished reading some stuff, and I don't want to read anymore. Reading is boring now"
His grandmother raised an eyebrow.
"Boring, huh? Well, if you don't want to read anymore, maybe you should try writing something yourself. Use your imagination. Here, take this notebook"
Adam wasn't sure what to do with the notebook. His first thought wasn't to write, as his grandmother intended.
No, at first, he tried drawing.
Yeah!
But his "people with magical powers" turned out to be a disaster.
So… no yeah.
Eventually, he decided to attempt to write something.
He recalled parts of the Harry Potter manuscript he had read and, since he didn't remember all very well, he filled in the gaps with his own version of the story.
It was harder than he expected, but also kind of fun.
….
Before he knew it, he had been writing until 11:30 at night.
Adam was quite shocked to find out this.
But at least he felt satisfied knowing he had almost finished his short story.
He never would have thought writing could be fun, let alone that he could spend hours doing it without even realizing it.
After a long internal debate about whether to finish writing or go to bed to avoid waking up late the next morning—which might result in punishment—Adam kept his bedroom lamp on and decided to finish his story as quickly as he could.
His handwriting was a mess, and much of it didn't make sense, but at least he was done and could finally sleep peacefully.
Or so he thought…
What Adam didn't know was that, just as he finished writing, the clock struck midnight... and for some unknown reason, time stopped.