Meet Brad

When I wasn't with Ben hearing tales of mystery, heroism and wisdom I mainly liked to skate. Skates are fairly large water creatures with hard heads that resemble rocks. 3 times a day they go to the shallower ends of the fast flowing rivers, and act as a filter so that passing fish are forced to enter their mouths. It was basically clever team feeding. They look scary and have sharp teeth, but they're not poisonous and they can't really kill you very easily. The worst injuries being big bites - but they don't really have the strength to bite through you unless they're really big. Anyway, the people (skaters) hop from head to head to cross the rivers in style without getting wet. Some places hold professional events with ultra large skates (that can kill), and skaters that do tricks and spins to earn points to better their opponents.

We weren't that good ourselves but we skated for fun in areas with smaller skates. I did it with lots of friends and although I was never the best. I was always very passionate about it. My friend Brad was always more skilled then me. He had a natural ability to pull off crazy moves and get the spectators going. He had style and very rarely got injured. He was like Ben in the sense that he was another friend that I looked up to. I always thought that he could go pro, but he never went for it. He was quite happy where he was.

I guess I was quite happy too. Everything was going pretty smoothly. I was growing up with people I knew and the area we grew up in was really safe...