NIT BOY by Tristan Bancks
Chapter Two: The Golden Child
Deep within the forest of Lewis Snow’s hair something very exciting was happening. A nit was hatching. His name was Ned. And he wasn’t just any nit.
Ned’s egg was filled with gas. He’d been breathing air in through his shell for a week and passing that air out through his backside. The build-up of putrid gas finally forced Ned’s front end through the tip of the egg, cracking the tiny, grey shell. This is how all nits are born. Disgusting but true.
Ned was very relieved to be free. A crowd had descended from the hair canopy to the scalp to witness this extraordinary event. They held their breath as Ned crawled into the light and plopped onto Lewis’s scalp.
Ned’s eyes fluttered open. The first thing he saw was a sea of repulsive lice-faces staring at him.Terrifying. Then the crowd erupted, snapping their claws together in applause – silent to human ears but almost deafening to a nit.
Ned’s father, Keith, was the Head Louse. Ned watched his dad climb onto a slippery nit egg, glued to the bottom of a hair shaft, and address the crowd.
‘Thank you for being here, people. I mean nits. Until this moment, we lice have had to crawl from head to head like primitives. Our legs have not been fit for jumping. But those days are behind us. No longer do we have to wait for these nitwit humans to put their heads together or swap hats so that we can travel. May I present to you Ned – the first ever jumping louse!’
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