Stop and think How do you think the story continues? What is Scratch’s idea? Listening: Paranoid Park – Part 2 Listen to the second part of the extract and check whether you were right. Reading: Paranoid Park – Part 3 Read the next part of the extract, find out where the story turns from a harmless incident into a horrific experience and mark this passage in the margin. There was a private security car parked on the road up ahead. It faced the train, its headlights shining directly onto the train as it passed. Standing beside it was a man in a security uniform. He had black gloves on and a black wooden stick in his hands. The security guard saw us immediately. He was big, not fat exactly, but massive. Scratch climbed farther up the metal ladder. When the security guard reached us, I thought he would shout at us or tell us to get down. I thought we’d hop off and walk away. What could he do to us? Yell at us? Call our parents? There was nothing he could do. I was wrong. The security guard went for me first. I was high up, so he could only reach my knees. But he took an enormous swing with his stick and I swear, if he had reached me, he would have broken every bone in my leg. By pure luck and reflexes, he missed. I tried to climb higher, to get away from him. The train was still moving, thank God. The security guy had to run beside it to keep up with us. He took another swing at me, hitting the metal ladder hard. I almost fell off the ladder. He wound up to swing again. Now I could be reached easily. I wasn’t high enough to avoid the nightstick. I jumped. I had no choice. I jumped as far as I could. I landed hard and tumbled on the gravel. Scratch jumped, too. The security guard must have fallen somehow, because when I came out of my roll, he and Scratch were both on the ground. I came to my feet. I ran for my skateboard. Obviously, this security guard was out of his mind. Then I saw the guard running after Scratch and he hit him in the back with his nightstick. I swear to God, I thought he would kill him. And it was so brutal. Why was some rent-a-cop doing this? For riding on a train? It didn’t make sense. Scratch fell and tried to crawl away. The security guard, breathing hard, stood over him. The guard was big and out of shape, but he knew how to swing that stick. I couldn’t let that happen. Without thinking, I ran at the security guard and rammed the front of my board into his ribs. He barely noticed. He was very big. But he did turn and swing the club at me, this time just missing my head. Scratch, meanwhile, came to his feet and ran toward the train. The guard caught the back of his shirt for a moment. By now I was so scared I didn’t know what was happening. I honestly thought he was going to kill us both. So I took my skateboard and slammed it into the back of his fleshy head. I put all my weight into it this time and I could feel my board hitting his skull. He definitely felt it this time. He froze for a moment, then stumbled, then fell forward onto the gravel beside the train. Scratch and I both ran back a few feet, watching to see if he would get up. He started to – he lifted his head and felt around for his nightstick. When he found it he tried to stand up. Then something strange happened. It was hard to see exactly, in the dark, but it looked like his coat was caught on something under the moving train. It lifted him up and pulled him sideways. Scratch and I were still running away, but we saw that the guard was getting pulled along by the train. We watched him try to free himself, all the while moving sideways, like a crab, trying to keep his feet under him. Then he was turned around and was suddenly under the train. The train had him. He got folded up. It was like a rag doll getting folded up and stuffed 3 4 c27 5 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 55 60 65 70 75 80 85 101 Nur zu Prüfzwecken – Eigentum des Verlags öbv
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