David Richards

David Richards is a fictitious character in the Dreams to Reality universe, appearing in all three incarnations of the series as a fairly minor character. In the novel series, he is likely to play even a smaller role than in his previous appearances. Little is known about his past or his family life, and there are actually no real plans to develop the character in the novel series, which would seem to imply that either he is not going to be making many note-worthy appearances or isn't going to be around very long. In the web series, he befriended Danielle Grayson shortly after she moved to Eagle Creek and developed a crush on her, but his feelings for her went unreturned due to her own crush on Michael Bennett.

In the Web Series (2000-2004)
On a late spring day at Eagle Creek Junior High School, David Richards spoke with his new friend Danielle Grayson about an upcoming school dance. Danielle asked him if he'd spoken with Rachel McCarey that day about whether or not she had asked Michael Bennett ot the dance yet. David knew that Rachel had not asked Michael herself and had no immediate plans to becase she was too shy to do so. He also didn't believe that Michael had asked her to the dance yet, either, which Danielle felt was perfect because she plannet to ask Michael to go to the dance with her after this class. David warned Danielle not to open herself up for trouble, figuring that if Rachel wanted Michael badly enough, she could become pretty vicious. Danielle planned to make sure that Michael didn't ask Rachel to take her to the dance before he could ask Rachel, and that way if Michael accepted her invitation, Danielle could claim that she didn't know that Rachel had a crush on Michael. David could only hope that Danielle knew what she was doing, but Danielle felt that she knew exactly what she was doing and thought by the end of that week, Michael would be hers. She asked him to do her a favor and grill Michael during their study hall together in the next class period about whether or not he had asked Rachel to the dance by then, and tell her immediately after the bell rang after the study hall so she could speak to him before he gets a chance to talk to Rachel. David reluctantly agreed to Danielle's request, which prompted Danielle to excitedly (and loudly) thank him for his help, which called attention to the fact that they were not pay attention to Ms. Warner's history lesson about World War II. Ms. Warner would question David and Danielle about why they were disrupting her class. Danielle claimed that David had just given her his notes to borrow from science class due to her having been absent for the past couple of days in order to prevent her from getting behind. Ms. Warner accepted this claim, but asked Danielle to keep her outbursts to a minimum before continuing with her lection. David chastised Danielle for coming up with such an excuse, saying that she's lucky Ms. Warner didn't think about the explanation too much, because David's "grades suck," mostly because he does not take notes in class. Danielle was only glad that the explanation worked, and reminds David of their plan before the bell rang, signalling the end of class. David would go to his study hall period and meet up with Rocky Fronset and Michael, where Rocky would watch as Michael stared at Rachel as she walked into the study hall room and walked to a pair of desks across the room to have a conversation with Jamie Blonner. Rocky demanded to know why Michael was so fascinated with Rachel and accused him of having a crush on her. Michael quickly denied this claim and wanted to know what made him think that. Rocky had pointed out that Michael that he'd been staring at Rachel and drooling all day, but Michael claimed not to know what Rocky was talking about, as he already has a crush on someone else. David asked Michael who he had a crush on, but Michael claimed that they wouldn't know who it is. Rocky clearly didn't believe Michael claims, but Michael didn't care if he did or not and said that he and David would not know this girl. David thought that it might be because this girl is an imaginary friend, but Michael revealed that they wouldn't know this girl because she is new in the area, which led David to believe that Michael was speaking about Danielle, who only just moved to Eagle Creek the month before. Rocky continued to prod Michael to tell them who he has a crush on, but Michael refused to reveal her identity for fear that Rocky would go right up to her and tell her how he feels just to irritate him. David realized that this girl must go to their school with them and assumes that he is referring to Danielle. Michael's additional description of the girl having brown hair and brown eyes really leads David to believe he's talking about Danielle and replies, "Oh, God, it can't be." Rocky asked David what he meant by that just as Rachel and Jamie approached the three, with Rachel asking Michael who he has a crush on. Michael took Rachel away from David, Rocky, and Jamie to speak wiht her privately, while Rocky asked David what was wrong. David claimed that he just remembered that he forgot to tell someone something, and then Jamie changed the subject by asking David who he is going to the dance with. David revealed that he and Josh Poncek were not planning to come to the dance that night at all because the two of them had been invited to a birthday party at the Rollerskate that night. Jamie would then ask about Josh's girlfriend, Nicole Halloway, having assumed that Nicole would surely be attending the dance. As far as David was aware, however, Nicole was still planning to attend the dance alone, but added he didn't think she would be alone for long. (DtRW #1)

At the end of the school day, Danielle approached David at his locker and startled him when he didn't notice her approach and she was suddenly standing behind his locker door when he shut it. Danielle apologized for startling David and then asked him if he talked to Michael during the previous school period. David responded that while he didn't exactly talk to Michael about Rachel as planned, he did find out "some interesting things" about who Michael has a crush on. When Danielle asked him who it was, David told her that Michael had said that he has a crush on someone who is new to the school with brown hair and brown eyes, which coincidentally made it seem as though he were describing Danielle. Danielle was very excited to hear this news, despite David making it clear that Michael did not specifically name anybody by name, but concedes that it does sound like Danielle was the one Michael was decribing. Danielle thanked David for making her "day, week, month, year, whatever!" before taking off to go "get my man" with David's well wishes, though he privately hoped that he had been right about Michael having a crush on Danielle, or she would "get a free ticket to the Heartbreak Hotel." Soon, David would encounter Mandy Marin in the hallway at school, where she informed David about Nicole Halloway and Mark Shane's near-simultaneous accidents earlier in the day. David was stunned to hear about Nicole being pushed down the stairs and asked if Josh had been told about this yet. Mandy told David that Melinda Flint had told Brandon Danber that she deliberately pushed Nicole down the stairs, and Brandon would subsequently tell Ashley Chamberlain, Josh, and Danielle about it. David immediately told Mandy to come with him to stop Josh from doing something he'll regret later. David and Mandy would soon arrive at the top of a secluded stairway, where Josh was holding Melinda by the shoulders at the top of the stairs as he threatened to push her down the stairs the same way she pushed Nicole down the stairs earlier. Mandy called out for Josh to stop it and gets in between him and Melinda, allowing Melinda to retreat away from the top of the stairs. Josh demanded to know what Mandy was doing, figuring that Melinda deserves everything that she got because Nicole may die because of what she did. David backed Mandy's assertion that Josh pushing Melinda down a flight of stairs would make him no better than Melinda, but Melinda wouldn't believe that Josh was ever going to actually push her down the stairs. When Josh railed at Melinda that he was actually going to do it and called her a "stupid whore," David stepped in and physically took Josh away from Melinda. Once they were away from Melinda and Mandy, David told Josh that he could have killed Melinda, but Josh finally told David that he never inteneded to ever push Melinda down the stairs, and was only trying to scare her to the point where she'll get out of his and Nicole's lives for good. David figured that killing Melinda by pushing her down the stairs would successfully get her out of their lives, but Josh would insist once more that he wasn't going to really do it and was only trying to scare her. David posed the question about what would have happened if anyone else had found them, like Mrs. Manning. Josh wasn't concerned with this, because ten days afterward, they would be finished at the school and be moving to the high school the following school year. David then told Josh that he should get to the hospital to be with Nicole. Later, Josh and David would fill Travis Sirlon (who had been absent from school that day) in on the events of the day at Portage General, including Josh's confrontation with Melinda at the top of the staircase at school. Josh would angrily assert once more that he was only trying to scare Melinda, and Travis pointed out that this behavior was a little out of character for him, but Josh insisted that Melinda needed someone to put the fear of God into her, because from what Brandon had told him, Melinda was extremely happy with herself for what she did to Nicole. David asked if it worked, but Mandy, who arrived on the scene at this point, would inform them that no, it didn't work, because Melinda would subsequently slap Mandy and threaten to push her down the stairs as well subsequent to David taking Josh away from her. David asked where Melinda was now, but Mandy didn't know and "couldn't care less." At this point, Jarrid Harlen, Jack Brock, Dustin Finley, Michael, and Rachel would arrive at the hospital at this point with the news that an arrow was shot into the passenger side door of Jarrid's mother's car with a note attached to it claiming that Nicole was dead and that Jarrid would be next if he got in the way. Jarrid asked Josh if Nicole was still alive, and Josh assured him that he had just seen Nicole a couple of minutes ago and that she was conscious. The teens would then speculate about whether or not this was an isolated sick prank or a potential threat on Jarrid's and apparently especially Nicole's lives. During this conversation, Nicole would scream in horror from her nearby hospital room, and Josh and Michael would quickly trot off to investigate while the rest of the teens, including David, eventually made their way to a hospital waiting room, where they watched an episode of ''The Jerry Springer Show. ''Danielle would arrive at the hospital and ask how Mark and Nicole were doing, and David told her that while they hadn't heard anything about Mark yet, Nicole was conscious. Rachel would then take Danielle aside to talk to her in private to tell her that Michael had asked her to the dance earlier. While Danielle tried to feign happiness for Rachel, David knew he was about to be in big trouble with Danielle. Danielle would loudly proclaim that she needs to talk to David after a moment of conversation with Rachel and would quite literally drag David away from the TV and Jack, Jarrid, Mandy, and Dustin despite David's initial protests that Jerry Springer was about to bring out a guest's sister, who the guest had apparently been sleeping with. Danielle would yell at David that Michael likes Rachel, not her, and David swore to her that the girl Michael described sounded exactly like Danielle, citing Michael's claim that the girl was new to the school, and pointed out that Rachel had gone to Eagle Creek schools since she was in kindergarten and doesn't even match the physcial description Michael gave. Danielle accepted this, but was very disappointed. David gave Danielle a supportive hug, but Danielle said that she just needed to be alone before taking off in tears, leaving David to return to his friends on the other side of the room, where Dustin wanted to know what that scene was about. David would tell Dustin not to worry about it, but Jack would demand to know what was going on because Danielle just came in here and dragged David out like she was his mother. Rocky would then arrive at the hospital and interrupt David from telling everyone what Danielle said to him when he asked for an update about Mark and Nicole. Dustin, Rachel, and Jarrid would then explain to Rocky about the note shot into the side of Jarrid's mother's car door for Jarrid. Jarrid would then place a call to Melinda to accuse her of shooting the note at him, but Melinda would instead play him an ominous voice mail on her answering machine from someone speaking in a distorted voice claiming that the person was her father and that they would soon be rid of Nicole forever. Jarrid would soon end the call to Melinda and inform David, Dustin, Jack, Rocky, and Rachel about the message on Melinda's answering machine, adding another layer to a potentially dangerous mystery apparently just starting to take shape. (DtRW #2)

Background & Trivia

 * David has long been a character planned to eventually play a larger role in the series than he ever ultimately has, but lack of character development and his association with more minor characters has prevented his character from ever really being fully developed. He played a larger role in the novellas, in a storyline in which he, Rocky, and Travis Sirlon were kidnapped by Skullface and held hostage in the abandoned train station in Eagle Creek, which was a primary storyline for several early novellas. The storyline was planned to be carried over into the web series eventually but while three people were kidnapped by Skullface in the web series and held hostage in the train station for a time, Rocky, Travis, and David were not. Storylines planned for for the time period in which a good portion of the cast was in Long Beach, California, helping to launch the Past to Future spin-off would have included an adaptation of this storyline from the novellas, but it never panned out due to the web series' premature cancellation. It is currently unknown if the storyline will be adapted in the new novel series, but it is fairly likely that David is going to play a limited role in the novel series due to the larger cast size and lack of real back story for the character from the series' previous incarnations to work with.
 * In the web series, David was portrayed as a friend of Danielle Grayson at the beginning of the series. Due to Danielle not relocating from Coral Beach to Eagle Creek in the novel series until nearly fifteen installments (if not more), David will not be one of her friends in the novel series for quite some time (if ever). In the novel series, he will be more involved with characters such as Rocky, Travis, Amanda (Mandy), Sean, and Hillary, but all of them will play smaller roles than the web series may have suggested. His friendship with Josh Poncek will be re-introduced in the novel series, as well, but none of these characters are going to be especially influential, as the series is going to have to split time between Eagle Creek and Coral Beach somewhat equally, so as a general rule, only the major characters from the web series are going to be given a whole lot of things to do in the novel series, with everyone else playing supporting roles.