CHANCES

Excerpt from the Sequel * Choices*

Gracie Adams was dragging her feet as she got closer to her residence,she was dreading to go home. She just wished she had somewhere to run to or probably pass out time but she had nowhere to go and she even barely have friends. As the house come in sight she sighed and slowly approached the stairs and grimaced when a voice said,
" Aye lad,where have you been since morning" the voice boomed
She turned around to see her foster Father Fred Adams " from school
" School by this hour! You lad is getting a bit tiny lazy now get your ass up change and go and join Megan at the shop" he spat.
" Yes sir " she nodded and walked inside the house . Gracie and her twin sister Geraldine were adopted by Fred and Megan Adams( an Irish immigrant family)  although they had no children of their own but adopted the twins: anyone who would see them out will think they are a lovely family but on the inside they were the worst of scum: they only adopted the twins just for the money, Gracie and Geraldine were just Seventeen years old but they look like skinny and scrawny because they barely had enough to feed, the Adams were not too nice to them although they have tried a couple of times to run but nowhere to go and currently at the moment Geraldine had asthma so they had to play it cool,Gracie shuddered the last time when she remembered the last time they had tried to run away and was caught it was not a funny issue they were starved for three days and locked up in their rooms . So the thought of running away was out of it. And also They owned a pastry down the street,it was just a local store but if it was for anything Megan Adams surely knows how to cook,her meals were so delicious and had the divine hands for baking, the shop ought to be doing well for cash but Fred a deadbeat husband always bankrupted the shop,he would come in odd times take money from the register go out with other women drink and do whatever he wanted: Meghan knew it was her husband that was running down the shop but turned a blind eye to it,and worse she could leash out her frustration at the twins sometimes Meghan could be nice to them when Fred was not around but once he is she turns to a monster like her husband,but the twins understood that she was just afraid of her husband after all she didn't want to lose him since she had no given him a child yet for seven good years and greatly feared that he might have fathered a child outside.a
Gracie entered their room, obviously Geraldine was not in,she would be in the shop waiting for Gracie to come back n take over from her, Geraldine was the older twin,Fred had said that it was a waste of money sending the twins to school so he better send the smartest of them to school which was Gracie and Gracie home-schooled her sister, Gracie was at the top of her class so whatever she learnt she taught her sister, she once overheard a drunk Fred telling his friend that once the twins turn eighteen he would marry off Geraldine, so Gracie kept working harder in school so as to educate her own sister.
The whole kitchen stank and Gracie knew it was Fred that messed up everywhere so she decided to clean up so that the work won't be much for her twin sister when she comes home to prepare dinner, Geraldine was the wife material she can cook,clean and do stuff while Gracie was more of a bookworm, domestic chores irritated her
" But how can you keep your home if you don't know to cook " Geraldine asked her
" I will be rich by then so I will have Maids and servants hopefully get married to a rich man
Geraldine smiled she knew her sister had wonderful dreams.

Gracie was tidying up and was singing " an ode to Avery" she was singing probably because Fred had left the house,he forbade her from singing and almost beat the hell out of her the day she said she wanted to become a singer,
" Focus on ye education become a doctor and come back and pay me for everything not to become a singer! Singers are rubbish! Prostitutes! How much does singing bring ! Huh!" He bellowed after of course wiping the poor Gracie.
Fred dislikes anything singing even music in the house: it was said that his love the woman he loved had ran away with another man who had promised to help her music career so the hatred was there! Poor woman ! Who would blame her! Anybody who was close to Fred would probably want to run far away from him" Gracie thought.
Lizzy Arden was one of her best singer,she was one of her biggest fans that Gracie would save up money to buy her albums and listen to her music in secret, she had always wanted to be like Lizzy infact Lizzy was her role model, when the famous star died,Gracie mourned for days it was even funny because Geraldine kept consoling her because she stayed for two days without eating and almost ran away to the capital just to witness her burial
It's been two years now since her death and next month was Lizzy's posthumous birthday,her company had an a programme set up just to celebrate the late singer her music and of course birthday and there was a talent show too for that .
Gracie wanted to go but she barely could afford a tfare talkless of getting the talent show ticket.
The more she thought about it the more she became frustrated, wiping her hands on the dish cloth she surveyed her handiwork the kitchen was clean ,now taking her books with her she locked the door and matched down to shop hoping to use Geraldine phone to do some work.Fred had only gotten her a phone: it wasn't per Geraldine's phone it was the shop's phone but Geraldine was the one with it.Fred had insisted that Gracie will not have a phone because phones distract kids from learning this days and if she wants to research or do homework she should use the public library..

The ceremony went on as usual,Richard looked on from where he stood, the new initiates were three in number and he remembered the first time he ,Avery and Lizzy were initiated and shuddered,the booming voice of the Grandmaster resonated over the hall,..it's has been two years since the death of Avery and her husband: Master was not happy and kept looking for the perfect womb for his re-incarnation..
Looking around everybody was solemn..he has been given a red robe and his status have been elevated to that of one of the elders. His stardom has upped he has over 300 movies to his name and now he has been thinking of retiring and start movie production and open  a movie academy but what the heck he thought he is still young and good looking and also rich so he was weighing retirement.
His attention was drawn to the initiates who were doing their stuff and he cringed when he found out that one of them was being assigned to James Avery's former manager .he inwardly prayed she doesn't end the way Avery did because James was lousy and talks too much..

As soon as he got home he downed another bottle of vodka, that's how his life has been : unlike him alcohol has become the order of the day he has been into Rehab and out on different occasions but it just keeps coming back.. Recently he had just won an award for the best actor and he was aghast whether to go or not. Even the blogs have started carrying rumors of his alcoholism. Last two months he was DUI when his sports car rammed into a pole on his way back from a friend's party.
Shoving his hand into  pocket he looked out his window, the sky was dark and the street looked cool n empty except the street lights on..