One Last Chance

Chapter 20

Steam wafted up from the cup set upon the coffee table.

Crashing down into the sofa, Daniel leaned back and sighed, watching the rain pound the windows.

Daniel smiled and reached out, longing to feel the warmth of the cup of hot chocolate on a chilly, rainy day. For him, as long as he could remember, hot chocolate had a magical calming effect. And that was what he so desperately needed right now, to clear all the mess out of his mind.

He closed his eyes as his hand reached for the ceramic surface, and waited to feel the warmth spread through him.

But it never came.

Instead, he felt a bolt of icy coldness biting into his hand.

Daniel jolted awake with a start.

His eyes roamed the ceiling for a moment or two, wondering where he was, but everything came racing back.

After they left the bomb shelter, Edward had led him to town and bought another packet of Panadols. With nowhere to go, they spent hours aimlessly walking around town.

Until they found an abandoned building on the outskirts of town. It was purely by luck they had found it; the little three-storey building was half hidden by a hill and a clump of trees. The paint on the outer walls had long cracked, having suffered years at the mercy of the rain and sun. Vines creeped up the side of the walls, threatening to envelope the entire building.

The entrance was a rusting metal door that had squealed loudly and sagged into a half-bow when Daniel pushed it open. He winced and gingerly stepped inside.

The floor was covered in a fine layer of dirt that crunched beneath their feet and abandoned junk. And to top things off, the ceiling of the first storey had collapsed, leaving a gaping, jagged hole and a mountain of debris on the first storey. The rusted metal filing cabinets suggested that the building had been an office at a time. But what kind of office was half-hidden by a hill?

Daniel had been surprised at just how little he knew the town he had lived in for thirteen years. It was perfectly understandable, really. What with all that bullying he had suffered in primary school, it was hardly surprising he spent most of his time in a triangle consisting of school, the library and home.

Home.

When was the last time he had said that word such longing? 

When was the last time he had said that word with such misery? 

When was the last time...?

No. Stop thinking about it.

But he couldn't get the images of home out of his mind.

Stop. Stop. You're going to make yourself homesick. You can't go back. There's nothing for you to go back for. There's no one for you to go back to. Your sister is gone. Your father is gone. Your mother is gone.

You are all alone.

The thought of home descended over Daniel, filling him like a kind of hunger that nothing could fill unless he was back home with his sister and his father (when he was not in one of his drunken moods) and of course his mother.

Mum.

She'd gone missing on a trip to California with two of her best friends, six years ago. The police had no leads on the three women who had so mysteriously disappeared, leaving all their luggage behind in their hotel rooms. According to them, the last person who had seen them was the hotel porter, who had seen them walking out of the hotel for dinner.

When the police scanned all CCTV footage within a fifty mile radius of the hotel, they found nothing suspicious. The disappearance of the three women had even hit the headlines for a day or two.

Daniel could still recall that day when his father had picked up the phone and answered the fateful call from the police. He could have sworn that a tear or two had trickled down his father's face before he turned away and wiped it discreetly.

His mother's luggage had been packed and sent to Daniel's home three days later. He could remember his father carrying his mother's flashy purple suitcase into the room, and he and Rebecca peeking into the room, seeing his father tenderly going through all his mother's belongings before breaking down and sobbing. His father had seen the brother and sister quietly standing by the door, and pulled them both into a teary group hug.

Daniel knew that his father still kept the contents of the luggage and every single piece of his mother's things in a large metal box in the house's storeroom, after having allowed Daniel and Rebecca to choose a keepsake from them. Daniel had chosen the necklace his mother often wore, and Rebecca a medal his mother had won during her college days.

I wouldn't be here now if Mum hadn't disappeared....

The thought flashed into Daniel's mind. It was his mother's disappearance that had led to all this. If his mother had not disappeared when he was seven years old, his father would not have taken to drinking. And of course, that was the very beginning of his father's alcohol addiction.

It started small, as every addiction does. At first his father drank a glass every other day. Then it became every day, soon two glasses a day, three, four, five, six... And soon a whole bottle. Very soon his father was rarely seen without a bottle in his hands. And even rarer sober. His breath constantly reeked of alcohol and his once handsome face had aged ten years in two.

And Rebecca.... Where was she now? Was she okay?

Daniel let all his thoughts swirl in his mind, swirling faster and faster, before letting sleep claim him once again, and drifted off to a thankfully dreamless sleep.

A/N

Hiiii! I'm back!! :)

I'm really sorry for taking so long to update, but it was important to sort out all the little details in the story.

Sorry again to disappoint you guys, because this is just a filler chapter, but I promise you the next few chapters are going to get more and more interesting!! In them, we will be digging deeper into Daniel's past and a little of Edward's too, with more clues revealed and the mystery of Rebecca's disappearance being solved. So stick around and wait for it!!!

On a happier note... I'm going on holiday... to Taiwan!!! Yay!!

Aaannnnd finally... One Last Chance made it to the recommended pages!!! Thank you for all the support and don't forget to keep voting!!

•phoebechew7600•