Page 4 of Second Chances

“Ryan, do you know what’ll happen to them if they take too much of this drug?”

I do. I’ve seen it once before when I was eight. Chantelle had taken more than she should, and she got sick. An ambulance had come for her, and I’d been hidden away. It wasn’t until Chantelle had come back that Dwayne had beaten her black and blue for being so stupid and nearly dying. So I do know what happens when you take too much of the stuff.

“You can die.”

“They haven’t been very nice people to you, have they?” My grandfather points toward my arm. “Did he do that?”

I nod.

“She doesn’t feed you. They won’t let you watch what you want. They beat you. They call you names. Do they deserve to live? If you injected the liquid into their arms, it would take them away forever.”

I gasp.

“I can’t.”

“Why not? Have they ever shown you one caring moment? One kind word?”

I try to think hard, but every memory I have of these two people, who’d been raising me since my birth, involved violence, drugs, and hatred.

“No.”

“Do it. Get revenge for all the years of suffering. Nobody’ll know. My men have made it look like an accident. Send them to hell.” My grandfather’s words stir something inside me. An insane need to destroy the people who’ve treated me like dirt. I need to extinguish the memories plaguing my brain. My feet carry me toward Dwayne, first, and my fingers grasp the plunger of the needle. I take a deep breath and push. Dwayne sits up, and I jump back. My foster father’s eyes widen, and his mouth moves, but nothing comes out. Then, he slides back down into the chair.

I look up at my grandfather who’s smiling happily. “Well done. Now, her.”

I go over to my foster mother and do the same. She doesn’t sit up, though, she just slumps farther down into the chair. The men with my grandfather go to the two lifeless bodies and check their necks.

“Gone,” one says.

“Same,” the other confirms.

“Do you have anything that you want to bring with you?” my grandfather asks.

I look around at the filthy squalor surrounding us.

“No,” I reply and follow my grandfather out to the car. We climb in, and the car sets off. Nobody speaks. I’m not stupid—I know I’ve just killed my foster parents. Surely, I should feel sadness or guilt, but neither of those emotions are inside me. No. Happiness floods my body, and a feeling of finally being free.

I pick up the box containing the remainder of the pizza before looking back, one final time, at my past. I notice two people, a man and a woman, pulling up in a Ford Cortina outside the house. I almost pity them…they are about to discover the sort of man I've become.

Chapter One

Elena

“Thank you, Miss.” The group of nine and ten year old girls giggle as they run to their parents standing at the back of the dance class waiting to collect them. They all match in their pink leotards with frilly tutus and ballet shoes. Their hair is neatly pulled back in buns. I wave goodbye to them and make sure each child is collected by the right person. When they all leave, I hand over the reins to the new deputy manager, Lucinda. Since my best friend and the dance school owner, Amy North, gave up full time teaching to start a family, she’s virtually handed the running of her school over to me. I don’t mind, though—I’m enjoying it. It takes my mind off other things such as how crap my life is: no boyfriend or even the hint of a love life to speak about, and a good job but not the glittering career I was destined to have when growing up.

But I shouldn’t feel sorry for myself, and it’s nothing a Chinese takeaway and a large glass of wine can’t fix. It’s only then I realize that’s not going to happen tonight, because it’s Tuesday, and that means dinner at my mother’s house. Ever since my father passed away from a heart attack four years ago, it's been a regular date on a Tuesday night. I even had to schedule my classes around it when I first started working for Amy.

I pick up my bags, and with a grumble, I trudge out into the warm London evening. It’s late September, so the sun hasn’t set yet, despite it being six o’clock. Another month, and it’ll be dark when I leave work. It doesn’t bother me, though—winter is one of my favorite times of the year. I love being all snuggled up in warm blankets and wearing thick woolen socks. Nothing beats watching a film by a warm fire while dozing off.

God, I sound like I’m a hundred not just turned thirty.

This is what going to visit my mother does to me. It depresses me and leaves me old before my time.

Come on, Elena, snap out of it.I reprimand myself. Maybe a chocolate bar will help raise my spirits. It’s probably just a lack of energy after dancing for most of the day. I nip into a newsagents on the corner of the street, next to the dance school, and grab a Toffee Crisp: biscuit, puffed rice, and caramel all wrapped in chocolate—what more could a girl desire. I hail a taxi and jump in. Giving the driver my mum’s address, I sit back and practically inhale my chocolate bar during the ten minute journey from Kennington to her home in Chelsea.

When he was alive, my father owned his own import and export business, which is a massive industry in the UK, and he made a lot of money from it. That, combined with the insurance policy he’d taken out on himself, has left my mum comfortable for as long as she lives. Her house in Chelsea is worth a staggering amount and would be very profitable for her if she ever decides to sell it. My parents purchased it before the property price boom of the late nineties. Basically my mother is minted, but I refuse any offers of help she tries to force on me. I want to do things my own way, and I think I haven’t done too bad a job running the dance school: it is profitable, well renowned, and already expanded over the UK. All of which I’ve assisted Amy in coordinating. I’m effectively the head of the whole company now and paid handsomely as a result.

“We’re ’ere, love,” the cabbie informs me when the taxi stops. I tuck the now empty Toffee Crisp wrapper into my bag and check my mouth in the mirror to ensure I don’t have any chocolate around it.

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