A challenge

There had been a time when I didn’t have to bother about what I’d be having for breakfast, lunch, or dinner.

I was in high school and the only expectations my dad had from me were the words he said to me every morning before placing a kiss on my mom's lips and waving us away as my mom would drive me to school. “Be sure to have good grades.”

He never asked for my report card after school so I might not even count that as an expectation. Yet I held on to it tightly and did have good grades.

My mom was a different person entirely. All I got was “Have fun today!!!” Whenever she dropped me off at school. Thankfully, she never forgot to ask if I did have fun at dinner while we ate.

Sometimes during my teenage years, I began to find my mom and dad kind of love and intimacy disgusting. How they were always kissing at dinner, or in the kitchen, or anywhere else.

I made sure to stay out of their way and as I was the only child, I was quite lonely.

Then I met this girl at school. She had a twin brother. They did everything together, walked together, sat together, ate together, and I saw them as another version of my parent. Disgusting.

But one day, I ran into Darcy. She had been alone, in the back of the school building. I loved to sit in the school garden, and it had become my base.

That day, I sighted someone sneaking in and went in to investigate. It had been Darcy. She fought with her twin brother, Duncan, and now she didn’t know what to do with herself because she had always done everything with him.

I got to know Darcy was a very awesome person when her brother wasn’t beside her. We spent some time in the garden, I told her about my parent but all she had to talk about was her brother.

I wondered if my mom and dad only talked about themselves and never about me with their friends.

I saw Darcy as a challenge, and I wasn’t going to give up on her.

“I think he treats you like this because he thinks he’s all you have.” I taunted, driving her to where I wanted.

“But he is all I have.” She whined.

“Not anymore, Darcy,” I smirked. “You now have yourself.”

So, Darcy and I cut classes and went cut the rest of that day’s classes.

First, we had started like two teenage girls who just wanted to have fun. It was our first time doing something like this on our own.

First, we had a bit of money on us. Darcy had taken her brother’s wallet thinking he’d come after her when they had fought, but he hadn’t seemed to care. Later we found out that he hadn’t realized his wallet was missing.

Anyway, we had ice cream and cake, and after an hour of touring the city, we were hungry again and a sandwich sounded like a fun option. Darcy and I had so much alike. She was ruled by the choices of her brother while I was ruled by that of my parent. It was the first time we decided on what to eat by ourselves.

Darcy loved the freedom so much that she decided to do something more daring.

Things began to slowly slip out of our control when two guys approached us just after we were done with the sandwich.

I wouldn’t deny the day had been nice. The hair had felt different, it was the feeling of the innocence of freedom. Later, I discovered there was no fun in being free. Another reason why I accepted to be Mrs. King.

“Good afternoon girls.” One of them tried first, sounding all mature.

“Maybe you should give up the baritone, it makes you sound 12. I’d rather you sounded the 17 you are.” They had both gasped in shock.

I wasn’t usually that bold, but I had reasons to believe they were both students like us who had cut classes.

They wore socks. Darcy and I still had the sense to remove our socks the moment we were off the school’s premises.

I couldn’t remember their names anymore but unlike us, this wasn’t their first time doing something like this.

They knew every possible way into trouble. However, they forgot to mention that they knew no way out of these troubles.

It was supposed to be a coffee shop. They had amazing coffee, nice biscuits, and dark chocolates. Darcy turned out to be a great fan of coffee and the scent had drawn us there.

We entered with the mind of getting coffee, but Darcy thought of something fun.

“Let me show you my brother’s coffee combo.” She begged.

“This whole adventure is to set you free from your brother, not walk in his steps.” I disagreed.

“I don’t usually drink this, but I’ve always wanted to. He never lets me though. So, if he was here, I wouldn’t be doing this even in my dreams.” She begged.

I agreed. This would help her self-confidence.

I had thought it was a crazy combination. Turned out it was more than a drink. It was a gambling code. There was a secret door.

Gambling was and still is illegal.

It was weird when the man smiled at us and asked us to follow him.

“Which base are you from? I’ve never seen you around here.” He asked Darcy.

“I’m trying out new things.” Darcy smiled back; we both gave each other a weird look.

We should have turned back right after we saw it. But the call for adventure was too strong.

The boys ran quickly to the table like they had done this all their lives. Darcy and I stood there in our skirts trying to look like we belonged there.

Maybe because it was our first time. We didn’t know how deadly gambling was.

We watched the boys lose and laughed at them. Finally, I signaled for us to be on our way. I couldn’t tell the time.

When the boys stood up in defeat, one of the big guys pulled both of them by the shirt. “You boys owe $100000 in total.”

“What?” I exclaimed.

“We don’t have any money.” They mouthed to us.

Darcy and I couldn’t leave them there, so we tried to help. Instead, the whole thing got rowdier.

Until one of the men sitting at the other table stood up and walked towards us.

“What’s going on boys?” He asked in a very confident voice. The perfect baritone. I couldn’t remember his face, but I knew I would never forget that voice.

“These kids owe a million dollars.”

“That’s impossible, we only played for a few minutes,” I argued.

“Look kid, minutes? You’ve been here for three fucking hours.”

What? My mom would be searching for me. She would be scared. What would my dad say?

The man had looked up at me and smiled.

I glared at him.

He laughed at my expression.

“We would like to leave now,” I spoke.

“How do you intend to pay your debt?” He asked. He pulled a chair forward and pulled out a seat. Every other man at the table stood up immediately after he sat.

He seemed to be the boss here.

I took a deep breath.

“How about I challenge you to a game of cards?”