Chance of Fate

Sitting at the kitchen table with her face down, her head throbbing like mad, a blurry scene popped in her head. An image of a distraught, angry woman with a small, little boy cowering in the corner. The little boy tried covering his eyes, crying he yelled out, “Mommy don’t!” The woman yanked the boy’s arm and pushed him back down. Chance’s heart raced as a lump formed in her throat. Fear took hold of the boy as he stood waiting in anticipation. His heart thumped in his chest, ringing through Chance’s ears.

Cold beads of sweat formed across her forehead, perspiration dribbled down over her eyes. Chance wiped her hand across her damp hair thinking, “Why do I keep having these visions?” Covering her eyes, she couldn’t bear to witness any more of what was happening. It was too much to watch. She saw and felt everything the boy did. She was looking through his eyes and reliving every moment of terror he experienced.

The boy wailed louder, kicking and screaming on the floor while the woman held him down with one hand and slapped him across the face with the other hand leaving a deep, red welt. Chance’s body then shook, convulsing as the woman dragged the boy up with the shirt of his collar, tearing the fabric. Yanking him like a lifeless doll, she struck the dark haired boy again, this time with so much force the boy flew across the room. The boy lay cold and stationary trying not to make a move. The last thing he wanted was to entice her. He hoped and prayed the punishment would stop and she would leave. The blonde woman stood up almost toppling over with a wine bottle in her hand. Tossing it in the trash, she cursed out loud at the boy, “I don’t know why I ever had you!” She continued assaulting the child as she walked out of the room slamming the door behind her.Chance saw the weak boy crawl from where he lay back to the corner. He sat there wrapping his arms around his body trying to form a protective coon from the world. He rocked himself back and forth humming softly trying to forget what just happened, although that was impossible. His eyes brimmed full of tears, red and blood shot, the hopelessness and fear etched upon his face. Every single emotion the boy held flooded Chance. Just than blackness took over, she raised her hand to her head. Light headed, the room circled around her, leaving her in a dizzy state of mind. Her head grew more heavy as she collapsed flat on the table. sweaty hair matted, tangled about her face with a hint of blood dripping down from the corner of her nose.

“Chance, are you all right hun? You look upset. You look like you’ve been running a marathon with how sweaty you are.” said Alexia, unaware of what just happened to her daughter. Chance’s mother had come walking in the kitchen sophisticated as always with her blonde silky hair smoothed back in soft shiny waves, wearing a chic chocolate skirt, cream blouse, diamond necklace with matching diamond earrings and bracelet.

Chance didn’t respond to her mother’s voice. She sat at the table with her arms outstretched and face down. Panicking her mother shook her daughter’s body. “Chance, what’s wrong? Chance!” She shook Chance harder trying to jolt her daughter awake.

Chance gasped for breath, swiping her hand across her nose to clean the bits of blood that had dribbled down. Surprised to see her mother staring at her with a perplexed look on her face, Chance mumbled, “Oh sorry, I didn’t notice you come in. I was just sitting here. I guess I got lost in thought.”

“Something just happened and I’m concerned. You collapsed right here at the table. I will take you to the doctor for a full checkup. Don’t try talking yourself out of it because you’re going. We have talked little any more. It seems here lately you’ve been lost in thought a lot. Is there something on your mind you want to talk about?”

“No, not really. I’m all right. I need time to myself for awhile.” Chance said wondering why her mother was acting interested in her life right now. Never did she care what was going on with her. Her mother was always too busy with whatever social event she had to attend. Appearances was important with her mother. Appearances and her interior design business she ran.

Chance’s mother, Alexia Montgomery was from a well to do family, prominent and powerful. With Alexia everything had to be perfect and sometimes caring for a family was not high on her priority list. What mattered to her was how she appeared to her friends, wearing designer clothes and entertaining socialites at her house. She wanted to be a better mother, but she was clueless as to how. She thought often how her own mother abandoned her when she needed her most and the promise she made to herself to not put her own daughter through that. And here she was doing what her mother did to her. Alexia felt a failure in every sense and seeing her daughter suffering and going through something so emotional brought back some painful memories, memories that were unsettling and something she cared not to think about. She wanted to get closer to Chance. God knows she was not close to her own mother. But how could she get close to her daughter when her daughter always shut her out. From the day Alexia laid eyes on her she knew deep in her heart that Chance was different, something special and set apart from the rest.

Alexia looked at her daughter with a warm caring in her eyes. “You know Chance I do care about you, whether you see it or not. I want the best for you and I want to be a better mother to you.”

“If you want so much to be a better mom than you should start by not being so self absorbed and wrapped up in your little world where everything has to do with superficial, meaningless things that matter nothing to me. I don’t care about money or social status, only you do. How about for once you see me for me, accept me for the person I am and actually spend time with me.” Chance said with strong conviction.

“That felt good,” Chance thought to herself. To tell her mother what she felt about her, even if it meant it hurt her feelings. Sometimes the truth hurt and her mother needed to hear that. Her mind slipped back to the vision she had earlier. She searched her mind trying to figure out what the images meant, who these people were and if they meant something to her.

All Chance knew was that she would not have any kind of normal, peaceful life until she found out the reason for her visions. If it was the last thing she did she would set out to find out why these visions were occurring.

Snapped out of her thoughts and brought back to reality by her mother, “I would like if we spend a bit of quality one on one mother daughter time. That would be nice. We could spend a day shopping and go to the spa for beauty treatments. Your father is supposed to be back Sunday night from his business trip. How about we go Saturday afternoon before he gets in, would you enjoy that?”

“Yeah, mom that sounds nice.” Chance said with a grim solemn voice, “I’m sure it will be a day I’ll never forget. We can plan on something Saturday, that is if something else more important in your life doesn’t come up.”