Young Writers Society

Hi, new story idea that's been churning for a while. This will eventually be a romance centered story but it will probably take a good few chapters for that aspect to be introduced. It's mainly grammar that i need help with, especially in the dialogue. But if you could let me knowwhat you think of the story so far as well i'd appreciate it.

By the way i'm English so if there's any words or anything you don't understand, feel free to ask.

Thanks :)

Lucky Me

Chapter One

I was running late, again. Not surprising. Anyone who knows me will tell you that as a rule, I’m late for everything. Not on purpose of course, time just seems to slip away from me. But tonight was important, and this queue was taking forever.

Pulling my phone out of my bag, I looked at the screen and sighed loudly. I had 20 minutes to get out of this wretched place, catch the bus to town and walk the rest of the way up to the restaurant. The bus alone was a thirty minute journey. I was tempted to catch a taxi, but pay day was a long way off and my bank balance was looking dire already.

Shuffling forward slightly I looked around me. I was in line at the cigarette counter at the local co-op, but considering I worked here the other six days of the week, it’s really not where I wanted to be on my day off. However my cravings were kicking in. I’d managed to go all day without a cigarette, which for me was actually pretty good, but there was no way I was gonna last on a night out without my fix.

Looking across at the checkouts I caught the eye of one of the male colleagues, Adam. He’d been not-so-subtly eyeing me up, his eyes travelling up and down my body until finally reaching my face.

“Hey Liv,” he said, flushing a little at being caught. “You look nice, where you going?”

“Town for my best friends twenty first,” I replied. “You gonna be out tonight?” I didn’t really know Adam that much, he was new at work but I’d seen him in a couple of bars and clubs before. While he wasn’t really my type….he had a couple of friends who were positively yummy.

“Nah, I’m skint ‘til pay day. You have a good night though,” he replied, smiling.

“Cya later,” he said, turning his attention away from me as a customer started unloading their shopping onto his checkout.

“Bye.”

I was almost at the front of the queue now so I opened my bag and took out my purse, pulling out a ten pound note to be ready. Someone tapped me on the shoulder and I turned around to face a little old lady with huge round glasses and a friendly face.

“Here, I think you just dropped this dear,” she said, handing me a crumpled lottery ticket, her hands shaking.

“Oh, thank you, it must have fallen out of my purse,” I said, smiling back at her. She was small and frail looking and my heart went out to her a little bit. She must have been at least ninety, if the lines on her face were any indication.

“It’s ok dear, good luck.” I didn’t know what she meant at first, until I remembered the lottery ticket in my hand.

“Thanks,” I said, turning back around and walking the short distance up to the counter.

“Wow, someone’s dressed to impress,” said Laura, the girl behind the counter. I’d known Laura for a couple of years now, she’d worked here longer than me and we’d been out on a couple of work do’s together.

“Thanks,” I replied happily. I was wearing a new dress, it was short and black with a strappy back and the material clung tightly to my body. I’d paired it with black stiletto shoe boots and soft wavy hair. My make-up was a little heavier than normal, part of the reason why I was running late, but all in all I was rather pleased with the look. I didn’t get to dress up very often these days, so when I got the chance I tried to make the most of it.

“What can I get you?” Laura asked, looking and sighing at the queue behind me. I knew that feeling, she was in for a long night.

“Twenty Marlboro light please,” I smiled consolingly at her as she rolled her eyes and grabbed the cigarettes.

“That’s seven thirty six please,” she said, and I grimaced as I handed her the money. “I know, the price of cigarettes is ridiculous these days, makes me glad I quit last year.”

“I wish I could quit,” I said. “I’ve tried, but this place drives me up the wall. I don’t know what I’d do if I didn’t have a smoke to calm me down.” She handed me my change as we chuckled conspiratorially.

“Did you want me to check that for you?” She asked, nodding at the lottery ticket I still held.

“Erm, yeah actually you can do,” I said, giving her the ticket. I had dozens of old lottery tickets that had never been checked in my other bag. I just always forget and then end up throwing them away when the clutter gets to be too much.

Laura quickly straightened out the ticket, conscientious of the ever growing queue, and shoved it into the machine. The motors in the machine whizzed and gurgled before eventually spitting the ticket back out.

“Sorry,” said Laura. "It’s been playing up all day.” She tried it again, but the machine was having none of it.

“Don’t worry about it, it won’t be a winner anyway,” I said. The clock was ticking and I really needed to get a move on, not to mention the impatient customers behind me whispering and moaning.

“Hang on a sec I’m just gonna key it in,” said Laura determinedly. She pulled a face as she concentrated on entering the long sequence of numbers from the ticket. Finally she looked up and smiled as the machine made the noise again, this time printing out a small piece of paper.

“Oh looks like you’ve-“ Laura started to say before she looked back at the screen. “Oh my god,” she said, her eyes momentarily flitting up at me before going back to the screen.

“What? What is it? Are you alright?” I asked a little worried, her face had gone pale and she was still staring at the screen.

“Oh my god,” she said again, before shaking her head and finally acknowledging me. “Olivia, you’ve won.”

“What? What do you mean I’ve won? How much?” I’d won on the lottery before on a couple of occasions, only small amounts though, the most being ten pounds.

“You’ve won the jackpot!” She said excitedly. “You’ve won twelve million quid!”

“Shut up, you’re taking the piss!” I smiled, honestly believing that she was messing with me. She was known for being a bit of a prankster, her April fools pranks were thestuff of legend, so you had to be a little wary of her sometimes. But then she handed me the small ticket that the machine had reluctantly spat out.

And on it it said:

JACKPOT WINNER!

£12,736,823.66

And then I feinted.