Red-Haired Rookie Chapter 2

Roy froze to the spot facing his wife, Sylvia. He could tell she was upset. Her hands were on her hips, her posture was straight and she glanced at Roy with a judgemental look on her face. Nervous Roy didn’t say anything. Finally, she spoke...

“I thought you’d be back by 11, Roy?”

Roy thought fast and quickly thought of an excuse. 

“Sorry love… Traffic was a nightmare.” He began.

“I would’ve called you sooner, but no phone boxes were around”.

She wasn’t buying it. “Yeah… Nice try, Roy!” Sylvia replied. “I know you were out street racing again.”

Roy couldn’t lie anymore. His wife had caught him in the act. He had to come clean.

“Sigh… Yes, I was.” He admitted sadly. “But I also went and did the shopping like you asked.” He held up a Tesco bag with pride and enthusiasm as if trying to defuse the situation. But if there’s one thing his wife was good at, it was staying on topic. 

“That still doesn't excuse the fact you went street racing, Roy!” Sylvia replied.

“We talked about this! Now that we have a daughter we must leave this street racing business behind and look out for our daughter. So, she doesn’t grow up to have a Dad with a criminal record.” 

“It can’t be that bad!” Roy said, trying his best to defuse the situation. That didn’t help. “Oh really?!” yelled Sylvia. “Then why were you taking off the car's number plates?!” 

Roy stammered then stopped. And then he sighed while looking into his wife’s cross yet concerned face. “How did she see that?” he thought. “I’ve also been listening to the radio.” Sylvia continued. “And when a traffic update came on it said something about an accident involving a police car. The woman reading the traffic update also said that the police car was chasing two hot hatchbacks.” 

At this point her eyes narrowed. “And one of the cars was identified as a white Astra GTE.” There was silence for a moment. Sylvia could see her husband was upset.

Roy thought hard about what Sylvia said. He loved racing a lot but couldn’t help but feel that Sylvia was right. He wasn’t sure what to do so he said 

“Look… I will try my best to stop, okay?”

Sylvia gave a comforting smile. “I know this is hard, but it’s for the best, Roy. Now we look out for our daughter.” She spoke. “But what do I do now?” Roy asked. “I haven’t got a job anymore. You’ve been doing all the work around here for at least a whole year.” 

Sylvia thought for a moment and eventually said “there are some jobs being advertised in the yellow pages book. You could try that.” 

Roy still wasn’t sure. But he felt too concerned to say anything. So, he said nothing. He headed off to bed and Sylvia followed. 

As Sylvia got the bed ready, Roy checked on Ruby. He peaked round the door to see her fast asleep with a big smile on her face. His daughter was one of the happiest things that’s happened to him. Being 10 years old Ruby was in Year 5 and after looking at her test results, Roy could tell that she had a promising future. Roy smiled and said calmly “Goodnight, my little gift sent from above.” He closed the door and turned to the bedroom he and Sylvia shared.

As they both got into bed, Roy tossed and turned. He couldn’t get to sleep. He then thought about Ruby and said before falling asleep.

“Now I know I must change. “

And indeed, he did.

So what change did Roy make?

How promising a future did Ruby have?

How did Roy know this to be true?

Read Chapter 3 Here!