Chapter 8

Liam walked out feeling happy about life. It was pretty late and is actually the evening.

Then Liam remined himself that he should watch Phineas and Ferb. Ever since it came out, Liam loved the show. And Liam decided he would eat popcorn with drinks while watching the show.

Liam daydreamed about it as he got on his bike and biked all the way to the store. An episode would come out on around 7:28PM. And Liam was waiting for this show. It would've aired earlier, but a cable incident happened where Disney XD and they were not able to run the show. So, it had to be held until it could run again, and that predicted time was 7:28PM.

Liam then made it to the store. It had a broken sign store with glass. Inside there were shelves. And music played in the background. He walked around and found the popcorn isle. He grabbed a pack and walked towards the counter. The counter guy was a Mexican named Pedro. "You want to buy this? 0.77 cent." Pedro said.

Liam got out his card to pay then he left waving goodbye. Then he went to his house to watch the show eating popcorn and laughing. Then he fell asleep.

Liam woke up the next day early in the morning just in time to see another episode of his favorite show. He watched it until the episode ended then he got up and redressed himself. Then he called his friend Ivan. "Hey Ivan, I don't get much to do so want to come to my place to chill out?" Liam said. "Yeah sure. I'll be there in a few seconds." Ivan said, then he hung up.

I walked outside without any shoes and looked around waiting for his friend Ivan. He looked at the sun and smiled, he was rich, and he could be a billionaire for life! He smiled so much that the sun formed a red smile with red dotted eyes and Liam had to stop smiling and shake his head to get the effect out.

"Hey Liam" Ivan said walking. He was holding something in his hands; it looked like a MP3 player. But it didn't have a wheel. And he actually had to. "Hey Ivan, what are those in your hands" Liam said a bit confused.

"They are bank counters. A new tool where you can check your bank account without needing to go to an ATM! They are edge technology and only you and I have them. He gives one to Liam. It was blue with a black screen. It showed my current money, 3.3 BILLION dollars. And it had options to deposit and withdraw.

Then Liam noticed it had a hole to put in change and to put in money to deposit.

"And you can give money to people just by pointing it to them. I call it the bank card." Ivan said smiling. Liam was impressed; this was probably worth more than Bill Gate's whole career. "Anyways, let's go inside." Liam said. They went inside and watched some Cartoon Network shows. Then they got a very strange ad.

It showed a poor family in a dusty house. They had dust on their faces and were trying to cool themselves. Liam noticed the shelves that were made out of broken wood having no food and them at the dinner table. Even their shirts were dirty and unwashed. There was an older sister and a little older brother with their mother.

"I wish we had food and a good home. With AC too!" The older sister whined. "Me too." Said the mom. Then a guy with a slick back brown hair, white skin and a grey and black suit walks in with the camera panning to his face. Liam and Ivan were very annoyed by this; it was probably does ads where they hire people to act like they are poor and then convince you to join their program.

"Hello, my name is David and are you interested in joining a society with affordable food, free education and homes? With no crime rate? Then sign up for David's society. We spent years on this project building the skyscrapers and neighborhoods! So, show your love for our hard work and sign up now!" The guy with a slick back said.

Then it shows the family now rich and happy thanking him. Curtains close and it shows the number to contact. And it will only be going for a week. "Wow what a weird ad. We don't need it! We're rich!" Ivan said. Liam smiled but then a noise came from their bank counters. It showed they were at 0 dollars. It had a description onto why.

Turns out that a kid like Ivan having more money than the US is like giving Hitler atomic bombs. He bombed it by making terrible choices which made them to go bankrupt. And because Liam kicked the door, people are going for his head at a range of 2,000 dollars, and compared to others it is not much but it is still bad.

"Wow Ivan. Now we got no choice, good job man." Liam said with sarcasm. Ivan sighed as they both got out their phones to make a phone call. It took some time, and Liam tapped his feet as he waited. Then it finally answered. "Hello, this is Davids society calling. To apply you must state your name, sex, and race." It sounded like a woman. "Okay so I am Liam Freelance, I am male, and I am black. African American." "Okay got it. You will be given a letter in a week. It will show if you are accepted or not." Then she hung up. Ivan finished his call a few seconds later.

"Alright I'm going to ask if anyone else is going to participate. Maybe we can make a plan to make sure we are more likely to enter." Ivan said.

THE FIRST day:

They noticed that there were posters advertising it. They took them down and went to the abandoned factory to burn them. It was pretty hard to do cause Liam was wanted dead or alive.

They also tried to make it seem like it was the worst place to ever go to. And after that they got tired and laid down.

The SECOND day:

They saw people had paper advertising it in their mailboxes. So, they took it out and ripped it to pieces. They got pretty tired after that and went home.

THE THIRD DAY:

They gaslit people into thinking it never existed.

The fourth day: Because Liam was wanted, they had to skip this day and the next day too because there were too many people after their head.

THE SIXTH DAY: Liam felt pretty nervous. The letter would come in the very next day.

THE FINAL DAY:

Liam woke up. He got on his shoes and a basic shirt with his socks on. He looked in the mirror to make sure he looked good, and he did. Then after that he got on his phone to call Ivan. "Hye Ivan, you got your letter?" Liam asked. "Yes, I have it. I'm going to come to your place so we can open it at the same time." Ivan said. Then he hung up leaving Liam alone.

Liam anxiety and impatience to see was extremely nerve wracking, Liam was sweating even thinking if he failed. Then Liam jumped outside and then opened the mailbox. There it was a white envelope with blue circles. He had the primal urge to grab it and rip it open to see what was inside.

He waited a few minutes, and Ivan still was not there, so he decided to grab the envelope to open it. There was a folded letter inside in light blue. He opened it to see bold black letters say "Use a coin to scratch off the metallic on it. If you get a YES, YES, YES on it, you get starter money, starter house, and starter food with a starter job. If you get two YES and one No you get a starter house with starter food. If you two Nos and 1 Yes, you get only a starter house. If they are all No's, you get nothing and get to stay home."

Liam then pulled out the bank counter he still had to scratch it off. The first one was a no; second one was a no. Liam was starting to sweat. If he didn't get a yes, he couldn't go! He scratched the last one off, and it said NO. Liam stood still with tears flowing down his eyes. His face didn't show his sadness, his tears did.

Then Ivan called out. "SORRY I WAS KINDA LATE LIAM; I GOT TOO EXCITED AND OPENED IT BEFOREHAND. AND I GOT TWO YES AND ONE NO! I AM SO HAPPY!" Ivan said cheerfully. Then Ivan arrived and the first thing he noticed was his tears and him holding the paper. Ivan snatched it from him and saw he got all No's. "Damn man, that is tuff. But at least I get to go. They say we are going Monday so this is going to be our last day together." Ivan said.

 "Oh" Liam said. His hopes and dreams were destroyed, and Ivan would leave him in the dust. His hopes of escaping to a better life have faded and would grow up to be miserable. But even then, Liam decided to have one more day together.

"Alright, then let's park some people before you go. Our bullies, neighbors, teachers" Liam said with a fake smile hiding his tears. "Yeah, sure man. Let's troll our teachers I know where they live" Ivan said smiling.

Then they got on their bikes to ride to their teacher's house. He was the math teacher, Mr. Wunce. He was very mean and miserable and gave kids unreasonable amount of homework. So before going it'd be right to give them some payback. So, they got on their bikes and biked to the teacher house.

Although he was miserable, he was rich and owned a big mansion. And it had armed security guards that once shot down a baby because it wandered into the front gates. So, if they were not careful, they would get shot down and game the fuck over. They saw the guards stand at opposite sides of the entrance they took one good look at the boys and gave them the signal to leave or be shot.

They pretended like they left but they actually sneaked to the back. Then they realize something, that they didn't fully plan this through. They would just find them and shoot them. But luckily, Ivan always carries handguns. So, he gave Liam one with a few magazines then they jumped over the fence then started to sneak around. The front yard was massive, so they were a fair distance away, but then they realized their second mistake. There were guards at the back. Shit