"Chris Mclean", Grandpa Joe started, "is maybe the most amazing chocolatier and confectioner this world has seen in the last hundred years. He came out of nowhere one day, and started making chocolate that made everyone crazy! It was creamy, sweet, and filled with delectable pieces of anything you could imagine. Nuts, nougat, fruit, you name it! Anyway, Chris Mclean established his shop right where it is today almost twenty years ago, but it wasn't always so large: When he first opened it, it was scarcely bigger than this room!"
"That's right! I was the second employee he ever hired", Grandma Georgina continued. "I was only a cashier, but every day I worked there I felt like I had the most important job in the world. Mclean would always stop by with some new chocolate invention of his and ask me to try it. He would ask me what I thought, and he actually listened to me! Well, sometimes he did...depended on the day. But I loved working there. To see the smile on all the childrens' faces as they tasted the sweets still warms my heart to this day. For years, he ran a small shop, needing nothing more than smiles as payment. As well as money, of course. Eventually, he decided to renovate his factory."
Grandma Josephine picked up the story. "When we say renovate, Cameron, we mean he renovated the place. Suddenly, a huge factory popped up where the small one had been. It almost touched the rooftops!"
Cameron interjected. "Wow, is that the same factory that I pass every day on my way to school?"
"You bet it is!", exclaimed Mr. Wilkins. " Why, I remember going there as a child myself. Only the front room of the factory was open, but Chris Mclean himself was there! I remember feeling the same sense of wonder you probably feel whenever you walk by. He was nothing but nice to me, and even encouraged me to keep dreaming. Shame about what happened to him with the spies and all, though."
"Wait, what spies? Did Mr. Mclean hire spies to eliminate his competition? If so, that's a scummy thing to do. Totally removes the respect I was beginning to have for him!", said Cameron.
"Quite the opposite, lad" said Grandpa George. "The spies came for Mr. Mclean! After a while, Mclean noticed that O'Halloran's candy shop across the way had come up with their own version of Sticky Marshmallow Chocolate Bombs. He also noticed that Don's Chocolate somehow invented their own recipe for Crazy Nut Blasters! Mclean was convinced that spies were working among him, so he fired all his workers! There was no chocolate that came out of that factory for years, Cameron! Years!"
"But the factory is still up and running now! How can that be?", asked Cameron. The five adults looked at each other and shrugged innocently.
"No one really knows, bud. One day a couple of years ago a single truck came out of the factory with a fresh supply of chocolate, and the next thing you know, there was a genuine Mclean chocolate shop open downtown!", Mr. Wilkins explained.
"I never thought I'd see it run again...After I was fired, I thought for sure the factory would never open again! But it has, but no one ever goes in to the factory, and no one ever comes out! It's a mystery how they produce all that chocolate.", Grandma Georgina explained.
Cameron took all that in. "How was Mr. Mclean as a person, grandma?"
"Well, I'll tell you the truth. He could be a bit selfish, but when you make chocolate that tastes that good, I believe you have a right to be. Plus, he was always perfectly kind to me. I might even go as far to say he inspired me!"
"If that's the case, I really want to meet this man! I'm going to find one of those golden tickets, and I'm going to go to the factory and I am going to win that lifetime supply of candy!", Cameron shouted eagerly.
Mr. Wilkins winced. "I would love for you to win that prize, son, but unfortunately money is tight."
"But dad, my birthday is in two days.", Cameron said. "I'm gonna get a bar then, right?"
"We'll see, kiddo. Hopefully. Would some TV ease your mind?", Mr. Wilkins asked.
Cameron agreed, and the family gathered around the TV. The same brown-haired boy they had seen reporting the other night was standing outside a house. "Breaking news, everyone! This is Topher Jones from Channel 5 Action News, and we are getting word that one of Chris Mclean's fabled golden tickets has been found! We are live on the scene, and we're going to try and see if we can get an interview with the lucky winner." Topher opened the front door, where there was a full press conference going on in the kitchen. All the microphones were pointed at a rather large young man, with a shock of blonde hair, wearing a white shirt with a teal maple leaf on it. He was currently eating a slab of ribs, paying little mind to the cameras and flashing lights around him. Off to the side stood what looked like his parents, who were similarly rotund.
"Welcome, welcome! One question at a time, please. I'll see if I can get my little Owen to respond!", the woman said, beaming. Topher muscled his way forward and asked, "Owen Moore, how does it feel to be the first winner of the Golden Ticket, and therefore a lifetime supply of candy?"
Owen's ears perked up, and he stopped chewing, face still covered in barbeque sauce. He burped and responded, "Oh, man, it's so great! It'll be awesome for when I get hungry between my first and second lunch! Ya know, as soon as I saw that Mclean was giving away a tour of his factory and a lifetime supply of candy, I went straight to the candy store and bought 10 full boxes. It took a while, but on the seventh box, when I bit into one of the candy bars, I felt something weird. It tasted weird, too. Like spoiled butter. Anyways, I spit it out and saw that it was the corner of the Golden Ticket!"
Topher had a shocked, if not disgusted, look on his face, and it took him a second for him to regain his composure before he continued. "That's great, Owen, now are you going to share any of that candy with me?", he joked lightheartedly.
"No chance, dude! What a stupid question; I'm keeping it to myself!", Owen snarked, apparently missing the joke.
Topher listened to something in his headset. His eyes opened wide, and he headed for the front door. "Th-that's Owen Moore, everyone, the first Ticket winner! But we are just getting word that not only has one Golden Ticket been found today, but a second one has just been uncovered! We send you live over to our...other correspondent", he said with an eye roll, "Sierra Jefferson! She is live with the second winner."
The feed cut from Topher and onto a tall woman with long, braided black hair with purple extensions. She was standing inside a posh living room that looked immaculate. The room was decorated with many paintings and pictures, all of one person, who was sitting on the couch stroking a cat smugly, with her father looking on.
"Ladies and gentlemen, I'm Sierra Jefferson with Channel 5 Action News, and I'm here with the second Golden Ticket finder, Heather Watson!" The girl on the couch smiled and posed for the camera. Heather was a taller Asian girl (not as tall as Sierra), and her raven hair fell straight down to her waist. She was wearing a maroon top with olive shorts, and her hair, neck and wrists were covered in adornments of the finest gems; she obviously came from money. Her smile, however, was anything but genuine: The only genuine thing about her was her attitude.
"Hello, Sierra, and hello to all you other poor people! I won the second Golden Ticket, and you didn't! How does that feel?"
"Pretty bad, actually", Sierra replied. "But nonetheless, how did you find your Golden Ticket, Heather?"
"Not to brag or anything, but my daddy helped me find it!", Heather replied before her father, a tall lanky man with black hair and a pencil-thin mustache spoke.
"Yes, that's quite right. I am Sir Nicholas Watson, and I am in charge of Watson's Peanuts, the largest and most profitable nut factory in the city. I usually don't venture out of the nut business, but when my daughter heard about Mclean's contest, she made it quite difficult for me to refuse helping her."
Heather nodded. "I've become quite good at getting my way. Whenever I want something, I usually just tell my daddy that I want it and he buys it for me. Here, I'll give a demonstration!" Heather then turned to her father and screamed "I WANT A GOLDEN TICKET DADDY! GET ONE FOR ME OR ELSE! YOU DON'T LOVE ME IF I DON'T GET ONE!"
Sierra was quite shaken up by this display, which had almost blown out her microphone, but Heather's father seemed unfazed; on the contrary, he was smiling. "Yes, that's what I came home to every day. I don't mind though. After a couple days of her 'caring loudly' at me, I bought a whole shipment of bars and gave them to my workers. I said to them, 'If no one here finds a Golden Ticket, I'll fire the lot of you!' Luckily for them, one of the workers found it, and here we are!"
"I still would've fired them, daddy,'' Heather said as she pouted. "They didn't thank me for saving their jobs. By the way, I need another pony. I'm bored of the other three."
"Of course, darling" said Mr Watson. "We are all so glad that Heather won the Golden Ticket, because now she is happy. And when Heather is happy, we're all happy."
Sierra took a second before she spoke. "Well, this has been a treat, Heather. Do you have anything else to say to the world before we sign off?"
"As a matter of fact, I do! I just want to tell the world that I won and they didn't! Plus I'm getting a lifetime supply of candy, so beat that, losers!"
Mr. Wilkins shut the TV off. "What horrible children" he said sadly.
The rest of the family murmured their agreement. "Boy, that fat kid really got me mad! All that food and he won't share any of it! Why does he get to have an unlimited supply of candy, and we don't?" said Grandpa George.
"Don't forget that spoiled brat! What was her name again, Heather? She just sounds like pure evil. Thank god you're not like that, Cameron" said Grandma Josephine.
Cameron just sat there in silence. Two tickets already gone. Time was running out.
Thank you for everyone who has been following along and leaving reviews! This is my first fanfic and I am glad that people are liking the story so far! Please don't be shy to critique me or review my work. How did this chapter turn out? I'm happy that I was able to introduce Owen and Heather, but I feel like I may have cut off Mclean's origin story just a bit. Let me know!