To everyone that is new to the book or rereading it. I am in the process of editing the beginning 20-30 chapters because of how old they are. So they might not connect with the actual story. I'll try to edit one each day. So right now it might be confusing if you read the story now. But thank you and hope you enjoy it.
"We found you a close friend of your parents who they put you to live with if something ever happened to them." The lady from the system said. I rolled my eyes.
I was sitting in the same stupid office that I've been traveling in and out of for years. Ever since my dad went to jail and my mom up and died. It felt more like a jail cell than a room of the people who are supposed to "help me'. Not like CPS ever does anything.
The room was bleak and beige. A normal wooden chair in front of a wooden desk and metal pullout cabinets behind Juliet. The woman who is supposed to take care of me this time. She had dull brown hair and brown eyes. Like most of the CPS workers, it seems like she has given up on life and is just going through the motions.
She most likely already has her mind set on who I am and where I'm going based on the stupid file of me. Is she most likely right, yes. But that doesn't mean I can't be annoyed about it.
I rubbed my face with my hands sighing. "I'm almost eighteen, why can't I live by myself? " I asked her, again. This whole time I've basically been ignoring her and asking the same question. She is either deaf or doesn't give a fuck
"Because your record isn't the cleanest." She stated in the same monotone voice while going through the papers in her hands. Not looking up at me once.
"That wasn't my fault. You saw who I was living with. Now she lost custody and is in rehab." I leaned back and crossed my arms over my chest and my legs over themselves. Juliet looked at me with pity. I fucking hate pity, you don't know me so keep it to your fucking self.
"How about the time before that?" Juliet questioned not buying it for a second. "Which one to be exact, there's a lot." she forced a smile then ignored me. I frowned and closed my eyes thinking back to all the shit that led me here.
During middle school, my mom got diagnosed with pancreas cancer. The problem with that is my family at the time was lower middle class so we could barely afford to take care of her. What was worse is that it turned into stage 4 pancreatic cancer has a five-year survival rate of 1 percent. The average patient diagnosed with late-stage pancreatic cancer will live for about 1 year after diagnosis. So she ended up passing away during my freshman year of high school.
Now I and my dad were in millions of dollars in debt because of the hospital bills. But he acted like it was alright and still let me do dance making us in an even worse situation. Not wanting to stress my dad out while coping with my mother's death I drowned myself with school work, clubs, and dance. I was an overachiever and graduated with all A's.
But my dad started to lose it with grief from the loss of my mother. He was coping with it even worse than I was and started to turn to substances like alcohol and drugs. Soon he decided to fix our financial issues by trying to rob a bank high off his ass on meth. He wasn't armed with a gun thankfully but the dumbass had the meth on him and ended up injuring people physically. It wasn't a lot but he was still charged for that on top of the battery. Getting himself six years of jail time and leaving me alone at the end of my sophomore year.
During that time I was coping with my drug-addicted depressed dad and nonexistent mother. Then I ended up meeting him, my ex. The complete opposite of what I was and was trying to be. He and his friends were the kids that got into fights with anyone, drank and smoke in class, ran from the cops, and just did stupid illegal shit. And I loved it, I was desperate for an escape. And it was my escape.
Then the system came in and decided to move me to my godmother, my Aunt Trisha, and Uncle George. What they didn't know is that they owned a strip club and bar and uncle George was a creep and Trisha was a bitch. So if I wanted dinner I had to participate. Either making drinks at the bar or dancing in the cages or on stage. And my aunt would try to beat me if she saw my uncle show any interest in me.
My boyfriend loved it, encouraged it honestly. But I started spiraling during that time. With the toxic relationship, my dad, my mom, my abusive uncle, and my aunt. Me and my boyfriend started to become unhealthy and toxic but we could never end it. He needed me and I needed him because his life sucked too. So he would cheat on me, then I would spiral and hate him. Hook up with his friend or do something stupid only to have angry makeup sex and start all over again. It was hell.
Then my Aunt and Uncle got caught for doing shady stuff and letting a minor work at a strip club. Getting me yanked back into the system and landing with my aunt on my mom's side during my senior year. Too bad Olivia ended up being a raging alcoholic that had a different man come over to her shitty trailer house every other day. Then me and my boyfriend ended up getting into it pretty bad and had a bad break, again. Sending me off the edge and I got caught with drugs and alcohol in my system as I was fighting a bitch at a party that was crashed by the police. Sending me onto probation where I had to stay clean for a few months, do community service, and was on house arrest for a bit. During that time Olivia OD'ed, she survived thankfully and was taken to rehab. Leaving me homeless once again and without a boyfriend to stay with or rely on that understood. But at that moment it made me want to stay clean at least.
After that, I started to live with my best friend and it has been a few weeks since. The system has been freaking out trying to find where to put me. I thought it was going to be some shitty group home but apparently, one of my mom's friends came forward. She volunteered to take me in. But that catch is, is that she lives in another fucking town hours away from here.
"We know, but that doesn't excuse you from it nor what happened." I sighed; whatever, I knew this was going to happen anyway. She reached back and yanked out another file from her metal cabinet in the back, "I'm going to ask you a few questions now."
"Wait, hold up, I want to ask a question first. Olivia went to rehab a few weeks ago and I've been completely fine. Even before that, I was fine," I paused for a second, "ish, fine-ish. Besides that I have friends, I like it here. No one judges because they all have their own crap I had to deal with. So why do I have to leave now when I can live with a friend?" Juliet took a breath.
"That's not how it works Chris and you know that. Now please let me ask you these questions." She looked up at me this time seeing if I would cooperate. I leaned back once again and moved my hand in the air, standing for her to go.
"Well have you been stable, no thoughts or actions, participating in anything bad or indulging in anything more than you should?" I knew what she was talking about and I've been clean for a few months now since I was put on probation. I nodded because she knew that. "Then let's continue," she asked me more questions about life, health physically and mentally, including other things.
"You will have to move in with this family. But your dad might come back or another relative. Be happy it's at least a family friend. " I forced a smile before letting it drop quickly. After her blabbering on some more, I could finally go. I went outside to my bike and biked to Yaz's house.
When I got there I went to the door. They had a little chair by it, not for sitting though. But forgetting the house key. It was tapped on the ceiling outside. I moved the chair and stood on it. Grabbed the key and quickly unlocked the door, then put the key and the chair back. I walked inside and shut the door.
"Yo, Yaz, I'm back!" I yelled inside the house. Her parents weren't home yet because it was a break for us, but they still had work. Then her siblings were at their friend's houses or were in their rooms. She has 1 older brother, 2 younger brothers, and a sister close to her age. She was the oldest out of all of them.
My best friend Yaz came barreling out of the hallway connected to the living room wearing a robe that used to be white but is now colored by hair dye stains. Her black curly hair with bleached ends going up to her chin, dripping water as her brown eyes swiveled wide. Her tan skin was wet with drops of water from her hair as she clutched a pink hairdryer in her hands over her shoulder as if it were a baseball bat. Once she saw me she dropped her defensive stance and laughed.
"Sup girl, you scared me, and I thought you'd be back later. And when you came into the house and yelled I was like shit! Someone broke, then I almost grabbed the hairdryer to beat the shit out of you. Then I realized you're the only one that calls me Yaz-"
"Yaz you're rambling again." I smiled and shook my head. "Oh yeah. " she laughed. "Well, how'd it go?" I cringed at her question. "Less than stellar." She walked over and wrapped her arm around mine. "Let's go to my room and talk about it." I laughed. She's in for a ride.
We went into her small room that had a twin-sized bed with gray sheets and a white blanket. There is a pullout bed underneath that I sleep on. Her walls were covered in anime posters, band posters, and pictures of her and her friends. Her room didn't have an actual light so she had a lamp on her dresser that she used. Other than the junk lying around her room was pretty bleak.
She dragged me in then sat on her bed making room for me. Even though it was minuscule because she was lying down. "Okay, talk." She demanded. Not putting up any fight I rehashed the details from the meeting. She already knew everything else.
"Damn, that sucks girl, But you can't move. We just started getting you back to your old self. Before those asshats and witches made you depressed and psycho and one of them. " She teased. I pretended I was hurt and clutched my chest, "Damn Yaz really had to call me out like that." She just shrugged and smiled.
"I know I'm evil but a witch is too much." She shoved my arm, "And I don't think depressed and psycho go together." She snorted. "Maybe, but for you they sure as hell do," she argued, clearly not taking any of my bullshit.
"I'm not sure if you were depressed when you acted like a completely wild animal. Especially when you were with," I gave her a look telling her she better not say his name. She nodded and winced at me, telling me she understood. "With dick face, y'all went at it like animals. Like damn you would think you were a y/n character." I barked out a laugh knowing full well that was pretty accurate.
"I guess I did go off the rails, but your mom decided to say peace out. Your dad thought he was in fucking GTA. Having to live with unstable drug and alcohol addicts, have to 'dance' just to be treated with a little bit of respect. Live where dirty and untrustworthy guys and people come to your house for sex. Dept and more dept. Started to drink and get high and having sex to forget about all my issues. As you said, I lost my marbles." I stated overdramatically and sarcastically. Trying to make it sound funnier than it was. Yaz was one of the few people that really knew all the emotional shit that I was going through. And one of the reasons why I loved her was because she never tried to comfort me or pity me. She was just like 'that sucks bruh'.
Yaz snorted and cringed, "Major understatement. A few screws were loose up there. You acted like a complete and utter dumb ass, like an actual maniac."
"That's why I now have a tattoo on my hip over some cigarette burn marks saying "live life like there's no tomorrow' in french. And yes it does say that, thankfully." Yaz rolled over on her bed to face me. Her rob started to open but neither one of us cared.
She let her smile drop and got serious for a second. "Please don't continue, we all know what happens next and you and I both don't want to relive it." I nodded my head in total agreement. but at least you can still drink at parties if you want to go. " I shook my head.
"No way, maybe a beer but that would be it. But maybe Juliet was right. Maybe leaving this town and the memories would be good. Start fresh, try to stay my demons, and become 100% me again, not 75 or 50." She nodded and sat up.
" I don't know, I'm going to miss my number one partner in crime. " I laughed at her, knowing full well I was the only one doing said crimes. "Yeah, we did a lot of stupid crap together." We started to reminisce about the good times. "Like it was raining outside for once during class and you asked the teacher if you could go out in the rain and she said no. So you asked what would happen if you just left and she said detention. So you grabbed my arm and opened up the window and out in the pouring rain! " I started laughing.
"I do remember that! I started dancing and singing then more people from class joined till it was all of us. Then more classes started coming out!"
"Yes! We all looked like drenched rats. We acted like kids again." she sighed in between laughing. "That was fun."
"Sure was. " she glared at me. "Now I feel like crying you jerk." She shoved my shoulder. I laughed and side bumped her. Then put my pinkie out. She wrapped hers around it. That was a little thing that we did since freshman year when we met each other in creative writing.
"Now I'm really going to cry," she whined and started fanning her face before throwing her head into her bed. I smiled at her antics before getting one of my usual impulsive, possibly regret later ideas. "Okay whatever, I have an idea." she looked up from her blanket, eyes misty.
"What?" She whipped her face.
"Do you still have that red hair dye we bought a while ago?" She looked at me skeptically. "And you have the tips of your hair bleached." She nodded, " so let's dye your hair. Sort of like the last hurrah. " she started to smile.
"My mom will kill me." she tried to deflect half-heartedly. I shrugged my shoulders, "I'll be leaving soon and at worse, she will cut it off. And you have been complaining about doing that for a while now. It's permanent and she should be used to our shenanigans by now."
My argument seemed to work on her because she jumped up from the bed and ran out of the room. Then came back with a tube of red hair dye and gloves. It's not our first rodeo when it comes to randomly dyeing or cutting hair so we were prepared.
We ran to the bathroom and spent an hour on her hair. And must I say it came out great a dark-colored red. Similar to my hair but artificial. I already have deep ruby-colored hair. Naturally, I might add, so we didn't dye my hair, and wouldn't do anything.
"You look great." She smiled and waved her light brown and red hair.
"Do I look emo like you yet?" She made a fish face while I scoffed at her. "Oh my god, it looks so natural. The curtain totally matches the drapes." she gave me a look. It's an inside joke we've had for a while. My hair catches a lot of attention and the first time we talked was because an asshole came over and asked me that. The emo is because I only wear black and she thinks it's because I don't have a soul.
"Okay maybe you're in denial but being emo isn't a bad thing. It's just something people do to classify people because apparently everyone needs a label. Like, come on. Anyways thanks for the dye." We ended up talking the rest of the night and watching Vampire Diaries on her tablet.
Once we heard her parents come home we wrapped her hair in a towel and started negotiations. Trying to convince them to let her dye her hair. Thankfully they said yes because we would have been in so much trouble.
I've always been thankful to Yaz and her family because they were always there for me. Even though they have a big family and financial issues like everyone in the town they still tried. They helped keep me grounded, taught me how to cook, and even taught me a good amount of Spanish because that was their first language. I definitely didn't want to leave that. But they had a big family and didn't need me sticking around anymore no matter how much I try to deny it.