Amaya's POV
The high school was exactly the same.
Literally not one thing was out of place.
I led us towards the main office where mami said I needed to grab my keys.
We walked in an the secretary Señora Garcia was still there. After all her years I expected her to retire soon.
Well more like 6 years ago but what do I know?
"Can I help you? School doesn't start until next week."
"Yes, I know that. My name is Amaya Jackson. My mother Mrs. Sanchez said this is where I should pick up my keys."
"Your keys. Keys are for teachers only. Not high schoolers."
"Señora, I graduated almost 7 years ago. From this high school. And he, well I don't know if he graduated but I'm a teacher here."
"Oh! I'm sorry. What was your name again?"
"Amaya Jackson. Or AJ Sanchez. I don't know what they have me down as now."
The old woman got up from her computer chair and puttered over to the back room.
"I graduated by the way." Oscar says making me turn around.
"I didn't know if you did." He nodded.
"You were at my graduation. With your mom." He says quietly.
Before I could ask more questions the old woman returned with a big yellow envelope with 'AJ Sanchez' written across it.
"Here ya go. Room N-237. Oh Mr. Diaz, I'd like to thank you about Walter." I turned around but Oscar avoided my eye contact.
"No problem at all. Call again if you need something." She thanked him and then I thanked her.
We walked over to the elevator which I finally had a key to.
No way in hell am I about to walk up 2 flights of stairs with this backpack.
"So who's Walter?"
"Her husband. Prophet$ tried robbing him."
"And you helped how?"
His silence was his tell.
I just nodded and walked out of the elevator when it dinged at the second floor.
We walked down the hall halfway to my new classroom. It was definitely the same as when I was last in this room.
"You're the new computer teacher?"
I heard sounds of amusement as he asked his question. It pissed me off.
"Yes. Why?"
He just shook his head at me and grabbed his coffee.
I pulled out my laptops from my backpack. Setting up my desk just like I like it.
Clean and organized.
Oscar trailed the room looking at all the programming posters and what not.
He finally sat down at a desk and I started to work. New security systems, firewalls, all being downloaded and programmed.
These shitheads weren't gonna be able to embarrass me or themselves.
No porn or playing games.
Strictly computer programming and Word.
Oscar kept staring at me. I noticed every time I looked up he just be sitting there 10 feet away staring at me. It didn't feel weird or perverted.
It felt like he was just simply seeing me.
My work wasn't done but my time in the classroom came to an end as the teachers were gathering in the quad to start the first facility meeting.
Lead by my mother.
"Good Morning! As we all know the school year is soon upon us. Let us go forth and change the minds of these young people."
I thought that Oscar had the idea to stay in the classroom but I felt someone brush up against me and he was there.
"Change the minds of some kids who grew up here? All they can do is tell them not to join a gang."
"That doesn't work."
"How do you know?" He whispers as teachers gather by their respected subjects.
"Look at you and then look at me." Oscar stepped back and looked at me.
"One of us had a choice. The other didn't." I stepped back to go join the other teacher in the computer department but stopped.
"We both had that choice and you know it."
"What does that mean?" He throws back at me.
"I could have been you. All I had to do was open my mouth and say I wanted it. All you had to do was walk away like I actually did. But we both made our decisions."
"'It's not about making the right choice. It's about making a choice and making it right.'" He says to me.
"J.R. Rim." He nods.
"I made my choice and now I'm making it right."
"But how? There's still gang violence all over town."
"But which gang is causing the violence? Cause its sure as hell not us."
I scoff.
Oscar gets mad.
"Says the one with teardrop." I add to the burning pile of shit we just lit.
"Hables en voz alta por una hyna que vivio la vida." (You speak loud for a woman who lived the life.)
"Lived. Past tense."
"You can take the hyna out of the ghetto. But you can't take the ghetto outta the hyna."
I want to slap him. So badly.
Oscar's POV
God she pisses me off.
'We both had a choice.'
No the fuck I didn't.
She did because even when we all expected her to join the gang, we all knew she'd leave.
At least I knew she'd leave.
With her papi gone and no one around to 'protect' her like him, Amaya would always choice herself over the family.
As fucked up as we were as a 'family' we were one. At least I thought of all of us as a giant disfunctional, homicidal, gang family.
Amaya left to go join the other computer teacher and I walked over to Señora Sanchez.
"Hola Oscar. How's it going with her?"
"I forgot how headstrong she was."
"AJ definitely got that from her daddy not me. I was always 'go with the crowd'. Just don't forget Oscar, she's still the same girl. She just has some walls built up a little better than years ago. AJ will come around to Freeridge, it's her home."
"I told her 'you can take the girl out of the ghetto but you can't take the ghetto out of the girl'. Amaya knows that this is her home cause we all know it is."
"Like you said, she might have gotten out but she's still herself. So watch yourself because you Santos may think I'm the crazy one but you have to remember that she was raised by a Santo. AJ's got my crazy plus her daddy's thrill factor making her a bomb waiting to go off."
I nodded at Señora Sanchez.
She was right.
Amaya was a Santo.
She lived and breathed as a Santo. She may have never been inducted into the Santos our way but she was always one from birth.
Just like me.
That was fucking terrifying.
I remember her running from cops just like the rest of us. Getting in just as much trouble as us when we'd get caught. Getting in even more trouble with us when Cuchillos found out and they had to bailed us out.
Hyna might have run away from our life but she's back.
Amaya made her choice and then took it back.
Because she's back now.
Like it or not, Amaya was a Santo now more than ever.