anything (a cameron boyce love story)

eighteen: release.

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you had a lot of moments
that didn't last forever
now you in this corner
tryna put it together

how to love.

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Ada sat at the kitchen table again like she had been for the past week every morning at 9 AM. Staring blankly at the bowl of Cheerios in front of her. Cameron was trying to implement a routine. As soon as Ada wakes up, make her come to the kitchen and "have breakfast".

This meal usually took an hour or two to complete, with Ada simply sitting there until she finally lifted her spoon or when Cameron was forced to gently shovel the food into her mouth.

No one else was home, with Victor and Libby taking Maya to the airport so they could bid farewell as she headed back to college. And so far it had been thirty minutes of waiting for Ada to eat, and Cameron had settled himself next to her like he always did. Working on any acting work he could as he leaned back in his chair, thoughtlessly messing with his curls as he did some actor studying.

But as Ada stared at her bowl of cereal, she daydreamed. Thinking and reviewing over the scenarios of her life, something she'd been doing all day, every day, at every hour since she was forced to come to terms with the events in her life.

She was mad at every mistake she made. Stupid, fatal mistakes. Her ignorance and naivety helped mark her outcome. Like crying over a damn doll instead of being grateful for the one she was getting, ensuring that her family would've gotten home safe. Or maybe warning her father about the big black truck. Maybe if she was smart enough at 11 years old to know the signs of an incoming drive-by, her father would've run the stop-light.

Pissed off with every adult of her past. Her paternal grandmother for getting sick and dying, resulting in her father being forced to find and squat in places with his baby girls. Her maternal grandmother who moved to Texas and married a rich man, selfishly removing her drug addicted daughter and her endangered grandkids from her life to "start over fresh". The same one who declined having Ada come and live with her after she was orphaned. And mad at both grandfathers for being absent in her parents' lives, their presence maybe creating a safe haven for her had they stuck around long enough to even know she existed.

Livid with her sorry excuse of a mother. Her crack pipes being washed in the same dish water as Ada's baby bottles. Was so high one time that she left 6 month old Ada and Anari in the bath alone, almost drowning them. For showing up at their doorstep after two years of leaving holding a baby boy, showing him off as a five year old Ada did nothing but stare at the infant. For getting good drugs that hit her just right that it made her forget about her children. For just not being there.

And she was enraged by the tens of foster families she'd encountered. The horny fathers and uncles. The matriarchs jealous of their partner's lustful pedophilia instead of taking care of the victimized child. The wicked children, using her as target practice with their hateful words. The cold nights without covers, laying on couches, eating leftovers from family dinner that she was not invited to, being nicknamed "State Check." Her belongings in trash bags, huge black ones or plastic grocery store ones. Any toys she brought with her from home were beheaded and broken by wild children, her clothing stolen. Hits, bruises, spit-filled yells paired with belts and switches and pots and pans and anything in sight flown at her head. Her body thin and her soul broken.

She was pissed at all the pain she was forced to go through just because someone decided to stick three Glock 19's out of a car window and riddle holes into her family and her life. Deathly, bullying, violent, abusive, name-calling, back breaking, soul bursting, suicide inducing pain.