Nothing to Lose

2

Her

She furrowed her brow at the boy that was standing across the yard. She couldn't help but smirk at him looking away all dumbfounded. She hadn't seen him before. She wondered what brought him to the island so late into summer.

"Viviana!", her father called, "Dinner's ready."

She held the book in her hand and walked inside, but before she did she took one more glance at the empty spot where the boy once stood.

•••••

"Do we have any new neighbors?", Viviana asked her parents, her fork pushing the peas around on her plate.

"Not that I know of", her mother shrugged.

"Not even around the block a ways?", she asked, "Nothing?"

"I- I don't know", her mother answered honestly.

"Why do you ask, hunny?", her Dad questioned.

"Just saw a new face earlier", she shrugged, "Doesn't happen often."

"Yeah, well you're about to see a lot of new faces soon", her Dad smiled and took a drink, "Have you decided between the two yet?"

"No", Viviana shook her head slightly, "I'm not sure they're the colleges for me-"

"Viv", her Dad sighed and dropped his fork, "You have to decide. We all said business was the route you wanted to take, so take it. Stop stalling."

Viviana nodded but felt her heart drop inside. She used to be set on going to one of those schools, until she realized she wanted to change her major. Arts were here passion, but business was practical, and that's what their family needed right now.

This wasn't exactly the summer she was used to. Her Dad started his business from the ground up when they had moved to Louisiana years ago. It took off, they accumulated a lot of money in a short time, but he still wanted more. He got clipped for embezzlement at the beginning of the summer, which is why they had to flee here. Her father had a lot of con tactics up his sleeve. He was used to scraping to get by, that even when they got money, he missed the rush of stealing and scheming. She picked up on a lot of that. She had a good set of morals, but thinking of taking things just because she had the talent for it gave her the same rush.

Staying under the radar in this place had been easy so far, so much so that she gotten used to it. She didn't know if she was ready to get back into the swing of things, especially doing something she wasn't one-hundred percent sure of. She saw where it got her father. Drugs, bad habits, blowing money, getting pinched for stealing the smallest of things all through her childhood. But they needed her now, and she just turned eighteen, so she'd have to shape up.

All she had to do was change her last name and finally enroll in the college of "her" choice. Her Dad had connections, it'd be easy.

"Can you go to the supermarket to get some groceries tomorrow?", her Mom asked as they did dishes after dinner.

"Can I take Benny with me?", she asked.

"Nope", Benny popped in to grab a popsicle, "I've got plans."

"Riding bikes with Jeremiah is not plans", Viv sighed.

"Still", he shrugged, "Busy."

She turned with a roll of her eyes. Her brother was fourteen and one of the closest people to her. She'd protect him over anything, even though he rarely needed it. He was always doing reckless stuff with his friends, gone for all hours of the day. As sad as it was to admit, she missed him. He was acclimating nice to this environment, while she was struggling to find anyone to go to the store with.