𝚂𝚝𝚛𝚊𝚒𝚐𝚑𝚝-𝚜𝚑𝚘𝚝 | 𝚂𝚊𝚕 𝚡 𝚁𝚎𝚊𝚍𝚎𝚛 (S𝚊𝚕𝚕𝚢 F𝚊𝚌𝚎)

Chapter one: Hey old Friend

I wake up to a huge bump sending me flying out of my seat. Once I landed I shifted my head around, not recognizing where I was for a moment until I looked at the seat in front of me.
Oh, I'm still in the car
Maria hit a speed bump too hard and I got the aftermath of it. Aggravated, I shifted back down into my seat and pulled out my phone, I had a text from Owen, my best friend that I left back in Fort Wayne. I was homeschooled when my moms adopted me, so I was stuck inside the house most of the time unless they would let me go to the park a couple of blocks away from the neighborhood. That's where I met Owen. He was trying to do a flip on the bar close to the slide, but he slipped. when he fell, he smacked the side of his head on the slide. The heat alongside the speed of his falling rubbed off some skin. I ran over as soon as he belly-flopped in the white sand.

"Are you ok??"

He looked back up at me, blood starting to seep from the wound on his jaw. He took a second to breathe because the fall knocked the wind out of him. Tears were lightly welling up in his dark brown eyes from the pain of it all. His eyebrow scrunched together with anger flashing across his face for a second.

"Of course I'm fine!! Why wouldn't I be??"

I looked around the shaded area and didn't see his mom anywhere. As far as I knew, it was just me and him.

"Are you sure? You're bleeding..."

He got up swiftly, and put a hand to his jaw, slightly wincing when he touched it. His eyes went wide as saucer plates when he saw the crimson on his hand.

"Oh."

I told him that I didn't live very far away and that my moms could fix it. Since then, we would always meet up at the park to play or do whatever we wanted, as long as we were both back home before sunset. Years went by and we started getting older, gradually getting closer. Spending the night at each other's houses, going to movies together, trying all the flavors of ice cream at a nearby parlor, all that stuff.

Cockroach:
Where are you? You didn't answer my call last night.

I looked around the area, i saw a couple of grocery stores, a seven-eleven, a high school, and a few apartment complexes. I looked over to Maria, whose eyes were still pretty focused on the road.

"Where are we?" I asked, after tapping her shoulder.

"Nockfell, I'm pretty sure," she replied, looking over her shoulder for a moment.

Me:
Nockfell, finally... I'm not looking forward to moving all of those boxes.

I put my phone away as Maria turned into the apartment complex, right across from Addison apartments. I get out of the car and stretch, raising my arms over my head and standing on the tips of my toes. Twelve hours was a long time, especially inside a cramped Nissan with no air conditioning. I took a deep breath and took in the apartments in front of us, a big building, stretching up into the sky. It was a faded gray color, some windows cracked, broken, or just completely missing altogether.
Maria went inside the apartment complex while Donna and I waited outside. She was wearing a denim, light wash jumper, with red converse and a red-spotted bandana around her head. She pulled out a small mirror from her vintage black purse and reapplied her lipstick. She always had to be dressed to perfection, even if we are sitting in a car for 12 hours. Maria came out of the complex and handed us our keys, and went to the back of the car to start unloading.
"Can't we get movers to do this, or something?" I sighed, ready to just go in.
"Hey, you're lucky we got a movers truck to get the furniture, otherwise we would be hauling that too," she replied, not too pleased with my tone.

"Ugh, I want a nap..."

" You better wake up princess, we got work to do" Maria smiled at me as she handed me a box.