Midnights

🔨 Part 13: Ray 🔨

🔨 Chapter 11: Ray POV 🔨

"You know I like a London boy, boy, I fancy you."

-London Boy, Taylor Swift's Lover

Ray stares wide-eyed at herself in the mirror, almost losing her breath in disbelief again.

It's the girl's second day back in the city since the skiing trip. Yesterday evening, April dragged her shopping. Ray could tell that the redhead was not in a good mood, so she let her dress and drag her wherever she wanted.

Today, she wore new clothes April gifted to her. Ray had to say, she look pretty good. Her fit consisted of tight jeans that made her ass look amazing, a gray corset (that complimented her smaller bosom), harness bag, pig tail braids.

And the real kicker...the real shocker..sitting pretty on her neck, the Chang Gang chain...

It's been two weeks since she got it, but it still makes her heart pound in disbelief at the sight.

After seven long months of sweat, tears (sad and happy), anxiety, fun, laughs and much more... she was in.

Finally.

She could cry. Actually she did cry after first receiving it. But she was going to cry again. She never expected her life in Los Santos to be this.

All she wanted was to go somewhere to find a home. To find something she could cherish and love and hold as tightly as possible. She thought she'd get that by moving closer to her brother after high school. Once she got here, she'd go to school and then work at some company as a manager like she did with Vanilla Unicorn for that short time. Maybe she'd be an EMS or a cop.

(Ok... cop was going too far. She'd never do that.)

But instead, even though it was later than she expected, she found something so much more.

This is the best thing that could have happened to her. She never felt more at home, more loved than with CG. The ravenette had a family. And home and love and...

She's happy.

It doesn't feel like limbo.

It's not quiet or lonely.

They're not trying to shun or shelter her from the world. They let her make her own decisions. They allow her to be irrevocably herself. She had a family down the street or a call away most times. Ones who actually gave her the time of day.

They'd steps right in and been everything when she lost her parents. They'd been there to stomp on her loneliness. She'll hoped to never have to feel that again.

Ray almost buckles under the relief she felt at that thought. Taking a deep breath to control her emotions, the girl wipes her tears. Taking another look in the mirror, she smiles and adjust her chain, then heads out of her studio to meet Randy.

When Ray got her chain from Mister K, her entire family surrounded her. Randy handed the chain to her personally. Hell, April cried more than she did. Ray wanted to be strong in front of her new family so only a tear or two slipped out. Once, she was hidden away in her studio, she really let it out.

Today, she would be able to see Randy for the first time in more than a week. He went on a mission (Ray could actually know missions and what most of them entailed now) with Ramee and just got back late last night. The girl's excited to see the man, and wonders if he'll like her outfit at all.

The raven's standing outside Alta waiting for him with a light blush scattered on her cheeks when her phone rings. "Hey, Tommy T! What's up?"

Tommy promised to help her with driving but so far they'd only been able to get one session in which was interrupted because Tommy flipped his car. On her vacation, he'd kept in contact with her too, checking in often. She couldn't be more grateful at how amazing the MDM leader was.