The Price ࿊f Peace

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Somewhere in Oakland
Saturday April 13th, 2024

Syara trudged tiredly back through the door of her 1 bedroom apartment.

Her muscles were aching, her feet hurt at the soles, and her stomach was grumbling.

That'd teach her to fight on an empty stomach.

She hated fighting. It had become a constant part of her life even before she was in foster care. She'd been 'out' of the system since she was freshly 14.

More so, she was kicked out of the system by a foster mom that she was pretty sure still received checks for her.

The fight wasn't anything too serious. It was gang related, oddly enough. Ever since the day she had been jumped in, Syara had been back and forth with girls from other sets and even some from her own set about bullshit.

She never cared much for arguing, seeing as she'd always get made fun of for the accent she most definitely still had as well as her softer voice.

It was very clearly jealousy that caused this one, but it wasn't like she was new to it. It happens.

She drug herself to the bathroom, not even bothering to check her face before she turned the knob on the shower, allowing the water to crank to a spray. She intended to wash the entire day off before it even started. It was only 10 am and she still had to work.

She was grateful for the job that had kept her alive all this time. She was grateful for her boss that had become more of her Big Homie than anything.

She grabbed a towel from her cabinet, letting down her back length braids that she had done on herself a week prior to pull herself out of a hair depression.

She wiped her feet on the towel first, stepping onto the tile and pulling another part of the towel to wipe her face off as she stood in front of the mirror.

She finally pulled the towel away from her face to see the minimal damage. The girl she was fighting had practically no aim, but she did have a gold nugget ring that cut into Syara's skin, directly on her eyebrow.

"Mmcht." Syara smacked her lips as she examined the cut on her brow. She sighed, it wasn't too bad and maybe it'd make a pretty scar.

Her phone rang from under the heap of clothes she had left on the floor of the bathroom. Sighing once more, she stood up straight from where she was bent over the sink to get closer to the mirror and walked over to the pile of clothes, grabbing the singing cellphone and placing it to her ear.

"You rang?" She asked softly.

"Sisterrrr." Calaia dragged over the phone. "You on your way over?"

Syara checked the time, pulling her phone from her ear, "Mhm. I just gotta get dressed."

Calaia, or Kisses, was a member of the same gang that Syara was in. She was one of the people involved in Syara's put on as well. They weren't close-close, but they were good friends and they trusted each other more than most.

She was the more outgoing one of the two, seeing as Syara wasn't much of a talker. She didn't have many friends either. Her days consisted of school and work.

She was doing virtual college courses to get her bachelor's degree, but she planned to switch to in-person by the next semester. She was running track for her college as well and she had promise.

Syara worked two jobs. One legal. And the other illegal. For Camarro, at first, she was just selling on the corner. And she made a lot of money for him. At the time, his corner boys were constantly getting jacked up by the police and he had just lost his best seller.

It was harder to suspect a young girl with bows in her hair and overall shorts would be selling drugs. Even some of the fiends didn't believe it at first.

Eventually, she gained more trust and she was moved up in her position. She went from distributing, to bagging, to just counting money.

That was her only job for the operation as of now, counting money. And Camarro had let her know that she could decide to quit at any time and she'd still be welcome in her hood. She had earned that much.

Her other job, her legal one, was working at the front desk of an orthodontist office. It was mostly taking calls and making appointments, so it wasn't difficult and it was good money. It was also part time and only 3 days of the week, so she was free a lot of the time to sit on her ass.

She knew that at 19, people expected her to be out partying or fucking or getting drunk, but Syara had priorities and she was trying to get herself set up for the future. There's more to life than just the right now.

Calaia was the same in a way. She had priorities, but they consisted less of school and money, and more on having fun in her teenage years. And there was absolutely nothing wrong with that.

She was young and she had the time to do whatever she wanted. Syara was in full support of it. And Kisses never tried to push her to be anything she wasn't, just like Syara never pushed her to be anything she wasn't. That's why they worked so well as friends.

"Okay, if you say so." Calaia played with the hem of her blanket. "You heard Camarro brother got out?"

"Who?" Syara asked absentmindedly, pulling her loose sweat shorts up over her ass. She pulled on an orange hoodie and some Nike socks next.

She had a rose gold anklet that she wore everyday sitting on her dresser where she propped her foot up to clasp it on as Kisses filled her in, as per usual, on shit she didn't really care about.

"Money?" She asked her, attempting to spark her memory. "Um..Elijah." She tried, trying to think of where Syara would know him from. "From Mrs. Sifter's in 10th grade."

"Oh." Syara nodded in recognition. "Yeah..yeah, I remember something about him."

Elijah was a hothead, if she could remember correctly. And he'd always had it out for her for virtually no reason. When she would be around Camarro, he would always stare her down or ignore her, he just didn't like her.

Elijah was in and out of jail as well. As previously mentioned, he was a hothead, and his latest bid was awaiting trial in Brynhurst County Jail for the accused attempted murder of a rival gang member.

Unfortunately, however, said rival gang member was the star witness in the case, the only person who could testify that it was Elijah, ended up dying in a freak "accident" in his own home, two days before trial.

A mistrial was called and Elijah was allowed to walk freely.

She didn't really keep up with that, simply because it had nothing to do with her. He had been in there for about 6 months awaiting trial and before that, he had been in and out so much that she hadn't even seen him face to face since she was 16.

And she wasn't planning to either.

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Hi my beautiful baby boooooos! I'm trying sum a lil different this time...lemme know how we're feelingggg.... 💕💕💕