The Price ࿊f Peace

☮️: 039

Somewhere in Oakland

Syara was stressing. She was stressing bad.

She had no idea how this would go, like how Elijah would interact with her siblings. Riyah had opted to ride with him, and Manny didn't know Elijah enough to trust him with Riyah, so he tagged along too.

Syara was practically shaking the whole drive to the park. She had no idea what was going on in that car, what they were saying to each other. It wasn't like there was anything bad, she was just nervous.

She hadn't let anyone be alone with her siblings, never trusted anyone with them willingly. But, she trusted Elijah. She knew who he was, and she trusted him.

This was just all so new for her.

Her foot leg was bouncing up and down where she had it resting on the arm rest, half-curled in her seat in the parked car. RIP by Mariah The Scientist was playing lowly through her speakers, and she was staring forward at her steering wheel unseeingly.

Her gun was in her purse next to her, and her hand was resting on it, tightening when she saw a shadow approaching the side of her car on the driver side out of the corner of her eye. She almost pulled it out completely, before she realized it was just Elijah through her side mirror, loosening her hold on it.

He tapped on the window, causing her to roll it down, immediately taking notice of the rapid-talking voice of her little sister, who was rattling off a story to Elijah who was nodding along as she talked.

He didn't seem to really care, but he still listened, eyeing her out of the corner of his eye as he waited for Syara to lower the window.

Manny wasn't even hiding his intrigue, looking up from the phone that was held in his hand to look at his sister while she told the story of how a girl was currently trying to beef with her over something that happened in middle school.

"...and I said I'm not fighting in school." She told them, scrunching her face up like she was talking to the girl personally. "And, then, I told her meet me down the street from my house. And guess what?"

She paused for dramatic effect, looking between both Elijah and Manny, who already knew the story. Syara was the one who asked from inside of the car, still relaxed in her seat with her leg up. "What?"

Seriya looked to her sister, answering almost immediately. "The girl pulled up to my actual house and was banging on my mama door."

"Mm." Syara scrunched her face a little. "Y'all fight?"

Seriya shook her head, frowning, "No." She sighed. "Melissa start playing crazy and yelling, and my mom got scared 'nd said I couldn't go out there."

Syara nodded, that made sense. Seriya's adoptive mother, Bea, was a nice lady, very sheltered. Her husband, Kieran, was more of the fighting type. Bea had grown up in a pretty bad area, so she was homeschooled until college, and Kieran grew up in that same area, but he went to the public schools out there.

"Next time, call me." Syara told her, maintaining eye contact. She waited for Seriya to nod before she turned her car off, and stepped out of her car with her purse on one shoulder, and her duffel on the other.

Syara looked to her siblings who were talking amongst themselves—well, mostly Seriya with the occasional phrase from Manny who could barely get a word in.

She looked back to Elijah, meeting his eyes. "Yall." She called to her siblings.

Both Riya and Manny's eyes snapped up to look at their older sister. "Go stretch, and do warm ups. I'll be over in a minute."