Fallen Angels

6

We stared at her in disbelief.
"What? Why? How?" I asked to shocked to even form full sentences.
"I couldn't afford rent the last few months,"Abby sobbed." The restaurant has been doing really bad lately so there's been pay cuts."
"Oh Abby, why didn't you tell us. We could have gotten jobs. We could have helped." Elle said desperately trying to hold on to any hope of keeping the house.

"No sweetie you're all too young, and besides with the amount any job in this town pays, it wouldn't have been enough. The landlord has given us until tomorrow to get out."

"Does Vicky know?" I asked.

"Yeah," Abby replied. "She's gone to see if anyone we know has a place for us."

Just at that moment Vicky walked through the door.

"I looked everywhere, Tom down the road said he had room for two of us but that was it."

"Well," I said."You and Abby go stay there. Elle and I will be fine."

"Are you sure?"Abby asked concerned.

"Yeah!" Elle piped up. "We're independent women."

"No you're independent fourteen year olds." Abby retaliated.

"Come on Abby, you're only twenty and you've been living on your own for ages." Elle said.

Abby realized that we had a point. "Fine," she reluctantly agreed. "But promise me if anything goes wrong come find me."

She and Vicky packed up their few possessions and pulled me and Elle into a big hug.

"Promise me you'll be okay?" Abby pleaded. Elle and I assured her that we would be and ushered them out the door. Once the girls had gone, Elle and I sat down on our bed. She sat between my legs and leaned her back against my chest. I wrapped my arms around her and held her tight.

"What are we going to do?"she asked me.

"I really have no idea baby. How about we sleep now and think about this in the morning."

We lay down on the mattress. Elle fell asleep in my arms nearly straight away. I stroked her hair until I too fell asleep.

I woke up early the next morning. Elle was still asleep so I had to prise my arm carefully as to not wake her up. I walked over to my bag and started stuffing all my things into it. It wasn't even half full when I had finished so I started folding Elle's few things and putting them in too.

After a while Elle woke up too and started to help me. "Do you have any ideas on where we are going to go?" J asked her.
"I could maybe talk to Alex. See if she has any room to spare."
"Well let's go then!" I said half-heartedly. We stand up off the floor, I sling my bag over my shoulder and grabbed her hand.
"Where to?" I asked.
"To Alex's place. It's just at the outskirts of town."

We walked for about ten minutes until we reached a dark alleyway. If I had been with anyone else I would have felt unsafe but I knew Elle would never lead me a stray.

We walked over to some old pallets. Elle jumped up on one and started climbing. I followed her and we slid through a window and onto a stairwell. We climbed a flight of stairs until we reached a door. Elle opened it and we walked in.
"Yo bitch!" Elle called. Alex walked into the hall.
"Hey. Come in why don't you." Alex replied sarcastically. We went into a room with a battered old couch and two old armchairs.

"Alex, I was hoping you could help us. We've been evicted from our old place and we have no where to go." Elle said.
"Of course you can stay here guys!" Alex replied. "It'll be cool to have girls my own age here."

Just then two girls walked in. They looked about 11 or 12.
"Hey guys." Alex said. "AJ this is Scarlett and Dani."
The girls were almost identical. Scarlett had shoulder length brown hair and brown eyes. Dani had brown hair almost to her waist and glasses.
"Girls this is AJ. She and Elle will be staying with us."
"I like your hair," Scarlett said.
"Thank you, I like yours too," I replied.