Once Upon A Time in 2016

Into the Hood: Chapter 3

Days slowly turned into weeks as Sam enjoyed his new found status. As everyday passed he felt himself growing stronger until even Josh and Daniel no longer bothered him. The other kids skittered around him as soon as he made his presence known. He was powerful. He was respected. He was feared. So why was there a nagging feeling deep inside his heart every time his fist connected with a jaw, or when his leg thrusted into a stomach? Why did Amy's disappointed shake of the head and unmasked fear in David's eyes bother him?

"Hey! Sam! Wait up!" Sam turned to see Eric running towards him with a big grin on his face. If there was one good thing that had happened since the day that he punched David was that the two were now inseparable. Even is Josh and Daniel attempted to put Sam down on the odd occasion, an angry glare from Eric shot them down very quickly.

"What's going on? You look super excited," Sam grinned at his friend's obvious joy.

"You'll be too when you know what I managed to snag last night," Eric said, his eyes gleaming as he rummaged around his bag. Curious, Sam waited. He gasped as he saw Eric pull out two golden invites from his bag.

"Are those what I think they are?"

"You bet they are. I know a guy whose brother is well close with the Raggedies. These are not just any invites to their Uptown Rave tomorrow night, these are V.I.P passes. Dude we'll be mingling with the top dogs! Anybody who is anybody is invited. And you gotta be somebody to get your hands on these. There'll be chicks, booze, drugs-"

"Wait, drugs and booze?" Sam took an involuntary step back from the invites, "Bro, we aren't of age yet, and I sure as hell don't want to be doing drugs."

"Relax dude, no one's asking you to take drugs. Drugs just have to be at the rave with them being the Raggedies main business and all. And come on, what harm can a little booze do?"

"I don't know...I'm still not comfortable..."

"But Sam, you're my best friend." Sam stopped short. He was never someone's best friend before. "I thought I can count on you, just one appearance at this party, and we're set for life. We'll be on a whole new level, an-"

"Let's go."

"What?" Eric looked at Sam as though he was not quite sure what he had said.

"I said, let's go. Me and you. To the party."

"That's my man!" Eric grinned, fist bumping Sam on the way through the school gates. As they entered, Josh and Daniel joined them, and the four burst into laughter at some joke Josh shared with the group. All the while She watched.

The party was in full swing by the time Eric and Sam had arrived. The tiny room reeked of sweat and alcohol. Whatever Sam was expecting, it certainly was expecting it certainly was not this. He had just braved about 10 huge men every 3 meters for security purposes, and each of them looked like they ate little children for breakfast. All of them had made a huge show of checking the invites, and Sam was sure he had wet himself a little under their penetrating gaze. All for this so called 'party'. It was cramped, and the sight of people sniffing away made him want to throw up.

"Isn't this great?" He turned to see Eric looking around with an ecstatic look on his face. "No, not really," Sam yelled, but it was clear that Eric was not listening. In fact Eric was more interested in making his way towards 'Sleepy', the self-crowned King of the neighbourhood. He called out, "Eric! H-hey! Wait u-"

It was then he saw her.

Long black hair, face half covered with a cowboy hat. Not that it stopped her from staring at him though. She stared at him with her uncovered eye, her steady gaze never wavering. Despite the crowd, she seemed to have a good 1 metre radius around her. Whenever someone ventured too close to her bubble, she did not need to remove her one eyed gaze from Sam; the poor soul whimpered pathetic apologies and excused themselves as swiftly as possible.

For some reason Sam felt all his courage that he had built up over the last few weeks disappear. He began sweating under her penetrating glare, yet he could not bring himself to look away. Ever heard of people being able to into other people's souls? Only she seemed to be able to see right through to his soul, and more, all the way to the 'Buy one get one free drink' sign on top of the bar.

"Sam! Sam!" He felt himself being shaken, forcing him to loose eye contact. He found himself facing a worried Eric. "What's wrong man? Are you ok? You're sweating up!"

"I...She...," Sam turned to point out the woman in the cowboy hat.

She was nowhere to be seen.

"Who?" Eric asked confused.

Sam gulped. "No one. Let's get out of here."

As the two friends left the party, she watched from the shadows.

Hello everyone!! I hope you enjoyed this chapter :) As you guys can see, 'Into the Hood' is a bit more darker than 'The Beast', so I hope it hasn't put any of you guys off. I have a few announcements, so please bear with me. Thank you to XxWonderlandAwardsxX for accepting OUATI2016 as a submission for the Wonderland Awards. I'd also like to say a huge, huge thank you to your_figgy  for the amazing and helpful review you have given this book! It really means so much to me!!

I would  like to welcome Shadows_Gurl , RichardDue , maameawua , ElgeanEran, TracyHamlinMcIntyre , thelyd , sprinkELLEss ,soyjuicesux , PsyPhyPhan , lyanaLimbaugh , zaldymlim and XxWonderlandAwardsxX  to Bookworld, thank you so much for following me guys, I really do appreciate it, and I really hope you enjoy my books :) Of course thanks to all of you who are already following me too ;)

And now, the big announcement! *cue drum roll* The give away!! In the past few days we have hit 95 votes!!!! Yayyy!! Thanks to all of you who voted!! So the necklace (that I imagined Judas giving Ana in 'The Beast') I made came out more aquamarine than green, as you can see in the picture. To enter all you need to do is vote for this chapter, comment and click follow! You can follow me here or on Instagram (kittyinbookworld) and I'll announce the winner next week Sunday (the one after the 23rd). This is an international competition, so everyone, everywhere are welcome to participate, and I'll try to get the prize to you guys as soon as possible. I am going back to Malaysia for 3 weeks from Monday 25th July, but don't worry, my mum has promised to post out the necklace on my behalf. Shout out to IIWishingOnAStarII for managing my Instagram account!! Love you so much, and thanks for doing it for me! OK, end of super long announcement. As always, if you liked the chapter, please vote and comment, and feel free to leave any constructive criticism.