We Come Alive 5

What's Wrong? What's Right?

Wednesday morning, Ethan was doing his usual routine in the facility. He had just gotten out the shower, but had to go back to his room to get a new pair of jeans since the ones he had didn't match his outfit like he wanted to. Ethan walked back into the bathroom and started getting dressed, but stopped seeing the back of Craig walking into one of the stalls.

"You always coming in here to see me?" Ethan asked aloud, putting on his shirt since it was the last of his clothes.

Ethan just heard Craig groaning, not a painful one but a satisfied one. Ethan frowned, hesitant to see what he was doing but his curiosity took over him. Ethan stood in the doorway of the stall since none of them had doors on them for safety reasons.

Ethan's eyes grew wide seeing Craig pulling the needle of a syringe out of himself. "What the fuck are you doing?!" Ethan whispered yelled at him.

Craig threw the syringe into the toilet and flushed it just to turn around to face the younger Spanish boy. "I told you, I got an insider on my side. You want your happy drug or not?" Craig whispered to him. "Those pretty white pills that you know you'll risk it all for. Or if you want something new—"

"No." Ethan cut him off. "You do what you think you need to do, but I'm not taking any part of this. I gotta go to school, don't overdose and die while I'm gone."

Craig just shrugged his shoulders, watching Ethan walk off out of the bathroom and to the common area of the facility to be met by a guard and taken to Christin's car that was waiting for him outside.

~**~

A few hours later instead of going to her class, Clover decided to skip to talk to the person she was growing closer and closer to as time went on. The African American girl walked into the athletic building and straight into Mateo's office. When she walked in, she wasn't surprised to find the person she was looking for.

Kiara was sitting at Mateo's desk typing on the computer while all the athletic coaches were at a meeting. Kiara's hazel eyes looked up at the doorway and smirked seeing Clover standing there.

"You look nice today. I guess I didn't see you before you left." Kiara complimented, looking over Clover's outfit of a black tank top, ripped jeans, heeled boots, and a jacket in her arms.

Clover just gave her a smile as her thank you while she walked over to the desk and sat down. She let out a sigh, looking at her feet then to Kiara. "Mother daughter talk?" She asked.

Kiara dropped her hands down onto the desk and gave Clover her full attention. "What's up?"

"What if you knew someone who everyone called trouble? No one ever gave them a chance to prove who they are, rather they made up their mind about them from the start. You get to know them and they're really nice and really genuine, but all the things they say about them is right?"

Kiara raised one of her eyebrows in confusion. Clover let out a groan as she sat up fully and played with her hands.

"I'm friends with this kid named Baylor and everyone says he's this vicious fighter and is probably in a gang. They say that he's no good and he's going to end up in jail...again. All the teachers hate him and all the students are scared of him. Well, I gave him a chance and he seemed to really appreciate it even though the boys told me to never talk to him. But...I've heard everything they've said about Ricky. How he's no good, a poor excuse for a person, and isn't going to get anywhere in life. But I know Ricky, I know that...he means well."

Kiara chuckled at Clover's answer, but kept listening seeing that the young girl was in distress.

Clover moved her hair behind her ear and let out a sigh. "But the boys thought he had a gun yesterday, so they sent me to go see if he did. And...he did. But before you tell me that I shouldn't be talking to someone so violent and dangerous, he said it was for his protection and he didn't want to use it. He was born into his family's gang. He had no choice. He was jumped into it when he was 14 and his brother is so controlling over him. Baylor has no choice but to be in it or die on the streets just because of who he is. I just..." Clover put her hands to her face then dropped them. "We talked about it and he said that he doesn't want to be in it. He hates the idea of being stuck in this gang for the rest of his life. He doesn't want to be what his father, brother, and cousins are. He wants to be his own person but if he just turns his back on them, they may not understand. The times he shows that to his brother, his brother says that he has no choice."