Shadows and Popularity

Chapter 21: Dead End

Chapter 21: Dead End

Maya was trying her best not to break down.

Never in her entire life had she ever felt so scared, so terrified. She looked around the empty block, her arms wrapped around a thick yet small, brown box. This was a part of town she wasn’t much fond of, dangerous and suspicious all right, with littered streets and dark alleys, the sunset giving her last rays of hope for escape slowly turning into ashes. The gas lamp was no better. It kept flickering on and off every other second or so.

She was starting to have doubts too, as she adjusted her yellow blazer a tad. Her blue, floral dress was modest enough at least, but she wished she had worn pants that day. If worst comes to shove and the plan was to end in anyway unwanted it to go, she would have had a better time running in pants.

The earpiece Sakri gave her crackled to life, as the voice of a familiar girl chimed in.

“Maya, you doin’ all right?”

Alexandra Rivers, or preferred to be called Alex for short, was a kind-hearted soul who was gracious enough to give her comfort the minutes before she was sent out on the cold streets while the rest of the boys were busy fixing themselves up. She was a sophomore too, and the first time Oliver, Aaron, and Cardor had brought her to the Taco Truck to be used in guise when the plan was to take place, Maya already saw her as her only mate in the group. Her easy-going smile reminded her too much of Clarisse, and she suddenly wished she had dragged the musician over for moral support. The guys weren’t any good at it anyway.

“Y-yeah…” She gulped, shakily peering over the decrepit old house across the street. Her fear made her voice quiver. “At least, I hope so…”

“You’ll do fine!” Alex chimed through the intercom. She was hiding in an alleyway a few feet away from her, but they needed to keep quiet nevertheless. “I know you can!”

Maya nodded, then jerked back when the gas lamp suddenly flickered off, then on again. “I hope.”

A new voice chimed in the earpiece. “Tanberry? You ready?” It was Sakri.

“I hope…” She said, clearly distraught.

“Well, stop hoping and start hopping. It’s time to move. Get out there.”

The rebel was as caring as usual. Maya sighed, then raised her head up, a single light open on the top left window.

She took her time crossing the road, following Cardor’s instructions not to rush anything since she was better in sneaking around with steadiness and not speed, as a bead of sweat fell from her temple.

She waited for the last rays of sunset peering through the roofs to disappear completely, before she slowly dropped the box on the front step. Her next action was to knock on the door and get attention, but her head got clogged when a deafening sound of glass breaking echoed through. She raised her head, and everything seemed to have moved in slow motion. Sakri’s and Cardor’s and Alex’s voices muffled in her earpieces, all of them telling her to get out of there, the suspense of the door creaking open, the small rays of light cascading through the crack, her legs moving back step by step.

But it was too late.

“Who the fuck are you?”

Maya felt all the blood run out of her face, the burly teen looming over her giving her a scary look. The wallflower stepped back, but tripped on her own feet and fell on her butt. She was shaking, she was scared, she didn’t know what to do, and she had no idea what was going on now either.

She was hearing nothing but static in her earpiece too, and now she wished she hadn’t gotten herself so involved in any of this.

“Hey! Joe! Who’s at the door?” Another burly teen came out, this one holding a baseball bat for some reason, and gave her a stare, his eyes stopping by her knees. “And who’s this?”