Freedom Ignited

1; the world keeps turning

IGNATIUS' POV

Fresh air surrounded me as the gate finally opened, liberation welcoming me with open arms for the first time in two years. Yesterday I turned eighteen, which signalled the end of my sentence in Juive. It couldn't have come sooner because honestly, I was getting a little tired of the same old routine everyday. Horizons Correctional Facility was in my rearview as soon as my foot crossed the gate's threshold, my sister waiting for me on the other side with a Cheshire cat grin plastered on her face.

"Freedom!" I screamed, dropping the plastic bag of my belongings to the ground and throwing my hands in the air.

"Get over here, idiot!" Calista yelled, jumping into my arms. She had filled out in the last couple years, each time she visited she looked more and more like Ma, more and more like a woman rather than the baby faced fourteen year old I left behind in court.

It scared me, how different she looked outside the gate, the light finally hitting her brown eyes made them shine brighter than the hot summer sun. Fluorescent lights did her no justice, no justice at all. The thing that still hadn't changed, though, was the way she looked at me: like I was still her hero big brother, the one who let her practice her tattoo designs on my skin with a ballpoint pen, rather than the one who was literally walking out of jail.

"I missed ya' kid." She finally dropped back onto the ground and pushed some of her black hair out of her face. We were close our whole lives, even more after Pops died, and being with her was the most normal feeling on the planet.

"Adrian was gonna come too but he had a class," She referred to my older brother. Adrian was more than smart, he was a genius, top of our crappy highschool and basically the only good thing to come out of our neighborhood. Queens, New York, wasn't exactly a cesspool for college students, or highschool graduates for that matter, but Adrian was different, always had been.

"It's cool, you didn't have to skip school to come get me, ya know?" She just started her junior year of highschool a few weeks ago and she was on track to graduate, which was more than could be said for most of the students there.

"I'm gonna pretend you didn't say that," She scoffed and moved to the drivers seat of her car. The 90's Camero was just as I remembered, dull red metal hanging low to the ground, this time it was actually working instead of being stopped in the driveway with our heads under the hood.

"So, what's happened since we talked last week?" I had a good family, they all visited every couple weeks, calling whenever we got a chance to talk, and Ma didn't hate me like I had totally expected her to. There were kids I knew in there that didn't have anyone visiting them, much less an entire family; it almost made me feel guilty, maybe a little sad. But, there wasn't room for that, letting your guard down basically meant you had given up and were ready to be somebody's bitch, and that was the last thing I would ever be.

"Nothing really, been planning your party mostly," She shrugs and turns right, away from the facility. "Isaiah hasn't calmed down since he heard you were actually getting out by the way." She smiled, glancing over to me.

I loved Cali and Adrian, more than anything, but Isaiah was my brother by bond, not blood. We met in elementary school, after he stole my damn juice box and I bit him and we spent a time-out together there was no going back. We were unstoppable, the dynamic duo for almost eleven years, right up until I got pinched. The dude visited me every week, twice sometimes if they let him, and no matter how much of a loser I felt like, or how much shit I had been through on the inside, he never stopped being my bro. Ugh, I'm getting sappy.

"How'd you manage to keep him in school?" Queens College wasn't as high up as NYU, but it was cheaper and Isaiah liked the idea better than being in debt for the rest of his life.