Taken By The Bad Boy

46 I Want To Be Nine!

           ~Raleigh's POV~

Sweat drips down my body as I try to finish this set of pull-ups. Ethan convinced me to start hitting the gym again to stay in shape and "the adults" have been trying to get all of us in the gym so now we have family workouts too. But most of the time we all workout by ourselves or with one other person. Sometimes  more of us go but it just depends what everyone is doing at that moment.

I look over and see Zaya doing some yoga, really stretching and working on her flexibility. Ethan is doing Russian twists with a medicine ball. Randy is boxing with a punching bag, letting out all of his anger and by the way he's punching and kicking, he has a lot. Zoey is doing a plank which she's been doing for the last four minutes. Uncle Devan does some bicep curls and smirks as he catches Uncle Scott looking at him. Tillie is doing some step-ups. Each of us has our own music going because at public gyms you're not supposed to blare music through speakers.

       Public gyms make me miss the gang gym for many reasons. But I can't think about that since we all walked away from that. We all decided that a real family is better than being divided. Plus we've all lost too much to go back to that lifestyle. Speaking of that, I wonder what Liam is doing right now. Or after that phone call, if he's even alive. What if that gunshot was what killed him?

       "You done?" I hear Zaya ask right after she takes a sip from her pink water bottle, snapping me out of my thoughts and I nod my head, grabbing my water and my duffle. She grabs her duffle too and we wait for everyone else to finish up.

       "You all set?" Ethan asks us and we nod our heads. Everyone soon finishes up and we walk to the locker rooms to shower and change before heading home. Once we get home, we all throw our dirty clothes and towels in the washer and Zaya starts the wash for us. Ethan and Tillie head to the kitchen to start dinner for us.

      "What do you feel like?" Ethan asks us.

       "Ice cream!" Zaya exclaims, laying on the couch.

      "Mac and cheese!" Randy says, laying on the floor.

      "That's not healthy." I hear my dad say and I look up from the pillow to see "the adults" walking into the room, carrying shopping bags from a ton of different stores.

       "What's all that?" I ask.

      "Motivation to get you all back to find good jobs and get an education." Aunt Janet responds.

       "How can we move on when so many are still gone?!" I demand and she sighs.

       "Raleigh, we have to move on with our lives, they'd want that. We can't wait for them and then try again when we are older because then it'll be too late. Life is short, honey, and a lot of it is already gone. Don't waste anymore."

"I wouldn't consider looking for our family wasteful!"

"That's not what she meant, honey." My mom pipes in.

"Oh really? Then how did she mean it?"

"Can we not fight for once?!" Tillie yells and we all stare at her. I nod my head, get up and go to my room, making sure to slam my door really loud. Although I'm about to get a beating for it. But then again I don't really care at the moment. I stare at the door for a minute or two, waiting for my mother or father or someone to barge in and demand I apologize or to give me a lecture but they don't. Maybe they finally realized that I'm an adult.

        I shake my head, after looking at my door for ten minutes and lay on my bed with a sigh. I look up at my ceiling and just try to think. Try to make time stop or just slow down. I don't know what I'm doing anymore. Every time I think I'm making progress, something like this happens; I snap and I'm right back to where I started.