They Don't Know About Us

Chapter 2

Even after the girls finished up their burgers, the rain continued to pour outside, thunder and lightning seeming to shake the restaurant as the storm raged on. They gazed out of the glass door at the downpour, a displeased look adorning all of their faces. By the time they finished up eating, the sun had set, casting darkness onto the city, faint lights shining from nearby street lights.

“Well, I have a meeting to get to, so I have to brave this,” Jackie sighed out, refusing to ruin her perfect attendance streak for her club meetings. She shifted her leggings farther up on her hips, preparing to make a mad dash back to campus.

“So much for getting my hair done,” Stephanie muttered as she brushed her dark brown hair back behind her bare shoulders.

Ava grabbed the door handle, counted everyone down, and then flung the door open. She ran out into the rain, immediately feeling her clothes get soaked. She darted along the sidewalk in front of the other girls, the streetlights blurring from the rain and making it hard to see. 

“Cut into that alley!” Jackie shouted through the loud pounding of the rain, pointing to an opening through two buildings up ahead as they ran down the sidewalk.

Ava slowed down to head into the alleyway, keeping close to the brick wall of the building to hide beneath its small awning. She leaned her head back against the wall, panting quickly to catch her breath as her friends huddled beside her. She felt calm until she heard a sharp groan farther down the alleyway, prompting her eyes to the side just to see a man wearing a dark cap taking a sharp punch to the stomach by a man wearing a black hoodie. Her heart threatened to pound out of her chest as she started to back away toward where she just came from, her eyes widening as she watched the tall man in the hoodie land blow after blow on the other helpless person.

The man with the cap eventually crumbled to the ground, completely giving up and just trying to protect his face as more punches and rain thundered down on him.

“Let’s go!” Jackie urged Stephanie and Ava, her voice trembling some as she turned on her heel and darted out of the alleyway with Stephanie right behind her.

Her shout caught the man in the hoodie’s attention, prompting him to glance up just as lightning crackled across the sky, lighting up his face for a second as he noticed Ava still standing in the alley.

Ava felt frozen in place for a second, her mind begging her to move, but the fear and shock stilled her. Through the lightning, she caught some of the man’s features, like the fair color of his skin and the sharpness of his jawline. It was a face that she would never forget, but she knew better than to keep staring at him. Breaking free from her anxiety enough to move, she ran back out of the alley and into the rain, hurriedly making her way across the street to catch up with Jackie and Stephanie. Even if she was across the street from the man, she kept pushing herself to run all the way back to the dorm, not wanting to risk the chance of the man coming for them after he finished with the man wearing the cap.

“What in the world was that?” Stephanie gasped out once they shut the dorm room door behind them, the sound of heavy breathing filling the room as they recovered from running so hard and so fast.

“He just kept hitting him and hitting him,” Ava murmured as she grabbed a towel from the bathroom to gently pat dry her hair, her head shaking in disbelief at what she had just witnessed. She had never seen an actual fight before in person, and it was way more intense than she had ever imagined it to be. She couldn’t believe how harsh the man in the hoodie had been to the other person. She couldn’t help but wonder what made him so upset to do all of that.

“Cap guy must have messed up big time,” Jackie sighed out as she kicked off her wet shoes, goosebumps erupting over her skin as the air conditioner continued to run in the dorm. She headed into the bathroom to change out of her soaked workout clothes into casual clothes that were dry and warm.

“I’ve never seen something like that before,” Ava admitted to Stephanie as she opened her closet door to grab clothes to change into. She was pretty sure Stephanie had experienced some intense situations like those since her and Darren were friends with people that had a rougher edge like that. She had heard plenty of stories from Stephanie about dealing with the wrong people or encountering trouble with past customers. The drugs they sold tended to attract a few bad situations and people every once in awhile. 

“You’ll get used to it. Adults fight all the time,” Stephanie muttered as she dried her phone off on a sort of dry spot on her black tank top. Once she got any water off, she turned on her phone and read a message from Darren, a curse bursting from her as she immediately headed to the door. “I have to see Darren. It’s an emergency,” she managed to say before disappearing out of the door, silence falling onto the dorm for a few moments before Jackie exited the bathroom.

“Where’d Steph go?” Jackie asked Ava, her hands smoothing down her grey shirt and black athletic shorts as she headed out of the bathroom and toward her nightstand, her head glancing every which way for Stephanie.

“She said she had to go see Darren because there was an emergency,” Ava told her before going into the bathroom to strip off her white blouse and black skinny jeans. She changed into grey sweatpants and an oversized black shirt, sighing softly in relief now that she wasn’t freezing in soaked clothing. She headed out of the bathroom to see Jackie organizing some papers regarding her student government organization meeting. “Want to borrow my umbrella?” 

“You’re the sweetest, Ava,” Jackie told her with a grateful smile. Once Ava pulled out the umbrella from the drawer on her nightstand, Jackie took it and swept Ava in a quick hug. “Think about those clubs we talked about! I don't like leaving you all alone so much.”

“I will. I’m just trying to figure out what I like to do,” Ava replied as she gave Jackie a squeeze before letting her go. Jackie was like the mom of the group. She looked after Ava as she stumbled around campus blindly trying to find her place, and she reeled Stephanie in from any really crazy activities as much as she could. Ava preferred Jackie’s mothering over her own mother’s.

“Hey, you have that psychology class tomorrow. Maybe it’ll strike a chord in you. They even have a psychology club you can join if you really like the content of the class,” Jackie suggested as she shoved her binder of papers into her sky blue backpack. She pulled on her rain jacket and then her backpack, looking ready to brave the rain once again.

“We’ll see. Have a good meeting,” Ava replied, giving her roommate a friendly wave until Stephanie headed out of the dorm. Silence fell on the small room, coaxing Ava to retreat to the left side of the room that was hers with her bed, her desk, her nightstand, and her closet. Even if it was only a quarter the size of her house, she felt like the space was more hers than any other place she had been in.

Suddenly, her phone went off on her nightstand, her screen lighting up to display a familiar name. Ava took the time to audibly groan, her head tilting back exasperatedly as she stared at the ceiling for a moment. She considered not answering her mother’s call for once, but the frenzy and panic that would follow would not be worth it. Her mother was the type to call the cops after a few missed calls. After willing herself to get it over with, Ava grabbed her phone off of the nightstand and brought it up to her ear. “Hello?”

“It’s mom. What are you doing?” The familiar drawl of her mother’s voice immediately poured out of the speaker with unnecessary urgency.

“In my dorm room,” Ava merely said, keeping her answers short and sweet. Hopefully, the conversation would be short and sweet, but Ava figured all of her luck was spent even getting to go to college.

“It took you awhile to answer. Are you with someone?” Her mother’s tone turned accusatory.

Ava hardly ever got irritated, but her parents just had a habit of getting under her skin unlike anyone else. Their words struck her harder, hurt her more than if anyone else had said them to her. Since they were her parents, Ava had figured they would support her and care for her just because they loved her, but she felt like everything they did was somehow for their own benefit. They only let her go to college because of the prospects of her getting a good job and giving them money, like she owed them. Everything she did had a price it seemed like.

“No, my roommate just left. I’m here by myself,” Ava explained as she sat on her bed, her hand lifting to pinch the bridge of her nose. She already felt a headache forming, her anxiety growing more and more with each accusatory remark her mother made. She could’ve told her mom that she was currently finding a way to cure cancer and she would still be questioned. 

“Are you doing homework?”

Ava flopped down onto her back on her bed, starting to grow tired from all of the questioning. She did have homework to do, but sleep seemed like such an alluring thing right now. “I was about to until you called.”

“You need to be on top of your studies, Ava. If you fail and lose your scholarship, we aren’t bailing you out. Your father and I don’t have that kind of money to be throwing away.”

Ava gripped her phone tighter, willing herself to not break apart. She felt her eyes burn a little at how unsupportive her parents were, but she knew crying about it wasn’t going to fix anything. The best thing for her to do was to graduate and move as far away as she could before her parents sunk their claws into her once again. She felt bad for leaving her younger siblings behind, but she knew that one day they would understand and follow in her steps to get away from their parents.

“I know. Have a good night,” Ava replied before hanging up the phone. Even talking on the phone felt too close to being at home. She placed her phone back on the nightstand to the left of her bed before rolling onto her back, her braids streaming out around her shoulders. 

No matter how toxic her home life was, Ava still felt guilty about how she wanted to be away from her parents. She was supposed to be happy to see them or to get a call from them. She was supposed to feel protected and loved by them, but she just didn’t. Even when they were near her, she felt all alone. It saddened her, especially during orientation when so many college students had their parents with them. Her parents didn’t even offer to go. She just wanted them to actually care, but she felt like that was even too much to ask of them. 

Deep down, Ava still loved them. They were still her family, but love wasn’t enough to keep her with them. As she grew older, especially once she got to college, she realized that it was more important to build her own life. She had to move away from them or be subjected to being miserable forever. She finally wanted more for herself. She wanted a life of her own. She wanted adventure and risk because she didn’t grow up with those things. Her parents did everything for her, claiming they would get it done better than she could. So, she never learned. Jackie taught her more life lessons and skills than her own parents, like how to do laundry and how to firmly tell someone no. She owed Jackie, not her parents.

Her eyes shifted to the window between her and Jackie’s beds, watching the rain plummet against the window so hard that it almost sounded like knocking. Her thoughts jolted to the hooded man in the alley from earlier, her heart rate rising just at the thought of the experience. She was so curious about what the man in the cap even did to make the hooded man so angry. Maybe they were fighting over a girl? She shook her head, figuring it had to be something else. 

Ava couldn’t help but think back to the man’s face, his features lit up with lightning. She hadn’t gotten too clear of a look, but it was a face that she could pick out of a crowd. It stuck in her mind, refusing to leave to let her focus on her homework. It had been the wildest occurrence she had ever experienced, which was telling of her simple life. It was like another Tuesday night for Stephanie, who occasionally ran into trouble while dealing. Maybe the two men had been fighting over drugs?

“Focus, Ava,” she sighed aloud as she sat up, reaching over to grab her laptop so that she could look over some notes. It wasn’t like she’d ever see the guy again. After knocking the other guy’s lights out, he probably fled town. Ava centered in on her homework, knowing tomorrow was a new and busy day. She had to focus. She had come too far to slip back because her parents would drag her back home at any sign of her struggle. Her fingers moved to the keyboard, flying over the keys to fill the room with the sound of typing, lightning and thunder rumbling just outside of her window.