1 Chapter one

Rowan's eyes opened slowly to complete silence, just like every morning. At first, she laid there, staring at the blank ceiling, thinking about how things would be if they weren't so hard in the first place. But, then she heard the sirens about a block away, and she knew she was right where she was last night, not in her made-up fairytale of being just a normal teen with a normal life.

She slowly got up out of bed, brushed her teeth and hair, and threw on some of the very few decent looking clothes she had as she walked down the tiny hallway to check on her grandmother.

She was staring blankly at the wall, like every morning, and didn't acknowledge Rowan coming into the room.

"Hey, grandma," Rowan said with a forced smile. "Want some breakfast? I actually found this bread on sale yesterday. We can have toast!" Rowan's grandma said nothing, and continued to stare into the wall.

But, Rowan was used to this. Her grandmother hadn't spoken at all after the death of her daughter, who was Rowan's mom that died in a fatal car crash.

Rowan hadn't known who her dad was, her mother had never told her. She guessed that if her father really cared about her, he'd have already gotten her and her grandma out of this hell-hole called downtown Los Angeles.

When Rowan made breakfast for her grandma and made sure everything was okay for her to leave, she threw on her old converse and headed out.

Like usual, Rowan had to climb down the fire escape to avoid all of the super sketchy people that hung around her apartment, but she was used to it.

As she made her way down, a familiar voice called her name.

"Hey Rowan! Did that creepy guy with the gold teeth scare you again?"

Rowan rolled her eyes and jumped down.

"No, Griffin, he did not 'scare' me again. Besides, he wasn't around today."

Griffin smiled. "Hah, sure."

Griffin and Rowan walked together almost every single day-they both couldn't remember the last time they didn't.

They were each other's best friends, and they looked out for each other like family members.

As they walked along the sidewalk around Rowan's apartment complex, Rowan suddenly remembered something.

"Uh, Griff, I just remembered I can't come to school today."

Griffin half-rolled his eyes.

"Rowan, you can't just keep missing school. If you ever wanna leave Los Angeles, you have to work for it. And by work for it, I mean by going to school, not washing and fixing cars."

Rowan sighed. "Listen, Griff, I've heard that same lecture every single time I tell you I can't come. Also, to leave Los Angeles, I don't just have to go to school. I have to do so many other things too, y'know... and washing and fixing cars just happens to be one of them."

Griffin replied with a gruff "whatever", but Rowan could tell that he wasn't being spiteful.

As Rowan parted with Griffin and made her way down to the auto shop where she worked, she started thinking about what Griffin had said.

Maybe she did need to stop skipping school. She was sure that the auto shop would be fine without her for a couple of d-

Suddenly, Rowan was knocked straight over onto the road, her face on the hard gravel.

The next thing she knew, she was being pulled up by the shirt and held in front of a rough looking guy who only meant one thing: trouble.

"Give me your money, kid!" The guy spat loudly into her face.

"I don't have any money! Let me go!", Rowan spat back while trying to get free from his grasp.

"Give it to me now and I'll let you go. Stop fi-"

Suddenly, Rowan kicked the guy as hard as she could, sending him plummeting backwards and freeing Rowan from his grasp.

As Rowan took off, she stuck her tongue out and flipped him off.

"Heh, that's what you get, freak!"

When she made it to the auto shop, she closed the door behind her and turned the "open" sign to "closed".

"Ey, Rowan, what'd ya do that for? I was expectin' customers today!" An older woman at the desk exclaimed subtly.

Rowan took a small breath of relief.

"No reason, Barb."

"There's gotta be a reason. Did ya get in trouble with one of those thugs again?"

Rowan turned to the side while tying up her dark brown hair, a stray piece falling down to her face.

"You know me so well."

Barb rolled her eyes and switched the sign back to "open."

"Now," she said. "Get to work. We've got people wantin' their cars fixed n' washed. Whaddaya standin' around for?"

However, Rowan had become distracted by the very large dark cloud that had suddenly covered up the usually bright California sun. It wasn't supposed to rain today.

Rowan shrugged it off. Eh, what can you do? Weather people get mixed up sometimes.

Little did she know that it was much more than just a small mix-up.