Fall for You

15 year old Shayera sighed heavily as she played around with her lunch, debating whether or not she should eat the only non repulsive looking item on her tray.

An apple.

It was bright red with not even a spot of green or brown on it, and considering apples are her favorite fruit it would almost be a sin for her NOT to eat it. But she decided against it, even though she had skipped breakfast and her stomach was slightly growling, though it didn't really bother her since the noise of all the other teens conversing drowned out the embarrassing sounds coming from her stomach. Even as her three best friends tried desperately to include her in their conversation (which included her status with a certain Mathews) she just wasn't in the mood and they knew that but that didn't stop them from at least attempting. Shy's eyes searched the lunchroom for nothing in particular, just something to get her mind off of last night disappointing event. Her eyes finally landed on the "cool" table which just so happened to include said Mathews brother and unfortunately his evil girlfriend who for whatever reason looked beyond pissed off at him. She searched his face for an emotion other than the one that was obviously evident on his face; frustration. It was almost as if he could tell she was looking at him and suddenly turned his head to look at her, their eyes instantly meeting. She wanted so bad to look away and lower her head so her long hair could cover her blushing face but for some reason…..she couldn't. Their eyes kept in contact and now it was his turn to search her face for some type of emotion but unlike her he found several different emotions, grief, hurt, disappointment, and a hint of anger. Shayera noticed his own look of frustration quickly dissolved and a new emotion replaced it; pity. Noticing this she finally willed herself to look away not really wanting his pity; she already got enough of that from everybody else. She tried her hardest not to let her mind wander to what occurred last night but it was no use, the scene already started rolling in her mind.

Flashback

She probably should have been scared, after all anybody else in her situation most likely would have been, but she wasn't. She had done this so many times throughout the years it almost seemed normal to her, but it wasn't normal, far from it actually. WAY far from it.

"Thanks for coming with me, Mya." She smiled weakly at her cousin, thankful for her presence and encouragement. "You didn't have to though."

Mya smiled back at her best friend, giving her a one armed hug. "Hey, how many times do I have to tell you, you DON'T have to thank me? I would have to be crazy as hell to let you come down here to this Godforsaken place by yourself."

"You didn't tell Calvin where we were going did you?" Shy quickly asked, suddenly a little worried. Calvin, Damon, Enrique (Aqua's big brother) and Drake (Karina's big brother) are all BEST friends just like me and my girls. Like I explained earlier all of our moms are best friends, they grew up together, so the friendship was passed on to the next generation; our generation. Anyway, Damon also emails the guys whenever her can and Calvin is horrible at keeping secrets. Before Damon left he made it quite clear he didn't want me anywhere near here and made his friends make sure I stayed away.

"Of course not." Mya firmly assured, "I mean yeah, he asked why I needed his car but I just told him it was so we could go visit some friends from school's house."

"And he fell for it?"

Mya giggled, "Yup, he's such a dumbass."

The young women reached their destination not even five minutes later, Mya pulled into the old parking lot and made sure she locked the cat as they exited the vehicle. Shayera linked arms with her best friend as they walked into the old building keeping her head held high as they ignored the sexual whispers and comments being made about them.

They stepped in the elevator and pressed number 5 as the elevator started to move, Shy fiddled with her fingers and bit her bottom lip, all signs of how nervous she really was. They stepped out the elevator and walked down the hall making a right and then a left before they arrived at the apartment they were looking for.

Mya looked over at her with a sympathetic look, "You ready?"

Shy took a deep breath, "Yeah."

Mya nodded understandingly before she knocked on the door, it took a few minutes before someone answered the door. The sounds of locks being undone were heard before the door opened.

Shayera smiled slightly, "Hi Larissa."

The older women looked the two girls over, wondering who the hell they were before she finally recognized them. "Shayera? Samiyyah? What the hell are ya 'll doing here?"

"We…..I wanted to come and check on you, can we come in?" Shayera asked, before Larissa moved to the side signaling for the two teens to come in. Mya looked around at the dingy, old, looking apartment as the women locked the door back.

Larissa turned and examined the two, mostly Shayera. "Well this is certainly a surprise; you've got to excuse the mess I usually don't get many visitors. Damn, look at ya'll all grown up and everything. How old are you now?"

"I'm 16 and Shy is 15." Mya answered while Shy frowned slightly, she didn't even know how old she was………

"Damn, kids these days, ya'll mature so much faster than we use to back in the day. " Larissa coughed slightly, looking around her eyes darting around the room. Shayera noticed she looked a little spaced out and that her eyes were red, she frowned as she realized what Larissa was doing before they got there…..

"You look good." Shayera commented looking her over, truth be told she didn't look good……at all. She was only 38 but looked like she was 50; she had frown lines and bags under her eyes. Normally her caramel skin would glow complimenting her dark brown almost black eyes, but she wasn't glowing at all in fact she looked……..drained. Her naturally jet black hair was now covered by a long tomato red wig that was kind of crooked on her head; she was dressed in a pair of dark skinny jeans and a green tank top. Her figure, which was much like Shayera's minus the thighs, was really the only remotely attractive thing about her at the moment.

"Thanks……. I can't have ya'll staying to long; I got to go to work in an hour."

Shy frowned deeply this time at her definition of "work" and waited a few minutes thinking about how she wanted to say what she had came there to ask. "Larissa……." She trailed off, "You don't have to do this you know, you don't have to live like this…."

Anger quickly appeared on this woman's face, "Is that what you came here for? To try and convince me to come home?" She questioned slight angry, "What, you think I can't take care of myself?"

Mya shook her head, "We just want to help you."

She scoffed, "Like hell you do, listen little girls, I am a grown ass women and I can take care of myself, I've been doing it for a long motherfucking time. And besides I know what you mean by "help" you just gonna throw me in one of those crazy houses and leave me there like all those rich white kids do to their parents, and I ain't having it."

"No Rissa, we wouldn't do that to you, I wouldn't do that to you. We just wanna help you get over your addiction, put you into a rehab you know." Shy tried to explain.

"There's no such thing as a "nice rehab", look at me Shy, I'm a crack head okay? Or as the teachers at that big fancy prep school you go to say "drug addict". This is who I am now okay? There's no hope for me, I don't know why you keep on coming here, and you're just wasting your time."

"Larissa……." Mya trailed off.

"Now I gotta go get ready for work, so ya'll best be going." She said getting up picking up random things trying to clean up.

"Okay." Shy said, realizing their conversation was going nowhere, "We'll come back when we can to check up on you okay?" The women didn't respond or even look at the girls; she just sat back down and stared at the floor. Mya muttered a bye as she walked to the door, Shy however went and gave the troubled women a hug and kissed her on the cheek. "Be careful okay, I'll be praying for you."

Larissa scoffed, "Don't bother, God doesn't care about me, hasn't for a while to be honest."

Shy ignored her comment and walked to the door; right before closing it all the way she looked back one more time. "I love you……" She croaked out in a teary voice, "Mama."

End Flashback

It took everything in Shayera not to burst into tears right then and there, the events from last night kept playing over and over in her head like a bad song on repeat. Seeing her mother, the one who gave life to her, in that kind of mental state was nothing short of heartbreaking. More than anything in the world, Shy wanted her mom to come home, so they could be a family; a real family. Looking at her watch, Shy saw she still had 8 minutes of lunch left. She wanted to be alone so she excused herself from the table, emptied her tray and walked out the cafeteria. Normally she would go to her spot on the roof but didn't want to risk the chance of running into Corey; he was really the last person she wanted to see at the moment. So instead she made her way to the girl's bathroom, it wasn't the best place to clear her head but it certainly wasn't the worst. She didn't even bother to try and use the bathroom; she hadn't eaten anything all day so nine times out of ten she wouldn't be able to go anyway. Instead she just leaned over the bathroom sink and splashed her face with cold water, the sound of the running water blocked out noise so Shy didn't hear when someone walked in and locked the door. The multi-racial teen splashed herself a few more times before reaching to turn the water off and looking up in the mirror at her reflection……and the reflection of a pissed of Vanessa.

"You bitch!" Vanessa yelled, quickly grabbing Shy by her hair pulling as hard as she could as she shoved the girl into the wall right before slapping her as hard as she could. "I can't believe you!"

"What are you talking about?" Shy asked placing her hand over the now sore right side of her face where Vanessa assaulted. Her long black hair was now out of its messy bun and cascaded down her back.

"Don't you dare play dumb with me! You know exactly what I'm talking about slut!" Vanessa screamed, she was pissed off, no scratch that, she was furious. "I know your sleeping with Corey!"

Shy's jaw literally dropped, she couldn't believe what she was hearing, "What? No I'm not, were just tutoring each other, that's all. I'm helping him with his Spanish and he's helping me with my Algebra."

Vanessa gave her an incredulous look, "You honestly expect me to believe that? How stupid do you think I am?! Yeah you guys are helping each other alright, helping yourself into each other's pants!"

"Vanessa you have to believe me I would never-"

"Just shut the hell up okay! I know Corey! I know how he is; he NEVER passes up a pretty face especially when she's got a body to go with it."

Shy was shocked and confused, did Vanessa just……compliment her?

"Look," Vanessa was starting to calm down, "I can't control who Corey does and doesn't fuck. I know that." A look of sadness crossed her face, and Shy couldn't help but feel bad for the girl. She had always figured that Vanessa was only with Corey for his money and popularity; never had she thought Vanessa could actually have true feelings for him. But judging from the hurt and pain in her voice and eyes, it was obvious she did. "But if you think that I'm going to let a poor black bitch like you come in and steal him from me, you're sadly mistaken! The only reason Corey is even bothering with you is because 1. You're an easy fuck and 2. He feels sorry for you. You do realize that right?" Shayera didn't answer but just continued looking down, "Of course you do, but know this whore, Corey is MINE and I will get rid of whoever and do whatever it takes to keep him. Got it?" Her voice was hard and cold and all Shy could do was nod in agreement. "Good." She turned around to walk away but turned back and smirked at Shy before slapping her once again before she finally left the bathroom.

Shy looked at herself in the mirror and noticed two small but bleeding scratches close to her temple, most likely cause by Vanessa's sharp cat like nails. Looking at her watch she saw she had three minutes until the bell would ring signaling the end of lunch.

She had three minutes to think about everything that happened last night.

Three minutes to think about what just happened.

And three minutes to cry her eyes out.