Preface: 

 

When you think of two things, you usually find something to compare both of them. 

 

When you think of love and life, some may be able to diffuse the two. But I can’t. 

 

Such diverse words and different definitions should make it simple. For me, those words are almost identical. 

 

For love is part of life, and what would life be if there wasn’t love? 

 

Chapter One: 

 

Our brown eyes met through the cold, steel bars. Her expression appeared to be cheery as usual. It worried me a bit. How could she hold a smile even though she’s had more than enough trauma? 

My guard stood outside the cell, hand to his holster if the time were to come. Another guard came with a chain of jingling keys, one of them to open my cage. He fiddled with them for a moment, only then the metal fit like a puzzle piece and he slid the barred door open. 

If I could, I would flip my blonde hair dramatically for my exit. But the policy here for girls’ hair is to keep it into a tight, neat bun. I rubbed my bandaged knuckles as I stepped outside the cell. I still couldn’t believe this was happening. After four years, I’m finally getting out of this hole. 

Even though I was on the outside of my cell, I could still smell the rotten essence of JUVIE. The other delinquents stared at me, thirsty for a fight but also jealous they weren’t in my shoes. Anyone would pay anything to escape. 

My mother embraced me as soon as my foot touched the ground. Her arms wrapped around me into an enormous hug. She squeezed me so tight, I almost couldn’t breathe. 

“Oh, darling,” she whispered into my ear as she rubbed my back. “It’s been too long.”

“Mmm,” was what I managed to say to my mother in four years. 

The guard with the keychain stepped forward. “Mrs. Nelson, there’s still some paperwork that needs to be finalized.”

“Yes, of course.” Mom replied. 

The two of them left me alone with the guard in front of my cell. He gestured for me to follow him, but even though I was being released, it was still on instinct to follow a guard no matter what. He hefted his belt over his big belly as he led me to the lost and found. 

The lost and found was where the released got their “new clothes.” But really, it was clothing past delinquents had left here to turn in their jumpsuits. I knelt to the dirty ground as I searched the cardboard box for anything that was my size. I found a pair of jeans that could most likely stand up themselves and a frilly purple top. As for the shoes, I would keep them. 

I got changed in enough time; Mom had finished the paperwork and was waiting for me outside the restroom of the station. It felt strange to have someone waiting on me, but at the same time, it was also comforting that someone didn’t leave me either. 

The two of us hopped into the car, slamming our doors shut simultaneously. Mom turned the key into ignition and backed out of the JUVIE parking lot. I still couldn’t wrap my head around it. The four years of my imprisonment felt like four decades. It’s been my life. I can’t simply forget the times I had in that place. 

I rubbed my bandaged knuckles again. The dried blood was visible on the outside, but I didn’t mind it. When you’re in prison, you’re exposed to much worse than a meager bloodstain. My mother on the other hand couldn’t take her eyes off it. Every second or two, her eyes would avert from the road to my hands. 

Mom cleared her throat to start a conversation. “What would you like for dinner?” she asked casually. 

I shrugged, placing my hands on either side of my body. “It doesn’t matter to me. Anything is better than the slop they served us in there.”

“How bad was it?” she hesitantly asked. 

“You don’t want to know.”

Mom left the conversation at that. She fixed her gaze back at the road in front of us as we sat in silence the rest of the way home. 

 

Once we reached our driveway, Mom and I exited the car and made our way to the front door. She fidgeted with her keychain until she found the one that opens the lock. As soon as the door opened, I flopped onto the couch. Mom found that amusing and cupped her hand over her mouth in a chuckle. 

I smiled weakly. It felt weird to smile instead of scowl at someone for stealing your soap. 

As I sat open-legged on the sofa, Mom walked over into the kitchen and turned the oven on. I saw her take out a bag of frozen pizza from the freezer and placed it inside the burning machine. Pizza was a major step-up for me. It felt like a century since I’d ate pizza. 

“You can go upstairs while I make dinner, honey,” she said, setting the timer on the oven. 

“Okay,” I said as I slowly walked upstairs. 

Each time my foot touched a step, it creaked loudly. It made me flinch every time. I don’t know why. Maybe I just wasn’t expecting it to. I’m always observing my peers and rivals, I forget that objects can have actions too in a way. 

When I reached the next floor, I noticed there were four doors: Mom’s room, a bathroom, a closet where we kept absolute rubbish, and my room. My room, that I haven’t seen, nor slept in, in four years. I slowly tip-toed to my door and ever so gently creaked open the door. 

Inside my room was light blue stained walls with some sort of celebrity poster hanging on each side. Against the wall was a trundle bed with too many fluffy pillows to count. Right beside the bed was a desk with a laptop atop of it, along with a stack of notebooks and a cup of pens. It was foreign seeing my room. I didn’t remember it being like this. 

Rooms weren’t a thing when I was in JUVIE. We had a cell that you shared with someone who disliked you more than you disliked them. It was smelly, watched every second, and the beds gave you back problems you couldn’t begin to comprehend. It was a complete death trap. Which, I suppose, is the point of the whole building in the first place. If you commit a crime, they’re not going to give you fancy food and an expensive mattress. 

I remembered all the delinquents who stared at me during my release. All of them hated me. But that was mostly their jealousy taking over their nerves. If you really thought about it, it was almost a balance between jealousy and the hunger to pound me to the ground. Their dirty faces gave me glares I can never forget. Especially Sam’s. 

Samantha Jenkins was my only so-called friend in JUVIE. We got sentenced the same year and bonded over what little similarities we have. She lived in New York, but ran away and took a bus to Maryland to get away from her mom. When she got here, her issues got the better of her and she started committing crimes left and right. Sam never told me what she did that landed her in JUVIE, but I can only assume what was bad enough for her to get a six-year sentence. 

She was furious that I was released before her. I suppose she thought I wanted to stay there with her until her sentence was over. But I couldn’t change the system with a simple snap of my fingers. I was upset to leave the only friend I had ever made, but I had to keep it inside of me. I vowed to myself I would never let anyone see me on the inside. That was a door to never be opened. 

For now, I can only put on a fake smile and a fake face. 

After a couple of minutes of reorganizing my room, Mom called me down for supper. We sat at our little dining table in silence, subtly taking bites of the steaming, hot pizza. I burnt my tongue a few times, but I didn’t mind it. Mom would take sips from her mug of coffee every second or two, holding the half-eaten slice in the other hand. 

“So,” she began, swallowing her beverage. “I was thinking about sending you to school. Since you’re practically a junior in high school now and I would appreciate it if you went to college.”

I almost choked on my food. “Wha–?”

Mom held a hand up to stop me. “Halo, there is nothing wrong with going to school. And, I highly doubt they taught you anything educational when you were in prison.”

“It’s not prison,” I muttered. “They made JUVIE for a reason. To divide the age groups of delinquents.”

Mom sighed, exhausted by how fast this conversation got out of hand. “You don’t get a say in this. You’re going to enroll at East Valley High, you will graduate, and you will get yourself a good, well-paid, job to secure a stable lifestyle because, Halo, I’m not always going to be at your beck-and-call for money and resources. Understood?”

I sighed as well, irritated by her little lecture. “Fine.”

“You start tomorrow,” she said, shifting her focus back to the food. 

I couldn’t finish my pizza. Instead, I stomped upstairs, slammed my door, and screamed into my pillow. High school? It sounded worse than four years in prison. I had already missed out on normal parts of a teenager’s life, and now I was just supposed to adapt to it automatically? There had to be something else I could do. 

I got tired of brainstorming: there was obviously no other way I could go to a school that would fit Mom’s idea of a “perfect curriculum.” I changed into my pajamas instead and fell face-first into my bed. I grabbed one of the fluffy pillows, hugging it beside me with my left arm. I stared up at the ceiling, wondering what life in high school would be like for a former delinquent like me. 

Sam was two years older than me. She had gone to high school and she told me everything from her experience. I can remember it vividly. We would sit at the lunch tables together, both sporting the ugly orange jumpsuits while Sam would gesture with her fork as she spoke. 

“High school is absolute garbage,” she said in between bites of slop. “It’s similar to JUVIE in a way, I guess. Everyone judges you, there’s always some sort of drama going on — like fights — and you definitely don’t want to be on the alpha’s bad side.”

I knew who she meant by “the alpha.” There was a delinquent named Ellie. She was practically seven feet tall, and no one wanted to be on the wrong side of her. Ellie was considered the alpha of JUVIE, although I had gotten into a few fights with her. It was Ellie who caused my knuckles to be bandaged: she bit them. It burnt like crazy. I still remember the blood trickling down the back of my hand, but I didn’t scream. The memory made me rub the white cloth surrounding my hand again. 

I hope I meet someone like Ellie.