Author's Note - Thanks for the reviews! Could you please point out where I'm going wrong if you complain about my work? (It only helps me become a better writer.) This is a longish chapter, sorry for the delay in updates. Read and Review

-Peace

Chapter 4

Family Life

As I looked around my barely furnished room I started realising what life could have been like for me. I could have gone to a good school where they appreciated gifted and talented people and not taunted them. Trey wouldn't have been tempted by crime so he'd still be with me and not in jail and I would probably have had a mother and a father supporting me and helping me through life, not weighing me down.

But soon, everything will finally go right for me. I'll be with my brother and when I'll look back and reflect on these days, I won't feel so much pain anymore. Because that is what life used to be, and I will have so much to look forward to.

Ryan will be coming for me soon. I haven't seen him for so long, I wonder if he has changed. He sounded the same over the phone, like the kind and sweet protective brother he was. I remember when these guys were teasing me at school because at the time I had dyed my hair green, Ryan came and made them back off.

I finished packing away my sewing machine that Grandma gave to me before she died, and all her sewing books and my materials when I heard the doorbell ring.

I stared at my reflection in the mirror for a few seconds and brushed my black hair that had been messily tied back and took a deep breath and walked towards the front door. "This is it," I told myself.

I reached the door and started unlocking it. "Please God, Please God, Please God," were the only words running through my mind. What was I praying for exactly?

As I opened the door my head just automatically faced the ground and I stared at my Pink Converse Hi-Tops (a treat from Mom) for a few seconds before I could face Ryan.

"Chelsea!" Ryan exclaimed and grabbed me into a brotherly embrace.

"It has definitely been too, too long."

He stood back and just looked at me, kind of like he was taking me all in.

I noticed that even though his lifestyle had change, his taste in clothes hadn't changed much. Sure, he wore more expensive brands now but he still looked like when he had left me about 7 months ago.

He helped me take all my suitcases and belongings into his car. Once we started driving, I could feel him looking at me.

"What?" I asked smiling and playfully slapping him on the shoulder.

"Nothing." He said smiling back. "I know you don't want to hear this, but you've grown."

"See what those people have done to you, they've turned you into Great Aunt Maude."

I put on a mock voice and said "Ryan, oh Ryan, come give your Great Aunt Maude a kissy poo on the cheeks"

He laughed at my attempt to mimic her.

"I missed this, you know. I missed you, not so much Mom and Trey, but I missed how much fun we had together."

"I did too."

I looked down at my shoes again. "Hey, speaking of Trey, you don't mind if we go to the jail to visit him for a little while. When you were gone, Mom stopped visiting him, so I went once a week after school without her knowing and brought him something nice to eat like a cake. He doesn't know that I'm going. I just kept putting off telling him, but I know that I probably won't see him for a while."

"Sure. We can go. And, Chelsea, whenever you want to come back to visit, just tell me ok. Unless it is something really important with my friends or something, I'll probably be able to take you down to visit Trey."

"Thanks." I flashed him a smile. "So, tell me all about Newport, all your friends and the marvellous people I affectionately call, "The Christ-Like Cohen's"."

He laughed at my joke. It was nice to see him happy. Whenever he was living in Chino, I always new that he was never truly happy. He'd put on a brave face for my sake when we hung out together but I could tell. I could see it in his eyes that something was permanently wrong.

Now they were clear. He was happy. At least happier than before.

It saddened me to think that his time with me was sad and that when I was horribly torn out of his world that everything went right for him.

I know that I wasn't the cause. Mom was. She was the cause of everyone's problems. She just didn't understand how to care, how to be a mother. And now, she couldn't even stay with us anymore. She had abandoned us. She new that she stuffed up our lives and she was just too cowardly to face her problems.

But I knew, deep down, that whatever didn't kill me, made me much, much stronger. That is the only thing I thank her for. If she hadn't created us, and had other kids, they probably would've ended up dead, in this neighbourhood. Trey, who got the worse end of the stick, literally didn't turn out as bad as he could of in her hands.

The hands that could break you, the hands that slapped and dismissed you, the hands that held her glasses of whisky and the hands that comforted on the odd occasion that she wasn't out of it or doped up.

"Why are you staring at me now?"

"You're happy. You're truly happy." I replied and then got out of the car and walked through the gates of Chino Minimum Security Prison.

"Chelsea, Ryan!" Trey's look of amazement and happiness made it only harder for her to break the news to her other older brother. Trey. It didn't matter what he had done, he was truly a sweet person who always put his family first. Mom might have seen them as failures, but I saw them as special. Like Ryan, he was the protective brother type, until he went to jail, that was when Ryan took it upon himself to look after me.

I remember when I had my first date. Rowan, was sweet and I guess I was the only girl who'd go out with him due to his lack of popularity. He was in my gifted and talented club and well, I was a weirdo, so you could say, like him. Anyways, I'll never forget the day when I was 12 and his mom and him came to pick us up. Trey and Ryan practically beat him up then and there. Let's just say that wasn't the greatest memory I've ever had, but it is one of the better ones.

It's funny how the few memories I have when life wasn't bad usually have some kind of embarrassing aspect to it.

"Trey, umm. I don't really know how to tell you this but. Ryan is coming to take me."

"Take you where?" he responded promptly.

"Well, mom left."

"She…!"

"She left, Trey!" I calmed down. " Mom, packed up and went and left me alone. I have no where else to go. The Cohen's have agreed to take me in. So I'm moving to Newport."

My face turned sad again as I said those last words, 'I'm moving to Newport'.

"It's full of opportunity's Chelsea, don't be stupid" I told myself.

About half an hour later we were ready to go. Trey took me into a hug and kissed the top of my head.

"Take care of her Ryan. You know she's smart, don't let her go snooty around all those rich people."

I smiled while buried in his chest.

"I won't change Trey. You know I'm not one to follow the crowd."

"I know Chels, I know."

"Anyways, we have to go." Ryan said and did that guy handshake thingy with Trey.

We started walking out and I could see Trey being taken back to his cell.

"I'll visit as often as I can. And I'll bring pie. Because you know there is nothing better than pie."

He heard me and got out little joke and smiled. I waved goodbye and Ryan and I made our way back to the car.

"You ok, you seem to be doing that a lot lately?" Ryan asked.

"What ?"

"Staring at your shoes."

"Oh."