Azlia

I wake up to the sun beaming on my face. I do my morning routine and decided to let my curls hang. Everyone keeps telling me to cut my hair but I like how it is. It stops at the middle of my back.

I go into my closet and Pick out a white cropped tank and some light washed shorts. I got downstairs and make my way to the door. I open it and see the Cameron's, my next door neighbors.

I see Sarah and walk over to her. I walk past Topper and his minions. One of them whistle and I flip them off and continue walking towards Sarah.

She was talking to a little girl. "Hey Azi." She says. "Hey." I say back. The little girl taps Sarah and gets her attention again. The little girl lost her teddy bear and Sarah said she'd get it for her.

"Okay, I'm gonna go get her." Sarah says. "Be careful of electricity." The little girl says.

Sarah walks across the fallen tree carefully, trying not to step on any wires. "Hey there's 14,000 volts of those wires." Rose shouts. "Hey, Sarah be careful!" Topper yells.

Sarah reaches the boat. "I see her!" She says. the little girl giggles with excitement.

She falls into the boat and screams. Everyone gasp out loudly. She waves the wire cord around and starts laughing. I do the same. "It's disconnected." She laughs.

Sarah walks over to me still laughing. "Good one." I say giving her a high fine while still laughing. "That was fun." She smiles.

We continue walking. "How's John B and JJ?" She ask. "Well John B's face is getting better and JJ is just JJ." I say laughing. "Well can you tell them i'm sorry on behalf of Topper, even though it doesn't make anything better." She ask. "Of course." I say giving her a hug.

We say our goodbye and I make my way to John B's.

I walk up to John B's porch and open the door. They all stop talking and stare at me with dropped jaws. "What?" I asked a little confused and scared. "Did you just make us completely stop and stare at you?" Ki ask. I look around not knowing how to answer the question. "You look stunning." She compliments me. I look down and at my plain outfit. "Thank you?" I say but in a questionable way. I look at JJ and he's just smiling widely.

"Also, Sarah wanted me to tell you guys that she's sorry on Toppers behalf, or whatever that means." I say facing John B and JJ. Ki gags and I roll my eyes and laugh. "Sarah Cameron?" John B ask. My facial expression gives him his answer.

JJ continues his story about how they went to Lana Grubbs house and the same men that attacked us attacked Lara.

"And all we here is just bam, bam, bam!" JJ tells his story. "Knocking paint off the wall, G! From the inside. And i'm just look at him like- Wait, first off, look at this shit." He says cutting himself off. He walks over to the three of us and runs his hands through his hair. "That dandruff, disgusting." Ki says. "Okay we get it." I say shoving his head away from us. "That's paint." JJ says.

The four of them started talking and I just zoned it out. I started thinking about what these guys want and why they need it.

"Yo!" Pope says snapping me out of my thoughts.

"These boys, these killers. They're square groupers." JJ says hitting his Juul. Pope sighs and puts his hands on his hat. "They're square groupers, like narco square groupers, like Pablo Escobar square groupers?"

"Yeah, man." JJ sighs.

"You guys, not everything is a kingpin movie." Ki says. I start zoning out again but JJ sudden panic screams snap me out of it.

"Why would they want the compass?" Ki ask. "It's a piece of shit. You could pawn it off for five bucks if you wanted to, no offense." Pope says to John B.

"The office." JB says. "What?" I ask. "My dads office." He says.

We all follow John B to his dads office while be talks about how he hid all of his stuff in there. We get to the office door and come to a complete stop. John B unlocks the door and slowly opens it.

"I've slept over here like 600 times, and I've never seen this room before." Pope says as we all walk in.

We all start looking around the room for anything that could give us hints about the compass.

John B sits down and we all huddle around him. He opens the compass and there's writing in the back of it. "What's that." Ki ask. "This is my dads handwriting." He says looking at all of us. "How do you know that." I ask. "Because he does these weird R's with the- see it." John B shoves the compass in my face and I let my eyes adjust to it.

JJ takes the compass in his hands and tries to read the writing. "Red-rout-no it looks like an A."

"It says Redfield." I say. "Okay well what's redfield?" Ki ask. "Besides the most common name in the country." Pope adds. "Maybe it's a clue to where he's hiding." JB says. I sigh to my self at John B's words.

"But if it is a clue, maybe it's an anagram." Pope says. "Yes. Perfect. Anagram. You need paper." John B shuffles around.

John B hands Pope a piece of paper. "How can you concentrate with that thing crowing at you." Pope says annoyed.

"JJ loves the rooster." John B says.

"I love the rooster." I say.

I go over to the a desk and John B follows me. We both start writing stuff down. I look out the window and see a black truck pull up. "B." I say getting John B's attention. He looks up. "Shit."

"Guys, somebody's here." He says talking over everybody. The all run towards us and look out the window.

"Guys, guys is that them?" Ki panics.

"JJ listen too me, where's the gun?" John B ask pushing JJ against the way. "Gun? I, uh, I can't-," Ki cuts JJ off. "Now you don't have the gun the one time we need the gun." "It's was in my backpack, and then I- I- my backpacks on the porch." JJ says rubbing his head. "Go get it!" I whisper yells.

JJ fast walk out the room and I stand my the door. "John Routledge!" Somebody yells. JJ comes running back and pulls me by my waist back into the room. "Where's the gun?" John B ask. "They're on the front porch guys." JJ whispers. "Oh no no." I say, my voice starting to crack.

"Get out here!" One of the guys yells. We hear crashing and shelves falling. "Guys we gotta leave!" Ki whispers holding my hand. "Window. Window." I say and we all run over to it. JJ and Pope try to open it but it doesn't budge. "What's happening why is it taking so long?" I panic. "It's painted shut, okay." JJ says frustrated.

I look over at one of the desk and grab two scissors. I hand one to Ki and we both try chipping up the paint. JJ and Pope

"Come on! Come on!" JJ urges. "We're going fast as we can." Ki says back.

"Sh, be quiet." Pope and John B both say. We all freeze and the door nob starts rattling. Ki and I immediately go back to chipping up the paint. "You better not be in there!" One of the guys yell slamming against the door. I throw my pair of scissors down and try opening the window and Ki does the same. A few seconds later it opens.

The guy starts kicking at the door and John B and Pope run away from it. As soon as we all crowd out of the window we hear a gunshot which makes us move faster. Ki starts running towards the rooster coop and we all follow.

Ki climbs in and I climb in after her. JJ gives me a boost by pushing me up from my butt. I blush a little but then fear takes over my face. We all crowd into the coop basically on top of each other. I'm literally on JJ's lap and Pope is halfway on Ki. John B sits there criss cross taking up half the space.

I get off of JJ's lap and look out one of the cracks with John B. All of a sudden the rooster goes crazy. "Do something Pope, shut him up." JJ huffs. "What do you want me to do?" He ask. "Pet it or talk to it I don't know." Ki cries. The loud rooster catches one of the guys attention and he slowly walks over to us with his gun up. "Shit." I quietly say turning back around with my back against the wall. John B quickly does that same.

JJ grabs the rooster by the neck and forces it against the ground. The rooster crows in pain until JJ snaps it's neck.

A single tear falls down my face and I breath in and out.

"Ratter! What the hell are you doing? Let's go." Someone yells. Soon the engine of a truck gets farther and farther away.

A few minutes later I open the coop door and slowly crawl out, letting all the tears come down my face. I lay on my back and just stare up at the sky. I see JJ hover over me and he puts out both his hands lifting me up. I wrap my arms around him and he draws circles on my back with his hand.

~

"Bro, you know how I process my sad feels, dank nugs and the stickiest of ickies." JJ says responding back to Pope. "I'm not concocting, okay. My dads trying to give me a message" John B says.

We were all in his van going, who knows.

"If it helps you believe, John B." Ki starts out saying. "Look, I don't need a therapy session, okay? I'm not trippin out." He yells back. "It's okay to trip our bro, but-," John B cuts JJ off. "Look, my dad is missing, okay, missing, you don't know what it's like to have the person closest to you vanish and then have no idea what happened." John B states.

JJ looks up at me and I just shrug my shoulders. "It's been almost a year." Ki says. "Hey he could've been kidnapped. That's definitely a possibility." JJ says. "Yeah, could be in a Soviet sub getting interrogated by the KGB somewhere." Pope adds. "Could be." I say. "Absolutely, or Atlantis." JJ says. I give him a confused look. "It could be a possibility." He says defending himself.

John B said that he thinks the message is Redfield, so we're going to the lighthouse.

John B decided him and Ki would go in the lighthouse and JJ, Pope and I would keep a lookout. If we split up we would all meet back at JJ's house.

I was sitting on top of the van fidgeting with all the yarn bracelets on my arm and Pope and JJ were playing with a ball.

"What do you thinks happing?" I ask let my feet dangle. "They're probably macking." JJ says throwing the ball to Pope. "JJ." I say on a little annoyance. "Could be true." Pope says.

It's been a while since John B and Ki were in the lighthouse and all of a sudden we heard police sirens coming towards us. "Oh shit." Pope says running into the van. JJ helps me down and we also run into the van. "Come on we gotta go, well just meet them at JJ." I tell Pope. He steps on the gas and we speed off.

"They're gonna fucking hate us." I say ashamed. "If we stayed we would've been caught." Pope says keep his eyes on the road. I look up at JJ and see him about to light a blunt. I snatch it out his hands and throw it out the window. "Smokings bad for the lungs." I shrug.

It was about an hour later and the three of us were at JJ's house. "They should be back by now guys." I say. I was laying on the floor admiring the celling. JJ sits on the couch in front of me and I balance my feet on his knees.

"Maybe they got caught." JJ says. "Doubt it." Pope says leaning back in one of the chairs.

Another two hours pass and we're all just chilling around doing nothing. All of a sudden a horn beeps and it catches our attention. A smile appears on my face. "Let's ride." JJ says putting out his blunt. "This better be good." Pope says. "Hell yeah it will be." I say dapping John B up.

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