Chapter 7: Asher

I followed Ko into his room to make sure he didn't run back downstairs to put the bitch on the brink of death, although it would be pleasing to watch we can't risk being thrown out of the organization. The Gregorious couple don't seem that bad but their sons are complete assholes after hearing what the bitch said about us and then going after us individually, I wanted to reach out and break his finger. I heard his and Alex's voices before entering the room and all I could make out was "disgusting", "poor", and "uneducated", so when they asked us what we do on our free time I said read to show them we're not stupid it's a pretty childish move but it's not like I can attack everyone that has the same thoughts. Their faces were pretty funny though seeing them made me laugh internally from the mere shock that we can read, well surprise surprise we're not uneducated.

Before going to my room I made sure Mal was tucked in and checked on Ko, that old man called him by his name which he hates.

Lani was already there sitting right next to him on the bed, their backs facing me. "To bad we all couldn't hit him, he was really pissing me off, thanks but you need to be careful. I don't want them calling the police and pressing charges.", her voice was caring and warning. She was right, Ko has been to the police station more than once and the next could make him go to jail for a while. Most of the time the families we stayed with called the police because he started a fight with their son or husband or cousin, it didn't matter but the fact was he never initiated the fight it was out of self defence but this time was different because now it was proven that he started it. He sighed and gave a low grumble but agreed which she returned with a hug, I was still in the doorway and knocked a little on the doorframe before stepping in and closing it. "Hey dumbass, you all good?"

"Yea, I'm glad I was able to hit that asshole before leaving.", he said with a slight smirk on his face.

"Your one lucky bitch."

I sat next to Lani, making her in between the both of us, we sat there in a comfortable silence for a while. We would have stayed like that if we didn't hear a yawn from Lani, making that our queue to sleep, we said night to each other and I followed her out the door watching her safely go upstairs before going into my room.

Right when I closed the door I went straight to the shower, right after the long walk I wasn't able to shower because I was helping Mal. The thought of us being stranded and seeing that disgusting woman made me pissed and wanting to hit something, but once I felt the warm water all my thoughts washed away. It felt so fucking nice to shower in warm water after so long, we never had the privilege of warm water or even showering because of how past families thought of us as dirty little brats that don't deserve anything. Getting out of the shower and putting on some new clothes that I brought, my thoughts went back to dinner and what the old man called Ko. Luca. All of us hated our names, even Mal and Mea didn't really like their first given name because of who gave it to us, and Ryan. Emily was a real bitch and didn't give a fuck about us even if we were her kids, all she wanted was money to feed her drug addiction that grew over the years. It started off with just being a little alcohol everyday but it evolved to drugs and becoming a prostitute, during this whole time she would beat us and kick us out when she had "guests" only giving us some snacks to keep us alive to do the chores. At age four we were thrust into the shady world trying to pay off Emily's debt that she gained, but little did we know something much worse was coming. Even with all the people our mother slept with she always said we had the same father, even with how young Mal and Mea are. We all looked similar so we never doubted it, with wavy brown hair and somewhat similar facial features that we got from our dad with only our eyes different from each other, we could pass as siblings even if it wasn't true we still loved each other to death. She only gave us a first name, Lani was the one who gave us our middle names which we go by but they were so long she shortened it to call each other Mal, Kai, Ko, Mea, and Lani. As for our last name, we got it from a friend we met that helped us out.

Only our little group of five call each other by these names while everyone else calls us by our given names. We don't like outsiders calling us by our nicknames because of how we're never meeting them again or how meaningless they are to us.

Going down memory lane is never fun because the shit we went through just to keep each other safe and stay together. Until we went into the agency things were hell but getting into the "program" made things a little better because there was a little bit more food given and we got to stay together. We can't leave it just yet, we need to get the information about his location before disappearing.