The Runaways

The Job.

I'm Miya I was born on the 15th of July, I live with my mum, dad and little brother Leo. Ever since I was little I've wanted an adventure but not like your normal one like rock climbing or cave diving but one with a little more danger. I have a perfect life with a loving family and great friends but it's got boring. So I decided when I finish year 8, to stop waiting for one to happen and make my own. On the 21st of July at 10 pm I packed my bags with the essentials and took the last of my birthday money. I got dressed into a shirt, hoodie and a pair of jeans looked around my room, then snuck into my brother's room when he was sleeping and left him a note saying 'goodbye, for now.'

When I took a step out of the door I was hit with lots of emotions; excitement, fear and a little bit of doubt. I started walking even though I didn't know my destination. It was a warm evening so I took of my hoodie and put it in my rucksack. I thought the best place to go was the city where no-one would look for me. At 11 o'clock I decided to have a sleep before my long walk, so I sat up against a nearby wall of a house and closed my eyes. When I woke it was midnight. As I was walking I saw a car pass. I looked at my watch, it was 1:40am. 'It's probably people coming back from a club or something' I thought. It was getting to me that I might have made a mistake but I need my adventure.

I was just entering town when the sun started to go up. I looked at my watch again it was 5:12am, I've been walking for about 5 hours now, my legs were aching, I started looking for a place to sit and rest. I found a nearby bench, sat down and took off my shoes and started rubbing my feet. I then laid down and shut my eyes before the rush of people come into town.

I started hearing the sound of cars and people about 3 hours later. I made sure that I woke up straight away and moved on before anyone noticed me. I got my rucksack and my hoodie, which was being used as a pillow, looked in my pocket and counted the money £10 exactly. I never got much money for my birthday mainly clothing and gift cards. I had got £25 that year. I realised I needed to spread my money wisely, so I went to the 99p store and grabbed some food (energy bars, crisps and a few sandwiches) and two bottles of water. I paid and then headed out the door and thought that it should last for a little while with this food and then afterwards I don't know what I would do.

It got to lunchtime and I didn't eat anything for breakfast and by now I was a little hungry. I ate an energy bar and took a sip of the water. I found a newspaper outside a newsagent and looked in the job section but nothing was there for people with no qualifications like me. It's a shame that they don't give jobs to the less educated but I guess if they have money they don't care about the less fortunate. I wondered around for a bit and looked around for people who might give me a job, I might have to result to asking people for money. I saw this man in the corner of my eye talking to some people and handing out leaflets, so I decided to take a look, on the leaflets there were lots of different jobs and he said to me that they were hiring people who are younger and want a bit of money. There was an event on this Saturday at 6pm that I was interested in going along to. Today was Friday so I had a whole day to think about what kind of job I might be good at, I started skimming through jobs; Paperboy/girl, working at a till but there was one that caught my eye 'Are you between 13 and 30 would you like a job as an army cadet? Do you want to help your queen and country? Well come and join us now!!!' This is the adventure I was waiting for, this was my type of job.

It was now an hour before the job fair and I wondered round trying to find where it was until I saw balloons and streamers and knew that this was the place. I saw lots of tables with leaflets on but I had my eye out for the army one. I started glancing at the other tables but I couldn't find the army one, then released why, it was crowded by other people who were interested there were loads of them pushing and shoving trying to get to the front and sign up. I gave up on that idea and walked out the fair. It was devastating I had a chance to go on an amazing adventure but so did every other person there with the same idea as me. As I walked down the road I saw that guy with the leaflets again but this time he wasn't crowded by people but standing next to a big white van. I started to get weary and changed my route so I didn't get anywhere near him. But he knew me, he recognised my face. He looked straight into my eyes and smiled at me, not a kind smile a friend would give you but a small sinister one.

I kept thinking about him all that night as I was settling down on a bench. It got much colder that night so I used my bag as a pillow and my hoodie as a blanket. I didn't think about a sleeping bag. In the middle of the night I got up and went to the public loo and washed up. I looked in my bag for my water to get a drink and as I was looking I found my phone which I had completely forgot about I checked the time on that and found out I had 12 missed calls and 20 text messages all from people in my family. One text read 'You are in so much trouble when you get home.' Followed by this 'I found the message in your brothers room and we are so worried please call us.' I forgot about the note I left that night and now I regretted leaving home, I didn't think about how many people would be effected.

I keep waking up at 5am and doing the same things like drinking and eating, I've still got a bottle of water and some energy bars left. Something felt different about today, I had hope. I walked down to the nearest shop selling newspapers and looking through it then paused on a page. It had the picture of the man I saw with that van. He was offering a job that paid £20 an hour. Better then nothing I thought to myself. At the bottom was the address, which I wrote down on my hand with one of those pens chained to the lotto stand.

As I was walking to the place I started thinking about the ad and that I didn't see what the job was, what if it was something I couldn't do? I let that thought pass and started saying to myself that I need to get money to survive out here. When I reached the house I saw that it must have been expensive it was massive with millions of rooms and stained glass windows. It had a gate around it with one of those speaker things. I pressed the button, kind of scared and said my name and that I saw advertisement in the paper for the job.