sanctuary. [oscar diaz]

[6] the girl named catalina.

THE GIRL NAMED CATALINA.

"Me and some of the guys are going to the game at Cesar's school, wanna come?" Oscar asked, looking down at me as I sat on the couch.

"Football's not really my thing," I declined, nicely. "But what is my thing is shopping."

"I'm not going shopping," he shot down, quickly as he crossed his arms.

"You don't have to go, just drop me off," I said.

The last few days for me have been stressful as hell. I've heard gun shots, I've hung out with gang members, I've been in a lockdown and who knows what else could happen. I needed a break and shopping was the best break there was.

"Fine," he sighed. "Where you wanna go?"

Ever since our argument yesterday, Oscar has been a little reserved and distant. I think he was still mad at me for questioning his decision with Cesar, but I knew I was right. Cesar shouldn't be in the gang, and I still stood by my opinion. Regardless of me believing I was right, all it was was an opinion.

My personal opinion.

At then end of the day, it didn't matter what I thought. All I was to him (and to the rest of the Santos, probably) was a spoiled rich girl. I didn't know what it was like to be in a gang, or to even live in a bad neighborhood. I didn't know anything besides designer clothes and gourmet meals. I could see why my opinion didn't matter to him.

It was an opinion on a life I didn't understand.

"I don't know what's around here, so I'll trust your guidance."

"There's a nice shopping mall one town over?" he suggests.

"Well, vamanos!" I smiled, standing up from the couch excitedly. I ran to my room and grabbed my purse. I slipped into some brown wedged sandals, that went perfect with my casual look. Black jeans, and an opened jean shirt with a white blouse under. Luckily, the heat wave was beginning to die down, or else I'd be melting.

I walked back to the living room to see Oscar standing in the same spot. Except this time he wasn't alone. Cesar and two other Santos accompanied him. I hadn't seen them before, they weren't outside with us the other day. They seemed older. Older than Oscar. And way bigger, too. They greeted me and I said hello.

We all walked out of the house and piled into Oscar's impala. I sat in the passenger seat while the two men and Cesar sat in the back. I had to stop myself from laughing seeing the two big gang members jammed in the back, and then with Cesar smushed uncomfortably between them.

The drive to the next town over wasn't long. I learned the names of the two men were Cisco and Eagle. I was pushed to ask how in the hell they got those names, but I decided not to. I just stared out of the window while Oscar and his homies talked. I was trying my best to not speak where there wasn't a need to, which was kind of hard, but a little progress was being made. Being better was pretty fucking challenging, and it's not even been a whole day.

Once we crossed the line it was easy to tell the difference between the two towns. This town was way nicer. It had nicer buildings, and bigger homes. It had small stores, and restaurants scattered around unlike Freeridge that only had liquor stores on every corner. However, it seemed to be smaller than Freeridge. And there were people here of every race instead of just black and brown people.

We pulled into some sort of town square. Oscar pulled into a random parking lot and put the car in park. I clicked my seatbelt off and thanked him, opening the door and hopping out. Eagle climbed from the backseat and got in the passenger seat, and the look of relief on Cesar's face made me laugh.