| Four Years Before Everything |

Humming quietly to myself, I looked around the precinct. Why did they all look the same? L.A.P.D seriously needed to hire a new decorator. Think of all the opportunities they had missed; They could've thrown up some motivational words on the walls, like 'you do the crime, we make sure you do the time.' What a major opportunity missed, honestly.

Looking to my side, I found a slightly older woman sitting in a chair by the next desk over, cuffed to her seat like me. She wore fishnet stockings and had what I was pretty sure was a weave in her hair. The pink top she wore and the short skirt both looked three sizes too small, but she didn't seem to care. What she did care about, however, was my incessant staring. She flipped her eyes to mine and cocked a brow. "See something ya' like, kiddo?"

"Are you a prostitute?" I asked.

Instead of replying to me, she just smirked slowly. She puckered her lips a little, then licked them with a dirty wink.

Okay. Definitely a prostitute.

Snickering to myself, I turned my head away from her and begun to awkwardly scratch my nose against my shoulder when I felt an itch. I was interrupted mid-rub when a police officer finally smacked his ass down in the seat by my chair, throwing down a clipboard on the desk in front of him.

"G'n'evening," I offered, giving him a big grin. He returned it with a flat stare and then shifted his eyes to the clipboard, picking up a pen.

"Has anyone read you your rights yet?"

"Yup. Read and subscribed."

"So you've called a parent or an attorney to come fend for you?"

"Nope."

The cop whose name badge said 'CLIFFTON' lifted his eyes to me and rose a bored brow. "You didn't use your phonecall?"

"No-no, I used it, I just don't need a parent or a lawyer."

"If you didn't call anyone to come fight your case, then who'd you call?"

I opened my mouth to answer, but in that moment a voice by the doors to the precinct called into the station.

"PIZZA FOR CALEB?"

"Over here!" I shouted back and then edged my hands out of the cuffs I had picked a while ago. I raised a hand to signal the delivery guy who instantly spotted me and headed my way.

"What the..." The police officer blinked in confusion, but then immediately stood up and grabbed the cuffs from my hand. "How the hell did you get out of these?"

I sent him a flat look over my shoulder as the pizza guy stopped up in front of me. "YouTube, dude. You can learn anything online."

Officer Cliffton glared at me in disbelief while I paid the delivery guy with a bill I had kept stuffed into my sock. After telling him to keep the change, I took the steaming pizza and hungrily sniffed it through the lid. I was so damn hungry I was ready to become vegan if vegan food was all that was left.

The next second, though, my very un-vegan pizza got torn out of my hands. Officer Cliffton threw it down on his desk as far away from me as possible and grabbed my wrists and expertly cuffed me to the chair again. He then slammed his ass back into his chair and glared. I glared right back.

"Did you just steal my pizza?"

"I confiscated it," He barked, his eyes flashing with annoyance, apparently over me. "You are under arrest, son, you don't go ordering food here. This is serious, do you get that?"

I just kept glaring at him, then flipped my eyes to my pizza. "You stole my pizza."

Officer Cliffton slowly leaned forward on his knees and fixed me with a straight look. "Listen, kid. You're facing serious charges and you didn't call for any adult representation to come and speak for you. Instead of worrying about your pizza, you should be worrying about how long you're going to be stuck in juvenile detention."

"I don't need any 'adult representation'. I can handle myself, I'm not a kid."

Scoffing in disagreement, the cop leaned back. "'Kay then. You wouldn't mind if we get along with this here form then?" He said and lifted up his clipboard again. "Since you're all grown up and stuff, let's hear your info."

"I want my pizza first," I stated and looked indignantly at him. "I'm starving here, man."

"You'll get it once we've finished this." He waved the clipboard at me.

"Fine, then ask me," I growled and leaned so far back into the chair, I almost laid down in it.

He nodded satisfied, then shifted his eyes to the form. "Let's start with your full name."

"Princess Consuela Banana Hammock."

Cliffton lifted his eyes and glared at me again. He didn't look amused.

"What? You don't get the reference? It's Friends, man. Come on! Phoebe?"

"Answer the question properly, son," He snapped. "State your birth name for the record or we're going to do this the hard way."

"Caleb Montrell." I finally growled. I really just wanted to go home and get some sleep.

"That wasn't so hard, now, was it? Date of birth?"

"Same as Jesus."

He went back to glaring.

"Oh, come on!" I protested angrily now. "You don't even know Jesus's birthday? That's fucked, man."

"Don't get smart with me," He warned me.

"Excuse me, hold up; are you asking me to stop being smart?" I said, cocking a sharp brow. "That's a fucking stupid thing to say."

"Son—"

"We live in a world where people post duckface photos online and literally use the word literally when it's not needed," I snapped back, my eyes thundering at him. "Finding smart people today is like finding an honest politician, and here you are, asking me to not be smart." I leaned back in my chair and gritted my teeth. "America spends millions of taxpayer dollars advertising the importance of an education, and yet there are still people like you out there who keep using stupid expressions like that."

"That's enough." Officer Cliffton puffed his chest out and made me roll my eyes. "I need you to calm down and focus on filling out this form—"

"You mean this arrest order?"

"—and for that, I need you to stop playing smart with me," He bristled, looking me square in the eyes. His brown eyes squinted seriously at me and his nostrils flared ever so slightly. He was angry, I could tell. Well so was I.

"Fine," I coldly replied. "Ask me your fucking questions."

He watched me closely for a moment, but then turned back to the form where he left off. "State your date of birth."

"December 25th, 1992."

"You're a minor then," He noted, scribbling down my answers. "Your parents?"

"Dead."

"Guardians?"

"Emancipated."

The cop lifted his brow, but then wrote that down, too. "How do you make a living?"

"I boss."

"You're the boss at a company?"

"No, I'm just boss," I said, providing him with a cocky smirk. I saw the irritation flame up on his face again, and with that, he slammed his pen down.

"Didn't we just settle this?"

"Yeah, we did," I replied. "You told me not to be smart, so now I'm being stupid. See how that's working out for you?"

"Son..."

"My name is Caleb. Call me 'son' one more time and I'll start calling you daddy. Got it?"

Surprise flashed across his face for a second, but then the irritation came back and instantly replaced his shocked demeanor. "Alright, Caleb. Here's your situation; You were arrested at a nightclub tonight, a place not suited for a minor, and you were found in the possession of illegally distributed marijuana," He listed off, leaning back in his chair and crossing his arms. "You didn't call anyone to come down and help you with your arrest, you have no parents, and you're not being cooperative. It's not looking too bright for you right now, and that attitude ain't helping."

"Actually," I said, now leaning forward to catch his eyes, "I was only allegedly caught with illegally distributed drugs in my hands. You have no proof."

The cop cocked a flat brow, then without a word dived into one of his drawers and pulled out an evidence bag. Slamming it onto his desk, he pushed it towards me. "Want to tell me what that is?"

I smirked slowly. "That appears to be a blue bong, Sir."

"That's correct, and it just so happens to be the same blue bong that you were caught holding upon your arrest. Any comment on that?"

"You said it yourself," I said and leaned back in my chair again, still grinning. "I was just holding it. For a friend."

Officer Cliffton barked out a laugh, then ran a hand through his graying hair. "A friend, huh? That's brand new."

"What can I say? I'm a genius."

"Right. So this friend of yours," He continued, brushing past my comment with satisfaction. "Where'd he get the drugs from?"

"I have absolutely no idea," I said, throwing myself back into my chair, crossing my ankles. "I don't know how to get drugs, I don't use them."

"That so? Then I guess you don't mind if we swab your hands then."

"Go ahead, be my guest, but I'll tell you this, they'll probably come back positive. It was a dive club, man. The whole place is probably scrubbed and polished in drugs. I think everyone there tonight would've come home with traces of drugs on their hands, intentional or not."

Officer Cliffton studied me for a long moment with a glint in his eyes, all the while rubbing his chin with a little smile. The cocky expression on his face danced as he then opened his mouth and continued. "Alright, maybe that's not the best way to go about it then. Maybe we should have you pee in a cup or keep it clean and just swab your mouth."

"And again, the result will probably come back as positive as an accidental pregnancy. Everyone at the club was smoking weed, all except me of course, so it's natural that the drugs will have gotten into my system somehow." I shrugged.

"So that's your official statement as to why your breath smells like weed? You inhaled their smoke?"

"Well... I won't deny the possibility that it could've gotten into my system in another way," I said, blowing a raspberry. "Could be that someone breathed directly into my mouth, or," My eyes slowly drifted to the prostitute who was glancing amused at me, watching the show. Her eyes sparkled and I winked at her. "Maybe I kissed someone who smoked it?"

The cop now chuckled as I met his eyes again. He shook his head and observed me with newfound interest. "You're not stupid at all, are you, kid?"

"I could just be playing smart again."

"Hmm," The cop slowly hummed and sat up in his chair. "So you deny having been in deliberate contact with any sort of drugs tonight?"

"Intentionally, knowingly and/or purposely," I stated, but then licked my lips. "But here's the thing, Cliffy—you don't mind if I call you that, do you?—Here's the thing, Cliffy; I'm young. I'm easily influenced. Even if I have been in contact with drugs tonight, which I'm still not admitting to, I could've been easily coerced by an older individual to smoke it. That's the youth today, man," I said and gave him a megawatt grin when he slowly rose an impressed brow at me. "The young ones get peer pressured into so much shit they don't want to do, which gets them into trouble. It's an understated problem, I tell you."

Officer Cliffton chuckled and then sighed deeply. "You've got a smooth tongue, kid. I'll give you that."

You have no idea, Cliffton. You have no idea.

"But that doesn't excuse the fact that you were still caught holding illegal drugs in your hands," He continued. "You say you were holding it for a friend, right?"

"That's correct, Sir."

"Mind telling me the name of that friend?"

"Yup, sorry," I said and shook my head seriously. More or less. "In case you didn't notice, he has a certain addiction to weed," I told with graveness. Damn right he did. "And telling you his name would only land him in more trouble, when the truth is, he's trying to get out of it. That's actually why I was holding his bong; I took it from him."

"Really?" Cliffton mused. "So you stole the drugs from him because you were being a good friend?"

"Stole? I'd never steal, Sir," I firmly stated, coating on a dramatical drawl. "That's a very unfair accusation given what I just told you."

The cop rolled his eyes. "Alright, so if you didn't steal it, what would you call it then?"

I glanced sideways at my pizza that was still just laying there on his desk.

"I confiscated it."

• • •

Happy? I think this is the peer pressure he was talking about.