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𝐜𝐚𝐫𝐦𝐞𝐧.
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𝙤𝙥𝙚𝙣𝙞𝙣𝙜:
(𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚍𝚊𝚢 𝚌𝚊𝚛𝚘𝚕 𝚋𝚞𝚛𝚗𝚜 𝚏𝚒𝚗𝚊𝚕𝚕𝚢 𝚙𝚞𝚝𝚜 𝚑𝚎𝚛 𝚏𝚘𝚘𝚝 𝚍𝚘𝚠𝚗)

    TODAY started like any other day.

In the midwest United States was the Windy City, also known as Chicago. A city that like New York never slept. A city where crime rates boomed but culture thrived. It was a city where the cops were over-armed, where drugs ran the streets, and the smell of smog weighed over it.

And alike to most Fridays, a certain young lady (the term lady was debatable in this case) ran wild with a group of so-called friends when they all should be in school. However, Fridays were deemed as the official "skip day" within this particular group. It was a terrible idea, but none of them seemed to care as they were already two months into the school year and no teacher nor facility member had called them on their skipped days.

This young lady happens to come wrapped in dark jeans, thick boots, lacy gothic shirts, inky hair with randomly colored highlights that changed near every month, more piercings than most thought appropriate for a 17-year-old (but to be fair, she was entitled to her own sense of style. Besides since when was piercings considered a lot?).

From an outsider's perspective, she was described as pretty in her own unique sense, but she was also terrifying in some ways. While threats often fell from her lips alike to honey in almost every other sentence she spoke, it still had the uncanny ability to send those who did not know her running for the hills.

And that was the way that Carmen Burns liked it.

Her entire life, as far as she was concerned, had been a series of ups and downs. She was born from some dude her mother opened her legs for at one point. Unfortunately for Carmen (or maybe it was fortunately, she still was not sure as she had never met her birth father) her mother was never able to track down this man, and so Carmen was raised solely by Carol Burns.

Thankfully (for Carol at least, it sucked for Carmen) after almost 10 years, Carmen was introduced to a new man her mother brought into their lives. Taron Weninger, the man who would serve to be Carol's off and on for the next two years until, of course, Carol got pregnant and that was when she demanded this off and on bullcrap to end.

She gave Taron a choice—to stay or go. There was to be no in between, because now with two children on her shoulders, Carol was not about to deal with Taron's bullshit on top of that.

She already had her hands full with Carmen, who had by this point began acting out drastically. To be fair, it was not like Carmen had the most stability. Both adults in her life seemed to act spotty at best.

Then once her little brother, Dickson, came alone, that little shit managed to make things worse. To Carmen, all that brat served for was a leech who sucked everyone dry of everything they had. Just as his name suggested, Dickson truly was a dick in the making.

Carmen did not respect Taron in the slightest and her mother, while she respected her to a certain degree, was never the best in raising Carmen. Sure, Carol was there physically, but emotionally, it seemed she was always too busy chasing Taron around to notice her daughter's mental or emotional state.

But Carmen grew used to that and eventually accepted it, independence was her best friend, after all.

Carmen prided herself on the fact that she was not some pathetic little flower girl who cried upon getting a bump on the head. No, Carmen was tougher than nails and needed no one but herself.

Now, Carmen's life has been more than interesting in her short 17 years alive, but those details can be sorted out later. For right now, Carmen has gotten herself into quite a nasty situation.

It was Friday, her and friend's skip day from school. And Carmen enjoyed causing trouble, it was her middle name... literally. Carol had decided for whatever reason "trouble" was a cute name and deemed it as Carmen's middle name.

Carmen often wonders what her mother was on to think that was a good name.

However, now Carol regrets that decision deeply as she is convinced she jinxed herself by naming her daughter that. Because now that is just what Carmen Trouble Burns is... trouble.

Carmen was no stranger to having run-ins with the cops or doing some bad stuff if you will. And by bad she means: smoking weed or drinking at a party (maybe in school if it's boring enough that day), screwing some loser in their car just so she can swipe a few bucks out of their wallet when they are not looking, tagging some walls around Chicago with truly amazing graffiti art, and anything else that trouble entails.

Except for in this particular case, what she and her friends got up to may be considered just a tad worse than normal.

And if you asked Carmen, she would tell you that at the moment it seemed like a good idea. Get some shiny new things, break some rules... have fun... hell yeah. How could it not sound tempting?

And honestly, if you asked her later down the line, she would probably say even with how that day ended, she still did not regret it. Because, what a damn rush it gave her, nothing could beat the feeling of pure adrenaline.

Not even weed or any other drug or drink.

To put this into perspective, Carmen is laying under a California King bed with four of her friends, two on either side, she was stuck in the middle. This particular bed is sitting in the master bedroom of an extremely rich household, a mansion in a gated community.

In a nutshell, Carmen and her friends thought it would be fun to try and rob these rich-ass people. It was not like they had never robbed anywhere else before either. Sure it was on a much smaller scale: cars that idiots left unlocked, grocery stores, convenience stores, retail stores, any sort of store or place you could stuff things in your pockets or backpack and it was a victim to Carmen Burns bad shoplifting habits.

And maybe there were just a few instances where she committed grand auto theft, but she always returned the cars (she only ever liked the joyrides).

Overall, if Carmen had been charged for every illegal thing she ever did, it would be enough to keep her in the slammer for decades to come. Thankfully, she was sneaky and got away with almost everything she pulled.

This was their first major robbery, and it had been going fine at first. Carmen managed to knock out the security system to the house, and for the past hour, the group of five had been messing around—trying on shiny necklaces, expensive clothing, and shoes, admiring the many handbags the apparent woman who owned this house had.

It was a blast, they fit as much shit as they could into their pockets and backpacks.

But alas, all good times must come to an end.

In this case, it ended with a tip from a suspicious neighbor leading the house to be surrounded by the Chicago PD not even five minutes later. All of which had many guns pointed toward the house and threatening the teens over the megaphone to come out with their hands up.

Carmen was even sure she heard a chopper up top.

The police thought the robbers to be people much more serious and threatening than just a couple of teens, because who would expect some teenage girl to be able to take out a top of the line security system.

No one knew how Carmen did it. The only thing her friends knew was that one second she stood in front of the front door and the next she claimed the system was gone. Carmen had not lied either, because after she said that, they walked in and the system was completely fried—so much so that it had fallen off the wall and onto the floor.

They had no clue how, but she did it.

However, that did not matter anymore, because they were all trapped in the house with no means of escape surrounded by the cops.

Carmen was upset, and not because she was about to be arrested, but rather because she had snagged a rather nice pair of pumps that she intended to cherish with everything in her. Maybe, if she tried hard enough, she could hide them in her jacket and the cops would never find them.

She mentally snorted at the thought, fat chance.

And fat chance was right because two minutes later all five were walking out of the house slowly with their hands in the air and guilty looks upon their faces. Well, everyone but Carmen who was giving the cops a sarcastic smile.

Five minutes later and Carmen was being wrestled to the ground by three cops, all of which were in disbelief at how a girl who was no bigger than average was able to take on all three at once. One might say Carmen just had a fighting spirit.

"NO! It's mine, I found them, so I get to keep them!" Carmen roared as her friends who were in handcuffs cheered her on with amused looks in the background.

"Yeah, you found them right inside the Walzakey household! Now, give em' here!"

The shoes were finally pried from Carmen's hands and Carmen herself was finally beat as four different cops forced her to the ground. It was also at that moment that a journalist who had arrived on the scene minutes before snapped a shot of the sight.

Not that any of them knew it at the time, but in less than three hours, Carmen's fighting form would be posted all over the Chicago Daily with an article about how she and her friends broke into the rich household. It would also go onto explain how much effort the cops had to put in just to get her on the ground.

The cops would never admit it because of their pride, but there were about three different moments where Carmen nearly slipped away.

Thirty minutes after this moment and Carmen was the last of her friends to pose for her mugshot.

One hour later and Carmen was pacing the jail cell before she was allowed her one phone call.

As tough as Carmen acted, she was dreading this phone call. But as much as she hated it, it was either the phone call or spend the next few months in prison.

"Hello? This is Carol speaking," Carmen physically cringed when her mother's voice came through the line of the county jail.

She bit her lip, playing with her lip piercing while twirling the wire of the old-fashioned wall phone in her hand.

"Mom, it's me," she had said, her voice the epitome irritated.

"Carmen?" Carol had said in surprise before confusion and concern drifted into her voice. "What's wrong? Why are you calling me from this number, you're supposed to be in school."

So maybe Carol Burns did not know about her daughter's habit of skipping school every Friday. Carmen was no idiot, at the beginning of the year she put her own phone number in for the school to call instead of her mother's. Now whenever she skipped or did something wrong, Carmen was the one who received the call from the front office.

"Can you come pick me up?"

"From school?"

"...From jail..."

And that was the reason that two hours later, Carol and Carmen Burns stood in the living room of their small house on the outskirts of Chicago having a screaming match.

Carol Burns, with her skinny figure clad in business attire and hair pinned in a perfectly tight bun. Her face outlined in smooth makeup, her cherry lips drawn into a vicious snarl that one would not normally see a mother directing to their kin.

Thankfully, Taron was out otherwise it would be two against Carmen. Actually, scratch that, because Taron was admittedly more afraid of Carmen than he let out. One piercing glare from her would have him hiding behind Carol with his tail between his legs.

Sometimes, it seemed Carol Burns was the only one Carmen could never truly intimidate. Even her principle was wary of the teenager. To say it bothered Carmen was an understatement.

Carmen liked having control, she liked making people do what she said.

However, when it came to her mother, more often than not she was the one doing as her mother said. Alike to most mother-daughter relationships she supposed.

"I cannot believe you! How could you go and do something so stupid!" Carol growled, glaring fiercely at the daughter who truly looked far from herself.

Carmen and Carol had never truly looked all that similar, but at one point, the similarities between them were at least able to be spotted. It was in little things such as the way they smiled, laughed, walked, talked: in all while Carmen physically never took after her mother, she used to try and be exactly like her in other ways.

That all changed once she turned thirteen, and suddenly the already scarce similarities seemed to disappear.

"Seriously, Carmen, what the hell? Partying, drinking—fine, I can deal with that, but attempting to rob somebody's house? Do you know how lucky you are no charges were put against you! This is where I draw the line!"

Carmen scoffed, crossing her arms. "Deal with what? You don't deal with any of my shit, you never have," Carmen was almost snorting in her mother's face.

Carol seemed to turn red from anger.

"Even your damn little brother, who is seven, is more behaved than you!"

"Dick is exactly as his name states, mom,"

"Do not talk about your brother like that! He already learns enough bad language from you as it is!"

"More like from you and Taron fucking all night long,"

So disrespectful, and yet Carmen was drawing an almost sadistic amusement from this confrontation.

"Excuse me? What is wrong with you! I did not raise you to be like this!"

Carmen shrugged, but on the inside, she knew exactly what to say.

'You didn't raise me at all,' and yet the words would not leave her mouth.

Carmen did not say another word, simply spinning on her heel and walking away.

"Hey, don't you walk away from me," Carol followed after Carmen.

Carmen only ignored her with a roll of her eyes, her heavy boots thudding against the hardwood ground of the hallway. In seconds, she swung her bedroom door open, intending to lock herself inside for the rest of the day and catch up on some much-needed sleep.

What met her sight was not what she was expecting.

"What the hell? What is this!" Carmen screamed furiously, her voice thundering around the house.

Dickson was not home either, he was at school as he was supposed to be.

In front of Carmen Burns sat two different suitcases, two duffel bags, and a backpack. All of which were halfway packed.

Her room appeared to be turned upside down, the heavy metal posters were still intact, and the blackout curtains still hanging; however, her closet doors were tossed open, and her dresser draws spilling with clothes.

Carol Burns entered her daughter's room right at that moment.

"I told you already, Carmen," Carol said despondently, "I can't deal with this anymore,"

Carmen was gobsmacked.

"So you decided to kick me out?"

Carmen knew she and her mother had a more than rocky relationship. But she never imagined that Carol would be so willing to throw her out onto the rough streets of Chicago. Carmen may have been tough, but tough enough to survive homelessness on the city streets at the age of sixteen?

No way.

"No," Carol scoffed as if that was the most ridiculous idea ever, "you are just going to be spending some time with your Uncle Charlie and your cousins,"

By "spending" they both knew it was living with him for a currently unknown amount of time.

"But mom, they live halfway across the country!" Carmen motioned with her hands. "On a freaking island off the coast of Maine!"

"So?"

"So!?" Carmen spluttered. "In case you didn't realize, I like my life here, in Chicago! I have school and friends...!"

Carol scoffed a snort, "are you joking right now? As much as I wish you did, you don't give a flying crap about school, Carmen. And friends? Those delinquents you always get yourself in trouble with? No, I don't think so,"

"I haven't seen Uncle Charlie and the others for over five years, mom! Uncle Charlie is a damn cop, Kade's a firefighter, Dani is some rescue pilot, and Graham is an engineer: all of them are a rescue force! You think they have time for me?"

"I've already talked to your uncle about it, he is on board and thinks it's a great idea. He's raised your cousins already and is raising Cody just as well. I can't say I've had the same form of luck in terms of you, but maybe my older brother will,"

"I am sixteen, mom! My childhood is over, this is who I am now and forever! There's no changing that!"

"That is not true and you know it!" Carol snarled. "You need a male figure in your life who you actually respect, and if Uncle Charlie isn't enough, then he, Kade, and Graham together will be! You need discipline and the fact that Charlie is a cop won't give you much leeway to try and pull the same stunts there that you do here."

For once in a long long while, Carmen was at a loss for what to do.

"Is this some sort of sick joke?" The teenager finally settled on growling.

She hated that she felt tears forming behind her eyes, she hated being weak. Crying was a weakness, and even if they were forming, they would never fall.

"No, stop being a bitch about this, Carmen. Being with your uncle and cousins in a new and safer environment than Chicago will do you good. You'll be around better influences and in more capable hands..."

"But—" Carmen could not even finish her argument.

"But nothing!" Carol finally ended it. "You are going and that's final, so finish packing your bags because you leave tomorrow afternoon."

And with that Carmen was left standing in the middle of her room in shock as her mother slammed the door on her way out.