"Hey Cook!" I said, swinging into the restaurant.

Cook grunted as I breezed past him.

"Bye Cook!" I said, hopping through the door leading into the staircase.

"Filian," he called sharply, right before the door shut.

I did a 180 and peeked out. "Hm? Did you call?"

"C'mere."

I skipped over to him, swinging my bag of apples in one arm. "What's up, Cook?" I asked, a big smile on my face.

Cook wiped his forehead with a rag and regarded me suspiciously. "Why're you so happy?" he barked.

Well, Gramps and Grams (his super nice wife!!) had just given me yet another bag of bruised apples, and they'd given me a raise, so like, of course I'm happy! But that would be a bit of too much information, so I just said, "Haha!" and left it at that.

He probably didn't understand a thing, if his weird look was anything to go by.

"Umm, so what's up?" I asked again.

Cook folded his burly arms up and gave me a once-over. I tilted my head, waiting. "Sales've been high," he barked.

"That's great!" I answered immediately. "Yay! Good for you, Cook!"

"So," he continued, his voice still gruff. "Can give you a raise."

I gasped, my hands flying up to my mouth. I barely noticed the bag of apples hitting my forearms in the process. "Seriously?"

"Not much--" he began, but I cut him off with a squeal and started doing this weird shuffle dance thing on the spot.

Two raises in one day! What was this, my lucky day?

"Pay raise! Pay raise!" I chanted, not even caring that Cook was giving me a major eye-roll. But was that a small, satisfactory grin ghosting right above his lips? Why, it very well could be! "Pay raise! Pay raise!"

When I didn't show any signs of stopping, he finally clapped his large hand over my shoulder and barked, "That's enough." I immediately ceased the dance and flung my arms over him instead.

"Thanks so much, Cook. You don't know how grateful I am... to..." I choked, tears backing up in my throat. "Ack," I said, my voice warbling.

"That's enough of that, too," he answered gruffly. He peeled me off of himself and made a stern face, but tears were already spilling down my cheeks. "You cry too much."

"You're right," I sniffed, wiping the tears away. I wanted to say more, but I knew I'd just cry more, so I kind of just went "Thank you" again.

"It's only by a Vel¹worth $2.50, so that's a lot," Cook sighed. He sounded exasperated, but I knew he was only faking it. Always acting tough on the outside, man.

"What do you mean, onlyyyy," I wailed. "That's so muuuuch!"

"Bah. Now go away. I'm done."

"Okaaay," I said, turning away. "Thank you, Cook."

Cook only grunted again and went back into the kitchen, where he began barking orders to the cooking assistants there. As per usual, I thought, still sniffing away tears. What would mom say!

I didn't make it too far, though, before the door swung open. "Filian!" someone hissed.

I looked backwards and blinked. "Ryan?"

"Shhh!" Ryan hissed, before scampering to behind the bar. "Don't tell anyone I was here!"

"Wait, what?"

While I was still furrowing my brows in confusion at his agitation, he ducked down and hid himself. "Ryan--"

"Over here!" a kid called outside. "The doors are still swinging!"

"What the--"

"C'mon! Quick!"

My heart sped up and I held my breath. What had Ryan done now?

The doors swung open again before I could ask Ryan himself, and a couple of boys came in. I recognized them from the ragtag group of petty thieves that always hung out by the Row²if you don't remember, the more poverty-stricken district of Minstia.

One of them, who had a hefty stick in his hand, scanned the area before stopping at me. He raised up his chin at me immediately, squaring his shoulders. "We're looking for a boy. Came in here." He narrowed his eyes. "You seen him?"

Well, well, well. These itty bitty boys think they can intimidate me with their narrowed eyes and buffed up shoulders. Ha! Rosa and I were basically friends of your seniors, boys. And I, for one, was an excellent liar.

If I said Ryan hadn't been in, they'd know I was lying because they'd already said they saw the doors still swinging shut. An amateur mistake: you can't scream out what you know for the world to hear. It can only be held against you.

The best way to lie was to acknowledge what they already knew and build on that. Easy peasy.

So I jerked my chin towards the kitchen back door. "Went out that way." 

The guy who spoke to me, with the stick in his hand, stared hard at me. I held his gaze nonchalantly. After a tense second, he looked away and nodded. "Leggo," he said, and the boys all scrambled out.

I waited a couple more seconds in case they tried to come in again, though I didn't expect that from such apparent amateurs. When I was sure that the sound of running feet had faded away, I sighed. "Care to explain, Ryan?"

He peeked out from the bar, looking very much like a scared rabbit. (He probably wouldn't appreciate the comparison.)

"I, uh," he gulped. "I'm running away?"

I raised my eyebrows. "I could tell," I said, sarcasm dripping from my voice. "From?"

"From..." His eyes darted between the door and me several times before he said, his voice dropping to a whisper, "From death."

I threw up my hands. "What, you too?"

He whimpered. "It's true! They said they'll kill me if they catch me."

"And why, pray tell, will they kill you?"

His voice got even smaller. "Because," he eked out, "I'm hiding from them?"

I gave him a look.

He shrank back. "I'm not allowed to tell," he squeaked, his voice cracking.

"...want me to tell Rosa?"

"I'm sorry! It's because I said I'll join the group but then I didn't want to anymore and said I don't want to but they said there's no way out! I'm sorry! Please don't tell Rosa!"

Ah, Rosa, how would you like to know that your brother fears you more than he fears gangs? You'd probably be pretty happy, wouldn't you?

I rubbed my eyes and groaned, even as Ryan coughed out a few more "I'm sorry"s and "please not Rosa"s to me. "So you joined a gang," I said, cutting off one of his apologies again.

He nodded.

"And now they're not letting you leave."

He nodded again.

"So they're going to kill you and you are running away."

He nodded frantically.

I blew on my bangs, ruffling up my own (short) hair. "If I say I can get you out of this situation, will you promise me you'll never do something like this again?"

Ryan's eyes widened, and he nodded so hard that his light brown hair (so like Rosa's, just not as silky or sparkly) flew all over the place. "Can you?"

I cracked a wry smile. "You have Rosa to thank for that."

Now, which of my ex-gang Row friends would be famous enough to make those little boys cower in fear?

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A/N: The answer is Rosa. Rosa would be more than enough to break up gangs. :D Hope you enjoyed!