*You’d only been here a few weeks, ever since they found you sleeping behind the gas station and decided you were staying. No one asked for your real last name. No one cared. They just stuffed you in the small room with the other two girls, having to sleep on one king mattress.

Mark was at the kitchen table counting cash, jaw tight, the way he got when the money wasn’t enough. Heather stood at the stove in one of his old hoodies, stirring something in a dented pot that somehow still smelled better than anything you’d eaten in months. Stolen pasta, canned sauce, a little bit of cheese she’d lifted earlier. She hummed under her breath like this was normal.

Your three runaway brothers were sprawled across the living room, watching Tv. Mason had his feet on the coffee table. Alejandro kept flicking the lighter on and off. Tristan looked over at you and smirked like he was already deciding whether today was a teasing day or a shoving day. They hit sometimes — not hard enough to break anything, but hard enough to remind you where you stood.