The Gangsta's Salute

Chapter 21

Chapter 21- The Funeral Speech

"Nobody is born a warrior.

You choose to be one when you refuse to stay seated.

You choose to be one when you refuse to back down.

You choose to be one when you stand up after getting knocked down.

You choose to be one because if not you, who?"

Black dress. Black shoes. Black jewellery. I always found the funeral attire extremely depressing. The word black just screamed murder to me, not mourning.

The sun shone brilliantly and the virescent colour of the spring day under it's glare was offensively bright and cheerful. It was as if they conspired to show me how the world would go on without her, without my precious best friend. It shouldn't. Everything should be as grey and foggy as my emotions, it should be cold and damp with silent air. But the birds still sang and the flowers still bloomed. I stood in the graveyard like a silhouette of myself, wishing I really was as insubstantial as the shadows so that my insides might not feel so mangled. As I took a step nearer to the front of the casket, tears began to flow. But I was not ashamed. I loved her. And now she was gone, a light had been extinguished forever in my heart. I stood in silent grief, swallowing as all the curious, tear stained eyes gazed at me.

They don't have the right to cry.

They didn't know her.

I took a deep breath, relaxing as a familiar hand held mine in support. I sent Brooke a small smile and steadied myself.

" I met Rebecca Clarke when I was 14 years old. I was desperately trying to support myself and my twin brother, when she proposed that we joined together- as one. My extraordinary fighting skills mixed with her firearms techniques proved to be a good decision. We basically picked kids up from the streets, ones who were hurt, ones who needed a good home. We all came together for one thing- family.

They were the best years of our lives. They called us the Vipers. Fighting and Alcohol were the rulers of our people...and me and my sister ruled the state.

We were fucking untouchable.

'Anybody can have the joy of killing us but they won't ever have the satisfaction of seeing our fear.'

I was 15 when I first killed somebody. He tried to attack a young boy on the street so I slit his throat. The Vipers had changed all of us, we were ruthless.

We made that pact when we first started and we still use it today. I saw the look in my sisters eyes before she died. She wasn't scared. She knew she was dying, I knew she was dying.

We always found power in books, words especially. Their ability to change somebody's mind were impeccable.

Before she died, Bec spoke to me. Just a few sentences but that didn't matter to me. Her words meant something, and they hit me full force.

'Family over all. Never give up. Never surrender. In all, I will not die. My sister.'

The difference between my family and others is that my family never ended in blood.

None of us were related by blood, except the twins. Asher and I. Sawyer and Shae.

But we all chose each other.

We all were there for each other.

It was little.

And broken.

But still good.

My sister is no longer with us, but she will live on in our hearts. She will live on in her sisters brazen personality. She will live on as each of us survive. 

Farewell, my dear sister."