Fang War

1 ☽

There are many logical ways to deal with stress. Ways in which, college dropout Lila didn't bother to put effort into. Nothing, but this, seemed to help. Getting away, putting distance between herself and everything.

On this last year of her teenage life, Lila impulsively followed highway signs to Seattle. She didn't look back in that rear-view mirror; no need to.

She hoped her father would forgive her. Just days ago she blew out nineteen little flames from a cake he bought from the supermarket around the corner. Their first birthday celebration together; it felt just as forced as it sounds.

Everything with her dad, her life, felt forced. Which was why she dropped out of college with only a year in. Well, a year of just barely passing and in poor attendance...

Whatever green highway sign read Seattle lead her to pick up a bit from her slouch in the worn cushion. She knew she was being rash, trigger-happy, irresponsible, but she didn't care anymore.

It rained here more than it did in Vegas. A lot more.

She missed the desert and the hot weather already. The olive tone her skin favored under the unforgiving desert sun, grew fairer with each given mile away from it. 


With a life conditioning her to up and leave and never get attached, Lila struggled to understand why this latest venture nagged her so. Guilt, perhaps, for leaving her dad. A dad she only knew through countless letters over the years and timed phone calls, until they let him out of the big house over two years ago.

Even after his return home, she stayed with her Grandmother, till she too, died just like her mother. In a life with so much death, change, and instability, Lila found comfort in simply moving on to the next thing. 


Leave it all behind. Start over. Most importantly, never get attached. Never.


Eying the stash of cash sticking out of her gym bag, she shoved it down as if to hide the shame of where it came from. Some of the cash might have been hers, but a lot of it belonged to her father.

Now that, he might be pissed about, but he left the safe open...

Why should she care if he was angry? He owed her more than several hundred dollars. He'd been gone most her life as her mother struggled to make ends meet.


She huffs out between dried lips, blowing off the stray hair from her face, determined to focus on the road collecting pelts of rain.

As she pulled up to the hotel, she throws her cracked phone in the bag that hadn't been turned on since she left the house in Vegas. 


It's Friday and Vinny would be home from his double shift any minute. With the closet door left open, he'd see that his cash and his daughter, vanished. Then, the note of her short apology might set him off further, then nothing more. She was an adult now. At her age, she could go wherever she wanted, so the cops couldn't help find her. Considering the conditions of his parole, he couldn't follow her out of state here himself, if he even knew where to start looking. He'd be stuck, without any option or way to get in contact with her or to find her.

For once, Vinny's former life in prison became a convenience for Lila.

The sun attempted to blast through the thick grey overcast above, readying to disappear entirely in just a few short hours. As Lila checked in and paid with her stolen cash, she remained careful to keep her gym bag close to her side. Clearly not in the best part of the city, she nervously adjusted the strap on her shoulders, bringing it as close as she could when she felt eyes lingering on her for a bit too long.