“Doña Guille, Se quema la casa!” (“Mrs. Guille, the house is burning!”). It’s two in the morning and my family and I are woken up by fire reflecting through out the house windows. At a first glance it looks like my house is on fire, but when my cousin’s husband woke us up he didn’t realize that it was my neighbors house bursting into flames. We stood there shaken up by the event that we didn’t know what to do. With me being the only one who spoke English, I had to call the police and talk to them. I was about eleven years old, but the face on my parents faces showed me that I had to be their voice. I managed to tell the police everything in bits and pieces. After hanging up all I could see was a destructive ball of loud yellows and reds. The old house that once stood there was nothing more than a base structure. That night all I could think of were the ashes of what once was the house across the street. In seconds I learned something. Everyone in this world has moments of fear , but in that instance, mine was failing my parents.
Eager from being three weeks away from summer, everyone in the bus’s heart synced to a sudden stop. Even though I was only in fifth grade, I knew that something was wrong. There had just been a shootout. The bus was stopped by the police. Everyone was escorted to and sheltered in the mobile home office building where I lived, while the arriving residents were’t allowed into or out of their homes. A wanted felon was hiding in one of the mobile homes and the police got a tip and took action. The man shot a cop while trying to flee and was gunned down. The lockdown lasted three hours. The next day, I woke up early and again, I was eager for summer. Three more weeks to go.
After a friendly soccer game with the kids from my block, one of my homies began to walk towards the parking lot. He was talking shit to a rival gang member who was creeping by in his car. The man got out of his car but wasn’t willing to fight my homie because he was only 16, three years older than me. An older homie jumped in and they began to fight. Smashing each other into car hoods and windows, they fought merciless. A nearby neighbor called the police and we all ran. I didn’t do anything, but living where I live, being at the wrong place at the wrong time just doesn’t cut it.
Ten minutes into my daily jog and I notice two figures dressed in red baggy t-shirts walking towards me. Being affiliated with a sureño gang, I only saw one outcome. My legs begin to lose strength, but I fight my fear that now begins to creep up my body. As I get closer I start to see one of them is holding a wrench and and I notice that they have Aryan tattoos on their arms and heads. Realizing I am by a creek that no one frequents I begin to regret my run. We make eye contact as I jog by and I take a deep inhale awaiting a beating. I make it past them and don’t even look back. The next day I was on the same path jogging, but this time I had my blade. By 17 years old, I learned to not plan on using weapons, but also to not to get caught off guard twice.
In agony and shot in the leg. A young woman was found by the police after her client decided to rob her after he paid for sex, as the news report said. The client was a Santa Rosa Junior college athlete and student about my age. I was driving home from Sonoma State when I noticed the police activity was heavy around this hotel. I paid little attention, only because there are often drug busts near by. I didn’t find out what had happened till the next day. The victim and the perpetrator were only a few years older than me. The perpetrator was a football player and lost everything over trying to hustle a woman, who herself was hustling to get by. I too know first hand that unfortunately sometimes you have to put a lot on the line to make ends meet.