bad life"

Rain hit the tin roof like a thousand tiny fists, but Malik didn’t flinch. He sat still on the floor of the abandoned mechanic shop, knees pulled to his chest, arms wrapped tight. The city was always loud—sirens, gunshots, yelling—but tonight, it was the silence between the noise that unsettled him most. That silence meant nothing had changed. And in his world, nothing changing was the worst thing.

He hadn’t eaten in two days. His stomach had stopped growling by now, replaced by a hollow numbness. His last meal was a bag of stale chips he’d stolen from the back of a busted vending machine. Before that, a bruised apple he found in a trash bin behind a shuttered grocery store. Survival didn’t taste good. It tasted like guilt, rot, and rust.

Malik was fifteen. He hadn’t been home in six months.

Home, if you could call it that, had been a one-bedroom apartment with peeling paint, a drunk father, and a mother who vanished when he was nine. After his dad’s third arrest, the state came knocking. Foster care was worse. Every house, every so-called guardian, just another transaction. Another place where he didn’t belong.

So he ran.

Life on the streets wasn’t a choice—it was a necessity. And every day was a gamble. Would he find food? Would he avoid the gangs, the cops, the cold? Would he make it through the night without getting jumped, caught, or worse?

He wasn’t sure what hurt more: the hunger or the loneliness. He had friends once. A crew of other runaways who called themselves “The Ghosts.” They had each other’s backs, shared what little they had, cracked jokes to forget how broken everything really was.

But then came the fire.

One of the boys, Rico, tried to siphon gas from a parked car and messed up. The explosion lit up the alley like fireworks. Two of them didn’t make it out. After that, the Ghosts scattered like ash in the wind.

Malik never forgave himself. He should’ve stopped Rico. Should’ve done something. Instead, he froze. Just like he always did when it counted.

A loud clang snapped him back to the present. He looked up. Someone was in the shop.

He scrambled to his feet, eyes darting toward the broken window at the back. But before he could move, a voice cut through the darkness.

"Relax, kid. I ain't here to hurt you."

A figure stepped into the moonlight—a tall man, late thirties maybe, with a weather-beaten face and a thick jacket.

"I saw you sneaking around the yard yesterday," the man said. "Figured you'd come back."

Malik backed up. "What do you want?"

The man held up his hands. "Just to talk. Name’s Ellis. I run a shelter a few blocks from here. Not the fancy kind, but it’s warm. Got food, too."

Malik narrowed his eyes. "I don’t trust shelters."

"Neither did I when I was your age," Ellis said. "But sometimes… survival means knowing when to stop running."

Malik hated how tired he felt just hearing those words. Stop running. The idea sounded soft, dangerous. But the hunger… the cold… it wasn’t noble. It was killing him slowly.

"And what's the catch?" he asked.

Ellis shrugged. "No catch. Just a place to rest. Maybe even get back on your feet."

Malik thought of Rico. Of the kids who didn’t make it. Of the ghosts that haunted every step he took.

He wanted to say yes.

But survival had a price. Trusting people was part of that price. And every time he’d paid it, he lost more than he gained.

“I’ll think about it,” Malik said finally.

Ellis nodded. "I’ll be at the old community center on 5th and Harris. Come by if you want to change the story."

As he left, Malik sank back down. The rain kept falling, heavier now, like the sky itself was breaking.

He sat there until the sun began to rise, casting dull orange light through the cracks in the shop walls. He stood up slowly, joints stiff, body aching. Hunger gnawed at his insides, but something else stirred—something he hadn’t felt in a long time.

Hope. Small, fragile, almost foolish.

Maybe this was the cost. Not just surviving, but daring to want more.

Malik looked toward the city skyline, gray and crumbling but still standing. Just like him.

He picked up his torn hoodie, stuffed his hands in the pockets, and started walking.