I thought the emptiness would come and swallow me up completely after I could no longer see Mom. That was not the case, though, because there was still more that could be taken from me. The next day, after Mom said goodbye, they came for Carlos.

  We were the only 2 kids from the original 10 that had not been taken away. Boss was the most memorable one, but Santi, big and little Mateo, Jose, Pancho, Miguel, and Anteneo had been taken away. I had barely noticed them leaving most of the time, when one of them was matched out of Time Out like they were joining the military.

  Most of the time, the thugs would try not to make a spectacle out of taking someone. They would lead them away after they had brought the food, or would take them straight from the visiting room to Marge’s door.

  It seemed like they made an exception to this if the kid was “Top Dog,” as my brother liked to say. Two of the thugs came to get my brother that day. It was not something they tried to hide. It was morning, when some of the kids were still waking up. My brother was talking to some of his lackeys who always followed him around.

  I could not for the life of me remember what their conversation was about. I could only guess they revolved around fighting and who they were going to beat up next. I had never realized, until just recently, that my brother was not just a protector here in Time Out, but also a bully.

  I can remember when Boss was the best fighter and would strut around the place, making everyone call him Boss. He was not actually that bad. The respect was what he was after. If you were willing to bow your head and acknowledge him as the leader of Time Out, he barely did anything to you. Comparing Boss to my brother was just a sad thing to do for me. My brother did not seem to be after respect alone; he was trying to instill a sense of fear in everyone here.

  I used to not notice what was going on around me regarding his behavior, or just assume he was protecting me whenever he ended up fighting. The more I saw, the less I could deny it. He just seemed much crueler, and I could not understand what had happened to the loving brother who had shown me how to use a pencil sharpener on my first day of school.

  The thugs walked up to my brother that morning, and despite how he was a bully, despite how he had treated our mother, despite how he was ignoring and shunning me, all I could think about was that conversation I had heard months ago. “After he just killed her favorite child.” I could accept it if it were me, but I never wanted my brother to be killed. He always fought the other kids with everything he had, but that was because he was fighting the dread and sorrow of Time Out, shuffling out the spark within him that loved to be alive.

  I could see it deep beneath the surface, the brother who did everything he could to protect his little bro. He was hiding it, and I did not know why.

  They started leading my brother away, and I wanted them to be taking me instead. Why did they have to kill my brother? He was the last thing that I still had in the world.

  I charged at one of the thugs. He was not going to take my brother. I was going to stop him and save my brother from this execution. I did not even get to throw a punch before I was spinning through the air and hitting the ground hard. Having never really had to fight or defend myself for the whole time I lived in Time Out, had made it so that I could barely throw a punch. I had never regretted not becoming strong like my brother as much as I did seeing him slowly walking away with them as I lay there on the ground trying to get up and run after them, but being unable to.

  My brother did look back once at me as he walked out the door for the very last time. He had a smile on his face, but tears in his eyes. I felt like I suddenly understood; he knew the same thing as me; they were going to kill one of us, and this was the last thing he could do to protect me in this life.

  I shouted after him as the door was closing, “I love you, brother.”

  When I finally got my feet under me, I tried to run after him, but the door was once again shut, and I was alone for the first time in Time Out.

  I no longer knew what I was here for. I just lay around, then eat, then slept. Day after day after day. There was no purpose for me being here. Everything seemed to combine into a gray blob. I do not know how long I was in that state before they came for me. They did finally come for me, though.

  I did not know what they were going to do with me. It did not seem like they needed me for anything anymore. They had already killed my brother and already taken away something from my mom that I did not know what to call. I was alone, and I had no value to them anymore.

  The author's narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

  One single man came to lead me away one day after lunch. I did not put up a fight; I just followed him slowly out of Marge’s door. I did not think anyone would notice I had even left. I took one last look behind me as the door closed. I was wrong. There were four pairs of eyes following me.

  I did not know why they looked so sad about my going. I might have been the first ghost, but that did not mean anything to me. I barely gave them any comfort. If I had to explain why they relied upon me so much, I would say that having someone to follow gave them a sense that there was someone who had been where they are now and was still here past that point. The simple physical representation that there was a future for them gave them comfort.

  I saw them all hug each other as they saw me leave, and I know I would miss the warmth they had given me, regardless of where I ended up. I should have done more for them. I should have at least learned their names. I did not know how much they meant to me until I was leaving them behind. I vowed that I would not forget them, for as long as I lived.

  The door shut, and I looked up at the thug who was leading me. They looked familiar. I tried to understand why. They had a scraggly beard and were only a head taller than me. The most distinguishing characteristic they had was a long scar across their face. I tried to remember into the past, if I ignored the beard. Oh, it was Boss.

  “Boss, what are you doing here. I thought you got taken?”

  He turned back to me and looked a bit worried. “Don’t let anyone else hear you call me that. I am not Boss anymore; that is Domingo. Just stay quiet; that will make this whole thing easier for everyone.”

  My mind struggled to make sense of what I was seeing. Boss had joined the thugs; did that mean they were going to make me join, too? I never wanted to help Domingo, so they couldn't make me do a job like that.

  The idea of hurting children or watching silently as they fought, if I could do something to stop it. It made me sick. The Doc might have been the person to cause me so much pain, but it was one of the thugs who had dragged me in there as I tried desperately to get away. I would never do something like that, and the idea of them making me do something like that was so upsetting that I stopped walking and stood there silently in the hallway.

  “Fuck, kid, get your ass moving. Don’t think just because I was in Time Out with you that I wont whip your ass for not listening.”

  What I said next just blurted out of my mouth without thought. “I wont be one of you. You can’t make me.”

  Boss, or whatever his name was, just laughed at my dread. “Relax, kid, there is no chance of that happening. You don’t have what it takes to be a Falcon. Just follow me and do what I say, or I will show you what I have learned in these years of freedom.”

  I did not know why he would bother lying to me, so I just ended up following him down the dark hallway. I realized his actual threat didn't scare me at all. I knew pain, and whatever he could do to me would be nothing compared to what I now ignored. My body was screaming at me almost all the time, from my eyes to my foot. It did not affect me as it once would have.

  We passed two different sets of thugs on the way. One was pretty much right outside Marge’s Door. The other set was right near the end of the hallway. It opened up into a large garage. They had three cars parked there, a white van, a red pickup truck, and a shiny black sedan. I could guess they brought the food in the other 2 cars; I just didn't understand the reason for the sedan.

  That was the car that the man formerly known as Boss led me to. I got in the passenger side seat. I had always had to ride in the back seat with a car seat when I drove with my Mom or Grandma. It did not hit me that I had changed so much in Time Out until I could sit in the front seat without any trouble getting the seat belt on.

  I was starting to feel excitement. I had been dreaming of the day I would be able to leave Time Out for years. Sometimes I did not think it would ever happen, that I would just die in there without seeing the real world ever again.

  The car started driving out of the gray basement garage, and I could not understand my emotions. I could feel that excitement, but there was more to it. I started to feel fear; I was afraid I wouldn't have a place in the real world. I had been trapped in Time Out so long that I had no idea how to live a real life. I should be almost 12 years old now. I was supposed to be smarter and stronger than Carlos was when we were brought to Time Out in the beginning. I did not feel any smarter than I was when I was brought there, and I could not even fight at all.

  I had no one to talk to about this. I turned to this man who had been in Time Out and now had made a place for himself outside of it. He knew how to drive, and he knew how to live on the outside. I just wanted to ask him something, anything about what I needed to know, but then we took a turn, and we were no longer driving in a concrete tunnel. There was a whole city in front of me. I could not say a word. I could barely breathe. The colors were everywhere. There was a mural of every color bird flying through the sky on the building to our right. I just looked at the vividness of all the beauty in that painting until our car drove around a corner, and I could not see it anymore. There were people walking around everywhere on the sidewalks. They wore a variety of clothing; some women wore dresses that reached the ground, with flowers sewn into the white fabric. I was overwhelmed by each and every sight I saw. When I was in Time Out, I could remember my time at Grandma’s house, but the gray walls day after day had drained the memories of all their color.

  Just this one car ride brought me to tears by the beauty the world had been hiding from me for years.