“Are you guys almost ready?’ Stella yelled upstairs.
“Yes!” Andrew and Carol yelled back in unison.
Stella is eighteen years old and is the guardian of her younger twin siblings, Andrew and Carol. Stella moved out of her mothers house right when she turned eighteen, due to the fact that her “mother” was anything but. A few months later Stella decided to rescue her siblings from their so called mother and became their legal guardian. This leads them to where they are now, getting ready for school.
    “C’mon! You don’t want to be late for school do you?” Stella questioned her siblings.
    “We’re coming, jeez Stella,” Andrew said.
The three of them walk outside and towards the school. Seeing as they live not even a block away, they got to the school in five minutes. Stella turned to the twins and said, “Meet me at the same place, okay?”
    “Okay,” Andrew said.
    “Yep,” Carol replied.
Stella began to make her way towards her high school. Stella walks straight to the bench where her and her friends meet.
    “Hey Stella,” her friends, Finn and Lilian, said.
    “Hi guys,” she replied.
    “Are you okay?” Finn asked.
She was surprised he could sense something was wrong with her, but told him anyway.
“Actually I feel a little sick today. I don’t know, I just feel like something bad is going to happen today.”
“Well that’s too bad,” Lilian said.
Stella and her friends head to their first class when the bell rings.
Stella doesn’t really enjoy lunch time because the school lunch isn’t the best, so her and her friends just hang outside. Today was different.
“You should come and eat with us today,” Jessie, the leader of the “popular” group, said.
“No that’s okay,” Lilian said.
“Oh come on, I insist,” Jessie said as she pulled the three friends into the cafeteria.
“Here, you come with me Stella,” Jessie smirks.
“Okay,” Stella said timidly. Stella and Jessie go down the line of various foods. They’re at the end of the food line when Jessie stuck her foot out and tripped Stella. Stella gasped as all of her food fell on top of her. Jessie and her clique surrounded Stella and laughed at her.
“Sorry. Accidents happen,” Jessie hysterically laughed.
“Come on Stella lets get out of here,” Finn said as he helped Stella up.
“I just knew today was going to be bad,” Stella said. She secretly hoped that this would be the only bad thing that would happened to her today, yet she couldn’t shake the feeling of more trouble coming.
“How ‘bout we head back to my place for the rest of the day?” Lilian suggests. They all agree and make the walk to her house. Right when they walk through Lilian’s front door, Stella’s phone rings. She walks back outside and answered the unknown phone call.
“Hello?’ Stella said as she answered the phone.
“Stella, how many times do I have to call and tell you that if you don’t give me my money back, I’ll have to get violent?”
“Derek, I-I told, I don’t have the money right now,” Stella nervously said.
“I can’t wait any longer! I’ve given you too much time. Next time you see me it’s not gonna be fun, but it will be a game, for me atleast,” Derek laughs. The line went dead and Stella knew she had dug a hole too deep to escape from. She went to Lilian’s living room and layed on the couch as she was pretty shaken up. Lilian went and sat by Stella.
“Um Stella?” Lilian said softly. “Can I ask you something?”
“Yeah sure, go ahead,” Stella said.
“Well, Finn and I were wondering if you still, like, y’know sell drugs?” Lilian stuttered out.
Stella pales. She had just started to forget about Derek’s phone call.
“No, I stopped a couple of months ago,”
“Oh, okay. That’s good,” Finn sighs out in relief.
“We’re glad you stopped,” Lilian added.
Stella, Lilian, and Finn sprawled across Lilian’s L shaped couch. Stella checked the time, it was only 1:30 and the twins got out of school at 3:00. She decided to take a nap to pass the time. The next time she woke up, it was 3:30.
    “Oh no! I’m late,” Stella said as she began to panic.
    “What’s going on?” Finn asks as he wakes up.
    “I’m late to pick up the twins!” Stella exclaimed as she put her shoes on.
    “Well I’ll tell Lilian you said bye,” Finn said.
    “Okay, thank you,” Stella said and she hugged Finn goodbye.
Stella rushes out of Lilian’s house towards Andrew and Carol’s school. When Stella got to the oak tree where she and her siblings usually meet, they weren’t there. Stella began to worry.
Oh no. Where are they? They’re supposed to meet me right here! Maybe they went back to the house. I really hope they are there.
Stella began to walk towards her house. She couldn’t stop herself from running the last few minutes of her journey. Stella pushed her front door open and ran straight to Andrew and Carol’s shared room. She pushed their door open and hoped they would be in there. When she opened the door her heart began to pound. They were not in there. She frantically looked under their beds, in their closets, and even in their bathroom. Stella then had come to the realization that they might have walked back onto school campus and into the school’s office. She took her time to walk back to the school. She was almost positive that Andrew and Carol would be in there. Stella pulled open the office doors and went to the front desk.
    “Hello,” the receptionist said.
    “Hi. I was wondering if two kids by the names of Andrew and Carol Carson are in here?”
    “Um,” she got up and checked a room in the back. “No. They are not in there. I’m sorry.”
    “Oh. Well thank you for checking.”
Stella was devastated. She thought they would be there. Stella started to walk home. She couldn’t think of any place other than their house and the school, but then again she couldn’t think of anything. Stella was so overwhelmed that she couldn’t think straight. Stella opened her front door and went into the living room. She sat on her couch and began to cry.
    “WHERE ARE YOU?” Stella cries out. “Please..just come home,” She whispers.
Stella tried to stop crying and think of places Andrew and Carol could be. For a second Stella thought that Derek might have them. She tells herself that that was stupid of her to think. Derek doesn’t even know where we live. How could he know where the twins go to school, Stella thought.
She wakes up to the sound of her phone ringing. It doesn’t really register to her that her phone is ringing until its too late. She reaches for her phone right as the ringing stopped. Stella tried to call the number back but it was a private number. She thought the person might call her back so she waited. Five minutes later her phone started to ring. Stella rushed to answer it.
    “Hello?” Stella answered.
    “Jesus Stella. It only took four years for you to answer,” Derek said.
    “Derek, why did you call me? I will get you your money just..it’s not a good time right now,” Stella told Derek.
    “Oh I know you’ll get me my money,” Derek said
    “Then why did you call me?” Stella said.
    “I called to tell you your time is up. I need to you to meet me at 1258 Danner Street,” Derek told Stella.
    “Why do-” Stella tried to ask but was interrupted.
    “You’ll find out when you get here. Oh and p.s if I were you, I’d try to hurry,” Derek said right before he hung up.
Stella knew Derek wasn’t one to play around so she went outside to her car, which she rarely used. She got in her car and drove to Danner Street. Stella pulled up outside of what looked to be an old warehouse. She walked up to the door to find it locked. She wasn’t quite sure what to do so she stood there for a couple of minutes. Stella finally realized that she should knock on the door. She raised her hand to knock while quietly laughing at her slowness. Her knuckles hit the large metal door which made an echoing sound inside and out of the warehouse. Stella heard footsteps come from the inside and heard locks being opened. Suddenly the large door was opened. Stella was not sure if she should go in or not so she stood rocking back and forth on her feet.
    “Well aren’t you going to come in?” Derek asked.
    “It depends, what is in there and should I be afraid?” Stella replied.
    “I mean it is your choice to come in,” Derek said as he came into Stella’s view. “But, I have something of yours and in return of this certain something, or shall I say certain someones, I want you to give me the money that was rightfully mine.”
    “What do you mean ‘certain someones?” Stella asked.
    “How about you come in and find out for yourself?” Derek offered.
    “Derek, can’t you just tell me what is going on?” Stella tried to persuade him.
    “You see Stella, I can’t do that. It would ruin all the fun,” Derek laughed. “Now come inside.”
Stella stepped through the threshold, following Derek into the dark warehouse. Derek disappeared somewhere, leaving Stella to stand in, what she presumed, was the middle of the room. All of the sudden lights flickered on. Stella turned to her left to see a table with different types of guns and bullets resting on it. She turned to her right to see Andrew and Carol tied to chairs with tape over their mouths. Stella ran towards them but was stopped when she felt an arm wrap around her waist.
    “Not so fast Stella,” Derek said
    “Please Derek. What do you want?” Stella pleaded. “I’ll give you anything.”
“You know exactly what I want Stella. That’s all I am asking for,” Derek told her.
“You can’t be serious. I can’t just pull 40 grand out of my pocket.”
“And I know that. Stella you really do underestimate me.”
“What do you mean?”
“I knew you wouldn’t be able to come up with the money so I came up with an alternative.”
Derek walked over to the twins and pulled the tape off of there mouths.
    “Stella please help us!” Andrew yelled.
    “Please Stella. Please get us out of here!” Carol cried.
    “You two better shut up. I already told you what was going to happen,” Derek snapped at them.
    “What is going on?” Stella asked confused.
    “Since you’ve failed to get me my money, and I know you don’t have it with you right now, I’m going to give you a choice, you either kill Andrew or you kill Carol to make up of for the missing money,” Derek said.
    “Why are you making me choose between them? Isn’t there another way to settle this?” Stella tried to bargain.
    “Stella, you’ve taken something very important to me. Do you understand this?”
Stella nodded.
    “To make up for you taking that away from me, I was going to take something meaningful away from you, but then I thought ‘why don’t I make her do it herself” and that leads us to now.”
Derek walked over to the table and lifted up a pistol. He walked over to Stella and handed it to her.
    “This seems suitable doesn’t it?” Derek asks.
    “C’mon Derek. It doesn’t have to be like this,” Stella said
    “It really does though. So do you want me to kill all of you or do you want only one of you to die?”
    “Just give me the gun,” Stella said “This is so unfair,” Stella began to cry.
    “Don’t start crying. Its really not that big of a deal. People die everyday.”
    “Not like this Derek. People aren’t forced to kill their own family,” Stella sobbed.
    “Just do it already Stella” Derek said getting annoyed.
    “PLEASE STELLA DON’T DO IT!” Andrew yelled while crying.
    “I said to be QUIET,” Derek walked over to Andrew and hit him in the face. Derek had hit Andrew so hard that he knocked him out. Carol began to cry harder once she realized that Andrew wasn’t conscious.
    “Shut up! Stella shoot one of them now.” Derek said. “God why can’t you listen for once”
    “I-I can’t do this,” Stella whimpered.
    “Stella if you don’t to this, I will,” Derek said. He walked over to the table and grabbed a gun and made his way back to Carol and an unconscious Andrew. Derek put the gun to Carol’s head. Stella knew what she had to do. She made the decision right then and there.
“I’m sorry,” Stella cried as she lifted the gun.
Stella pulled the trigger