x
Most girls remember dolls, ribbons, birthday cakes.
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Me? I remember shadows.
How they used to move before the lights even went off.
How I could tell what kind of night it’d be by the sound of the door slamming shut downstairs.
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I was seven when I learned not all monsters live under your bed.
Some sleep in the next room. Some wear your mother’s perfume. Some smile in your face before they sell you out for a fix.
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They called it “foster care,” but I called it trading hands.
One dirty couch to the next. One man’s rules to another’s hands.
By nine, I’d already counted more locks than birthdays.
And by eleven—I stopped waiting on anyone to come save me.
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I started learning passwords instead.
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I’d sneak into libraries and watch YouTube tutorials on coding, pretending it was just curiosity.
But truth was, I wanted something no one could take from me.
Something stronger than fists or fear.
Information. Power. Silence that listened to me for once.
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That’s when Nova Rae was born.
Not the broken girl with scars under her sleeve.
But the ghost who could follow the money, the threat, the lie—and make it all disappear.
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People look at me now, and they see the gloss, the glow-up, the girl with the clicks.
But they don’t know about the girl who had to hide her tears under fluorescent lights in shelters.
Who kept a blade under her tongue and code in her bones.
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I don’t want your pity.
Just remember—
Pretty doesn’t mean untouched.
And loud girls like me? We learned to scream because no one ever listened when we whispered.
I was twelve the first time I hacked someone.28Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡMIGjKRih56
Not for money. Not for clout.28Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡf65HhaH1MB
For survival.28Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡV4I1F2U5xI
28Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡSUKGSpQkc7
28Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡOjLHhVSKro
Miss Laney—my third foster mama in two months—had sticky fingers and a nastier attitude.28Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡI91A1zUDAn
Kept her fridge locked, her mouth mean, and her eyes on my clothes like they were her property.28Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡaOYDeJpkh2
She’d smile in front of the caseworker and say I was “adjusting just fine.”28Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ0R6eDi0pQh
But the minute that door closed, I was back to being her little maid with a mattress on the floor and bruises she said I earned.28Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡTXpcRoZvJA
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I’d had enough.28Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡK0u3FxyxoO
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She had this dusty old Dell laptop she guarded like gold.28Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡq2dy9G8ofk
She’d always log into her food stamp portal in front of me—bragging about how much she’d get “just for feeding little street rats.”28Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡbE2Gu4mbzx
Except she never fed us. The cabinets stayed empty.28Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡCu8Ij2XMeA
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One night, while she was snoring off boxed wine and bitterness, I snuck into the kitchen.28Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡl4xN3WC8Zt
Took her laptop. Sat on the floor with a flashlight between my knees.28Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡxQKm8yGX2q
Heart pounding. Hands shaking.28Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡASMtlDkTYC
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She used the same password for everything—Laney1234.28Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡxoMS4JL3Cf
Too easy.28Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡk8zYVvJLUf
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I clicked into her account, found her full name, her case info, and her EBT card ID.28Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡVbWxCdD66G
Felt like God when I figured out how to reroute that whole deposit.28Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡGLEEVJ8z6P
Transferred every dollar to a new account linked to a prepaid card I’d watched a kid at the shelter set up earlier that week.28Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡPa5lBoQ0fb
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I didn’t stop there.28Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡOAl3YwvyoL
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I forwarded her entire search history—every sketchy ad she posted, every complaint the other kids had written about her but never submitted—to her case manager’s inbox.28Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡGogY3smTsE
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Then I put the laptop back.28Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡbp7bLMf4Vx
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The next morning, she cursed the devil into the floorboards trying to figure out why her card declined.28Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ2q5scYQ5YL
By that afternoon, a social worker was knocking at the door.28Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡxrZMfbkgKL
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I didn’t smile when they pulled me out of that house.28Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ5m2FreIkhw
But inside?28Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡNuCqjVc7ge
I was lit up like a sunrise.28Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ4rEAxdgO23
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That was the day I realized something.28Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ4UqwDJWiRt
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I didn’t need to fight with fists.28Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ51TUyYk3Qg
I had keystrokes.28Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ8j8ABGnXdh
And people like Miss Laney?28Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡhcLSehCfGn
They had no idea what a girl like me could do once she learned the system.
