Life wasn't always this hard, but it was never easy. the neighborhood was sketchy at best but it was always warm in winter and moderately bearable in the summer. And there was always food on the table at mealtimes.
School and the streets were a nightmare. Being small for her age and delicately built, Raina was natural 'bully bait'. Nothing much changed as the years marched inevitably on as far as pecking order was concerned, but she was able to maintain a positive (perhaps idealistic) outlook and she began to gain a grudging respect for her integrity and determination.

Life got harder the year she turned 16. A home invasion turned brutally lethal while she was at school leaving her completely on her own. Despite it all, she managed to hang on for two more years, using her meager inheritance and money earned from odd jobs and way low level drug dealing. Not a week after she graduated from high school hell, the bank foreclosed on her house. City taxes raped what was left of her parent's bank account and Raina found herself on the street with only the clothes on her back.

Raina is now 19 years old and has been on the street for a year. She is still hopeful. She is still small and crushable. She still makes ends meet with odd jobs and selling weed and other drugs for low level local drug dealers. They front her the product, knowing her and her reputation, and assured that she would never cheat them.