Life gave me a second chance.

Waking up this morning was unsettling after all the events that happened a couple hours back. Although I gladly say, I'm so thankful to be alive. This experience is by far the most scariest thing I have ever encountered. I never thought I would see the day again. I never thought I would be able to hug my parents and tell them how much I love them. I never thought I would be at home typing this right now to share this story. I never thought I'd hear any of my friend's comforting voices again to tell me everything's going to be okay. But most of all, I never thought I'd be alive.

Last night I was over at my cousin's condo for a farewell kickback for his boyfriend. About fifteen of us were in there chillin, having a couple of drinks, talking, etc. As the night progressed it reached 10:30-10:45ish and my cousin had curfew, so some of us walked her home to her condo since it was in the same community. While walking back, my cousin, her best friend, and I saw this mexican gang trying to call us over to join them. We're thinking, 'oh god, these lame asses have no life,' so we snobbishly ignored them. It was about 1:30am when people started leaving the kickback, and since I was pretty gone that night I was advised to sleep over cos I couldn't drive my car to my other cousin's place to sleep over cos I drank and was already a bit intoxicated, lol.

I remember the exact time this happened because I was making a phone call to my friend before I went to bed, it was 1:44 am. She didn't answer, so I thought of just going to sleep. Literally TEN SECONDS later, I heard two gunshots and I felt glass hitting my face so I screamed cos I thought I was hit. Fortunately, it was just glass and no bullets hit anyone. My cousin whispered to me to stop screaming and to crawl as fast as I can to the bathroom so I wouldn't be seen. One by one we were all in the bathroom hiding from whoever shot at us. We immediately called 911, keeping our voices lowered so no one would hear us. We told the dispatcher everything so she sent the police for us. I was in such fear that my whole body was shaking uncontrollably, but at the same time I was getting so frustrated because the police were taking such a long time to get here. We were hiding in the bathroom for about 20-30 minutes, but it felt like HOURS in there. While we were hiding we heard leaves and bushes moving so we thought they're near the house. We were so paranoid of the noises of crackling since we thought they were trying to break in through the broken glass window and get in the house. A few minutes later the dispatcher told us the police are outside of the front door, but scared as we were we didn't want to take the risk of getting out of the bathroom. Although we heard "911's here!" so we thought, okay we need to get out of here and let them in. Thank goodness it was them, I'VE NEVER BEEN MORE HAPPY TO SEE POLICE IN MY LIFE! I walked out of the bathroom and got my cellphone that was on the bed and I looked up to see where the gunshots were, and it was right on top of the bed I was sleeping on, just a couple of feet down and I would've gotten shot at. I told this to the police and they investigated it, they said it wasn't just a bullet, it was a whole bunch of pellets that had gotten fired! I felt the bits of glass on my feet so I got my shoes and put em on. My purse was near the lamp and glass went inside! I was borrowing Andrew's camera for the day so I looked for it, and thank goodness it still worked! Anyway, the police said that the people who did this was a mexican gang because all the neighbors saw them too and complained to the police that they were making trouble in the neighborhood. It makes me so mad because they're so heartless doing this for no specific reason, and now my cousin's condo is a hot mess and so many damages are there, his boyfriend that just flew in from san francisco visited him but now he must not want to come back since this shit happened, and this experience is making me paranoid, traumatized, and scared shitless.

After all this I called Kevin, Andrew, and my mom. I was scared to call my mom cos I didn't wanna wake her in the middle of the night since it was about 2:30-3:00 am already and if I told her she'd be so worried that she might get a heart attack or something, but I didn't wanna wait cos I know she needed to know. Although to my mistake, she was PISSSED OFFFFF and she was yelling and screaming through the fone. I tried being calm and tell her I'm okay, but all she could do is blame my cousins for letting this happen to me. I told her it wasn't any of their faults cos we didn't know this would've happened, but she got pissed because I wasn't spending the night at my other cousin's house where her parents were there, instead I slept at my cousin's who lived alone. So now I just feel really bad because my parents don't trust me being with them anymore =/ Although I know things will patch up later on and I'm just extremely glad to be alive right now. I really don't know what's going to happen now. FOR SURE my parents won't let me go out in a long time, and its too bad because kevin, john, and I planned a roadtrip next monday, so maybe this is giving us a sign that we REALLY shouldn't do the roadtrip anymore. I know that I don't want to go anymore either since I'm paranoid now and message to Andrew, YOU'RE RIGHT.

Through this traumatic experience I did learn a couple things; that life really is too short so I shouldn't take things for granted, and I shouldn't waste my time doing things that won't be successful for me in the future. Everything happens for a reason, it REALLY sucks that it had to take THIS to help me realize what I should be doing in my life, and not wasting my life on things that would get me in any kind of danger. Whoever is reading this, I just want you to know to appreciate the things in your life, the people in your life, and to stay true to the things you want to do to become successful, whatever that may be. Life lesson LEARNED, but I really am just so thankful and grateful for being here today.