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Maya Francesca De Soto

16 – Should be in High School, but hasn’t attended in almost a year.

At first raised by her Abuelita more than she ever saw her mom. Until the old woman died when she was 4. Since then it’s been her mom and an endless string of boyfriends. Some good, some bad. Her babysitters were whomever were available. Ladies in the apartment building, a friend from the neighborhood, the boyfriend of the month. Sometimes she would just have to hang out at the salon where her mother worked and keep out of trouble. The older she got and more independent, the less attention her mother felt she needed. Unless, of course, she needed something and then it was a lot of bribing and begging. Her mom wasn’t a bad person, but she just didn’t think about the future or consequences. She lived on drama and falling in love.

When her mom died, it kind of stopped Maya’s life. Maybe if she had died from drugs or a disease, it wouldn’t have shaken Maya so bad. But it was an accident. A simple bad luck accident. The woman had a little too much sangria, slipped in shiny heels and cracked her head open on the sidewalk. It was so sudden and so unexpected. Maya was a zombie for awhile. She automated through the funeral, completely missed her mother’s boyfriend taking over their apartment and everything they owned. She didn’t snap back in to attention until social services were trying to figure out where she was going to live. Maya didn’t have any other family, and everyone she knew had their own kids and problems to worry about.

After a couple months in foster care, Maya decided to hunt down her real dad. Her mom was so weirdly proud of her romantic history (she said she genuinely loved every single one of her boyfriends, even the ones she cheated on, even her clandestine short affairs, even the crazy assholes), and she kept a box of memories for all of them. Maya narrowed it down to the men closest to her conception date, and started contacting potential fathers. The first two were more than happy to prove they didn’t have a long lost daughter. The third so vehemently refused he got violent. (She snatched some of his hair in the scuffle and paid for the test herself. Maya had never been so happy to find out a guy WASN’T her dad.)

Now she’s got one last guy on her list and she doesn’t want a repeat of the last dude. Maya got herself a cheap gun off the street to defend herself, or worst come to worse, to threaten the guy to take the test.[/et_pb_text][/et_pb_column][et_pb_column type=”2_5″ _builder_version=”3.25″ custom_padding=”|||” custom_padding__hover=”|||”][et_pb_image src=”https://www.space-kitten.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/maya-de-soto_jenna-ortega1.png” _builder_version=”3.25.4″][/et_pb_image][/et_pb_column][/et_pb_row][/et_pb_section]