In 6th grade, I learned an important lesson that had nothing to do with English, Math, Science, or Social Studies. It had to do more with real life. At twelve years old, I realized that a good friend can turn into an enemy in the blink of an eye.

When I entered middle school that first day, I was very nervous about it because I would have to adjust to new teachers and a new environment. In spite of my anxiety, I was happy because soon I met some cool friends. One of them was named Nicolas and I could tell that he was going to be my best friend. Nicolas was short chubby with black spiky hair. Everyday, we would hang out after school and go places like the Staples Center to skateboard.

Everything, was going fine until one day at school during lunch, Nicolas surprised me with a strange question.

He asked me, “Do you want to get in the crew?” At first, I didn't answer.

I knew that he was in a crew and I knew it was bad. Nicolas was young and he had his whole life ahead of him. I didn’t want him to throw it away by getting in trouble.

Even though I knew that getting in a crew was wrong, I also didn’t want to lose my best friend. Plus I didn’t want other kids to think that I wasn’t down, so I said, “Yeah.”

That same day after school, we all met at the school soccer field and Nicolas and his friends jumped me into their crew. They punched, kicked, and beat me up for 8 seconds.

I didn’t know what to do, until they screamed, “You can swing back!”

I was in the middle. Part of me felt mad because they were hitting me, but I knew why. I swinging back and blocked my face.

When it was all done, Nicolas laughing, “Welcome, now you’re in the crew!.”

The whole thing went by really fast and in the end I barely even had bruises. My mom didn’t notice anything when I went home that day. From that day forward, I continued hanging out with Nicolas and his brother Diego, who was one year younger than us and was also in the crew.

That’s when my life started changing. Instead of going skating after school, we would start going around the block on our bikes to look for our other crew members. I started to get into trouble at school we got in fights with other crews. One day I got caught catching a spot “Tagging” on a school wall with a spray can. I got a ticket for tagging with Nicolas. I had to go to court and they gave me community service.

My mother was very mad at she yelled at me, “I don't want you to hang out with that kid anymore.”

I whispered, “Okay...”

She grounded me for four months.

I asked myself, “Why did I even do that?”

I started hating Nicolas for being a bad influence on me and getting me in trouble. One day, I almost got in house arrest for something he did. He took a knife to school and when they caught him, he blamed it on me.

I was angry I yelled at him, asking, “Why the f*** did you blame it on me?”

He said, “I didn't foo them teachers are stupid.”

I said, “What the f***!”

I pushed him because I was angry and he pushed me back. I clipped him and he fell down on the floor. He didn't get up; he just said, “I'm sorry foo”

I yelled back at him, “F*** no, you did it on purpose. Don't you don't ever talk to me Again.

Then I got my bike and went back to my house. My mom was so angry but I explained to her that the knife wasn't mine. She kept on repeating “Don't hang out with him anymore.”

However I still hung out with him for a while longer. On Sundays we still watched movies in my house with Nicolas but when we got bored so we went to ride our bikes I had a black beach cruiser he had a BMX bike.

Everything was going great until suddenly, one day at school Nicolas was mad at me. I don't know why but he started talking s*** about me, I don't know why but I was confused that he was mad at me I didn't even do nothing to him. I always asked myself I think that he was a bad influence for me. I decided to stop hanging out with Nicolas because he always would get me into trouble.

After we were about to fight they stopped us so they were asking all this stupid questions but they let us go because we were just pushing each others so we went to back to class I walked back then my other friends asked what happen I told them that Nicolas was just mad at me for no reason. One of my other friends told me that I didn't let Nicolas borrow my PSP I was like ooh no Wonder he got mad at me I would of let him borrow it but my mom doesn't like when I borrow stuff to other people. I said that is some stupid reason to get mad at.

As the days went by, I never talked to him I am in 9th grade and I haven't talk seen him I tryed ed to talk to him but I don't know why but I didn't want to talk to him because he was a little gang related and I didn't want to get shot you know. So I decided to leave the crew I got out and started skateing and also decided to stop hanging out with him and I started hanging with some dudes I meet iv also change. I ask my self why did I ever hanged out with Nicolas he always thought he was so tuff that he could beat us up and all that s*** so I wouldn't consider Nicolas as a good friend I regret being his friend. Make sure you choose the right friends don't choose the ones that make you do bad stuff.