Leave The City (Book 8 of Adopted by the Josephs)

16. Brendon

"We agreed on midnight. She came home just after one. But that's not the issue. I mean, it's an issue, but it's not the issue. Tyler, your daughter was shitfaced when she came home last night. She could barely keep herself upright, or keep her eyes focussed."

"No, that's not Sam. She wouldn't do that. Not to you, not to us."

"And yet, she did. I have a few ideas of how I intend to handle this. For starters, I'm not letting her go to any more beach bonfires. I'm thinking at least the next two weekends she's not going out at all."

"That's fair. Except next Friday, she's supposed to come home. The trial starts that following Monday."

"Good. So she wouldn't be going out anyway."

"What else are you planning on doing? Remember, she's kind of fragile. But this really doesn't sound like Samantha. Are you sure her blood sugar wasn't just out of whack? You know that can look and smell like she's drunk."

"I'm sure. Her friend told me she hadn't realized how much Sam had had to drink."

"Oh," Tyler said.

"Yeah. For what I have planned, so far, I have already woken her up," I said.

"It's only, like, eight in the morning there," Tyler said.

"It is. And yes, she has a hangover. And no. I don't want her to sleep it off. I want her to know that getting that drunk feels like shit, and I don't want her to think she can do this again. I also don't want her to think just because she's here and you're not, and that we're not her parents, that she can get away with this kind of stuff. We're responsible for her, and we take that very seriously."

"I know you do. I appreciate that. And I'm glad you're not letting this be some 'she's not at home, let her have some fun' kind of thing. I'm really surprised at this, to be honest. After Tristan and the dance, I would have thought she'd be more careful. I'm a little shocked. And a lot disappointed," he sighed. "Okay. Well, you know how we feel about punishments with Sam. Nothing really serious or too isolating."

"Oh, I know. Don't worry. I'm not going to disassemble her social life here completely. It'll take a hit, and I don't think I will be her favourite person today. I put her in her shower, but I didn't know if her leg could get wet much, so I didn't turn the shower on her. I gave her 15 minutes to shower and get downstairs," I said. "Today, she's going to walk the dogs, change the beds and skim the pool."

"Okay," Tyler said. "So far, that's reasonable."

He agreed, so this would be easy.

"She's not getting a nap," I said.

"Oh. No, Bren, don't do that. She can have a seizure if she's overtired."

"Shit. Right. Okay. She'll have a nap if she needs one," I said. "Straight home from school every day until she goes home for the trial. Except for practice and games. We will be there to pick her up every single day at exactly two thirty. We'll be at every practice and game."

"Okay. Sounds fair. What about group projects?"

"They'll have to come here to work on them," I stated.

Tyler was nodding. Jenna came into the frame.

"Hang on, back this puppy up. I was dealing with a Junie blowout. What's this about straight home from school and napping?"

"It would seem, dear wife, that our daughter got drunk at a party last night and broke curfew by a little over an hour."

"Not Sam," Jenna said. I nodded.