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

39. Tyler

I couldn't tell if she was being sarcastic, serious or trying to be funny. I looked at her with confusion I suppose, evidently on my face.

"Dad, relax. I'm okay," she said. "I mean, I want to hear what the doctors say, too. But I'm okay."

"Sam, you've been through so much in just the past couple of months. I'm so sorry this happened."

Sam looked down at her foot and sighed.

"I've stopped asking myself, or the universe or whoever, why this keeps happening to me. Maybe I'm cursed. Maybe I'm just incredibly unlucky. But one thing I know, if I hadn't run away that night, I wouldn't be here today."

I hugged my daughter, who even through her own pain, heartbreak, trauma and sadness was able to reflect on what could have been. And she was right. Based on what we knew about her upbringing, what she'd told us, what we'd learned through the years and the one time we got to meet Stanley, she was probably right. After all, he'd very nearly killed her when he'd had her abducted right after our adoption went through. But he was sadistic, because he also spent that time he had her beating her, berating her and doing everything he could to raise her blood sugar by feeding her sugary food, when he'd feed her at all, from what little she'd remembered.

She had been so traumatized from that week, we weren't sure we'd get our daughter back at all. Even once we had her back home, she had remained silent for three weeks. She was afraid of everything and almost everyone.

But she'd worked through that with Doc, and he'd guided her through so many traumatic things.  Specifically the school shooting. We hadn't realized just how affected Sam had been. She'd hidden her pain so well when we'd been on tour, that we hadn't realized how devastated she was until she'd been home and back at school, and had gotten so bad, we had to have her hospitalized. It was only then we saw in photos that as much as she was smiling in a lot of the photos she was in, that smile never made it to her eyes.

"Lunch time!" Zoe said, coming in, with Brendon and Sarah right behind her with the girls.

"Sammy? You awake?" Rosie asked, as she peeked her head into the room.

"Hey, RosieRo!" Sam smiled. I looked at her and watched her blue eyes begin to sparkle.

"Hi, Sama!" Junie said, toddling up to Samantha's bed.

"Hi, Junie!" Sam smiled.

"You wake!" Junie smiled.

"Nope. I'm asleep," Sam said, and then dropped her head to her pillow and pretended to snore loudly. Junie giggled.

"Sama, you silly!" She clapped. I picked Junie up and put her on Sam's bed where she immediately crawled over to Sam's left foot and grasped her toe. Sam started to wiggle her toes and Junie giggled. Rosie climbed up on the bed and lay down beside Sam.

"Sammy?"

"Yeah, Ro?" She asked, turning her head to her sister.

"I missed you. But? Now you awake. I telled you stories. Do you remember me saying stories to you?"

Sam glanced over at me. I didn't know how to answer that.  But Sam answered before I had an opportunity to.

"You know, Ro, I might have. But, I was so deeply asleep, I don't remember them. So you can tell them all to me again if you want. Because now I'm awake and I can hear and listen and remember."

I smiled. Since the day Rosie was born, Samantha and her sister have had such a special relationship. Apparently, their relationship started before Rosie was even born.