Cleo's POV:
I leant back in my chair, placing my head in my hand whilst I pressed my work phone to my ear. I was just talking through some things with Kristin Watson, hoping that her and her family would be able to take in the young girl I'd just picked up the case of.
Said girl was sat in the corner of the small office, holding a teddy someone at the hospital had given her, tightly. She and her dad had been in a car accident early this morning and her dad's injuries had been quite serious. There was no family to take her in, so she'd been placed in the care system. Depending on her dad's condition when he woke up, she may be spending the rest of her childhood in the social care system and that troubled me slightly. You always heard horror stories and you always hoped you were doing the right thing.
"Yea, she's only 9 so you probably would need a smaller bed."
"Got it, we are sorting it out as we speak, Phil, can you get it here?" There was a pause down the phone, "yes? Okay, we can take her."
"Thank you!" I sighed out of relief. "Oh, I forgot to mention, she's blind."
"Right, okay. Umm, yea we can still do it. We will work it out, anything specific for us to know?"
"She's strong-willed, and she's got her cane with her. She told me she's got a bit of sight, not a lot but she can make out large shapes and shadows."
"Okay, we'll work it out. Thanks Cleo."
"Thank you so much, I was worried she'd end up being placed with a family who didn't get it. Grian mentioned how brilliant you are with disabilities."
"Did he now?" I heard her laugh.
"He did, trust me the whole of the county knows, you're likely to get a lot of calls when a disabled kid is involved in a case."
"Well, if it's because we're good at it then we'll take it as a compliment."
"Yep. Anyway, we've not been able to get back to the house, so she's got nothing. By looking at her she's probably aged 7-8 in clothing, she's a little short that's all, would you be able to get some stuff?"
"Yes, I'm going out in just a second."
"Okay, I've got to finish up some paperwork and then I'll drive her over. Should be at your's around 9:30?"
"See you then Cleo"
"Thanks Kristin." I put the phone down and stared at a document on my laptop.
"Are they nice?"
"Yes Kelly, Kristin and Phil are really nice and they are very helpful."
"That's nice."
"Yea, can I get you anything?"
"No, I'm fine thanks." She paused, "is my dad okay?"
"Last I heard from the hospital was he was going into surgery. They promised me they'd call me when he was out. But I bet he'll be out and feeling better way soon. The doctors and nurses are going to do their best." She hummed and ran fingers over the scabs all over her body. She'd come out of the crash practically unscathed. The smashed windscreen had sent shards off glass everywhere, some of which had cut her but the front of the car had taken most of the brunt and there were concerns that her Dad would lose both his legs. I felt scared for her. Sat in the back of that car, listening to it all happen around her must have been petrifying.
"Okay!" I wondered whether she didn't understand the gravity of the situation or whether she was so strong that it truly wasn't affecting her.
"I was going to have a cookie, would you like one?" She nodded nervously and gave me a sweet smile. For the first time since she'd met me, she folded up her white cane and placed it to her side on the chair, letting go of it.
Time skip:
I knocked on the door, still half crouching down so I could guide Kelly properly. The ramp had helped (once I'd explained it's existence) but now I could tell she was getting nervous.
"Hey!" Kristin opened the door; she had a kind smile and crouched down to Kelly's level immediately. "It's nice to meet you, would you like to come in?"
"Hey Kristin, this is Kelly." I said, meanwhile Kelly breathed nervously but didn't say anything.
We stepped in the hallway, Kristin closing the door behind us. "Would you like to take your shoes off?" Kelly released her grip on my arm and felt for her shoes, undoing the velcro easily and slipping them off. She moved her leg around slightly, getting a feel for where she placed them before standing up straight again. "Why don't we sit down and talk a little?" Kristin spoke softly and guided Kelly herself to the dining table.
We were offered drinks and food, I explained Kelly hadn't eaten dinner and Kristin promised to make a proper meal for her when she was more comfortable. "Would you like to ask me anything?"
"Do you like unicorns?"
"That's a great question! And yea, unicorns are awesome."
"They aren't real, you know."
"Well they might be, maybe they are just living in a super secret place."
"Yea, but no. They are cool though." Kristin smiled at me.
"Are unicorns your favourite thing?"
"No."
"What is?" Kelly shrugged her shoulders. "My favourite thing is baking. Our sons don't like baking very much but when I find time, I bake really tasty cakes and decorate them with all sorts of things." Kelly still didn't say anything. "My husband, Phil, he likes sewing. He doesn't find a lot of time to do it either, but he's sewing some special fabric in two of our sons' clothes so that the labels don't scratch them."
"Gymnastics." She twiddled her hair round her finger, a nervous habit obviously. "Dad takes me 3 times a week and I've got my first proper competition in a few weeks."
"That sounds like fun. If Cleo can get all the information for us, we can still take you."
"But Dad can't?"
"I know bud, and you're allowed to be upset about that. Phil and I are going to do our best to help you but it isn't going to be the same as your dad."
"I'll make sure I'm calling Phil and Kristin all the time about how your Dad is doing, Kelly." I said, feeling the need to remind her he wasn't going to be left out of the equation.
"What if he can't take me after that? The ambulance people said he might lose his leg and then he can't walk properly."
"Why don't we wait to hear what the hospital says?" Kristin suggested.
"Fine." Kelly said, angrily sitting back in the chair and crossing her arms. "I just want him to be okay," her voice wobbled.
"Would you like a hug?" Kristin asked, holding Kelly tight when a few seconds latter the little girl nodded. I said awkwardly still at the table, hoping things would end up being okay in all of this.
Phil's POV:
"Wilbur please do not muck about!"
"Sorry Dad." He sack back on his heels and looked nervously at Tubbo.
"No, sorry mate, I shouldn't have raised my voice with you. Just want to get downstairs and help your mum out as soon as possible, so, just get this bed built."
"We're nearly done!" Wilbur said, trying to boost the mood.
"Yea we are. Just pass me that bit there Tubbo." I took the new piece of got my screwdriver back out, "thanks mate."
It took another 10 minutes to finish building it and moving it around to be in the right place in the room. I left Wilbur and Tubbo to put the new bedding on it and tidy up the bits left behind. Then I checked on Tommy and Techno.
"Everything alright?"
"We're fine. He'll be out the bath in a second. I've promise him he can come watch me play minecraft for a bit."
"That's alright mate. Not too late though please."
"I've got it Dad." I thanked him once more before rushing downstairs.
"Sorry Cleo, I was just building the bed. We had the double in there and of course that wasn't going to work so we had to sort all of that out quickly."
"It's no worries Phil, it's really not a problem."
I smiled and walked closer to greet Kelly. "Hey there, I'm Phil, it's nice to meet you."
"Hello." She said quietly, stroking the ears of a teddy she was holding tightly to her lap.
"That's a nice teddy bear."
"I prefer unicorns."
"Oh, right. Would you like it if we went out and bought a unicorn tomorrow?" She nodded with a smile. "We have a big whiteboard in the hallway and we right all the stuff we are doing on it, would you like to come help me do it?" She nodded again, unfolding her cane and holding her arm out ready for me to take it.
"What colour what you like to use? We've got a pink one we haven't used yet."
"What about blue?" I mentally made a note about not forcing pink on young girls and how stupid that had been.
"We can use blue, yep. What shall we put down?"
"Huh?"
"Shopping for a unicorn?"
"Yea, yea, write that."
"Okay. We were going to go to the park tomorrow too. Tommy, our youngest son, he's only two years older than you and he loves going on the swings there."
"That sounds fun."
"Good."
We headed back to the table, where Kristin and Cleo were running through paper work. Kristin whispered something to me about Kelly not haven eaten dinner yet and I jumped into action. "Right what do you want to eat mate? I bet you're hungry."
"Not really. I don't feel very well."
"Oh I'm sorry. How about just a little something? Toast?"
"Have you got strawberry jam?"
"Would you like strawberry jam?"
"If you have it." We giggled and I relaxed.
"Right, 2 pieces of toast with strawberry jam coming right up." She settled herself into one of the chairs at the breakfast bar.
"How old are your other sons?"
"You can meet them when you feel ready."
"Maybe later."
"That's okay, you just let us know. Let me think. Tommy's 11. Tubbo is 13. Then Wilbur is 15 and Techno's 17."
"17?!"
"Yea, but he's not scary I promise."
"But he's like an adult."
"Yea, he nearly is an adult. But one day he was a kid turning up at this house, not knowing anything and being very scared, maybe a little bit like you?" She half-nodded. "All of the boys were like that one day. So it's normal to be nervous okay."
"I'm not nervous about being here, I mean you're all strangers but you seem really nice. I'm just worried about my dad."
"It's okay to be worried, hopefully we'll have some good news soon." I passed over the plate of toast with a smile. She felt around for it, landing her hand in the sticky substance. "Sorry mate, that was definitely my fault, anything I can do to help?"
"It's fine. Dad always says that why human beings have hands."
"To get messy?"
"No, so you can feel around for stuff."
"Ah of course, silly me." She smiled, taking another bite. Kids often bounced back from this kind of stuff surprisingly well. The trauma mostly buries itself deep and then surprises you as an adult. That was certainly my experience.
Wilbur's POV:
"If the Xbox was up here, we could all be playing on it now." I moaned, getting bored of sitting awkwardly on a chair we'd borrowed from Mum and Dad's room just so I could watch Techno play on the hypixel minecraft server.
"Yea, well it isn't. And it's Tubbo's go next."
"Yea, but you go goes on like 20 minutes longer than everyone else's because you're so good at it."
"Why don't we move onto build battle then? That's the same time slot for everyone." I nodded. It wasn't like we didn't have enough devices to do this. Tubbo and I could technically be playing on our phones, but his was downstairs still, having left it there earlier and not been able to get it before we were shoved upstairs. And mine was in my room charging back up from 3%.
I looked over at Tommy quickly just to check on him. He was half-asleep, curled up in Techno's duvet and leaning against the wall. Tubbo had put a youtube video on for him and he'd sat quietly there for a good hour now. There was a slight mark on the wall where his wet hair had been against it but all things considering, we'd got through a completely different evening routine with no meltdown so far. Techno was pleased and I didn't think that gave me a reason to complain. I was still complaining about the minecraft though.
"But Techno, you're the only one who's any good at building!"
"What about Tubbo!"
"No, Tubbo's good at coding!" Tubbo nodded, but gestured for me to be a bit quieter.
"Fair enough. But it's nearly 10:30, Tommy should really be in bed by now. Tubbo you want to help? We can leave Wilbur for him to get a bit better at minecraft, seems like he could use the extra practice."
I sighed, "no, I'll help too."
So that was how the three of us ended up dotted about Tommy's bedroom, listening to Techno read a few chapters of the book they were currently reading. Having been dropped half-way through the story, Tubbo and I were highly confused but let it pass and just enjoyed the peace instead.
Dad came upstairs and was talking to someone. I stayed quiet, and stood in the doorway of my room. Tommy had been asleep for 20 or so minutes. Techno was on nightmare duty, curled up on a beanbag and Tubbo was hanging out in my room until he could go back downstairs. I looked at the cane and the way Dad had his arm. At least me being there wouldn't scare her.
"Who's that?" She immediately asked as that thought had passed through my head. A finger pointed in my direction.
"It's fine, it's just Wilbur. He was just going to bed." Dad gave me a look that read 'talk!'.
"Hey, sorry, I didn't mean to scare you." Guess I'd thought wrong about the cane.
"It's fine."
"We got you some pajamas," I continued, "they are on the bed."
"Thanks," she mumbled, looking back in Dad's direction.
"Wilbur could answer some questions if you have any. He went through the system like you?" She bit her lip and nodded. "That's great. Why don't we get you dressed first, and ready for the bed and then Wilbur can come in and you two can talk."
"I can get dressed by myself," she simply stated and I did my best to hold in laughter. Dad was sometimes a total pushover and got caught out by us kids who knew what we were doing.
"Okay then, I'll just make sure you've got the pajamas." He gave me a smile as they went into the room. I returned to my bedroom, and sat beside Tubbo.
He had a confused expression on his face. "She's cool," I said. He nodded and smiled. He probably remembered when he first turned up here. Staying in that room. The fear of not knowing what the system was actually like. At least she won't have to deal with me being an ignorant idiot like they did.
A/n Hey! Guess who got lost watching a tv show this evening and it's now Tuesday! Sorry about that, my time management has been totally removed from my brain at the moment. Also please excuse all the POV hopping in this chapter, I hope it at least kept it entertaining? Thanks for being here everyone and being supportive.