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Chapter One

Fifteen, Almost Sixteen Years Later…

She is awakened by the sound of all the screaming children. This is her fifth morning here, in this new foster home, and this is the fifth morning that she has been woken up by all of the screaming children. It doesn't help that the screaming children kept her up for hours last night. She has probably at most gotten three hours of sleep. Of course, she is one hundred percent use to this. This is her seventh foster home is her short fifteen, almost sixteen years of life. And every single foster home she has been to has included the loud, screaming children. They really shouldn't bother her, but these kids, oh these kids are different, very different. All they do is scream and scream and scream. It never ever ends. They scream all day, they scream all night. All they fricking do is scream. She is only glad that for once she has her own room. Of course, her room is the smallest out of all of them, but it doesn't matter though. Not anymore. Today, hopefully, everything changes.

She really hopes that today everything changes. She has all the papers, all of the papers to get herself emancipation so she can get out of the foster system. She already has a job lined up and she has plenty of money saved from her last jobs when she was at all those other foster homes. She has learned to save as much money as possible. Here's the thing, some foster homes, the foster parents are nice and feed you on a regular basis while other foster homes and other foster parents aren't so nice and don't feed you on a regular basis hence the reason why saving all the money and having jobs even when there really was no reason to have a job. She needed all the money she could get. Now she has plenty of money saved, a really good, new job at a local bookstore, which leads to her being able to afford an apartment and she has actually looked at an apartment that she could afford and the apartment building actually did have a really nice landlady. However, there is just one little problem. Okay, so maybe not a small problem, maybe a big problem, a very big problem. She, or rather her social worker, has everything in order for her trial in three weeks except for one thing, one very important thing. She, okay again, or rather her social worker needs her parents to sign away their parental rights which apparently failed to happen at the time of her birth. Yep, she (yes, her social worker) needs the signatures of the people she has never even met, the people who were supposed to raise, but didn't. She doesn't hold a grudge against them, after all, she doesn't know why they couldn't raise her, all she knows is that they couldn't raise her. She has their names or rather she has a name. Just one name. Her father's name.

Jess Mariano.

She is not actually supposed to have his name. But one thing leads to another and she may have looked at a paper that her social worker had in her file and well, there he was, well there was his name. Jess Mariano. She had a name. But more importantly, she had an address. An address that just happened to be right here in Philadelphia. What are the odds, right? She has been putting this back as long as she possibly could have, more like waiting for her social worker to track down her father and get him to sign away his rights. However, even though they are in the same exact city, it is impossible for her social worker to actually have the time to get his signature which means she has to do it. She has to go and get her father's signature to his parental rights. This should be easy, more than easy. He gave her up once (when he should have signed away his parental rights), he should be able to do it again.

She takes a look at the clock on her small nightstand and realizes it is time to getting ready and head to the only address she has for her father. God, she hopes he is still there. She doesn't know what she will do if he's not there. If he's not there, if he is long gone then that means she is going to be stuck in the foster system until she turns eighteen and there no way on this planet that she is going to be stuck in the foster for another three, more like two years. She has already been in the system for fifteen, almost sixteen years. She is done with everything that comes from being in the foster system. She is done. She wants out. OUT.

She pulls herself out of the bed and quickly dresses. Right now, she is more than grateful that she took a shower last night and had not waited until this morning, typically during the morning she can barely get in the bathroom for five seconds, she couldn't get into the bathroom to take a shower and all the jazz. She grabs her bag and gathers the very few important things that she needs for the day. She also grabs her leather jacket on the way out the bedroom door. As soon as she exits her room, she is thrown into chaos. She is pretty much thrown into the wall by some of the kids running by. She doesn't really hurt herself, only a few small cuts and probably eventually a minor bruise. She manages to miss getting thrown into the wall once again when some more kids come running by her and with that, she manages to make it out of the house without any other damage. Once she makes it outside and few streets over from the house, she lets out a deep breath. She can't help but think today so far has been just like any other day. However, she knows that this day isn't like any other day, she is going to see her father. Well, hopefully, she is going to see her father. The address she has could possibly, is more likely to be from fifteen, almost sixteen years ago. A lot can happen in that time, a lot.


She gets off the bus right at the address she had found. Truncheon Books. She is so not sure about this place. She is not even sure what this place is. She has never heard of it and she pretty much knows all of the bookstores, book places, basically, she knows about everything related to books around her. Well, except for this place. She lets out a shaky breath before she walks up to Truncheon Books. The place doesn't look open so she hits the bell next to the door. At first, no one comes to the door so she rings again and again and again and again. On her seventh ring, the doors finally open. Once the doors finally open, she finds three men standing in front of her. Well, more like one man standing in front of her and the other two standing a few feet behind, off to the side, both leaning up against a counter.

"Listen, we don't want any girl scout cookies," The man standing in front of her says. "We already have plenty of thin mints."

"Who is it?" One of the men leaning on the counter asks.

"Just a girl scout," The man standing in front of answers.

"Get some cookies," One of the men leaning against the counter says while the other one says. "Two boxes. Two boxes of cookies."

"Oh, no, I'm not a girl scout, I'm actually looking for," She gives a slight, small smile as she looks at the piece of paper in her hand even though she has already memorized her father's name to heart. "You're probably not him, but I'm looking for a Jess May-Riano."

"It's Mary-Riano," The man in front of her corrects. "That's me and what can I do for you?"

"You're Jess Mary-Riano," She says, using the correct pronunciation this time while also being taken aback. "You are Jess Mariano."

"Yes, I am Jess Mariano," The man standing in front of her, now known as Jess, says. "Like I asked before, what can I do for you?"

By now, the two other men leaning against the counter have gone silent. All three of them are waiting for the young woman to answer. The suspense growing by the second.

"You are really Jess Mariano?" The young girl once again asks. "You are Jess Houston Mariano."

"Houston?" One of the men leaning up against the counter questions.

"My middle name is not the big issue here," Jess replies to the young man without even turning around. "Okay, I am going to go through this one more time, yes, I am Jess Houston Mariano and now I am going to ask you this one more time, what can I, Jess Houston Mariano, do for you, young lady?"

"Wow, okay, well, I guess, here goes nothing" She pauses, looking down at quickly before looking back up at the man standing in front of her, Jess Houston Mariano, her father. "Well, um, you see…"

"What is it?" Jess interrupts, apparently running out of patience. "Listen, it's pretty early and when all had a late night so…"

"I'm your daughter," She says.

"Whoa," One of the men from the counter says.