++++++ Quick chapter before bed.

It's 12.15 am here and I'm zonked.

Night all.

I hope you enjoy.

I do not own ++++++

Three

The Allen-Lee household would never be the same again.

"Who's staying, daddy?" Bart asked his dad, bouncing on the bed of the guest bedroom, a huge grin on his face. "Will they read to me daddy?"

Barry shrugged as he worked on putting the new quilt cover on the bed. After picking Bart up from day care, father and son went to the shopping mall to buy some stuff for their new house guest. The girl at the shops had said that roses and skulls were very popular with teenager girls which is why he was now putting a black quilt decorated in skulls and purple roses on the bed. "Her name is Scarlet," Barry told his son, "she's come from a very bad place and mummy agreed to help her."

"Is she like us, daddy?" Bart asked. The twenty question game was very big right now. "Should I not run in the house?"

Barry laughed. "You probably shouldn't un in the house to start with. We've gone through six vases in one week."

"But it's fun!" Bart pouted. "Daddy, will she be my new sister?"

Barry sighed and sat down on the bed. "Bart, my man. We need to talk about what this means for us. Scarlet is a very angry girl. She didn't grow up like we did. She wasn't loved by her mum and dad. They did some bad things to her but mummy is going help her get better again. Okay? And if she doesn't Scarlet won't be staying."

Bart flashed a grin when the two of them hear the front door open. "Can we show Scarlet her clothes?" he grinned.

The same assistant who had helped with the bedding had also help with clothes. There was one shirt Bart had picked out on his own, a Batman logo shirt. He grabbed the shirt and flashed down to the foyer where Starla was, standing outside in the cold was Scarlet. He grinned and flashed over to Scarlet. "Hi!" he smiled. "I'm Bart! What's your name? You're Scarlet right?"

Starla smiled. "Scarlet Lords, this is my son Bart and my boyfriend Barry."

"I picked out a shirt for you!" Bart laughed, jumping up and down. He held up the black fabric for her to take. "Daddy said you lived on the streets so we got you all new clothes! Will you read me a bedtime story? Can you colour in? I can't do lines yet but I try super hard."

"Slow down, Barty Speedster," Starla warned him. "Perhaps you can show our house guest where she'll be sleeping?"

Barry grabbed Scarlet's hand and he pulled her through the house at a normal pace. "I made you a sign with your name on it!" he told her.

Starla took her jacket off, shaking her head. "I half think she agreed to stay with us so that she could run away."

"Agreed," Barry answered. He kissed her on the cheek, "I got stuff out to make pasta, oh cooking queen."

"Working?" she asked him. It was supposed to be Barry's night to cook dinner but since he'd had to leave work early to pick Bart up he would be working from home.

Barry nodded. "Yeah, sorry." He kissed her and disappeared into his study.

The entire evening Bart hung off Scarlet whilst Starla prepare dinner. Barry was doing some work from home in the study so it was just the three off them.

"Tomorrow I've arranged for you to sit an educational test," Starla told the teenager. "We need to figure out what level of education you're at so we can enroll you in school."

"I'm not going to school," Scarlet replied. Her answers with Starla or Barry were snippy and short, but whenever Bart asked her for something, she would talk to him in a low warm tone like she was his mother, not Starla. It was clear that Scarlet had a soft spot for children, it wasn't just her little circle of children but in general. She was so affectionate with Bart, such a change from the meta-human who was trying to squash her only hours before.

Starla sighed. "Listen, Scarlet. I know you're new to this but I do have rules in this house. No swearing. Do your chores. Clean up after yourself. Your curfew is nine pm and you will go to school."

Scarlet shot her a look across the table. "School? What's the point? I take what I need out of people's minds."

She groaned in frustration. "I'm a telepath and my rule is that I do not use my powers on my friends. Your rule regarding your power is that you will not use them period. This is my home, my family and if I feel you're putting my boys in danger I will end you."

"Like you could," Scarlet replied.

"I can create illusions and put them in people's heads," Starla warned her. "I can make them feel so real that I can be enough of a challenge to you. What I'm trying to do here is find a medium. So tomorrow you'll sit the damn test and then we can start on some sessions."

Scarlet leant forward in her seat. "I'll make you a deal. You let me see my Jessie and Jason and I'll give your stupid test a try. Otherwise, no dice, lady."

Starla frowned. "I'll see what I can do," she replied through gritted teeth.

Dinner was tense, everyone was quiet apart from Bart slurping away at his noddles. Starla was getting glared at by Scarlet who picked at her dinner. She guessed that it was because she often gave her shares of food to the kids so she never ate full portions like this before. Starla needed to take her to the doctors and started on some vitamins to get her nutrition back up. After desert, Bart and Barry started to get ready for bed. When Barry went to get his son's favourite book off the shelf for story time, Bart declared he wanted Scarlet to do story time with him tonight. He found Scarlet in the hallway, staring at the photos on the wall.

In her mind the girl had no clue what to make of the happy family. Why couldn't she have grown up loved like Bart was?

"Will you read me a story?" Bart asked her tugging on Scarlet's shirt.

Scarlet looked down at the kid as he held up a tattered, old copy of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. She took the book and looked it over and shrugged. "Sure. Okay."

The kid grinned when he saw she was wearing the shirt that he had picked out. Bart grabbed her hand and yanked her to his bedroom. Scarlet was surprised to see that the bedroom of the son of the Flash was decorated in the Batman theme. She dragged her over to his bed and blurred the rest of the way so that he was under the covers.

Scarlet lay down on the bed, curled in beside him. She opened the book to the first chapter. "Once, there were four children whose names were Peter, Susan, Edmund and Lucy. This is about something that happened to them when they were set away from London during the war because of the air-raids…"

-XXX-

Starla was in a panic. She'd had the girl in their house for less than four hours and she was missing. The meta-human was ready to go out and look for Scarlet when Barry called her upstairs.

"Your missing kid, my lady?" Barry asked her, pointing into Bart's bedroom.

Starla gasped. Lying asleep in the bed were both Scarlet and Bart curled into each other, Bart's favourite book in between them. She sighed and turned the light off. Truthfully tonight had been easy, it was tomorrow that would be when the hard part started.