Samantha slept over at Sam and Max's house that night and stayed with them for the rest of the week, which was only one day since the next day was Friday. They told her and Maxine what they intended to do, and of course, they were both ecstatic.
Sam and Max waited until Saturday and drove over to Samantha's parents' house to pick up her stuff and get them to sign some papers. Sam parked the car and let the girls out while Max went in ahead with the papers.
"Okay, girls," Sam said. "You know the rules of the game. Whoever stuffs the most of Choco's stuff into our trunk gets to choose what we do for lunch."
"Don't I have an unfair advantage since I know where my room and all my stuff is?" Choco asked.
"She does," Maxine said crossing her arms and pouting.
"You are too smart for your own good, Choco," Sam said. "You'll get far in life."
"It's alright, Maxine," Choco said smiling. "I'll tell you where everything is. That way it'll be fair."
"I'm glad you got that sorted out," Sam said pulling out a whistle. "I hope you keep getting along this well after Max officially promotes Choco to the status of god-sister. I don't want fighting."
"I can't promise we won't fight," Choco said. "But we'll try hard to get along."
"I can't hate her," Maxine said giving her friend a side hug. "She's my little buddy."
Sam smiled as he looked back at the memories he and Max shared. He was sure that living together would only make their friendship stronger.
"Okay," Sam said. "Are you girls ready to get Samantha's stuff moved out of there?"
"Yeah!" they both yelled at once.
"Alrighty then," Sam said holding up the whistle. "Get ready, get set, go!"
Sam blew the whistle and both girls ran to the door and into the house. He knew that this was an unorthodox method for getting Sammy's things moved out, but he and Max had agreed that they wanted this whole episode to be as undramatic for Sammy as possible. She had experienced enough pain in her life without having another memory to scar her. God knows that she would have plenty of those later, especially since she was living with them.
Meanwhile, Max had entered the house and found his relations as he had expected, lying in a state of hungover stupor.
"Hello, Simon!" Max said after he had opened the door. "I need to talk to you about something."
Simon sat up on the couch grumbling to himself as he did so as he looked upon his cousin.
"Max? What is it, cop?" Simon asked. "I have a really bad headache."
"Yeah, what gives, man?" Esther asked standing up from the floor.
"I can see that you're both hungover as crap so I'll cut right to the chase," Max said holding up the papers and a pen. "It's about Samantha. I want to be her legal guardian since you two are too busy drinking to know where she is at any given moment. You can still see her and send us money on her behalf. You just won't be breaking her heart and her stomach anymore with your gross negligence."
Simon supported his head with his arms and said, "I thought you were too busy beating up criminals with your boyfriend to care about anyone other than yourselves, Mr. Holier-Than-Thou! What do you really want? Is this a sting or something? Since when do you care about my kid, Max?"
"Since she wandered into my life the other day with her neglected heart, big brain, and empty stomach. I don't know why I hoped that the next generation of my family would be less monstrous than the previous one. I always acted cynical about it, but I honestly really hoped things would get better. It looks like I was wrong. If any of us are going to be improved, I'm the one who will have to intervene."
Maxine and Sammy threw open the door and ran towards Samantha's room. Maxine opened the door and Sammy followed her in. They emerged with stuff from Sammy's room a few seconds later. After a few seconds, they ran back in to do the same thing.
"What's going on?" Esther said looking over across the room in her daze. "Why are they running around? Oh, God! Is the house on fire?"
"Unfortunately, it's not, Hungover Hannah," Max said. "You can go back to sleep if you don't want to fight for custody."
"Thank God!" Esther said starting to walk off to her room. "Let him do what he wants, Simon. If your cousin wants Sammy, let him have her. We have too much to do to look after her all the time anyway. All she does is get into trouble. She got us kicked out of our last apartment because she 'kidnapped' the landlord's kid. I swear to God. She's more trouble than she's worth…Wait, we will get to see her. Right?"
"If you stop partying and get your asses into some rehab, maybe."
"Then, forget it," Esther said walking over, taking the pen from Max's hands, and signing the paperwork on the ground while the two girls continued running in and out with Samantha's stuff. "I have too much fun to look forward to. I never really wanted to be a mother. It's too much work. You try to do the right thing by letting her do what she wants and everyone is on your case and then people threaten to call child services. It's ridiculous. Just sign the papers, Simon, and get Samantha off our backs."
"Okay," Simon said moving over next to her and signing the paperwork in hesitation while he looked at the papers closely to make sure they were what Max said they were.
In the meantime, Max walked over and picked up the suitcase of money that was on the floor.
"I see you've been dealing again," Max said holding up the suitcase.
"What the hell are you doing with our money?!" Esther asked.
"Yeah, jackass!" Simon yelled. "What gives? Is that why you came?"
"Think of this as child support or an investment in your daughter's future," Max said pulling out his luger. "My new child will need this money to get a car, go to college, or to pay for future therapy bills. Back off or I might have to turn this money in."
"I knew it," Simon said stepping forward. "You really were just trying to bust us! You don't care about her or anyone else."
"You used to be right. I used to only care about myself and Sam, but now, I care about myself, Sam, my goddaughter, and now my adopted daughter. It's an impressive record by my own standards."
Maxine ran out the door, but Sammy saw what was happening and stopped in her tracks.
"Max, what's going on?" Sammy asked. "Why do you have a gun?"
"It's alright, Choco," Max said bending down, taking the paperwork and pen with the same hand that was holding the luger, and backing away to the door. "Your new daddy is just getting you a nest egg, but we need to get out of here now."
"Why?"
Sam having heard the shouting opened the door, picked up Samantha, and ran out. Max ran out behind him.
"Get in the car, Maxine," Sam said. "Things have gone south."
"Okay," Maxine said running on ahead.
"What's going on, guys?" Sammy asked while she was being carried to the car with her arms full of clothes.
"It's okay," Maxine said calmly running to the trunk with the stuff and throwing it in before jumping into the back of the DeSoto. "Your parents are about to try and fight Daddy and Uncle Max so we have to run away now. They're freelance police so this happens sometimes."
"What?" Sammy said.
"Max, you said you could handle this without gun violence," Sam said shutting the trunk.
"Why did you have a gun if you were only talking?" Samantha asked suspiciously while she was lowered into the back of the DeSoto.
"The people in our family aren't reasonable people, Choco," Max said as he and Sam jumped into their seat. "Sometimes you make demands and they respond with violence, so you have to be prepared. I asked them for something and they weren't happy about it."
"So, Mommy and Daddy are bad guys?" Choco asked.
"In layman's terms, yes," Max said as Sam stepped on the gas just as Sammy's parents ran out of the house with machine guns.
"Bye!" Samantha yelled at the top of her lungs before her parents opened fire.
The two girls ducked down just in time. Sam drove faster to get them out of the line of fire.
"Why are they shooting us?" Sammy asked.
"That's just what bad guys do, Choco," Maxine said.
"My Mommy and Daddy really are mean!"
When they were a safe distance away, Sam slowed down to a stop in the parking lot of a Stuckey's.
"Well, that was fun," Sam said. "Do you think your cousin will stay away from us?"
"They will if they know what's good for them," Max said. "I have custody of their only child now, and if they violate the agreements, I could take them to court. I also could mention their dealing money if they tried anything."
"What does all of that mean?" Maxine asked.
"It means that Choco is now officially your god-sister," Max replied.
"Yay! You're my sister now, Choco," Maxine said turning to her friend who was quietly crying. "What's wrong, Choco? Why are you sad?"
"They don't love me," Sammy said with tears going down her face. "They shot at me. They didn't care if I got hurt. They don't care about me."
"We do," Max said climbing into the back and lifting Sammy onto his lap. "We're your family now. I'm gonna be your Daddy, Sam is gonna be your uncle, and Maxine will be your sister. We'll take care of you. You don't have anything to worry about. Okay?"
"Okay," Choco said looking like she was thinking about something. "Max, can I call you Daddy?"
Max felt unexpectedly touched.
He smiled warmly, hugged her close and said, "Yes, you can, baby."
"I love you."
"I love you, too."
After a moment of silence, Maxine asked, "Daddy, who won?"
Sam took a moment to remember what she was talking about.
"Oh, yeah," Sam said. "I don't know, Maxine. We kinda left in a hurry, so how about we call it a tie?"
"We can eat here," Sammy suggested pointing at the restaurant they were parked in front of. "I've never been here before."
"You haven't?" Max asked opening the car door and letting the two girls out. "Then you're in for a treat."
"Yeah," Sam said exiting the car and walking to the place with the rest of them for the first time as a family. "My family used to come here all the time when I was growing up. I still remember the food poisoning…"