~Taylor's POV~

Callie had asked to go to a silent movie for our night out once we had started into town. I still felt bad about leaving Lena home with only Mariana when she wanted us all to stay for dinner but my excitement was a greater emotion. "So, Callie, is this like a date?" I questioned smirking already knowing her answer.

Callie rolled her eyes at me and laughed. "Nope."

I stick out my lower lip and try to give her puppy eyes begging her to cave and give me my way. Trembling my lower lip I see her finally sigh and playfully swat me. I smirk knowing that I was winning this fight, that Callie would pretty much always cave to me.

We walk into the theater and I give Callie a questioning look, "They still play movies with no sound...or in black and white? What are we as old as Stef and Lena?" I joke causing her to crack a smile. She rolls her eyes at me and goes to pay, the two of us don't bother on fighting who's going to pay because we both know that our money comes from Stef and Lena.

"Are you coming?" Callie questions me as she starts to walk into the theater and pulls me from my thoughts. I nod slowly and follow closely behind her.

I nervously look around to see who was in the theater but there were only two older people who didn't seem to pay any attention to Callie or I so I calmed down. Maybe tonight would be the best night of my life afterall.

~Callie's POV~

I sat closely watching Taylor as she watched the movie play on the big screen. There weren't many people in the theater and the few who were here didn't pay any attention to us. Taylor finally looks away from the screen and towards me, "I am so bored." She complains whispering. I laugh and then silence myself remembering that there were other people in the theater and motion for her to follow me out. I walk down the street a past a few stores before stopping at the coffee shop. After Taylor and I place our orders we go to sit down in the corner.

"So." Taylor starts but then quickly looks to the ground.

"So...what?" I ask her.

She bites her lip and finally looks at me again, "Have you heard anything about what's going to happen with..."

I slowly shake my head and know what she wants to ask about, Liam. She wasn't sure how she was supposed to react when I first told her, sometimes she's still quiet around the topic but at the same time she's curious about it. I take a small breath, "Stef talked to some lawyers about it. That's the last I heard of it."

She nods slowly trying to figure everything out. "Are you okay?"

I'm surprised by the question, "Yeah, fine. I just wish it would all go away."

Taylor stands up, "We should be getting home, you know curfew." I nod, unsure of what I should trust her with, she was only two years older than Jude and I didn't want to ruin her innocence, even if whatever had happened in her past had already partially broken her. We leave the shop and take a back road home to avoid anyone we may know.

"I'm sorry, I shouldn't be asking these things. I need to learn when to shut up." Taylor mumbles after a long five minutes of silence.

"For what Tay?"

"For asking you about it all. You don't ever talk about it but I always ask about it. I feel bad because it's not like I answer questions about my past why should I expect you to do just that?" She looks upset and like she's beating herself up.

I think for a minute about what she said, "Then I have a way to make it fair. Answer a few of my questions and then you can stop feeling bad about what you asked me. Fair?" I wait for her to nod and then think of what I want to ask. I knew that Taylor had been beaten by her parents for being gay, and then she ran away and landed at the Foster house all accidently. What I didn't know was everything inbetween. "What was the last straw, what happened that final time before you ran away?"

I see Taylor's face darken and almost regret asking her about it. "Normally," She started, "they would mostly just hit me. Fists, hands or push me into a wall or down the stairs. Bad but not life threatening. And then the day I ran away, they cut me with a knife. I grabbed it from the kitchen, I was only trying to protect myself when my father got it and well," She stopped and pulled back the strand of hair she always had placed carefully in front of her face revealing a scar clearly from a knife. "So I ran. I didn't know what else I could do." She let the hair fall back to the sides of her face.

I felt an overwhelming need to just allow Taylor to cry while I held her there. It always seems like it was her father Taylor was talking about, she never mentioned her mother, and though I was curious I didn't want to pry and make Taylor even more upset.

She took a small breath, almost as if she didn't want me to see her calming herself down. "You have another question about it all. I can tell. What is it? And don't spare me Callie. I can talk about it if it happened to me. I'm not too young."

I nod, I understand that she doesn't want to be treated like I child, after what she had been through, she wasn't a child anymore and she expected that I of all people would understand that. "Okay." I agree, "Did your mother ever do anything to you?"

Taylor nodded slowly like she needed to think about it, "Yeah. Once. But the look afterwards that she had on her face. When she saw the bruises my father left on me afterwards. It seemed like she didn't feel what she had done was right. But she still did it and when I need help she never stood up to my father. She's just as bad as he is."

I hadn't noticed until then that we were at the Foster's front door about to enter. "And Callie? Can we not talk about it around the house. Everyone knows what happened but everyone gets awkward when it gets brought up?" I saw the silent plea in her eyes and I nodded in agreement. When we walked in nobody was around which I first thought of as strange but figured Stef and Lena must have just gone out after their dinner ended.

"So Callie?" Taylor laughed as she asked. "Think they have the house bugged so Stef can yell at us for 'making out in the kitchen'" She giggled mocking Stef's earlier comment when deciding how our relationship was going to work. I just rolled my eyes. It surprised me how quickly Taylor's mood had changed just based on topic change. Though I could tell most of it was just for show, I knew it because I had been doing it for years. Pretending everything was alright.

"I'm going to go through my coat upstairs, want me to grab yours?" I ask Taylor as she walks towards the kitchen to shovel down the leftovers from Stef and Lena's dinner tonight. "Thanks Callie!" She called from already in the kitchen and I smirk. She's so worried about showing off what charm she has, I think as I roll my eyes.

I walk back down the stairs and into the kitchen when I hear the door open. "Anyone home?" I hear Brandon call out as Taylor puts away the food she was eating and follows me out into the entranceway where Brandon is standing. "How was your movie?" He questioned us.

"Silent." I replied smiling.

"Boring." Taylor whined again laughing towards me.

"How was that concert?" I ask him, he had been looking forward to it all week and I was surprised he hadn't already been talking about how amazing it was.

He just shrugged, "It was good. Uh Tayla went with me actually."

"Awkward..." Taylor whispered and then laughed, "So you went out with your ex?"

I agreed with her silently but didn't say anything out loud to Brandon, "Are you two like a thing again or..?" He just shrugged in reply as someone knocked on the door.

Brandon answered the door and I saw an officer standing in the doorway. I took a sharp breath, there was a few things that could be happening with an officer at the door, none of them were good scenarios.

~Taylor's POV ~

"Brandon?" The officer questioned, "I work with your parents. Your father has been trying to reach you."

Brandon look terrified, "Sorry. I turned my phone off during the concert and forgot to turn it back on. Is everything alright?" The officers took a moment before answer, "Your mother, Stef, she's been shot." I froze with terror and couldn't think. Brandon did to but he hide it slightly better, he just nodded. I turned to face Callie and I think she noticed something I didn't because she slipped her arm around my waist and held me upright as my legs almost gave out. "We should go." She whispered and Brandon nodded in agreement.

The three of us sat silently in the back of the police car on what seemed like the longest drive possible. As we pulled into the parking lot of the hospital and got out I gave Brandon a quick hug, he slowly returned the hug by wrapping his arms around my shoulders as we were led into the building. I let go of him and fell into step with Callie as we entered the waiting room where Mike and Lena were sitting together and the twins were sitting off by themselves. Brandon immediately went to hug Lena as Callie and I just stood there. I looked over to the twins, Mariana wouldn't look up from the ground but Jesus was staring right at me.

"You alright?" I mouthed the words to him. He nodded ever so slightly yes but looked like he regretted it the minute he did.

"What about Mari" I mouthed a new set of words. He looked to his twin sister and back to me, shaking his head no, "Blames herself." He explained. I was about to reply when a doctor came out to tell us that Stef was stable and that Lena could go in to see her. Lena left and Mike went to go speak with his boss leaving only us kids in the waiting room. Brandon sat down and Callie went to go sit with him. I went over to sit with the twins. I reached for Mariana's hands and whispered to her, "it's not your fault." When she pulled away from me and continued to move farther away I moved next to Callie and Brandon. It was clear to me that at least one of the twins wanted to be left alone so I left them both there to figure things out. We sat for a few more minutes until Lena finally came out.

"She's good. She's opened her eyes and...and she's good." She explained. She was clearly struggling to come to terms with what was happening. One of the nurses called Lena over to fill out some papers as Mike left with his boss once again leaving us kids as the only ones sitting in the waiting room.

Brandon turned to face the twins, he was clearly angry, not an emotion that was commonly seen on Brandon's face, "What the hell is wrong with you? I thought you didn't want to have anything to do with your birthmom? That she was a drug addict and a con artist. We took you in when nobody else wanted you and this is how you repay us?

Callie and I stood off to the side speechless until Callie finally spoke up, "Brandon don't."

"Because of you my mom is in there fighting for her life." He screamed.

Jesus finally spoke up, but he was surprisingly calm for the situation, "She's our mom too."

Brandon continued on his rampage by looking to Mariana, "and you, you started all of this."

Jesus practically shielded his little sister, "Back off she feels bad enough."

Brandon just shook his head out of anger, "Yeah well she should feel bad."

I finally stop biting my tongue, "Knock it off! Brandon shut up! Turning on each other like this isn't going to do anything to help anyone and Stef would kick our asses if she heard us all bickering like this." I was practically screaming as I stormed out leaving Brandon and the twins glaring at each other. I saw Brandon walk out soon after I did to calm down.

I was sitting outside of the hospital, it was dark and I was just looking at the sky when Callie came to sit down next to me. "Did you hear anything?" I ask her quietly, I know the answer, it's only been two minutes maybe three since I stormed out of there so no, they hadn't heard anything but I asked anyways. Callie sighed, "No. Are you okay? Things were pretty tense in there."

I just laughed, "Tense? That's a nice way to put it." I felt a tear running down my cheeck, it was then followed by several others, Callie must have noticed because she asked me what was wrong, "What if she dies Callie? No really think about it for just a second, if Stef doesn't make it, will Lena be able to handle having that many kids, will she want us? Where can I go? Where can we go? What if this ruins the things that have slowly started looking better? What if we lose the closest thing to a family we have?"

For a long minute Callie didn't reply. Then I looked at her and she smirked, "You were right in there you know." Confused I didn't answer and just waited for her to explain more of what she meant. Callie laughed, light heartedly, even the things going on were taking their toll on her, "Stef is going to kick our asses when she finds out that there was a sibling brawl in the waiting room." I couldn't help but crack a smile as Callie slowly took my hand and stood me up off the ground where I had been sitting. "Come on, it's freezing out here and there's people in there who need us." I nod knowing that I would need to talk to Mariana again, and eventually there would be news on Stef so I agreed to go inside even though the cold night air on my skin was a refreshing reminder that I wasn't in a nightmare.

I was sitting behind Lena and Brandon next to Callie who was next to Mariana when Jesus came and sat next to me. "Something happen?" I ask him quietly. He just rolls his eyes and doesn't answer me, "walk with me." I meant for it to sound like a question but it sounded more like a demand. He stood and followed me into the hallway. "Something happen?" I try again and he sighs.

He turns to face the wall and punches it. "Ana. She wasn't at the women's shelter. She took the money I gave her and left. Mom got shot for nothing. And I trusted that woman again! After she ditched us the first time! I trusted her again!" He looked like he was about to punch to wall again so I stepped in between him and it. Better not for him to have a broken hand during all of this. He finally turned so his back and head was resting on the wall and slid down so he was sitting on the floor. I saw a single tear roll down his cheek, it was the first time I ever saw Jesus cry. After watching him cry, Brandon cry, Lena be engulfed in rage, even if it was just for a moment, I began to worry that Stef might not ever be able to kick our asses. That this was even more serious than it seemed.

"Immediate family only." The doctor explained when Brandon asked if we could see Stef. Lena was explaining to all of us that she was hooked up to tubes, to help her breath and stuff. As everyone was about to go in Callie stepped away. I followed her. I couldn't manage to see Stef helpless. "I'll stay with Callie." I whispered and Lena just nodded at the two of us as she led Brandon and the twins in.

"Why didn't you go in?" Callie questioned me.

"I couldn't. I couldn't see Stef helpless, she's my protector, she has been since the day she found me." I try and explain but I'm pretty sure it only makes sense in my head. Callie nodded like she understood and a part of me was hoping she would. We sat in silence for the rest of the time. Brandon and the twins came out, Brandon was going to drive all of us so we could try and get some sleep. The car ride home was tense with Callie and Brandon in front and the twins in I in back. There was silence and very little movement. Mariana and I sat quietly she smiled weakly at me as if to apologize for everything that was happening and I just hugged her tigtly for the rest of the ride home.

"I'm not going to be able to sleep alone in my room tonight." I whisper to the twins as I stand on the stairs watching them. They were digging through a box of junk, most likely Mariana's way of dealing with her guilt. "Come here Tay." Jesus motioned to his free side. Mariana was leaning against him on one side and soon I was sitting with them with Jesus's arm around me.

~Callie's POV~

"Taylor, come with me for a minute?" I asked so that Brandon could talk to the twins alone. She nodded understanding and we both sat on the steps listening to the three talk. "You did this. They would have still been fighting but you said something to Brandon didn't you?" Taylor whispered to me, she was almost smiling, almost happy and it filled me with joy to see her almost smile given the circumstances.

"I have no idea what you're talking about." I smirk at her while standing to go upstairs for the night. There's a knock at the door and I turn to see if Taylor heard it too and she nods, "What's that?" She whispers. I shrug but take a quiet step towards the door. Jesus, Mariana and Brandon are all also standing confirming that they heard the knock also. While we're all standing at the door Mariana instructs Brandon to ask who it is. "Who is it?" He questions.

"It's me! Jude!" A small voice, Jude's voice explains from outside the door. I sigh and take a step forward as Brandon opens the door.

"What are you doing?"

He shrugs, "I couldn't sleep so I came home."

I look at him skeptically, "You walked home in the dark? And what about when they walk home and they find you gone?"

Jude didn't miss a beat, "It's not that far, I didn't want to wake up Connor or his parents, I left them a note telling them I came home. The told me what happened to Stef." He paused and looked around the room and then back to me, "I just wanted to be with everyone."

I pull him into a hug, "Just don't ever do that again okay?"

Brandon finally speaks, "We should all get some sleep." We all mummer our agreements.

"I already told the twins I can't sleep alone in my own room tonight. Can we all just sleep down here?" Taylor asks, we all silently agree. Taylor starts up the stairs, "I'll go get some sleeping bags and blankets, Jude, Mariana help me?"

Once we all get situated and I believe Jude is asleep I close my eyes hoping to get some rest myself. After sleeping for a few hours Jude shakes me awake, "Callie. This reminds me of our mom." I smile softly to him, "I know buddy." And I do, it's the reason I couldn't see Stef today, it reminded me to much of our mom's death when I was younger. "Is Stef going to die?" Jude asks me, he looks worried. And though I don't ever promise Jude anything or say something that could be a lie I tell him no, "This family's not like ours, they're lucky." Jude nods like he understands and lies back down to go to bed.

In the morning I'm the first one up so I go to the kitchen to make biscuits and gravy. Something I learned from my mother when I was younger. "Did you sleep last night?" Brandon asks as he enters the room.

"No, not really. Did you?" I ask him still working on the food.

"Same." He explains, he looks exhausted. "What are you making?"

"Biscuits and gravy." He gives me a puzzled expression, "You're telling me you've never had biscuits and gravy? It's comfort food."

He asked me a few questions about my mom and I went quiet I answered his questions about how she died in the car accident and how my father had gone to jail. I explained how I use to write letters to my father but he stopped replying.

I went to get the other kids up after Lena had called Brandon letting him know that Stef was about to go into surgery and got them into the car. The car ride was just as quiet, even more cramped but thankfully less tense than last nights. While sitting in the waiting room Lena looked around, "Have you guys eaten?" We all just shook our heads in reply. We were all old enough to realize that Lena had other things to worry about right now.

Taylor and I sat together in the waiting room with Taylor falling asleep on my shoulder, I smiled when I saw that Jude had fallen asleep on Lena's shoulder, no one slept last night. As the doctor entered to room I gently moved enough to wake Taylor up who bolted upright one of her hands in a fist, when she remember where we were she unclenched it and joined the group of us standing in front of him. "She did great, we removed all the fragments, and we feel like she is going to make a full recovery, in about an hour we're going to move her to ICU and you can all see her." The doctor exited the room and everyone started hugging eachother. Taylor, Jude and I just stood off to the side in our corner and let them enjoy a family moment. "This means we bought ourselves a little bit more time." Taylor whispered and I laughed, "Lena would have kept us you know, she has a heart just like yours, she wouldn't have been able to get rid of us." I whisper causing Taylor to blush and I just enjoy that everything for the moment seemed like it was going to be okay. Jude just looked up at Taylor and I as I flirted and Taylor blushed and he giggled.

Author's note:

sorry that it has taken so long for this update but I've been super busy. Anyways it's a longer chapter and I explored more of their feelings for eachother. I was wondering if you all wanted to see this story follow the storyline of the show where Callie would run away next chapter or not. Also I changed Taylor's story a little from her original story (in the fosters+1) to work in this storyline eventually. Let me know what you would like to see for next chapter and I'll try to update soon. Thanks for all your previous reviews, favorites and follows!