Chapter Eight: The Big Uneasy

WARNING: Mentions of child abuse, neglect, and sexual abuse. Minor mentions, nothing is graphic.

Will stepped out of the cab, leaving the door open for Tate behind him. He walked around to the back of the car, and pulled their bags out, tapping the trunk once he was done to signal to the driver he could leave.

Will climbed up the steps to the door of the three-bedroom home, with Tate following behind him. He paused at the top of the stairs to dig his keys out of his back pocket, and unlocked the door.

"Home sweet home," he said, flicking the light on. He watched Tate look around, surprised, like she hadn't been expecting it. Will understood that, as up until the death of his father he'd lived in an apartment in the French Quarter. However, once his father died, he couldn't bear to part with the place, even if the wall in the living room was a constant reminder of what he'd lost, despite having covered up the word "Jones' long ago.

"I'm surprised you're actually this clean," Tate said, laughing a little. Ever since Will had told Tate she'd be coming back to New Orleans with him, he'd noticed she was much less withdrawn. Without the fear of CPS hanging over her, she was a much more lively, funny kid.

"That'd be Amelia's doing,". If there was one thing Will's sister in law couldn't stand, it was a messy house, and whenever she came to check on it while he was away, he knew she cleaned it.

"Cmon, why don't I show you your room?" Will asked her, leading her up the winding staircase. The first floor of the house held the kitchen, living room, one bedroom, and a bathroom, while the upstairs held two more bedrooms and bathrooms. Will had claimed the downstairs bedroom when he moved in, as he had no desire to stay in the bedroom he'd had as a child, or his father's bedroom, which were both on the second floor.

The room was quite bare, having been used mostly as a guest room for the past few years. The walls were a light blue, and a large area rug lay in the middle of the room. Only a few pieces of furniture, a bed, dresser, desk, and a nightstand occupied the space. On the far wall, closest to the back of the house, sat a large bay window overlooking the yard. On the wall adjacent to it were two doors, one leading to the en-suite bathroom, and the other to the closet.

"I know it's not much, but we can paint it or do whatever you'd like to it," he told Tate.

"It's great, thanks," she said quietly, looking around the room.

"I'll leave you to get settled then". Will set Tate's bag down on the bed, and headed out into the hallway, closing the door behind him.

Hearing the door latch, Tate let out a sigh of relief. She'd been trying to pretend she was fine all day, and it was getting exhausting. It wasn't that she didn't trust Will, but the fact that he was an unknown quantity is what worried her. She and Theo had gone through their fair share of foster homes during their five year tenure in foster care, most of which had been less than desirable.

There'd been the Winchesters, who had been their first foster parents. An elderly couple in their sixties, they were everything you could want from foster parents. They'd been welcoming, patient, caring, and they actually seemed to enjoy having Theo and Tate there. However, they only took in emergency placements, not long term ones, and thus, less than three weeks after the death of their parents, Theo and Tate moved to the Jeffersons.

The Moores were younger, in the early forties, and had their own son and daughter, eleven-year-old Andrew and nine-year-old Beth. At first, they'd been perfect, the typical white picket fence family. The Jacobs siblings soon discovered that they were nothing more than a bother to the family, and were only kept around for the CPS check the Moores received in the mail every month.

Mr. Moore also had a habit of taking his anger out on his foster children. First a few slaps here and there when he was drunk, and eventually using his belt, even when he was stone cold sober. The reason the siblings were finally removed from the home wasn't because someone at CPS finally noticed, but rather due to Bill LaMontagne taking a sporadic trip to see his "godchildren" (or so he told their caseworker). Upon his arrival, he noticed the bruises lining Tate's arms and Theo's black eye. The next day, they were removed from the home, having spent a little over a year there.

By the time they were removed from the Moore's, CPS had apparently decided that little eight year old Tate and fifteen year old Theo would be better off in a group home. And so off they went, joining the 20 other children at the New Horizons Home for Children. Nothing in particular was wrong with the home, they were fed, provided for, and no one ever got hit, but there was something it was lacking. Love.

With six workers looking after a constantly changing group of 20 children, no one employed by the home felt the need to get too attached to the kids. But Theo and Tate were together and safe, and that was all that mattered. Bill called a few times over their year-long stay, and even visited once, but dialed back communication once he was content with their safety. After the incident with Archie, the group home was shut down, and all the kids were sent off to new homes. Unable to find a home to take both children, the newly nine-year-old Tate was sent off to live with the McClarens while Theo was sent on to a group home for older boys.

The McClarens had welcomed the scared, timid girl with open arms. Mrs. McClaren taught English to the sixth grade at the local middle school, while Mr. McClaren worked at an autoshop not two blocks from the house. They had a 15-year-old daughter, Leah, who unlike the Moore children, seemed to love having a foster sister.

Without Theo by her side, Tate had clung to the older girl, and they soon became inseparable, playing soccer outside, baking cookies together, playing board games, and going to the local park. So when Mr. McClaren crept into her room late in the middle of the night, about a month after she'd arrived at the home, and told her they were gonna play a game, a secret game, she didn't say anything.

Even all these years later, she'd never said anything to anyone, not even Theo. The abuse continued for months, but never escalated into anything more. Tate suspected he never raped her due to the fact that the man didn't want to do anything that could leave evidence, rather than his own self-restraint. However, despite her efforts to stay in the home, to stay with Mrs. McClaren and Leah, she was removed after thirteen months when Mrs. McClaren was diagnosed with breast cancer.

The Andersons were a brief placement, also without Theo. They'd made it clear that the only reason they were letting her stay in their home was to be a babysitter for their three-year-old son, Ethan. At first, she didn't mind. The Andersons were quiet, and mostly stayed out of her way so long as Ethan was cared for. It was a difficult job for the ten-year-old, but she succeeded most of the time. Tate had only lasted for five months there, before being removed from the home after showing up to school with a black eye. Mr. Anderson, a perpetual drunk, had gotten rather upset when Tate had accidently dropped a glass in the kitchen.

It was after the Andersons that Theo told CPS if they didn't put him and Tate in a home together, he'd run away. Assuming it was an empty threat, they kept Theo in the group home he was in, and ten-year-old Tate was sent off to another foster home. Making good on his promise, Theo ran away that night. It took the police almost a week to find him, and to save themselves the hassle of having to deal with Theo running away again, they sent Theo off to join Tate at her foster home.

The Wilsons were a younger couple in their early thirties, and had no other children. They simply collected their check, and left Theo and Tate to their own devices. Theo had honestly been relieved by it. He could handle a little neglect, but he couldn't stop a foster father from throwing hands when the children apparently did something wrong.

With the fridge left empty most of the time, Theo got two jobs, a paper route before school and bagging groceries after, to make sure Tate was fed. He worked hard for a year, counting down the days until he turned 18. With the large amount of money he inherited from his parents on his 18th birthday, Theo had little to no trouble getting custody of Tate. He was responsible, had good grades, never had a run in with law enforcement, and thanks to Mr. Miller, a means to provide for himself and Tate.

After seeing that he was clearly financially stable and responsible, the judge signed off on the custody arrangement, and soon Tate and Theo moved back to the family home in Dover. After five years in foster care, Tate was a traumatized twelve-year-old and Theo was eighteen and the sole parent to his little sister. None of it had mattered, because they were finally back together, and more importantly, they were safe.

But now, all of that was over. Tate was once again left alone, and this time she knew if something went wrong, no one was coming for her. Even in the worst of homes, when she was being attacked and abused by her foster parents, she'd known that Theo was out there. She'd listened to the promise he'd told her over and over again, that all they had to do was make it to his eighteenth birthday, and then no one could ever hurt them again.

Except that hadn't been true, and Tate was now 1,500 miles away from the only person left in the world she knew she could trust. She knew Grant would do his best to help if she called, drop everything and come running, but she also knew his best probably wouldn't be good enough.

Part of her wanted to distrust Will immediately, to shut him out and never let him in. After all, if you expect disappointment, you can never be disappointed. However, there was this tiny part of her that begged the rest of her to trust him, just a little bit.

She'd learned over the years that never trusting anyone, always being on the lookout, was exhausting. But, if he was anything like his father, if he was anything like the man she'd seen over the past few days, the one that had helped her, comforted her, and saved her life, she could trust him. Maybe even depend on him.

The only part she couldn't figure out was why? Why would he choose to bring her back home with him? Why would he go through the trouble of calling a lawyer, a judge, and getting legal custody? It certainly wasn't for money, judging by the house he had a fair amount. Perhaps it was just to honor Bill's promise to her father. The promise that Bill hadn't truly upheld, even when he was alive. Will seemed like the type of guy to uphold his father's word, as well as his own.

There was also the confusing factor of JJ. Will had said JJ would be visiting, at least once to twice a month, if not more. Tate had no clue as to how JJ felt about the fact that Will had taken in a 13-year-old. On one hand, she seemed to like Tate, and was always nice to her. But on the other hand, it was pretty much JJ's job to be nice to Tate, and maybe she just hadn't wanted to upset her boyfriend. Or maybe she was just waiting until she could convince Will to get rid of Tate, and ship her back to some group home in Boston.

As much as Tate wanted to figure JJ out, she knew she could only focus on one person at a time. So for now, all she could do was figure out Will.