A/N: Okay, the good stuff is coming up in the next chapter; this is kinda a gap-filler type I guess. It's not the best of the series, but don't worry! The good stuff is yet to come! The songs used in this are Tu Robaste Mi Corazon by Selena. The other song mentioned after that is Tequila by Eduardo Verastagui. I wrote out the lyrics for Tu Robaste Mi Corazon, but my computer doesn't put accent marks on things well. Sorry that some of the words that should have accent marks, don't. Well, that's all.

Back Track



Abby looked at the door as she heard someone slip a key in the lock. Luka and the twins were home! They opened the door and she smiled brightly running over to Luka and throwing her arms around him in a big hug. She hugged the twins next and then followed them to sit on the couch.

"How was your flight?" she asked.

Luka yawned, "Tiring. The girls got some sleep but I wasn't able too."

Abby smiled at him. "Poor Luka," she said and then looked at the girls. "Hey, would you guys like some supper? I can fix you guys something?"

Alexandria looked up and smiled, "Yeah, that would be great!"

"What about you Ana?" Abby asked.

"Yes, please."

"Luka?"

He smiled, "Yes, thank you honey."

Abby smiled back at them. "No problem."

She went into the kitchen and Mariana looked at Luka. "Can I call Mitchell?"

Luka nodded his head, "Go ahead sweetie."

She smiled at him, "Thanks Luka," she grabbed the cordless phone and walked towards her room. When she got back to the door she turned around and said, "And thanks for coming to get us."

"I wanted too. I missed you guys," Luka said.



The phone rang twice before Mitchell picked it up. "Ana?"

Mariana smiled. "Hey Mitchell!"

"What happened? I called the day after the funeral to see if you were okay. I wanted to call after I got home but my mom said that I needed to give you time. And then when I called the next day this lady answered and said that you were in Colombia?" Mitchell asked.

Mariana sighed, "Yeah, I was in Colombia."

There was a pause and then Mitchell asked, "What the hell were you doing in Colombia? I was worried sick about you baby!"

Mariana smiled and told him, "You know my Aunt Koryn?"

"That bitch who always blamed you for your dad's abusive behavior?" he asked.

Mariana smiled wider and said, "Yeah, her. Well, she came and kidnapped us. We flew to Venezuela and then from there went to Colombia. And she made us work as nurses aides in this hospital thing she owns. And Luka came and got us back. But she was ready and willing to give us up. Said we didn't work hard enough."

Mitchell laughed, "What, did you expect you guys to do slave work?"

"Yeah! Pretty much!" Mariana said before mimicking her aunt. "Do this, and do that. And make sure this gets done. And then make sure this happens! Get a move on it! You're not working hard enough! Why did you yell at that poor man? He's sick! And I'm like, well, excuse me! But I had no damn clue what he was saying! I only sing songs in Spanish, I have no clue what I'm singing when I do though! And I was trying to tell him I'd go find someone, but he wasn't listening!"

Mitchell sighed, "My poor, sweet Mariana."

Mariana sighed, "Yeah, so what's up?"

"There are a bunch of rumors flying around school. No one knows quite what happened. Only that you were hurt, your died dad, and now people are saying you were sold by someone for drug money!"

Mariana laughed. "Aw! The way rumors fly!"

"Yeah, so, the Principal asked me to give you his phone number and he told me to have you call him if I heard from you," Mitchell told her.

Mariana nodded, "Okay, what day is it?"

"Friday. Next week is a short week, only two days," Mitchell said.

"Okay," Ana replied. "What's Principal Heggerts number?"

"Five," Mitchell told her.

Mariana smiled into the phone, "I need a little more than that buddy."

"Five straight across the board," Mitchell replied.

"Seriously?"

"Yup."

"Okay, well, I should call him," Mariana said.

"Yeah, I'll talk to you soon baby," Mitchell said.

"Yeah, bye," Mariana said and then hung up. Dialing the number it rang twice before a woman answered. "Hi, may I please talk to Principal Heggerts?"

"Yes," the woman said and then yelled, "Harry!" she returned to the phone and said, "Is this Mariana Watkins?"

"Yeah."

"Oh! Hi sweetie! How are you? Heard you were sold for drug money," the lady said.

Mariana rolled her eyes, "That was just a rumor."

"Oh, so what happened? Oh! Never mind. My husband is here," the woman said and then passed the phone to Principal Heggerts.

"Hello?" her principal came on the other line.

"Hi Principal Heggerts. This is Mariana," she began.

"Hi Ana!" he greeted her enthusiastically. "How are you doing?"

"I'm fine, I guess," Mariana replied.

"You've had a soap opera type life the past couple of days, haven't ya?" he asked.

Mariana nodded her head, "Yeah, I guess you could say that I have."

"So, what exactly happened?" Principal Heggerts asked.

"Uh, well, I was stabbed by my father. Then he signed custody release papers, and this really nice doctor at County adopted us. I snuck out of the house one time to go see my father to say goodbye and while I was at the bar, this dude came in and shot my father, but he meant to shoot me my dad just jumped in between us. Then we had the funeral and my aunt came and tried to take us away but Luka stopped her and took us home. Then she came and kidnapped us and took us to Colombia but Luka came and brought us back home, and here I am! I just got back," Mariana told him.

"Wow!" Principal Heggerts exclaimed. There was a short pause before he said, "Okay, so here's what I'm wondering. There are plenty of rumors flying around school at the moment, and everyone is worried about you and Alexandria. You are two of the schools most beloved students; everyone loves you, staff and students. So, I was thinking maybe you and Alexandria could do a little presentation for the school on Monday and assure the students that you two are okay and doing fine. And if you could sing that would be great too! The school loves to here you sing whenever they get a chance!"

Mariana smiled. "No problem. Alexandria and I will tell everyone what happened and I'll sing. Mitchell and I'll do a song."

Principal Heggerts smiled. "Okay. Thanks! I'll schedule you guys in!"

"No problem," she said as her principal hung up the phone. She quickly dialed Mitchell's private room number again. He answered on the second ring.

"Hey Ana!" he exclaimed. "Call the principal?"

"Yeah, he wanted Alexandria and I to do a little presentation thingy. So, I told him that we would and that you and I would sing. We're gonna sing Tu Robaste Mi Corazon. Well, talk to ya later, bye sweetie," she said quickly hanging up the phone, knowing that he would start to complain if she didn't.

Running out to the living room she saw that Abby was putting dinner on the table. Luka and Alexandria were already sitting at the table and Mariana quickly ran up to join them.

"Have a good talk with Mitchell?" Alexandria asked.

Mariana nodded her head, "Yeah. I also called our principal. He told Mitch to tell me to call him. He wants us to do a little presentation about why we were gone on Monday. Apparently one of the rumors is that we were sold for drug money. So, I told him that we would."

"You singing?" Alexandria asked.

"Yeah, I told him that Mitchell and I would sing. We'll sing Tu Robaste Mi Corazon."

"Does Mitchell know you two are singing?" Alexandria asked her, smiling.

"I told him," Mariana said.

"And you hung up right away too I'll bet," Alexandria replied.

"So?" Mariana asked.

Alexandria burst out laughing, "That was mean Ana!"

"I know…" Mariana said smiling.

Luka smiled, watching the girls as they usually acted for the first time.



Alexandria stepped up to the microphone as the students sitting in the auditorium cheered. "Hi everyone! I've been asked to explain to you all what happened to Ana and me. I'll start at the beginning. As you all must know now, our father was abusive towards Mariana. Why he chose Mariana, I don't know. But Mariana was the one who knew more than anyone else, how much my father loved both of us.

"Well, sometime last week, I'm not exactly sure when, I came home from the store and found Mariana lying in our kitchen. She had been stabbed, by him. I called an ambulance and she was rushed to County General hospital where this really great doctor and nurse worked on her and saved her life. She was moved up to ICU, she had to have some surgery to repair her diaphragm, now she's ready to sing for you all later today! She was on a respirator for awhile, but she was released ahead of time.

"The day she had been stabbed some police and social service workers met with us and were going to move us into a foster home. Dr. Kovac, the doctor who saved Ana, didn't want us to go to a foster home; he wanted us to be adopted. He got the police and social services to give me some custody release forms. I found my dad, and he signed them. They were searching for an adoptive family, and then they came to us and said that they found someone who wanted to adopt us. Dr. Kovac – Luka – is the one who adopted us.

"After Mariana got home from the hospital, she decided that she wanted to go say goodbye and thank you to our father. She found him in one of his favorite bars and they were saying goodbye when some big bar dude came in and was about to shoot Mariana. But our father stepped between Ana and the bullet. He was killed.

"We had the funeral and at the funeral Ana left the service early. I followed her and this lady followed us. This lady was our Aunt Koryn. She tried to take us away, but Luka wouldn't let her. He took us back to our new home, but later that night she came and kidnapped us. She flew us to Venezuela and then drove us to Colombia.

"When we were in Colombia, she had us working as nurse's aides in her hospital. Luka found out she took us to Colombia and came there to find us. When he found us he brought us back here. We just got back on Friday.

"So, as you can see, some of the things that are going around school are true. But others are not. If you have any more questions, please come speak to Ana or I. We are the only ones who know what really happened.

"And now, Mariana is going to sing Tu Robaste Mi Corazon, a Selena song, with Mitchell!"

The student audience clapped again as Mariana and Mitchell came on. Mitchell was wearing black pants and a white, large shirt. Mariana was wearing black pants, and a white shirt. The sleeves were rolled up to her elbows, and the bottom was tied at her waist. She had dark red lipstick on, and black eye shadow lightly covering her eye lids. They smiled as they came on and grabbed two microphones. They had decided to sing the whole song together, not split the parts up. They began to sing…



"Como he llegado a caer aqui contigo,

Entre tus brazos de sed, amor

Que bonito es encontrarse al fin

Despues de tanto tiempo solo

"Como es que todo se ve mejor contigo

Como es que nada parece igual

No puede ser amor lo que siento en mi

Es mucho mas de lo que imaginaba

"En un momento el Corazon perdi

Sin darme cuenta todo te lo di

Y en mi pecho siento nueva vida

Donde mi Corazon dormia



"Tu, tu Robaste mi Corazon que puedo hacer

Me siento presa de ti

Y no me Quiero escaper de tu vida

Tu, tu llegaste a mi Corazon

Con tu querer

Con tu alma y tu ser

No te Quiero perder

Nunca, nunca

"En un momento has cambiado todo amigo

Lo que esparada al fin llego

Lo que en nadie mas pude encontrar

Sin esperar cai en mis manos

Como es que todo se ve mejor contigo

Como es que nada parece igual

No puede ser amor lo que siento en mi

Es mucho mas de lo que imaginaba

"En un momento el Corazon perdi

Sin darme cuenta todo te lo di

Y en mi pecho siento nueva vida

Donde mi Corazon dormia

"Tu, tu Robaste mi Corazon que puedo hacer

Me siento presa de ti

Y no me Quiero escaper de tu vida

Tu, tu llegaste a mi Corazon

Con tu querer

Con tu alma y tu ser

No te Quiero perder

Nunca, nunca"



Mariana and Mitchell both put their microphones back in the microphone stands and bowed. Then Mitchell pulled Mariana in his arms and kissed her on the lips before pulling her offstage.



It was a slow day in the ER. Luka stepped into the lounge. Opening up his locker he pulled out a letter that he had had Alexandria write the day before, telling him a little about the girls. It seemed awkward though, reading about who his daughters were in a letter.

Luka ~

Okay, you wanted this letter about us, so, here it is:

Me: I am an artist. I love to draw and paint and do all those types of things. I'd be happy spending a day doing some sort of artwork. At school I paint murals on the walls and stuff. I do sets for plays and musicals. I also love caring for things, especially animals! I love animals more than I love art! I hope to be a vet one day.

Mariana: She's a performer. She sings, dances, acts and plays the flute, percussion and some piano. She's always doing one of the lead rolls in school plays and musicals. She's the choir director's favorite, and she does a lot of singing at school events too. Sometimes she gets Mitchell to sing with her, like he's doing today. She's not exactly sure what she's gonna do in life yet, but one thing is for sure, she's gonna have fun!

I don't know what you were thinking when you adopted us. We're gonna be a handful, I can guarantee it. But, I also know that we love you for it. Thanks!

~Alexandria

He smiled. Sometimes he wondered what had possessed him to adopt two teenage twin girls. But things had been going pretty well so far. Other than the bar shooting and chasing them halfway around the world of course!

He folded the letter back on and placed it on the top shelf of his locker. Walking out he saw Alexandria and Mariana walking in, smiling and laughing as they talked. Abby was behind the admit desk, talking to Jing-mei, Carter, and Randi. Abby looked up as they walked in and smiled.

"Hi Alexandria, Mariana! How was school today?" Abby asked them.

"Pretty good," Alexandria answered as they set their bags down by the side of the desk.

Luka came over and stopped before them. Mariana walked over to him and gave him a hug before walking behind the desk and looking at the radio. Looking around she said, "Can we play the radio?"

Abby nodded, "Yeah, we can now. We don't have any patients in today, very unusual."

Ana smiled and flipped the switch. "AM!" she shouted in disgust. "How can you guys listen to this crap?"

She quickly switched the radio from AM to FM and then tuned it to a Latin station. The song that was playing was just ending. Another song started up right away and Mariana smiled.

"Tequila!" Ana shouted and started dancing around. Alexandria started dancing around as well. Slowly, Abby and Luka joined, then Randi. Then Carter and Jing-mei.

In the middle of the song Romano came down and the ER staff quickly went off to different spots, trying to breathe normally so that he wouldn't see that they had been dancing also.

When Alexandria saw this she danced up to Carter, and started dancing with him. Romano stood in front of the desk watching them as Carter hesitantly started dancing with Alexandria. Mariana danced around the counter and grabbed Romano, dancing with him.

The staff held their breath, wondering what he'd to her. They were all surprised, however, when he began dancing along with her. Luka and Abby started dancing, and Jing-mei and Randi decided to dance together.

It was quite a sight to see! The ER staff that was on duty dancing around the admit desk area, with Romano and Carter in the middle of the group, dancing with teenage girls to an upbeat Latin song.



Mariana groaned as she tried focusing in on the cells in the microscope. When she finally got it focused she looked back at the drawing on the lab. Why she had been glad to finally get back in school she didn't know.

She tried to find the cell they were supposed to draw, but couldn't. "Al, can you find it?"

Alexandria pulled the microscope closer to her and searched for the cell, but couldn't find it either. "Nope!"

They looked around to find their medical biology teacher so that they could get him to help. There was a knock on the door and everyone watched as their teacher answered it. He talked quickly with the person outside and then the man came in.

Luka walked towards the girls table. Alexandria smiled, "Hey, Luka! Can you find this cell for us?"

He looked at the lab sheet and then into the microscope. He moved the slide around and then pulled back. "The pointer is on it."

Mariana looked in and smiled, "Thanks!"

"No problem," he said leaning against the lab table. "Hey, how would you girls like to go to Croatia tomorrow?"

They looked at him in shock. "You'd take us to Croatia?"

"Yeah! I think we need to go someplace so that we can start to be more like a family. And after all we've been through I think you two deserve a vacation."

Mariana smiled, "I'd love to go to Croatia!"

Alexandria nodded. "Yeah, me too!"

"Great! Come on, I'll take you two home now and we start getting ready to go," Luka said smiling.

The girls smiled and, in unison, they ran up to him and threw their arms around him. "I love you, Luka!"



Coming Soon: Scrabble Babble ~ While in Croatia, something happens to one of the twins. And the Kovac household will never be the same again.