Hey, people, it's me. Okay, to clarify Kaylee's age, she's 7 ½.. I really appreciate the reviews, so keep 'em comin! If you wanna IM me or email me, to say hi or ask me a question, do it! ThirdWatchCruzeraol.com My AIM name is ThirdWatchCruzer, too. I'm almost always on.. If anything is unrealistic, that's okay cuz it's fanFICTION. Here's the story... ENJOY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Just so you don't think your going crazy, I'm backing up and reminding you what happened at the end of last chapter.
Don't Let Me Go
Chapter 7
Cruz took out her cell phone and called the precinct.
"5-5 precinct."
"She's gone."
"What? Cruz? You lost her?" Swersky wasn't happy.
"She walked outta the hospital crying."
Swersky sighed. "Tell them to lock the hospital down. Cruz, we need this girl."
"I'm aware of that." I need her too.
Cruz turned back to the nurse. "We need to lock the hospital down."
The nurse stared at her. "The whole hospital?"
Cruz looked at her. "No, we just need to lock down certain parts of it. YES the whole hospital!" she shouted.
The nurse continued staring at her. "For one little girl?" she asked in disbelief.
"Yes." Cruz practically shouted at her. "This little girl is very important to me. I mean us. The precinct. Dammit." She slammed her hand down on the counter. "Call your boss up and tell him to shut down every exit. NOW!"
"Yes ma'am." The nurse picked up the phone and dialed the chief of staff. She waited until he picked up.
"What?"
"Sir, it's Nurse Fox on PEDS. I have a police sergeant with me and she needs to lock down the hospital."
"So? Why'd you call me? Call the head of security."
"I need your authorization."
"If an officer tells you to do something, do it!" he shouted at her.
"Yes, sir." She hung up and picked the phone right back up again.
Cruz made a motion with her arms behind the nurse saying 'What the fuck are you doing?' "Um. Hello?" she shouted.
"I'm calling the head of security."
"That's just wonderful. Now she's probably gone and wandering around an alley somewhere."
The nurse brought her finger to her lips telling Cruz to shut up.
Cruz Well excuse me, lil bitch.
"Security."
"We need to lock the hospital down." Nurse Fox said.
"Why?"
"There's a little girl wandering around. I have the order from a sergeant with the 5-5."
"Fine." the voice replied and hung up.
Nurse Fox hung up.
Cruz looked at her. "Well?"
"He's taking care of it."
"Just like that?"
Fox nodded.
Cruz thought. "Who did you speak to?"
Fox shrugged. "I have no idea. It was a guy. He answered the phone 'security'."
Cruz sighed. "Keep looking for her." How the hell did you get through nursing school?
"Yes ma'am." Fox stayed still for a minute.
"What?"
"Shouldn't it come on the PA system?"
"No. What should come on the PA system is someone calling her name." Cruz went behind the desk and grabbed the microphone. "Kaylee Castillo, I repeat Kaylee Castillo, go to a place with a desk. When you get there, tell them your name. Watch out for your arm. Kaylee Castillo, go to anywhere you can find with a desk." Cruz's voice trailed off since Fox grab the microphone back.
"The hospital's being locked down. There's nothing else you can do."
Cruz stomped away and went to wait for an elevator. She figured there'd be a better shot of finding her on the bottom floor.
Meanwhile, Kaylee was walking around the hospital, trying to figure some things out. What do I want? I wanna live with Ritza. What's the problem with that? She don't wanna live with a whiny kid. There must've been a reason that mean lady everyone says is my mommy beat me. Think, Kaylee think.
"Kaylee Castillo, I repeat Kaylee Castillo, go to a place with a desk. When you get there, tell them your name. Watch out for your arm. Kaylee Castillo, go to anywhere you can find with a desk."
Kaylee looked up. What did Ritza say my last name was? Castillo! Was that Ritza? It sounds like her. She started looking for a desk. All she saw was doors that were closed. She saw one that had a person in front of it. She walked over to it.
"Excuse me, I need a desk."
The guard looked down at her. "Why?"
"'Cause I was told to find a desk and tell them my name."
"What's your name?"
"Kaylee Castillo."
"You're the little girl everyone's looking for?" The guard looked and saw she had something wrong with her arm. He figured that must've been what the person that did the message was talking about.
"I guess so." Kaylee looked unsure. How many people are looking for me?
"Come with me." He held out his hand.
Kaylee took it.
They started walking and with his other hand, the guard radioed in.
"I have the girl. Over."
"What girl? Over."
"Kaylee Castillo. Over."
"Bring her up to PEDS. I'll tell the sergeant. Over."
"On our way. Over."
Kaylee was staring at the man. "Why do you keep saying 'over'?"
"So my boss knows that I'm finished talking."
"Where are we going?"
"To the elevators. We're going up to the 5th floor."
"What floor are we on now?"
"2nd."
"Oh." Kaylee let herself be led to the elevators. When they got there, the guard pushed 5. They were on their way.
"You Sergeant Cruz? with the 5-5?"
Cruz nodded.
"Okay, I was sent here to tell you that we found Kaylee. A guard is bringing her up to PEDS now."
"Thank you."
The young man started to walk away, but Cruz grabbed his wrist.
"Who told you to tell me?"
"Mr. Garcia. He told me that he got a walkie-talkie message from a guard that said he had her."
"Okay. Oh, PEDS is the 5th floor?"
"Yes ma'am."
She nodded and let him go.
By now, she was on the first floor in the ER. She had to get back to the elevators which she just walked away from and go back to the 5th floor. As soon as I get home, who knows when that'll be, I'm going straight to sleep. Unless I have Kaylee. She walked back to the elevators and pressed the up button. In a couple of minutes, one finally came down.
Bout frickin time. She got in and pressed 5. The elevator stopped on every floor so by the time she got to the 5th floor, it was 5 minutes later.
Trying to get out of the elevator was a whole separate mission. Since she was the first one on, she was all the way in the back and had to shove her way out.
"Excuse me. Move. Get outta my way." She said and finally she was out.
She headed in the direction of the desk and there she was.
Kaylee was being talked to by someone, she didn't know who and she really didn't care. All of a sudden, she felt something. She couldn't explain what it was. She turned around and saw Ritza.
"Ritza!" she cried and ran towards her.
Ritza smiled and bent down so she could catch her and bring her up in a hug.
While she was running, Kaylee had a quick thought. This doesn't look like someone who doesn't want me to live with her. Maybe there's a chance after all.
"Ay mi chicita." Ritza picked her up and gave her a huge hug. "Where did you go?"
Kaylee wrapped her good arm around Ritza's neck and had the other one just floating around.
Kaylee wasn't sure what to say as an answer that didn't make her look crazy.
"I wanted to go for a walk." she said simply.
"Next time, tell me!" Ritza scolded gently.
Kaylee nodded.
Cruz wanted to yell at her more, but she looked down at her innocent face and couldn't bring herself to do it. All she wanted to do was hold Kaylee and never let her go again.
Their happy reunion was interrupted by Cruz's cell phone. Cruz shifted Kaylee from one hip to another to answer her phone.
"Cruz."
"You find her yet?"
Cruz Shit, I was supposed to call him. "Yeah about 5 minutes ago."
Cruz could hear Swersky breathing a huge sigh of relief.
"Is she okay?"
"Yeah." She put the phone down for a minute and whispered into Kaylee's ear, "How's your arm?"
"It's okay. A little sore."
"Yeah she's fine. Her arm hurts a little bit though."
"Fine."
"Um, Lieu, what are we gonna do with her?"
"Whaddya mean?"
"Are we gonna put her in the system?"
"We have no choice, unless you wanna take her." Swersky said sarcastically.
Cruz didn't say anything.
"Cruz? Do you wanna take her?"
"Yeah."
"Did you talk to her about it?"
"No."
Swersky sighed. That was so like Cruz. "I think that'd be a good thing to do first."
"Yeah. I'll ask her."
"Call me later."
"Why?"
"To tell me if she's gonna stay with you or if we have to call ACS."
"Oh, right, okay." Cruz didn't sound completely with him.
"Bye, Maritza."
"Bye, Lieu." She hung up.
Swersky Why would that little girl wanna live with Cruz? unless she's that different.
Cruz struggled to put her phone back in her pants pocket and hold Kaylee at the same time. After awhile she got it in.
"Kaylee, I need to talk to you about something very important."
Kaylee Oh no. This is it.
"Let's go back to your room and talk, okay?"
Kaylee nodded.
Cruz walked back to Kaylee's room, Cruz still carrying her.
After what seemed like forever to both of them, they got to room 521.
Cruz walked over to the bed and placed Kaylee on it gently and then went and closed the door.
Tucking Kaylee in safely under the blankets, she sat down on the bed.
"So." She didn't know what to say.
"So." Kaylee answered.
"This has been one helluva day, huh?"
Kaylee nodded. "What time is it?"
Cruz checked her watch. "4:56."
"Oh."
"Kaylee, I wanna ask you a very important question. I don't want you to lie to me, okay?"
Kaylee nodded.
"When you get out of the hospital, which is in a day, we need to figure out where you're gonna live." Cruz paused to make sure Kaylee was still with her. "My boss says that you have to go into the foster care system."
Kaylee felt tears welling up.
"But I don't want you to go there." Cruz paused. "I want you to live with me."
Kaylee was about to start crying, but then she heard what Cruz said. "I want you to live with me."
"Do you mean that?" Kaylee asked.
"Of course." Cruz replied. "Do you wanna live with me?"
"YES!" Kaylee shouted.
Cruz Better words have never been spoken. "Okay. Now, normally, we would haveta go through this whole system thing, but since I'm a police officer, I'm cleared automatically and you can be discharged into my care tomorrow."
Kaylee felt like there was a ferris wheel inside her head. "Do I haveta go to school?"
"Yes."
"Whose gonna sign stuff for me? Like when we have a field trip?"
"I will."
"But your not my real mommy."
"I know that, but I'm gonna be your guardian until I can adopt you. It'll take a long time, but until then, I'm gonna be your temporary guardian."
"What does adopt mean?"
"Your gonna become my child."
"What does temporary guardian mean?"
"That I have custody of you and if anyone ever comes and tries to take you away, that's not good and they'll go to jail for a very long time."
Kaylee was quiet for a minute and finally said, "Can I call you Mommy?"
Cruz was about to cry. "Of course you can, if you wanna."
"Okay, mommy."
Okay, I hope you liked it! I'm gonna do an epilogue, and then I'd like to do a sequel. If you want me to do a sequel, write it in your review! Also, I'm not really sure if all police officers are automatically cleared, but it made sense to me. I mean, they have backround checks and everythin. So if it turns out there not automatically cleared, please don't write that in a review. I also figured it'd be shorter and I won't have to go through the whole boring legal process which I really know nothing about. Okay, newayz... I really hope you liked it. Please review! And remember if you want me to do a sequel, TELL ME!