"How are we going to get her to realize she needs someone to help her." Lena sighed, she could tell that Bell was hurt by Aria refusing her help, again. To be completely honest with herself she was hurt that Aria wouldn't let her or Stef help either.
"I don't know if we can." Stef sighed clearly defeated from everything that had happened in the last few days, "I'm thinking that this is worse than she's letting on."
Lena nodded lost in thought, "I think Bell's in a bad place too. Maybe we can get Aria to help herself though helping her friend."
Stef shrugged, suddenly getting an idea of how to help her daughter, "But. We can't focus on another girl when our own baby girl is hurting herself."
"Stef," Lena was surprised with her wife's actions, "We can't let either of them hurt, we have to love and care for them both. And Aria and Bell will be able to help eachother. I mean, today they did something amazing, and somehow Bell got Aria to talk. So we can't just turn our back on this girl."
"I know." Stef whispered wiping away a tear knowing that this wasn't something that she could just fix in a couple of minutes.
"Stef, Lena?" callie asked as she quietly knocked on her moms bedroom door as she slowly opened it.
"Yes love?" Stef was the first to recover from the emotional conversations that had been going on all night.
"Is everything alright with Aria?" Callie asked as she stood in the doorway.
"Yeah love, of course." Stef answered quickly, trying to cover up the quick answer she continued, "Why?"
"She has been eating less, like she was three years ago" Callie responded.
Lena saw an opportunity to find out more about what she had never been told, "What happened three years ago?"
"She was 11 and she was getting bullied at school a lot. She would be told that she was fat, and that she was a pain in the ass and a bunch of stuff like that, so she started starving herself. At that point she got down to 90 pounds before she fainted and had to be taken to the hospital. Of course she was also swimming 3 days a week for one and a half hours" Callie responded as she moved closer to the bed. The only reason she was telling her moms this was because she was worried that the same thing was going to happen again.
"But she got better?" Stef asked, "How did you two manage that?"
"I stopped letting her swim, and would not let her leave the table until she finished at least half of what was on her plate. I also stopped eating in front of her and said that is she wasn't eating then neither was I. She was worried about me not eating so she started to eat" Callie said.
"How long after she stopped eating did she end up in the hospital?" Lena asked realizing that she may have to worry about the same thing happening to Aria again soon.
"It was like three months" Callie replied.
Both of the moms froze, not really knowing how long Aria had gone without eating. "Is there anything else that happened we should look out for, before you guys got here?"
"Other than her almost taking a handful of pills, nothing else that I can think of" Callies responded as she started getting closer to stef. Needing to feel some comfort.
"Come here love," Stef whispered wrapping her arm around her oldest daughter, "I think that's enough for the night." She whispered, both to herself and Lena, no more questions that may upset Callie.
"Thank you guys so much for making this a safe home for us" Callie said as she leaned into Stefs embrace.
"You don't have to thank us love, this is our job as your moms. And we love you." Lena whispered to her daughter as she hugged her.
"We love you guys to" Callie responded.
"Do you want to go to bed, or stay in here tonight?" Stef asked starting to get situated to go to bed.
'Can I maybe stay with you guys?" Callie asked.
"Absolutely." Stef replied without a thought.
"Thank you" Callie responded as she snuggled under the covers getting closer to Lena.
The three fell asleep soon after, sleeping for a few hours before Stef jolted upright and practically jumped out of bed, she could hear screaming coming from downstairs, not knowing what was wrong and forgetting that Callie was in bed with Lena and her, she jumped up and tried to shake Lena awake.
"Stef?" Lena asked covering her ears from the blood curdling screams coming from the living room, "Who is that, what's wrong?" She too was soon up and out of bed on her way downstairs to help.
"One of the girls." Stef called already sprinting into the living room.
"Aria? Love? What's wrong?!" Stef kneeled down quickly next to her daughter.
"Bell." Aria quietly breathed, clearly upset about what was going on with her friend.
Stef turned around quickly placing her arm onto the girls shoulders to keep her from flailing and hurting herself.
"Bell!" Stef whispered fiercely, again she tried softer, "Bell, love, this is Stef. One of Aria's moms, remember? Love, you stayed the night at our house, and you're safe right now okay. Listen to me and focus on that, you are safe. Everything is okay, you are safe."
"Momma, what's going on?" Aria whimpered to Lena as Lena pulled her into a hug, "Stef?"
"She's calming down." Stef replied quickly and then focused back on Bell, the same girl just a few hours earlier who she was willing to give up on, "Bell, love, open your eyes, you're okay." Bell's body started to relax, a terrifying minute or two later Bell's eyes quickly opened and she was gasping for breath, Stef quickly pulled her into a hug, resting the girl's head on her shoulder, Stef knew that Bell would never want them to see her cry. "Shh, love, you're safe now. You can trust us."
After a few silent minutes, Bell lifted her head from Stef's shoulder, whispering "I'm sorry." again and again. She was still shaking which is why Stef hadn't let her go yet.
"Love, why don't you and Momma go make the four of us some tea, I think that would be good right now?" Stef smiled gently at Aria who was still clearly worried about her friend, Stef wanted to give Bell a few minutes to calm down without everyone watching her.
Once Lena and Aria had left the room, Bell rested her head again on Stef's shoulder, "Thank you." She whispered, she had already grown to feel close with Lena, and Bell was slowly realizing she could trust Stef too.
"Do you want to talk?" Stef asked, gently rubbing the girls back.
"Not really." Bell answered truthfully shaking again, she was only just starting to trust the family, she didn't trust them completely, yet.
"Aria and Lena will be in the kitchen for a minute," Stef was still trying to get the young girl to talk, "If that's who you're worried about hearing."
Bell shrugged, "I don't want to burden you with it, really it was nothing. I just feel awful for waking you all up." Seeing Stef look at her, clearly disbelievingly, Bell continued, "It happens sometimes, it isn't normally that bad. I just sometimes can't wake up from these dreams, normally I don't have anyone to wake me up either though. Most of the time I don't remember what the dreams are about."
"Do you remember this one?" Stef asked.
"No." Bell lied quickly as she saw Aria and Lena enter the room, she couldn't burden them with her problems, she needed Stef and Lena to focus on Aria.
"Bell? Are you alright?" Aria asked clearly very concerned for her friend as she handed her one of the cups of tea.
"Yeah." Bell tried to smile as she choked back a cry stuck in her throat. "Sorry." She added quietly.
"What the hell are you sorry for?" Aria asked as she gave her friend a hug.
Bell didn't say anything, not trusting her voice to be steady enough to be convincing but gratefully took the hug from her friend.
"Bell, sweetheart, you know you can tell us anything yes?" Stef said as she too gave the girl a hug.
"Not really." Bell muttered and immediately regretted saying it. "Sorry, I didn't mean that."
"What do you mean?" Lena asked, she wasn't use to people not trusting her and Stef.
"It's nothing," Bell mumbled, "I just meant... Okay. It's just you're my teacher which means you have to report every single thing I would say if I had anything to tell."
"I only have to report it if you are thinking about hurting yourself or anybody else, or if you are currently getting abused" Lena said softly. It pained her to see this little sitting in front of her not able to trust her.
"Bell? Love, look at me." Stef whispered, "You can still tell us anything, I'm not your teacher, and I'm sure that there's a way around Lena reporting anything if you tell her here instead of school." She shared a look with her wife, hoping it was true and she hadn't just lied and given Bell false hope.
Bell nodded shaking slightly, "Okay."
"Come on," Stef said laying down next to Aria and Bell, "Why don't you two try and get some sleep."
Bell nodded gratefully laying down and covering up trying to stop from shaking. Stef and Lena shared a look as one laid next to each girl.
"Coffee?" Stef mumbled still half asleep, she hadn't slept very well on the floor, "I love you so much." She joked pouring herself a cup and giving Lena a quick kiss. The two sat at the kitchen table in a comfortable silence, each thinking.
"Last night was," Lena paused, "Intense. What happened with Bell?"
"Night terrors." Stef sighed, that was about all she knew, "She wouldn't talk about it. She said it happened sometimes but didn't want to talk to much more about it. Maybe we can get her to talk this morning?"
"Okay." Bell whispered from the doorway in agreement, "Aria's still asleep."
"What do you want to know." Bell asked, trying not to quiet down and run away like her instincts were telling her to.
"Well, do you mind talking about last night?" Lena asked, motioning for Bell to come sit at the table between the two women.
Bell shrugged, "I guess not."
"So what happened?" Stef immediately asked.
"Stef!" Lena said to her wife before turning to her daughters friend "Just tell us what you want us to know"
"Well," Bell whispered, "It happens sometimes, and sometimes it's the same thing, sometimes its about things that are going on. A lot of time, I don't remember."
"And last night?" Stef asked softly and looking to Lena hoping she wasn't sounding inconsiderate, again.
"Aria." Bell finally admitted, "Last night when I freaked out."
"What about me?"Aria asked sarcastically, having already heard what Bell had said. Aria then looked to her friend, "How did I cause you to freak out?"
"It wasn't you." Bell practically jumped when she heard Aria, "It was... What happened to you, with my father." She mumbled the last part, not really wanting to tell Stef and Lena about her home life.
"What about me and your father?" Aria asked as she stood next to stef.
"When you left, he needed someone new to push around, and since I was the one who had called..." Bell stopped talking and looked at the ground.
"Please tell me he didn't..." Aria trailed off not wanting to know the answer for fear of the worst.
"I'm okay." Bell tried to assure her friend, and then glanced at Stef and Lena, "I'm okay." She repeated.
"Has it stopped?" Aria asked as Stef hugged her.
"Yeah." Bell lied quickly to get them to stop talking about it.
"When?" Aria asked still hugging Stef.
Bell stuttered for a minute, "Um, a while ago."
"Okay" Aria said in an unconvinced tone.
"Why don't you two go wake the others up?" Lena suggested looking towards her daughter and wife. "And Bell, can you help me cook?"
Bell nodded tugging at her sleeves, "Of course."
"Come on mom, lets wake up the others and tell em breakfast is going to be ready soon" Aria said as she headed towards the stairs.
Lena started in on breakfast, hoping to use the time cooking to talk to Bell, not entirely convinced that her home life was better now, hoping that the progress that she and Stef had made with the girls would continue when she went to speak with Bell about everything later.