3;

The woman knelt down and portrayed a sympathetic smile.

"Hi Riley, welcome to your new home. My name is Ms. Hammond, but you can call me Sara if you'd like. You'll be living here with our little family for a while until we can find you a nice loving family of your own to care for you. Until then, there are plenty of other children here your age to make friends with if you'd like."

Riley slowly looked around the small room, observing everything in it and paying no attention to the woman speaking in front of her.

Sara put a hand on the girl's shoulder hoping to get her to focus. "I know this is a big change for you and that you probably want to be back home right now, but there are people here who care about you and will look after you. They'll try their best to make sure you're happy, but you'll have to make an effort too, okay?"

Sara knew that Riley, like almost all the children, would have a hard time acclimating to the dramatic change in her life, and that being forcefully thrust into an entirely foreign environment would be stressful on anyone, especially someone as young as her.

She looked up at the man standing near the doorway. "Ron, would you take her upstairs to her room and make sure she gets settled in?"

"Of course. Come on, Riley." He held out a hand which she simply stared at. "Right… well let's go."

The building that was now her new home was a relatively modern orphanage that lacked any real character. It was built up in two levels in the shape of a horseshoe, the exterior nearly texture-less and painted a slightly off-white color. The ends of the horseshoe each had two medium sized windows on the upper floor and a large bay window on the bottom, the rest of the building with a repeating pattern of smaller windows.

The pathway that led to the front entrance was lined with small bushes on either side and ended with a few small stairs leading up to the main entrance. Just on the inside a single staircase to the right of the door stretched itself upwards toward the second floor complete with an off white railing. Immediately beyond the staircase on the ground floor sprawled the great room where the children could gather to play whatever games were available or simply read books.

Hallways on both floors branched left and right, each containing a series of bedrooms for the building, and each one of those containing four bunk beds laid out in a two by two pattern. The back left corner of the building housed the small kitchen and a couple of the offices for the workers, of which at least one was always present.

Ron walked toward the front door and turned around to walk up the stairs, peering over the railing to make sure the girl was still following him. He took a right down the hallway and stopped at the doorway to a room on the left side about halfway down. He held out a hand and gestured toward it.

"Here you are Riley. This is where you'll be staying."

He followed her in and pointed out parts of it. "The upper half of that bunk bed is all yours, won't that be fun?" He continued after more silence and a quick sigh. "Your clothes will be in those shelves there. The bathroom is out this door and to the left, all the way to the end."

Riley slowly walked past him and sat on the bottom bed of her bunk and looked out the door. "I'm hungry."

Ron perked up at the first words he's heard from her yet. "Of course, the kitchen is downstairs. It serves food three times a day, but we'll yell it out in case you forget. They serve snacks too, so if you head down they'll give you something."

He walked towards the door where the girl was again staring at silently and turned back to face her. "If you ever need anything or have any questions, just ask. We're always around. Also try to make some friends. There are a lot of nice kids here who I'm sure would love to play with you." He smiled before leaving the room and heading back down the hallway.

.~~~.

Ron was standing in front of Ms. Hammond's desk inside of her office while she herself alertly stood behind it.

"It's been five weeks, Sara."

"I know, Ron."

"She refuses to play with, let alone even talk to, any of the other children. And I'm pretty sure she hates us."

"I'm sure it's just a distrust of authority figures."

"Still, we practically have to force her to eat and drink. She's healthy, but this is a lot of work."

"She's been through a lot Ron, we just need to give her time."

She took a seat behind the desk in her light brown leather chair. The window directly behind her was letting in a flood of light which caused Ron to suddenly see her only as a silhouette.

"I know she has, but so have most of the other children in here. There's even a few others who have been through something similar as her who are adapting better."

"You can't compare the progresses of children to each other. They're all different and they all improve at their own rate in their own way. It's clear that she's not… handling it as well as most of the others, but with time she'll get there." She cleared her throat and leaned forward slightly. "I understand your concern, but we need to be patient. Is there anything else?"

He straightened himself back up and shook his head. "No. That's all."

.~~~.

The cramped room they were sitting in housed a single large window on one side wall that faced out toward the main area, and a small painting of generic flowers on the other wall. The floor was lined with hardwood which, while attractive, amplified even the slightest of noises in the room.

Sara was sitting in a chair next to Riley, both of whom were facing toward a smiling man and woman in another pair of chairs opposite them. She spoke up with the most upbeat personality she could.

"Lastly, Riley here actually just had her 9th birthday about a week ago. Wasn't it fun?"

"Wonderful." The sarcasm in her tone was thick, causing Sara to nervously laugh.

The man smiled and let it slide. "I'm glad to hear it." His gaze moved back up to Sara, who clearly looked uncomfortable, and quickly back down at the girl. "It was very nice to meet you, Riley. If you don't mind, we'd like to speak with Ms. Hammond alone for a little bit. Just to see where we go from here."

Riley simply nodded, hopped off her chair, and casually walked out of the room.

Sara looked nervously back and forth between the two. "So, what do you think?"

The man watched through the window as Riley disappeared out into the great room area. "She's not the most talkative little thing, is she?"

The woman with him laughed off the girl's attitude. "No, not really. But she seems sweet."

Sara quickly interjected. "Oh, she absolutely is! She's had rough childhood, as have most of the kids here, but she's much doing better than when she first arrived."

"That's good." The couple looked at each other and talked amongst themselves.

"So?"

The man smiled. "I like her."

The woman smiled back. "I do too."

"We're really doing this?"

"I think we are."

They both turned back toward Sara with enthusiastic grins. "Okay. We'd love for Riley to come home with us."

Sara's face lit up in surprise. "That's fantastic! I'll get the process finished up and, if you'd like, you can go tell her. Or wait until everything is finalized which will take some time."

"We'll tell her now. We can't wait."

A few months later after their initial meeting, Riley was in her room with Ron packing what little possessions she owned into a small bag. He followed her downstairs and out into the courtyard where her new foster parents were waiting. She greeted them with a forced smile and an uncomfortable side hug, then kept walking to the car and sat herself inside and waited.

.~~~.

"Damn it, Riley! This is the second family that you've gotten yourself kicked out of this year alone. Not to mention the others you've ruined your chances with over the last five years. I get that you're pissed off and that you have trust issues, I really do, but you can't take it out on these people who just want to take care of you."

"I don't give a shit about what they want and I didn't ask to be taken care of. I'm fine on my own and I don't need these people thinking that that they can be my family! How could they be so stupid to think that?"

"Because they don't care you're not their real daughter, Riley, and you shouldn't either!"

"Fuck them!"

Riley slammed the door on the way out of the cramped room, rattling the small painting of flowers off of its nail and onto the floor. The sound of shattering glass knocked Sara out of her adrenaline-fueled state. She took several deep breaths to control her pulse before grabbing a small dust bin from the corner and picking up the pieces of broken glass littering the floor.

Riley was now a teenager and her appearance matched her chaotic mixture of emotions. The clothes she worse were mostly black and ragged, purchased from nearby thrift stores with what little money she earned doing jobs around the orphanage. She let her hair grow out past her shoulders and was parted to one side, intentionally showing of the other half that had been shaved down to little more than stubble. Her age, tendency for emotional outbursts, and obvious mistrust of everyone didn't make her an ideal candidate for fostering or adoption.

Riley made it only a few strides back toward her room before an oft heard voice pierced her brain.

"What's the matter, Riley? Another family that that kicked you out of the house?"

She looked over to see a smirk on the fat kid of the orphanage who commonly struck out at others for fun. She knew why he did, but that didn't garner any sympathy from her nor the many other orphans who also had daily run-ins with him.

She stopped in her tracks and turned to stare straight at him. "The hell did you say, John? Do you really want to be messing with me right now?"

"You heard what I said. You make even people who want to love you get sick of you. You'll always be alone, you're gonna be here until they kick you out at eighteen." He looked around the room for support but found most of the others keeping their distance. "I bet even your mom didn't love you before she died."

With those final words she moved swiftly toward him and landed a solid kick between the fat kid's legs, causing him to immediately land on his knees and gasp for air. A fist connected to the side of his head knocking him the rest of the way over and onto his back. She straddled his chest and stared straight at the boy. He stared back into the eyes of a girl who seemed more focused than anything.

She continued with a barrage of hits to whatever part of the face she could make contact with which started causing his vision to slowly blur and darken. The event elicited a small gathering of other orphans to watch, the noise level growing as it continued.

"Riley, get off of him!"

Ron rushed over and put her into a bear hug from behind to pull her off and subdue her. She jerked her body back and forth to try and free herself with varying levels of yelling.

"Stop struggling! Stop!"

She kept wriggling but eventually wore herself out and sank to her knees. Ms. Hammond came hurrying in to see what the commotion was, initially only seeing a bunch of scattering children. When they cleared she spotted Ron with his hands on Riley's shoulders who was sitting on the ground and breathing heavily. She looked slightly to the right and saw the bloodied face of another child trying to sit himself up.

"John, don't move. Just lie there ." She instructed one of the other employees to grab one of the medical kits from the offices. They obliged and quickly disappeared. "What the hell happened here?"

Ron let his hands fall free of Riley and turned toward Sara. "I found Riley here on top of John repeatedly hitting him in the head."

"Jesus. You can't just physically attack someone like that, Riley! Look what you did!"

Riley looked over at John who was wiping the blood from his eyes. "That asshole started it."

"That's not a good reason and you know it." She eyed Ron who was still carefully watching Riley. "Please, just… take her to one of the rooms and keep her in there. Make sure she can't leave until I figure out what to do."

He nodded and pulled her up by one of her arms and led her down the hallway to a small room. He gestured inside to which Riley accepted with no resistance as she was fine with the isolation. He closed the door behind her and locked it before returning to Sara's office.

"What are we going to do with her? If she keeps this up she's never going to get fostered out. And she'll especially have no chance with adoption. Not to mention the mayhem she'll likely cause in the house in the meantime."

Sara remained quiet while slowly pacing back and forth behind her desk. She stopped and shook her head in disappointment with an idea. "I don't like this, but maybe we consider relocating her."

"Relocating her? To another orphanage?"

"Yes. There's one a few cities over."

"And you think that's the best choice?"

"Possibly. I absolutely hate the idea since the only reason I got into this field is to help children, but I need to be reasonable here. She, at best, has little chance of being fostered due to her being… her. She's adding unneeded strain in the building, plus she'll have just as good of a chance elsewhere as here."

Ron slowly nodded his head. "I think you're right. It's, at the least, something we should seriously consider."

She sighed and broke eye contact. "I don't think there's a need to. I'm going to go ahead and get the paperwork started."

"Are you sure about this?"

"I am. But once I send it out and it gets approved, one of us will have to break the news to her." She reached below her desk and pulled out a several folders of paper and separated out the ones she needed. "Go ahead and let her out. Just keep a close eye on her for the next few weeks."

Riley sat in one of the corners of the dark room rubbing her knuckles. Most of the eight were bruised and some of them were cut and slightly bleeding. The door cracked open and a bright narrow beam of light projected itself against the wall next to her. The beam soon expanded and flooded the whole room as the door opened with Ron standing directly behind it.

"Come on, get up."

She peered upwards at him with her head held low, causing him to shift his stance in frustration. She sighed and pushed herself off the ground and walked past him out into the main room. She spotted John, now bandaged up, watching her carefully as she walked by and up the stairs with Ron following close behind.