Chapter 17.

AN: I do not own the Fosters. I do own the characters Danny Evans, Harry O'Reilly, and any other original characters i chose to introduce.

Jude's POV:

We all hid out at my place until Connor's dad sent us the all clear. The cops had arrived at the diner about thirty seconds after we had all left. We were all sitting at the table on the back porch, thinking about what an interesting day it had been.

"I can't believe her." Danny said quietly, "You both told me she was unpleasant. I never realized how little you were truly exaggerating."

"I've told you guys the story about how I got shot right?" Connor asked Danny and Harry.

"Yeah." They both said.

"It took her a month to come and see if I was okay," He continued, "And when she did, she walked in on me and Jude cuddling on the couch. Tried to beat me. She got a few kicks in before Dad came in and threw a knife at her and threatened her with his old samurai sword. Then he gave the knife to Jude."

"I always wondered where he got that knife." Harry said.

"He gave it to me as a peace offering." I said, "A show of acceptance of Connor's relationship with me."

Connor's mouth quirked into a smile so small that it was barely visible, and it faded quickly into a look that made me nervous. It was a look he only wore when he was planning something.

"What are you planning Connor?" I asked bluntly.

He jumped and looked at me funny.

"What do you mean, Juju?" He asked, feigning innocence.

"You're planning something, I can tell. Spill." I said shortly.

Connor sighed and rubbed his eyes. I noticed that his eyes were full of worry.

"What if she tries something?" He asks shakily, "What if she tries to carry out her threat? I can't let you get hurt, Jude."

"Do you think she would?" Harry asked.

"SHE'S A PSYCHOTIC BITCH!" Connor shouted, "OF COURSE SHE WOULD!"

I slammed my clenched fist down on the table, and Connor flinched.

"That's enough!" I said sternly.

"No, it's not enough!" Connor shot back, "Since I came out, she's done nothing but try to ruin things for me! It'll be enough, when she's in fucking JAIL!"

"Connor, calm down!" Harry said worriedly.

Connor jumped out of his chair and started pacing. He started to go into a bit of a meltdown.

"I know what she'd do to me if she had the chance!" Connor continued ranting paying no mind to our pleas for it to cease, "I've heard it straight from her mouth! If she got a hold of Jude... there's no telling what she'd do!"

I could see my siblings standing at the back door watching. Callie, Mariana and Brandon all had murder in their eyes as she listened to Connor's rant. I had a sudden vision of Brandon strangling Danielle Stevens with a length of piano wire while Mariana force fed her nail polish and Callie wailed on her with a baseball bat.

God, I'm demented sometimes. I turned back to Connor's rant.

"She never liked Jude, even back when we were just becoming friends! She would always make snide comments about how I shouldn't be friends with somebody who is, according to her, and I quote: a poor, broken, damaged, freakish, runt of a boy who should have been drowned at birth!"

Okay. That hurt a bit, even if it had been true at the time. Well, minus the drowned at birth part.

It suddenly dawned on me just how good of an actress Mrs. Stevens was. I had met her before Connor's dad divorced her, and she had seemed pleasant towards me at the time.

"What do you suggest?" I ask.

"We have to be careful. Watch our backs. And I think we should consider what dad said about hiring security for the wedding." He said, "Also, unless we are at school, I want you to carry your knife at all times."

I nodded.

"As long as you aren't planning something stupid, then I can agree to that." I said, narrowing my eyes, "You aren't planning something stupid, are you?"

He shook his head.

"No, I swear." He stated.

My mind drifted back to something Connor had just let slip.

"What did she say she would do to you?" I ask suddenly. Connor turned to me, his eyes full of tears of anger and sadness.

"And after she found out about me and you, she tried to get custody of me back." Connor revealed.

"You never told me that!" I said.

"I know, I didn't want to worry you." Connor said, "Anyway, she came over to the house the day after somebody arrived to serve dad the papers. Dad sent me upstairs, but I hid at the top of the stairs. I heard everything."

"What were they planning to do Connor?"

We all turned to see the siblings approaching us. It was Mariana who had spoke.

"Do you mind if we join you guys? We couldn't help but overhear," Callie continued, "We could hear Connor's shouting from upstairs."

Connor nodded, and they all sat down.

"She said that if she got custody of me, she was taking me away from California, and she was gonna..."

"Gonna what?" Harry asked, as he picked up his unopened can of Coke.

Connor stared at me.

"It's not important. She didn't get custody of me. The courts wouldn't even hear the case." He said, trying to avoid the subject.

"Connor, just tell us what she was gonna do!" I snapped, kind of irritated that he had hidden this from me for so long.

"She was... she was gonna send me to a conversion therapy camp." Connor whimpered.

I leapt out of my chair and rushed to wrap him in a hug. Callie and Mariana gasped, while Danny and Brandon began swearing loudly. After twenty seconds, I heard a loud pop and a crunch and we all turned to look at Harry.

Harry had crushed the full, unopened soda can in his hands.

We all looked at him with wide eyes.

His eyes were wide, unfocused and wild. He was visibly trembling. His head made a violent twitching motion.

"Oh damn." I swore.

He was having an episode. Slowly, Connor and I made our way around the table to stand by Danny.

We had only seen Harry do this once before, and that one only lasted for a few moments, but this one... this one seemed worse.

"Harry?" Danny asked softly.

"nooo." Harry whispered shakily, shaking his head slowly.

"Harry?" Connor asked, reaching out and touching his shoulder.

Harry's eyes went even wider with panic, and he screamed. He shot out of his chair, tumbling to the ground. He crawled backwards and his back until his back was against the wall of the house. He fell onto his side and curled up into the fetal position, gasping for breath. He gripped his head and pulled at his hair. Danny ran to his side and rubbed his back slowly.

"Calm down, Harry. You need to calm down. You're gonna make yourself sick." Danny said to him calmly, trying to calm him down.

I shot Connor a troubled look, which he returned with a look of confusion. Danny pulled him into a sitting position and wrapped his arms around Harry's shivering form.

Ten minutes later, Harry started to calm down enough to speak coherent sentences.

"Help me to the chair." He whispered brokenly.

Danny picked him up and carried him back to his chair, bridal style. Connor and I returned to our chairs as well.

"You okay now?" I asked Harry.

"Sorry 'bout that." He muttered, staring at the table.

"You never have to apologize to us." Danny said gently, rubbing comforting circles on his back.

"Why did you react so badly?" Connor asked.

Harry gave a dry chuckle. It was an alien sound to hear coming from him. It held no warmth, no humor, no happiness. It held only hatred, sadness, and buried pain. He turned to look at Connor.

"You're so lucky, that you will never have to see the inside of one of those fucking camps." He said emotionlessly. He paused for a moment before continuing.

"One of us is enough."

Oh. Fuck. No.

"What?" I growled.

"That's why my step parents sent me out here in the first place. The place they sent me to didn't work." He said, with a very faint air of sadistic pleasure tinting his voice at the motion of pissing off his adoptive parents.

Danny stared at him in unconcealed horror.

"You have no idea what they do in those places. The methods they used." Harry said, his voice slowly turning from a whimper to a snarl as he spoke, "They tried to do and exorcism on me, to cast out the homosexual demon that gripped my soul. They tried hypnosis, the fucking imbeciles. Forcing us to pray to god for deliverance for hours on end. When all else failed, they used electroconvulsive therapy on me."

Everybody gasped, but nobody stopped him from continuing. It was clear that he need to get this out.

"Yeah. They would drag me out of bed at five in the morning and strap me into a chair, stick needles into my fingers, and they'd show me pictures of men in explicit positions while shocking me until I could barely form a coherent thought. Eventually I just started telling them what they wanted to hear, and they pronounced me cured. When I got home, I told my parents it didn't work, and the next day I'm on a plane to San Diego. And good fucking riddance to them."

Danny wrapped him in a hug.

"I'm so sorry."

"You have nothing to be sorry for." Harry told him, "None of you do. You guys have given me the family I deserve, and through Danny, I met my biological parents."

I gave us all a smile. I was comforted to see that it had some of its old warmth back.

"Besides, I received some good news yesterday." Harry continued, "I will only have to go back to Georgia once, and then that chapter of my life is over."

"What do you mean?" I asked him.

"My adopted parents have effectively tortured me, then abandoned me." Harry explained, "I told my biological parents what they did when I talked to them during our weekly Skype call. They are trying to get custody of me back, but in order to do that, they'll have to go to Georgia and get the abandonment papers signed. If everything works out, they told me they are gonna move here, and I'll be back with them by the time Spring Break starts next year."

"We'll go with you to Georgia." Danny promised.

I nodded my agreement.

"Hell yeah we will," Connor said, "I wanna give those bastards a piece of my mind."

"Not too big a piece, I hope?" Harry joked softly, "Otherwise there won't be anything left for you to use."

We all chuckled softly. If Harry was okay enough to make a joke out Connor's mental wellbeing, then he was gonna be fine.

Or at least I hoped it would be.

We've all been through a lot in our short time on this Earth. Too much. I don't know if any of us could handle another big loss or shock. Especially Danny or Harry. We'd all finally gotten to a place in our lives where everything seems to be looking up and going right...

...If something happens to mess that up, I'm afraid it'll be the death of us.

AN: All my original characters have multiple secrets about their pasts. Harry's is finally revealed. The methods of conversion therapy used in this chapter are taken from an article in the Huffington Post. It can be found at: 2011/10/31/11-conversion-therapy-methods-curing-homosexuality_n_ . Also, I don't know if what I have Harry's biological parents doing is actually possible or legal, but for the sake of the storyline, let's say it is.