Sorry it's been so long since I posted! Things have been busy on a board I admin, so I had to focus on that. Still, haven't forgotten my stories and wanting to give you all hope that I remember. :)

...

"You ... you're what?!" Sam asked blankly.

"Your guardian," Spencer said brightly.

Sam gave a single, hoarse chuckle. She cleared her throat, ran her fingers through her hair, then spoke. "Funny joke. Haha. Now, I don't think they leave me much longer for visits, so maybe instead of this craziness you could at least tell me how Carly's doing."

"I'm not joking. These are real papers."

"But ... but how?" Sam questioned, even as she doubted.

Spencer finally took a seat across from her and began to tell the story.

"I've been trying to get in touch with you for the last few months."

Sam ducked her head a little. Not all of those calls had taken place while she was in juvie. She remembered refusing at least a dozen calls from Spencer.

"I figured you just needed some time to yourself, so I stopped try for a bit. But when Carly started telling me you weren't answering her calls either, I thought something might be wrong."

Sam had never turned down calls from Carly. The idea of worrying her best friend over her sudden "disappearance" into juvie made her feel queasy.

"Freddie tried to, and when he didn't hear from you either, we looked."

Sam cringed, imagining where they had looked.

"Freddie tried tracking your phone usage and all that tech stuff. He was sure you had been kidnapped after he saw you hadn't been on social media for a week."

Sam's heart hurt a little at that. Just like Benson to be so scared. Still, if he was scared for her ... he cared.

She wasn't sure if she wanted anyone to care.

"He got us in touch with your roommate, the Kitty girl."

"Cat," Sam corrected.

"Yes, Cat. But she had just been on vacation with her family, and she hit her head pretty hard at some point during her trip, and she could not really remember where you had gone, although she remember that you had been in trouble."

Sam shrugged. "It doesn't take a concussion for Cat to forget things. She just does, even though she was there when I was arrested."

Spencer laughed a little. "I thought maybe that was the case. She seems a little..." Sam raised an eyebrow at him. He read her defensiveness properly and adjusted to, "She just seemed like your opposite. I guess that works."

"It did," she murmured softly. The idea of Cat going through a concussion while she was in here was hard to hear. The poor girl hardly had any extra braincells to sacrifice to hard bumps, and Sam had the foresight to expect that Cat would face a lot more of those in the coming years.

"Anyway, Carly also tried Melanie. She didn't have any luck." Sam rolled her eyes at the mention of her twin. They may be identical, but they were not alike, and she tended to avoid too much contact with her. Angelic little Melanie had the ability to make Sam feel guilty, something which she tried to avoid.

"Then, I tried to contact you mom. Turned out she was in prison for two weeks for breaking her parole, which is why it took me so long to get in touch with her. It took me until yesterday to find her."

Figures.

"She told me that you were in juvie and ..."

"Wait. So she did know?"

"...Yes."

Nice to have that little detail confirmed.

"For how long?"

"What do you mean?"

Sam's voice was dangerously even and severe. "I never got in touch with her. She never answered my calls. How long did she know?"

"I think she said that she found out after she was released. I guess they never got the message to her in prison."

Not the usual location to check for a guardian.

"How long ago did she get out?"

Spencer cleared his throat nervously and looked down at his hands. "I think four weeks ago."

So, she knew. She knew I needed help. And she didn't come. Not even for this. Despite me only taking after her, she really doesn't care enough to come get me. Not even when I was so seriously injured. They tell parents about things like that, don't they? But she didn't care. She never came. Not at all. Nothing. How bad of a person must she think I am to not care about me at all?

Spencer seemed to know the dark thoughts going through her mind and interrupted them.

"She seemed ... unable to come get you herself..."

"You mean she didn't want to," Sam said it bluntly.

Spencer paused. There was nothing he could say to make her feel better about that broken relationship at the moment, and it was good that he did not even try. After a few quite minutes passed, Spencer finally continued, "I couldn't just leave you. So, I talked to your mom and she agreed to sign some papers to make me your legal guardian so I could come get you."

"So, what? You're just here to spring me? So I can go back to my apartment with Cat?" Sam asked skeptically. It did not seem like the kind of plan the self-proclaimed "authorities"" around here would agree with.

"No. Like I said, I'm taking you home, to Seattle. To my home. Make that, your home too."