Chapter 1

July 2007:

Callie Jacob was more excited than she could ever remember. Today, she, her mom, and little brother Jude were going to see her first movie in the theater for her tenth birthday-Ratatouille.

"Mom, when's it going to start?" Callie asked impatiently.

"Just a few minutes, Callie-girl," Colleen Jacob smiled sweetly. "Remember, Jude, when the lights go down, we have to be very quiet so other people can hear the movie."

Jude nodded seriously, taking a handful of Callie's Junior Mints. Callie slapped his hand.

"Callie! Apologize to Jude right now!"

"Do I have to?"

"Yes, or we're going home."

Callie's shoulders slumped. "I'm sorry, Jude."

"And Jude, maybe ask before you take your sister's candy next time?"

"Okay, Mommy," Jude said with a smile.

"Here," Callie smiled, holding the box out to him.

Jude had a similar grin as he took some. Just then, the lights dimmed.

Callie was drawn into the movie, never realizing that her life would change forever in two months.

"...I remember you shared your Junior Mints with me," Jude said. "And we both loved the movie. I still can't watch it. Not without you."

He was standing in a nondescript room at the San Diego Long-Term Care Nursing and Rehabilitation Center. His blue nail polish-manicured fingers reached for a pale hand.

"I miss you, Callie," He whispered, his voice defeated.

16-year-old Callie Jacob layed in bed, completely unresponsive to Jude and everyone around her.

He squeezed her hand gently. "I'll see you next week."

He walked out the door. He could see his adoptive mother Lena in the waiting room, checking her phone. He touched her arm.

Lena looked up. "Hey, baby! How is she?"

Jude shrugged. "No change."

Lena smiled at him sympathetically. "I'm sorry. You want to get some lunch on the way home?"

"Okay," Jude replied. It was their normal post-visiting Callie routine.

Lena stood up.

"Lena, can I talk to you for a second, please?" She heard.

Sending Jude to the car, she walked over to the nurses' station. One of their favorite nurses, Amber, was working at the desk.

Amber looked up. "I hate watching that poor boy every week. Leaving here more dejected than he was when he got here."

"I know."

"Have you and Stef talked about maybe….stopping the visits?"

Lena shook her head. "As long as Jude still wants to visit every week, we'll let him."

"But Lena….you have to know by now that she's not going to get any better than this. Her heart's strong. She could stay like this for a long time to come."

Lena nodded. "I know. And my partner knows that. But…I think we're all holding to that thin thread of hope that she'll wake up one day."

"Speaking of which, Billing needs to see you about this month's payment before you leave."

"Okay, thanks."

Lena walked out to the car. For not the first time, she wondered if she and Stef had done the right thing by Callie.

…

The Sunday afternoons after Jude visited Callie were always quiet. Jude was often downhearted, so Brandon, Jesus, and Mariana usually made it their goal to cheer him up.

So that afternoon, they were all playing video games. And Stef and Lena were in the kitchen starting to prep dinner.

"Amber pulled me aside today," Lena shared.

"Yeah?" Stef asked. "What'd she want?"

"To ask if we ever considered stopping Jude's visits with Callie."

"Why would we?"

"Stef…honey, I know you have an attachment to her, but the fact of the matter is, it's been six years with no change. Six years of Jude being let down every week when he visits her."

"I know, love."

"I'm not seeing we stop making the payments, but maybe we-"

"Give up on her?"

"No. Stef, that's not what I meant."

"I saved that girl's life, Lena. I feel like that was for a reason."

"And look what her life is now."

Stef was quiet.

"She's not getting better, honey."

"I know."

"It's not even our call to make anyway. It's CPS. She's still technically a ward of the state."

"Not in my book."

"We are her legal guardians."

"With medical proxy. That means we have a say as to whether we continue her care."

"Is it fair to Jude to keep expecting her to wake up?"

"I don't know, Lena. I really don't. All I know is, she's as much our daughter as Jude is our son."

Just then, Brandon walked in. "Hey, Moms."

"Hey, baby," Stef replied.

"Did I walk in on something?"

"No. Mama and I were just talking."

"About Callie?"

"How'd you know?"

"You guys always get tense when you talk about Callie."

Stef sighed. "Look, B, you shouldn't have to worry about this."

"Callie's been a part of our lives for as long as Jude has. She's like my sister except not. I'm not ready to give up on her."

"Me neither," Stef admitted.

Brandon went to leave, but turned back. "You really love her, don't you, Mom?"

"Who?"

"Callie."

Stef looked out the window. "Yeah. I do."

…

Stef stepped into the long-term care center. Silently greeting the nurses, she slipped into Callie's room. Sundays might be visiting days for Jude, but Sunday nights were her time.

"Hey, Cal," She murmured. She sat down. "You look good. The nurse said she saw a slight improvement in your vital signs tonight. That's great news."

Callie gave no response.

"You and I have to talk," Stef said. "It seems like everyone's ready to give up on you. Give up on you ever getting better. But I know you, Callie. Even though we've never formally met or had a conversation, I felt I knew you the second I saw you in that ditch. You were thrown 30 feet from your parents' car, and no one expected you to be alive when you got to the hospital. But from the minute you took that gasp for air when I started doing CPR, I knew you were a fighter. You are a fighter, Callie. And you have so much life left in you to live. That's how I know that you're going to come out of this someday."

Stef squeezed Callie's hand.

"Anyway, let's see where we left off last week." She adjusted Callie's blanket. "Brandon has his big competition for the piano scholarship tomorrow. I wish you could hear him play, Cal, he's so talented…."

Meanwhile, Jude was sitting in the living room reading. Mariana tapped his knee and sat next to him.

"Hey. Mama said it's time for you to get to bed."

"I can't sleep," Jude admitted.

"What's wrong, Judicorn?" The nickname had been coined by Mariana almost as soon as he moved into the house when he was 6.

"I was just looking at these."

Mariana looked over his shoulder and saw a photo album. It was full of pictures of him and Callie as kids. For the first time, Mariana saw the vibrant girl Callie had been before the accident-laughing, vivacious.

"I remember her like this," Jude said. "After the accident, when she first got moved to SDLTCC, I could still picture her like this when I went to see her. I would close my eyes, look past all the tubes, and see her running around playing tag with me, or dancing, or drawing. She loved to draw."

"I didn't know that."

In response, Jude turned the page to reveal a drawing that must have been Callie's. It was a beautiful drawing of a garden.

"Mom's garden," Jude explained. "It was on our fridge at the house we grew up in."

"It's pretty. Callie was pretty talented."

"Well, the thing is…it's getting harder and harder to picture her like that. Today, I was in the room, and I tried to close my eyes and picture her awake and without all the equipment…and I couldn't remember anymore. It's all blurry now, what she used to be like."

Mariana was quiet.

"I don't want to give up on her…but it's too hard for me to remember. And it's too hard to see her like that if I can't remember what she used to be like."

Tears had begun to roll down Jude's face. Mariana pulled her little brother, who had been adopted just a few weeks after Jesus and her, into her arms and held him as he cried wretchedly.

Stef, who had just gotten home, was watching them from the doorway. Unbeknownst to them, she had heard part of the conversation. And though she still had hope for Callie, and felt like she could still come out of it, she had had no idea how much Jude had suffered seeing his sister like that every week with no change.

She slowly climbed the stairs. Lena was making the bed in their bedroom.

"Hey." Lena's smile faded at her partner's sad expression. "Honey, what's wrong? Is everything okay?"

"Jude's crying in Mariana's arms because he's starting to forget the way Callie used to be."

"Oh," Lena sighed.

"Lena, love, are we…are we doing the right thing? Taking Jude every week? We already know it's hard on him. And we always said we would stop the visits if it got too hard for him."

"You said this afternoon-"

"That I wasn't ready to give up on Callie. I know. But…but we have four other kids, Lena. Including one who has to mourn for the sister he lost even though she's right in front of him every week."

Lena nodded. "So we talk to Jude? About whether he wants to keep going back?"

"We talk to Jude," Stef confirmed.

…

The next afternoon, Lena was at work, deep in thought about Callie and the conversation she and Stef would have with Jude that night when her cell phone rang.

She dug it out of her desk and answered. "Hello?"

"Hi. I'm trying to reach Stef Foster or Lena Adams?"

"This is Lena Adams."

"This is Heather from the San Diego Long-Term Care Nursing and Rehab Center."

"Yes, hi. What can I do for you?"

"We were wondering if you could come down."

"Now? Is Callie alright?"

"There's been a change in her condition."

"O-Okay. I'll come right now."

Lena rushed to the center. She called Stef on the way, but was met with her voicemail. Suddenly she remembered Brandon's piano competition was that day.

She got off the elevator, where she was met by the physician on Callie's case, Dr. Eric Abrams. He had been her doctor since she was transferred to long-term care. Joining him were two nurses and a man she had never seen before.

"Eric," Lena greeted the doctor by his first name.

"Lena."

"I got here as fast as I could. They said there was a change in her condition."

"Yes. This is Dan Wilson from Social Services."

"Why isn't Bill here?" Lena asked the younger man, referring to the social worker in charge of the Jacob kids' case.

"He had an emergency with one of his other cases. The department sent me."

"Sent you to do what? I still don't understand what happened."

"CPS was to be notified if there were any updates in Callie's condition."

"Lena." The doctor spoke up.

"Will someone please tell me what's happening?"

"Lena…Callie woke up a few hours ago."

The news knocked her for a loop. Never in her wildest dreams did she imagine this would be possible.

"She…she woke up? You're sure it wasn't a reflex? Some involuntary thing?"

"She spoke."

"She-wow."

"This obviously changes your arrangement with CPS," Dan explained.

"The reason we didn't call you immediately is because we wanted to be sure it wasn't a fluke. We wanted to run some tests."

"I-I need to call my partner. Can I see Callie?"

Eric looked at her sympathetically. "I don't think that would be a good idea."

"Why not?"

"Lena-"

"Eric?"

"She doesn't know who you are," He told her bluntly. "She still thinks it's before the accident."

"Eric…what year does she think it is?"

He hesitated. "2007."

Lena swallowed. "Of course."

They would have to figure out some way to tell Callie that her mother was dead, her father was in prison for causing the accident, and that her younger brother had been adopted by two women who were complete strangers to her.