Hello everyone…
At first, thanks to guests and Bonnie Sveen fan for reviewing. Since they're posted anonymously I'll post some answers here.
Guest review posted November tenth: There is just one thing I don't get about some people- how does break people break people and believe it will heal them? Can it? I really don't understand it.
One more thing- once, I must have done something because I was appologizing for it. And my uncle laughed, hugged me and said "That's the good thing about us G's. We're not resentful" (I put G and not our full, quite unique last name for obvious reasons) But I've remembered it to this day. And I have been reminded since that he was right.
This story has had a lot of weird reviews through the years. And while I can't remember yours specifically. You're forgiven and I think it's one admireable thing to do to come back to me and appologize rather than try and forget about it. I'm really happy you're in a better place now.
-Linnéa
Bonnie Sveen fan: I didn't know that she had done the audition for Tracy originally. But she and Dani Harmer both got roles that suited them best so I'm really happy with the way things worked out. This chapter is for Charlie, but Justine too should have another chapter soon.
Guest review posted December fifth: I think those boys and Tracy being cousins are in the books about Tracy. But I can't remember it ever being in the series. I put it in a oneshot once though, so when I write another chapter for them I might add it.
In the poll Justine won. Second came Zac and Ryan, then Maxy and last came Adele.
I'm sorry for all of the time that passes that you have to wait for the new chapters.
Since I updated latest I added another part to a light in the dark, finished we're coming home and the moment I needed the most and posted a oneshot for Austin and Ally.
And like every year, I begin 2022 with starting on chapters for all stories I'm working on. It's gone very slowly this year, but as of now (February 18th) I have updated all stories except for this one. And published a oneshot for The Night Shift. After all I am working on six multi-chapter stories and a oneshot for Harry Potter. Including four of those stories that are close to their finish lines. Although this one will still be going on for as long as the dumping ground series do. And here's a brand new chapter.
Charlotte "Charlie" or "Lottie" Morris
Two years before this story starts, when Melanie Lawrence had met her Patrick Morris and fallen head over heels in love, her parents had not been happy.
Patrick Morris was even known around town. He was trouble. He was drugs and stealing and in and out of prison. That he was almost twenty years older than Melanie didn't make him any better in Melanie's parents' eyes. But what were they supposed to do? They loved their daughter, and they had to admit- age was just a number and there were no rules in love.
A year and a half after they met, Melanie had peed on a stick and towards sthat white, one extra blue line had shaped.
And eight months after that, one early, early February morning in 2002 their daughter had been born. With light brown skin and dark, thick hair- and Melanie knew in all of her that this was her chance to make everything right that had happened since the moment she and Patrick met.
They were in their own room in the maternity ward, when Melanie looked down on her daughter she couldn't help but smile even though Patrick kept in the background and didn't seem sure of anything he could have done.
"You can come closer you know." Melanie told him, but spoke carefully. "You're not going to…." The door suddenly opened slowly. "Mum! Dad!"
That was right. While they didn't agree to their daughters choice of partner. Henry and Charity Lawrence loved their daughter more than anything. And there would be nothing in the world that could ever keep them from staying by her side. Or getting to know their granddaughter.
"So you managed to make your way here in the middle of the cold?"
"I can't remember it ever being so cold." Henry Lawrence went ove, kissed his daughter on the forehead. "And it's snowing so bad you can hardly see your own hand if you hold it up in front of you… We wouldn't let wild horses keep us away from here today. Hello baby…" He put onee of his fingers into the baby's palm. "I'm your grandpa… And here comes grandma."
While Henry took a step back and Charity took a step closer Henry also looked back on Patrick that still stood in the same corner of thee room he'd been standing all day. And Patrick only glared back- he was well aware Melanie's parents didn't like him. But how could they after getting their daughter into all of the trouble he had.
Patrick must have known what he could do for them to get a new picture of him. For them to look at him in new kinds of ways.
"So have you decided on a name?"
"Well. We were thinking of some different ones…" Melanie said slowly, while looking down on her daughter as if she was deciding on what she looked like. "…Pat? Come over here…." Patrick slowly moved from the corner where he'd been standing. "I think it's Charlotte…" The grandmother gasped and had tears in her eyes. "Yeah. I do believe it is, is that your name? Charlotte?"
"I think…" Patrick said something for the first time during the day. "…Maybe Charlie, for short…"
Melanie knew very well how Patrick had wanted a boy. And now when the baby had turned out to be a girl Patrick wouldn't be happy with any other name than a gender neutral one. But she just pushed away the knowledge and pretended Charlie was the most beautiful name she had ever heard.
"Yeah… That sounds about right. Charlie but short for Charlotte… Do you know what that means?" She looked up on her parents who both shook their heads. "It means free. And if I know you two right, how could a grandchild of yours- let alone the first be anything else than free? How could anything ever fit better?"
"I don't think I could do much else than agree." Charity said. "And it is an honor for me to have something as similar for her first name as mine."
But meanwhile Henry didn't say anything for a long while. The thoughts in his mind were just spinning too many for him to have put them into words in a thousand years.
He loved his new granddaughter, and his daughter too of course. He loved them more than anything and so much it hurt in his chest. But loving them so much, he wanted the best in the world for them too and he was so certain that wasn't what they had- not a single piece in Henry trusted Patrick Morris still. And it had only been made worse after Melanie suggested the name, she loved it. But Henry had seen the look in her eyes when Patrick suggested Charlie- she didn't like that but she didn't dare say anything.
But was Henry supposed to say?
He had realized there was nothing he could say right now that he hadn't already said that would help them. He felt he had already done it all and if he tried again now he would never get to see his daughter or granddaughter again. And for Henry there was no worse thing that could happen.
So with that he forced a smile, but promised himself to always do what could keep Charlie safe for now, and for all time forced while he moved forward. And reached one hand forward to lay his finger in Charlie's little hand and the other hand to pat Patrick's shoulder- as if to show they were okay right now.
"That you are very right about… So, when can we take her fishing the first time?"
"I don't know." Patrick spoke. "But… I just love her so much. And when I look into her eyes it's like everything bad I've ever done before just runs off. None of it matters as long as she is here and we are here and we're together."
Maybe… Henry thought. Becoming a parent was something special and it changed everyone. So maybe Patrick could actually keep his promise.
XxXxX
Four and a half years had passed since the day in the maternity ward of Pottiswood's hospital, and Patrick Morris had shown himself, alright?
Well… he had showed the fact that he was never going to change, Not for anything or anyone. And now both he and Melanie had been taken in by the police. While Charlie sat in an uncomfortable plastic chair outside a hearing room at the station.
And where she sat, her legs not reaching far over the seat's edge,, and police men passing her without barely looking at her she felt mostly like crying. Her mum and dad had been taken away from her to the other side of that door in the other side of the room, and here she was sitting and she couldn't figure when they would be back.
A minute after the other, an hour after the other passed by. Charlotte couldn't figure what was going on and she couldn't undrstand what had happned, what was happening and what was ought to happen in the future.
No one would ever be able to understand why no adult on the police station that day, took the time to explain what was going on. Maybe if Charlotte would have been someone loud, kicked and screamed and hit until someone had told her anything it would have happened. But instead she just sat there- tears burning behind her eyes and not understanding a bit.
"Lottie…."
Sometimes Henry would just refuse to use the nickname Charlotte's dad had made for her. Despite that one being what most people except for him and his wife called her. But still, Charlotte had been in the waiting room at the police station for hours and it was almost dark outside by the time Henry and Charity found out what had happened and where their granddaughter was.
"Grandpa." Charlotte got up onto her feet on the chair when finally seeing someone she knew. "Grandpa…" For another few moments she just didn't know what to say. "I don't understand why they took them away. When will mummy and daddy come back to me, so we can go home again?"
Feeling helpless, both of them, Henry and Charity looked towards each other. Henry's stomach dropped while he took his young granddaughter in his arms and wished he could have hold on like this forever.
Henry and Charity had hoped something would make their daughter split with her daughter and boyfriend. They had hoped for it the first time Patrick was unfaithful, second, third and fourth. They had hoped for it when Melanie told them, days afterwards that toddler Charlotte had been left alone while Patrick forced Melanie with him to whatever party, they had hoped she would leave him before she was dragged into the mud of criminality too deep. Just like it was right now.
And here they were, it was almost dark outside and Henry was holding tightly onto Charlotte while Charity hugged her from the other direction. She would have held on to Lottie herself, but she was old and her heart was weak and she didn't want to take a risk and lift something- or someone.
Finally, a police woman came into the room and walked over to the family of three, and when she glanced over Henry and Charity's faces they would have had to be completely blind if they couldn't understand what the look meant.
"Lottie, love." Charity said carefully, as if she was afraid she'd break the young girl if she spoke too loud. "Your mummy and daddy won't be coming back here right now or at all today. So you'll have to come with me and grandpa home. But… It's only for tonight. Okay?"
Henry was the one who looked the most questioning to the policewoman while Charity tried to calm down their Lottie. The policewoman looked so sad, none of these four people barely knew anything at all. But maybe she knew the most of them that if Charlotte went to stay with her grandparents tonight, it would definitely not be only for one night…
"Maybe…" He said slowly. "…It's late. Far later than your bedtime. And did you ever have any dinner Lottie?" Charlotte shook her head- her stomach grumbling with hunger that she had tried to ignore. "I think a lot has happened today and we have all got a lot to think about. So we will go home now, eat some and then you can sleep. And then, tomorrow we can… talk about, or at least just try and figure what has happened. And maybe find out some about what will happen now?"
For a long while, in between Henry, Charity, Charlotte and the police woman it was all quiet…
"I guess…" Charity said slowly at last. "…There isn't much else to do. Now come on. Your grandfather's right Lottie. It's long beyond your bedtime."
While Henry carried her out, Charlotte kept her face against his shoulder and watched towards the door she had seen her parents disappear last. Even though she liked staying at her grandparents' house she couldn't help but wonder when her parents would be back and when she'd be abble to go home.
None of them- Charlotte the least knew right then that Patrick they'd never see again, or how long it would be before they saw Melanie again.
Maybe if they'd known, Charity had dropped dead right then and there of a broken heart.
XxXxX
The one night Charlotte was going to spend at her grandparents' house had turned into many. And Charlotte had now grown into a teenager whom preferred the nickname her father had given her, she was now thirteen. And even though Henry would most likely have kept her by him every second of the day, forever. He knew more than ever that wouldn't be it.
They had known already the day they took their granddaughter in, that Charity was living on borrowed time. They knew her heart was failing, but that her mind was strong. There was a risk every day could be her last and everything they could do really, was for her to take many pills every day, and wait for them not to help anymore.
Henry and Charlotte had told doctors that Charity was going to make it for far longer than she had been told originally. And hadn't they been right all along? She had made it for years and seen her granddaughter's thirteenth birthday even.
Until she one night, unexpectedly just zoned away in her sleep one night.
"Are you ready for this now? We don't have to do this if you don't want to."
A few months after the worst morning of their lives Henry and Charity were standing by one of Dover's many cliffs. Behind them were trees, and in front of them was only water as far as they could see. Almost right beneath them were waves roaring white hitting up towards stone….
"There is no time limit for when we will have to move you know."
"Lottie." Henry interrupted her, but maybe none of them wanted to do what they were about to with the urn Charlotte held in our hands. "You know your grandmother didn't want to be left standing on the mantle for ever. She'd want to be here and go with the wind, just like she always was. And today…." As if the weather heard him the wind blew more again, and Charlotte took theh lid of the brown urn she held. "Ready?"
"Ready!"
Charlotte handed the lid to her grandfather, and walked as close to the edge of the cliff as she dared. Then she first threw the urn in the air without letting it go. So what was left of her grandmother flew out of it and through the air, when she tipped it more and more the dust got stuck in the wind that blew around them.
"Farewell my dear."
Henry had always been sort of fascinated by it. He and Charity had spent so much of their whole lives together and now she was gone and he was left to take care of Lottie.
But how could he take care of her when his whole body was old, slow and broken down?
A bit more than what he liked to admit, and more than what he wanted he knew Charlotte was more and more the one who had to take care of him than the other way around- that it should have been.
But he must have known all along…
Of course Henry, and Charity too would have liked for their Lottie to grow up anything she wanted to be. Lottie did like reading books, and they loved about her that she could spend hours with one gone from their world. She loved good food just as much as her grandfather did, but in difference from her grandmother it was usually best for them all and their tastebuds if she stayed out of the kitchen, despite loving to cook and bake. And she kept all of her grades up.
But she was also the free girl, who loved spending time outdoors. Lottie could put up a tent and wasn't scared of the worst of thunder storms. She could fish and cook over a camp fire, she knew how to dress in January and in July, she could climb trees and knew what could be eaten in the forest and what could not.
And at the end of the day, when they had put up their small tent, and Henry had come down on the ground despite his old and achy joints, she could curl up in a fleece pyjamas and sleeping bag and come close, close to her grandfather to keep warm.
Just like she did the night after they had let Charity go with the wind and Henry knew things would have to change even more. While the storm blew around the tent, they had put it to the ground just the way they knew it was stuck to the ground.
"These were always my favorite times…" She said, half asleep but with a slight smile. "Of course I wish that grandma was still here. And of course I always wonder what would happen if mum was here. And maybe even dad. And then we could all live happily… But now…." Charlottte snuggled close to Henry but was too drowsy to even notice the tears that was slowly rolling down his cheeks. "…but we'll be okay, won't we grandpa? We'll be okay as long as we have each other."
Right now Charlotte, who zoned away to sleep, seemed even smaller than what she had at the hospital, as a newborn all of those years ago…
Henry didn't want to leave her alone for anything in the world. But he also didn't want to put too much pressure on his teenage granddaughter. And too much pressure was being put on her when she was the one that had to do all chores at home, go to school and do her homework. Being there, with her he knew he put her through that even though he didn't want it.
Then there was that knowledge about where his daughter, Charlotte's mother was. The fact that she was always only a few miles away, but they couldn't just go see her. Or what would most likely happen if they did anyway…
When Henry thought about everything his daughter and granddaughter had been through. His daughter's mental health and how she had hoped to meet someone who could make it all better, but ended up meeting one who did the exact opposite. Patrick's promise that he would change now he was a dad, but soon going back into old habits. How his Lottie had grown up into her own person, personality and mind. And then that fateful day his Charity had passed away.
Henry had wanted to ignore it, tried not to think about it. Even though every little piece of his body hurt more for every day that passed by, even though it was harder and harder for him to sit down on the ground and get up again- he could no longer do it without support, despite knowing his heart wasn't what it had been and even short walks made him out of breath…
Despite everything he'd wanted to ignore, he knew the days he and his granddaughter had together were coming to an end…
But maybe, while Charlotte slept, Henry's tears dripped slowly and salt down on the pillow while he cried himself to sleep. How could he not? He had lost so much, all of his friends had gone before him, and now there was one single decision to make that had already been made for him and he actually knew it very well.
They didn't even know how near their life together were…
Random fact
We're now in March. But with this I have finally posted this chapter and updated every story in 2022. Although I'm still working on that Harry Potter- oneshot.
