Callie POV
August 26th
I arrived at the Adams Foster house earlier than I told them I would. After all of this time, it's nothing surprising. This feels like a second home to me. I haven't felt like a guest here in a long time. It's been a few years now, since I last rang the bell as well. Jude hasn't rant the bell, when he comes over, as well. He just marches in. Duke greets him like family. As it should be. We are family.
This was the weekend, when the Adams Fosters were going to throw a little party to send off the oldest kids off to college. It won't be anything extravagant. Just a simple BBQ with family. All they wanted was to spend some quality time together, before the kids leave home for weeks if not moths. Their grandparents will visit as well. Mike was going to be here. Mom and Cooper were invited as well.
Duke, who was sitting in the passenger seat barked out, when I stopped the car on the side of the road next to the house. He got really excited, when he saw Frankie run up to the window and wave at us. I waved back at the young girl after I stopped the engine. Duke's tail started to wiggle and he tried to stand up on the seat, getting restless. Frankie disappeared from my sight. Duke looked to me and whimpered at me, getting inpatient with me. Eager to get outside.
"Hold on...give me a sec!" I told him as I opened my seat belt and leaned over so I could open the passenger side doors. Duke jumped out of the car the same time Frankie opened the front doors and came out.
"Duke!" Frankie called out as he ran up to her and started to wash her mouth causing her to giggle out
I got out of the car, opened the doors to the backseat and leaned it. On the backseat stood a blueberry pie mom and I made yesterday for today BBQ. It was still in once piece, which I was thankful for. I pushed the doors close with my elbow, locked the car and walked towards the house.
"Hi, Callie!" Frankie greeted me cheerfully as she was patting Duke's sides
"Hey!" I smiled at her as I walked the path that lead to the house "Can you open the doors for me?"
"Sure!" Frankie jumped up to her feet, Duke put his snout to the ground and started to sniff around
Frankie held the doors open for me "Is that blueberry pie?" she asked me as I walked pass her and into the house
"Yes," I looked over my shoulder to her, she was following me "Don't even think about it!" I gave her a stern look, before I averted my eyes up front. I heard Stef and Lena in the kitchen. There were footsteps upstairs, others were up as well.
"Just one small piece," she begged as she hurried up to my side, her eyes on the pie that I was carrying "It will be hours till we get food and it smells really good," she blinked her eyes at me
"It's barely 11," I frowned my forehead up and glanced to her "You ate breakfast what…hour ago?"
"2 hours," Frankie corrected me "But I only ate cereal. And Jude ate my favorite, so I had to eat the yukky ones only Mariana eats," I laughed lightly at that statement
"They are probably more healthy," I answered, when I set my foot into kitchen. Both Stef and Lena smiled at me, when they saw me enter. The kitchen table and counters were all occupied with bowls, cutting boards, food, ingredients. I looked around looking for a place to set the pie down.
"They taste like...nothing," Frankie whined as Lena cleared a corner of the table "Set it down here," Lena told me putting a cabbage aside
"If you eat one piece now, then the others will want one piece now as well. And if you each take one piece now, which is 7 pieces , 8 if I eat one as well, there will be no pie left for later!" I argued back as I set the pie down. There have been enough BBQ and parties that I know how these things go. It's rare, when there are leftovers in this house.
"You're early," Lena said before we leaned into one another for a quick hug
"Are you surprised?" I smirked back at her, leaning out of the hug
"Not really," Lena smiled back at me as she walked back to the island table and resumed cutting tomatoes, that I assume will be for one of the salad they were making
Stef came over to me and gave me a small peck on my cheek "Missed you and your mom at the self-defense class Thursday."
"Yeah..." I dragged and rubbed the back of my neck "Had some stuff I had to take care off."
"I know. Doesn't mean we didn't miss you," Stef replied, briefly touched my arm and smiled at me warmly. Mom had informed Stef that we won't make it for the class, so she doesn't worry that the both of us don't show up. She was very discrete about it. Didn't gave anything, like she promised me.
"What time will Amy and Cooper be here?" Lena asked briefly pausing the tomato cutting and looking over her shoulder
"Um...They said..." I thought about it, trying to remember, what mom told me at the breakfast table "Around 2," I answered as I walked over to Lena"They had few errands they had to run before coming to the party," I explained as I reached for a small tomato piece she had cut and tossed it in my mouth
"Okay," Lena nodded back, but then added "Stef and I will drive to pick up our parents from airport in about hour, so it could we are not home, when they arrive."
I nodded my head back "It's not like the house will be empty,"
"No it won't," Lena agreed with me and resumed cutting the tomatoes
"Need any help?" I asked wanting to help. There were five big, red tomatoes lined up next to the cutting board.
"Umm..." Lena dragged looking around the counter "No, I think Stef and I are handling it!" she said as she pushed the cut up tomato in a bowl that stood on the right of the cutting board.
"We are on top of everything!" Stef chimed in and opened the tap to wash some cucumbers
"You can go and chat with the kids," Lena added and picked up the next tomato
I turned around to face the kitchen table, ready to head upstairs, but stopped "You have got to be kidding me," I laughed, when I saw that Frankie was eating the pie quietly with a fork. She was sitting on the stool, leaned over the table. Her left elbow pressed to the table, but with her other hand she was holding a fork with pie on up to her mouth. Lena and Stef both looked over at Frankie.
Frankie quickly ate the bite before anyone could take it away from her "In my defense!" Frankie raised the fork up "I know your mom and you made a second pie, because one pie is never enough!"
I looked between Stef and Lena "She isn't wrong," I shrugged my shoulders a bit "Mom is bringing the second pie!"
"Then take the pie, forks and head upstairs," Stef waved at me with the cucumber she was still holding in her hand
"Yay!" Frankie grabbed the pie and hurried towards the stairs "Get the forks, Callie!" Frankie shouted from the stairs "We got pie!" Frankie's voice from the second floor was heard
"Duke is somewhere...around," I informed them, when I took the forks from the drawers
"He's watering our flowers," Lena said looking out the window to the backyard
"It hasn't rained in weeks," I reasoned back to Lena as I slowly backed out of the kitchen
When I got upstairs, I found everyone at Jesus and Jude's room. They were sitting on the floor in a circle. The pie was in the middle. Once Mariana took a bite, she handed the fork to right, to Jude, who took a piece as well.
"Hey, guys!" I smiled, greeting all of them. Mariana and Jesus scooted to side, letting me sit between them. I handed out the forks, so everyone could have one.
"Excellent pie!" Jude complimented pointing his fork down to the pie
"There will be a second one, right?" Brandon asked, holding his fork with the pie up to his mouth
"Yes, mom is bringing it," I answered and struck my fork in the pie taking a small piece
"Don't eat so much," Jesus pushed Frankie's fork up with his and dug in the pie himself "You already ate downstairs! Leave some for the rest!"
"I'm the only one still growing, I have to eat!" Frankie reasoned back now hitting Jesus fork away from the pie with her fork
"So...what are you up to?" I asked and licked my fork clean
"Nothing much," Jude answered with a small shoulder shrug "Before Frankie showed up with the pie, everyone was helping me find the PSP4 Connor gave me years ago."
"You lost it?"
"It's not lost!" Jude reasoned back "It's somewhere in the house," his eyes darted around the room
"Somewhere," Mariana chuckled at the word choice of her brother "We have been looking for it for a half an hour already. No sign of it!"
"Why do you need it?" I questioned "Does Connor wants it back?" I asked curiously, remembering the fact that mom and Stef saw Connor in the city few days ago. Maybe they met up and Connor asked back for the game he so kindly had given to Jude. All thought, now that I thought about it, it seemed highly undoubtedly. The tech is few years old. I haven't seen anyone play PSP4. With the smart-phones, high spec PC, newest PlayStation and x-box, VR stuff, hover boards and everything else that's been going on, PSP4 is kind a like a flip phone – no one uses them anymore.
"No," Jude shook his head "I just want to play it," he shrugged his shoulders a little
"Mama took away his phone for a day, because he wouldn't stop using it at dinner table yesterday," Jesus snickered at his brother
"Uuu," I laughed "Who were you texting to?"
"No one," His cheeks turned a bit pink "Can we not talk about me anymore?" Jude asked looking around us with pleading eyes and still bright red cheeks. We all laughed about it for a moment, but eventually moved along. Discussing other stuff, while we ate. Mariana did whisper in my ear afterward "His name is Spencer. They met in camp!"
~o~o~o~
An empty pie dish stood in the middle of Jesus and Jude's room. I was on my toes, looking at the top shelf in the closet of the boys room. Once we had eaten the pie, the Adams Foster clan resumed looking for the missing PSP4. I, of course, joined them in on the search, because what else would I do.
"Anything?" Jude called, sounded like he was underneath his bed
"No. Nothing. Don't see anything," I closed the doors and turned to look at Jude. Only his feet were visible as the rest of his body was underneath the bed.
"Oh!" Jesus called out and got out from underneath his bed
"Found it!" Jude called out and then a loud bump was heard, because he hit his head at the bottom of his bed "Auch!"
"No, I found a gum!" Jesus raised it up. He took one out and tossed it in his mouth "Callie, want one?"
"Sure," I replied and Jesus instantly tossed it over to me
"I'm going back in!" Jesus told me and slid underneath the bed again, head first
I took a gum and held on to the gum packet a bit longer. As I looked at Jesus, or should I say only his feet, because his torso was now underneath his bed, I asked them "I don't understand, why you are both looking underneath the beds? How could it possible be there?"
"Better safe than sorry," Came a reply from Jude. Looking over to his side of the bed, I saw him get out from underneath it "It's not under my bed," he stated in sadly and dusted off his clothes
"Where's the gum?" he asked, when he got up to his feet. I tossed the gum over to Jude.
"Kids!" Came a shout from downstairs, it was Stef "Mama and I are going to airport to pick up your grandparents! We should be back in some 2 hours! Don't burn the house down while we are gone!"
All the Adams Foster kids shouted something something in reply, so their moms would know they were heard. I heard Duke barking from the outside, he must have heard the shouting going on.
In about 5 minutes we all gathered in the hallway. Neither one of us had found the tech. Jude looked defeated.
"We have checked everywhere!" Brandon said "It's not here!"
"It must be in the house! I knew I saw it laying around somewhere!" Jude ran his hand through his hair, probably trying to think of a spot we haven't searched yet
"There is one place we haven't checked yet," Mariana spoke up. Everyone turned to her. I thought we had already gone through the whole house. Jesus, Brandon and Frankie even checked the garage.
"Which would be?" I raised my eyebrow at Mariana in curiosity. All Mariana did was point her finger up. We all tilted our heads backwards and looked up. There was an attic pull down doors.
"How would it get in the attic?" I questioned still keeping an eye on the attic doors
"Moms store stuff there time by time," Brandon explained "Mariana is right. We should check it. It could me the PSP4 is there ,in some box that moms stashed away a while ago."
"Someone should go up there and look!" Mariana stated and looked at her brothers "I can't go… I washed my hair this morning," she pointed to her hair "Also there could be rats up there and I'm scared of rats!"
Brandon turned to Jesus and patted his shoulder "Go on up!"
"Oh hell no!" Jesus raised his hand ups "I'm not going there!" he backed up a step "You go up there. You're the oldest!"
"It's Jude's tech we are looking for. He should go up himself!" Brandon turned to Jude
"I'm afraid of…dark!" Jude made up an excuse
"Since when?" I laughed at him
"Now," Jude replied in a dead serious tone as his eyes once again traveled up to the attic door
"We have an attic?" Frankie asked shocked as she frowned her forehead up. We all looked to her briefly. Frankie was still staring up to the attic doors. Neither one said anything at her, we just stared at her for few seconds and exchanged few looks with one another.
Suddenly all of the Adams Foster kids, expect for Frankie, who was still staring up to the ceiling, set their eyes on me. I was taken aback by their sudden attention. That was until I realized, why they were looking at me like that.
"Oh, no!" I raised my hands up just like Jesus had minute ago "Not doing it!" I shook my head. They all continued to stare at me "It's not even my house!" I reasoned back
~o~o~o~
I shined the flashlight around once I was in the attic. The ceiling was low, so I couldn't stand up tall. I was half bent down. It was very dusty and stuffy in here. As I sniffed the air a bit, I could tell, there was a dead rat somewhere in here. I hoped that I will not see it. As I took a step deeper, I almost tripped on some wires that were lying around.
There were bunch of stuff lying around. I counted at least 5 cardboard boxes. There was couple of old dinning chairs. One was missing a leg, other didn't have the seat. At the corner of the attic, I saw a big cardboard box that had a pile of some cloth inside. Could be old curtains or table cloth.
"Anything?" Jude called from downstairs
"I just got up here!" I shouted back briefly turning back to the exit
"Look in the cardboard boxes!" Mariana suggested
"There are many cardboard boxes in here, Mariana!" I called back as I walked up to one and dropped down to my knees by it. With my right hand I held the flashlight while with my other hand I rummaged through the stuff in the box. This box contained Christmas lights, Christmas decoration like angels, stars that go on the top of the tree, there was a box on candles inside and silver and gold spray pain for Christmas trees and other Christmas decorations.
I moved on to the second box. It had newspapers inside. I could see a date on one of them. It dated back to July 27th 2009. I reached for the paper, expecting to be able to crumbled the paper up and toss it aside. Instead my fingers hit something solid. The paper was used as a wrapping and padding. I opened the top of the paper and peaked a look to see what was inside the wrapping. It was a flowery vase. Not sure how much it could be worth. Probably nothing much, since it's up here not downstairs. Once I lifted the vase out, I saw that there were multiple other wrappings like the vase. I opened up another one and saw a set of plates with flower patter at the side of them. By the form, I could tell there were few cups wrapped up as well. Maybe they are a set to the plates I just saw, but I didn't open them up to check. This stuff probably didn't have a place in the house anymore, so Stef and Lena packed it up and set it aside. Or it could me they didn't want the kids to break these vases and china.
The next box that I walked up to had stuffed animals inside. I reached for one and lifted up a teddy bear that didn't have an eye. The teddy bear's shirt was missing a button as well. I shined the light in the box to see what other toys were there. There was stuffed dog toy, Rudolf the red nose reindeer, Ferby, baby dolls, miniature toy car, another teddy bear, stuffed lion toy. In the box next to this one, were other toys that a kid would play with. I smiled looking through this box.
I set the teddy bear aside and reached for stuffed dog toy that had caught my eye before. Something squeaked, when I grabbed the stuffed animal. This stuffed dog used to bark – I thought to myself as I picked it up. Once I had lifted it out of the box, I squeezed it again, expecting to hear the same sound. But the sound never came.
"Huh?" I turned the stuffed animal around, examining it "I wonder whom you belonged to," It looked to be well preserved, at least it looked to be in the best shape of them all. Once I turned the animal to face me, I guessed to myself "Where you Frankie's toy?"
As I was setting the dog back in the box, I heard the squeaking sound again. I leaned closer trying to tell where the sound was coming from.
"Aaaaaahhhh!" I screamed out, when I saw multiple rats looking at me from the bottom of the box. I fell backwards and hit the floor. As fast as I could I crawled away from the box all while throwing the dog toy back into the box. Dust raised up in the air from the air movement. It went up in my nose, tickling my nose.
"Callie! Are you okay!?" The Adams Foster kids called concerned, but neither were brave enough to climb up here on their own to check on me
"Yeah...yeah...I'm good!" I said getting my composure back "Found the rats!" I informed them as I got up to my feet. Forgetting that the ceiling was low, I bumped my head as I stood up. The sound of that was pretty loud. It hurt as well.
As I rubbed my head, Jude asked me "What was that sound?"
"Nothing...nothing!" I winced a bit in pain "All good!" I shook it off
"Can you hurry up with the boxes?" Mariana shouted from downstairs "I think there is dust coming in the house from the attic!"
"You are welcome to come up here and join me in the search!" I shouted back as I walked across the attic room to the next box. This box and the two next to it contained magazines, notebooks, papers and books. I moved to the next boxes, because I was sure, the tech I was looking for won't be with paper stuff.
This next box I was looking for had nerf guns. Lots and lots of nerf guns. I picked up the one at the top, but underneath it I counted at least 6. I lifted few of them out to see if they had the nerf bullets in and in what condition they were in. The ones I checked were fully loaded and looked to be in perfect shape.
"Why do you guys have a collection of Nerf guns up here?" I asked out of curiosity
"They are up there?" I heard Jesus ask back "Can you bring them with you, when you are coming down?" No question about whose favorite toy was this one. I set the Nerf gun back down and pulled the box closer to the exit so I wouldn't forget about it.
When I walked up the last box, I saw the tech that Jude was looking for. It was stashed between old headphones and an old router. Underneath it were wires, old PC mouse, old flip phones, few more headphones and other techy stuff, that probably no longer worked and was not necessary. I grabbed the tech Jude was looking for and proceeded to exit.
"Got it!" I called out, when I was up to the attic doors
"You did!?" Jude appeared by the stairs
"Yup! Here it is!" I handed the tech and the flashlight down. Before I climbed down myself I took the box with Nerf guns with me. Jude was standing aside checking the PSP4.
"What's that?" Frankie asked as she waited for me to climb down
"Haha!" Jesus exclaimed and hurried up to me "My old Nerf guns!" he picked up two and aimed both at Mariana
"Hey, lower that thing down," she turned her side to her twin in case he shoots her with her with it
"I'm not sure if they work," I said as I picked one up myself wanting to check it out. It was a blue color. By the looks it had two cylinders where the Nerf bullets could go in. Almost like a revolver.
"Owww! Jesus!" Mariana suddenly exclaimed
"They work!" Jesus grinned at me "And don't be such a wuss. This doesn't hurt!" he stated picking up the Nerf bullet he had fired at his twin
"Battery is dead," Jude announced and put the PSP4 down on the closet surface he found and then came up to the box as well
The bathroom doors opened and Brandon came out "Wow..you found our old Nerf gun stash! I thought mom threw them away! Mama hated when we played with them," he came out up to the box as well "Jesus, remember how we used to play with these?" Brandon said examining the play gun in his hands
"Yeah, we had so much fun!" Jesus said while I tried to fire the Nerf gun I was holding. The bullet flew out, pass Brandon and hit the wall behind him
"Hey, B! Does your work?" I asked nodding to the Nerf gun in his hands
Brandon shot Nerf bullet to Jesus side "Yup!"
Frankie took one as well and tried it as well "Wow! So cool!" she called out once the bullet few into her room. I handed one to Mariana and Jude as well. They both check to see if they worked and if they bullets.
"These all work!" Jesus commented, but then froze for few seconds. His eyes darted around all of us as she slowly repeated, what he just said "Guys...these all work!"
"These all work!" Jude repeated staring at Jesus at his realization. His eyes shining of excitement. "We could play 3 against 3!" Jude suggested, clearing up what the two of them were thinking
"Girls against boys?" Jesus suggested with a smirk on his lips
AN: I'm trying to go with a more playful chapter this time. I think after the last four, it's needed. Some quality...kids time.
I hope you enjoy and that you will stick around :)
AN2: It would be very helpful, if you could fill the poll I put out. Thank you.