Chapter Text
Today was the almost perfect night for grace he had gotten a discount on his favorite fast-food meal and was now watching his favorite movie the martian, (the guy who thought of that story must be a genius anyway) everything was going his way he finished gradeing papers early and was now about to doze off on the couch until he heard his trash can being tipped over and raided through grace thought to himself if he wanted to go check who or what was digging through his trash eventually he found the courage to peak out the window and check
Instead of finding a homeless person or raccoon it was a girl, she couldn't of been older then his students probably younger by the looks of it and she was by herself in the middle of the night digging through trash, after stating the obvious in his mind, grace realizes if he doesn't act fast the girl will probably go back onto the streets so he pushes open the door despite having a phD he never thought that the girl would run, twist her ankle and fall face flat onto the ground
"OH MY GOD ARE YOU OKAY" grace yells hes not sure how to deal with this situation the girl stays quiet
Grace quickly leans over the girl to make sure her ankle isnt broken only to be fought by the girl thrashing around and fighting
"GET OFF ME LEAVE ME ALONE" she yells while kicking and thrashing despite that grace halfway drags halfway carrys her to the front steps of his house
Ryland trys to recall his teacher training "think stupid brain think" he eventually settles on calling the cops ring...ring...ring
"Hello 911 whats your emergency" the operator says sounding to composed to hear a possible crime "uh yeah hi I found a girl going through my trash her ankle is injured and she looks to be alone" grace was never good at phone calls with new people but hes trying "alright sir we will be there right away please tell us the address"
the operator speaks sounding more serious now "the address is 1345 mary street" (idk i had to come up with something) "alright sending a someone right away" the phone hangs up and hes left in silence with a unknown child
"This is all your fault if you would of done nothing I could of gone away without trouble" the girl scoffed bitterly
"am not going to leave a child on the streets am a teacher for godsake" grace said firmly after that the girl went silent it was a long and uncomfortable silence
"whats your name kid?" grace asks breaking the silence he hates the silence part of the reason he talks so much
"lei" the girl says facing away from him "thats a nice name, my name is-" grace gets cut off my the police car pulling up and two officers get out " thank you for your patience sir we'll take it from here" police man 1 says while watching police man 2 load lei into the back of the car,
grace thought to himself she looked so small and afraid nothing like the kid who was fighting him a few minutes back "Wait" grace suddenly speaks up " let me go with you" grace should of regretted those words but he didnt as a teacher he shouldn't let children be afraid like that hes supposed to protect them
The two officers look at each other for a bit before helping him into the back seat grace could immediately feel lei's eyes glaring at him after a few minutes they arrive at the station where they immediately put lei in a separate room
Not long after 2 c.p.s agents come in and one comes up to him while the other goes to the lei's room, the agents sits down in front of him and begins asking questions "Hello my name is Carl boyce and im with c.p.s" the man said firmly "why did you decide to come with this girl when you could of had nothing to do with it" the man sounded friendly yet intense which scared the crap out of grace but still
" well im a teacher i couldn't just leave a child like that its part of my job...probably?" Grace had always been awkward but now wasnt the best time for being socially awkward but the man just nods and starts with his next question
"Would you be interested with adopting or fostering this child in the future" the question hit grace like a slap to the face and grace knew what a slap felt like, would he like to take in a child he barely knew,
hell his father didnt even teach him how a dad should be like. How would he know what to do but just imagining the girl alone in whatever hellhole c.p.s would put her in sent shivers down his spine he was quite aware about the horrors of the foster system
" sir would you like to answer the question " carl said a bit annoyed this time " yes I would be interested " grace gulped he wasnt even sure what to do with a child he had a spare bedroom in his house ready to use but it was a lot for him " great sign these papers" Carl said like it was the easiest thing in the world and the girls whole life wasnt going change but either way grace signed the papers
all he could do now is wait