Adopted by Six on Broadway

No Way

Angie's POV 

My poor vision blurred as the memory of Mark flashed through my head. He cornering me, beating me until I'm knocked out, then, I can't even think about it. Andrea had just said what he had always said. Whenever I screamed, whenever I tried to get away, he'd say that and pin me.

Andrea reached out for me, but I squirmed into Samantha's arms.

"Dre I think you triggered something." Samantha whispered as I tried hard to regulate me breathing, but ultimately failing.

Andrea nodded. "Just help her."

"Angie I need you to tell me three things you can see."

I struggled. "The sweatshirt you're wearing. My Alyssa Greene Pop figure. The pink in you hair." I still struggled with breath.

"Now I need you to tell me four things you can touch."

"The denim of my old jeans. The blanket on the couch. Your hands." I gasped and tried to talk. "The-the pillow."

"Good, one last thing, five things you can hear."

I focused as much as I could. "The traffic, Anna hitting a riff at rehearsal, your breathing, the heater, the coffee machine in the other room." It took me a second to realize I was breathing normally again.

"Good job." Samantha held me close, and started singing For Forever from Dear Evan Hansen.

After a bit, Andrea asked me gently, "Are you okay?"

"It's just that, my dad's friend, M-M-Ma,"

"You don't have to say the name Angie." Samantha told me.

"Okay. My dad's friend. He was the worst of all of them. And he'd, he'd say that."

"Well ain't, oh wait. I'm sorry Angie I didn't know."

"It's fine. Things happen. Why is everything still blurry I stopped crying."

"You might need glasses Angie." Samantha said.

"Glasses cost too much."

"Well technically, that our problem now. We were going to tell you later, but, today when we ran an errand-" Andrea was cut off by Samantha.

"We opened an account in the bank for you, so any money you get you can put in the account, we even got you a debit card. And we made sure it was okay for you to stay in the theatre for a couple weeks while you figure out where to go." She handed me a debit card.

I hugged her. "Thank you." Andrea tentatively gave my hand a comforting squeeze.  

So they went to rehearsal, while I continued to read The Big Book of Broadway.

A little while later the alternates came in and we played Go Fish while we continued our Disney Princess marathon.

A little while into Beauty and the Beast, I heard the show end. I lifted my phone to check the time, and realized it was broken.

"Oh that won't do Dwarfy." Mallory informed me, taking the phone. "Tomorrow I'm taking you to get a new one, no protesting."

So the next day we went to the bank, because Mallory had an account she wanted to draw money from.

"Hi I'd like to draw money from my account." She told the attendant.

"What's your information?" Mallory rattled off a list of things like her account number and her name, while the bank person typed it all into a computer. "And who's this?"

"This is Angel Flores, a friend of mine."

"Angel Flores why does that sound familiar?" The attendant lady checked a list, then gasped. "Your mother opened an account for you about nine years ago, she said you were five? You're fourteen now?"