Adopted by Scarlett Johansson

chapter eight - central park

TW - mention of panic attack - TW

10 minutes later Maddie found herself on the floor of a beautifully decorated bedroom, playing with toys of all shapes and sizes. Dolls. Teddy's. Puzzles. Pens and paper. The whole lot. She felt like a seven year old all over again.
Rose kept gibbering on about things she had learnt in school or things she had read in books. Things she was excited to do now she was staying with 'mummy and auntie Lizzie' in New York. Obviously Maddie didn't mind. She just sat back and watched Roses excited face light up every time she thought of a new story.
Every now and then Maddie would get little flashback memories of orphanages in the past. Little snippets of children she used to be friends with. Little excited faces when they got adopted. The look on the tiny faces when stories were being told of the magical worlds in story books. Maddie missed the simplistic childhood life. Because although she was very aware it wasn't 'normal' to not have parents, she wished one day that her parents would swoop in and adopt her and take her on magical journeys across the world.
However the older she became though the more unrealistic that thought was. The more it doomed on her that she may not find a forever family. That she would go out into the world alone.

"Maddie....Maddie.....Lizzie's calling us to go downstairs. I think we're going to the park"
Maddie quickly snapped out of her trance and stood up. Smoothing her jeans down she followed Rose along the hallway to the stairs. Quickly popping into her bedroom to grab a jumper. She would really need to go back to the foster home soon, just to grab a fresh pair of clothes.
Making her way downstairs she noticed that Scarlett and Lizzie had massive sunglasses on. Now, looking out the window a few minutes ago it was cloudy. The sun was obviously there but there wasn't a need to wear sunglasses that big, was there?!  Maddie was about to ask why they were both wearing these massive glasses until she realised. 'The paparazzi!' Maddie hadn't even thought about the pap!
Not wanting to make anything awkward by asking questions, she started putting her shoes on and followed Scarlett out the door.

Maddie hadn't been out the house since yesterday and as she tried to occupy her mind with watching Rose skip along the pavement with Lizzie, she couldn't help but continuously check over her shoulder. After a few minutes of always checking, Scarlett noticed and stopped them both.
"Hey. Are you okay? You keep checking behind you. Is someone following us?"
"Oh no. Sorry. I think I'm just a bit cautious from what happened last night."
After hearing what Maddie had said, Scarlett pulled her into a big hug. "Look. As long as you're with me nothings going to hurt you ok. And if they do. Remember, I trained to be black widow for nearly ten years. I can beat their asses senseless"
Maddie laughed and stepped back from the hug. "Thank you. You really do know what to say in all situations"
They both laughed and went to catch up with Lizzie and Rose.

About 25 minutes they finally arrived at Central Park (it took a little longer than expected as they all stopped to stroke every dog possible). However when they arrived Maddie started to feel weird, but she couldn't ruin their day. They had only just arrived. So she pushed it down and played with Rose. Chasing her along the paths and across the lawns without a care in the world. Her and Rose had been running around for a good hour now until the reached a certain fork in the path.
Maddie immediately had flashbacks to last night. She felt faint. She felt her chest start to tighten. Her breath became shorter. She started to feel sick. She felt sweat building at the back of her neck.
The last thing she could remember was collapsing on the floor trembling and crying. She had assumed she had passed out from the impact of the concrete but she wasn't sure. By then she was already out cold.