The dumping ground - life as a care kid *COMPLETE*

Cold, lonely park

TEE'S P.O.V

We were having absolutely no luck. No sign of Amelia anywhere. We screamed out for her, checked in all the shops that we went past and even asked strangers if they had seen a girl with long brown hair, brown eyes, freckles and pale skin. Nothing. I was really starting to worry. All I could hope was that we would eventually find her or maybe that the other's were having more luck.

RICK'S P.O.V

"What now?" I asked as we reached a path that separated three ways.

"Well... one of us go left, one of us right and one of us go through the park," Elektra rolled her eyes as if it was the most obvious thing ever. Now that I think about it... it was pretty obvious.

"Okay I'll go through the park." I decided, looking down the dark and rough alleyway and then looking at the really busy street. I thought I'd be better off to go through the park. I'm not saying I'm a wimp but the dark way looked quite scary. Elektra would've been much better off going that way.

"I'll go to the left, Elektra are you going right?" Frank asked.

"Yeah. Come on then!" So Elektra went right, Frank went left, and I crossed the road - straight to the park. It was still chucking it down with rain. By then my hair had just flopped down my forehead. Once I got in the park gates, I slowed down a bit, making sure to look everywhere just in case. As far as I could see, there was no Amelia - no one at all. But I kept walking, straight through the park for what seemed like hours. That's when I saw someone. It was hard to see, it was so far away, but it looked like a girl all huddled up on the bench in a thick coat.

"Amelia? Amelia?!" I started screaming at the person and running towards them. I started feeling so relieved. But whoever it was saw me and started running, away from me. I chased after them, as quick as I could. I recognized something about that coat... It was Amelia's.  "Amelia wait!"  Once they got out of the park, someone jumped on them from the left, throwing them to the floor and stopping them from running. It was Frank and Elektra.

"What are you guys doing here?" I tried asking, getting my breath back.

"We couldn't find her so we were going to come through the park and find you. I'll ring Tee and tell her that we found her." Elektra got out her phone as Frank and I  helped the soaked person up off the floor.

"Leave me  alone!" It was definitely Amelia. She turned around and started walking to a bench just inside the park. I followed her and sat down next to her. I know I was the last person she wanted to see but I still wanted to get her back to the dumping ground, into the warm.  Once I sat down, she took her hood down a bit and looked at me. She looked freezing. Her face was as white as a sheet, she had water and hair dripping all down her face and she was shivering. It even looked like she had been crying. She had no bag with her or anything and when I looked closely, she had bruises on her face and hands. 

"Amelia... what happened? Why did you run away with absolutely nothing  and why do you have bruises on your face and hands?!" She looked at me sadly before bursting into tears. I shuffled towards her and wrapped my arms around her as I looked over at Frank to see that Faith, Tee and Tyler had got there.

AMELIA'S P.O.V

It was awful. All I could picture was the knife being held to my stomach as A group of men took my stuff and started beating me. Even half an hour later, I could still see it so clearly. They left me on the floor of the park, left me to get pneumonia. That's why I ran when I saw Rick coming - It didn't look like him, just a man in a black coat and it reminded me of the beating. But for some reason, when Rick wrapped his arms around me, I felt safe, as if no one could get to me ever again.

"I-I don't want to talk about it." I felt Rick move and then felt an extra layer on my back. Rick had taken his coat off and put it on my back. Was he crazy?! He was going to freeze to death. I took it back off my back and wrapped it back around him. "Don't.. you have it."

"Look... I know I've been an idiot with the whole Johnny thing and arguing with you..  but I just got a bit too protective that's all. I worried that Johnny would hurt you but that was me wasn't it? I hurt you. Like I said - the day of the football - when we were still together, I said that I get over protective a lot, especially about people I care about. And I care about you Amelia.. I do, I'm not going to pretend that  I don't have feelings for you, even though I know our chances are completely out the window now... I at least want to be friends, back to the way things were when we met.. without the feelings. Now I want you to have my coat, you've been out here longer and you're freezing. I don't care about myself, take it." I couldn't even reject it, I wasn't strong enough to stop him putting a coat on my back, I used up all my energy to run. Tyler called over saying that May-li had left the others at the house and was on her way.

"I-I don't want.. to go b-back!" I started crying even more. The thought of being stuck there with images in my head about the men and Johnny was horrible. It was getting too complicated; Did I have feelings for Johnny? Did I still have feelings for Rick? Not even I was sure.

"Amelia It'll be fine. I promise." Rick started holding me tighter, rocking back and forth in the long and dreaded  wait for the mini bus to come.