The Lost Girl

Chapter 3: A Mystery Call

Ben's POV

I left the room in search of blankets for Quinn. As I searched through a closet, my phone rang. I pulled it out of my pocket and answered it.
"Hello?" I said. No one replied. Just slightly heavy breathing on the other end. It was weird. Then the line went dead and I went back to searching for blankets. I found some and went to go put them on the couch and check up on Quinn. When I walked into the kitchen, she was sitting at the table staring at her food. I plopped the blankets down on the couch and went over to her.
"Quinn, you gotta eat. What's wrong?" I said.
"Nothing," She said. And if I hadn't been standing near her I wouldn't have heard what she said.
"Quinn, do you have any family around here?" I asked. She shook her head no. "So no one would call in case you picked up?"
"No," Quinn said quietly.
"Okay, so it's all set up. I know you fell asleep back stage, but you should sleep now. That is if you're not going to eat," I said. I could tell my voice sounded awkward. Quinn turned back to the food. Then my phone rang again.
"Hello," I said as I answered it.
"Hey, Ben," Andrew's voice replied.
"What do you want?" I asked him.
"The manager of the theatre thinks we should tell social services about Quinn."
"They'll put her in an unsafe environment, Andrew."
"You don't know that."
"Its New York. There's not really a safe place for a kid here."
"Many people are born and raised here."
"I know, but social services might place her with an addict. I don't want that. She's scared enough as it is. I can't bare the thought of her never not being scared," I said.
"Damn, you really care for her, don't you?"
"Yeh, I do," I said. I turned and saw Quinn eating. She turned her head and saw me looking at her, then she stopped eating. I turned around and continued talking to Andrew.
"Have you figured out how old she is yet?" He asked.
"No, but she looks about 14," I replied, looking back at Quinn for a second.
"Does she have any clue to who she is yet?"
"No, I don't know when she will. And I don't know if we'll be able to keep her long enough to know who she actually is."
"Ben, I'm going to tell you something that you might not like," Andrew said. He sounded a little guilty of something. My heart sank in my chest. I knew that the next words out of his mouth were "I called social services".
"What is it?" I asked. It was sort of hard to get out.
"I called social services, and I also have some news you'll like."
"What?" I could feel my heart stop sinking.
"We can keep Quinn. We just have some limits," Andrew said.
"That's great! What limits?"
"We need to get her into a school, she can't spend nights in the theatre, and one of us needs to make sure she eats at night during performances. Now I know it'll be hard for you make sure of the last thing, but Kara and I can make sure of it," Andrew went on about how we can make this work for Quinn. I was just happy that we'd be able to keep her. Even if it was a temporary set up, I felt like having her near or even in a theatre would help her remember. This was great. I turned to Quinn ready to tell her the news.
"Quinn, I have some great news," I said. I could feel a huge smile on my face.
What? Quinn wrote. She had kept the pad of paper and pen from when I  handed to her.
"You get to stay with us," I said excitedly. I still couldn't believe it. I watched a smile enter her face. This was a happy moment. She stood up and hugged me.
"I think you should get some sleep. Tomorrow morning we'll look at some schools near the theatre," I said. Quinn nodded and went to the couch.
"Does this mean I'll have to talk a little louder?" she asked.
"It would be nice, but go at your own pace," I replied. She nodded and layed down.
"Goodnight," she said as I covered her with the blanket.
"Goodnight," I said. I turned off the over head light for the living room. Then I realised that she might get scared. "I'm gonna turn on a lamp. I hope you don't mind," I said as I turned on a lamp across the room.
"It's okay. I wanted a light on anyway," she said. I smiled at her and sat down in a chair next to the couch. But then my phone buzzed.
"I have to take this," I said. I got up and went into the kitchen. "Hello?"
This phone call was the same as the one before. No one answered. It was just someone breathing. I had gotten a little fed up with this.
"If you call me again with no answering anything I say I will call the police," I said. I tried to keep my voice a little quiet so Quinn wouldn't hear me. Then the line went dead. I sighed and went back to Quinn to make sure she was getting settled in.
"Is everything okay?" Quinn asked when I returned to the chair.
"Yeah, I just had a weird phone call," I replied. Quinn had been sitting up. "Quinn, lay back down and get some sleep. If you get scared, my room is down the hall and the door on the right."
"Okay," Quinn said. She laid back down and I recovered her with the blanket. Then I went into my room.

Quinn's POV

I couldn't fall asleep, so I after five minutes of staring at the ceiling I went into Ben's room. He was on the phone with someone.
"Okay, this is getting ridiculous. I'm calling the police," he said. He hung up on whoever it was and dialed a number. "Hello, I would like to report something."
I backed away from the door. I began to think that he was going to say it was because of me. I didn't know why I thought that, but I did. I went back to the couch and laid back down.
A little while later, Ben came back to check on me.
"Quinn, I know you were at the door. That report I made was because someone keeps calling me. They never say anything though. It's just breathing. I did tell them about you, but they aren't going to take you away. And just so you know, I don't think any of this is because of you," he said. I looked at him. I could see tears form in his eyes. Looking at him made me tear up too.
What did they say about the phone calls? I wrote.
"They can't do much right now, but if I go to the station at some point and they call me again, they will track the number and arrest the person. They said that this can be considered prank calling," Ben replied. "Now, why are you still awake?"
I can't fall asleep. I looked up at Ben.
"Okay, follow me," he said. He held out his hand and I took it.