Taylor Marie "Alister" Foster (16) is the daughter of Drew Alister and his high school sweetheart. One day, Taylor turns up at San Antonio Memorial where she sees her dad for the first time in years.
It had been just under two weeks since Taylor's operation. Taylor had been kept sedated for 4 days and was now awake and out of the ICU. Now that she was healing well, the doctors were happy to let her start physiotherapy to rebuild the strength in her legs. Today was her second session and Taylor was struggling. It was hard for her to even stand up, let alone walk. "I can't do it!" Taylor growled frustrated as she collapsed back into the chair. Rick stood up from his chair and walked over to her. "Hey...yes you can! Come on...you've got this." He reassured her, giving her hand a squeeze. Taylor looked up at him with watery eyes. "Look...hold on to me. I've got you." Rick encouraged her as he helped her stand up. Taylor looked at him. "Trust me." He stated, as he held his arms out and held her arms tightly. He slowly walked backwards and Taylor took small steps forward. After 10 or so steps, she had to sit down again. "You did it." Rick said happily. Taylor nodded. "Hey...you'll get there. You went through a massive trauma. Just take it one step at a time..." Rick said. Taylor smiled and pulled Rick in for a tight hug. She knew that he was using his past experience to help her and that meant a lot. "Thank you..." She whispered into his ear. "Right...that's enough for today I think. Tomorrow we'll work on building the strength in your ankles. Until then, take these. Use them when you feel up to it. They'll just help your muscles recover and keep the tone that they already have." Morgan, one it Taylor's physiotherapists, said as he handed her some stress balls and elastic physio bands. Taylor nodded and allowed Morgan to help her back into her wheelchair. They then started walking down the corridor. When they got back to her room, Rick and Morgan helped the teen back into her bed, obviously seeing how tired she now was after her strenuous physio session. She got comfortable as a familiar face appeared in the door way. "Hey." Taylor grinned, happy to see Scott. She had only seen him a few times since the accident. He had gone back to work a few a few days after the accident but clearly he blamed himself for the accident and therefor he blamed himself for the teens current condition. Taylor noticed how quite Scott was being around her. "Hey, ermm Rick, do you think you could grab me some snacks?" She asked, looking at him in a way where he would understand that she wanted a few minutes alone to talk to Scott properly. "Yeah, sure. I was going to go see your dad anyway." Rick said as he stood up from the chair. He grabbed his jacket before he left, leaving Taylor and Scott alone. "Come sit down." Taylor said smiling as she pointed to the chair next to her bed. Scott hesitated before he did. There were a few minutes of awkwardly silence before Scott finally spoke. "I'm sorry you know..." Scott said avoiding eye contact. "I don't blame you Scott...I'm just annoyed this happened" Taylor reassured him. She reached out and took his hand. He looked at her. "I don't blame you...please stop blaming yourself. It was just some stupid accident. We're both alive and I'm getting better. Everything's going to be okay." Taylor said seriously, making sure he knew her thoughts on the whole situation. Scott smiled at the teen. "And thank to you, I got out of some boring test that everyone apparently failed." Taylor joked, trying to make him feel better. Scott couldn't help but chuckle. "Honestly, I'm not missing much. Rick's going to go get me some work from school so I don't fall behind." She added, reassuring him that things were fine. He nodded and smiled. "Anyway, aren't you meant to be working?" She teased. "Aren't you meant to not be a smart-arse?" Scott shot back as he stood up. Taylor laughed and said goodbye as he headed back to work. She spent some time on her phone before she decided to have a nap as she was pretty tired. Later that day, Taylor was sat in her bed on her laptop. Rick had been called into work to sort a few things out so he hadn't come back. Drew was obviously still working, but Taylor didn't mind. It gave her some peace and quiet and plenty of time to catch up on some of her shows that she had missed. The teen looked up from her screen when she heard the door open. "What do you want?" She asked her 'so-called mother'. "Taylor, honey. Just hear me out. Please..." "I'm listening." Taylor sighed annoyed. "I want you to come back to Seattle with me. Come back home. I care about you honey and I want to look after you-" "Care about me?!" Taylor scoffed. "Right..." Taylor laughed. "You didn't even know that I'd left Seattle. Then it took you over a month - of persistent phone calls - to get here. You don't care about me. I don't want to come home. I'm staying here. This is my home now. Drew, Rick and everyone here, they're my family. I can't deal with you anymore. Get lost." Taylor said seriously, crossing her arms over her chest at the last part. Her mum looked at her. "I said leave! I don't want to see you!!" Taylor said raising her voice annoyed as she threw the stress ball that she had in her hand in her "mother's" direction. Katherine glared at her daughter. "Go to hell." She muttered before she stormed out of the room. Taylor just laughed and shook her head. She then sent a text to both Rick and Drew. Mums gone. Won't be back. I told her to get lost and she told me to go to hell. I'll explain fully later. I'm fine though, honestly.
A few hours later, Taylor was sat up in her bed talking to her dad and Rick. "...so she just came in here and started saying how she wanted me to come back to Seattle. How she wants to look after me. I told her to get lost. When she didn't leave I may or may not have thrown my stress ball at her...that's when she told me to go to hell and left." Taylor explained to her father and Rick. She saw the way they were looking at her. "I'm good though. I honestly don't care. I'm happy here, with you two." Taylor added, making both men smile slightly. "Well, that's actually something that we've been talking about." Drew, making Taylor look down slightly thinking they didn't want her here either. "We want to get full custody of you. With everything that's happened, I don't imagine a judge will look two ways about it." Drew explained, holding Rick's hand. "Really?" Taylor asked surprised. "Yeah. We want you to live with us, here. Permanently." Rick answered, making the teen grin widely. "I'd love that." She told them, giving her dad a hug. "We'll get the ball rolling then." Drew told his daughter, staying next to her on the bed. Taylor grinned. "Love you dad." She said, leaning against him. "Love you." Drew said, leaning down and kissing the top of her head. "And you! Get over here." Taylor grinned, beckoning Rick over to join in their family hug. He smiled and laughed slightly at her bossiness, as he made his way over to the other side of her bed and joined them. "I love you both...you know that right?" Taylor told them seriously. Both men smiled.
——————————————————— Hey guys! Dharma here. Sorry it's been so long since we updated it like we said, we're really not feeling this book anymore. I've been crazy busy between work, college work and other stuff he seems why I haven't updated soon. Hope you like this chapter! There's only a couple chapters left until this book is complete! Hope you enjoy and and thanks for reading! x
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
