Once Abandoned, Now Found

Chapter 4

With Alex safe in bed with her saviours, it would have been easy to think that the night would have been spent peacefully asleep. But while Alex was safe physically, in her head, all bets were off.

"What did we say about talking you rat!" The sound of a slap echoed through the room, a younger Alex falling to the floor. She clutched the side of her face while staring up at her tormentor. Alex couldn't see his face, only a fuzzy black outline with flaming red eyes, but she knew who he was.

"N-n-not to" Alex stuttered out, trying desperately to crawl away.

"And what happens when you do?" The man glared, marching towards the small girl with a deathly stare.

"P-pun-p-punish." Alex hung her head and braced herself for what was coming. Her screams, plus the sounds of fists and boots hitting her small body echoed around the house, the screams piercing the previously peaceful night.

"Stupid"

"Bad girl"

"Bastard child"

"Worthless"

"Ugly"

These words were all Alex could hear, circling in her head until they took over the rest of her senses.

"Alex! Alex, baby!" Maggie called out, trying to wake the sleeping girl.

"No, no, no hurt!" Alex screamed, thrashing about under the bed covers.

"Come on baby you need to wake up." Danni was trying too, but no amount of talking and shaking was waking Alex up.

"Okay, new plan" Maggie muttered. In a quick second, her pyjama t-shirt was off and, after removing Alex's onesie, she stood up and held Alex to her chest, rocking her gently.

Alex's screams almost immediately turned into cries and then subsided into sniffles, her head buried into Maggie's neck. It wasn't clear if Alex had woken up, or if Maggie's actions had only removed the nightmare, but either way, Maggie continued to rock her arms and hum lullabies quietly into Alex's ear.

"No, no hurt" Alex mumbled, holding onto Maggie as if for dear life.

"No hurt baby, no hurt" Maggie said softly. With both her arms under Alex's bottom, she could feel the wet diaper and knew that would just be adding to Alex's discomfort.

"How about you have a small bath, a change, and then we all go back to bed huh?" Danni suggested, already remaking the bed.

"Baf" Alex sighed, finally beginning to relax.

Danni went ahead into the bathroom, beginning to fill it up with warm water to help relax the poor girl. Maggie slowly made her way in too, not stopping the rocking or humming in an attempt to keep Alex as calm as possible.

Maggie made quick work of undoing the tapes on Alex's soiled diaper and carefully deposited Alex in the warm bath. As this was to relax and clean, Danni began washing Alex gently with a washcloth, cupping extra water in her hand and letting it run down her back.

"Where 'nesie?" Alex asked, her voice laced with exhaustion.

"I took it off you baby. You were unhappy, I took it off so we could have some skin-to-skin contact" Maggie explained, setting out a towel, clean diaper, wipes, and the onesie. Maggie wasn't sure if Alex would be okay with her actions if awake, but desperate times called for desperate measures, and Maggie wasn't willing to let Alex suffer.

"'Kay" was all the reply Maggie got, as Alex slowly began to fall asleep in the bath.

The bathwater was drained, and Alex hoisted into a warm fluffy towel, that quickly reminded her of how much better sleeping warm is.

"S'eep?"

"In a minute darling, we need to get dressed for sleep first" Danni cooed.

Alex was laid on a second towel, and once dry, had the diaper taped snugly around her. The dinosaur onesie quickly returned too, earning a small smile from the girl.

"You feeling better now little lady?" Maggie asked, picking Alex back up and setting her on her hip.

A dinosaur yawn was Alex's answer. Maggie got dressed again too, and soon the three found themselves peacefully asleep in bed. They would address the nightmare in the morning.

————

A loud banging downstairs woke them all up, Maggie and Danni groaning while Alex went straight to sobbing.

"Oh baby, that loud noise must be horrible huh?" Danni immediately snapped into mama mood, picking up the crying little and holding her close.

"No 'ike" Alex sobbed, putting her small hands over her ears.

"I bet. How about we stay here while Maggie goes to find out what's banging baby?" Danni gently bounced Alex, rubbing the small of Alex's back with her free hand while beckoning Maggie to find the source of the noise.

Maggie was still groaning as she headed downstairs, after Alex's big nightmare, plus several crying episodes all she wanted to do was sleep. Instead, she had awoken by someone inconsiderately pounding on her front door and now had a crying little upstairs.

"What!" She grumbled, throwing open her front door.

Stood in front of her was a well-dressed man. His suit was pressed; his shoes were an almost mirror from polish; his hair gelled back to complete the ensemble. In all, he was not what Maggie expected. There was a few moments of silence, the man not expecting a frazzled woman in her pyjamas, and Maggie was not expecting, well, him. The man cleared his throat before reaching into a pocket and pulling out a badge.

"James Witherstone, Littles Protection Service. I believe you called us last night?" His voice immediately put Maggie off, he sounded like he belonged in some high-class establishment, not outside her house.

"Oh shit, um, yeah, yes we did. Sorry, um, come on in" Maggie was desperately trying to make up for her previous introduction, though she wasn't sure if Mr James Witherstone was ever going to forget this.

"I'm Maggie Briggs, my girlfriend is upstairs with Alex" Maggie explained, "do you want a drink?"

"Tea, milk, no sugar." Mr Witherstone's eyes were seeming to examine every inch of Maggie's hallway, and then the living room once he was there.

"Danni love, it's LPS, can you bring Alex down?" She called, waiting to hear a response before moving on to the kitchen.

One boiled kettle and three mugs of tea later, Danni, Maggie, and Alex found themselves sat on the sofa opposite Mr Witherstone.

"Sorry about this morning, Alex had a difficult night." Danni was attempting to explain why they haven't dressed even remotely appropriately for what turned out to be 11 in the morning.

"I'm sure."

Danni did not like James Witherstone. Maggie did not like James Witherstone. Alex just wanted to go back to sleep.

A/N Here's chapter 4. I'm trying to stay a chapter ahead so that if anything happens one week I can still upload a chapter. 

Thank you to everyone for reading this, and for the votes!