Surprise!

Claire’s POV:

I woke up to a bunch of text messages from everyone wishing me a happy birthday. I was very pleased that no one important to me forgot. I start to get up as my mom bursts through my door.

“Where is it!” She screams.

“What? What are you talking about?” I reply rubbing my eyes.

“I know you took it, you always take my stuff! Give it back to me or get the hell out of my house!” She grabs me by my pajama shirt and starts shoving me.

“What the hell are you talking about you psycho!”

“What’s going on?” Teddy says, coming down the hall.

“It’s okay champ, go back to sleep. Mom lost something. I’ll help her find it.” I tell him knowing damn well he was already up for the day.

“Happy birthday, sis. I love you!” He comes and gives me a tight squeeze. Before we knew what was happening, our mother is on top of us beating the crap out of us. She gets teddy right in the nose. He starts gushing blood.

“You crazy drunk bitch! What the hell is wrong with you!” I scream trying to pull her off him. I finally get a good enough grip of her sweaty arm to throw her off him. “That’s your son!” “I know you took it! Give it back!” “We didn’t take anything! You’re losing your mind!” “Just get out! Both of you! I don’t need you or want you here! GET OUT!” She shrieks. “Gladly!” I say as I grab everything I can for me and my brother. Teddy is trying to hold back his tears but his little heart is just so broken. He just stares at our mother in disbelief. “You will never see us again. Not ever!” And with that we went out the door.

We walked down the street and came to a diner. We went in to have breakfast. I told Teddy to order whatever he wanted. The waitress was nice and brought us extra whip cream for our hot chocolates.

“What are we going to do?” Teddy says as I take a huge bite of my whip.

“Teddy, I don’t want you to worry. You don’t know how good it is yet, but you will. Once you see how life is supposed to be, and how loved you should be. You’ll see.” I reply, knowing he was still upset.

“I’m sorry this happened on your birthday. I wish mom wasn’t so crazy.”

“That’s okay champ! It was the biggest blessing I could have asked for!” I say.

We finish our breakfast and go outside. I call a cab. I tell the cab driver the address and me and Teddy sit there in silence.

We pull up and Teddy can’t believe his eyes.

“Where are we?!” He yells excitedly.

“We’re at Selene’s. This is our family now.” I still can’t believe I’ve never brought him here. I should have, a long time ago….

Knock. Knock. Knock. We wait patiently for someone to answer. Selene opens the door with a confused look on her face.

“Hey! My man!” She greets, shaking his hair.

“Come in!” We both go inside and sit down.

“Woah! You have a pool!” Teddy says.

“Sure do! Why don’t you go into the hallway and yell for our maid Luisa? Tell her you would like to go swimming and she will help you.” She replied with a laugh.

“Heck yeah!” Teddy starts running down the hallway yelling “Luisa! Luisa! Luisa!”

“What’s going on? You’ve never brought him here.” Selene says with worry on her face. I explain the whole story starting from the very first day I went back. When I’m finished explaining she was silent. She looked as if she was making a decision. “Why didn’t you just stay here? You know how she is.” She finally says.

“I-I didn’t want to ruin your rest.” I reply, looking at the floor. She grabs my hands and says “you and Teddy are always welcome here. No matter what. We are your family!” I was so relieved to hear it, I started to cry. I don’t know why I was so worried about it. I knew they would take us in. I have the best friend in the whole world, I thought to myself.

She took me upstairs to her room to drop off our stuff.

“We will figure this out as it goes” she says enthusiastically. I just nod my head.

“You better start getting ready for your big night! Me and Teddy will just watch movies until you come home!” “Thank you!” I give her a big hug with tears welling up in my eyes. As I set off to get ready for the night I thought maybe I should just stay in. Today was kind of a rough day. And I didn’t want to leave Teddy without me. But I quickly changed my mind when I realized that Selene’s put so much effort into this event it would be really rude to not go. I turned on the shower and got in. I let the hot water run over me for a while. I slowly washed my hair and let the suds run down my body. Getting out and patting myself down with a towel I went to get dressed. Out of the corner of my eye I see a big box with my name on it. And a note. The note read:

Claire,

We love you so much. I hope you have an amazing night in this gorgeous dress. Live your dream!

Signed, your sister Selene

I opened the box and gasped. It was the dress I picked out weeks ago on one of our shopping sprees! It was so expensive I put it back. I remember it fitting like a glove. I put the dress on and the heels it came with. The dress was beautiful. It was black with sparkles. Coming to mid thigh, strapless and backless. It was a very beautiful dress. I went back for it a week later because I was kicking myself for not buying it. But to my surprise it was gone! Now I knew why. Looking at myself in the mirror I told myself: “LET’S DO THIS!” And walked out of the bathroom.