Kiss Me Hello (Sweetest Kisses)

by Grace Burrowes

  “With a vengeance,” Mac assured her. “He’ll meet Luis at school, and if Luis doesn’t want to move back to a Baltimore placement, then Trent will stop at nothing to keep him here.”

  “Luis won’t fight it. The fight went out of that kid about four placements ago.” The “kid” was now as tall as his foster mother.

  “Then we’ll fight for him.”

  Mac spoke calmly, with utter conviction. When he gently pushed Sid’s head to his shoulder, she resisted, peering around to see his eyes.

  More conviction.

  She rested her head on his shoulder and wished like hell she’d done a better job of accepting Mac’s apology when she’d had the chance.

  * * *

  Trent Knightley closed the door to the world’s plainest conference room, and set his briefcase on the floor.

  “It’s like this, Luis. The Department is in charge of licensing foster homes. They can move you from one to the other without so much as waving at the judge, but when they move you to a more restrictive placement—treatment foster care, a residential treatment facility—then they have to get the judge involved.”

  Luis gave the guy credit for holding eye contact when he delivered bad news. Terrible news, really. Sid wouldn’t like this one bit.

  “Mac told me that,” Luis said, folding into a bright orange plastic school chair that was probably sized for a fifth grader. “Isn’t moving me out of county something a judge needs to do?”

  Trent took one of the other chairs—blue, which went with his shark suit. “A judge has to be the one to order your case transferred. Do you know when your last permanency planning hearing was?”

  Plans, plans, plans. Luis’s last social worker had explained to him that the feds got tired of paying for kids to grow up in foster care, so the local jurisdictions had to do a creditable job of moving kids to some final destination, as if a kid’s life was a game of Chutes and Ladders.

  The state had to come up with a plan to situate a kid somewhere permanently, and then had to get a judge to sign off on the plan at a hearing. Across the room, etched in red on a square whiteboard were the words: “I have a dream.”

  “I was fourteen the last time the permanency planning came up at court,” Luis said. Sid had dreams. “Why?” The hearing had lasted a whole five minutes longer than usual too.

  “The Department isn’t recommending any change to your permanency plan. In fact, DSS isn’t even putting your plan before the judge to consider. They’re treating this as a routine case review, when you’re way overdue for a change of plan to adoption or even independent living, which they call Another Planned Permanent Living Arrangement, or APPLA. You can read their recommendations on the last page of this document.”

  Trent slid the usual ration of crap across the table, though at each hearing, the social worker’s update was a few pages longer.

  When had the Department’s damned plans ever done Luis a bit of good? “So what will happen?” Luis would read Amy Snyder’s immortal prose later.

  “First, tell me what you want to have happen.”

  As a lawyer, Trent Knightley was different from his predecessors. He’d scheduled this meeting at school, during gym class no less, and he hadn’t let the guidance counselors leave them in the guidance suite’s waiting area to meet. Trent had insisted on privacy.

  So Luis studied a Rorschach butterfly-shaped stain on the industrial tan carpet and chose his words.

  “I want to stay with Sid.”

  “You’re positive about that? I work for you. My job is to make sure the judge knows what you want, and to advocate for that if it’s reasonable. If you want to be placed with your sisters…?”

  Sid had been babbling, apparently. The stain also looked like pelvic bones, sorta.

  “Don’t insult me, Trent. Ozzie and Harriet would no more take me in than you’d leave your kids alone with a starving wolf.” A starving, rabid wolf with deviant sexual tendencies and bad body odor.

  “If they’d take you in, would you go?”

  “No, I would not. They’ll take good care of the girls. My sisters look more Anglo than I do.”

  Meeting Trent’s eyes when that truth saw the light of day was hard, but not impossible. The guy knew better than to let his pity show.

  “You want to stay with Sid. Anything else? You want regularly scheduled visits with your mom? Visits with your sisters?” Trent wasn’t taking notes, he was listening. Grown-ups who listened were a damned pain in the ass.

  Grown-ups who didn’t were worse.

  “Visit with my sisters, yes, though that won’t happen. Mom—I write to her.”

  “She might be at the hearing.”

  Huh? “They never transported her to my hearings before, not after the first couple. I thought that meant she didn’t want to come.”

  Trent withdrew a business card from a gold case with a rearing horse on it, and tossed the card in Luis’s direction. The white rectangle settled immediately before him, as if that toss had been one of the skills taught along with evidence, divorce law, and how to look sharp in a three-piece suit.

  “Sometimes,” Trent said as Luis picked up the card, “failure to transport an incarcerated parent means nobody gets the writ for transportation submitted in time, or the Division of Corrections loses it, or their van is in the shop, or there’s traffic on the interstate. If she’s there, you have to ask permission to hug her, though talking to her is usually OK, as long as nobody gets upset.”

  Luis would deal with Mama if she was there; he’d deal with it if she wasn’t. “We’re going to lose, aren’t we?”

  “Why do you say that?”

  “Because the Department has legal and physical custody of me. It’s their ball and their bat.” A Louisville Slugger, aimed at Sid’s happiness.

  Trent’s smile was reassuring and not at all nice. “But not their rule book. The gold standard for making decisions in these cases is the best interests of the child, and your interests are in no way served by moving you out of county.” Trent took the card and wrote on the back—even this guy’s pen was gold. “This is my number, my cell’s on the back. If I’m in court, I can’t pick up, but I answer all messages usually within the same business day. You think of anything, you call me, and, Luis?”

  Luis stood and picked up the eraser at the bottom of the whiteboard. “I know: No screwing up the night before court. No shoplifting. No putting my hands on some girl. No getting into a pushy-shovey with Sid. No hooking school. No getting high or partying. No AWOLing. No nothing. I’m not stupid.”

  “You’re human,” Trent said, rising. “If you’re tempted to misbehave, just think of how much fun you’ll have when DSS bounce-passes you to juvie. Lotsa smart guys have ended up in juvie. Don’t you be one of them.”

  “I won’t.”

  Trent smiled at him, a brief flash of teeth that reminded Luis of Mac, and of that wolf he’d mentioned earlier. Not a guy to mess with, this one. The image of Luis on his knees before a bucket popped into his head.

  “You saw me drunk.”

  “I did.”

  Luis tossed the eraser just high enough to kiss the drop-ceiling tile but not leave an imprint.

  “Why would you go to bat for me when you know I don’t deserve to stay with Sid?”

  Trent flipped his tie, some abstract design in blue and white. “If you think one tipsy morning makes you worthless, you need to reexamine your priorities. Everybody stumbles—me, Mac, Sid, everybody. The difference is that some of us acknowledge our mistakes and try to do better, and others pretend they never screw up. Mac is meeting with Sid to go over the Department’s recommendations—informally, of course, because a foster parent has no standing in the court case.”

  Trent extended a hand. “I’m trying to get hold of your worker, and James is checking his traplines for random intelligence. We’ll meet w
ith Hannah before court, because she has foster care expertise that goes beyond the courtroom. Your job is to not screw up between now and court.”

  Trent had a good handshake. Nothing pansy or reluctant about it.

  “I can do that.”

  With four lawyers circling the wagons on Luis’s behalf, screwing up wasn’t an option, no matter how badly he might be tempted. Trent left, and Luis followed him out, but took a minute first to erase Dr. King’s inspiring words from the whiteboard.

  * * *

  Luis reported to Sid that Miss Amy Snyder had met with him at school—he’d missed lunch to hear her out—and she’d patiently explained to him that being nearer his sisters was in his best interests, even if the girls’ foster family treated him like dirt and thumbed their noses at court-ordered visits.

  She’d further explained—Miss Amy was apparently fond of the sound of her own explanations—that Luis’s attorney, whose name had escaped her, would advocate for his interests before the judge. Luis was not to worry. His attorney would be certain to be present the day of court.

  “Sometimes,” Miss Amy had said, “the Department’s hands are tied, and the regulations leave us no options.”

  Then she’d taken his damned picture, switched off her SmartPad, and left.

  She wasn’t even nice. Most of Luis’s workers had been at least superficially nice, many of them more than that. They tried their best to make a complicated, unwieldy system do handsprings, and it wasn’t their fault the results were disappointing.

  “You made brownies for a legal meeting?” Luis asked Sid as she took the pan out of the oven.

  “Double batch, considering who’s coming over. Anything you want to say to me before they arrive?”

  I love you. Except admitting that smarmy crap now would just make Sid cry, and that would make Luis crazy.

  She was smart, Sid was. She didn’t turn and spear him with her mama-eyed lightsaber, she kept puttering in the big kitchen, making a racket with the bowl and spoons she’d used to put together the brownie batter.

  “I don’t want to leave here. I don’t want to leave you.”

  She did turn then, draped a dish towel over her shoulder, and crossed her arms as she leaned back against the counter.

  “You know I love you, Weese?”

  “I know that. You should be more careful who you love, but I know you love me.” And leaving Sid would ruin him and his chances for a decent future. Luis knew that too. Sid talked about college like that was just the next thing on the list.

  “If you want to go to damned Baltimore,” she said, “I’ll drive you there. I’ll pack your stuff and call DSS myself, if it’s what you want.”

  Damn her and her mama-bear bravery. “I don’t want to go to Baltimore.” Luis hadn’t meant to raise his voice.

  She folded the towel over her shoulder, as if it were some kind of fashion accessory.

  “OK, so you want to stay with me, but you don’t want me to adopt you. One measly little adoption, my friend, and they couldn’t do this to you anymore.”

  “I know that too. Just lay off, would you? I’m going to check on the horses.”

  Luis left the kitchen at a near run, letting the screen door slam, though he knew it drove Sid nuts. He was already in tears by the time he buried his face against Buttercup’s coarse, stinky mane.

  * * *

  “The Department isn’t wrong,” Trenton Knightley said.

  If his tone were any more reasonable, Sid would have to choke him. The kitchen bore the lovely scent of fresh-baked brownies, some fool bird was chirping madly out in the oak tree, and Sid was contemplating lawyer-cide.

  Not for the first time.

  “Viewed from one perspective,” Trent went on, “if Luis were placed closer to his sisters, that would be less restrictive. The Baltimore court would have considered that before they sent Luis out here with Sid, though, and the Baltimore judge decided continuity of placement was more important than visits Luis wasn’t even getting.”

  “Sid would haul him to those visits if DSS set them up, I’m sure.” The comment came from James, who sat on one side of Sid at the kitchen table. Hannah sat on the other, which meant Sid was across from Mac, Luis, and Trent. Vera, may the woman be canonized, had volunteered to look after Grace and Merle.

  “I got Luis to every visit that was scheduled,” Sid said. “When Luis and his sisters were in the same jurisdiction, their respective workers could coordinate visits, though the other foster parents had endless excuses. This week it was a cold, the next week it was a dress rehearsal for the first-grade play. Always something.”

  While Luis had stopped asking if he could even call his sisters. Both girls apparently took the world’s longest showers, then went immediately to sleep. Every single night.

  “I can hammer on the fact that the visits haven’t been set up since Luis got here,” Trent said, choosing a brownie from the stack on the plate in the center of the table. “I can make the point that the local Department has dropped that ball miserably.”

  “And you’ll lose,” Mac retorted. “The Department will apologize heartily, and point out that you’ve made their case for them. The visits were easier to schedule when Luis was in the same jurisdiction as his sisters. Brian Patlack isn’t stupid.”

  “Who’s he?” Luis asked around a mouthful of brownie.

  “The attorney for DSS,” Trent said. “If he knows he has a contested case on his hands, he’ll sometimes try to reason with his client until a compromise can be hammered out, but he’s out of town all week at some golf tournament. I’m striking out with Ms. Snyder’s supervisor, as well, because he’s at an off-site training.”

  Worse and worse. The half mug of milk Sid had managed wasn’t agreeing with her at all.

  “If it’s any comfort,” James said, “nobody at DSS likes Amy Snyder. My contacts there are reasonably professional, but some of them go back a few years, and every single one of them gets that pissy, oh-her tone of voice when I mention Amy’s name. She’s not a team player, won’t take the hard cases, and seems to have her supervisor wrapped around her finger. One of the ladies hinted Amy’s uncle is close to the governor.”

  The governor. Sid could not bear to meet Luis’s eyes when James had shared that cheering tidbit.

  “Did you get the sense she cuts corners, James?” Hannah asked.

  “I can answer that,” Luis said, balling up his napkin and lobbing it into the trash. “Amy Snyder loves the rules, and they are more important to her than what’s right. She wins if the rules are obeyed, and if the rules are contradictory, like the best interests of the child, meaning I’d stay, while some other rule means I’d go, she gets mad. She hates it.”

  Hatred, a fine quality in a child welfare worker.

  “I agree with Luis,” Sid said. “He’s pegged her accurately. Amy isn’t confused or bewildered by conflicting guidance, she’s pissed. Insulted, peeved, affronted that she should have to deal with untidiness. Luis and I are square pegs to her, and the right outcome is for Baltimore to solve the problem that Baltimore created.”

  James pushed the plate of brownies at her—a considerably less full plate of brownies than it had been at the start of the meeting.

  “Why are you square pegs?” he asked.

  When had they ever been anything else? “Because Luis doesn’t want to be adopted, he doesn’t have relatives who can take him in, and he isn’t clamoring to be emancipated.”

  “That’s an option,” Mac said. “The judge can spring him, turn him loose by court order, make him an underage adult, and then Luis is free to do whatever he wants.”

  Trent dipped his brownie in a glass of milk and took a considering nibble. “Judge Stevens won’t spring a sixteen-year-old new to the area who has no money in the bank, no family around here, no place to stay outside a licensed foster home, no plan for how
he’ll complete his education.”

  “I have a trust fund,” Luis said. “That might count for something.”

  The four—count ’em!—attorneys at the table exchanged glances. Four of them, and still they’d be unlikely to convince a judge to set aside the Department’s plan.

  “You haven’t seen a nickel of that trust,” Mac said. He’d not touched the brownies. “But the fund is another reason to leave you with Sid, because she’s the trustee. Much easier for her to disburse the funds to you if you’re living under her roof.”

  Excellent notion, though still probably not excellent enough.

  They batted ideas around until the brownies were nearly gone and Luis was discreetly yawning behind his hand.

  “I’m going to turn out the girls for the night.” Luis said.

  James got to his feet. “I’ll go with you. Moon should be coming up soon, and it’s a pretty night. Sid, try not to worry. If the judge wants to know where Luis will stay when he’s emancipated, he can stay with us. Be convenient to his summer job, and Twyla would adore him.”

  “He could stay with us too,” Hannah said. “Grace has asked me more than once for a big brother.”

  “Or there’s my place,” Mac said, staring at the few remaining brownies. “Kid could put that pool table to some use.”

  “You’d take him in, just like that?” Sid asked.

  “Why not?” Trent replied. “You did.”

  Sid sat back, swallowing hard, saying not one word as Trent and Mac left the kitchen behind James. Hannah patted her shoulder and rose, taking the brownie plate to the counter.

  “Something puzzles me,” Hannah said.

  While Sid was tied completely in knots. “That would be?”

  “Where is your foster care worker in all this? And where’s your plastic wrap?”

  “You mean Amy? She’s all too apparently running the damned show. The plastic wrap is in the drawer beside the sink.”

  “No, your worker. Every licensed home has a worker whose job is to look after the foster families, not the foster kids. They handle the things that relate to licensure, they stay in touch with the families as a kind of support chain, and they visit from time to time regardless of which children you’re fostering.”