𝗝𝘂𝘀𝘁 𝗙𝗿𝗮𝗻𝗸𝗶𝗲

12. 𝗧𝗵𝗲𝘀𝗲 𝗙𝗲𝗲𝗹𝗶𝗻𝗴𝘀

(5)
Flashback
Lena's POV

It had been a few months since Frankie had begun her journey with us. Stef and I had always wanted a child, but we weren't expecting it to be this soon. I was shocked when I had gotten the call from her. At first it felt not even close to real. Far from it. Hours later, Stef walked through the door with a sleeping Frankie in her arms.

It didn't take long after for reality to hit. Staying up late with this little girl to comfort her with her night terrors. Then waking up early with the birds and her.

That kid never seemed to sleep. And when she did, it was very few hours of restless sleep. She seemed to be even more alert at night. Very cautious of her surroundings, especially around the two new strangers that were taking care of her.

Stef and I deep down knew something very bad had happened to this little girl. We could ask her but we didn't want her to have to relive it by talking about it, as badly as we wanted to know.

Frankie already had an extremely defined personality. We got to experience it first hand. As much of a joy it was to see the different sides of her, it also made our hearts break even more.

Her emotions went in waves. In the short time we had gotten to know her, we had seen the spunky chaotic side of her. Running around the house as we chased her. That high pitched little squeaky laughter. Her big smile and two small dimples that appeared. Stef liked to call them her little apple dumplings. The two of them soon came up with their own little game. Frankie would try not to smile or laugh and  Stef would have to figure out ways how. Once this was achieved, Frankie's apple dumplings would show and Stef would lightly grab her cheek and say "I got your apple dumplings!" This would cause Frankie to smile even harder.

The two of them had a bond, since day one. I myself had also created a different bond with her. Sometimes I almost felt jealousy towards Stef and deep down inside, I was the only one that knew why. But I couldn't tell her. I didn't know how to even begin with the words I would soon have to say. I kept pushing that constant tugging to the side and focused on how happy my wife was with this little girl.

But Stef wasn't always happy. That is because Frankie wasn't always happy either.

Rather than having an emotion appear for a bit, then moving to the next emotion and so on, Frankie was a bit different. Hers was more of a hurricane. Her being in the center and us spinning helplessly around it. Multiple feelings being thrown at her resulting in many multiple reactions.

We had seen days where Frankie wanted nothing to do with the both of us. She wouldn't become scared necessarily, just bold with what she wanted in that moment. We did discover she would become overwhelmed quite easily, so that's when we would give her the space she needed to unwind and regenerate.

Other days, Frankie was jumpy. Skittish. And timid. All these pointing to signs of past abuse. We had a long way to go with this young child that sadly had to experience so much of that at such a young age.

Frankie did end up unwinding certain ways such as wanting some time to herself. Or  unwinding in a different way, that is by hitting Stef in the face.

This kid had an angry flare in that tiny body. She tended to get angry or violent at us very quickly, often times without warning. This resulted in an outburst of vocal screaming, then proceeding to thrash her body onto the ground.

What scared us most is when she would purposely bang her head against a wall and even the hard wood floor. Stef said she was self destructive. Like a ticking time bomb just waiting to go off.