Lost And Found

Lost

Stephen Morton
I have had it with Anastasia and her not doing as asked. Talking back to me. I adopted her after marrying Carla after Frank died after falling down his stairs. I checked the stairs and I just don't see how he could have fell and died from falling down them. Anastasia was five when I met Carla. At first we were alright and then things got weird.
Carla
I can't believe the brat is causing problems for me yet again. So I made her regret opening her mouth again. She will learn not to back talk to anyone. After ten smacks to her mouth I locked her in the closet for a day and told her she had better not mess up the floor. The first thing she did was run to the bathroom, when I freed her. She was quiet and I allow her to eat something and drink as well, but I remind her the food she is eating is paid for by Stephen and she should be grateful and happy that she has food and a roof over her head. She won't look at me at all. She stopped making eye contact with anyone at this point. She has a list of duties she must do, luckily she can read. Somehow she learned somehow. She has to attend school after a CPS arrived at our doorstep. A neighbor reported us and she had to have her shots up to date, which costs money and time. Stephen was mad about the money for Anastasia and we had a big fight about it. Things went from bad to worse and we moved out and made sure no one saw Anastasia. We made sure she was punished if she attempted to get out.
Anastasia
After mom and dad hurt me this time, I ran away from home. I took my dictionary and my blanket and the pennies I saved that were on the floors after they went to bed. My sheet is keeping the blood from flowing, I tore it in strips. I kept walking until I couldn't, I saw a car on the road with it's door unlocked. I got in it and laid behind the seat in the floor boards. The car started moving and I kept quiet, I had fell asleep. I am having trouble breathing and I can't see anything. I feel the car stop. I need help so I open the door and make whoever it is aware I need help. I see a couple of people watching as I collapse on the road.
Analisa Steele
I watch as a small child makes her way out of the back of our now broken down car. She collapses as soon as she sees us. I can't tell how old she is, but I can see the bloody bandages on her head. Raymond calls an ambulance and we check for anything or anyone else in the car. The car was towed from Portland to Seattle. She has been there possibly since Portland. They took our statements at the hospital. I find a clean blanket to cover her from the RV we own. We take his pick up truck to the hospital.
Raymond Steele
I can't believe how the person chose one of the few times I left that car unlocked to find her way into it. She looked like a homeless person. A very beaten homeless child. We followed the ambulance to the hospital hoping no police would stop us. We followed the gurney in and tell them we are with the young girl. They let us follow her to the exam area. The cops are asking us questions and we tell them how we found her. I had to go move the truck and one of the cops follow me and gets in the truck with me. I don't think he believes us about finding the child like we did. Possibly because she looks like my wife. I told him to run a DNA test at their expense not ours if they don't believe she isn't our child.
Dr Grey
The cops are asking the couple who came in following the ambulance to assure this young girl was okay. I go to work on the child very quickly and she is in a coma and her weight is horrible. Someone was nearly starving this child. Old bruises from head to toe were on her. I look at the couples hands and neither have marks on them. Granted his hands were rough they looked like they were used for manual labor. Hers were soft and pale like the child she looks like the child. The cops asks for a DNA and we do it. But we need to get her head scanned and her body. The bruises were made by fists not big ones either. They had a couple of witnesses that were there when the child got out of their back seat of the car towed from Portland. The witnesses arrived and verified what had happened both worked for the couple and one was the guy who towed the car. Luckily she had no brain injuries just a skull fracture. It was the broken ribs and healed broken leg and arm that had us more concerned.
Three days later the DNA proves they aren't the child's parents. Her belongings were brought to the hospital. A dictionary, a blanket, torn sheeting into bandage strips and a bag of pennies. The dictionary has her name, well her first name and last initial in it. Anastasia M has somehow made her way to Seattle from Portland. She hasn't woke up from her coma. The Steele couple have been here for the girl and we have allowed them to have visitation with her. The missing child reports are not showing her photos or her description.
Analisa
We need to get back to work and give our numbers to dr Grey about fostering Anastasia until she can be adopted. We decided to fill out the paperwork for everything at once. Whoever this child belonged to had nearly killed her.