Perfect (Second Opportunities 2)

"Her what!?" he uttered in disbelief.

"Don't judge the Family Services people too harshly, which I can see you're doing. For the most part, they're extremely dedicated and conscientious, but they're only human. Given how overworked and underfinanced they are, it's amazing they do as well as they do. In any event, to make a long story short, the foster parents had a houseful of kids to look after, and they assumed Family Services couldn't find adoptive parents for Julie because she wasn't very healthy. By the time Family Services realized she'd gotten lost in their shuffle, Julie was five, and she'd passed the age of greatest appeal to adoptive parents. She also had a history of poor health, and when she was removed from the foster home and placed in another, she promptly came down with a series of asthma attacks. She missed large chunks of first and second grade, but she was "such a good little girl" the teachers promoted her from one grade to the next anyway. Her new foster parents already had three physically handicapped children in their care, and they were so busy looking after those children that they didn't notice Julie wasn't keeping up in school, particularly because she was getting passing grades. By fourth grade, though, Julie herself realized she couldn't do the work, and she started pretending to be ill so that she could stay home. When her foster parents caught on, they insisted she go to school, so Julie took the next obvious route to avoid it—she started cutting school and hanging around with kids on the street as often as she could. As I said earlier, she's feisty, daring, and quick—they taught her how to snitch merchandise from stores and avoid being picked up as a truant.

"You know most of the rest: Eventually she did get picked up for truancy and shoplifting and was sent to the LaSalle facility, which is where kids who aren't doing well in the foster care system are sent. A few months ago, she got busted—unfairly, I think—along with a group of older boys who were demonstrating to her their particular prowess with hot-wiring cars." With a muffled laugh, Terry finished, "Julie was merely a fascinated observer, but she knows how to do it. She offered to demonstrate for me. Can you imagine—that tiny girl with those enormous, innocent eyes can actually start your car without a key! She wouldn't try to steal it though. As I said, she only takes things the kids at LaSalle can use."

With a meaningful grin, Frazier tipped his head toward the glass. "I assume they can 'use' one red pencil, a ballpoint, and a fistful of candy."

"What?"

"In the time you've been talking to me, your prize patient has filched all that from the reception room."

"Good God!" said Dr. Wilmer but without any real concern as she stared through the glass.

"She's quick enough to do sleight-of-hand tricks," Frazier added with reluctant admiration. "I'd get her in here before she figures out a way to get that aquarium out the door. I'll bet the kids at LaSalle would love some exotic tropical fish."

Glancing at her watch, Dr. Wilmer said, "The Mathisons are supposed to call me right about now from Texas to tell me exactly when they'll be ready to take her. I want to be able to tell Julie everything when she comes in here." As she spoke, the intercom on her desk buzzed and the receptionist's voice said, "Mrs. Mathison is on the phone, Dr. Wilmer."

"That's the call," Terry told him happily.

John Frazier glanced at his own watch. "I'm having my first session with Cara Peterson in a few minutes." He started toward the connecting door that opened into his office, paused with his hand on the knob, and said with a grin, "It's just occurred to me that the distribution of workload in your program is grossly unjust. I mean," he joked, "you get to work with a girl who filches candy and pencils to give to the poor, while you give me Cara Anderson who tried to kill her foster father. You get Robin Hood and I get Lizzie Borden."

"You love a challenge," Theresa Wilmer replied, laughing, but as she reached for the phone, she added, "I'm going to ask the Family Services people to transfer Mrs. Borowski out of LaSalle and into an area where she'll only be involved with infants and small children. I've worked with her before, and she's excellent with them because they're cuddly and they don't break rules. She shouldn't be dealing with adolescents. She can't distinguish between minor adolescent rebellion and juvenile delinquency."

"You aren't by any chance getting revenge on her because she told your receptionist that Julie will steal anything she can get her hands on?"

"No," Dr. Wilmer said as she picked up the phone. "But that was a good example of what I meant."

When she finished her call, Dr. Wilmer got up and walked to her office door, looking forward to the surprise she was about to deliver to Miss Julie Smith.

Chapter 2

"Julie," she said from the doorway, "Would you come in please." As Julie closed the door behind her and walked forward, Terry added cheerfully, "Your time in our testing program is over. All the results are in."

Rather than sitting in a chair, her young patient took up a position in front of Terry's desk, her small feet planted slightly apart, hands jammed into the back pockets of her jeans. She gave a jaunty, dismissive shrug, but she did not ask about the results of the tests, because, Terry knew, she was afraid to hear the answers. "The tests were dumb," she said instead. "This whole program is dumb. You can't tell anything about me from a bunch of tests and talks in your office."

"I've learned a whole lot about you, Julie, in the few months we've known each other. Would you like me to prove it by telling you what I've discovered?"

"No."

"Please, let me tell you what I think."

She sighed, then gave an impish grin and said, "You're going to do that whether I want to hear it or not."

"You're right," Dr. Wilmer agreed, suppressing a smile of her own at the astute remark. The blunt methods she was about to use on Julie were completely different than those she would normally use, but Julie was innately intuitive and too streetwise to be fooled with sugared phrases and half-truths. "Please sit down," she said, and when Julie had slumped into the chair in front of her desk, Dr. Wilmer began with quiet firmness. "I've discovered that despite all your daring deeds and your show of bravado to your companions, the truth is that you are scared to death every moment of every day, Julie. You don't know who you are or what you are or what you're going to be. You can't read or write, so you're convinced you're stupid. You cut school because you can't keep up with the other kids your age, and it hurts you terribly when they laugh at you in class. You feel hopeless and trapped, and you hate those feelings.