Which is how Evelyn ends up receiving a phone call about a child who needs to be placed urgently. 

She has all three bedrooms free right now, so it's not a difficult choice, like it might be if she had one or more current foster children who could find it disruptive. What's the situation? 

     It's a very large adoptive-slash-foster family, eleven children. Not strictly from the Reno area, no, she wouldn't have encountered them before, but - well, finding places to put all of them, after the allegations of abuse and Social Services deciding to take all of the children into foster care, is a challenge.

Evelyn is listening, but she wants to make it clear that she does not have eleven bedrooms!

     ...Of course. Evelyn isn't being asked to take a large sibling group placement. Actually, they have exactly one child in mind for her. 

Go on? 

    Annie. Three and a half, and - complicated. She has a medical history and special needs; she was in hospital for most of her infancy and early childhood, after her parents died in a car crash that she somehow survived. (It's definitely been considered whether she had a traumatic brain injury as a days-old infant, that might explain her current symptoms, but - only after the fact, at the time she seemed fine aside from being an especially screamy baby.) Anyway. She's blind. Has a lot of sensory issues, there are expert consultations and discussions of an autism diagnosis, but her speech came early - very early, actually - rather than late, like would usually be expected for autism. She was able to communicate her needs - confusing as they were - quite clearly, according to the most recent documentation from the institution she was in before she went to the foster family. The one that turned out to be abusing her and her many foster and adopted siblings, yeah. They...don't really have any documentation of the nine-month period she spent there before Social Services intervened. 

Evelyn has an enormous number of questions. And concerns. None of which are reasons to not take in this poor, poor child. All of this is spectacularly upsetting, and Evelyn doesn't actually feel all that qualified to care for a young child with possibly-complex medical needs, but - Annie needs somewhere to go. 

She says yes, obviously. There isn't really time for her to redecorate the bedroom - and Annie is blind, right, it's not like she would notice - but she's emotionally as ready as she can possibly be, when the social worker's car arrives in her driveway, and Evelyn goes out to meet them. 

Annie hops out of the car. She seems really good at navigating for being a blind three-year-old, up until she trips on the curb - not like she didn't know it was there, just like she didn't raise her foot far enough - and flops on the grass. She gets up, unperturbed, and declines to take her driver's hand in walking up to Evelyn.

Oh no she is TINY and CUTE, and trying to be independent, and - Evelyn has feelings, that are possibly the 'getting attached' feelings, even though she should really know better given the reasonably-high likelihood that Annie will end up leaving in a month or five. 

Evelyn crouches down so her face is closer to Annie's. "Hi. My name is Evelyn. You're going to live with me for now. - I'm a foster parent, which means my job is to take care of kids who can't live with their parents anymore. Did anyone explain to you why you're coming to live with me?" 

(Early language development, yeah, but Evelyn is maaaaybe finding herself talking to Annie like she would to a child a few years older just because Annie is acting like a child a few years older.)

"Someone noticed the Georges were not particularly nice. You're a different foster parent and they are pretty sure you don't hit people." Her eyes don't focus on Evelyn, but she seems - aware of Evelyn, maybe just because of her voice, and is pointing her face in the right direction, at least.

"I don't! Hitting people is a bad thing to do and they shouldn't have hit you, I'm so sorry."

(Is that how being blind works? Evelyn remembers reading once that a lot of blind people have some vision, like they can see light and shadow, and also that blind people learn to have a better sense for sounds. It's still impressive just because Annie is three. It seems like Annie is impressive for a three-year-old in multiple ways.) 

She stands up most of the way. "Annie, is it okay if I give you my hand to hold so we can walk in? There's a step and I don't want you to fall." 

Annie will hold her hand. She doesn't trip on the stair but does stumble on the walk leading up to it.

Good thing Evelyn was holding her hand, then! (...She is slightly confused about the pattern of tripping versus not but she's mostly not paying much attention to it.) 

"This is my house! I would normally give you a tour but I'm, uh, not sure what would be useful since you can't see. There's an upstairs and a downstairs - we take our shoes off here, and the living room is just around this way and the kitchen is straight ahead... Your bedroom will be upstairs." She put a stairgate up but should definitely make sure to explain it to Annie. "I live here by myself, right now, so it's going to be just you and me. My son Jeremy is grown up and in college but he visits sometimes. ...Are you hungry or thirsty? We can get you a drink or a snack in the kitchen while your social worker tells me a bit more about you." 

"I'm not completely blind but a tour would be a little pointless. I would like some ice water."

Kitchen and ice water, then!

(...Annie continues to be articulate and seem overall like a much older child in her communication, and also - hasn't really given any indication of being "difficult" or "complicated"? Evelyn had been vaguely expecting random screaming and there has been NO screaming, random or not.) 

"I haven't looked after a kid with any kind of blindness before," she says, after guiding Annie to the chair with the booster seat in it and (after a quick explanation) hoisting her up. "It sounds like you can see a little bit - is it just light or dark, or more than that?"

"I am medically very confusing but if you assume I can read and can't see anything that isn't text you will not be far wrong."

She drinks most of the ice water and then puts an ice cube on her head and holds it there.

"Wow! Do you know how to read already?" Evelyn says brightly, because that's the least confusing part of that sentence to respond to.

(That...is not...how being blind works...?) (also why is she putting an ice cube on her head? The house isn't especially warm, Evelyn doesn't think -)

"Yes, I like to read."

"That's great! We have a lot of books here," Evelyn's mouth says. 

(She is confused on several levels but it's mostly not the thing that matters, right now, the thing that matters is making Annie feel comfortable and safe and at home.) 

"- Would you like more ice water? You look like you might be feeling too warm." 

"I'm always feeling too warm. It's one of my medical confusions. I can't just drink ice water literally all the time. I have been told that even water can kill you if you drink too much of it."

Evelyn is not a medical expert but that does sound like the sort of thing that could go badly. 

(What is the social worker up to, is he avoiding talking to her - he seems to be bringing in Annie’s things from the car but he’s really taking his time at it…)

“Is there anything that does help?” she asks Annie. Being too hot all the time sounds awful.

"Air conditioning, ice packs, not trying to sleep with blankets on."

“I won’t make you sleep with blankets if you’d rather not. Our air conditioning is for the whole house, I’m not sure I can make it cold just for your room, but - do you want a bag of frozen peas in a pillowcase?” Evelyn doesn’t really own ice packs.

"If you don't need the peas for anything that would be lovely."

She does not! The bag of peas can maybe be wrapped in paper towel rather than a pillowcase, since the spare linens are upstairs, and then handed to Annie to...do whatever one does with a bag of frozen peas when it's not being applied to a specific sprained joint and is just to cool down. 

"- Will you be all right here for a moment? I need to go speak with your social worker now." Annie's bags deposited, he's now at the front door and making 'come over here' gestures, which presumably means he wants to say something privately. 

"Yes, thank you." She will sip what's left of her water and put the peas on her shoulder pressed up against her neck.

The social worker is called Anthony, apparently, and looks honestly too young to be out of college. He seems very relieved to have a seat in Evelyn's living room and sip his own glass of water. 

"So?" Evelyn says. "Can I get the rundown of the rest of the complex medical needs? ....Also, um. She claims she can read. She's blind." 

    Anthony squirms, looking faintly uncomfortable. "The cause of blindness was never diagnosed. She has some sight, obviously, and there's nothing physically the matter with her eyes, it's - something going on in her brain. Not that she's faking it, obviously, but some sort of neurological problem, her vision isn't wired up right."  

Evelyn squints at him. "Like one of those what's-it-called's that people who've had a stroke get sometimes, where they can't recognize faces or name things even though they can see otherwise? Except everything except writing?" That would be incredibly weird and specific but at least it posits an explanation that sounds physically possible. 

     Shrug. "I don't have her medical chart. There's a lot of it that seems like, well, something going wrong in her brain. It's not just the blindness, either, she's - not deaf, obviously, but it's like she can't make sense of some kinds of sound? Traffic noises, that sort of thing, it's like she just doesn't parse it. And then with some sounds, she - I think the diagnosis was misophonia but it's very specific, it's just music. She can't stand it. Acts like it's agonizing torture. Which, I mean, autistic kids can be like that, right, but it's apparently still - unusually intense." He sifts through notes. "The constant overheating is - I think the consensus is that it's not a medically dangerous kind of overheating, she doesn't collapse with heatstroke or anything, it's - clearly a lot more than just 'psychological' but that's the kind of thing. More like a sensory sensitivity than a metabolic problem or something." 

...Wow the intense music misophonia is genuinely inconvenient. Evelyn winces. "Do, uh, earplugs help with the music issue?" How is she supposed to get through however long of a placement this is without ever listening to music. "- She doesn't seem autistic. She's very polite and social." Honestly, she doesn't seem three. If Social Services didn't have clear documentation of her entire childhood since birth, Evelyn would be wondering if she had some kind of growth condition and had been mis-estimated to be a toddler when really she's ten. 

     Uncomfortable shrug. The social worker would clearly like to be less put on the spot with questions. "Anyway, I know her needs sound complex, but none of her medical diagnoses are even potentially life-threatening. She's not on any medications - I understand they tried some drugs, when she was very small, but nothing seemed to help." 

That is so incredibly beside the point. If anything Evelyn feels more qualified to give a child medications at the right times than to make sure someone with Annie's needs has them accommodated well enough not to be abjectly miserable. 

Sigh. "Any more details on the family situation and the, uh, nature of the abuse? And will she have contact with any of the siblings?" 

     Another shrug. It seems to be Anthony's favorite gesture. "I don't think so. None of them are her natural siblings and she wasn't there long. My understanding is that the children were neglected - not hard to imagine when there were eleven - and they, er, for religious reasons were believers in harsh discipline. We don't have much of a sense of how it will affect her, yet, and she's lucky, many of the children were there much longer." 

Sigh. Personally, Evelyn thinks that 'lucky' is the last word you could reasonably use to describe Annie's short life to date. "I'll be careful about introducing house rules here, and explaining how we handle consequences for breaking them. ...Do you have anything on her interests? Likes and dislikes? Does she eat well?" 

    Anthony shakes his head. "I don't think the George's really believed in letting kids be picky about food. She claims to like reading - not that I have the slightest idea where she learned to read, many of the siblings are educationally behind - and I feel like her dislikes are all the obvious things." 

Mental note, Annie might well have foods she dislikes - it seems like the sort of thing that goes along with the other sensory sensitivities - and also have food insecurity trauma about it. She'll keep an eye out, and try to make sure Annie knows that things are different here. Not that she can eat candy all day or anything, but Evelyn once looked after an autistic boy who only ate light-colored foods and that was fine. 

She fairly quickly concludes that Anthony doesn't have much more to tell her. Fortunately Annie is an early talker and can express her own needs. They finish signing all the paperwork, including approvals for her to take Annie to her own pediatrician and dentist, and she ushers Anthony out and then pads back over to the kitchen to see how Annie is doing with her icepack. 

She has moved it to her lap. She's wearing as little clothing as they'd let her get away with. The ice water is all gone. "I'm sorry about the music problem," she mentions. "Earplugs don't help but if you have it very quiet on headphones that will usually work, especially if I'm in the next room."

"That makes sense. - And you don't need to apologize, it's not your fault and it really sounds much more unpleasant for you than for me."

Maybe Evelyn will have to invest in fancier earbuds. Jeremy has his Apple ones and raves about them; Evelyn's cheap earbuds (about one and a half steps up in quality from the kind they hand out for free on airplanes) are totally fine for podcasts but really not the same as her nice stereo system. Hopefully at some point they'll figure out a routine that involves Annie sometimes being out of the house. 

...And it seems like she probably heard the entire conversation, which was not Evelyn's plan but is...probably fine? She doesn't think she said anything she categorically wouldn't feel comfortable saying in front of a not quite four-year-old? 

"Anthony hasn't known you long and wasn't able to tell me very much about your likes and dislikes," she says, sitting down. "Other than the obvious ones, of course. Do you have favorite games or activities? A favorite food?" 

"Most food is fine. I like macaroni and cheese, and chicken fingers. I haven't tried a lot of games. I had play-doh one time and that was pretty good."

That is one of the most tragic sentences Evelyn has ever heard out of a child's mouth. "We have fish fingers in the freezer! I can make them for dinner tonight if you like. And you'll learn lots of new games and activities here. I suppose we'll have to explore and see what kinds of games and crafts work for you with the amount of vision you have, but I'm sure you'll find things you like. If Play-doh was fun, we have modeling clay you can bake in the oven to make it harden into a little sculpture. Does that sound like something you would enjoy trying?"