Tommy was feeling better as she came out of the shower. She didn’t have any clean clothes. Raven gave Tommy a pair of leggings to wear, and Beverly gave Tommy a T-shirt to wear that had a Jamaican-dressed cat smoking a joint. She looked like a child wearing their sister’s clothes.

“We need to stop and buy some clothes for you, Tommy.” Beverly looked at Tommy's outfit.

Tommy looked at herself in a mirror, and Beverly was right. She had to use a rubber band to hold up the leggings. They were too big on her waist.

“We can do that at our next stop.” Kevin was amazed at how clean Tommy was.

“I can pay for them.” Tommy looks at Kevin when he mentions getting some clean clothes.

“If you can pay for them, Tommy? Why didn’t you stay at a hotel or something?” Chyna looks at Tommy for an answer.

“Because I have limited funds on the card. It’s prepaid, and other than getting a job, I can’t reload it off the trust fund my father left me without letting my stepmother know where I am.” Tommy has been very careful using the card.

“No, this is on us, Tommy.” Raven didn’t mind buying Tommy some clean clothes.

Tommy looks at Raven. “Thank you.” Tears leak from her eyes.

“You’re welcome, Tommy.” Raven smiles at Tommy.

“Tommy, is there anyone else you can call or ask to stay with?” Olivia looks at Tommy.

“I wish. Most of my father’s relatives are busy with their own lives and don’t have time for people my age. As for my birth mother’s people, they disowned my mother when they found out she was pregnant with me.”

“Do you know why they hated your father?” Beverly was curious about Tommy’s background.

“Because my parents haven’t always been rich. My father was just a college student when my mom became pregnant with me. He came from a well-to-do family, but he wasn't stuck up, and my mother came from a high-end middle-class family. My father made his fortune by writing custom code for companies. He and his partner, Adam Smith, opened their own software company. In no time, the company took off. They had military contracts and worked for several fortune five hundred companies to custom-write software.” Tommy liked watching his father work.

“So, when did your stepmother come into the picture?” Olivia was curious.

“When I was five years old. My mother was diagnosed with cancer and died from the chemotherapy treatment she was getting. The treatment ended up killing her. My father married Tammy, my stepmother, a year later. She had two sons from her previous marriage that were older than me.”

“So, why didn’t she like you?” Zane looked up from the information she had been reviewing on her cellphone.

“Who knows? She pretended to like me from the beginning, and then after she married my father, her attitude changed. When one of her sons accidentally kicked me in my groin. She never liked me and secretly started using drugs on me.” Tommy found some drugs without his stepmother finding out.

“What type of drugs were they?” Raven was curious because she knew certain types could hurt a growing child.

Tommy grabbed her cellphone and brought up the drugs she found or was given. She hands Raven her cellphone.

“These.”

Raven accepts the cellphone and looks at the medication. She scrolled through the pictures and saw the medication. She stops, googles some of them, and finds out most were for animals, but would work on humans. One was to stunt Tommy’s growth. Another one was a strong hormonal pill to help women going through menopause.

“Wow! Your stepmother is a real piece of work.” Raven looks at Tommy when she says that.

“Tell me about it. She drugged and injured me, while doting on her own sons. I think one of them is using steroids.” Tommy was enjoying a Coke. Normally, she didn’t trust drinks handed to her.

“Well, the question is what to do with you now.” Kevin looked at Tommy thoughtfully.

“I could still keep doing what I was doing before all of this happened.” Tommy figured she could intern with the crew.

“You’re not fifteen yet, Tommy. Plus, working as a stagehand or roadie is too dangerous under the child labor laws.” Kevin knew the child labor laws.

“Tommy could always work for us, as a golfer or something.” Juniper looked at Kevin as she spoke.

“She can also work with me.” Thomas didn’t mind teaching Tommy how to use the soundboard.

Kevin looked towards his boyfriend. “And it would mean you could take Tommy as an intern.”

Tommy was listening to everything. She didn’t mind being an intern to the Zombie Girls. It would mean she could stay on the move, making it hard for her stepmother to track her.

“There is still one more thing we are forgetting. Her schooling- how are we going to handle that?” Beverly figures they could homeschool Tommy.

“I could always just take the GED. That way we don’t have to worry about my education.” Tommy figures she could pass it.

“You’re too young to take it, Tommy. The minimum age to take it is sixteen. You’ll still have to wait.”

“Then we should sign her up for either online classes or home schooling.” Zane had set aside her laptop to interject into the conversation.