Yes, Mother Hen. "Yes, ma'am. I'll do everything right, ma'am."

"All right," Carey said. "I'll trust you." They had almost reached the shore when Instructor Donaldson approached.

"Instructor Carey, may I speak with you for a minute?"

"Sure," Carey said

Grace took the cue. "Um, I have to get my sneakers, ma'am."

"Make sure you wear them," Carey said. "I don't want you getting any splinters."

"Yes, ma'am." Grace quickly walked away, hoping to avoid another list of dos and don'ts. Her mild annoyance was rapidly replaced by quite a different feeling. She played with me. Unable to contain it, the teen smiled happily as she sat down and pulled on her sneakers. I bet she didn't spend time like that with anyone else. The smile remained with her throughout the walk back to the cabin.

"Your favorite time of the day," Carey said as she unlocked her office. "So what should we talk about for forty-five minutes?"

"I aced my paper for English, ma'am," Grace said.

"Good," Carey said as she tossed her cap on the hook and took her usual seat behind the desk. "I knew you would. Let's see, that took ten seconds. What else do you want to talk about?"

Grace shrugged. "I don't know, ma'am."

Carey leaned back in her chair. "One of these days you're going to surprise me and actually want to talk about something," she said. "I just hope I don't have a heart attack from the shock." She picked up an envelope from the top of her desk. "Here. You have mail," she said, handing Grace the envelope. "I thought you would want to open it."

"Is it my test scores?" Grace asked, tearing it open at the perforation.

"I would think so," Carey said, ignoring the slip. "Come on, let's see how you did."

Once the three sides of the envelope were tom off, Grace hesitated. "What if I didn't do good, ma'am?"

"Do well," Carey corrected. "I've told you before, as long as you do your best, that's all that matters. You can always take it again." She rose from her seat and walked around the desk, leaning against it so she was facing the teen. "Open it."

Grace looked at the scores. "Seven twenty on the verbal, seven sixty on the math, ma'am."

"You're kidding," Carey said, taking the paper to look at it. "A fourteen eighty combined? That's fantastic."

"Is it, ma'am?"

Carey smiled and handed back the paper. "Yes," she said. “That and your GED will get you into college."

"If I passed the GED," Grace said. "Ma'am."

"You passed it," Carey said confidently, pushing off the desk to return to her chair. "You're too smart not to, and you told me yourself that it was an easy test. Right now it's just a matter of waiting for the diploma to arrive."

"Diploma?"

"Three, two..."

"Ma'am."

Carey smiled. "Yes, Grace. A diploma. It is called the General Equivalency Diploma, after all." She took a piece of paper and folded it in half, using it as an example. "The top half is the score and your certificate number and the bottom half is your official diploma from the state." She scribbled a quick note to herself on the paper. "You really didn't know that?"

Grace shook her head. "I didn't think about it. I figured I'd get something like this." She held up the SAT scores. "Does it look like a real diploma?"

"A little smaller, but yes, it looks like a real diploma because it is one," Carey said. "I'll tell your father what size frame to get." She circled the note she had made. "You should be proud of yourself for those SAT scores, Grace. By the way, what happened to ma'am?" She chuckled at the panicked look in the teen's blue eyes. "I suppose getting a fourteen eighty on the SAT earns you a free pass today. Relax." Opening the bottom drawer of her desk, she pulled out Grace's folder. "I need to make a copy of those scores before you can keep them," she said. "I want to put it in your record."

Grace set the paper on the desk. "Thanks. So it's really a good score?"

"Yes," Carey said. "You can thump your chest all you want." She leaned back, resting her left ankle on her right knee. "Are you going to tell your mother about the SAT?" She watched as the light left Grace's face, replaced with the stony tough-girl look the teen got whenever she was trying to protect herself from some inner pain.

"Why bother? She doesn't care."

"I don't think that's true, Grace," she said. "You're her only child."

"So?" The teen crossed her arms. "I'm almost eighteen. I will be by the time I get out of Crestwood. I'm never going back there." Blue eyes focused hard on the paperweight. "Never."

"You don't have to but, for better or worse, she is your mother." Carey said. "You only get one of them." She found herself in the unenviable position of defending a woman she personally disliked. "Grace, I know she's made mistakes."

The teen snorted. "Just a few."

"I don't see a halo over your head," Carey said. "How many times did she have to come pick you up from school because you managed to get yourself suspended? How about the police station?"

"So I'm a lousy daughter," Grace said, still staring at the glass egg. "She should be happy to get rid of me then, right?"

Those walls go up so fast, don't they? "If she was happy to get rid of you she wouldn't have shown up here on the first visitation day," Carey said. "She loves you, Grace. It may be hard to see sometimes but she does." She waited for a response but none came. "Uncross your arms and look at me. You think I don't remember how excited you were that day when you were waiting for her to come? It may be hard to admit it but under all that pain you love her, Grace. Don't look away." She waited for the teen to focus on her again. "You do."

"You want her to get a copy of the scores? Fine, I don't care."

"Watch that tone with me," Carey warned. "I'm not the one you're mad at." Actually at the moment you're probably pretty pissed at me, she thought, seeing the teen glaring at the paperweight. "The decision is yours, Grace. I know you're hurt and angry with her now, but that doesn't mean you have to cut her out of your life."

"I'm not ready to forgive her."

"I know, but someday you will," Carey said. "It's a lot easier to fix a bridge if you don't bum it first." She reached out and took away the paperweight. "Up here, Grace."

There was a long silence before Grace spoke. "I suppose if I saw her I could be civil," she said. "But not if he's with her."

"He won't be," Carey said. "Not here, anyway. But once you're out in the real world that's a problem you're going to have to face."

"No I won't," Grace said. "I’ll just tell her if she wants to see me that she has to leave that jerk somewhere."

"So you're willing to work at fixing your relationship with your mother?"

Grace shrugged. "If she wants to."

"I didn't ask that," Carey said. "I asked if you were willing." Look at those gears turn, she thought as she waited for Grace to answer.

"Yeah, I guess so."

"So you'll send your mother a copy of the SAT scores along with a note telling her she can come visit?"

“Just her," Grace said.

“Just her," Carey repeated. "You know, if your mother and father both came for visitation, it would be an excellent time for a family conference."

"You mean put my mother and father in the same room together?"

Grace shook her head vehemently. "No way."

"Why?"

"Because they'd fight. They can't stand the sight of each other. I don't want to listen to them yelling. I'd rather visit with her for a little while and then spend the rest of the time with Dad."

"Don't rule the idea out completely," Carey said. "A family conference could be very beneficial." There was a quick rapping, then the door swung open.

"We've got a problem," Instructor Gage said from the doorway. Carey knew from her friend's look that it was serious. "Waters, we'll talk later."

"Yes, ma'am."

Waving Sue in, Carey closed Grace's folder as the teen left. "What's going on?"

"Our little saboteur struck again. Broke into the shed and punctured every ball."

Carey sighed and reached for her cap. "And I was hoping it would be a quiet day."

With Carey working late and her homework done, Grace decided to go to the rec room and hang out for a while. She was pleasantly surprised to see Jan playing solitaire at the table. "Hey."

"Hey there," Jan said. "Thought maybe you forgot this place existed."

"I get bored with jigsaw puzzles and checkers," Grace said. "So have you heard anything?"

"Nothing more than the usual," Jan said. "Most think Grenner and her toadie did it, but no one saw them."

"So those bitches get away with it again, right?" Grace picked up a paddle. "You serve."

"Looks like it," Jan said as she retrieved the ping pong ball and the other paddle. "And we suffer with no more basketball, soccer or volleyball."

Grace spun the paddle in her hand. "So what are we supposed to do for PT? Run every day?"

"Unless Scary and Short Shit decide to set up more obstacle courses," Jan said. "Ready? Zero serving zero."

“Oh please no,” Grace said as she returned the serve. "Anything but obstacle courses."

Jan hit the ball hard, grinning when Grace missed it. "My point. Hey, walking piles of shit coming in."

Grace, who had been kneeling down in search of the ping pong ball, glanced at the doorway. Lauren Grenner and Sally Dawson entered while several girls decided the barracks would be a better place to hang out and left. There's gonna be trouble, Grace thought as she tossed the ball to Jan.