Shannon - Rosile (warren buffett book recommendations txt) 📗

HEROIC SAM

She was driving me crazy! She had been my best friend ever since I was 3, I wasnt even in pre-school. She was my best friend and I loved her (as a friend not anything else.) But I had given up hope. How could you just stop talking to some one like that? Liz keeps telling me to give up and move on. I couldn’t do that. Not just because I didn’t want too, but because she was my best friend and she needed my help. Let’s just say her living conditions weren’t that great.
Her step-father was violent among other things. She was the subject of most of the abuse. Her step-brothers are like his little buddies and Shannon’s life is Disney World. I needed to help her get out of there. I don’t know how to contact her father and her mother… has some… problems in which made her unable to help. My father hated her for some reason; the only thing I can think of is contacting Child Protective Services. Only one problem with that idea was I had no idea how. I couldn’t exactly go to the school counselor because it was summer. I thought of going to my sister, but how would I do that. Just walk up to her and say “Hey I need to contact the CPS any idea how?” No that was out of the question. She would completely freak out before I even get the story out. Definitely not! Fester and Foster, they were perfect. They already knew the story so they wouldn’t freak out. It was perfect! I was already planning on going there this afternoon to help Fester with the new ship. (Fester and Foster are these crazy mad scientist that can build anything out of nothing.)
Fester and Foster were in the lab looking at some odd colored ooze. I knocked on the door.
“Hey Sam.” Fester said. He knew I was here not just because of the ship as soon as he saw my face. “How’s it going?”
“I need your help with something.” I told him. Fester has a way of seeming that he can see right through you. He was doing right now. Whatever it is he saw it told him that it was something big.
“Okay let’s go in to the rec room.” He said moving past me. I fallowed a few paces behind. I hoped he could help. If he couldn’t I don’t know what I would do. I would have to find some way for Shannon to live in the Jade palace while I find some way to get in contact with her father even if I had to fly out to Spain to do it.
The rec room was not a standard rec room. It was more of a meeting room. We just called it a rec room; it was sort of like a mask name, like the underground rail road, it wasn’t really a rail road.
“So what’s the problem Sam?” Fester asked in his I mean business and nothing else voice.
“Well you know about Shannon and everything,” he nodded, “Well I need you help to contact the CPS to get her out of there.” He sat back in his chair and smiled like he just won something big.
“Does Shannon know you’re doing this?” he asked in his “the boss” tone. He uses a certain tone of voice in different situations in order to get more effect on people.
“Do you think I would be here if she did?” Shannon had a problem with people trying to help her, even in disparate situations like this.
“Probably not.” He leaned forward folding his hands on his desk. “Sam you do know that Shannon is my boss, and no matter what the circumstances are I cannot do anything without her approval.”
/ “Fester you do it all the time.” I said in “as a matter of fact” tone.
“I was just getting to that.” He said with a big grin on his elf face. “Now I can do it in a Jack way or a Shannon way. Which would you prefer?” A Jack way would be when you would do something to deliberately break the rules with an excuse to get you out of the punishment. A Travis way (Shannon’s oldest step-brother. Jack is Shannon’s only fully biological sibling. Michelle and Jade are Shannon’s half-sisters.) would be just down right breaking the rule no matter what the consequences are and beat the life out of anybody who says he can’t do it. A Shannon way would be to find the loop holes in the rule or law to make it impossible to even suggesting a punishment. I have no idea how she does it but, like most everything else, the solutions come naturally to her.
“Jack. Less trouble that way.” He smiled the same smile as before.
“We’ll say that because you are second in command you told me to give the number and I just had to give it to you.”
“Or I can just not tell her you were involved.” Why didn’t I think of this?
“You could do that.” He said with the same smile. “We should get busy on that ship if we want to get it done before your next mission. You never know when those Shades will attack.” He said leading me out. He was so easy going. He never freaked out about anything. We walked down the hall toward the garage and he still had that smile on his face.
“Did you and Foster make a bet or something?” His smile spread across his face giving his eyes a mischievous look.
“We bet on how long it would take you to find out and do something about it. Foster bet that you would never find out and as you probably guessed by now I bet that you would.” He seemed excited even more as he explained. He picked up the pace and his eyes darted back and forth between the other hallways. Looking for Foster I assumed. It must have been a good bet. When we reached the garage door he stopped took a deep breath and put that smile back on his face before opening the door. Foster was sitting at one of the many computers in the garage trying to figure out some kind of formula.
“There you guys are!” he said when he saw us. He took one look at Fester and he knew he was in trouble. “What happened?” he asked as the dread washed over his face. Fester laughed victoriously. Sometimes it was fun to watch these guys work. “What?” Fester pushed past him and walked across the room (with Foster right on his heels) before turning around.
“I have won the bet!” Fester said standing strait and tall with his head in the air. It was his specialty to be over dramatic.
“What bet?” Foster said looking more worried than ever.
“The one where you guys betted on how long it would take before I found out and did something about it.” I said trying to make myself sound as angry as possible. Foster had a look of shame on his face. Fester still smiling turned to his computer without even a glance in my direction.
“Sorry Sam. I wanted to tell you, honest I did. Fester didn’t want to, and, well you know how he can be.”
“Just think boy, Shannon didn’t tell you either. There for we are not… the only ones to blame here, now are we?” Fester said saving his own skin.
“I wouldn’t have expected Shannon to tell me.” I replied with a sigh.
“Sam please don’t be mad at me!” Foster pleaded.
“It’s okay Foster I’m not mad at either of you. I’m just… a little upset, that’s all.” I said trying to calm him down. Why was he still woried about this? We had almost the same conversation about a week ago.
“Well, we decided it would be more fun for us if you found out on your own.” Fester said turning around to face me.
“How did you find out anyway?” Foster asked taking the seat by the ship.
“I…walked in on it.” I said remembering what I saw. “I don’t think I can ever see that man again without wanting to….” I trailed off letting my mood linger and settle. My anger grew stronger every time i thought about it. It was silent in the room besides Fester’s typing. I took a deep breath trying to control my anger while Foster watched me clearly wanting to hear more.
“Is she okay?” he asked.
“Physically it’s nothing more than she’s had in the past… before him. I don’t know if mentally she’s okay, she won’t talk to me about anything. As soon as I mentioned the CPS she completely shut off.”
“That must hurt.” Fester laughed. Foster looked at me sympathetically.
“As long as she’s out of there I’ll be fine.” I sighed. “She’s given me the silent treatment before.
“I remember when she did that!” Foster laughed. “You went practically insane trying to get her to talk to you!”
“Who knew all it would take was, you saving her life?” Fester said sarcastically. I laughed. I was actually was getting somewhere before that. She was starting to acknowledge that I existed again, which was good. Think me saving her life just made her speed up a bit. It was the first time the shades ever put her into the hospital. It was like “What happened” suddenly became magic words that could break the spell. She’s ignored me a few times after that. None of them were as bad as that though, until now. Now it’s like I’m dead too her. What makes it even worse is that I don’t know if she’s okay or not. I’ve tried calling, our usual call, let it ring twice then hang up and call again thing, I’ve tried just letting ring but it was never Shannon who answered the phone, it was either her mother or him, and they always said that she couldn’t come to the phone or she wasn’t there. I think this time I will go insane. At least after I called then I would know that she would be safe.
The next afternoon I called the CPS. I was nervous but I knew it had to be done. I answered all the questions and filed the report and it was pretty easy. The lady was nice, she said they would be down soon to check it out and make sure everything was okay. There was only one problem with that, he could easily get away with it. One of the many things I learned from Shannon is that if you play it right then you can get away with anything, and he could be an idiot sometimes but I’ve seen idiots get away with murder, not that they don’t get caught in the end, but you see my point. One thing I knew I had to do was somehow talk to Shannon’s father. I couldn’t talk to her mom without him being there so the second best thing to do was to talk to Shannon’s sister Michelle. I decided this after a couple hours I called the CPS.
I headed over to their house as soon as I made the connection. I don’t know why I didn’t call first; maybe I wanted to see if Shannon was there. Either way Shannon wasn’t there but Michelle was, which was