Apology Accepted

I let out a big huff of air as Oli and I plopped down at a table in the food court. My feet were tired and I was so hungry I could hardly stand up straight. I watched as Oliver pulled his wallet out and grabbed some money. I went to reach for mine, but he stood up before I was able to pull any money out of it.

"What do yeh want?"

I looked around the place, finally deciding on Panda Express, "How about some fried rice?" I paused, handing him some money, "Here."

He pushed it back towards me, laughing, "Sam. I'll pay fer yeh. Yeh 'ave a problem with just sittin' 'ere and watchin' the presents? Don't want anyone nabbin' 'em from us while we're stuffin' our faces."

"Yeah. I can stay here."

With that, Oliver walked towards the line at Panda and I turned back towards the table, looking at the pattern on it. Once I found myself bored with that, I leaned over in my chair and peered into the bags, poking through all the presents Oli and I had managed to buy. We'd spent the last three hours ignoring people who wanted to start fights over gifts and waiting in ridiculously long check out lines. It was a miracle we had any patience left with each other, much less at all, after having to deal with all the holiday shoppers. We'd spent more time making fun of old ladies in bad Christmas sweaters and hiding from girls Oliver knew. We stood behind signs and ducked behind people, giggling like elementary school kids trying to get out of taking their bath. When the girls finally gave up, we couldn't help but burst into laughter. We got dirty looks, but it didn't matter. Oliver and I were in too much of a good mood to care.

I was rather proud of all the gifts I'd bought for everyone. I purchased a bag of Columbian coffee for Ian and a nice sweater for Carol with the help of Oliver. I then went on to buy Matt a bag of apples as a small gag gift and some action figure Oli told me he wanted. I was uneasy about buying it, because I was afraid that Oliver was just messing with me, but he seemed serious so I took it up to the counter and shelled out the money for it. We walked around a cute little vintage store in the mall that had all kinds of weird little knick knacks. I browsed through it quickly, guessing Audri's size and grabbed her a dress spotted in little red and white flowers. As I was standing in line, arguing with Oliver over buying myself a dress to wear, I managed to catch small glimpse of a necklace with an owl hanging from it and picked that up as well.

I followed Oli into a camera store and walked around as he stood by the same lens and looked at it for a good twenty minutes. I watched as he pulled his money out and counted it twice, an upset expression coming over his face. He grabbed the box again and took it up to the counter, questioning the salesman. I walked up behind him, hearing him trying to bribe the salesman into lowering the price. I reached into my pocket and grabbed a few bills, still unaware of how much I was handing Oli, because he'd been handing my money over to everyone, and gave them to him. He looked towards me with a questioning face, but I'd already walked off, not wanting to get into a disagreement over buying Tom's present. I hadn't bought Tom anything yet, and I didn't mind pitching in to buy him something nice.

Once we'd finished there, I walked into a store with a lot of sentimental gifts. You could create your own teddy bear and send it to someone, or order them chocolates with their name printed on them. I finally chose to get a picture frame with mine, Marsha, and Marilyn's name on the sides of it. Oli grinned at me, muttering, "Proper waste of quid right there." I merely shoved him lightly and asked him if he wanted a Christmas present or not. Which in turn, earned me a kiss and a pervy suggestion for his present. I couldn't help but turning red as the man painting on the frame looked right at us and started laughing.

Besides that, it was nice shopping with Oliver. I thought I'd get lost or not have enough money or something, and I was glad that didn't happen, because it would have turned my whole Christmas shopping experience into a serious disaster. I'd never gone before, so I wasn't sure what to expect. But, as always, with Oliver, it was the complete opposite of what I'd thought it would be, which was a good thing in this case. I was grateful to be with only Oli, even if half of it was spent pulling our hair out and making sure we had enough money to pay for what we had in our hands.

"'Ey Doll." Oli grinned, setting a paper plate in front of me, remaining on his feet, "I forgot teh ask yeh if yeh wanted anythin' teh drink. I can go back and' get yeh somethin', if yeh want."

My eyes wandered over to the line Oli had previously been in and shook my head, "That line is ridiculous Oli. We'll just share your drink, if you don't care."

He sat down, pulling his drink away from me, talking louder than necessary., "I don't want Sam germs all over my drink! Ew!"

"Shut up Oli!" I laughed, watching as people's eyes were averted towards us.

He grinned at me, winking and watched as I picked up a scoop of rice with my fork, stuffing my mouth full and swallowing roughly before shoveling another bite into my mouth. I looked up at Oli, who was staring at me with an amused expression on his face. I quickly swallowed and dropped my fork on my plate, feeling my face heat up with embarrassment.

"Yeh 'ungry?" He chuckled, "I told yeh teh eat before we left, Sam."

"I couldn't eat. I was too excited."

Oli shrugged, taking a swig of his drink and then setting it in the middle of the table, "I don't understand why yeh got all excited 'bout goin' Christmas shoppin'. 'Ts a pain in meh arse."

"Yeah," I agreed, "I guess it could get old going every year. But I've never gone before, so it was something new."

"Yeh 'aven't?" Oli asked, looking surprised.

"No."

"Why not?"

"Kids in foster care don't really do Christmas. You get a donated coat or a used coloring book and some broken crayons for Christmas. And it's not like a little kid in foster care is going to be able to get a hold of money to go buy gifts. So I've just never gone."

Oli suddenly looked embarrassed as he took another bite of his egg roll, "I guess I never really thought 'bout it."

"Not a lot of people do." I said, pushing my remaining rice around with my fork, "Foster kids are just given what's left over. It's hard to find a nice family. A lot of foster kids would trade everything they've got for a nice Christmas day with a family that loves them."

"Is that what yeh always wanted?"

"Yeah. But I'm pretty sure that I've found it."

"Yeah, Marsha and Marilyn are nice people."

I shook my head, "No. I'm talking about your family Oli."

"What?"

I blushed slightly, starting to feel stupid for telling Oli this. But, I might as well tell him now or else he won't stop pestering me about it.

"Just they way they've all accepted me. Sure, it was rough at first, but that's expected. You've just have to look at it this way; I basically ruined their relationships with you. And they still allow me to come bunk at their house for almost a month and spend Christmas with everyone. Not a lot of families would do that."

Oliver rolled his eyes. Which, I will admit pissed me off at first. But I didn't want to sit around being irritated with him all day. So I just assumed he had something stuck in his eye.

"Yeh make it sound like it's the best thing that's ever 'appened teh yeh."

Scratch that. His foot is shoved down his throat.

I looked up at him as he realized the stupidity of his sentence and looked back down at my hands as I merely muttered, "It is."

He looked embarrassed all over again and returned to his food. He didn't say anything else to me for the next five minutes, giving me enough time to finish eating. Once he had finished, he grabbed both my plate and his, tossing them in the trash can beside us. He then picked up as many bags as he could and didn't say anything to me as I reached for the three remaining ones. I suddenly felt like I'd said something offensive. But I knew I hadn't. I wasn't sure what I'd done, which left me in a bad place because I was too scared to ask him about it and I didn't understand what it was I said that could have pissed him off. Therefore, there was nothing I could say to fix it.

Great. I put Oli in a bad mood right before Christmas.

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As Sam and I dragged the last of the presents into my room and slammed the door shut to start wrapping, I still had my foot lodged halfway down my throat. I couldn't believe how stupid I'd acted. I must've looked so selfish and arrogant, groaning about Christmas shopping when Sam had never even been before.

Then, she went on to tell me how amazing she thought my family was and I was too embarrassed to say thank you, instead I had to be a complete idiot about it. The more the thought flipped around in my head, the quicker I began to realize that it was actually Sam who was the incredible person here. Not my mum, or my dad. Especially not myself. She'd managed to bring our family back down to Earth and shoving us closer together, just by showing us how horrible it was when we were apart.

I just couldn't wrap my mind around how someone who'd never been properly loved or cared about managed to love so quickly. She'd been fostered, beaten, lied to and hurt. It made absolutely no sense how she held faith in anyone, especially me. After what I had done to her, she should never want to speak to me again. I did the same thing everyone else did, I left her.

But, that got me thinking about how she was left. Maybe her parents had no other choice. Maybe they were scared about raising a child. With those thoughts, it suddenly occurred to me that I never really asked Sam about her real parents before. I didn't know if they were dead or too young to have a baby. I didn't know anything about them, besides the fact that Sam was their daughter.

"Did yeh ever want teh meet yer parents Sam?"

I listened as she stopped unrolling the wrapping paper and she turned around, knocking something to the ground and picking it up before saying, "I did."

I paused my hands stopping in the midst of pulling a piece of tape from the dispenser, "Were they nice?"

"Yeah, I guess so. I lived with them."

"Yeh lived with 'em?" I paused, my stomach sinking as I realized something must have happened to them, "What 'appened teh 'em?"

"They just didn't want me anymore."

"Didn't want yeh?"

"Yeah. My mom was pregnant again, with a boy. Which is what they wanted in the first place, and they didn't have enough money to take care of both of us, so they got rid of me."

I swallowed roughly. How could they do that to a little girl?

"'Ow old were yeh?"

"I don't know. Six? Maybe seven?"

I whipped around to face Sam's back, anger radiating from every orifice with my body. I never knew I could hate someone that I didn't know as much as I hated Sam's parents at the moment.

"Are yeh fuckin' kiddin' meh?"

I watched as she turned around, walking towards me with a somber expression. Her arms hung limp at her sides and she looked up at me, almost no emotion across her face as she said, "Oli. It happened a long time ago. It doesn't matter now."

"Yeah it does! 'Ow could two idiots just get rid of a little girl? They 'ad yeh for six god damn years! They just threw yeh out the door 'cause they were too fuckin' stupid an' lazy teh make enough money teh take care of both of yeh! They were all yeh knew an' they just abandoned yeh." I yelled, "That's a pile of shit Sam."

"Oli! Babe!" She laughed slightly, pulling me into a tight embrace, "Don't get all worked up over it, okay? I don't need them. I've got you."

"But, 'ow can yeh just... I mean..." I sighed, at a complete loss for words.

"What?" She asked, pulling away from me.

"Nothin' Sam." I said, shoving hair away from her gorgeous blue eyes and kissing her softly on the mouth, "I was just 'bout teh tell yeh that I love yeh."

"I love you too, Oli." She grinned, "Why don't we take a break from wrapping presents and watch a movie?"

"Sure Doll. What do yeh wanna watch?"

She turned around and dug into a blue plastic bag, pulling out a DVD and turning back towards me, "Stand By Me."

I grabbed it from her and turned it around to read the back side, "When in the bloody 'ell did yeh buy this?"

With her cute little grin plastered on her face, she stole it back and began tearing the packaging open, "When you were trying to rip off that poor sales guy over that lens, I found it sitting on the corner of a book stand. So I bought it."

I laughed slightly, watching as she pulled the DVD from its case and opening my player, trading the movies. She then closed it and turned on the TV. Before she had time to turn up the volume, I grabbed her around the middle and threw her onto my bed, covering her cheeks with numerous sloppy kisses.

"Oli!" She laughed, pushing against my chest, "You're getting slobber all over my face!"

Grinning, I licked her cheek and then quickly kissed her on the mouth before she was able to protest. I was immediately taken off guard when Sam bit down on my bottom lip. Not roughly, but not in a very soft manner either. Her tongue found its way into my mouth, surprising me yet again. She refused to go further than holding my hand when my parents were home, in fear that they would walk in and catch us. But, after about 5 seconds of Sam flicking her tongue all over the place, I realized she was playing a game with me and I pulled away from her. I wiped my mouth on the back of my hand and looked at Sam who was now laughing hysterically.

"That was not alrigh'." I said.

"You licked my whole face!"

"At least I didn't try choking yeh with meh god damn tongue!"

She looked at me, still grinning and then turned towards the TV, and back at me, holding a finger against her mouth, "Shhh. This movie isn't going to make any sense if you don't watch the beginning."

I shook my head at her, still laughing and planted a kiss on her forehead before clutching her against me and proceeding to actually watch the movie.

Although, I couldn't pay much attention to the movie for two reasons. One being that Sam's knees were pulled towards her, so I couldn't see from where I was laying and the second one being that it was almost impossible for me to watch something while trying to think at the same time. I know Sam told me I shouldn't worry about it and that it really didn't matter, but I just couldn't put to rest what she'd told me earlier. It made me feel so much worse for leaving her.

I finally understood why Sam was so self conscious and held absolutely no trust for anyone at all. And now I had a small understanding as to why she didn't mind so much when Tom had insulted her from the beginning. In Sam's mind, she'd much rather lose someone before she got to know them, rather then wait until they became an important part of her life to discover they were just going to get rid of her again. That's the way Sam's mind worked and it didn't single out anyone.

Finding out what happened to Sam made me appreciate her so much. I was so lucky to have even the tiniest bit of Sam's heart. I couldn't imagine being given away like that. Her insecurities and feelings of inferiority suddenly seemed so obvious to me now. I felt so horrible for becoming irritated with Sam when she didn't speak with confidence. I just wanted to lay here forever and never let go of her. I wanted to tell her how much I loved it when her eyes sparkled and her mouth was pulled into a grin. I wanted to kiss her over and over again until she got sick of me and shoved me away. I watched to tell her how much I love her, which I'm not even sure I could do using only words. I wanted to tell her the reasons why I loved her. I felt like she should know all these things.

No one had ever spent enough time with Sam to realize these things about her, much less tell her. Sam was never told how amazing she really is. She'd fucked up and that's all anyone knew of her, because they'd just pass her onto the next family that didn't really give a fuck. Which finally made me realize why she felt so happy to be around my family and why she was so excited to put the star on our Christmas tree. Sam just wanted to be cared about and loved. That's all she's ever wanted.

And even though I may never understand why Sam's parents got rid of her or how they manage to live with themselves after losing what could have been such an amazing part of their lives, I realize that it doesn't really matter. Because I now understand parts of Sam and the things she's gone through. I know why she's scared. I know why she appreciates everything so much. And I know why she loves me, which is all that really matters anymore.

"Oli?" Sam's voice questioned, derailing my train of thought.

"Yeah?"

"You're squeezing me." She paused, "Like really hard."

I didn't realize how much tension had found it's way into my arms while I was thinking. But I quickly relaxed my arms and laughed nervously, "Sorry."

She merely kissed the inside of my elbow and entangled her leg with mine, focusing back on the screen once again.