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the-wize-1 · 1 year ago

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Thawing the Widow (A Natasha Romanoff Story): Chapter 1 - Ding Dong

Chapter Summary: Kimberly Kingston, a social services worker, is determined to have a meeting with Trevor Gray. Instead, she meets his sarcastic ten-year-old niece.

Chapter Warnings: Hints of child abuse.

Notes: Hey there! This is my first chapter of a new series following Natasha Romanoff accidentally becoming the guardian of a sarcastic but endearing 10 year old girl. Formatting might be off as I’m not used to Tumblr. Please let me know what you think!! Happy reading! Chapter 2 will come Thursday at 5PM PST.

Thawing the Widow Masterlist

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November - Trevor’s Apartment

Ding-dong. Ding-dong.

Kimberly Kingston rang the doorbell for the third time.

“Mr. Gray! I know you’re in there! Open up, please!”

She was dressed sharply, in a navy blazer and matching slacks. Her tidy appearance was a stark contrast to the rickety old apartment, which was in ruins. The walls were peeling and stained, the carpet was shaggy, and it smelled strongly of smoke. On the way up, she’d passed several drunks. Throughout these five visits, she had added several notes to her official-looking clipboard.

Kimberly rapped on the door three times impatiently, tapping her foot. She was not usually an impatient woman, but she had visited the apartment three times, each time with no success in meeting Mr. Gray. He had sounded agreeable on the phone, but proved to be frustrating and unreliable. The first time, she had waited twenty minutes before getting an answer. Mr. Gray had called and said that he’d been out of town. The second time, his excuse was that he’d forgotten he had a poker game. The third time, he had simply locked the door and refused to answer until she left.

This time, he wasn’t getting away with it.

Trevor Gray had been made the legal guardian of his niece, Catalina, six months prior.

The girl’s parents had died in a gruesome car crash when she had been only eight. She’d initially been placed in the foster system, cycling through a variety of different families before they located her distant uncle, Trevor Gray, who agreed to take her in. Mr. Gray lived in New York, a drastically different environment than California, where the girl had previously lived with her parents.

Poor girl, Kimberly had thought. She’d gone through so much.

The first few months, social services had paid them a few visits to see how she was settling in, and each visit had raised no suspicion. However, a few months later, a concerned neighbor called in, suspecting domestic violence. The kind old lady who lived a room away had told Kimberly that she frequently heard shouting coming from Mr. Gray’s residence, accompanied by sounds of violence. After a quick round of interviews, this story was confirmed by a handful of neighbors around the area.

Catalina Gray’s teachers at school had told Kimberly she was clearly an intelligent student, but didn’t try in classes. She frequently got into fights at school, which was troubling. One teacher had reported seeing bruises on the girl in class, but when questioned, the girl had refused to explain why.

“Mr. Gray!”

Kimberly raised her hand to knock again but was halted by the door aggressively swinging open.

Kimberly, who had been expecting a malicious older man, was surprised to see a young, fair-haired girl standing in the doorway, nursing a mug of coffee that dwarfed her hand. The girl had wide, innocent brown eyes and soft features, reminding Kimberly of an angel.

Then the girl scowled at her. “Jesus, lady, could you be any louder?”

The visual of an angel immediately dissipated. The girl looked like she’d just gotten out of bed— messy hair, drooping eyes, wearing only a tank top and flannel pajama bottoms. With the coffee, the annoyance in her voice, and the bedragged appearance, she looked startlingly adult and not at all like a ten year old girl. Kimberly could only blink, momentarily wordless.

She quickly gathered herself, giving her a friendly smile. “Hello! I apologize for the noise. You must be Catalina.”

“Uh-huh.” The girl leaned against the doorframe, looking decidedly unimpressed. “Who’re you?”

“My name is Kimberly Kingston. I’m a social services worker.”

“Uh-huh. And you wanna speak to Trevor?”

The girl called her uncle by his first name. As inconspicuous as she could, Kimberly made a note on her notepad. “Yes, I’d like to ask your uncle some questions. Is he home?”

“Sure is. If you wanna talk to him you’d better wait till noon. He passed out drunk about twelve hours ago, dead as a rock. I think that’s the saying, anyway.”

Kimberly frowned and made another note.

The girl took a long drag from her coffee and made a face, which Kimberly might’ve found amusing, had she not been so dumbfounded.

“I suppose I should invite you in,” Catalina said after a while. She stepped further inside, looking at her expectantly.

“Oh!” Kimberly peered inside, noticing Trevor Gray, who was indeed passed out on the couch, beer in hand. “Are you sure your uncle wouldn’t mind?”

Catalina made her way to the couch. She waved a hand in front of his face. Her expression was unreadable as she glanced up.

“Like I said, dead as a rock.”

Kimberly stepped inside the apartment, briefly wondering if she was following protocol by doing so. She took it as an opportunity to observe the apartment. It was in worse shape than the outside. There were dirty dishes piled on every surface, old clothes strewn across the floors. Kimberly took note that Mr. Gray smoked. There was a pile of cigarettes sitting in an ashtray. Empty beer bottles littered the corners and the table.

The girl was watching her like a hawk. Her eyes, so dark and strangely intelligent, were following her as Kimberly paused by certain objects and scribbled in her clipboard. She had finished her mug of coffee and had set it in the sink.

“Why are you taking so many notes?”

“I’m just jotting down some observations. It helps me remember.”

“You want some coffee?”

“No, thank you.”

“What about cereal? We have Fruity Pebbles. Well, they’re actually the cheap ripoff version. ‘Fruity Crisps’. Tastes the same, though.”

Kimberly smiled. She was reminded of her sister’s kid, who also tended to jump from question to question with no transition. “I’ve already had breakfast, thanks.”

Catalina shrugged and yanked open the fridge. Kimberly glanced at the contents inside and noted that it was nearly empty. It was mainly composed of cans of beer, takeout, and energy drinks. There was no milk.

The girl seemed to come to this conclusion as well. She glanced up, surveying the kitchen. Her gaze drew Kimberly’s to an empty gallon of milk, sitting by the TV.

“Looks like we’re out of milk, too. Bummer.” Catalina looked at Kimberly seriously. “By the way, you should never use water instead of milk in your cereal.”

“I’ll keep that in mind.”

Kimberly watched her shake the cereal from the box into a relatively clean bowl. The girl was oddly graceful, having none of the careless clumsiness that kids around her age had. She grabbed a spoon and plopped down at the kitchen table, clearing it from scattered Bud Light cans.

Catalina sighed. “Are you just gonna stand there or what?”

“Excuse me?”

“You said you’re a social worker. Social workers ask questions. So, go on. I know you wanna.”

“Well, all right.” Kimberly suppressed a smile. She took a seat across from her. “Catalina—”

“I go by Cat. Catalina’s stupid.”

“Okay, Cat. How do you like living here?”

The girl shoved cereal in her mouth like she hadn’t eaten in years. “S’alright,” she said around a mouthful of Fruity Pebbles. “School sucks.”

“How so?”

“All the kids hate me ‘cause I’m a Know-It-All, which is fine because most of them are dimwitted little jerks that I don’t wanna be friends with anyway. All the teachers hate me because of that one time I punched that little guy Moose. Ironic name, huh? Yeah, so I was like— pow! Right in the nose! He cried like a baby, of course, but no one ever blames the little guy, even when they’re the ones starting it. Oh yeah, so the principal hates me because I keep doing stuff like that, and then he has to fill out more paperwork. The only person who doesn’t hate me is the janitor...”

She suddenly looked down to where Kimberly was scribbling furiously. She caught a glimpse of the words on the page.

“You spelled ‘troublesome’ wrong. Thanks, by the way. I love being analyzed by random people I’ve just met.”

Kimberly quickly pulled the clipboard up from the table, away from view. “Oh, I wasn’t talking about you, sweetheart. I was just describing the situation you’re in as ‘troublesome.��”

Cat didn’t look convinced. “Uh-huh.”

“I can see you’re a very intelligent girl, Cat. Sometimes intelligent children need an outlet for their creativity.”

“That’s a nice way of saying ‘You’re a freak.’" Cat paused. “Sorry. Was that mean? Sometimes I say mean things. I have ADHD. Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder. Sometimes I start talking and I just can’t stop. That’s why you’ve gotta stop me sometimes, when I’m talking. ‘Cause I just go on and on and on. See, I’m doing it again.”

Kimberly nodded. This conversation was getting off-topic. She searched for a way to get back to talking about Trevor Gray. “Does your uncle give you medication for your ADHD?”

“No.” Cat’s eyebrow wrinkled. “It’s not like it’s a disease, right? Do I need pills or something?”

“No, you certainly don’t. Does your uncle ever drink?”

Cat laughed like this was the most hilarious thing in the world.

“Okay, obviously he drinks. What does he usually drink?”

“Mostly beer. Bud Light, Budweiser, Natural Light. He keeps the hard stuff in there.” Cat nodded to the cupboard above the stove. “Rum, tequila, the goods.”

Her questions were becoming a lot less subtle. Cat seemed almost pleased to unveil the truth about Trevor Gray’s horrid parenting, so Kimberly pressed on. “How often does he get drunk?”

“He’s only sober fifty percent of the time. I’d hate to see his liver.”

“Have you ever been scared of him when he’s drunk?”

Cat froze. Her hands, which had been fiddling with her spoon, went still. She glared at Kimberly like she’d just been insulted. “I’m not scared of anything.”

“Okay.”

“You don’t believe me?”

“I believe you,” Kimberly said steadily. She was looking at Cat’s eyes, which had turned from playful to defensive.

“Okay, good.”

“Has your uncle ever harmed you intentionally?”

Cat chewed her cereal slowly. Kimberly watched her closely, aware that she’d hit a nerve. “No,” she said calmly.

“Really?”

“Really,” Cat snapped, voice hard. “Back off, okay?” Her voice softened, and her eyes grew regretful. “Sorry. I was being mean again.”

“It’s okay. Really.”

Kimberly was suddenly struck by how much Cat looked like her sister’s kid. Justin had the same guilty look on his face after he knew he’d done something wrong. It shouldn’t have been surprising because the two were about the same age. But Cat’s way of talking and acting had been much closer to an adult’s than a kid’s. For a few minutes, Kimberly had forgotten she was talking to a girl who was decades younger than she was.

She could tell Cat’s walls were up from the last two questions. She was scraping the bottom of the cereal bowl, not making eye contact. Kimberly took this as a cue to stop. She grabbed her clipboard.

“Okay, I think we’re done here.”

She started to stand up, but Cat stopped her.

“Wait.”

She was staring at Kimberly, eyes thoughtful.

“We haven’t had a visit from social services in months. What brings you here now?”

Kimberly wrestled with the idea of telling her the truth. She sat down again, holding eye contact. “Cat, we know that your uncle has been abusing you. Now, I realize it’s a strong word—”

“Am I going to go to one of those— what do you call them— foster families?” Cat interrupted.

“I’m going to be honest with you here. It’s a very likely possibility.”

There was a shift in her expression. “No,” Cat said firmly. “I don’t want to live with strangers.”

“It won’t be as bad as it sounds. We’ll give you to a nice, loving family who we’ll have checked thoroughly to make sure they are trustworthy—”

“Yeah, you guys did such a great job with Trevor, didn’t you?”

“I don’t know what to tell you. I’m sorry, sweetie. There’s really no other option. From what I’ve discovered, this is not a safe environment for you to be in. Frankly, your uncle is far from the ideal guardian.”

“I don’t care. I’m not being shipped off again.”

“Cat, just—”

Kimberly’s phone buzzed in her pocket. “Ugh!” She checked it. EMERGENCY , the text read in all-caps. PICK UP YOUR PHONE.

“Hold on,” she said. “I’ll be right back. Stay right here, okay? I just need to step outside...”

She spent a brief five minutes on the phone with admin, said something about needing to get back to a case she was on, and came back into the apartment.

There was no sign of a fair-haired girl. Kimberly searched the apartment and called her name, certain that the girl must be hiding somewhere or doing something equally childish.

And then she noticed that the girl’s closet had been ransacked, and so had the kitchen. The box of Fruity Pebbles was nowhere in sight. A window was cracked open, a light breeze flowing through.

Kimberly pinched her nose, fighting the urge to scream. It was obvious what had happened.

Ten feet away, she heard the sounds of someone throwing up. Trevor Gray started when he saw her. He swore at her, demanding who she was and how she got into his apartment. Stumbling a little, he looked around wildly like he expected an entire fleet of police to show up.

“Wha’ th’ hell’s goin’ on?”

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