School was over and Grace was relieved. It wasn't that she disliked it, she had missed it in a way. But with Javier seeming to make a point to make her day miserable every day, it wasn't her favourite place to be, either. Sometimes it made the nine year old uncomfortable, and she didn't really understand just why he seemed to dislike her so much, but she was determined to work through this. It wasn't that bad. Even if her arm hurt from getting shoved into the wall. At least Henry hadn't seen that today.
Henry. Who had betrayed her. Part of her understood. He was worried and he was related to Snow White and Prince Charming. It was who he was. But that didn't mean he should have told the adults. Or her father. Coming home to that had been unpleasant. And then she had gone back to the boards that day to see just what was said and she had been distracted that his head had been chopped off. It explained the scarves. But her papa had lost his head, quite literally and Grace really had no idea on how to respond to that. Or what to say.
Because of what had been revealed, she knew that she should just go straight back to the complex, but she didn't want to deal with questions on if Javier had stopped hurting her. (He wasn't. It wasn't as bad as Henry seemed to think. She could handle it but now people were involved and worried and she didn't like that) He hadn't and she didn't want to lie but she didn't want her papa to worry. Or pull her out of school. Or get involved. It was very frustrating for the nine year old and she almost walked right by the red head at the tree.
It was the lack of winter coat and scarf that first caught Grace's attention. And she was staring up into the tree.
"Did you lose something?"
Helping someone was a perfectly good reason for not heading straight back to the Complex. Besides, what if they were new and needed help? She could help them, being nine didn't stop that.