Her Knight in Shining Armor

We chatted some as we made our way to Furniture World. The more I talked to her the more I realized I'd made the right decision, she was a scared girl in trouble. Not a banger or wanna be, didn't have a nasty attitude as so many youngsters do today, she was down and out, in need of someone who cared. I bought a decent twin mattress set with a frame, we grabbed some sheets and blankets, then headed back. It was well after 10 before I had the bed set up, she quickly put sheets and blankets on. As she stood there staring, I asked if something was wrong. She shook her head no.

"I haven't had a bed since I went to live with my mom. I slept on the couch or the floor."

"Well, you have one now. I'm afraid you'll have to trust me tonight as far as the lock is concerned, I'll pick one up tomorrow. I'm up by six so I'll get my shower out of the way and the bathroom will be yours."

I brought her backpack to her and bid her goodnight as I closed the door. I generally do laundry early on Saturday while nearly everyone else is sleeping in, sometimes the gossipy old lady upstairs would be there as well. I quietly opened her door, grabbed her bag and emptied it on the couch to sort her clothes. I was appalled at their condition, three pair of underwear thread bare and with holes, two pair of very worn socks, one bra that had a broken clasp, I assumed she had been wearing the good one last night. Two blouses, a couple of pull overs that looked entirely too small, and no pants.

My mind was spinning. You mean to tell me this girl was wearing the only pair of jeans she owned? Worn out as well. And it all needed to be washed. I lightly tapped on her door to which she responded, I opened it a crack and asked if she was decent. Yes she was, as I opened it I said good morning, put a terry cloth robe on the foot of the bed and told her I was making breakfast if she'd like to join me. She was nodding her head as I left.

I heard her rummaging around then her door opened, into the hall she stomped, and I rightly guessed she was looking for her clothes.

"Mr. Ted why are my clothes out here on the couch? Why did you go through my bag?"

"Do you drink coffee Tina? Come have a cup with me and I'll explain. I do my laundry early Saturday while the rest of the building sleeps, so I grabbed your bag thinking you might need some clothes washed. That's why your clothes are on the couch."

"I'm so embarrassed. I wish you hadn't done that."

Putting eggs and toast on her plate I told her there was no reason to be embarrassed, I'd been as destitute in the past as she was now.

"Here's what we're going to do Tina, after we eat and you get some clothes on, you and I are going shopping. I know Kohls isn't fancy, but they have decent clothes and a shoe department. If you need the latest and greatest I'm afraid you're out of luck."

"Mr. Ted, you've seen my clothes, I would just like clean and not falling apart. I don't need more than that."

"Okay, you get showered, do your hair and put on your face, then we can head out and buy you some duds. I know the shampoo in the shower is guy stuff, we'll get you some girlie shampoo today."

I think she thought we were going in my service van like we had last night, I have a Tundra as my private vehicle, she was standing at the passenger side of my service van when I started the pickup. She laughed and ran around to where I was, it was the first I'd ever heard her laugh. I explained we didn't have anything large to haul so we'd take the pickup.

We bought three new bras, a half dozen pair each of nylon bikini panties and cotton boy shorts, two thongs, a six pack of multi colored socks, three blouses, two skirts, and two pair of jeans along with a pair of nicer slacks. Two pair of shoes, one for ramming around in, one for good. A stop at Wal-Mart on the way home for makeup, shampoo and toiletry items would complete our shopping. She was nervous as a cat and I asked her what was up.

"Um, I need, um, I need some women things."

"You mean you need tampons or pads?"

"Yes, I thought you'd be embarrassed paying for that stuff?"

"Tina, I was married over twenty years and grew up with four sisters, there aint nothin I haven't seen regarding feminine hygiene products. Get what you need honey, it won't phase me a bit. NOW, I don't want them laying all around the apartment, okay?"

She smiled and nodded. It was nearly two by that time and we were famished, I suggested Perkins, she agreed so we hot footed it over there. Waiting for our food she asked about dinner. I thought to myself we haven't even gotten our food and she's worried about the next meal. Then it hit me, that was exactly what she was doing, not being used to any guarantee there'd be a next meal.

"How about we order pizza, that sound okay?"

She was all for that. I picked up some pop at the convenience store and we headed to the apartment. As I helped get all her stuff in the room and watched her put things in the bathroom, it felt good to have a girl's smells and fragrances inside my once boring prison like walls. I told her we'd look for a used dresser in the penny shopper when the new one came out Tuesday, until then she'd need to stack her stuff on the floor.

Over pizza I told her I was going to wake her at 6:30 the next morning, we were going to do laundry to get all her new under things washed and for lunch we were going to Red Robin. When we first started laundry she was a bit embarrassed with me watching her sort her "dainties" as she called them. Which made no sense to me considering I'd helped her pick them out the day before. By the time the last dryer cycled off she was as comfortable with me folding her panties as she was watching me fold my underwear.

Tina wasn't a big girl, her panties were a medium, bras a 34 C, jeans a 26 waist, 28 length, blouses a women's medium. Hair was long and jet black, skin was a very light bronze with gorgeous dark eyes, she couldn't have been more than 5'6". No getting past the fact that this girl was more than cute, she was attractive. I called my boss Sunday night and told him I'd be an hour or so late Monday morning. I took Tina to school Monday morning and as we were walking in we were met by an elderly lady.

"Tina, nice to see you. Where have you been?" The first bell rang and Tina said bye, she'd see me at home after school.

The old broad had an eyebrow cocked staring at me.

"Turn your dirty mind off lady. Her mother left with some guy and she was without anywhere to go, I took her in with the provision that she finish school. Nothing more to it than that."

"I see she has new clothes, is that part of the package?"

"As a matter of fact, yes, yes it is. Hers were thread bare and tattered, I replaced them, she shouldn't have to be ashamed of her clothes, especially as a teen. You know lady, you really take the cake, no wonder our society is so screwed up with people always assuming the worst, it makes me wonder what you're teaching the next generation."

"I'll have you know I am an educated woman, I have degrees. "

"Well la de da. I have an engineering degree from the Milwaukee School of Engineering, but I sure as hell don't wear it on my sleeve. By the way, just who are you?"

"I'm the vice principal and I'll tell you right now that girl will not graduate, she's too far behind."

"And I call bullshit, there's always a way if she's willing to work for it."

A younger male version of her walked up introducing himself as the student counselor. He agreed with the snooty bitch that she was too far behind to graduate.

"If I can get her teachers to assign extra credit and work with her is there a way she might graduate?"

He replied, "Well yes, I suppose so."

I looked at her and said, "Told you so." Then walked away.

That night I quizzed Tina about the altercation. She admitted to staying home or skipping when she didn't have clean clothes or was extremely hungry. She would rummage for aluminum cans and get enough for a cheap sandwich somewhere. I asked her to give me the name of every teacher she was behind with. I then had her give a letter to the teachers asking if I could meet with them one on one that evening.

Each one asked the same question. "Why do you care?"

My answer was the same to each one, "Because someone has to."

They all agreed to a plan for her to do extra work and earn enough credits to at least qualify for graduation, she wouldn't make it into college with those grades, but she'd graduate. In a final meeting with the counselor and vice principal on Thursday it was brought up several times that she couldn't get into college so why bother. My answer really pissed them off.

"College is over rated, you two are a perfect example."

They were going to veto the plan except the school administrator, who had been monitoring the entire four day process, stepped in.

"He's right. She needs to be given the chance to graduate, if she fails it's on her, not us. I know her to be a smart girl, I think she'll make it. The plan is approved. Mr. Engler it'll be up to Tina now."

With that the meeting done and her plan approved she could find her way to graduation. It wasn't going to be easy, but I knew she could do it if she applied herself. Telling her about it after supper she was jumping around and squealing. At one point she threw herself into my arms and kissed me on the lips. As quickly as she'd done it, she withdrew with a worried look on her face.

"It's okay sweetheart, you're excited, no harm done."

I explained that school work would have to be a priority and become a nightly event. She was to talk to the teachers tomorrow and see if they would give her extra credit work to complete over the Christmas break.

"You know Tina, with Christmas so close I think a celebration is in order. Let's go out for a nice dinner, then shop for a tree. There isn't room for a regular tree in here, but we could get one of those little ones that sits on the table. Does that sound like something you'd like to do? Anywhere in particular you might want to go?""

"I'd like that very much, I've never been to a Texas Road House. Could we go there?"

"We might have to wait five or ten minutes to be seated, if that doesn't bother you, then yes, we can go there. I smell like refrigeration oil so while I take a shower and change why don't you get yourself all prettied up and we'll go."

I was watching the last of the news when she came out of her room. What a beautiful young lady. Her hair was pulled back on both sides with a hair clip above each ear, she wore a skirt with one of the cotton blouses, her white sneakers and a sweatshirt for a wrap. Her makeup was perfect, the focal point was the red lipstick on her tiny mouth. She asked if she looked okay.

"Perfect Tina, you look perfect. You are a knock out girl, I'll be the proudest guy out there tonight."

"What do you mean?"

"Honey, its not often an older guy like me gets to hang out with a pretty girl like you. That's what I mean."

At dinner she wondered what her price range was, everything looked so expensive. I told her to order what she wanted and that there were take home boxes if the portion was too much. I ordered the New York Strip, not knowing what to order she did the same, with the exception of me having fries while she ordered a baked potato. We took half of her meat in a to go box and headed for the mall to find a tree. As we drove I noticed she shivered from time to time and didn't have anything on her hands.

We found a little two foot thing with tiny lights and ornaments. I asked her to follow me with the cart, leading her to the women's section, she wondered why we were there.

"Because you need a coat, hat, scarf, and something to cover your hands. It's going to get colder not warmer over the next two months, and you need to be able to stay warm."

We found a warm coat and the other items she needed, being Christmas, most things were on sale, I told her we'd saved over twenty five dollars, was there anything else she wanted. Standing in front of the nylons she looked at me with that wondering face, was she asking for too much?

"Tina, if that's what you want, get some, we were prepared to pay more for the other stuff, so what's the difference?"

After finding what she liked she gave me another hug, this time a little tighter and longer. I thought I heard her sniffle as she turned rushing down the aisle away from me. Walking a few feet behind her I could see her wiping at her cheeks, I gave her plenty of space to regain composure. We set the little tree on the table, plugged in the lights and sat on the couch. She wondered if it would be okay to turn off the living room lights leaving only a night light in the kitchen and the tree lights. I told her to go for it.

It was nice having her in the apartment with me, sharing what I felt with the tree lights and a sense of Christmas after all. I mentioned I may have a pine scented candle in my closet, after five minutes of rummaging I'd found it, shortly thereafter the room smelled of pine. She was a few feet away and asked if she could sit close to me for warmth. I held up my arm and she snuggled in tight to my chest.

Sitting and watching the tiny LED's blink on and off she began to open up and talk. The early years of foster care were okay, as she got older they became harder, especially when she reached puberty. She was raped at 13 by the 17 year old son of her foster parents, him saying she initiated it, which forced social services to find her another home. People don't want foster teens, the next was worse, this time it was the husband who attempted to rape her. Had it not been for her screaming loud enough that the wife broke in the door, he would have succeeded.

It was at that time her mother suddenly reappeared, Tina reuniting with her, which wasn't much better. To her mother's credit she was adamant about not letting any of her tricks or junkies touch Tina. She may not eat, or she may have to sleep on the floor, but at least she wasn't being raped or pimped. She spoke of the few boyfriends she'd had, coming to the realization that they viewed her as easy because her mother was.

She'd let two boys have sex with her, but they were fast and sloppy, usually hurting her in the process. She told me she reached the point where if they pressed her too hard she would give them a quick blow job, pulling her mouth off when they came. In her words they were never more than a minute or two before shooting their tiny load. By the time she was done talking her eyes were leaking like a faucet, makeup smeared, lips quivering. I held her close for a long while as she cried it out. As we were preparing to go our way for bed, she sat facing me.

"Mr. Ted, why are you doing all these things for me? Spending all this money and talking to my teachers? You don't know me, not really. I have a key to your apartment how do you know I won't steal everything you have?"

"Will you steal everything I have?" She shook her head no. "That's what I thought, I may not know you Tina but I'm a fairly good judge of character. As for buying you underwear and clothes, you needed them, end of story. I'll stick with you and help you as long as you don't lie to me. You start out with 100% of my trust, that will only diminish if you give me reason to trust you less."

"I'll do my best to not let you down Mr. Ted. Good night."

As I lay in bed, I couldn't get the story she'd told me out of my head. No one deserves having to live like that. I would try to be something more in her life than what she'd known before. The teachers of classes where she was so far behind all assigned her extra work for the holidays. With Christmas being on Tuesday her last day was that Friday, returning January third. She grumbled on Saturday when I said she should do some homework before we left the house after lunch.

"Tina, you have a very small window of opportunity, if you don't take advantage of it you won't graduate."

That seemed to motivate her and the morning flew by without her noticing. I'd done our laundry and was putting her stuff in her room when I realized I hadn't gotten her a dresser. I walked to the corner convenience store to get a Penny Shopper and had perused most of the furniture section by the time I was back at the apartment. I set it down to hang my coat, Tina picked it up and saw one I'd completely over looked.

We contacted the people, it was still for sale, they needed extra for Christmas so would let it go for $25 since no one seemed to want it at $35. I chose to get it before lunch, glad I did, there was another person waiting if I hadn't shown by two. I suggested Mexican for lunch, we then made our way to the mall.

"Tina, do you have anyone you'd like to get a gift for?"

"I only know a few people at school, and I wouldn't call them friends. The only person I know that I care about is you Mr. Ted. And what would I get for you? You have everything."

"The best gift you can give me is to buckle down and finish school, to get your diploma. I need to ask something personal. My sister bought all her bras and stuff at Victoria's, she said it was a little more costly but well worth it. Have you ever shopped there?"

"You saw what I had, all I had were hand me downs until you bought me what I'm wearing now. Why do you ask?"

"I wanted to get you a gift card from there for Christmas, then you can pick out something nicer than what I got you at Kohls. Something you really like, something that makes you feel good from the skin out."

"I've always wanted a pair of silk panties, I remember my first foster mom wore them and she loved them. Since then I've always dreamed of owning a pair."

Taking her hand, I led her into Victoria's, purchased a $50 gift card, gave it to her and told her happy shopping. She wondered if I was staying.

"Oh no darlin, I'll be sitting on the bench right outside the door."

Smiling, the young sales gal pointed in the direction of underwear and said another would be there to help her in a minute. An hour later she emerged with two smaller bags, smiling, strutting her stuff. I asked if she'd found some, she nodded yes with a grin on her face. Telling me how the lady had told her how to hand wash them and then let them air dry. Leaning into me she whispered.

"I got two pair and a bra. I can hardly wait to wear them."

Saturday evening I made a teriyaki chicken dish that we then wrapped in a pita along with a salad. The newest Denzel Washington movie was now on Red Box, we walked down to the convenience store to pick it up. When we got there I observed several young men milling around, being a nuisance. As they approached us I stepped in front of Tina, I could feel her hand on my back.

"Who's the chick old man? We want to talk with her, not you, you might wanna step aside."

"You might want to go elsewhere young man. I may not be able to whip all of you, but you'll damned sure know you were in a fight. We can do this one of two ways. You walk away, or I start dropping people where they stand."

Mister big mouth stepped toward me all puffed up and cocky, waving his arms around and spewing threats as bullies always do. He dropped to his knees as I throat punched him. That gave pause to the other three, I asked who was next, all of them backing away talking shit. I didn't really care what they said as long as I didn't have to fight them all at once.

I'm not a big man, only 5'11", stocky and in decent shape although not a fitness junkie, I can hold my own when I need to. With our movie in hand we stepped away from them as I guided her along, not taking my eyes off them. By the time we were fifty feet away they were helping smart ass to his feet, still gasping for air.

On the couch eating popcorn she paused the movie.