What a difference a day brings, though I think I knew on Saturday, today has brought a bit of a deeper sigh of relief all around.
Caleb.
He can no longer threaten me. He can't threaten Henry, he can't do a damn thing except for run this magnificent business with the flair he has shown thus far, and be a good father when he feels like it, since Henry is already rich in fathers and doesn't need more.
He can't touch me anymore. Saturday's threats were a final taunt. He already knew it was over.
It will be a tense symmetry like it has always been. The boys will continue to farm their talents collectively and the harvest will be split equally. The relationship will remain cordial, effective and friendly. I still need to be able to deal with Caleb. I still will be working for him. The difference is he won't be able to hold my son over my head in order to spend time with me doing things he has no business doing.
I already have a husband. And frankly I have a boyfriend too, sometimes. That's enough. That might be too much for some of you but that's okay because this isn't your life, it's mine. And when I got the call from my lawyers today telling me that Caleb has agreed to my terms and the only counterpoint he requested is that he not be referred to as Satan hereafter in my writing or in person, I jumped for joy. If you know me, I don't do that. I never do that.
No more devil references? I think I can manage that. Unless they meant in all languages, and then I'm probably screwed.
One thing we're going to do is leave history buried in an unsuccessful cornfield in Eastern Canada, because some dogs are better left sleeping. Even Lochlan is fine with that. Good, because I really can't manage more than one event at a time anymore.
It took me a very long time to gather up my proof. Letters, emails, notes, witnesses, phone calls, video. Some of it was legal, some of it was not but Caleb's reputation means an awful lot to him and he did not wish to refute anything I had. He didn't wish to have his debaucheries aired in a more public eye, and he didn't wish to acknowledge how incredibly myopic he had become.
All of it was presented to his legal team. And then he was advised how to proceed. But he's a lawyer. He already knew. It just took a jury of his peers and a set of closed doors to really hammer home how tenuous his life, his career was becoming thanks to his obsession with his sister-in-law. He needed a very loud and persistent wake-up call. It has come. This is finished.
Maybe I was just lucky. I like to think I am. I put myself in some awful positions recently but it was time. Enough was enough. And I'm okay. I'm relieved. I will deal with my own proclivities concerning Caleb and my memories of Cole the best I can. That wasn't the right way. Nothing about that was right.
But who is going to argue with me? No one ever tells me no. Ben will not start to impose limits because that got Jacob nowhere but he won't turn a blind eye like Cole did because then things just get worse. So Ben acknowledges and allows and he fights with me anyway and then he worries himself sick and I couldn't do that to him anymore. Ben deserves better. He deserves everything.
But this was something I had to change on my own. Just like Ben said when he asked me to be with him: he couldn't fix any of my problems but he would hold me while I fixed them myself. Almost three years later he has kept his promises. All of them. Anything else wasn't a promise made.
I can spend as much time as I want standing behind my row of knights. God love them, they've done everything for me. Absolutely everything, fighting all of my battles, raising me, helping raise my children, holding us up when I have been a thankless, selfish little monster in return. Standing by me now as I have lost whole years being silent grief, unwilling to help myself or listen to them. Demanding that they fix this, fix everything, turn back time, bring me the good parts and make everything else go away.
It's been like surfacing at last, after diving into the deep blue ocean and swimming down until my lungs might burst and then staying there. For too long, until my head ached and I had not a single molecule of air remaining.
Rescue arrived and she surprised me. A petulant five-foot tall blonde with circles so dark under her faded green eyes you might stop and stare and wonder if she ever sleeps.
Well, she doesn't. Yet.
That might change.
(Do I really think this is the end of Caleb's provocation? I really don't know. I hope so. Maybe I'll just start with that and see what happens. I have to see him several times each week and I'm just going to take it one minute at a time.)
