Fade Away

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My memorial service was four years ago. I was legally declared dead two years after it. Doreen and I married as soon as Brent Willis was declared dead– we are now Mr. and Mrs. Simmons. When we got married we already had a little girl, and we now have a little boy on the way.

Doreen and I have no money problems. In addition to my inheritance we have the money from the sale of Doreen's business to her employees, and the salary that we get from the charity we work for. Ever since the charity that Doreen set up got their $2,000,000 donation they have had enough money to hire her as the full time operations director, and me as the financial director and investment counselor. Through the charity we have been able to help hundreds of underprivileged families and get great satisfaction from our work, including by increasing our outreach every year.

Tom retired and he and Lydia moved to a place only about fifteen miles from our house in order to be near us, and especially their granddaughter and their grandson-to-be.

I love Doreen more than I ever loved Melissa, and she loves me more than Melissa ever did. That makes me feel guilty that I didn't choose her after college. The entire mess with Melissa and her family could have been avoided.

I stopped trying to find out what had happened to Melissa, Jack, and Carolyn. The news was never good, and just enhanced my guilt. The last that I heard Jack and Carolyn had established a scholarship in my name at the college that Melissa, Doreen and I had attended, and Melissa had gotten out of the mental health institution after six months of treatment and moved away.

Doreen and I could not be happier with each other and our life together except for one thing. We could not have more guilt than what we feel for how absolutely successfully my "revenge" was executed. We now know that not even guilty Melissa, let alone innocent Jack and Carolyn, deserved what we did to them. I wish that I was not such a chicken-shit and had confronted Melissa and simply divorced her. "What ifs" are a bitch!