February Sucks - A Sequel

"Any other questions for Linda?" Dr. Webb asked me.

"Yes, one more." I said trying to lull them into thinking I was serious. "Do you want to go Christmas shopping for the kids the Monday after Thanksgiving?"

I caught Samantha out of the corner of my eye and she was starting to wipe tears from her eyes. Dr. Webb seemed to be having a similar issue with himself. Linda just smiled and nodded eagerly. "Ok good, but we have a budget so no going crazy over there." I looked straight ahead and tried to hold myself together. It finally felt like the long nightmare that started in February was coming to an end.

On Thanksgiving I got the kids to Linda's parent at 7:30am. They weren't very happy about being up so early. Her parents didn't understand either, but I told them I had an errand to run that morning and apologized for the short notice. I told my parents to be at Linda's parent's house at 8:30. They also didn't understand the reason, but I fed them a story that Emma and Timmy wanted all their Grandparents together to feel like a family and watch the parade. My parents bought the story.

I got to the hospital excited to see Linda and for the day we would all be together. She was sitting in the lobby ready to go. I signed the necessary forms and we were on our way. As I drove I put my right hand down on the console between the front seats. A moment later Linda's hand was on top of mine. We drove that way in silence all the way to her parent's house. I asked her to stay in the car for a moment. I was concerned that she would be alone since I wasn't allowed to let her out of my sight, but I had to get inside and get everyone situated for the surprise.

I had everyone sit in the family room and told them I had a gift for them I was going to bring in from the porch. I got Linda and when we came inside made sure she was quiet. I yelled, "Cover your eyes no peaking," and we walked back to the family room. I made sure everyone had their eyes closed and brought her to be in front of the group.

"Ok on the count of 3 you can look." I felt tears growing in my eyes and knew I had to get going on the count. "Three, Two, one."

"MOMMY!!" Emma yelled. And everyone got up to hug her.

"Linda! Oh My God!" I heard over and over.

They carried on and I couldn't control my tears. I slipped away to the kitchen and completely fell apart crying. We'd made one more step to undoing the hell Dee, Dave and LaValliere had brought to our lives. As I had a thousand times before, I cursed them and whatever it was that led to that night and the results of it. But slowly the healing was happening.

Linda's mom found me in the kitchen, "Why are you here and not with us? Why are you crying?" I hugged her.

"You have no idea what emotions I've been through and am going through. I'm so happy we're here and are slowly digging out of hell. I didn't want my crying to dampen the happiness you guys have."

"Jim, you're a gem of a man. I don't know what the future will be. But I thank God you're part of our lives." We just held each other.

I went back into the family room and there was Linda with Emma on one side and Timmy on the other. She had a wonderful smile and was where she belonged. The universe was slowly correcting itself. The day went on beautifully. It was sad to see it end. I thought about the path the next few weeks would follow. I had an idea on how I wanted it to go and Dr. Webb was going to help bring it to reality.

I dropped of Linda and walked her back to her room. When we got there she was a bit depressed about being back in her room. I sat next to her. "I know. I'm working on it."

"Working on what?" she asked confused.

"Don't ask. Just be patient ok. When you feel down, do this for me." I pulled out a picture frame that had a new picture of everyone earlier that day and gave it to her.

"Oh my God," she exclaimed.

"When you feel down. Look at this picture and just say to yourself 'be patient'. Can you do that for me?" She nodded. I hugged her good night and left her room. Then I realized something. I walked back to her room.

"I forgot something." She looked around as if to find something I left. I leaned over and kissed her on the cheek. "Goodnight beautiful. I'll talk to you tomorrow." She had a big smile and seemed to find a lot of comfort in that small kiss on her cheek. Truth be told, it gave me a lot of comfort as well.

We talked the next day for a little while and I looked forward to shopping Monday. I picked her up that day and we had a huge amount of fun. It really started to feel like old times. One thing that happened that I felt bad about was at lunch. There were a few women sitting at a table near us and I heard one make a comment about Linda. They didn't recognize her since you would have to really look hard to see that she was the woman in the paper with LaValliere. The comment was something about, "That old cougar over there with that young guy." Linda heard it and it made her very self-conscious.

"Hey. Ignore them. They don't matter." I tried to reassure.

"But I do look old now." She said somewhat sad.

"You know as well as I do that you're eating better and that's bringing back how you look."

She nodded but replied, "Maybe a little true but I'll never look like I used to. Does that bother you?"

"We all age. Trust me I'll catch up to you." And smiled at her. "It's fine. I always wanted to date a cougar."

She smiled at me, "You suck. You know that right?" I smiled at her. "What? What?" She asked confused.

"That statement. What you just said. That's why I married you. That's you, and that's what I." I paused and realized what I was going to say. I didn't pause to rethink what I was going to say, I paused to savor this moment of wanting to say what I was going to say. I smiled at her. She looked at me waiting for me to complete my sentence. "And that's what I love about you."

Her eyes got huge and she let out a small gasp. I nodded. "Yep." I said that like my comment was just a normal day to day comment and nothing of note. But it was of note. It was a big deal. It was a hurdle that two months ago I would have laughed at and said was absolutely fucking impossible. But it was possible and was real.

"I love you to." She said with the softest eyes ever.

"Patience." Was all I could muster as a reply.

The next weeks became very stressful for me. It felt like having Linda in the hospital was counterproductive to her continued healing and recovery. Dr. Webb agreed to some degree but there was only so much he could do. The wheels of the state mental health community evidently turn slow. I just tried to get Linda out as much as I could. She had dinner with us at home at least four nights a week.

I had lined up in the middle of December that I could sign Linda out from Christmas Eve through the day after Christmas. At least we had that as a positive. The weekly sessions had begun to take on a little bit of a different feel. They were much more focused on the idea of Linda back in society. We knew there would be challenges to that and wanted to be proactive on those.

The other thing that helped was that Jane came to visit her frequently. They had grown close due to Jane's outing of Dee and Dave. It seemed to help Linda that they could talk about what Dee and Dave did to them which gave them something to bond around.

It was Christmas Eve morning. No one knew that Linda would be with us for three days straight. I knew it would be a wonderful time for everyone. I got to the hospital at three to pick Linda up. I brought a suitcase for her to use. I signed the temporary guardian papers and loaded up the car.

As we drove Linda got a somewhat worried look on her face. "Jim, where are we going?" I hadn't occurred to me that I never told Linda that I had sold the house and moved.

"Oh, I forgot to tell you and I guess it never came up in our sessions. I sold the house and moved," I said wondering what she would think.

She got a somewhat sad look on her face and then said, "I can understand that. I guess if we were there we might have flashbacks to the day I, I came back." I reached my right hand over and put it on her left hand. She smiled at me.

We got to my house and pulled into the garage. Both our parents were already there and I thought about how to surprise everyone. Linda and I had come up with plan. I went inside and had everyone looking at me with their backs to the door from the garage. Then I said to the group, "I have a Christmas Eve surprise for you guys."

Unexpectedly Emma asked, "What is it?"

Winging it perfectly Linda replied, "Me!"

Everyone turned around and surrounded her in a big group hug. After the excitement subsided I explained that she was there until the day after Christmas. I took Linda's suitcase to the master bedroom. I showed her where she would be sleeping. She looked around and said it was nice. Then she asked me, "Where are you sleeping? Will you be sleeping here with me?"

My original plan was to sleep on the couch or the chair in the master bedroom. I told her I would do one of those and that was what Dr. Webb approved.

Christmas Eve was very nice and Linda was really coming out of her shell. This was all clearly helpful to her. I texted Dr. Webb a few times to let him know how things were going. I sent him a picture of Linda with the kids by the tree.

He replied, "This picture is the best Christmas gift I will ever get. Merry Christmas Jim."

The time with Linda at home flew by. I was sad the morning of the 26th knowing I had to take Linda back to the hospital by 5pm. Around midday I got a text from Dr. Webb, "I need to you bring Linda back an hour early. Can you have her here by 4pm?"

I wondered why the change but he was in charge so I replied, "Yes I can. Is there a problem?"

"No problem. You'll understand." I wondered what that was all about but set it aside knowing I would find out later.

Everyone was sad to see Linda go, and she was very sad as well. On the way back to the hospital she didn't say a word. I felt bad we had to go back. We got to the hospital and I took Linda and the suitcase to the room. I set it on her bed and told her I needed to go talk to Dr. Webb about something. She asked what it was and I told her he didn't tell me.

I got to the lobby and went to Dr. Webb's office. "Jim! Sit down." He closed the door. I couldn't recall him ever doing that before which made me a little nervous.

"Well," He began, "I got something delivered to me this morning from downtown." He slid an envelope in front of me. He motioned for me to open it. I looked down at it.

"Oh my God." I was stunned. I looked up at him.

"Call it a late Christmas gift." He said with a huge smile. I on the other hand completely lost it and cried for five minutes.

I went back to Linda's room. As I did I ran into Jerome. "Jerome did you have a Merry Christmas?" I asked him.

"Yes Mister Jim I did. I got an Ohio State Buckeyes sweatshirt. It has a hood and everything!" He told me proudly. I just smiled at him.

Before I could respond I heard Dr. Webb, "Jerome I have something special for you to do." Hearing that Jerome had a big smile on his face.

I got to Linda's room and she sat there sad and dejected on her bed looking around her room. I sat next to her. The emotions in me were overwhelming.

"Linda, if you didn't live here where would you want to live?" I asked barely able to get the words out.

She looked at me perplexed and seemed to be searching for words. "Well I, I guess I, maybe, umm,"

At that moment Jerome walked up pushing what looked like a luggage cart in a hotel. He had the biggest smile I've ever seen on his face. Linda looked at him confused. I was trying to speak to tell her what was going on but couldn't even make a sound as I tried to choke back my tears.

Linda looking confused she asked Jerome, "Jerome what is that?"

Smiling he said, "This, this is the special cart. Didn't Mister Jim tell you the letter that came today?"

Linda looked at me concerned, "Jim?" Tears were running down my face.

Jerome then continued, "Miss Linda I'll help you fill up the special cart."

"Fill it up?" She said still not knowing what was going on and getting more concerned.

"Yes Miss Linda. Fill it up with all your stuff. Didn't Mister Jim tell you about the letter? The letter that says you can go home to live with Mister Jim now?"

"Jim is it true!?" She said excitedly. All I could do was nod and grab her to hug her.

She burst into tears and we just bawled our eyes out sitting on the bed. We eventually calmed down and Dr. Webb entered the room. He sat next to Linda and smiled.

He put a letter in her hands and began to speak. "The State has granted Jim full guardianship for you. I was able to line this up faster than the full process to reinstate your full rights and relinquish you being a full ward of the State. That's just a formality and should come in the next couple weeks."

They hugged and she thanked him for everything.

He then said sheepishly, "I have a confession to make. I did something that was sort of, technically unethical in terms of the mental health community. Months ago before I called Jim I contacted."

Before he could finish his sentence a female voice in the hall said, "Me." Samantha was standing there and walked into the room. "He contacted me. Somehow he figured out that I was Jim's counselor from the divorce filings. He contacted me and asked what I thought about an idea he had for your treatment. I thought it would help Jim so told Dr. Webb to make the call and see where it led."

We thanked them and loaded up Linda's things. As we walked out I pulled Jerome aside and told him that I had something I needed his help on in the future. He seemed excited that I had a project for him.

I sat in the car and asked Linda if she was hungry for dinner. She was and so I texted both hers and my parents. I asked them to get a reservation for 7pm at Alberini's. I also told them that I needed them to look down at the table after I talk to the kids. They didn't understand and just asked them to trust me on this. We drove there quietly and the day was trying with the extreme emotions.

After we got there and parked I went in first and told Linda to wait for my signal. I began to talk to the Emma, Timmy and our parents. "Kids I wanted to tell you something. I've met someone that I think may be someone I may want to marry. I'm not sure yet and I want to stress that. But I feel very optimistic and wanted to have dinner with her to start the next steps in our relationship. Do you guys have any questions?"

Emma asked sadly, "What about Mom?"

With a soft smile I replied, "We can talk about her in a minute if that's ok."

"Ok." She responded with a tear in her eye. I looked at all the grandparents and looked down so they knew that was their cue.

I motioned to Linda and she walked to the table. She got behind the kids and I said, "Kids would you say hello to."

They turned and screamed, "MOM!!!" and got up and hugged her.

I sat down and Linda's Mom hugged me with tears flowing down her face. It took me a minute to get my composure.

Emma then asked, "How long does Mom get to stay with us this time?"

I smiled and with tears in my eyes, "Forever." I held Linda's hand tight and looked at her.

We had a wonderful dinner and headed home. I put some of Linda's clothes away and got her stuff basically situated. "We'll have to figure out getting another dresser for you." She smiled.

She was set for bed and I asked her what she wanted to do for sleeping arrangements. She looked at me and bit her lip, "You can sleep with me if you want."

"I'd like that." I said peacefully.

We held each other and for the first time in many months, I felt like the balance in the universe was almost back to normal.

The next few days were busy getting Linda back into the normal swing of things. Jane came over a few times to help and I appreciated that. About a week later I got a knock on the door. A man was standing there "Jim Carlisle?" I nodded. "Registered letter for you. Please sign here."

I opened it and there it was. The final decree releasing Linda from State guardianship. That was all I needed for what would come next. I set up a reservation at Alberini's.

We all sat at the table with Linda across from me. I got everyone's attention. "Hey guys. I have a question that I want to ask Linda and I thought we should share her answer at one time."

I looked over at her and she was nervous. I stood up and then came around the side of the table to be nearer to her. I held out my hand and as I began to kneel she was able to see the ring case I was holding. I could hear her Mom gasp and then start to cry. Linda put her hands over her mouth as began to say, "Will you marry me, again?"

She screamed "YES!" and grabbed me and kissed me passionately.

We got married just weeks later on a very specific day in February to try to wipe away a bad memory. Jane was Linda's Maid of Honor. Linda pressed me on who my best man was going to be and I told her it was a surprise. Linda wore a simple white dress and a small bouquet of flowers.

As her Dad walked her down the aisle there were many in attendance with tears in their eyes. Linda was smiling at everyone and saying hello. She didn't pay attention to anyone else and as she got to the alter, she saw Jane. She then looked towards my best man and before she realized who it was, he turned to greet her. "Miss Linda you look beautiful!" She hugged Jerome and told him he looked handsome in his suit and wore the best smile in the church.

I walked over and took Linda's hand from her dad. He was crying and shook my hand. I turned towards the alter and held Linda's hand. I looked at her and for once I didn't see that night. All I saw was the future.