Chain Reaction 3.64: Worries

     "Everything you touch rots, and you have my Emily!" Graham's voice nags me in my head.
     He'd really lost his mind in prison. Everything I touch doesn't rot. Does it? No.
     I think about my life, starting at the beginning. I was a pampered child of a powerful and evil man. I was friends with Brielle, and I thought she hung the moon. If her dad wasn't around, she was always so confident. Did I ruin Brielle's life? All I ever wanted was for her to be safe: safe from her father, safe from Graham, safe from that whack job who raped her, safe. In my 'safe from Graham,' I backed the two of them into a corner, sending all of us here.
     Next comes my marriage to Laura. Mistake. Disaster. Heartache. ... Rotten.
     And my son Drake. Headstrong. Vindictive. Evil. ... Rotten.
     But my company has been a success. Maybe not so much now, but I can still call it a success.
     And I love Emily, ironically the daughter of the man I despised.
     And my son Alaric. I could never imagine him rotten.
     But... it's because I see so much of Emily in him that I can't imagine him rotten.
     "And you have my Emily!" I know. I know. I fell in love with your child. It wasn't something I set out to do, but that's the way life works. That's how love happens sometimes.
     "You're a poison in their lives." Am I poisoning Emily?
      I think back to how she was before I impulsively kissed her. Then I go further back to when she was dating Drake. I get the mental image that she was just floating along in life. I'd like to think I gave her a foundation. All I've wanted was for her to be happy. I admit I mostly wanted her to be happy with me, but ... With me.

      "Emily is my after-school activity." Emily. Emily. Emily. He always talked about Emily, thinking that was hurting me because she's Brielle's daughter. No. That's not what was happening. In the haze of my misery, he was implanting a light of hope.
     I'd always fought to keep primary custody of Drake, even though he was nothing but cruel to me. I later figured out it was because I knew him being there would mean Emily would be there too. I needed her simple, brilliant, sincere, calming presence. I started thinking she was too good for Drake. But I never told him this because that would mean she'd go away.

      Too good for Drake.
      Oh, plum, she looked delicious that morning. What shocks me is how I wasn't shocked at what I was feeling. It was like going from crawling to walking.
      I woohooed Selena like a maniac that afternoon, trying to drive out blossoming thoughts. I wouldn't let myself consciously realize how attracted to Emily I'd become. Maybe I'd thought she was too good for me as well.

      Too good for me?
      I kept fighting it. The worst was that moment after when I'd thrown Selena out and was hugging Emily. Drake was right. I would've kissed her had he not walked in on us. I was seconds from it. I felt like a monster. Break up with a 24-year-old and then almost kiss an 18-year-old? Plum! I'd lost my mind.
      But Emily had never seemed her age. Ever. Not mentally. She's brilliant. As a child, she could converse with adults like she was one herself. When she was 5, she could've been 12. When she was 10, she could've been 18. When she was 18, she could've been 28. 29. 30. And when she was 18, her looks matched her personality, and I was beyond all hope of resisting her.
     Why should I? I'm perfect for her. I understand her better than anyone. I see her better than anyone. I love her.

      Graham thought I was ruining her. I haven't "ruined" her. I awoke what was naturally inside her. It's not my fault if he never saw it.
      She's the love of my life. And to think, I tried to separate her parents. How foolish I was. The other half of my soul was floating around, waiting to be born from the woman I thought I loved, and I was impatient. I was ... rotten.
      No wonder Graham thought that.
      But he never saw the good side of me! The side his daughter brings out! He only saw the darker side of me.

     "There's a darkness inside you. ... You're a bad boy cloaked in gentleman." Selena's words echo now. I haven't seen our daughter Diamond in months. Selena is keeping her from me because of the media frenzy. It's probably best she stay away anyhow.
     But is my darker side so bad that it makes everything I touch rot? I mean, here I am thinking that it's best Diamond stay away from me! I'm protecting my daughter from... myself!
     Tears escape my eyes. Maybe Graham is right.
     "Alex?" My sniffing must've awakened Emily. "Are you okay?"
     "I'm fine. I'm just thinking too much." I've been doing nothing but think too much being practically under house arrest like I am.
     We adjust our positions.

      Her voice sounds dreamlike. "Hm. Then don't think too much. You should sleep."
      I pull her close. She's mine, Graham. If everything I touch rots, then she's the cure. "I love you." I kiss her forehead.
      "Then do as I say and get some sleep."
      That makes me chuckle, mostly because I know she's serious. "Yes, ma'am."

      The three of us do our best to cope under the stress. Furston has ordered me not to talk to the press. I want to. I want to explain how I didn't do it. I want to tell the world that I didn't kill the man I fought so hard to free. But Furston is probably right. They could take anything I say and twist it to further their story. They've already put out a nutzo piece on us simply decorating our house for Christmas. They're getting desperate.

     Alaric is so wonderful. He's being fantastic about dealing with the stress right now. I've been teaching him what I know of the piano, and he's taken to it like a mouse to cheese.
     I have to win this upcoming trial. I want to be here as he grows up.

     He's a billion times better than Drake. That son of mine is a conniving snake. He keeps calling Emily, and worse, she takes the calls! I trust her, but I don't trust him for anything. She repeatedly acts like she wishes we could settle our differences. She says that she and Drake are friends, that she knows Drake is always looking for any angle to be more than friends even if she won't have it, but I wish she would drop the friendship!
     Every time he calls, I have to beat the bag upstairs. I'm getting older, but that doesn't mean I can't pack a punch.
     History is repeating itself, and the irony is that this time, I'm Graham. Emily, like Brielle, is mistakenly thinking friendship will work, and Drake is milking it for all it's worth. I need to make it stop, but first, I have to make sure I'm not sent to prison.

     The next morning, I find my beautiful wife in the downstairs bathroom. "Good morning. I'm going out today." I have to go to my lawyer's. He got a tipoff that something bad has happened with the case. I stayed up half the night worrying.
     "Alex!" She's gasping. "Your hair!"
     "What about it?" I've been getting grayer, but Emily knew this, of course.
     She points to the mirror. I look, and my mouth drops. I doubt I have a single black hair left on my head. I've heard of people graying overnight, but plum! I've never thought it would be like this!
     I turn back to Emily.

     "Should I dye it?" Previously, she's tried to get me to, but I'd always said no, that I liked the grays. This, however, is hard to swallow.
     She does swallow. "No, you don't have to. It'd be different if I hadn't have aged up a little while back. It's just shocking how quickly it happened."
     "Think about it, though. I will if you decide you want me to." I quickly kiss her cheek. "The driver is waiting. I have to go. Stay inside, and..." I want to tell her not to talk to Drake. "...be safe."
     She nods. "I will."

     Furston is right. His news is not good.
     Later, I come home, and I find my lovely wife in the living area.

      "Hello, beautiful." I lean in and kiss her. We might lose. They're going to lock me away for a crime I didn't commit. They're going to take me away from my precious Emily and wonderful son. "I love you."
      Part of the reason I love her is that she's brilliant, too brilliant not to notice something is up. "What happened?"
      "I can't tell you."
      "Yes, you can. I don't have to testify."
      "No, it's not that. I don't want to worry you." I watch as her whole face falls.

     It keeps falling, and she starts crying.
     "No, Emily! It'll be fine."
     "Don't lie to me, Alex. What's happened?"
     "It's just they found some new evidence is all, and Furston is scrambling." I wrap my arms around her. "It's all a bunch of bull plum. It'll probably get thrown out." This is stuff we're not even supposed to know about, but, like his client, Furston has ways of finding out things.

      "Put it out of your mind, Emily. Can you do that for me?"
      She sniffs and nods. "I'm tired of all this. I just want to go back to a normal life."
      "Me too. And we will. Besides, tomorrow is Christmas Eve."
      "Are you inviting Drake and Valentino?"
      "No." I keep my reply short.
      "What about Diamond?"
      "Selena thinks it's best if she stay with her, and I don't want to argue with her about it, at least until this is all over."

     In the morning, I make us all a big breakfast, but I don't have the appetite I act like I have. I can't shake the feeling that this new development has sealed my doom. Their evidence has to do with the weapon. They claim it was registered to me, but I've never owned a gun. Someone is screwing with the system, and it's untraceable. I know. I've tried.
     I can't give up, though.

     A blizzard rages outside, so we have a little peace from the media as we celebrate Christmas. I do everything I can to make it special. Next year, Alaric will be a teen.
     After Emily goes to sleep tonight, I get on the computer upstairs in what used to be the butler's suite. I pull out every trick I know to try and get to the bottom of where that phony 'evidence' came from that Furston got tipped off about. All I can tell is that it came from the inside. Either it's real, which it isn't, or the police are fabricating it. I just have to prove the fabrication.

     I won't be taken from my family. I'll fix this. I'm still Alexander Goth, dammit.
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Brielle grayed as well: