Carol was holding her and Mike was holding them. I noticed I was crying too. ‘I need some time.’ I said. Megan said, ‘All of us are here for all...of you. Stay or go, nothing about us has or will change. We love you.’ The four of us dressed and Mike drove us home. Nothing was said during the drive. As Mike stopped in our new garage he opened the door and said, ‘Lee’s right and we all know it.’ He helped Carol out and I helped Jenny. I held her hand until we were in the house and then I fell into. She quickly scrambled out from beneath Luisa’s boa constrictor legs and stood tentatively on her feet, as she warily eyed her opponent kneeling on the floor, nursing her injured breast. Luisa looked up at Helen now with fear in her eyes. This was the first time she got hurt by Helen, and she wondered just how strong and cagey a fighter Helen had become. Luisa’s reverie came to an abrupt halt when Helen’s foot lashed out at her full flush on her chest. This caused Luisa to topple down backwards. The following courses were then served and my thoughts wondered just what kind of situation I was now in. Freda, other than the one squeeze, kept her hands in view at all times and I was beginning to think that it had merely been a ‘friendly’ moment.After the meal though, individual conversations were struck up as guests and family spread out over several rooms and Freda buttonholed me in a small room adjacent to the lounge.“Howard,” she purred. “Oh, don’t worry, I’m not about to interfere with. “He knows you and Nadia very well. He hardly knows me at all. I’ve spoken to him twice in my life.”Celestine started to reply but Nadia spoke first.“He knows of you,” she said. “To him, you and the band of people you put together were the first wave of what his army managed to complete. You and your sisters – along with groups like Rucar assembled – continued to fight long after everyone else laid down their arms. He will always respect you for that – and he will always love you.”“We were just.