In-Between Prologue and Chapter 01 by Sofia Hammerstein

Cameron Sylvester has grown up always hoping he'll live up to the heritage of his mother's family height. She was a ten-foot-tall Big, after all, and his father was a tall Mid, which meant it shouldn't have been a question that he would grow out of the Little category of height early on. A bright student, he's been at the top of his class in science and math throughout his academic career! Looking toward his high school graduation and towards college, he's received scholarships to attend Emerson University. it's a question of inches if he'll be left to the fate of being a Little with a limited future or manage to make a future as a short 'Betweener.' Even as a Betweener, the question remains to be seen if he can be a normal adult or if he'll be left 'In-Between.'  (A Tale from the Diaper Dimension)

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The Legal Stuff: In-Between © 2020-2026 By Sofia Hammerstein
 
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
 

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission.
 
 

I included a content warning on the previous chapter that may have caused some readers to skip to this segment. I will summarize the events here. If you read it, you can skip to the chapter name below!

Cammie awakened in a sterile and foreboding lab alongside Addy. Soon their captor, Addy’s mother Aubry, arrived with her sister Danica who is working with her. They planned to permanently physically regress Cammie and Addison with experimental nanites to the size of infants who would become Danica’s new baby girls.

Though helplessly bound, Cammie taunts Aubry into attacking her with the serum first. The syringe caused horrible pain, and minor effects before stopping as her body fights it off mysteriously no matter how many doses they use. The chapter concluded with Aubry taking a mega dose and preparing to inject Cammie with it to permanently alter her gender. Just as she injects the needle the lights went out!

 
 

Chapter 62: Decisions
 

“FEDERAL AGENTS!!! HOLD up your hands!!!!!!” I heard a voice order even as Aubry maniacally laughed and pushed down on the needle’s plunger.

The resulting cold, pain, and fear made me scream!!!!

“Back away from that man!!!!” A man in black shouted at her and ripped her away.

The needle moved as she was pulled away, and I screamed at the unbelievable pain increasing!

“Oh shit!!! Get the medics in here!” Another man shouted.

“Pull the goddamn thing out!!!!” I screamed!

One of the men did just that while looking down at me sadly. I could feel the nanites trying to do something, but after seeing the shocked look on his face, I succumbed to the pain and passed out.
 

“WE’RE INBOUND WITH a trauma patient!” I heard a voice say. “Significant mutilation and damage to the genital area. Mid, estimated 140 pounds, twenty-eight years old…”

I blacked out again.
 

“GET HER… HIM?” I heard confusion while addressing me.

‘I’m a girl now?’ I wondered at their reaction.

I passed out again.
 

BEEP, BEEP, BEEP was the next thing I identified. I struggled to open my eyes but was relieved that the pain was gone. I saw a white hospital room around me.

“He’s awake!!!” Kendra said.

I found her in the room, “What…?”

“Cameron, let David get your doctor…”

I tried sitting up but found a strap across my chest holding me down.

“Just tell me, Kendra, I’m completely destroyed down there, aren’t I?”

She had this habit of moving her jaw back and forth in poker games we had played before. I always took it as a sign she was bluffing and that I should bet big on the pot. It had never served me wrong as a ‘tell’ with her, and I knew I was screwed.

“Don’t try and move yet; they want to keep you still for now,” she told me, not answering.

“Water?” I asked.

“Wait for the doctor…” she told me.

I rested my head back on the pillow and probably would have just closed my eyes, but a higher voice said, “Sorry, I was in my office.”

I looked over and saw Doctor Nickerson… the Little Doctor Nickerson.

“Hi, Doc,” I said to her.

“Hi yourself,” she said. “I wanted to see you get your freedom back, but this wasn’t exactly the excitement I wanted you to go through, so…”

“Trust me, this excitement isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. Kendra isn’t telling me anything; give it to me straight, Doc!” I told her.

“Fair enough,” she said, finding a step stool to climb to a more even height with me on the bed. “You currently have a contest running inside your body to see if you have more nanites or living blood cells… We’re not quite sure what to do about that part yet.”

“I’m a cyborg now?”

She looked at me and laughed, “I guess you sort of are…”

“Doctor Westerfield… have you called her in by chance?”

“Mrs. Stein called her in; she should be here soon.” She told me.

“Okay, so you opened with that… I assume that’s the good news…?”

She shook her head, “No, the good news is you didn’t lose any height from this botched procedure. You have lost a lot of bone and body mass, though, and your face and arms now have a definite feminine look. You’ve also lost about thirty-four pounds since you were here a few weeks ago.”

“As if I didn’t have problems before…” I groaned.

“If it makes you feel any better, I understand where you’re coming from?”

“How?”

“I was a male doctor in the other dimension. I woke up changed on this side.”

“Shit, that sucks,” I said. “I still can’t believe your mommy lets you practice medicine…”

“It wasn’t an easy sell,” she told me.

“Okay, so quit dancing around. What did the bitch do damage-wise last?”

“Cameron, be careful about the language…” Kendra warned.

“Am I still adopted?”

She shook her head, “No, actually, we were coming to spring you with an order from Judge O’Connor ordering your release when we saw three SUVs taking off from the driveway from Miss Harris’ house. Luckily we thought we caught just a glimpse of someone passed out in the back of one of the SUVs, or we might not have figured out what was happening.”

“So close…” I sighed. “Okay, I’ll watch my mouth to avoid ending up back in babyhood. What’s the damage, Doc?”

She sighed, “I’m still not entirely sure, Cameron. The nanite dose there seems enough to change eight hundred or more patients! It definitely began the process of changing your penis into a vagina. Your body was somehow fighting them and the other nanites off, so it didn’t complete it. The biggest damage seems to have been caused by the needle being shifted when they pulled Aubry Harris off of you… It appears it destroyed both of your testicles.”

My face turned white at that statement, “So… Umm... do I still have a penis?”

“At the moment, in my old dimension, I would consider you intersexed… You still have part of the shaft sticking out, but your urethra shifted, and there was an attempt by the nanites to form ovaries, but they were stopped somehow…”

“Kendra, is this room clear?” I asked.

“As much as we can make it,” she told me.

“Doc, I guess I need to fill you in… maybe you can figure this out then…”

I had just finished explaining what I knew of Stacy’s tweaks to keep me safe with the nanites to her when Amanda walked in.

“Oh my God, Cameron, are you okay?!?!” She asked me.

I shook my head, “I’m alive, but I’m pretty messed up. Doc, please tell her what you know… I have a feeling I will need your help, Amanda…”
 

FOUR HOURS PASSED of scanning, prodding, and seeing for myself the mess that was my genitals – which caused me to vomit and cry for a half-hour. Right then, I also learned I was at least bladder incontinent at that moment... Those hours disappeared quickly, though, and the shock of the trauma fully hit me. Finally, they stopped the testing as Amanda and Doc disappeared to discuss my case with several other specialists, leaving me with Kendra and now David in my room.

“So, what happened?” I asked.

“Cameron, maybe you just need to wait and worry about your health right now…” Kendra tried to say.

“Tell me, I need to know!”

She sighed, “Judge O’Connor was planning on holding onto his decision another couple of days, but the news that there was a verified connection from Aubry Harris to Judge Taney’s shrinking – not sure if you knew about that – caused him to issue the order for your release. Unfortunately, another judge released Aubry Harris two hours before that on a twenty-five-million-dollar bail bond…”

“I got the idea she was out…” I said sarcastically.

“Yeah… Well, we followed the vehicles most of the way to where they took you before one of their security cars noticed us and pushed us off their trail. That’s why it took so long to find you and get a warrant to get you out of there…”

“What about Addy? Is she okay?”

“Addy and Danica were both rescued…”

“WHAT?!?!?!” I screamed, “HAVE THE POLICE ARREST DANI TOO!!!!!”

“What?” David asked.

“Shhh!!!” Kendra said.

Right then, a nurse entered and tersely asked, “Do we need a pacifier for this Little girl?”

“Out,” Kendra told her. “Sorry about the noise.”

“What about Danica?” David asked.

“She’s complicit!”

“Shit!” David said as he grabbed his phone and dialed.

I listened to him explain to an Agent he had been working with. We all sat still for a half-hour before getting a phone call back that they had found Addy tied up at home and were bringing her back to the hospital again to get checked out…”

Unfortunately, Danica was nowhere to be found!

I didn’t have any time to worry about that since Doc and Amanda were back, along with the Big Doctor Ivy Nickerson.

“All three of you are here… that’s not a good sign…” I said worriedly.

“Well, it’s not a bad sign either,” Doc told me. “It just means we needed more brain power here. The good thing is you do have all three of us.”

“What’s the verdict?”

“Well, it’s a toss-up,” Amanda told me. “First, you didn’t end up shrunken to a newborn size like the nanites were programmed to do. The nanites already inside you acted as an immune system, pillaging and hacking those nanites each time after they’d only had a small window of time to do damage.”

I nodded, “I could kind of feel that…”

“The problem is that it wreaked havoc with your genetic code. From the tests we ran, it appears about half of your cells have changed from XY to XX.”

“What does that mean?” I asked.

“Probably trouble long-term,” Doc said.

“I’d be concerned about cancers,” her mommy added.

“So, am I just out of luck?”

“Maybe not… I think we do have to put you back into one camp or the other. It’s always been harder for the nanites to change girls into boys, though, so it will be riskier if you want to return.” Amanda replied.

“Is that even possible?” I asked.

Doc nodded, “It might be… The problem is finding an uncompromised source of your old DNA. Doctor Westerfield said that your parents are both deceased?”

I nodded, “Yes…”

“Any idea where we could get a DNA sample from? I don’t think hair will have enough to be sure the code isn’t compromised…”

I sat there thinking momentarily before remembering and saying, “I gave a semen sample the day I came here the first time. Would that work?”

“Where is it stored?” Doctor Ivy Nickerson asked.

I filled her in, “It’s cross-listed under Cameron Sylvester and Camille Harris,” I told her.

“Let me go call…”

“Okay, assuming we can get this DNA sample, it opens up trying to put you back to normal,” Doc told me, “But it’s got risks…”

“Like?”

“Well, you could end up shrinking?” Amanda said.

“Would I be a man again?”

She shrugged, “Theoretically?”

“Any chance we can ask Stacy about it?”

“I did… she didn’t have much more of an idea than what we do.”

“What would you choose?” I asked Doc.

“Honestly, I’ve been happy as a girl these past ten years. I don’t think switching teams is as big of a deal, but if you’d asked me right away, I would have wanted it fixed…”

I grimaced, “If you just made me into a woman?”

“We could make you into a pretty normal-looking woman your height, with breasts, functional organs, etc.,” Doc told me. “We also have the advantage of having a solid genetic profile if we use the common Xs on both types of cells in your blood. You would probably just end up being a lot closer to your mother’s genotype.”

“What about these extra nanites?” I asked, trying not to focus on my gender, “Are they a problem?”

“I think they’re potentially a big problem, but I don’t want to tackle them until we do this procedure one way or another,” Amanda answered.

“Can this be done without shrinking me?” I asked nervously.

“What’s so bad about shrinking?” Doc asked me.

I sighed, “My mom was a Big, my dad was a foot taller than me, and I just made it past the line of being a Little by inches… I don’t want to go backward…”

She sighed, “Yeah, being short in this world sucks…”

“Stacy had one suggestion there,” Amanda mentioned. “I don’t know if it’ll work, though…”

Right then, Doctor Ivy Nickerson returned to the room, “Okay, they’re sending over part of the sample by courier… hopefully we can sequence it and reprogram things?”

“It’ll take me a couple more hours once you get me the DNA sequence,” Amanda said.

“I’d like to help?” Doc told her.

“Sure,” she smiled at her.

“So, what do I do?” I asked.

“Make up your mind; which way you want to go?” Doc told me.

“I just want to be me…” I said with tears forming in my eyes.

I received hugs from Amanda and Kendra then, and they all left me for some space when a nurse came to change the wet diaper I was wearing. She was kinder than the first, but the cooing indicated that she thought I was a Little, not just an adult with a problem.

‘What the hell should I do…?’ I was trying to figure it out.

“Knock, knock?” I heard at the door.

I looked up and felt my jaw drop in disbelief, “Aunt Ruth?!?!”

She came over and hugged me and kissed me on the top of my head, “I couldn’t get out here until today, though I was hoping to be here congratulating you on the good news, not find you in the hospital! What happened to you now?”

I watched as she pulled a chair nearer my bed and took the hand that didn’t have an IV into hers. She lightly stroked the back of my hand, “Well… Addy had taken me to the zoo with a couple of college friends of mine – one’s adopted to the other – and we had a pretty good time together. We returned to her house and discovered her mom had sent some of her goons to kidnap us…”

I did my best to tell her what had happened but ultimately lost it when I told her about what Aubry had done to me at the end.

“That woman!!!” she seethed. She had that angry Judge Jones look on her face, and I figured it was good that Aubry Harris was sitting safely in a jail cell somewhere. “What about this, Addy? She’s the one who adopted you? Who is she?”

She and I talked for a long while. Eventually, I grew tired but calmer, as it was like having a mother show up to care for me. I missed her so much!

“I just don’t even know what to do!” I told her. “The nanites may be able to fix me… but they may shrink me even if they work.”

“Could you have kids then still?” She asked me.

I shrugged, “They were going to look at the DNA samples from that specimen and figure out an answer.”

“So, if you can’t have kids as a man, I know most of the nanite procedures can let you do so as a woman?”

I squirmed, “A baby inside of me…?”

She laughed, “There are many downsides, but it’s also one of the most amazing things of all time.”

“I’ve never wanted to be a girl, though!”

“Then why the long hair?”

“It started because Addy liked it that way?”

“When she broke up with you, why didn’t you shave it off…?”

I shook my head, “I couldn’t tell you then… but Beth liked it long too…”

“Once she was gone?”

I sighed, “At that point, I kept it, hoping she would come back someday…”

She nodded, “So if you choose that way, though, what are the downsides?”

“I wouldn’t have my legal credentials anymore?”

“Simple name and gender change form that any judge can sign off.”

I smirked, “Including one on the Supreme Court?”

She smiled, “Including that one.”

“I wouldn’t ever be taken as seriously? I’d be short and just adoptable?”

“And you weren’t before?” she asked.

I squirmed, “I’m not…”

“You certainly are, Cameron. I won’t lie and say that part of my instincts didn’t ever want to cuddle you some myself.”

“You never showed that?”

She shook her head, “Jenny taught me long ago to control that… I needed to for her sake since she might have been adopted if she hadn’t had that last growth spurt.”

I nodded.

“What do you think you should do?”

I sighed, “I don’t…”

Another knock came, “Oh, hi, I didn’t realize Cameron had other visitors,” Megan said as she suddenly appeared carrying Meg.

“I guess everyone’s coming…” I thought aloud, a little embarrassed.

“Well, duh! We’ve been worried, you doofus!” Meg told me as Megan sat her on the bed next to me so she could give me a hug.

“Megan, Meg, this is Judge Ruth Jones, or as she insists I call her, my Aunt Ruth.”

“The… Supreme Court…?!?” Megan looked shocked.

She laughed, “I’m just an ordinary woman like you.”

Megan and Meg provided a needed distraction for a while to avoid my problems. Kendra and David showed up again at one point too, and then suddenly, the talk grew serious again about what I should do.

I was shaking as I tried to figure out how to salvage things with my life that was in tatters after not only this nanite situation but also the forced adoption, losing my fiancée, and everything else!

Amanda and Doc showed up, and I was left with them to discuss my decision.

It wasn’t an easy one…
 
 

Chapter 63: Visitations
 

I SPENT AN entire week in the hospital recovering after the procedure. It had been an agonizing decision, but I had no regrets now that the treatments were over and had gone so well.

I saw Kendra walk in, “Ready to go?”

I nodded, “They just finished giving me the last packet of bills…”

“Don’t worry about those; Aubry Harris and SafeFoods will be covering all your care expenses… and much more when all is said and done.”

I nodded, “I just don’t want them to get off easy…”

“I promise you they won’t. I know you talked with the federal prosecutor yesterday. Still, everything I’m hearing is that they are making this series of charges as serious as possible.”

“I just don’t know if a jury in this state will even convict her,” I told her.

“I’m sure they will,” she said just as a nurse came in with a wheelchair, followed by Doc, or rather Holly, as she had insisted that I call her the past few days.

“Holly, I heard a patient was trying to escape?” the nurse said.

“You heard right, but this time there’s paperwork allowing it…” Holly laughed.

She watched as I stood up and hopped into the wheelchair. I had a set of sweats and a long-sleeved shirt on for the trip home. “Here, don’t forget her!” Kendra said, putting Rings in my lap.

I’d been unconscious for two days following the initiation of the procedure while it was completed. Then the nanites were siphoned out of my blood. When I woke up, I discovered Rings and a get-well card sitting next to my bed from Addy, simply signed ‘Love, Addy.’ Other than giving a deposition to the prosecutor, she had all but disappeared completely.

I put the top of the stuffed animal as I was pushed out of the room and debated giving her to someone at the hospital to give to a kid… Somehow though, I was too attached to her to let her go.

“You sure you don’t want to come straight back with us for a few weeks?”

I shook my head, “No, I promised Amanda and Fred that I would go stay at their place for a few weeks so they can keep an eye on me. Amanda wants to make sure there are no weird side-effects still.”

Kendra bit her lip but nodded, “You’re not worried that she…?”

I laughed, “I’m safe there. Safer than in a courtroom apparently…”

“I doubt anything like that will ever happen to you again,” she told me as we reached the automatic doors to the outside.

“I’d like to think that would be the case, but honestly, unless I grow another foot or two, it will always be possible in a state like Ames. That’s what has me more annoyed than anything, Kendra! How easy it is to have your rights taken away here is completely unfair!”

“More reason to get you back to New Haven…”

“Not until after we finish Beth’s case,” I told her.

“You sure you don’t want to just oversee everything from home?”

“Very,” I told her. “I still have a score to settle!”

I hobbled into the door David had opened in their car. A simple backless booster sat on the seat, and I could belt myself in fine on my own, even as my muscles twinged a bit still. I petted Rings’ soft fur absentmindedly all the way to Amanda and Fred’s and soon enjoyed a surprise ‘emancipation’ party. With everything that had gone on, it had almost been easy to forget Judge O’Connor’s order, which had completely overturned my Maturosis ruling. I had been ruled to be an adult capable of everything, and another order was made from him stating that no Maturosis order was to be allowed against me again in his circuit without his approval.

That night I enjoyed drinking a single beer with David and Fred after Fred assured Amanda that one wouldn’t hurt me a few days after the procedure. It had been a glorious confirmation that I was indeed an adult again!

Almost as glorious as using the actual toilet had been throughout the day was the dry Pull-Up that greeted me the next morning!
 

WEEKS PASSED BY quickly, and I soon entered the courtroom for a second shot at Beth’s case. “All Rise!!” The Bailiff introduced Judge Nathaniel Manasco, a tall, gray-haired man with a scruffy beard who looked like he could have been Santa Claus at Christmas.

Kendra was back in New Haven, but David had come out to join me.

“I have been informed that there is the possibility of a settlement being discussed?” He asked, getting down to things once introductions had been made.

“Yes, Your Honor, we would like to ask for a continuance of twenty-four hours so that we may meet with the plaintiffs one last time?” A new lawyer named Elliot Naples said.

“Mr. Benson, do you believe this is in good faith?”

“Your Honor, we’re willing to listen to what they have to say. Honestly, I don’t know what the offer they will make is?”

“We plan to make some generous offers, Your Honor. With the shift in leadership at SafeFoods, our shareholders just want this incident behind us.”

“Very well, we’ll meet back here again at fourteen o’clock tomorrow to either give my approval to the settlement or begin jury selection.”

We exited the courtroom, and Elliot looked down at David and me, “Can we use one of the conference rooms here?”

“Sure, we’ll hear you out,” I told him.

We soon sat across from Elliot and SafeFoods’ new CEO, Ivy Nickerson.

“Doctor Nickerson?” I asked in surprise.

“Surprised? I heard I may have gotten this job because of you…?”

I shrugged, “I mentioned your name thinking you would be a more responsible person to be in charge of SafeFoods. Hopefully, it works out for you?”

“Certainly seems to financially; I’m going to leave these discussions mostly to our attorney and CFO, though.”

“I’m Lynn Manchester,” she said to us.

“So, other than seeing a decent human being as your new CEO, I’m extraordinarily unhappy with your company. So, let’s get down to brass tacks; what’s your offer?” I asked.

Lynn looked taken aback by that, “Now…”

“Offer,” I said, “Or we leave it in the jury’s hands.”

She sighed and nodded at Elliot, “We understand you have a total of three hundred plaintiffs that have signed onto your suit, correct?”

I nodded, “Those are the ones we’ve identified so far. From your records, though, it appears you had nearly a thousand participants in the studies?”

He grimaced, “That’s true…”

“So, let’s assume one thousand victims need a settlement fund,” David said, “Please keep that in mind with your offer.”

“We’ll set aside a relief fund of five hundred million dollars,” Elliot said.

I laughed, “That’s a joke! That doesn’t even hit five hundred thousand apiece with a thousand victims! And that’s with us not taking a share for our firm’s pro bono time! Five hundred thousand doesn’t even pay for the medical care, daycares, and other supplies that each of these individuals now needs for the rest of their lives. Nor does it fully offset the income they lost that would have provided for families and children. There were plenty of mothers like Ashley Fehler who could have contributed more to their families in the coming years.”

“What do you think is fair?” Doctor Nickerson asked.

“Ten million per victim,” I told them. “That ensures proper care for their lifetimes, maybe a chance to research a cure of some sort, and serves as a punishment and a deterrent against any company ever experimenting on unwilling subjects like this ever again.”

“But that would be…”

“Yes, Mrs. Manchester, ten billion dollars seems more appropriate. Additionally, there will need to be one hundred million dollars in a settlement made to Benson and Stein to cover our lost expenses due to your former CEO. If you cover that, we won’t seek further damages from SafeFoods on behalf of my associate here.” David said.

“Let us talk for just a moment?” Doctor Nickerson asked.

I nodded, “We’ll step outside for a moment.”

Outside, we waited. “Think they’ll go for it, David?”

“Depends on how serious they want to get past this scandal. I think it’s cheaper than they’d get off from the jury.

A little under thirty hours later, we were back in the courtroom with Judge Manasco, “Both parties are in agreement to this settlement?”

“Yes, Your Honor,” I said.

“Yes, Your Honor,” Elliot said.

“In that case, I certify it as a court-sanctioned settlement. You are not seeking this to be a sealed settlement, Mr. Naples?”

“No, Your Honor, SafeFoods has a very long road ahead of itself to regain the trust of its customers. This is a step along that road, and we feel that hiding the settlement would be useless to the shareholders.”

“Very well! The court is adjourned!”

I turned around and saw Beth’s dad standing there. I walked up to him and shook his outstretched hand. “Thank you,” he said to me.

“I’m only sorry that there seems to be nothing they can do for Beth…” I said sadly.

He shrugged, “You’ve only had a short while to come to that conclusion; I made that conclusion two weeks after they regressed.”

“I won’t let them stop looking for a cure…” I told him.

“I don’t think there is one, unfortunately. Even if they remove the chemicals that bonded to their brains, it’s too much damage… At best, they might be able to re-learn things… but I’m not even sure that’s possible now.”

I felt tears in my eyes, “What now?”

“Well, I’m taking Ashley and Beth back to New Albany. I’ve bought a house up there and hired a woman who I think is trustworthy enough to be a nanny for them. She’s kind and won’t be mean to them, at least…”

He held his hand out again, “I so wanted to call you my son-in-law; I hate that this happened. Thank you for not letting them get away with it.”

I shook his hand and watched as he left.

I felt a hand on my shoulder; David said, “Now that we have that done, ready to return to New Haven?”

“Set a flight for tomorrow?” I sighed, “I have a stop I need to make before I leave.”

He nodded. “You’re returning to Amanda and Fred’s tonight, right?”

I nodded, “Yes, sure you don’t want to stay with them?”

He shook his head, “I’m happy in the hotel, honestly. I’ll text you with information on when I need you to pick me up at the airport.”

I nodded, “Thanks,” I said.

I navigated my way through the courthouse and out to the rental car that was waiting for me. I felt nervous walking around the Bigs once more without my own ‘mommy’ for protection. Still, it was slowly becoming normal again to do so. I drove back out to my childhood home first. There was one last small box I hadn’t sent back to my home in New Haven yet, as I wanted to carry it on the plane with me to ensure nothing happened.

I pulled into the driveway and saw the ‘For Sale’ sign standing proudly, with a ‘Sale Pending’ board hanging beneath it. At that point, I skipped using the garage and walked up the front steps to discover an envelope waiting with ‘Cam’ written in neat script taped to the front door. I nervously looked at it, and it felt like all it contained was a small letter. I opened the door and carefully used a key to slice it open, finding a letter that dropped out along with a cashier’s check that I didn’t look at too closely.
 

Dear Cam,

I really am bad at these letters. I’m sorry this is the second one you’re getting from me… After everything that has happened with my mom and Dani… I just can’t come to see you yet. I wanted to be in court with the SafeFoods case this week, but honestly, I’m not sure I can look you in the eyes now with everything that happened. I’m still dealing with my own recovery yet too... I’m so ashamed of my small part, but mostly humiliated to come from an awful family!

I made a deal with you towards the end of things you held up, so I’m holding up my end too. The cashier’s check enclosed should cover the buy-in that Kendra said she needed you to pay in to be a full partner of your firm. They both agree it’s long overdue, so hopefully, this will help you overcome some of the damage we’ve done to your life.

More than anything, I want you to know that I have and always will love you. You are a precious person, and I wish our lives could have been simple enough that I could have said ‘yes’ years ago. I know we both would have been much happier now!

Take care of yourself,

Love,

Addy
 

Tears streamed down my face, and I noticed the check was made to Benson and Stein for eight hundred and seventy-five thousand dollars.

I wiped away tears with the sleeve of my dress shirt and continued upstairs to my room, where the one small box still sat. I carefully looked inside the box, that I couldn’t bring myself to ship.

Inside were a few mementos of Mom and Dad, but most preciously, the engraved poem from a woman who would likely never write poetry again.
 

A dream to grow, a dream to be together.

Inches, just inches, sent our paths askew.

May this be a token and a tether,

For our memories of love, in inches.
 

Tears ran down my face as I thought of the broken dreams that seemed to follow me everywhere I went.

I couldn’t sit there any longer; I turned, took one last look at the staircase I had grown up climbing, and carried everything out to the rental car for my next stop.

This was a place I’d promised myself I would come to on this trip…

But I hadn’t when I’d arrived, and then I didn’t have another chance – though I guessed Addy would probably have brought me there if I’d asked.

I walked up to Mom, Dad, and my baby sister Cassie’s joint tombstone with a bouquet of flowers I’d stopped to buy. I cleared out some dead flowers that looked to have been left by some other visitor besides me. Dad and I used to come out once a week when Mom first died, then it became once a month… and by the time he died, it was just once a year. Neither of us dealt with our grief very well when Mom died, but I’d never really thought about how much it hurt him to have lost them both. As a child, everything was about me, really…

“Hi, Mom, Dad, Cassie,” I said aloud after I put the flowers in. “I don’t know why I can’t bring myself to visit much… but with moving across the country, there’s been even less opportunity. I just needed to see you all, I guess, and say I love you… I’m like the most cursed person in the world; everyone around me seems to die, get regressed, or leave me. I don’t know I’ll ever have a family like you all again, and it hurts…”

I sat and spoke to their graves for an hour before finally saying, “I’ll try and come back someday, but I’m getting out of Ames safely while I still can… I love you all…”

I walked back to the car in tears and half-worried when a tall woman noticed me and looked at me with concern. I just kept moving, climbed into my car, put the seatbelt on, and drove back out to Amanda and Fred’s for one last night before I had to say goodbye to all of them too.
 
 

Thanks for reading! There are two more chapters and an epilogue I'll post on Monday or Tuesday evening.
As we near the end, please leave a comment about what you think and press the Kudos button! The full novel is complete (65 chapters plus Epilogue) and published on Amazon if you wish to be impatient though! (Your purchase of my works really does help me out!)

All of my published works have AI read audiobooks available for them. I’ve spent some time tweaking pronunciations, and they’re pretty good when you can’t afford thousands to pay for audiobook creation! They’re a $1.99 addon to the $5.99 price on Kindle. If you’ve already purchase the book it should come up as only $1.99. They’re also available on Audible directly, but that’s $9.99 versus the cheaper price! https://www.amazon.com/author/babysofia