Epilogue
Skyler
A year later
It honestly doesn’t give me much satisfaction to say that Marjorie Henshaw got what she deserved because she is clearly a troubled woman. She had to sell her house to pay for everything the jury awarded. Her creepy ex-husband disappeared into thin air after she admitted to the sheriff that Monty Henshaw was the one who beat her up and threatened her into making false claims about me. She was so embarrassed about the lawsuit, she tried to leave town and move in with her married daughter, but apparently her daughter and son-in-law wouldn’t take her in. Word around town—spread by her daughter’s local friends—is that her family claims they don’t want their kids to grow up in the toxic atmosphere that woman creates, and they don’t like that things of value routinely go missing whenever she visits. I don’t know if it’s true or hearsay that the only job she could get is as a cook in the women’s prison in Pewee Valley. If so, that’s adding insult to injury for the inmates. I’m just glad she’s not part of the Honeybee Hollow community any longer.
On a much happier note, my gallery exhibition at Imagine was fantastic. It felt like most of the town showed up for the opening gala, and all of the paintings sold during the month they were exhibited. I have lots of orders for new ones, and Jack was so thrilled he wants to do another one-man show once I have enough inventory again. It might be a while, but it feels wonderful to be painting like this. I still have to rest my arm and hand when I go overboard with inspiration (icing it helps), but I see gradual improvement there all the time. I’m happy people respond favorably to my freer, looser style of painting. I rely more on the use of color than I used to now that my strokes are more expressive and less intricate. Anyway, it’s the best I can do, and I’m learning to love it.
I never did go back to the garden center to work, but my parents are happy with that. They have wanted me to concentrate on my art for a long time because they understand how much it fulfills something in me.
Levi is doing great. He still has his moments of moodiness and depression because he can’t completely shake the guilt he carries about our buddies who died. But we both continue with therapy, and it helps. Perhaps time will heal his psyche even more.
And yes, I still get those damn migraines now and then—mostly when I don’t get enough sleep. I try to be careful.
Levi’s music has gotten serious attention, and he writes all the time. Brooke and I have talked to him about auditioning for The Voice , but he says he could never be away from us that long if he did well enough to go the distance. He’s satisfied to sing locally and sell his songs to famous singers, which brings in some nice royalty income. He rarely has to resort to using his cane to get around and doesn’t even have much of a limp unless he’s completely exhausted.
Exhaustion, however, is a common theme in our household now that we have baby Samuel Colfax Spencer, named after Samuel Adams—the founding father, not the beer. We liked the name, but Brooke joked she hoped he wouldn’t become a revolutionary at too young of an age. Anyway, we looked through names of American patriots—not the football team—and that one kept popping out at us as something we’d like to say all the time. Sam. Sammy. Samuel. Our son.
In case you’re wondering, he has dark hair and brown eyes and looks like a baby version of Levi. Cool, huh? I couldn’t be happier for Levi, considering the doubts he carried for so long. The look of love on Levi’s face when he first held Sammy is an indelible image in my brain. The warmth in his eyes could have melted a glacier.
My parents are over-the-moon excited to have a grandson, so I guess it’s safe to say they have finally accepted our threesome as a permanent thing. This lucky kid is going to have three sets of grandparents, and all of them have been for a visit over the past few weeks. Levi’s sister Kate also brought her family down from Lexington, and Lulu gave Sam her stamp of approval by saying he was “cute.” She wanted to know if he’d grow up faster than her little brother, though, because she wanted someone to play with. Kate reminded Lulu of her responsibility to be a good big sister and said that included being a good big cousin too—and it was important to be patient.
As expected, Brooke is a wonderful mother and generally wears Sammy in a sling where he has unimpeded access to those delicious tits of hers. Lucky little guy. She’s on extended parental leave right now, but I think she’s feeling ready to get back to work soon. No matter what, at least one of us will always be around for anything Sam needs. We have a freezer full of Mom’s milk in case he’s hungry while Brooke is on a conference call. Levi and I also try to do the middle of the night feeding and changing so Brooke can sleep.
It’s no surprise that Sammy loves it when Levi sings to him. He can sing to me anytime. Sometimes I get up with him just so I can watch them together and hear that amazing man croon lullabies to our son.
We tried to figure out the best way to make us all equal partners in our relationship, so we made sure our emergency, insurance, and medical paperwork includes each of our names. I also had my lawyer put my property into all three of our names.
A few days after he was born, I became Sam’s godfather. The hospital refused to put both Levi’s and my name on his birth certificate at the same time, although Brooke raised quite a stink about it. They said I needed to either be the biological parent with DNA proof (in which case they’d leave off Levi’s name) or have paperwork showing that I am married to Levi. Since the only legal way for that to happen would be for him to divorce Brooke and marry me, that was out of the question. When Sam goes to school, we’ll make sure I’m listed as one of the parents on all of his documents though.
Being Sam’s godfather is cool. And when we had him baptized, the Episcopal priest blessed our three-way union, even if he couldn’t legally marry us. That was something at least, and it made us all feel good.
We’re hoping eventually Kentucky will join some of the cities in Massachusetts that acknowledge poly families and more than two parents. It may be a long time in coming, but we’ll see how it goes. All we can do is love each other to the best of our abilities and raise our kids—yes, we hope there will be more—in a loving, open-minded home.
I suspect you think I’ve forgotten to tell you about Brooke’s birthday present. Don’t worry! I was saving that for last. Brooke called Dr. Lassiter’s veterinary office to see if he knew of any litters of puppies, but he told her instead about a special program for rehoming dogs in need. This led her to two young dogs who tragically lost their family in a devastating hurricane—poor guys. They definitely needed to be adopted together. Brooke couldn’t resist their story, so I borrowed a big van from the garden center, and we drove all day down to a shelter in the Florida panhandle to bring them home. They’re both only around a year old. One is a golden retriever named—according to his collar—Teddy Roosevelt and the other a white Clumber spaniel whose tag says he’s called George Washington. When Brooke found this out, she figured it was one hundred percent fate that we needed to go adopt those dogs. Teddy and George adore Samuel and look out for each other like it’s their job. They’re good boys.
Our love keeps multiplying with each new member of the family.
The End