Dear Alex,

I know now that I am more like you than I thought I was. I see everything through the eyes of the law. I see everything in legal terms. I measure right and wrong, truth and lies, correct and incorrect, by how much physical evidence is available in regards to the particular situation.

I realize that this is the aspect of Mother's personality that allows you to be the incredible attorney that you are, especially in the office you are in. However, at this particular time, I consider the fact that I, too, inherited this trait a curse.

Everything is pretty much the same. Daddy is still trying to hold together Drew's business by its few threads. You know how determined he is to prove that they can make this work. I truly believe he will hold it together until the day he dies... but after that... well, I just don't know if Drew would be able to keep himself in business if it weren't for Daddy.

Mother still just nods with that fake "smile of denial" whenever Daddy talks about the business and what they need to change in order for the business to start making money instead of just barely enough to support itself. I hate it when she does that. She doesn't even try to look like she cares, and she should care. After all, it is her son's future at stake. The... other thing... hasn't gotten any better either.

Sometimes I wish I weren't part of this family, since most of the time that's how it feels anyway.

I hope everything is going better in New York than it is in Chicago. We all miss you. I miss you the most. The day after high school graduation, I'm on a plane to NYC.

LYS,

Lainey

Alex sighed as she set aside the letter from her little sister. The only thing she had regretted about taking the job with the New York City D.A.'s office right out of law school, was the fact that she had had to leave her sister half way across the country with their parents. Their brother was there too, but he was so immersed in trying to get his business to be self- sufficient that he did not have much time to look out for the well-being of his younger sister. It was not that he did not care about her; he was just busy, and Alex did not hold him responsible for looking after Alaina.

It was herself she had always placed that burden on.

Once the initial feelings of over-protectiveness and guilt for not being there had faded, Alex picked the letter up again, this time reading between the lines. Alaina's letters always said more than just what she wrote with her pen.

She was not sure what the first two paragraphs meant, but they did worry her. The paragraph about their dad told her that Alaina still saw him through rose-colored glasses. She had been too young during their father's abusive days to realize that he had a temper that could make a grown man cower.

The paragraph about their mother told Alex that Alaina was upset by her mother's behavior more than she would let on. Alex knew what "the other thing" was, and the fact that her sister would not discuss it beyond the fact that it had not changed bothered Alex very much. Alaina was too apt to bury her feelings, pretend that she did not notice things or that they did not bother her, in order to keep peace for the rest of her family. With Alaina's weekly and sometimes daily letters, Alex was seeing the tendency more and more in her sister, and she did not like it.

When she returned the letter, Alex would have to remember to ask how much time Alaina would have off of school for Thanksgiving. Maybe if she paid for the plane ticket, her mother could be convinced to allow Alaina to spend the holiday in New York. Alaina wanted to come anyway, to see New York and to see Alex, and to spend some time in the D.A.'s office, to see if she really wanted to follow her sister's path as she had thought she wanted to for the past 3 years.

And she could meet John and I could get her opinion.

Now where on earth had that thought come from?