Sam walked to her mother with the speed of a condemned man. Her breath was slow and deliberate and she pulled back the chair and sat facing her mother. The older woman's hands were shaking and her cheeks were wet with tears.

"What happened?" Sam asked as she sat down. There was no answer. She shuffled in her chair while Jane rubbed her temples.

Sam tried to speak several times, but couldn't think of anything to say.

It was several minutes before Jane asked, "What did I do, Sam? What did I do to make you hate me so much?".

"What are you talking about? I don't hate you!"

"Then how could you do this?"

"What? What did I do?"

"Dammit Sam!" Jane screamed. "She's your sister! How you could you do that to her?"

"I didn't do anything to her."

This wasn't the literal truth, but Jane didn't need to hear those kind of details.

"Taking advantage of your brain-injured stepsister counts as 'doing something' Samantha!"

Sam loved her mother and felt sorry for the stress she could see on the older woman's face, but she knew that she had to speak up now if she and Brooke were to have any chance.

"I love her, mom, and she loves me."

Jane's face grew stern. She didn't expect this, and wasn't happy about it.

"Dammit Sam! She lost her memory, her brain was damaged. She doesn't know what she's doing."

"She's fine! Her doctors said she was completely competent! Don't you think I thought of that?"

"You… you asked them?" Jane stammered.

"No, Brooke did – because I asked her to, and they said she was as capable of making a decision as any other teenager."

Sam left out the concluding words, for what that's worth and took her mother's hand.

"We didn't plan this, and we didn't expect it, and we certainly didn't do it to hurt you or Mike."

Jane started to speak, but Sam continued. "It just happened, and, to be really honest mom, it's about us, not about you."

Jane sat and stared at Sam, her anger stunned into silence for the moment.

"So, you're… a lesbian?" she asked.

"Seems that way," Sam answered. "Explains a lot, really. I never could wrap my head around the boys and sex thing, and Brooke always assumed that it got better eventually."

"But Harrison, and George – and Josh!" Jane was waving her hands as if pointing to boys who weren't there.

"I loved George and Harrison – though the way he's been acting lately, I never wanna speak to him again, but the thought of…. being sexual with them – I just thought that after I'd done it for awhile it wouldn't be so gross."

"But with Brooke it… isn't 'gross?'" Jane asked. Curiosity seemed to be distracting her from her anger, much to Sam's relief.

"Well," Sam said, sitting up as straight as possible, reminding herself to look confident. "We haven't… been together yet – not completely. We decided to give it some time. But, yes, when we're with each other, it's not awkward, or scary, or strange. It's perfect.

Jane wiped a tear from her eye to hear her daughter describe being in love the way only someone young and in love for the first time could. She wanted to hug Sam right now, but she took her hand instead.

"Mike thinks that… he's very angry Sam. He thinks you betrayed Brooke, and him and that hurts because he loved you like his own d.."

"Don't use that word!" Sam interrupted. He's not my father, and you're not Brooke's mother." She took a deep breath. "Listen, he'll understand. Brooke will explain it to him – unless…"

"What?" Jane asked.

"Unless the real issue for him is that I'm a girl," Sam said. "I mean, would he be acting like this if it were Harrison?"

"He's not like that Sam," Jane said, taking Sam's hand again. "We have friends who are gay. We know lots of gay people."

"But it's his daughter," Sam said, pulling away, "not just the mailman or someone at work."

Jane sighed. "That's true, but he's a good man. He'll come around."

************

Mike didn't speak to Brooke as they drove, dismissing her attempts to speak to him. He took her to a motel and checked in. The clerk eyed the older man with the pretty young girl, but said nothing. Once in the room he promptly disconnected the telephone, telling her that she wasn't to speak to Sam. Brooke sat on the bed meekly. Part of her was still expecting to wake up.

Mike sat down opposite her. "So," he said, "you've really fucked things up now, haven't you?"

She tried to protest, "Daddy, it's not…"

"Oh don't' bother," he said, dismissing her words with a wave of his hand. "It wasn't a question. You've fucked everything up again. It's what you do. People are happy, trying to make the best of their lives and you come along and destroy everything just to satisfy your own selfish need to be the center of attention."

"No!" she shouted. She didn't even feel his hand hitting her face. She was just lying on the floor, feeling something wet in her mouth. She realized it was her blood. It was only then that she felt the pain where he'd hit her.

"I wasn't finished yet," he said. Brooke was sure she'd seen his eyes change color for just a second. They'd turned black.