Ch 30: Reflections

The expected flurry of questions from the three curious and likely worried little boys never came when Kirk, Spock, and Winona arrived at the farm house. Instead they were welcomed by the sight of three sleeping boys and three sleeping Vulcans. T'Maire, who had allowed herself to sleep but did so lightly, heard their entrance despite their attempt to be silent. She looked up through half closed eyes, her arms around the boys who used her as a pillow, and smiled.

"Hey guys," she said groggily. "Has baby sister been delivered?"

Winona gave an equally sleepy smile and replied, "Yes, baby Jacqueline is alive and well. She's resting with her mom and dad at the hospital. They should come back home in another day or so. Were the boys any trouble?"

T'Maire shook her head slowly. "They were no trouble at all. They were so excited about their baby sister all they could do was to ask a ton of questions about her. About an hour after you left they burned themselves out."

Winona turned to Kirk and Spock and asked, "Could you guys help me get the boys to bed?"

Both giving her a nod, they moved to either side of T'Maire and gently picked the boys up. Chris roused from his sleep as Winona picked him up and mumbled, "Where's Daddy?"

"He's at the hospital with your mommy and your new sister Jackie," Winona answered.

"But who will go to sleep with me?"

"You can sleep with me if you like sweetheart."

"Noooo, I wanna sleep with Miss T'Maaaire," Chris whined.

Winona and T'Maire exchanged looks and laughed quietly. T'Maire rose from her spot on the couch and took the sleepy boy out of her arms. "Guess I'm more popular than I thought," she mused.

"Looks like it. Follow Jim up the stairs to Sam's room. The bed should be big enough for you and the boys. I'll bring some extra blankets and pillows up to you when I get Surok and Sarek settled."

T'Maire nodded and followed Kirk up the stairs, Spock not far behind her. Winona looked over at Sarek and Prime and debated whether waking them would even be necessary as they looked comfortable enough in the chairs. In the end she decided that she would be a good hostess and show them both to the spare bed room that had been set up with beds for them.

She walked over to Prime and gently shook him awake. He looked at her through heavy lidded eyes and muttered, "I assume the delivery went well?"

"Yes," Winona said. "Sam and Aurelan are still at the hospital with their new baby girl. Come on. Let me show you to the spare bedroom."

Prime rose from the chair slowly and followed Winona to a room in the back of the house, where three small beds were prepared for him, T'Maire, and Sarek. He turned to her and said, "Thank you, I will be fine from here."

She nodded at the elderly Vulcan and made her way back to the living room. To her surprise, Sarek was wide awake and sitting up straight in the chair. Startled, she said, "Sarek! I thought you were asleep! I do hope we didn't wake you up while we were moving around."

"You did not," Sarek said. "I sensed your presence and woke myself up."

"Ah," Winona said with a sigh of relief. "Well that saves me the trouble of waking you up then! I'll show you to the guest room…"

"Now is not the time," he interrupted. "I wish to have a word with you."

She blinked at his frank manner of speaking. Of course, this was simply the way Vulcans spoke, but she was not used to it by any means. She watched as he rose from his chair and stood in front of her. His face betraying nothing of what he felt or what his intent was, he simply stated, "I have yet to see the land your home was built on. If you would please show me around, it will make speaking with you much easier."

"Alright," Winona said. "If that's what you want."

Winona led Sarek out of the house and began showing him around the farm. She noticed that he shook ever so slightly from the chill morning air, but said nothing about it. She showed him the barn, the stable, and the garden she grew in the back of the house. After the basics were shown, she began leading him further out onto the property, showing him the space that the animals grazed in and led him to a stream on the outskirts of her land.

It was when they reached the stream that Sarek finally began discussing things with her. "The reason you and your husband have divorced directly coincides with the human wedding ceremony for Jim and Spock."

She hesitated to respond, but after a deep shaky breath she replied, "Yes, that's exactly why."

"Is it safe to assume that he was displeased that his step-son was marrying a male?"

Winona closed her eyes. "You don't know the half of it."

Sarek looked at Winona quizzically. "You do not wish to speak of it with me."

"It's not that," Winona said, turning away. Something about the Vulcan's calm visage made her feel even more ill at ease about the subject than she already did. "It's just painful. He's always been a thorn in my children's sides, but he kept me from feeling lonely. Our relationship was far from perfect, but he filled the hole that my husband left me when he died. The fact that he…"

Her voice cracked as a lump formed in her throat. She still wasn't over it. As much as she hated him, she missed having someone always there with her. Even so, she didn't like being torn between her sons and her husband.

"If it is too painful to speak of, there is another way to tell me," Sarek said. "It is called the Vulcan mind meld. We do not typically use it freely or often with strangers, but considering the traumatic nature of your experience, it may be easier than talking about it. I must warn you that by reaching into your mind for the memory, the emotions of the memory will resurface in full. If this is acceptable, I can perform it."

Again Winona hesitated. She was already feeling emotional about the memory as she recalled it in her own mind. Was she ready to completely revisit the entire scene?

She drew a deep breath. If she was going to tell her son about it, she'd have to be ready to face it again. She'd have to deal with his emotions when she told him and couldn't afford to deal with hers at the same time. This could be like an alien form of therapy, allowing the father of her son-in-law to see into her mind and replay that painful incident again.

Facing Sarek, she said, "Do it. It'll be better and easier this way."

Sarek nodded and withdrew his hand from the long sleeves of his robes. Carefully he placed his fingers on her face and said, "Close your eyes and calm yourself. Breathe deeply. You will feel my presence in your mind."

When Winona's eyes closed, Sarek closed his as well and began to chant. "My mind…to your mind… My thoughts…to your thoughts… Our thoughts together…our minds are one." He paused as he saw her physically react to the mental connection. He spoke calmly and slowly. "Now think back to the discussion you had with your ex-husband that led to your divorce."

Eyes still closed, she spoke as if in a trance. "It happened a month after Jim told me the news about the wedding on Vulcan…"

Behind her closed eyes, the scene played before her as if she were a spectator.

The fireplace crackled in the background while Frank stared blankly at the television screen before him. He was in his usual grubby pajamas and flannel robe drinking a cup of bitter black coffee. Winona hadn't been entirely fond of having a television in her house; to her it was a horrid waste of time that distracted from the real work that needed to be done day to day. Of course, Frank's refusal to live in her house without the presence of a television convinced her to allow it for his sake only. Her sons had never been allowed to watch it, not because she forbade it, but because Frank did.

Given Winona's pre-existing hatred for the television, seeing her husband slumped in his favorite chair in his pajamas when he needed to be ready to leave the house put her off. "Frank!" Winona said in a disdainful voice. "We need to get you fitted for a tuxedo today! Why aren't you dressed?"

"'Cuz I never agreed to go to this damned wedding, that's why," he retorted without looking away from the screen.

Hands on her hips, she marched over to the television and promptly turned it off. The trance Frank had been in while watching the television broke instantly. "What the hell are ya doin' woman?"

"Franklin S. Marshall, you will get up from that chair and get dressed right now so we can get you fitted for your tuxedo!"

"Don't talk to me like I'm some boy Winny!" Frank said as he jabbed a sausage-like finger at her. "I ain't goin' to no wedding! I didn't go to Sam's wedding with that baby maker of his and I ain't goin' to your faggot son's wedding either!"

Winona's eyes flashed red for a moment. If it was one thing she didn't take kindly to, it was having her sons be put down. Frank had done far more than his fair share of ripping on her children over the years and she was at the end of her tolerance rope. Her eyes narrowed, she said, "I dare you to say that again."

Frank stepped forward and unnecessarily stretched his body to tower over the already shorter woman before him. Dropping his voice down low, he said, "You heard me. I ain't going to that faggot son of yours' wedding! You should be ashamed that your son likes to take it in the ass, but you loved his poofter father so damned much you probably allow it to make yourself feel better about him dying."

He laughed cruelly at her, noticing the rage and sadness that was welling up in her eyes. "Guess the real reason he killed himself wasn't to save your life, it was because he knew his son would be a fairy just like he was. Couldn't stand the fact that between his newborn faggot son and the whiny bitch you gave birth to before him he couldn't bring a real man into the world."

A woman in Winona's situation would usually slap someone for saying such things, but being the country bred woman she was, a closed fist was what she used to strike Frank in the nose. His head snapped back as soon as her fist collided with it. His hand moved to the already swelling nose and pulled back with blood on his fingertips. Like a bull seeing red, he backhanded Winona onto the floor.

Body crumpled and tears streaming down her sobbing face, she tried began to crawl away from Frank. Smirking above her, he said, "I told you about hitting me woman. This time you actually had the gall to punch me. I'll see to it you don't even punch me again."

Winona reached her target against the wall, a handmade sculpture she had made not long after her husband had died. It was one of the few things she was permitted to keep out in the open from before she married Frank. She clutched onto it and remembered how she once was before she met him. She had changed for the worse since she fell in love with Frank. It was time to correct that.

Using all her strength, she swung the solid sculpture like a bat and made contact with Frank's leg. Frank howled in agony as he reached for his leg, bouncing on his good one. Winona took his imbalance as a chance to further her attack. Using the sculpture she had just used as a weapon as a crutch, she came back up from the floor and punched him again in the face. Frank flew backwards onto the floor from the impact of the blow.

When he flipped onto his back and looked up, the fury that he witnessed on Winona's face was that of a woman who allowed herself to be belittled and abused for too long. Winona looked down at the worthless man below her who only knew how to make himself feel better by putting others down and gave the same cruel smile he had given her before raising her foot and slamming it down between his legs.

Frank screeched as his manhood became a pancake underneath Winona's heel. She was now quite happy she had picked pumps to wear that morning. With a sneer, she said, "So, do you feel more like a man now that you've put down everything I've ever loved? Do you? Do you feel more like a man after hitting me for seventeen. Long. Years?!?"

With each word, she lifted her foot back up and slammed it back down on Frank's groin, causing a higher and higher pitched scream with each stomp. Digging her heel in, she huffed, "You are a blight on my life. I don't know why I ever thought that being with scum like you was better than being alone! I want you out of my house right now! And don't you dare try and bring a posse back to claim revenge because half the town already knows the truth about you! All I have to do is say a single word and you'll have so many damned shotguns aimed at your head it'll make your eyes bleed!"

Frank struggled to catch his breath. "Bu-but my stuff…what about my stuff?!?"

She grinded his groin again and said through gritted teeth, "Everything you own will be sent to that bar you frequent so much. I'll call ahead so Jacob knows to expect the junk pile that will be delivered this evening, along with official divorce papers."

With a final push, she removed her foot and held the sculpture like a bat once more. "Now get out of my house before I make your ugly face even uglier."

Giving a frightful nod, Frank tried to stand, but the sharp pain in his leg protested. He gave Winona the look of an injured puppy, but she was unfazed. "Winny…" he begged with arms open.

"You don't deserve to call me 'Winny' ever again," she snarled, pulling the statue back as if to hit him.

He winced and covered his head. "Okay, okay, Winona!" When she eased up on the statue, he lowered his arms. "Winona, you got me good. I can't even walk. Surely you could give me a ride to the bar at least! It's ten miles on foot!"

"You're a man, walk the pain off," she said coldly. "It's the least you deserve for running my children off and making them treat their home like it's cursed!"

Slumping in defeat, Frank limped his way to the front door and out of the house. She followed him to the doorway and stood with the statue still in hand, waiting for him to keep walking until he was out of sight. When the last bit of adrenaline she had been acting on fizzled, her legs gave out from underneath her. Dropping the sculpture, she covered her face in her hands and sobbed loudly.

When the mind meld ended, Winona's face was wet with tears and her mouth hung loosely open. Though she had closed her eyes at the start of the meld, her eyes stared blankly out into space. With a shaky hand she covered her mouth to hold in the sobs that she was letting out. Sarek opened his eyes and slowly withdrew his hand. In a somber tone, he said, "My apologies for bringing such a painful memory to the surface."

Closing her eyes once more, she leaned forward into Sarek's chest and cried openly. Having felt her pain and being experienced with comforting a human woman, he put his arms around her and gently held her as she cried. Holding her in his arms only reminded him of the wife he had lost long before he had expected to, but he easily contained his own sadness so that he could comfort Winona.

"You are better off without a man such as him," Sarek said in a soothing tone. "It was made clear to me that his sole reason for marrying you was to have someone take care of him and do his bidding. For a human, such a life is unacceptable. You deserve better."

"I know," Winona sobbed in his chest. "I just hate that I let him treat me that way for so long!"

"You wanted companionship," Sarek reasoned.

"I could have gotten a dog for that! I let him beat me and push me around and dictate my life! I'm surprised the boys can even look at me for what I put them through!"

"You wanted them to have a father figure."

"It wasn't worth it! None of it, the bruises I had to hide, the way he treated Sam and Jim, all those years I threw away, none of it!"

Sarek grabbed Winona by the shoulders and pulled her back. She stared up at him with eyes full of sorrow and remorse for her decisions. For a moment a vision of his own late wife flashed before him. Pushing the thought away, he said, "You have had long enough to repent for your decisions. You know you made them with the best of intentions and in the end your children still grew up to be prosperous and happy. They still love you dearly in spite of the choices you made. Instead of lamenting the past, look forward to the future you and your family will have together now."

Winona stared at Sarek in stunned silence for a moment before wiping her face clean. She nodded at him and said, "You're right. Of course you're right, you're a Vulcan! I'm being stupid tearing myself up like this. The boys are happier now that Frank is gone and so am I. I spent so much time being afraid to be alone that I made us all miserable just to avoid it. I'm able to go back to being myself now and the boys are entitled to that far more than I am. Sam's got a family and Jim's staring one of his own. They need their mother to be at her best and I'm my best without Frank."

"That you are," Sarek agreed.

She looked at Sarek and said, "What was it that made you react so poorly to Jim and Spock being together, aside from their secrecy about it, Jim being a human male, and the whole ponferthing of course?"

"Pon farr," Sarek corrected. "I am embarrassed to say that part of my contempt for their relationship, aside from those reasons you mentioned, were rooted in your son's reputation."

As he expected, Winona raised an eyebrow at him. "You cannot place blame on me for being concerned that my son was merely another addition to your son's expansive number of conquests. Given their secrecy about their relationship, it was easy for me to conclude that their relationship was completely physical."

"So in other words, you were worried your son would get hurt."

Sarek looked at Winona with a blank look on his face. "Spock may be half human, but he exhibits Vulcan behaviors and emotional patterns. He would not let something of the sort hurt him. However their relationship also threatened their careers, so naturally I was looking out for my son's future."

"But if he got kicked out of Starfleet he could have gone back to New Vulcan to help you and the other Vulcans, which was more of what you wanted in the first place, correct?"

Silence hung in the chill night air. With a smirk, Winona said, "Is it so hard to admit you were worried about him?"

"Yes," Sarek answered. "It is not the Vulcan way to admit such emotional reactions towards others, even if they are our family. It is especially difficult to admit this to those we do not know well."

"I'm human," Winona chuckled. "Who on Earth would I tell if you did?"

Sarek nodded. "You are right. For a human, you are quite wise."

"Thanks," she said with another chuckle. "Wish I agreed with you."

"To answer your question, yes, I was concerned about Spock's welfare. I felt as though he was being rash and irrational in his choices. That was before I understood what it was that he and your son truly had. Once I understood that, my apprehensions were vanquished."

"Funny how that works," Winona said.

The two stood in silence once more, letting their conversation sink in. Inhaling deeply, Winona said, "Well, regardless of what we've experienced before now, I'm glad that we're going to be family Sarek. I hope you feel the same."

He gave a nod. "I do."

Sarek looked at the horizon and noticed the creeping pinkness that was spreading through the sky. He looked back at Winona and said, "We have stayed up talking for far too long. We must return to your home and rest. If we do not, we will be sleep far after the others awake."

"Yeah, we better head back," Winona agreed.

The two walked the rest of the way back to the house in silence, but as they did, Winona occasionally stole a glance at the tall Vulcan walking beside her. It was amusing to see them deny just how much like humans they really were.

Sam and Aurelan's arrival back at Winona's farm house with Jacqueline the next evening was highly anticipated by all in attendance. Sam's knees and waist were violently assaulted by the arms of the three little boys who had desperately missed their father. They were much gentler with their mother who held their baby sister. Excited, they cried, "Can we see her?" "Lemme see, lemme see!" "Oooh, that's her isn't it? Can I hold her?"

Smiling, Aurelan bent down carefully and showed her sons their sister, whose eyes were wide open and looking around in quiet wonder. The boys oohed and aahed at their tiny sister, their faces aglow with delight. Aurelan said quietly, "This is your sister Jackie. You have to be careful with her because she's still very small and very fragile."

"What's fragile mean?" Thomas asked.

"It means she can get hurt very easily," Aurelan answered, "so you have to take extra good care of her so she can grow up to be strong."

"Like you mommy?" Chris asked.

Laughing, Aurelan nodded. "Yes honey, like me."

The boys continued to look at their sister intently while Aurelan and Sam exchanged an amused look. Behind the boys came Sarek, Prime, and T'Maire. The moment T'Maire saw Jacqueline, she gasped. "Oh my God!" she squealed. "She's adorable! Can I hold her?"

"Of course you can T'Maire," Aurelan said as she stood back up with Sam's help. Walking over, she handed Jacqueline over to T'Maire and said with a smile, "It's the least I can do to thank you for watching the boys for us."

"Aw, it was no trouble at all," T'Maire grinned. "They wouldn't leave my side, asking so many questions and telling me little stories." She looked down at Jacqueline and smiled. "Hello there Jacqueline, you precious little thing you."

Jacqueline reached out a tiny hand and grabbed at T'Maire's curled hair that tumbled down her shoulders. Making a fist, she gently tugged at T'Maire's hair as if she were comparing it to her mother's. Laughing softly, T'Maire looked at Aurelan and said, "She seems quite curious."

"She is," Aurelan said. "The entire world fascinates her already."

Prime and Sarek both looked over T'Maire's shoulder at the baby girl. Neither Sarek nor Prime voiced this, but as they looked down at T'Maire holding the baby, they pictured themselves doing the same with the child that would one day be born to Kirk, Spock, and T'Maire.

"The girl appears to be perfectly healthy," Sarek said blandly.

"Indeed she does," Prime concurred. "She also takes a great deal after her mother in looks."

"Lucky for her," Kirk said behind them. During the time they were looking at the new arrival, Kirk and Spock had come in to see them. "If she looked like her dad, she'd never stand a chance with the guys."

"Quit trying to stick my little girl with some hoodlum dweeb like you," Sam said, hands on his hip in mock anger. "She hasn't even said her first word yet and you're already trying to put her on the market!"

"Yeah, yeah, just you wait, the guys are gonna be knocking down your doors to get at her," he said, wiggling a finger at her from over T'Maire's shoulder. Recognizing her uncle, her hand released T'Maire's hair and reached out for him. He let her grab his finger and then kissed her soft, pudgy hand.

Winona came in from the kitchen wiping her hands and spoke loudly. "Alright you lot, they just got home from the hospital. They don't need all this excitement so soon! Let them sit down and kick their feet up for a bit!"

The rest of the night went as one would expect it to. There was lots of chatter and excitement for a couple of hours, but soon everyone settled down and then made their way to bed. Everyone, that is, but Sam and Winona. The two of them sat at the dinner table with cups of coffee that Winona brewed so the two of them could talk. Winona looked down into her cup while Sam looked directly at her.

"You have to tell him Mom," he said sternly. "He has a right to know what happened."

Winona closed her eyes and shook her head slowly. "I can't," she said as if she were exhausted. "I don't want to ruin his special day."

"His special day is still a few days away! You're not going to ruin anything by telling him the truth! It's not like Frank is going to be there so what are you worried about?"

"I don't want to hurt him! You know how he felt about Frank!"

"All the more reason you should tell him! He's not a little boy anymore Mom! In case you didn't notice, he's a grown man, one who's technically already married!"

"Don't you think I know that?" Winona snapped. Sam was well beyond the age where his mother snapping at him would make him jump. Instead he just leered at her impatiently. "I just don't want to hurt him. It's been so long since he's been home and I don't want to ruin it by telling him!"

"You'll never know if it'll ruin my stay if you don't just tell me."

Winona and Sam turned toward the entrance of the kitchen and saw Kirk standing there with his arms crossed. He pushed off the doorway he was leaning on and walked over to the kitchen table. Pulling out an available chair, he sat down and clasped his hands in front of him. His gaze went back and forth between his brother and his mother before he asked, "Do I get a cup of coffee too?"

Winona blinked out of her surprised stupor and rose from her seat. "Yeah, of course, I'll fix you up a cup."

She skittered over to the cabinet and pulled out an extra mug. She grabbed the coffee pot and poured the steaming hot beverage into the mug. Grabbing a spoon, she returned to the table and placed the mug in front of Kirk.

Kirk took a moment to spoon some sugar into the mug and stirred it, watching the coffee swirl around in the mug and the steam rise up from it. He picked the mug up and held it in front of his face, breathing in its aroma. Carefully, he took a sip and savored the sweetened black coffee. Placing the mug back down, he took a deep breath and asked, "So what is it that I need to know?"

Winona looked at Sam and Sam looked back at her. The look in Sam's eyes silently said "Tell him," and made Winona look away. She took a long drink from her cup and sighed. Still avoiding eye contact with Kirk, she said, "The day I kicked Frank out, he…" She paused and bit her lip to keep herself from crying. "He called you and your father faggots."

Kirk's facial features didn't change, but the clenching and unclenching of his jaw revealed his anger. He tightened his grip on the mug in his hands so that his knuckles turned white. Both Winona and Sam noticed this and knew they were trudging through dangerous waters. Winona pleaded to Sam with her eyes to help her, but Sam simply shook his head in a way that said "You're on your own."

"Is that all?" Kirk asked, wanting to know the full story.

"Well," Winona said, "I punched him because of it. It wasn't the first time he'd put you down and I had more than enough of it. Well…" She fidgeted with her mug nervously, still avoiding looking at her son. "He…he hit me."

Kirk's head snapped up and ice cold eyes stared at his mother, but she refused to look back at him. He moved the mug away from him and asked, "Was that the first time he hit you?"

Still Winona wouldn't look at him. In a fit of rage, Kirk stood up so fast he knocked his chair over and made his mother look at him. Holding her tear stained face in his hand, he asked again, this time more forcefully, "Was that the first time he hit you?!?"

In a shaky voice Winona answered, "No."

"How long has he been hitting you?!?" Winona closed her eyes and tried to turn her head away, but Kirk held it firm. He raised his voice, "HOW LONG?!?"

More tears fell from Winona's face as she answered, "Since we first got married."

Kirk immediately released his mother's face and walked out of the kitchen. Sam knew exactly what Kirk was going to do and stormed out of the kitchen after him. By the time he reached his brother, Kirk already had his jacket on and was grabbing his brother's keys to his station wagon. He grabbed his brother and held him firmly.

"Let it go Jim!" he cried. "It's over and done with! You'll do no good going after him!"

Kirk struggled against his brother's grip, anxious to leave the house and pursue his mother's ex-husband. "I don't care!" he yelled. "The bastard deserves to die a million times over for treating mom like that after she gave her life up for him!"

"You'll only make things worse for yourself! Think about what will happen if Starfleet finds out! What will you tell Spock?!?"

Kirk stopped struggling the moment Sam mentioned Spock. He closed his eyes and exhaled deeply. When he felt his brother's grip slacken, he snatched his arms away from him. He turned his head toward the kitchen and saw his mother standing there, face wet with tears. Looking away briefly, he looked back at her and asked, "Why? Why did you put yourself through that without telling us?"

"I knew," Sam said, staring at his brother.

Kirk whirled around and stared him dead in the face. Dropping his voice, he said, "You knew? All this time she was getting beaten and you knew?!? Why the hell did you let it continue if you knew about it?!? Why the hell didn't you tell me?!?"

"I didn't tell you because I knew you'd react this way!" Sam yelled. "You were troublesome enough once you hit puberty; if I told you Mom was getting beaten who knows what you would have done?!?"

"Then why didn't you stop it yourself?" Kirk yelled back. "You could have easily stopped it once you got old enough!"

"Oh yeah, how the hell would I have been able to stop it? I couldn't even keep my ass in this house!" Sam paused and looked at Kirk. "You've always been the stronger of us Jim! I may have dad's name, but you have his spirit and strength! The whole time Frank was in our lives, you lived through it, fought him and defied him! I had to stay with our aunt and uncle two towns away because I didn't want to deal with it! Even as an adult, I avoided this house like the plague, even though I was more entitled to live here that he ever was! You really think someone like me could have stopped him?!?"

Kirk stood in place, breathing deeply to keep himself calm enough to speak. "You didn't even try," he said, his own voice shaky. "If you had just put in a little bit of effort and tried, you could have stopped it. Mom shouldn't have had to wait seventeen years to find the strength to fight him off on her own!"

"I should have been strong enough to fight him from the start!"

Both Kirk and Sam stared at their mother with wide eyes, but she covered her face and wept. Behind her hands she cried, "It's no one's fault but my own! I never should have stayed with him when he started beating me! I shouldn't have let my loneliness overshadow my judgment!"

The two brothers exchanged a look and moved to either side of the weeping woman. They hugged her and shushed her, rubbing her back and stroking her hair.

"It's not your fault mom," Sam said. "The moment I knew I should have said something to someone in town that could have helped."

"I shouldn't have reacted the way I did," Kirk said, guilt washing over him. "I'm sorry."

"No," she wailed behind her hands, "You shouldn't apologize. You have every right to be upset! I'm ashamed of myself for allowing it to happen at all! If I were stronger…"

"Hush," Sam said. "It's alright now. Frank is gone and you'll never have to deal with him again. You got full rights of the farm from the divorce and he had to pay you for the abuse you went through."

Kirk looked at Sam in surprise. "Wait, Mom got money out all this?"

Winona nodded, no longer crying but now wiping her eyes. "When his father passed away he received a rather large inheritance that he working his way through. Unfortunately for him he didn't spend it fast enough and about 50 percent of what he had left went to me."

"How much did you get?" Kirk asked.

She smiled weakly and said, "264,000 credits."

Kirk's jaw dropped. Giving a laugh, he said, "How on Earth did you manage to get that much money?!?"

"Sam helped me present my case in such a way that my defense was flawless," she answered, "though it did help that we dropped your name in court."

Eyes wide, Kirk asked, "You mean mentioning me helped your case?!?"

Winona nodded proudly with a smile. "You're the hero of Riverside remember? You're the hope for all the little kids who're growing up here. It just so happens that the judge's son is one of your 'biggest fans' and the judge grew up with your father."

Smirking, Sam added, "Sometimes it helps to have a famous brother and father."

Kirk laughed happily and hugged both his brother and mother tightly. "That's great!" he said. "Now you can finally do all the renovations to the house that you've wanted to do!"

"So you forgive us?" Sam asked.

Kirk looked at his brother and his mother and smiled. "Yeah, I guess so." He walked past them and went back into the kitchen, sitting back down at his chair and drinking from his still hot coffee. "On one condition," he said with a devious smirk. "You have to serve your famous blueberry cobbler to everyone at my wedding."

Winona and Sam exchanged a look. Grinning at her son, Winona said, "Anything for you honey."