James responded with something he described as comprehensive. The suit did not materialize. Derek called me once, two weeks after the ruling. When I answered, he was silent for a long moment and then said only quietly, ‘Mom,’ I said, ‘Derek.’ We sat in that silence that holds everything too large and too broken to speak. And then the call ended.
I did not call back. What I decided was this. I was not going to close the door forever because closed doors are heavier to carry than open ones. and I am 74 years old and I am not interested in heavy things anymore. But I was also not going to walk through it on anyone else’s timeline. If Derek ever found his way to something true, not apology as strategy, but the real kind, the kind that cost something, then perhaps there would be a conversation.