"What do you think?" I asked Harry as we sat together on our bed in the hotel room. I intertwined my fingers with his.

"I want to marry you," he said in a very no nonsense way.

"I know, and I still want to marry you. But what about our parents? I don't want to upset them."

"I know, but this is what I want. What we want. They shouldn't be able to tell us what to do," he said and it wasn't necessarily a defiant tone of voice. But he looked at me for confirmation. "Right?"

This was probably a gray area for him. He had always had to obey his nannies under threat of some harsh consequences, and Theodore had been an absolute dictator. He was relishing his freedom and yes, he was an adult and had the autonomy to make his own decisions. But that didn't mean we should just completely disregard our parents' concerns.

"Yes, of course. Ultimately the decision is ours," I said. "But I understand what they're saying. Do you think we need to get through some of this crap before we take such a big step?"

"Why?" He asked. I pulled him to lay his head on my lap and I hovered over him as I ran my fingers through his hair.

"I don't know," I said. "We're probably going to go through some hard emotional stuff with the trial and adapting to life afterwards. You're going to have to make some big adjustments. And I know we haven't talked about it much, but you're probably going to have to go to therapy for a while."

"Why?" He asked again.

"Because of the way you were raised," I said. "You didn't have a normal family life and you were oppressed in unthinkable ways. That's going to raise some issues for you, I think. Especially when we think about having our own kids."

A delighted smile crossed his face. "I can't wait to be a dad."

"You will be a fantastic father," I agreed. "But you don't have anyone to look up to in terms of what a good father should look like. How will you know how to do it?"

"Is it that hard?" He asked and I actually laughed. Hard.

"I'm sorry, baby, I'm not laughing at you but I think maybe you don't understand the full impact of fatherhood." I caressed his face and leaned in to kiss him. "Parenting is sacrificial. You have already sacrificed much of your life, unwillingly, and you need to focus on yourself and healing from your  past. And I want to help you with that, too." He nodded, seeming to understand my concern. "Sacrifice also means you put the needs of your child before yourself. So when the baby is crying at two in the morning and you have to work the next day, you have to give up your sleep to take care of the baby. When a three-year-old is throwing a tantrum about everything in sight, you have to have patience to not yell or scream at them. You have to teach them to be good and loving and kind and patient and you have to act that way as well so they learn from your example. And what if we have two or three kids and one wants help with homework and one wants help with tying their shoes and the baby is crying?"

"Wouldn't you be there to help me?" He asked and I laughed even harder.

"Of course I would! I'm just saying that parenting changes your life. And when you never had a role model except a man who belittled you and hit you, it might be hard to figure out how a good father acts."

"I would never hit a child. Or anyone," he said in absolute sincerity. Then he gave me a mischievous little smile and said, "Except Theodore." And we both laughed hard enough that our eyes were watering.

When we stopped, I said, "I also think you will have to work through some of the hurt of not having your mother while you were growing up. That's not a small thing. And you probably have or at least you will have a lot of anger to work through as well. Even without all that, people can change a lot in their early twenties. You only found out that you were an actual adult a few months ago. Before that, you still thought you were a kid. What if you....what if your feelings for me change?"

I had laid down on my back and he pushed up on his elbow and leaned over me, saying, "I will never stop loving you. I promise." And I knew he meant it with everything in his heart.

"But your feelings will change. Love is a commitment and we have to be willing to work through any problems we have, no matter what. There will be times that you are so angry with me that you will want to walk away, and the same may be true of me towards you. But love is the commitment to take the time to cool off and then come back together to work through our problems."

"I know," he said and I just shook my head in wonder.

"So what did your mom say?" I asked.

"Kind of the same things your parents said. But she said she knows I'm an adult and she just wants me to be happy," he answered. "But she also said she wants to spend some time with me before I go through any more major life changes." That made a world of sense to me, and I really hadn't thought about it from her perspective. 

My dad knocked on our door and pushed it open since it was slightly ajar. "Hey," he said. Harry and I sat up to make room for him to sit down.

"So Mom and I talked some more," he began. "We had an idea. What if everyone comes to Ohio for Christmas and the two of you can get married there? Your siblings will want to celebrate with you and I'd rather not spend Christmas in a hotel room away from your mom anyway. Anne and Clive are both welcome to stay with us as well; we have plenty of room. It would also give us a few weeks to plan a little celebration."

"Us? As in you and mom?" I asked.

"You can't get married and not have a reception, Jules," Dad smiled. "How does that sound? Better than running off to the justice of the peace, I hope."

I looked at Harry and he grinned. "Perfect," we said in unison. I had to admit, I did really want to celebrate with my siblings, and I wanted them all to meet Harry. In person.

We pitched the idea to Anne and Clive and they seemed to agree that it sounded perfect. We would have to apply for a passport for Harry right away so he'd have it in time for us to fly home for Christmas. The next several days were filled with much more pleasant diversions as Harry and I talked about a very simple wedding.

Anne stayed busy working on getting the house cleaned and repaired, with Clive's unfailing help, of course. She ultimately decided, with our strong encouragement, to just bulldoze what was left of the apartment and not rebuild it. The door would lead to a nice patio or something that could be constructed in the spring. The restoration company did a fantastic job of getting the smoke smell out of everything. After that, it was really a waiting game. She didn't want to live there and she didn't feel right making any other decisions about all of Theodore's things. I personally would have burned them, but that's just me.

Anne and Harry finally received the results of the blood test that Officer Michaels had suggested weeks before and it definitively proved that Anne was Harry's birth mom, which meant that Theodore had indeed lied to her and to Harry about his mom's death. A definite advance in the case.

Updates on the case were frequent and encouraging. Charges would be brought against all the goons who guarded the doors and helped Theodore when Harry overdosed - Joe Struthers, Mitch Davis, Amos Cardwell, and Roger Tackler, even though he hadn't originally been arrested. It was believed that they were the closest to Theodore and thus were likely in cahoots with him as opposed to being coerced. Denise Davis, the cook and Mitch's wife, was also charged with aiding and abetting a criminal since it was believed that she knew of Theodore's treatment and oppression of Harry.

AnnaMae Watson, the maid, who was also the woman in charge of bringing Harry's pills to the suite each week, agreed to testify against Theodore. She said he was manipulative and he made several sexual advances towards her, suggesting that he would give her more money or more responsibilities if she would sleep with him. That sounded way too familiar. She said he also threatened her severely, saying if she ever ratted him out, he would rape her or kill her, or even go after her family.

Harry's nannies Sarah, Amy and Kim also agreed to testify against Theodore and his particularly strict punishment methods. Regina and Margaret were both charged with misdemeanor child abuse while Renee was charged with misdemeanor abuse based on the fact that she gave Harry chewable Benadryl to make him sleepy.

Benjamin Blake was charged with practicing medicine without a license, prescribing medicine without a license, and falsifying medical documents. He was stripped of his degree and fired from the university where he had taught.

It was mid-December when Nathan gave us the good news: The trial was set to begin on Monday, January 8, exactly two months after Harry and I set the fire and escaped. According to him, it was unprecedented to get court date that quickly for such a complicated case. We just couldn't wait to get it over with.

In the meantime, we were preparing for a few very exciting distractions. The first was to give Harry his first - and hopefully best - Christmas ever. Well, at least it would be the first one he could remember. From what he could recall, it sounded like his nannies usually went home or had vacation during the holidays and Theodore would occasionally look in on him but they never celebrated Christmas together, not once that he could remember. 

However, we soon discovered that, as much as we wanted to get married, it wasn't going to happen in just a few weeks' time. As soon as we started researching the legal requirements for not only getting married, but for Harry to apply for US citizenship, we realized that we were in for a long process. The first consideration was proving that our marriage would be legitimate and not just a green card marriage. Then, there was proof of income, proof of permanent residence, as well as all police and court records. Since we were both involved in a major, ongoing court case, we decided that it was going to be too much complicated to try to get married any time soon.

* * * * *

So PLEASE BE AWARE that I changed this part of the story from the original. Harry and Jules will not be getting married right away, but the story will still have a happy ending.

Please be aware that when it comes to all the legal mumbo-jumbo, I don't have an education in law, so I might have to make some things up. I've been doing the best I can with what I can find via Google, but a case like this is complicated and there are so many steps before an actual trial can begin. I'm probably going to get a lot of stuff wrong but just roll with it and pretend it really happens that way, okay? :D