Gloria's Letter
Chapter 16 - Gloria's Letter
Three years into her sentence, Gloria wrote Derek a letter, the first direct communication between them since her sentencing, delivered carefully through Farrah Nasser's office to ensure Derek retained complete control over whether to read it at all.
He debated for nearly two weeks before finally opening it, Megan supporting whatever decision he made without pressuring him either direction.
*Derek,* the letter began, *I don't expect a response, and I understand completely if you choose not to read past this first line. I've spent three years in mandatory therapy here, working through exactly why I believed what I did to Megan was ever justified. I don't have a version of that reasoning anymore that survives honest examination. I understand now, fully, that I was never protecting Jake from anything. I was simply repeating the exact pattern of control and fear that cost me my relationship with Tyler in the first place, this time aimed at a different family entirely.*
Derek read the letter twice, feeling a complicated mixture of old grief and something considerably more settled than the raw fury he'd carried in the years immediately following that terrible morning.
*I'm not asking for forgiveness,* the letter continued. *I understand I may never earn that, and I've made a kind of peace with the possibility that I won't. I only wanted you to know that the version of me capable of what I did to Megan has actually, genuinely changed, through considerable difficult work these past three years. I don't expect you to believe that from a letter alone. I only wanted the chance to say it, once, honestly, regardless of whether it changes anything for either of us.*
Derek sat with the letter for a long while, showing it eventually to Megan, who read it carefully before setting it down.
"How do you feel," she asked.
"I don't know yet," Derek admitted. "I don't think I'm ready to write back. I don't think I'm ready to close the door on ever writing back either. I think I just need to sit with it for a while longer."
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"That sounds like exactly the right amount of uncertainty to actually be honest," Megan said. "You don't owe her a resolution on any particular timeline."
Derek folded the letter carefully and placed it in a drawer, not quite ready to respond, not quite ready to discard it entirely either, understanding that some kinds of healing simply required more time than others to fully settle into their eventual shape.
