Here I am again, sitting wearing one of these scratchy, paper gowns in a florescent room that smells like disinfectant. It brings back so many unpleasant memories.

The doctor was right that day in the hospital. There were no repercussions to my attack. It has been three weeks, and I haven’t even seen or heard from another officer since that day. I have been coping.

Soon after the doctor left, I am discharged. Outside of the hospital Lana is doting all over me, trying to get me back to her car. Even after the day I have just had, she is still determined not to hide our connection. She is kissing my head and stroking my arms.

It is such a cliché, but life doesn’t always go as planned. You may get what you want, but not always the way that you expect it. As I sit here, I am not sure how something so destructive could ever turn good, but I have always been annoyingly positive despite my socially unaccepted life choices...

After the initial family drama melt down the first night I had returned to work, things seemed to go a little more smoothly. Everyone tried to understand that me returning to work and leaving them to do more things on their own was less about hurting them and more about making myself happy. It was not very hard to see that working with Mark made me happy. I was finally happier than I had been in quite some time, and it was very noticeable.