Stolen Lullaby

Mosaic of Time

Taylor leaned over to make sure Sophie's headphones were securely on and she was engrossed enough in her movie that she wasn't paying attention to them.

"Steve wrote us a response to our letter declining to meet with him." She said in a slightly hushed voice still worried that Sophie still might somehow over hear them.

"I don't give a shit about anything that man has to say, burn whatever letter you have from him." Taylor could tell that Joe was already getting angry and was serious about wanting to burn the letter and she hadn't even told him about the bigger envelope.

"Joe!"

"It is not worth it in the slightest to read what he wrote. We said no to meeting him and no to hearing any bullshit apologies he had to offer. If we didn't want to hear it in person why would we want it in written form?"

"I just think you might be overacting-" before she could finish her sentence Joe cut her off his voice unintentionally rising in anger.

"Have you forgotten this is the same man that voluntarily drove his deranged wife to the hospital to murder our daughter?" Instinctually Joe held Maisie tighter causing her to squirm in discomfort. They had really thought they'd lost Maisie that terrible afternoon like the painting in her nursery stated, it was a true miracle the doctors were able to reignite the tiniest spark of life that was left in her. They had been ready to call time of death when her body initially didn't respond to the emergency efforts to get her breathing again. But at the last second as they were about to turn the equipment off, she took two deep breaths welcoming air back into her lungs proving that she wasn't ready to give up. The memories of that period of time haunted Joe and he was unable to forgive nor forget, the mere thought of Steve or Carol sent him into a dark rage to such an extent that he barely recognized himself and would need to go off on his own to calm down. Sometimes on his solitary walks his mind started gearing toward thoughts of revenge. These two people had tried everything in their power to take their daughters away and it was maddening that the legal system was letting them off without meaningful punishment. The idea that karma would eventually catch up and give them what they deserved didn't seem like enough. There were genuinely times when Joe fantasized about going after them himself wanting to impart some kind of hurt to balance out the pain they caused their family.

"Yes, I am very aware of that fact. I was in that room with our baby as she was dying in my arms and I don't appreciate you accusing me of forgetting!" Taylor snapped.

"I don't get why you're even open to the idea of forgiving him." Joe shot back icily.

"Who said anything about forgiveness? He wrote us a response and I picked it up from Lana's office that's all. I don't know why you're getting this idea that I'm ready to shake his hand and be friends."

"Let me read the letter, where is it?"

"It doesn't matter where it is right now, you're already mad so I'm not going to let you read it while we're in the air with seven more hours to go before we touch down!" Sensing the tense atmosphere between her parents Maisie began to fuss in Joe's arms.

"Give her to me, she probably needs to be changed and you need to relax and sort yourself out right now." Taylor took the baby from Joe and went to change her diaper in the bathroom. Sophie curiously peered over her Ipad screen at what was going on, even though she couldn't hear exactly what they were saying she knew that their voices were loud.

"Daddy is everything okay?" she asked taking her headphones off and putting her tablet down.

"Everything's fine my love, Mommy and I were just talking." Joe tried his best to give her his best smile to convince her nothing was amiss. Knowing her dad too well Sophie wasn't convinced that everything was fine. Digging into her travel on bag she pulled out her travel sized CandyLand board game and brought it to Joe.