Infinitely

Charlotte saved me

"It's just a cold," Justin tells Quinn that night. "He's really okay."

"But you can call and we'll come right home," I tell him.

"You won't need us," Justin shakes his head. "Come on, Charlotte, let's go."

"But," I look at Caelen one more time. He's passed out and will probably stay that way most of the night. The truth is he'll never know if I'm here or not.

"I'll call if I need you," Quinn promises.

"Thanks," Justin says and guides me to the door. "We'll be back late."

I go out to the car and Justin opens my door for me even though the driver is waiting to do it. We're off to an awards show, our first major public appearance since the disaster with my father. Then again it's only been a week since he was arrested.

The FBI had been watching my grandfather and then my father for years. As much as we liked to think that the police ignored our way our life, the reality is that polygamist groups have been a source of criminal acts for a long time. Underage marriages were just one part of that, a part that for a long time the church avoided. At least that's what I thought.

As it turned out, Sarah was just one of the 17 year old girls they tried to marry off. There were a few 15 and 16 year olds too. Almost 10 men have been arrested for either statutory rape or for helping make it possible.

The more I find out about all the terrible things my father was involved in the more I feel like I'm losing my mind. It's a story that gets worse every time I hear it and the truth is the part about the underage girls isn't the worst part. I have to stop watching the news because it's all too much. I already knew my father was a bad person and hearing these things doesn't help.

What gives me a little bit of comfort is knowing that Sarah and I actually gave the FBI the evidence they needed to arrest him. Posting that video on her YouTube channel was basically the same thing as testifying. The FBI had it taken off YouTube while we were in protective custody but now it's back up, hopefully helping Justin's fans understand what happened.

His fans are the hardest consequence of this whole thing. They pretty much all hate me, which I knew was coming. I don't blame them because they're all just so confused. I'm still confused in a lot of ways and I'm part of it so I can't imagine what it looks and sounds like to them. All they know is Justin lied and that him being with me means he's involved in this weird mess. They just want him to be okay - and as far away from me as possible.

Which is why I've tried everything I can think of to get out of going to the awards show with Justin tonight. As long as I'm at home I don't have to see any of it and I can pay attention to the other things that are going on since our FBI interviews. Having Caelen at the protected custody center with us for 5 days meant he was exposed to all kinds of germs and people I never would have let him near. Now he's sick - just with a cold, as Justin likes to point out - and I just want to hold him until he feels better.

And of course there's Sarah. I don't know how she was able to get through life being almost completely oblivious to the kinds of things my father did. She saw him kidnap me and that was bad enough. But now that she knows what he's done, everything she's ever known has fallen apart. How could anything he ever taught us be true?

I can't blame her for having a hard time with it because I went through the same thing. I just had the chance to do it slowly, one "truth" at a time. Her world was knocked upside down all at once so it's been really hard on her. And that's just part of it.

The other part is trying to help her accept that she's really pregnant. She keeps saying she doesn't want it which I knew better than to believe but of course she had to go and say it in front of the doctor which meant Justin's bodyguards had to come carry her out of the exam room when she tried to offer Sarah some information about adoption. All I could think was that I was glad she was too far along for them to even mention abortion because she probably would have been arrested.