Destiny Drew Us Together

The Phoenix Arises

Sonja

In the end we both had to come in for a second single session because of what all the years in law enforcement had done to us. I also had the pain of being beaten up by my boyfriend in high school, the divorce of my parents and being shot while trying to take down Baitfish hanging out there.

Ramone was a whole 'nother story. I was deep, I mean deep into this cover. I saw way to many killings and I needed some comfort so I allowed myself to become intimate with him. He seemed to care for me and I was able to escape from all the dirt and dirty people surrounding me. I allowed my feelings to cloud his involvement in the operation. It wasn't until I went 'back in' when the Vets came back to town that I realized that Ramone was a king pin too. He was the weapon supplier and his actions had cost several ATF agents and civilians their lives. He would have killed me this time if Tammy hadn't of rescued me at the last second. I was stupid and my idiocy cost some good men and women their lives.

Pride was right, there was so much pain. I ended up on the floor weeping over those agents and their babies that they did not return to. All that guilt and pain came out of me like a flood. Then there was Marian. I turned my back on her. She really was innocent in the beginning of the situation. She almost died because I did not believe that she wanted out. In the end both she and I almost died.

I couldn't even begin to talk about Christopher that night. She scheduled me for a second session to talk about the other men in my life and Chris. She asked about Savannah. I told her I had no ill will toward her. Chris loved her and because of his love for her I realized that he could make a commitment to another woman. The Christopher LaSalle that I heard of was a womanizer, men called women like Chris a hoe. He had had that lady killer smile and that drawl, but I was only impressed with his skill as an officer.

I had seen the light in his eyes when he talked about his mermaid. I also saw the pain in his heart every day when I sat next to him in the office and in the car after she died.

Then there was Melody and Tucker. It was only when I saw her in his house that morning that I realized how much I really did care for Chris. I had not allowed myself to think past the fleeting looks that he gave me but now confronted with another woman, I found places in my heart where Christopher had infiltrated. I would pick up his jacket and smell the aftershave on it. Tammy caught me one day and I lied and said I thought my dad use the same thing. I only then found myself confronted with the fact that I did care for him and now it was too late for me to do anything about it. I asked Chris one day what he wanted after he told me that Melody wanted more from him than he did and that she was not his idea of the wife. Before he could answer, a noise came from over the fence.

Tammy had ridden my ass after Clearwater. She got real sneaky about it. Always asking how I was doing, if I was ready to go back to the streets. Always dropping comments about something that Chris had said to her or the time that he was working on a door jam and it fell in on him. Of course she had no idea that I didn't want to hear it. She had no inkling how it crushed me to have him reject me that night. And so that pain had to come out too even though we were now officially together. How did I know that a situation wouldn't come up again and Chris would hide a former relationship from me trying to save my feelings? Hell, I knew of five other women personally that he had burnt.

Also with Chris came the daddy issues. Comparing him with the only other man I truly loved was common the counselor said. It is how all girls measure up men – against their father. While there were less tears that night, it didn't mean I was less tired. I was exhausted when I left the office and I still had a thirty minute drive to get home.

La Salle

Well if I thought that Pride and Rita were hard hitting, it didn't touch what the counselor had in store for me. Katrina had taken an unknown toll on my life and I still carried bitterness and some fear from being on the streets every day with the NOPD and the Feds not giving us what we needed to contain the violence and keep the city safe after 'Nola flooded. I had nearly gotten shot twice while with the drug enforcement task force. She told me that this trouble was going to surface sometime and that it was best to deal with it now and not wait until something trigger the memories.

I thought that I had cried enough but at the end of the initial session, the counselor told me that I had to come back. She was right of course and the next go around focused on the three women in my life. I had never really mourned Savannah until Sonja asked about her one night. Deeks had encouraged me to tell Sonja once I knew she actually loved me. Telling her about our early years was easy but talking about the time closer to Savannah's death caused me great agony. I was embarrassed to cry in Sonja's presence, but she took my hand and lay down with me on the sofa and in that intimate space I spilled my guts out to her tears, snot and all.

As I recounted my history and love story with Savannah to the counselor, I began to weep again. Then she asked me if I had shared any of this with Sonja. When I said that I had, she asked how Sonja reacted. It was then that I really lost it as I realized that Sonja had listened to me for several months talk about Savannah and never offered any hint of being jealous or tiring of hearing about her. I managed to get out about the night that I went to my old house and told Savannah that I had met someone else and was going to try to move on with her.

I did not realize how wounded that I was from Melody. Even though I had tried to forgive her, deep in my heart I still harbored resentment from her using me. I had grown to love Tucker and his removable from my life hurt immensely.

I already knew the truth when the counselor said that it looked to her that I was able to be secure with Sonja both on the job and at home. I finally left the sorrow there that night and while I often think of Savannah and Tucker, the memories now bring only a smile to my heart.

We attended two joint sessions with the counselor. The first was to talk about what we wanted in a relationship and if we wanted children. She also asked us if we would have an open or closed marriage. That one surprised me because just the thought of Sonja being with another man made see red.

She asked how our families and friends felt about us being in an interracial relationship and if we had considered what it might be like to raise children together in a multicultural manner. An hour later in the session we were still talking about details that I thought we had hashed out weeks ago.

The discussion in the second joint session revolved around our hobbies, finances, retirement plans and if we wanted to buy a home. We had seen the list in some books and knew that she was going to ask about the types of music, books, food, TV shows and movies that we liked as well faith issues. We told her that we had hashed out the food thing since Sonja was vegan. Sonja didn't have a TV but I had to watch my 'Bama teams and the Falcons. She encouraged us to stay with our 'boys' and 'girls' night out and urged me to do some 'control exercises' to help me cope with the fact that Sonja was a better shooter and bowler than me and assured me that there would be others that would come out during the marriage.

At the end of the final joint session, she recommended some additional readings and encouraged us to periodically attend marriage seminars in the future. She reassured us both that as far as she could determine that we were able to confront the difficult parts of our lives and encouraged us to seek further counseling if the resurfaced events caused us any problems in the future.

She wished us well as we entered into marriage and commended us for making the relationship legal as well as social.