It's never too late to be happy

I'm trying to be straightforward here

After staying in silence for nearly an hour, the three women prepared dinner together as they've been doing during the past week.

They kept the conversation to a minimum, not because they didn't want to talk, but because neither one of them knew exactly what to say. They all felt like so much was said but at the same time so little. They all wanted to keep talking, releasing and facing all the bad thoughts, feelings, and emotions.

Helen and Jo believe that Harper's walls finally came down, but they are still afraid to test the veracity of that. They're both scared that they misinterpreted the situation and Harper is still closed up inside her dark and scared world, where their presence was kept to a minimum for four years. They are scared that one single word could make her close herself up again or worse, leave.

Helen took a more authoritarian and decisive approach previously, while talking to Harper about her happiness and how she needs to stop misplacing the guilt, but that bravery was completely drained. She's back to being afraid to tell Harper something that she might perceive as aggressive or intrusive of her own space.

Jo is still shocked with what she heard. Her heart aches for her sister as she tries to put herself in Harper's shoes. She wished she had known sooner and she wished she had tried harder to find the reason behind Harper's behaviours instead of just justifying them as 'her own coping mechanism'. She wished Harper was more like her when it comes to expressing what she's feeling. She wished she could take Harper's pain.

Harper is shocked too. For so long she kept her feelings to herself. For so long she believed she would never be able to express what she was feeling and why she was feeling it. Now, four years later, she did it, to a certain extent. There's still so much she could say, but somehow she feels like it was enough and that makes her angry. Angry because, after all, she could've said something sooner. She could've apologized sooner, she could've express her guilt and shame sooner, she could've started fixing everything sooner.

But she didn't, and that upsets her. That only adds up to the shame and disappointment she feels.

In her head, she apologized multiple times to her father for everything she did and didn't do. And for the first time, she also promises her father to try.

She'll try to fix everything. She's willing to do it, to work for it.

After dinner, Harper excused herself to go to sleep and before she climbed the stairs, Jo asked her if she could sleep in her room again. Harper nodded and smiled.

It wasn't long until Jo joined Harper.

-"Are you still awake?" Jo whispers as she lays down.

-"MhmMhm." Harper mumbles.

-"Here..." Jo extends Harper's phone to her. "You left it in the living room."

-"Oh...right. Thanks." Harper grabs the phone and sees that she has a couple new texts from her friends and one from Rachel. "Shit!"

-"What? Everything's okay?"

-"Yeah, just some texts I should've answered."

-"Can I ask if there's someone in particular..." Jo asks, carefully and playfully.

-"That would be the less intrusive conversation we would be having today." Harper gives her sister a half smile.

-"Not true. In the morning we talked about my kicking skills during sleep. That's not intrusive. Well, not for you at least." They both chuckle. "So...any text from the doc?"

-"Maybe..."

-"What does it say?"

-"Intrusive."