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You may be bristling at that, but let’s be serious here, Leona. If he had kept at you, whatever he was doing, your bond sickness would have gotten much worse, and you were already basically a walking skeleton. I remember what you looked like back then.

Sometimes, when I think about what he put you through, I hate him.

That sounds funny, doesn’t it?

In a way, I guess it wasn’t his fault. It was all my fault. Only I regretted it, you know? Every day, I regret it. I told you, I’d do it again for my babies, and I would. But I hate what it did to you, and I hate what it did to me, and I hate what it did to Damian. Even Vincent, I guess. I hate what it did to Vincent, too.

Even so, the best thing Damian did for you after he bit me was to let you go, and you know it. You know he had to.

I still hurt for you during that time. I still hurt for you now. I think about how you never got married and you never had any children, and I worry you’re lonely there in the city. I worry that you don’t have a friend to call, that there’s no one who is to you what I was to you. I worry you don’t have anyone to talk to when you need someone.

I know worrying about you doesn’t make up for anything. I know you don’t want my worry.

It’s not so cut and dry, that is all I am saying. I want your forgiveness so badly that I actually stopped writing just now, and I sent a text to Vincent and asked if he would ever be willing to speak to you on my behalf so that I could talk to you before I passed.

He texted back that he thought that was a bad idea. He said that I was fragile and that you would be angry. He said he was only thinking of me, that he wants me to hold on as long as I can, and that it would be bad energy to release on me. He said I was only asking because some part of me has given up.

I can’t shift anymore. The wolf in me is diseased and rotted. It slams itself around in me, howling in pain. Sometimes, all I want is for the pain to stop.

What am I saying? As if you’ll ever feel sorry for me. You’re probably reading this thinking that it’s good that I’m in pain, that I deserve it.

Where was I?

My life with Damian.

I’m not saying things started out well with us, but after Jace was born, it was different. I needed him. You have no idea how much pregnancy and giving birth takes out of you. Without him, I wouldn’t have managed, and we bonded during that time period. I learned to rely on him, and he learned to be what I needed.

Even so, you have to understand that we didn’t have a normal relationship.

I had just given birth, so I wasn’t much for having sex, anyway, but that fizzled out with us—if it had ever been a spark, really.

And then, I pulled Vincent into it.

Damian thinks—they both think—that I did it because I wanted to hurt Damian or I wanted to cause drama. I can’t deny there’s a part of me that feels good if I wind Damian up. Some part of me always wants to get his attention any way that I can. I’ve always known it’s you, Leo. I’ve always known he settled for me.

But it isn’t why, with Vincent, really.

I was actually just lonely.

But I want to apologize to you about that, because I think there was a time when Vincent would have gone after you, but he needed to think that Damian and I were happy, and I shattered that for him, and he never had the courage after that. I don’t know if you could have been happy with Vincent, but…

You remember that time, when we were all smashed into the front seat of the truck, and you were right up against him? You remember how you two would always agree on the music? You remember that time that you guys got in that contest to see who could eat the most slices of pizza, and you won and he was so impressed? You remember when the four of us would start playing board games, and Damian and I would wander off and you two would be hunched over Monopoly, arguing over the rents on Park Place?

Sometimes, I wonder if we were just crossed the wrong way? The four of us?

Because it took years, but things changed with Damian and me. It was slow, and it snuck up on both of us, I think. We got used to each other.

You know what it’s like to wake up with someone who’s brewed your coffee already for you, because they know what you like? You know what it’s like to be able to order Chinese without getting the other person’s order, because you know what they always get? You know what it’s like to know just what to get someone for their birthday, because you know them?

It was like that with us.

And sometimes, that would morph into affection. Eventually, it became physical affection, and that’s how Henry was conceived, during that phase of our lives together.

At the beginning, when we had sex, it was always so intense. He was angry. He hated me. It was as if he was going to punish me, as if he was getting off on having power over me.

But things turned softer and sweeter. Tender, even. I guess that’s the kind of sex you always had with him. I don’t know. I don’t even know why I’m telling you this.

I think some part of me wants you to acknowledge that, even though the way I went about this was very wrong, that what I ended up having with him was valid and true and good, and that you’ll respect it, and you won’t make him destroy my memory.