Leftover Baggage from Llanview

18

Dorian:

December glides forward rapidly with the holiday decorations overflowing through DC.

I see my therapist once a week and plan to continue therapy for perhaps the next year or two.

My nightmares, anxiety attacks and flashbacks have eased, but are not completely gone.

I have no illusions that a few short weeks of therapy has "cured" me.

Walking home alone still sometimes makes me nervous, so I often have a senate guard accompany me.

And many early mornings still wake me up feeling fear, but it's more vague now, as if I'd had nightmares that I don't remember.

The nightmares I do remember are mostly silent ones and many with just still flashes of images.

Risa spends several all-nighters at the libraries at the university. In addition, she is working part-time at George Washington University Hospital.

Her birthday is this week, so once she completes her last final of the semester, she and I celebrate by going out to eat in Chinatown at a quiet, but elegant Chinese restaurant.

There, the staffers bring her a slice of fortune cookie with a birthday candle in it and sing happy birthday to her, which Risa loves.

After we eat, we decide to take in the nearby annual holiday market where we complete a few last trinkets of holiday shopping.

Risa and I find a table, a tall, rather rickety table to sit at where I have tea and Risa has a pretzel along with her tea.

There's a small group on the makeshift stage singing and playing Christmas carols, so we watch them for a while.

"Happy birthday, Risa," I tell her at one break between songs as Risa polishes off her pretzel.

"Thanks, Gran..." Risa says. "And thanks for helping my mom out that night with adopting me."

"You're welcome," I hug her even as my brows rise in surprise.

"Mom told me how she came to your door late Christmas Eve night praying that you'd open the door," Risa adds. "You were in a fight, yet you welcomed us both in...I'm so grateful you put your neck out to have me join your family."

"You're sweet..." I say, touched. "I'm glad you were able to join our family."

We sit close a minute, enjoying the chilly December air. I love being a grandmum.

I admit to initially having mixed feelings about being a grandmother that late spring of 1993 when Cassie announced that she was pregnant with her first son William.

Perhaps it was fear that Cassie and I would grow further apart since Viki and her then-lover Sloan and much of the rest of Llanview's elite fawned over Cassie and Andrew.

And since especially back then, Cassie seemed so hungry for Viki and her clique's approval and friendship, I was nervous about not only Viki seeming to "adopt" her, but what effect the Buchanans would have on my grandchild.

And since this was shortly after my breast cancer operation, in addition to being at a time I was feeling insecure about my age.

It didn't help matters when a staffer at Llanview hospital assumed that I was Jason Webb's mother.

Jason and I had been lovers for a couple of years until mid-1994 when he moved out of Llanview.

I'm glad that we touch base periodically by text and he is a freelance photographer in upstate New York.