Chapter 11 - Surviving Was Not the Same as Recovering
People expected me to feel victorious.
I didn’t.
My muscles were weak for months.
Two fingers in my right hand remained partially numb.
I had trouble swallowing.
Sleep became impossible unless a lamp stayed on.
Closed elevators made my heart race.
The smell of lilies made me vomit.
And I could not drink coffee.
Not even from a sealed cup I opened myself.
My therapist called it trauma conditioning.
I called it irritating.
Mara stayed with me initially.
That created different problems.
She inspected every medication.
Every delivery.
Every person entering the house.
One afternoon I finally snapped.
“I survived Olivia. I’m not going to spend the rest of my life being supervised by you.”
Mara froze.
Then nodded.
“You’re right.”
I regretted saying it that way.
She still went home.
That was probably healthy.
Daniel helped freeze disputed estate transactions.
Because I was alive, probate ended before it truly began.
Olivia had no widow’s claim to exercise.
The marital agreement remained relevant to divorce, but attempted homicide allegations changed everything surrounding asset access.
I filed for divorce.
Not because I wanted a dramatic legal victory.
Because I did not want her legally connected to any medical decision involving me ever again.
Olivia’s attorneys argued she had been manipulated by Mason.
That became her central defense.
Mason knew medicine.
Mason controlled dosage.
Mason had debt.
Mason faced the Harbor Recovery audit.
Olivia loved me, they suggested, but became trapped in an affair and gradually coerced into increasingly dangerous acts.
The texts made that difficult.
One message destroyed much of the sympathy:
Mason: We can stop.
Olivia: And go back to waiting for Ethan to give me permission to live? No.
Another:
Mason: This is getting too risky.
Olivia: Then finish it.
She had not been dragged toward murder.
At least not all the way.
Some distance she walked herself.
Mara read those messages once.
Then refused to read any more.
“Why?”
“Because I don’t want her voice living in my head longer than necessary.”
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I understood.
I had already spent enough time trapped inside a box listening to Olivia explain exactly what she thought my life was worth.
