Ramaswami/McDermott Random Legacy ch. 18: Poison

Lauren becomes a toddler. She has her grandmother's red hair, her mother's blue eyes, and her father's nose and eye shape.

Regina's baby is a boy, who she names Regan. Regan of course has to ask her cousin why she gave her son her name.

"What could be more fitting than giving him the name his father cried out when he was making his baby," Regina laughs, "It could be worse, I could have named him Mortimer."

"Are you angry at me?" Regan asks, detecting something wrong in Regina's laughter.

"As a matter of fact, I am. I'm angry that you're still sleeping with that bastard, despite everything," Regina answers, "You're not just my cousin, you're my best friend. One day Donovan is going to break your heart, and I don't want that to happen, especially when I know it can be prevented. You've wasted too much of yourself on him already. Dump him now before you're old and bitter, and alone."

"Regina, I love him. I can't just stop how I feel for him."

"Love doesn't go seducing other women for their money, Regan. Love isn't afternoon sex on a desk in an office, and you know it. He's treated us all like dirt, you most of all."

As the cousins talk, Regina's younger sister walks by unnoticed. Alison Goth has only recently graduated high school, and her older sister still treats her like a child to be ignored. But Alison is an adult now, and she's going to make sure her family knows it and starts treating her like one.

Late at night, when they're all asleep, Alison meets Donovan as they planned. He's always treated her like an adult, even when she was still in high school.

No one before Donovan has ever needed her, or even wanted her around. So, she leaves Goth Manor and her family behind to elope with him. Her trust fund, of course, comes with her.

Unbelievably, he shows up on Regan's doorstep the next day as she's heading off for work.

"Congratulations," she says bitterly, "I hope you're happy you finally married the money you were after." The whole town has heard about Donovan Landgraab's midnight elopement with Alison Goth.

"You know why I had to do this, had to marry her. But this doesn't have to change anything between us, Regan."

"It changes everything, Donovan. I should never have gotten involved with you in the first place, and now I'm stopping it."

"Do you think I wanted it to be like this?" he asks, nearly shouting in his anger, "I love you! I would give anything to be with you. If I didn't have this debt and the estate to keep up, you would be the only woman in my life. Please, you can't desert me now. You are the only woman I've ever loved or ever will love."

He pulls her to him in a deep, passionate kiss, and she returns the passion, still weak to him despite everything.

But she's not so weak as to given in completely. The business with her aunt Kamala, the seduction of her cousin Regina hadn't been enough, but his running off with Alison finally opened her eyes, and she pulls herself, reluctantly but firmly, out of his grasp.

"I'm sorry, Donovan. We could have been great together, but your estate and family name meant more to you than I did. You seduced and married a girl you don't love for her money, to save your own ass. I can't be a part of that anymore, I have to let you go. Try to be a good husband to Alison."

Regan walks away from him to her car, glad she has to go to work, an excuse to get away now before he manages to talk his way back into her life.

It took everything she had to say goodbye to Donovan. She has every reason to hate him, but she still loves him anyway. Every day is an exercise of will to not call him, or show up at his office for an afternoon' date'. Finally, Regan decides to try travel, hoping that getting far away from Sunset Valley for awhile will get him out of her mind, cure her of her addiction to the poison that is Donovan Landgraab.

(Challenge Notes: If little Lauren didn't have such great grandparents, there's no way she'd make it through the 'perfect children' part of this generation's challenge. While Regan was gallavanting around town, one of her grandparents would be parked with Lauren, doing the training and toddler book skill reading. Lauren has one day left before becoming a child, and we've got it all done. Finally, she can play with the dollhouse.

Regina naming her son Regan actually happened in the game, I didn't name him. I was floored when it happened. I've seen him as a toddler now, btw, he has Cornelia Goth's purple hair (as does Regina, though sometimes it looks black in pictures), and Donovan's blue eyes.)