David Phillip Garner

David's situation

David runs an aggressive, win at all costs, law firm in LA and heads a branch office in SF. He in actively involved in politics, business, show business, arts, and legal circles and has too many powerful friends to mention.

Inside, David is crushed.

David came from a rich conservative family, he went to a good school, went to university, studied law and was sure he knew how the world worked. In reality, his upbringing was sheltered and he had never had his values threatened.

He was single, young, rich and rising fast in the law firm when he met Leda. At first he was just looking to score, but over the weeks that followed, he found that he had fallen totally in love.

Leda challenged everything that he had just accepted at face value. She was independent and self ware in a way he never imagined. Where he would state his beliefs, she would ask the question that none of his family or friends ever had and cut right through to the heart of the issue. Soon David realized that he was a just full of prejudice and assumptions that he had never questioned. Leda just smiled. She had found herself a lawyer to defend her book shop.

David was soon in deep smit. Leda just destroyed his assumptions. The two would argue the whole night away but it never became personal. David rapidly reexamined his whole life and all his assumptions and suddenly found himself changed.

Sadly, the long nights conversations, the holidays to San Francisco to visit Leda and his work proved to be too much and his work started suffering. He thought about dropping out, but to his surprise, Leda wouldn't let him. "You couldn't adapt to my life. Yet. Looks like I have to move to LA." He tried to talk her out of it but she wouldn't change her mind.

Leda moved in with David and things calmed down a bit. He would work in his straight cooperate law environment by day and by night, chaos. He never knew what to expect coming home, but it was usually new and surprising.

When his parents visited, they freaked out. Normally his father and mother intimidated anyone that they met, but Leda just sat and calmly argued with them. David thought his father was going to explode at the dinner table, but Leda just calmly stood up, handed him her card "In case you want to continue the discussion. I'm feeling intimidated by the auras in this room. I'm leaving now." She stood up and left. Panicked, David rushed out to follow her, but she just shrugged and said she was going to stay at a hotel and would call him later the next day. That night, reviewing what had happened, David resolved leave his parents in the house and to propose to Leda the next day.

Leda said she wasn't really the marrying type and spent the rest of the morning outlining the reasons why she objected to marriage. She didn't want to merge their two lives into one and as she explained it, David realized that he didn't want that either. Love was not a limited thing that could could channel to one person. So many people needed and deserved love, Leda argued and David realized that was one of the things that made Leda special to him. Again he agreed. Leda had lots of reasons and started listing them. By lunchtime had given up hope, but over vegetarian bagels, she said she would be willing to accept the social assumptions people would read into the relationship if it meant so much to David.

The marriage changed little in the details of their life, but it did seem to cement the bond between the two of them. Oh, isn't it cute? :)

When an opportunity to form his own firm came up, David leapt at the chance. Suddenly everything was going perfectly. Naturally, it wouldn't last.

Leda decided that she was ready to move to the next stage of life and announced that she wanted to become a mother. David was, surprised, but happy, although a little embarrassed that Leda had decided and announced it at at a party for his clients.

Leda soon fell pregnant and soon they discovered that they were expecting twins. Towards the end of the pregnancy, Leda started to get sick and the doctors couldn't identify exactly what the problem was.

Leda insisted on a natural birth and at the birth, the first child, Jayde, was delivered reasonably easily. Gemma, the second, was misaligned and there was complication after complication. Leda strongly refused medical assistance with the delivery and by the time the doctors started emergency procedures, Leda was showing the strain. She died soon after and the doctors rushed to deliver Gemma, who was stillborn. The doctors tried to revive both, but only Gemma recovered.

David was destroyed.

At first he was angry, and he sued the hospital and the doctors who delivered his daughters. He won a large settlement, and raised a few eyebrows by using the home video of the birth in court.

Winning didn't help. He still felt empty and ripped apart. He discovered that work, while it didn't fix the feeling, at least made it go away for a while. He submerged himself in his work obsessively and started to push his firm forward aggressively.

The following few years are a blur for David. He made lots of money, but he didn't care about money any more. His firm became one of the most powerful in LA, but that didn't matter because he had no use for that. He accumulated success, and had no use for it, so he just accumulated more and more.

His daughters were growing up, but he saw so much of Leda in them that it cut him to his heart to be reminded of her. He hated himself for it, but he avoided his daughters.

After a few years, he remembered what Leda had said about people needing love and he decided that he needed love. He knew she wouldn't mind because she had had lovers while they were courting and married. So, he set his mind on it and went out like a predator and hunted that down. Not surprisingly, nothing he found was satisfying.

David just spiraled round and round, gaining money and power, and looking for someone to... to... replace Leda, shame him though it did to think it. Naturally no one really measured up to Leda.

His accident stopped all that. As he sat in the car, slowly losing feeling in his body and listening to Joan, his latest lover, stop breathing, Leda appeared to him. She sat down next to him and started explaining how she felt and that she felt he needed to do better. David talked to Leda for a couple of hours.

Leda said she was sorry for dying, but that something important had come up and that it was her time. She said that she had tried to talk to him before but he wasn't listening. He was too busy screwing up bringing up their daughters and generally being self indulgent.

As usual, Leda made him look at his life and reevaluate it. He didn't like what he saw and he promised to fix everything. Leda promised to talk to him more often to try and help him stay on course.

When he got out of hospital, and arrived home, the first thing that he noticed was that the painting in the hall of Leda seemed to be smiling at him. He smiled and felt some joy return to his life and he wasn't surprised to see the painting smile back.

He immediately went to work righting things with his daughters. He tried to explain what he had experienced to them, but halfway through he realized he probably just sounded insane.

He had missed most of their childhood, but he was damn well going to be there for them from now on. He wasn't really good with children, but dealing with them as adults seemed to work well. Now when he saw Leda in them, it made him feel happy rather than empty.

He took an interest in their school work, and social lives. He suddenly discovered that he was really proud of his daughters. Gemma was really smart and Jayde was the leader of the school social activity.

Looking round LA, David decided that he didn't really like the environment. Gemma was always getting sick with smog and the money culture wasn't good for the girls attitudes. Leda wouldn't be impressed with Jayde's focus on money. David thought about moving and San Francisco leapt into his mind. He looked around and decided on Berkeley area. It was just the right sort of environment, and it was near the university when the girls graduated.

He bought a big block of land and had a new house designed. On the work front, he suggested to the other partners that starting a new office in SF and dealing with Internet law and such would be a profitable idea. They leapt at it and David offered to head the office.

So they all moved out to SF. Jayde complained about the disruption to her social activities, but David was adamant.

These days, Leda talks to him less often, but thats OK. He knows that she is watching and he feels her pride in the twins too. He still talks to her though, just to keep in contact.

Numbers

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