Chapter 15 - Jocelyn’s Defense
Jocelyn did not confess to trying to erase Emmett.
She rejected that phrase.
Her deposition:
“I was trying to find a sustainable solution.”
She had been exhausted.
Our marriage cold.
Emmett resisted her authority.
I undermined her.
Sometimes true.
She said:
“He would tell me, ‘You’re not my mom,’ then Declan would comfort him instead of correcting.”
Did I?
Yes.
Sometimes.
I had feared forcing a replacement mother.
Maybe I overcorrected.
Then:
“Did that justify sleeping outside?”
“No.”
Good.
“Did you believe it was abuse then?”
“No.”
“Now?”
“Some of it.”
Not enough perhaps.
Then Vermont.
She argued:
I had discussed longer stays.
True.
She believed Ruth and Alan were safe.
True.
She wanted trial semester.
Maybe.
Then why fake email?
“I knew Declan would reject anything I proposed because it came from me.”
“So you impersonated him?”
“I communicated logistical information.”
That answer was terrible.
Her lawyer redirected.
“Did you believe he would ultimately agree?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“He avoids conflict after decisions become practical.”
That matched her text.
Then:
“Were you trying to permanently deprive him of his child?”
“No.”
This would matter to attempted custodial-interference charge.
Then:
“Why one-way ticket?”
“Return date depended on school.”
“Why move Cecily into bedroom before departure?”
“Mom needed room.”
“Why tell Emmett Daddy wanted Vermont?”
“Because I believed Declan did, somewhere underneath his guilt.”
There.
She substituted her interpretation for my consent.
That was the whole marriage problem.
Then one statement I believed:
“I did not hate Emmett.”
I believed.
Hatred would have been simpler.
She resented him.
Feared him.
Competed with a dead woman through him.
Loved me.
Wanted a marriage where my son took up less emotional space.
May you like
She built a cruel solution to a real emotional problem she should have spoken aloud.
People do not need monstrous motives to do monstrous things.
