Fern, Lux and others in “Family Therapized”

That's what this is really about, right? Cate not being there?

I say yes, and what? You send me away to live with someone else? I don't want to live with someone else. I want to work it out with Cate and Baze. I just...

Look, I'm the one who's going to decide if you stay together, but ultimately, it's not up to me. It's up to you. If you can't be straight with me, you're never gonna be straight with Cate and Baze, and then you'll be right back on my couch six months from now, so when you say that Cate wasn't there for you, tell her what you mean.

(long pause, turns to Cate) Where were you?

What?

I was out there my whole life. Where were you all that time? You never even checked. You never wondered what had happened, if I was okay?

I...I mean, I...I didn't really think that I had to worry, because they told me that you were gonna be adopted, that you were gonna have a better life. I really, I really thought that I was doing what was right for you.

It wasn't for me. If it was for me, you would have checked! But you did it for you. You did the right thing for you!

Lux, it's not all on Cate. I wasn't there exactly, either.

Yeah, but you didn't know, and nobody who knew you would have expected you to be there.

I was sixteen years old. You know, I didn't have anyone to turn to. You know my mother. She was drinking her way through another divorce. I even wrote a letter to my father, but when I realized that I didn't know where to send it...you know, that's when it hit me. I had no idea what a good parent was. There was just no way that I could be one. Not at sixteen.

Then...what about a few years after that, when I was three and stuck in a hospital where no one visited? Or two years after that, when my foster mother shoved me into a wall and told the social worker that I fell off a swing? Where were you? We used to make up these stories about why we were given up, because we didn't want to believe that our parents, our mothers, could hold us--their babies--and just give us up! But you did. You gave me away to nothing, like I didn't matter to you, because I didn't!

No, no, Lux. You do. You matter now.

No.

No, Lux. You matter. You do. You matter now, Lux!

No! (stands up) Now doesn't count! I...I'm sorry. I don't forgive you, Cate. I don't. (walks out)