Chapter 13 - Celeste takes a plea on the kick
The battery case resolved first.
Celeste pleaded no contest? Better guilty to misdemeanor battery with factual basis? Let's do guilty.
She admitted:
She intentionally made forceful contact with my brace using her foot during the argument.
She did not admit intending spinal injury.
Good.
Sentence:
Twenty days jail.
Eighteen suspended.
Two days actual.
One year probation.
No contact.
Anger-management course.
Restitution for my uncovered emergency medical costs.
Could 60-year-old first offender get 2 days? plausible.
The judge said:
“The absence of new spinal damage is fortunate, not exculpatory.”
Good.
Then Celeste spoke.
“I was angry because I believed my daughter was taking property from me.”
The judge corrected:
“The property dispute did not authorize physical force.”
“Yes.”
She served two days.
No humiliating orange-jumpsuit scene.
Then Citrine House.
Melissa used conviction to trigger a conduct review under operating agreement.
Could misdemeanor battery trigger expulsion?
No.
Not business-related enough.
She remained member.
But bank required Celeste step back from sole treasury control while financial charge pending.
Melissa became temporary finance manager.
Celeste remained creative director/client lead.
Salary reduced? Member draws maybe. Let's say management compensation adjusted from $180,000 to $125,000 while responsibilities reduced.
She called it theft.
Operating agreement allowed role-based pay set by both members? Dispute. They mediated.
Settlement:
$140,000 annual management compensation.
No unilateral banking over $10k.
Review in six months.
Again.
Specific.
Then my own workers’ compensation case.
Medical improvement.
Brace discontinued at fourteen weeks.
No surgery.
Physical therapy twice weekly.
I could drive again.
The first time I drove alone after injury, I cried in a grocery-store parking lot.
Not because of Celeste.
Because dependence had made independence feel new.
Then estate distribution.
Silver Mesa asked whether I wanted ring shipped once final receipt signed.
Not yet.
Specific gifts could now distribute because title dispute resolved.
I signed receipt.
Two days later Victor brought a sealed evidence box to his office.
Not dramatic.
Chain of custody.
Inside:
Grandma’s ring.
I held it.
It looked smaller than everything built around it.
Victor said:
“Do you want to insure it?”
“Yes.”
“Wear it?”
“No.”
“Sell it?”
“No.”
“Good.”
“Why good?”
“Because you answered without asking what your mother would think.”
I rolled my eyes.
Then tennis bracelet.
I sold it.
Why?
I never liked it.
Grandma knew that? Maybe not.
Sale after appraisal:
$37,500.
I invested proceeds.
No need turn every inheritance into relic.
The ring I kept.
Then Celeste’s financial case plea negotiations stalled.
Prosecutor wanted felony.
Defense wanted gross misdemeanor/misdemeanor and restitution.
Since actual financial loss repaid and no loan funded, there was room.
May you like
Trial set in three months.
Main conflict active.
