GH: Franco’s Fate Decided
■ The judge issues her ruling on whether Franco must remain subject to Elizabeth’s power of attorney — but the fallout from Kim’s explosive testimony may prove to be just as consequential to his desired future with Kim.
After Scott drags a confession out of Kim about her attempt to get pregnant with Drew’s child by drugging and sexually assaulting him, Franco has new — and unpleasant — insight into the woman he loves. “Up until this point, he has understood how complex a situation this is for so many people, specifically Elizabeth, her family, Scott, etc.,” begins Co-head Writer Chris Van Etten. “He understands their point of view. It is much simpler for him because he has no experience of Franco, he only has his own experience as Drew, and up until this point, he has been able to couch Kim’s processing of this situation the same way. The last time he saw her, it was a bittersweet goodbye, and a, ‘Maybe one day we will see each other again and build on these feelings that we share.’
That is all he wants to get back to. And then he finds out that in his long absence, her experience of giving birth to and raising Oscar only to lose him has had a profound effect on her life.” Finding out the dangerous and illegal lengths she went to in the wake of that loss “throws everything that he had hoped to get out of seeing Kim again into question. He cannot simply take everything that she has said for granted; now he knows that she has been coming at him from a diminished position. He is calling her choices into question.”
Kim senses a shift in “Drew’s” attitude toward her. “Kim would be totally blind to be trying to go forward with Franco as though nothing has changed,” Van Etten says. “That doesn’t mean that she won’t try! Kim is in love with this man and is clinging to him and will do everything in her power to keep him close, regardless of what new information he has gleaned.”
She’s not the only determined woman in the mix, though, as Elizabeth remains dead set on reclaiming her husband. “Elizabeth is a hero and she loves Franco,” the scribe declares. “Their relationship has developed over the course of a couple of years, and she is not going to give up on him. She has come this far and no matter what the judge decides, she simply won’t give up on the man who she loves and who sacrificed himself to save her son.”