”She sniffled again and looked up at me plaintively. “It…it was?”“Yes, baby,” I said, looking deep into her eyes. Eyes that mesmerized me.... They were filled with need, a young girl’s desperate desire to be loved. “That was the most special thing that has ever happened to me, sweetheart. I just…”“Just what, daddy?”I sighed. “I just got afraid.”“Afraid that someone would find out about…what happened?”“Yes,” I said.She looked away for a moment. “It would be pretty bad if anyone found out we…were. He put the car away and sat on the patio, just staring at the clouds moving by toward the beach. He was between the proverbial rock and a hard place so he pulled his hat down over his eyes and tried to take a nap. ‘Maybe, it’ll take care of itself and blow over,’ was his last thought before he fell asleep. An hour later, she brought him a cheese and baloney sandwich and quickly retreated back up the stairs into the apartment. That afternoon, a penitent Cindy approached him with a single tear. .. wondering where that went.”“Under the couch,” I managed.She picked up the sheet and sat next to me, setting the song aside on the far cushion along with the equations.“I got worried when you weren’t coming back,” she murmured.“I don’t know how many more sad songs I can take.”She eyed the paper. “Oh, forget that ... It was just an idea I had today in school.”“No, it’s not just an idea. It’s my fucking life, Lara!”“And it’s my sanity, Matt!” she suddenly retorted.We both froze, shaken at the. I should see her smiling at our baby. I should be listening to her talk about her day. We should be living in a house of our own, with kids and joy and a future.Instead, I was sitting on the floor of a garage apartment, drinking alone and crying for a life that wouldn’t ever be. I lost myself in sorrow, weeping turning to sobbing, sobbing turning to whimpering as I daydreamed about her on our wedding day, about holding her hand as a doctor told her to push, about listening to her sing in the.