Sarah can find us a table in her restaurant when we're old and crippled."

"Do you think they'LL make it work?" Rachel asked later, putting away a stack of plates. She nodded her thanks as Josh pulled utensils out of the dishwasher and sorted them into the cutlery tray with a clatter.

"I think our parents said the same thing about us when we were their age," Josh replied.

Rachel smiled sadly. She and Josh had fallen in love from the time they first met at a party after a basketball game. When she had discovered she was pregnant with Alex, the thought of terminating the pregnancy had barely registered with either of them. Despite her parents’ furious protests, they had been married in the summer following Rachel's freshman year. Alex had been born in November.

Her absolute insistence on having her child and marrying her boyfriend had put her relationship with her parents under enormous strain for years. She had been the first member of her family to go to college, the great hope for the next generation. They had thought she was throwing her life away in exchange for a marriage which was doomed to fail. Her father especially had seen Josh as nothing more than a dilettante, the pampered son of hippie throwbacks who had no idea what

“real work" was like. For the first time she wondered if her furious reactions to some of Joshua's more incendiary projects were born out of guilt due to her parents’ early deaths. Was she trying to somehow prove them right by hamstringing her own marriage?

“I think they'll do fine," she said at last.

“Sarah, at least. She is such a good cook, Josh. And she picks things up so quickly. You only have to show her anything once.

“Alex, I'ma little more worried about. I wouldn't know a good actor from a hole in the ground. But he's miserable where he is. Might as well see if we can help him get into NU and let him stretch his wings a little."

"I agree." He put away the last of the clean dishes and turned to her.

She felt her body heat as he looked at her, his eyes full of promise.

“It's only eight o'clock," he said.

“Too true," she sighed. "Do you think the kids would be scandalized if we went to bed this early?"

"Maybe," he said. "How about we go out to the workshop? I haven't shown you what I've been working on."

“So what's the big mystery?" she asked as they entered the small building. Josh turned on the Lights and closed the door behind them.

She took a deep breath of the scents that no amount of airing could completely remove; wood shaving and paints, stone dust and leather, turpentine and sweat. Then, embarrassingly, she gave vent to a huge yawn.

"Sleepy?" Josh asked.

“Just haven't been sleeping well lately," she replied. "You know, the trial. And the kids. And looking forward to you coming back," she said, letting her voice deepen.

In fact, she had been sleeping horribly. Ever since her conversation with Maria on Monday, she had been almost completely unable to sleep, tossing and turning until the early hours of the morning. When she finally dozed off, her dreams had been confused and amazingly vivid, with repeated appearances by a beautiful, blond-haired woman who seemed to be urgently trying to tell her...something. Interspersed with her had been incredibly explicit dreams about her husband which had woken her to a hot, squirming horniness no amount of masturbation could entirely alleviate.

The man in question regained her attention.