kingsbury smalley gave them a sad smile. "It's the real reason we asked you to come tonight."

One at a time, the adult kidsmade their way toward John and Elizabeth. He led them into the family room, grateful the grandchildren were upstairs playing. Peter wheeled Hayley into the room and positioned her near the chair Brooke had taken. When they were all seated, John led Elizabeth to the front of the room, they remained standing.

"Dad, what is it?" Ashley couldn't wait. Her face looked "Tell us." John tightened his hold on Elizabeth and felt her lean against "Your mother found a lump in her breast a couple weeks . She... uh.,. she had some tests done and we found out the Friday." His voice broke. "I'm sorry." He sucked in a breath and looked at the faces around him. "The cancer's back. Your mother has to have surgery tomorrow morning."

Peter, Kari, Ryan, Ashley, Landon-the news worked its way across each face, until finally Brooke found her voice. "Are you having a mastectomy, Mom?" The words were calm, but the terror in her eyes was an expression of how they were all ohn could feel their fear like a.physical assault.

Quiet tears were streaming down Elizabeth's face. She ohn's hand, her signal that she couldn't talk, couldn't lift her eyes to look at them. Not yet.

John tried to think like a doctor, tried to remember his training and the way he'd been forced to give bad news of patients over the years. "A double mastectomy. . Steinman is hopeful that he'll get it all if they operate had expected a dozen questions, but the shock was simtoo great. They couldn't ask a single question that would the facts. Their mother had cancer. Serious cancer. And morning she would have a double mastectomy in a attempt to save her life.

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What could they say?

Their father's announcement had said it all.

One at a time they stood and found their way across the room. Some with tears, some with quiet whispers, they circled their arms around Elizabeth and John until they were one-one group of people who would stand together, stay by each other and see Elizabeth through, no matter what happened after to " morrow.

They would survive whatever came because they were Baxters, and that's what Baxters did. They stuck together-believing, praying, supporting each other whether the news was glorious enough to sing about.

Or the worst news of their entire lives.

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CHAPTER EIGHT.

Before everyone left, Elizabeth found the strength to make a three-way call to Erin and Sam, and Luke and Reagan. 3iness, Ashley and Kari shared first. The response was of course, positive, Luke especially finding reason to shout out loud when he heard that Ashley didn't have HIV.

Then John finished the call by telling them about Elizabeth's surgery. Elizabeth closed her eyes for that part, certain she could hear Erin crying in the background. Sam had to finish for her, and both he and Luke promised to call the next day for a report.

Finally, when the kids and grandkids had gone home, Elizabeth got ready for bed and climbed in beside John. "You were . He rolled onto his side, and with his fingers he brushed her hair back from her eyes. "About telling them?"

"Yes." She sighed. "John, tell me this isn't the end." She looked at him, searching for a glimmer of hope.

' "We've talked about this." He looked tired, the strength he'd 84 REUNION.

shown earlier long gone. "We beg Jesus for a miracle and we believe it'll happen. Look what God's doing with Hayley." John's voice gathered some of his earlier strength. "We have to believe, Elizabeth. Otherwise we're doomed from the beginning."

She nodded and sank deeper into the sheets. "I keep thinking about him, wondering where he is now."

John leaned up on his elbow. "Thinking about who?"

"You know who." Her eyes found his and a knowing was there, a knowing even John couldn't deny. "Come on, John. Don't tell me you don't think about him."

He breathed out in a way that revealed a lifetime of regret. "I try not to.

Until you brought him up the other day, it'd been years, Elizabeth. Four years, maybe."

Quiet settled around them. "I thought about him the night before Luke's wedding." She blinked, staring at the ceiling, seeing images from that winter night in New York City. "It was snowing outside, remember?"

"You stayed up and wrote a poem for Luke."

"I said something that triggered my thoughts. I said it was hard knowing my only son was getting married." Her voice grew pinched and she shook her head. "Only he isn't. He is my second son. Luke will always be my second son, even if you and I are the only two people in the world who know the truth."

John let his head fall back on the pillow, his eyes still on her. "We tried, remember? Back when you were sick the last time."

"Ys." Elizabeth pinched the bridge of her nose and squinted, as if somehow she could see back to that time in their lives. "The answer was what we'd expected."

"The adoption was closed, sweetheart." His voice was tired again. "It would take a miracle to find him, honey."

"He could find us."

"But why would he? It's been thirty-five years. He wouldn't know you were sick or thinking about him."

Elizabeth nodded and the conversation died. Before long, John kissed her on the cheek. This was the last time they'd kiss

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good night before her surgery. The last time they'd share a bed together while she was still whole, before she was cut apart, her breasts taken away forever.

"Kiss me again, John. Please." She moved onto her side and gazed deep into his eyes. She knew that everything in her heart was already in his.

"Elizabeth... this isn't the last time; you can't tell yourself She touched his face, the familiar shape of his cheekbones, jawline. "But it is,John." Her voice was softer than the moan of the wind outside. "In some ways it's the very last."

He didn't argue. Instead he took her face in his hands and her. Not a kiss of anticipation or sudden desire, but a kiss that told her he wasn't being quite honest inwhat he said. A kiss put a coda on a lifetime of physical love, a love that would changed forever when morning came.

When it was over, tears shone in both their eyes. John's forehead fell against hers, his cheeks wet against her own. "God, .

God, we know what we're supposed to say."

She could feel him trembling beside her, hear the emotion in his voice. Her arm came around his waist and she held him, not sure which of them needed the other more as John continued "We're supposed to ask for you to make sure everything goes well tomorrow. We're supposed to be grateful and hopeful, but honest, right now, God, we're confused and not sure Ftoxv scared to death," Elizabeth whispered.

we're scared to death." John exhaled hard. "I wanted honest, and now I'll say the rest. God, give us a miracle. I )the doctors get into that operating room and find they clon't I to operate at all, I pray the cancer is gone and Elizabeth. can free of this awful disease. If not, I pray you heal her and that the cancer hasn't spread." He hesitated. "VZe're

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begging you for a miracle, Lord. One more miracle for the Baxter family.

Please."

John kissed her once more. This time their eyes were dry, and John breathed a good night against her cheek. "Believe, Elizabeth.

Don't stop believing."

"I won't."

He was asleep in ten minutes, the way he often fell asleep before she did. Even now, when he had more pain in his heart than ever before, he could sleep. It was his trademark.

But Elizabeth could only stare at the dark ceiling and let herself drift back back to that time when she and John first met. Back when they were forced to do something they never wanted to do.

She wasn't sure if she fell asleep and dreamed it, or if it only felt that way.

However it happened, the years melted away until she was back in 1967, her freshman year at the University of Michigan. Yes, she'd been a home economics major, but when they'd told the story to their kids over the years, it always jumped from their meeting to their marriage. Only Elizabeth and John knew the truth. That a lot of living and hard lessons had taken place between those two events.

John was a med student, and the two of them met at a mixer the summer before her freshman year. The event was intended for all new or returning students.

The ironic thing was how it had all come together. John never should've been there; he was too old. But he'd been living with a family, and their oldest son was also a freshman that year. John had taken him as a favor to the guy's parents. It should've been a slow evening, a time of chaperoning and making sure the young man got home at a decent hour.

Instead, five minutes after John arrived, he spotted Elizabeth across the room.

She was talking with a group of freshmen girls. Elizabeth's family lived down the street from the university, so she wouldn't stay in a dorm like the other girls. Rather she would at

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think I should be able to talk to boys?"

boys you don't know." Her mother pinched her lips together. "What have we always taught you, Elizabeth? Boys only want one thing. Don't forget it." Her family had attended a strict denominational church back then, a faction that didn't believe in loud music, or dancing. Definitely not dancing. In fact, if her mom had known there'd be dancing at the party that night, she would never have allowed Elizabeth to attend.

the school had done a good job of advertising, careful as back in those days to make the event sound tame, a mandatory function of having a successful freshman gathering. Her mom knew the junior girl who was taking her. The girl's church with her own, and that, too, made Elizabeth's mother feel better about the event. Still, she worried. And Elizabeth with the final admonition: "Don't talk to boys."

Elizabeth had climbed into the junior girl's car, the night was going to be nothing like her mother pictured. The girl, Betsy, wore a skirt that fell just above her knees, and on her lips was a cherry red color Elizabeth had never seen before.

to dance, Elizabeth?"

and gave a final glance over her shoulder house "Sure don't."

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"Well-" Betsy turned up the music and something with a loud beat filled the car-"you will after tonight."

And so it was that Elizabeth was standing with a few other freshman girls near the punch table when John walked up, smiled at her, and said, "Hi."

"Hi." She felt her cheeks grow hot and she looked around. He must have been talking to someone else, she figured. Someone older or prettier. But he stayed, and his eyes never left hers. "I'm Elizabeth."

"I'm John. John Baxter." He shrugged. "I'm too old to be here, but I brought my little brother."

"Really?"

"Well, not exactly." John leaned against the wall and studied her. Later he would tell her that it was a classic case of love at first sight. He'd dated girls before, but no one had ever taken his breath away until he met Elizabeth.

He explained his situation. He had no parents-his father died in the war, and his mother, a few years later of a broken heart. "I live with these friends of my mother's, a family we've known for a long time." He gestured across the room at a gangly young man helping himself to a plate of food. "That's Bill. He's the oldest son of the people I live with. I told 'em I'd show Bill around and make sure he got home safely."

"I see." Elizabeth felt suddenly shy. "What year are you?"

"I graduated last year. I'm about to be a second-year med student." He smiled.

"Other than coming here tonight, I haven't been anywhere but the library, school, and home again for the past year."