Steph dropped her hand from his waist to lace her fingers with his. "It wounds amazing, having someone that close. I'm an only child, so I know that I don't...really get it. I wish I could. I wish I could meet her."

She didn't know what separation meant but she recognized the hurt in his eyes. She'd felt it herself - a dozen times a day, a hundred days - when she'd realized that she couldn't keep her child. It was the feeling of losing a piece of yourself, of having that piece somewhere in the world that you could never see or touch.

Time healed, but she remembered the hurt.

"Does it help to talk about her?"