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Lara tugged on Ian's sleeve and whispered, "She's not dead"

"She is to us," Andrew said

Lara tugged harder "No"

Ian turned to the child, surprised at the ferocity of her tone "Lara?"

Lara sed "ThisnowWe would make Miss Selena so sad, she would cry"

"Lara's right," Johann said softly "Selena believed so much in all of us It would kill her to knoe've fallen apart"

For a fewEach of theht

And suddenly Ian discovered soift that Selena had left behind She was there, deep down inside, in the pit of his loneliness and his grief and his sorrow, she was there, sharing it with hi up at him

"We have to go on," Ian said quietly, and in hishis, he felt the heat of her s sun "Astiet her Day by day, one selfish word at a tio back to our own solitary lives, and one day we'll wake up and no one will re in us to mark her time here But if we listen to the part of her she's left in our hearts, she'll never be gone"

Maeve got to her feet and held out her hands One by one, wordlessly, they joined in a circle Ian was the last to stand, the last to reach out He felt a split second's

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hesitation to touch the this loss alone, of facing every moment in his life alone from here on out

He looked around, at the sad faces of his househt; they needed to touch each other now, to connect and share and ado when his father died, and he knew fronored could eat abehind

Slowly, squeezing his eyes shut, he reached out his hands Maeve took one; Lara took the other

Iered back For a second, he was caught up in the swirling pain of their emotions A headache started at the base of his skull, radiated to his eyes