Time was like sand slipping through Sam's fingers. With every blink another year seemed to pass.

He'd never had anything in his life that he could be proud of and now he had a family, a beautiful wonderful family. His art was his living, but his wife and his daughter were his life.

But suddenly, what felt like barely days after she was born, Stasia was no longer theirs anymore. Their baby had grown into an independent young woman.

As soon as the excited twenty-one year old started talking about how a few of her friends were looking at getting a huge apartment to share in Sector Center Sam locked eyes with Mercedes, knowing that if she was feeling even a fraction of what he felt, then she'd be utterly devastated. For so long they had dreaded it, and now the time had finally come.

"… and they asked if I wanted in too. And I said I'd definitely be interested but of course I wanted to run it by my folks first…" Stasia looked at them with an expression of pure hope in her eyes. Mercedes glanced over him too but he hung his head and avoided her gaze, using all of his energy to fight the agonizing pricks of tears that he felt ashamed were starting to form. The inevitable was happening and he wanted to do everything in his power to stop it.

Only there was no stopping it.

They didn't have a leg to stand on and he knew it. Mercedes had been younger than Stasia when she'd left home with him, and her leaving had meant completely leaving her family behind and travelling across the country, not simply moving into digs in the middle of town. With a heavy heart he stepped towards Mercedes and took her hand. She held onto it like a vice but then he changed his mind, disentangling his hand so that he could wrap his arm around her shoulder, unsure if the action was to support her or support himself. They'd already talked about this day coming. It's wasn't as if she didn't already spend most weekends crashing away from home with one friend or another so that she wouldn't have to come up the hill late from wherever she'd been out with them.

Finally he calmed himself enough to raise his head and find his words. "You already know that we can't stop you from going. Obviously we'd love you to stay here, and you'll always have a room in this house with us, but if this is what you really want to do then we will support you in your decision."

Stasia's eyes wordlessly confirmed it was what she really wanted to do.

Mercedes sniffed as she reached forward and pulled their daughter into her arms. "My baby's all grown up! I don't know what I'll do without you in the house!"

Stasia chuckled and raised an eyebrow. "I'm sure you and dad will definitely think of something," she said, with a wicked glint in her eye.

"What's that supposed to mean?" Mercedes tilted her head in curiosity and Sam internally cringed, knowing exactly where this was going and not wanting it to reach its destination. He tried desperately to change the subject. "Anyway, how about-"

But Mercedes was having none of it. "One second Sam. Stasia was trying to say something."

The girl was now blushing furiously and so was Sam. Somehow this had come up in conversation once before, and it was a conversation which he'd hoped would never be revisited! Unfortunately mother and daughter were equally blunt and shameless. "What I meant is that you and dad won't have to try and be quiet for my sake. The walls in this house are thin. Let's just say I got my sex education waaay before I went to school!"

Mercedes let out a gasp of mortification while Sam eventually relaxed and laughed, grabbing her hand and kissing it with a wink that was more for Stasia's benefit. "She does have a point. And I'm sure we can definitely think of plenty ways to fill our time!"

Things moved quickly. It felt like only a matter of days before the house was overrun by Stasia's friends who were 'helping' her to pack. He chose to stay and quietly get on with his painting outside, leaving Mercedes to deal with the chaos of a house overrun by young people, cardboard moving boxes and seemingly endless bags of clothes. His daughter's love of clothing rivalled her mom's and he wondered if her new housemates quite understood how much space all of her things would actually take up!

Stasia didn't even have the decency to look sad about leaving. Her eyes were bright and shone with excitement as she hugged her parents at the front door, her friends beeping the horn of their car for the third time in a failed attempt to get her to hurry a little.

"I'll be back for lunch on Sunday!"

"Don't be late, I'm making something special!"

Everything Mercedes made tasted special and even Sam looked forward to what the meal might be.

Stasia waved one final time, her arm weighed down by the giant bag Mercedes had pushed into her hand at the last moment. An edible care package of freshly baked cookies and brownies that he knew, between his daughter and her friends, wouldn't even make it the journey to her new home.

"I know what you did." Mercedes spoke without taking her eyes off the car as is disappeared into the distance, Stasia waving madly through the back window instead of facing forward with her seatbelt on as Sam would have preferred her to be.

"What did I do?"

She picked the incriminating large cookie off the front of his sweater and he knew there was no place to hide. "Three cookies Sam! Three!"

He grinned sheepishly. There was no defense but neither was there regret. All three had been delicious and devoured in one bite.

Mercedes matched the grin. "I had to take a fourth, just to even it out again. And for quality control." She chucked, "I'm sure Stasia is too excited to notice a missing row of cookies."

"I thought I'm Mr Quality Control around here!"

"Today is a special occasion so I needed a second opinion. Besides," she poked at his slowly expanding waistline, "I'm going to have to start baking less pies and cookies and dishing up more salads. What happened to those firm abs of the handsome young man I married?"

"The still handsome but now slightly more distinguished man that you're still married to still has them. He just prefers to keep them safe under a layer of delicious cookie dough."

Mercedes rolled her eyes with a smile and led him back inside by the hand. "Indeed…"

The first few days after Stasia's departure felt strange but they quickly fell into their routine. It was just back to plain old Sam and Mercedes as it had been in the years before their little girl had come along. And they were happy with that. All they really ever needed was each other. They were each other's air. Life had been good to them.

Life for them was also far more comfortable. Mercedes's business was flourishing with her own store and small fashion label. When they looked back to where it had started, with just some fabric and the second hand sewing machine that she'd bought the first time Sam had allowed her out of their bed after their honeymoon was nothing short of a miracle. She would have loved for mention of her success story to get back to her Sector to give hope to other little girls who wanted to do more with their lives than be simply wives and mothers, but her Sector believed she was missing, presumed dead, and that was the way it was going to have to remain. But Sam always believed that she could excel at anything she put her hand to. If she'd decided to go the other route to medical school to train to be a doctor she would have been top of her field, but her skills had been used in another way and she was equally happy with the successful outcome.

Sam too was successful in his field. As well as his online commissions, which he could now charge pretty much whatever he liked for, he also had some full sized paintings on display in a gallery in Sector Center 2.1, the largest city furthest away from the coast. The fact that he didn't make appearances only added to his value. He was doing what he loved without having to deal with people. Everything was handled via the SectorNet and his anonymity became a unique selling point for his work.

They were going to miss Stasia bustling in and out of their lives, but now that he was well over fifty, he could also handle the slower pace of life with just him and his boo Mercedes. The fact that a word like 'boo' had become part of his vocabulary was testament to how ingrained into his life she was. If anyone had told him, the morning of the fateful diner incident, what his life would be and who he would be with he would have laughed in that person's face.

Him and her. Stuff like that didn't happen.

It flew in the face of what each of them had been brought up to believe.

However broken the world around them was, the reality that they'd been able to create was something bold and beautiful. Without each other they would each have lived a life of sadness and loneliness yet they were thrown together, two opposites in every single way and the result was happiness beyond all comprehension.

As Sam snuggled against her soft ass as he spooned her in bed, he broke into a random chuckle.

"What's so funny?"

"Us."

"What about us?"

"I was thinking about that cringe worthy embarrassing speech I made when I proposed that night on the beach."

"Really? I thought it was really romantic. Well most of it was, but there were parts where I wasn't sure whether you were complimenting me or insulting me!"

"It worked though, didn't it? You married me the very next day."

"I Sure did!"

Sam pulled her tighter. "Well, I was just thinking about how my wish has come true. I've slept in your arms every night since then."

She thought about it. "Yeah. You're right. We have."

"And I just wanted to thank you."

"For what?"

"For loving me. And for saving my life with love."

"You love me too Sam. And you saved my life too so we're equal."

"I guess so."

"And the best part is that now we're growing old together."

He tickled her in the ribs and made her squeal. "Who are you calling old?"

She laughed and turned slightly to touch his face. "Remember those laughter lines? They're ravines now!"

"Ouch! That was harsh!" He pretended to be offended. "Just because you don't look a day older than you did the day I met you."

"Didn't I tell you all those years ago? Black don't crack! But anyway, I did find a gray hair today."

He gently stroked the scarf that covered her head. "Poor you! You can show it to me tomorrow."

Her smile grew cheeky and she stroked his face. "You can see it now if you want."

"But you've already tied up your hair for the night."

"True." Her mischievous grin was back. "But it's not on my head Sam…"

It took him a couple of moments before he cottoned on to where she was going with this and felt himself harden in eager anticipation. "Aha! Well in that case, all that leaves me to do is remind you that without Stasia there is no need to try and muffle yourself with a pillow when I make you scream..."

He moved down her body to check out this gray hair and indulge himself in his favorite familiar taste. Even after all these years, Mercedes was still as responsive to his touch as she had been after she'd stepped out of her 'wedding dress' that first night all those years ago.

Maybe having the house back to themselves wasn't going to be too bad after all…