Donna unlocked the door and took the vase of roses inside. She set them down on the stand beside the couch, where the bright red blooms could shine their brightest.

                               She headed up the stairs and down the hall to Lynette and Todd's room, still closed off. The family binder had become her and Robert's responsibility to maintain, so now regular trips into the room of her departed in-laws were to be expected. She hesitated for a moment before opening the door and going inside.

                              When Donna and Robert were dating, this bedroom had always been off-limits when they were here alone, and now, here she was, letting herself in to store important documents in their binder.

                               She caught sight of their clothes in the closet, and of Lynette's vanity in the corner, and she wondered what they would think now. She wondered if they would think she and Robert were doing the right thing, or whether they would object to their son's fake marriage.

                               Donna tiptoed carefully to the closet, and pulled the cord to turn the light on. She grabbed the family binder from the shelf and opened it up to one of the clear plastic pages that was empty and slipped her new marriage certificate into it. The names on it now read Donna-Beaumont Hess, Bride, and Robert Beaumont-Hess, Groom. She put the binder back on the shelf and turned the light off.

                              When she returned downstairs, she saw that Robert had come inside, and was examining the roses carefully.

                             "Robert, is something the matter?" She asked, looking back to the half-open front door.

                             "It's these roses." He said almost cryptically.

                             "Thank you for those, by the way." She said with a smile, coming over and wrapping her hands around his neck.

                              "No, these-I didn't send these." He said, looking down into her sky blue eyes.

                              "Oh," She said, letting go of him. "Then, you know what? We'll just get rid of them." She said, taking the entire vase and going into the kitchen with it. She stepped on the garbage can step and threw the entire thing in.

                              Neither of them had to ask who it was that did send them. It was Beau. He still wanted Donna, and he was making it clear.

                              "Don't throw those away, Donna." said Robert, when she returned.

                              "Why not? If you didn't send them then I don't care who did. I don't want them." She explained, once again putting her arms around his neck.

                              "Because he loves you, and he's doing a better job of it. Okay? Every day I feel guilty that you're here, that at your first wedding I made you cry. I feel guilty that you're only eighteen and I made you a wife, and an adoptive mother."

                              Tears began to make themselves apparent in Donna's eyes. "Robert, I wanted to do this with you. Mark and Delilah have suffered worse than we did. They're so young, and their parents were ripped away from them, and I know how that feels. I know what it's like to want to ask your Mom for her help, and to then realize you don't have a Mother. Or what it's like to wish for a Dad who'll carry you on his shoulders, and then realize that there isn't one. I decided that it doesn't matter how I feel, I will not let them have to grow up the way I did."

                              "But think about your life. And everything I can't give you. I mean, my God, you're married to me, and you couldn't even say 'I love you'. You deserve to be with someone who you can look at every day and say you love him."

                              "And don't you think you deserve that too, Robert? That girl right next door cares more about you than you realize. But you did the right thing for Mark and Delilah. You went right over there, and broke up with her, and that-that is why right now, I can look at those roses in the trash, and leave them there. Because we are doing what's right."

                            Robert brushed her tears away from her cheek. "You-you can still go out with him if you want."

                            Donna grabbed Robert's hand and took it down. "No." She whispered. "I'm gonna stay right here, with you."