Lange and Ruess - Mice and Men...

Ruess,
My grandmother's appearance at our most recent reunion was intentional.  I mentioned she doted on the newest born?  That would be Eve, my granddaughter.  My fifteen year old daughter, Karen, gave birth to her back in March; it was an incredibly difficult delivery and Karen almost died.

The last year and a half of my life has been a thief.  I know the quote about the plans of mice and men, but I doubt mice have dreams for their daughters like I had for Karen.  They weren't dictator-dreams like 'you are going to be a surgeon!', but they weren't 'why not be a fifteen year old mother?' dreams either. They were dreams we shared with Karen; she's our only child. God only knows how much I love her.

The father is Aalim, a boy in Karen's class at school.  His family is Muslim.  When news broke of the pregnancy, they immediately shipped him off somewhere, we still don't know where.  Then the family moved, no goodbyes, no nothing, just gone.  Karen cried for weeks.  My wife, Rebecca, still cries.  I liked Aalim.  Eve has his dark skin, dark eyes, and dark hair, but not his presence.      

Those are the bones, Ruess, there doesn't feel to be much flesh left.  My grandmother's parting words roused something in me that felt like life, but then it was gone.

Of course, in all this there's the crucial, intelligent word: Why?