I gathered. [Pause, then, sympathetically.] It's hard. [He shrugs a little.] She... she'd changed by then, anyway. We neither of us were quite who we'd been, or been intended to be. This is closer, now. Rania and I. I do miss my daughter who isn't with my author--and my son, although he always hated me. He's probably happier this way.

Authors are... ridiculous, sometimes. [Half-smile.]