ANOTHER WORLD TODAY EPISODE #113-2

"Ever since Amanda told me about her marriage," Rachel began her toast, successfully hiding her ongoing displeasure regarding the haphazard manner in which she'd been filled in. "I've been thinking about what I could say to congratulate them, and to welcome Kevin into our family."

There was a smatter of laughter about that. Everyone for their own reasons.

"I started thinking about Amanda and what an amazing gift she was to her father and I. How long and how eagerly we'd waited for her, how thrilled we were when we finally had the daughter we'd both dreamed of."

The hint of a smirk Amanda had assumed in preemptive defense as soon as her mother began speaking slipped away, and she blinked, first in surprise, then to keep back the tears. Any mention or reminder of Mac always made her cry. She didn't even use an Apple computer, and had banned them from Brava, because it was too evocative.

Kevin took her hand and squeezed it comfortingly. She rested her head on his shoulder.

"And then," Rachel said. "I thought about Kevin. And everything his grandmother was forced to endure before he reappeared in her life." She smiled at Alice. "I suspect Alice would say he was worth it."

Alice looked at Kevin, who didn't appear so sure, and, without hesitation, nodded firmly.

"Amanda and Kevin are proof that good things come to those who wait. Not just for their families, but for each other. No one here this afternoon," Rachel swept her gaze from Cass and Frankie to Felicia and Lucas to Jamie and Lorna to Alice and Spencer before finally settling, with a warm, grateful look, on her own husband. "Has had an easy course to chart throughout their lives. But, I think they'll agree, we are all precisely where we should be now."

***

Rachel offers her tentative blessing to Amanda and Kevin's marriage, then makes a surprising request of her own husband. Felicia turns to Cass for aid only he can offer, Jamie introduces his daughter to Alice while attempting to discern what's bothering his son, Dean makes a confession to Lorna, Sarah delivers Grant's message to Marley, and Jeanne lays out her position to a flabbergasted Matt.

All at: http://www.anotherworldtoday.com/2011/2011_113p2.html