The enclosed haven of the stairway bounced around the sound of laughter; laughter at the shared realisation that they had averted Hemingway's crisis of the unused baby shoes. They each held one and climbed while their faces shook free of the wrinkles from the smiles. They would never admit it to each other -- not even from the ***** of the darkest depths that they would sometimes sink to in unison -- but the true horror was not the anticipation of a non-existent child. No, it was that the flower grew so fast that they could not grasp it, and all they held was a banister in one hand and the past in the other, and they did not know who they would be nurturing tomorrow.