A/N: Y'all really don't deserve this, but I want to get on with this story and get into the sequels, but don't think you can still get away with not commenting.
Here's another update.

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"This is killing me!" I complained to the computer screen.
"It's probably because that guitar isn't a calculator," Harry's pixelated image replied.
I looked down at the blue guitar in my lap. "Really? I thought it was," I said sarcastically, setting it aside. "Where'd I put the damned thing anyway?" I stood up, peering at the floor around me. I sat down, still calculator-less. "If losing things was an Olympic sport, I'd have a gold medal. Several of them. I could probably lose a tampon in my vagina."
Harry made a face. "Too far. Too far. Don't ever say that again."
I laughed.
"You and me both," Natalie said from her kitchen. "I'm surprised I haven't misplaced Melanie yet."
I laughed again. "Can you imagine? Melanie showing up here, all grown up. 'Mommy, why'd you leave me in my stroller on a sidewalk? Why, Mommy, why?" I said, cracking up.
Natalie laughed. "The worst part is that I could totally see that happening!"
At that, even Harry cracked and started laughing, finally forgetting the awkward tampon thing.
A crash came from the kitchen, and I whipped my head around to see Natalie staring at a broken glass on the floor.
"What was that?" Harry asked.
"Natalie dropped a glass and it broke," I said, standing up. I placed the computer on the counter and gingerly tiptoed around and over the broken glass.
"I dropped it," Natalie said quietly.
"It's okay, Nat," I said. "I'll clean it up." I got down on my knees and started picking up the shards of broken glass.
"I dropped it," she repeated, still quiet. A tear splatted against the tile floor, and I looked up to see more tears falling as she knelt to the ground and started dropping shards into the bowl I had retrieved from the counter.
When all the pieces had been picked up, Natalie sat on the floor with her knees drawn up to her chin like I so often did when I cried. I was about to give her an awkward hug when Melanie cried from her nursery. I looked over at Natalie, who had that faraway look on her face. She hadn't reacted to Melanie's cries, so I assumed she was thinking about a certain father who never got to meet his daughter.
I need to stop thinking about this before I start bawling, too.
I stood up and put the bowl on the counter, blinking away my own tears. When I looked up, Harry was still on the computer screen, staring pensively at me through his webcam.
"What?" I said.
"Don't cry. I have no idea what to do when someone cries."
I stared at him for a moment. "You've handled it pretty well with me."
"Well, yeah, but I was physically there. Right now I'm just a moving picture on your computer screen," he said. "And there's already two crying girls. There's doesn't need to be a third."
I nodded, then looked down the hallway toward Melanie's room. She still hadn't stopped crying.
"You stay here with Mommy dearest here and I'll get the kid," I said, placing the laptop on the floor next to Natalie. "Work your magic, Harold. Don't disappoint me."
"It's not like I have a choice or anything," he grumbled.
"That's right. You don't!" I said, skipping away toward Melanie's room. I glanced back at the kitchen when I was at the door, knowing that I wouldn't see Natalie because she was still behind the island, but I felt the need to anyway. Then I opened the door and flicked on the light. "Well, hello there, baby girl!" I said cheerily, picking her up out of her crib and placing her on the changing table.
She gurgled and kicked her legs.
"I'm gonna change your diaper now!" I said in the same bright tone, peeling away the soiled diaper and going through the process of putting a clean one on her. I shook a generous amount of baby powder into the diaper before finishing the process.
Melanie made a few sounds, her eyes getting really wide and her tiny pink mouth formed an O shape.
"Oh, really?" I said in a baby voice. "And then what?"
I gently rubbed some baby lotion onto her soft skin as she babbled.
"No way! She said that about me? I think I'm going to have a stern talking-to with your mother," I said, grinning at the small child. As she kept babbling, I grabbed a onesie and pants for her at random and began dressing her. The entire time, I was looking at her face, watching as her mouth moved and seeing her facial expressions.
When I went to put her pants on, I stopped. Her onesie had "I love Daddy" written on it. A tear slid down my cheek and landed on Melanie. She stopped babbling and looked about ready to cry.
I quickly rubbed my eyes to wipe the unshed tears away and grabbed a different onesie and re-dresses the little girl, thinking about the father she would never know, the man who would never see his daughter grow. He would never see her crawl or cry, he would never get to change an up-the-backer or dress her like she lost a fight with a pack of Skittles. He wouldn't be there when she took her first steps or babbled her first word, never be there for her first day of school or her last. He'll never be able to try and pull out her first loose tooth with dental floss or cry when she graduates high school and college. He'll never get to see her on her wedding day, all dressed in white and walk her down the aisle or hold his first grandchild and witness the miracle of life all over again.
Little Melanie will never meet her father, the wonderful man who died so young doing what he would always do – come home.

Notes

I'm going to be downright nasty to you guys now because I got two comments. TWO.
I guess I'll see who really reads this when I stop writing and start the sequel.
If I even post it on this website.

So Snoball is next week. It's my school's version of a winter formal. I have a dress, so I won't be going in jeans and a T-shirt like I had originally planned because I didn't have a dress. But now I do!
I think winter formal is a homecoming for basketball. Am I the only person that's figured this out?

Oh, and just in case you were wondering (which you probably weren't, because nobody reads this anyway), Melody spent the night at Natalie's and it's morning in this chapter.