The Belted Gator

Previously on Her Story: Nicole comes home from Hazelden with footing. A sponsor, a rhythm, a year of sobriety that holds. Then a job — bookkeeping for a tutoring company, a Facebook page that actually works, a phone that actually rings. She is good at it. Genuinely, visibly good. The job lasts a year and a half and ends the way these things end — someone's fiancée takes over the books, no hard feelings, that's that. She is still standing. The math is still close. But something has shifted.

Previously on Her Story: Nicole comes out of Hazelden on a Tuesday in April 2013. Justin had driven up with the kids to get her. It was Easter weekend. On Sunday morning at 4am, he went down to the hotel lobby and asked the clerk if he could set up an Easter egg hunt for his children. She said of course. He hid every egg. The kids came downstairs and it was Easter. Then Tuesday came and Nicole walked out. They drove home.

Previously on Her Story: 2012. Justin lands a real step forward — Manager of Electronic Trading Support at ABN AMRO, an hour each way by Metra into Chicago. At home, something else is happening. Nicole's alcoholism surfaces slowly and then all at once. Hospital stays at Palos Hills. Silver Cross. Her mother stepping in for pickups and practices more than she should have to. By the end of the year, they make the call: Hazelden Betty Ford, Minnesota, 28 days. Justin takes fourteen-year-old Kaitlyn to the family sessions. He hates it. She holds herself together. The work is hard and it doesn't end cleanly.

Previously on Her Story: The seven-year plan met 2008 and lost. Upside down in the mortgage, nowhere to go, they refinanced and stayed. When Kaitlyn aged into high school, Justin — not religious, not Catholic, not someone who thought he'd ever write a check like this — enrolled her at Providence Catholic at eleven hundred dollars a month. Plus cheerleading. He counted every little bit.

Previously on Her Story: The Joliet house — brand new construction, closed on their anniversary, a 7/1 ARM loan, and a 30-foot mountain of dirt in the backyard right where the fence needed to go. They moved the mountain. Papa John moved in and filled the house with coffee sounds and Korean War stories. Then a pregnancy, a room problem, and the hardest conversation: asking someone you love to go. The baby was a boy. Two dogs. Two cats. Three kids. The house was full.

Previously on Her Story: Two kids, a cat named Sox, and a townhouse they'd bought on thin credit and sheer determination. The floors came up over one weekend. A toilet was replaced in the dark after the bolts went down the drain. A shed got built for Nicole's mom — wrong in one dimension, perfect in every other. And while Justin was on the roof covered in shingle grit, Nicole pulled up in a brand new Honda Odyssey. They were moving. May 20th, 2004 — their wedding anniversary, two years later to the day — they closed on a brand new construction home in Joliet.

Previously on Her Story: The townhouse in Tinley Park became theirs — barely, on will and thin credit history, but officially theirs. September 11th happened. Nicole quit her job, ran the math, and chose to be home. Justin proposed in sweatpants on a couch with no ring while a frozen pizza cooked in the oven. She said yes. They got married at the courthouse with Joe and Kim as witnesses. He still gets grief about the proposal. He accepts it.

Previously on Her Story: Two cars stolen in two years. A $500 stereo ripped out of a dash by someone who probably got tipped off at the tint shop. Months of fighting a $42-a-month insurance company that found the words "key left in vehicle" in the police report and decided that was enough to deny the claim. Eventually they paid. He switched to State Farm the same week. He'll tell you about it if you give him thirty seconds.

Previously on Her Story: They'd built a real life in Glenwood — best friends in the apartment upstairs, a four-wheeler stuffed into the shared shed, a daycare that felt more like family, and two careers finally pulling in the same direction. Then someone stole their van from the Harvey train station, took the coloring books, left the gift cards, and crashed it. The van was totaled. Karen came to pick them up.

Previously on Her Story: Justin drove a minivan 1,000 miles back from Jacksonville to be a father. They tried living in her mom's house — that lasted about as long as you'd expect. They moved into a one-bedroom apartment in Steger with a spectacularly stupid cat, discovered on their first night that freedom doesn't come with plates or silverware, and got the midnight shift at the Sears Tower to make the numbers work. When a two-bedroom in Glenwood came up, they broke their lease and moved. Forty dollars for the mirror they left behind. Lesson learned.

Previously on Her Story: Nicole grew up in Glenwood, Illinois — piano before sunrise, figure skating after, cheerleading when the skating was over. Justin had a red Jeep, a rebuilt engine, and oversized tires that rubbed the fenders when he turned. They fell for each other in sixth grade, lost touch, found each other again senior year, went to prom, spent a chaotic weekend in Indiana, and then June arrived. He left for the University of Florida. The phone rang. She was pregnant.

This is the first episode of an ongoing story about two people who had no idea what they were doing and figured it out anyway. It starts, the way most good stories do, with a girl.