Olivia discovers she's pregnant, moves back home, in with mom and dad. She has Hunter, stays with him his first couple years, goes back to school for her Masters in Theatre, uses that to begin a theatre program at the high school from which she graduated. She buys a home near her retired parents, who pick up Hunter each day after kindergarten and through elementary school.
Early into Hunter's eighth grade year, Olivia, a smoker, is diagnosed with lung cancer and dies less than a year later. Hunter moves in with his grandparents, finishes high school, goes to the University of Arizona on a baseball scholarship and majors in journalism. His grandparents sell in Orange County, move to Tucson.
A week after Hunter graduates they are killed in a crosswalk by a drunk driver. Hunter tends to affairs, moves to Chicago to begin the Northwestern University graduate journalism program, gets his Masters, moves to Maine for a job with the Bangor Daily News, works there a few years, leaves to travel Europe for a year, returns for a sports editor position at a magazine, meets Barbara, a photojournalist.