Asked if he remembers someone or what he's been doing or any number of other questions, John replies with an old favorite phrase: "It doesn't matter." But the meaning has changed.

He's not a happy man. He's not an unhappy man. He simply is.

· · · · ·

Lael will never forget her relief when Scott, Jane and Charlie told her they didn't carry the genetic mutation for Huntington's. Or her grief — and rage — that her baby, Danny, did. She wasn't surprised that Amy and Julie had the mutation.

"For the couple of years between John's diagnosis and Danny's testing, I'd been known to say I can handle John, Julie and even Amy, but if it turns out that Danny has it, I think my heart will break in two."

Now, Danny occupies the strangest place in this family's tale. He is well but knows he will be sick. The question is when and to what degree. Nobody can foretell that.

At 21, he's a handsome young man with a powerful build and the clean-cut look of a returned missionary, which he is. He got back from Chile in May.

His two years in the mission field gave him time to think about his future and to make some decisions. He got a chance to decide what was important and what wasn't. And it gave him time to read, over and over, a talk given by the late LDS Church President Spencer W. Kimball, entitled "Tragedy and Destiny."

Danny says President Kimball was talking about death and disease. And he said God made people sick for a reason. If he healed everyone, the prophet reasoned, he could mess up God's plan.

"Faith plays a huge part for me. My two years on the mission helped me a lot. My basic belief is this world is short. We'll all be resurrected. We'll all be perfect. And we'll all be together.

"This is just the way it is now."

It is, perhaps, not surprising that Danny takes a comforting long view of life. Because he was growing up when his father was falling apart and his mother had to work extra hours to meet expenses, he "largely raised himself, and did a great job," his mother says.

Lael did what she could to maintain some stability in a very unstable time. As they down-sized their houses, they always left Danny in the same school, so it was like they hadn't moved. He was able to participate in sports and get good grades and enjoy his school experience because he wasn't always uprooted.

And he was always a rock when it came to supporting his family, Scott says.

"It never occurred to me that Danny could get it. I was sure he wouldn't. When he called me, I cried and cried and cried. He was comforting me, telling me it would be OK."