HARTFORD, Conn. — On Dec. 14, 2012, 26 families huddled inside a firehouse in Newtown, holding onto their last fragments of hope that quickly drained from the cold, crowded space.
All around them, frantic parents, spouses and siblings searched for the gaze they wanted so desperately to lock onto in the crowd, the face of the person they loved who was inside Sandy Hook Elementary School that morning when a lone gunman shot his way in.
For what felt like an eternity, they watched the reunions happen over and over, a swirl of relief and grief and fear, and they watched the crowd in the firehouse dwindle.
