Susan Westfall and Alan Fein met at Burdine's. It was a summer job for both. They were supposed to be taking inventory of merchandise, but they apparently took inventory of each other as well, because they're still together, and it's going on 25 years now.

They met in 1973. Alan was going to the University of Pennsylvania; Susan was on at Florida State. The relationship survived four years of college. Alan decided to continue his studies at Georgetown Law School. Susan studied acting in college and learned enough to realize that she wasn't particularly good at it. So she took up playwrighting, which turned out to be a very wise move.

Their relationship ebbed and flowed through some long distance formative years and eventually came to a turning point.

"During a lengthy, tumultuous courtship, I decided to move to Washington to be near him," Susan reminisces, then adds, "and also because I wasn't brave enough to move directly to New York."

For an aspiring playwright, Washington D.C. was no New York. But she copped a job as assistant to the producer at the Folger Theater Group, where she was dutifully impressed with rare copies of the Bard's rare Folios.

Meanwhile, Alan became an aide to an aide at the Carter White House.

"It was a great time in Washington," Susan says, "exciting to be able to do things like sit in the president's box at the theater."

But soon they came to another fork in the road, and this time they took the path back to South Florida, where they were both raised.

"It was hard to leave D.C. because the move was not thrilling in a professional sense," Alan admits. "But Miami was a good place to start a law career because, historically, there's not a great talent pool."

Susan went along. Although Miami was further away from New York than even Washington, they were engaged and soon to be united in holy matrimony, if not name.

"I have a supportive husband who said that I had a cool name and there was no reason why I shouldn't keep it," Susan Westfall explains. "Besides, when people ask you how you feel and you say, 'I'm fine,' and you're a Fein, they always laugh. Alan's used to it, but I'm not."

So they moved to Key Biscayne in 1979. It was one of their few major debates, as Susan would have opted for Coconut Grove. But the important thing was that they were here, close to their roots and families. And the professional landscape was as promising as red skies at night.

Alan started working for the powerhouse firm of Sterns, Weaver and Miller. Susan finagled a job at the Coconut Grove Playhouse and wound up public relations and marketing director.

In 1984, Alan got wind that the Miami Sports and Exhibition Authority was looking someone to chair the NBA committee to bring a professional basketball team to South Florida. Alan volunteered for the post, even though the early prospects weren't as promising as a sixth round draft choice.

"We began to woo the NBA, but they told us to come back when we found a multi-millionaire to back us," Alan says. "Then we found Mickey Aronson."

When the Heat was born, Alan became the team's attorney. So far he's outlasted two managing partners, three coaches and a slew of players. It's a good job for a guy like Alan who enjoys basketball and gets off on doing things for the community.

"To be involved with anything like that from the ground up, and have that idea end up with 15,000 screaming fans, is very gratifying," Alan says. "And now that they're winning..." his words trail off as his mind hops, skips and jumps ahead. "(Coach Pat) Riley's the key because he works harder than the players. He's also got a sack with 15 championship rings, which is a pretty good motivational tool."

Meanwhile, back in the wonderful world of the theater, Susan started getting commissioned to author plays. One was called "Voices at Mary Elizabeth Hotel," which was set in a legendary but real hotel in Overtown. It was at the Mary Elizabeth that black entertainers would stay after singing and dancing for the white folks on Miami Beach.

"The story is about a guy who grew up there and goes back to the Zebra Lounge where he summons up ghosts from the past," Susan explains. "At the opening, a lot of little old black ladies who knew the hotel in its heyday came, and when the playwright was introduced, one looked up at me in surprise and said, 'You're white?!' It was a nice compliment."

Another commissioned work was a bi-lingual play about the Cuban missile crisis. It was called "1962," and helped give some historical significance to a childhood memory.

"That play had personal resonance for me because when I was a kid, that week was the week of my birthday party," she says. "I always remembered being upset because something more important than my birthday was happening."

She wrote five plays for the New Theater including a musical review called "You Are Here." She also penned a 15-minute mini-musical which was performed for Queen Elizabeth on her visit to Miami.

Despite their professional successes, something seemed to be missing from Alan and Susan's relationship. After nearly 19 years together, something was missing from their lives.

And then along came Jake.

Their son was born in 1992, joining a family that already included two humans, a pair of dachshunds named Greta and Garbo and four cats. The adjustment was difficult, especially since Alan got hired to represent a banker named Alan Levan in a high-profile libel suit against ABC concerning a "20/20" segment.

"No one prepares you for bringing home a baby for the first time," Susan says. "and during that early, colicky, infancy time, we often were impatient and felt overwhelmed. Then the hurricane came and it did an awful lot to take us out of ourselves by creating a bigger problem, like putting our home back together.

"I survived that experience with a new respect for hurricanes. But I also learned how to look for the positive in things. They say that a hurricane clears out all of the undergrowth, which then allows new things to grow. In a way, Andrew had the same effect on our relationship."

Shortly after Hurricane Andrew, Susan started writing a column for The Islander News. It was called "Out of the Mainstream" and turned out to be sparkling snippets of life on the Key. One column was about trying to replace a beloved Seagrape tree that fell to Andrew. She wound up using it as a monologue for a play that needed a gratuitous, sentimental piece. Another was about the relationship between Jake, the cats and Greta and Garbo, where the animals seem, at times, more human than the baby. All of her columns seem to blend wit and humor with poignancy, a winning combination that cuts through cultural and generational lines.

"As a playwright, works take a long time," she says. "The column fit between naps with Jake and was like instant gratification."

Cut to the present, where Susan Westfall and Alan Fein are sitting in the living room of their spacious, airy, bright Allendale home, talking to a reporter over coffee on a Monday morning. They seem very comfortable together and answer questions without ever interrupting each other, which is unusual when two people are being interviewed at the same time, and nearly unheard of when those two people are married.

They talk mainly about Alan's career, because he was the original focus of the story. The ABC libel case finally went to trial in 1996, and seven weeks later, a jury awarded a $10 million judgment. Alan is happy but guarded about the major league victory.

"Eventually, they'll probably appeal it to the Circuit Court in Atlanta and then the Supreme Court," he states. "I suppose they'd appeal it to the Intergalactic Court if they could."

This isn't the only noteworthy case Alan has won. Along with Gene Stearns, he won a $2.8 million suit against the makers of the Dalcon Shield, an IUD that caused a Mercy hospital nurse to have a total hysterectomy.

Asked what qualities have made him a successful trial lawyer and Alan glances at his wife before answering.

"To be a good lawyer, you have to be like a dramatist," he explains. "You take a complex set of facts and present it in a manner that is entertaining and easy to understand and hits themes that everyone can relate to."

A lot of Dade voters were glad he possessed these qualities when he was instrumental in knocking a rather caustic Miriam Alonso off the county commission ballot a few days before the election because she didn't live in the district she was running to represent.

"I thought I'd be a lot more involved with politics in Miami when I first moved here," he says. "But the political arena is just too dirty here."

Instead, he focused his attention on the community where he'd lived for the better part of two decades and was now raising a son.

"It's fun to be involved on Key Biscayne because the government is honest and at a level where you feel that you can accomplish things," he says. "The goal shouldn't be to find where you can shave a few dollars from the budget, but to make Key Biscayne the best community in the county."

That goal led him to found and serve as the president of the Friends of Key Biscayne, a grass roots organization whose focus is on things like building a community center and improving the quality of the school.

"I organized the Friends because I saw we had a solid majority but had gotten a little bit lazy," he explains. "Meanwhile, there was a vocal minority which seemed to want progress to come to a grinding halt."

Alan also serves as chairman of the board for City Theater, which was founded by Susan and a couple of friends so that they could produce their own plays.

"Alan has to raise money and put up with me," Susan says with a laugh. "He's very good at both of these things."

On April 9, a golf tournament was held at the Golf Club of Miami to raise funds for the City Theater, which will soon after start it's Summer Shorts season at the University of Miami's Ring Theater. Life is about to get a bit hectic again, but for the moment, the pressure is off and they almost seem to wallow in the luxury of being interviewed together on a Monday morning.

"We've shared a lot of history since 1973 and have an enormous amount of flexibility in our personalities," Susan says, trying to explain the success of their union. "We've kept busy and challenged and still manage to surprise each other frequently."

When the interview is over, they pose for pictures on a porch swing. They're both 42 years old, but still look like school kids in puppy love as they swing back and forth together, again and again.