Worlds Apart Read Online Free Page B

inch of her, inside and out, flaws and warts and scars along with all the good parts. She knew he would do nothing to hurt her, she had understood this even before he hadn’t bought her a popcorn that day, buying instead the one for Belinda and the one for himself that he had said she could mooch from! A gentle man. And he had been Laurie’s safe harbor from that day forward. And with luck, forever.
    As the years slipped by, the secret that Lonnie hadn’t shared with Belinda didn’t occur that often. When their children were younger, this was a relief to Lonnie and Laurie, for the worry that is an inherent part of every parent’s life could never entirely be quelled while they were alone. And as more time passed, and it happened with less and less frequency, they almost didn’t notice, so engaged were they with living.
    “Do you think we could ever make it happen again?” Laurie whispered late one night when it had been so long that neither of them could recall the date of the last occurrence. But Lonnie didn’t answer.
    For it didn’t really matter. It was just what used to happen. And what might happen again some day .
    They had each other either way.
     
    * * * * * * * * * * *
     

Chance Encounter
Part One: They Meet
    “One of yours?” said the angel called Lloyd.
    “Yup. Name’s Jillsy . She’s a peach,” said the angel called Farber.
    “Huh! That she is!” said Lloyd. “Wish she were one of mine.”
    Farber looked about, and quickly spotted a gentleman of twenty-eight or so, finishing up a call at a bank of public telephones. He was talking rapidly, while at the same time his fingers were probing the adjacent telephones’ coin return slots.
    “He gotta name?” said Farber. There was no question as to whether or not this fine representation of humankind was one of Lloyd’s; that much was clear.
    “ Ungh . Wilford . Wilford Middlewick ,” said Lloyd. “He’s a challenge. A challenge for sure.”
    Both Lloyd and Farber were silent as Wilford Middlewick concluded his conversation with a boisterous “ Seeya , then! ”, hung up the receiver with a chunk, and then went fishing in the two coin return slots that had so recently been just beyond his reach.
    “You’d think he’d get himself one of them cell phones,” said the angel called Lloyd morosely. “He’s just cheap. Nothin ’ I can do about it, neither. Cheap is cheap. No way to influence that! ”
    One short block away from where Wilford Middlewick was quitting his quest for coinage, the woman named Jillsy turned a corner and headed briskly along the sidewalk, straight toward Wilford . Jillsy was not exactly one of God’s most handsome creations, but nonetheless she was pleasant enough to look at, and she carried herself with an air of competence and sincerity that far outweighed any deficiencies she might have possessed in the beauty department.
    “Can you even imagine how much Mr. Middlewick got teased about that name when he was a kid?” said the angel called Lloyd.
    “Hey!” Jillsy called as she and Wilford were about to pass one another. Wilford’s head jerked; he’d been thinking about what to catch on the tube tonight, since everyone he’d called had professed business, or illness, or just plain tiredness as an excuse for not seeing him tonight. Not a one of them had pleaded disinterestedness, which Wilford suspected was the primary reason for the succession of NOs to his query about “maybe hangin ’ out or something, hey?”
    “What are you doing in this part of town?” Jillsy asked, a challenge that Wilford Middlewick found confusing, since this woman hovering before him did indeed look familiar, but was hardly someone he could place.
    “Uh, I’m… I, uh, work near here,” Wilford managed.
    “Oh! So do I !” Jillsy replied. “Two blocks down Fifteenth, in the Sutter building. Fancy that, both of us working in such close proximity, and being neighbors, too! You’d think we’d have run into each other down