A Voice In The Night by Brian Matthews Page B

they’re my own. But they’re not. I get a little taste of what it’s like, but I know it’s just that – a taste.”
    “But now you can do it all over and get it right this time,” he said. She’d forgotten her newly realized youth while they were talking.
    “Yes. Yes I can. I hadn’t even thought of that until you said it. I’m still stuck in the old reality, the 56-year-old reality. She told him then about her stewardess career, how the constant traveling made it impossible to sustain a relationship. Men wanted someone who was there, not gone for two weeks every month. “I loved the job, but I stayed too long and didn’t see where it would leave me in the end.”As they sat there, it occurred to them both how easily they could talk to each other, the instant rapport and trust each felt, even on the very personal things they spoke of. Silence then. Finally he reached across the table and put his hand on hers. “Well now you get a second chance. Maybe we both do.”
    The mutual fund business was his passion.
    “People think I’m nuts but our company is something that’s like a special calling. I can remember my grandfather and then my father preaching, pounding it into us that our purpose was to help people get to a point of financial security, not to make a pile of money for ourselves. They would say, we were in this for the little old ladies. Never forget that for a moment. They would fire any broker who was getting clients to change funds just to get the commission. And they held everyone to incredible standards. That’s what made the company grow so big. That and our being the first kids on the mutual fund block.”
    She felt his earnestness like a tremor that ran across the table between them.

Chapter 21
    Eileen grabbed her handwritten errand list as she headed for the car. Sliding into the seat she hoped the MG would behave. It started right up, startling her a little because it usually groaned over and over a few times before kicking to life. Maybe Luke wouldn’t have to bring it in for a checkup after all. It looked like it was going to be the perfect day to put the top down and take the long way to each of her stops, to cruise the Pacific Coast Highway, watching the blue-green waves curl and break along the beach out of the corner of her eye. There was still some of the early fog that hugged the coast in the morning, but it would start to burn off soon. It made the ocean and surf look like impressionistic art, softening and blurring the scene. And it made the car run roughly again. She’d have to tell Luke about that. It could mean something.
    At the bottom of the hill she decided to turn into the parking lot that served a small sliver of beach just North of Torrey Pines to enjoy the scene for a moment. Closer to the water now, the fog was much denser. She couldn’t even make out her front fenders or the stones marking the entrance, squinting to find her way. Then she stalled, and instinctively reached for the ignition switch. In that instant there were noises and forces that she could never have imagined. A movement, rolling, crushing, sliding, grinding, screeching that made her insignificant. It was an entity unto itself, huge and voracious. An attack against which she couldn’t defend, except to beg for something higher to save her. Then a fleeting awareness of nothingness, then being transported somewhere both known and different. Out of focus, but with familiar forms and sounds.
    She was no longer, and yet she was.
    The truck driver was dazed and trembling but only superficially hurt from holding tight to the big steering wheel and standing on the brakes. He knew the small car was beneath him, obliterated. He crawled down from the cab and slid underneath, then quickly back, feeling like he was going to pass out from what he’d seen, a beautiful young woman, oddly unscathed, but clearly gone. Then his experience kicked in and he began lighting all of his warning flares and calling on the