To purchase:
Available on Amazon
Available at ibooks, Nook, Kobo and others here
The Alien and the Girl in the Rain
Curiosity kills the cat unless the cat has an inoperable brain tumor.
Natalie Cardellini wondered not for the first time why she’d filled out an online dating service application the day after her diagnosis. Denial? Maybe. Hope? Probably. Whatever the reason, she’d vetted the matches and delayed meeting with one of them.
Until today. Curiosity overcame any moral objections. One harmless date would give her a glimpse into what-might-have-been and lift her rock-bottom spirits.
Natalie tapped her phone and compared the app photo to the guy sitting four tables away in the Chicago coffee shop she’d selected. His short, dark curly hair and dark eyes behind glasses reminded her of a British professor, bookish and in need of a glass of brandy and a Bassett hound.
He watched the doorway for her arrival, but she’d sat in at a corner table for the past half hour. She’d never shied from adventure and didn’t understand her hesitation to walk across and introduce herself. A cup of coffee and a few minutes of conversation wasn’t a lifetime commitment. No harm would be done by enjoying the company of the opposite sex.
Convinced she hadn’t created a deception, and she deserved a treat, Natalie stood.
A young couple entered the coffee shop as if pushed in by a whirlwind. The old-fashioned bell over the door jangled. They laughed, and the man hugged the woman close, his hand bunched in the fabric of her dress at the waist. He smiled into her eyes and bent to kiss the side of her neck. The kiss, inaudible, struck like a gong in Natalie’s ears.
She crumpled into the chair, her hand trembling as it grasped the table edge.
How dare she seek a moment of a relationship when the fates had cut short any time it might have to grow? She’d been a fool to think otherwise. Furthermore, false hope was unfair to the man.
The couple stood in line, blocking the view of her date. Natalie used the distraction to stand and slip out the door.
The August sun beat down on her bare head as she walked three lonely blocks to her apartment.
Buy the book to continue reading:
Available on Amazon
Available at ibooks, Nook, Kobo and others here