Next to the name was a number. And a comment; I miss my baby girl, thx for letting me see her one last time…

I scribbled the number down on my hand and shut the book.

I had work today. Luckily my boss was letting me get away with things lately, being late and the like – because of Marlene’s death and all. “Emotions get in the way of fine work, take a break kid” were his actual words. He was a good man.

I crawled through the jammed city streets to get to work. I really should get myself transferred to some building closer to home, the bad traffic around here was slowing me down, it’s not like I needed time to think.

I got to work, late, trundled up the stairs, sat at my desk and found something to keep me busy. I was awfully behind on my work and I needed to catch up.

I worked steadily through the piles of pages, the calls and the emails until it came time for my lunch break. I stared at the phone for a while, then picked it up and dialed…