"What are you doing here?" he asked.
"I'm studying your rocks," she replied, taking a sip of beer to moisten her dry mouth, another symptom of the state of her nerves.
His smile disappeared, and his eyes widened. He glanced about and the...
Fast forward two and a half hours and the morning, which had opened with a jubilant back dive in the straight position, approaching a perfect 10.0, was barely treading water. Tom was sitting at the kitchen table, his broad shoulders hunched over the newspaper, his behind—umm, that would be his taut, athletically moulded behind—maintaining only the bare minimum contact with his chair. His stance was reflective of his mental state, namely, he was on edge, not unlike a lifeguard poised to offer his services to a distant, flailing swimmer, if only he could determine whether the swimmer was at play or in need of him.
The aftermath of a fiery crash that had both lit up and closed down Highway 400 between TO and Barrie the day before was plastered across the front page: a smouldering, blackened, jackknifed tractor trailer thudded onto its side, almost a dozen cars scattered, two crushed to half their size, among them an SUV, its front end nosed into the side of the truck, emergency vehicles (fire trucks, ambulances and two OPP cruisers). Although it was Tom's third go at the accompanying article, it still wasn't clear to him whether there had been four fatalities, with eight people taken to hospital, or vice versa—he rather hoped it was the former—nor whether the truck had swerved into the SUV's lane (according to eyewitnesses), or the reverse.
One might have gathered that it was Tom's confusion, or the carnage, that was responsible for his agitated air. It wasn't that he wasn't trying to concentrate, if his deeply knit brows were any indication. Perhaps it was the reporting? Any expert who has read a newspaper article in his field—this one, alas, was in Tom's—can attest to the fact that reporters are jacks of all trades, and masters of none.
His cell phone and a cup of lukewarm black coffee—he hadn't bothered to add cream to this one—sat next to the paper. His eyes remained fixed on the article, his finger curled through the handle of the cup. Vacantly lifting it, he tossed back a gulp. It didn't help matters, of course, that it was his third cup of the morning. He'd sipped his first while strolling about the kitchen and smiling to himself—it had been difficult to stay put. His second while pacing on the front porch, looking down his own street and the one that formed a T-junction with it; he'd still been smiling then. His third here, in his present state.
His gaze shifted to the phone and lingered there. Releasing a massive sigh that had to have expelled most of the air in his lungs, he snatched it up.
