Oreos and milk. Milk and Oreos. Another night by herself, secretly stuffing her face. It was only her, her TV, and fat cat. A fluffy pink robe, sensible panties, and comfortable slippers were all that she wore. In fact, every thing she had was comfortable and loose. She didn’t own a single pair of tight jeans or improper shoes. She was a little too chubby and she knew it and hated it as she stuffed two more Oreos in her mouth.

Moderate was a good word to describe her. She had morals but would have given them all up just to have a man inside of her. She just wanted to be touched and held. It had been a long time and she didn’t have any current prospects. She was in her mid-thirties and her sexual prime. It’s too bad that no one cared. She shoved another milk-laden Oreo into her mouth.

She could have been attractive, but at some point in her life she decided that she wasn’t and couldn’t be appealing. That decision carried over into her every day life. At work, she was distant and professional, a hard worker, and lonely.

She wiped the crumbs from her robe, and refilled her glass with milk. She ripped open a new package of Oreos and headed to her room. They were waiting. They were waiting for her. They were her only friends in life. She turned on her PC and logged into the Chat room. In that room, she was someone special, someone loved and respected. In her bedroom, she was alone. Her fingers moved and fingers around the world replied, never touching her body. She smiled and sighed at the same time. She would be up all night. Oreos and milk. Milk and Oreos. They would all be gone by morning.

The phone rang at my desk. I picked it up and said, “Hello.”

“Are you there?”

She always asks that question. Only once did I ever make fun of that question.

“Am I here? I just answered the phone didn’t I?”

I could feel her silence on the other end of the line. I had hurt her. She was that way, sensitive and caring, very aware of herself in an awkward kind of way. She’s not conceited, just sensitive.

“I’m here,” I said.

“Are you busy?”

“Just a little, but I can break away for a few minutes,” I softly said to her. I knew what she wanted. To be honest with you, I like what she wanted.

We work on the same floor. I looked around to make sure no one knew what I was doing and I went to the back stairs and went up one flight to the door that led to the roof. She was there waiting for me. She didn’t say a word but only smiled as if I had done something magnificent. I walked closer and she slipped into my arms and her head tucked tightly under my chin.

“I love you,” she quietly said and held me closer.

She snuggled into our hug and made herself at home. She’s quiet and sensitive you know. Traffic scares her. Stray dogs make her nervous. Her boss terrifies her. I don’t scare her at all. She’s never afraid when she’s in my arms. I feel her love and she feels my love too.

After a few minutes, we release and kiss goodbye. She leaves first and then me a minute later. She’s embarrassed about the rendezvous. She likes it and but doesn’t want her friends to know. It’s too private to talk about.

Two hours later, my phone rings.

“Are you there?”

I always am.

Chance by name and chance by nature. Boy, could that girl fly.

In Paris, she ripped holes in her thirty-dollar black tights, painted her lips magenta and strode along the Left Bank wearing Russian combat boots and a leather skirt no wider than a street urchin's grin. In Marseilles, she danced on the tables, whirling like a dervish to the thunderous applause of a crowd of French Matelots.

Barcelona was summer, and letting down her long, red hair. Clad in an eighteenth-century riding jacket and a crushed silk skirt that swirled around her lean thighs, she climbed our pension stairs at 2 a.m., laughing infectiously.
In tow was a gypsy guitarist and a leather faced Catalin flower seller. She purchased his entire stock of carnations and asked him to stay.
We all drank sangria and ate tapas as the gypsy strummed a passionate rasgueado.
Then we stumbled about decorating every inch of the walls with the carnations.
The next morning we were evicted for out efforts.

Back in America, Chance giggled like a child watching Marx Brothers re-runs at 4 a.m.

Mugged in New York, Chance persuaded her assailant to take her out to dinner on her own money.

She visited a children's hospice in Yonkers to sing nursery songs to the terminally ill, and cried for hours afterwards.

After an appointment with a New York specialist, Chance fell into a deep silence for a week and would not tell me what was wrong.

Chance, who came out of it by suggesting we learn skydiving.
On our first solo flight she kissed me warmly, told me she'd always wanted to fly and jumped from the plane.

She dropped with arms outstretched, her face ecstatic, her long, red hair streaming behind her like flames in the sun. She didn't even bother to open her parachute.
Yeah, that girl sure could fly.
Right 'til the end.

I can’t stand change. Just when everything is fine, something has to hit the fan. Her name is Jackilynn. She’s our new manager. Damn. I don’t think it’s going to work out to good here. We’re a bunch of middle age guys who are comfortable with our pay and ability to skate through the day. First day was scary.

I don’t mind macho in men, but her? First thing I noticed when she entered our world was her black leather jacket. It wasn’t all feminine and stuff. It was a Harley Jacket, well worn by the elements. Next thing I saw were beady eyes peering out of a face that hadn’t ever seen a touch a makeup, just challenging you to challenge her. It was scary indeed. She had huge sun drenched freckles that looked like melanoma all over her face.

She talked like a sailor and was loud and arrogant. She walked like a man. Bobby was kidding us that she probably stood up when she took a leak. Funny thing, I bet she could. What I noticed about her was her jeans. She wore Levi jeans that had a perfect fit on her manly butt. I noticed them in the coffee room as she was getting some black coffee.

I was behind her and saw the Levi’s label. It showed their size, 36 X 32. Now I know from my wife something about Levi Jeans. Women’s jeans don’t have the size on the label. She said women just don’t want to advertise that kind of thing. This Jackilynn wore man’s jeans. She was always hitchin’ them up like a road crew foreman when she talked.

I can’t stand change. Jackilynn just hitched up her jeans and called us all to a meeting.

She slipped though the archway, dressed in a sleek black velvet dress, pulled low to expose the cleavage she had so carefully placed into its folds. No one else would have dared arrive without a date, but for her, that was part of the fun. It was a game to her. She would show up at these parties unattached, and see how long it would take before some dolt fused himself to her side, ready to take her to his apartment and give her anything she wanted for the night. Most of them didn't even ask her anything personal. All they cared to know was what movie she was working on next. Or was she modeling now? What is it like working with Cameron Diaz? Could she get him into any of the Oscar after-parties?

She stood tall and confident, taking long strides across the room, looking each person in their eyes as she passed by. Immediately, a tall, well-dressed accountant-type caught her eye. He was standing at the bar with his arm around a petite blonde, but that didn't stop her from thinking he would be the next victim in her game. It would just take a little extra time, she thought, and that meant extra fun.

She glided onto the tall chrome bar stool next to the accountant, and glanced coolly in his direction. The blonde beside him gave her an irritated look and burrowed herself even closer to his side. “Ginny Evans?” the man blurted, setting his drink on the bar and pulling away from the blonde. “Ms. Evans? Is that you?”

She ran her fingers down her neck and adjusted her cleavage, while flashing a smug grin at the blonde. This looked like it was going to be fun, indeed. “Yes,” she purred in her most sultry movie-star voice. “You can call me Ginny. What should I call you?”

“One, two, three…” she counted.

“…Fourteen, fif…” her count cut off as her foot collided with something. Tumbling to the ground, her prosthetic elbows didn’t lock when they hit and her face pounded against the oaken floors.

“GOD,” she screamed, knowing her caretaker must have moved something. She knew it was 17 steps from her bedroom door to the foyer. She knew because she had to know. The only blemishes to her blonde-framed face were her permanently closed eyelids. Her sapphire eyes had helped her to modeling success before the accident. Now her life was defined by her counts.

She had been the portrait of perfection before that night. No model before had the star power she garnered. She was the crossover queen with acting roles and a number one album. She walked every red carpet from Cannes to the Kodak*.

Now she was a broken recluse. Besides filching her sight, the accident had shorn her arms off nearly to the shoulders.

She suffered constant nightmares. She knew she hadn’t been an ordinary person; the world had been set before her. The difference in lives was the bitterest hurt for her. She knew she could not turn back the clock. No medical breakthrough would soon come to restore her sight or arms.

Her boat, which her agent jokingly called The Bounty, was long sold. Her jet set friends had abandoned her after they drained the cool out of hanging at her bedside. Even Drake Francis, her fiancé had broken it off and departed. Her only companion was her caretaker, a young woman named Polly.

She got herself up and finally to the door expecting to hear Polly’s young voice. Instead she heard the gruff utterances of a delivery driver. “Who would send me anything?” she thought to herself.

=============================
*Note: The Kodak is the theatre in Los Angeles, CA, USA that has hosted the Academy Awards Ceremony for several years.

He heard too late the crash of boots touching down behind him. His muscles twitched around the machine gun nestled in his arm, his heel barely beginning to turn as a cold barrel was pushed into his neck, a leather-clad forearm choking the alarms from his throat.

"Easy, easy..." said his captor, no more than a whisper, "look to your left, mon captif."

He looked out upon the rolling waves beyond the boat's sturdy rail. The sun was just starting to be extinguished by the endless fathoms, but not before scorching lines of pink and orange into the sky.

"Throw that big gun into the water and don't miss, mind me now" he felt her arm tighten just a little. He turned the gun over in his hand and flung it into the murky depths.

He felt his captor push her small frame tight against his back, her leg appearing briefly between his own as she walked him toward a large door a few yards down the deck.

Once more the whisper returned to his ear, he felt her warm lips against his skin as she spoke, "Now, unlock it. No funny stuff and you just may live." He recieved a small kiss on his neck as reward for compliance.

He did as he was told, his hand unsteady as he slid the key home in the lock and turned it. Beads of sweat broke on his brow, he wasn't even sure if it was from being so close to death.

All at once the arm and barrel disappeared from his body. He wheeled around quickly to do something, but ended up doing nothing, a plan having no time to formulate in his occupied mind.

He was arrested once more by the raven-haired woman that stood before him, the setting sun turned her wind strewn hair into a dazzling flame. Emerald green eyes sparkled as her lips curled up in a half smile. She raised the pistol from where it rested against her hip and belted him across the head, knocking him into a series of sweet dreams.

Eva kicked his forearm from the path of the door and slipped inside to finish her mission.

“I’m sorry, what did you say?” she asked softly.

The man must have been blind to miss the hard look in her blue eyes. He smiled condescendingly then repeated his sentence.

“Thanks, sweetie, I appreciate all the woman-hours you put into this report. Now don’t worry your pretty little head about it – the guys will take it from here.”

The fury radiated off her in waves. Only her strong self-control kept her temper in check. The muscles of her jaw twitched as she ground her teeth together. Her lips, normally full and lush, flattened in anger. Her perfectly manicured nails dug deeply into the palms of her hands. I heard her breath escape in a controlled hiss. If he was smart, he would escape while he still could.

He wasn’t smart.

He smiled at her again. “You look a little tense. Why don’t you take a break and get a cup of coffee? Oh, and bring one back for me, too. Thanks, honey.”

I watched her back stiffen as she drew herself up to her full 5’ 4” height. Her hands unclenched to smooth the front of her tailored suit jacket. Her chin tilted up and her eyes widened slightly.

When she finally spoke, her voice was saccharin-sweet. “I would, honey, but I’m afraid that I’m just not qualified. You see, I never learned to fetch coffee while I was an undergrad at Princeton. And my pretty little head just couldn’t be bothered with it while I was doing my MBA at Stanford. Besides, since we know that 1 woman-hour is the equivalent of 5 man-hours, a simple cost analysis shows that it is obviously a better use of company resources if a man gets the coffee. So I’ll take mine with cream and sugar. Thanks, sweetie.”

I watched entranced, in total silence, as she appeared around a bend in the path. While I had expected to meet her here, her sudden appearance surprised me slightly.

Walking toward me with easy grace, every step was placed with soft, deliberate care, barely disturbing the loose leaves underfoot. In the soft, tree-filtered light, she more resembled an apparition than a living being.

She glanced back over her left shoulder, not nervously, but with obvious confidence. Her demeanour spoke clearly of her self-belief and her assurance of her position in the world. She bowed to none, not unless they could prove their superiority over her. And even then only reluctantly, and not easily.

In a small patch of sunlight she paused. She was not young, probably early middle age. Her short reddish-brown hair had a delicate sprinkle of grey, but in that light it only emphasised her mature poise as she looked around.

I saw where life had left some of its more visible marks on her, and guessed that there were others I could not see. A small scar ran from just above her right eye upwards for an inch or so, while another was plain on her knee. She wore them without pretence or artifice, boldly accepting that they were there, and that they were an integral part of her.

Turning again to follow the path, she noticed me for the first time as I stood in the dark shadow of the trees. She gave no indication of surprise at seeing me standing there. Her light brown eyes locked onto mine, and in total silence each strove to assert their will over the other. At length, I relented and glanced away, beaten by her inner strength. I shuffled nervously, and her mouth opened into a wide grin.

With one last victorious flick of her eyes, the vixen turned off the track and vanished into the bracken.

"Where is she?" grumbled Allie Cassidy. As the production manager for the live "Sunrise at 7" morning television show, it was Allie's responsibility to make sure all talent was in place. Missing this morning, as on a lot of mornings, was the "weather-gal", Alexandra Simpson.

A few minutes before airtime, Allie gave up searching and was just about to change the segment when Alexandra appeared, looking sleepy and irritable. Allie gave her a hard look, but said nothing. Alexandra was a local beauty queen, and everyone knew the job was just a stepping stone for her.

For Allie, this job was everything. A short, slim (uncharitably called "skinny" by some) young woman, Allie had no illusions about her looks. She had once been told she was the "best looking homely girl I've ever seen." Allie's only nod to beauty was her expressive, hazel eyes that unfortunately, were also myopic. Not known for her patience, (Allie did not even like to give a piece of toast time to become proper toast ) she also had no patience for contacts, and instead wore glasses.

"cue camera one" Allie ordered the technical director. For the next hour, she flew around the studio control booth, making sure the program was on time, and all proper commercials and promos inserted. She checked to see that the guests for the show were ready for their appearance when called from the "green room." By the end of the show, several strands of red hair had started creeping down her neck from the hastily done "up-do" she favored.

Alexandra departed the studio before Allie had an opportunity to talk to her. "I've got to deal with her soon" Allie muttered to herself. She thanked the guests and then left for a meeting with the ambitious, talented show host, Bob Fetterly, to do the show's post mortem and discuss the next day's program. Allie was apprehensive as Bob had told her he had something "personal" to discuss with her.