“Where’s everyone else?” I asked.“They’ll be here in about thirty minutes. I wanted some time alone with you!”“To talk about karate?” ... asked, deadpan.“No!” she giggled. “Of course not! Do you want something to drink?”“Dr Pepper if you have it, Coke if not.”“Coke it is then,” she said, getting a bottle from the fridge and replacing it with one from a carton on the counter.She handed me the Coke and we sat on the couch.“Were you serious about what you said to me outside the ER?” she asked.“About. Together they picked out a couple of things and then before finishing Graham stopped Kerry and pointed at the phone screen.“You have to get that for him too!”Kerry burst into laughter making me flush with embarrassment and said okay and completed the order. She promised Graham to take some pictures for him when the stuff arrived. Kerry and Graham chatted as they finished their drinks and got me to serve them two more. I could see Kerry was quite drunk now. They talked about where they lived,. ”“Yes, that’s right. It’s always been near the bottom of the scale, almost to where it would become hypoglycemia.”“Which, I think, may be why you always drank soda. You didn’t realize it, but it was a form of self-medication. If your blood sugar dropped too low, you felt lethargic and drank sugar water with caffeine to pick yourself up again.”“Now that you mention it, that sounds right.”“How do you feel right now?”“OK, I guess.”“I’m a bit worried about the two events so close together. I’ll. ’ She smiled and said, ‘You are certainly a well informed man.’ ‘More a repository of sometimes useless information but in my business you never know what you’ll need to flesh out a story.’ She mixed the whiskey, sugar, mint and spring water and we retired to the front porch swing. We sat and sipped in companionable silence. I held her hand and she moved closer to me. I leaned toward her and smelled her freshly washed hair. ‘Laura,’ I said, ‘I can’t tell you how peaceful and fulfilling this is,.