Free Fall from Grace by L. R. Wright

called it. But she never found any, had never spotted a cat-soul: they kept them well hidden.
    First, he’d gotten married. Right out of high school. To a girl so young she was practically still a child. Hetty had suspected that the girl was pregnant, and that had turned out to be true. Bobby’s mother, Rachel, had been furious.
    And then his father, Wallace, dying like that. Hetty’s brother. Hetty had tried to blame everything that happened next on Wallace dying, on the pain and confusion his death created, but she couldn’t. People had to be held accountable for their actions no matter how much pain they were in, or else there would be chaos.
    The Siamese sat up and rubbed the top of his head against Hetty’s chin, and the sound of his purring comforted her.
    She got up from the couch and went into the kitchen, where she brushed her skirt almost clean of cat hair and washed her hands. Then she prepared lunch and put the coffee on to perk.
    A few minutes later Bobby arrived. He gave her a big hug and lifted her into the air, laughing.
    She hustled him into the sitting room and poured coffee into two mugs. She sat on the edge of her straight-backed chair nodding, smiling, pleased by the sight of him. He was a strong, healthy-looking man with wide shoulders, slim hips and clear skin. There was a scar, a little one, on his forehead that hadn’t been there before he went away.
    He didn’t have much to say, but that was all right.
    â€œHowlong?” she said, after a while.
    â€œDunno. Depends,” he said. “I’m going away for a couple of days,” he told her, scooping more sugar into his coffee. “But I’ll be back. At least for a while.”
    He stirred his coffee absently. Then he stood up, and walked over to the window. He stood staring out at her side garden, his hands in the pockets of his jeans. Hetty watched him for a few minutes. He didn’t move, just stood there, staring outside. He looked different, of course. Ten years was a long time.
    She had written to him while he was in jail. Sometimes he wrote back, and she taped his letters carefully into the scrapbook. He had phoned her when he got out, from Vancouver, to tell her that he wasn’t coming home right away. She hadn’t heard from him again until three weeks ago, when she’d opened her front door to see him standing on the porch, smiling down at her.
    She got up and went to him, and lifted her hand and put it on his shoulder. She didn’t know what exact thoughts were in his mind, but she knew that they were sad ones, maybe angry ones. She knew he was in turmoil. She wanted him to start his life all over again, and she thought he wanted that, too. But it’s not possible, thought Hetty, her hand on his shoulder, gazing outside at the small patch of brown grass between her house and the neighbor’s rickety fence. You can’t start your life again. You can only resume it. Continue. Proceed.
    â€œThis guy wants to see me,” he said absently. “I dunno why.” He gave her a grin meant to be reassuring. “You got anything to eat around here?”
    She had made ham sandwiches, and bought some cinnamon buns.
    She would have liked to be closer to him than she was. But she thought she was probably as close to him as anybody would ever get. A couple of outcasts, Hetty thought. That’s what we are.
    He seemed to shake off his sadness, if that’s what it was, while they ate, and drank their coffee. He talked, and even made some jokes, and when he stood up to leave, he seemed almost lighthearted.
    â€œWait,” she said, a bony finger tapping at his chest. Then she pointed to herself. “Speak.”
    Bobby folded his arms. “Shoot.”
    Hetty was excited about what she had to tell him—too excited for her crippled speech. Frustrated, she hurried to her desk and scrawled a message on a piece of her stationery.
    She thrust it at him and waited,