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You can find it here :
The previous short stories, should you wish to read them in order, are :-
TOSG: Faking It.
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TOSG: Goodbye Mr A.
viewtopic.php?f=9&t=21880
TOSG : Of Gods and Monsters
viewtopic.php?f=9&t=23369
The others above you dont need to have read but this one you do -
TOSG : CORNUCOPIA.
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This story follows on immediately from where CORNUCOPIA left off and is in seven parts. The first post is largely a character piece as I wanted to show how she had been affected by the previous story and how she dealt with it and then it all kicks off in part two. I accept part one might not be everyone’s cup of tea. It’s a bit of self-indulgence on my part – I wanted to write and show her as a person, as it will influence how she behaves and what she will do in the larger story arc. This sequence had to happen at some point for the larger story to work, so I made it part of a short story.
Maybe it works, maybe it doesn’t, but I like it and I hope you do too. If you do or don’t as ever please post a comment to tell me why.
Enjoy (I hope!)
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PART 1
“You alright in there?”
Rob’s voice made Kara start, with a splash that sent a wash of water over the side of the bath as she sat up suddenly, blinking and spluttering. She rubbed her palms over her face as she blew out water from her mouth. She looked around, disorientated , blinking at the unfamiliar room. Then she remembered. The awful silence of the massive explosion, too loud and too close for her to hear before her ear drums ruptured from the pressure of the blast. The white light of fire that filled her vision, filled the whole horizon as she flew backwards through the night for miles, blown by the blast as the massive liquid gas tanker exploded. She remembered it all. The terrible end of the Cornucopia. The faces of her Captain and crew, depending upon her, trusting her to save them. The ambulances, police cars and tv trucks all on fire at the cliff top. Barely a trace of the three other little boats that had been trying to save the monster tanker. Chieftain, a crisp and modern Ocean going tug that had been towing at the stern; the William Joseph Morgan, the lifeboat from the little village of Penbridge whose crew of volunteers had left their wives and warm beds to try and save the Cornucopia’s crew; The Lady Leanne, the rugged and rusty old tug whose Captain was gruff and rude and unlikeable. All of them had gone, The Lady Leanne crushed by the tanker itself against the rocks just before the explosion as it tried to save her. She could still hear that faint toot-toot of the ships whistle like the shout of a friend in a cheering crowd, far off and barely heard but welcome none the less. She would never know for sure if the grumbling and miserable Captain of that tug had actually known what he was doing, or whether he had a blind faith in that old boat that she would somehow survive anything. She liked to think the former. But the over-riding memory of the incident earlier that night was that she had failed.
“Love?” Rob called again.
She remembered then, that she had come to her friend’s café in the middle of the night and was in his empty apartment above the shop, taking a bath before she went out again.
“I-I’M F-FINE ! I’m fine, Rob…” she rubbed her face again with her hands, then more strongly affirmed “I’m fine” as she fought back another wave of tears and the lump in her throat. But she wasn’t. The last thing she wanted to do was go back out on patrol; she had flown back from attending a peace mission with her cousin Kal the day before on a distant planet, then called in to see her friend Rob before she hit the hay, only to hear about the tanker adrift in the Bristol Channel between England and Wales. Rob’s friend Dave ‘O’blivion’ Williams was on the ship and so it had become a personal promise that she had silently made to Rob that she would save him. But she hadn’t. She had been looking at Dave just as the ship exploded, struggling to hear him cry a warning that ‘She’s a-gone!’ a split second before the blast started in the engine room.
“Come on then, love! Time you got back in the game. Oh, I meant to say don’t dry yourself with the blue towel, I think I flossed with that one when I showered this morning, use the white one.”
“Ok…” she answered uncertainly. “Flossed?” she queried her big blue eyes flicking up at the ceiling as she awaited an explanation.
“Ya know…er…dried me bits…” he called awkwardly from outside.
“Your…? Oh, GOD FLOSSED!!!! ROB! You don’t need to be so detailed! Ya coulda just said you had used it! That’s gross!” she said horrified at the mental image she now had.
“Sorry. But anyway slow coach, we need to hustle , get you back out there…”
“I really don’t feel up to it Rob…”
“Yeah well….I don’t care. Look, this is something you gotta do, and I DON’T JUST MEAN FOR YOU! Look, people will be in shock over this, they ain’t used to things…not working out when you or your brother are involved…”
“Cousin.”
“Sorry, you or your cousin. Point is, they’ll be looking for someone to blame. And you were there so they’ll be demanding to know why you didn’t stop it. They are hurtin’ is all, they won’t be thinkin’ straight. I rang Fat Bobby, ya know Dave’s brother, I said you’d got hurt tryin’ to stop it, and tryin’ to save Dave. He understands. He was askin’ if you were ok.”
“I –I didn’t get hurt Rob! “ she said as the tears came again.
“Oh no? You turned up here with your ears all bleedin’, you got hurt alright. Fact you have got better now doesn’t change the fact you were hurt. But anyway, they’ll be asking why you didn’t hang around, and you being injured will deflect a lot of the aggro, but you going out and saving someone else tonight, that really shuts them up. Plus like I said you need to do this for you too…” he called through the door hesitantly.
“I guess…” she said weakly. She was dismayed by his words that people would blame her, but he was probably right – it was only human nature. “I-I should go and see the families maybe, try and explain…”
“NO! FUCK NO! There’s over a hundred people been killed, you’d be days or weeks goin’ to see them all. The LIVING need you. You can’t ‘elp the dead. Saving people is what you do, like those lifeboat lads. They regret any they can’t rescue but they don’t go to a funeral if they are still needed to go out and save others. You gotta be like that. What if a thousand had died, would you go to see all their families? Its NOT YOUR FAULT KIDDO, it just was one of them things - you gotta be above the sort of crap that’s gonna be flying around after this, you just gotta carry on and be you. You can write a letter of condolence or something for the families and I can get it to them via Fat Bobby, but you can’t do it face to face. Like I say you need to get out there and help others and put this behind you. Some people will say some bad things about you over the next few days, it don’t mean it’s true it’s just they are grieving and lashing out. You can mourn the dead, you can honour the dead, you can bury the dead, you can respect the dead and you can remember the dead, but you CAN’T BRING BACK THE DEAD. Ok? You ok?”
“I-I…I suppose so…” she said tearfully with a voice as soft as snow.
“Just to be clear…there ain’t gonna be any sexiness tonight between us is there?” he called.
“WHAT? WHAT THE HELL? NO!!!” she said, stunned by the question.
“NO-NO! I didn’t think there would be, I just thought I’d ask, ya know, in case, like. Didn’t want you feeling all lonely and unloved and me missing a chance to get me leg over…” there was silence from the bathroom. “That was a joke…” he added lamely. ”I mean, I know there ain’t nothin’ sexy gonna happen between us, ‘cos, well ya know, that ship has sailed…?”
“Rob, that ship was NEVER IN DOCK!” she said forcefully staring at the wall in disbelief.
“Oh.” He said disappointedly.
“What happened to you being my big brother?” she said slightly angrily. She stared at the wall with a frown whilst she listened for his answer.
“Well that’s more kinda the other you, ya know the mousey brown haired gal downstairs. You are just... well, so hot. And if we are like brother and sister, I was just checking whether we was Arkansas sort of brother and sister or a brother and sister from anywhere else…”
“You…”she shook her head “I…” she gave a huffing sigh of frustration.”Unbelievable.” She said quietly shaking her head. But as she did so, she realized he was only trying to distract her from what had happened. “Rob, you asshole.” But she found she was smiling anyway.
“You mean like in a sexy way though, right?” he said optimistically.
“WHAT?!!! NO! I mean in an asshole kinda way, you moron!”
“But you mean like a sexy moron, right?” he asked hesitantly.
“NO, YOU IDIOT! I MEAN IN A MORONIC KINDA WAY!YOU STUPID MANIAC” she shouted exasperatedly.
“Sexy stupid?”
“NO! WILL YOU STOP PUTTING ‘SEXY’ IN FRONT OF EVERYTHING I SAY! GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR! YOU’RE IMPOSSIBLE!”
“I’m sexy an’ you know it!” he sang outside the door. "Don'tchya -wish-ya-boyfriend was fat-like me! Dontchya!" he sang on, switching songs as she screamed and threw a loofah at the door that hit with a wet thud. There was a short silence and then she burst out laughing. She needed that release of emotion, and she realized now that he knew that too and was just playing the fool.
“Thanks Rob.” She called to him and this time flicked an x-ray glance through the door where she saw him side on to her, looking down the landing, smiling proudly, pleased with himself. ‘Well, so you should be’ she thought.
“I put candles in there…’cos… ya know,… women like candles in the bath, …for some reason…” he said uncertainly. ”Bloody stupid…” he said, mumbling quietly to himself.
She looked around. There were three. One had fallen over and gone out, one was broken halfway up, standing wonkily like a drunken sailor and one had melted to nothing with just the flame barely flickering above a large pool of wax. They were dinner table candles. None of them were scented. It was pathetic, but somehow endearing. She softened towards him. He was kinda hopeless. Then she saw an unlit birthday candle stuck upright in a bar of soap. Her mistake, there were four. She smiled.
“Yeah…I see them Rob. Thanks. They are supposed to be scented candles though, to help you relax…”
“Oh….that makes a bit more sense, now then. ‘Cept I ain’t got none of them ones. I suppose they burn off the oxygen and make you drowsy that way too. You coming out then?”
“Gimme a minute” she called.
“There’s no sexiness stuff goin’ on, I promise…” he said hesitantly.
She smiled. “You bet your ass there isn’t!”
“Oh.” He sounded disappointed.
She stepped out of the bath, swathed herself in the clean towel and picked up her smoked and battered uniform reticently. She froze as she held it. All those people. She ran her hand over the sigil that meant ‘Hope’ in her language, so often mistaken for an ‘S’. It wasn’t stylised with the top loop larger than the bottom but deliberately distended as that is how the symbol was written. But now she felt as if she had betrayed it somehow. She felt sick to her stomach and ached at the memory of the last time she had worn it. Part of her, a tiny part, longed to throw it away…but a bigger part of her didn’t. Rob was absolutely right when he had said earlier that others out there needed her help. And she also needed to help them. She took a deep breath, blew her legs dry and then swilled the uniform beneath the shower head, scrubbing and rubbing it with her super speed, her hands a blur. She rung it dry in a few seconds, blew over it quickly to finish it off, then towelled herself dry and donned her underwear and the cleaned garment. She put on her boots and stepped sheepishly through the door.
Her head was dipped and she raised it only slowly, uncertainly, peeking out hesitantly from below her brow, between strands of her hair that hung down, as if somehow seeking his approval, his reassurance.
He looked at her open mouthed for a moment, stupefied by the radiant image of loveliness that stood before him. Eyes like the bluest sapphires, hair like spun gold, her blue top shining, her cape, her skirt, her boots all rich and red, with the regular band of her belt like the yellow stripe of a rainbow. She mistook his hesitancy at first for disdain and she felt the dread rise in her until he smiled at her reassuringly, obviously pleased to see her, and her heart soared. She felt her confidence return again and all from such a simple thing as a friend’s smile.
“I thought we could call this ‘Operation Phoenix!’ “ he said excitedly, “Ya know, you putting it behind you and rising again sort of thing…ya know, going out on a mission!”
“What? Rob I don’t name these…missions. Actually I don’t even think of them as missions …I just sort of…go out there, on… on a patrol I suppose you would call it…I don’t call them anything really…”
He looked devastated. “Oh.” He said in a little voice. “I thought that was a cool name for it, like…” he said quietly. Then he seemed to rally. “But never mind! Because first we have to commence with 'Operation: Great Idea'!” he grabbed her by the wrist and led her excitedly into the small living room above the shop where he had laid out the table for her.
“Ta-da! 'Operation: Great Idea'! There’s tea and some toast and I made you some sandwiches to take with you. I thought you’d be hungry by now, so have a cuppa and a bit of toast and then you can go off and save the world again!” he said excitedly, looking enormously pleased with himself.
She felt…warm inside. But the tears came again. “Oh Rob. That’s so sweet.” She hugged him affectionately. “I can’t believe you made me sandwiches…”she laughed. “I can’t fly around carrying a lunch pail I’d look ridiculous!”
He went bright red and dropped his gaze as she let him go and shuffled awkwardly. “Oh, I’m sorry…I didn’t think.”
“And the toast!” She looked at the two jet black pieces of bread. “That’s pretty damned burnt Rob! Where’d ya toast it, Mount St Helens?”
“Well, I ain’t good at cookin’.”
“You run a café!” she exclaimed.
“Yeah, but its not a very good one.” He said honestly. “Plus I thought you might like it well done…” he said. “But there’s two pieces of bread there spare, I thought you could ya know…use your eyeball –“
“ ’-bomb- thingies’ to heat it up?” she finished for him with a smile. “You mean my laser heat vision?”
“Aye-aye. That. Doo-dadd stuff.” He said smoothing his palms down his apron clumsily as he looked at her anxiously with his head lowered.
She smiled softly at him. “You’re the best Rob. But we can’t call it Operation: Great Idea…that would be stupid…” he looked even more crestfallen “when it’s Operation: Brilliant Idea!” she teased him.
“Oh!“ he said delightedly, pleased with her acceptance.
She sat briefly , flashed a glance to turn the bread into toast, buttered it, added some hawthorne honey and then ate it as she drank the tea. He hovered nervously around her, something clearly on his mind.
“I got you your own mug!” he said proudly “Well, not yours but Brown Eyes, you know the other you for downstairs in the caff like…” he showed her the mug which had ‘LYDIA’ printed on it. She sighed and gave a nodded thanks with a tight smile. Rob was hopeless with names. She looked at it for the first time properly and frowned.
“Er…Why is there a big fat pig on it?” she asked, raising an eyebrow and turning the mug for him to see.
“Well, because they didn’t have one with a big fat cow on it.” He said matter of factly.
“Why youuuuuuuuuuuu!” She smirked and then narrowed her eyes in feigned outrage, but they both ended up smiling at each other like the good friends they were. She took a swallow from the insulting mug.
“Ya know…” he said finally as she looked up “when…when I hit you…well…I don’t hit girls. I’ll carry the shame of that to my grave…” he struggled to look her in the eye, and when he did they were shining with tears. “I know its stupid but of all things, I thought of that bit in ‘Airplane!’ , ya know when that woman is hysterical and they are all queuing up to slap her…its dumb I know but that’s all I thought of…and so…well.” He sighed deeply. “I’m just so sorry I hit you. I’ve never hit a woman. It ain’t right. My Grampa would kill me.”
“Well, seein’ as you hit me…it’s only fair I hit you back, yeah?” she raised her eyebrows as she looked at him seriously for acknowledgement.
“Well, yeah I guess…I am so sorry…” he said uncertainly.
“Ok. Brace yourself.” She stood, wiped a crumb of toast from the corner of her mouth as she finished chewing, then drew back her fist and held him by the neck with the other hand.
“I’ll try not to break your neck or...ya know drive your jaw through your skull…” she said seriously.
“Oh crikey!” he swallowed hard. “C-could you not like, hit me a bit less hard then?”
“Not really, I only do kinda full on thumping…”
She felt him swallow underneath her hand at his throat. She was struggling not to laugh visibly.
“Alright then…will it hurt?” he said nervously.
“I should think so. Its what I do. You might wanna close your eyes…” she said with sincerity.
“Oh God!” he took a deep breath. “I-I suppose it’s only fair. Look, I’m really sorry…” he screwed up his eyes and grimaced. “But like…couldn’t you slap me a bit instead? Or can I pay a fine?”
“Nope, its an honour thing where I come from. Gotta be done.” She looked at him standing rigid with his eyes shut tight.
Kara smiled openly then and said “HERE IT COMES!” loudly, as she just gave him the gentlest scuff of her knuckles on his chin, then leaned forward and kissed him on the nose.
He opened one eye and saw her smiling and just burst into a huge smile. “Awww, you bloody waster!” he shook a fist at her but laughed, though his eyes were shining with emotion.
She felt emotional too. “Its ok Rob. I understand why you did it.” They both embraced for a long moment.”Ya know, you cry an awful lot for a big guy…”
He shrugged and looked embarrassed. “Well, it’s been an emotional night…”
That was undeniable. “How’s the hand?” she nodded to the hand swathed in bandages, the fingers wrapped in surgical tape from where he had hit her earlier.
“Oh, its alright.”
“Let me see.” She took it tenderly and used her x-ray vision. His little finger was cracked and he had dislocated the middle knuckle of his fourth finger, which had caused a lot of swelling. “Ok, its dislocated, I’m gonna pop this back in for you now, Ok? Nothing to it.”
“Will it hurt?” he said nervously.
“Nah. Big tough guy like you? You’ll be fine. On a count of three, ok?”
“Yeah alr-AAAAAAAAAAAGHHHHHH! FUCK!!!! FUCK!!! FUCK THAT HURT! SHIT! YOU BLOODY SAID ON THREE!” he screamed as she popped the knuckle back in with a loud and painful crack. “AND YOU SAID IT WOULDN’T ‘URT! SHIT!!!! YOU BLOODY ROTTEN THING!!!”
“Well, I kinda lied on both counts…” she smiled at him. She was feeling more her old self. Still slightly empty inside, but infinitely better for his company. She would save her grief for later. As would he, no doubt. She looked at him fondly. He was a good man and she realized a lot of what she had seen here tonight was purely for her benefit, just him putting on a bold front. He no doubt missed his childhood friend, but he had set aside his grief to care for her, to minimize her pain. He really did love her she realized.
“YOU BLOODY COW!” he frowned at her angrily as his dog barked in alarm at all the commotion.
“You big baby.” She said affectionately as he looked at her sheepishly, his palm still clamped under his armpit.
“Finish your tea and piss off” he said with fake anger.
She laughed. That was something a little while ago she never thought she’d do again. She leaned forwards and kissed him on the cheek. He had helped her to pull it together. Now time to earn her keep.
He blushed furiously, but did a poor job of hiding a huge smile. “You know what I’m gonna say, don’t you?” He said, as he saw her turn to leave.
“Rob, with the way your crazy Celtic mind works, I never know what you are gonna say for sure. But this time I think I can guess.”
“Be careful, sis.”
“That was pretty much it.” She gave a shy grin at him.
It was around 5 am by the time she left the shop, and by 9 am Metro time she had saved three car crash victims in a multicar pile up, one family of four from a house fire and even (though she was too embarrassed to mention it) a cat from up a tree. But true redemption for her came when she had assisted a plane with engine trouble. In truth it was not actually in a lot of danger, but her help ensured that there was indeed absolutely no danger at all and it had landed safely.
That one widely reported incident served to temper the public disbelief that she had failed to save the tanker, and exactly as Rob had said, the initial anger and criticism had been dissipated.
Over the next few days she avoided watching the newsfeed footage of the tanker disaster and indeed of the recovery operation – the search for bodies at sea, the attempts to recover wreckage and identify those burned beyond recognition at the cliff top. Anyone outside had been incinerated in the blast, but those in the vehicles had at least retained some semblance of humanity, albeit a very charred one. Only one body had been recovered from the Ocean, a crewman from the little tug that had saved her, the ships engineer. She attended his funeral in secret and also made a point of visiting the widow of the tug boat’s Captain, again incognito. It was difficult but something she felt she owed him. A memorial service for the victims was to be held in three weeks after the search for bodies had finished. She had looked for any bodies herself, but anything exposed to the blast had largely been vapourized, and after several nights searching she too had found nothing. She resumed her regular patrols of Metro city.
When she went out over the city now, she went out for longer, searched a wider distance, trying to protect more people and keep them safe. It was guilt, she knew. But each life saved helped her conscience, restored her self belief.
Rob continued to tell her it wasn’t her fault. Some days she believed him. Some days she didn’t. As on that very first night after the terrible tragedy, her emotions see-sawed between confidence and self-doubt. But in the main, thanks to her friend, her self-belief won out. But there were three instances that got her fully back to her old self.
The first involved an ordinary man called Julio Trecca.
Julio looked down the street from the 14th floor window of his girlfriend’s office building, but failed to see any crowds. He sighed wearily. Typical. No one was ever interested in him. Not his family, not Claudia his (ex) girlfriend, and certainly not all the people busy ignoring him in the street below. He had been up on this ledge for an hour, but no one had even noticed. That bitch who had dumped him was on the holiday at Cape Cod that HE had paid for, with some other guy. He had come to her building to show her, to show her what she meant to him- and she wasn’t even here. She had dumped him three days ago and he never for one second thought the bitch would have the nerve to still go away without him. He had decided to go ahead anyway, at least initially, as he thought the tv and newspaper reports would make her feel guilty when she saw him get talked down. But now, with the world ignoring him, what was the point? But then, what was the point in going on without her? Somehow, though he had fully intended to let himself be stopped from jumping, now he seemed to be intent on committing suicide. He wasn’t sure how that had happened but it had. Fuck it. He looked down between his feet at the street below. It was a loooong way down. To hell with it. He stretched out a foot to step off and closed his eyes.
“WHOA! Only I can pull that kinda stunt off.” said a female voice beside him.
He screamed and cowered back, pressing against the window as he opened his eyes. Supergirl hovered before him, arms folded across her chest.
“Don’t mind me, you carry on.” She said squinting into the sunshine. “But it’s a loooong way down.” She dipped her head to look down below her own dangling feet, turning her toes up idly as she stared. Julio was frozen, arms braced against the window frame.
“Aren’t you gonna…? Ya know…” she whistled and unfolded an arm, arcing the hand up and then slowly down to indicate him jumping off, still with the low, long whistle. When her arm was fully extended she splayed the fingers and made a ‘splat’ noise.
“I-I-I…I don’t know!” he stammered.
“Well, maybe you ought to go in to decide, hmmn?” she looked at him with one eye closed to the sunshine, her golden hair streaming behind her. If ever a man had a reason to live, looking at her at that moment was it. She was stunning.
“I-I…I guess…but….I-I was…I just wanted to show her…”
“Show who? Girlfriend?” he nodded, “Show her what, your intestines? Your brains on the sidewalk?”
He swallowed and half shrugged then seemed to realise he was teetering and gripped the window frame more tightly.
“Why kill yourself over a girl?” she asked him and deep down she was genuinely curious as to his answer. But she hoped for something a little more insightful than what she got.
“I LOVE HER! AND THE BITCH DUMPED ME!” he sobbed, gripping tighter.
She sighed. “Well I’m guessing you didn’t really love her if you are calling your beloved a bitch….?”
“Well,…I…AWWWWWW, I DON’T KNOW!” he seemed to crumple, emotionally and physically. “I-I just wa-AAAAAARRRRRRRGGGGGGHH-OH!”
He screamed as he slipped and fell from the ledge, only to suddenly realise she held him beneath the arms with each hand and flew him gently to land upon the roof. He told her then his story of how his girlfriend had left him and even taken someone else on the trip he had already paid for. She sympathized with his plight but she could also see that what he was suffering was pretty much the same as herself: his confidence and self-belief had been shattered. She still didn’t really know how she could continue to cope, long term, (she just hoped she could) but she did see a way to help him out and restore some of his self-esteem. She waggled her fingers inviting him to hold her hand.
“Fancy a trip to Cape Cod ?” she asked him with a smile.
Julio stopped crying and a huge grin spread over his face as she explained her plan.
Claudia Moreno was sprawled on a towel at the beach, braced, leaning back on her palms. She looked around idly from beneath her sun hat and behind her black shades. Her head froze as she stared down the beach. Her new boyfriend was walking towards her from the right, up from the sea, but she was transfixed, staring off to her left. He followed her gaze as he kept on walking.
Her mouth dropped open and she lowered her shades with one hand to stare over the top of her glasses at what she saw. It appeared to be Supergirl, flying slowly on her back with her arms wrapped around someone who bore a remarkable resemblance to Julio, who appeared to be kissing her. As they very slowly moved passed them at about ten feet off the ground and the same in front of her, they rotated slowly and the man pulled his head up from his onerous duty.
“Oh, hi babes!” he said matter-of-factly, before he resumed his task as they slowly flew by, off to her right, Claudia turning her head to follow them, as did her new boyfriend as he now ended up stumbling backwards toward her, staring after them, before he tripped over her and landed in a heap as she hit him angrily.
“Say, wasn’t that guy your ex? But he was with-“
“YES, I KNOW!!!!” Claudia shouted angrily at him as she huffed and folded her arms irritably.
Kara returned Julio to the roof of his building. He had surprised her by respecting their agreement and only pretending to kiss her. Most guys would have tried it on.
“Thanks.” He smiled gratefully as she set him down.
“No, thank you for being a gentleman. Now, wasn’t that a nicer way to spend the afternoon than denting the sidewalk?” she smiled back at him as he laughed and nodded. “No more self-pity, Ok? There are always reasons to go on as long as you are able. If you are dying anyway or in endless pain then maybe that’s a bit different, but if there’s nothing wrong with you, then there’s no reason to waste your life needlessly. Things can and will get better, no matter what they may look like at the moment. Think of all the people in the world who are struggling to survive, and there’s you just throwing your life away. Or people that might need your help, just like you needed mine today.“
That was the first incident that helped her to recover, as she pondered her own words to Julio :
No more self pity. Things can and will get better, no matter what they may look like at the moment.
The second was the arrival of Aftermath.
I can see your confusion.
)