*4*

Bob was getting hungry and bored. He glanced over at Brandy. What the heck. So, what's she going to say, no? Big deal. He walked over to her desk, leaned slightly over the short partition.

"Hey, can I buy you lunch?"
She smiled, a slight but gentle tug at his soul. "Sure."
That was easy. "How about around 12:30?"
"Yeah, okay," she said, smiling. "I just need to finish this report for MaryAnn," Brandy added, with a nod toward her boss. Bob tapped the top of the partition and went back to his desk.

Bob got back into his work, and before long 12:30 rolled around. He got up and made eye contact with Brandy. She smiled, put down her work, grabbed her purse and stood.

"Meet you at the elevator?" Bob asked.
"Okay," Brandy replied.

Bob stopped over at the men's room to wash up. Hot damn. He went over to the elevator. Hmm, no Brandy. Maybe she is waiting downstairs. What to do - damn, Bob hated being confused. These things happen, a minor miscommunication and the consternation it causes. He thought it best to just stand there and wait for a few minutes. Brandy walked around the corner and smiled.

"Where to?" she inquired.
"Oh, I don't know ... I'm kind of in the mood for something spicy. Hurry Curry?"
"Okay," Brandy smiled again, embellishing a zeitgeist slightly into the nape of his brain.

Normally, Bob would have defended himself, but instead he allowed her intrusion. Subtle and with courtesy, they both understood that they would defer to each other's karma. As they walked down to the restaurant, they explored the boundaries of each other's souls... gently and with respect.

Brandy amazed Bob: although clearly half a saint, other people's feelings toward her strange beauty had torn her badly. Brandy could see how Bob, a spiritualist bound by honor, found himself constantly in a battle with the world of lost expectations. Bob attempted to scan back through time, through Brandy's past, but she instantly blocked him. Bob frowned. He tried to scan forward through time, blocked again. Okay, maybe he was just a figment of Brandy's life, at least for lunch.

Cars passed by in slow motion; Bob and Brandy moved through their own private space. It could have been snowing or a hundred degrees outside, it wouldn't have mattered - they were in their own little world. Suddenly they were at the corner, ready to cross the street. They waited patiently for the light. It could have been seconds, or minutes. Time dissolved as a dimension. They were just souls here, now, in this place. Brandy attempted a packet pass that went over Bob's head: Bob noticed the attempt, but missed the content.

The went into Hurry Curry, grabbed a tray and ordered their dish.

After he had ordered, Brandy asked Bob "don't you want something to drink with that?"
Bob felt a strange mix of emotions. She wasn't being condescending: she actually had some motherly concern for him. "Yeah," Bob said, looking over at the bottled drinks of juice stacked in the mounds of shaved ice. He ordered a lemon iced tea.

They sat and chatted over their lunch. The curry and rice tasted exceptional. They exchanged smiles. The other patrons sitting nearby faded into the background. Brandy exposed the remainder of her soul, backwards through time first. Bob, suitably impressed, noted multiple passages, near-nobility. He couldn't discern the still foggy future. The near future? Short, very short. Why? Brandy cringed.

"What?" Bob asked.
"I've got one of my migraine headaches," Brandy replied.
"Is there anything I can do?" Bob asked.
"No ... they come and go as they please, I'm pretty much used to them by now."
Bob, concerned, started "You should see a doctor ..."

Bob wished he hadn't used "should" as soon as the word left his mouth. Too late. Brandy closed down the window to her soul. Brandy tried to retrieve the probe from Bob's soul, but Bob did a reverse steamroller, freezing the line. Brandy sighed. There were other ways.