Lucinda had not been sleeping well for a month or so, but it had been especially hard tonight. Shed finally made that damned appointment. Shed been hoping she could avoid it, figuring that the result of Kels sperm test would come back with their answers. But when his results had come back totally fine, her worst fears had been realized; their inability to have children was all on her.

She fumbled with the pack of cigarettes and lit one up in the darkness. She hated the habit and only had a few a week. She figured if things went well tomorrow and the following days, shed have to give the habit up. She was fine with that, though. It was a small price to pay if it meant she and Kel could get pregnant.

Taking a deep drag and puffing it out into the night, Lucinda wondered if thirty-nine was too old to be making a push for pregnancy. It made her regret waiting so long. Until two years ago, she and Kel had both agreed they never wanted to have kids. But something had changed in both of them and now here she was, Lucinda Masters, age thirty-nine, with an appointment with a specialist the following day.

As she took another drag, she realized that though she was tired, she did have a good feeling about tomorrow. She and Kel had made their change of heart on kids unprompted and at roughly the same time. It almost seemed destined to work out. She wondered if

She heard something to the right, just beyond the deck. She walked in that direction, wondering if the damned racoons had come back. Theyd been a menace to the neighborhood last fall, tearing through everyones trash cans. She walked to the railing, nudging past the grill, and looked over.

At first, her eyes did not understand what she was seeing. Shed been expecting to see a racoon or twoso when she saw the figure of a man standing right there at the edge of her deck, there seemed to be a hiccup between her eyes and her brain. And by the time she figured out exactly what she was seeing, the man was reaching up towards her.

Lucinda let out a cry of surprise, the cigarette falling from her mouth, but it was cut short by the sudden pain along her scalp. It felt like she was being skinned alive up there and it took the sudden jerking motion and then her falling over the side of the deck railing to understand that the man was pulling her by her hair. When she fell, the scream tried to come out again. But when her back and head struck the yard six feet below, all of the wind went rushing out of her.