He found her still in the office a few moments afterward. She was standing before his Earth poster, with British Columbia and Alaska rearing blue-green over her right shoulder. She was staring at the small photo-album, her eyes obviously overmatched by what they saw. She glanced at him, then closed the album. She set it down on the desk, almost reverently.

'Nora?'

She leaned against the poster and crumpled, not to the ground, but in a direction not described by space. Her sunglasses fell from her fingers.

'I forgot,' she said. She gestured weakly at the album. 'Forgot th-that there were pictures of… pictures of…'

She started weeping.

Thomas clutched her in his arms without realizing he'd crossed the room. She shuddered, sobbed.

'Oh, Tommy,' she gasped. 'Pleeaase-pleease-pleease…'

'Shhh… All we can do is wait, sweetheart. Be strong for Ripley.'

'Ripley,' she sighed, breathing deeply. 'Ripley…' as if she were the only mantra, the only prayer she had left.

He brushed tear-soaked hair from her face, stared into her anguished, vulnerable eyes. She seemed so open, so derelict and exposed. So true.

They kissed. Slow, soft, and yet swollen with promise. She tasted like mint.

Her lips became desperate, even violent. Her hands searched his back. She pressed against him. He clutched her right breast, felt her sigh into his mouth.

He pressed his left hand up her skirt, between her thighs, against warm, powdery cotton. She gasped. She undid his fly, began tugging on his cock with cold hands.

He pulled her panties aside and pressed himself against her heat. She hooked a leg around his thigh, then suddenly, shockingly, he was moving inside her. No, something whispered inside of him, far too late.

She cried out, smeared his cheek with wet lips. He thrust harder. 'Ungh,' she moaned. 'Ungh…'

He'd forgotten that this was what she had felt like—tender, yielding center, clawing legs and arms. Insatiable mouth.

'Upstairs,' she gasped.

He withdrew. Things were moving too fast anyway. He wanted to enjoy her, cherish and remember her. He wanted to make her come the way Neil had made her come.

Thomas scooped her in his arms, carried her down the hall to the stairs. She watched him with swollen eyes. 'I missed you, Tommy,' she whispered.

They undressed slowly, the memory of heat and hardness still thick between them. Then she stood before him, older, but glorious still. How could such a woman…

He pressed her down onto the bed. Tears streamed from her eyes.

'I want my little boy back,' she murmured. 'My little baby.'

Lyrics from a different song.

Thomas stared at her, horror-stricken all over again. She rolled onto her side, and he curled naked behind her. He pressed himself between her legs, but not inside. He held her as she wept. Combed her hair with his fingers.