I know I could have milked this one into a tear-jerker; but if you have read my other works, you know that that is not my style. I hadn't wanted this to be a wallow-fest, and so I went the more contemplative route.
As a writing exercise for myself, I wrote a companion piece in which I tried to keep the story as similar as possible to this one, except that I reversed the roles. (That is, I had had Lois be the survivor and only made changes to the story where required to maintain character consistency.) Because that story didn't prove to be as strong, and because about 90% or 95% of it is identical to this story, I am not posting it here. But if anyone really wants to see it, I would be happy to e-mail it to them privately.
As always, all feedback appreciated.
Joy,
Lynn
