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as memories of the past swept over her. College was…freedom.
                  “I had this roommate,” she said quietly, “who grew up in a strict religious family, so when she got to college it was like she was a prisoner just released from death row. She wanted to do everything: eat ice cream and French fries, go to clubs and drink alcohol, date a dozen different guys and not introduce them to her pastor.” Jo laughed at the memory. “It was a real experience following her around and seeing all those mundane things through her eyes and experiencing the clubs and the boys with her.”
                  “I knew some guys like that in the military,” Mark told her. “But somehow they always managed to get themselves, or me, into trouble.”
                  Jo nodded, glancing at him under her eyelashes. “She eventually had to go home because her parents got wind of some of the things we were doing. They blamed me.”
                  “Of course. People like that can’t imagine that their sainted children could turn bad on their own.”              
                  “I often wonder what happened to her.”
                  “She probably wonders the same thing about you.”              
                  Jo balled her napkin in her hand and tossed it on the table. “I don’t know. But she changed my life. I had never really dated until I met her.”
                  “I bet you had a lot of admirers in college.”
                  Jo blushed again, the familiar heat rushing across her face. “There were a few,” she admitted.
                  “But no soul mates?”
                  “No soul mates.” Jo grew wistful for a minute. “A few really great practice runs, though.”
                  Mark shifted in his seat and rubbed his palms against the rough fabric of his jeans. “I always wondered what it would have been like to go to college instead of the military. Not much opportunity for clubbing and dating in the Army.”
                  “How did you meet your wife?”
                  “Hmm,” he sighed, tension causing him to sit up a little straighter. “We were high school sweethearts.”
                  “Romance over Algebra books, huh?” Jo asked in what she hoped was a light tone.
                  “Something like that.” Mark glanced at his left hand, as though looking for the wedding ring that should have been there. “We dated all through high school, but she ended it when she found out I was joining the Army. That lasted about six months. Then we got engaged when I came home on leave. A year later, we were married. Would have been eighteen years last August.”
                  “I’m sorry,” Jo said quietly.
                  Mark glanced around the deli, as though he had just realized where they were. “I should go,” he said abruptly.
                  “Mark, I—”
                  But he was gone.
     
     

Chapter 7
     
                  Jo was scrolling through the movies on her DVR when the phone rang. She groaned when she saw her mother’s number on the caller ID. She knew it couldn’t be good, her mother calling her this early in the afternoon. Her mother believed in sleeping until noon and spending the afternoon having facials, manicures, and whatever else it took to keep her looking the way she did. Therefore, a call before four o’clock always meant bad news.
                  “Hello, mother,” Jo said formally into the phone.
                  “Where did you go last night? Did you know we ran out of champagne? Do you realize how embarrassing it is to run out of champagne at your daughter’s engagement party? How could you allow that to