person in this entire city – the city she had chosen for her new life – facing her exact conundrum. Abby picked up her canvas, intending to lay it carefully on the ground in preparation for packing away her easel and other supplies, but before she continued, she paused to take a closer look. As she had expected, there he was, the face she saw in her head, projected onto one of the passers-by in the painting. The features she had outlined were disturbing, not because they were alien, like those of the faces around her, but because they were so close to being familiar. They added up to a face that looked almost like one she could have grown up with, but slightly off – the skin a little too ruddy, the shape a little too round. The overall effect wasn’t ugly, far from it; rather, it was just different enough to be unsettling. I can’t get away from him today, she thought. Why? She felt she could have closed her eyes, reached out her hand, and closed it on him; or failing that, run straight to him, the Bond pulling her in his direction. Her thoughts were disrupted by a chime. Her breath skipped and she nearly jumped in surprise, but she recovered quickly and, after setting her canvas down, picked up her cell phone from where it had been sitting on her easel. She didn’t recognize the number offhand, but she flipped open the phone anyway, fairly certain of who would be on the other end.
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