Her grin widened. The evening was looking better all the time!Rachel looked at herself in the mirror. "You still got it, girl!" she told her reflectio...n as she rotated to check out the skin-tight jeans. She was proud of the firmness she saw and carefully ignored the wrinkles that she didn't want to see ... not if she wanted to stay in a good mood.She slipped off her extravagant diamond ring, put it in her jewelry box, and slipped on her wedding band. It was gorgeous and expensive but not. It’s funny, how I was walking and smiling, knowing I was happy with myself, but my mom and sister are going to freak out. Dad will be curious, but he will be damn proud. I deeply inhaled as I broke through our front door. ‘Mom, I’m home…’ ‘Jason, Honey, come here please. I need some help.’ I walked into the kitchen to see my mom preparing a big dinner. It smelt wonderful, a big turkey, mashed potatoes, carrots, peas, I was overwhelmed. ‘Oh my god, what happened to you!?’ Screeched my grief. Those first days of sheer horror might be two years in the past, but she continued to feel, each time her eyes opened to face yet another day of hopless captivity, the despair of her first seconds after stepping into that tiny cell. Her days were still devoted to forcing her mind to enter another world and leave this claustrophobic hell behind her, but the effort was growing harder each day her ordeal came that bit nearer the end. At the back of her mind was a growing fear that her last few. ” The old man reached down and hugged me then he kissed my brow and said “Have a pleasant journey, my child.” Then I was staring up at a dark black head bowed in grief over me. I noticed for the first time that it was peppered with grey, I couldn’t help but to reach out and stroke that beautiful mane of hair and through a gruff parched throat I said. “You better love me well in this life or you can forget the next one” I still laugh at the look on his face to this day. We don’t talk about it.