"Oh, ok. Some other time then . . . Me too. Bye," Eileen said before hanging up the phone and collapsing onto a chair in the living room.
"I take it your date is cancelled," Veronica guessed.
"Yes, something came up with work that Lawrence has to take care of."
"Well, if you're going to be involved with a man who's serious about his work, you'll have to get used to cancelled plans once in awhile."
"Yes, I know."
"What's this?" Arthur asked, catching the end of their conversation as he entered the room. "I wasn't that neglectful of you when I was working, was I?"
Eileen and Veronica exchanged a look before Veronica answered, "No, dear, you weren't. I've never felt neglected by you. I've always understood how important your work is to you and I understood when you had to cancel plans because things at the office had to come first. Of course, I'm just as dedicated to my own work and there were times when I had to put my career and my patients first too."
Eileen listened with interest, picking up on that last point especially. With her career as a psychic phone friend cut short and her days as the life of the party on campus behind her, she really needed something else in her life. As strongly as she felt about Lawrence, her life couldn't revolve around him and she didn't want it to be all about him.
"Now that I'm out of business, I should start making up for that lost time," Arthur declared. "I'm here for you both any time you need me with nothing to call me away."
Veronica smiled. The therapy must be helping. Arthur was finally starting to seem like himself again.
"Since none of us have any other plans, why don't we spend this evening out as a family?" she suggested. "We can go out to dinner. As long as I don't get an emergency call from a patient we should have no interruptions."
Zara opened the front door of the house she rented on campus, to see Lawrence waiting on the other side. For a moment she was too surprised to say anything.
"Hi, I was wondering if we could talk," Lawrence said.
"Sure, come in." Zara stepped aside to let him in.
"I'm sure you know why I'm here, so I'll get straight to the point. I saw you protesting at the building site and I want to know why your group is so opposed to it."
Zara never would have thought that he would want to hear their point of view. Pleasantly surprised, she decided to make the most of the opportunity. "Autumn Lake is a pristine natural area. We don't want to see the beauty of the area destroyed and the wildlife displaced just so you and your friends can build some fancy, exclusive place to live. There isn't a shortage of housing in Bay Pointe, there's a shortage of natural areas and once the natural areas are gone they can't be rebuilt as easily as a housing division."
"The housing board has done an assessment of the area. If our plans were disruptive to an area that needs to be protected, they would reject our proposal."
"Just because they should, doesn't mean they will. People in power have been known to take bribes."
"Not in this case. There is no bribery involved and no pulling of strings. We are doing everything we can to make sure everything is done correctly. I want everyone to know that."
"That's not really the point," Zara said. "We really just want to make sure the area is protected. We don't want it destroyed by a big housing division."
"The main reason we want to build there is because it is a beautiful area and we definitely don't want to do anything to destroy that. I wanted to talk to you to find out if there is some way we can work together to reach a compromise. There must be something we can do to make this project acceptable to both sides."
"I'm not sure what that would be, but I'll talk to the others and see what they think," Zara promised.
Lawrence thanked her and said goodbye. He drove away just as Thomas was walking up to the door.
"Was that Lawrence Arrendale I just saw leaving here? What did he want?"
"You won't believe it. He actually wanted to listen to our views and he's interested in working out a compromise. Isn't that great news? We actually caught their attention and we're getting something accomplished."
"Don't get ahead of yourself. Nothing is accomplished until we put a stop to this proposal."
"But with the right compromise-"
"Don't be so naive, Zara. This isn't a situation that can be compromised. It's all or nothing." Thomas looked thoughtful for a moment. He didn't trust Lawrence's reasons for approaching Zara. "What exactly did you tell him?"
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