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that they were meant for each other. Louise’s was black and Reuben’s was maroon. Mary parked her car, and she and Ponter headed for the front door. Mary had to pass Louise’s car; she thought about feeling the hood, but had no doubt it had long since cooled off.
    Reuben had a couple of acres of land in Lively, a small town outside of Sudbury. Mary quite liked his house, which was two stories tall, large, and modern. She rang the doorbell, and a moment later Reuben appeared, with Louise standing behind him.
    “Mary!” exclaimed Reuben, gathering Mary into a hug. “And Ponter!” he said, once he’d released Mary, hugging him as well.
    Reuben Montego was trim, thirty-five, and black, with a shaved head. He was wearing a sweat suit with the Toronto Blue Jays logo across its chest.
    “Come in, come in,” said Reuben, ushering them out of the cool evening air into his home. Mary removed her shoes, but Ponter couldn’t—because he wasn’t wearing any. He had on Neanderthal pants, which flared out at the bottoms into built-in footwear.
    “It is a quarantine reunion!” declared Ponter, appraising their little group. And indeed it was: the four of them had been locked in together for four days by the order of Health Canada when Ponter had fallen ill during his first visit.
    “Indeed it is, my friend,” said Reuben, acknowledging Ponter’s comment. Mary looked around; she very much liked the furnishings—a smart mixture of Caribbean and Canadian, with built-in bookcases and dark wood everywhere. Reuben himself was a bit of a slob, but his ex-wife had obviously had great taste.
    Mary found herself immediately relaxing in this place. Of course, it didn’t hurt that this was where she’d begun to fall in love with Ponter, or that, indeed, this had become her refuge, safely locked in, with RCMP officers outside, just two days after she’d been raped by Cornelius Ruskin on the campus of Toronto’s York University.
    “It’s a bit late in the season for it,” said Reuben, “but I thought we’d try a barbecue.”
    “Yes, please!” said Ponter, most enthusiastically.
    Reuben laughed. “All right, then. Let me get to it.”

    Louise Benoît was a vegetarian, but she didn’t mind eating with those who were enjoying meat—which was a good thing, because Ponter
really
enjoyed meat. Reuben had put three giant slabs of beef on the grill, while Louise had busied herself making a salad. Reuben kept coming in from the backyard, working with Louise on getting everything set. Mary watched them puttering about the kitchen, working together, touching each other affectionately now and again. The early days of Mary’s marriage to Colm had been like that; later, it had seemed as though they were always in each other’s way.
    Mary and Ponter had offered to help, but Reuben had said none was necessary, and soon enough dinner was on the table, and the four of them sat down to eat. It stunned Mary that she’d known these people—three of the most important people in her life—for only three months. When worlds collide, things change
fast
.
    Mary and Reuben were eating their steaks with knives and forks. Ponter was wearing recyclable dining gloves he’d brought with him, grasping his hunk of meat and tearing chunks off with his teeth.
    “It’s been an amazing few months,” said Reuben, perhaps thinking the same thing Mary had been. “For all of us.”
    Indeed it had been. Ponter Boddit had accidentally been transferred to this version of reality when a quantum-computing experiment he’d been performing went awry. Back on his version of Earth, Ponter’s man-mate, Adikor Huld, had been accused of murdering him and then disposing of the body. Adikor, plus Ponter’s elder daughter, Jasmel Ket, had managed to re-establish the interuniversal portal long enough to bring Ponter home—and to exonerate Adikor in the process.
    Once back home, Ponter had convinced the High Gray Council to let him and Adikor try to open a permanent