Purely by Accident

Cecil Lawrence was lost in thought the day he met Mark Vogel. Being lost in thought and not watching where he was going was the catalyst that facilitated the chance meeting between the two men when Cecil happened to step out in front of Mark's car. The next time the two men met was a few hours later on the sixth floor of the Parkland Hospital where Cecil had been taken and where Mark had gone, after dealing with the police, to check up on how the older man was doing. It was the first of a number of visits over the next few days and the beginning of a deep and meaningful friendship between the two. Cecil Lawrence was retired from a job that "involved computers". He had recently returned to Texas, after over two decades living outside of the US, in hopes of receiving treatment for what turned out to be terminal cancer. Mark Vogel was a middle-aged software executive with a company of which he had once been a part owner. Struggling with a marriage he was regretting...