| Notes on "First Touch" This story stems from a reflection on the ways in which the Internet has changed traditional rules of human interaction and the possibilities that presents. It takes the premise of works like 'You've Got Mail' and stretches it to it's potential extreme--having the first sensory contact between two people being of the most intimate type. From a narrative standpoint, I couldn't envision the opening other than how I wrote it, with the woman ready and waiting. However, that meant compressing the story into the 'time' it takes someone to walk up a staircase, so resort to the flashback technique used in "Atonement" was necessary. The challenge was to give enough background to flesh out the characters and explain the premise without having the background story line swamp the main one. The idea of inter-weaving the two threads and having them meet at a point seemed a solution. Left to the reader's imagination is the whole dialogue by which the characters 'plan' the event and such doubts the main character may have had as to the sanity of the idea. Were I to do this story over today, I might have the characters' sexual experience be a bit more awkward (which would seem to me closer to likely reality). This was my second story, and the first omitted sexual union altogether, so I guess I felt compelled a bit to include a grand 'climactic' moment. NCM Jan. '01
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