2020届山西省临汾市高三高考考前适应性训练考试（二）英语试题 Word版含答案

姓名 准考证号
秘密★启用前
临汾市2020年高考考前适应性训练考试（二）
英 语
注意事项：
1. 本试卷分第I卷（选择题）和第II卷（非选择题）两部分。第I卷1至11页，第n卷 11至12页。
2. 答题前,考生务必将自己的姓名、准考证号填写在本试卷和答题卡的相应位置。
3. 全部答案在答题卡上完成,答在本试卷上无效。
4. 第[卷听力部分满分30分，不计入总分，考试成绩录取时提供给高校作参考。
5. 考试结束后，将本试卷和答题卡一并交回。
第I卷
第一部分 听力（共两节，满分30分,不计入总分）
做题时，先将答案标在试卷上。录音内容结束后，你将有两分钟的时间将试卷上的答案 转涂到答题卡上。
第一节（共5小题;每小题1.5分，满分7.5分）
听下面5段对话。每段对话后有一个小题,从题中所给的A、B、C三个选项中选出最佳 选项，并标在试卷的相应位置。听完每段对话后，你都有10秒钟的时间来回答有关小题和 阅读下一小题。每段对话仅读一遍。
例:How much is the shirt?
A. £ 19.15. B. £ 9.15. C. £ 9.18.
答案 :[A] [B] [C]
1. What is the woman going to do?
A. Have a coffee・ B. Clean her office. C. Attend a meeting.
2. At what time will the speakers get to London?
A. About 12：15. B. About 12：30. C. About 12：45.
3. What are the speakers probably doing?
A. Preparing for camping. B. Buying sleeping bags. C. Cleaning up the car.
4. What are the speakers mainly talking about?
A. The coming rain. B. Their favorite games. C. The weather.
5. How much will the woman pay?
A. $ 12. B. $ 8. C. $ 6.
第二节（共15题。每题1.5分，共22.5分）
听下面5段对话或独白。每段对话或独白后有几个小题,从题中所给的A、B、C三个选 项中选出最佳选项，并标在试卷的相应位置。听每段对话或独白前，你将有时间阅读各个小 题,每小题5秒钟;听完后，各小题将给出5秒钟的作答时间。每段对话或独白读两遍。 听第6段材料，回答第6至7题。
6. Why has the man never seen the woman lately?
A. She had a traffic accident.
B. She moved to another place .
C. She is working unusual hours.
7. Where does the conversation take place?
A. In an office. B. At a bus stop. C. In an apartment.
听第7段材料，回答第8至9题。
8. What are the speakers mainly talking about?
A. The color of a painting. B. The meaning of a painting. C. The style of a painting.
9. How does the man know about painting?
A. He took some courses.
B. He worked for an artist.
C. He learned it from his aunt.
听第8段材料，回答第10至12题。
10. What are the two speakers generally talking about?
A. People in big shops.
B. Shopping in different places.
C. Goods in various qualities.
11. What is the man?
A. An employee of a department store.
B. A manager of a supermarket.
C. A salesman in a small shop.
12. What might the woman think of supermarket staff?
A. They' re very nice. B. They' re unkind. C. They' re well - paid.
听第9段材料，回答第13至16题。
13. Where is the woman going on a trip next summer?
A. South America. B. Central Europe. C. Northern Europe.
14. How many people is the woman traveling with?
A. Seven. B. Six. C. Five.
15. When is the woman probably leaving?
A. Next July. B. Next August. C. Next October.
16. What will the speakers do next?
A. Have dinner. B. Pay their bill. C. Find another restaurant.
听第10段材料，回答第17至20题。
17. What did the speaker decide to do after lunch that day?
A. Stay to help her friend. B. Walk alone to her car. C. Wait for the rain to stop.
18. What can we learn about the speaker then?
A. She worked at a hotel. B. She had bought a new car. C. She was having a baby soon.
19. Where did the speaker meet the taxi passenger?
A. At a crossroads. B. In front of a hotel. C. Beside a car park.
20. What does the speaker talk about?
A. An exciting lunch party. B. A well- known short story. C. An unforgettable experience.
第二部分阅读理解（共两节，满分60分）
第一节（共15小题;每小题3分，满分45分）
阅读下列短文，从每题所给的四个选项（A、B、C和D）中，选出最佳选项,并在答题卡上 将该项涂黑。
A
Support tech education for street youth in Lebanon
About CodeBrave
We train former street youth in digital skills, coding and robotics, helping them to secure jobs that are not only well-paid but future-proof too. We run our programme in a shelter for homeless children.
We have now been successfully carrying out the programme since June 2018. In this time, our children have gone from barely knowing how to use a computer, to writing the code for basic websites totally from scratch. We want to carry on developing the programme in 2020 by continuing appropriate tech education of 2() children, and to engage a further 40 children.
Former street youth are often forced into exploitative work.
Young people living in shelter often end up back on the street as soon as they leave state care. They become trapped in a cycle of poverty, as they don't have marketable skills to secure well-paid work. Often the only work opportunities available to them are hard manual labour.
Why is the tech sector a window of opportunity?
Tech education provides young people with marketable skills in a sector where there is a growing demand and shortage of supply in the Middle East. It also gives them access to an international online job market.
Where Your Money Will Go
Help us give former street youth in Lebanon an alternative to exploitative work through tech education.

Flexible funding — this project will receive all donations made by 3rd April 2020 at 11:55pm

£25 or more
Funds I student's coding & robotics education for a month.

£50 or more
Funds a new Arduino robotics starter kit for our students.

£100 or more
Funds 1 student through an internship(实习期)(for bus and lunch money).

£300 or more Funds 1 student's coding & robotics education for 1 year.

21. What can we learn about CodeBrave?
A. It's a shelter for the young. B. It's a free project in digital skills.
C. It's a program for the homeless. D. It's a profitable training organization.
22. What made CodeBrave choose tech education?
A. The importance of marketable skills. B. The desire to get rid of poverty.
C. The request from the state care. D. The demand of the employment market.
23 . Where are most of the donations spent?
A. Equipment. B. Teacher Training.
C. Operational Costs. D. Teaching Costs.
B
Going to college was not optional. In my family, it was just another step toward the American dream. As soon as I graduated, I enrolled （入学）in the English Department of Colorado State University. I went on to earn two scholarships, and membership in the National Honor Society. I truly believed the hard work was worth it.
It wasn't until a few months ago that I realized how clueless I was. I had been combing through the classifieds when my eyes fell upon my dream job. t（ National College Magazine looking for writers .”
Thrilled, I spent the weekend composing a resume . Needless to say, I was stunned when the interviewer barely took one glance before throwing it aside.
"No experience," he said flatly.
I felt like screaming, "What do you mean, no experience? Look at these grades・"
I was left to absorb the shock of rejection, thinking that nobody ever told me that a 4. 0 student would be turned down for a job.
Didn't all of my hard work count for anything?
I see plenty of demands for two years of experience at a print publication, but none requiring extensive knowledge of how to write academic papers. Yet 95% of my energy in school went toward the latter, leaving me little time to devote to anything else. If career preparation is supposed to be the point of college, then why isn't it the focus?
Has a college degree just become another societal status symbol like fancy cars or designer clothes?
Given my experience, I feel that a college degree would be a lot more valuable if students were required to get some outside experience to supplement their in — class knowledge. Instead of requiring four science classes, why not three science classes and an internship? In my college career, I took one class that taught me how to write and submit essays for publication. This ever — so — brief taste of the real world was like holding an ice cream sundae in front of a child and only giving her a small bite.
24. Why did the author study so hard at college?
A. To maintain a family tradition. B. To land an ideal job.
C. To fulfill parents' expectations. D. To win scholarships for the tution
25 . What accounted for the author's failure in job hunting?
A. His dull resume. B. His misjudgment in high scores.
C. His lack of experience. D. His poor performance in the interview.
26. What does the underlined sentence in the last paragraph imply?
A. Academic writing is a small part of college life.
B. College education always covers unimportant things.
C. Competition in college is not as fierce as that in the real world.
D. The author feels held back by his lack of real — world experience.
27. What does the author want to tell us by writing this article?
A. Get a college degree and you will go far.
B. College students should make the best of their time.
C. Career preparation is a necessity for college education.
D. Landing a successful career is better than a college degree.
C
They asked Katherine Johnson for the moon, and she gave it to them. With little more than a pencil, a slide rule and one of the finest mathematical minds in the country, Mrs. Johnson, who died at 101 on Monday, calculated the precise trajectories （轨道）that would let Apollo 11 land on the moon in 1969 and, after Neil Armstrong's history—making moonwalk, let it return to Earth.
Yet throughout Mrs. Johnson's 33 years in NASA and for decades afterward, almost no one knew her name.
Mrs. Johnson was one of several hundred strictly educated, supremely capable yet largely unrecognized women who, well before the modem feminist movement, worked as NASA mathematicians. But it was not only her sex that kept her long unsung. For some years at midcentury, the black women were subjected to a double segregation （隔离）：They were kept separate from the much large group of white women who in turn were segregated from the agency's male mathematicians and engineers.
Mrs. Johnson broke barriers at NASA・ In old age, Mrs. Johnson became the most celebrated of black women who served as mathematicians for the space agency. Their story was told in the 2016 Hollywood film "Hidden Figures," which was nominated for three Oscars, including best picture.
In 2017, NASA dedicated a building in her honor. That year, The Washington Post described her as " the most high - profile of the computers" — " computers ” being the term originally used to describe Mrs. Johnson and her colleagues, much as “typewriters” were used in the 19th century to represent professional typists.
She "helped our nation enlarge the frontiers of space," NASA's administrator, Jim Bridenstine, said in a statement on Monday, "even as she made huge steps that also opened doors for women and people of color in the universal human quest to explore space."
As Mrs. Johnson herself was fond of saying, her tenure （任期）at Langley — from 1953 until her retirement in 1986 — was “a time when computers wore skirts."
28. What is the function of the first paragraph?
A. To present the Apollo moon mission.
B. To stress Mrs. Johnson's contributions
C. To honour Neil Armstrong's moonwalk.
D To mourn a great woman—Mrs. Johnson.
29. What does the underlined word "barriers” in Paragraph 4 refer to ?
A. Gender inequality and color line.
B. Mrs. Johnson's unrecognized talents.
C. The agency's male mathematicians and engineers.
D. The hardships before the modem feminist movement.
30. Why were Mrs. Johnson and her colleagues described as "computers"?
A. Because they used computers to keep their work secret.
B. Because they were the agency's human calculators'
C. Because computer systems engaged them deeply.
D. Because they opened a door to outer space.
31. What can we learn from Mrs. Johnson's experience?
A. Try things that may not work.
B. The world awaits our discovery.
C' Use knowledge to wipe out ignorance '
D. Never be limited by the labels attached by others.
D
Although it has been indicated in recent years that plants are capable of seeing, hearing and smelling, they are still usually thought of as silent. But now, for the first time, Itzhak Khait and his colleagues at Tel Aviv University in Israel found that tomato and tobacco plants made ultrasonic （超声的）sounds at frequencies humans can't hear when stressed by a lack of water or when their stem is cut.
Microphones placed 10 centimeters from the plants picked up sounds in the ultrasonic range of 20 to 100 kilohertz. Human hearing usually ranges from 20 hertz to 20 kilohertz. " These findings can alter the way we think about the plant kingdom , " they wrote in their study, which has not yet been published.
On average, drought - stressed tomato plants made 35 sounds an hour, while tobacco plants made 11. When plant stems were cut, tomato plants made an average of 25 sounds in the following hour, and tobacco plants 15. Unstressed plants produced fewer than one sound per hour. It is even possible to distinguish between the sounds to know what the stress is. The researchers trained a machine — learning model to separate the plants，sounds from those of the wind, rain and other noises of the greenhouse, correctly identifying in most cases whether the stress was caused by dryness or a cut, based on the sound's intensity and frequency. Water — hungry tobacco appeared to make louder sounds than cut tobacco, for example. Although Khait and his colleagues only looked at tomato and tobacco plants, they believe other plants may make sounds when stressed.
Enabling farmers to listen for water — stressed plants could " open a new direction in the field of precision(（精准）agriculture", the researchers suggest. They add that such an ability will be increasingly important as climate change exposes more areas to drought.
Khait's study also suggests that insects and some mammals can hear and respond to from as far as 5 metres away. A moth may decide against laying eggs on a plant that sounds water - stressed. Edward Farmer at the University of Lausanne, Switzerland thinks the idea that moths might be listening to plants is “a little too speculative”. After all, there are already plenty of explanations for why insects avoid some plants and not others.
32. What were tomato and tobacco plants' reactions to different stresses?
A. They reacted to different types of stress with the same sound.
B. Cut tomato plants produced more sounds per hour than water — hungry ones .
C. Cut tobacco plants seemed to make lower sounds than drought - stressed ones.
D. Tobacco plants might make louder sounds than tomato plants when short of water.
33. What's the main idea of Paragraph 4?
A. The potential applications of the research.
B. Challenges facing farmers in the future.
C. Farmers' contributions to the research.
D. The future development of agriculture.
34. What does the underlined word "speculative" in the last paragraph probably mean?
A. Practical. B. Surprising. C. Unsupported. D. Complicated.
35. What may be the best tide for the text?
A. Silent scream B. Mysteries of nature
C. Inner voices D. A yet - to-be - published study
第二节 （共5小题;每小题3分，满分15分）
根据短文内容，从短文后的选项中选出能填入空白处的最佳选项。选项中有两项为多 余选项。
I was packing my suitcase for a trip. By the time I got to the hall closet, I couldn't remember what I came for. 36 However, as a neuroscientist, I know the problem is not what it seems.
37 But age is not the major factor so commonly assumed. The 20 - year - old often make short — term memory errors as well. They walk into the wrong classroom. They forget what the professor said two minutes ago. On the other hand, some aspects of memory actually get better as we age. For instance, our ability to extract patterns, regularities （规律）and to make accurate predictions improves over time. 38 If you' re going to get an X - ray, you want a 70 — year — old radiologist reading it, not a 30 - year - old one.
So how do we account for our experience that older adults seem to have difficulty with words and names? 39 As long as given a little more time, older adults perform just fine. Second, older adults have to search through more memories than do younger adults to find the fact or piece of information they're looking for. Your brain becomes crowded with memories and information. It's not that you can't remember. Actually, you can! 40
So, my advice is experiencing new things. It is the best way to keep the mind young and growing — into our 80s, 90s and beyond.
A. That's because we've had more experience.
B. First, there is a widespread cognitive （认知的）slowing with age.
C. This is widely understood to be a classic problem of aging.
D. First of all, senior citizens have better long - term memories.
E. It's just that there is so much more information to sort through.
F. Besides, I forget names that I used to be able to think of effortlessly.
G. Researches show that our ability of the short — term memory declines slightly after 30.
第三部分 英语知识运用（共两节，满分55分）
第一节 完形填空（共20小题海小题2分，满分40分）
阅读下面短文，从短文后各题所给的四个选项（A、B、C和D）中,选出可以填入空白处 的最佳选项，并在答题卡上将该选项涂黑。
I spent one Sunday afternoon helping my friend put together the ice hockey net he' d just bought for his kids. It 41 me of my childhood when my friends and I played our games with do - it - yourself 42 , which helped us to be 43 and taught us leadership and teamwork.
Each goal of our game was 44 by two boots spaced as equally apart as we could manage. The trouble was that they often went 45 when the puck （冰球）hit them hard enough. The 46 had to chase a boot that had moved, and reset it quickly, or risk someone taking 47 and scoring a goal. And we also had to 48 our eyes peeled for the occasional 49 goalkeeper who might move the boots closer together.
This situation led to 50 over what might or might not have been a goal, but we improved our debating skills and learned to 51 to kids who wanted to dominate （控制）everyone else.
52 , the number of competitors would 53 out as moms called them home for supper.
We had to trade the players and reset the team to keep the teams 54 We joined our new team no questions asked, just taking the position on the ice the captain 55 us to. With fewer players on the ice, there was more 56 to freewheel. We learned to 57 the adjustments well, turning enemies into friends and learning to work as a（n） 58 team. This was another valuable lesson .
Sometimes we are asked to 59 specific and measurable goals. But I raise a stick to 60 goals, to playing under a starry sky with boots as goalposts. Here's to goals that are boundless.
41. A. convinced
B. freed
C. reminded
D. informed
42. A. sticks
B. nets
C. skates
D. pucks
43. A. creative
B. ambitious
C. pleasant
D. practical
44. A. checked
B. assessed
C. settled
D. marked
45. A. shaking
B. wandering
C. sliding
D. skipping
46. A. children
B. competitors
C. goalkeeper
D. captain
47. A. courage
B. action
C. responsibility
D. advantage
48. A. keep
B. fix
C. open
D. make
49. A. unfriendly
B. dishonest
C. awkward
D. selfish
50. A. agreements
B. arguments
C. complaints
D. puzzlement
51. A. give up
B. stand up
C. live up
D. look up
52. A. Unavoidably
B. Coincidentally
C. Surprisingly
D. Unexpectedly
53. A. clear
B. drop
C. thin
D. run
54. A. even
B. just
C. moving
D. continuing
55 . A. forced
B. invited
C. pushed
D. pointed
56. A. space
B. energy
C. strength
D. time
57. A. judge
B. manage
C. evaluate
D. change
58. A. easier
B. better
C. new
D. strong
59. A. treasure
B. confirm
C. achieve
D. identify
60. A. short - term
B. firm
C. everlasting
D. imprecise

第II卷
第三部分英语知识运用(共两节，满分55分)
第二节(共10小题;每小题1.5分，满分15分)
阅读下面材料，在空白处填入适当的内容(1个单词)或括号内单词的正确形式。
Modem mammals, including humans, owe their sharp sense of hearing 61 three tiny bones in the middle ear that were absent in their reptile ancestors, but the point at which this transformation 62 ( occur) has remained unclear.
Scientists have now identified the transitional stages in the remains of a 63 ( new) discovered species that lived 125 million years ago in 64 is now northeastern China: effectively a missing link in the evolutionary chain. Their 65 ( find) were published in the journal Science on Thursday and 66 ( welcome) as a landmark moment in the field of paleontology by peers.
Senior author Jin Meng of the American Museum of Natural History in New York explained that the study was based on the remains of six individual animals, 67 ( name) " Origolestes lii". The hearing system in mammals is 68 (delicate) and complex than that in reptiles, who use their jaws to both chew and to transmit external sound. It was assumed that the so — called separation of the hearing and chewing system removed the physical limits the two processes placed on each other, 69 (allow) mammals to both diversify their diet and improve their hearing.
"Now we have provided the fossil evidence in the evolutionary time 70 confirms the assumption," said Meng.
第四部分 写作（共两节，满分35分）
第一节 短文改错（共10小题;每小题1分，满分10分）
假定英语课上老师要求同桌之间交换修改作文，请你修改你同桌写的以下作文。文中 共有10处语言错误,每句中最多有两处。每处错误仅涉及一个单词的增加、删除或修改。
增加:在缺词处加一个漏字符号（∧)），并在其下面写出该加的词。
删除:把多余的词用斜线（\）划掉。
修改:在错的词下划一横线，并在该词下面写出修改后的词。
注意：1 .每处错误及其修改均仅限一词；
2.只允许修改10处，多者（从第11处起）不计分。
My grandfather5 s motto a Nothing is ever easy” seldom gets across to me until a couple of day ago. I was doing my day's work while I noticed a bumblebee on the skylight. I thought to myself remove the bee would be easy. But after my fighting with it for a hour, the insect was still here. I was disappointed find the living room was in a mess and that I was extreme exhausted. I did not expect to waste so much time in the insect. Only then did I understand what my grandfather was meant.
第二节书面表达（满分25分）
假定你是李华，你校交换生Jim回国后，想通过形象的手绘图片教他同学学习汉字。他 向你求助，希望你能帮他画出图片。请你回信询问以下内容：
1.所教汉字； 2.着色与否； 3.截止日期。
注意：1.词数100左右；
2.可适当增加细节,以使行文连贯。

2020 年高考考前适应性训练考试（二）英语答案及听力材料
听力
1-5 CBACC 6-10 CBACB 11-15 BBACA 16-20 ABCAC 阅读理解
21-23 BDDBC 26-30 DCBAB 31-35 DCACA 36-40 CGABE 完型填空
41-45 CBADC 46-50 CDABB 51-55 BACAD 56-60 ABCDD
语法填空
61. to 62. occurred 63. newly 64. what 65. findings 66. welcomed 67. named 68. more delicate 69. allowing 70. that / which
短文改错

书面表达
One possible version
Dear Jim,
I hope this email finds you well. It impresses me greatly that you plan to teach your classmates some basic Chinese characters with hand-drawn pictures. I'm willing to lend a helping hand, but I need to inquire about some details .
To start with, would you please give me a list of Chinese characters you want to teach, which helps me make preparations in advance. Moreover, it's necessary for me to know whether you prefer the pictures in colors or in black and white. The last point I'm not certain about is the deadline for this.
Please do feel free to let me know if you have other requirements. Looking forward to your early reply.
Yous sincerely,
Li Hua
听力材料
Text 1
M: What about coming to my place for a coffee, Mary?
W: I can't, John. I've got a meeting at ten o'clock, so I have to go to my office now. Another time, maybe.
Text 2
W: Excuse me, sir. What time is it now?
M: It's almost 12:15. We'll arrive in London in about a quarter of an hour.
Text 3
M: Well, I think we've got everything in the car.
W: I thought the tent wasn't going to fit. And the sleeping bags and fishing equipment take up a lot
of space, too.
Text 4
M: I hope the weather is nice this weekend, so I can go and play basketball.
W: I heard that the weather should be good. It's not very likely to rain.
M: Hopefully, we'll both have good weekends.
Text 5
W: How much are these eggs?
M: $1 for one, $2 for 3 and $3 for 6.
W: I would like a dozen, please. Here is the money.
听第 6 段材料，回答第 6 至 7 题。
Text 6
W: Hi, Don! So nice to see you.
M: Pam! Where have you been for the last three months? I never see you anymore.
W: Oh, I've been working strange hours these days. I don't see much of anyone anymore.
M: Well, I understand. I wish I could stay and talk, but here comes my bus. Why don't we go out sometime?
W: I'd like that. Call me soon.
M: Sure. Are you still living in the same apartment?
W: On Walker Avenue.
M: Okay. Take care!
W: Yeah, you too. See you later!
听第 7 段材料，回答第 8 至 9 题。
Text 7
M: Hey, Rose. That's really a lovely painting.
W: Thanks, Ted. But it's not that perfect. You know I'm just learning.
M: Let me see. I think it might be the color of the mountain.
W: Why? The mountain is yellow, isn't it? After all, it's autumn.
M: I mean the autumn can be full of other colors, such as reds and greens.
W: Oh, yeah. That's the point.
M: By adding some other colors to the mountain, you'll get a more natural picture.
W: I'll try that. How do you know this? Have you taken some art courses?
M: Not actually, my aunt is an artist. She's told me a lot about painting, and has taken me along with her to different exhibitions.
W: I see. I hope I can meet her some day.
听第 8 段材料，回答第 10 至 12 题。
Text 8
M: Hello, Louise. Have you seen my new supermarket yet?
W: Yes. I've heard of it actually. I suppose you must like it.
M: Yes, I mean it's excellent.
W: Oh, Jeff. I really can't agree. I don't like it at all. My shop is much better.
M: You must be mad. I think it's really...you know...so easy to buy everything in one place.
W: Yes, it's easy. But don't you think the food isn't...I mean small shops usually have much fresher food.
M: Maybe, but you pay for it. Small shops are more expensive, aren't they?
W: Yes, I agree with you, but supermarket staff are badly paid and they are really...but you get better service in small shops. They are much more friendly.
M: No, everyone in my supermarket is very nice.
听第 9 段材料，回答第 13 至 16 题。
Text 9
W: What a lovely restaurant! Where on earth did you find this place?
M: A friend at work recommended it. He said the food is amazing.
W: Hey, have I told you that my friends and I are planning a trip to South America next summer? My husband thinks we should go to Northern Europe, but I think we're going to do that another time.
M: Wow! That sounds like an adventure!
W: Yes. We're all very excited. There are six of us planning to go.
M: Sounds exciting. What are the plans?
W: We're hoping to go for at least seven weeks, and tour as many countries as we can.
M: Really big plans! Sounds like the adventure of a lifetime.
W: Yes. I've never done anything like this before. Right now each of us is researching the places we want to visit. I'm researching Peru.
M: Very interesting. When do you plan to leave?
W: Probably next July; so we still have ten months to work out the details.
M: Our waiter is coming over. Why don't we order some food for dinner and you can tell me more about the trip?
W: Absolutely. I'm looking forward to the food and more great conversations!
听第 10 段材料，回答第 17 至 20题。
Text 10
W: Hello, everyone. In today's program, I'd like to share a true story of mine. One day, my friends and I had just finished lunch at a hotel when it started to rain heavily. When it became lighter, I decided to brave the rain to get my car and go home. It was parked three blocks away. My friends argued I shouldn't go because at that time I was due to give birth in three months. I promised I'd be very careful. One of them wanted to come with me, but I insisted she stay with another friend who needed help with her baby. When I walked to the first crossroads, a taxi stopped and a passenger came out with an umbrella. Before I knew what was happening, he walked right beside me and told me he would walk with me to where I would go. I refused, but he insisted. During our walk, he kept telling me to walk slowly. When we got to the car park, I thanked him, and we parted ways. I did not get his name and may not even recognize him now. Did he purposely stop for me? I'll never know.