It's raining. It's cold. It's bright grey through the blinds of the narrow window. Two windows look out over the street. The head of the bed is pressed against one window, one side of the bed resting against a wall. The book shelf sits under the second window. The desk on the empty wall across from the bed is covered with books; the shelf sitting on the desk is overflowing with books. The shelf under the window has so many books they're double stacked and every now and then a book loses its precarious balance and tumbles out. The desk chair doesn't fit under the desk; it stands in the narrow room, taking up space.
There's a closet on the wall opposite the windows, a bureau next to it. There are so many clothes in there they threaten to pop the draws open at any second. It's stuffed, everything is brimful.
And she stands in front of the window's bookshelf and stares out at the rain pattering on the street outside, a pedestrian walks by, turns their head and it's almost as if they can see her but she knows they can't, not really. Her arms are crossed, it's cold. The heater blasts next to the desk, in front of the bookshelf.
She sniffs and pushes her hair behind her ear again. Her grey cardigan's arms are too long and they cover her palms, only the tip of her thumb and fingers are exposed. Her auburn hair is tied loosely back into a bun at the nape of her neck, she hasn't washed it in a couple of days. Her green eyes look just as dirty as she feels but she doesn't know what to do about it; the feeling not the eyes.
It doesn't really matter anymore she decides; he's gone and she couldn't picture a worse outcome. A year ago she would have been indifferent to his passing, perhaps even on some small level relieved; but not anymore, not anymore. He was everything, he was all important.
In the space of a few months he'd completely eclipsed her world, and now with him gone it was painfully bright and she couldn't breathe, couldn't think, couldn't feel. It was all gone. Nothing mattered, the world had ended. It was all gone. It was so cold.