Felicity looked at herself in the mirror. Her hands were shaking as they fixed the drop pearl to her left ear. She'd dropped the backing twice already. The first time, it'd taken her five minutes to pick it back up again. She kept on fumbling while trying desperately to steady her hands. She continued to look at her herself as her trembling hands moved up to her industrial piercing. She had been wearing the two separate bars for a while now, she wondered if the long bar would ache. Removing each piece took time and precision, her hands making the process more difficult. Her eyes glanced down to the fake oak dressing table, and she ran her fingertip over the replacement bar. She'd bought the bar a couple of years back as a joke to herself. She'd seen the piece in her favourite jewellery shop that always smelt like oranges, and she had to buy it. She couldn't wear it of course, just incase someone made the connection, but she'd kept the bar anyway. Now it didn't matter what anyone could infer from it.
It was a simple arrow.
Her throat was thick and painful; she picked up the bar. She unscrewed the ends, taking even more time than she had done on her pearls. Her reflection stared back at her as she positioned the earring and fixed the ends back on. A stranger watched her: someone with dull hair and duller eyes. Her hot pink lipstick was the only thing that was bright, and even that seemed muted. But the arrow in her ear felt right, despite her throat growing thicker and her breathing becoming harder.
There would be no funeral. Thea had fled and they couldn't prove to the police why they knew he was gone. All she had was this arrow in her ear and it would be her memorial. The world might have been capable of forgetting, but she was not. She would carry this memorial like an albatross around her neck: with her head high and her shoulders stiff and aching.