The mist rolls over the wet shingles of a small house; one where no children dare to fare. A little peak of sunlight threatens to bathe the house in golden heat. Wildlife chirps happily and the waterfalls not far create sweet music that Isabella Marie can sway to.

She's not miserable and hurtful, something you'd expect from an aged woman in the woods. It's just her home, where the birds sing and the pressing matter of her age keep her occupied. It's late in the day, late in her years. It's nearing, waiting on the brink, that tall dark shadow with a hint of crystals.

Some say she married, and when they do they get smacked upon the head for their stupidity because of course she was and it was no secret. But they don't mean that old dead man, Newton. They mean a time before she was desperate for a marriage and children, back when she was happily in love. But the silly parents won't talk about it, saying their children need to leave that old woman alone.

They don't want to mention her, especially when they saw her bare to the world. They saw the seeping misery that swept through her for months, edging on a year. It had been a Cullen fellow that left her, and she became pathetic. Her misery made them uncomfortable, and she had no right being selfish says the townsfolk. But they are some dried up coots, aren't they, shaming the poor little woman like that especially when her husband just passed and her little shit of a kid ditched her to have a wild life at college.

They like to say she's near death, and she is. They sometimes see her walk through town to get groceries and nobody dares to help her. Sometimes she gives money to that old washed up hobo, the one who lost his job at the bay. Sometimes she strays to Aberdeen for the view. Some even see her on the long endless stretch of beach that shows a grand view of the ocean that's wasn't only a few miles away.

Some say she left a day before her death, sitting there on the beach and waiting. Waiting for something they couldn't see.

Some went to her funeral, got to see the open casket. Some say she had a smile. Some say she was a little too cold.