A/N: Just a short story to keep you occupied while I re-write the latest chapter of STDP for the third time. :-(
Disclaimer: The characters in this story don't belong to me they remain the property of Paxson Entertainment and Pebblehut. I'm just borrowing them for a while.
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Shattered
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Lying in bed at night and first thing in the morning with her eyes tightly closed, she could almost convince herself that she was in her own home and everything else was just a bad dream but she knew as soon as she got up and looked into the bathroom mirror the illusion would be shattered. The pale-faced stranger with the short, dark brown hair who stared back at her, reminded her that this was indeed reality and had been for the past eight-and-a-half months. The life she'd lived for seven years had gone and after so long away, she wasn't sure she'd ever get it back. A lone tear escaped to run down her cheek but she quickly brushed it away, fearing that if she allowed herself only a moment of self-pity, she'd never be able to stop crying. Cleaning her teeth and brushing her hair, she tugged on a pair of tatty jeans and an oversized sweater and shivered as her body finally registered the cold air. With a wistful look at the warm bed she'd just vacated, she half-walked, half-hopped to the kitchen pulling on thick wool socks as she went to make up the fire until it was light enough outside to start the generator.
Opening the curtains she gazed outside, where the sun was just putting in an appearance and making the newly-fallen snow twinkle like shards of broken glass. It must have been falling for most of the night as it had covered the footprints the children had left the day before and the wind had whipped it into drifts against the trees. To many it would have been an idyllic location… A cabin tucked away in a wooded area, with no close neighbours, free from the hustle and bustle of the big city. The snow… the trees… the wildlife in the warmer months all welcome distractions, but to her it was a prison. She'd always loved the snow as a child, taking long walks in the woods and looking for the first signs of spring but now she almost hated it. The charm and beauty was lost on her and instead she saw a bleak, white landscape which mirrored her life perfectly. If asked, she would have been prepared to admit it had been fun at first, an adventure for both her and her daughters but as the months had dragged on and the weather grew colder, it had gradually lost all its charm.
Christmas had come and gone without fanfare. She'd made one small concession and attended a carol concert in the local village which lay about two miles down the hill and the residents had welcomed them warmly. They'd been invited into the small teashop for hot soup and fresh bread afterwards but that had been the extent of their celebrations, apart from one small present for each of the girls. There had been no tree or decorations, no cards and they'd all been in bed by ten where she'd cried herself to sleep. A Christmas without family or friends had been even harder than she'd expected and, a month later, she still hadn't been able to pull herself out of the depression she'd settled into. Sighing, she walked over to the cupboard to collect the things she needed for breakfast. She was going to have to make her way down to the store later to restock, just in case the weather got any worse.
The owners always seemed pleased to see her when she ventured inside and often gave the girls sweets and other treats but she could see the pity in their eyes and it cut deep. To them she was Mrs Susan Malone, the pretty deaf woman who had given up her life in the big city for the sake of her 'handicapped' children. The younger one, who was also deaf but could say a few words and communicate by sign and the other who could hear perfectly but never spoke or signed and only responded to questions with a nod or shake of her head. A child who appeared so traumatised by something that had happened in her life, she'd withdrawn into a world of silence. Their father..? They'd never asked her about him outright but they did discuss it between themselves, often forgetting that she could read their lips and they'd come to the conclusion that he'd probably buckled under the strain of trying to cope with an 'abnormal' family and deserted them; an assumption she'd done nothing to discourage.
It wasn't in her nature to be evasive and she'd never been a good liar so she found it easier to distance herself from them as much as possible but it hurt her to allow them to go on thinking of Dan, one of the kindest, gentlest men she'd ever known, as an uncaring, unfeeling absentee father, when nothing could be further from the truth.
She immediately gave herself a mental telling-off, she was being unfair to the villagers and she knew it, most of them were both kind and considerate. They'd appointed themselves as her protectors, right from the outset and while trying hard not to be intrusive, they did their best to help her. She'd barely noticed at first that the log bin outside never seemed to empty, no matter how much wood she used for fires, and then packages mysteriously begun to appear outside her door… Spare blankets, second-hand clothes and books for the children… Candles and matches to light them with... She'd learned the hard way that she needed to keep a stock of those as the generator was notoriously temperamental, especially on really cold days. They also acted as a buffer between herself and the outside world… If a stranger so much as passed through, she'd be told about it the next time she visited the shop or if she hadn't been in for a few days, a note would be slipped under her door. They never knocked or disturbed her in anyway but she knew it was the teashop owner's son who ran most of the errands; she'd caught a glimpse of him from the window one day when he'd dropped off some fresh rolls.
The sun was full-up, so she grabbed a heavy cardigan from the peg behind the door and made her way to the shed at the back, said a quick prayer and pushed the button, offering up a word of thanks when the generator shuddered into life. It was time to get another day started and she needed to wake Judy and Carly, get them fed and make her way down the hill.
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