Disclaimer: All publicly recognizable characters, settings, etc. are the property of their respective owners. The original characters and plot are the property of the author of this story. The author is in no way associated with the owners, creators, or producers of any previously copyrighted material. No copyright infringement is intended.

It had been days. Or maybe weeks. Time alternately crept by and passed in a flash in between the haze of the pain killers and the hours of sleep. I was numb, still. Even after so long, I couldn't feel anything. The doctors said that was normal, I had been through a trauma… all of the regulation bullshit.

Broken bones healed, bruises faded and time inched on. I hated it. The pain faded and I wanted nothing more than for it to come back. Because it meant something. It proved something. It showed me that I was still alive. I was, of course, but I didn't feel it. I woke up, dressed, ate as little as I could and slept. I was numb. That was it. Sometimes I would go to an appointment, sometimes I would just… walk. Put on my work boots and my green teddy bear hat, tied a scarf around my neck and just… wandered.

The snow had been falling in record breaking amounts this year, drifting in pristine piles around town, and today was no different. It was falling heavily, catching on my eyelashes and melting against my cold cheeks. It was beautiful and frigid, the silence that it cast in it's wake screamed so loudly it almost hurt. And I just walked.

I never went anywhere, not really. I explored side streets and wooded trails; wandered through the orchards behind the primary school and stood in awe of the beautiful victorian architecture in the old part of town. It was calming and cold and quiet and perfect.

I was alone, almost always, both physically and inside my head. After the funeral, after the first time I had set foot in an empty house that wasn't mine, I pushed people away, not because of them, but because of me. My mother had tried to stay with me for a few days but the room I had taken at the tiny inn had been far too small for her and her baggage and she had gone in a cloud of righteous indignation and Chanel No. 5, as was her custom. That had been weeks ago, or maybe just days.

I'd had a hard time with time since everything had happened, more do to being off work than anything else. I didn't know how to fill my days, and I hated feeling so… lost. I hated feeling at all, and I really didn't, not much anyway. Except wrong. I felt that at the strangest times. When I was sipping my tea in the afternoon or nibbling a piece of toast for dinner, it crept up, insidiously. I was wrong. Not about one thing but about everything. About how I felt. I could still hear Justin's voice sometimes, just a whisper. I knew it wasn't real. I wasn't losing my mind. It was quite the opposite, in fact. I had never felt more sure of who I was, although that was not entirely a good thing, not at all, because it meant that I had to face myself.

The mirrors in my room and the attached bathroom were covered with sheets, retrieved from the linen closet at the end of the hall and I kept the shades drawn during the day unless it was snowing. I couldn't deal with the looks, with the whispers. 'Poor girl' I had heard it time and again, everyone from the housekeepers to the staff at the funeral home. It was genuine, of course, always, but it wasn't accurate.

I wasn't poor, not in any sense, and I wasn't grieving. I was… relieved and that was why I was wrong. There was a part of me that was glad my husband was dead and I hated that. I hated knowing that I was capable of being happy at someone else's demise, especially someone I had once loved.

That was the thought that whirled in my head as I wandered through the silent, snow covered streets. The sun, such as it was behind the heavy, dark clouds, had just set and the navy sky was still tinged with streaks of dusky purple and blue along the horizon.

I don't know how I ended up here, in front of a building I hadn't been in since… well, since that day, but I was drawn to it. I stood, silently in the storm, watching through the glass window, golden light pooling out onto the street. My fingers cheeks were raw from the cold and I was almost itching to be inside. It would be so easy, just a few steps, a turn of a knob and I would be seated at my desk again. I could see it through the plate glass, and it sat empty, waiting, the folders still stacked haphazardly in piles beside the neatly organized office supplies. I missed it. A smile pulled at my lips as I saw Duke mosey towards the window, his droopy ears almost brushing the ground as he stopped, staring out at me. I could almost see the recognition on his face, even from here, and I stepped forward off the curb just as he started howling excitedly, behind the glass.

Then I saw him and my smile faded, instantly as I spun on my heel and headed back towards the inn, my head down. It wasn't that I didn't want to see Woody, not at all. I had seen him, several times since Justin, but rather… I didn't want him to see me. I didn't want him to know what I was thinking, the thoughts that passed through my head over and over since the shots had rang out. He had saved me when I was too weak to do it myself and I couldn't tell him.

I stopped once I was far enough away from the station not to be seen and glanced upwards at the sky, searching in vain for the stars that I wanted so desperately to see. But it was not to be. Instead the snow continued to fall, melting as it came in contact with the tears that tracked down my cheeks.