Why must they stare?

Their golden hawks-eyes stare into my soul and their whip tongues lash out harsh words as if they knew me.

But they don't know me at all. How can they? How can they pretend to understand what I've gone through, what I'm going through?

I open the door to the bakery and a bell jingles in a far off, distant place. The baker smiles a warm smile, and when he does his apron bulges. He hands me a loaf of still-warm bread, and I place two silver coins upon the counter.

I find myself relishing in the normalness of this transaction, as if the man I love is not cursed and I am not pregnant with twins he will never see grow up. But all the normalcy fades when the baker's children enter.

They may be poorer than I am, but that does not stop their mouths. They weren't trying to be quiet when they spoke to each other, loud enough so that I could hear even as I left the bakery.

"That's Elizabeth Swann. She's pregnant but she hasn't got a husband. She used to be the governor's daughter but he left her."

My hand stops on the door knob.

I want to turn and scream. To yell and shout and scream at them, to tell them truth about me. But what would that do?

"Nothing." I said to myself as I walked out the door.

I tried to block out the whispering with my heavy breathing.

"Just one more stop." I said, looking at my list as I walked into a cloth shop.

Whatever had been going on in that shop stopped immediately as I walked in.

Dagger- eyes met me and I felt them pierce my skin but I kept my eyes forward and walked to a row of fabrics. I rubbed my finger over one of them, pretending to examine it closely. But I was shaking. Inside and out. How long could I do this? I felt like crying.

I tried to pretend what everyone else thought didn't matter at all to me. And it didn't for the most part.

But there were those times when I felt strangers, or even people I knew, stare and I couldn't take it. Maybe it was because now, I'm so alone. I have no one to run to when I'm hurt- no Will to hold me so I can cry, no Dad to tell me he'll always be there for me- I have no one.

It seems dreadfully simple, that thought and I feel a single tear run a straight line down my face.

And then I remember.

I hold my head up high and walk out of the shop, inexplicitly determined to find the one person I might still have.

Jack.