Colleen was used to lying awake while Dan slept. Usually because the throbs and pangs of the bruises wouldn't let her rest. Sometimes because she couldn't let go of the fear of him enough to loosen the knot in her chest, even though she knew he hadn't meant it, even though she knew it was her own fault in the first place.
She was used to lying awake while he slept.
She wasn't used to getting up, carefully and quietly. She wasn't used to carrying her shoes out into the hall, shrugging on her coat, slipping on her shoes as she opened the door.
She wasn't used to walking out the door and down the street and into the night.
She walked down the block and then down the next one and the one after. She could tell it was cold, cold enough for her breath to steam in front of her face, cold enough to make her shiver, but she didn't feel cold. Her shoes weren't really made for walking and raised blisters on her feet, but she didn't feel pain.
She walked.
Eventually she found herself staring at a phone booth. It was daylight, Colleen realized, even if only just. She had walked all night.
She had no idea where she was.
She had nowhere to go.
She had a dime in her pocket.
She had a dime in her pocket and two phone numbers stamped in black ink on a white page clear in her mind.
It was daylight, so she tried the office number first.
It was daylight, so of course Jack McCoy was already at his desk. "Hello?"
Colleen tried to speak, failed.
"Hello?" McCoy asked impatiently. "Who is this?"
Colleen forced the words out, unable to recognize her own voice. "Mr McCoy."
"Mrs James?" McCoy said instantly.
"Thank you for making me type the numbers," she whispered.
"Are you — where are you?"
"I don't know," she admitted. "A pay-phone. I don't know where."
"Read me the number." When she did, he said, "Just hold on, Mrs James. Don't hang up. I'm going to get someone on the other line who will know where that is, okay? Don't hang up."
The beeps, then. Her time was up, and she was out of change. Out of nowhere, a sob tore through her.
"I will call you back," McCoy said firmly. "Mrs James. Just stay there, and I will call you back."
And the phone did ring, almost immediately, and it was Jack McCoy's voice on the other end of it. "Alright," he said easily. "It's alright, Mrs James. I know where you are, and there's a patrol on its way to you. It's going to be alright."
