Roxy sat in the corridor outside of Ronnie's room, the plastic chair she was sitting on hard and uncomfortable, but she couldn't feel it. She couldn't feel anything right now. All that she was aware of was that Jack was inside that room, Jack was sitting beside Ronnie's bed, holding her hand and waiting for her to wake up.
They had arrived an hour ago, an hour of utter silence and nothing but emptiness passing between them. They had simply existed in the same space for the few minutes that Jack had taken to drive to Walford General, with Roxy not saying a word about why her sister was there in the first place.
Roxy closed her eyes, trying to shut down the memories that seemed to embrace her mind with the echoes of a time that revisiting only served to rip her heart to pieces.
Ronnie sat on the staircase of the Vic, her legs crumpled beneath her and her body limp. She looked down at the black dress she was wearing, a reminder of what that day had represented. Bradley's funeral.
"What're you doing?"
She looked up to see Roxy stood at the banister, watching her.
"Nothing, I just . . . nothing."
"You went to the funeral?"
Ronnie nodded.
"He killed our dad, Ron-"
Ronnie looked away, she couldn't hear this. Not now, not ever. And not from Roxy.
She didn't say anything, her silence communicating the words that were screaming in her mind clearly enough.
Roxy sighed and sat down next to her sister, but Ronnie visibly flinched, uncomfortable with the sudden intrusion of her personal space. Immediately, she stood up; unable to bear the presence of someone else next to her.
Her younger sister grabbed hold of her hand, but Ronnie shook it away, the touch feeling as though it was scalding it. She couldn't bear it.
Refusing to acknowledge the hurt expression on Roxy's face, Ronnie turned away from her and walked towards the cellar door. "I'm er, I'm going to get some air."
Roxy called after her, following Ronnie, watching as she slipped through the alleyway and out into the dark Square. She watched as Ronnie passed through the centre of it, one hand clinging onto the black railings, as though they were a life line, the only thing keeping her anchored to that moment. And then Ronnie had frozen almost, her body rigid. She had turned her face upwards, looking at something before making her way to the bench that sat pride of place in the Square gardens, unmoving, unchanging – no matter what happened, that bench would always remain.
Roxy swallowed the lump that was in her throat, pushing down the urge to call out once again to her older sister, wishing that somehow her words could reach Ronnie, wishing that they could bring her big sister back, home again at last.
Turning her back on Ronnie, she retreated to the warmth of the Vic, hoping and praying that her sister would soon do the same.