FOUR
It's not defiance, and it's not any calculated plan to desensitise herself to the wider world in preparation for rejoining it.
Ellie just goes out because, one day, she's sick of the four walls looming over her, and the feeling has swelled so large in her heart and head it's pushed out any thought of why she's trapped in here in the first place.
Tom she settled in a boarding school near Bath. It was his choice and one she can live with—at least until the end of the year.
Slash, the end of the trial.
She doesn't trust her ability to read Tom anymore. To know or do what's best for him. He's lost his best friend, his father, his home in less than a year. She hopes he doesn't think he's lost her too. She wasn't happy about his decision but she's wary of smothering him. Fears struggling to hold them together might ultimately drive a wedge between them—or prevent Tom from moving on.
She could follow him; nothing is holding her to Broadchurch. If anything, the town feels keen to be rid of her.
Her own town can't wait to see the last of her.
Her eyes remain dry.
She's overstayed her welcome as it is. But moving on will require a plan, and she has no idea how to go about deciding on one for herself.
The walls of the hotel room lean over her.
Today she bundles Fred into the buggy and heads out with no clear destination. They end up in a rundown internet cafe a decade past its best well away from the high street.
At first the stares slice like razor blades; after a while she learns how to stare right back and through the ghoulish onlookers.
She does it by deadening her own curiosity.
She used to be able to spot a subtle haircut at twelve paces; the shifty giggle of a clandestine office romance. Nish bounding up the stairs only when he'd done well off the horses. Frank's habit of hugging his coffee mug close when he wanted to avoid publicly disagreeing with you. People did things—and she could catalogue those actions. Find a pattern and separate it out from all the other hundreds of little random movements people make.
Had thought she could catalogue those movements.
Obviously she'd missed a few other important ones.
Now the sharp edges of things blend, layer on layer, as she flattens the outside world and her gaze chooses to slide over it.
But it isn't natural and, while it dulls the ache in her chest and makes her days easier to act out, she can't pretend she isn't starving.
People are her 'thing' and if she can't let herself care for them anymore, what's the point?
She googles 'resignation letter samples' online.