Prologue - It had ended and begun with a knock on her door. She hadn't truly registered the badge flashed before her eyes but she could never deny the coat he'd proffered for her inspection, the one she had bought for Shey.
The officer had held out a picture, pushing it into her uncomprehending hand. A picture of her, five years younger, smiling, in love, her address scrawled on the reverse. The only means the police had of identification when Shey had stepped off of the bridge. A bloodied coat and a creased photograph, all that remained of his extinguished life.
The lack of a body had given her hope but, as she'd listened to the officer's words, that had died. Witnesses driving under the bridge had seen him poised above; too many had seen him ready to jump into the darkness. There could be no doubt that he had ended his life, coat retrieved from the storm drain alongside the motorway,
She'd listened distantly to explanations about run-off from the storms, of other bodies washed away, of a bloody handprint on the side of the drain. It seemed he'd crawled from the road, fallen unconscious into the fast flowing drain, been swept out to sea but all she'd understood was the coat and the picture. At the end, Shey had taken her with him.
Chapter two - She crumpled, sliding to the floor, falling on hands and knees. Her tangle of dark hair fell over her ravaged face, stray tresses clinging to the sodden tracks of her tears. She swallowed hard against the sobs threatening to overwhelm her again.
Her nails dragged across the carpet, balling into her fists, bloody crescents appearing in her palms as she fought against the agony in her heart. Her back arched, head thrown back in a silent howl of anguish, the flow of tears never truly abated, renewed and strengthened as she saw his image slipped into the frame of her mirror.
Her breath came in unsteady gasps, chest heaving under the pressure of self-inflicted silence, the patch of carpet between her hands turning from pink to red as her tears fell.
A sound from the room below froze her in place, terrified that he would catch her weeping again. Father he might be, that he loved her beyond question but even his patience had found its limit. Her air of quiet isolation whenever she appeared had at first drawn one armed hugs and awkward kindnesses. Sympathy had given way to kindly humour as the months had passed and then to confused irritation as her weight had dropped away and her appearances become rarer.
A snapshot of summer, love fallen from the pages of a book had sent her into hysterical weeping, Shey's beloved face filling her vision. Her father had snapped, tearing the photo into pieces before her eyes, telling her that she had to move on. He had left her on her knees, trying to piece the image together. They had not spoken since. She heard him sigh, cross the lounge and mount the stairs with heavy tread.
She struggled to her feet, nails raking her face as she was lost again to memory, bloody tracks washed with salt tears. She crossed to the mirror, staring at the photograph and reached a bloodied hand for the picture, slipped it from the frame and turned it over.
A single dark lock lay curled on the reverse, bound with a blue ribbon. She eased it from the plastic pocket and felt his silky hair beneath her fingers once more, a single sob of desperate longing escaping her parched lips.
With trembling hands she tied the ribbon into her hair, his curl nestling against hers for the last time and then she turned the photograph over. She bit hard on her lip to prevent the scream of agony escaping as his face swam into focus through her veil of tears. His soft smile embraced her bruised heart; his intelligent gaze soothed her sundered soul. She heard his voice instantly as her gaze locked with his, felt the phantom weight of his arm about her shoulders.
"Hey, look up. Green eyes for my blue girl."
His teasing response to her down times, her tired days. A fleeting smile chased the pain from her face and for a brief moment she was once more his pale beauty, his fragile English rose. Then his ghost was gone and the shadows returned turning her from maiden to crone in seconds. She traced a lingering finger over the curve of his cheek, image as cold as the grave where she'd buried his coat and slipped the photo into her pocket.
The house was still, only the faint sound of her father's breathing filtering through the night air. She picked up her boots and crept to the door, careful to avoid the creak of a floorboard, the squeak of a hinge and slipped onto the landing. She edged her way to the stairs, one hand clutched to her breast where his picture rested, unconscious of her talismanic superstition, her belief that he watched over her even in death. She stepped onto the first riser and fled to the bottom, certain her father would wake, know what she planned.
Her heart pounded too hard, blood rushing through her head and making her dizzy, a combination of malnutrition and adrenalin draining her remaining strength too rapidly from her ravaged frame. She steadied herself with one hand on the wall and then slid along, the faint light from a streetlamp her guide as it filtered through the fanlight above the front door. She sought for the door to her father's study with questing fingers, relief flooding her as she found the handle, released it and slipped inside, leaving the door ajar, ready to flee at any sound from above.
Her eyes slowly adjusted to the darkness. Finally she could see well enough to locate the desk and the key beneath the lamp base which unlocked the desk drawer. She searched through the tumble of papers within and closed her hand around the object she needed, withdrawing it quickly and tucking it next to the photo in her jacket. She slid the drawer silently into place and slipped from the room as she had entered, without a sound.
A moment later she was outside, listening to the minute click of the front door latching behind her and checking the street. Busy by day, it was eerily empty at that early hour and she walked the pavement unnoticed, head down, hand clutched against her jacket pocket, the object there giving her confidence to walk the deserted streets fearlessly.
She headed down several side roads and emerged onto a motorway bridge. She paused as she reached the centre, looking down at the ceaseless flow of speeding death, wondering if she stood exactly where he had. Wishing she had the courage to follow him, knowing she did not. She moved on, ethereal, a ghost in all but the beating of a broken heart.
Across the bridge she passed beneath pools of antiquated gaslights, pausing to watch a dark moth fly to the illusory flames before moving on, seeming to float across the cracked cobbles that lead to her destination.
She laid her hand on the wrought iron railing, as cold and unfeeling as the thing that lay next to her lover's image. That same image settled before her mind's eye as she pushed open the gate and slipped into the cemetery. A light sprinkling of stars gave the only illumination but she needed none to find his resting place. Her feet followed the achingly familiar route between two crumbling crypts and placed her before his grave, pristine white, painfully new to her exhausted heart.
She watched distantly, ensnared by a spider building its intricate web between the stone and the willow tree she had planted beside him. They had made love for the first time beneath a weeping willow in the deepest reaches of the night, alone in a tiny wood he had found and made their own.
She felt his hands caress her face and smiled, close now to the only peace she could find. She knelt, her body as cold as the stone beneath which his coat lay, her fingers feeling for his name carved deep into the stone. She traced it and the words she had asked to be placed there.
'Always look down on me green eyes.'
She whispered to him now, asked him to excuse her, that he understand she could endure no more without him, her heart dead with the stranger at her door.
"Don't go without me my love."
She took his photograph from her pocket and smiled softly, placed the gun to her temple and pulled the trigger.
A shadow fled across the cemetery. A second later and she would have been lost to him forever, his motion barely fast enough to deflect the bullet.