Chapter 148
Grace returned to her cramped rental apartment, embarrassed. "It feels like a lifetime has passed since I left for Thanksgiving," she said, surveying the space. A chill seemed to hang in the air, but she couldn't help a wry smile. "I'm alone again," she murmured. "No one to talk to in the night, no one to call me 'Sister.'"
She gathered clean clothes, washed, and began tidying. "Jason was only here briefly, but his things are everywhere," she sighed, noting the cutlery, towel, toothbrush, clothes, and shoes. She gathered them all into a cardboard box.
"Should I throw them away?" she wondered. "They'll just take up space, but I don't want to. I miss those days with Jay. It was an illusion, a fake Jason, but my feelings were real! I was so happy, not alone anymore."
She picked up the half-finished gloves she'd been knitting for him. "I was going to finish them after Thanksgiving. Now… I never will." She added the gloves, needles, and yarn to the box, sealed it with tape, and placed it in a corner.
"I'll still be alone. Jason was just a dream," she thought. That night, she slept with the lights on. "When I left prison and didn't have Jason, I always kept the lights on. The darkness reminded me of jail. Then, with Jason, I didn't need them anymore. Now, the habit's back."
She called Lina. "Will you be at the apartment tomorrow? I'll come see you," Lina said.
"Yes," Grace replied. "It feels like this apartment is the only place I have left."
Grace couldn't sleep. Jason's face swam before her eyes, and the metallic taste of blood lingered, despite repeated gargling.
The next day, Lina arrived and saw Grace's exhaustion. "I saw the news this morning," Lina said urgently. "Were you accosted at the hospital yesterday? Are you hurt?"
Grace shook her head. "Embarrassed, but not hurt."
Lina was furious and heartbroken at her friend's self-deprecation. "I'm furious that those people, knowing nothing, treated an innocent woman like that. And distraught that you were wrongly charged with drunk driving, when you weren't even drinking!"