In the days that pass, your body heals. You fish the shards of glass out from your flesh, flushing the shallow wounds with water, hoping against hope that you don't get any infections, and use some of the old woman's clothes as bandages to stop the bleeding. Your bruises fade, gradually shifting from dark purple and blue to sticky shades of yellow and green. You find yourself falling into a routine, a new sense of normalcy, if what you are doing now could be called such. You wear the old woman's clothes because they're yours now. She wore a lot of flannels, and so now, so do you. You find a pair of old tennis shoes in the attic and walk down the road into town. You walk leisurely; you take your time. You take in the entirety of the town. On a light post, you see a missing person's flyer for the two men who attacked you in your home. They were brothers; their names were Thomas and Daniel Rohdam. Their names mean nothing to you, and you feel nothing as you read them. They were both childless and unmarried. For some reason, that makes you feel better about their bodies that were buried in your backyard. Not to imply that you felt bad; you truly felt nothing. Nothing at all. Only now, you feel better. Your sudden and complete apathy is a stark contrast to the way you felt only a few days ago. You still remember how the guilt of the manager's death consumed you. You can remember the feeling, but for reasons unknown to you, you cannot recreate them. You cannot draw them to the surface. Even remembering the way you retched in the bathtub as you wept for him feels like you're recalling a dream. Your memory feels foggy, weighed down, as though you're looking at them from above water as they sink deeper and deeper into the dark and murky recesses of your memory. You realize that the sudden change in your feelings and opinions should be jarring; you know you ought to care more, but you don't. You don't know why, but you just don't. You keep the sunglasses with you everywhere you go as you explore. You don't feel the compulsion to put them on any more, but you also feel no need to resist it. You discover the laundromat, the library, a couple of bars, and the grocery store. You steal what you need to fill the fridge because while you no longer feel guilt or shame, you still feel hunger and pain. The only remaining semblances of your deteriorating sense of humanity. You even repair the window. Well, you have some random guy you met outside of the local bar to fix your window. He approached you, offering to buy you a drink, and you asked if he would be willing to fix your window instead. He followed you home and replaced the plane of glass so well it was almost as though it had never been broken at all. He then asked for payment, and when you told him honestly that you had no money, he sneered at you in an awful, twisted way that made your stomach turn. That was another human emotion you retained: disgust. He lunged for you to collect whatever sick and demented payment he had convinced himself that he was entitled to, but you had your sunglasses. Your best friend took care of him just as quickly as he had the others, and he dragged the man's body out into the backyard to bury him beside Daniel and Thomas. You remember what pity felt like, but you can't tell if that is another addition to the list of feelings you can no longer access within yourself or if that man simply doesn't deserve it. Either way, you think as you smile at your best friend, who smiles back at you; It is kind of funny. You giggle, and Jack laughs with you. You lose yourself in laughing. You laugh and laugh and laugh.
The End.
