True to her word, no less than ten minutes later, Miss Carolyn’s red pickup truck screeched into the muddy field where only a few minutes ago Kate and Clark watched the sing-along down in the valley. As she walked out from the forest towards the glow of the headlights, Kate reeled. To get this far from town that fast, she probably didn’t even pause for stop signs.

Miss Carolyn ran to meet her, scooping her into one of her world-famous hugs. For the first time in her life, the woman’s warm embrace did nothing to soothe Kate’s cracked heart.

“You’re gonna freeze to death out here,” Miss Carolyn said. “Let’s get you in the car.”

“Yes ma’am.”

Kate followed the older woman’s lead. Her swishing silver hair glowed in the moonlight, leaving a distinctly witchy vibe in her wake. As grateful as Kate was for Miss Carolyn’s rescue from the forest, the worry lines creasing her face dropped a pile of lead into the pit of her stomach. A pair of reindeer antlers sat crown-like upon her silver hair and a tacky Christmas sweater replaced her usual red flannel, a uniform Kate probably would have replicated if she hadn’t spent the entire day falling head over heels for the perfectly wrong man. The initial appeal of calling Miss Carolyn was her sage advice, the wisdom she’d always offered Kate through her life. Now, Kate didn’t want advice. She wanted to shut herself off from the world and forget everyone else existed.

They settled into the cab and took off into the night. The Woodward House was private, fenced-in land, but if anyone knew the way to sneak in and out through a broken or missing stretch of fence line, it was Miss Carolyn. That woman knew everything.

“You warm enough?”

“Yes ma’am.”

Snuggling into the familiar tobacco and air freshener scented seats, her shivering finally subsided. Though she’d stopped crying a while ago, her face was caked with the salt from her teardrops, as if she’d been swimming in the ocean all day and forgotten to shower. Kate no longer wanted to sob and weep over Clark Woodward, but the salt cracking on her skin almost reminded her of armor.

She marveled, in the beginning, at Clark’s ability to feel nothing. It frightened her more than anything; she swore she’d never let herself get to that point, where she so spurned the idea of feeling that she simply chose to avoid it all together. Tucked in the cab of Miss Carolyn’s car, Kate realized the choice wasn’t a conscious one. She hadn’t decided to die inside. It just happened. Somewhere between hanging up the phone and finding her way into this truck, she just stopped caring. About everything.

What had caring gotten her? What had caring gotten Clark? A big, fat nothing.