Bastard!

She thought he was different. Yeah right! He was just like everyone else - he abandoned her. Just like Richard, just like Luka, just like everyone else in her life...he got fed up and walked away! She knew that it hurt more this time though. The others were nothing compared to Carter. Just physical. Not John. She had trusted him...let him see her - the real her...but it ended the same was. Another door closed in her face. Unlike the other times, she had wanted this one to stay open.

'Unreachable' was the word everyone used, looking at her with sad eyes. She didn't want their pity. She didn't want any of this. She just wanted him here, holding her, promising he would never let her go. Not that she'd admit it.

He was gone. Nothing changed. The world kept spinning, people got on with their lives. No major problem. But not her. She closed herself off, became like him...unreachable. She just went through the motions. Everyday she went to work, came home, slept. All the time pretending she didn't feel that hint of excitement every time the phone rang or someone knocked on her door. But it was never him. She didn't know if it would be ever again. Was he coming back? He still had a job...but it wasn't like he needed it.

She looked around her empty apartment drained - physical, emotionally. So many feeling. Fear, anger, pain, loneliness...not that she'd ever let anyone see. She'd never let anyone close again. She'd learned her lesson.

She dropped her head into her hands. She wouldn't cry. She refused to cry. Too much time had been wasted on tears. No more.

So instead she sat there in the darkness and wondered how two weeks could feel like a lifetime. And how silent and empty her apartment was compared to two weeks ago. How silent and empty she now was. Funny how things change when you're truly alone. He had gone. The last person that meant anything real to her, the last person who ever showed her a glimpse of happiness was gone. So, she sat, breathing in the silence. This is what her life had become. A vast wasteland of silence, coldness.

But it didn't last. Silence was interrupted but the shrill of the phone. And there it was. The feeling of hope and relief rose from the pit of her stomach and out through her throat.

"John" she whispered into the emptiness. Her hope was immediately replaced by regret and sadness. It wouldn't be him...it never was.

She found herself holding the phone. It wouldn't be him.

"Hello," she answered, her voice hollow and empty.