Abigail Doesn't Live Here Anymore

The misgivings crept in on shadow legs so slowly that when she finally took notice, it seemed to her they had always been a part of her. Yes, they'd unpacked and taken up residence deep in the marrow of her bones. And like the steady ticking of the clock, they measured time by how they waxed and waned. Mornings, a wispy, vague sense of unease. Afternoons, a gnawing trepidation building as the shadows grew. Then came the night, and with the dark, a deep sense of foreboding. Another day passed and still, no one came. Kerosene and candlelight failed to chase away her growing sense of unease.
These days, she felt shapeless, lonely, forgotten. She sat at night, peering into the shadows at the edge of the cabin searching there for some sense of her former self.
"I am Abigail Turner",
She often found herself chanting this mantra to herself hoping it would wake her from her fog, compel her to do something! And yet, here she sat, rooted to this place. Alone. Made inert by the weight of these apprehensions.

The men waited quietly among the trees until the last of the mourners drifted away, moving slowly down the hill and disappearing into the cabin at the edge of the clearing. Then, with shovels hoisted over their shoulders they moved in towards the grave.

The passage of time no longer held any meaning for Abigail. The clock upon the mantel had long since stopped measuring time. Abigail spent her days drifting about the cabin. She felt like a wisp of her former self. The loneliness was slowly strangling her, draining what was left. She often found herself now standing at the window, staring up the hill, wondering, how long had that grave stone been there? In some odd way, it seemed to her that it had always been there, and yet ...
had just appeared.