Life was simple, for a few weeks.

Trudy supposed this was how it was supposed to be. Total freedom and comfort. There was no television in the house, and the WiFi didn't seem to exist, so she felt completely cut off from the rest of the world. It was bliss. Not once did she think of TNM or the attacks (once or twice they popped up in her dreams, but it was still a massive improvement). Even thoughts of her old life in the city were gone. Mundane worries that had kept her awake on ordinary days were gone. Money, food, socialising. Fantasies about situations where Trudy became revered or – and now it made her cringe – loved, they were dead and buried.

All that mattered now were the words in her book. There were many positives to this new lifestyle as a hermit, particularly that she didn't have to think about making ends meet for months, and it was a kind of freedom she was realising she had never truly felt. Not once.

Obviously she had to leave the house a few times. Trips to the village shop, of which there were two. One was a local business, which Trudy had grown to guess was favoured by the villagers. The other was a corporate supermarket, oddly plonked in this middle of nowhere village. From the dirty looks villagers gave her and the shop's typically isolated aisles, she was fairly sure that the shop you bought from determined your reputation here.

It would have been nice to continue like this. A steady routine, days cooped up away from the rest of the world in the little cottage on the edge of it all. If Trudy had known how easy it was to just hide from everything, she would have committed to this lifestyle long ago. As the days rolled on, it was getting to a point where Trudy was considering just buying out a place and squandering her money for the rest of her life, barely living. It might be better, in fact. It might invite the core worm back. That was one thing that had decided to circle back into her mind. Back in the city, thoughts of the core worm were few and far between. It had been over a decade since it had told her it was going to need her one day. Sometimes, Trudy didn't even know if it had happened or if she had made it up for something to hold onto. She regularly leaned into the second idea Nowadays, thoughts filled in the empty spaces left by ordinary adult worries. It was the one thing that distressed her, but it wasn't enough to make her disavow this lifestyle.

Of course, in Trudy's life, nothing was permanent. When something started to seem good, it was sure to vanish immediately. She scolded herself later, for being so confident that the world would actually give her a break. It seemed whatever God that drove many humans to their knees out of love, would push Trudy to hers in a bid for her to submit.

Another rainy Tuesday rolled around. It was her fourth week; she was meant to leave come the next one but was seriously starting to believe in dropping out of the writer's retreat. It would upset Mary – there was that blip – though here, she would never have to face that consequence.

In the afternoon, after hours hunched over at the dining table with her book, papers, laptop, and pen, she finally peeled herself from the wooden chair that had started off uncomfortable, but that she had grown accustomed to. She was sure she was starting to emanate the shape of it, anyway. Her hand was just as cramped and aching as her back from hours of frantic scribbling. Ideas flowed so freely here with an empty head. Nothing existed to distract her. Sometimes in the evenings, her ideas were so good that she laughed and cheered out loud, or would rabbit to herself all night to keep them coming. She'd reached a standstill between one idea and the next now, so had decided that she should probably get herself something to eat.

In the kitchen (that now smelled less like wet dog and more like smelly, unwashed woman), she scoured the cupboards and shelves for something to snack on. All she was met with were empty punnets, their berries eaten, pots once home to dried noodles that had been combined in a mega-dinner she'd had for herself as a celebration for being so smart, and trays on trays of eaten ready meals. She hadn't bothered to take the rubbish out since the first week, so it cluttered her space. The bin collectors just drove past the house now. Maybe they'd forgotten she was there – she hoped so. The sparse cupboards could only mean one thing. The one thing Trudy was most reluctant to do, the thing that sent her groaning and whinging.

Trudy had to leave the house.

Worse – she had to go to the shop.

She scrunched her knotty hair into a bun at her nape, hauling her wool coat over her pyjamas. Her raincoat was long-gone, had been burnt on a bonfire out the back of the house in her second week once she'd garnered the confidence to do so. She only wished she hadn't thrown out her pyjama bottoms to burn too. Wet hair it is. Not that it bothered her much. Since being here, her hair had assumed its natural texture – loose waves, something she used to try and make straight but which now she didn't care much about. She rarely looked in the mirror. There was one in the whole house, up in the bathroom over the sink, yet even when she brushed her teeth or washed her face and hands she didn't look. She didn't register her face even if she did. Trudy was caught in another world, one far beyond the body she possessed.

Squashing her feet into her boots and slipping the cold key into her pocket, Trudy barged out the door and squinted at the light. It was cosy and dark in the house, and she was already prepared to turn back. A nearly ten minute walk to the village didn't seem worth it – but the growl of her stomach suggested otherwise. With a sigh, she locked the door and was off down the road in the miserable weather.

She felt surprisingly light. Not just for the absent weight of her phone in her pocket, but with what felt like... an appreciation for life. And was that a skip in her step? The air was crisp and fresh, and the world was ready to come alive. Trudy let the breeze carry her – or tried to, though it blowed and whipped rain in her face. The sky was cloudy, but so bright that you couldn't make out where the clouds began or ended, as if the sky had simply turned white. She didn't know what time it was, and the sky certainly didn't help. Hopefully the shop was still open.

Thankfully, it was. After the long walk, one which felt endless and had definitely reduced her feet to formless lumps, Trudy emerged between houses on the street where the rival shops face one another. It was an odd village. Stretched out on a dip in the landscape, with houses on the sides of the hill, atop it, or down in the heart, where Trudy now stood. It was also sort of a maze, thin streets of houses starting one another down opening onto slightly wider ones. The widest part was this small shopping street. The supermarket had clearly once been a different building, for it held no signs that it was corporate beyond the flashing logo above the door. On the other side of the street, the small general store locally owned and maintained had a less flashy sign, one that was instead hand-painted. There were a few people outside it, observing a notice board by the door, who turned to stare at Trudy as she crossed the road to the supermarket. She pointedly ignored them, which had her oblivious to the fact that they had started to form a slowly-growing communion that was pursuing her down the road to the shop. It was of no consequence as she turned into the little building, focused on completing this task as quickly as she could.

It was a small space inside, all warm colours and wooden shelves. There was nothing of the interior to remind her of the supermarket back home; certainly a good thing, considering she didn't think she could face fluorescents, white tiles, or cranberry juice - ESPECIALLY cranberry juice - ever again. She made a lengthy trip of it, making sure she had enough food so that this would be her last trip here until she left. With straining bags stuffed full of ready-meals and noodle pots, she left the bliss of the quiet shop and the self-checkout and re-entered the world.

To a crowd of people waiting for her outside.