I've lost it all, I'm just a silhouette

The awful thing is, at first, she believes him. It doesn't change how fucked up his leaving seems, or how abandoned she feels, but Lee tells her that he'll be back, and Molly doesn't have any reason not to take him at his word. Even when she gives in and lets herself break down the way she's been trying not to for what feels like an eternity — waiting just long enough, once Lee has closed the door behind him, that he should be safely down the hall and out of earshot — it's not because she thinks he's gone for good. Whatever worries she might have, they aren't really his fault, and it's not fair, or so she tells herself, to attribute them to him now. She can't blame him for being upset about this when she is, too, and everything that's happened, however far from reassuring, makes sense under the circumstances.

That's what she wants to think, anyway. For a little while, she manages it. But minutes turn too quickly into an hour, and then one hour turns into two, and the more time passes, the harder it is to trust that he'd meant what he told her. Needing some space to process this is one thing, but even so, it doesn't take hours to get some air, and to go that long without so much as a fucking word makes it seem all the more unlikely that that's actually what's happening here. Besides, it wouldn't be the first time someone said something like that without meaning it. Stephen told her he'd come back, too, and by the time he finally did, it was too fucking late. Things aren't going to end the same way this time, but knowing that makes her no less uneasy about where she and Lee stand now.

Under any other circumstances, she'd call him, or at least text, but as it is, she's not sure she could take it if she didn't get an answer. Too much of this is too familiar as it is, and she's not looking to make that any worse for herself, which is the only thing that would accomplish. She just also isn't sure, as the night wears on, how much longer she can sit around waiting for him, feeling like she's going out of her fucking mind. It's with that in mind that she goes into the bedroom and starts to get some things together, thinking she'll go stay somewhere else for the night. Halfway through doing so, though, she realizes there's no one she'd want to talk to about this, and gives it up, leaving her partly-packed bag on the bed and heading for the kitchen.

She means to just have one drink. One drink, she thinks, in a fit of desperation, can't do any real damage. She's only just found out, after all, and she'd have been drinking tonight if she hadn't taken that stupid test yet, and it's hard to imagine that making any real difference. One drink, though, as it turns out, isn't nearly enough to take her mind off everything going on, and it isn't long before one becomes several becomes what's left of their bottle of scotch, left empty on the table when she dozes off on the couch, still dressed in yesterday's clothes.

If falling asleep had been too easy, then waking up proves to be the opposite, her head pounding before she even opens her eyes. Molly hasn't been hungover like this in a while as it is, and remembering the events of the night before doesn't help at all on that front. Even then, though it should be fairly obvious that she's still there alone, judging by the fact that she's still fully dressed on the couch, a part of her can't help hoping that maybe, just maybe, Lee will have come back during the night and this will all have been one big fucking misunderstanding. One look around the apartment, and that part of her is very quickly let down. Lee's coat and keys are still gone, and everything is still where she left it the night before, from the empty bottle on the coffee table to the bag she'd started to pack before she wound up drinking instead.

From there, everything she does feels like nothing more than going through the motions. She throws up all she'd had to drink the night before in the bathroom, thinking bitterly that she's going to have to get used to doing so anyway, brushes her teeth, takes a couple aspirin and drinks some water, throws out the empty bottle and puts her glass from the night before in the sink. She's in the middle of straightening up the couch when she hears the door open, and though she knows there's really only one person it could be, she's still visibly stunned when she stops and turns to see Lee coming inside. For what at least feels like a long moment, she can't do anything but stare. Then, finally, as if she can't quite wrap her head around the fact of it, she says, "You're back."

In retrospect, maybe she should have seen this coming.

For a couple of weeks now, Molly has been helping to draft statements about this string of disappearances, people vanishing and returning days later with stories about some alternate, fucked up version of Darrow. The story is largely the same as it was when the same thing happened a few years ago: a roundabout way of saying that they have no fucking idea what's going on, and that people shouldn't panic about something that absolutely merits panicking. At least, that's how she sees it, but she remembers not long after people started turning up in this place, when the whole city was like that and she nearly died trying to get to one of the churches. She remembers, too, the shape Russell had been in when he got back the last time this happened. The fact that, once again, it's apparently temporary is a small comfort, but the idea of it happening at all is still terrifying, and so she mostly doesn't think about it. Outside of the context of work, it isn't worth it, nothing that's affected her yet, nothing that she has any reason to think will do so.

The latter is clearly where she's mistaken. Not giving it any more thought than she has to has helped insofar as making sure she doesn't freak out about it, but it means that when she steps out of City Hall in the evening to find the world changed in a way that's uncomfortably familiar, she doesn't know what to do with it. All she can do is stand there for a moment, trying to force herself to breathe, difficult as it is with the ash in the air and when she's so fucking terrified. She could have prepared herself for this, at least to an extent, but she didn't. None of the official statements issued by City Hall could really have driven home what it would be like to find herself here, with the knowledge that, when it finishes getting dark, she'll really be in trouble, at least if what happened before is any way to judge. She might be a little more capable now than she was three and a half years ago, but that's only saying so much. It's certainly not enough for her to want to take any chances.

Tempting as it is to stay there and shut down and start to cry, she knows she'll only be worse off if she does that. Instead, she tries to think through things she can use to try to keep herself grounded — that she's lived through this or something like it before, that she's lived through what she would describe as worse, that it is, by all accounts, something that should only last a few days. That, and that there's still a little bit of time left before the sun has set and she's screwed.

It's with the latter in mind that she finally heads away from City Hall, in the direction of the nearest church. From here, it's a bit of a walk, straight through the park to the other side of the city, and she probably won't be able to stay there for too long, but she might at least have a chance to pull herself together and possibly get some sleep tonight before dealing with this head-on. Right now, she barely feels like she can deal with it at all.

For an occasion that she's largely come to dread, knowing how difficult it's tended to be the past few years, Molly doesn't actually think her birthday has been that terrible this time around. If anything, it's been pretty nice, though she still doesn't feel much like celebrating or even drawing that much attention to it. There's no need. She'd much rather hold on to the fact that she feels alright than make a big deal out of what shouldn't have to be, an occasion that doesn't really mean all that much in the first place. Twenty-four isn't even that significant an age, and as long as she can keep at bay thoughts of how much older she is now than she ever would have gotten to be back home, she can get through this just fine.

When she heads back to her building, even after going out for a couple drinks, it's relatively early, but she still goes straight to Lee's apartment instead of her own, having texted a little earlier to make sure he'd be around by the time she got there. For months now, longer than she's even stopped to think about, this has been normal for the two of them, a routine she's comfortably fallen into. She can't think of anyone she'd rather spend the rest of tonight with anyway, even if she wouldn't have already been doing so in the first place.

Standing outside his door, her bag over one shoulder and blazer folded in the crook of her arm, she knocks on his door, rocking back on her heels and biting her lip through a smile as she waits for him to answer.

It's only once they actually get to Kagura and are settling into their room that Molly realizes she's never actually done this before. Ski trips are practically tradition for her, something her family used to do often, when her dad had the time away from work; in that regard, this is familiar, normal. Not once, though, has she ever gone away for a weekend with a guy she's been seeing. Even when she had a boyfriend she lived with for a while, nothing like this ever entered the picture. She isn't sure, then, what's more telling — that they're here at all, or that she said yes to this without having to give it a second thought. The latter, she's pretty sure, isn't just because it's been a long time since she went skiing, and it'll be nice to get to before Kagura is shut down until December, either.

Really, it isn't as if she hasn't considered it before, how serious they might be getting. The times she has, though, it's always been fleeting, nothing she could or had to determine one way or the other. Now, she has to wonder if maybe she was just postponing the inevitable, if the last few months were always leading here. She can't say that the idea doesn't freak her out a little, but all things considered, it's not as bad as it could be, or even as she would have expected. Whatever they've been doing, whatever it means, she likes it. A weekend trip to a ski lodge sure as hell isn't going to change that.

She's actually pretty excited about it, no matter what kind of a step this might be. Timing-wise, it's worked out kind of perfectly, with their getting up here just before the end of the season, so soon after her getting promoted. There's actually a fair bit she wants to do, too, but for the time being, she flops onto the bed, sighing exaggeratedly as she does. "Okay, so you know we are going to have to leave the room at least once this weekend, right? I'm just putting that out there now."

It would've been the easiest thing in the world, going upstairs to her own apartment after waking up on New Year's Day. The power has been just fine, and even if it weren't, even if she were worried, she could always have opted to take the stairs instead of the elevator. Molly has a feeling, though, that even if she had, she would have wound up right back here sooner or later. With everything shut down, the snow accumulation too great to go anywhere, City Hall closed for the day anyway, she'd have quickly gotten bored, called Lee, and gone back to spending her New Year's mostly in his bed.

With anyone else, she imagines this would all feel like too much, too soon. The party at Kagura was their first actual date, after all, though she kind of has to wonder, now that it's happened, if maybe it really was a long time coming. Even that doesn't have as much to do with her sticking around like this, though. It's comfortable for other reasons, reminiscent of when nearly everyone vanished and Lee let her stay with him, something that still means more than she would know how to tell him. Regardless of how different the circumstances may be, it leaves her feeling more at ease here than if he were just some guy she'd been fucking, or someone she'd agreed to go on a date with.

She would never have done this sort of thing with the last guy she dated, even before he tried to kill her.

Once she's been there and spent the night — again — it really only makes sense, then, to call out of work on Friday. From what Molly can gather, both from looking outside and from checking her phone, the roads are clear now, at least enough for the city to be functioning again, but she says that they're too bad for her to come in anyway, and considering the fact that she walks to work, and would be doing so on sidewalks that may or may not be cleared, with four feet of snow on the ground, it's not really an implausible story. At least, it doesn't seem to raise any questions. She barely ever misses work as it is. Giving herself a long weekend really can't do that much harm.

Maybe, at some point, it would be good to talk about whatever it is they're doing, since she still isn't really sure. For now, though, she's far more interested in just enjoying it, leaning over to kiss Lee quickly before pulling herself to her feet, wearing only a shirt of his. "I'm gonna go get something to drink," she says. "Do you want anything from the kitchen? Or maybe we should see if there's anywhere actually open that'll deliver food."

The morning starts like almost any other. Molly wakes up with her alarm, makes coffee, gets together some of the papers she'd left scattered in the living room the night before, curls her hair and puts on a little makeup once she's gotten dressed, a routine she's largely kept for a long time. It hasn't been a particularly long week, per se, not more than any other, but she's glad even so that it's coming to an end, which also tends to be the case. She loves what she does, and that she gets to do something at all, but that doesn't mean it isn't exhausting, or that she isn't grateful when the weekend rolls around. She could use the break.

Once she steps outside, though, she isn't thinking about that anymore, nor does the morning seem like a typical one. The streets are fucking empty, filled with cars that are stopped in their tracks, abandoned, barely a person visible. The couple others that she does glimpse look about as confused as she feels, which doesn't tell her anything except that they won't be helpful, so there's no point sticking around to ask. The sight alone is unsettling, but not knowing what it means is even more so, her heart hammering in her chest as she walks, somewhat faster than usual, the few blocks to City Hall.

All she can think, like an instinct, something she can't recognize the lack of logic behind, is that they've got to be in major crisis mode, trying to figure out what the fuck this is, so busy that no one's gotten in touch with her, based on the lack of messages on her phone. It's not as if she's that important anyway; she doesn't need to know what's going on when it's not like she can do anything from the sidewalk.

What she sees when she gets there, though, is a hell of a lot worse than any emergency she could have imagined. City Hall is empty. Not quiet, and not just the lobby, either. Molly looks, yells out some names, just in case, tries calling a few of her co-workers with no response, checks the goddamn mayor's office, and there's no one in the building at all, as far as she can tell. At the thought alone, never mind how deeply eerie it seems, it's hard not to panic. She can't say this is the most afraid she's been since she got here, not even close, but it feels a little like being in a fucking horror movie. None of this is right, and still, she doesn't know what it means. Not everyone is gone, she can tell that much, but it's close enough to it, and, God, this isn't all supposed to be on her shoulders. Something has to be done, for those of them who are left, and she doesn't see how she could be the one to do it on her own.

In a way, it reminds her of the early days in Darrow, when the city was still all but empty. Not exactly, it hadn't seemed so frightening then, because people weren't just gone, but as far as she can tell, there's as much left to them — whoever that may be — as there was two and a half years ago. Back then, it had been exciting, the reason she'd gotten back into politics in the first place. She still remembers the way Stephen sold her on it, talking about a government from the ground up, a once in a lifetime chance. It isn't really either of those things anymore, but it's just as much a necessity. While that ought to be all the more reason for her to step the fuck up now, it's hard to get past how freaked out she is, to figure out where to even start. She's known for a long time to expect the unexpected here, but this isn't something she could have ever prepared for.

When she finally thinks to pull her phone out of her pocket again, scrolling through her contacts, it's abrupt, like she knows what she's doing before she can entirely piece it together herself. There are other people she'll have to try to call later, but it's Lee's number she finds now, holding her breath as she brings the phone to her ear and listens to it ring, practically fucking praying that he picks up. Of all the people she knows here that she doesn't work with, who clearly aren't around, he's the one most likely to be able to help her with this. They've talked politics enough for her to know that. Besides, she needs to know if he's still here, or if he's just vanished like most of the city seems to have.

Hearing his voice on the other end of the line comes as even more of a relief than she's expecting, something she tries not to focus on for the time being. There are more important things at hand: asking him to come to City Hall, telling him there's no one here. Given that she doesn't know anything else yet, that just about covers it. Then there's nothing for her to do but wait, pacing anxiously in the lobby until the door starts to open, and she stops and whirls around to face it. "Lee?"