Isabel

I am drunk on whiskey and high on the thought of forgetting. I know there is nothing good that can possibly come of this combination. I try to ease my conscience; I remind myself that today is the one-year anniversary. I have excuse enough for my behaviour – and then some.

I take a swig from my canteen. The whiskey burns like fire down my throat, and my fingers are numb against the metal of the canteen. I can feel the shadows cast by the firelight dance across my face, warm to cold and back again. My cloak slips off my shoulder and my bare skin prickles with goosebumps. I tug it back up, the wool rough but warm against my neck, sealing out the bite of cold carried on the early November air.

Yellow eyes round as lamps calmly survey me from the other side of the clearing.

"Oh, Grimm! Must you really?" I exclaim, exasperated.

He emerges from the brush, a satisfied grin pulling the corners of his lips away from the mangled, bloodied rabbit dangling from his mouth. I stroke the mottled gray ruff of my four-legged friend as he settles himself next to me. I turn my head delicately to the side as he starts in on his rabbit, sharp canine teeth flashing, paws clasped tightly around his bounty.

As Grimm washes rabbit blood from his paw pads, I wrap myself in my cloak and lower myself to the leaf-littered ground. I fall asleep to the steady rasp of tongue on paws and the contented murmurs of the forest around me.