Empty. The perfect word to describe how Alice felt. It had been two weeks since the two CNO’s (Casualty Notification Officers) appeared at her door step. It all still seemed so unreal. While the rest of world continued to move she remained still. Mentally Alice slowly bean to accept the truth of Tasha death however getting her heart to follow suit was another matter entirely. Her heart remained in denial. Tasha her friend. Her wife. Her lover. The woman she pledged her undying love and support too couldn’t be dead. There love might not have been destined but it was strong, determined, and everlasting. Since Tashas death Alice had lost a significant amount of weight. Dark circles were now ever so present around her eyes. She wasn’t eating and spent most of her days in bed. She was a mere shell of herself. For her close friends and family it was disheartening to see. They placed themselves on a schedule that way someone would be home with Alice at all times. They all were worried about her and rightfully so. None of them had experienced the loss of losing a partner and here was Alice going through this again. Although, her and Dana were not together at the time of Danas death the loss hurt and cut deep. Over time that wound had healed however with the passing of Tasha that wound had now been re-opened and this time Alice wasn’t entirely convinced it could ever heal.

Because she and Tasha were married Alice held power of attorney over everything. Tasha had made sure of this before she deployed. Nothing could be authorized without her consent. This posed as a problem for Tashas family as they felt they knew would be in the best interest of Tasha and what she would have wanted. They wanted to plan a very over the top and lavish memorial service for her, however Alice knew that was something Tasha would not have wanted. Tasha was far from lavish and a small memorial service with close friends and family seemed more fitting. Alice already dealing with so much emotionally did not want to fight or argue with Tashas family she hoped that things would remain cordial.

Nobody understood her pain more so than Tashas mother. She had lost her only daughter and Alice had loss her partner. Tashas family after she came out were not very accepting initially. Tasha came from a very religious background where it was embedded in her head at an early age that homosexuality was a cardinal sin. In fact despite the other sins mentioned in the bible according to her parents homosexuality seemed to be the worse of the worse. Her father was a police officer and she had five older brothers. Given her background she struggled most of her life hiding who she was in her personal life as well as in her professional life. She wasn’t ashamed of who she was but the fear of being judged and ousted by her family was something that she feared the most. Eventually Tasha got sick of hiding who she was and during a family dinner came out to her family. None of her brothers were surprised in fact they had suspected that she was since she was a little girl. Every year for her birthday her mom would buy Tasha a Barbie. She would open up the box and play with the Barbie for ten minutes before putting it down all to appease her mother. After the ten minutes were up she would place her Barbie at the very bottom of her toy chest, sneak into her brothers room and play all day with their Transformers, G.I Joes, and Ninja Turtles action figures. She hated wearing dresses and anything that made her seem girly. Her parents took her being a lesbian the hardest. They strongly believed as parents they had failed Tasha and as a result she choose to be a lesbian.