“Touching from a distance, further all the time…”

The melancholic and cavernous voice of Ian Curtis spilled into her ears and expanded through her mind as if the song were made out of gas instead of sound. The guitar riffs were determined, frill-like stitches drawing patterns on her brain and…

Fuck. I’m pissed and I’m listening to Joy Division. Contrary to what some people thought when they saw her for the first time, most of the music she listened to was not loud and/or senseless. It could be heavy but it had to be ornate; it had to feel like an invasion and it had to swallow her up and drown her. Just like a drug. Sometimes to make her forget, and sometimes to make her disappear. Just like fucking.

“See? I’m not that complicated, am I?” she asked out loud, but the loft-like apartment was empty. She was all alone. “I’m not, I’m easy, so easy…”

She had been here before, feeling not unwanted, but alone, which was too similar a feeling for her liking. In those other circumstances in which she had felt something similar to this, she had done the usual: gone out, downed a bottle of something-or the-other and shagged somebody senseless, managing almost to forget. That had always been the plan, but now, instead of sinking deeper into her spiral, she had paused and settled for the booze, giving way to the flood of unwelcome thoughts.

And she could still feel her, as if Cat’s burning skin had branded her own with ever-lasting reminders. She raised a hand to her own bangs and rubbed several blonde strands of hair between her fingers, feeling Cat’s instead. However, Frankie knew that she was not actually feeling Cat, but her absence – not a ghost but a shadow.

She had last seen Cat when they had all gone to see Tess’s debut at the Tron. Before that, not one sign of life. While it was true that Frankie had kept her distance, she had expected something -a call, a text message, an email- from the woman she needed so desperately. Keeping her distance was not something she was precisely known for, but had forced herself to do it for Cat’s sake, because that was the last thing the woman needed. But she could’ve indeed said something.