It had been a week since Tina came
home from the hospital and things were moving along smoothly. One only had to
look at her to tell she had made great improvement. The bruises were slowly healing;
she was sleeping less and more active each day.

Most of the time Bette went about
doing the daily things that kept a house in forward motion while she sat on the
couch and read a book or talked on the phone with Angie or Kasey each of them
called daily.

However what Tina didn’t know was
in the evening they each called Bette’s cell too just to make sure Tina was
doing as well as she was telling them. Tina had also contacted her employer and
ask that they send over a few case files so she would not fall so far behind on
her case load but her boss had refused telling her to rest and get better then
they would worry about her job.

Tina was in a hurry to push her
healing along. She felt bad about taking Bette away from her life and work. She
had noticed that although she had tried to talk to Bette about this and other
things Bette seemed unusually quiet. Although, Bette had always had a reserved
side to her years ago Tina noticed it was now more pronounced. But one evening
over dinner at the table Tina did manage to pull the information out of Bette
that she rarely had visitors to her home which surprised Tina.

Tina wondered why Bette had changed
so much. She knew that it all wasn’t because of her. In the past Bette had been
a social butterfly if it was due to necessity or other wise Tina was now unsure
but she had certainly closed herself off over the years. Her phone rarely rang.
She had not once heard Bette mention their old friends nor had she talked of
any new ones in her life. That was the problem she said nothing at all. She
seemed to be an island on to herself.

Last night was a prime example of
this after her shower Bette excused her self for the night even though Tina had
waited on the couch to talk with her before going to bed. When Tina knocked on
the door to her room she opened it only to find Bette sitting up in the bed
playing a game on her lap top. Not wanting to push the issue Tina had made the
excuse of telling her good night before closing the door once again.