Two weeks.

The loss of hope was nothing more than a silent admittance of irreversible defeat, laid in unmarked grave the only thing to which she clung with dwindling conviction. Yet was she not such, tainted each breath with the earthy tang of grave soil, a monument to those passed living only for that she was incapable of releasing the memories she had grown desperate to hold. A time when she may grow, learn from the experiences that populate the spaces between unconscious action, from her taken by the graveyard built within her chest.

Late the hour she was roused, deemed a supposed necessity a rarely claimed extended rest, the situation one often making impossibility such occurrence. Slow the creeping extension paws made along smoothed sheets, grown cold with the lack of sought companions. Harsh the surprise that arose, a bubbling, cloying heat, ruined her covering by sudden movement. Too much. Careful had been the one to tuck close the blankets, an ocean in which she drowned, frantic the wild kicking.

Foolish child, scared of everything.

No longer constricted, with the once tidy quilt now left in a bundled mess at the foot of the bed, shame produced a tepid, yet somehow more agonising, heat scorching chest and cheeks. To righting the mess she had been a direct cause of was no thought spared, left in her clumsy wake, each stumbling step a cacophony drowning out all thought. There was nothing until the warmth of grains crept between spread toes, flexed and buried, grooves worn as opaque crescents raked along the golden shore.

Heavy the breath that skirted parted lips, cruel the ensnaring rage wound about the guttering spark of her shame, back shifting until encompassed was soft visage with the sharp frame of a snarl. Unfitting it alongside the prickle tears caused in tightly closed eyes, shuddering each breath as the moments passed, erratic the jerky twitch of her tail though still all else.

She was gone and such must be accepted, yet her heart rejected such notion for a moment, bitterly sweet the few memories that populated mind clouded beneath what she may only understand with time.

Slow the first step, seconds suspended before next was performed, stilted her progression. Best may it have been to return, quell any worry that may have arisen with the haste of her departure, but this was needed. On did she continue her trek, soothed the rapid beating of her heart as the hushed symphony the ocean conducted with the advanced and subsequent retreat of the tide, closer creeping until wet grew her paws in the rising surf. Too soon had it all come to an end, however, above the sodden grains paw hovering.

Disruption within the smooth expanse of golden grains a point of dark brown, shape odd if indistinguishable at such a distance. Intrigue washed away any sense of worry and closer did Suitekit move, surprise arising alongside a dampened joy. Imperfect it, a shape similar but not quite as that of the instrument her father had once lovely tended with care, whispered between them much until it seemed a carrier for all those inconsequential not quite secrets. Careful the manner she extracted it from the bed of sand, frown fixed into place as she made note of the broken strings.

"Merci, papa." Long since had he take his last breath, stolen from his eyes the jovial light of joy in days she could recall only in fragments, too young even to give shape and weight to his countenance. Yet she was sure within her conviction that he smiled upon her from where he watched with pride, gently cradling the ukulele to her chest with a smile and tears staining her cheeks.