She heard their labored breathing coming closer now. She huddled closer into the doorway, willing herself to be blend into the red painted facade of the building. She shut her eyes, a childish hold-over, believing that if she couldn't seem them, they couldn't see her. Of course she knew that wasn't true, but maybe if she closed her eyes, tight enough, she could mute the pounding of her heart; a sound so loud she was convinced her pursuers could hear it echoing in the damp and empty alley way.

"BANG!" She nearly screamed out, at the sudden and intrusive sound. But it turned out to be nothing more than a cat leaping out of a garbage can and tipping over the lid. She closed her eyes again and gathered the edges of the gown closer to her. Wishing, not, for the first - nor she was certain, the last- time that she had chosen a more opportune time to leave her husband.

Or, she supposed her husband to be, since the marriage was never consumated. She snuck out the back door of her own wedding, done up in the finery associated with that. N