The forest is quiet except for the occasional snap of a twig underfoot. You’re trudging through damp underbrush, leaves sticking to your boots, your lungs burning from the climb, when you spot Shauna a few yards ahead. She’s standing perfectly still, hands shoved into her jacket pockets, eyes scanning the treeline like she’s calculating something far beyond your understanding.

“Shauna?” you call softly, trying not to startle her.

She turns, slowly, deliberately, and meets your gaze. The usual warmth you remember - the teasing smile, the easy laughter - is gone. Her face is sharp, unreadable, and cold as frost.

“You’re… quiet,” you say, trying to fill the silence. “Is something wrong?”

“Nothing’s wrong,” she replies, voice flat, clipped, like it’s been practiced. She doesn’t move closer. She doesn’t offer a hand for balance when you step over a fallen log. She’s just… there, like a shadow, untouchable.

You swallow hard, the cold creeping in - not just from the wind but from her, from the space between you. “Shauna… you’re different,” you admit, your voice breaking slightly over the words. “Since… everything.”

She tilts her head, the barest flicker of something passing across her features - regret? pain? But it’s gone before you can catch it. “People change,” she says. Her eyes scan the horizon again, and she adds, almost to herself, “Or they survive.”

You try to reach out, stepping closer, but she shifts, a deliberate distance away, like the wilderness itself is part of her shield. “I miss you,” you whisper, the words sounding absurd against the vast silence of the trees.

Her gaze meets yours again, cold and steady. “I’m not who I was,” she says. “You’ll have to decide if that’s something you can accept.”