The wind off the Gulf of Alaska doesn't just blow; it bites, a jagged thing that hunts for any gap in wool or skin. Joelle Park stands on the edge of the regional tarmac, her single black suitcase huddled against her boots like a loyal, mourning dog. The small prop plane that carried her from Juneau is already a retreating drone in the grey sky, leaving her with nothing but the smell of spent kerosene and the vast, terrifying silence of the Tongass National Forest.
She reaches up to touch the thin gold chain at her throat, the ring cold against her collarbone. Six weeks. It is a manageable stretch of time, a sterile clinical window to breathe in air that doesn't taste like her failed marriage or the sharp, antiseptic corridors of Seattle Grace. She pulls her charcoal coat tighter, the cable-knit wool of her jumper offering a fragile barrier against the plummeting afternoon light. The regional clinic is expecting her, but out here, under the shadow of the jagged, spruce-choked ridges, she feels less like a doctor and more like a trespasser.
A muddy, dark green sheriff's cruiser rounds the hangar corner, its tires crunching heavily over the ice as it slows toward her.
