“That’s why we wanted to find you. You’re family. I missed you. Actually, I was kind of beside myself, too.”
I tear my eyes from my feet. It may be the first time I’ve seen Eric look shy, but his gaze is steady. I open my mouth and close it again. I can’t say it back, but I can tell him something else. I look away. “You were right—what you said a while ago.”
“About what?”
“I…could stand to be happier.”
His warm palm grazes my hair. “You will be.”
“Happiness is just around the corner?”
“Yep. Right behind the zombies.”
I laugh. I want to cry, but I laugh—the story of my life. “You were right about something else.”
“What’s that?”
“We could be friends.” I fiddle with a boot buckle, insides churning with the familiar feeling of the search for a playmate on the playground of my new school.
“We already are.”
I hear his smile and know he can see mine, although I can’t meet his eyes just yet. I want to tell him what happened with Grace. I’ve already told him far too much. What’s one more thing?
“We made it to Brooklyn Heights,” I say. “They were gone. All of them. Grace’s parents’ house burned down at some point, but we know they were okay for a while because Logan waited for Grace in their apartment. He left a note every time he went out for food or water or to check on her parents, then he’d come back and leave another when he went out again. The last note was dated the day after we tried to get there, when you went to Paul’s.” Eric winces, and I nod. “So we waited for him at the apartment. She finally agreed to leave, but then she said something.”
“What did she say?”
I don’t answer. Eric’s arm comes to rest on my shoulders. He smells good. I don’t want to think about how bad I must smell. You could cook French fries using the grease in my hair.
“You don’t have to tell me,” he says.
I want to. I’m tired of disliking myself and feeling as though others dislike me. Eric says he’s my friend, and I’m going to take that at face value. I do need friends. If I don’t have Grace, that leaves me with nothing. I don’t want to have nothing.
“I said that maybe they were okay. I didn’t know what to say and I didn’t want her to lose all hope, you know?” He murmurs agreement. “She said she’d be with them if it wasn’t for me. That I don’t have anyone—that I never have—so I don’t know what it feels like to lose them.”
“Ouch,” Eric says, arm tightening almost like a hug. “I’m sure she didn’t mean it.”
Here’s the part where I tell him the rest. I can’t hold back if I want to be sure he likes me, warts and all. I’m handing him a dagger and tossing my breastplate to the ground. “When we got back, she tried to apologize, but I said something really shitty.”
He waits, face impassive.
“I said she was right, that no one cares if I live or die, but that now she knows how it feels.”
I wait for his arm to drop, feel for the tiniest bit of recoil, but he only nods. “You were hurting.”
“So was she. We were only blocks away from Logan, and we left. Do you know what that’s doing to her? All she did was cry the whole time we were gone. And then I said that, after I told her not to give up hope.” My throat tightens when I recall her face at my words. I’ve never been a shitty friend, but that winning streak has come to an end.
“You were both wrong. You both have people who care. Sitting right next to you, in fact.”
His words smooth down the prickly ball of insecurity that lives in my chest. It’s unfamiliar to be accepted for who I am, no changes required—or, more realistically, only a few changes. I try to commit it to memory: This is the feeling of people liking you. Try to get used to it.
“Maybe you and Grace need to punch each other,” he says.
I can’t hold in my laugh, which I’m sure is what he’s going for. “That’s a great plan. Thanks.”
He turns to me with a grin. Only inches away. Thank God I have that toothbrush in my bag. “Happy to help.”
“You never said what you did to deserve your punch from Paul.”
Eric glances behind us. “I’ll tell you another time. It looks like Grace wants to talk.”
I turn. She stands by the hatch, swollen and sad-eyed. Eric pats my shoulder and then pats Grace’s on his way down. I try to smile at Grace, who gives me a pained one in return before she drops beside me.
“I’m sorry,” I say quickly. It doesn’t matter how many other people I have in my life, I still want Grace.
“No, I’m sorry. I don’t know what came over me. It’s…God, Sylvie, it hurts so much.” Her voice is evidence of that—as if she’s taken a hit to the stomach. She closes her eyes until she continues, “I wanted someone to blame. It’s hard to be angry at the whole world, so I took it out on you. What I said was unforgiveable, but I hope you can forgive me anyway.”
Grace has always been there for me. And even if they haven’t been directed at Grace, I’ve said my share of words I didn’t mean. I understand how it happens, how you try to break others when you’re broken inside, and how remorseful you feel afterward. At least she’s stellar at apologies.
I prod her with my boot. “It’s okay. You know I’ll always forgive you.”
Grace rests her head on my shoulder. “Maybe that’s why I thought I could say it. But that doesn’t make it okay. I just felt so…alone.” I nod. It may be true I can’t quite fathom her particular pain, but I understand loneliness all too well. She exhales. “How did you do this all your life and not jump off a roof?”
“Maybe I didn’t know what I was missing. And then I had you and your mom. I never told her…” My voice fails because I should have—they were words she deserved to hear.
“She knew, Syls, and she loved you so much. And I am so glad we’re together. I hope you know that.”
“You sure have a funny way of showing it.”
She jabs me in the side. “You know what I was thinking? That your mom saved our lives. If we’d been home, we wouldn’t have met Maria. We’d probably be…like everyone else. The last thing your mom ever did, even if she didn’t mean to, was protect you. That’s pretty amazing.”
“Ruth Rossi finally came through?”
Grace sucks her teeth. “About fucking time.”
She joins in my laugh, then sits up and twists her wedding ring around and around on her finger. “I don’t think they’re alive, you know. You think I’m all puppies and rainbows, but I’m sure they’re gone.”
I won’t try to convince her otherwise, but I won’t agree with her, either. “We’ll try again.”
She crosses her legs under herself and breathes in slowly, hands resting on her knees. Peace suffuses her body—I swear she filters it out of the air somehow. “Maybe,” she says.
“What do you mean maybe?”
“I mean that looking for them isn’t worth us dying. Not when the chance is so slim and we have no idea where to look. They’ll come for me if they see the note. It will happen if it’s supposed to.” She opens her eyes and a small smile plays on her lips. “The world is still a beautiful place.”
“Oh God, don’t start with that,” I say.
“It is, my pessimistic friend. We have people. You have people. Good people, right downstairs. It’s ugly at first glance, but if you’d let yourself see the beautiful things, Syls, you’d know it’s true.”
I want it to be true. I want to see the world as she does. But, even if I never get there, I do see the beauty in the people downstairs, who’ve made the unknown far less daunting than it’s ever been before. That has to count for something.
“I’ll tell myself they’re dead so I’m not disappointed,” she says. “So I can go on every day. Because, for some stupid reason, I do want to go on.”
“It’s not stupid. You have me to entertain you. Who wouldn’t want to go on?”
“You are prett
y entertaining.” Her eyes glisten when she searches mine. “Are we okay? I’m really sor—”
“Stop already. It’s done. Don’t walk around feeling all bad and moping. It’s even worse than insulting me. And don’t even start crying.”
Grace wipes her eyes with a sob-laugh because she was already well on her way. I hug her close and wrinkle my nose. If I smell anything like she does, it’s worse than I thought. “Love you, Gracie. Even though you stink.”
“I love you. But, and I mean this—you smell like ass.”
Our laughter carries across the rooftops. Grace links her arm through mine and pulls us onto our backs to watch the sky. The dust clouds have finally dissipated, at least until the next strong wind blows, and storybook clouds float in bright blue. I try not to think of it as a cheesy metaphor for our situation thus far, but, cheesy or not, it feels that way. I’m bound to create more dust storms, bound to screw something up. Right now, though, I feel as light as those puffy clouds.
“It’s pretty,” I say.
“It’s beautiful,” Grace whispers. “It really is.”
Maybe she’s right.
Thanks for reading!
Stay tuned for the next book in The City Series:
Peripeteia (book two) coming in 2017
Want to read more?
The Until the End of the World series is on Kindle
Until the End of the World, Book One
Visit www.SarahLyonsFleming.com
Like me on Facebook
Join my spam-free mailing list
Sarah Lyons Fleming is the author of the Until the End of the World series.
She’s also a Laura Ingalls devotee, wannabe prepper and lover of anything pre-apocalyptic, apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic—or anything in between. Besides an unhealthy obsession with home-canned food and Bug Out Bag equipment, she loves books, making artsy stuff and laughing her arse off.
Born and raised in Brooklyn, NY, she now lives in Oregon with her family and, in her opinion, not nearly enough supplies for the zombie apocalypse. But she’s working on it.
Acknowledgements
I like book acknowledgments, and I’ve always read them. Why? I like to see what went into the creation of someone else’s work because although we writers live in our heads much (the majority?) of the time, there are always folks who help us out with advice and reading and rereading and a boot in the butt when we need it. They deserve thanks because many—most—of them do it out of the goodness of their hearts, at least in my world.
So a big-ass thank you to my beta readers for the genuine goodness of their hearts.
First, my author-readers:
Rachel Aukes, Lindsey Fairleigh, Rachel Greer, Denise Kawaii, Rain Stickland, and Julie Tuovi.
I so appreciate your input and respect your opinions. You know I’m here for your next drafts!
Second, my other beta readers. And by others I mean Most Awesome People on the Planet:
Jessica Gudmundson, Danielle Gustafson, Jamie McReynolds, and Tracey Nielsen.
Third, my parental readers: Mom and Dad and Mama P and Big La. Y’all hunt for errors and dumb stuff and reread the book and are, as always, insanely supportive of me. Love you!
And thanks to Will, husband and editor. No book is done until Will says so. It’s pretty cool that I have an in-house editor, but, honestly, I couldn’t pay for better service. His edits are a labor of love and spot on every time.
The City Series (Book 1): Mordacious Page 51