When I wake up, he’s still asleep. But strangely enough, he hasn’t moved. He’s still right next to me, right where he was when I fell asleep. It’s closer than we’ve ever slept before, but I don’t mind it. I think I appreciate it, even. I sit up slowly, trying not to shake him. He looks like he’s alright. I guess he probably wouldn’t show if he wasn’t alright when he’s sleeping.

I tuck my knees under my chin, and wrap my arms around them. I think I’ll be okay. I don’t feel particularly okay, but it’s better than yesterday. I suppose we could follow one of the roads out of here… Another week plus of just the two of us, walking. It might fix me. But there’s no guarantee that wherever we go there’ll be anything different. Or maybe this is the only hub, and we’d just be travelling away from the only chance we have.

I’m not crying, and that’s an improvement. At least it means I can breathe. Do I even need to breathe? I hold my breath.

I guess I don’t.

At some point, I feel panicky, like I should be breathing. But as long as I push that down, I don’t need to breathe. I knew I was dead, but this still feels like… life. I guess I was bound to find differences at some point.

Lian stirs next to me. I almost lay back down, but that would be useless. I scan his face as he wakes up. I guess he’s fine… there’s no moment of ‘oh shit remember what happened yesterday’, there’s no grimace or wince as he sits up. I breathe out a sigh of relief. I guess I was more worried about him than I thought. I clear my throat, and hope that my voice will work. I wonder what not breathing does to my voice?

“You good?” Lian asks me, but he still sounds sleepy. He rubs his eyes, and looks up at me. I shuffle backwards a little bit. Now that we’re both awake, it feels too close.

“I’m good.” My voice isn’t too terrible, so that’s a relief. Lian reaches up with his eyes closed, and his hand covers my face.

“You sure?” He kinda pats it, and I suppress a snort. I wouldn’t want to spray snot on his hand. Do I still have snot? Just in case, I don’t.

“I’m sure,” I insist, and the heel of his palm angles down and hits me in the mouth.

“Oh there’s your lips. I thought I’d lost them.” He says, smirking. I push his hand off my nose, and grab his wrist.

“Lost them?” I ask. It’s an odd thing for him to say, I think. I’m not sure. I hold my hand up to his, and sigh. His fingers are almost delicate looking compared to mine. Longer, obviously, but slimmer.

“It would be difficult for you to speak without them, I think.” He says, and he rotates his hand slightly so his fingers slip between mine. “Seriously though, are you feeling okay?” I’m looking at his hand, and how it’s very clearly holding onto my hand, but I glance back at his face. His eyes are open now. He does look serious.

“I’m okay,” I insist, and pull my hand away. I rock forward onto my knees, and then back onto my heels. I stand up, and brush off my jeans. Obviously there’s nothing on them, but it feels weird if I don’t. I hold my hand out to Lian, almost an apology for pulling away. “We gotta figure out what we’re gonna do today.”

He takes my hand, but only uses it to sit up. He runs it through his hair, and tugs on a curl. “What are we going to do today?” He asks slowly, looking up at me towards the end. I can tell he’s trying to be sensitive. He’s trying not to bring up anything that will make me go off like a water fountain.

“I suppose we could walk around. See how big it is, if there’s anything but those… things.” I wish I could call them people, but that’s not what they are anymore. If you’re unable to control yourself, I don’t think you can count as a person. A person has free will, and the ability to make decisions.

“That seems like a good place to start. We should mark the ground, see how many roads there are.” Lian says, patting the sand-like substance that we know well. I crouch down, and run my finger through it. A line forms, just like sand. So I suppose I could just…

I push the sand into mounds. I push the sand into as high of a mound as I can, watching the sand trickle down the sides slowly, as though it’s trying to return to where it was. But most of it stays, so I stand.

“Good enough to let ourselves know we’ve been here before, yeah?” I ask Lian, and I watch his eyes. They dart up to my face, and back to the sand. Up to my eyes.

“Yeah. Let’s go.” He stands up, and we start to walk again.