... 

I must have fallen asleep because when I heard the door open, it was dark outside. A small lamp in the corner gave off all of the light in the room.

“Hey, sorry I’m back so late. Maribelle saw me and had me work on some things around the infirmary. I got to check on Jack, he’s doing well. Darcy was hanging out with Connie and they were chatting together. Jack seems to like Prescott and Dawson, but they aren’t doing much yet. Connie is also looking a lot better. They both say hi. I got some soup for you and a sandwich for me. I also saw Bob taking stock at the canteen. He gave me a letter for you to read.” Emery set the bowl of soup down on the nightstand. Her hair was a little frizzy, and she looked very tired in the yellow light on the lantern.

“You ok, Emery? I can feed myself, you can sleep if you want,” Emery shook her head.

“No, I want to work on my sketchbook some more, I almost finished a drawing, and I wanted to show you it. We just hadn’t had much time lately.” I frowned. We had lots of time together in the past, I would get back to our room early after digging, and Maribelle would let Emery come back early so Jack could go to bed. Emery just would tend to Jack and fall asleep. Her back always towards me.

“Well, I thought that we had some downtime a little bit ago, but you just weren’t that talkative.” I curled my left hand into a tight fist and started chewing on my lip a little bit. My heart was racing and my palms were getting sweaty. Emery sighed and sat down on the edge of the bed.

“I guess we have to talk about that, I was hoping to just ignore it.” She pushed some baby hairs off of her forehead. I looked at her and shook my head.

“What did I do wrong? Did I hurt you? Why did you hate me so much?”

“No, Ollie... I didn’t hate you, I was just mad. I was mad at everything and took it out on you. We lost Jerry and Margaret. We lost Jay. I saw Jan die. We lost Rosie,” Emery’s voice cracked on Rosie a bit, but she continued. “And Rosie helped me heal when I lost my parents. She helped me find comfort in a new motherly figure, and I know she did the same for you. She was always there for us, and she helped everyone in our group. Sure, she got into fights with Bob over nothing and got Jan all riled up just because she could, but she cared about us. She protected us and let us lean on her. Now she’s gone. They’re all gone. I guess that I blamed you because you brought us here, but I brought us here too. We came here to keep Joey alive, and I’m glad that he’s alive. I shouldn’t blame anyone for what happened. It’s the zombie apocalypse, and people die. But, I just thought that I could keep mine alive. Now even more people are dead. It was stupid and wrong for me to take it out on you, I realize that now. I just wish it didn’t take you almost dying for..” Emery stopped.

Her hand was gripping the material around her chest, her body was shaking with each breath she took. Her eyes were glassy and unfocused. I reached out to bring her hand away from her chest, her knuckles were turning pale from how tight she was holding on. I thought I heard her joints pop.

“Hey, Emery. Look at me.” She did. There was guilt and regret swimming around in those beautiful coffee-colored eyes. I just wanted to empty her sadness into me so she wouldn’t have to feel so terrible anymore. “I don’t blame you for being so upset with me. I would have blamed me too, and I do feel guilty for not doing more. Maybe if I had kept Nestor from opening the gates, this wouldn’t have happened. I can’t change the past, but I can try to do better. I do take responsibility for Jerry dying. And Jay. And Jan. And Margaret. And Rosie. I take responsibility for all of that, but I will try to do right by them. I take responsibility for the deaths on the raid. It’s probably my fault that the truck broke in the first place. I won’t let them die in vain. They tried to protect us for so long, so now we need to make sure that we stay alive for them.” I looked down at my right arm, disgust and guilt enveloped me. “Even if staying alive is the hardest thing to do.” Emery took her hands in mine. They were shaky and warm. I tapped them three times with my fingers.

“Don’t blame yourself. It’s Nestor’s fault. He was an idiot for opening the gates. What did he think was gonna happen? That lady should have tried climbing the fence. Zombies can’t climb, so she would have been fine.” Emery shook her head. She stood up, her face was growing red. “Ollie, you definitely shouldn’t blame yourself. This is Nestor’s fault. He has no idea what he is doing and shouldn’t be in charge. He sent us out on a raid that wasn’t even necessary. So many people have died because he doesn’t want to act like a real adult. He’s a wolf in sheep’s clothing, and we’re all gonna die if someone doesn’t stop him, I’m gonna go talk to Maribelle-” Emery stopped when I grabbed her arm. Her right hand was on the doorknob, and my right hand was gripping tight to her wrist. It hurt to move, but I couldn’t let her leave. Emery was too high on adrenaline and angry to see what she was doing. Nestor would kill her if she marched up to him like this, he almost killed me for the same reason. She had to listen to reason, not her heart.

“Emery, how about we switch topics? We’ve both said sorry and forgiven each other, how about I eat some soup, you eat your sandwich, then I’ll read the letter out loud while you finish your sketch. I would love to see it.” Emery stared at me with a shocked expression on her face and nodded. I tried moving my hand away from her, but the pain made me dizzy. I started to fall when she caught me. My face was inches away from hers, her breath smelled like toast and cinnamon. I could see little flecks of glitter in her lip gloss now that we were this close. Her freckles were accompanied by a deep blush as she stared at me. I felt my own face growing unbearably hot. She guided me back to the bed and helped prop me back up.

Emery set the bowl of lukewarm soup on my hands with the spoon clicking on the side. She grabbed her sandwich and started devouring it. I wonder if Emery had eaten anything besides toast all day?