The girl is outside Joel’s cabin flashes behind his eyes like fragments of a memory. Her eyes, her lips. he clings to distant pieces of her existence as he stood there and wash dishes.

From the corner of his eye, Joel catches a flash of movement weaving between the tall, overgrown trees, out the window. His heart beats heavy as he thinks about what it might be, maybe a infected following him but his breath hitches still when he realizes that it’s you darting towards his home slowly.