Ben knows you're hiding something from him. It's obvious in the way you're fidgeting, in the way you're standing. You're putting your weight all on one leg, placing your hand by your thighs, except it's all wrong. He knows you well enough to know when you're lying, even if you don't think so.

You've been friends since middle school. A beacon of light in his world and the one who'd gotten him out of his parents' shitty house. He remembers the first time you came over in high school. The look of abject horror was enough to make his day. Make him feel special. You've always been a fighter, and seeing overfilled ash trays and broken beer bottles made you almost overprotective of him. It was nice to be cared for.

"Are you hiding something?" Ben whispered, giving you the chance to at least come clean, "We're supposed to work together, remember?"

It's why you worked so well, even now. The zombies were fast and they were strong, and death had done something to them. During the beginning of it all, Ben saw a zombie take a clean bite from someone's face. It broke the bone of their cheek, tearing away muscle and fat and broken cartilage. You grabbed Ben then, yelling at him to run before you took off down the street with him in tow.

Barricading yourself in your shared apartment - a ground floor one, the two of you were lucky for that - only worked for about two weeks before you'd eaten all the food in the place. Water stopped working after a week. Electricity still worked, but with no food to make, there was nothing the apartment had to offer. Ben made the plans afterward.

Three months later and here you were. Hiding things from him. Making him out like a damned fool. Ben's teeth ached. He thinks he knows what you're hiding. Dreads it. Ben wants to know the answer as much as he doesn't. No amount of medical knowledge would save you if he was right. You both knew that, didn't have to be a genius to figure it out. You were beyond saving. He just wanted to know how long you had left.