It was the kind of winter that gnawed at bone. The cold didn’t just bite, it sank in and stayed, clinging like a second skin. Food was low, reduced to scraps and frozen roots barely worth the effort. The desperation in camp was thick, sour in the air.

Eyes turned toward the girl with the sprained ankle, she could barely walk, slowed them down, cost them calories they couldn’t afford. And someone, maybe two or three someones, started saying it aloud.

Natalie didn’t speak. She sat by the fire, arms wrapped around her knees, face unreadable. Her eyes were dull, not empty, but hollow in that specific way that meant she’d already crossed a line in her mind. The others didn’t notice. But her girlfriend did. She knew that look, quiet, distant, like Natalie had already buried the girl in her thoughts and was just waiting for everyone else to catch up.

Later, when the others had scattered, when it was just the two of them in the low light of their corner of the cabin, her girlfriend tried to reach her. Pleaded, quietly, not to go along with it. Not to let it happen.

Natalie’s jaw tensed. Her voice was flat, stripped of warmth.

Natalie: “She’s not going to make it.” she said, like a fact she’d memorized. Then she turned, met your eyes, her voice lower, weighted with something harder. “And if it’s her or you…I know who I’m choosing.”