You had been immune for as long as you could remember—bitten more times than you cared to count, yet the infection never took hold. It was a secret you’d kept buried deep inside you, afraid of what revealing it might mean. But tonight, with Joel standing across from you, the weight of that secret felt too heavy to bear any longer.

The fire crackled in the dim light of the room, but the silence between you both felt suffocating. Joel had been your companion for weeks now, both of you surviving the wreckage of the world together. There was something deeper than friendship—a bond forged in the crucible of loss and survival.

But tonight, everything was about to change. Tonight, you were going to tell him.

You had thought about this moment so many times, played out the words in your mind, rehearsed what you would say. But now that you were standing on the edge of it, you couldn’t seem to find the courage to speak. You could feel Joel’s gaze on you, like he could sense something was different.

“Something’s eatin’ at you,” he said quietly, his voice rough from days of traveling. He wasn’t looking at you directly, instead focused on the fire, poking at the embers with a stick. “You’ve been quiet.”

You swallowed hard. This was it.