- A well-fitted shoe goes a long way.

  - Running barefoot is better than flopping around with broken slippers.

  - Crawl if you must, but running is survival.

  - No one looks cool limping away from a zombie.

  ---

  I always hated shoes. They made my feet feel trapped. Like toe prisons. I lived in house slippers, the kind you could flick off with a lazy kick or use to swat a bug if needed. They were comfortable, quiet, and made me feel like I wasn’t trying too hard.

  Turns out, they’re also death traps.

  The first time I had to run for real, I was still in denial. I’d holed up in my little rental house at the edge of Gracetown, with all my research notebooks, an emergency water jug, and exactly one can of tuna. I thought I was safe. I’d watched YouTube preppers. I had this.

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  Then I heard the glass shatter.

  It was two doors down, my neighbor’s front window. There was screaming—cut off, sudden—and then this wet, meaty sound. My stomach dropped. I peeked out the window and saw someone bolt into the street, barefoot, bleeding from the thigh. Something stumbled after them. Bloody. Stiff. Smiling.

  My brain went blank. I grabbed my bag, my notes, my makeshift spear (a broom handle with a steak knife duct-taped to the end), and ran for the back door. I didn’t think. I didn’t plan. I just moved.

  I was halfway across the yard when it happened.

  My slipper caught the edge of a loose paver. It twisted, bent, snapped—some treacherous plastic betrayal. I faceplanted into the grass, skinned my elbow, and barely rolled over in time to see one of the infected lurch through the gap in the fence I’d never bothered to fix.

  That’s when I ditched the slippers.

  I ran barefoot, through gravel, over broken tile, across a neighbor’s kiddie pool. I climbed a low wall like my life depended on it (it did), tore my pajama pants, and hid in a bush until the moans passed.

  After that, I broke into a shoe store. A decent one. Found a sturdy pair of sneakers, size ten. Tried on three different pairs before settling on the ones that didn’t pinch or squeak.

  Best decision I ever made.

  Lesson learned: comfort is for couch potatoes. Survivors wear shoes.