- It’s good within the confines of your shelter and around your friends.

  - Bad if you do it in front of a zombie. Or any danger for that matter.

  - Getting eaten because you were talking about your 3rd grade crush is a bad way to go.

  ---

  It was one of those rare Cleveland evenings where no one was bleeding, crying, or threatening to fight a mutated deer. A proper rest day. We earned it.

  The four of us sat in the lounge area of the repurposed bandit base, now affectionately called “The Fortress” by Alex. The generator hummed in the background, casting a soft light over us. Someone lit candles—not for romance, but because the damn hallway switch still didn’t work.

  We had food. We had time. So, naturally, we did what all survivors eventually do.

  We got a little sentimental.

  “Alright,” Alex said, plopping down onto a pile of reinforced cushions. “Everyone’s gonna spill. Pre-apocalypse stories. Childhood trauma optional.”

  “No therapy, just vibes,” Jules added, hugging a pillow.

  Gail leaned back in a beat-up recliner, arms crossed like he was about to interrogate a suspect, not share his teenage memories.

  I cleared my throat.

  “I’ll start, I guess.”

  All three turned to me. I immediately regretted volunteering.

  “So… yeah. I wasn’t anything special.”

  Alex snorted. “No kidding.”

  I gave her a glare and pushed on. “I wasn’t some accomplished guy. No secret degrees. No black belts. I wasn’t even an average Joe either.”

  “Below average?” Jules offered, grinning.

  “Let the man talk,” Gail said, probably enjoying this more than he should.

  “From a young age, people thought I was smart. Gifted, even. Could read early. Retained stuff. Teachers made a big deal out of it. My folks weren’t really around, but they’d send money every month like clockwork. Until I hit eighteen, anyway. Then it stopped. Poof. Guess my ‘subscription’ expired.”

  “That’s cold,” Alex muttered.

  “Eh.” I shrugged. “Never really felt connected to them. But that praise? The ‘You’re so smart, Elliot!’ stuff? That... fades. Turns out, when everything starts to need effort, and you’re not instantly good at it, people stop being impressed. I kind of shut down after that.”

  Jules leaned forward a little. “You dropped out, right?”

  “Yeah. Did two years of Entrepreneurship. Thought I’d be a businessman or something. You know, make something of myself. But I couldn’t focus. Felt like I was dragging a corpse through every class. Eventually, I dropped out.”

  Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

  Alex tilted her head. “That when you became a shut-in?”

  “Not fully. Just… ‘shut-in adjacent.’” I chuckled. “I did babysitting gigs. Pet-sitting too. People in Gracetown would drop their kids or their Chihuahuas off, sometimes both. Paid surprisingly well. Especially when I had four kids and two lizards in the same weekend.”

  “You ran a daycare?” Gail asked, eyebrows rising.

  “Unofficially,” I said. “Used the cash to fund my gaming obsession. Internet, movies, those big dumb action flicks where people jump off buildings and walk away from explosions. That kind of stuff.”

  “That sounds...” Jules paused, choosing her words.

  “Lonely?” I supplied. “Yeah. A little pathetic? Also yeah. But it was comforting. Predictable. Safe.”

  There was a pause. Not awkward. Just quiet.

  “I mean,” I added, “beats this zombie crap, honestly. I’d trade my axe for a microwave burrito and a laggy Wi-Fi connection in a heartbeat.”

  Jules let out a soft laugh. “You? The guy who calls zombies ‘meat puzzles’ and swings an axe like it’s an Olympic sport?”

  “Even meat puzzles can’t fix chronic loneliness,” I said.

  Alex got up and ruffled my hair, which was less affectionate and more “I hope this gives you whiplash.” “You’re not pathetic, dude. Weird? Yeah. Kinda soft? Totally. But not pathetic.”

  “Thanks?” I said, unsure if that was encouragement or a roast.

  Gail gave a small nod. “Comfort’s a rare thing to find, even before the world went to hell. Doesn’t matter if it was unconventional.”

  Jules nudged my leg with hers. “You were surviving in your own way, Elliot. Just like you are now.”

  I blinked. “Did you just say something nice to me?”

  “Don’t get used to it.”

  I leaned back against the wall, cup of watered-down juice in hand, and sighed. “Alright, who’s next? Let’s hear about Alex’s rebellious punk rock phase.”

  “I never had a punk phase,” she said defensively.

  Gail just smirked. “Photos or it didn’t happen.”

  She glared at both of us. “Fine. But when I talk about the time I broke a guy’s nose with a toaster, I don’t want to hear any judgment.”

  “Zero judgment,” I said. “Maximum applause.”

  And just like that, the rest day turned into storytime.

  ---

  After I finished my little trip down memory lane, everyone sat with it for a bit. Some of it stung. Some of it warmed. But mostly, it just was—a piece of me tossed onto the table like the last can of peaches.

  Then Alex sighed and leaned forward, elbows on knees, eyes on the candle.

  “Alright,” she muttered. “My turn.”

  Jules perked up, but didn’t say anything.

  “I had a good childhood,” Alex started. “Like, legitimately. Loving family. Siblings who didn’t treat me like crap. Parents who gave a damn. We weren’t rich, but we weren’t struggling either. Just… normal. Happy.”

  That surprised me. I think it surprised Gail too—he shifted a little in his chair, like he didn’t know what to do with the image of a younger, tinier Alex smiling in a family photo.

  “I wasn’t some star student,” she continued, “but I liked taking things apart. Never the books, just… watching people. Especially the folks fixing power poles near the school. Climbing up with their tools, wires sparking. That was more interesting than any history class.”

  “You liked one of them,” Jules said, teasing.

  Alex glanced at her. “Shut up.”

  “Ha. Called it.”

  Alex smiled, but it didn’t quite reach her eyes.

  “There was one guy. Never knew his name. Just liked watching him work. Not in a creepy way! Just… I don’t know. He looked free. Like he knew what he was doing. Like everything made sense up there.”

  I nodded. “Yeah, I get that. The appeal of someone who’s got their life figured out.”

  “Yeah.” Alex rubbed her hands together. “Anyway, high school came, and so did the confusion. I knew I wasn’t really into girls. I liked guys. But where I’m from—Maplethorn—being a boy who liked boys? That made you a target.”

  Jules winced. “Small town charm.”

  Alex snorted. “More like small town pitchforks.”

  She went quiet for a beat, and then added, “It wasn’t just that though. It wasn’t who I liked—it was who I was. I didn’t feel right. In my skin. In the mirror. Something was just… off. Constantly. Like I was a guest in my own body.”

  I stayed silent. I’d had suspicions, of course. But I never pried. And now, hearing it straight from her? It felt… honest. Brave.

  “I got out the moment I could,” Alex continued. “Moved to a college in Cincinnati. That’s where I found myself. Started figuring out who I was. Started saving up for—well, everything.”

  She made a vague gesture toward her torso.

  “I got bottom surgery,” she said, matter-of-fact. “Worked my ass off for it. Didn’t even tell my family until after.”

  “That must’ve been hard,” Gail said, low and thoughtful.

  “Yeah,” Alex muttered. “My mom flipped. My siblings ghosted. But my dad… he stayed. He didn’t understand everything, but he wanted to. He told me, ‘You’re my kid. That’s all I need to know.’”

  Jules let out a quiet breath. “He sounds like a good man.”

  “The best,” Alex said softly. “He was the reason I went back to Maplethorn. To see him. To show him… me.”

  She looked down at her hands.

  “But by the time I got there… it was too late. Chaos. Sirens. Smoke. Carnage already in full swing. I tried to find him. I really did. But I couldn’t. I had to run. Ended up holed up in that bookstore for months.”

  I winced. “Five, right?”

  “Five,” she nodded. “Five months of hiding. Starving. Waiting to die. Then you showed up.”

  I blinked. “Me?”

  “You fed me,” she said, eyes locking with mine. “Didn’t ask questions. Didn’t make me explain. You just… gave me a granola bar and a bottle of water and sat with me like it was the most normal thing in the world.”

  I rubbed the back of my neck. “I mean… it was a really good granola bar.”

  She huffed a laugh.

  “You saved me,” she said, serious now. “And then you kept doing it. Without even knowing the whole story.”

  “Well…” I gave her a crooked smile. “I kinda guessed. But it didn’t matter.”

  Gail nodded slowly. “It still doesn’t.”

  Jules raised her juice. “To Alex. The most dangerous woman with a fuse box I’ve ever met.”

  Alex rolled her eyes but smiled.

  “To Alex,” I echoed, clinking my can against hers.

  Gail lifted his drink without a word.

  There was a peace in the room after that. A warmth that even the apocalypse couldn’t touch.

  For a moment, we weren’t survivors. We were just four broken people learning how to live again.