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Patrolling.

Keeping watch while I sit here trying to remember how legs work.

I reach the car and stop.

A folded piece of paper is tucked under my windshield wiper. Beside it sits a small white box.

My heart gives one hard kick.

I glance around, but the camp stays quiet. No Leon stepping out from the shadows. No tall, red-haired menace leaning against a tree with that almost smile on his mouth. Just firelight behind me, darkness ahead, and Joanie’s snoring rattling Max’s windows like an omen.

I take the paper and the box, then slide into the driver’s seat as quietly as I can. Joanie grunts in her sleep and rolls over, one hand flopping dramatically onto the seat between us.

She snores louder.

Of course she does.

I snag her portable reading light from the console, click it on low, and unfold the letter. The paper is folded neatly, but the ink near the bottom looks fresher, darker, like he added something after we came back.

The greeting hits first.

A hand around my ribs.

My Clair,

My vision blurs before I even reach the next line.

After we graduated, I still heard about you. Small things. Through Trish. Through people who knew people. Through every piece of news I pretended not to be hungry for. You working. You pushing through. Raising your daughter. I wondered about her more than I had any right to. What she looked like. If she had your smile. If she laughed with her whole face the way you did when you forgot to hide it.

I heard when you went back and got your GED. I heard when you got your teaching license. I heard when your students loved you, which didn’t surprise me at all. You always made people feel like they mattered. Even when you didn’t believe that about yourself.

I was proud of you, Clair.

I still am.

A tear drops onto the page.

I don’t wipe it away fast enough. The ink blurs slightly, and I press my thumb beside the spot like I can keep the words from running.

Trish had mentioned the after-school program at Poppy’s school more than once. She was always trying to get people to volunteer, always talking about the kids who stayed late because their parents were working or running errands or trying to hold normal life together with both hands. I’m not going to lie and tell you I didn’t volunteer just for the chance to see you again.

So when the screaming started, I didn’t think. I ran.

And I saw you in the street.

Through the bodies. Through the smoke. Through the blood and the screaming and every dead thing between us.

I saw Russ raise the gun.

I saw the bullet hit you.

I couldn’t move. It was like the shot went through me too.

A sound slips out of me, small and broken enough that Joanie snorts in her sleep, then settles again.

I got to you as fast as I could. It didn’t feel fast. It felt like the street kept stretching. Like every body between us had ten hands. Like the world knew I was trying to reach you and wanted to prove I was too late.

You were bleeding. Pale. Still worried about Poppy before yourself. Of course you were.