Chapter Text
The snow crunches beneath your boots, the subtle light of the moon illuminating the forest around you. You have no idea what time it is, but you know it is late. Your eyelids have begun to feel heavier, each step forward seeming to suck more energy out of you. It was quiet, the sounds of wind and running water somewhere off to your left the only sounds echoing throughout the night. You loved nighttime in the winter. Even when the sun had long since set, the light of the moon reflecting off the snow still created the illusion of light. The infected seemed to settle more with the cold, becoming less active as more snowfall covered the area.
Your drowsiness has begun to overcome you, but you welcome it with open arms. You always struggled with sleep, even after the most exhausting days. That was the whole reason why you were out here, while all the other citizens of Jackson were long since asleep in bed, away from the cold and the infected. Most nights went the same for you - most days as well, for that matter. You went out on patrol. You forced down some food, if you remembered to grab any. You tried to block out the pain of your memories by busying yourself with chores and assisting people in town with various projects. It helped, and you enjoyed the days far more than you enjoyed the nights. But when night fell, and it always did, the rest of Jackson, aside from the guards at the entrances, turned out their lights and the town drifted into a silence far too loud for you to bear.
You remember your first few months in Jackson, when you would simply lie awake in the safety of your small home and try to will your thoughts to quiet down enough for you to get some rest. It had never really worked. You might have got a few hours of sleep a night, if luck was on your side. But mostly you sat in your bed while the wounds of your past festered and made you shake with frustration and grief. You would emerge from your home once the clock hit five in the morning, when it was more acceptable for you to wander around Jackson or go speak to the guards, sometimes swapping them out. That routine had worked for a while, but the few friends you had in Jackson didn’t take long to realize that something was off. Your appearance probably gave you away - dark bags had become a permanent feature of your face, your eyes were usually puffy and bloodshot, and your hands had taken on a prominent shake that you couldn’t hide.
Nobody commented out of politeness for a while, and you preferred it that way. After several months of this, you had taken to sitting out on your front porch during the sunrise, and found the person living in the house across from yours had formed a similar habit.
You would take a mug of hot water out on the porch, and watch as the sun bled into the sky, signaling the rise of the rest of Jackson. After a few weeks of keeping the same routine, you decided one morning to raise a hand in greeting to the man across the street, the one you saw sipping from his own mug each day like clockwork. He nodded to you politely, and you carried on with your morning. After a couple more weeks of friendly nods and waves, you decided to approach him and introduce yourself. He was older, his beard dusted with silver and white streaks. He reminded you briefly of your own father the last time you had seen him.
That was how you met Joel. You would often join him over on his porch each morning, mostly enjoying the sunrise in silence. Eventually, you formed a friendship of sorts. He even offered you a mug of his precious coffee he had traded for.
It was nice, getting to know someone around town. But it didn’t really change things. After a few months of this shared routine, of each day a dull carbon copy of the last, something inside you just cracked.You just couldn’t keep doing it anymore. That was when you started sneaking over to the east wall each evening, beginning your daily solo venture beyond the walls of Jackson. If Joel knew, he would probably tell you it was stupid. And risky. But what Joel didn’t know certainly wouldn’t hurt him.
Tonight, you had walked to the old boarded up library and spent the hours of the night choosing out different books for your next few visits. You change up your location every few weeks, but the library is nice. It’s entertaining, and reading the books is a welcome distraction from your thoughts, bringing you a small sense of peace as you wait the passing hours until sunrise.
It has worked itself into an almost daily routine. By the time you get back to the east wall, it’s usually around four in the morning. Each time, you silently haul yourself up one of the big pine trees and scale the rest of your way down the wall. Nobody ever lurked around this edge of town this late, giving you a discrete entrance and exit point for your little outings. You had been doing this for months. You count six total on your fingers. That sounded right. This new routine helps you relax, helps you to escape the trapped and anxious feeling that often weighs upon you when sleep abandons you.
The east wall becomes visible in the distance, and you trudge the rest of the way there. The climb up the tree is especially difficult tonight, the cold making your hands particularly numb and stiff. You scrape them to shit amongst the sharp branches, gritting your teeth at the sting. Whoops. You regret staying out so long, but you had lost track of time exploring the library. You heaved yourself over the top of the fence, dropping down into a crouch. You reach your arms out, shaking the stiffness out of your limbs. It’s so nice to finally feel tired.
You head back towards your house, watching the snow come down to settle over Jackson. It’s peaceful to see the town so quiet this time of day, your fatigue strong enough to relax you. At the same time, there’s something almost eerie about it, but you don’t mind. You creak open your front door, kicking off your boots and extra layers before settling in your bed, praying for at least a few hours of decent sleep.
***
You wake up with your head and heart pounding, scrubbing at your cheeks with your palms. A now-forgotten nightmare still lingered in the anxiety crushing down on your chest, and you let out a shaky breath. You get ready for the day, grabbing your mug to take out on the porch. When you open the door, the sight of the sun beginning to rise up over the row of homes greets you.
Joel is already seated on his own steps, and you can see the cloud of his breaths puffing out into the brisk morning air. He glances over as your door knocks shut in the frame, and you raise your usual hand in a hello, heading in his direction.
“Morning, kid,” he calls out as you approach him, settling yourself down on the bottom step. You clasp the warm mug between your hands, letting the warmth seep in.
“Hey, old man,” you say back with a sleepy smile. The morning goes similarly to the rest. You chat with Joel for a while before heading back to your own place, feeling content enough to face another day. Once you get cleaned up, you head out for your daily patrol shift with your bag slung across you back.
*** The day passes with a blur, just like all the others. You try to enjoy the light and the company around you, but there’s a numbness to everything, just like there always is. The sun sinks lower and lower in the sky, and you find yourself dreading nightfall once again.
***
Before you know it, the streets of Jackson are quiet and dark once again. Beggining your usual affairs, you skirt out the door, heading for the east wall again. You glance over at Joel’s place on your way by, and notice that the light in the garage is still on. His kid, Ellie, must still be up. You’d met her briefly a few times, and crossed paths occasionally. She is a year older than you, and you liked her just fine. But you weren’t really in the right headspace to form friendships this past while. That’s why your best and only friend is an old man, though it’s a thought that makes you chuckle softly to yourself.
***
Ellie groans in frustration, balling up another page from her sketchbook and tossing it into the bin. She couldn’t sleep tonight. Patrol had been busier than normal, getting her all riled up after a run in with a few infected. She glares out the window, watching the snow feather down from the sky. She sits there for a while, thinking about different things she could sketch. She thinks about all the things she had planned to do tomorrow, going through a quick mental checklist. Flexing her fingers, she couldn’t shake the antsy feeling. About to turn her attention back to her sketch, she stills when a movement across the road captures her attention. She watches as you emerge from your home, closing the door behind you. You glance cautiously around the row of houses before sneaking away down the street.
What the hell? Ellie looks down at her watch. Why were you leaving your house at midnight? She knows Joel cares about you, but she doesn’t know much else about you. Nobody seemed to. She peers through the window, catching a final glimpse of your jacket.
She can’t sleep anyways. What’s the harm in investigating?
*** You hop the wall, heading on towards the library for the second night in a row. You keep an ear out for infected, but you were looking forward to settling in the library and cracking open one of the books you had set aside the previous night. You were going to work your way through a set you had found in the section labelled as ‘classics’.
You didn’t recognize the names, but you hadn’t expected to. You squeeze in through an old broken window on the main level, leaving the front door chained and undisturbed. Patrols still came through the area frequently, and you didn’t want to leave any obvious trace of your presence. Nobody really had reason to sneak out of Jackson, other than for a few nights out to party each month. You didn’t really worry about getting caught, but you did your best to avoid it.
The library is dark, but you navigate your way over to the staircase with ease, going up to the second level. After so many nights here, you were starting to know it like the back of your hand. You walk over to one of the seating areas, reaching underneath it and pulling out your personally selected stack of books. You grab the top one, tracing your finger over the author’s name. Jane Austen. You might as well start with this one. You get a few pages through it before you hear a bang echo through the library. You shoot to your feet, grabbing your knife and abandoning the book on the stained chair. You creep along the staircase, mouth open in shock as you see a very not-infected figure standing opposite you.
“Hey,” she says, breathing heavily, one hand holding on to the strap of the backpack across her shoulders. A mess of books is now scattered in front of the staircase, where she had apparently knocked over one of your selected stacks.
“Oh, sorry,” she huffs out in laughter, reaching down clumsily to stack them back up.
“What the hell are you doing here?” you ask, accusingly, your eyes narrowing at her. You fold up the blade in your hand, tucking it back into your coat pocket.
“You scared the shit out of me,” you tell her, irritation evident in your tone.
She looks at you wide eyed, gesturing at you.
“What am I doing here? What the fuck are you doing out here?” she asks, eyebrows furrowing in suspicion.
You open your mouth, trying to come up with an answer.
“Sometimes I can’t sleep, so I walk. So what?” you counter defensively, crossing your arms and shrugging.
She just hums in response, nodding her head as she looks around the dark library. She flicks her flashlight on, scanning the upstairs.
“Why the library?” she asks you, heading past you to go up the stairs.
“Uh,” you don’t answer her right away, still taken aback by her presence.
“Did you follow me here?” you climb up the stairs behind her, struggling to catch up with her quick pace.
‘Yeah,” she admits, shrugging her shoulders.
“So? Why here?” She asks you again, turning to face you.
“I don’t know. I like books. It’s quiet, and there’s usually no infected in this area. I just thought it was as good a place as any,” you mumble.
“It’s pretty dumb, you know,” she told you, throwing a glance at your over her shoulder.
“Coming out here by yourself. In the dark. Do you even bother to tell anyone when you leave?” she asks, though the accusatory tone had now faded away into genuine curiosity.
You look down at your fingers with a gentle sigh, picking at the cuticles of your nails.
“I don’t really have anyone to tell. So, it doesn’t matter either way,” you say, crossing your arms and watching her as she runs a finger along the old bookshelves. She stops, laughing out loud, the sound cutting through the air. She grabs a book from the shelf, the front cover ripped a little and worn with age.
“This is a good one,” she abruptly tosses it in your direction.
You catch it instinctively, looking up at her in confusion. She nods down at your hand, the comic now curled into a scroll-like shape in your grip.
You sigh softly, shaking your head in mild amusement. You barely know this girl. Why would she care enough to follow you out here in the dead of night?
Your eyes widen and you let out a soft giggle, looking down at the comic.
“You read this stuff?” you ask, pressing your lips together to avoid laughing again.
“Yeah, I do. Something funny about that?” she asks you in a mock serious tone. You flip through it briefly, your eyes scanning through the busy illustrations and blocky text.
“Nope,” you say, looking at her with your eyebrows raised, though a huff of amusement escapes your lips. You cover your mouth with your hand momentarily, laughing even more.
“I’m sorry,” you say between breaths of laughter.
“I just wouldn’t have pegged you as someone to read comic books,” you tell her, and she fakes an offended expression.
“Okay, Fancy-pants. What do you read then?” she asks you, gesturing to the shelves.
“Go on, pick me something. You read mine, I read yours. And I better be impressed,” she looks at you, waiting for a response.
“Seriously?” you ask her. She just nods firmly in response. You glance around the dark library, feeling oddly like someone just waltzed into your home uninvited. But- you were kind of excited?
“Yes, seriously. I’ll wait,” she plunks down into the chair you were lounging in earlier, making a face and grabbing your abandoned book from beneath her.
You scan the shelves, looking for something suitable. If she liked fast-paced comics, she would probably fall asleep reading any sort of classic or history novel. You smile to yourself as you searched the shelves, looking for the horror section.
“Are you kidding me? You judge me for Savage Starlight, but you’re the one reading this snoozy romance garbage,” she calls out to you from the chair, where she has your Jane Austen book propped open on her knee.
You scoff in offense, popping your head out from behind the shelf to face her.
“Excuse you,” you say.
“It’s not snoozy. It’s a classic,” you defend it weakly. In all honesty, it wasn’t exactly a page turner so far.
She laughs at that, muttering the word ‘classic’ under her breath.
“And romance isn’t garbage,” you continue, your eyes scanning the slim pickings of the horror section.
“Are you a cornball?” she asks you. You don’t answer, eyes still searching for a suitable read to give her.
“You’re definitely a cornball,” she says, her laugh rasping throughout the room.
“I’m not a cornball. There’s nothing wrong with a little romance. I need to live vicariously through someone,” you tell her. A title catches your eye, and you hold it up victoriously.
“This,” you announce, walking over to her seated position in your chair.
She glances up, snatching it from your hands. You cast the flashlight beam down on it, letting her look.
“The Talisman,” she reads out, looking up at you, seemingly unimpressed.
“This better not be a romance book,” she warns. You laugh.
“It’s not. It’s Stephen King. My dad told me about his books. When he was a kid, he read a bunch of them. Mostly horror novels, this one doesn’t sound scary, though,” you say.
You haven’t read this one before. You wonder if your dad ever did. Your heart tugs in your chest at the thought of him, but you push it down. He had been taken from you a long time ago, but you feel like a piece of you had died with him.
She hums, turning it over to read the description.
“Fine, this will do,” she relaxes back into the chair, opening it to the first page. She fumbles with the flashlight on her backpack, which is now tucked on the floor with the poor Jane Austen book. She unclips the flashlight, pointing it down on the yellowed pages of The Talisman.
She looks over at you, scrunching up her nose and letting her eyes fall on the comic still in your hand.
“Less staring, more reading,” she says, winking at you. You scoff in response, your cheeks flushing with mild embarrassment. You hadn’t even been staring at her, not really.
Flopping down onto the ground beside her chair, you groan as your eyes scan the first page of Savage Starlight.
***
You aren’t sure how long it has been, but your neck aches slightly as a result of your scrunched position. You made it a few millimeters through Savage Starlight, and are a little ashamed to admit that you’re enjoying it so far. You stretch out your neck, rubbing your hand against it.
You glance up at Ellie, who sits with a concentrated look on her face, eyes scanning the page in front of her. You smile to yourself as you notice the furrow of her brow. You wonder if she likes the book so far. You let your eyes trace her features, looking at her closely for the first time. Freckles dust her face, though they are difficult to see in the darkness. Her hair falls, shifting forward as she adjusts her position, the strands framing her face.
She glances over at you, a smile tugging up the corner of her lips. She looks down at the comic in your hand.
“So?” she asks, brows raised in question.
You let out a breath.
“Don’t let it get to your head,” you say, and she laughs.
“Too late. And I told you,” she says smugly, nodding her head in satisfaction.
“How is it?” you ask, looking down at the book resting in her lap.
“It’s actually not bad so far,” she says, yawning softly. You feel your own yawn building as you watch her.
“You tired? We should probably head back soon,” you say, looking down at the comic somewhat wistfully. You didn’t really want to leave just yet, but your eyelids were beginning to feel heavy. You couldn’t remember the last time you had enjoyed yourself like you had been these last few hours. It was nice to have company.
“A little,” she admits, flicking off her flashlight and stretching her arms behind her head. You stand, legs stiff from sitting for so long.
You tuck the comic into your bag, reaching over to grab Ellie’s book from her lap.
She stands up from the chair, brushing dust off of her jeans.
“Shall we?” she asks, and you nod, holding your flashlight out to illuminate the stairs. She follows you out of the library, and you converse back and forth about the different characters of Savage Starlight. You compared your favorite characters and discussed the parts you had read so far.
“Look, I can’t say anything about that because it would spoil the next one,” she says to you.
“But I will say, it picks up right after that one. There might be a little cliffhanger though,” she told you, rubbing her hands together to fight off the cold. The snow crunches beneath your boots, and your face stings slightly in the cold air.
“You have a decent amount left to read before you’re done that one though,” she says, referring to the comic tucked into your bag.
You nod in acknowledgement, and the familiar lights of Jackson became visible ahead.
“You know,” she says, turning her face towards you as she walks.
“We could always come back out tomorrow night,” she suggests nonchalantly. You look over at her, a bit surprised.
“Really? You want to come back out?”
“Well, yeah. Did you see that fat ass book? Might take me a while to get through it. Besides, you’re actually not the worst company in all of Jackson. Surprisingly enough,” she says, and you scoff, lightly shoving her shoulder. She laughs, and you find yourself laughing as well.
“Okay,” you agreed.
“Tomorrow then,” you say, feeling lighter for the first time in months.