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After all Joel and I went through, it all felt different.
We had found the Fireflies. They would try and find out why the hell I was different, why I was immune. Or so I thought.
Then I woke up and Joel said there were many more people immune like me. However, they gave up on finding a cure.
“Well…” Joel’s voice got me out of my thoughts as I remembered the past and examined the bite in my inner forearm. The one that was supposed to turn me into one of those infected like they did with so many people. The one that finally didn’t change me but still served as a reminder of everything that I went through. Everything I lost along the way. “Looks like we’re walking”
I got out of the car and followed Joel in silence. We were going back home.
If there was a home anymore….
*
It got to a point where I was eating my head too much and I just had to talk to him.
I trusted Joel. I knew all he wanted was to keep me safe. But I also knew that he saw Sarah in me. And I wasn’t Sarah even if he was scared to lose me like he lost her.
That was why my instinct told me that something was wrong. Something had definitely changed. It did ever since I woke up in that car, still wearing that fucking hospital gown, and Joel told me it was all for nothing. I didn’t believe him completely.
“Hey, wait” I asked him, my voice low.
Joel turned around and looked at me.
I wanted to tell him about Riley. That moment where everything definitely went to shit for good.
Frustrated as I found it so hard to explain myself, I sighed.
“Back in Boston, back when I was bitten, I wasn’t alone” Joel was staring at me, wondering why I was telling him that. “My best friend was there too. And she got bit too. We didn’t know what to do. So… she says ‘let’s just wait it out. Y’know, we can be all poetic and just lose our minds together’. I’m still waiting for my turn”
“Ellie…” Joel said with some short of apology in his deep voice, but I wanted to finish telling him.
“Her name was Riley and she was the first to die. And then it was Tess. And then Sam”
“None of that is on you” He told me, as if just those mere words made everything okay.
Everything that I did. Everything that I lived. With the Clickers and the Runners, with David, with Riley. It all couldn’t just disappear off my memories as if it never happened. And it felt like… it was all for nothing.
“No, you don’t understand” I told him, shaking my head as he crossed his arms over his chest.
“I struggled a long time with survivin’. And you-” I noticed Joel touched his broken wristwatch as he did many times, probably without even realizing. “No matter what, you keep finding something to fight for”
I was fed up with it. Even if I sensed he was affected in his tone, I interrupted him.
“Swear to me” I sternly told him, doubting all that he ever said about it was true. “Swear to me that everything you said about the Fireflies is true”
He flinched for a moment, but then he looked straight into my eyes and said it.
“I swear” He said with stern determation.
“Okay” I nodded after a brief pause.
Words are just words. That was why I couldn’t erase the doubt I felt about it all. Still, part of me wanted to believe him.