Girls Save the World in This One - Ash Parsons Page 0,116

I didn’t mean for it to be funny, but it is.

A small laugh ripples through us at the image, the thought of a well-deserved hurkening.

Imani and Siggy wrap their arms around me and each other, and I do the same with them, a group hug.

Then Siggy lets go and stands.

“I’m going to go look around. See what all’s up here. Just to be sure.”

Checking that there’s nothing else we can do, that there’s no surprise cache of supplies or a stowed prepper bugout bag. The instinct still there, keep searching. Keep trying.

Maybe there’s something.

I nod.

Imani stands, too. “I’m going to see if there’s a way to reinforce the doors.”

I nod again, and want to tell them I get the message.

Don’t give up yet, June.

I don’t want to steal their hope, or tell them it’s pointless.

So I just nod.

My friends walk off, my strong, beautiful friends. I want to cry, a mix of love and sorrow and I don’t even know what, a longing.

Instead I just sit some more.

On the ballroom floor below, zombies seethe, their guttural growls and the automaton clacking of their jaws rising into the air, like a buzzing of devouring bees.

Hunter puts a hand on Imani’s chair, then sits down next to me.

“A swarm,” I say, waving my hand at the zombies below us. “They sound like a swarm of zombies.”

“I think they sound like a saw,” Hunter says, like this is a normal conversation. Like the zombies below us are performing. “A band saw of zombies.”

I nod. Then I glance at him.

“I was going to ask you a question,” I say. “When this day started. At your opening session.”

Hunter shakes his head gently. “Feels like a lifetime ago.”

“A whole other world,” I agree.

He crosses his arms over his stomach and stretches out his long legs, crossing them at the ankles. He tilts that crooked grin at me.

“So, you’re a fan, then?” he teases.

“Oh yeah.” I push my hair back off my shoulders in an exaggerated gesture of preening-pride. “I was Clay Clarke’s biggest fan.”

Hunter’s eyes cloud slightly. His eyebrow inches up.

“Was?”

“Welllllll.” I draw the word out. “Let’s just say I’ve decided that I like Hunter Sterling the person more.”

Hunter gives a little laugh.

“Oh,” he says. “That guy.”

His tone is joking but there’s something underneath, small but noticeable, like a sliver of splinter under the skin.

I touch his arm, just once, because it feels like I should be able to telegraph the truth to him through my fingertips.

“Yeah,” I say. “That guy.”

Hunter clears his throat, a little shy cough.

I smile, and he smiles back, and below us the zombies buzz like summer cicadas.

“What was your question, anyway?” Hunter asks.

I laugh. Why not?

“In that interview, you said you identified with Clay because he was searching for something.” I sit up and lean forward slightly, then glance back over my shoulder at him.

“What is it that you’re searching for?”

Hunter laughs, and shakes his head, the movement causing hair to fall over his eyes.

His default shy-gesture.

“I don’t know,” he says.

I wait.

“That’s the answer.” He glances at me. “I honestly don’t know. But sometimes I feel like there’s something out there, calling to me. Something I should find. Something that will make everything make more sense somehow. Like finding the key to a test. Does that make sense?”

“Oh yeah,” I answer. “That makes sense.”

I feel a light brush on my hand. Hunter’s knuckles rest tentatively against mine.

Hunter smiles, sweet and sad, and I smile back. In spite of everything.

It’s confusing, but no one cares, so I smile back.

I turn my hand over, and Hunter takes it, pulling it onto his leg and threading