"What the hell are you doin' out here?"
I jump at his voice and turn round quickly, wince as my neck muscles crick. I stare at him, holding his crossbow at his side, his eyes small and suspicious. Words don't come though, and I stare mutely.
"Y'know I almost shot you," he says, giving a small huff of impatience.
Again, I don't speak. And neither does he. We stare at one another in the moonlight, his bare arms shiny with perspiration and his forehead wrinkled up in what I can only describe as curious disgust. Suddenly he nods towards the group of tents a hundred yards away.
"Why aren't you with the rest of 'em?"
This time I look away from him, and slowly shake my head. "I don't want to be around them right now," I say softly, my eyes fixed on the tree line a stone's throw away. My mouth opens, but no more words come out, and instead I stare ahead, seeing the trees yet at the same time seeing nothing.
Grief has weakened me.
He shifts his crossbow to his other arm and sighs loudly, as though finding me so near his campsite is a pretty large inconvenience. And I suppose it is.
"C'mon," he says, turning around and heading towards the fire flickering a dozen or so yards from where we stand.
I watch him walk away and contemplate my choices, wonder if he's just being nice after what's happened. I'm still thinking when he turns around and says impatiently, "Are you comin' or not?"
This time my feet don't hesitate and I follow him dutifully across the field, watch the moonlight glint off his bow and his short unruly hair. For a reason I don't quite understand, I feel more comfortable with him than with any of the others. Perhaps its because he seemed to be the only one who cared about Bobby, the only one who tirelessly looked for him, and never gave up hope.
The fire is crackling when we step to it, and he throws another log on top. I watch through hooded eyes as the sparks fly up, seem to reach for the sky before petering out. My hands are trembling worse than ever and I hunker down beside the flames, staring into it as though all the answers are there.
He's rummaging around in his bag but I don't watch. I'm mesmerized by the flames, watch as they come up like fiery tongues, searching for something to lick, to set aflame. The thought comes to me – what would it feel like, to step into those flames and say bloody hell to it all – and I cringe. As grief stricken as I am, I don't think I could do it.
There are always guns, I think.
A hand appears in front of me, clutching a smudged bottle with a label I haven't seen since the world ended. I stare at the liquid that's sloshing around and wonder if it's possible.
"Take a drink," he says quietly, nudging my hand with the cool bottle. "It won't take your troubles away, but it'll make your hands stop shakin'."
Very slowly I grasp the bottle in my fingers and turn to him. "How have you been hiding this? You know the others-"
"What they don't know won't hurt 'em," he says simply. He glances over at me, half his face in shadow and nods at the bottle. "Take a good one, then pass it over."
My fingers shake as I unscrew the top. I bring the bottle to my nose and inhale, smell the alcohol, feel my face tingle. The bottle is at my lips before I can think about it, and I swallow a mouthful, shudder as it makes a fiery path into my stomach. My eyes water as I pass the bottle over and slowly slide my legs out from under me so I can sit down. He takes a long pull, then screws the cap back on.
"Look at your hands," he says, nodding towards them.
I hold them out, watch as they stay steady for the first time in days. The whiskey makes me feel more like myself, makes the world around me a little more real. "Thank you," I whisper.
Neither of us speaks for a long time, and it isn't until he throws another log onto the fire that I pull a battered pack of cigarettes out of my pants pocket. The cellophane is wrinkled, and the flames dance merrily across the clear surface. I stare at the pack, turn it over in my hands as though it's the first time I've laid eyes on it.
"I've had this pack since the night everything went to hell," I murmur, pulling a slim, white cigarette out. "One a week. I feel like it's going to last me forever."
He chuckles softly and grabs a stick, pokes the fire a few times. "I didn't take you for a smokin' girl."
A faint smile touches my lips and I turn to face him. "Do you want one?"
"How many you got?"
I shake the pack and estimate. "Ten or so."
He drops the stick and scoots closer. "Why'nt we share it?"
I nod and pass the cigarette to him, but he shakes his head. "Nah girl, you start 'er."
The smoke nestles comfortably in my lungs and I hold it in as long as I dare. It starts to trickle out when I open my mouth and I give him the cigarette, watch as he inhales deeply. We pass the cigarette back and forth a few times, and he unscrews the bottle of whiskey, takes a long pull before handing it to me.
We smoke it down to the filter and he watches me when I flick the butt into the flames. "It's the best part of the week," I say softly.
He grunts and stretches out on a dark sleeping bag a few feet away, his hands nestled behind his head. I envy him, living apart from the rest of us. Loneliness keeps me with the group, but tonight I can't stand to hear them. The sounds of their fires, the soft murmurs of their conversations just grate on my nerves.
"I don't want to go back," I find myself saying, speaking more to the fire than the man next to me.
"Then don't," he says gruffly.
It startles me when he speaks, and I act on impulse. I don't want to leave this fire, I don't want to go back to them. I get on my knees and crawl towards his sleeping bag, lie down quietly beside him.
"I didn't mean you could share my sleepin' bag," he says, though he makes no attempt to push me away.
I lace my hands on my stomach and stare up at the sky, marvel over how many stars there are. Bobby comes to me and I remember curling up with him in our tent outside of Atlanta, talking about the universe. How he laughed when I told him the closest one was a billion years away.
He shifts beside me. "Roll over girl," he says quietly. "Face the fire."
I do as he tells me and feel the weight of a blanket settle on top of me. He moves in closer so we're both under, and rests his arm across my waist. We don't speak.
The fire crackles softly beside us.