I listened to Julie's soft, teary breathes become heavier, longer, then smooth into the regularity of sleep. I'd spent so long studying her sleep patterns I knew the exact second she dropped off. Her back was still to me, her body curled in on itself for warmth. I hated that I was the one who had made her feel this way because it only intensified my longing to be the one to make it better, if only I knew how. I pushed away the image of holding her in my arms while she slept for what seemed to me to be the hundredth time. She didn't want me, and especially not now she knew for sure who had taken Perry from her.

The dead do not sleep.

So, I didn't immediately click where I was when I opened my eyes to the rich vibrancy of green trees and registered the burst of birdsong within the branches. Uncomprehending, I looked to either side. Grass. Trees, and more trees. A dirt track that wound in a natural curve, part of the landscape instead of intruding.

I didn't hear her voice, or see any footprints, but I knew with a clarity that matched the blue sky overhead which direction Julie was in.

I took a step. I knew I was going in the right direction, it felt so inherently true, but it took several more before I even noticed the change.

I wasn't dragging my feet. My limbs swung with effortless ease. The world looked different, as if the angle had been tilted, but then I realized I was walking properly, standing up straight, and I was viewing everything from an unfamiliar height.

They were nestled in an open glade between two young trees, three familiar faces even though I'd never properly met two of them. Nora featured in Perry's later memories, and he was instantly recognizable even though I was usually seeing the world through his eyes, not looking at him. He sat with his legs crossed and his arms, also crossed, resting on his knees. Nora was hunched up in a crouch that looked uncomfortable but she held easily, toying with an apple in her hands. Julie, lying on her belly with her legs stretched out behind her, was half way through hers.

"If you guys could pick any job in the world, pretend that everything was totally different, what would you wanna do?" Julie asked the question, of course.

Nora smiled down at her friend. "Nursing." She replied after a moment.

"Yeah?"

"Yeah. Healing people, and saving lives... yeah, finding a cure for all this."

I had a hard time figuring out what Nora meant. This peaceful orchard looked like a pretty nice place to me. Who needed curing here?

"I like that." Julie was studying her apple. Perry's expression was more downcast than either of the girls, grimmer.

"I think some day someone's going to figure this whole thing out. Exhume the whole world." Julie took a bite of her apple.

"Exhume. And what does that mean?" Asked Nora.

"Um, exhume means to like revive." Julie's brow furrowed, trying to remember a classroom that has little impact in the real world.

"It means to dig up." Perry corrected with finality. "As in, digging up a corpse."

"Whatever." Julie grumbled, not letting him derail her from her train of thought. Nora was looking at Julie and laughing, but Perry glared mildly at me, like I was really there, like he could really see me. Maybe he could. I saw him all the time, why should it be different in reverse?

"What the hell are you doing here?" He was still staring towards me, so I check behind me just to be sure. There was no question now. He saw me. He didn't sound friendly, either. But why would he? I'd stolen his life in more ways than one. Julie had seen me too now. She sat up, her gaze lingering on mine, far more welcoming, open to the idea, than Perry.

"Are you actually dreaming right now?" Perry questioned me, half laughing at the absurdity of that notion.

"I'm not sure." One thing is for sure - that doesn't sound like my voice. It's like my walk - rock steady. Easy. Natural.

"You can't dream, Corpse. Dreaming is for humans." Perry hauled me back down to earth.

"Chill out, Perr." Julie scolded him, defensive of me. She climbed to her feet, standing up for me at the same time. "He can dream if he wants to." Her voice was very soft. It melted my insides in two seconds flat. She came toward me and I felt like I was seeing her properly for the first time. There were no dark circles around her eyes, no wary, watchful glances around potentially hostile surroundings. She was at home here, her skin warm to look at in the sunlight.

I had to smile as she approached.

"What about you R? What do you wanna be?"

I gave my head a little shake. "I don't know. I don't even know what I am." I replied honestly. It wasn't a moment for white lies, or any other colour.

"Well, you can be whatever you want." She meant it. Her smile and her eyes and her expression were so trusting, that standing there in an orchard with her, I believed her words. I believed in her. I believed in us. "Isn't that what they say?"

"We can right? You and me?" She nodded once, smiling still. You and me. I couldn't believe how easy it was to think those words. To speak to her. To look into her blue eyes. I'd be all right, everything would be all right, as long as she was with me.

Perry grounded me quickly. "It's not gonna happen, loverboy. Not after you told her you ate her ex."

We both looked at him at his words. Julie turned back to me and she wasn't smiling anymore, she studied my face carefully, seeing the pain that Perry's words caused me.

Then she lifted her shoulders, and the smile returned. "Shrug." She told me affectionately.

Birdsong.

Blue eyes.

The smell of apples, and growing grass.

My eyes opened.

I was curled up on my side, and for a moment I was disoriented and could barely recognize my own fingers in front of my face. My eyes flickered to the bed I was lying on the floor beside, the blanket thrown back...

JULIE!

It hit me all at once, staggering, and I ripped myself up off the carpet to take in the empty bed. I almost panicked as I pushed off the floor with my palms, almost fell down the stairs, almost knocked myself out on a low beam at their base.

I made it to the front door despite the limitations of my body. It was grey outside, chilly, gloomy. I looked helplessly up and down the street.

The car was gone, and Julie with it.

She's gone. She left me alone here, and I felt as hollow as the monster I was. I staggered back inside, but the first thing I saw was the photo from last night. I lifted it with my shaky hand. Julie. Julie.

I needed her. It didn't matter that I couldn't explain why, I just knew that I needed her. Without her I was... I was the nameless shadow that you couldn't even make out because there were too many clouds.

I needed her, and she was gone.

I was in a daze when I left the house behind. I didn't even think about the danger to myself. Corpses never traveled alone, since despite our physical strength, one on one we rarely came out on top of an armed human. A Living could have leaped out wielding a shotgun and popped me in the head without my protest, I was so hollow.

So much for dreaming. You can't be whatever you want. All I'll ever be is a slow, pale, hunched over, dead-eyed zombie. What'd I think was going to happen, that she'd actually want to stay with me? It's hopeless.

This is what I get for wanting more. I should just be happy with what I have - things don't change, and I need to accept that. It's easier not to feel. Then I wouldn't have to feel like this.

So I'm just going to go home, I'm gonna blend in, I'm gonna stop thinking so much. I'm going to forget about her. Just like I forgot about everything else.

At first I didn't notice the rain. Then it made me think of Julie, and my heart screamed at me, ripping me apart from the inside.

Then... then... something happened that I don't expect. My skin chilled. I shivered. I wrapped my arms around my body, scant protection from the rain that lashed down unforgivingly.

Shit, am I cold? Is that what this is? Corpses don't get cold. I must have be suffering some sort of mental stress, thinking about Julie shaking in the rain last night.

"Yooooooo!"

I recognized the shout, but I didn't believe it. Slowly but steadily, the figure, a few paces ahead of a shambling collection of zombies, grew closer, fist raised in a triumphant gesture.

It was M. M had come looking for me. I stared at him until we were almost face to face, then M stretched his hand out to me. Brokenly, I reached out to grasp it, then, overwhelmed, I half fell on him and hugged him. I'd never been so relieved to see him. Having my best friend at my side made me that tiniest bit less lonely.

"Come on... you... freezing." Muttered M after a moment, obviously a little awkward, and gave me a push towards an overpass. Under its shelter, the others watching us with various levels of interest, I asked M what he was doing here.

"Boneys. Chased me out." Grunted M. "Came to find you... where is she?"

I didn't think the words would be audible. Surely if they were, he'd hear my heart breaking in them. "Went... home."

M's shoulders slumped and he exhaled heavily, almost a sigh, and he reached out and put his hand on my shoulder.

"You okay?" He asked me for the second time in my memory.

I shook my head. "No." I would never be okay. M jostled me roughly but with feeling a few times in an effort to cheer me up. "Bitches man." I might have cracked a smile if he'd said it under a different circumstance.

"Boneys... looking for you." I shrugged hard, my head drooping. I didn't care. Let them come for me. M's focus didn't waver though. "And her."

That got my attention. I did care about Julie. I knew now that even if I tried to forget her, I would always care about Julie.

But why were the Boneys looking for her? A chill far worse than anything from the rain gripped me. Julie was safe behind the wall... wasn't she? What about the next time she was on a salvage mission? Would the Boneys be waiting for her?

I looked up, looking M in the eye. "You started... something." He continued, then lifted a finger and tapped his temple. "I saw... pictures. Last night. Memories. My Mom. Summertime. Cream... of wheat. A girl."

"A dream." It wasn't just me. After finding out Julie had left me, the vivid colours of my dream had paled in comparison to the present, and I'd had no time to think about the fact that I'd been asleep. Let alone dreaming.

"A dream." M's voice held wonder, but satisfaction. He remembered.

"We're... changing... eve-rything." The morning's helplessness was wearing off. The realization that Julie and I, the two of us together, had somehow changed the rules, was snapping me out of my misery.

M is nodding. "We are."

"We are." The notion that there was a we swept through every tired cell of my body. It revitalized me, warmed my cold skin. I knew that whatever the risk to me, Julie needed to understand the way I did right now. "I have to tell her." I said out loud. It came out an almost normal sentence, natural, flowing.

"Will you help?" I looked to the crowd standing behind M. They stare back, not quite as far along as M and I. "Help... exhume?" I pulled the photo I'd taken out of my pocket and held it up. Julie smiled out at the corpses. There was a knowing murmur, nods, though few actual words.

That didn't bother M. "They said... fuck yeah."

I turned Julie's photo around and look into her blue eyes. I'd see her soon. The thought had me grinning like an idiot.

Even the weather pointed us in the right direction - the clouds parting over the highway, the pale sunlight helping dry my damp clothes as we headed towards the wall. I tried to come up with a plan while we moved, with significantly more energy than was normal for us. I didn't know what we were going to do when we got to the wall.

"You know the way." I recognized the voice instantly even though it was an echo, not an audible voice. "We know the way." I could hear the amusement in his voice, tinged with irony. It was overwhelming. Perry had brought me to this moment, as if he had picked which of his memories to show me, to point the way back to Julie. He'd painted a masterpiece and stood aside to let me take the credit. I couldn't understand why. As if the voice in my head understood my confusion, he spoke again. "Look Corpse, I'm not going to pretend like we're best buds. It's weird for me, you know, you and Julie. But you're going to take care of her from now on. Try not to feel too bad about... you know. I was ready to go. I had a meaningful death, yeah? It could have been worse. Oh, but you didn't have to steal my watch. I hope you fucking break it, you dick." He's laughing. I wondered if I was dreaming again, and if I'd been dead so long I've forgotten the rules. Could you dream while you're awake?

At the edge of the stadium was a glass-covered room I nodded to M to stop the others in. "Wait here."

He spoke when I was a few paces away. "Be careful." I turned back to look at him. He was changing. "Kay?" I dipped my head in a single nod and started towards the door in Perry's memories.

"So I'll wait here." I paused at M's voice. Yeah, he'll do what I ask, but he doesn't have to like it. I pulled a face at his childish tone and keep going.

I remembered watching Perry and Julie cross the stadium as I trotted in the opposite direction, retracing their steps in reverse. The escalator led down, not up, but I know it's the right way.

I put a little too much effort into kicking the door - my first strike dints it, my second knocked it clear off the hinges. Oops.

Nobody came running to investigate the clang of the door. I carefully clamored over it, remembered to pull my hoody up, and then I stepped out into the world behind the wall.

Julie and I were giving the others hope, and it was spreading fast. I guess the Boneys didn't like that, that must be why they're looking for us. I have to tell Julie before it's too late.

This world was full of life. People walked in twos or threes, chatting quietly, riding bikes, leading a dog on a leash. I passed a pen with a few cows, and a man leading a little herd of goats. One straggler turned away from its flock and trotted after me for a few paces. I almost panicked - could it smell that I was different? Please, go with your friends. Shoo, leave me! That's it. Okay.

Leaving the goats safely behind, I focused, wandering down a long, curving street as dusk fell. I had to find Julie. It was becoming a need so strong it was physical, the urge to see her again. Concentrating, I could still smell her... maybe it was more than just her scent. Like all the times she'd been in danger and I'd found myself led to her because she needed me, except this time it was the other way around. I needed her.

I happened to spot a dark window that reflected a picture back at me, and it made me pause for a few seconds.

My eyes were closer to blue than grey, why hadn't I seen it a few days ago? I gave my reflection a quick smile. We'll have Julie back soon. She was close now, I could feel it.

Darkness had fallen by now, but the building I wound up at was lit with street lamps and lights on inside on the top floor. It was an elegant, fancy sort of house, with a wrought-iron balcony on the second floor and big concrete columns. My heart pounded painfully inside my chest, nerves cramping my insides. This was Julie's house, I was sure of it. What was I going to do now? Knock on the door? What if it wasn't her who answered? What if it was her and she didn't want to see me? Uncertain, I lingered in the shadows outside, running out of plans now that I was on her doorstep.

It was while I was debating with myself weather I should climb through a window, that the balcony door opened, and Julie stepped outside.


A/N - I know, rotten place for me to leave it right? :P

Thanks for all the birthday wishes guys, I could not think of anything I'd rather have been doing than spending some of it with my favourite characters!

I was a little nervous about the end of this chapter. I haven't mentioned Perry very much, because R doesn't think about him very much, and in this chapter Perry sort of becomes closer to the book version of Perry when he's all but alive inside R's head. I'll leave it up to you if that's what you think happened here or if it's just R's way of coping with his feelings of guilt over murdering Perry and then falling for his girlfriend.

Three cheers for me - I ordered my Warm Bodies DVD today, and I cannot wait to sink my teeth into all those special features! Now I just have to wait for it to arrive. Sigh.

On another note, I was watching one of my other favourite movies today, Just Like Heaven, and it got me thinking how similar the situations are between R and Elizabeth, the main character who is a ghost. She can't remember her name or who she was, but she forges a connection with the man who moves into her apartment building, David. He helps her remember things about her life and piece it all together again, like Julie does for R - made me chuckle that I'd never noticed until now!