My dad said he was shining a light for Sophia to see, but the reasons go beyond that, I realize too late. Walking in the woods in the dark, with a roof of leaves blocking out most of the moonlight, is not what I could call easy. My eyes adjust alright, but I still stumble more than a few times as I follow Dad and Andrea, two jumping lights – one smaller than the other, Andrea must have brought a flashlight – that I keep about eighty or so feet ahead of me. Sometimes closer. Yeah, I try to keep as close as possible, especially since the lights are facing the opposite direction of me and it feels like they could just slip away at any second and leave me alone in the black. I also like to hear the sounds of their voices, my dad's, Andrea's. And I like to keep away from the things that move behind me, things that crunch leaves, break branches. Though that's all probably just my imagination. Or just a squirrel or rabbit or snake or something. I know that. But still.

It's a challenge, keeping up with Dad and Andrea as we travel deeper and deeper into the forest, since not only am I doing it without any light but I have to be extra quiet. I'm not as good as my dad at making my footsteps light, soundless, but I'm still pretty good, and I do it, squinting at the ground sometimes but mostly just relying on luck to keep me from stepping on something I don't want to step on.

And I look for Sophia, of course, look for her shape in the shadows, clues in the night. I even call to her a few times, in a whisper. But I never get an answer.

Sometimes I can make out what Dad and Andrea are saying to each other, but that usually means I've gotten too close and need to back off and so I only catch a few things here and there. Like one time, when Dad says, "She could be holed off in a farmhouse somewhere. People get lost, and they survive. Happens all the time."

"She's only twelve," Andrea replies.

"So? My kid's ten. She'd make it through, no problem."

I grin. He sounds proud, in his own way.

"And hell, I was younger than both of 'em and I got lost. Nine days . . ."

And that's all I hear, because I know I should hang back farther, even though Dad's never told me this story and want to hear more. Maybe I can figure out a way to bring it up later.

We've been out here thirty minutes when I fall. The underbrush is heavy and tricky, which I can handle fine in the daytime, but things are more complicated at night. So something catches my ankle mid-step and sends me down. My knees collide with the ground and I skid a bit and my left knee burns in a way that lets me know I've just managed to cut it, even through these jeans. Worse, I make noise, and that forces me to drop all the way down, flat, as the grownups' lights spin this way. I hear Dad's voice, then Andrea's. Silence. Dad's voice again. And footsteps. I peek, and they're moving on. I sigh and sit up. I touch my knee and feel a small hole in the denim and warm liquid that of course is blood. The cut stings, but I don't think it's deep. I don't look around to see what I cut myself on, but I don't have to, because my hand presses on something else sharp on my way to a stand, and it doesn't press hard but it presses enough, and I know: Thorns. I hate thorns.

But I'm tough and I have a job to do. So on I walk, turning to survey the area every now and again, whispering Sophia! and watching for walkers and ignoring the stinging pain and the spreading, sticky patch of wetness on my jean leg.

I can tell when something changes later on. Those two lights I'm following pause and then veer off a bit, going a slightly different direction than the one my dad's been on so far. My heart starts beating faster, but I focus on my footsteps, keeping them soft, can't let that change. I watch and creep along, but within a minute the lights have come to a full-on stop. My dad and Andrea are standing still. What's going on? I can hear them talking, can't tell what they're saying. I have to risk it, I have to. I allow myself a nibble on my knuckle before I walk slowly, silently, closer and closer to the two lights, until I can hear better. And when I can hear better, it's not just my dad and Andrea I'm hearing. There's a walker growling, too. There's a walker growling, and it's all I can do not to go running to my dad right then, punishment be damned. But I don't do that. I cover my mouth and listen, because if the walker's not dead yet my dad must have a reason, and Dad's talking right now.

"Dumbass didn't know enough to shoot himself in the head," he says, "Turned himself into a big, swingin' piece of bait. And a mess."

What? I step closer, I can't help it. Step, step, step, and I can see it then, I can make it out, a campsite.

Andrea's coughing. "You alright?" Dad asks.

"Tryin' not to puke."

"Go ahead, if you gotta."

I'm already sick to my stomach just hearing them talk, just listening to the walker. I don't understand, but I have to see. Like a car wreck. I move closer, I sneak along, closer, closer, until I'm right on top of the campsite, until I can see the whole place and the back of Dad's head and Andrea, stooped over, saying she's fine but she needs to talk about something else, asking about how my dad learned to shoot, and I don't listen to his answer, because I'm too focused on the thrashing walker hanging from a tree beyond the two. My dad has his spotlight on it, so I can see it well, too well, and my belly swirls inside of me but I don't puke, I just stare, I stare at this living corpse as it dangles from the rope around its neck, its arms outstretched towards my dad, legs kicking around.

Dumbass didn't know enough to shoot himself in the head. This was suicide.

"I guess it's the closest he's been to food since he turned," Dad's saying now. "Look at him, hangin' up there like a big piñata." He moves his spotlight closer, puts it right on the legs of the walker, and I see that they're basically just bone. Bloody bone. My dad's voice is fearless, as always. "The other geeks came and ate all the flesh off his legs."

Andrea throws up. "I thought we were changing the subject!" she croaks after.

"Call that payback, for laughin' about my itchy ass," Dad replies, and I don't know what he's talking about and I don't care. I want us to leave. I want my dad to put the walker down and then I want us to leave.

Dad turns the spotlight this way and I shrink against a tree. But no, not this way, just close, he hasn't seen me, he's not going to see me. "Let's head back."

What? But the walker, the walker –

Andrea speaks for me, speaks for hidden-in-the-shadows me. "Aren't you gonna –"

My dad glances back at the geek. "No. He ain't hurtin' nobody. Ain't gonna waste an arrow, either."

The walker snarls, a rabid dog but worse, arms reaching and fingers grasping air.

"He made his choice," Dad says. "Opted out."

And I get it then, I get it. How this hanging walker could match up with suicide. This was a man, this was a man who got bit and decided to kill himself. Didn't shoot himself in the head, left his brain intact, so he became a walker. But he killed himself, still.

And that's when anger comes. Because my dad, my dad has that same easy, off tone he had earlier today, when we found the man in the tent who'd shot himself. I know what that tone means now. I get it, I get it, it means disapproval. And I think, I think it might even mean you're a coward. And that tone, that tone riles me up, because getting bit and killing yourself? That's Mom. That's Mom, and there was nothing wrong with that, and my dad has no right, no right to be mad at Mom –

Stop. Stop. Now is not the time.

"Let him hang," Dad says, and I grit my teeth, dig my fingers into bark. But I keep swallowing back the mad and just listen, watch, as Andrea steps closer to the walker even as Dad steps away. There's silence between them before Dad moves to her again. "You wanna live now? Or not?"

Andrea looks at him.

"It's just a question."

" . . . An answer for an arrow. Fair?"

I think I hear Dad say yes, say mmhmm, and then I know he must have, because Andrea talks.

"I don't know if I want to live. Or if I have to, or . . . or if it's just a habit."

My anger is slowly replaced with sadness and I'm not totally sure why. I'm just sure I'm tired. I want to go back to the RV and sleep. I should never have left, this was all pointless, Sophia's still missing and I've gotten myself upset with Dad and I hate that and I'm just tired.

"That's not much of an answer," my dad says, but he raises his crossbow. Just as he does though, Andrea says something else, something even quieter.

"Sydney wanted to stay behind. Didn't she?" It's the kind of question that's really more of a statement, and it makes me bite into the side of my cheek. I taste blood and it reminds me about the cut on my knee, and I reach and feel it, and it's not bleeding so much anymore, but it still hurts a lot. I don't care. I move even closer to the campsite, leaning against the nearest tree, not wanting to miss a word.

My dad, my dad doesn't answer her right away. "My kid ain't suicidal," he eventually says. "That's your territory." And then there's the hiss of an arrow and the crunch of a skull and the walker in the tree is quiet and still.

"Waste of an arrow . . ." Dad mutters before turning. He walks off, going at an angle from where I am, so I'm safe. Andrea follows after a couple of seconds. Once their backs are to me, my foot decides it needs to move forward, and I don't want to, I don't want to see the walker any closer, but somehow I take one step, two, out from behind the tree, and then my foot lands on a branch and there's a snap that I swear can be heard all over Georgia. And now I'm in the spotlight in the worst possible way. I flinch against the light, but I would've flinched anyway at the tone of my dad's voice.

"Sydney? Son of a –"

He turns the spotlight to the ground, and I catch his other arm falling from his waist, from his knife, and even without light, I can tell my dad's face has taken on a very bad expression that I don't see all that often. An expression that comes with a look that doesn't mean anything good for the person on the receiving end of it. And me, I'm that person right now.

He moves over to me, towers over me, and my shoulders slouch right away, all by themselves, because my body wants to make me small now.

"What the hell are you doin' out here?" he hisses.

I inhale. My eyes dart to Andrea, but she can't help me, and so I look at the ground. "I . . . I followed you."

Dad makes a huffing noise. Like he just can't believe how stupid I am.

"How'd you get past Dale?" asks Andrea.

I shrug. I need water. "I snuck under the cars."

"You snuck under . . . Jesus Christ . . ." Dad turns away for a second, takes a few steps, spins back. Oh, he's mad. I knew it, I knew he would be, why did I let myself do this? Why didn't I stay in the RV?

"Like I said," he growls to Andrea. "We're headin' back, now." He takes my arm – his grip is stiff – and pulls me around, points me in the right direction. "My kid and me gotta have ourselves a little chat about mindin'."

And I want to sink into the ground and hide forever.