"Holy shit." Ellie gasped. "Who were those guys?"

Joel didn't want to answer. "My… old drinking buddies. Back when I was an alcoholic."

"They called me your girlfriend." Joel could hear the disgust in Ellie's voice. "They tried to grab me. How were you friends with them?"

"I was at a low point in my life." Joel spoke quietly, staring ahead at the dark road. "I hardly even noticed who was around me. I just wanted to not think about anything, and they were more than happy to oblige me. Tommy wasn't." His fists tightened on the wheel. He couldn't stand to remember what he'd said to his brother. What he'd done with Adrian and his group of shitheads. "They were the first thing I ditched when I started to get better."

"Geez." Ellie muttered.

Joel's heart beat faster. Would she condemn him? He remembered the disgust he'd seen in his brother's eyes. He couldn't stand to see it in her eyes too.

After a long pause, Ellie spoke again. "You must have been having a shit time to hang out with them."

Joel's laugh with shaky with relief. "That's one way to put it."

Another long pause. He felt Ellie's gaze on him but didn't turn to meet it. He knew what she was going to ask.

"What happened to her?" Ellie asked.

Joel stared at the empty road ahead of him, the trees glowing with a golden light as the headlights caught them, then fading into darkness behind him. Sarah's light had been so short. He should have been able to share his grief with her husband, her children, her adult friends, the scores of people whose lives she should have affected. He never should have grieved her at all; she should have grieved him. Instead, she left behind just him and Tommy. And then, as Tommy learned to keep living, just him.

"Brain cancer." He found himself answering Ellie's question. "The doctors found it when she was twelve. We tried some treatments, but it was an aggressive cancer and they found it too late." If only he'd taken her to a doctor earlier, if only he'd known… "She was gone before her fourteenth birthday."

Ellie sucked in a sharp breath. "I'm sorry." She whispered. "I- I didn't know she was my age."

"Yeah." Joel couldn't say anything else. He took a deep breath. "I didn't mean to be harsh earlier, but I don't think I can raise another kid."

"Right. I get it." In his peripheral vision, Joel saw Ellie wrap her arms around her legs. "Can I still leave my keys at your house?"

Joel's heart ached at the tremor in her voice. He knew that fear. He'd felt it when he sat by Sarah's hospital bed: the feeling that the person he needed the most was leaving him.

"Yeah, you can come by like you do. I'll still take you to get food sometimes." He tried to smile, but his face was stiff. "I'm already an uncle to one girl. May as well add another."

"Ok." Ellie's voice was small. She didn't sound disappointed, but she didn't sound happy either. "I've never had an uncle. What do they do?"

"Oh, all sorts of crazy stuff." Now Joel did smile. "Once, my uncle picked me up late at night and drove me down an empty road while I stood in the back of his pickup truck. It was incredible."

Ellie's eyes widened. "Can we do that?"

Joel instantly regretted his words. "That was a long time ago, and we shouldn't have done it then. It's too dangerous."

"Come on, Joel!" Ellie was practically bouncing in her seat. "It's late at night, we're on a deserted road, and you have a pickup truck. You wouldn't have told that story if you didn't want to do it."

"I said no. My answer is final." Joel responded. Ellie considered his answer for a moment, then unbuckled her seat belt and opened the door.

"Ellie!" Joel screeched to a violent halt in the middle of the empty road. In a moment, Ellie was out of the truck, and Joel felt the vehicle sway as she jumped into the back.

"Hit it!" Her distant voice yelled. Joel smacked the dashboard a few times in frustration, then climbed out of the truck.

"Don't you dare try to take me out." Ellie snapped as she backed away from Joel.

"If you're going to do this, you need to know how to not die." Joel retorted harshly. "Feet spread apart, leaning forward, hands here." He indicated an old handle near the top of his truck that he had installed to steady himself when he was unloading materials. Ellie jumped to do as he said.

"Like this?" She asked.

"Yes." Joel sighed. "And you need to hold on. You fly out of this truck, you're dead. You understand?"

Ellie's green eyes were dark as they met his. "I won't let go."

Sarah holding his hand, in pain, crying. Don't let go, Daddy.

I won't. He promised over and over, long after she couldn't hear him anymore. I won't let go.

"Good." Joel's voice was gruff as he climbed back into the truck. Why was he doing this? This was such a stupid risk. He stared at his steering wheel, and for a moment, he saw his entire life. He remembered jumping into a lake as a small child and almost drowning because he couldn't swim. He remembered playing pranks on his teachers growing up and climbing over the fence surrounding his school during recess to escape. He remembered marrying a girl he'd dated for a couple years and having a child when he was barely more than a child himself. His entire life was stupid risks, and he'd felt proud of that.

Then his daughter died, and he saw for the first time the tremendous risk that came with loving someone. He took no more risks after that. After what he'd lost, none of them were worth it.

He remembered standing in the back of his uncle's pickup truck as a fifteen-year-old kid screaming into the wind, then laughing with his uncle after as they sat and gazed at the stars. His uncle was long gone, almost a decade before he lost Sarah, but that risk had been worth it. He remembered that now.

A thud on the back window made Joel jump. "Hit it, will ya?"

Joel smiled. "Hold on." He hit it. 5 mph, 10 mph, 15 mph… "Come on, I can walk this fast!" 20 mph, 25 mph, 30 mph… "Yes, keep going!" 35 mph, 40 mph, 45 mph, 50 mph…

Ellie's scream filled the night. Joel kept the speedometer just below 60 mph and listened to her. He heard anger and fear, but also joy and triumph. A scream that said she had gone through so much, but she wasn't going anywhere.

In the truck, Joel screamed with her.