"All the tales the same
told before and told again
a soul that's born in cold and rain
knows sunlight
and, at last, can grant a name
to a buried and a burning flame
as love and its decisive pain."

Hozier
[Sunlight, from Wasteland, baby!]

The couple argued for a few more minutes before agreeing on a course of action: since the farm wasn't an option anymore, nor were the North, the coast, and anywhere on New Hope's range, the continental West was the only solution, regardless of if the mall was worth the struggle or not; furthermore, they needed to find a place to camp in, better if near the river, search that would, in any case, push them toward the mall. The final decision about the possible exploration was then postponed until they settled.

After three long hours of driving, luck kissed the group, by gifting the perfect place to rest just a few minutes on foot down a little side road.

"Marc and I will go take a close look," said Tom, grabbing the third to last cigarette.

The young man turned so fast he almost made himself fall. "What?"  he shrieked. He cleared his voice, before speaking again, with a calmer but no less unconfident tone. "Are you sure that's a good idea?"

"Why not? It's not like both Sophia and I can go out there. One has to stay behind with the truck."

"But... I..."

"No buts, dude. You need to get used to this. It's your reality now too."

"What, you can't both go because I could steal your car?" chimed in Anna, with a satisfied grin on her face.

"No, because you two can't defend yourselves. And because you could steal our stuff and leave. Two reasons."

"He's right, Marc," commented Sophia. "I know it's scary, but things can and will get much scarier. It's better to practice when it's quiet like this, and you're in Tom's company."

"All right..." he lamented, pouting. "Let's go, then..."

The man put his arm around the companion's shoulders and shook him. "I'm gonna need more energy from you."

TOM AND MARC

The two were walking along the path, Marc a couple of steps behind; Tom slowed down, to let him catch up. Strangely enough, he found Marc's presence comforting, even though they had known each other for very little at that point. Maybe it was the contrast with how unnerved he felt being in the presence of the new addition to the group. It wasn't even about her attitude, it was more that whole connection with New Hope that freaked him out, opening up a wound that he thought was long closed. Sophia's strong reaction to her didn't put him at ease either, since she was all calm and collected during difficult situations.

Before the Infection, she had a moment every couple of months where she would crush under the pressure of the negative emotions she'd been bottling up, to spend the whole weekend isolating, crying, and letting herself go; on the following Monday, she was ready to start the new cycle like nothing happened. Although she insisted it worked well for her, he couldn't attest to the healthiness of that way of living, and had often wished she'd go to therapy. Now she hadn't taken that break since they'd left their house for the last time. 

The thought that she might be starting to crack made him shudder. He wasn't ready to take the reins, much less now that they also had the responsibility of keeping two other human beings alive.

"Uhm... Tom?"

The man shook his head, like it helped getting rid of the idea. "Yes?"

"Can I... ask you something?"

"You can ask me whatever you want, whenever. Answers are not guaranteed, though."

"It's a bit of a weird question..."

"Okay..."

He hesitated to speak; it was hard to tell what was going on in his head. Tom couldn't think of a time he didn't look bothered by something on a profound level. "Why do you pretend to hate her? I mean Sophia."

The man was so taken aback that he didn't know how to react, or what to say. All that came out of his mouth was a high-pitched: "What?"

Marc immediately got nervous. "Don't be mad, please, I don't mean it in a bad way..."

"Speak your mind. I'll only get mad if you keep stumbling and mumbling like that for no reason."

"It's just that..." he started, only to choke on his words again. Tom almost went at him again, but decided to give him a bit more time. "At first, I thought you didn't like each other. Those fights that you had... it was like you couldn't stand to be together. But then... then I saw you there, right after... right after what happened with Vin... you were touching her face. And you were talking to her so softly... it was like seeing a whole different person... it was very sweet..."

Tom remained silent for a whole minute, pondering over how to respond. It was easy not to think about things like those when there was no one else around. "Why were you spying on us, Marc?"

"I-I wasn't... I didn't mean to... I don't..." He stuttered, until he heard the other chuckle. "Tom. It's not funny."

"I'm sorry, but you should have seen your face. Priceless."

"Tom, please... just answer the question. I promise I won't open my mouth again if you do."

Seemed simple enough. "You tell me something first. How old are you?"

"What does that..."

"Just tell me."

"This August I turned twenty-two."

The man stopped walking. His cigarette was almost finished; he took it out of his mouth, out of habit, then went back to finish it. 

"Sometimes... when you get into a relationship, and then you grow older... things get a little bit complicated. It's weird, and you can't do much about it. So, yeah... that's just how it is."

The guy sighed loudly. "What a terrible answer. You sound like my dad... and he hated my mother for real. Mom hated him too. Never saw them be nice to each other after I turned twelve."

Tom looked at him with a contrite expression. "Damn Marc. Don't you think you're oversharing a little?"

"Yep. I didn't like what you said, so I'm not keeping my promise. I'm gonna make you uncomfortable until we get back to the truck."

He threw the butt of the cigarette, now burned up to the filter, and used his foot to make sure there wasn't any spark left. "Sounds fun," he said, starting to walk again.

SOPHIA AND ANNA

The two were at the back of the truck, Sophia leaning on it, Anna sitting beside the boxes of cans. The latter was fidgeting with an object she had taken out of her sack. It was small, round, and made of some kind of metallic material.

"Is that a compass?"

The girl scoffed. "Is that suspicious too, officer?" There was a whole minute of silence before she came down and spoke again. "The guy, Tom, is it? He said that you're the one who wanted me to stay."

"He wanted it too. Neither of us is like that."

"Yeah, but you looked like you really didn't want me to stay. I just don't get it."

"You needed help. I know... We know how that feels."

"But what if I had bad intentions?"

"Do you?" Sophia asked. No response. "We considered that, obviously. But you didn't seem too much to handle. We're not new to the game."

"That's why you threatened me back there? To make sure I knew you were stronger, to establish dominance or something like that?"

"No, you're reading too much into it. We had a terrible day. I got mad. And I was scared."

"Scared? You? You can't be scared. You're, like, the Terminator. You can't be scared."

She smirked, reminded of old conversations. "Believe it or not, I get scared all the time. I just hide it well."

Anna looked down for a moment. "Is it about New Hope?"

"Yes."

"Is it about... the human bait thing?"

Sophia tensed up, looking at her dead serious. "Did Tom tell you about it?"

"Mentioned it."

"Good. That's good." She paused for a second. "I'm sorry I grabbed your arm like that. It wasn't nice. I wouldn't have liked that at all."

"I'm sorry about saying those things, I was being rude. I wouldn't have liked that either."

The two smiled at each other. 

The girl was harmless, they were all safe, and everything was under control.

Sophia was quite happy about how she was handling the conversation: she'd never been too good at socializing, and since the Infection she hadn't gotten much practice. For the whole time, she thought she was comfortable not speaking a word for weeks on end; with Marc joining, the woman had started realizing that she had forced isolation upon herself, and was starved of connection, a strange realization for her. It must have been a thousand times worse for her husband. She shoved down the new layer of guilt to be with all the other ones.

"Yes, it's a compass," said Anna, suddenly. "It's the only thing I brought with me from the bunkers. My great-grandfather gave it to my mother, she gave it to me."

"Thank you for telling me about it."

"Do you also have something from your house that you keep with you?"

She hadn't thought about it in a while, let alone seen it, or talked about it. She wasn't keen on sharing, in general; in that moment, like under a spell, the woman reached for her backpack, pulled it towards her, and used her whole arm to get something from the very bottom: it was a clear CD case, with a folded piece of paper inside. She held it out to her new friend. "It's two things, but they were small enough to be carried together, so I took them both."

The girl opened the case to unfold what was inside. "Is this your family?"

"Yep. Mother, grandparents, aunts, uncles... it was my cousin's wedding."

"Wow, so many people..."

"Yeah, reunions were a pretty big deal," she replied, smiling with fondness.

Anna carefully put away the photograph to look at the CD. "SOPHIA SPECIAL MIX," she read aloud. "What is this?"

"It's a song mix. Like a playlist on a CD. Tom gave it to me as a gift along with a portable player when we first dated."

"That is so... sweet... You didn't strike me as romantic, both of you..."

Sophia chuckled. "I get it. I never was, to be honest."

"So why did you keep this, of all things?"

"It's a bit of a long story..."

TOM AND MARC

They had been walking for about ten minutes when they reached the end of the path. Marc hadn't stopped talking about his family; Tom tuned him out right away.

"Like, in hindsight, it is kinda funny, but still..."

"Marc?"

"Yes?"

"See that pretty little cabin over there?" he said, pointing in front of him.

"Oh, yeah, it looks nice, not as cool as the farm, but it's nice."

"Does it look abandoned?"

The young man changed expression, from relaxed to concerned. "Not... not really..."

"Do you know what that means, Marc?"

He paused for a moment, the folds between his eyebrows deepening. "There could be people inside."

"Or Infected. Fresh ones, the most aggressive."

"Oh..."

"Now, I know it's scary," Tom said, turning to him. "But I promise you that as long as you stay with me you're safe, okay?"

"Okay..."

"Okay. Now follow me and do as I say. We'll look at all the possible entrances from a distance to see if there's a breach. We don't know how many there could be, but most probably it'll be two, max. We haven't seen a single horde in a year. I know because I wrote it down in my notebook. In any case..." The man stopped himself, noticing that Marc had taken a few steps back and was too quiet. "Hey, are you there?" No response. He put himself in front of him, blocking the view of the cabin. "Marc?" This time he got a vague noise of acknowledgment, but the guy was pale as a ghost.

And suddenly he was transported three years back, something that only resembled a human was screaming and hurling itself at him, no one could help, not even Sophia, who didn't know how to use a gun yet. Except he was thirty-five and knew how to defend himself in some way.

Tom gripped his shoulders, looking at him in the eyes with great intensity. "Hey, listen to me. I will not let anything bad happen to you. I will not let those things hurt you. I promise. But you must trust me and do as I say. Can you do that for me? Just this once." Marc nodded, shaking like a leaf. "I need you to use your voice. Can you do that for me?"

"Y-yes..."

"Good. Good," he mumbled, letting go. "Now follow me. Stay close."

They did as the man had anticipated: walking around the building they checked every door and window, front, side, back, side. Everything was closed, so they approached the main entrance. Tom pushed it, first with little force, then with more, to see if it was solid. It seemed like it was, at least enough to keep inside a sick adult who can't use their hands.

"All right, I will knock to attract anything that could be inside. Don't worry, nothing can reach us from there."

Without waiting for a response, he followed up. From the other side of the floor came a visceral screech that got louder and louder, until the source launched itself onto the door.

Marc flinched.

While the thing screamed and scratched the wood, desperate to get to them, the man pressed his hand across the other side, sliding it like looking for something. He stopped in one point, at chest level, then pressed the barrel of his shotgun right there. Two seconds later the trigger was pulled, the bullet went through, the screaming ceased.

Tom took a deep breath. "See? All done. It wasn't so bad, was it?"

"So it's... gone?"

He half-smiled. "Yep. The only way it will bother us now is by having to clean it out. And the bad smell, too." The boy scrunched his face in disgust, to which he chuckled and patted him on the shoulder. "Let's get back to the truck. We need Sophia to finish up."

SOPHIA AND ANNA, STORY OF A TURBULENT RELATIONSHIP

The conversation which followed was long and not entirely coherent, so much so that I had to piece together  the story from the testimony I received of it. For the sake of making this text easier to digest, I've reported it as a sort of summary, which will still give the idea of what you, the reader, need to know.

The two had met during the last year of high school. She had come to the country as an exchange student, and ad she was the most exciting thing that had happened to those small-town kids, Sophia was initially showered with incessant attention by everyone. Girls and boys alike tried to win her over; the aura of mystery from her introverted habits made her seem even cooler to most. Tom himself, the well-liked class clown gave it a try. When the sense of novelty washed over, the girl was just seen as snobby and unlikable. Truth was, she found herself rather boring too, all she cared about was school. Toward the end, she'd pretty much been forgotten. Except by him, of course, who a couple of decades later admitted to having had a crush on her already then.

After one year she'd gone back to the country to study in college, not because the one she had chosen was especially good, but because she needed to once and for all detach herself from a family that had her feeling suffocated, with parents that were all but caring, and sisters she'd had to look after since being a child. The ultimate choice was to become a microbiologist.

Funnily enough, the college had a humanities department, so Tom was there too, studying theater.

The two reconnected – or to be more accurate, they connected for the first time – and became good friends, right before starting to date. He was sweet, caring, energetic, kind...

"He was like... ugh, how did Milly say it... a gold receiver?"

Anna looked at her, confused. "What?"

"The dog who is friends with everyone and is nice and playful, how is it called? I always forget."

"You mean, like... a golden retriever?"

"Yes, that's it! Our friends used to always say that we were complete opposites, like a dog and a cat..."

Fate wanted that it couldn't last long, about seven months; it was in the midst of it all that he had given her that gift: Sophia didn't have strong hobbies or interests, so he had started sharing his, and she'd liked some of the music she was introduced to. Neither of them had anticipated how long the CD would have stayed with her.

The breakup had a few different reasons: she was emotionally closed off, and he was still that awkward insecure kid who thought she was too cool for him anyway. They swore to keep being friends, but not long after she had to move back to her country due to her father's passing.

It was a tough time for Sophia. When her phone broke, taking all her contacts with it, she felt isolated like never before. The fear of getting stuck there for the rest of her life devoured her during every waking moment, the nights weren't of much comfort either. The only thing that eased up her anxiety was that ridiculous mix of songs she listened to on repeat instead of sleeping. She held onto it like an oath that she'd return to the life she had built for herself.

After two years her mother, to her absolute surprise, insisted she go back to finish her college course. Sophia managed to meet again her old roommate, Milly, who was in the process of getting her Ph.D., and even her old acquaintances from school, but Tom wasn't there anymore. She saw him again a few months later while accompanying Milly to a friend's birthday party. They reconnected again; this time he had a girlfriend. Trying to be his friend proved fruitless, as she had feelings that couldn't be ignored, so she distanced herself for what should have been the last time.

Finally, they met again when Sophia was working as a researcher at the college. Tom had driven his little cousin to get some information on the courses she was considering for herself. They reconnected for the third time, and that was when they decided to try one last time with a romantic relationship.

They got married about a year after that.

Here it is, the great love story of Sophia and Tom, the one that made Anna a little too invested in those strangers' lives just a day after meeting them.

BACK TOGETHER

Tom glanced at Marc, who was dragging his feet, silent in an unusual and unnerving manner. He cleared his voice, loud enough to get his attention. "Since you wanted to know so bad, and you did very well back there, I will give you a better answer to your question. If you still want it, of course."

The boy looked at him, nodding with renewed energy. "Yes, I wanna know."

"Very well then..." he said, then paused for a moment. "It's not that we pretend to hate each other. It's a bit convoluted, to be honest... But, well... Before all of this happened, we had things in our personal lives we realized were hurting our relationship, so we tried working on them. When the Infection came, we had to learn to survive, and it was kind of like we hit reset. We went back to being the people who had a hard time figuring out how to be together."

The young man frowned and on the verge of tears mumbled: "I'm sorry for insisting so much..."

"It's all right, buddy," Tom replied with a soft tone. He wasn't sure why he'd thought that conversation would cheer his companion up; at least he wasn't thinking about his fear anymore. "I think it's kinda adorable that you care enough to want to know."

"It's just that... you guys have been taking care of me and... the more I go on, the more I realize... how hard it is to be nice in this horrible world... and..." The end of the sentence got suffocated between sobs.

He stopped walking. "Don't hold it in. Crying is good. It's healthy."

And so he didn't. He cried and cried, while Tom occasionally patted him on the head, trying to comfort him.

When the guys reemerged from the path, Sophia felt an intense sense of relief wash over her. It was true that the outdoors was much less dangerous now than it used to be, but expecting the worst was by then the default. She realized that it had been the first time the two had been apart for so long in those three years, unless you wanted to count being on two different floors at the farm.

As they got closer, she noticed Marc had red eyes, so she glanced at Tom, without saying a word.

"Amazing news, girls. We found a perfectly intact cabin, and we could hear the river not far from there, and there was just one Infected inside."

"Did you take care of it?"

"You can bet your butt we did. Tell her, Marc."

"Well, I mean, I didn't...." he started mumbling.

"His first reconnaissance mission and he didn't even budge," interrupted the man, punching him lightly on the shoulder. "Tough as a nail."

Sophia couldn't help but smile. "That's incredible, Marc. You did much better than us, we were both crapping out pants our first time."

Tom took one step toward her. "Maybe you were crapping your pants. Mine were clean". He then handed her his half-smoked cigarette.

"Yeah, sure, whatever makes you feel better" she said, making Anna giggle. Before he could sport his best mean look, the woman touched his arm and whispered: "Let's just go, so maybe we can rest a bit tonight after we finish cleaning."

He turned back to her for a moment, watching as she went back to sit on her spot, then walked to the driver's seat.