Chapter 6
A year later, I heard there was a large base in the South where humans and zombies were actually learning to coexist.
Growing food.
Building homes.
Starting over.
One afternoon, a zombie mail carrier showed up with a letter.
It was from Maya.
She wrote that the southern base was thriving and asked if I wanted to visit sometime.
I wrote back at once.
Our side is doing well too. Want to come see ours?
I was bent over the table finishing the letter when Ethan leaned over my shoulder from behind.
“Whose is that?”
“Maya’s.”
He wrinkled his nose.
I turned to look at him.
“Are you still jealous?”
He buried his face against my neck and breathed me in like he was trying to live off it.
“No,” he murmured. “I just want to eat you.”
I elbowed him.
He laughed.
Outside, Luna was chasing two lesser zombies around the yard while Ryan shouted that she was teaching them bad habits and Carter swore he was not, under any circumstances, babysitting a telepathic zombie child ever again.
The world was still strange.
Still broken.
Still dangerous.
But it was ours.
And maybe that counted for something.
I thought that was the end.
I was wrong.
Because if you really want to understand how a Zombie King ended up crying over instant noodles and hiding in bushes with wildflowers, then you have to go back to the beginning.
To Ethan.
To before the world ended.
To before he became mine.