His hands on my neck - Joel Miller.

9.

An echo of the footsteps was heard in the snowy woods. Joel kept his eyes around in case if they had company around. Hope was looking around trying to remember every single little thing around them just to find the way back to Jackson. The two tried to get deeper into the woods so the noise will not disturb or build suspicion to anyone in the city.

- Are you sure you want to do this? – He looked around as they found the lawn that looked too perfect not to stop by.

- If I wasn't I wouldn't be here, - She stopped next to him, understanding that they have reached the final point of their walk.

- Okay, have you ever shot even randomly? – Joel saw an old broken tree and started placing the old bottle out of his bag, and took a couple of steps back, finding the perfect position and giving his rifle to her.

- Well, theoretically, - Hope tried to remember if she really ever shoot, but the haze in her memories was telling her that most probably no, but the uncertainty was still present in the air.

- You're holding the rifle too good for it to be the first time you ever touch a weapon, - A man paid attention to that, but brushed all the suspicious thoughts away. After all, the apocalypse changed many people who never thought they might kill someone in their life.

- My father had a rifle. After the accident, we were trying to survive and I was probably too small to learn how to shoot, - She whispered, feeling his breath on her skin, as the man was placing her hands on the rifle, trying to find the best position to shoot at the targets.

- What about the time when you grew up? – The interest was playing its own game in his mind. Maybe it was trust issues still taking him under control from time to time, but he tried to trust her. After all, she was one of the few people he lived under one roof for a long time.

- I don't remember much about these days, but everything could be, - And she wasn't lying. Of course, as we grow older the memories fade with time, but spending bigger half of the life in survival mode made every day seem like a long memory of a certain period of time.

- Okay, let me just, - Joel enjoyed the silence and peace of the woods as he was focusing on the bottles. Finding the right spot, he turned Hope to the side, so she could see the same thing he did. - Do you see this bottle?

- Yeah, - She closed her eyes for a moment trying to focus. The weight of the rifle was quite unusual to her, but yet, it didn't scare her away. At least, as they talked before, in case of danger she won't have only her bare hands to fight with.

- Now, shoot, - A man took the last look at the bottles as he made sure everything was in the right place. Feeling the deep sigh from a girl, he didn't want to intrude her own thoughts. Maybe they did a lot of mistakes in life, but this will be something he will never regret. At some moment, Joel didn't even notice how he lost concentration for a short period of time. When he looked back up at the bottles, and only two out of five were still standing on the old tree.

- It is obviously easier to shoot in bottles than people, - Hope shrug her shoulders feeling a lot more confident now, she turned around to catch a smile on the man's face, as out of the good feelings inside her all she could just leave a small kiss of 'thank you' on his unshaved cheek.

- You're right, but I will not train you on people for my own sake, - He let out his rare laugh, but he couldn't help but wonder, wasn't the result too good for the first time?