His hands on my neck - Joel Miller.

23.

The night was quiet. Unlike the daytime in spring, the nights were colder often with a strong wind. Right after the sunset, the coldness was falling on the ground, making everybody forget about the warm rays of the sun that they could feel just moments before. Harrington opened her eyes after something disturbed her sleep. Thinking nothing of it, she turned around only to notice Joel on the other side and hoped to fall back to sleep as if nothing happened.

- Joel, wake up! – Hope gave up, at first she thought that the wind outside was picking up speed, and the old windows were letting it inside the house. But, when she heard something suspiciously falling down, there was no other choice but to wake him up.

- What the hell? – It wasn't very long since Joel came back from another patrol. Still feeling tired and sleepy, he raises up a little on the bed to look at her.

- Shh... something or someone is making the noise downstairs, - She whispered, hoping that the man won't fall back to sleep. She could swear she heard something, but first, he had to take her words seriously.

- Did you adopt a cat last night? – He whispered, lowering his head back to the pillow and being sure that there was nothing really making sound, and Hope was just too tired, so her mind was playing games with her.

- No, - A girl's felt a bit annoyed by this question, but understood that most probably it was a trick made by the man to calm her down and make to think about all the other things.

- Okay, because I can't hear anything, - A man kept on whispering, slowly coming back to sleep, as his head fell down on the pillow, making it more comfortable for his night sleep.

However, after a second his sleep disappeared at one moment. The loud bang was heard clearly from downstairs. He understood that Hope wasn't lying, and their eyes met in eye contact before she whispered. - Can you please check what was it?

- I better be dreaming, - Joel got up from the bed and wondered what the actual hell could happen downstairs.

He found his gun under the bed, making sure that Hope was too concerned about the door as if she was sure that someone will enter inside of the bedroom at the very same moment. The man hoped that the floor would play on their side that night and give no creaking under his heavy steps. The door slowly opened, and he checked the bathroom first, and then the two other bedrooms upstairs, to at least make sure that one floor of the house was safe before he was distracted by another noise downstairs.

Joel held the gun in his hands, slowly walking down. He was ready for anything waiting for him downstairs, while every second of the time seemed like an hour. The living room was clear, and then there was it. In an unknown way, there was an infected standing right there, in their kitchen. It took Joel a second to shoot him down. It felt like an instinct. And there was the reason. The back door that faced the woods was wide open. At this moment he was even thankful that his sleep was disturbed earlier, than later. He took some time to fix the door lock and to check every other room in the house, including the basement.

- Thank you for saving us, - Hope walked down, standing in the doorframe of the kitchen as she was looking first, at the reason for the noise, and then at the man.

- I didn't teach you how to shot for you to wake me up in the middle of the night, - Joel let a small smile appear on his face, as he turned around to look at her.

- I wanted to seem fragile at least once in a while, - A girl fixed her hair behind the ear, as she let herself lean against the kitchen door watching him.

- You better sing me a lullaby, it will take a long time to fall asleep after this, - He winked at her as he finally finished with the door lock and walked closer to the girl, looking into her eyes.

- We will manage it, don't worry, - She sleepily giggled, and caught the man's hand in hers as they walked back into the bedroom to fall back to sleep in the darkness of the night.