GLOWING (Joel Miller)

7 | The Hotel

We walked for a few minutes, most of the time spent listening to Ellie marvel and gawk at the surrounding city, as Tess explained everything to her. She had never been outside the quarantine zone before. Lucky kid.

I hung back, walking a few paces ahead of Joel, as we trailed behind the other two. We were silent. After our brief moment of civility back in the building, we hadn't uttered a word to each other. My stubbornness forbade me to apologise or reason with him. He was acting like a dick and it wasn't my job to bring it up.

"You ever been out here before?"

I turned my head to the side, slowing down so he could catch up. He side-eyed me as we fell into step, his shoulder almost brushing mine.

I nodded. "Only once." Joel was still watching me expectantly. "I was a kid in FEDRA camp." I mumbled, picturing the disgusted look that was probably on his face. "I wanted to see what was out there and I get why she did too."

I tilted my head towards Ellie, who was staring into a large crater in the middle of the street. Joel sighed. "Why'd you go to FEDRA school?"

"Because my mum and sister were starving and I could get them extra ration cards and shit." I brought my hands up to grasp the straps of my bag, as I tried to stay calm. "My sister was in school and my mum had a back injury so she couldn't work." I turned to Joel who was staring down at his feet. "Life is tough, but it's even tougher when you can't fend for yourself."

We fell into silence as we approached a fallen building, blocking the street. "So, the State House is across there," Tess explained, pointing to the blockage. "It's about a ten minute walk if we could go straight."

I came to a halt beside Ellie and Joel stopped beside me. "So..?"

"Long way or short way?" Joel asked sarcastically, turning to look at Tess.

She met his gaze. "I mean, it's the long way or the we're fuckin' dead way."

"Well," Ellie began, looking up at the looming wreckage. "I vote short way, just based on that limited information."

I chuckled. "I second that."

Joel looked at me scrutinisingly and I met his gaze, quirking an eyebrow curiously. He shook his head, looking past me at Tess. "We'll have to check it from the hotel first."

Tess nodded. "Good." I watched for a moment as Tess and Ellie began to make their way towards the wreckage. Joel stood beside me, a tense expression on his face. I glanced up at him and he reciprocated, gesturing with his gun for me to go first. With a subtle nod, I jogged after the others. Who knew he could be a gentleman?

Tess led the way up onto one of the many crumbling overpasses and we began to pick our way through the conglomerate of abandoned cars and trucks that littered the road. It was reasonably uneventful. Ellie and Tess just kept talking a few paces ahead as I took in the view of the ghost town of a city.

I managed to tune out their conversation for a little while, until Joel and I caught up with them. "Everyone said the open city was crazy," Ellie explained, glancing up at me. "Like, swarms of infected running around everywhere."

From beside me, Joel sighed. "Not exactly like that."

"You know, people like to tell stories," Tess added, walking a few steps ahead of us the rest of us.

I nudged Ellie's shoulder with my elbow. "If anyone at FEDRA says the outside's crawling with infected, they're bullshitting you." Ellie let out a humoured snort. "They're just trying to impress you."

Ellie clicked her tongue thoughtfully. "So, there aren't super-infected that explode fungus spores on you?"

"Shit," Tess mused. "I hope not."