Safe and Sound

Part 4

"You sure you know how to work that thing?" You ask as you take a cloth from your bag and wipe your face, looking at Ellie through the mirror. Ellie, who had most likely found the gun at Bill and Frank's blissfully aimed gun in front of the mirror, mimicking the firing sounds. As you wipe away some dust from your cheeks, which you guessed came from falling down (Let's just say, just as you were in school, Rei...Ellie and you had made everything a competition much to the dismay to Joel) after getting tackled by Ellie while trying to get out of the truck. At the moment, Joel was doing some adult thing while you and Ellie wandered, so you both had found yourselves in the bathroom, the ground overgrown and the windows broken in, nonetheless, the cracked mirror did just fine.

With a shrug Ellie looked to her friend, watching you as you leaned forward on the countertops, and she smiled, "Do you know how to shoot a gun?"

"Kinda gotta if you have Joel and Te-" You paused and cleared your throat, "If you have smugglers as parents." As you spoke you started to put away the rag until you noticed a smudge of dirt on Ellie's cheek and mindlessly you leaned forward and wiped the dirt off, and when you turned back to put the rag away you didn't see her go red. You both were silent for a moment and you then looked up at her from where you knelt to get to your bag, "Can...Can I ask you a question? Don't gotta answer it."

Without skipping a beat, thinking it was going to be related to something completely different, Ellie nodded and then took a step closer to you, "Yeah, shoot."

As you thought of a way to phrase the question you couldn't help but sigh, you knew it would most likely be a sore spot but you had to know, "Wha-what happened?"

"Whatcha mean?"

"When you and Riley vanished." You said as you pulled your dirt covered backpack over your shoulders, and you met her gaze, you saw the pretty brown eyes lose their light and you stood, "I'm sorry, I shouldn't have asked, I just..." With a motion around you rolled your shoulders a frown appeared on your face. "I missed you guys. I thought-God I thought you died! I thought both of you-"

"Riley got bit too... I had to...I had to shoot her."

You stopped your rant and you held your breath, just by judging by the past few days and the few small talks about school and your friend group you had assumed Riley was gone, you had made a guess, but still, hearing it made your heart drop. Riley was the only one who knew of your little 'crush' on Ellie, Riley had been your friend for so long that the words made your blood run cold; not as intense as Tess's infection or Bill and Frank's letter, but it made you stop for a moment, just to chew on those words. "Oh."

Ellie shrugged, looking away from you, and then shoved the gun back into her pack and then slipped it back on. "Don't talk about it."

A small nod, "Okay."

It took only a few moments of staring at each other before you sighed and walked past her, leaving her alone in the bathroom. As you walked out of the small, desolate, gas station your eyes wandered around the open desert. It was dry, sandy and if you were honest with yourself you could feel yourself getting a sunburn from the sun, even though ninety nine percent of your skin was covered and you had only been in the sun for a few minutes, still you could feel it. As you go over to the truck you open the door and throw your bag in, it took you a few minutes to figure out where Joel was. But you had found him, blowing into a tube to get the gasoline out.

You watched for a moment, and then you sat down on the other side of the gas tank leaning your head against the tire, which you were unaware would leave a large black tint on your hair. "I wanna throw a rock at Ellie's face."