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❝ chapter four — flame in the night ❞
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– ꥟ –
DESPITE THE DECAYED, SICKENED STATE OF THE WORLD after the end, there was still beauty to be found. It was found in small moments, rare moments, but it was still there; those reminders of the glittering past. As the sun slipped down below the hills and the gloom settled over the forest, Birdie found that beauty.
In the dusk's fading light, the pines became a sea of stars. Dozens of glowing insects surrounded her. They twinkled like small suns around the blonde, bobbing and blinking as they went about whatever business fireflies got up to before the night captured the Earth.
Birdie sat at the base of a tree, body aching from dragging herself through the pines for hours without rest, dodging the occasional Walker and tripping over her sprained ankle. She couldn't help but smile as she watched, ensuring that her gaze never landed on her swollen, throbbing foot, no matter how urgently it pulsed.
She reached out to grab a lighting bug as it floated around her head, her smile growing as she captured it. She opened her palm and studied the insect as it crawled across her skin and around her thumb before its wings spread and it was off again. With it she sent a prayer that Sophia would see the fireflies wherever she was, just to be reminded that not everything in the world was dark, bloody, and painful.
Birdie had loved chasing fireflies around her South Carolina home with her little brother Dean. They spent every summer night they could exploring the backyard, hunting for tiny stars to collect in Mason jars. Elsie, their sister, had always been so scared of bugs, but having them captured inside the glass, like bottled lighting let her find glee in those warm nights as well.
She could imagine her brother's laughter in her mind, chasing their sister around the backyard with a jar of a dozen tiny stars. She wondered when she would get to hear that laugh again, or her mother calling her back inside for supper.
