The Living and The Loved

Chloe Smith is eighteen years old and freshly out of high school - no college plans, no big ambitions, just a quiet summer ahead of her. She grew up in a loud, warm household in Virginia: her dad, Negan, was a high school gym teacher who filled every room he walked into, and her mom, Lucille, was the kind of woman who made home feel like the safest place in the world.
Chloe was never the most remarkable person in the room - she knew that about herself and was mostly okay with it. A small circle of friends, a handful of hobbies, a life that was simple in the best way. To celebrate finishing high school, she treated herself to a solo trip to Atlanta, Georgia - her first time traveling alone, a small act of independence before real life had a
chance to set in. She turned eighteen on the day the world ended, alone in a city that wasn't hers, with no way back home. Ofall the ways to mark a birthday, that one takes the cake.