The Lightkeepers

30

10. Vulnerable It became a ritual. Every night, I would stare at and memorize the photos of before. I ’ d

replay their memories and fall into a dreamless sleep. If I did dream, it was utter nonsense.

Sometimes it would be trivial things, like learning how to drive, something I never got to do, and

panicking when it came to parking. I ’ d been practicing this for a while now, and so far, the

hallucinations were less frequent. I still saw Ellie hovering gracefully by her grave, but I no longer

saw the hordes. I climbed down from the beacon room and situated myself under the ladder. My

brows furrowed in concentration, my lips a thin line.

The blunted tip of the butter knife grated against the stone as I carved another tally into the

wall of a darkened corner of the lighthouse. Footsteps padded up the stairs. Henry ’ s dark hair swept

over his eyes as he poked his head through the doorway. Spotting me under the ladder, his face

screwed up. His brows furrowed.

“ What ’ re you doing? ” He asked softly.

“ It ’ s been six months, ” I muttered. Satisfied with the marking on the wall, I spun to face

him, stepping into the middle of the cramped room. Henry stared between the rungs of the ladder

at the groups of tally marks I had carved on the wall. His face softened as he realized their meaning.

I tucked the knife into my back pocket. The sun was beginning to set and my shift was finally over.

I handed him the quiver of arrows which had been clipped to my belt and relinquished the bow to

him. Henry handed me a plate of food I hadn ’ t noticed he ’ d been holding.

A minute smile tugged at my lips, though they barely twitched. A few plump strawberries

from the greenhouse had been paired with a handful of granola and what I thought was seagull

meat. Without looking back, I walked down the stairs and sat in the first window I came across.

My parents ’ voices floated up to me. I could barely make out what they were saying, their

whispered words distorted by the air. I twisted my body to gaze out the window. Below me, I could

see the growing grass, a vibrant green now that the storms and winter had passed. As I finished

my plate, I set it aside and let my head rest on the cool windowpane. The winter had been long.

Hunting had been scarce, but we managed.

Somehow, we moved on. Sure, we looked back and remembered, but the best way to honor

them was to keep moving, to keep surviving. It had been hard without Ellie that first month.

Without her, it became harder to imagine that others survived, too. Maybe our family was still out

there somewhere. Cousins, aunts, uncles, somebody we knew had to be alive still. After the attack,