Distance Between Us

The first thing Diego noticed was the fire.

Not the warmth of it, the sound. The soft, indifferent crackle of something burning down to nothing. His throat stung. His clothes were still damp and clinging, and there was a blanket over him that smelled like woodsmoke and someone else's sweat.

He didn't remember falling asleep.

He didn't remember anything after the current took him.

Voices drifted in low and careful, like people trying not to wake something dangerous:

"...barely made it out of the water."

"He tried to bite Nolan, June. I'm just saying..."

"He was scared, Junie. Leave it."

He opened his eyes slowly. A dying fire. Dark treeline beyond it. And crouched near the coals was a woman, forties, with kind eyes set into a face that had learned to be careful. Beside her, seated on a log with his forearms resting on his knees, a boy about Diego's age. Broad-shouldered, blond, mud drying on his jaw. He was wrapping a cut on his arm with slow, practiced patience.

His eyes found Diego's before Diego had fully lifted his head.

"He's awake," he said. Quiet. Not alarmed.

The woman rose and moved closer, hands loose at her sides.

"Hey, sweetheart." Her voice was measured, gentle the way you'd gentle a dog you weren't sure about. "You're safe. You're with good people."

Michael's hand slipping from his. His father's voice swallowed by the current.

Diego's heartbeat spiked hard.

He didn't know her. He didn't know any of them. He didn't know where the treeline ended or whether it was full of Feral or worse, people, and the blanket was tangled around his legs and he was trapped.

He moved before he thought. The blanket hit the dirt. His hand closed around a fire poker still warm from the coals and he was on his feet with sparks scattering, back to the fire, facing all of them.

"Back off." His voice came out wrecked and ragged. "Don't touch me."

The woman stopped mid-step. Somewhere to his left, a girl with wild curls and an oversized jacket threw her hands up. Someone else's fingers closed around a knife handle, not drawing, just ready.

And the blond boy stood. Slow. Deliberate. Palms out, empty.

"Hey." No urgency in it. No fear either, which was almost worse. "Nobody's going to hurt you. You almost drowned. We pulled you out."

"That's what raiders say," Diego snapped, eyes cutting to the treeline, "right before they take everything you've got."

"If we were raiders," the boy said, "you'd still be in the river."

Diego hated that it was a reasonable answer.

"Nolan." The woman's voice, low and warning.

"He's scared, June." He didn't step back. "Let me talk."

There was something in his tone that made Diego's grip tighten on the poker, not because it threatened him, but because it didn't. Like this boy had done this before. Like he knew how to stand in the middle of someone falling apart and not flinch.

Diego took a step back toward the dark.

"Stay back," he warned, voice cracking at the edges. "All of you. I swear I will..."

"You're bleeding."

That stopped him. He glanced down. A deep gash along his forearm, still sluggishly dripping, he hadn't felt it until Nolan said it.

He raised the poker anyway.

June exhaled slowly and shifted to the side, opening space like she'd thought about what a cornered person needed.

"You've been through hell," she said. "That's plain enough to see. But we're not your enemy, kid. If we were, we'd have left you face-down in the current."

No one moved. The night hummed, crickets, the faint pop of dying coals, the distant sound of wind moving through branches that might be wind, or might not.

Then Nolan took one step forward.

Not fast. Not aggressive. Just... forward.

"If you're going to hit me," he said quietly, "then hit me. I was the one who pulled you out. You'd be dead without me, so." A faint tilt of his head. "I figure that earns me a minute."

The firelight moved across his face. Tired. Mud-streaked. Sincere in a way that looked almost painful on him, like he couldn't help it.

Diego hated that he hesitated.

He hated that it landed.

The poker trembled. Not from fear anymore, or not only fear. A year of running lived in his arms and his jaw and the backs of his eyes, and it had nowhere left to go.

June exhaled and stepped aside. And then the girl moved, the curly-haired one, jacket mismatched at the sleeves, a handful of odd buttons stitched down one side like she'd collected them from everywhere she'd ever been. She stepped into his line of sight carefully, palms visible, a crooked almost-grin on a face still smudged with ash.

There was a scar along her jaw, thin and pale. Something about it pulled at Diego without his permission.

"Hey," she said, voice a little too bright for the middle of the night. "I'm Emily." She glanced at the poker. "You okay holding that with one hand? Genuinely asking. It looks like a lot."

It was such a strange thing to say that something almost cracked in Diego's chest.

Nolan, still standing, held out a strip of cloth, makeshift bandage, a little bloodied at the edge. Not his blood.

"We've got clean water and something for the pain," he said. "You don't have to..." He stopped when Diego didn't reach for it. Didn't push. Just let it sit there in his outstretched hand, offered and undemanded.

Somewhere in the trees, a branch snapped.

Emily flinched. Nolan's eyes cut to the treeline and back to Diego, patient and steady.

The fire ticked down to embers.

Everyone waited.

Diego's chest rose and fell, fast and shallow. He could feel the question building before he could stop it, the only thing left once the adrenaline had nowhere else to go.

The question tore out of him before he could stop it.

"I was with a man and a boy," he said, his voice shaking despite his effort to sound steady. "Where are they?"

Every head turned toward him. The forest held still, the fire popping faintly in the space between breaths.

June frowned, glancing toward Nolan, then Emily.

"We didn't see anyone else," she said gently. "Just you. The current was too strong. You're lucky we spotted you at all."

Diego swallowed hard, his jaw locking. That wasn't an answer. He looked from face to face, searching, hoping, but all he found was pity.

"We can send a couple of people upriver tomorrow," Nolan offered, his voice low and careful. "If they made it to the other side, maybe."

Diego cut him off with a short, bitter laugh. "Maybe." The word tasted like rust in his mouth. "You don't even know who I'm talking about."

Nolan hesitated. "No. We don't. But it sounds like you care about them. That's reason enough to look."

Diego didn't answer. His throat tightened, and he forced his eyes to the ground. The fire flickered against his damp clothes, painting his skin in orange and shadow.

Emily stepped forward a little, holding out a canteen. "Here," she said softly. "At least drink something. You'll pass out otherwise."

Diego stared at it for a long moment. Then, slowly, he reached out and took it, not as acceptance, just necessity.

The cool water hit his tongue, and it was the first thing all day that didn't feel like it was trying to kill him.

A quiet settled over the camp. Nolan sat back down, still watching Diego from across the fire, cautious but not afraid. Emily finally exhaled like she'd been holding her breath the whole time.

Above them, the stars glinted faintly through a break in the clouds.

Diego handed the canteen back without a word, turned his shoulder to them, and walked a few steps away. The poker scraped softly against the dirt as he dragged it with him.

There was a fallen log at the edge of camp, half rotten and covered in moss. He dropped onto it, the damp wood soaking through his jeans, and stared out at the darkness beyond the trees.

Behind him, the group exhaled as if they'd all been holding their breath at once. The murmur of voices returned, softer now. Someone stirred the fire. Someone laughed quietly at something Emily said, but it died fast when June cleared her throat.

He pretended not to listen, but his ears caught fragments anyway.

"He's scared, that's all."

"We can't just take anyone in, June. What if he's with raiders?"

"He's not," Nolan said. "You saw him. He's alone."

That last word hit harder than it should have.

Diego curled his fingers around the poker until his palm ached, keeping his eyes on the dark. There was movement out there, branches shifting in the breeze, maybe an animal, maybe something else. He couldn't tell anymore.

His body felt heavy. His clothes still clung cold to his skin. He was alive, but it didn't feel like it.

Nolan glanced at him across the firelight. Diego caught him watching. He didn't look away this time. There was something in his eyes Diego couldn't name, not pity, not judgment, just quiet understanding. It made him uneasy.

Emily noticed too, a faint smirk flickering on her lips before she hid it with her hand.

June's voice cut softly through the flicker of the fire.

"Alright, that's enough chatter for tonight. Nolan, you take first watch. Emily, you're up after him. The rest of you, get some sleep while you can."

The others grumbled quietly but started settling in. Blankets unfolded, the last embers of laughter faded, and the forest swallowed the camp in a calm that felt almost unreal.

June wiped her hands on her jacket, then turned toward Diego. Her boots crunched over the dirt as she crossed the small distance between them.

He tensed, instinct again, but she stopped a few feet away, keeping her tone careful.

"You can sit out here if you want, sweetheart. Just, it gets cold when the fog rolls in."

He didn't answer. She didn't expect him to. Instead, she knelt near one of the supply crates and pulled out a folded bundle: a gray T-shirt, a flannel, and a pair of sweatpants, all clearly scavenged but clean enough.

"They'll be big on you, but they're dry. I can turn around while you change, or you can take them somewhere else. Up to you."

Her voice was steady, that same tone she'd probably used before the world ended, to coax scared kids down from trees or calm someone after a nightmare.

Diego glanced up, uncertain.

"Why're you helping me?"

She paused, like she was deciding how much of the truth to give him.

"Because I've buried people I should've helped sooner," she said quietly. "I don't plan on doing that again if I can help it."

She placed the clothes on the log beside him and rose slowly.

"There's a spare tent by the van. Nolan set it up earlier, you can use it if you want. Or stay out here. No one's gonna bother you."

Then she patted his shoulder gently, careful not to startle him, and headed back toward the firelight.

Diego watched her go, the poker still resting across his knees. The night hummed with insects, and the fog was creeping in just like she'd said.

The bundle of dry clothes felt heavier than it should have.

Diego sat there long after June disappeared into her tent. The night deepened until the fire was no more than a soft pulse of orange behind him.

The clothes rested beside him on the log, neat, folded, dry. He stared at them like they might bite.

His thoughts drifted back to the river. The roar of the current. His father's hand closing around his arm, then slipping away. Michael's scream fading under the water. He remembered the silence after, heavier than the noise itself.

He pressed the heel of his palm against his eyes until colors burst behind them. But the memory didn't leave. It never did.

Somewhere behind him, Nolan murmured something to himself, probably counting the seconds between his own thoughts. Diego could hear the shift of his boots when he paced, the faint click of his safety catch on his rifle. He was careful. Too careful.

The air grew colder. Diego pulled his damp jacket tighter, but it was no use, the chill found its way through everything.

Finally, he reached for the folded bundle. The fabric was rough but dry, a luxury he hadn't felt in weeks. He glanced toward the camp, made sure no one was watching, and changed quickly in the dark. The clothes smelled faintly of soap and smoke.

When he was done, he dropped the wet ones over the log and stared at the camp again.

Nolan was still awake, sitting near the fire now, rifle across his knees. His head tilted slightly, maybe sensing movement, but he didn't call out. Just nodded once, slow, acknowledgment, not invitation.

Diego hesitated a moment longer. Then he stood, grabbed the poker out of habit, and walked toward the tent June had mentioned.

Inside, it smelled like old canvas and dust. There was a blanket rolled out and a lantern turned low. For the first time in a year, he lay down without a weapon in his hand.

He didn't sleep right away. He listened, for the wind, for the Feral, for the river, until the exhaustion finally dragged him under.