Toby.
Toby Fritz.
From Spokane, Washington, who likes yellow, stained-glass windows.
I like the leaf, Toby.
Man, you'd think with it being 2028, and we've got fucking tech that can let you read someone's heart rate without even touching them, that I'd have a way to just transfer my thoughts straight into this paper and tell whoever this person is that I like the leaf.
Toby, whoever they are, is in my home state. Maybe they'd be able to visit my storage unit in Kennewick, if they didn't mind the drive.
What do they look like? I keep thinking 'they' in my head—is this a dude or a chick? Maybe they are a they. Do they write left-handed? Do they have brown eyes like Margie? Bet whoever they are, they don't laugh like she did.
Cold wind cuts across my raw face. By the time I've read the letter a fifth time, I've made it back to my tent.
Jim's crying has started to muffle into hiccups. Elijah's talking to him in Hindi. I trip into the tent, walk right up to them, and put myself on Jim's other side.
He's warm as hell, I'm nearly frozen solid. "Here," I whisper, holding the leaf to Jim. He pulls his face from the crook of Elijah's neck and glares at it, then me.
"What...?"
"This was in my letter," I tell him, seeping in Jim's body heat by bringing an arm around his back, hooking it with Elijah's. "I want you to have it."
Jim takes it with pink fingers, turns the stem around. The longest prongs of the plate-sized leaf trace over his chin. He closes his eyes, voice raw and cracking as he sighs, "Yellow was Margie's favorite color."
"Sure was," Elijah nods, resting his temple on the top of Jim's head. "Did you get anything else in your letter?" he asks.
I nod, too, and unfold the letter. Jim keeps his eyes closed as I read it out loud to them. "I like the sound of this Toby," Elijah says, his own lashes a still wet.
"Me, too. You two want anything?" I mentally beg them to ask for something easy, like water bottles that don't taste like old carrots, or a book or a crispy $1.
Don't ask for me to write to Toby and beg for loved ones to come back from the dead. I couldn't do that.
Jim mumbles, "Yeah um. Yeah I'd like...I'd like Cheeze-Its."
"You got it. Vishou, anything for you?"
"A movie ticket." Jim chuckles and coughs, and I break a smirk and tilt my head to Elijah who shrugs. "I miss going to the movies. Any movie ticket, any year. I just wanna hang onto it. Like a legit one, not one off a smart phone."
"Movie ticket and Cheeze-Its, and whatever Hannah wants. Okay, let's see what this Toby can do."
YOU ARE READING
Starts with a Match
Horror"Most people in the units, especially here on the front lines where they're sick and bored of all this shit-they call them gluts. Gluttons. Ravenous, insatiable. Zombies. Can't be a zombie if they're still alive. Which they are. They're just starvi...
