“Ed never let me wear nice things like this,” he hears her as he strides by, intent on looking for some gas and a way the hell out of the traffic snarl they’ve landed themselves in. He thinks it’s a waste of time – but Rick is hell bent on heading to Fort Benning and fuck, it’s not like he has any better place to be.

Her words bother him as he works. They niggle at him for days, weeks, months after they leave that pathetic strip of concrete – the last place they saw that little girl alive. He thinks about it – the drab tans and browns that blend into nothingness that he’s seen her in. He thinks of the smile on her face as she’d pressed that red fabric against her chest and held it there. She’s quiet – pale and colourless since they left the farm. It’s like he can see the colour bleed out of her right before his very eyes. He wants her to smile again.

Ed never let me.

Well. Fuck that, he thinks. He’ll show that son of a bitch.