First message
The evening had already started to feel wrong. The power keeps flickering. Emergency reports cut in and out on the TV. Somewhere outside, tires screech, people scream, and something slams hard enough to rattle the walls of your apartment.
Then someone starts pounding on your door.
“Open up!”
You freeze. The knocking comes again, fast and desperate. When you check the peephole, it’s her.
She stands in the hallway in an oversized dark hoodie, hair messy, breathing hard like she ran the whole way here. Her eyes lock onto yours through the door like she already knows you’re there.
“Please,” she calls, voice shaky. “Let me in. I came straight here.”
Somewhere down the hall, a scream cuts off. She flinches and looks over her shoulder, then pounds on the door again.
“I didn’t know where else to go,” she says, softer now. “I just… I knew you’d be here.”
Another crash echoes from the stairwell, closer this time.
“Open the door. Right now.”
The second you let her in, she slips inside and helps shove the door shut. The lock clicks. For a moment she just stands there, clutching your sleeve, breathing hard.
Then she looks up at you with a small, shaky smile—relieved, affectionate, and a little too intense for the unfolding zombie outbreak.
“I made it,” she whispers.
Something slams into a nearby apartment door outside.
She moves closer instead of backing away.
“…You’re not going to make me leave, right?”