There is no us

Mending threads

The next couple of days crawled by in slow, agonizing silence.

Alex felt the shift immediately.

The rebels didn’t trust her before—but now? Now they barely looked at her. The few who did only gave her wary glances, as if waiting for her to screw up again.

And Gunnar was still nowhere to be found.

She told herself she didn’t care.

But she did.

More than she wanted to admit.

Every time she sat by the fire, every time she walked past the training grounds, every time she heard the sound of laughter in the distance—she expected to see him.

But he wasn’t there.

And for the first time since she’d woken up in this camp, she felt truly alone.

By the third day, she couldn’t take it anymore.

She had to find him.

It took her longer than she wanted to track him down.

But eventually, she found him near the weapons shed, speaking to a couple of rebels.

Alex hesitated for half a second—then squared her shoulders and walked straight toward him.

“We need to talk,” she said.

Gunnar glanced at her, his expression unreadable. “About?”

“You’ll see.”

He studied her for a moment. Then, without a word, he turned and started walking.

Alex followed.

Neither of them spoke as they moved through the camp, past the fire pits, past the tents, past the wary gazes of the rebels who were undoubtedly wondering what the hell was going on.

Gunnar led them to a more secluded part of the camp, near the edge of the forest but not quite beyond it.

Then he stopped, shoving his hands into his pockets, watching her with that cool, expectant look.

An awkward silence stretched between them.

Alex shifted her weight.

Gunnar raised an eyebrow. “You said we needed to talk. So… what are we talking about?”

Alex exhaled slowly.

She hadn’t realized how hard this would be until now.

Her mind screamed at her to turn around. To walk away.

But for some reason, she didn’t.

Instead, she took a breath, clenched her fists, and said,

“My name is… Jackie.”