When the city locked down, Daniel Caldwell was there on a work trip. A month later he got out through the army’s cordon with a small burn on his arm and one thing left to do. He’d told his wife, Erin, he was coming home. He’d promised.
Home is twelve hundred miles away. A bite turns a person in hours. The food and the water turn you slowly. Daniel runs out of the clean kind early, and the burn starts to spread.
By the time he reaches his own street, he’s sure he’s turning. The promise has shrunk to this: see her once, from a distance, and go.
The house is empty. On the wall of the high school, in her capitals, is a message: I’M ALIVE. LOOKING FOR YOU.
To find her, he’ll have to become someone else.