The Lightning That Woke Us

Maggie traced the lifeline on my palm with her index finger, something she hadn't done in seven years of marriage. The last time was on our honeymoon in Kauai, beneath actual palm trees, back when we still believed in destiny.

Now we were in a budget motel in Daytona Beach, the air conditioning unit rattling like a dying animal. Outside, a Category 2 storm was moving up the coast.

"Your lifeline's shorter than I remember," she said softly.

"Or maybe you just stopped looking."

The words hung there, heavier than I intended. We'd come to Florida for my sister's wedding — a trip that was supposed to reignite something between us. Instead, we'd spent three days walking alongside each other like zombies, so drained from our jobs, our mortgage, the relentless machine of existence that neither of us knew how to stop.

Maggie was an ER nurse. I managed corporate accounts for a pharmaceutical distributor. We made good money. We hated our lives.

"Do you remember when we used to talk about opening that bookstore?" she asked, not meeting my eyes.

"That was before."

"Before what?"

"Before we became this." I gestured between us. "These people who wake up, go to work, come home, watch television, sleep, repeat. Living dead."

She pulled her hand away.

The first bolt of lightning struck the ocean behind the motel, illuminating our room in harsh blue-white. Thunder followed immediately, shaking the windows in their frames. The power died. Darkness swallowed us.

"I'm pregnant," Maggie said into the dark.

The silence that followed was absolute. Lightning flashed again, and I saw her face — scared, hopeful, waiting.

I'd assumed zombies were the ones who shuffled through life half-alive. But maybe real zombies were the ones who didn't know they'd died until someone forced them to look at what they'd become.

I took her hand in mine, palm against palm.

"We're not dead yet," I said.

Outside, the storm broke.