I just stand there, transfixed and speechless. It's hard to believe it, but I know it's true. It's Alex. He's standing in this very room, but it's not possible. Before I ran, I had seen the blood on his shirt. He most certainly had been shot. Yet, here he is. I want to run to him, but Julian is here as well. I don't want to hurt his feelings. Now I am torn. I love Julian, but I also love Alex. Alex is all I dream about at night.
Finally, I am able to speak and move.
"Alex?" I question him, still shocked by seeing him here, after what I had seen in a different lifetime.
"It's me, Lena," he assures me.
"How…what…?" I try, unsure of what to ask first.
"I'll explain everything," he tells me.
"So this is Alex; the one that gave you the deliria; love," Julian says to me, looking at Alex now.
"It is. I guess he's not dead like I thought," I reply.
As we sit down by the campfire eating what little food we have, Alex tells us what happened to him. After he had mouthed to me to run, he had done the same thing and somehow survived. He hadn't been as badly shot as I had seen from afar. And when he was far away from the city and had taken care of his wounds he had received, he had searched far and wide for me and had finally, tonight, found me.
In addition to his story, I told him mine. How I had been nursed back to health by Raven; how I had been welcomed as one of them; how we had lost some members when the Scavengers had come; how I had made my way to the city and found out about the DFA; how I had been captured and met Julian; how Julian and I had escaped; and finally, how I had saved Julian's life with a little help from Raven and the others.
Later, when Julian had long gone to bed as well as the others on the homestead, Alex looked at me over the campfire in the dark.
"Do you love him?" he asks me.
"I think so," I reply.
"Do you still love me?" he asks.
I stare into his eyes and he does likewise with me. His eyes, hardened earlier, are now soft; Like I could melt into them.
"Yes. You're all I've dreamed about since I left. And I still do."
"Then show me; if you want to."
I know what I'm being asked. He wants me to show him how much I still love him and, even more so, how much I miss being with him.
I go to sit beside him and we face one another. Then, a moment later, we're kissing. A familiar sensation ignites as we do. It's the familiar electricity that I always feel whenever he and I touch. It's the same thing with Julian, but it's stronger when Alex and I are touching.
We pull away a few minutes later, panting, as we look at one another.
"I love you," he says.
"I love you, too," I respond.
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