We walked down the tree-lined road, and I looked around, noticing all the shattered windows and the occasional collapsed home. None of the chimneys near the school had any smoke streaming out, and everything was silent, except for our small talk. I couldn't help looking at the glass shards in his boots, wondering if some of those came from the houses around us. When we turned two corners and crossed the street, I recognized exactly where we were.

"Our walks home in middle school," I said. "That's your second favorite memory? Didn't those take place across—"

"Weeks," he said. "Months, but time passed so quickly, so they're just one memory really. And plus, it wasn't just the walks, but our arguments about axes vs swords."

I groaned. "Are you going to bring those up again?"

"Yes I am," he said. "I'm still right. Swords are way better than axes. Imagine trying to swing a big, lumbering axe compared to a graceful and elegant sword—"

"Imagine bringing a sword to a battle against a fully armored knight and just having nothing happen since plate armor can take any sword hit. But guess what it can't take, the blunt force of an axe."

"Plate armor is a myth," he said. "Just think about running sound cloaked in metal—"

"I'm pretty sure there's a video online that debunks the idea that plate armor was hard to move in and was actually quite mobile."

"Well, I'd look it up, but the internet doesn't exist anymore," he said. "So your source, by default, doesn't exist—"

"We're never going to find closure on this, will we?"

"We would, if you just came to the light side," he said. "We have cookies and electricity and the internet."

"I think I'd prefer to stay in my land of no internet and suffering, thank you," I said.

He shrugged. "Your loss. I'll be chilling here with my anime."

I ignored him. "Remember how we'd create stories around this debate?"

"We still never finished that fictional battle, did we?" he asked. "The one in the map that I created with the poisonous forest and all of the mini-bosses and castle defense systems."

"I think you were going to win, with your weird time-slowing mechanism," I said. "Now, I wish that I have that power, so that I can stop time for all of us and let the world move on until everything gets better."

"So that you don't have to leave," I wanted to add at the end, but left it off because I didn't want to sound too sad. I'd been trying to avoid making him guilty for leaving because I couldn't let his last impression of me be so negative. If only I could stop time and prevent all of this from happening. I'd put his family and mine in a bubble and let time rush around us until the days when sunlight bursts from the skies every day and the ash storms and tidal waves are just a bad memory.

It's too bad these things are only possible in my head.

"I'd totally help you," he said. "Maybe even pull out a bit of telekinesis and push the moon back into its normal place, so that we can get to your future quicker."

"That'll really show the moon who's boss," I replied, and we both chuckled.

We had finished walking down the street and were facing our middle school. I turned to Charles. "What are we leaving behind here?"

"I was thinking of something more symbolic and dramatic," he said. "Like settling our axe vs sword debate in the only way possible: a duel."

"Or we can just agree to disagree."

"Neal, you can be so boring at times," he said, and he put his hand out. "But fine. Agree that swords are the best?"

"I disagree," I said and shook his outstretched hand. "But at least we've gotten some closure."

Some closure that I'd never get when he goes away. I guess it's like Mira and Leon's situation, where both Leon and Charles are just out of reach. But at least Mira was able to get some closure with Leon's letter from Southern California. With the roads collapsed on and mail trucks retired due to increasing petroleum shortages, I'd never hear from Charles again. It's like once his car turns the corner and passes the gold-lettered sign marking the border of our city, he'll be alive and dead at the same time. But either way, forever gone.

We went into the school, though it took us a while to actually find a way in since the whole front was chained up. Luckily, they left one of the fences in the upper fields open, and I told Charles that we were walking towards the track because that's where the second greatest moment happened.

"Remember when we managed to beat two fastest kids in school here?" I asked.

"That was probably the best relay that I've ever ran," he said, his eyes tracing the oval rim of the track.

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"We were unstoppable," I said, thinking about the memory and smiling.

It was a hot day in late May, during our final PE class when the teachers organized a massive track-and-field mini-tournament. I personally wanted to just do the long-jump and quickly get my participation logged, but Charles insisted that we do the two-person relays. Plus, he'd already signed me up, so there was no going back.

I was the second runner, placed right next to the fastest runner in our school. I was so nervous that my legs started shaking and my teeth started chattering, even when I was sweating out buckets. When he was nearing me, I was terrified of dropping the baton or having it slip out of my hand that I nearly pulled out of the race.

But as soon as he was right behind me, the baton outstretched as I stretched my arm behind me, I grabbed it and didn't look back, only glancing to the side to realize that I was in first place. When I crossed the finish line, I nearly threw up from the cramps and the nerves, as Charles gave me a high five since we had managed to do the impossible. It was amazing.

"Of course, it didn't help that the other two people messed up their pass, but who cares?" I added.

"We went from the bottom of everyone's picks during PE to the top," he said. "Not like it mattered since after summer, everyone forgot about it, and we went back to being complete unknowns. But for a glorious few seconds, we were on top of the world."

"It was the best day of seventh grade," I said.

"By far, I can't even remember anything about seventh grade other than that," he said. "It's freaky how much that I've forgotten."

When I thought about it then too, I realized that seventh grade was all a blur. I couldn't even remember my social studies teacher's name, and I started panicking at that moment. It's terrifying when you think you know something, but you realize that you've forgotten it, even if the memory is just on the tip of your tongue. But thinking about it, it's not the worst kind of forgetting. The worst would be when their name is the only thing that you could remember since while you've been trying to preserve something as symbolic as their name, everything about them falls apart and crumbles into ashes.

"You alright?" he asked me.

"Yeah, I'm alright," I said, somewhat betraying my vow to tell the truth. "Let's head out of here."

"Wait," he said and walked across the track field to snap off a branch from a fallen tree before returning to me.

"What is this for?" I asked.

"Let's live in the moment again," he said. "So that the memory is still fresh."

He stood a couple of paces behind. "Imagine that the air was hot and dry, the smell of cheap deodorant and wet socks wafting in the air. You're standing with your arm outstretched, ready to grab the baton, as I'm zooming around the track."

I looked back as Charles ran in such exaggerated slow motion that I couldn't help laughing, even when I was supposed to be nervous. He continued with his speech, "I'm suddenly right behind you, baton in my hand. I'm ten feet away, five feet, thee, two, one."

At that moment, I could feel the baton in my hand as I pretended to run, and when I closed my eyes, the full, raw memories of that day came back. The gusts of wind pushing through my hair, my feet pounding against the rock-hard sandstone track, nausea and exhaustion meeting the rush of adrenaline. What was once a dying memory came back to life again, a brief moment of heat and nostalgia before the coldness in the air froze it up again.

"I'm going to miss middle school," I said and put the stick baton on the ground.

"It was fun working together," Charles said. "We really were the best running partners."

When we closed the gate behind us, it felt like we were leaving another chapter of our life behind. Instead of heading back the same way that we went, Charles and I headed westward. "We're going to the beach, right?"

"Yeah," he said with a shaky breath, and I could see that he was a bit intimidated, even as he tried cracking a small smile. "There are tons of great moments there."

"It's going to be alright," I said, though my scattershot breath betrayed my calmness.

I guess both of us were nervous about going back to the beach. I swore that I wouldn't go back, but for this project, I needed to because two of my greatest memories ever were right by the seaside. It was hard, though, especially since nothing good had happened at the beaches since the moon brought the tsunami tides. If anything, the beaches reminded us of everything that we lost, the place of summer memories now a hellish bog of quicksand and flooded homes.

Walking alongside the boulevard, I think the both of us were a bit relieved that the tides were fairly close to the border but receding away, so that we'd be in no rush since it'd take an hour or so for it to go far enough that it'd be safe.

"You want to have lunch?" he asked.

I nodded and we sat on the damp-ish ground, staring west towards the ocean. When I reached into my bag, I realized that I hadn't brought a can-opener to actually eat from them. Charles noticed this because he split the protein bar that he was nibbling on. "Have it."

"You can keep it," I said. "I'm not that hungry anyways."

"I thought we weren't supposed to lie today," he said, knowing that he had caught me. "No one's not hungry anymore."

"You need it more,"

"Just take it," he said. "Think of this as a minor payment for all that you've done for me. And I will not deal with low-energy Neal."

"Fine. I'll take half of what you're giving me," I said, and split the half that he was offering me.

He reluctantly took it from me and popped it into his mouth. I wondered where he got those protein bars, but I was too scared to ask. There's no way that he got protein bars from an abandoned home since they are too convenient to carry around and too invaluable. Only people would have this resource, right?

After a long period of silence, he turned to me and said, "I'm scared."

"Me too," I said, grateful that he made the first comment.

"The first time we went to the beach, there was a body. The second time, the nightmares plagued me," he said. "I don't know what's going to happen this third time."

"Maybe the third time will be the charm," I said, trying to keep positive.

He smiled a little, as I continued, "Maybe it's important that we go down there, to confront the bad memories and reclaim our vision of the beach from the apocalypse. It's the one thing that it can't take from us."

"That's all very inspiring," he said. "But that's what I did last time, and it didn't work."

"That's because we weren't on the same page," I said, and I think he knew that I was talking about his secret and my hesitance to talk about the nightmares. "But now, we're confronting this together. You and me."

After a small lull, Charles smiled a bit, and I said, "What?"

"Nothing," he said. "But that speech was a little cheesy."

"You know what, cheesy things are inspiring," I said. "And your swing story about the moon was much more cheesy than my speech."

"What are you talking about?" he said and scoffed. We ended up arguing about whose life stories were more cheesy and cliche (we concluded that the best stories and speeches are always a bit cheesy, even when they come directly from our heart) until the tides had rolled far into the distance and the midday sun had begun to sink towards the ocean.