The vines give one last violent twitch.
Then they go still.
Fire keeps chewing through the patch, but the thing at its center is done. No movement. No pulling. No thinking.
Just ash, smoke, and the stench of roasted ruin.
I cough, drag in a burning breath, and watch the flames erase what tried to kill us.
When the ringing in my ears fades enough for me to breathe again, I push myself up.
I don’t have time to feel victorious before Shaun is there. He barrels into me, hands shaking, and kisses me like the world might still end if he doesn’t. It’s desperate. Messy. All teeth and breath and relief.
I kiss him back just as hard. Maybe harder.
The taste of smoke and blood and adrenaline coats my tongue. His hands slide into my hair, anchoring me. My fingers curl into his shirt, fists full of proof that he’s here. Alive. Real.
We break apart only because we need air.
Foreheads pressed together, we laugh and cough at the same time, bodies trembling from shock and heat and the aftermath of terror. Fire crackles around us. Embers drift past like stars falling out of the sky.
“Told you,” I rasp, throat shredded, grin splitting my face anyway. “Final girl.”
He pulls back just enough to look at me.
His face is smeared with soot and blood, but his grin shines through.
“Damn right,” he says, voice wrecked and full of promise.
Cole clears his throat and delivers it like a eulogy. “This smoke isn’t good for my sinuses.”
I blink at him, adrenaline still buzzing in my veins, ears ringing from the explosion, skin humming with heat. Of all the things to say after surviving a pumpkin-fueled massacre, that somehow tracks.
Then he sneezes.
His glasses launch off his face like they’ve had enough of tonight and skitter across the dirt. They land near a charred vine that twitches once and finally goes still.
I snort, but it quickly turns into a wheeze that sets my throat on fire. Shaun’s hand slides to my back without thinking, rubbing sweet circles like my lungs might listen if he asks them nicely.
“Bless you,” he says, dead serious.
Cole squints at the ground. “If anyone steps on those, I’m haunting you.”
Once my lungs stop burning, I pick up Cole’s glasses and hand them to him. We start moving, away from the patch, away from the flames still chewing through what’s left of the farm. The night crackles behind us. Corn collapses. Vines hiss and snap as they die. Smoke rolls low across the ground, thick and bitter. I have a feeling we will forever smell like a bonfire.
Every step sends a fresh ache through my body. My hands sting. My ankle throbs. My throat feels like I gargled gravel. I don’t care. I’m upright. I’m breathing. I’m holding Shaun’s hand. His shoulder is brushing mine like a quiet roll call.
Still here.
Still here.
We’re almost to the entrance when headlights sweep across the dirt road.
A familiar engine growls.
Then screeches.
My mom’s car fishtails slightly as it slams to a stop, gravel spraying. The driver’s door flies open before the engine even cuts.
