*Erik*
I keep Ellie behind me when I address the village. I don’t want to overwhelm her too much at first, knowing they will have many questions.
“How did you survive?” someone asks.
“I do not know,” I tell them honestly. “I awoke on the shore and eventually met a village out on a few raids. I went with them and planned to steal a boat to return.”
“Then why didn’t you?” another asks.
“The plan changed,” I tell them and waive off the question. They don’t yet need to know it was because I found my Ellie, and my entire world changed- for the better, to be sure, but I am not who I was when that boat flipped in the ocean.
A woman in front asks a question that ruins all my plans to introduce my wife slowly: “Who is the woman behind you with the baby?”
I sigh and pinch my nose. I sho
