Where It Belongs

“A heart locket?” You mutter as you search the ruins of yet another apartment. “Why does this matter so much?” You ask as you turn to face your companion “like, we need food more than a locket Ames”

Ames sighed beside you, probably already fed up with you and your attitude, but honestly after 2 weeks of stumbling around Manhattan looking for a locket you felt complaining was justified.

“You’ll understand when we find it, alright?” He snapped, whipping his voice at you with barely contained frustration.

“No” you snarled, facing him, “I refuse to look for a second more unless you tell me what’s going on!”

“And why should I explain it?” He yelled back at you, moving yet another broken bramble of rebar and cement “you clearly don’t give a shit and would rather go back to looking for food”

“Yeah I would rather look for food because we kinda need it to survive!” You shouted, abandoning all pretense of looking around “shit hit the fan two weeks ago and the entire time you only cared about finding a stupid locket that probably got crushed when the power-plant exploded. We aren’t even supposed to BE here!”

“I need it alright?”

“But why? Why does this matter so much?”

“It just does”

“No it doesn’t! You keep getting weaker and don’t pretend I didn’t see the radiation burns last night” you said pointing at his right leg “you can barely walk, when are you going to admit we need to get out of here?”

“If you want to leave then leave, I can’t waste any more time, I have to find that locket”

“But why?”

“Because I fucking said so that’s why” he shouted as he stormed towards a wrecked car.

“You know what? FINE may-“ you started coughing, stopping the age old argument at this point.

“Oh now you’re coughing? Are you trying to be dramatic?”

“Well if we had left maybe I wouldn’t be coughing up blood right now” you raspily shout back as you wipe your face on your stained sleeve. That's probably the 3rd time today you needed to wipe up blood and frankly you’re getting worried now.

“It hurts to breath”

“Then stop”

“Wow Ames way to be a complete douchebag, you didn’t even ask if I’m alright”

“You aren’t so why does it matter if I ask?”

“I don’t know maybe you could at least pretend that you care about me for one goddamn second and I wouldn’t want to kill you long enough to help you find this godforsaken locket”

You both lapsed into tense silence, broken only by your ragged breathing and the sounds of moving rubble.

“We should be close to it now,” he muttered as he kicked aside a red leather mens shoe.

“And how could you possibly know that?”

“Well for one thing that shoe belonged to my gaudy neighbor,” he said lifting a larger rock out of the way “and for another I can still read and that sign says “valo” on it so at least we are in the right pile of rebar this time”

“The Avalon? Really? There’s 10 floors and you lived on the bottom one”

“So?”

“So that means we have to move an entire fucking apartment complex before we can even really search for this thing!”

“Listen I don’t care if you stay or if you go but I have to find that locket and I have to find it fast”

“But why? What could possibly be so important you don’t care about dying in the process?”

“I will die if we don’t find it alright?!” He yells, staring you in the face for the first time in days

“Yeah and this is all some crazy dream” you snark , “I’m going to wake up tomorrow and go to work like normal and probably break up with you over how annoyed I am with your shitty dream self and then drown myself in wine to celebrate”

“I'm not lying, you annoying whelp! I have about 4 hours to move all this trash and shove that locket back where it belongs”

“And where does it belong?”

“In my fucking chest! Pumping blood! Stopping me from dying!”