The book comes out on 02/17/2026, but I thought it’d be fun to release the first chapter a week early. Before we get to the chapter, here’s a few details about the book. And just to be clear, no AI was used in the making of this book, or its art. All of this was done by humans (myself and my cover artist, Carter Johnson).

Title: The Future is Bright

Genre: Cozy Post-Apocalyptic Romance (I’m not sure it’s an actual genre, but it should be.)

Synopsis:

The funny thing about death is that life keeps going…whether you want it to or not.

Selena has had her fill of loss. She keeps everyone at arm’s length, determined to survive without getting attached. Quill, the Facility’s manager, has somehow managed to retain his cheery optimism, but he’s had enough heartbreak for one lifetime.

A single impulsive lie brings them together, and leads to a fake relationship that seems like the perfect solution to unwanted attention. No expectations. No real feelings. Just a convenient fiction.

Until it isn’t.

Selena and Quill must navigate grief, healing, and the terrifying possibility of hope. This is a cozy post-apocalyptic slow-burn romance about love after loss, finding community, and choosing to embrace life after the worst has happened.

And now…without further ado…

Chapter One

March 19, 2020

The thing she’d always remember was just how quiet it was when the world ended.

It was disbelief.

It was horror.

It was chilling.

She’d never experienced a quiet like it before, and she never would again.

Dr. Stevens, the Facility manager, had summoned both the entire Security and Medical staff to his office that morning. Walking in was when Selena first noticed the quiet. They all knew something was wrong. They all suspected what it was.

The quiet grew as the rest of the residents were informed. It grew and grew until it couldn’t grow anymore, and it burst like a bubble.

“It’s a mistake.”

“Are you sure?”

“This isn’t happening!”

“This isn’t real.”

Shock and disbelief were echoed by every single person. No one wanted to believe the worst had truly happened.

The rest of the day was a blur. Later, when she looked back, all she had were little flashes of images. Memories of half-heard sentences. She wasn’t a grief counselor, but that day she was.

At the end of the day, when half the residents had been sedated and the other half were still in denial, she left the clinic ready to collapse into bed. Her feet, however, had other ideas.

There was a long, rocky path that connected the Facility to the main door higher up on the mountain. Selena wearily dragged her body up that path. Even though she knew what awaited her at the end, she still needed to see it.

Only one month earlier, she’d walked through the massive steel door into the cavernous chamber the path eventually opened into. How different that day had been. No one, including Selena, had believed they’d actually get stuck here. All around her people had talked and joked, and there had been a lightness in the atmosphere that was now long gone.

The door was shut.

Dr. Stevens had said it was sealed. She’d had no reason to doubt him, but until the moment she saw it for herself, there had been the tiniest speck of hope that maybe it was all a mistake. Maybe it was just a bad dream.

It wasn’t.

She went straight to it and cautiously touched the smooth silver surface. It was cold against her fingertips. She slid down to the floor and rested the side of her head against the hard, dull metal.

There was no home for any of them to go back to. Even though she felt like she had less to lose than the other residents, what she had lost was hard to wrap her head around. Everything and everyone she knew and loved was gone. The sheer scope, the immense magnitude, of what had been lost was impossible to fully comprehend.

She closed her eyes and pictured a bright summer day, conjuring up the warmth of a sunbeam and the smell of freshly mown grass. Day shifted to night in her mind, and her thoughts were filled with a pitch-black sky polka-dotted with countless points of white light.

Her mind summoned up the image of a grave without a headstone. Her dad had never liked his first name. She’d been insistent the name be written the way he preferred, but the marker hadn’t been placed before she left for the Facility. What if the military had gotten it wrong? Just ignored her request and did it the way it appeared on every piece of identification the man had? She’d never be able to get it fixed.

What did it matter? No one was ever going to see it. The absurdity of it made her begin to giggle.

Her giggles grew and grew until they morphed into wild, hysterical laughter. It bounced off the rocky walls surrounding her, making it sound like multiple Selenas were there, laughing like a pack of hyenas. She couldn’t stop. She tried and failed multiple times. It became more and more unhinged. Without warning, it transformed into great, choking sobs. They wracked her body, and she wrapped her arms around herself tightly in a futile effort to get them to stop.

Hot tears streamed down her face, and she gagged on phlegm. Her stomach tossed and rolled, and the inside of her mouth felt strange. With a jolt, she realized what was about to happen and just barely managed to get to her knees before she vomited bile onto the floor, forming a yellow-green puddle. She’d barely eaten over the past two months, so there wasn’t much of anything else inside to lose. Even when she ran out of bile, she continued to heave for several seconds. Once it ended, she crumpled against the door, hugging herself again. Her abdominal muscles ached, her throat burned, and the tears continued to fall. With great effort, she lifted one hand and used the neckline of her scrub top to wipe her mouth.

“Dr. Fletcher?”

She shrieked and slapped a hand over her mouth as she looked around frantically. Her eyes lit on the intruder and she calmed, but only slightly. Dr. Stevens stood a few feet away, worry obvious on his kind face. She tried to get to her feet, but her body was too wiped to cooperate. Hoarsely, she said, “I’m sorry.”

He crouched down, studying her, and his concern seemed to grow as he asked, “Do you need me to get you some help?”

She shook her head. “No…no, I’m…I’m fine.”

He glanced at her mess and back to her. “Really?”

“I’m as fine as I can be,” she replied, her voice weaker than she wanted.

“You know it’s okay if you’re not, Dr. Fletcher—”

“Please don’t,” she interrupted.

He tilted his head, looking uncertain. “Don’t what?”

Her bottom lip trembled, and she hoped she wasn’t about to have another round of heavy crying. “I can’t…can’t be Dr. Fletcher right now. I’ve been her all…all day, and I can’t…Just call me Selena.”

“Okay, Selena.”

She wet her lips. “Thanks, Dr. Stevens.”

“It’s Quill,” he told her as he stood. He started to walk away and ordered, “Stay there, I’ll be back.”

She watched him disappear into a little alcove she hadn’t noticed before. There was the sound of running water and then he reappeared with a damp towel. At first, her brain was too sluggish to realize why he had it. It was only when he knelt next to her vomitus that she understood. Horrified, she tried to move and said, “Here, I’ll…”

He started wiping up the mess and told her, “It’s okay. I’ve got it.”

Her body still had no interest in cooperating, and she tried not to panic as she said, “Please, I’ll take care of it. You don’t need to.”

He glanced at her and gently said, “Selena, I’ve got it. I don’t mind doing this. It’s okay to let someone help you.”

A couple seconds later, he stood, the befouled towel in his hand, the mess on the floor gone. He returned to where he’d gotten the towel from, and she heard the water turn on again. Soon he reappeared, sans towel, and took a seat a few feet from her. “How are you feeling?”

“Tired,” she said.

He nodded. “I’m not surprised. You did really good today. I know you had your hands full. I’m grateful for you and everyone in the clinic keeping calm.”

She was taken aback by the words of praise. People didn’t tend to talk to her that way. They seemed to assume she’d be helpful. They expected it. Quietly, she replied, “Thanks. You…you did good too. Things could’ve gone so much worse, but you handled it so well”

“Thank you,” he replied. A moment later, he added, “Theo said things are going to be rough for the next few days.”

Theo was the other doctor in the clinic and had spent the last decade and a half working in emergency medicine. She grimaced. “He’s not wrong, although it’s going to be longer than a few days. Easily weeks or months. Possibly longer. Grief is…it’s unpredictable.”

“There’s five stages, right?”

“Yeah, but don’t expect anyone here to experience those stages in any sort of order that makes sense. It’s not a one-and-done thing either. Just because you’ve gone through one of the stages doesn’t mean you won’t go through it multiple times. It’s not a neat little packaged thing. It’s messy and awful.”

“Sounds like you’re speaking from experience.”

“You could say that.” Sighing heavily, she added, “I honestly don’t know how bad it’s going to get. There’s no way to prepare for this level of catastrophic loss or know exactly what to expect. People are going to act irrationally, and we’re all going to need a lot of grace. It’ll get worse before it gets better.”

“I’ll remember that,” he told her earnestly.

They sat in the quiet for several seconds. Something suddenly occurred to her and she asked, “Wait…why are you up here?”

“That’s what I should be asking you,” he said, giving her a very pointed look.

“Honestly, I…I don’t know. I didn’t…I didn’t plan to come up here. I left the clinic and somehow I ended up here, instead of in bed.”

“I see.”

Her eyes dropped to the floor. “How much trouble am I in?”

“Trouble?”

She swallowed, trying to dislodge the lump that wanted to form in her throat, and said, “Because I’m out after quiet hours.”

“Oh, that.”

She looked up, and he shook his head. “I think I can let this one slide. It’s been a weird day.”

Exhaling a sigh of relief, she nodded. “It really has.”

He glanced around the room and asked, “Want to head back with me, or are you plannin’ to stick around here for a bit?”

She was so exhausted, she yawned and shook her head. “I think I’m going to head to bed, but I think I might need some help getting up.”

Quill stood and held out his hands to her. She took them, and a few seconds later she was standing, facing him. For some reason, she couldn’t let go of his hands, and he didn’t try to make her. The woman who hated being touched looked down where their hands were joined and suddenly wanted something that made absolutely no sense.

“Selena?”

She looked up and met his gaze. It was startling to be so close to him. In the month they’d known each other, she’d never really noticed how vividly green his eyes were. They were beautiful. Beautiful and kind. That kindness was what loosened her tongue to say, “I need something, and I need you to know it’s…it’s not something I’d normally ask for.”

“What is it?”

She chewed at her bottom lip for a few seconds trying to summon the courage to ask, and finally got out, “Can I have a hug?”

He didn’t hesitate at all. Her hands were released, but only so he could open his arms and let her walk into them. She wrapped her own around his torso, and a second later he enveloped her in a comforting embrace. No doubt, she smelled horrendous, but he gave no indication that he noticed. His hold was gentle. Not too tight, not too loose. Just right. It was the best hug she’d had in a very long time.

How long they stood like that was anyone’s guess. She lost track of time and just focused on how secure and solid he felt. How safe. He didn’t let go until she did.

They headed back down to the main part of the Facility. Her legs were still not wanting to cooperate and she was grateful that he said, “Just hold onto me, I’ll get you back.” She clung to his arm, finding stability and strength. He didn’t leave her side until he’d made sure she was safely back in her assigned apartment.

Preorder Now: The Future is Bright