diff --git a/string_chunk.c b/string_chunk.c
index 5dcfe04..f3c3caf 100644
--- a/string_chunk.c
+++ b/string_chunk.c
@@ -48,9 +48,8 @@ fn String stringChunkToStringWithPadding(Arena* a, StringChunkList list, u32 ext
   String result = {
     .length = list.total_size,
     .capacity = cap,
-    .bytes = arenaAllocArray(a, u8, cap),
+    .bytes = arenaAllocZero(a, cap),
   };
-  MemoryZero(result.bytes, result.capacity);
   // copy the string bytes out of the StringChunkList into the correctly-sized String
   StringChunk* chunk = list.first;
   for (u32 i = 0; i < list.total_size; i++) {