We With Daisies Lie

Killin' is Livin'

            There wasn't much to the camp site, it was mostly just a clearing with a few benches and tables set up by the lake. But we were grateful for the clean water and fire-pits. There were also two abandoned tents- Spencer reckoned whoever was staying here had heard about the 'commotion' and took off looking for their family. There was also the possibility that they were whisked off to heaven before anything bad happened to them, 'Only if They's good Christian of course,' Spencer had told us. By the looks of the tents, I'd put my money on the former. One leaned crooked and bent half trampled, the other flat on the ground with dirty boot prints running across, fully trampled. And there were supplies left behind all over the place. Power bars and hiking gear, fruits and Nalgene bottles. Good Christians don't leave their stuff scattered out like that, people in a panic do. I didn't have to ask before Spencer offered an explanation for his still being with us.

“I don't think the big man upstairs would take me out of the game when there was so much I could still be doing, like helping you Ryan and Emily here. That'd be like benching your star quarterback before the game even started. Plus, I'm Christian, but I ain't exactly good,” he said with a wink and a smirk.

            My first instinct was to fill up the bottles and ration the food for the week. I knew the military wouldn't be able to clear things up for at least a month or two- not after what I had heard on the radio. Spencer's first instinct was to make weapons by breaking the benches and tables and marrying them to the metal skillets in the fire-pits. It made me think of Liz in her apartment, about what she had heard and how she dreaded it to the point of suicide. I told Spencer I agreed, weapons first.

            There was something about the uncertainty of those first few days, I can still feel it- I remember looking up to the sky and feeling like the earth had already died and we were the left over bacteria feeding off the corpse.

           

* * * *

            We slept in half hour shifts, whoever did the most work during the day, either hunting or searching for fire wood, took the first shift to rest. On that particular day it was me. I was about two hours into the deepest sleep I had had in four days when I heard them, the dead. Their throats pushed out a lulling droll, it's impossible to mistake it with anything but the vocal chords of something that shouldn't be making any sound at all. The first came at me through the tent- he clawed at the fabric trying to rip his way inside. I jumped up and ran out to the rest of the group- Emily sat against a tree, eyes closed, makeshift weapon in hand. She'd fallen asleep on watch. The dead thing rose from the tent and stumbled toward me quicker than I thought they could- I snatched the two by four from Emily's hands and drove the metal pick we'd hammered into it through the it’s frontal lobe.

            Emily woke up with a start- her hands prickled in splinters. For a moment she looked at me like I was a madman. Then it dawned on her. What had happened, what was still happening. Spencer woke up and raised Ryan, they rushed to the cache of weapons and armed themselves. Ryan tried his best to pretend he wasn't about to shit himself.

            There were only three left but in those early days, three seemed like a lot. One was still fresh, still strong, those were the biggest priorities- Spencer must have seen him too because before I could do anything, he had already knocked him down and put a boot through his skull. The others must have turned when it all started because their skin had begun to dry up. Spencer hammered his bat down and blew one of the thing's head's open, the way his skull split made me think of a watermelon breaking in half. I did my best to swing as hard as possible for a one hit kill, there's nothing I hated more than having to bash their heads in repeatedly- it didn't go my way. It growled and reached for me, its teeth baring like a shark's. I hit it in the head over and over until it finally popped. Spencer thought it was cute how hard I was working to kill just one. “It's not that easy for me. A month ago the thought of bashing someone's brains in never would have crossed my mind,” I said between breaths.

“Things are different now, killin' is livin', he said, and though I didn't want to admit it, he was right. Killing was a part of life, and the more I wanted to fight that fact, the least likely I was to survive. But I dreaded being in a group with someone who so easily accepted it- and the worst part was, because of his callousness, Spencer was the most useful member of the group. That simple fact raised a number of philosophical questions I didn't have time to think about. When it was all over Spencer charged at Emily, he grabbed her by the throat and squeezed.

            “You could've killed us!” he shouted and pushed her back against a tree. For a moment I was quiet, I knew I couldn't beat him in a fight and reasoning was out of the question. Then I remembered the boy running into the woods and I thought about how he would probably be here right now if I had been brave. I pulled Spencer's arm down- Emily collapsed to the ground, eyes watering, neck bruised, “We can't turn on each other, she fell asleep, it was a mistake, it won't happen again.”

            He towered over me breathing hell fire from his wide nostrils. I knew he was still hot from the fight and the pumping blood in his veins fueled his rage- I gripped my weapon tight, he dropped his.

“Fine. You're on watch then,” he said and went back to his tent, “Emily!” he called. The tiny girl jumped up and ran after him, still rubbing her neck. Ryan walked past me in silence and fixed the fallen tent. “I'll take the next shift,” he said and went to sleep.

            The next day Spencer gathered us all for a meeting. Emily's right eye was black and swollen. It was like living at home again. The way she looked to the ground whenever his eyes wondered toward her reminded me of Bambi. But my sister knew how strong she was, Emily had no idea. She wasn’t weak or fragile. I could see the potential in her when he wasn’t around. She was more than she knew, she just had to be told that.           

“How'd that happen?” I asked Emily, looking to her eye. She looked at me with surprise. No one really addressed Emily directly, you had to go through Spencer first. I knew she wouldn't respond. And I knew what the answer was. But I asked anyways so it wouldn't be ignored, so Spencer knew it wouldn't be ignored. Like I said, I couldn't take him in a fight, and if he decided it was my time to leave the group I wouldn't have much of a choice. So a seemingly normal question was the only way to get us both on the same page without me signing my own death certificate. Emily only watched as the earthworms dug by her feet. Spencer looked at me like I was the guy who tells you the item you're buying costs more than you have.

“Happened in the scuffle,” he said. A lie was more interesting than the truth. It showed he knew it was wrong and that he cared what we thought of him. “This camp ain't safe enough. We either gotta make it safe or go somewhere else,” he scanned mine and Ryan's face for a reaction. The truth is he was right, again, and I told him so. That's all he needed.

            We would gather up food and anything else we needed to head out and be on our way. That night I took first watch, I sat out in the dirt staring at the stars thinking about the future. Living in a world like this would only make a guy like Spencer worse. I knew my time with him was limited. It didn't matter how useful he was when shit went down, if he couldn't control his temper, he was a liability. I wasn't going to let what happened to my sister happen to someone else. I had lied all my life afraid of my father, helpless to help my sister. It wasn’t going to happen again. But Emily wouldn’t take the first step, it was too much of a risk, he kept her too afraid. I knew Spencer wasn't leaving Emily, and he wasn't leaving the group, but neither was I.

The thoughts soaked in my head until Ryan came for his shift. As I lay in my tent waiting to go to sleep, I had one very clear idea in my mind, one that stayed until my brain shut itself off from exhaustion. Sooner or later, I was going to have to kill Spencer. Knowing what I know now, it should have been sooner.