Don't Get Eaten

Chapter Thirty Nine

I was lagging behind.

I was trying my best to stay with the group, but it was getting harder and painful to do. We have been walking around twenty minutes and already I was wanting to give up. Shit, maybe I should take Zared's offer and piggyback ride after all.

Speaking of him, not once did he leave my side, even though I knew he wanted to hurry along with the others. But I couldn't do it anymore. I needed to stop and get off my foot. We were just passing by a small old beat-up gas station, and I took the chance to call out.

"Hey, you guys. I need to stop, sorry, but I can't." I truthfully said as I stop in the middle of the road leaning heavily on my right leg to get the pressure off my left.

Everyone turns to look at me. "You guys can go on ahead, we'll catch up." Zared takes my arm and wraps it around his shoulders to help me get to the curb and sit down.

"We'll wait with you. We're too close to the danger zone to split up now. Besides, you could get lost in there not knowing where we'll be at." Lacy comes up and stares down at my foot that was now being revealed as Zared takes off my shoe once again.

"It's a bit swollen but doesn't look as bad as I thought it would." He mumbles as he gently applies pressure to both sides of my ankle. "I wish we had ice."

He carefully puts it back down and looks at me. "Let's head over there and get it elevated at least. That will help the blood flow back the other way, so it doesn't swell more."

This time both him and Leo help me up and get me over to the gas station where there was an old freezer box sitting outside by the door. I plop right on top and lay back against the long cooler, breathing irritably. Zared sits right where my legs were bent up and pats his shoulder.

"Lean your foot on my shoulder so you can elevate it."

I do as he asks and just sit there feeling like a hopeless invalid. The others gather around putting their stuff on the ground next to me. Lani walks up to the window that was caked with dust and peers inside.

"Anything suspicious?" Lacy asks as she takes out water bottles and packets of food for each of us.

"No, it's too small of a space. Looks like only a few people could fit at a time. Want me to head in to see what we could grab?" She takes her face away from the window to look at her.

"Just water. We can grab whatever on the way back if needed." She uncaps a water bottle and takes a drink.

Leo and Lani both head inside, still cautious in case there was something in there. At this point I was so done feeling on guard, on edge every time we came in contact with a building that I didn't even care if we get attacked right now. Or maybe it was the pain talking, I don't know.

After minutes go by, I felt the pain start to ebb away the longer my leg was up. Zared just sat there letting me use him as a stepping stool, but he doesn't seem to mind while he looks around the area eating whatever the hell was in that packet.

"I'm guessing it's past one or two o'clock." Leo states after taking a drink of his water.

Lani puts the water bottles they were able to grab and shoves them in all the packs as much as she could.

"Depending on how well everything goes, we should be out of downtown before dark. There's a small hotel not to far off that we can camp out for the night." Lacy points in another direction as she says this, standing close to him as they both look out.

"And if things do go south for us, then what?" He asks her and I was wondering the same thing.

She turns to look at me with a frown. "With Jinsen in the condition he's in he might not be able to run as fast as the rest of us. We'll have to think up a strategy in case things don't work out in our favor."

"There's an old, abandoned apartment building in the center of town near the Security Bank building, if things go off course we can just head there and stay out of sight for the night." Zared mentions as he takes a hold of my foot, turns slightly, and while still elevating it, begins to rotate my ankle gently.

It throbbed but at least the pain wasn't as bad as if was before. And even though Lacy said I may not be able to run fast if bad comes to worse, she doesn't know me very well. I don't care if my ankle was broken there was no way I'll be slowing down even if it ends up damaging my foot for life. But that's beside the point.

"Okay, well, let's recharge for a bit and we'll start heading on our way. The faster we get to them, the faster we could head back." She takes a swig of her water while everyone else finds a spot to sit for the time being.

I sit up as Zared starts tenderly rubbing my entire foot now. He looks to me with a frown. "How does it feel now?" He whispers.

Honestly, it felt ten times better because he was the one taking care of me. Who knew that it actually mattered when it was someone you care about above all others? His worried look wouldn't go away.

"I'm feeling a lot better thanks to you." I tell him.

He gives me a tiny smile, still gently rubbing my ankle. Then it disappears, the frown coming back in full force. "Maybe you should sit this one-"

"No." I quickly cut him off, realizing what he was going to suggest.

He gives me an exasperated sigh. "Jinsen." He firmly states my name.

But I wasn't going to budge on this. "No, Zared. I'm going." I state back just as firmly.

His shoulders sag in defeat. "I don't want to lose you." he says, making my heart flutter and clench at the same time hearing it.

I lean closer to him, grabbing his jaw in my hand, turning it to look at me, a jaw that needed a good shave by the way. "You're not going to lose me."

"You can't say that for sure Jinsen. It's a huge possibility." He argues.

I release a calming sigh. "It's a huge possibility regardless if I'm hurt or not." I point out.

"I know, but your chances just slimmed down after getting hurt. I'm just worried." He confesses.

Grabbing his cheeks with both hands I couldn't help leaning in and kissing his lips. The tiny 'oh' brought us apart and looking over in the direction it came in. My face flushes when Christina stood there staring at us with surprised eyes.

Ah, right she didn't know. At this point I was tired of trying to keep it a secret and I think Zared was too. We both give her a small smile.

"When did...how did...?" She was at a loss for words, pointing first at me then at Zared.

"It's...hard to explain." I rush out just as he says, "I confessed, he accepted. End of story."

I quickly hold in my laugh at the seriousness of his face as he stares at her. She just blinks.

"Oh...okay." Then she turns around again.

We look to each other and both shrug at the same time. "Try not to use too much pressure on this foot, alright."

Easier said than done. How could I possibly not put pressure when I had to walk or maybe even run at some point? I'll worry once we get back to the hotel and we're safe. But for now, I was more worried about us staying alive and getting those people somewhere safer.