Zero

Chapter 38

Chapter 38

By the time the sun sets, everyone is nervous, brimming with anxious energy, but ready. I'm ready. I look at each person, family or not, memorizing their faces because I know damn well this may be the last time I see them.

Squirrel is purposely avoiding my eyes, either still pissed or too proud to make amends. She keeps running her fingers through her red hair, pulling out imaginary tangles or examining split ends. Anything to focus on that isn't what we're all about to do. There's a part of me, tiny though it may be, that wants to try to make this right before we part ways, but I don't. She'll do better if she's pissed at me.

Atlas and I haven't spoken a word since I slapped him. We've been taking turns, like children, staring at one another across the room, looking away before either makes eye contact, too stubborn or scared to bridge the gap. He looks worried. More worried than anyone else, which is strange and I want to ask him about it, but don't. I don't know if I can't speak first because I'm still upset with him or because I'm scared he hates me.

He'll be OK though, Hunter somehow managed to talk him into letting me be the one to go. I can't imagine what was said, but they're all surprisingly on board with the idea. Hunter's been a little weird all afternoon, making me wonder what he could have possibly said to Atlas to get him to agree. Now he sits quietly next to me, his leg brushing up against mine, his hand gripping on to my own. He's nervous too. Probably as worried about the whole thing as Atlas, but I assume Hunter's nerves have more to do with me being in harms way than anything else.

Braces is really doped up on painkillers we took from Safe Haven. They've made him a little loopy but at least he can walk without too much trouble. He's the only one that isn't bouncing with nerves. He looks calm, at peace even as he watches everyone in the room, occasionally making jokes. Drugs can do wonderful things for a person.

We all sit in nervous silence as the room grows dimmer. Occasionally someone cracks a joke and others giggle anxiously but then we inevitably lapse back into silence, waiting. Finally the room is cloaked in darkness and all we can see as outlines of one another in the house.

"Remember the first time we were surrounded by a horde?" Atlas says quietly breaking the silence.

I glance at Braces, putting my free hand on top of his. It had still been just the three of us, before we found Squirrel or Birdie or Bambi. Braces and I had been practicing killing them quickly, but only one at a time. Any groups we saw, we avoided. I don't think that Atlas had ever actually killed one at that point.

And then suddenly we were surrounded. Looking back, it wasn't a sudden thing, and if we had been smarter we could have avoided it altogether, but at the time it felt that way.

We were inexperienced and clumsy and it's amazing we all survived it.

But we did.

Knowing the three of us are remembering the same moments Atlas adds, "We got through that, this'll be a piece of cake."

"Yeah," Braces says. "We got this."

"Ready?" Hunter asks. He waits for an answer from us all but only gets a few grunts. That's really the best we're going to get. Slowly we all stand and gather the packed bags at our feet. I don't take one. I don't need anything slowing me down. So I have a knife and a handgun and nothing else.

I want to say goodbye to everyone, but I can't bring myself to do it. We all walk to the window at the back of the house and they begin to pile out, carefully sneaking into the gap between homes. No one makes a sound but everything still seems way too loud.