Immune-ish

Chapter Nineteen

EVA:

I am looking through all of the amazing portraits of people when Xander snatches them out of my hands.

"Why were you looking at those?" he demands, having dropped that hideous shirt back on the floor.

"I just found them," I say in defense. "They're really good, Xander."

"No, they're not," he insists. "Leave them alone!"

"Please let me see?" I beg.

"No. Just leave my stuff alone."

"But they're so good!"

"No. They're not. Leave them alone."

"Fine." At that, I walk out of his room and into his parents', closing the door behind me. I mess around with more makeup all morning and snoop in the family's personal belongings all afternoon.

*****

"Goodnight, Eva," Xander calls from the hall around nine o'clock. I just pray he won't come in because I am looking through some old photo albums I found.

"Goodnight, Xander," I say just loud enough for him to hear.

His footsteps echo down the empty hall as he finds his way back to his room. Chloe's moans have been all I could hear all day; she hasn't made it any farther up the stairs. Where has Xander been? Did the cure have anything to do with his disappearance? Or did he even leave?

I continue looking through the album, studying the pictures in the dark. I come across a family picture taken near what I think is Xander's tower. Xander is small, maybe seven or eight years old. His sisters are even smaller. One girl looks about a year younger than him, with short brown hair and dark brown eyes. My eyes wander to a baby version of Chloe because her blond hair sticks out in the crowd of mostly brunettes. Even though it is gray now, it's quite simple to tell that it was once blond. The final daughter is about four years old with gorgeous auburn hair and foxlike brown eyes. His mom has dirty blond hair and brown eyes and his dad looks just like him with brown hair and piercing blue eyes.

The family looks so happy, a sight I haven't seen in a while.

I finish looking through the album, which ends abruptly with a picture of a six-year-old Chloe on a small hill with a flower in hand and a fence with zombies pushing against it in the background, and wonder what I'm supposed to do next. I can't sleep so I have nothing more to do to waste time.

I enjoyed looking through Xander's life and I want to see more. I want to know him better, and the only way to do that is through other sources because there's no way he'd ever be open enough around me. There's only one other thing I can think of that would let me see another side of him . . .

I pause and silence myself, which isn't very hard because I've found that I don't really have to breathe, listening for any disturbances in Xander's room next door. When I think I've heard a few even breaths that sound like those of sleep, I creep to the door. I twist the handle and open it with a surprising, cat-like silence. I then creep along the hallway with a lightness that I've never noticed before. I find his door open just a crack and I swing it gently so the gap is just large enough for me to fit through.

Somehow, I have managed to stay quiet and agile this entire time, and Xander has not stirred. I am about to open the desk drawer, when a thought pops into my head. I've never seen Xander so unguarded as a person can be in their sleep. I've seen him sleep, but he was obviously in pain then, and his guard was definitely up. A peek at him like this wouldn't hurt.

So I creep around the right side of his bed, where he is facing, and I crouch down to get a good look at his face. His mouth is partially open, his brown hair has flopped onto his forehead, and his eyes have softened around the edges, making him look younger. I guess everyone looks younger in their sleep, though.

I want so badly to wake him up, to stay up until all hours of the night, and just talk with him about whatever. I only want to know more about him.

But no.

That is forbidden.

So I tiptoe back to the desk and slide the drawer open as quietly as possible. The drawings are all on top, where I first saw them, but now they seem to have been thrown in more carelessly in Xander's rage. I slip them out and sort through them. The drawings depict women and men, all of different races and ages. But one thing remains consistent throughout them all: the sadness and loneliness in their eyes. I have never seen anyone capture such emotion so beautifully in something as simple as a pencil drawing.

Xander rolls over, and on instinct, I hold a breath that I don't even have. A sliver of silver moonlight comes into the room past the curtain over the window, and I know that if he were only to sit up, he would find me looking at things he told me not to look at. 

I am slowly turning back to the pictures, when he says, "Eva." It's not a question, he knows I'm here. But I still don't want to say anything. I hope he's just sleep talking.

I hear him shift around more. "If you really must know," he begins, "they're drawings of corpses I saw in the forest. Except, not as corpses." He takes a ragged breath. "They're what I imagine human versions of these people would look like." He doesn't rise up to see me. "Don't rip any of them. I'm kind of proud of them."

Did he just show emotion? His words make the pictures even more hauntingly amazing. The portraits are just so realistic.

I look through each of them, carefully studying every single detail and committing them to memory. I could swear that one of them I have even seen before.

When I am finally finished after nearly twenty minutes, I whisper, "Goodnight, Xander." I don't want to awake him again if he's fallen asleep. But how could I even think he'd fall asleep with a threat like me standing only feet from him?

"Goodnight, Eva."

I go back to his parents' room and lie down on the bed, staring at the ceiling and reviewing all of his portraits. Eventually, I fall into a sleep-like state, but never truly asleep. Xander has begun to warm up to me, but knowing him (even for just two days), it won't last long.