A Story To Tell: Season 1| A Zombie Apocalypse Story (Completed)

Day 70.0

Amber

We all peer out the window as Grant and his girlfriend, Tonya, make their departure. Mason flips his middle finger up towards their direction and then kicks the side table. "Mason,  I'm sorry about this... your dad shouldn't have left you and your mother. I know how difficult it can be," I say with a soothing voice.  

"No, you don't," he mumbles. All of us go out to the dock to view the waterfront. Cate and I take everyone's dirty clothes and go out into the water with stools. We take a couple of washboards that we found on the voyage here from near Richmond with a couple of stops we had.

Axel walks up to the young teen and places his hand on Mason's shoulder. I listen in on the conversation. "Mason-" Axel begins to say, stopping and sighing. He wipes the corners of his mouth with his fingers. "My dad, for quite a while, would leave me home alone. He never interacted with me, and he always brought women I didn't know home after the deaths of my mom and my step-mom. This happened before in my old life, before this. It's difficult, but you're stronger than your father. You can become the man that he never was for yourself. You just gotta stick around to do it."

"Thanks for trying, but it doesn't stop the fact that I'm still pissed off." He kicks the corner of the dock. I start to scrub the clothes on the washboard. This new chore of mine is a real bother.

"We're gonna go huntin' for some food. Some squirrel. Maybe turk'y. I dunno. We'll get whateva we get. Come on, kid. Axel and I will take ya and teach ya to shoot," Hank suggests, taking one of the hunting rifles he has strapped onto him. I glance towards them, wishing I could go with them instead of washing clothes. I suppose that we also have the job of protecting Jackie and Meredith.

Axel glances in my direction and smiles slightly with the corner of his mouth. "We won't be too far, but we'll be gone for a few hours. You should be able to hear our gunshots. Fire two shots into the air if there's trouble. Amber, keep Jackie and Mere safe for me. I know you can," Axel says, certainty in his voice. I see Cate eye him with an evil glare. She returns to washing the clothes.

I continue to scrub the clothes, breathing in the saltwater scent. I shiver at the water. Just because summer came early when it comes to the temperature, it doesn't mean that the water is warm yet. I watch the group descend away. After they're gone, I look towards the house.

"So, tell me, Cate. What were you doing before this?" I ask her, darting my eyes towards her.

"Um, well. I was on a family road trip. I'm homeschooled. Well, I was. Sadly, my parents and little sister died," she responds with her voice without a hint of sympathy. Her face stays blank. I look back down at the bucket. I hear a very faint gunshot. They must've gone farther than I expected.

"How long ago was that?" I pry further. I walk over to the side of the dock and hang some clothes over the water. I think of when I would go to my grandma's home and go into her river. I thought about her dock and how we would hang our bathing suits along the deck railings after swimming all day. I smile at that memory.

"Well, it happened, what? Two months ago? The outbreak got bad in Michigan, first. They tried covering it up on the news. That it was just a flu epidemic. So, I fled-we fled." I notice her stutter in those last few words.

My trust for this girl is dwindling smaller and smaller. "Hey. I'm going inside for a second to check in on Meredith and Jackie. I'll come back out in a few," I tell her. I drop the clothes back into the bucket and run inside. I go to Jackie's room.

When I enter, I see Meredith alongside Jackie on her left side, both napping. I stand in the doorway, deciding whether to wake Jackie up to ask how she's feeling. I look towards the ground.