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Voodoo Girl Pt. 01

By: GirlintheMoon



I'm fighting so hard not to make some kind of pun here.

Thanks, Zana, for your help. 

Tinkz was my volunteer editor and did a great job.

*****

How strange it was to hear birds chirp, or to see an active waterfall, or even to witness a black cat running through the woods. It was even odder when I saw deserted cellphones strewn on the sides of roads. It amazed me that I found valuable laptops in almost perfect condition. People would have died to own them once upon a time. All the technology we garnered since the time of Neanderthals, and it was entirely lost in a matter of weeks.

A year ago terror swept throughout the United States. It didn't take long for the contagion to spread across the ocean. No one knew what to call it, or them. Their brains still worked to an extent. Some even said their hearts continued to beat. Yet they craved flesh, human in particular. So people called them zombies. Very apt, no? 

It was unknown what caused it. One day people started eating each other. They couldn't be killed, at least by conventional means. Doctors tried to examine them. The zombies bit their hands off, or tore out their still-pumping hearts.

Scientists attempted to reason with them. They didn't look like the zombies in movies. They didn't look like dead people stupidly and ravenously searching for their next meal. They didn't appear to decay, and they didn't shuffle around like brainless idiots. They could move quite fast, as a matter of fact. They continued to look like our neighbors, our parents, our loved ones. The only difference was their eyes: they were completely void of any emotion. 

Some lost their limbs in fights, sure, and that fit in to the picture we had in our imaginations. Strangely that would calm me when I saw them. It was evidence they were unnatural beings that would never be real live people again. I saw my neighbor once, both of his arms missing, and it helped take the guilt away when I chopped off his head. 

I watched them kill, feed and walk away as though they hadn't ate most of their victims' necks. It filled me with a rage I never knew I could feel. I wanted to tear out their hearts, to slaughter their families. Unfortunately it wouldn't make a difference. They wouldn't care. They didn't bleed as I did-metaphorically and literally. 

And how I bled, watching my family, my friends, the people I'd bonded with since the world went to shit be eaten alive-or worse, become one of them.

So I went off alone, trying to stay alive in an abstract sort of way. I gathered deserted food, carried a backpack filled with weapons and tried to find every book I could. 

Reading books filled my time. It was boring waiting to die.

_______

It was raining. I couldn't remember the last time it rained.

I sat near the window in the little cottage I'd found, watching water accumulate in the bottles I'd placed out there weeks before. I'd been desperately hopeful that day, and finally the hope paid off.

A crack of thunder and lightning bolted through the sky. I nearly fell off my chair in fright. Funny that I could still be afraid of something so insignificant. 

The storm went through the night. I was grateful for the hypnotic thrum on my roof, but I couldn't sleep. I lay awake; staring at faded posters the previous occupants had left behind, and reveled in the moment of peace. It had been so long since I felt tranquil, and though one of my hands rested stiffly on my knife, my body relaxed more than it ever had since the world died.

I'd nearly fallen asleep when I heard the thud.

My body jolted awake. I listened as the rain beat against the windows. There were no more thudding noises, but I knew that meant nothing. I got up and gathered my things, and then I peered out the bedroom window. All I saw was wet darkness, but I knew they were out there. 

The rain most definitely carried my scent. It wouldn't be long before their mindless bodies thumped against the doors and windows, tirelessly working for their next meal. 

I quickly pulled my hair back into a high bun and threw my backpack over my shoulder. 

Glass broke downstairs. I should have known the cottage wasn't a good place to stay. I'd indulged in a fit of fancy, thinking it was so pretty, that it looked like an illustration in one of the books my grandmother used to read me. Stupid.

The floorboards made a great deal of noise beneath my boots. The zombies below began tearing the place apart, looking for food. For me.

Thankfully I knew about the stairs to the roof. I opened the slat and climbed. The rain blinded me and made it difficult to hold on, but I managed. Eventually, I stood on the slick roof. I knew they weren't far behind me. The side of the cottage had a ladder and I prayed it hadn't fallen. 

I located it and nearly cried with relief. The steps were slippery, and I nearly fell a few times, but I made it to the damp earth. I saw them in the windows; their shifting shapes cast shadows across the floor.

"Bastards," I whispered. My fist clenched and my jagged nails tore into my palm. 

I was childishly upset that they'd invaded my one moment of quiet. I hated their blank faces, their painless scars and their tattered clothes. For a brief moment I considered bursting into the house and fighting them. It would be a fun way to die.

But not a worthwhile way. 

That still mattered to me, even through my despondency, my rage. So I relaxed my fist and turned my back on my brief, bittersweet retreat to the past.

______

Occasionally, I would meet other vagabonds, wandering around for food and comfort. I never spoke to them much. In my experience, they were either violent or crazy, or both. People still fucked. Babies were born. Children were eaten. Men fought over women. Women fought with each other. Life went on for a great deal of them.

I wanted no part of it. Of course there were times I craved another's touch, or I had a particularly tantalizing dream. My memory was kinder to my last boyfriend's sex appeal. He was my first, and we only had sex a few times before he disappeared into a riotous crowd at the train station we fled to. At night when I gazed at the stars, or drifted off in some abandoned bed, I recalled each stroke, each caress. In reality, he hadn't been a great lover, at least by my friends' and raunchy novels' standards. 

Joe. Average Joe. He loved baseball and he wore a Yankees t-shirt almost every day. He had reddish hair and faint freckles everywhere. His cock was the biggest thing I'd ever seen. He called my clit a "nub", and my friends and I laughed about it later. He was always horny. 

He loved me, I think. When everything fell apart, he rushed to my apartment and dragged me behind him, searching for help. Maybe he just didn't want to be alone, but there was something in his stare when we had sex, when we lay naked in bed and whispered tales of our childhoods. 

Now, when I ran into other people or snuck into compounds to steal food, I watched the men from afar with a detached sort of appreciation. Even the most corpulent men slimmed down. And there was grimness to them now, a sort of intense focus that warmed my stomach. 

There were times I idly contemplated introducing myself to the men I watched. I imagined rolling around with them, their strong thighs locking against mine as we battled one another to come. I knew why people still fucked: it made them feel alive. 

It was fun to daydream, but I knew I'd never do it. It was a cruel joke to hope to connect myself with anyone on a deeper level. I also didn't want to risk bringing a kid into a world where your own mortality was thrust down your throat every time you walked out the door.

So I existed passively, always expecting death around the corner.

____

I was thirsty. Water was miles away, and the sun was stubborn. I went to one of my favorite compounds, intent on sneaking in and grabbing a scant amount of food (too much would be rude). I ran into a woman who lived there once, maybe a few months before, when I was scavenging the woods for food. She was middle-aged and too kind. She wanted me to come back with her. I thanked her and fled. 

Every now and then I crept into the compound. I think she knew it, because the people guarding had to have heard me and they never came after me. I figured she warned them.

I wanted to wait until dark but my stomach ached horribly and sparks danced before my eyes. I needed to eat. 

I crawled beneath the electric fence into the little tunnel I dug. A few people were guarding the main entrance, chatting amongst themselves. Once I was good to go, I sped toward the barn they kept their food in. No one was watching it, and no one was inside. 

They had potatoes. I could have wept. As I shoved things inside my bag, the back of my neck began to prickle. Someone was watching me.

I spun around, and sure enough a man stood near the door, casually watching my every move. I couldn't see his face; he was a black shadow against the sunlight.

"I wondered when you'd come again," he said. His voice was gravelly and emotionless. I held my knife tighter.

"Nate, you're scaring her." The woman I'd met before moved past him. She took my hand, ignoring my flinch and the knife I held in the other hand. The woman began to tut, looking me up and down. "You're so skinny."

"That's a surprise considering she takes all our food."

"Shush, Nate." She stroked my face. I took five steps back. "Why don't I cook you something before you go, sweetheart?"

I cleared my throat and tried to compose myself. "No. Thank you, but no."

The man came into the barn and was illuminated by the stripes of light coming in from the roof. He appeared to be in his early to mid-thirties. He was at least a decade earlier than me. He looked a bit like Viggo Mortensen, I thought. I wondered if he was still alive, too. My mind trailed off, thinking about all the movies I loved and the actors in them. Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt. Bradley Cooper. Leonardo DiCaprio. Were they dragging their own corpses through Hollywood at this very moment? I shuddered.

"So she steals what's not offered, and rejects what is. Interesting."

The woman whipped her head towards him. "If you can't be any help, then just go," she snapped.

His eyes burned into mine. "There's no way in hell I'm leaving you alone with her. She'd stab you for those potatoes."

I remembered the weapon I held in my hand and blushed. I was a lot of things, but I had yet to descend into a murderer. 

She snorted. "Please." She looked back at me, softening her face. "Please let me make you a meal. I swear that you'll be free to go afterwards. And you can take as much food with you that you want."

"No." I looked back at the man. "I want to go."

"I won't let that happen," he said. "You'll stay until she makes you something or you leave with nothing."

I dropped the potatoes. "Then I'll leave with nothing."

"No!" His mother picked them up and shoved them back at me. "You can take whatever you want. I just... I wanted to help. I think about you all alone out there and I worry. There's no need for you to be alone. We have plenty of room, and you'll just have to do a few chores. Everyone will give you privacy, I swear to you."

"Mom, give it up," the man said. "She's practically feral." He looked back at me. "Normally I'd have kicked your ass out of here by now, but I don't want to upset my mother. You're staying here for dinner or I'll cut your throat."

"Nate!"

"I don't want to hear about you anymore. I don't want my mom worrying about your ungrateful, thieving ass. So you'll come back with us, and you'll let her wash you or whatever the fuck she wants to do with you, and you'll sit down and eat with us and then go on your fucking way. And I never want to see you again afterwards, you understand me?"

I had no choice. I could run, but the gleam in his eyes assured me I wouldn't get far. 

My shoulders slumped. 

____

He followed us back to the large house. His mother introduced herself as Wendy, and she looked downright thrilled I was coming with her. She babbled about the others, but I didn't listen. I searched for ways out, for someone I could overtake.

We burst into the house but Wendy moved too fast for me to study the surroundings. We climbed the stairs and went into the first room with an open door.

"So this is my room," Wendy announced, tugging me in behind her. The room was airy and feminine, and the bed looked incredibly comfortable. I stole longing glances at it.

She brought me into the bathroom and my eyes bulged when I saw the grand tub. I used to love, love, love taking baths. She caught my excitement and grinned. She had a jug of water in her hands and poured it in.

"I'm sorry that I can't make it hot right now. Maybe next time."

My back stiffened. "Next time" made me freeze up and she recognized her mistake immediately. "I didn't mean that. I know you're going." She eyed the water and changed the subject. "Would you like me to help you wash?"

"No. I can handle it."

She smiled and pointed at a basket of bars of soap, still packaged. "Soap's in there. Enjoy yourself."

Before she shut the door entirely, she stuck her head back in. "Could you tell me your name? I'd love to know it."

I bit my cheek. It had been so long since I heard someone say it. The last person was probably Joe, screaming for me as the horde of undead ripped him away.

I wanted to hear it just as much as I wanted her to touch my face again, as much as I wanted to soak in the water. This was all so dangerous. There was no point in forming attachments; they'd be broken eventually, and in a horrific way.

But Wendy was incredibly kind. Something about her made me want to open up and be held in a tight hug. She looked so hopeful standing there, as if me telling her my name would make her day.

"Fiona," I whispered.

Her grin was huge. "Fiona. What a pretty name."

I tried to smile. "Thank you."

"Enjoy your bath, Fiona. I'll see you downstairs."

"Thank you," I said again, because it felt really good to say.

________

She left me a pale blue dress on her bed. It was worn, and missing a button, but it was perfect. She'd also left me a frayed bra, and silky underwear that I'd never dared to wear before. It was amazing to put real clothes on, to feel attractive again. 

I tiptoed to her full-length mirror, terrified to look at myself. It had been a long time since I'd seen my reflection, and I had no way of knowing what a year of hunger and stress had done to me.

A girl stared back at me. She was tanner than I ever thought I could be. And skinny. My grandmother couldn't refer to me as her chubby lovey anymore, if she were here. I angrily pushed that thought away and focused instead on how good I looked in the dress, how wonderfully long my brunette hair had grown. My brown eyes appeared to be a shade lighter when I took in my whole appearance. 

Eventually I tore my eyes away. Wasn't vanity a deadly sin? I didn't want to push it.

I tugged on my boots and allowed myself one last peek. I looked like a hippie, like a hipster girl who loved to mix soft with hard. So not like my preppy days. I liked it. I liked how the material felt against my skin, how the dress swayed against my knees. 

"Fiona? Dinner!"

It was Wendy's voice. She called for me as if she'd called for me for years. As if I were her daughter. How casual, and familiar it all was. I blinked back tears.

Heavy footsteps approached my door and I reached out for my backpack, intent on yanking out my knife, but it wasn't there. Fear gripped my heart. I was never without my knife. Were they planning to attack me? Would they keep me alive for a while and cut off parts of my body to appease the zombies that attempted to break in, as I heard some people did?

My door burst open and there stood Nate. His gaze swept emotionlessly over my body, and eventually met my own. "My mother called for you. Let's go."

I followed him as if he led me to my execution. Wendy stood in the dining room and smiled when she saw me. 

"That dress is perfect for you. You look wonderful."

I looked around the room. The others were curious. Judgmental. Some gave me unwelcoming glares. 

"Thanks."

"Sit down, sweetheart. Right here." She pulled a seat out for me. I sat down gingerly, as if the chair itself would eat me up. "We're having a real treat tonight! Roasted chicken."

I didn't ask where they got it, or how they cooked it. I realized they were a very efficient group of people who admirably made do with what they had.

A hot plate was placed before me, and it took everything I had not to tear into it as violently as the zombies ate their food. Wendy smiled wider as if she knew my thoughts.

She sat down next to me. "Gravy, Fiona?"

I nodded and she poured a little on luscious-looking mashed potatoes. 

Her son sat across from us. He kept his eyes on his own plate, but I could sense anger vibrating off of him.

"Let me introduce you to everyone while we eat. That's Libby," she said, pointing at a short woman with cropped black hair. Libby didn't look particularly friendly. She had a hoop in her nose and a tattoo running up her forearm. "And that's Ariel." 

Ariel had long blonde hair and green eyes. She was quite beautiful. I bet all the men there had tried to fuck her, and I bet she loved it. Her smile didn't meet her eyes. I was sure she was as unhappy about my presence as Nate was.

Wendy gestured towards a tall man with dark skin and big eyes who appeared to be in his forties. "That's Doug. He's a sweetie."

He was a big guy. "Sweetie" didn't seem like the right word to describe him, but he didn't seem bothered. Then he offered me a genuine smile and I saw what she meant. "Nice to meet you."

Wendy pointed at a quiet man in the corner. "And that's Zach."

He nodded at me, not cracking even a fake smile. He wore glasses and an expensive sweater, in spite of the heat. His hair was fluffy and super black, and his eyes from what I could tell were a bright green. I was pretty sure he used to be a preppy guy with a Labrador retriever. He was my type, actually, before all this. I wondered how the hell he ended up here.

"Well, that's everyone. Let's eat." Wendy gave me another scoop of potatoes. 

Libby watched me like a hawk, and her stare held a great deal of displeasure. She took a chug of water and wiped her mouth with the back of her hand. "Are you alone?"

"Yes," I said.

"How have you survived this long?" 

"By staying on my own."

Nate looked unimpressed and poured himself a glass of wine (where the hell did they get wine?). "That's not entirely true. You steal our food."

I opened my mouth to object, but shut it when I realized he was right. My grandmother's voice in my head urged me to apologize, but I refused to say sorry for trying to survive. We lived in an even more dog-eat-dog world than before the contagion, and we both knew I could have done a lot worse than steal a few eggs and some loaves of bread. 

Ariel snorted and ran a hand down her long neck. Then she crossed her arms so her breasts pushed out. Nate was too busy staring at me with displeasure to notice. 

She cleared her throat. "I'm sorry, but may I be blunt?"

Wendy shook her head. "Not now. This isn't the right time to-"

"No, I'd like to know why we're all falling over ourselves to welcome this chick when she steals our hard-earned shit."

"I'd like to know that, too," Zach chimed in. His voice was as quiet as I expected. "We exiled Frank just because-"

"Enough." Wendy shut them up, though Ariel looked down at her plate like a petulant child. "I just wanted to bring her in for a nice meal. Where is your sense of human decency? I hope to God you haven't lost it, because that's all we have left."


Voodoo Girl Pt. 01



"Frank would never-" Ariel started, but she was interrupted when Wendy slammed a fist down on the table. I didn't have to know her that well to know this was an uncharacteristic and, judging from the expressions from those at the table, frightening side of Wendy.

I cleared my throat. "Look, I should go. Thanks for the meal. It was... really nice of you. I appreciate it."

I went to stand but Wendy grabbed my arm. "They're right about one thing. I can't allow you to take our food anymore. It's not right to the group."

"I won't," I said, perhaps too quickly. 

Her smile was disbelieving. "Yes, you will. And then I'll have to let them deal with you. Please do us all a favor and join us."

"What?!" Ariel shrieked. "Are you kidding me right now, Wendy?"

"I really don't think we need another person here," Libby snapped. 

Ariel tugged Nate's sleeve. "What do you think? You don't agree with your mom, right?" 

"I think," he began, "that my mother's right." He eyed me with suspicion. "We let her in, we keep an eye on her. First sign of trouble we kick her ass out."

"Of course she'll be trouble. She's been stealing shit for months!" Ariel pushed her plate away disgustedly. "I can't believe you right now."

"Ariel, if you can't act like an adult you're more than welcome to leave the table." Wendy sounded so much like a stern mother that a small laugh escaped from me.

Then my smile died. I couldn't remember the last time I laughed, or smiled, or found anything amusing. The ball of emotion in my chest grew. I didn't want this. Any of this.

"No." Their faces turned towards me. "I don't want my story to become yours, or your story to become mine."

"Your story is already ours," Wendy whispered. "We share a story. It's a tragedy, and it's terrible, but we fight every day to make it better. Please stay with us. I want to help you."

I stifled a sob and laughed bitterly instead. "Help me? How can you help me? And why the hell would you want to help me?"

Wendy reached over and hugged me. God help me, but I wept. I couldn't stop. Tremors of pain, of unreleased sorrow wracked through my body. 

She helped me stand and brought me upstairs. I hardly knew what was happening, but somewhere in my mind I registered she was setting me down on a very soft mattress. How good it felt. 

I cried harder. "I miss my mom. I miss my grandmother and my father. I miss everyone."

Wendy pushed some hair back from my forehead. "I know you do, sweetheart. I know you do."

_______________

At some point I fell asleep. When I woke, I nearly had a heart attack. I couldn't remember where I was or why. 

Slowly everything came back to me, and I blushed with shame for having let myself be so vulnerable in Wendy's eyes. In all of their eyes. If I didn't want to stay before, I knew I couldn't stay now.

I tore off the blue dress and stepped into my tattered jeans and my wrinkled t-shirt. The house was quiet, but I wasn't an idiot. I didn't doubt someone was watching for me. 

But when I got downstairs, there wasn't a soul to be seen. I rushed outside and finally relaxed when my boots hit the grass. 

"I hope you aren't planning on grabbing some take-out while you sneak away."

I spun around and spotted Nate on the porch, watching from the shadows. 

I tried to stand straighter. "Of course not."

"Right." He came closer to me. He assessed me frankly and deeply, so intently I could have sworn he read my thoughts. "You have an important choice to make: stay or go."

"I made it already."

He shook his head. "You can stay here. Be isolated, fine. Never speak, okay. But my mom's got it in her head you belong with us. She likes you."

I stared at the ground. "That's crazy. I haven't given her a reason to."

"No," he agreed with a smile in his voice, "but that's just my mom. She's a sentimental kind of lady, and she's going to be brokenhearted when she wakes up to see you snuck out in the night. She also loves projects. And the truth of the matter is she thinks we need you just as much as you need us."

My head lifted so I could stare at him.

"We all need to stick together or we're never going to survive."

"I thought you hated me. That you couldn't trust me."

He pursed his lips and gazed up at the sky. "I don't trust you. I also think my mom is nuts for wanting you to stay."

I hugged myself and rubbed my arms. "So why are you stopping me?"

"Guilt," he said simply. "I wouldn't be able to face her if I couldn't at least say I tried." He still kept his gaze on the sky.

"I just..." I, too, looked upwards. The sun was rising, and thousands of stars were melting into the dawn. "I don't know. I can't make up my mind."

"You can always leave later. We're not gonna chain you down."

"I don't think I can do fuzzy and happy like you guys do."

He laughed mirthlessly and I glanced at him, struck by how much more attractive he was when he smiled. "Fuzzy and happy? Clearly you're seeing what you want to. If you don't think we haven't suffered, lost, been nearly killed then you're an idiot."

I felt like an idiot. "I'm sorry. I just mean-"

"We haven't checked out like you. The only thing that separates us from them is we can still feel. We can make a decision to stay alive, and really live, or do what you're doing. And honestly? What you're doing sucks, and it isn't that different from being like them." His eyes flicked down and then back up my body. "Think it over."

He went back to the front door and entered the house.

I already knew what I was going to do. I'd been running too long and I was tired. I wanted to avoid people, to avoid depending on anyone else, but I forgot what it was like to be touched, to talk to someone. To be around people that didn't want to eat me. 

I knew it was stupid, that I'd be sorry, but fuck I was greedy. I wanted more. I wanted to stay.

Yet another deadly sin. It felt too good to pass up. And hadn't I already done my penance?

So I spun on my heel and went back upstairs.

________

Ariel gave me such a nasty look the next morning I nearly smiled. Zach sipped from his mug, seemingly resigned to the fact I stayed.

Libby and Doug came into the kitchen, laughing about something. They stopped short when they saw me. Libby rolled her eyes and muttered something under breath.

Wendy poured me more coffee-coffee!-and sat down.

Ariel stood, her chair dragging loudly against the floor. "I'm going on patrol. Zach, you coming?"

Doug sat across from me. "Don't worry about her. She's resistant to change. We all are. Things have changed enough, no?"

"I don't want to upset everybody." I stared down at my coffee. "It's not fair to come here and screw everything up."

"You already have," Libby said. Wendy shot her a glare. "What?! She has!"

"I want the two of you to take Fiona around on a tour of the farm, okay?"

Doug nodded and downed his coffee. Libby looked like she wanted to stab herself with her butter knife. She ran her fingers through her short, black hair and watched me curiously.

"I'm surprised you made it all this time by yourself. You don't seem like the type."

"Libby," Wendy muttered in warning.

My eyebrows lifted. "The type?"

"You're kind of a Barbie girl." She bit her fingernails and I took a better glimpse at the long and very detailed snake tattoo curling up her arm. 

I was more than a little insulted. "A Barbie girl? Just because I don't have skulls tattooed on my tits doesn't mean I'm not capable of taking care of myself."

Libby smirked and Nate decided to stroll into the kitchen at just that second. He poured himself some coffee and sat down at the table with us. I could have sworn he was fighting a smile.

"She's definitely not Ariel's type," Doug said, continuing on the conversation.

"Ariel couldn't last a day by herself, and didn't. She was lucky as shit to have found Zach to save her. I'm just curious about this one, that's all."

Wendy changed the subject. "Shouldn't you three be heading out?"

Libby rolled her eyes but Doug smiled and put his arm around my back. "Prepare to be amazed."

_______________

They had cows and chickens. They made their own cheese, and on special occasions had steak or chicken. Mostly they ate a vegetarian diet, which I heartily approved of. It was hard eating animals after we knew what it was like to be hunted. It was also a question of logistics; they just didn't have that many animals to eat.

"And we have an electric fence," Doug said, a big, proud grin spreading across his face.

My neck snapped to gape at him. "How? How do you get the electricity?"

"Generators. We have a waterfall nearby and we've taken over an already existing system there using a running turbine. It's some pretty awesome, high-tech stuff. Zach helps us out with it. The water runs across the turbine, which moves the copper coils of the generator. We have power lines that run along over here that carry the electricity. There's more to it than that, but Zach's got it covered. He's invaluable, man, let me tell you."

I was impressed and looked up the power wires, rubbing the back of my neck. 

"We turn them off whenever anyone is out on a mission. We try to keep the communication heavy, you know, because we don't like keeping them off for long."

"Mission?"

Libby snorted. "Yeah. Sometimes we need supplies, so we go looting. We're rural here, so it takes a while. Somebody needs to go head over to the place Doug just told you about and make sure it's running smoothly. All this has to be done in as much daylight as we got. And sometimes we trade with people passing by, whatever."

"Everyone has a role of some kind." Doug smacked my back in camaraderie. "You'll get used to it."

We'd reached the barn and Libby sank onto a pile of hay. "Know how to shoot?"

"A gun?" Her smile made me feel like an idiot. "No. Seemed like an unnecessary risk using them. They're so loud and I've just used my knife. I used to have a big sword but I lost it."

It sounded ridiculous to say "sword", but she nodded to herself and looked out to the center of the compound. Zach and Ariel looked like they were arguing about something. "Uh oh, Romeo and Juliet are fighting." 

I peered over at them, not even aware they were a couple. They seemed like total opposites, and the way Ariel watched Nate I was sure they had something between them. 

Libby smiled at me. "That'll be next for you then. You have to know how to shoot one."

"I'll teach you," Doug volunteered.

I exhaled heavily. "Thank you."

"Are you overwhelmed?" Libby asked me, plucking a piece of hay between her fingers.

"A little."

She smiled slightly. "I was, too. You get used to it."

"Do you think I'm too much of a Barbie to get there?"

Her eyes flicked up to mine and her smile widened. "Time will tell, Princess. Something tells me you could kick a few asses if you had to." Her face sobered and she stood up. "Look, I'm sorry. It's just not in my code to like and trust somebody blindly. It's gonna take me a while. Just stay out of my way and do what you're supposed to and we'll be good."

"Understood." I was surprised she even said that much.

We went back to the house a little later. I felt strangely, and as I saw Libby smile at me (albeit reluctantly), I realized it was because I was already making the steps to belonging—whether I wanted to or not.

____________

That night I separated from the group after dinner and sat on the porch. My bare feet dangled over the damp soil. It awed me that things still grew from it, that mosquitoes buzzed around me even now and that the earth managed to continue spinning. 

I leant back on my elbows and stargazed for a long time. After a while I became aware of a presence next to me.

Doug was to the left of me, whistling softly. He stared into the expanse of grass that eventually faded into the dark forest and rubbed his hands repeatedly over his knees; he was obviously anxious about something. As the minutes stretched on, I absorbed some of his nervousness and felt dread about whatever he was working up to say to me.

He cleared his throat. "I don't want to bother you. I don't know if you want to be alone or not."

"It's okay," I said slowly. "What's on your mind?"

"I just wanted to tell you... I'm glad you're here. And ignore the girls. Libby'll warm up to you soon enough, she's a good girl. And Ariel? Ariel... just keep ignoring her."

I smirked at the last part. Truly I was touched and surprised he was going out of his way to reach out to me. "Thank you."

"You're going to like it here. It's really safe. Good people. Nate is my hero. He saved my ass a few months ago." He glanced at me, a small smile playing on his lips. "He's a few people's hero around here."

I didn't want to touch that, but I did have a question I'd been dying to ask someone. "Who's Frank?"

Doug's face clouded and he leant away from me. "A man who used to live here."

I pulled at a stray stand of fabric of my dress and bit my tongue. I wanted to know more but it was too soon. I figured I'd get it out of someone eventually.

"It doesn't matter," Doug said after a bit of silence. "You'll learn that. It doesn't matter what came yesterday. Not anymore."

I let that statement swim through my mind. It sounded like something Doug recited to himself to get by, and there was a bit of truth in it that depressed me. It didn't matter that I graduated college at the top of my class, or that I used to sing at a local bar, or that I didn't think I could ever love Joe back. 

I tried to change the subject. "I'm impressed by the way you've guys set yourselves up here. I've seen a few other camps and they're nothing like this."

Doug nodded with a wry smile. "That's why we don't have to just protect ourselves from those undead shits out there. Others want what we have, and you better bet your ass they'll do anything to get it."

"Do they come often?"

"Yup." Doug pulled up a weed. "Truth be told, I hate them more than those monsters. These people are still people and they know what they're doing, and they do it anyway."

I shuddered remembering some of the horrific things I'd seen-fathers slitting sons' throats because they wouldn't give them more food, daughters leaving mothers behind to be eaten and dismembered.

"But like I said, you're safe here. As safe as anybody could be."

Every star was out that night. I watched them, recalling a fact someone told me once: When we look at stars, we're really looking into the past. Most of the stars are already dead. They died millions and millions of years ago, probably, and we only saw them now.

Doug put his hand on my shoulder. "It's going to be okay, sweetie."

I collapsed into his shoulder, realizing only then that I was crying.

_________

Wendy set me up on a bed made of a dozen comforters in the middle of the living room. She also gave me a bunch of clothes that fit closely enough. She apologized she didn't have a mattress for me yet. I waved off her worries and fell into my bed, submerging myself into the deepest sleep I'd ever known.

Libby shook me awake. It was dark, and my brain was foggy. I rubbed my eyes. "What's wrong?"

"It's our turn to milk the cows," she whispered.

I fought back a groan and sat up, shuddering in the early morning cold. I shivered on some sweats and followed her outside.

There were two cows there and four calves sleeping beside them. It was an amazing sight to see.

She handed me a pail and knelt down, pointing to the space beside her. I took the hint and knelt down into the soft earth. The hint of manure in the air nearly made me gag. 

"You should wash her udders first," Libby whispered. She dipped a cloth into a pail of cool water she'd brought with her and tenderly wiped the cow. "It relaxes her."

She then wrapped her fingers around one teat. "Just like this. Then squeeze firmly, but not too hard, and get maybe three or four squirts out of it. Gets rid of dirt and bacteria."

"Okay." 

I must've looked a little queasy because she actually smiled and said, "You'll get used to it."

Everyone kept saying I was going to get used to things and it was slowly driving me crazy. That was one of my biggest fears. I didn't want to get used to things, because things were unbelievably shitty.

Libby went on with her directions. "K, so then you wrap your thumb and finger and gently squeeze. You'll feel the milk coming, so that's when you release your fingers a bit. And that's it. Got it?"

I nodded but I didn't really. "I'm probably going to fuck this up. I wasn't made to do this kind of thing."

"None of us were," she snorted. "Just milk the cow."

I sighed and reached out my hand for one of the cow's udders. I massaged it like Libby showed me and then squeezed. That's when the milk squirted me right in the face.

Libby burst out laughing and even I joined in. I couldn't recall the last time I found something funny, so I basked in it. Libby showed me how to do it again and I got the hang of it.

We worked in silence for a while. When Libby was satisfied we had enough milk, she tapped my shoulder and we headed out. The sun was just rising and the sky looked beautiful. Libby stopped walking and stared at something in the distance. 

"Oh, there's my cat! He's sleeping. Come meet him."

I followed, strangely excited to see a cat and a little surprised that Libby of all people would have a pet. 

"Oscar!" she called, bending down to pet him.

Libby froze. I looked down at the bundle of fur and couldn't understand her trepidation. I stepped closer and she hissed, "Don't!"

"What's wrong?" I hated how scared I sounded.

"He's dead," she said flatly. 

I knelt down beside her. Sure enough the cat's tongue hung outside the side of his mouth and one eye was opened, staring at nothing. The quiet between us was eerie. I wanted to apologize, to say some comforting words, but I knew my comfort was unwelcome. Her face was stony and frighteningly devoid of emotion.

She dropped her hands and relaxed into the ground. She let out the most heartbreaking wail I'd ever heard. Tentatively I wrapped my arm around her shoulders. She turned and wept into my neck. We sat there for what seemed like hours, mourning for something much more than a beloved pet.

_____________

Libby didn't come down for dinner. No one said a word about the horrendous sobs we heard coming from upstairs. At some point as we ate canned beans and boxed potatoes, the crying stopped. Doug stood.

"I'm gonna go check on her."

Wendy looked beside herself. When Doug disappeared, she touched my arm and whispered, "Did the cat look like... it had been attacked? I've wanted to ask since you came home but—"

I could feel Nate's stare, and I shifted uncomfortably.

"No. He looked... it looked natural."

She smiled at me with watery eyes. "Thank you, Fiona. I don't know how to comfort her. She's so delicate and I'm overhanded with the sympathy sometimes."

I didn't know what to say. Ariel rolled her eyes and the sight provoked me. I turned back to Wendy. "No, you're not. I just think Doug is the best person to hang with her for right now."

Zach cleared his throat. "Maybe this isn't the best time, but it's important. I saw MacKenzie this afternoon. He didn't say anything, he was just... watching."

Everyone grew still at the news. Nate and Wendy stared at one another, carrying on a silent conversation. 

I was at a loss but I sensed this was more important than I could imagine. "Um, could someone please explain?"

"MacKenzie is just a boy with too much time on his hands," Wendy said, but she wouldn't meet my eyes.

Doug snickered. "He's not a boy, he's an asshole. A dangerous asshole. He has a bunch of mavericks following him around who are crazy idiots. They like chaos."

"They want what we have, and they like to play around with us. It's a sport," Wendy explained. "We have to fight them off every now and then."




Voodoo Girl Pt. 01



My eyebrows lifted. "Fight them?"

"We usually just trade with them, but we've had a few fights. They think it's funny," Zach piped in. I wasn't sure if he'd ever spoken to me directly before, so I sat up. "I guess we always have to be prepared in case they decide to get violent."

"They're dicks," Doug muttered. "I'll tear MacKenzie apart if he even thinks about—"

"Shut up. Please. I don't want to hear this tonight," Wendy cut in. 

"Sorry that a dose of reality is infringing on your dream world, Wendy."

Wendy took a deep, calming breath. "Can't we have a nice meal?"

Nate slammed his fists against the table. "Jesus Christ, Mom, a nice meal? Are you fucking kidding me? A nice meal? We're not your version of a happy family, anymore."

His cheeks were red and his eyes glittered with fury that made me shake. He looked down at his plate, disgusted. A moment later he flipped the plate over onto the floor and it shattered. He got up and walked over to the window, his hands in his hair. "You are so far from reality sometimes, Mom."

Wendy's face was completely white. Tears fell down her face, but she kept her expression blank. She stood unsteadily and stared at Nate's back. "What do you want us to do, Nate? Should we put a bullet through your brain so you won't have to worry about waking up after? It would definitely be the easy way out, and I don't think any of us would blame you."

Nate turned half his body and stared at her. "You know that's not what I want."

"Tell me what you want, because I know what I want. I want to make my last days on this earth as happy as they can be. I want to be with my son. I want to laugh. I want to live as fully as I can, because I know it can't be for long. Maybe I've been selfish shoving this idea of a happy family sticking together down your throat. For that, I'm sorry." She went for the stairs and paused, glancing at all of us. "It's been a long day and I'm going to bed."

______________________________

The next morning I was shaken awake. It took me a few blinks to make out Nate hovering over me.

"We're going hunting. And I'm going to teach you how to shoot a gun."

"Hunting for what?" I asked, my voice thick with sleep.

He didn't answer my question. He swept out of the room, his boots heavy on the floor. 

I looked down at what I was wearing-just a long shirt Wendy had given me, and panties that had been washed too many times. I blushed but was content that the shadows had hidden most of it. And truth be told, I didn't think Nate cared, or even noticed.

I straightened myself out and met up with Nate who was smoking on the deck.

"You smoke?" I was shocked but I didn't know why. He did look rough, but I thought he was smarter than to suck on a cancer stick.

In the context of our lives, however, I figured it didn't matter.

He nodded, not looking at me. "When I feel like it."

Zach slipped by us and headed for the barn to milk the cows.

"We have to be careful today," Nate said.

I looked at the side of his face, trying to figure out his meaning.

"Doug wasn't exaggerating about Mac. Things have been semi-peaceful but we don't trust each other. I trust a zombie near a baby before I trust him."

He led me to an extended piece of land where we could just barely make out the farmhouse. We walked over to a decaying, abandoned wooden fence with a few glass bottles standing on top.

A weird sense of childish glee came over me and I grinned. "Oh my God, I feel like I'm in a movie."

I couldn't remember feeling this excited since everything in our world was wrecked.

Nate was obviously confused, and the expression was kind of adorable on him.

I giggled. "Some guy is teaching me how to shoot a gun on a farm. Are you going to stand behind me and help me aim?" I laughed harder.

Nate squinted his eyes. "Are you okay?"

"Perfect, sorry." But I couldn't stop laughing.

He sighed and rubbed his face. "We don't have all day."

"I know, sorry." I tried to get serious but I couldn't help it. A choking laugh escaped me and Nate groaned.

"I fail to see how learning how to shoot zombies is amusing."

Tears fell from my eyes and I bent over, giggling like a madwoman. How odd that laughter just a few days before was so unfamiliar to me. 

Nate shook his head. "Are you finished? 'Cause it's really not funny, and this is important."

I cleared my throat and stood, wiping the smile off my face. 'Yeah, yeah. Sorry."

Nate handed me his gun and moved behind me (just as I imagined). He taught me how to hold it, touching my elbows or brushing his fingers against my knuckles. My cheeks flushed and I felt like a moron. He smelled nice. Really nice. I used to love passing by the cologne stands in the mall, catching the scent and closing my eyes for a moment. Joe never wore cologne, and it never occurred to me to buy him any.

Nate must've had some cologne stored away, and it tickled me that he still used it. There was also a hint of sweat and skin when I moved closer to him. And he was so warm. Unconsciously I stepped back a little more into his body. 

"So you keep your target just above the line of sight over your gun, okay?" he was saying.

I refocused. "Okay."

He slid something back and forth. "Insert the trigger finger into the trigger guard."

We did this a few times before he took the gun and pulled out a few bullets. His eyes bore into mine. "This is really fucking important. Make sure the safety is on when you load." He showed me the safety again and I nodded. He moved behind me again and took the safety off. "Take it off only when you're in firing position."

"Okay," I said, feeling a bit overwhelmed. 

"Then when you shoot, you should fire in time with your breathing. Keeps the shot steady."

"I don't think I can do this," I blurted.

Nate shifted the safety back on and stepped away from me. He moved in front of me and studied my face. "You have to."

"I can't shoot a gun."

"Of course you can."

"I can't. I'll just use swords and knives and other shit."

His expression softened slightly. "You'll die that way."

I blew out a breath. "Everyone here knows how to shoot a gun?"

"Yup."

"Even Wendy?"

Nate looked at the ground to hide his smile. "She knew how to before all this."

"Wow." I inhaled and exhaled deeply. "Okay. Let's try it again."

Nate moved into position behind me. I listened closely to his directions.

"Now squeeze the trigger steadily, but not too quickly. Too fast will throw off your target. And don't forget to follow through-don't move for a few beats after. Now squeeze."

I didn't think about it; I just squeezed. The sound was loud and terrifying. I think I might've cried out, but I was too caught up in staring at where the bottle I shattered used to be. I eventually looked over my shoulder and caught Nate grinning. 

"Nice shot."

My arms lowered slowly and Nate reached over to flick the safety. "Then afterwards you unload the gun and double-check it's unloaded. You should really keep it loaded, but it's up to you."

I took a shaky breath. "Okay. Here, take it back."

"Nope. It's yours now." He pulled another handgun out of his back pocket. "We have a surplus. It's one of the first things my Dad and I collected."

My mind caught onto Dad and it occurred to me that whoever his father was, whoever Wendy's husband was, he wasn't with us. I didn't ask him about it and he didn't share anything more. Instead I followed him to the gate of the electric fence. I examined at it warily. 

"Are you sure the electricity is off?"

Nate looked at me over his shoulder. "I didn't take you for such a scaredy-cat. I thought you were a tough girl."

He said the phrase mockingly, as if he thought me the exact opposite. 

"Fuck you, I am tough. I just don't want to get electrocuted at this very minute."

I think he wanted to smile, but he suppressed it and pushed open the gate without bursting into electrified flames like I feared.

It must've rained sometime in the night because the soil was wet. My boots sank into fallen leaves and broken twigs. A bird swooped over our heads and I jumped.

Nate scanned the area attentively. One of his hands rested on his gun.

He nodded as if satisfied by what he heard, or didn't hear. His eyes came back to me and waved a hand forward.

"Let's go."

We travelled deeper into the woods. Raindrops occasionally slid off leaves and slipped onto our skin.

I couldn't take the quiet. "So, did you grow up here?"

He peered at me from the corner of his eyes. "Yeah."

"It's really beautiful."

"Uh-huh."

"You're an only child?"

His eyes slid to mine. "Yes."

We walked around for a bit before I had to tell him to stop. I was winded.

I sipped some water and watched him pace. "What exactly are we hunting for?"

He shrugged and crossed his arms behind his head. "A deer would be nice."

I tried to ignore the fact that when he reached up, his shirt rode up and displayed his tanned stomach. It wasn't muscular, just lean. Before the war, I never thought about men's bodies much before. I knew I appreciated a strong jaw, messy hair and scruff (on some guys, if they could pull it off). And I knew abstractly that I hated exaggerated muscles. I appreciated quiet strength, like when a man gripped you and you were shocked at how strong his hands were. 

But I never analyzed the parts, and if I did take notice of stupid things like a guy's stomach, it certainly never sent the sparks of awareness through my body that Nate's did now. 

I stopped that train of thought.

"A deer?"

"I'm also hoping we have enough light to make it to town. We could use some pain meds."

I sat on a tree stump. "There is still stuff left in your town? How is that possible?"

"We had a particularly violent wave of them come through town before everyone could loot. And afterwards we decided to take trips for stuff when we really needed it. To preserve it, you know. We can't carry it all, anyway."

I plucked a wet leaf off my arm. "It sounds really dangerous."

"It's more dangerous not to have medicine."

I stared at him hard. "Maybe we should try to take as much as we can today."

He shook his head and gazed at some point past me. "It's too far to carry all that we need."

I got up and brushed myself off. "Then let's go."

________________

I was used to seeing ghost towns. At first they scared me and gave me nightmares. There was something terrifying about magazines featuring the last celebrity news still waiting to be purchased from their racks, candy bars sprinkled across the floor and blood smeared on the cash register. You expected someone—an elderly woman, perhaps, or an impatient mother—to come around the corner with a carriage, but there was no one ever there. Not even a zombie.

This town was no different. Bullet-filled bodies lined the streets. Crashed cars sat in the holes they tore in the dry cleaner, the deli and the nail salon. Blood and body parts lay messily across the road. Nate stepped over them and I followed.

We stopped at the general store. Nate carefully pushed the door open and flicked on his flashlight. We listened for a moment, but there was no sound. Neither of us were stupid enough to believe the coast was absolutely clear, but we were satisfied enough to slip inside. 

"Grab what you want but remember you have to carry it back," he murmured.

I spotted a box of Benadryl and grabbed it. The past few nights I hadn't had trouble sleeping, but I knew the insomnia would come back. I passed by the display of condoms and couldn't help but let my eyes sweep over all the different kinds. I wondered if I should take a few. It couldn't hurt to have them on hand if anybody wanted to use them.

I looked over my shoulder and spotted Nate watching me. I looked away, totally embarrassed, and blindly reached for some random box nearby. 

We worked like this for a while. I'd nearly cleaned all the shelves and shoved their contents in my backpack. Nate gave me a dubious look. 

"And you're going to be able to carry all that?"

"Yes."

"And hold your own if we come across something?"

"Yes."

He sighed, not looking convinced. 

We walked out into the late morning sun. I felt strange and spun around, closely watching for something. Panic rose in my chest. 

Nate must've felt it too because he reached for his gun. Too late, for a bullet zipped by me and right towards Nate's arm. His blood practically exploded and splattered against my face. A small shriek escaped from my throat. Nate's frenzied eyes met mine. 

"Run!"

He grabbed my elbow and dragged me behind him. I fell to one knee and he cursed. "Get the fuck up!"

I stood on shaky knees and ran after him. I tried to channel the survival skills I'd honed on my own, but my brief period of shelter had softened me. My senses were dulled. Clouds covered the sun and an abrupt downpour fell from the sky, making the trek back even more difficult. I slipped on the leaves and landed on my right knee. 

Nate heard me fall. "Get up! Get up!"

Another bullet flew past me, this time bursting into a branch. I sucked in air and ignored the splintering pain in my knee as I stood to chase after Nate. 

"Faster!" he yelled.

I heard more gunshots. I knew we were still a long way off from the farmhouse and my legs were growing tired. I thought my knee might be broken but I pushed my legs harder.

"Is it MacKenzie?" I screamed

If Nate heard me, he ignored me. He moved much faster than I did and I desperately tried to keep up. I felt blood trickling down my leg and fought the urge to collapse. The gunshots kept coming. It soon became difficult to distinguish thunder from shots.  

Finally the fence was in view. I could have cried with relief. My back was killing me with the added wait of our loot and I knew my knee was about to give out at any moment.

Nate reached the fence first. He turned and screamed, "Fuck!" when he saw how far behind him I was. He came back for me. He roughly pulled my backpack off my back and put it over his good shoulder, and then crouched down. "On my back. Now."

I draped myself over his good shoulder. He grunted and stood. He moved as fast as he could with me on top of him. Doug was at the gate, his eyes and mouth wide with fear. A string of gunshots rang through the air.

"Hurry the fuck up!" Doug screeched. 

We finally made it. Nate fell to the ground and I landed on his back. Doug swung the gate closed and someone turned the electricity back on. The charged hum was a comforting sound.

Nate rolled away from me and stood with effort. He yanked his gun from his pocket and shot rounds off into the vast forest. Whoever had attacked us had stopped shooting, and didn't seem to intend on advancing further. At least, not today.

When Nate's gun was empty, he tossed it to the ground in disgust. He was covered in sweat, and shivered and bled heavily. 

I crawled over to him. "Get inside. You need help."

He looked down at me, not really seeing me. "I'm gonna kill him."

Doug approached him and touched his good shoulder. "Let's get inside, man."

Nate glared at the woods and screamed. "Next time you come over here I will shove my gun up your ass!"

Doug pushed him. "Get back to the goddamn house."

Nate turned his back slowly and stalked off. Doug helped me up and had me lean my weight against him. I hobbled back to the house, looking over my shoulder every few minutes.

"You're safe now," Doug whispered, but even he didn't believe it.

_____________

"It's not broken," Ariel said. She sighed and got up, taking some bandages Wendy held. 

I was shocked when I heard Ariel was a nurse. She had absolutely no bedside manner, but she worked effectively. I bit back a scream when she poured some alcohol over my wound. She pressed the bandage down and looked up at me. 

"You're going to have to keep your weight off it for a while. It's really banged up." She handed me a few pills and a glass of water. I swallowed them down and sank back onto Wendy's bed. "You're going to be groggy for a while."

"Thank you."

She threw some things out in the trash and passed me to go check back in on Nate. The bullet miraculously just grazed him. It hurt like hell but he'd be okay, thank God. Ariel whispered to Wendy he might not be able to move his arm well for a while. 

Wendy came over and hugged me. "Are you okay?"

"Yes."

She sat next to me with an exhausted groan. "They don't think it was MacKenzie."

I lay down on her pillows. "They don't?"

"He's not usually this aggressive, and he doesn't typically try to hurt us. He likes to play, but that's it." She looked out the window. "It seems like there's another group of idiots out there who like to shoot their shiny guns at us for entertainment."

"What do we do?"

She looked down at me. "Nothing."

"Nothing?"

"Nothing for a while. Doug and Nate are planning to go out there in a few days, see if they can draw 'em out."

My eyelids felt heavy. "But we're safe?"

She stroked my forehead. "Yes."

It was a lie. I could feel it deep inside that Wendy had no fucking clue if we were safe or not. But she comforted me nonetheless, and it helped lull me to sleep.

I dreamed about when I was twelve or thirteen and my mother took me to a beautiful field of sunflowers. She wore a blue dress that fanned out near her hips. She looked so happy that day, I remembered. When I looked back on it, it made sense: it was the day before she left us.

We rested in the grass. Mom ran her fingers up one of the stalks of the sunflowers. 

"They're beautiful, right?" I remember her asking me. 

It was so hot and I was sweating in the frilly pink dress she made me wear. "Yes."

We ran around like wild things for the rest of the day, and in my dream I got back the feelings of innocence and elation that I'd long forgotten. 

Then the mood of my dream changed. Mom kept running farther away from me. I opened my mouth to call for her but no sound would come. She disappeared and I screamed for her frantically, but a horrific silence fell over everything. I couldn't hear the birds, or the wind. I didn't even hear my own heart beating.

I tripped and fell down hard on my knees. My surroundings came to life again, so loudly I had to cover my ears. I heard a loud humming and looked behind me. Horror slid down my throat and plopped into my stomach when I saw the huge hive of bees I'd tripped over buzz to life. Thousands upon thousands of glistening bees rose from the hive and came for me. I tried to get up, to run, to beg my mother to come back, but my legs were paralyzed.

I woke screaming in Wendy's arms. "Shush, honey," she whispered. 

Slowly I settled down and realized I was covered in sweat. My heart was thumping so loud I could hardly hear anything else.

My head was in Wendy's lap and my arms were wrapped tightly around her middle. It couldn't have been comfortable. 

"I dreamt about my mom."

Wendy stroked my hair. "What about her?"

"The last memory I have of her."

"I'm so sorry," she said in a soothing voice. It was then that it occurred to me she thought I meant a year ago, and that maybe Mom had become a zombie, or had been torn apart by one. Which she could have been, for all I knew.

"I don't know if she's alive," I whispered. "She left me when I was thirteen."

Wendy continued running her hand through my hair.

"She called me when I graduated high school. I begged to come live with her but she hung up on me." I covered my eyes with my hand. "Then she called my father's house the day I graduated college. Or maybe it wasn't that day. I can't remember exactly. Looking back on it, someone must've told her when I was home."

"And did you talk then?"

"No. This time I hung up on her."

"Did you know where she was living?"




Voodoo Girl Pt. 01



I sighed and sat up beside Wendy, against the headboard. "She moved to Florida. My dad and I moved in with my grandmother."

"That must've been terrible for you." Coming from anyone else, that line would have sounded like trite filler. Looking at Wendy's big blue eyes, I knew she meant it. Impulsively I hugged her.

When I pulled away, I saw that she was crying. "I'm so grateful to have my son here with me."

"I'm sure you are. He's lucky to have you."

"I chose him over my husband," she said in a rush.

I didn't know what to say, so I stayed silent.

"There was... It was before we had the electric fence working. We were constantly on guard. Jim..." She swallowed down a sob. "Jim was working on the fence. Tinkering around. I yelled at him that he didn't know what the hell he was doing, but he was stubborn." She gave me a tremulous smile. "A lot like my son."

I forced a smile and took her hand. I could tell she needed to get this off her chest. "And then what happened?"

She stared at the wall, obviously looking back at that day. "I heard someone shout and I looked away. Whole masses of them were coming in, and they were fast. I couldn't move for a minute. Then Jim shouted my name and I grabbed for my gun. Jim didn't have his on him. I could see..." she shuddered and stopped to pull herself together. "I could see the fear in his eyes. Not having your gun is like a death sentence. So I stayed by him and we tried to get to the house, but there were so many of them that we got separated. Then I saw Nate in the distance. Nate was stumbling to the ground, wrestling one of them. And it was winning, and then I looked. I looked towards Jim and he was rolling the grass with the other one. I picked up my gun and missed. My hands were shaking so bad." 

She wiped at her nose and stood. She went over to the window. I watched her stare out of it, illuminated in the moonlight.

"I saw I only had one bullet left. Nate was pushing back but he just didn't have enough strength left so... I shot the zombie fighting him. Nate looked stunned for a minute, like he didn't know why there were all these brains all over him. He caught on quickly and he got up and ran for me. He grabbed the back of my shirt and then Jim looked up at me. He just looked up at me. And he told me he loved me just as the zombie bit into his throat."

"I'm so sorry," I whispered.

She looked at me. "A good mother chooses her children. I'm sorry you didn't have that."

Then she came back to me and pulled the covers up under my chin. She kissed my forehead and my heart broke.

"Would you sleep with me tonight?" I begged, feeling like I was seven all over again.

Wendy smiled sweetly and picked up the sheets. "I snore."

"I don't care," I laughed.

She rested herself next to me in the big bed and I fell asleep almost instantly.

__________

The next morning I woke up to a pot of coffee brewing. I washed quickly with water Wendy left for me and put on another dress she had—white and airy. When I finally limped downstairs, Ariel gave me a bored look.

"How's the pain?"

"Better."

"I have more pills with me but it's better to conserve. Let me know if you really need them."

"I will. Thanks."

She got up and went upstairs. Nate was sitting at the end of the table, watching me closely.

"What?" I asked. 

His shoulder was bandaged up and he had much more scruff on his face than before. He looked downright terrifying, all scruffy and tan. Something in my stomach dipped.

Wendy brought me out a coffee and tutted when she saw him staring me down. "Leave her alone, Nate."

He gave her a scorching look. "Leave her alone? We almost died because her thousand bags of sunflower seeds—that were so fucking important to bring back—weighed her down!"

Anger ran up my spine. "Excuse me? You're blaming what happened yesterday on me?"

"Obviously not the whole thing. You weren't the one shooting me, were you?"

"No, unfortunately not!" I spat. "And it wasn't all sunflower seeds, what the fuck?"

He ignored that. "I'm talking about afterwards. You could barely run. Did I, or did I not, warn you about carrying all that shit back?"

"I could barely run because I fell, jackass!"

"Why do you think he fell?" He looked up at the ceiling with an expression of mock wonder. "Hmm? Do you think it was, oh, maybe, the fucking hundred-fucking-pound bag on your fucking back?!"

"Enough!" Wendy snapped. "You getting bested by some stranger isn't Fiona's fault! For God's sake."

Nate stopped screaming out loud, but I knew he was calling me every bad name he could in his mind. 

I tried to ignore him. "Did anyone figure out who it was yesterday?"

Wendy shook her head. I downed my coffee and decided I couldn't deal with the burn of Nate's glare anymore. "How's Libby?"

Wendy shrugged and sat down next to me. "Better, I think. The action that happened yesterday was enough to snap her out of it."

"Where is she?"

"The barn, I think."

"Really? Is that safe? Can't they just, like, shoot us as we walk through the yard?"

Wendy smiled weakly. "Zach and Doug are guarding. Walking around the perimeter. Just try to stay as far away from the edges as you can, bring your gun with you and keep a look out."

"Okay," I breathed. "I'm going out there. See ya." I got up and smoothed the bottom of my dress, accidentally meeting eyes with Nate.

"Be careful," Nate bit out. "I wouldn't want to get my other arm shot to shit just because you were an idiot again."

I squinted at him, dreaming of punching him in the jaw. I told myself it wouldn't solve anything, and I hobbled out into the yard. 

The woods were eerily still. I waited for someone to appear, or for shots to be fired again. A hand fell on my shoulder.

"Hey," Doug said. "I went out there this morning. There's no one out there, at least for now."

I nodded and thanked him. When I got to the barn, I found it empty. Libby must've gone back. I sat down on some hay and tried to quiet my mind. It was boiling hot in the barn and I felt sweat dripping down my back. I wiped my forehead and got up, beyond thirsty. That's when the back of my neck prickled.

I looked up and saw Nate leaning against the wall. He'd come in and I hadn't even heard him.

"My mom told me to apologize."

I snickered. "Are we in the third grade?"

"It definitely feels that way sometimes." He rubbed a hand through his hair. It was strange how beautiful I thought it was, considering I loved brown hair on a man. His was a perfect shade of dirty blonde, and combined with his dark blue eyes, there was no doubting he was a handsome guy. "Look, I lost my temper. I don't usually get so angry but—"

"But we were in crazy circumstances. I get it. You were an asshole, but you're forgiven." I stared down at some wayward straw beneath my boots. "And I'm sorry I packed all that crap into my bag. I should have listened to you."

I heard him laugh and my eyes darted up to his. 

"What are you laughing at?"

"Nothing, it's just... I thought that was going to be a lot harder. You're generally a pain in the ass."

"Wait a minute, weren't you just apologizing? And already you're telling me I'm a pain in the ass?"

Nate smirked. "Even you have to admit you're a brat."

"A brat! How am I a brat?"

He shook his head, but he continued smiling and—fuck—he had a beautiful smile. Something began loosening in my chest and I couldn't stop it. My lips turned upwards without my approval.

"I'm heading back. Don't stay out here too long by yourself. It isn't safe."

I nodded, and just like that he was gone and our moment was over.

__________

That night we all sat in the living room and past around a bottle of wine. It turned out that Wendy and her husband had a wine cellar and were big collectors. Thank God for it, because if there were ever a night I needed a drink it was this one.

Zach was watching me, I realized. Not just in an idly interested sort of way, but that sizzling way a man looks at a woman he wants. Ariel noticed, too. Her head continuously swung between us.

Great.

I didn't know what I did to provoke his admiration, if I did anything. These were insane times, and insane times drove people to fuck more. It was a fact, proven time and time again by history. It was something that brought simple joy, temporary closeness and a fleeting appreciation to be alive.

Libby cleared her throat. "I think we should draw them out and fight them. I don't want to live day after day peeking over my shoulder, and they're not going to stop."

Doug nodded beside her. 

"I don't think we should be starting a war when two of our people are incapacitated," Wendy said. 

"For God's sake," Ariel hissed. "I'm so tired of this back and forth shit. Frank was a real leader. He told it like it was, and he made the tough decisions and you couldn't deal with it, Wendy."

"How many times have I told you not to talk about him?!" she screeched. This unhinged Wendy was quite a sight and I watched, fascinated.

"You can't silence me, Wendy, you're not my fucking mother!"

"Thank God for that!"

Libby snorted from somewhere across the room.

"You were afraid of him," Ariel went on. "Admit it! You knew that we all were listening to him and you hated it."

Wendy stood. "This is my house. I don't answer to anyone. And if you don't like it, you can go, too."

Ariel swallowed and Zach took her hand. She ripped it from him.

"I think it's been a long night," Nate calmly said. "I think we should all go to bed."

Wendy stomped upstairs. Ariel watched her with a furious glare, but she was forced to look up at Nate when he moved across the room to stare down at her

"If you ever talk to my mother like that again I'll feed you to the zombies, piece by piece. Do you understand me?"

She swallowed but she didn't look away. "I'm not afraid of you."

Nate's smile was slow and frightening. "You're here out of the goodness of our hearts. Don't you dare try my mother's patience. She's a warm-hearted woman but she'll make no bones about shredding you apart if she thinks it's for the greater good. That's what happened with Frank, and that's what will happen with you. Do you understand me?"

She bolted up and went off to wherever she slept. Zach followed, shaking his head. Whether his annoyance was at her, at Wendy or Nate, or at everything in general I couldn't be sure.

_______

Months passed. Nothing and everything changed. There were no more attacks. We were lulled back into as much security as we could possess in those times.

I smiled more. Libby and I became friends. We all listened as Ariel fucked Zach in the middle of the night after waking up from her constant nightmares. Nate stalked around, broody but handsome. Doug made us all laugh. He used to be a stand-up comedian before all this. Wendy watched us all with a sense of pride and contentment. It soothed her, I think, to see us all get along and clutch the pieces of who and what we used to be before. 

And as the days went on, I learned more about the people who'd become more or less my family. Ariel was a bitch but she could really be hilarious when she wanted to be. She had a filthy mouth and knew more dirty jokes than even Doug did. Libby had two children. She'd sent them off with their father to California just as things got bad. It was supposed to be better on the west coast, or at least that's what they said in the early days.

She wept in the afternoons, underneath the large tree at the back of the property. She told me once she dedicated that time to feeling sorry for herself. She let out all her pain, her confusion, her anger, her grief in that hour. It didn't go away when her time was up, she said, but it helped her get through each day.

And Doug! Doug hated relationships, he said to all of us one night. We were having dinner together, talking about past lovers (Nate and Wendy didn't participate), and he began to cry when he said he wished he'd married one of his ex-girlfriends. He wished someone out there was missing him.

Nate was a different story. He was a mystery. I couldn't get close to him; he didn't let anyone probe the man beneath the rugged exterior. Libby said that's how he survived, but I wasn't so sure. He loved his mother. It was clear when he looked at her, when he joked with her. He was capable of great love. I could feel it.

One day I was passionately telling Libby this and she grinned at me, all fucking knowing.

"What?" I'd asked, self-conscious.

"You're into him."

My eyebrows went up. "What?"

"You want him. It's cool—I think he wants you, too. You should see the way he watches you when you walk around camp."

That had sent a deep flow of warmth from my head to my center. "Really? I mean, are you sure he's watching me? Or that, like, there's even any desire in it? Because I think he considers me to be pretty ridiculous. And silly. Maybe at most he could think I was cute. Maybe."

Libby shook her head. "Babe, you two are so going to fuck soon."

A thrill had gone through my spine and my mouth watered. I'd hoped she was right because I was desperate for touch, Nate's in particular. But it didn't appear she was correct because Nate avoided me as much as he could.

There were other routines developed. Our relationships with one another were important, but surviving was our absolute concern. We went through protocol. We were constantly on guard, watching and waiting for whoever shot at us to return. Sometimes we convinced each other it was a random attack. Most of the time we accepted the distinct possibility they'd be back, and they'd come at us a lot harder.

In the mornings I went out to milk the cows alone. It was peaceful to hear the birds chirp, the farm animals' soft morning noises, the wind occasionally brushing against and through the old barn. It was the one time of the day I was entirely alone and I loved it. 

One morning, when my thoughts were consumed by memories of what my mornings used to be like back in the day, straw crunched behind me. I spun around and went for my gun, but then I spotted Nate holding both his hands up. 

"Sorry."

My heartbeat slowed a bit. "Jesus Christ, Nate."

"I'm sorry," he said again. "I thought you heard me."

"I did hear you. I just didn't know it was you." 

He shrugged and sat on a pile of hay. He watched me squeeze the udders for a while.

"What's up?" I finally asked him.

"Ariel and Zach. All night."

"Ugh."

His eyes met mine. "Exactly."

"Were they a couple when they got here?" I was genuinely curious. They were such a mismatch, and so volatile. It was incredible to me that they hadn't shot each other yet.

"I don't know. I just know they showed up together, and I'm pretty sure they slept together right away."

I finished milking the cow and pet her back. "Sweet thing. Thank you."

Nate snickered. "Did you just thank the cow?"

"Fuck you, Nate."

Something happened when I said those words. Something switched in his body, and my own being became acutely aware of the change. And then both of our bodies locked and our stares tangled, sparking into wildfire. 

He wants me to fuck him, I realized. He wasn't made of stone. He wanted to be good, to stay out of trouble, to not complicate things. It all became clear to me and he didn't even have to say a word.

He took a step towards me. When he extended his hand to reach for me, my breath caught. Instead of grabbing me and pulling me to him, he stroked my hair. 

"This is a very bad idea," he whispered.

"Yes."

"We have a lot of other things to worry about."

"I know," I breathed.

"The last thing we need to do is turn into Ariel and Zach."

I could only nod.

And then he brought his body to mine and kissed me. His lips were a little cold, which somehow made our kiss sizzle even more dramatically. My body disconnected from my mind, and it wanted only one thing: him.

He must have felt the same desperation because he pulled his mouth away and watched me heave in oxygen. God knows what I looked like, all frazzled and pink and raw. 

"I need you," he confessed. "I wish I could say we could go gentle or easy, or go on a date first or something but I'm so hard. I'm so hard. You make me so hard. And I'm so—"

We heard a scream and both of us froze. Nate kicked back into action before I did. I ran after him into the yard. Fear spread through my blood when I spotted the zombie. 

I didn't have a chance to wonder why, or how, or who. It all happened so fast. There was a zombie on our side of the fence and he was standing over a cowering Wendy.

Doug ran toward them, a gun in his hand, but he didn't see another zombie come darting out behind the broken down tractor next to the barn. The zombie was a teenage girl, dressed as if she were off to celebrate at a high school football team. She even had a jersey number drawn on her cheek. She lurched toward him and caught him off balance. They struggled against one another. I was so horrified I couldn't even scream.

Zach and Ariel ran out of the house with their guns. Zach managed to get a bullet into the zombie fighting Doug. Libby sank down next to him and hugged him, running her hands over his body to make sure he was okay.

Nate shot the zombie on top of his mother. He dragged him off of her and shot him again in his chest for good measure. I stepped next to him and looked down in horror.

Wendy's throat was in shreds. Her eyes were wide and her pale hands were wrapped around her throat, trying but failing to stop the blood from pouring out. Nate was absolutely frozen, staring down at his mother with ineffable horror.

Wendy looked at me and whispered something. I couldn't hear her. I wiped at my eyes and knelt my good knee next to her. I tried to stop crying so I could hear her, and put my ear next to her shaking lips. "Sh-shooot meee."

My head snapped up. "I can't!"

"Shoot meee!"

I looked up at Nate. 

He didn't react. His eyes were wide and wild.

I looked back at Wendy. "P-please," she begged.

I was so smothered in tears I could hardly see or breathe. 

"Shhhhoot me. Before-"

I lifted my gun and shot her in one smooth motion. Her blood was all over me. 

Libby cried out and got down on her other side. She took her head into her lap and screamed. I dropped my gun and scrambled to stand. My hands were covered in blood. Nate just stared at Wendy, unmoving and emotionless.

Doug came over and lifted me in his arms. He brought me into the house and laid me on the couch. I sobbed so hard that I had to throw up. I bent over and gagged on nothing. My stomach spasmed, over and over again. I was grateful for the distraction, but eventually my sobs died down. 

Zach sat next to me. He looked as though he pitied me. He didn't even know me, not even the little amount the others did, and he was giving me that look. I wanted to stomp on his eyes, to throw acid in them, to boil them so they could never look at me like that again. "It's okay. Take a deep breath."

"I shot her! I shot her!"

"You had to, shush," Doug soothed. He sat on the other side of me.

I sobbed until I had nothing left. Then I stared at the wall, numb and spent.

Doug and Zach went outside at some point. Ariel came inside and paced in front of me, wringing her hands and pausing every now and then to stare out the window. Libby joined us and sat on a stool, restlessly jiggling her leg.

"The boys are investigating," she explained when she realized we were staring at her.

"Wendy?" Ariel asked.

"Taken care of."

Minutes passed. Hours, maybe.

"Someone let them in," Libby eventually whispered. I wasn't sure if she was talking to me or to herself. "How did they get past the fence?"

About twenty minutes later, Doug, Zach, and Nate came back in. Nate collapsed on the recliner and said nothing. He didn't even appear to notice we were in the room with him.




Voodoo Girl Pt. 01



Libby stood up and scanned the men desperately. "What happened?" 

"Wasn't MacKenzie," Doug grunted. "At least that's what he claims."

Ariel's mouth dropped. "You saw him? How do you know it wasn't him?"

"We got the guy who did it. He was... proud of himself. Thought it was funny. He wanted this all to himself." He wiped the sweat from his face with his shirt. "We kicked the shit outta him. Dragged his ass to Mac. Mac said he didn't know him, the guy said he didn't know him. So we shot him in the head and threatened Mac."

"I don't believe him," Libby hissed. "I don't believe that lying shit one motherfucking bit."

"We don't have proof," Zach said. "We have to let it go for now."

"Oh, until he lets even more of those shits in here?"

"Shut the fuck up, Libby," Ariel spat. "What else can we do? Doesn't he have more people with him, too?"

"Even more, now. But there's no point in worrying about it this second," Zach said. He kissed her cheek and she calmed down a little, but his eyes were on me. I wanted to retch. He put his hand around her waist and looked at all of us. "We're going to bed. I suggest you all get some sleep."

They went upstairs. Nate stood and only then did his eyes seem to come to life. "I'm going to bed. If you need me..."

He trudged upstairs. I wanted to follow, to beg for his forgiveness. My eyes were filled with unshed tears, so full I could hardly see. 

Libby disappeared into the kitchen and came out with a wet washcloth. Then she tinkered with a cabinet and pulled out a full bottle of whiskey. She grabbed two shot glasses. I assumed she wanted a drink with Doug. 

Instead she grabbed my hand and hauled me out of my seat. "Let's get a drink."

I tried to speak but my throat was swollen from crying. She wouldn't have stopped, regardless. She yanked me to the back porch. There was a swing on it and she pushed me down. I swung back so hard that I slapped against the house and cursed.

She plopped next to me and filled the glasses. The washcloth in her hand was used to clean my face of its salty tears.

"We live in a world with death. We always did. I thought you knew that?" She handed me a glass. I took it because I was desperate for anything that wouldn't make me feel.

"Wendy was a smart lady," she said before downing her glass.

I swallowed my own, sputtering as the alcohol burned down my throat. I'd never been a fan of the heavy stuff.

Libby ripped the glass out of my hand, filled it and then shoved it back into my palm. I tried to hand it back to her but she wouldn't take it. "We're getting drunk together. Right now. Drink."

What the hell. The both of us had a few more shots apiece. She handed me the washcloth and I tried to get as much of the blood off me as I could.

"No one blames you," she said after a bit.

I was staring at the way the night wind blew across the overgrown grass, but my neck snapped towards her at her words. 

"I shot his mother in the head as he watched."

"He couldn't do it. He wouldn't have been able to do it himself. You did him a favor." She poured me some more whiskey. "Stop making this about you. Wendy died. We're all hurting."

"This is why I didn't want to stay here," I confessed. 

Libby waited for me to continue.

"This hurts. I hate it. I feel like... like I've lost my mother all over again."

"Would wandering alone through the wilderness be any better, Fiona?"

My eyes shut. "No."

I nearly dropped my whiskey when Libby laced her fingers through mine. "For my part, I'm glad you're here. I don't think I could have done what you did, either. You're strong, whether you believe it or not."

"How are we going to make it without Wendy?" 

Libby inhaled deeply and tilted her head back to take another big shot. When she looked at me, I saw her eyes were glazed over. I wanted that drunkenness and extended my glass out. 

She watched me shove three more shots down my throat and snorted. "You're going to be so hung-over tomorrow."

"I don't care. You didn't answer my question."

Her smile faded. "What do you want me to say, Fiona? We'll survive without her because we have to, just like we survived after we lost everyone else. We're survivors, obviously, or we wouldn't be here now."

I licked my lips but I couldn't feel it. I shook my head and it was so heavy, and the movement was so slow. I felt like I was underwater. I heard Libby snort again.

"I want to get fucked," I heard myself saying.

I wasn't sober enough to be embarrassed. 

Libby burst out laughing. 

"I mean it." My blurry eyes searched for hers. "I've never been fucked."

She let out a surprised laugh. "What? You're a virgin?"

"No, no." I shook my head and marveled at how fast the backyard was spinning. "No. I've had sex. But I've never been fucked."

"You still have time," Libby grinned. Her grin softened and she poured me another shot. "Last one, lightweight."

"What if it's me tomorrow? What if someone is shooting me in the brain to put me out of my misery? To make sure I don't come back?" I touched my chest as if that alone could quell the swell of fear I felt at the thought.

Libby shrugged and rested back on her hands. "What if?"

"That's terrifying."

"It's no way to live, so stop worrying about it. And you wouldn't know it happened, anyway. What difference does it make?"

"I've never been fucked. I never went to France. My grandmother and I got into a huge fight and I didn't make up with her. I hadn't called my dad in months."

Libby offered a rueful smile. "It's funny how people can only appreciate this stuff when death is staring them in the face. Look, if you were given another year you probably wouldn't do most of the stuff you want to do anyway. And it doesn't matter now. Worry about making it through tomorrow." 

Fatigue hit me and I rested against her arm. "How are we going to make it without Wendy?" I repeated in a whisper.

"Day by day," Libby whispered back, and poured us one last shot.

______________

I woke up sometime in the night. I was confused and still drunk, and heartsick over Wendy. Tears had dried in streaks across my cheeks.

I crept barefoot over to Wendy's door and hesitated. I wanted to lie in her bed and be comforted by the smell still on her sheets, but I wondered if that might be worse for me. In the short time I knew her, she'd become like a mother to me. I took a deep breath and pushed the door open. I stumbled in and fell on the bed diagonally. 

"Shit!" someone hissed.

Someone turned on the lamp and I lifted my hand to cover my burning eyes. 

"Fiona? What the hell are you doing in here?"

Nate. It was Nate.

I smacked my lips and slid up beside him. He released a long sigh and dropped his head back, closing his eyes. 

"I'm so sorry."

His neck turned and his eyes opened.

"I hated how that happened. I'm sorry."

"Don't be. Someone had to do it. I should be thanking you."

Tentatively I reached out a hand and stroked his jaw. "How are you?"

Nate wrapped his fingers around my wrist and pushed it back towards me. "I don't know. Have you been drinking?"

"A little tiny bit. Really just a sip. A half of a sip."

He rotated so that his body faced mine. "Is that why you're in my bed?"

"It isn't your bed."

He didn't answer and I wanted to kick myself for bringing it up.

"I wish I could offer you some comfort."

His lips twisted into a wry smile. "You can't."

"Yes, I can. There must be something I could—"

Before I could come up with a good way, Nate's lips were on mine, working against them. He sucked my lower lip into the space between his own lips. Immediately, I burst into thousands of flames. I wasn't sure what was happening, but I wanted more. I wound my fingers through his hair and pulled. He groaned into my mouth and pressed his tongue against my lip. I opened my mouth and his tongue immediately slid in, pushing against mine. 

I sighed into the kiss and heaved my breasts into his chest. His hands settled on my waist as his lips traveled down my throat. At the slip of skin between my neck and chest, he sucked and kissed until I was moaning his name. When he was satisfied, he pulled back and blew air over the wetness on my skin.

I gasped and my hands tightened in his hair. His hands slipped under my shirt and rubbed circles against my stomach. I wanted his touch everywhere, and I needed his mouth on mine. As if he read my mind, he gave me a passionate kiss that literally took my breath away. My body was thrumming with alcohol and pure pleasure. 

I lifted my hips and touched his hard cock. He moaned and bore down on me, shoving his cock into my clothed pussy. I squeezed him between my thighs and writhed beneath him, grinding against him. He buried his head into my hair and whispered things I couldn't hear.

And then he tore himself away and rested on his back beside me, covering his eyes with his arm.

I waited for him to speak but he said nothing.

I touched his arm and he flinched. "Don't touch me."

"What's wrong? Did I do something or—"

"No. I'm not angry. Just don't touch me right now. I can't take it. If I fuck you right now, it'll be because I'm using you to get over my grief."

My pussy desperately clenched. "I don't mind."

He peeked at me under his arm. "Well, I do, and so would you if you weren't plastered."

He was right. This wasn't the time. I was ashamed with myself and told him so. He just waved it off. I stopped moving and was afraid I was about to fall asleep. I rested my eyes and took his hand. He flinched again, but didn't pull his hand from me. 

"I'm so sorry. I didn't know her that well, but I loved her."

"I know you did."

"She loved you so much, too. She told me all the time how good you were."

He put an arm around my back and positioned me so we could spoon. "Thank you."

"Who let them in, Nate?"

His fingers skimmed down my arm, over my elbow and stopped at my hand. "I don't know."

We were silent and I could have sworn he fell asleep. Then he started speaking.

"I keep remembering this stupid memory I have of this dinner Mom prepared. Must've been a month before the outbreak."

"A dinner?" I asked in a whisper.

He distractedly rubbed my wrist. "She loved throwing big dinners. We hated them."

"Did you have a nice time?"

He snorted. "Sort of. It was just nice to get us all together. And Mom was so happy. She was beaming. And I remember thinking if something as simple as getting us together for dinner could make her so happy, I'd never give her a hard time about it again. She just loved that, us all sitting at a table together, talking over one another, fighting over the remote."

I covered his arms that were clasped around my waist with my own. "That's a nice memory. I'm sure it was for her, too."

"I don't want to talk about it anymore. Let's go to bed."

"Let's go to bed" sent an inappropriate shiver through my body. I was simultaneously turned on and ashamed of myself. He was right; we couldn't do this now. Wendy's death was fresh, and I was drunk and Nate was broken. And we had someone in our midst who let those zombies in. Without a doubt, I knew it in my soul. 

I got up but he tugged me back down. "Stay with me."

I stared into his eyes. "I want to take a walk around the house. I'm restless."

"Don't go outside."

"Okay."

"I mean it."

"Okay." Then I kissed his cheek. "Anything. Anything I can do for you, I will."

I went downstairs and disobeyed him, but just barely. I took a few steps out back and put the cigarette I stole from him between my lips. The flame ignited the cigarette and the familiar burning smoke filled my throat. 

I flicked some ash away and looked up at the sky for the millionth time, looking for answers I'd never received.

As I smoked my cigarette, I gazed at the stars and wondered if Wendy was a part of them now. I was almost jealous of her, and I was furious with myself for that fleeting thought. But she was somewhere peaceful now. Maybe not Heaven. Maybe not anywhere. But at least she wasn't here. She wouldn't have to wake up and go to sleep afraid. The horrific suspense of when, not if, she'd die was over. She was away from the monsters—both human and inhuman. 

I heard the wood floor creak behind me. I looked over my shoulder and saw Nate standing there, tears on his cheeks. I'd never seen him like this. He needed me, my arms around him, my lips on his. I'd done enough time in my head, philosophizing and blaming and complaining. He needed me, more than ever in this moment.

I put out the cigarette and walked back into the house, letting the screen door slam behind me. I wrapped my arms around his warm, hard body. 

"I'm here," I promised.



Voodoo Girl Pt. 02



Her skin is white cloth, and she's all sewn apart and she has many colored pins sticking out of her heart.

-Voodoo Girl, Tim Burton

I woke up alone.

I woke up alone and wide awake. I didn't want to be; I wanted to be in a deep sleep, and if I had to wake up, then I wanted to wake up and be back to the life I knew before. But that was never going to happen. That life and that world was gone.

I knew Nate wasn't beside me, and that he hadn't been beside me for some time. I felt the lack of him acutely and worried, as I was prone to doing, about how much I was attuned to him.

And of course I was hungover, as Libby promised. The world was dim and slanted. Every muscle hurt. My head throbbed unbelievably, and though I craved it, I knew if I asked Ariel for an aspirin she'd give me a glare.

Getting out of bed took great care. I nearly threw up once I was in an upright position. Then I smelled Wendy's perfume and a lump of loss stuck in my throat.

I stared at her wood floor that she still made time to clean, and it just seemed incredible to me she was gone. One minute she'd been comforting me about my mother; it seemed that the very next I was shooting her between the eyes to put her out of her misery. I hadn't been with her the longest, but she'd felt like a mother to me. A real mother. She was the glue that held us all together, and we all knew that. She knew how to tame us at our worst. Who would do it now? Who would want to?

It broke my heart to see the clothes she had set out in her bathroom, I guess to wear for the next day. Forever an optimist, she was. Perhaps the last optimist left. I shut my eyes tightly, telling myself I had to keep going, and when my eyes were open again I went quickly about my business. I brushed my teeth with some of Wendy's collected water, and ran some loosely against my body. I still had a bit of her blood on me, some Libby must've missed when she rinsed me off the night before. I refused to let myself think about that. I used her deodorant and then stared at myself in the mirror.

My nose was getting very brown. It made it look even more up-turned than usual. And I was thin. So thin. I was an entirely different person now, inside and out. I didn't recognize the girl staring back at me, as suspicious and curious about me as I was about her.

A huge swell of homesickness came over me. Where was my father? My grandmother? Were they breathing? Part of me hoped they'd died. Taken pills. Got into a car accident. Something like that. I didn't want them living like this. Grandma wouldn't be able to handle it. She always believed people were good, that they were just victims of their circumstances. What a surprise she would have had, staring at the landscape of our new world, seeing what people could and would do to one another to survive.

And what about my mother? Was she an undead crisp in Florida, or was she hiding out in some house, too, sweating and waiting to die? Missing her only daughter? Nah. Was she stewing over her regrets? Embroiled in some end-of-the-world love affair? The last scenario seemed most likely. She would seek the most dramatic exit she could.

After putting my boots on, I reluctantly went downstairs. Libby sat on the bottom step and lifted her hand to me. I took it.

"Sit with me, girl."

I sat close to her and huddled into her warmth. We watched Nate and Doug lug things around outside through the dirty screen door.

"What are they doing?" I asked after a few minutes.

Libby sighed and rested her head against mine. "They're looking for ways we can cross the field without worrying about being shot at. And the chance of a zombie coming at us without us knowing will be much smaller."

She ran a hand down my knotted hair and pulled it away from my face and over my shoulder. I met her dark eyes and tried not to cry. "You okay?" She rolled her eyes. "I mean, are you as okay as you possibly can be under the circumstances?"

I smiled, getting her meaning. "No."

"You're smiling," she said, pushing one last wave of hair out of my face. "That's a start."

"Are you okay?"

Libby bent over and peered into the kitchen. When she sat back up and saw my face, she mouthed, "Ariel".

"I'm okay," she said out loud. "Want to go collect the eggs with me? We should probably go together, anyway."

I followed her outside, jumping when the screen door slammed against the old house. I was still on high alert. Zach was sitting in the porch swing, sketching in his notepad while Doug and Nate did all the work. It provoked me.

"And what are you doing?" I asked him.

He glanced up at me. "Sketching out various ways we could arrange the hay."

I looked over Doug and Nate, ignoring the flare of electricity when Nate's eyes met mine. "We're making a maze of hay?"

"For the time being, until we can warp some metal or something to stand up, ward off bullets."

"That's... That sounds really stupid. I mean, they can still climb up on top, right?"

Nate eyes narrowed and he jammed his rake into the dirt. "Yeah, a zombie climbs really well, Fiona."

"I didn't realize the maze was protecting us just from the zombies, Nate."

Libby took my arm. "We're going over to get the eggs."

"That's not wise right now," Nate said, coming to stand in front of us.

God, I wanted to hug him. I wanted to hold him as I had the night before. I longed to run my hands over the muscles in his back, feel them flex under my touch. He needed me and my lips on his shoulder as my hand calmed him. He'd suffered a tremendous loss, something I couldn't even begin to understand or appreciate. I knew, however, that daylight changes everything. The heat and tenderness in his eyes were gone; now he was all business. He had to be, and I understood. It still sucked.

He looked awful. His scruff had grown in, and his eyes didn't look right. They never stopped scanning, searching, looking for something. He looked tired but mean. Nate had been a dick to me since I first arrived on the compound, but this Nate appeared wild. Feral. He was ferocious and just waiting to bite off the head of the next person who gave him a hard time. I would have put a bet on myself, if I could've.

"C'mon, Nate, five seconds."

"Can't risk it."

Libby groaned. "Fine, we're going out back. To be alone, okay?"

"Nobody's interested in your sex stories, Libby," Doug called out, trying to lighten the mood. "Or I am, actually, if you two are going off to make out. Nate, man, I might need a break in five."

Zach and Doug tried to laugh.

It didn't help.

"We'll call you if we need you," Zach said, surprisingly easing the tension. I never heard him so fucking talkative before.

Libby dragged me to the back, her expression changing from nonchalance to genuine concern. She made me bend down low to the ground behind some crates.

"We need to get out of here."

My heart pounded. "What are you talking—"

"Someone is working with MacKenzie. We all know it. No one has the guts to say it, not even Nate. He's out there with Doug like a moron, trying to fix something that can't be fixed. I won't wait for some fucker to come in here and mutilate me, not after everything I've gone through."

Bile filled my mouth. "But the guy said that he... he wasn't... whatever you call it. Working with him. Affiliated with him."

Libby gave me a quick smile. "Darling, you are so out of your league. It's a sinking ship here, sweetheart. Doesn't matter if he was with Mac or not, though my vote is yes. We have a lot of great stuff and it kills me to leave it, but it will kill me if I stay. Us. Kill us. And I like you. I want to protect you."

I smiled, heart warm. It was nice to have a friend after plowing through alone for so long.

"Who else is coming?"

Libby fiddled with a ring on her finger. "No one." When I began to speak, she put a finger over my lips. "We can't risk it."

"Nate and Doug are obviously not in on it," I whispered furiously. "And we need men. We have only so much body strength. We wouldn't last a second out there without them."

"You did." Libby looked me over. "When you came to us, you'd lasted—what? A year? All on your own."

"Yeah, but—"

"Just think about it," Libby said.

I heaved in a breath and smiled disbelievingly. "What about Doug? He's your friend."

We both heard a sound and jumped, peeking over the crates. We didn't see anyone, but I felt the prickling feeling on the back of my neck that someone had been listening.

Libby looked back at me, spooked. "It's go time, Fiona. Think about it."

_____________________

Dinner was a strange affair. We ate canned beans and no one talked much. Wendy missing left a haunting gap that no trite chitchat could fill.

Nate avoided me as much as he could throughout the day. It hurt my feelings, as much as I attempted to rationalize it.

It wasn't all about me, I told myself. He had a lot of shit on his plate. I wanted to be next to him, to be all over him, but I had to man up and accept he couldn't be all kissy-feely with me at the moment. Not only was his mother gone, but he was now in charge. It wouldn't look right for him to make out with me in front of everyone. I got that.

Yet now, during dinner, it seemed he couldn't keep his eyes off me. His expression wasn't lusty or affectionate, however; it was calculating. Not a good sign for me.

I finished early and grabbed a paperback, hoping he'd leave me alone. No luck.

He stomped into one of the many little cozy rooms the house had and stood on top of me so that I had to tilt my head back uncomfortably to meet his eyes.

"We need to talk," he said gruffly.

"What is it?"

One of his rough hands traveled up my arm. "We need to leave here."

"The room?"

His eyebrows went up. Apparently he didn't appreciate my snarky attitude. Then it dawned on me.

My heart sped up. "Oh, Libby talked to you, too?! Oh, thank God. She said... Well, I was going to tell her no but maybe—"

"Libby?" Nate cut in.

Sound was sucked from the room as we studied one another.

I wasn't a moron; clearly he knew nothing about what Libby intended.

Nate paced. "Fuck. Fuck!"

"What's the problem? Shhh. So, she had the same idea. It doesn't mean anything. It's not surprising considering what's happened."

He came back and bent over me. "I think it's her," he confided. His voice was low and close to my ear.

I inhaled, breathing in the smell of him—smoke, leather, freshly cut grass and just the teensiest bit of liquor.

"Don't be ridiculous. She's my friend."

"There are no such thing as friends these days. Did you forget?"

"Then what are we?"

He sat next to me on the couch and pulled my forgotten book from my hands, tossing it somewhere. "I don't know."

"A bad idea?"

He rested his head against the back of the couch, still facing me. "Yes."

Poor Nate. He'd been through so much, and he didn't even have a moment to acclimate himself. To grieve. He was our leader—we looked to him—and he knew it. Now he had to come to terms with the fact he might have to flee from his boyhood home, from the land his father reaped and sowed, from where he had memories—nice, wholesome memories.

My hands wanted to go to him but I wasn't sure he'd be receptive. "How are you doing? I mean, are you okay? As okay as can be expected?"

My phrasing reminded me of Libby and a sad note struck my heart.

He kissed me, touching both sides of my face gingerly as if my skull might collapse beneath the weight of his hands.

"I'm surviving."

_______________________________

Nate continued to sleep in Wendy's room, but I went back to the room I'd been given when I came. We both had a lot to think about the week following Wendy's death, and it seemed like a romantic entanglement should be last on both our lists. He never said anything about it, never asked me to join him. He didn't kiss me again.

But I couldn't help but be aware of him. In the mornings we typically rose at the same time. We sipped coffee on opposite sides of the kitchen. I watched him from the corner of my eye; he usually looked out the window. We didn't speak again about leaving, and Libby didn't bring up the topic, either. It brewed in the air, though; I could feel both of them thinking, planning.

I knew Libby was waiting for me to approach her.

Ariel was my pick for the person who betrayed us. I watched her like a hawk for the next few days, and she knew it. She sighed whenever she caught me studying her for some sign of guilt.

"I didn't let that undead fucker in," she finally said one night, fed up.

It was boiling hot and we'd left the screen door open for some cool air. The others were off doing whatever, but Ariel and I were pretending to read in the main living room.

I slammed my book shut. "You did keep questioning Wendy's leadership."

"Look, the woman pissed me off sometimes but I'm not gonna risk my life or anyone else's just because of a few squabbles. Okay? So stop staring at me. It's fucking creepy."

It didn't alleviate my concerns, but I did open my book back up with a tiny smile. It was the first time I nearly liked Ariel.

Later that night I knocked on Nate's door. He opened it a sliver.

"What's up?"

"Can I come in for a minute?"

He inhaled slowly. "I was just about to go to bed."

Wow.

"Like I said, it'll only take a minute."

He opened the door wider, just wide enough for me to slip in, and put his hands on his hips. Now I knew why he was reluctant to open the door—he was only in boxer-briefs.

I quieted my hormones and stared into his eyes. "I'm worried. Ariel isn't responsible, either. I just know it. That leaves Zach."

Nate ruffled his hair. "Or Doug, Libby."

I gave him a look.

"Fiona, have you forgotten what I said to you before? Nobody is anyone's friend here. We just coexist. We all play a part in keeping each other alive, otherwise every last one of the others would betray us if it saved their asses."

I felt a little thrill when he said us. I blame stress for what I said next. "Nate, will you do something very weird and possibly dangerous for me? Just this once?"

He examined me before answering. I think he might have even had an idea of what I was going to ask him. "Yes."

"Will you kiss me? I could really use a kiss right now, to just feel close to someone. And you're one of the few people I trust...and I just want you. It's crazy, I know, but I just keep thinking about your lips on mine...."

Nate's eyes caught fire, but he said, "I think you might regret that later."

"There is no way I'd regret it."

"I can't give you what you want, Fiona. We're not two people who bumped into each other at a bar. We're fighting for our lives."

My eyes embarrassingly began to fill up with tears. "Don't you think I know that?"

"I can't be your boyfriend." He pitied me. I could see it in his eyes, the way he breathed. "I can't start this. I don't have the time, the attention span. I can't mean something to someone and vice versa, okay? I don't want to mess with you any more than I already have."

I wiped my eyes with the back of my hand. There was no point hiding my tears from Nate; he saw everything, anyway. The worst part of it was that he was right. It would be so easy for us to come together, to melt into each other's bodies, but when it was over those pesky feelings would be even harder to fight. At least, for me. Probably mostly for me.

"Okay," I whispered.

"I'm sorry. Really, I am. I wanted to—I liked kissing you, too, okay? And I keep meaning to thank you for laying with me that night and just being a big help."

A big help. Like I brought him a casserole. This was quickly becoming worse.

"All right."

"If things weren't so complicated—"

"I get it, Nate," I cut in, "thanks."

He looked like he wanted to say something else. The moment passed and he nodded his head.

I walked over to his door, hating that this one fragile, deep connection I felt with someone was being torn from me again. The loss of Wendy was tremendous. This was even more so, especially since I'd begun to crave Nate. Inappropriate, crazy, unnecessary craving...yes. But I craved him all the same.

"Good night," I said as cheerfully as I could, which wasn't very cheerful at all, before walking out and clicking the door shut behind me.

______________________________

I was prodded awake earlier than usual. I wiped my eyes and saw Zach hovering above me. My body froze and I sat straight up in bed.

"What is it?"

"Will you help me milk the cows?" He flashed a grin. "I'm sort of hopeless at it."

Out of everyone in the house, I trusted Zach the least. I didn't know why, exactly. He'd never done anything to make me dislike him. Perhaps that was just it—he seemed like a quiet bystander, always watching. And waiting. Call it intuition.

"I think you can handle on your own. The rest of us do, and I'm sure you've done it before."

I was just beginning to get comfortable when Zach spoke again. "We need to talk. It's very important."

My eyes fluttered open and I watched Zach carefully. He didn't seem like he planned on hurting me. I was probably a moron to go with him, but I was curious.

"Give me a minute to get dressed."

It was a brisk morning, but I knew the chill wouldn't last for long. It was supposed to be one of the hottest days this week.

I followed Zach to the barn and then dragged over my stool, snorting when I saw how Zach approached the cow's poor udders. I walked over, correcting his method the best I could. Then I sat back down and we worked in silence for a while until he finally got to the point.

"Are you planning on leaving the compound?"

I focused on squeezing milk into the pail. "Why would I leave the compound?"

"Don't be coy. Doesn't suit you, and you're the shittiest liar I ever saw."

I opened my mouth to disagree but he was watching me in the dim lighting, and as much as I didn't trust him, I knew he had me figured pretty well. I sighed and wondered how bad telling the truth could be. "I might be leaving. I don't know. Things haven't been great around here."

"Really think that's a good idea? I mean, we have everything we could possibly want here."

"Yeah," I said with a bitter laugh. "That seems to be the problem." I turned back to the cow but kept an eye on him. "What does Ariel think?"

"She doesn't."

"Don't you think you're being a little harsh? Ariel isn't stupid."

He sighed and pulled his hands away from the cow. "Could we not talk about Ariel, please?"

"Have a fight?"

He scoffed and kicked a little at the dirt. "She's a bitch. An idiot. She fights me on everything little... She's not what I want. Who I want."

The danger compass that's in every woman immediately went south. I struggled to change the subject.

"Um, well." Swallowing, I twisted my hair up into a bun. "I guess you've decided already you won't leave."

"I think we all should stay put. Whoever is doing this crap wants us to scatter." He sniffed and wiped his nose. "Easier to pick us off that way."

I studied him. "Do you really think that?"

"Absolutely."

"Have you told Nate?"

Zach sort of rolled his eyes. "I broached the topic but he says it doesn't matter, we gotta protect lives, not solve mysteries, blah blah blah."

"Don't you think he's kind of right, too?" I gave him a small smile. "Your theory is interesting but they seem to be picking us off one by one already if you think about what happened with Wendy."

"I think," he began, turning to face me, "that maybe whoever did it didn't intend on Wendy dying."




Voodoo Girl Pt. 02



I looked down, feeling fear simmer in my stomach. "You almost make it sound like you're the person who let it in."

"Oh," he laughed, "no. I'm the observer-type, Fiona. I don't fuck shit up. I just watch, and go along, and flee when everything explodes." He made an exploding sound and gestured with his hands.

I went back to milking the cow. "Do you have any idea who might've—"

"No."

My shoulders sagged. I still had no idea why Zach made me come down here with him.

"So, what do you want Zach?"

He blew out a breath. "I want you to try to start trusting me. I'm not the bad guy here, Fiona. And I think you're smart, and you're strong—almost as strong as Libby. You're valuable. I'd hate to lose you."

My bucket was full. I stood and watched Zach stand, too. We regarded one another for a long minute.

"I'm not making any decisions just yet." The sun rose high enough to begin illuminating everything. Faint sunlight filtered through the slats of the barn and ran in stripes across Zach's body.

He stood still and kept staring at me. I refused to fidget or show him he made me uncomfortable. I didn't like the gleam in his eyes.

"But do you trust me?"

I sighed, eager to get the fuck away from him. "Does it really matter, Zach?"

He looked down at the ground and smiled to himself. "I would say so. You trust Nate, don't you?"

"I trust people who give me a reason to trust them."

He pushed his hair back slowly from his forehead. His eyes ran down my body and I couldn't hide my shudder this time. "What have I done to you to make you not trust me?"

"Absolutely nothing. Zach, I think we should—"

"I guess Nate's just your type, eh?"

My eyes narrowed. "Excuse me?"

"I know you're fucking him."

"I am not, but even if I were it would be absolutely none of your—"

Zach moved too fast and sprinted towards me before I could run, wrapping his arms tightly around my waist while also restricting the movements of my arms.

"Get off of me!"

"You smell good." He sniffed my hair; his exhale was damp and hot when it fanned against my neck. "I've wanted you for a long time. So long. And you're such a bitch about it, always teasing me. I'm gonna have you now."

He'd snapped.

I felt him then, hard and poking my thigh. It made me want to throw up, and for a moment I thought I might. I screamed but he slapped a hand over my mouth; with only one arm of his around me, I managed to twirl away from him. I ran towards the exit but I tripped hard, of course, and then he was pulling me back towards him by my flailing calf. I was fully under him and tried ineffectively to swat at his face. I stabbed his forearms with my nails but he didn't care.

"Come on, Fiona! Stop fussing. You must want it." He thrust against me. "Must need it. I can give to you. All of it. Right now."

"You're not going to get away with this!" I sobbed.

He threw me on a pile of hay and was on top of me before I could sprint away. He apparently didn't care about the consequences; he was far too gone. With one strong arm he kept me pressed down; with the other, he reached down to unbuckle his jeans and open his fly. I could feel the blood trickling from the knee I fell on.

Tears flowed from my eyes. "Don't do this, Zach. This isn't you."

"How the hell would you know what's me and what's not me? You've never bothered getting to know me before." He pushed against me and his eyes closed with bliss. "Besides," he panted, "no one is who they were anymore. No one." It was only then, with his naked cock against my flimsy underwear, that I began to panic.

"Help! Help! Someone, please help! Help me!"

"Shut the fuck up!"

Zach punched me in the gut, knocking the wind out of me, but I wouldn't be deterred. My will to survive had always been there encouraging me; it wouldn't fail me now.

I opened my mouth to scream again but no sound would come out. I inhaled heavy heaps of air, but I still couldn't catch enough air. Zach was just beginning to slip off my panties when I got my second wind. I kneed him in the balls—hard. The sound of his pained yelp gave me such exquisite pleasure as I pushed his disgusting body off of me.

Nate ran in, brandishing a rifle, but there was no need for it.

I covered myself, took a few deep breaths and then stalked over and kicked in Zach's face. Blood poured from his mouth. "You're disgusting."

Ariel was there suddenly, analyzing the scene. Her eyes went from him to me and back again. She knew. I could see it in her eyes she knew the truth. But it was scary being on your own in our black world, and she couldn't team up with me, or Libby, or Doug. Even Nate.

She ran over to Zach and tried to help him sit up. "I think you broke his nose," she said flatly.

"Good," I hissed.

I turned my back and ran for the house.

____________________

An hour later there was a timid knock on my door. I figured it was Libby and said "come in".

But it was Nate, looking so tall that I thought for a second he might not fit through the doorframe.

He was cradling his wrist.

"What happened?"

He followed my line of sight and put the wrist behind his back. "Nothing."

I smirked. "You punched the shit out of him, didn't you?"

Nate wasn't amused. His eyes, however, glowed with a sense of male satisfaction. Yeah, he'd beat the crap out of him. Zach probably wouldn't be able to walk right for days. I probably should have been alarmed I felt such glee over that, but fuck it.

"Ariel and Zach will be leaving the compound this evening."

Strange, but I hadn't expected that. I hadn't imagined the repercussions yet; I'd run upstairs to my room and cuddled into the fetus position. "With such little light? Maybe you should let them—"

"Oh, so he can try to rape you again?"

I looked down at my bedspread—it was beautiful; someone in his family must've made it—and shuddered. "You're right."

He took a soft breath and I could tell he was sorry for mentioning it.

"Has Libby said anything more to you?"

"No. I think she might be waiting for me to come to her."

Nate sat on a wicker chair near the window. The afternoon sunlight illuminated him wonderfully. He looked cozy. Like home, whatever that was. A home I never had, that's for sure. I coveted the life he'd lived there. Old-fashioned bedspreads woven together with knobby hands and homemade breakfasts and the American Dream draped around your shoulders. It must've been beautiful. I felt more sorry for him than I felt for myself. To have such bliss and perfection ripped from you, to be thrust into the greedy underbelly of human nature, to fight off your bloodthirsty neighbors who probably used to fucking tip their hat to you or something old-fashioned and country-like, must've been an outrageous shock for him.

He looked over at me and perhaps sensed my wistfulness—and maybe even a little of my envy.

He got up slowly, so as to not startle me, and then sat next to me on the bed. A large hand came to run its way through a wave of my hair. I wanted to tell him not to touch me, that it was confusing, but it felt too good.

"I'm meeting with Mac in a half hour."

My heart skipped a beat. "What?"

"He sent a message. He wants one of us to come, and I'm it."

"And you go. You, of all people! We all depend on you, Nate. What if something happens to you?"

Nate took hold of both my shoulders to calm me. "He isn't going to hurt me."

"Right. Like he isn't going to set a loose zombie in here."

He let out a big breath. "It's something I have to do, or he'll come here and we'll have an even bigger problem."

"I'm coming with you," I declared.

For the first time in a long time he smiled. I had genuinely amused him. Too bad I was deadly serious.

He touched a finger to my lip and then ran the back of his knuckles up my jawline. "I wish you could. He'd get a kick out of you."

"I'm fucking coming!"

Nate's smile faded. "Fiona. You've been hurt, and you know absolutely zero about any of this shit. You're staying behind."

"If you don't take me," I began, my mind desperately searching for a good enough incentive, "I'll...." and then it came to me, and it was cruel but necessary, "run away with Libby. Tonight."

He didn't react. His face didn't even twitch. His eyes didn't do an extra blink, and the vein in his neck didn't pulse. None of the stuff people tell you someone furious might do. I started thinking maybe he didn't hear me correctly, and then I really felt small and ludicrous when I knew he had and didn't care. God, I'd sounded sixteen!

He stood and nodded, looking at me straight in the face. "If that's what you want. If you think that's best."

He didn't say that ironically, or sarcastically. It was like a boss who just received your resignation letter going, "good job, thanks for all your work, buh-bye!"

It threw me off, but Nate was always good at that.

"Good luck with everything, Fiona," Nate said.

Then he dipped out of my room.

______________________

Ariel was wrapping up Zach's arm and helping him put his weight on her when I came downstairs. Doug cast me a concerned look, but Libby leant against the wall and watched the couple struggle. I almost wanted to offer to help until I remembered what happened. My ribs remembered and ached every time I breathed.

I looked at the two of them and knew they'd never make it out there. They probably wouldn't make it through the night.

Zach hissed and Ariel lost her balance, falling into the wall.

They definitely wouldn't make it through the night.

My mind began to work. It always worked peculiarly, my father said.

We needed Zach. He was a huge help to us on many levels. Forget about how he managed to organize the compound in his sneaky yet helpful ways, he was the main engineer behind how we got power. And even though he tried to molest me in the barn, he made a lot of great points when he tried to convince me to stay. I believed most of it. He was not the bad egg. Or at least not the bad egg we were searching for.

Perhaps keeping him in some sort of prisoner capacity could make all parties happy. We'd benefit from it immensely, of course, and he wouldn't be fucking dead.

How Ariel would take this was the only part I was uncertain about. I meant what I said to Zach that morning: Ariel was not a stupid woman. Surely she knew the odds. Looking at her, you'd never know she was panicking on the inside, but I was sure of it. I would be.

"Stop," I called out, coming to the bottom of the stairs.

Ariel gazed at me coolly. Zach kept his eyes appropriately on the screen door. He looked terrible; Nate really went crazy on him.

"You two aren't going to make it out there."

"Fiona, you—" Libby began to say, but I shushed her.

"Zach is very smart. We've established this. We've benefitted from this. In exchange for his work, he can remain here. Under supervision. Heavy supervision. And depending on how you behave, Ariel, the same arrangement can be made for you."

"Are you even allowed to make such an offer?" Ariel asked snottily. "You're the head of the group now? That'll come as a surprise to Nate, for sure."

I crossed my arms over my chest. "Be my guest. Go out into the dark with all the mosquitos and uneven dirt and wild animals, and of course, the zombies. Go out there with no guns. Go out there supporting an incapacitated grown man. Be sure to get a good grip on your flashlight with your free arm, yet practice being able to whip out that knife I know you carry around. Then worry about who is making you generous deals."

I turned my back on her but she called my name before my body could do the full rotation.

"What would... 'heavy supervision' entail?"

____________________________

I sat on a rock at the edge of the property, waiting for Nate's return. It was approaching midnight and he hadn't come back yet. I was worried and more than a little pissed off. He should have been back by now.

And then there was a shape moving with a familiar walk. The gate's electricity was shut off—Doug was on watch—and Nate walked onto our property looking much as he did when he left. I heard the hum of the fence being turned back on.

His eyes ran over me, taking me in, and it occurred to me for the first time I'd never dressed properly for the day. I'd never even cleaned up after Zach attacking me. I never dealt well with trauma. I was still in dirty sweat pants and a pink camisole.

"What are you doing out here?" he asked eventually, pulling me through the hay maze until we were up on the porch. "I thought you were leaving with Libby."

I ignored his baiting statement. "Waiting for you. I wanted to get to you before anyone else could."

He analyzed my expression and tried to read me. When that didn't work, he finally asked. "What did you do?"

"Why don't you go first and tell me how your meeting went?"

Nate just continued to stare at me.

I took a breath and tucked my hair behind my ears, trying to not have a heart attack. "I kept Zach and Ariel."

I could feel his body tense. I expected him to yell, or curse. Maybe even get up and find Zach and Ariel for himself, casting them out once again. He surprised me when he put his arm around my shoulders.

"You're not okay, are you?"

I snorted. "Do you notice how that's how we all talk to each other? 'Are you okay'. Over and over, and I know it's because we have nothing else to say but it's driving me crazy." I shook my head. "It's fucking ridiculous. There are things out there, eating people like you and me, people with flesh and blood and thoughts and hopes and fucking dreams... like maybe some dude wanted to be a fucking doctor or whatever, and his arm gets torn off. Bam, he's dead. Fucking finished. It's fucked up. So, no, I'm not okay. I'm never going to be okay. Neither will you. Neither will anyone. Christ."

He let me rant without comment. Then he sighed. "I see. So explain why you thought it was a good idea to keep a rapist and a raging bitch with us?"

I explained my reasoning, watching his expression carefully. He kept it calm. I told him Zach was tied up in the barn. Ariel was free to walk around, which would have been stupid under different circumstances but I knew she wouldn't leave without Zach and he was immobile.

Then Nate leaned against the railing of the porch and studied his hands. "I guess it might work. We'll have to see."

"You're not furious I acted in your stead?" I laughed.

He turned back to face me and he was smiling. I wished I could bottle up his smiles and whip them out when everything was terrible. Then his expression sobered.

"Have you thought any more about leaving?"

I stared down at my feet. "You can't leave here, Nate. It's not in your nature."

"I'm not an idiot. I know when it's time to run."

"Is that what your meeting with Mac told you?"

He rested against the railing again, this time facing me, and crossed his arms. "He said again it wasn't him and he wants to set up a barter system, which I agreed to. Anyway, I know it wasn't him. I know it in my gut. He blamed it on other nomads." A small smile touched his lips. "He called them rude and filthy."

"Dangerous, as well, then."

"He even advised me to get the fuck out of here. Told me we've been flirting with danger for a long time. I'm inclined to agree."

"You can't leave here. It's your home."

Nate laughed bitterly. "Home? This isn't my home. Not without Mom and Dad. No. Now it's just a shell with ghosts and too many empty rooms, and assholes roaming the halls. It's a coffin." He looked me over. "And what about you? What about your home? You ran away from it, too. You do what you have to when it comes to survival. You know that."

"And Libby?"

"No. Just you and me."

"Doug? Ariel? We just sacrifice them, leave them behind? Shouldn't we warn them?"

"Fiona, I'd drag you outta here barefoot right now if I thought I could. I would love to bring Doug along, but he will never separate from Libby. Feels beholden to her. And I don't trust her, not anymore."

I shook my head back and forth. "No. Libby...We're close."

He scoffed. "You think you're close."

"We are. That's why she wants us to go away."

"Look, it's simple. You have a choice. You hold the power. Me? I'm leaving in a few days. I'm going to gather as many resources and then I'm gone. You can come with me if that's what you decide. If you don't, no hard feelings." He stepped closer to me, intimidating me with his height just as much as that burn in his eyes. "But don't you dare tell anyone my plans. I'm trusting you with them, do you understand?"

"Yes."

Then he unexpectedly pushed me against the house and kissed me, running his arms up my body. His hips pinned mine against the house and he pushed roughly between my thighs. He was devastatingly hard, and I was desperately wet.

His tongue was calm and slow as it explored his mouth, but his hands were frantic and fumbling as they slipped beneath my shirt and found my breasts. A moan caught in my throat. His rough thumbs brushed against my nipples and I nearly wept.

That's when he moved against me in a steady pace, fucking me through our clothes in the sticky, humid night. He pushed me up and against the house with every movement. We panted into each other's mouths and stole kisses. My arms clutched his back and I delighted in the tense bunching of his muscles, indicating his quiet strength. I lowered my hands to his jean-covered ass, clutching it as best I could through the material. I tried to bring him closer. I wanted to absorb him; I wanted him to absorb me. I wanted us to sink into the other. But we were both wearing too many clothes.

One thrust moved against me sharply, pressing hard against my clothed clit, and I let out a loud, delighted gasp. Nate froze.

Slowly he lifted himself off my body, dragging his hands down my stomach and pulling them out from under my shirt. He looked into my eyes as if he didn't know me. The spell was broken.

"I'm sorry." He swallowed visibly. "I didn't mean to do that."

"It felt amazing," I confessed. I was breathless. "More. I want more. Please."

"I can't."

"Why?" I sobbed.

"I can't care about someone like that. I don't want to care—I can't do it. Feeling too much for you. I already like you. Please don't ask me to do more than that."

I knew a huge part of this was his loss of his mother. His father. The disillusionment he faced finding out what the world really was like beyond the sheltered farm he grew up on.

It didn't hurt any less.

"How do you expect me to go away with you when this will keep happening?"

He closed his eyes for a second. When he opened them, he was the same old Nate. "I told you. It's your choice."

"You're being so unfair." Fuck, I was crying.

At least he looked a little miserable again. "I know."

He disappeared inside the house.

______________________

The next morning I went for a walk. It was dangerous considering I was moving about without cover or someone spotting me, but I needed to gather my thoughts and I couldn't think in that stuffy house.

Nate was right. It was a coffin, filled with bad memories and bitter feelings. No one spent much time together anymore, not even Libby and me. Doug had withdrawn into himself and I didn't know why. Every time I tried to talk to him, he shot me down or made some excuse and ran away as fast as he could.

Ariel stalked around sulkily, spending most of her time in her room. Libby was either sitting in the kitchen, staring out of the window and looking deeply thoughtful, or I guess in her room.




Voodoo Girl Pt. 02



We were all running out of steam.

I heard the crunch of twigs. The rustling of leaves. My hands went on both hips and clutched my knife and gun. People were whispering. There was no hum from the fence; it was off.

I looked around a tree and spotted Libby, Doug and a man I didn't recognize. Libby held a gun to Doug's head. The man was saying something, but then his eyes slid to the side and he spotted me.

Libby slowly looked over her shoulder. When she saw me, she took a heavy breath.

My throat wouldn't work. I wanted to ask what she was doing, but it was obvious.

There was a long silence. Then Libby shifted her feet and waved her free hand through the air.

"I didn't want it to work out like this," Libby sighed. "You're my friend."

Nate's words came back to me, that there were no such things as "friends" anymore. I wanted to repeat that, but I couldn't speak. I was too terrified. My hands shook. I kept my gun and knife pointed at them, but I knew they could overpower me if they wanted. He was a big, burly man, and it was well known how strong Libby was.

She'd been so sad when Wendy died. And furious. Hadn't she been? Was she pretending all along?

Doug's wide eyes met mine. "Run, Fiona!"

The man punched him in the gut and Doug sputtered, clutching his stomach.

I tried to breathe evenly so I wouldn't hyperventilate and faint. "You let it in."

Libby's head cocked.

"The zombie," I continued. "You killed Wendy."

I felt numb at the realization that Libby wasn't my friend. Not at all.

"No," she whispered, looking sad. "That was an accident. I wanted to make everyone feel unsafe, spook everyone into leaving. I approached everyone about leaving, not just you. Wendy was so fucking stubborn about leaving her house.... I never wanted her dead, Fiona."

"I did," the stranger said. He spit to the side. "Fucking cunt."

"Shut up, Frank," Libby hissed.

I drew a sharp breath. "Frank."

The man I'd heard about, the man who'd been cast out. He offered me a smirk.

Zach had been right; there was someone out there who wanted us to scatter, to pick us off one by one. Then reap what we had sown.

"Are you with us, Fiona?" Libby asked, looking hopeful. God help me, she did like me. It made it burn even worse.

"Fuck her," Frank said, moving closer to me. "Can't trust her. Took too long to make up her mind."

He didn't appear to have any weapons on him but I wasn't stupid. And Libby still had her gun pointed at Doug, who looked entirely unsurprised by the news. He and I shared a glance.

"Was Doug with you?"

Libby gave Doug a sad look. "I wanted him to be. Told him all about it a few days ago. He overheard us talking. But he was going to tell Nate." She exhaled heavily. "Dougie, I'm sorry. I wanted this all to be so different."

"No, you didn't. You told me you were leaving him," I said.

She turned back at me, eyes sharp. "I didn't mean it. I thought you would be more likely to run away with only me. But of course I wanted to take Doug. Of course. And of course we'd return once the others were be gone. Wendy and Nate were goody two-shoes, with their rules and their unrealistic views of morality." She flung her head side to side and tears began to swell in her eyes.

How could she possibly have come up with or believed this convoluted plan?

"I don't believe you," I whispered. I was crazy for saying so, but I couldn't help it. I'd never felt so betrayed. "You were lying to one of us." I looked Doug over, and even though he was technically their hostage, he looked stronger than the both of them. She must've wanted him for his strength. But if he said no...she would have taken me. It was whoever said "yes" first. "Or both of us," I amended.

She let out a slow, tired breath. "I just wanna head west. Find my babies. I'm gonna ride up and down the coast. I'm gonna search every inch of it. Frank is headed that way, too. He's moving west, out to Cali. He's gonna bring us. Me. We just need to set up camp here for a while, get our shit together. Get strong." She must have seen the contempt on my face because she waved her hand through the air in a "what can I do?" sort of gesture. "Nate would have never allowed Frank and the friends he made back in here. Never, and you know that. Some stupid rule would've been drafted up. I know you're blind when it comes to Nate, but think about it, Fiona! If we could get him and Ariel and Zach out of there, and move our guys in, we'd be so much better off. Now Frank and his team can get strong, you know, having supplies and a steady source of food. We've got so much of it! Then, when they're fat and happy and trained, Frank is taking me to California. "

I took another look at him and had to hide my scoff. No, he wasn't. He was using her to infiltrate the compound. He was going to kill her, or subdue her, the first chance he got. Or perhaps he'd kill Nate first. It was a toss up in my mind. Then, of course, this would all be his. His and the dirty, rude nomads Mac must have been referring to.

Finding her kids was an impossible task. Deep down she must've known it. I looked into her eyes, wondering if she'd lost her mind, or if she'd just grown tired walking around the compound waiting to die.

Doug took a step closer to her. I forced my eyes to stay on Libby while tracking his movement. She was distracted by me, and Frank had his back to us, staring down towards the house to make sure no one else surprised us.

Then Doug lunged. Libby's gun went off, there were curses and screams, and Frank was on top of me, battling me for my gun. He was so heavy. He punched me in the face and it felt like he nearly knocked my eyes out of my head. I pushed ineffectively against him and tried to find my knife, which had fallen somewhere on the ground to the left of us. My fingers desperately searched, shoving into the soil and dirt.

And then my fingers touched cold blade.

Frank's thick fingers went around my neck and squeezed. Between him strangling me and his heavy body resting on my ribcage, I couldn't breathe. Tears came to my eyes and streamed down my cheeks. I kicked at him but it was pointless. I tried to get a handle on the knife, cutting myself in the process.

Then it was in my left hand and I was stabbing his back in one motion. I held on tight—I was right-handed—knowing he could easily roll over and rip it away from me. Everything happened so fast. The blood poured from his back and covered my hand. I was terrified I was going to lose my grip.

He pulled back from me and his hands quickly left my throat. He tried to reach around toward his back but I kept pushing the blade into his skin and muscle, as hard and deeply as I could. His eyes were wide. Furious. Disbelieving.

He fell to the right and I tried to move away from him as fast as I could. I looked down at him and was convinced he was dying. For good measure, and to make sure he didn't come back like the others, I lifted my gun and pointed it at his head.

"Don't," he grunted.

My hand didn't shake when I fired.

I had no idea what was happening with Doug and Libby. My eyes desperately swept the area. Then I saw them still fighting each other. I ignored the aches and pains in my body and sprinted towards them.

It seemed Doug was winning. Libby was on her knees, holding onto her gun as Doug kicked her in the chest. Still, she wouldn't let go.

I pressed the hot barrel of my gun against her temple. "Let go."

She was sobbing so hard that it was difficult to hear her, but I know she begged for freedom, for the chance to see her kids. She gave the gun to Doug.

"Let me go," she plead, "and I promise I won't do anything to harm you. I'll just be on my way. I just want—want to g-go to California."

I looked up at Doug and nearly fainted when I saw the wound in his stomach. He was covered in blood. The shot from earlier must've caught him in the gut. His feverish eyes bore into mine. He wasn't going to survive this. I walked to him, wiping my tears with my bloody hands, and put my hand on his shoulder.

We both watched Libby tremble on her knees as she waited for her fate.

"Have compassion," he whispered to me. "She's got cabin fever, sweetheart."

The tears blinded my vision. "I can't." My breath caught on a sob. "You know that's not it."

"It makes everyone crazy. Look at Zach, losing his mind. You can figure out something for her like you did for him." His voice was low and shaky. He was losing energy. I chanced a glimpse at him and had to squeeze my eyes shut. He already looked dead. "She was good to you. To all of us."

I heard steps behind me. Then the footsteps paused. I glanced over my shoulder; Ariel and Nate were surveying the scene. His wide eyes assessed me head to toe, cataloguing each wound. I turned my head back.

The arm holding the gun had grown tired and heavy. I wanted to let go, to forget. To forgive. I could set her out into the wild and never see her again. Except I knew that wasn't true. She'd round up Frank's "friends" and come back to us as soon as she could. And it would just be three us left to fight—Nate, Ariel and Me. Zach was still wounded, and Doug wouldn't be alive beyond the next ten minutes.

It was obvious we'd have to leave camp. How we'd drag Zach with us, I didn't know. But Nate had been right when he said it was time. We needed to lay low for a while. It was awful giving up his family home and the life we'd carved out here, but it was better than being killed or worse by the people that hung with Frank—savages, no doubt.

As I stood there unsure and hurt, Libby stood and sprinted before I could react. She zoomed through the gate and into the wet foliage. The others were saying something but I ignored them, chasing after her. She was stronger than I was, but I was the better runner.

I spotted her, held my ground and prayed to God I'd make my target. The shot rang out and she fell to her knees. I ran to her to see how badly she was wounded.

It was in her chest. She was gurgling blood and trying to say something. I stared at her, in disbelief that the woman who I thought was my friend was laying on leaves and clumps of mud, staring at me with a wound in her chest. That I caused.

She kept whispering so I bent over to listen.

"I was never a good mother, anyway." She laughed and choked on blood at the same time.

I wept as I caressed her cheek. "I don't believe that."

She coughed up blood and it flowed down her chin. "Do you think they're alive?"

Probably not.

But I said, "Yes," anyway.

She smiled at me, likely knowing my thoughts. "Thank you."

A flock of birds emerged from one of the trees overhead. We both looked up.

A minute later she spoke again. "Will you do it for me now? Shoot me in the head? It hurts too much."

I got up and aimed for her head, trying to ignore my crying. Just before I killed her, she whispered, "I'm sorry."