No one said anything. Pumpkins and Halloween had seemed so logical before. Now that Jared questioned it, they did the same.
“Not really,” David said. “I mean, no. We’re not ... f-ing stupid. We weren’t all gonna carve pumpkins. They were for the girls.”
“Right,” said Nicole, glaring at her little brother. “And it was up to the big, strong boys to get them for us. We can’t get them on our own because we’re girls and it’s scary outside.”
David said nothing as he looked back at her.
“Whatever,” Jared said, stretching. “Point is, you guys got no food either, so we’re all screwed anyway.”
“No,” David said. “We’ve got some food.”
Nicole sighed loudly and walked out of the room, nearly bowling Alex over as she went.
“Really?” Jared asked. He looked genuinely shocked. For the briefest moment Kaitlyn noticed he looked like a normal kid. It didn’t last. He grinned “Well then, let’s eat, boys!” He slammed his hand down on David’s shoulder and hauled him to his feet.
David winced at the pressure that Jared applied, but then he grinned.
Looking at David’s goofy grin, Kaitlyn felt bad for him. He’s not stupid. He’s just not used to having people like him. She shook her head, not only at David, but at the memory of herself doing stupid things because she thought a boy might like her. She couldn’t help thinking about Patrick Taylor; how she had ignored her responsibility and he got hurt. She wondered if she’d ever get the chance to apologize. If he was still out there somewhere, running.
ALEX
Alex couldn’t get out of the way fast enough this time, or perhaps it wouldn’t have made a difference if he had moved or not. Jared slammed his shoulder into his as he passed by. “Sorry, Alec. Didn’t see ya there.” He flashed him a quick smile. “Lunch time!”
Alex almost went after them. He was sure that Jared would rummage through all of their food and supplies, make a mess, break important things and eat half of it. He stopped himself. Maybe if they just gave him some food—even half the food, he didn’t care; it would be worth it—then Jared would leave. Go back to his so-called bomb shelter. Maybe it did exist, and he would take the food that he came looking for, and then he would leave.
He didn’t.
He filled up on bread, chips, and peanut butter, shovelling them in by the handful. As if he hadn’t eaten for days.
Then, he fell asleep in the bedroom in the afternoon and slept through the rest of the day. No amount of noise disturbed him—he didn’t even stir. If he hadn’t eaten in days, he hadn’t slept in a week.
Throughout the afternoon, most of them ignored Jared. David checked on him periodically, probably hoping he would be awake, but otherwise continued working on his new device. He had started plans for tools that would help them remove the dead-dead mudmen from the pikes without having to get too close to them. Kaitlyn and Hannah played with the board games they had found. Nicole joined them for most of a game of Monopoly, but otherwise spent the afternoon reorganizing the supplies room after Jared had made a complete mess of it.
Alex, however, watched Jared for hours.
At first, he made it look like he was doing other things in the room: talking to Ryan, looking for the cat, reorganizing the mats and blankets in the room, making it clear that there was room for six people to sleep there—not seven—and other equally pointless, made-up tasks. After nearly an hour, he sat in the corner with David’s book on his lap. Occasionally, he would read the same sentence, but otherwise his eyes were locked on Jared. After a short period of that, the book slipped off his lap and he didn’t even notice. He just waited.
He wasn’t waiting to get the courage to tell Jared to leave, or for someone else to come in and do that either; he knew no one would. He thought David might even fight to keep him there if someone did say something. He wasn’t waiting for him to wake up, pack up some food and be on his way, back to his bomb shelter and waiting family, especially since he knew it was a lie.
He was waiting for Jared to screw up. To screw up so badly that no one could question kicking him out. To do something that no amount of charm or excuses or physical strength would undo. Alex’s problem was that he couldn’t think of anything that would be so horrible that they would force someone out with the mudmen.
“How’s the book?” Kaitlyn asked from the doorway.
“What?” Alex hit his head off the wall behind him, surprised to hear a sound that wasn’t Jared’s breathing. He looked at Kaitlyn, then at the book on the floor. “Oh. Um ...” he flipped through its pages. “It’s fine, I guess.”
Kaitlyn smiled at him. She giggled a bit at seeing him so clearly flustered. “I don’t think he’ll be a problem,” she whispered, nodding at Jared.
“I’m not worried about him!” Alex lied.
“Okay,” Kaitlyn said, “I didn’t say that you were. Just, yeah, Nicole said that you were not happy about him being here, but—”
“Well, Nicole needs to mind her own business! And so should you!” He opened the book to a random page and pretended to read.
Kaitlyn took a step closer to him. “I was going to say that I don’t really like him being here either.”
“Oh,” Alex said, looking back up at her. “Good. Thanks.”
“You’re welcome. But I’m not just being nice.” She leaned in, as if with a secret. “He makes me feel ... weird, you know?”
Alex looked at her quizzically. She had certainly gotten his attention.
“Like ... like he might do something?” she said, clearly unsure of what exactly she meant.
Alex nodded, then looked back at Jared as he slept.
“Also,” Kaitlyn said, calling his attention back to her, “you should talk to Nicole about him.
