“Maybe not, maybe he was being sincere,” Ian suggested.
I looked at him, “Is there any part of you that actually believes that?”
Ian shook his head, “No, not really.”
“I can tell you right now, those two are up to something and it’s bad. As soon as I’m healed, we’re gone. Maybe before but we can’t stay here much longer,” I said.
Ian nodded in agreement, “Don’t take your eye off Milo either.”
“You don’t think…” I began but saw the expression on Ian’s face. “You’re right.”
We headed back to the car. Natalie was awake when we got in there.
“Hey,” I said. “You sleep well?”
She shrugged, “Yeah except my neck hurts now.”
“That’ll happen. Listen you’re going to be staying in the apartment next to me and my friend Emma. If you need anything, you can stop by okay?”
“Okay. Thank you for everything,” She said.
Ian drove around the complex. He gave me a gentle hug before we parted ways. He whispered in my ear to be careful and I told him to do the same.
I showed Natalie to her apartment. There wasn’t a lot of furniture in this one. Whoever lived here didn’t have a lot or didn’t feel the need to own many things.
I did a sweep of the apartment. I knew all the apartments were supposed to be clear but I wanted to make sure Natalie was safe.
“Anything I should know?” She asked. “You and Ian don’t seem to really like it here.”
“What makes you say that?” I asked.
“I heard you back at the antique store debating not to come back because of the people who run the place.”
I sighed, “It’s safe from the zombies.”
“But not safe,” She replied.
I looked at her face. She looked concerned, maybe a little scared.
“They have keys to all the apartments. They do random checks. If you’re worried at all, I can change the lock on the bedroom door and you can put a chair in front of it as well.”
“You can change the lock?” She asked.
“Ian and I got a bunch from a hardware store a while ago,” I said.
We weren’t supposed to make any modifications to the doors or anything in the apartments. I changed the door knob on mine anyway to have a lock that worked. I also made more modifications than that. Since we didn’t get inspections because of Emma, I put a chain lock that locked above the door on mine. I also hung up wind chimes in the hall way when I was alone in case a zombie somehow got in. If things went downhill and zombies overran the place in the middle of the night and one got in, I wanted to be protected and prepared.
Natalie double checked the bedroom. She came back in the main room.
“There’s a bookcase in there. I’ll use it to block the door. Thank you Cate, for everything. You know like saving my life even though I tried to maim you two.”
I laughed, “It’s okay. These things happen.”
She laughed, “Goodnight.”
“Night Natalie.”
Milo followed me out of the apartment and into ours.
Emma was sitting at our table eating when I walked in.
“Oh my God,” She said upon seeing me. “Are you alright?”
“Yeah, I fell fighting a zombie.”
She got up and gave me a hug. She wasn’t as gentle as Ian and it caused my side to hurt really badly.
“I’m so sorry about earlier,” She said with tears in her eyes.
“I’m sorry too; I said some really mean things that I didn’t mean.”
“It was true Cate. You shouldn’t be sorry for telling the truth,” She said and sat back down at the table.
“Emma,” I began.
“Cate, I’m not like you. I never was. You can survive out there. You can survive this. I can’t. Not on my own. I know it’s stupid that I’m sleeping with this guy to stay safe.”
“Emma, I can’t survive this. Have you seen the left side of my body?” I asked.
She laughed. I went over to the table and sat across from her.
“Thanks for making a joke,” She said.
“Well, there’s comedy in truth so.”
“Truthfully, you’re good at this. You can handle this. I can’t. I keep myself sheltered.”
“Do you like Aaron?” I asked.
“I do now. But it didn’t start out that way.”
I shrugged, I didn’t agree with her methods or her taste but it was one time I felt I needed to lie. “If you like him now, why feel bad? You’re safe and you have stress relief.”
She shook her head and laughed.
“I love you,” She said.
I took her hand and said, “I love you too.”
I told Emma that I needed to get some rest. She was going to head to Aaron’s before dark anyway. She did ask if I wanted her to stay but I told her it wouldn’t be necessary.
After she left, I headed to my room and into the bathroom. The light barely reached into the bathroom during the day and as it was starting to get dark, I had barely any visibility.
I got one of my lanterns and took it into the restroom so I could have some light to access the damage I did to my side. I took off my shirt and noticed that I had massive bruising under my left breast. My left arm was bruised and scrapped.
I did a bit of clean up on my hand back at the store but didn’t clean my arm. I got out the first aid kit and wiped my arm with one of the antibiotic wipes.
I took off my jeans and noticed that there was a pretty good size bruise on my thigh and knee. I didn’t think this through and had to put my clothes back on
