“Not crazy far, just a little ways. Want to move while the sun is out so we can scope the place out better.”
Natalie nodded and asked, “Are we always going to be on the move?”
I shrugged and sighed, “I hope not. I hope we find a place that’s safe that we can stay at for a while. Maybe we’ll try Prescott but we got to come up with a plan, course of action. Just not right now.”
“Do you think anything these days is going to go according to your plan?” She asked with a smirk.
I gave out a little chuckle. “Probably not but one should never be unprepared.”
“True,” She said. “Cate, do you think this is forever?”
I sighed, “I have no idea. We just have to take it one day at a time and hope there’s an answer on the way.”
“Why do you think this happened?”
I shrugged, “Just bad luck I guess.”
She made a face of exasperation. I gave her a hug. It was a hard world we were living in. It made the stuff we used to go through seem so easy. I remember when I used to worry about things that were trivial and had no real bearing on my life.
We got in the van and headed on west. We didn’t drive for very long. It wasn’t my intention to go that far, I just wanted a little more distance between me and where we had been. No one knew the van. Ian and I never discussed it with anyone else. I never even told Emma. I mentioned maybe leaving the safe haven mostly to feel her out but never mentioned the van because she never sounded like she would be willing to go. And in the back of my mind I always thought she would tell Aaron.
A part of me wondered if she knew what Aaron was planning. I hope she wouldn’t do that to me but truth was none of us were who we once were. Everyone had changed, hardened. Survival had become priority number one and sometimes that threw loyalty, morals, and humanity to the way side. I hoped that wasn’t me. I hoped I would never be that far gone but it’s hard to say what you will and won’t do to survive until you’re facing the barrel of the gun or the zombies decaying teeth as it were.
We pulled into another deserted parking lot. This one was a little less deserted. There were a few zombies hanging around an old burger joint at the end of the strip mall area. They seemed to pay no mind to the van so Natalie and I agreed it would be fine to stay. Trying to find a place completely deserted of zombies was next to impossible, we got lucky the night before. I didn’t even hope to get that lucky again.
Natalie and I made work of covering the van windows. We took turns taking restroom breaks and I took Milo for one last walk before it got dark.
I dug through the food stash and gave Natalie a can of Vienna sausages and a pudding cup. I decided on some canned spaghetti and meatballs and a fruit cup that’s juice got all over my hands when I opened it. There was dry dog food that I fed to Milo and we all had a little bit of water but we were conservative on drinking it since there wasn’t a ton in our supply.
We ate in silence. I was hungry as I’m sure Natalie was as well. Neither of us had eaten anything since we left the safe haven. I didn’t even think of food the entire time and besides, I was hungry all the time anyway. It was nothing new to feel that way. I didn’t think I’d ever know what being full would feel like again. I missed Thanksgiving dinners when I’d be so full at the end and felt like I didn’t want to eat again for a whole year but then would have a slice of pie anyway. Those were days of the past. Food was scarce and had to be preserved. It would probably never be a luxury again. I felt bad that there were people who went through this struggle before the dead walked among us. I wished I had done more to help people in that situation. If the world ever went back to normal I would be sure to help the hungry. I had a feeling that the memory of this kind of hunger would never go away, not entirely. I think my stomach would always feel the pangs in its memory, assuming stomachs have memories.
After Natalie finished her pudding she asked, “So where were you when all this started?”
“Home. I was supposed to be at work but I called in that day,” I stated.
“You were sick?” She asked.
I shook my head, “No, I hated my job and used one of my sick days. I don’t think anyone in the office made it out that day though.”
“Really?”
I nodded. “I got a text from my boyfriend…”
She cut me off, “Boyfriend?”
I closed my eyes and sighed, “Yeah. We’d only been dating maybe five months. He was a manager there so no one knew about it because he would’ve gotten fired. I wanted to quit but he encouraged me to stay there. I hadn’t even told my sister about my relationship with him. That there should’ve told me the relationship was doomed.”
“Is that why you wouldn’t pursue your feelings for Ian?”
“There’s a lot of reasons I wouldn’t but that was a big one. I didn’t talk about that relationship with Ian and I felt like it would’ve been a betrayal somehow. Plus, I didn’t want to go through it again but I did anyway.”
“What was his name?”
“Justin.
