“Are you sure that’s a good idea? So early in the morning?” she asked. Jake shrugged without humour.
“It seems like the perfect time to become an alcoholic, right? Seemed to be working for those guys,” he muttered. Megan’s heart sank and she hung her head. She’d been trying to lighten the mood, but it seemed like it hadn’t really worked. Jake sighed.
“Sorry...yesterday was long.”
“It’s alright. There’s not much to laugh about, is there?” Megan replied solemnly. They ate the rest of their meal in silence and took turns swigging from the bottle. Megan had always hated the taste of beer, but it felt good to have some alcohol in her system. It made everything hurt a little less, even if only for a moment.
“We should keep moving,” Jake said after the last dregs had been drained from the bottle. “We don’t want to give them any chance of catching up to us.”
Megan nodded and stood up, helping Jake pack away the last of their supplies. Now that the beer was finished and some of their food was gone, their supplies seemed meagre. They wouldn’t last long, she realized. The last of Megan’s exhilaration from their daring thievery was gone. Now, she was hit with another dose of reality.
“Things are just going to carry on being hard...aren’t they?” Megan asked. Jake didn’t answer, but that answered Megan’s question anyway. Jake was still in a dark place. She was still leading the way. Of course things were going to be hard.
They continued walking uphill. In her tired mind, it took Megan a while to gather that wherever the lake was, they weren’t walking toward it. They’d been told to head downhill. She stopped in her tracks and Jake looked at her in confusion.
“What? Why have you stopped?”
“We need to go that way,” she said, pointing to her left. “But head downhill as we do. That’s the most likely way we’re going to get to the lake.
“I don’t think that’s a wise idea,” Jake said. “If everyone is heading toward the lake then we’re only going to walk into more danger. We should keep walking uphill and find the main road. We can stick to the trees, but stay on the route. That’s the best way we’re going to find friendly communities...they won’t be hiding out in abandoned houses in the woods.”
“So you’re not even going to consider my idea?” Megan asked, folding her arms. “It’s the closest thing we have to our original plan and you’re just ready to abandon it? What happened to giving me some respect and trusting my ideas?”
“Your idea takes us closer to the gang,” Jake said through gritted teeth. “We want to walk away from them, not back in their direction.”
“They saw us head this way. They’re going to expect us to head to the road if they bother to follow us,” Megan retorted. “Besides, this time, if we have any sense, we’re not going to stop off at strange houses.”
Jake snorted. “Oh, so you’re blaming me for what happened? Nice.”
“I didn’t say that. I’m saying that we won’t make the same mistakes again.”
“Exactly, which is why we’re not going to the lake. We’re going uphill.”
“So we’re walking away from the one possibility we have of finding somewhere to heal, somewhere safe, somewhere that Aby might head to?”
“She’s not there!” Jake cried out. “Aby would stick to the roads. It’s what we’ve discussed a million times. It’s what we’ve done every time we’ve run into trouble…”
“And look where that’s got us,” Megan snapped. The pair of them fell silent, both quietly seething as they stared one another down. Their argument was entirely unproductive, but neither of them were backing down. Jake sniffed and turned his back on Megan.
“Well, I’m heading this way,” he said. “You can do what you want.”
He’d done it again. Given her an ultimatum. Once again, he was showing that he thought he knew best. Megan was seething. She desperately wanted to walk away. She was the one carrying the supplies. She was the one with any common sense left. But as Jake began to struggle on up the hill, she sighed and followed him. She didn’t know why. She was losing patience with him very quickly. She didn’t even know if she could consider him an ally or a friend anymore when he was always working against her. But her good nature wouldn’t let her abandon him. She could see why he wanted to follow this path. If he was sure Aby would head to the roads, then why wouldn’t he do the same? He’d do anything for her, clearly.
Even if it ended up getting them killed.
They walked for almost a whole day. In their battered state they made very slow progress, especially heading uphill, but it was progress all the same. Megan barely said a word to Jake, but she kept an eye on him. She watched how he was retreating into himself, barely eating or drinking, fidgeting every time they stopped for a break. He was a broken man, she realized. It seemed like it was only a matter of time before he went off the rails entirely.
Every now and then, Megan would whip her head around, convinced she’d heard something creeping around in the trees, but she never caught sight of anything or anyone. She knew she was getting paranoid, but she’d rather be paranoid than dead. She had reason not to trust the world around them, after all.
They pressed on as long as they could. They ate another strange, makeshift meal
