Fourteen

    I didn’t have to open my eyes the next morning to see that someone was watching me. I could feel their presence. I could sense their eyes boring into my body with a thousand daggers. It wasn’t the soft, warm gaze of Daniel that woke me the next morning; it was the dark, odious stare of James. I jumped when my groggy eyes made contact with his. A swift visual scan across the room made it clear that Daniel had gotten up prior and that I was now left alone with his furtive best friend.

            “What do you want,” I lowly said. I didn’t care regardless, and my tone seemed to make that evident, because he didn’t seem to want anything other than to instill uneasiness within me. He was standing about a yard from the edge of the bed where I lie on my side. I had rolled in my sleep. James was still shirtless, but he had pulled his long black coat over his wide shoulders.

            “Sleep well?” he murmured with a mocking undertone.

            I pushed against the bed, up righting myself a few degrees. “Would have slept better surrounded by the dead than your sorry self,” I huffed.

            His jaw twitched, his lip turning upwards into what I interpreted as an amused smirk. He lowered his head, sticking his neck out in a peacock’s way of exerting intimidation. “We can make that possible.”

            “Good morning.” Our stare off was interrupted by the calm voice of Daniel. He was standing in the doorway, eyes drifting between the two of us.

            James corrected his posture, puffing his chest out as he sent me one last glare. He walked past Daniel and out the door without another word. I let myself relax, fully sitting upright on the bed. I pulled my knees to my chest as Daniel walked around the end board and sat beside me.

            “What have I done?” I asked with brows furrowed. “Did I wrong him in another life? Please don’t tell me I remind him of an ex or look like his mother.”

            Daniel cracked an amused half smile. “Nothing; not sure; no; and I can’t answer that last one. James…has his faults; but you will one day learn to decipher his positives. He is the furthest thing from an open book.”

            “Edvard doesn’t seem to be a fan of me either,” I scoffed.

            “Edvard doesn’t seem to be a fan of anyone,” Daniel nodded. “Hector is the only one that can get through to him. Even I haven’t tried making friends with him. But he is a good shot and fights on our side, so I haven’t messed with that.”

            Daniel let his fingers graze over my knee. His gentle touch sent shivers up my spine. I kept my eyes down while his remained glued to my face. I found myself too shy to look at him. He corrected that by lightly gripping my chin and turning my face towards his. His blue eyes were set on my lips. My heart fluttered with nervousness.

            “May I?” he whispered ever so softly.

            I nodded, my eyes watching his face move closer and closer. My eyelids pressed tight as his lips made contact with mine. His second kiss was just as soft and reserved as the first, like he was afraid I would break in his arms if any amount of pressure or hast was introduced. His thumb caressed my jaw. I smiled into the kiss, causing our lips to part and Daniel to let loose a light chuckle.

            “Sorry,” I blushed.

            “Don’t be,” he said pressing his forehead against mine. “It’s cute.”

            “Oh, god, disgusting!” Aaron suddenly entered the room. Daniel’s younger brother stood in the doorway, arms up and dressed in a white t-shirt and green plaid boxers. My cheeks darkened even more, this time out of embarrassment.

            Daniel chucked a pillow at him. “You’ve walked in on worse,” he laughed at his younger brother.

            I suddenly felt very small. I was a mere seventeen-year-old amidst a group of men who had a few more life events to talk about than I could even try to understand. I didn’t care to know what Aaron had walked in on Daniel doing with another woman, even though I had a few ideas. It felt wrong to be embarrassed by it, even hurt. My history with men would never be compatible with their past with women. I stood, excusing myself.

            Brittany and my Aaron were standing in the hallway, smiling. I folded my arms, approaching them with a less than amused expression. Aaron brought a hand to his lips, but it wasn’t enough to hide the wide grin he was bearing.

            “There is no Munster, is there,” I said through pursed lips.

            Aaron shook his head, his big brown eyes twinkling. Brittany did the same. “I see the smile peaking through that glare, Miss Hamilton,” she teased.

            I half rolled my eyes, unable to commit to a full on huff. “You planned this, and you pulled an innocent child into it.”

            “We were helping you,” said Brittany.

            “How so?” I inquired.

            “Think about it. Daniel is always trying to protect you. He is always trying to make you feel comfortable; always trying to get you to be happy, make you laugh, get you to smile. You blush every time he passes you and find humor in every joke he makes. He watches you like a hawk, his advances noticed by everyone but you. He likes you and you like him. Why not pursue that?” she said.

            Her words made me feel good at first. I was giddy and excited, but also scared and shy. My focus had always been to get good grades and to please my parents, but without both now present in my life, I was afraid to let myself pursue other things, especially a man who had several years on me.

            “What if it doesn’t work out?” I found myself asking.

            I could tell that Aaron had checked out of this conversation, his six-year-old mind uninterested in what his older sister was experiencing. Brittany was heavily engaged, her advances becoming like that of a mother. She looked up at me with undivided attention.

            “You deserve the type of happiness that Daniel can give to you. Even before the whole world went to hell, Daniel was that once in a lifetime guy that every woman wishes she could find. It took a pretty devastating event to happen, but it happened. You two are stuck under the same roof. Go for it,” she encouraged.

            “Who has a window open!” the authoritative and deep voice of Hector suddenly shot through the manor.

Daniel and Aaron instantly joined us in the hallway just as a heavy set of footsteps was heard clambering up the stairs. Brandon came flying through the archway into the hallway, his arms pushing against the floor of the last step as his weight was pushed forward. He stood, breathing heavily. “Destiny is outside!” he rasped.

My eyes widened. We all ran after him as his feet managed to step over themselves. There were two pointed stained glass windows within the brick walls of the helical stairs. One was at the top of the third floor and one was at the beginning of the second floor. That was where a large crowd of people was gathered. The small window had been pried open. I pushed my way through the gawking bodies, shocked to see Destiny carelessly sitting on the branches of the tall sweetgum tree that resided away from the other trees that made up the surrounding forestry. This particular tree was just outside of the tall iron fence’s guard, which meant that any being, dead or alive, could find its way under its many branches. This sweetgum was young; it’s trunk and limbs still very thin and nimble.

“How did she get out there?” I asked Hannah, who happened to be the closest on looking figure to my right.

“I don’t know,” she said, eyes wide. “We caught her just as she was leaving the window. She must have jumped into the branches.”

“Destiny!” I called out, but my voice landed on deaf ears. The young girl was sitting on a limb, her back grazing the bumpy trunk. Her brown hair blew in the light breeze. She was holding one of the pointed leaves, staring at it with a deep yet vacant gaze.

Hector pushed his way through all who had piled on the steps. Veins pushed across his thick neck as he strained to look out the window. His nostrils flared and he looked down at me. He grabbed at my arm. “Get her back inside,” he hissed.

“Hector, I’m trying,” I whimpered, trying to pry his strong fingers from around my arm. The skin was turning white from how hard he was gripping me. “Calm down.”

“Calm down? Look at what your girl has brought!” he hissed. He shoved me closer towards the window so that I could get a good look at the zombies that were now populating at the base of the tree. It first began with three of them, all sluggish and hungry, their throats gurgling with mud and blood. They held their arms up, their fingers clawing at the bark of the trunk as their lazily moved. Destiny was too far-gone to pay them any attention.

“Hector, let her go,” Daniel said through gritted teeth.

Hector looked at the man who stood on the highest step of the helical staircase. The cadet growled before letting me go. He threw his arms up, only to bring them down against the back of his head. He looked through the window, exasperated.

“Destiny!” I tried calling again.

            “She can’t hear you,” my sister suddenly spoke. “She is in one of her states.”

            “Destiny!” a voice cracked. Andrew had joined us, his body franticly twitching as he watched his girlfriend playing with the leaves of the tree. “What are you doing? We have to get her back inside!”

            “We are trying,” I said to him. “She isn’t listening to us.”

            “Destiny! Destiny!” he shrieked. “Why aren’t any of you helping her!”

            Andrew was a mess. He had torn off the sleeves of his red shirt, revealing the honey amber skin of his lightly toned but still small limbs. Sweat was forming along the black hair of his forearms. His ran his fingers through his thick hair. He spun around in a frazzled circle before pushing past everyone. It was only a few short minutes before he came scrambling back with a simple six-foot ladder. He carelessly tried getting it through the narrow stairwell and out the window.

            “Andrew, what are you doing?” I questioned in disbelief.

            “I have to get her,” he said, a maniacal expression in his dark eyes.

            Daniel grabbed for the ladder just as Andrew tried pushing it out the window. “Andrew, no,” the man said.

            The teenager elbowed the man and continued on with pushing the ladder out the window. The further out the window he got the ladder, the harder it was for him to control from inside the window. He tried getting the legs to rest on one of the branches. He almost lost grip on the ladder when the legs slid off the branch. Daniel put his hands right under where Andrew was grabbing, helping the young boy direct the legs to the branch so that a bridge was created.

            “Don’t,” I said as Andrew then proceeded to climb onto the ladder through the window.

            He pushed my hands away. I looked to Daniel for help but the man didn’t seem to have an answer and he clearly wasn’t about to manhandle the violent teen. I watched Andrew falter as he looked below him as the group of zombies that had began to develop. With every minute that passed, another staggering dead seemed to join the group that flocked along the trunk.

            Andrew let his long legs fall through the first gap of the ladder as he sat on the first rung. His hands wobbled against the rail as he leaned forward until he was crawling across on his hands and knees. Daniel and Hector were gripping the end of the ladder that teetered in the stone window frame. My heart was beating with every second that past.

            As Andrew made it past the middle part of the ladder, it began to wobble. I watched the muscles of Daniel and Hector flex as they put more pressure on the end of the ladder. The end against the branch began to slide as the wood dug into the soft bark.

            “Andrew!” I cried, my hands flying to my lips as the ladder tipped. One leg had slipped from the branch, causing Andrew to flip over so that his left hand was gripping onto the ladder. His body dangled above the group of zombies who now had their attention on the boy.

            The single leg was burrowed between the branch and the trunk, but as Andrew swung back and forth, his legs and arm waving around frantically, the last leg began to slip. Andrew tried getting a second grip of the rung, but it wasn’t enough. Even the pressure that Daniel and Hector were applying to the ladder wasn’t enough to keep the leg in place.

            “S**t!” Hector cried as the leg dropped from the tree. The force and Andrew’s weight was enough to pull the ladder straight out from under them, letting the boy fall. Andrew hit the earth on his back, crushing two creatures below him. His screams carried up to us as the other zombies fell upon him, their nails digging into his smooth stomach and dissecting him bit by bit.

            No noise could leave my body as I watched in horror. A gunshot rang out and we all cast our eyes on the man who stood inside the courtyard, a double barrel shot gun sticking its way between the iron bars of the fence. James shot another round into the skull of a second zombie. The creature fell back against the tree, motionless. James reloaded the gun and continued to shoot.

            Destiny seemed to stir, her eyes becoming glossy as she blinked. Her face paled. She looked down at what remained of her boyfriend. Her mouth was wide, fear now reflected in her eyes.

            “Destiny!” I cried, catching the startled girl’s attention. “Don’t move, we will get you down.”

            “Andrew…” she murmured.

            I had to force myself to continue speaking. “Destiny, look at me. You’re going to have to come back in the same way you went out,” I tried coaching. “Now pull yourself forward. Drop the leaf and slide back across the branch. We will pull you in!”

            Destiny ignored me, her eyes looking at the leaf in her hand. She twirled the stem. “I can’t.” Her voice was soft, pulled away by the light wind.

            “Destiny! Come on!” I called.

            The girl looked up at me with an expression I had become all too familiar with.

            “Destiny, no. Don’t you dare,” I cried.

            Her thighs loosened the grip that had been placed round the branch. Her body fell forward in a slow graceful movement, almost like an Olympic diver. Before her body had even hit the ground, the zombies were upon her, tearing into her milky skin with such vigor. Only a few screams were emitted before her throat was torn from her body.

            I pulled Lainey and Hannah away from the window, my eyes frozen open in horror. Daniel and Hector ran past everyone crowded on the stairs and into the hallway. I raced after them, an echo of guttural gagging still present in my ears. My feet beat against the ground, each step as deep and loud as a native drum. Daniel and Hector each grabbed a rifle from the front closet. They left the door open as she darted through the front door and down the porch stairs. I looked to my right, my eyes gazing over the outrageous loot of weaponry. There were things in there that I had never seen; things that looked manmade and thrown together in haste. All were spattered with flakes of dry blood. I reached into the shallow closet and pulled what my hand first touched. It was a shotgun; one of lesser design than the hulky one currently possessed by James.

            A chorus of gunshots demanded my attention and I found myself breaching the outdoors for the first time in over two weeks. The warmth of the sun was enough to get me to stop, but I pushed past its seduction. I rounded the corner of the brick manor to see Daniel, Hector, and James with the barrels of their guns all pushed through the iron bars of the fence. Most of the dead creatures were too focused on the glob of flesh and bone pushed into the grass to pay any mind to the three men knocking them out one by one. I hastily lifted the weapon to my eye, its butt pressed flush against my shoulder. My finger pulled the trigger, and a round fired. The bullet nicked an iron bar, its direction deflected into the gut of a dead man. The creature’s stance barely faltered.

            James looked over his shoulder with a sudden swing. Once seeing that it was I who had fired the rifle, he rolled his eyes and focused his attention back on the gate. His frustration was enough to get me riled. I threw the shotgun against the side of the brick wall and jumped for the gate. I opened it and pushed my way through the five or so zombies that were pushing to get in. I felt their bones and rubbery skin slide across my back as the struggle lifted my shirt a few inches. Their weight pressed down on me as the men send rounds through their skull, their bodies still trying to pull me down even in their second death.

            I crashed to the ground, blades of glass slimy with Andrew and Destiny’s blood. The young teenager’s body was all but there. Her legs had been picked clean, leaving two debased lines of bone. The skin of her stomach and chest had been pressed so far into the earth that she was nothing more than flesh colored paste. All that remained were her shoulders, bits of her neck, and a twitching head. Her mouth was open, blue eyes still wide with a bit of glossy life. I could see her pain, feel it radiate off of her as I hovered over her. Her eyelids shut slowly, only to instantly open with a new design. They were now yellow with a merging red ring. She had turned in the mere blink of an eye.

            A large hand suddenly wrapped around my neck, pulling at my long brown hair. My heart was too heavy to even bother releasing a startled scream. I was pulled up and back by James, the man yanking me so hard that I spun around directly into the arms of Daniel. He held me against his chest as I heard a sickening crack. James had kicked Destiny’s skull in, instantly sending her to her second death. Daniel held me close to him, his left hand clutching his rifle and his right pushing deep into my lower back. My rapid hot breaths created a head between us as my intermittent heaving started to overwhelm me. Daniel pulled me back inside the courtyard. James and Hector shut and locked the gate, making sure there were no more lurking zombies.

            The return to the darkness of the manor was sudden. I crashed to the dark wooden floors, my knees burning as my body slid against the sleek material. The bones of my elbows rolled against the ground. My back was arched and my head was bent towards my chest. I felt a presence crouch beside me, the unmistakable hand of Daniel caressing my back as I let out all of the erratic breaths and screams that I had been keeping in.

            “Burn the zombs,” I heard Daniel mutter. “And cut the tree down.”

            There was a shuffling near my head and a quick beam of light let into the room before the front door was shut and locked. Two bodies had exited to follow his command. I didn’t care whom at this point. My thoughts were elsewhere.

            After an indefinite amount of time had surpassed, albeit my grieving had only just begun, I sat up back onto my legs. My fingers held onto one another against my knees. My chest was sunken in, my back bent like a cripple. My head slowly turned to the left, my eyes looking up each step until they settled on the group of silent onlookers that stood at the top. The heads of the little ones were pressed between the legs of the sullen teenagers. The young adults stood with mouths covered and avoiding eyes. Kora and the Reverend were still.

            Like a heavy weight, my head rolled forward, falling back a bit to see Hector sitting in the plush chair by the grandfather clock. His head was bent towards his knees, his expression concealed by a dark shadow. James and Aaron stood directly before me. The darker man’s gloved fingers were still tightly wrapped around his rifle. His sharp-featured face held no emotion as he watched me.

            “I made a promise,” I rasped. “Even within the walls of a brick sanctuary, I cannot keep it.”

            “Audrey,” Daniel whispered beside me.

            “She was sick,” I continued. “And I didn’t even try to help her.”

            “Audrey, don’t,” Daniel said. His hand was still on my back and his voice was softly flowing towards my ear.

            “And I had judged them both. Judged them. And I didn’t even know them.”

            Daniel let out a low sigh, his neck relaxing to let his head fall forward. There was a long and heavy silence that filled the manor. We had all seen strangers parish, even loved ones. Regardless of the relationship, or lack-there-of, there was always a kind of sadness and disparity that followed a death. To have chalked Andrew and Destiny up as two unimportant, ignorant youths of the twenty-first-century was a mistake on my part; a mistake that I would never have the chance to ask forgiveness for.