“Aaron, we don’t have time for this,” Sam said. “What are you doing?”
“Rule number one, Nikki, is don’t panic. Just think. Watch them, look at how they move. You need to be able to spot one if you’re out in the world in a second.”
Nikki focused on the slow mob and tried to focus her eyes in the dark. The moon provided just enough light to make out their shapes.
“There’s eight of them.” She hugged herself to fight the chill she was feeling. “What is that noise they’re making?”
“Good. Forget the noise. It’s scary, I know, but ignore it. Now one or two, you can outmaneuver and work around. Eight, you’re either gonna have to run or kill them.”
Nikki was afraid, but Aaron and his calm voice helped steady her nerves.
Sam leaned down next to Aaron. “We need to move. We can kill them all from behind the fence.”
“Teach Nikki how to shoot.”
“What? Are you kidding?”
“No. She needs to learn.”
“Aaron, you don’t even know how to shoot a gun. This isn’t the time or place for this.”
He stood up and nocked an arrow. He released, and his aim was dead on, even in the dark. A corpse near the front of the mob fell as the arrow pierced its skull.
“Don’t need a gun.”
Aaron flashed Sam a smile. Nothing about a mob of undead shuffling toward them frightened him in the least.
Sam had the feeling that Aaron was hiding something.
“Shit, what the hell am I doing?” Sam muttered as she knelt next to Nikki.
Aaron watched as Sam gave Nikki the quickest crash-course on firing a weapon in history. She told Nikki to use both hands and aim for the head. There was also recoil she had to watch out for.
Nikki killed every walker. She hesitated at the walkers she recognized, whom not even ten minutes ago had been her living friends. The last one she shot was only a few feet away. Sam had her hand on her combat knife the entire time, but there was no need for it.
She grabbed her gun from the shaking teen’s hands.
“You did great, Nikki,” Aaron said. “You should never be outside the school at night, or any time for that matter. At least not until you get some training.”
Nikki was crying. Aaron put an arm around her shoulders and gave a gentle squeeze. Perhaps Sam was right, it was the wrong time and place, but Nikki needed to know how the world worked beyond the fence.
He felt guilty as he helped her to her feet. The kids were watching him, trying to imitate him, and it cost a few of them their lives.
Aaron and Sam walked Nikki back to the school. They found Richardson and explained what happened. He took Nikki to the cafeteria to calm her down while Aaron and Sam grabbed a few torches to burn the corpses. They stopped by the forge to light them.
“What the hell was that about?” Sam asked. They walked across the parking lot back to the front gate.
“Someone needs to teach her. Everyone’s too scared to gather the kids and take them to the Pit, teach them about walkers.”
“So what did you get out of that?”
“Nothing. Hopefully Nikki got something.”
Sam was quiet a moment. “I, uh, wouldn’t even have climbed the fence if you weren’t there.”
“Really? Why not?”
A sudden wave of anger overcame her as old memories flooded back. She faced him as they stopped near the dead corpses.
“Because no one would have done it for me,” she said. “When I was her age, I looked out for myself. If the corpses weren’t closing in, the fucking sick rapists and slavers were. Every day, a fight to find food and water. I don’t need anyone to take care of me.”
He shook his head as he put his torch to the first corpse until it caught on fire. “I got bad news for you.”
“What?”
“I’m looking out for you now. So get used to it.”
She was quiet as she watched him move from corpse to corpse. She replayed the scene with Nikki in her mind. Aaron hadn’t hesitated to help her. He never hesitated to help anyone. In a world full of walking corpses and bad people, even apathetic people like Sam, Aaron tried to be the best person he could be.
She didn’t like how she was starting to feel.
Chapter 10
Aaron knocked on Sam’s door. He waved to Scott as he passed by in the hallway. Scott gave him a pat on the back for how he handled Nikki’s situation last night. People were a little nervous that eight walkers were just outside the fence, and some of their young had lost their lives, but were still glad Aaron and Sam were on the fence to handle it.
Everyone already liked Aaron, and couldn’t stop talking about him.
“Sam?” he said to the door. “You in there?”
He slowly opened the door. He could see Sam wrapped under a sheet on her mattress, one leg sticking out. Judging from how much leg he saw, he guessed she wasn’t wearing anything. For the first time, he saw a scar on her right thigh. He had no doubt she had her share of scars.
The morning sun threw light across her room through the curtains, but she was sound asleep. Aaron couldn’t blame her, as he was tired himself. He nudged her shoulder.
“Sam. Wake up for a second.”
She pushed his hand away, then shot upright when she realized she wasn’t alone. She looked at Aaron with wide eyes and pulled her sheet to her chin. “Aaron, what the hell are you doing?”
“I knocked this time,” he said. He sat in the chair opposite her mattress. “I really did. You didn’t answer.”
“That’s ‘cause I was asleep. We were up all night. Shit, how are you even awake?”
He tried to keep his eyes steady. “Do you always sleep with nothing on?”
Her face grew hot. She pulled her leg under the sheet. “I’m getting sick of you seeing me naked. Turn around.”
He complied as she got dressed.
“How’s the girl? Nikki, is that her name?”
Aaron thought it was strange that Sam barely knew anyone.
“She’s fine. She’s with Susan, at the garden. Just trying to keep her head on straight.”
“Hell, aren’t we all?”
“Yeah. Listen, Sam, I need your help with something.”
“What’s that?”
“I need you to teach me how to drive a truck.”
Sam laughed. She grabbed him by the shoulder and turned him around. Aaron gave her a nod. Even with only a few hours’ sleep and bedhead, she was beautiful. She ran a brush through her hair.
“What are you talking about?”
He held up a piece of paper. “I’ve been asking people about things we need. I’ll go get everything, but I don’t know how to drive.”
“That’s not gonna happen, Aaron.”
“Why not?”
“Everyone likes you. I know that. But you’ve only been here a few days. Richardson isn’t gonna let you drive. Besides, he only gives the keys out to Garrett and his little puppet Ray.”
“I saw what happened the last time they took the trucks out. You got left with me.”
“I know. I don’t like the rules. I’m just saying, forget about it.”
“I’ll go talk to Richardson.”
Sam smiled. “This I gotta see.”
They found Richardson near the back gate of the school chopping down a tree while Larry split wood. They had an audience. Some of the kids were playing and watching them.
“Hey, Richardson,” Aaron called. “Can we talk for a second?”
Richardson buried his ax into the tree and warned the kids not to touch it. He approached Aaron and Sam while wiping sweat from his forehead.
“Best time to cut wood,” he said. “It’s not too hot yet. How’s Nikki doing?”
Aaron shrugged. It was strange how everyone thought he knew everything. “She’s with Susan. She’ll be alright. Listen, I want to take one of the trucks out.”
Richardson chuckled. Aaron was irritated at everyone laughing in his face.<
br />
“No can do, Aaron.”
“Look. Just tell Sam to teach me to drive. I’ll go out alone, no big deal. No one gets hurt.”
“And what if you get yourself killed? You think about that? Then we’re out a truck, and a person everyone looks up to.”
“I’m not gonna get myself killed.” He paused a moment. “People look up to me?”
“No one ever goes out alone, Aaron. That’s why we have teams, led by Garrett and Ray.”
“Assholes.”
Richardson tried to hold in his laughter. “Anyway, ask them if they’ll let you join them, if you want to get out that bad.”
“Aaron doesn’t go without me,” Sam said.
Aaron turned to look at her. He knew they were friends. Still, her loyalty was surprising. It wasn’t long ago that Sam told him to his face she would leave him to die if she had to.
“Sam, thank you, really, but I’ll be better off taking the truck out alone. Just teach me how to drive right here.”
“You go out, I’m going out with you.”
“No.”
“You don’t tell me no. I do what I want. Who do you think you are?”
“Hey!” Richardson said. “How old are you two again?”
Aaron and Sam looked at each other. He went first.
“You said the corpses first rose up twenty-three years ago? I’m twenty-three then. I was born on the first day.”
“And I’m twenty. Maybe twenty-one?”
Richardson shook his head. The joke sailed right over their heads. “Look, I know you think Lexington might not be as bad as Baltimore, and you might be right. Still, there’s no way you, by yourself, even if you could drive, can get anything from around here.”
“You’d be surprised.”
Richardson rolled his eyes. He couldn’t believe he was going to waste gas for this. Part of the reason he was compromising was Sam. Aaron was bringing a side out of her he’d never seen before. She was focusing that strength of hers on a friendship, instead of what deals she could make.
He looked at her. “Samantha, you know where the keys are. Take Aaron to wherever he wants to go. Show him it’s pointless, then come back here. If you spot some easy gas, grab it.”
Richardson went back to chopping wood without another word. Sam gave Aaron a smile, pleased at her little victory.
“Like I said. You go out, I’m going with you. You ready?”
Aaron said nothing. He was frustrated. He just wanted to help, and Richardson and Sam were actually preventing him from doing so. He understood Richardson’s thinking, but he didn’t understand Sam’s.
“Why are you coming with me?” he asked.
They entered the school. She led him through the hallways to the old office where Richardson kept the truck keys.
“Cause we’re friends.”
“I know. Larry and Richardson are friends too. I bet they wouldn’t risk their lives for each other though.”
She shrugged. She didn’t feel like analyzing her feelings for Aaron now. “I’m safe with you. You’re safe with me. I don’t want you going into walker territory without me.”
Aaron watched her as she fished the keys out of an old desk drawer. He knew he was a lucky man.
“Fair enough.”
* * *
The drive through Lexington wasn’t too long, only about twenty minutes. Like driving on the interstate, there were times Sam had to slow down to maneuver around old cars, fallen light poles, masses of dead bodies, and packs of walkers milling about.
Aaron helped her navigate with a map he’d found in the library. He wanted to head to an old Home Depot. He helped his family raid one when he was just a child. He knew all these years later there might not be anything to get, but even just a little wood would help out. Susan needed two-by-eights and soil for flower beds in the vegetable garden. Travis needed plywood and tools to fix the smokehouse. Larry needed two-inch hose to fix two of the broken shower stalls. Everybody needed something. Lexington was a good place. It kept people alive, but people were shaken up. The death of Nikki’s friends was enough to get people talking and afraid. Hope was starting to dwindle, and Aaron wanted to make sure that didn’t happen.
His own spirits fell when Sam pulled into the back of the Home Depot parking lot.
There were walkers everywhere. Maybe a few hundred or so stumbled around, and surely there were more inside the old store. Cars and trucks were turned over on their sides. Old carts littered the lot. One walker pushed one in a circle constantly, nearly tripping over its own feet.
Aaron would have laughed if he weren’t in such a bad mood.
“See?” Sam said, gesturing in front of them. “Nothing here but corpses.”
Aaron said nothing. He’d hoped that the corpses would be manageable, that he and Sam could just park the truck by the front door and quickly load up. Two sets of hands were better than one, and with her help, he’d have no problem crossing items off the list he’d written.
But the corpses weren’t manageable. Even if every single person at Lexington High came along, with weapons, they would all die within an hour.
He wouldn’t risk Sam’s life.
To drive the point home, walkers made their way to the truck. They started beating on the sides. It was just light tapping at first, but as more walkers came, the louder it got. A few started beating on Sam’s window. She started driving slowly to throw the corpses off.
“I’m sorry, Aaron,” she said. She put a hand on his arm. “But you probably needed to see this. It’s why we risk our lives getting supplies in the city. You getting things for just yourself in Baltimore is one thing, but for sixty people? Not quite the same. We can’t stay here, they’ll be in this truck in minutes. We gotta head back.”
Aaron didn’t argue.
He wasn’t happy, but he wasn’t done yet.
Oh well. Plan B it is.
He had seen where Richardson kept the keys to the truck. He also watched every move Sam made while driving.
He glanced at the Home Depot in the side mirror as they drove away, knowing he’d be back again soon.
* * *
Sam was pulled from her sleep by someone knocking at her door. She slowly looked around her pitch black room. It didn’t feel like dawn. It was still the dead of night.
The knock came again, more forcefully this time.
Aaron, I’m gonna kill you.
“Hold on!” she shouted. She didn’t care if she woke up her neighbor in the classroom next to her. “Give me a second to get dressed.”
She dressed in clothes that were so old and torn she wouldn’t have a choice but to throw them away soon. She was surprised Aaron hadn’t just barged in like he always did. She opened her curtains for the moonlight and opened the door.
It wasn’t Aaron.
“Richardson?”
She’d seen Richardson angry before, but it was rare. He knew he always had to be positive, keep the happy face. Everyone looked to him as the leader, and as a leader, he couldn’t afford to be seen angry or unhappy.
This was not one of those times.
“Where is he?” he asked.
Sam wiped the sleep from her eyes. “Is it still night?”
Richardson stepped inside and gently closed the door behind him.
“Where is he?” he repeated.
“Who?”
“You know damn well who. Aaron.”
Like Sam always did whenever someone pointed anger at her, she got angry back. “I don’t know. It wasn’t my turn to babysit him.”
“Stop feeding me that shit, Samantha. You two are best buddies now. You’re always spending time together.”
“He doesn’t sleep here, Richardson. He lives in the library.”
“I know.”
Sam felt a knot in her chest. “And he’s not there?”
Richardson took a deep breath, trying to get his anger under control. “When did you see him last?”
“We had dinner together in the ca
feteria. He said he had some things to do, and he’d see me later.”
“Did he say anything about going out on his own, or just flat out leaving?”
“No.”
“Well, one of the trucks is gone. I talked to Gabe who was watching the gate. Aaron left, and told Gabe I said he could go. And dumbass Gabe believed him.”
Sam couldn’t believe what she was hearing. “What?”
“He left, Samantha. He stole our truck, and he’s gone.”
She was stunned. She felt miserable as she sat on her mattress.
He’s gone.
“He wouldn’t just leave,” she said. “He’ll be back.”
Richardson almost laughed. “Oh, he will?”
“Yeah.”
“And why is that?”
“Cause we’re friends.”
Richardson looked down at Sam. He’d never told anyone before, but when Sam first came to Lexington, he almost thought of her as a daughter. It was only when Sam made it clear she wanted nothing to do with anyone that he kept his distance.
He sat next to her.
“Samantha, I’m so glad you finally made a friend. And I don’t know him too well, but I think Aaron is a good man. I don’t think he’d steal a truck and run, but you know he isn’t coming back.”
She turned to look at him. The moonlight revealed just enough of her face to show her pain. “Why do you think that?”
“Because he’s dead by now, whatever it was he was trying to do. He didn’t even take his bow with him. And everyone says he doesn’t shoot a gun? He’s already dead then.”
His words made sense, but Sam couldn’t bring herself to believe them.
“No. He’s not dead. He lived in Baltimore, with the walkers. He’s tough.”
It broke his heart to see her upset. He didn’t think anything could ever upset her.
“I’ll leave you alone,” he said. “Sorry to wake you. I was hoping Aaron had said something to you.”
“No, nothing.”
Emotions Sam had little experience with attacked her. She was angry, afraid, hurt.
Why would Aaron leave? What is he doing? Why didn’t he ask me to come with him? Why didn’t he say goodbye? I’m supposed to be his friend.
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