by M. J. Haag
“What would you do if I took my shirt off right now?”
“I would tell you it’s too cold for a human to sleep without one.”
When the brush swiped free on the next stroke, I stepped away from Ghua.
“Eden,” he said in a chiding, impatient tone.
If I was thinking about staying, I had to know what I’d be compromising. With my resolve set, I gripped the bottoms of my shirts and pulled them off as I turned.
Ghua’s eyes went wide, and his mouth dropped open. Wearing an expression of panic, he looked at the ceiling, the floor, the door, then back to me. A sound wheezed from him a second before he slapped his hands over his face. The bristles of the brush he obviously forgot he was holding stabbed him in the eye.
I cringed as he hissed in pain and dropped the thing. Had the sight of my boobs actually just blinded the one guy who could keep me safe?
Eleven
“Eden,” Ghua said in a strangled voice, “put your shirt on, now. Peekaboo with boobs is a bad game.”
I grabbed my t-shirt, tugged it over my head, and hurried to stop Ghua, who was slowly stumbling back toward the door.
“Are you okay?” I asked.
“No. Put your shirt on.”
“It’s on. Let me look at your face. Can you still see?”
He cautiously lowered his hands and relaxed slightly as he blinked his profusely watering eyes at me. He looked fine, physically, but I had the feeling I’d just mentally scarred him.
He grabbed me firmly by the shoulders.
“Boobs are private, Eden. Never let anyone see yours again.”
I stared up into his watery gaze.
“Not even you once I’m eighteen?”
He swallowed visibly, released me, and brushed his hand over his mouth.
“No.”
“What happens when I’m eighteen, and I take my shirt off again? Are you going to think that it means I want to have sex?” I pressed.
“No, Eden. I will keep my word. I will be your friend and keep you safe.”
I desperately wanted to believe him.
Sighing, I picked up the brush and finished brushing my hair. Ghua said nothing as I crawled into bed and moved to the far side to make room for him. He surprised me by closing the door and sitting in front of it instead of joining me.
We stared at each other from across the room. Seeing him naked had upset me deeply, and I couldn’t help but wonder if I’d just done the same to him.
“Did I scare you, Ghua?”
“Go to sleep, Eden.”
I closed my eyes, and for the first time in forever, I went to sleep feeling safe, not just from the infected but Ghua too.
* * * *
The soft sound of Ghua’s steady breathing tickled my awareness. I opened my eyes and found Ghua lying on top of the covers next to me. Weak, early morning light came in through the windows, proof that I’d lived through another night. Thanks, once more, to Ghua.
Unsure when he’d finally come to bed, I didn’t move to get up. Curled on my side, I studied his sleep-relaxed face. His pointed ear rested against the pillow, partially buried in his long black hair. The darkness of him didn’t seem so weird anymore, and that worried me. Anyone who was foolish enough to be lulled by anything these days ended up dead. Yet, I was so tired of fighting everything all the time.
If only I could trust what Ghua said. He’d proven so many times that I was safe with him. Now. When he thought me a child. How many times had I been burned by someone’s smooth promises since the quakes, though?
Outside of Homer, a “family” that had supposedly stopped to help us when Dad was syphoning gas out of an abandoned pickup, convinced us that a bigger group was safer. They’d taken off with our supplies and vehicle in the middle of a scavenge run.
That was how my parents and I had ended up being taken by the first group of raiders. They’d promised to keep us safe with their guns while we searched houses. Only, their guns had been trained on us as often as they’d been trained on any infected. And, all that so-called protection hadn’t kept my parents safe. When an infected bit Dad, he told me to run.
I’d escaped one group just to get snatched up by another. Oscar promised everyone equal shares for equal work. The food might have been equal, but the work hadn’t been. And just like the rest, he’d wanted more than he’d said too.
Everyone lied. Everyone wanted more than what they said. Words were just used as smooth promises meant to hide darker intentions.
I gazed at Ghua and tried to ignore the hurt consuming my chest. I just wanted someone to be nice. To care. I wanted Ghua’s offer of friendship to be genuine. I wasn’t looking for a free ride, just a ride that wouldn’t require me to lie on my back and spread my legs.
Unable to help myself, I shifted closer to Ghua and laid my head on his shoulder, soaking up the comfort of his nearness. His hand immediately smoothed over my head and down my back.
“Did you sleep well?” he asked, his voice a husky rumble, proving I’d just woken him.
“Yeah. Sorry for waking you up.”
He turned his head toward me. The last thing I expected to feel was the warm brush of his lips against my forehead.
“It was time, anyway,” he said. “Are you hungry?”
I nodded, trying to suppress my shock.
He rolled away from me and got out of bed in one fluid move.
“I will pack the bag and leave a can of food out for you.”
He left the room without looking at me. I lightly touched my forehead where his lips had pressed. My chest gave a weird squeeze, and I quickly rubbed the spot to erase the feel of the kiss.
Frowning, I got out of bed and quickly changed into the clean clothes I’d set out the night before. When I joined him downstairs, he had my coat and boots ready along with the can of food.
“There are a few infected outside. Stay in here and eat while I remove them.”
Relieved he didn’t mention the kiss, I slipped into my boots.
“I think you need to find a better way to kill,” I commented. “Ripping off heads is way too messy. You’ll run out of clean clothes at this rate, and your size isn’t easy to find.”
“How should I kill them?”
I shrugged and looked around the kitchen.
“I usually use a knife and stab them through their mouths. It works, but it’s dangerous because they could bite.”
“Their bites do not bother me.” He pulled one of the knives out of the butcher block on the counter, then replaced it. “I might still get messy with a knife.” He moved off to open the closet just off the kitchen and withdrew a mop.
“I will try killing them with this.”
“A mop? That’s for cleaning floors.”
He grunted, already on his way toward the front door. I grabbed my food and rushed to the nearest window.
Each of the five infected stopped their listless shuffle and turned toward the sound of the door opening. Ghua stepped out onto the porch and gripped the end of the mop as the infected broke into a run. With a twist, Ghua removed the useless mop head, leaving behind a jagged metal end.
The first infected to reach Ghua got the mop handle shoved into its mouth so hard it erupted from the back of its head. With a jerk, Ghua freed his weapon while knocking back the second infected with his elbow. The woman stumbled back a step, giving Ghua enough room to twist around and skewer her the same as the first.
With lightning fast speed, he dislodged her then spun his weapon around to catch the next infected through the middle. It didn’t kill the man, though. Ghua swung the mop to the side, sending the skewered man into the fourth infected. Both tumbled to the ground. Ignoring them, Ghua jabbed the metal end of the mop through the final infected to reach him. The two he’d knocked down never had a chance to get back to their feet before they joined the rest.
It had only taken him a minute, maybe two, to kill all of the infected. Stunned, I could only continue to stare as Ghua straightened
, looked down at himself, then started toward the house. Not a spot of blood dotted his clothing.
“This works well,” he said, coming inside.
He noticed me by the window and moved toward me.
“Where do you want to go today?”
How was it that the world could open up and offer so many more possibilities in just a span of a few seconds? I’d seen Ghua kill a single infected, and I’d witnessed the aftermath to know that he could kill many of them. But, until I’d seen it, I would never have believed the level of his abilities. I now understood his certainty that he could not only keep me safe but have an easier time finding food than me.
“I’m not sure,” I answered. “But, I’m ready to get going.”
“You didn’t eat your breakfast yet.”
“I’ll eat while we walk.”
The brisk morning air made my nose cold within minutes as we made our way further east. I had no idea where I was going. I was still just seeing how long he’d let me keep walking to the east. If we hit the ocean, perfect. I’d find a nice mansion on the beach to take over.
When I finished my can of food, I tossed it aside but pocketed the spoon.
“Would you like me to carry you?” Ghua asked.
He already had the backpack and mop weapon weighing him down.
“Nah, I think your hands are full enough.”
“Did you remember to brush your teeth when you went to the bathroom?” he asked, treating me like the kid he thought me to be.
“Yep.” I patted the pocket that held the toothbrush. “I can still taste the mint around the dog food.”
He grunted and turned his head to the south.
“What is it?” I asked softly when his pace slowed.
“It sounds like a vehicle.”
Without warning, he picked me up and started running.
“Are we running toward the sound or away?” I asked, still unable to hear what he’d heard.
“I’m keeping pace. I want to see where it goes.”
The “where” turned out to be a subdivision on the outskirts of a small town. Ghua stopped before we reached the first house.
“I want you to wait in a tree,” he said, setting me on my feet and taking off the bag.
“No way. I hated being up there.”
“It kept you safe.”
“It also trapped me. I would have killed myself trying to get down on my own if, for some reason, you never came back for me.”
He grabbed the back of my head and pulled me in close to press his forehead against mine.
“I will always come back for you.”
I shook my head in frustration. Just because he couldn’t get infected didn’t mean he couldn’t die. The thought brought me up short.
“When you said you lived in caves for thousands of years, you meant your people, not you, right?”
“Both. My brothers and I have lived many lives in darkness. Why?”
“Does that mean you can’t die?”
“In Ernisi, our old home, we never aged; and we never truly died. We were reborn.”
“And up here?”
“Here we can truly die.”
“This is not making me feel better,” I whispered.
He pulled back to brush his lips against my forehead again.
“I will be back, my Eden.”
Then, the rat bastard threw me into a tree again.
“You better hurry up,” I whispered down to him. He nodded and ran toward the houses at the same time gunshots rang out.
Guns meant people. And, possibly the same caliber of people like the gunmen from the bunker. They’d shoot holes in Ghua without hesitation.
I looked at the ground and swore. My chances of making it down safely were slim. Ghua had, yet again, picked a tree where the lowest branch was at least eight feet off the ground.
The faint echo of someone’s anguished cry reached my ears, and I frowned. Gunshots were bad. Yelling was worse. Whatever was happening couldn’t be good.
Using the monkey skills I’d learned from my last stint in a tree, I worked my way down to the lowest branch. Unlike the last time, Ghua didn’t magically show up to help. I carefully scooted forward until the branch started to bow slightly under my weight. The narrower branch made it easier to turn and dangle from my hands. I dropped the three feet to the ground and landed with a soft crunch of dried leaves.
Grabbing the bag, I dug out my knife then took off in the direction of the sounds. Twice, I almost ran into an infected sprinting toward the source of the noise. I moved forward cautiously, using the houses and cars in the streets as cover.
When I found Ghua, I couldn’t believe my eyes.
He stood near a woman who lay sobbing uncontrollably on the ground. She was clutching at a dead man beside her. Infected bodies lay in a scattered ring all around them. As I watched, Ghua fought off two more, removing their heads before glancing at the woman.
“You must be quiet,” he said. “They will keep coming.”
She didn’t seem to hear him in her grief. If she didn’t stop, she’d bring every infected within miles. She probably already had. We needed to get out of there.
I looked around then sprinted from my cover. Ghua saw me at the same time an infected, hiding behind the opposite house, did. The infected bolted in my direction, its groaning wail echoing down the street. Another answered not far away.
With two infected trailing behind me, I ran all out, the bag bouncing on my back.
Ghua took two steps toward me and motioned for me to run faster. Behind him, the woman continued to wail. As soon as I passed Ghua, he roared and attacked my two followers. Not pausing, I grabbed the woman by the shoulders and hauled her away from the man. She flopped on the pavement, not even trying to use her legs in her effort to get back to the man.
Tears streamed down her shock-stricken face as her eyes remained locked on the dead man. She needed to snap out of it.
The crack of my hand coming down on her cheek was immediately followed by Ghua’s sharp voice.
“Eden!”
However, the slap had done its job. The woman stopped making noise and looked at me with a dazed expression.
“If you want to die, that’s fine. But I don’t. You need to stop screaming,” I said.
Tears continued to stream down her face as she suddenly clutched at me.
“They killed him. They took our kids and killed him when he tried to stop them.”
“Who?” I asked.
“The men with guns. They took our kids.” She was starting to get loud again.
I grabbed her head between my hands and forced her to look at me instead of the man.
“Do you love them?”
She nodded.
“Then shut up. You can’t help them if you’re dead.”
She sniffled.
“I can’t help them, anyway.”
Another infected groaned and rushed toward us from around one of the houses. Ghua quickly killed him.
“Come on,” I said, releasing her. “We need to get out of here. You can explain what happened once we’re somewhere safer.”
“I need my wheelchair.”
I jerked back and looked at her again. This time I saw the thinness of her legs through the jeans covering them. I wanted to swear. Instead, I looked around for her wheelchair and found it tipped over nearby and covered with infected blood.
“Ghua, we need that,” I said, pointing.
He righted the chair and used his shirt to quickly wipe off the blood.
“Are you hurt anywhere?” I said, focusing on the woman once more.
“No. They left me alone when they had what they wanted. I was useless to them.”
Ghua brought the chair over and lifted her into it.
Together, we silently worked our way through the yards to get back to the trees. Ghua killed anything that came at us from between the houses, until the chair got stuck. He scooped up the quiet woman without missing a step.
&nb
sp; “Please don’t leave my chair,” she begged.
Ghua quickly used some wash line from someone’s backyard to rig a way for him to carry the chair on his back so he could still use his arms for her.
No one talked as we avoided infected and put more distance between the houses and us.
Just outside of town, we found an old farmhouse. It didn’t look like much, but it had heat and water and, after Ghua cleaned it out, no infected.
He carefully set the woman on the couch and looked at her with concern. Her hair, once a cute pixie cut with highlights, had grown out, and now the shaggy mass showed a healthy mix of salt and pepper color. Her bloodshot eyes shifted listlessly around the room.
“I'm Eden,” I said, trying to gain her attention. “What's your name?”
“Nancy.”
“Nancy, who took your kids?”
“I don't know. We never saw them before. We were in town for a supply run. I was guarding the car. Russ and the kids were working together to clear the houses. I heard their truck before I saw it.”
Fresh tears started rolling down her cheeks.
“The men in the back jumped out and pulled me from my chair before I could get a shot off. The kids heard them laughing and came out from the house they were searching. Zachy put an arrow through the hand of one of the men. They threatened me with a knife to get the kids into the back of their truck and to keep Russ away.”
“The last thing my kids saw was their dad get shot when he tried to stop them from leaving with our babies.”
Her gaze focused on me.
“Will you help me find them?”
“Do you have any idea where they went?”
She shook her head, and hopeless despair clouded her gaze once more.
“They just told my daughter, Brenna, that she'd be safer in their bunker.”
My stomach dropped.
“How old is she?”
“Seventeen. Zachy is fifteen.”
I looked at Ghua.
“I think it's the same men who took me.”
Ghua bared his teeth, which made Nancy gasp. She started crying again in earnest as she gripped my hand. Terror lit in her eyes as she stared at Ghua.