~
“Say Zack,” Anna began when she saw that he was finishing taking his nightly medicine, “could you answer something for me? Have you ever been in love?”
Zack’s eyes widened when he was asked the question. It was something that seemed completely out of the blue! If she hadn’t waited a second or two, he might have choked on the water he was using to down his meds.
“Why would you ask me something like that,” Zack mustered, unable to come up with a proper answer that would satisfy her.
“Just…curious,” Anna said, pretending to sound innocent. “It’s just…I started to think about all of my old friends. We would spend lazy, summer days like this probably hanging out at the mall or at the beach. Sometimes they would bring along their boyfriends – and some their girlfriend – and I always felt a bit jealous that they were able to have that special connection between each other.”
“You’re telling me that you’ve never had a boyfriend.” Zack nearly laughed. Anna, even with her jagged haircut, was a very attractive young woman. Not necessary someone who could be a Miss July, but she had her own ways of showing off her beauty.
“I didn’t exactly say that,” Anna said, nervously laughing. “It’s just, not a lot of my relationships lasted that long. Only one lasted for several months, and I really cared about him, but I found out that he was seeing someone from another school; someone younger.”
“Sorry to hear that,” Zack said. His own father had cheated on his mother, so he at least knew somewhat of the turmoil that victims of such an unjust act go through.
“I’ve been over him for a long time,” Anna said. “None of the guys I’ve been ever really clicked with me. It may sound cheesy, but I’d like one of my romances to end up like the ones in the movies.”
“That’s not really possible,” Zack returned, without even thinking. The logical part of his mind turned off as the analytical part took over. “Remember, we’re in the middle of the zombie apocalypse, which has wiped out almost all of humanity. There really aren’t that many guys to choose from anymore. And even without that, the problem with a lot of big Hollywood romance films is that they romanticize falling in love, but they refuse show what happens afterwards. From what I’ve noticed about people, falling in love is actually pretty easy, it happens all the time. The real struggle is keeping the passion between the two of them going for as long as they can.”
Halfway through his small monologue, Zack realized that his words weren’t necessarily helpful. In fact, they may have done more harm than any good that he actually intended. He couldn’t stop himself though. By the time he finished, he looked over at Anna, who was now looking down at her cupped hands.
“Look, what I said was just rude. I didn’t mean to be so cold; I’m sorry, really.” Zack knew that a simple apology wouldn’t be much help for what he had done.
Anna then looked up, staring at Zack in the eye. Her eyes were gleaming, but it didn’t appear as if she was ready to cry. Instead, it resembled another emotion: passion.
“It’s okay, really.” Anna, said to him. “You were right about one thing though.”
Before Zack could ask her what she meant, Anna stretched out her right hand and placed it onto Zack’s cheek. The warmth of her palm, which was a bit sweaty, pierced through the warmth of his cheek. Quickly, she leaned in, pushing herself over the table that separated the two of them, and kissed his lips. Zack wasn’t quite sure how to react to this; he had a few girlfriends, and had indeed kissed them, but this felt different. He kissed her back, and then the next second, they separated. Within a few seconds of silence, both of their faces were a very dark shade of red.
“So, uh, what exactly was I right about, Anna,” Zack stammered, unable to really look at her in the eye.
“My choices are very limited, so you’ll have to do.” Anna giggled. Zack’s face squinted, catching onto the very twisted humor of his friend, or whatever she was now. This wasn’t normal behavior for her, but nothing in this modern world was actually normal anymore. “But also, you said that it’s easy to fall in love. I guess I shouldn’t really trust movies after all.”
Zack was both happy and scared. He wasn’t quite sure if he wanted a girlfriend. Their current situation aside, his life was a ticking time-bomb. Even if he found enough immunosuppression medications to last the next twenty, maybe thirty years, his body will eventually destroy his heart. He had resolved before that when that time came, he wouldn’t want anyone to be too close to him because he would be hurting them. It was conflicting because he wanted someone to be there for him emotionally, but that would mean eventually causing that person sadness.
That night was particularly different for the two of them; very different from the previous nights. They didn’t bother to turn on the television, and they had all of the lights off, save for one of their flashlights that was filled with fresh batteries. The two of them sat on the living room floor, simply talking over the dim light that was placed between them. They didn’t discuss relationships, or what the kiss earlier meant; all of that seemed to have been answered for the two of them in a much unspoken manner. Instead, the two of them asked each other about who exactly they were in their lives before this one.
Anna was an only child, and was very involved in school activities over the past few years. Before being an axe-carrying zombie killer, she had played varsity basketball for the past two years. She had also indulged herself in poetry, which incidentally allowed her to earn high marks in her English classes. While she had a wide group of friends, they couldn’t help but envy her to a point of rage because she was very much of an overachiever. In the end, she blamed it on her upbringing; being an only child, her parents were very hard on her to do well in nearly everything.
Zack was honestly indulged in hearing Anna’s story. She was a much more open person that she was in the previous existence of this world. With Zack, his past life was very different from Anna’s. He didn’t do much because he grew up with a heart disease. Even after the transplant, his behavior was so engrained into who he was, he couldn’t fight his old habits. The only thing that changed about his life was that six months after his transplant, he joined a local Kendo dojo. Zack had always been fascinated in the art of Kendo, and his doctors agreed that it would be good for him since it would help be maintain his health. He’d rarely talk to people in school and spend many lunches in the library. In fact, he didn’t have many people he would necessarily call “friends” or “acquaintances”; they were more like people who surrounded him at school. Many of the girls who he dated over the years were set up by his parents, which he felt really embarrassed about.
“You mean, you never had many friends,” Anna asked in a sympathetic voice. She reached her hand out to his.
“Not exactly,” Zack said, trailing off in his thoughts. “In Texas, before I moved over here for the transplant, there were a few people who I really considered friends. I lost contact with then some time ago, and I doubt that they’re still around now.”
“What makes you think that,” Anna asked.
“I don’t know,” Zack answered. “But, you have to figure that they’re dead, just like everyone else who’s been hit with this infection.”
“Well, don’t you want to go out and check, just to make sure?” Anna moved closer to Zack, closing in on his personal space. Instinctively, he backed away from her.
“What would be the point,” Zack asked, thinking realistically. Even if they went and he found that they were still alive, it had been years since he had even spoken to them. There was probably no way that they would even remember him, or that’s what he felt anyway. Anna didn’t quite enjoy the answer that Zack gave. She grabbed both of his hands, cupping them in hers. Zack’s eyes widened, instinctively wanting to run away.
“Don’t think like that,” Anna belted, sounding a bit like an order. “Why don’t we just get up and go? I mean, what’s keeping us here anyway? Maybe we could find more people who could help us.”
“I was doing fine by myself,” Zack blurted. A pit in his stomach caused him to feel nauseous, knowing that he said something that wasn’t fair to Anna.
Zack looked at Anna in the eye, even though he really didn’t want to. This time, she was actually allowing tears to fall down her cheeks. Anna released her grip from Zack, but he quickly reacted and held onto her hand as tightly as he could. She fought back, but he had enough energy to keep their palms connected.
“I didn’t mean that,” Zack tried to tell her, squeezing on her palms. “Look, I’m just not good at this kind of stuff. The two of us have been able to keep ourselves alive just by staying here. If we try to leave, how do we know that everything’s going to be okay? We could just be going into a giant crowd of monsters who are starving for human flesh.”
Zack still had plenty to say for legitimize his reasoning of not going back to El Paso. He was cut off however when Anna finally released herself from the boy’s grip. Zack thought that she would walk away from him, but instead, she embraced him tightly. Without thinking, he hugged her back, releasing the pressure that had been building up inside of him. He didn’t realize how tired he actually was until that moment. The clock that was mounted on the wall claimed that it was well past midnight, the longest he had stayed up for a while.
“If something happens, I’ll be right there with you. That’s what friends do for each other.” Anna’s words were warm and soft.
Immunosupression Page 8