This isn’t what my life was supposed to be like, this isn’t who I am. I’m not the type of person to go around killing things – dang, before this I had trouble killing the bugs that got into our apartment. After a few years of this, what will I be like? Will we even survive?
God, years of this, years of this... tears are falling down my face, so I slow down to slip behind Cassie so she won’t see.
After a few hours of riding we stop for lunch. Cassie picks out a large tree on a hill not far from the road.
“We can have a picnic,” she grins at me and races up the hill on her bike. I try to grin but it doesn’t stay long on my face. I follow her up the hill and rest my bike on the ground, then start rooting in my backpack for food while Cassie throws a blanket on the ground. I set one can each of vienna sausages in front of myself and Cassie, and then open a large can of peaches in the middle for both of us to eat from.
I get a couple of bites of sausage in when Cassie twists away so that her back is to me. She fiddles with something, and then turns around.
“Ta-da!” she holds up a makeshift necklace – a thick black string that’s looped through a black thumb drive. “That’s for you.”
“Thank you. What is it?” I ask, taking the necklace.
“It’s a copy of the lab data.”
“Cassie,” I look at her, stunned. “I can’t,” I try to hand it back to her.
“No, go ahead. I’ve got a copy too,” she reaches in her shirt and pulls out a necklace like mine. “I just thought you should have one too, you know, just in case...” her eyes slide to the ground.
I grip my drive. “Nothing’s going to happen to you Cassie. I’ll keep a hold of this one just in case you lose yours or get separated form it again.” I slip the necklace over my head. “Thank you.”
“Okay,” she says.
“Hey, who has matching necklaces?” I ask, twirling mine.
“We do,” she grins.
We dig into lunch, eating messily but heartily, and as I get full I lean back against the tree. I’m feeling better and I have Cassie to thank for it. Giving me a copy of the lab data, yeah that was smart, but it also shows that she trusts me. She trusts me to hang on to something important, something that if used right could change the world. Looking at the little black USB drive, I realize that this is the first time that someone’s trusted me with something important like this. I want to make sure that I live up to that.
I’m savoring one last bite of peach when I notice a bird flying overhead.
“Hey Cassie, what’s that?” I point at the bird.
“It’s a bird,” she deadpans.
I smile and shake my head. “I know it’s a bird, goober, but what kind?”
She grins and looks up, shading her eyes to try and catch a better look. “I think a hawk, but I’m not sure.”
It’s the first animal I’ve seen in weeks. If animals can survive out here, maybe we can too.
We spend the rest of the afternoon riding, without seeing any other beings, alive or undead. We are seriously in the boonies. Eventually, I realize that I haven’t seen any shelter for the night – not a car or a house or anything – so as the sun begins to set, I look for a hill or something.
“How about there?” I point to a large grassy hill that has three large trees at the top.
“Sure,” Cassie agrees. We eat dinner in the same way we did lunch, with a blanket on the ground and food in between us, watching the sunset. Then Cassie starts to stretch out on the ground. I look around us and I don’t see anything, just like I didn’t see anything all afternoon, but I’m still a bit nervous. I glance at the tree behind me and notice large, strong branches.
“Hey, Cassie, just to be safe, how about we sleep in the tree?”
“Sure. That should be neat.”
She scales the tree like it’s as easy as walking up her staircase at home. It takes me a bit longer, and I gain some scrapes and bruises, but eventually I get up there. I shift around a bit, until I wind up facing a branch, wrapping my legs around it, and then kind of lying down. It’s not very comfortable, but hopefully I won’t fall this way.
“Goodnight,” I call to Cassie, and notice that she’s already fallen asleep. I watch the night deepen, very black with no moon, and try not to think any thoughts. I try to just empty my mind and think about the present – the bark beneath my cheek, the tree beneath me, the soft sounds of the night. Eventually, I fall asleep.
When I wake the next morning my cheek is scratched all over, but at least I’m still in the tree and so is Cassie. This turns out to be a very good thing, because sometime in the night we’ve attracted four zombies.
