I was laid up in bed early that morning, wishing I could smell the warm scent of pancakes and sweet syrup, or scrambled eggs and salty bacon. Or the sounds of my mom rummaging around downstairs for her favorite mug to fill with her black tea and just a tablespoon of honey, and my dad would be beside her telling her she put it in the dishwasher the night before. I could picture my dad sitting at the breakfast table with a couple slices of toast smeared with homemade strawberry jam placed in front of him with a cup of steaming black coffee and a book in one hand. I knew that by the end of the day he would already be halfway through the book and by dinner time he would regale my mom and I about the world he was getting himself lost into. Mom would roll her eyes, but I would just nod and listen because the way my dad would get lost in the tale of his book was admirable. He would get this twinkle in his eyes that wasn't really around these days, and I missed it.
I missed lots of things, like waking up early in the morning just a few minutes before the bus swung by our house and I would rush to put on clothes and brush my hair. How I had to sit in a classroom for six hours a day learning how to divide and multiply numbers, and read about how the Native Americans were happy to be moved from their homeland to make room for the European settlers, and thinking to myself what a load of crap that was. Or how about sitting with my friends at a table during lunch and trading a packet of fruit snacks for bag of potato chips, chatting away about who the best superhero was. But most of all, I missed my mom.
Her sweet smile beamed bright in my mind, flashing her perfectly white teeth with a chip in one of them. She had long, beautifully dark hair that fell down her back in rippling waves that stopped at the small of her waist. Russet dark cheeks always held a charming blush. My mother was as stunning as she was on the inside, witty and kind, gentle but strong, my dad said there wasn't a thing wrong with her. I didn't find that true though, because there was one thing wrong with her that I hadn't realized until she passed away and that was the blazing fact that she cared too much.
Everyone admired my mom for her big heart, always ready to lend a helping hand and expecting nothing in return because that was the way she was raised by her folks. 'What's so wrong with that?', you may be wondering, and I'll tell you: she died helping someone who ended up getting her killed.
It happened not too long ago, about a month I would say, and we were as happy as we could be with the world in such a disarray as it was. We had a house that was nearly untouched by other survivors, and hidden a fair distance away from any roads, an ideal place to lay low when you're smack dab in the middle of an apocalypse. I remember my mom sitting on the rocking chair outside on the front porch when I heard the faintest of screaming coming in the direction of the nearest highway. Dad was away in a nearby town scavenging for some extra supplies, and had he been here then perhaps my mom would still be alive, or maybe if I hadn't helped convince her to go she would be lying next to me in bed with her arms wrapped securely around me.
She was hesitant to go at first, worrying about leaving me by myself at the house, but I promised her I would stay in my room until I heard either her or dad come back. She still wasn't happy about it, but the screams grew frantic and I couldn't help but think that maybe they had children that needed saving, or that they were all alone after having lost their group and needed food and water. I shared my worried thoughts with her, and that seemed to help her make the decision to go, and the last that I saw of my mom was her dead body being carried in the arms of my dad through the door front door of the house. Her shirt was soaked with blood, arm bleeding from a gaping bite wound, and her once gleaming brown eyes were now dull and lifeless. A hole was gaping from the middle of her forehead.
I don't remember much after that, only that my dad buried her in a field of grass and wildflowers behind the house. He read excerpts from the Holy Bible before having me try to sing one of the songs that my moms' side of family sings at funerals. It was choppy, and I felt that I could have done better, but my dad just shook his head and leaned down to kiss my temple, saying that he was proud of me regardless, and my mom would have felt the same way. I cried then, burying my face in his chest and clenching at the fabric of his shirt. He wrapped his arms around me and rubbed my back, whispering words of comfort, and to 'just let it all out, honey.'
No matter how many times I asked, my dad would never tell me how he found my mom, or how he thought she died, so that left me to fill in the gaps myself. I imagined she had rushed to help, as she said she would, and when she found the person, they were fighting off a couple biters, swinging and slashing with whatever weapon they had. To help in anyway my mom could, she grabbed the walker and threw it down, but lost her balance and fell beside it, allowing the biter to take advantage of her state of vulnerability and pin her to the ground with its weight. Crying out for help herself, my mom looked to the person and pleaded for them to kill the monster while she had it distracted, garnering the attention of the other stray biters who converged on her like a swarm of bees. In a fit of cowardice, the person ran off into the woods, not even caring to look back as the monsters tore into my mom like a pack of hungry wolves.
However, that's all speculation, and all that I could come up with. I didn't know how my dad found her, and the more I thought about it the choppier the story got. So, after a few days of trying to find closure, I decided that enough was enough, and did my best to let the death of my mother rest where she was now, in that beautiful field with the wildflowers. I felt that if I thought too hard then it would take up residence in my heart and spread like an infection and consume me until I was bitter and angry, just like those biters.
Later that afternoon, after having eaten my fill of some assorted berries I had picked and a hefty chunk of meat from the fresh kill my dad made that morning, I was out in the backyard with my bow my mom had helped me make. She told me it was the way our ancestors made it when we still lived by our old ways, before the settlers came and in their process to wipe us out we lost the knowledge of not only making hunting bows, but a lot of other things, like our language. It was a long and trying ordeal, since it was dangerous to make a fire out in the open during the day, and the type of wood traditionally used didn't grow in our general area, so my mom and dad had to make a day trip a few miles out to find an oak tree. The process of drying out the piece of oak was the worst; it was months before my mom even considered touching it to continue the extensive work that needed to be done.
From there it was a lot of sanding and bending the wood, checking every couple of minutes to see if there were any cracks or imperfections in the oak. My mom said that if I found any cracks or splits then we would have to start the whole process over, and I wasn't too happy to hear that. It did, however, urge me to work slower and more diligently than normal.
My dad offered the idea of just going out and finding me a compound bow to practice with, but my mom just shook her head. She wanted me to learn the old-fashioned way before taking on a more contemporary way of shooting a bow, and that it was easier to just make more arrows than going out and finding them (which, I found out later, was a complete lie). Not one to argue with my mom when she was dead set on something, my dad relented and let us continue making the bow. After three months the weapon was complete. But I wasn't allowed to shoot anything until I was able to pull the drawstring back completely.
After a couple weeks of working on my strength and doing sets of push-ups here and there throughout the day, I was able to pull back the drawstring. My mom made me a complementary set of a dozen arrows that she made me watch her make because it was easier to mess up the arrow than the bow itself. Sitting there and watching her as she made notches in each shaft and glossing over the wood with a light coating of oil made me wonder what could be so difficult in making arrows. But she told me that it was easy to mistake an arrow for being straight when it wasn't, and if there was even a slight bend in the shaft the arrow was completely useless. I nodded as if I understood and continued to watch her work her hands over the wood.
"Good, now widen your stance a bit," my dad commented, tapping the insides of my feet.
I did as he told and slid my feet a couple inches further away from each other, glancing down for a split second to make sure that my feet were really shoulder length apart. My dad tsked and flicked me gently on the side. Pulling the drawstring back, I brought my right hand back to my chin and lightly pushed it into the underside of my jaw, the string now brushing my lips and nose. My breathing was steady as I looked at the red striped bullseye target a good thirty feet ahead of me, a few arrows already protruding from the wood. Some didn't even hit close to the center, others were a little better, and then there were a few that sailed past the target and now laid hidden under leaves and pine needles.
"Now, whenever you're ready, honey." He stepped back to give me space.
Tilting the bow just a hair to the right, I took aim and after a few moments I released. The string sounded with a loud twang as it snapped back into place, forcing the arrow forward at a blinding speed. With an audible thunk, the arrow lodged itself into the target, just two mere inches from the bullseye.
I grinned and turned to my dad. "Did you see that? I almost hit the center," I said excitedly.
He smiled back and patted my shoulder, saying, "good job. Now go get your arrows, we've got to get going."
The day before yesterday, my dad had me pack up most our belongings, telling me to only pack the essentials that we would need for our trip across state. I didn't argue and folded a few sets of my clothes and packed a couple books to keep me entertained when things got boring. He checked my bag over to make sure I wasn't trying to bring along some outrageous and completely useless thing like a teddy bear, but I outgrew stuffed animals when I turned thirteen four months ago.
Placing the last of my arrows back in the plastic container my dad found for me, I proceeded to amble over to the blue, four-door pickup truck. Setting my weapon in the back seat, since it really was too big and bulky to keep up front with me, I buckled myself in and waited patiently for my dad to get into the truck so we could be on our way.
I was sad that we had to leave our house, even if it really wasn't our house to begin with, but in this new world "finders' keepers" meant something. It held too many memories of my mom and the few good laughs we all shared together. Like during the winter when we all decided to start a snowball fight and mom nailed dad right in the gut, the force toppling him over and right into me. In a flurry of powdery white we were all dog-piled on top of each other before mellowing out, so my mom laid beside my dad with me wrapped in both their embraces, looking up at the sky and just enjoying the quiet.
During the colder months in Georgia, it seemed that the biters didn't move around as much, since they technically were still alive in some way and even though they couldn't physically feel the pain of frostbite they were still affected by the cold. It was times like this that we took advantage of their weakness and didn't have to worry as much about being too loud or taking turns keeping watch. We were allowed some air to breathe instead of constantly watching our backs in case of danger.
Twiddling with a rubber band on my wrist, I barely noticed the small group of men that were gradually making there way closer toward our way. They hadn't noticed us yet, but they were sure to want to look through the place since a shiny pick-up was just casually parked in the front yard of a red- bricked house. I was frozen in place, not really knowing what to do and stuck between wanting to stay in the car or going to go find my dad to warn him about the strangers.
The latter option won out, not liking the idea of being alone when the group showed up and pushed open the car door to rush inside the house to see my dad just coming down the last bit of steps with our bags in hand. He stopped short when we saw my wide panicked eyes and looked past me outside the front door, spotting the group of men now for sure making there way to our house since they probably spotted me rushing inside. He pushed my bag into my hand and signaled for me to keep quiet.
"I want you to go upstairs and lock yourself in your room. If a gun goes off, I want you to climb out the window and book it into the woods, don't stop for a damn thing." He took out a piece of paper and unfolded it to reveal a map. "I want you to meet me here in the next town over at the purple house with the rose bush out front, it ain't hard to miss," he instructed, finger pointing to the map.
If I was scared before then I was absolutely terrified now. My dad was telling me to leave him to fend off a group of strangers by himself that could possibly be armed to the teeth as if I was supposed to be okay with that. The thought of being without him to help me made tears well up in my eyes as they shifted to him, to the door, and then to the stairs.
Letting out a shaky breath, I squared my shoulders and nodded firmly to let him know I understood. He smiled sadly and leaned down to kiss my temple, reaching into his pocket to pull out a silver chain and slid it into my pocket, zipping it closed.
"I was going to give that necklace to your mom as an anniversary gift before she died, but I never go the chance. I wanted you to take it and think of her whenever you look at it. I love you, so damn much." I smiled softly and wrapped my dad in a tight hug before taking my bag and rushing up the stairs to my room at the end of the hall.
I readied the pack across my back in case I had to make a quick getaway and quietly slid the window open, popping the screen out and watching as it fell to the ground.
From where my room was positioned, I couldn't see the men approaching, but I could hear them as they began talking to my dad. Their voices were too muffled by the thickness of the walls for me to hear, but as far as I could tell, it sounded like my dad was trying to convince them to leave him alone. The strangers didn't take too kindly too that and they began trying to intimidate him, voices rising in volume. it was nearly laughable because if you ever met my dad then you would know he wasn't a man to be messed with.
It was quiet for a moment before the scuffling began and cries of pain and grunt drifted up from downstairs. Glass shattered and things toppled over and then boom.
The gunshot sounded.