I wake up feeling stiff, my head aching terribly, my mouth drier than sand paper, and the cold ground freezing me. Wait… Ground? I force my eyes open, the pure sunlight disorienting and blinding me and I fight to focus my eyes in the blurriness. When it does, I find myself staring at tree trunks while lying in a soft patch of grass under the shade of the trees. Even though I feel exhausted, I push myself to my knees to get a better assessment of the area and figure out exactly where I am. Turning around I find my best friend and roommate, Pyper, sleeping soundly with miniscule snores letting through. How did we end up in a forest? What were we doing before we got here? Maybe she knows. I crawl over to Pyper, abrasively shaking her shoulders since I want to go home, take some medicine, and sleep in my own comfy bed. "Hey, Sleeping Beauty, wake up. I want to go home." I command hoarsely and feebly since my throat is just as dry as my mouth.
"Fuck off." She grumbles, curling more into herself and trying to swat me away. I groan since I am definitely not in the mood for her right now; it's a good thing she's my best friend or I would have smacked her by now. Well, that seems like a good idea still. I don't hesitate to smack her in the back with full force, and I dearly hope she is as hungover as I am. She lets out a small pained gasp, causing a light smile on my face as I can see her in a worse state than I am.
"Wake up! Pyper!" I shout, my scratchy voice echoing in the forest and I hear groaning coming from the trees behind us. I turn around, but I'm so shocked that I have no voice to scream as I see the person, if it is a person, who walks out from the shadows. A middle-aged man with black hair, sickly pale skin, half of his face hanging off, and his left arm missing. The stench of rotting flesh hits my nose, I hold back a gag, and I go into professional mode, walking towards him.
"Sir, are you alright?" I question, going into my nurse mode. I graduated high school a year before my expected year, so I was able to apply to a college for a year-round program, and become a registered nurse. I've been working at the local hospital for over a year now. It's a good thing I'm on vacation for two weeks, but that means Pyper and I won't be able to give a surprise visit to our families back in the southwest.
"Fucking hell, Sue, did we get drunk again?" I look back to Pyper who's now sitting up, holding her head, but I don't have time to say anything before I am grabbed from behind. I scream in pain as a rough hand yanks my long brown hair back and not a second later, I am pushed to the ground. I feel the man topple on top of me, knocking the wind out of me, but the weight leaves as soon as it came. I look up in time to see Pyper kick the man off the tiny, steep hill, and not long after, I hear something breaking. I crawl next to Pyper, peeking over the hill to see the man in the bushes with his neck bent in the wrong direction, as he is lifeless. "Oh dear." Pyper whispers, sorrow deep into her throat, but she doesn't speak as more groans come from other parts of the forest and people step out from hidden places.
"We have to go!" I shout as the people reveal to look close to the man we just killed and my instincts are telling me that we're in danger right now. As they gather, Pyper and I run the opposite way from the hill and in a couple minutes; we find fences leading to a suburban neighborhood come into view. Pyper cups her hands together; I leg up onto the fence, sit on the wood, reach down, and help Pyper up quickly. Just as the sick people come into view, we simultaneously slide off the fence into somebody's backyard before they could see us. Groans and bangs come from beyond the fence; we walk backwards away from it until our backs hit the porch of the house. I hold my breath as gunshots come from a distant and the groans turn away from the fence and head off into that direction.
"What the fuck was that?" Pyper rushes out, looking pale and for a second I'm concerned that she'll pass out or something else. "We just killed someone! I just killed someone! Oh God, I feel so sick." She says, leaning against the porch to catch her breath. I just leave her alone for a minute, walking around the yard to see where we are, but this seems familiar for a strange reason. I see a covered pool, a treehouse with childish drawings, a tire swing that I want to go on, and a pink tea set at the trunk. "Sue, your arm's hurt." Pyper says and I look down at myself for the first time.
I'm wearing white poncho covers a short beige flowy dress with the same color ankle boots, dark brown leggings cover my legs, and my hair is flowing loosely down to my mid-back. A brown leather choker necklace with golden tips is wrapped around my neck and a brown leather wrap bracelet is on my left wrist. My right arm has a deep cut that must've come from when I fell down, but I don't feel the pain I should. I turn to Pyper to see her wearing a pair of black shorts with black tights underneath leading to her black boots, a tight black tank top covered by a black and white flannel; her rainbow hair is tied back in a lazy bun, and black sunglasses that take up half her face. She was a matching brown leather bracelet as I do, but that is our best friend bracelet. So we're wearing our usual clothes, but I don't understand why we're here and what happened before or what we're supposed to do. I shake off the feeling and look at the house, "Let's go see if we can get help here." I say and we head to the back door.
"Hey! Is anybody inside?" Pyper calls out, knocking on the glass door as we try to see inside. It's so dark that I can only make out the first few feet before it's covered in shadows and a blue screen in the far back. "Anybody at all?" With no response, Pyper slides the door open and we walk in, "We're coming in! We just need some help!"
"I don't think anybody is home." I tell her, looking at a coloring book with a unicorn being colored as she looks at a bowl of fake fruit. I shake off my white poncho and set it on the counter since the weather has suddenly changed from fall to spring. The rest of my clothes can do, but the poncho seems too hot to wear right now.
"I'm not sure if that's good or bad." She admits, walking into the kitchen but she doesn't go far before she screams and falls backwards. I burst out laughing, even after I see that she slipped in a pool of blood because the way she fell was too hilarious. "SHIT!" She yells, getting out of the puddle as fast as humanly possible. "That's fucking gross!" She rushes to the sink, trying to hurry and wash out the blood before it can stain her flannel. I think it's already ruined though, and I keep laughing at her. "SHUT UP!"
"Sorry dude, but that was too much." I giggle out, heading to the fridge and looking at a note left for a babysitter. Well, at least I know we're in Georgia now. Don't know how that's possible, but I guess I should stop getting drunk so I don't end up on the other side of the country. "Pie, I think we got so drunk that we're now in Georgia." I tell her, digging through the drawers, but everything has already been ransacked and there's nothing useful, but an old walkie-talkie I took. I even drink the stale cup of water near the sink as Pyper starts to take off her tights since it's completely soaked through and isn't worth saving anymore.
"Georgia? Damn. What the hell did we do? Man, I can't even remember how we ended up here." She says, now sitting entirely in the sink. "Last thing I remember was us talking about saving money for a couple of pets…"
"I'm just guessing that since I have a headache, that we probably got drunk and now we're here." I tell her, sitting on the counter next to her. "For some reason, I feel like this is familiar, but I can't remember from where."
"Same, but my head hurts too much to try to think." She says getting out with minimal blood now. "Come on; let's try to find a phone or something." I follow her into the living room, not prepared to see a door barricaded by a bookshelf, but I don't want to question it.
"Three new messages." The answering announces as Pyper clicks it and we look around the room. On the wall near the front door is a child's drawing and handprints framed and a TV is blue-screened on input. Pyper goes into a trance, looking at a photo next to the answering machine, but I leave her alone. "Message one: left at 5:43 P.M. Hey Sandra, this is Diana. We're still in Savannah. Ed had a little 'incident' with some crazy guy near the hotel, so we had to get him back to the ER and have it check out. Anyway, he's not feeling well enough to drive back tonight, so we're staying an extra day. Thanks so much for looking after Clementine, and I promise we'll be back in time before your spring break!" Diana chuckles on the message, but I'm sure my heart has stopped because I forgot how to breathe. That's why this seems so familiar…
"Clementine?" I whisper, falling down onto the couch, no longer able to hold myself up. No, it can't be. This just has to be a weird coincidence, but I have never believed in coincidences before, so why should I think that now.
"Message two: left at 11:19 P.M. Oh my God, finally! I don't know if you've tried to reach us, all the calls are getting dropped. They're not letting us leave and aren't telling us anything about Atlanta. Please, please, just leave the city and take Clementine back with you to Marietta. I've got to get back to the hospital. Please let me know that you're safe." Diana pleads before the message ends and Pyper comes over to sit by me with the picture of Clementine's family still in her hands.
"Shit…" Pyper mumbles as I take the frame from her hands, get up, and place it back onto the table stand with the answering machine. Pyper hurries to finish putting on her shoes since we probably won't stay here for much longer.
"Message three: Left at 6:51 A.M. Clementine? Baby, if you can hear this, call the police. That's 9-1-1. We love you…we love you… we love y-" The message cuts off and both Pyper and I know what happened, but this is surreal.
A moment later, the walkie-talkie in my hand comes on, "Mommy?" Pyper looks at me and I wish I could wake up from this nightmare. I turn the device to face me and hold the walkie-talkie up to my face so I could speak clearly to the small girl on the other end.
"Hello?" I answer, definitely not sounding like Diana.
"You need to be quiet." Clementine advises, and I lower my voice slightly, going to sit at the breakfast bar as Pyper stands across from me. I've seen a few people play this, but I never actually played this game by myself, so I'll just have to go on guesses.
"Who are you?" I question even though I already know the answer to the question. I finish coloring the grass on the unicorn drawing as Pyper watches the walkie-talkie cautiously.
"I'm Clementine. What's your name?" She asks.
"I'm Sue, and I'm with my friend, Pyper." I answer, looking to Pyper who smiles at me since I used her real name instead of a made up one. "Where are your parents?" I ask grimly, but she doesn't know that I know where her parents are.
"They took a trip and left me with Sandra. They're in Savannah, I think. Where the boats are." I'm just going to believe she's right because I don't know Georgia.
"You're safe, right?" Pyper chimes in, leaning across the counter to speak in the walkie-talkie. I guess she wants to talk to Clementine now, so I hand the device over to her and she takes it happily.
"I'm outside in my treehouse. They can't get in." Clementine says and Pyper walks over to the window to look at the girl. I go to the back door, looking from there instead.
"That's a good idea!" Pyper comments cheerfully, leaning on the sink counter.
"See?" I hear on the walkie-talkie, "Can you see me? I can see you guys in the window and door." Clementine says, opening the treehouse door and waving at us from there. I give her a salute as Pyper just gives her a Spock sign. I laugh for a second, but it's interrupted as Clementine screams, followed by Pyper as a zombie Sandra attacks her. "AHH!"
҉ Here I Am Again ҉