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Sometimes, Juliet had to pinch herself hard to remember that her baby blue eyes were wide open and that she was living, not dreaming.
Sitting cross-legged on her bed with a collage of faded photographs laid out on the pink sheets, the teenage bombshell tenderly ran a finger over the familiar faces—in each picture, every one of the faces were lit up with smiles. Arms were locked, hands were held, teeth sparkled, and eyes squinting from smiling were on the camera. There was Andromeda, getting a piggyback ride from her boyfriend, Whatshisname, while Michelle photobombed the shot by flipping off the photographer. On the right of that picture, Kiersten and Aria wore neon shutter shades and stuck out their Pop Rock-stained tongues. In yet another still, Brittany, Soon-Yi, Deirdre, and Juliet herself posed in tie-dye tankinis with the calm Pacific Ocean serving as their background.
All seemed well, almost perfect, as though everything and everyone would always be okay.
All of it was so fake.
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It took losing it all in order to understand that she had everything a girl could ask for.
A mid-morning epiphany had struck the Starling's mournful heart like lightning—today was Michelle Martin's 19th birthday and there would be no one to celebrate it. Juliet came to this rueful realization over a glass of orange juice and a torn Polaroid.
In the past, there was a private, never-ending jealousy brewing between the lean blonde and the older brunette. As beautiful as both of the girls were, they had the same insecurities and – although neither would admit it publicly – they both wanted to be the other; Michelle wanted to be the captain of the San Romero Knights cheerleaders and Juliet yearned for the normalcy of a teenage girl's life, complete with an honest relationship with Nick.
Oh, Nick.
Nicknicknicknicknick.
God, did she love Nick.
In fact, everyone she knew loved Nick.
She still remembered the day when the two of them became an item. How could she forget the way the jock's cheeks burned a bright scarlet as he cutely stammered out an invitation to the movies?
He was her Prince Charming. Not like that femmy prince from Shrek either—ew! No, Nick was her...
Well, her everything really.
There were days, nevertheless, when she needed a reminder from him that his eyes were on her, and her alone. She would incessantly ask questions, such as, "Does this make my butt look fat?" or "Ugh, are you sure I don't look bloated?" Sure, her inquiries were a clear sign of insecurity, but Nick would answer truthfully. His jaw, on occasion, would drop and he trembled in pleasure by running his eyes over her body. Without any type of physical intimacy, the tall athlete made her feel like both a princess and a queen when she was nothing more than a damsel in pseudo-distress.
But Michelle could change that in an instant. Or rather, she would change that. A giggle, a flutter of her long lashes, a simple smile and a "Hello;" somehow, anything that the leggy brunette elicited, Juliet quickly took note of the way Nick reacted. The ashy blond tugged at the collar of his varsity jacket, cleared his throat, and became increasingly disinterested in whatever the zombie hunter was talking about. It didn't take long for the blonde cheerleader to become fed up, especially when the seductive teasing would happen right in front of her.
Thinking back on it now, the teary-eyed blonde wondered if their secret begrudgery was the only true thing in her life. The hatred was natural, as though the two were destined to loathe one another upon first glance.
And now, that bond – that irrevocable, abhorrent, and all-together normal bond – had been cut short.
Without thinking, Juliet rested her elbows on the wooden table and buried her face in her hands. In doing so, her half-full cup of juice tipped over from the aftershock of her trembling wails. It wasn't until the blonde felt the cold liquid pool around her arms that she tended to the mess. Grabbing a roll of paper towels, she sighed shakily and soaked up the pulpy fluids in a couple of wipes.
"Oh well, OJ before brushing my teeth leaves a funny aftertaste anyway."
After the table was clean, the sullen teenager placed the cup into the sink and walked out of the empty kitchen. She climbed up the carpeted stairs with heavy feet. As she made her way into her pink room, the pictures from earlier were still scattered across her bed. Juliet paid no mind to them and instead walked toward her closet. Sliding the mirror doors open, the blonde was greeted with a particularly messy rack of clothing. Not wanting to sort through each hanger for an outfit, she grabbed for a white shirt that hung in a less cramped corner.
Examining the shirt for any noticeable wrinkles, Juliet decided that it looked decent enough to pick rubble up in and it smelled like fresh cotton detergent, even if it was a tad too large for her slender frame. Then, she picked out the first pair of pants she saw—a stonewashed-inspired pair of jeggings—and changed on the spot. There was a long day in store for her and really, with San Romero in disarray and the school demolished, who's going to care if she skipped one shower?
As soon as her curvy body was fully clad in the casual wear, Juliet closed the door in a silent slide and stared at her downtrodden reflection in the mirror.
Today was going to be a long day, indeed.
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The polluted horizon slowly bled orange into the morning sky of San Romero, California, or at least, whatever remained of the once a bustling city. As the sun blanketed the town in its familiar warmth, the devastation was revealed—inner-city homes and offices had collapsed and killed many in their wake, which, in turn, left a powerful stench of the decayed. Scattered throughout the streets of San Romero were numbers of people, homeless or otherwise, putting forth the effort to pick up the jagged pieces of their hometown.
A mere month had passed since that day—the day an outcast took things further than shooting up the school that shunned him. He brought forth the apocalypse by summoning the undead, and by the time Death robbed him of his one soul, that bastard had murdered thousands more in his wake. That day, her birthday of all days, went down in history as the single most-devastating twenty-four hours for humanity to endure.
Juliet, sitting on her bike atop the gargantuan hill of Canterbury Avenue, peered over the city as the breeze gently danced with her sunlit tresses. Life had gotten so much more complicated after the zombie holocaust of San Romero. For starters, reporters all over the world were having a field day, as zombies were considered nothing more than a myth. Not to mention, a war on religion had been sparked. Atheists, Christians, traditionalists, you name it—an international religious debate between practitioners of several faiths had become so widespread that a TV channel in the United States and Canada was created specifically for these arguments.
It sort of made Juliet question her own beliefs.
After all, being raised to learn how to slaughter the undead isn't something that's preached about in the Bible. And to be honest, what kind of "God" would allow his earthly children to be killed by some goth with a vendetta against some school in California? In her eyes, it seemed silly to put so much faith into someone who watches from above while his potential angels are left to do the dirty work.
That's not to say that she doesn't believe in a heaven, per se. There were angels and a pure white door that led her beloved sensei, Morikawa, to eternal divinity after he had died. And then, right before the battle with the Killabilly, Morikawa had somehow contacted her by phone. At the time, she didn't want to admit it to Nick because of their bickering, but her bodiless boyfriend was right; Sensei's voice was weirdly ghostly and she couldn't help but notice the number that he'd called from was 872-2683, which – if decoded correctly using the alphabet on a dial pad – was UPA-BOVE, or up above.
Nevertheless, the thought only served to infuriate her further. So God can give an angel a free call to Earth, but cannot help out humanity, the very people He created?
She could believe in angels because she had seen them and heard their melodious harps. She could believe in demons because their rotten flesh had met the blades of her bejeweled chainsaw more often than naught. But a lack of God's prowess and of Satan's as well—how could she believe in something that's just not there, or at least refuses to be there?
Ugh, she should start her own religion and call it Starlingism.
Believe in what you want. If Catholicism's morals call out to you, but you wish to meditate like a Buddha and abstain from eating pork like a Jew, then so be it. Be true to yourself—live life the way you want to live.
Nope, scratch that. Starlingism wouldn't be a religion; it would be an entire movement. At least, it would be in a perfect world.
Sighing softly, the disheartened blonde pushed herself forward with the tip of her white shoe and pedaled down the hill.
If an international and internal struggle with religion wasn't enough, there was even more to deal with in her everyday life. Even before coverage of the zombie uprising broke, Juliet had revealed her clandestine life when she saved that boy in the parking lot. His gratitude was admittedly overwhelming and appreciative, but not everyone felt the same way.
After the Killabilly met his explosive demise, news outlets everywhere bore the Starling name in all of the headlines. The family had been publicly declared "The Darling Starlings" for their charitable work in bringing down the zombies and helping to repair their beloved hometown afterwards. Her father, Gideon, and her strong-willed older sister Cordelia both continued to serve as the nation's finest zombie slayers with unlimited access to the nation's arms; her mother, Elizabeth, started up the largest homeless shelter in the state and often spent days to keep the patrons warm, fed, and in a positive mood; and her younger, hyperactive sister Rosalind and herself dedicated themselves to cleaning up the city alongside hundreds of able-bodied volunteers.
What a joke.
Gideon and Elizabeth immediately started quarreling when it came to light that Juliet was the unlikely heroine of the attacks. Elizabeth couldn't believe for a second that her three little angels and her loving husband kept their affairs covert, even from her. Gideon's argument was that their united silence would keep her safe from worry and harm. It wasn't long after their debacle that her mom opened the homeless shelter in the south side of San Romero, far, far away from the family home on Canterbury Av. Maybe it was Elizabeth's way of punishing her family for their lies, and if it was, then it worked too well.
Cordelia, in her role as Daddy's Little Girl, felt it necessary to keep him out of the house by taking him on zombie endeavors which can last several days. At the moment, the pair had gone off to Los Angeles for three days on "classified" business, but really, who knew when those two would come back? And Rosalind...
Well, Rosalind was still crazy and weird. And for once, Juliet couldn't be happier about it. Maybe that's why the two were appointed as heads of the newly concocted Litterbug Allegiance, a government-launched project with a terribly deceiving name. Litter did not even begin to describe the ruined city. Debris and chunks of bloody meat blazoned the streets like circus confetti. Skyscrapers, most notably the Fulci Fun Center, turned into senescent tombs overnight. The death toll rose to a staggering 10,000 while hundreds more were still missing.
The reality of it all seemed unnervingly surreal. But Rosalind, despite coming off as a bit twisted, made light of the situation with her random outbursts about the size and shape of skulls that she had found over the course of a day. It seemed like the audacious girl was the only one who could smile through this horrible ordeal and the only family member who bothered to stick around the house.
"Hey, HEY! Juliet!" Speak of the devil.
Juliet squinted as the former San Romero High School came into view. The beaten sidewalk she rode on daily had been partially demolished towards the school, so she slowly tightened her pull on the handlebar breaks and came to an easy stop just short of the end of the smoothly-paved cement. Jumping off of her bike, the girl guided the pink contraption the rest of the way on foot. As she neared the former building, the familiar sounds of heels click-clacking and maniacal laughter filled the otherwise lonesome air and Rosalind – in all of her weird pop-punk glory – dashed to meet her sister with a grin. At the sight of her, Juliet herself relaxed a bit and smiled. 'Well, maybe today won't be so bad after all.'
When the youngest Starling finally met up with Juliet, her Cheshire cat grin had morphed into a pout. "Juliet, it's about damn time you showed up! You know, you're over twenty fucking minutes late and it stinks trying to manage this stupid allegiance alone."
Said blonde frowned at the sudden remark.
Yeah.
Today was going to be long.
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a/n so, how do ya'll like it so far? is it intriguing enough to continue or nah?