Chapter Three:

When Jillian and I return home, the sky is beginning to darken as the world starts winding down. We get inside the house and I quickly close the door and lock it in fear of pursuers or Walkers. I turn and head to the kitchen to organize the supplies we gathered, Jillian follows, sets down the stuff she collected and, without a world heads straight to her room and shuts the door. Great, I think to myself, I hope she didn't get messed up too bad from that, I will talk to her later.

"Let's see," I mutter to myself as I begin to make a list of our provisions, making lists is something I have always been OCD about and the apocalypse isn't going to change that now. I start taking inventory of what we have in our house plus what we just scavenged.

Provisions

27 rolls of toilet paper

6 gallons of water

2 24-packs of water bottles

Enough toiletries to last forever…

3 bottles of fruit juice

18 canned goods, 30 miscellaneous dry goods

Several other random food items

First aid kits, medicine, matches, candles

35 assorted batteries

I look at the list and begin to worry on our current food situation. We have enough water to last a while, however, fiftyish dry/canned goods can only last two people a couple of weeks, even if we ration it. I sigh in dismay, you would think that when almost 3/4's of the world's population is dead, there would be enough food to go around for years but no, idiotic looters and gangs had to go an burn down the majority of the supermarkets in this area for shits and giggles, dumb asses, I think. I begin to wrack my brain on where I can find some more food. Most of the houses down our street have already been looted by me a Jillian as well as others, and with the road getting more and more dangerous as we head away from home, I don't see any safe way to get more provisions until the gang at Krupp's is dealt with and, they must be pretty pissed that their guys haven't come back yet. I continue to think of places to go until it is half past nine when I finally force myself to give it a rest and to go to bed. I will continue thinking in the morning.

As I go upstairs, I hear sobbing coming from Jillian's room. I walk over to her door and go to open it but, it is locked tight. I contemplate knocking, but past experiences with Jillian being upset like she is stops me from going too far as she doesn't accept company when she is in this state. I sigh, and continue upstairs to my room. I guess I will deal with two problems in the morning, I think grimly to myself. I open my door and head inside, falling onto my bed in exhaustion. I almost forget to take off my weapons but, right as I do, I instantly fall asleep. That night, I dream that Jillian is killed by the thugs in the house while I stand there, helplessly watching, unable to pull myself out of the horrible nightmare.

When I awake in the morning, I find myself more fatigued than when I went to sleep and I consider going back to bed but, I manage to reluctantly pull myself out of it and get ready for the day. I get dressed and head downstairs to find Jillian preparing breakfast.

"Good morning." I say sleepily to her as I pour myself a small glass of juice and sit down at the table.

"Morning." Jillian replies as she tries to make oatmeal over one of those portable flame things.

"You're cooking oatmeal?" I say, "Are you trying to kill us?" I give a small chuckle after I say this.

"Oh, hush up and deal with it," Jillian retorts although I can tell she is slightly amused, "I figured cooking would help me take my mind of things." She says this time more seriously.

"You want to tell me about it?"

"No, I'm fine."

"You know you can tell me anything Jill." I push.

"I said I'm fine Alec, just drop it!" Jillian yells this time and spills some oatmeal on the floor. "Shit, there I go again screwing things up again like I did with Mom and Dad." She mumbles as she goes back to vigorously stirring the oatmeal.

"Is that what it is? Mom and Dad?"

"Mom, Dad, this whole goddamn world that we are living in." She says, her voice shaking. "I thought life was hard back when I had boy troubles and college, then the plague came and shit got ten times as hard."

I stare at Jillian with sympathy, however, she isn't done and I want her to get it off of her chest.

"When the plague came, I thought it wouldn't hit Michigan that hard for some reason. I came home just in case and then I fucked it all up by getting Dad killed protecting me from a stupid Walker. Then mom just went out there and killed herself right fucking next to him." Jillian is now shouting and I almost tell her to quiet down due to possible walkers lingering about but I don't want her to take her rage out on me. She continues, more softly this time, her voice barely audible, "It's all my fault that their dead and then when we almost died yesterday, I knew I was letting them down by getting us killed after I got them killed." She has all but stopped cooking and the oatmeal begins to burn. I walk over, blow out the flame, and gently sit her down.

"It wasn't your fault that they died." I say in the softest voice I can while she rests her head on my shoulder. " Dad died doing something he believed in, protecting his family, and how were you supposed to know that you were going to get attacked by a Walker? If you had died, he would have died in a sense with you." She starts sobbing and I rub her back to comfort her while I hug her. "Mom was always unwell with depression and when Dad died, she snapped. It is not your fault that she was ill and it is not your fault she died."

"I almost got us killed yesterday though." Jillian chokes out.

"To hell you did Jill, you are the reason we survived. You courage and your archery kept us alive and it gave me courage to fight back too. You did the world a huge favor by killing those assholes let me tell you." I tell her this, hoping to stop her from inflicting anymore self pity on herself.

"Thank you Alec," Jillian say, "You really have been there for me all along."

"And I plan to for the rest of our lives." I gently say, "Now, how about we eat that creation of yours before it crawls away." I walk over to what's left of the oatmeal, add some cinnamon and sugar because I know it's going to need it, and I ladle it into two bowls. Her eyes are red and puffy from crying and she still seems a little shaken but, she appears to be a lot better now that she has all of the things that have been bothering her off her chest.

As I hand Jillian a bowl, she calls me a dick over the oatmeal but we embrace and go on to eat out meal.

"No matter how hard things get, we will overcome it together." I say to her reassuringly. She smiles and we continue on to eating breakfast.

I think one thought during breakfast that worries me; Can we overcome anything? Or will things go downhill from here on out? I immediately push the thought away, but I know it will always linger in the back of my mind.