Chapter 7: Starting Over


Dad just looks at me. "You want them to do what?"

I'm still in R's room, although by this point I've gone back to sitting on the edge of his bed. Dad came pretty promptly, all things considered. He had even managed not to say anything when he saw us in bed together.

"They can do salvage runs for us. It's perfect. I mean there are probably still some corpses out there that haven't gotten the memo. The recovering corpses should be pretty safe from them. And they can go places we never dared to. Like the airport. So they'll be contributing. We humans won't have to be at risk, and we'll get some amazing stuff. I know there's more fruit cocktail." I pause, considering.

"No beer left," R says, a note of humor in his voice.

"Not on your plane, no," I agree cheerfully. "But there are other planes."

Dad rolls his eyes, then returns to the subject at hand. "You're serious?"

"Absolutely, Dad. I mean, listen, everybody in this city has good reason to hate and fear corpses. I want to give them some counter-examples."

Dad looks sideways at R. "You think they'll go for this?"

"I can ask," he says, hardly stammering at all. "I think they will. Have to take care of bonies, first."

Dad nods. "We're organizing that now. The stadium's been cleared out. We'll send out soldiers and corpses, working together to hunt down the rest of them."

"Can I see my friend, before?" R asks. "Think his name started with M."

"We can probably make that happen - if I can figure out which one he is."

I nod. "I'll bet you've met him by now - he was kind of leading the pack last night. Older-looking guy, in a sport coat, mostly bald?"

"Sounds familiar, yeah. In that case, he's pretty close. I think he said his name was Marcus. I'll send him over. With," he adds, looking at me, daring me to object, "an escort for protection - his and others."

"Good idea," I reply, and I think I surprise him. "Hey, we're pretty much all trained to shoot corpses in the head on autopilot. It's gonna take time for that to change."

"You think we'll get there?" Dad asks.

"If I have anything to say about it, we will." I'm going to be a one-woman former-corpse public relations campaign if necessary. " And I plan on having something to say about it."

"Me, too," R says, looking at me with a small smile. "We're changing everything. Together."


Lunch was fine. R didn't feel very hungry, but he ate some bland food and kept it down. He's been drinking a lot of water today, too. The doctor had looked pleased at that, and said R's measurements were still improving. Almost normal, now, if on the low side of normal. I am so taking him home. Which reminds me of a song. Which reminds me of how he sometimes uses music to communicate.

"Shame we don't have a record player and your collection, R," I tell him, standing next to his bed, running my fingers lightly over his arm. "You could play a song, like… Take Me Home Tonight."

His eyes light up. "Really?"

"Oh, yeah. Too crowded around here." As if to prove my point, I hear a swell of voices out in the hallway. I go over to the door, open it, and look out to see M. He's the center of a crowd, smiling and saying "Hi" to everyone.

Individually.

There's a guard there, too, with a gun slung around his neck, but he's smiling broadly, enjoying the reflected attention, I think.

The doctors and nurses have had a little time to get used to the idea of the formerly-dead in their midst, apparently.

M makes his way toward us, smiling a little crookedly at me. "Julie," he greets me, much like he did the night before.

I'm a lot happier to see him now. "Hey! I hear you're a big shot."

He shrugs. "Doing… what I can."

"Well, come on in, R and I have a proposition for you."

He enters the hospital room. His guard and R's guard both stand just inside the door – more out of curiosity than apprehension, I think.

M shuffles over to the bed. "R," he says.

R nods happily. "Hi."

M sniffs the air. "Living," he says, deadpan, looking down at R. "Eat."

The guards stiffen, exchanging looks, but R smiles and I laugh out loud.

"Careful," I tell M. "You're going to get yourself into trouble with that sense of humor."

I glance at the guards, who are still looking kind of uneasy. "It's an inside joke," I tell them. "He's not serious. They're old friends."

M reaches out to touch R on the shoulder, shaking him gently. "You okay?"

"Yes," R answers, catching my eye. "They're taking good care of me. And Julie's here."

M glances my way, too. "That's… very good."

"Well, where else am I going to be?" I ask, rhetorically. "Plus, if I run away he'd just come after me – probably saving my life again in the process, and that's just too much effort right now."

M nods, a glint of humor in his eyes. "Heard you saved him, too."

"Fair's fair," R says, sounding proud – of me?

"That's what friends do," I add. "And speaking of which, we have something to ask you."


It was dinner time before I finally managed to bring R home. Dad had made some noises about finding him somewhere else to stay, but I was adamant. I was going to be with R, wherever he was, and I didn't want to move out. So Dad caved. I think he was scared of making me choose between him and R, considering the result the *last* time he made me choose.

To make things less awkward, all around, though, R got his own room, down the hall from mine. "So here you are," I say, escorting him in. "What do you think?"

He walks inside, looking around carefully. "It's very.. empty."

"Well, no one's used this room for years. But it has basic furniture, including a bed - which is very important. Um," I suddenly realize what that sounded like. "Because, you know, you sleep now, so, well, you um, need somewhere more comfortable than the floor."

He looks at me, hesitant. "I knew what you meant. Julie, I don't..." he pauses, searching for the right words, I think. "I don't want you to feel... obligated. I appreciate everything you're doing for me. You don't need to, you know, do anything else... anything you don't want to."

I go up on my tiptoes to press a quick kiss to his mouth. "Thank you. But you're not here because I think I owe you something, or... or that I feel responsible for you. You're here because I want you here." I chew my lip. "Maybe I should have asked..."

He smiles. "You didn't kidnap me," he points out softly, his hands coming up to rest lightly on my hips. "I'm here because... I want to be here. With you."

"For... a few days?"

"For as long as you'll let me stay."

I catch my breath, lost in the love shining out of his blue eyes. "Oh, that'll be a while." I want to kiss him, but this is important. "Look, R, there's no rush. You're still recovering, still getting used to being alive. Let's not make any permanent decisions until you're fully up to speed. But... just to warn you... I'm going to want you to stay. With me."

"In that case," he says, leaning down slowly. "There shouldn't be a conflict." Then he's kissing me and I'm kissing him, and it's better now than it was this afternoon, just like this afternoon was better than the day before. If this is him only being partially recovered, then it's going to keep on getting better. Whoa.

I feel him stagger slightly, and I break the kiss. "Oh, you shouldn't still be standing."

His face does look a little pale, although it's hard to tell, considering.

He nods. "I could maybe sit down."

I take his hand and lead him into my room, settling him on the couch before sitting right next to him, curling up against his side. "When you're feeling stronger, once the Bonies are taken care of... we can take a truck out to the airport and get some of your stuff."

"That'd be nice," he agrees, one arm coming around my shoulders. "I kind of miss my record player."

I smile. "Me, too."

"Some of the rest of it, though..."

I wait, but he doesn't continue. After a few long moments I prompt, "Yeah?"

"Julie, I got all that stuff... while hunting. For food."

"You can't blame yourself for that," I insist, squirming around to look him in the eyes.

"That's what I used to tell myself," he says quietly, looking at me, suffused in regret. "That this was just the way the world was now. I never thought... I could change."

"Why should you think that?" I ask. "No one else did. But, R, I think all that stuff... was your way of trying to hold on to... to, I don't know, your humanity. You didn't totally give in."

"Maybe not, but Julie, I've… I've killed people. A lot of people. Including Perry."

"And then you saved me," I point out. "And then we saved the whole world. That kind of... balances out the scales, a little, don't you think?"

He looks like he wants to believe me.

"Hey, I meant to ask you - did Perry shoot you?"

He looks a little confused at the apparent change in subject, then furrows his brow a little, looking down, thinking back. "Yeah," he nods. "He did. In the chest. I had been going towards you, when he distracted me. I kind of... lost it. Angry that he was interrupting."

I nod, smiling a little. "I thought so. Think about it, R; he was on the counter, you weren't paying a bit of attention. Why didn't he shoot you in the head?"

He frowns. "I... don't know. Can't remember what he was thinking."

I raise an eyebrow at that, but he doesn't notice. He's going to have to be careful about that; what happened to Perry needs to remain our secret. No one else needs to know. For now, though, I decide not to comment. "I think I can tell you. He was thinking that he was so tired of fighting. And it was all hopeless anyway. Some part of him... wanted to die. To get it over with."

He looks at me, eyes widening slightly. "Yeah, I think you're right."

"And then when you, um," How do I put this? "Acquired his memories...? I think Perry saved my life that day, almost as much as you did."

He thinks that over, and I wait. Patiently. He needs to really get this, and I can see his expression lightening, practically see the guilt starting to leak away. Eventually, he nods. "Okay."

I smile at him. He smiles back.

"We don't need to get your stuff," I offer, "if you'd rather forget it."

He shakes his head. "No, there are some things I want to keep. Things I did with you."

"I'd like to keep some of that, too. Things like-"

There's a sudden loud noise from downstairs, and I jump. I can feel R tensing. Then I hear Nora's voice. "Yo, Grigio, are you here?" She sounds happy.

"Yes," I yell out the door, "and you almost gave me a heart attack!"

R settles back against the couch. "Me, too. I think."

I listen to her run up the stairs, too comfortable where I am to move. She'll find me.

"Julie, great news!" She bursts into my room, skidding to a halt as she sees me. She grins at the sight of me with R. "Hey, R. Jules, I finally got accepted into the program!"

It takes me a second, but then I get it. "The nursing program? Really? Nora, that's great!"

"Yep," she says, so happy she's bouncing on her toes. "I start training tomorrow."

"That's fast, isn't it?"

She shrugs, still practically dancing with excitement. "Yeah, they figure they're going to need a lot more help in the near future. And, well… Kevin pulled a few strings."

I blink. "And you're okay with that?"

"Are you kidding? It's the sweetest thing he's ever done for me!" She grins. "I was going to ask if you minded if I didn't sleep here tonight, but I'm guessing you'll be well-entertained without me."

I roll my eyes, and possibly blush.

"I'm happy for you, Nora," R says, only stuttering a little. He's still not as fluent with other people as he is with me. "I know you r…really wanted this."

Um, yeah, no - Perry knew that. I frown at him, and his eyes widen as he realizes what he said. "Julie told me," he adds hastily, covering before Nora has time to notice his slip.

Not that she seems inclined to analyze anything right now. She may not have even heard him.

"So, anyway, see you tomorrow, Jules!" Nora throws me a wicked grin on her way out of the room. "Have sweet dreams *with* your zombie."

Then she's gone. I yell "Ex-zombie!" at her retreating form, but she doesn't respond. I just shake my head and lean against R. "Told you they'd get back together."


Life did not return to normal after that. Thank God. Corpses and humans worked together to wipe out the Bonies, and then we started settling into a new normal, where former-corpses moved around, learned to eat Carbtein, and began to form relationships with the living. Friends, mostly. Some family members found each other.

We had a volunteer drive, at first, sort of a Big Brother program for the undead instead of the underprivileged. But with the corpses fighting the bonies alongside us... and bringing back exotic canned goods... and steadily turning up in the medical tent to have their heartbeats checked and be declared alive again... things went really well.

Marcus was apparently quite the ladies' man. Although his sense of humor still needed a little work. Then again, maybe not. I mean, the awful jokes were very useful at breaking the ice.

R stayed in my house, in his own room. We decorated with a small portion of his collection, just the stuff we both wanted, if they didn't have any bad memories attached. He had some nightmares, but not as bad as I'd feared.

Speaking of stuff, some of the former dead are agitating to get their old things back. Trying to reclaim their former lives, if they can remember – or figure out – what they were. Dad's of the legal opinion that you can't take it with you. But we have a civilian government now, so it's not up to him. They'll work something out, I suppose.

We've come such a very long way in only a few months. It's still sometimes hard to believe. For so long, things had been hopeless. Until everything changed, and now there's an abundance of hope. It's beautiful.

So now, we're sitting on the side of an old stone bridge in the late afternoon sun, overlooking the city below. The view should be terrific from here. As we're waiting for the fireworks to start, a stray thought hits. "R?"

"Yeah?"

"Do you remember your name yet?" I'm pretty sure he hasn't, but I've been kind of reluctant to broach the topic, remembering how sad he seemed way back when on the plane, struggling to introduce himself.

He shakes his head, looking down at our hands in his lap, not seeming upset.

"Well, you know, you could give yourself one." I mean, I'm the one who started calling him R. He shouldn't feel stuck with it. "Just pick one. Whatever you want."

He considers that for a moment, then looks at me. "I like R," he says, almost surprised at himself.

"Really?" I smile. He wants to keep the name I gave him? "You don't want to know what it was? You don't want your old life back?"

He shakes his head, glancing down again. "No," he answers, not even a shred of doubt. He looks at me and smiles. "I want this one."

He is so adorable. I lean my head against his shoulder, snuggling up. "Just R, huh?"

"Just R," he confirms. Quietly, contentedly.

Below us, explosions start, bringing down the wall. We don't need it anymore. The plague is gone, humanity is starting to recover.

See, Dad? I think lazily. Sometimes things *do* get better.

And just like R, I am exactly where I want to be.

"Have I mentioned," I ask quietly, holding R's hand, "that I love you?"

"Not since lunch," he says, amused. "But the evidence then was pretty convincing." He stretches a finger to touch my brand new engagement ring. "And in case you didn't know… I love you, too."

I sigh happily. Life is pretty damn near perfect.

The End.

A/N: Thanks to all six of my readers - you are all awesome. I'm so glad you enjoyed this ride with me. Hope you liked how I ended things. Thanks very much for every review, favorite, and follow; I greatly appreciate the ego boost.

Special thanks to NotMarge for being a fabulous fanfic friend and letting me bounce some ideas off her.