Chapter 10
The house thing didn't go over so well with the group. While they liked the idea of the house, they didn't want to leave their original camping spot. In the end, half the group went to live near the house and the other half stayed where they were. Everyone worked to make a clear path to and from the sites. This way travel would be safer.
I lay on the roof and watch the sun as it rises to start a new day. I hadn't been able to sleep the previous night. Actually, I'd hardly slept for the past week. Every time I'd been able to fall asleep, I was plagued by nightmares. Sometimes I was running through a forest alone calling for someone; I don't know who. Other times, I'd be running and trip. That's when the walkers would get me.
There is the noise of someone opening the door to the roof and I don't even bother to check who it is. When I continue to ignore the person that has disturbed me, they decide to stick their head into my vision.
"Hi Shane," I say in a bored tone. I hide my smile and stare up at his face blankly. I'd been experimenting for the past few days. Whenever Shane talks to me, I hide my feelings to see how he reacted. For the most part, he doesn't seem affected, which bothers me.
"Brooding on the roof?" Shane asks and smiles at me.
"I'm just relaxing," I reply. "I wanted to watch the sun rise before Merle and I go hunting."
"I don't think it's a good idea that you're hanging around with Merle," Shane says with a frown. "He's not a good person for you to be around."
"I'll hang with anyone I want to," I reply hotly. "Besides, you don't know Merle well enough to judge him. I doubt you've even had a real conversation with him."
Shane shakes his head at me. "I don't want to have a conversation with him. It would only end in a fight like when he decides to start up a conversation T-Dog."
I purse my lips and refuse to say anything on that subject. T-Dog is different from normal people; Shane wouldn't understand that. "What do you need?" I ask in hope that it will change the subject.
"I actually want to take you on a field trip," Shane informs me, "to visit your dad."
My eyes grow considerably wider. He wants to go visit Dad? Is Dad even still alive?
I get up from the roof and brush off my pants. "Let's go then." I climb down the ladder and look up at Shane who smiles down at me. "Are you going to come or what?" I ask as I reach the bottom of the ladder.
"Yeah," Shane says and follows me. As we leave my room, Shane grabs a hold of my hand and entwines it with his. A sharp pain goes through my chest and I try to hide the pain. Maybe he does care, I tell myself.
As we reach the bottom of the stairs, Merle whips his head around to look at us. Shane moves to hide our entwined hands, but I stop him by removing my hand from his. It pains me to do so, but I just can't stand the thought of holding hands with someone that refuses to let our relationship be known to someone that already knows. Merle raises an eyebrow but doesn't ask anything. As we walk out of the house, Merle shakes his head and I see it out of the corner of my eye.
When we reach the front lawn area, Lori walks up to us and bats her eyelashes at Shane. It's enough to make me about puke. Also, it doesn't help my confidence any. Shane's face grows a little red and I frown. He's letting himself fall into his trap.
"What are you two up to so early in the morning?" she asks demandingly.
"We are going for a supply run," Shane replies coolly. He's lying and I know it, but Lori doesn't know. She doesn't even think twice about trusting him.
"Is Claire going with you?" she asks as she heads to grab something.
"Yeah, I figured that it would be a nice break from this place and I need another person that can fire a gun," Shane explained. "Well, at least someone that I trust firing a gun."
"I was trained by the best," I reply.
My mom smiles and returns with a canteen of water. "Here." She hands it to Shane. "I figured that you'll need this. I just put water in it this morning. It should be nice and cold."
"Thank you," Shane replies as he takes it from her. He slips the strap over his head and lets it dangle from his neck. "We are going to get going now. I want to make it out early so we can avoid the walkers."
"Alright, I won't keep you," Lori says and goes back to hanging laundry from the line.
Shane marches past her and I quickly follow him. He jumps in the van and slams the door shut. I get in the passenger side and I watch him carefully. He starts the van and he throws the car into reverse. We head out and when we're on the road, Shane looks at me with huge puppy eyes.
"What?" I ask defensively. "Are you going to keep staring at me instead of watching the road like you should be?"
Shane smiles and turns his head back to the road. "You know, sometimes I just like watching you," Shane tells me and my face turns incredibly red to the point I think that maybe I am a tomato.
"That's a bit creepy," I reply and try to cool my face down. "That makes me feel like you watch me while I sleep, which I am totally hoping you don't do."
"Your fears are completely unmet," he says and reaches over to ruffle my hair. "I have boundaries."
"I know that," I say sourly under my breath. His boundaries were so profound that I hated them at times, and at other times they amazed me. He had nerves of steel.
"We haven't spent a lot of time together since everything," Shane says quietly and my heart breaks. "It seems like Lori is always standing between us whenever we get the chance to talk."
"Well, maybe she wouldn't do that if you didn't stick your neck out for her every time we fight," I reply angrily. Seriously, I was his girl friend. I'm the one he should be backing up.
"Claire, you don't understand everything in this world," Shane says with a sigh. "You're too young to understand adults and why you're wrong when you fight with your mother."
"Shane, I may be young, but I'm not the adult that agreed to go out with a sixteen year old." Shane opens his mouth to interrupt me, but I say, "No, just let me talk for a minute. I may be young and I may not know a lot about this world, but I know one thing; I'm still a human being. You may not seem to understand what I feel, but I certainly know what I feel. Every time you take my mom's side, it's a slap to the face. I know that you loved my mom for the longest time, and every day that thought is in the front of my mind. Every morning I wake up scared that this will be the day that you leave me for my own mother."
"Claire, you know that I love you," Shane says.
"No, I don't," I reply quietly. "You say that you love me, but where's the proof? The only real evidence that you've given me hangs around my neck and I can't even show that piece of proof to anyone besides myself. You try to hold my hand, but you hide our connection from people that already know about us."
"Wait, there's someone that knows about us?" Shane asks in a worried tone.
"See! You're more concerned with the fact that I told someone than with the fact that I'm hurting inside. That's exactly the reason that I can't do this anymore!" I reach into my pocket and withdraw the 22 necklace. Wordlessly, I throw it on Shane's lap.
"Claire," he says quietly and reaches for the necklace. "Are you sure about this?"
"I'm sure as I'll ever be," I reply and withhold tears. "I don't want to date the man that can't decide whether he loves me or my mother."
Shane goes to talk again, but shuts his mouth right away. I figure he doesn't know what to say. He didn't deny the fact that he loves my mom, which only makes my heart hurt worse. All those month ago when I started this stupid thing, I should have known better. I should have known that nothing good would come from being in a relationship with him. Now, everything seems to clear to me. Hindsight is 20/20.
The car ride is long and awkward. Shane stares ahead at the road and I grumpily to my right at the rolling countryside. I probably should have saved the break up for the ride back so we wouldn't have to sit in this awkward silence for the entire ride.
We pull into town and I study all of the buildings. Most of them had been boarded up and broken into. They were in a sorry state. It was nothing like the town that we had left those two weeks ago. A tear rolls down my face and I quickly wipe it away.
"Don't cry," Shane says sadly.
"I can't help it," I reply and wipe a few more away. "I miss the way things used to be." I know it's a childish thing to say, but it is my true feelings. Looking at the houses I used to go by everyday just makes me sad.
"I think we all do," Shane replies as we pull up to the hospital. "There's nothing we can do now. Nothing will ever be the same again. We can only move on and try to make the best of things." Despite our fight, Shane pulls me over to him and hugs me tightly. When I finally calm myself down, I push away from him and smile falsely. "Are you ready?"
"Yeah, I think so," I say and check my gun to make sure it's loaded. "Are you ready?"
"Yep," Shane says and get out of the car. I follow in suit and we leave the doors open so we don't make noise while shutting them. We don't need more walkers on our hands than we're already doomed to see.
With gun in hand, we silently approach the hospital doors. I look over my shoulder and scan the area every few seconds. Shane opens the door slowly and pushes it open. He scans the inside and nods for me to follow him into the building. Once inside, we walk the halls slowly, watching for walkers, but thankfully there's nothing to be seen.
Shane walks down the familiar hallways to a familiar room. "Are you ready?" he asks as he stops in front of it.
"You have a knack for asking terrible questions," I reply, "but yes, I'm ready."
Shane slowly pushes open the door. As we look into the room, we're both expecting the worse, but to our surprise, Dad is completely untouched.
"Dad," I whisper as I walk over to him. My knees grow weak and I collapse just short of the bed. I pull myself up to his side. "Dad, you're alive." I whisper as I take his pulse. He managed to live this long. It's a miracle. "Shane, he's alive." I glance over my shoulder at Shane, who looks like he's battling an internal struggle.
"That's amazing," Shane says and walks over to join me. "We have to try and wake him up."
I reach over and shake my dad's arms, but he doesn't even show any sign of waking up. Desperately, I shake his limp body, but still he doesn't wake. I want to try yelling, but that will only bring us unwanted attention from something else.
"Here, try this," Shane says and hands me a vase of water. I take it from him and splash it on his face. "Damn, he's still not awake?" Shane half states half asks.
"I don't think that he'll wake up," I say sadly. "He's still in his coma and without someone regularly changing his IV, he will probably waste away soon." Shane puts his hand on my shoulder. "Maybe we can come back and change it every now and then."
"That's not any good," Shane replies. "Without power, he'll stop breathing soon enough. It's a miracle that this hospital still has power."
"Yeah," I whisper before standing. "We'll just have to leave him here and pray he somehow makes a comeback."
"I'm sure he'll wake up soon enough," Shane replies.
"We better scavenge for supplies before going back," I say.
"Sounds good," Shane says and we leave the room with lower spirits than ever.