1 Week Before The Apocalypse

Sure, it was the last 10 minutes of class but that didn't mean my partner had to be snoring while laying his head in his arms placed onto the table we were sitting at. So, I did the rational thing and smacked his arm to make sure he'd wake up.

He hummed in response to the contact and slowly opened his eyes, obviously irritated by the light in the classroom.

"You're snoring again," I whispered to the boy next to me. He just looked at me with disinterest and closed his eyes once again.

I rolled my eyes, not bothering too much as this was the usual. The only reason he was passing this class was due to me. He never paid attention in class and was often sleeping. At the end of class, I'd have him take pictures of my notes to look over before the bell rang. Math class was our last class for the day and we'd go our separate ways.

Sure, we didn't necessarily hang out throughout the day. He would usually hang out with his friends and I'd go ahead and hang out with mine. Yet even though we only had that one period together, just a solid 50 minutes, I could still consider him as one of my closest friends. Despite his lack of words or sentences. Every Friday though I would hang out after school to watch his baseball practice. I never did much after school besides go home and work on homework but at the end of the week, I had extra time. Since I was around him already, I decided to might as well watch and hang out. Sure we didn't speak much while he practiced, sure afterward we only said a simple "bye" and left home, it was something I looked forward to all the time.

The bell had rung meaning our Friday was finalized. I elbowed the boy next to me to grab his attention once again because not even the bell could help wake him up occasionally. "Class is over, Mouse."

This time he just groaned in response, obviously not ready to wake up. "Gotta walk you to baseball practice and make sure you don't fucking die along the way." I chuckled slightly at my joke. It's not narcissism, it's self-love.

He finally sighed and sat up from his seat, grabbing all of his stuff and putting away his math book and notebook into his backpack, and zipping it up. "Here," I showed him my notes for him to take the usual pictures of. He, of course, snapped the pictures of all of my notes and I put them all away and we both got up, put on our bags, and were prepared to walk towards Ethan's locker to grab what he needed for baseball practice.

We made it to a locker when I got a message from my childhood friend I had when growing up. She was a great friend and we grew up due to my parents being friends with hers.

"Oh hey," I looked up from my phone to face Ethan. "Sue was wanting to hang out today, she has a free day. Is that okay with you?" I asked. He just nodded in response. Yeah, he was a quiet boy, but for some reason, he just seemed more quiet than usual. "Ethan?" I said, saying his name rather than the nickname I gave him to show some sincerity. He looked at me waiting for my response. "Are you okay? You've been a bit quieter than usual."

He just shrugged in response before he said, "Yeah. I'm good."

I knew he wasn't, I could tell. I didn't want to pry though as I know speaking his emotions was difficult. It'd be easier to ask again during the text. Still likely he'd avoid, but easier to get him to speak more. "I'll make sure to see your practice on Monday to make up for today, okay?" I smiled at him. He just nodded once again. "I'll walk you there."

Once we finished at his locker, I casually walked him over to the school baseball field. We didn't speak much but that was usual, this time though felt a bit sadder rather than comfortable. I knew he was having an off day and I felt guilty that I wouldn't be around that day. If he needed me though I would drop anything. "Do you want me to stay for practice today?" I offered.

Ethan shook his head. "It's okay, you don't get to spend much time with Sue. You get to see me almost every day." He explained.

I gave an apologetic grin still feeling a bit guilty. "Okay. If you need anything, don't hesitate to call okay?" He nodded, like always.

...

"So Mr. Bob Head was a bob head more than usual?" Sue asked when I was explaining my day then ended it with my concerns.

"Yeah. It's a bit worrying but I don't want to end up pushing him away by trying to force him to open up a lot, you know? I want him to tell me when he's ready but I also don't want him to ignore me and never open up." I explained. I was genuinely worried.

Sue shrugged in response. "I'm sure he'll appreciate you checking up on him anyway, even if he isn't able to open up. Just knowing someone is there is something that is the most reassuring to a lot of people."

I smiled. "Thank you, Sue." I hugged the girl who was a bit shorter than me. Her being 4'8 while I was 5'2 did give a small difference, but even then we both still belonged to the "below average height for woman" group.

"So, are you going to trust me with his name now?" Sue smirked at me.

"No," I laughed. "I know what you're capable of. You are not going to stalk him."

"Fine."

The rest of the night was just a nice time catching up with a friend of mine that I had wished to see more often.

...

4 Days Before The Apocalypse

The bell rang and as usual to the routine, I woke Ethan up, let him take pictures of my notes, and we walked over to his locker. I was keeping my promise to him by watching his practice after school that Monday.

"You doing better, Mouse?" I patted his shoulder when he had finished grabbing his stuff from his locker, closing it shut. He just nodded in return.

"Hey, Liyah?" He began to speak.

"Yeah?"

"I have a home game this Friday. Are you going to come?" Ethan asked. He seemed curious in his question as well as possibly nervous. He never was usually nervous before a game, so it was a bit unusual for him.

"Oh, yeah!" I smiled. "If you'd like me to go, I'll be there."

A small grin grew upon his face. "Do you think maybe you could wear my-"

"Hey, bob head," One of Ethan's teammates came up to Ethan, roughly patting his shoulder. "Coach wants us to get to the field as soon as possible. We need to go." He pointed his head towards the front entrance, ushering Ethan to follow. Then he looked at me. "Sorry, closed practice."

I frowned a little. "You can go ahead, I can watch tomorrow okay?"

Ethan nodded and the teammate quickly had him turned around and walked quickly out of the hallway. I sighed, a little disappointed to not be able to hear the end of his question.

...

1 Day Before The Apocalypse

It was Thursday. 1 day before the home game. Ethan was excited, even if he didn't show it. I only knew him from that one class period and some chatting after school but I was still able to tell a bit of what he was feeling just from his body language.

Each day was a closed practice. I was disappointed because the last practice I was able to see I ended up spending with Sue. It's fine though, I can just watch Ethan's practice next week? Right?

The teammate who would usually pick Ethan up from his locker had finally arrived but before Ethan could leave with him I grabbed his arm. "Hey, can you tell me what you were trying to ask on Monday? It's been stuck in my head and I don't want to miss it before your game." I explained.

Ethan, with no facial expression as usual, just opened up his sports bag and brought out a jacket. He handed it to me, gave me a nod, then left.

I wasn't sure exactly what he put into my hands, but when I unfolded it to see the full thing I noticed it was his baseball letterman's jacket. It was covered in patches that were usually to show the achievements the person had made. He had a good amount. Had patches on the front along with the school's branding, patches on the sleeves, and a patch of the school's letters on the back.

I smiled at the wool-woven jacket. I put down my backpack to slip it on over my arms. Much larger than myself, as he was almost an entire foot taller than me so the jacket went all the way past my hips, I felt a large wave of comfort over me. I put back on my backpack and went to head outside to my car to drive myself home, excited for the next day to come to show up to Ethan's baseball game wearing his jacket.

...

The Day Of The Apocalypse

When it finally came to math class it was a bit quiet. Ethan wasn't there as he was out with the team getting prepared for the game. Though he wasn't talkative, it just felt empty without him there and too quiet without his usual light snoring. The class felt like it was just going to completely drag on until something happened. At first, I thought hearing the fire alarm go off was a miracle meaning that the rest of the day I could just blame not doing my work on the drill. Except it wasn't a drill. And it wasn't a fire.

We all started to slowly exit the room like the protocols, but instead, we were faced with running kids in the hallway. The confused math teacher yelling at the kids to not run was quickly interrupted when a classmate jumped on him and began to start taking massive bites out of his arm.

Everyone screamed, including me, and ran out of the building. We were lucky our classroom was very close to the main entrance.

I wanted to run straight to my car, put my life before any others, drive off to safety, find my family, stay there with them. I couldn't. I thought of my friends, who I would eat with at lunch. I also thought of Ethan.

"Baseball," I whispered to myself and ran as fast as I could towards the field. By the time I got there the place was already in complete distress, blood splattered over certain areas, and a couple of now late teammates roaming around. I stayed longer than I should've, wanting to look through the bodies to see if I could see Ethan there. I was relieved to not have seen him but afraid that maybe I was just trying to give myself some false hope.

Before the zombies could hear me I quickly ran off. I needed to find my car, I needed to find my friends, I needed to get out of there. I ran back over to the parking lot of the school and tried to find my stupid brown car that looked as if it could break down any second. It never did but anxiety was creeping up on me feeling like maybe now would be the time it decides to break down on me. I was hoping to find any of my friends to take along with me, but I saw none of them. I didn't see their cars either.

"Did they leave without me?" I quietly spoke to myself. Although I understood why they would, they had to put themselves first, yet it still put a small pang in my heart knowing that I was someone who could easily be left behind.

I didn't blame Ethan for running off. I doubt he had the choice to come look for me either. Followed his team for safety. Was he thinking about me?

Before I had more time to think, more zombies started to run out of the school. We don't know how they got here, or why they began to turn only now, but what we did know was that we needed to get out of there at all costs.

I sprinted to my car as fast as my little body could to get in before anyone else can either break into it, or before a zombie could try and break into me. Immediately getting inside I grabbed the keys I had put in my backpack and started the ignition. While looking down I had realized I was wearing the letterman jacket Ethan had given me. It was all I had left of him, wasn't it?

I snapped out of my thoughts and ignored my emotions as fast as I could to finally put my car into drive. There was so many people in front of my car, so many other cars just trying to get through the people. I did the best I could, having to switch into reverse and going as fast as I could while doing so. Luckily there were less kids behind me than there were in front of me, and they quickly moved out of my way as soon as they saw me beginning to leave.

I immediately put my car back into drive and pressed my foot onto the gas petal to get myself to move away from that area. I had to get home. I needed to get home. I needed to see my parents. Make sure they were safe. Make sure everything was okay.

Maybe it was because of the tears rolling out of my eyes, or the sense of panic I was going through, or even me just being so incredibly lost in my thought because before I knew it a car had collided right into the drivers side, causing my car to go out of control and hit a pole. Everything was blurry for a small bit looking toward the extremely cracked window next to me to see a dead driver in the vehicle that hit me. Before I could do anything else, everthing went black.