(A/N: I'm back! And sooner than expected! I really have no excuse for not putting these chapters up since they're already all typed up but I just don't wanna overwhelm you guys with chapter after chapter!
Speaking of chapter...here's a new one! And to my lovely reviewers...
To An Amber Pen: Oh, it won't take much longer now... ;) And thanks! I don't like reading stories when the OC is just immediately part of the "gang" so I tried to give Bree a little backstory. We'll be getting glimpses of her life back in Florida throughout the book!
To Blueberry:
CH. 5: Bree - Harry and the Boombox
The change starts almost immediately.
Not even a week goes by and things have already started changing around the Sanctuary for me. People are practically shoving their goods at me. I can't leave my room without someone trying to give me a piece of bread or a new puppy. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that something's changed. I'm not complaining at all; it's just…strange. From the way Harry acted about my earphones, I expected everyone to be just as tight-fisted with their belongings.
Speaking of Harry, I really want to find him. I'll admit that I feel kind of bad about the way things went down between he and Negan. I don't condone his racist and rude behavior in the least, but I feel like I cheated him out of his reason he starves. Plus, seeing a full-grown man wet himself has a lasting effect on a person.
That's how I find myself walking down the sidewalks of the Sanctuary, searching for the lanky electronics dealer. I find him in a lone alley, sniffing at some white dust in his hand. The blonde man startles when he notices me approaching him. The white dust goes flying around in a cloud of poison.
The lanky man curses and tries his hardest to capture whatever particles he can. He shoves what he manages to catch back into his pocket and fixes me with a glare.
"Whatcha want, gal?" he hisses at me from between his rotted teeth. He sniffs and rubs at his leaking nose.
I grimace. I have the mind to turn around and leave, but I don't. Instead, I pull off my duffel bag and set it on the ground. I squat beside it and dig inside, searching for the item. I pull out the small, portable DVD player and hold it out to the sniffing man.
His beady eyes study the white object before raising to meet my eyes. "What do you want for it?" he asks. "This is good for—"
"You take it," I interject. I smile at him. "Consider it payment for the earphones, okay?"
The blonde gives me a suspicious look. "You're tellin' me…you're givin' me this…for free?" I recoil in disgust when he spits near my shoe. "I don't buy it. What's the catch, petals?" He gestures at the flowery headband I have wrapped around my head today.
I shrug. "There's no catch..." I eye his outfit and spot a red handkerchief hanging out of his pocket, "…Red. I just feel bad about how things went down last week. Just please accept it, okay?"
The man sniffs again. I'm surprised when he reaches out and actually takes the player from my hand. He inspects it, quickly rolling the item around in his hands like a jeweler inspecting a diamond. He gives me a nod and a hint of a pleased smile.
"This is nice. Thank you kindly."
I watch as he puts the DVD player into his backpack. He zips it back up and hoists the bag on his shoulder. I do the same with my duffel bag. I give the lanky man another nod and turn to leave. I feel a little better now. I hope that can buy him a little something. The little devil on my shoulder is quick to whisper, "Like some new pants?" but I don't laugh. I'll wait until I get to my room to do that.
Harry's scratchy voice stops me in my tracks.
"He's crazy, you know."
I shift my bag around so that the strap rests on my other shoulder and then turn to give Harry a curious glance.
"Who is 'he'?" I ask.
Harry glances around and then gestures me closer with an inclination of his head. I look around and then step a bit closer. We're the only two in the alley, so I'm not getting too close to this guy.
Harry's filmy, blue eyes scan the area behind my shoulders before he licks his cracked lips and leans towards me.
"Negan." Harry's voice is barely a whisper. "The guy is a classified lunatic. You would do best not to hang around him."
My eyes narrow with confusion. Sure, Negan is a bit….weird but that doesn't make him a lunatic, right? In all of my time of living here, he's been nothing but kind to me. It's only been three weeks, but I'd say that Negan is the person I trust the most here. Whenever we find time to talk, I always have fun talking to the gentle giant.
Harry looks like he wants to say more, but Butch, one of Negan's best friends, pokes his head into the alley. It takes a lot for me not to like someone, but Butch has given me enough reasons plus one hundred more. The guy is a complete jerk. Whenever I see him, he's either harassing some poor woman or bullying someone smaller than he is. The muscular man, with his shaved head and dark eyes, is nothing more than an oversized schoolyard bully.
Butch grins at me and Harry. "Well, well, well…. What do we have here? A romantic reunion in a rat-infested alleyway? You could've picked a more romantic spot to sweep Shorty off of her feet."
I glare at the man, ready to tell him off, but Harry speaks first.
"We were just trading," he mumbles like a child being scolded by his parent. He brushes past Butch and darts out into the streets. I move to follow after him, but Butch steps in front of me. I look up at him. I hate to admit it, but the 6'4'' former Marine is especially intimidating at this distance.
"Negan is looking for you, Shorty," the towering man tells me with a malicious grin. "Better go and find him."
I bump past the man and hurry after Harry. "I'm around," I yell over my shoulder.
"He doesn't like to be kept waiting!" Butch yells after me, but I ignore him. According to Harry, there was a lot of other things I don't know about Negan, but I'm about to find out.
I catch up to Harry easily. He's paused at a corner to resume snorting up his white dust. I fold my arms and position myself in front of him.
"Y'know… drugs are bad," I inform the preoccupied man. "They taught you that in school, right? Don't tell me it's been that long. You can't be that old—twenty nine?"
Harry finishes snorting the last of his dust. His eyes flutter to the top of his head for a few, terrifying moments. When they come back down, there is a hazy look about them.
"Twenty five," he corrects me in a slow drawl. "Don't judge me. This stuff is the only thing keeping me sane right now."
I nod and look away to chew at my bottom lip some. "You," I begin nervously. "You said something about Negan being crazy. What did you mean?"
Harry shrugs. "We're all a little crazy, aren't we?"
That wasn't the tune he was singing earlier. Either he had short-term memory loss or our little run-in with Butch must have scared him. I open my mouth to call him out on this, but he gives me a silencing glare.
"Forget what I said, okay? Just forget it."
I swallow, which is painful due to my dry throat. "Fine," I give in. Harry looks relieved. He sinks against the wall we are standing by and pulls out a cigarette. He's really fixated on rotting his body from the inside-out, isn't he?
I decide to drop Negan's supposed insanity. Like he said, maybe we're all a little crazy. Some of us just show it a little easier than others. I lean against the wall beside him and sigh. "No one really has fun here, do they?" I note quietly. I take in the sights around me: the bustling people, the vendors, the animals. What I thought was lively when I first entered the Sanctuary is really nothing but people struggling to get by. No one really looks that happy. It's like a prison without bars—no one's trying to escape because they're afraid of what lies outside.
"Who has time for it? We're just trying to survive, not throw pool parties," Harry says between his desperate sucking at the white stick of tar between his lips.
My lips curve into a frown. I go to shove my hands into the pockets of my jeans but a smooth object blocks the entrance of one. I latch onto it and pull out my MP3 player. I smile a bit at the device before leaning my head back against the brick wall.
One of my fingers tap against the wall. An idea is forming in my mind. It's stupid, really, but I think it might be stupid enough to work. "Hey," I begin. "You wouldn't happen to have any battery-operated stereo systems, would you?"
-o-o-o-o-o-o-
It just so happens that Harry seems to have the entire Radio Shack at his disposal. He leads me to his place, which is really nothing more than a hole in the wall, but it has some of the best electronic devices I've ever seen inside of it.
Harry is obviously excited to be showing his collection to another human being. His blue eyes are lit up as he explains each product like he's showing off his very own children.
"Latest Apple phone," he boasts while holding up the sleek device. I marvel at the phone in his hands. I've never been this close to a high-end phone in my life. My family isn't exactly poor, but we don't reach the middle-class style of living. The phone in my duffel bag is reliable but it doesn't come close to the Apple phone that Harry is holding.
"Nice," I compliment. Harry beams and puts the phone back into a bag. He goes on to show me the latest headphones, more cell phones, MP3 players, and even flat screen televisions.
"There's not much of a demand for the ones that need electricity, but the ones that just need a few AA batteries really sell." Harry suddenly pulls out a boombox. He drops it in my hands. I'm so shocked that I nearly let it fall to the ground. I manage to catch it just in time. I marvel at the clean sound system in my hands. I shake my head and raise my head to thank Harry.
He holds out a hand. "Don't thank me. It's the least I can do for the DVD player. That little baby will feed me for a month." He pauses and rubs at his nose with his black-tipped fingers. The faintest hint of blush creeps up his pale neck. "Just consider it an apology for callin' you that name when we first met. I normally don't speak ill of people like that. I've just… changed since all of this craziness started."
I nod understandingly. I've changed myself, even if it doesn't feel like it's that much. I'm still Bree Evans, the slightly awkward, quirky drama kid with a crooked smile and long bangs that annoy me to no end. There's just that little tick, deep down inside of me that lets me know that something has shifted within.
"Hey, don't worry about it. It's all in the past." I clutch the boombox to my chest and smile down at it. There's an auxillary outlet in its side, so my MP3 will hook up to it with ease.
"You're Bree, right?"
Harry's question startles me. I look up to find him observing me curiously. I give a shy nod and return my gaze to the boombox.
Harry sniffs. "Had a little sister named Breanna. She was your age, you know. Got bit in the throat by a Puppet when the outbreak began."
I glance over at the man and feel my heart bend when I see that his dark eyes are filled with tears. He tries desperately to blink them away but this only succeeds in making them fall down his face.
"Harry…" I begin, but Harry starts talking again. His voice is broken.
"She had everything going for her, unlike me. She was in college, had a nice boyfriend, and her whole life in front of her. Me, I'm just a gadget-obsessed crackhead who dropped out of college after a month. Daddy said that I wasn't going to amount to anything. But Breanna…." He pauses to give a ragged laugh. "That kid was going to make something out of herself. I know it. And she believed in me. A billion people in this world and she was the only person who believed in me."
Harry breaks down in tears then. Now I can see him as he truly is; behind the mean words and the cruel looks, he's a shattered man who cares about people, especially his baby sister. The way he speaks makes me think of my older brother. I love him more than anything in the world. I wonder if he's thinking the same things about me.
I feel tears coming to my eyes as I step towards the crying man. My hand goes on his arm. I give him a light squeeze and a smile. He looks up at me, tears streaming down his face and snot dotting under his nose.
"Breanna would be really proud of you for keeping her memory alive," I smile.
Harry starts crying harder then and I'm surprised when his lanky arms go around me. Stiff at first, I eventually relax and pat his shoulder. I allow him to cry on me, feeling like a mother. The musty smell of tobacco goes ignored for now.
It takes him a while to get it all out. When he does, he wipes up his face with his arm and tries to look anywhere but my face.
"Thanks," he mutters. He fumbles around in his pocket and draws out another cigarette. He inhales for a long moment before blowing out a steady stream of smoke. He swipes at the remaining tears under his eyes and gestures at the forgotten boombox in my arms.
"What do you need that for, anyway?" he asks, still not meeting my eyes.
The flippant smile that touches my lips makes Harry smile back. "Do you want to help me with something, Harry?"
Cerulean: Harry! You're actually an okay guy!
Harry: Meh. *blows smoke in face*
Cerulean: Gah, why do all of you guys bully me? I'm the writer here! :'( Anyway, hope you enjoyed! What does Bree have planned for the people of the Sanctuary? And what will Negan think of it?
See you guys in the next chapter!