August 23, 2003
My stomach lurches, effectively emptying the contents of my stomach onto the ground. I groan at the disgusting smell and taste associated with vomiting. This is the third time in the past few days that I've gotten sick. I assume it was caused by Pete's adventurous cooking of whatever animal he can find.
I take a moment to catch my breath and begin to brush my teeth. I was fortunate enough to grab my toothbrush before sprinting outside. No one comes outside to see if I'm okay, which I am thankful for. I prefer no one else to see me spill my guts all over the ground.
Once I clean my mouth to the best of my ability, I trudge back to the RV. I enter the door to find all eyes on me.
"Everything okay?" Nick asks.
I shrug and take the seat next to him. "Yep, I just threw up a little bit."
Luke tries to question me further, but I brush him off. Instead, I try to engross myself in the game of poker between Nick and Pete. To no one's surprise, Pete ends up beating Nick by a landslide. Nick throws his cards down in frustration.
Pete laughs and claps his hand on Nick's shoulder. "Maybe someday you'll be able to beat me, son."
Nick rolls his eyes and shakes Pete's hand off his shoulder. "Anyway, Luke, you said we needed supplies? I'll go for a run and take Bea with me."
Luke and the others send us off with our supplies. I was not made aware of the need for supplies, nor the fact that I was going on a run with Nick. I suppose the group talked about it one of the various times I was outside with nausea.
The two of us trek down a dirt path in the woods. Ever since we slept together the other day, Nick has been not so discreet with his actions. He has been very touchy and flirty, earning odd looks from my brother. As much as I enjoyed our intimate time together, I can't help but feel it was a mistake. Nick is on the verge of making my brother aware of our secret feelings. I cannot let that happen.
At first glance, a dead lurker appears to be lying in the path. As we near, it groans and tries to reach out for us. It can't reach us, because its legs are trapped underneath a fallen tree. The poor thing couldn't have been older than eight or nine when it died.
"Poor kid," says Nick. "He's been here awhile. He didn't even get a chance."
A tear slips from my eye and I wipe it away, hoping Nick didn't see. It's always hard to see kids end up this way.
He pulls me close and kisses the top of my head. "Don't worry, I'll take care of it."
He crouches in front of it. It strains its body to try and reach him, but to no avail. Nick drives a knife into its head. He pulls me away from staring at the gaping hole in its skull and the surrounding puddle of blood.
About ten minutes later, Nick speaks up, "You're not gonna puke on me are you?"
"I'm fine. I just think Pete's roadkill isn't settling too well with me."
He laughs. "I know you're fine; I'm just messing with you. The others didn't bother me, but you're right. The raccoon last night wasn't my favorite either."
We continue in silence, listening to the peaceful noises of the forest. Eventually Nick stops moving altogether and speaks up. "Hey, there's something I've been wanting to talk to you about."
I stop in my tracks, smiling at him to continue.
"I was wanting to talk about us…"
The color in my face drains. I pretend I don't know what there could possibly be to talk about. The nausea makes its reappearance. "What is there to talk about?"
He rolls his eyes at my feigned obliviousness. "What are we? I mean, are we together?"
Pinching the bridge of my nose, I answer, "Nick, you know the answer to that is no." We have had conversations in the past similar to this one. He knows that no matter how the two of us feel, it would be an utter shit show to even try a real relationship. We could try to have a relationship in secret, but I'm certain we would get caught.
"So, we've fucked more than once, but we're not together? Are we friends with benefits or something?" I can tell he's frustrated.
"Nick," I start, my voice cracking and my heart breaking. "We aren't anything. We can't be anything. I'm sorry I probably confused you when we slept together. But with the way things are now, we can't be together."
He steps in front of me. His large hands cup my face, forcing me to look at him. A deep sadness swirls around inside of his blue eyes. I just want to melt into him. "Bea, can you seriously look me in the eyes and say you have no feelings for me?"
"This isn't about what I want or how I feel. Can we please just get to where we're going?" I pull away, mutter a pitiful apology, and follow the path.
In retaliation he storms off far in front of me. I don't blame him. He shows his emotions as anger, and I show mine as sadness. I wish I could show him that I care about him so deeply, and that everything I do, I do to protect him.
Up ahead, he calls out to me. As expected, he can't stay mad at me for long. After quickening my pace, it doesn't take long to reach him. He's standing in a clearing, surrounded by a desolated campsite.
A baby blue tent lies in the dead center, completely torn apart. The rest of the campsite is filled with overturned chairs, demolished boxes of supplies, and two dead bodies. The two corpses, a man and a woman, lie on their backs. They each have bites on their arms and bullet holes in their heads. It's apparent that they took their own lives to prevent reanimation.
I start to move forward, but my foot crunches something below me. I pick the object up. It's an action figure. Strewn about are other kids' toys.
The toy falls from my hands and my hand shoots upward to cover my mouth. "You don't think-"
Nick nods sadly in agreement. "I think that kid must've been theirs. God, that's so fucked up."
My stomach does naseouting somersaults. The disgusting smell of decomposing bodies infiltrates my nose. I strain to keep down what little is left in my stomach. "They wreak."
He leads me to the other side of the camp. The broken down boxes of supplies are strewn about. "You look around here to see if there's anything worthwhile. I'm gonna go see if their guns are still loaded."
He makes his way toward the bodies. Usually, I would do it, but right now my stomach can't handle the stench. I turn toward the boxes to avoid seeing him pry the weapons from their clenches.
Most of the supplies are ruined or useless. I sift through the small amount of untouched items, collecting them in the only box that isn't completely smashed. Nick meets me after a few minutes.
"Both their guns were almost fully loaded, and I found some boxes of ammo, too," he says as he places the items in the box I've put together. He picks it up. "Ready to go?"
"Yep," I respond, getting up off of my knees. "Oh, wait."
My eyes spot a can of soup lying under the bushes a few yards away. My arm stretches out to grasp it. From within the bushes a pair of teeth latches onto my hand. I cry out in pain, trying to shake the strong pair of jaws off of me. Finally I pry its jaws off, and the snake slithers back into the brush.
My vision blurs a bit as my hand bleeds a hell of a lot more than I expected it to. Even through my cloudy vision, I can see Nick's panicked face. From his position, he wasn't able to see the attack clearly.
"It's just a snake bite!" I assure him louder than I mean to. "Just a snake bite that's bleeding a lot…"
He drops the box, the contents clanging together loudly as he does so. To stop the bleeding, he rips a piece of his shirt and wraps it around the wound. As he holds it tightly, I can't help but stare at the exposed part of his stomach.
"Fuck, was it poisonous?" he asks.
"No, I recognized it from around the farm. Just a lot of blood... and pain…"
"You're not gonna pass out on me, are you?" he asks at the sight of my eyes going in and out of focus. He grabs my chin with his free hand, forcing me to look at him.
His eyes still look beautiful, despite my vision not being clear. I feel myself slipping, but I jerk back before I let myself lose consciousness. I shake my head, hard. My vision slowly comes back as I ground myself. "I'm good. Let's get back. Quickly."
He leaves the box of supplies and tries to grab me. I push him off. "What the hell are you doing?"
"Helping you get back," he says as if it's the most obvious thing in the world.
"No, take the supplies. I'll be okay." He tries to object again, but I silence him. We need these supplies. If I'm going to get bit by a snake while collecting them, I'm sure as hell going to make sure they make it back to camp.
We set off back toward camp. Nick keeps glancing over at me nervously, as if I could drop at any second. The entire way back I have to focus intently on my steps, one foot after another. I shake my head over and over again. Don't pass out.
I mentally cheer in my head when we reach camp what feels like hours later. At my ghostly white face and bloodied hand, Luke freaks out. "Are you bit?!"
"It was a snake," I mumble out.
Martha races over to me and sits me down near the campfire. The bleeding has thankfully slowed tremendously. The strip of cloth over the wound is caked with dry blood, as is my arm. "Oh dear, it wasn't a poisonous snake was it?"
Before I can answer, Luke speaks up. "How the fuck did this even happen?"
The look on Nick's face is pure guilt. I knew he was going to feel horrible about this, and now it is apparent. It was nothing but a freak accident; Nick shouldn't feel any guilt. I answer, "The stupid thing came out of nowhere. I was just in the wrong place at the wrong time."
Martha pours hydrogen peroxide over the bite marks. My teeth grit to stop myself from crying out. The pain fizzles out after the blood washes away. She finishes up by wrapping my hand in bandages. "The good news is you don't need stitches, which is great because we don't exactly have the supplies anyway. Also, if it was poisonous you would have had a reaction already."
"Thank you," I tell her, before turning to Nick. "And I'm really sorry about your shirt."
The both of them shrug. Like mother like son, they're always so humble.
The evening fades away from us, my hand feeling better as the night continues (although it still bleeds in random spurts). Martha and I are prepared to take the first shift of watch. Pete, Luke, and Nick all offer to take my spot, but I assure them that I'm fine.
Several hours into a rather unusually peaceful night, Martha interrupts the silence, "Honey, have you been feeling okay lately?"
I ponder hard at what she means with her question. Does she mean physically or emotionally? In terms of emotionally, I am still shaken from the deaths of my parents and Blinker. In terms of physically, I just got chomped on by a snake.
"I suppose," I ultimately say. "My hand has been feeling much better."
She shakes her head at my answer, the breeze flowing through her hair. "No, I mean, have you felt anything weird lately. Maybe some unusual emotional or physical feelings that are unrelated to your hand or losing your parents?"
I shrink down in my chair, wishing for the first time in my life that a lurker would come and interrupt us. She has a point. I have felt unusually the past week or so, but I just chalked it up to the emotional duress I've been under.
"I'm fine…" I tell her, but it's myself that I am trying to convince.