I know I asked for the whole story, but it didn't make it any better when he started.

"It's all my fault, Isabelle. This shouldn't have happened." I pulled him close and he sobbed quietly into my shoulder. My heart ached for him, I could feel his pain because I felt like I lost my other half too. I tried my best to tell him otherwise, but no matter what I'd been trying to tell him it only seemed to hurt him more. What am I doing wrong?

He sniffled several more times and took a deep breath, "Right, right." He told himself, "I'm sorry, Isabelle. I keep getting off track."

I rubbed his shoulder tenderly and nodded, "Take your time. Seriously."

"The man…who bit you," he started as he eyed my bandage, "he had a disease. It was on the news really early this morning, the reason I wasn't here was to get food. I should've stayed. I'm such an idiot, Isabelle. I'm so fucking stupid."

I sighed, "Luke, don't. Don't start playing the blame game and thinking 'what if', it's not going to make anything better."

"The news reported that the dead were coming back to life…like zombies or some shit. I don't know, all they reported was that if you were bitten you would turn into one after you died."

"Zombies?" I asked skeptically. I knew what zombies were, hell I always watched zombie movies back when in college and afterwards I would play some Dead Rising or Left 4 Dead. But in real life? Come on, I'm not stupid.

I let out a nervous laugh, a bad habit of mine. "I just...I'm sorry. It feels like this isn't even real life."

"Yeah, but they're not being called that. They're called walkers." It seemed more like a fitting name…since I just wouldn't be able to bring myself to ever call them zombies, zombies were fictional, they shouldn't and wouldn't ever exist. Just like these "walkers" Luke was talking about.

"I don't… want to believe this. At all." This couldn't be real. This was a dream, had to be. I tried my best to pinch my arm and wake myself up, only for Luke to grab my hand to stop me.

"It's hard to take in, I understand that, but we need to both…" he sighed as if he didn't want to finish his sentence, "we need to figure out how to survive all of this."

I nodded my head, I wanted to cry. I really did. I wanted to scream and yell and break everything in sight. I just wanted to be home with my family.

My family…

"Luke, where has this been happening?" I asked and felt my chest tighten in anticipation for his reply. The last thing I wanted was for something to happen and me not being there. They were in California and I was stuck here in Georgia, I couldn't imagine it would be possible to hop on a flight back home or anything.

"So far it's the east coast, haven't heard much about the west coast." He paused, taking notice of the very worried look etched on my face, "But I'm more than 100% sure that your mom and brother are okay. I know it, Isabelle." His soft tone helped somewhat, but it wasn't enough. It wouldn't be enough until I'd hear their voices and them saying that they're alive and just…safe. I just wanted them to be safe.

I jumped off the bed and tried to go downstairs to get my cell phone, but I was stopped by Luke. "You won't have much luck, Isabelle. All the towers are overloaded, I couldn't get through to my parents either."

"Damn it!" I pounded my first on the wall, not caring about the pain radiating down my arm. "How am I supposed to know my family is okay? Huh?" I shoved him out of anger, "How the fuck am I supposed to know?"

"Isabelle, please." He pleaded, "Calm down, we can't risk them hearing us!"

I took multiple deep breaths, "I just want to talk to my mom and brother. That's all, Luke. Just give me a working phone and I'll shut up."

He stuffed his hands into his pockets and pulled out his cell phone to hand to me, it had barely any signal. This was going to be fun.

I quickly dialed my home phone number. Several rings and no answer. Fuck. I tried calling my mom's cell phone. Didn't work either, fuck fuck fuck.

God, I know I've sinned before in my life, but please take it out on me and not my family. Please make sure they're okay. Please.

I tried one more time by calling my brother's cell phone. One ring. Two rings. Three rings. Ring ring ring. More rings.

I was on the verge of giving up and smashing the phone into the wall, until my brother answered in a whisper.

I almost squealed but I tried to keep quiet due to Luke's glare, "Lucas! Lucas! Oh my god, I'm so fucking happy to hear your voice. Where are you? Is mom okay? Are you okay?" I know I was overwhelming my brother with questions and that now was probably not the best moment to be doing so, but I needed to know.

"Yes…we're fine, Isabelle. Mom's with me. We're at a marine base in San Diego right now, preparing for an evacuation to the Catalina Islands. It's our best bet for survival. What about you? Are you okay?"

I didn't want to tell him, I just couldn't bring myself to tell him the bad news, but I had to, it wouldn't have felt right to keep it from him. I lowered my voice, "Lucas, please don't tell mom this…I was bit. I don't know what's going to happen." My voice started to break, and I tried my best to stay strong for my brother, "Jane got bit too, and she died about twenty minutes ago but…she came back. I don't remember much about this morning, I just remember being bitten."

My brother sighed on the end of the line, yet remained calm, how he managed to do so was beyond me. "Isabelle, I need to know how long it's been and how you're feeling now."

"It's been about four or five hours…and I don't feel terrible. I did earlier, but now I feel fine. No fever or anything."

"Where are you?"

"Upstairs in a boarded up house."

"Fuck." He said silently, "Mom's going to freak."

"No, please don't tell her." I begged, I couldn't break my mom's heart like this. I already hated not being with them, "Please just tell her I'm safe."

"And if something happens to you?"

"I'll be fine, I just need to talk to Luke about our plans to get evacuated."

"Is it bad in the neighborhood you're in?" He sounded like he was getting anxious, and pretty fast as I was starting to hear my mom in the background.

"I don't know - haven't been outside. But please just focus on getting you and mom safe, don't worry about me."

"I have to fucking worry, Isabelle!" His voice lowered, "You've been bit and you're all the way across the country!"

"I feel fine though!"

"Maybe you're one of the lucky ones, Isabelle…" I was just about to question what he meant until I heard the phone snatched from him and I could hear the frantic calls of my name coming from my mom.

"Isabelle? Isabelle? Baby, are you okay? Where are you?" My stomach tightened as much as I was relieved to finally hear my mom's voice.

I still smiled at the sound of my mom's voice, "Mom, I'm fine. Don't worry, I'm in…a safe place. I should be getting evacuated soon." I felt terrible for lying to my mom like this, but I didn't have the heart to tell her how it really was here.

"Oh thank god, Isabelle. The way your brother was talking on the phone scared me."

"How about you, mom? Are you okay?"

"Si, mi amor, don't worry. We were the fortunate ones to get to some military base, there aren't that many people here so I think we'll be fine. But don't even worry about us."

Luke looked over to me as if I needed to wrap things up, I knew that we had a lot of things to attend to.

"Mom, I have to go now. I love you so much and please stay safe. I'll try to contact you whenever I can." I paused for a brief moment, "Can you pass the phone to Lucas so I could say bye?" I asked softly, holding back a sniffle.

"I love you too, Isabelle. Here's Lucas." I heard the phone being passed and my brother answered softly.

"Yeah?"

"I'll try to contact you guys when I get the chance. Protect mom, alright? And I'm going to try my damn best to get to you. I love you."

"Stay strong. I love you too." He said before hanging up, I was praying that it wouldn't be our last words to each other.


The next couple of hours, Luke and I had to prepare for the following weeks. Fortunately, he had a radio so we could stay up to date on the news. I couldn't listen anymore as we heard more and more places experience what was going on in Georgia. San Francisco. Seattle. Boston. New York. Chicago. All nearly overwhelmed by these walkers.

We decided on a watch schedule and divided up the food among us, there was enough food to keep us going for at least two or three weeks. In the corner of the master bedroom we placed our backpacks and Luke's handgun in case we'd have to abandon the house. We were both hoping the whole threat would die down in a matter of weeks, but had to come to the realization that we'd have to eventually abandon the house.

The master bedroom is pretty much where we'd be staying, waiting out the storm. It was in the middle of the upstairs area and was the biggest room with not too many windows. The most vital part was that it was in the front of the house, so we could see ahead of the house into the street and the driveway was right below us in case we needed to get to his car.

He explained to me why he had the axe, besides the obvious use as a weapon, but to destroy the staircase.

It was now probably 8 pm or 9 pm, and Luke was still waiting until there weren't any more walkers in the area before breaking the staircase. So I took advantage of when he was peeking out the curtains to sneak downstairs and grab my things.

Before I was able to get past the doorway, Luke had already turned around, I was caught.

"Where are you going?"

"I…I was going to get my stuff downstairs." I replied hesitantly, while trying to sneak away from the door casually.

"Let me get it for you, I don't want you making noise downstairs. I need to check the windows anyways."

I sighed and slumped down on the bed, "Alright fine, I just need my phone and clothes."

"Your clothes are already in your backpack because Ja-" He paused, he couldn't even finish the sentence, "I'll get your phone."

This sucked. I mean really, it was hard to describe how shitty the situation was, but it sucked ass.


The nights were the worst. I wish Luke had somehow gotten a hold of some ear plugs or something. The incessant moans of the walkers kept ringing through my ears the whole night when I was trying to get my rest, no matter how hard I'd try to tune it out. Although Luke always assured me he would be fine with taking the night watch, I could feel how torn he was when he'd hear her scratch at the door and groan. The guilt was tearing him apart, and no matter what I would say, nothing would help.

Sometimes at night I'd hear him quietly sobbing in the bathroom, and as always I'd ignore it and pretend I never heard it, but it was just as painful for me as it was for him…to be constantly reminded of a mistake you made.

I was woken by the sunlight bleeding through the windows; it'd been at least two weeks since the outbreak hit. Luke and I were doing fine, I mean we could be doing better, but we were still alive. But the radio eventually went silent, leaving us in the dark.

My wounds had been healing nicely, and yesterday I was finally able to take off the bandages. There was a slight bite mark, but it could've been mistaken for something that happened when I was much younger, which was really good for me if we were to come across other bands of survivors. From what the radios have been saying, a bite turns you into them and if someone were to see my bite mark…I didn't even want to think about it.

Not much had happened the past couple of days, besides the occasional walker coming up to tap on the windows downstairs and maybe a hiss or groan here and there.

Something was different this morning though, Luke wasn't in the spot he should've been. I checked the clock on the wall, the time wasn't wrong or anything. I definitely hadn't slept in either, how could I have with the constant reminder of the undead outside?

Okay, this was getting borderline weird. He didn't even have his gun with him. Ever since day one, Luke always carried his gun. But it was here, on the dresser. And not with him.

I raised an eyebrow and grabbed the gun to holster it in my pants, just in case one of those bastards had broken in. I swear I would've heard it too.

"Luke?" I called out quietly, hoping nothing bad happened to him, or else I'd be shit out of luck. I turned back to the room, there was still supplies (but barely), and he wouldn't have left without telling me anything. Our bags were still there too.

I checked all the rooms upstairs, and still no sign of him. The ladder (which was now used instead of the staircase) was untouched. I would go down there…but I was never allowed to. Luke told me before that I would always stay upstairs because it was safer.

I heard some…weird sounds coming from downstairs. Like…

…flesh being eaten.