EIGHT

The following morning Rick did not awake to the sound of chirping birds or, thankfully, the sound of rain pattering against the roof (as much as they needed the water, he had had quite enough of rain thanks to the prior afternoon's events—at least, for a few days). Instead, he awoke to the feeling of a ten pound feline sitting directly on his breast bone and purring less than two inches from his face. He grumbled and reached out a sloppy hand to give Tux a stroke. The cat leaned into his touch and soon flopped down on Rick's chest and rubbed his face against Rick's chin and jaw. The man coughed from the feeling of fur entering his mouth, but really he didn't mind. Nothing short of zombies learning to climb up into the treehouse would have damped his mood that morning.

A few moments later, when Tux's purrs had turned to insistent meows, the writer grumbled and sat up in bed. Tux hopped down to the ground and happily began leading his owner to the room that held his food bowls. Rick caught sight of a clock in his way into the kitchen and saw it was barely ten-to-six in the morning; he grumbled. "You can never sleep in, can you?" he asked the black-and-white fur ball. Tux merely yowled in response; Rick took this as a "no."

After dumping a can of food on a plate and putting it on the ground, Rick yawned and leaned back against the kitchen counter, considering his next course of action. Going back to bed was obviously one choice, but despite the early hour he actually did not feel that tired, which was probably due to a lengthy nap the afternoon before. Instead, he decided he was hungry, which afforded him the perfect opportunity to present the lady in his life with breakfast in bed.

Normally on such a morning he would go all out: pancakes and bacon or waffles dripping in chocolate and whipped cream. And coffee—there would definitely be copious amounts of high quality, freshly-ground coffee. Sadly, in their present state he was unable to concoct any of those things. The most romantic breakfast he could muster was cut up peaches served over dry granola; but it was better than nothing. As he sliced up the fruit, he couldn't help but smile as he reflected on the prior twelve hours.

The prior afternoon after making love Rick and Kate lay on the couch listening to the sounds of the rain lessen from violent droves to a softer pattering. As they were already in the process of dozing, neither of them suggested moving until the rain had all but come to an end an hour or so later. They hurried back to the treehouse with the intent of putting on dry clothing and finding some food, but ended up falling into bed and making love again before spending the rest of the day laughing, talking, and only moving from their oasis to get something to eat.

After losing his home, his family, and everything he used to recognize as reality, Rick never thought he could have a perfect afternoon again, but he had the day before, and he had every intention of having another one that day as well. In fact, he wanted the entire day to be perfect, which was why he was starting it by making breakfast.

With their cereal bowls completed, Rick grabbed two spoons and returned to the bedroom carrying their meals. He entered just in time to see Kate arching her back in a stretch as she reached her hands up high over her head. In doing so, she exposed her bare chest and he grinned, though it wasn't simply the sigh of her breasts he was smiling at, but her—every beautiful inch of her.

Standing there, watching her, he realized how silly he had been to second guess transitioning their friendship to more. Experiencing what he had the day before made him realize there was no way he could have waited one more second to love her and be with her in that way; life was too precious.

Kate was incredible. He knew it before, but after making love no doubt existed in his mind. Just how close he had come to losing her would make him sick if he thought about it too long. He didn't want to think about it because he didn't want to lose her and knew from that moment on he'd do everything in his power to keep her safe; to keep them safe.

"Mmm-morning." She hummed when she opened her eyes and saw him standing a few feet away.

"Morning." He echoed. He walked over to her, brushed his lips against her forehead, and then handed her one of the bowls and spoons. "Made you breakfast."

Her expression brightened the moment she accepted the bowl. "Oh. Wow. That's very sweet—thank you!"

He merely shrugged as he took a seat by her feet with his own breakfast. "It's nothing special. If we were back in my apartment I would have made you the best breakfast you've ever had."

She chuckled and scooped up one of the peach pieces with her spoon. "The best breakfast I've ever had, hmm? I hope I get to try that someday. But in the meantime this is perfect."

Not a minute later, Tux jumped up on the bed in between them and stuck his entire face in Rick's cereal bowl while he was in the middle of chewing. "Hey!" He groaned, yanking the bowl away. Tux yowled at him and reached out for the bowl with his paw. "No!" Rick said, giving the cat a nudge with his elbow. "What are you doing? This isn't for you—you just ate!"

Kate laughed. "Maybe he thinks it's his dry cat food; it might smell the same."

The writer grumbled as he took another bite while being protective of his bowl. "It better not; this is high quality store brand granola." Tux yowled loudly before jumping down off the bed and propping himself up in the doorway to lick his paws. "What's his problem?"

"He's probably mad at us for kicking him out of the bedroom for most of yesterday."

Rick grunted. It made sense; the cat had made his displeasure known by scratching at the door and yelling when he'd been banned. Fortunately, he didn't notice the racket for too long as he was quite happily occupied. Turning to the feline he said, "Well, prepare yourself: it's going to happen again in about twenty minutes."

"Twenty minutes?" Kate asked, her voice ringing with curiosity.

"Yeah, as soon as we're done with this," he said, gesturing towards their breakfast.

An expression of amusement crossed her face. "I see. Did you have anything else on our schedule for today or…?"

"No, not really; just lots of sex."

Kate laughed. "Well, I hate to disappoint you, but we do have plenty to do today—things that involve us being clothed and outside of this treehouse," she added for clarification.

"Such as…?" he asked, seeing absolutely nothing that took precedence over celebrating the fact that they were alive over and over and over again.

"Well, first, we have to check on the chi-"

"NO!" He cut her off immediately. "Are you kidding me? You're never going back to that place again."

"Rick!" She said, her tone indicating a mixture of annoyance and amusement. "That's absurd. Obviously, I'm going to be a lot more careful this time. Besides, we have to get the eggs, fix the fence, feed them, possibly go and look for Clara…"

He huffed. All enjoyment he had for Hannah and Shelby had vanished the moment of Kate's near-bite. Deep down, he knew he was being childish, but for the time being he did not want Kate to set foot anywhere near the chicken coup and if that meant losing the chickens, so be it.

"Plus," Kate continued, "we have to collect all the water. We must have gotten gallons and gallons of it—how great is that!"

On that point, Rick did need to concede. The horrible storm had given them probably nearly a month's supply of water, and that was nothing to take lightly. "Alright—we'll collect the water, make sure it's all secure so we don't lose any of it and then," he paused to lean close to her and waggle his eyebrows, "we'll come back here for some fun."

The grin on her face began to mirror the one on his as she said, "Sounds like a plan to me."


"It's not that I don't appreciate the rain; I do. But did we have to get so—ugh—damn much of it all at once?" Rick grunted as he hoisted the final basket of water up and over the balcony railing. They had spent nearly four hours collecting, organizing, boiling and storing their water harvest—far longer than Rick had wanted to, but as Kate pointed out, if they did it all at once, they would be done. Of course, their work was never done. The water collections system had been destroyed as she predicted, so it needed rebuilt, but she agreed that was a project they could start on the next day.

After stomping out the fire they used for water purification, Kate ascended the rope ladder and hoisted it up behind her. "I know; it's frustrating to have a few washout days like that, but what are we going to do? Despite your attempts at rain dancing, we cannot control the weather."

"I think right now we need an anti-rain dance," he pointed out. "And, really, it's not so much the fact that it stormed as the fact that we didn't know it was coming. Honestly, I think the thing I miss most is the weather app on my phone."

Kate walked to the balcony doorway and gazed at him. "Really? The thing you miss the most is something that was inaccurate half the time anyway? Not, oh, I don't know, consistent access to food, running water, electricity…"

He gave her a slightly perturbed look. "Point taken."

She flashed a smile at him. "I'm teasing—kind of." She definitely was not joking about any of those three things as they were the top three things she missed the most about the pre-apocalyptic world—in ranking order. Yet, she understood where he was going with his statement. "I know what you mean, though. I never really thought about the weather report before, but now that our lives are so nature-dependent it matters a whole heck of a lot more."

"Precisely."

Walking into the treehouse from the balcony, Rick drained his water bottle and then rested his hands heavily against the countertop. Thanks to the rains, the day was significantly cooler than the prior week had been, but Kate knew that didn't make the task of hauling up gallons and gallons of water any easier. Walking over to him, she wrapped both her arms around once of his and pressed her lips against his shoulder. "Are you ready to have some fun now?"

"No!" He groaned. Then, he gave her a sideways glance. "This was part of your plan, wasn't it? Tire me out with heavy lifting so we didn't have to have sex again."

She laughed as it did sound like something she could have contrived, but that could not have been further than the truth. "I swear it wasn't. I definitely want us to have sex again. It was…kind of amazing." She husked with her lips against his cheek. And she wasn't just saying that because of the ten month dry spell she'd previously experienced. Making love to Rick had been more than just life-affirming, but life-changing.

"Well, I don't think I can disagree with that." He turned towards her and moved his hands from the counter to her waist, drawing her in for a sweet kiss. She pressed her body against his, giving his hips a little tap with hers and he groaned into her mouth, immediately skimming his hands down her hips and beneath her thighs so he could hoist her up on the kitchen counter. Her head bumped against the cabinets, which didn't hurt so much as surprise her, so she merely laughed and continued to kiss him.

With her heels locked behind his knees, Kate had every intention of making Rick forget about his exhaustion, but after several moments of kissing it appeared he had other things on his mind, because he pulled back and gazed down at her with an expression so peculiar she had to ask, "What's wrong?"

"About yesterday. I…I was so scared, Kate; so scared."

She felt tears begin to prick at her eyes at his devastating tone. They hadn't talked about it, not really. After making love she'd been too happy to bring up such unsettling thoughts. Her nature as a cop was to bury it down, pick herself up and move on, but she understood his need to talk it through.

She brought her fingertips up to skim against his cheeks and sighed, "I know; me too."

"Truly. I think that was the most terrifying moment of my entire life. Possibly second only to the time when Alexis fell head-first off the monkey bars when she was four."

Kate grimaced at that awful-sounding event. "Was she okay?"

"Bit her lip, needed three stitches, but otherwise yeah."

"Oh."

"But Kate…when I saw…" His hand traveled up her right arm and landed at the spot in between her neck and shoulder, right where the zombie's teeth had come millimeters from puncturing her flesh. She shuddered at the memory.

"I know." She murmured as the tear escaped her eye and slid down her cheek. "I…I'm not ready to go yet." Somehow she knew she had more living yet to do—and not just day to day, trying to survive, but living. She and Rick—they were going to make it through this undead-filled world and get to the other side where a semblance of a normal life could be found again. They'd earned it and so they would get it.

"Kate," he said, desperation a bit more evident in his tone, so she looked up at met his eye. "I'm not ready for you to go. I'm not ready to go either, because, Kate, I-"

Rick's words were stolen from his throat by the piercing echo of a gunshot echoing through the otherwise silent forest. Both occupants of the kitchen gasped and looked in the direction of the patio door. Tux growled and slunk off the couch towards his safe-haven under the bed.

"What was-"

Kate clamped her hand down over her companion's mouth to silence him. She pressed her index finger against her lips as an indicator that he should be quiet. Delicately, she slid down from the counter, dropped to her hands and knees, and crawled towards the still open balcony door. She slid on her stomach out just far enough to be able to peer down into the clearing. In that moment, she had never been so thankful that not only was their fire out, though disappointingly, not cold, but the rope ladder was also raised, making them nearly invisible from the ground.

For a solid three minutes she practically held her breath, not daring to move an inch. She took shallow, controlled breaths to make as little sound as possible just in case whoever shot the gun came close enough to the treehouse to be heard. Just when she was about to give up, she heard voices drawing nearer.

"Do you see any more of them?" said a man with a deep, gruff voice.

"Nah, I think it was just that one," responded another person with a higher pitched voice, though Kate guessed it was also a man.

"Oh, hey. Look over here!"

"What's your problem?" grumbled the second man.

"Look at this. Jesus, it's like a massacre."

Just then, the figures entered the clearing and Kate could just barely see them through the slats in the balcony railing. They both carried long rifles in their hands and one had a spare strapped to his back. Scooting closer to the edge of the balcony, Kate saw that they also both appeared to be toting machetes and smaller knives on their hips. From their discussion, she could only guess they were referring to the wall of zombie bodies she used to camouflage her scent the treehouse and discourage any humans from getting too close.

"Think any of these bodies are the family from that big 'ol house over there?"

"Who knows, who cares?" The second man responded. "Whoever they are, they're long gone."

"Probably right. Let's get out of here and go see if we can find Thomas."

With that, the two men disappeared from Kate's line of vision, walking back towards the cul-de-sac nearest their treehouse. For two minutes, she didn't move and barely breathed. All she could do was listen, strain her ears as much as she could to hear more voices or footsteps crushing on underbrush, but she heard nothing.

Using her palms flat against the ground, she pushed herself back into a crouch and attempted to waddle her way back into the house, but her path was blocked by Rick, who was crouching just inside the balcony door. She sat back on her haunches and studied his look of concern. Honestly, she didn't know what to make of it. The first humans they'd seen since the woman looking for baby food, only these humans were much more heavily armed.

"Maybe we should go after them." He whispered to her.

Kate's brow rose and her eyes flared wide for she had been thinking the exact opposite. "No, I don't think so. Didn't you see them? They had those huge guns."

"Maybe they have a camp."

"Maybe they're going to rob us and shoot us."

He frowned at her. "Maybe they're trustworthy."

She scoffed. Rationally, she knew it was possible the heavily armed men were doing so solely for their own protection and they would happily take a couple who could provide food and a significant amount of water into their fold. Yet, the cop in her told her that was not the most likely scenario. Unfortunately, the other scenario ended with them being beaten and possibly severely injured. At the very least that scenario involved their treehouse being taken from them along with all of their supplies. That was not something she was willing to risk. "Says the man who was robbed of all his belongings twice. We don't know who we can trust, Rick. If they're part of a group, we don't know how large it is and there are only two of us with only one gun."

He pressed his lips together, clearly considering, before saying, "You trusted me."

"I…that's different."

"Why?"

"For a bunch of reasons," Kate said, the foremost of which being that he was one person and she was one person—a person who was also armed. In her mind, it was all about odds. Back when she first met Rick, she knew the odds were in her favor if they ever had an altercation due to her weapon. With another group, the odds were decidedly opposite.

"Such as…?"

Despite his curiosity, Kate shook her head and pushed herself off the ground, stepping over his legs to reenter the treehouse. "It doesn't matter."

"No, I want to know why. Why did you let me in, Kate? Why did you let me stay?"

Kate felt an odd tingling sensation at the back of her neck and skimmed her fingertips across it delicately. Though two months had passed, if she closed her eyes she could still see him kneeling in the clearing, hear the pleading tone of his voice and feel the sick feeling in her gut that it had given her. "I heard you scream when those two zombies started to attack you. I went out on the balcony and I watched you fall to your knees and pray for it to be over… I knew exactly how that felt because that was me before I found this place." She shook her head as she looked over at him, taking notice of how curiously he was gazing at her. It had been a dark time for her, for certain. She had never gotten to the point where she fell to her knees and begged for it to be over, but she had spent many hours particularly at night wondering how much longer it could go on, how much more she could take.

"Back then I wasn't sure if I would make it another day, another week. Then, I found this place and things became a little easier. I wanted to give someone else that chance to take a break, to reset, to realize that things were bad, but not as bad as they thought they were. I wanted to give you that chance and then once we met I..."

Her voice drifted off and she shook her head, taking a step closer to him. This was it, the moment she wasn't going to waste. In her past life, she never would have dared confessed such intimate thoughts, but now, knowing that it could all be over in an instant, the confession felt natural and not scary at all.
"As it all fell apart, after I left the city and got separated from my group I thought I'd just be going through the motions, trying to survive. I thought I would never have anything to look forward to again. I'd exist only to find water, food, and shelter. Stay alive somehow, but never really living. But then I met you and these past two months have been different. That's why we need to stick together and stay safe, because if something were to happen to you I...couldn't because I..."

Kate's emotional stammering was cut off by Rick striding forward, sliding his hands beneath her jaw, and pulling her mouth up to meet his. Her hands fell at his waist and she pulled herself into him, getting lost in the feeling of his lips against hers. When he pulled back, Rick brushed his thumbs against her cheek and gazed down at her with a fire that had her breath hitching in her chest.

"I love you."

A grin burst out onto her face immediately; she was so happy to hear he felt the same. Never in her entire life had she fallen in love with someone so quickly. Then again, their situation was entirely unique. "I love you too; I'm so glad you're here."

"Me too." With that, he kissed her again and made his intentions plain by sliding his hands down her jaw, over her back, and across her shorts so he could squeeze her ass. She grumbled out his name as a warning and he chuckled with a breathy, "What?"

She placed her hand flat against his chest and pushed him an inch further away. "We shouldn't…what if they come back?"

With a cheeky grin he said, "Then, they'll get a show."

She shook her head. Just in case they came back, she did not want to have herself in any compromising position; they needed to be ready. "Let's just sit here for a bit and listen, okay?"

Though he protested, Rick ultimately joined her on the couch where they sat quietly together, their arms around each other. "It's too bad we don't have cameras on the outside of this place. Or telescopes."

"But you couldn't see anything through the trees."

He clicked his tongue. "Don't ruin my ideas with your logic."

Chuckling slightly, Kate tucked her head against his shoulder and continued to listen to the sounds outside the treehouse.


"What are you thinking?" Rick asked as he skimmed his fingertips gently down the freckled skin on Kate's biceps. They lay together in bed two hours later after his insistent kissing of her neck had convinced her to abandon her post in the living room and join him beneath the sheets. For the prior ten minutes her dopey smile had been replaced with a displeasing frown.

She exhaled slowly and pressed herself back against his chest. "I'm wondering if they broke into the main house to search it, if they've found the chickens, any of our hidden supplies…"

He hummed. "They may have just been passing through."

"Maybe. If not, there will always be another group…"

"So," he began, cradling his head in his palm as he gazed down at her, "are you saying you think we should leave?"

She slid her body so she could lay fully on her back and meet his gaze more easily. "I'm thinking about the future." She was never not thinking about the future. Yes, the treehouse was an oasis for now, but was it long term? They had gone through all the houses in their cul-de-sac and the next closest one and mined them completely for food and water. Yes, the recent monsoon had solved their water problems and they had at least enough food for a month, but after that, what would they do?

She wasn't sure how far away the next neighborhood of houses was. Even if it was close by, the group they saw that day proved there were others in the area. Maybe those houses were stripped bare of supplies as well. Were that the case, they would need to keep venturing further and further away from the treehouse for supplies and then, did it make sense to still call it their home base? Besides, as nice as it was, the treehouse was far from the perfect hideaway.

"I know it's just the end of August now, but I was thinking ahead—to winter. It'll be getting cold before we know it and the first frost is not the time to make a plan. The treehouse is great for now—camouflaged and amazingly has a little bit of electricity, but as soon as the trees lose their leaves, it won't be hidden anymore. Plus, with this whole thing being wood how would we heat it? If we lit a fire in here, not only would we suffocate from the smoke, but we could easily burn the place down from underneath us."

"So you do think we should leave," he concluded.

Sad as it was, leaving seemed the only logical conclusion. "I think we have to, but I have no idea where we'd go other than south." In the south, the winters weren't as harsh and their likelihood of freezing to death seemed slim. Granted, if they went too far south—and the world was still a disaster in a year—they'd have the opposite problem as it would be too hot to survive in the summer.

Rick leaned down and pressed a kiss onto her head. "We don't have to decide right now. After everything that's happened in the past twenty-four hours I think we need to just take some time and breathe. Let's just take a few days, okay? We'll get organized, have a plan and maybe just take some time to pretend we're on a really weird vacation."

She almost laughed. "Really weird vacation?"

"Yeah." He grinned. "I'd like a day or so to pretend the whole world isn't different. Our little oasis has sheltered us from that. Plus, you know," he paused to skim his hand beneath the sheet and cup one of her breast, "this is fun and new so we should keep doing it."

She laughed deeply as she flipped over onto her side and threw one of her legs over his hip, using her heel against the back of his leg to draw him a bit closer. "Yeah well I think I know a place we can get some leather straps and a ball gag if you're interested."

He cringed. "I'm...not..." he said, his tone indicating a small amount of concern mixed with fear.

She laughed and shook her head. Bondage was certainly not one of her interests in the bedroom—though she had not been entirely opposed to using her police cuffs for some fun on rare occasion. "Me neither."

Rick appeared relieved. "Oh good. Plus using other people's sex toys is gross."

Her grimace matched his. "Agreed."

He brushed some hair back from her face and cradled the back of her neck with his hand. "So we're taking some time…?"

As much as the A-type personality in her wanted to jump out of bed and start packing that moment, she knew Rick had a point. So much had happened in the prior twenty-four hours it would be ill-advised to begin making hasty decisions at that moment. Assuming when they went exploring they did not find the main house overtaken by a group of potential foes, she did think a short respite would be good for all of them, but as soon as they had a plan, they needed to put it in action. "A week?"

He agreed with a nod. "A week." Then he leaned down and kissed her before whispering in her ear, "It's going to be amazing."