I remember she even when she joined our little glee club for her own, selfish reasons. She wouldn't acknowledge me unless she was going out of her way to make my life just a bit more miserable. And she wouldn't even attempt to do so if she didn't know for a fact that she could. No, she sat in the back with the other girls in matching uniform, filing at her nails with her high ponytail so tight on her head that sometimes I wondered if they did it so their skin seemed firmer, and she stayed quiet otherwise. Every now and again you could hear her laughing with the blonde girls of her same social status. Every now and again she would smile or flirt with the boys that were there. That was it. It was a presence that you felt, and she didn't even have to do anything. I didn't hate people. But I hated her for it.
But now, as I watched her lie in the shadows, her breathing a little shallow and her tanned skin covered in dirt and her hair piled around her in a dark halo, she almost seemed like a normal person- no longer the cold soul that everyone began to associate her with, the scowl she usually wore gone without even a trace left… It was strange to see. The tears in her clothing showed where her once flawless skin was covered in either the brown of dried blood or the silvery-white of healing scars. The cut above her lip seemed so unnatural on her face.
I broke my gaze only for a moment to see if her attacker had stumbled off in another direction after he'd gotten back up from the blow to the back of his head. My upper body strength wasn't much, but in the adrenaline rush, I'd managed a swift hit and had her dragged behind the counter in a matter of moments. To be honest enough, I wasn't even sure that was what had happened anymore. It all seemed more a blur. I didn't see him now though, and praying silently that he was gone- for now at least- I pushed myself to all fours and sneaked around the broken glass strewn across the floor. There had to be bandages around here somewhere. There just had to be. It was a convenient store after all, and nothing would be more convenient in this moment than bandages and rubbing alcohol. And, for her sake, perhaps drinking alcohol would be great in this case as well.
It was also a blur to me how we got here, when I tried to think about it. And it certainly wasn't a time to think back to high school days spent being tortured by the only two people I'd really spent any time with since the outbreak. What good could possibly come from that now? If anything, I was going to get us both killed. Of all people to see here, infected and shambling about like that, and it had to be Jesse. And I froze. And even when she tried to shoot, I couldn't let her. I think she managed to find a way to sneak down from the roof, but... How had all of this happened? And so quickly. Here she was, dying, and over the radio of another fallen member of our group who was seeming to reanimate right in front of me, I listened as the base we'd been calling home was overrun by a horde no one saw coming. Quinn had been right. It was only a temporary fix to a problem that was going to haunt us and only get worse. I'd stayed because I thought, just maybe, we could pretend to be happy in all of this, but...
Quinn, where are you?