Chapter 11:
After my "procedure", Daryl led me out to the hall, I refused to sit in that room with him and needles any longer. The kindly doctor graciously applied Neosporin and a gauze pad to my now stitched cheek. Unfortunately I was left to wait alone until after about 20 minutes when Dr. Jenner exited the room with his victims.
"So, I hear you haven't eaten in a while?" At the prospect of food I jumped to attention, getting on my feet rather quickly. Daryl looked at me amusedly as Jenner took a few steps forward, tracing his way through the crowded hallway. "Well I think that can be remedied, if you'll just follow me down through these doors." Cheerfully he wagged his two pointer fingers towards a set of double doors on our left. "Vi, lights on in the mess hall." Almost like a scene from a movie, the florescent lights clicked on one by one illuminating the hall.
Rows of tables were set up in front of us and my mouth dropped when the buffet line came into view. A few "ooos" and gasps came from behind me.
"Mommy, can we eat?" Sophia asked quietly. Carol murmured something, only to be interrupted by Jenner.
"You can have anything in the kitchen, and as for you," He turned to me and a few of the others. "There's a cabinet and cooler back there with enough alcohol to last years." Then he gestured in the direction of the cabinet.
"Seriously?" I asked without thinking. My words were slurred slightly because my cheek was still numb. Feeling my cheeks grow hot I covered my mouth.
"Come on, A.A." Daryl nudged my shoulder with a smile and I playfully punched him back as he led the way to the cabinet. As he opened the cabinet my eyes grew wide, there were wines and vodka's, champagnes and cognacs.
"This is my kinda party." Daryl huffed as he grabbed out four forty's of Bud light. I raised an eyebrow at him.
"And I'm an alcoholic." I snorted, reaching for my face. The stitches were still tender and I felt them pull everytime I smiled. He handed me two of them and grinned widely, devilishly.
"First one to the bottom wins." We both took a step away from the door, allowing the others to grab out a few crates of wine to drink with dinner. I looked at the bottle in disgust. "Oh come on Georgia Peach, Don't tell me Miss Backwoods can't drink with the best of em?" I eyed him up and down, realizing his little taunts had caught the attention of Glenn and T Dogg. They both stood watching us, looks of pure amusement on their faces. Slowly I unscrewed the top of my bottle.
"Nooo, I just don't want to embarrass you." I clinked the bottom of our bottles together and smiled the sweetest smile possible. "Bottoms up?" Taking a big swig I turned away from the men and began walking back towards the rest of the group. T Dogg and Glenn maturely continued to tease Daryl who still stood where I left him, cussing both of them.
...
Lori and Carol took up work in the kitchen that evening, making spaghetti and chicken and something that included bacon. Once everything was on the table it didn't take long for people to dig in.
After I had stuffed my face, I sat on a stool out of the way, still drinking my first forty. I was nearly halfway done, and all the way tipsy. My tolerance hasn't been the same from the lack of frat party's in a post apocalyptic world.
Carl's parents had been pressured, persuaded, whatever you would like to call it, into letting him try a sip of wine. I laughed at the face he made.
"That's my boy." Lori smiled, taking the glass away from him. I could feel myself relaxing when Daryl walked up to me.
"You should stick to soda pop little man." Shane replied with a smile.
"Not you Glenn," Daryl spoke. Glenn had already been drinking profusely and he looked up, astonished someone had said his name. "I wanna see how red your face can get." The table laughed and began to dog Glenn. Daryl, proud of himself, poured two shots of Southern Comfort, bringing one over to me.
"Here." He held it out for me to take, and I dropped my head back, groaning in reply.
"Oh god."
"Oh god what?" Daryl asked with a smirk. I looked over at him.
"Ain't you ever heard of the rules?" I had surprised myself, hearing my southern upbringing clearly in that last sentence. It was the liquor. Daryl raised an eyebrow at me and I continued. "Liquor before beer, have no fear, beer before liquor never sicker." Daryl chuckled, extending the shot to me again.
"I'll hold your hair back darlin', now drink the damn shot." I did as I was told, taking in a sharp breath as it burned my throat. I made a face and felt my cheeks flush when Daryl did the same, except his reaction was much better than mine. "This is gonna be a long night for you." He teased.
There was a tapping of glass, a toast of some kind, which drew all of our attention to Rick.
"It seems to me we haven't thanked our host properly."
"He is more than just our host." T Dogg stated drunkenly, raising his glass. Every yelled out their agreements including an ecstatic Booyah from Daryl.
"Booyah!" I cheered, feeling myself relax a little. Shane, however, was not relaxed, and being the only sober one at the party brought up a point we all would have thought rather valid, had we not been under the influence.
"So when you gonna tell us what the hell happened here doc?" The excitement and the playful energy immediately died, and I pulled my bottle of beer away from my mouth. "All the uh, other doctors that were supposed to be figuring out what happened, where are they?"
Daryl scowled next to me and Rick gave Shane a frown.
"We're celebrating Shane, no need to do this now."
"Wait a second, this is why we're here right?" Shane countered. The tension was building again, and I felt my drunk disappearing with every passing second. "This was your move, supposed to find all the answers." Shane stared challengingly at Rick. Maybe he was drunk, because I could see his rage building from someplace unknown. "Instead, we found him?" Shane began to laugh. "We found one man, Why?"
"Well, when things got bad, a lot of people just left. Went off to be with their families." Jenner paused for a second, swallowing something hard, before continuing. "And when things got worse, when the military Cordon got overrun, the rest bolted."
"Every last one?"
"No. Many couldn't face walking out the door. They… Opted out. There was a rash of suicides." Jenner's tone was plain, somber, informative and I felt disgusted with him. I took a deep breath, putting my bottle on the table for good. "That was a bad time."
"How come you didn't leave?"
"I just kept working, hoping to do some good." I was about done with this conversation as I stood up straight. Looking at the Doctor sitting across the room from me, I saw the agony in his eyes. I knew he'd probably thought about death many times, but probably never found the courage to pull that trigger.
"Dude, you are such a buzz kill, man." Glenn was somber and he slowly took a seat.