Desolate

“So where do we go now?” Jordan asked as she looked at Zakk, who was driving steadily down the road.

“Find some other store to hang out in for awhile,” he replied with an exasperated sigh. Jordan unbuckled her seatbelt and made her way to the back of the van with Charlie, Alex, Jason, and Darren. She sat in between Charlie and Alex, sighing.

They drove for a few hours in complete silence with a little bit of small talk in between. Jordan listened to the heavy raindrops pound against the van, trying to use it as music since her ipod wasn’t going to help her much. She rested her eyes and leaned back against the van, humming along with the rain.

“Charlie, come here. Do you think we should stop here?” Zakk said as he slowly came to a stop in the middle of the street. Charlie stood up and leaned down to look out the window. Jordan’s curiosity made her stand up to look too. It was a college that she’d never heard of before. Just like the department store, this place was completely empty. There was no sign of life at all. Not even a few faded blood drops.

“Definitely!” Charlie said with a big smile on her face. It was a smile that Jordan hadn’t really seen before. She’d seen a few smirks, a few amused smiles that could hardly even be considered a smile. Zakk smiled with her and turned into the parking lot of the college.

“This has everything we need! Food, a room to sleep in, a hot shower and it’s huge which means we can stay longer!” she added enthusiastically.

They cautiously moved through the parking lot quickly, hoping not to be noticed by a passing zombie. If one zombie noticed them and stuck around waiting for them to leave, a bunch more would gather and they would be stuck.

“This will take us forever to search,” Jordan groaned as she looked out the window of the lounge.

“Well for now we’ll only check this area, since all we need at this point is to bathe,” Charlie replied, pulling at the hem of her blood stained shirt. They ran through the halls of each floor of the building. But they came up blank.

“What the hell? There isn’t anybody here,” Alex said when they met back up at the lounge.

“I guess all the students and staff figured it’d be safer to go where the zombies wouldn’t be,” Jordan said, shrugging her shoulder.

“Well they’re not very smart. There aren’t even any normal humans here!” Charlie said, another smile spreading on her face. She wasn’t the only one feeling good about herself. Everyone was feeling victorious for finding such a perfect place.

“So now that we’ve figured this out, we need to all bathe,” Jordan scoffed, looking down at herself and pulling her shirt down, getting a good look at the blood that now stained it.

“You can go first if you want,” Charlie said. Jordan shrugged, not fighting it as she turned and walked down the hall that seemed so creepy without people running around. She closed the bathroom door and turned on the shower. She stood for a few seconds watching the steam rise from the hot water, so thrilled to finally be able to see it.

She undressed and stepped into the shower, shocked by the heat of the water. She eventually got used to it and let the water run onto her head. She could stand there for hours to try to soak up the hot water while she could because she would have to leave eventually. She slicked her wet hair back and turned so the water would hit her face.

There was suddenly a loud noise, which made her turn her attention to the door. Even though it was probably Charlie or Alex, she slowly reached for her gun that sat on top of her dirty clothes. She got out of the shower and grabbed a clean towel that was folded on the counter. She unfolded it with her free hand and wrapped it around herself, keeping her gun pointed at the door.

“Of course this would happen to me,” she grumbled to herself. She was so sick and tired of this. She couldn’t go to sleep without being woken up by every single little noise, thinking she was in trouble. She couldn’t eat without constantly looking over her shoulder every five minutes. And now she couldn’t even shower without something going wrong.

She could feel her hands shaking with rage as the doorknob turned slowly. It opened slowly and like she’d predicted, a zombie was staring at her with its one eye. The other one was missing and there were tiny little maggots eating away at his empty eye socket. Jordan almost gagged as she pulled the trigger, shooting the zombie in the head. She shot at the dead zombie’s head even though she was sure he was already dead. What other way could you release your anger when a zombie has just interrupted your shower?

She looked up from the zombie’s shattered head to see Charlie, Alex, and Zakk staring at her.

“Of course this would happen to me!” she snapped as she threw her arms in the air. Charlie put her hand over her mouth to hide her amused smile.

“Don’t laugh Charlie! If it hadn’t happened to me it would’ve-” she stopped herself and couldn’t help but laugh too. Her and Charlie burst into laughter that made Zakk and Alex exchange looks.

“How is that funny?” Zakk asked.

“Don’t worry about it. I’m going to go change now,” Jordan said, her laughter dying down. She grabbed her dirty clothes and her backpack. Charlie, still laughing grabbed her bag and shut the door to get into the shower. Alex rolled her eyes as she walked away, leaving Jordan and Zakk alone.

“Did they know you were following them?” she asked. Zakk shrugged and nodded.

“And they didn’t ask why?” she said.

“Nope. Why?” he asked.

“Well, if that were Charlie and Oliver and Darren were following me into the bathroom to check on her, I’d be a little curious as to why,” she replied.

“I don’t see the problem here,” he said.

“Because obviously I was ok, but the chances of me being covered were slim, and last I heard, you’re a guy and I’m not,” she laughed.

“I don’t think it would’ve mattered anyway,” he chuckled.

“Fine, but when Charlie starts asking questions, don’t bring up the whole sort of…kind of…secret relationship we’ve got going,” she said. Zakk rolled his eyes and nodded.

“Good, now I’m going to go change. Don’t run in if you hear gunshots. Weirdo,” she said, poking his nose as she walked down the hall and into one of the dorm rooms. She sighed and flopped herself onto the double bed that she planned on having to herself. Zakk would be getting the other bed.

When she got dressed, she came out as Charlie was coming out of the bathroom with a white robe tied tightly around her waist. They looked at each other and chuckled again, still amused. She glanced at Zakk and then back at Jordan and they both knew.

“Yeah, I know he followed you in there,” Jordan sighed.

“Do you know why? Because that was kind of weird,” she said, glancing at Zakk again.

“You’d have to ask him because I have no clue,” Jordan said, hoping Charlie wouldn’t see right through her. Jordan didn’t think it would be a good idea for anyone to know…even though she barely had a relationship with Zakk. It wasn’t like she’d gone any farther than kissing. It was almost like her relationship with her fiancée. Except there weren’t zombies running around and there wasn’t anything stopping them. And nothing would go wrong.

Jordan wasn’t superstitious. She was full aware that whenever something good happens, something bad will follow.

Still, seeing Zakk shirtless would be worth it…