Desolate

Charlie came back with just about as much as she left with. But supplies weren’t necessary at the moment. They’d be leaving in the morning and there had to be supplies somewhere else.

“Charlie, are you sure you don’t want me to try and convince Jordan to go with you?” John asked softly that morning as her and the others were loading up the van. She glanced at Zakk, who was looking at her with the same hopeful expression as John did.

“She won’t listen,” Charlie sighed, “Maybe it’s best if she stays.”

John nodded in agreement as he snapped his finger and took a folded piece of lined paper out of his pocket.

“Jordan wrote this before she fell asleep last night,” he said, handing it to Charlie. Charlie looked down at the folded piece of paper, then back at John, “Thanks.”

John nodded and followed everyone outside. He stood on the porch and waved at her as she climbed into the back of the van. Oliver climbed into the driver’s seat and started the van. John continued to wave until the van was far down the street.

Charlie sat in the back of the van, with Zakk close to her to see what Jordan had written. Charlie sighed as she scooted away from Zakk and unfolded the paper.

Let me start by saying that I don’t think you’re a bad person and I think we could’ve been friends under different circumstances. But it’s not enough to keep me quiet about what I really need to say to you.

Despite this, I don’t apologize for yesterday and I don’t take back anything I said. You claimed that you accepted my mistake and that I’m a hypocrite, which isn’t true. You didn’t accept my mistake at all, so that just makes you a hypocrite. But then again, hypocrisy is everywhere. Get over it.

Your excuses for shoving me down the stairs boggle my mind. The idea that you weren’t paying attention to the stairs because you were that mad is ridiculous. I haven’t known you for long, but I’ve never known you to have any kind of anger problem that would make such an excuse true. And yes, I may have shoved you first, but you could’ve killed me, or caused me to become paralyzed. That’s worse than anything I can possibly do to you.

After all this, I’ve realized that it’s the constant being in a small space all the time that’s making me so pissed all the time. I know that my anger is getting the best of me. But to say everything was fine until I showed up is completely unfair. Do you honestly think you all wouldn’t still be like this, even if I wasn’t around?

This isn’t how I usually act or react to things. I really don’t want the hell is wrong with me. Maybe I just need time to figure it all out. But you need to as well. You need to grow up Charlie. But that’s ok, because I do too.

Charlie crumpled up the paper and tossed it out the window. She ignored the look of shock and irritation on Zakk’s face.

“How can you just throw that away?” he asked.

“I’m not going to listen to her telling me how wrong I was,” she grumbled.

“But you were wrong!” Zakk exclaimed. Charlie turned her head and glared at Zakk for a second before ignoring his comment and looking back at Oliver. Zakk shook his head and scooted to the corner and took out his phone. Before he’d left, him and John had swapped numbers. He looked to see no new messages or missed calls. He sighed and pouted as he put his phone back into his pocket. He hadn’t told Charlie, although he didn’t really think she’d care. But considering the cranky attitude she had, he figured it was best to wait before he told her anything.

“Look!” Charlie yelled, pointing to the large building to the right of them, “we can get some supplies!”

Oliver turned to the right and pulled into the parking lot. Everyone got out cautiously and ran into the mall.

“Grab only what you need,” Charlie said sternly, “I don’t feel right here.”

Everyone scrambled around the mall, grabbing everything they needed in such a short amount of time. They all ran back to the middle of the mall with their backpacks full of stuff. They all headed for the entrance when they saw a herd of zombies banging on the front door.

“Let’s head out the back!” Charlie yelled. She led them to the other side of the mall to see another group of zombies.

“Come on, we can take them!” Charlie shouted.

“There are way too many!” Oliver retorted. They all exchanged glances, except for Charlie, who refused to accept defeat. They heard the big crash of the front door being broken down.

“What do we do?!” Darren yelled. Charlie scanned the mall, knowing that hiding in stores would be completely pointless. She noticed a door nearby

“There!” she said, pointing to the door. They all ran towards the door and they could all hear the zombies following behind them. Charlie turned and twisted the lock before joining the others onto the roof. She shoved herself in between Oliver and Alex to look down at the zombies that moaned and groaned for their flesh.

“There isn’t that many,” she mumbled, “Maybe they’ll eventually go away.”

“I don’t think so,” Oliver said, pointing to the large group of zombies heading towards the building. Charlie stared intently at the zombies, as if she could count exactly how many there were. She turned, noticing Zakk leaning against the door and playing with his phone.

“What are you doing?” Charlie asked, gesturing to the phone. Zakk looked down at the phone, then shook his head and walked away.

* * * * * *

John stood up when his phone began vibrating in his pocket and went down to the basement, leaving Jordan and Paige with the snacks that he knew would be gone when he got back.

“Zakk, what’s wrong?” he asked when he answered his phone. Zakk explained everything that happened in the brief hour they’d been gone.

“What should I do?” he asked.

“Get Jordan to come,” Zakk said quietly.

“Sure,” John said, nodding as if Zakk could see him, “where are you?”

“Tell her to look for a mall with a huge crowd of zombies at the front entrance,” Zakk said, “with a few actually climbing up the building.”

“Ok,” John said quickly before hanging up and going back into the living room, where as he predicted, Jordan and Paige sat, licking their fingers with empty snack bowls on the coffee table.

“Jordan,” John mumbled softly. Jordan looked up before she could put her salty thumb in her mouth, “the group needs you.”

“We all need things,” Jordan muttered irritably.

“Jordan.” John said sternly enough to make Jordan sit up straight and pay attention to what he had to say.

“I know that you feel that you’ve been wronged,” he sighed, “and what Charlie did wasn’t right but…”

“But what?!” Jordan snapped.

“But maybe you shouldn’t have been talking behind her back,” he said, “Maybe you should’ve discussed this with her in a mature way.”

Jordan opened her mouth to respond, but John raised his hand and she closed her mouth, “you told Charlie in that note that she needs to grow up and that you do to. Right now is the perfect time to start.”

Jordan sighed and stood up, “Fine, I’ll go.”

Jordan placed her gun in the passenger’s seat of John’s car and walked around to a worried Paige.

“What do you plan to do?” Paige asked softly.

“Don’t worry about it,” Jordan mumbled, shaking her head as she opened the driver’s side door.

“I don’t like the sound of that,” she whimpered, “I want you to come back, ok?”

“I can’t promise you that Paige,” Jordan said softly as she slid into the car. She looked at Paige through the window and couldn’t help but tear up. She had no idea if this was the last she was going to see of her.

“Paige,” she said, rolling down the window, “Don’t worry about me. Just worry about John and the baby.”

Paige put her hand on her stomach and looked down, then back at Jordan. She nodded and Jordan sped off down the street. She drove for maybe twenty to thirty minutes before she saw the extremely large crowd of zombies that was slowly growing and growing. She looked from the undead crowd to the roof, where she saw Zakk and the others, shooting vigorously at the zombies climbing up the building’s walls.

Jordan drove slowly, trying not to attract too much attention. She searched the side of the building and found a door that led inside. She turned into the little driveway slowly, keeping her eyes on the large crowd of zombies moaning and clawing at the walls, the more evolved ones having an easier time to climb up the building. She slowly got out and tip toed towards the door. She opened it slowly and winced at the loud squeak. She slipped inside when there was a big enough space for her to fit through and shut the door before any zombie could run in after her. She looked around the dark room to see boxes piled on top of boxes labeled with different store logos. She fondled for the door and pushed it open once she found it.

She was finally in the mall and she could hear the faint growling of a few zombies. She peeked over the wall and heard the sounds of guns coming from the other side of the mall. She ran on her toes and grabbed the door handle, with no luck. She scoffed and was about to shoot the door knob but realized it was a stupid idea. She looked around and found a Claire’s. Picking a lock with bobby pins always worked in movies. She hurried into Claire’s and searched for bobby pins. She found a display of bobby pins and yanked two of them out of the cardboard they were pinned to.

She ran back to the door and pulled the bobby pins until they were far apart. She picked the lock, although she didn’t really know how she did it. She closed the door behind her and locked it. She ran upstairs and threw open the door onto the roof. They were all shooting from different sides of the roof. But Charlie was the first to catch her eyes. Charlie was shooting zombies off the edge of the roof but just as a big buff zombie made his way over the edge of the roof, she ran out of ammo. Her yells for assistance were oppressed by the sounds of everyone’s guns. Jordan slowly raised her gun as the zombie lunged for Charlie. She pulled the trigger and the zombie’s head exploded. Charlie turned to see where the shot came from. She wiped pieces of the zombie’s head off of her face and widened her eyes at the sight of Jordan.

“What are you doing here?” she asked. Jordan shook her head as she tossed her some more ammo.

“Get them out of here,” she mumbled as she pushed Charlie towards the door. Everyone began to notice Jordan and stopped firing.

“I didn’t think you’d actually come,” Zakk said. Charlie turned her head and stared at Zakk, with some kind of emotion that couldn’t be read.

“You called her?” she said softly.

“Not her,” he said, “her brother.”

“It doesn’t matter why I’m here!” Jordan snapped. She cleared her throat, not wanting to start something again, “all that matters is that you need to get out of here.”

“What about you?” Zakk asked. Everyone nodded in agreement and she smiled faintly.

“Don’t worry about it. Just go,” Jordan said softly but firmly. She sat on the edge of the roof and she heard the sounds of footsteps leaving, then footsteps coming closer to her.

“Zakk…” Jordan grumbled, motioning for Zakk to leave.

“I can’t just leave you to die!” Zakk exclaimed. Jordan sighed and felt another strong wave of nausea, but ignored it as she stood up to face him.

“Zakk, I need to do this,” she said softly, “I’ve caused a lot of hell these pass few days.”

“Jordan, I can understand why you’ve been the way you are,” he said. She sighed and shook her head.

“I’m doing this,” she said, “I have to.”

“Jordan…” he said, his voice cracking.

“Zakk, if I’m here to distract them, they won’t bother you when you escape.” She explained.

“If you’re going, then I’m going too,” he said firmly. She shook her head and looked down at her feet.

“I don’t have the heart to let you do that,” she said softly. He sighed, knowing he wasn’t going to change her mind. She looked up at him again with frightened eyes. She grabbed him by the neck and pulled him to her into a passionate final good-bye kiss. He didn’t hesitate to kiss her back as he wrapped his arms tightly around her waist. Tears escaped from Jordan’s tightly shut eyes.

They finally broke apart, but still stayed close together. He finally pulled away from her and backed away from her slowly as she turned away from him and stared down at the crowd of zombies. He ran out of the building and got into the driver’s side of the van without a word.

“What took you so long?” Charlie asked.

“I tried to convince Jordan to come with us,” Zakk said blankly as he pulled out. He stopped the van in the middle of the street and stared up at Jordan, who was staring at him. There were more evolved zombies now, as if they smelled her. There were at least five or six climbing up the walls. She was backing up with her gun raised.

“Zakk!” Charlie hissed. Zakk ignored her and continued to watch Jordan. Charlie was talking to him but he wasn’t listening or paying attention to anything she was saying.

Jordan backed up slowly with her gun raised. She never wanted to do this. She suddenly regretted not leaving with Zakk. Her foot fell back off the edge of the roof and she looked down behind her to find a large pile of trash bags. Perfect for breaking a fall…

She looked back and stared at Zakk, hoping to send some kind of message. Zakk sped the van to the back where it smelled of rotting food with flies surrounding them with their buzzing sound so loud that no other sounds would be heard if this city was still alive.

“What are you doing?!” Charlie snapped. Zakk shushed her and she narrowed her eyes at him, ready to chew him out when he whipped his head to look at her.

“If this were Oliver, you’d be doing the exact same thing,” he snarled, “so shut up!”

She bit her bottom lip and gave Oliver a quick glance before sitting down, not in the mood to argue.

Jordan smirked at the zombies and she closed her eyes and fell off the roof. Luckily, it wasn’t that long of a fall, and the garbage bags didn’t have anything sharp or hard in them. It was like landing on plastic pillows, which was odd considering the smell.

She crawled out of the large pile and ran towards the van. She threw open the doors and met the four pairs of eyes staring at her. Despite the explosion that happened the day before, no one seemed to be irritated that she was there. She sat down next to Charlie and suddenly remembered something she’d overheard her say the night before when she was writing her note.

I don’t even care anymore Alex! I’ll push her pregnant ass down the stairs again!

Jordan sat down next to Charlie and patted her shoulder, “I’ll remember to keep my ‘pregnant ass’ away from stairs when you’re around.”

Charlie glanced at her, clearly seeing the amusement in her voice, and not the disdain. Charlie smiled and chuckled as Zakk patted her shoulder. Without words, Charlie stood up and got into the driver’s seat.

“I’m glad you changed your mind,” he said softly as he kissed the top of her head. She smiled and lifted her head as she pressed her lips to his.

“So, where are we going now?” Alex asked, breaking Jordan and Zakk’s moment.

“Before we do anything, we’re getting supplies,” Charlie said, looking up at Jordan through the rearview mirror. Jordan stared back for a second before she looked away back at Zakk.