Walking With the Dead

Emma had repeated the tale a dozen times over, but she still couldn’t believe it had actually happened.

“I couldn’t sleep,” she would start. “I went to the library. Miguel followed me. We talked. He…changed. He talked about the women he’d…” Killed, she would finish silently, unable to say the word out loud.

“He cornered me. He had my knife. He cut me…” He kissed me… “He tried to kill me. But I killed him. I killed him.”

Four days had passed since Emma killed Miguel, and they were the longest four days of her life. She couldn’t sleep. Whenever she closed her eyes, she was haunted by a pair of poisonous black eyes, leering at her in the darkness.

The day after killing Miguel, Hershel had given Emma a dose of morphine, to combat the pain, and she had fallen into a drug-induced haze. Her memories of that day were shrouded in a cloud of fog. According to Glenn, Emma had, unnoticed by everyone, walked out of the prison and to the fence outside the courtyard, where she started throwing her body against the gate, yelling and screaming at the top of her lungs. She had narrowly missed being snatched by a passing walker. If T-Dog hadn’t been passing by after bringing a load of trash out to the burn pile, she would be dead.

Because of this, Hershel stopped administering pain medicine, and Emma was forced to endure the constant throbbing on the left side of her face. Miguel had cut her face up pretty good. There was a four inch gash on her left cheek, starting at the corner of her mouth and curling up towards her earlobe. It had taken Hershel over an hour to close the wound on her face, using more than twenty stitches. When finished, he gently rubbed some antibacterial ointment over the tender flesh.

“You’ll carry that scar for the rest of your life,” he said, taping a clean piece of gauze to her cheek. “But at least you have a life.”

Emma knew Hershel was trying to keep her spirits up, trying to show her the silver lining, but Emma wasn’t hearing any of it. All she could focus on was the burning, throbbing pain in her cheek, the cold hand of fear that clutched around her heart whenever a noise caught her off guard, and the revolting disgust she felt towards herself when she remembered she killed a man. Not some undead, soulless walker. A living man.

It was the middle of the day, and Emma had spent the entire morning sedentary in her cot, exhausted, hungry, and in pain, but that was nothing compared to the overwhelming itching beneath her bandage. Hershel had warned Emma to keep the stitches covered for a few days, to prevent from infection, but she couldn’t handle it anymore.

Emma stood up from her cot, already fully dressed, and secured her belt around her waist. T-Dog had fixed the belt buckle a few days ago, so Emma was able to freely walk around with both her gun and knife tucked against her body. Fully armed with everything she needed to feel safe, Emma headed to the washroom.

Each of the survivors had been given a small metal bowl for personal washing, and Emma grabbed hers and filled it with water from the sink. Luckily, the prison was connected to a water tower, and there was enough pressure to send water running through the taps. However, because there was no electricity, warm water was a thing of the past. Still, Emma preferred cold, clean water to warm, murky water any day of the week.

Emma slowly peeled the bandage off her cheek, wincing as the adhesive pulled against her tender skin. She balled the bandage up and tossed it to the ground. Then, after dipping a wash rag into the washbowl, Emma started to gently wash away the dried blood and pus that had accumulated around the stitches. She worked slowly, and after she was done, she splashed her face with the remaining water and dried it off with the sleeve of her coveralls.

Then, for the first time in months, Emma had the chance to look at herself. Really look at herself.

Hershel had been right; she was going to carry that scar for the rest of her life. Even though the wound was still healing, a thin pink line curving along her cheek, she knew she was forever going to resemble a lopsided Joker. But the scar wasn’t the worst part.

She was pale, and her face was thin. In the past few months, cheekbones that every Romanian supermodel would have died for had emerged, but on Emma they just created a tired, sickly appearance. Her eyes, too, had changed. They once had been bright green, sparkling with life. Now they were dull and hard, constantly flicking from side to side with paranoid suspicion. But what Emma focused most on was her hair.

Before the world had turned to shit, Emma’s hair had been her crowning glory. She had spent hundreds of dollars carefully dyeing it the perfect shade of honey blonde, with just enough lowlights to make it appear natural. It was quite an accomplishment for a native Seattleite to dye her hair blonde and make it seem natural, and it was something Emma had mastered.

Emma bought only the highest of high-end products for her hair, giving it a rich, healthy shine. As often as she could, Emma would braid her hair before going to sleep. She remembered hearing a woman say that sleeping with braids helped promote healthy hair growth. Emma didn’t know if there was any scientific basis for that claim, but she still slept with braided hair.

But those days were gone. Emma realized that when she looked at her reflection. Her hair hung limp around her face, falling about her shoulders like withered straw. The ends of her hair were frayed, broken, and bunches were caught in such wild tangles that even the highest grade conditioner would have trouble fixing them. Her hair had grown out, too. The once-beautiful golden-hued hair stopped about three inches from her scalp, quickly receding into her natural and ordinary dishwater-blonde.

It made Emma’s heart sink and her stomach clench when she saw those roots she had worked so hard to cover up over the years. Her natural hair color was so ordinary, so boring. The dull color washed her face out, making her appear gray and lifeless. Her dull hair, neither blonde nor brunette, made her indistinguishable. It turned her into another face in the crowd.

Sudden anger, sudden disgust, seized Emma, and she grabbed her knife and, without even thinking, started hacking away at the blonde bits of her hair. She grabbed fistful after fistful of hair, sawing away with her blade until every strand was cut loose, and then she opened her hand and let the golden strands fall to the ground.

It took less than five minutes for Emma to cut the blonde from her hair. When finished, Emma looked at her reflection. She looked nothing like herself. Her crooked smile, dull eyes, jagged, dull-brown hair and chest heaving from exertion made her look like some sort of crazed beast. She looked nothing like the Emma from before the Rising. That Emma was gone.

Disgusted with her reflection, Emma grabbed the metal bowl and slammed it against the mirror. Because it was built for a prison, the mirror had been reinforced so no ordinary man could break the mirror and use a shard as a weapon. But that wasn’t going to stop Emma. She slammed the bowl against the mirror again and again and again, screaming at the top of her lungs and tears streaming down her face, the salt stinging the still sensitive stitches.

Finally, the mirror cracked, and with one final push of energy, Emma slammed the bowl a final time, and the mirror shattered into a hundred little pieces.

She was shaking, and suddenly she was too tired to stand up. Emma collapsed onto her knees, ignoring the mirror shards that were scattered around her. A few drops of blood fell to the ground. Emma didn’t know where they came from, and she didn’t care. She just sat there, trembling, crying.

She heard frantic footsteps down the hallway, and moments later Glenn burst into the washroom.

“Emma? Where have you been? Everyone has been running around looking for you… Emma? Emma!”

Glenn rushed forward and knelt beside Emma. He grabbed onto her chin, forcing her to look towards him. It took a moment for her eyes to focus. “Emma, you’re nose is bleeding?”

Numb, Emma touched the space between her lips and nose and looked at her fingers. They were coated with something bright red. “Oh…”

Glenn quickly grabbed a washcloth and held it under Emma’s nose to mop up the blood. “Emma, what happened?”

Emma went into auto-pilot. “I couldn’t sleep. I went to the library. Miguel followed me…”

“No, no. I already know that story. But what happened here?” Glenn emphasized. “Just now?”

Emma looked around at the washroom. She saw the golden strands of her hair on the ground, the shattered mirror and drops of blood on the floor. Tears flooded to her eyes. She didn’t know how to explain what just happened. She didn’t even understand what had just happened. But she did know one thing.

“I can’t be alone anymore.”

“You’re not alone,” Glenn started.

“Yes I am. I am alone. I’m always alone. Even when I’m with everyone, I feel so alone.” Emma started sobbing. She couldn’t help herself. She felt so weak and tired and helpless, and she hated herself for it, but she still couldn’t help herself. “I can’t be alone anymore.”

Glenn wrapped his arms around Emma’s trembling body, pulling her into a hug. “You won’t be alone anymore, Emma. You won’t.”

Emma spent the rest of the day with Glenn, following him like a sick shadow. That night Glenn had offered to share her cell, sleeping in the top bunk. Emma initially refused, knowing Glenn usually stayed with Maggie during the nights, but Glenn reassured her he spoke with Maggie, and she was alright with the arrangement. And while part of Emma was embarrassed that she needed constant babysitting, the other part of her knew she needed it, so she accepted Glenn’s offer.

That night, Emma was in her cell, setting up the top bunk with extra sheets and blankets for Glenn. When Emma removed an extra pillow from her bed to place it on the top bunk, something caught Emma’s eye.

Someone had stuck a pack of cigarettes and a lighter between Emma’s pillows. Emma grabbed them and looked at them. The cigarettes were unopened, and the lighter full of fluid. There was no note, no sign of whoever had left it. But Emma knew who had left it. There was only one person who knew she smoked. Hot tears filled her eyes, and Emma clutched the treasures to her chest.

“What’ve you got there?” Glenn asked as he slid the cell door open.

Emma quickly turned around, hiding the cigarettes and lighter in her pockets. “Nothing.”

Glenn looked at Emma with a raised eyebrow, but said nothing. He threw his backpack on the ground and climbed onto the top bunk. “Maggie says I snore like a pig. Hope it doesn’t bother you.”

“It’ll be fine. I’ve heard worse.”

Or at least she thought. Glenn’s snores practically rattled the bunk, but Emma didn’t mind. She hadn’t expected to find sleep tonight, anyways. She stayed awake half the night, holding in her hands the packet of cigarettes. She held it close to her face, and, when she concentrated hard enough, she could smell the scent of pine trees and musk that lingered on the cigarettes. Surprisingly, some time before dawn, Emma had fallen asleep, clutching onto that pack of cigarettes like a talisman.