Chapter Fifteen
In the morning, I help Tobe cook breakfast, and I try to ignore Ryder when he takes a seat across from me at the dining room table. Sadly, I can’t avoid him forever, and Reese knows that. “Ryder’s going hunting for game today, and I’m going to stay here with Tobe,” Reese says, looking at me. “You’re gonna have to go with him and look after each other.”
I narrow my eyes at Reese. If he’s purposely trying to shove the two of us together, I’m gonna kick his ass later. “Reese–”
“Look, the prepared meals won’t last forever, alright? We should probably be trying to save as many as possible in case we have to leave in a hurry. Ryder’s also going to hide a bag of them on the boat today, just so we don’t have to leave with nothing if we have to leave in a hurry. Sam, I know you two probably don’t wanna spend the day together right now, but you’ll have to suck it up and get his done.”
He’s right, but that doesn’t make me hate him any less right now.
Ryder doesn’t look happy either, and I try not to let that bother me any. He just finishes up his breakfast, takes the empty dishes away, and sets them in the kitchen sink. I can hear him clanking around, probably trying to kill time, before finally returning a few minutes later. “Alright, let’s get this over with.”
I sigh, and head back to my room. The Glock is on the bedside table, and I grab it, before tucking it into the holster Ryder gave me a couple of days ago. Ryder is waiting for me by the door. Instead of his usual rifle, he’s holding the bow, and there’s a quiver of twelve arrows strapped to his back. It’s amazing how dangerous he still manages to look, even without his high powered assault rifle.
“You ready to go?”
I nod, and follow him down the steps. Tobe’s boiling water to clean the dishes with, and she winks at me. “Good luck,” she says under her breath as I pass. I just roll my eyes and quicken my pace to keep up with Ryder. I’m not sure if he’ll consider leaving me behind, but I don’t want to take the chance.
Ryder walks into the trees near the house, and I follow silently after him. I’m not sure how Ryder remembers the path to the boat, but he does, and he leads us there. It takes almost an hour to reach the boat and, when we do, Ryder sets the bag of prepared meals in the back of the boat. “Alright, there’s a hidden dirt path that leads away from here and circles around. If we follow it, we’ll eventually make our way back to the house. It’ll take about two and a half hours to walk the whole thing, and we can hunt for game along the way.”
He doesn’t sound optimistic about our odds of finding game, probably because I’m making so much noise just trying to keep up with him. Every time I step on a branch, or kick over a rock, or rustle a bush, Ryder flinches, and I half expect him to turn around and yell at me. He doesn’t, but I can tell he’s getting angrier and angrier each time I move.
Ryder stops in the middle of the path, and I bump into his back. “Ryder?”
He shushes me, and readies his bow. I have a bad feeling about this, so I take my gun out of its holster and listen to the woods around us. There’s a rustling in the bushes to our left, and a zombie lumbers out. It’s a man, and his throat has been ripped open almost entirely; it’s a miracle his head is still attached to his body.
Ryder’s arrow buries itself in the zombie’s left eye socket with a pop, and the zombie drops to the ground. Another stumbles out from behind a tree, and I take aim, and pull the trigger. I get lucky, and the bullet takes out the back of his head, and the zombie hits the ground with a dull thud. Seven more step onto the path, and Ryder looses another arrow. This one embeds itself in the shoulder of a zombie, and it keeps coming.
I pull the trigger again, and the shot goes wide, lodging in the throat of the one next to him. Ryder looses a third arrow, and it goes in through the zombie’s open mouth, sending the zombie tumbling to the ground. I can’t take the time to watch, because there’s a zombie that’s seen me, and she stretches her arms out wide.
I pull the trigger, and I get lucky. The bullet hits right between her eyes, and she hits the tree behind her before sliding down the trunk. There are three left, but Ryder doesn’t have the time to put another arrow up before they’re on us. Ryder resorts to stabbing with an arrow, and he manages to take out two of them that way.
One latches onto my shoulder from behind, and I scream, dropping my gun in the process. Ryder whirls, and runs the arrow right through the zombie’s ear, stabbing all the way into the brain. He tries to pull the arrow free, but it lodges, and that one mistake costs us.
A zombie comes up behind Ryder and rips the quiver of arrows from his back. The bow falls to the ground, and Ryder grabs my hand. He drags me away from the clearing at a run, and we look for a place to hide out. We’re almost two hours from the house, and I’m not sure if anyone heard my scream. We’ll have to assume that we’re on our own, with no weapons.
I can hear the zombie’s groans; they’re not far behind us, and we have nowhere left to run. Ryder stops us at the bottom of a large tree, and cups his hands. “Climb,” he orders simply. I step into his hands, and he boosts me up into the tree. “Hurry!”
The zombies are only a few yards away, and Ryder grabs a branch to haul himself up. One of the remaining zombies grabs a fistful of his jeans, and tries to haul him back to the ground. He grunts and tries to kick him off, and I can only watch helplessly, hoping that Ryder figures something out.
With a gasp, I bend over and untie my sneaker, and throw it at the zombie that’s trying to dig into the muscle of Ryder’s leg. It collides with his nose, and thick, slightly congealed blood begins to seep from it. I’m not sure if he registers the pain or not, but it gives Ryder the second he needs to pull himself free and drag himself up into the tree.
He climbs up to join me at least fifteen feet into the air, and he leans against the tree trunk. He’s sweating and breathing harshly, and I think this is the most shaken I’ve ever seen him. He just takes a moment to catch his breath, before looking down at the base of the tree.
There are four zombies crowding around the trunk of the tree, and they’re all looking up at us, trying to reach us even though their arms thankfully aren’t long enough. Each of them has a hungry, slightly pissed off expression on their faces, and I’m glad we’re well out of their reach.
When Ryder’s breathing has slowed a little, he looks over at me and frowns. “Are you alright?”
I nod, trying to calm my racing heart. “I don’t think I’ve ever come this close to being eaten. Even the ambush as the gas station wasn’t this bad, right?”
“Yeah, this was pretty bad. I can’t believe I was stupid enough to drop my weapon. That’s one of the first things I learned: never drop your weapon, or you risk dying or getting others killed. I dropped my bow, and we both almost died because of it.”
“Don’t only blame yourself. I dropped my gun, too. And if I hadn’t screamed, you might not have gotten so distracted. So, if you wanna blame anyone, blame me. I’m the reason we’re stuck up in a tree with no food, one bottle of water, and no weapons.”
He sighs. “Thank you.”
“You’re supposed to blame me, not thank me,” I say, looking at him.
“Thank you for saving me. That was quick thinking with the shoe. If you hadn’t thrown it when you did, I’d probably be the main course of a zombie luncheon.”
I laugh shakily; it seems like a better option than crying. “Nothing like laughing in the face of death, huh?” He snorts, and then leans his head back against the tree. He’s on a branch lower than me, but it doesn’t look like it’ll support his weight for long. “Um, Ryder, my branch is a lot thicker than yours. I think you should join me.”
The branch I’m sitting on isn’t particularly wide, but it grew right next to another one. They two separate limbs are the same thickness, and they’re almost touching, creating a wide, flat space to sit across. It should be sturdy enough for the two of us.
He looks down at the branch he’s perched
on, and winces. “I think you’re right.” When he goes to stand, the branch bends under his weight, and I swear I hear it creak. I give him my hand and help him climb up to my branch, which is more than twice as large, and I scoot over to give him enough room to sit. He wraps his arm around my shoulder, and sighs. “Well, we might be here for a while. What should we do to pass the time?”
“We could talk about why you were such a dick to me yesterday morning. All I did was wear a dress and you snapped at me, and told me I was stupid. I don’t know about you, but I’m pretty sure I didn’t deserve that.”
He sighs, and runs his hand nervously through his shaggy dark hair. “No, you’re right. You didn’t deserve that. I’m sorry I said what I did.” He hesitates for a second, before adding, “You looked pretty in that dress; you shouldn’t have taken it off.”
For some reason, that really angers me. “Why the hell couldn’t you have just told me that when I actually had the dress on? Do you have any idea how bad I felt about myself after you said what you did? I ripped the dress and shoes off and threw them so hard they dented the wall. I cried, Ryder.”
He flinches, and I continue.
“I cried. Not because of a zombie attack. Not because some creeps tried to barter for time with me. I cried because of something you said. Simple as that.”
“I’m sorry, Sam. I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings or anything,” he says, looking away from my accusing stare. I get the feeling that this conversation is making Ryder very uncomfortable, and I think it might have something to do with the fact that he’s almost thirty, and I’m barely an adult.
Too bad if he is uncomfortable. He’s gonna suck this up and talk to me, because I’m not going to spend one more minute feeling sorry for myself.
“Ryder, I care about you. More than I ever have before about someone. More than I probably should, especially considering the situation we’re in, but I can’t help it. I can’t explain why I don’t feel the same way about Reese as I do about you. I can’t explain why I’m drawn to you the way I am. It’s just the way I feel.”
“Sam, Reese is my little brother, and I know he likes you. I can’t hurt him. I have a problem with being into a girl that he likes.”
“You know, you didn’t seem to have a problem with it last night when you asked me to dance! You almost kissed me, and you would have if Reese hadn’t interrupted.”
He frowns again. “I shouldn’t have; I don’t know what the hell I was thinking. But don’t worry, because it won’t happen again. We need to keep our heads clear, and we need to focus on surviving, not stupid feelings that’ll probably go away in a few days or so.”
I flinch, and turn away from him so he won’t see how upset he’s making me. I’ve come to terms with how I feel about Ryder, and now he’s telling me that it isn’t possible, that we need to focus more on what’s happening around us. I can’t believe that of everyone I could possibly have as my first “love”, I’m stuck with someone like Ryder.
He’s confrontational, angry, and even an outright dick sometimes. It just figures that he’s the one for me. Do I fall for his mild mannered, sweet, caring brother who’s actually closer to my age? Nope. I fall for his older brother, who’s almost ten years my senior, and I’m gonna get my heart trampled because of it.
Ryder starts talking again, even though I just want him to shut up and leave me alone. “And, it’s not like these feelings can go anywhere. We’ve known each other for about a week. You can’t fall in love with someone in a week. It’s just not possible. These feelings will pass.”
Is he trying to convince me, or himself?
“I think you’re wrong.”
He looks at me. “What? What am I wrong about?”
“Yeah, we’ve only known each other for a week, but that shouldn’t matter. Ryder, look at all the stuff we’ve been through together. You saved me on that rooftop, you saved me from that dog, and you bandaged me up and carried me back to the others when I got separated.”
“Sam–”
“You stood up for me when those creeps wanted to take me for an hour, you saved me from the zombie in the water, and you felt horrible about forcing me to witness that creep blow his own brains out. You didn’t make fun of me, and you didn’t pity me. You just took care of me, like someone does for a person they care about.
“Yeah, we’ve only known each other for a week,” I say again. “But it’s been one hell of a week. Most people go out for coffee or a movie; they don’t kill zombies and face constant terror and life-threatening situations. That forces people together, and gives them a bond that can’t be denied or ignored.”
“Sam, none of that changes the fact that we’ve only known each other for a week. You’re a nice person, but I’m not going to risk my relationship with my little brother just for some girl.”
Some girl? Is that all I am to him? After everything we’ve been through in the past week?
I can feel my lip begin to quiver, and there’s a familiar burning behind my eyes, and I know that any second, I’m going to start crying. I try to fight it, to force the tears back, but they spill over anyways. I sniff, and wipe my face with the back of my hand, hoping that Ryder doesn’t laugh at me for being such a stupid girl.
“Sam–” he says, reaching out for me.
I slap his hand away, and pull as far away from him as I can without sliding off the branch. I’ve gone as far as I can, and I’m still only about a foot and a half away from him, but that’ll have to do. As long as I’m not touching him, and I don’t have to listen to him, I’ll be alright.
I look down at the ground, where the zombies are still crowding around the base of the tree. Their moans are loud, and I’m sure they’re letting any other nearby zombies that we’re here, and they’ve got fresh meat. Soon enough, this place will be crowded with zombies, and each one will be trying to rip into us for their next meal.
I just hope zombies don’t figure out how to climb trees. If they do, we’re screwed…
Ryder and I spend the next few hours sitting in the tree, waiting either for help to arrive, or for the zombies to leave. Neither of those things happens, and we’re still up in the tree when night falls. Ryder and I have drained the bottle of water we had, and we’re both hungry, thirsty, and in serious need of a bathroom.
Ryder takes his belt off, wraps it around his thigh and the tree branch, and fastens it again. “Do what I did; it’ll hopefully keep you from rolling out of the tree in the middle of the night. Try and get some sleep, I’ll keep watch.”
I do as he says, and realize I don’t like the feeling of not being able to move my legs. But if it keeps me safely in the tree instead of on the ground with the zombies and a broken back, I’m not going to complain. So, after securing my belt, I close my eyes, lean back against the tree trunk, and try to get some sleep.