The First 30 Days (PUBLISHED)

Twenty-Three - Day 10

She was probably younger than me, and the look of absolute terror on her face eliminated any thoughts I was having that she was anything but human very quickly.

"Hang on," Shawn was watching out the window with a look of serious concentration on his face. Guessing at what he was planning, I grabbed for the dash in an attempt to steady myself. I hadn't had time to put on my seatbelt yet. The tires squealed as the jeep lurched forward, towards the girl. It only took a second before he spun the car sideways, expertly stopping it broadside to the running girl and giving her a clear shot at the back door. The maneuver left me wondering where he learned to drive like that, but the thought only had a brief chance to flash through my mind before the girl wrenched the door open and dove inside.

The trio of zombies had been right behind her. She didn't have time to get the door closed before one of them was reaching inside. The girl grappled with the door, trying to pull it shut, but the creature had managed to get it's head and shoulders too far in. The smell that rolled off of the zombie instantly filled the interior, making me fight back a gag. Each time I encountered one of them, they seemed to be even more revolting than the last. The ear splitting shriek that it blasted us with made my blood run cold as I envisioned just how bad being trapped inside of a vehicle with a zombie would get.

Cursing, Shawn stomped on the accelerator, and the jeep lurched forward. The other two zombies bounced off of the side as they tried in vain to find a way in.

The rotting zombie lost it's footing as the car shot forward. Letting go of her death grip on the door, the girl swung around in a move that I wasn't sure I could have pulled off, and planted both booted feet squarely in the zombie's face. Kicking hard, she sent it flying the rest of the way out the door.

I had turned around in my seat to watch the struggle, holding up the knife and trying desperately to figure out a way to defend us if the zombie actually made it all of the way into the backseat. Behind us, the zombie rolled and tumbled along the pavement, tripping one of the others who had been chasing us at top speed. Reaching out, the girl grabbed the open door and slammed it shut, before slumping back into the seat.

Her cheeks were flushed and she was breathing in gasps. Closing her eyes, she visibly tried to get her breathing under control. I took the second her eyes were closed to look her over. I had been right, she probably wasn't any older than seventeen or eighteen. Shoulder length, nearly black hair was in a wild tangle all over her head, prompting me to wonder briefly what my own, longer locks must look like by now. I was guessing that her skin was that beautiful, perpetually tanned olive tone that had always left me a little jealous, though it was hard to tell because of all of the dirt.

I glanced over at Shawn, who had been switching between driving us away from this deathtrap of a town and trying to watch the newest member in the mirror. He glanced at me and I noticed the worried crinkle of his forehead.

It didn't occur to me until that moment that we had just let a complete stranger into the backseat. She didn't look all that dangerous, but looks could be deceiving. Every zombie show ever created had made it clear that people were your most dangerous enemy during an apocalypse. What if she was crazy? What if she was some sort of a decoy? What if she had been bitten?

A little alarmed now, I looked back at the girl just in time to see her open wide brown eyes. She focused on the two of us in the front for the first time. "Thank you."

Shawn looked in the mirror at her again, a slight frown mostly hidden behind the beard that was starting to grow out of control on his face. "You're welcome."

I looked down at my own stained clothes and only slightly less dirty fingers. I hadn't been anywhere near a mirror in a couple of days, but I was guessing that we weren't any cleaner than the girl in the backseat.

"I'm Fallon. You two just saved my life." She pulled herself up a little straighter in the seat. "I don't think I could have kept running for much longer." She sounded like she really meant what she said.

"I'm Bri. This is Shawn," I chimed in. My instincts had always been pretty good about people, and they were saying that Fallon wasn't anything to be scared of. She was just like us, struggling to stay alive in a world gone mad.

I noticed that Shawn studied me for a second before nodding almost imperceptibly. By then, we had already made is several miles back into the mountains. So suddenly that I almost toppled from my backwards perch on the seat, he braked the jeep. Stopping in the middle of the desolate road, he threw the vehicle into park and turned around to face Fallon. "Are you bit?"

If the abrupt question caught her off guard, she didn't let it show. Shaking her head, "No. None of them got close enough."

I couldn't find any trace of deceit on her face. Apparently, neither could he. Looking at me again, we shared a moment of silent communication where I knew we were both thinking the same thing. Taking a stranger back to our hideout was a gamble, but could either of us live with ourselves if we left this girl behind? I couldn't help but think about how Jack and Shawn had found me in that restroom, bloody and exhausted, and still a little clueless about exactly how bad things actually were. Neither of them had known a thing about me, but they had given me a chance, probably saving my life in the process.

Really, the decision had already been made for us, and we both knew it.

Turning back around, he put the car back into gear and kept going. I noticed some of the tension leave the stiff set of Fallon's shoulders as she seemed to realize that we weren't planning to kick her out of the vehicle. I sat down in my seat myself, keeping my torso twisted so I could still see the girl in the backseat. "There's a place we've been staying. It's not far."

She nodded her head and pulled the bag that she had been sitting on top of out from underneath herself, dumping it next to her on the seat. I hoped that there hadn't been anything breakable in there, not that she had had time to move the thing before diving into the jeep. "Thank you," she said again. "I've been hiding different places in town for a few days, but none of them lasted for very long. I don't, um," She hesitated, a flash of some unhappy memory crossing her face, before finishing the thought. "I don't have anyone left and after my car ran out of gas up on the highway, I started walking. I ended up here. It seemed like it would be a safe place to stay at first. But I guess no place is safe anymore."

I nodded at her in understanding. For a brief time, I had dared to hope that the camp would be safe. But that lone zombie had set me straight on that in a hurry. There was no such thing as safe, anymore. Only marginally less dangerous.