Anarchy on Earth

~23~

Things could have been nice, I suppose. However, I had been always known as the kid who had to be ready for everything. Never laid back. I think the last time I had laid back, Henry had died, just two days before. Everyone else seemed to be having a halfway decent time though. They had looted through the house, finding clothes of all shapes and sizes. Lot's of kids must have lived here, because we managed to find pretty much everything in a couple minutes with still unsearched rooms.

Miranda and Jordan found a ton of clothes. Despite mass stereotypes, neither spent very long trying to choose what to wear. Miranda found some black tights, and a green sweatshirt that said MICHIGAN on the front. Jordan found flannel. THAT was stereotypical.

TK and Griffin simply changed into shorts and T-Shirts. Still, they were different. For example, TK's shirt had a picture of continental Asia on it. Griffin managed to find a football jersey, and some pads for protection.

At that point, they were all watching The Shuffling Dead on the TV. Miranda was up close next to Griffin, Jordan was half asleep, a knife in between her teeth on a couch, and TK sat on one of the big chairs, watching intently. I was not with them. I stood in the doorway, my raggedy jeans, and torn gray T-shirt still on, sword half slung over my shoulder. I watched the TV half-heartedly, as Rock's son Coral got eaten by the shufflers. All's I could see was Henry being ripped apart by Auden's bloody, hands, his face destroyed by disease. I turned around and walked away, up the stairs, and down the hallway. I found one of the bedrooms that looked okay, and went in. I sat down by the small twin bed, and kicked the door shut. It closed with a rattle.

It was a small room, with a dresser, a small bookshelf with nothing on it, a  desk with some paper, and a couple rap music posters put up. A couple seconds later, I heard a click as TK opened the door, and came inside, shutting in behind him. He eyed me, and then sat down at the desk.

"What's up?" He said. raising his eyebrows.

I looked over at him. "Why do you assume something is up?"

"Because I know you well." He told me. "And you've never acted like this before."

"What do you mean?"

"Whenever you're upset, you... well, actually, you're usually pretty chill most of the time... so I don't actually recall you ever being upset." He said, rubbing the back of his head, and laughing nervously.

"Times change." I said.

"Yeah, but you don't." He said, frustrated. "What's going on?"

"Nothing." I said, clasping my hands together, and looking down again.

"That's just it!" He said, prompting me to look up. "You're shutting me out! You never shut anyone out!"

"I"VE BEEN THROUGH A LOT, OKAY?!" I yelled.

"And we haven't?" He shouted. "You think this is all you? You don't even-"

He paused.

"Yeah?" I said, quietly. "Give it to me."

TK hesitated, and then sighed. "When this all started... with that massacre at the school..."

"Huh?"

TK frowned, but then continued on. "Some of the buses didn't make it to the school-"

"Like me, Henry, and Miranda's" I said.

"Yeah. When we got to school, we thought everything was fine. That the network had just gone down, and that our friends had lost their phones. Little did we know that inside, all the teachers had turned... so instead of first period Trigonometry, everyone in our class got killed, or infected. Ripped apart by teachers. I saw Mr. Baker in the mess somewhere. Lot of kids died before they even knew what was going on. James was one of them. A pocket of us escaped. We broke through the hallways, and made it through the doors. Someone said we had to go home. We all stuck together. On our way out of the school, there was about 20 of us. As we moved through Brookevale, one by one, we were killed, eaten, or infected, until it was just Auden, Jordan, and I. Then, Jackson showed up."

I nodded, and TK continued.

"Anyway, all of that happened a lifetime ago... hell, at this point, it probably would have been..." His voice trailed off suddenly.

I grimaced.

"But, the point is, is that we've all seen some tough shit Jack. But, we all came together, and you seemed to know what you were doing... so we followed. "

"Why though?" I asked. "I can't be responsible for everyone! I can't save everyone!"

"Well maybe not." TK told me, standing up. "But who you can save, means more to all of us than you think. So what, Henry's gone. Auden too. It was better them than us right?"

"That's a pretty sick way to put it."

"Maybe so, but until we get out of here, or until we all die at the hands of those things... Any life saved matters a whole lot more than you may think."

He left it at that, and exited the room, softly closing the door behind him. I remained on the bed, thinking. About past things. It had been 17 days. 17 DAYS! It seemed a lot more than that, didn't it? I counted the days in my head, and realized what today was. Today was Thanksgiving. The day of the year where we celebrate a truce between brutal colonists, and peaceful natives by garbling the oily flesh of a flightless bird that ol' Ben Franklin thought should be our nation's National Bird. I laughed quietly to myself. What nation?

Happy Thanksgiving.

I thought of a couple things to be grateful about. The fact that I wasn't a stranger... or dead... or that I still have friends left. But there were things that I still hated. My mom, and brother still kept me up at night. They were most likely dead, if not worse. I would feel bad about my dad, if I had known who he was. Society was gone, no more government... but there was always reconstruction, right?

But how can you reconstruct what's not there?

A snail makes it's way down the street every night, trying to get to a piece of food. It's only a couple of feet away, but it's still too far away for a mere snail. He leaves his home every night at 8:00 PM under a shroud of darkness to try to get at this piece of food. But, every night, by the time he gets halfway to his food, it is daytime again, and he has to go home, risking being picked up by the nearest bird. One day, the snail decided to ignore the light of day. It continued on, desperate to get the food. He tries hard, and fights to move faster, but in the end, is killed by the bird anyway, just inches away from his goal.