When I awoke the next morning, I was laying on a sleeping bag that Cole had out next to the bathroom door. During the evening I had gotten tired and decided to take a nap. Cole had promised to wake me up, but from the look of sunlight shining through the small window, he had not.
“Morning.” I heard Gina’s voice chirp.
Sitting up, I rubbed my eyes, “Good morning.”
“There is some breakfast upstairs for you.” She told me.
When I stood up, I could see her sitting in the chair that I had previously occupied. Cole was no where in the room and I figured that he had probably gone to sleep. Gina was looking over some paperwork as I left the room.
Upstairs, I found Alec sitting at the table. He was eating the last of his breakfast that looked like some sort of soup with green leaves in it. There was a bowl on the counter waiting for me. I picked it up and sat down across the table from my brother.
“Did you sleep late?” I asked him. Seeing how there was no one else eating breakfast, I figured that he must have slept in as well.
“First time that I have slept in a bed for months. I milked it for as long as I could.” He grinned.
I hadn’t seen him smile in a long while, and it did my heart good to see some humor return to him. Alec was the jester in the family growing up. We never thought he could make it in the military, but the military actually gave him some maturity. He still goofed around a great deal whenever we saw him. After all that we had gone through, however, I was beginning to wonder if all his humor had gone.
Of course, I didn’t really have much of a sense of humor myself in the past few months. It felt like we were acting more like robots then human beings. We should have done something to relieve the stress and the pain, but there was no time to mourn. I think we were finally able to feel safe enough here to realize our losses and let ourselves begin to heal.
“Vion keeps getting weirder.” Alec mumbled to me as I took a bite of the creamy soup.
“Blah, this soup tastes like shit!” I stuck out my tongue.
“I think it’s some sort of spinach soup. I’ve eaten worse.” Alec lifted up his spoon and allowed the soup on his spoon to drain back into his bowl.
“I’m sorry, what did you say before I interrupted?”
“I said Vion is a strange man.”
I rose my eyebrow, “Why do you think that?”
“Last night, Gina and I went out to the bonfire after dinner. He was walking around and rubbing people. Someone would complain about an ache and he would massage them. Not like he was trying to make it feel better. Hell, it barely looked like he was touching them and he would lay his head on them.” Alec frowned, “Then the strangest thing happened. I was telling Gina about your back so I could find out about the medications they have here. Vion asked me how you hurt your back and I told him. After that, he didn’t say anything to me. Just stood up and headed back to the house.”
My eyebrows came together, “That’s odd. He came in here and was rubbing my back last night. Cole thought that he and I were a couple because of the way he was touching me.”
Alec didn’t look like he was keen on the idea of Vion rubbing my back. “That’s not even the worse part. This morning, he left with a few others to go fishing for dinner tonight. He kept saying how he had never gone fishing before or seen a live fish.”
I shrugged my shoulders and looked back down at my shoes, “Something isn’t right about him.”
“Ya think?” He said sarcastically.
“Good morning.” Cole walked into the kitchen. He had some pajama bottoms on and looked as if he still needed a couple more hours in bed.
Alec glared at him as he entered the room. I couldn’t be certain, but I thought my brother was aware of Cole’s affections towards me. Alec never approved of any man in my life. Even Drew was a good friend of his, but he threatened him to keep him away. “I promised that I would help with the barn.” Alec stood up and gave me a look that told me to be careful.
Cole took Alec’s seat with his own bowl. He slid Alec’s bowl to the center of the table and examined the contents of his breakfast. “Mmm, puke.”
I giggled, “Do I even want to know what this is?”
“What? You think that I know?”
“Well, it is your sister that cooks.”
Cole smiled, “She must have just thrown some things together and prayed everyone could tolerate it enough to swallow. We don’t yet have enough food to be picky about what we eat.”
“I think I was eating better when I was eating dogs.”
He suddenly burst out with laughter. For a moment, I thought he would dip his face in his food, because he was laughing so hard. As quickly as he had started laughing, he stopped. His face reverted back to his serious stare, “Did you really eat dogs?”
“Yes, I really ate dogs.” I must have sounded insulted, because he apologized immediately.
“I didn’t mean to offend you. I thought you were kidding.” His cheeks reddened slightly as he stared down at his soup, “Did Mabel eat them?”
“Yes.”
Cole bit his lower lip, “Do me a favor and don’t tell her mother that.”
I stared at him in a confused fashion for a moment, “Why not?”
“Let’s just say they are both dog lovers and leave it at that.” Cole took a couple bites of his breakfast. “I think that’s enough for me. Time to get back to work.”
“How long have you been asleep for?”
He shrugged as he stood up and placed his bowl in the sink, “Two or three hours.” Before I could respond he started to talk again, “I am sorry that I didn’t wake you up. You looked like you really needed some sleep. When I went to bed, I didn’t think that you would appreciate me waking you up to sleep upstairs.”
I ignored his apology, “You can’t work on two hours sleep.” I put my own bowl in the sink.
“The hell I can’t.” He looked offended.
“No, you can’t. As a doctor you should know that people need…”
“I know what people need. At this time, however, my health is irrelevant. I need…”
“To sleep for another six hours. Gina is down stairs. She can take care of things. Go back to sleep.”
Cole lifted his index finger near my lips, as he opened his mouth to say something I snapped at his finger with my teeth. Alec use to stick his finger in my face when he was upset and I would always pretend to bite it. My brother would always move his finger just in time before my teeth met with his flesh. Cole was not as quick. I always wondered if I would actually hurt someone if I bit them. The answer turned out that I wouldn’t.
He watched as my front teeth gently placed pressure on the tip of his finger. I was slowly applying more as the moments ticked by. A grin formed on his lips and he dropped his hand, “Alright, I guess you win. But only because you resorted to violence.”
With that said, he turned around and went back upstairs to his room. I was pretty sure that I shocked him which had left him with nothing to say. My ego, however, wanted to believe that I had somehow excited him. I giggled to myself and washed the three bowls in the kitchen. Afterwards, I went downstairs to see if Gina needed any help.
Days past into weeks, and I found myself up all night with Cole and spending the afternoons with Gina. She did not seem interested in speaking with me. I heard that her daughter had died shortly after she was captured and thought this was the reason for her behavior. I thought that she had engrossed herself in her work to forget her loss, but after some time I noticed her glares. I continued to rinse out and dry some of the vials and beakers that Cole had asked me to clean. Upon occasion, Gina would look my way with a stare that was less than friendly. I would return our eye contact with a grin.
I had no idea what I had done to make her upset, and I hoped to remedy the situation. Three weeks was far too long for someone to remain angry with me when I did not know why. As I dried out another beaker, I gathered the courage up to ask her what the matter was.
Clearing my throat, a strand of my hair fell from behind my ear into my eye. I had cut my hair recently and some of the short strands didn’t want to stay in my hair tie. Buying some more time, I played with the strand of hair to fix it behind my ear. I did not know why I was so intimidated by Gina, perhaps it was the thought of what her answer might be that scared me.
She suddenly glared over at me and my shyness gave way to anger. “Why the hell do you keep looking at me like that?”
Gina sat frozen for a moment with a look of start upon her face. I suddenly realized this was deja vu and if she admitted that she thought I was pretty, I would kill myself right then and there.
Her eyes watched me for several long moments, and they slowly transformed from shocked to angry. “You really want to know?”
“I asked, didn’t I?”
“He’s mine. I’ve been working with him for years. Don’t think you can walk right in here and take away all the time that I’ve put into this.”
I rose my eyebrow, “Excuse me?”
Gina’s frown deepened, “You saved me from an awful fate, and I thank you more then words can express. But I love Cole, and I will fight you to the end for him.”
“What gave you the impression that I have any interest in him?”
“The two of you down here all night. I’m not stupid. He use to work with me, but now…”
“His sleeping schedule is different. Why don’t you stay up?”
Her glare towards me only thickened, “Stay away from him.”
“I have lettuce sandwiches.” Cole announced as he walked into the room with a plate.
He handed me a sandwich with butter and lettuce on the inside. The bread was nothing more then flour and water, and it tasted just like flour as well. I really couldn’t complain, it was better then some of the food that we had been eating.
Gina gave me one more glare, before taking a sandwich from Cole. “Thank you.” She said with a smile.
After we ate our dinner, Gina told us that she was going to bed. I couldn’t believe after she had just yelled at me about spending the evenings with Cole, that she would just leave us alone together. Cole chuckled as he sat down in Gina’s seat.
“The two of you behave.” She winked at him.
“Oh, you know we won’t.” He responded to her, which caused her to stop and glare over her shoulder at me.
At first, I wasn’t bothered by what she had said. That was until I started to understand that she had forbid me to do something. I immediately became interested in pissing her off, but I didn’t want to pull Cole into the middle of it.
“Hey, have you been down to the lake yet?” He snorted, “What am I saying? Of course, you haven’t. You’ve been down here since you arrived. We should go.”
“That’s alright. I’m not really interested in a big pool of water.”
“A big, natural, beautiful pool of water, thank you.” He said as he looked over some of the notes that Gina was writing.
I giggled, but didn’t answer him. I hoped that would tell him that I hadn’t changed my mind.
“Come on, we can call it a first date.”
“Cute, but no.”
Cole turned his chair towards me and crossed his arms, “You have been flirting with me since you arrived, but now you are saying no to a romantic evening by the lake with me?”
I frowned, “I have not been flirting. I have no idea where you got that from.”
“No, huh?”
“That’s what I said.”
He chuckled, “So, if I got up and kissed you right now, you wouldn’t be affected at all.”
My frown deepened and I crossed my arms before leaning against the table. “It might hurt our friendship and I would definitely hit you.”
We stared each other down for several long moments, before Cole grinned. “I think that might be a risk that I am willing to take.”
“Do you?”
“Yeah, I think you are bluffing. I think you have been flirting with me. You just are too proud to admit it.”
“Right.” I said sarcastically.
Cole ran his fingers through his hair before he stood up and came to stand in front of me. I kept my defiant look when he grinned. His eyes fell towards my hands as I uncrossed my arms. He wrapped his hands around my own to stop any attacks that I had planned. It almost made me chuckle but I held my stone face.
“You think that will stop me from hurting you?”
He shook his head, “No, I think this will though.” He raced his lips to my own.
My first reaction was to pull at my arms to release my hands from his grasp, but he held them firmly. I wasn’t entirely sure if I would have pushed him away or embraced him had I gotten my hands free anyway. I was rather relieved that I didn’t have to make the decision. He pressed his body closer to mine, trapping our arms between us. To my disbelief, I realized that I had begun to kiss him back.
In all my life, I had only kissed one man and that had been Drew. Even in that case, it had taken Drew nearly four months for him to kiss me after we got back together. I always moved slowly in relationships, or perhaps it was Drew that did so. It may have also been that I needed some sort of contact with another human being. I missed being held at night and constantly being in contact with another’s skin. I may have allowed my guard and pride down in those moments, just to have what I missed so deeply.
I felt Cole release my hands. His own hands began to slide up my arms until they reached my shoulders. I wasn’t entirely sure what I wanted to do. All I could think about was my loneliness and Drew. As Cole’s hands touched my neck, I began to cry.
Cole immediately pulled his lips from mine as my blubbering could not be ignored. He looked confused for a moment, but did not say anything. Instead, he wrapped his arms around my shoulders and allowed me to sob into his shoulder.
“It’s okay, Elliot. I promise that it will all get better from here on out.” His hands gently rubbed my back. “Everything will be alright.”
I don’t know how long we stood there with my cries being muffled by his shoulder, but Cole just continued to hold me. I think he was surprised by my sudden burst of emotion, but I think he also understood what had happened. I was letting go of the tragedies of the virus. It would take me many more years to heal, but the process had finally begun.
My head rested on Cole’s shoulder while his fingers rubbed my hairline. We had gone to my bedroom and had begun to discuss many of the things that we both had been hiding. Cole had been the center of strength for the group. Everyone had looked to him for answers when he normally had none. He told me about how he would make guesses and hope they worked out for the best. How his mistakes cost people their lives. What caught my ear the most was when he talked about how he wanted to die.
After every mistake, he couldn’t help but blame himself for everything that had happened. He spent every night with a knife in his hands. The blade would rest against his wrist and he would mumble to himself, “Don’t be a coward, just cut them.”
No matter how much he wanted to die, he knew that he had to live. The people around him needed him to be there, even though he didn’t want to be their leader. He hated making the decisions for the group, but no one else would step up. Those from the hospital knew him to be their boss and others saw him as a doctor. Even Gina stood firmly behind his decisions, no one ever questioned him.
“We tried to stay in the hospital for as long as we could. The sick couldn’t be moved and we couldn’t leave them behind either. So, we waited… waited for them to die… that way we could move on.” His used his free hand to hold the hand that I laid upon his chest. After a moment, he began to play with my fingers. “My mother, father, most of my siblings, they just melted away. My sister and I were perfectly healthy, and all we could do was stand there and watch. We have no idea why we lived.”
“Is that why you are working so hard on the virus?” I asked him.
His hand stopped fidgeting with my finger, “In truth, yes. I have to know why. My demand for this knowledge may help others, but I really do this out of selfishness.”
“It’s not selfish to want answers during a time of tragedy.” I closed my eyes to my dark and bare room. “I can still remember everyone’s death in my mind. Their eyes holding the question of why, when I had no answer to give. Most died without even knowing who I was. There was nothing that we could do, and nothing that we could say to make it better.” I swallowed, “The doctors were dying themselves, so were the nurses. There was no one to help.”
“I can imagine how you and Alec made it for so long without anyone else. You two are stronger than I ever imagined two people could be.” His chest rose a little higher then usual and he released a loud sigh.
“We survived by lying to ourselves. By pretending that yesterday never happened and that tomorrow never would either. All we had was the moment that we were living in and nothing more.” I wrapped my fingers into the cloth of his shirt, as he continued to rub my hairline. “I remember my mother telling me to live in the moment that tomorrow wasn’t for certain, because I always worried about everything. Now that I have done just that, it wasn’t all that she said it would be. People need to pretend there will be a tomorrow and happier times ahead of them. Otherwise, they are just robots bent of survival and nothing more.”
I looked up at Cole’s face and he looked down at me, “Don’t know how your brother couldn’t talk to you about these things. I find your responses to be thought provoking and relaxing.” He smiled.
I grinned in return, “I’ve had a lot of quiet time to think these things through.”
He nodded, “Haven’t we all? Though, you seem to have come up with satisfactory answers.”
“No answer can satisfy when all that you love is gone forever. Sometimes, knowing the answer is as good as revenge. You will feel good for a moment, but it will only lead to wanting more of the same.” I licked my lips, “Hmm.”
“What?”
“I never thought about it that way before. I just started to talk and…” I bit my moist lower lip, “I guess it’s true. Knowing why won’t bring them back, but if that is true why do I need to know so badly?”
Cole sat up which caused me to roll onto my back. He looked down at me with a frown, “Because if there is no answer, then they all died for nothing. No one wants their death to be meaningless and if we don’t find an answer that’s exactly what their deaths will be.”
I slowly nodded, “You’re right.”
“Even if they exist no more, be that physically or spiritually, they do continue to live.” He pointed to his heart, “I mourn them because I take them with me in here. In order for them to rest peacefully in my heart, they have to know why they died.”
I smiled, “And you didn’t think you had any answers.”
A grin formed at the corner of his lips. “Like you do, I start spouting off answers until one makes sense. I had no idea what I was going to say until I said it.”
We sat in silence for several moments, our eyes watching each other. Cole slowly slipped down towards me until our lips touched. He kissed me gently and then pulled back some to look at my expression.
“If you cry this time, I’m going to think that it’s me.”
When I chuckled, my eyes closed and by the time I opened them Cole was making another attempt to kiss me. Suddenly, I remembered Gina’s words from earlier. I placed my hands on his shoulders and pushed him up. I didn’t want to cause hostilities between the two of us. After all, we did have to work and live together.
“What’s wrong?”
“Gina.”
I heard him moan before he collapsed onto the bed, “Did she ask you or threaten you?”
I had placed my feet on the ground with my back towards him. When I heard his reply, I looked over my shoulder to see his face in the pillow. “A little of both, I suppose.”
He rolled over onto his back, “She always does that. Every time she meets a girl that I… that I… shit, how do I say that without sounding like a stalker?”
“That you were attracted to.”
Cole winked at me, “Remember that you phrased it that way. She always tells them how she has been working on me for years and to stay away. Before the virus we worked together a couple years earlier. I asked her out on one date that didn’t go well. She’s clingy….and needy. I eventually had to fire her so she wouldn’t harass me anymore. When the virus showed up, I needed the best of the best to work at my side. Gina is one of the best.”
I rose an eyebrow, “She doesn’t seem like the freaky stalker type.”
“She’s not. She is the type that doesn’t take no for an answer.”
“How do I know that you didn’t play it smooth with her like you are doing with me?”
“I’ll admit that I hardly know you… well, before tonight that is. After we’ve shared our experience, I think I know you pretty well by now. Your history, if not your inner personality.”
“It’s hard to trust anyone now, Cole. People come and go as of recently, and I just don’t have the emotional energy anymore to deal with it.” I was about to stand up, when Cole caught my hand.
He sat up and cupped my cheek with his free hand. His eyes looked into my own as he spoke. “I’m sorry if I have given you the impression that I date hundreds of women and toss them aside without any remorse. That is not who I am. You can ask my sister if you wish. All of my relationships have been long term, minus the few one time dates.”
“I still don’t know.”
“Alright.” He nodded sympathetically. Standing up from the bed, he kissed my cheek before walking towards the door. “I’ll be in the basement if you need me.” He opened the door and looked back at me, “I can wait, Elliot.”
I laid in bed and stared out the window at the stars. My arms behind my head, I tried to find the face in the moon that everyone says is there, but I never could find it. Midnight had made my room dark, and there were no light posts out in the country. I could barely see my own hand in front of my face, but the moon shined brightly through my window.
The same moon that shined on me a year ago before the sorrow of loss struck me. I used to look at the moon as a symbol of romance and even friendship. Now, it shined like a beacon of grief and mourning, for whenever the night came upon me, I remembered. It was the only time that I really had to remember all those that I had lost. Friends and family wilted away before my eyes and there was nothing that I could have done.
Yet, that night after spending my time with Cole, I could only allow myself to remember the happy times that I had with those long lost. Fishing trips with my father and chatting with my mother on her front porch. The time that Alec and Olivia drove me around for three hours with a blindfold over my eyes to take me to an amusement park, because I had refused to go. The day that Drew bought me a diamond necklace that he had saved up for two years to purchase.
They were all people that I couldn’t live without, and now I was doing just that. I began to realize that it wasn’t that I couldn’t live without them, but instead that I couldn’t be without them. Who I was in those very moments was born from the person they helped me to create. Therefore, they were with me as they had become part of me. It hardly made me feel better for their loss, I would rather have their physical form in front of me.
Of course, I did have Alec. Though since we had arrived at the farm, he seemed to distance himself from me as much as possible. I think my face brought painful memories with it, after all I know that my mother and sister shared similar features to my own. I knew that time would eventually heal his wounds and so I remained patient. I couldn’t rush him anymore then I could rush myself.
I heard my bedroom door open and I sat up in bed. The form that entered my room was tall and slender, not at all like Alec nor Cole. “Yes?” I said, not afraid of whomever it was.
“It’s me, Vion.” His voice said in a low mummer, and he walked over to my bedside.
“Where have you been?” I asked.
“Around.” He answered as he sat down on the edge of my bed.
“Giving more back massages, I suppose?”
He chuckled, “Yeah. How is your back?”
“Feeling better, why?”
With a sudden move he laid down on the bed beside me and placed his arms under his head. For a moment, I was uneasy with him laying beside me, but I settled in next to him.
“The moon is a pale white here, not gray like in the city.” He told me and I turned my eyes back to the moon.
“One can see it more clearly here.”
“It seems many things become more clear out here.”
I rose my eyebrow though he could not see it, “Oh?”
He didn’t respond, just allowed me some time to think over his meaning. With a long sigh, he finally spoke again. “Are you lonely?”
“A little bit. Alec doesn’t like to speak with me much, but there is Cole and Gina. What about you?”
I felt him move beside me and I assumed it was a shrug, “I meant here at night when you lay in the darkness by yourself. Are you lonely in these moments?”
“I use to sleep with someone if that is what you mean, and after that Alec was always near by. Y… yes… no, it’s not loneliness, but the fear of being alone. For so long there has been the rule that you aren’t supposed to leave each other’s sight. Now that rule is no more.”
He turned onto his side to face me, “I use to sleep in a bunk with fifteen others. At night, we would sing this song to dreams together.”
“Can you sing it to me?”
Vion chuckled, “No, it’s a rather personal, and you wouldn’t understand it.”
“Personal with fifteen others?”
“You can be close to more then one or two people, especially if your lives depend on each other.”
“Were you in the military or something, Vion?”
“Or something.” He responded and I saw him lift his head to look back out the window. “Do you want to be my bunkmate, Elliot?”
I giggled nervously, “Is that a strange way of asking me if I want to have sex with you?”
He was quiet for several moments after I asked the question. At first, I thought because the answer was yes, but then I decided that he didn’t want to dignify my joke with an answer.
“I’m sorry. It was a strange question.” I told him and turned my eyes back to the window.
“I will if that is what you want.” Vion’s words shocked me into silence, “I meant to lay here together while we sleep, but if you are interested in mating…”
“No!” I yelled in embarrassment and sat up on my elbows, “I mean, no. It was just a joke. I made a bad joke because your question made me nervous.”
“Jokes often speak truth, I have found.” He sat up.
“Not that one, it was meant as a funny. No secret meaning behind that one.” I realized I was even more nervous then before and talking far too quickly.
His hand touched my cheek and pulled my face to his own. I don’t know why I allowed him to kiss me. It was a strange kiss, almost as if he was the one that didn’t want to be kissed and I was the one forcing him. I was not attracted to Vion by any means, but instead I think I enjoyed the idea of being close to someone in those moments. I had rather wished Cole had been this forceful with me and not turned tail at my rejection.
Vion’s kiss turned from uncertainty to passionate within moments. When it hit such a high stage, I pulled back. “Ok, enough. That was funny and all, but… I’m not interested, alright?”
“Interested in what?” He asked me in all seriousness.
“In being with you, alright? You’re weird and I’m not attracted to you.” I wrapped my arms around my knees.
“Being with me as in a relationship? I do not wish that either.”
“Good, then you should leave now.”
Without a word, Vion stood from the bed and exited the room. I felt a moment of disappointment in my heart when I realized that he was really gone. Followed by a moment of relief, that soon turned into lust.
Next Chapter: http://rkphunt.com/forum/showthread.php?tid=67
“Morning.” I heard Gina’s voice chirp.
Sitting up, I rubbed my eyes, “Good morning.”
“There is some breakfast upstairs for you.” She told me.
When I stood up, I could see her sitting in the chair that I had previously occupied. Cole was no where in the room and I figured that he had probably gone to sleep. Gina was looking over some paperwork as I left the room.
Upstairs, I found Alec sitting at the table. He was eating the last of his breakfast that looked like some sort of soup with green leaves in it. There was a bowl on the counter waiting for me. I picked it up and sat down across the table from my brother.
“Did you sleep late?” I asked him. Seeing how there was no one else eating breakfast, I figured that he must have slept in as well.
“First time that I have slept in a bed for months. I milked it for as long as I could.” He grinned.
I hadn’t seen him smile in a long while, and it did my heart good to see some humor return to him. Alec was the jester in the family growing up. We never thought he could make it in the military, but the military actually gave him some maturity. He still goofed around a great deal whenever we saw him. After all that we had gone through, however, I was beginning to wonder if all his humor had gone.
Of course, I didn’t really have much of a sense of humor myself in the past few months. It felt like we were acting more like robots then human beings. We should have done something to relieve the stress and the pain, but there was no time to mourn. I think we were finally able to feel safe enough here to realize our losses and let ourselves begin to heal.
“Vion keeps getting weirder.” Alec mumbled to me as I took a bite of the creamy soup.
“Blah, this soup tastes like shit!” I stuck out my tongue.
“I think it’s some sort of spinach soup. I’ve eaten worse.” Alec lifted up his spoon and allowed the soup on his spoon to drain back into his bowl.
“I’m sorry, what did you say before I interrupted?”
“I said Vion is a strange man.”
I rose my eyebrow, “Why do you think that?”
“Last night, Gina and I went out to the bonfire after dinner. He was walking around and rubbing people. Someone would complain about an ache and he would massage them. Not like he was trying to make it feel better. Hell, it barely looked like he was touching them and he would lay his head on them.” Alec frowned, “Then the strangest thing happened. I was telling Gina about your back so I could find out about the medications they have here. Vion asked me how you hurt your back and I told him. After that, he didn’t say anything to me. Just stood up and headed back to the house.”
My eyebrows came together, “That’s odd. He came in here and was rubbing my back last night. Cole thought that he and I were a couple because of the way he was touching me.”
Alec didn’t look like he was keen on the idea of Vion rubbing my back. “That’s not even the worse part. This morning, he left with a few others to go fishing for dinner tonight. He kept saying how he had never gone fishing before or seen a live fish.”
I shrugged my shoulders and looked back down at my shoes, “Something isn’t right about him.”
“Ya think?” He said sarcastically.
“Good morning.” Cole walked into the kitchen. He had some pajama bottoms on and looked as if he still needed a couple more hours in bed.
Alec glared at him as he entered the room. I couldn’t be certain, but I thought my brother was aware of Cole’s affections towards me. Alec never approved of any man in my life. Even Drew was a good friend of his, but he threatened him to keep him away. “I promised that I would help with the barn.” Alec stood up and gave me a look that told me to be careful.
Cole took Alec’s seat with his own bowl. He slid Alec’s bowl to the center of the table and examined the contents of his breakfast. “Mmm, puke.”
I giggled, “Do I even want to know what this is?”
“What? You think that I know?”
“Well, it is your sister that cooks.”
Cole smiled, “She must have just thrown some things together and prayed everyone could tolerate it enough to swallow. We don’t yet have enough food to be picky about what we eat.”
“I think I was eating better when I was eating dogs.”
He suddenly burst out with laughter. For a moment, I thought he would dip his face in his food, because he was laughing so hard. As quickly as he had started laughing, he stopped. His face reverted back to his serious stare, “Did you really eat dogs?”
“Yes, I really ate dogs.” I must have sounded insulted, because he apologized immediately.
“I didn’t mean to offend you. I thought you were kidding.” His cheeks reddened slightly as he stared down at his soup, “Did Mabel eat them?”
“Yes.”
Cole bit his lower lip, “Do me a favor and don’t tell her mother that.”
I stared at him in a confused fashion for a moment, “Why not?”
“Let’s just say they are both dog lovers and leave it at that.” Cole took a couple bites of his breakfast. “I think that’s enough for me. Time to get back to work.”
“How long have you been asleep for?”
He shrugged as he stood up and placed his bowl in the sink, “Two or three hours.” Before I could respond he started to talk again, “I am sorry that I didn’t wake you up. You looked like you really needed some sleep. When I went to bed, I didn’t think that you would appreciate me waking you up to sleep upstairs.”
I ignored his apology, “You can’t work on two hours sleep.” I put my own bowl in the sink.
“The hell I can’t.” He looked offended.
“No, you can’t. As a doctor you should know that people need…”
“I know what people need. At this time, however, my health is irrelevant. I need…”
“To sleep for another six hours. Gina is down stairs. She can take care of things. Go back to sleep.”
Cole lifted his index finger near my lips, as he opened his mouth to say something I snapped at his finger with my teeth. Alec use to stick his finger in my face when he was upset and I would always pretend to bite it. My brother would always move his finger just in time before my teeth met with his flesh. Cole was not as quick. I always wondered if I would actually hurt someone if I bit them. The answer turned out that I wouldn’t.
He watched as my front teeth gently placed pressure on the tip of his finger. I was slowly applying more as the moments ticked by. A grin formed on his lips and he dropped his hand, “Alright, I guess you win. But only because you resorted to violence.”
With that said, he turned around and went back upstairs to his room. I was pretty sure that I shocked him which had left him with nothing to say. My ego, however, wanted to believe that I had somehow excited him. I giggled to myself and washed the three bowls in the kitchen. Afterwards, I went downstairs to see if Gina needed any help.
---***---
Days past into weeks, and I found myself up all night with Cole and spending the afternoons with Gina. She did not seem interested in speaking with me. I heard that her daughter had died shortly after she was captured and thought this was the reason for her behavior. I thought that she had engrossed herself in her work to forget her loss, but after some time I noticed her glares. I continued to rinse out and dry some of the vials and beakers that Cole had asked me to clean. Upon occasion, Gina would look my way with a stare that was less than friendly. I would return our eye contact with a grin.
I had no idea what I had done to make her upset, and I hoped to remedy the situation. Three weeks was far too long for someone to remain angry with me when I did not know why. As I dried out another beaker, I gathered the courage up to ask her what the matter was.
Clearing my throat, a strand of my hair fell from behind my ear into my eye. I had cut my hair recently and some of the short strands didn’t want to stay in my hair tie. Buying some more time, I played with the strand of hair to fix it behind my ear. I did not know why I was so intimidated by Gina, perhaps it was the thought of what her answer might be that scared me.
She suddenly glared over at me and my shyness gave way to anger. “Why the hell do you keep looking at me like that?”
Gina sat frozen for a moment with a look of start upon her face. I suddenly realized this was deja vu and if she admitted that she thought I was pretty, I would kill myself right then and there.
Her eyes watched me for several long moments, and they slowly transformed from shocked to angry. “You really want to know?”
“I asked, didn’t I?”
“He’s mine. I’ve been working with him for years. Don’t think you can walk right in here and take away all the time that I’ve put into this.”
I rose my eyebrow, “Excuse me?”
Gina’s frown deepened, “You saved me from an awful fate, and I thank you more then words can express. But I love Cole, and I will fight you to the end for him.”
“What gave you the impression that I have any interest in him?”
“The two of you down here all night. I’m not stupid. He use to work with me, but now…”
“His sleeping schedule is different. Why don’t you stay up?”
Her glare towards me only thickened, “Stay away from him.”
“I have lettuce sandwiches.” Cole announced as he walked into the room with a plate.
He handed me a sandwich with butter and lettuce on the inside. The bread was nothing more then flour and water, and it tasted just like flour as well. I really couldn’t complain, it was better then some of the food that we had been eating.
Gina gave me one more glare, before taking a sandwich from Cole. “Thank you.” She said with a smile.
After we ate our dinner, Gina told us that she was going to bed. I couldn’t believe after she had just yelled at me about spending the evenings with Cole, that she would just leave us alone together. Cole chuckled as he sat down in Gina’s seat.
“The two of you behave.” She winked at him.
“Oh, you know we won’t.” He responded to her, which caused her to stop and glare over her shoulder at me.
At first, I wasn’t bothered by what she had said. That was until I started to understand that she had forbid me to do something. I immediately became interested in pissing her off, but I didn’t want to pull Cole into the middle of it.
“Hey, have you been down to the lake yet?” He snorted, “What am I saying? Of course, you haven’t. You’ve been down here since you arrived. We should go.”
“That’s alright. I’m not really interested in a big pool of water.”
“A big, natural, beautiful pool of water, thank you.” He said as he looked over some of the notes that Gina was writing.
I giggled, but didn’t answer him. I hoped that would tell him that I hadn’t changed my mind.
“Come on, we can call it a first date.”
“Cute, but no.”
Cole turned his chair towards me and crossed his arms, “You have been flirting with me since you arrived, but now you are saying no to a romantic evening by the lake with me?”
I frowned, “I have not been flirting. I have no idea where you got that from.”
“No, huh?”
“That’s what I said.”
He chuckled, “So, if I got up and kissed you right now, you wouldn’t be affected at all.”
My frown deepened and I crossed my arms before leaning against the table. “It might hurt our friendship and I would definitely hit you.”
We stared each other down for several long moments, before Cole grinned. “I think that might be a risk that I am willing to take.”
“Do you?”
“Yeah, I think you are bluffing. I think you have been flirting with me. You just are too proud to admit it.”
“Right.” I said sarcastically.
Cole ran his fingers through his hair before he stood up and came to stand in front of me. I kept my defiant look when he grinned. His eyes fell towards my hands as I uncrossed my arms. He wrapped his hands around my own to stop any attacks that I had planned. It almost made me chuckle but I held my stone face.
“You think that will stop me from hurting you?”
He shook his head, “No, I think this will though.” He raced his lips to my own.
My first reaction was to pull at my arms to release my hands from his grasp, but he held them firmly. I wasn’t entirely sure if I would have pushed him away or embraced him had I gotten my hands free anyway. I was rather relieved that I didn’t have to make the decision. He pressed his body closer to mine, trapping our arms between us. To my disbelief, I realized that I had begun to kiss him back.
In all my life, I had only kissed one man and that had been Drew. Even in that case, it had taken Drew nearly four months for him to kiss me after we got back together. I always moved slowly in relationships, or perhaps it was Drew that did so. It may have also been that I needed some sort of contact with another human being. I missed being held at night and constantly being in contact with another’s skin. I may have allowed my guard and pride down in those moments, just to have what I missed so deeply.
I felt Cole release my hands. His own hands began to slide up my arms until they reached my shoulders. I wasn’t entirely sure what I wanted to do. All I could think about was my loneliness and Drew. As Cole’s hands touched my neck, I began to cry.
Cole immediately pulled his lips from mine as my blubbering could not be ignored. He looked confused for a moment, but did not say anything. Instead, he wrapped his arms around my shoulders and allowed me to sob into his shoulder.
“It’s okay, Elliot. I promise that it will all get better from here on out.” His hands gently rubbed my back. “Everything will be alright.”
I don’t know how long we stood there with my cries being muffled by his shoulder, but Cole just continued to hold me. I think he was surprised by my sudden burst of emotion, but I think he also understood what had happened. I was letting go of the tragedies of the virus. It would take me many more years to heal, but the process had finally begun.
---***---
My head rested on Cole’s shoulder while his fingers rubbed my hairline. We had gone to my bedroom and had begun to discuss many of the things that we both had been hiding. Cole had been the center of strength for the group. Everyone had looked to him for answers when he normally had none. He told me about how he would make guesses and hope they worked out for the best. How his mistakes cost people their lives. What caught my ear the most was when he talked about how he wanted to die.
After every mistake, he couldn’t help but blame himself for everything that had happened. He spent every night with a knife in his hands. The blade would rest against his wrist and he would mumble to himself, “Don’t be a coward, just cut them.”
No matter how much he wanted to die, he knew that he had to live. The people around him needed him to be there, even though he didn’t want to be their leader. He hated making the decisions for the group, but no one else would step up. Those from the hospital knew him to be their boss and others saw him as a doctor. Even Gina stood firmly behind his decisions, no one ever questioned him.
“We tried to stay in the hospital for as long as we could. The sick couldn’t be moved and we couldn’t leave them behind either. So, we waited… waited for them to die… that way we could move on.” His used his free hand to hold the hand that I laid upon his chest. After a moment, he began to play with my fingers. “My mother, father, most of my siblings, they just melted away. My sister and I were perfectly healthy, and all we could do was stand there and watch. We have no idea why we lived.”
“Is that why you are working so hard on the virus?” I asked him.
His hand stopped fidgeting with my finger, “In truth, yes. I have to know why. My demand for this knowledge may help others, but I really do this out of selfishness.”
“It’s not selfish to want answers during a time of tragedy.” I closed my eyes to my dark and bare room. “I can still remember everyone’s death in my mind. Their eyes holding the question of why, when I had no answer to give. Most died without even knowing who I was. There was nothing that we could do, and nothing that we could say to make it better.” I swallowed, “The doctors were dying themselves, so were the nurses. There was no one to help.”
“I can imagine how you and Alec made it for so long without anyone else. You two are stronger than I ever imagined two people could be.” His chest rose a little higher then usual and he released a loud sigh.
“We survived by lying to ourselves. By pretending that yesterday never happened and that tomorrow never would either. All we had was the moment that we were living in and nothing more.” I wrapped my fingers into the cloth of his shirt, as he continued to rub my hairline. “I remember my mother telling me to live in the moment that tomorrow wasn’t for certain, because I always worried about everything. Now that I have done just that, it wasn’t all that she said it would be. People need to pretend there will be a tomorrow and happier times ahead of them. Otherwise, they are just robots bent of survival and nothing more.”
I looked up at Cole’s face and he looked down at me, “Don’t know how your brother couldn’t talk to you about these things. I find your responses to be thought provoking and relaxing.” He smiled.
I grinned in return, “I’ve had a lot of quiet time to think these things through.”
He nodded, “Haven’t we all? Though, you seem to have come up with satisfactory answers.”
“No answer can satisfy when all that you love is gone forever. Sometimes, knowing the answer is as good as revenge. You will feel good for a moment, but it will only lead to wanting more of the same.” I licked my lips, “Hmm.”
“What?”
“I never thought about it that way before. I just started to talk and…” I bit my moist lower lip, “I guess it’s true. Knowing why won’t bring them back, but if that is true why do I need to know so badly?”
Cole sat up which caused me to roll onto my back. He looked down at me with a frown, “Because if there is no answer, then they all died for nothing. No one wants their death to be meaningless and if we don’t find an answer that’s exactly what their deaths will be.”
I slowly nodded, “You’re right.”
“Even if they exist no more, be that physically or spiritually, they do continue to live.” He pointed to his heart, “I mourn them because I take them with me in here. In order for them to rest peacefully in my heart, they have to know why they died.”
I smiled, “And you didn’t think you had any answers.”
A grin formed at the corner of his lips. “Like you do, I start spouting off answers until one makes sense. I had no idea what I was going to say until I said it.”
We sat in silence for several moments, our eyes watching each other. Cole slowly slipped down towards me until our lips touched. He kissed me gently and then pulled back some to look at my expression.
“If you cry this time, I’m going to think that it’s me.”
When I chuckled, my eyes closed and by the time I opened them Cole was making another attempt to kiss me. Suddenly, I remembered Gina’s words from earlier. I placed my hands on his shoulders and pushed him up. I didn’t want to cause hostilities between the two of us. After all, we did have to work and live together.
“What’s wrong?”
“Gina.”
I heard him moan before he collapsed onto the bed, “Did she ask you or threaten you?”
I had placed my feet on the ground with my back towards him. When I heard his reply, I looked over my shoulder to see his face in the pillow. “A little of both, I suppose.”
He rolled over onto his back, “She always does that. Every time she meets a girl that I… that I… shit, how do I say that without sounding like a stalker?”
“That you were attracted to.”
Cole winked at me, “Remember that you phrased it that way. She always tells them how she has been working on me for years and to stay away. Before the virus we worked together a couple years earlier. I asked her out on one date that didn’t go well. She’s clingy….and needy. I eventually had to fire her so she wouldn’t harass me anymore. When the virus showed up, I needed the best of the best to work at my side. Gina is one of the best.”
I rose an eyebrow, “She doesn’t seem like the freaky stalker type.”
“She’s not. She is the type that doesn’t take no for an answer.”
“How do I know that you didn’t play it smooth with her like you are doing with me?”
“I’ll admit that I hardly know you… well, before tonight that is. After we’ve shared our experience, I think I know you pretty well by now. Your history, if not your inner personality.”
“It’s hard to trust anyone now, Cole. People come and go as of recently, and I just don’t have the emotional energy anymore to deal with it.” I was about to stand up, when Cole caught my hand.
He sat up and cupped my cheek with his free hand. His eyes looked into my own as he spoke. “I’m sorry if I have given you the impression that I date hundreds of women and toss them aside without any remorse. That is not who I am. You can ask my sister if you wish. All of my relationships have been long term, minus the few one time dates.”
“I still don’t know.”
“Alright.” He nodded sympathetically. Standing up from the bed, he kissed my cheek before walking towards the door. “I’ll be in the basement if you need me.” He opened the door and looked back at me, “I can wait, Elliot.”
---***---
I laid in bed and stared out the window at the stars. My arms behind my head, I tried to find the face in the moon that everyone says is there, but I never could find it. Midnight had made my room dark, and there were no light posts out in the country. I could barely see my own hand in front of my face, but the moon shined brightly through my window.
The same moon that shined on me a year ago before the sorrow of loss struck me. I used to look at the moon as a symbol of romance and even friendship. Now, it shined like a beacon of grief and mourning, for whenever the night came upon me, I remembered. It was the only time that I really had to remember all those that I had lost. Friends and family wilted away before my eyes and there was nothing that I could have done.
Yet, that night after spending my time with Cole, I could only allow myself to remember the happy times that I had with those long lost. Fishing trips with my father and chatting with my mother on her front porch. The time that Alec and Olivia drove me around for three hours with a blindfold over my eyes to take me to an amusement park, because I had refused to go. The day that Drew bought me a diamond necklace that he had saved up for two years to purchase.
They were all people that I couldn’t live without, and now I was doing just that. I began to realize that it wasn’t that I couldn’t live without them, but instead that I couldn’t be without them. Who I was in those very moments was born from the person they helped me to create. Therefore, they were with me as they had become part of me. It hardly made me feel better for their loss, I would rather have their physical form in front of me.
Of course, I did have Alec. Though since we had arrived at the farm, he seemed to distance himself from me as much as possible. I think my face brought painful memories with it, after all I know that my mother and sister shared similar features to my own. I knew that time would eventually heal his wounds and so I remained patient. I couldn’t rush him anymore then I could rush myself.
I heard my bedroom door open and I sat up in bed. The form that entered my room was tall and slender, not at all like Alec nor Cole. “Yes?” I said, not afraid of whomever it was.
“It’s me, Vion.” His voice said in a low mummer, and he walked over to my bedside.
“Where have you been?” I asked.
“Around.” He answered as he sat down on the edge of my bed.
“Giving more back massages, I suppose?”
He chuckled, “Yeah. How is your back?”
“Feeling better, why?”
With a sudden move he laid down on the bed beside me and placed his arms under his head. For a moment, I was uneasy with him laying beside me, but I settled in next to him.
“The moon is a pale white here, not gray like in the city.” He told me and I turned my eyes back to the moon.
“One can see it more clearly here.”
“It seems many things become more clear out here.”
I rose my eyebrow though he could not see it, “Oh?”
He didn’t respond, just allowed me some time to think over his meaning. With a long sigh, he finally spoke again. “Are you lonely?”
“A little bit. Alec doesn’t like to speak with me much, but there is Cole and Gina. What about you?”
I felt him move beside me and I assumed it was a shrug, “I meant here at night when you lay in the darkness by yourself. Are you lonely in these moments?”
“I use to sleep with someone if that is what you mean, and after that Alec was always near by. Y… yes… no, it’s not loneliness, but the fear of being alone. For so long there has been the rule that you aren’t supposed to leave each other’s sight. Now that rule is no more.”
He turned onto his side to face me, “I use to sleep in a bunk with fifteen others. At night, we would sing this song to dreams together.”
“Can you sing it to me?”
Vion chuckled, “No, it’s a rather personal, and you wouldn’t understand it.”
“Personal with fifteen others?”
“You can be close to more then one or two people, especially if your lives depend on each other.”
“Were you in the military or something, Vion?”
“Or something.” He responded and I saw him lift his head to look back out the window. “Do you want to be my bunkmate, Elliot?”
I giggled nervously, “Is that a strange way of asking me if I want to have sex with you?”
He was quiet for several moments after I asked the question. At first, I thought because the answer was yes, but then I decided that he didn’t want to dignify my joke with an answer.
“I’m sorry. It was a strange question.” I told him and turned my eyes back to the window.
“I will if that is what you want.” Vion’s words shocked me into silence, “I meant to lay here together while we sleep, but if you are interested in mating…”
“No!” I yelled in embarrassment and sat up on my elbows, “I mean, no. It was just a joke. I made a bad joke because your question made me nervous.”
“Jokes often speak truth, I have found.” He sat up.
“Not that one, it was meant as a funny. No secret meaning behind that one.” I realized I was even more nervous then before and talking far too quickly.
His hand touched my cheek and pulled my face to his own. I don’t know why I allowed him to kiss me. It was a strange kiss, almost as if he was the one that didn’t want to be kissed and I was the one forcing him. I was not attracted to Vion by any means, but instead I think I enjoyed the idea of being close to someone in those moments. I had rather wished Cole had been this forceful with me and not turned tail at my rejection.
Vion’s kiss turned from uncertainty to passionate within moments. When it hit such a high stage, I pulled back. “Ok, enough. That was funny and all, but… I’m not interested, alright?”
“Interested in what?” He asked me in all seriousness.
“In being with you, alright? You’re weird and I’m not attracted to you.” I wrapped my arms around my knees.
“Being with me as in a relationship? I do not wish that either.”
“Good, then you should leave now.”
Without a word, Vion stood from the bed and exited the room. I felt a moment of disappointment in my heart when I realized that he was really gone. Followed by a moment of relief, that soon turned into lust.
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