A Place To Call Home

Patrol Training

Summer - 2035

Ellie had been sitting in Joel's living room since this morning, she was under house arrest for the next few days. She had tried to burn the bite mark away from her arm with acid this morning, but she had been caught by Joel in the process. Joel had been outside hanging out his washing when he heard Ellie crying out in pain, he had rushed into her garage apartment and found her crying on the bathroom floor. He had been panicked with the sight that greeted him, he comforted her before he rushed her to the community medical center. Joel had to lie to the doctor, he had told him that Ellie had accidentally knocked over some acid and burnt her arm in his basement. Luckily for Ellie the bite mark had been burnt away from her skin by the acid, but the scarring that would be left behind wouldn't be pretty. Ellie had seen the mess of her arm before it had been treated, her skin was red and blistered. The doctor had to wash her acid burn in cold water before he dressed it in a bandage, the doctor had told her that back in the times before the Infection took hold of the world the treatment would have been different. He didn't have antibiotic creams or anti-itch medicines, it would have to heal naturally.

Ellie was going to have to keep her wound clean all by herself, she had been given clean bandages and some pain killers. Joel told the doctor that Ellie was going to be staying with him for the next few days, Ellie had protested at first about it but she was fighting a losing battle. It didn't help much when Maria had turned up with Tommy, it was like three versus one. Maria had persuaded Ellie to stay with Joel, she ended up agreeing with her because Maria could be very persuasive when she wanted to be. So for now Ellie was staying at Joel's house until her arm was better, she couldn't wait to get back home though because Joel had been fussing over her like an overprotective babysitter. Staring over at the open window in the living room she saw Tommy walking along the sidewalk, he was carrying a dish of food. It was probably Maria's famous chicken stew, Ellie really did love Maria's chicken stew with fluffy dumplings and sliced tiny mushrooms. Her mouth began to water at the thought of food, she could actually do with a snack right now. She heard Tommy knock at the door, it wasn't long until Joel walked through the hallway and answered the door. She could hear them talking from the hallway, they weren't even being quiet about the conversation they were having about her neither.

" How's the patient doing?" Tommy asked.

" She quiet, but she just needs to rest up." Joel replied.

" I can hear you talking about me you know!" Ellie sighed.

" I see her hearing hasn't been affected!" Tommy said.

" You've got that right, Tommy!" Ellie said. 

" Now, now kids!" Joel said with a chuckle. " Play nice!" 

Joel told Tommy to take a seat while he got him something to drink, Ellie watched Joel walking passed the doorway with a dish in his hands. Tommy joined Ellie in the living room, he sat down on Joel's armchair and told Ellie that Maria had made her some chicken stew. Ellie thanked Tommy and told him to thank Maria too, but their little chat soon turned to Ellie's accident with the acid. She didn't really want to talk about it, but she knew Tommy already knew about the bite mark. She tired to change the subject, but Tommy forced the subject on her and asked her to be honest with him. 

" Okay, fine!" Ellie sighed while she pulled her knees to her chest. " You guessed right, okay? It's just Cat is going to be doing a tattoo soon on my arm, I was hoping she would be doing it on my left arm. But she said the right arm is the arm she wanted to do the tattoo on..."

" Is that why you did it?" Tommy asked.

" Yeah, I know it was stupid." Ellie replied.

" It was dangerous, you had Joel really worried about you." Tommy said.