Rotting World, Blossoming Love I ONC 2021

Chapter 9

The first thing I register when I come to my sense is the steady movement. However, I am pretty sure that my legs aren't moving on their own accord.

Terrified of the unfamiliar notion, my eyes snap open, and the first thing I see is a pair of mesmerizing eyes looking down at me with worry.

"Marissa, are you okay?" Nathan asks.

From how anxious he sounds, it's clear that it is a question he has already asked me, probably multiple times.

"I'm fine," I say, although I'm not sure that I am.

All I want to do is wipe away the wrinkles that worry has painted on Nathan's face.

When I stop talking, the memories of what happened, what I did, rush back to me, and I cringe at the intrusion.

The mere recollection makes me wince as the pain of realization settles throughout my exhausted body.

I killed someone. A living being has stopped existing because of me.

I look at my hands, expecting them to be covered in blood, but they look the same. They look innocent. As if these same hands didn't hold a gun in them, as if they didn't cause someone's demise.

They look like hands made for tenderness, and the fact that I have misused them in such a gruesome manner makes me question everything I thought I knew about myself.

"Marissa?" Nathan asks gently.

"Just memories catching up with me," I say honestly.

Nathan nods his head in understanding as if he knows what I am going through.

Then again, he might know exactly what I am going through. As a soldier, he has probably been through far worse, killed far more people.

"How do you do it?" I ask as he hurries through the forest.

I can hear his parents close by, so I allow myself the luxury of being carried a bit longer.

Honestly, I am not sure if my legs are ready to hold me just yet.

"How do I do what?" Nathan asks, scanning our surroundings.

"Live with all the blood on your hands," I blurt out without really meaning to.

Nathan's eyes snap back to mine and what I see in them is so intense that I have to look away. The emotions there are so raw, so real, that I don't dare to try and understand all of them.

"By focusing on the good things, by concentrating on all the lives that I saved by killing those people. Thinking about all the good in the world helps as well," Nathan says with sadness in his voice.

It makes me feel horrible that I am the one who has made him feel miserable. However, I need to find a way to deal with this, and who better to ask than him.

"I am sorry," I say, raising my hand to wipe away one stray tear that snuck up on Nathan's self-control.

"I'm fine," Nathan says, smiling, although it doesn't reach his eyes.

"I thought that was my line," I say teasingly.

Nathan chuckles quietly, his body rumbling so close to my own.

"That it is," he says.

Watching that smile of his and seeing him trying to be strong even though he is clearly broken inside makes me realize what I am fighting for, what I fought for when I killed that zombie.

I was trying to protect Nathan. The one who was used to protecting others needed my protection. Killing that zombie kept that bright spark in the dark world that was Nathan alive.