Into The Darkness

Chapter Sixteen

Our second winter in the apocalypse was much harder than the first. We had plenty of food, but firewood was a different story and harder to come by than I thought. Most nights were below freezing and there was more ice this year than I've ever experienced my entire life. We burned through our firewood so much faster than we intended to.

When we ran out of wood, everything was covered in ice. So much we couldn't even walk outside without slipping and falling. Not to mention finding gas for the chainsaw we found was impossible. We ended up pulling off all of the doors in the house except for the front and back door, along with the bathroom door. We burned them first, and hung thick blankets over the doors in the living room. We also covered the windows with blankets and the doorway into the kitchen, hoping to keep all the heat in the living room so we wouldn't freeze to death. We burned the bed frames next, we even took an axe and cut a few 2x4s out of the walls in the upstairs closet... I know it's not the safest, but we have plenty of other homes to choose from since we tore this one apart. With every passing day, running away to California where it's nice and sunny during winter was sounding better and better.

Thankfully though, the ice and snow are starting to melt and it's been sunny for the past few days. So I'm hoping spring is around the corner. Alex climbed out of our warm bed and opened the back door, I felt the cold air seep into my bones.

"It's actually kind of warm this morning."

I groaned, "Winter is over rated, I hated it before the world ended. And I REALLY hate it now."

Alex laughed, "You know the first one hundred degree day this summer and you will be wishing for winter."

I rolled my eyes, "We'll see." I got up, grabbed some clean clothes and hurried to the bathroom.

Having to wash yourself in the winter with melted snow water is not as glamorous as you would think. We had water for a while, thanks to the well in the back, but I'm pretty sure the pipes burst some time when the first freeze happened. Since then we have just been collecting snow, rain and melting ice in buckets to use for cooking and baths. I stripped down, took a few deep breaths and sank into the freezing bath water. I almost screamed when I came back up for air, instead I quickly began scrubbing off the filth. I quickly rinsed off and wrapped up in a few towels and stood by the window.

I got dressed and sat by the bathroom window while I braided my hair, I've been thinking about cutting it off. It will be much easier without my hair. I noticed a rotter hobbling down the road, it was all alone. I watched it for a minute and noticed it was acting strange, so I lifted up the window to get a better look.

"What the hell?" Then I realized it wasn't a rotter, it's a person! They were coughing violently. I could see their clothes were torn and they looked rough. I hurried down stairs, Alex wasn't in the room, so I grabbed my knife and hurried out the front door. When I reached the person I realized it was a woman, her head was in her hands, still coughing. Her clothes were torn, and her hair was filthy.

"Hello?" I called softly. Everything around me went quiet and all I could hear was the gun hammer click back as it was stuck to my head. My heart began racing, "Don't shoot." I said, slowly raising my hands.

"PUT IT DOWN!" Alex shouted from somewhere behind me.

I felt the gun leave my head, so I slowly turned around to see who it was. I was shocked to see it was a familiar face.

"Dan?" I said, quietly. Then I quickly turned to the woman, she was looking at me now, "Addison!" I grabbed her freezing hands, "Come with us."

I led them inside and sat them next to our wood stove, then wrapped blankets around them. The room was quiet for a while, until I decided to speak up.