Strangers Staring

Chapter 2

     We finished searching the houses on the street and headed up the road ahead to try to find a place to sleep for the night. When we made it about a block away from the neighborhood we searched we noticed a person walking in front of us. At first, Jordyn and I thought that it was a walker, but as we got closer we realized that he had a pistol in his hand, and was aiming it at us. We both took out our guns and held them up, showing that we were of no harm, but he kept his locked on us. He had a beanie on his head with a torn green jacket on him. His blonde hair was over grown and greasy. He had a look in his eyes of sorrow and regret, even though he tried to disguise his feelings by gritting his teeth and forcing a scowl. You could see right though it.

"Drop your guns," He yelled from a few feet away, "A-and empty your backpacks!"

We both dropped our guns and looked at each other, then Jordyn said, "Hey, we don't want any trouble, we're just trying to find a place to sleep for the night..."

He was sweating now, he hesitated as he yelled out his next few words, "I-I said empty your backpacks!"

"Hey, we need this food just as much as you do." I said gripping the straps to my backpack. He was starting to get frusturated and in an act of despair, he shot his gun at our feet. Jordyn and I both jumped back and started taking off our backpacks. We held them upside down letting all of it contents fall out on the ground below.

"Just- save yourself three cans of food... and I don't want the whiskey." He said feeling defeated, you could tell he didn't want to do this, but somehow he felt he needed to. We both grabbed what he had told us we could keep and hurled our backpacks to him, "I'm... I'm sorry..." He said grabbing the supplies out of our backpacks and running away to the neighborhood to his right.

"God dammit!" Jordyn yelled out of anger.

I kicked the ground and said, "I know, I know! Let's just go, it's getting dark."

     Neither of us talked while we walked down the road hoping to find a place to call home for a night. We made our way north and saw a church. The big main door was boarded up along with all of the windows and any other possible point of entry. I'm not a religious person, I never was, but I will admit that seeing a church in that shape, did make me a little sad. All of the paint on the sides of the building was peeling off, showing the tan color that had been painted over years ago. Standing on top of the roof was a cross, that had been untouched, there wasn't a scratch on it. Some people might see that and call it a sign, I say that if that will give somebody incentive to keep going, I'm glad it's there. Jordyn and I walked up to front door, grabbing and pulling on the boards to try and rip them off, we both knew it wouldn't work, but it was worth a try. I started walking around the church as Jordyn started saying,

"Want to try and find another way in or do you want to move on?"

     By the time she had finished asking me, I had already noticed a giant hole in the roof where it had given out. There were wall trellis's with blood red roses climbing up them on the sides of the church. We could climb the trellis's up onto the roof and though the hole. Jordyn looked over at me and like she was reading my mind, she came over to me and started to climb up. I climbed up after her, trying to stick my feet into the small holes as I did. As I reached the top and hoisted myself up, a thorn from a rose cut the side of my arm. The black roof of the church burned my hands as I picked my self up to stand. Jordyn was jumping down into the building as I got my ground and stood up.

"Hey, wait- and you're gone." I stopped myself, "Is it clear?" Looking down I searched for her. All I could see was about 5 rows of pews and the dark hard wood flooring they were on. Starting to get worried, I called, "Jordyn!"

"I'm fine!" I heard her call from a distance, "Just come here...!"

     I quickly jumped down, not thinking of how far the drop was. The drop sending pain up my leg to my hip, I regained my balance and stood up. Doing a 360 look around the room, I tried to see Jordyn. I made my way down to the back of the church where there was a doorway into an office. The door opened, I saw Jordyn standing still, looking at the ground. Seeing where she was looking, I looked also. There was a mattress there with a stuffed bear laying sprawled out on his back. A blood trail led from the mattress to behind a desk in the far corner of the room. Following the trail to the end, was a man. He had died a long time ago, that was clear. Upon further inspection of his body, I noticed he was hugging something, it was so small I thought that it was maybe a pillow. It wasn't. He was holding a little boy, maybe around five years old. Perhaps it had been his son, or maybe it was just a boy he took under his wing. I didn't know, and I never would. Seeing this made me walk as fast as I could to the main room, grabbing Jordyn's arm on the way out. Closing the door behind me, I leaned by back against it. We weren't going back in there.

       It was damp and humid in the room, so I pulled off my faded blue hoodie to reveal my black spaghetti strap shirt I had underneath. Jordyn rolled up her sleeves and pulled back her hair into a messy pony tail. Somehow she managed to make her hair look intentionally styled. As we laid down and tried to settle, we soon realized that we weren't going to get much sleep. Both of us were restless and I could tell she had something on her mind.  I could hear the pew she was laying on squeak every time she rolled over or repositioned herself. She finally spoke out after about 2 hours of restlessness,

"I've never been in a church before,"

"Oh," I said sitting up, "I don't care... I mean- I don't care, you know?" I knew I was an awkward person, but when I was talking to Jordyn, it just felt like I couldn't spit out my words properly.

She stayed laying down, "No, I know." She sighed, "It's just kind of weird."

"Yeah, I understand." It was weird. I had never been in a church, either. I certainly didn't expect my first time in a church to be during a god damn zombie apocalypse. Life was different now, more different than I ever imagined. I laid back down,  "Hey, I'm glad I came with you," I smiled, even though she couldn't see me.

I couldn't see her either though I could tell she was smiling, too, "So am I."