The Night that never Ends

Preparation

There was only one word I could use to define our group of survivors at this exact moment in time...silent...everything we did for the duration of the afternoon we did in utter silence...

Ryan was standing over the gravesite with a shovel in his left hand. He stared at the ground where there were so many dirt lumps and where everything seemed uneven. He closed his eyes to picture the familiar voice of the departed Emily, her soft soothing tone. That thought led him to remember his family, how everything was before the apocalyptic outbreak. It was a perfect time.

Lexi sat huddled up next to the fire, she was mesmerized by the glowing embers, as were us all. But she was silent the entire time.

Kayla was still sitting in the living room watching the wall, expecting something to pop out at her, but to her dismay there was nothing. All she had was the silence.

Jacob was in his dorm throwing knives at the wall, he didn't utter any curses or threats for that matter, he just watched the tip of the knife slam into the revealed cracks and crevasses. Lexi had wanted to be alone, and didn't want any sympathy, so he turned to silence.

Eli was still in the cellar, tampering with different tools and devices used to create miscellaneous weapons. In fact, he enjoyed the silence the most, there was no distractions or anything to bother him while he worked. Every other moment he would take and think about the good times he shared with Emily, and the rest of his friends. Then he would resume fusing together different metals and compounds, then pausing to think again...

As for me, I stood in the middle of everything. I offered to break the silence and engage in conversation, but everyone dismissed me in a shy way. They either titled their heads away from mine, or just didn't need any comfort. I never to this day held it against them. I knew what they were going through from personal experience. I felt what they were feeling, I had empathy...

The sun, unable to be seen, had begun to set, and the cloud cover began to thicken like it had been doing the past months. The temperature dropped immensely, to the point where we all started to meet around the fire like previous nights.

It was still light out, but dark enough to where straight ahead seemed dark, unrecognizable. I instead turned my attention to the fire.

Everyone except for Eli were standing together, huddle close around the fire. We became instantly mesmerized by its inviting glow, it crackled and popped officially ending the silence. But I never truly despised it.

I almost considered this moment as our celebration of life for Emily, a proper ceremony to honor her memory. I did most of the listening while Lexi did most of the talking, sharing old stories, memories, while we all looked at each other and into the fire,

"If only I could've been there." Lexi said lastly,

"We all feel that." I say in a way to comfort her,

"Yea, Eli especially." Ryan spoke for Eli, who was feeling most convicted.

I turn and look at Ryan to answer a question that has been on my mind,

"How is our shelter holding up?" I ask trepidaciously,

Ryan had to give his answer some thought, I could tell,

"I want to say we're okay, but at this point in time, lying is getting us nowhere. Our shelter is barely meeting up to our bare necessities. Our food levels are low, our heating conductors are starting to fail, our electricity is dwindling. I guess the only thing we can rely on is our repellent levels. At least we have that going for us." Ryan was swift with his response,