The Earth Underneath Us

Ch. 6: Survival

       MEMORY:

"Hey sweetie, what game are you playing?" Mom asks looking over my shoulder at the tablet. 

"Hey mommy, I'm playing this game where you have to run away from zombies taking over the world."

"Woah, sounds scary."

"Oh come on mommy, I'm a big girl now. I'm 9 and a half."

"Oh right, you are a big girl! Hey, why don't you say we put that down and go outside for a little bit." 

"Okay, fine," I say getting up and running out the door. Mom giggles.

REALITY:

The sun pours through the open windows flashing into my eyes. I rub my face and brush my hand through my hair sitting up. Ethan wasn't here so he probably went out to look for things. I get up and go to the nearest bathroom to wash off my body. Once I get to the bathroom I look at myself in the mirror. I had big gashes all through my forehead and cheeks. My hair was all over the place in knots and dried up blood. I pull up my shirt to see my stomach. I had scratch marks and bruises but nothing bad. I remove the sleeve from my thigh to check on it. It was still purple and swollen, but it seemed to get a bit better. It hasn't been hurting as much because I don't think about it. 

I find a small white towel laying on the ground. I grab a bottle of water from the breakfast area and wipe myself down. I would love a hot shower right now, but nothing is working. The electricity, plumbing, everything. I continue to wipe myself down including my face. I grab my hair tie from my wrist and tie up my hair in a ponytail. 

"Morning." Ethan says when I was finished. He had trash bags in his hand full of stuff. 

"Morning." I say back. "What's that?" 

"A bunch of supplies I found around here. There's some food, water, pipes, knives, so on."

"Why do we need the knifes and pipes?"

"You never know when we might need it." He hands me the bag of food. "Eat up before we start to get going."

"Where are we gonna go?" I ask putting my hand through the bag. It was mainly stale bagels, old bananas, small boxes of cereal, and breakfast bars. 

"No clue. I think we should keep walking the way we came from."

"Sounds good," I say stuffing my mouth with a bagel. 

After we eat and get what we need, we start walking. I feel like it wasn't as worse as yesterday because my leg got a bit better, plus we got to rest. The whole time we were walking all I could think of was my mom. How was she? Where was she? If...I mean since she is alive, she must be around here.

"I think we should go back," I say finally.

"What, why?" 

"Because my mom would be back where we came from, home. She wouldn't walk this far." 

"Lia, there is no sign of people there, none. Why would she be the only one still there?"

"Well, we're still here," I say. He stays quiet for a minute.

"We already made it this far, do you seriously want to turn around? What if she isn't there and we just wasted our time? I feel like if we keep walking we might have a chance of finding someone rather than hanging out in a dead zone." 

"Okay fine, we can keep walking." I finally say. "But if we don't find signs of anybody, I want to turn back." 

"Fine." He says picking up his pace a little. Maybe my mom did walk this far. She might be looking for me right now. Or worse, she might be taken. I brush the thought off my head and keep walking.