After The War

Picnic

Then
Kyla

I watched the boy I had met moments ago inhale all the food I had prepared.
Honestly, I was relieved because now his mouth was so full of half chewed food that he couldn't talk much.
Silently I watched him and ate my share. I wasn't even hungry.

I had planned to eat this later, maybe keep something in case I wouldn't find anymore camps I could steal from. I didn't know why I had listened to the boy. I didn't know why I was giving him my food. Hell, I'd have given him all of it if he hadn't chased me down and annoyed me into sharing it with him.

Somehow ... I had felt bad for him. I remembered the first months of being all alone, without anyone to look after you. It wasn't really funny.

I hated this sympathetic side of me. I'd been in the process of killing it but apparently I hadn't had so much success with that yet.

"Thish ish good!", the boy exclaimed now and looked up at me. "Did you make thish?"

The moment he'd started talking again he was going on my nerves.
He really was annoying. He probably had been a mummy's boy before they had killed her. I bet he would always run to her whenever he'd had a bad dream. She'd probably always calmed him down and made him feel safe. She'd probably been wonderful and loving.
I wondered if they would have adopted me. Would I have liked having a family? I didn't know.

"So", I said, not sure why I was talking to him. "How did your family die?"

For a second he stopped chewing and just looked at me.
"Don't want to talk about it", he said after a while and stuffed more bread into his food hole.
"Why not?", I asked taking a bite of the squirrel meat. Death was a part of life.

"I don't know", he said, suddenly shrinking back into the pathetic mess he'd been when I'd first met him. "Will you tell me what happened to your family, if I tell you?"

I nodded. I didn't really like talking about my mum. Not because she wasn't around anymore, not because she'd left me behind, but because I normally didn't think it was anyone's business. Not that I met a lot of people I could talk to anyway.

"Well, ..."

Something snapped in the woods and my head immediately turned into the direction the sound had come from.
The boy just kept on talking as if he hadn't heard anything. There was a real possibility that he hadn't.

How had he survived until now? I would have given him a day, if not less.
Yet here he was, maybe two or three months after his family had been killed. Alive and without any visible injuries.

I never had believed in this force that my mum had called God, but maybe there was something, someone, watching over this boy. As much as I hated to admit it, I couldn't see another explanation.

There was another snap. My head whipped around but I couldn't see anything.  This time it had been louder. Whoever this was, they were coming nearer. 

"What's wrong?", the boy asked now, interrupting his story. At least he had noticed something.
Maybe he wasn't completely hopeless.
Still, I didn't answer.

There were more sounds coming from all around us now.

Carefully I grabbed my knife and and stood up.
I could see them now. Behind the trees, ducking next to bushes, lurking in the shadows. Waiting for just the right moment to attack.

The grip on my knife tightened as I tried to get my trembling hand under control.
Weakness was something I couldn't afford. Not now, not ever. Weakness - fear - would do nothing but get me killed.