Z-O-M-B-I-E-S

Chapter 5

I woke up at five, so I'd have plenty of time to get ready. I did my makeup and tied up my hair. Carefully, I put on my cheer uniform, trying to avoid getting foundation on the collar. My mom and dad had to leave early that morning, so I needed to walk Tyler to school. I prepared breakfast for both of us and helped him style his hair. Before we left, I checked his backpack to make sure he had everything. 

I ended up piggy backing him the last half mile to school, which wasn't fun at all. I didn't want to complain about how tired I was and make him feel bad. My exhaustion was obvious to Zed though. All our periods were cut short, due to the rally at the end of the day. Our classes were basically just study halls for the appropriate subjects. Since I was on top of the classwork, I didn't need to catch up on anything. I tried to relax by drawing. The stress would get to me later, so I wanted to unwind. It was my attempt at doing damage control.

At lunch, Zed attempted to get me to eat, but I refused to. Normally, I didn't get nervous over performing in front of a lot of people. That was actually why I loved cheering, but that day I had a bad feeling enveloping me. There was an empty pit at the bottom of my stomach, and I knew I'd throw up if I ate anything. It was the feeling I always got when I was high up in the air. I was a flyer because of how small I was; not even five foot, two. Ironically, I was terrified of heights, but the fear wasn't too bad during cheer, because I trusted the base to catch me. I was a little baffled at how bad I was feeling that day. There was no need to worry about anything.

Later that day, the crowd chanted, "Five, four, three, two, one!" Bucky jumped through the banner, and the rest of the squad ran out after him. I got into position in the front left corner and ran through the choreography. "Go Mighty Shrimp!" the crowd and us chanted. After a moment, the Acey's and Bucky brought out spirit sticks. We did some spins, and then I cartwheeled towards the center of the gym. Three other cheerleaders lifted me up and held my left foot. I brought my right knee up punched my arms up into a 'V', shaking my pom poms. After a solid three seconds, they started lowering me and grabbed my waist as well. I bent my knee and looked straight up. They pushed me up, and I straightened my leg. Right before I hit my peak height, I leaned back, starting to flip. As I was upside down, Bonzo ran off the bleachers and ran through the cheerleaders below me. They scattered as I fell, and I shut my eyes, internally freaking out.

I never hit the ground. I'd fallen into someone's arms instead. The gym went silent, and I opened my eyes to find Zed looking down at me. He was breathing heavily, so I figured he must've run from the top of the bleachers to get to me. "Are you hurt? I don't think any part of you hit the ground, but I'm not sure."

"I'm fine. Thanks for saving me." My heart was practically pounding out of my chest.

"Someone had to." He got off his knees and put me down. I was shaking, still processing what had happened. 

"Zed, we need to talk!" Coach yelled from the bottom of the bleachers.

"Give me a moment." Zed looked back down at me. "Deep breaths. You're fine now. I'm not going to let you get hurt. I'll always be there right on time." I nodded. "Okay, I'm going to see what Coach has to say, but I'll come find you after." He squeezed my shoulder and walked away.

I went to the cheerleaders' private room where Addison was screaming at Bucky. "You knew the spirit sticks were going to trigger some of them. If Zed wasn't there, Y/N would be in the hospital now, if not dead! Don't you ever think anything through?"

"I needed to show everyone how zombies really are."

"There are some humans who are afraid of fire too. It's not just a zombie thing. That was a very stupid thing to do. Your hate towards zombies doesn't even make sense. So what if they're different? Technically we're all different from each other."