The Passing

Chapter Six [updated]

The air around me is thick with the coming summer breeze. Everything is peaceful, the scenery around me dream-like. Glancing up, I see her standing in the midst of our backyard full of tall grass and wildflowers. The wind carries her hair delicately as I find comfort in her brown eyes. So swiftly, they could warm a bitter, cold heart, and turn it humble with a simple blink.

She wears a long white summer dress and a smile is dancing on her face as she skips and spins gracefully. Through soft laughter, her crooked teeth make her grin all the more contagious. I wave to her and she waves back, an overwhelming feeling of pure joy fills my heart. My mother, my beautiful, courageous mother.

No one could ask for a better moment.
But I know what comes next.

For the slightest instant, time momentarily freezes as they stumble like drunken men from the woods that surround our small camp. Her face grows cold, her body jolts to a stop as pure and utter fear overtakes her. I watch her eyes dart from the monsters, to me, and back to them. From every angle, they creep towards us, limping on broken legs with glistening teeth and arms outstretched.

I squeeze my eyes shut.

Keep the nightmares out.

Time is thrown forward, skipping seconds fast enough to give someone whiplash. Something claws at my bare shoulder, digging five shallow cuts into my skin. I open my mouth to yell out, but not a single breath escapes me. Her eyes fling open and the color starts to fade. A siren-like cry pours from her lips, deafeningly echoing in my ears. Her eyes lose focus and her limbs go limp as body falls atop of mine; making herself a human shield to protect me from the monsters digging through her.

Directly in front of me, inches from my face, I watch the awakened dead man sink his decaying teeth deep into the crane of her neck. Blood streams from his mouth and the new gaping wound as he tears a chunk of flesh from her body. I feel her body tremble against me, the pain too much for her to bear. Her hand clutches onto me, squeezing tightly. I meet those eyes, so full of agony, and see her give me a look as if saying I love you one last time. All too quickly, I feel her grip loosen before falling limp beside her life-drained body. I pray that he would be the only one, yet, more and more come, climbing atop our bodies. Their starving mouths feed on her flesh, ripping it from her bones as they engorge their swollen bellies with their catch.
Utter fear paralyzes me. My jaw is deadbolted by a glass-shattering scream. Tears drain from my bulged and petrified young eyes, my ears ring with the deafening sound of their moans. As if someone chained me to the ground, my efforts to move are pointless. Blood mixes with sweat over all my exposed skin, as my muscles involuntarily spasm. My mothers graying eyes stay pierced with mine, although, there is no life flickering behind the once molten iris. There is no more warmth from her touch, as it has already faded. As much as I long to run, to hide, to far away from this moment, I am stuck. The weight of the bodies pin me down, their still ravenous mouths searching for the healthy skin below.

I will die here, if I don't move. But, I can't leave my mother. I can't leave her here—not like this. I can't let the cruel world claim her body, I can't leave her to decay among them, the monsters, the Roamers, the ones who so crulely ripped her from me. I have to stay. I need to stay. Here, with Momma, holding her hand as she would mine. Here, with Momma, stroking her hair and praying for a better life.

"Maybe the next one won't be so cruel." She would whisper to me in the dead of night, when the darkness lingered too far behind my eyes, when I felt the unforgiving burden of all we had lost, all we had left to lose. "Meet me there, my Love. I promise, we will be together, always."

"I'll meet you there Momma." I whisper, shallowing my breathing, bracing for the pain that I know will come. As long as I have Momma, I know I will be okay.