Roommates? My Nanowrimo 2018 Story

CHAPTER TWO: COLLISION, PART TWO - Anna

Hey. It's me, Anna. If you've read the rest of this, you'll know who I am. If you haven't, well I don't know who you are but you probably should. Unless you don't like it, in which case I don't think you should be reading it at all. Uh... yeah. The Elvis kid gave me this note because he doesn't understand what's happening with me. He says writing helps. I hope it does. I don't know where I'm supposed to tell from, so I'll go with from when I found the Elvis kid. Actually, no, that's a while ago. I'll go from the car ride, I think. That's always a good place to start. Name me a good thing that doesn't start with a car ride. Not that there aren't plenty, and not that this is a good thing. So uh, never mind that, just let me start.

I was in the car, in the front seat, with Eloise, the new kid and Serina are in the back. Gotta stop calling him the new kid, his name is Elvis. Even though I've only called him the new kid in my mind, I'm sure I'll slip up and call him the new kid out loud eventually.

He's telling Serina a bit of the stuff he already told me. He's not very good at it, but I can't judge. I don't even know how someone can be bad at telling someone something. Actually, scratch that, I totally do know how that works. I know way too well how that works.

I kind space out until we pull up at this weird looking house. It's really weird looking. Vault doors, fake windows, the whole nine yards. There's a little man in medieval armour going through the door as we pull up. I don't know what to think about that. It's cool I guess.

New kid Elvis leads us up to the big bank vault door, and opens it, and makes us all step in a weird little closet behind it. We are all showered with something, and then blasted mostly dry, still a little damp. That seems like a little much for a virus that only goes through biting, but I guess you can't be too careful. Then a door in front of us opens and there's suddenly a lot of faces.

The first one I see is a middle aged man with glasses and a lab coat. He has a weird look about him. I don't know what to think of him yet. I'll decide when I know him better, probably. He's talking to Elvis and Serina. I don't know what about, I'm not paying attention. The next one I see is a rugged looking guy wearing overalls with no shirt, and a baseball cap with an American flag over his mullet, grinning widely. He looks like a piece of work, I want to know who he is. It would be entertaining. I keep looking down the line and see...

Her.

No.

No why is she here.

It's my ex. Brittany Wells. The one who ruined me. Well, I mean, the one who made me ruin me, I guess. Why is she here? All my meandering thoughts stop immediately and I stare. She seems to have just noticed me too. I haven't seen her for five fucking years. And now she's standing in front of me in this random apocalypse house. Not only that, but the next face down the line, is the fucker that she couldn't explain. The one I found her with.

"What are YOU doing here." I shout. I don't know what I'm feeling. I'm shaking with anger, but I don't want to go through what I went through again. I can't handle being near her. It's tearing my head apart. This is not normal. There is something wrong with me.

"I'd ask you the same" Brittany says, looking mildly pissed off at me. That's all. Mildly pissed off. After everything that happened. "In fact, I'm going to. How the fuck did you survive?" She continues.

"How did you?" I retort. It's the best I can come up with under stress like this. I don't get hurt by a lot, but when I do, I really do get hurt. And she is one of the few who can hurt me.

"By being here." Brittany says, not offering any explanation. That's fine. I don't care how she got here. I just don't want her to be here anymore.

"Can you... not be here?" I ask. "And take HIM with you." I point at the dude beside her. Not the weird redneck one. The other one. The one I saw her with. He looks a lot more emo now, but he's definitely the same guy.

"I do not understand what I have done." The guy says. "But I am clearly being pulled into an emotional conflict I am not part of. Leave me out."

The nerve of that, Jesus Christ, I want to break something.

"YOU KNOW WHaT's HAPPENINg DON'T PLAY DUMb!" I scream.

I have to get out of here. Anywhere. I can't handle this. After I scream I think, maybe, it's true he doesn't know. Maybe she never told him I exist. That just makes me hate her even more. I run. Somewhere, anywhere, through the closest door. I seem to be in some kind of supply room, full of medical stuff and guns and things. I run to the back of it and hide inside my jacket, breathing super fast and shallow. Is this a panic attack? I wouldn't know, I've never had one before. 'Panic attack' feels like something this would be called.

Eloise comes in after me and sits down at the back with me. I like Eloise. He's a nice guy. Not one of those Nice Guys, an actual nice guy. I'm glad it's him I decided to trust. But I don't want anything to do with anybody right now.

"Hey, you ok?" he asks. "What happened there?"

"She did." I say. I don't know how to elaborate on that. That's scary. I can always elaborate. What's wrong. Uh... I need something else to say. "She's my ex. The one I talked about."

"Shit, that's one hell of a coincidence" Eloise says, looking taken aback. "That's rough, buddy"

It is rough, buddy. I don't know what to think anymore. I don't know what to do anymore. There is no way this is normal, normal people don't react like this. Hell, who am I kidding, I don't know how normal people react. I'm not a normal people. I don't interact with normal people. I have nothing to do with normal people.

"I don't know what to do" I admit to Eloise. I'm close to tears now. I don't like tears. They don't taste good. And also they usually are associated with not feeling good. "I don't know what to do more than I normally don't know what to do. What am I going to do?"

"Uh... I dunno" Eloise says. "It's a bad situation, I guess. But if you're gonna have to stay here, I think you two have got a bit to work out."

He's right, as usual. I should really. But I don't know where to start. So I push it out of my head.

"No" I say. "No, I could run away, I could live out there, it wouldn't be too bad, would it?"

"No offence bud, but you wouldn't last five minutes" Eloise says. "You gotta work this shit out with her. Figure out what really happened. Cause what happened out there just now looks like a class twelve misunderstanding if I ever saw one. That emo kid really didn't know what the hell was going on."

"I... I can't" I say. "I can't talk to her, she looks angry at me too... she'll murder me or something, what did I do wrong? "

"This is exactly what I mean. More evidence it's a big-ass misunderstanding." Eloise says. "You gotta talk to her and find out what she thinks you did wrong"

"I can't!" I repeat. "I can't, I shouldn't, I won't, I wouldn't, and I shan't!"

"Ok, here's a deal for you, alright?" Eloise says. "I'll figure out what she thinks you did wrong for you, but then you have to talk to her about it, ok?"

I can't say no to that. It... it makes sense. Also it puts off having to talk to her.

"Ok..." I say weakly.

"Cool beans. See ya in a bit." Eloise says. He holds out his arms for a hug.

I accept it. It works. Hugs seem to be like some kind of magic or something. Cause I feel a lot calmer. Also it has been a long time since the last time I had one. As in, five years long time. Maybe that enhances the experience or something. Anyway. Eloise gets up and walks out of the dark storage room, leaving me there with my thoughts.

At the very least, I try to think of anything but Brittany and her pet Emo. The other people here seem interesting. I look forward to meeting them.

Maybe living here will be tolerable.

I hope so.