Walking Amongst Them (Among Us, Book 2)

Thinking Too Hard

The first house was a bust, being completely empty save for cobwebs. But the second house was filled to the brim with everything you could think of. It was painted a red color on the inside and the living room was lined with too many clocks to count. It looked cozy with two large couches and an impressive flat screen tv.

There was a dog bed on the couch and a cat scratching post near the fireplace. I glanced at Sam who had ignored all of this and walked straight to the large cabinet next to the dining room table.

I resisted the urge to sit on the couch, reminding myself that we were technically breaking and entering. Stealing from these people who used to live here. I wondered where these people were. If they had made it to some sort of compound or quarantine. Or if they were off like I was, like Sam was, raiding other people's houses.

I didn't allow myself to think of the alternative, deciding that these people had survived and that they wouldn't mind knowing who was in their house and for what reason.

I slipped into the bathroom and grabbed the soaps from inside of the shower before checking the shelves in the mirror. There were a few bottles of generic medicine and a large thing of mouthwash. I grabbed it all, not sure what would be useful and wanting the mouthwash.

After going through the entire bathroom, and finding a few extra bottles of soaps, I moved onto one of the bedrooms. I didn't see Sam as I walked to it, but I figured he was busy checking a different part of the house out.

The bedroom was made up all neat and impersonal. If I had to guess, I would say it was a guest bedroom. There were no clothes in the dresser, and the large closet only held things of storage. Like Christmas tubs and Halloween decorations. The sight of the Christmas tubs made me pause, wondering exactly what day it was.

Not that it mattered. Christmas wasn't exactly something we celebrated back before, and now it seemed a little useless next to surviving. I closed the closet doors and made my way back out to the living room, backpack in tow.

"Oh, there you are," Sam said, his own backpack looking filled and heavier than my own, "I think we need to steal the wagon back for raiding, because this backpack thing is a killer."

I smiled, "I found some shower things."

"I know, I went to check the bathroom but you'd beat me to it. What was in that room?"

I glanced over my shoulder in the direction of the guestroom, before looking back to him and replying, "Oh, nothing. Just a guest room."

He nodded, and together we walked out of the house, talking about what he'd found in the cabinets and pantries. Which wasn't much, but it was something. We'd decided that our canned food stock was good and that we'd leave whatever canned foods we found for the next people, unless our stock began to run low. In which case, we'd know where to look.

As we walked on to the next house, after returning to the church and grabbing the wagon, we looked for a place for Abby to play. Michael hadn't been at the church, but Abby and Adam had been. Which meant he still hadn't found a place he approved of.

"How do you do it?" I asked, finally.

"Do what?"

"Go through these people's houses like it's nothing? It feels wrong to me."

He was quiet for a moment before responding, "Well the way I see it, is that these people- whoever they were, abandoned ship. I wouldn't be surprised if someone had raided my house, and I don't ever plan on returning. I think the same of these people. They left without the intent of returning, and left all their stuff without expecting to see it again."