Jessamine Dixon lives in the apocalypse

18 Miles Out

After I took another walk in the field I went back into the house.

I couldn't hear anybody else. I walked into Beth's room and she wasn't in the bed but her bathroom door was closed. I sat on the foot of the bed and looked around the room for a second.

"Beth?" I asked.

"Is that you Jessamine?" I heard her small voice from the bathroom.

"Yeah, Beth, it's me." I told her.

"Are you alone?" She asked and my heart sank, that was something you didn't want to hear while somebody was in a situation like that.

"Yes. Why?" I asked her slowly.

"Just...um wondering." I heard her nearly whisper.

"You okay in there?" I asked and looked around the room again. Lori frantically walked into Beth's room and immediately walked to me when she made eye contact.

"Um, can you come here, Jess?" She asked me and I stood up so I could walk with her. I followed Lori back to the kitchen where she leaned against the table and had a towel thrown over her shoulder.

"What's goin' on?" I asked and she looked back to the bedroom. Almost like she was afraid of what was in there. Andrea walked into the room and leaned against the other side of the counter.

"Let's just wait for Maggie." She told me and I suspiciously nodded. We watched as Beth left the bathroom and went to go sit back on the bed. Maggie walked in a few minutes after that and looked at us like she had been doing something out in the field.

"You wanted me, Lori?" She asked and looked from the both of us.

"Beth was going to uh, she was gonna kill herself." Lori told us and both me and Maggie were looking at her with wide eyes. I looked from Lori then to Maggie.

"I guess I'll go talk to her." Maggie told us as she was nodding her head. Maggie walked into the room and shut the door behind her. Seconds later there was yelling from the top of there lungs in the bed room.

I started to pace around the kitchen. Lori and Andrea were talking together. The three of us could still hear Maggie and Beth's voices from inside the bedroom.

"You shouldn't have taken the knife away." I looked back to the girls. How could Andrea even say that?

I walked out of the house. I did a stress lap all the way around and then walked back into the kitchen. They needed a minute to discuss whatever it was they were going to throw around.

They were still arguing and I listened to what it was they had to say. They were arguing over everything but the situation that was on hand. I scoffed and walked around the corner.

"Wow." They both looked at me.

"Andrea, suicide doesn't take the pain away, okay, it just passes it right on. The people that it would pass onto our some of the hardest workers at this farm. Lori, I will pitch in with laundry more and cook, clean, if you guys need it, then I'll keep watch when you don't need help. Andrea, once in a while you need to pitch in with more than just keeping watch, because you obviously aren't doing well right now. Andrea, yeah, she crashed Maggie's car. Lori, you shouldn't have even gone. Andrea, Lori knows that she got lucky when Carl and Rick ended up surviving. At least Lori is still doing thing and living her life, like the baby, instead of sitting and moping around. And, yes, we have all suffered, guess what, that includes Lori. Andrea, stop, okay, you act like Lori has nothing going on and everything is perfect. Lori thought that the world was ending and that her husband was dead. If she could go back and change it she would. Is everybody happy now, or must I continue?" Both of the girls nodded and looked at the group.

Andrea walked past me and went into Beth's bedroom. I didn't even stay to hear what she had to say before I was outside.

I don't know how long I was outside walking for. But when I got back I heard more screaming. Except these were screams of danger and I knew exactly where they were coming from.

I sprinted into Beth's bedroom. Both Lori and Maggie were trying to bust the door open. They were pounding on the door and trying to shove it open. Glass shattered and they tried to hit it harder, they tried to yell a little louder. But none of it was good enough.

"Girls, move! Move!" Both of the girls move. I knelt down and got into the runners stance. I rocked back and forth three times and then pushed off with my back foot. I sprinted towards the door and lowered my shoulder. I collided with the door like a bull after red.

The swung open and pieces of wood flew everywhere. We looked around and saw the broken mirror hanging above the sink. Beth turned around and was clutching her wrist. I could see the blood seeping through. 

Beth apologized while Maggie help her and walked her out of the room. The whole thing made me have a bad feeling in the bottom of my stomach. The scars on my back felt like they were hotter than the flames of a fire. Those were the ones that a human was able to do to a child, but nobody was there to help. But the seven on my thigh felt like they were splitting open. Those were the ones that I was able to do to myself, guess nobody would be there anyways.

I was wrapping Beth's wrist when I looked up at Maggie. She kept her eyes on her sisters wrist and then looked at me. 

"They were shallow enough to tell me that you chose to live." I looked from both of the girls and gave them both a small smile.

"I left her with Andrea." My head snapped to Lori in the door frame back to Maggie standing next to me. Maggie sprinted out the door and Lori tried her best to stay right behind her. 

"If I'm not gonna chew Andrea out then I'm glad Maggie's the one doing it." I said with a smirk and went back to what I was supposed to be doing.

"How do your stitches feel?" I asked Beth and she kinda just shrugged her shoulders. 

"Is Maggie mad at me?" She asked and she sounded like the last thing she wanted was for her sister to be mad at her.

"No, Beth, she's just happy that you chose to live." I told her and she nodded. But then she looked at me seriously.

"How do you know so much about this type of stuff?" Beth asked and I must have looked at my right thigh to long because when I looked back at her she was looking at the same thing. Beth took her left hand and put it over the one that was wrapping her wrist.

"We'll get through this. We're the ones that are meant to make it, the ones who struggled. We're supposed to make our comeback." I nodded and smiled at Beth. Maybe that was the way it was supposed to be, I sure hope so at this point.

"Yeah, Beth. That is our destiny."