I nodded adamantly in agreement. Someone would have to step up because these people were scared, worried, and directionless. It would take a strong leader to keep them from going down the wrong path and if what I had seen so far was any sign, that leader was already Julia. "I have another favor to ask you," I blurted out changing the subject realizing I didn't have a lot of time to get my affairs in order. "What's that?" "I need you to watch over my kids."I indicated to my boys that had suddenly appeared next to me mid-conversation, apparently. "No, Mommy!" Johnny said horrified. "Johnny, I can't take you with me." "No, you have to!" he insisted. "Honey, I'll miss you a lot as well. But this is going to be too dangerous for you!" "But, Avamarie said you had to! That you can't do this without us!" That gave me a pause, a long hard angry pause. No, that was impossible. Surely, she didn't truly expect me to take my children on something like this. That would be insane, suicide,

His voice broke then. I looked over and saw trauma and an absolute terror on his face. It was obvious that, even though his eyes were on the dash, he was reliving that moment in his head. "I just wanted them to stop, stop chasing me, stop trying to go after Bianca, just stop. They were zombies, right? It was a once in a lifetime shot, you know. And... And... I watched as the arrow went right through Dad's head and slammed into Moms then they both fell over the staircase and landed on the basement floor with such a loud thud. I couldn't believe my eyes, so I went over to them. There was so much blood, so much blood it was everywhere… everywhere." That was the end, he couldn't speak anymore all that was left was his gut-wrenching sobs. I reached over and pulled him close letting him cry on my shoulder as my own tears flowed freely down my face. I held and rocked him murmuring what I hoped was something that would help him. I didn't even know what I said or if it was coherent over my ow

I looked up at him shocked and saw his face was an odd shade of green and white. "Why?" "Just trust me, Vicki. You don't want to go in there." It slowly dawned on me what he meant and when it did, I shoved him out of the way and raced inside unable to believe it. The moment I caught sight of the carnage scene in the living room I stumbled back outside and emptied the entire contented of my stomach into the bushes. The sounds I had heard the last time I had talked to him suddenly made horrible sense now. I felt Benjamin's hand awkwardly rubbing my back before handing me a bottle of water and a washrag. "Thank you," I whispered out hoarsely. "No problem," he said with sadness in his voice. I sat up and washed my mouth out then went about cleaning my face off. Leaning against the house I tried to catch my breath and build my courage up to get back into that house. I looked over at Benjamin and saw he had picked up the puppy which had apparently escaped outside as soon as the door wa

She gave me a suspicious look but dropped the subject when Chandler walked up to us. "Julie, can I speak to you?" he asked softly. Julie? I thought to myself as I slowly melted away feeling distinctly uncomfortable suddenly. Julia looked like she would melt for a second before stiffening her spine and giving him a cool look. "I really don't think we have anything to say to each other," she retorted haughtily. Instantly his face clouded with anger, and I knew he had finally had enough of the heartless way she had been treating him. "I've had just about enough of your cold shoulder, Julia! I know I'll never be able to fix what happened between us, but you should know me-""Know you?" she snarled turning on him. "I don't know you at all! The man that went to prison for selling drugs was not the man I married. The man that got tweaked out and beat the shit out of me was not the man I married. The man who forced my uncle into stealing drugs from hospitals was not the man I married. I d

-A feeling of foreboding… that was putting it lightly. If I had known what was happening, then I would have realized how bad things were coming to be. Because at that moment a dark shadowy figure was blocking out the moon and swooping in for whatever souls remained. - My dreams were jumbled, chaotic, and violent. Blood, sex, and darkness circled and swooped all around me. Faces sailed by swiftly on an unseen blast of wind that swept my hair into my face almost blinding me. A few of the faces that I saw I recognized immediately. My husband, granny, the woman that Melissa had called her mother. But several others I didn't, and those were the ones that scared the hell out of me. A whisper floated on the wind, I couldn't understand the words or recognize the voice. "Animo repetere tenebris. Habeo, inquit, tenebrae Ut id ipsum mihi voluntarie, Tenebris est dicere animam tuam Meum erit lumen ab rutilans Sumam eam: et propinabis de illo Nunc te mea omnia Tenebris est dicere a