I made a face at that. I didn’t realize he was going to be so literal.
“Try again.”
I took a breath and tried not to get annoyed. Whatever the answer was that he was fishing for, it would be subjective. It would only make sense to him and I just didn’t see the point in that. I decided to go along with it. At the very least, I was curious to hear his reasons. After a few seconds I came up with another answer. “When it’s the right thing to do.”
He shook his head and I started to get angry. It was a trick answer. Chris was the one asking the questions, so only he should have known when that would be true. “So then who gets to decide when it’s right or wrong? What makes them so special?”
I was starting to get enough of his bullshit again. “You’re seriously gonna wait for me to answer a riddle?”
“If you really want my help, then yeah. I’m seriously gonna wait for you to stop thinking like an idiot.” He got up to brush his pants off. “I'll take overwatch tonight. Get some sleep. You’re gonna need it tomorrow.”
I turned away and watched as his shadow passed over me and down the hall. After only a few minutes, I started to feel bad about attacking him like that. I was starting to get used to his company, no matter how irritating it could get sometimes, and I didn’t like being alone. I tried focusing on answering his question. Maybe I could make it up to him in the morning.
Chris seemed like a good guy—genuine, at the very least. He must have had his reasons for teaching me the way he did. I stretched my mind for the most extreme examples I could think of. I grabbed the heart pendant around my neck and slowly traced the shape with my thumb and forefinger. The girl in my dreams had killed people, but she almost seemed to enjoy it. I assumed Chris didn’t, but they were both killers, so what set them apart? After a few moments, I thought I had it, and it would explain why he didn’t like talking about his past either.
He was a killer with a conscience.
“You got a thick head, you know that?”
I scrunched my nose in self-defense as a pillow hit my face.
“Come on, princess. Get up.”
I tossed the pile of feathers away and turned onto my side, a super-hot, totally attractive mutter escaping from underneath my morning breath. Supposedly it wasn’t audible.
“What was that?”
I kept my eyes shut and let out a stream of air.
Some people…
“I said princesses usually get their beauty sleep.” Another pillow hit my face and I finally turned back to peer at my mom standing over me through rusty eyes.
“Come on, breakfast is ready. Everyone’s waiting on you.”
I grunted at that. She always had a talent of making everyone seem like they had gone out of their way just to help me, but really it couldn’t have been any more inconvenient. For starters, I had to get up. That was already asking a lot.
I wasn’t even committed to the cause or halfway awake by the time I dragged myself downstairs and took a seat next to everyone else. I yawned past dreary eyes and grabbed a glass full of orange juice, barely paying Zach any attention in front of me.
“What’s up, raccoon-eyes?”
I gulped half of it away before putting the glass back down and stared back at him, not even bothering to wipe my mouth.
Not much, boy-that-keeps-me-awake-at-night.
It was hard enough that I was stuck in a room with my little sister, but it only got worse once I had found out through text that my ex-boyfriend was going out with one of my best friends. I had been stuck in the same house with my family and Zach for days. I needed to get away with him for at least a few hours. I really wasn't expecting anything to happen. I just figured it would do me some good. But first I decided to ignore him for the time being and go to town on the orange juice again. I needed to come up with some better comebacks anyway.
“So,” said Oliver, rubbing his hands as he sat down. “I was thinking that we could all head into town today. You know, get out of the house a little bit and see what’s new.”
I frowned as I automatically stared down at my phone. It was beginning to turn into a really bad habit. I had somehow become one of
those
girls.
“What do you think, Jessica?”
I looked back up at Oliver, only paying half attention to what he had been saying. “Oh, ughh...yeah, sure. Sounds great.”
He must have watched me fumble with the piece of junk in my hands. “What’s wrong?”
I finally gave up and put my phone on the table. “I can’t get a signal.” It had been fine since the day before. I was surprised that I had even gotten a connection so far away from home, but the timing could have been better. I knew I shouldn’t have cared. I just wanted to learn more about my lost love life.
“Maybe they’re doing maintenance?”
I frowned. “Maybe...” I really wanted to know, too.
“I’m sure it’s fine.” Oliver put a hand on my shoulder. “A little time away will do you some good.” He nodded at the cute boy in front of me spooning scrambled eggs into his mouth and lowered his voice, careful not to let my parents overhear—though I doubted they would have been able to; Sara was too busy entertaining them. “Maybe Zach can finally take you shooting?”
I had been excited to do it since he had first brought it up, but we hadn’t gotten around to it with the weather. I watched Zach smile and then wink as he washed down another bite. I knew he had wanted to do it too.
He offered me food and I shook my head. “Sure. You ever shoot an AR-15 before?”
I wasn’t sure what that was, but for some reason I wanted to say that I thought my car ran on four AR-15’s. I was glad I didn’t. “Nope. Nothing.”
He grinned. “Trust me, you’ll love it. It’s not like anything else.”
*
I pushed the bolt on the Model 700 away from me and loaded another bullet into the chamber, closing the breach and cocking the firing pin. I leaned my cheek against the butt stock and gazed through the lens in front of my eye, careful to let a breath loose as evenly as possible. Every small deviation in elevation or direction would affect the accuracy of my shot. Fractions of an inch in front of my face would turn into feet a hundred meters down range. Any motion had to be deliberate.
I let the memories seep away, but for some reason I took the time to realize that Zach had been right after all. There really was nothing quite like shooting a gun, yet it was what happened afterward that he had neglected to go over. That part was something else entirely.
“You see him?”
I flexed the muscles in my hand and slowly turned the gun until I spotted the familiar markings that we had been looking for. I watched as the wind blew the tall, spent blades of grass towards my left. I had to make a mental note not to adjust as much as I thought I should. “Yeah.”
Chris lay right next to me, also on his belly, and peered through a set of binoculars. “Bearing—zero. Range…” He bounced his head to either side. “Fuck it. One hundred meters.”
I adjusted the tabs on the optic to match the distance and tried to keep the barrel from swaying. It was the longest shot I had done yet. After a few days out in the middle of nowhere, I’d finally gotten to play with the big toys. We were also quickly starting to run out of food again and Chris had wanted to see me kill something. I didn’t care what we did as long as he didn’t make me shoot at the same mangled set of tin cans.
“He’s moving.”
“I see it.” I made sure to keep the white-tailed deer in my scope as it took a few steps towards my left before its head bobbed down to take another bite of grass.
“Try not to be a badass. Just aim for center of mass.”
I readjusted my aim and tried to relax. How did he know?
“How’s the target?”
“Still got it.” I waited for Chris’s words and kept my crosshairs equidistant from both pairs of legs.
“Send it.”
I held my breath.
Sorry, little guy.
I pulled the trigger and the gun kicked back into my shoulder. A shard of metal spewed out away from me faster than the speed of sound in a controlled explosion that managed to hurt my eyes and ring out my ears. I waited, already getting used to the feeling, when the bullet tore through the air and into soft flesh a football field length away from me. I looked up and Chris confirmed the hit.
“You got it.” We smiled at each other. “Good job, rook.”
I shouldered the long range rifle and brought up my M4 in case anyone was curious enough to find us. The shot was loud and we were in open terrain, but we should have been far away enough not to warrant a gander. After a few minutes, we found the blood stained patch and began to follow its trail.
“Looks like he’s a fighter.” Chris motioned for me to take the lead. “Track him. He can’t be too far.”
I reluctantly took the steps to get in front of him. I had been hoping for just the opposite. I didn’t want to have to see the poor thing lying on the ground and gasping for air. I was hungry and I just wanted to be done with it. I followed the trail as best as I could. Chris had only briefly explained the process, but I figured the patches of blood were a good enough place to start as any. Bent pieces of grass had to do when I couldn’t find those and I assumed the thing had run away from the sound of my gun, which pretty much narrowed down the guesswork. I finally found it after a few meters, almost exactly like I had imagined it, except that it wasn’t trying to breath. It couldn’t.
I stopped and looked down at the helpless animal, a patch of red staining its otherwise seemingly pristine coat of browned red fur. Some blood had even managed to get near its end, turning the white into pink. It merely stared at the patch of grass in front of its face in silence, its belly barely moving. I wondered if it was scared. Maybe it was too far gone to even notice anymore.
Chris leaned in over me. “That’s a good shot.”
“Yeah…”
He must have sensed my trepidation. “You’re not the first one to do this, Tess. And you’re sure as hell not gonna be the last.”
I nodded. He was right. It wasn't like I was a vegetarian. I had known all my food had come from somewhere. It was just easier not to think about it. Hell, most animals probably had it a lot worse off than this little fella. It didn’t make me feel any better, though.
Chris tried his best to keep my mind on track. “When do we kill?”
I had to take a moment. His stupid questions made me feel like he was training me to be a serial killer, but it probably would have been a red flag if he had taught me without any guidelines. He used to be a solider, evidently an experienced one at that. I could only guess what he had gone through. I really shouldn't have second guessed his motives. “When there’s no other option.”
He took a knife out of his belt and handed it to me. “How do we kill?”
I grabbed the smooth wooden handle, knelt down, and watched as the sun gleamed off the blade. “As quick as possible.” I put a hand on the deer’s snout, my fingers just hovering above his big, brown, milky eyes surrounded by white circles. I hated the third question. I didn’t think I would ever get it right.
“Why do we kill?”
I moved the tip of the knife above its head, just waiting for the impulse of my arm to send it through the top of its skull. The girl in my dreams would have loved this, but I didn’t. I couldn’t. Where she had found pleasure in taking life away, it had only made me sick to stomach. Experiencing both at the exact same had only made it worse.
“Tess… why do we kill?”
I readjusted the grip on the handle. My fingers were starting to slip.
That’s a good fucking question.
I stabbed the knife into the ground and walked off before Chris could say anything else. I didn’t get very far before I sat down and put my hands over my face, wishing I could press my reality through my eyes and out into oblivion. I didn’t want to be there. I was frustrated. How was I expecting myself to help someone when I couldn’t even help myself? It didn’t make any sense. I was a coward.
I waited for what seemed like too long until Chris found me with a filled duffel bag over his shoulder. We were going to have enough food to last us until the town and then some. I should have watched and learned how he had harvested the meat, but I didn’t want to see his face. I was too embarrassed.
He caught my eye without giving anything up and walked right past me. “Let’s go.”
After a mile or two of hiking through dead grass, I readjusted the straps on my shoulders and ran up to Chris so that I’d be able to walk beside him. I had gotten used to him teaching me tactics or military lingo every second in every minute of the day. The silence was starting to make me nervous. “Are you angry?”
He stared at the horizon for a moment before shaking his head. “No. It was a good shot.”
I wasn’t sure what to say. I thought he would know that wasn’t the point. He might not have been expecting me to fight up close, but even if I was shooting from a distance, I’d still be able to see a lot. Using a gun would be the same thing to an extent. It was just more efficient.
He made sure to wait until I was looking at him again. “I’m not worried.”
It was still morning by the time we got back to the outlet mall. I had managed to convince Chris to stay there well beyond what he was comfortable with. In exchange, he had made me clear out every single nook and cranny on the concrete and place traps in front of all the doorways except for a select few. Most of them only made noise, like stepping on broken glass and running into a string of beer bottles, but towards the end he had finally started to teach me the good stuff. Anyone who found themselves stumbling around our place at night was bound to get a nasty surprise.
We split off from each other after we stored the meat in the coolest room we could find. It wasn’t like him to give me any time off, yet I found myself sitting in an empty bumper car with our last can of peaches in my lap and my rifle just to the side. For once it felt good to just sit in the shade and not think about the best way to kill a group of people. He found me not too long into that. I let my legs dangle off to the side as I lifted my chin up at him. “Target practice?”
He waited until he leaned his back against a neighboring car. “No. You’re getting pretty good and I wanna hold on to what we have left.”
We had spent a few days hiking out into the middle of nowhere and fired off a few rounds down range each time. It had been good practice for the both of us and it also had the fortunate pleasure of making each return trip slightly lighter as I hauled all the guns and ammo back. I didn’t think I was getting any stronger, but I was eating more and I was starting to get accustomed to blocking out any physical discomfort. It made life a lot easier whenever I stopped thinking about the pain.
I put my feet up on the front of the car and my hands on top of my head. “So what’s the plan?” I'd long gone stopped asking him when we would return, even though the words always wanted to fly out and stung in the top of my throat. The truth was that every day I had spent with him made it painfully obvious how little I actually knew. I was better off for it, no matter how much it hurt to think back about everyone that I had left behind.