“Nothing,” she answered truthfully. “It just took me awhile to figure that out.”

Juan was too sleepy to understand so he just kissed her forehead.

When Jenni fell asleep, she wasn't afraid anymore. She wouldn't give Lloyd anymore of her life.

She was done with him.

3. The Time of Beginnings

Katie stared at the little stick, squinting in disbelief. She checked the box again, then sat back on the edge of the bathtub and exhaled slowly.

Despite all the insanity of their life, despite the dead world, despite all the terror, this was a choice they had made together. They had decided to live a new life and embrace it fully. In their strangely accelerated world where there was really no time to mourn, but only time to fight to live, this had been a distinct possibility they had embraced.

“Travis!” She pulled the rayon robe tighter around her body and held the stick in one hand as she crossed her legs.

The door opened and he peered in at her. He must have fallen asleep while she showered. He looked a little bleary-eyed. He was clad in his pajama bottoms only and his hair was mussed.

She held up her announcement and he padded into the bathroom to squint at it. It took a few seconds for it to register in his mind.

“For real?”

Katie lifted her eyebrows and nodded. “Oh, yeah.”

Travis let out a wild laugh and dragged her to her feet. “Amazing!”

Katie began to laugh and tossed the stick into the trash. “Yeah! We are! We've just made our life a helluvalot more complicated.”

“I'll take it!” Travis gathered her close and kissed her.

Happiness and fear were jumbled up inside of her mind, but Katie embraced those feelings. In a world full of death, life was something to embrace.

She kissed Travis and felt the first of her tears on her cheeks.

Joyously, Travis clutched her tightly. And together they laughed with delight.

4. Time of the Dead

Katarina watched the zombies beating against the wall with cold eyes. She knew there were plans in the morning to destroy them and clear the area around the fort. She would be sleeping at that time. She was fine with that. She had done enough killing to last her for awhile.

The deadlands beyond the fort were dark and full of mystery. She had no idea what lurked out there and she wasn't sure she wanted to know. There was enough weirdness in her world as it was. Zombies and the ghost of her mother were enough to make her on edge.

She wasn't too sure what to think of the ghost. It didn't speak to her, just stared at her with disapproval. At first she thought she was dreaming, but she was seeing her mother's stern angry face more and more often. She had overhead other people talking about dreaming of dead ones or thinking they saw them in darkened corners of their room. Maybe it was just paranoia. Or maybe there were ghosts.

The dead now outnumbered the living. How did that affect the world beyond the obvious? Maybe the dead weren't just walking and hunting the living, but haunting them.

Katarina rubbed her eyes and looked over her shoulder. Her mother stood in the shadows, near the doorway.

“You're not really here,” Katarina said.

The ghost remained.

Shaking her head, Katarina looked back toward the street and the zombies.

“So, if hell is full and the dead are walking the earth, Mr. Romero, where are their souls?” Maybe she should ask the Reverend.

In silence, Katarina watched the moaning dead and ignored the ghost of her mother lingering over her shoulder.

She had too much work to do to bother with the dead anymore than she had to.

“Fuck the dead,” she whispered. “This is our world.”

Chapter 20

1. The Seasons

Fall lived up to its reputation as a time of harvest as the occupants of the fort loaded up on as much supplies as possible. With the area around the fort pretty much clear of zombies, they worked as hard as they could preparing their winter stores. The hunters brought back venison, fowl and beef to fill the hotel freezer. Every bit of food was carefully cataloged and menus were prepared well in advance of the cold weather.

Halloween came and went. Despite the obvious reality of monsters in the world, the handful of kids in the fort had fun dressing up and trick or treating through the hotel. Everyone stuffed themselves on candy and a pumpkin patch that Ed knew about allowed Jack-o'lanterns to be placed on the fort walls. These seemed to disturb the few zombies that did appear during the holiday. The teenagers had fun pelting the dead with them.

Thanksgiving was surprisingly joyful. Wild turkeys ended up on the menu and pumpkin pie was a wonderful delicacy that everyone enjoyed. As December approached, the world seemed remarkably peaceful, despite the occasional zombie.

It began to feel like the fort was truly secure, that a true victory had been won over the dead.

2. The Good Things in Life

Jack, the German Shepherd, wanted a cookie.

Lying on the floor, watching Jason on the phone, he wondered if the boy could see the sheer hunger that loomed in his eyes, hunger for a cookie.

Jason was talking and talking and talking…

Jack yawned, his sharp teeth flashing in the early morning light. He couldn't understand why his boy was always talking on that stupid phone with Shelley. Shelley lived just a few doors down. In fact, Jack could hear her voice quite well from her room without the phone.

Girls were loud.

Jack whimpered a little and was rewarded, not with a cookie, but a pat on the head.

Jason finally hung up and walked out of their very untidy bedroom, into the small living room. Jack followed, head down and tail limp, trying to show Jason how desperately he needed a cookie. He could hear Jenni and Juan snoring in the other room. They had been wrestling a lot last night and despite his doggy whimpers and his scratching on the door, they had not let him in to play.

Jason leaned down and hugged him tight, kissing his head and nuzzling him. Jack forgot his cookie for a moment, enjoying the love he received from his boy. He loved his boy very much, but sometimes it was hard taking care of him.

They left their rooms in the big house and went down to the weird room Jack wasn't too sure about. For one thing, there were never cookies inside, but also, it did a weird thing where when the doors shut they always opened to a different room. He also didn't like the way it moved. It made his head swim. With a doggy sigh, he walked into the small room, head down and endured the strange noises.

Happily, after they left the nasty little room, they made their way to the dining room. Jack inhaled the rich fragrance of food and felt much better. As he walked through the room, many people gave him pats on the head and a few nibbles of bacon. He gave them his biggest grin and wagged his tail extra hard. Certainly someone had a cookie.

But, alas, no one did.

With a certain amount of grumpiness, he wandered over to his dish and was happy to see someone had put a few pieces of bacon and some of that good yellow stuff on top of his kibble. Tucker was already at his bowl, eating slowly since he was an older dog. Jack knew Tucker was very old and very tired. He liked to sleep a lot, but he enjoyed Jack's occasional companionship. Tucker swung his head toward Jack and they touched noses briefly in greeting, then went back to eating.

Jack gulped down his food, then drank a bit of water. Tucker rubbed against him as he ambled away and they sniffed each other briefly, mostly as a courtesy. Licking his muzzle, Jack trotted away, searching out someone to give him a cookie.

Glancing back one last time at Jason, he noticed the boy was holding Shelley's hand under the table. Ah, his human puppy was wanting to mate. Oh, well. That was okay, but he really needed to be better about cookies.

Jack strolled down the hallway, looking around for one of his many human friends to greet and see if they would understand his need for the sweet goodness that was a cookie. He had loved Halloween when the human puppies had sneaked him lots of treats. But that was a little while back and yesterday's turkey was just a memory. He had gotten lots of hugs with people telling him they were ‘thankful’ for him.

Again, humans were kinda weird at times, but he loved their hugs! “…and they took my Hummer and make me scrub floors and toilets!

My nails are broken and there is not a decent manicurist around here!

And you are doing nothing about this,” a woman's voice was shrieking from the stairwell. “And now Travis is mayor and you're nothing!”

Jack kept walking. He didn't like the woman who smelled too clean and always kicked him when no one was looking. He wanted a cookie not a kick.

The very stinky man was standing in another hall. He was holding up what he called a camera and talking to himself. Jack thought the man smelled great. He smelled of chickens, dogs, and yucky stuff.

Jack wondered if he could roll around on top of Calhoun while he slept and get that great scent on him. But Jenni would probably throw him in the bathtub and give him a bath like she had when he had managed to roll around on a dead squirrel before she caught him.

Jack pushed past Calhoun and looked into the room. Travis was there talking to Pepe's man. Pepe's man had nice leather shoes that Jack wanted to chew on, but never got the chance. Peggy was there, too, and Jack looked around for her puppy. The puppy usually had cookies or candies. But to his disappointment, there was no human puppy with goodies in his pockets.