Serendipitous

21.

The booming gunshot fills my ears, I let out a sigh while feeling frustrated from missing yet another target.

"Still a virgin" Shane says teasingly.

"The target's too small" I tell him feeling a little defensive.

"Come on, that's crap. Half an hour ago I saw you nail a bull's eye at 25' feet"

"It wasn't moving"

"You think a walker's gonna hold still for you? Focus and reload, go again." He responds, I frown at his tone while annoyance takes over me. "Uh-oh, did I piss you off? Come on, girl, you've got walkers all around you. They're the woods. They're in the RV. You're gonna need to try harder"

"Stop badgering me" I snap at him.

"You're too damn emotional. You need to shut it down. Take all that guilt, take that fear, that being pissed off, take it out" He persists. Seriously? Maybe I am so emotional because I'm pregnant with your child right now, but we're not going to talk about that now are we?

"Right, 'cause you're so calm"

"See that? See, I can be pissed off. I could be whistling "Dixie" and I'll always hit the target. But you, you shoot like a damn girl. You stand here and you point your weapon. Point like you point your finger. Do not think about it. I'm talking about muscle memory, girl—muscle memory. Now go on, shoot that son of a bitch. He's coming for you! He's 10' feet away! He's 9'--he's 5' feet away! Right there. Now you shoot that son of a bitch! Shoot him!"
Is he being serious right now? He can't be serious. As if I'm not under enough pressure right now with figuring out when I am going to tell him I am pregnant. I clench my jaw as I fire one more time at the moving target, my head really hurts and I have another awful wave of nausea coming on— If I wasn't irritated a hour ago, I am now.

"Happy?" I ask before setting the gun down while walking away. I'm so tired of this, if my parents wouldn't flip out then maybe I would be able to announce to them that I am pregnant—With Shane's baby. But no, I can't do that. Not without a huge scene to be caused that would probably get us kicked off of Hershel's land. Not without risking Shane asking me to end the pregnancy, I don't want to end it. I want to keep it. And now this, I don't need all of this stress right now. This is so frustrating that I can't even tell Shane right now, how can I tell him any of this? The sound of a car slowly pulling up behind me grabs my attention, I glance behind me. Of course.

"Come on, let me give you a lift" Shane calls to me. I keep walking.

"My feet work just fine" I respond without looking at him.

"Look, I'm just trying to get you rattled, give you an idea what it's like when the shit starts to fly" He admits, continuing to follow me. I don't need to be 'rattled' right now, I'm pregnant and stressed out. But he doesn't know that and I need to remember that, maybe if he knew things would be different right now. I wouldn't be walking on the side of the road pissed off and he wouldn't try to give me a one on one training coarse on how to be tough.

"Is that an apology?"

"I know you haven't been feeling good recently, I know you're stressed out, I took it too far. Yeah, it's an apology"

"You're a real dick sometimes" Sigh. I don't really mean that.

"Yeah, I acknowledge that. I'll tell you what, I've got a lead on Sophia. I'm gonna go check it out. Why don't you come with me, be my backup?" He offers, the car stops. I turn to face him as I smile weakly.

"We're gonna have to go house to house. We'll start at the far end and we'll work our way back" Shane tells me, we both get out of the car. The two of us quietly walk into the abandoned house, it's dark but what's left of the sunlight shining through the windows helps to see.

"Sophia? Anyone? Sophia?" I call out, "They walled off the hallway?"

"They tried to make a stand here" Shane replies as we crawl through the large hole in the wall to the other side of the room.

"Sophia?" I call out again, the sound of flies buzzing fills my ears in the almost quiet house while I follow him into the next room away from the pile of dead walkers. We both begin walking down the stairs to the basement slowly and quietly, unsure if more walkers lie ahead. We enter the garage to find another dead corpse and more flies, Sophia was never here. Hopelessness fills me.

"She was never here,was she? I don't know how to tell Carol this was another dead end" I say letting out a sigh. Before Shane can respond the sound of snarling walkers from the garage door that's slightly lifted which leads to the driveway outside.

"Come on, let's move" Shane hurries  me as we quickly escape the house, my heart thuds when we make it to the road to find more walkers headed our way. We're like sitting ducks.

"Cover that street. I'll clear the car" He instructs me while taking down a few of the creatures with his gun. I attempt at shooting what looks like the walking corpse of a woman with red hair, she's emaciated. I aim for everywhere except her head.

"Oh shit" I curse to myself quietly when I realize my gun is out of ammo. Shane turns to me, as I quickly reload my gun he takes the walker down.

"Focus now. Clear the jam. Focus" He reminds me. My shaking hands quickly ready my gun as another walker heads my way, snarling sounds come from his mouth as he gets closer to me, too close. I realize Shane isn't going to shoot this thing, he's waiting for me to do it.

"Are you kidding me?" I ask in frustration as I glance at Shane.

C'mon on, I got your back. Now go" He instructs with his aim to the walker that's far too close to me, too close for comfort as it continues snarling. I don't hesitate as it's arms outstretch for me, I quickly aim for its head— it drops to the ground as the loud gunshot fills my ears. I did it. While I try to even my breathing, I shoot another walker, then another while the gunshots fill my ears. I'm taking them down.

"Molly, Molly, let's go." Shane's voice snaps me out of my thoughts as I set my gun down to my waist and follow after him. "Come on. Molly, come on"

We reach the car successfully, but I'm not finished yet. "Molly, come on" Shane urges while another nasty thing walks toward us, I want to kill it again— the loud gunshot fills my ears, I get in the car.
The drive is quiet, normally if the world weren't ending I would have my phone hooked up to the Bluetooth right now and I would be choosing from my favorite Spotify playlist. But I'm enjoying this silence with Shane, no growling walkers, no screams of fear. Just the two of us—and a half—while the cool ac blows on our faces. My eyes flicker toward him as he keeps his eyes on the road, his arms are so muscular and he pulls off the damp t-shirt torso sweat. It looks good on him, but what doesn't look good on him. I was really snappy today, I'll tell him I'm pregnant soon and we can figure everything else out together. But right now, I want him. My hand reaches across the car and lands between his legs on his jeans, I mischievous smile forming on my face. He glances over at me before pulling the car to the side of the road before I straddle his waist in the drivers seat. His hands tangle in my hair as the taste of his lips send me into a frenzy, I need him.

We pull into the farm, my jeans our buttoned and my shirt is back on, I raise my head from resting it on Shane's arm while he drove as we both get out of the car, Carol and Dale approach us.

"Anything?" She asks us, hope lingering on a string in her eyes.

"Not today" Shane informs them both.

"I'm so sorry. We'll cover more ground tomorrow" I try to reassure her.

"What happened out there?" Dale asks, his eyes flickering between Shane and myself. I feel blood rush to my cheeks as my mind wanders back to riding Shane in the car, this time we could be as loud as we wanted to.

"Um, I—"

"The place was overrun" Shane answers him, our eyes meet for a moment as he fights the urge to smile at me. He must be thinking about exactly what happened in the car, too. Dale seems suspicious.

"Yeah" I mumble now feeling sheepish.

"Let's go get you clean up" Carol tells me, her arm wraps around my shoulders as we go walking to the rv. My head begins throbbing as soon as I sit down, another horrible wave of nausea hits me. How much longer can I hide this? I need to tell someone soon and before I start showing.