Journal of the Survivors

Chapter Five--Kyra

            “Hey! Just ‘cause I’m short doesn’t mean I can’t kick ass!” I retort as we start to walk back to the warehouse.

            “No, you’re right. It’s because you’re a girl that you can’t kick butt,” he replies.

            “Take that back,” I say “threateningly”.

            “Make me, leprechaun.”

            I chase him into the warehouse and leap onto his back.

            “So I see you two made up,” Tammy says as we walk in.

            Danno pokes his head out from the storage room. He has dust all over his face. “Hey! You guys are normal again! Well, normal for you two at least.”

            “Arch isn’t being grumpy anymore?” Iz steps out of the food storage room followed by Jackie.

            “Aw! Everything’s back to the way it was!” she declares.

            “Yea, we sorted through our arguments, had a little pep talk, and now Kyra’s going to be brave.”

            “Be brave? For what?” Jack asks.

            “Facing her fears,” Archie replies. He doesn’t even know my full story yet he totally hit the nail on the head with that one.

            “What are you afraid of Boss?” Isaiah questions.

            “Parties,” Archer answers for me making everyone laugh.

            “It’ll be fun, Boss. We’ll make sure of it,” Daniel says.

            “I’ll be counting on it,” I tell him. He smiles his cute smile and goes back to clearing away boxes.

            Arch piggybacks me into the ammo room. “See? Now was that so hard?” he teases me.

            “Shut-up,” I tell him again.

            “I saw you ogling him.”

            “I was not!”

            “Let me finish, Ms. Defensive. As head of the party committee I am assigning you to box duty with Danno. You can thank me later.” He turns on his heels and quickly exits.

            I run to the door. “Wait! Archer! I—”

            “No. No waiting. Go before I change my mind,” he says without turning around.

            He goes into the boys room and softly shut the door.

            I watch the door for a while, waiting for it to reopen. It doesn’t. I take a deep breath and go into the storage room.

            “Hey,” I squeak.

            Dan turns around. “Hey yourself.” He puts the box down and wipes his hands together trying to brush off the dust that’s accumulated on them. “What are you doing here? Don’t you have some super secret planning to do?” he jokes.

            “The big honcho changed his mind. I’ve been assigned to box duty.”

            “Well, I guess that sucks for you, but it’s good for me.”

            I blush. “So, uh, what do you want me to do?”

            “Right now I’m just stacking boxes. I’m sitting on some of them to see how comfy they are. If they’re kinda comfortable I put them against that wall so that we can sit on them,” he explains while gesturing around.