My heart hammers through my chest as I try to keep my expression calm and controlled. Miss May is in front of me, at the front door of Ms. Dowry's house, testing the door. We had just come from the house next door, where I had to put down the little old man that lived there. I for the life of me couldn't remember his name, but I've seen him around for years. It hurt to see him wandering around mindless until he saw us then he hobbled at us with arms stretched out.
Miss May turns the doorknob and pushes the door open. She takes her tire iron to the door frame, knocking on it loudly. We both waited at the front door, my bow pointed and ready to let an arrow loose. When we don't hear anything but the breeze in the trees, I move into the front room. I take a deep breath, not smelling any rotting like I did in the last house. It helps my nerves calm, no rotting, no noise. The house isn't cleared but I have a good feeling that there are no zombies.
Going from the front room, I move into the living room, with dark green carpets and gold furniture. I can't decide if I weirdly like it, or if I want to cringe. Moving from the living room to the kitchen, I take note of the open cabinets and the empty spaces in them. Miss May and I clear the few bedrooms the house has, and the bathrooms then find a staircase to the basement.
"Holy treasure," I said letting my bow fall to my side.
"Ms. Dowry seemed to like to preserve food." Miss May says looking over the industrial shelves that are crammed packed full of things. "I wonder why she didn't take anything from here, but things from upstairs."
"Maybe she was just in too much of a hurry to get out," I said moving around the basement. There are huge glass jars filled with red sauces, green sauces, veggies, fruits, and some things that look really gross. Then there are large white containers along the bottom shelves, with 'AP flour' 'sugar' 'oats' 'rice', and a few others written in sharpie on them. It doesn't make sense that she wouldn't take it wherever she was going unless she decided she didn't have time to pack up a bunch of stuff or figured it was too dangerous to stay here. I turn to Miss May with a question. "Do you know if she has any family?"
Miss May looks off at nothing, thinking about that for a second, and shakes her head. "I didn't know her that closely. I think she's mentioned a sister that's in a nursing home but I'm not sure if she's still there."
Ah, maybe that's it. "Maybe she wanted to get her sister, bring her back, or take her somewhere else?"
Miss May shrugs. "I have no idea. It could be a number of things."
That's true, we'd never be able to know without being able to actually ask her. "Let's not take a lot, at least yet. We should have enough between the three of our houses for another week at least."
"And we can always come back." Miss May nods in agreement. We settled on gathering a few boxes of dried noodles, jars labeled as spaghetti sauce, and some jars of ground beef. I was hesitant about the ground beef, I have never heard of people jarring it, but if Ms. Dowry ate it, could it be that bad? I hoped not. It did look gross. We did find some produce stashed away, onions, garlic, and different kinds of potatoes. I know those things could last a long time if stored properly.
We peek around the rest of Ms. Dowry's house, and we do find a large file cabinet filled with folders of seed packets. It's another thing we will have to come back for because I didn't want to load up too heavily. Before we leave we check the backyard, finding it just starting to grow. We could come back once in a while to water it, maybe it'll produce food as long as we are here.
We get back to my home and share our finds with Kendra who looks happy to see all the things we brought back. Except for the jars of meat that she looked at like it was going to bite her, I didn't blame her for that. After the day passes, after we all eat dinner and start splitting off for the night, Kendra pulls me aside. And I think I know why.
"May said you might be going out by yourself, to maybe get more arrows." Kendra starts and I nod. She gives me a soft sad smile. "I know this is a big ask-"
"You want me to check the firehouse?" I ask her and her mouth pops open in shock, the hope in her eyes sets my mind on what I'm about to say. "It's a long shot, but if I'm able to I'll swing by the building. I'll try but I can't promise."
"You promising to try is good enough," Kendra said, tears springing into her eyes as she smiles up at me. She grabs my hand and holds it between hers, her trying not to cry is making me super uncomfortable. Because I was trying not to cry. "Thank you, Taylor. I know it's a big ask, but I can't stop thinking he's alive, that he's just stuck somewhere."
Well, I know it would take him being stuck somewhere or hurt to stop him from being with Kendra and Kyle through this. If he was still alive anyway.