I am Bexley chap 38 the Bloodletters Scourge

My boyfriend Ben was standing his ground. I never saw him so ferocious. It made me feel invigorated yet a bit concerned. Amory’s sudden reappearance as he told us to run with twisted hands made me feel like my knees were going numb.

Emma and I tried to pick up Stan as we all tried to get out of the creepy, seemingly frozen forest. Earlier, I felt like the earth was falling apart, shaking, and that tree Fox slammed into.. oh Lord, my heart was hurting from how hard it was beating. Almost like my heart was working overtime trying not to break. But I saw my Ben, and my heart started to feel safe again. Just like when we saved each other on that runaway train.

Oh baby, Ben was my savior but he also was my heart. He saves me all the time. Especially during my worst anxiety attacks… he holds me so tightly until I can stop feeling like a stranger in my own head.

But my mind is stuck to something. To someone: Indigo.

My sister Emma, God bless her soul, is praying out loud as we all try to make our way through the thick brush and trees. She’d pray like that all the time when we were kids. Like how she used to say prayers for our safety when we’d go out to find butterbur and other plants, especially since it was illegal for us humans to leave our bunker like that so much. She’s holding on tightly to India, her girlfriend who is a Bloodletter.

“Cara, girl, pray!” Emma would often tell me. I’d never argue back. This time she just gave me a look and I started.

It’s not surprising that lil sis is love with a woman. I had an inkling she might like girls as much as guys as teens. Emma would swoon over a particularly beautiful woman if she ever saw them at the Army base (where humans usually got more supplies and traded goods).

But Indigo. I can’t stop thinking of her. She just up and left, I know it killed Amory when she just ran off like that. I had gotten to know Amory a bit. He seemed so nice but so defensive, so angry and yet so very sad. And Indigo… she’s feisty, angry and fierce. Those two.. I can tell they’ve known each other for a long time because the way they talk feels very… strong. Deep. I really started to like her. Like a good friend.

“You two play off each other like a couple of instruments in a band, like a duet… it’s kinda weird but it’s like.. y’all know what buttons to push to make each other react..” I had said to Indigo as they had yet another pointless argument over something dumb.

Indigo furrowed her brow, signing, “He don’t push.. he doesn’t interfere with nothing of mine, I can assure you of that!” She smacked her hand on a rock for emphasis. This made the fuming Amory look over at her but he said nothing.

I laughed. “Girl… how do you even know that dude?”

She growled. “What is a dude? Our families met long ago,” she sighed but looked confused by her words.

I looked at her questioningly. “Family? What?” I laughed lightly. “And a dude is like a guy. Or a girl, like anyone you know…”

“I mean… I met him through his old handler.. Rhetha. She was a batty old witch. I hated her. She … she died… I tagged along after all the battles and raids became more complicated…” Indigo looked like she was struggling with something very serious and couldn’t quite understand what it was. Her sign language had a strange dialect at times too. Like a foreign language.

Ben told me it sounded Gaelic, but more Irish than anything. Since Ben had studied other languages before, I thought that made the most sense.

“But you said your families met long ago… like an Irish thing?” I asked, testing the waters as I knew through understanding India, that Bloodletter’s memories were very spotty and full of holes.

“How’d you know I was Irish?” She sighed in an accusatory way, looking at me with narrowed white eyes.

“My boyfriend Ben understands different dialects.. he’s good at picking up on it,” I explained. She shrugged.

“Can you teach me how to mark paper? With those scratching marks?” Indigo asked me with a wide eyed look.

“You wanna learn how to write?” I asked.

“Cara, is that your name?”

I nodded, touching her arm and she flinched.

“Hey girl I ain’t gonna hurt you!” I smiled as she quietly came up to me, looking at my face with a funny closeness. “You can call me Cara or dude. Whatever.”

Indigo gave me a funny smile. “Dude… that’s what I’ll call you.”

I laughed. “Okay. Dude it is.”

I tried to fist bump her but she growled. I took her hand. She quietly resigned to my touch. I balled her fingers into her palm to make a fist. Then I took my fist.. and connected them.

“It’s called a fist bump. It’s a bro move, Indigo. That’s what Stan taught me…” I laughed. Indigo almost fully smiled. We practiced the fist bump again.

That was my first real interaction with her. Now she’s gone. In our spare time or rest, I’d practice writing letters with her.

She’d write in a very short, almost violent manner but we learned to slow it down, as Amory watched us from afar.

Indigo. There was mystery in her. There was something deeper inside of her and I couldn’t get it out.

Then Amory started freaking out after that Bloodletter got killed by the zombie mob. Honestly I think when Amory started ripping off his own skin, that was too much for anyone to handle, especially her. Bloodletters and zombies can’t cry. But oh my gosh, that girl was sobbing. Emma thinks that Amory got possessed in a cave. I think that is the only logical explanation for someone to hurt themselves so badly.

As we all escaped in a panic, I realized something. It made me stand still. I surveyed the intensely quiet forest. Amory was on the ground. Ben was ready to attack, looking like a bear with his shoulders arched and his eyes so wide and hungry.

But…. Nothing was coming.

No one was there.

“Ya’ll, come over here! Ain’t nothing chasing us!” I yelled. Everyone was still on the move but slowing down. “Amory was tweakin’.. there’s nothing chasing us…!”

Ben came over to me, looking around like a scout, his breath running over me like falling drops of invisible rain, pitter-pattering on my face.

I took his hand, gripping it tightly, as he slowly tried to calm down.

“C-Cara, honey, you sure?” Ben asked me.

“I don’t know. But I get this feeling that Amory here had a hallucination… something is not adding up here..” I added.

Everyone comes over and Emma is fully enveloped in prayer, as India has her arm interlocked with Emma. Stan is still there but not really there. His eyes are open but he’s very still like a freshly fallen log.

Everyone stands closely and we all stand still.

“Wait… what did Amory see then?” India signed with a confused look.

Emma took in a shaky breath. “Something we didn’t see. Or maybe something only he could see.”

“Let’s just go back to our original plan guys. But why don’t we find a new area to camp? This has been the worst day I have ever experienced…” Ben said calmly. Everyone silently agreed.

We all made sure Amory and Stan were safe from all this noise. Now I was watching, wondering, waiting.

Who would wake up first?

Stan might, but I wasn’t worried about him as much. He has his confidence, a wife, a real family. He has friends.

But Amory… he seems so utterly lost and lonely. He is someone I feel would feel loneliest when there’s a hundred people around. But with just him and Indigo… there’s everything.

I can’t think of Amory without Indigo. When Amory wakes up, the first thing he’ll notice is she’s gone.

That’s heartbreaking to me.

I remember when Indigo wrote her first thing in legible writing. I still have it in my notebook.

BANG bang bannng BANG

He makkes me so angry in me hands

Cara teach me “twitterpated”

I says no. He makes insides go

BANG

I say no. I just wanna grind hem up

Him up

I smiled at her words. I told her she looked Twitterpated when she was with Amory. Like a gushing, sweet, nervous burst of love. In love, I tried to explain to her.

She gritted her sharp teeth, writing that down as I helped her not grind the pen through the notebook. I actually have several bite marks, scratches and stabs in my book. I look at them fondly.

When Amory wakes up, I’ll maybe show him her markings.

I hope she’ll return to him. Oh Lord, I’ll pray for that too.