I See Dead People

It had been an incredibly long day, and God, was she tired. Surprisingly, Bobbi had been one of the first people to volunteer to go out searching for the missing townsfolk. And once the storm had calmed down enough, she and a few others had gone out to perform their search.

Moving any debris that had been blocking exits and trapping people inside any buildings had been the hardest part. She had managed to get snagged in the fleshy part of her arm at some point. When and how, she wasn’t certain. She barely even noticed it, and the only reason she did now was the hole in her sleeve had finally caught her attention. Which was annoying, but whatever. Finding and escorting people back to the town hall had been taxing, simply because it took what seemed like forever.

It wasn’t until later that evening, when she was finished, was she finally offered a reprieve. She found an empty spot to settle, groaning as she sat down, happy to be off of her sore and angry feet. What she wouldn’t give to be back in her apartment, snuggled in her bed right now.

She looked up when a shadow loomed over her, an annoyed brow raising at the interruption of her small moment of peace. “Nice weather we’re having, huh?” she huffed. The amount of times she used that line today…

After what felt like hours of bouncing from person to person, he shouldered his med kit and began looking for something somewhat remote to take a break in. Unfortunately, far too many people were crammed into town hall that he was debating hiding in a broom closet just to get some privacy. He was just about to do so when he noticed Bobbi off by herself.

Open Starter: @thecatastrophicstarters

Flynn could feel the exhaustion in his bones. From the time the storm hit it’s peak, he had been busy. It started with a couple of the field workers coming in with minor injuries. Nothing too taxing. The worst was someone’s foot had been stomped on by a horse when they were locking them in the barns. Two broken toes from the looks of it. But even before the end of the world, there wasn’t much to be done about broken toes except tape them and let them heal on their own.

As the storm had picked up and people were told to relocate to the safety of the town hall, Flynn began to grow a little nervous. Only because of the harsh winds that nearly knocked him over as he made his way to the safety zones. By the time things seemed to calming, he could see the destruction the storm had caused and was glad he had thought to grab a medical kit before leaving the clinic. Branches from trees had been brought down in the streets, a few windows were busted out of random buildings, and the garbage cans and planter pots that had been set up to make the town square look more homey were all missing, no doubt scattered around the town somewhere.

He had aided in the search for those who might be trapped somewhere, helping escort them back to toen hall before set to work cleaning cuts and checking for serious injuries. What he wouldn’t give for a cup of coffee at that point. Or even a cot to rest on for a few hours.

The initial hit from the storm was an unexpected one. Evie had suspected at least a little rain when she woke up that morning. Her knees, especially the left one since that wonderful wreck almost a year and a half ago (that limp never quite left either. Which was lame), always had a habit of aching when there was change in the weather. That was what kept her in bed. That was what made her late for her shift.

Not that she wasn’t late for her shift often. Because she was. Often. Everyday. Fashionably, fashionably late. Some things never changed. Perhaps that was why it was so hard for her to keep a job. Yes, that was most definitely it. Her sparkling attitude never once played a part in her frequent termination. Her complete disregard of the value that was other people’s time was the culprit.

She should have just stayed in bed. Because as soon as she arrived, all hell broke loose. Good thing, too, because of she had of come into work on time, she would have promptly taken a nap in one of the warehouses. One of the ones that had been completely wiped out. How embarrassing would that have been to have been killed or seriously injured because she was taking a nap?

Pretty damn embarrassing, that’s how much.

Now, she was nestled against one of the windows in the town hall, looking out at the weather. She had just been brought in not too long ago, and she was wet. And cold. And did her best to not shiver, drawing her knees up to her chest as if to distract anyone watching her from the fact that she was cold.

Harper hated storms. She’d always had, ever since she was little, and she wasn’t sure why, but the roaring thunders had a way of getting under her thick exterior and unsettling her. It was her luck that a huge one would happen while she was in that place.

Vulnerability was for the weak, and Harper refused to let this group of strangers see her that way. Everything happened so fast. One moment they were all there in the common grounds, on the other, the stormy clouds had rolled into what had been a peaceful sky and turned the day into night.

That first thunder still echoed in her ears even long before it was gone. They needed to move out of there. She needed to move out of there. And they were too late in their reaction time, unable to reach for a better place to be. Now they had the chance to live one of Harper’s worst nightmares: being all cramped up in a narrow space with people she didn’t know. To say she was on the verge of snapping at all possible times was an understatement. At least their supplies would last for a little while.

Shedding off some of her sodding clothes, Harper did her best to distract herself from the chaos outside. Breathe, she instructed herself, dabbing at the water on her skin and hair as best as she could. “Are there towels in here?” she asked the first person who made a sound next to her, a defense mechanism so she could direct the course of the conversation.

When the storm hit Fairvale, seeking shelter hadn’t even really crossed his mind. He was in the middle of pulling weeds from the flowers he had planted in the cemetery when the the sky grew dark. Even as the wind picked up and the sky darkened, he hadn’t really given it much thought to retreat inside. Until the lightening started. He knew better than to be outside during a lightening storm.

The cafe wasn’t where he intended to be but it was where he ended up, soaked to the bone, as the storm raged outside. He followed with the flow of the people in the diner, getting cramped in the small kitchen with what felt like a dozen people. No places to sit, no view of outside. Just people mulling about with varying looks of worry on their faces.

Flynn’s feet barely touched the ground as he settled into the chair, using his toes to slowly spin the chair from side to side. When Addy got up, he stopped, putting his feet up on the footrest. A small crossed his face at the normalcy as she wrapped the cape around his neck. It was almost comical how normal the scene was. All that was missing was some music playing in the background and a group of women gossiping and reading magazines under the hairdryers.

“You can do whatever you want to do with it.” He told her honestly, reaching up to pull the scrap of fabric out of his hair so she could do her job. “I hate this heat. I’m from Vermont. It’s never this hot up there. I was on vacation when all this went down.”

“Oh don’t give me free reign like that.” Addy can’t help but chuckle as she starts combing out the longer parts of Flynn’s hair. “My bestie told me that once. She left my bathroom with purple hair and about six inches cut off.” Her friend did tell her she could do anything and it wasn’t Addy’s fault she still had purple dye under her sink from where she had given herself a few streaks a week before. “Though I don’t think I would trust any hair dye that has been sitting for as long as these have been so you are safe there.”

Flynn looked down at the headstones of the graves of those who had died in town. There were still a lot that were marked only by crudely made crosses and a name painted on. Making something without a proper kiln was trickier than he had ever thought it would be. No matter how he tried, son always ended up burn it with large cracks. Nothing he thought would be worthy of marking someone’s final resting place.

“Yeah. I did. I’ve been maintaining the cemetery since I got here.” He told her, a small proud smile on his face. It was a job that people seemed to unintentionally neglect. “Did you come to help or are you looking for someone?”

🧨 

“Why?” Mel asked, blurting the question out before she could bite it back. Trying to cover, she added, “Nobody else wants the gig?” For the nonviolent, it could be a preferable gig to working outside the walls.

Would anyone call it help, what Mel had been daydreaming of doing? “Are these all new? I mean - how far back do the deaths go?” She was dancing around the answers pointlessly; there was no reason to act suspect. Hugging herself, despite the heat, Mel finally blurted, “The, uh, Foleys. Should be a pair. I was looking for them.”

It had been a long time since Flynn had gotten a proper haircut. At least two years. Before the end of the world, a friend’s little sister had just started cosmetology school and used Flynn as one of her practice heads. More than once he had walked out with a terrible hair cut or dye job. It had taken months to grow out the horrible bleach fried mess he had had just before leaving for vacation in Mississippi. Since then, he had been letting his hair grow, tying it back when it got too long with an athletic headband or a scrap of fabric.

“Do you wanna cut mine?” He asked, stepping deeper into the shop. Looking around, he imagined how normal the shop would look with just the right lighting. It made his heartache for something normal. Even the gross smell of perm solution would have been welcomed at that time. “You can’t do any worse that this girl I knew from back home.” He crossed the shop floor in a few steps and dropped down into the salon chair beside hers. “Unless you think I should keep growing out the man bun.”

A genuine smile stays on Addy’s face as Flynn looks around the shop. When Addy had asked the town council if she could use the old hair salon she was hoping that it would bring something else to the town. Some feeling of normal that had been missing. And even if Addy hadn’t gone to school, at least she knew she wouldn’t cause someone to loose all of there hair without having bleach around.

Closed starter: @betterthangrief

Flynn found an odd comfort in the town cemetery. The solitary quiet of it was always nice. Especially in comparison to the bright, loud atmosphere that was the med clinic where he also worked. If it had been up to him, he would have focused more so on the cemetery than on helping in the clinic. His preference and expertise lied more so with the deceased than with caring for the living. Although in this world, that meant something entirely different with the dead refusing to stay dead. Still, there was a comfort in caring for the cemetery. It provided a sense of what used to be his normal.

After so many had died due to the tainted water, he had been working extra hard to make the homemade headstones for them. A couple others in town had helped put crosses together with stick and loose boards, the same as what they had been doing before he arrived. But Flynn thought their lost loved ones deserved more. The soil of the cemetery was rich with clay that he worked to harvest when he was digging the graves. There wasn’t much he could do other than giving the poor lost souls a decent resting place and a proper grave marker. He hoped that his efforts brought others some comfort as well. At least this way, their lost wouldn’t be forgotten.

In his free time, he was working on larger memorials for those who had been lost before arriving to Fairvale. So many people shared the same story of surviving outside of the walls, of loved ones lost to the virus or the walkers. The vigil had given them the idea. People talked of strangers to the town, grieving in their own way. After hearing a couple people talk, he began writing down name after name that was mentioned. The length of the list when everyone was done speaking had brought tears to his eyes. These were only the people that were mentioned. There were probably so many more lost loved ones from people who hadn’t talked.

She hadn't asked where their parents were, not yet. Mel may not have been the best at reading people, but it took zero insight to know the topic was raw for the sisters. They were all still grieving, in their own ways; and while Mel wished she could pluck any grief for that man from all three hearts, it was what it was. It would take the time it took.

Didn't keep her from circling nearer and nearer to the improvised graveyard inside the new borders of Prescott. From warming herself with daydreams of a violent sort. Vengeance stolen from her.

So, on a day nobody needed her (did anyone, ever, really?) Mel crossed into the cemetery at last. She'd smelled the would-be headstones in the past as they'd heated, but the results were new to her.

Flynn was a bit surprised to see one of the empty shops in town square open. It was always a bit surprising to see a new shop opening up. That was his opinion anyway. Life going on as normal was an odd concept to him. In the world before, he had been in his first year as an intern to the coroner in town. Now he was working as a medic due to his doctorate. At least his eight years of medical school were paying off. His uncle always complained that he didn’t need to get a full fledged medical degree simply to embalm bodies. But Flynn had wanted to do more. He wanted to be able to do proper autopsies, give causes of death. More than just prep bodies for burial like his aunt and uncle did. Doing so in the apocalypse was not part of his plan.

If he hadn’t been so busy with the sickness and then with burying the bodies in the cemetery, he probably would have noticed the store front being cleaned out and he would know what the offered business was. If he had known what it was, he probably wouldn’t have stopped in out of curiosity. The chipping paint on the window said it was a salon but he didn’t always trust the signs. For all he knew this could be the comic book swap shop he dreamed about in the least run down shop in town.

“Is this really a hair salon?” He asked, looking around at the chairs and mirror set ups.

Addy had hoped that just the fact that something was different on main street to get people’s attention. She really didn’t do any advertising that she would be there since she didn’t exactly plan on it being a full time thing. Mainly, Addy just needed to cut her own hair and had hoped she could at least help out one or two other towns members as well. If people showed up she might ask the town if she could open the shop once a week or so, not wanting to do more and waste the little power she needed for a light or two and the razer if someone wanted something more then she could do with scissors.

So far it had proved slow going. Addy is figuring many people had the same idea to just cut their own hair since up until now there wasn’t a service for it. She notices Flynn walking up before he enters and is already smiling his way when he walks inside. 

“I guess I’m on a mission to find you a bikini then.” Flynn remarked. Even if he did go looking through people’s wardrobes in the abandoned houses, it would still feel weird to him. Raiding the kitchens for food or the bathrooms for medical supplies was fine. Digging through their drawers, trying to find new clothes somehow felt wrong to him. It was obvious none of the former residents of these homes would be coming back, but it was still too intimate. “Not an asshole. At least I try not to be.”

From what Flynn knew from being in town for what felt like forever, the houses on the outer edge of the settlement were still left as if the owners were planning on returning. “I think a lot of places still need to be cleaned out. Most people have stuck close to the center of town, so that’s what’s been on the list of getting cleaned and restored.”

At the mention of nail polish, he perked up a bit. The apartment he had moved into he believed belonged to a woman. Or at least someone who did nails. Under the bathroom sink he had found an entire bin filled with polish, nail files, remover, even nail polish pens that he hadn’t known existed until he stumbled upon them. “That one I can actually help with. My apartment wasn’t cleaned out entirely and I’ve got a lot of nail polishes you can have.” He had tried painting his own nail. While he liked the colour, it was always mess.

“I’ll wait with bated breath, then,” Bobbi responded, before adding, “I work at the library. So that when you find one, you can deliver it there.” She winked up at him. Not that she was expecting him to really go out and find her one. It was all just playful fun. She’d have little to no reservations about searching through someone’s abandoned wardrobe. They weren’t coming back, and it was such a waste to simply just… leave it there.

“Ooooooh, I forgot about the properties further out.” And it was easy to, because she, like he said most of the townspeople did, stayed near the center. Might be worth exploring a bit later down the road. If she could muster the effort needed to actually care to put into it. Or she just might leave that for someone else.

What she was not expecting was him to say he said he had nail polish. That certainly got her attention, and she shuffled a bit to cross her legs, straightening up in obvious interest. “You do?” She held out her hand, inspecting her nails. There were in serious need of grooming. Uneven from breaking, mostly because she didn’t paint them anymore to offer that extra layer of protection. Her cuticles could use some work.

It wouldn’t have been uncommon for her to paint her nails a few times a day, painting them one color before deciding she wanted something else. Mostly because she liked the peace and quiet she got from doing it. It was soothing.

“We could always explore those houses sometime. If you wanted. Might be fun to see how the other half lived.” He offered with a shrug. While it would be strange to go through dead people’s houses, he was always curious about the ways other people lived. Especially some of the larger houses, like the ones that sat at the edge of town. Some were bigger than the house he grew up in. But the majority of the main floor of the house he grew up in was dedicated to the family’s mortuary business. The basement was for prepping the bodies, the large room was for the visitation, an office for his uncle, and a private meeting room for the bereaved. Growing up the only room that was never off limits on the main floor was the kitchen. He knew not everybody had a business run from their home, so it made him all the more curious about how they lived.

“I drink for the social aspect. Gives me an excuse to be with people.” Flynn sighed, wishing there was an easier way to get to know people in town. He couldn’t blame half the town’s population for being drunks. The world was awful and no matter how disgusting some of the brews on tap were, they made it easier to forget. If he had been out and experienced the true horrors longer than he had, he would probably be more inclined to drink just like everyone else. But the hangovers were never worth the trouble in his opinion. “Nah, you just look homeless. Do you ever comb your hair?”

“That’s a shitty excuse,” he said, shaking his head. “I mean… I was a bartender, so I’m not new to it, but… hmmm, guess I don’t like being social with people to begin with,” he added with a grin. Total lie, of course. He was needy and lonely a lot, especially with Kit and his group gone. He rolled his shoulders. “Everyone one has a reason to drink, good think you haven’t gone over to the ‘drink to forget’ part of the town.” Then paused. “I’m only partly in it, I’ll have you know.”

Addy started cutting her own hair in middle school. She had wanted to get bangs and her mother had told her not to so Addy did them herself after watching a few youtube videos. Her best friend helped her and it was the start of Addy not going to a salon and just trying to cut and dye her hair herself after that. It didn’t always turn out great at first. Addy had fried her hair with bleach so she could make it the perfect shade of bubblegum pink more then once.

Eventually she got better at it. Good enough that her brother closest to her age had him do his once and then Addy started just doing everyone’s in the families after that. Addy is pretty sure if she hadn’t wanted to follow in her fathers foot steps from the day she could walk her second choice would have been cosmetology school.

If he hadn’t been so busy with the sickness and then with burying the bodies in the cemetery, he probably would have noticed the store front being cleaned out and he would know what the offered business was. If he had known what it was, he probably wouldn’t have stopped in out of curiosity. The chipping paint on the window said it was a salon but he didn’t always trust the signs. For all he knew this could be the comic book swap shop he dreamed about in the least run down shop in town.

“Beats me.” Flynn shrugged. There was no real way of knowing what the council was planning. It was entirely possible that they had decided in wake of everything from the end of the world to the deaths they just endured that the Fourth of July was no longer a holiday worth celebrating. Did America really even exist anymore? Of course the land still did. But everything that made the country what it was…who knows? It’s likely that someone who was now president was locked away in a bunker still. The Secret Service would have put saving those people as well as all important documents at top priority. Or that’s what he thought at least. Even if a president still did exists in some bunker deep under some random mountain range, that didn’t effect them in Fairvale.

“Shit, I’ll make you one of that’s you giving me permission to stare at you in a a bikini. I bet one of these empty houses has one somewhere.” He joked with a grin. There were bound to be endless supplies of clothes in the houses the council hadn’t assigned people to clean out any empty yet. The thought of finding himself new clothes, seeing as he had had the same 3 outfits on rotation since arriving in Fairvale due to his short stature, some new clothes would be appreciated.

-

“I’ve never been one to shy away from letting someone cute see me in a bikini,” Bobbi explained nonchalantly. “Unless they were an asshole.” Her eyes followed him head to toe, letting out a soft hum. “You don’t look like an asshole.”

“Unless they were cleaned out when everyone first got here and everything was taken to the warehouse,” she pointed out, waving her finger, making an almost disappointed tsk. “Though, the idea of clothes much cuter than this is kind of tempting me to see if there is anything.” She looked down at the outfit she was wearing. Stained (no matter how many times she’s had them cleaned), used to be white skinny jeans that lost their skinny, a grey t-shirt and tennis shoes.. Hardly her first pick.

God, she missed wearing heels. Sure, they hurt her feet, but they made her legs look great. Not that she’d wear them now.

From what Flynn knew from being in town for what felt like forever, the houses on the outer edge of the settlement were still left as if the owners were planning on returning. “I think a lot of places still need to be cleaned out. Most people have stuck close to the center of town, so that’s what’s been on the list of getting cleaned and restored.”

Flynn leaned against the doorframe, watching as Jules finished cleaning his mess. As much as he wanted to help, it was clear the other didn’t want it. If it had been anything more than a water cup, he would have insisted on helping.

Seeing Jules yawn made him worry. Since moving in together, all he could do was wonder when the man slept. Over the few months of housing together, there had been plenty of mornings where Flynn would wake up to Jules still wide awake somewhere in the house. As much as he wanted to believe that he slept while Flynn was at work, it didn’t seem likely. Jules had a job too, no way was he getting as much sleep as he needed.

“It’s not that much earlier.” He insisted with a shake of his head. “As long as you’re staying awake, I am. Do you want me to make you some tea, see if that will help you sleep?” He was already pulling the stove top kettle out from the cupboard.

🌙

it was obvious that flynn wanted to help clean up the mess, but jules was glad he’d let him do it on his own. he’d done it, so it was only fair to clean it up himself, especially since he’d woken up his roommate in the process. still, the guilt didn’t quite go away as the other insisted on staying up, even though he could easily leave jules on his own at this late hour.

rather than protest once again, jules kept quiet as he sat himself down on the counter. the effects of lack of sleep were slowly creeping on him but he knew he couldn’t rest even if he tried — his mind seemed to race every time he shut his eyes, more often than not leaving him more exhausted than before.

Flynn had his own fair share of tokens but making Benny spend his was more fun. Since finding out that he was trans, the man seemed to go out of his way to be nice to Flynn and it entertained him to no end. Did it make up for him being the world’s biggest dick when he first arrived? Maybe. Jury was still out. It was nice to have someone who knew the truth though. And to his surprise, Benny has kept his secret a secret. “Do you think someone is gonna brew something new? The last beer I had tasted like butter and not in a good way.”