S c a r l e t

January 4th

"Gardening all in one for dummies, hmm. Seems legit." Samantha glanced up at me, before looking through the book. "But why is it so long? I thought this was going to be easy."  She had a distasteful look and I laughed.

I rolled my eyes at her grabbing another gardening magazine off the store's shelfs.

"I'll just leave the reading to you." She stated, stuffing the thick book into her black backpack.

"Of course." I scoffed, but I knew that I was in fact going to end up reading it all and telling her what I read.

I inspected the small magazine I had picked up, but placed it back down when I didn't see any tips on how to garden. It seemed to only mention the different types of plants and what not.

Basically stuff I didn't want to read about.

I moved to the books that talked about survival, I was still in the same isle, just a little bit closer to the back of the store. I picked up a book that said 100 Deadly Skills: Survival Edition, I didn't need to look inside it to know that I needed it.

Survival books are like gold mines for us right now.

I quickly stuffed the book in my red backpack I had found, before turning around to walk back towards the front.

I wanted to make sure we were still in the clear. I was trying to make it a habit to be aware of our surroundings more often, our lives depended on it.

I peeked out the shop's windows again.

This was the first time Sam and I have gone to do a raid in a store alone. Usually, it'd be Nico, Sam, and I. But now it's just us two. It's not like I wanted Nico with us, not after my mom. I swallowed the lump that was starting to grow in my throat before taking in a deep breath. Sam and I barely know what we are doing, however there isn't much supplies at the house so we had no choice but to come.

Samantha and I cleaned out some rooms yesterday and we've so far made a weapon room, and a health room where we keep weapons and health supplies. The names are self explanatory, but we just thought I'd be important to have them. We emptied out all four duffel bags, and made a list of supplies we had.

We don't have much food supply, only two bags of rice and the food we brought with us from the base. All the meat we had found we threw away for obvious reasons.

I bit my lip, seeing nothing but two walkers out on the street. At least there wasn't much Walkers to worry about. It'd be a nightmare to be mobbed by them on our first raid alone.

"Sam we should get going. I don't want to leave the kids at the house for too long." I checked my phone that I had kept safely with me for all these months. It was now almost three, Sam and I have been out for almost two hours now.

We had originally set out to go to Home Depot to get gardening items, but once we had got there, we realized we had absolutely no idea what to get. So then we drove around for a bookstore such as this one. Where we are looking for books on how to garden. The survival book was just a plus.

"Okay, just let me get something for Samuel really quick. It's his birthday today." Sam reminded me.

I almost forgot the kid turned five today.

I turned away from the window to see Samantha pick up a race car box. I frowned when I saw she only got one.

"Sam, it's not fair to get Samuel something, and the others nothing." I said, shaking my head. I could already imagine the outcry Alex and the others will have. Man that would be such a headache, one I do not want to deal with.

Samantha rolled her eyes. Taking the toy and forcefully fitting it in her bag. "Soo?" She excused, not caring.

I let out a long sigh, slightly annoyed that she wasn't taking the other kids into consideration. After all, they were children and their feelings are quite sensitive. I went over and got the others race cars too, one for each of them. I carried them in my arms and turned to Samantha who looked at me blankly. "Are you serious?" She deadpanned.

"Does it look like I'm kidding? I don't want to hear the others complain." I justified.

Samantha shook her head, while I struggled with the boxes. However, she didn't make any movement to help me.

"Go. You need to lead because my hands are currently occupied.." I said, nodding to the door of the store.

Samantha muttered something under her breath, I couldn't quite catch it but I chose to ignore her. It was probably something rude that would start an argument anyways.

She pushed the door open, which caused the store's door to ring a bell at the top. I winced, sound attracts the dead. I peeked over to the walkers I had saw, making eye contact with one as it growled ferociously at us.

Samantha raised her rifle, aiming at the two walkers that had started to limp in our direction. As she shot at them, I jogged as best as I could with the toys in my arms to the truck, before dumping the toys into the backseat.

I turned just in time to see Sam finish off the second Walker. I watched as she jogged back over to the truck, walking to the driver's door. I opened the passenger door, before hopping inside and waiting for her to start the car.

"I don't think it's fair of the other kids to get toys when it's Samuel's birthday. They can wait for their own birthdays." Samantha told me as she turned the truck on and buckled herself up.

I put my seatbelt on as well, internally rolling my eyes at her words. "They're kids Samantha, living in the apocalypse. I don't care if it's Samuel's birthday, if one kid gets a toy, so does the other." I told her, putting my red backpack in front of my legs.

"That's so dumb. That's just spoiling them." She argued, and I could her the annoyance she felt in her voice. "Those kids always gotta be so damn selfish."

I raised my eyebrows at her statement, taking offense to it. They were after all my nephews and nieces she was talking about. "What the hell is your problem? They're children, you don't need to be talking about them like that." I snapped, why was she picking a fight with me about something so materialistic? Especially since everything is free now.

Samantha shook her head, keeping her eyes forward. She stayed silent, which kind of irritated me. She knew it annoyed me too.

I hate when I'm talking with someone and they act like I'm not there talking to them.

I also knew she didn't say anything else because she knew I was right.

Her comment was unnecessary, and rude.

She ignored me for the rest of the drive to Home Depot. I didn't speak to her as well, instead I did exactly as she did and kept my thoughts to myself. After all she was the one who started it.

When we got to Home Depot, I checked my phone for the time again.

3:18pm

I emptied out my backpack, taking the four books out and placing them beside the toy cars. Samantha copied my actions, doing the same with her bag. After my bag was empty, I zipped it back up, placing my phone in my jacket pocket.

I then placed the strap of my honey badger over my head, making sure I still had a full extra clip in my bag, and grabbed the list of gardening tools and items we needed, before opening the door and getting out of the car.

Samantha and I had already cleared the store out when we first came here, so I simply walked in through the broken glass doors since I didn't have to worry about the dead.

I heard Sam walking behind me, but I didn't turn to look at her. I just made my way to the gardening isle, holding the folded list in my left hand.

I carefully unfolded the list, and I stopped walking to check and see what we needed to look for first.

"What do we need to get?" She asked.

I scanned the items and right when I was about to reply she spoke up again.

"Scarlet, what do we need to get?" She repeated in a much more demanding tone.

I narrowed my eyes at her. "I was about to answer you Samantha." I gritted out.

She was really determined to make me mad today wasn't she?

"That's not what I asked." She told me, looking me dead in the eyes.

"You know what." I ripped the paper in half, and I shoved one of the halves onto her hands. I didn't need to tell her what to do with it, in fact I didn't bother to waste my breath. Instead I just turned to go over to the plants without a look in her direction.

Thankfully the half I gave her was the half with the gardening tools, and the tools were on the other side of the store. It made no sense to me as to why Home Depot but the gardening items so far apart, but I wasn't complaining.

"Stupid best friends with stupid problems." I muttered to myself, fuming at her attitude. Honestly she had no right to be mad and rude to me. I'm only thinking about things logically and bringing everyone toys is freaking logical! It wouldn't be fair to bring one kid a toy and get the others nothing.

That's favoritism. Even if it was his birthday, we live in the apocalypse. Having toys is a luxury. If things were normal, I wouldn't care about not getting the others something. But we don't live in a normal society, we live in a world where we have to kill in order to survive. Where kids can't play outside without fear of being eaten alive or having to shoot somebody.

I made it to the side where the green house doors and all the seeds were currently at. I looked inside the greenhouse through the doors, having to push a shopping cart out of the way to do so.

I wanted to see if there was any plants we could possibly save and bring with us.

However, I saw that all the plants had dried out, none of them seemed to be salvageable so I didn't bother to enter the greenhouse and get any of them.

Instead I turned to the shelfs that held the seeds and I grabbed all the seeds I could find. I stuffed them into the front pockets of my bag, still muttering incoherent words under my breath.

When the shelves were emptied, I turned to look down at my list. Soil enrichments were next. I read somewhere in a book that it was always good to have them to plant vegetables.

I searched for the soil enrichments we needed to plant the seeds with. I continued to gaze around the big empty store, before spotting them a distance in front of the doors that belonged to the greenhouse. I sized the bags up and frowned when I realized I couldn't carry them.

I looked over to the shopping cart, and I removed it from its spot and pushed it towards the large bags of soil. I let my gun hang beside my backpack before heaving one of the bags into the cart.

It took me off guard by being lighter then I had imagined, and I lightly laughed at myself. I dumped as much bags of the soil as I could in the cart, which in turn turned to be four.

I jumped when three bags fell down from its original pile, knocking some flower pots down as well. The sound was loud and it echoed through the store. I laughed nervously, shaking my paranoia away.

I looked down at my list again, and ignored the mess.

It's not like the store had to look pretty anymore.

I was about to make my way to the anti-weed spray cans before I froze, hearing multiple subtle growls. I quickly jumped around, and my eyes widened when I saw a mob of walkers coming out of the greenhouse doubled-doors.

"Oh shit!" I quickly pushed the cart running as fast as I could to the glass doors. I skidded down the isles, dodging some items that had fallen onto the floor, as well as dead bodies. When I made it to the exit, I didn't hesitate to push out of the doors and continue to run to the truck.

Now at the truck, I turned around to see if I was still being followed. I let out a breath of relief when I saw that I was in the clear. I ran so fast with the cart, those walkers had nothing on me.

"That was so close." I said out loud, dumping the bags of soil into the back of the truck.

When I finished, I felt like I had forgotten something. I looked over the list, making a mental reminder to tell Sam to stop somewhere else for the weed killer spray. 

"Oh no." I muttered, my eyes widening. I whipped my head back to the store. I swallowed fearfully as I looked at the now over ran entrance to Home Depot.

My heart dropped.

"Sammie!"