Here is the next chapter and sorry it took me so long to update. i have been busy, but here is what you have been waiting for. ENJOY AND THANKS FOR READING!!

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We see the lasting days fall upon us

Watching the winter fields melt into a warm spring

Turning the dry barren land into white flowers

Each sprouting seeds to begin to a life anew

But where the seeds end up

Is not for me or you to choose

Life is like the wind

Always changing direction and sometimes dying off

But where do we go when the wind stops blowing

Is that the moment when we fall, and see no way to make it stop?

Or will something else catch us before we hit the ground

And lift us into a new wind direction, our paths intervened

With one another

Who I am I to choose who lives or dies

Just like we can't choose how to run our lives

Because sometimes life plays a weird game

And sometimes there are different paths that we must choose

Some lead to the high road other to the low

But which ever we take

We all make mistakes and will meet somewhere in between

So I ask the question again

Who am I to choose who lives or dies?

Who am I to choose how my life will be

Will the wind take it on a straightforward direction?

Or will it chriss cross with someone else's path

Maybe then I could see what life is all about

And find myself within me

That is the only way I can be free.

I woke up a few hours later to nothing but eerie silence. Sitting up I noticed how cold it was in the room. Well seeing my breath kind of gave it away and since the electricity had died almost four months ago, the notion that it winter was nothing shocking. The apartment we were in was small to say the least. A dark curtain, probably closed by the others so we wouldn't draw attention to ourselves, slightly blowing, blocked the living room windows. Sighing I looked around the room to see everyone was asleep. Matt was near the front door with a gun in his lap, while Jenny, Kiora, and Coby were still snuggled up in another corner of the room.

I smiled a little. So much we had been through and still I think out of all of us, these three were the most filled with hope. They always did everything together, even though Kiora was 16, Jenny 13 and Coby 7, they still held on to the little strain of faith that there may be a better tomorrow. Where they get it from I think is from each other. Laughing I looked around the room for John. That was when I noticed something clinging onto my hand. I looked down and saw John, sleeping and holding my hand. My eyes widened as I turned away blushing. Did he really like me like that? Wait no. I quickly took my hand away from his.

He didn't like me like that. He was just probably making sure that I wouldn't try to kill anyone else. What if he was working with Linda? What if they all were? I mean I am a young quick-witted person. Would they really get that much to sell me? I looked back at John who was now wide awake and staring at me. I started to shiver as the more notions ran through my mind.

I could run. I could try and run, but how far would I get? Maybe far enough to lose them." As if my mind and body were somehow linked I quickly got out of the bed and started towards the door. My arm was quickly grabbed and John who sat me back on the bed gently pulled me back. I tried to fight harder now with his grip. No, no I had to fight. They couldn't do this to me.

"Hey, what's wrong Annie?" he asked gazing into my eyes. I guess he could see the fear in my eyes and knew something was wrong because he let go of my arms and held my hands in his.

My mind screamed that it was just a trick to get me to stay, but for some reason my body refused to move.

"Go! Go!" my mind kept screaming to me. "They are going to sell you to some stranger and then leave without you! Are you crazy? Why are you just sitting there? RUN Dimmitt RUN!" my head and every inch of my unseen soul screamed, but still I sat frozen like a statue, locked in the remands of what was or may happen.

"Annie, are you alright?" John asked again, trying to keep quiet and not wake up the others. I was kind of surprised that they hadn't woken up since my attempted escape only a few minutes before.

I looked away from John's stare, but he forced my eyes to meet with his and again I got the same sense from his eyes as I had before. Then the thought hit me. Maybe they weren't against me, but how could I be sure." I had learned over time that by just looking into people's eyes, you can really see what the want, their true ambitions both evil and good, and you could get a sense of how they felt, that normally you would never see. As I saw it, the eyes were a window into the soul. But what did I see when I looked into his eyes?

To tell the truth I had never peered into someone's eyes like his. Right away I could sense the fear, loneliness, anger, and hatred, a swell of emotions that subsided in the darkest parts of his mind. But as I saw more into his eyes I saw something that I have never seen in any of us and that was the feeling of pain. Pain. It may have been the pain of losing someone or a past mistake that he could never fix. I couldn't tell what it was from, but from all that gathered information in just a mere couple of seconds, I could tell he wasn't the type of person, I had so conceded him for. And now I think I was surer that the others weren't the same way.

"A-Annie…" he asked again, this time shuddering my name. Had he known that I just caught a glimpse into his soul, but I just couldn't tell him the truth because he was like me in more ways than I could imagine. Here I had been so worried about myself and more interested and self-contained in my own problems that I had ignored the fact that there were other people around me who had the same kinds of feelings. But the truth was if he was like me as much as I thought, you didn't want to tell anyone how you felt because I think that most people wouldn't have cared.

So I did what I was best at. I told him a lie. "Sorry just a nightmare." I spurted out. For a moment he was silent, looking at his hands, which were now in mine.

"You don't need to lie." He said standing up. "I know it was something else. You trying to run from us." He said pausing as if waiting for me to answer, and when he got none, sat next to me on the bed.

"You know… I had a sister who acted exactly like you. Always jumping the gun. Running now and talking later." He said smiling. I knew of his younger sister Becky, was five years younger than him. She was with my friends when we had been separated months ago. Then why did he say had?

I looked up at him. "Becky may still be alive you know. Maybe she got out with my friends and will be waiting for us in Nevada. Heck we are all going to have our little group with the bigger one and take down these zombies one by one." I replied trying to ease the moment and at the same time, secretly trying to get an answer to my thought question.

He sat silently for a minute or two as if debating whether or not to answer what I had just said. Finally he looked at me and I could see his eyes starting to water. Had I said something wrong?

"I-I had two sisters Annie. There is my younger sister Becky, and. …And my twin sister Grace. M-My other sister was.." he started, but couldn't; finish the sentence. I could see him trying his hardest to hold back the tears that were threatening to spell. Then I realized that he was trying to let go some of the pain that was bottled up inside.

"I couldn't. …Save her. I-I promised our mom and dad I would protect them…but I couldn't. I let them down. All of them." He continued his voice going hoarse and dim, but this time he couldn't hold back the tears any longer and started to cry into his knees. This was the first time I had ever seen any of us cry.

At first I didn't do anything as I continued to hear his crying. What could I do? What could I say? Was there even anything I could try to ease his pain? "

Finally after a few minutes I turned to home and this time instead of looking at a well built, determined young man, all I saw was a scared and uncertain child, just like me. We were the same, except that he just confided in me one of his kept secrets. It was now a little off his shoulders and onto mine. Some may say it is like a burden, but I see it as an equivalent trade. He had taken on the duty to protect me from any danger that is out there, probably without him even realizing it and I was to take on the duty of listening to him. Hearing what only the heart can tell now. We were all the same. We were all human.

Then I did the only thing I could think of to do. I hugged him. Pulling him from his shell, I put my arms around him and let him cry into my shoulder. I medially I could feel the tension around us disappear.

A short little simple act that I think is what we both had needed. A small notion that let us both know that there is someone still looking out for them even though they might think they are alone and to give you a sense that there is someone there when you need it the most. Maybe in that time the healing, not only for him, but for me as well had just begun.

Maybe we were going to be all right after all.

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yeah i know i may be a little sucky at romances, well it is kinda my first try. so hope u enjoyed this chapter...thanks again for reading and if you have time please review! THANKS!!