living_history (living_history) wrote in the_colony, @ 2010-08-09 22:12:00 |
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Entry tags: | ^ week 18, andrew kirke, bridget mackenzie, | bridget and drew |
Week Eighteen - Thursday
Characters: Drew and Bridget.
Location: The Farmhouse
Summary: After Drew arrives back at the farmhouse, Bridget is there to give him a piece of her mind.
Rating: PG for language.
It wasn’t a very long drive. In fact, Drew felt so guilty to have used the gas at all that he stopped inside the first building he came across and meticulously stripped it down, taking every available and possibly useful thing that he could manage. It gave him something physical to do, helping him burn off the excess energy and work out his aggressions.
How could she say such a thing to him? How could she make him feel like he was the second choice? The questions continued to loop in his head like a bad commercial, breaking up every stray thought with its repetition. She may have intended to try and console him, but all he could see was the anger in her face, the words she said.
It was just so illogical. Gas was precious, and should never be wasted. It was starting to snow now, and he knew fuck-all about cars. What if they broke down? What if something happened, and it was just the two of them lost on the road? Hundreds of other what-if’s came into his mind, but mostly he just thought of how stupid it was that she was so determined and attached to these people, and if she’d been so attached and so convinced he was dead, why she would’ve left in the first place? All of it was wrong. Whether or not she would openly admit it to him, he knew that things had changed between them. It would never be the way it was before the virus; the evacuation had destroyed that.
He hated himself for having ever suggested it. And a small part of him hated that she’d ever came back; he couldn’t help feel like the image of her he once had in his head was better than this new world’s recreation of her.
Roseburg wasn’t far. For the first time in a long time, he thought about his parents and sister. Had they survived somehow? Had they gone to evacuation camps, or locked themselves away with the hopes that things would blow over? The more he thought about it, the more his heart ached with the want for familiarity. Maybe he’d sneak back into the house and pack up his things after everyone else had gone to sleep, and make a little trip out there. It wouldn’t hurt, and he needed to get away while he still could.
She might be waiting for me, he thought morosely, sitting in the newly-filled car and not yet turning it on. Molly would’ve noticed he was absent by now, too. Maybe Molls would go with me. At least that way I wouldn’t be alone. The young girl’s arrival into his life had reminded him how much he’d really missed connecting with others, and he didn’t want her to think he was abandoning her. When the sun finally started to set, Drew started the engine and headed back to the farmhouse. It was just starting to get dark enough that he needed to turn on the headlights when he drove up onto the paved road leading to the house. The silence was almost deafening when he killed the engine, settling in the garage rather than outside in the driveway so as to keep the contents of the backseat and trunk safe from the constant fear of intruders. He didn’t yet exit the car, staring at the wall in front of him through the windshield.
Bridget had heard the car pull up the drive, she’d been sitting in the parlor with a book and only half seeing what was printed on the page. Her attention had been more focused on Drew and Ana and what she’d say to the man when he finally came back. While she still thought Drew was an idiot for getting upset with Ana, the other woman hadn’t covered herself in glory during the argument either.
Once the sound of the engine shutting off, the young woman hauled herself out of her chair and started toward the back door. Hopefully he’d be in a mood to listen.
She found him still sitting in the car unmoving in the garage. He almost appeared to be sleeping, but upon seeing movement he moved, opening his door after popping the trunk from the latch near his feet. It didn’t take much to find the lone light bulb on a wire hanging from the ceiling, and upon finding the drawstring he gave it a tug, illuminating them. He said nothing - though he felt his nerves prickle at being found - and started to unload his haul.
“You really shouldn’t go raiding on your own you know,” Bridget leaned against the wall, and drew her field jacket tighter around her swollen form as she watched him unload the trunk. “We were worried about you.”
Truthfully she wasn’t sure if most of the others had even realised he was gone yet, people had been busy with their own tasks.
“I didn’t want to have wasted gas,” Drew muttered in answer, moving back and forth from reaching in and bringing whatever he grabbed to the ground. Every kind of container imaginable was within, mostly stuff he’d found in the house to carry things with as he’d been sort of spontaneous with the whole not planning it thing. It didn’t matter. “I didn’t go into the city. Just a split-level house.”
Bridget nodded, accepting the explanation. It looked like he’d had a successful raid, the house must have been untouched since the swine-flu had swept through the region and killed everyone off.
“Looks like a profitable haul...” she sighed and decided that it was better just to quit pussyfooting around and get to the point. “Got a minute to talk?”
I have a feeling I won’t be the one talking much, Drew thought in answer, but bit back the words, still pulling out bag after box and soforth. “What’s on your mind?”
Bridget took a deep breath and reminded herself this wasn’t the first time she’d gotten into a relationship argument with a man. It was the first time she’d done it with a man she wasn’t involved with though. He was still a member of the species though, hopefully she could get through to him. Now, the metaphorical two by four between the eyes or try to be subtle about it?
After a moment she decided that subtle wouldn’t get her anywhere, it was time to go for the mental two by four. “You’re an idiot, you know that?” She wished the man would look at her, but for right now this would have to do. “Ana came all the way from fucking Seattle to find you, stayed when the power went out, travelled up here with us and has been here all this time, and you think she’s going to leave you for this other guy?” Bridget rolled her eyes. “Please.”
The young woman found herself on a roll. “Do you have any idea how jealous I was when the two of you showed up, together and obviously in love with each other?” Her hands rested on the sides of her belly. “Do you have any idea what I would have given to have my husband show up out of the blue like Ana did? You’re one of the luckiest people on the face of the planet and you’re throwing it all away because you’re jealous of this other guy? If she had any real feelings for him she never would have left Seattle, because the odds were pretty damn good that you were dead. She came anyway.”
Drew kept quiet even after she found a pause in her tirade, closing the trunk once it was emptied and going to the driver’s side back door to pull out more. Inwardly he had to remind himself that the woman in front of him was hormonal, and that - like she said - she’d had her own personal reasons for seeking him out and unloading her frustrations. He was just a target, nothing more. Part of him felt agitated that Ana had just gone on and talked to the first willing person, though. It wasn’t anyone else’s business. And all this ‘dead’ business... he’d never given up hope. Why were people so hopeless?
Because it’s a coping mechanism, he told himself, though he hated the idea of it. Because it helps them get over their guilt or their hangups or whatever else. Fuck that. I’d rather have hope. Or at least, he had. He wasn’t so sure anymore.
“Anything else?” he said nonchalantly, giving a labored breath as he pulled out something particularly heavy.
Bridget’s eyes narrowed at the attitude and wished he’d look at her. “I’m just getting stared.” She warned, warming to her topic. “Ana loves you, you idiot. If she just wanted to go back to this other guy, do you really think she’d ask you along? She wants to show you off to her friends there, show that it was the right decision to leave them and that you were alive. I’m not saying she was entirely in the right during your argument.” She allowed, willing to give him that much. “Once people who care about each other really get into it they sometimes don’t stop and think about what they’re saying.”
Her last statement gave him reason to roll his eyes. Thanks, Dr. Phil, he inwardly snarked. Drew grunted as he reached as far as he could to the other side of the car’s interior without going to the other side, grabbing the last bag and pulling it out before shutting the door. He’d leave everything in the cellar and let Meg and whoever else sort through it later. All he wanted was to go inside and find somewhere to sleep. Maybe the living room.
Drew paused to look at everything on the floor, trying to decide the best method on how to carry everything without straining himself too much. He decided on slipping bag over either shoulder and then grabbing a box, and began to do just that.
“Just a suggestion?” he said, his words straining a little as he tested the two bags first by standing before crouching down to grab another box. “It’s hard to take anything you say to heart when you keep calling me an idiot.”
“Then stop acting like one and I won’t have to call it like I see it.” Bridget frowned and tried to take one of the bags from him, but he pulled out of her reach.
“Nah, I got it,” came the quick explanation.
Maybe she was being a little harsh, but she couldn’t help it. The young woman saw Drew and Ana together and all she could think of was Jake. “Look, you had a fight. That means the two of you are human is all. She didn’t mean it when she said she wanted you to clear your things out of your room.” The young woman wanted to take him by the arms and shake him until his teeth fell out. Why did men have to be so goddamned stubborn?
“Stop,” he said. Fully loaded up, he finally ventured a look at her, his expression carefully constructed and his voice calm. “I don’t need you to assess my problems with my girlfriend, or reassure me. And I’m sorry, but it’s not your business.” He shifted the weight of his load, heaved a sigh, and frowned at her. “I know Analise. I know the kind of person she is. Was,” he corrected. “And if she still is that person, then shit will work itself out. It always does. But I stand by my feelings. Whether or not you or her think I’m an idiot, I have a right to ‘em.”
Bridget took a deep breath, not really able to argue with most of his points. “Actually, it is my business, kind of.” She refuted, knowing that he was trying to keep his annoyance and temper in check. “We’re all cooped up in this house together now, it’s in my interest to get the two of you patched up. Ana’s a friend, you’re a friend. I don’t like seeing my friends hurting.”
“I’m not really a fan of people telling me how to live my life,” Drew said with a hint of irritation before he managed to get himself evened out again. “Chores and labor and whatever else, sure, but my personal life is not yours to mold in the way you’d best like to see it. Like you said: people fight. Whatever happens, I will always, always care about her. I have always cared about her happiness, and put it before mine. You don’t know us, and what we’ve gone through, or the promises we made to each other before we were separated. She was never dead to me.” His voice had started to get emotional, and he paused for a moment to find his bearings before continuing on.
“Do you understand how reckless and unsafe it would be driving up to Seattle? We can’t just do whatever the hell we want in this world anymore. Nevermind the roads not being maintenanced and whatever the fuck else... people are fuckin’ crazy; you know this, I know this. Her comin’ to Vegas was a risk, and she also knows this. If you were to leave tomorrow Bridget, I wouldn’t expect to see you coming back just to reassure me that you were safe’n sound. We can’t just take a leisure trip, and quite frankly I have no interest in meeting the people who charmed her and kept her from me. I really don’t care if they were her friends or not.”
Now that argument she didn’t have a comeback for, at least the practical side of it. She thought that herself for the most part. But she was willing to bet that those particular points hadn’t been part of his argument earlier. “Drew, while you stayed in Vegas after the flu I was travelling across the country. I lost the last of my family and probably my husband on the road.” Her eyes were shimmering with tears just thinking about it, recalling the events of the past year. “I know exactly how unsafe it might be. I wasn’t saying you should go along with Ana’s idea, but I also don’t think it was very fair to shut her down because you were jealous of them. Do you have any idea what I would give to have your problems?”
“By all means, you can have them,” he answered, scowling slightly. “I’ll say it again: I stand by my feelings. I’m not going to call you an idiot or hate you because you claim to be jealous of us. I have every right to feel the way I do. And if she wants to go up there with Tom or Jed, or a few others, then she can go. I won’t stop her, even if it’s a stupid idea--” and even if the idea of her being there with them makes me sick, he added inwardly. “--But I’m not going, and nothing either of you say to me is going to make me wanna go. Okay?”
“I didn’t say I was jealous now, Drew,” the ‘idiot’ was left unsaid this time, but Bridget rolled her eyes. Maybe she was still a little jealous, but she’d worked through most of it. “I’m not even saying you and Ana should go. I’m saying the two of you shouldn’t be yelling and screaming at each other. Life is too precious now. I’m betting you didn’t use these logical explanations for why you didn’t want to go earlier, right?”
“Actually I did manage one, but she didn’t give a damn. When she wants things, she rarely does,” he explained, feeling a twist of agitation once again.
She sighed, tired of fighting with him. It wasn’t healthy for her anyway and it had been a long day already. “Look, just don’t move your things out and actually talk with her, be honest about why you don’t want to go instead of accusing her of wanting to go just so she could be with this guy who was interested in her up in Seattle. She could have stayed up there, she chose you instead.”
“I wasn’t planning on leavin’,” he said through clenched teeth, ignoring the last part of her words. You didn’t hear what she said to me. You wouldn’t be sayin’ that if it’d been said to you. Truthfully, he had no interest in talking to Ana right now, or ever bringing up Seattle again. She wasn’t ever going to really let it go, he knew it, and it only proved how much she would rather be up there instead of with the group she and Molly had convinced him to join. While he certainly had garnered polite friendships with the people he now lived with, he had never wanted to be with them. All he’d wanted was his girl, and a safe place to hide them in. Other people were not important to that equation.
He shifted the box in his arm. The strain of having been holding it the entire time was starting to wear him down. “Are we done now?”
Bridget sighed in defeat. She’d given it her best shot, but she was a history professor, not a relationship counselor. Not that she’d ever claimed to be that, but Ana was her friend and she didn’t want to see the other woman hurting. If Drew wanted to keep being all cave-man about it there was little she could do about it. “I guess so.”
The young woman turned and started out of the garage, holding the door open for him. With another shift of the box he headed out into the near-darkness, heading toward the cellar from muscle memory. He knew by the time he was finished that there’d be no problem with falling asleep. At least that was a comforting thought.