Looking Forward, Looking Back.

[12_Gauge_Chimp]

Hey y'all, here's my second attempt at a zombie story. It's called "Looking Forward, Looking Back". Thanks again goes to Tater Raider for helping me with the story title.

I hope you all enjoy it and let me know what you think of it.

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September 12, 2015- Just another day in the land of the dead and I often ask myself why I'm still here when pretty much everyone I ever cared for is gone.

This all began a few months ago when some poor bastard ate a tainted burrito from a gas station that could qualify as a toxic waste dumping ground. I think every town had at least one of those places. Anyway, the guy developed symptoms that made the Ebola virus look like the common cold and soon the whole country, and world for that matter, became ground zero for the zombie apocalypse.

I make my way across this wasteland that I once called home and constantly wonder what lies ahead for me. The story of how I came to wander this land is a long and not very interesting one, but I guess it's necessary that I tell it. So gather round, everyone and listen to my ramblings. The info I share with you may save your life one day. Well, that or it'll keep you entertained for a little while.


"Son of a.." I said as I looked out my bedroom window. The sight that greeted me was one of absolute horror and morbid curiosity combined. It looked like my house had been plucked from its foundation in Arizona and dropped in the middle of downtown Baghdad. Cars were overturned and on fire and bodies littered the streets. It looked like something out of a war movie. At first it looked like a terrible accident happened. I walked outside to see if I could help and I barely made it out to the front gate when I noticed my neighbor Charlie covered in blood with half of his left arm missing. The poor bastard had lost a massive amount of blood, but yet he was still standing in the street, staring off into space.

"Charlie, you OK, man ?" I asked as I tried opening my front gate. No answer from him so I asked again, this time I was treated to the sight of Charlie's face covered in blood and few pieces of what had been a person at one point hanging from his mouth. "Oh hell." I said as I stumbled backwards in an effort to get the hell away from what used to be Charlie. He let out an inhuman scream and charged at me. Thankfully, the idiot tripped over the curb and landed chin first onto the top railing of my fence. He landed on the wrought iron fence posts with a sickeningly wet thud that sent bits of his brain and skull flying into the air. Charlie didn't move after that and I sure as hell wasn't about to take any chances, so I hauled ass back inside and called 911. The answer I got wasn't what I was expecting to hear. "We're sorry, but the 911 emergency call system is currently overloaded with calls, please stay on the line and your call will be answered in the order it was received. Thank you and have a nice day."

"What the hell, have a nice day !? I just saw my neighbor impale himself headfirst on my damn fence. How the hell am I supposed to have a nice day now ?" I thought to myself as I hung up the phone.

At the time I didn't really know what the hell was happening, but one thing I did know that it wasn't safe to be in my neighborhood anymore. So I decided to get the hell out while I still could and that's why I'm still around to tell my story. The road that brought me here was one that was long, dangerous, and filled with its share of good times and bad times, mostly bad times.

[Dogan]

First to moan, last to groan: MOAR!

Excellent start. I'd've put more about the location where he starts reflecting if I were writing, but I'm not, and it's great. Keep going!

[Snapshot7.62]

Good start!

[12_Gauge_Chimp]

I was just outside of Hobbs, New Mexico, travelling with my one constant companion, an AK-47 I've taken to calling "Chimpov" on account of it being a Russian gun and the fact it has a sticker of a chimpanzee on the butt stock. I know what you're thinking and, no, I had not lost my mind. Not completely anyway. It was a slow trip with me constantly on the look out for zombies or any other survivors. So far in the few months prior to that, I had only seen zombies, but I started seeing signs of there being other folks out there besides myself. I hoped they were friendly and wouldn't shoot me without good reason.

I pulled into a Stripes gas station on the outskirts of Hobbs and scoped out the area with a set of binoculars. No signs of zombies, but the bastards were getting smart, so I wasn't taking any chances. I checked Chimpov's ammo supply, which yielded 28 rounds in the mag with six extra mags in a chest rig I had found during my travels. I also checked the ammo supply for my sidearm, a beat up but still very functional 1911 .45 pistol.

Chambering a round, I slowly checked out the store to see if I couldn't find myself some food. Some of those little gas stations were gold mines for canned food and other stuff with long shelf lives. I was getting a bit tired of Spam, but it's not like I could stop off at a McDonald's or Burger King and grab a burger anyway. I stuffed a few canned goods in a bag and headed back to my truck. I hadn't had a hot meal in almost three weeks at that point, but I really didn't want to risk giving away my position to whatever may have been out there with a fire or using up my limited supply of canned fuel. After lunch I proceeded to make my way through the town, cautiously and slower than I would've liked. Scoping out the area, I saw little signs of anything useful and zero signs of any human activity in the last few weeks. Some of the houses had caught fire and destroyed a couple blocks worth of homes and businesses in the area. I didn't know if it was intentional or accidental, but the place looked like Nagasaki after the US dropped the A-bomb on it and Hiroshima during the closing months of WW2.

I decided to check some of the houses that were untouched by the fires and see what I could find. The houses didn't turn up a whole lot of useful stuff, aside from one that had a single 20 round box of 7.62x39 ammo for Chimpov and a good sized fixed blade knife. I thought about taking the knife, but it was too big to be of any real use and I already had a decent fixed blade attached to my chest rig anyway. I took the ammo and headed back to my truck. The drive out of town was uneventful as there was very little to check out and almost no places for zombies to hide.

[12_Gauge_Chimp]

As I drove along, I thought back to the first time I killed a zombie. It was just after I left my house in Arizona and tried making contact with my folks in Texas. I was looking through some nameless shop when I came face to face with a zombie. The thing, who at one point had been a nice looking young woman, came charging at me from around a corner. I popped off a few rounds in her direction, missing her completely. She tackled me and tried biting me, so I grabbed whatever I could get a hold of and tried beating her with it. I managed to get up and fired once more, this time hitting her in the throat, severing her spinal cord and turning her into a zombie rag doll. I put one more bullet in her head to end it and then walked out of the shop, empty handed except for my rifle. I sat in my truck for a good hour just staring into space thinking to myself, "I just took another human beings life." That was one of the hardest things I ever had to do and I have repeated that quite a few times since then.

During my slow trip down the road between Hobbs and whatever the small town is called, I noticed what appeared to be another human walking down the highway dragging a suitcase and carrying some kind of rifle. I didn't feel like getting shot so I pulled over and looked through my binoculars to make sure they were alive and not just a reanimated corpse. I decided to drive up to the person and see if they needed a lift somewhere. I guess they heard my truck approach and took cover behind an old tractor, aiming the rifle at me as I got out of the truck. Considering I was probably the only living person they had seen in awhile, I could understand why they'd do that. Hell, I'd probably have done the same if I were having to walk through a land infested with dead things that wanted to have me for dinner.

[12_Gauge_Chimp]

I had no other choice but to level my rifle at them and take aim. The time spent in the standoff seemed like an eternity as the other person came out from behind the tractor and I was able to get a good look at them. To my surprise, the person on the other end of the rifle was a young girl, probably no older than 20 or so, dressed in a pair of jeans and a flower print t-shirt. I wasn't really paying attention to her clothes as I was more focused on the rifle aimed at my head.
"Ok, I'm going to lower my rifle and I hope you'll do the same so we can talk. Sound good ?" I said, taking my finger off the trigger and lowering my rifle. The girl lowered her rifle and sat down on the grass by the tractor.
"Where are you headed ?" I asked.
"I'm trying to get back home to Dallas, but my car broke down and I've been walking for the last couple days." the girl replied.
"I can probably drive you that far." I told her.
"Really ? That'd be great. " she replied, picking up her suitcase and heading for my truck.

I headed back to my truck and set Chimpov on the rest I had made from an old rifle rack as I got in. The girl was eagerly waiting for me to start up the truck and get going. We drove down the road and talked, well, she talked while I listened and kept my eyes open for zombies and anything else unusual.
"I feel like such an idiot right now." the girl said.
"Why is that ?" I asked.
"Well, because we've driven for almost a half hour and I don't even know your name and I didn't introduce myself. It's rude of me." she replied.
"No offense, but I'd rather not know your real name. Keeps us from getting too familiar and makes our eventual split up a bit easier to handle." I told her. "If you want to call me anything, just call me Chimpov and I guess I'll call you whatever you want me to call you. Aside from your real name of course."
"Chimpov ?" She asked, confused.
"Well, I figure it's the easiest name I can think of right now and it's also what I call my rifle." I answered.
"That's a weird name, but I guess it works. I guess you can call me Dallas then. " the girl said.
"Nice to meet you, Dallas." I said to her.
"If you don't mind me asking, why don't you want to know my real name ? I know you mentioned our eventual separation, but is there another reason ?" Dallas asked.
"Well, I've always been kind of a loner and I've had this irrational fear throughout my life that anyone I got real close to, aside from family, would leave me. I had a few relationships that didn't work out too well and they kind of reinforced my fear." I replied.
"So, that's why you don't want to know my real name ?" Dallas asked.
"Pretty much." I replied. "I know it makes me sound like an asshole, but it's just something I've done for as long as I can remember."
"No, it makes sense. It kind of sucks that you feel you need to do that instead of being able to get close to people, but it kind of makes sense considering the world has gone to hell." Dallas said.

[12_Gauge_Chimp]

We pulled up to the outskirts of the small town and I got out to scope out the area with my binoculars.
"What are you doing ?" Dallas asked me.
"Just checking the area for zombies. I'd rather not end up as dinner today." I replied.
"Makes sense." Dallas said as she got out of the truck. "Is it clear ?" she asked.
"As far as I can tell, it's clear, but I could be wrong. These things can be scary smart when they want to, but for the most part they are pretty stupid. Stupid zombies I like, smart ones not so much. I guess we'll drive on and see if there's anything worth stopping for." I say, getting back in the truck. We drove past a high school and what had been a Wal-mart at some point. The store looked like someone had taken a paint sprayer filled with blood and gore to it and the amount of cars in the parking lot lead me to believe that it was during peak shopping hours when the zombies came knocking. I couldn't even begin to imagine what the local hospital looked like.
"All those people at that store, can you imagine it ?" Dallas said to me.
"Yeah, I imagine a really bad scene. And before you ask, no, I'm not going to stop the truck and check it out. I've had bad luck with stores like that. I almost bought it at one like it and I'd like to continue living. I can assure you the only thing inside that store is death and lots of it." I replied, not even looking at the store as we drove by.

We pulled into a small gas station and got out to stretch our legs. Being cooped up in a truck for a long period of time can be murder on the legs.
"So, do you want to see if the gas station has anything of use ?" Dallas asked.
"I doubt it'll have much. It looks like it's been picked clean." I replied.
"Can we just look ?" Dallas asked me.
"I guess." I replied. We checked out the store and found little of use inside. Whatever the store had that was useful it seemed someone else beat us to it. I remembered from my days of working in a crappy gas station, that some of these small gas stations had a gun behind the counter, so I checked it out and lo and behold I found a snub nosed .38 revolver. I figured Dallas only had the rifle and no secondary weapon that I knew of, so I thought I'd give her the revolver. Granted I didn't know if she even knew how to use a gun, but I figured I could teach her the basics later on. If we survived that long, that is.

[JCgoose]

I am enjoying it chimp, keep it up mate

[12_Gauge_Chimp]

I am enjoying it chimp, keep it up mate

Thanks, Goose.

[12_Gauge_Chimp]

We got back to the truck and I topped off the tank and the gas cans I had strapped together in the back. I figured being in the middle of nowhere there wasn't going to be a lot of gas stations in the area.
"Well, I guess that store was a bust." Dallas said, climbing into the truck.
"Well, a lot of folks probably had the same idea that we did and I guess they got here first. I did find a few useful items, though." I said, reaching into my jacket pocket and handing Dallas the .38. "Here, I figure you could use a sidearm to go with your rifle. It ain't much, but it's better than nothing."
"Thanks." she replied. " What about you, don't you need this gun ?"
"Nah, I already have a sidearm. You didn't see the 1911 strapped to my belt ?" I told her.
"To be honest, the only gun I noticed was the rifle you had pointed at me a few miles back." Dallas said.
"Yeah well, the AK is usually the first thing folks notice, the next is the guy who looks like Grizzly Adams holding it. " I said, laughing.
"Who's Grizzly Adams ?" Dallas asked.
"Never mind, he was well before your time. Now that I think about it he was before my time, to be honest." I replied. " You're going to need some extra ammo for that .38, I don't carry one so ammo is going to be a problem since that thing only holds six rounds, so I say use the rifle when you can and only use the .38 when you absolutely have to." I told her.
"Ok. I might need some extra ammo for my rifle. I only have like a box or two maybe." She replied.
"Crap. Ok, let's see what we can find here." I said.
"What about the Wal-mart we passed earlier ? " Dallas asked.
"No, no, hell no. I told you before, we are not going in there. Who knows if there's any of those things in there ?" I said." And besides, what makes you think no one else has already gone through and taken anything useful ?"
"Well, we won't know unless we look." Dallas replied. I had a bad feeling about that, but I figured it couldn't hurt just to check.

We drove up to the parking lot of the Wal-Mart and saw the destruction up close.
"Are you sure you want to check this place out, Dallas ? " I asked her.
"Now that you mention it, this place is kind of giving me the creeps. Maybe it wasn't such a good idea after all. Can we go now ?" Dallas replied.
"Are you sure ? " I asked.
"Yes, I'm sure. " She replied.
"Are you absolutely sure ? Because once we leave this place, we aren't coming back. So I want you to be 100 percent sure of your decision." I asked.
"Yes, yes, I am absolutely, 100 percent sure I don't want to go in there. " Dallas replied.
"Ok then. We'll leave." I said, putting the truck in reverse. Dallas didn't say anything as we left that parking lot and I really didn't blame her. This was probably the first time she had seen anything like that and it got to her. I had seen quite a few burned out and otherwise destroyed places like that Wal-Mart before, so I might have been used to the sight of blood and decomposing bodies, but something told me Dallas sure as hell wasn't.

[12_Gauge_Chimp]

"Have you ever seen anything like that ?" Dallas asked me.
"Yeah. Plenty of times and it always fucks with my nerves. I almost bought it a few months back in a store just like that. I foolishly decided to check it out and see if I could find any survivors. The only thing I found was a zombie who at one point was a young woman just like you. She had probably turned just a few minutes before I got there and when I showed up, she figured I was lunch. She was quick and strong, which is another thing about these things, when the virus first kicks in, it acts like an adrenaline shot to the system. Over time it'll go away and the zombie will eventually become weak and slow down considerably, but don't let that fool you, these things are still very dangerous even in that state. Anyway, I struggled with her for a few minutes before knocking her away and I manage to get a shot off with my sidearm. My first shot nailed her in the chest, but she didn't go down, it appeared to me like she was stunned for a minute or so. I aimed a bit higher and struck her in the throat and the shot apparently severed her spinal cord because she went down like a sack of rocks. She was still going, twitching like a meth head going through withdrawals, so I put a bullet in her head. That pretty much did it for her. That's what keeps them all down, a shot to the head. I walked out and got back in my truck and just sat there for a few minutes, just staring into space. I had never taken a life before then and I've had to do so quite a few more times, but in this strange new world, it's either them or me and I sure as hell ain't going to let it be me. So you can see why I'm hesitant to go into places like that Wal-Mart back there." I told Dallas. Dallas didn't say another word for awhile after that and just stared off into the distance.

[JCgoose]

Oi Chimpov how about a bit more

I am enjoying this

[12_Gauge_Chimp]

The next few hours passed by slowly, without a single word said between the two of us. We were almost to the next town when Dallas finally spoke again.
"So, what did you do before all this ? " She asked me.
"Not a whole hell of a lot really. I worked at home and rarely left my house. I spent most of my time chatting with some friends from back home online and looking up stuff for work. Not exactly a glamorous life, but it paid my bills and kept me occupied. How about you ?" I told her.
"I was working in Santa Fe and living with some friends from college when this all went down. My friends never came back from work that day and I decided to wait for them for a few days. Well, I waited and I didn't hear anything from them so I grabbed my suitcase and that rifle because I heard things were bad all over and left them a note saying I was going back home to Dallas. I have to get to Dallas and check on my family. I just have to." Dallas said.
"You will, I promise you that." I told her.
"What about you ? You have any family in Texas ?" She asked me.
"Nah, my folks headed off to visit my uncle in Montana about a month before all this happened. I tried contacting them when I got out of Arizona, but all I got was my uncles answering machine with the message ' We have bugged out to a safer place. If this is my nephew, please know that we are all ok and that we love you and pray that you find a safe place to ride out this event as well. Take care and we'll see you on the other side. Dasvidaniya, tovarich and God bless you.' That was the last I heard from them. My uncle was always considered nuts for preparing the way he did, but he had good reason to be as prepared as he was." I told Dallas.
"Why is that ? " Dallas asked.
"Well, my uncle always figured something big was going to go down in his lifetime and he figured he'd be prepared for whatever it was. I wonder if he ever figured on zombies being the big event." I replied. "Whatever it was he prepared for, he made sure I was prepared as well. When I moved to Arizona, he sent me an old rifle crate crammed full of survival gear. That rifle I had pointed at you was a gift from him as was the 1911. I added the chimp sticker to the AK out of sheer boredom a month ago. All of the gear I have in this truck was in that crate, with a few small items added by me later on." I added.
"Sounds like your uncle cared a lot about you. " Dallas said.
"Yeah, he did. " I replied. "Listen, it's getting dark and I'd really rather not drive any further tonight, if that's ok with you." I added. " I'm going to pull over to that rest stop ahead of us and you can go ahead and sleep for a few hours. I'll keep an eye out for any zombies." No sooner than I pulled into the rest area, Dallas was asleep. She probably hadn't slept for a few days so I really didn't blame her. I could have used a rest as well, but I had work to do.

[JCgoose]

MOAR or we send some kangroo cavalry

[12_Gauge_Chimp]

Morning came pretty quick and I was outside the truck looking around. Dallas woke up and asked if I got any sleep.
" Nah, I spent most of the night on watch and I can sleep later when we find a safer place. We should get going, don't you think ?" I replied.
"Yeah." Dallas said. We drove on for awhile and come to the next town and pass through it without stopping. I made the turn to the north and continued on.
"Can I ask you something kind of personal ? " Dallas asked me.
"That depends on what you want to know. " I replied.
"Well, you said some words I didn't understand yesterday, like tovarich and dosvidaniya and you had a slight accent when you said them. Where is that accent from ?" Dallas asked.
"It's Russian. My uncle and my mother were from Moscow and I grew up in a Russian speaking household. I can speak Russian fluently as well as read it, I just can't write it, but I never really had the need to do so. I only visited Russia once and that was when I was very little." I replied.
"Ok, that makes sense." Dallas said.
"Anything else you want to know about me ? " I asked.
"Not really, I was just curious about that." Dallas replied. "Maybe later, if you feel like it, that is." She added.
"Sounds good to me." I said.

[12_Gauge_Chimp]

The roads were unusually clear in that area, but I guess those roads didn't get a whole lot of traffic even before the apocalypse happened. I saw maybe two or three cars on the road and that was it. The strangest thing I saw was a combine harvester sitting in the middle of the road surrounded by mutilated and decomposing bodies. It was kind of hard to figure out which bodies were non-zombie folks and which were zombies. I guess the poor bastard who drove it was trying to get away from the zombies. Bad idea, but from what it looked like, the driver decided to take a few zombies with him before he got killed. Looking over the scene, I felt the hairs on my neck stand up like something bad was about to happen. Sure enough, before I could even react, I noticed a small group of zombies shuffling their way down the road towards my truck.
"What are we going to do, Chimpov ? " Dallas screamed.
"We're getting the hell out of here." I told her. I put my truck in gear and drove around the combine and plowed through the mass of bodies before me. Zombie heads splattered against the grill guard and bodies went flying into the air. We made it through the mass and I didn't let up until I was at a distance where I felt safe. I have to admit it was a dumb and potentially dangerous move, but we were alive, albeit a little shaken up.
"You ok, Dallas ?" I asked.
"I think so, where the hell did those things come from ?" She asked me.
"My guess is they heard my truck and were attracted to the sound. I don't know why I didn't see them earlier. I guess they were hiding behind the combine or in the fields. I told you these fuckers were smart, didn't I ?" I asked Dallas.
"Yeah. They're smart. Scary smart. " She said, staring off into space. I was really starting to hate those things.

[JCgoose]

Good work mate keep it going, in fact I demand one update a week

[12_Gauge_Chimp]

I guess Dallas wasn't used to seeing that many zombies in one place. I had doubts that she even fired that rifle of hers, but I only knew her for a very short period of time, so I could've been be wrong. We continued driving and eventually Dallas snapped out of her daze.
" You ok, Dallas ? " I asked her.
" Yeah, I'm fine. I've just never seen that many zombies before. " she replied.
" I'd like to say you'll get used to it, but that never happens. Hell, I've killed a bunch of those things and I'm still not used to it. You have to remember to not have a fear of them. If you are confident in your ability to kill some zombies, then you are a much bigger threat than they are. If you freeze up and get scared every time you see them, that's when you end up as zombie food." I told her.
" I don't want to end up as zombie food, Chimpov." Dallas said.
" Well, then we'll have to work on building up your confidence when it comes to these things then, ok ? " I told her. We continued driving until Dallas noticed some movement at a farm house just off the road. I pulled off to the side of the road and scoped out the place with my binoculars.
" Do you think they're alive ? " she asked me.
" I don't know, but I'm not sure if I want to take any chances and find out that they're just a bunch of corpses with an appetite." I replied. I continued looking through my binoculars, trying to figure out whether or not the farmhouse occupants are truly human or not, when I noticed someone in one of the windows looking back at me with their own binoculars.
" Well, I guess we have our answer. " I told Dallas.
" What do you think they want ? " Dallas asked.
" I don't know. Give me a second." I told her. I looked through my binoculars again this time seeing a old man holding a sign that read, " Channel 37." I assumed he meant channel 37 on my CB, so I turned it there and heard, " Hello ? If you can hear me, please respond. Over."
" I can hear you loud and clear, friend. Over." I replied.
" That's fantastic, if you're able to, why don't you drive up to the house and we can speak in person. Y'all look like you've driven a good ways. Over. " the man said.
" Roger that. Over." I replied. We drove down the dusty road leading to the farmhouse and in the back of my mind I was wondering what was going to happen to us and just who in the hell this guy was. At least he wasn't a zombie.

[JCgoose]

Hmm I might have to ask for some more

[golem3]

Great story so far, can't wait to read more. Keep up the good work.

[12_Gauge_Chimp]

We pulled up to the house and saw the radio guy standing on the front porch waiting for us. I got out first and grabbed my rifle, hoping I wouldn't have to use it. Radio Guy was about my height, give or take an inch or so, wearing the stereotypical farmers outfit of blue jean bib overalls, a plaid western style shirt and a John Deere truckers cap. The house itself wasn't in too bad of shape and reminded me of my Uncle Viktor's place in Montana. The only differences between this place and Uncle Viktor's was the lack of Soviet era machinery out front and a big USSR flag hanging in the window. It looked to be at least 100 years old and right out of an old Norman Rockwell painting. Obviously, Radio Guy took good care of the place over the years. I was just hoping he didn't have zombies in the cellar who he would end up feeding us to later on.
" Welcome to my home, y'all. Come on in so we can talk." the man said.
" I'd rather chat with you out here for a bit, if you don't mind, sir. " I told him.
" That's fine with me, friend. What are y'all's names ? " the guy asked.
" You can call me Chimpov and you can call the girl Dallas. I'd rather not tell you our real names because we may not be staying here for long. " I replied.
" Well, I guess you can just call me Farmer John then." The man said. " Now the formalities are taken care of, why don't y'all come on in and relax for a bit." Farmer John seemed like a decent guy to me, but only time would tell if we could truly trust him. He led us into the living room and sat down on an old recliner that had seen better days. Farmer John looked as if he'd led a tough life as well and the wrinkles on his face showed it.
"So, where are you folks from ? " Farmer John asked, leaning back in the old recliner.
"Well, I'm from Arizona and Dallas is from, well, Dallas." I replied.
" Y'all headed home or what ?" Farmer John asked me.
"I'm trying to just survive out here and I made a promise to the girl that I'd get her back home to Dallas." I replied. Farmer John went pale when I mentioned going to Dallas and I guess something big went down there.
" Something wrong, Farmer John ?" Dallas asked.
" Y'all didn't hear what went down there ? " he replied.
" No." Dallas said. "To be honest, we haven't heard much from anybody since this all happened."
" What happened there, John ? " I asked.
" Who wants coffee ? " Farmer John said, trying to turn the conversation.
" Screw the damn coffee and tell us what the hell happened in Dallas, John." I told him. Farmer John let out a pained sigh and proceeded to tell us just what happened in Dallas.

[Mr. E. Monkey]

Moar?

[JCgoose]

Moar?

What he said, dont make me bring out the stonefish

[12_Gauge_Chimp]

Over the course of the next hour, we listen and are horrified at what went down. The neighborhoods I saw destroyed by fire in New Mexico were nothing compared to the devastation in Dallas. I looked over and saw Dallas put her head in her hands and start crying. I got up and headed out the front door and onto the porch with Farmer John right behind me.
" You ok, Chimpov ? " he asked me.
" I'm as ok as I can be at this point. Dallas on the other hand, I don't think she's going to be ok for awhile. " I replied, sitting down on the edge of the porch.
" I didn't mean to upset the girl, Chimpov." Farmer John said to me.
" I know, John, but Dallas really wanted to get home to her family and I promised her that I'd get her there. It may take some time for her to recover from this." I replied. " You mind if we stay here for a few days ? I'd rather not have to expose her to those things again so soon." I added.
" Yeah, sure, y'all are more than welcome to stay here for as long as you need to. I got plenty of supplies and I wouldn't mind the company either. It gets awful lonesome out here when you're by yourself." John replied. " I'm going to go check on Dallas and see if she needs anything, Chimpov." he added. I said nothing as he walked back in the house. I could still hear Dallas crying in the living room and it was painful for me. I made a promise to her that I'd get her back home, but from what it seemed, home didn't exist anymore. Now I wish I wouldn't have asked him about it, for Dallas' sake. I also wish I hadn't stopped drinking before all this happened because I sure as hell could have used a strong drink at that point. I knew that my deal with Dallas was pretty much null and void at that point, which meant I could very well have gotten in my truck and left her there with Farmer John. Yet, for some reason, I was still sitting on that farmhouse porch staring off into the distance and wondering what was waiting for me beyond the horizon.