We woke up to find Johnathan not in his bedroll. We assumed he must have gotten up early, so I went outside to look for him. I didn't see him anywhere outside the barn door, so I called out for him. I heard him answer from behind the barn and I went to him. He was standing next to a pair of graves. They read "Samuel S. Mason 1963-2020" and "Elizabeth F. Mason 1959-2020". Each tombstone, made out of what looked to be broken slabs of counter top marble. shared the same inscription. "Forever joined, no longer suffering. May Heaven be all the more blessed to receive them."
Johnathan broke down and began crying quietly. No bellowing. No snobs. Just audible sniffling. I asked if he knew these two, and he said he didn't. I had to give him a few minutes. After he composed himself, he said he needed to talk to me. We sat on the fallen log that looked to be placed next to the tombstones as a bench for visitation.
He apologized before he began, and I had a look of concern on my face. He said he hates us, Kat and me, being together. I was taken aback by it, eyes wide open staring at him. He hated feeling that way, guilty for being so jealous, but it was pure jealousy flowing through him. He was trying his best to not let it get to him, but last night when Kat and I were fooling around under the blanket mere feet from him, was too much. I apologized again, but he said it was like we were rubbing it in his face. I assured him we weren't, that we just lost control, but it didn't matter to him. He was sick of us having sex all the time. I just didn't know how to reply to that.
He started getting angrier by the moment, occasionally raising his voice to a shout. I held out my hands to him trying to get him to calm down, but it had little effort. Instead, I asked him to really explain where this was coming from. That's when he told me he was a virgin. He felt like a loser. Even though John did well, working from the bottom of Home Depot and climbing up the ladder to owning one, he never had luck with women. It was always something. He wasn't the right type. He wasn't a good kisser. He had no ambition (even though he made 75k a year, it wasn't enough for some women apparently). Sometimes he dated women who were already dating, or even married to, other men. He never found love and thanks to the zombie apocalypse, he never would. Kat and I fell right into each other's laps, and he hated that, just absolutely hated that.
I truly didn't know what to say. What are you supposed to say to someone like that? How are you supposed to act around someone like that? Part of me was angry with him and wanted to cuss him out for having the audacity to be pissed off at two people in love with each other, but this was a sensitive issue, and I didn't want to make the situation worse. We needed Johnathan. Not only was he important to us as a group, he was also our friend. I just put my hand on his shoulder expecting him to shake it off, but he didn't. I used it as an invitation to start talking.
The first thing I told him, as cliche as it sounds, is that there's someone for everyone and that living in an apocalypse doesn't rule out the possibility of finding love. Kat and I were proof of it. He blurted out "BULLSHIT," but I let it slide. I was upfront him, though, saying that this jealousy of his was going to be a problem because it would affect trust. Trust is the most important thing to have in this world, especially when the three of us are traveling 500 miles north. I made him a promise that we would try to keep PDA to a minimum around him. He apologized for feeling the way he did, but I actually thanked him for telling me. It took some courage to say that, and the fact that he talked to me about it revealed a level of honesty that I appreciated. That made him feel better, and he also asked me not tell Kat about all this. Of course I wouldn't.
Just then, Kat came around the corner having some trouble with her crutches as they dug into the soft dirt. She wanted to check on us and see if we were okay. She caught Johnathan puffy eyed and he turned away wiping his face with his sleeve. She asked him if he was alright and before he answered, I waved to the tombstones and said it just got to him. She let out an aww and hobbled over to him and hugged him. He looked at me over her shoulder and although he tried to conceal it right as it happened, his face had a look of murderous intent. I don't know if he saw me pick up on it or what, or maybe I just imagined it but whatever the case, I just got a very bad vibe from him.
Kat let go of John and turned to me and I quickly had to erase the concern off my face as she hugged me next and kissed me good morning. I had to make the kiss short as I watched John hurry back to the barn. She felt me pull away abruptly and asked if everything was okay. I lied and said it was, that I was just in a rush to get breakfast going so we could take off and make the most out of the morning sun.
With Jonathan close by to us all day, I didn't have time to talk to Kat while we were walking. Even though I told John I wasn't going to talk to Kat about what he told me, the look I saw on his face when she hugged him, although it didn't last for more than a fraction of a second, chilled me to the core. I'm trying not to dwell on it, because I told him that trust was everything. If I started to think he somehow wanted to harm either of us, that would weaken the trust. I was afraid that I might actually end up trusting him less than he already trusted us. It's so uneasy now.
We managed to push a full 30 miles hitting I-74 heading west. There was a Hampton Inn that we decided to make our stay at. I guess the one good thing about apocalypses is that you can stay in hotels for free. The downside to that is no housekeeping. The hotel's air was both dusty and smelled of mildew. It looked like the roof leaked in several places. A few rooms were too messy to stay in. One actually had a pile of corpses in it as if someone were killing zombies and used the room for storage.
Johnathan said he was going to take off and find a room of his own. I told him not to take one too far away, that we should be close to each other in case of an attack. He didn't bother answering back. He just took off down the hallway, passed several rooms, and then went into one and closed the door a bit harder than you normally would. Kat knew something was going on, and squinted at me when she asked if everything was okay. Hector, man, I could sure use some tips on poker faces. I tried to say it was, but she did that thing that women do when they suspect you of lying. She turned her head just slightly to her left, squinting even more. Fuck...
So I told her, but I held back his look of murderous intent. I really didn't want her starting to feel uneasy about John, and I started doubting myself for keeping that kind of information from her. She didn't seem to be too bothered by the jealousy. In fact, she said she understood perfectly. She wanted to go down to his room and talk to him, but I told her I didn't think it was wise. He needed to be left alone to get his thoughts together. If he wanted to talk about it, he would come to her. And well, I did tell him I promised I wouldn't tell Kat. She looked down and said, "Oh." I don't like betraying someone's confidence, but I did make a promise to Kat a while back saying no more secrets, and I'm already breaking that one as it is.
We had a small dinner of dried apricots (which I'm not a fan of) and granola bars. Kat said she missed real food. She wanted me to take her out to a real restaurant where the waiters held towels over their arms and read off wines you never heard of and gave you menus with names of entrees you couldn't pronounce. She wanted us to go out on a real date where afterword, we'd hold each other's arms and walk around the block talking about how good the dinner was and how great of a time we were having. She wanted to be that girl who would invite me up to her apartment for some coffee knowing full well coffee wasn't coffee. I just closed my eyes imagining the real world that escaped us so long ago.
Thank God she crashed the moment she laid in bed. To be honest, I wasn't feeling like cuddling, which would probably lead to sex. I needed to think clearly tonight. My mind's a mess right now. I'm trying to sort this whole Johnathan shit out. I'm really bothered with it to be honest. Now I have to act differently around Kat because of him, and I really think that's unfair! I'm trying not to be angry by it, but I just feel like the good thing Kat and I have has to suffer because of his bad luck. It's not my fault he always had relationship problems. But I will say this. The MOMENT he tries anything, either with me or Kat, I won't hesitate to kill him. For John's sake, I hope he keeps his emotions under control
Until tomorrow.
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