Everything went by so fast. One moment Nick is about to give me a tour of the library, the next moment there’s a knife pressed against my throat. I was so terrified, I didn’t want this to ever happen to me again. Not to be taken hostage, not to be threatened by death again. Being able to do nothing but concentrating on not fainting. So much fear and torment that it is haunting my dreams yet again. Yet this time there is a light in this terrifying darkness, this time I had a flicker of hope. Nick had gotten me through this nightmare, he had guided me on the narrow path in the middle of this dark abyss.

“I’m not afraid to kill you” the man hideously breathed into my ear. “I’m going to take everything away from you” he laughed a most dreadful laugh. I can’t move, my body won’t budge. “Oh. Is someone scared?” the man leans around me shoving the gun into my neck. He snorts into my ear, then moves away will a hysterical laugh. A shiver is sent straight down my spine, spreading throughout my body. I still am unable to move from this dark abyss. The man fades away and Nick appears in front of me as the light rolls over him. “Your going to be okay. Do you trust me?” Nick asks getting closer to me. “I-I don’t know” I say in a small voice. He comes closer to me, his face inches from mine. “Do you trust me?” he asks again. I look into his kind silvery eyes, those eyes that I’ve never seen the likes of before. No hatred, no blame, no anger. Just caring, loving eyes. “Yes” I mutter, “Yes, I do” I say louder, a smile sneaks onto my face. “Good, then I’ll take this burden away from you now” he reaches up and kisses my forehead, I try and save the lingering feeling of his lips against my skin. “You are safe now. Run, get far away from here” he smiles at me, he begins to back away (No don’t leave me. Please, don’t ever leave me alone). He fades off into the black.

The tie falls away from my hands. No, this is all my fault, it’s our fault this is happening to him. I fight as tears try to invade my eyes, (I have to get Helen and Doug) I run up the fleet of stairs and run through door after door in search of the married couple. (Where are they, I need their help, Nick needs our help) I run through the maze of door looking, searching for them. I burst through one more door to find them messing around with a science kit, they both look up at me puzzled. “We need to help Nick!” I panic and hold back more tears. “What are you talking about?” Helen asks, “Nick, he’s in trouble, we need to help him” she stands up and walks over to give me a hug. “What’s the matter, we’re here, your safe. It’s okay, calm down” Helen rubs my back. “What’s up with you, we need to help Nick!” Helen tilts her head and looks unconcerned. “It’s going to be alright, your safe with us now” She says in a calm voice. I wrestle out of her grip, “Nick needs Us, He Needs Me. He Needs My Help!” I yell, angry as I can be. I run back, the background blurring through my tears. I reach the stair-cased hallway, Nick is standing at the bottom looking half dead, he looks up to me and grins. He’s covered in black splotches and his skin looks like he got a sunburn, his hair is singed a little and his clothes are burnt in various places. I run up to him and hug him with all my might, I lean back and look into his eyes. I feel like kissing him, so happy to see him alive. He smiles at me, “Thank You for the trust”. Those words echo in my mind. I grab one of his hands and hold it to my chest.

“I’m so sorry” I whisper. I open my eyes. I see Nick about a foot away from me, laying beside me. His arm is reached out to me, I look down. With a quick gasp, I notice that I’m hugging his hand to my chest for dear life. I quickly let go of his hand, heat rises to my cheeks (glad nobody saw that). I slid over close to his side, I tuck my right arm into my chest and lay my head against his chest. I concentrate my mind to his lungs, his breathing is still a little bit rugged but it’s much better. Without thinking, I place my left hand on top of him. My hearing flows to the sound of his heartbeat, ba-dum ba-dum ba-dum. I close my eyes, my mind drifts off.

My cheeks burn as Nick passes out in my embrace. His last words made my stomach and heart do a flip, (thanks for trusting in me). Such common words that are said by friends, yet this echoes in my brain continually. I wasn’t planning on hugging him when I got here, but in the spur of the moment. When I saw the state he was in, my body had just moved on it’s own. “Um, sorry to interrupt, but what exactly happened here” Helen asked, (That’s right, I didn’t really explain too much. Kind of in a hurry). I lay Nick down on the ground properly, sit down by his head and lay his head in my lap. Still jittery, I try to explain in greater detail “First, when a few minutes after you guys left us, a guy jumped me. Some things happened and Nick lead us down to the door. In which he negotiated for me to be tied to the railing while only them two went in” “Are you hurt” Helen asks with a very concerned face. I shake my head, “No, Nick made sure I got out of the situation as soon as it was possible. As you can see, Nick is the only one that had anything happen to” I use my sleeve to try and rub some soot off his cheek, while holding back some tears. “How did you get untied” Doug asks, “Nick tied me up at a place he knew was able to cut the zip-tie. He told me to run as soon as I got it cut, then he unlocked the door and I lost sight of him from here”. I tried but failed to hold my tears back anymore, they cascaded down my face. Helen immediately rushed to my side and gave me a bear hug, “Your okay now, your safe. No one’s going to hurt you anymore” I continue to cry into Helen’s arms. “I was So Scared!” I cried loudly, “I bet. But your safe here now, with us” she cooed into my ear. “This is all of our faults, we did this to him” I cried out, Doug tilted his head “What do you mean?”. I cried some more, when I calmed down a little Helen leaned back and looked into my eyes. “Alexia… What do you mean we did this?” Helen questioned me. “Nick asked the man how he had found this place” I recalled the conversation they had with each other. “This place is kind of hard to miss since it’s the only one left in this town. Anyone could have and already have come here to threaten the people living here” Doug said trying to figure out what I meant. “Yeah, but that’s not all he said. He told Nick that he had followed us here, that he had been following us for days” I explain more. Doug gives an exasperated oh “I see, so he may not have found this place without us”. “We did this, we took his home away from him. We are responsible for this. I am responsible for destroying Nick’s home” I begin to cry again and Helen wraps me up again, “No no, you aren’t responsible. It wasn’t your fault. You didn’t do this” she cooed back into my ear, tears continued to fall.

“I’m surprised that he went this far to protect someone he had just yesterday” Doug knelt by Nick while staring at him. “He sure must have really liked you in that white dress last night” Doug grinned at me, I felt the heat rise up again. “This is not the time to be making jokes” Helen said sternly. Doug shrugged, “I guess we better get him upstairs for that fresh air he asked for”. We helped Doug swing Nick over his shoulders so he could carry him to the library.

Doug set Nick down on the couch I found him on yesterday when I pointed my pistol at him, I stared at his soot covered body on the couch. “Oh yeah, he took my gun too” I say out loud when I remembered him grabbing the pistol out from my pants, another shiver ran down my spine. “Just saves me from having to take it away from you. Though would have been nice to still have it” Doug flashed half a grin. He motioned Helen over for a quick chat then spoke to me “Hate to have to do this to you right after what just happened, but we’ll be back in a minute”. I shake my head “I’ll be fine… I think”. Doug and Helen leave for a couple minutes and come back with a few fire extinguishers. “I’m going to go put out whatever fire is still left and see what there is left to salvage. Helen I want you to get the packs ready, then come down and help me. Hopefully I’ll have it all out before you come down… Alexia, you should stay here and keep an eye on him. Also if he wakes up, so he doesn’t think we just up and left him.” Doug threw out some commands then left the library with the fire extinguishers. Helen grabs all the packs and places them near the couch, “Are there any bottled water in them?” I ask, she digs around in one of them and hands me a bottle. “If your good, then I’m going to go help him now” I nod to Helen, she hesitates then walks out of the library too. (Okay, first I should maybe give him some water) I lift his head up and tilt the bottle to his lips, letting small amount flow into his mouth. He starts to swallow, few seconds later he begins to have a coughing fit. I set the bottle down and lay him back again. (Now I need to check his breathing) I get close to him and touch my head to his chest, labored breathing and rugged sounds, but still breathing. I suddenly feel tired, the couch is fairly big so there’s enough room for me too, and still a little bit of space in between. I lay down beside him, I feel the heat from embarrassment (It’s not like I’m actually sleeping with him though). As I stare at Nick’s smeared face I replay the events that had unfolded. I replay them over and over again feeling dismayed, my eyes slowly close without recognition.

I feel an arm wrap around me and realize that I had fallen asleep again, but this time on top of Nick. “Good morning” Nick says, “For what do I owe for this pleasure” his says with his beautiful stupid looking smile, my stomach does a flip. I keep my head pressed against his chest, hearing is heartbeat, as my cheeks flame. I don’t know how long I had been asleep, but it was long enough for my body to become entangled with his. I press my hand against his chest to quickly get up, he gasps and cough. I raise my hands to my mouth “I’m sorry… H-how are you feeling, any better?” I ask. He takes a deep breath while gazing at me with those silver eyes, “Much better thanks to you, doesn’t hurt as much now to breathe” he looks up at the ceiling then back at me “Some water would be nice though”. I reach down and grab the bottle, he sits up with some effort. I tilt the bottle and he drinks a lot more than last time, “thanks for nursing me back to health” he says with half a grin. I blush as I put the bottle back to the ground. “Could I have you check my lungs to see how they sound” he asks me. I lean my head back down against his chest and listen for a moment, “there’s a little wheezing and crackling sounds but they have gone down” I say “that’s good, that means I’m getting better. It’s not good to breathe in smoke and I’m not certain on how long I was in there either. But… everything is going to be fine” he says. I let out a small cry, “I’m so Sorry” I say to him. “Why?” he sounded puzzled but I don’t want to look at him in fear of breaking down. “Because this is all my fault” a few tears run down and wet his shirt. He begin to stroke my hair, it feels so good, so reassuring and I continue. “If we hadn’t of come, this wouldn’t have happened to you. Your home wouldn’t be destroyed… I’m So So Sorry” I begin to sob again. Nick wrap his arms around me and I collapse onto him, I sob even louder into his shirt. When I quiet down he begins to talk, “No no no. By no means is this your fault. And before you say that you brought him here, I want to say something. He may have followed you here, but you didn’t bring him here, he come by his own free will. You didn’t force him to do all of this, this is all on him. He may have followed you here, and he may have not found this place if you hadn’t of come” my chest tightens up so much it’s hard to breathe “ but on the flip side, even if you didn’t come here, he probably would have stumbled upon the town some point in time anyways. He would have done the exact same thing as what he already did. If you hadn’t of come, I wouldn’t have been able to meet Doug or Helen. I wouldn’t have been able to meet you, ma belle. So don’t have those thoughts of never coming here, ever.” “But what about your home?” I ask. He chuckled, “I had a similar talk with Doug earlier. I don’t own this place, it isn’t mine. I was just a resident here, you were just as welcome to it as I was. Fact of the matter is, you didn’t take my home away, the meteors and the infection did. It was this apocalypse that took all that stuff away not you. And plus, a home is were you feel loved and where you can love. I’ve been alone for a month, if I had to destroy this to meet you guys, I would have bombed this place weeks ago. So don’t ever feel guilty about what happened here today, the only thing you should feel is joy and gladness that you and I are still alive. And together with your’s and my new found family” He smiles brightly.

He kisses my on the top of my head, I can’t help but blush. He sits up and leans back against the couch, I curl up a few feet away from him. “Now that that’s over with, where are the others?” he asks me. “They went to see what they could salvage from the rubble” “Ah, have fun with that, all of it was pretty much on fire, my guess is the propane ignited, flash burning everything. I’m just lucky I got the table down fast enough.” He laughs. (How can you find all of this so funny right after it just happened.) “May I ask you a question?” I say with a question. “Sure, fire away” he smirks (not funny). “I kept hearing you say that last night and just now. What does ma belle mean?” I ask curiously. He laughs, “It’s probably good that you didn’t know until know” he grins.

“It’s a French phrase variating off the word for lovable. It means, My Beautiful. For you, Alexia, are very beautiful to me.” I don’t know how to respond to that, so I just look down to my feet as my face heats up quite a bit. And is most likely very very red.