Dear Journal,

Do you want the good news first, or the bad news? I’ve always been one to want to hear the good news first because I feel like it makes the bad news feel less bad, but I know a lot of people like to hear the bad news first because they just want to get it out of the way. But really, are you getting anything out of the way by hearing it first? In the long run, you still end up having to deal with it anyway.

Since you’re a book and can’t answer which one you’d prefer first, I’m going to start with the good news - Mr. Williams is doing a lot better! I don’t know a lot about a lot of the medicines that we brought for him, but apparently my mom recognized a lot of the names from when I was sick as a baby. I told you that that should be one of the first things they taught you in mom school! Apparently, it was, at least in my mom’s case. So she found something that she said was an antibiotic that the doctors always gave to me when I was little and ended up with bronchitis. I don’t know how my mom knew that Mr. Williams even had bronchitis or if it was just a lucky guess that the medicine would work, but for whatever reason, it did end up working, so yay! Mr. Williams has even been up walking around a little bit recently - just around the inside of the coffee shop, not going on any major hikes or anything, but it’s a totally huge improvement from where he was before. That alone makes our whole trip worth it to me.

The bad news is that, while I was hoping that my mom would forgive us for sneaking out as soon as supplies got a little low, that ended up not happening. Not that we ended up getting super low or anything, but we haven’t really done a ton of scavenging since Mr. Williams first got sick, so our supplies were about at the level when my mom would normally let Jared and I really ramp up our scavenging efforts, but this time, she said that we had to stay inside and help Mr. Williams with his walks around the coffee shop while she and Ben went out to look for food. Which, to me, was so stupid - Ben has hardly even been out of the coffee shop since this all started, and he only just started talking to my mom like right after we got back, and now they’re suddenly the best of friends who can go out and find food together? And last time my mom went out without us, she barely found anything, anyway. As annoying as Jared is, I can admit that he’s definitely the best at finding food out of all of us, with myself being a close second. To make us stay inside and help someone walk around just because we broke one of her stupid rules is just too extreme of a punishment, and it’s stupid on top of that. Hell, the one time there was even potentially in trouble while we were out, Jared and I were super careful. Shouldn’t that count for something??

Not that I told her about that part yet - when we got back, she was so mad that she barely talked to us, and she hasn’t wanted to hear anything about our “stupid and reckless” journey since. Maybe if she stops being such a bitch about it, I’ll tell her about the people we saw out there.

A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

I still think it would be best for us to go and find those people, personally. I know there’s some danger to it, obviously (I’ve seen disaster movies before - I know that some groups are probably evil, but I also think that a lot of that is super overly dramatic just because it’s in a movie. There’s so much food around, after all - there’s no need for people to be resorting to a cannibal cult just yet or anything), but I honestly think it’d be a better plan for us to be in a large group. My mom knows a lot and all, but what if she hadn’t recognized the medicine that we needed to give Mr. Williams? He could have died, and as far as we know, maybe that group is filled with doctors who could have easily helped us out. And if nothing else, they’re all so much that they probably have figured out some better way to handle the food situation. We can’t just keep searching through the same buildings hoping to find canned goods, after all.

Plus, from the little bit I saw of them as we were leaving, they looked like they were super clean, like they’d taken a shower before they went out to go scavenging. I wouldn’t mind teaming up with them just for the chance that we could get access to a shower of some sort because honestly, the scent of BO in this coffee shop is starting to drive me insane. Honestly, the thing that I wish we would find the most when we’re out scavenging is an intact Bath and Body Works so we could actually get some body wash and body spray, but of course, those don’t seem to have survived the bombings. So lame.

I talked with Jared about the group we heard during one of the times that my mom and Ben had abandoned us in the coffee shop. We even looped Bryce in, with the condition that she pinkie swore not to tell my mom about it. Once she heard what we were actually talking about, she immediately wanted to tell the adults about it, which I get, but they were so far away that I don’t think it’s a huge deal, and honestly, my mom is pissing me off so much that I don’t want to give her any information if I don’t have to. She already didn’t listen to me telling her that it would be fine if we spent the night away from the coffee shop, so why would she listen to anything we’d say about the other group?

Bryce is with me, though, in thinking that if we ever find this other group again, it might be better to join forces than to just keep hiding from them. Jared immediately tried to tell us that we shouldn’t be approaching any group we don’t know right now, and like duh Jared, we’re not going to just wander up with no protections whatsoever! I still think that Jared has seen too many bad zombie movies and is way overestimating how evil a group will be - after all, we’ve all been in the apocalypse, and none of us have turned out to be evil - but there is still something to be said for stranger danger. Do you remember stranger danger? Back when, you know, there were enough people around to be worried about meeting strangers on a regular basis? Now, the most recent stranger I’ve met is Ben, and he doesn’t even feel like a stranger anymore.

I don’t know, journal. In all likelihood, I’ll never see any of them again, especially if my mom makes us all stay here captive like animals in a zoo (side note, do you think any of the animals survived the blast? I haven’t seen any lions or anything wandering around, but until a couple of days ago, I hadn’t seen any other humans either, so who knows?). If we do somehow happen to see them, though, I think I might introduce myself. It might be dangerous, but I think it might be a risk we have to take if we want to find anyone who knows more about surviving the end of the world than a group of teenagers and my mom.

Love,

Kayla