“That’s…” Eva was about to decline. She wanted to decline. The prospect of meeting Juliana’s mother, a mage-knight, outside of combat gave her pause. She rather hoped she’d never have to fight Juliana or her mother, making friends now might help. “Alright. I’ll go.”
A look of surprise touched Juliana’s face. She quickly recovered and nodded. “I must warn you. My mother can be a tad… overbearing at times.” She turned and led Eva out of the dorms.
Eva didn’t know what to say to that. She shrugged to herself and followed after Juliana. “How’s the town anyway? What is the damage?” she asked after a moment of silence.
“Five students died. I’m not sure how many people in town died, heard it was a lot. Not to mention the people who became the original zombies.”
“It couldn’t have been too many. Brakket’s population is what, a thousand? Two? Not including the students.” Eva glanced around the streets as they walked. People milled about. Shops were open. If anything, it seemed busier than before.
Juliana stopped suddenly. Eva had to jump to the side to avoid crashing into her. “How many is too many to you, Eva?”
“Enough for the school to shut down, I think,” Eva said with a frown. She stepped off the sidewalk and into a bit of deep snow in her efforts to evade Juliana. She could feel the snow seeping into her socks and shoes.
It wasn’t very pleasant.
“This is a sleepy little town apart from the school. The kind of place where everyone knows each other. Even a handful of untimely deaths affect the people more than you could guess.”
“You shouldn’t let such things bother you. There are simply things you can’t change.” Eva thought about pulling out a pen and drawing some heat runes in her shoes. She didn’t know why she hadn’t already thought of doing that. Unfortunately, Juliana started walking again.
“I should have been able to change things,” Juliana said after a pause. “Instead I cowered in the dorm while you went out doing whatever you were doing.”
“Hunting zombies, and you weren’t cowering. You were watching over an injured friend. That’s far more important than helping random people.”
“Is that all they are to you? Random people?”
“Since you didn’t name any names, even when you mentioned students, I am going to assume that yes they were just random people.”
“They were people with lives, Eva.” Juliana stopped again and turned to face Eva. Eva was more ready for the stop, she didn’t have to dodge this time. “People who might have been eventually in your life if they wouldn’t have died.”
Eva frowned. Juliana seemed to be taking this conversation more personally than she should. “Did someone you know die, Juliana?”
“Not really,” she said. She turned and resumed walking. “I heard Mr. Toomey died.”
“He, well, probably didn’t deserve it,” Eva lied. “Thousands of people die every day that don’t deserve it and you don’t worry over them. Just because some died close to us–physically, not emotionally–does not mean we should lie down and act differently than normal.”
“That’s a cold way of looking at it.”
“Maybe so. There isn’t much I can do about it, especially after the fact. I’ll concern myself with those close to me before I worry about others.”
Eva wondered how true that actually was. The closest people to her before was a very short list consisting mostly of Devon. Arachne probably got on the list sometime more recently, but neither of those two really needed to be concerned over. Arachne was nigh-immortal and Devon was Devon.
Nowadays she had friends. Real ones. Probably. Did she concern herself over Juliana? What did that even mean? It sounded good when she said it, but now it started feeling weird.
How do people even know if they’re friends anyway?
Juliana didn’t say anything the rest of the way. Eva wasn’t complaining. She doubted friends often talked about such morbid topics.
Eventually they came to a stop in front of a homely little cafe stuck between some decrepit looking buildings in town. A faded signboard let customers know the shop was called The Liddellest Cafe.
It was a quaint little cafe. Painted on red roses and giant mushrooms adorned the window. Glowing yellow eyes and a teeth filled grin were reflected in the window, but nothing was there when Eva turned to look.
“Well, don’t make a fool of yourself,” Juliana said, “she’ll tease you as long as she knows you.” She paused with her hand on the door. “And let’s try to keep the conversation light, shall we?”
Eva nodded in agreement. She’d had enough with heavy for one day.
Juliana opened the door and stepped through the large horseshoe that framed the doorway. She walked straight to a corner booth–a large table that seemed to be a giant clock–with only a nod towards one of the staff behind the counter.
