Rebecca's P.O.V

We had been at the Shady House for a month now and we still hadn't gotten the password. We had gotten comfortable and no doubt would be helpless if we had to leave this place, but it wasn't ours and that pissed me off. Okay, I can be honest, I wasn't really angry about not having the house to ourselves. I was pissed that Melissa kept abandoning us to go on adventures with Evelyn.

Apparently Evelyn was just always gone, all the time, for long periods of time, and now she was taking Melissa with her. That meant when the two got home there was this big fanfare. Oh My Gosh! Evelyn and Melissa's are back! What did they bring back for us? Food? Clothes? Videogames? Movies? Weapons?

And they always brought something. Even then, when the excitement about the new things wore off, the attention was still on Evelyn, because she ran the house and she was in charge of getting everything. And that was just as annoying if you asked me.

Evelyn we need a new light bulbs. Put it on the list. Evelyn we're running low on ice cream. Put it on the list. Evelyn the house shut off the water again! Fine I'll fix it.

Sure the shut off times were longer now, waiting at least four days before starting sleep mode. But it still happened and it pissed me off. Oh, and that list? Evelyn had a huge whiteboard on the wall on the second floor, coincidentally the floor where she had put us, the third floor was apparently hers. I thought it was an attic, turns out it was Evelyn's little abode.

Anyway, this whiteboard had columns on it with names. Names of people she needed to go scavenge for, some of them I knew, like Flemming and Jack, others were unfamiliar to me, like Cooper and Tiberus. She had our names up too, a subsection under the column for the house. All we had to do was write what we wanted down and at some point Evelyn would go and get it.

And yeah, that was pretty cool but we had some pretty stupid rules too.

Okay, so maybe they weren't all that stupid.

The first one was don't touch her computer, which we did all the time, it was on the second floor for some reason, off of this other room we weren't allowed to touch. Melissa reckoned it belonged to a family member, but the thing was covered in dust and boyish memorabilia so it was clear that whoever had it had belonged to wasn't around anymore.

The second rule was don't go onto her floor, which was easy enough to obey as she locked the fucking door to it.

The third was don't mess with the wall of generators in the basement. Like we ever would.

The fourth was don't let the zombies out.

The fifth was don't let anyone in.

The Sixth was remember to feed the zombies. Why the hell would we want to feed the zombies? Luckily the boys would do that for me.

So you see, some were stupid, some were essential. But even though our quality life had greatly increased and I now had everything I could really want, I wasn't happy. I wasn't the center of attention, Evelyn kept allowing Will to have his own room and time away from me, I literally had nothing to do in this big house except for chores which I hated, and no one ever came to see me.

The only people who showed up these days were either Jack or Godrick, usually it was Godrick bringing Jack but both of them were only interested in seeing Evelyn. Sure Godrick was always interested in talking to me, but his main concern was Evelyn and not me and Jack's main concern was either Evelyn or Melissa, more often Melissa.

This week Evelyn and Melissa had been gone six days, which was longer than usual. And as I mentioned before the house starts shutting off after four days. We immediately went into panic mode, we attempted to contact Evelyn but she wasn't answering her radio, so we filled the sinks and bathtubs with water and got the flashlights. I was absolutely livid.

And to top it all off, the fucking radio wouldn't shut up. Some stupid person named Coop trying to get a hold of Evelyn. Of course it was the work radio not the emergency radio and of course rule number eight was not to touch that thing so we just had to sit there and fucking listen to this guy beg Evelyn to answer and oh my god stop being so selfish, and seriously how long were you going to be out on rounds Ev-ie and the most confusing: "Brand-o has your goddamn card you better freaking answer."

So by the end of the sixth day the water was officially off, the power had been off for three days and yet the radio kept talking, we had no air conditioning, but the fridge still worked so at least we had food. But I was so mad that I was officially going to punch Evelyn the second I saw her smug face. Upstairs and Keith was screaming: "I see her car! I see her car!" and then the boys came rushing down the stairs like a pair of over abundant puppies.

Then then waited at the door that connected the house and the garage, bouncing up and down and chittering non-stop about what the two of them brought back with them, and what stories they could tell. I heard the garage open and shut, seconds later the lights flicked back on and right after that there was Evelyn coming through the door shaking the dust of the road off of her with Melissa right behind her.

The boys crowded around them demanding to know what they brought back and taking the bag full of goodies like a bunch of children on Christmas while I hung back watching the two women in front of me laugh. They thought they were so cool with their inside jokes and their dirty smelly bodies but I could see right through them and they weren't cool. They were disgusting.

Evelyn walked past and I grabbed onto Melissa and held her back while the boys chattered aimlessly about whatever it was the two had brought back and demanding to know all about their adventures.

"You were gone for six days!" I hissed and Melissa rolled her eyes at me which just made me angrier. "I didn't know if she had killed you or something!"

"Well, obviously she didn't so calm down!" Melissa whispered. Her eyes were still on Evelyn who hadn't even shot us a second glance but instead was attempting to make tea as the boys jumped around her pretty much just acting like pathetic little puppies. If Will wasn't so hot I'd have kicked him to the curb by now.

"Melissa, we can't keep living like this! You may be happy but the rest of us are miserable!" I cried being damn certain that Evelyn couldn't hear us.

At that exact moment I heard Keith scream: "I've never been so happy!" and I could have kicked him in the nuts if he were close enough. Melissa pinned me with a smug grin and went to join Evelyn who was sipping on a cup of tea and handing Melissa her own cup. I couldn't help but scoff at this, Melissa had never been a big tea drinker before. I mean, we never really had water to boil... or tea bags... or sugar and milk... but that's not my point here.

This was all so stupid, bowing down to Evelyn just because she got us some things we didn't think we could get again, or had this amazing house that was super safe and still had electricity. We needed to get rid of her, she was unpredictable and unreliable and I was the only one who saw that.

The Radio had my back though, for as soon as I decided that I needed to sit my group down and have a strong chat with them about their betrayal of our original plan, the static cut through the joyous exchange in the kitchen. Everyone fell silent,

I swear to God Evelyn I'm this close to giving Brand-o your private line! You can't see my fingers but their like millimetres apart!

A cross look donned Evelyn's face as she slammed her teacup down. "How long has he been calling?" she asked everyone in the kitchen.

"I unno, all week," Will said with a shrug. "It's on the work radio so we didn't touch it!"

Evelyn rolled her eyes, she moved to the cabinet and picked up the receiver. "You know you're on the house work frequency, right?" she asked. "And, as you know, I've been out all week."

There was a grueling three minutes of silence before we heard: Oh shit... yeah... okay that explains a lot.

"What's got your panties in a twist Coop?" she asked shaking her head.

Brand-o....

"Yeah? And what's that French Fuck up to?" she asked with a grin.

He's in trouble. Immediately Evelyn's smile faded she stared at the receiver like it was a poisonous snake about to bite her. He needs you.

"What happened?"

He lost his settlement. Ran into some Drifters. He's already pulled out R's card.

"Survivors?"

Not anymore. That should have been a terrible thing to hear but Evelyn breathed out a sigh of relief. All he has is his immediate family, it was all R would allow.

She pinched the bridge of her nose. "He's pulling my card, isn't he?"

He needs you to meet him in Ottawa, wants an escort I believe.

Evelyn was silent a moment. "That's out of my territory, and you know that. He can't be seriously asking me go all the way there as an escort."

Bring Steve.

Evelyn groaned. "Ever thought that Steve is busy?" she asked sarcasm dripping from her words.

We both know if you ask he'll go with you, busy or not. It's your best bet if you're going to leave the city. R won't mess with you if you bring Steve.

Evelyn groaned again and began to pound the receiver into her head with her frustration. After at least a good solid six hits Coop said: Stop hitting yourself with the receiver, you're stuck Evelyn you have to go.

"Fine give me the frequency, I'll call him when I'm on my way out," she said. He gave her the numbers for the channels, which she wrote down on a pad of paper she kept by that radio and then hung up.

She stood there glaring at the radio, boring holes into it as if it were the cause of all her problems. She turned to us, all of us staring at her waiting on baited breath for any explanation of what just happened. Her eyes zeroed in on Melissa. "Wanna go on a road trip?" she asked her.

Melissa was immediately smiling. "Damn straight I do!" she cried. "I'll go get us more ammo!"

Before Melissa could run off I stepped into the kitchen and glared at Evelyn. "How long will this trip to Ottawa take?"

"I don't know," Evelyn relied quickly going to the fridge. "Do you think you guys could make us some food while we pack?"

"You can't keep doing this! Your house shuts off without you, either you don't go or you give us your password! I won't take no for an answer anymore!"

Evelyn turned to stare at me, she glanced at the guilty faces of the boys who were probably thinking the same thing but not about to tell their newfound hero this. She sighed. "Fine, I'll give you guys the password before I leave, happy now?" she asked. She handed the business of making food to the guys and then left to make sure that she had enough gas.

As soon as she was out of the room we all joined together to confer.

"It's time we got rid of her!" I told them

No one seemed too pleased about my decision, Melissa least of all, but they knew I was right. We could not trust Evelyn, she had to go.

"I unno, she's not that bad," Will said softly and I could have killed him for going against me right now.

"You say that now, but what's going to happen when she's bored of us? When this little game of hers isn't fun anymore? Obviously she needs to go and then we can do anything to the house. We can take her collector clients, we could control everything! Melissa just has to get rid of her!"

"Me?" Melissa cried. "You're the one who hates her so much, why don't you do it?"

"You're going all the way to Ottawa with her! You'll have ample time to do it!"

"And what if she brings Steve? For godsake the guy sounds like some super soldier, what's he going to do to us if I kill her?" she snapped.

"Do it when he's not around, leave her body somewhere where zombies will get it. Make it look like an accident, anything! God this has to be done, she's too unpredictable!" I snarled.

The boys winced but nodded in agreement. Melissa sighed dejectedly. "Fine, if she gives us a password that works, I'll do it, I'll get rid of her."

I smiled triumphantly, having literally no idea that someone had heard our whole conversation.