III

Chapter 3

Annabelle

After about fifteen minutes of taking wrong turns, I finally arrived at the cafeteria. No surprise that everything was white except for the tables. However, what surprised me the most was how different it was than my expectations. There were approximately a hundred people in this vast room.

The cafeteria surprisingly looked like a normal high school lunchroom. That's where I got surprised the most. Everyone was socializing and laughing as if they were actually in high school. It looked like nobody was minding the fact that they were at risk of dying. There were even some couples making out with each other on some tables.

I made my way to the back of the room to get in line. Everyone was talking to at least one person and I felt a little left out since I didn't have anyone to talk to. The line was moving at an acceptable pace and soon it was my turn to get my food. Ladies fully dressed in a plastic suit wad scooping it and placing it on my trait as I advanced. It mostly consisted of veggies and other stuff that I didn't quite know off. I tried telling one of them that I didn't want any but she completely ignored me and proceeded to do what she was doing.

Once at the end of the line. I slowly scanned the whole cafeteria for a vacant table. Luckily I found one next to a window so I wasn't forced to sit with somebody I didn't know.

The tables were rectangular with small circle-shaped seats on both of the longest sides. I sat down on the one right to the window. I was able to have a limited view of outside but it was enough for me. The sun was shining brightly in the sky bringing some sunlight on me but I didn't mind. I considered myself a heat person. Whenever a heatwave was present during a summer day, while everyone was rushing to get inside and turn on the air conditioning, I was always the one person to sit outside and absorb as much heat as I can get. If that's weird enough, I never got sunburned once. That's why I thought of myself as a heat person. Also because I was born in the summer.

For the first couple of minutes of sitting in this unfamiliar environment, I just tossed my food to one side to the other. I wasn't even that hungry, I don't know why I bothered coming here. I started observing the type of people who were here. More specifically, the table right in front of me. There was a group of five people, two women and, three men. There were obviously two couples because they were all making out while one boy was left out and awkwardly sitting and eating. As if sensing my stare, his eyes lifted and landed on me. I quickly shifted mines to someone else so I could look a little less rude but who am I kidding, he most likely already saw me.

From the corner of my eye, I could see a group of three females walking towards my table. Once next to me, a beautiful looking blonde stepped up and smiled at me.

"There aren't any more tables available. Do you mind if we sit here?" Not wanting to be mean and start an unnecessary argument. I nodded and they installed themselves.

"How long have you been in here?" The blondie asked when seated in front of me. I didn't respond for a small while but when she rose a brow at me I snapped out of my daze and spoke.

"One day," I responded shyly and became even more self-conscious when every pair of eyes landed on me. They looked at me with pity and that was the complete last thing I wanted from people.

"Well, it must've been such a shock suddenly being trapped in here but don't worry everyone is very welcoming and this place is actually not that bad." Really, not that bad? I'm being kept in a facility with no one I know and away from my child. Excuse me if I think that this is one of the worst situations I got into so far. To top everything, I'm infected with a deadly disease. I didn't give a direct response, I just sighed and took the first bite of my food. Saying it tasted awful was an understatement. This was worse than my brother's cocking that tasted like rotten eggs. Sorry brother but you had to know.

"Let me introduce ourselves, I'm Miranda." The blondie said smiling showing off her perfect set of teeth. She seemed like a person with confidence, a leader.

"This is Tamara." She pointed to a beautiful African looking woman sitting right next to her. Light puffy black curls were hanging from her head and covering a small part of her round face. She looked like the kind of person who isn't scared of saying what's on their mind. Unfortunately, she was too busy stuffing her food in her mouth to notice anything around her. How could she even eat this so-called food?

"And that's Roxie, she's Irish." I turned to the redheaded Irish girl who was offering her hand to me. With a close enough look at her face, you could capture the small freckles surrounding her upper nose. I accepted her shake without hesitation. She looked like that kind of girl who was always joyful and smiling. Everyone at least needs someone like that in their life.

The rest of the lunchtime went smoothly. I came to loosen myself a little with them and they're really fun to hang out with. They've told me that they're all in section B of the rooms since they've had some fevers and a few times the flu. Miranda has been in here for almost three months and the others came in a couple of days later. We've planned to hang out more often but since they are not in the same section as me, I'm not going to see them a lot.

I was walking down a hallway not knowing where I'm heading to. I didn't feel like staying in my room and doing absolutely nothing so I decided to take a walk and explore some parts of the facility. From what I've heard, it provided some nice diverting activities so at least my stay here doesn't sound too boring so far.

Turning on a corner without knowing where it'll bring me to, I found a pair of large doors. With my curious side suddenly showing itself, I approached them and applied light force on them. It automatically opened to let me in. The scenery before me had me speechless. There stood a huge greenhouse filled with exotic plants that I've never seen in person before. Multicolored flowers surrounded me and I was absorbing it all. It was just so pretty. Seeing all of the sunlight infiltrate the room to focus on the flowers was making the scene even prettier.

When I decided to finally move from my spot, I walked down an aisle and reached the back of the greenhouse. There were benches so people could sit and an extremely long hose to water the plants.

"What are you doing here?" I screamed and quickly turned around. I was met with the creepy guy from the phone cabin.