I Used My Nemesis as a Chew Toy for 468 Days

I kept my nemesis locked in my bedroom for 468 days. Every night I climbed on top of him and licked and bit whatever I could reach.

After I turned, I came out too weak to kill anything. I was starving out of my head, and he was the only meat I could get my hands on.

Then, on day 468, a line of text scrolled past above my head. [The female lead is about to show up with her team.

She rescues the male lead, and then she puts a bullet in the villainess's skull.] I kicked Kieran off the bed so hard he hit the floor. He looked up at me, furious.

I looked anywhere else. "I—I want to try someone new," I said. "You've been smelling kind of bad lately." Chapter 1 "Try who?" "…Do I smell?" Kieran's eyebrows pulled together.

He lifted one arm and sniffed. Then the other. "I shower every day." He wasn't wrong, and we both knew it. That excuse had come out of my mouth like a brick.

He'd been locked in this room for over a year. He ate what I gave him, went where the chain let him.

And he still scrubbed himself clean every single night before he got into my bed. He was running out of patience. It was in the flat line of his mouth.

I thought about the comments and hunched my shoulders. "I'm sorry, okay? For all the times I drooled on you." "Don't worry.

Starting tomorrow, I'm done ruining your life." Kieran folded his arms and looked down his nose at me. "Wren. You'd better actually mean it this time." I didn't answer.

He gave me the look of a man who had heard this exact speech nine hundred times, then pushed himself up off the floor.

The chain on his ankle dragged across the boards with a sound that went through my teeth. He put his hand on my forehead. "Can zombies run fevers now?

Is that what this is?" "I'll have to write it up." The words were barely out of him when the comments started rolling again. [The villainess says HE stinks.

Has she smelled herself?] [Thanks to her, the zombie world finally has its own twofaced pickme girl. Bet our boy loved that.] [Locked in a basement and still doing virus research.

Our boy is such a saint. I'm sobbing.] [Strongest fighter x genius brain. Our girl and the male lead were MADE for each other.] [Sunshine x ice prince, nom nom.

I eat redemption arcs for breakfast.] On and on. Line after line, packed so tight I couldn't see the ceiling through them. My eyes burned.

I still didn't know who the female lead was. I just knew she was going to save Kieran from me, the villainess, and then she was going to keep him.

He climbed back onto the small double bed. I dragged the blanket over my head and pressed myself flat against the wall. If I could have gotten out through the plaster, I would have.

All night, I behaved. No chattering at him. No poking him in the ribs until he threatened to bite back. Nothing. Kieran watched me for a while.

His eyes moved across the galaxy of empty mattress between us. Then he turned over without a word and curled up in the dark. Kieran was my nemesis.

Him hating me was the natural order of the universe. The comments said the female lead was coming for us soon. But how soon was soon? Next month. Tomorrow. Tonight.

All I knew was that he had to be gone before that bullet showed up. Chapter 2 A year ago, a private research lab in Nevada sprang a leak. The X220 virus got out.

Inside of a few months it had the whole planet. Back then I'd just landed my dream job offer. My whole life was sitting there waiting to start. Then something bit me in my sleep.

By morning, I'd changed. I figured out pretty fast that I wasn't like the others. I wanted flesh, sure. My teeth ached with it. But I could think.

Most of the time I could talk myself down. I kept a lot of my human habits, too. The second I confirmed I was infected, I did the only logical thing.

I walked across the hall and kicked in Kieran's door. We'd been at each other's throats since we were kids. Test scores. Height. Who got the last cookie. Every single category.

I wasn't about to lose this one either. If I was turning, he was turning with me. So I shoved his shirt up, looked at that flat stomach, and chomped down with everything I had.

Here's what I did not account for. The bookworm had been quietly lifting weights for years. His abs were like biting into a curb. I nearly cracked a molar.

I didn't even break the skin. I clapped a hand over my mouth and tried to run. Kieran caught my wrist. "Wren. You're infected?" His forehead creased. It came out like an accusation.

What was that supposed to mean? Was he enjoying this? Was that a dig? Heat shot up the back of my neck. I put both hands on his chest and shoved him with every ounce I had left.

Kieran didn't catch his balance. He stumbled back, cracked his head on the corner of the table, and dropped like a coat off a hook.

When he came to, I was sitting in the chair across from him, grinning like a cartoon villain. "Kieran. Welcome to the doomsday shelter I picked out for you." "Be a good chew toy.

Heh heh heh." He looked at the chain on his ankle. Then at the front door, and the three deadbolts I'd added to it. His hand curled slowly against his thigh.

Finally he lifted the hem of his shirt like a man handing over his wallet. "Then… go easy." Here's the thing. Somewhere in all that time, I stopped wanting to beat him.

Four hundred and sixtyeight days I kept Kieran in that room. He was the only human being I knew in the whole dead world. I started needing him there.

Bickering with him was the only thing that made me feel like a person instead of a thing with a heartbeat problem. I didn't want him to leave. But I wanted to live more.

Morning came. For the first time ever, I made him breakfast. He'd always cooked it himself. Milk. A sandwich. A softboiled egg on the side.

In the apocalypse that's a fivestar menu. Kieran was still asleep. His lashes threw little shadows down his face, which was annoyingly nice to look at.

I bounced over, put on my best kissup smile, and shook him. "Kieran! Breakfast!" "…Breakfast?" He wasn't all the way awake.

His voice came out rough and confused, and he blinked at me like I'd asked him to solve a math problem. The comments flew past. [Ma'am. He is ASLEEP.] [I can't.

He had no blanket all night, he nearly froze, and now she's shaking him awake for no reason.] [His favorite food is our girl's seafood risotto!!

Not this!!] [Food made by a zombie is disgusting, throw it out, THROW IT OUT.] My hand stopped in the air. Kieran didn't say anything about it.

He washed up, sat down at the table, and ate quietly. "Is it good?" I asked. He nodded. "As long as you like it." Those black eyes stayed on me the whole time.

Like he was trying to find the trap under my nice little smile. I took a breath. Held it. Turned the words over one more time. "Kieran.

When I said I'd let you go yesterday, I meant it." Chapter 3 "When you're done eating, go. Leave." Kieran's fork stopped halfway to his mouth. "Why?

Because I smell?" I couldn't look at him. "Sure. Let's say that." "Wren, you've been gnawing on me every night for over a year.

There's nothing left of me but the pit." "If anything around here smells, it's your spit." He leaned in and narrowed his eyes at me. "Being locked up by you is miserable, I'll grant you that—" "But there's food, there's water, and nothing out there can get in.

When this is over, I can get three straight papers in Nature out of the data I've collected on you. I'll be untouchable." The corner of his mouth curled.

It was the single most punchable expression I have ever seen on a human face. "So no. You don't get to throw me out." That sneaky, calculating rat.

He'd been sitting on that this whole time! He settled back into his chair like a man with all the time in the world and blew on the milk I'd warmed for him.

I sat there thinking about it until my jaw ached. And there wasn't one thing I could do about it. I didn't know how much time I had before the female lead showed up.

But I wasn't going to sit here and wait for it. She was going to find this building. Fine. Then she wasn't getting in.

I spent the day downstairs stringing a chainlink fence in a ring around the whole block, then baiting it until a crowd of zombies packed in against it. A wall that walked.

I reinforced every door on the perimeter while I was at it. By dark my legs were shaking. I dropped into bed and was out cold. I didn't even have the energy to bite him.

The whole time I worked, Kieran stood at the window and watched me. Dark eyes. Not one word. I have no idea what was going on in that head.

The comments started up again. [Our boy is observing the villainess again.

Research log +1] [Nobody will understand what she is doing for the next hundred years.] [What do you think she's doing, she's scared he'll run.] [Not gonna lie, that's actually a smart move.] [Zero people care about the villainess.

Focus on our girl, please and thank you.] [Doesn't matter. Tonight is the male lead's first meeting with our girl. She can build whatever she wants.] I put my head down.

There were blisters across both palms. I looked at them and let out a long breath. That night I lay in bed and couldn't fall asleep. My hearing had gotten sharp after I turned.

Usually that was a problem. Voices drifted up from the street. Low ones. "You're sure this building has the highgrade zombie we've been looking for?" A woman's voice. Nice voice.

Doubtful. Something in my gut said: that's her. In the dark, my fist closed around the edge of the blanket. "Confirmed, Captain. We came past on a supply run a few days back.

There was a female zombie squatting in the doorway eating a brain. Behavior's nothing like a normal one." That was a dragon fruit, you freaking idiot. I punched the mattress.

But those three words stuck in me anyway. Highgrade zombie. Me. The one who can't get through human skin. High grade. Then the gunfire started, braided together with screaming.

The comments detonated. [HOLY CRAP our girl looks so good shooting. Total girlcrush.] [She fights like something feral. Nobody warned me.

Chills.] [She made captain in a squad full of Powered on raw physical ability alone. You think that's a joke?] [Screenshotting this!

Go get her, that's your first blood!] [Wait, wasn't the villainess captured by the main team, studied at the Compound for a while, and then shot?] I told myself I was ready.

I'd known this was coming for a day and a half. My body did not care what I'd told myself. Kieran was awake beside me. He must have noticed something was wrong.

His fingers brushed the back of my hand. "Wren. Don't move. I'll go look." Chapter 4 He never got the chance. The window blew inward with a bang.

A body came through the glass like a thrown knife and landed on its feet. Adair unhooked the rope from her belt and crossed to the bed in three strides.

Then she got a clear look at Kieran's face, and something flickered across hers. It didn't last.

The muzzle swung off him and onto the space between my eyebrows, and her finger started, slowly, to close. "Got you.

You nasty little maneater." So that's what it feels like to have a gun to your head