Mattie hoped that her presence hadn't agitated Nicholas. Trying to convince herself that it was the pain in what used to be his arm, not her, that had caused the crying, she patted him gently on the head before glancing toward the front door. [i]So weird,[/i] she thought. [i]Why would there be ding-dong-ditchers in the apocalypse?[/i] But it didn't even take a second for Nicholas to be front and center in her mind again. She wanted to apologize for letting him into that house on his own; she assumed he was crying for the arm he'd lost. But sorry, she knew, hadn't been good enough [i]before[/i] the zombies. 

She hadn't even noticed Jacob approaching with pain killers. He'd startled her, as people often did, but she dipped her head gratefully. Although she was more concerned with the blood loss issue. Surreptitiously she craned her head to look at the stump of Nicholas' arm. It didn't yield much information as to weather a scab had formed, for all she could see was the dark stain on the bandage. The thought of him slicing into his own arm like that...it made her momentarily nauseous. 

"Need help getting those down?" she asked anxiously.