Reflections - TWD

107. Kind.

Daryl and Connie went to the top floor, Lydia and Henry went to the middle floors and Isabella and Freddie stayed on the ground floor. Isabella hated Daryl's team picking. It was so awkward.

"You got your knife?" Freddie asked, tapping his foot slowly and breaking the silence.

"Yeah," Isabella mumbled, holding it up to show him. "It's not like I can do much, you know, with a broken rib and all."

Freddie put a palm to his face and scoffed. "It wasn't even me."

"Yeah, it sorta was," Isabella tilted her head to the side and put her knife back in her pocket. How could Freddie stand there and deny it when there were literally witnesses?

"Jesus. When did you stop being so nice?" Freddie grumbled.

That hurt more than a broken rib. That was probably the only thing Isabella did want to be. Kind. A good friend. Was she not that anymore? Was she being to hard on Freddie? Something could've happened over the six years they were apart, something that she didn't know about.

"Can you just shut up?" She rolled her eyes.

"Fine by me," Freddie mumbled and leaned against the wall. "Girl with one ear," he whispered so quietly that Isabella barely heard it, but she did.

And suddenly, Isabella was nine years old again. Except this time, she couldn't run away to play with baby Judith and Tara, she just had to stand there and take it.

Those years in the woods may have done herself some good, but it felt like everyone around her grew and changed, but she just stayed the same. Everything was different. It made Isabella want to go back into the woods and spend her nights talking to Daryl about everything that was on her mind. He'd lay next to her and listen until she talked so much that she wore herself out and fell asleep.

Freddie just kept on looking at Isabella, but she wasn't going to give him the satisfaction of a reaction.

"Can we go for a walk when you finish that?" Isabella sat on the dirt while she watched Daryl fixing up the boat. He'd try to fix it all the time, but he didn't have a great amount of patience and he'd just give up. "Do you need any help?"

"Maybe, and nah," Daryl shook his head, mumbling with a screw in his mouth. "Shit," he mumbled as he dropped his hammer into the lake.

"Seems like you needed help," Isabella shrugged, trying to make light of the situation.

"Mhm," Daryl hummed. He got off the boat and dried his hands on an old towel. "Seems like I did," he replied as he walked over to Isabella and tickled the side of her ribs.

She giggled and pushed his hand away, standing up and grabbing onto his sleeve instead. "Can we go for a walk now?" She gave him the biggest smile she could muster up just to convince him a little more.

"Sure," Daryl mumbled. They both started to walk side by side through the trees. "Ain't really much of a walk for you. Ya just get tired and then I've gotta give ya a piggyback."

Isabella nodded quickly. "That's the best part."

"Not for me it ain't. I gotta listen to ya snorin' while I carry ya back," Daryl raised his eyebrows playfully.

"I do not snore!"

"Do too," Daryl shrugged.

•

"Why did you come after me?" Lydia asked Henry.

"Because..." he breathed. "I care about you."

Lydia furrowed her eyebrows and took a sharp breath in when Henry took a step towards her. Henry leaned in, cupping the side of her face and closing his eyes. Lydia's eyes went wide and she took a step back.

"Is there something wrong?" Henry asked, awkwardly clearing his throat.

"No-" Lydia shook her head. "No, it's not you. It's just...Isabella's been nice to me, she likes you...I can't do that to her. She's, like, the first friend I've made in a long time."

Henry shook his head and chuckled. "This isn't about her," he continued, still trying to convince Lydia to give into the kiss.

Lydia shrugged. "I just...I can't, Henry," she turned her back and walked out onto the balcony.

Even if Isabella didn't know it, at least one person found her to be kind.

•

Isabella picked up her radio from her pocket and spoke into it. "The walkers are coming to us now. We can see Beta, but we're pretending we can't so we can sneak up on him if we need to."

Daryl spoke back down the radio. "Got it."

The barricade of chairs and tables that Freddie and Isabella had put up was down within seconds. They thought it would hold for at least a couple of minutes, giving them time to get to another room or something, but it was completely down and the walkers were piling in.

The worst part was that they couldn't even tell who was a walker and who was a whisperer. It was too dark in the building, and even if the whisperers were insane, they were also insanely good at pretending to be walkers.

The plan was for Isabella and Freddie to head up to the fourth floor when they saw the walkers, that's where everyone else was meeting, but they'd missed their queue and pretty much fucked the entire plan up.

"Screwed this up, huh?" Freddie mumbled as he took his knife out of his pocket and started walking forward.

"Yep," Isabella whispered, doing the same thing.

One of the whisperers grabbed Freddie's shoulders, but he was quick to twist his arm around and work his knife up to the person's head.

Isabella tried to push the whisperer that was coming towards her away, but she failed at it. She tried to do the same as Freddie, but she couldn't do it. Why couldn't she fight?

She hadn't had to fight for all those years in the woods, and she'd probably lost most of her skills out there. It wasn't like she was ever an excellent fighter, but she was struggling to even push someone back.

Freddie jabbed his knife into the whisperer's head and then grabbed Isabella's wrist, pulling her behind a wall. She felt pretty pathetic. Freddie, who hated her guts, had to save her.

If she struggled with one, how was she gonna handle the rest?

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the intros to two of my new fics are out now! one is a Minho tmr fic and the other is a twd Negan's adopted kid with Daryl being a father figure too! :)

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