𝐖𝐇𝐄𝐑𝐄 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐃𝐄𝐀𝐃 𝐋𝐈𝐕𝐄 | CARL GRIMES [TWD]

3 | feeding behaviour

— CHAPTER THREE —
feeding behaviours
[ 3917 words ]

"Carl! Jesus, you're alright!"

A woman bounds towards them, a long sheath jiggling against her back. She wipes a fringe of locs from her face and folds down to Carl's height.

"Michonne, what's going on?"

As if proving to herself he's real and tangible, Michonne cups his face. The touch is roughened by hysteria, but Carl doesn't flinch away. Sylvie, though, does. She glances  down at her feet, feeling like an intruder on their intimacy. The vulnerable shine to Michonne's eyes isn't meant for her, no matter how much a weak and childlike part of her is drawn to it.

"You said you'd stay close by." Every word is taut and wobbling.

Carl's voice snaps Sylvie's attention back. "It's okay! I'm okay. We're okay." Michonne slowly directs her gaze to Sylvie, all the softness in her voice melting to form a needle-sharp spearhead. Appeasing Michonne's scrutiny, he continues, "I found her when I was walking. Convinced her to come back."

"She doesn't look convinced."

"I am," says Sylvie. All the determination in her voice is feigned.

Michonne nods slowly before gesturing for them to follow her to the church up ahead. "A few of the others went out looking for you. You had your dad worried sick. All of us were."

Carl doesn't apologise, but hangs his head sheepishly. It's strange to see his fire quelled, but Sylvie doesn't dwell. Rather, a new realisation claws her by the throat as they spill onto the dirt path. This is the church — the one to the northeast. She would laugh if she weren't so averse nowadays. Even if Carl had never saved her, their paths would have clashed anyway. Stupid fate.

The Church is a gravestone for hope. Roof planked with silver metal, bruised with rust along the slope and dusted purple by the night. White wood scarred with grime and scratches: some shallow, some deep, all man-made. Beneath the awning, she watches cobwebs quiver in the crannies — refuge for spiders and bait for flies. Carl kicks her boot, attracting her scrutiny back to him. She almost throws him a scowl, but seals her lips: they're waiting for her. Michonne props open the door.

Inside stinks of ash and rotting paper. Rows of spruce wood pews cut across the hardwood floor, all sparsely lined with familiar bodies. At the crown, hunched over an altar across which a tawny Bible splits open, is the priest. His chants carry across the room. Desparate. Shivering.

One of the bodies whirls around, stern features softening in the amber lantern glow. "Sylvie?" says Maggie, more question than greeting. She pushes a lock of brown hair behind her ears, eyes alight.

Sylvie shuffes her feet in the doorway. She doesn't know what to do with the weight of that — Maggie's surprise, the hint of happiness that tinged the notes of her question. So she lets it settle on her. Feels a little lighter. But that lightness is swiftly lanced by the sheer number of eyes Maggie's incited to stare.