Deanna approached me slowly as if approaching an injured animal.
"I'm Deanna Monroe."
"I know."
"This house. It's yours if you want."
I shrugged not wanting to get into why I'd be gone by tomorrow.
"May I ask why you chose one so far away from the members of your group? I'd have thought all of you would want to stay close to one another. It seems you're the only one who chose to be alone." She pried.
"I just like my privacy, that's all." I turned my head to gaze up the street as the lie rolled easily off my tongue. It rose on a hill and a couple of children kicked a red ball around.
"You're different." Deanna started again not taking the obvious hint. My eyes grew heavy with fatigue.
"Proceed with caution, Rick warned me about you. But, I can see in your eyes that you have a story to tell."
"How many walkers have you killed?" I asked, ignoring her ridiculous statement. I didn't really give a fuck about Rick's pointless antics but I wanted to change the subject to something familiar.
"What?"
"It's what we call the dead. A member of the group came up with it. Now, please answer the questions. I'm curious. It's been a little more than a year and I want to know how many of the dead you've killed."
"None."
"Do you know how to kill them?"
"Through the head."
"Yes, but it's a bit more complicated than that. The skull is hard to get through especially with a dull blade and walkers are incredibly strong. Stronger than you think."
"I don't need to know that, really." She said, waving her hand at me, a pinched look on her face. I chuckled, sliding off the banister.
"Oh, you think so? How many people have you killed?" I asked taking a few steps toward her.
Deanna took another step forward to meet my eyes. She was a head taller in her heels. The floorboards creaked under her weight and my hand reached for the knife in my leather strap at my waist. I curled my fingers around the hilt but didn't pull it out. Deanna stopped.
"Why the questions?"
"It's something the group used to do. Or still does. I don't remember. I haven't heard them do it in a long time. You really want to know about all of us?"
"Of course. You intrigue me. I need people like you and your people?"
"What would it be for?"
"What?"
"This—this interview process you're forcing on all of us. I think it's all pointless."
"How so?"
"This world doesn't belong to us anymore. It belongs to the dead and we all die eventually. Recruiting people to fight them or build some community isn't going to stop what's happening."
"It's not necessarily about taking the world back. At least, not right now. In the future, maybe. But, right now, it's about building hope. Building a sense of structure and leadership people can follow. People want to feel normal again and I want to give them that. And I want all of you to be a part of that."
I just stared. Deanna deflated at the dead look in her eyes. No reaction. No joy. No hope. So, she mentioned what she assumed would bring something alive in her.
"Fuck hope." I seethed through my teeth getting closer to her face but she remained confident. With a deep breath, she asked the one question that held the power to shatter my entire world.
"Daryl mentioned an Adrian. Who was he to you? What happened to him?"
My heart skipped a beat and my neck flared with heat.
"Excuse me?" I asked, dangerously low. Every instinct of mine told me to leap off the porch, find Daryl, and punch him in the face until I cried. But, I breathed in through my nose and out through my mouth slowly and deliberately.
"Don't say his name again. Do you hear me?" I warned trying stay tough.
"I don't mean to offend you or your family. I offer my deepest condolences and I have no idea what you've been through, how much that person meant to you."
"No. You don't." I growled, my fingers curling into fists. I felt myself starting to lose control. Heat flushed across my skin despite the cool breeze of the night, my hands shook, my jaw trembled, the corner of my eyes burned, butterflies hurt my stomach, my heart thudded against my chest, my head started to pound.
Water welled in my eyes, her image going blurry. I flinched when she took my hand so gently that it almost hurt like fire. I let her touch me.
"I lost my daughter before all this happened. She was my everything. When she died, it felt like the world ended right then and there. Time stopped and it felt like hell, like it was never going to get better. I'm not going to lie to you and say you're going to be back to normal but time does make it more bearable. You don't have to forget about them but you can't let that grief turn you into something unrecognizable. "
I stood frozen as her words struck something deep inside of me that lay dormant, something broken and in desperate need of love.
"No one knows what..." I whispered but every word I longed to scream at my family caught in my throat and the emotions swelled.
"Oh, honey." Both of her hands wrapped around mine and somehow we were both on our knees on the porch, tears streaming down both our faces. With my face buried in her chest, I sobbed, the release opening the gates to all my grief. Silent cries escaped my mouth turning into wails, her hands cupping the back of my head and holding my shoulders as I collapsed further.
I didn't know how long we sat there but I eventually calmed down into whimpers, my chest heaving up and down with the aftershocks of my cries. She brushed my hair from my damp forehead.
"I'd like to know about him and your story. He deserves to be remembered and I just know he got you here. Focus on that, focus on the good..."
The good...
The good....
What good was it all?
What happened, what Daryl did, how was any of that good?
nikki.
Start from the beginning
