¹ 𝐒𝐂𝐑𝐄𝐀𝐌 𝐎𝐅 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐁𝐔𝐓𝐓𝐄𝐑𝐅𝐋𝐘, the walking dead

twenty eight. counting the days

"Yes?"

"Hm?"

Presley snapped out of her daze. She blinked back to reality, her eyes focusing on Georgia who'd looked up from her drawing from the dinning room table.

"What are you doing?" The girl asked, her eyebrows furrowed. Her tone was slightly accusing, as if she'd noticed Presley had been staring for a while and she was getting annoyed with it.

"What are you doing?" Presley's was more accusing, more pointed as she glanced down at the green crayon in her hand.

Georgia's eyebrows furrowed.

"Coloring."

"Why?"

"What do you mean 'why?'" she asked, "'Cause I wanted to."

"No but —" Presley sighed, growling as she leaned against the back of the chair. She huffed. She was doing what she hated people doing to her. She was sticking her nose where it didn't belong, and she was trying to ask questions that would have her banging her head against a wall if they were asked of her. "Like. . . why? How are you not like . . . a vegetable right now? Like Beth? I just, I don't get it, it's weird."

Georgia stared at her for a moment.

"Do you want me to be a vegetable?"

"I don't know!" Presley tossed her hands up, letting them slap down onto her thighs dramatically, "I just don't get how you're so fucking patty cake right now. Like fuck, everyone's in a mood, and I mean like next to Carol, I think you have one of the most valid reasons for being in a mood, but you're just . . . coloring. It's anticlimactic, and honestly, I don't think that can be really healthy."

Georgia stared at the girl, her eyes slightly narrowed. Her fingers curled around the green crayon, some of her golden locks fell from her bun, framing her cheeks. The silence had Presley sighing, she hated uncomfortable long silences.

Long silences were fine, but during a staring match? Fuck her with a spoon, that shit sucked.

The girl placed the crayon down.

"My life—" Georgia paused, taking a deep breath, "has . . . stopped. I'm going deaf, in a world where that feels like a death sentence. My mother is dead. My friends are dead. My grandmother, my uncle. My grandfather put in my head some false hope that they'd be fine, and that they were sick, and he was wrong. "

She spoke softly, slowly. So very much like her father it almost gave Presley Deja Vu.

"You've had years to cope with your own shit Presley." Her voice got louder, her stare got sharper. "Years."

Presley blinked, her eyes narrowing.

"But honestly, Presley . . . if you wanna try talk about my shit, how I handle my shit, don't. Because I don't want to take advice from a girl who almost beat a man to death with a wash board, or the girl who beat one of the dead in the forest. If I want to sit here, and for one moment forget about the way my life has been taken from me, then I'm going to sit here and do that. Maybe go find something that can take your mind off the trainwreck yours has been. But do me a favor, and do it in another room."