Sheriffs Hat | Carl Grimes (PROGRESS ON PAUSE)

l i f e l e s s

Carl and I laugh as Michonne drops herself down onto one of the remaining benches. But it's true, this is the first time in what feels like forever that we actually have the ability to relax, whatever that word could mean nowadays.

"Oh!" I exclaim, remembering something I had saved for an occasion like this. My feet rush me into one of the rooms within the back of the church, opposite of the rectory, and I slide open a drawer connected to a desk, it revealing a simple blue and white box of playing cards. With a smile, I snag the cards and run back out to the others. "Carl, I'm teaching you how to play poker. And Judith, I honestly think she'll be a faster learner than you."

Carl laughs and Michonne smiles, watching me run over to the boy and sit on the ground, him joining me with his baby sister in his lap. I slide the deck out of its box and begin shuffling them with all the techniques I learned over the years.

"Now, where did you learn to play poker?" Michonne chuckles and sits up in her seat, carefully watching me deal cards out to Carl and Judith, although she can't truly play poker.

I chuckle. "My dad had poker nights every Friday, guess I picked up a thing or two from observation."

This wasn't entirely true. Every week, a poker night would be held at my house, that was true. However, I learned about poker and how it works through asking questions, questions to distract my dad while he was with his friends so my mom could sneak out to retrieve groceries for the family without getting screamed at. Anytime she even mentioned leaving the house, it would be an hour long battle before she was permitted to go.

After minutes of playing and trying my hardest to teach Carl, he speaks up gently.

"You never talk about your parents," He fidgets with a card, not daring to look at me. Judith fusses gently and Michonne almost unnoticeably peers up from her laying position. "What we're they like?"

I stiffen, adjust my posture, avert my eyes as far from Carl as possible, and begin dealing a different set of cards.

"They were something." Is all I say. Carl doesn't need to know, neither does Michonne. They don't need know the way my past has built me, the way I had to learn knife skills even before the apocalypse. They don't need to know that I've been prepared for times involving lacks of food and water for many years. They don't need to know that before the dead could continue stumbling around, unsafe situations became my domain.

Michonne and Carl spare a glance to one another that doesn't go unnoticed.

I decide to ignore the look and ignore the fact that they are now interested in my life, which they shouldn't and don't need to be. "Alright, so, with those cards-"

"Please let me in! Help!" Ear-piercing screams rupture from outside the church. "They're getting close, help!"

Michonne sits up fully, her eyes blown wide and her face now deadly serious. Carl and I stare at each other, both of us breathing more heavily than we had been just mere seconds ago.

"It's Gabriel." Michonne mutters under her breath.

More screaming comes from outside, pleas of help, until eventually the noises circle around to the front of the church. The door rattles aggressively as Gabriel pushes on it and uses all his strength to push it open, the wooden boards preventing that from happening.

"He'll never get it open," I murmur. Thinking quickly, Michonne and rush over to the small stash of weapons made. She grabs an axe and I retrieve a machete. Carl follows behind quickly, loading a pistol with ammunition.

"Carl, Michonne, Maia, please help me!" Gabriel shouts and cries from outside the doors as we rush to the front. Immediately, Michonne and I begin striking at the wooden slats in order to take them down. "I had to see it, I know that now, let me live with it!"