𝐘𝐨𝐮 𝐏𝐫𝐨𝐦𝐢𝐬𝐞𝐝 | 𝐂𝐚𝐫𝐥 𝐆𝐫𝐢𝐦𝐞𝐬

𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐫𝐭𝐲-𝐟𝐢𝐯𝐞

"Changing conversation to avoid talking about you and Carl? Now I wanna know; you kiss?" Kareem asks, raising a teasing brow and smirking.

"No."

"Did you two admit your wittle feelings."

"No."

"It's one of those two, I'll figure it out."

Ahead is three cars; we see only the hood of them because we refused to step closer to see up the hill. Miles of seeing nothing but road and now we see something that's useful. Understandable that the first thing we think is set-up; understandable that we were a little hesitant.

"I'm gonna head into the woods.." Daryl says, looking over at Rick. "..circle back."

"May I come with?" Carol asks him and he's quick to respond.

"No. No, just me."

I use this time for my advantage; to rest. I sit in the dirt, between the road and forest. The sun's shaded by the trees above me, it makes the wind cool again. Soberly, I sigh and watch while the leaves dance amongst the branches they sprouted from. I rest my head on my bag and cross my legs; it feels the same, like every day is the same day. I feel extra exhausted because of it.

After they searched the cars and the area, only to find nothing, they join me. I make room for them, shuffling away as far as I could. I like it this way and I thought that this is how they liked it, too. I was wrong.

"You're bothering me." I breathe, looking at the boy who sits beside me.

"You're ignoring me." Carl counters back, drawing out a sigh.

"I'm not in the mood to talk about how we feel, so, can we save it for later?" I wanted to sound a little standoffish or rude so that he would leave me alone. He doesn't. "We can talk about what happened when we're under a roof."

"Are you okay?" He murmurs; it's like he didn't hear what I said, like it slid over his head and down his back.

"Carl." I groan lowly while covering my eyes, crossing my arms over them.

"Okay." Carl laughs and I couldn't control my eyes; they fall to his lips then back up to his eyes. "Okay."

Rustling and growling from the other side of the street makes us all snap up, quickly, and when it's dogs that step out and in our view. Kip stands, growling and barking at them, making Kareem toughen his hold to keep him away from the wild dogs. It gets bad when they start, aggressively, barking at us.

Daryl and Rick rises slowly, large knives tight in their hands; silenced shots makes me jump back. We watch as they fall like flies, whimpering as they're killed. Sasha was who pulled the trigger, no regret, no hesitation. But the others said nothing, if anything, they were more silent than they were before.

Rick snaps sticks or branches, into twigs. They're used to hold the meat of the dogs over the fire. They ate the dogs, I refused to— no matter how hungry I was.

"Eat." The stench of dead and cooked dog makes me scoff and turn away from Carl's hand. "If you don't, you'll starve." He says again.