SHELTER | DIXON

|25|

Twenty minutes. It had only been twenty minutes since Madison and Maggie left Beth in Andrea's care— just enough time for them to scarf some food down and head back up to Beth's room. Madison hadn't even bothered to change out of the tank-top and sleep-shorts she had worn to bed, too worried about Beth to even give a second thought toward what she was wearing as she followed Maggie back upstairs. Twenty minutes.

It had been twenty minutes too long.

"Beth?" Maggie called out when they entered the door and saw that Beth wasn't sitting on her bed. Andrea was nowhere in sight. "Beth?"

The sound of sobbing from the bathroom connected to Beth's room brought their attention to the closed door. Madison sprinted across the room and attempted to open it, only to realize that it was locked. "Beth!" She shouted, both she and Maggie pounding on the door when they heard the sound of glass shattering. "Beth!"

"Madison? Maggie?" Lori asked, entering the bedroom when she heard the commotion. 

"She's in there," Maggie told her frantically as Madison leaned away from the door and started looking for something to help open it. "We heard glass."

"Beth, you alright?" Lori asked, hurrying over to help Maggie try and get Beth to open the door. Maggie pleaded with Beth not to hurt herself, explaining to Lori that they had left her with Andrea. Lori frowned at that, but made no comment on it. "Where's a key?" She asked instead.

"Probably has it in there with her," Madison answered her. Her gaze caught sight of the iron fire poker then, and she quickly snatched it as she told Maggie and Lori to move out of the way. Shoving the pointed end between the door and its frame, she pried against it with all her strength until the door finally gave way and swung open. Beth stood in front of her bathroom sink, the mirror shattered, her wrist covered in blood as she whirled around to face them. She sobbed out an apology as Madison dropped the fire poker and hurried to her side, helping put pressure on her wrist. "Get my father, please," she told Lori, leading Beth down the hall to a different bathroom. Maggie hurried after them, grabbing a few towels for Madison to put against Beth's wound until Hershel arrived with the proper materials for Madison to stitch her up.

While she and Hershel tended to Beth's wrist, Lori took Maggie outside for some fresh air. It was only after Beth was taken care of and had fallen asleep did Madison finally dare to leave her sister— and when she did, fury finally made it to the forefront of her mind. She stormed outside, her blue eyes flooded with anger when she caught sight of Andrea standing near Dale, T-Dog and Carol by the RV. The rest of the group was there, save for Shane and Rick, who were still out, and Lori and Carl, who were in the house— but she didn't pay the others any mind. "Andrea!" She shouted as she stomped toward the blonde. Everyone looked at her in surprise, seeing the fury in her expression. 

Andrea, however, simply sighed. "Maggie already talked to me, Madison."

"Oh, did she? Well, I'm gonna do a lot more than fucking talk to you!" Madison yelled at her, pushing past T-Dog as he half-heartedly tried to tell Madison to calm down. "How dare you, Andrea?! You left her in there by herself knowing she would do something like that!"

"She made her choice! She wants to live!"

"She tried to kill herself!" 

"No, she didn't! I already explained this to Maggie!"

"Explained it?" She repeated incredulously. "I have my sister's blood on my hands from where I just had to stitch her up after she slit her wrist! Explain that, Andrea!" Madison screeched, her anger reaching a new height as her voice echoed through the otherwise-silent air. "And you, you went in there, played mind games with her, and you were just going to let her kill herself!"