ALL THE LOVELY BAD ONES | CARL GRIMES

nine. lavender blood

The fact that I had lost my entire family in less than two years, from the day my mother never came home or to how they found my dad's body but not my brother's, was something I tried not to dwindle on. Or the word orphan as it terrified me. However, that was the truth of the story. My family was dead. I was alone. I was an orphan.

I took a moment and tried to remember the sound of Jody's voice.

I felt my heart break a little when I couldn't.

And I wondered when I would finally be able to mourn.

x-x-x-x-x-x

"What's going on between you and that Carl boy?" Lizzie whispered to me early that next morning when said boy was out roaming the halls as if there was a breech. We had been clearing out one of the offices to make more room for sleeping arrangements. I had been worried that things would be different with Lizzie, given what happened to her father, but she was her same old self. It was refreshing, I suppose, to know I wasn't the only one who was... Well, forcing themself to move on.

"Uh, nothing."

She coughed into her elbow before giving me a rusty chuckle. "You guys are getting a lot of alone time in that hallway."

"It's not like that."

"So he's not your boyfriend?"

"Liz, I need a boyfriend like I need a nail in the head." I wasn't entirely sure if I was using the phrase right, it was just something my father said often.

That only made her laugh more at my expense. "You may not be interested but I've seen the way he looks at you."

"What do you mean?"

Lizzie tilted her head at me, narrowing her eyes as a smirk crossed her lips. "He gets this far-away look in his eyes, like you're the only thing he sees. It's adorable, really." She told me wistfully, as if it was some gorgeous fairytale ending. "I wish a boy were to look at me like that."

I wanted to tell her the only person he looked at in that way was Beth, not me, but I didn't want to push the subject so I altered it.

"Don't worry, someone will, Lizzie." Still trying to process the information I've just been told, then I quickly try to cover. "And he and I are just friends. Just friends."

"Why though? Are you friends with him, I mean? He's such a jerk."

I quickly jumped to defend. "Only because you go out of your way to irritate him."

Lizzie shrugged, the smile still playing on her mouth. "I can't help it. He's just so easy to annoy." She paused a moment before asking the next question right off the top of her head. "What if he was your boyfriend?"

"No, that's stupid." I replied quickly, my face heating up with embarrassment at the puerile sentiment. "The whole boyfriend-girlfriend thing is so pointless." Especially at such an age. I remember watching 'couples' in my sixth grade class parade hand in hand around the gym and how ridiculous I thought they looked. I had too much pride to put on such a display.

Back when we lived in Woodbury, Jody had a girlfriend for a couple of months. She was a tall, pretty girl named Christine, but we all just called her Chris. Jody was absolutely crazy about her. I couldn't help but think how ridiculous they looked, standing on the porch with their hands clasped, whispering words to each other they could not say with anyone else in earshot. They spent every spare second together, my dad had to create a rule that Jody's bedroom door must remain open when he had a 'guest' over, which didn't really matter because the second my dad would get called away on an errand: Jody's door would slam shut and lock. I learned to just take myself on a walk whenever that happened. In the end, though, they broke up. I don't know why or how, just one day she stormed out with tears cutting down her dark cheeks and Jody proceeded to not sleep or eat for three days.