MADISONS POV.
Two long, painful days of nothing has passed. I know my feet are taking me somewhere with the group but my mind doesn't follow, it just keeps repeating the same scene over and over. Her. Lying in the pool of her blood as her face turns a deep shade of purple while she chokes and then too quickly her eyes glazing over, her face now turning a ghost pale and her hands as cold as ice. The worst parts are when I realise what I could have done differently or What should have happened. But now, it doesn't matter because shes dead. My mind is still blank, even after two days, I still don't talk to anyone and I make it perfectly clear I don't want them to talk to me. Even Carl has tried multiple times but even he can't dull the constant, throbbing and endless pain.
I hope that if I ignore him enough he will stop trying with me, but he doesn't and all I want to do is be left alone and crawl into a ball like a child and cry myself into nothing but a pool of salted water, but the tears refuse to come, they refuse to let me escape the pain and I know its what I deserve. I deserve to feel the pain she felt though it should've been me. I know people are trying to talk to me or they're talking about me, but I don't care. Nothing matters anymore. My purpose for being here has vanished. Its gone. Just like her. I'm angry at myself for not being able to save her and not keeping my promise to her. Im mad at her for leaving me even if it was inevitable. Im jealous because she doesn't have to live in hell anymore. But none of those emotions compare to the saddness, grief, loneliness and the guilt. I have no more family, no more of the people who made me who I am, and i've disgraced them all.
I barely feel someone rattle my shoulder and my head turns but I don't make eye contact with them. I notice its Maggie because of her familar shoes and her knife strapped to her thigh. I hear her voice.
"Madison, you have to eat. You havn't eaten in two days. Your withering away." She explains.
Am I ? I don't care!
I don't notice the pain in my stomach until she told me about not eating. But I just shake my head, no. Everyone is sitting down eatting what looks like rabbit. I don't even remember them hunting it.
Were we hunting? I don't care.
I don't even know where we are. I let the pain from my stomach consume me. The pain makes me feel better, like i'm actually capable of feeling something. The pain is what I deserve.
I sit on the ground, leaning my back against a tree, away from the group, completely isolating myself from everyone. I close my eyes and still the same images flash behind my eyelids. A few moments later I feel someone tap my shoulder so I open my eyes and glare at the disturbing source.
Rick.
He lifts a spoon hovering it in front of my face.
"You need to eat." He whispers.
I don't even realise I slapped it away until I feel the slight sting on my knuckles. Furiously, I get up and grab my bow, stomping into the trees to get away from everyone. I just want to cry, to let this feeling thats building up inside me, out. I want it gone.
I keep marching away from the group, not too far that I'll get lost. I finally find an opening into a small field filled with different flowers. I walk slowy into it, watching the long grass dance in the breeze. The winter is almost over and spring is beginning, but the weather isn't cold anymore. In the field its surrounded with beautiful flowers of different colours.
Blue, purple, white, pink, yellow....
I walk into it and lie down, letting the flowers engulf me. I take deep breaths to calm myself and when I open my eyes again I stare at the flowers.
The flowers remind me of her. The beauty of the flowers resemble her, and the colours represent her constant, happy, glowing personality. I take a pink flower into my hand and pinch the tiny frail petal. It reminds me too much of her and I can't stand it. It angers me that she can't see the beauty of the flowers, the beauty she had but never acknowledged. But my surroundings of beauty are ruined by the same scene that plays in my head on repeat. She too, like the flowers, was too tiny and too frail but most of all too pure and kind. She was too good for this world and so it took her, like it takes every other good thing.
A flame that burned that bright wasnt meant to last.
In the distance I hear someone calling my name, but I pay no attention to them. The breeze is stilling and the grass and flowers no longer dance before me. They hang still and limp, almost like their dead.
It breaks me to understand that it also represents her spirit. How she was once bubbily and happy and now she is at rest.
I hear the horrible sounds of the creatures we try so hard to survive from. I don't bother getting up. I don't know how close they are, how many there are or where they are. But....
I. Don't. Care.
I see a walker now and it has seen me. It strains towards me but I don't move. I just watch it as it comes closer and closer. So close that eventually its kneeling on the ground next to me and its hands are almost touching my face... No, not my face. My neck.
Thats when it clicks, that this is how she died. It bite her neck. The fury that builds inside me is uncomprehensible. I push the walker back with my foot and I stand to my feet with my bow in my hand. I look up and realise just how many walkers there are in the field.
Too many.
Usually I would make my way back to the group, but the rage inside me makes it hard to walk away. So I don't. I imagine the walker biting into my sisters neck. I imagine it being one of these walkers and I let out something between a cry and a scream. I lunge towards the walker that nearly took my life. I see the red bandana wrapped around its head and I pull it down to its neck and pull while I shove my foot against its chest until its rotted head is under to much pressure and comes clean off. Blood splatters my clothes but I pay no attention as I move to the next walker. I use my hand to shove an arrow in its head, hard. The next comes towards me so I stomp on its knee, breaking its leg as it falls to the ground. I smash its head to the ground repeatedly until it stops moving. Another walker catches me off guard and grabs my top while i'm bent over. I bodyslam it to the ground and shove my mothers knife into its skull. Adrenaline and rage pump through my veins, they keep me fighting, keeps me out of control and I love it. I love that I can easily end the monsters dead life. I love that they are so useless and I can tower over them and slam my foot into their skulls. I love that I am in charge and that the blood on my hands makes me want to kill more. These monsters killed the only family I had left and they're gonna keep killing and feeding until our existance is extinct. I load my bow and take out another three walkers. I use the end of my bow to push the walkers to the ground while I use my knife to put them down. There are still too many walkers left and they crowd around me. I know I wont make it out but i'm okay with that. I don't believe in God much but maybe I can see my sister.
I've never been a quitter and I won't stop now. I'll keep fighting until they tear me up and leave me as a pile of bones. They come too close now and my heart hammers against my rib cage. They come from every corner now and I push and shove and do everything in my power to kill as many as possible. A walker grabs my arm and brings it to its mouth while I fight off another at my shoulder, and just as the walker tries to devour my arm I watch it drop to the ground. I kill the walker at my shoulder and look at the one on the ground that tried to bite me.
Its dead.
What? I didn't even touch it.
I look up to see more dropping to the ground, stone dead.
I don't understand, but I keep fighting. I drive my arrows into their heads either with my hand or using my bow. My knife is often used also. My skin and clothes are layerd with thick blood. Its hot and sticky and makes me want to gag but I keep going. I watch as more walkers quickly fall to the ground. The number of attackers are rapidly decreasing until i'm surrounded by piles upon piles of dead walkers lying on the now dead, blood stained flowers. I look up to see why the walkers were all dead, and why I wasn't dead.
I scan along the long grass and in hedges, and there standing tall and powerful among the trees, was Beth holding up her gun with a silencer on the barrel.
She doesn't say anything she just lifts her hand to motion me towards her. I do as i'm told and I walk towards her. When I reach her I stare at her feet. I havn't been able to look anyone in the eyes since before. She catches me by surprise when she uses her hand to guide my face up to look at her. I look into her eyes which are only filled with concern and not pity. I'm glad, I don't want pity and I most definately do not want sympathy. This was my fault and I have to live with that.
"Your not alone Mads.... I'm here." She tells me while holding both my bloody hands in her own.
I speek for the first time in two days.
"You don't have to be."
"I know.... But I have nowhere else to be." She whispers. We sit down leaning our backs on the bark of a tree while she lets me lean my head on her shoulder. She seems unphased by the blood I get on her, she only wants to comfort me. Maybe I don't have to talk to everyone, but I can atleast talk to Beth.
We stay like that for a long time and all the while I feel the monster inside me thrashing to be unleashed. The tears fill my eyes and threaten to spill over, but I never wanted to cry with someone here, I wanted to cry alone. In peace. That is until she pulls me into a hug and whispers.
"Its okay to not be strong Mads. Its okay to feel broken and abandoned. Your human, your defeatable and sometimes we need to remind ourselves of that. It's what seperates us from the monsters."
I feel stray tears fall down my face as I listen to her words and how true they are. The lump in my throat makes it hard to breath evenly and I look up to the sky and try to blink away the tears, but its no use.
"I'm afraid if I cry i'll never stop." I admit.
"Well, when you decide you need to let go, i'll be here. I'll always be here, waiting."
And thats when I cant hold back any longer. The tears stream down my face without permission and once they start I don't try to stop them. My whole body shakes and Beth only holds me closer. Whispering reassuring words to me about how someday it will get easier. Thats what I like about Beth. She gives it to you straight. She doesn't lie and she doesn't dance around the truth. She tells me how for the longest time it will be dark and I''ll feel like there is no way to escape the pain, but someday, not now, or in a week, or in a month, but someday the pain won't be as harsh anymore. It will always be there but soon i'll realise that the pain never fades you just learn how to live with it.