Dead Men Walking-Audrey Rhee (TWDXOC) Book 1

Chapter 3

I followed Carl as we walked to Ron's house. "You're Carl?"

"Yeah, Carl Grimes. And you're Audrey?"

"Emerson, Audrey Emerson."

"That's a nice name. How old are you?"

"I lost count of the months, but I'm turning 15 around..." I started counting with my fingers quickly. 18, 19, 20, 21, 22...

I saw Carl smile a bit and laugh quietly.

"What?"

"Nothing."

We stopped at a doorstep. Carl knocked on the door, and a very pretty blonde lady answered. "Hey, Carl! Nice to see you again."

"Nice to see you too Jessie."

"Ron is in his room- Oh hello. I haven't seen you around here. Who are you?"

"Why are so many people asking? I-It's Audrey."

Her eyes opened seeing I was annoyed by all the questions. She let me in anyway. Carl took me to Ron's room and opened the door. There were three kids in there besides me and Carl. "Who is that?" one of the kids asked. "This is Audrey," Carl replied. "Wow, she's hot." Some girl hit his head with her book. "Hey!" She glanced over at me and back into her book. "Ow! I was just joking. God." He was rubbing his head from the hit. The boy got up and introduced me to everyone. "That's Mikey, Enid, and I'm Ron."

"Hey.."

I looked over to the girl. She had an X-Men comic.

"Is that the X-Men?" I said hopefully.

"Yeah?"

"That's my favorite comic."

"Cool."

She wasn't talking much, her mind was somewhere else. I sat down next to Ron and grabbed a controller. "How do you guys still have these?"

"We have games here, but the internet turns off after 9:30 so we don't attract roamers. Wanna play?"

"Yeah, I haven't played one of these in forever."

"You played before?" He looked genuinely surprised.
"Yep, I think it was in elementary. We had a gaming contest with another school and I played for my school. I won and I became the most popular girl there."

"Awesome! You are our new best friend."

I smiled as Ron handed me the remote. After months of being alone and not trusting people, I felt at home. I had friends. I started playing with the boys and I won multiple times. I was happy after a while of being afraid. It was around 8:45 when Carl walked me home. I waved as he walked back to his house. I walked upstairs and took a shower! I couldn't get enough of it. Everything felt like a dream. I didn't want to wake up from this one.

I took out some of the comics that were in my backpack and stacked them on the shelf on top of my desk that I had. I was able to make this room feel like my own, and I didn't take advantage of that. Maggie lent me some of her old clothing to add to my closet and gave me some pajamas for the night.

"I'll ask Glenn to take us on a supply run to get you some more clothing."

"Thanks, Maggie."

"No problem, kiddo."

***

I woke up early in the morning. It wasn't a dream. Maggie had set out a plate of scrambled eggs on my nightstand and some orange juice on it.