ALONE | where our hearts sink into the earth.
― I don't want to be alone anymore.
The world had not been kind to us, the boy and the girl, and the souls within.
Made to suffer, minds that were created for this world, they do not sink; they swim.
but...
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TESS
"How did you even find us?"
A voice that the earth had sworn I wouldn't hear again carried through the large house with ease. Rick Grimes was alive; not well, but alive in the end. At the front of the dining room table, he sat, eyes easy on the woman who sat across from him at the other end; Michonne. A woman who the earth had promised the same fate was alive, willing, and here in our presence. Together, in the moment, they were the world's rulers, the only king and queen fit to serve.
She had found us through the last ounce of hope that still lingered. A miracle I didn't think I'd live to witness. With the count of days, Carl and I were no longer the only living souls walking the soil. The boy had been given his father and family back. Through every ache that swallowed my empty sorrows, I bellied each wave, each reminder. I would never receive the same gift Carl had been given, but all was well in that reality. I was content enough in the fact that he got another day with his father.
Carl and I sat on either side of the dining table, where my eyes sank back and forth between the three. Watching how Rick quietly admired Michonne from across the oak wood, how Michonne settled into the chair like she had always belonged here, and how the curve in Carl's lips never left, not once. I prayed he hadn't caught me staring yet; it had been an act I'd practiced all morning, catching glances when no one was looking. To see them happy, reunited, I wanted to soak in that feeling.
A smile played at Michonne's lips, too, as she leaned hard into the dining room chair. "Followed some tracks outside of the woods, went with my gut. i was hoping it'd lead me somewhere safe...looks like it did." She eyed the three of us individually, teeth pressed into the curl of her lips. "It wasn't very hard to tell where to find you. Not with that empty pudding can giving away your hiding spot. I figured Carl had to be somewhere around here."
The boy and his cheeks ignited in crimson, an embarrassment washing over him. Above it all, though, a smile pulled at him. So hard and so bright that I savored the image, took a picture in my mind for days when I needed a reminder that there was still hope; it lived within Carl. Whether he realized it or not, the bounds of hope remained in his heart and soul. Carl deserved his family to be back in his arms.
He was different in morning light, a stark comparison to the boy from a day ago. He wore different clothing, an act I'd yet to change into. A blue shirt and his flannel he had stolen back from me, he was cleaned up, a sight for kind eyes like mine. Without his hat, he looked younger, a childhood left forgotten hiding behind his sights. You would never be able to tell by the smile caressing his lips, how they curved right into his flesh. I would pray, even if no one was left to listen, in hopes that we could stay this way forever.
