broken claims

Part 22

People were gathering in tight little groups around the church and Leigh felt a sense of awkwardness as she surveyed her options, torn between isolating herself or trying with some of the others. Daryl was off with Glenn and Maggie, the trio talking quietly with their heads bent together, each holding some of the wine generously donated to the evening by Gabriel.

She looked around and saw Beth's legs sticking out from the pews and slipped around to join her. Beth was safer than trying with someone new. "You good?" She asked awkwardly, unsure by the tight expression on the other girl's face.

"Sure."

Leigh joined her on the floor. Beth had torn a page from one of the hymnals and was folding it into the shape of a crane. "No offence but you don't look that great."

"Wow. Your honesty is brutal," Beth said, looking at her work. "You ever make these?"

"I sucked at arts and crafts. My grandma tried to get me into stuff like flower arranging all the time."

"How'd that go?"

She cracked a smile. "I hated it. I ended up lacing this one arrangement with poison ivy. I got it all over my hands, which sucked, but it also got on my grandmother's hands."

Beth laughed. "That's awful. Did she make you do it again after that?"

"She figured the best punishment was the repetitive type. And she had the gardener clear that patch growing, so it kind of killed a second round of that."

She finished her crane by pinching both wings into shape before setting it aside between them. Lines of music were shaped across the body. "My daddy used to make these. Not often, but sometimes he'd get this itch inside him for a drink. It was easier to do something with his hands," Beth said, shrugging. "He taught me how to do it."

"I know you want to pretend that you're totally cool and everything, but you could talk if you wanted. I'd listen."

Humour melted from Beth's face and she fidgeted with the sleeve of her shirt. "Why?"

"I like you best. If I need to pick a side, I'm picking yours," Leigh decided. Daryl had told her to start with one person. "So, yeah. I'm good for listening."

Someone laughed from the back end of the church. More voices broke up, loud and boisterous, before settling down to a steady chatter. "Maggie didn't even try looking for me. She just assumed I was dead and gave up on me," Beth said very quietly. Her hands turned into fists and she looked at Leigh with a flat expression. "Maggie didn't know anybody even got out alive but she was looking for Glenn, leaving him signs to follow everywhere. But I'm her sister. I would've gone anywhere for her."

"Oh."

"Yeah."

Everyone sounded so happy, flashes of banter bouncing back and forth. Even Rick was smiling from where he was sitting. "I get it. I really get it, actually. That stuff stings."

"I'm not strong. I think that's why Maggie knew I couldn't make it on my own," Beth continued, knuckles blanching white. "She just... probably it was easier for her, thinking I was dead and gone. Nobody needed to put any faith in me."

Leigh frowned at her. "You think you aren't strong? That's stupid, Beth. You weren't going to leave that hospital without me, and you probably would've dragged me down the elevator shaft if I'd let you try. You're the one who left me a scalpel."

Her memory was foggy between drugs and adrenaline. Her recollection of Steven's blood was garish. Leigh only managed that slight victory because Beth had given her claws to fight with. Daryl might've finished the job with his own hands but she managed to return some of the hurt herself. "You don't know what that meant to me," Leigh awkwardly finished, looking at Beth carefully.