When The World Caves In |C.G.

fifty two

"Come on, lets go on a walk." Carl says reaching for his sister. He was reading a book, sitting close enough that I could lean my head on his shoulder. I hand her over, listening as she coos. Even though not a single part of me wants to hand Judith over, because when I don't got Judith everyone thinks they can bombard me with things I don't wanna talk about. Which don't make sense because it's not like Judith is going to have any input in the matter. Whatever. Tyreese gladly takes the baby, sitting in a pew as she plays with his hands.

When I make no move to get up, Carl yanks on my hand dragging me to my feet. Very few of us are left at the church, most of them left a couple hours ago. Beau and Mom talk quietly on a pew. They watch carefully as Carl takes me outside. 

The two of us make our way around the building. Abraham is working under the short bus, trying to get it to start up again so that he can resume his mission towards D.C.  I'm not sure if the rest of us are following him. We don't have much of a plan right now, but whatever Rick says goes. 

Carl stops in his tracks, directly in front of some sort of carving in the side of the church. They run along the side of the window shutters and my throat constricts. 

"What the fuck?" I whisper, touching the knife marks lightly. They form a string of words that make my skin crawl. 

YOU'LL BURN FOR THIS

"I don't trust this place." I tell Carl, my fist clenching tightly. "And I sure as hell don't trust that creepy ass priest." 

"Roo" Carl says attempting to reason with me. "We don't know if this means anything." 

"He's hiding something." I try to tell him, my voice grows hoarse and my throat feels like it's constricting and I feel like I can't breathe no more. "I don't want to wait around here with our thumbs up our asses for shit to hit the fan. I can't, I just can't. Not again. I don't think I can last through something like..." 

"Aurora." Carl says seriously, he grips my face in his hands and forces me to look at him. "You're working yourself up okay? Just breathe." 

My hand finds my rubber duck in my left pocket and I squeeze the thing tightly. Maybe I should go inside and get Mr. Tubbins, he always helps. I scowl at the thought. For someone who acts so tough all the time I sure do rely on that bear all the time. Maybe I'm not as strong as I thought.

"Just breathe," he says ever so calmly. "He's just one guy. I promised I'd always protect you back at the prison and I meant it. I've done a shitty job of it as of late, but that doesn't mean I won't." 

"Briggs was just one fucking guy!" I say, tears beginning to stream down my face. I take large gulping breaths of air, trying to force the humid air into my lungs but it just feels even more constricting and heavy. 

"Rory, what happened with Briggs..." Carl says, beginning to realize where this lack of trust is really stemming from. "That's not going to happen again." 

"You can't know that!" I gasp out. "He was in an entire group full of sick and twisted men. A group who wanted nothing but to hurt us for no reason. When we were in that house, he tried something there too, and I hadn't even done anything to him at that point except exist in that room.  He got close enough to try..." 

I swallow loudly, trying to avoid the way Carl's gaze falls on me. His blue eyes bore into mine without straying. 

"He got close enough to try and assault me twice." I finally manage to get the words out and it makes me crumble. My palms grow sweaty and I want to throw up. "I never did anything to him other than defend myself." 

"I know, I know, I know." Carl whispers pulling me into his embrace. I wet his shoulder with my tears as my body shakes. 

"Hey." Rick's voice calls out, he's back from the run. I pull away from Carl and dry my eyes on the sleeve of my flannel. My dad's flannel, I suppose. "Tyreese said you two were out back. Come on in, we found food. A lot of it."