where the graveyard blooms - carl grimes

XV

-

xv.

different seasons
"time continued to pass. the oldest trick in the world, and maybe the only one
that really is magic."

-

Things are as they should be.

Spring is breaking through, the world stirring awake. The days stretch longer now, the air softening with the promise of warmth. Apple blossoms peek tentatively from their branches, shy with their offerings of rouge and gold fruit.

I never thought a life like this could be mine.

Hilltop has become home in ways I didn't think possible. Not just to me, but to Carl as well, who was offered back his apprenticeship after the snow melted.

Carl works in the forge. And I've become the unofficial babysitter to Thomas, the baby boy abandoned by one of my people months ago that had been taken in by Earl. We make quite the pair, Thomas and I. Left behind by our mothers and taken in by this welcoming life that would have been unheard of otherwise.

I had been there when he was born, actually. Her name was Frances, I knew that, I had watched her stomach expand over months before a slick of water burst from her and she then labored for twelve hours. Quietly, she didn't cry out or even groan. She brought him into this world without help, lying on the forest floor, as a few of us curious onlookers watched. She caught his head, then his shoulders as he exited her womb. She brought his wet, bloody little body to her chest, cord still tethering them together, and told us simply: I have a son.

And then, he cried. Just as my brother did. Just as all babies do. For a while, I guess, it didn't attract anything. But when they came to retrieve me at Hilltop, his fussing drew in a herd and Frances set him down per my mother's instructions. After everything she went through to bring him into this world, she carelessly was about to allow him to be taken from it.

Connie had rescued him in the nick of time. And then Earl's wife, Tammy, had taken him in, named him Thomas. But Tammy didn't survive the massacre at the fair. Now, Earl's left to care for him, and the strain shows in every weary movement he makes. So, I help. I walk hand in hand with Carl to the forge after breakfast and Earl happily passes over Thomas to my waiting arms and thus our day begins.

And Carl works, shirt damp with sweat as he hammers at the forge. And I watch him, perched on the edge of the workbench while Thomas starts to go limp against me, debuting his first nap of the day.

"Another layer?" I ask, teasing as I watch him shrug off his flannel and resting it on the stool along with his jacket, revealing the sinewy muscles of his forearms glistening with perspiration. He's been shedding clothes all morning, the heat from the forge too much for him to keep up with.

Carl glances up at me, his blue eye catching the light of the flames, and my chest feels light, fluttery. I smile at him.

"I feel like I'm boiling alive in here, love." He says, smiling back in that easy way he has. Love. He calls me that often. Just dotes it upon me, like even when he's not saying he loves me, he wants to remind me that he does. It almost feels like my name sometimes, maybe I am love.

"You really enjoy this, don't you?" I ask, as he steadily dunks the perfectly crafted horseshoe into the barrel of water, steam hissing around him.

"It's just blacksmithing." He replies, downplaying it like he always does. His work is effortless now, he's become quite skilled and it shows.

But I shake my head. "No, it's more than that."

Even though this life is still so new to me, even though there are parts of me still trapped in the shadows of where I came from, I know this is where I want to be. With him.