The Mini Badass

Chapter 41

Carl and Michonne went on a run to get some supplies, leaving me and Rick at the house. The older man was still recovering and my calves were still sore from all the walking the last few days.

I'm sprawled out on my new bed, book in hand. I get a few chapters into it before stumbling on a word I don't know.

After making a face at the pages I dogear it, walking over to the other bedroom. I knock on the door getting a yeah from inside.

"Help." I tell Rick, walking over and jumping onto the bed, sitting crisscross with my feet under me. "What the hell word is that?" I ask, opening the book and shoving it at him.

"Which one?" He asks closing his own book and taking me. "The long L one." I tell him as he sits up, scanning the page.

"This one?" Rick asks again, pointing at the hard word. "Yes."

"Leviathan." He tells me and I make a face at him earning a laugh. "Leviathan is basically a sea demon from mythology." Rick explains, flipping the book over to the cover. "Why are you reading Moby Dick?"

"Had the word dick in it." I tell him with a shrug. "Thought it'd be funny." I continue, taking my book back. "It's not." I say tossing the book aside.

"Lay down, I'll read you this one."

Rick's story was also boring, so boring that I fell asleep listening to it only waking from a loud bang downstairs followed by a scream.

The two of us shoot up, Rick also having fallen asleep to his story. I look at him wide eyed as at least two men laugh downstairs.

"You plan on finishing the job?" One man asks as Rick raises a finger to his mouth, shushing me while he reaches for his gun only for it not to be there.

"Where's your gun?" Rick asks me in a hushed tone, having given his to Carl. "My room." I whisper back to the man as the ones downstairs keep talking. 

"After what he did he deserves to bleed." A different man says as Rick grabs his watch off the side table.

Footsteps coming up the stairs makes us both roll off the bed. Rick stands by the door, keeping me at arms length as we both watch a man walk into the room I would've been in a riffle in hand.

Rick grabs my wrist, pushing the two of us under the bed while the man leaves my room.  We watch his feet walk into the room we're in, stopping at the foot of the bed, right in front of us.

I place a hand over my mouth, trying to keep my breathing calm while the man kicks clothes that are on the ground.

He opens a door, quickly closing it all while sweat drips down my face. The man walks back over to the foot of the bed and now I take note of the blood on his shoes.

Bloody shoes walks over to Rick's side before the bed above us dips and squeaks, the man sighing.

"This will be our abode for the evening." A man downstairs says as the bed keeps squeaking, the man above us getting comfortable. "Clean up your messes Harley."

I look over at Rick who shakes his head, quietly telling me to stay put. I listen to the man, quietly placing my forehead against the hardwood floor.

The man snoring above us makes me lift my head, turning it to Rick who nods. We both start sliding out but are stopped as more footsteps get closer.

"Yo." Approaching man says after we'd scooched back in. "Comfy?"

"You waking me up to see if I'm comfy?" Sleeping man asks, clearly angry at the disturbance. "I want to lie down." The other man tells him from the door way. "There's two other bedrooms to choose from."