Stars will fall | TWD

the lake

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Rhea sits there the entire time Carl and Shane are messing around in the water, hopelessly trying to catch frogs. At one point she took her baby blue sneakers and socks off, dipping her feet into the lake water. It's so hot that she just wants to go swimming really badly.

Soon the two boys come out of the water as Lori approaches, looking irritated about something.
Rhea looks at her, wondering what's wrong with her.
Lori lightly graps Shane's arm, leading him somewhere quickly, Rhea just watches confusedly.

Carl also now fully comes out of the water, sitting next to Rhea on a rock with a small groan. The girl turns her attention away from the two adults to the boy who's a year older than her.

"What's up with them all the time...? Especially mom.." Carl asks.
Rhea just shrugs, not knowing why Carl's asking her like she would know.

"Have you noticed how weird they've been acting? After... Dad?" Carl asks, speaking the last part more quietly, his attitude quickly changing.

"Yeah." Rhea simply answers, her gaze falling back to her feet in the clear lake water, some of her brown hair falling onto her face as she looks down, making her thug it behind her ear. She feels bad for Carl, because his dad died a couple months ago, atleast they think he did. She knows what that must've felt like. His dad was the police chief of Atlanta, which Rhea thinks is pretty cool.

It's suddently quiet, Carl not asking any more stupid questions, but Rhea can feel his gaze burning to the side of her face, she glances at the brunette boy.

"What?" Rhea mumbles, confused why he's literally staring at her.

"Nothin'." Carl quickly mumbles back, looking away. Rhea's eyebrows furrow in slight confusion, but she also looks away and back into the water. It's silent again.

After a moment of pretty awkward silence and Rhea having her feet in the warm lake water, she pulls her feet back up to the rock, her knees to her chest now.
She sits silently next to Carl on a rock, the sun hitting her dark blue eyes. She can hear officer Shane and Lori silently arguing about something faithly in the background of her thoughts.

Rhea often wonders what it would be like to have a mom. What would her mom do when there's dead people walking around? Also her dad's very angry all the time, which she gets tho. She's angry herself, just all silently. Her momma isn't here anymore.

Rhea looks up to the blue sky, faith clouds floating around. She often wonders where her mom is, if she's in a better place. She must be, right? It wasn't her own fault that she died, she fought hard.

"Hey."

Rhea snaps back to reality, glancing at the boy next to her.

"You know about the space, right?" Carl randomly asks. Rhea's eyes immediately light up, but she gives a single nod, not knowing where Carl found out about that.

"Why is it so hot?" Carl mutters.

Rhea thinks that's the dumbest question ever. Has he ever even been to school?

"It's just not cloudy at all. And the sun's very hot because it's summer." She answers pretty simply, since he seems too stupid for any more scientific explanation.

Carl nods silently, his eyes looking back at the water. He's wearing some shorts and a white t-shirt with a Science dog logo on it, he also seems really bored.

Rhea sighs, standing up on the rock and silently and carefully hopping off of the rocks back to the sand. She puts her socks and baby blue sneakers back on. She glances at the weird boy, still sitting on the rocks.

Rhea walks away, back to camp.

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author note; a really short and boring chapter bc idk what I was doing at the start but next one will be longer and more interesting i promiseeee
& I'm also back home so i have time to write now, new chapters will be posted more often :)