Fighting to Survive: The 3rd installment to Daring to Feel

Chapter 6: Little Girls

Daryl shimmy's the door open to a building while Carol and I guard him. It takes a few minutes but he manages to get it open just as a small heard gets closer to us. We pile inside the dark hallway and shut the door quickly behind us. We go down the hall and Carol takes a set of keys off a dead body. She uses them to open a door with the words 'service center' written on it and we shut it behind us, "you work here or somethin'?" He asks Carol.

"Something" she simply says back. We move the desk in the office to block the door and she unlocks another door in the room. We proceed forward further into the building.

We move from one room into another, a place where there's some beds and a desk, there's even a bathroom, "what's this place?" Daryl asks, shining light down on a book that reads 'Surviving Childhood Abuse.'

I don't need to ask, I know the answer, "It's temporary housing." Carol answers him.

"You came here?" He asks.

She quickly answers him, "we didn't stay." She stands over by the beds, "I'll take the top bunk." her things plop down on top of it, "I think that one's more Daryl's style, don't you Sadie?" She turns and smiles at me. Daryl and I laugh at the pink blanket covering the bed, "you two should sleep. I'll take first watch."

"This is locked up pretty tight." I say sitting on the bed and taking my shoes off. I used to worry about that kind of thing, back when I was weak.

She walks to the window, "I know."

"Then we're good, then." Daryl says, telling her it's okay to relax, to sleep.

"I'll keep first watch. I don't mind." She persist.

"Suit yourself." Daryl sits on the bed now that I've moved in. I lay my head down on the pillow, waiting for him to do the same.

"You said we get to start over." Carol says in a low voice, still facing the window where we can see her.

"Yeah." He answers back.

"Did you?" She asks him quietly.

He looks at me for a moment, and puts a hand on my leg, "I'm tryin'." He tells her, looking at me with a smile. I smile back to him, putting my hand on his. She doesn't say anything else, and Daryl knows somethings wrong, "why don't you say what's really on yer mind?"

She pauses, but answers him, "I don't think we get to save people anymore."

"Then why are yew here?" He asks.

"I'm tryin'." She answers, coming over and sitting on the chair across from us.

"When we were out by the car, what if I didn't show up?" He asks her. I look between them, not sure what he's meaning by that.

"I still don't know." She answers looking down at the ground.

There's a banging coming from somewhere on this floor of the building that gets our attention. Carol leads the way out of the room, me behind her and Daryl in the flank. We walk down another hallway and come across a walker banging on a door. She must have died here, maybe of natural causes, and is stuck in the room. Just as we are about to leave another walker comes up to the door next to hers, only this one is tinier. It's a child, banging like her mother wanting to get out. Carol goes to open the door, to kill them and end the suffering but Daryl stops her, "you don't have to." He says, putting his arm in front of her. She goes to move again, but he stops her, "you don't!" his eyes wide, meaning what he is saying. She looks over to me and I shake my head up and down, telling her it's okay to leave them. She drops her arm and makes her way back to the room we are set up in. Daryl climbs into the bunk first and I cuddle up next to him. I face the room and he cuddles me closely, wrapping his arm around me and pulling me tight into him. It's a twin size bed, but it's more than enough space for me. I hear him fall asleep next to me, his breath getting longer and his leg twitches. I let that sound soothe me into my own sleep.

I wake up in a sweat, my back soaking the blanket underneath me. Daryl is turned, facing the wall and my head lays on his arm. I sit up quietly, not wanting to wake the two of them. I had another dream, the one where I am killing Rick. I don't understand it, why I would be killing him of all people? Since the prison, it's usually been people from my past. People who've deserved to die for one reason or another. The Governor, one of my old foster parents, people who've done horrible things. I don't know why it's Rick now, he's done nothing but be there for me, take care of me. I take the flashlight and walk out of the room, grabbing my knife along the way. I make my way back to the hallway from the night before. The walkers aren't banging on the door anymore, the sounds of us sleeping not loud enough for them to hear. I go through the door with the adult first, taking her out easily. I lie her on the ground before she plops to avoid the sound drawing the little child in. I close the door behind me when I exit and walk over to the other door. I count slowly in my head from 5, opening it on 1. The girl stands in the room over by the window. She turns once the door opens and comes at me with an open mouth. She isn't fast, obviously not having anything to feed her since she turned. The girl is in a blue dress, red ribbons in her braided hair. She looks nothing like my little sister, yet I see her standing in front of me, "you're not her.." I tell myself as she gets closer, "you're not Joanna Beth.." I keep telling myself this as she moves closer. I step back into the hall, trying to keep the distance. The knife gets sweaty in my hands, almost slipping as I try to get the nerve to put the child down, "she's gone. You're not her." I breath, taking long hard blinks waiting for my sister to go away and a dead girl to appear. She gets closer and closer, and I'm against the hallway wall now. I hear footsteps quickly round the corner and see Daryl there, his bow at the ready. "No!" I shout out to him.

"Sadie-Mae! What are you doing?" He shouts to me in a panic. His face hard as stone as he keeps the bow close to it, ready to save me.

I keep my eyes on the girl now, "I have to do this" I say as she gets closer.

"No, you don't!" He tells me now.

"Yes I do!" I demand back.

The girl takes a giant tumble towards me and I stab her in the head, all the while my eyes play a trick on me, pretending it's Joanna Beth. She falls and I catch her in my arms, falling to the ground with her and letting the tears fall from my eyes, "what were you thinking?" Daryl comes over and stands above me, clearly upset.

"It's not her..." I smile through my tears, looking back up to him.

"of course it's not.. Sadie.." He sighs out, then squats in front of me, "is that what this was about? Yew scared the hell outta me!" He tries to keep his voice down.

"I'm sorry. I had to do it. I see her everyday and I just can't take it anymore. I had to." I tell him, feeling a weight lifted off of my shoulder.

"Alright. Let's finish up here." He says as he begins moving the young dead body off of me. He takes my hand and helps me up, "you go start a fire out on the roof. I'll get these two out there." Carol meets us on the roof just as Daryl brought the young girl out. We stand there, our hearts heavy while they finally get put to rest.