Hard Candy [Carl Grimes/The Walking Dead]

Riding Solo

Carl refuses to acknowledge me for nearly two solid weeks, aside from the occasional asking me to pass dishes at the table. I take full notice of the curious and prying glances from everyone. They all look like they want to ask Carl and I questions, but seem to think better of it, because they act like nothing's wrong. Multiple times I catch Glenn trying to catch up to Carl as if he wants to ask him something, but Carl just brushes him off. He brushes everyone off, in fact. His dad, Daryl, Carol, even Michonne, who I know is just about his best friend. He won't even play games with Karel anymore. He just silently makes his way upstairs to read or outside to walk around and practice shooting. He's basically deleted himself from the rest of us.

Unsurprisingly, he won't even stay in our room anymore. After lunch one day, I find him shoving clothes and comics into his bag. I question him, and he actually answers: "I'm staying in my dad's room."

Dumbstruck, I watch him place carefully folded shirts at the bottom of the bag. He doesn't acknowledge me any further, just keeps packing.

If I were braver, I would have yanked the bag out of his reach and covered his mouth with mine before he could protest, and then pulled him onto the bed and we could become the puzzle pieces that had held the love between us in an unbreakable bond.

Unfortunately, I'm not that brave.

Instead, I continue to watch him pack his bag with frantically tear-blinking eyes before I instinctively step aside and let him out the door.

Aunt Kizzi has noticed too, unfortunately. One day, my aunt takes me aside and gives me a long, boring talk about the ups and downs of young love, and how it never means much at this age and is surprising it lasted this long. When she gets to that point, I just get up and leave. She calls after me, but I pretend not to hear. She doesn't follow me.

She was wrong, I write in my journal afterward. She was wrong about everything. It does--or did--mean a lot at this age. It meant everything to me. I found solace in him, and now he's gone.

I snap my journal shut, not because I've finished writing, but because a wave of tears has made its way to my eyes and I don't want to smear the ink on the pages. For the first time since we broke up--God, I hate saying that. It sounds so permanent. So irreversible.--For the first time since we broke up, I break down and cry. Steady, streaming tears like a spring rain. Unlike rain, though, they don't bring relief or ease. Instead, they remind me how whenever a memory of my family or friends popped up and I just had to cry, Carl would always be right there, hugging me, holding me, embracing the sadness out of me.

I wasn't ready to break up with him. I'm still in love with him.

God, I could use him now.

I, too, have withdrawn myself from the group. While the rest of them go out house-hopping or to the park at the school, I excuse myself to read, write or draw. But even that can't distract me. I find Carl as every loving boyfriend in novels, or every unnamed lover in songs, and I even find myself sketching his eyes or his smile without wanting to. I can't help it.

Nights are no better than days either. Nighttime is plagued by dreams of memories we shared, but twisted memories. Disoriented memories. Nightmarish memories. If the dream starts off with us spooning in bed together, it turns out I'm actually Melly with him. If we're target-shooting, he suddenly tuns the gun on me, or worse, himself. Possibly the worst dream I've ever had of him was reliving his proposal--as he placed the ring on my finger, he crumbled to dust and blew away in the wind as I silently screamed for mercy. The dreams seem to repeat themselves. I can't escape them.

Break-ups are hard. No one said they were easy. But then again, no one to my knowledge mentioned anything about completely succumbing to a downward spiral of misery and defeat, similar to quitting drugs cold turkey. Carl is my drug, and I can't get enough of him. But there's no rehab, no detox, no distraction from the cravings and desperate need for the one thing I can never have. I'm only human, and I can't take it. I'm withering away.