Lost Too Much 【REDONE】 ║ Daryl/OC or Shane/OC

Chapter 57: Don't thank me yet.

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(DAY 042) Martinez, Paul, and I are now running a gun training class for some of the guards and citizens that think they aren't safe enough to live without the knowledge of using a gun. There was this building that once caught on fire before the apocalypse and was never used for anything afterward, so we fixed it up a little bit and brought in some mannequins from a store not far from here. We decided on some requirements for people to take the class, like age, recommendation from at least 3 people around the town, stuff like that. We haven't actually started classes yet, but we are going to soon.

A nice woman a good bit up the road taught me how to bake cookies from scratch the other day. I passed her on the street heading to a shop, and she knew who I was instantly because I'm dating Phillip. She said that she 'absolutely adored me' and stuff like that, and I learned to make cookies. I made some for Phillip and Martinez, and they knew that it was Mrs. McGeary that taught me. Mrs. McGeary also suggested that I find a hobby when I told her how I was starting to run out of things to do in my spare time. I'm gonna teach myself to play guitar, maybe knit, paint, stuff like that. Okay, maybe not all of them. I am going to start teaching myself guitar eventually, though.

I never had any hobbies before this. When I was a kid and in high school, I read a lot and I was really into taking walks and trying to be all deep and dramatic and think a lot about stuff. I even joined a poetry club once in 9th grade. Yeah, and senior year I realized how dumb I was for trying all that stuff, because none of that is me. I don't read. I don't do poetry. I do still kinda like walks, and I always think about stuff for way too long, but not in the same way as then. Now, I do it to adjust or just occupy my time or cope.

But after high school, I stopped all that bullshit of trying to be cool and edgy. I started being me after I got the hell out of there. The year after I graduated, I came to terms with the fact that I was never going to be the smart kid, or the cool, popular one, or the pretty one, or the class clown. I was the one that stayed in the background and observed and took in as much I could without being part of the spotlight at any point. Out of high school, I had no serious hobbies. When I became an adult, my hobbies were drinking and hanging out with my friends. There was nothing else to occupy my time. I wasn't out drinking every night, and I wasn't with them every night, so I didn't ever have anything to do in my spare time. I just watched TV or took walks or found something random to do.

Merle had made jokes before about me learning how to do origami or play some video games. I never had the money for video games, and what the hell would I do with origami? Once in the midst of us discussing hobbies, Daryl came in, and we asked him. He had no clue and just told me to 'write a book'. It wasn't the worst idea I had heard, I'll admit. I did consider it at some point, but I never actually did it.

I have to go now. It's getting late and I need up early for a shift.

Signing out,
Corynn Elaine August (Jenner)
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Swallowed in darkness, we traveled down the wooded road, watching in every direction. I could hardly see my own feet as I placed them carefully on the concrete, praying that we'd make it to Hilltop without me falling. That was the last thing anyone needed at a time like this ---another pregnant lady in need of help.

We had filled up the RV's tank with the last of our gas just when it got dark, preparing Eugene for the expedition he'd take while the rest of us got away. He was as sure as the rest of us that his duty was dangerous, pretty much playing as a pawn for the Saviors while we escaped. He knew he had a chance of dying tonight, maybe even being held captive for some god-awful reason. That was why before he left, he handed off some crucial information to Rick. Eugene had knowledge of how to craft bullets and ammunition, something very important these days. He didn't want to risk dying with that information locked to only himself, so he wrote down what he could and passed it off to the rest of us.