𝐏𝐀𝐍𝐃𝐄𝐌𝐎𝐍𝐈𝐔𝐌 (𝐷𝑎𝑟𝑦𝑙 𝐷𝑖𝑥𝑜𝑛)

𝑇ℎ𝑖𝑟𝑡𝑦 𝑇ℎ𝑟𝑒𝑒

In the following days after the accident, I almost exclusively stayed inside the house and helped Maggie care for Beth, who fell into a depression after watching her undead mother stumble out of the barn when Shane decided to take matters into his own hands. Lori would help out too but generally managed to avoid me. She hadn't uttered a word to me since the night of the accident, not even to ask if I was all right or to apologize for almost getting me killed.

Things took a turn the day that Rick and Shane drove out to drop off Randall at some high school they discovered. Lori found out that Beth had stolen a steak knife so she could kill herself, and Maggie was less than pleased.

"You're being so selfish!"

Maggie's screams echoed into the kitchen all the way from Beth's room. I sat on a stool, eating some sliced tomatoes at the small table in the middle of the kitchen. Lori and Andrea were also there with me, listening to the two sisters hash it out.

"Where's Hershel?" Andrea asked Lori.

"He doesn't wanna know yet. It's a family matter, we'll let them work it out," she answered as she folded a hand towel.

"That's working it out?" Andrea scoffed. "This could've been handled better."

I kept my comments to myself and stabbed a tomato slice with my fork, pushing it in until it went all the way through. I found that staying neutral in the majority of conversations usually worked out in my favor and I wasn't about to change my streak now.

"How so?" Lori chewed on something crunchy as she leaned against the kitchen sink.

"You shouldn't have taken the knife away."

I froze with my fork raised halfway in the air and felt my eyes widen. Here we go.

"Excuse me?"

"You were wrong. Just like Dale taking away my gun. That wasn't your decision," Andrea shook her head sympathetically. "She has to choose to live on her own. She has to find her own reasons. If she's really serious about it, she'll find her own way."

Lori sighed and walked over to a cupboard to put away a bowl from the sink. I ate my tomato and used my fork to play around with the food that I had left on my plate.

"That doesn't mean that I can't stop her or let her know that I care."

"That has nothing to do with it, Lori. She only has so many choices in front of her. And right now she sees the best option as suicide," Andrea explained to her.

"That's not an option," Lori shook her head. Just as I felt myself growing comfortable with my invisibility, it quickly came to an end.

"Charlotte, what do you think?" Andrea asked me. Damn.

"Uhm," I set down my fork and racked my brain for an answer. I didn't want Beth to die. I also didn't want suicide to be her best option. But if Andrea was right, then there really was no stopping her.

Beth was only a year younger than my brother. I thought back to his own struggles with his mental health. When he was twelve, he tried to kill himself when I went to go visit him and my mother for the summer. I was the one who found him lying in the bathtub, floating in the blood-stained water. I understood Maggie's plight, being an older sister myself. If I would have lost my brother that day, my life would've changed forever.

"I don't think anyone here wants Beth to die. She's going through a hard time right now and sometimes, when people are overwhelmed with emotions like grief, they tend to make rash decisions," I said carefully.

"So all she needs is a loaded gun right?" Lori side-eyed Andrea. "You'll understand if I don't send you in there."

"I came through it!"