FOREST FIRE ¹ ━━━ the walking dead ✓

20 | a fair amount of provocation

20; A FAIR AMOUNT OF PROVOCATION
(season two, episode ten)

[TW; attempted suicide]
(it's the beth attempt😕)

TIME MOVED SLOW at the farm.

Only a measly eight days had passed since Lori's car accident, Glenn and Rick's retrieval of Hershel and Randall's grand entrance.

Everything was still the same.

Shane spent his every waking hour goading at Rick — criticising his decisions, keeping a glare trained on his back and openly belittling him.

Freya couldn't stand it for a second longer. If her father and Shane stepped into each other's vicinity whilst she was present, she wordlessly made herself scarce and didn't look back.

Today that wasn't going to be a problem. Both Rick and Shane had left the farm early in the morning — thank god — with Randall in tow. The latter had made a swift recovery thanks to Hershel's expertise and they were now sending him on his way, having made it abundantly clear that he wasn't welcome on the farm.

Beth had woken from her catatonic shock a few days earlier, but sleep had done very little to elevate her ever-plummeting will to live. She was ghost-like — pale, unblinking and only speaking when someone emphasised their unwillingness to leave without a response.

Freya got the impression that the Greene girl just wanted to be alone.

The problem was, leaving Beth on her lonesome in her current state was hazardous. It held an infinite number of potentially devastating consequences and the last thing anybody needed was more loss.

Especially not the loss of someone who still had so much to give to the world.

So, Freya had decided to camp out in a chair at Beth's bedside, only leaving when she knew that a trusted individual — Maggie, Patricia or Lori — was taking her place. She wasn't going to let Beth slip through her fingers.

"Beth?" Freya called out, hoping her words might initiate some movement from the blonde. "I just wanted to say I'm sorry. You know. . ." She released a tired exhale. "For what Shane did, for what you had to see."

Silence had been the expected response, so Freya's heart clenched when an emotionless voice responded, "Maybe it was for the best. Maybe I needed to see it."

Freya swallowed down her surprise, clasping her hands together to calm herself. "No. No, Beth, nobody deserves to see that. Not ever."

"Daddy told me they'd get better. . ." Beth remained perfectly still, glassy eyes locked on the ceiling above. "He said that they were just sick but they weren't and they didn't. They were never sick. They were just dead the whole time. Dead in our barn. It's so stupid."