forever and always ///// Carl Grimes

30. reunion

We all follow Rick to our deeper into the woods, the trees growing taller and looking older, I can't identify them but they feel familiar. Walking beside Carl we are slightly quieter still processing all that happened. I turn my head to look at his face. Freckles spilt along his cheeks and nose. His eyelashes framing his blue eyes, the ones I so deeply love looking into.

I'm smiling to myself when we stop, Rick begins digging into the ground his fingernails scraping along the rocks and dirt. This confuses me, hell it confuses everyone except carl and Michonne who where here with him after the down fall of the prison but I don't question it, Rick knows what he is doing. Eventually among the loose dirt I see a black nylon bag he heaves it up and pulls out a variety of weapons. I smile knowing that Rick placed the weapons here earlier.

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Now we have begun following Carol, I am walking beside Carl looking down at the floor. "I missed you, you know after the prison" I tell him, I don't know why but I feel like I have to. I look up at him awaiting an answer, when he doesn't reply I panic and continue on with what I was originally saying, hoping to save myself from embarrassment "I thought that the group had made it back together and you guys had left me." He looks into my eyes and stops walking for a moment. I fear that after all this time I have scared him, my morbid thoughts. after the break that pause in our friendship has given him time to rethink ever talking to me, I mean who would want to talk to me? "We would never leave you, your a part of this group now whether you like it or not, I promise" I smile up at his words even though he does not know how much that mean to me. "Wow, a promise is a lot in this world" I try to lighten the situation with sarcasm, my cure to everything.

"I missed you too" he spoke at a lower tone. I kept wanting to go back and to find you, I thought it was my fault because I let you go back inside. When one of the towers fell I thought you died."

I look at his face studying it every freckle, and space. I pause for a moment at a loss for words. We are to young for this, we never got to experience those things. "I'm going to make it out of this world, and I'm going to bring you with me. We will survive, I promise" after saying that I wrap my arms around his torso, soon after letting go so we can continue walking.

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We finally walk back around and make it onto solid road, my feet are thanking me, looking down at my old worn out converse high tops I think that it might be time for a shoe change but these shoes will last as long as i need them to, my trustworthy shoes. After a short minute on the road we see a hill, upon the hill is a small shack, so We hike up a small hill, when we are met with the sight of Tyreese and a small figure beside him. Before I can even comprehend who it is Carl and Rick begin to bolt, Smiles and laughter fill the air, Judith. I close my eyes thankful that she is alright before smiling happily and pulling Charlie higher on my hip. I hug him tightly it is finally sinking in that we are fine, we actually have a chance.

Finally I catch up to the reunion, Judith is in Carl's arms and everyone in the group is here. they are all my family. I walk over to where Glenn and Maggie are standing, "where are we going to go now?" I question curiously but all I get as an answer is "I'm not really sure at this point but as long as we are together we will be fine" Maggie smiles at me after she finishes talking and all I can do is smile back.

walking over to where carl is standing with his small baby sister, "oh look my two favourite kids in the world, finally reunited" I stand next to carl, while Judith and Charlie make grabby hands at each other, I smile and laugh airily at this. the closest thing they will get to a normal childhood, the closest thing they will get to what me and carl got. even though we are nowhere near grown it feels like it sometimes, the responsibility that has been laid upon two teenagers. It's nice to get small moments like this where we feel like we can take on the world.

Little did we know we were going to take on the world... Just not in the way we hoped