A Place Just For Us (Rick Grimes)

Chapter Thirty-Six: Alexandria

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❝ And his voice is a familiar sound
Nothing lasts forever ❞
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Yet again, while walking, my mind became a mess. My thoughts loomed at all hours of the day.

An owl, the sound of everyone's frustrated sighs, music of leaves rustling because of the wind, or heavy footsteps, nothing could pull me out of them.

     I didn't know how to brush them away anymore at this point and fall instantly back to focusing on the road ahead of us. Sometimes, though, a mere nothing, like a sense of dread or shame, would slip its way in my head and make me feel even worse than I was already feeling.

     Life on the road had left this group feeling beaten and beleaguered.

     Most of the time it was quiet. Not many words were spoken ever since we ran out of food and water. The sun continued to suck the life out of us.

     Through it all, I managed to hold onto the slightest bits of hope. I tried my best to share that with others, but after a while I became as blank and hungry as the rest of them. However, Rick seemed to be pulling through with a decent pace, but it was obvious also he became slowly unmotivated.

Eventually Daryl caught up with me. I hadn't even noticed he had wandered off into the woods to hunt for a while.

"Nothing at all?" I asked.

He shook his head. "Nah. It's too dry."

I looked up, my eyes squinting. It just needed to rain for a few minutes.

But it would not come, and sure enough not one but many more complains were coming. They were no longer mentally.

I thought of an image that told me more than I originally longed for, as though, despite all my frank admissions to myself about what I wanted from life and him, and how I'd want it, there were still a few corners I'd avoided, where I hadn't dared to go yet.

I was starting to realise what I'd known all along but had hidden in those corners with the rest of all my deepest wishes.

I was preparing for something just like I'd longed for something. It wasn't exactly a new feeling, just stronger and way noticeable— even quite motivating in a situation like this but only because it caught my curiosity.

Knowing at some point that I would, I felt the palm of his hand collide with mine, but just for a minute or two when nobody was looking.

     I wanted it to always be like this; holding hands and talking and showing him all the love— all that love that had been like a prisoner beneath my ribs and was so desperate to get out and hang onto him.

This moment made me long for things I would never have thought myself capable of.

Regardless of how much I wished for rain or food or water, regardless of the horrors that we went through and are going through, the image of him and me and Carl and many others living somewhere safe, manage without having to starve and love without having to worry made me want fight for that as long as we lived.