with you [clouis]

[chapter four]

The page remains blank.

No matter how much Violet wills the pen to move on its own, to put all thoughts both known and unconscious to paper, it remains beside the open notebook. As outrageous as it sounds, a small part of her hopes one day the pen will magically come to life and solve all of her problems with its problem-solving ink. Then everything will be okay.

Though she has a feeling the walkers will go extinct before her pen develops a sentient personality or therapeutic skills.

And she'll be dead by then, so it wouldn't matter anyway.

"It helps if you pick up the pen," Aasim said, not bothering to look up from his own work. "Just saying."

She knows even by his deadpan tone that he's trying to joke with her, even if he's not good at it. Laying bait for her to bite back with a sarcastic remark of her own.

"But then I'd actually have to write something down."

"Oh no," Aasim smirks, paying her a brief glance. "Effort."

That cracks a small smile out of her, and for a fleeting moment, they're smiling at each other as if that's a normal thing. It's hard to maintain that connection, so damn hard, so Violet hides her smile from him by turning away to look towards the gates.

The very same gates that Clementine, AJ, and Rosie pass through. Back from patrol, if she overheard correctly. Even from a distance, Violet can see the delighted grin Clementine wears, a grin only matched by AJ's. Far brighter than Violet's.

AJ hugs her tightly before breaking away and bolting towards Louis, James, and Tenn. Clementine remains, though, arms folded over her chest as she watches the group of boys with such fondness that it damn near makes Violet want to scream.

Shit, just.... Shit .

"Hey," Aasim reaches over, tapping on the blank page of her journal with his own worn-out pen to grab her attention. "Lucy had her babies this morning. Seven of them. Well, eight, but one of them didn't make it."

Violet tears her glare away from Clementine to instead glare at Aasim.

"Who the hell is Lucy?"

"One of the pregnant rabbits, remember? Not the one that had babies last week, the other one."

"We're still naming them?" Violet asks. Aasim made it very clear that no names were to be used when they started up the rabbit farm by the greenhouse.

"They're food, not pets. No names. No attachments."

That didn't last long.

" I didn't name her," Aasim corrects. "Willy did, even though I've told him again and again not to. Now when it comes time for us to put Lucy down, he's not going to talk to me for another two weeks, as if I'm the only one at fault. Remember Albert?"

"Ah, Prince Albert," Violet nods. "He sure was delicious."

Everyone agreed that the lovely Prince Albert was one of the handsomest rabbits they had with his snow white fur offset by brown feet and ears. They also agreed that he made one of the best rabbit stews Omar's ever created.

Including Willy. That is until Omar offered him one of Prince Albert's lucky feet and Willy realized just who he had consumed.

The boy didn't speak to Aasim or Omar for a week, but Violet believes that he still carries around one of Prince Albert's feet for good luck, despite everything.

"Yeah, anyway, did you want to come with me to check on them? Ruby's out there now. Maybe you could stay with her and help out?"

Violet scoffs.