Dear Hongo En
and AGGXX5
and RHatch89
and FriendlyNeighborhoodHufflepuff
and DampishPoet

aha heh...


First bit's in Carl's head, rest is Oliver.


Left my home still as a child
I walked a thousand sorry miles
To wait for my father, to gather up his tools

He said, "My boy, you've gotta run,
Don't wait for me, don't wait for mum,
We'll come get you, when it's safe for us to move"

So I waited many years
Held back the pain behind my tears
For my father, to come find me like he said

And in that time I was alone
So many years without my home
I made brothers of a different kind instead...


"Could you hand me the flowers, Enid?"

"Sure."

"Thanks... There... promise kept. Think he'll like them?"

"Yeah. I think he will..."

"Come on."

"Where are we going?"

"Nowhere."


When I was really little, Patrick told me that when we died, we'd either go to Heaven or Hell — this all before he became a practicing Atheist. He said we'd walk up a big flight of golden stairs to some tall pearly gates and God and one of his angels would ask us questions, and then they'd either send us to Hell or allow us through into Heaven. "Mamma said so."

"I don't want to go to Hell," I'd told him, crying.

"You won't," he'd said. "Hell's for bad people. Mamma said we're good. So we'll get to go to Heaven."

I never knew if I believed it. Not really. And if I did I was afraid of it. I didn't know if I was a good person. I didn't know if God and his angel would let me into Heaven. But I liked to imagine that when I died, I'd wind up somewhere I knew, at least, somewhere I felt safe, and the people I loved would be there to make me feel better. I figured the universe could spare me that much. Yeah. I figured that would be enough. But another part of me thought that was stupid. Another part of me thought that when you died, there wouldn't be anything at all, you'd just... not anymore.

I figured that was what was happening to me, except I was thinking about it, and something about that and being dead didn't make much sense so I decided to try opening my eyes, and that's how I wound up waking up at the clinic.

Morgan was there. And Rosita, asleep in the hospital bed opposite me. I saw my prosthetic over on my bedside. A sling was supporting my left arm and my leg was raised by a bigger sling above the bed, wrapped in bandage and what looked like home-made cast. Things were written on it but I couldn't see what without my glasses.

My head felt light and heavy and achy and someone shushed me and slipped something over my face, my glasses, and I could see better. Carol was leaning over me, placing her palm against my forehead and coaxing me to lie back again. I looked and looked at her and then I said, "Where's Sasha?"

"In the ground," Morgan answered. "Held her funeral two days ago."

I wiped my face.

Morgan had his hands clasped and his elbows rested next to me on the mattress. Nobody was saying anything, so I said, "Where is everybody?"

Morgan smiled. "Around."

I took his word for it. It was easy to take Morgan's word for things. I looked at what he was wearing. "Ben give you his armour?" I asked.

Morgan's face did this weird falling thing then.

"Something like that, yeah," he said, almost breathing it.

I smirked and looked around, "Where is he? I gotta give back some stuff." Only I stopped talking when Morgan put his head in his hands. I just looked at him for a really long time. It felt like centuries. And then, after all those centuries, I just said, "Oh. Okay." I looked at my hand, and then across to my sling, my cast-up leg.

'hi! from enid'

'C.J. GRIMES WAS HERE'

'Get well soon little dude.
Love from Jerry xx'

'I Wish You A Swift Return To Full Health, Young Warrior.
– K.E (& S xx) My Apologies. Jerry Wrote That.'

'Tara loves you like yoyos and strawberry sundaes'

'FROM A FRIEND, aka. Aaron and Eric'

'Michonne xo
AND RICK'

'Praying for your recovery!
— G'

I felt my face frown and flush. It's strange, the things that run through your head when you realise that someone you care about is dead. You'd think the first thing you feel is sad, and I guess it's true, but it's other things too like confusion and anger, almost at them sometimes — I don't know why. I was trying to think of all the reasons Ben couldn't die and there were none that made it untrue and I was disgusted.

"Was the Saviors," Morgan explained. "Day after you left." I don't remember a lot of what else he said, something about a cantaloupe and that Richard was dead too and that Benjamin's death was what changed Ezekiel's mind about helping us fight, and then for a while Morgan sat in silence. I thought about how Benjamin meant a lot to him, how he meant a lot to me, and for similar reasons. Ben reminded us of our family, the family that died when we weren't there to do something to stop it.

I don't think Morgan and I were very good at being reminded of our family. I felt all out of shape, like Ray said, and then I started to cry — to really really cry. I thought the noise was something outside the room, like Shiva, but then I realised it had to have been me because I could hardly breathe. I held my face and wailed and Morgan just touched my wrist and said, "I know, shh. I know, I know," until I stopped.

Carol was still sitting beside me on the chair. I could have asked her why she came back, why she wasn't running anymore too, but I didn't say anything. She didn't either. Instead, as I laid down and tried to sleep, she just combed her fingers through my hair, like she would once, and I let her.


Later in the evening, the sun was starting to fall asleep all pink and purple and blue across Alexandria's sky. My body was weak and my head and arm ached, but mostly my leg just hurt from walking all the way to the graveyard. Although it was bearable with the meds and Carl and Enid supporting me.

They'd put flowers on Mikey's grave for me. And Carl found me a beanie hat, a grey one almost identical to my old one — said he took it off some dead Savior. Enid had her knife back, too — said she took it off the same dead Savior. After a while the three of us went home. We sat out on the porch. I sat in the rocking chair while Carl and Enid sat over on the steps. Enid was playing with an uninflated green balloon between her fingers and Carl had his arm around her shoulders. They told me about the meeting in Alexandria that'd taken place the evening of the fight. Ezekiel, Rick and Maggie had all spoken, representing the Kingdom, Alexandria, and Hilltop.

"Things are going to change," Enid said, her voice soft, like the breeze. "Nobody really knows what's going to happen anymore. Then again, nobody really knew before."

"We're gonna fight," Carl mumbled. "We know that much."

"Yeah..."

"But that won't be it," I said. "I mean, it's gonna suck. And we'll lose people, but you said it before, right? Nobody's ever really gone. Not if they live on inside you."

I got up. Carl asked if I needed help but I shook my head while I hobbled over and sat with them carefully, and together we looked out at the community.

"We'll fight, but do you know what else?" They both looked at me and I smiled and said, "We're going to win."

We didn't talk much more after that. Enid just put her head on Carl's shoulder and Carl took my hand. And after everything, lost boy or not, I knew then that I was exactly where I was supposed to be.


Notes

Song was The Lost Boy by Sons of Anarchy.

Thank you infinitely for sticking through this bullshit.

Book 4 up now, available in my profile. Don't read for the romance...

As always,
Happy reading.