Hello!
This chapter is kind of fluffy, but it gets a bit exciting towards the end.
As always, I own nothing to do with The Walking dead. Wish I did, but I don't.
Aaaaaand go!
"Hey." Blake greeted Carl as she walked into the living room. "How're you feeling?" she sat down on the couch next to him, offering him a can of corn that she had just opened for breakfast. She snuck a peek at Carl's stiches. He had kept the cut jeans on, allowing easy access to the injured area. The stitches themselves looked fine, and the area around them didn't seem overly swollen or irritated.
Carl took the offered spoon and had a bite of corn, savoring the sweet flavor. "Better." He answered around a mouthful before swallowing. "Leg still hurts like a bitch, but not bad other than that."
"Good." Blake got up again, leaving the corn with Carl.
"Wow, great conversation!" he called to her as she left the room.
"Oh shush!" Blake teased back, smirking. "I'll be back." She was just going to the kitchen. "I was out searching some houses with your dad yesterday and ran across something you could use." She explained as she came back into the living room. "Ta-daaa!" she displayed the crutches to Carl.
"Nice!" he smiled, enjoying the thought of getting off the couch and moving around without someone else's help.
"Once we're done breakfast we should go for a walk, test them out."
"Where?" Carl handed the can back to Blake.
"The creek isn't even thirty feet from the backdoor. We can go refill water, maybe wash some clothes."
"Sounds good." Carl reached down to grab his hat and moved to put it on his head, but Blake swooped in, grabbed it and placed it atop her own head. "Hey!" Carl objected, laughing. He snatched for the hat.
Blake stood up and moved the crutches out of her friend's reach. "Come get me!" she taunted.
"Okay, not fair!"
"What are you two doing?" Michonne chuckled as she limped into the room, still not used to the air cast she had to wear. It reminded Blake of when her mother missed the bottom step and tore ligaments in her ankle. She had to wear the cast for two months and never quite got used to it.
"Quick Michonne! Get my hat back!" Carl laughed, noticing how good the hat looked on Blake.
"You mean this one?" Michonne quickly plucked the hat off of Blake's head and placed it on her own. "I think I'll keep it."
"Oh no you won't!" Blake snatched at the hat, knocking it to the floor and accidentally sending it towards Carl. He picked it up and held it away from Blake, who was reluctant to climb over him for fear of causing her friend pain.
They went on like this for a few minute, allowing themselves the fun distraction, but stopped just before Rick came downstairs. "Morning." He greeted, pausing when he saw his old hat sitting on Blake's head. Carl had let her win the game and wear the hat for a while. "How is everyone?"
"Fine." The other three replied in unison.
"Good." Rick nodded, heading to the kitchen and coming back out with a can of peaches for him and Michonne seeing as Blake and Carl were already partway through a can of corn. They had lots of food from scavenging around the houses and the girl's run a few days ago. "I don't really have anything planned for today, anyone have requests?"
"I was planning on doing some laundry and filling up on water." Blake sat down on the couch again. "I was thinking maybe Carl could come too, since we have the crutches now."
Rick looked concerned and contemplated it. "Okay." He seemed very reluctant to allow his son out of the house. "Just make sure you have plenty of ammo."
"Of course." Carl and Blake replied at the same time.
"You want to check out some of the closer houses?" Michonne suggested. They had started scavenging at the far end of the street and were working their way back.
"Sure, maybe a couple." Rick agreed, handing her the now open can of peaches and a plastic fork. "We'll go after we finish eating."
A half hour later, Blake had gathered all of the dirty clothes, a bottle of dish soap and the empty water bottles into a laundry basket. Carl had gotten up off the couch using one of his crutches for balance and limped to the backdoor, waiting for Blake.
"Be careful." Rick said, squeezing Carl's shoulder. He looked like he wanted to tell them not to go, but Rick knew Blake was more than capable of watching over Carl, and wouldn't take any chances. Besides, Carl could still shoot a gun, if it came down to that.
"We will." Carl smiled reassuringly at his father.
"Yell if anything happens; we won't be far."
"Okay."
"Ready?" Blake asked, opening the door as she did so.
"Yup." Carl nodded and followed her out the door.
The creek was less than two minutes walk from the house, even with Carl's half speed crutch walking. Once there, Blake helped Carl sit down on the bank, left leg stretched out beside him. She sat next to him and duped the clothes that needed washing on the ground. She passed about a third of the clothes to Carl, knowing he wouldn't wash as fast as her. Both teens rolled up their sleeves, not wanting to get them wet in the cold water.
Blake could feel Carl's eyes on her as she opened the bottle of soap and poured a bit onto Rick's very bloodstained shirt. "What?" She asked with a smirk, turning her head so she could see Carl's stare and handing him the soap.
"Nothing." He smiled. "I still want my hat back." He poured some soap onto the jeans he held and dunked them in the water.
"I'm still not giving it back." Blake smiled, turning back to the dirty shirts and scrubbing at the blood stains with her hands. "Looks too good on me." She joked.
Carl sighed "You're right." He agreed. At that comment, both teen's heads snapped up and they met each other's eyes.
"Thanks." Blake felt her cheeks go red and looked back to the shirt she was cleaning. The comment was obviously a slip, which made it super cute.
"Well, it's true." Carl's face also began to get warm, and both teens went back to washing the clothes in silence.
After a few minutes-and a few more articles of clothing-Blake struck up another conversation. "Carl?" She said, quietly.
"Yeah?" He turned, handing her the shirt he had just finished cleaning.
Blake placed the shirt in the laundry basket with the other clean clothes as she responded "Do you remember that day in third grade when Mrs. Mueller brought us cookies and licorice?"
"Oh yeah." He smiled. "We had a competition to see who could build the tallest block tower that day, right?"
"We did."
"Mine fell over, you won." He chuckled, remembering that day, how much fun they'd had.
"Actually…" Blake giggled, remembering the day. "I may or may not have cheated and knocked your tower over."
"What?!" Carl exclaimed, pretending to be mad. "How could you do that to me?"
"I'm sorry!" the two were trying their hardest not to laugh. "Third grade Blake was competitive!"
"You have always been competitive and always will be!" Carl finally let out his laughter. "It wasn't just third grade you! We were on the same soft ball team, remember?"
Blake gave in too, and let the laughs come out. "Right, I forgot about that."
Carl and Blake just laughed for a while, thinking about the old days when this much laughter was normal.
Once the giggles died down, both teen stared at each other, smiling, memories passing through their heads. Fond memories of partner projects in science class, homework sessions at each other's houses, video games, movie marathons, cheering each other on during softball games, pitching for each other after school. Blake remembered all of the times that Carl defended her when boys from other teams would tease her for being a girl. Carl remembered when Andrew Silton-the class bully-tried to beat him up for no reason, and Blake tackled him. She earned a detention for that one, but she didn't care, as long as Carl was okay. They had always been close, best friends even. They spent almost every day after school together, whether it was at softball practice or a study session, the two were together more often than they were apart. Rick and Lori always teased Carl about having a crush on Blake, and her parents did the same. They both always denied it but now…
The teens were startled out of their thoughts by the all too familiar snarls of walkers and Blake was on her feet in an instant. She had her machete out and Carl pulled his pistol, just in case. The walkers stumbled out of the trees, three of them.
"Save your bullets." Blake said to Carl, walking towards the snarling beasts so they wouldn't go near Carl or the clean laundry.
Blake easily sliced through the walkers, their heads coming clean off their shoulders with each swing of her machete. "Nice." Carl smiled at Blake as she began cleaning the machete in the river. She smiled back at Carl, a smile that dropped in an instant when she saw the very quiet walker lunge at him. Blake sprinted the ten feet between them and dove over Carl just as the walker grabbed him. The girl and the body went tumbling Backwards, and the walker ended up on top of Blake, snapping its teeth and grabbing at her face. Blake realised why they hadn't heard the thing earlier: its throat was ripped to shreds to the point where a single growl couldn't escape its decayed lips.
Blake tried to throw the thing off of her, but it weighed too much, she was too small. She realised she had dropped her machete in the rush to help Carl, and she couldn't let go of the walker to grab Tegan's knife unless she wanted the thing to bite her throat out.
The walker jerked to the right in an attempt to get to its meal, and Blake lost her grip on the thing. It fell on top of her, but didn't bite. It was silent. Carl was standing above Blake, ripping the knife out of the walker's skull and helping to push it off of Blake, who sprung to her feet and wrapped her arms around Carl's neck. She was breathing hard as the adrenaline wore off, and realised she was slightly frightened from the near death experience.
"Are you okay?" Carl hugged her back, slightly panicking from seeing Blake come so close to death.
"Yeah." Blake's voice was breathy as she tried to calm her spastic lungs, "Are you?"
"Me?" Carl exclaimed, holding Blake by her shoulders and looking into her eyes. "You're the one who almost died. That thing barely touched me before you jumped in. Literally. Jumped."
"What's wrong?" Blake asked as she noticed Carl wince slightly, shifting his balance. Blake's eyes found their way down to Carl's leg. A leg that was drenched in blood.
Hope you enjoyed! Another chapter will be up either tonight or tomorrow.
Please review!
'Til next time!
