"Elyza, you've got to be kidding me! We could be searching for food! We could be siphoning gas!" Madison scolded Elyza out front by the fountain.
"What's got her worked up now?" Ofelia leaned on the front wall of the house beside Alicia, eyes studying the feuding women.
"Elyza wants to go to a library," Alicia stated, arms crossed, a subtle smirk curving her lips.
Ofelia knew immediately what the blonde planned to do. She pushed forward from the wall and strolled casually to the two blondes. "Library, huh?"
Madison sighed and rolled her eyes. "Yeah. Don't you think we ought to be searching for gas? Food?"
"I don't know, it seems like Elyza has food covered... where did the apples come from, anyway?" Ofelia turned to Elyza.
"Oh, I haven't shown you guys the backyard beyond the side door," Elyza twisted to look at the house. "I have fruit trees and chickens."
"Chickens!" Madison yelled and threw her hands up. "What don't you have?"
"Patience for this conversation."
Ofelia covered her mouth to subdue a cackle.
However, Elyza's face remained stony. "You can do what you want, but I'm going to the library. Want to come Ofelia?"
"Sure. Alycia!" she turned to the house. "Let's go!"
The brunette grinned and trotted down the walkway and under the solar-panel canopy to Elyza's car.
"Oh no, absolutely not," Madison warned as she stalked toward her daughter. "You don't know what could be at that library."
"Nothing worse than what I've seen," the teenager leveled, sat down in the passenger seat, and slammed the door.
The tension rolling off Alicia hammered into Elyza the whole ride to the city's library. Ofelia's attempts at putting the girl at ease by naming stray walkers fell in failure. "Dipshit" usually amused Alicia to no end.
None of them could say they were surprised the library sat completely untouched, unoccupied by both dead and living. Though, Ofelia did make a good point that this wealth of knowledge would have benefited those who were smart enough to think about it in the first place.
The three girls exhibited completely different goals for the trip. Ofelia snooped around in backpacks, shelves, and every doorway she could find in search for more supplies. Alicia stuck to the front of the store, surveying the array of knick-knacks. And, as planned, Elyza scoured the psychology section for something, anything. Freud, Freud, Freud. Jung, Jung, Jung. The sections of each book "dedicated" to autism contained a skimpy page of information, if that. Just as she contemplated calling it quits, the last copy of the DSM-5 toppled down with the last book she jerked from the shelf. Triumphantly, she plopped down on the floor and cracked it open. The table of contents didn't provide a clear-cut path to the information she needed, so she scanned each paragraph, page by page. Finally, a header saying "Autism Spectrum Disorder" ended her search.
Some of it made sense, some of it didn't. Her mother always told her that nobody ever fits every symptom or sign description, no matter the issue. She'd noticed Alicia did things the book failed to mention, and didn't do some of the things it did mention. Overall, however, the description fit.
"So you know."
Elyza yelped, dropped the book, and whipped her head around to the source of the statement.
Alicia stood stiffly behind Elyza, eyes fixed on the manual, face expressionless.
Elyza couldn't read the brunette, and as a result, couldn't formulate an answer.
"Who told you?" The question was flat, devoid of a rise to indicate it was such.
Elyza considered lying, saying she just had a hunch and wanted to investigate.
"Was it my mom?"
The blonde stared up at Alicia, still reeling. "No. Ofelia told me." Alicia opened her mouth to talk, but the guilt eating at Elyza's entire being compelled her to explain further. "She was saying your mom is too protective of you because of it, she didn't mean any harm. I don't care. No, I mean, like, I do care, but not in a bad way. I don't think of you any different, you're just you, and I like you."
The few moments Alicia spent processing Elyza's ramble stretched on for eternity through the blonde's eyes. Alicia turned over the last bit of the speech in her head repeatedly. I like you, I like you, I like you. She cracked her fingers and nodded once.
Elyza rose from the inflexible carpet. "Are you mad?"
Alicia shook her head, eyes migrating from the book to Elyza's left hand.
"I don't know what to say," the blonde uttered.
Shockingly, Alicia smiled. Elyza couldn't begin to fathom why she did, but it dawned on her that that's just how it would always be with this girl. Going with the flow was all she could do, perhaps Madison struggled so much with her own daughter just because she insisted on trying to swim upstream every time the current pressed her forward. Ofelia allowed it to guide her. However, Elyza aspired to rise to Nick's level: swimming along with the current, keeping up with it and occasionally maybe, just maybe, paddling ahead.
"Why didn't you tell me?" Elyza wondered aloud.
"Nobody ever understands," Alicia raised her eyes to meet Elyza's. "I hide it as much as I can around you. People don't handle it right."
"Then I'd love to know the right way to handle it, straight from the source," she encouraged. "I don't want you to feel like you have to hide."
"Just don't judge me," Alicia shrugged. "I do what I need to do when I need to do it, if I can. Everyone should have that freedom."
"Is there anything you need to do right now?"
The brunette sighed and made the conscious effort to allow herself to let go in Elyza's presence, to just be. She clasped her hands together and twisted her wrists while humming a single tone, high-pitched. She pushed through the anxiety of stimming in front of someone she barely knew, and forced herself to acknowledge that nothing bad was happening, and that Elyza's expression lightened into a smile and gaze of adoration.
"Sweet freedom," Elyza beamed, delighted by the prospect that this girl trusted her, even if only a wee bit.
The humming broke into a single giggle before ceasing.