(Clementine's Pov)
I just opened the door but then I hear the one sound I never wanted to hear. I turned my head to see Violet slumped down gun in her hand.
"What was that?" I hear fade and I hurry over to Violet. I place my hands to her shoulder and shook her a bit.
"Violet?" I say and I moved her to lay her down on the ground. I see the bullet hole in her head and I shake my head.
"No, No, No, NO!" I yelled as I shook her.
"WAKE UP!" I yelled as I shook her more.
"God, damn it wake up." I cried as I place my hands to her face.
"Please for the love of god wake up." I tell her and I feel a hand on my shoulder and I shove them off me and I see that it's Luke.
"GET OFF ME!" I yelled at him and I look to Violet again.
"Come on, wake up, wake up go damn it." I say and shake her again.
"She's dead." I hear him say and I glared at him.
"SHUT THE FUCK UP! SHUT YOUR FUCKING MOUTH!" I yelled at him then look to Violet.
"SHE'S FUCKING DEAD DEAL WITH IT!" He yelled and I glare at him then He is taken out the room by Elenor and I look back to Violet. I move the bangs to her face to cover up the bullet hole.
"The Walkers are covering the building; we can't get out unless we can get a few Walkers to cover ourselves in." I hear and I move Violet a bit so that I could place her head onto my lap.
"It's going to be ok; it's going to be ok Violet." I cried as I place my hand on top of hers.
"Clem." I hear and I take a breath and I shake my head.
"Shut up, leave us alone." I tell them and I held her to me.
"We can't just do that." I hear and I gripped Violet's shirt. I got mad and I turn to look at them then back to Violet.
"Clem, we have to go." AJ says and I shake my head.
"Not without her." I tell him and I look at him as he sat next to me.
"We can come back and get her." He says and I shake my head.
"No, we are not doing that." I tell him.
"Then help us get a few Walkers, and we can cover ourselves and Violet just to be safe, we can head back home if it's safe and give Violet a proper funeral." He says and I look at her.
"She's not dead." I tell him.
"Of course, she's not sorry, she's sleeping heh heavy sleeper." He says and I nod as he helped move Violet and I grabbed her bag and handed it to AJ who took it.
"I'll carry her, your leg." He says and I nod as he puts the bag on and then grabbed Violet.
"Be gentle, her head." I say and he nods.
"I know, I got her." He says and I nod at this. We walked out the closet and I headed over to an emergency exit, and I see AJ place Violet down and I go over to them and take a seat.
"Clem-."
"I'm staying with her." I tell him and I hear him sigh as I grabbed her and placed her head on my lap and I take a breath as I rubbed the back of her head. I liked it when she did this, it was calming how she was so gentle. How she knew it would help me fall asleep. I feel my chest tighten a bit and I look to see the others as the door opened and they grabbed a Walker then killed it. I look back to Violet and she just kept her eyes closed.
"She sure is a heavy sleeper." I mutter and looked to the side. They had cut the Walker open and I look back down to Violet.
"Come on, wake up, got… got to go home." I tell her quietly and she still didn't wake up and I sighed.
"Still not going to wake up… heh ok." I mutter and I see AJ come over with a Walker.
"Hey got to cover her up." He says and I nod a bit as I lay her fully on the floor and we covered her with the Walker guts. When we finished up AJ grabbed Violet and we all headed out. I kept my gun ready and I walked with AJ as he carried her. We were able to get to the mall and see the Walkers were mostly gone. We get over to the vehicles and AJ hurried and got Violet in the back of the truck and I got in with her. The truck jolted a bit as AJ started it so I grabbed Violet and they hurried and rammed into the Walkers. I lay my head back against the back window. I could hear the Walkers as they were hit by the truck and I look to Violet as she still slept. I don't know how long we were on the road but the truck slowed to a stop and I see the other pull up to the side of the truck and I look down to Violet again.
"Hey wake up Vi, we're at a safe point." I tell her but she still wouldn't wake up. Why won't she wake up?
"Hey." I hear and look up to Minerva.
"Sorry, Vi just won't wake up." I laughed and looked back down to Violet.
"Yea, she's a pretty heavy sleeper hu?" She asked and got in the back of the truck with me.
"Yeah… um sorry about the blood, she's not feeling so good." I tell her.
"I see that." She says and I look back to Violet and I rubbed Violet's head gently.
"Clem… you… you know she isn't going to wake up right?" She says and I look at her.
"The hell do you mean?" I asked getting angry at her.
"Clem, she… she is sleeping yes but… she's not going to wake up." She says and I shake my head.
"She'll… she'll wake up." I cried and pulled her closer to me.
"She'll wake up, and I can tell her I'm sorry, I… I don't think she thought I meant it, that's why… that's why she's doing this." I cried more and I look down at her and I see the bullet hole in her head so I covered it up.
"Clementine." I hear and I shake my head and I cried more.
"I told her I hoped she got bit… I told her I'd let her suffer if she did, but I didn't mean it, I didn't mean it Minerva." I tell her as I cried.
"She knows you didn't mean it." I hear her say and I shake my head.
"You said she got bit, right?" She asked and I nod.
"Well… she's just sleeping off the infection right now." She says and I nod.
"Yeah, Yeah, she's just sleeping off the infection, she'll be right as rain… hahah Violet said that once." I tell her.
"Did she?" Minerva asked and I nodded.
"Yeah, it was after she fixed my leg when it broke the… god the fifth time." I say and I looked to Minerva.
"We're going to head back out." I hear and nod at this.
"I'll hop out." I hear and I grabbed Minerva as she was about to leave out the truck.
"Please… stay." I tell her and I look at her.
"Ok." I hear and I nod just as the truck moved and I look back to Violet.
"You know, Violet once told me about the time her and AJ played catch and broke a window." Minerva says and I laughed at this.
"Yes." I laughed more.
"Oh god, she threw the ball to hard and AJ couldn't catch it, she… hahah she ended up busting the window to the trailer that you live in." I laughed and so did she.
"That's why she freaked out when I asked about the hole in the window." She laughed and I look at her then to Violet.
"She once got so excited when AJ asked to fix up an old bicycle in the shed, she taught him how to ride it, hell she even made sure to go into town to get him a helmet and kneepads, and elbow pads…. AJ didn't want to wear them but she was able to convince him it was Walker protection." I laughed and rubbed the back of her head some more and I feel tears in my eyes.
"She got books for AJ too and they went down to the creek… they found arrowheads and she would talk about them, basically she is his teacher." I say and looked to the road a bit and I sighed a bit.
"What about you and her?" Minerva asked and I look at her.
"What do you mean?" I asked.
"What did you two do?" She asked and I think.
"… On our fifth-year anniversary, she set up the house with some candles, she even found some fake flowers and… Wine even, she found Wine Minerva and it was so good." I say and I look to her.
"I'm guessing it was her parents' wine." Minerva laughed and I nod.
"I know, but it was so romantic." I say as I think a bit.
"She even found a baby bunny, AJ asked to raise it and we did, we even stopped eating rabbit because AJ thought it was so cute." I tell her and chuckled.
"Then one winter her and AJ and I were able to build snow forts, then we had a snowball fight, AJ wanted to fight us and oh god it was so funny, he threw a snowball right at her face and he thought she was going to be mad at him but she just started laughing." I tell her and I take a breath.
"Violet… told me a lot about what happened to her… dark things, but… she told me that she was worried how she acted around you." She tells me and I shake my head.
"I called her self-centered." I say quietly.
"What?" She asked.
"Before we got in the closet, I called her self-centered, I was angry she was yelling at me and I yelled back and I just… I." I stopped and I placed my hand to her side and looked to the bite.
"We were yelling at each other… I didn't mean what I said." I tell her.
"I know… it's ok." She says and I shake my head.
"Surprised these bumps aren't waking her up." I say and I keep rubbing Violet's head some more.
"Hey you should get some rest Clem, if Violet wakes up, I'll make sure to wake you up." She says and I nod a bit at this and I shut my eyes and go to sleep. I woke up a bit when the truck stopped. It looked like we were home and I look to see Minerva as she looked down at Violet.
"Minerva?" I asked and yawned a bit.
"Yea sorry was just making sure that if Violet wouldn't wake you up." She says and I nod at this. The trunk was opened up and I along with Minerva helped get Violet out.
"Bring her into the house, lay her on the couch." I say.
"Clem."
"Please… please just do this." I say to her.
"Ok." She says and I nod as we bring her inside and lay her on the couch. I go and grab her a few blankets and lay them on her.
"Oh god she's losing it." I hear and I look to see the others from the window and I shake my head a bit as I walked out.
"Keep it quiet, Violet is sleeping." I tell them.
"Clementine, Violet is dead." Aasim says and I shake my head.
"She is just sleeping, that's it, she's a heavy sleeper, and you know it." I tell him.
"God damn it, she snores when she sleeps, has she snored once?" Aasim says.
"She… she's learned to stop." I say.
"Clem, she has a bullet hole in the head, you need to snap out of it." Omar says and I shake my head.
"She is fucking sleeping, keep your mouths shut and leave us the fuck alone god damn it." I tell them and Minerva placed her hands on my shoulder.
"Clem just let Violet sleep, come over to my place, she's very tired after what happened and you are too, I promise when she wakes up, I'll tell her you just came to have some coffee at my place." She tells me and I look to her.
"Fine, but if she doesn't wake up, I'm going over to her." I tell her.
"Alright, just go to my house." She says and I nod and head into her house and I sighed as I took a seat on the couch and I look around the room a bit. It was a bit as I look to see Minerva come inside and I look to her.
"Clementine, listen to me." She says and I look at her.
"She isn't dead, you can't convince me that she is dead, you all are fucking idiots." I tell her and she takes a seat next to me.
"Clem… Why do you feel like she isn't dead?" She asked and I glare at her.
"Because she isn't dead." I tell her.
"You said you think she thought you were lying to her." She says and I look to the side and shake my head.
"Yeah, she's just being a brat about it." I muttered.
"Clem do you know what death denial is? Or Complicated Mourning?" She asked and I look at her.
"She… what?" I asked and she takes a breath.
"Violet had it." She tells me.
"Oh? What is it?" I asked getting a bit interested on this.
"It's basically when… god… it's basically… you… you and Violet are going to grow old together right?" She asked and I nod.
"Yea we are." I say.
"Well… We don't live forever; you know this right?" She asked.
"I know that." I mutter.
"Well… right now you… kind of think that Violet can't die." She says and I was confused.
"You… it's hard to talk about this." She says and I look to the floor and she takes a breath.
"You can't accept the fact that Violet could be dead." She says to me.
"Because she isn't." I tell her.
"Clem, You and I know that Violet snores when she sleeps, when has she snored?" She asked and I look to her then to the floor.
"She has been working on her snoring, I complained about it and now she's working on it, doing a great job too." I mutter and I look to her.
"Clem…. Violet couldn't get over Tenn. and Mary's death, look how she acted." She says.
"She's working on it, we worked on it, we talked about it." I tell her.
"But she never actually got over it, she had nightmares, she blamed herself every single day, she never got over it, to the point where she would have hallucinations, she… she thought that they were still here with us." She says and I look to the floor again.
"Yeah, I know about this." I mutter.
"Well… you're kind of having the same reaction except not having the hallucinations." She says and I look to the ground.
"She… shot herself…. She… had to." I tried to say something and I shake my head.
"Are you upset that she… basically had to take out a loved one?" She asked and I clasp my hands together.
"She took Lee out for me…. and then took herself out." I mutter and I hold myself.
"She…. Did it herself, and I… I told her I'd let her suffer, God I let her suffer I couldn't fucking take her out, she fucking threw up blood and… and she didn't even tell me to take her out." I cried and I held myself tighter.
"She… she fucking suffered and I let her suffer." I cried more.
"But… but you made sure she was comfortable." She says.
"How the fuck did I make her comfortable? She fucking died throwing up and pain god I don't know how much pain she was in and I didn't… I just… let her suffer." I say to Minerva and I glare at the floor.
"She… I need to go check on her." I say as I get up but she stopped me.
"Let me go, I need to check on her, she's probably awake asking where I am." I say worried.
"Clem, stop just sit down, she's still sleeping." She tells me and I shake my head.
"No, she's awake I know she is." I say as I try to get out of her grip.
"Clem please stop." She says and I shake my head and hit her in the chest but she doesn't budge and I get angry and I hit her more.
"LET. ME. GO!" I yelled at her as I hit her.
"Clementine, please stop this, she's gone, we both know this, we all know this." I hear her say and I hit her again over and over until I start to get tired.
"I need… to see her." I cried as Minerva held me to her.
"You can soon, just not right now." She says and I shake my head.
"She's not gone." I cried and she takes me over to the couch.
"It's going to be ok." I hear as I cried more. I must have cried myself to sleep because I woke up to some sun in my face and I look around to see that I'm in Minerva's house. I get up and I head over to the door and outside to see the others were working on the gate. The gate that Violet was going to put up and I head over to my house. I go inside and see Violet laying on the couch still so I go and take a seat next to her and I rubbed her head gently. She was looking away from me and I sighed a bit.
"Clem?" I hear and look to see AJ.
"Oh hey." I say and kept rubbing Violet's head.
"Clem, we need to bury her." He tells me and I look to him.
"She…. She's not gone." I say quietly.
"Clem." He says and takes a seat next to me and I look to Violet again. I feel the tears in my eyes and I keep rubbing her head.
"Clem, I miss her too." He says and I look to him.
"I miss her…. It's fucked up, it's really fucked up." He says and I nod.
"She didn't say goodbye." I tell him.
"Could she even talk?" He asked and I nod a bit.
"But she didn't say goodbye, I just opened the door and bang… she was… sleeping." I say to him.
"She's in a better place." He says and I look at him.
"How can you say that?" I asked.
"Think about it Clem… she isn't having panic attacks anymore, she isn't going to have any more outbursts, she doesn't have to feel bad-."
"She left me AJ… she fucking left me, she should feel bad about that, she… she is causing me pain right now, we were suppose to grow old together, we were supposed to work things out, I could help her god she was so happy, for fuck sake her birthday was just two days ago." I cried.
"I know, I know." He says and hugs me and I cried some more.
"She… should be here." I cried and gripped his shirt.
"I know… I'm sorry." He says and we stayed like this for a while. I hear the door open and see the others and I look to the floor a bit as I let AJ go and look back to Violet.
"Clem can we… take Violet?" Minerva asked and I shake my head. She then takes a seat next to me and I look at her.
"Clem we need to take her." She says and I look down.
"Just… just a little longer." I say to her.
"Clem." I hear and shake my head and look to Violet.
"Dear god." I hear and look to see Luke looking at us. I get angry and clench my hands into fists.
"Get them out." I say.
"Ok." I hear and I see Aasim telling them to leave and they start arguing and I get up.
"GET THE FUCK OUT, LEAVE US ALONE GOD DAMN IT!" I yelled at him as I shoved him away from the door.
"Jesus Clem you're not like this."
"I KNOW WHAT I'M LIKE AND YOU FUCKERS SHOULD HAVE JUST LEFT US ALONE!" I yelled as I shoved him again and he looked at me and I glare at them.
"Clem sto-."
"I'M NOT STOPPING, THEY NEED TO FUCKING LEAVE NOW AND LET ME MOURN!" I yelled again getting more and more pissed off as I look to the others.
"She was a bitch, she deserved to-." I then punched Elenor in the face and I was grabbed from behind.
"Let me knock this bitches teeth in, you didn't know Violet, none of you fuckers did." I say to Luke's group and they look at me and I take some deep breaths.
"She was a kind woman, she had been through so much and you fuckers made things worse, you fuckers broke the gate when a fucking herd was coming, you kept pissing her off, god damn it we should have let you die in that herd, you fuckers killed her." I tell them.
"We didn't-."
"YOU FUCKERS MADE MORE WALKERS, THEY WOULD HAVE BEEN GONE NOW IF YOU HADN'T MADE MORE OF THEM!" I yelled.
"Get the fuck out, you are not welcomed here, and if any of you come back I'll fucking shoot you, I don't give a damn if I knew you Luke, you're a bastard, Elenor you're a fucking bitch, NOW GET OUT BEFORE I SHOOT YOU BETWEEN THE FUCKING EYES!" I yelled as I was pulled back more.
"YOU HAVE NO IDEA WHAT I-."
"I DON'T GIVE A DAMN WHAT YOU HAVE BEEN THROUGH, I LOST SOMEONE IMPORTANT TO ME YOU BASTARDS!" I yelled.
"You need-."
"You need to fucking leave now, before you say something even more idiotic." Ruby tells them and I glare at them.
"This group is fucked up, Clem you're acting like Kenny." Luke says.
"GET OUT NOW!" I yelled and they look at me as they end up leaving and I get out of AJ's grip and I look to my house and I go inside and take a seat next to Violet again.
"Clem." I hear.
"Can… can I make her grave marker?" I asked quietly.
"Of course, do you need me to get the wood?" Ruby asked and I look to her and I nod a bit.
"Aasim and Willy are wondering where you want the grave." Minerva says and I look to her and think.
"I don't know… she stayed by the workshop but… I don't here there." I say to them. I think a bit and look to them.
"Clem?" Ruby asked.
"What about cremation?" I asked.
"We… I uh… never thought about that." Minerva says and I look to both of them.
"Is it possible?" I asked.
"We'd have to take her to a crematorium, but I don't know how to work it." Ruby says and I look to them.
"It's fine it was just a dumb thought." I say and I get up.
"She can be buried behind the house, not near her parents." I say.
"Would you like to show us?" Minerva asked and I nod as I take them to the spot it was close to the garden but not close enough to cause damage to the garden itself.
"It's a nice spot." Ruby says and I nod and I see Aasim and Willy come over and they get to work. I go over to the workshop and look at it a bit before I finally go inside and look for anything to use to make the gave marker. Ruby was helping me look and I pull back a sheet and see some parts here and there.
"What's this?" Ruby asked as she looked to it and I see a book on the side and I pick it up and read it and I take a seat.
"Looks like she was building something." I say and I see what it should look like completed and I wipe my eyes a bit.
"Oh… Vi." I say quietly and look down.
"What is it?" Ruby says and I show her the book.
"Oh… I'm sorry." She says and I shake my head as I grabbed the book form her gently and I place it back on the table. I cover the parts back up and we find some spare wood parts and we head out. I tried to carve Violet's name but I would have to stop here and there and I hear them talking.
"We should play some music hu?" I hear and I look up to see AJ looking at me and I nod.
"Yea, Violet loves music." I say and he goes inside and grabs a portable stereo and plays some soft music. I kept working on the grave marker and I look to AJ.
"Looks nice." He says and I nod.
"Got to make it nice for her." I say and think.
"Can you carve flowers on it?" I asked him.
"Sure." He says and I hand the wood to him and he starts working on it and I watch him as he got to work.
"Any flowers in particular?" He asked and I laughed a little.
"Violets." I say and he laughed as well and made some flowers.
"Maybe a rose too right here." He says as he points to the corners and I nod.
"That would be nice." I say and he looked at his work. I look at it a bit and I sighed.
"Sorry, if I messed it up." He tells me.
"No, no it's fine AJ, it's fine." I tell him and I look at him then to the marker.
"She was working on a leg for me." I tell him.
"I know, she showed me." He says and I look at him.
"God damn it." I mutter and he finishes on the flowers and I grabbed it and looked to it a bit.
"Hey we got the grave ready." Willy says and I look to them and I nod.
"Alright… alright." I say and get up and help them move the body to the back yard and we put the body in the ground. We got out the hole and then Aasim put the dirt on top of her and I look to the side and take a breath.
"Uh what are we doing?" Delilah asked and I look to her.
"Delilah not now, go to your mom right now." Aasim says and I look to the little girl as she runs off and I look back to the grave for a bit. After some time passed and AJ and I placed the marker on the grave we stepped back a bit and I look to see Minerva as her and the others came over. No one said anything and I just look to the grave. The fact that this is really happening makes me not only sad but angry as hell. I was angry at Violet because she could have told me, I would have been able to do it, I could have done it.
"So… what do we say?" AJ asked and I look to him and I shrugged a bit. Violet wasn't really the type to want to talk during funerals, ever since Tenn and Mary she just kept to herself.
"I don't know… any good things?" Willy says and I look to the grave again. We all kept silent and I just didn't know what to say, I don't know what we could say, there were good memories but we had experienced the bad as well. I just kept looking to the grave and I glare at it.
"She was a bitch." I mutter.
"What?" AJ asked.
"She was a bitch, she had problems but didn't really let us help her, she got bit and didn't tell me till it was too late, she fucking shoots herself the moment I opened the damn door, she was quick to anger, and god damn it, she hated herself and I couldn't say anything to make her see that she shouldn't." I said getting angry.
"But… she still thought of others before herself, she worried about AJ, Liz, everyone." I say and I see Sasha go lay by the grave and I look to the dog.
"New people just made her angry, they didn't understand and they never will, they kept pushing and pushing and they never stopped, and I should have said something when Luke said what he had said but I was so shocked because I never thought something like that would have come out of his mouth…. And it makes me angry that Violet… still thought that she deserved this." I cried and then glare at the grave.
"She didn't even give us the time to say goodbye, she had fucking time for it she could have given us a goodbye and I would have been ok with what she had done, but no, she just… did it… like it was a damn chore that needed to be done." I say and rubbed my arm a bit.
"Everything seemed like a chore to her at this point." I say and I shake my head.
"At least she isn't suffering anymore." Minerva says.
"Yeah." I mutter and I look to the side a bit.
"I think we are done here." Ruby says and I nod a bit and we go inside and I take a seat on the floor.
"Um, so… we should talk." Aasim says.
"What about?" I asked as I looked up to them.
"Well… Violet knew most of what to do-."
"Look at her books that's all I can say." I tell them and lay my head back on the couch and looked to the ceiling.
"I know but… it seems kind of wrong going through her things." Ruby says.
"She won't care, she's dead, she can't do anything about it." I say bluntly.
"Clem."
"She's dead, what the fuck is she going to do?" I asked and I look at them.
"Seriously what the fuck is she going to do?" I asked them.
"We didn't even touch Louis's stuff when he died." Willy says.
"Yeah, well Louis didn't have important stuff." I tell them.
"But… she use to write personal things in her books." Minerva says and I look at her.
"Her thoughts, what if we grabbed the wrong book? She didn't label them." Minerva says and I look to the ground.
"I'll look through them… just… go." I say and everyone seemed to leave but I feel someone sitting next to me and I look to see Liz.
"Are you mad?" She asked and I look away.
"At who?" I asked.
"… At Violet." She says and I shrugged.
"Yeah… I'm angry at her." I say and take a breath.
"I think she's angry too." She says and I look to her.
"Why would she be angry?" I asked and I see AJ come in and he takes a seat.
"Because she got bit." AJ says and I look down.
"And that she couldn't say goodbye." Liz says and I look to the both of them as they look to the ground.
"… Remember when Violet would play catch with you?" I asked AJ and he nods.
"And remember when she took you two fishing?" I asked them both.
"Yeah, it was fun." Liz says and I think and take the photo out of the vest pocket. I look to see a younger Violet and I show it to Liz and she looked to it.
"I took that photo of her when we found the farm… It was after we met up with Mary and her mom." I tell them.
"She looks happy." Liz says and I nod.
"She was… We said we were officially married at the time, she use to carry around small hard candies with her too." I tell Liz and she looked up to me and I nod.
"She was… it was before everything, she was happy that everyone was safe, she might have had some hatred towards Minerva at the time but she grew to trust her again over time… she was strong, protective, kind…. She made sure everyone was safe." I sighed and looked to the photo. I then began thinking and look to the back door.
"She has a photo of me with her, or I hope she does." I say quietly.
"We have the photo book she made." AJ says and I smiled and I get up and go and grab it. We all take a seat on the other couch and I opened the book and Liz laughs as she points to one photo that showed AJ and Violet with oil on their faces and AJ was missing a tooth.
"Oh god I remember this day, Violet was teaching me how to change the oil in the truck, I messed up." AJ says and I laughed and nodded. Then pointed to another photo.
"Remember this?" I asked as it showed a picture of AJ and Violet working on making the wall the way it is now. Violet was wearing a tank top and carpenter pants with a few tools on the toolbelt and AJ had one as well though at the time it wouldn't fit around his waist, he wore it like a bullet belt across his shoulder.
"Yeah, we were working on the Wall that day, if I remember she was teaching me how to properly measure out how the wall would be and how much concreate we would need." AJ says and I nod. I look to the photos more and chuckled a bit.
"You two took me to the creek this day, you found so many arrowheads." I say as I point to a photo of AJ who had mud all over his pants and Violet in the background hanging upside-down on a tree branch before it snapped.
"She… haha, she broke the branch because she was trying to do sit-ups." AJ laughed and so did I. we flipped through the book and told Liz about the story behind the photographs.
"Why isn't she smiling here?" Liz asked and I see it's Violet outside a house holing a bottle of beer and I sighed.
"This is when we were at Joans." I say quietly and we flipped to another page and I see a photo I never took.
"I don't remember this." I mutter as I look to it. It showed Violet with a bunch of other people, she was smirking as two soldiers were wrestling in front of her and I remembered them.
"That's Delta and Romeo." AJ says as he points to the two men wrestling.
"I remember this day wait." AJ says as he takes the book from me and looks then points to someone.
"Look there I am." He says and shows us the photo.
"The soldiers came to the school to show us some training moves, Violet was also part of the matches." He says and I look to it some more and then flipped the pages and there was a photo of Violet laughing with Juliet as they clanked their beer bottles.
"This was at the Barbeque we held at the house." I say and lean my cheek on my hand.
"She and I caught two bucks the day before for this." AJ says and I look to the photo and I see me in the background and I smile a bit.
"Mary took this." I say.
"What does Mary look like?" Liz asked and I looked and then pointed to the girl as Violet and her were getting the water sprinkler to work.
"That's Mary." I say and she looks to the girl.
"She kinda looks like you." Liz says and I look to her.
"And you look like Violet." I tell her and she looks down.
"I'm sorry." She says and I raise a brow at her.
"What for? No reason to be sorry." I tell her and we look through the photos more.
"Who is that?" Liz asked and I look to see Tenn.
"That is Tennessee, Minerva's little brother and by extent Violet's brother." I say as I look to the old photo.
"Wait Violet and Louis use to be friends?" She asked as she points to a photo of Louis and Violet as they had their arms over their shoulders smiling at the camera and I laughed as Violet was wearing the tuxedo shirt.
"Oh god this was at our wedding." I say and smiled some more.
"But yes, they use to be friends, he actually got Violet to wear that shirt, said she had to look good on her wedding day, though I just kept my jean jacket." I laughed as we looked at more photos.
"Look AJ was so little." She says as there was a photo of Violet picking AJ up and I was right next to her as we all smiled.
"First family photo." AJ says as he looked to the picture.
"Yeah, this was the last of the film from the school camera." I say and we look through more.
"Why are the photos out of order?" Liz asked.
"Violet said it makes her remember things this way, it didn't make sense to me and still doesn't." I tell her.
"She was weird." Liz says and I chuckled and nodded.
"Yeah, she was weird, but it was funny." I say and I see another photo and it showed Violet laying on the couch drooling and her arm was over her eyes.
"Oh goodness, this was when we were at the farm and Violet just said 'I'm taking a damn nap, the suns a bitch.' And we all just laughed and said it was because she didn't put sunblock on." I laughed as did AJ.
"But she was kind of tan when I met her." Liz says and I look at her.
"Yeah, she stayed outside more, but before that she just burnt in the sun, she was so red at one point that I had to beg her to come back into the house I thought she was going to pass out." I tell her.
"She did look red in the other photos." Liz says and I nod a bit.
"Oh yeah… oh god I remember this." I say as I looked to the photo of Violet sitting on her motorcycle.
"That's when she finished the motorcycle right?" AJ asked and I nodded.
"Yeah, she was so proud of herself." I say and looked to it a bit and sighed. I then flipped the page and saw a photo of AJ, Violet and I sitting by our tree during the day when we were at the farm and I wiped the tears from my eyes.
"Mom?" I hear and I cried some more and rubbed the tears out of my eyes.
"Sorry." I say and I look to the photos more.
"Hey we can stop." AJ says and I shake my head.
"No, no I just… I missed this Violet so much." I say quietly. As we kept looking through the photos more.
"She looks so happy here." Liz says as she points to one photo and I laughed a bit at this.
"Violet taught me how to ride a bike that day, see." He says as he points to the blur and I laughed.
"She was so happy that day as well." I say and I look at the photo.
"Hey, what's that a photo of?" AJ asked as he points to one and I look at it.
"Oh, Violet had found some fireworks, and set them off, you tried to take a photo but it was too dark." I explained as it showed mostly the flashes from the fireworks.
"So, was this my first photo?" He asked.
"No, actually this was." I say and go to the next page and point to the photo that AJ took and it was a blurred photo of Violet and I sitting on the porch as she worked on my leg.
"She was working on my leg that day and you said 'Got to get a photo of how to fix the foot'. It was so adorable when you showed us the photo." I say and I look at him and he smiled.
"What's happening in here?" I hear and look up to see Minerva and the others.
"Looking at some old photos." AJ says and I nod.
"Oooh, let me see." She says as she takes a seat.
"Remember when Omar made a cake." AJ says as he pointed to the photo for Willy's birthday.
"Oh, it was such a fun day, Violet and I thought it would be a great idea to shove cake in Willy's face." Minerva says and I chuckled. After a while the others came and we looked at all the photos and we laughed at one in particular.
"Oh god, what happened in this?" Ruby asked as she handed me a beer and I look at the photo.
"Violet once told AJ that pigs kept cool by rolling in mud and so, for the hell of it… haha, AJ grabbed the hose and started to make mud in the yard and AJ threw mud at her." I laughed.
"Then she threw mud back at me and it became a mud war." He says and I took a drink of the beer.
"I thought it was so cute I had to take a picture; Violet then threw mud at me." I joked and I took a breath.
"It was so much fun." AJ says and I look to another photo.
"Hey this looks nice." Minerva says as she points to a photo of Violet and AJ in the garden as Violet was teaching him how to plant the seeds.
"This was when Violet was teaching me about apple trees, we found an orchard not that far from here and I said it would be great if we just had our own apple tree." AJ says and I smiled.
"God it's sad that I forgot that she could have been happy for once." Aasim says and I lean on my hand a bit.
"Hey when was this?" Willy asked.
"Oh, that was when we were at Joans, she was helping me with homework and Mary was wondering how to work the camera." AJ explained and I look to the photo.
"Oh, it does look posed." Ruby says and AJ laughed.
"That's because Mary asked us to act like we were studying." AJ laughed and I look to the photos. We all had sat here for hours talking about the photos and I took another drink and I look to the others. It's sad that this was the only time we could all talk kindly about Violet, where we didn't have to worry about her anymore. I felt so bad thinking this. It wasn't long till everyone had left and I look to AJ and Liz as they each slept on the couch and I go and grabbed a blanket for them and cover them up. I then head out in the back yard and to Violet grave with a beer and I just stare at it.
"God I'm so sorry Vi." I say to the grave.
