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RHatch89- Much obliged :)

"Yesterday was a bad day."

"Why exactly was it a 'bad day'?"

"You have to ask?"

"Indulge me."

"Okay... well, to start, I lost an ear. Then I killed someone. Then nineteen people were killed by the wolves..."

Denise clicks her pen like she always does, during our sessions. Jotting her notes with indecipherable chicken scratches.

"That's everything?" She asks when she's done writing.

"No," I admit. "Enid left. Carl says she's alive, but she left right before the horde surrounded us... so she's stuck out there, alone."

"Are you planning on-" she pauses, thinking about her wording. "-considering going after her?"

"No... how could I? There are walkers outside," I state the obvious.

"So yesterday was a bad day," Dennise agrees. "Why not make today a productive one? What are you going to do now that our session is over?"

"Well," I sigh, "Carl is babysitting Judith all day, and Maggie has taken a whole day of guard duty, so I asked Mikey if I could hang out with him. He's helping his mum out with some things."

"Sounds like a productive day," Denise smiles.

"I guess..."

"If you come back tomorrow," she gets up, walking over to Pete's old desk- her desk now -picking up a walkman. "I have made some improvised hearing tests that we can start on, to test the damage of that ear... you should also be able to take the bandage off in a week or so."

"I'm fine with it on," I tell her, my hand jumping up to my head instinctively. "The hearing stuff sounds good, though."

I stop by Olivia's on my way to the Monroe house. She opens the door when I knock, and I tell her I left my guitar in Enid's room last time I was here. Olivia tries smiling, but I can see she's upset about not having Enid around the house at the moment.

I take a while looking for my guitar and avoid her questions when I come back into the hallway empty-handed.

"Guess I didn't leave it here," I shrug.

She stands by the door waiting for me to leave.

"Shoot, I almost forgot," I tell her suddenly. "Pretty sure Rick wanted to talk to you about our ammo situation... like, if we've got enough and stuff."

Olivia stands a little straighter. I can't tell if it's because she feels important at the idea of speaking to Rick or if she's just still scared of Rick like most Alexandrians.

"Right, okay," she grabs her house keys and gestures swiftly to the exit. "C'mon, I need to lock up."

"I need to grab some bullets," I awkwardly point towards the armoury door. "Five bullets, actually."

Olivia obviously knows what I used my five bullets on yesterday, since she's staring at my bandaged ear and looking sorry for me. I hate it. Plopping the keys in my hand, Olivia grabs her coat and tells me to lock up when I leave.

I'm a little later than I said I'd be when I get to the Monroe house. Mikey doesn't greet me with one of his usual wide and toothy grins, although definitely seeming grateful to see me, I don't think he's fully gotten past yesterday.

I'm led through the house that brings back fresh and scarring memories, the bannisters at the top of the stairs are still splintered and spilt open from where I fell with the wolf I killed. I notice how hard Mikey's trying not to look towards the living room rug; a faint but dark stain still discolouring the fabric. There's definitely something else still there too. Something only the two of us can see.

We go to Deanna, down in the basement where her office is located. She's sitting at a large, ornately decorated oak desk as she pours over scrolls of building plans and old looking books on architecture. There's a gold wedding band lying upon a black glasses case that matches her own. A glass of unfinished whisky sits beside a gas lamp and mug of fountain tip pens.

I say hi, and she smiles up at me, seeming better than she had yesterday.

The plans on her desk are detailed. One shows where she plans for the next expansions to be. Graphite lines gently dust across the parched paper showing mills and cattle pens, farmland and new homesteads. I find plans showing a map of Alexandria's sewer hidden under a book about early medieval construction.

"How do we keep the sewage systems working," I ask, studying the map- a maze of twisting and turning tunnels running under the town.

"Oh, it's simple," Deanna tells me, putting a thin finger against the map. "It's mainly self-sufficient, but if there's a problem, we can always get down there from here and fix it," she moves her finger to the solar panels on the map. "There's a grate here that leads down."

"That place reeks," Mikey says, sitting in a comfy chair facing the desk, picking up one of the pens from the mug and playing with it between his fingers. "You can smell it just from walking by it."

A sound of glass shattering comes from above our heads.

The mother and son beside me both jump, look up at the ceiling. They go upstairs to investigate, leaving me alone in the office. I hear muffled shouting, Spencer's voice arguing with Deanna's.

Mikey comes back down, gloom all over his face.

"Want me to go?" I ask.

He gives me a face like he wants to say no. "Probably a good idea," he says instead. "Sorry."

"No problem," I tell him. "See you later?"

"Yeah."

With few places left for me to go, I swing by home, to 99. Carl and Judith are sitting on the living room floor, toying with a stack of playing cards that I think belonged to Noah. I watch as Carl desperately tries to stop his sister from biting the ace of spades. I snicker at the sight of them.

Carl turns around, hearing me, smiling when he sees me standing by the front door.

"What're you doing?" he smirks, holding the ace above his head when he finally manages to wrestle it from Judy's grip.

"At you, doofus," I punch his arm as I sit with them on the floor. "What are you guys even doing?"

Judith tries to explain by throwing a three of hearts at me. Carl telling me after I dodge the flying card.

"I'm trying to teach her poker," he explains.

I laugh at him.

"What!?" Carl folds his arms defensively.

"Carl, she's a toddler."

"So?"

"So... how's she meant to get it if you're fifteen, and you're shit at poker!" I laugh again, finding it hard to stop now.

Judith burst with giggles at my language, pointing at me and clapping.

"Dude!" Carl tries to be serious through his own laughs.

"What?" I frown at Jude dramatically. "You don't mind, right, Judith?"

She keeps clapping and giggling.

"See?" I tell Carl with a shrug. "She doesn't mind."

Carl rolls his eyes at me when he stops laughing. "If you keep saying cuss words around her and her first words are cuss words, my dad will literally kill me."

"What if her first words are... I love you?"

"Why would they-?"

"I love you," I tell him.

Carl shoves me. Then he kisses me. Judith laughs at the interaction.

"Love you too."

I told Denise the worst parts of yesterday so I didn't have to tell her about the worst part of today.

How today, I decided to break a promise I made yesterday.

After finishing off a few things, I find myself in the last place I want to be. I find myself doing the last thing I ever want to do.

I find myself upstairs, in 101, knocking on Carol's bedroom door.

She answers it, looking me up and down, waiting for me to speak.

I do.

"I need your help..." I say after a long pause.

Carol lets me in. She still hasn't spoken.

"I'm going out there," I tell her.

She's still staring at me, like she's trying to work out how to respond, whether to take me seriously.

"How?" she finally asks, sceptical eyebrows raised above equally sceptical eyes.

"The sewers," I tell her. "Maggie said that's how she was trying to sneak out... I managed to get Deanna to tell me where it is."

"What about Carl and Maggie?"

"Maggie and Carl are busy all day. By the time they realise, I'll be gone."

Carol frowns, crossing her arms, her baby-blue cardigan getting caught up in them.

"Why?" she asks, sounding annoyed for no reason.

"Enid's out there. I'm going to go find Enid. Then I'm going to find Glenn and Nicholas, then we're going to find Sasha, Abraham, and Daryl. Then we're all going to come back here and help deal with the dead."

Carol shakes her head. "I mean, why the hell are you asking me?"

I grind my teeth in a mix of shame and frustration. "When Carl and Maggie realise I'm gone, they'll come after me because they'll be worried about me... if you're gone too, they'll know I'm not alone. Plus, they won't leave this place that unguarded," I keep my words short and to the point, needing to be taken seriously.

"That all?"

I sigh, "I can't do it on my own, not after my ear."

"You've really thought this through," Carol almost sounds proud, and I hate it. But then she tells me, "This is a childish plan..."

"Like blowing up cannibals with a firework and sending a horde into their lair to rescue your people?"

She lets herself smirk for a brief moment. "We'd need guns... more than just our pistols."

"I already visited Olivia's... she gave me the keys, so it wasn't hard to sneak some rifles out. I've left them hidden by the sewer grate with my backpack."

"When did you decide to do all this?"

"I couldn't sleep last night," I tell her, "My ear keeps ringing. I decided to do this."

Carol cocks an eyebrow, apparently impressed.

"You in?" I ask, impatiently checking my watch.

"Give me two minutes to pack a bag."

A/N

Are y'all excited for some Carol and Rhys adventures? Because I sure am!

Next Time: Rhys and Carol make their way into the world outside.