⊱ 10 ~ ❝ word vomit ❞ ⊰
〖season two, episode three〗

A small plate carrying one perfectly made peanut butter and jelly on top slid into Clementine's view. "Hungry?" A girl with blonde hair asked, smiling sweetly. The kindness in her face and voice was nearly enough to push the dismal feeling away that hadn't budged since the moment in the woods.

Clementine stared at the sandwich ⎯⎯ hungry didn't even begin to cover the churning ache in her stomach from the lack of food. She regretted allowing herself to upchuck so easily when whatever substance had remained in her belly could've held her over a little longer . . . but it had been hours now of feeling as though her stomach was eating itself.

"Here, take it and sit outside with my sister ⎯⎯ Maggie." She clarified, lifting the plate closer to the girl.

Clementine hadn't left her place on the hallway bench since Lori had arrived. If she was being entirely honest ⎯⎯ the bench was the most uncomfortable place she'd sat for hours on end with part of the cushion being stiff and the other having little to no stuffing at all.

She grabbed the plate, resting it on her knees just to stare at it for a second. "Okay . . ." Clem mumbled, earning a wide-eyed look from the teen in front of her ⎯⎯ she'd probably reached her own conclusion that Clementine was nonverbal or lacking the ability to speak at all.

The blonde girl smiled wide with accomplishment at getting through to the girl. Patricia had told the teen that she didn't seem interested in talking to anyone. "If you need anything, you can ask me. I'm Beth." 

A sigh exhaled out Clementine's nose, she just couldn't find it in herself to care that much about anything . . . but she'd do as the girl said and go outside where this Maggie was supposed to be.

Walking past the bedroom, Clem gazed in only to immediately drop her head to stare down at the plate instead when Lori looked up at her. Lori's lips pursed at the girl, wondering what on earth her twisting tornado of thought had constructed inside that brain of hers, but Clem was already exiting through the screen door ⎯⎯ slowly closing it behind her to avoid the noise it had made prior.

The sun had completely gone out of sight and the peach-colored sunset vanished into a caliginous sky. Away from the city stars were more visible but Clementine knew nothing about them. She used her time to learn about other things, but boy were they beautiful to look at.

"Hello, again." Maggie greeted, her soft country accent intertwining her few words. Clem walked over to where she sat on a rocking chair ⎯⎯ the same one Clementine had relaxed in earlier in the day but now it was on the opposite side of the porch. "Want to sit?" She asked, starting to stand up, but Clementine shook her head and slowly crouched down to sit up against the wooden railing. "That looks good."

Clearly, she was trying to partake in friendly conversation or pull Clementine out of her bubble with leading statements, but none of them quite lured her into wanting to talk about just anything. Beth only managed to get the bare minimum from Clem but she could only think of one thing when in the woman's presence again.

"She's not my mom." Word vomit. It came out like word vomit just like almost anything Clementine had ever said. It wouldn't have surprised anyone at all to find out that she didn't have the mechanism in her brain to think about what she was going to say before she said it. It formed in her mind and then came out. There were a few occasions where she managed to bite her tongue and keep the thought fully contained inside.

Maggie's eyebrows curved curiously, not entirely understanding. She'd forgotten about calling Lori her mother ⎯⎯ but for Clementine, it had played on repeat in her head ever since.

"Lori." A huff blew from her lips as she fidgeted with the crust surrounding the peanut butter and jelly, slowly tearing pieces of it off and discarding it in a pile on the plate. "She's not my mom," Clem repeated, staring straight down at the plate in her lap. "Rick and Carl . . ." Her words cut short, it was one thing to mention her mother, but another to bring up her father and brothers.

Brother. She hadn't said that word out loud in ages. Everyone from the Atlanta camp only knew she even had siblings because of Jim's meltdown where he, like Clementine, word-vomited their entire journey before the camp in a few crushing words. Her eyebrows twitched together as her eyes glossed over, fighting to keep the emotions firmly inside.

There was plenty Maggie thought of saying, but fell silent. She'd experienced the same grief the little girl in front of her had and didn't want to be the person who said all the right things when nothing about it would ever be right.

"Your sister said I should come out here," Clem murmured, gazing around at the poorly lit porch, letting the previous topic fade into nothing. "Made me this . . ." She motioned to the plate when finished ripping the crust off.

Maggie's lips turned up softly. "Beth. She loves kids, probably saw your pretty blue eyes and fell apart."

Despite still not liking everyone calling her a kid, little girl, or child ⎯⎯ one corner of her mouth turned up at the compliment, and she took a bite out of the peanut butter and jelly trying to hide the reaction.

Physically, she froze with the bite of food sitting on her tongue in her mouth. Right then she was half certain it was the most delicious thing she had ever eaten in her entire life, but that was probably just her stomach desperate for any sustenance talking. Whatever the reason was, it pushed her to take another big bite.

A sound of a car door closing alerted Maggie, but Clem was entirely enveloped in finally eating something ⎯⎯ growing tunnel vision on the simplistic flavor of it tasting like pure happiness.

"So do we ring the bell? I mean it looks like people live here."

Clementine lurched, almost dropping the plate and shattering it into pieces when a voice close somewhere behind her reached her ears. It was Glenn. "Holy shit." She gasped, fear-stricken from the new presence.  Maggie chortled a soft laugh at the harsh language, Clementine just kept surprising her. "Glenn?" She asked confused, setting down the plate and standing up.

Up on her feet, the wooden pillar on either side of the steps no longer blocked the second person beside Glenn. Her eyes widened and a smile stretched across her face as she darted toward T-Dog.

He was alive, and that was enough for her at that moment. "T!" She threw her arms as far around his waist as she could and held on for dear life.

T-Dog grunted at the small impact, stumbling back a step. He didn't look good ⎯⎯ sweat glistened on his forehead and compared to his naturally dark complexion he had paled significantly. "Hey, 'lil froggy."

The smile he gave was forced ⎯⎯ he was in pain, but the nickname fluttered her heart with joy. "Come, come." Clementine hurriedly grabbed his hand tugging him toward the steps.

"Did you close the gate up the road when you drove in?" Maggie asked, her voice thicker with her country accent and a lower tone than when she spoke to Clementine. She now held the discarded plate in her hand, not wanting the food to sit on the porch flooring where bugs could crawl onto it.

Clementine looked back at Glenn, eyebrows raised in questioning ⎯⎯ wondering why he wasn't responding quickly. "Uh, hi." Glenn said, his mouth agape. "Yes, we closed it. Did the latch and everything." He spoke awkwardly ⎯⎯ earning a confused gaze from Clementine. The twenty-something-year-old man was always awkward but this level of it was new. "Hello, nice to see you again. We met before . . . briefly."

"What's your deal?" She asked eyebrows furrowed up at him and her lips quirked with suspicion ⎯⎯ but T-Dog's state was much more important than whatever was making Glenn feel nervous. "Maggie, he needs help." Clem waved her free hand toward T-Dog.

"Look, we came to help. There anything we can do?" T asked, his head lulling side to side. Maggie stared at the wrapped bandage on his arm, uncertain about approaching the man. "It's not a bite. I cut myself pretty bad though . . ."

She nodded, stepping toward the screen door. "We'll have it looked at. I'll tell them you're here."

"We have some painkillers and antibiotics. I already gave him some. If Carl needs any." Clementine looked down at her shoes ⎯⎯ the reminder of Carl slamming all the happiness to see T-Dog alive into oblivion.

"Come on inside. I'll make you something to eat. Here, sweetheart." She said, handing the plate back to Clementine.

The three of them followed Maggie inside, and the two men stepped into the wide-open bedroom door ⎯⎯ finding the older man leaning over Carl to check on him. Clementine couldn't bring herself to pass over the threshold, standing firmly beside Maggie instead, peaking through the gap at Carl's form.

He looked peaceful . . . as if he was just sleeping and would be awake by morning in perfect condition ⎯⎯ but that was a fairytale.

"Hey." Glenn finally spoke after a few seconds of pure silence. Neither man had their own children and couldn't begin to understand how the mother and father were feeling sitting at that bed watching their son lie motionless.

Rick leaned his head in his hand, exhausted in every shape and form. "Hey."

"Um, we're here, okay?"

Lori nodded, finding the will to give a soft smile. "Thank you."

"Whatever you need," T confirmed, pulling the woman's attention to him. Her eyes kept moving, landing on Clementine where she stood back, plate in hand. Lori tilted her head in a silent questioning ⎯⎯ as if to ask her to come in. She hadn't spoken to the little girl, hardly seen her face since the church . . . but something was willing Clementine to stay away, and whatever it may be Lori would let the girl be at least for the time being.

With the woman's attention suddenly on her, Clementine shrunk back ⎯⎯ avoiding the confrontation her mind had concocted by going into the kitchen, where she didn't have to see Lori's sorrowful eyes.

• ───────────────── •

The peanut butter and jelly that was made just for Clementine was left on her plate ⎯⎯ forgotten when the sight of Patricia stitching up T-Dog's arm had snuffed out all her appetite that had once been all-consuming just minutes ago. At least she'd gotten a couple of bites in, the level of hunger she had was lessened just from that.

"You got here right in time. This couldn't go untreated much longer." Patricia spoke matter-of-factly, her drawl of an accent much stronger than Maggie's.

The sight of his bloodied arm being gruesomely sewn shut was both hard to look at and look away from at the same time. T-Dog's head leaned on his own shoulder as he hissed and flinched in pain. The medicine did little to help on that front. "T?" Clem croaked, her voice coming out high-pitched with worry.

"It's okay . . ." He grunted, his eyes trained on the ceiling as he gripped the edge of the table with his free hand. Even in the midst of pain, he did his best to console her.

"Merle Dixon," Patricia said suddenly, looking at the orange pill bottle on the table. The name shocked Clementine, so she grabbed the pill bottle to inspect it herself. Merle Dixon was right, that's what it said right above a word that looked impossible to pronounce. "Is that your friend with the antibiotics?"

Clementine puffed at the insinuation. "Friend." She muttered to herself, rolling her eyes at the memory of the damned man.

"No, ma'am." Glenn purposely spoke over Clementine's mutterings, not wanting the girl to get too ahead of herself as she had so frequently. Glenn had witnessed Clem go on a tangent about her feelings involving the Dixon brothers and didn't want that to happen again. "Merle's no longer with us. Daryl gave us those ⎯⎯ his brother."

That had shocked the girl even more. "Daryl?" She said shocked. "Willingly?"

Glenn released a chuckle, nodding his head at Clementine's questions. "Not sure I'd call him a friend." T-Dog sputtered through the pain, his eyes glancing over at his own arm.

"Woah, don't look at it. You're gonna throw up." Clem grimaced, her shoulders racking with shivers when her own eyes looked over at T's arm. It reminded her of Frankenstein ⎯⎯ except Frankenstein's stitches were meant to be prominent, while, Patricia looked like she knew what she was doing.

"He is today. This Doxycycline might have just saved your life." The name of the medicine repeated in Clementine's head, trying to pronounce it. Docks-eye ⎯⎯ she gave up almost instantly, shaking her own head like it would knock the thought out of her brain. "You know what Merle was taking it for?"

"Clap . . . Uh, venereal disease. That's what Daryl said."

"I'd say Merle Dixon's clap was the best thing to ever happen to you."

"I'm really trying not to think about that," T-Dog spoke painfully, biting down on his lip as the woman finished off her stitches.

Clementine's eyes bounced around from one adult to the next awaiting someone to clarify and as the question popped into her mind it instantly filtered out. "What's clap?"

• ───────────────── •

T-Dog was given a place to rest on the couch and Clementine hadn't left his side since, but he was falling asleep. She wouldn't force him to stay awake just so she had someone to talk to, so she sat on a chair opposite the couch and stared at a clock on the wall.

It was ticking menacingly, and if she squinted her eyes she swore she could see it sticking out a tongue at her in a mocking taunt. Shane and the man who shot Carl still were not back ⎯⎯ and every so often words would filter out of the bedroom loud enough for her to hear.

Running out of time, surgery, how is he, how much longer, losing blood ⎯⎯

She covered her ears ⎯⎯ wishing for the insistent buzzing to return so she didn't have to hear any of it at all. Patricia came barrelling through the house with a long metal table on wheels, but headlights outside the window got Clem's attention.

Clementine stood up and rushed toward the door. It was the same blue pickup truck Shane and that man left in. They were back, finally.

As she charged through the front screen door she let it slam behind her and for the first time, the nightmare-inducing image of Carl colliding with dirt, grass, and leaves didn't pop into her mind. It didn't because a smothered sense of promise was arising. There was a chance for Carl still. 

Out came Shane from the driver's seat, a duffle bag and backpack thrown over both shoulders ⎯⎯ if Shane was back that meant they found what they needed, and if they found it then the surgery Carl needed could finally happen. Hope kept resurfacing out of thin air and while Clementine struggled to grasp onto it for long ⎯⎯ there it was as clear as day. Just a little bit, but it formed in her stomach asphyxiating the feeling of dread to a lesser extent.

"Carl?" He huffed, limping toward the farmhouse where people were hurriedly gunning past Clementine and toward Shane with wide eyes.

"There's still a chance." Rick managed to upturn his lips ⎯⎯ it was a smile, but the joy in it was lacking substance when the only good thing was simply Shane had made it back with what they needed. It didn't entirely mean Carl was saved and that knowledge was clear in the father's face.

Clem craned her neck to look at the truck, where was that man? From where she was stood on the steps it was already hard to see but the headlights blinded Clementine even further, making the windshield appear opaque ⎯⎯ she couldn't tell if he was there or not, but she didn't need to wait to find out. It seemed the one fighting to save Carl's life had realized the same fact when his head whipped around to do a double-take at Shane. "Otis?"

Otis. She didn't even know his name ⎯⎯ hardly even saw his face for more than a couple of seconds and yet, "No . . ." He was gone.

"We say nothing to Patricia. Not till after. I need her."

A lump formed in Clementine's throat ⎯⎯ Carl's likelihood of survival had just skyrocketed, but at what cost? A man tried to make his wrongs right and in the process, God was laughing whilst digging his grave.

Clementine couldn't begin to fathom just how the residents of the farm were feeling about Shane and Otis' adventure at that very moment . . . or Rick and his injured son showing up on their front doorstep ⎯⎯ literally.

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〈〈 𝐀 𝐔 𝐓 𝐇 𝐎 𝐑 𝐒 𝐍 𝐎 𝐓 𝐄 〉〉

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Ayo ya girl hit double digits on the chapters, never done by me before I'm proud of myself.

I know Clementine wasn't there so there's no written proof, but in my heart when Lori is telling Rick how she's not sure the world is made for kids ⎯⎯ in my HEART she tells Rick "Look at what it's doing to Clementine." or something. I heavily debated Clementine overhearing the discussion just so I can make it real but it just wouldn't line up with other scenes I have planned if Clementine was there to overhear it.

ALSO, no they did not tell her what clap is LMAO

I always get a lil scared of writing about god in twd universe because (i personally don't rlly care to believe or not believe in god but) the lack of faith kind of comes with the nature of the... yk looming death and grief of the apocalypse. BUT I DONT JUDGE ANY BELIEFS YOU DO YOU.

Fanfic Editing Account: thinn.skinned.wp

Editing Account: rheeedit