━━━━━━━━━▼━━━━━━━━━

****

****

━━━━━━━━━▲━━━━━━━━━

****

◤━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━◥

◣━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━◢

Third Person POV

While the mother and daughter were packing up their belongs, the little that they possessed, while the father was off on the opposite end of camp. There bustled two other individuals, switching places with both Blake and Daryl.

Whether be the bad energy from them that caught onto these two was unknown, but the anger always linger. Especially on Shane's side.
It was Blake who was getting him angry, he likes her, and the only thing is worried about in her mind is Addie...and Dixon. For one very big reason.

As the two cops relieved them of their duty to get packed and ready for departure, it was then that Shane could no longer take the silence. So his huffing and puffing commenced as Rick forcefully made him speak.
"Okay...I'm thinking if you'd stayed here, if you'd have looked after your own— instead you went off...You took more than half our manpower with you. I'm thinking maybe our losses wouldn't have been so bad." Shane spewed out, continuing to shovel forward without looking to Rick the moment he was done.

Rick knew somewhere in the back of his mind that screamed of Shane already criticizing Blake for being an unlawful mother, and now he was targeting himself...There was something that wasn't right here, and he felt out of place bringing up Blake when she's already heavily upset.

Lori claimed that she'd watch her, but she was nowhere to be found near Blake. Who sat comfortably with Addie reading a book. "If we hadn't gone off and brought those guns back when we did, I think our losses would have been a lot worse. Maybe the entire camp." Rick challenged, and Shane just spits forward. 

They were trying to shovel the other out, and in doing so they missed the returning sound of the truck approach. That's when both eyes came to wander forward, and in a low whisper from Shane to his partner did he state:
"Blake ever mention the Dixon's to you?" And a solid shake of the head commenced as Daryl himself made it towards them.

"I still think it's a mistake not burnin' these bodies. It's what we said we'd do, right? Burn 'em all, wasn't that the idea?" He questioned, and neither one of the three saw the oncoming group of people here for the service. 

And in the hands of Blake, was her daughter. Needing a small boost up the hill as her short legs couldn't go that far up. As Daryl continued to spew out insight into the situation of burning to bury, the entire group came forward and stopped halfway.

Especially when the mention of 'rules' were set in motion. And although Rick argued that there are no rules, the quick glance at Lori as both her husband and Blake knew she would speak up. "Well, that's a problem. We haven't had one minute to hold onto anything of our old selves. We need time to mourn and we need to bury our dead. It's what people do."

Blake was still steaming with anger from earlier, Dixon was so close to her the second time that she couldn't fumble what she stated next. "...Says the one who didn't touch an ax or a shovel all damn day." She spits, there were no glares, nothing outlasting about it all. Except for the smirk from Dixon, as he knew full well what was happening.

He was changing her all over again.

It was hard for him, to see her crying and not being able to comfort her. To see her hurting all because of what he did. Or what had done all those years ago, but it was always the recurring thought, and has been since he saw the tattoo. 

How much does she still hold on.

And the answer to that question was in her arms around now, as her hands cupped together around her daughter's shoulders. And there laid the bunny, the stuffed animal Merle was claimed to have gotten her.

Daryl's eyes were set against looking at it, but he couldn't help it.
Addie is a sweetheart, he couldn't deny that.

She's her mother's daughter, no doubt about it. And although it hurt hearing that Blake had moved onto someone else, Daryl had to remind himself that it was only fair.

And it's better her than him, considering it was all his mistake. 

As Andrea refused to have any aid in bury her sister into the deep grave Daryl and Blake had dug, all whilst arguing. Considering it was far too deep for a given grave within here, probably why Andrea picked it to begin with. 

Addie was crying softly into her mother's thigh, she liked Amy. Always offering to style her hair, make little arts and crafts. But it was even harder to see how bloody Andrea was, Blake knew to offer her help, but she didn't know how to. 
The Dixon was completely throwing her off, especially when his main focus was her tattoo. How many times he's traced over it when they shared a bed, sprawled out and naked.

That isn't something one should be thinking of at a funeral, but he somehow managed to do it. As he shifted his legs a bit more evenly, trying to give away his thoughts. Was it easier to assume that he was relatively upset rather than thinking about what he and her had done before.

It's been a few minutes and the group members had all valued the time standing above the graves before returning back down to pack. While Rick and Lori stayed behind, did he realize how upset his wife was on Blake's outburst.
"I-I-I don't know what I did to...To anger her."
"We had more than a few close calls in Atlanta, and last night? Nobody was watching Addie—-...I know I know." Rick stopped his wife before she could defend what she had told him. 

He trusted that Shane was trying to manage the whole camp, but the sudden realization of how close he was with Lori and Carl compared to Addie and Blake astound him. And that was a major red flag in his mind, but he pushed it aside to comfort his crying wife.

"Shane blames me for not being here. Do you?" He asked, but in reality, he wanted to know if Lori retracted her response from before, when he and Daryl were first introduced and she opted her husband into the ring.

It was silent as she thought of a valid answer, and he tried to compete with what she was thinking. And in one flicker did it work, she sided with them both. Until he mentioned the CDC, she was forced into helping make the tough decisions.

And now, at the very moment did she realize why Blake was torn between the mixes.

She was probably asked the same question, plopped right into the center of him and Shane, and she understood completely.

Lori claimed she wants certainty, and the only thing Rick could've provided was that he loves his wife. And somehow it worked enough for them both to shed another set of tears.

_____

Date Posted: 08-10-18 // Time: 8:44

Word-Count: 1184

______

Short chapter I know :( I'll try and post another one again in a few hours!