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Carl hadn’t been the same since that night. None of them had been. Ron had heard bits and pieces of what had occurred in what was now being called “the death circle”, but he still couldn’t get out the full story from any of them. All he knew was that Abraham and Glenn were dead and that this Negan person was the literal devil.
Everyone was dealing with it in different ways. Some of them tried to go about their lives like nothing had happened in order to keep themselves from falling apart. Others let themselves feel the grief and anguish, often crying and finding solace in those who were left. Carl, however, completely shut himself off from everyone. He did not speak. He hardly ate. Not even Michonne or Rick could get him to open up.
Ron tried his best to be there for his boyfriend, but how could you comfort someone through something like this? He wasn’t a therapist. None of them were. No one expects something like this to happen to them in their lives and both of them were already dealing with so much trauma and baggage as is. Carl never gave up, even when it was becoming too much for him to handle. He was always quick to bounce back and put others first, which was why Ron was so worried over this.
Carl wasn’t bouncing back. He was sinking deeper and deeper into depression and isolation. After everything he had been through, what if this was the final thing that pushed him over the edge? Ron had been pushed over the edge before and it had caused him to act impulsively and he would always regret trying to kill Rick until the day he died. Every time he looked at Carl, he would be reminded of what he had done. Ron wished it had been him that had been torn apart by walkers.
But right now, Carl needed him. Ron visited him every day doing his best to be there for not only Carl, but the entire Grimes family. He could see the torment in Rick’s eyes as he stumbled through the day like one of the walkers beyond the walls. There was no life in his eyes. He had been torn apart emotionally and didn’t know how to recover.
Many nights, Ron would be the one making dinner for the Grimes family and making sure all of them were eating. He stayed with them during their recovery, sleeping either on the couch or in bed with Carl. Ron heard Rick’s quiet sobbing late in the night while he held Judith close, rocking her to sleep. He could feel the pain that lingered in every corner of the house.
The late afternoon breeze drifted through the open window in the kitchen. Ron had sent Carl upstairs to shower while he made them lunch. He had finished making their sandwiches and Carl still hadn’t returned. He felt the need to check on him and he headed upstairs towards the bathroom. Ron pressed his ear to the door before he said a word. He could hear the shower running behind the door, but quietly under the noise, he could hear crying.
Carl Grimes never cried.
“Carl?” Ron asked.
The crying suddenly stopped.
“Carl, honey, I’m going to come in, okay? If you want me to leave, just make a sound or something and I won’t come in.”
Ron waited a moment listening, but only heard the sound of the shower running. He turned the doorknob and entered the warm, steamy bathroom and shut the door behind him. He heard a slight sniffle from behind the shower curtain. Ron carefully pulled back some of the curtain to find Carl sitting in the shower, his knees to his chest. He looked up at Ron pathetically. His eye was reddened from crying and his bottom lip was quivering as he tried his best not to cry.
“Oh, honey,” Ron said softly. He kneeled down and pulled Carl into a hug, not even caring about the water. Carl wrapped his arms around him, burying his face into Ron’s shoulder. He started to cry again, unable to hold it back. Ron just held him while he cried. He held the back of Carl’s head.
“Let it out,” he whispered. “It’s alright.”
The sobs grew louder and deeper as Carl clung to him desperately. Ron just held him tighter, refusing to let go. Carefully, Ron got into the shower as well so he could better hold Carl close. Clothes would dry. Ron gently rocked Carl as he let it all out. How long had he been holding this all back? How long had he wanted to cry, but refused to let himself feel it? How long had this been weighing down on him? Ron kissed Carl’s forehead.
“Let it out,” Ron whispered. “Let it out.”
They stayed like this until Carl began to quiet down. Ron moved away long enough to turn off the water before he returned right back to his boy.
“Feel better?” Ron asked. Carl nodded. Ron pushed the wet hair out of Carl’s face, tucking it behind his ear. He ran his hand over Carl’s cheek comfortingly before kissing his forehead again. His fingers brushed against the rough scars around Carl’s eye.
“You’re beautiful.”
“I love you,” Carl said softly. His voice trembled. Ron had never heard him sound so broken. Ever since the two of them had met, Carl had been nothing but strong for the sake of others. He always put on a tough face when things got intense in order to soldier through and stay alive. His heart was so big and full of compassion for a world that wanted him dead.
“I love you too,” Ron said. “I love you so much, Carl. You know I’m always here for you. I always will be.”
“I know. You’ve been so kind, not just to me. I’m just sorry.”
“Sorry for what?”
“Sorry for making you see this.”
“Carl, it’s okay to cry.” Ron gently tilted Carl’s chin up. “Crying doesn’t make you weak. It’s the strongest thing you could ever do. I used to think that too. I used to think crying made me weak and that I couldn’t let people see me cry, but my mom, she told me it was okay. Letting yourself feel what you need to feel, it’s healthy. None of us wanted this. None of us expected to be in this world. I never wanted an abusive father. Neither of us wanted to lose our moms.”
“I miss her,” Carl whimpered. “I just want my mom back.”
“So do I. God, so do I.”
Carl let out another whimper, burying his face against Ron again. “They’re dead, Ron. They were my family and they’re all dead. Everyone keeps dying. I thought Glenn would always be there, but he’s gone. What if I lose my dad or Michonne too? What about Maggie? Or Daryl? What if I lose you ?”
Ron knew these thoughts all too well. He had struggled with the concept that all of them were just on a ticking clock for the longest time. Nothing was forever and they could all go at any second. Life was no longer a guarantee. It was a privilege. It was something you had to fight for and you had to know who you were willing to give that away for. Ron had no doubt in his mind that he would die for the Grimes family. If he was given the choice to give his life to spare the life of any of theirs, he would in a heartbeat.
“You won’t,” Ron said firmly. “Not as long as I have a say in it. I know I can’t promise you that I won’t ever die, but what I can promise you is that I’ll never stop trying to protect you. I’ll always return to you if we ever get split up. I promise not to do stupid shit that could get me killed.”
“You better not,” Carl said softly. “Or I’ll kill you myself.”
“Was that a joke?” Ron asked. “Did you just make a joke?”
“What if I did?”
“I’d say that’s a step in the right direction. I’m just glad to hear you talking again,” Ron said. “I thought I’d never hear your pretty voice again.”
“It’s not that pretty.”
“It is to me.”
Carl moved back from his hold. “You’re wet.”
“So are you,” Ron pointed out.
“I was taking a shower,” Carl said. “Your clothes are all wet.”
“Then how about I hang them to dry and we finish getting you cleaned up, hm? You’re probably tired from letting that all out, right?”
Carl hesitated a moment before he nodded. Ron stood up and stepped out of the shower, taking off his soaked shirt and tossing it onto the counter.
“Then you’re gonna rest for the rest of today, and I’m gonna spoil you. You deserve to feel normal for once. Forget what’s outside and what we went through. We’re gonna play pretend,” Ron said.
Ron felt his heartache for a moment as his mind replaced Carl with Sam. There had been many times growing up that the two of them had played pretend to forget what was going outside beyond the walls. To forget what was going on inside the walls of their house. Just play pretend and it would all go away for a few moments.
Ron plugged up the tub and began to run the hot water before he finished stripping down. Carl watched him as the tub began to fill up around him. Ron turned off the water once the tub was full, then carefully got back into the tub and settled down behind Carl. He wrapped his arms around him and just held Carl against his chest for a few minutes. He could feel Carl relaxing against him.
Ron ran his hands down Carl’s chest, feeling all the different scars that he carried. His fingers stopped on the scar on Carl’s stomach from the bullet wound when he was younger. Carl had told him the story about Hershel’s farm and about the buck in the woods. Ron wasn’t sure if he believed in God or not, but the fact that the shot hadn’t killed Carl was a miracle. Especially when hospitals and doctors had disappeared.
“You’re a fighter,” Ron said. “You never give up or give in. That’s what it means to be a Grimes. You’re tough, but you’re so caring. You loved me even after what I did to you. You gave me love I didn’t deserve. This world doesn’t deserve you and you deserve a better world.”
Ron reached over and took the shampoo bottle from the side of the tub. He put some into his hand before he began to soap up Carl’s hair.
“We’ll heal and we’ll mourn,” Ron said. “But we’ll carry on. You’ve said it yourself, we have to make the world better for those who we lost and for those we have to protect.”
Ron rinsed his hands off before he cupped water into his hands and washed out Carl’s hair. He heard Carl sigh and it sounded like a sigh of relief. He was getting talked down from the ledge. He was beginning to relax.
“It’s just another dark chapter. We can’t give up. Not when there’s something good coming after it,” Ron said.
“How do you know something good will come?” Carl asked.
“Because I should have died when I shot you, but you loved me. You loved me despite me permanently scarring you and leaving you disabled. You gave me a family. You made me feel truly loved.” Ron kissed Carl’s shoulder. “You gave me something so good after the darkest moment of my life. We all have those moments, but we all get to come back. You showed me that.”
Ron placed another kiss on Carl’s shoulder, then his neck.
“I think I’ve been there the whole time,” Carl said softly. “And I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to come back. It’s getting harder and harder to pretend that it didn’t happen. That none of it happened. Ron, you don’t know the things I’ve seen.”
“I do. You had to survive out there. You had to face it. I know I was sheltered-”
“No. Ron, you don’t know. I never told you it all. I never. I haven’t.”
“Do you want to?”
Carl shifted in the tub to look back at Ron. Ron could see the brokenness and desperation in his eye. He needed so badly to get these things off his chest. If society was still together, Carl needed a therapist badly, but society wasn’t still together. There weren’t any therapists. There was only each other.
“When the outbreak happened, there was this girl,” Carl started. “Her name was Sophia. She was Carol’s daughter. We became fast friends and I wanted to keep her safe. I hardly knew what was happening, but I saw how scared she was and I wanted to be like my dad and protect people. Sophia went missing when walkers attacked us. We looked everywhere. I wanted to find her.”
“We found her. In the barn. Hershel..he kept walkers. He thought, maybe, maybe there’d be some kind of cure. Maybe his loved ones could be cured. Sophia was dead. I’ll never forget her twisted, rotting face.”
Carl wiped at his eye sniffling before he continued.
“I’ve been shot. I’ve been held captive. I killed people. I killed my mother. I was almost raped and murdered. I survived a tornado. I watched people I loved die and I was fucking helpless. I just..I just wanted to be a cop like my dad when I grew up. I wanted to help people.” Carl’s voice was trembling and he was starting to cry again as all the memories came back to him. “I wanted to make mom proud.”
Ron pulled Carl’s hair back, ringing out the water.
“She is proud of you. I have no doubt in my mind she is. You’ve been through hell and yet, you’re still so loving,” Ron said. “I bet you’d make the best damn cop this world has ever seen. No doubt you’ll be an amazing leader too.”
“Leader?” Carl asked.
“You think Rick’s gonna be leader forever? He’s gotta retire at some point, and you’re the perfect replacement,” Ron said. “Hell, you practically run this place as it is. Your dad might be the one who deals with people beyond the walls, but you’re the one that’s keeping this shit hole going.”
“I don’t know if I even want to be the leader,” Carl said. “I just wanna be a kid again.”
“Then why don’t we be kids again?” Ron suggested. “Whenever we’re not doing our jobs, just enjoy life for a few moments. Run barefoot in the grass. Play in the lake. Capture fireflies. After all, Judith is gonna need a big brother to play with.”
Carl leaned back against Ron and shut his eye with a sigh.
“I just wish I could forget it all. I want to be a good brother for her, but I just feel so..dirty.”
“Then wash it off.”
Ron took the soap and lifted one of Carl’s arms. He ran the bar of soap over his arm slowly and gently.
“You’ve been carrying this all for so long, and we can’t change the past. All we can do is wash it off and keep living,” Ron said. He moved to Carl’s other arm before he started to soap up his chest.
“When did you start being a voice of reason?” Carl asked.
“When I lost everything,” Ron said. “Made me do a lot of thinking, you know? Started thinkin’ that maybe your way of doing things wasn’t so dumb after all.”
Ron poured water onto Carl, washing off the soap before placing more kisses on his shoulders. When was the last time Carl had been given proper attention? When had he done anything for himself? Ron hugged him close, not wanting to let him go.
“You mean everything to me, Grimes,” He said. “And I’ll be right next to you for as long as you’ll keep me. I’ll be strong for you when you can’t be. You’re not alone anymore.”
Ron continued to hold him, resting his head on Carl’s back as Carl began to cry again. Ron knew that this was only the beginning of something much darker, and he was terrified for the citizens of Alexandria. He was terrified of losing his found family. He knew that once Rick managed to find himself again that Negan would pay for what he had done, and if Rick didn’t do the deed, then it was highly likely that Carl would step up.
It was only a matter of time and Ron wasn’t about to let Carl do it alone. He would be right there on the front lines alongside the others. They were fighters and they always would be. That’s what it meant to be a Grimes. Protect the innocent and make the world right again. Wash away the death and the injustice.
“I love you,” Carl whimpered as his tears began to subside.
“I love you too,” Ron replied. “I’ll always love you.”