Alicia Clark has always been (thestrongone) wrote in crownplazaic, @ 2020-10-29 00:14:00 |
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The last thing Alicia expected to wake up to was the jacket on her bed. She'd barely opened her eyes when she saw the foreign item down near the bottom, on the unused side of her bed. It hadn't taken her long to sit up and investigate what it was. One look and she knew what it was; her mom's jacket. The jacket Madison Clark had worn all the time. The very jacket she'd been wearing the last time Alicia had seen her mother alive. When she'd sacrificed herself to give her children a chance to live. So they could get away from the walkers surrounding them. So they could have lives. So they could have hope. It hadn't really worked out quite that way. Instead, Alicia and Nick had given in to their grief and let it twist into revenge. That's what had driven them both. Strand too. Even Luciana, though Alicia suspected, while she loved Madison, she'd gone along more for Nick's sake than anything. But, it had been Alicia and Nick's desperate need for revenge on Mel and the Vultures. They were the reason those walkers were there. The reason the walkers destroyed the stadium they'd spent so long building a real home in. Madison wanted to make something of that place and just like every other asshole out there, Mel had decided he wanted what they had. So he and the others hadn't stopped until they got what they wanted. They even stooped as low as sending Charlie, a twelve-year-old kid, in to spy on them. Alicia and the others, they'd let that need for revenge fuel them until they'd come across Althea, John and Morgan. Then Nick had found Ennis, Mel's brother. Technically he'd been the one to bring all those walkers to overrun the stadium, but as far as Nick and Alicia were concerned, it was all of them. But, Nick had finally tracked down Ennis. The Vultures had managed to evade them for a while, but now, they couldn't hide. Nick killed Ennis. For killing Madison. Then, in a sick twist of fate, Charlie, that little kid they'd tried to help. That Nick had tried desperately to help, shot and killed Nick. Alicia had to watch, helplessly, sobbing her eyes out and begging to whoever would listen, as her brother, the only family she had left in this world, died in her arms. To say Alicia went off the rails after that was an understatement. She did a lot of things she still carries guilt for. A lot of bad things. But she'd lost everyone. She went to a pretty dark place. She only wanted to kill walkers. She only wanted to be alone. She didn't really care if she lived or died, or so it seemed, as recklessly as she was living. Then something changed. She got stuck in a house during a hurricane with the last person on Earth she would have ever wanted to be trapped with; Charlie. The kid who killed her brother. She was just a kid. A kid who lost both parents and hated herself for what she did to Nick. A kid who had no family. In Charlie, Alicia found a lot of herself. They weren't so different. From that moment on, after an experience where they had a true bonding moment, the two were close. SLowly, Alicia had been pulling herself out of that darkness. The radioactive blood was the most recent thing after her desperate need to help some other kids who didn't want help. She had a lot to make up for, Alicia did and she finally realized that she was, in her own way, trying to. Hell, she was still trying to. Even here, at the hotel. Now this jacket was here. Alicia held it to her face and she could still smell her mom's scent clinging to the leather and tears filled her green eyes. Slipping it on she smiled and just let herself have a moment. It was when she slid her hands in the pocket that Alicia discovered the photo of her, Nick and their mom. And that just made Alicia cry. She thought she had gotten stronger than this. She wasn't sure if she should say thank you or fuck you. But it had her head all kinds of messed up. It had been all day. So, when Cora offered to distract her, she wasn't saying no. She just wanted to forget about it, or talk about it maybe, she wasn't sure yet. Alicia got dressed and she reached for her own leather jacket she'd arrived in, but instead grabbed her mom's jacket and slid it on. She hoped somewhere, somehow, her mom was proud of her. She'd been trying to keep her memory alive as much as she could. The door opened and Alicia looked up as Cora came in. She felt this overwhelming feeling of gratitude for this girl who'd been looking out for her since she'd gotten here. Cora had quickly become the most important person to Alicia in this hotel. So she found herself rushing forward and launching herself into Cora's arms and hugging her tight before she could stop herself. She couldn't help it. She just needed that right now. |