“I know.” She did. Bea was capable, even if it did make her nervous that her friend was out there putting herself against the throng of undead. There were others, too. Mimi had done it. Ellie, too, even back before the incident with Elliot. It was a risk that people had to take, she knew that. “I just hate it. We've lost enough. Too much.” She swallowed thickly. “I realize that I can't put people in a bubble or anything. I know that nothing's really safe anymore.” Not even the compound. At any moment, the government folks could come back. Attack them just because they wanted to. “I just wish there was... safety. In general.” She sounded stupid. She knew it.
Glancing up at him, Rae went quiet. She knew that he understood what she meant, especially now, and especially with Mike being gone. “I know I shouldn't complain. I could have it a lot worse.” His reminder that he was mourning slapped her out of her self-pity for a moment, and she squeezed his hand, letting him know silently that she was there for him. That he still wasn't alone. “I know. I just wish I had. I just wish... this hadn't happened.” People died. It was a truth even before the infection hit. But David's disappearance was too fresh a wound to just look over now. To act like he was just someone else who died.
Would she rather be Bea or Leah? “No. I mean... I don't know. I wish I was stronger, is all.” She wished that she wasn't so easy to hurt. She paused, then turned to look at him when he told her that there was nothing wrong with the way she was. It had been awhile since she'd heard that. The next thing he said shocked her even more, but she gave him a weak smile. “I don't think I could honestly even change it if I tried.” She chuckled. “I'm stuck in my ways, I guess. For the record, though?” she looked away from him, looking at the ground sheepishly. “I like the way you are, too.”
Internal wars were never easy. Rae had never been all that good at denying what she wanted, and it was becoming more and more obvious to her that what she wanted... was him. Everything felt... okay. For the first time in months, when he was holding her and kissing her, everything felt okay, and she was loathe to let it go.
But just as quickly as it had happened, the memory of the last time they'd done this jumped into her mind. The way he'd pulled back. The way he'd told her that it was a bad idea. It didn't feel like a bad idea to her, but if he'd said so, he must have had his reasons. He'd never lied to her before, that she knew of, so she had to trust that fact.
And with everything he'd done for her, all she'd done so far was take advantage like this.
Hesitantly, with a disappointed expression, Rae pulled back from the contact and turned her eyes to the floor. “I'm... I'm sorry,” she said, practically a mirror of what she'd said a week ago. “I keep...” she slid her hands away from him and stepped back from his embrace, though she instantly wished that she was back in it again, “I keep doing this.” Sure, it had been him that had kissed her this time. But she had to have been sending out some kind of signal or something. “I don't know why you keep hanging around with me, if it always leads to this.”