Four months later

He was a zombie.

I felt bad, but I knew this had to be for the best. Natalia wouldn't hurt him intentionally.

She must've been thinking about it for a while. She knew she needed to leave without us suspecting anything.

Which meant me telling Prime what I saw made her leave faster.

I wish she would've told me. I would've gone with her.

Or at least helped her. I owed her that much.

At least she wasn't here. I could picture her happy. Prime wasn't so easy to avoid.

I hadn't heard him speak in at least a month.

He spent most of his time curled up in the blankets she had left behind, and shutting out the world.

He hadn't showered by himself in four months.

The only form of cleaning he had now was Rosa throwing him into the shower and turning on the water.

She was sympathetic at first, but Ana was due any day now. Rosa was barely sane.

I'd been staying with Jazmin, Ana's grandmother, and Carlos, Ana's grandfather, for about a month.

I couldn't stay in that house anymore.

I sort of understood what Prime was going through. Still, he was getting on my nerves.

She was alive, he had all of the resources to find her.

And he was laying on the floor drinking beer trying to drown out his sorrows.

I stood over him. He looked, and smelled, disgusting.

"Okay, you're done with this." I waved my hands over him.

"I... hwave no idea what you are.. talking about." His speech slurred.

I grabbed the drink from his hand. He whined in protest. Crawling towards me as I walked to set it on the counter.

I grabbed his arm and pulled him onto his feet. I moved him through the house, his feet slid on the floor as he tried to move away from me.

I stripped him into his boxers when I got the the bathroom.

I set him down in the shower and turned on the cold water. He tried to move away from it but I held him in place. He started protesting loudly.

"For the love of God, just water board him." Rosa groaned from the doorway.

"Then he can't help." I looked at her.

"You think he can help like this?" She pointed at him.

"No, that's why I'm cleaning him."

"Throwing him under cold water won't make all his troubles go away Avox." She rolled her eyes.

"No, but it will make him more sane, then we can look for Natalia. I miss my sister. I don't care that he's sad anymore. I know I'm a terrible person, but my boyfriend bled out in front of me and I was showering by month two."

"Fair enough, but you need to be nice to him."

"You gave him a concussion last time you cleaned him." I looked back down at Prime. He was sobbing again.

"I'm stressed okay, and Ana was in false labor or whatever the fuck it's called."

"Yeah yeah. Want to clean him, he my guest. I was planning on dumping soap on him. I just can't physically handle the smell anymore."

Ana's head peeked around the doorframe. "I can help."

"No." Rosa looked at her.

"You don't let me do anything. Please?" Ana begged.

I grabbed Rosa from behind and shoved her out the door. Ana slipped into the room behind me and locked the door.

"I hate you." Rosa glared at me.

"I didn't want to take care of him, you didn't want to, that leaves Ana."

"Okay, back the fuck off off of me." She shoved me away.

"I didn't want you to break down the door." I laughed.

She stormed away, seething.

The shower had stopped. I heard faint voices and pressed my ear against the door.

"I know your not a child, but your going to take a bath anyways." Ana soothed.

Prime muttered something I couldn't hear.

"Avox wants to find her, he needs you to help. The first step is getting you ready. So you're going to take a bath, you're going to eat the food I give you, and then you're going to bed." He voice was scarily calm, I didn't know how she could handle him still.

"It's not even lunch time." Prime sniffled.

"I don't care. You need the sleep."

I walked away from the door, he needed his sheets to be changed, it had been to long.

Natalia washed her clothes here anyways, it would still smell mostly like her. It felt stupid that I cared about that, but it was all I knew.

I changed the sheets, made the bed, and got new clothes for Prime to Ana.

Then I picked up all the garbage in the room, which was a large task.

We'd tried to keep it clean but he didn't like us coming in here.

After half a can of Febreze the room was tolerable. It actually smelled kinda nice.

Ana walked Prime into the room and tucked him into bed. She had cut and dried his hair too. His beard was trimmed.

She put in way more effort than I would've, and I'm not nine months pregnant.

She followed me out of the room and shut the door.

"You have to be nice to him when he wakes up." She looked at me. Panic was in her eyes.

"Okay? Won't you be here?"

She looked down. I saw the puddle underneath her. "Go get Rosa." She whispered.

...
Time jumps.

wHat diD yOu thINk?

*screams internally*

This one doesn't get a fucking chapter title. And you're not going to say shit about it.