AN: So this is all liveinadive's fault for the prompt…she knew what would happen.

And by that I mean my thanks for this prompt goes to liveinadive, whether or not it will be what she wants it to be. ;-)

This is a "time" piece, which means that there will be some practices/beliefs/etc. that I don't necessarily agree with, but I'm expressing certain beliefs that people do hold.

I do not claim this to be historically accurate and in many places I'll be taking poetic license so it shouldn't be taken too literally. It is simply a work of fiction for entertainment purposes and should be taken as such.

It will be a Caryl story, so if that's not your thing, stop reading now. There will be quite a few time jumps in this story, but I'll try to make sure that they're carefully marked to avoid any confusion. Characters will be somewhat "OOC" to go with the situation that they are being placed in.

I'll be updating sporadically and when and where I'm inspired to do so.

If you read this, I hope you enjoy! This one will be getting started kind of slowly and it will probably be quite different than anything I have done.

And if it needs to be said, I own nothing from The Walking Dead.

Let me know what you think!

111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111

She looked at her lap again, it was the only place that she'd felt comfortable looking for any extended amount of time since she'd gotten into the car. Her finger now was bare of the small chip of a diamond that she'd worn with pride for the last six months…the chip of a diamond that had promised that she would be married to the man that she loved.

The very man who had put the diamond on her finger and had taken it off, four days before, so that the band wouldn't leave a mark there. The band wouldn't leave the telltale indention that anyone even intended to marry her.

She loved him, and she lived in a world where she had very few people to love.

But now she had shamed him, and he'd made sure that she knew it…he'd made sure she knew how angry he was at her.

But he'd left no mark on her face, and he'd left no mark that couldn't be explained by her endlessly clumsy nature. She was always falling down, stumbling, tripping…running into things. She was terribly clumsly, almost to a fault…except that she could no longer remember how many times she'd actually suffered from the clumsiness and how many times it had simply been used to cover up when he'd corrected her for doing something wrong, something that she didn't have the raising to know that she shouldn't do or that she should do differently.

And she was thankful to him for his corrections because he was shaping her into being a proper wife for him. He was teaching her what she needed to know to be the woman that he would spend the rest of his life with…the woman that would keep his house and mother his children.

She was only a few months shy of sixteen years old.

She had lived with Mr. Edward Peletier Sr. and his wife for almost a year. They'd taken her in as an act of charity when her father had passed away and she was left, with no direct next of kin, with little choice of where to go in life and what to do.

Her mother had passed at a time in her life that she no longer retained any memory of the woman. She had one photograph of her mother, and sometimes that was the face that she saw in her memory when she tried to bring the woman that had given her life to the forefront, but she feared that now it wasn't a true memory of the woman at all, rather it was a memory of her photograph and nothing more.

Her father had been a heavy drinker, but always a kind and just man from what she'd known of him. He'd worked to make sure that they got by, and they did get by, but there was little left over when the necessities were met.

But Mr. Edward Peletier Sr. and Mrs. Peletier had taken her in and she was eternally grateful to them for that because she had no idea where she might have ended up otherwise.

And Ed, the son of the couple, had taken something of a shine to her, and he promised to marry her when she turned sixteen and he could do so without anyone having anything to say about it, not that anyone in town was really concerned with Carol's fate. They hadn't been before.

They would have a home, a small two-bedroom starter that Mr. Edward Peletier Sr. was helping his son purchase, even though he wasn't entirely supportive of the union, and Ed would work with his father, bringing in, before too long, more money than they even needed to survive. He would make, like his father, enough money to be well to do.

And that was why his father wasn't particularly mad about the idea that his only son was planning on marrying Carol Ann McAlister, an ugly girl with nothing much to offer him on any front.

So she would have to work that much harder to prove to them that she was a suitable wife. That she'd be able to be everything that he wanted her to be, that she'd be worthy of him and worthy to carry his name and carry his children.

And she was thankful to Ed that he was already teaching her the things that she needed to know and teaching her not to overstep herself…teaching her to behave properly where she might not have learned it before from her father. She had learned a lot from him, and she knew that she still had a good deal to learn.

"Ed," she said softly, still looking at her hands folded in her lap, "we could marry early…"

"Marry you before your sixteen? In some kind of shotgun wedding?" Ed spat as he drove his father's car along the almost abandoned road. "We don't need some kind of scandal…some little wretch ruining the family name. Do you even know what that would do to my father's business? To his name? It would ruin every one of us…you're not worth something like that."

Carol didn't protest. She knew it was true. She wasn't even sure what Mr. Edward Peletier Sr. did for a living, but she did know that his reputation was important in town. That was why he was bothered that his son had gone and proposed to her…that his son was going to bring into the family a woman that wasn't worthy of the family name.

"We could wait, like we planned," Carol said. "Two months isn't that long and when he's born we can say that he came early. No one has to know."

Ed chuckled ironically. He moved one of his hands from the steering wheel and Carol flinched as something of a natural reaction to the movement. He didn't reach out toward her in any way, though, he simply rubbed at his face.

"My family has done a hell of a lot, Carol Ann, to become what they are," Ed said. "A bastard kid is the last thing they need. No one is going to believe the kid came early and you're already fat enough that people are going to start to talk about you being the little whore that everyone knew you would be."

Carol forced herself to swallow.

"He's your baby…you know that Ed," Carol said.

Ed had convinced her that it would be fine...that it was something that he expected of her…to do her duty to him as a wife. Even before they were married, it wouldn't matter because they'd be married as soon as they could be without causing people to talk too much.

And she'd gladly given to him what was his. She loved him and she dreamed of the day that she could, as his wife, give to him everything he wanted from her, so giving him what was his early hadn't even occurred to her to be problematic.

Because they were to be married, and she had the ring to prove it.

Ed shook his head at her and at the situation.

"You'd ruin me from the start! You'd shame me and the child too! We'd never recover from this," Ed declared. "My father…you know what he wants me to do? He wants me to send you away for good…you're lucky that I love you enough to pretend that you're going to visit some mythological aunt before you marry. You're lucky that I'm pretending that you've got somewhere to go and not that you're off having some bastard child that you went and got knocked up with before you got married! You're lucky I don't just leave your ass there!"

Carol didn't respond. She rode in silence until he pulled into the roundabout in front of the brick building that looked like something crossed between a school and a hospital.

She stayed in the car, looking at her bare fingers in her lap, until Ed had gotten out of the car and gotten her suitcase out the back of the car.

He opened the car door and huffed at her.

"Are you getting out?" He barked. "Stop dawdling, Carol Ann!"

Carol got out of the car, her heart thundering in her chest and her feelings rising up in her throat, but she fought through the tears because Ed didn't care for tears at all…and she didn't want to do anything that would make him think, especially after she'd gone and done something so terrible as to end up pregnant before it was time, that he was making a mistake by marrying her.

Carol stood facing him, wringing the same hands she'd been examining in the car.

"You're going to come back for me, right Ed?" She asked. "You are coming back…when it's not a problem anymore?"

Ed looked at her, his jaw flinching slightly and he nodded.

He reached and pulled her to him and she sunk into his body, gratefully accepting the kiss that he planted on her lips. He rubbed his hand over her hair.

"I'm coming back…just take care of the problem," Ed said.

"I'm sorry…" Carol offered.

"You'll make it up to me later," Ed said. "Come on…let's get you signed in."

Carol nodded her head, unable to find the words, and she followed him as he carried her suitcase into the building.

When they got to the desk, Carol stood to the side, her hands still wringing together, while Ed signed her in. She'd leave it to him since he was more suited to handle such things. He was the one that knew what to say. And he was the one that knew how to handle these things in the most delicate way possible.

And he was right. She tried to convince herself that he was right.

No one would believe that the child was conceived after they married and it would ruin them…and the child would be better off with someone else. He would be better off with a family that was prepared to have him, a family that he wouldn't bring any kind of shame to. He would be much, much better off.

And Ed had promised that one day, when they were married and more financially stable without the support of his father, they would have children that they could keep…as many as she wanted…a house full of strapping boys that carried their father's name, maybe a girl for her as well.

Ed was right and this was for the best. This is what she had to do to prove to him that she loved him…to prove to him that she was the type of woman that he wanted to make his wife, even if she really didn't deserve to be married to him.

Carol could only half listen to the things that were said to her. It didn't matter anyway…Ed had handled everything. He knew the way that things were supposed to go. He had taken care of everything. She wasn't going to question his decision. It was the best for both of them…the best for all of them.

She signed the papers offered to her, gave the best smile that she could to the woman in the white uniform and before she went with the man who came for her luggage, she turned to Ed who was standing, passing the key to his father's car from one hand to another.

"You'll write to me?" She asked.

He nodded slightly.

"Just take care of it," he said.

Carol nodded.

"You'll be back?" She asked.

He nodded again, but he didn't say anything else. It wouldn't be proper to have a show of affection…those were for private spaces, not for others to see. He'd taught her that already. Affection wasn't a public affair…their relationship wasn't a public affair.

Carol watched as he turned and walked out of the building, not looking back, and she turned to follow the man who had taken her luggage, sucking in a breath and reminding herself that this was the best thing…this was the only thing.