Since the S5 MSF I've had this idea of the day Rick and the others will have to explain to Judith about not only Lori but her second mother—Beth. It's something I've thought about for a while and finally I decided to sit down with my laptop and see what happens. I'm in no way an expert at writing from a little girl's perspective but I was one once so we'll see how I do.
A couple notes: This idea is briefly referenced in my last TWD story What Hurts the Most and this story gives a minor reference to it in return. These two stories can be considered to be in the same universe but you don't need to read the first one necessarily to read this (I'll love you if you do though!).
I don't include too much information about where they've ended up or how they got there because I wanted to focus more on this moment, but just know that the group has been living in a cabin in a small community for the past few years. Not Alexandria. The group members that are still around are mentioned so if they're not, you can assume they're dead or gone
I own no part of The Walking Dead or its characters. If I did, things would be going very differently!
It's not until a few weeks after her tenth birthday—or what day her daddy figures to be her birthday—that Judy Grimes begins having dreams of the mystery woman. At first she thinks she must have imagined the woman. The images she sees are fleeting in her mind—more like flashes of passing moments. And she's so pretty. Judy isn't sure she's ever seen anyone this pretty before.
The dream woman is young, a little younger than Carl is now probably. Her hair flows around her like sunshine and her eyes are big and shining and her smile is so wide, so comforting. In her mind Judy feels like the woman is looking down at her, although she doesn't really understand why. And while she only appears in brief moments, the mornings Judy wakes up after dreaming of the woman she always finds herself feeling a little bit warmer than usual.
She knows this woman isn't her birth mother. Lori. It feels sort of strange to call her anything else. But her daddy and Carl have described what Lori looked like to her. Everyone tells her how she has her mother's dark eyes and dark hair, although she chooses to wear it shorter like Aunt Maggie does. She has the same dusting of freckles across her cheeks that Carl did when he was her age. And sometimes her daddy looks at her like he sees someone else in her eyes, or maybe he's just looking for that someone else. She's growing taller now, and many days this summer he's commented on how she's becoming the same string bean her mother was.
Judy has only seen string beans once in her life, a few summers ago when they managed to grow some, but she wonders if she should be feeling proud in knowing she's a miniature replica of her mother. The mother she never knew.
She knows she has her daddy and her brother as immediate family but she also has Michonne, and Aunt Maggie and Uncle Glenn, Uncle Daryl, and Aunt Tara looking after her. Yet after dreams of the woman she feels like she's spent the night wrapped up in a group hug from all of them at once. These dreams make her feel more loved than ever and she wakes up wondering why she also feels like she's missing something.
She remembers Jessie, who had been around for a while with her sons. But that lady is long gone now. Judy supposes that if she has a mama now it would be Michonne, although her daddy told her what happened to her real mother when she was born.
As much as she tries, Judy can't remember Lori. Her daddy and Carl tell her stories occasionally, describe how she cared for Judy while she was pregnant with her. She supposes that she misses Lori, in a way. She never knew Lori but misses her mama the way you feel sad when you realize you'd forgotten yesterday was the first day of the season to pick berries in the woods with Uncle Daryl. A lost opportunity.
Missing this woman feels different. Judy feels a longing to know who she is—who this woman is to her specifically. She wants to know why it took her this long to dream about her. It feels familiar to dream about this woman and think about her, but for the life of her Judy can't remember a time she'd ever met this woman.
She doesn't tell anyone about her dreams. Doesn't ask what they might mean or who this woman is. Judy convinces herself that she's made up the woman in her mind. She reminds her of the princesses in the stories from some magical, far-off world called Disney which Aunt Maggie tells to her at night, when she's tucked up in her cot in the loft at the top of the cabin.
They've been in this cabin for several years now; most of what Judy remembers is from here. A wooden cabin with a few bedrooms—one for Uncle Glenn and Aunt Maggie, one Carl and Uncle Daryl, a small study Aunt Tara and Michonne use. The loft she uses as a bedroom extends from the upper part of the cabin where the rest of their rooms are. Her daddy sleeps in what everyone says used to be a walk-in linen closet, just barely able to fit a twin sized mattress on the floor. She has no idea how he finds space in there, let alone space for Michonne. They don't know but she can hear Michonne sneaking out of her bedroom and into her daddy's space most nights. She figures Aunt Tara must know. She wonders why they don't just tell everyone they're together because everyone can see it.
There are a few other cabins in this little community with them. A resort community, her daddy had figured when they'd found it. The cabins are all the same and each houses a number of families like theirs does—the Clevelands and Parkers in number four; the Wilsons, Pages, and Jankowskis in number six; another group of random people who found each other like their family did in number two; the huge Merkowitz family in number one. Number five is the largest and they use it to store rations and as a community space. When it's rainy or cold out, Judy plays in there with the Page sisters and Molly Parker. She doesn't really like Molly Parker but there aren't many kids her age around so she takes what she can gets. Especially now that Carl doesn't want to play with her anymore.
Judy has grown used to playing by herself, especially during the warmer seasons where everyone is tending to the crops outside, or hunting for fresh meat, or fixing things and working on other projects that are easier to do when the ground isn't covered in snow and the air doesn't turn your breath into a foggy puff ball.
She plays by herself but she has the dolls Uncle Daryl and Uncle Glenn and Carl have found for her while on supply runs. For her birthday Uncle Daryl made a small bow and a quiver full of sticks carved into the shapes of arrows. They're the perfect size for her dolls and she enjoys creating adventures for them where they have to go on their own runs for supplies. She can't wait until she's fifteen, when her daddy has promised she'll be old enough to join in, just like Carl did.
Her dolls—Aurora, Ariel, and Topanga (a princess from a story Uncle Glenn had told her once. He wasn't the best at it and for some reason everyone scoffed at him for using that name, although she couldn't tell why. Topanga is a beautiful name, in her opinion)—need supplies to be found in order to go on a supply run, so today she's busy with her colored pencils and notepad. She draws cans of vegetables and moth-ball blankets and batteries for their flashlights and a doll-sized Swiss army knife like the one Carl always keeps on him.
She dreamt about the woman last night and this time she was singing. Judy doesn't remember if there were words but the song is familiar to her so she must have dreamt it before.
It's just a bit before dinnertime and most everyone is coming in from the day's work. Carl and Uncle Daryl are sitting in the living room with her, cleaning the blades of their knives they were using to skin Uncle Daryl's latest catches. Her daddy and Michonne have gathered buckets of water from the creek a mile away and take turns filling the large pot over the stone fire pit they built where the old oven used to sit. Judy has never seen an oven or stove work before but she imagines how nice it would have been to have something warm up your food without having to build a fire first every time.
Uncle Glenn, Aunt Tara, and Aunt Maggie step through the screen door covered in sweat and dirt. They've been working on building an underground cellar to store fruit and vegetable preserves in over the winter, as none of the cabins have basements. Aunt Maggie hates songs and singing but she's in a good mood today, so Judy figures if she hums to herself quietly enough it won't bother her.
The song comes back to her, dances through her mind as she begins to sketch the outline of a kerosene lantern, her legs swinging lazily behind her from where she's laying on her belly. She feels the rumbling notes start from her belly and travel through her chest until they come out her nose. They're slow at first, not really connected but soon she remembers enough of the dream song to hum it at the pace she heard in her mind, and just like that the words come back to her.
"Hold on, hold on,/ You got to hold on,/ Take my hand, I'm standing right here—"
Before she really even realizes she's begun to sing quietly, everyone in the cabin has reacted to her singing. The first thing she hears is one of the plastic buckets dropping in the kitchen and water splashing everywhere as Michonne says a bad word under her breath. Uncle Daryl says a bad word too, and she looks over to see he's nicked his thumb with the knife he's holding. He doesn't seem to notice the blood or Carl frantically pressing a bandana to the cut, simply stares at her with wide eyes and an open mouth.
Aunt Maggie has the worst reaction of all.
She's on the staircase with Uncle Glenn and Aunt Tara standing below her and she falls onto the steps, her hand cupping over her mouth as she sobs. Uncle Glenn moves to sit beside her, rubbing her back and whispering in her ear. Aunt Tara goes back and forth between looking at Aunt Maggie and looking at Judy.
They're all silent for a moment while Judy gulps and then pulls her knees up to sit on them. Aunt Maggie looks at her through the slats of the railing and her eyes are all red and wet and her mouth is shaking. She wipes at her nose before moving to stumble up the stairs. Uncle Glenn follows and closes their bedroom door behind them.
"I'm sorry," Judy rushes to say, looking over to her daddy who's staring at her like all the others. "I know Aunt Maggie doesn't like singing. I didn't mean to."
"Judith," her daddy says quietly, in his This Is Important voice. He looks at Michonne, who's still standing in the large puddle of water, before crossing the kitchen to crouch in front of where Judy is still sitting.
Everyone is staring at her and she doesn't know why but she feels like she's about to get into trouble. Her eyes feel hot and her vision becomes blurry as fat tears begin to gather. She blinks quickly to make them go away but it only makes them fall down her cheeks even faster.
"Judy," he says again. This time he reaches out to wipe a thumb at the hot tracks the tears have left. "You're not in trouble, sweetie. You just…surprised us. Where did you hear that song?"
"I…I…" She hadn't planned on telling them about the dream woman but wonders if they might actually be able to answer all her questions about her. Is it possible that this woman is real? What happened to her? Judy may be young but she knows what this world is like. She remembers Aunt Carol and Uncle Abe and Aunt Rosita and Uncle Aaron. She knows what happened to them and she knows what death is. But everyone still talks about them, still talks about Lori and others from time to time. They share memories or make jokes about what a certain person would have done in a specific situation. No one has ever mentioned the dream woman, as far as she can remember.
"I dreamt it," Judy explains finally, surprised at how good it feels to finally tell someone. "Last night, I heard the song in my dreams."
Her daddy frowns and turns to look over his shoulder at Uncle Daryl, who finally took the bandana from Carl to press against his thumb. He's still staring at her and looks more scared now than after any run-in he's ever had with a walker.
"Have you dreamt about anythin' else?" her daddy asks when he looks back at her.
Judy licks her lips, taking a moment to look at everyone else around the cabin, "I see a woman sometimes. She's young. She has bright hair and she makes me feel happy when I see her in my dreams."
From the corner of her eye, she notices Aunt Tara lifting a hand to cover her own mouth, her eyes filling with tears just like Aunt Maggie's. "Daddy," Judy asks, "who is she?"
He sits back and sighs through his nose, wiping his hand at his face. "Her name was Beth."
"Beth?" she tries it on her own lips. The name doesn't feel familiar, but then she remembers…
"Aunt Maggie had a sister named Beth, right?"
Her daddy nods. "She doesn't like to talk 'bout her. But when your mama…when Lori died, Beth took care of you. Loved you like she was your own mama."
Millions of questions rush through Judy's mind at that. If this woman took care of her like she was her own mother, why is this the first time she's ever heard of her? Why don't the others want to talk about her? What happened?
Before she can let out any other questions, Uncle Daryl growls and rises from the couch. He clomps out the back door, letting it slap closed behind him.
Her daddy must see the confusion on her face because he continues, "Your uncle Daryl was…well, he was very close to Beth. Cared a lot about her."
"Did he love her?"
He doesn't seem to know what to say to that one. He turns to look back to Michonne, who finally gathered some rags and began mopping up the spilled water. She looks up from her crouching position and stays quiet for a moment before nodding and locking her eyes with Judy's. "Think he did."
"Why didn't you ever tell me about her?"
Her daddy sighs again, "It was hard enough telling you about Lori, er, your mom. Your birth mom. There's a lot of pain for Maggie and Daryl over Beth's death, and they don't really like to talk about it. Just became easier not to mention her."
This time Judy is the one to frown. "But, she loved me and took care of me while I was a baby. I must have loved her too, right?"
"You did," Carl finally speaks up. His voice is tight and scratchy as he scratches at the back of his head. "When Mom died, it was really hard for me and Dad to deal. And…seeing you…well, Beth stepped in for us. She loved you like you were her own baby and you loved her. Even in your most stubborn nights, you always went to sleep if you were in her arms. Especially when she sang to you."
"She sang to me? Did she sing that song?"
"She did," her daddy says, a smile growing on his face. "It was always one of our favorites. Real pretty when you sing it, too."
"Yeah?" Judy turns to Michonne, needing a girl's opinion on this. "Was she a pretty singer?"
She nods and steps into the room to sit on the floor beside her. "You sound just like her. She would have loved to hear you sing."
That makes Judy smile, because the voice in her mind is the most beautiful thing she's ever heard and she would give anything to sound like that. The door upstairs is still closed and she looks up at it, "I didn't mean to upset Aunt Maggie."
"She knows, baby," Michonne answers, rubbing a hand on her back. "Just surprised her, is all. Like your dad said."
"Think she'd tell me about Beth?"
"Maybe. If you give her some time."
"I'll go check on her," Aunt Tara offers, sniffling quietly herself as she takes the stairs slowly.
"I'm sorry we didn't tell you," her daddy finally says. "We should have. I should have. I'll tell you anythin' you wanna know 'bout her."
Judy nods but finds herself looking at the back door again. "Is it okay if I go talk to Uncle Daryl first?"
Her daddy and Michonne look at each other but finally agree, insisting she be respectful if he doesn't feel like talking to her just yet. Judy nods insistently, her eyes wide at the thought of even remotely bothering Uncle Daryl. He's always made time for her but this is new territory. She has no idea how he'll react to her right now.
The screen door slaps behind her just as it always does and her eyes scan the small plain of grass between their cabin and the woods, before finally settling on a dark figure leaning against a tree in the distance. Taking a deep breath, she forces herself to hold her head high as she takes the two rickety steps down before crossing the grass to reach him.
Uncle Daryl doesn't look up when she finally stands before him, instead keeps fiddling with the leather wristband he's worn on his wrist since she can remember. She knows he can get into moods like this sometimes and has learned from experience that it's best to let him be at times like these. Yet she can't make herself walk away. Not yet. Not while the thought of this woman—Beth—is so fresh in her mind. She wants to know everything there is to know about her and while Aunt Maggie was her sister, Judy has a strange feeling that Uncle Daryl is the one who knew her best.
She edges into the clearing where he's sitting before slowly lowering to sit cross-legged before him. She stays quiet, waits for him to speak first. If he let her approach, she knows enough to know he'll talk to her eventually. Just has to wait till he's ready.
"Didn' scare you, did I?" he asks finally, keeping his gaze locked on his hands. His knees are bent and his elbows rest on them while he leans back against the base of the tree.
"No, not really. I'm sorry I upset you."
He shrugs, "You didn' know. Just hard to think 'bout her sometimes."
"Because you loved her?" she asks again.
That makes him look up at her, his blue eyes flashing as he stares at her. He chooses not to respond to that but she knows. She's heard stories of heartbreak and eternal love and has seen what happens to people who lose the person they love the most. She may only be ten but she can recognize it on his face in this moment.
"Will you tell me about her?"
He eyes her for a moment, resting his head back against the bark of the tree. "Sing that song again for me?"
She doesn't know most of the words but hums what she can and sings the words she does know. Uncle Daryl closes his eyes as she goes through the song and she almost thinks she can see a tear roll down his cheek by the time she's finished. It's getting darker out though, and she's never seen Uncle Daryl cry before, so she tells herself she must have imagined it.
He gives a small smile when she's done, opens his eyes to look at her. "She sang that song a lot to you."
"Did she hold me a lot? I think I remember that, in my dreams."
"Would hardly put you down," he answers as he nods.
That makes Judy smile and she feels the warmth slowly returning. That same warmth the dreams of Beth bring her. The more she thinks about her, the more she begins to think that feeling of missing something was really the feeling of missing Beth. The mama she never knew she had. "She must have loved me, huh."
"Loved you more than anythin' and anyone."
"More than you?" she can't help but ask, her cheeks flushing a bit. She's heard stories of love and sees it between Uncle Glenn and Aunt Maggie, even between her daddy and Michonne, but something about this love feels different to Judy. Uncle Daryl never cries over anyone, so if he cried over Beth they must have had something pretty powerful.
He smiles at that but keeps his gaze on his hands again and she thinks she sees his cheeks turning a bit red as well. "She had a lot of love in her heart. More than anyone I know. She was the best person I've ever known."
"She was pretty too," Judy continues, feeling him growing more comfortable with this conversation. "I see her sometimes. Her long blonde hair."
He nods again. "It was too damn long but she refused to cut it. Always wore it in a ponytail with a braid in it. Never understood why, but she seemed to like it." Judy immediately wonders if she asks Aunt Maggie, when she's ready, if she'll put a braid in her hair like that.
"How long did you know her?"
"She lived at the farmhouse we stayed in for a while, with Hershel. Told you 'bout that right? She was his daughter. Got to know her a little bit when we all got into the prison later on but I didn't really know her until we had to leave. Was just the two of us for a while and she…she kept me goin'."
"And you fell in love," Judy finishes and finally a full smile breaks out across his face.
"You always been this obsessed with love, girl?"
"C'mon, Uncle Daryl! Tell me the whole story," she says instead of answering. Truth is, she's never cared that much for love stories. She's always favored adventure but she wants to know about this woman who managed to get grumpy ol' Uncle Daryl to fall in love with her. Uncle Daryl who, as long as she's known him, has never even given a lady a second glance.
He chews on the side of his thumb for a minute before wiping it against his jeans and tilts his head back to look up at the trees. "I'll let Maggie tell you about Beth as a kid, their life on the farm. Start with the prison, I guess. When you were born."
"Deal," Judy nods, sitting up eagerly.
"But you gotta keep singin' that song for me. Any others you can remember, too," he says, giving her a small smile as she nods in agreement. "All right, well…your daddy decided he was gonna be a farmer at the prison, after your mom's death he and Carl needed some time. So Beth stepped in to start takin' care of you. She found out pretty early in that nothin' calmed you down better'n the sound of her singin'…"
As he continues to tell her about their time in the prison and their time alone together before Beth had been taken, Judy finds the small bit of warmth she always feels when she's dreamt about Beth before filling her in a completely new way. She hopes she'll continue to dream about Beth, her second mother, for the rest of her life. And even if she doesn't, she knows all she has to do is sing the dream song to feel Beth with her.
Thank you for reading!