Disclaimer: I don't own AMC's The Walking Dead or any of its characters, wishful thinking aside.

Authors Note #1: I was inspired to this write after I got a delightful little anon prompt in my tumblr inbox that went as follows: "I have a sudden desire to read a fic pairing Tara and Beth. Know what I mean? Eh? Eh? Do you think you could work your magic?" – This is my attempt to do that prompt justice!

Warnings: This story is meant to fit in after the season four finale, during some point in the distant future when Beth has been reunited with the rest of the group and a handful of years have passed. *Contains: adult language, references to PTSD, depression, possible sexual/physical abuse/assault (regarding Beth's ordeal after getting 'kidnapped' in late season four), adult content, mild sexual content, fem-slash, religious references and some vague season four spoilers.

One for the Money (two for the show)

Chapter Two

As weird as it sounded, that was what they bonded over. It started off simply enough, more a game than anything. It was a shared interest, a way to pass the time when night fell, something to keep your mind from dwelling on how much the world had changed.

She'd always loved games.

And like any contest, any challenge she'd taken up in the past, she took their impromptu mission seriously. Every look, every glance and pause suddenly seemed important, something to tally and keep track of. Something to talk about – all hushed whispers and mingling breaths - around the fire come nightfall.

It felt so stupidly good to do something for herself again that she couldn't help but go a bit overboard. And this time, she had to admit that the lack of moonshine burnin' its way down her throat only seemed like that much more of a bonus.

At first it reminded her of better times. Of hours spent after school with her friends, gabbing about that new cute guy or the theatre's latest blockbuster. It reminded her of the way things used to be, the good parts. Later it didn't remind her of anything at all. She had no way to measure it, no previous experience to describe how she felt when Tara looked up, grinning, all huge, wide and honest when she saw that look on her face.

The one that said 'oh boy, have I got something to tell you' or 'you'll never believe what almost just happened.'

It should have been like anything else, any other friendship, only it wasn't and she cultivated it. She babied the feeling as it warmed, idle yet insistent just underneath her skin. It was hers, hers to protect, to nurture and keep safe as the days slipped past, each one inexplicably easier to bear than the last.

It wasn't much but she took it for what it was, a blessing. A way out of the prison she'd inadvertently created when all she'd wanted was a shelter. Either way, it gave her an opportunity she hadn't realized she'd been searching for, a chance to get to know Tara better.


It was a few weeks after the night around the fire that Maggie finally sat her down. She wasn't caught off guard. She'd been watching the question brew in the back of her eyes for days. Only this time she didn't put her out of her misery. A few months ago she might have. But this time she let her stew, knowing that eventually her sister would come to her.

"You've been spending a lot of time with Tara," Maggie observed, blunt and only slightly accusatory as she sharpened her knife on the flat edge of a rock.

She stayed quiet, listening to the rasp-rasp-rasp-click as she changed Judith's diaper, ticking her fat little belly until the tot giggled, stuffing her fingers in her mouth as she burbled nonsense.

"Beth?"

They were going to have to think about potty-training her soon. She knew it was a little early, but diapers were getting harder and harder to find these days. More and more the childcare sections of the stores and strip malls they tried to scavenge were cleared out, empty to the last pacifier. It seemed as though anyone who'd made it this far was having the same problems they were. Try as they might, life always found a way.

"We don't know her very well," Maggie cautioned, picking at a piece of lint on her sleeve before going back to her sharpening with a determined air – drawing it out.

The silence stretched. She closed her eyes as the clouds shifted and a ray of sunshine streamed through the forest canopy. She felt the heat on her face, soaking it in as her skin prickled with gooseflesh. She'd always loved the sun.

"She's one of us," she replied firmly, finding her tongue just as Sasha and Bob stumbled out of the trees on the other side of the clearing, breathing hard, their clothes rumpled, laughing. They didn't seem to notice they were there but headed deeper into the brush all the same. Sasha squealed, pretending to struggle when Bob snapped her up in a fireman's carry, marching smartly through the green and out of sight as Sasha shrieked indignantly.

In the end, that was all they said about it.

Maggie didn't mention it again.


She figured out pretty quickly that Tara was a mess of contradictions. Her personality was just about as loud as she was, but it was clear to anyone who dared look that she was making liberal use of the mute button. She was keeping herself under a sensor, like there was some invisible quota of personality she could express on any given day and clammed up when she'd reached it.

She looked like she was waiting for the other shoe to drop. Like she'd never considered she'd make it this far and didn't know what to do with herself now that she had.

She could drink Abraham and Daryl under the table but hated the way her hair looked, slicked back by the rain. She never met Rick's eyes, but could laugh and joke with Glenn, Eugene and Rosita like she'd known them for years rather than weeks.

She was crude, sincere, unapologetic, loyal, sarcastic, kind, brash, and lord if it wasn't giving her a headache trying to keep track!

She was quite possibly the most confusing, frustrating and completely unavoidable person she'd ever met. And the fact that she didn't mean that in a bad way confused her more than she cared to admit.


She didn't bother trying to keep track of the days anymore. Her journal was a jumble of conflicting weeks and months. She relied on Eugene for that now, to remind her if it was a Monday or a Friday. As if it even mattered in the first place. Daddy always said it did. That you had to remember where you'd come from to make sense of your future. But lately, well, she wasn't so sure.

Maggie tried to talk to her sometimes. Often she didn't realize it until her sister was in mid-conversation and she came back to herself only to get the cliff-notes, snippets that ended with things like-

"So hate me if you need to, but please don't shut me out."

"Bethie, this isn't what Daddy would want. Please talk to me."

"-when we lost the prison I thought- I knew you were dead. That was how I rationalized it. I let you go. I put you to rest. I told myself it was okay, okay because you were with Dad, that you weren't alone. I couldn't handle the thought of you being out here alone. That was how I dealt with it. I killed you. And you have no idea how much that tears me up inside."

"When you stumbled out of the brush I thought- …Beth, look at me!"

She was the first to admit that she had a lot to work through. That she was wounded - damaged. But every time her sister tried, all she could think about was that it sounded a whole lot like Maggie was trying to make herself feel better, not the other way around.

By the time she was ready to start listening, Maggie wasn't interested in talking anymore.

She wasn't sure what to feel after that.


Tara was good at keeping her occupied.

It was always something, a constant stream of the weird and unexpected, like "hey, you busy? Good. Let's play backgammon," or "yo, how do you get blood out of satin? Like pale yellow satin? Ask no questions. Just take pity and tell me," or even, shockingly enough, "so, what are your thoughts on banana flavored condoms?"

She didn't always let her hide behind Judith either. She wanted to hate her for that, especially in the beginning. But she could never quite bring herself to manage it.

They still talked about Carol and Daryl. About soul mates and 'certain' people that couldn't see their nose despite their face, but gradually they started talking about other things. One day, while out on a supply run with Abraham and Rosita, she told her about the farm, about the peach trees and the smell of Patricia's cooking wafting all the way down to the eastern most pasture. And in return, Tara regaled her with stories from her time in the Police Academy, earning them the stink eye more than once when their giggles threatened to rise above a whisper.

It only seemed to snowball from there.


Daddy often said that sometimes all two people needed was a push - a moment and nature would take care of the rest. And it must've because she was coming back from the river, a plastic tub of wet clothes balanced in her arms when she caught sight of Daryl and Carol pressed up against a tree – making out like teenagers on the outskirts of camp.

She froze, forgetting for a moment that the weight of the tub was digging into her palms, or that a bead of sweat was itching its way between her shoulder blades, fair skin burning under the glare of the summer sun. And quite frankly, the sight alone was worth every minute of it.

There was something in the way they moved that fascinated her, a slow roll of hips, awkward but passionate that told her this was as new to them as it was to her. Her heart was beating embarrassingly, no- damningly loud between her ears when Daryl's hands settled on Carol's hips. The act itself was tentative but the feelings underneath were another story entirely. His fingers flexed across the curve of the woman's hip, practically screaming with an uneven barrage want-need-mine-can't that it took her off guard.

Her teeth worried her bottom lip. How could he stand it? The air was practically singing with it and here he was, keeping himself on a short leash. She knew what he wanted, what he wanted to do, and yet he held back, refusing to-

She wasn't sure what made her think it, but the longer she watched, the more she knew it'd been Carol who'd made the first move. It wasn't just the way the woman had him pressed up against the tree or the way her hands were resting on his face, tipping his chin so she could mouth her way down the curve of his jaw. It was everything else. The resigned stiffness that still held sway in the muscles of his forearms. The way he was holding her, firm but delicate – calloused palms brushing across her skin almost reverently – like she was something unearthly and infinitely precious.

She nearly dropped the washing when Daryl moaned, a low throaty sound that caused the hair on the back of her neck to prickle. There was heat building in her belly, a tangled knot of pleasure and embarrassment when she realized she was just standing there, gawking like a teenager who'd snuck into an R-rated movie at precisely the right moment.

So, naturally, she did the only thing that made sense at the time.

She fled.


She hadn't been able to contain her glee. She shoved the tub into the first set of empty arms – Bob's - and hurried back to camp. She skidded to a stop beside Tara's tent, squirming through the open flaps and practically right into the woman's lap in her haste. Their hushed whispers and girlish confidences lasted just about as long as Carol's poker-face when the two of them finally sauntered back into camp about half an hour later.

Daryl looked sloe-eyed and slightly dazed as he followed in her wake.

The look of utter and complete glee in Tara's eyes had been like nothing she'd ever seen. It was raw, honest - clean and so utterly beautiful in every way that she barely knew how to quantify it. She'd felt lucky – blessed just to see it. It sounded stupid to say it aloud, but she'd smiled for what felt like the first time in years.

After that a whole bunch of things seemed to happen at once. Both her and Tara's heads popped through the tent flaps as they walked past. Stifling laughter as they took in the sight, trying to find any evidence of what had transpired, anything to fuel the reel of lurid images currently streaming through her mind's eye as Tara elbowed her in the kidney.

"Shhh! Don't spoil it," the woman hissed, dark hair curling, fuzzing with sleep and split ends. The sight alone was so tempting she had to stop herself from reaching over and smoothing them, wondering what it would feel like to sink her tips into that thick dark hair and-

Michonne looked up, sharpening stone stuttering to a halt as a look, indescribable and brief flittered across her face. If she'd had the energy to focus on anything more than how Daryl was rubbing the back of his neck, all but bleeding awkward as Carol passed him a cup of water, she might have paused on it.

But, before she could make a decision either way, the thoughtful look rippled, making way for a sly, lazy sort of smile that went all the way to the woman's eyes. Off to her right, Carl looked up from his book – the same one he'd been nursing for the last two days. The same one she didn't have the heart to tell him was only the first in a series of four that would never have a conclusion.

There was a moment of absolute silence – delicious and anticipatory as Carol stretched in place, rolling her neck from side to side, fair skin a mess of stubble-burn and clumsy hickies as she leaned down to refill her canteen. Daryl just grunted, knuckling his forehead when he realized everyone was staring.

The moment broke unexpectedly when Glenn dropped his armful of kindling.

She choked on a giggle, the sound loud and understated as Rosita shuffled out of range, fixing Glenn with a glare as he sagged into the closest chair, throwing his hands up - fists closed like a victory pump as he yelled something that sounded suspiciously like: "Fucking finally!"

The entire camp devolved into laughter and well-meant ribbing.

Carol just looked remarkably self-satisfied. Like the proverbial cat who'd caught the canary and then some. Daryl hung back, half behind Carol - ducking his head, bashful and irritated as Rick's grin threatened to split his face clean in two.

But later, when everyone had gone to sleep, she stared into the black and tried to remind herself why she didn't cry anymore. Unable to shake the feeling, whenever her gaze drifted over to where Carol and Daryl were sleeping, that she felt that much more lonely because of it.


A/N #1: Thank you for reading. Please let me know what you think! Reviews and constructive critiquing are love! – Thank you for all the support and enthusiasm on my latest venture! There should be two more chapters.