Chapter Ten

Author's Note: So after everything that's happened in recent episodes, this chapter seems a little bit jarring to me, but it fits with the rest of this fic so I hope that you like it.

I'm also so sorry for not updating sooner. I've recently developed RSI in my right elbow and forearm and its been quite painful. Hopefully normal service will be resumed soon!

Disclaimer: I own nothing but my imagination, I wrote this for fun with no copyright infringement intended.

Andrea was stripped down to her underwear and the hot shower had filled the cramped bathroom with steam when there was a knock on the Greene bathroom door. Even though she knew that walkers wouldn't be as polite as to knock before they broke down the door, her hand reached for the pistol that rested atop the bathtub.

"What is it?" She called out, her other hand lingering on the door handle.

"Its Maggie!" The eldest Greene daughter called from the other side of the bathroom.

Andrea exhaled a deep breath and tried not to let her temper get the better of her. All the wanted was five minutes' peace and quiet, away from the group. But she was in Maggie's house, using her water, towels and toiletries, so she wasn't in a position to say anything. So she eased the lock free and inched the door open.

"What's up, guys?" She said, surprised to find Carol and Lori flanking Maggie, their arms full of what seemed to be clothes and bottles.

Carol thrust something soft and pale into Andrea's arms. "Thought you could do with some clean clothes after spending so long outside in the woods." She said softly. Like usual her face was red and blotchy from crying, but there was something in her eyes now, something that Andrea hadn't seen since Sophia went into the woods: hope. Andrea wasn't sure why it was suddenly there now, wasn't sure what had prompted this renewal, but it was that new look in Carol's eye which made Andrea's hand engage around the material and willingly accept the gift.

Lori and Maggie exchanged a look before they gave her a collection of bottles that Andrea recognised as travel-sized shampoo, conditioner and shower gel. "We found these." Maggie said awkwardly. "I, uh … I have allergies to stuff that's, y'know … real fragranced."

"And since the baby it makes me feel sick." Lori added. Carol offered no excuse as to why she didn't want the toiletries, but the three women almost chorused, "We thought you'd like 'em." It wasn't so much a question as a statement, and their intent gazes pinned Andrea to the floor.

"Uh ….. okay." Andrea said as she took the small bottles, shaking her head in confusion as the women were gone almost as soon as they had arrived. It wasn't that she didn't appreciate their generosity – far from it – but she just didn't understand their insistence: what did they care how she smelled unless it was real bad?

When the smells of jasmine and lavender hit the steam, she decided that she wasn't going to look a gift shampoo bottle in the mouth.

She stayed in the shower for longer than was really necessary, luxuriating in the simple pleasure of washing her hair with shampoo rather than the soap they had been using. She didn't blame Maggie or Lori for surrendering the toiletries; they were pungent but after so long of smelling of generic 'clean' it was a simple pleasure to feel her hair made soft by synthetic conditioner and to smell the scent of the shower gel long after she had killed the shower faucet.

Predictably, it was Daryl who jolted her out of her pleasant fiction.

"Andrea!" He banged on the door. "Y'aright in there? You been in there hours, girl!"

"Stop exaggerating." Andrea said to the closed door, rolling her eyes as she towelled herself off with a towel so clean it was stiffly standing to attention. Once she was satisfied that her skin was damp rather than wet, she quickly rubbed some moisturiser – another bottle from Lori – into her skin, and picked up the items of clothing that Carol had given her. It was a shirt of some kind on coral pink. It definitely wasn't hers, nor was it something that she recognised, but it was gathered around the waist, with sleeves that rested just on her shoulders and it fit well enough over her cropped jeans and sandals. Her hair was still wet, but she dried it as best she was able and let her fingers linger in the strands, marvelling at their new softness. As she stood and surveyed her new look in the mirror, she barely recognised the clean, moisturised, scented face staring back at her.

"Lori asked me to come get ya." He said through the door, and Andrea heard her confusion in his voice.

"Lori?" She said. "She was just here, didn't say anything to me."

"Well, maybe she just remembered."

"Since when were you Lori Grimes' messenger boy? You got a little sign on your shirt with UPS on it?" Andrea opened the door then to find Daryl standing on the other side of it. He took a step back when the steam and several fragrant smells tumbled out.

"Jeez!" He exclaimed as he began coughing. "What the hell's that smell?"

Andrea shrugged. "Lori and Maggie gave me some toiletries they couldn't use." She said, nonplussed. "Figured that since I'd been washing my hair in nothing but soap I'd use them. Why?" She asked as she saw his nose wrinkle. "What's wrong with you?"

"Smells like where unwanted flowers go to die." He said, taking another step back even as he surreptitiously appraised her. The smell wasn't bad, it was just way too strong. Andrea smelled like one of those women who doused themselves in expensive, heavy perfume which hung around for hours and suffocated everyone. She smelled much better when she didn't use anything. But her hair was clean and her skin cleaner and she was wearing a shirt he hadn't seen before which really suited her. And he blinked: once, twice, three times.

Andrea folded her arms stubbornly when it became obvious that he was staring. "Well excuse me if I don't want to smell like deer shit and dead squirrel all the time." She said.

"Y'know, walkers'll smell ya a mile off, smellin' like that." He said.

Andrea glared at him as she pushed past him. "Well maybe they'll just mistake me for an unwanted flower graveyard and leave me alone." She retorted as she pushed past him.

"I hope ya didn't use all the hot water!" He called after her.

"Does Andrea look different to you?" Glenn asked as he and T-Dog took turns basting the deer that Daryl and Andrea had brought back.

T-Dog looked up from his task of poking the dead animal with one of Herschel's cooking instruments and frowned. "She looks pissed to me." He said as he watched Andrea descend the steps of the Greene farmhouse and stalk towards them. "But she has just spent the past forty-eight hours with The Great Outdoorsman. "

"Huh." Glenn said, a blush colouring his cheeks as Andrea walked past them. She looked cleaner than usual, he reflected. Cleaner and …. More stylish. She'd done something with her hair and her skin almost glowed and she was wearing a shirt that he was pretty sure wasn't hers (not that he kept an inventory of his own clothes, never mind the others', but they all had a finite supply of clothes and he was pretty sure that he had seen everything that everyone had to wear). She looked …. Nice. Pretty, actually.

"What does that mean?" T-Dog asked.

"Nothing." Glenn said quickly.

T-Dog gave Glenn a look. "Uh-huh, man. Its never 'nothing' with you. You always know something. So spill."

Glenn felt his cheeks flush. "Nothing!" He insisted. "I know nothing …. Maggie might have said …. Something." He said at length, finally wilting under T-Dog's gaze. "Something about how maybe Daryl and Andrea might have something going on."

T-Dog's eyebrows shot into his forehead at that. "Andrea and Daryl Dixon?" He speculated. "You serious?"

"Is it that far-fetched?" Glenn asked, his eyes flickering to Andrea. "I mean, they're kinda similar, if you think about it."

T-Dog looked at Glenn as though he had lost his mind. "Man, I'll be the first to admit that Daryl saved my ass twice in the last week, both times when he didn't need to. He ain't like his brother but …. Unless you see something I don't, I can't picture Andrea the city lawyer with the Benz and the sat-nav with Mister Outdoors."

Glenn shook his head. "Do you think those distinctions really matter any more?" He asked softly.

T-Dog stole another glance at Andrea before his eyes darted back to the house, where Daryl had emerged and was standing on the back porch holding what could only be his dirty laundry. Like Andrea, he had showered and changed clothes – another pair of pants and ripped plaid shirt – his hair was wet from the shower and the hot water had washed away the dirt and sweat that was now commonplace among the hunter. But that wasn't what T-Dog was looking at.

He was looking at the way that Daryl was looking at Andrea.

"Well I'll be damned." He said softly, nudging Glenn with his elbow. "Think your girlfriend might have a point. Dixon's checkin' her out. Look."

"You think something happened out there in the forest?" Glenn asked, the two men awkwardly turning away from the approaching Dixon as he descended the stairs and began to walk towards them.

"They were out there for awhile." T-Dog said.

"What you two talkin' about?" Daryl said as he approached them.

"Nothing!" Glenn and T-Dog chorused.

Okay, so people in the camp are officially acting weirder than usual, Shane decided as he observed the scene unfolding from atop the RV. Dale has wanted to get some of the deer meat now that it was cooked, and Shane had been glad to get away from, well, everyone so he had volunteered to take over watch while the others ate.

The only problem was that they were acting so weird it made keeping watch impossible.

It had started out innocuously enough: the members of the group had thanked Daryl and Andrea for bringing back the deer (Daryl was an unpredictable sonovabitch who Shane would have taken great pleasure in locking up in another life, but Shane had to admit that the group would have been far worse off without the younger Dixon's hunting skills). True to form, Carol was distributing the plates of food (Shane made a mental note to check that Dale hadn't poisoned his plate. It would be just like the crafty old bastard) to those who were seated around the fire and still-cooking animal (seriously? They thought that cooking a whole deer was a good idea with a forest full of walkers? And Rick went along with it? Shane shook his head at his former partner's idiocy), finally taking her own seat once the others had been fed. Only Andrea and Daryl remained unseated, the former helping herself to water from the RV while the latter poked and prodded at the meat using a cooking utensil from the Greene farmhouse. Finally, he was done and took one of the last vacant spots, on an upturned, felled log, next to T-Dog.

Andrea came out of the RV then bearing a glass of water and her plate. She moved to the closest available spot, which was next to Lori and Carol, but didn't appear to have any luck for Lori shook her head and gestured to the other seats, where Maggie was sat with Glenn. Shane was too far away to hear anything other than hushed voice-sounds, but he deduced that there was some kind of seating dispute going on. It was like being back in high school all over again, where the cool kids told the unpopular kid to find their own table. Amused, Shane watched Andrea move towards Glenn and Maggie, only for the exact same situation to happen. What was new was that Maggie and Glenn exchanged surreptitious glances with Lori and Carol as they did so.

Huh. Shane thought as he watched Andrea, who by this point was probably frustrated and a little confused, move down the line and obviously cajole T-Dog into moving. Well how about that: they're in this together. If only they'd apply their group thinking to staying alive, we might just make it out of this mess intact.

It appeared that T-Dog was also in on whatever plan the group had concocted, because he did move, but rather than move closer to Daryl, who was watching the whole exchange unfold with a bemused expression, T-Dog moved closer to Glenn, almost squishing the young man off the end of the bench. The spot next to Daryl, however was wide open and it was with a certain degree of fanfare and a not-inconsiderable amount of exasperation that Andrea finally sat down. Only when Daryl handed her the last of what appeared to be mashed potato (Shane's eyes had always been better than his ears) did she finally crack a smile and realisation dawned on Shane as he saw the coy smiles ripple around the remaining members of the group.

Huh. They're playing matchmaker between Nature-Boy and Lawyer-Girl.

He laughed out loud at that.

"What's so funny?" Dale said as the older man's head crested the top of the RV. As promised, he bore two plates of food and Shane was impressed that he had managed to scale the top of the camper with a rifle as well as the food.

"Just people-watchin'." Shane said, nodding in cautious thanks as Dale handed him the food complete with a dark look.

"Well, fell free to people-watch down on the ground if you want." Dale said pointedly.

Shane emitted a burst of surprised laughter and threw up his hands. "Fine, fine, I know where I'm not wanted." He paused as he descended the RV. "How long have Daryl and Andrea been doing …. Whatever?" He asked.

If Dale was surprised then he didn't show it. "Why do you care so much?" He asked.

Shane shrugged. "Didn't realise her standards had slipped so low." He said.

Dale glared at Shane. "I'd think very carefully about where you're going with this, Shane." He said. "Because I think that Daryl is twice the man that you're ever be."

Shane didn't say anything to that, but he couldn't help but let his eyes wander to the campsite as he stalked off to take the rest of his patrol.

TBC …..