AN: Here we go, another chapter here.
I hope you enjoy! Let me know what you think!
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To Carol, there was even a different feeling to the steady paced march that drew them closer and closer to whatever promised land they were searching for. It didn't make sense, of course, that there should be a different feeling in the air. After all, just because everyone knew they were together—or that they were trying to figure out what that even meant anymore—didn't make it any different than it had been. But still, it did make it different.
Carol caught herself, as they walked, looking back at Rick. For the moment he was three or four steps behind her, just off to her right, and a quick look cast over her shoulder could find him. It wasn't anything unusual. She'd looked at him a thousand times, maybe even more, while they'd walked. But still it was different. Because now? She didn't feel like she had to hide the look. She didn't feel like she had to do it quickly or like the glances were stolen.
She could catch him looking back at her, something that she was now aware that he did often, and she could smile at him. She could flick her eyes back to the road and then back at him and find him still looking at her, a smile playing on his lips too, and there was no concern about what others might think. There was no worry about what they might say.
Nobody was saying anything. Nobody had really said a single thing other than to offer their form of congratulations if they felt so inclined.
The only two people, maybe, that had even been the slightest bit odd about it—and perhaps that was even being a touch too dramatic—were Tyreese and Daryl. And it seemed, even if she might be imagining it, that the farther they went along and the closer they got to their destination—whatever that might truly end up being—the more the tension, even if it was barely perceptible, seemed to grow.
It had been, now, more than two weeks since Carol and Rick had made their announcement to the group. They'd kept up a steady travelling pace, at least as steady as travel could be when Walkers interrupted them throughout the day and they had to detour frequently in search of food, water, and shelter. They felt like they were getting closer to Virginia. They felt like they were getting closer to something. The demeanor of everyone changed slightly when they spoke about the place. But really? In the past two weeks? There hadn't been too much time for talk or for anything, really, that didn't involve moving forward.
Carol knew that many of them were clinging to the idea that, somehow, they'd cross the line into Virginia and the whole state would unfold in front of them like some magical fairy land where Walkers didn't exist and everything that was happening to them now was a thing of the past. Maybe, stepping just over the imaginary state line, they'd be met by something as ridiculous as someone selling ice cream and asking them if they'd like a tour of the place while they picked out their new homes. In some ways, Carol was clinging to the fantasy too. Because, after all, that was the key. It was a fantasy. And deep, deep down? They all knew that it was. But the moment they stopped hoping, they started dying.
Carol never pointed out to anyone that she feared there'd be nothing more for them in the whole state of Virginia than they'd had in the whole state of Georgia. She didn't point out to a single person that it might even be worse. The population, after all, might even have been greater and would translate to more Walkers and less peace. She didn't let anyone know about the negativity that was trying its best to take over her mind.
Instead, she focused on the happy little flicker of something that was burning inside her. She focused on the strange sensation that pulsed inside her every now again. It was a burning in her stomach sometimes. Others, it was a pleasant ache in her chest. Sometimes it travelled lower—others it bubbled up in her throat. Wherever it went inside of her, though, she held onto it with both hands. She held onto it because it had been so long since she'd felt it and she was afraid of being entirely without it again.
And it had been Rick that had given it to her. And it was Rick that, every time she caught him glancing at her out of the corner of her eye, gave her a little comfort that she hadn't lost it. Not yet. And that, maybe, if she was as lucky as they all wanted to believe they'd be, she never would have to lose it.
It was dangerous to hope that much, and Carol knew it, but it was the only feeling that let her know she wasn't numb. It was the only feeling that made the days, somehow, seem worth it.
When they finally reached the Virginia line, their whole party had stopped on the road and had something of a quick celebration. There were smiles from people whose faces had been, only hours before, drawn up in fatigue. There was something akin to dancing that broke out in the excited steps of a few, their energy renewed by their new location. Carol, herself, had gladly accepted Rick's embrace and she'd pulled him in a circle with her as they celebrated a chance. Because that's really what it was—they were celebrating a chance.
Immediately they'd decided to make camp. There was no need pushing their minds, their bodies, or their luck any more that day. They'd accomplished so much. They'd made the first step toward the life they were dreaming about.
They'd found a house, quickly enough, that was barely big enough for all of them to squeeze into but which had a well for what had once been a small farm and still had gas that they could use. One by one, they took pots of hot water to wash. Daryl found them meat for a meal. And then, like children dreaming about Christmas, most of them had gone to bed.
Carol, feeling a little overwhelmed for something like sleep, had settled in to take the first night watch. She sat on the porch, sipping weak tea that was little more than hot water—but was still delicious to her at this point—and looked out over the property. It was surrounded by a fence made of mostly rotting boards, but in the few hours that she'd been out there, she'd only taken care of four Walkers and had greeted one curious raccoon and an opossum that became disgruntled at being discovered and had waddled off to find himself a less crowded place to pass his evening.
She recognized Tyreese's heavy and slightly uneven step even before she turned around to see that he'd joined her on the porch. He stood, towering over her in this position, for a moment before he gestured toward the step with his hand. Carol patted the boards with the same silence he'd been guarding to invite him to join her. He did, scooting close enough that she shivered with the contrast between his warm body and cool night air.
"You want to talk," Carol said.
"What do I want to talk about?" Tyreese asked.
Carol hummed.
"You have to tell me," Carol said. "But—I can tell you want to talk."
Tyreese didn't say anything for a moment.
"Is it Rick?" Carol asked.
Another silence, but eventually Tyreese broke it.
"He's a man who likes his power," Tyreese said.
"He doesn't like the pressure that goes with it," Carol said.
"Nobody who wants power does," Tyreese said. "They just want the power. Not the responsibility."
"He's gotten us this far," Carol said, a knee-jerk response and she knew it. Even if she loved Rick, she wasn't blind to his faults. Ed had taught her what becoming blind, all in the name of love, to someone's faults would do for her.
"We've gotten us this far," Tyreese said. "Rick wouldn't be anywhere if it hadn't been for you. If it hadn't been for—for what you had to do at Terminus."
"He's a good leader," Carol said. "When he keeps his head about him, he's a good leader."
"And when he loses it?" Tyreese pressed.
"Then he's just a man," Carol said.
Tyreese made a sound like a snorting laugh in the night and Carol turned and looked at him. In the dim and flickering light that came from the small lantern she let keep her company, she could see that he was smiling. He was smiling, and he was watching her.
"If we get to D.C., even if it isn't what Eugene wishes it was, there could be something there," Tyreese said.
"Isn't that what we're hoping for?" Carol asked. "Something? Somewhere?"
Tyreese sucked in a deep breath and let it out in a sigh.
"Yeah," he said, almost grunting out the word. "But—if what's there is established? What's going to happen when Rick doesn't have the power anymore?"
"He'll be happy to hand it over," Carol said. As she tasted the words on her own tongue, she was certain that she didn't believe them. She'd said a lot of things in her life, though, that she hadn't believed to be true. This was just another in a long chain of things.
Tyreese didn't believe them either. He let it be known with a light laugh.
"He's better with you," Tyreese said. "But—if something happens? If he loses it again?"
"Say it, Tyreese," Carol said. "The night doesn't last but so long."
"Longer sometimes," Tyreese commented.
Carol hummed. She knew he was stalling. He was buying time to think about what he wanted to say—or to think about if he really wanted to say it. What he didn't think about was the fact that anything he might say, she'd probably turned it over and over in her mind a few times already.
"He threw you out," Tyreese said. "He threw me under the bus. Said I'd kill you without—without even hearing you out. Like I don't have more self-control than an animal and you were nothing more than...cold blooded."
Even with the love that had taken root in her chest, growing slowly every time that she and Rick had even a moment to water it and tend to it, the words still pained Carol. They still brought back the ache that she'd felt when he'd turned her away.
"He's sorry for that," Carol said.
"Sorry enough not to do it again?" Tyreese asked. "Some other way? We don't know what's going to happen."
"That's just it," Carol responded. "We don't know. We don't know what's going to happen. Good or bad. But..."
"But?" Tyreese prompted when Carol's words fell off and she didn't make any move to start speaking again.
"But I love him," Carol said. "And if I'm going to love him? I have to trust him." She sucked in a breath, almost groaning at her own thoughts. "And if you love me? You have to trust him too."
"I have to trust you to make your own decisions," Tyreese said. "And I have to trust that—that Rick knows that if I have to? He wasn't entirely wrong. If I have to? I can...I can kill. I don't want to—I don't even want to be party to it. But I can—if I have to. I want you to be happy. You deserve that. There's so little of it left these days. I want you to have it, if it's there to be had."
"But you don't believe I will be?" Carol asked.
"I'm just worried," Tyreese said. "About what might happen. About what we might find. I'm just worried about—what we've seen happen whenever Rick starts to feel like he's losing control."
Carol swallowed and hummed.
"I can't tell you everything's all going to be alright," Carol said.
"Didn't ask you to," Tyreese said. "And I won't ever ask you to."
"But," Carol said, almost interrupting his words, "I can tell you that—I think things might be different for him. If he knows he's not alone? If he knows it's not all on him and he knows that—he's not to blame for everything? I think things might be different. This time, whatever happens? Wherever we end up...I just feel like they'll be different."
"Wishful thinking or you've got a reason to feel this way?" Tyreese asked.
"Rick's never had me beside him," Carol said. "Not before. Not like this. And me? I've got so much support. After all—I know you're on my side."
Tyreese was quiet for a moment. His only response was to rub her back in circles, roughly but affectionately, with an open palm and then to drape that arm over her shoulder in something of a sideways hug.
"But if he doesn't treat you right..." Tyreese said, not finishing.
Carol hummed, acknowledging the comment.
"I'm not thinking about that," Carol said. "I'm thinking about—oh, but what if he does?"