Five Minute Window

Chapter 25

After Beth stopped the fight, people calmed down and most of them attempted to regain some form of self control. What needed to get done got done. The deer got butchered up faster than any deer Rick had ever seen. Then they all sat down and roughed out a plan for the next day. The plan had not changed much from the last time. They were still going to break down one of the gates at Woodbury. The noise would attract the walkers. Hopefully a lot of them. While the residents of the town dealt with the dead, the prison group was going to steal their trucks and clear out their armory. Now they were just going to do it while they thought the governor and a few of his key enforcers were gone. Seemed like pussy shit to Merle, but he kept his mouth shut. He had his own plan. One he didn't intend on sharing.

The kids helped Carol cook up some of the venison for dinner. She made a rough sort of chili out of it, which was seasoned with the right amount of hunger and tasted better than it smelled. The rest of the meat was cut into strips and hung out over several smoky fires to dry so it would keep without having to be refrigerated.

Rick kept a close eye on RickyJo and Maggie, since they were the ones he thought seemed most likely to start up fighting again. But the two women seemed to have made some sort of truce, temporary as it might have been. During the planning, they sat together, leaning the swollen knots on their heads against the one cold pack that Hershel had left in his limited medical supplies.

After the food had been eaten and the plans had been made, RickyJo retreated into Michonne's room. Neutral territory. Rick figured things were calm enough for the time being and headed out to take watch in the tower. As he started up the steps, he heard the sound of someone's quiet voice drifting down the steps from the small room above. As he climbed higher, he realized he was listening to Beth sing. The song was sad, and not the type of music he would expect a teenage girl to listen to.

...so she left Monte Rio, son

Just like a bullet leaves a gun

With charcoal eyes and Monroe hips

she went and took that California trip

Well, the moon was gold, her

Hair like wind

She said don't look back just

come on Jim

Oh you got to

Hold on, Hold on

You got to hold on

Take my hand, I'm standing right here

You gotta hold on...

Beth must have sensed his presence in the doorway, since her voice trailed off into nothing. She was leaning against one of the windows, her breath making a soft cloud of fog on the dirty glass. When she turned her big blue eyes on Rick, he shifted uncomfortably in place. Like he had been caught watching her undress.

"What are you doing up here by yourself?," he asked, trying to cover up his discomfort.

"Everyone was planning the attack," Beth said with a sigh. No one ever bothered to ask for her opinion. So she came out here. Beth figured she could help by keeping watch while everyone else was inside. No one even noticed when she left. Sometimes she felt invisible. She thought it would get better when the new girls showed up, since she might have someone to hang out with. But what she found was that she was too old to feel comfortable hanging out with Jessica's daughters. They were nice, but they played with Judith like she was a baby doll. Beth found she didn't have much in common with them. The older women were either too intimidating for her to try and hang out with, or like Carol, they treated her like a child.

"You're part of everyone," Rick reminded her. She looked so sad. So lonely. The same way he felt inside since Lori died. Really, he had felt that way since he killed Shane. But Lori's death intensified it. He thought Judith should be filling that hole in his heart, but he mostly just found himself staring down at the little girl and trying to figure out if she looked like him. Which she didn't.

"No one cares what I think," Beth said. The way she said it was what got Rick. Like it was nothing more than a simple fact of life for her. Like she was a waste of air. Which she wasn't. He felt terrible for her. Before he could stop himself, Rick found himself closing the distance between him and Beth and putting an arm around her shoulder. She relaxed into his chest. It felt good having the small blonde girl in his arms. Better than he thought it would. Her hair smelled like the end of the world never happened. He wasn't expecting that.

"You're not Michonne, you're not Carol, you're not me, or your sister, or one of Daryl's crazy family members," he told her. The last part made her giggle a little. "But you're still here. You're a survivor too."

Beth spun her body, so she could wrap her other arm around his waist. Her back was to the window now, one soft cheek resting against his chest. Then she pulled back slightly so she could raise up on her tiptoes and plant a chaste little kiss on his cheek. She lowered herself back down onto her flat feet, but she made no move to get out of Rick's arms.

"How old are you?" Rick hear the words vomiting out of his mouth before he meant to say them. Beth smelled so good. One of his hands was resting on her hips, the other was between her shoulder blades. He was starting to get aroused, thinking about how good her hair would feel if he ran his fingers through it. And he was also feeling like a bit of a pervert. Beth was way too young for him. And she was Hershel's daughter. Which made it feel even worse, like he was betraying the man.

"Eighteen," Beth answered, her lips turing up into a smile. Beth lied, telling Rick what she knew he wanted to hear. She was really seveteen, or maybe even still sixteen depending on what month it was. At some point she stopped counting. What did her age matter at the end of the world? Rick was such a cop sometimes. She had been through more crap in the last year than most adults went through in their entire lives. I don't want to die a virgin. It wasn't the first time the thought had crossed her mind. She had written about it a few times in her diary. But up until now, there had been a lack of willing participants in the activity she had been thinking she might want to engage in.

Rick was looking down at her. She could sense a lot of hesitation in him. Maybe because he knew she was lying about her age, or maybe he was just nervous. But he still had his arms around her. So that counted for something. She knew if she wanted anything else to happen between them, she was going to have to make her desires known. But Beth wasn't really sure what to do. The only boy she ever did anything with was Jimmy, and he never needed any encouragement.

Beth raised up on her tiptoes and pressed her lips against Rick again. But she didn't kiss his cheek. This time she kissed him on the mouth. His lips felt dry. She flicked her tounge out to wet her own lips and felt it graze across his by accident. His arms tightened around her, pulling her closer. She could feel how hard his body was. And there was a hard lump in his pants that had not been there before. It was pressing into her stomach. The thought of what that was made her want to press her thighs together. Instead she took one hand back from around Rick's waist and slid it between them, rubbing him awkwardly through his pants. She didn't know how men liked to be touched. He moaned and slipped his tounge between her lips she so figured she must being doing something right.

TWD

Michonne and RickyJo were lying side by side on the lower bunk in Michonne's was asleep on the bunk above them, snoring softly. Jessica had come in and sat with the women awhile, combing out and braiding RickyJo's long hair for her into two long tight ropes that hung down her back and swung when she moved. Then Morgan had come to collect the woman for bed. A few minutes later, RickyJo could hear muffled moans coming from their cell. It made her smile. She was glad Jessica finally found someone to love that loved her back. She didn't know Morgan very well yet, but she had been watching the man closely. He was patient with her neices and protective over Jessica. RickyJo had not made her final judgement yet, but so far she liked him better than any of the woman's previous boyfriends, of which there had been too many to count.

Thinking about Jessica's love life led RickyJo to thoughts of her own. And what a colossal mess she had made out of it. Trying to sort out her feelings made her brain hurt worse than her heart. She was grateful for Michonne's quiet ways. The woman didn't bombard her with questions the way Jessica had. She just moved over on her bunk so they could lie side by side and shared a bag of stale peanut m&m's with her. The women ate the candy slowly. Who knew when or if they were going to find any more. RickyJo took one piece at a time, sucking on the candy and letting the chocolate melt in her mouth before she chewed and swallowed the peanut. She felt a little guilty about not sharing the candy with Toby, but not guilty enough to stop eating it or save him any.

There was a light tap on the bars of the cell. RickyJo craned her neck, looking to see who it was with her head almost upside down. She was hoping it was not Merle or Daryl, but sort of hoping it was one of them at the same time. It was Merle. He had his arm piece off.

"I need yer help with ma thing," he informed her. She knew what that meant. The arm piece he insisted on wearing more than he should rubbed his arm the wrong way sometimes. Also his stump didn't get much air stuffed inside that thing, and in some parts where the skin was still healing it would crack and bleed. He needed help taking care of the wounds and sore spots and wrapping his arm in gauze and padding.

RickyJo grabbed one more piece of chocolate and popped it in her mouth. Then she rolled off the bed and followed Merle back to his call. Or maybe it was still their cell? She didn't know anymore after what happened earlier today. Michonne watched her go until she was out of sight, but made no move to call RickyJo back. If she wanted to come back she would.

Merle sat still while RickyJo tended to his arm. How gentle her touch was always surprised him a little. While Merle normally hated taking help from anyone, he liked watching her work on his wrist. RickyJo had been the one to cauterize his wrist after he cut his hand off, and since then she had been acting like it was her personal mission to make sure his wound healed right.

He wasn't happy about her acting like she was going to sleep in Michonne's cell, he would rather have her in his room. But at least she wasn't sleeping with Daryl. Merle figured that meant she had not made up her mind yet about who or what she wanted. Which meant he still had a chance. He wasn't stupid enough to start demanding answers from her now. He had known her long enough to know all that would do was make her clam up.

"Ready for tomorra?," he asked her. She was biting at her lower lip, spreading a thin layer of neosporin over one particularly bad spot on his wrist. RickyJo nodded, not taking her eyes off what she was doing.

"Ready as I'll ever be I s'pose," she said with a shrug. Then her eyes flicked up to meet his.

"Thinking 'bout changin' the plan aren't you?," RickyJo added. Merle snorted out a laugh. She knew him well. It wasn't that he thought the plan she and Rick had made was bad. He just thought priority number one should be killing the governor. They knew where the man was going to be tomorrow. Merle thought they ought to go there and kill him. Then take the town. Without Phillip, the town would fold in a heartbeat.

Merle thought long and hard before he spoke. He didn't want to put RickyJo in more danger than they were all already in. But he knew he could use her help for what he was planning to do. And he would rather have her by his side during the fight where he could see her and help her if she needed it, rather than just letting her go with the rest of the group and just hoping she was going to make it back alive.

"I could use some backup," he finally admitted.