Disclaimer : I do not own any character of (The Last of Us) TLOU is owned by Naughty Dog, but all the Oc character are from my invention.


Chapter 27 : Back at Jackson Part - 2

Tommy and Maria follow the young nurse to the room where Alice is. The nurse tells them that she needs rest, and recovery time as well. Maria is desperate to talk with this woman, as Dylan is attended by the doctor - she needs to know what happened to Ellie.

"Okay, I will give her the pill for relaxing and go wait for Dr. Wilson to come out with any news. Remember, try not to stress her out too much; she needs to rest, too." Maggie opens the door and enters the room, followed by Tommy and Maria. "Are you feeling better?" asks Maggie as soon as she gets close to her. Alice is sitting on the edge of the bed, still covering herself with the blanket Maggie gave her earlier. She looks at her with a sad and desperate expression; not knowing what happening to Dylan is eating her up.

"I feel better, thanks. Do you know something about Dylan's condition?" asks Alice desperately.

Tommy moves close to answer her. "Not yet, but we are hoping that he gets out of there soon. This is Maria, my wife. I know that you're tired and worried, but she'd like to ask you a few questions, if that's okay with you?" says Tommy nicely.

"Okay, I'll be back in 15 minutes, just take this. That will help you to relax a little, okay?" Maggie gives the pill to Alice along with a glass of water. Alice puts the pill in her mouth and drinks the water.

"Thank you for everything," Alice tells the nurse while she gives her the glass back.

Maggie looks at Tommy and Maria before leaving the room. The pill is going to take effect in 5 or 10 minutes, so try not to take long." Then she leaves the room and closes the door.

Maria moves closer to her and introduces herself again. "Hi, my name is Maria. Like Tommy said, I'm his wife, so welcome to Jackson," she says, extending her hand to her. Alice takes her hand and shakes it.

"Thank you!... Dylan told me a lot about this place, and mentioned you two. I'm glad to finally meet you two in person. I don't know how much more I can help you... I already talked with your husband, but if you need to know something about me, you can ask anything. I know that you have rules here, and I'm like an intruder, but I just want to make sure Dylan is okay. So if you want me to go or anything, I will understand." Alice feels a little out of place, but with all the things Dylan told her about this place, she is hoping for the best. But if the two people in charge here came to talk to her, it has to be something. Alice continues looking at both of them, waiting for what they're going to say. She already talked to Tommy, but it seems like his wife is a nice person, too.

"Yeah, we have some rules and conditions to admit new people here. Also, we need to do a complete medical examination. We have to make sure that no one enters here with any disease that could be contagious. I know that the nurse gave you a small check, but the doctor needs to do the full version on you. For now, it's better for you to stay here, so he can do that later," says Maria softly.

"Okay, I understand all that… and thank you for helping me out," says Alice with a sad face.

"Yeah, don't worry about that... if you're with Dylan, I think it's okay. Now, I know that we don't have much time, and you need some rest, too. I know that you spoke with my husband about what happened with Ellie and Dylan, but that can wait for later. The only thing I need to know right now is if you know where she went."

"Thank you, I will try to help you the best I can, but the thing is that I don't know. She just left in the middle of the night. I think Dylan should know more, but he didn't mention anything to me. The only thing I know is that she was going to find this friend of hers... in some kind of outpost or a trade town, something like that. I think that was up north, but like I said, Dylan should know more," says Alice with a yawn on the last part, feeling tired now, as the relaxation pill starts to take effect.

"Okay, that's something, at least... we can check that later, thank you. Now get some rest, and we'll let you know as soon as the doc comes out and gives us any information on Dylan... okay?" After that, Alice lays down on the bed. Maria and Tommy leave the room and walk toward the lobby of the clinic. Maria is feeling a little sad, not only because she didn't get much information about where Ellie is, but also about Dylan, because if the doctor is taking this long, it has to be very bad.

As soon as they get to the lobby, Tommy suggests to Maria that she go back home and let him handle this. He doesn't want her to get any more stressed because that's not good for the babies. But Maria tells him that she wants to be there until the doctor comes out and make sure that Dylan is going to be fine, so they just sit there and wait. After one hour, some people arrive at the clinic; they came as soon as they found out about Dylan, to see how he was doing. But Tommy and Maria don't have much to tell them, except that Dylan is in bad condition. Some ask for Ellie, like Victor and a few of Ellie's friends that worked with her. They stay for a little while, but some of them have to go back to work. After a while, Jenna and Brad arrive at the clinic. As soon as they both enter, they start looking for Maria or Tommy. When Maria sees Jenna, she stands up, and Jenna walks over to her and gives her a hug as soon as she gets close to her.

The hug doesn't last long. As both women are pregnant now, they both look at each other with a sad expression. After that, both women go to sit while Brad goes to talk to Tommy. "I came as soon as I heard that Dylan was back... they told me that he was in bad shape, but they didn't tell me anything about Ellie. Is she alright?" asks Jenna quickly.

"We don't know... she didn't come with him," Maria answers sadly.

"What!... why isn't she here with him? What happened?" asks Jenna, surprised.

"We're not sure about that yet... the woman that came with Dylan didn't say much, and Dylan is with the doc."

"Oh... Yeah, how is he?" asks Jenna.

"Not good. Wilson's still working on him. Rose came out like 20 minutes ago to let us know that Dr. Wilson was doing his best, but the operation was going to take more time. So now we have to wait for him to finish and pray that all goes well."

Jenna asks her a few questions about Ellie, and about this mystery woman that came with Dylan, but Maria answers with what she knows so far. After a while, Jenna asks her about the babies and when she is going to go into labor. Maria tells her that the doc said that she is probably going to go into labor in 3 or 4 weeks. When Maria asks about hers, Jenna touches her belly and tells her that her baby is fine, and that she is six months along now. She also tells her about how Brad wants a boy, but she wants it to be a girl.

A month after Ellie and Dylan left town, Jenna found out that she was pregnant. After she told Brad, they went to speak with her mother. As they were already engaged, her mother suggested that they move the wedding day up. Jenna didn't want to do that because she wanted Ellie to be there with her, but her mother convinced her and Brad to get married before she started to show. Jenna didn't care about what people were going to say, but her mother wanted it that way, so they got married a month later. As the doctor realized that the town was starting to have more pregnant women, he asked Maria to add a new nursery to the clinic. The town was getting more populated as they were receiving more people over the years. So Tommy and Maria are planning to expand the town by cleaning up the part with the abandoned houses and making new ones. But that project is going to take more time.

Jenna and Maria continue talking about their babies; it's a good distraction while they're waiting for the doctor to come out. But they stop talking when Maria sees the woman walking from the room corridor toward the lobby.

"Hey, you should be resting," says Maria to the woman, then she stands up. Jenna does the same.

"Sorry, I can't sleep much, knowing that Dylan is still in there and no one's told me anything," says Alice, moving close to them.

"Hi, I heard that you came here with Dylan and thanks to you, he's still alive," says Jenna while she gets close to the woman, too.

Alice looks at the two women with some curiosity. She notices that both women are pregnant. "I wouldn't say that, because it was my fault that he ended up like that. He was trying to protect me from some infected when he got hurt," Alice starts to explain.

"Oh, I see... sorry. But Maria told me that you care about him, so this must be hard for you. Dylan is a good man... he always cares for other people. So how did you meet them? ...Sorry for asking you like that, but Ellie is my friend and I just want to know what happened to her, and why she isn't here," asks Jenna desperately.

"You must be Ellie's friend. She told me a little about you during the little time we spent together. Even though she didn't like to talk much, especially about this place or what she and Dylan were doing out there. Dylan told me a few things about this place, but we had more time to talk."

"Oh, I see... so you two got close?... I mean you and Dylan, of course," asks Jenna curiously.

"... well... we became… umm, friends, I guess. I`m not sure about that... things got a little complicated. Look, I know that all of you are worried about the girl. I don't blame you. I'm worried myself. I know that she is only a teenager and shouldn't be out there alone. I really want to help you, but I don't know where she went, and even though we wanted to go after her, Dylan was injured at that time too, so we couldn't do anything," says Alice sadly, a little frustrated about that.

"It's okay... we don't know what happened to them out there, so we just want to understand. Ellie is a very beloved person to some people here, so we're just worried for her," says Jenna calmly.

"Yeah, I understand that. She looked like a nice girl, and from what I could see, she can take care of herself. Right now, I'm more worried about Dylan. Don't get me wrong, I hope that Ellie is alright and maybe on her way here. But… but… Dylan… I just need to know if he is okay. So do you know anything about his condition?" asks Alice nervously.

"Sorry, the doctor hasn't come out yet, but I can assure you that he is doing the best for him. We have a great doctor here, and if anyone can-" Maria stops when all the people there hear a door open in the corridor and see Dr. Wilson and Rose come out of the emergency room. He has some blood on his medical robe and on his gloves. As he was walking in the direction of the people there, he takes the gloves off and throws them in a nearby trash can. He stops before getting close to the lobby and says something to the nurse in a lower voice. Rose nods at him and walks away to his office.

All the people there look at the doctor and see that his expression isn't so good. He starts to walk again, and enters the lobby. Tommy moves away from the group and gets close to him, and asks him about Dylan's condition. "I hope you have some good news for us, Doc - how is he?" asks Tommy quickly.

"I'm afraid that the news is not going to be so good," says Wilson, looking at the people there.

Some of them go silent, not expecting something like that. Alice moves away from Maria and Jenna and gets close to the doctor with some tears falling from her eyes.

"No, no, no... please just tell me that he is going to be okay… you said that you're going to take care of him… he can't be… he can't," Alice says desperately, so Maria moves close to her and grabs her shoulder in support.

"How bad is it?... He's not… dead, right?" asks Maria.

The doctor looks at her to answer. "No!... He's still alive … for the moment, but his condition is bad."

"How bad?... Is he going to be okay?" asks Tommy.

"Well, that's going to depend on him now. He is in a coma, so for now, we need to wait and see. But he is a strong man, and I believe that he has a very good chance to recover. But his condition is still delicate. I treated his wounds the best I could, but he has an infection that damaged one of his kidneys, so I had to operate on that. The other one is fine, so he can survive with only one. He lost a lot of blood, too, but thanks to the almost freezing condition, the infection didn't spread too much to other parts of his body," Wilson explains.

"I don't understand... Is he going to be okay?... can I see him?" asks Alice desperately.

"I'm afraid that you need to wait a little longer for that. We need to move him to another room to monitor him and make sure everything is okay. We don't have the right equipment here to treat someone in this condition, but I assure you that we're going to do our best," says the doctor.

Some tears come out of Alice's eyes as she hears what the doctor is saying, so Maria is trying to comfort her a little. "Don`t worry, the doctor said that he has a good chance… isn't that right, Doc?" asks Maria, looking at the doctor now.

"Yes, of course, but like I said, we need to wait. I stopped the infection, so he's not going to have any problems with that. His condition is still delicate, but if he responds well to the treatment, he's going to be okay."

"Thank you, Doctor, I know you're going to do your best. And if you need anything that we can help with, let me know," says Tommy.

"Yeah, now that you mention that, we've almost used all the reserve blood we have, so we're going to need more. So if you can get some volunteers to donate some blood, that would be great," says Dr. Wilson.

"Okay… I can work on that. I will announce it at a meeting to discuss all this. Well, about Dylan's condition and the new arrival... thanks, Doc," says Tommy.

"Okay then... Brad, can you help Maggie with the stretcher so we can move Dylan to another room?" asks the doctor, looking at the young man.

"No problem, doc... anything to help," says Brad quickly.

Dr. Wilson looks at the young nurse and tells her to take Brad to the emergency room and transfer Dylan to room number five, which is the only one that has some working equipment to monitor a patient. After that, both of them walk out of the lobby and go to the room. "Okay, I don't want to sound rude, but if no one else needs medical attention, you can go home. There is nothing you can do for now, and I will handle things here and let you know of any progress," says the doctor to the group of people there.

The doctor is starting to walk away when Alice speaks again. "What about me?... can I see him when he gets transferred to another room?" says Alice with a sad voice.

"… Ummm… Alice, right?" asks the doctor, not really remembering if that's the name she gave him when they arrived at the clinic.

"Yeah, that's my name… ummm... Maria said that you need to do some kind of check on me," says Alice, a little nervous now.

"Yeah, we need to do a full exam on all the people that come in here, just to be sure that they haven't brought any diseases and not infected," explains the doctor. "I can do that later, but if you want to see Dylan afterward, we can do that now while he's being transferred to another room."

"That's a good idea, Doc. I will stay here with her until you finish," says Maria.

"Okay then, if you will be so kind and follow me, we can start that now," he says to Alice, then he turns around and walks toward one of the empty rooms.

Maria tells the woman to go with the doctor and that she's going to be there shortly. After Alice goes, Maria looks at Tommy and Jenna, and before she says something, Tommy talks first.

"Babe, you don't need to stay here, I can ask someone to take care of this woman. You need to go home and rest. This situation is not going to help the babies," says Tommy.

"It's okay, Tommy, I will be fine, don't worry. I'll stay with her and see if I can get more information about Ellie. You can go and prepare the meeting, and make sure that everything is okay in town," says Maria softly to him while she moves close and gives him a small kiss on the lips.

"Yeah, we're going to be fine, and as soon as Brad finishes, I will send him to help you out," says Jenna quickly.

"Are you serious? You are pregnant, too... You two would be better off at home. Doing this is not good for the babies, you know," says Tommy, shaking his head.

"Don't worry, honey, we're in the clinic - if something happens, there's no better place to be," she says, smiling.

"Okay then, I will go and check a few things and go to the hall to inform the people about Dylan's condition, and that we need some volunteers to donate blood. Here, keep the radio, I will pick up another one from the house. If you find out anything about Ellie or ummm… Joel, let me know, even though she never mentioned him... but who knows, maybe she'll remember something."

"Okay, Tommy, I'll let you know, thanks," says Maria, taking the radio in her hand.

After Tommy kisses Maria one more time and walks out of the clinic, Maria and Jenna start to walk toward the room where the doctor is going to examine Alice, hoping to know more about Ellie.

Dr. Wilson just does the regular physical check, and of course makes sure that she doesn't have any bite marks. He tells Rose to take some blood samples, but those are going to take a little time to get examined. Maria and Jenna stay outside the room until the doctor finishes and leaves the room. He tells Maria that Rose is going to do the rest of the tests, but if she wants to go inside and talk to the woman, she can do it now. He is going to check on Dylan and make sure everything is fine. He also tells Maggie to attend any volunteers that come to donate blood or let him know if someone comes in sick. After that, Maria and Jenna enter the room and ask Alice if everything is okay, and if she and Jenna can stay there with her. Alice tells them that it's okay, that the nurse is almost finished with her. So Maria and Jenna just find a chair and sit there, seeing how things go.

After a while, Maria notices some of the marks the woman has on part of her legs and arms. Some are old, but others are fresh. The woman is wearing a paper robe, some generic one that they traded for with the other town. Maria remembers that she mentioned the fight they had with some infected before getting here. Everyone is silent in the room except for Rose, who is asking the woman some questions, so Jenna takes the opportunity to try to get some information. "So you and Dylan are close now?" asks Jenna with some curiosity.

"What!" says Alice, now looking in Jenna and Maria's direction.

"I'm just asking, because I can see how worried you look for him. I don't know what happened out there, but it looks like you are close to him, or am I wrong?" says Jenna, waiting for the woman's reaction.

Alice looks at the woman, not knowing how to answer. Yes, Dylan and her had become friends during the trip, and yes, they'd kissed several times - well, a lot of times - but they never went beyond that. He never told her that he loved her or anything like that, and neither did she. And after what happened at the restaurant, something changed in him. Dylan didn't talk much about anything... he was more quiet. Even though he talked a lot about this place, before the restaurant, she noticed that he felt guilty because of the girl. She knew that even though the girl was strong, Dylan was the adult, so she knew that he was responsible for her. She noticed that he was worried about what was going to happen to her, and that he didn't go and help.

"How long was it after they found you?" asks Maria, snapping the woman out of her thoughts.

"Oh, sorry, I was just… ummm… yeah, right. I'm not sure… it's hard to track the time out there. But I think like 3 weeks before the restaurant, and like two months after. And for the other question, I'm not sure… ummm, friends, I guess," answers Alice to both women.

"So you don't have any idea where Ellie went after she left you two?" asks Jenna now.

"Dylan didn't talk much about what they were doing up in the north... the only thing I know is that they were looking for someone. I think Ellie mentioned once that he was a friend of hers, and that she needed to find him."

Maria was going to ask another question when Rose speaks and tells everyone that she is done for now. That she is going to take the blood sample to the doctor and that he's going to give them the results in a few days. But for now, everything is okay with Alice, so she doesn't need to stay in the clinic.

"Okay, thank you. Can I put my clothes back on and go to see Dylan now?" Alice asks the nurse.

"Yeah, sure. But the doctor said just for a moment. He doesn't want anybody else there until he gets more stable."

"Oh, don't worry, Rose, we're just going to be there for a few minutes," says Maria, standing up. Jenna does the same while Rose moves close to them.

"Don't worry, the doctor did a great job with him. I'm sure he's going to be fine in no time. Now if you'll excuse me, I need to help Dr. Wilson with a few things and take this to him," says Rose, opening the door and walking out.

After the nurse goes, Alice finishes putting her clothes back on. While she is doing that, Maria notices that her clothes have some blood stains, and have some holes in them, too. "You know, I think I have some clothes that you can use," says Maria, looking at the woman.

"Well… that is a nice gesture of you, thank you. But I don't want to bother you with that. You've all been so nice to me even though you don't know me. I still have some others that I can use in my backpack. I know this isn't good, but I didn't have the time to change and this was better than freezing to death."

"It's okay, don't worry, you're going to be fine here. We don't let good people die out there if we don't need to. We can find a good place here for you, if you want to stay."

"Thanks… That's a really nice offer from you, even though you know nothing about me. But I really want to go to see Dylan, if that's okay," asks Alice, a little desperate.

"Sure… that's not going to be a problem, let's go," answers Maria. The three women walk out of the room and go to the one Dylan is in. Rose already told them what room they put him in, so they arrive there in no time. When they open the door, Dylan is in a bed with some instruments monitoring his condition. Alice asks them if she can go alone for a few minutes, so Maria and Jenna stay outside.

After Alice goes inside, Dr. Wilson comes from his office and stands in front of them. He asks Maria if she found out anything about Ellie. "Did she tell you anything about Ellie? I didn't ask when I was checking her, because she seemed too stressed out, and I didn't want to complicate her condition. But I really want to know what happened to Ellie, and if she didn't come with them… I just don't want to think the worst," says the doctor sadly; he misses the girl very much. She was good at her job, and she suffered so much, that he only wishes the best for her.

"She didn't tell us much, but so far, Ellie left them to go looking for Joel when Dylan got shot before they came here. So we don't know yet what happened to her. This is worrying me... Ellie is just a girl, and even though Joel taught her how to survive, being alone out there is just…" Maria starts to get sentimental as some tears come out of her eyes. Jenna pulls her into a hug and starts to tell her that Ellie is going to be fine. The doctor tries to change the topic, as he starts to tell them about Dylan's condition and how almost freezing to death saved his life. They continue talking for a few minutes while Alice is inside the room.

Inside the room, Alice walks close to the bed. His body is covered with a sheet to keep him warm and he has some instruments attached to him. When she gets close, she notices how slow his breathing is and how pale he looks; if she didn't know better, he almost looked like he was dead. Those thoughts bring some sadness to her mind, but she tells herself that he is going to be alright. As soon as she is beside him, she takes one of his hands in hers and moves her head down to be closer to his face.

"I'm so sorry…" Alice starts with a lower and sad voice. "I know this is my fault... if I was more careful and didn't insist on going into that building, none of this would've happened. Ellie trusted that I would make sure you got here in good shape, and now it feels like I failed on that too…" she lowers her head and puts it on top of his hand, then she closes her eyes as some tears start to come out of her eyes. "Please, I can't lose you like I've lost everything else. I know that we just met a few months ago but... I need you… so please don't leave me - I can't do this alone, not again."

At that moment, Maria knocks on the door and enters the room slowly, just to tell the woman that they need to go. But as soon as she sees the scene, she starts to wonder what happened in the last four months that Ellie and Dylan were out there. Thinking about Ellie isn't helping at all. She is just an 18-year-old girl, out there in this cruel world. But she has to accept this for now… there's nothing they can do for Ellie at this moment, but Dylan… He needs them right now. Maria approaches the bed slowly behind Alice and puts one hand on her shoulder, and speaks.

"He is a good man, don`t worry about him... he's going to make it, we're going to make sure of that," says Maria with a soft and kind voice.

Alice opens her eyes and moves her head to look at him. "He is the kindest person I ever met - he helped me and those at the outpost where I was, without any vacillation. And gave me his friendship without question," she says with a sad voice, but she continues. "He offered me a home... a place to live and be happy, and he didn't even know me that well at that time. He gave me hope, a new beginning to start over, but I can't take any of that, if he… if he won't be there to share that with me." In that moment, Alice knows how much she loves him; even with the short amount of time they've spent together, this man found a way to her heart.

Maria can see now that this woman really loves him. She is happy for him. He's been alone here since his father died; he didn't have many friends here until he became Joel's friend. Who knew that Joel and Dylan were going to be friends? But this man has a big heart; he can connect with anyone. "We need to go now, but don't worry - I'll talk to the doctor and make sure that you can come visit him later. But for now, he needs to recover, and so do you… c'mon."

"Okay... thank you." Alice kisses his hand and puts it back on the bed, then she moves away.

Both women leave the room as Maria closes the door behind her. Jenna is waiting outside the room. "How does he look?" asks Jenna as soon as Maria and Alice get out there.

Maria tells Alice to wait for her in the lobby because she needs to talk with Jenna for a moment. Alice nods in response and walks away sadly. Then Maria turns to look at Jenna. "He seems okay, but we need to wait and see. There's nothing we can do here for now, so why don't you go home and I'll let you know if I find out something about Ellie, okay?"

"What do you think about this woman... do you think she is telling us everything?" asks Jenna, suspicious.

"I don't really know her story, but I can tell you what she's feeling for Dylan is real. I will talk to her again and try to find out if she can tell me more about Ellie." Maria looks in the direction of the lobby where the woman was sitting, waiting for her. Maria can't say why she trusts this woman, but the way she looks at Dylan and the way she cares about him is something that she's seen before. She tries to remember where she's seen this recently, but the only thing that comes to her mind is Ellie and Joel.

"Well, I hope Ellie is fine, or at least that she found Joel and is with him. I just worry for her, and I think that this woman knows something about her and doesn't want to tell us."

"Don't worry, I'll tell you what I can find. I don't think she is lying, but when she's more relaxed, maybe she can tell me more. I know that Ellie was obsessed about finding Joel, but going on her own?" C'mon, Ellie, why did you do this? Going out there alone just to try to find him… I know that he was important to you, but... Maria stops before she starts thinking about feelings she's not sure about.

"Okay, so what are you going to do with her? Because she doesn't need to stay in the clinic, right?"

"Well, she's with Dylan now, I can tell you that. So maybe she can stay at his house until he wakes up and recovers. But for now, I want to keep an eye on her and get to know her more, so I'm going to take her home."

"Are you joking?... You're going to take that woman to your house and in your condition?" asks Jenna, disbelieving.

"I don't think that she's going to do anything or that she is dangerous. I really think that she is a good person. And that way, I can talk with her more and try to find out what happened to Ellie."

"Okay, just let me know if you need anything." After that, Jenna and Maria say goodbye to each other and walk to the lobby. Jenna says goodbye to Alice and continues to the exit of the clinic.

Maria stops in front of the woman and looks at her. "We don't know how long this is going to take, but Dylan has a house here, and I assume he will be happy if you stay there. But for now, you can stay with me and Tommy," says Maria gently.

"I don't want to cause any trouble just because I am with Dylan. I know that I'm just a stranger here, and it's enough that you are so kind and let me stay here," answers Alice, lowering her head.

"Oh, you don't need to worry about that - we have a spare room there that you can use, so it's not going to be any problem. Besides, I could use a little help in the house now, you may have noticed."

"Yeah, I can see that... your belly is so big, and Dylan never told me that you were pregnant."

"Well, that's because I'm going to have twins, and I don't remember if Dylan knows that. We didn't tell too many people until it was starting to show, but Ellie knew."

"Wow, that's great - congratulations! You don't see many pregnancies these days, let alone twins," says Alice, standing up from the chair. "Ellie didn't tell me either, but I didn't speak too much with her. We didn't spend that much time together, and she seemed too sad to talk. But Dylan talked all the time... well, at first, anyway… after the girl left, he was more quiet," says Alice with a sad voice.

"Well, maybe we can talk about that while we're preparing the dinner for today... what do you think?"

"That sounds good, but I don't know if I can eat anything while Dylan is like that… I just-"

"Oh, c'mon, he's going to be fine. I know that he's a strong man, and from what I can see, now he has someone to fight for," says Maria, putting her arm around Alice's shoulder.

Alice's face turns a little red from the comment, and she lowers her head to try to hide it. "I don't know about that... we kissed sometimes, but we never talked about all that," says Alice shyly.

"Oh, don't worry about that. I'm sure that he feels something for you. And I can see that you feel the same. Now let's go to my house and eat something - I'm starving. After that, you can rest. I can show you some of the town tomorrow if you like," says Maria, smiling.

"Thank you for all of this. Dylan was right: you're amazing people." With that, both women walk out of the clinic and toward Maria's house. Maria is still hoping that Tommy will find some apples for her; she still wants that pie.