AN: Here we are, another chapter here.
I have to give a thanks to my friend V (in case she wishes to remain somewhat anonymous). Although her idea wasn't used (yet), it did give me just the right feels and inspiration that I needed to get this one going again!
I hope you enjoy the chapter! Let me know what you think!
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Andrea came out of Hershel's bedroom with Hershel just behind her, one of his hands resting on her shoulder in a familiar and affectionate way.
Carol had spread out a blanket in the living room to make a comfortable place for Sophia to play, and Sophia was entertaining herself with a bucket of small plastic animals that Hershel had obtained for her when he'd taken her for a walk. Carol had been nervous about letting her have the little things, but Sophia had agreed that she understood that the animals weren't for eating, sucking, chewing, or even tasting. There was absolutely no reason that any of them needed to go anywhere near any opening of her body and, if she varied from those instructions at all, she would automatically lose her entire menagerie until such a time as she could be relied upon to follow them.
She could, also, only play with the animals under adult supervision.
Hershel had insisted that Sophia had done well with not swallowing the collection of pebbles, leaves, sticks, snail shells, and other varied items she gathered on her adventures, so she was unlikely to swallow a kangaroo when she'd been explicitly told that kangaroos were for bouncing along the blanket landscape of the living room and not for snacking.
So far, Hershel was right. Sophia's strongest interests seem to lie in sorting her animals into piles that, as far as Carol could tell, were completely arbitrary—especially since Sophia didn't know what most of the animals were beyond those that appeared in a zoo book she'd acquired. However, when Carol had attempted to help Sophia sort them by putting a bear into what she assumed might be a small collection of mammals, Sophia had nearly had a breakdown and had insisted that the bear didn't belong there because "him goes with his friends" and, evidently, Carol had not spent enough time with the plastic toys to know their familial and friendly ties.
Carol turned her head toward Andrea and Hershel as they emerged from the room.
"Well?" Carol asked.
"Everything looks just fine," Hershel said.
Andrea smiled, and Carol caught the contagious expression. The need to be examined and reassured by Hershel—even after a perfectly capable and trained human doctor had said everything was fine—spoke more about their comfort with Hershel and the trust that had been built up over years of experience than it did about the man's actual skill level at caring for pregnant women.
"I imagine that you've got somewhere around a month and a half to two months on Andrea, but Woodbury should be overrun with Dixons by spring," Hershel said.
"And the wedding?" Carol asked. While Hershel had been spending some time with Sophia earlier, Carol and Andrea had gone to rifle through the boxes of random jewelry for rings that pleased Andrea.
"For as much as it's going to be a wedding," Andrea said. "We're thinking tomorrow."
"Tomorrow?!" Carol declared, getting herself off the floor with, honestly, enough grace that she had to stop a second to silently congratulate herself on maintaining so much of her flexibility despite the growing evidence of their son.
Andrea's cheek—the one not bandaged to help her scratches heal—blushed pink and her smile grew. For the first time since Carol had questioned her about the pregnancy, Carol saw Andrea's hand go affectionately to her stomach. She was happy to see it. It was, she thought, pretty clear evidence that Andrea was happy about this and beginning to really accept it. The shock was wearing off a bit.
"It gives Merle less time to overthink things," Andrea said. "And—I think he'd do better if he could just act on it now instead of trying to wait for…something. Besides? Why in the world should we wait?"
Carol smiled and shook her head.
"You shouldn't wait," she confirmed. "But—we have to plan, and we have to plan quickly if we're going to put together a wedding by tomorrow."
"I'm not expecting anything big," Andrea assured her.
"Of course you're not, but every bride deserves something special on her wedding day. You'll need a dress."
"I don't want a wedding dress," Andrea said.
"Something practical," Carol agreed quickly. "Just something new to you. That you like. We may even be able to find something that can grow with you and your baby."
Andrea's face lit up a little at the suggestion, and Carol could tell, immediately, that she was onto something. A wedding didn't have to be a big affair to make it something special.
"Merle can choose something nice to wear," Carol said. "I can help you with your hair."
"Sophia can be my flower girl," Andrea said quickly.
Carol smiled and nodded.
"She would love to be Aunt Andrea's flower girl," Carol confirmed. She looked over her shoulder at Sophia who was lining her animals up as they clearly marched toward the overturned bucket from which she'd dumped them earlier. She'd heard her name and, with a brow furrowed from such serious play, she stared at Carol. "Do you want to be a flower girl, Soph? Help Aunt Andrea and Uncle Merle get married tomorrow?"
Sophia clearly considered the question. She sat up on her knees and worked the little yellow animal in her hand with her fingertips.
"Tomorrow?" She asked.
Carol bit the inside of her mouth so as to not laugh at the serious expression her daughter was wearing.
"Do you have something scheduled for tomorrow that you can't move?" Carol teased. Sophia didn't fully understand the teasing, of course, but it didn't matter. "Do you want to be a flower girl? You can wear a pretty dress and—I'm sure we can find some flowers, even if their fake, for you to carry. Maybe—she could double as the ring bearer?"
Andrea nodded.
"It would all be wonderful," Andrea said.
"What do you say? Can you carry the rings? Give them to your Daddy so he can hand them to Uncle Merle in the wedding?"
"My Daddy's gonna be in the wedding?" Sophia asked.
"I'm sure he'll be the best man," Carol said. She looked at Andrea again. "Unless—did I just hijack your wedding?"
Andrea laughed and shook her head.
"Of course not," Andrea said. "If he will…if you will…you'll be the best man and the…the matron of honor. And you'll be my witnesses, and whatever else we need." Andrea looked at Hershel. "What else do we need?"
"I'll handle the ceremony," Hershel said. "And really—the rest is up to you. Where do you want to have it? Do you want to invite people?"
"I don't have anyone I really care to invite," Andrea admitted. "I'd like it if—we could do it in our apartment? I just want it to be private and comfortable. I don't want anything fancy. I just want to be married to Merle, and I want us to…have a life."
Hershel moved his hand and affectionately squeezed the back of Andrea's neck.
"You and Merle will be married tomorrow," he said. "Unforeseen circumstances notwithstanding. In your home. It's beyond my power to grant you the life that you want, but I have a pretty good feeling you'll make it happen if anyone can."
"I'll bake a cake, too," Carol said. She looked back at Sophia who was listening to everything they said with all the concentration that a child of her age possibly could. As she sometimes did, she'd focused on the conversation to the point that her eyes looked slightly glazed, and her mouth had opened a little as her jaw slackened. In her hand, she was still working the yellow animal with her fingertips. "What do you say, Sophia? We're all going to be in the wedding. Are you going to help us make it happen by being a flower girl and carrying the rings?"
"I wanna—can I see a ring, Mama?"
Andrea laughed and walked over to where Sophia was sitting. She stooped down and offered her hand out to Sophia. She was wearing the ring with a stone on it—an opal. Sophia didn't drop her yellow animal to examine the ring. Instead, she simply held the yellow animal with one hand and Andrea's hand with the other.
"That's pretty," Sophia whispered.
"Thank you," Andrea offered. "Tomorrow you'll carry two bands. Can you do that for me?"
"I could—I can carry one in my hand," Sophia said.
"Not two?" Andrea asked.
"I have two hands," Sophia said, furrowing her brow at Andrea like she'd suddenly grown concerned that her aunt wasn't very intelligent.
"That'll be perfect," Andrea said, laughing to herself. "All you'll have to do is hand them to your Daddy, OK? And if you forget—that'll be OK, too. As long as you're there."
Sophia smiled.
"You wanna play with my aminals?" She asked. Andrea laughed quietly and situated herself on the blanket on the other side of Sophia's animal line that had been marching toward the bucket as Sophia had moved each of them, one at a time, to shift the line. Sophia took Andrea's position as evidence that she had a new playmate. She pointed to one of the decorations on the blanket. "That's you house," she informed Andrea.
"Where's your house?" Andrea asked. Sophia pointed to a different decoration. "What do we do with our houses?"
"You live there," Sophia said. "Aminals live there."
"I don't have any animals," Andrea reminded Sophia.
"You can have these," Sophia said, picking a few from the line to hand to Andrea, one at a time. "But—just—but just to play, OK? You can have 'em for play."
"Perfect," Andrea said, dragging the animals that Sophia gave her over to her indicated house.
"We ought to go look for some things for tomorrow," Carol offered.
"We'll get it before dinner," Andrea said. "Right now—I think I have some important play to take care of."
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"What am I gonna do?" Merle asked.
Daryl's chest ached for his brother.
Merle had fucked up more than most human beings in his life. Some may even argue that a good number of the shit things that had happened to Merle in his life were his own damned fault. Daryl wouldn't really argue too much with those people, besides pointing out that there were, maybe, circumstances that they weren't considering. Still, Merle was his brother, and Daryl loved him. And he understood, where others didn't, that there were a great many layers to Merle that most people didn't see.
Merle had just realized that, traditionally, he would be expected to hold Andrea's hand during the ceremony—while he put her ring on and, also, while she put his ring on.
And Merle was missing a hand. In fact, they'd already had to cut the sleeve of the button-up shirt to make it fit his cuff better.
They were on their way up. In a matter of minutes, the rest of the so-called wedding party would arrive. There wasn't an aisle. The grand appearance of Merle's bride would simply take place when they arrived. The vows would follow shortly after. In less than half an hour, they'd be eating the cake that Carol had baked and hidden in their kitchen downstairs.
Daryl decided to ground Merle with that.
"You gonna get married. That's what the hell you gonna do."
"I can't even hold her fuckin' hand, Daryl!" Merle barked. His anger was great, and large, and wholly misdirected, but Daryl accepted it.
Before Daryl could respond, there was a knock at the door. The wedding party didn't wait for invitation—perhaps, and more than likely, they'd heard the explosion that had been Merle's voice. They wouldn't want to give him time to overthink.
Daryl knew they had overheard Merle's angry outburst when, instead of setting some kind of stage for some sort of moment of reveal, Andrea came in ahead of Hershel, Carol, and Sophia. Her dress was navy blue and loose, falling around her ankles—the kind of dress that seemed a few sizes too big in the stomach area, and Daryl knew it was so that she could wear it as the baby grew. Carol had done her hair, but as was typical she was fresh-faced. Most of them had eschewed trying to use any make-up they found, since it expired and did more harm than any possible good.
She looked pretty enough, Daryl figured, but Merle looked a touch more miserable upon seeing her.
She didn't miss a beat. She came directly to him.
"We're getting married," she said, touching Merle's face with her fingers. "And we're doing it right now, Merle. If you say no—we're not getting married later."
Daryl thought his brother might appreciate such a direct approach.
"I don't even got enough hands for this shit," Merle said.
Andrea laughed quietly.
"We'll make it work," she assured him. "If the hardest thing we have to overcome is…you don't have enough hands to do this some traditional way? Then, we'll do it our own damn way, Merle. Things have been pretty untraditional so far, right? So—we'll just work it out."
"If I could interrupt," Hershel offered. "That's pretty much the premise of a successful marriage."
Merle looked at him and then at Daryl. Something on his features had changed. It was subtle, but Daryl—having spent most of his life looking at his brother's face—could see it. This was probably one of the first times that anyone, who wasn't Daryl or maybe Andrea, had suggested to Merle that he might actually be successful at anything; that he even had a chance. And it was Hershel that was telling Merle that he might very well be successful at one thing that he truly feared screwing up.
Hershel seemed to read the shift, too.
"It's true, son. Marriage is about compromise. It's about—flexibility. Figuring out what you need to do to fix something that's just too good to throw away because it isn't what some people might consider perfect. It's problem solving."
"You always been pretty damn good at problem solving," Daryl urged. "When you wanna be."
"Whatta you say, Merle?" Andrea asked. "You have to make a decision. Now or never. Do you want to…solve a few problems with me? For the rest of our lives?"
Merle glanced at the so-called wedding party that had gathered around them instead of taking any kind of formation that might resemble a wedding. Sophia, having left Carol's side, apparently decided to abandon any ruse of being a flower girl, and she tugged at Daryl and attempted to climb him. He picked her up to save himself from the embarrassment of her doing something like pulling his pants down in an attempt to scale him.
"I got rings, Daddy," she offered. "I can't drop 'em." As if to illustrate her point, she lifted up the tiny cloth bag that hung around her neck on string. The bag had been a creation of Carol's, fashioned quickly the night before, when she realized that Sophia might very well lose the bands. Sophia liked the bag because Andrea, Daryl knew, had already told her that she could keep it once the wedding was done, and it was the perfect size for carrying treasures.
"What'cha say, Merle?" Daryl asked, readjusting Sophia on his hip.
"The hell are you all lookin' at me for?" Merle asked. "It's Hershel that's supposed to be handling the damn weddin'."
Daryl laughed to himself but, like everyone else, he accepted that as the final word on things. They took their places to play their roles. There were no flowers, and there was no music. There was nothing, really, besides Andrea and Merle—flanked by their closest family in the living room of the apartment that they now called home in Woodbury.
Now that it was decided that they would work things out, and now that Merle was riding something of a high that people believed he was actually made, not only for this world, but maybe for the role he wanted to have in this world, there was very little drama surrounding the vows. They exchanged traditional vows, omitting, as Daryl and Carol had, the part about obedience. Marriage, after all, was about problem solving and working together, not about how well someone could take orders from someone else. Then, they exchanged rings and, during the moment when Merle must put the ring on Andrea, and when he was clearly nervous—as evidenced by his very visibly shaking hand—that his lack of a right hand would somehow mar things, Andrea curled her right fingers around his arm, her fingertips touching the skin above his cuff, and offered her left hand to him to accept the band that he slid into place.
And when he kissed her, his lack of a right hand was evidently forgotten in the soft smiles exchanged between them that followed the kiss that sealed their marriage.
Daryl cheered with the rest of them, and Sophia followed suit and loudly cheered for them as well.
"Now for the best damn part," Daryl said.
"The honeymoon?" Merle asked with a laugh—not that they had plans to do anything more than seclude themselves in the apartment for the night.
"Carol's cake," Daryl offered in response.