The fun part of having no real deadline for any part of their trip is that aside from Shane's insistence on avoiding any highly populated place, like Tampa or Miami, he seems happy enough to let Beth play navigator. Although the lure of the Bahamas is definitely still there, Florida has interesting places of its own, namely Everglades National Park.
It's a place that Beth's only seen on television, although she knew folks who vacationed down there. Usually big places like Disney World are a bigger draw for family vacations, and maybe before the world ended, she would have liked to go to the amusement parks. Now? The last thing she wants to see is what became of any of those.
They take their time getting down to the marina Shane says accesses the park. It's normally a trip of hours from the Naples area, but so many islands fascinated Beth. She's still learning all she needs to know about sailing, so practicing before they do anything serious seems like a good idea, especially since the weather is staying nice and calm. After a week on open water, Shane is letting her take lead more and more.
Every night, they anchor off shore and take the dinghy in to one of the many islands that give the 10,000 Islands area its name. One even has a walker, a man who took his kayak out to the solitude of the islands. They can't determine what killed the man, so Shane takes him out in the dinghy for a sea burial after Beth puts him down.
The downside of the islands is that the little no-see-ums love her. By the time she applies enough insect repellant to be invisible to them, she stinks enough that sleeping on the island loses its appeal. The boat's far more comfortable than a tent on an island, but the islands give the dogs much needed exercise, and Shane has her spend time with her marksmanship each morning before they leave for the next one.
Supper is whatever fish or other seafood they've caught for the day, and fishing is easy and plentiful, although nothing like what she's used to. Catching their own baitfish is fun, and Shane tends to prefer that to using lures, probably because the baitfish species are pretty populous.
As much as she thought Florida would be shorts, bikinis, and tank tops as they got further south to warmer weather, she's followed Shane's example of wearing lightweight sailing trousers with reinforcement in apparently key areas and a light colored, fairly form fitting long-sleeved shirt. The material dries fast, which is a plus when they do get wet. Even better, it's got some sort of UV protection, so she's not going through gallons of sunscreen.
The safety vests they both wear felt odd when he first made her wear one, with the harness along her back and chest that's designed to auto inflate. Now, it's just part of the outfit whenever the catamaran or dinghy is underway. Even her underclothing has been exchanged for things intended for athletes and wicking moisture away from skin, although she hasn't worn a pair of socks since they reached Naples.
This morning they're going to round Cape Sable, and Shane is standing next to her under the canopy. He points toward shore. "Little Shark River. Place is sheltered enough to ride out any storms coming in out of the Gulf. Deep enough we could go inland a ways even in this if we wanted to."
That's been his biggest caution, telling her facts like that, despite the fact that he's collected charts and logs from other boats like some people collected baseball cards in the old world. The little office area off her cabin is chock full of all sorts of information. Although the GPS navigation systems still seem to be working, Shane's reluctant to rely solely on them, since the satellites could fail or drift without warning. She doesn't blame him, even as she studies the depth charts for the river he indicates.
"All those mangroves. Major bug territory, I bet," she grumbles, although at least the mangroves usually equal seeing manatees, which is almost worth the bugs. "It's still not fair that they don't bother you and eat me alive." Even mosquitoes don't seem to notice Shane. "You could go out there buck naked and nothing!"
Although the naked comment gets her one of those side looks similar to what Daryl often leveled at her or Carol if they said something deliberately off color, Shane shrugs. His looks never hold the hint of embarrassed offense that Daryl's did, though. More like he's just surprised she said it. "Bugs will get less populated the further we get out of the wet season, but they've always ignored me. Made fishing a lot more fun to not have to carry bug spray. Kinda spent most of my summers outdoors as a kid."
"I can picture that." The sheer amount of birds on the shore is more amazing than the dolphins they'd seen playing near last night's island. "It's so pretty down here. Quiet."
"Yeah. I didn't explore as much as I should have when I came through before, either time. Good fishing is the main reason I lingered. You still sure you want to do the canoe trails?"
"How about we try whatever the easiest one is and see how the puppies do?" The puppies have spent enough time on the catamaran, dinghy, and an inflatable canoe in practice for the canoe trails that Beth thinks they'll do just fine. Biscuit's always been a natural on the water, according to Shane, and Muffin's unflappable nature means she doesn't seem to care what mode of transportation she's dealing with.
"Works for me." Shane brushes his hair back from his face, before going inside and retrieving the hat he left inside earlier. Although he trimmed back the long beard to something neater as soon as they started spending a lot of time around salt water, muttering about it itching, he hasn't done anything about his long hair.
Beth's learned the value of a good sun hat, along with keeping her hair carefully braided when they're outside. Even as slow as they tend to sail, her hair tangles like a briar thicket. Her sun hat's wide brim is nice enough on the bright days, even with wearing sunglasses. Shane's hat is similar, black where hers is cream colored.
"Would you like me to cut your hair?" Beth asks when Shane fusses with his hat.
He freezes, taking the hat off and running a hand slowly over his head. Wide brown eyes look at her for a moment, and her brain catches up to what was probably the last time the man cut his hair. His head had been shaved down to stubble the day they buried Otis. After a minute, he swallows hard. "Might be a good idea."
With that idea in mind, and knowing they'll encounter a variety of bugs when they reach the marina, they drop anchor while still far enough out for wind to keep anything from swarming. They've got a couple of camp chairs for being off the boat, so she unfolds one for Shane after finding the scissors she owns to keep her own hair trimmed neatly. He sends all the dogs inside and shuts the door, obviously not trusting the puppies around their feet while she cuts his hair.
He's sitting so utterly still and quiet as she runs the comb through his hair that she isn't sure if he's upset or not until she catches the small flexes he makes to lean into her touch. Making it take longer than it needs to to detangle the long hair, she is sort of glad he can't see that she's smiling. "How short do you want it?" she asks once she's delayed as long as she can.
"About like this." He indicates leaving about two inches of hair, so she starts to work, letting the long strands fall at her feet. It hadn't been quite long enough for him to tie it back properly, although it was close.
"Lots of folks didn't bother much with trimming their hair at the prison," she muses as she works. "But I used to practice on my brother's hair. Shawn never cared if it didn't turn out quite right, because he knew our mama could fix it."
Shane doesn't respond right away, but then he clears his throat. "Last person to cut mine was Lori. She trimmed it up at the quarry camp. Me and Carl both."
If he's ignoring the shaving incident, she can, too. There's a lot from those days on the farm that can be forgotten, as far as Beth's concerned. The fading scar on her wrist is definitely one of them.
"His hair was getting pretty shaggy by the time the prison fell. Bit like yours, to be honest." If Lori cut Carl's hair most of his life, Beth thinks she knows why the boy always made himself scarce when her scissors came out. "Glenn always liked his tidied up. Him and Carol especially. Daddy grew his hair out, believe it or not. Had him a little ponytail."
"Seriously?" Shane sounds as unbelieving as Beth would be if she hadn't witnessed it. Her prim and proper father had been avoiding his haircuts for similar reasons to Carl. Without her mama to keep him trimmed and prompt him to shave, he'd changed a bit.
"Yeah, he did. Wish I had a picture of it, to be honest." If she'd realized she was going to lose him so soon, maybe she would have made him pose for a picture with Judith, too. "That and his Santa Claus beard, as Sophia called it."
"Wish you did, too." It's almost too soft for her to hear, but Beth does, so she pauses in her trimming to place a gentle hand on Shane's shoulder and squeeze lightly.
"I have pictures of him, thanks to you." If he hadn't been willing to go back to the farm to bury Hershel, she wouldn't have been able to gather her few treasures from home. She moves around to stand in front of him to even up the front and sides from that viewpoint. Gripping his chin gently after she's finished, she tilts his head back and forth, and he moves easily as she directs.
It gets her a view of just how dark his lashes are, framing brown eyes that turn coppery with the sunlight when he glances up at her. As much as everyone compliments her own pale blue eyes, she thinks his might be prettier, because you have to really look to see their true color. Now they won't be half hidden behind a sweep of hair all the time.
"Looks good, I think," she says, dropping her hand away and brushing stray bits of hair off his shirt. "Go check it out. Let me know if you want it shorter."
While he's gone, she sweeps the deck, sending the hair into the water. It swirls away from the boat as the dogs come romping out. The puppies have to inspect the deck, especially the chair she's folding to put away, making her laugh. A splash nearby makes her study the dolphins in the bay, following some school of fish to feed.
When Shane reemerges, he's smiling a little bashfully as he runs his hand over the neatly trimmed hair. "You did good. Looks like my barber used to do to keep me in regs with the police department. I'm looking about respectable again."
Beth just smiles at him. "You looked perfectly fine when we first met again." If she's honest, he'd seemed like a miracle, standing in front of her in that veterinarian's office. "But now you're prettier, maybe."
Shane arches a brow, shaking his head as he smiles. "I'm not sure anyone's called me pretty since the first time I got my nose broken."
"Maybe they should have had better vocabularies then." Setting the chair into the storage compartment, she catches him studying her when she finishes latching the hatch. "Just telling the truth."
He doesn't seem to know what to say to that, so he does what he usually does and changes the subject. She wonders if he would be offended - or Daryl come back to haunt her - by making the obvious comparison out loud. "If you want to get us back underway, I'll get them in their life jackets and then come help you make it into the marina. It's tricky at the end, depending on tide levels."
"Alright." Since she's already near the anchor hatch, she retracts the anchor. Time to tackle the Everglades, if they can.
In the first two days of canoeing different trails around the Flamingo Visitor Center, Shane is glad that they practiced with the puppies and didn't leave the dogs behind. The area wouldn't have felt truly safe for that anyway. Confining them away from the predator population of the Everglades would have condemned them to a cruel death if something happened to Shane and Beth on their little adventures.
The first day, they tackle the seven mile Mud Lake Loop. It is a good test of Beth's fledgling paddling skills, since they take two canoes. Initially, he thought about putting them all in one of the larger canoes, but the innate sense of caution he's survived by decides two means they have a backup. It also pushes Beth to more independence, something she craves and he knows is a side effect of feeling helpless after the prison fell.
The pups do well sitting in his canoe with their mother, curious but well used to being told to hold still. They take in the scenery like it's the best game ever. Biscuit cruises along with Beth like he's a mascot specially made for her. Coot Bay has enough wind to really give Beth a challenge, and she's grinning ear to ear by the time they get back four hours after they started.
As excited as it makes her, he wishes he'd found some digital camera or something. All they'd seen that day was birds, but she's been enchanted by those ever since they started seeing large numbers of them along the shores. He really regrets the lack of photography when she spots the huge crocodile on the Nine Mile Pond Trail the next day, though.
There's no fear or apprehension in her face at seeing the thirteen foot reptile, just bright joy. She's ahead of him, so he gets glimpses of her happy smile over one shoulder as she makes sure he's paying the old croc his due admiration, too. Her blonde hair is escaping the complicated double braid she put it in, kept in place only by her sun hat. It's enough to almost make him forget how haunted her eyes can get at times, aged well beyond her barely two decades.
Day three? That gets more interesting, and Shane realizes they're going to be using the camping gear he's been packing along for the first time. The Hell's Bay Trail is living up to its name, navigable because of the white PVC markers in the mangrove forest. It's so thick that they don't even see any birds, although fish and turtles are easily visible in the water.
Beth grumps at a tight turn, lays her paddle down, and just grabs ahold of a mangrove to push herself along, making Shane laugh. She twists to shake a finger at him, trying not to laugh herself. "Use all the tools available. Isn't that what you always say?"
He just salutes her, grinning. The interchange makes Jelly curious, with the pup venturing toward the front of Shane's canoe, wagging her tail enthusiastically at Beth. "It got the job done, didn't it?"
"Of course." Picking up her binoculars, Beth locates the next marker before picking up her paddle to propel her canoe forward again. Once she figures out the mangrove assist trick, she uses it consistently until they exit the maze.
When they reach the Pearl Bay Chickee, Beth studies it for a minute before glancing back at him and sighing. "Potty break," she announces, tying off her canoe and managing to get up on the dock.
"Careful. Doubt there's walkers or wildlife out here, but that's still a closed door," Shane cautions, but she's already kneeling to hoist Biscuit up onto the chickee's platform. The dog just seems curious, sniffing around the platform. Beth readies her knife, opening the portapotty to reveal an empty interior and making a disgusted noise.
Shane ties off his canoe and laughs, figuring the puppies and Muffin could probably use a break after four hours in the canoe, too. "It's a portapotty in the middle of a Florida swamp. Not gonna smell like anything good."
"Keep it up, and I'm pushing you in." Shutting the door after delivering the mock threat, she disappears from sight, so he unloads puppies and Muffin, letting the dogs explore the tiny bit of wooden human real estate that's not yet been reclaimed by the Everglades. He's not surprised that all three puppies find an edge of the dock with evidence of bird poop to relieve their small bladders.
Butter decides that barking at the fish he can see below the chickee is entertaining, at least until Muffin nips him into being quiet. Shane doesn't even have to give the verbal command for the pups to hush most of the time, and he admits that probably ninety percent of their training is Muffin's doing. By the time Shane uses the portapotty, Beth is sitting down, a little journal open in her lap as she scans the water.
"Seeing anything new?" he asks.
"Well, not new, technically. Osprey and roseate spoonbill for my bird log." There's a mini-sketch on the page when he looks, but she's drawn the chickee, not the birds in question. He's seen her writing in the leather bound book enough to know it's not just a travelog, so he looks away aside from that. "Oh, dolphins!"
Sure enough, there's a pod of four dolphins in the bay. They seem to be playing, not hunting, so sitting to watch them seems much more interesting than coaxing the dogs back in the canoes. "You wanna tackle heading back or keep going?" he asks Beth.
She hums softly, glancing at the sun. "I'd probably be faster on round two through the mangroves, but why don't we head down to the other chickee and camp there? Might be the only time to do something like this."
Considering these manmade campsites on open water will eventually be reclaimed by the Everglades, she's likely right. It doesn't take long to load back up and paddle to the next chickee. Shane sets up the tent and sleeping gear, while Beth takes over the second platform as a camp kitchen and gets out their fishing gear. She's distracted from her task though, because there's a flight of white ibises.
With her hat and sunglasses off, her blonde hair is now completely free of her braids, setting a golden halo around her head in the late afternoon sun. The long tresses remind him of sitting still for the haircut a few days before. The gentle touching as she checked her work and her face so close to his still has him a little unsettled. Hugs and other light touches to get attention or guide the other are one thing.
That? There'd been something in her expression that reminded him that she's been flirting endlessly with him since the night she corrected him about her age. It's never anything he can't brush off, and she seems to actually expect him to do so. He's old enough to know it's not uncommon for a girl to flirt a bit, practice figuring out who she is, with an older male she finds particularly safe to be around.
In fact, enough of her small tales about her little group at the prison makes him fairly certain she'd given Daryl Dixon a bit of a run for his money. Man was likely five to ten years older than Shane, considering Merle's age in the equation, too, but the only man Beth mentions as much as she does Daryl is her father.
It makes him curious about her sharing few stories of Glenn, who was family. With her sister and the young Korean being at the age where being self-absorbed in a relationship is common enough, it's likely little sister just got left behind. That's without even considering Maggie disregarded her in those messages along the railroad tracks.
She spots him watching her and grins sheepishly, returning to casting her line. He rubs at his bearded jaw, where he can still feel that phantom touch. Sighing, he finishes getting the tent set up. With this chickee being right up near the trees, it's likely to be mosquito heaven come dusk.
Beth's already humming and cooking when he gets done, since eating in the canoes had been limited. She's caught a fish, but fileting is something she's still learning, so he cleans the fish and passes the filets over to her to drop into foil packets. It leaves him to catch the dogs' supper, which is easy enough. The complete lack of human interaction with anything here definitely is benefiting the fish and wildlife.
They don't talk all that much while they eat, even Beth quiet tonight. It's their longest trip yet, so he can only imagine she's tired. After they eat, they escape into the tent away from the bugs that did make an appearance as soon as the sun started setting. He's half asleep when Beth shifts and turns the lantern on. She rolls to her side, propping on her elbow, and eyes him across Biscuit's warm bulk between them.
"When's your birthday?"
The unexpected question takes him a minute to process. "January twenty-eighth."
She lays back down, still on her side to watch him. "What day is it today?"
He really should make sure she wears a watch. Most of the time, he isn't sure why he keeps up with one, but he likes more warning of the seasons than trusting the weather and temperatures. Raising his left wrist, he illuminates the watch face to make sure he's correct. "November twentieth." She's been with him for a month and five days now.
"I bet that makes Thanksgiving this week, doesn't it?"
"Watch says today's a Sunday, so yeah, should be."
"I'll have to cook something good on Thursday then." Before he can tell her she doesn't have to, she sighs. "Last year…we were still wandering. I don't think anyone even realized we missed the end of November until it was halfway through December."
"Alright. Might not manage turkey, but we can sort something out. More fish. If you're brave, we can snag a python out of the mangroves."
She makes a face, but it's silly, not offended. "Snake tastes like fish."
"Not sure a python would taste the same as whatever you ate up in Georgia," Shane muses. "Could go frogging." He says it before he remembers the quarry and Carl, and the silly playing in the water that never would have caught any frogs but made Carl laugh when laughter was in short supply. It had been the last really carefree time he spent with the boy. Lori's words after…
The memory makes him ask something he might not have normally. "Why'd you decide to adopt Judith?" He's wondered a few times, because Carol seemed so much more likely to take in an orphaned baby than a girl barely past eighteen.
Beth blinks at the subject change, reaching out to run a hand down Biscuit's soft fur. "Because Lori saved my daddy's life. I owed her to look after Judith. Carol had Sophia and other responsibilities. Me? I could give Judy all my attention like no one else had time to do."
Shane swallows hard at the wistfulness in Beth's voice, especially when she drops the formal 'Judith' in favor of 'Judy'. "How'd Lori save Hershel?"
Lori's the subject they avoid very carefully. He isn't entirely sure of Beth's reasons, other than simply being goodhearted enough not to bring her up without Shane inquiring first. His? Guilt is the strongest. He got Lori pregnant, and he left her to deal with it, knowing her relationship with Rick was probably cracked beyond repair.
"He got bit, when they were clearing the prison. It was on his calf, so Rick chopped off the leg with a fire axe. They brought him back, and Carol got the bleeding stopped. But it was touch and go. I was sitting with him… and he just stopped breathing."
Her voice hitches with threatened tears from the memory, and Shane rolls to place his hand over hers. She turns her hand from petting the dog to clasp his fingers.
"I panicked. Didn't know what to do, despite having my CPR certification. Lori? She brought him back to me." Beth's hand squeezes his hard. "She died a week later, because she got separated from Daddy and Carol both when walkers got inside. Maggie and Carl saved Judy."
When she starts crying in earnest, Shane nudges Biscuit down to join the other dogs so he can hug Beth close. After the first two weeks, crying's been more of a random thing for both of them, but Beth lost a lot more than he did. The way Hershel died makes him wish he hadn't asked, since the answer led back to her father.
"I'm sorry," he says softly, once her tears dry, and she's just laying on his chest. Her hand is idly petting his chest much the way she'd been petting the dog, earlier, and he's not sure she's doing it consciously. "I didn't realize it would bring something like that up."
"It's okay. You never ask questions, because it might make me cry. You can ask all you need to, you know. Eventually, maybe I won't feel like crying, but you shouldn't be afraid to ask."
"I'll remember that. Try and get some sleep." Smoothing her hair back from where it's getting in her face, he reaches for the lantern, turning it off. For the first time in weeks, he doesn't move away to sleep apart from her, but lets her fall asleep on his chest.
Tonight's likely to be a nightmare night for them both, and even though he'd be only three feet away in the tent how they were set up to sleep, it feels like too much. Focusing on her breathing instead of the dire images his imagination threatens, of just what would have had to happen for Maggie and Carl to deliver a baby to a woman who needed a c-section, he whispers a different apology.
Hopefully, Lori's spirit is out there somewhere to hear it.
A/N: In rewatching Season 3 with BetaDaughter, I realized I completely forgot about Lori doing CPR on Hershel when he stopped breathing after his amputation. It fit into Beth's psychology about Judith, especially for this AU.
The crocodile in the chapter really exits. Park workers and visitors call him CrocZilla. 😁
Reader Question: Do y'all really have to see the actual sail to the Bahamas? Because I've watched a bunch of videos, but I still don't think I can do it justice. I was thinking a time hop to have them being beach bums.