Like many girls she knew in her rural hometown, Beth grew up thinking about what her future wedding might be like every time someone got married at her church. The extra details changed over the years, because of course, a seven-year-old has a very different imagination than a sixteen-year-old. Maggie had laughed about Beth's unicorn-driven carriage idea for years.
But the one thing that never, ever changed was Hershel Greene walking her down the aisle. Maybe it's an archaic tradition like Maggie claimed, one man giving a daughter away to another man. She didn't care then, and she certainly wouldn't have cared now. Hershel giving her away today would mean he's alive.
Theirs isn't the only wedding today, since two other couples were ready to make the same step. The others are waiting in homes in Lookout, as the only clergy on the island is an elderly Catholic priest from Barbados. Father George had been more than willing to perform the weddings outdoors with either a beach or the volcano as a backdrop, but there's something heartfelt for Beth to still get the church wedding she always figured would happen. The other two brides had agreed.
Today's traditions are a patchwork representing more areas than she can count, and the two most obvious differences are facing her now.
Her dress is white as a nod to that particular tradition, but it flows like a sundress instead of formal wear. She could almost imagine wearing it for other special occasions, not packing it away like her mother's beautiful, formal dress back home in the attic. Annette had always wanted Beth and Maggie both to wear the dress, but Beth thinks her mama would like this one. Gillain and her mother, Sarah, sewed it for her, standing in for the family Beth no longer has.
Sarah styled her hair like she once did for Gillain, weaving brightly colored tropical blooms into Beth's blonde locks. When missing her mama and the rest of her family got to be too much, and Beth cried, Sarah and Gillain hugged her until the tears passed. It's a reminder that she and Shane are no longer anywhere near as alone as they were a few months ago.
The other difference? There's no hiding from the groom here until the ceremony.
As soon as Beth steps out of the bedroom of the house they're using as a stand-in for their own home, which is on the other side of the island from the church, Shane stands. He's been sitting with the families of two friends he's made on the island, just like Gillain's family and Dr. Rolle's family are Beth's people today.
"I don't think you've ever been more beautiful," he says, sounding awed in a way that makes Beth's sorrow at who isn't here today ease just enough to feel joy.
Taking his offered hands, she smiles at the heartfelt compliment. "I think your look was made for you."
Mid-March or not, no one is going to try wearing full formal wear on Montserrat today, even if they could be bothered to track it down. Luxuries exist, but some are just completely unnecessary. Instead of a suit or tuxedo, Shane's clad in white linen pants and one of the loose linen dress shirts that most of the men wear when they want to dress up a bit for a community event. The brightness of the white shirt emphasizes his tanned skin in a way she envies just a little. Months of Caribbean sun have only contributed to her sunscreen use, not bronzing her milk-pale skin.
"Avarinda is still disappointed I didn't do the pirate getup."
Beth looks to the former policewoman who'd been their guide to Montserrat when they first arrived, but Avarinda just laughs and lazily waves a hand at Shane. "Can you blame me?"
"Not one bit." The impish reply earns her the barest brush of a kiss from Shane.
Sarah steps out onto the porch, and some signal must be visible now, because she waves her hands for attention from the open doorway. "It's time."
"You ready?" Shane asks, squeezing her hands.
He looks so earnest that Beth knows she could say no, and he would call off their part of the ceremony without thinking twice. But for everything in her life that isn't what she thought it would be on her wedding day, the one thing that does feel absolutely right?
That's the man she's marrying.
It's Beth who leads the way out into the street to start their winding route up to the church, keeping one of his hands linked to hers. The dogs fall in step with them as if they'd been trained to it, even the puppies trotting sedately as if Muffin's lectured them on good behavior like any mother bringing her children to a wedding. Guests gather behind them, a growing procession of people they don't know well, but who want to share in the happiness of those people who scavenged love in a world gone mad are many. After the church ceremony, there will be black cake, plentiful food, music, and dancing, with everyone celebrating that even now, the world goes on.
Today will be perfect no matter how it turns out.
Two years ago, Shane knows that no one ever expected him to get married. Making it to his mid-thirties as a determined bachelor set his course for life in the rural county he spent his entire life in. He'd been content enough with the judgment since nothing ever felt lacking. He had Rick and his family for those rare times he wanted an evening or Saturday spent in the traditional American dream.
Then Rick was seemingly snatched away, leaving them scrambling for balance in a world steadily going crazy. He hadn't known what to call his feelings for Lori when they intensified in grief and the push for survival, other than to consider himself in love with her. His old life hadn't taught him enough to cope with something that wasn't the simple brotherly love he had for Rick or being Carl's unofficial uncle.
When everything fell apart, he quite literally lost his mind, holding on to just enough sanity not to act on the dark thoughts he harbored.
The next time his life fell apart, he wasn't alone. There was Beth, and a gentle progression of feelings that looking back makes him finally understand what Rick had spent years trying to articulate. He thinks it's why Rick fought so damn hard to push Shane away when Rick wanted to regain what he once had with Lori, before years of stress over Rick's job and married life in general soured the Grimes' marriage. Without Shane to fuck it up, maybe they would have managed it.
It's a thought he starts to push away, but instead, he decides to commit it to memory. Beth deserves him to be the better man that learning from his mistakes can train him to be.
Beth is still dancing long after his energy for the activity passed, and her white dress flares as she spins with her partner, Dr. Rolle, to the lively music. They've lit up the beach where everyone is dancing after eating with torches and bonfire, making shadows still dance around everyone. The golden chain he'd given her back in Georgia to keep her family's wedding bands close glints in the firelight, the newest addition nestled into the rings glittering. It's not an engagement band, because she declared one a frivolous waste, but the tiny hummingbird suits her better, he thinks.
He's absorbed in just watching her, feeling the unfamiliar texture of the silicone wedding band on his hand that matches hers. Neither of them wanted metal, not with the dangers with sailing and agricultural life, but somehow a scavenger group brought back a huge stash of silicone rings like he remembered first responders and medical staff back home favoring. Beth chose ones with a metallic shimmer that is supposed to be from being infused with precious metals. Although she has alternate ones, for today, she'd selected shimmering bluish-white rings described as diamond-infused.
"She's like something out of a fairy story, isn't she?"
Avarinda nudges his elbow and passes him an icy cold cup of something that smells fruity, condensation glistening on the outside. He eyes it warily for a minute, because he knows from the scent of someone's cup earlier that the wedding punch has gone into the territory of rum with a splash of juice at this point, hours into the celebrations.
"It's just limeade, I promise. Father George has been standing guard over those pitchers for those who need to stay sober."
Reassured, Shane takes a drink, smiling over the rim of the cup when he sees Beth stolen away from the physician to dance the last bit of the song with Gallain's ten-year-old brother.
"Don't ever forget how you feel right now. It'll carry you through even the hardest times you can imagine. Like the first sunshine after a hurricane."
It's a solemn statement, drawing his attention back to Avarinda, who shrugs, her braids shifting across her shoulders. He's reminded that she'd lost her husband to cancer a year before the virus struck. She hadn't intended to send his thoughts toward loss, he knows, but there's a part of him that knows despite the perfection of the day, the unmistakable absences for him and Beth both will always make it bittersweet. They both lack the witnesses their wedding should have had.
Somewhere in his imagination, his mind fills in an even smaller form among the dancers. What would Judith have thought about today? Would she be dressed in bright colors like the other children, giggling as they skillfully weave their way among the adults, inventing their own steps to the dances?
Probably. Beth raised her, and Shane's never known a single other person able to find such joy in life as the woman he married today.
The music ends, bringing Beth back to his side. She deftly steals his cup, drinking half the contents before giggling and passing it back. In a wedding back home, he'd suspect she'd been sampling the champagne heavily, but he knows she's abstained. Her high spirits are just her being happy.
It pushes such a surge of want for the beautiful woman he's married that he tips the cup back, finishing it off. Before he can do anything with the empty, Avarinda whisks it out of his hand.
"Go away, you two. Beth, take your husband off somewhere private before he goes all caveman in front of innocent eyes like mine."
Shane likes that idea just fine, but he reacts before Beth can, sweeping her into his arms as she laughs. They're staying the night on the Iris tonight before heading out in the morning for a few days exploring the island of Saba, so he doesn't have an impossibly far distance to travel. With her arms securely around his neck, the real distraction is not getting caught up in kissing Beth, especially once she starts pressing butterfly soft kisses against his throat.
They don't get far without their five shadows, with the dogs seeming overjoyed they're back at the catamaran. He has to set Beth on her feet so they can board the Iris, but he doesn't mind all that much. It's probably a good thing no one else is living on the moored sailboats, because he discovers the advantages of the loose, flowing sundress Beth is wearing versus something sleek and traditional is that she sheds the garment in a smooth movement that leaves her nearly bare.
Moonlight instead of firelight illuminates her slim figure to him now, and his chest hurts with the sheer love he feels for her. He'd change every single hardship she faced to reach this day if he could, but the one thing he could never give up is being absolutely, irrevocably in love with his wife.
Days like today make Carol question why anyone is ever crazy enough to take on a position of authority. It isn't that it's all on her shoulders, because they've instituted a council system here, too, but with Hershel gone, his leadership has fallen to her. Rick seems content with it so far, but they haven't had much to potentially butt heads over, even as she insists he is part of the decision-making here. Daryl, Glenn, and Sasha do their parts, but the way they tend to defer to her as they all used to look to Hershel makes her feel damned old. Even Lamson, who she brought on board to represent the original Grady residents, tends to yield too often.
She wonders if Hershel ever daydreamed of climbing the prison fence and running away for a few weeks. Somehow, she thinks he did.
"Plumbing's failing," Eugene reports, fidgeting with the back of one of the chairs in the conference room they've taken over for council meetings. "I can patch it together with a lot of careful ingenuity and reengineering, but it won't remove the root cause of the problem. City sewers aren't meant to go without maintenance for years and still have new contents added."
"How long do we have?" Sasha asks, quick to the point as always.
"Couple of weeks. Month at most. Priority needs to be split between repairs and finding a more viable settlement, preferably something not completely dependent on a government's willingness to award contracts to the lowest bidder."
"Something rural, you mean." Daryl straightens up. "Like a septic system or something."
"It would be the ideal. Septic systems fill up, we can just pump them out and dispose of the unwanted contents elsewhere, so long as we can maintain both pumper truck and the diesel to fuel it." Eugene looks relieved that he isn't having an uphill battle on conveying his bad news.
Carol checks her notes on recent patrols before turning to Lamson. "You're the most experienced with the area. Is there anywhere bordering Atlanta that might work? City still has viable supplies to keep gleaning, and I'm not entirely sure we can move everyone across any long distances."
Running a hand over his bald head, Lamson sighs. "It's not Atlanta, so it would be an undertaking to get everyone and all the necessities moved, but maybe Lake Lanier. There's a peninsula there that has decent infrastructure we could take over, and the connecting point is an isthmus that's maybe a half-mile wide. We could jam that up easy enough, block the two bridges for the state highway, and then sweep through to clear out any walkers."
"It would be enough space?"
Outdoors again sounds nice, although without any walls, Carol knows they're vulnerable to a different type of predators than walkers. They've repelled two incursions on Grady already, groups smaller than twenty who thought they should raid instead of trade. It hadn't worked out for either set of invaders. Carol's people learned from their mistakes with the Governor.
"More than enough. Probably too much, but it's the easiest place I can think of where we wouldn't spend weeks building or reinforcing walls, outside of a prison." The ex-cop knows that last is something that just isn't viable, especially when Rick can't quite hide his flinch.
Logically, Carol knows that they'd picked an already damaged prison suffering from years of administrative and governmental neglect long before the dead rose. How the hell the place hadn't been in the news for constant escapes, she'll never know. There are newer prisons in Georgia, thanks to having one of the higher incarceration rates in the country, but she can't lead her people back to living in cells.
"Rick, can you and Lamson take a team up there and make sure we're only evicting walkers?" Both men nod, so Carol assigns plumbing and hardware runs to Glenn and makes a few notes. "Any other concerns anyone has brought to you?"
Sasha's expression turns earnest, and Carol wonders what else they're about to tackle. "Noah wants to know if he's free to go home to his family, now that the weather's warming up."
The very idea that Noah thinks he can't leave without permission horrifies Carol a little. She'd only asked him to wait until March, but it is halfway through that month, so she understands that he might be getting anxious. "He is free to go anytime he likes, Sasha, you know that. I don't know how far he could get on his own, though. Sending a teenager out solo to cross five hundred miles on his own doesn't feel right."
"I thought maybe we could send some folks with him. Do a little scouting around up near D.C. while we're there. Eugene may have gone about it the wrong way, but he had a good idea that D.C.'s one of the few cities the government would fight to keep standing."
Carol thinks Sasha's suggestion over, glancing at Daryl and Rick both. It's just a habit by now, to see what the men are thinking. Neither of them has much of a poker face where she's concerned, even if others claim they're hard to read. Rick looks intrigued, probably the most lively she's seen him since the prison fell. Daryl is more of a surprise, because he looks honestly curious. Maybe her best friend has been cooped up in a city too long.
"If we got your people settled on this peninsula, Lamson, do you think you'd be able to keep things safe if all of my people escorted Noah?"
It's honestly not a huge group that Carol's proposing, but outside of the cops who survived Carol's coup, they're all the most experienced fighters. The Grady people aren't Carol's, not in the way her family is hers. Leaving them behind, even if just temporarily, wouldn't feel like abandonment.
"After a winter of training with your people? Yeah. We could hold our own against any group any of us have seen so far. And if there is some semblance of a government left, that's good news for everyone, if they're willing to gather up survivors."
Carol doesn't believe there's anything like that left, not in her heart of hearts, but sitting in Georgia and waiting won't get them the information they need to know one way or another just how desolate the country is now. Even without formal government or military, there could be other survivors, maybe with better sustained settlements or fewer marauding idiots.
"Tell Noah that if he can wait long enough for us to resettle at the lake, if it turns out to be viable, we'll make sure he gets home to his family."
Sasha nods at the confirmation, smiling broadly, and no one else has any new issues, so Carol concludes the meeting. She doesn't leave right away, and somehow, she's not surprised that Rick lingers once even Daryl's trailed out of the room.
"You don't think D.C. is going to pan out, do you?" he asks, moving to sit next to her, close enough that his shoulder brushes hers.
His nightmares have stopped finally, but he still zones in on her for comfort in a way that makes her wonder just how much touch starvation contributed to his mental instability at the prison. She wishes there was someone left who could confirm her suspicions that Rick was naturally tactile before his world got turned upside down and ripped apart. There's only Carl to ask, if she doesn't want to stir bad memories for Rick, and she knows from Sophia that the boy misses his mother and Shane too much to open wounds for Carl either.
"No, I can't imagine a city that size surviving. I'm betting if there's any government left, it's either out west, near the Rockies, or maybe far north. I know I wouldn't mind being in a state with as small an original population as Maine or Montana."
Rick thinks it over and nods. "I know it would be safer to leave the kids with Lamson's people, but I just can't consider it."
"You and me both." Anytime they lose sight of their people, it's too great a risk of losing them. Lamson's a good man, but he's not family.
"Lori always wanted to take Carl to tour the nation's capital. Somehow, I don't think it'll be the same."
Carol can empathize with the wistful tone, remembering the conversation in the Cherokee back at the beginning, when Rick and Lori told Carl about the interrupted trip to the Grand Canyon. Rick had so confidently included Sophia and Carol in that imaginary trip they would all take west one day. Maybe they'll be able to fulfill a different wish Lori had for her son. For now, she just leans into his warmth, allowing herself a hug and a few minutes of drawing comfort from him while she can.
As long as they keep their family together, the rest they'll figure out along the way.
A/N: Okay... I said this chapter would start the forward progress toward the convergence of our separated folks in Virginia, but... the wedding sort of escaped and ran a bit wild. So Shane and Beth get another chapter in the tropics.
Expect some things to occur differently (and somewhat off camera) in regards to Shirewilt, Alexandria, and eventually meeting Jesus, as Rick isn't as dominant a personality for the group at this point as he was in the show (and isn't as unstable, after months to recover from the events after the prison fell).