December 25, 2003
The sun set over an hour ago, but we're just now preparing dinner. It's been so cold this month; we're in the heart of winter. But today is Christmas, and although we don't celebrate, we get a Christmas miracle in the fact that it is the warmest day in ages. There's no snow, so we're able to find dry wood for a fire.
I rub my stomach whilst watching Pete cook above the fire. My stomach had grown quite a bit the past month, but I'm still far considerably smaller than you'd expect me to be. I feel run-down these days, but I'm not the only thing feeling run-down. The RV is on its last leg. It's running slower and slower everyday. Everyone has noticed it, but no one acknowledges it. It's one of those things that are better left unsaid.
We finish our dinner rapidly and in silence. After I finish my last bite, Nick rubs my arms. "Come on, let's get you out of the cold," he says.
"I need to pee first." My bladder is full yet again. At first, I dealt with non stop nausea and vomiting, now I've moved onto continuous urination. I'm not sure yet which is worse.
"Let me come with you," he offers.
"Nick," I insist, "I'll be fine."
I remove myself from the group before Nick, or anyone else, objects to me going off on my own. It's polite of everyone to be concerned over me, but I'd like a minute alone, even if it's just to pee. It takes me a while to actually do my business, because of how full my bladder was. I zip my pants back up, struggling a bit as they're a bit tight on me. I approach the edge of the treeline, ready to rejoin the others by the fire, but my heart stops at the sight in front of me.
Nick, Pete, Luke, and Martha are on their knees with their hands behind their backs. Three men and one woman stand around our campsite, their guns drawn and pointed directly at my family. My brain is running wild with anxiety and attempts to develop a plan to save them.
"We already told you! We're the only members of our group!" Luke yells.
"Bullshit!" The group's apparent leader, a middle-aged man with a beard, pushes his gun against Luke's head forcefully, moving him forward. "You said there were four of you, but there's five plates. Can you believe that, Ralph? This fucker is lying right to my face!"
"Move!" he orders Luke, roughly shoving him forward. Luke lands in front of the fire, unable to catch himself because of the way his hands are tied. The man grabs Luke by the back of his shirt, pulling him back up to a kneeling position, his face covered in dirt from the fall. "Drop your weapons and help me stick this fucker's face in the fire since he won't just cooperate!"
My heart starts hammering faster than it was before, which I didn't believe to be possible. I have to do something, but I don't know what to do. They all have high-powered guns, and I am defenseless. I can't just sit here while Luke dies.
"Winston, man. Don't you think that's a bit harsh?" says one of the other men.
"I don't fucking care! Get over here!" Winston shouts.
The two other men drop their guns reluctantly and move toward Luke and the fire. The woman of the group hesitantly places her gun on the ground beneath her, but makes no advances toward the others. She stands stoically still. Throughout this entire encounter, she has looked saddened, or even afraid, of her group's actions.
I try to think of a plan, fast. Winston is pushing my brother's face closer and closer to the fire. His group stands pathetically at his sides, except for the woman who is still standing off to the side with her head down. Luke is fighting hard against Winston, but he's hissing in pain. He has no chance against Winston, who has both of his hands pressing against Luke's head. Nick, Pete, and Martha are yelling at Winston, their voices going hoarse.
I need to make a move quickly. I remember the gun in my holster, but it has no bullets-I used the last one this morning and forgot to reload. Luke's head isn't too far from the flame now. I run out of the forest without another thought, my useless gun drawn and pointed at Winston's head.
"Let go of my brother and maybe I won't put a bullet in between your eyes!" I yell.
Winston releases the pressure he's putting on Luke and looks at me with bewilderment. "No, Bea!" Luke shouts at me with worry.
"Huh, the pregnant bitch is gonna do something. That's funny," Winston mocks me.
"I mean it! Let him go!" I yell, threatening him. My voice is so loud and sturdy, I almost convince myself that I'm an actual threat, and not just a tiny, pregnant woman with a useless gun.
Winston rolls his eyes and lunges for the discarded guns on the ground, but a bullet hits the ground dangerously close to his feet, causing him to stop in his tracks.
The bullet came from the woman of their group. She stands fiercely now, looking completely different from the saddened and ashamed person she presented as just a few minutes ago. A single tear forms in her dark brown eyes, but she bravely blinks it away. "Let them go," she says.
Her and I look at each other and silently nod, like we can read each other's minds. My first and obvious task is to move the guns on the ground far from Winston and the other men. Next, I cut the zip ties from my group's hands, while the woman aims her gun at Winston and his men. They kneel on the ground with their hands behind their heads. Winston stares me down, a nasty look on his face.
Once my group is freed, we collect the other group's discarded guns and quickly board the RV, keeping an eye on Winston.
"Come with us," I tell the woman, offering her a hand. She gives one last look to her old group before accepting my hand and hopping into the RV. Pete starts up the RV and we drive away, leaving Winston and his men in the trail of exhaust.
"That gun has no bullets. What the fuck were you thinking? You could've been killed!" Luke starts, just as I'm taking a seat and steadying my breath.
"You're welcome," I say to him in rebuttal. "You know, for saving your life."
He sighs and pulls me into a hug. When he releases, Nick sits next to me and pulls me into his side.
"I'm Bea," I tell our newest addition to the group, who is standing awkwardly against the cabinets. "This is my brother, Luke. And this is my boyfriend, Nick. Nick's mom is sitting up there. Nick's Uncle Pete is the guy driving the RV. Welcome, and thanks for your help." I gesture to everyone when I mention them, and they give a small wave to introduce themselves.
"I'm Bethari. Thank you for welcoming me, even though I was with them. I didn't know they were capable of something like that. I was on my own for a while before finding them. It's tough, being out there on your own. They were jerks, and sometimes creeps, but never anything like that. I'm glad to get away from them."
"Nice to meet you, Bethari." I smile at her, gesturing to a seat. "Please, come sit down."
She smiles back and gently takes a seat across from me. "You're pregnant?" I nod and she continues, "That's adorable, with how the world is now. How far along are you?"
"Just over five and a half months," I respond.
"How long have you two been together?" She asks politely, trying to make conversation.
"Like two months," Nick replies.
Bethari mutters a confused "oh," and I wack Nick on the arm. "Don't say it like that! She'll think we're weird!"
"Just telling it how it is." Nick shrugs with a smug smirk on his face.
"I'll spare you the boring details, but Nick and I have only officially been together for a bit. However we've always liked each other since we were really young. Luke, here, was the overprotective big brother, afraid to let his little sister and best friend get together. Well, things happened and eventually big brother lightened up, and now here we are." I clap Luke on the back, who appears utterly embarrassed. Nick and I try to suppress a laugh at his embarrassment of the situation.
"I think I'm following," she says with a laugh, then pauses, her demeanor changing. "I hope I'm not being rude in saying this, but from your physical appearance, I would've thought that you were maybe only two or three months along."
"It's not rude at all," I say. "Don't worry, we all notice. It wasn't that long ago that I started showing at all. I suppose I'm just carrying small, like my mom did."
She starts to say something else, but a sudden feeling in my stomach causes me to let out a half-squeak, half-groan. It's a feeling that's entirely foreign to me, and the suddenness of it scares me, but I don't think it's bad. Nick, of course, is at my side in an instant, trying to infer what's wrong.
It takes me a moment, but I finally realize what it is. It starts out as little flutters, but grows to full-blown taps. I grab Nick's hand-who is still sputtering words of concern-and place is on my stomach. His worries stop the second he feels it too. "Is that…?"
I nod, a bright smile on my face, and for some reason, tears stain my face. "That's the first time she's ever kicked."
"The baby's kicking?!" Martha jumps up from the passenger seat and jogs over. "I want to feel!"
"Unfortunately I think she just quit for the night," I tell her because I no longer feel her little kicks. "But next time she starts, I'll make sure you're first in line."
"How do you know the baby is a girl?" Bethari asks.
"Just a whim," I say. "Mother's intuition."
"Do you have a name picked out?"
Nick and I share a look. "We do, but we aren't going to share it until she's born." It's one of the only things that Nick and I get to share in secret. We spent many nights together, lying close and whispering ideas back and forth into the early hours of the morning.
Nick gets to his feet, yawns, and stretches. "Well, you've had a crazy day, so we better get you to bed."
I look at Luke and Bethari and joke, "Guess I have a curfew now." Nick's face drops. He must think that I'm actually upset with, when in reality, I think it's sweet. "I'm just joking with you. I'm exhausted."
Before settling in for the night, I make sure to gather an extra blanket and pillow for Bethari. "Sorry there's not an extra bed for you tonight. You'll have to sleep on the floor."
She gratefully accepts the blanket and pillow. "I spent the last three months sleeping on the ground outside, using a tarp for a blanket. This is basically The Hilton."
I bid the others goodnight and retire to our bedroom for the night. I shed my body of the day's clothes and my weapons and their corresponding holsters. I redress in more comfortable clothes and crawl into bed. Nick is in the corner searching for something. It's gotten crowded in this little room since we added all the baby supplies we found last month.
"Found it!" Nick says, producing a bottle of lotion from my bag. He comes over and plops onto the bed beside me. "I figured you'd want it- Hey what's wrong?"
I realize that I have a sad look on my face. I try to smile to make up for it, but it's too late; Nick already noticed something was wrong. Truth is, something has been wrong for a while, but I just never bring it up. I don't want to be a bother to anyone. We've all got enough going on anyway.
"Do your feet hurt or is it your back?" Nick asks.
"Both." My feet and back constantly aching is yet another symptom I've been dealing with in recent weeks.
"Babe, why don't you tell me when things are wrong?"
"Just don't want to be a bother. Besides, that's not even the main thing bothering me."
"Tell me," he says. He lifts up the shirt I'm wearing, which happens to be one of his. He starts rubbing the lotion on my stomach, an activity that we've made a habit the past couple weeks.
"It's just hormones and stuff. I'm sad that I don't get to experience the 'normal' things about pregnancy. No ultrasounds. No camera to take pictures. No baby shower."
"Should I have knocked you up before the fall of humanity? My bad." Nick jokes, trying to lighten the mood. "I'm not trying to say it doesn't matter, but it's just surprising that you're bringing this up. You never used to care about stuff like this."
"I wouldn't really care, it's just…" I trail off, not wanting to finish my thoughts in fear that I will cry, but I press myself forward anyway. "My mom would've eaten all of that stuff up. She lived for planning events. Too bad she didn't get to do it very often. You know, she was this rich city girl extrovert who lived to party and entertain. She had planned on growing up to be that housewife that planned a different dinner party every day. But then she ends up running into this country guy at a party in college. A country guy who was already set up to inherit his family farm, but decided to go to college anyway, just to prove that he could. So then they end up falling in love and settling in the middle of nowhere and Mom hardly ever got to plan her gatherings. Maybe it was a sacrifice or maybe we all grow up and end up differently than we planned."
"You and Luke always had the most badass birthdays."
"I guess what I'm just trying to say is that I miss my parents terribly."
"I know you do. They would be so proud," he says, then pauses when the baby starts kicking rapidly at his hands that are resting on my stomach.
"Guess she knows who her dad is," I say.
We wait in a comfortable silence until she stops, which takes a few minutes. Once she quits I question him, "Do you ever wonder where your dad is now?"
He answers immediately, as if he needs no time to ponder the question, "Yeah, I do wonder. Sometimes I wonder if he drank himself to death before all this happened. Maybe he's a lurker. Or maybe he's still alive and off ruining someone else's life."
I get worried that maybe I shouldn't have asked that question, maybe my curiosity got the better of me, but Nick just smiles at me.
"Let's get to bed."
January 1, 2004
"You guys do know that today is January first, right?" I say once we all finish dinner.
"I do now," Pete says, pulling a box of cigarettes from his pocket. He takes one for himself and offers one to Martha, who hesitantly takes it. The two of them go outside to share a smoke, something they don't often do.
"Happy new year?" Nick says, but it sounds more like a question.
"I wish we could do something fun," I say.
The others agree, but there isn't much we can do. Pete had found some beers the other day, which Luke and Bethari help themselves to. Pete and Martha each take one when they come back inside. Pete offers one to Nick, who doesn't have to think twice to deny it.
Bethari and Luke talk amongst themselves on the couch, while Nick forages through the closet. Bethari has fit amazingly into our dynamic here, despite only being with us for a few days. She is a tough fighter, who is incredibly resourceful, polite, and funny. It's been comforting being around another person who isn't my family, especially one who is relatively close to my age. She took some of Martha's clothes to wear, since she is way too tall to wear any of mine.
"Found it!" Nick yells from the closet. He approaches the rest of us with a box in his hands. He drops the floor, sitting in a criss-cross-applesauce position. The box is nudged across the carpeted floor to my feet. "Here's your fun."
"Monopoly? I ask, bending over carefully to examine the box. "Where'd you find this?"
"Knew it was in that damn closet somewhere," he mutters. "You all down to play?"
Bethari and Luke silently nod and join Nick on the floor, who is opening the box and setting up the game. I lower myself to the floor beside Nick carefully and slowly. I still may not be very big, but that doesn't mean that my back never hurts.
The board and pieces are probably fifteen years old, but miraculously, they're all there. I ease back to lean against Nick's chest, the back of my head resting against the material of his henley. Luke leans forward and picks out a piece for himself, before grabbing a piece for me and tossing it in my direction. "Bea always plays with the thimble," he says, mostly to Bethari.
Nick and Bethari pick out their pieces, but before we start, Luke leans toward Bethari and loudly whispers, "Just a warning: Bea always wins at games like these."
I pretend I don't hear him while suppressing a smile.
Three long hours later, we finish the game. It was a close game between me and Luke, but I ended up winning by the smallest inkling.
"That's the closest I've ever come to beating you at something in a long time. Thought I almost had you for a minute there," Luke says.
I brush him off in a joking manner. "There's no skills involved in games like this, Luke. It's just luck."
He takes a long, slow mouthful of his beer. "You must be pretty lucky, then."
I just shrug, but maybe I am pretty lucky. I am still alive after all. I just hope that luck doesn't run out anytime soon.
"So tell us more about you, Bethari. You've been with us for a few days, but I feel like we know hardly anything," Luke says.
"Well I've told you the basics," she offers. It's true, she's told us essential details of her life: she's thirty, she lived in New York City but was on a business trip in North Carolina when things got bad, she worked in management for a textile company, and she has an older sister whose whereabouts are unknown.
"Yeah, but we wanna' know the juicy details," says Nick.
"Okay…" Bethari begins with a deep breath, "I guess I can start with my parents. They were born in Indonesia, and when they were nineteen, they got married and had my sister. They stayed in Indonesia until my sister-who is a genius, by the way-expressed an interest in going to college in the States. So, when my sister was nineteen, her and my parents went to America. They only planned to live there until my sister finished college, but shortly after they arrived here, my mom got pregnant with me. It was a total accident of course, I mean, my sister was almost twenty and in college. So my parents and sister decided to make moving to America a permanent decision. I was born in New York and that's where I grew up. Even though my sister was nearly twenty years older than me and exceptionally busy, she still spent a lot of time with me growing up. Annisa was her name, and she worked as a doctor after college. My parents owned and operated a little grocery store that specialized in selling Asian food items. I worked there a lot growing up. I always wanted to go to Indonesia to see the culture there, but my parents always said they couldn't afford to leave the store. I learned how to cook excellent Indonesian food, though. Eventually I went to college, got a job, and now I'm here. I just wish I knew my sisters and parents are alive."
"That's an incredible story," I tell her. "Your family seems resilient; I'm sure they're still around." It may just seem like I'm just saying that to reassure her, but I really mean it.
By this point, it's late and dark, so Nick and Luke head outside to do watch. I expect it will be a quiet night outside. It's extraordinary cold and snowy outside, which causes the lurkers to slow, and sometimes they even freeze completely.
"I wish we had the ingredients for you to make us some Indonesian food," I say to Bethari before I head to bed with my rumbling stomach.
"You and me both."
Author's Note: Just wanted to add in case anyone missed it,: the three guys from the group that attacked Luke were Winston, Ralph, and Victor! They were the men who attacked Clementine and Christa in the beginning of Season 2.