October 16, 2010
Morgan radios in an alert as they make the first turn off the highway toward the compound, and Shane takes a deep breath. Although the older man did speak privately with Shane earlier, to alert them that everyone was coming, he was also honest that there are potential problems. It seems to be more Greene than Grimes, so he can't exactly raise any objections to how that family feels about him.
"Might be best for you to take the lead, Michonne," he suggests as they do one last sweep on the larger of the two houses they've prepared for the new arrivals. They now know there's a third group, but since that one has an RV, they'll sort out space for them tomorrow.
"Is that really fair, though? You started all this, Shane." She frowns, reaching out to touch his bicep like she's become prone to since they first discussed anything more than friendship between them.
"If that's the only qualification, then Sophia's just as much in charge."
Michonne laughs at him. "I'm about ninety percent sure she's in charge anyway, but I don't think she's going to last past showing she's alive to all these people."
The teenager's growing agitation is why she isn't helping them clean the houses. Even Carol, with her need to keep Sophia in sight, got worn out by the nervous jitters and sent the girl to help Eastman and Andrea with putting in a new coop to separate the ducks from the chickens. Hopefully some banging and building will burn off energy where cleaning did not.
"I wouldn't be surprised if she's as elusive and feral as Lucifer for a bit." It makes him feel bad for Carol, who didn't watch the gradual change in Sophia like he did.
"Hey, Shane? Gimme a hand with the generator?" Merle yells through the open door from the laundry room. He feels grateful for the older man's excuse for him not to be part of the welcoming committee.
Michonne shoos him toward the backyard, where Shane finds Merle eying the soundproofing box Shane set into place around the generator earlier. "Didn't figure I wanted to monkey with the actual turn on one-handed."
With Morgan gone, the entire installation had been Merle showing Shane how to do it. It's not a full reprieve though, because it really is just a matter of switches at this point, between the generator itself and the circuit box inside the laundry room. The sound of the propane generator is such a low key hum that they already know it doesn't orient walkers, after testing it in town for the one they installed for the house that's now occupied by Morgan, Andrea, and Eastman.
"Is the fridge on?" he yells to Michonne.
"Got the whole kitchen going and just in time. Both of you get your asses out front so I'm not the entire welcome wagon."
That order leads to them stepping off the front steps just as the first vehicle clears the gate about seven hundred feet away. The fenced property for this particular house covers five full acres, with the house on the side of the property furthest from the main road and mostly hidden by large trees up close and by a thicket of privet gone a little wild up by the main road. The shrubbery has been encouraged because of acting as a sound and visual barrier.
Shane recognizes the first truck as the one Daryl drove off this morning, and many of the others look familiar from the Greene Farm. There's a city work truck and an RV that are new. The entire chain of vehicles comes to a halt along the road, with Daryl's truck far enough past the driveway that the others can turn in once directed.
With all the eyes on them as they walk down the gravel drive, Shane reconsiders letting Michonne go alone. She obviously considers the possibility, because she reaches out and grabs an elbow on each of her escorts. Merle laughs, but Shane sighs.
Then all reluctance is gone, because the second he opens the gate at the end of the drive, there's a shout of his name and Carl is running as fast as he can up the road. Shane braces for the impact of the hug when he realizes that's what the young teenager is aiming for, holding him close. The boy sobs against his chest, but Shane's eyes aren't dry either.
He's barely aware of Michonne stepping around them, going closer so she can address the others. It seems to be a quiet direction to take their vehicles up the drive, so Shane edges Carl into what was once the lawn, although she halts the RV. There's been a lot of water shifting the driveway this summer, and it's probably not really up to the weight of the vehicle. She points them up the road to Gloria's place, the one with the best space to park the RV for the night.
"You're alive, Shane," Carl mumbles against his chest. He smoothes the boy's hair and smiles a little.
"Yeah, I am. All in one piece, even."
"I saw Dad stab you. You went down, and there was a walker."
Even though he hates the idea of showing off the scarring, Shane tugs free of Carl to lift his shirt. "It's all healed, see? And the walker was dead, so he ended up protecting me like the one Daryl put on T-Dog on the highway."
"I shot him. The walker, I mean."
"Well, buddy, I guess along with Sophia, you saved me. All that herd just ignored me and walked on by."
Carl's fingers are calloused in a way they weren't before when he tentatively touches the twisted flesh. "It doesn't hurt?"
"Not really. Gets a little stiff at times, because of the way it healed, but I'm fine." There's time later, if the boy really wants the details. "Sophia turned out to be a damn fine doctor in training."
"And she's really okay? I saw Merle, but she's not here?"
The angle Shane's at shows him that the entire pack of kids is approaching, although he suspects that Molly and Luke are only there because the adults looking after them trekked up. "Why don't you turn around and see for yourself?"
It takes Carl a minute, for his brain to process the changes in the once mousy little girl he played with so much back at the quarry. But the boyish hair and garb don't fool him for more than about three heartbeats, and then he's gone, running toward Sophia the same way he did Shane.
"Damn that boy missed you two," Merle observes, rubbing his good hand along the joining of his prosthetic and forearm. "Can't speak for the rest, but I'm thinking he's forgiving whatever happened in that field."
Daryl and Carol return from where he crossed into the yard across the street to talk to her when she came out of the smaller, two-bedroom house. It surprises Shane when he gets a gentle shoulder pat from Carol as she passes by, obviously eager to reunite with the others she's spent so many months with. The hunter comes to a halt next to his brother.
"You might have the best idea, staying out here," Daryl says, sighing. "Maggie and Hershel aren't really sold on the idea. Don't know if Morgan told you everything over the radio, but they only came because Beth said she was coming with or without them."
"Why on earth would she give them that sort of ultimatum?" Shane wonders. He can make out the slim figure of the one that seems to be Beth, as he only remembers one other blonde that survived the farm, and Andrea is just now making her way up the driveway with Eastman beside her. Honestly, he isn't sure he could pick the girl out of a police lineup, because she just never really crossed paths with him. Not like Maggie or Hershel did, for sure.
"She wants to hear your side of things about what happened with Otis that night." Daryl looks a little haunted. "Girl was out with me, scavenging, when we found some of Randall's old posse. She helped me put them down when they were attacking a woman and a boy. Watched me interrogate them."
Damn. Much like Sophia, Beth has already made that unenviable decision to protect others at all costs. It strikes him as a little odd that the seemingly shy younger sister is the one, but perhaps Maggie's just been exceedingly lucky. Doesn't seem like Daryl's shielded the girl anymore than Shane has Sophia.
"Hate that part for her, but at least she knows she can fight for herself if she ever needs to," Shane says at last. "I'll talk to her anytime she wants. It might not go in my favor, but I don't insist that it should."
About half the group heads inside the house, but Shane's surprised to see that one of the ones who is still outside is Lori. She heads over to a set of stone benches set around a firepit, half hidden by flowerbeds gone riot for a summer and fall with no one gardening. The way her slim figure is rounded out to the unmistakable signs of pregnancy strikes a chord with him, and he can't stop staring even as she sits and hides most of her shape.
Daryl clears his throat. "Pretty sure that's an offer for you to go talk, Walsh. They took Rick inside when your doc arrived with Andrea. That was our agreement that he has to talk to the doc a time or two before he sees anyone except from a distance."
Surprisingly, Shane feels a big hand nudge him square between the shoulder blades. Merle just smirks when he stumbles forward. "Go. It'll just be worse if you wait."
Since there's a very real possibility Merle might actually bodily move him down there if he doesn't go, he sighs and nods, making his way toward the unoccupied bench. By now, the only people outside are Andrea, Beth, and T-Dog, everyone else drawn inside by Michonne and Carol. He imagines it's a bit on purpose, but if Lori's health is as fragile as implied, it would explain why everyone didn't go.
For the first time since their conversation at the windmill where Lori finally admitted there was something real to their relationship, he is face to face with the mother of his unborn child. There's no more dissembling about the baby being Rick's, he doesn't think, because Carol seemed very insistent in telling him about his daughter when she talked about the baby.
It's an uncomfortable silence. Neither of them seem to know how to break. Shane finds himself glancing back to the gathering of kids, despite knowing Merle's on alert. It's a second nature since the Claimers.
"Carl missed you so much." Lori looks drained by those words. "It's easy, when you're angry to forget kids don't see the same things. No matter how much we changed, you were still his favorite uncle."
"Not ever changing that, Lori, not by my choice. You know I love Carl."
"I know you do." She fidgets, cupping her hands below her belly. "I'm sorry for what Rick and I said about the baby."
"I wasn't exactly auditioning for father of the year then." He can admit that much. As out of control as he spun sometimes at the farm, he knows he would be wary of someone like he was then being around his kids.
Lori actually smiles at that. "I'm fairly sure that child services wouldn't have approved of any of us then."
"Probably not. Might have given that social worker back home a stroke, and not just us. You don't have to worry about me thinking there's something permanent between us. Had a long time to think since then, trying to get healthy here."
He sighs and taps his forehead. "But I'll sit down with you and the doc to go over what needs to be talked about. Carol says you've been having a bad time of it, but the baby's a healthy girl."
Lori's hands move to her rounded belly as she nods. "Best they can tell, it's something called hyperemesis. We've got it mostly under control, especially since the worst of the heat eased. But yes, she's healthy. Did Carol tell you it's a girl?"
"She did." Shane clears his throat, feeling that wave of intense emotion about the baby again. "Said she is due the end of February."
"You aren't wishing for a boy instead?" While the tone is teasing, just a little, Lori's eyes are too solemn for it to be entirely a joke.
"Sounds trite, but healthy is the important part." Shane turns and motions toward the kids. "She has older siblings already. Why they all adopted me, I'm not all that sure, even now, except maybe Sophia."
Lori looks toward the children intently, most of whom are listening to Carl and Sophia and their enthusiastic reacquaintance. "Which ones?"
"The tallest boy with glasses and the younger one with his head shaved close. That's Patrick and Luke. And then Molly is the one watching us like I might disappear somehow."
"They're so skinny."
Shane relates haltingly about the conditions the children were rescued from, which still have the power to make him want to resurrect the men he killed to do it more painfully a second time. When he goes quiet, Lori has that same expression that Michonne and Carol wore: mama bear.
"My God, those poor babies."
Patrick might object to the baby term, but Shane understands the sentiment. "Sophia's the only one who knows about the baby. I wasn't going to tell them until I knew for sure there was a reason to tell them."
Hell, he didn't even tell Sophia until he had to, and he wouldn't be surprised if she told Patrick and even Duane. But like him, there's no way she would tell the two little ones, not without a certainty that the baby will be family.
"I won't keep our daughter from you, Shane. That was a poison we nearly killed us all with. She deserves to know where she comes from, as long as you stay stable. I don't think I can handle both of my children's fathers with their minds gone AWOL at the same time."
"I am doing my best there. Got a lot of checks and balances now."
"Like the woman who told us she was our point of contact for anything?"
"Michonne? Yeah. Plus Morgan, and weird as it sounds, Merle. They all three know everything, even the CDC." Shane figures Lori has the right to know that. She flinches at the reminder, and he bows his head for a minute. "That will never be me again. Even more than everything else I did, that will never be me."
Jesus, when he imagines that night…
"Shane."
He blinks, and from Lori's concerned expression, he thinks maybe she called his name more than once.
"What almost happened that night? It's not something either of us will ever forget. But I've known you a very long time, and that wasn't you, at least not the man I've always done. You've got the psychiatrist here, right?"
"Yeah." His voice is rough and barely audible, but he doesn't look away from her intense gaze.
"That's something you unpack with him. Why it happened and how you make sure it never happens again. Not talking about it will do you no good." Lori takes a deep breath. "But I don't want to talk about it between us ever again."
"Alright." Those are her terms, and he'll abide by them.
She looks out toward the road. "Molly is looking really lost. You could call her over, if you want."
Shane turns, and she's correct. Molly isn't with the other kids anymore, but inching this way. "Molly? Do you want to meet Lori? She's Carl's mama."
The girl looks at the new boy receiving so much of Sophia's attention and finally ventures off the driveway across the grass. As he expects, she doesn't come up beside him. Instead, she stands almost behind him, his torso mostly between her and the stranger. Eastman's term for a lot of Molly's issues is regression.
"Molly Dolly, Lori's good people. Like Michonne and Carol and Andrea." Not that Molly's really warmed to the last two yet, but she stayed with Andrea on the little farmyard for far longer than expected today.
The buzzcut hair makes Molly's look more Luke's five than her own eight, especially with how her eyes dominate her features. She does manage a smile of sorts for Lori. "Nice to meet you."
As she leans her thin little form into him, Shane turns to snake an arm around her waist. It makes Molly relax and hide a little less.
"It's nice to meet you, too, Molly."
"It's almost dark," Molly half-whispers to Shane. "She should be inside where it's safer with the baby."
"We should probably all get home for now." He gives Lori an apologetic smile. "Supper's in the crockpot back at the house. Carol has extra, so she'll probably go fetch it in just a bit."
"Sounds good. Maybe I'll see y'all tomorrow." Lori goes to lever herself up, and Shane puts his free hand out automatically. She takes it, allowing the assist, and moves toward the porch before stopping. "Carl's probably going to want to stay with you tonight. Is there room?"
"Yeah. Maybe not his old room just yet, but there's space. You sure about that?"
"Sure enough I was going to send him to visit you a while without me, before I understood we were all supposed to come. I meant what I said. He's missed you desperately. I won't see him hurt like that again by keeping him away from you."
Shane hears the 'unless', but since it's one he applies to himself, he nods. "I'll let him know. Have a good night, Lori."
"You too."
He doesn't watch her make her way to the porch. When he and Molly reach the rest of the kids and suggest heading home, Carl's expression turns distraught.
"Go kiss your mama goodnight, Carl. You're included in that."
The boy beams and runs to his mother, hugging her with care before running back. Molly moves away to take Luke's hand, while Andre insists on being carried. The walk home is a happy one, filled with chattering children, and he's finally got one of his missing pieces back as Carl walks alongside him looking like Christmas came early.
There's a lot still to face and work out, but for now, he's just enjoying his family being much closer to being intact again.
A/N: I've posted a rotational posting schedule in my Profile to give folks an idea of how I'm trying to space out the different series so that they don't clump up and there be two weeks between anything of a series if I only put out a chapter a day. The offspring seems to have virtual school attendance well underway now, so I'm likely to be back to more of a regular writing schedule that could be as many as two chapters a day, now that I'm not helping her navigate video meetings, what seems like seven kinds of new software, and the very entertaining fun of virtual band and PE classes...