Better Days

Chapter 312

Author's Note: Of course, you all know by now, I'm going to do the whole thing with Glenn and Quinn (and Nicholas) returning with Tara and see the group reacting. You'd be all disappointed if I didn't right? And Carol is MAKING a casserole, not delivered yet. What did that casserole bake in five minuets? Details people. Please review.

Group POV:

Glenn and Quinn both jumped out of the van as soon as Eugene stopped. "Help! I need help!" Glenn yelled.

Quinn looked at Nicholas who was still in the van. "Do something useful, help get Tara out of the van!"

Nicholas picked up Tara's feet and Quinn and Glenn both supported either side as everyone started to run outside.

"What happened?" Rick questioned as he went to support Tara's middle part.

Glenn looked at him then at Quinn. "We'll talk later alright?"

"Where's Noah?" Beth asked as she ran out.

"I'm sorry Beth," Quinn answered as she let her eyes fall to the ground.

Jewel handed Mika Hope. "There's nothing we can do about the dead right now, but we can for the living. Mar support her head, don't let it move. Carl, run to the infirmary, get that door open," Jewel started to bark orders. "Abraham get on the other side of Rick, support her from other side. Her body needs to be even," she instructed. She saw Quinn look at Nicholas and saw that she didn't want him anywhere near Tara. "David take her feet from Nicholas. Quinn are you alright if I switch you out?"

Quinn nodded. "Yeah, family should do this."

"You are family," Glenn told her. "She stays."

Jewel nodded. "Then let's move it! Slow and steady. We don't want any part of her to move," she instructed.

Deanna and Reg had both joined everyone on the streets. "Quinn where's your brother? Are you injured?"

Quinn looked at her parents'. "This is all Aiden's blood. I couldn't save him from himself and Nicholas, but I can help save Tara," she told her.

Jewel turned to look at everyone. "I know you all have questions, you can see that two people didn't make it back alive. But Tara is alive, and the top priority right now is her and distracting us from getting her help, isn't going to make those two people come back, but it may kill Tara. So you are all going to have to wait for explanations, that includes you Deanna. I'm sorry about your son, I really am, but I don't want another person to die because we hesitated," she told the other woman before she turned attention to Tara and the others. "David, carefully turn to go up the steps, the rest of you follow the lead, doing it at the same time."

Both Pete and Ronnie stood at the door of the infirmary. "I don't want you in the infirmary," Pete told Jewel.

"Oh get over yourself," Jewel hissed at him. "I'm not getting into this with you, this isn't about you and your over inflated ego. This is about saving Tara's life, and as much as I hate you, you and Ronnie both are needed to save her life. I mean if you are sober enough to handle it," she told him. "On the count of three, we're going to lift her as one onto the table," she instructed as she looked at everyone. "One, two, three," she called out as she watched everyone put her on the table.

Ronnie and Pete both immediately went to the table. "Mar and Rosita can stay, the rest of you need to give us space," Ronnie instructed as she looked at Jewel.

"She's right, we need to clear out," Jewel instructed. "Quinn you need to make sure your girls and Gus know you're alright, and you need to tell your mother what happened out there. I'm sorry about Aiden, if you ever want to talk…." she told the other woman.

"Thank you," Quinn answered as she walked out of the infirmary door.

"We'll be right outside," Jewel told Ronnie.

"I don't expect any less," Ronnie told her as she nodded in appreciation.

Quinn's POV:

Quinn walked outside on the porch and just walked through people, not saying a word. She stopped in front of Deanna and Reg. "I need…to get the blood off…then I'll tell you what happened. But, I will tell you this mom, if you had listened to me, if you had put Glenn in charge, if you had made Aiden and Nicholas step back, then everyone would have made it back."

Spenser stood behind there parents and moved beside Quinn. "We don't need to do this right now," he told her. "Pointing fingers isn't going to help. Go get cleaned up, your house still has power then come over, bring Bri. We need to be together as a family right now. We all lost Aiden."

Quinn pulled her arm away from Spenser's arm. "You don't have to tell me Aiden's dead! I was there, I was trying to save him. You know who else was there? Not Nicholas, but Glenn. Aiden begged for Nicholas to stay, but he was a coward and he left, he was going to steal the van and leave us. He got Noah killed….if he just listened to Glenn, we would have made it back too. But no, Nicholas showed his true colors. So, don't tell me Spenser that we all need to be together right now, I know what I need. You weren't there, none of you were. You didn't hear Aiden and Noah's screams, I did and I will never get them out of my head. I will always blame myself for there deaths' because maybe if I tried harder to stand up to you mom, then they'd still be alive," she told them. "I'll be over…but I'm bringing Gus and Chloe too, they are family," she said as she walked away from the peering eyes of the crowd.

Nicholas was waiting farther away. "Quinn, I need to talk to you."

"I have nothing to say to you," Quinn responded as she walked by him.

Nicholas grabbed her arm. "Look we need to tell your mother that Glenn was responsible for Aiden's death."

Quinn looked at him. "Excuse me?"

"You can tell your mom that blaming me was just grief, that now you've calmed down, you see it clearly," Nicholas explained.

Quinn pulled her arm away from him and punched him. "You have the audacity to come to me and ask me to lie for you? I'm going to try to make this as perfectly clear as I can. You. Are. A. Coward. You ran, not once, not twice, but three times. You didn't check Aiden, you ran off. Aiden begged you, his best friend, to stay with him, but you ran off. Glenn, Noah and I tried to tell you to listen to Glenn, that his plan would work. But, what did you do? You. Ran. Off. You got Noah killed. You think I'd lie for you? Do you even know me? Now I have to go to my house, tell Bri that Aiden is dead, tell Chloe that you and him were responsible for killing another person. And, I need to get this blood off of me, my brothers' blood," she said as she stormed off leaving Nicholas in the dust.

Jewel, Rick and Glenn's POV:

Jewel handed Glenn a glass of water as she sat on the step below Glenn and Rick was squatted down across from him. "Drink it," she instructed.

Glenn nodded as he drank it. "I almost left him out there, could have told a story," he said as he saw Rick's glance. "What you think I should have?"

Jewel looked at Rick, watching him. "They don't know what they're doing, any of them," Rick told Glenn.

"We'll show them," Glenn instructed.

"I don't know if they can see it. How things really are. I don't know if they can yet, they haven't caught up," Rick told him.

Jewel put her hand on Rick's shoulder. "Glenn you said Quinn was family. What did she do to make you say that?"

"She did what I told her to do, she was scared, but she didn't run. After Noah…she made me see that we needed to get back, to tell Deanna the truth. She gets it, she does, Rick. If we met her out there, we would have taken her in," Glenn informed him.

"That's just one person," Rick told him.

"We just started with a few, and look at us now," Jewel responded.

"She's right," Glenn responded. "I followed my instincts with you and you led us this far," he told Rick. "We have to be here, we have to."

"Yeah we do," Rick agreed. "But their rules, we don't answer to them."

"We are them, Rick," Glenn emphatically told him. "We are now," he said.

Jewel sighed. "Battle lines are already drawn Glenn. Deanna says she brought us in here to help, but every suggestion we make, she doesn't agree with it. Pete grabbed Summer, hard enough to leave a hand print on her arm, it's bruising. It's sore, not that she would ever admit it, but you can see the way she favors it. She went with Michonne to tell Deanna what happened and Deanna had the audacity to ask if one of us did this. Deanna talks a big talk, but she hasn't heard one thing that we said, hasn't taken us seriously on any suggestions. If she had, then Noah would still be alive, her son would be alive. I'd be more than willing to follow some of her rules, if she took some of our suggestions."

"She put people at the tower," Glenn reminded them.

"No, Jes did that," Rick responded. "She wasn't going to let us be without protection, from what's out there, from what's in here."

"Noah believed in this place. I'm telling you we have to make this work," Glenn pleaded with them.

Jewel squeezed Glenn's shoulder. "I agree with you, we have to make it work. I'm promising you Glenn that no one is going back out there, especially Maggie," she told him as she looked in his eyes letting her know she knew there secret. "I'm not going to let my babies go back out there, but we may not be able to," she glanced at Rick, "live under the current management," she told him as she stood up. She saw Rick looking at the small pond across from them. "It looks like you're going to have company standing vigil over Tara," she nodded to most of the family walking over. She saw Carl pushing Judith in the stroller, and Summer carrying Hope in her carrier. "We'll be back, then you are going home and taking a shower. She's not going to be alone. I promise you that, Glenn."

Jewel, Carol and Rick's POV:

Jewel and Rick came through the back door and walked out to the front porch where they found Carol on the porch looking at the Anderson children and Jessie.

"I'm baking the Monroe's a casserole, I want them to know that we are sorry," Carol answered.

"Whose baking us a casserole? For Noah?" Jewel questioned as she sat on the porch rail facing away from Jessie and the kids. "Don't you think you're being a bit to obvious Carol?" she asked.

"I don't care," Carol responded. "Have you thought about Pete? About what I said?"

"Yeah," Rick responded.

"It's kind of hard not to when your daughter can't move her arm without grimacing. Noticed Ron today out with some of the kids, and Carl. He can't lift his left arm over his head. Saw a lot of that while I was in the emergency room, parents' grabbing there kids to hard. Hell, I had a couple times I couldn't move either of my arms. Daryl and Merle were stronger, not sure if either one of them got any injuries like that," Jewel answered.

"Talked to Sam some more. He said his mom put a bolt on the inside of his closet, tells him to lock himself in sometimes and not come out till morning. He said he can hear his dad yelling, things breaking, his mom crying. Last month it got quiet right in the middle of it and he went out and found her on the floor unconscious, bleeding. Pete was just sitting on the porch," Carol told them.

"Like he didn't do anything, that he wasn't ashamed of anything. Yeah, dad did that a lot too," Jewel responded.

"Why do you care about what happens to Jessie?" Rick asked Carol.

"You know why," Carol responded. "Why do the two of you care?"

"He touched my daughter, Carol. He made it my problem, our problem," Rick answered.

"I know what the kids are going through, been there done that. And there are no shelters' here, no where she can escape to with them. But Rick's right, when he grabbed Summer, he involved us weather he likes it or not," Jewel responded. "I'll talk to Jessie in the morning," she told them.

"I'm going to go with you," Rick told her.

"No you aren't, Rick. I don't mind you being around, but I need to talk to her. Mother to mother," Jewel responded.

"If walkers hadn't gotten Ed, I wouldn't be standing here right now," Carol informed them.

"Yeah, you would," Rick told her.

"We would have made sure of it," Jewel responded. "When you deliver the casserole, most of the family is outside the clinic, standing vigil. We're heading back there now," she told her as she felt Rick's arm go around her as they started to walk.

Rick kissed the top of her head going down to the pond. "The way you talk about what your father did to you, did to your brothers, like it was another person it happened too, so calmly," he told her as they stopped in front of the water.

"It did happen to another person," Jewel responded. "If I had let it drag me down like it did Merle, then I wouldn't be standing here today. I wouldn't have given up drinking, I wouldn't have raised a strong daughter, I wouldn't have met you in this hell hole of a world we live in, and we wouldn't have found some happiness. I know this is going to sound harsh, but I really don't care about Jessie, I care about the kids. I know she's getting abused too, but she's letting it effect her children, and that's what's wrong."

Rick gave a small smile as he kissed her. "That's why I love you, Mrs. Grimes," he said as he kissed her deeper.

"Hey Rick, Jewel," Pete's voice came out of nowhere. Jewel clinched her fist against Rick. "You ok man?" he asked.

Rick turned around putting Jewel slightly behind him. "Keep walking," he said sternly.

"What are you talking about? I just wanted to say there was no hard feelings between me and your wife, I mean her aim was horrible if she was aiming for my head," Pete told them.

"I wasn't aiming it at your head, it hit exactly where I wanted it. But you're making me regret putting it through your head. And, there are hard feelings," Jewel informed him.

"Keep walking, Pete, or I'm going to tell Jewel to do it, to kill you. You touched our daughter, then you play it off like it's nothing. It's everything, now move," Rick told him, leaving no room for argument as he tilted his head.

"Alright…" Pete answered as he walked away.

"You were five seconds from shooting him yourself," Jewel told Rick as she kissed him.

"One second," Rick responded.