Chapter 2 – 2nd Life

Rick Grimes' truck jostled as he hit a pot hole. Nobody spoke. Lori was asleep in the passenger's seat, and Carl leaned against her, fast asleep himself. Sophia was curled up, lying across the seat, head resting against her mother's leg. Every once in a while, Rick would look in the rear view mirror, and her eyes would meet his.

She leaned her head back and watched as the daylight slowly faded into dusk, and she gently ran her fingers through her daughter's hair, something she'd done as a way to sooth her ever since she was little. She'd run her fingers through her hair, her fingertips gently caressing her scalp, letting her know that her mother was there for her, and she always would be.

She doesn't deserve to die like this. Carol felt the tears sting her eyes as she looked down at her little girl. Sophia had seen too much bad in her short life. Carol had always tried to hide the bruises from Ed's beatings, but she wasn't perfect. There were times when Sophia would wake up crying in the night, asking her mother if they could just leave, and they would. They'd go to a shelter in Atlanta, and they'd stay a day or two, but it never lasted. Carol choked back the taste of bile as she inwardly scoffed at her weakness. Part of her hated herself for never being strong enough to leave him. She hadn't been strong enough for herself. She hadn't been strong enough for her daughter.

"Thank you." Rick's words cut the silence, and Carol's shoulders jumped with surprise. Her gaze met his in the mirror, and she swallowed back the lump in her throat. "You saved us today."

"It was your grenade," she said meekly, looking down at Sophia's sleeping face.

"I'd forgotten about it. You kept it, and you…you're the reason we're still here." Carol said nothing. She just put her head back, and she put her hand over her heart, feeling the way it pounded so fast beneath her breast. She felt the anxiety bubbling up inside of her, but she forced it back with all of her will. Whatever strength she'd had in her seemed to rise up and float away, and she felt empty and exhausted and like everything was spinning out of control.

She'd saved them today. Saved them to what? A life of being hunted, being hidden, being hungry and cold and frightened?

She closed her eyes and took a few deep, calming breaths, thinking about everything they'd learned today, everything they'd lost. Jacqui had decided it was better to die than to face another day in this harsh, new world. Jenner had likely- been driven mad from solitude and had convinced himself that choosing death was the only way to conquer the epidemic. Carol realized, as she began to drift off to sleep, that embracing death was only one way to find peace. But living? Living and fighting until the very end was the only way she could go on. She had to go on for her daughter, and she had to believe that there could be more to her life than being Ed Peletier's abused wife; Ed Peletier's meek little doormat. Living life with him had been a fate worse than Hell, and she was free now. Free of him, free to find her way and guide her daughter and pray like hell that tomorrow she could wake up and find a kind of peace that others had been lucky to have found before the turn, before the world turned into a waking nightmare.

She looked over her shoulder at the trail of headlights behind them, and then she settled back down against the seat. She'd saved them today. This was her family. This was her chance for something more, and even with all of the horrors surrounding them, she was willing to take it.