AN: So this chapter/episode is the first in "getting to know" the new people. It's focused mostly on Sadie. The next one will be more focused on Mark and dealing with the new issues that are going to be facing our friends as we continue on.
I hope you enjoy!
1111111111111111111111111111111111
Carol was washing sheets and Michonne was keeping her company and watching the girls play in Judith's playpen, which Carol had lined with extra blankets. Hope had finally begun, a few nights before, to toddle between Daryl and Michonne on the floor. She still had the same general nature to her steps as a newborn calf, and she spent a lot of time falling back on her bottom, but at least she was testing out her legs a little. Judith, whether on purpose or not, wasn't too helpful. She would frequently bump Hope, knocking her down before her own faltering steps would have brought crashing back down. Fortunately enough, though, Hope didn't seemed bothered by the setbacks, and she actually cackled most of the times that Judith bumped her.
Sadie approached the two women, looking more than a little disoriented in her approach.
"Well, she's alive," Carol said.
Michonne laughed. "Did you doubt she was going to make it?"
"I'll be honest, I wasn't sure about all that medicine I gave her, but it looks like it finally wore off," Carol responded. "Are you hungry?" Carol asked Sadie as she approached. She knew the woman hadn't eaten in a while, and she wasn't sure how long it had been when Daryl had found her.
Sadie looked at her a minute, without responding. Michonne watched her. The woman in front of her was probably comparable in age to her, and she was very pretty, even if she looked exhausted right now and her eyes were a little sunken.
"Do you want pain medicine?" Carol asked. "Are you in pain? How does your wound look?"
Michonne watched the interaction for a moment and then caught herself laughing. She couldn't help it. She honestly couldn't control not laughing at the two women in front of her. Carol was growing visibly frustrated and Sadie's face sunk into a deeper state of confusion each time that Carol, who was almost yelling, asked her something.
Michonne had a few deaf clients when she was a lawyer, but she'd always been given and interpreter for each of them. The interpreter had eased any of the difficulties in communicating that could arise. Sadie, however, was now navigating her world without the aid of an interpreter, and Michonne imagined it could be frustrating.
Sadie finally walked over to Carol, put her hand under Carol's face and turned her face toward her.
"Talk to me," Sadie said. "I need to see your mouth."
"Do you want something to eat?" Carol asked, drawing out her words. Michonne snickered again.
Sadie smiled.
"Yes, I'm hungry. You can talk normally to me, it's easier to read your lips that way," she responded.
"I'll get you something to eat," Carol said.
"Thank you," Sadie said, gesturing at Carol. Michonne assumed she was likely signing the words as she spoke them, not fully thinking about the fact that no one in this group was going to have a clue as to how to communicate with her that way.
Michonne got up from her chair and walked toward headquarters, bring one of the extra chairs from the porch. Carol had slipped inside to gather up what was left of breakfast for Sadie. Michonne put the chair near hers. Sadie watched her, silent.
"Sit," Michonne said, pointing at the chair. Sadie did sit, thanking Michonne. Carol returned moments later carrying a plate and some water which she offered to Sadie. The woman took the food and was eating greedily before Carol could even apologize for the fact that it was cold.
"I guess she was hungry," Carol said to Michonne.
"Looks like it," Michonne responded.
Carol took her place then, returning to washing sheets.
"She's pretty," Carol said, making sure not to look in Sadie's direction. MIchonne took her lead, resting her elbow on her leg and resting her chin in her hand, making sure to slightly cover the movements of her mouth with her hand.
"She is, you're right," Michonne said.
"This could end up being a test of the loyalties of the menfolk of this group," Carol said, laughing a little.
"You think?" Michonne asked.
"Please, Michonne, I'd sleep with her," Carol said, laughing again. Michonne responded with a laugh.
"I don't think Daryl and Tyreese would do anything," Michonne said. "Rick might be another story. I guess we could find out how dedicated he really is Rachel."
Carol didn't have many doubts in regard to the personality of the woman, but she realized that communication was going to be something that they had to work on and get used to. It wasn't going to be easy to remember that you had to speak directly to Sadie if you wanted her to respond in any way.
Sadie watched the two women, feeling a little uncomfortable. They were talking, and she was pretty sure they were talking about her. Both were making at least some effort to conceal the movements of their mouths. She wasn't any stranger to this practice, though, and she was sure that eventually the women would be more comfortable around her. When she finished with her food, the little pixie woman took her plate and offered her two pills. She looked at them and then looked back at the pixie, waiting for some sort of explanation.
"Pain medicine," the pixie explained.
Sadie nodded, hoping the pills weren't the same thing she'd taken yesterday. She had rested, and they had kept her from feeling the throbbing pain that she felt right now, but they had made her completely disoriented and had given her some dreams that she'd rather not repeat if it could be avoided. She swallowed the pills.
When Carol returned from taking the plate to the kitchen, she tapped Sadie on the shoulder.
"How does your wound look? Is it leaking?" Carol asked.
"No, I don't think so," Sadie answered. Honestly she hadn't thought to examine it. She'd woken up, a little confused and with no idea where she was. She'd been alone in the house, and she'd wandered around it for a bit, finding their bag in another room where Mark had apparently slept. Other than that, there was no indication of where she was. She'd gone outside and hadn't really seen anybody for moment, finally she'd began walking down the street in search of someone and had come upon the two women.
"I'll look at it later," Carol said. "I can change the bandage if it needs it. It shouldn't be too bad healing. It's a nice gash, but it isn't very deep."
Sadie smiled again and thanked her again.
"Um…your name?" Sadie asked.
"Carol," Carol responded. Sadie looked around for a minute and then pointed to the ground.
"Write it?" She asked.
Carol dried her hands again and smoothed some of the dirt near her, clearing out a little of the grass to make more room. She wrote her name carefully in the dirt.
"Carol," Sadie repeated. Carol nodded. Sadie pointed at Michonne and Carol smoothed the dirt back over her name. She suddenly realized that she had never written Michonne's name before and had no idea how to spell it.
"How do you spell your name?" Carol asked.
Michonne spelled her name for her and Carol wrote it in the dirt.
"That's nice," Carol said. Michonne snickered at her.
Sadie had a little more difficulty sounding out Michonne's name, but it was close enough.
Michonne tapped Sadie on the shoulder and the woman turned to her. For a minute Michonne felt a little taken aback. The intensity with which Sadie regarded her was one that she wasn't very used to.
"I'm sorry you got hurt," Michonne offered. "Daryl really didn't mean to do it. He's very sorry."
"Who?" Sadie asked.
"Daryl," Michonne repeated. "Can you write it for her, Carol?"
Carol obliged Michonne and wrote Daryl's name so that Sadie had a visual to go with it.
"This is going to take forever if I've got to write down everything we say," Carol said.
"Not everything," Sadie said. "Names are easier if I can see them spelled."
Carol blushed a little, not realizing that Sadie would have been able to read her lips on her last comment.
"I'm not mad at him," Sadie said. "I know it was an accident, or he wouldn't have brought me here. I didn't know it was an accident at the time, though."
Michonne nodded. She couldn't imagine what Sadie had been thinking with Daryl and Beau approaching her and then finding herself suddenly injured. If what Mark had told them was true about the various attacks on their camps, she wouldn't be surprised if Sadie was pretty deeply traumatized at this point. She did hope that Daryl proving that his actions were purely accidental would keep her from being anymore traumatized. There were a lot of men, a lot of people, out there these days that would hurt you simply for the sport of it, but Daryl wasn't that kind of man, and he'd been beating himself up about the accident since it happened.
"You have babies," Sadie said, looking toward the playpen where the girls were playing. They were squealing, but Michonne realize that the noise wouldn't have drawn Sadie's attention before. Carol quickly wrote "Hope" and "Judith" in the sand and tapped Sadie's leg. She gestured to herself and then pointed to Judith's name. Then she pointed to Hope and pointed to Michonne.
Sadie smiled. "I love babies. There were two babies in our group before the last attack," she finished.
"Speaking of babies, I need to give you some birth control," she said, starting to get up.
"No," Sadie said.
"Community policy," Carol said.
Sadie shook her head. "I don't need it," she said.
"I don't care if you're not with anyone, things seem to happen quickly around here," Carol said.
"No, I mean I don't need it," Sadie said. She made a cutting motion at Carol. "I got my tubes tied, after my last baby."
"Oh," Carol said. "I guess you're lucky, then, you don't have to worry about it." She went back to the sheets then, hoping to finish the task soon.
"It's easier," Sadie confirmed. "I never have to worry when something happens, like when the group was attacked. I knew I wasn't going to get pregnant."
Carol was quiet for a minute. Mark had told them about the other groups. Carol couldn't imagine, and didn't want to imagine, how Sadie had felt if she'd been one of the women violated in both attacks. Although she was sure there was very little comfort to be found in a situation like that, she was sure that knowing that you weren't pregnant, that you couldn't be pregnant was at least some sort of comfort. Even after her incident with Earl, which seemed paled in comparison to what Sadie's group had apparently gone through, she had been a little worried about what she would do, how she would handle it if something like a pregnancy had come from it.
Carol felt like she should say something to Sadie, offer some sort of comfort, but she was completely at a loss as to what she might say. She just remained quiet.
Michonne, noticing the somewhat awkward lull in conversation, tapped Sadie.
"So you had children?" Michonne asked.
Sadie nodded. "Five," she said. Michonne and Carol both made a face and looked at each other. Sadie laughed. "I know, I know. My oldest was almost ten, and my youngest was six months old when we left Atlanta."
No one had to ask what had happened to the five chidren, and neither Carol nor Michonne would ask. If Sadie wanted to share that information, she was welcome to, but they weren't going to drag it out of her. They knew what had happened, they just lacked some of the details.
"Welcome to the club," Carol said, after having drawn Sadie's attention.
"Just two children?" Sadie asked.
"Well, there's Carl," Michonne said. "I'll write it later. We'll make you a list of names," Michonne said.
"Right now I wish we had a bunch of those tags we used to wear when I took Sophia on school field trips. You know, the ones that have 'Hi my name is' on it? Then we could just label everyone," Carol said.
"That would be handy," Michonne agreed. "There's Carl," she repeated, "but he's hardly a child anymore. Then there are the girls, and I'm pregnant." She realized that with the way she was sitting the little physical evidence of her pregnancy would be hidden from Sadie, so the woman wouldn't have noticed and might not have known otherwise. Michonne felt like she was at the stage in her pregnancy right now where someone could easily mistake her baby weight for just a little added weight.
"Oh?" Sadie asked. "I'm sorry," she said, her face very clearly concerned.
"No, it's nothing to be sorry about," Michonne explained. "We planned to have it."
Sadie looked struck for a minute and then nodded her head again.
"Then congratulations?" She said.
Michonne smiled.
"Thank you," she said. She realized that it would sound bizarre to anyone from the outside of the community to admit that they had planned a pregnancy.
"So you had five babies?" Carol asked after a second, slinging a little water in Sadie's direction to catch her attention.
"Yes," Sadie said.
"Don't let Daryl hear that," Michonne said with a chuckle. Sadie couldn't see her, and Carol snickered a little at her. "Of course she's only one up on me at this point," Michonne added.
"Did you ever deliver a baby, by chance?" Carol asked.
Sadie looked confused for a minute and Carol wondered if her angle had caused Sadie to miss what she was saying.
"I had five," Sadie repeated.
"I mean did you ever deliver any?" Carol asked.
"Oh, you mean me deliver a baby for someone else?" Sadie asked.
"Exactly," Carol answered.
"No, I was always on the giving end, not the receiving," Sadie said with a laugh.
"Darn," Carol said. "I was hoping we might have stumbled on a doctor or a nurse or something."
"No," Sadie said, "I was a professor, so I was a doctor, but not the kind that delivers babies. Sorry."
"What about Mark?" Carol asked.
"I don't know what Mark did," Sadie said. "But I know he wasn't a doctor. We didn't have a doctor in our group."
Sadie motioned toward her chest.
"I thought you were a doctor," she said. She looked confused and for a minute Carol had to make herself not laugh at her passing thought. For as deadpan as Michonne could be at times with her facial expressions, Sadie was the exact opposite. She had a million facial expressions, and they were so revealing that Carol was somewhat certain that she could carry on a pretty fair conversation with Sadie based entirely off her facial expressions.
"Nope," Carol responded. "Housewife. You entrusted your life to a completely clueless housewife, without even knowing it."
Sadie laughed.
"I don't think you are clueless," she said. "I didn't die, so it was a job well done."
"We'll see what it looks like when it heals before you start singing my praises too much," Carol said. Sadie laughed again. Carol knew that it was going to leave a very noticeable scar. Her stitching abilities were fair, maybe even above average for someone with so little official training, but they weren't good enough to avoid leaving scars.
"I'm sure it will be fine," Sadie said.
The women sat there in silence for a little while. Carol finished the sheets, hung them out to dry, and dumped out the water.
"I'm done here, ladies, but you're welcome to stay here if you want to and watch the girls. I've got a few things to get done," Carol said.
"Do you need help?" Sadie asked.
Carol smiled at her.
"I'll take you up on that offer when you're healthy. For now you can keep Michonne company and both of you can take it easy," Carol responded.
Sadie nodded at her, and she turned to start on the other tasks on her list for the day.
Michonne and Sadie sat side by side, watching the babies. Sadie didn't seem to feel the need to fill the time with conversation, and Michonne certainly didn't mind. She liked conversation when she was in the mood, but she wasn't the kind that felt that silence was a bad thing. She imagined that Sadie was even more so like that due to the fact that she couldn't hear. Michonne thought that maybe the lip reading and talking was even a little tiring for Sadie, so she decided to just sit there, watching the girls with the new woman by her side. She didn't know much about Sadie yet, but she already felt comfortable around her, and that was saying a lot. She felt like Sadie wasn't hiding anything, and that made her a lot easier to trust, and a lot more pleasant to be around.