"I never thought I'd be living in a bar," Sinclaire overheard Andrea tell Carol.

"It's a better set-up though," Dale said, squeezing Andrea's shoulder and giving her a smile.

"Or at least it will be," T-dog corrected. "Once we get to that hardware store."

"We need to make a plan," Rick said, taking a swig of his water. "For how many rooms, where they're going to be…"

He glanced at Sinclaire and Merle, giving them first dibs. She shrugged and looked at Merle. He was the territorial one of their little partnership.

"We got three rooms, and the back porch," he barked. "Ya'll can do whatever ya want, but I ain't sleepin' in the kitchen."

"Does anyone have any experience building?" Sinclaire asked. "Because I have absolutely none."

"We do," Daryl said, gesturing at himself and then his brother.

"I spent a few summers roofing," Shane admitted.

"And I did a lot of the work when we remodeled the kitchen," Rick said, glancing at Lori who nodded in confirmation.

"My mom built us a deck," Sophia piped up suddenly. Carol blushed, but she nodded.

"Okay, so we could partner up," Sinclaire suggested. "One person who knows what they're doing and one person who needs to learn. Is that good with everybody?"

There was a general chorus in the affirmative and she gave the group a smile.

"So…everyone choose your partners."

The grin widened when Daryl pointed at Glenn and Merle scowled. Shane raised an eyebrow at Sinclaire and she nodded, trying to hide her surprise. Merle didn't bother to hide his.

"Now who the fuck's gonna hand me stuff?" he asked.

Lori and Rick had partnered up, Shane and Sinclaire, Daryl and Glenn, Carol and Andrea…

"Lucky you," Sinclaire said, patting him on the shoulder. "You get Dale and T-dog."

At Daryl's suggestion, they all trooped into the bar and began looking around.

"I don't guess anybody has a measuring tape?" Rick asked rather hopelessly.

Daryl turned and walked out to his truck, coming back in a few moments later with a measuring tape, which he handed to Rick saying, "Ya ask, ya measure."

The bar area was pretty big; they discovered that they could make three "bedrooms" in there and still leave room for the bar…a living room of sorts. The bedrooms wouldn't be huge…hell, they wouldn't even be big. But at least people would have walls and doors to call their own. The next room was the pool room and, after measuring, they discovered that they could leave a pool table inside and still fit three rooms in there.

"That's six," Glenn said. "How many do we need?"

Andrea counted quickly and answered, "9."

"There's always the back porch," Rick pointed out with a smile.

"We'll have to see what's at the store," Daryl replied. "Might not even be able to do what we're wantin'."

"So, six rooms," Sinclaire mused. "If Rick, Lori, and Carl share, and Carol and Sophia…"

"Me and Dale," Andrea cut in. "I think I see where you're going with this. Three free rooms and six people."

"Two per room and we'd be fine," Sinclaire agreed. "We could fix the porch later. I was actually thinking of that for a bathroom, if we could move the tub."

"We can," Merle assured her. "Once. It's probably fuckin' heavy as hell."

"We could just keep with our tent arrangements, I guess," T-dog said.

Daryl had a sudden coughing fit as Glenn said, "Me and Daryl and you and Shane then?"

Sinclaire was the only one who knew the coughing was Daryl doing his best not to laugh. She wondered if Glenn knew that Merle thought he and Daryl were an item. If he did then he had the best poker face in history.

"What the…ya'll share a…" Merle began in outrage.

"Anyway!" Sinclaire spoke over him. "We need to figure out who's going to the store."

There was a general discussion about that and the party that would head to the store the next day ended up being Sinclaire because she'd ended up being pretty possessive over "her" box truck, Daryl for the silent weapon edge and heavy lifting purposes, Glenn because according to everyone in the group he was the best for getting in and out of a building without dying, and Rick and T-dog for extra muscle for carrying lumber and an extra gun if things got sticky.

They also decided to take the Daryl's truck in addition to the box truck just in case there was a lot of great stuff. Lori had hopefully mentioned mattresses. Sinclaire tried to remember if she'd passed a mattress store on the way into town. She didn't think so…but now that the idea was there it was damn near irresistible.

They spent the rest of the day muscling two of the pool tables outside and cooking supper.

"Might be the last night we're sleeping in here," Merle said, stretching as he lay down. "Ya gonna miss it Yank?"

"Absolutely," Sinclaire answered with a grin. "The heat, my sleeping bag on metal…" she gave a theatrical sigh. "At least I've still got my roommate."

"Yeah. I wasn't about to share a room with any of those other fuckers…or make ya put up with 'em neither."

"I like them," she said mildly. "None of them seem like bad people really."

"Ya threatened to blow Walsh's brains out this mornin'."

"That was idle conversation," she replied, propping her head on her arm and looking at Merle with an eyebrow raised. "I told you…after being in the Army a woman knows all about Alpha Male Syndrome. And also, he kind of had reason to believe that you'd killed everyone."

"Reckon so," Merle said. "I still think he's a prick bastard though."

"He's probably not someone I'd seek out if I had other options," she admitted. "But we might as well all do our best to get along."

"Why ya think he's wantin' to work with ya?" Merle asked.

She shrugged and answered, "I have no idea."

"Long as he ain't tryin' to get in your pants since Rick came back," he rolled over and put his arm over his eyes. "It'll be a cold day in hell before I let him even think on fuckin' ya."

"You say the sweetest things," she said with a laugh. "And you know Daryl's not gay right?"

"Jury's out," Merle replied darkly. "I've got my eye on him and the chink."

She shook her head before rolling over onto her stomach and closing her eyes as well.

"If you watch too closely people might start wondering about you," she teased into the silence.

"Fuck off Yank."

"Good night, Merle."