Between the Thorns
Chapter 37
On the ride back to the outpost, Daryl did his best to reassure Rose that what happened wasn't her fault. She wasn't as upset as he expected. She just leaned into him and let him wrap his arm around her slim shoulders, spending the rest of the ride sitting quietly at his side. It wasn't until Rose saw her mother that she burst into tears. Jean gathered the girl against her, smoothing her hair down with her hands and letting Rose sob down the front of her shirt. Daryl explained what happened, being as truthful and brief as possible. Jean nodded, not commenting on the situation until Rose stopped crying and allowed Lily to lead her off to the kitchen area for something to eat.
"Maybe it was a bad idea to take her," Jean said, biting at her lip as she hugged her arms around her slim body. Daryl nodded. Taking Rose on the tribute pickup wasn't his best decision. If he'd known he was going to get accused of being a pedophile while he showed up with the girl, he might have thought twice about letting her come. But he still stood by his original reasoning for doing it.
"If ya want them ta live," he said, keeping his voice low and soft. "...then they gotta learn to live in this world." Jean didn't argue. She nodded once. Then she sucked in a ragged breath and turned on her heel walking as fast as she could towards their room. Daryl stared after her, unsure if he should follow Jean or just give her some time to calm down. While she wasn't as complicated to understand as he always assumed a woman would be, being in a relationship was still new to him. Daryl often found himself overthinking his actions.
Jean held in her tears until she heard the door click shut behind her. She sat down on the bed, burying her face in her hands. After a few hard shaking sobs, she was able to gain control over herself. She wiped her tears away with the backs of her hands. In the confines of the Sanctuary, it was easy for Jean to let herself live in denial. She might not have admitted it. But she honestly believed that the whole outbreak apocalypse was temporary. Surely there was some semblance of government or military left somewhere. They would eventually come. Order would be restored. And life would go back to something close to normal. The ride to the outpost was sobering. To see how much disarray the world was really in. And the more time Jean spent away from Negan's base of operations, the harder it was to keep convincing herself that all she needed to do was hold on until some sort of rescue came. She was embarrassed of her own naivety.
"Hey," Daryl said, nervously poking his head into the room. "You a'right?," he asked. Jean waved him inside, eagerly wrapping her arms around his waist and resting her head against his chest. Despite the upsetting experience they had just been discussing, Jean felt herself becoming aroused. Just Daryl's body being in such close proximity to hers was enough. But she pushed those urges away for the moment. Jean took a deep breath and told Daryl the truth. She admitted she was hiding in the Sanctuary, waiting for the rescue that she believed was eventually coming. Daryl rubbed his hands down over her long dark hair. He waited until Jean was finished. And then he told her a story he hadn't before. He told her about his trip to the CDC in Atlanta. He told her the outbreak was world wide. He told her there was no help coming.
"You must really think I'm stupid," she lamented. She felt stupid. That was certain.
"Naw," Daryl sighed, sinking down on the bed next to her and pulling her into his lap. "Sometimes false hope is better than no hope," he said.
Daryl caught her under the chin, tilting her head back and capturing her mouth with his. Jean wrapped her arms around him, kissing him back. They lingered in the moment for a while, happy to be lost in each other with thoughts of the new state of the world pushed to the backs of their minds. But Jean broke the kiss before it could go any further.
"I want to learn how to shoot," she said, a look of intense determination on her face. Daryl nodded, lifting her from his lap and setting her on her feet next to the bed. Then he took her by the hand and led her from the room.
It wasn't Jean's first time firing a gun. Her husband gave her a few lessons at the beginning of the outbreak. But he only taught her how to use their shotgun. Which he filled with buckshot when he left her alone with the girls to go out for food or supplies. All she had to do with that was point it in the general direction of her target and pull the trigger. The one and only time she actually fired it, Jean ended up with a giant purple bruise on her arm from the recoil. Because she was holding the gun wrong. She was scared to try again after that.
Jean kept her arm around Lily's shoulders, listening carefully as Daryl explained how a handgun worked. He had a rifle out too, but Jean chose to learn how to use the smaller gun. It looked less intimidating. He unloaded the guns, letting her and Lily load them. Rose stood nearby and watched. She'd already had this lesson. And a few more since. The gun safety lesson was first. Rose liked to think of that as the how not to shoot your own ass off lesson. Then how to load a gun. Actually shooting the gun was next. That was the fun part. Daryl taught her with a hunting rifle. The one she got her first deer with.
"You go first," Daryl encouraged, ushered Lily forward. "Show yer mom how easy it is." Lily nodded, lifting the small handgun Daryl picked out for her to use. He moved in, correcting her stance and offering the girl a few pointers. Then he gave her the okay to fire the gun. He had a row of bottles and tin cans set up. Behind that was a huge mound of hay bales. And a brick wall. It was where everyone at the outpost practiced shooting. There were a few of the younger men practicing when they arrived. But they were happy to move back and allow the girls some room. Daryl's lesson had drawn some interest. And Lily glanced nervously towards the small crowd that was gathered far off to her left, watching her. She swallowed the lump in her throat. And then she picked out the target she was aiming for. It was a large green tinted wine bottle. Lily stared down the barrel of her gun and pulled the trigger. Like Daryl warned her, the gun seemed to sort of kick back when she fired. And it was loud. Almost like a small explosion in her hands. She didn't hit anything. But she also didn't suffer any ill effects from firing the weapon.
"That's okay," Daryl assured her, "...try again. Ya got four more rounds in there."
Lily didn't hit the large green bottle she was aiming for. But on the third shot, she hit the beer can next to it. And since no one knew she'd actually missed what she was aiming for, they broke out into a round of applause, cheering her on. Gavin stuck his fingers in his mouth, whistling loudly before he hollered at Lily, joking that they ought to take her with them on the next run.
"Just kidding," Gavin quickly added, holding his hands up in surrender and trying not to laugh at the death glare he was getting from Jean. She looked like she was about ready to use him for target practice instead of the bottles.
After Lily stepped back, Jean took her place. She held the gun up, positioning her hands the way Daryl showed her. He put his hand on her shoulder, adjusting her stance slightly and telling her to move her feet apart. Jean noticed his hands lingered on her a little longer than necessary, moving down from her shoulder to the curve of her slim waist, resting there for just a moment before he stepped back. With everyone watching, Jean felt pressured not to be shown up by her own daughter. She focused on a cracked beer bottle, trying to picture someone she'd like to shoot. In her mind, she saw Negan's face. Laughing at her as the big man called her nothing more than a hole to fill in front of the entire cafeteria. Jean pulled the trigger. And the bottle exploded. There was a round of applause from her left. But she ignored it, focusing on the feel of the gun in her hands. Shooting it felt better than she expected. She shifted her body slightly, aiming for the next bottle on the ledge. One after the next, she hit every target she aimed for until her gun made a hollow clicking noise when she pulled the trigger.
"That was great!," Daryl exclaimed, snatching Jean up into his arms and swinging her around. Jean giggled, guessing that the only reason he wasn't jamming his tongue down her throat was because they had an audience. She pressed a kiss into the stubble on his cheek, wrapping her arms around his neck. Daryl gave her one more tight squeeze before he set her back onto her feet. He was planning to have the girls do a little more target practice, switching out the guns they were using. But that plan was quickly abandoned with a woman exited from inside the compound with a large tray of cut up cantaloupe and watermelon slices.
Daryl managed to get himself a large slice of watermelon before all the fruit was gone. He glanced around, spotting Rose with one large slice of fruit in each hand. She was sitting on the hay bales they were shooting at just a few minutes before. She had watermelon in one hand. And a slice of orange cantaloupe in the other, taking alternating bites from each fruit. Daryl headed over, lowering himself down next to the girl.
"How're ya doin"?," he asked. "It's okay if yer still upset about what happened." Rose bit a large hunk from the pink flesh of the watermelon, chomping on it before she answered him.
"I'm not upset about shooting that guy," Rose admitted, glancing to her side to gauge Daryl's reaction before she continued. "I guess I was upset about not being upset. I know I should feel bad but I don't. I'd like to go back and shoot the rest of them too, 'cause I didn't like the stuff they were saying to you." Rose paused again, taking another bite of melon. "Does that make me a bad person?," she asked.
"Naw," Daryl said, bumping his shoulder into hers. He took a bite of his own slice of fruit, thinking about what Rose admitted to him. He'd killed a lot of people since the outbreak. And the only ones that lingered in his conscience were the men he'd killed at the satellite station. And that was only because he wondered if one of them was Jean's husband.
"Sometimes, it's them or you," Daryl said. "And wantin' ta live don't make ya a bad person."
