Thank you for reading!
Try as she might, Carol couldn't get into the spirit of the day. So much work had gone into preparations for Glenn and Maggie's wedding, so many hours trying to find a way to make a cake without milk or eggs, with only what they could cobble together out of the increasingly scarcer supplies in the surrounding area, so much scrounging through dress shops trying to find something that was still in good condition that fit Maggie …
But it was still a prison, and the dead still walked outside it, and the world had ended, and Carol couldn't help but feel that they were trying to cling to traditions that were long past.
Of course, maybe she felt this way because of her own marriage. Because her own wedding, a beautiful church ceremony with all the trimmings, had been the precursor to so much pain. Maggie and Glenn had already been through more pain than two young people should have to suffer in their lifetimes—she ought to be happy for them, shouldn't she? Celebrate their love and the fact that they, at least, had enough faith in the world righting itself somehow that they were willing to take this hopeful step?
She said as much to Daryl, quietly, when he joined her in the front row of seats. Hershel was conducting the ceremony, of course, with Beth as maiden of honor and Rick as best man. Carol and Daryl sat up front, on what had traditionally been known as the groom's side, to reflect the fact that Glenn's own family couldn't be here.
Daryl looked up at Hershel, whose eyes were suspiciously wet as he turned the pages of his Bible, his lips moving as he prepared for the ceremony. "Yeah," he said quietly, "it's a fucked-up world. And who really cares if people shack up or they go through all this mess to make it official? But … I guess Maggie does. And Glenn does. And Hershel sure does. And if making people happy doesn't matter anymore, maybe nothing matters."
Carol glanced at him with surprise. "Who knew you had the heart of a poet?"
He squirmed in his seat, blushing. "Stop it."
She chuckled, nudging his shoulder with hers. "You ever think about it?"
"What, getting hitched?" He looked horrified, and Carol grinned wider. "Never."
"Would you do it now?"
Daryl shook his head.
As far as Carol could tell, he'd never considered shacking up, or anything that might lead to it. She hadn't, either, of course, and maybe somewhere in his past he had reasons that made the idea as impossible as the memory of Ed made it for her. If so, those were his secrets, and she certainly didn't intend to pry. "Me, neither," she said, turning to look backward down the aisle.
Maggie stood there, waiting, in the simple white dress they had altered for her. She wasn't wearing a veil, and had laughed at the idea of a train, but she carried a bouquet of wildflowers that Daryl had brought in for her. Again, Carol marveled at what a poetic soul he hid under his pretense of not caring.
She looked at Glenn, whose eyes were as tear-filled as Hershel's. How that kid had grown over the time since the world had ended—toughened, strengthened, matured. Maggie had had a lot to do with that, but a lot of it had also been circumstances, Glenn stepping up to help protect them all, learning to advocate for himself and for Maggie and for all of them, when his voice was needed. Carol was proud of him, and she was glad that he had won his heart's desire. Someone might as well, the way the world was now.
Standing with the rest of the residents of the prison, shifting baby Judith on her hip with automatic muscle memory, Carol watched Maggie walk down the aisle, the shy smile on her face that of a woman who had forgotten, if only for a few minutes, what lay outside these walls. Maybe that was it, she thought—maybe she envied Maggie and Glenn the relative normalcy of their love, the way they could look at each other and be transported away from the dirt and the bad food and the constant fear to a place where only they existed. Carol hadn't had anything like that since Sophia died, and really, not even then. She'd been too constantly afraid for Sophia to know what a blessing it was to still have her.
Cuddling Judith as the baby started to fuss, Carol closed her eyes to listen to a woman from Woodbury play a very stripped down version of the wedding march on a violin they had discovered. When she opened them again, it was to see Glenn and Maggie standing hand-in-hand, turning to Hershel as he cleared his throat to begin.
Tears sprang to Carol's eyes, and she was relieved. People were supposed to cry at weddings; they'd been doing so for generations. Her own mother had cried at hers—not as much as she would have if she'd known what awaited Carol on her wedding night, but still …
Daryl leaned over. "You all right?"
Carol nodded. "Fine."
He looked at her skeptically, then reached for the baby, adjusting her onto his shoulder. Judith quieted as she always did for Uncle Daryl. Carol reached up and swiped at a tear that had rolled down her cheek. She hoped Glenn and Maggie had a long life together, a happy life … but she didn't believe they would, and none of the pretending that this was normal, that the world had room for weddings and happiness, would make her believe it.
No one needed that reminder, though. Not today. So she would keep her cynicism to herself, and she would smile at the bride and groom and pretend to be buying into the dream. It was what she did, after all.