A/N: Enjoy!

Chapter 6: Now and Later

Rick was driving like a mad man, trying his damnedest to cut the 45-minute drive to the hospital in half. I didn't doubt his ability to do so. He'd been a speed demon all his life, but once he completed his driving training at the Sheriff's Academy, he started driving as fast as he wanted, whenever he wanted.

Unconcerned by how he weaved in and out of traffic, I looked out the passenger window as one question after another rushed through my mind.

Would Hershel be ok?Was Maggie ok?Was Carl with Daryl at the hospital?Was Carl ok or was he being fussy?Was Rick ok after meeting Mike?Was Mike ok after meeting Rick?Did Mike really think Rick was in love with me?Did Mike really think Rick was taking advantage of me?What if Mike was never ok with Rick and Carl?What if Rick, Daryl and Gleggie were never ok with Mike? What if Hershel wasn't ok?What would we do if Hershel wasn't ok?

My thoughts collided into one another, filling my head with too much noise. Frustrated by my inability to focus, I glanced at Rick with the hope that he would still my mind. I could tell he was deep in thought by the way his lower lip jutted out a bit, but just because he was too preoccupied to talk didn't mean he couldn't help distract me from myself.

I turned towards him to study his body language and to pinpoint the thoughts that were running through his mind. He wasn't tense, so he wasn't thinking about Mike. There wasn't a faraway look on his face, so he wasn't thinking about Lori. He did seem to be cringing a little, but that could mean—

"Michonne, stop," Rick softly ordered.

"Stop what?" I innocently asked.

For the first time since we'd left the restaurant, he directed his blue eyes to mine before looking back at the road in front of us.

"I know what you're doin' over there," he said as he maneuvered around an 18-wheeler.

"And what am I doing, Rick?"

He shook his head and laughed. "Really, Michonne? Am I really supposed to be buyin' the wide-eyed Bambi act?"

I shrugged, refusing to either confirm or deny that I'd been trying to Bambi him.

"Uh huh. Well, I'm not ready to talk about thangs yet, so stop tryin' to figure thangs out. Ok?"

He gave me a raised eyebrow stare.

"Ok," I said with a dramatic sigh. "So bossy. And eyes back on the road, please."

"Yeah, yeah, yeah," he mumbled, changing lanes and accelerating to pass slower vehicles. "Your phone's been beepin'," he noted once he was satisfied with our position in traffic. "You been gettin' Hershel updates from Gleggie?"

I shook my head when he glanced at me. I'd left voicemails and sent texts to both Maggie and Glenn, but I hadn't heard from either. The text messages were coming from Mike.

Rick rolled his eyes when he realized it.

"That could be a good thang—not hearin' from Gleggie, I mean. They could be busy talkin' to doctors about Hershel's recovery."

"Could be," I replied, hoping that was the case.

My mind flashed to the memory of Rick not answering or responding to countless calls and texts when I went into labor. That ended up being a very bad thing.

"Two different situations," Rick said softly, giving my knee a comforting squeeze.

"How about you stay out of my head, and I'll stay out of yours," I playfully sassed. "Ok?"

"Ok," he said, grinning.

When he let go of my knee, I grabbed his hand, craving a reassurance I didn't want to voice. Rick interlocked his fingers with mine.

"Hershel will be ok."

"He will," I replied more confidently than I felt.

"Michonne, he will."

I looked down at our hands, watching as his thumb slowly, gently strummed over mine. Up and down... up and down... up and down.

"Thank you," I whispered to him, squeezing his hand and turning to look out the passenger window.

Rick and I lost ourselves in our own thoughts and let the comfort of silence settle between us.

"Checkmate in two moves, 'Chonne," Daryl said in the cocky voice he always used when we played chess.

The only reason I didn't shoot him a dirty look was because I didn't care to see the cocky look on his face. I studied the chess board on my phone's screen and mentally calculated which move would burst his arrogance bubble.

"You can't avoid the inevitable, girl. Checkmate in two," he gloated.

Rick chuckled, and I rolled my eyes.

"Read your magazine, Grimes," I snapped without looking up.

We were doing what we could to pass the time in the waiting room until we received an update on Hershel. Rick was unable to join us in phone games because he refused to buy a modern phone. The only game he was able to play on his archaic device was Snake, which he'd grown tired of playing hours ago. Daryl and I openly pitied him for his technological shortcomings, but he refused to upgrade no matter how much we shamed him.

Glenn had fallen asleep in the chair next to me and was snoring softly. Before he fell asleep, he filled us in on how Hershel ended up in emergency surgery. He'd started drinking heavily in the morning and continued drinking throughout the day. In a state of drunkenness, he decided it was a good idea to start pulling bales of hay with his tractor. The tractor overturned, pinning him beneath it, after he lost control of it, drove through a fence and clipped the side of his barn.

It took emergency crews over an hour to free him.

My heart broke for the Greene family. Hershel and his wife Annette had welcomed me, Rick and Daryl into their family because of how we had welcomed Maggie and Glenn into ours. I thought about the Sunday dinner when Hershel informed us that he'd no longer be inviting us over for meals.

"Family eats together without the fuss of an invitation. If you're hungry, you come over and eat," Hershel proclaimed in his soft voice. "But keep in mind, family helps with the cleanup after the eating. If you don't cook, you clear the table and wash the dishes," he said with a warm smile.

Maggie laughed. "Don't be too flattered. Daddy just hates cookin' and cleanin'. You three get him one step closer to just eatin' and then watchin' tv."

The youngest member of the Greene family was Maggie's sister Beth. She had a deceptively sweet baby face but was a very rough around the edges 28-year-old. She happened to be at the farm when Hershel had his accident, but Glenn wasn't sure what all she witnessed. The only thing Glenn knew for certain was that Beth left the hospital without saying a word to anyone once he and Maggie arrived.

Daryl told us he noticed Beth walking from the hospital when he was driving to get there. He pulled over, unloaded Carl and caught up to her on foot. She was crying and refused to return to the hospital, so Daryl gave her a ride back to the farm. She wouldn't talk about Hershel but offered to watch Carl. Daryl left him with her and drove back to the hospital.

We'd been at the hospital for hours. I was glad Nugget was with Beth because I could imagine how cranky he'd be right about now.

I hadn't seen Maggie yet. When we arrived, she was in an observation room with Annette, watching Hershel's surgery. While I knew she needed to see what was happening for her own peace of mind, I desperately wanted to see her for mine.

I yawned and stared at my phone, still struggling to figure out the combination of moves that would block Daryl from checkmating me. But it was difficult to concentrate in the hard plastic chair I was sitting in... and with Glenn snoring directly in my ear... and with the harsh, unnaturally bright waiting room lights starting to burn my eyes. Before I could complain about these conditions, Maggie walked through the double doors of the waiting room.

I nudged Glenn to wake him up and nodded in Maggie's direction. He jumped up and ran to her, and Rick, Daryl and I stood and held our breaths.

"He's gonna be ok," Maggie said, her voice breaking with emotion.

Glenn hugged her tight, supporting her as the stress of the day finally took its toll. We gave them a moment before joining in. Rick was the first to embrace them, followed by Daryl. I completed the group hug by wrapping my arms around as many of them as I could.

Hershel was going to be ok!

We slowly broke off the hug and stood protectively around Maggie, but I reached out to give her another hug.

"How are you?" I whispered into her ear.

"We're ok," she whispered into my ear.

Maggie recently found out she was pregnant, though she still hadn't shared the news with Glenn. She said she was "waiting for the right moment," but I suspected she was too afraid of what Glenn's reaction would be to tell him. Although they were in love, Maggie focused on how they weren't married. Although they spent most of their time together, Maggie focused on how they didn't live together. Although they were a couple making all kinds of plans together for the upcoming year, Maggie focused on how they never discussed plans beyond the year.

I pulled out of our hug to look her over. There were dark circles under her red eyes, which were swollen from hours of crying. I hugged her again.

"Hershel?" Daryl asked once Maggie and I separated.

"He's stable. Sedated," she told us. "When the tractor rolled over, one of Daddy's legs was pinned... It's broken in two places. They put in a rod, and pins and God knows what else to save it. He... His..."

Maggie seemed to lose her train of thought as she scanned the waiting room.

"His recovery won't be easy... He needs physical therapy... He won't be..." She trailed off and looked at Glenn. "Where's Bethy?"

She looked around again, her eyes filling with tears.

"She's ok," Glenn assured her, putting his arm around her waist. "She's with Carl at the farm. She's ok. Hershel's ok. Everyone's ok. Take a breath."

Once Maggie looked a little less like she was going to fall apart, he handed his phone to her. She sniffled and tiredly trudged over to an empty row of chairs to call Beth.

"What can we do?" I asked Glenn.

"Right now? Go home," he said.

Before I could protest, he looked at me, Rick and Daryl and gave us a grateful smile. "You've all done so much just being here, and that means everything. But it's close to four in the morning. Go home, guys. Get some rest. I've got Maggie."

I looked at Rick and Daryl and silently discussed if that's what we would do. We agreed that we would and gave Maggie and Glenn hugs goodbye.

I turned to Daryl when we were waiting for an elevator. "Do you know a good—"

"Already on it. I left a message with Bob Stookey earlier. He's one of the best substance abuse counselors I know. He'll help if Hershel's ready to accept it."

"And I'll check with the department to see if any charges are bein' filed against him," Rick added.

"If there are, I'll have an attorney at the firm reach out to him," I said, mentally running through the names of possible attorneys.

"And make sure Beth is ok," Rick said to Daryl. "What she saw couldn't have been easy. She went through somethin' too."

Daryl grunted. "On it."

"And thank her again for watching Nugget," I told him.

"Yep," he replied.

Satisfied that we had a plan of action for the Greene family, I felt some of the day's stress start to release its hold on me. We stepped onto the elevator and a very loud, very long growl came from Rick's stomach as the doors closed.

Daryl and I stared at him.

"What?" he asked defensively.

"You had an opportunity to eat," I reminded him.

He scoffed. "Lost my appetite."

"I would've lost my damn appetite, too!" Daryl unnecessarily added.

"Daryl, you weren't even there," I pointed out.

"Didn't need to be. I heard all about what happened. And I can tell him to fuck off in five different languages, in case he has a problem understandin' one of 'em."

I groaned and rubbed the bridge of my nose. "Calm down, Daryl."

"Panty Man sounds like a goddamn prick!" he shouted, in no way calming down.

"Panty M—" I said before stopping myself. "Mike is not a prick."

Daryl stared at me as if he didn't understand the words that had come out my mouth.

"And if you think about it, it's quite fortunate that he didn't invite you and Gleggie to dinner," I continued. "If he had, Maggie would've been on the other side of town when Hershel had his accident. You wouldn't have been there to see Beth walking down the street."

Daryl stared blankly at me. I shook my head and looked at Rick.

"Should we head to the cafeteria? Let's head to the cafeteria," I suggested as we stepped off the elevator.

I caught Rick and Daryl exchange a glance and narrowed my eyes at them.

"What was that?" I asked suspiciously.

"I'm headin' out," Daryl said, ignoring my question. "Call me when you want me to drop Carl off."

He gave Rick a half hug and a pat on the back and gave me a hug and a kiss on the forehead.

"He's a prick, Michonne. You know it," he grumbled, walking away from us. "Fucking Panty Man."

I sighed in exasperation and looked at Rick again.

"What?" he asked innocently.

I rolled my eyes. He knew I wanted to know what that look between him and Daryl meant.

"C'mon," he said, placing his hand on my lower back and forcing me to walk. "Let's find the cafeteria. It's time for 'later.'"

A/N: Thank you for reading! Please take the time to leave a review. It's appreciated!