Entombed

I don't know what Maggie had told Glenn about the barn, but I assume that she told him to keep his mouth shut. When I saw him the next morning, anxiety was radiating off of him. He didn't look anyone that spoke to him in the eye, as if afraid that he would slip and spill the secret that Maggie had probably forced him to promise he wouldn't tell. In a way, I felt extremely sorry for Glenn and sorry for the fact that he had to carry this burden from the rest of his group. But then again, it was Maggie's responsibility to deal with and not mine. I witnessed a confrontation between him and Maggie, but I didn't hear exactly what she mumbled under her breath at him.

Rick and Shane were discussing another plan of action to find the little girl, when they should have been accepting the fact that the poor thing was probably long gone. Shane desperately wanted to get into gun training with the camp. He believed that teaching everyone how to properly use a gun would be beneficial, but Hershel still disagreed.

"I want no one going out there alone, we stay in pairs." Rick said to Shane, who just nodded his head. I had the distinct feeling that Shane wasn't one to receive orders well, but instead would rather give them.

Glenn approached them quietly with the basket of peaches and jerky that Maggie had bribed him to keep quiet with earlier. Each of them took one and Glenn turned to walk away. In the short time that I knew him, I could tell that the secrets he was holding were eating him from the inside out. The bubbly, smiley Glenn had disappeared and left a quiet, anxious one in it's place.

As Glenn left, Rick and Shane looked at each other but Shane laughed it off and shook his head.

I leaned over the hood of the car next to Jimmy as Shane looked back at the map and Rick looked over at me. Rick smiled and I smiled back, but looked down at the map too.

"We'd like to join you for gun trainin' today." Beth said as her and Patricia approached the truck. I turned to look at Beth and gave her a stern look.

"Hershel wouldn't agree with that." I stated.

"No, Hershel has been very clear. I can't involve any of you in what we do with out his okay."

"He doesn't like it, but he consented." Beth answered.

"Beth, your father consented to you learning how to shoot? Patricia maybe, but you?" I asked, taking a bite out of my peach.

"Otis was the only one who knew guns,well, besides Shannon. But now that Otis is gone, we ought to learn how to protect ourselves better. No offense Shannon."

I nodded slightly. It was true after all. Uncle Otis knew guns best, and just taught me enough to get by. This group was weaker without him, and one girl knowing how to aim wasn't going to get us far.

"No offense, but I'll ask Hershel myself." Rick said, looking weary of what he was told. I didn't blame him for that.

Shane walked away and over to Carl who was leaning against the RV and soon they disappeared together out of sight. I glanced over at Lori who was folding clothes and noted the angry look on her face that Shane was alone with her son. I couldn't believe Rick didn't notice the tension between her and Shane. It was so thick you could cut it with a knife. Something had happened between the two of them that they were both desperate to hide.

---

Rick and Shane stayed true to their word that gun training would begin and took a group off the farm for lessons. Beth was truthful about Hershel's word and his approval shocked me. For someone being so against guns, letting his child learn was a contradiction.

I stayed behind in camp and cleaned up around the house. There was still dried blood on the floor and wall from Rick and Carl's arrival, and I took it upon myself to be helpful. I heard the door open and noticed Glenn walk into the living room, looking around. I made a dirty look and rung out the wash cloth in my hand. He was probably looking for Maggie.

"Hey." I heard from behind.

When I looked up at him, he was less anxious than that morning, the light back in his eyes. Maybe he had finally told someone about the barn. "Hi." I looked back down at the freshly cleaned floors.

"I have to make another run into town, I was wondering if you wanted to come."

He helped me stand up and then picked up the bucket of dirty water, waiting for an answer to come from me.

"Sure." I nodded after thinking quietly to myself. Of course part of me wanted to go, but then another part was still jealous of the affair I had overheard about between him and Maggie.

"What should I do with this?" He asked, lifting the bucket up.

"Dump it behind the house. I'll be right out."

He nodded and exited back out the front door. I walked to my room and put a few things I needed into my back pack, including extra ammo for safety. I slipped the gun into the back of my shorts again and slung the back pack on. Glenn was already waiting at the front of the stable for me, and I headed over to help saddle up two horses.

"Let's give Nelly a break." I said and patted the horse's snout. "We'll take these two here."

---

On the road into town, Glenn was awfully quiet and so was I. I didn't have much to say, yet the nosey part of me wanted to question him about yesterday in town with Maggie. It wasn't my business, however, and putting him on the spot wouldn't be fair of me.

"You didn't have to come, you can hate me from a distance." He spoke up.

I glanced at him then back in front of me. "I know I didn't have to come, and I don't hate you."

"Seems that way today." He shrugged. "Quiet, no jokes."

I shrugged in response. "Why didn't you just ask Maggie to go?"

"Maggie isn't exactly speaking to me right now."

"And why is that?" I rolled my eyes.

He was silent for a moment. "I know about the barn. I know about the walkers."

He waited for me to say something but instead I stayed quiet and kept my eyes away from his.

"I accidentally told Dale."

"You did what?" I asked, stopping my horse and looking at him.

"Now you really do hate me, don't you?"

"Why would you tell?"

"It was too much for me! Keeping a secret like that. How could you keep walkers in your barn, how could you just keep them going like that."

I stopped answering and kept walking. The quicker we got through this, the quicker I could avoid this conversation.

"So Hershel thinks they're sick?" He pushed. "Do you agree with that?"

"No, I don't agree with that. But Hershel took me, my Uncle and Patricia in when he didn't have to. It's Hershel's home, Hershel's belief and it is not my place to go telling people whether or not he's right or wrong or even my place to go telling some outsider and his group what's in the barn."

That shut him up.

I looked over at him. "Hershel believes that there's a cure. That they're still people, they're just sick." I said after sighing. "His family is in there. His loved ones and his friends. To him, they're still people."

"Well what are they to you?" He asked as we climbed off our horses in front of the pharmacy.

I looked at him. "To me, they are gone. There's no cure. If there were, the radio would be broadcasting it. The world has gone to shit and we're left to pick up the pieces. Let's go."

"So to you they are walkers?" He asked as I cautiously walked through the doors.

"You'd be better off if you didn't use that term on the farm."

I walked through the pharmacy to scavenge for anything I might have missed during my run earlier this week and Glenn fetched something for Lori, once again. Maggie mentioned that yesterday had been the same situation.

"What does Lori need now?" I asked.

"I can't say." He frowned.

I looked over at him and noticed he was struggling to figure out where her request would be this time.

"Here, let me help." I asked.

He handed me the piece of paper Lori had given to him and I read it in my mind then looked back up at him. "Glenn, she's pregnant?"

"Look Shannon, you can't tell anyone."

"Does Rick know?"

"I don't know." He answered firmly. "But please don't tell him."

I stared at him for a moment and then left him where he was standing for the feminine section of the store. I didn't know if this type of medicine would be out with the other products, but it would be worth it to check first. When I saw that it wasn't, I headed to the back of the store where personal prescriptions used to be filled for the living and began my search. At least now this secret wasn't on Glenn alone, though I didn't really want a part in Lori's situation either. I had a feeling that this had been pushed onto Glenn to begin with.

Glenn wandered through the rest of the store for anything that may be useful to his group and I checked bottle after bottle for the right thing. I grabbed some vitamins that I had found and some other antibiotics that I hadn't thought to grab before. We still needed all that we could get, especially now that the group had nearly tripled in size.

As I lifted up a bottle of pills and read the label, a hand thrust through the open back and grabbed onto my wrist. I screamed and tried to pull my arm away, but the walker's grip was tight. My legs flew up to a ledge on the shelf as I tried to use my weight against the shelf to pull myself free.

"Shannon!" I heard Glenn scream as he ran from the other end of the store.

The walker was trying to pull me across the shelf and I frantically twisted and turned and punched with my free hand to avoid the bite I was afraid was inevitable. Glenn came across the counter with a board from a shelf and bashed the walker in the head. The walker let go of me and fell to the floor where Glenn jumped down and hit it in the skull several more times until he was sure it was done.

I sank back against the wall that was behind me, holding my free wrist in my hand and started sobbing. I had been out on runs so many times and this had never once happened. Sure, I had come close to walkers, but never had I been so close to death ad I just was.

Glenn dropped the board and rushed to be by my side, dropping to his knees and throwing his arms around me. I wrapped my arms around his waist and sobbed into his shoulder and he silently hushed and cooed me, trying to calm me down.

"It's okay, you're okay. He didn't get you." He said, pulling me away from him. He put both of his hands on either of my cheeks and wiped the tears away. I looked up at him, trying to calm myself down and reassure myself that I wasn't scratched, I wasn't bit and I was going to be okay.

"Hey, hey, it's alright." Glenn tried to smile, pushing hair out of my face.

Once I had calmed down and stopped crying, I re-wrapped my arms around Glenn's waist and slumped onto him. "Thank you, thank you." I mumbled into his shirt.

Glenn had relaxed too, having probably panicked in his own mind. His arms were still around me and he had shifted to sit with his butt on the floor.

"Don't thank me." He mumbled.

"It's not your job to protect me, you could have just left." I said, recalling how Shane had done just the opposite of Glenn.

"Well, now it is my job." He stated blatantly. I looked up at him, wiping my face off and he looked down at me. I looked down at my arms and my wrist where the walker had me. "You're okay, he didn't get you."

I nodded and looked him in the eyes. On impulse, I pulled Glenn in and I kissed him on the lips. "Thank you." I said again quickly and stood up.

I left Glenn sitting there for a minute before I help up the right bottle for him to see. "Come on, let's get back."

He nodded, probably slightly confused and stood up. We went outside to the horses. I shoved the bottle into my bag and climbed back onto the horse, waiting for Glenn to do the same. Our ride back to the farm was virtually silent besides the hooves hitting the gravel roads and grass.

Back at camp, we stabled the horses and Glenn asked me for the bottle. "I'll give it to you, but I'm going with you."

He made a weary look but nodded and turned to walk to where his group had set up. I followed, wrapping the bottle in a knapsack and handing it to Glenn.

"Lori." Glenn said, gaining her attention from the pot she was sitting over. She turned around, but her face dropped as she noted me behind Glenn. I could see on her face that she knew I had found out. Glenn handed her a bag with the other items that she requested, including the pills.

"Here."

"You found everything then?"

He nodded in response and Lori's gaze shifted back to me.

"He deserves to know." I simply stated to her.

Lori looked down and then back at me, and must of noticed the bruises forming down my arm and wrist. "Are you okay?"

I nodded. "Next time you need something, get it yourself. Glenn isn't your slave."

She looked down again, ashamed and I turned to walk away. Glenn stood there for a minute but turned and followed me, running a few steps to be behind me.

"You're not going to tell anyone, are you?"

I looked at him and sighed, shaking my head no. "He's going to find out sooner or later. Whether she, or I, or you tell him."

I walked down the dirt road away from the farm and slid down the trunk of a tree. Glenn had followed me there and stood above me. I rubbed my wrist and stared at the ground to avoid looking at him.

"Look I'm sorry. If you're going to blame anyone, then blame me."

"Glenn, I don't understand why you do this to yourself."

"Do what?"

"How can you stand there and tell me to blame you when she's the one that almost got me killed. If it weren't for her needing pills to abort her child, then you and I would not have been put into that position. Glenn, you are constantly hiding secrets. From your group, from me, from everyone. You sit there and let her push all of her problems onto you and you let Maggie push that secret onto you. You let them put you in positions where you're anxiety ridden, wondering when and where and to who you're going to slip up to. You're not their slave, Glenn. You need to stick up for yourself, worry about yourself, not what everyone else has going on."

Glenn stared down at me and then finally sat down next to me. "Look, I'm sorry, okay? I shouldn't have asked you to go. That's on me. And I'm sorry that now Lori's secret it on you too."

"It just isn't fair to you that you let them boss you around. 'Get into this well so we can drag this walker out and almost get you killed.' 'Go get these pills for me to abort a child I'm not even going to tell my husband about.' 'Don't tell anyone about these walkers I just let you discover.' Isn't any of this even sounding crazy to you?"

"No, you're right. It is crazy." He mumbled.

"Then stop." I said.

There was along silence between the two of us until I grabbed his hand and held onto it tightly. "I've already lost so many people that I care about. You're smart, you're brave, you care immensely about people, you're handsome. But people use you. I know it, you know it and your friends know it, but they dont want to admit it. They'd rather have you running errands and fetching peaches then leading the group. To them, you're walker bait."

Glenn gave my hand a squeeze and sighed. "I know. Alright, I know." He looked at me. "No secrets then, okay? No secrets between us."

I looked up at him and nodded.

"I slept with Maggie." I heard him say to me and I looked away, my jealously pouring back into my system.

"I know."

He looked at me shocked. "How?"

"I overheard you talking to Dale. I wasn't trying to snoop, but I just heard."

He nodded slightly. "I'm sorry."

"For what?" I asked.

He shrugged and looked back at me. "For today."

---

After Glenn kissed me goodbye, I left him to return to the house for more chores and he went to talk to Lori after what I had said to her. I didn't know what our kisses meant. They were only kisses after all, and he had slept with Maggie. I didn't feel okay knowing that he was involved with the two of us, though they were in different ways. Maggie was his sexual outlet and I seemed more to be his emotional outlet. But which of us was more important to him, I didn't know. And that bothered me too.