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He half doesn’t expect her to follow him.
She’s got no reason to. Her people are dead, according to her her entire family is dead, and he’s part of the reason for all that. She’s got no interest in whether or not he ever sees Maggie again. He’s a stranger to her, and not only that, but a stranger who was complicit in the murder of her people.
But when he glances over his shoulder, she’s a few feet behind him, stumbling after him like a little lost lamb after its ewe. She’s bleeding, bad enough that her sleeve is slowly turning scarlet; shrapnel must have winged her during the firefight. When he catches a glimpse of her face, her eyes are sparkling with tears.
He doesn’t stop to comfort her. But he does slow down his pace slightly, letting her catch her breath as she follows along behind him.
“You never told me your name,” Glenn says finally, if only to break the awkward silence. Her breath hitches a little at the question, but she hops a few steps to keep pace with him, eyes downcast.
“Tara.”
Her breathing is ragged and her voice cracks with grief, so low and miserable Glenn almost doesn’t catch the word she mumbles. “Tara. Okay. I’m Glenn.”
She doesn’t respond. He didn’t really expect her to. “Listen...thanks for helping.”
No answer. He sighs, wondering to himself if talking to Tara is always like talking to a rock. “Stop for a minute. We need to bandage that cut.”
“‘S fine.” She’s limping. She’s trying to hide it, but the corner of her mouth twitches with pain every time she puts her left foot down and there’s a barely noticeable skip she can’t quite hide.
“Tara, I’m still getting over the most fatal asshole of a flu I’ve ever had the pleasure of nearly dying from and you’ve clearly been beat to hell, I can see you limping. Sit down and let me bandage your cut.”
She finally meets his eyes, and she’s perilously close to crying now. “But your wife-”
“Maggie can take care of herself better than I could ever take care of her,” Glenn says stiffly, and as much as instinct screams to find her as soon as possible and never let her out of his sight again, reason wins out and he sinks down onto a nearby rock, reaching into his hastily thrown-together pack for gauze and alcohol. “Let me see.”
Maybe Tara’s smart enough to accept that the cut needs cleaning, or maybe she’s just too shell-shocked to think about disobeying him, but she stumbles over to the rock, not resisting as he rips away the bloodied fabric to expose the cut.
Glenn nearly gags. It’s not just a scrape like he figured, but a deep gash, a chunk of flesh gouged roughly from her shoulder. A massive, twisted hunk of shrapnel remains buried in the flesh, dried blood crusted over the jagged edges. Creamy pus oozes from the wound, layers of scabbed flesh and dried blood telling him that this isn’t a new injury. “Holy shit, Tara, this has to hurt like hell - how many times have you reopened this cut?”
“Three or four,” she mumbles, eyes shut tightly against the sight of the oozing mess of dried blood and pus. “Got hit with some metal back there, that was the worst-”
“Why didn’t you say anything? ” Glenn snaps, flooded with a bizarre rush of protective anger. “This has been festering for God only knows how long - Tara, you could lose your arm!”
“Don’t yell at me!” Tara cries out weakly, pulling her arm away from him, and the last word turns into a poorly muffled sob. After that, the floodgates are down, and she’s in hysterics beside him, weeping into her hands. Glenn sighs heavily, and tries to pull away, tries to ignore it, but she whimpers every time she moves her shoulder and her sobs sound so pathetic-
“Dammit,” he mutters, desperately wishing he could have somewhat more dubious morals. But he can’t, and everything in him aches at her pain. “Okay. Tara, I’m gonna pull the metal out now. It’s going to hurt, a lot, but it’ll feel better when it’s out.”
Before she can react, he draws his knife, cutting a thin slit on either side of the cut to free the metal. She cries out in pain, but he ignores it, scanning the woods surrounding them briefly for any signs of walkers summoned by her wails. Seeing none, he takes a deep breath and pulls hard and steady on the chunk of metal in her arm.
With a sickening ripping noise, it comes free, tearing the abscessed flesh as well. Pus streams down her arm, dripping into the remainder of her sleeve. Blood flows easily from the wound, now that the metal is no longer there to block it. Tara bites down hard into her palm to muffle a scream, her eyes squeezed shut from the pain, hot tears still leaking down her cheeks.
With some light pressure on each side of the wound, Glenn frees the remainder of the creamy, infected pus, stifling a sharp gag at the clog of off-white matter drooling slowly from the wound. But it’s been drained, and he takes her hand almost subconsciously to let her squeeze before squirting some of the alcohol into the wound. Tara squeezes so hard she pops his knuckles, surprisingly strong for a city kid, fresh out of college by the looks of her. But she manages not to scream, and Glenn claps her good shoulder when it’s done. “You’re tough. I like that. The worst is over, I just gotta bandage it.”
She sits still for the white gauze, and it’s easy enough for him to tape it up, covering the wound in sterile bandages. “Done,” Glenn tells her finally, packing his first aid supplies back into his pack. “I’ll stop torturing you now.”
And for the first time, she manages a smile, albeit a weak and shaky one. “Thanks.”
“No problem,” Glenn tells her, helping her up off the rock. “If we’re gonna be a team, I’ve got to have you functional, now, don’t I? Come on, we’re wasting daylight.”
Her smile gets a little more real as they start walking again, and this time, she’s by his side.