Entry #11

It felt like I was incapacitated for days even though it was just one night. I drifted in and out of sleep every few hours, with my consciousness finding me for moments at a time and then fleeing. The first time I woke up, I didn't open my eyes, but the smell of dust and cigarette smoke filled my nostrils, followed by the sound of rain steadily pelting the roof above me and the windows around me. I drifted back off within seconds, but the dark silence of sleep was interrupted just minutes – or at least it felt like only minutes – later. This time, I used all my strength to lift my eyelids and look around. I didn't move my head or neck, only my eyes, but I took in the darkness around me, broken only by a small candlelight feet away that cast an eerie glow around the dusty room I was lying in. The couch beneath me seemed to swallow me, and I couldn't find the willpower to move even an inch. The smell of cigarette smoke was still prevalent, but the smell of rain nearly conquered it. When I strained my eyeballs to look around, I saw the shadowed windows on the wall with droplets of water racing down their outer edges, and the paintings hung around the room were creepy and foreboding. The candlelight flickered and cast oddly shaped shadows all over the walls. And there was Daryl, sitting on the floor just feet away from the couch I still lay on. He had something in his hands, and it took me a few moments to realize it was my knife in one hand, and in the other, he was running the blade against a dark stone set in his palm. I knew what he was doing, but I had to rack my brain for the word. What was that thing he was runnin' my knife against? A stone of some kind… then the word finally came to me: a whetstone. He'd found a whetstone to sharpen my blade against. He was no more than a distinct shadow of a man, his dark hair hanging over his face as he concentrated on the task in front of him. The sound was sharp and distinct in my ears, but it blended in with the noise of the rain outside and created almost a melody. I saw the red cherry glow of a cigarette that hung carelessly from his mouth, puffs of smoke circling his head and driftin' up towards the ceiling just to disappear within seconds. The sound of rain seemed to be louder than it should be, and I realized he had cracked one of the windows open just a couple of inches to let in the cool breeze from outside and the smell of wet earth. Claps of thunder echoed in the sky every few moments and the faint sound drifted inside like a misplaced ghost.

I still hadn't moved my head, but my eyes lazily focused on Daryl's shape for a few moments. My brain felt like an old computer trying to reboot, whirring to life but takin' forever to regain its full functionality. He must've felt my gaze on him because he stopped running the blade against the whetstone and looked up, flipping the long hair out of his eyes to meet mine. When he saw my eyes open and staring straight at him, he dropped what he was doing, snuffed his cigarette out in an ashtray sittin' on the floor, and got up to stride to my side, then knelt down beside the couch and studied my face wordlessly.

"Hi," I rasped, my mouth dry and my lips cracked.

"How ya feelin'?" He asked, gently brushing a strand of hair off my forehead and pressing the back of his hand to my skin for just a second to check my body temperature.

I shut my eyes again and took a deep breath in before answering, "Weird. Thirsty."

He grabbed up a bottle of water that had been sittin' on the floor within my reach and took the cap off, then held it out for me. I took it in a shaky hand and he helped me guide it to my lips for a tentative drink. The water splashed against the back of my throat and immediately brought me relief, and I ended up swallowing a few drinks of the cool liquid. Daryl eased back on the bottle.

"Careful, don't wanna drink too much at once," he grumbled, pulling the bottle away from my mouth as I breathed out a sigh of relief. I nodded in understanding and shut my eyes again.

My head was poundin', but it slowly faded to a dull throb as my system took in the hydration. When he saw that I was ready, Daryl helped guide my hands to tip a few more swallows of water down my throat, then returned the cap to the bottle and set it back on the floor.

"What time is it?" I asked. It was more out of habit than anything, because as soon as the question left my lips, I remembered that there wasn't really any way for us to tell what time it was. We hadn't owned a watch in ages.

He glanced over his shoulder and gestured to the large, round clock mounted on the wall on the far side of the living room. I strained to make out the numbers, but they all blurred together, and the dim candle glow was only illuminating the layer of dust that covered the glass face of the clock.

"Quarter to five. Sun should be comin' up 'fore too long," he answered me.

I nodded. "Then where are we gonna go?"

He scoffed as if I'd made a stupid joke. "You ain't goin' nowhere. Not like this."

A tiny fire burned inside me and I opened my eyes wide, forcin' myself to fully wake up before I pushed myself up to a sitting position on the couch. Daryl looked surprised at my sudden movement, but leaned back to give me space and watched me closely. I settled back into a cushion and rubbed my eyes until I saw stars. Then I looked into his shadowed eyes with indignation.

"I'm fine. I just needed some sleep, that's all," I started.

"No, yer not," he stopped me. "Ya nearly got yerself killed out on the road, couldn't even stay standin' up, let alone defend yerself against a Walker. This ain't one of yer tough girl things, this is a damn concussion, and we gotta treat it as such."

His comment only proved to make me angrier, and I furrowed my brow at him. "Tough girl things? This ain't about none of that, I just had an accident but I'll be fine. I gotta get back on my feet or –"

"Or, or, or – or WHAT?! Ya might actually heal in a decent amount of time? What the hell's so important that we gotta leave so damn fast and risk yer brain gettin' more damaged than it already is?!" He snapped.

My mouth clamped shut and I had nothin' to retaliate with. His blatant mockery and little burst of anger had me taken aback, and even in my hazy state, I could see the telltale signs on his face – he was genuinely worried. And when he's worried, he gets angry. Typical Daryl Dixon.

I looked down at my lap and forced myself to understand that he was right, at least in a way. But that did nothin' to soothe the fire in my belly. Even with a concussion, wakin' up and not knowing where I was or what had happened – and even right now, every second that I'm sitting still and not putting miles beneath my feet - I have this constant ball of anxiety inside me that burns and swells and tells me there's somethin' I need to be doin', somewhere I need to be goin', and I ain't got much time to do it. The clock was silently ticking away seconds – and chances – while we sat in this house and waited for my stupid head to stop screwing up.

"My brain ain't damaged," I said softly. It was the only thing I could think to say.

He scoffed again, but more out of amusement. "If you say so. Now let's change yer bandage and see how yer giant goddamn wound is doin'."

I scooted forward on the couch until I could put my legs over the edge and set my feet down on the floor. Daryl must've taken my boots off while I was out because they were resting on the floor beside the water bottle, and the hardwood floor sent a chill through my thick, stained socks. I decided to pick my battles and didn't say another word in argument. Instead, I just leaned my head forward and moved my ponytail out of the way while he carefully unwrapped the ripped shirt from around my head and revealed the wound on the back. It stung when the air hit it once he'd peeled away the bandage that was practically glued to it. The blood had dried and scabbed, and I winced as he peeled the old bandage off. He showed it to me and I saw that it had been once white, but now it was nearly completely red and soaked through. It struck me that I'd been hurt worse than I had originally thought. I had no idea that I was bleeding that much.

Maybe Daryl was right to be so worried.

"Ain't damanged one bit, huh?" He said sarcastically, tossing the old bandage to the floor and reaching for the bag sitting nearby to pull out a new one. I caught the bite of bitterness in his sentence, and it didn't sit well in my ears.

But I didn't say anything, instead lettin' him enjoy his moment of being right for once. I didn't know how to make him understand that it wasn't a pride thing with me, it was a burden thing. The more helpless I am, the more I feel like I'm draggin' him down and putting him in harm's way. If I could've just bled in peace and kept trucking along right behind him, I would've done so all night long. But I just keep getting hurt, I keep acting stupid and getting into the wrong situations, and it's not his fault that he cares so much and ends up having to clean up my messes.

Daddy said we all got jobs to do, and right now, my job is to keep me and Daryl alive, and I'm not really doing that. I thought I could defend myself, maybe even him when he really needed it. But I can't even keep myself from cracking my own head open. How could I ever help him? He acts like this is his first nature, like the way things were before The Turn were just inconvenient and temporary, and he was only waitin' for the world to go back to the way it is now so he could use everything he knows to stay alive and thrive. No matter what happens, he just keeps showin' me day after day that he really was made for this – for the way things are now. And I keep letting him down and causing him a bunch of worry. What good am I if I just keep gettin' in the way?

The cut on my head stung when he dabbed hydrogen peroxide on it. He'd soaked the bandage with the liquid and tried to ease me into the fresh wrapping, but I couldn't hold back the hiss of pain when the cold fluid hit the healing scab, and it sizzled to life with fresh agony. It sent a spider-web of shock through my whole head and I had to stop myself from jerking away.

"Cracked yer head bad," he mumbled in his low growl of a voice as he cleaned the wound and gently pressed the bandage against it, giving me some relief. "This shit ain't nothin' you can walk off. It's yer head, it's the most fragile damn part of ya. Gonna take some time, whether you like it er not."

I pursed my lips and kept my ponytail out of the way as he wrapped the black fabric around my head once again, the bandage still damp and pressed tight against the throbbing spot on the back of my skull. He really likes being right. And I knew he was, but it was horribly disheartening to think of how much time we were losing by sitting in this old, abandoned house, waitin' for me to heal. I'd tried not to think about it lately, but it forced its way back to the front of my mind – how much farther away were Maggie and the others getting while we sat in this house? How many miles were they crossing while Daryl assumed they were dead? Did they think the same of us – just assuming we were dead, that we hadn't even made it out of sight of the prison? Did they think we were just a couple of Walkers right now, wandering the Georgia backwoods in search of food? Or did they just assume that of me, while knowin' Daryl was out there somewhere, probably finding his way back to them the best way he knew how?

What would Maggie say if me and Daryl finally caught up to her? If she saw us walking towards her from far away, and realized that the toughest person she knew and the weakest person she knew had stuck together after the prison and actually SURVIVED… what would she say? How would she act?

I think about that a lot. I wish I didn't. But I just can't help it. Daryl was made for this, and I wasn't. Maggie might love me, but I know she's smart enough to understand that and admit it. She probably doesn't expect to find anything of me ever again – not even a body.

I'm starting to think that tryin' to find them might be a waste of time. Maybe we'll never reach them. Maybe we'll never cross paths again, or find out what happened to everyone we cared about. Daryl seemed prepared for that. He had already started to accept it.

Maybe I should, too.

Once my head was wrapped again, Daryl looked me over with an indecisive expression on his face.

"Look pale," he mumbled, narrowing his eyes and studying me harder, if that was possible.

I shrugged, but my eyes drifted to the windows behind him. The way the rain was racing down the glass outside was entrancing, and the sound of thunder was continuously drifting in through the small open space between the pane and the glass. My eyelids started to droop and my body was screaming at me to lie back down, that I wasn't nearly rested enough.

Daryl put his hands on my shoulders, firm but gentle, and pushed me back down to lie on the couch. He set my head gently on a pillow and made sure to situate my fresh wrapping and bandage so they wouldn't slide out of place as I lay down. I put my feet back up on the couch and let my eyes drift shut, the sound of rain and thunder filling my ears. The cushions enveloped me once again, and all I could remember was Daryl grumbling somethin' about a blanket he'd found before I felt a soft weight over my body. Then sleep overtook me again.

It felt like I'd only been out for a few minutes when I felt a light pressure on my forehead that left a small bit of moisture – like a pair of thin lips pressed to the skin for just a second. I couldn't discern it from my own sweat, but something that felt like hair tickled my face and I stirred. The smell of leather and sweat filled my nose for just a moment. Before I could push my eyes open or grasp the seconds of consciousness, though, it was gone, and I drifted back off.

I can't remember any of my dreams – or nightmares – but I know I was tossing and turning on the big couch, and when I finally came to and found enough strength to lift my eyelids, it was still dark out. The rain persisted, but the thunder was lighter and farther between. The inside of the house was permeated with the smell of rain and wet earth, and a cool breeze drifted in and across my sweaty skin, makin' me shiver. I instinctively looked to the clock on the far wall, which read 6:48. I blinked and took in my surroundings, tryin' to figure out if I'd really only been asleep for a couple more hours.

I turned my head and saw Daryl on the floor across the room, sitting beside the open window and peering out into the rainy darkness. When he heard me rustling around, he perked up and glanced over at me. I stared at him blankly, still trying to get my bearings. It seemed a lot more difficult for me to wake up than usual. I felt groggy and sore, and my head was throbbin' again. It ebbed away slowly, but continued to make its presence known.

Daryl had stood up and crossed the room to my side again, kneeling down beside the couch and lookin' me over, as if he thought he'd find something else wrong with me that he'd missed before.

"Is it still morning?" I asked in my raspy voice.

He shook his head and handed me the bottle of water, once again helping me to guide it to my lips for a tentative drink. The relief flooded through my body and I realized I hadn't used the bathroom in hours, and my bladder was telling me I needed to go before I could get any more rest.

"Nah, ya slept all day," he said. His voice had lost any edge of aggression or impatience. I was surprised to hear that I'd slept so long, but it seemed like his hours upon hours of being alone had softened him a bit, and I'd even dare say he was eager to see me awake and talkin'. He looked exhausted, though, and the bags under his eyes were heavy and dark.

"Shit, I'm sorry, I didn't – " I started.

He shook his head and interrupted me, "Ya needed the rest. Don't worry 'bout it. I been up keepin' watch. It's been quiet around here… found some cans that're still good in the kitchen if yer hungry."

I perked up at the thought of food and my stomach rumbled to life. His mention of how quiet it had been rustled my senses a bit, but the worry dissipated almost immediately. I had a brief and curious look of the room around me, wondering what the doors led to and where Daryl had been spending all his time; the ashtray by the window was full of cigarette butts and surrounded by empty cans so I had a pretty good idea.

"Is there a bathroom?" I asked, stretchin' out my legs and preparing myself to stand up as I scooted to the edge of the couch.

Daryl stood up when he realized I was getting up and grabbed my hands to help me stand up and steady myself. My balance came to me a lot easier than I'd expected and my legs ached from being still for so long. I wasn't used to lying down for quite so many hours.

"Yeah, I only used it a couple times. Dug a ditch out back earlier, too," he answered me, warily letting go of my hands and watching me close to make sure I was completely balanced.

I nodded and looked at him expectantly. He gestured to a door off in the corner, near the staircase. I took slow steps at first to ease my muscles back into movement, crossing the room quickly as my need to relieve my bladder intensified. I pushed my way into the small, dark bathroom and shut the door behind me, quickly undoing my belt and jeans. Daryl had found a candle and set it on the edge of the sink where it cast a dim glow around the tiles and dusty wallpaper. There was a tiny, rectangular window at the very top of the far wall, but the dim moonlight was too obscured by rain and clouds to permeate the glass.

The bathroom was small and technically only a half-bathroom, containing nothing more than a toilet, a simple sink and cabinet, and a medicine mirror. I silently pondered how early it was in the day to have gotten so dark outside. It wasn't even 7 pm and the sky was already black, offering no hint of remaining sunlight. I was thankful for the small light from the candle, otherwise it would've been too dark to even see my hand in front of my face. For a second, I wondered if Daryl had been tryin' to prepare the house for when I eventually woke up.

I had just finished buckling my belt and was in the process of lowering the lid of the toilet back down when a noise came from above my head. I jumped slightly, lookin' up to find only the ceiling of the small bathroom. My ears perked up and I stood completely still, trying to breathe as quietly as possible. A few seconds passed, then another noise. It was a thumping sound, inaccurate and heavy, obviously not the footfalls of a human, but definitely something alive. I hurried out of the bathroom and back to where Daryl sat on the couch, rustling through our bags obliviously.

"Psst!" I hissed at him, eyes wide and pulse quickening.

His head shot up and he looked over at me, setting the bags down immediately and standing up. He looked at me expectantly, communicating with nothing but facial expressions.

I narrowed my eyes and glanced up at the ceiling, then back to his eyes. I tried to whisper as quietly as possible, and he had to take a couple of silent steps forward to hear me. "Didn't you hear it…?"

He shook his head and eyed the ceiling suspiciously. We both stood as still as possible, and I think he may have been holdin' his breath in an attempt to hear better.

The seconds seemed to drag on as the rain continued outside and I prayed there wouldn't be a rumble of thunder to make me look like I'd only been paranoid. When a full two minutes went by without a hint of another sound from above us, I approached Daryl until we were only inches apart and leaned in close to his ear. I didn't know what had been makin' the sounds upstairs, but I did know that whatever it was, I didn't want it to hear us downstairs yet.

"Didn't you check the upstairs already?" I asked in the quietest whisper I could manage.

With my face so close to his, I had the sudden feeling of recognition from somewhere I couldn't pinpoint at first, kinda like déjà vu – then the fuzzy memory from hours before, when I'd been drifting off to sleep the day away, came back to me, and I placed the scent that had filled my nose then as the same one invading it now. I pushed away the fluttery feeling in my stomach and remained still and serious.

Daryl shook his head, and our eyes met to reveal matching worry. I pursed my lips for a second and nodded my head toward the stairs in gesture.

"I think there's somethin' up there," I whispered.

He sighed, as if it were more of an annoyance than anything. He also sounded a bit like he'd been dreading havin' to go upstairs and assure it was safe, and now he knew there was no way around it.

I gave him a quizzical look, "Why didn't you check it yet?"

His dark blue eyes seemed to soften. Or maybe I was just seein' things. He furrowed his brow quick and quietly grunted back, "Couldn't be alone up there – what, ya expect me to go clear it by myself, no backup? Don't even know how big it is…"

I saw through his act this time. He was trying to make me feel guilty for askin', like it was a selfish thing of me to have expected. But the real reason was that he didn't know what could happen down here if he were up there for too long, or got stuck, or hurt. Then I'd be a sitting duck, injured and useless.

Yeah, I can think like him sometimes, too. The more time I spend with him, the more it becomes a residual habit.

I didn't argue back or antagonize him, wanting nothin' but cooperation out of fear for what could be behind the numerous doors on the second story. I whispered as calmly and clearly as I could, "We gotta go clear it. Or it'll come to us."

He nodded and looked toward the ceiling with tired eyes. I remained completely still as I watched him quietly step over and grab up his crossbow, which looked like it'd been cleaned and was already loaded with a bolt, prepared for immediate use. He leaned down and picked up my knife from where it lay atop a shirt on the ground, the whetstone next to it, and handed it to me. I took it and immediately felt safer, the handle cool and smooth against my palm. He motioned for me to follow him as he led the way up the stairs, but I stopped when I saw how dark it was at the top. I reached over and grabbed the candle that Daryl had been primarily using in the living room for light, carrying it with me in my free hand as I crept up the stairs behind Daryl, both of us trying our hardest not to elicit too many squeaks from the stairs.

I listened closely and tried to move as cautiously and quietly as possible, but there was no more sound coming from the second floor. I thought it would get louder or more obvious as we moved closer to the source, but it seemed to have gone silent once more. However, I thought, how long had it been makin' noise without either of us noticing before this? I had doubt that Daryl had spent hardly any time in that tiny bathroom, let alone enough to hear the thumps that I had picked up on. I reasoned that it could be a raccoon – hell, even a family of raccoons for all I cared – but I couldn't EXPECT it to be that. If I don't expect the worst, then the worst is sure to happen. So, I assumed, it was probably a Walker trapped in a closet, or maybe even tied to somethin'. It could be a kid, too, especially considering it was upstairs behind a door that probably held a bedroom.

The stairway was long and a bit steep, and we had to have crept up at least 25 steps before we reached the top. The second floor of the house was eerily dark and quiet. We stopped at the very top of the stairs, Daryl's feet just inches from the first step. He motioned for me to move around him and go ahead, so I crept around him to the other side until we were both facing the closed door at the top of the staircase. I turned around to quickly place the candle on a small table that was sitting against the wall behind us, a couple of feet out of the way of the doorway. If I'd heard something alive from the downstairs bathroom, it would be in this room.

We shared a communicative look before Daryl perched his crossbow, ready to fire, and I gripped my knife tightly in my hand. He carefully turned the knob of the door before shoving it open in a flash. The door banged off the wall when it swung back and the sound sliced through the silence. My nerves jumped to attention and that familiar shot of adrenaline coursed through my veins. Shadows moved and shifted inside the bedroom, the bay window on the far wall refusing to let in any sort of light from behind their heavy, dark curtains, and the candlelight from behind us just barely enough to send a glow inside the room. But the movement gathered and sped across the floor of the bedroom and out the door, gliding past both me and Daryl at no more than ankle height and shooting straight down the stairs in a dark blur. It must've been a trapped cat or somethin', but it moved so suddenly and so quickly, it surprised us both, and Daryl stumbled a bit where he stood. My eyes had averted away from the open door and to Daryl, watching him regain his balance and return his attention to the bedroom, but in that split second that we'd both been distracted, a much larger shadow emerged, and it definitely wasn't a cat.

I couldn't understand why we hadn't heard any noises if it was a Walker – they're usually so loud and miserable, with their groaning and growling and disgusting moans. They sneak up on you, but if they're trapped or they don't know you're there, they can be pretty hard to miss. Especially once you get used to the silence of places like large, abandoned houses. But this one hadn't made a sound, just the random thumps that had peaked my attention. It made sense, though, when the Walker emerged and just enough light reached its figure to reveal that its entire head had been wrapped with multiple bedsheets, the layers smothering and silencing any sounds that could've emanated from the undead corpse. They were secured tightly around the decaying head with thin rope tied off in complex knots. It left the Walker silent, but also blind and mostly deaf. Even though the layers were thick, its sharp teeth had managed to poke their way through in a few spots, makin' an otherwise foolproof Walker into an actual danger.

I was partially thankful that it had turned out to be an adult and not a child, but that didn't make it any better when it stumbled toward us, arms outreaching and jaw snappin' against fabric. Daryl leaned to the side suddenly, dodgin' the grasping fingers. But he leaned too far to the left, and the little balance he had regained from our first scare quickly left him. His feet stumbled and he raised his crossbow in an attempt to save it, free hand flying out wildly, and I stepped towards him just in time to reach out and grab it. I don't know how I acted so quickly, or how my brain was even able to process the situation that fast, but I saw him falling towards the giant set of stairs, backwards and vulnerable and weighed down, and my first instinct demanded the reaction. He was a lot heavier than I was prepared to hold, and my feet nearly flew out from beneath me, but I dropped my knife and reached out to grab the top of the railing for the stairs. I was still going to lose my grip on him, but I kept him from fallin' and he reacted by dropping his crossbow and grabbing the railing nearest to him. He quickly lifted himself up and returned to defensive mode as I did the same, but now our weapons were on the ground – his had tumbled down a few stairs - and the Walker was taking blind, stumbling steps toward us. Its hands were inches from grasping us, and the hallway was too narrow to step back any farther.

"Move!" I yelled, and I acted on the first thought that entered my brain.

Daryl looked over and immediately did as I had instructed, stepping back away from the staircase as the Walker moved to take another uneasy step toward him. I stepped forward confidently and put every ounce of strength I had into a hard, flat-footed kick into the hip of Walker. The body was fairly decomposed but still had some weight to it. Luckily, I was able to knock it off balance just enough to tip it off to the side, and it fell down the stairs, tumbling over every step with loud thumps and thuds.

I snatched my knife up from the ground and rushed to the top of the stairs, watching the Walker come to a rest at the bottom and scramble to pick itself back up. Daryl rushed past me to grab his crossbow from where it had stopped, caught in the railing of the stairs, having miraculously avoided being smashed by the tumbling corpse. Without another word, he lifted it before him and shot a bolt down the staircase. It impaled the corpse directly through the middle of its sheet-wrapped head, and its body finally fell to a rest on the floor below. He looked back at me and I saw relief in his eyes.

"You should really watch yer step," I remarked smartly as I returned to the small table in the hallway and picked up the candle, holding it up to give more light to the expression on Daryl's face.

He stepped toward me and briefly glanced inside the bedroom, but it was still and silent now, and his head turned back to face me. He was smirking. He didn't say anything else as he walked forward and past me, and I automatically followed, bringing the glow of the candlelight with me to break up the black shadows of the dusty hallway.

The whole encounter had raised my blood pressure and brought back the painful throbbing in my head, remindin' me of how wounded I was. I winced when I felt it hit but didn't let out any sounds or give any indication that might've caught Daryl's attention. The pain slowly ebbed away as we traveled down the hall in silence, but it left a dull ache in the back of my skull to remind me it was always present.

We opened a door to another bathroom – a real one this time, with a porcelain bathtub and everything – and then a door to a linens closet and another door to a small office before we finally found the door to the master bedroom. Daryl swung it open carefully, and I lifted the candle just a bit to try to shed more light on what was inside. The room was large, and decorated mostly in purples and oranges, but the candlelight was quick to illuminate the most enticing part of the room: the California King-sized bed covered in overstuffed pillows and a thick, plush duvet.

We looked at each other simultaneously, and I couldn't hold back the smile that broke across my face. "And I've been sleepin' on a couch this whole time?"

This time, he agreed that he should've searched the upstairs a lot sooner.

-E.G.