So I watched the episode where Daryl finds Carol after she's been missing and kind of wanted to expound on what (I think) he was thinking. Because hearing Norman Reedus say that Carol and Daryl hooking up should be as awkward as possible makes me think, game on! Potentially more than a one shot (but no promises). T for language, thanks to Daryl's potty mouth. A sort of sequel to my other story, but reading not required to understand this one. Just saying that makes me feel douchy. Anyway! Spoilers of the TV show abound. I think that's all. Enjoy!
6 months earlier.
(Approximately.)
Carol is crying for the third night in a row over her beautiful, angelic daughter and dead husband.
Her dead, son of a bitch husband.
The first night it happens, he rolls over and puts his pillow over his head. "Give it a goddamn rest, will ya?" because he remembers that night, however long ago it was now, feels like lifetimes, when he found her at the quarry and he still thinks about that sometimes, the way she looked at him and the way she looked to him in the moonlight, but he doesn't want her to get the impression that he actually gives a shit. Even though he does.
The second night, he puts the pillow over his head, but says nothing. He wants her to stop. Not because he blames he for crying, but because she's lost so much and he can't fix it. He's spent months trying, but he can't. He's an idiot for believing, even for a second, that roses and shoulder massages could change the hurt she feels.
The third night, he sits up and they do nothing except stare at each other. She continues crying and he feels better knowing that he's up with her, able to watch her; she won't go doin' nothin' stupid while he's awake. They smile simultaneously when this thought crosses their minds at the same time. Or so he thinks, anyway.
He sighs.
She'll be the death of me, he thinks. What a nice way to go.
/
Daryl's holding her knife. He slams it into the ground he's sitting on, feeling the vibration of the blade on concrete all the way up his arm, in his marrow, directly in his core. It's like he's shattered, every bone, every piece of him. It's like there's nothing worthwhile left, nothing in this whole world since she's left it. She left him.
He slams the knife again.
He realizes that she's really gone, has been for days, likely will never come back.
He wonders if he'd be able to kill her, if she turned into one of those things.
He thinks not.
He shatters a thousand times over.
His knife – her knife – collides with the floor and then with the wall and then he's standing, pacing, thinking Dixon's don't cry and trying to hold himself to it. He'd mourned his brother, of course he had, he does, but what did he gain without him? A family. A real one. People who care if he's gone for any amount of time and who care about how he feels and what he wants and… people who just care. Merle taught him all he knew of the world and Daryl remains grateful; but both had their demons and really what he learned from Merle was that you can't ever outrun your past. It always comes back to you.
And she.
She.
She was beautiful and she was nice to him. She didn't judge. She had a spine, more so than anybody else around here. She yelled at him when he needed to hear it and she was quiet and caring, even though he refused to be the same. She gave him something he didn't know he craved and she gave him something stronger than believing in Darwinism to fight for when the entire world went to shit. She accepted him. She was everything. Everything.
God, he misses her.
/
Before the apocalypse, Daryl would relax by drinking cheap whiskey or smoking one too many cigarettes, having sex with a stranger who's name he wouldn't know or remember the next morning or getting in a bar fight.
Before the apocalypse, his big brother would have been present for all of these occurrences.
Before the apocalypse, Merle was always the catalyst.
Before the apocalypse, a woman like her wouldn't have given him a second look, on account of his reputation.
Before the apocalypse, he wouldn't have looked twice at her either.
Before the apocalypse.
Well.
Everything was different then, wasn't it?
(Yes, obviously.)
This is the apocalypse, the end of the goddamn world. And to decompress, Daryl wants to rip something limb from fucking limb. The door in front of him opens and shuts tantalizingly.
Yeah, I'm comin' for you, asshole.
/
He kicks the door and wonders if this will help. Wonders if this will quell in him the monster that he's become. He kills without thinking because he's a survivalist first. He always has been. Maybe Merle gave him that, too.
Fuck.
There's no fighting it and he's done resisting. The walker lying dead in front of the door is moved and he's barging in ready for blood. Ready for death. Ready for absolutely anything and nothing at once, until he looks down and there's a moment where he pauses, wonders where the war he's waiting for is, why it's not coming, but he catches sight of something moving on the floor. He raises the knife, ready, here it comes now, sweet oblivion, a world that is designed specifically as an outlet for the kind of rage only brought out of someone who loves-
It'syouohmygodholyshitfuckit'syouit'syou.
-the one thing he's not ready for.
"Carol."
He touches her, her face, because he has to, because he needs to know she's real, because he doesn't trust and she recognizes that in him, so she doesn't flinch away ever, even if she's got a thousand reasons to. He touches her because he hasn't lost her. He touches her because he knows now, more than ever, that he's never going to let her go again.
His arms slide under her small frame and she falls against him. His heart is racing.
Don't worry, I gotcha now.
/