More Than This

by GraveyardWhispers

Summary:

Love and violence had always come wrapped around one another in my life. Until her. And I wasn't sure I knew how to untangle them.

Dixon men loved in anger and fists and blood. I couldn't risk loving someone that way.

---

Naomi Payton was Daryl Dixon's childhood best friend. In truth, they were each others only friend. But sometimes growing up means growing apart and when Naomi's ambitions and Daryl's loyalty to his brother drive a wedge between them, the end of the world might be the only thing to bring them back together again.

Chapter 1: Prologue

The girl and the boy stopped in their tracks. It was midnight, or near enough, neither of them had expected to see anyone else. In the shadows of the trailers around them, they'd come looking for peace they weren't allowed in the daylight. The boy was walking a well-worn track. The girl was trying for somewhere new.

They hesitated. And then the girl stepped forward. A dim light from a nearby cracked window hit her face. One he didn't recognize. Messy, unkempt hair and eyes that were, in that dark place, sad but kind. It made the boy turn away.

"Hey," she said, slightly above a whisper. She didn't want to be caught out here any more than he did but it was loud enough to make him glance fearfully at the shadows he'd come from. The dark window where he knew a shattered bottle of brandy was still clutched in a sleeping man's hand. It was usually a deep sleep. But you never could tell. He turned back to look at her.

"You ain't from round here," he said, his voice heavy with distrust.

"No," she said. "I ain't. We just moved. You going up there?"

She pointed to the hill she'd been heading for. He nodded.

There was a moment of silence where all that could be heard was the rain on trailer roofs and the wind rattling a few loose pipes. Somewhere, far from them, was the familiar wail of a distant siren. Close. But never close enough.

"We can go up together if you like," she said with a shrug. "Ain't nobody gotta know."

He stepped forward into the light. A mop of hair, as unkempt as her own. He was small and scrawny for his age. Blue eyes that didn't trust anything he looked at. She felt him sizing her up, weighing his options.

"Alright," he said eventually. "But don't slow me down."

In the end, they kept pace with each other. They even raced to the top. She saw a piece of a fallen tree far from the nearest forest, she didn't know it but it was the boy who'd dragged it up here for a place to sit on nights like this. It had been meant just for him but it was big enough for two. She didn't ask for permission when she sat down and he didn't complain.

"Looks less shit from up here," she said as they both looked out over the trailer park, the rest of Atlanta glittering in the distance. From the top of the hill you couldn't hear the arguments, you couldn't smell the crack pipe smoke or liquor stained carpets and you couldn't hear any babies crying. It was just them and the rain and the rumble of two small and empty stomachs. She reached into a battered brown satchel that was draped over one shoulder and pulled out a pack of shop-bought sandwiches. She opened it and held one out to him, "You want one?"

His stomach growled so loudly it nearly drowned out his, "Yes."

She passed him one and kept the other for herself. The bread was soft, buttery. There was ham inside. Neither of them spoke again until they'd eaten.

"Where'd you get it?" he asked.

"Stole it," she said with a shrug. "Momma stopped for cigarettes at a gas station and they was just sitting there."

He nodded. He knew the gas station she meant. "They throw you in jail for that," he warned. "For stealing. Happened to my brother. He's had to go away for a while."

"Only happens if you get caught," she said. Then, because the worry was too big for her small head she said, "They really throw him in jail for stealing a sandwich?"

"Nah," he said. "He took the money from behind the counter. Used a fake gun so he didn't hurt anyone. But still. He's in juvie for a few years."

"Well there you go then," she said, although she felt relieved. "They don't care so much about a sandwich."

He didn't look like he fully believed her. But he nodded.

"Which one you living in?" he asked. She squinted down through the drizzle at the rain-soaked and shiny tops of each trailer, trying to work it out.

"That one," she said eventually. "Four in from the left fence."

"The Miller's old place," he said. "He's in jail now too. Real jail. Not just juvie."

"What'd he do?"

"Shot his wife."

"They have kids?"

"No."

"That's good."

"Yeah," he agreed.

She turned to him. "So which one is yours?"

"That one," he said and pointed to the one which, to him at least, looked the darkest. She followed where he was pointing and nodded.

"You at school round here?" she asked. "I'm supposed to start tomorrow."

"Yeah," he said, glumly. "But it's shit. I ain't going much."

"What grade you in?" she studied him with narrowed eyes, like she could guess his age in his small, thin face.

"Second," he said.

"Oh good," she brightened and stood up. "Well you better come tomorrow so I have a friend."

She looked down at him, expectantly. He looked back up at her. He hadn't been planning on going. He never did, and if his daddy was hungover enough he could get away with it. He considered telling her that when she got there, she wouldn’t want to be his friend because nobody else there did. They all thought he was weak, they didn't like that he was unwashed and smelt bad most days, or that he stared hungrily at their packed lunches while eating nothing himself. He was small and easy to pick on. But he didn't tell her any of that, she'd find out soon enough. He just said, "Maybe."

"Suit yourself," she shrugged. "I'm heading back now, before my momma gets home."

"Okay. Thanks for the sandwich."

"That's okay," she said. "See you around I guess."

She started to run back down the hill. He stood up. "Wait!" he called after her, finally not scared to raise his voice above a whisper. She stopped running and turned around. "What's your name?"

"Naomi," she yelled back. "What's yours?"

"Daryl."

"See you around, Daryl."

She raised a hand to her temple, gave him a salute like they were both little soldiers and ran the rest of the way back down the hill.

They were both at school the next day. And at lunch time they sat together, eating nothing. Only this time it wasn't so bad because she made them play a game until they both forgot that they were hungry.

And the next night, they walked up to the top of the hill together again. He brought a dead squirrel that he'd managed to trap. She showed him how to build a fire and they cooked it and are it and they weren't hungry any more.

"There," he said. "Now you don't need to steal no more."

He knew it was a slippery slope from stealing a sandwich to getting locked up.

And so a new routine was born. Some nights, she didn't come. Some nights, he wasn't there. Some nights he had fresh wounds on his back, some nights she had new cigarette burns on the inside of her thighs. But they didn't talk about any of that. They'd talk about everything else. And sometimes they didn't talk at all.

Chapter 2: Surviving Ain't Living

Naomi

"You ever stop reading?" 

I was vaguely aware he’d said it before something soft bounced off the side of my face, hit the open book and slid into my lap. I looked down at the smiley face of a small, stuffed bear looking back up at me. I picked him up, pressing my thumb into the metal loop still sticking out of the top of his head from where he'd once been attached to a keyring before he'd fallen off and been found by two grubby little children on the way home from school. 

“Did you just throw Knievall at me?” I asked, picking him up. We’d called him that because the little bear had a little leather jacket and shades on and I’d said he looked like a little daredevil. Daryl laughed at me but the name had stuck. 

“Yup,” he said. “And I’m gonna keep throwing shit at you until you quit that damn reading.”

I looked up at where he stood in front of my kitchen table, silhouetted against the morning sun. It wasn’t the kind of morning sun you see pictures of or read about in books that is golden yellow and softens the skyline. I don’t know where you see one of those in real life because in our little trailer park, the only colour it seemed to give off was grey. Tired. Tired of shining on the same old shit and wondering why it bothers to rise at all. 

“I’ll stop reading when I'm done,” I said. “Have you even started?”

“Nah,” Daryl said. “I ain't doing it.”

“Bullshit,” I said. “It aint that hard. “You could get it done in, like, twenty minutes.”

“I know I could get it done,” he said, pulling out the chair in front of me and throwing himself down into it. “But I don’t wanna.”

I rolled my eyes. “Daryl.”

"You don't need to study. You're gonna ace the test, you always do," he said.

"I always do because I always study." I countered. "And you ace 'em too when you try."

He sighed. “If I do it now, can we have fun later?”

“Yes,” I said. “Or you can go home and stop annoying me and I’ll come get ya when I’m done.”

He looked up at me. “Nah,” he said, reluctantly. “I’d rather stay here, even if you’re going to be borin’ about it.”

He was more agitated and restless than usual, he had been since he arrived. Usually, he gave me space to do what I needed to do before he started complaining. He opened his own book and stared at it but I could tell he wasn’t taking anything in. One of his legs bounced restlessly up and down, knocking against the table. I doubt he realised it was happening but it was annoying. I sighed and put my book face down so I didn't lose my place. 

"Alright," I said. "What do you wanna do?

"Hunt," he said. "I wanna get something real good for dinner tonight. Maybe rabbit, deer if we can find one." 

"That's a fancy meal you've got planned," I said and looked back down at my book. It was more of the same shit we always did so I couldn't work out why he was so eager to get going. "You got a date tonight I don't know about?"

"No," he sounded horrified I'd even suggested it. But there was something he wasn't telling me, something he was holding back. I could tell. I could always tell.

"Well in that case, I got a shift at the diner tonight so you can swing by for some food there as usual," I said. Hoping the matter was settled but knowing damn well he was still biding his time to tell me something else, I went back to reading. I didn't take any of it in, I could feel him watching me the whole time.

He sighed, "You're always working these days."

"Gotta pay rent somehow," I shrugged. "Don't wanna end up making money like my Momma." 

"She back yet?" he asked.

"Nope," I said. "Cops are only letting me stay here because your daddy says he's looking after me but if she ain't back soon I'm gonna have to leave."

He was quiet for a moment. "We could both leave then," he said. "Get a place together. Don't have to be much."

"What kind of landlord is gonna rent to two fifteen year olds?" I asked him. He didn't answer, just leant back in his chair, his unfocused gaze fixed on the table. "Not one we want to be renting from, that's for sure."

"We don't have to tell 'em how old we are."

I smiled, I couldn't help it. He'd grown a lot in the past year. After towering over him for most of our friendship, he was now finally a little bit taller than me. He'd started to fill out too, was less scrawny than he had been. But his face was still so young, nobody would believe either of us were older than fifteen.

"Daryl…" I started but he cut across me.

"We could make it," he looked up at me then and I knew he really believed it. "Just me and you. We could do it. I'll get a job. You can keep going at the diner or find another one. We can hunt if things get bad. We'll do fine."

He was so confident, so serious it made my heart sink. I took a breath, needing a moment to think about how to respond. 

"We could survive that way," I said gently. "But that ain't really living."

He looked away again, defeated. 

"It could be," he muttered and I felt awful. I shut the book, put it down and stood up. 

"Walk with me," I said. He was angry with me, I could tell, but he stood up and grabbed his jacket from behind the chair. 

"Where we goin'?" he asked as we stepped outside the trailer I was in danger of losing if I couldn't cobble together enough rent or find where my Momma had gone on her latest bender. I didn't answer right away, just pointed to the hill behind the trailer park. He sighed, "Nowhere new, then."

I ignored his sulk and kept walking, knowing that he would follow. What had seemed like such a big, steep hill in our childhood shrunk with every year that we grew. It didn't take us long to get up there now and we were never out of breath doing it unless we raced each other. Sometimes I let him win.

Our log was still at the top. Older, with crumbling bits of bark that flaked off. Sometimes we picked it off when we got bored. He’d carved our names into it with a penknife once but even that was fading. It was still big enough for two. Just. I sat on it and he sat down beside me. We looked out over there trailer park and towards where Atlanta could be seen in the distance. It wasn't as nice in the morning as it was at night, when it was just glittering lights but it was still a pretty damn good view.

"If we leave now," I said. "If we pack up and run, sooner or later someone will notice. If your dad don't care and my Momma doesn't come home, then someone at school will check up on us. Then the cops get involved and they haul our asses home. Then what?"

He shrugged, "We leave again."

I shook my head. "Best case scenario we're back here and things are like the are now. Maybe not though. Maybe we get put in the care system and we don't see each other again."

"Nah," he said but his confidence was slipping. "I wouldn't let 'em do that. We could end up in the same place."

"We ain't brother and sister, they don't have to do shit to keep us together."

He scowled because he knew I was right. 

"They ain't gotta find us."

"Okay," I said, playing along with his new hypothetical. "Let's say they don't. We leave school now then we got nothing to show for it. No qualifications. I can keep laying tables and you can get a job some place but they ain't well paid. You gotta be educated to get good pay."

"Didn't think you gave a shit about money," he said.

"I don't," I said. "But if we leave now, we'd only be able to afford to live in a place like this. Your dad ain't gonna be there but other drunks will. My Momma ain't gonna be there but other assholes will. Different people, same shit. There's gotta be more than this."

"So where do you wanna go?" he asked.

"If we got money, we could get some place in the city," I said. "One of the nice bits of town where people aren't always coming around trying to sell gear or get you involved in some dodgy shit."

"Atlanta?" he said. He glared at the distant buildings like they were some kind of trick and would disappear if we got too close to them. "We ain't been there before. Just ‘cause it looks nice from here don't mean it is. Even our homes look less shit from up here."

"Yeah," I admitted. "It might be shit. If it is was can go some place else. When you got money, you got options. Hell, maybe even a whole other State."

"You wanna leave Georgia?" he asked like it was the first time he'd ever thought about it. It was the first time I considered that he might not have thought about it. I’d been dreaming about leaving since I was old enough to dream. I shrugged. 

"Maybe. All I know is I want to be far from here."

He was silent for a very long time.

"Well make sure you remember the rest of us when you make it out of here, yeah?" 

There was a bitterness to it that I hadn't expected. I turned to him. "You're coming with me, dumbass."

"Nah, you're gonna be President or some shit," he said. "I ain't got the brains to keep up with that."

"First off, I ain't running for office," I said. "Secondly, you got the brains for anything. You're smart. You're hard working and you ain't afraid to get your hands dirty. You can do whatever you want."

"Yeah?"

He wouldn't look at me.

"Of course," I said. "Daryl, I wanna leave as much as you do. I just wanna make sure that when we do , nobody will be able to take it away from us."

He nodded but I knew he was reluctant to agree with me. "So we wait?"

"We wait." I nodded. "And then we get out of here. For good. Together."

"Okay," he sounded weary and more than a little impatient. 

"You still wanna go hunt or are you swinging by the diner?" I asked. 

"I'll be there," he hesitated. "Is it okay if Merle comes too?"

Ah ha. 

There it was. The thing he didn't want to tell me. 

"Merle's back?"

"Supposed to be back tonight," Daryl wouldn't look at me again. The root of his restlessness became clear. Merle returning always had that effect on him, I should have guessed it. But Merle came and went so frequently these days, in and out of juvie. Disappearing off on some shady shit. He was back earlier this time than I thought he would be, he must’ve got less time for good behaviour. It always annoyed me that he couldn’t hold on to that good behaviour when he was out.

"Yeah of course he can come," I said. Daryl smiled, grateful. I knew he wanted to impress his older brother and make sure he was doing okay but wouldn’t have the money for good food otherwise. I wondered how long Merle being back would last. Things were always better for him where Merle was around because then there were two of them to deal with their daddy’s shit.

I stood up because I didn't want him moping around thinking about his brother. And I didn't much want to think about Merle anymore either. "C'mon. Let's track something."

Daryl

"Welcome to Judy's Diner, what can I get you today?" she smiled at the people in the booth next to ours. I liked watching her do it because, although her smile was always warm and friendly, it wasn't the same smile she gave me. She had one smile for me and one for everybody else.

"Pretty sweet set up you got here, little brother," Merle said with a low whistle. "Free dinner whenever you want it, you're living like a King."

"Only when she's workin’," I said. 

"Well, still, it's awful nice of the management to let friends eat for free."

I knew they didn't. I knew Naomi paid for all of my meals out of her paycheck and thought I didn't know. But I did. She was always bad at keeping secrets from me. I could have told her I knew, I guess, but I also couldn’t really pass on a free meal. I liked watching her at work, too. I liked making sure she got home okay after. So I ordered the cheapest thing on the menu and we’d both pretend we didn’t know she was paying for it. And at the end of her shift we could walk home together, eating any leftovers that couldn’t be kept for the next day. 

I didn't tell Merle any of that. I thought if he knew she was paying, her try and order everything. That was the kind of bullshit he'd found funny. 

"Hey," Merle dropped his voice to a whisper and leaned across the table. I should've known from the glint in his eye that he was about to be a dumbass. "You slipping it to her yet?"

I wanted to punch him. He’d been back less than an hour and already a tiny part of my wanted him gone again.

"It ain't like that," I said. "We're friends is all."

"If you say so, little brother," Merle chuckled. "But if not, you better move fast. Girls like her always think they're too good for people like us."

I clenched my teeth and said nothing. 

"What can I get you boys today?" Naomi smiled down at us. I'd been so distracted by Merle's bullshit I had lost track of her. She looked a little frazzled, if was busier than usual. Her dark curls were pulled back into a high ponytail, a few flyaway hairs had already escaped. It was as untamable as she was. The fluorescent lights in the place made her look paler than usual. I noticed she was a little tired. Her eyes, blue like her uniform, fixed on mine. One smile just for me, another for everybody else. 

"Cheeseburger," Merle said. "Coke. Extra fries. Side of onion rings."

She nodded and took it all down but I could see the panic in her eyes over how much this would cost her. 

"Just fries," I said when she looked at me. "I ain't that hungry."

She didn't believe me but she didn't argue neither. Not with Merle ordering extras.

"Anything to drink?"

"Nah, I'm good."

"I'll be right back," she said. Then she hesitated, looked at Merle. “Welcome back.”

“Thank you, little darlin’,” he said. “It’s good to be back. You been keepin’ my little brother outta trouble?”

“Of course,” she said with a smile. She looked like she was about to say something else but then some asshole a few booths down yelled to get her attention, snapped his fat fingers at her. I wanted to punch him too. She whispered, “Be right back.” 

Then she fixed on her Everyone Else Smile and walked over to the other booth.

“Sweet girl,” Merle said and though I didn’t disagree, I didn’t like the way he watched her walk away. “How come she’s pulling shifts here?”

“Her Momma’s disappeared for a while,” I said.

“Bender?”

“Probably,” I shrugged. “We’ll know when she’s back. Dad’s told the cops he’s looking after her for now.”

“Well that’s awful nice of him,” Merle said. He didn’t smile and neither did I. “How is the old man?”

“Still breathin’,” I replied. Merle drummed his fingers on the table top. “Still drinkin’.”

“So, business as usual, then,” Merle said. I nodded. He watched Naomi wipe down a table. Somewhere in the kitchen, I heard a bell and my stomach rumbled. “You not got yourself a job yet?”

“Nah.”

“Not even working here with your girl?”

“She ain’t my girl,” I said. “And no. They ain’t hiring.”

“I could find you something,” he said. “Got a few connections that could get us both working.”

“Alright, that’s one cheeseburger,” Naomi interrupted us. I studied her face, to see if she’d overheard Merle’s offer. She looked worried but it could have just been the stress of a busy diner. “With extra fries and onion rings. And here’s your Coke.”

“Much obliged,” Merle said, immediately reaching for the burger.

“Here’s your fries,” she said, putting a plate down in front of me. “And one chocolate shake.”

I hadn’t ordered it. She knew that. I knew that. But I didn’t refuse it either. 

“Thanks,” I said. 

“Anything else I can get for you?” she asked. 

“That’s fine, thank you darlin’,” Merle said. Sometimes when he smiles, he looks like a wolf. 

“Well you know where I am if you need me,” she said, more to me than him. “Just holler.”

“Will do,” Merle said. She left us to it and he took a big bite of his food. Melted cheese dripped down his chin and he closed his eyes. “They don’t give you shit like this in juvie.”

I picked at a few of my fries, trying to make them last. The milkshake was good, filling, I think she’d put extra ice cream in there. And crushed up Oreos on the top. Merle ate in silence. He obviously hadn’t had any decent food for a while, although he was looking a lot more jacked than when he’d gone away. Naomi refilled the ice machine. Another table left and she cleared their plates away. 

“This job you could get me,” I said. “It pay well?”

“Hell yeah,” he said. He leant closer to me. “Off the books so you don’t gotta pay taxes on it either.”

It made sense now. “These connections you got. They from prison?”

“It’s juvie, it ain’t real prison,” he shrugged it off. That didn’t directly answer my question but it told me what I needed to know. When I didn’t say anything else, he sighed and sprayed a mouthful of fries all over the table. “C’mon, little brother at some point you gotta start making your own money. And it’s better than clearing up after assholes.”

He looked pointedly at where Naomi was arguing with a customer about whether he’d been overcharged for his extra large steak. Her face flushed with anger and embarrassment. They guy towered above her, talked to her like she was shit on his shoe. 

“It ain’t legal though, is it?” I asked.

“Not strictly,” he said. “But it’s good money. What else you got to do?”

“School an’ that,” I shrugged. 

“Shit, you still going to that dump?” he asked. His eyebrows raised in surprise and he gave a low whistle. “You’ve lasted longer than I did. You some kinda brainbox or something?”

After Merle’s first stint in juvie, he’d been too behind to catch up. Not that he’d really tried to. 

“I do alright,” I shrugged, thinking about the chat Naomi and I had had, the plans she'd laid out. “And I need to stay if I’m gonna get a good job.”

“That’s where you're wrong, little brother,” Merle said, stuffing the last of his fries into his mouth. “You ain’t gotta go through all of that shit. You can make a lotta money real quick without any kinda school. I can help you with that.”

“Maybe,” I shrugged. “I’ll think about it.”

His eyes followed my gaze to where I was still looking at Naomi. I looked away but I was a little too late. 

“You’d make enough to support yourself and a girl,” he said. Then, when I glared at him, he shrugged and said. “Y’know, if you had one.”

“I said I'll think about it.”

“Alright, suit yourself.”

He licked the grease off each of his fingers. I was still pushing a few fries around my plate. I was used to making them last for Naomi’s whole shift. They were always soggy and cold by the end. 

“How long you back for this time?” I asked him as a way to change the subject. 

“Long as I can,” he said with a shrug. “I ain’t going away again, don’t worry about that.”

I’d heard that before. 

“You staying at home?” I asked him. 

“Yeah,” he said. “‘Til I get enough to get my own place.”

I nodded. I’d heard all of that before too but I weren’t about to start an argument with him. Not this soon after he got back. I wanted him to stay. He was already bored, though. I could tell. 

“Eat up, slowpoke,” he said. “Let’s go do something fun.”

I wanted to tell him that I usually waited to walk Naomi home. There were a lot of roads between this place and ours and they weren’t all that safe. But I knew he’d make fun of me. And I didn’t want him to join us. Those walks were ours. So, I ate the rest of the fries and downed my milkshake. Merle was on his feet before I’d even put the glass down.

“Good to see you, Naomi. Thanks for the food!” he yelled. 

She was swamped taking orders so I couldn’t go and say goodbye. She just waved at us both and then we were out in the sunset. 

Merle was in a good mood. He showed me a new bike he’d got, I didn’t ask where from, and we rode it around for a while. I thought about what he’d said, about what Naomi had said too. I knew that she was right, if we did things the proper way then we might be able to make a nice life. And we would lose it in a drug bust. She was always saying things about the cycle of crime and poverty and how paying everybody fairly would change it for people like us and folks we knew. It made sense when she said it, which was why I always said she should be President someday, she’s the only person I knew who could have made that kinda difference. I’d have voted for her, anyway. 

I agreed with what she said when she said it. I knew we both wanted a life that was safer than the one we had. But I agreed with Merle too. If all we needed was money, why couldn’t we make it fast? Then, when we had enough for what we needed we could stop and get regular jobs. Do things right, like she wanted. Maybe I could make enough money for her to stay in school and do things her way. Maybe she wouldn’t even have to know what I was doing with Merle. 

When we got home, our old man was still awake. I’d felt Merle psyching himself up for this the whole journey back. They weren’t three sentences in to a conversation before the first argument started. I left so quietly neither of them noticed. I checked the time and decided to take Merle’s bike back to the diner. If I was quick, I could be there before closing. He’d only just shown me how to use it but I’d got the hang of it enough to get going. When I got back to the diner, the lights were off and the doors were locked. I knocked a few times at the staff entrance but there was nobody there. I took the long way home to see if I could find her on the roads but they were empty.

Chapter 3: Bruises and Bust Lips

Naomi

He was late. That wasn't so out of the ordinary for him but now that Merle had shown up again, I was worried something bad had happened. Merle always gives me that feeling, like a cold knot of dread sitting in my stomach just waiting to unravel when something went wrong. I waited, holding the books that would fit in my bag and stared at the silent Dixon household. 

Eventually, the door opened and Daryl stumbled out. He looked more dishevelled than usual and closed the door so quietly behind him, I knew that meant there was someone still sleeping. He kept his head down, his hair falling over his face. Not enough. I saw the bruise. 

"Hey," I said. I reached out and touched his face. I was gentle but he still flinched like I might hurt him. It made my heart heavy. "Let me see."

Reluctantly, he turned his face towards me. I brushed his hair away from the bruise around his eye. "It bad?" he asked. 

"You'll live," I said. "Which one of them did it to you?"

"Merle," Daryl admitted, which made sense because Mr Dixon preferred to leave his bruises in places people wouldn't be able to see them. "He didn't mean to, though. He was going for dad and got me by mistake." 

I let his hair drop back down to cover it. "You wanna ice it?" I asked. "I have some stuff at mine that might help."

"Nah," he brushed past me and started walking away. "Let's go."

I ran to catch up. He was quieter than usual, which for Daryl is saying something. I often worried that if we weren't friends, he'd never say another word again. I wondered where Merle was and if he was still sleeping off the hangover of his arrival. I wondered if Mr Dixon had stayed the night or if his eldest showing up had prompted another bender. Maybe he’d end up in the same place as my Momma. Maybe they were both dead. I glanced at Daryl and wondered if that would be the best thing for him. My house had certainly been a lot more bearable since my Momma had up and left. 

"Where were you?" Daryl asked, nudging me out of my thoughts. He nudged a little too hard and I wobbled on the road. 

"What?"

"Last night, I came back to the diner and you weren’t there,” he sounded moody. But a bad mood was always to be expected the day after Merle got back. 

“Did you?” I said with a shrug. “Diner emptied out not long after you guys left so we got to close up early. I didn’t expect you to come back so I didn’t wait. I thought you’d want some time with Merle.”

He didn’t say anything, just stared at his feet as we walked along with a non-committal grunt. I stopped walking, I could feel myself getting angry with him.

“You mad at me, Daryl?”

“No,” he said but he kept on walking. 

“‘Cause if you are, you gotta tell me,” I yelled after him. “It ain’t fair to be mad me for something I didn’t know.”

He stopped then but didn’t turn around. “I ain’t mad at you,” he called back. I walked to catch up with him. He waited, looked at me out of his bruised eye. “I just like our walks home.”

“Me too,” I smiled and we started walking again. “But you deserved some time with Merle, we ain’t gotta do it every time I work.”

He looked like he disagreed with me but didn’t say anything. I knew he was thinking about the long and dark roads between the diner and home and the kind of people that might also be travelling down them. I felt safer with him near - always - but I also knew I could keep myself safe. I knew the best route home, I knew the ways to avoid and I knew to walk close to the light. I carried my keys so that they stuck out between my fingers and knew to go for the eyes of anyone who tried to sneak up on me. I hadn’t been tested yet, because Daryl was usually there, but I was sure I’d be able to fight if I had to.

“Sorry,” he said eventually. “I ain’t mad and I didn’t mean to be an ass.”

“Just a natural talent then?” I said. He didn’t reply but he did smile. 

We both slowed down as we reached the school gates, not that we were walking all that fast to start with. I could hear the playground. The unmistakable sound of hundreds of teenagers bitching and laughing about the weekend, talking about the things they did, the parties they had and didn’t invited us to. Even with Daryl being later than usual, we were still early. We always left early and walked slow, that was our routine. It gave us time to talk as the sun came up. Daryl looked at me with the same kind of look I imagined inmates on death row. 

It was best to walk in through the back gates, with your head down so that nobody makes eye contact with you. Sometimes that’s enough to make them forget that they hate you.

We have most of the same classes but Daryl takes Shop where I have Speech and Debate. He is good with his hands, he gets how things work, it may be his best class. He ain’t good at taking the stuff he makes home, though. Maybe he’s worried his dad’ll break it, maybe he’s too much of a perfectionist and winds up hating the finished product. Whatever the reason, he gives a lot of it to me. I have a reading light by my bed, some bookends on a shelf and a birdhouse outside my window all thanks to his final projects.

We meet for lunch. I pull leftovers I’d managed to salvage from the diner the night before out of my bag. “Here’s a bonus of not walking home together,” I said. “We got lunch today.”

Daryl grins. “You didn’t eat them already?”

“Nah,” I said. “Didn’t feel right pigging out alone.”

I passed him a burger, I didn’t know what kind, I’d just grabbed any two I could before they were thrown out. It was cold and the bun was soggy but Daryl still closed his eyes in appreciation. It made me smile to see him so content with such a terrible burger. That boy could eat anything. I ate my own and didn’t even notice how much I wasn’t enjoying it. When we were done I’d managed to grab a leftover piece of pie too. 

“Shit,” he said. “You did good.”

“There’s only one,” I said. “But don’t worry, you can have it.”

“Nah,” he said and stood up. I was shocked, I’d never known Daryl to walk away from free pie before, but then he returned carrying two forks he’d stolen from the kitchens and it became clear. “We share. Like always.”

He held one out to me and started digging in with the other. It was infinitely better than the burgers had been.

It wasn’t long before we came to regret how much we’d eaten. We had Gym class next and I hadn’t run more than two steps before I started feeling queasy. I wasn’t great at team sports at the best of times, given that it was rare for anyone else on the team to like me enough to include me, but that day I was particularly bad. Someone passed to me and I don’t know if it was the shock of being acknowledged as part of the team or if it was the day-old burger and half a piece of pie sitting in my stomach, but whatever it was made me slow. I caught the ball. I froze. 

And then a heavy body slammed into me. And then I slammed into the ground.

A shrill whistle lingered on in the now silent hall as people stopped running to look at our Gym teacher, Mr Ellis. I felt a sting and tasted metal. I propped myself up on my elbow top wipe the back of my hand across my mouth. Blood. From a wound on my lip I could already feel was starting to throb. 

"Watch where you're going!" Connor loomed over me and yeller. 

"Sorry," I mumbled, still touching my lip and trying to assess the damage.

"She had the ball, dickhead!” Daryl’s anger took the tension in the room to a whole new level. I sat up properly. He was pacing. I knew that meant he was trying his best not to hit Connor. One more fight and he’d get suspended. I tried to tell him to stop but it was hard to get the words out through my now swollen lip. Daryl got right up close to him, pointed in his face. "That was a foul an’ you know it.” 

Mr Ellis was hovering as close to Daryl as he could get, ready to restrain him. But nobody was doing the same to Connor and I could tell by the glint in his eye that Connor was the one who really needed restraining. He was getting exactly what he wanted from the situation. A circle of classmates and teammates alike formed around us.

"Daryl..." I said, a quiet warning. He looks at me.

"It was a foul, Mr Ellis,” he said through gritted teeth. "He hurt her on purpose.” 

"No I didn’t,” Connor said. “She was in my way.”

“Jackass,” Daryl shook his head.

Connor turned to everyone else. They were grinning too, willing a fight to break out. "Did anyone else see me "foul" Natalie?" he asked them.

“It’s Naomi, dickbrain,” Daryl corrected him.

“Naomi Dickbrain,” Connor smiled. “Unusual name. That ‘cause she’s a whore like her mom?”

“Alright that’s enough!” Mr Ellis grabbed Daryl just before he lunged for Connor’s throat. A few of Connor’s friends had to join in, more than there needed to be. I could tell they were enjoying holding him back. Daryl struggled against them. Mr Ellis looked at Connor and said, “Connor, apologize.”

“I’m sorry,” Connor said, incencerly. 

“Alright,” Mr Ellis nodded, thinking he was regaining control of his class. "Now, if Connor says it wasn't a foul, and none of the rest of you saw it-"

“I think I’m owed an apology too, Sir,” Connor said. 

“Look, it was clearly an accident,” Mr Ellis said. “And she’s not that badly hurt, so-”

“No,” Connor said. “Not from her. From him. ”

Daryl, who had only just stopped struggling, started trying to break free again. 

“From… from Daryl?” Mr Ellis said. He sounded worried. He should have been. 

"Yes,” Connor said. “It was an unprovoked outburst. And I think it would do Daryl some good to apologize so he doesn’t end up with the same anger issues as his dumb, hick brother.”

Daryl glared at him and stayed resolutely silent.

“Connor, that’s enough!” Mr Ellis warned but he was too busy restraining Daryl to do anything about it. It wasn’t enough. Connor wasn’t done. 

“You’re gonna end up just like him,” Connor said. “Nothing but a trailer trash piece of shit who’ll never amount to anything.”

Daryl tried to get him, letting out an incoherent roar of fury.

“Connor!” It was all Mr Ellis could manage, he was out of breath from holding Daryl back. 

“You’ll end up in the cell next to him soon,” Connor said. “And when they let you out you’ll hit the bottle like your old man. The world would be a much better place if you and your whole cockroach family were-”

Dead. 

He was going to say “dead”. 

But he never did because I got to my feet and punched him in the mouth. 

It was a blur. One minute I was on the floor, a hand over my bust up lip. The next, I was on my feet with throbbing knuckles and Connor was the one on the ground. He went down easier than I thought he would. He looked shocked. Everyone did. Everyone, that is, except Daryl, who threw his head back and started to laugh. 

Daryl

I waited for her outside detention, I had nowhere else to be and I feel like the least you can do for someone who’s in detention for punching another kid in the mouth for you is walk them home. Also, this was the first time she’d been in detention, usually it was me sitting in there and her waiting outside for me to be done getting in trouble for dumb shit. I liked the role reversal. Connor was in there with her, I could see his ratty little face through the window. Mr Ellis hadn’t been stupid enough to punish one of them and not the other, I’d only escaped because I hadn’t technically punched anyone. I’d just tried to and you don’t get in trouble for that. Too much admin.

“Hey,” I yelled, at Connor as he came out of the building just before she did. He avoided looking at me. “What’s wrong? You got nothing else to say you little prick?”

He scurried past me, never as big or as clever on his own as he was with all of his friends cheering him on. I noticed they weren’t anywhere to be seen now and there was a bruise forming on his jaw. 

Naomi came out next, a scab on her lower lip. She brightened when she saw me. “You waited for me?”

“No actually, I’m waiting for Connor,” I said, loudly so that he could hear me. “We’re going bowling.” 

“Shut up you dumb hick,” he said, quietly but not quietly enough. 

“Hey, what’d you say?” I called over to him. 

“Yeah,” Naomi joined in. “What was that?”

He looked away from us both as we laughed. Someone came to pick him up in a shiny car, probably either his Momma or his Dad. We were still laughing as it drove away and I wouldn’t have switched places with him for all the fancy cars in the world. 

“You ready?” I asked her. 

“Yeah,” she nodded. “Let’s go.”

She had an armful of books like always. She always had too many damn books for her bag.

“You working tonight?” I asked. 

“No,” she said. “Night off. Thank God.”

“How’s the hand?” I asked. She switched her personal library to under one arm and held out her right hand, wiggled her fingers just to test them. 

“Hurts a bit,” she said. “And I think his teeth got one of my knuckles. I dunno how you can fight so much and still have both hands.”

“Lemme see,” I took hold of it. It was warmer, softer, than I thought it would be. There was a small graze across the knuckle of her index finger. “You’ll live.”

I let go of her hand as she looked up at me. Her smile was smaller than usual and I could tell it hurt her cut lip. 

“Might not,” she said, looking away from me. “Might get infected with his dumbassery.”

“Maybe,” I said seriously. “If it does I’ll amputate it for ya.” 

“Appreciated,” she said. 

It was a nice time of day to walk back. The sun was starting to set. It was cooler. On the way we laughed about Connor and his dumb friends. She told me about how much he’d snivelled when they’d been pulled in to see the headmaster, the way he’d almost cried his way through detention. By the end of it she almost sounded like she felt bad for him. I told her all of my best detention stories and, even though she knew them all already, she still laughed with me.

The sun was almost set by the time we got back. Someone’s shitty loud music was already blasting from somewhere in the park. Beer bottles rattled. The air was heavy with weed. 

“Oh shit,” she whispered, coming to a complete stop. I glanced her way, saw the fear on her face. She got so pale so fast it made my own heartbeat speed up.

“What?” I asked as I followed where she was looking. 

Cops. 

Two of them. Not unusual for ‘round her. But they were at her door and that weren’t normal. She looked at me and for the first time in a long time she looked scared. I walked closer to her. There was a woman at the door in plain clothes, the two uniformed officers with her were looking around the side, trying to peer in the windows. 

“Can I help you?” she sounded more confident than she looked. They turned to look at us. 

“Do you live here?” the one at the door asked while the other two quickly stopped snooping. She said it with a smile she hadn’t had before. People in other trailers were peering out of their windows, some of them came out to gawp in person. Cops ain’t always to be trusted and you gotta work out why they’re knocking on doors if you have something to hide. Which most everybody did. I was willing to be whoever had brought out their dope was regretting starting to smoke so early in the evening. 

“I do,” Naomi nodded. 

“You’re Naomi Payton?” one of the cops ask. 

“Yes, ma’am,” Naomi replied, as polite as ever. I looked at her, saw one of her hands starting to shake. “This about my Momma? Is she dead?”

Her voice cracked. The sound cut me deep in my chest.

“Not that we know of,” one of the cops quickly assured her. “We just wanted to see if she’d come home yet?”

“No,” Naomi admitted, she couldn’t lie now that she’d already revealed she didn’t know if her Momma was even alive. 

“No,” the woman in the grey coat repeated. She said it in a gentle whisper but Naomi still flinched like she knew what was coming. “Well then, Naomi, my name is Miss Buchanan. I left a message on your phone the other week, I’m from Social Services. We’re here to take you-”

“No,” I said before I’d even realised I had said it. They all looked at me in surprise, like they hadn’t noticed me before now. 

"Who is this?" Miss Buchanan asked Naomi, like I couldn’t speak for myself.

"Daryl," Naomi said. Her voice was quite, shaken. I think she was answering the question but hearing her say my name like that felt like she was calling for help.

"She's staying with us," I said and I stepped in front of her, trying to get between Naomi and the people who wanted to take her away. "My dad's looking after her, he told y'all that last time you were here."

"Ah," Miss Buchanan looked down at her clipboard. "Daryl… Dixon, I presume?"

I nodded. 

The cops exchanged a look. 

"Can we speak to your father?" one asked. 

I nodded. "Yeah, right this way."

Naomi let out a sigh of relief. I swallowed as I lead them to my place. Dad had stormed out after fighting with Merle and I couldn’t say how long he'd be gone. For the first time in my life, I prayed my dad was in. I prayed he was awake. I prayed he was waiting for us.

"Dad!" I yelled when we were in sight of my place. Nothing moved behind the windows. "Dad!"

I called for him again as I opened the door. I could feel the silence grow behind me. And then a voice from deep inside my home. "He ain't here, dipshit. He'll be back at the watering hole."

Merle.

I'd damn near forgotten he was back. 

He burst out of the shower, his hair wet and his lower half wrapped in a stained brown towel. As he leaned out of the doorway to yell at me some more, he clocked the police officers. I saw the slight panic in his eyes. Usually cops at our door were looking for him.

"The hell is this?" he asked them. 

"I assume this is not your father, Daryl," Miss Buchanan said, looking at Merle like he’d taken a dump in front of her. 

"No, I'm his brother," Merle said, looking her up and down. "The hell are you? He in some kind of trouble?"

Miss Buchanan didn’t answer him. She just turned to Naomi and said in her quiet, gentle, patronising-as-hell voice, “I’m sorry, Naomi. If we can’t prove there’s a legal adult looking after you, we’re going to have to take you in to care.”

“No,” I said again, louder than before. Naomi didn’t say anything. She just stared at the ground, breathing hard. I could feel my hands shaking. I was sweating even though it was starting to cool down.

“Just for now,” Ms Buchanan said. “Just until we review your situation.”

“You can’t do that,” I told them. But I knew they could. And we both knew “reviewing” Naomi’s situation would take until she turned 18 and then she’d be in some halfway house god knows where and we’d never see each other again. I felt sick. I balled my hands into fists and wanted to use them. 

“All she needs is an adult?” Merle asked. 

Silence. 

Everyone looked at him. Ms Buchanan raised an eyebrow. 

“Pardon?”

“All she needs is an adult and then she can stay?” Merle asked.

“Yes, Mr Dixon,” she said. “That is correct.”

“I’m an adult,” Merle shrugged. “I’ll look after her til her Momma’s home. Y’all need me to sign something?” 

The silence this time was longer. I held my breath, hardly daring to hope that Merle’s offer was real. He’d turned 18 in juvie and they’d been too lazy to transfer him to an adult prison to serve out the rest of his time. I’d forgotten that. And I didn’t know what that meant for his record, or what would show up if they were to go and run a background check on him.

“You’re an adult?” Miss Buchanan said. 

“You need to see my ID?” Merle asked. He lifted his wallet from the counter by the door and passed it out to her. When I saw he’d handed over his real one and not one of his fakes, I knew he was actually trying to help.

Miss Buchanan stared at it for a while. She passed it to the cops who stared at it too. Then, she handed it back, her already thin lips were just one line. 

“Are you comfortable with Mr Dixon being your temporary guardian?” Ms Buchanan asked Naomi. 

“Yes,” Naomi said immediately.

Another pause.

“Alright,” she said. “We’ll review your situation in a week, Naomi. But for now, you have to make sure that you’re living under the same roof as Mr Dixon here, no staying at your old place, okay?”

I almost asked her to repeat it. 

Naomi nodded a lot. “You might if I pop home for a bit?” she asked. “I just need to get my stuff.”

“Of course,” Ms Buchanan said. “We’ll come with you and then we’ll be on our way. Mr Dixon, I suggest you get dressed.”

“Will do boss lady,” Merle grinned at her as she left. 

I watched them escort Naomi back to her place. 

“Thank you,” I said to Merle and found it harder to speak than I thought. 

“No problem, little brother,” Merle said, turning around to find some clothes. “She’s a good kid.”

I sat on the steps up to the door and waited in case they didn’t bring her back. But they did. She was less pale and not shaking anymore, carrying a trash bag full of things she might need. They said goodbye to all of us with a promise to return that sounded more like a threat and then Naomi came inside and we shut the door.

The first thing she did was drop the bag and throw her arms around Merle. “Thank you,” she said. “Thank you, thank you, thank you.”

“Hey,” Merle laughed, taken aback by her sudden show of affection. He patted her on the back. “It’s okay, kid. It’s okay. If you’re family to my brother, you’re family to me.”

She let go and stepped back. I could see that she was crying. I put a hand on her shoulder. “Hey,” I said. “You okay?”

She nodded. “I thought I was a goner,” it came out as a whisper. 

I pulled her towards me. Held her tight.

Merle grinned at me like a damn idiot so I flipped him off. I was smiling too, though, I couldn’t help it. 

“Alright,” Merle said. “If I’m gonna be the daddy ‘round here, there’s going to be a few house rules. First off, no sleeping in the same bed.

We let go of each other pretty fast. 

“I will be taking the master bedroom and you two can have the bunks. I’ll let you fight it out for the top one,” he said. “Secondly, you have a curfew of whenever you damn well please but if I’m asleep you both better keep your damn mouths shut. Third, if I have a lady round I expect you both to piss off. And fourth, I’m starving so get me the damn phone and we’ll order a damn pizza.”

I didn’t ask where he got the money for takeout food so soon after getting out of prison. I didn’t want to know. And I didn’t much care. Naomi was smiling again. 

Merle ordered three large pizzas and said we could take the rest for lunch. We ate until we felt sick. 

“Hey, what happened to your face?” Merle asked, pointing a crust at her scabby lip. 

“Got in a fight,” she said with a mouthful of pizza. 

“She punched some douchebag right in the mouth,” I told him. 

“Well shit,” Merle raised his eyebrows, impressed. “You really do belong here.”

I’d never loved him more.

Merle went out that night, we didn’t ask where, we just did some homework and watched a movie until we were both tired. I took the top bunk because she said she was worried about falling out of it. That one was usually Merle’s, when he’d been around, but now our Dad was gone he’d be able to take the double bed. I guess if our old man stumbled home any time soon we’d have to work something else out. But that was a problem for another night. 

Naomi fell asleep and I listened to the sound of her breathing. I wondered if we’d done the right thing. Even if her Momma did come back, she wasn’t good enough to look after Naomi. I appreciated what Merle had done but he was no angel either. And if my dad came back too drunk to realise she wasn’t one of his kids, there was every chance she’d wind up taking a beating. But if they took her away, where would she go? I thought about living in this place alone. I thought about her without me and me without her. It made me feel sick again, sweaty. Made my hands start to shake. Like Dad without his drink or Naomi’s momma when she couldn’t afford another hit. Everyone here had their addictions, something they couldn’t live without. Something that made this place bearable. I guess I didn’t realize it, but she was mine.

Chapter 4: Momma

Naomi

The Dixon boys lived like wild boars. They ate a lot, they fought a lot and they didn’t clean shit. I think Daryl tried for my sake but it wasn’t something he was used to or good at. I was grateful for it, though. I was grateful for all of it. The end of the week rushed towards us like a freight train, Ms Buchanan and pale grey coat speeding with it. That week we went to the top of our hill less than we ever had. The freedom of having both of our places to ourselves meant we didn’t need to get some air on top of that log. Some nights Merle was out and we’d have the place to ourselves. Some nights he’d stay in and teach us card games. It was nicer than I thought to have him around. He was more relaxed at home than I was used to seeing him, wasn’t trying to fight anybody.

Daryl and I sat on the steps outside his door as the sun came up, listening to Merle’s snores from inside the trailer. It had become part of our morning ritual now that we didn’t have to meet each other to walk to school. When one of us was awake the other one would get a smack in the face with a pillow. Then we were both up and the day could start. Everything was as quiet as it got at that time. Mostly everyone was sleeping, even the babies that cried through the night had screamed themselves to sleep by then. It was cool, with the sun just coming up and the light made everything look a little bit nicer. Not how it usually did. It was like living in a dream where it was just Daryl and me. 

“You wanna hunt today?” I asked. It was Thursday. Daryl looked at me like it was him I’d set a trap for instead of rabbits. 

“We ain’t got time,” he said. “We got school. All the good light’ll be gone when we get back.”

“Yeah...” I said, hesitating. “We… we could skip it.”

“Skip school?” his look changed to one of mock concern. He pressed the back of his hand to my forehead like he was checking for a fever. “You feelin’ okay?” 

“Yes,” I rolled my eyes. “It just means a lot that you guys would let me stay here. I wanna contribute.”

I didn’t mention that it was nearly the end of the week and that might mean the end of my time with them. Friday loomed over me like a debt.

“You ain’t gotta worry about that,” he said. “What’s yours is mine, you know that.”

“But it ain’t just you,” I said. “It’s Merle too. And I know he weren’t that fond of me before all this, so-”

“When’d he say that?”

“He didn’t.” I shrugged. “Just a feeling I get.”

“Merle ain’t that friendly to anyone,” Daryl brushed it off. “Don’t take any of his shit personal. He likes you, he just-”

He stopped himself so abruptly it left his mouth hanging open. It was the first time I knew that he was holding something back from me. I didn’t like it. It wasn’t us. We could talk about everything, no matter how dumb. 

“Just what?” I prompted. He shrank away from me a little and it was a while before he spoke again. 

“He thinks you think you’re too good for… for a place like this,” he said it like he was embarrassed. I felt my face getting hot too. Something struck a nerve in me.

“Why?” I demanded. Daryl stayed silent. “‘Cause I wanna leave it? ‘Cause I don’t wanna sit around here all day getting drunk like your Daddy or shooting up like my Momma?”

He said nothing. I stood up. 

“We should all wanna leave this place,” I said. “Everyone here deserves more than a place like this. I ain’t a snob for wanting more.”

I walked quickly away from him. I heard him scramble to his feet, the rush of his footfall as he ran after me. He caught my arm. I stopped. “I know you ain’t,” he said. He was closer to me than I thought he would be. “I know you ain’t. Merle just don’t get it, is all. He ain’t smart like you.”

“He ain’t dumb,” I said. “He can’t be if he’s already making money a week after getting outta prison.”

“He’s a different kinda smart then,” Daryl said. “He knows to take advantage of the place he’s in and he ain’t looking to change it. Not like you.”

I sighed. It really bothered me that Merle had made assumptions like that about me. But I guess I’d made my share about him too. “Do you think I’m a snob?”

“Nah,” Daryl said immediately. “Wouldn’t be here if you was. I ain’t arguing with you anymore today, though. Let’s play hooky.”

“We going hunting?”

“Yeah. I’ll get my things.”

He let go of my arm and went back inside, quietly so as not to wake Merle. I waited outside, listening as the people around me started to wake up. They weren’t really his things, they were his dad’s but I’d never known his dad to use them so we’d stopped thinking of them as borrowed. He had a lot of hunting stuff and I wondered if he’d been more like Daryl before Daryl’s Momma died. I wondered what she’d been like, if she’d have liked me. If things would’ve been different for Daryl and Merle with her around. 

He came back out, crossbow slung over one shoulder and a canvas bag of knives in the other hand, which he promptly handed to me. 

When we were younger, we'd had more traps set up. We'd needed them more and smaller things were harder to catch. Since taking the job at the diner, we'd had to hunt less out of necessity. I had access to free food and money to spare if Momma paid the rent on time. It was still fun to do from time to time and good to make sure we weren't getting rusty, you never knew when times were going to get lean again. 

The forest was quiet, which was how we liked it. It makes your thoughts louder and the rest of the world hush up. we rarely spoke on our hunting trips. There wasn't always a need to in a friendship like ours. He can tell me things with a look that I wouldn't understand as fast in a written paragraph from someone else. It was effortless. If I wanted to tell him something, it was easy with a gesture or a pointed glance. After a while it always seemed like something in our brains synced up, I think about something and he'd move, having had the same thought. 

Afterwards, when everything went wrong, the forests always made me think of him. Made me calm.

That day we caught a turkey, big and plump and far from whatever farm it had wandered away from. We took it home and plucked it. I sliced its head off and then ran the blade in one clean line down the middle. 

"Maybe you'll be a surgeon when you grow up," Daryl said, watching me peel back the flesh. 

I scooped out some of its guts and threw them into the sink. "This ain't what surgeons do," I said. “They tend to keep all the guts inside.”

"Nah," he said. "That's what a big, fancy school is for. To teach you how to put it all back in right."

I laughed. “Well maybe I’ll put turkey-butchering on my college applications.”

I always found it easier to scoop out their insides with my hands, make sure I was getting it all. When I was done, we seasoned the turkey and stuck it in the oven. 

"It's like having Thanksgiving in April," Daryl smiled.

"Kings don't eat as good as we do," I said and he nodded in agreement.

The front door opened. Both of us turned to see Merle in the doorway, mouth agape. 

"What in the holy hell is this?" Merle asked, staring at the feathers, the blood, the guts. "You a pair of serial killers? This some Bonnie and Clyde shit?"

I see now how the blood and the guts might have made a stronger impression than the feathers.

"It’s a turkey, dumbass," Daryl gestured to the oven. "We caught it."

"Okay," Merle nodded. "Why?"

"Dinner."

"Well shit," Merle chuckled. "Is this how you live when I’m not here? This is some caveman shit, bro. You help with this too?"

He looked at me.

"Yes."

"It was mostly her," Daryl said. "She gutted it too, takes way less time than when I do it." 

"He's being modest," I said. "He's a better tracker than me. And he's the one who shot it."

"I could only shoot it because you distracted it for me. Also, you should see her traps, Merle. She can build the best traps outta nothing." 

He beamed at me like me and my traps had single handedly solved world hunger. 

Merle laughed for about a minute and then said, "You two are feral."

Daryl grabbed a handful of turkey guts from the sink and threw it at him. He ducked and it hit the wall behind him with a loud, wet splat. We all watched it slide slowly down the wall, leaving a crimson trail of blood in its wake. 

"It's like a goddamn horror film in here," Merle said. "And I ain't cleaning it."

"We'll clean it," I promised. Daryl sighed. I gave him a look. 

"We caught and cooked the damn thing," he complained.

"Yeah," I agreed. "Which makes this our mess. Get scrubbing."

I thought he'd complain more than he did but after a few grumbles he got over himself and got stuck in. He's so good with practical things, does what needs to be done and enjoys seeing the result when he puts the effort in. By the time we finished, the place was cleaner than it was when we started. 

The turkey was almost done, we threw in some of the few vegetables in the house to roast alongside it. We let Merle be the one to carve it up, still laughing at us for going out hunting in the first place. I wanted to remind him that Daryl and I wouldn’t have learned how to do any of this shit if there’d been an adult with a brain around to make sure we didn’t have to but then I remembered that Merle himself was only just an adult. It would be unfair to hold him to the standard of a parent when he’d just been a kid himself.

The turkey was good. It had been a while since we’d had one. 

"This is some good shit," Merle nodded his appreciation, mouth full. "But you guys don’t have to do this shit no more. I got money."

"What kinda money?' Daryl asked. 

"I got a job, I told you that. Good pay, you don’t have to bring dead things home for dinner any more. No more of that cold diner food, either.”

He waggled a turkey bone at me.

“The pie’s good though,” Daryl said, looking worried that his brother was cutting off pie supply. I gave him a reassuring nod so he’d know that, whatever Merle said, leftover pie would still be his. 

“I can get you a whole damn pie,” Merle said. “All for yourselves. Hell, one each if it means that much to ya.”

That was a bold promise to make, given how much pie Daryl could put away when given half the chance.

“You get that kinda money from your new job?” I asked. Merle nodded. 

“Yeah I got pie money,” he said. “I got all sortsa money now.”

“How’d you get it?” 

“What?”

“The job. How’d you get it?”

There was an uncomfortable silence where I thought he wasn’t going to answer me. I watched him glance at Daryl and then back at me. Then he shrugged, “Some friends of mine hooked me up.” He looked at Daryl, “I can hook you up too, little brother.”

A cold, hard knot formed in my stomach. The thought of Daryl wandering down the same shady path as his brother made me queasy. 

“Maybe…” was all Daryl said, it was non-committal. But not enough to stop the fears bubbling up inside me. “What are we gonna do when Dad gets back?” 

I think he was trying to change the subject, to stop me from stumbling on to something that might have been turning in his mind for a while. But I knew Daryl’s mind better than my own, I knew the temptation Merle was putting in front of him.  

“Leave him to me,” Merle replied and reached over me to cut himself more turkey. He smelled of sweat and cigarettes. “And you won’t have to worry about any of that when I got my own place.”

“What?” Daryl put down his fork.

“I’ll be getting my own place soon. And I’ll take you with me when I go,” he promised. “Both of you.”

It was generous of him, to extend the invite to me. He didn’t know shit about me, other than that I was friends with his brother, temporarily homeless and able to pluck and gut a turkey. It was suspiciously generous. 

“Where you moving to?” I asked him.

“City, probably,” he said with a shrug,

Daryl turned to me with hope in his eyes, “You have been talking about the City…”

I ignored him, leaning closer to Merle. I wondered if the features he shared with his brother would make it easy for me to read him too. “What is the job?” 

“Supply and demand,” Merle grinned, not even trying to hide things from me.

I knew what that meant. 

My Momma was part of the ‘demand’ group of Merle’s new business, whatever men like him were supplying was the reason she’d up and disappeared, the reason we had no money, the reason for the needle marks in her arm.

“So it’s dangerous?” I said. I felt so angry but I had nowhere to put it. I knew if I pushed Merle to hard I risked of ending up out on my ass. 

“Only if you’re stupid,” Merle said. “Which Daryl ain’t. Are ya?”

“No,” Daryl said but he would not look at me. I sighed. 

“Well there we go then. Sorted.” Merle sounded happy. “When I got my own place, we’ll go and when you’re ready to work, bro, you just let me know.”

“Will do,” Daryl said. Merle stood up, his plate empty and his stomach full. He grinned at me again. It didn’t seem all that friendly. 

"I'm off for a drink," he said. "Thank you both for dinner. You're the weirdest kids I ever met."

He laughed to himself again. I listened to his footsteps fade, heard his bike drive off in the distance. Then I turned to Daryl, who's eyes were on his half eaten dinner. "Promise me you’ll be careful.*

"What?" he said but I knew we both knew what I was talking about.

"With whatever Merle’s trying to get you involved in."

"I ain’t dumb," he scowled at the table.

"No. You ain't." I said. "But still. Promise me."

He looked me in the eye. "I promise."

I felt so much better. Because Daryl Dixon hadn't ever broken a promise to me. 

Daryl

Naomi’s Momma came home just before our week was up. It was good timing, I guess, because it meant there'd be someone there to talk to the social service lady when she came back. But it felt like the end of everything good and the start of something terrible. 

We only knew she was back because there was a light on in Naomi's house one night. She stared at it for a while, she'd been talking about some book she'd been reading and I was only half listening but I noticed when she stopped talking. I think it was mid-sentence and mid-word. I remember looking at her, wide eyes in the dark. I followed where she was looking. Saw the light. Said nothing. Just waited for her to speak. 

Eventually, she turned to me and said, “I’ll get my things then.”

The way she said it, so quiet and sad, was like someone put a needle in my gut. 

“You don’t have to,” I said, although I knew she’d disagree. I wanted to say it anyway so I knew that she knew she had a choice. “You can stay as long as you like.”

“She might need sorting out,” she said. Her eyes were back on that light in her house. “Who knows what state she’s in.”

There it was, so sad again. Needle in my heart. 

I didn’t say anything this time, I just nodded and watched her turn around and pack up all of her things into the trash bag she’d brought them in. 

“Tell Merle I said goodbye,” she told me. It sounded weirdly final.

“Tell him yourself,” I said. “You ain’t gonna swing by no more?”

“‘’Course I will,” she smiled and shook her head. “Sorry, I dunno why I’m being a dumbass about this. Guess I kinda got used to being here.”

“When Merle gets his own place,” I said. “We’ll both be there. This is just temporary.”

She smiled but I knew she didn’t believe it was going to happen. I didn’t want to start a fight with her, not now, so I didn’t say anything else about it. I went with her when she went home. She didn't ask me to and I didn't ask for permission but she didn't stop me neither. Miss Payton wouldn't be surprised. In those days, Naomi and I came as a pair. When we walked it was like we had one shadow. 

It became obvious when we got close that her door was open. Light spilled out onto the ground where there a few empty beer bottles there, which hadn’t been there a few hours before. Naomi slowed down when she saw them. Her breathing became less easy. Cigarette smoke wafted out the door towards us.  

“Come on in from out there, sweetheart,” a man’s voice, definitely not her Momma. I saw Naomi’s bottom lip start to tremble. She took a deep breath and stepped in. I followed close behind. I wished I brought Merle’s gun. I knew where he kept it. 

“What do you want?” Naomi asked. There was a muscular and heavily tattooed man sitting down at her kitchen table, smoking her Momma’s cigarettes into her Momma’s ash tray. He looked at me. 

“What’s this, you brought back up?” he asked. 

“A friend of mine,” Naomi said and then repeated her own question, stronger than before. “What do you want?”

“Brought your Momma home,” he said. He stood up, nearly the height of the whole room. He gestured to where Miss Payton was lying passed out and wrapped in her own vomit-covered faux fur coat on the sofa. I saw Naomi panic as she looked over, until she realised that you could see she was still breathing. “Don’t that deserve a thank you?”

“Thank you,” she said. She sounded timid in a way that made me angry. Not with her. But with this colossal man threatening her in her own home. 

He smiled. But it weren’t nice. 

“She owes me money,” he said. “And I ain’t leaving ‘til I get it.”

“What does she owe you?”

“Two hundred dollars,” he said. “She thought she could cut and run with my takings. So me and you are going to come to some kind of arrangement over how you’re gonna help pay her debt. You gonna work for it like her?” 

“She’s fifteen, man,” I heard myself say, my anger spilling out of my mouth. 

He looked at me with a smirk and a shrug. “A lot of gents are into that.”

I felt sick.

“I can pay,” Naomi said quickly. “I got money.”

His eyebrows raised. “You got money?”

“Yes,” she said and went to the biscuit tin in the kitchen where I knew she hid all of her money from the diner in case her mom stole it. I also knew that was the money she’d saved for rent gone in one fell swoop. She took out a bundle of notes and handed it to him.

He took it from her and started counting through every note. “How’d you get money?”

“I got a job,” she said. “It don’t pay that well but I got enough for you to leave.”

I stepped closer to her, slightly between her and the big, tattooed man, in case he took offence to what she’d just said. His eyes fixed one me. He laughed. “Stand down, kid, I ain’t gonna punch your girlfriend,” he told me. “She’s been honest and given me what I came for. Our business is done here.”

“Thank you,” she almost whispered it. 

“Pleasure doing business with you,” he smiled. “When your Momma wakes up, tell her to get in touch.” 

And he was gone, the stench of his cigarettes still hung in the air. Naomi’s hands shook when she put her biscuit tin away. 

“You okay?” I asked her in a whisper in case that man was still loitering nearby. 

“Yes,” she whispered. “He’s been here before but… not for a while. Will you help me get her over to the bed?”

She was looking at her Momma, still passed out on the couch. I nodded. Not because I wanted to help Miss Payton but because I wanted to help Naomi. I wanted Miss Payton to leave again and not come back and for Naomi to come back to living with me. But I knew that weren’t going to be possible. Not for a while. So lifted her by the arms and Naomi took her legs and between us we got her onto the bed. Naomi took off her vomit-coated coat and wrapped a clean blanket around her.

“Thank you,” she whispered to me. I didn’t like it because it reminded me of the way she’d just spoken to that pimp. I never wanted to be the reason she felt that small. 

“You ain’t gotta thank me,” I told her. “You want me to stay over?”

Please say yes. 

She shook her head. 

"No, I got a lot to do," she said. "I need to take care of Momma and she'll be mad if she wakes up and you're still here."

"Okay," I said as she walked me back towards the door. "Well you know where I am if you change your mind."

"Thanks Daryl," this time she thanked me with a smile. I stepped out onto the top step and turned to look back at her. Then she did something she didn't usually do when we said goodbye to each other, she threw her arms around me and whispered, "Thanks for everything."

"You ain't ever gotta thank me," I said, feeling like I was repeating myself. This time it came out a little more gruff, like there was something stuck in my throat. I hugged her tight and then she let go. 

That first night she wasn't with us I lay awake and all I could hear was Merle snoring and I missed the sound of her breathing. I thought about her, wondered if she was lying awake too. If she'd managed to clean up her Momma, what would happen when she woke up. The whole place felt colder. Her smell was still there.

The next day she didn't come to school. I waited for ages. Then I hurried along the road in case I was the one who was late and she'd gone on without me. But she wasn't there. Or in any of her classes. 

I skipped the last one and walked home, where I found her sitting on the steps outside her home. Inside, everything seemed quiet. I wondered if her Momma had taken off again. I waved. She didn't even blink. I stood right in front of her and she barely saw me.

“You okay?” I asked. “You didn’t show for school today.”

She looked up at me, dazed, like she hadn’t expected me to be there or thought I was some kind of hallucination. She was pale. There was a horrible moment where ice-cold fear gripped my heart and I thought that somehow some of her Momma’s drugs had wound up in her system. 

No.

Not her. 

Not my Naomi. 

She weren’t like that and she would never let herself be. 

“Daryl…” she blinked up at me a few times. I saw her hands tug on her jeans, holding them up and away from her skin. I don’t think she knew she was doing it and I wondered if there were any fresh burns there. There was an anger inside me that wanted to lock her Momma up inside that trailer and burn the whole thing to the ground with her inside it. 

I sat down on the step beside her. “Noami,” I said. “You okay?”

“She’s pregnant,” Naomi said. Her wide eyes gleamed in the light. It didn’t make sense to me. 

“What?”

“My Momma. She’s pregnant.”

I was so shocked I didn’t know what  to say. So I said, “You sure?”

She swallowed down a lump in her throat. “Yup.”

“She keeping it?”

“If it survives,” she shrugged. “If she can stay sober for long enough.”

I relaxed, just a tiny bit. Sounds bad to say but it seemed unlikely that Miss Payton would stay sober long enough to have a healthy baby.

“What about the dad?” I asked, mostly because I had nothing else to say. 

“Doubt she knows" Naomi said. "She never knew mine.'

"Don't matter, you turned out perfect." I said.

I don't think she was listening. "Probably some John who paid her more if he didn’t have to wear a condom.”

“Well," I shrugged. "Dads are overrated."

She finally looked at me. Her eyes were bright, tears about to spill over. “It’s all over Daryl.”

I felt my heartbeat speed up. Cold panic. “What do you mean?”

“School, college, getting a job and getting out of here. It’s all over. I can’t do it now.”

“Yes you can, ‘course you can," I said quickly, shocked she could even be thinking things like that. "You’re the smartest person I know. And that includes all of those dumbass teachers.”

She shook her head. “I can’t leave that kid with her. I’m gonna have to look after it. Make sure she’s okay.”

Naomi looked too young and too small in that moment to be talking about taking on something so big. “That ain’t your problem.”

“I can’t turn my back, Daryl.”

“She raised you right.” I said. I nearly said perfect again but I stopped myself. "She'll do fine."

“She’s worse now. She’s so much worse than when I was a kid. A new one doesn’t stand a chance.”

It sounded like she'd reached a decision and there was nothing I could do about it. So I made my own decision. “Well you ain’t doing it alone.”

“Daryl-” She closed her eyes, two tears slipped out. 

“No. I’m not having you throw everything away for some kid that ain’t even here yet," I said firmly. "You’ve worked too damn hard. You’ve got too much to give. World needs people like you running the show.”

“I can’t-”

“You can. I’ll help," I promised. "Merle’s gonna help. There ain’t a person here you haven’t helped in some way. Folks are gonna want to return the favour.”

She didn't speak for a moment, just wiped away a few tears with the back of her sleeve. I put an arm around her and she rested her head on my shoulder. More things were decided in that moment than I think she knew. We walked up our hill together, looked out over Atlanta as the sunlight failed and the lights came on. I promised her over and over again that she'd get everything she wanted, everything she'd worked for. 

When I got home, Merle was in. 

"You're late home little brother," he said. I ignored it. 

"You got a job for me?" I asked him. He smiled. 

"I sure do."

That night, I lay awake and thought about Naomi. The life we could have, the future I could build her, the baby we might raise.

Chapter 5: Birthdays and Bikes

Naomi

He knocked on the door. Softer than usual. Probably worried that Momma was sleeping, which she wasn’t. She was half-awake, propped up in her bed by a mountain of pillows I’d built beneath her. She’d spent the last week shifting between sleeping for fourteen hours at a time and having bursts of energy where she’d scrub the place from top to bottom, The first couple of times she did it, I thought she was looking for my stash of secret money that I’d already used to pay off her debts. She made us both go to church, where she’d tell me how much better she was going to be now and how much better my life was going to be than hers. I stood outside the confession booth while she repented for leaving me on my own to get high. She apologized to God and to our pastor but not to me. Never to me. When her burst of energy was gone, she’d spend her time half-asleep, half-awake, seeing things that weren’t really there. Withdrawal gave her the shakes. 

Another knock.

I almost didn’t answer. 

The memory of the last time we’d seen each other - crying on his shoulder, the state of my Momma, her pimp showing up - made me feel so ashamed. I never wanted him to see me like that, see me or Momma so weak. We hadn’t talked much since then. Some days Momma had dragged me to church instead of school, Daryl had missed a few days himself. In the evenings, I’d either been looking after Momma or taking extra shifts at the diner to make up for the rent I’d had to pay to settle Momma’s debts. I had started to wonder if he was avoiding me because he was as embarrassed by everything that had happened as I was. 

He knocked again and I knew I had to answer or he’d worry about me for another week. I braced myself and opened the door. He stood on the bottom step, hands behind his back. 

“Hey,” I said, quietly.

“Hey,” he whispered back, I saw him peer behind me slightly. I think to see if he could see my Momma. Or someone else. “You alright?”

“Yes,” I said. “Are you? You didn’t come to the diner this week.”

It sounded more accusatory than I meant it too. I felt like I’d swallowed a shard of glass and it made my words come out sharper than I wanted. 

“Oh yeah,” he said and glanced down at my feet. “Sorry. Been busy.”

Such a lame excuse. I nearly closed the door in his face. I guess I was more hurt than I thought I was by him avoiding me.

“Naomi!” Momma called and her words kinda slurred together. “Who’s at the door?”

“It’s just Daryl, Momma,” I called back. 

“You comin’ in or goin’ out?” she hollered. It made my mind up. 

“Out,” I said and stepped out of the door. Daryl stepped back a bit, hands still behind his back

“Well don’t be too long,” she yelled as I shut the door. I didn’t respond, who knew what level of consciousness she’d be in when I decided to come home. I doubted she even knew what the time was. Without thinking about it, I started walking towards our hill. Daryl ran to catch me up. 

“How’s she doing?” he asked.

“Fine,” I said but we both knew that was a lie, so I added. “Better.”

“Okay,” he said. He didn’t say anything else until we were near the top of the hill. Then he said, “Will you slow down a minute?”

He kind of snapped it at me and, although I guess I deserved it from snapping at him earlier, it rubbed me up the wrong way. 

“What?” I turned and glared down at where he was slightly below me on the slope. His hands were no longer behind his back and he was holding out a brown leather satchel. I stared at it, “What’s this?”

“Happy Birthday,” he said with a shrug. 

It took me a moment to remember what date it was, everything in the last week had blurred together. Had I really forgotten my own damn Birthday? It was unlikely that Daryl was wrong. He never missed it. I stared at the bag again. “This for me?”

“Yeah.”

I lifted it out of his hands, which he immediately stuffed in his pockets. It was sturdy, big enough for all of the books I’d need in a day plus a few extras if I felt like reading more. The strap was strong and the perfect size for me. There was even a handle on top so that I could carry it like a briefcase if I wanted to. “Daryl,” I said. “This must’ve cost you. You shouldn’t have done this.”

Truth was, I was worried Merle’s drug money had paid for this and, given the state my Momma was in, I was in no mood to accept anything made with that kind of money. 

“Nah,” he said and looked away, embarrassed. “I made it.”

“You made it?” I repeated, lifting it closer to look at the detail in the stitching, the way it seemed to be both exactly what I needed and more attractive than anything I’d have been able to afford even if I’d been able to keep all of my diner money for myself. 

“Yeah,” he said. “Sick of you carrying those damn books around. Sorry it ain’t much.”

“Are you joking?” I said incredulously. “Daryl, it’s gorgeous.”

“Oh.” I think he blushed. 

“It’s hands-down the nicest thing I own,” I said, and I meant it. “I can’t believe you did this.”

“Turn it over,” he said. He was looking at me again but kind of nervously, like he thought I might punch him or something. I did as I was told and gasped. Kinevall dangled down from where the loop on his head had been soldered to the bottom of the clasp to close it. His stupid little smile in his teddy-bear face, his silly little leather jacket. I couldn’t speak. Daryl took my silence as some kind of indication I didn’t like it. “You left him at mine when you stayed over. Sorry if it’s corny.”

“It’s perfect,” I told him. I looked back up at where he still stood nervously in front of me. “Perfect.”

I hugged him. He squeezed me back. He’d brought cake too, which he definitely hadn’t made because it was cooked all the way through and I saw the wrapper when he took it out of his bag. We sat on our log and ate the whole thing between the two of us. I was extremely queasy by the last mouthful and I’m sure he was too. 

“Happy Birthday,” he said again. “Sweet Sixteen.” 

At that moment it went from a Birthday I’d forgotten to the best one I’d ever had.

Being pregnant made Momma real sick. Or maybe it was withdrawal from whatever cocktail of drugs she'd been on while she was away. Maybe a mix of the two. Either way, I had to stay home with her a lot. I didn't always get to school. I always did my homework and I could get my projects and essays done while she was sleeping. Sometimes Daryl dropped things off for me or picked them up to take them in again so that I didn't miss deadlines. He wasn't always there on the days that I went in but he took enough shit there and back for me that I thought he was still going regularly. 

I was wrong. But I wouldn't know it until it was too late.

After my Birthday, I didn’t see him properly for a couple of weeks. He’d drop by the diner with Merle sometimes while I was working. I was still pulling extra shifts, I’d have to for a while. On my rare nights off I’d take my study materials up to our log in the hopes he’d come up too but he never did. Sometimes, if I was there late enough, I’d spot him ride in with Merle and a group of his friends. All on bikes. All noisier than they should be. It was usually too dark to see their faces but I could tell which one he was by the way he walks. Sometimes I thought it looked like he looked up at our hill before they went inside. But I can’t be sure. 

And then one Wednesday there was a knock on the door, later than usual. I worried about who it would be at this time of night. It was Daryl. And the look in his eyes made me worry more.

"Merle's gone," was all he said. I could tell by the way he said it that he thought Merle was never coming back. 

I stepped aside to let him in. I saw the blood that had soaked through the back of his shirt. "Your dad come home?" I asked, watching the way it blotted through the material. It made me so upset I felt sick. He looked over his shoulder at me and just gave me a nod. 

I shut the front door and walked over to close my Momma's bedroom door too. She was sleeping in there with the TV on, I hoped it was loud enough that she wouldn't hear Daryl and I talking if she woke up. It was late and having a boy in the house at this time would make her mad, even if it was just Daryl. 

When I turned back to him, he was sitting at the table, elbows crushing the exercise book I'd just been using. I stood behind him, tried to assess how bad his injuries were but it was hard to see through the shirt. 

"Daryl," I said, gently. He was only half in the room with me, the rest of him had floated off to the same distant place that people who feel pain regularly escape to. It was a state I was familiar with, one that let you be numb to everything around you just to deal with what was happening. "I need you to take your shirt off."

"Nah," he said immediately, probably more sharply than he meant to. He grabbed at the bottom of his own shirt to stop me from pulling it. 

"I gotta clean them," I said. "Let me take a look."

I tried to gently lift up the collar of his t-shirt so I could get it over his head. He stood up so violently he sent the chair toppling to the ground. He turned on me, fist raised. 

"I said no!" he yelled.

For a minute I thought he was gonna hit me, judging by the fire in his eyes, I think he did too. And then a part of him came back and he looked at his own fist like it was a strangers. Then he looked back at me. 

"Daryl…" I raised a hand but it was shaking. I tried to stop it, I didn't want him to know how much he'd just scared me because I knew he'd beat himself up for it. I also didn't want any more noise. If he'd just woken up Momma, she'd be listening for more. 

"Shit," he whispered, his lip quivering and his balled-up fist falling to his side. "Naomi… shit."

I could see that he was sobbing now, almost uncontrollably. I tried to reach out to him but he sprang away from me like I'd given him some kind of electric shock. 

"It's okay," I murmured as he backed towards the door. I didn't want him to leave. Not like this. Not so hurt. "It's okay."

"No it ain't. I coulda hurt you."

"But you didn't." I reminded him.

"I was gonna," he said and then he couldn't even look at me. "I was gonna."

"But you didn't," I repeated. "You could. But you wouldn't."

He turned away from me. I saw the red stains in slashes across his back. They were bigger than the last time I looked, which meant they were still bleeding. It hurt to breathe, just looking at them I felt like someone had shredded my heart with the end of a belt.

"Please don't leave," I whispered. He stopped then, his hand on the door. Something in my voice kept him in the room. "Please, you gotta let me look after you for once." 

He sighed. His breath shook on the way out.

"I don't deserve it," he said. 

"You do," I said and felt my heart break for him. "You deserve the world, Daryl Dixon."

"I don't."

I knew whey it was turning his back on me. I knew the fear that was pushing him away. When you have a shitty parent, your worst fear is always that you will be just like ‘em. Shitty parents teach us shitty things. And any time something happens where you remind yourself of them, makes you feel like everyone you love would be better off if you were dead. 

But it ain’t true. 

Not for me. Not for Daryl. Not for any kids like us. We teach ourselves to be better.

"You ain't like him," I said. "What you almost did… what you just stopped yourself from doing.. you ain't like him. He wouldn't have stopped."

He sniffed.

I waited, hardly daring to breathe. He was a good man. The best I knew. 

"I never wanna hurt you, Naomi,” he said eventually. “You're all I got."

"We're all each other got," I said. "And I know you'd never hurt me. Please. Let me just make sure those wounds are clean."

He hesitated. Then he turned back to me, head hung in shame that shouldn't have been his. I watched him wince as he pulled the shirt over his head. I straightened up the chair he'd knocked over. 

"Bathroom," I whispered. It was where I kept the first aid kit. There were things in there for cleaning and bandaging wounds. Depending on what Momma had taken, she weren't always steady on her feet and that had lead to a lot of cuts and bruises. I thought that meant I would be prepared for this kind of thing. But looking at Daryl's back in the harsh light of our bathroom filled me with a mix of emotions I had never felt before. I wanted to go over there in the dead of night and slit his daddy's throat. I wanted to take Daryl to the other end of the earth if that's what it took to keep him safe.

There were deep gashes on his shoulder blades and across some of his spine. Other parts were inflamed and would probably bruise by the next day. 

"This'll sting," I warned him as I took an iodine soaked cloth and dabbed it on his shoulder blade. He didn't react. I knew it hurt. I tried to be gentle. He stared at his knees the whole time, not reacting or taking anything in. 

When everything was clean and I was satisfied that he’d stopped bleeding, I attached some steri strips to the worst wounds to help him heal and then covered them all with fresh bandages. 

“There you go,” I said and stepped around him to wash his blood off my hands. 

“Thanks,” he said. 

“You’re staying here tonight.”

“Nah.”

“It wasn’t a question,” I said sternly. “You’re staying.”

There was no way I was sending him back to his dad. Not without a gun to put a bullet between his eyes.

I didn’t have bunks like the Dixon’s did. Just a twin bed in a small room right next to the bathroom. I gave Daryl an old band shirt to sleep in, it was too big for me so fit him just fine.

“Top and tail like when we was little?” he asked. I nodded and moved a pillow down to the bottom end. He had to sleep on his side because his injuries made lying on his back too painful, which actually turned out better in terms of space.

“You still got that hunk of junk?” he asked as I reached over to switch off the bedside lamp he’d given to me after he made it in Shop. 

“What d’ya mean hunk of junk? ” I scolded him. “That’s a Daryl Dixon original I’ll have you know. Designer. Ain’t nobody else in the world got one like it.”

“Shut up,” he said, but he was laughing for the first time since he’d arrived. 

“Look, when you grow up and get a whole shop full of things you’ve made, I’m gonna sell that lamp for millions.”

“Nobody’s crazy enough to wanna buy shit I’ve made,” he said. “Except maybe you but you’ve been getting them for free all this time.”

“Are you joking?” I sat up, saw the way the moonlight hit his face. He had his eyes closed and  was smiling, probably because he thought I couldn’t see it. “Handmade. Uniquely crafted. Repurposed scrap metal. That’s the kind of shit fancy New York types love paying thousands for.”

His eyes opened then, maybe he realized I was sitting up. “The hell do you know about fancy New York types?”

“I’ve seen Sex and the City,” I said. “I know what’s cool.”

“You’re the least cool person in the whole world,” he told me. I pretended to be hugely offended. “Especially for watching Sex in the City. Now got to sleep.”

“I only watched it ‘cause Momma had it on,” I protested, neglecting to add that I had secretly quite enjoyed seeing how rich New Yorkers lived and even tried to keep a sophisticated diary, like one of Carrie Bradshaw’s columns. But I’d had nothing to write except ‘ caught a squirrel with Daryl’ or ‘ Daryl and I built a fort out of a dead tree today’ so I’d given up after about a week. Daryl had closed his eyes again. I moved so that we were sharing a pillow.

“Go to sleep, Naomi,” he said without opening them.

“Not until you say that I’m cool.”

He smiled again, opened his eyes. Sometimes, if he weren’t looking at me, I forgot how blue they were. “You ain’t cool,” he said. “And it’s the best thing about ya.”

I smiled at him then. I couldn’t even pretend to be mad.

“You ain’t cool, either,” I said as he closed his eyes. 

“I know,” he said. “Now go to sleep, dumbass.”

I settled down and closed my eyes. I’d been tired before he got here but the adrenaline of everything that had happened since pulsed through me and made it hard to go to sleep; Daryl on my doorstep, him almost hitting me, knowing with absolute certainty that in that instant I would have murdered his father if he’d asked me to. Maybe even without being asked. It was a lot to get my head around. And then there was Daryl himself. We’d had sleepovers before, back when we were young. I’d lived at his for a week when Momma disappeared. But there was something different now. Maybe it was to do with seeing him so hurt. It filled me with a rush of gratitude that he was here, that he was alive . I was so aware of him. His breathing. The way he smelled. The warmth of his body.

In the dark, I reached for his hand and found that he was reaching for mine too. He gave it a squeeze and only then did I feel calm enough to close my eyes and go to sleep. 

Daryl

“They can’t do this!”

She was angrier than I thought she’d be. I’d never seen her face so red. I wished I’d hidden it from her for longer but it was the last day of school and I knew time was up. The longer I left it, the madder she’d be. Her Momma was over the worst of her withdrawal and morning sickness so she’d been coming to school more. There was only so long I could pretend to be ill too. I certainly couldn’t keep faking it through the summer and all into the next school year. 

“They can,” I told her. “And they have.”

“This is bullshit,” she snatched the letter from my hand and read it for herself like she thought I was pranking her. I’d had it for weeks and only brought it with me when I came to meet her because I’d known she’d go through a strong phase of denial. She was too mad to read the date it had been sent. “Bullshit!” 

Before I knew what was happening, she was storming back towards the gates of the school. 

“Naomi, wait!” I yelled, running after her. 

“No,” she yelled over her shoulder. “I’m sorting this shit out.”

“Naomi, please,” I moaned but she had already disappeared back inside the school. She was faster than usual because she weren’t carrying so many damn books around. I cursed even making her that stupid bag. I hurried in after her, keeping my head down in case anyone saw me and knew I weren’t supposed to be there. 

It didn’t take long to work out where she’d gone, I could hear her hollering from the entrance. The door to the headmaster’s office had been thrown open. She’d slammed my letter down on the table and was staring, still red in the face, down at Mr Hampsted who looked surprisingly calm. I never stayed that calm when Naomi was yelling at me. He looked up at me while I hovered in the doorway. 

“Ah, Mr Dixon,” he said in his familiar, boring drawl. “Care to come in and sort this out?”

“No!” Naomi said, her voice a pitch higher than normal. “It’s you that’s gotta sort shit out. What is the meaning of this?”

She slammed her fist down on the open letter. Mr Hampsted didn’t look at it. He had no need to, he’d sent the damn thing. 

“The meaning of this,” he said. “Is that your friend here won’t be coming back to school after the summer.”

“It ain’t fair,” she said. “Sure, he ain’t always here. But he’s been coming to more classes than me and you’ve been very understanding of my situation. Why don’t he get the same?”

Usually, when Naomi spoke to teachers she spoke proper, right grammar and all of that, but she was too angry now to bother. It made me want to laugh but now wasn’t the time. 

“Actually,” Mr Hampsted said. “Mr Dixon has attended less school than you and given no reason for it. He hasn’t been passing his classes or turning in his assignments. As he is now sixteen years old, we have no obli-”

“So that’s it?” she cut across him. I’d never seen Miss-Goody-Two-Shoes Naomi Payton speak without being called on before, nevermind interrupting a teacher. “No warning, he’s just out on his ass?”

“He had plenty of warning,” Mr Hampsted sat up straight and tried to stare her down. An impossible task, I’d tried it myself. Guilt twisted in my stomach. Here came the bit I’d been dreading. “He was told to buck up his attendance, he was told to start turning in assignments and turning up for tests. That was the meaning of all of our previous letters, which I gather he has neglected to show you.”

She turned and glared at where I was standing watching this all unfold like a coward in the doorway. “This true?”

I nodded. 

“Then, he was told that if he wanted to come back here, he would have to repeat the year,” Mr Hampsted continued. “Mr Dixon declined and, as he is now sixteen and obtained the permission of a legal guardian, we cannot stop him from dropping out.”

Naomi took a big, deep breath.  

“Your dad agreed to this?”

“He thinks I should be working,” I nodded. Truth was, he was so drunk when I got him to sign the permission thing, I doubted he remembered it.

“But this was your choice?” she asked, her voice low and shaking. Her eyes pierced me, impossible to lie to because she’d see right through it. She always did. 

I nodded again. 

“If you can convince him out of it, Naomi,” Mr Hampsted said. “He’d be welcome back.”

“Good,” Naomi nodded. 

“Do you want to change your mind, Mr Dixon?” he asked me. 

I cleared my throat. “No.”

Naomi looked away from me. 

“I know you two are close,” Mr Hampsted was speaking all gentle and disappointed and that was always worse than when he yelled. “And I think you’re both great, smart kids. So, I will forgive this little outburst. But I do have to ask you to leave now.”

Naomi turned sharply on her heels. “Dumbass,” she hissed at me as she brushed past me. 

Mr Hampsted’s gaze met mine and he gave me a sympathetic smile. “Good to see you, Daryl.”

“You too, sir,” I said and followed Naomi’s trail of anger back into the hallway. She was already storming towards the exit. I ran to catch up with her. 

I pretty much had to run all the way home just to keep pace with her, her rage had stuck a real rocket up her ass and she was superhumanly fast. She didn’t speak to me. Didn’t so much as look at me until we were almost home. 

“You ever gonna talk to me again?” I asked her as the trailer park came into view over the hill. She stopped so suddenly I overtook her and had to double back. She glared at me and it was horrible. 

“Why?” was all she said. Her voice was flat. Disappointed. It was even worse than when it was Mr Hampsted.

I shrugged. “I don’t wanna go anymore.”

“Bullshit,” she said and started walking again. I’d got her talking, that was all I needed. 

“I ain’t a brainbox like you,” I told her. 

“That’s bullshit, Daryl,” she said. “You’re just as smart as me.”

“No, I ain’t,” I said honestly. I knew I weren’t dumb but Naomi is a whole other level of smart. Always has been. 

"You are. You just don’t believe it so you’re giving up. Well, I ain’t.”

“I’m not asking you to leave too,” I said. “I just-”

“I mean I ain’t giving up on you, you dumb shit,” she said. I didn’t point out that she’d just contradicted the point she was trying to make. “You are staying in school.”

“No,” I said. I was tired. “I ain’t. I’d rather just get a job. Make money. Move out.”

I knew she’d at least understand that. 

“Is that what you’ve been doing?” she asked, suspicious. “All those times you were meant to be in class? You been working?”

I hoped she wouldn’t ask about any of that. Guilt twisted up my insides again. “Kinda…”

“Kinda?” she repeated. “The hell does that mean?”

Uh oh. 

"Merle…" I started. Her eyebrows shot up. "...he hooked me up."

"Merle," his name exploded from her mouth like a grenade. " Merle got you into some shit?"

"Kinda," I admitted. 

"Fuck," she closed her eyes and I was glad. There was a fire burning in them that I didn’t want to see anymore. "Daryl. Are you selling shit for him?"

"Not exactly," I said. I knew she'd be mad. I knew the shit her Momma got hooked on was similar to some of the stuff Merle was selling. "I'm mostly just backup in case something goes wrong. But that don't matter now. Merle's gone so I'm out."

"You're out?"

"Yeah."

"You promise?"

She opened her eyes again and fixed me with an accusing stare. "Well you've promised before and that was bullshit so what fucking good is this promise now?"

"Naomi, please…" I hated how I sounded. It made me feel weak. "You gotta believe me."

"If Merle's gone, if you're really out," she said. "Come back to school."

"No."

She stormed away from me again. 

"Naomi!" I yelled. I ran after her, caught her arm. She spun around. 

"You fucking liar, " she said. 

She was crying.

That was the worst bit. 

It damn near knocked me over. Took the wind right out of my lungs. While I was trying to catch my breath, she managed to slip out of my grasp. Her front door slammed before I could catch up with her again. 

We didn’t usually fight. Not like this. I didn’t know what to do about it. So, I waited where I was for a bit, staring at her closed door to see if she'd calm down enough to come out. When she didn't, I walked up to our hill and sat in our spot.  

It was the first day of summer. Usually, we'd celebrate not having to go back and see a bunch of jerks for another two and a half months. We'd meet up there and talk for a while like we usually did. We'd each bring some kind of treat we'd managed to save just for this. And then, when we saw my dad leave to get more drink we’d go to mine and watch Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. I don’t know why it was that one we picked. It was one of the few movies we had lying around and I guess it had just become a sort of tradition that it was the one we’d watch on the last day of school. 

And this was my last last day of school ever. 

I watched the sunset on my own and stayed there as it got dark. 

I saw her door open and someone stepped out. I knew it was her from the way she walked, she had her hair tied back and her ponytail swung with every step. My heart started to beat real fast as she disappeared in and out of view behind other people’s houses, taking the route that I knew would lead her up here. 

As she got closer, I looked down at my feet. If she didn’t expect me to be up here and turned around when she saw me, I didn’t want to know about it. I heard her reach the top of the hill. There was a silence that followed where she didn’t come any closer but didn’t walk away either. 

"I get it," she said. I looked up at her. Her eyes were red around the edges like she'd been crying. She swallowed. "I get why you want to get out of here."

"Yeah?" I hadn't spoken since I'd yelled at her, my voice came out all gruff. She walked over and sat down next to me. 

"'Course I do," she said. "And I want you to stop living with your dad as soon as possible. I know making money would give you that freedom. I just… I don't want you to drop out."

"I know," I said. "And I get it too.”

“Yeah?” 

“Yeah. I know you want me to get good grades so we can both get some kind of cushy office job, maybe in the same place, and earn good money but that just… it ain't me."

"I never said office job," she pointed out. But then she sighed and I recognized her signs of defeat. "But I know. I know it ain't you."

She rested the bag I’d made her on her knees. I hadn’t seen her without it since I’d given it to her and every time I saw her with it, it made me weirdly happy. Even now. Even after we’d had the biggest fight we’d had to date.

"You got brains and grades for both of us," I said. 

She was still looking down at her bag. "You don’t need the grades,” she said. “You got talent and whatever you do, I know you'll be brilliant."

"Thanks."

She rested her head on my shoulder. The quiet of the forest around the top of the hill wrapped us both up tight. 

"Sorry I was such a bitch about it," she mumbled into my shoulder.

"Nah," I said. "You weren't. You want what's best for me, I know that."

And you’re maybe the only one I can honestly say that about.

"It ain't just that."

"No?"

"I don't wanna be there without you," she said. Her voice sounded so small. 

"Naomi," I whispered and rested my head on top of hers. I breathed in the smell of her hair. "You're gonna be fine."

"You're all I got," she said. Something in her voice made me wonder if she was crying again but having her head on my shoulder was so nice I didn't want to move and look at her in case she stopped. "I don't know what I'll do without you."

"You'll probably be better off," I said. "Kids won't pick on you for hanging out with me and I won't be there to throw things at you when you're trying to get even more facts into that big, dumb, super smart brain."

She laughed then. Just a little.

“Won’t be the same,” she said. 

“No,” I agreed. “But we will. We’ll always be the same.” 

“Yeah,” she said. The worst bit was, I think we both believed it. She pulled a big bag of chips out of her bag. "Been saving these."

"How'd you get them?" I asked. "Ain't you be working double shifts to get your rent together?"

"Yeah I'm mostly on top of that now," she said. "Anyway it don't matter cause I stole these from-"

"Gas station?" I finished for her. "They really gotta ban you from that place."

She grinned and opened them up, sitting up to share them with me. My shoulder felt cold without her head there. "Movie tonight?" she asked. 

"Maybe," I shrugged. 

"Maybe?" she repeated, fixing me with a curious stare. "What else you got in mind?"

"Merle left his bike," I said. "Thought he might come and get it but he ain't been back yet so I figure it's fair game. You wanna go for a ride?"

Her eyes lit up. "Hell yes." 

I wasn't sure what kind of response that would get. I thought she might get all safety conscious about it but whatever streak of rebelliousness in her that enjoyed the occasional theft of a gas station snack, was clearly on board with a bit of not strictly legal biking. She stuffed the hardly-touched bag of chips back in her bag and started to race down the hill. 

"Hey!" I called after her. "I ain't done eating those!"

I ran down after her. She was faster than me. And she'd had a head start. She was already investigating Merle's bike by the time I got there. "Can I try?" she asked. 

"You know how to ride one of these?" I asked, trying to catch my breath. 

"No. That's why you're gonna teach me, dumbass."

"Am I really?" 

I pretended like I had to think about it for a moment and even though being responsible for Naomi's first time behind the wheel made me feel mildly sick, the way her eyes were all lit up meant I didn't have a choice. Not really. 

“Move,” I told her. “I’ll show you how it’s done first.”

She sighed and stepped away from the bike. I climbed on and nodded for her to climb up after me. I hadn’t ridden with a passenger before or thought about how that might change things. I sorta forgot how close it would make us. I wondered if she was as aware of it as I was.

“We just gonna sit here or you gonna start this thing?” she asked. 

“You gotta hold on,” I told her. I’d never thought about getting a helmet before but I suddenly worried that she should have one. She had a lot of brains in that head of hers that I didn’t want to be responsible for spilling all over a road somewhere. Messy. She hesitated. And then her arms wrapped around my waist but loosely, hardly touching me. I wondered if she felt as weird and uncomfortable about it as I did. I’d never sat up so straight, even breathing more shallowly so I wouldn’t get closer to her than she wanted me to be. Every move she made, I was so aware of. It was weird. I hadn’t ever felt uncomfortable with her before. 

I started the bike, felt it roar and vibrate underneath us. I could feel her peering over my shoulder to watch what I was doing. The first time the bike sprang forward she wobbled, unused to it. Automatically, she hugged me tighter to steady herself. I took it slow, let her get used to it. And then, just as she started to relax, I sped up. She shrieked and then I could feel her laughing against me. And it was easy again. 

I took her to an unused car park round the back of an abandoned mall. The windows were all boarded up, the signs were fading and paint flecked off the walls. I stopped, climbed off and we switched positions. I talked her through what to do. I was hardly finished talking before she’d started the engine. Her wide, uncontrollable smile was infectious and terrifying. She was slow at first but it didn’t take her long to get more confident, build up some real speed. Then it was me who was gripping her until my knuckles turned white while she sped down empty roads. With Merle and his buddies, riding always felt like a race, a competition. With Naomi, it was like flying.

These were the good days. We just didn’t know it yet.

Chapter 6: Family

Naomi

“It look okay?” he asked. 

Before I actually looked at him, the temptation to tease him was strong. I’d never seen Daryl dressed in anything close to formal. None of his own clothes were remotely appropriate for an interview. He’d had to borrow one of the shirts Merle had bought for one of his many hearings in front of a young offender’s committee, although now that seemed unlikely Merle was going to return maybe he could just keep it now. The only jacket and tie we could find in his house were old ones of his dad’s. The jacket hadn’t been worn for a while and probably wouldn’t fit Mr Dixon now that the drink had bloated him. His dad’s clothes were what held me back from immediately giving him shit for wearing a suit. If I’d had to wear any of my Momma’s old clothes and increased the chances of me looking anything like her, I’d probably have set myself on fire. I knew Daryl would feel the same. So, I didn’t say anything. I just looked up. And it was weird. 

"You look good," I said and it wasn't a lie. I weren’t used to seeing him like this. Clean cut. Sharp. He looked older. Different. For a moment, I stood in front of a stranger with a familiar face. It made me nervous.  

He fidgeted with the lapels on his jacket, shifting his tie up and down, clearly unable to get it to sit comfortably around his neck because he wasn’t used to having one there at all. He slouched more than someone in a fancy suit should and one of the laces of Merle’s only formal pair of shoes wasn’t done up. Noticing these little things reminded me it was just Daryl, it helped me keep my cool.

“For real?” he said, trying to smooth out a crease in his pants and glancing at me like he was expecting me to laugh. I didn’t. There was nothing to laugh at.

“Yeah,” I said. Now, I was probably almost as uncomfortable as he was, having to talk about the way he looked. I was worried I was over-doing it, that he’d take something I said the wrong way. The last thing I wanted to do was offend him or throw him off his game right before a job interview. “You look put together. Very… handsome…”

Handsome. 

The word clunked in the air. I felt my stomach twist as I said it and he immediately looked at me. The fidgeting stopped. It had slipped, unconsciously, from my brain to my mouth and now all of the cool I thought I’d been keeping was gone. It was too strong a word, I knew it instantly. This wasn’t how Daryl and I usually spoke to each other. Heartfelt compliments were much harder than meaningless insults. 

I could feel my heart pounding in my ears and it was so distracting I couldn’t read anything into the look on his face. That weren't normal, it was usually easy for me to tell what he was thinking. There wasn’t much I hadn’t seen him do, or feel, or think. But now he was standing there looking so different, it was like he was actually different, like we were different. 

“Handsome?” he repeated and I wanted the ground to swallow me up. 

"I just meant," I said, trying to claw back an ounce of dignity. “If I didn’t know that you can belch the alphabet and I hadn’t seen you gut a fish or a freshly caught rat with nothing more than a sharp rock and your bare hands, I’d think you were some kinda fancy Wall Street guy for sure.”

"You think only Wall Street guys are handsome?" he said. He was really clinging onto that word. 

I rolled my eyes. "No, that's not what I meant."

"I ain't judging ya," he said. "I just didn't think you'd have such fancy taste in guys is all."

"You know what I mean," I said, desperate to talk about anything else. 

"No, actually," he said. "I don't. What do you mean, Naomi?"

"You look different is all," I tried to explain. "I ain't used to seeing you all cleaned up. You look-"

"Handsome?" he said again with a ginormous grin and put his hands in his pockets.

“Alright,” I turned away from him so he couldn’t see that my face was getting hot. I could feel it, right down to my neck. What the hell was wrong with me? This weren’t like me. “Don’t let it get to your head.”

It was just Daryl. My Daryl. Silly squirrel catching Daryl. Why was this so weird?

“I ain’t,” he laughed. 

I distracted myself by collecting up all of the scraps of paper that were strewn on the kitchen table. I’d made lists and mind maps and prep interview questions. 

“Which interview is this?” I asked. We’d managed to line up a few for him in the weeks since he’d dropped the bombshell on me that he was leaving school forever.

“That bank in town,” he shrugged. “Just behind the counter, y’know. Nothing fancy.”

“Doesn’t have to be anything fancy,” I said with a shrug. “It’s a start.”

“Bank don’t really feel like me though, does it?” he said. 

“No,” I agreed. “But money is money. And if you wanna start working, you can't be fussy. Not at first. You think serving assholes at the diner is my dream job?”

“True,” he brightened at the thought of earning his own money for the first time. “We got time to go through more prep questions?”

“Yeah,” I nodded and held up the appropriate sheet from a binder where I’d started collecting all of my research on jobs Daryl could go for. I had started a separate one for steps to getting him to his dream job and some ideas on what that might be, because at the moment it seemed like he had no idea. I hadn’t shown him that one yet, I didn’t want to overwhelm him. I’d give it to him when he was ready for it.

“You’re a real nerd for doing all of this,” he said. “You know that, right?” 

I was extra glad I hadn’t shown him the second binder.

“You are welcome for my extreme preparedness, which you would probably be dead by now without,” I told him. He opened his mouth to disagree but I held up my hand. “Now go outside and come in again like we’re meeting for the first time in a real interview.”

"Okay," he said and went to stand by the door. 

"Outside," I told him, waving him away with one hand. "And knock."

“For real?” he sighed, looking incredulously from the door to me and back again.

“Yes!” I said. “Now go.”

He gave a massively over-exaggerated sigh and turned around. I could hear him muttering his complaints to himself as he walked out. I waited. He waited. And then he knocked. “Come in,” I called, sweet as sugar. The door opened. Daryl walked in, still half-laughing at how seriously I was taking everything. I stood up to greet him, “Ah, you must be Mr Dixon.”

I offered him my hand. He looked at it for a second. “Er… yes.”

“I am Mrs Thompson,” I said. “Thank you for coming in to see us today.” 

I could hear him whispering, “Are you fucking serious?” under his breath. I pretended not to have heard him. Finally, he took my hand and shook it.

“Thank you for seeing me, Mrs… er-”

“Thompson,” I reminded him. 

“Right,” he nodded.

“Please,” I said, “take a seat.”

He hesitated before he sat down. I sat down opposite him. 

“How are you today, Mr Dixon?” I asked him. 

“I’m fine thanks,” he said. “How are you, ma’am?”

I smiled because I liked that he’d added ma’am. 

“I’m well, thank you,” I said. “Running a bit behind today because my husband’s sick so he couldn’t do the school run-” 

“Husband? Kids? Fuck’s sake, Naomi why has this become a one-woman play?” he sighed, unable to hold it in any longer.

“Daryl!” I snapped. “Do you want to go out and come back in again?”

“No,” he said. “But can you just ask me some of the actual interview questions, you weirdo?”

“Fine,” I sighed because there was a chance I was getting too caught up in a fake backstory for the person I was pretending to be. “But you gotta relax, man.”

I started to run through the list of questions I had prepared for this specific interview scenario. We ended up doing it five times. Each time I did it a different way, as a different person. Sometimes I asked him deliberately hard questions so that he wouldn't get thrown off if whoever was actually interviewing him was a hard ass. Eventually, he stopped getting distracted by me pretending to be different people and knuckled down. I told him he was great and that I’d definitely hire him. He told me I was biased, which weren’t exactly untrue. 

I went with him to the interview. It was the summer holidays and I wasn’t working that day, so there weren't much else for me to do. I sat outside while he was in there. |When he came out, he was a weird mix of exhilaration and nerves. No matter how hard I pressed him, he wouldn’t tell me how he thought it went. 

A week later, he got the job. 

Two weeks after that, he quit. And we were back on the job hunt. 

That summer, I think he had about five different jobs. Some he quit, some he was fired from and one restaurant just went out of business. It was a real fancy one with mostly steak and wines we’d never heard of. Folks around here couldn't afford that kind of shit so it was no real shock when it went bust. And Daryl was just fine because we’d gotten real good at combing through the job ads. My binder was full of every option and I always made him update his resume every time he got or left a job. 

I had flowcharts and diagrams and book recommendations all ready to help him try and figure out what it was he actually wanted to spend his life doing. I knew that when he did, he’d be brilliant. And happier. And that was the most important thing. 

By the time school rolled around, he was working nights stocking shelves at the nearby Walmart and he’d held down that job for nearly a month. It had been perfect during the summer because it meant I could just take evening diner shifts and we could still hang out for most of the day. Nights when I wasn’t working, I would either add to my Daryl-binder or pour over all of the baby books and medical journals I could get out of the library. Momma was a timebomb, her belly growing by the day. I read up on all kinds of things that can go wrong with babies when their Momma’s a drug addict. I knew they could be born addicted and I wondered if I had been, if that meant I was more prone to getting hooked on it when I was older than kids whose Moms had taken gummy vitamins instead of cocaine. 

The only trouble with his Walmart job was now that I was heading back to school, him working nights would mean we’d see less of each other. Hanging out would be real hard and that made a part of me real sad. It was a very selfish part, the same part that had been mad at him for dropping out. Most of me, most of the time was just proud of him for working so hard to get himself financially independent from his piece of shit dad. I also knew that being out of the house at night meant getting away from his dad at his worst, which probably helped him stick at that job for longer than some of the others. He was growing too, not just getting taller but filling out. I think lifting heavy shit around all day was building up his arms. I hoped that made him less of a target when Mr Dixon was drunk and angry.

I was dreading being back in school without Daryl. I thought that the other kids would immediately notice that I was alone and comment on it. But the truth is, very few people noticed he was missing, or at least if they did they didn’t care enough to say anything about it. I think Connor tried to say something smug and shitty about how he’d been right about Daryl turning out like Merle but all I had to do was glare at him and he stopped. Probably worried I’d punch him again. 

It was lonely. But it was survivable. And Daryl had been right, I did get more studying done without him around to distract me or throw things on my books while I was reading them. 

“Naomi!” Mr Hampsted called from his office, when I passed it on my way to my locker. I immediately felt like I’d been caught doing something wrong even though all I was doing was minding my own business. 

“Yes?” I turned around and tried to think of anything I might have done that would land me in some kinda trouble. I wondered if Connor had said something about me glaring at him and if that was enough to warrant the headteacher stopping in the hallway. 

“Will you come in here, please?” he asked. 

“Yes, sir,” I said with a smile but my feet felt heavy and I could hear my heart beating hard in my chest. 

“Close the door, will you?” he asked so I closed it behind me, my pounding heart sinking down into my stomach. I looked back at him, reluctant to come much closer. “Take a seat, Naomi.”

“Thank you,” I said quietly and sat down opposite him, trying to think what assignments I might have forgotten or done so badly in that it was enough to get me pulled in here.

“How’s your mother doing?” he asked. 

“Oh,” I was surprised by his question. “Much better thank you, sir. She’ll be having a baby real soon.”

“That must be very exciting for you,” he said and I nodded and smiled because I didn’t want to tell him how terrifying it really was. "And how is Mr Dixon, are you two still in touch?"

Oh, I thought. So maybe that's what this is about, he's mad that I couldn't get Daryl back in school

"Oh he's good," I said brightly. Nerves made me talk fast. "Working nights at Walmart just now but he's doing real well. And once he figures out what he wants to do with his life long-term I'm gonna help make sure he gets there. I'm sorry I couldn't get him to come back to school but I this have a twelve step plan in my Daryl-binder all ready for when he-"

I started to pull it out of my bag so that he could see I hadn't completely failed my best friend.

"Slow down, Naomi," Mr Hampstead said with a laugh. "That's not why I got you in here, although it's good to hear that Daryl's doing well."

"Oh," I relaxed a little. "Then why did you call me in here?"

"I was wondering whether you'd given much thought to your own future or if you'd been too busy planning Mr Dixon's?"

"Um…" I blushed because until that second I hadn't thought of mine and Daryl's futures as being separate things. 

"Do you have a binder for yourself in there?" he nodded at my bag. 

"No…" I said, feeling dumb. "Just Daryl's."

"Is college something you've given much thought to?" he asked. 

"Yes," I said, like it was obvious although I guess to him it wasn't. He wasn’t Daryl so he didn't have the luxury of me boring him to death with all of my talk about college.

"Good," he gave me a big smile. "I'm really glad to hear that, Naomi. There's a scholarship I think would be really great for you."

"A scholarship?" I repeated, a thrill of excitement passed through me. I'd looked into so many options already, so many potential loans too that had sent me spiralling into a panic about how much debt I would be in before I’d even got my diploma. I knew I had no chance of any kind of athletic scholarship so that ruled those ones out at least. The choices were still overwhelming.

"It's academic," he said, as if he'd read my mind. "It would be a lot of work but I think you have a real shot. It's designed for kids like you." 

"Kids like me?" 

"Extremely bright but from low income households."

I felt my face get hot and I looked down at my feet in my scuffed shoes. It was usually only Daryl who said nice things like that about me. And he always said it while calling me a dumbass or a nerd, so it was much easier to hear. 

I think I hesitated for too long because he quickly followed it with, "I didn't mean to offend or embarrass you, Miss Payton."

"You didn't," I looked up at him again. I could feel a lump in my throat, formed by the unexpected compliment. I swallowed it down. "You really think I could do it?" 

"I do," he said. "And I've got the details of it here. Call it my Naomi-binder."

He held up his own folder, thinner and less covered in dumb stickers than my Daryl-binder. I took it from him and could see my hand shaking. "Thank you," I said and for a moment it felt like I was about to burst into tears, which was weird because I was so happy. 

"Read up on it, tell me what you think," he said. "You’re an exceptional student and you deserve the same opportunities as everyone else."

"Thank you," I said again but it didn't sound like enough. I hadn’t realized how much I needed Daryl’s insults to stop myself from becoming an emotional mess when someone said something nice. 

"See you tomorrow," he said and picked up one of the papers lying out on his desk. I took it to mean that I was now dismissed. I put the Naomi-binder in my bag right next to the Daryl-binder. I barely remember the walk home, I think I did it in record time so that I could get there and read up on what I needed to do to change my life. 

He weren't wrong. It would be a lot of work. Between that, the diner and Momma's new baby, I wasn't sure if be able to do it and sleep and eat and function like a regular human being. 

I read it all. Twice. And then I took it outside with me and sat on Daryl's doorstep until I heard his bike approaching. Then I stood up, clutching the binder to my chest. 

"Naomi?" he stopped when he saw me standing there and took off a bike helmet I’d gotten him when I got worried about him riding around unprotected all the time. He sounded tired and anxious. "Everything okay? What's happened? Is it your Momma? Is the baby okay?"

"I spoke to Mr Hampstead today," I said. I was way louder than I meant to be but I'd had nobody to share my excitement with until now. I felt like a can of cold that had been shaken a left sitting around and now Daryl had unwittingly opened it. "There's this scholarship he thinks I could get. Full ride to college."

"This about school?" he started laughing. "I thought this was some kind of emergency. It's four in the morning."

I was too jazzed to feel embarrassed about it. 

"You have to read this," I said, pushing the binder in to his hands. 

"What is it?"

"It's the scholarship details," I said. "I'd have to maintain this crazy high GPA and take on a few extra classes and assignments."

"What do you need me to read it for?" he asked. "Sounds like you got it memorized."

"You gotta help me decide whether I should go for it or not," I said. "I'm supposed to see Mr Hampstead about it tomorrow."

"You said it's a full ride scholarship?" he asked.

"Yes."

"So you can go and you don't have to pay anything?" 

"Pretty much," I said. "Doesn’t cover all of my living costs but I can get a job for some of that."

He pushed the folder back toward me. "Then, yeah. You should do it, dummy."

"You ain't read it," I protested. "It's a lotta work and what about Momma? The baby?"

"I told you, we'll deal with that when it comes."

"It's gonna come before college, Daryl."

"I know," he said. "But you ain't dealing with it alone, I told you that too."

"Okay," I said. "But it's a lotta work. You think I can do it?"

"'Course you can," he said. "You're the biggest nerd in the whole of Georgia. They gotta accept you. Just apply, idiot."

It was all so much easier to listen to with insults peppered in. 

"Thanks," I breathed a sigh of relief. Felt like a weight had been lifted off me. 

"Can I go to bed now?" he said. "Or do you need your massive ego stroked some more?"

"You can go to bed," I grinned. I started to walk away from him but turned when I didn't hear his door opening. "Hey, Daryl!"

It was too dark for me to tell whether or not he was looking at me. 

"I miss you. I ain't seeing you enough these days," I said. 

"I know. I miss you too."

In dark and quiet, neither of us moved away from the other. But we didn't move closer either. 

"Proud of you, though," I said. Not sure why. Maybe it was hearing so many nice things about myself that day, reminded me to tell Daryl some about him too. I knew he wasn’t getting it from anyone else.

"What?"

"Proud of you for working so hard," I said. 

"Did someone say something to you?" he said, aggressively suspicious. 

"No… what would they be saying?" I said, my curiosity immediately piqued. 

"Nothing," he said real quick and opened his door. 

"Daryl Dixon, you tell me at once," I sped towards him. 

"Keep your voice down," he hissed. 

"I'll shout so loud it wakes everyone," I threatened. "Unless you tell me what it is you're keeping from me."

"It's nothing," he said but he was so embarrassed that it clearly was something. "Leave it."

"Nope." I stood in front of him and put my hand on the doorframe so he couldn't shut it without crushing my fingers. "C’mon. It's just me, Daryl."

He sighed. A real big over the top sigh that told me I'd won. 

"They gave me employee of the month," he said. He said it so quietly, I almost didn't hear. It took me a second to hear it through all of his mumbling. And then I squealed. Louder than I meant to. He put a hand over my mouth, which was fair enough, I'd have done the same to him if I'd been worried about him waking my Momma. 

"Shut up," he whispered. I bit his hand. Not hard enough to hurt, but enough for him to let go. 

"I'm so proud of you," I said, this time in a whisper to prove that I could be trusted not to yell my head off. "That's really good news. I'm so happy for you. Bet they promote you any day now."

"It's not that big a deal," he said but I could tell that he was smiling. Even in the half-light, even as he tried to turn away so I couldn't see him. 

"It's really good," I said, sincerely. "It shows they value you and the work you're doing. I always said you were a hard worker. Now I have the proof."

"Yeah, well it's no full ride scholarship," he said. 

I jumped down off his front steps, ready to go home now that I'd gotten his secret out of him. "I ain't got that yet," I reminded him. "But you've already achieved that for sure."

"Alright," he conceded, probably mostly to shut me up. "Thanks."

"Can't believe they made you the King of Walmart," I said. 

"They did not-"

"And now you get to rule over all of the other employees. You can make them fetch you snacks. Hope you still remember me when old Mr Walmart dies and leaves you the company."

"Go to bed, Naomi," he said. “You’re so annoying.  I miss you.”

"Night, dumbass," I grinned.

"Night," he said. It sounded like he was grinning too but it was hard to tell in the dark. 

 

Daryl

Mia Payton was born just before Christmas. It was cold. I got back from work and all I could think about was putting on some more layers and wrapping myself in a duvet. But before I could open the door I found a post it note stuck to it. I knew it was Naomi's handwriting right away, it's all slanted and so neat that if you look at it from far away or squint at it, it looks kinda like she typed it. It just said that she had a sister and they were all at home now. I dumped my work stuff on my doorstep and made my way to hers.

The lights were on when I got there but it was real quiet. I expected to be able to hear a baby screaming but there was nothing. I knocked real soft in case they were all asleep. Naomi answered almost immediately. She looked tired and her hair was all messed up but the big grin on her face was radiant. There was a bundle of blankets in her arms.

"Hey," she said with so much joy it made my heart speed up. She was speaking real low, so I thought the baby she was holding might be asleep. "Come in."

I was kinda nervous, stepping into her house. It had been a while since we'd seen each other. Longer than either of us would have liked. I started to try and count back how long it had been but it made me sad so I stopped. Christmas and Thanksgiving were busy times at work. And she was studying every waking hour that she wasn’t in the diner. 

"This her?" I nodded to the bundle of blankets in her arms. 

"This is Mia," she said and moved so I could see her face. She was so tiny. So asleep. "Ain't she a kick-ass little sister?"

"Yeah," I said. Because she was. It was unbelievable that someone could be so tiny. That someone so tiny would grow into a full sized person. I stared at her tiny face and a calm kinda washed over me. She had everything ahead of her. Every chance for her life not to be fucked up. "She kinda looks like you."

"Shut up," she laughed. "All newborns look like potatoes, everyone knows that."

"Nah, she's beautiful," I disagreed. Naomi smiled even wider.

"You wanna hold her?" she asked. 

"Nah," I said, feeling nervous again. "I don't know how."

"I'll show you," she said. "C'mon, hold your arms out, she wants to meet her Uncle Daryl."

Uncle Daryl. 

Something about it sent a rush through me. Maybe it was just feeling close to her, hearing her say something like that out loud. She’d always felt like more than family. It was nice to hear it weren’t just me who felt that way. We gave each other so much shit sometimes it could be hard to say anything soppy, no matter how true it was. 

I held my arms out and tried to mirror the way she was holding the baby. Very slowly, very gently, Naomi placed her in my arms. She was heavier than I thought she’d be, especially for someone so small. So sold. Warm. I was worried she’d immediately start crying when she left her sister’s arms and I panicked when she wriggled a bit but her eyes stayed shut.

“She born today?” I asked. 

“Nah, a few days ago,” Naomi replied. A shock passed through me. I looked up at her. She looked so happy. I couldn’t believe something so big had happened to her and it had taken days for me to know about it. That weren’t normal for us. Normally, she was the first person I told everything to and I assumed it was the same for her, although I’d never actually asked. I wanted to ask but that would have been too soppy or needy and even thinking about it made me uncomfortable. Something I was thinking must’ve showed on my face because she added, “I’ve been at the hospital with her and Momma since then. We only got to bring her home today.”

It made sense and I knew there was nothing she could do about it. But I still hated missing out on something so big.

“She always sleep like this?” I asked, changing the subject to distract us both from how depressingly out of touch we were with each other. “Or are you just good with her? I thought babies were supposed to cry loads.”

“She cries a bit,” Naomi said. “I think most of the crying comes later. Right now she’s just shocked to be in the world.”

“Ain’t we all,” I said and Naomi smiled again. 

As if she’d been listening, Mia opened her mouth, but it was just a yawn. A big one for someone so small and sleepy. 

“Come and sit down,” Naomi’s hand gently guided me towards the sofa. I’d never walked so slowly in my life. Mia felt so small and breakable, like a doll made of the world’s finest china. The last thing I wanted was to drop her and have Naomi mad at me for killing her little sister. I’d be mad at me for that too. She was hard to hold, not just because she was heavier than I thought but because she seemed so fragile. I couldn’t stop thinking about how her life was, very literally, in my arms. One wrong move and she was a goner. She needed Naomi and me to keep her safe. I’d never felt needed like that before.

I sat down beside Naomi slowly, so I didn’t move Mia too much or wake her up. 

“She’s so small,” I said because it was all I could think when I looked at her and I hoped saying it out loud would let me worry about something else for a while. 

“I know,” Naomi said. 

“She’s amazing.”

“I know,” she said again. “And I love her so much. Isn’t that mad? I only just met her and already I know I can’t let anything bad happen to her. Like I will kill anyone who so much as looks at her wrong. Do I sound crazy?”

“Nah,” I said. “I get it.”

Because I loved her too. She weren’t related to me by blood, I know that. But it didn’t stop me from feeling like I was responsible for her, like any harm that came her way would have me to answer to. Maybe it was just being able to see a piece of Naomi in her tiny face, the thought that she might have looked exactly the same as a baby, that made me feel so connected to her. Protective of her.

Naomi rested her head on my shoulder to get a better look at her baby sister. The silence was so comforting, so warm. Even though it was December and the ice outside had nearly sent my bike skidding off the road a few times on my way home, I had never felt warmer. I knew in that moment that there was nothing I wouldn’t do for either of them.

“Where’s your Momma?” I asked, the urge to scoop both girls up and run away with them forever was overwhelming. 

“Resting,” Naomi replied. “She’s doing well though.”

“Yeah?” it was hard to believe, I didn’t think I’d ever heard her say something nice like that about her Momma. 

“Yeah,” she nodded. “She’s been great with her so far. But it’s only been four days.” 

The way she said it made it clear she thought that meant it was all still to play for. Which I guess it was. It’s probably easier to be a mother for four days than for the rest of your life. Looking down at Mia, it made me even angrier than I usually was that Naomi had the kind of mom who could up and leave her for long periods of time. The kind that left bruises and burns on her skin. I wished I’d been around when Naomi was this tiny to stop all of the shit she’d been through from happening. But, I guess, when Naomi was that tiny, I hadn’t been all that much bigger myself. 

“How’s work going?” Naomi asked.

“Yeah, okay,” I nodded. She nodded too. It was nondescript and part of me felt bad for being so vague. I knew she’d want to hear more details, that was why she’d asked. But I’d just come from a long shift and it weren’t really something I wanted to keep talking or thinking about. I felt the weight of Mia in my arms, the warmth of Naomi’s head on my shoulder. I wished more than anything that this was our own little place and Naomi’s Momma weren’t sleeping on the other side of her closed door. “Think I might start looking for something else soon.”

“Yeah?” that got her so interested she lifted her head off my shoulder. “What kind of thing?”

“I dunno,” I shrugged. “Something I’m actually interested in, maybe something that makes more money.”

Something that pays for a place for me and you and Mia, I wanted to add but didn’t because it would have been way too corny.

“Good for you,” she said and sounded sleepy. 

“You still got that nerd folder?” I asked, deliberately mis-naming it to annoy her. 

“My Daryl-binder?” she said. “Sure do!”

She sprang up. I watched her lift that damn silly bag I’d made her off a coat hook on the wall. It was nice to see that she was still using it for school even if I weren’t going with her any more, it made me think that she actually liked it and hadn’t just been humouring me when I’d given it to her. She pulled out a ring binder. It looked like it doubled in size every time I saw it. 

“That’s grown,” I said. “What you been feeding it?”

“I work on it when I’ve got time,” she said with a shrug like it was nothing. It weren’t nothing. “It’s as finished as it’s gonna be so you can probably take it now. Or we can work on it together.”

I could tell from her enthusiasm that she was extra keen for the second option. 

“I’ll take it with me,” I said quickly. I was in no hurry to take up homework as a hobby now I’d left school.

“Fine,” she sighed and brought it over to sit back down next to me. “Or I can take Mia and you can flick through it now?”

“I could do that I guess…” 

“Please,” she said. “It’ll be fun.”

Fun seemed like a strong word but she was so keen for it, there was no way I was saying no. Plus, my arms were getting tired from holding Mia in the same position all the time. Looks like I had some stamina and arm strength to build up before I had kids of my own.

Passing her over was difficult and not just because she was so cute that I didn’t really want to let go. Also because I hadn’t done it before I was worried about her head being unsupported and her neck snapping or one of us dropping her and her breaking into a thousand tiny but adorable pieces. When Naomi had assured me (several times) that she had her, I let go and slid Naomi’s so-called Daryl-binder out of her lap. 

“So how does this work?” I asked. 

“Well,” she said. “It’s divided up several ways. There’s an index of all of your best qualities and the jobs I think match up with them, then you just follow the page number beside it for a full list of the job description, places you could contact to see if their hiring and any other skills or training you might need to do. I’ve also ordered them by what I think you’d enjoy most so if you just want to go through it chronologically that’s fine too.”

I swallowed down the impulse to call her a nerd because it was the nicest thing anyone had done for me and the time and effort it must have taken her was huge. Curiosity took me to the index at the back where I found an embarrassingly long list that was essentially just ‘Nice Things Naomi Thought About Me’. I think, due to her approaching it like a school project, she hadn’t thought about a list of what she saw as my best qualities actually just being a list of compliments, but it was all I could think when I was skimming it so I quickly stopped and flipped to the first one before I got too embarrassed.

“Mechanic,” I read aloud. “Subsection: motorcycles.”

“Yeah, there’s other mechanic stuff in there,” she explained. “But that’s the one I thought you might like best. I’ve seen you fix up your bike. You love that thing, you’re good a building stuff and you’re very mechanically-minded.”

“Yeah,” I said. I did love fixing up my bike, learning more about it wasn’t a bad shout. “This ain’t bad you know.”

I felt excited about the future, maybe for the first time.

“You trust my process now?” she said. 

“Yeah,” I nodded. “Although, I don’t know why you bothered doing any more one you’d come up with this one.”

“You could do anything. I want you to have options,” she said with a shrug that woke up her little sister. Naomi smiled down and Mia stared up, her big blue eyes trying to focus. She still didn’t cry. Naomi held her up, turned her to face me with her hand supporting that tiny head. “This is your Uncle Daryl.” 

“Hey there, Mia,” I said as she tried to focus on me now. 

I stayed for longer than I thought I would, I even flipped through most of Naomi’s stupidly thick binder of ideas. It was real late and I was exhausted but leaving was the last thing I wanted to do. All of this had got me thinking about family and the future, I couldn’t help it. I thought about how my dad made me ashamed of my last name, how every time Merle up and disappeared from my life Naomi was always there, how blood didn’t always mean much. She was family I chose. I chose Mia too. I had never given a moment’s thought about what it might be like to have a kid of my own until then.

“See you soon?” Naomi said, when I did eventually drag my ass off her sofa. 

“Yes,” I said. “We can’t leave it so long again.”

“Agreed,” she said.

“I got a day off on Saturday,” I said. “See you then?”

She hesitated. “You mind hanging out at the library with me?” she asked. “Not all day. I just… got some things to do but if you come with me, it means we can spend the whole day together.”

“‘Course not,” I said. 

“We can do something fun after,” she promised. I nodded. I didn’t say that just hanging out with her was fun enough and it didn’t really matter where we did it because that would have been too soppy, and meeting Mia had made me soft enough for one day. 

“Tell your Momma I’m mostly on nights so if she needs someone to watch Mia in the day, I’d be happy to,” I said. 

“That’s kind of you,” she said. 

“I mean it,” I replied. “You tell her.”

“Will do,” she said.

I knew she wouldn’t. So I went round the next day while Naomi was at school and told Miss Payton myself. And that’s how I became one of Mia’s unofficial babysitters. 

There were a few of us around the neighborhood who popped in to help out but Naomi did the lion’s share. Mia balancing on her hip while she had her nose in a book became an extremely common sight. Miss Payton was better than I thought she’d be but my expectations were very low. My favorite times were when it was just the three of us- me, Naomi and Mia. 

I started an internship at a local garage. They did more than bikes and the pay was crap but it was only a few hours a week and I was learning a lot and still earning a wage stocking shelves. On nights I wasn’t working, I’d take Mia with me to visit Naomi while she worked at the diner and we’d sit at the counter and test her from one of her big textbooks. It amazed me how much she could fit in her brain, how she could remember all of it while dealing with shitty customers and remembering their orders. I doubt Mia was old enough to know what was going on, but I thought it was good for her to see her sister being such a smartypants.

Time went fast. Mia turned one year old when Naomi was in her last year of highschool. We both took the day off and threw a party for her at Naomi’s. I think it was more for us than Mia, who had no idea what was going on, but was happy that her two favorite people were there. At least, I hope we were her favorite people because she was in my top two for sure. We laughed a lot. I don’t remember what about now. I just remember those days as some of my best. 

After that, Mia and I lost Naomi a little bit to an avalanche of school work and college applications. She was always physically in the room with us but part of her brain was elsewhere, always planning, always working on the next thing. It was amazing to watch, to be near. But it could be lonely too, when she disappeared to that space in her head that I couldn't follow her to. Exams came and she was nervous all the time. She burst with energy, always fidgeting and moving from one foot to the other. It was nearly impossible to get her to sit still. I don’t think she slept. I think she’d given up sleep before Mia was even born. She didn't talk about it but I knew her GPA was whirring around that great big brain of hers. 

She aced everything. Obviously. Because she was amazing. 

And then one day, close to the end of the school year, there was a late night knock on my door. I knew it would be her before I opened it. I also knew what it would be about. I felt weirdly calm when I walked towards it, like I'd been preparing for this moment my whole life. Or at least, the parts of it I'd known Naomi, which were really the most important bits. 

"You have any idea what the time is?" I said when I opened the door. Her shining, excited eyes gleamed up at me. I could see the envelope in her hands. I knew what would be inside. I was already proud of her. 

She held it up. I stepped outside, closing the door so she couldn’t see the state of my dad, who was passed out on the sofa behind me. Not that she’d have noticed, in the state she was in herself. Excitement. Her eyes were a little bloodshot like she might be about to burst into tears. But the smile that was about to break across her face told a different story. 

She waved it at me. It was big, white, torn open at the edges with such hurried anticipation that she’d almost split the whole damn envelope in two. I knew what it was. But she was bursting to tell me so I feigned ignorance. “What’s this?” I asked. 

“I got in,” she said.

I was happy for her. I’d never been more proud of anyone in my life. But I was also sad. Things were changing in a way that felt like an ending. 

The world ended for real a long time after that, and I know it ain't related to that moment, but when I look back on everything I lost, this felt like the start of it. 

Chapter 7: Freshman

Naomi

“I think this one’s yours,” Daryl said, checking the piece of paper in his hand twice. His other hand was dragging a big bag bursting with all of my stuff across the floor. I peered over his shoulder at it and then up at the number. Room 306 . And then, because whoever had allocated the rooms had clearly known I was some kinda chicken shit, underneath were the names Abigail Jeffries and Naomi Payton.

“Yeah,” I said. And I felt sick. “I think it is.”

A pit filled with butterflies opened up in my stomach. I wished that this wasn’t my dorm room and that I’d never applied in the first place. I wished to be back on that dumb hilltop with Daryl, anywhere but here. He started to walk in ahead of me and then hesitated, doubled back. 

“C’mon,” he said, quietly. “There’s people in there and they’re gonna think I’m some kinda creep if I go into a girl’s dorm on my own.”

“There’s people in there?” I repeated, feeling like he’d just told me one of the people in there was a hitman hired to assassinate me.

“Naomi,” Daryl looked me dead in the eye. “You got this.”

He was so certain of it that suddenly, I was too. 

“Yeah,” I said and nodded. “I got this.”

He moved towards the door again, propelling me ahead of him this time so that no matter what happened, he wasn’t the first one in. There were three people; a girl who looked about our age and two others that I assumed were her parents. They looked at us both when we came in.

“Are you in this room too, sweetheart?” the woman asked. She was pretty, with smooth blonde hair that was shiny like out of a shampoo commercial. She was dressed real smart too, one of those fancy pencil skirts and a matching blazer with an electric blue blouse. 

“Yeah,” I nodded. “I’m Naomi.”

“Naomi,” she repeated. “What a pretty name. This is my daughter, Abigail. Looks like you two will be roommates, isn’t that exciting.” 

“Hi,” the girl gave me a smile and a small eye roll, the kind of look that says aren’t parents so embarrassing when they’re like this? I smiled back in a way that I hoped made it look like I knew what she meant, even though I didn’t. “You can just call me Abbie.”

“Nice to meet you, Abbie,” I said. Abbie was pretty like her Mom. The same shiny hair, but hers was longer. She was well dressed too, and I regretted wearing my sweats. They’d been comfortable to travel in but I hadn’t thought about how much of a slob I would look like when I actually got there. “And you, too Mrs Jeffries.”

Abbie’s mom smiled at me, “How did you…?”

“Name’s on the door,” I gestured back at the open door. 

“Of course,” Mr Jeffries smiled. His teeth were so white. They were like a family of movie stars. “Are your parents here? It would be nice to meet them, too.”

“Uh, no, sir,” I said. “My Momma… she’s working today, couldn’t get out of it.”

The lie came easily. I could feel Daryl staring at me. I prayed he’d keep his trap shut. 

“Oh,” Mrs Jeffries looked surprised. “That’s a shame. What about your father, is he not here to drop you off?”

“No, he’s dead,” I shrugged. That one felt like less of a lie because I’d said it so many times. I didn’t know him from any other stranger on the street. For all I knew he was dead. For all I knew Mr Jeffries could have been my dad. The thought and the awkwardness of the silence that followed my revelation almost made me laugh, to distract myself I said, “This is Daryl.”

Daryl didn’t say anything, he just gave a grunt that he usually gives to strangers he doesn’t care about. They waited, I think for me to give some context as to who Daryl was to me but I didn’t because I don’t think there’s a word for it. 

“Hello Daryl,” Mr Jeffries said after a long pause.

Daryl just nodded at them and then turned to me and said, “Shall we get the rest of your stuff?”

“Yes,” I said, extremely grateful to have an excuse to leave this interaction. 

“I left you the bed by the window,” Abbie said. 

“Thanks.”

“We’re going to get some lunch on campus and then we’ll head off and leave you two girlies to get to know each other,” Mrs Jeffries said. The only thing that made me feel better about anything she’s just said was that Abbie looked as terrified by the idea as I was. 

“Okay,” I forced a smile. “Have a great time.”

“Thank you, sweetie,” Mrs Jeffries said. “I’m sure we will.”

I was pretty sure she kept calling me sweetie and sweetheart because she’d already forgotten my name. Daryl took a bag of my stuff over to the bed Abbie had left for me and dropped it on there. I took the one I was carrying and put it down on the floor at the foot of the bed. There was a long and awkward silence while Abbie and her family shuffled out of the room. I didn’t feel like I could breathe properly until they were gone. 

“Well shit,” Daryl turned to me. “Looks like you got a fancy-ass roommate at this fancy-ass school.”

“Yeah,” I sank my non-fancy-ass down onto the bed. 

The mattress was bare, stained in a couple of places. “I forgot to pack sheets.”

It was a small thing but it absolutely crushed me. It felt like a sign that I wasn’t ready for college and that I didn’t belong in this room with Abbigail Jeffries and her perfectly made bed. She even had extra cushions and a neatly folded throw. Her side of the room smelled like everything had been freshly washed with vanilla. 

“We can go get you some,” Daryl said. “There’s a Walmart nearby. You can use my employee discount.”

I looked up at him and when our eyes met my heart felt heavy. He looked worried. Probably about me, which was kinda silly because I knew I was just moping around and being a drama queen about some damn sheets. This was meant to be a good day but I felt like an idiot for having worked my ass off just to sit it on this lumpy and uncovered mattress.

“Thanks,” I said and, figuring enough time had passed for Abbie and her family to be out of the building by now so we wouldn’t run into them, I stood up. “Let’s go get everything else.”

The corridors were full of other people, arms laden with boxes and bags. Anxious parents buzzed around. Their kids either looked sad or annoyed but sometimes both. Some of them looked terrified and it was nice to see I wasn’t the only one. It was a blur of people and faces, way more than I was used to seeing all crammed in one place. The only thing it was kind of similar to was when the bell rang between classes at school and everyone poured out into the halls, except here most of them were also carrying boxes or wheeling fancy suitcases. 

We made our way to the truck I’d rented. Daryl had managed to get me a good rate on it because the truck’s owner was the same guy who had given him the apprenticeship at the garage. It was good to see they were clearly getting on well. Daryl grabbed a box of books and groaned, “You have to bring all of these?”

“Yes.”

“You know they’re gonna make you read more here, right?” he said. “Ain’t that the point of college?”

“I know,” I said. “Those are just my favourites.”

“Right,” he said, with a slight eye roll. I grabbed another box. The reading lamp he had made was sticking out the top of it. He frowned at it, kinda did a double-take like he couldn’t believe he’d just seen it. “Didn’t know you’d brought that with you. No wonder you got so many damn boxes, packing all kinds of shit, huh?”

“‘Course I did,” I said as he kicked the door of the truck shut behind him. “How else am I supposed to read?”

“They have lamps here, dumbass.”

“They won’t be as good as mine, though,” I said. He rolled his eyes but as we approached the door of the dorms I caught him smiling and I was extra glad I’d brought it with me. 

It took us about four trips to get all of my shit from the truck to the dorm. Daryl took my books out of their boxes and put them on the small shelving unit in my half of the room. He muttered to himself about how he could build me a better one that didn’t wobble and could fit more damn books on it. I half-listened as I hung up my clothes but I was distracted by how shabby and worn all of them looked compared to Abbie and her well-dressed, pristine family. I tried to remember the last time I’d bought something new for myself, or if I even owned a pair of jeans without a hole in them.

“Hey!” a book slammed against the floor beside me. Close enough to get my attention but real far away so it had no chance of hitting me. “Anyone in that brain of yours Naomi?"

“What?” I spun around to face him, feeling weirdly guilty about being distracted by something as dumb as the state of my jeans. 

“We’re pretty much done here, you wanna go pick up some sheets and get some food? I’m starving,” he said. 

“Oh,” I said, feeling a bit dazed. “Yeah. Sounds good.”

He nodded and we left the room. It felt weird to leave all of my stuff in a strange room. I wondered if Abbie would come back while we were out, if she’d notice all of the holes in my crappy clothes or that they didn’t smell like vanilla the way hers did. 

We took the truck to Walmart where Daryl watched me stand and stare at different kinds of bedding for about twenty minutes before he sighed and said, "Can you just pick some damn sheets already?"

"Sorry," I shook my head. My thoughts felt like they were stuck in some kinda fog. "Don't know what's wrong with me."

"What about these?" he picked some up, seemingly at random. "They're… elephants. You like elephants."

"Do I?" 

"Do you not?" he looked confused. "What's wrong with elephants?"

"No, I do," I said. "But not any more than any other animal. Just, like, a regular amount."

"Okay…" Daryl nodded, chucking the elephants back on to the pile. "Well this one is very you. Ultimate nerd sheets."

He held it up with a grin. It was hard to see it properly because it was all folded up inside the packet. I took it off him and stared at the little picture on the front. The whole thing was printed to look like books, some open, some closed. Handwritten pages. Like sleeping in a library. 

"I actually really like this," I said, mildly annoyed that he’d done so well on his second go.

"Course you do."

"I'm taking the elephants too," I said, picking them up from where Dary had dropped them. "'Cause I do quite like them. And I will need spares."

"Knew it,” he said. "See. That weren't so hard."

I gave him the money for it and he took them to the tills so he could get his Walmart discount. Afterwards, we found an open and fairly empty greasy spoon to get some food in. He got a burger, I went for mac and cheese. I was absolutely starving until it arrived and then I felt queasy. I pushed my food around my plate for a while while he wolfed his down. 

“You talk different around fancy people,” he commented, pulling me out of a weird funk. I’d been imaging Abbie and her parents arriving back into our room to find all of my second-hand books and shit lying around and then promptly binning it all because they’d mistaken it for garbage.

“What?”

“You talk different with fancy folks. It’s the same voice you use for teachers,” he said. “All proper grammar and stuff.”

“Do I?” I pretended I didn’t know, like it wasn’t a conscious choice I made so that people didn’t assume I was a dumb hillbilly the second I opened my mouth. 

“Yeah,” he nodded. He shoved a few more chips in his mouth and chewed over the silence. I moved macaroni around my plate but didn’t touch any of it. “Why'd you lie about your Momma?"

"What?" I felt a twist of guilt in my stomach. I hoped he’d take the hint and drop it. He didn’t.

"You said she was working."

"Yeah," I sighed. "I know what you meant. I just… I don't know them. Don't need them knowing my business."

He nodded and immediately understood. I kinda knew he would. The only person either of us really shared anything with was each other. Daryl leaned forward. His hand almost touched mine on the table. 

"You ain’t gotta worry, you know," he said.

“What?”

“You ain’t got anything to worry about,” he said. “People are gonna like you, no matter what you wear or how you talk. They gotta.”

I swallowed. I kind of hated that he could pin-point exactly what was wrong without me saying anything. I guess it was more obvious than I thought it would be. Maybe everyone felt this was on their first day of college. 

“They might not,” I said. I sounded small. I felt small. “I might have no friends here.”

“You might,” he shrugged. “But you won’t.”

“How do you know?”

“Because I had no friends once,” he said. “And then this really annoying girl shared and stolen sandwich with me and I ain’t been able to shake her since, no matter how hard I try.”

“Shut up,” I laughed. The nerves were still there, but they were happier. 

“Nah, I’m serious,” he said. “She is so annoying. But she’s also the best thing that ever happened to me and any of those fancy assholes would be lucky to call her a friend.”

“Daryl...” I said. Because I didn’t really know what else to say. 

“Didn’t say it was you,” he shrugged. “Might be talking about someone else.”

“Shut up,” I said again. “And thanks.” 

“Eat your damn food,” he said. “It’s getting cold.”

I ate and found swallowing much easier than it had been when we’d arrived. Daryl was done already and disappeared back up to the counter to get us both some milkshakes. I watched him have a quiet conversation with the server and when he came back there were extra crushed up Oreos on top of mine. I almost burst into tears when I saw them. 

“You wanna stay tonight?” I asked and my hands shook when I reached for the straw on top of my milkshake.

“Gotta get the truck back tonight,” he reminded me gently. “Otherwise, we’ll have to pay for another day.”

“Oh yeah,” I felt my heart sink. “I gave you the money for that didn’t I?”

“Yeah,” he said. “You did, even though I told you not to.”

“I let you pay for gas,” I reminded him. “That was our deal.”

“Very generous of you,” he grinned. I flicked a piece of macaroni at him and he caught it in his mouth. 

When it was time for him to go, I didn’t ask him to stay again but I had to choke down the impulse. He looked sad, pulled me close to him. “Take care of yourself, Naomi,” he said. His voice was more gruff than usual. It sounded weirdly formal and too final for my liking. 

“You too,” I didn’t dare speak above a whisper in case I started crying. “Make sure Mia doesn’t forget me, yeah?”

She was one and a half now and couldn’t even really say my name properly. Momma hadn’t really spoken to me much on the run up to me moving away, which meant she was angry about it. So I didn’t trust her to make sure Mia remembered me when I was away. 

“I won’t talk to her about anything else.” He gave me one last squeeze and then held me at arms’ length. “Visit soon, yeah?”

“‘Course,” I nodded. He lingered. Neither of us said anything. We just looked at each other in the failing light. There was too much I wanted to say to him, it all got tangled up and caught in my chest. 

“I should get the truck back,” he said, when we’d lingered for longer than we should. 

“Yeah,” I agreed. “Go.”

He took a deep breath. 

Still, neither of us moved. 

Knowing that when this moment was broken everything would be different kept us stuck in it like glue. I wanted to fill the silence with promises that things would always be the same but I didn’t because I knew it would be a lie. Seeing each other had been hard enough when I was at school and he was working nights. But now I was hours away by bus, he couldn’t just pop by the diner to quiz me on my physics assignments. I couldn’t sit on his doorstep and wait for him to come home any time I had a life decision to make. We couldn’t sit on our dumb hill and talk about the hypothetical future. This was the beginning of it.

The only way I could step away from him was by telling myself that it was temporary, that by the time I was done studying Daryl would be working full-time on his bikes. I’d start working too, someplace near enough to him that we could go for dinner after work. He could open his own shop. We could live someplace safe. 

This is not goodbye, I told myself. Not forever. Just for now.

If I’d have known then, how things were going to turn out, I’d have frozen us both in that moment. I’d have built a glass dome around us so that no one else could get in and we’d live there, like two idiots stuck in a snowglobe. 

But I didn’t know. I couldn’t have known. 

So I gave him a salute instead of a hug and said, “See you around, Dary,” because I couldn’t bring myself to say goodbye. 

He said, “Bye, dumbass,” and got in the truck. 

I did not call for him to come back. I did not watch him drive away. 

When I got back to the dorm, Abbie was there already, lounging luxuriously on her bed in a way that made her look like a model but would have made me look like a real slob if I’d tried to pull it off. 

"Nice of your boyfriend to help you move," she said. It took me a second to realise who she meant.

"Oh. Daryl isn't my boyfriend," I said. "Just a friend."

"Oh, good," Abbie smiled and for a second I felt a jolt of worry pass through me but before I could figure out why, she said, "I always think it's a mistake when girls bring their highschool boyfriends to college. It never lasts. That’s why I broke up with mine the second we got in to different places."

"Oh, I'm sorry to hear that," I said because that's what your supposed to say when someone breaks up with their boyfriend, although Abbie didn't seem all that cut up about it. 

She shrugged. "Better to be single your freshman year."

"Yeah," I agreed, although I didn't know why. 

“Seen anyone you like on campus yet?” she asked. 

“Um… no,” I said because we’d been here for all of five minutes and I couldn’t remember seeing anyone’s face, never mind a face I liked. “You?”

“Yeah,” she shrugged, in a cool, non-committal kind of way. “I spotted a couple cuties. There’s some freshman party tonight, you coming?”

I wanted to say no. I was tired. I was sad. I just wanted to curl up in bed, turn on my reading light and crack open a book. A familiar one because I didn’t feel like trying a new one just yet, not with all this other newness around me. 

But I thought that saying no would set the tone for the rest of my freshman year. I thought I’d become the kind of loser that just sat in her dorm room reading while everyone else was out partying like real college students did in films. I’d have no friends. Worse than high school because at least there I’d had one friend. I’d had Daryl. I checked the time and tried to guess what point of his journey home he’d be at, how long it would be before he got back home. 

“Yeah,” I said. “Sounds fun.”

“Great,” Abbie smiled and grabbed a towel from the back of the door. “I’m going to head for a shower and then we can start getting ready.”

She looked so excited about it. I felt my heart sink. 

Abbie had definitely been cool in high school. One look at her room and her commercial-shiny hair was enough to tell me that. She’s already hung up several well-coordinated outfits on the back of the door as options for tonight. While she was showering down the hall, I started a desperate rummage through my closet in the hopes that I’d find anything I liked enough to wear to a party, anything that looked like I’d put as much thought into my clothes as Abbie had. But I didn’t have the brain for it. I couldn’t coordinate that kind of thing. Most of my clothes were bought with three things in mind - was it cheap, would it keep me warm in winter/cool in summer and could I go hunting with Daryl in it? 

When Abbie came back, I was sitting in a pile of my own clothes, feeling like I was about to fail an exam. She looked at me and said, “You’re not much of a girly girl are you?”

I felt like a spy who’d been found out to be undercover less than five minutes into their first mission. I shook my head. 

“I thought as much. That’s okay,” she smiled. She said it a reassuring way but it made me feel like a child. “You can borrow something of mine if you like.”

“You sure?”

Her clothes looked far too nice for me. I felt pathetic for saying yes, given that I hardly knew her but the thought of turning up in my old clothes to a party full of people who could afford the same kind of stuff as Abbie, made me want to get on a bus back to my Momma’s house. Even if she were giving me the silent treatment right now.

“Of course,” she said. And then I saw a glimmer of excitement in her eyes. “Can I give you a makeover?”

“Sure,” I said, although I felt like I was giving her permission to shoot me in the head.

She squealed with delight. “This is going to be so much fun.”

I smiled back at her, hoping it was convincing enough and then said. “Just gonna hit the showers.”

“Fair warning,” she said and I picked up my towel and tried to fold it in a way that hid the fact there was a hole in it. “They’re pretty gross.”

I thanked her for the warning but they weren’t so bad. They were shared with the other room in our hallway. It seemed like a fair few people had used them already, there were shampoo bottles lying around and already a few long hairs in varying colours stuck in the drain but they didn’t have any used diapers or needles lying around so it was in a better state than my bathroom had ever been. The bathmat outside had soaked up the shower water of everyone before me, so that was kinda gross I guess, but I was sure Abbie was in for a shock after this place had a term’s worth of use. 

I’d brought shampoo but no conditioner. It seemed like everyone else had some so I made a mental note to buy it the next time I went shopping. When I got back, Abbie had already blow dried her hair. We’d had a blow drier once, not as nice as Abbie’s, but it had caught fire a while back and we hadn’t replaced it so I was used to just letting mine dry naturally. Abbie made me sit down in a desk chair so that she could dry it and then she got out her flat irons.

“You’ve got great hair,” Abbie said as she clamped it between them. It felt like it was about to set my scalp on fire but I didn’t say anything because I didn’t want her to think I was ungrateful.

“Thanks,” I said. My smile didn’t feel real. None of me did. 

“You ever thought about putting highlights in it?” she said, squinting down at the top of my head. I shrugged. “I think it could look really cute.”

“You think?” I said, trying to sound enthusiastic about it. I wondered how much that kind of thing cost. And then I wondered who would cut Daryl’s hair now that I wasn’t there to do it for him. Maybe he’d just wait until I visited. Or take himself to the barbers now that he was earning his own money. 

“Defo,” Abbie smiled. By the time she was done, my hair was straight and smooth and shinier because of some stuff she sprayed in it. I couldn’t stop touching it, it was so much softer than I was used to. She asked me to do the same to her hair next, which didn’t make much sense to me because it already looked perfect. I did what she asked, smoothing over every little piece of it real carefully because I didn’t want to fuck it up. I didn’t know how obvious it was that I hadn’t done any of that before but she seemed very relaxed so I can’t have freaked her out that much.

“How come you're such a tomboy?”

Until she asked, I didn’t know that I was.

“I dunno,” I said, sectioning off another piece of her hair. 

“You got brothers or something?”

“No, I’ve got a sister, actually, but she’s a lot younger,” I said. “Though, I guess Daryl’s my best friend and he’s not exactly into this kinda thing.”

I didn’t mention that Daryl was my only friend or that our kinda thing was tracking down wild turkeys and gutting them for dinner. 

“That’s cute,” Abbie said. Abbie said a lot of things were cute. “Anything ever happen with you guys?”

It took me a moment to realise what she meant. At first, I thought she just meant in general. I wondered if she wanted to hear about the time we’d found two dead deer at the side of a road and all of our neighbors had shared it for dinner and we’d had a party that spilled over into the night until the police came to shut it down when someone pulled a gun out. Then, I realized what she was really asking and went bright red. 

“No,” I said. “Just friends.”

“Okay,” she smiled like she didn’t believe me. I guess girls like Abbie had no problems with boys. 

“Your boyfriend,” I said, desperate to change the subject and to stop talking about myself. “The one you broke up with. Are you guys still in touch?”

“Not really,” she said. “He was kinda mad I dumped him. I just don’t want to be the kind of girl that marries their high school sweetheart. There are so many boys out there and girls don’t have to marry for financial security any more, we don’t have to be like our mother’s generation.”

I nodded like I agreed. But Mrs Jeffries hadn’t looked like the kind of woman who’d married Abbie’s daddy for money. She looked like the kinda woman who made her own money and probably also homemade ice cream. A friend of my Momma’s, who used to work the streets and shoot up with her, had married a middle-class ex-client and she was clean now. Had two kids. A house. A good job. She only got any of that because a guy got her out of it. So, what I’m saying is, I agreed with Abbie in principal but I knew in reality there were some women who needed stability.  

Abbie did my makeup. She was real good at it. I tried to watch everything she did, memorise it so that I could do it myself and so that I could teach it to Mia when she was old enough so that she wouldn’t hang out with other girls and get embarrassed about not knowing this kind of thing. I’d have to save up for some of my own first, if I was going to learn to do it for real. 

“You wanna borrow a dress or a skirt?” she asked, opening her closet for me to take a look. 

“Um…” I hesitated, thinking about the scars on my thighs and wondering if she owned anything long enough to keep them covered. Thinking about them made them itch. 

“I got some nice tops too,” Abbie said quickly. “If your more of a pants kind of gal.”

“Yeah,” I breathed a sigh of relief. “That sounds good.”

“I’ll get you in a dress one of these days,” she said, with a wink and threw me a few options. She took a pair of my black jeans that were a little ripped at the knee but she seemed to think that were fine. She cut them so the rips were bigger and made matching ones on the other side.

When she was done, I didn’t recognise myself. It weren’t a bad thing though, I looked way nicer than I’d ever looked before. I looked cool. The kind of person someone like Abbie might be friends with.

Being Abbie’s roommate was like a free pass to everyone else who was cool on campus. She was nice to everyone and everyone liked her. She weren’t always nice about everyone behind their back but she seemed to like me and it was kind of fun to talk about people when they weren’t there. Daryl and I had done it at school, I guess the only difference was that everyone had openly disliked us and we’d disliked them too. Maybe she only liked me because she could dress me up like a lifesize doll and she could try out different styles on me. I didn't mind. My Momma hadn’t done any of this girly stuff with me when I was a kid so it was nice to have someone who could teach me these things. I felt like I was wearing a disguise, like I could tuck nerdy, uncool Naomi from highschool away behind a few layers of makeup and different clothes. I got a job, Abbie took me shopping and I could buy a new costume for every day, trying on new versions of who I could be. But wasn’t that what college was meant to be about? Figuring out who you really were, who you could be? Maybe that was what I was doing, maybe not. Maybe it was just easier to live as a stranger than to find who I was without Daryl.

Daryl

"Oi, Daryl," Herb had been watching me for a while. I'd felt him staring but pretended not to. It was his garage so he could stare at whatever he wanted. Even if it was creepy and off-putting. 

"Huh?" I looked up at him.

"That's good work you're doing there," he said. I shrugged. 

"It's nothing."

"Nah, it's good," he said. "You wanna come full time with us?"

I put down the wrench. "For real?"

"Yup," he said. "You've been an apprentice here long enough."

"Thank you," I said. I'd already written my resignation letter to Walmart, I'd just been waiting for the day I could actually hand it in. 

"You still got a lot to learn, boy," Herb said. "But I think you could do well here."

"Yes sir," I nodded. "Thank you, sir."

I think I was being overly polite because of how happy it made me and I didn't want him to suddenly change his mind on me if I weren't grateful enough for the opportunity. He just nodded at me and finally let me get back to work. I hardly remember the rest of the day. I think I knocked off earlier than usual because I was so keen to get home. I definitely didn’t watch me speed on the roads and got honked at a few times. 

When I got there, I stopped outside her door. I could hear Mia crying inside. Miss Payton was in there trying to comfort her. Usually, I'd have gone in and tried to help but I couldn't move. 

I'd forgotten Naomi wouldn't be there. 

In my excitement for having something to share with her, I'd forgotten she was gone. I felt everything in my chest deflate a little and sadness crept in. 

Driving away from her had been shit. That truck had felt cramped on the way there, with all of her dumb stuff piled up high and her in the passenger seat next to me passing me snacks we'd brought for the road. On the way back, it was half empty wrappers and space and silence. So much space. I'd thought of her a lot, all nervous outside her dorm room and eager for me to stay with her. 

I'd wanted to say yes. 

But I was already late getting the truck back to Herb. And I knew she'd be alright without me. She was built for college, she'd been working for it her whole life. I was sure she'd be teaching the class herself by about the second semester. From what I'd heard about college - all of the reading, all of the studying, all of the arguments with people in classes about the shit you'd read - it was all like it was built for Naomi. She'd be at home there, like I was at the garage. We found our places in the world. Things were good, even if we had to be far apart for a little while.

But now, standing outside her door with so much to tell her, I felt like I did driving away from her again. Small and silent and surrounded by too much space. 

"Daryl?" the door opened, Naomi's momma stood in front of me, Mia balanced on her hip. "I thought that was you, what you doing lurking outside?"

"Forgot Naomi weren't here," I said and felt dumb. 

"Well, will you take Mia a second?" she asked. "I got something I need to do."

She was already holding her our towards me. 

"Sure," I reached out and took her. The door closed before I'd even pulled her close. She was still crying but less so than before. 

"Hey," I said. "You okay? You're growing so big now, little lady."

That little bundle I'd met in Naomi's arms was one and half now, heavier to carry around than she had been before. 

"Dar," she said, which was as much of my name as she could say at that age. 

"Hey," I said again. "What you crying for?"

"No-mi?" she asked, looking hopefully around at the huge amount of space that had been following me around since she'd left. It was like she expected Naomi to appear beside me. I didn't blame her, sometimes I did too. 

"She's off being a smarty pants," I said. "I'm sure she'll visit soon."

I don’t think Mia fully understood but she said, “Smarpants!” and started laughing instead of crying, which was a relief. The door opened again and Naomi’s momma leant out. 

“Thanks, Daryl,” she said. “Sorry, it’s impossible to get anything done when she’s crying like that.”

She reached out for Mia and I reluctantly passed her back. “Any time, Miss Payton, you know where I am.”

“Here you go,” she held out a bit of paper to me. I could see a number scrawled on there. It was kinda hard to read, nothing like Naomi’s neat writing at all. I took it from her, trying to remember if I'd asked her for anything.

“Er, thanks…” I said. “What’s this?”

“The number for Naomi’s dorm room,” she said. “You get through to these fancy student-ambassador types. But they should be able to put you in touch with Naomi. If whatever you came here looking for her about is urgent. I did it once when I was having some trouble getting Mia to sleep. They can’t always find her but she’s usually there.”

Miss Payton said it with a shrug but I worried about all of the times they looked for her and she wasn’t where she should be. It probably just meant she was in the library or some place having fun but what if she weren't? What if something happened to her? How would anyone know? I wasn't sure I trusted her  roommate to raise the alarm. She’s seemed kinda dumb.

I didn't have a cell phone yet so I gathered all of the change I could find at home and walked to the nearest payphone. Deciphering the numbers Naomi's mom has written town took a while and I was nervous at first that I'd get through to the wrong place. But then some perky, cheerful boy answered with the name of her school so I knew I was at least kind of in the right place. 

"I'm looking for Naomi Payton," I said. 

"Is she a student with us, sir?" 

It was weird to be called sir. 

"Er, yeah," I said. "Room 306."

I had it seared into my brain from when I'd dropped her off. 

"Ah, yeah, I know the one," he said. "If you can stay on the line for me, please, sir."

"Sure."

There was a silence that went on for ages. Every noise I heard on the other end made my heart beat faster. Was it her? What if they couldn't find her? I put more money into the payphone and waited. 

"Hello?" It was her. For a moment I couldn't speak. I heard her sigh. "That you, Momma?"

"No, dumbass."

"Daryl!" The joy in her voice made me feel warm. The line crackled. 

"Your Momma gave me this number. That okay?" I was suddenly worried she'd find it weird for me to call, like I was trying to muscle in on her new life. 

"Of course," she said. "Everything okay with you?"

"Yeah," I said. I closed my eyes so it wasn't like I was just talking to the inside of the phonebooth. The line started to beep so I put a few more quarters in. "Great, actually. Herb offered me a full time job."

I heard her gasp. I could picture the exact smile she'd give me, the one that was different from the one she gave to everyone else. It was almost as good as her actually being there. 

"That's amazing," she said. "I'm so happy for you! I knew it wouldn't be long before he brought you in for real."

"No you didn't."

"I did," she insisted and I knew she'd have that stubborn glint in her eye that got there every time she thought she was right about something. Which was always. "I knew he'd see your potential soon. He had to. Won't be long until you've got your own garage. He's probably offered you the job because he's worried about the competition."

"Shut up," I said, blushing even though there was nobody else in the phonebooth.

"No. I'm proud of you."

"Thanks," I said. I wanted to say more but it all felt too big to come out of my mouth so I said, "How are things with you, college lady?"

"Yeah," she said, her tone was light and breezy but forced. I knew it right away. "It's great, classes are great, everyone here is…"

"Great?" I finished for her. 

"Yeah."

There was a pause. 

"C'mon, Naomi," I said. "You wouldn't shut up about college since we were little and now you're actually there all you can say is it's 'great'?"

Another pause. Longer than the first. The phone beeped again to let me know I had thirty seconds until my money ran out. I emptied every last piece of change I had on me into the machine. 

"Classes are hard," she said eventually. "Like, really hard."

"Surely not for you though, smarty pants?"

She laughed but I could tell it wasn't genuine. 

"And people are…" she hesitated. 

"Someone giving you shit?" I asked. My fists clenched automatically. I thought about how long the drive would be, if it was worth it to fight one asshole. (It was.)

"No," she said, quickly. "Nothing like that. They're just... different, y'know?"

"Yes," I said even though I didn't really. "Don't matter, you don't need any of them. You've always been alright on your own."

I probably shouldn't have said that because she’d never really been on her own. Not with me around. A tiny part of me was relieved she hadn't replaced me with some college asshole.

"Yeah," she sighed.  "I miss you."

Something in her voice tugged at my heart, like there was an invisible thread connecting it to her. 

"I miss you too," I said. Again, I wanted to say more. 

"How's Mia?"

"She's awesome," I said. "Like always. Getting bigger every day."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah, she'll be at college herself in no time."

She laughed again, a real one this time. 

The phone beeped. 

"I'm outta time," I said. "No quarters left."

"Thanks for calling," she said. "And I am so, so proud of you."

There was a lot I wanted to say but I didn't know how to word it. So I said, "Bye, Naomi."

And she said, "Bye, Daryl."

And neither of us hung up until my money ran out and the line went dead. I opened my eyes, put the phone back on the receiver and stared at it for a while. I wondered if she was doing the same or if she'd had to immediately pass it back to the preppy guy who'd answered. I worried briefly about the note in her voice that had tugged at my heart but I brushed it off. College was meant to be hard, of course it would take time to settle when you move somewhere new. She'd be fine. And she'd been so happy for me. She couldn't be finding things that hard if she could still sound so happy for me, right?

Right?

Wrong.

But I wouldn't realize it until way too late. 

I started working full time at the garage the day after I'd finished working my notice period at Walmart. Herb had said I could take a few days off in between if I wanted to. I said no, that I wanted to get started right away. I thought that kind of dedication would work in my favour. Maybe I should have taken a day or two, maybe taken the bus to see Naomi. Maybe things would have been different then. 

Full time at the garage meant the other guys there stopped ignoring me. They started giving me shit though so I'm not sure it was any better. They'd move my toolkit when I wasn't looking. They'd make me get them beers from the fridge. One time, I'd packed myself a lunch and found everything with one bite taken out of it. Since then I'd started hiding it. They were assholes but I didn't really mind, I was sure it would blow over when I became an accepted member of the team. Or when some other new guy started. 

Two weeks into my new job I was concentrating real hard because Herb had trusted me to look after my first bike on my own. I didn’t notice that it got quiet. I didn’t hear a cough behind me.

"Hey there, stranger," I thought I'd imagined her voice. Sometimes my mind drifted to her and I'd forget she wasn't standing beside me any more. I'd turn to tell her something and then remember that she was a two hour bus ride away so she couldn't hear me. "Nice wings."

It was only when she said that and someone whistled at her, which was common whenever a girl walked in, and I knew she was really here. I could hear whichever idiots were standing near the whistler start to laugh. 

"Naomi," I said. My throat felt dry. I was suddenly very conscious of the oil on my hands and how much I'd been sweating. It probably didn't smell great here. "What you doing here?" 

She shrugged. "I was in the area. Thought I'd pop in and say hi."

"Everything okay?" I asked. This was far from any area she should have been in, it wasn’t even that close to home if she was just here to see her Momma and Mia. 

She nodded. "Just wanted to say hi."

"Hi," I said and I was annoyed at myself because I knew I was giving her the dumbest smile. 

"You didn't tell us about this pretty little lady,” Reg was all over the situation like a rash. He was probably also the dumbass who’d whistled at her. "This your sister or something? No way a girl as pretty is this is going out with an ape like you, huh Daryl."

He laughed. I knew I was meant to laugh with him but I wanted to punch him in the throat. Naomi’s smile was tense and polite. 

“We’re buddies,” I said, wiping the oil off my hands with an even oiler rag. I wanted to get between them before Reg could get his claws into her. 

Buddies. 

It sounded dumb. Too small and silly to sum up everything she was to me. Everything I hoped I wasn't her. I tried to read what she might have thought of it in her expression but she was still looking at Reg. 

"Hi, I'm Naomi," she said, extending a hand to him like she was some kind of businessman. He looked amused and shook it. 

"Naomi,” he repeated. “It’s great to meet you.”

“Gimme five?” I asked Herb. 

“Take as long as you need,” he said. “Reg, get back to work.” Freddie grinned at us both. “Stop by again soon, yeah?” he said to Naomi, who gave him a non-committal nod. I quickly moved her out of the workshop and round to the side of the building where it was quieter and there were fewer creeps around. 

“Seriously,” she said. “Nice jacket but you do look a bit like Kinevall.”

“Thanks,” I said. “That dumb bear was just what I was going for when I bought it.”

“It’s cute,” she said. I didn’t think I’d ever heard her call anything cute in my life so I didn’t really know what she meant by it. “And he’s a very stylish bear so I really don’t-”

“What are you doing here?” I asked. It came out way harsher than I meant it to. She blinked at me like I'd stung her. I felt bad about it but I was meant to be working and I was already annoyed by Reg's shitty behaviour. 

"Just wanted to come and say hi," she shrugged. "I'm home for the weekend. Thought I'd surprise you. Sorry if it's a bad time."

"Nah," I said, the look on her face made me feel super guilty. "It's fine. I just don't get off for another couple of hours."

"That's fine," she said, quickly. "I didn't expect you to. I'm okay to hang around until you're done. I spotted a bookshop in town, so-"

"Mr Kay's?" I smiled. "Yeah, I thought you'd like that dumb place."

She was smiling again. She seemed taller. Her hair was ridiculously straight, I'd never seen it like that before. 

"I'll go hang out there for a bit," she said. "You can come get me when you're done."

"Sounds good," I said. I was very relieved that she wouldn't be hanging around the garage. I made sure she headed off safely in the right direction. 

It was hard to concentrate for the rest of the day. I kept thinking I’d daydreamed it happening. Even as I went in to Mr Kay’s to meet her, I half-expected not to find her. 

The bookshop was smaller on the inside that it looked from the shop window. I think it was because every available space was piled high with books and more bookcases had been stuffed into the shop than was probably allowed by health and safety regulations. When Mr Kay, whoever he was, had run out of shelf space he'd started to pile them up on the floor too. Like a rabbit's warren built from bookshelves, it was almost impossible to navigate around. I kept ending up back where I started. 

"Naomi?" I called when I'd given up on trying to find her on my own. I felt bad for saying anything at all, a lifetime of following her from one library to another had made me terrified to say anything around books. Naomi was a real loud shusher and she had this glare in her eyes when you interrupted her reading, like you'd just set fire to her whole family.

No sooner had I said her name, than a small man in a shabby cream cardigan that was more holes than wool appeared around one of the corners. He had big glasses and a stern face. Without saying anything, he beckoned me over. I followed him a way that I was sure I had been down before. And then slightly further, deeper in to his nest of books. I wondered if this was Mr Kay himself and if he was silently leading me to where I wanted to go or if he was about to kill me. 

Then I saw Naomi. She was sitting on a window ledge, her knees pulled up around her and a book balancing on them. She'd tied her hair back,  small frown creased her face but her body was more relaxed than I'd seen it in a while. This was the most like herself she'd looked since arriving. In the moments I let myself think of her afterwards, this was how I liked to remember her. 

I smiled. As silently and suddenly as he'd arrived, Mr Kay was gone. My usual tactic when Naomi was in this kinda reading trance was to throw soft things at her until she paid attention to me again but I didn't trust Me Kay not to be lurking somewhere behind one of the nearby bookshelves, watching my every move in case I damaged one of his damn books. There was a half-empty mug beside her, full of either long-forgotten tea or coffee. I considered picking it up and dumping it over her but that felt a bit extreme, even if it would get those weird light bits out of her hair. She was dressed different. Jeans too tight for hunting in and a top I hadn't seen her wear before, the kind you probably didn’t want to get mucky. It didn't quite sit right on one of her shoulders. I wondered if it didn't fit right or if it was meant to be that way. She looked thinner than usual. I wondered if she was eating right.

I reached out and touched her shoulder. It felt bonier than usual. Or maybe I was overthinking it. I was gentle but she was so shocked that she nearly fell off her window ledge and sent her cup of maybe tea maybe coffee flying to the ground. 

It was way funnier than when I chucked stuff at her and I wished I'd discovered that sooner. 

"Oh," her eyes were wide and full of surprise. "You're early."

"No, actually I had to stay an extra half hour," I told her. "Nice to know I was missed."

She blinked at a watch. New. I hadn't seen that before either. "Shit you're right," she scrambled down from the ledge. "Sorry, let's go."

She put the book she'd been reading in to a bag that was overstuffed with others. 

"You bought all of these already?" I asked. "Yeah. And Mr Kay was nice enough to let me read them while I waited. He even made me a tea. I love this place."

She pushed the plastic bag inside the one I'd made her two years before. It was nice to see that even with all the new shit she'd got herself, she was still carrying that around. With her free hand she picked up the cold mug of tea. I followed her to a desk where she left it out for the still absent Mr Kay and then she lead me to the front of the store. She didn't get lost once. It was bizarre. 

"So what do you wanna do?" I asked. It was just starting to get dark. A few of the streetlights had come on. A few were still dark. 

"I'm taking you for dinner," she said. "To celebrate your new job. My treat, you can't say no."

"Okay," I said. And then I had to ask, I couldn't hold it in any longer. "You got a new job too or something?"

“Yeah,” she said. “Another diner in the city.”

There was a lie in there,  I saw a flicker of it in her face.

“Tips must be good,” I said. She just nodded. Gave me her Everyone Else Smile. It made my heart sink a little bit. She hadn’t been gone that long. But was it long enough for me to slip into ‘everyone else’ category?

“So what you in the mood for?” she asked and it felt like a deliberate change of the subject. 

I thought about it for a second. 

“Pizza?”

“You sure?” she asked. 

“Yeah.”

“I said it’s my treat,” she reminded me. “We can get something fancier than pizza.”

“This diner,” I asked. “They pay you in solid gold?”

She rolled her eyes. “Pizza it is.”

“Bike’s over here,” I said, pointing in the direction I’d parked it. “I know where I want to go. How’d you get here?”

“Bus,” she said. 

“So you need a ride?”

“Yes please.”

I nodded and didn’t say anything but I was real happy about it. My bike had been feeling a little bare since she’d gone away. It was nice to have her on the back of it again. I took us closer to home, to where the best pizza near us was. Or, at least the best in my opinion. I think it might have been the place that Merle ordered from when Naomi came to stay with us for a bit. Maybe that's why I liked it so much. 

“You wanna go here?” she said when we stopped outside it. She looked kinda like she didn’t believe it but I could also see the hint of a smile on her face too. 

“Yeah,” I said. “A pizza each. Take out. And some of them cookies.”

“Okay,” she laughed and climbed down from the back of the bike. “I’ll be right back.”

I leant against my bike and watched through the window as she ordered. Her hair was so poker straight and streaked with a lighter shade, I wasn’t sure I’d have recognised her from the back. She turned around and pulled a face at me through the window. I pulled one back. It was quiet outside. The light was dying. But it felt like home for the first time in ages. 

She came back out with three boxes, two big and one little. “Why’d you have to ask for take out?” she grumbled as she tried to balance all three of them and herself on the back of the bike. All of them smelt incredible. I smiled but didn’t say anything. I just waited until it felt like she were steady enough and then I started going. I tore right through the trailer park, not giving a shit if anyone got mad at me about at. This was a special occasion. I build enough momentum to get us to the top of our hill.

“Here?” she smiled, slipping down from the back, arms still full of pizza. 

“Yup.”

I stood my bike up and went to sit next to her on our log. She passed me one of the pizza boxes. The night was getting cooler but the box made my lap warm. I took out a slice and bit in to it as we looked out over Atlanta. 

“Don’t get better than this,” I said and I meant it. She laughed and for once I couldn’t tell if it was at me or with me. I looked at her as she tucked into her pizza. There was a lot I wanted to say to her, to ask her about everything she’d been up to while she’d been away. But there was also a part of me that weren’t ready to hear it. There was a part of me that couldn’t let go of how things had used to be, when it was just me and her. When I look back on this moment, which ain’t often if I can help it, I think about the way the light from the setting sun softened her face, how the growing shadows made the changes in her hair less obvious. How the darkness seemed to change her from College Naomi back to My Naomi. Not completely, but just a little. I think about how I should have said those things, should have asked them when I had the chance. Maybe then things would’ve gone different.

If I’d paid more attention to the changes, remembered the sadness in her voice when she’d called. She was quieter than usual. But I thought she might just be tired from the travelling she’d done to get here.

She stayed the weekend and it was nice to have her home. I think her Momma thought so too but she were never very good at showing it. She spent most of her time making passive aggressive comments about Naomi’s fancy new look and calling her a smartass any time she tried to say anything about college. I noticed that Naomi looked sad but I didn’t say anything about it because her Momma always made her look that way. 

I just thought about how I might be able to take on more hours at the garage and get a place of my own so that when Naomi visited, she could stay with me. Mia could too. Mia was so happy that No-mi was back, she hardly left either of us alone. Then, Sunday night I took Naomi to the bus stop and waited for it with her. She’d been getting quieter and quieter. She looked as nervous as she had when I dropped her off. 

“See you soon?” I said as the bus came over the hill. 

“Yeah,” she said with a small smile that didn’t mean much.

As she got on the bus I said, “Don’t be a stranger.” Which was lame. It was so, so lame. She turned and waved. I stayed until it drove off. 

It would be a while before I saw her again. I worked more hours at the garage to save up extra money. I always thought about calling her but didn’t because at the end of the day I was too tired. I started to wonder when the end of term was. I’d assumed she’d be back for Christmas. Mia’s second birthday was coming up before that and I was certain she wouldn’t miss it.

I was often the last out of work. Herb trusted me to lock up so I had my own set of keys by then. It was dark. Someone had moved my bike. Not far but just enough to fuck with me. I heard them scuffling around in the shadows, I had spent the last half hour in the garage feeling like I was being watched. 

“Naomi, is that you?” I yelled at the shadows, wondering why she was being such a goddamn creep and not showing herself. I don’t know why I thought it would be her, barging in on me and interrupting my work was way more her style. Maybe it was just hope. 

I heard a laugh that wasn't hers and then a shadow grew in front of me, much taller than Naomi would have been even in those weird heeled boots she’d had on.

“Hey there, little brother.” 

He grinned like a wolf and just like that, after two years with no explanations or contact, Merle was back.

Chapter 8: Blood and Glass

Naomi

“Post for you,” Abbie said brightly, handing over an envelope.

“Thanks,” I took it from her and when she wasn’t looking, hid it under my pillow. I knew what it was, I didn’t need to open it. The longer I lived with Abbie and tried to keep up with her lifestyle, the thicker my credit card statements seemed to get. I was easier to ignore them than to worry about how many diner shifts I was going to have to pull to pay it all off again. I always thought I was done, that there was nothing else I needed to buy to fit in. But then Abbie would invited me to get my nails done with some of the girls she’d made friends with and I wasn't used to be invited to that kind of thing, I didn’t know how to say no. 

Then there was brunch. There was always brunch.

Then there were shopping trips where it was weird to be the only one not buying anything. People would comment on it if I didn’t so it just became easier to buy something, even if I didn’t need it. It was Abbie who’d suggested I get a credit card because she had one and she made it sound so good; get something now, pay for it later. No more waiting for paychecks to come in. But then, after I got my first bill and quietly freaked out about how much I’d spent without realising, she made some passing remark about how her dad pays everything off for her and I realised that credit cards, like everything else in this place, weren’t meant for people like me.

"Y'know," Abbie was scrutinising me in the way she did when she was thinking about trying something out. I smiled in case she could see financial worry etched into my face. "I think you’d look really cute if you cut your hair short."

I glanced at my face in the mirror. I was pretty sure this wasn't true. I'd cut my hair into a bob once when I was about thirteen and it had looked godawful. My face was way too round and pale, Daryl had called me ‘Moonface’ for a month. But maybe I'd grown out of it? I squinted at my reflection. Abbie knew more about this kinda thing than I did. Maybe if I paid an actual hairdresser to do it, I wouldn't come out looking so shit. 

"I dunno," I said with a shrug. 

"I invited everyone to pre-game here," she said. "That okay?"

Like I could say no. 

She was always inviting people to pre-game at ours before parties on campus. I didn't mind. People liked being around Abbie, being her roommate made it feel like people liked being around me too. So I just nodded and she smiled and said, “Thanks, Nomes. You’re the best .”

Nomes.

Abbie never used anyone’s full name if she could find a way of shortening it. So now I was Nomes. She said it was cute but I thought it made me sound like a garden ornament.

The girls came round first, as always, to get ready together. It was a weird ritual that I wasn’t  used to but it was also my favourite part of any night out. We shared makeup and hair irons. We talked about people we knew, like it was our own secret club. Anyone not present would be talked about, which made me nervous any time I couldn’t be there because I was working. I worried what they said about me. We talked about boys way less than chick flicks had lead me to believe a group of girls getting ready together would.

Occasionally Fi, a girl Abbie knew from her Intro to Law course, would complain about how hard it was to see her boyfriend Matt. He was studying music at a different college in Georgia. Abbie would make a lot of sympathetic noises but when Fi wasn’t looking she’d give me a look that said ‘ See, this is why you don’t keep dating your highschool boyfriend in college'. She weren’t wrong, either. Matt and Fi broke up and got back together more times than I could keep track of. Matt was always coming round so I couldn’t work out how Fi even had time to miss him, nevermind complain about it so much. 

Most of the time we didn't talk about boys at all, we talked about bands I hadn’t heard of and TV shows they were obsessed with. Tiffany and Brittany, two fairly similar brunette girls who shared the dorm across the hall from us, were hooked on the Batcherlorette and invited us over every time it was on. To get ready for parties, they’d come to ours. I’d been introduced to them both at the same time and now had trouble telling them apart but it had been too long for me to ask their names again so my new tactic was just to pay attention whenever someone else spoke to them.

Matt was the first to arrive. As always. Fi was immediately all over him so they were clearly going through a good patch. He’d brought a box of his infamous magic brownies. He was an alright guy, more chilled than the rest of them, but I’d have liked him more if he brought fewer drugs to parties. 

Chase and Bryce arrived at the same time. Chase was dumb. And a total asshole. And super into Abbie. I could never work out if she liked him back or was just being nice to him. They looked nothing alike but he reminded me of Connor and that put me on edge every time he was around, which was a lot more than I'd have liked. Thanks to Abbie I was still disguised as someone better than me but I watched everything I said around him in case I let my real personality slip. He asked so many unwanted and intrusive questions, like he could smell the real me but couldn’t prove to anyone else that I was there. 

Bryce was his roommate, I think. He was way nicer and also in one of my Lit classes. While Chase was busy trying to impress Abbie with how many keg stands he could do, he’d come and tell me about the books he was reading. I couldn’t tell if he was nice because that’s just how he was or if it was just because his friend was chatting up mine and otherwise we’d be spending most of our time in an awkward silence.

When Jason, one of Chase’s teammates, arrived Abbie put on some music and handed out drinks. Peach schnapps because that was her favourite. The boys had brought bottles of beer, ready for a game of beer pong later. I didn’t get the appeal but everyone else was obsessed with it. I had better aim than all of them combined but I didn’t want to stand out so sometimes I’d deliberately miss. Despite their fancy educations and hunting club memberships, they’d all have been real terrible hunters if they’d had to do it for real rather than sport.

I took a glass from Abbbie and Matt started handing out his brownies. I felt my stomach sink down to my feet as they were passed around. 

"Not hungry, Naomi?" Chase asked with a smirk. 

"Leave her alone," Abbie said but she giggled. 

"Sure you don't want one?" either Tiffany or Brittany asked with a really sweet smile. I couldn't tell if it was genuine or not. She had the kind of sweet voice that meant it took a while to notice she'd said something horrible.

“Yeah, I’m sure,” I said. “Thanks, though.”

There was a hesitation and then they passed over me. I breathed a sigh of relief. There was a knock at the door. I looked around at everyone and wondered who else we were expecting, it could be hard to keep track of all of Abbie’s friends.

“Might be Hendrix,” Jason said. “He was asleep when I left.”

That made sense. He was constantly napping and often late, looking sleepy even when he did arrive. I had no idea if Hendrix was his first of last name or just a dumb nickname. He answered to it so it didn’t seem to matter. Abbie, always the attentive host, fixed a big smile on her face and headed towards the door. The rest of us kept listening to whatever Chase was bragging about. I was vaguely aware of Abbie sounding surprised and whoever was on the other side of the door hardly saying anything in the face of her cheeriness. 

"Uh, Nomes," Abbie turned to me. I jumped at the sound of my own name, it was so unexpected. I was used to melting into the background at these parties. She was doing her best to stay friendly but something had clearly rattled her. I stood up, worried that some asshole she’d rejected had come by looking for a fight. That happened sometimes. "Your not-boyfriend is here."

"My what?" 

There were a few guys that Abbie often teased me about dating. Basically anyone she caught me talking to. Usually, it was Bryce and he was already here flipping through my Virginia Woolf collection. I could see the shadow of someone looming in the doorway behind her. 

"Um… Darren?” she guessed with a shrug, as she got closer to me she whispered. “He is in a bad mood.”  

“Oh my God, Daryl ?” I asked her, feeling my heart leap into my throat. Was that who she meant? I caught the door before it swung shut. 

It was him.

He stared back at me. One of his eyes was swelling. I could see the bruise already forming. He didn't say anything but I knew something bad had happened. He was in a crap mood. All he could do was glower. I stepped out of the room and closed the door on the party behind me. “Hey. You okay?”

He nodded but it was an obvious lie. The sound of music and laughter wafted through the door and he flinched. 

“This a bad time?” he asked.

“No,” I assured him. “Never. We can go somewhere else, these guys’ll be gone to some dumb frat party in an hour or two. Let’s get some food.”

“Nah."

He continued to stand there. His eyes fixed on the ground at my feet. They were sad and angry. I knew that look. 

“Your face,” I said quietly. “Your dad do that?”

He nodded. Once. I wondered how bad it had been this time, if his back was bleeding again. As far as I knew, it had been ages since his dad had tried anything like that. He was older now, bigger and stronger. I’d thought that might keep his dad away, might stop the beatings. I thought the kind of cowards that took their anger out on children would stop when the child became a man. Clearly not. I tried to get a look at Daryl’s fists, to see if there was any sign on them that he’d fought back. They looked clean.

“Okay,” I said. “Let’s go.”

I wasn’t sure yet if I was going to take him for food to cheer him up or to kill his dad. I was angry and for the first time, I really thought Daryl and I were big enough to fight back. The two of us together, we could take on anyone. He could live here in my dorm. Abbie would just have to deal with it. I sure as hell wasn’t sending him home like this. 

A burst of laughter from behind the closed door felt jarring. This moment in the hall felt more real than the party I'd just stepped away from. I felt more real than I had in weeks, maybe even months. Fi and Matt’s long distance issues were nothing but background noise compared to this. I thought about how to kick all of them out so I’d have somewhere safe for Daryl to stay.

“Nah,” he said again. “Forget it.”

I thought for a second that he was about to leave. I reached for him. Then the door behind me opened again. 

“You guys okay?” Bryce’s smiley face peaked out at us and his friendliness felt so out of place, so unwelcome. 

“Yeah,” I said quietly. “We’re just gonna-” 

"You not gonna invite your friend in?" Chase called from behind me. “That’s not very sociable of you, Nomes. You embarrassed of us?”

I sighed. Daryl sighed too and I saw his fists clench. He stared at Chase over Bryce’s shoulder. Bryce looked apologetic, even though it wasn’t him who was being an asshole.

“Ignore him,” I said to Daryl. “Let’s just get out of here.”

“Nah,” he said. “Let’s go in. You having a party? Sounds fun.”

He said it all through gritted teeth, like it was the least fun thing he’d ever heard.

"You don't have to," I assured him but he was still staring at Chase and Bryce like they were challenging him to something. I wanted to leave with him. I wanted to go somewhere where it was just the two of us.

"Nah," he said, standing up straighter than he usually did. "It's cool. I want to."

He brushed past me without waiting for me to say anything else. I saw his eyes drink in everyone in the room and knew there wasn’t one person in there that he’d like. I followed him back in.

"This is Daryl," I said, as the door closed behind us and a nervous ball of ice formed in my stomach. 

"You want a drink?" Tiffany or Brittany asked him. 

“He doesn’t drink,” I said.

At the same moment, Daryl said, “Yeah.”

He grabbed an empty cup and held it out for Brittany or Tiffany to fill it up. She glanced at me, clearly unsure about what to do. I tried to rearrange the worry on my face but I couldn’t. I felt sick. I caught his arm. 

“You wanna go for a walk?” I asked, quietly. 

“Nah, I’m good,” he said and pulled away from me to take a seat on the floor. My spot on my own bed had already been nabbed by someone else but I wouldn’t have gone back there anyway, not with Daryl in such a weird mood. I could feel the anger radiating from him but I couldn’t find the root of any of it. I didn’t know if it was so obvious to everyone or if it was just because I knew him so well. An awkward hush had fallen over the room, it was just Abbie’s music playing that stopped it from being completely silent. Bryce looked at me, concerned. I tried to smile to put him at ease but I was so on-edge, it was hard to know what I looked like. 

“So…” Chase said, clearly getting a kick out of how awkward everything was. “Daryl. You look familiar, would I have seen you around here before?”

“No.” 

Daryl looked up at him with a glare Chase didn’t deserve, not for what had seemed to be a genuine question for a change. 

“You’re not a student here?” he asked. Daryl shook his head no. Chase nodded, “So what brings you here?”

I wouldn't mind knowing the answer to that myself.

“Passing through,” Daryl said with a shrug. He didn’t say anything else, didn’t smile, just downed his drink without breaking eye contact with Chase.  

“What college are you at?” Bryce asked and my heart sank, although I knew he was just trying to be friendly. 

“Ohhh let’s guess!” Fi said, clapping her hands in excitement. 

“Let’s not,” I glanced sideways at Daryl, wondering why he hadn’t just told them that he wasn’t studying. Should I tell them? Would that embarrass him? I widened my eyes at Fi, trying to silently communicate to her that she should drop the subject.

It didn’t work and before I could say anything, Fi had said, “North Georgia? That’s where my Matty goes.”

Matt whooped. Daryl said nothing. 

“Savannah State?” Bryce guessed.

“Nah,” Chase said. “Guy like this has gotta be Princeton or Yale material, ain’t that right champ? Harvard, maybe?”

“Chase, shut up,” I said. He let out a quick, surprised laugh.  

“Well, Nomes. I think that’s the most I’ve heard you say.” 

I was easier to stick up for Daryl than myself. Chase’s smug face usually just made me mildly annoyed but now it just filled me with hate. There was a flicker of anger in Daryl’s eyes. Still, he said nothing. 

“Daryl’s working,” I explained. “He’s not in school.”

“That’s cool, man,” Bryce said, always calm and forever trying to diffuse the situations Chase got them both into. I wondered why someone halfway decent like Bryce put up with an absolute asshole like Chase. “What do you do?”

“Mechanic,” I said, when Daryl wouldn’t even look at him nevermind answer.

“Woah, that’s cool,” Bryce smiled and I was so thankful for him. While everyone else was on edge and didn’t know what to make of my friend, it was nice to see that one person from my new life was genuinely welcoming. Or at least, trying to be.

Daryl held his glass out for more. I wanted to stop him. I wanted to pull him out of the room and shake him out of whatever mood he was in. I should have. I wish I had. I could have stopped what came next. But I didn’t because I could tell from the way his jaw muscles were clenched under his skin that he didn’t want to talk. Even to me. I had never seen him like this before. It was like he was a different person. I moved closer to him, and tried to get his attention. I smelt something more than Abbie’s peach schnapps. 

“You have a drink before you get here?” I asked him in a whisper as his current cup was refilled. He didn’t look at me. Just nodded. My heart was racing. Daryl always said he wouldn’t drink for the same reason I was ignoring Matt’s pot brownies. Becoming anything like our parents was such a terrifying thought to both of us that we’d sworn off anything that might indirectly lead to it. I knew there was nothing all that wrong with weed. But I didn’t want to allow myself to have it and for it to lead to something else. Something worse. For Daryl to be drinking at all… it was huge. It was bad.

“Let’s play beer pong!” Abbie suggested as a way to break the tension and distract Chase. “C’mon. Me and Nomes against you and Bry.”

“Fine,” Chase said and started pouring beer into cups. Bryce put the book he was holding down and sighed, giving me a look that clearly meant he didn’t want to play either.

“Anyone else want to take my spot?” I asked. 

“Worried you’ll lose again, Naomi?” Chase asked. 

“No.”

I tried to catch Daryl’s eye again. But he didn’t look at me. He just topped up his own drink. 

That was at least three, plus whatever he'd had before he came. 

I wished he’d slow down.

Worrying about him filtered out all of my own bullshit worries about myself and I played the fastest game of beer pong I’d ever played. I didn’t have the brain space to hold anything back and Abbie and I absolutely crushed the boys. She was ecstatic about it. For a second, it was a normal Friday night.

“Again?” she asked, throwing the question out to the room and one arm around me. “Who wants to take on the reigning champs?” 

“I got another idea,” Chase said. The look in his eye did not fill me with hope. “Let's play Seven Eleven. That way, everyone can play.” 

A counting game. 

I knew it was because he expected Daryl to be too stupid to keep track. I didn’t say anything because I knew better, I knew that Daryl was smarter than Chase and I wanted to see him prove Chase wrong for underestimating him. But in the end, it was me who was wrong, Daryl was too drunk and too moody and didn’t give a shit about the game. He slipped up very early.  

“This is dumb,” he said, drinking down more than was needed for his forefit for losing. 

“Now, now,” Chase was gleeful. “Don’t be a sore loser. The rules aren’t hard but I can go through them more slowly if you like.” 

"Shut up, Chase, he ain't played before!" I was so angry I forgot to use what Daryl calls my Fancy Folks Voice. Chase picked up on it and immediately started mimicking me.

"It's okay," Abbie said in that sweet way that I knew was meant to sound kind but often came off as patronising. "We can just start again.”

"Nah," Daryl said. "This is dumb. How lame you gotta be to need a game to get you drunk, anyway?"

Did that mean he’d been drunk before? How long had it been since he’d broken his promise to himself to never start drinking in case he wound up with his dad’s addictions? We had sworn it to each other, sealed it in spit. Was that just meaningless childs play to him? Was I dumb for wanting to hold him to it? For keeping my promise so religiously? He picked up a bottle of beer and started chugging it. I'd lost track of how many he'd had while I was still holding my second glass of peach schnapps.

“I’ve just remembered where I’ve seen you before,” Chase grinned. Daryl stopped drinking. I remember a second of blind relief and then Chase fixed his beady eyes and smarmy grin on me. "Y’know, Naomi I always thought we couldn’t get you to loosen up and have a joint with us because you had a stick up your ass about it, but it turns out you were just waiting on this guy to bring you the harder stuff.” 

I felt my cheeks start to burn and my blood begin to boil. I weren't the only one. Daryl snapped, “Shut the fuck up man.” 

"He ain't a drug dealer." I said and I was ready to defend him. But then Chase grinned and Daryl flinched and I held back.

“Nah, I’ve seen you,” he said. “Downtown. You and your brother. You’re definitely selling something.”

“SHUT UP!” Daryl yelled.

“Daryl…” I looked at him, trying to warn him away from a fight. I knew if it came to it, Daryl would beat Chase’s ass into the ground. Chase was not the kind of guy that took the hits Daryl had been taking all his life. Daryl was forged in fire and built from steel. I just didn’t want to see him escorted off campus in cuffs. Or banned from coming back to see me.

To my shock, it was me Daryl rounded on, “You put up with this kinda shit now? What happened to you?”

I was too stunned to reply.

“Okay, man,” Bryce tried to step between us. “Take it easy.”

“You fucking this guy or something?” Daryl asked. “Why is he so up in your business?”

The tension in the room was immediately broken, some people laughed, others gasped. Bryce took a hasty step back.

I grabbed Daryl’s arm and felt myself go crimson. “Let’s go for a walk, yeah?”

He didn’t move. Didn’t say anything. I could feel everyone staring at us. 

“Okay…” Abbie said, slowly “Listen, Nomes, we can just meet you guys at the party. If you’re still coming…”

“I’m pretty sure it’s students only,” Chase said, pointedly. I nearly punched him. It stirred something in Daryl.

“You tell these assholes I was at college? You embarrassed of me or some shit?” he looked so angry. I’d never seen him that angry before, not with me. I couldn’t work out what I’d done wrong.

“No!” I said and I hated myself for not sticking up for him sooner, I hadn’t thought it would be this big a deal to him. I hadn’t thought about how the alcohol he’d had might have changed the threshold for how much bullshit he could handle. 

“Yeah, you sure?” he pressed. “Because they seem real obsessed with it. Sure you didn’t lie about me like you do about your Momma?”

“What?” there was a hint of amusement in Abbie’s voice, like she was about to hear some really juicy gossip. I knew that tone.

“Daryl!” I heard the panic in my voice, pleading with him. I could feel everything about my new life crumbling around me. I closed my eyes, willing myself to be in some kind of shitty nightmare. I could feel the hot tears of betrayal under my eyelids.

“We should go,” Bryce said. 

Daryl wasn’t done.

“Her Momma ain’t not visiting because she’s workin’,” he said. “She ain’t here because she’s off someplace getting high or fucking guys for money.”

I felt like I’d been punched in the gut. I could already hear the people around me whispering. 

I wanted to be anywhere but there, feeling so small I thought I might disappear. I wanted to.

“Alright, everyone out!” Bryce demanded, sounding like a school teacher. I heard them leave, heard them whispering to each other in the hallway. When the door closed I opened my eyes, wiped the tears on the back of my hand. Daryl looked a little bit sorry. But not enough. 

“What you do that for?” I asked, fighting to keep my cool as I was the more sober of the two of us.

“What?” he shrugged like it was nothing. Like he hadn’t just dropped a grenade into my social life. 

“You turn up here, unannounced, uninvited. You’re rude to my friends-”

“These ain’t your friends, Naomi.”

I took a deep but shaky breath, I felt like I’d swallowed glass. “Why are you being such an asshole?”

“Oh you think I’m the asshole?” 

“Yes.”

“Why? For pointing out that you’re a big fake phony now?”

"Just because I've changed, don't mean it's a bad thing!" I said but he wasn’t wrong. I hadn’t felt like myself since he’d driven away in that big dumb truck. The truth of what he was saying cut me deep.

"Look at you, Nomes ," he sounded disgusted. Like the sight of me made him feel sick. It made me was to peel off my new-Naomi skin and show him that underneath the dumb make up and clothes I couldn’t really afford, I was still just me. "We used to make fun of assholes like this."

"They ain't bad if you give them a chance."

It was another lie and we both knew it.

"Sure."

"You don't even know them." I could hear myself defending them but it was like it wasn’t me talking. It was my voice, my words but I wasn’t sure I really believed them. I was just so angry with him for drinking so much, for being so hostile when there was no need to be. For humiliating me in front of everyone I knew, even if they could be assholes sometimes.

"I know them better than they know you.”

The worst part is, he was right.

“Shut up,” was all I could say. 

“This ain’t you,” he gestured at me. “And they’re making fun of you, Naomi, they don’t like you. You look ridiculous. Playing their dumb games, dressing like them, letting them talk to you like you’re nothing. Nomes. Who the fuck calls you that?”

“Shut up. ”

I knew it only hurt so much because it was loaded with truth.

He stood up. As he did, something fell out of his pocket and hit the ground with a thud. A plastic bag. White powder. He stopped in the middle of the rant he was about to launch into. 

We both stared at it. I felt the fire in my veins turn to ice.

“What the fuck is this?” I asked, even though I didn’t have to. I knew. Daryl didn’t answer, he knew he didn’t have to. I took a deep breath. “So, Chase was right? You been out here selling this shit?”

No wonder he’d been so easily riled up. No wonder Chase had been so damn smug.

“Merle…” he said. He didn’t finish, he didn’t have to. We both knew. 

I was so angry that for a moment I couldn’t say anything. Daryl hung his head, slightly but not enough. 

“You selling for Merle?” I asked. He shrugged. I knew that shrug meant yes. “When did he come back?”

Daryl shrugged. “Couple months back.”

“Why the fuck would you do this? For Merle?”

“He’s my brother.”

“He left you.”

“Don’t matter.”

“Yes it does. What’s Herb gonna say if he finds this shit on you at the garage. Huh?”

“Herb already fired me,” Daryl said through clenched teeth. I felt like the room was spinning underneath me. I close my eyes for a moment. I was feeling too much. Too much anger. Too much pain. All I could see behind my eyelids was that fucking white powder. The way it looked in lines on my kitchen table, the way my Momma passed out for days afterwards.

“You’re a fucking idiot if you’re risking everything to sell for that asshole,” I said. “He’s just gonna leave you again when the next thing comes along. Or you are both gonna end up in jail.”

“Hey. He took you in when you need it. Didn’t see you turning your nose up at him then,” he yelled. “When you’re Momma had gone AWOL on you. You ain’t better than us just cause you’re at this fancy school.” 

“My Momma only went AWOL because of assholes like you and Merle selling her this shit.” My words ripped themselves from my throat. I felt like they were made from fire and blood and bullets.

“Hey, we just sell it,” he said. “We don’t make people fuck up their lives and abandon their kids. That’s on them.”

“Stay away from my Momma,” I said. I could feel my voice shaking with anger, bile rose in my throat.  “You come near her, you come near Mia...”

I’d never shaken with rage before. My hands balled up into fists and it took everything in me not to swing at him. All I could think about was those lines of coke, of Momma passed out, Mia crying on her own like I used to.

“How would you know if I did or not?” he said. “It’s not like you’re ever there.”

“Fuck you.”

Guilt and rage were jagged and sore. I hadn’t checked in on Mia for ages.

“Yeah? Well fuck you too,” he spat at me and stooped to pick up his little bag of powder.

“Merle’s a piece of shit.” I yelled at his retreating back. “And if you keep blindly following him, you’re gonna end up just like him and just like your -”

I stopped. 

I’d been going to say dad. 

I knew it. He knew it. 

But I didn’t. Because I didn’t mean it. Not even with how mad I was at him.  

I was aware of him throwing his half-empty bottle of beer in my direction but I didn’t flinch. I was used to him throwing things at or near me to get my attention and he’d never once hurt me. It hit the wall behind me and I heard it break but didn’t take it in because everything that mattered to me was already shattered. Our friendship in shards all around my dorm room. I watched the anger in his face dissolve into pain and horror. I wanted to tell him that it was okay, that we could stop this dumb fight now, that the people outside this door didn’t matter. 

I reached a hand out to him. 

And then I saw the blood. It ran in rivers down my arm from where a shard of glass was embedded in the flesh on the back of my hand. I remember being surprised by how warm it was. And that I hadn’t felt it happen.

I looked back at Daryl. 

I think I even called for him. But he was gone. 

I heard a door slam and the pain hit me all at once. 

Daryl

“You look like shit, little brother,” Merle’s face swam into view. His horrible grin made me want to punch him but I felt too sick and tired to actually go through with it. 

My head hurt. But my heart hurt more and at first, I couldn’t work out why.

“This sofa’s shit,” I told him, trying to sit up. It was both too soft and too hard all at once. “Why didn’t you put me in my own damn bed?”

He laughed, way too loudly. “You were some state,” he said. “I struggled to get you to the damn couch. You’re heavy these days.”

I sat up and the room started spinning. I quickly put my head between my knees and squeezed my eyes tight shut.  

“What happened?” I asked.

“I was gonna ask you the same thing,” Merle said. “Last I heard, you were off to get the rest of your stuff from dear old dad.”

“Oh. Yeah.”

“And I know you must have got there because my damn car is full of your shit.”

“Yup,” the room had stopped moving enough for me to sit up and look at him. 

“He in when you got there?”

“Yup.”

I had the bruises to prove it.

“You got any more details for me or am I gonna have to guess everything?” Merle asked. He was really enjoying this. I thought I might throw up on him and then I thought that if I did, he definitely deserved it.

“He was drunk,” I said, trying to remember going back there. 

“No surprises there,” Merle said. I nodded in agreement, although I felt like a hypocrite.  “What happened?”

I tried to remember. 

“We argued,” I said. I knew that much was true. I didn’t remember how it started. He might have just found out that I wasn’t working at the garage anymore, he might have just found out that I was living with Merle now. Both of those were things that had been going on for months but he was so off his face most of the time, I doubt he noticed either. I probably said that to him.

I remembered the beating I took. 

I remember how small it made me feel. 

Like I was five again. And alone. Just me and him. 

I’d thought I was bigger now, that I could take him if he tried that kind of shit again. But when it came down to it, I couldn’t. I was too scared. Too much of a coward. And feeling like that had filled me with anger I didn’t know what to do with.

I didn’t tell Merle that. My cheeks got all hot at the thought of it. And I was already so warm, like alcohol was sweating out of my every pore.

“Then what?” Merle asked. 

The memory hit me full force like a freight train.

“I got pissed off,” I said. “Drank the rest of his whiskey. Downed it all just to spite him.”

Merle was laughing so hard he’d started to wheeze. It was dumb, and even remembering downing the rest of our dad’s cheap-ass whiskey made me want to throw up again, but seeing how funny Merle found it make me feel less bad about the whole thing. He looked kinda proud of me. And that was nice. He weren’t proud of much.

“Bet he didn’t like that.”

“No,” I said and my bruises throbbed in agreement.  

“Then what?”

“I drove somewhere.”

I remember getting in Merle’s beat up old car with all of my stuff. I remember driving faster than I should have, way over the limit. I remember not caring if I crashed. 

“Where?”

I didn’t answer him right away. 

I remembered. But I couldn’t say it out loud. 

I also felt real sick. The head between my knees move had done nothing. I hauled myself to my feet and half-ran, half-staggered towards the toilet. Merle and his laughter followed me in there, only drowned out by the sound of the contents of my stomach hitting the toilet bowl. 

Goddamn peach schnapps. 

It tasted even worse on the way up than it had going down. Merle slapped me on the back a couple of times. I spluttered up more vomit. “Get it all out, little brother.”

When I was done I felt empty and queasy all at once, like my stomach couldn’t decide if it had more for me to throw up or if it wanted me to eat something. I didn’t move from the toilet just in case. I moved to sit beside it, resting my head on the cracked bathroom tiles. Merle sat on the edge of a bath rimmed with mold. 

“Dunno what Dad gets out of this shit,” I said. “Drink ain’t worth this.”

“Baby’s first hangover,” Merle laughed again, still sounding kinda proud. “You’ll get used to it, learn your limits.”

It weren’t just the hangover I was regretting, though. 

I remembered. 

The glass. 

The blood. 

I closed my eyes. It was the only way I could get through the next bit. “I saw Naomi.”

“Shit, you guys still close?” Merle sounded surprised. I wondered how it was possible that he didn’t know that. Had I not mentioned her in the three months I’d been living with him, even though I must have thought about her every single day? “What’s she up to these days?”

“College,” I said. Merle whistled.

“Wow,” he said. “So she really made it, huh? Good for her.”

I nodded, opened my eyes and fixed them on a patch of damp in the ceiling.  

“If anyone was gonna do it, it was always going to be her,” I said. 

“And us, little brother,” Merle said. “We took a different route is all. But look at us. We’re making our own money, ain’t back in that place with dad no more. We made it too.”

I nodded. I think up until then, I’d believed what he said but it felt like bullshit now. I remembered Naomi screaming at me about her Momma, how she wouldn’t have been able to get high if it weren’t for guys like us selling her shit. It felt less like we’d escaped from the conveyor belt of bullshit and more like we’d just moved further down the production line. I didn’t say that to Merle though, I could feel a cold sweat on my back from all the vomiting and I didn’t have the energy to fight him. 

“So why’d you go see her?” he asked. 

“Dunno,” I said. And that was true. I don’t think I’d planned to go there. I’d just felt the world speeding past me and in searching for a way to slow it down I’d found myself outside her door. Room 306. “She was having some kind of party.”

I could still hear the music, still taste the peach schnapps in the acid at the back of my throat. 

“A college party? Nice.” Merle said with an approving grin. “No wonder you came back so wasted.”

“Like you’ve ever been to a college party,” I rolled my eyes. 

“I been to plenty,” he said. “Smart kids need drugs too, especially the rich ones. And those college chicks love a bad boy. That why you go see her?”

The suggestive glint in his eyes made me want to kick him but I didn’t have the energy to do anything but raise my hand and flush the toilet. It drowned him out for a little bit and washed away the smell of my own puke that was making me want to hurl some more. 

“No,” I said, when the water and my stomach had settled. “I just wanted to see her.”

“That’s sweet,” Merle said but I could tell that answer bored him. “So you have fun at this party at least?”

“Nah.”

“How come?”

“Her friends are assholes.”

Merle gave me a sympathetic look like he understood but he didn’t. Not really. Her friends were assholes but I was the biggest one.

“They all college bitches?” he asked. 

“Yeah.”

I remembered Abbie and her dumb peroxide hair. The way she’d been all smiles and hair flips when she’d answered the door only to immediately turn around and say something catty about me being in a shit mood. And she got my name wrong, I’m pretty sure it was deliberate.

And then there was that Bryce guy, always trying to jump in the middle of shit like he was some kinda bodyguard. 

And Chase. Fucking Chase.

“You remember Chase Nelson?” I asked. I knew he wouldn’t, Merle was never the best with names. “Asshole jock type. Him and his friends bought some performance enhancers off you for some football bullshit?”

“Oh yeah. I think so,” Merle said. “Why?”

“We ain’t selling to him no more.”

“Okay,” Merle said. “You get in a fight with him.”

“Kinda,” I shrugged. Merle stared at me, waiting for more details. “He told Naomi I was selling for you.”

This was all his fault. 

“Why does she care?”

“You know what her Momma’s like.”

“That ain’t our fault.”

“That’s what I said.” It didn’t make me feel any better that my go-to excuse was the same one Merle used.

“You wanna go teach him a lesson?” he asked.

“Nah,” I said but I wanted to say yes. “He ain’t worth it.”

I also didn’t know how Naomi would take it if I let Merle and his friends visit one of hers. I didn’t even know if Chase was still one of her friends, after I’d called her out on all of her bullshit that night. 

I thought it would feel good. To point out how much a phony she was being, to make her see sense. I thought I’d get the old Naomi back, that she’d stop dying streaks of blonde into her weirdly straight hair and come hunting with me. Not that I’d been in a while myself. I remembered the way her eyes had lit up when she’d seen me, how her shoulders had relaxed and for a second, it was like she weren’t different. 

But she were. 

“We fought,” I admitted, although I’m sure Merle didn’t care. 

“Who?” he asked. “You and Chase?”

“No.”

There was a long second where worked it out. I couldn’t bring myself to say it out loud, to make it real like that. I think he read it in my face.

“You and Naomi?” he said, eyebrows raised in disbelief. I nodded. “Shit. I thought you two were thick and thieves.”

“We were,” I said. “Before.”

“Ah,” he nodded like he got it all of a sudden, like he’d ever had anyone in his life like Naomi. “She a real college bitch now?” 

“Yeah,” I said, although I felt bad for saying it. “Kinda. She’s different.”

“Shame,” he said. “I liked her.”

I nodded. I couldn’t say anything else.He thought for a moment and then added, “Still. I guess it must be hard, trying to fit in with a bunch of rich bitches like that. Could be kinda lonely. It’s nice you went to see her.”

It weren’t like Merle to have more insight than me, especially when it came to Naomi. But then I remembered dropping her off. She’d been real nervous. She’d been quiet. Even when she’d come home since then, she’d been quieter and quieter. She’d looked less and less like herself. 

Had she really just been lonely? Had she done all of that to fit in? 

I thought about the dumb shit I’d done to fit in with Merle and his friends since I’d been living here. I thought about how sad she’d sounded when I called her, how she might have tried to tell me then how hard things were. I thought about how I should have tried to call her more. 

Some of my thoughts must have shown on my face because Merle stood up and patted me on the head in a way that was mostly annoying but almost affectionate. “It’s okay, little brother,” he said. “Plenty more fish in the sea.”

“Nah,” I said because there wasn’t a way of telling him how wrong he was that he would get. Naomi weren’t some fish. She was family. 

“Okay then,” he said. “It’ll all blow over, that what you wanna hear?”

Yes. 

I could tell by the way he said it that he didn’t really believe it. But it was what I wanted to hear. I wanted it to be true more than anything. 

“We said some pretty horrible shit to each other,” I said. The memory made me wince. “Both of us.”

“It happens,” Merle shrugged. “Some things run their course, bro. You just gotta let go. She think she’s too good for you now then fuck her. You got new people now. You got me.”

I nodded. Merle was family. Blood. Real family. 

“He left you.” Naomi’s words echoed in my head as Merle walked out of the bathroom. Just because he’d left before, didn’t mean he would again. Right? I weren’t as sure as I had been before. Without Naomi I was a boat without an anchor. I drifted. 

It was easy to drift with Merle, that’s what he’d been doing his whole life. He had it down to a fine art. He got bored easy, knew just when he needed to jump out to the next thing. And I jumped with him. We went from one shitty apartment to another, Merle always said that the next one we’d be making enough money to live like Kings, but it was always only just enough to get drunk. To go partying. To pay for gas. 

You’d have thought that after everything, I wouldn’t have drunk again but I did. I did it because I was young. I was dumb. 

I did it because I had nothing else, nowhere else to go. 

I almost drove back to Naomi’s dorm several times but something kept me away.  I knew I weren’t welcome round her Momma’s house anymore, she’d made that clear, so I stayed away from there too. I wondered if Mia would remember me when she was older. 

“Merle’s a piece of shit. and if you keep blindly following him, you’re gonna end up just like him and just like your -”

She’d been going to say I was just like my dad. She hadn’t actually said it. But she’d been about to and we’d both known it. That’s what she thought of me of me now. It was no wonder she didn’t want me around her or her little sister.

I hated that she thought it almost as much as I hated her for thinking it. 

I hated that I proved her right.

The blood. 

The glass. 

The fear in her eyes when she looked at me.

I drifted to drown all of that out. It was like Naomi’s belief that I was a good person was what stopped me from being a piece of shit. Now she’d taken that away and I hated her for it. 

I hated her in that deep, burning way that you can only hate someone that you once truly loved. 

Chapter 9: The Funeral

Naomi

"Who's your best friend?"

"You are, silly," I said. Mia dangled her legs off the kitchen counter and gave me a hugely disapproving look. 

"That's really lame," she said. "A grown-up should not have an eight-year-old best friend."

I did my best not to laugh. I may have technically been twenty-four but I still felt like I was nineteen and figuring things out. Being called a grown-up by anyone was ridiculous. But I guess when you’re eight, even actual nineteen-year-olds look like grown-ups. 

"It's not my fault you're such a great kid,” I told her

"No," she agreed, very seriously. "But Hannah Franklin is my best friend so maybe you should find another one."

"I thought Jess Burnett was your best friend?" I said. She had more friends than I could keep track of.

"She was," Mia sighed. "But we fell out because she sat next to Gemma at lunch instead of me."

"Bummer," I said.

"Yeah," Mia agreed. "So you should pick another best friend because I've already got one."

"Okay."

"Did you have a best friend when you were my age?"

I glanced down at crescent moon shaped scar on my right hand which, for better or worse, always made me think of him.

"Yes."

"What was her name?"

"Him," I corrected her. "And his name was Daryl."

"Daryl," she said slowly like she recognised the name, a little frown crossing her face. 

"You want a cheese sandwich for lunch or PB&J?"

"PB&J," she said immediately. I’d known which she’d pick, I’d only asked her to change the subject. I reached into a cupboard and pulled out both jars. She was still looking at me in that intense way kids do when they think you’re hiding something. 

"Bryce is taking you to school today," I told her, slathering peanut butter on one slice of bread and jam on the other. "I gotta leave early, I’ve got a job interview.”

"Okay," she said but she looked a little disappointed and I hated that. "Hey, how come Bryce has got a car and you don't?". 

"Because Bryce got himself a very rich husband who can buy fancy cars for him," I said. 

"And that's why Bryce can't be your best friend either," she sighed like she was really, properly sad for me.

"Why?" I asked and cut her sandwiches into little triangles. "Because he has a fancy car?"

"No," she frowned like I was real dumb. "Because you're supposed to marry your best friend when you're a grown-up. Everyone knows that."

"Really?"

"Yeah," she said. "That's why people at weddings always say how happy they are to be marrying their best friend."

"You know a lot about this," I said, "for someone who's only ever been to one wedding."

"Yes, and it was Bryce's wedding and when he made his speech he called Andy his best friend so he can't be yours,” she said.

"Can't you have two?"

"Two best friends?" she said, shaking her head incredulously. "No. Don't be silly."

 She really had a lot of opinions about this. I packed the sandwiches and a few snacks into her lunchbox. 

“Why are you so worried about this?” I asked her.

“Because I don’t want you to be lonely anymore.”

“I’m not lonely,” I smiled and wondered why it tasted like a lie. Before I could think too much about it, there was a knock at the door. 

"That'll be one of my friends now," I said, pointedly. She stuck her tongue out at me. "Get your shoes on."

She jumped down from the chair and ran into the bedroom to get her shoes while I went to answer the door. There was always something kind of funny about seeing Bryce all dressed up in his designer sweaters and Levi's in the dingy and dimly lit hallway of my apartment building. The faint smell of weed drifted towards us and it was impossible to say whether it was a residual hangover from the night before or if someone was just starting early for a Wednesday morning.

"Morning," I said. "Thanks for taking her."

"No worries," he said, with a tired smile. "It's on my way and she makes the journey more fun."

"She makes everything more fun," I said. He nodded in agreement. “You want some coffee? I’ve got a spare flask.”

“Nah, I’ve got some in my car. Thanks though,” he said. “When’s the interview?”

“8.30.”

“And it’s for The Post, yeah?”

“Yup,” I said, feeling the nerves twist my stomach already. "How's work?"

"Well, y'know," he said. "Politics journals don't assistant edit themselves."

"So… boring?"

"Unbelievably."

"Hey, Bryce!" Mia yelled, much too loudly for our tiny apartment.

"Hey, kiddo,” he grinned. “You ready?" 

"Yeah!"

"You need me to pick her up too?" he asked as Mia clung to his legs. 

"Nah, I can get her. Thanks, though."

“Bryce,” Mia looked up him. 

“Yes?”

“Did you marry your best friend?”

Bryce frowned for a second. “Yes,” he said slowly. “But me and you are good buddies too.”

Mia didn’t care about that, she just looked at me and said, “Told you so.”

“Get to school,” I told her, pretending to be annoyed while she giggled. 

“Good luck,” Bryce called over his shoulder, having to take off pretty quick to chase after Mia who was already running towards the elevator. I could still hear her laughing when I closed the door. I had just about enough time to dump our breakfast dishes in the sink and run a comb through my hair before I had to get going. 

The bus was, mercifully, empty enough for me to get a seat and flick through the binder of things I had prepared for this interview; my resume, portfolio and lists of article ideas. I’d also stuck a few post-it notes with a list of questions that I thought might come up to the inside. I practised my answers to them on the way there. 

The bus was ten minutes late but that was okay because I’d given myself enough time to be half an hour early. 

Even the entrance was intimidating; all white brick and high arches and columns. I’d sat and looked at pictures of it online for what must have amounted to several hours of my life but standing in front of it, it felt much bigger than I expected. I waited for it to swallow me. I stood at the buzzer by the big, glass doors and took a deep breath. Then I pushed for the reception. 

“ Washington Post ,” a voice said through the tannoy. “How can I help?”

“Naomi Payton,” I replied, finding it a little hard to speak past a lump of nerves in my throat. “I’m here for an interview.”

“Come on in.” There was a slight pause and then I heard the buzz as the security around the doors was released. I pushed on them and found myself inside the high-ceilinged Reception Hall of the Washington Post. The receptionist behind a large, semicircular white desk stood up when I came in. “Miss Payton?”

“Yes,” I smiled.

“If you could just sign in to our visitor book, I’ll get you a Pass,” she gestured to the open guestbook on the desk. A thick, black pen lay beside it. I filled it out with my name, the date and reason for being there. She handed me a laminated white card with the word ‘Visitor’ stamped on it. 

“Thank you.”

“No problem, just take a seat and I’ll let Ms Westbrook know you’re here.”

“Thank you,” I said again and my nerves doubled in size. I hadn’t been sure that my interview would be with Ms Westbrook herself. 

I took a seat on a shiny, grey leather chair to the side of her desk and opposite a line of three elevators. I thought about shuffling my notes around again but knew that would just make me more nervous. I was as prepared as I was ever going to be. My portfolio was in the best shape it had been in for a while and, although I still wasn’t sure which of my articles they’d seen that had made them offer me an interview, I was confident that everything I’d brought was something I was proud of. I knew the publication well. I knew Marianne Westbrook well, too. Maybe too well. 

She was a journalistic goddess, famous for her take no-nonsense interviews and ability to dismiss -on the spot- any man who talked over her in a meeting. She’d been an idol of mine since I’d first learned her name. I absentmindedly ran a finger up and down the crescent-moon scar on the back of my hand. I didn’t do it deliberately but it always made me calmer. By the time I was called in, my heartbeat had almost stopped racing. 

Marianne Westbrook was smaller in real life than I had imagined her, a tiny firecracker of a woman. Her short, dark hair sat in perfect curls around her head. A dark navy pantsuit and a bold red lip. I dunno if it was just because of how much I idolised her but she had a presence far bigger than she was, like she could have walked into any room and had it bend to her will. I immediately wanted to tell her how much I admired her work and her work ethic, but I remembered reading in an interview somewhere that she hated ass-kissers so instead I stuck out my hand and said, “Thanks for seeing me, Ms Westbrook.”

“Thank you for coming in.” Her handshake was cold and firm. I wondered if she could feel how hard my heart was beating through the pulse in my hand. I worried that my hands were sweaty. Despite towering over her, I felt tall. “Please take a seat.”

She gestured to a lime-green chair opposite a white desk. Most things in the room were white, save for the occasional splash of bright green from the chairs, a desk lamp, a potted plant by the window and a piece of art on the wall that was too abstract for me to even try and guess what it was. 

“Thank you,” I said as I sat down. 

“Sorry about the green,” she said. “This is not my office.”

“It’s alright,” I shrugged. “I’ve seen worse.”

She raised one eyebrow, like she couldn’t quite believe there was worse than this. She ran through some fairly standard interview questions about my background, the classes I’d taken and my work history. We then moved on to look at the portfolio of pieces I’d written for the college paper and freelance pieces I’d managed to publish since graduating. She read them over. The silence while she was doing so felt huge. When she was done, she didn’t comment on them, just put them down and fixed me with her unreadable brown eyes. “You understand that we are also looking at candidates from Princeton, Yale, Harvard.. places like that?”

“Yes, ma’am.” I nodded. I wondered if I was meant to thank her for giving me a chance amongst all of those privileged assholes. Pride stopped me from doing so. A slight pause buzzed in the air along with my nerves.  

“So,” she crossed one leg over the other. “Why do you think you have an edge over those other candidates?”

“I didn’t come from money,” I admitted, like it was news to either of us. “Even with a scholarship, those Ivy League places were not a realistic option for me.”

“I didn’t ask for your sob story.”

“I’m not giving you one,” I said. “I’m just not going to pretend that it was a lack of good grades or work ethic that stopped me going there. It was circumstance, that’s all. And I’ll bet most of the people you’ve already hired have Ivy League educations.”

She looked a little taken aback. “That may be so-”

“So you don’t need any more of those kinds of perspectives,” I said. I didn’t care that I’d spoken over her. If she was going to be a snob about where I was from, me been meek and polite weren’t gonna change that. I’d given up pretending to be someone else a long time ago. “They’ve got no idea what’s going on with working-class Americans, what they care about, what they’re worried about. That’s why they don’t read your paper.“

Her lips formed one thin, surprised line. “Is that so?”

“Yes. When you’re trying to make enough to feed your kids or you’re worried about job security, it’s hard to care what’s going on in the Middle East because it feels so far removed from your own struggles,” I said. “It’s hard to care about whether or not it’s more ethical to eat quinoa instead of couscous when you can’t afford either.” 

“You speak like there’s a gap in the market there.” 

“Maybe there is,” I shrugged. I hadn’t thought of it that way. “It’s not that people are dumb, or wilfully ignorant, they just have more immediate things to worry about. Like surviving.” 

“Do you think these people who are, as you rightly point out, strapped for cash would shell out for one of our papers?”

“They would if they thought there was something worth reading,” I said. “Like I said, they ain’t dumb.”

“We report global news as well as local.”
“I know.”

“So are you saying we should stop that to focus solely on what matters to the working class on the off chance they might start buying our paper?”

“No.”

“No?”

“The global stuff affects them too. It affects all of us, it’s just harder to care about if you only hear about it from millionaires who don't know anything about what you're struggling with.” I said. “You just need a perspective that will show everyday Americans why they should care about it. And you ain’t going to get that from any of those Ivy League, silver-spoon folks.”

I sat back and felt my cheeks burn at how much of my home accent had slipped out. If Marriane noticed she didn’t say anything, she just sat back in her own seat and gave me a look I was too nervous to decipher. 

“Thank you, Miss Payton,” she said, eventually. “We’ll be in touch.”

“Thank you for seeing me,” I said, standing up to gather my shit together. She reached out and put a hand on my portfolio. 

“Okay if we keep this?” she asked. “The Hiring Selection Committee will need to see it too.”

“Of course,” I said, although it was my only copy so if I landed any more interviews I’d have to pay to print it all off at the library again. 

I don’t think I breathed properly until I was out of that room. The receptionist behind the desk caught my massive exhale and smiled. 

“She has that effect on people,” she said, sympathetically. “Can I get you anything - water? Xanax?” 

I laughed. “No, thank you.”

I handed in my visitor pass and signed out. I glanced up at the list of people who had signed in before me and wondered briefly if any of them had come in vying for the same position. 

I’d booked the rest of the day off, which I was starting to regret. I’d signed up to a temp agency and they called with some kind of work most days, from covering reception jobs to doing basic office admin. It was tedious but it gave me time to work on any freelance stuff that came in. Getting a permanent position would change everything for me and Mia. 

I regretted not planning something else to do. Because all I could do was go home and stare at my phone in case it rang, refresh their emails in case their rejection process was just that quick.

When my cell phone actually rang I almost jumped out of my skin. It was a number I didn't recognize. I doubted the Post would call back already or from a cell phone. Still, I answered it almost immediately.

"Hello?" I said and cringed at how keen I sounded. I wished I'd thought of something more relaxed and sophisticated to say.

"Hey Naomi?" The accent was from back home. I was so shocked that for a moment I didn't recognize his voice.

"Er… yeah?"

"It's Merle."

I thought my heart had stopped. 

"Merle?" I repeated, sitting up straight as panic rose inside me. I couldn't think of a single reason Merle would have to contact me other than if something terrible had happened to either Daryl or Momma. 

"The one and only," he said. "I got this number for your Momma, that okay?"

Not Momma, then.

"Is Daryl okay?" I asked. "He hurt or something?"

Visions of bike accidents and drug deals gone wrong flashed through my head. It was only when I heard him chuckle slightly that I relaxed. Merle was an asshole but he did love his brother, I knew that much.

"He's fine," Merle said. "Probably better than usual, actually. Our dad's dead."

"Oh." I paused. I wasn't sure how to feel. It was big news. I was sure it would have a big impact on both brothers. I was also sure that neither of them would deal with it in a healthy way. "I want to say I'm sorry to hear it but I ain't."

"Nah," Merle said. "We ain't either. Weird though."

"I'll bet," I said. Even with everything Momma had put Mia and I through, everything she'd done, I knew I'd have some mixed feelings when she died. Parents are still parents even when they're crap. "When'd it happen?"

"Yesterday," he said. "Or at least that's when they found his body. Could've been before that I guess."

"Yeah."

I didn't say so but I was glad a man like Mr Dixon had died alone. It was what he deserved.

"You guys having a funeral?"

I wouldn't have put it past them to have just burned the body on sight. But there were probably laws against it and they wouldn't have gotten away with it if it weren't them who found the body. Neighbors would ask questions.

"Yeah, it's on Friday but don't worry, you ain't expected to be there. I know you and Daryl ain't speaking right now. It just didn't feel right… you not knowing."

The moments where Merle showed he had a heart, were honestly the weirdest ones to know him. 

"I appreciate that," I said. "And I'll be there."

"Honestly, it's okay," he said. "I know you're some big shot in New York now. Don't make the trip for that old bastard."

Usually, when someone from back home called me a 'big shot', it just felt like a dig at me for moving away but with Merle it didn't feel like there was any venom in it. He actually sounded kinda proud. I looked around at my crummy one bed apartment and wondered if he'd feel the same if he saw it 

"Washington," I said. "It ain't that far. I'll be there."

"It's a long way to come to pay your respects to someone who don't deserve it.*

"Yeah, I ain't doing it for him," I said. There was a silence where neither of us hung up. It was weird, after all this time, to be connected to Daryl again, even if it was through Merle. "Does he know you called?"

Waiting for the answer, I held my breath. 

"Nah. Think he'd kill me if he found out "

Still not forgiven me then. 

“Okay.”

“Gotta go,” he said, in a quiet and hushed kind of way that might have meant Daryl was suddenly nearby. “See you later. Maybe.”

“See you soon.” I said it like a promise and I gave that promise more weight than I normally would have with Merle. Because it wasn’t a promise to him, not really, it was just passing through him. 

He chuckled to himself, like he always did when I said something he thought was too serious, "Take care."

It sounded like he meant it and it made my heart ache a little. I remembered Daryl saying something similar when he’d dropped me at college. “You too.” 

And take care of him, too, I wanted to add but didn’t because I was a coward. I heard a voice in the background, too far away to know if it was Daryl or not and then he hung up. In the crushing silence of my apartment, I took a moment to collect myself. And then I opened my laptop and bought two tickets to Georgia. They weren’t cheap, it was going to be a tight month. But when wasn’t that the case? 

I went in to Mia’s bedroom. I'd given her the one bedroom in the apartment when she’d moved out with me and invested in a good pull-out sofa for myself. I didn’t mind much, I stayed up working late most nights after I’d put Mia to bed so it just made a lot of sense that she could have somewhere away from my frustrated sighs and keyboard-tapping to actually get some sleep. I’d hoped that it would be more temporary than it had proved to be. I'd hoped by now I'd be earning enough for us to be living somewhere nicer, without the damp in the corner and the mold around the windows. But Mia didn’t seem to notice and at least she wasn't living with Momma any more.

I packed her a bag. And then I packed one for myself. Small ones, so we wouldn’t have to pay for any extra baggage on the plane. 

I was early to pick Mia up from school. That was usually the case, due to the way the buses worked out, it was either be super early or fifteen minutes late. And I never wanted Mia to feel the panic of coming out of school and not seeing the person who was meant to pick you up. I never wanted her to have to stand around while everyone else got to go home. It also gave me a chance to sit down and do some reading. Books had the added bonus of being a good way to block out the parents who’d stare at me, their judgements and assumptions that I’d gotten pregnant at sixteen written all over their faces. 

It was usually a time I had to myself but not today. Today, a woman approached me as I sat on my usual bench. 

“Hey there,” she smiled at me in a way that didn’t feel very genuine but it could have just been her unnaturally white teeth. Her smooth, shiny hair reminded of Abbie. 

“Hi,” I smiled back. 

“I’m Julia. Huntzberger,” she said. “Head of the PTA.”

There was no need for her to introduce herself like that. I’d read all of their damn weekly letters, I recognised the name.

“Nice to meet you,” I smiled anyway and held out my hand. “Naomi Payton.” 

She shook it. Her hands were cold like a dead fish. “Payton,” she said. “So you’re Mia’s-” 

She didn’t bother finishing the sentence, just let it hang in the air and looked at me with expectant, wide eyes.

“I’m her big sister,” I said, because I knew that’s what she and all of the other Mom’s at the school gates were here for; sniffing out a bit of scandal. “Half-sister, technically.”

Her eyebrows shot up at that, clearly enough intrigue for her to want to pry more into my family history and what she probably assumed was a failed first marriage. There was also a hint of satisfaction in her eyes, like the half-sibling aspect of it explained the slightly bigger than average age difference between us.

“Ah,” she smiled again. “We thought you looked far too young to be her mother.”

I knew it was meant to be flattering but there were girls back home who’d got pregnant at the age I was when Mia was born. I wondered if they’d had to put up with all of this bullshit too. Mia had been at this school for almost three years now and it had taken anyone that long to approach me, they’d spent the rest of their time just staring and whispering.

“You’re Gemma’s Mom?” I asked, having run through all of the classmate’s Mia had ever mentioned in my head. Of all the kids that Mia’s old best friend could have sat next to at lunch, did it have to be the daughter of the Head of the PTA? Was that why she’d come over? Were we in some kind of feud now?

“Yes, I am,” she said and paused. “So how come it’s up to you to pick up Mia?” 

“Our Mom… she’s pretty sick,” I said, which wasn’t a lie. Addiction is as much of a sickness as any other. “So, she’s back home in Georgia and Mia’s with me.”

I knew it wasn’t the answer that Julia had been expecting. Maybe a real lie would have been easier to swallow, maybe I should have left out the part about Mia’s biological Mom being in a whole other state, but I’d given up lying about my Momma. Just like I'd given up lying about myself after my disastrous freshman year.

“How long has she been with you?”

“Three years,” I said. “I moved here after I graduated. Once I’d started working, I flew her out.”

“That’s a lot for you to take on,” Julia said. I couldn't tell if she was impressed or scandalised. 

I didn't much care. I shrugged. “I’m happy to do it.” 

The bell rang and an instant later there was the familiar sound of children screaming. The doors burst open and a steady stream of them poured out. Mia tumbled out with a group of other girls, including both Gemma and Jess so whatever argument had happened the day before had clearly already been forgotten. They were all giggling about something and it took an age for them to say goodbye to each other. 

“Oh to be young again,” Julia smiled with a slight eye roll. I smiled back, like I could in any way relate to having a ton of school friends that I couldn’t wait to see every morning. It had just been one. Mia’s life was so different to the way mine had been when I was her age. And that was a good thing. 

I eventually managed to coax her away from her friends and we started to speed walk to the bus stop. Someone pulled up beside us and honked. I pulled Mia closer to me and dug my hands into my pocket to see if I could grab my keys in time to jab them in the eyes of whatever creep was following us to the bus stop. But then I heard, “You ladies need a lift?”

And Mia said, “Bryce!”

And my pounding heartbeat returned to normal. 

He peered up at us out of the open window, his car crawling to a halt. 

“You sure?” he asked.

“Yeah, jump in.”

Mia ran to climb in the back. 

“How was the interview?” he asked, as I sat in the passenger seat and strapped myself in.

“Good. I think. I hope," I hesitated. "I think I yelled at her."

"You did what?"

“I yelled at her. Just a little bit.”

“God, Naomi,” he heaved a sigh. “Why? Do you not want this job?”

“I do,” I said. “But she kept going on about how everyone else they were considering were Ivy League assholes, so-”

“Did she call them Ivy League assholes?”
“No, those are my words.”

“I thought as much.”

“I just told her that a fancy education ain’t everything,” I said. “And that having some different perspectives in her dumb paper might not hurt.” 

“Well that’s… bold of you.”

I shrugged and changed the subject. “Anyway, how was work?”

“Not too bad, thanks,” he said in that way that people do when they don’t wanna actually talk about the day they’ve had. 

“You’re off early,” I commented, checking the time.

“My last meeting of the day got cancelled," he said, not sounding too upset about it. I nodded and switched the radio on to cover the silence. "Andy’s having a few people round for dinner tonight if you guys wanna come?”

“That’s lovely, thanks. But actually we can’t. We’re heading home for a couple of days.”

“Home as in Georgia?”

“Yup.”

“Everything okay?”

“Are we going to see Momma?” Mia piped up from the back. I'd hoped the radio would have distracted her. 

“Yeah, we’ll see Momma,” I said. Because the thought of someone finding her dead days after the fact like Mr Dixon made me feel weird. Not happy, not sad. Just weird. Mia whooped. I glanced at Bryce and said, “An old friend of mine’s dad died. So, I’m going back for the funeral.”

“An old friend?” he repeated. 

“Yes.” 

I knew he expected me to say more but I didn’t. 

“You don’t have any old friends. As far as I knew, I was your oldest friend. Unless you and Abbie have suddenly reconnected.”

I snorted with laughter, “God no. I haven’t seen her since she blanked me in the library after I moved out of that dorm.”

“But you were a loner at highschool?”

“Do you mean loser?” Mia piped up from the back.

“Very funny, Mia.” I glanced at Bryce, “It’s Daryl.” 

“You guys back in contact?” 

“No, his brother called.”

Bryce nodded but I knew he was worried. I didn't blame him. He was the one who’d had to take me to the emergency room to get stitches in my hand that night. I’d told him that it had been an accident, that Daryl hadn’t been aiming for me, that he’d be the last person on earth to hurt me, but I don’t think it made a difference. And I knew how it looked to an outsider. Bryce and I were close now but compared to the way Daryl and I had been, everyone was an outsider. 

“You sure you want to go to that?” he asked. 

“Yeah,” I said. “I’ve known the Dixon’s since I was Mia’s age. Mr Dixon was a part of my life for a long time.”

I didn’t say what kind of part he’d played. I didn’t say that the smell of whiskey coming off him had always made me afraid or that I’d spent nights patching up the shredded back of his youngest son. I didn’t say that I’d dreamed of his death countless times and only wanted to go to check that it had really happened, that Daryl and Merle were really free. 

“Okay, well be sensible Naomi,” Bryce said, sounding the closest thing to a parent that I’d ever had. 

“Yes, Dad,” I rolled my eyes. 

Daryl

Death used to be this whole big deal, I think it’s easy to forget that these days.

Just because he’d finally done the decent thing and died, people who hadn’t seen our dad in years came out to sit around a box with his dead, bloated body in it and say some generic bullshit about his life. Like they knew anything about it. His drinking buddies slurred a few words about how much fun that asshole had been at the bar. 

I think we sang some hymns although I don’t remember which ones or why we picked them. They were probably just the first on the list of options Merle and I had been shown.

Funerals used to be expensive, too. Merle and I went for the cheapest options of everything, which were still too good for our dad. They were all still too damn expensive and our old man didn’t deserve a penny of it. I’d wanted to burn the trailer down with him inside it but Merle said that weren’t legal and the neighbours already knew he was dead so there weren’t anything we could do about it. I guess people would ask questions if there weren’t a funeral.

There’s been people I’ve put in the ground since my dad kicked the bucket that deserved a proper funeral a lot more than he did. Of all the bodies I’ve burned or just left to rot, all the people I’ve had to wrap in a damn cloth and stick in the ground with nothing but a few sticks to mark the spot, I wish he’d been one of them. I wish we’d left him to be eaten by wolves and been able to give an actual funeral to people who ain’t assholes. 

People who die now don’t even get a casket. 

Dad did. 

It was heavy too, especially with him in it. He'd gained a lot of weight towards the end. Merle and I carried him in. It saved us from having to pay for any more people from the funeral home to do it. I guess I was supposed to feel sad but I didn’t feel anything, except maybe annoyed that I had to carry something I cared so little about. 

I'd felt numb the whole time we were planning it, too. And when the minister asked Merle and me if we wanted to say anything about our dearly departed dad, I think we both laughed. It was only right at the end, when the minister was saying some bullshit about a next life that my old man certainly hadn’t earned, that I turned around to look at the clock. 

And I saw her. 

Sitting at the back next to her Momma. She looked like herself again; all curly dark hair and fiery eyes. She weren’t looking at me, her eyes were on the minister but I still spun back around to face the front as fast as possible.

“You seen a ghost?” Merle leant in real close to me and whispered. “Is dear old dad about to stumble in?”

“Nah,” I said but my hands were shaking.

I’d started to feel. Everything. Like just having her close to me was enough to crack open defenses I’d built that I thought were air-tight. She could always make me feel like that. Like no matter how numb I got when my dad was beating me, no matter how dark things got in my head, her sad but kind eyes and her warm hands would always bring me back out into the light. Lying on my side because of the sores on my back never felt so bad when I was lying next to her. I thought after five years of building walls specifically to keep her out, I'd be stronger than this. I wasn't.

“This’ll sting.” She’d warn me before she cleaned me up and pieced me back together again. And it did. 

But somehow it didn’t matter. 

I was angry now. I weren't just annoyed that Dad had drank away any money that could have gone towards his own funeral. It wasn't just the underlying anger of what a giant shitbrain he'd been to me my entire life. That anger was always with me, it was quiet and long lasting. The anger I felt now was the thought that if I hadn't gone to see him that day, if he'd had the decency to pass out or even die right then, there was a huge chance I wouldn't have stormed in to Naomi's party and been a huge waste of space. 

Or maybe I would. 

Maybe it was just a matter of time.

That kinda shit was in my blood, after all.

He passed it down to me like a sickness.

Before I realised I was on my feet, I charged at the coffin and sent it toppling off the dumb table it was sitting on. The impact caused the lid to spring open. His body flopped out onto the floor, smacking into it with a thwack. He looked pathetic. It was funny. How easy it was to knock him over now that he was dead. How I’d never managed to land a punch when he was alive but now he was a corpse, I could smash my fist into his cold dead face as many times as I wanted. I think it was the first corpse I saw, which is weird to think about now they’re walking around everywhere. 

It was Merle who pulled me off him, though I don’t know why. He held my elbows back and dragged me away, turned me around. I saw the fire escape and pushed it open. It was hot outside. Quiet. I could breathe again. I was panting, I hadn’t realised how much energy that had taken out of me. My arms hurt, my fists felt numb.

“You okay, little bro?” Merle said, his hand on my back. I nodded. “That was quite an outburst.”

I just nodded again. I weren’t in the mood to talk to him, mostly because it was rare for Merle to actually listen. Already, I could see that he was doing his best not to laugh. Everything was a joke to him, things washed off him like water off a duck. I wished I could be like that instead of just angry all the time. How was it that he inherted less of the anger from our dumbass dad? Why had I got most of it? 

Inside the Church, I could hear people talking, hear the sound of the furniture I'd knocked over being righted. Merle disappeared back through the door we’d come out of, probably to fix my mess and say something quippy about how hard I was taking our dad’s death. Then, from round the corner of the Church I heard someone shout, “Daryl!”

I think it was her . 

But I didn’t wait and see.

I just turned and walked as fast as I could away from the dumb Church and the dumber people inside it. I headed for the trees because I knew they’d hide me faster if anyone came round the side of the building trying to find me. I walked amongst a few very old graves, so old that whoever had put their family members or whatever in there was so long dead that they’d let trees spring up, the grass was overgrown. Weeds grew through cracks in headstones. I remember thinking that death looked nice and peaceful. 

Which is hilarious when you think about the way it looks now. 

But back when the dead stayed dead, death didn’t look so bad. It at least looked quiet. 

I found a bench far from the Church and close to a stream. I sat down, tried to switch off everything in my brain. It had been ages since I’d been outside like this. I didn’t do much hunting with Merle. Actually, we didn’t do any hunting. Merle wasn’t one for sitting outside. Or shutting up. He had a loud and disconnected group of friends, the members of his group changed from week to week without him seeming to notice. They were all as loud as the bikes they rode. It had been years since I’d had this kind of peace.

It lasted less than five minutes before I heard footsteps. A kid ran around the side of a nearby tree and stopped abruptly when she saw me. She might have felt bad for interrupting me. I was about to tell her that it was fine, when I looked at her properly and found something familiar in her face.

It was Mia. 

She’d grown so much. She had her sister’s nose.

I tried to do the maths. Eight. She must’ve been eight by now.

“Hey,” she said, looking unsure what to make of me. 

“Hey.” It hurt to look at her so I looked at my feet in their scuffed black shoes. 

“Sorry about your dad.”

“Don’t be,” I told her. “I ain’t.”

“Oh. Okay,” she said. I thought she might run off again but she sat down. “You’re Daryl, ain’t you?”

“Yeah.”

“You know my sister,” she said. I didn’t answer so she must’ve thought I was confused. ”My sister, Naomi?
“I knew your sister, yeah.”

“She’s looking for ya.”

My stomach dropped. “What. Now?”

“Yeah.” I must have looked worried because she said, “Don’t worry, you’re not in trouble.”

That’s what you think.

“Don’t tell her you found me, okay?” I said.

“Okay,” she shrugged. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see her legs swinging back and forth. She was so big now. I must have missed so much. “I remember you.”

“Yeah?” I wondered how much she remembered me. There were things she couldn’t possibly remember. Like the first time I held her when she was three days old; just me, her and Naomi cuddled up on her Momma’s stained couch. We'd been so good at playing like we were a family that I had believed for a second that we actually were. I wondered if she remembered that she’d called us Dar and No-mi, if she even knew that this was the first time I’d ever heard her use my full name. I wondered if she remembered the birthday party we’d thrown on her first and second birthdays, the cake we’d made her that wound up with a hole in the middle that Naomi had just filled with icing.

“Yeah.” she said. “You used to look after me sometimes. And you’d visit when Noami came back from college. You were nice.”

“You were nice too.”

“I still I am,” she said, all offended that I might have thought she weren’t. 

Well I ain’t. 

“My sister remembers you too,” she said. 

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. But she don’t talk about you much because it makes her sad.”

Makes me sad too.

“She doing okay? Your sister?” I didn't want to ask, but I couldn't help it.

“Yeah. We live in DC now. She’s gonna work at the paper and write the news.

“Good for her,” I said and I meant it. I’m not sure it sounded like I did. Then I caught the 'we' part of her sentence. "You live there too?" 

“Yup."

"Full time?"

"We come here on holidays sometimes," she shrugged. "But Naomi's been looking after me since I was five. Maybe you should visit sometime, then No-mi can stop being sad about not having a best friend anymore.”

“I’m sure your sister’s doing just fine," I laughed. It sounded meaner than I meant it.

And I’m double sure me showing up would make her 100% worse if she ain’t. It did last time. 

That dream I had of her and me and Mia safe in an apartment somewhere… it was nice that one of us got to have that.

"Mia!" I heard someone yell, I panicked for a while that it was Naomi but it was her Momma. 

"Gotta go," Mia said. "Not sorry about your dad."

"Thanks."

"See you around Daryl."

"See ya."

And then she was gone, running back around to the front of the Church in that way kids do when they kinda stomp and it makes them sound twice the size they really are. I thought about going back out there with her. After she'd made the effort to come, maybe Naomi and I could manage to say hello without ripping each others head's off. Maybe it had even been long enough that we could do some small talk. 

The thought of that kept me rooted to the bench. 

Small talk. 

With Naomi . 

Small talk was something you did with strangers, people you didn't really want to talk to but had run into grocery shopping or at the bar. 

Nothing about our friendship had been small. 

So, I didn’t go after her. I didn’t go and see why she’d bothered to come or why she’d come looking for me. I didn’t go and apologies. Or pretend like nothing had even happened and just try and talk to her like normal. I would regret that later. But right at that moment, I was too proud. 

So I sat alone and listened to the sound of people talking at the now distant Church. I heard it die down slowly, heard the cars start. Bikes too, probably Merle’s friends.

He found me eventually. When everyone else was gone. I heard him calling but I didn't say anything, just sat there and let him find me. I half expected him to give up. To leave like he always did.

“Wanna tell me what that was all about?” he said. I couldn't tell if he was annoyed or not. 

I shrugged. “Just got mad.”

“Right,” Merle nodded. 

“Having to sit there while everyone pretended to like that useless prick,” I said, trying to justify my outburst, even though if anyone should’ve understood me that day, it should’ve been Merle. “It’s bullshit.”

“Yeah,” he agreed. “But it’s gotta be done.”

“Why?” I said. “Just let him rot.”

Merle looked like he wished he’d taken me up on that suggestion when I first made it, back when we got the call about him being dead. 

He managed to sit quiet for about ten minutes, which I think was more than he'd ever managed before. Then he turned and said, “Drink for dad’s sake?”

“Yeah,” I said, though it sounded like the dumbest way to commemorate a man who’d drank himself to death and weren’t worth commemorating in the first place. My head was buzzing in a way it hadn't in years. I needed something to shut it out. 

We made our way to a nearby bar. We hadn’t arranged a wake or any kind of celebration afterwards so we avoided everywhere that had once been our dad’s usual haunts in case his drinking buddies were in there tryna give him some kind of a toast. I couldn’t hear another story about just how damn fun our dad had been for all of those nights at the bar before he’d stumbled home, taken his belt off and left deep gashes across my back. 

They must’ve looked gross, those wounds. I don’t know how she managed to touch them so gently. 

“This one do?” I asked, coming to a stop outside a bar that was neither of our favourites but also not one our dad had gone to a lot. 

“Sure.” If Merle was surprised by my sudden stop, he didn’t show it, he just let me lead him in. 

I got the first round. We sat at the bar and said nothing until we were a few drinks in. It wasn’t drowning things out the way it used to, the way I wanted it to. I looked at my brother, “Merle?”

“Yeah?”

“You invite Naomi to this shit?”

I already knew the answer, it had just taken me a while to get there with all of the other shit that had gone on. I studied his face anyway. He said, “No”

I took another drink. So did he. “Then how’d she know to come?” 

He raised his eyebrows like he was surprised, like he hadn’t given it any thought at all. He’s always been a shit liar, which is weird because he does it so often. “I thought you told her, little brother.”

“Bullshit.”

I put my glass down. Normally, I didn’t get that mad when he lied to me, but I was still full of anger. The alcohol was like pouring gasoline onto an already lit fire. I knew this was how I reacted to shit, I’d proved it a thousand different times in a thousand different drunken fights. Never stopped me, though.

Merle shrugged, “Maybe she heard from someone else.”

“Yeah? Like who?”

“I dunno. Her Momma, maybe?” he suggested. It was quick thinking but I still knew it was a lie. “Take it this means you didn’t speak to her?”

“Nah. I didn’t.” 

He sighed, didn’t say anything else. Just took another drink. 

“Why do you care all of a sudden?” I asked. “You never gave a shit about her before.”

“That ain’t true,” he said. “Looked out for you both, didn’t I?”

I shrugged. Because I couldn’t deny that he had. “When you were around, I guess.”

“Low blow,” he said. “You just been so mopey since you had that dumb fight. Thought you might have spoken to her is all. Bet neither of you can even remember what you argued about.”

The blood. The glass. I’d never forget any of that.

“So you did invite her?”

“I didn’t say that,” he said, annoyed I’d almost caught him out. “But she did come all this way.”

“She didn’t speak to me either,” I pointed out.

“Probably cause you pulled a Houdini and bounced before it was even over.”

“Makes a change, I guess,” I said. “Seeing as it’s usually you leaving."

He put his glass down so hard on the bar that I felt it shake my own. “You didn’t call dibs on being the asshole today,” he snarled. “We both lost our dad. We both get to have a shit day today.. So shut your damn mouth.”

“Yeah?” I yelled after him as he started to walk away. “Or what?”

“Or I’ll shut it for ya.”

I ran at him, tackled him to the ground like I’d done to the coffin. I heard the smack as he hit the floor and I think it must have knocked the wind out of him for a second because I got about two and half punches in before he managed to twist around underneath me. He grinned. There was blood on his teeth.

“Big mistake, little brother,” he said, grabbing the back of my head and pulling me to the side so I wasn’t pinning him down any more. I felt his fists, felt myself get a few punches in, felt the floor under me. I could hear people in the bar shouting things, I think some of them cheered. 

I felt calm again for the first time that day. Because the physical pain weren’t so bad. And it drowned out all the rest; all of the noise in my head and the pain in my gut. I knew how to deal with this kind of pain. I’d been living in it for as long as I could remember. It was like an old friend. The kind of old friend who didn’t change and turn their back on you when it suited them. Another burst of anger fuelled a kick that dislodged Merle from on top of me. I had seconds to scramble to my feet again. We circled each other, a tight wall of spectators had formed around the fight.

I ran at him. I’d lost the element of surprise so couldn’t get him to the ground this time. I think he was laughing but he could have been yelling. It was all just noise to me. My fists slammed into his torso. The leather on his jacket made him kinda slippery. 

His knee slammed into my stomach. 

I doubled over, trying to fight the impulse to throw up. There was acid in the back of my throat.

He shoved me. Hard. My right shoulder hit the ground first. I twisted, trying to get back up but Merle had already grabbed the front of my shirt. He punched me round the side of the head so hard I hid the ground again. He pulled me up. Hit me again. 

And again. 

And again. 

There’s a point when someone’s hitting you so hard and so much you stop feeling it. That was what I’d wanted, what I’d been looking for when I started this whole fight. Sometimes, just before you black out but after your vision has faded, or maybe it’s actually while you’re unconscious I dunno, it’s like you get smacked so hard you jump in to another moment. You can’t see it but you can feel it, like your brain is trying to protect you from the pain you’re actually feeling by letting you relive something better. 

I think somebody tried to break up the fight but they didn't get it. This was better than all that talking. I knew Merle would be feeling better too. Better than if we'd tried to do something to commemorate dad's memory.

Blood and fists and pain. 

This was the legacy he left us. 

This was how Dixon men showed love. 

When Merle’s face faded, surrounded by darkness, I felt something different. I felt like I was standing on a hill and all of Atlanta was glittering in front of me. There was a fire crackling, cooking something freshly caught. And I felt like wasn’t alone anymore.

Chapter 10: Outbreak

 

Naomi

Almost. It's a tricky word. It hides a lot of potential, good and bad.

I almost didn't answer the first call when it came through and if I'd missed it, things would have been real different. If I had missed any of the calls I almost ignored, things would have been real different. I was knee deep in research for my next article but when I checked the number the call was coming from, I saw it was Marianne's assistant. And you can't ignore a call from Marianne's assistant, especially when she's your boss. Stories move fast, you can't predict the news cycle, that was the main thing I'd learned working under her.

"New assignment for you, Naomi," said Hugh. Hugh never bothered with the pleasantries of 'hello' or 'goodbye' or 'how are you'. I liked Hugh.

I sat back among the mountains of research piled up beside me. "What is it?"

"There's some reports of an illness at Washington Hospital Center, and-" Hugh said.

"That's a health story," I cut him off, frustrated that he'd pulled me out of my work just to tell me something irrelevant to me. I stood up and walked out of my home office and into the kitchen to get myself another coffee.

"Yeah, and...?"

"Yeah, and that's Gary's area," I said. "He's health correspondent."

"Gary can't cover it."

"Why not?"

"He's called in sick."

"How ironic," I rolled my eyes, wondering what kind of man-flu he'd pretended to come down with this time.

"I know," Hugh said. "Hazard of the job I guess. But we need you on this."

"It that bad?"

"Not sure. Seems to be. Marianne wants to get it covered. Looks like she's anticipating it being front page for a week or so."

"Shit." I said. That did sound serious. And Marianne was rarely wrong about which stories were going to grab the national headlines. "Any deaths?"

"None confirmed but a whole wing of the hospital is on lock down and the CDC are being particularly cagey."

The more secretive the CDC were about something, the more serious it was. Preventing national panic was the reason they often gave for their silence but that was only part of it. Another part was saving their own skin until they knew exactly what they were dealing with and a had a cure for it all ready to distribute.

"Under quarantine?"

"Looks that way. There are similar reports from other parts of the country too but nobody will confirm anything. See if you can get them to."

"On it."

I hung up without saying goodbye. I knew Hugh would appreciate that.

My feet were cold on the wooden panels in my hallway and the tiles of the kitchen floor. There was underfloor heating somewhere but I never remembered to switch it on and honestly, I wasn't sure I even knew how to. It was a new apartment and so different from anywhere else I'd ever lived that it was a big adjustment. It felt too big for just Mia and I. It echoed in a way that made it feel like there was someone else there sometimes. In my most absent-minded and distracted moments, I'd turn to say something to them and then remember it was just me. I'd never felt too small for somewhere before, or like a part of me was missing.

I placed a mug under the coffee machine. It was a fancy one, with a touch screen where you could make all kinds of choices. I got it because Mia liked the hot chocolate options but it was as much of a treat for me as it was for her. It was nice to be able to afford things but I still often felt guilty about spending on just me. I selected a few extra shots of coffee and caramel than normal. I could tell it was going to be one of those days where a gallon of extra caffeine and sugar were needed. While it started whirring and filling up my cup, I got my phone out and called Gary. I mostly wanted to suss out of he'd even started working on this story and how long it might take him to get over his man-flu or hangover or whatever lame excuse was keeping him away from work so he could take it back and I could keep working on something I actually cared about.

I wasn't really expecting him to answer and for a while after he picked up, I wasn't sure if he actually had. It was like when someone sits on their phone and accidentally calls you. I could just hear the faint sound of other people talking, some deep breathing and something beeping not too far away.

"Gary?" I said, on the off chance that he'd hear and look at his phone.

"Yeah?" He sounded shit. Really, properly ill. His voice was weak. I felt bad for having thought he might be faking.

"It's Naomi," I said. He didn't respond. "From work… Marianne's assigned me your health piece… on this new disease."

"Stay away," he whispered. It was so quiet that I thought he might have been talking away from the phone, to someone in the room with him.

"Gary…"

"Don't visit anyone," he said. "Don't interview them, don't come near the hospital."

My stomach dropped like I'd missed a step on a ladder.

"Gary, where are you?"

"Hospital," he said.

"Hugh said it was on lockdown."

"I snuck in," he said. He interrupted himself with a bout of severe coughing. "Wanted to interview someone who was sick…"

"And you got sick too?"

"Yup."

There was a painful finality in the way he said it.

"Well, I guess hospital is the best place to get sick," I said in a way that was meant to cheer him up.

He started to laugh. And that lead to another few minutes of horrible coughing. "People don't get better from this."

"You've seen them die from it?"

"Yeah. Kind of," he said.

"How can you kind of die from it?"

He paused for a moment. "It's like they're dead… and then they're not anymore."

"What?"

"I can't explain it."

I wondered if the sickness he had came with any hallucinations. I should've checked how lucid he was before I started noting down everything he was saying.

"This disease," I said. "Is it like swine flu? Ebola?"

"It's more like a flu," he said. "Burning fever, coughing, all that fun stuff. They get a bit delirious too. Towards the end."

"God," I sighed. It sounded like he'd seen too many people 'towards the end'. "Do you mind me asking all this?"

"Not at all," he said. "If I'm going to be stuck in here I might as well be your source."

"Thanks. They letting you keep your phone?"

"They're too busy to care," he said.

"Okay," I said. "So how's it spread? Contact or airborne?"

"Contact," he said. I felt a little relieved. Contact sounded easier to keep yourself safe from. At that time, of course, I was imagining handshakes and hugs with someone who'd sneezed.

He must have known that would be where my mind went because he followed up with. "I was bitten."

"Bitten?" I repeated, thinking I must have heard wrong. "What does that mean?"

"It means exactly what you think it does," he said. It sounded like he'd clenched his teeth in frustration but it could have been pain. "I'll send you the details. Everything I've got. If things go bad-"

"They're not going to," I said.

"If they do," he said. "You gotta get this out to everyone. People need to know what they're up against."

This must be part of the delirium. Maybe he was closer to the end than I thought.

"I'll send whatever you give me to the Post," I promised.

"No, not just the Post," he said, urgently. "You need to get this to everyone. All of the outlets you can contact."

That was definitely an offence serious enough to get me fired.

"Okay," I said unsure if he was playing some kind of prank, hallucinating from fever or deadly serious. He'd studied disease and outbreaks as part of his job training. Did that make him an authority on this or just a paranoid weirdo? "Send me what you got."

"Will do," he sounded relieved. "And, Naomi?"

"Yeah?"

"Get yourself and everyone you love out of the City."

He hung up. The hairs on my arms stood on end. I called around other hospitals to try and get someone to talk to me but they all clammed up. Some of them got mad at me for wasting their time. Some of them didn't even answer.

Gary's email came through. It started out with great detailed descriptions of the quarantined ward of the hospital, lists of people's symptoms. Interviews with families of people waiting to heard news. And then it got weird.

Real weird.

Stories of patients dying and coming back to life. Trying to bite uninfected people. Biting Gary. Infecting him. The only way of stopping the patient had been when another one had stabbed them in the head with a scalpel.

It had to be a hallucination. Vivid and violent.

But it couldn't be real.

When my phone rang again, I thought it might be him calling to retract some of it because his fever had broken and he'd stopped hallucinating. I'd tried calling him back to clarify on what he'd written but I hadn't managed to get through. I hoped it was because he was receiving treatment or maybe that they'd found his phone and managed to take it off him. Anything, as long as he was still alive.

"Yes! Hello!" I said, picking up halfway through the second ring.

"Naomi?" whoever it was sounded surprised that I'd answered so fast. It was a woman, so definitely not Gary. I thought it might be someone connected to him though, or someone from one of the many hospitals I'd put a call into.

"Speaking," I said, in an attempt to try and claw back any of the professionalism I'd just lost.

"It's Mrs Jones," she said. "I'm a friend of your Momma's. Used to look after you when you was little."

"I remember," I said. It was weird how many people who thought that just because I'd moved I'd forgotten all of them. "How you doing?"

"I'm good, thanks," she said. "Your Momma ain't so great though. I think she's come down with something."

"What kinda something?"

"She's feverish," Mrs Jones said. "I think she's hallucinating sometimes… I've been trying to get her to a hospital but she's refusing."

It sounded like withdrawal.

Or something worse.

Gary's email lurked in the back of my mind.

"Can you stay with her?"

"As long as I can but I gotta look after some of the kids round here. You know how it is."

Mrs Jones did a lot of babysitting.

"Mia and I will be on the next flight out," I said. "Stay with her as long as possible."

"Will do. Thank you."

"Thank you for taking care of her," I said.

I didn't pack much. I called ahead to Mia's school and she was ready and waiting for me when I drove by to pick her up. Her eyes were wide and she looked a little pale. I hadn't given much information over the phone but they'd clearly passed some of it on.

"Is Momma okay?" she asked.

"She'll be fine," I lied. But I was lying to myself too so it wasn't that bad of me to lie to her too.

We must have, unknowingly, got one of the last flights out of Washington that day. Planes were grounded not long after that. At the airport I'd grabbed a bunch of hand sanitizer. I kept making Mia put it on every time she touched anything. I freaked out about us breathing in the recycled air in the airplane cabin. Who knew how many germs we were breathing in? I kept telling myself that Gary had said it wasn't airborne. But Gary had also said a lot of nonsensical things about people being dead and then not dead. He hardly felt like a reliable source.

I tried not to show my anxieties in front of Mia but she must have guessed. She was real quiet the whole way there. She kept glancing at me. Like she knew I knew something she didn't.

We took a cab from the airport to Momma's. It was expensive, we usually took the bus. But this was an emergency and I wanted to limit the time we spent with the general population as much as possible. Everyone who so much as sniffed too loudly suddenly looked infected to me.

The place was dark when we got there. Mrs Jones weren't there anymore. I unlocked the door, flicked a switch on the wall and nothing happened. Momma had clearly forgotten to pay her electricity bill. Or maybe she was dead already. I couldn't hear anything. Mia stuck so close to me you wouldn't have been able to get a hair in the space between us.

"Momma?" I meant to call it but it came out real quiet. I hoped I didn't sound as scared as Mia looked.

"My girls…" came a familiar, drowsy voice from the darkness. "So nice to see you…"

"Momma," I sighed with relief. Knowing she was here and still alive gave me a bit of hope and courage enough to walk in there. I opened up the kitchen drawer and took out a box of matches. I struck one and let the gentle orange glow fill the room, I could just make out the shape of our Momma lying in bed. I use the next one to find the box of candles we kept around for moments like these; power cuts or when Momma hadn't paid a bill. Mia helped me put them all around the house. It looked kinda warm and cozy when we were done, if you didn't think about it too much.

I went in to Momma's room, kept the lighting minimal in there in case it hurt her eyes.

"How you doing, Momma?" I asked. I could smell stale vomit somewhere.

"Okay," she whispered. Her breathing was labored and raspy, like she needed to cough. "Will you help me… move to the couch?"

"Of course," I said. She wrapped a blanket around herself a leaned on me as we walked from her room to the couch at the other end of the trailer. Mia stayed well out of her way without me telling her too. She watched us with wide eyes.

I set Momma down. She was pale and shivering even though I could see the sweat on her brown and she was boiling hot.

"Mia," she smiled at my little sister, who looked even more little in the shadows from the candlelight. "You got so big. How old are you now?"

The fact that she couldn't remember made me suspicious that this was drug-related and nothing to do with the mysterious sickness Gary had been reporting on.

"She's eleven," I reminded her, forgetting myself that neither might be to blame and she might actually have just been a crap Mom.

"Eleven," she nodded. I think she smiled but it was hard to tell in the half-dark.

"You comfortable, Momma?" I asked.

"Yeah," she whispered. And then she opened her eyes really wide and tried to sit up, like she'd just remembered something extremely important. "He bit me."

My blood ran cold. I tried to tell myself she was having some kind of feverish hallucination. But it was weird it was the same one Gary had.

"What do you mean he bit you?" I asked, getting real close to her. I spoke as quietly as I could, still not wanting Mia to hear too much or know what was going on. I thought if I kept her ignorant for long enough, I'd be able to shelter her from it all. Even with all I knew up to this point, I still thought there was a chance that things would go back to normal. I still thought they'd be able to keep things contained to the hospital.

"Bit me, Naomi," she said, a little annoyed I wasn't listening. "With his teeth."

"Who bit you?" I asked.

"This guy," she shifted around, trying to get comfortable on the pillows I'd put underneath her although it was obvious that the man discomfort she was feeling was from her illness.

"What did this guy look like?"

"He was downtown." Her hand shook when she wiped it across her sweaty forehead. "He looked... I thought he were dead."

"What were you doing downtown?" I asked. Downtown was where she used to get her drug, so maybe this was withdrawal after all.

"So many questions…you never trusted me…"

It took a lot for me not to yell at her. All I could think about were the many other times we'd both been in this exact position; her sick on the sofa, me taking care of her. The older that I got and the more I thought about moments like this, the madder it made me. Mia was older than I'd been many of those times and I'd never relied on her to take care of me when I was sick, even if it was just a cold. She was too young for that kind of responsibility. But Momma had made me do it since I was younger than she was now.

I looked at her, thinking about all of this had reminded me that she was here. She hadn't said a word since we got here. She looked so small and scared.

So young.

Way too young to be dealing with something like this.

"Mia. Go to Mrs Jones," I said. "She'll look after you for a little bit. Take a bag."

"But I want to stay with Momma," she said and she looked even more scared. I knew that fear. Fearing that if you left or looked away for a moment, she'd up and die on you. It was way too big a fear for such a small kid.

"Mia," I said, trying to keep my cool. "Go. Now."

"Why?" she said but she was on her feet.

"Do as you are told," I said. "I gotta look after Momma. I'll come and get you when she gets better. If it's contagious, I don't want you to get sick too."

"I don't want you to get sick, either," she said. Her bottom lip started to tremble, her eyes filled with tears.

"I won't," I said. "I will come get you, okay?"

She nodded and then ran to the door. She picked up her back and my old satchel and ran out of the door without saying anything else.

"Momma…" I turned back to her. All of my anger had disappeared now that I'd seen Mia's fear, remembered that she was the most important part of all of this. If our Momma didn't survive, that would be okay. But I had to keep Mia alive.

"I weren't doing anything wrong. I promise," Momma said. I'd heard that before and up until now it had always been a lie.

"Where'd you get bit?" I asked, realizing from Gary's description that a bite would be easy to find.

She moved the blanket from her legs and pulled up her top a little. On her hip there was a bite mark. It looked bad, deep. It had started to turn purple. I tried not to react or to let any of the horror I was feeling show on my face. "Okay," I said. "I'm just gonna clean the wound."

I got out some of the old medical supplies and tried to clean it as much as I could. I knew it wouldn't actually do anything but it was nice just to have something to do and it made Momma feel better, like there was anything that could be done to help her now. Enough of what Gary had said was true, that reality was starting to sink in. She relaxed enough to fall asleep. I moved as quietly as I could to pick up my things. I read through all of the notes from Gary. There was nothing that could help me and he hadn't replied since I'd last emailed him. I copied everything into an email and sent it to every contact I had in the news. I moved the most important information to the top:

Disease makes people rabid.

Bites get you infected.

Stay out of the cities.

I pressed send and prayed that all of the major news outlets would be able to get information out to everyone in time.

I knew there'd be mass panic. Maybe even riots. But that was better than just waiting for the disease to ravage the entire planet.

I hoped I wasn't too late.

Momma drifted in and out of consciousness for a few hours. It started to get dark outside. Someone was burning something somewhere close by so I got up and closed the window I'd opened in an attempt to keep her fever down. I tried to use the hotspot on my phone to stay online and stay connected, to see if Gary's message got out there but at some point it all went down.

I changed the sheets on Momma's bed so that they wouldn't smell of old sick any more. When I came out of her bedroom, I realized I couldn't hear her breathing. I didn't know how long that had been the case, I'd been so distracted by the internet going down I hadn't checked on her. She'd been so quiet. I'd thought she was asleep. But maybe it was more permanent than that.

I listened.

Nothing by my own shallow breaths and the crackle of a few dozen candles.

She lay still. Real still.

"Momma?"

Nothing.

I felt five years old. Like this was the first time I'd found her overdosed. I stepped in to the bathroom for a minute, splashed my face with cold water. I told myself to get a grip. I knew I had to check on her. I could do this. Nobody else was coming to deal with this situation. I was on my own, like always.

I opened the bathroom door.

"Momma!" I gasped. She was on her feet. Her shadow loomed towards me in the candle light. She wasn't walking right, like her legs were stiff from having lain down for so long. She knocked into the table in front of the couch. "Watch out!"

Too late. She sent one of the candles tumbling to the ground. She didn't even flinch. Didn't look at it. Flames spread from the candle to the magazines I'd piled on the floor for her to read if she got better. Her foot dragged right through it. The bottom of her pajamas caught fire.

Flames reflected in her glassy eyes. Looking at me but not seeing. Her breath rattled in and out like a whisper she couldn't make. Her mouth moved but she didn't say anything.

No denying it now.

She was one of them. 

I grabbed a knife from the kitchen counter and backed away from her. I knew that wasn't really my Momma anymore but I kept calling for her anyway. If she was ever going to show some maternal instinct, now would be the perfect time.

Her arms reached out for me.

Her jaw snapped open and shut.

Three more candles cascaded to the ground in a river of flame that soon became a sea.

She knocked into the table enough times to push it out of the way and then she moved fast, gaining on me. I stumbled backwards. I felt my heart drop and then I was on my back, staring at the ceiling of my Momma's room. I wondered what the hell I'd slipped on and felt a dull pain in the back of my head. The knife was out of my hand.

I heard her terrible breathing. Getting louder. Thudding footsteps on the kitchen floor. I struggled to sit up and then I felt her grab me. Cold, dead fingers clawed at my skin. The room was filling with smoke. Behind her, the whole kitchen was nothing but orange flame and black smoke. If I wasn't quick enough, the fire would hit the gas pipe. The whole place might explode. My route to the main door was already blocked. I was going to have to climb out Momma's window.

If she ever let me go.

I tried to push her off but she was too strong, her whole dead weight holding me down.

I looked for where I'd dropped my knife.

I thought I heard someone outside shout my name. It sounded like Daryl.

I held her back with one hand and reached for the knife.

Aim for the head.

My fingertips brushed it, it was almost within my grasp. Almost.

 

Daryl

Things weren't going so great. They never seemed to be and even Merle had stopped saying they were about to pick up. We'd wound up back at our dad's old place. We hadn't been there since he'd died. Years of dust and cobwebs had built up around the place. It was weird to be there but also the most welcoming it had ever been now that it didn't have our old man lurking around.

I don't think either of us were much looking forward to having to move back here.

We'd run out of money and run out of choices. We were always running out of money but this time was worse than usual so Dad's old place was the only place we had left. We hadn't even known that he'd owned it until after the funeral when some dumbass in a suit had come knocking, seeing if we wanted to sell the place. We couldn't believe our dad had managed to pay it off but figured it must've been when Ma was still around and he'd had his shit together more. Certainly explained why he could drink the day away and we never got evicted.

We started clearing shit out. The place was a goddamn tip. If anyone had broken in and tried to ransack it, we wouldn't have known. I don't think anything was missing but if it were, we wouldn't have noticed that either. There was booze stashed everywhere, having outlast the drunk asshole who bought it. Merle cracked it open to keep us going. It was a slow process. We both just wanted to set fire to everything in there but then we'd really be out of roofs to sleep under.

Nate Jones came round to see Merle. He'd been the closest thing to a friend that he'd had around here but only in so much that they'd occasionally hang out when Merle weren't in juvie or off doing some dodgy shit someplace else. He said he wanted to help us clear shit out but he and Merle mostly just sat on their asses and drank some of our old dad's old-ass beer.

"You hear Old Miss Payton's ill?" he said. My ears pricked up.

"No," Merle said, glancing at me out of the corner of his eye. "What's she got?"

Nate shrugged, "Some kind of fever. She's half delirious."

"She still on the wagon?" Merle asked. "Sounds like withdrawal."

"Dunno," Nate shrugged. It sounded likely. Wouldn't have been the first time that Miss Payton had come off drugs and been really ill. First time I'd heard of it since her daughter hadn't been round to take care of her, though. I think they moved on to talking and laughing about some other bullshit but it all just faded to background noise.

"You still got Naomi's number?" I asked. Merle stopped whatever he'd been about to say and frowned at me.

"Yeah. Why?"

"I should call her," I said. My heart was racing at the thought of contacting her again. "If her Momma's sick, she should know."

There was a slight silence. Merle and Nate glanced at each other.

"She's already here," Merle said.

"You sure?" I asked, although I didn't know why he'd bother lying about it.

"Saw her earlier. Sorry I didn't say," he said and then he shrugged. "Didn't think you'd wanna know."

"Oh," I said, trying to sound like I didn't care but the disappointment crushed something in my chest. "Yeah. Cool."

"You could go visit if you wanted. Sure she'd be happy for the company."

"Nah."

I'd regret that pretty quick. Things might've gone different if I'd swallowed my pride and just gone over there.

It felt weird to know that she so close but to find out from someone else. Used to be that Naomi didn't so much as breathe without me knowing about it. I remembered lying on the top bunk, hearing it under me while we both drifted off to sleep. I didn't sleep as good any more.

I blamed being back in that damn house. It was full of dust and ghosts.

His ghost in the dark shadow of his chair or the doorway where he'd take off that belt or under the table where all of his smashed whiskey bottles wound up.

Her ghost was in any of the light places... Not that she was dead yet but I could feel her presence like she was. Maybe it was just knowing she was near and not being able to speak to her.

Mere chucked a dusty magazine at me. I sneezed.

"Asshole," I said, throwing it away again.

"Well help us gut this place," Merle said, even though he weren't doing anything either. "Quit staring off at nothing."

"You wanna read these?" Nate asked, gesturing to the pile of magazines our dad had collected over the years. They were either full of coupons or dirty pictures.

"Hell no," I said. "Burn 'em."

"They ain't high-brow enough for him," Merle explained.

"Really?"

"Yeah, he reads the Post," Merle said, making his accent all post like I was some kind of fancy pants for reading the news. I felt myself go a bit red though, I didn't know he'd seen my copies.

"Like… the Washington Post?" Nate asked, obviously confused.

"Yeah," I admitted.

"You know we aint living in Washington, right?" he asked while Merle laughed like a damn hyena.

"Yes."

I wished he'd drop it.

"Why?" he asked.

"Why do you care?"

"I don't," Nate shrugged. "Must be hard to get it down here is all."

It was. I had to have it posted down special and it was always days behind what it would be if I lived there. I didn't mind, though. I weren't reading it to be up to date.

"I like the crossword," I said. Merle cackled. Nate looked like he weren't sure how to respond to that so opted for silence. Which was the smart choice.

We got off our asses and started cleaning again. Nate actually helped this time. Merle put the TV on as a little bit of background noise. I went in to our dad's closet and pulled out all of his musty old clothes. I started piling them up a good distance from the door, then I poured some whiskey on it and set the whole thing ablaze, pretending it was the man himself. Merle and I had our shit packed by the door, ready to move in when we'd cleared enough space.

 

When I came back in, Merle and Nate were back in front of the TV, more beers in hand.

"Now who's being lazy?" I grumbled. Merle sushed me.

"There's summat going on," Nate said, pointing at the screen. I went to stand in front of it.

Some news reporter was standing in a fancy suit outside Atlanta General Hospital, reporting on some kind of virus that had left the hospital so busy they were urging anyone with non-urgent appointments to stay home and reschedule them.

"Sounds like a whole lotta nothing to me," I said with a shrug.

"You never know, bro," Merle said. "Could be contagious."

"Looks like sitting on your ass is contagious," I retorted, staring pointedly at both of them. They sighed and stood up. We shut the windows because the smoke from the burning clothes outside was getting in. It took us hours to get all of the dust and cobwebs and shit outta there. There also weren't that much Merle and I wanted to keep. It was starting to get dark by the time we were close to finishing. Merle declared that was enough for the day and we sat down to order a pizza. Phone lines weren't working anymore but we just assumed they were busy until we turned the TV back on.

"A new sickness has shut down Atlanta General Hospital," said the news reporter. "Parts of the city are on lockdown and under quarantine. Authorities have asked people to remain in their homes."

"The fuck…?" Merle leaned forwards, turned up the volume on the TV.

The picture cut to an aerial shot of gridlocked traffic trying to head out of Atlanta.

"We have unconfirmed reports of similar scenes in other cities across America," the voice-over said. "The CDC is urging people not to panic-"

"Course they fucking are," Merle yelled at the screen. "Want us all docile like lambs to the slaughter."

"I'm sure it ain't that bad," Nate said.

Merle rolled his eyes. "They ain't gonna tell the likes of us that we're in danger. Bet they didn't advise the President to stay at home, bet he's in some cozy bunker somewhere. Probably already has a vaccine for whatever kinda swine-flu, bird-flu shit this is."

Images of the streets showed a crowd of people running. It was hard to see what they were running from. Others walked but they walked weird. Like maybe they were sick or injured.

"Symptoms of the virus include a fever, dizziness, fatigue, delirium, chills, nausea, loss of consciousness, dehydration, coughing up blood, internal hemorrhaging, organ failure and eventually death."

I remember thinking I'd never heard a list of symptoms so long. I never actually thought about what it would be like to see people you know go through it. I remember the reporter saying something unconfirmed about getting infected people through the head. It felt far away, confined to the city. Until Nate turned to us and said, "Kinda sounds like what Old Miss Payton's got."

Naomi. 

My heart flipped over. I gripped the arm rests on the side of my chair. I saw Merle glance at me nervously.

"You sure she's here?" I asked him. He looked like he wanted to lie to me but thought better of it.

"Yeah," he said. I stood up.

"My Momma's looking after the little one," Nate said. "Millie?"

"Mia," I corrected him. Merle started to say something else but I weren't listening, I was already on my feet and heading for the door. I grabbed my hunting stuff, my crossbow. If Naomi's Momma was one of those… things on the TV, I didn't want her to have to be the one who killed her.

I smelt smoke the minute the doors opened. Outside, everything was chaos. People ran, screaming. Some of them might have been bit, I saw the blood. Saw their fear. It was so much worse than it had sounded from inside our old house.

"Daryl!" Merle hollered. "Come back here."

I broke into a run, partly to get away from him but mostly because I was close enough to see that the smoke was coming from Naomi's Momma's place.

When I got there, flames were pressed against the window. Bright orange against the tar black smoke.

"Naomi!" It felt like her name ripped itself from my throat, like I'd only be able to breathe right again if I said it enough times that she answered.

Flames rose higher. There were so many people screaming and yelling that I couldn't hear if she was yelling back from inside.

Maybe because there's nothing to hear. 

No. She's gotta be alive. 

She gotta. 

A really dumb part of me thought I'd feel something if she were dead. Like she was a part of me and I'd somehow know if that part of me were ripped from this Earth.

The fire was tearing through the end nearest to me, too thick to see whether or not it had reached the back of the house. But I could see it were blocking the door. I reached the handle and managed to grab it.

It was boiling hot. A searing pain flashed across my hand. The fire must have been right up against it.

The windows. 

Smash all of the windows.

Get. In. There.

Hands grabbed my arm.

Merle.

Pulling me back.

I twisted against him, trying to pull myself free.

"Stop it, man! Stop it!" It was the first time in his life that Merle sounded like he was begging.

I screamed her name again. Nate was trying to hold me back too. I struggled. My feet dragged through the dirt, leaving track marks like a car. I managed to get my hands on the front of Nate's shirt. I shoved.

Hard.

He stumbled backwards. I remember him looking me dead in the eye, seemed surprised that I'd managed to dislodge him.

Then there was an explosion so strong and so close that I didn't even hear it. I just felt it throw me back, heat on my face worse than before. My ears rang. Couldn't hear anything but a high-pitched noise that came from deep inside my brain. The kitchen side of Naomi's had been blown wide open. The flames had got Nate. He was still moving but his flesh was almost gone. He might have been screaming, I wouldn't know.

I stared at the hole in the side of her house that was filled with flame. I knew I was yelling for her but I couldn't hear that either. I could just feel it, tearing from my heart and soul right up through my guts and out into the open air. I willed her to come through the gaps in the flames. I wanted to leap through it myself.

My feet scrambled against the dirt. I tried to get up but Merle's arms were already around my shoulders. I tried to kick but I was kicking at nothing.

When I close my eyes I can still see that gap in the flames, can still see the as yet untouched part of Naomi's house. I can still feel that pull deep in my chest that willed her to run outta the smoke or let me run in there. I tried to pull Merle's arm from round my neck, dug my fingernails right into his skin.

The ringing in my ears faded until all I could hear was things falling in flame and Merle saying. "We gotta go," over and over as he pulled me back.

He pulled me away from the house, away from the charred and burning body of Nate. Away from Naomi, if there was still a Naomi to be pulled away from. I fought him every step.

Until I heard a crash from far behind us that was probably the roof caving in, killing anyone that was inside. When hope left me, the fight did too. Merle weren't expecting it. I hit the ground. Hard.

Felt like someone had sliced me open, left my heart and guts and all my insides exposed to be eaten by wild animals. That might have been better.

The sky looked clear. I could see the stars. I wondered if there really was a heaven and how the hell I could get there. Bring her back.

Merle leaned over me. Even he looked sad.

"C'mon, man," he still sounded like he was begging. "Just a bit further."

I got to my feet, followed him as he ran. Everything was a blur of dark and trees.

We sat down in the forest, outside of the chaos of the trailer park. I could see our hill with our log. Looking at it made the whole world spin. Merle's face swam into view in front of it.

"We gotta go," he said. God knows how many times he'd said that to me today.

"I can't, man," I said. Felt like the truest thing I'd ever said. I knew he was right, that the danger in the campsite and all of those half dead and dying people would spread out in to the forest when they were done tearing the trailer park apart. If I'd had any of my wits about me when it had happened, I'd have suggested moving to higher ground first 'cause that was always safer. But I didn't. I just sat there and thought about how being torn apart by one of those things would be better than staying here and feeling like this. 

Merle caught his breath and pulled me to my feet again, "Look, I know you been holding a torch for her all these years. But you gotta let her go, man. She's gone."

Everything blurred.

No. I don't remember if I said it or just felt it, right down to my bones.

I looked away from him. He didn't get it. I'd held more than a torch for her. It weren't just some damn crush. She had found me when we were kids and I'd been nothing. Nobody. Just some kid that would've disappeared without anyone looking. Would've ended up in jail like his brother. Never would've thought there was any good in him because nobody ever said there was. Then she came along and she saw some kinda spark in me, something good, and she helped it grow into an inferno. She could see through all of my anger and my rage and my bullshit.

Dixon boys loved in anger and fists and blood.

Naomi's love burned with a fierce, un-tamable light.

Now she was gone. The world was darker. And I had nowhere to put all that fire.

Chapter 11: Aftermath

Summary:

So, for the next few chapters a lot of Daryl's part follows canon. Feel free to skip/skim them if reading what happens on the show isn't your thing! I'll add another note when things start to change/go more AU again :)
Thanks so much to everyone who's read it so far!

Naomi

Momma was the first one I killed. 

I think that made the rest of them a hell of a lot easier. 

I pushed her hard, just once and right between the rib cage. It was enough to momentary dislodge her from on top of me. I lunged for the knife, it sliced my palm but I managed to pick it up. 

Her cold fingers were back on my neck before I’d had a second to catch my breath. It was amazing that they could be so cold with the fire all around us. I twisted in her grip, saw a flash of her grey, dead flesh. Her snapping teeth. 

I jammed the knife into her skull. Little, tiny bits of brain oozed down the side of her face. Little chunks of grey matter and tiny crimson rivers of blood. My stomach turned at the sight of it and her whole body went slack immediately. Grief and guilt fought to control me but there was smoke in my lungs and I knew I couldn't last here much longer. 

I pushed her far away from me and tried to stand up. I'd almost gotten to my feet but then an explosion shook the ground, throwing me back down onto the ground. There was a flash. Bright, blinding fire. I rolled onto my side and faced away from it. It was all I could do to protect myself in the moment. The skin on my back was searingly hot for the longest second of my life. My eardrums hurt. Everything buzzed. A high pitched ringing sound made me dizzy. When I could open my eyes again, I fixed my gaze on Momma’s window. 

The fire crackled right behind me. The heat was way more intense than before. The kitchen had blown out, it would be moments until this place was nothing but flames. 

Now or never . 

I climbed back to my feet. So much smoke had already plumed in front of me that I had to make my way to the window by memory. It was so dark and so thick that I couldn’t see it or the latch keeping it closed. I could barely see my hands in front of me. They felt for it, my hands sweaty and panicked. I held my breath, knowing if I breathed in too much smoke I ran the risk of passing out. My heartbeat throbbed in my ears. Smoke stung my eyes. They we watered.

And then I felt the latch. 

I tugged it up. It opened. Finally. Smoke poured out ahead of me. I took hold of the windowsill and pulled myself up. The window wasn’t very wide and I felt either side of it squash against my shoulders. I pushed myself through. 

I fell. Hit the ground real hard. 

I think it probably hurt but I didn’t notice because of everything else I was feeling, from my slightly singed skin to the stinging in my eyes to the burning smoke in my lungs. 

The night air was refreshingly cold. I coughed so much I was sick and my vomit was black from all of the smoke I’d inhaled. I heard more of those dead things. My vision was still so blurred from the smoke that it was difficult to tell which of the people around me were dead already and which of them were just trying not to be. I stumbled away from my burning house, trying to dodge any more dead things and get as far from the smoke as I could. Legs shaking and lungs heaving, I wanted to collapse onto the cold ground but I knew the danger weren’t over yet. And there was only one thing running through my mind. 

Mia. 

Where was she? Was she okay? 

I could hear people screaming. Could feel them running past me and none of them stopped to help. None of them sounded like Mia. Then there were the other ones, the ones who weren’t quite running and who dragged their feet like they were broken. They reached out for anyone who got too close to them. They were dead ones like Momma. It kinda looked like they were swarming towards the flames. Was it the heat that was attracting them to it? The light? The sound of burning things falling in crackling flame?

Whatever it was, I was grateful for it. It let me slip away from them, only having to avoid a few who reached for me and then were immediately distracted by the fire.

Other sounds started to make their way through the ringing in my ears. There was so much yelling. So much screaming from every direction.

The house gave an almighty creak and I knew it was about to collapse. My lungs hurt so much, like the fire had made its way inside them. 

Crash. 

The roof caved. The weight of it suppressed the flames a little, almost extinguishing some of them. I looped back around to the front of my house, dizzy and disoriented, trying to get my bearings so that I could find my way back to my sister. 

On the other side of what had once been my home, a charred body lay sprawled out on the grass. I thought for a second it might be Momma’s, thrown outside by the explosion, but it was too tall. And dressed in leather that was melting off burning flesh. It looked like he might still be moving. 

Daryl? 

Could it be that I had  heard him outside and now here he was, dead and burned beyond recognition? 

A cold stab of grief right through my heart.

No. 

There’s no proof it’s him. 

There was another dead thing coming around the side of the house next to mine. It was probably heading for the glowing embers of my house but I was right in its path. I gripped the handle of my little kitchen knife and wished I had a goddamn gun. I ran, swerved around the burnt maybe-Daryl-body and kept running, wanting to save my strength for when I really needed it.

My feet carried me to Mrs Jones's on muscle memory alone.

“Mia!” I called as I got closer. There were three dead things at the door. When I yelled they all turned around to look at me… if 'looking' was even an accurate description of what they did. Their eyes didn't really see anything.

Shit. 

All three moved at once, like they had some kind of hive mind. 

I raised my knife, ducked out of the way of the first one and jammed it into the skull of the second. It crumpled to the ground so fast I didn't have time to pull my knife out properly and it almost took me down with it. I put my foot on its shoulder, gripped the hilt of my knife real hard and kicked the body away. My knife came free just in time for me to turn around and get the next one. This time, I squeezed the knife handle tightly enough when I pulled back that it didn’t stay stuck in the skull. I was learning. Fast. That’s all you can do to survive in this new world. 

I didn’t have time to think about that at the time.
I didn’t have time to think about anything. 

Two down, one to go. 

He lunged at me. 

I swiped back, my knife cutting the side of his face but not piercing the skull. A large and jagged scar appeared down the side of his face. A sliver of flesh started to peel away.
I almost threw up again. But I'd already thrown up everything in my stomach.

The wound bled. A little. But it was a dark, deep red that was almost black. Old blood. Dead and drying blood. Not like the bright red fresh blood of the living. I didn’t seem much like the dead guy noticed that his own face was starting to peel. How much could these things feel? Clean headshots had seemed humane so far. But maybe pain weren’t a part of their world anymore. Maybe I didn’t need to worry about that kinda thing. 

The next time he came at me, I stabbed through the eye. 

Somehow, it was worse than going straight for the skull. I think it was the squish. The eyeball juice that then kinda oozed its way onto the back of my hand. 

It fell to the ground. Dead. 

Again. 

How many times could these things die? Would I walk away only for them to get back up again? I looked for signs of a second afterlife but they stayed still. No twitching. None of their horrible, rattling breaths. 

Bang. 

It sounded like a bird flying into a window. I looked up. Mia’s face stared back at me. She banged on the glass again when she saw me. Mrs Jones appeared next to her, her face pale and wide eyed in the gloom. 

“Mia!” I almost burst into tears. 

She vanished for a second and then she was at the door. “Naomi!” she was crying so hard it stopped me from doing the same. I ran to her, pushed her back inside where it was safe and closed the door behind me. I'd never held her so tightly in my life. 

"Nate!" Mrs Jones grabbed my shoulders. "Have you seen Nate?"

"No, I’m sorry," I said. There was so much chaos in the trailer park around us, he could have been anywhere. She frowned and let go of me, walking back to take a look out of the window. “He might just be holed-up someplace.”

I offered it as a comfort because I had nothing else to say. She nodded but I think she was trying to reassure herself more than she was agreeing with me.

“He went off to see them Dixon boys,” she said. “He must be with them.”

“Yeah,” I said. My throat was dry.

Daryl. 

He was here. 

Somewhere

Or he had been. 

I remembered hearing his voice, thinking it was in my head or my heart and knowing now that it had probably been real. Had he come looking for me when he saw the flames? How’d he know I was here? 

I remembered the charred body outside my house and was filled with the urge to go back to check it for any signs that it was him but I knew from my own memory that whoever it had once been was burned beyond recognition. 

It might not have been him. 

There had only been one. I doubted Merle would have left his brother. I hoped he wouldn’t. I prayed. But he’d left before and you can never tell how someone’s gonna react to something like this. 

“What happened to your hand?” Mia asked, pulling me out of a cold pit of despair I could feel myself spiraling into. She took hold of my wrist and turned my palm towards her. 

“Cut it trying to get this knife,” I said. I stared at the open would, amazed by how little it hurt. Shock was keeping me from feeling a lot. I looked at Mrs Jones, who was still pacing back and forth by the window. “You got any bandages?”

“Over there,” she waved to the bathroom. I got up and went to wash the cut in the sink. Mia stayed close to me. 

“Where’s Momma?” she asked it in a small, quiet voice. Like she already knew. I watched the water turn red with my blood. 

“She didn’t make it,” I told her and looked up at her to see how she reacted, if she’d cry or blame me for not letting her stay with Momma. Thank God I didn't. She didn’t do either. There was a moment when I thought she would cry but then she just blinked a lot and the tears didn’t fall. 

“I’m glad you made it,” she said in a whisper. 

“I weren’t going to leave you alone," I said. "I’ll always look for you, no matter what. You hear me?”

She nodded. “What… what’s wrong with those people? The ones outside...”

“They’re sick,” I said. I glanced at her bare arms. No bites. Didn’t mean there weren’t one. “Or maybe dead, I ain’t sure. You see them?”

“Yeah.”

“How close did you get to them?” 

“Not very,” she said. “It was just the ones outside. Will they make me sick too?”

“Only if they bite you,” I said. “You can’t let them get close. And if they do get close, you gotta get them in the head.”

“Like you did out there?”

“Like I did out there,” I agreed. “You got that?”

“Yeah,” she said. She gulped and I knew she was dreading the thought of having to actually do it.

“Don’t worry,” I told her. “I’ll get any one that comes near you.”

She nodded and looked at me with so much trust in her eyes, it made me dizzy. It had always been me who was responsible for her but this was a whole new kind of responsibility. 

“Can we go home?” she whispered. It gave me a moment to pause for thought. No matter where I moved or what I was doing, Georgia would always be ‘home’ to me. It was the first place I thought of when someone said the word. It had shaped who I was. It was where my heart and soul would always be no matter where I was working. It hadn’t occurred to me that things would be different for Mia. 

Only her earliest memories would be here, all of the new stuff and (I hoped) the good stuff, would be in Washington. Her school, her friends, the first safe place she’d ever lived; all of that was back in DC. 

My second thought was that Washington might not be a bad place to head to. Not right now. Not when the cities were in the grips of their current panic. But maybe later, when they had this thing under control, Washington would have the infrastructure to survive it. The President had to be somewhere safe, as far as I knew there’d been no statement about any of this from the White House before the power had gone down. Somewhere, there would be a plan to keep the President alive during an epidemic.

“We can try,” I said. I saw her starting to get upset. I wondered if she’d grasped how bad this was or if she thought she’d be back at school with all of her friends on Monday. “I don’t think the airports are open. We might have to wait a few weeks for things to die down or see if we can get a car and drive.”

I guess the fact that I thought that another plane taking off ever again was possible shows that I hadn’t grasped how bad this was either.

“Okay,” she said and that seemed to calm her down a bit. 

I tied off the end of the bandage and tested out my hand. I could still feel the cut when I moved it around but it weren’t that deep. All of my fingers still worked so I clearly hadn’t severed any tendons.

I stepped past her and back into the living room. Mrs Jones was still peering anxiously out of the window. Things moved out there. But not like they were living.

“I should try and find him,” she turned to me, carrying on the conversation like I’d never left the room. I knew she meant Nate, I didn’t have to ask. “He could be anywhere out there.”

“You should wait until it’s light out,” I said. It was so hard to see out there. It was a good enough reason but I’d pulled it out of my ass. I didn’t want her wandering off out there unless she had to and I was too tired to have a reasoned debate about it. “You got any guns?”

“Nate’s got ‘em,” she said. “But maybe we should wait ‘til he gets back.”

I nearly snapped and told her how unlikely it was that he was coming back but I didn't. I just said. “I think he’d rather they were keeping you safe than sitting here doing nothing while we all die.”

That seemed to convince her. She took me over to a closet and a safe at the bottom that had a few small guns and a little bit of ammo. It weren't much but it was better than nothing. I picked them up and laid them all out on the kitchen table. I made sure they were all loaded but safe. I was so glad that Mia had the foresight to bring all of our stuff over from our Momma's house when she came  a had brought our bags over from our Momma’s house. It meant we had our toothbrushes, a few spare clothes. I remember being super happy that there were two books in mine, like they'd ever be of any damn use. I stashed the extra bullets in my satchel. Mia watched me doing it like I was stealing something but I weren’t planning on using them without Mrs Jones knowing about it so I didn't feel bad. 

The dark room flooded with light.
After so long in the dark, it hurt my eyes. 

I squinted around at all of them to see who had turned the lights on. Neither of them were near the switch and they both looked as surprised as I felt. “What the hell?” 

“Power went off a while ago,” Mrs Jones shrugged. “Must have come back now.”

It gave us all a false sense of hope and normalcy. The TV came back on, playing some pre-recorded message about how the station had shut down due to an emergency. It urged us all to stay calm and stay inside. 

And then something hit the side of the trailer.

Knock. Knock. Knock on the walls. 

And then another one, on another side.

I could hear the indistinct moaning that the dead make. 

Why were they bothering us now?

Was it the sound? The light? I knew I needed to work out what it was that these things were and weren’t reacting to, I just wished that experimenting weren’t so life and death.

“Turn it off,” I said, pointing at the TV. “Get it off. Now.”

Mia acted quickly, while Mrs Jones just started to whimper. I think she was whispering prayers, her hands shaking as she backed into the middle of the room. More knocks on more walls. I sprang for the light switch and flicked them off, plunging us back into darkness. Without the light bouncing off the windows, the faces of the dead ones outside were suddenly visible. One of them reached the door. Mrs Jones screamed. The dead ones outside started hitting the walls harder. 

I grabbed her and put my hand over her mouth. I pulled us both low to the ground and motioned for Mia to do the same.

“Shut up,” I hissed. “They can hear ya.”

She nodded and I took my hand away from her mouth. I hoped if we stayed still and out of sight, if we kept quiet and kept the lights off then they might get bored and leave us alone. 

We listened.

We waited. 

The noises outside got louder and more frantic. 

“My poor Nate,” Mrs Jones moaned. “Out there all alone.”

I refrained from pointing out that Nate was a grown man who could fend for himself. And either he was dead or he was with the Dixons. If he was with the Dixons then he was probably fine, I knew Merle weren’t dumb enough to hang around a place like this while everything was going to shit.

“We’re gonna have to leave,” I said. Thinking about Merle and his ability to survive anything by just leaving it when things got bad really made me think about how dumb we were being just sitting around and waiting for something to happen. “This place ain’t safe. We should get outta here.”

“Not without Nate,” Mrs Jones said. “I can’t.”

“We don’t have a choice,” I said. “That door won’t hold forever.”

It rattled like it had heard me. I knew these trailers weren’t well built. I’d seen many doors round here kicked in with minimal effort. I didn’t think these dead things had enough of a functioning brain to deliberately kick in a door but I knew if they threw themselves against it enough times they’d be able to knock it down. I moved quietly, carefully around each window, trying to gauge where they all were and how many there were. They were too evenly spaced for us to safely climb out of any windows. 

“Naomi?” Mia whispered. Her fear made her sound so young. “I don’t want to go out there.”

“I know,” I said. “But if that door breaks, we’ll have nowhere to run. It’s better that we do all of running now, while we’re still in control of it. We just gotta find somewhere safe, okay?”

I didn’t know how naive I was being, thinking there was still somewhere safe to run to. I was just filled with unfounded hope that things would return to normal. A lot of people had the same hope in those early days.

“What can we do?” Mrs Jones asked. 

“You got matches?” 

She nodded and pointed to a drawer by the sink. Mia ran to get them while I reached for some alcohol and an old dishcloth. Soaking the dishcloth in Scotch and ignoring all of the hurried and hissed questions from Mrs Jones about what the hell I was doing, I waited for Mia to bring me the matches. I picked up my stachel and swung it over my shoulder “Pack a bag,” I ordered Mrs Jones and then took the matches from Mia, “Get your stuff and open the window at the back, really quietly..”

She nodded and ran off to do what I asked. Mrs Jones didn’t pack much, partly because we were in a rush and partly because I think she thought she’d be coming back to her home soon. I guess we all kinda thought we’d be coming back to some kinda home soon so I can’t really judge her. When she was done, she stood next to Mia and looked at me. They were both so expectant, so trusting that for a moment it really threw me. When had I elected myself leader of these two? Who was I to think I knew anything to get us all out of this fucking situation? 

Now ain’t the time for an identity crisis. 

I was all they got. I was all I got too. 

“Okay,” I said, taking a deep breath to recover and shut out the annoying voice of self-doubt that was threatening to overwhelm me and kill us all. “Stand by the door, I’m gonna use this to distract them and then we gotta run.”

They both nodded. And then it was time. I lit a match, held it up to the Scotch-soaked cloth and watched it catch fire in seconds. I should have been closer to the open window when I started but it was the first time I’d done something like this, I still had a lot to learn. I bolted to the window, the heat on my arm was unbearable. The flames got bigger and bigger. I threw it as hard as I could and watched as the dead ones slowly turned around. Some of them started stumbling towards it. The door stopped rattling. The dead ones on the doorstep were moving away. They moved frustratingly slow. I was too scared to move too quick or make a noise before they’d got too far away in case they turned back. 

I crept away from the window and passed the loaded guns out to everyone. Just in case.

“Ready?” I whispered. Mia and Mrs Jones both nodded but neither of them looked sure. I steadied my shaking hand on the doorknob and turned the key. Slowly, wincing every time it made a noise. There was a click when it unlocked. I froze, listened, felt the people beside me freeze too. Nothing outside the door seemed to change but it was so hard to know for sure. 

If we waited too long, the fire would die out and we’d risk them coming back. If we didn’t wait long enough, they’d still be too close to make a safe exit. 

I turned the handle. Slowly, felt the latch click out of place. 

Time to run. 

I pulled the door open, sent up a silent prayer that it didn't squeak and never once thought about how weird it was that a non-believer was doing all of this praying. 

The way was clear. Kinda. I grabbed Mia's hand and we slipped out into the night. We ran and didn't stop until we reached the bottom of the hill. I hadn't realised that was where I'd been running too but it made sense. Higher ground was probably the best place to be. The dead ones weren’t that fast and they would take a little longer to walk uphill, so we'd be temporarily safe.

Mrs Jones grabbed my shoulders again, gave me a pleading kind of look and I knew she was about to ask about Nate. I was getting pretty damn sick of hearing his name. 

“We can find him later,” I promised. “When all of this has died down… Come with us. We’ve gotta get out of here.”

She looked around and for a split second I thought she was going to take me up on her offer. But then she shook her head. “I gotta find him,” she said. 

There was no persuading her. If I’m honest, I didn’t try that hard. I knew that if I hadn’t just found Mia I would have searched until I was dead too. So, I let her run away and was just grateful that Mia and I were back together. “You ready to run?” I asked her. She nodded. 

I grabbed her hand and we ran for the hill. I dunno if it was instinctual or common sense or just the memory that the top of the hill had been the safest place for me when I’d been growing up but that was where we ran.

I sat Mia down on the old and decaying log at the top of the hill. “Are you okay?” I asked her. 

“Yeah,” she nodded but she was all pale and looked like she was close to me. Maybe she was trying to be brave for me in the same way that I was for her.

Gunshots. Below us. 

Mia stood up, eyes wide and horrified. I turned. Beneath the hill and between the trailers a figure that was probably Mrs Jones was firing a gun at an approaching dead thing. I saw the flashes of light with every shot, saw the dead thing crumple like Momma had done. Relief flooded me. 

"Naomi," Mia whispered, pointing to the right of it all. I followed where she was looking and saw a group of six or seven of the dead coming up behind Mrs Jones. I raised my own gun, tried to pick off as many of them as I could but it wasn't enough. They were on her before I could get them all. We could hear her screaming from all the way up the hill. 

"Don't look," I told Mia, although it was way too late for that. We both turned away from it. 

Three dead things were close to the top of the hill, coming right for us. It must have been the sound of my gun. "Run."

I grabbed Mia's hand again and ran for the trees. I could hear more of them. Or maybe they were living. I could tell and didn't want to hang around to find out. I stopped 

"Climb." I told her and lifted her up to grab the lowest branch of the nearest tree. When she was safely on, I put her backpack on my back and threw the satchel until it caught on a branch. I pulled myself up. It had been a long time since I’d been tree climbing around these parts but it was like riding a bike; hard to forget.  

Mia looked down at me through the branches. 

"Keep going," I whispered. "High as you can."

She nodded and kept climbing. I was fairly sure tree climbing wasn't high on the list of things she and her friends liked to do but she was picking it up pretty well. We climbed out arms reach of anyone dead. They didn't climb up after us, I didn't think that would be in their skill set. If they'd taken me by surprise we'd have been fucked. There ain't many escape routes up a tree. 

We stopped on two branches mid-way up the tree that were thick enough for us to sit on and feel secure that they weren't about to snap.

"Now what?" Mia asked. Dead things swarmed at the bottom of the tree. 

"We stay up here, stay quiet and wait until something else comes along to distract them," I shrugged. "Sure it won't be long. They don't seem all that smart."

Mia nodded. It was a crappy and vague answer but it was enough for now. She leaned back against the tree trunk and didn't say anything. Neither of us did, hoping the quieter we were the sooner they'd go away. 

I rested my bag on my lap, trying to remember whether or not I'd brought anything useful. And then I saw Kineval, smiling up at me like always. I ran my thumb over the smooth part of his shades. I thought about Daryl again and where he might be in all of this. I wondered if that charred and leather-clad body outside my old home had been him after all. Or if he’d been far away when all of this had happened, safe somewhere with Merle and Nate. I had no idea where they hung out these days, where they might have run to when things went to shit. 

If you're out there, I'll find you.  

I hugged the whole bag closer to my chest, sent up a silent prayer that he was still alive. Safe somethere. I tried to push the burned, maybe-Daryl body from my mind. But on the worst nights it would be in my nightmares and I’d wake up drenched in sweat and regret. 

What a dumb fight not to resolve before the end of the world.
What a pair of fucking idiots. 

 

Daryl

“Guess I should be thankful you did all that crazy hunting when you were younger, huh little brother?” Merle chuckled. I glared at him, wondering if he were smart enough to work out that I’d only done it to keep myself alive while he fucked off someplace better and left me behind. “You know all this was gonna happen? You psychic or something?”

“Shut up.” I threw another log on the fire. We knew by this point that it were best to be quiet a night but even when it were life or death, it had always been damn hard to shut Merle up. End of the world hadn’t changed nothing.
“Although,” he said, “I’m getting a bit sick of eating nothing but squirrel. If you could catch something else that would be great.”

He gave me a playful punch on the arm. 

“You want something else, catch it yourself,” I told him.

“Ain't there deer or something round here that you can get?”

“Get it yourself,” I told him again. “Waste to get one deer for two guys.”

I knew that one dead deer was too much to feed two people because every time Naomi and I had done it, we’d shared with neighbors. Thrown a big cookout, talked well into the night.

"Alright, alright," he said. "I'm just sayin-"

"Yo, will you pipe down," I cut him off. "The Geeks'll hear ya."

"Nah, we're good, brother," he said. "We got all them crazy tin cans you've strung up around the joint.”

“What if it’s one of them Geeks with no legs?” I asked. “Y’know, the ones that drag themselves along with just their arms? They ain't gonna hit the wires, they're too high up. I shoulda put 'em lower down.”

I stood up to go fix it but Merle stopped me.

“Pretty sure we can outrun those ones,” he said. I was gonna ask him what he thought about trying to outrun one of them if it crawled over us when we were sleeping, but starting that kinda argument went against everything I was trying to say about keeping quiet at night. 

We didn't so much bother with keeping quiet in the day. We'd managed to save our bikes and they were pretty good at speeding away from all of the slow, dead, dumb bastards. You could take the bikes off road too and get to places that cars weren't able to, which was good. Roads were clogged for so long even though most of the cars were empty. Merle thought going in to the city might be a good idea because they'd have a lot of supplies. I told him you'd have to be a real dumbass to go in there. We’d seen on TV what kinda sate the city was in, you’d have to be a real dumbass to go in there. So we decided just to stay near Atlanta until things cleared up a bit or we got real desperate and had to risk it. 

Water was the hardest thing to get. Can't hunt that. Heading to the quarry seemed like the best idea. I knew there was fresh water there.

It was the first time we’d seen a group of people for a while. At the start they were everywhere- clogging up the roads; dying all over the place. But for a while it had just been me and Merle and the woods. It was the first confirmation we got that there were other people who’d survived all of this. 

“C’mon,” Mere said, to my surprise he started walking towards them. 

“Nah,” I said, starting to walk the other way. Merle did not follow.

“Why?”

“We don’t need ‘em,” I turned back to look at him. I could tell by the look on his face that his mind was already pretty set.

“They got a lotta stuff.”

I glanced back at them through the gap in the trees. There was a campervan, someone was carrying pots and pans and other kitchen shit out of it. There was maybe even a working toilet in there.

“So?” 

“So, we need stuff,” he said. Was that really all there was to it? A few weeks in the woods and he were missing creature comforts enough to play happy families with a bunch of strangers.

They seemed dumb too. I could hear one of them laughing real loud, like the world hadn’t ended. None of them were even alert enough to spot Merle and I watching them. You’d think, with all of the dead now walking about, people would try and pay more attention to what was hiding around them. “Look like assholes.”

“Yeah,” Merle said. He sighed too, in a way I weren’t expecting. Like it was me he was exasperated by and not those dumbasses. “They do. But they got stuff.”

“So?” I said. “You wanna go play house with them be my guest.”

“I ain’t saying we gotta best friends,” he said. “Although, I also ain’t gonna pretend I'm not looking forward to talking to someone who ain’t moping around all the time."

"Shut up, man." I said. But I knew he weren't wrong. The further we'd gone and the longer it had been since that night everything went to shit, the more numb I got to everything. Everything around me became like white noise, like static on the TV; empty nothingness that couldn't reach me. Except from anger, that feeling burned through. Like always.

"We ain't gotta be their best friends," he said. "We just get close enough to ‘em to get their stuff. Then we take off.”

“Fine.”

It was like I could only argue with him for so long now. Like there were fight in me but it got bored easy and then was replaced by that static nothingness. I only felt good when I was hitting stuff. Killing Geeks got the anger outta me for longer than bickering with Merle.

A loud guy in a uniform walked past where we were lurking. I glanced at Merle to see if he'd clocked it too. “One of ‘em’s a goddamn cop.”

“Ain't no cops now, little brother,” he reminded me. “All of that shit’s gone for good.”

Merle was the first person I heard come to terms with the fact that the world weren’t going back to normal. He was always smart like that. Adaptable. Like he could put on a different skin for any situation.

"Let's go," I said and stepped out of the bushes before I could change my mind. I was noisey about it but it still took the dumbasses at the quarry a second too long to realise we were there and point guns at us. We probably could have each taken out two of them out before they'd drawn on us. But we didn't. We came out of there with our hands up, all meek and quiet. 

"You been following us?" the cop asked. 

"Nah," Merle said. "We just came to get some water, that's all."

"Name?" 

Dumb question to ask. 

That's when I knew he didn't have the guts to shoot us. You don't ask a guys name if you're gonna kill him, you just pull the trigger. 

"Merle Dixon," Merle said. "This is my brother, Daryl."

I gave them a nod. Couldn't wave or shake hands or anything because my arms were still raised in a surrender that felt pointless now I knew they weren't gonna shoot us. Felt silly to keep up the pretence but people can always change their mind so I played it safe. Played it all innocent like Merle wanted. 

“Alright, well you guys can come get some water but then you gotta get going,” the cop said. “We ain’t taking on any more mouths to feed and we don’t want any trouble.”

Trouble. That’s all cops thought Merle and I ever were. Even now, when there weren’t any laws to protect, we looked like too much trouble for these kinda folks.  

“That’s fine, that’s fine,” Merle assured him while I glanced down at my shoes to stop myself from sayin’ something I’d regret. “We’ll get outta your hair as soon as we can. Although… my brother here is a great hunter. We been eating like Kings in all of this.”

I looked sideways at him.

Kings?

What happened to ‘sick of eating nothin’ but squirrel’?

“That so?” the cop asked. In the silence it took me a sec to realize it were me he was talking too. I looked back up at him and shrugged. 

“I ain’t bad,” I said. “We get by.”

“He’s being modest,” Merle said. “Ain’t nobody that can hunt and track like my bro. What about you guys? You guys hungry?”

He turned his wolfish grin to the band of people standing nervously behind the cop. It’s amazing, how Merle can make you like and hate him all at the same time. It leaves people too confused to know how to act with him. It leaves ‘em weak. Not that I was immune to it, either. Here he was using my hunting skills to barter our way in to a group I didn't want to be part of and I weren't saying anything about it. 

“Tell you what,” the cop said. “You guys contribute food and you can camp with us for a bit.”

He said it like it was his idea, even though I think everyone there knew it had been put in his head by Merle. Merle’s arms were already lowered. “Much obliged,” he said.

“I’m Shane,” the cop said. “When you’re done getting food and water, there’s a place to pitch a tent over there.”

He indicated to somewhere behind the RV. Some old dude standing in the door of it was looking at us like we’d just taken a dump all over the dumb white hat he was wearing.

“Alrighty,” Merle said. “Well, thank you kindly folks.”

Some of them gave us the kind of little smile folks gave now; one that says ‘aren’t we fucking lucky to be here even though the world’s gone to shit’ . The rest were looking at us like we’d already stolen their shit, which to be fair was the plan, but they didn't know that yet. Merle grabbed one of my arms, which I only just realized were still raised. I lowered them, let him lead me to a path down to the lake. I kept my eyes on Shane, who watched us until we were out of sight.

"Still think this is dumb," I muttered to him. 

"Well," he gave me a slap on the back. "Least now you can catch us all something bigger than a squirrel."

I wondered if he'd gone through all this trouble just to force me into catching him a fucking deer. 

It were hard for Merle and me to settle in at first. I wound up being glad that he'd promised I’d hunt for everyone because it gave me an excuse to hang around them as little as possible. A few people tried to make an effort but most of them didn’t trust us. It didn’t help that Merle was kinda bad at keeping up his ‘nice guy’ act for any length of time. 

Especially with Shane, because he was such a huge dumbass. Just an asshole ex-cop creeping around a family that weren’t his. Hard to respect a guy like that, which also made it hard for me to respect anyone that would follow him.

He was sniffing around  Lori, who as far as I could tell had lost her cop husband and seemed down about it for all of five minutes. Then there was her son, Carl, who I got to know too well to remember what my first impression of him was, but I think he cried a lot. He weren’t a badass yet. I probably ignored him for a while. He probably ignored me too. 

Carol was the same, pretty much. Back then she was real quiet and she still had Ed and Sophia. I regret not making an effort with them earlier but I’]m glad I never bothered with getting to know Ed. He talked to Merle sometimes, though. 

Dale was the old dude with the RV. Impossible to avoid because he kept sicking his nose in everyone else’s business. He was sharing with two blonde chicks, Amy and Andrea. At first I thought they were his daughters but he had actually just met them along the way. Andrea was a little mouthy and self important but she was at least trying to get shit done. Amy cried a lot. And she weren’t as young as Carl or Sophia so it was actually just real annoying.

There was the Morales family; Louis, Eliza and Miranda. They seemed alright but Merle got in a fight with them pretty early on over something dumb so they wound up being pretty hostile.

Glenn and T-Dog hadn’t known each other before any of this but had pitched up to the camp together, far as I could tell. T-Dog and Merle butted heads almost right away. Glenn was quieter, which made him great at getting in and out of the city while staying alive. 

None of them could hunt for shit. Not even Shane with all of his ego and mouthing off about how great he was. He was too busy talking too loud about how good he was at catching frogs or skinning rabbits to actually go and do either of those things. Frogs probably would’ve heard his big, dumb loud voice coming and hopped right outta there. 

The few days we all said we’d be there for, turned in to weeks. The woods were pretty safe from all the Geeks in the towns and cities. All these folks seemed like they’d been better off than Merle and me. While our access to electricity had been pretty much cut on day one, most of them had been able to get the news until it stopped. Apparently they’d all been told to head to the cities, that the government would be able to protect everyone better if they were all in one place. It was the opposite of what Merle and I had thought we should do and maybe we were right to stay away. Glenn said Atlanta belonged to the dead now. 

So, the new theory was that staying near the cities would help us when someone finally did show up with a cure to this mess. It kind of made sense to me. Merle and I hadn’t thought about it because he’d said pretty early on that things weren’t going back to normal. I didn’t give shit. When he told everyone at camp that he didn’t think anyone was coming for us, it caused a big argument. I think that’s why I was so surprised when he came looking for me and said, “People are heading into town.”

I was in the middle of skinning a squirrel. I liked to do it sitting away from camp because the kids got grossed out if they saw it. I stopped and looked up at him, wondering why the hell he was telling me any of this and when I might have accidentally given him the impression that it was something I cared about. 

“Okay,” I said. 

He kept staring. “Town,” he said again. “Like, downtown Atlanta.”

“Why?”

“Get supplies and stuff,” he shrugged. 

“That’s dumb, ain’t Glenn just going?”

“Nah, I think folks want more than that.”

“Okay.” I sat back because I thought that would be the end of it.   

“I’m going with ‘em,” he said. I looked back at him.

“Why?”

“See what’s there,” he shrugged again. “You coming?”

“Nah,” I sat back again, stared at the grass. 

“We might get some food an’ stuff.”

“I can get food and stuff right here,” I said, gesturing to the forest around us. “Whole damn world’s an organic farm now.”

"That mean you finally gonna get me a damn deer?" he asked. “Because we’ve been with these clowns for weeks and you still ain’t produced it. Maybe you can’t.”

'Course I can," I said. "Maybe I just don't wanna feed these assholes."

"Maybe," he said. "Or maybe it was actually Naomi who was good at getting the bigger shit and you've just been taking credit this whole time."

The mention of her name made me spring to my feet, like he’d lit a fire underneath me. Without thinking, I grabbed him by the collar. Her name felt like a secret I'd been carrying deep in my bones. Now he'd ripped it out from right under my skin and hearing him say it out loud in this new world felt wrong somehow. Like he'd tainted it. She belonged to the world before it became… this. 

"Easy, brother," he said but I knew he was getting a kick from getting a rise outta me. "Just a joke." 

I let him go. Turned away for a sec. Took a deep breath. 

"Have fun in Atlanta," I told him and walked off. 

It was easier to be with Merle than with the group of assholes we planned on robbing. But it was easier to be alone in the woods than with Merle. Quiet. I felt like I could breathe right. I stayed away so long it started to get dark. 

I was gonna turn back but then a set of tracks caught my eye. 

A goddamn deer. 

Like Merle had somehow willed one into existence. 

Tracks looked fresh too. I almost didn't follow them because of how late it was getting. But I thought about going back to Merle without it and having to listen to him bug me about it until I found another one. So I kept real quiet and followed the trail. It got harder, the darker it got but the thought of Merle’s damn annoying voice kept me going. My eyes got used to how dark it was, it got easier to pick out the way the deer had gone. I thought about dragging the deer’s corpse back to camp when I finally got it and stuffing it in a sleeping bag next to Merle so he could wake up with it.

I took a couple of breaks but it wound up feeling like I’d just tracked the deer in a big circle right back to camp. Another thing to file under 'waste of damn time'. 

I listened. 

Deer are real quiet so you gotta know what you're listening for. They hear good too so you have to try to be quieter than them, try and stay downwind so they don't smell a predator. There was a rustle not far off. I stopped moving, tried to train my eyes to see through the relative dark. Gaps in the trees let in light from the night sky. 

There it was.

I saw it through a gap in the bushes. Took aim. Took a shot. 

I got it but it weren't a fatal shot. 

It ran off, wounded. I suppressed the urge to swear because I didn't want to draw out anything that might be lurking in the dark. 

I followed it slowly, knowing the deer wouldn't be able to get far with that injury. The sun started to come up. I passed a few squirrels. They were slower, not as awake and alert as usual. I stopped to catch a few of them. The deer could wait, it would bleed out somewhere.

It was quiet. Morning was starting to break. Quiet. I felt good that I'd managed to get so much done. 

And then screaming cut through the quiet. Sounded like a kid. I started running back towards camp. At some point it stopped but that didn’t mean that whoever was screaming was out of trouble. I started to run back. I could hear a bit of a commotion. And then silence again. 

Then I burst through the bushes and it seemed like everyone from camp turned to look at me. I hadn't been expecting so many people. Carl was clinging to his Momma, looking real upset. It was probably him I'd heard screaming. I stared back at them all, saw they were crowded around my deer. Was that what had made the kid scream? Little bit of gore? 

Then a gap in the group of people showed a Geek's decapitated body and a huge chunk of the middle of the deer all bloodied and eaten. Its guts spilled onto the forest floor.

“Son of a bitch, that’s my deer,” I said. “Look at it all gnawed on by this filthy, disease bearing, motherless, poxy bastard.”

I spat at the dead thing even though it were dead. Started kicking it just to make myself feel better.

“Calm down, son,” Dale said. “That’s not helping.”

Neither are you. Didn’t see you catching nothing.

“What you know about it old man? I’ve been tracking this deer for miles,” I said, walking around it and trying to assess the damage. I took an arrow out. “Was gonna drag it back to camp, see if I could cook us up some venison. What do you think? Think we can cut around this chewed up part right here?”

I pointed to the bits that might be clean. 

“I would not risk that,” Shane said. Didn’t like the guy but I could admit when he was probably right.

“That’s a damn shame. I got some squirrel about a dozen or so. That’ll have to do," I said. 

Nobody replied but I could hear a noise, I looked down at the Geek's head. It weren't attached but it were still moving, the gross mouth snapping like it could still get some of my deer. Idiots couldn't even kill it right. How'd they survived so long? I took an arrow and drive it through the brain, glaring at those dumbasses while I did it. 

"C’mon people, what the hell? It's gotta be the brain. Don’t y’all know nothing?" I strode back in to camp, calling for Merle. "Merle! Merle. Get your ass out here. Got us some squirrel."

I couldn't wait to show him the half-eaten deer, just to prove to him that I'd been able to do it and then have the smug satisfaction wiped off his face when he realized we couldn't eat any of it.

"Daryl, slow up a bit I gotta talk to you," Shane called. 

Oh good.

"'Bout what?" I asked, hardly turning to look at him and hoping all the while that he'd realize it weren't nothing urgent and let me go about my business.

"About Merle," he said. What he do now? "There was a, eh, problem in Atlanta."

Problem.

Nothing but problems these days. 

I knew what "problem" was code for, though. "He dead?"

"Not sure."

The fuck kinda answer is that?

"He either is or he ain’t," I snapped.

"No easy way to say this so I’ll just say it," a guy stepped forward, all curly hair and sad eyes and dressed up like another damn cop. They way he held himself was like a cop too. I'd heard his tone before. They usually used it on Merle when he were acting up. Now, I'd been doing my best to stay out of everyone's business and not get to know anybody but even I knew I hadn't seen this guy around before.

"Who are you?"

"Rick Grimes." 

"Rick Grimes," I repeated, just to be sure he hadn't said Rick Rhymes like some kinda lame DJ. "You got something you wanna tell me?"

"Your brother was a danger to us all," Rick said, sticking out his hand the way I do when I'm trying to calm and animal, the way cops do when they're talking to people they think will be unreasonable. "So I handcuffed him on a roof, hooked him to a piece of metal. He’s still there."

"Let me process this," I said. Story was too damn bizarre to take in all at once. "You saying you handcuffed my brother  to a roof? And you LEFT HIM THERE?"

"Yeah."

I threw the squirrels is caught and lunged at him. Before I could land a punch, Shane had brought me to the ground. I dislodged him, managed to grab at my hunting knife for a second before Rick got it off me. I was on my knees. Shane's arm went around my throat. Squeezed tight. I thought my neck might snap or my head might pop off.  

"Best let me go," I warned, trying to tank his arm away from around my neck. "Choke hold’s illegal!"

"You can file a complaint," Shane said. He were squeezing tighter. Thought I was gonna pass out. "I can keep this up all day."

Fucking cops.

Rick bent down to be eye level with me, the way people talk to misbehaving kids. "I’d like to have a calm discussion on this topic, you think we can manage that?"

I wanted to spit at him but Shane was holding on too tight. He threw me down. The first breath in hurt like a bitch. 

"What I did was not on a whim," Rick continued in his kid-calming voice. "Your brother does not work and play well with others."

No shit.

I glared up at them both, hating them and their Good Cop, Choke-Hold-Cop routine. 

"It’s not Rick’s fault," T-Dog stepped forward. It was hard to keep track of exactly how many people had been involved in this damn pantomime that had left Merle chained to a goddamn roof. "I had the key. I dropped it."

Lame excuse.

"You didn’t pick it up?"

"I dropped it in a drain," T-Dog explained.

I stood up. "If that’s supposed to make me feel better, it don’t."

"Maybe this will," T-Dog said. "I chained the door to the roof so the Geeks couldn’t get at him. With a padlock."

"That’s gotta count for something," Rick said, like one padlocked door made up for leaving a man to die on a roof.

"Hell with all y’all," I said. "Just tell me where he is so’s I can go get him."

I had no fucking intensions of coming back to deal with any of them. Geeks could have them now.

"He’ll show you," Lori said, glaring pointedly at Rick. "Isn’t that right?"

It felt way too loaded for them not to know each other. But I weren't invested in either of their lives enough to care what kinda domestic Good Cop had managed to stir up in however long he'd been here.

"I’m going back," Rick said, like he were some kinda hero for feeling guilty about leaving a man to die alone on a roof. There was a moment of quiet while everyone started to gather supplies for the trip. It weren't a peaceful quiet, though. There were a lot of people who were bristling with anger at Rick's plan. 

Merle and I had been planning to screw them all over but they weren't exactly proving to be upstanding citizens themselves. 

"Why would you risk your life for a douchebag like Merle Dixon?" Shane asked. 

"Hey! Choose your words more carefully," I warned.

"Oh, I did. Douchebag’s what I meant." Shane snapped back. Asshole. "Merle Dixon… that guy wouldn’t give you a glass of water if you were dying of thirst."

Shitty assumption to make.

Merle weren't in the habit of giving people what they wanted. But something they needed? Something life or death? That was a different story. Not that none of these bastards could be bothered to learn the difference. 

"What he would or wouldn’t do doesn’t interest me. I can’t let a man die of thirst. Me ," Rick said. "Thirst and exposure. We left him like an animal caught in a trap, that’s no way for anything to die let alone a human being."

Pricks.

I wanted to punch them all over again. 

"So you and Daryl, that’s your big plan?" Lori said. 

Rude. 

Could do it alone if I knew the way.

Rick looked at Glenn.

What? Him too?
"Aw, come on!" he protested. 

"You know the way," Rick said, which was actually a good point. It stopped me from telling Glenn to fuck off. "You been there before, in and out no problem. You said so yourself. It;s not fair of me to ask, I know that. But I'd feel a lot better with you along. I know she would too."

He looked at Lori, who still looked pretty damn pissed. 

"That’s just great now you're gonna risk three men huh?" Shane asked.

"Four," T-Dog stepped forward.

Fucks sake

"My day just gets better and better don’t it," I spat at him.

"You see anybody else here stepping up to save your brother’s cracker ass?"

Ain't nobody forcing you.

"Why you?" I asked. I could do without him if all he were gonna do was bitch about Merle.

"You wouldn’t even begin to understand," T-Dog told me. "You don’t speak my language."

Fuck you, ya uppity prick.

"That’s four," Dale announced, probably because he thought I were too dumb to count.
"It’s not just four," Shane said. I didn't think for a second that he was volunteering. I just thought he might actually be the one here who was too dumb to count. "You’re putting every single one of us at risk. You saw that Walker. It was here. They’re moving out of the cities and if more come we’re going to need every able body we got. We need em here. We need em to protect camp."

All this talk was doing my head in. I was close to telling them all to shut up, that I was fine going it alone as long as someone just told me where my damn brother was. Every second spent wasted in pointless chat was a second longer Merle had to spend fending for himself.

"Seems to me what you really need most here are more guns," Rick countered.
"Right, the guns," Glenn sighed like the guns were something we all knew about instead of just more bullshit to discuss.
"What guns?" Shane asked
"Six shot guns, two high powered rifles over a dozen handguns," Rick listed them off. "I cleaned out the cage back at the station before I left. I dropped the bag in Atlanta before I left, I dropped it when I got swarmed, it’s just sitting there on the street waiting to be picked up."

"Ammo?" Shane asked. 

“700 rounds, assorted.” 

“You went through hell to find us,” Lori said to Rick. Everything kinda fell into place at that moment. Rick was the cop husband she’d assumed was dead. “You just got here and you’re gonna turn around and leave?”

“I… I don’t want you to go,” Carl said, which confirmed what I was thinking. It might have been a nice moment if I hadn’t been too busy worrying about Merle to give a shit.

“To hell with the guns, Shane is right. Merle Dixon? He’s not worth one of your lives even with guns thrown in,” I glared at her, wanting to say more but getting in any kinda yelling match with her would do nothing but waste even more of our goddamn time. “Tell me. Make me understand.”

Rick fed her some bullshit about a father and son who’d helped him get to Atlanta and who he’d promised to meet up with in Atlanta. But his walkie was in the same bag as the guns he’d apparently left there. I dunno what had happened to him in Atlanta but it was starting to sound like maybe Rick weren’t the best person to be following into the city. No wonder he’d wanted Glenn to come. While they were bickering and arguing about it, I went to get the van and all of my shit ready. I took everything that I might be able to use as a weapon, which at that point was really just my crossbow and my hunting knives. Looking at them, a bag of guns didn’t seem like such a bag idea. I knew Merle would definitely want them when he was back and we could raid these assholes and take their shit. 

Which I had been starting to feel kinda bad about but now they’d left Merle to die on a goddamn roof… they deserved what was coming to them. 

Rick and T-Dog got some bolt cutters from Dale so’s we’d be able to cut through the chains T-Dog had used to keep the door shut. 

“He better be okay,” I said to T-Dog when he joined me in the back of the van. “That’s my only word on the matter.”

“I told you, the Geeks can’t get a t him,” T-Dog said but he didn’t look so sure. “Only thing that’s going to get through that door is us.”

He held the bolt cutters up and shook them at me, like that would bring me any sort of comfort.

For the first time, I thought about what it might be like if Merle weren't on that roof. If we got there and he was dead… what would I do? I'd have to take out T-Dog, that was for sure. I knew avenging Merle would be exactly what he'd want. I knew Glenn weren't a threat but could I take out the cop before he got me? Did it matter?

Glenn stopped the van on the train tracks just outside of Atlanta, told us we'd have to walk in from there. I guess the city was too full of Geeks to risk running an engine.

The department store had its front windows all broken in, like the Geeks had thought it were Black Friday or something. Some of them were still in there, walking around all aimless and brainless. No different to regular shoppers really. We took care of them, quickly and quietly. An arrow through the brain'll do it nicely. 

Once we'd cleared the ground floor, the route to the roof was fairly safe. The Geeks ain't so good at climbing stairs. There's a lot fewer of them the higher up you get.  

The roof was worse than I'd imagined it. A big, wide open space with hardly any shelter from the heat of the Georgian sun. Rick weren't wrong, a man could die from thirst and exposure out here in no time. Sunstroke alone was enough to drive you mad. 

"Merle! Merle!" I yelled. But the roof was such a barren wasteland, I already knew he weren't there. I saw the pipe they'd most likely chained him to. "NO! NO!"

A bloody hand. A bloodier saw.

Fuck. 

Fuck I'm too late.  
I fixed my crossbow on T-Dog. Seconds later I heard Rick's gun click as he pointed it at me. 

“I won’t hesitate,” he said. “I don’t care if every walker in the city hears it.”

I wondered for a moment if I even gave a shit about getting shot. Naomi was dead, Merle was gone. What was left for me in a world like this? 

Was it worth dying to take out my brother's murderer and bring a City of Geeks down on these two assholes. 

But Merle was only gone. He weren't dead  

Merle always gone. 

He'd been gone most of my life. 

Always came back. It wasn't like he didn't know where I was now, he knew the way back to camp. My brother would find me, I was sure of it. 

Unless I found him first.

I lowered my crossbow, crouched down to take a look at Merle's severed hand. "You… you go a do-rag or something?" I asked them both. 

T-Dog handed me a blue handkerchief. I wrapped up the hand, taking a moment to study the way he’d cut it. Tried to show it to Glenn but he looked away, looking like he might hurl.

“I guess he saw blade was too dull for the handcuffs. Ain’t that a bitch?” I said, hoping it would make Rick and T-Dog feel like shit for being the grand architects of all that pain. I put the gross little package in Glenn’s dumb backpack. He tried to protest about it but I just acted like I hadn’t heard him. I went back to where the hand had been, noticed it was cleaner than you'd expect for hacking off a fairly big chunk of your body. “Must’ve used a tourniquet. Maybe his belt. Be much more blood if he didn’t.”

They were all looking at me like they were surprised I knew all of that. As well as hunting, it seemed like none of them could track for shit either. Surprised me that the cop couldn't do it, you'd think that would've been part of the job. But maybe this kind of tracking was only good for homicide detectives, or maybe he couldn't do it without one of those weird white overalls they always wear on TV crime shows.

I followed the trail of Merle's blood through another door on the other side of the roof. 

"Merle!" I called into the seemingly empty stairwell. "You in here?"

Rick followed me, kept tryna shush me and giving me that look like I was a dumbass for thinking I was gonna find him alive. I thought he was a dumbass for thinking anything different. Drops of blood went down a few flights of stairs and through to an abandoned set of what were probably once offices above the department store. Two dead Geeks lay on the floor, their heads done in and their dark, congealing blood splattered all around them. The bright red blood around them told me it was Merle who'd done it. 

"Had enough in him to take out these two son of a bitches, one handed," I pointed out. "Toughest asshole I ever met, my brother. Feed him a hammer and he’d crap out nails."

"Any man can pass out from blood loss," Rick said. "No matter how tough he is."

Not Merle. Even his blood's too stubborn for that. 

"Merle!" I called again.

"We’re not alone here, remember?" Rick said. My hollering was clearly getting on his nerves. Wimp.

"Screw that," I said. "He could be bleeding out. You said that yourself."

The tracks lead me to room that smelt weird. But also kinda familiar. Like a real bad barbecue. 

It was a kinda kitchen area, probably so the assholes who used to work there had a place to go and make coffee as an excuse not to do whatever mind-numbing shit they were employed to do. There was a gas burner that was still switched on and various kitchen stuff lying about. The burner can't have been on the whole time, it would have run out of gas in a few weeks or burnt the place down. It had to be Merle who'd turned it on. Next to it was an iron, covered in sticky, burned flesh. 

I felt queasy for a sec, while I remembered why that bad barbecue smell was so familiar. Naomi had smelt like that sometimes, when her Momma had been real bad. She'd never shown me where the cigarette burns were but I could guess.
"What’s that burnt stuff?" Glenn asked.
"Skin," Rick said. "He cauterized the stump."

"Told you he’s tough," I said and felt proud that my brother had proved this smug cop wrong. "Aint nobody can kill Merle but Merle."

"Don’t take that on faith," Rick said. "He’s lost a lot of blood."
"Yeah?" I said, following all signs of my brother to a broken window. "Didn’t stop him from busting out of this death trap."

"He left the building?" Glenn said. "Why the hell would he do that?"

"Why wouldn’t he?" I said. "He’s out there alone as far as he knows, doing what he’s gotta do. Surviving."

"You call that surviving," T-Dog said. "Just wondering the streets, maybe passing out? What are his odds out there?"

It was weird, that even with the world as shitty as it was now, nobody here understood survival like me and Merle. We knew that no matter what happened, no matter what pain you were in or how much you were bleeding or who it was that caused that pain, as long as you made it to your next breath could then you were winning. Breaking it down into manageable chunks like that meant you could get through anything.

"No worse that being handcuffed and left to rot by you sorry pricks," I said. I looked at Rick. "You couldn’t kill him, I ain’t so worried about some dumb dead bastard." 

"What about 1000 dumb dead bastards. Different story?" he asked. 
I shook my head. You take things one breath at a time and you don't see 1000. You just see that one that needs killing in that second.

"You take a tally, do what you want," I told him. "I’m gonna get him."

I went to climb out the window but the cop put his hands on me, "Daryl, wait-"

"Get your hands off me!" I shoved him. "You can’t stop me."
"I don’t blame you," Rick said. His sensible cop voice was out again, like he was trying to calm down a rioting crowd. "He’s family, I get that. I went through hell to find mine. I know exactly how you feel. He can’t get far with that injury. We could help you check a few blocks around, but only if we keep a level head."

I could do that. I waited.

"Only if we get those guns first," T-Dog said. "I’m not strolling the streets of Atlanta with just my good intentions, ok?"

Frustration that rose inside me was white-hot, had to bite my tongue to keep it down. I was sick of all of hearing all these excuses not to find Merle. But I knew I needed all of them. More eyes on the streets out looking for Merle, the more likely I was to find him. Guns wouldn't hurt either. If we didn't find him and bring him back, I knew he'd find me. And I didn't want that. If he got back to camp before we got to him, before he knew that me and the others had come to make things right… I didn't know what kind of revenge he'd unleash on the camp. 

Chapter 12: Found and Lost

Summary:

Naomi's community finds a new member.

Daryl's section covers from leaving the CDC to finding Sophia in the barn.

Naomi

The forest is loud high up. Being close to the treetops puts you with the leaves when the wind rustles through them. If you close your eyes and try to forget where you are, it can kinda sound like the ocean. Would've been peaceful if it weren't for the dead that roamed around underneath us. Moaning and snapping their jaws like deranged piranhas.

I sat, 20 feet above the ground, legs dangling over the edge of a ledge we'd built from bits of wood scavenged from the wrecks of other people's homes. I ran the blade of my hunting knife along the belly of a dead squirrel, feeling a rare sense of peace. There was a familiarity that came with gutting animals that really put me at ease. Not that I could readily admit that without everyone thinking I was some kind of psychopath so I'd make the same disgusted noises as everyone else while I did it. Truth was, it reminded me of the good bits of when I were a kid.

"Naomi," Mia said quietly, she'd learned to be so soft on her feet that I hadn't heard her coming. Got such a fright I nearly fell off the ledge. "I'm going to get more water."

"Not on your own, you ain't," I told her and put the half-skinned squirrel down. "I'll come with ya."

"Me and Perla were gonna go," she said. Her eyes were full of hope, the way she used to look when she was asking to have a friend over for a slumber party.

"Only if José goes with you both," I said. "He knows how to shoot."

"You could teach me how to shoot," she grumbled.

"I will," I promised. I knew how valuable that skill would prove to be, and the last thing I wanted was to leave Mia vulnerable. "But we gotta find somewhere safe enough to do it. Don't want to bring all the Groundlings in the woods to our camp, do you?"

"No," she said. "So… can I go?"

"If Perla and José's Momma is okay with it," I said. "Then, yes."

"They're asking now," Mia said. I looked over at where Blanca was doing the same kind of bargaining with her kids I was doing with Mia. José was doing a lot of nodding while Perla looked across at Mia in hope. Eventually, Blanca handed José one of our guns. Perla jumped up and down in excitement, which was a dangerous thing to do so high up.

"Alright, looks like she said yes," I said. Mia was damn near bursting with excitement. I held out the hilt of my hunting knife to her. "Take this with you. No dawdling. You get the water, and you come right back. Got it?"

"Yes," she nodded earnestly. I pulled her close.

"If there's any danger out there, you get yourself safe before you worry about anyone else. You hear me?" I said it quietly so that Blanca didn't overhear me telling Mia to ditch her kids at the first sign of trouble. I had no doubt she'd be telling them the same thing about Mia. Sticking with people was the only way to get by, but in moments of chaos, it's family first. Always.

"I hear ya," Mia whispered back.

I let her go.

"Take the empty buckets with you," I reminded her. "Replace the ones you bring back."

She nodded. "We will."

"Okay," I said. "C'mon. I'll take you over."

The wood creaked underneath me. That noise used to make me panic. I'd thought the boards hadn't been nailed well enough out of fear of how many Groundlings the sound would bring. It was always a lot. But, if you stayed up high and quiet for long enough, they'd go away. Something else would get their attention. They're easy to distract because they ain't smart. Thank God.

None of our boards had broken yet, so now the sound didn't worry me and the creaking wood was just a part of life. It really was like living on a ship.

There were sturdy wooden bridges made from thick planks of wood that ran between the platforms we'd built; high enough that the dead couldn't reach us and wide enough to pitch a small tent on each one. I dreamed of one day filling in the gap between them to make a proper floor between the trees. Or maybe it would be better to turn it in to a city of treehouses and let the dead have the ground.

I crawled across the makeshift bridge between trees. Standing was riskier. If you crawled, spreading your weight out evenly on all fours then you were less likely to lose your balance.

"You hear what these kids are doing?" Blanca said as I reached her.

"Sure did."

"At least they're not going far. I already gave my gun to José," she said. José gave me a smile that I'm sure was meant to look confident, but there was a nervousness in his eyes that betrayed him.

"We'll leave the ladder down in case you get into trouble," I said, to ease his worries. The rope ladder was bundled at the edge of the platform, I pushed it down and watched it unravel to the forest floor. "Remember, Groundings are slow so you can outrun them but don't get so focussed on the one you're running from that you forget to look out for others."

"Yes, ma'am," José said with a nod like I was some kinda army general.

"Okay," I said. "You first."

The rule was one at a time. We didn't know if we could trust our homemade ladders to take the weight of more than one person. We waited until José got to the ground beforr looking at the girls. Perla was nervous, so Mia went next, grinning at me as she stepped down onto the first rung of the ladder.

"Watch out for Groundlings," I reminded her out of habit.

"I will," she said and smiled like I was overreacting. On another piece of rope, I lowered down one of our empty buckets to José who untied it so that I could send down another.

When Mia was safely on the ground, Perla climbed down too. Blanca peered nervously over the edge until she saw her daughter was safely at the bottom.

"Never thought I'd live in a world where I felt good about giving my fifteen-year-old a gun," Blanca muttered. The kids, who now had an empty bucket each, looked up at us and waved before they started walking.

"It ain't far. And we can see most of the journey from here," I said. Another benefit of living up so high was that you could see further in all directions. It's why castles are best built on top of hills.

"That's true," she said. We both glanced at the path ahead of them to make sure it was still clear. "You think we should have stopped them? I don't like this."

"I don't like it either," I admitted. "But we ain't got a choice. If we don't let them learn to live in this world, they'll die in it."

"Yeah, I know," she said, but she didn't look too convinced.

"Plus, we need to give them things to do, they're getting bored," I said. "Bored kids do dumb shit. At least changing the water is a fairly safe job."

"Still…" she said. "They're just kids. They should be playing, not collecting rainwater to survive."

"It ain't fair," I said, nodding in agreement, lamenting the loss of a childhood that I had never had, Mia had half-had, and José had probably been lucky enough to have most of. It seemed like he had a good Momma.

"I came here to give my kids a better life," she said. "And now… this."

"Well, if it makes you feel any better, I think it's shit everywhere. Other countries would've sent aid by now if it was just us," I said. It didn't look like it helped, so I added, "Although, we're in a good place for when a cure comes."

"What makes you think that?"

"We got a head start in resources," I shrugged. "One of the richest countries in the world. I'll bet the CDC started work on a cure before any of us even knew there was a problem. The USA might not be the first to solve it, but we have the infrastructure in place to survive it and get vaccines out when they're available."

Blanca looked thoughtful for a second. "You think Groundlings can be cured?"

"Not sure," I said. "Once you've turned, you might be too far gone. But there must be a cure for people who've just been bit."

"So should we head to the CDC?" She asked. "Be first there when they get a cure?"

"Maybe," I said. I hadn't thought about it, but it weren't a bad shout. "I dunno how safe the cities are yet. Might be best to wait."

"Yeah, maybe," Blanca sighed. "I am just tired of so much waiting."

"Same," I said. "Mia and I want to head to Washington eventually. When things quiet down."

"Why Washington?"

"Mia thinks of it as home," I said. "We got friends there I want to check on. And if there's a place in America that'll be the first to get a cure, it'll be wherever the President is."

"Makes sense," Blanca said. "Do you think-"

I never got to hear what it was she was going to ask next. From somewhere, not too far off, came a loud and urgent, "Naomi!"

Mia.

My feet were on the first rung of the rope ladder before I had consciously registered that it was her calling. It was an instinctive leap, my body reacting before my brain. I called back to her, not thinking or caring about the Groundlings that this might alert to my location.

"Naomi!" she yelled again. "Come quick!"

Blanca was making her way down the ladder behind me. The safety policy of one at a time forgotten because the kids were in danger. It swings a lot when one person is climbing down, it swings even more when there's two. I nearly slipped more than once, climbing so fast I got rope burn.

"Mia!" I called. It was disorientating to be back on the ground without creaking wood and the feeling like if you took too many steps you'd fall. Smelled like forest and earth. I started running in the direction of our water stores. When something darted between one of the trees, I couldn't tell if it was a Groundling or one of the kids. I reached for my knife anyway, better safe than sorry. My hand grasped at nothing. I'd forgotten I'd given Mia my only weapon.

"Naomi!" she was close. She was real close. I head her footfall and then saw her run around the trunks of one of the trees. We nearly crashed into each other. I grabbed her by the shoulders.

"You okay?" I asked. "Are you bit?"

I glanced her over. She looked fine, I couldn't see a scratch on her. My knife was still clutched in one of her hands, clean and unused. I hadn't heard the gun go off.

"No, I'm fine," she said. "We found a guy. I think he's hurt."

My panic turned to anger in an instant. "That's what you was screaming about?"

She was shocked, she hadn't expected this reaction from me. "He's... he's hurt," she stammered

"Is he hurt or is he bit?" I asked. Another moment of surprise flashed across her face. I couldn't believe she hadn't thought of it. "Go home. I will deal with this."

With one hand on her back, I marched her to the bottom of the ladder. We got back just as Blanca had stepped off. Her eyes were still full of panic. "Where are they?" she asked. "What happened?"

"Get up there," I snapped at Mia, taking my knife back off her and propelling her towards the ladder. I watched as she started to climb and then I turned to Blanca. "They're alright. Some guy's been injured, they stopped to help."

"Idiots," she fumed. I heard her curse some more in Spanish and then she started running in the direction Mia had come from. "José! Perla!"

I ran after her. They must have heard the anger in her voice because they came running real fast. It's weird how all kids kinda have the same guilty look when they get in shit with adults. Even at fifteen and wielding a loaded gun, José looked just as terrified as his little sister.

"Mama..." Perla started to say, her eyes full of tears threatening to spill over and her bottom lip shaking. Blanca said something sharp in Spanish and both kids looked at the ground.

"Take them back," I told her. "I'll deal with this."

She nodded, grabbed each of her kids by their arms and marched them away. Not thinking to get the gun from José, I pushed forward with just my knife.

A soft moan from up ahead made me stop where I was. I kept listening, trying to find out if it were the rattling breaths of the dead or a cry from someone who needed help. I tiptoed towards the clearing where our water supplies were kept.

I saw his feet first, filthy sneakers under ripped jeans. The kind of shoes someone would buy for style rather than comfort. He groaned again, and his feet didn't move. That weren't like dead ones. I'd seen them walk despite all kinds of broken bones, seen them drag themselves around with just their boney arms. I stepped forward.

He looked at me. From the top of his maybe-blonde hair to the toes of his formerly fancy sneakers, he was caked in dirt. He looked half-dead, but half is much better than whole-dead.

"Name?" I asked. Dead folks can't speak, so it's a sure way to tell the difference.

"Lucas," he said it so quiet it was basically a whisper. But he did say it. His expression changed too, which is another thing the dead don't do, they only got one look. I relaxed, lowered my knife.

"Lucas," I repeated, taking a few steps towards him. "I'm Naomi. Are you bit?"

"No," he said, craning his neck to get a look at me. I crouched down next to him.

"You on your own?"

"Yes," he said. "I had a group, but we got separated. Been alone for weeks. Can't find any food or water. I heard there was a quarry near here, so I was trying to find it when I saw those buckets up there. They yours?"

"Yeah," I said. "We leave 'em there to catch rainwater. Get more rainfall in the clearing than the rest of the forest. Did you fall trying to get some?"

"Yes," he said. "I don't know if I'm just too weak or if you meant it to be almost impossible."

"Bit of both," I said. "We don't want folks stealing our reserves if they come across them, but there's also a pulley system that's so simple the kids can do it. You just have to know where to look. You thirsty?"

"Yes." I already knew he was by the hoarseness of his voice.

"Okay, stay where you are, I'll get you a drink," I said. I walked over to where the nearest rope was tied around a low branch. We'd disguised it with leaves so to the untrained eye it just looked like a vine or something. You could only see the buckets if you look up and most folks don't do that because they're busy looking around for the dead. I untied it, slowly lowered the bucket down. It was heavy, we must've caught a lot of rain. "How bad are you hurt?"

"My leg's busted," he said, putting a hand on his left knee. "I landed funny on my back. It's a miracle I'm still alive."

"Less of the pity party," I told him. The bucket landed gently on the ground, I tied the rope loosely again and filled up a flask of water that I kept tied to a loop on my belt. "You're fine now."

I slipped an arm under his shoulder. He let out a long, involuntary groan as I tried to move him.

"Is it your back that's giving you trouble?" I asked. He nodded. "Can you move your feet for me?"

"Yeah," he managed to wiggle his feet in his scuffed up shoes. There was a movement in his legs too.

Satisfied that his back weren't broken, I said, "Do you remember hitting your head when you fell?"

"No," he said.

"Let's see if you can sit up," I said. "We'll take it real slow, okay?"

"Okay," he said and, with a huge grimace on his face, he managed to help me get him up into a sitting position. Under all the dirt, he looked pale and kinda sweaty. I supported his weight so he could drink from the flask without choking.

"Alright," I said when he was done. "Let's get you someplace safe so if the Groundlings come you won't be lying out here like an all-you-can-eat buffet."

"What a way to go, I always hated those," he said. I smiled. Can't have been feeling that bad if he were cracking jokes.

"How long you been lying here?"

"I don't know," he said, which was extremely unhelpful. "My watch stopped weeks ago."

"Alright," I said, always amazed by how dependent some people were on old technologies and how unadaptable they could be. "But has it been more than a day?"

"No," he said.

"And do you remember where the sun was when you fell?" I asked.

"Um," he tried to think for a minute. Then he pointed. "Over there, I think."

"Okay," I said, glancing up at the spot in the sky and doing some rough calculations. Sun hadn't moved much. "Probably only about an hour."

"Felt like longer," Lucas said.

"You're lucky no Groundlings came by," I admitted. "You think you can stand?"

"Yeah," he said but didn't look so sure. I shifted my hold on him to take more of his weight. He bent his knees and tried to get a firm foothold on the ground. "Why do you call them that?"

"What, Groundings?" I asked. He nodded and managed to stand. "Because they can't climb."

"I see," he said. I could tell he didn't really get it but he would in time. Leaning on me hard, he took a step. It looked like it pained him. "And the kids that were just here. They yours?"

"One of them's my little sister. The other two live in our camp," I said. I realised he was asking all of these non-urgent questions as a way of distracting himself from the pain he was in, so I decided to keep him talking. "So, where are you from?"

He didn't much sound like he were from here.

"New York," he said.

"Oh, I always wanted to go there," I said. "Not a good place to be now though, I'll bet."

"No," he said. "Guess I had a lucky escape. I was here on business. Only supposed to be here for a night."

"What kinda business were you in?"

"Insurance," he said. "I was here doing a risk assessment for one of our biggest clients. Seems mundane as shit now."

"So 'the dead coming back to life' weren't one of the risks you assessed, huh?"

"Funnily enough, it didn't make the list," he said. "Maybe if it had, I'd be in better shape right now. Be in one of those bunkers with a load of canned food with other apocalypse preppers. Remember when everyone thought they were crazy?"

"God, I must've read a hundred think pieces on Preppers," I said. "Still, you're doing better than most."

It felt like most of civilization had fallen and taken a giant chunk of the population with it.

"I guess," Lucas reluctantly agreed. "So, what were you before all of this? Some kinda nurse or something?"

"No," I said, not wanting to explain that the reason I knew how to check for broken bones and head injuries was a childhood spent bandaging up myself and my best friend. "A reporter, actually. Washington Post."

"Oh," he said, surprised. People usually were. "What were you doing in Georgia?"

"This is my hometown," I said.

"What? The woods?" he said. I know he meant it as a joke, but he weren't far wrong. If I counted up all of the hours I'd spent hunting in the woods, would it beat the number I'd spent hiding in that damn trailer?

"Grew up just outside Atlanta," I said, because either way you sliced it, that were true. I started to tell Lucas about Momma being sick, the journey Mia and I had been on, the house burning down and hiding out at one of our neighbors. He nodded along, and I hoped it was an entertaining enough story to be distracting from whatever he'd done to fuck up his back.

"Naomi!" It was Mia again, yelling even though I'd told her not too. I looked up at where a small portion of our camp was visible through the branches. "Naomi!"

"Is that Mia?" Lucas asked. I nodded and was about to yell back at her to shut the hell up when I caught the urgency in tone, saw her frantic waving.

"Naomi, look out!" she hollered in a way that could only mean there were Groundlings nearby.

"Shit," I muttered and looked off in the direction she was waving at. Lucas started to panic. I heard his breathing speed up, his eyes darted around from place to place.

Not good in a crisis, I noted, How the hell has he made it this far?

I pulled my hunting knife out again and turned to him, "Can you stand on your own?"

"I... I think so," he nodded. I started to let go of him slowly, so if he couldn't hold himself up, I would still be there to catch him.

"I'll take care of these. If you can walk, head towards Mia. If not, stay here, and I will come get you. Got it?"

More nodding. I didn't wait for Lucas to say anything else, I just ran. Mia had stopped yelling now she'd successfully got me to look in the right place. I hoped that somewhere up above me, Blanca would have my back with one of our guns.

There were four of them, spaced out between the trees. The first took me by surprise. I heard a growl and then she was on me. Mia screamed again, this time out of fear for my life. I grabbed the dead girl's hair, a clump of it came off in my fist. There was still scalp attached to it. A bald patch of skull gleamed when it caught the sunlight. I drove my blade into it and immediately started to look for the next threat. Two of them were real close, drawn together by the sounds of the one I'd just killed. I kicked one in the chest, heard some ribs crack. It stumbled back just long enough for me to take out the other one. Then he was back, jaw snapping, arms reaching for me. He was missing a couple of fingers, and I wondered if that was pre or post-mortem. I got him in the eye.

A shot rang out. I got such a fright it stopped me where I stood. Something crumpled to the ground just behind me. The last Groundling, taken out by Blanca from somewhere in the trees. It was a loud gunshot, if there were any more close by, they'd be on us soon. I ran back to Lucas, who'd made slow progress towards where my friends were waiting for us.

"We gotta move fast," I said. "The dead will have heard that."

"Okay," he said, and I could tell he was trying not to sound afraid. He looked up. "I can't climb."

"That's okay," I put an arm around him again. We moved as fast as I thought he could handle. Every noise from the forest sounded like the dead coming to get us. I looked up at where Mia was still peering anxiously down at us.

"Tell Blanca to get the Crane ready. Get Alf if he's up there!" I called to her. Pointless to be quiet when there'd already been a gunshot. Mia's outline in the trees vanished, and I looked at Lucas. "We'll get you up there."

An agonisingly long pause and then the Crane descended from the treetops. 'Crane' was a generous way of describing it. It was just a sturdy old door that we'd strung up on another pulley system to help us haul bits of wood up and down for construction. Standing underneath it as it came down, you could still see the number 9 on it. Even had a letterbox.

"What the hell?" Lucas gawped at it.

"We use it to take heavy stuff up to camp," I said. "Climb on, they'll pull you up."

"What kind of heavy stuff?" he asked suspiciously.

"Bits of wood, anything that's too heavy for us to carry up ourselves," I said. "It should hold a person just fine."

We hadn't actually tested it, but it was pretty confident.

"I'm not sure..."

"Okay," I sighed. "But it's the only way of getting up there without climbing, so if you ain't gonna do it, then you're Groundling grub because I ain't staying down here much longer."

The Crane was eye level with us now, but Lucas looked up.

"You guys live up there?" he said, taking in the maze of platforms and bridges above our heads.

"We sure do," I said, and I was kinda proud of how much we'd been able to build, how much safer just looking at it made me feel."

"How many of you are there?

"Eleven," I said. "Twelve if you get on this damn Crane."

"Help me up," he said. It was now at hip-height, and whoever was up there lowering it weren't going any lower. I let him put most of his weight on me as he tried to sit down. The door swung and tipped towards us.

"Sit as close to the middle as you can," I said. "You'll be fine."

It swayed as he pulled himself into the centre. He looked nervous for someone who was in the process of having his life saved.

A Groundling stumbled out of one of the bushes. I patted the door.

"See you up there," I said.

The Crane started moving. It can only go up in these uncomfortable jerky movements which don't matter when it's scraps of wood but probably ain't ideal for a human being. When he was on his way, I ran for the ladder that was still down. My sudden movement drew the attention of the new Groundling. I leapt up the first few rungs, heard the too-familiar snapping of a dead jaw behind me but managed to climb clear of it. By the time I got to the top, there were three of them at the bottom.

"Thank the Lord they can't climb, huh?" a hand reached out to take mine when I reached up to pull myself over the edge.

"Amen," I said, taking the hand and letting it help me up. "You seen our newcomer?"

"Sure have," Alf replied. "Blanca and José are unloading him now. What's he like?"

"He's a complainer," I said. "And he's injured. But when he's better, it'll be good to have another person around to help."

"And until then he's just another mouth to feed, huh?" Alf said, but I knew he didn't really mean it. His grumpy old man shtick was mostly an act. He cared about the group more than most. I don't think he'd had many people to look out for before the world ended and now he had a group, he weren't taking it for granted.

"Come meet him," I said, and together we made our way over to where Lucas had been successfully unloaded from our rudimentary Crane.

"I survived," he said, looking more than a little surprised.

"Congrats," I said. "I see you've already met Blanca and José."

"Hello," they said in unison.

"Blanca's daughter, Perla, is over there," I pointed to where she was shyly looking over from behind a tree trunk. She gave a small wave and then ducked out of sight. "This is Alf. He's the architect of this whole place."

"Wouldn't go that far," Alf's dislike of anything that might border on praise turned the tips of his ears pink with embarrassment. He held out a hand for Lucas to shake.

"It wasn't you who built all of this?" Lucas asked me.

"Hell no," I said. "I ain't got that kinda know-how. Alf used to be in construction, which is great news for us."

"I can't do much of the heavy lifting myself," Alf said. "I threw my back out a few years back."

"I can sympathise with you there, friend," Lucas said, with a grimace.

"Well, you're great at telling the rest of us what to do," I said to Alf. "We have a group out on a run at the moment, you'll meet them later. And Mia is-"

I looked around. Alf and Blanca exchanged a look I couldn't decipher.

"Where's Mia?" I asked.

"She was kinda upset when she got back," Alf said. "She's over there."

He nodded back to our usual spot, where I could see Mia sitting down near where I'd discarded the carcass of the squirrel I'd been skinning. Living in such close quarters meant there weren't many places to hide and sulk.

"Thanks, Alf," I said, feeling my heart sink a little. "I'll go speak to her."

I left the group to help Lucas get settled in and crawled across the boards to where Mia was sitting, all folded up with her knees under her chin. Her face was shiny from the tears on her cheeks. When she saw me coming, she turned her head away.

"Hey kid," I said gently, scooching over to sit beside her. "I'm sorry I yelled at you. You just gave me a fright is all."

"I just wanted to help," she said. "That man needed help."

"I know," I said. "But you can't be so noisy. Groundlings'll hear you."

"I didn't think there were any nearby," she said. "I checked... or, I thought I checked..."

"It's hard to see that far when you're on the ground, it ain't like when you're up here, and you can see through the trees," I reminded her. "More and more of them are coming through the woods, you know that."

"I know," Mia said, finally turning her head back to look at me. "They almost got you... and it's my fault. I'm so sorry."

Having almost calmed down, she burst into tears all over again. "I'm okay," I said and put an arm around her. "Look. I made it back. I'm fine."

"You're always looking out for us. I just wanted to be like that... to look out for people too," she said, furiously wiping tears from her eyes. "And I nearly lost you."

"Don't beat yourself up about it. It'll take more than a few Groundlings to get me away from you," I said. "I won't lose you, kid."

"I know." She leant her head on my shoulder. "I won't lose you either."

She heaved a big sigh. I hated that she was disappointed in herself for trying to do the right thing.

"His name's Lucas," I said. "And we got him. He's safe now, thanks to you."

"Yeah..." she said, but she didn't look convinced. "Still put you in danger, though, didn't I?"

"Everyone messes up sometimes," I said. "I'm alright."

"I can't mess up anymore," she said. She sounded so serious. "Not with the world the way it is now. If you mess up now, you die, or someone you love dies."

She was putting a lot of responsibility on her own small shoulders. For a second, it made me angry. Not with her. Just with the world. I'd worked so hard to keep a stable roof over our heads and food on the table so that Mia would never have to grow up worrying about survival. Now, despite everything I'd achieved, here we were. Hunting. Scavenging for scraps.

Had it been worth it?

If I had known what was to come, would I still have done it all? Would I have studied my ass off, taken every job I could find? Or would I have taken Daryl's hand that night he asked me to run away with him? Would I have looked him in the eye and said, Yes? Let's do this. Let's fend for ourselves and be happy. Us against the world.

Would I have been happy?

Would Mia?

Would he?

"Are you mad at me?" Mia's small, sad voice pulled me away from thoughts about a life Daryl and I could have shared. I looked at her.

"No," I said. "I'm just sorry you have to go through all of this."

"It's okay," she said and managed a tiny smile. "I'm kinda used to it. And we'll be back in Washington one day."

"Yeah," I said. "Washington. That's the plan."

Something didn't feel right about it anymore. I don't know if it was the small part of me, the tiny ghost in my soul that whispered 'what if' every time I thought of Daryl, that stopped any path I was on from feeling like the right one. Maybe it was the amount of hope Mia was putting in Washington, I worried she hadn't thought about how much things would've changed. Had she considered the possibility that every one we'd known there might not have survived?

I didn't bring it up. It was a conversation for another time, I was already feeling too heavy from the weight of this one. Mia had only just stopped crying as it was.

"We never got water," I said. "When the Groundlings have wandered off, come with me to get some, yeah?"

"Yeah," she said.

It took a few hours for the Groundlings to clear, and in the end, it wasn't because they wandered off. The group who'd been out scavenging came back just before it got dark and picked them all off. We covered them from the treetops with the gun, but there was no need for it to be fired this time. Everyone made it up just fine.

"That's the most we've ever had down there," Jack commented when he was safely back at camp.

"Yup," I agreed. "More of them are coming out of the City. How was the run?"

"Alright," he said. "Managed to get a few canned goods that ain't gone off yet, some medical supplies. Who's the new guy?"

He'd spotted Lucas, sitting with his back against a treetrunk feeling sorry for himself.

"That's Lucas," I said. "Mia found him when she went to get some water. Don't have any painkillers on you, do you? He's a little injured."

"Sure do," Jack said. "We got painkillers, antibiotics, allergy tablets, some blue thing that may or may not be viagra, the label's come off."

"I told you not to bring that," Izzy grumbled. "Waste of bag space."

"They don't take up that much room," he said. "And I thought they were funny."

"You're a child," she rolled her eyes.

"Maybe just give him the painkillers," I said. "What you do with the rest is your business."

"Alrighty," Jack said. He headed over to give them to Lucas and introduce himself and Izzy.

"They bickered the whole trip," Will said, watching them go. He looked tired. "I am not going on a run with them again."

"Agreed," Frankie said, throwing her bag down at her feet and stretching out her shoulders. "How long have they been married?"

"About a week before all this kicked off," I said. "I think."

"God, what a shit honeymoon," said Dee. "Two months camping in trees with a bunch of strangers while the dead try to murder you."

"I dunno," Will said. "Some people pay a lot for glamping in treehouses."

"Well this ain't very glam, is it?" Dee sighed.

"It will be by the time we're done," Will said. "Which reminds me, I found a hardware store that I think it would be worth going back to, where's Alf so I can ask him what we need?"

"Over there somewhere," I pointed across a few bridges to a platform several trees away. Alf liked to keep to himself most nights. Will was prone to annoying him with overly enthusiastic construction questions. As he walked away, I turned to Frankie and Dee. "I'd like to lead another run tomorrow."

"Tomorrow?" Dee repeated. "What else do we need?"

"Weapons," I said. "We are not as well defended as we should be. The number of dead in the woods is just gonna keep growing. The kids should be trained too."

"We might have to go deeper into the City for that," Frankie said. She looked nervous. "I don't know what kinda shape it's in."

"Nah, I reckon the City will be clean out of guns by now. I say we start with the houses closest to us, see what kinda weapons people have left there. We need quieter ones too, so every shot we take doesn't bring every Groundling for miles. If we don't have any luck, we'll move on to the City," I said. "And I ain't going to make anyone come with me who doesn't want to. "

"Alright," Dee said. "I'm in. Tomorrow then?"

"Tomorrow," I agreed. "We'll go at first light."

We cooked up the squirrels I'd skinned and some of the canned beans the group had brought back. I'd never seen anyone eat as fast as Lucas on that first night, it must have been days since his last good meal.

We turned in earlier than usual, although staying up late wasn't something we did much of anyway. It's a lot less fun when there's no late-night TV to fall asleep to or lamps to read by. For the first time in a while, I dreamed. I dreamed I was back in my old Washington apartment. Not the fancy one with the coffee machine and the big windows and the underfloor heating I always forgot to turn on. It was the other one, the one with damp on the walls and only one bedroom. I sitting on the saggy old sofa working on an article and Daryl was there, making something in the kitchen behind me. He didn't say anything, but I knew it was him. Like I could sense it without looking. Whatever I was working on seemed too important to look away from until some small part of me that knew I was dreaming realised that this was my only chance to talk to him again. The urgency of willing myself to turn around in the dream woke me up before I had a chance to see his face.

I couldn't fall back asleep again. I just listened to the sound of the trees, and other people snoring around me. I watched the light in the forest grow as the sun came up and then, as promised, we got ready to go at first light.

Mia wanted to come, so did José, but after the previous day's antics, it was firmly decided this trip was adults only. When they'd been trained on weapons, then we'd teach them how to go on runs. Alf stayed behind with them, he were old and knew he'd slow us down. Lucas was too injured to come. On request of Frankie and Dee, Izzy was also made to stay back. They fed her some bullshit about needing one person at camp who was in a fit enough condition to protect the place, but we all knew it were just because they couldn't take another day of her bickering with Jack.

Jack seemed sad that she weren't coming, which was baffling to the rest of us given that at some time in the night they'd fallen out so badly he'd had to sleep in another tent.

"Married life everything you thought it would be?" I asked him on the walk, falling into step beside him.

"Can't say this is exactly what I pictured when I wrote my vows," he grinned. "But it could be worse."

"Really? Dead are walking about, and all y'all do is fight," I said.

"Ah, that's only part of it," he said. "We have our fights, sure, but we mostly fight those dead dickheads. We fight for each other when it counts, too, that's the important part."

"I guess that's true," I said and felt something horrible twist in my gut.

"Would've been worse if we'd been separated," he said. "Can't imagine surviving this without Izzy. I don't know how Frankie's still going."

There was a moment of silence while we both stared at the back of Frankie's head while she talked to Blanca. Dee turned around and whispered, "She thinks they'll find each other again."

"Maybe they will," I said, with a shrug. They both looked at me like I was crazy. "Stranger things have happened."

Jack laughed. "You're a lot more optimistic than I thought you were."

"What's that supposed to me?"

"I dunno," he shrugged. "You're always catching rodents to gut, setting up traps and talking about how to up our defences."

"Yeah, that's true," Dee agreed, thoughtfully. "Didn't have you down as a secret romantic."

"Wouldn't go that far," I said, but I could feel myself blush. "There's just no way of knowing how many survivors like us there are out there, that's all."

"I'll bet we're the only ones," Dee said. I could tell from her eyes she really thought that were true.

"How can you say that? We found Lucas yesterday," I said.

"Oh, yeah," she said. "Well... I reckon he's the last one."

"Nah," Jack said. "I'm with Naomi, there's gotta be more than us."

"Maybe," she shrugged.

"What about you, guys?" Jack asked, ready for a change of topic. "Either of you married before all this?"

"I'd just broke up with my girlfriend," Dee said sadly.

"God, that sucks," I said.

"Shit timing," Jack agreed.

"Worst part is I don't even remember why now."

"Sorry to hear that," Jack said, then looked at me. "What about you?"

"No," I said and held back a laugh at the idea I'd had my shit together enough to be anyone's wife.

"Ah, well," he shrugged. "There's still time. For both of you."

"Nah," I said. "Don't think there's much point in getting married these days. You could both be dead an hour after."

"That's the whole point," he said. "We're all living on borrowed time now. Why waste ay of it not being hitched to someone you love?"

I wanted to disagree, but I couldn't actually think of a decent counter-argument. So, I just shrugged and said, "I think most folks have more important things on their mind than dating."

"Right now they do, yeah," Jack said. "But it won't always be like this. One day you're gonna find someone that you wanna fight alongside in all of this. Someone you can only imagine making this shit show not just bearable, but better. Then you'll see."

I didn't say anything, just wondered what happened if you'd already met that person and ruined it in a big, dumb fight.

Dee sighed and said, "Neither of us will meet anyone because everyone else is dead," and we didn't speak again until we were in sight of some houses.

 

Daryl

Merle didn't come back to camp to seek his revenge like we feared he would. Either because he were dead or because it weren't long before there wasn't a camp for him to come back to. Maybe he tried, but by the time he got there, we'd already gone.

Walkers came through. First time we'd seen a group like that. Not quite as big as a horde but there were enough of them to overpower us, take us by surprise.

We lost people.

Eighteen in total.

Amy.

Ed.

Can't say I was too sad about that last one. I didn't know any of them very well at that point, but Ed was a real asshole. That much was clear from real early on.

Jim got bit, and after that, he got sick. We tried to get him to the CDC in time to get a cure, but he didn't make it. We left him tied to a tree - his choice, not ours.

We should've shot him, but the early days were weird, and none of us knew what to do with people when they turned.

We made it to the CDC.

We thought there'd be a cure, or at least some answers about how all of this got started and when it might end. I'd expected a whole team of people, a crowd of nerds in lab coats. But there was just one guy, Jenner, and all he had were some brain scans of infected patients turning into Walkers. He confirmed that they weren't alive, not really, so I hoped folks would feel less squeamish about shooting them. He had no idea what had caused it, so all in all it would've been a wasted trip, if it weren't for the fact he had showers and food. Booze too. We ate like Kings and stopped smelling like peasants. Just for a day.

Jenner had been alone too long. He weren't quite right anymore. Think it was the first time I really saw that you need people around you in all of this. To keep you tethered, keep you sane.

He blew the place up.

Took one of ours with him.

Jacqui, I think her name was.

We said goodbye to the Morales's too. They didn't die, just chose to go another way. Which kinda amounts to the same thing these days.

Life was just becoming a long list of people who hadn't made it, and I was tired. So tired. Felt like we was always on the road and the roads were never clear. And things were constantly breaking or getting broke.

Like the damn RV.

It needed a new radiator hose. We stopped where the road had been mostly blocked by abandoned vehicles and scavenged them for all sorts. We took their fuel, any water or fresh clothes we could find. Looked for a damn radiator hose for the damn RV.

Then came our first horde. We'd never seen a group that big. Must've been like a hundred dead dickbrains all walking towards us at once. We dove under cars, stayed real quiet. Real still. We could just see their feet passing through and smell the stench of their rotting flesh.

Lucky the dead are fucking idiots.

When it sounded like they were a safe enough distance away, I got up and kept looking for shit that might be useful. I was kind of aware that something was kicking off with the others, but I didn't pay no attention to it until I could fee someone staring at me.

"Hey," they said, and I looked up. It was Rick, looking at me so serious I thought he must be talking to someone else. Shane was already standing behind him, though. So was Glenn. Those were his usual go-to guys. "You're a hunter, right?"

I glanced behind me. Nothing but the corpse of a man who'd blown his brains out in a Honda, so it must be me he were talking to.

"Me?" I asked. "Yeah. Why? You hungry? Cause I don't think now's the time, man. Though I think Dale found some chips or some shit-"

"Can you track?" he cu me off.

"Course I can track," I said. Fucking dumb question.

"I need your help," he said. "Sophia's wandered off. You think you can come into the woods with me and help me retrace her steps?"

Now, all of the hullabaloo I'd been ignoring made sense. I glanced over at Carol, who was in floods of tears. Lori was trying to comfort her, but she looked distraught too. Sophia couldn't have been much older than ten or eleven. Old enough to look after herself but young enough to be scared our there on her own. Especially cause she had a Momma who cared about her. Kids that have that wanna get found when they run off.

"Yeah, of course," I said, quickly. "Lead me to it."

He took the three of us - Shane, Glenn and me - into the woods next to the highway. I worried for a second that this dumbass cop wouldn't be able to retrace his steps right. But he stopped by a creek and jumped down into it. I followed him, while Shane and Glenn stood on the bank. Probably worried about getting their shoes wet.

"I left her here," he said and indicated to the spot. I took a good look for any signs of a struggle or the direction she might've run off in.

"Waste of time, man," I heard Shane mutter. "This guy ain't gonna be able to tell you anything."

Fuck you.

I ignored him. "Sure this was the spot?" I asked Rick in case his dumb ass had got the wrong bit of the river.

There were very few signs of anyone being there, least of all a little girl. It was a good thing, overall, meant a struggle wasn't likely.

"I left her right here," he said again and seemed real sure of it. "I drew the Walkers away, off in that direction- up the creek. She was gone by the time I got back here. I figured she just took off and ran back to the group. I told her, go that way, and keep the sun on her left shoulder."

Good advice. Maybe less of a dumbass than I thought.

I waded through the water, towards where Sophia might've gone if she'd taken the cops advice. She seemed like the kinda kid who'd listen to a cop. Glenn was standing in the way.

"Why don't you step off to one side?" I told him. "You're mucking up the trail."

"You're assuming she knows her left from her right," Shane said. "The kid's tired and scared, man. She had her close call with two Walkers. I'm kinda wondering how much of what you said stuck."

What the hell were they teaching cops about finding missing kids? Or was Shane just one of them folks who don't know how tough kids can be when they have to or the kinda shit they can survive? Probably because he never had to think about survival until now.

"We got clear prints right here," I said, continuing to ignore Shane. "She did like you said- headed back to the highway. We'll make our way back."

Why had nobody done the right thing and given the kid a gun or a knife? She might've had a fighting chance with one of those. I lead them as far as I could find traces of Sophia.

"She was doing fine until right here," I crouched down where the tracks took a worrying turn, scanning the ground for any sign that I was wrong. "All she had to do was keep going. She veered off that way."

"Why would she do that?" Glenn asked.

"Maybe she saw something that spooked her," Shane said. "Made her run off."

Spooked, how? Don't remember you being out here with her, Detective Dumbass.

"A Walker?" Glenn said.

"I don't see any other footprints," I reassured him. "Just hers."

"So what do we do?" Shane asked, looking back at Rick. "All of us press on?"

If I ever had a kid who went missing, there wasn't a snowball's chance in hell I was calling Shane to help me find them.

"No," Rick said. "Better if you and Glenn get back up to the highway. People are going to start panicking. Let them know we're doing everything we can. But most of all, keep everybody calm."

Shane and Glenn left us to it. I followed Sophia's new trail, leading Rick deeper into the woods. We came across a Walker that had just eaten, cut open its stomach like we were the huntsman looking for Little Red Riding Hood inside the wolf, but all that was in there was chunks of a woodchuck.

Dead were eating better than us.

We lost the light and had to stop searching. Carol didn't take that so well, even though we promised we'd pick it up again at first light. Most of the camp came out to help, except Dale and T-Dog who kept watch on our stuff. Rick asked me to take the lead on the search. It was weird, to have the camp follow me like that, for them to look at me without hating me for the first time since I'd met any of them.

We found a dead guy in a tent. We found a church where the bells were still ringing even though there was nobody there to ring them. We found plenty of Walkers.

We did not find Sophia.

The light started to fade again, and Rick got me to lead the rest of the group back to the RV. He, Carl and Shane stayed to keep looking even though I told them it was pointless. In the dark, they'd just be tripping over themselves.

We'd not been walking for long before we heard a gunshot. Just one. Lori immediately wanted to turn back, but I wouldn't let them. Rick had trusted me with getting them all back safe, it couldn't be my fault that his wife wandered off on some dumb suicide mission. I tried to keep everyone calm, I probably weren't as good at it as Shane, and there weren't any chores to give people. It was just more walking and that ain't as distracting as you might think.

Morale was low. Carol's the lowest of all.

Andrea did her best to comfort her. "I'm sorry for what you're going through. I know how you feel."

It hadn't been that long since she'd lost Amy and since then, she'd kinda been on edge. Wouldn't have been all that surprised if she'd topped herself.

"I suppose you do. Thank you," said Carol, doing her best not to cry. "The thought of her... out here by herself... It's the not knowing that's killing me. I just keep hoping and praying she doesn't wind up like Amy."

Harsh.

Andrea flinched, and the rest of us fell silent. We'd all seen her turn. Seen her get put down. It weren't pleasant.

"Oh, God," Carol gasped. "That's the worst thing I ever said."

If that were true, Carol must have lead a pretty polite life before all of this. It certainly didn't remain the worst thing she'd ever said.

Andrea was quick to forgive her, "We're all hoping and praying with you, for what it's worth."

Fuck's sake.

"I'll tell you what it's worth," I said. "Not a damn thing. It's a waste of time all this hoping and praying. 'Cause we're gonna locate that little girl. She's gonna be just fine."

Carol didn't much look like she believed me, but it didn't matter because I did. I couldn't wait to prove her and everyone else wrong about it. It was enough to snap them both out of their little pity party so we could keep going. We pressed on towards the highway.

Another sound stopped us. A weirder sound; hooves beating against the forest floor. They were moving with too much purpose to be a wild horse. Unease grew as we looked around. I raised my crossbow in case Lori had been right to worry about the gunshot. Someone could've taken Rick, Carl and Shane hostage. Could've shot at them. Or just plain shot them.

From out of the bushes burst a chick on a horse. Didn't look armed but I kept my weapon up because you can't be too careful.

"Lori? Lori Grimes?" she yelled, looking around at us all.

"I'm Lori," Lori stepped forward.

"Rick sent me, you gotta come now."

"What?"

"There's been an accident," she said. "Carl's been shot. He's still alive, but you gotta come now. Rick needs you!"

"Woah, Woah, Woah!" I said, trying to get between her and the horse. "We don't know this girl. You can't get on that horse!"

If Rick did make it back, what would he say to me letting his woman ride off with a stranger just because she knew his name? She could be the one who shot Carl in the first place.

The chick on the horse kinda glared at me. Lori totally ignored everything I'd said and started climbing onto the horse. "Rick said you had others on the highway?" she said. "That big traffic snarl?"

"Uh-huh," Glenn said, sounding all dazed like he'd been hit on the head with something.

"Backtrack to Fairburn Road. Two miles down is our farm. You'll see the mailbox. The name's Greene." She spurred the horse on, Lori clinging to the back. Then they was both gone, left the rest of us in the dust.

Nothing else to do but keep head back to the highway and fill the others in on what had happened. Felt ridiculous, going into the woods to find one person and coming out with four less than we'd started with. There was division amongst us about what to do next. Dale was all for heading to the farm to check it out, check it was real and that the rest of our group were alright. Carol wanted to stay in case Sophia came back. I volunteered to stay with the RV, but Dale weren't happy to just leave it with me. Probably thought I'd take off with it or some shit.

In the end, it was decided that Dale, Andrea, Carol and I would stay with RV and leave a message for Sophia. Glenn took T-Dog to the farm to see if they had any medicine for his blood infection.

Night fell, and it was hard to sleep. Carol cried in the corner. It was soft, quiet, and I could tell she didn't want to draw attention to herself or wake anyone up. But it made me think that Sophia might be out there crying too, alone in the dark. And that made it real hard to sleep.

Kids who have a loving home should get to spend as much time there as possible. You can lose it so fast.

I got up to do a nighttime search. Andrea came with me. I weren't that keen on having her come with me, but an extra pair of eyes out there in the dark was always useful. Walkers are more active at night.

"You really think we're gonna find Sophia?" she asked.

I glanced at her. She looked tired and beat down. "You got that look on your face same as everybody else," I told her. "What the hell is wrong with you people? We just started looking."

"Well do you?"

"It ain't the mountains of Tibet," I said. "It's Georgia. She could be holed up in a farmhouse somewhere. People get lost, and they survive. Happens all the time."

"She's only twelve."

"Hell, I was younger than her when I got lost," I said. "Nine days in the woods eating berries, wiping my ass with poison oak."

"They found you?"

"My old man was off on a bender with some waitress. Merle was doing another stint in juvie, didn't even know I was gone," I said. This was back before I knew Naomi. Before I had anyone who would've noticed I weren't there. "I made my way back, though. Went straight into the kitchen and made myself a sandwich. No worse for wear, except my ass itched something awful."

Andrea looked at me and started laughing. "Sorry. I'm sorry," she said, trying to sound sympathetic. "That is a terrible story."

I didn't mind, weren't like the experience had hurt me. As far as my childhood memories went, it were one of the nicer ones.

"The difference is, Sophia's got people looking for her," I said. "I'd call that an advantage."

Sophia had the kind of Momma that would've put her picture on milk cartons if she'd gone missing back in the day. She'd have been all over the news. No way she'd have wound up eating worms like me.

We kept walking, kept looking for signs and listening out for danger. Something rustled nearby, and I glanced at Andrea. She'd heard it too. I raised my crossbow, and we crept towards the sound.

A tent beneath a tree.

I was about to call out for Sophia when the rustling got louder. I looked up and saw some dead loser hanging from the tree. His skin was so luminously pale it almost glowed in the dark. He'd strung a note up along with himself.

"'Got bit. Fever hit. World gone to shit. Might as well quit.'" I read it aloud. Shit rhyme. "Dumbass didn't know enough to shoot himself in the head. Turned himself into a big, swinging piece of bait. And a mess. You alright?"

I could hear the sound of Andrea wretching behind me. She looked real queasy. "Trying not to puke," she said.

"Go ahead if you gotta," I told her. Better out than in.

"No, I'm fine," she said but didn't sound it. "Let's just talk about something else for a minute. How'd you learn to shoot?"

"Gotta eat. That's one thing these Walkers and us have in common," I said. It was the only explanation I felt like giving her after she'd laughed so much a poison oak story. I moved closer to the dead guy, watched him go berserk as he tried to reach me. "I guess this is the closest he's been to food since he turned. Look at him, hanging up there like a big pinata. The other Geeks came and ate all the flesh off his legs."

It were mostly just bone dangling there, kicking at us.

Andrea threw up. Finally.

"I thought we were changing the subject," she complained, wiping vomit off her mouth with the back of her hand.

"Call that payback," I said. "For laughing about my itchy ass."

She gave me a small smile.

"Let's head back," I said.

"Aren't you gonna-" she looked pointedly at my crossbow and then at the hanging Walker.

"No. He ain't hurting nobody and I ain't gonna waste an arrow either. He made his choice, opted out. Let him hang.," I said. I tried to leave, but she didn't follow. Just kept staring up at that dumb dead guy. I wondered if she was still thinking about taking the same path. "You wanna live now. Or not? It's just a question."

I don't think she were used to people being so blunt, but I never knew how to word things to suit folks like her.

"An answer for an arrow," she said. "Fair?"

"Mm-hmm," I nodded.

"I don't know if I want to live or if I have to or if it's just a habit."

"That's not much of an answer," I said. But I shot the hanging man anyway. Because a deal's a deal. "Waste of an arrow."

I turned to leave, and this time she followed.

"You didn't give me much of an answer, either," she said.

"Huh?"

"How'd you learn to shoot?"

"Taught myself," I shrugged.

"Really?"

"I had to," I said. "Like I said, my family weren't... well, they weren't much of a family. They weren't around much. And I had to eat. So..."

She didn't ask anything else. Just gave me a look like social workers used to give me sometimes. Sympathetic, but also kinda patronising, like they could never imagine living in the only world I knew but could also never imagine bringing someone me into theirs.

Next morning, we made sure everything was ready in case Sophia came back and needed to find us and headed to the farm. Carl was in pretty bad shape by the sound of things, although only his parents were allowed in to see him. Hershel, the old guy who owned the farm, made sure the rest of us stayed outside. Turned out one of his guys, Otis, had accidentally shot him while he was out hunting a deer.

I wanted to say that this Otis must have been a pretty crap shot, but then it turned out he'd died on a run for medical supplies for Carl, so I kept my mouth shut.

Now that the whole group was back together, and we had a few extra people form the farm, I hoped that finding Sophia would get easier.

"How long's this girl been lost?" Hershel asked us as we stood out in his front yard.

"This'll be day three," Rick said.

Maggie, the chick who'd been on the horse and, it turned out, one of Hershel's daughters, brought over a map. "County survey map," she said, unrolling it across the hood of the car. "Shows terrain and elevations."

"This is perfect," Rick said. "We can finally get this thing organised. We'll grid the whole area. Start searching in teams."

"Not you. Not today. You gave three units of blood. You wouldn't be hiking five minutes in this heat before passing out," Hershel told Rick. I hadn't known Carl had needed blood. No wonder Rick was looking like shit. Hershel turned to Shane. "And your ankle. Push it now, you'll be laid up a month. No good to anybody."

"Guess it's just me," I said, glad I didn't have to actually team up with any of those assholes. Teaming up weren't a strength of mine. "I'm gonna head back to the creek. Work my way from there."

"I could still be useful," Shane said. "Drive up to the interstate, see if Sophia wandered back."

"Alright," Rick said. "Tomorrow then. We'll start doing this right."

Not if I find her today.

"We can't have our people out there with just knives," Shane said. "We need the gun training we've been promising."

Hershel said, "I'd prefer you not carrying guns on my property. We've managed so far without turning this into an armed camp."

Shane started to protest. A lot of what he said made sense but Rick stopped him and reminded him that we were on Hershel's land. We agreed to run an unarmed camp, which felt like the dumbest thing in the world, but I knew how valuable it was to have a base to search for Sophia from. We couldn't lose this place, not until we'd found her.

I didn't find her.

But I didn't find an old farmhouse, just like the one I'd been thinking about when I spoke to Andrea. Felt like a sign she was right, that she might actually be in there. I held up my crossbow just in case and pushed open the door real quiet. Place was a dump. Smelled of dust and damp and mothballs. People had definitely been through it to loot the joint, but it had been a while ago, and now the shit that was left was still gathering dust. I found a tin of sardines in the kitchen that looked like they'd been recently opened. I listened carefully to the sounds of the house, tryna see what were just the building and what might be a scared kid hiding out. In front of me, I caught sight of a door standing ajar and something made of cloth lying the gloom. I snuck forward, opened the door slowly and quietly. At the bottom, there was a little makeshift bed, too small for an adult. Probably perfect for a kid.

I walked back outside and called for Sophia. There was no answer, but right outside the door, I saw two white flowers. Bright and hopeful. The Cherokee Rose.

I remembered a story about them from school. About when American soldiers were moving Indians off their land on the Trail of Tears, the Cherokee mothers were grieving and crying. They were losing their little ones along the way - exposure and disease and starvation - a lot of them just disappeared. So the elders asked for a sign to uplift the mother's spirits. Give them strength. Hope. The next day them roses started to grow right where the mothers' tears fell.

It made me think about how much Carol had cried since her little girl had wandered off. And how lucky Sophia was that she had a Momma who'd cry for her like that. Any kid in the whole world would fight to get back to that kind of love. The roses felt like an answer to Carol's prayers, a little sign that was trying to tell us all that Sophia was alright and that she'd been holed up in that farmhouse. Just like I said.

I picked one, and I put it in an empty beer bottle and took it back to Carol. I told her the story of the Cherokee mothers, but she didn't much look like she knew what I was talking about. So I said, "I'm not fool enough to think any flowers are blooming for my brother, but I believe this one bloomed for your little girl."

She smiled then, so I think she got it. If a feral and unloved mutt like me could survive out there at six years old, it was only fair that Sophia did too. She had something to come back to, a reason to keep living.

Day four on the search for Sophia and it weren't just me who was on the trail any more. Rick divided the map up into grids that we could all search, using the farmhouse I'd found to give him an idea of the best places to send us.

Only Shane seemed to doubt that the little hiding place I'd found might've sheltered Sophia.

I volunteered to go out on horseback. Mostly to avoid getting paired up with one of those assholes. If the day before had proved anything, it was that I did better on my own.

I took one of Hershel's horses and rode up to a ridge above the creek. The higher I was, the more land I could see. If she was in the area, I'd spot her miles away. The forest was nice and quiet, without one of them assholes yammering away at me. I was glad to be on my own. Even caught a few squirrels to bring back to camp.

I didn't see Sophia, but I did catch sight of something the stream. For a horrible moment I thought it was her, and that she'd drowned. But it were too small. And human-shaped without actualy being human.

I dismounted the horse and climbed down to take a look. It was a doll, caught up on a piece of a tree that had fallen in the river. It had to be Sophia's. Can't say I was paying much attention to her doll collection, but who else could it be?

I called for her. Nothing.

I mounted the horse again and kept riding, further along the ridge. We were getting higher above the water, but not yet high enough to have a decent view of anything.

It was all fine until the horse got spooked. Don't know what by, but one moment we was walking along quite happily and the next I felt my stomach turn over. Like when a lift drops too fast. I saw the sky and then the ground and then the sky again as I was thrown from its back. I tumbled down into the riverbed. There was the shock of the water. And a burning pain in my side.

The water around me turned red. I looked down. On of my own arrows was sticking out of my gut. It was bad. But I didn't think it had pierced any vital organs. I swam to the side of the river as the burning feeling got worse. Knowing it was only a matter of time before the shock wore off and the pain was excruciating, I ripped arms off my shirt and tied them around myself to try and stop the bleeding. I looked up at the ridge I'd fallen from. Damn horse had run off and left me to die. I'd dropped my crossbow too.

I waded back out into the water, looking for any sign of it. I saw something lying on the bottom, just a shape in the murky stream, and dove under to get it. It was the crossbow. Thank God.

I slung it back over my shoulder where it belonged and swam to the shore, trying to assess the best place to climb up. It was either that or swim back to where it might be easier to get out. But that were miles back and I'd probably had bled out by then. I grabbed two big and sturdy looking branches and used them to help me on my climb to the top of the ridge.

I got about half-way before the earth gave out when I put too much weight on it. My footing slipped. It was earth and sky and earth again.

And then there was nothing.

And then there was a voice, "Why don't you pull that arrow out, dummy?"

Merle

Fucking Merle. The hell was he doing here?

Was I dead?

I opened my eyes just a little. It were brighter than I wanted it to be. Merle's butt-ugly, smug, grinning face swam in to view. There was a forest behind him. Somewhere, I could hear water. "You could bind that wound better."

Wound?

I tried to move, but the pain stopped me.

Oh, yeah. That wound.

"Merle?" I wanted to ask how the hell he found me out here, but the pain stopped me from talking too.

"What's going on, man?" he asked. "You taking a siesta or something?

"A shitty day, bro," I said.

Merle laughed. "Like me to get you a pillow? Maybe rub your feet?"

Unhelpful as ever.

"Screw you."

"Nu-uh," he said. "You're the one's screwed from the looks of it. All them years I spent tryna make a man out of you, this is what I get? Look at you. Lying in the dirt like a used rubber. You're gonna die out here, little brother. And for what?"

"A girl. They lost a little girl."

"So you got a thing for little girls now?"

Fuck you. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck you.

"Shut up."

"I noticed you ain't out looking for old Merle no more," he said, which weren't at all fair.

"I tried like hell to find you, bro."

"Like hell you did," I said. I wondered if he were going to punch me or if he were a hallucination. It seemed too weird that he'd managed to find me out here when he can't track for shit. If you hallucinated a guy hitting you, would it still hurt? "You split, man. Lit out first chance you got."

Hallucination or no, this was helping me stop missing him.

"You lit out," I said. "All you had to do was wait. We went back for you, Rick and I. We did right by you."

"This the same Rick that cuffed me to the rooftop in the first place? Forced me to cut off my own hand?" the more he spoke, the surer I was that he weren't really here. "This him we're talking about here? Are you his bitch now?"

"I ain't nobody's bitch."

"You're a joke is what you are," Merle said. "Playing errand boy to a bunch of pansy-asses. You're nothing but a freak to them. Redneck trash. That's all you are. They're laughing at you behind your back. You know that, don't you? One of these days they're going to scrape you off their heels like you was dogshit. They ain't your kin, your blood. Hell, you had any damn nuts in that sack of yours, you'd go back and shoot your pal Rick in the face for me. Now you listen to me. Ain't nobody ever gonna care about you except me, little brother. Ain't nobody ever will."

"That ain't true," I said, and it felt like the most real thing that had happened in the last ten minutes. "You weren't ever there. Not once."

"I been there you're whole life, bro. I've been the only one looking out for you," he said. "You think you'd have made it this far without me?"

"You don't know shit, man," I said. Then I groaned because the pain in my side were getting worse. Or I was more aware of it.

"You thinking about that girl?" he said. He didn't have to say her name for me to know who he meant. "You think she cared more than I did? 'Cause I gotta tell you, she didn't give a shit about you, neither. She ain't your blood."

"Hey, shut up."

"If she cared about you so much, where was she, huh? Face it, she went off to college and forgot all about you because you're nothing," he said. "I made you who you are. Me."

The truth set my skin on fire. The truth about how I'd hurt Naomi, and been too ashamed of it to admit it to anyone. Even Merle, who I'd seen do much worse. And the truth that he had made me who I was. All the bad bits were him. That was who I'd become while I were trying to forget about Naomi and be the kind of brother Merle might actually stick around for.

"Shut up," I yelled at him. The anger was enough to help me move a little.

"Or what? You gonna make me? Come on, then," he taunted. I could feel him moving my feet. It made my whole body hurt so much worse. "Get up on your feet before I have to kick your teeth in. Let's go. Come on."

I tried to focus on him, managed to sit up a little. Merle was gone. Some dead bastard was the one clawing at my feet. Was I already bit? My whole body was alive with the pain that radiated from my side, too hard to tell if there was anything wrong somewhere else.

I kicked him off and tried to scramble for my crossbow. Every move fucking hurt. It were just out of reach.

The dead bastard was back on me. Cold, strong hands. Snapping jaw. I fought back, desperate to keep its disgusting teeth away from me. We sprawled in the dirt. I grabbed a branch that was lying nearby, clobbered its skull until it broke.

There was another one close by. I stumbled away from it, grabbing the end of the arrow that was sticking out of me. I pulled as hard as I could, the only thing that stopped me from blacking out for the second time was knowing that if I did, I was dead meat. It came out in a moment of pain so bad it blinded me. I kept going, feeling for my crossbow.

My fingers closed around it.

I struggled to load the arrow. I turned. Fired.

The second Walker fell a few feet away from me. I leant back, took a few deep breaths. My heart was really pounding, my wound was open now I'd taken the arrow out. I'd lose a lot of blood if I didn't fix it soon. I got up and rebandaged myself. Felt better.

Son of a bitch was right.

The two Walkers that had nearly killed me was still lying on the ground. I spat at them. Cut their ears off to make a necklace. It usually didn't feel so personal, killing Geeks, but these ones had damn near got me and getting a way from them felt like an achievement worthy of taking a momento. Dehydration and bloodloss probably factored into my accessory choice too.

I'd still lost a lot a lotta blood. I felt too weak to climb out of this damn ditch I'd fallen into. My limbs were shakey, and I were sweating like a pig. Felt like if I stood up too fast I'd faint again. Luckily, I still had the squirrel I'd caught. I sliced it open, ate all the raw bits I could, and after a drink of water from the creek, I felt strong enough to try again.

I was alright until about halfway. Then the pain, the heat of the beating sun, the returning dehydration were all too much. I needed a breather. The top still looked so damn far. I looked up at the sky to where the birds were, wished I had an easy way of travelling like them.

"Please. Don't feed the birds."

Merle.

Oh, good. Back to hallucinating.

I looked up and saw Merle's face peering over the top of the ledge. This didn't bode well for my survival.

"What's the matter, Darylina?" he said. "That al you got in you? Throw away that purse and climb."

"I liked it better when you was missing," I told him.

Merle laughed. "Come on, don't be like that. I'm on your side."

"Yeah? Since when?"

"Hell, since the day you were born, baby brother. Somebody had to look after your worthless ass."

"You talk a big game, but you was never there. Hell, you ain't here now. Guess some things never change."

"Don't see your little bitch here, neither," he said. I started to climb again. "She don't even want to be your damn daydreams."

"You best shut the hell up."

"Or what? You gonna come up here and shut my mouth for me? Well come on and do it then if you think you're man enough," he said. "That why you really looking for that little girl? 'Cause you think it'll prove something? Like if you can find a damn lost child still alive, maybe you can find Naomi?"

"Keep her name outta your goddamn mouth," I roared, my fingers clawing at the dirt on the edge of the bank. When I pulled myself up, he was gone. Forest was empty. Not even any dead folks. My legs were shaking so much I damn near fell back down again.

"Yeah, you better run," I yelled to the forest, in case Merle was a ghost and not a hallucination. Didn't want to spend the rest of my life haunted by that prick.

I was lucky not to meet any Walkers on the way book. Couldn't see straight, couldn't walk straight. When I got in sight of the farm, I could hear some faint yelling and some people running towards me, but they was just blurs.

"Is that Daryl?" one of them said, sounded like Glenn.

Who the hell else would it be?

I was aware of a gun, did my best to focus on who was pointing it at me. Rick.

Who  else?

"That's the third time you've pointed that thing at my head," I said. "You gonna pull the trigger or what?"

I must've really looked like shit. I reckon they thought I was a Walker until I spoke. I thought I saw Rick lower the damn thing, but then I heard a shot. Felt a sharp pain on the side of my head and the ground beneath me. I looked up at the sky again for a couple of seconds before I felt some people haul me back to my feet. One of them was Rick. "I was kidding," I told him before blacking out. Again.

When I came to, I was in a real bed for the first time in months. Old man Hershel was checking me over. Rick and Shane were sitting in chairs near the bed like we was in some kind of hospital and it were visiting hours. They'd found Sophia's doll on me, wanted to know where I'd got it. Rick brought me the map.

"I found it washed up on the creek bed right there," I said, pointing to the place. Hershel was cleaning out my wounds with something. The sting was familiar. "She must've dropped it crossing there somewhere."

Rick looked pleased, "Cuts the grid almost in half."

"Yeah, you're welcome," I said. One day of looking on my own and I'd done better than either of the damn cops.

"How's he looking?" Rick asked Hershel.

"I had no idea I would be going through antibiotics so quickly," he replied. I guess he was worried that I'd get an infection, even though I'd washed it out in the creek. I guess I had scrambled up a lot of dirt. "Any idea what happened to my horse?"

"Yeah, the one that almost killed me?" I said. "If it's smart, it left the country."

Wouldn't say no to a nice horse steak right about now.

"We call that one Nelly," Hershel said, "as in Nervous Nelly. I could've told you she'd throw you if you'd bothered to ask. It's a wonder you people have survived this long."

Not a very original name, then, I thought, but I didn't say it because I was very aware that he was the one bandaging me up. He told me to rest awhile, and they all left me alone. This time, there was no Merle hallucination. Or ghost. Or whatever. I just slept until the smell of food woke me.

Carol brought me up a plate and asked how she was feeling.

"About as good as I look," I said.

"I brought you some dinner. You must be starving," she put the plate down and reached towards me. I flinched away from her.

"Watch out, I got stitches," I said.

Carol looked a little hurt, but I wanted her to know I weren't looking for Sophia because I expected any special treatment or favours for it. I really just wanted to bring her back.

"You need to know something," Carol said from the doorway. "You did more for my little girl today than her own daddy ever did in his whole life."

"I didn't do anything Rick or Shane wouldn't have done," I said.

"I know. You're every bit as good as them," she said. "Every bit."

And then she left. I felt weird. Uncomfortable. Hadn't had anyone say anything like that in a long time. It felt like a part of me I'd thought was gone forever were slowly coming back.

The next morning, Hershel let me move back to my own camp. He said I could stay if I wanted to, but I didn't. The bed was nice and all, but I wanted to be with my own people. Andrea brought me a book as a way of saying sorry for shooting me. It was a nice gesture but a crappy book.

At breakfast, Glenn stood in front of us all, looking nervous as hell. I glanced at him and wondered if he was about to tell us that he was seeing the farmer's daughter, Maggie. Because if so, I didn't think the enormous build-up was necessary. It had been pretty obvious since he'd gawped at her on that horse. "Uh, guys," he said. There was a long pause. I kept eating. "So... the barn is full of Walkers."

The hell?

Shane lead us on an excursion to investigate. Sure enough, when you got close to the barn, you could hear the unmistakable sound of Walkers. No wonder old Hershel hadn't wanted us going anywhere near it.

Shane turned on Rick, "You cannot tell me you are alright with this."

"No, I am not," Rick said, "but we are guests here, this isn't our land."

"This is our lives, man!"

"Lower your voice!" Glenn hissed as the sounds from the barn got louder.

"We can't just sweep this under the rug," Lori said.

"It ain't right," Shane agreed. "We either gotta go in there, we gotta make things right, or we just gotta go."

"We can't go!" Rick said.

"Why, Rick? Why?"

"Because my daughter's still out there," Carol said.

"Ok. I think it's time that we all start to just consider the other possibility."

"Shane, we're not leaving Sophia behind," Rick said.

"I'm close to finding this girl," I said. "I just found her damn doll a few days ago."

"You found a doll, Daryl," Shane glared at me. "That's what you did. You found a doll."

"You don't know what the hell you're talking about," I yelled. I tried to reach him, wanted nothing more than to punch him in the mouth. He came for me too, but Rick got between us.

Shane was mouthing off, "I'm just saying what needs to be said here.

Now, if you get a good lead in the first 48 hours... after that it don't matter. Let me tell you something else, man. If she was alive out there, saw you coming, all methed out with your buck knife and Geek ears around your neck, she would run in the other direction, man."

"Shut up!"

I tried to get to him again. I wanted to kick his teeth in. Again, Rick got between us, the rest of the group pulled us apart. He and Shane argued over what to do. I hated the guy, but a lot of what Shane said made sense. Having a barn of Walkers just sitting there put us all in danger. But we needed this place. We needed somewhere to bring Sophia home to.

Rick promised to talk to Hershel before he lead the group on another search for Sophia. But at midday a big group of people were still loitering around the farmhouse.

T-Dog and Andrea, who were meant to be part of the search party, approached them just as Carol and I were coming back from looking for more Cherokee Roses. I don't know if she got it yet, or if she were just humoring me, but I was determined to make Carol see that they were a sign her little girl was alright.

"You seen Rick?" Glenn asked them.

"He went off with Hershel," Andrea said. "We were supposed to leave a couple hours ago."

"Yeah you were. What the hell?" I said. Why was everyone just sitting around?

"Rick told us he was going out," Carol said.

"Dammit, isn't anybody taking this seriously? We got us a damn trail!" I said. I looked around for Rick, saw Shane approaching. "Ah, here we go."

Maybe his second in command would have shit to say about the situation. He was carrying a lot of weapons. Might have been all the ones we had

"What's all this?" I asked.

"You with me, man?" he asked, handing me a rifle. I took it. Shane looked at the rest of them, "Time to grow up. You already got yours?"

"Yeah…" Andrea said. "Where's Dale?

"He's on his way."

Shane kept handing out guns.

"I thought we couldn't carry," T-Dog said.

"Yeah, well we can and we have to. Now look, it was one thing standing around here picking daisies when we thought this place was supposed to be safe. But now we know it ain't." Shane turned to Glenn. "How about you, man? You gonna protect yours?

Glenn glanced at his girl before he took a weapon. Maggie looked mad as shit.

"Will you stop?" she said. "You do this, you hand out these guns, my dad will make you leave tonight."

"We have to stay, Shane."

It was Carl who spoke up. Stepped forward like a real man, speaking for what's right.

"We ain't going anywhere, ok?" Shane said. "Now, look Hershel- he's just gotta understand. He's gonna have to. And we need to find Sophia, am I right? Huh? I want you to take this. You take it, Carl and you keep your mother safe."

He tried to hand one of the guns to the kid but Lori got in the way.

"Rick said no guns," she said. "This is not your call, this is not your decision to make."

"Oh shit," T-Dog gasped, drawing all of our attention to where Rick and Hershel were emerging from the woods. Each of them had a snare pole with a Walker on the end. Shane took off running towards them, the rest of us not far behind.

Looked like they was heading for the barn. Were they adding to Hershel's hellish collection?

"Shane, just back off," Rick said when he saw him coming. He tried to sound all calm but I don't think his cop-techniques were working on a fellow cop. Training probably makes you immune to it.

"Why do your people have guns?" Hershel asked.

"Are you kidding me? You see? You see what they're holding on to?" Shane said.

"I see who I'm holding on to!"

"Nah, man, you don't," Shane was circling them, getting closer and closer to their Walkers each time.

"Shane, just let me do this. Then we can talk," Rick pleaded.

"What you wanna talk about, Rick? These things ain't sick. They're not people. They're dead. Ain't gotta feel nothing for them, because all they do is kill. They're the things that killed Amy. They killed Otis. They're gonna kill all of us."

One of Hershel's kids had started to cry.

"Shane, shut up!" Rick warned.

"Hershel, man. Let me ask you something," Shane said. "Could a living, breathing person walk away from this?"

Without warning, he unloaded a tonne of bullets into the Walker Hershel was leading. Hershel said nothing. It weren't nice to see. Walkers gotta be put down but one bullet to the head will do it. No need to toy with them. Or an old man.

"That's three rounds in the chest! Someone who's alive, could they just take that? Why is it still coming?" Shane yelled, shooting some more.

"Shane, enough!" Rick said.

"Hey, you're right, man. That is enough," he said, finally shooting the Walker in the head. "Enough risking our lives for a little girl who's gone! Enough living next to a barn full of things that are trying to kill us. Enough! Rick, it ain't like it was before. If ya'll wanna live, if you wanna survive, you gotta fight for it. I'm talking about fighting, right here, right now!"

Rick was screaming at Hershel, begging him to take the snare pole so he could deal with Shane. Not sure Hershel could hear him, he was still staring at the dead girl. Shane broke the down the barn door with a pickaxe until it was weak enough for the Walkers to do the rest of the damage themselves. The door broke, and out came the flood. One dead bastard after another.

I don't know how many there were. I wasn't counting, I was just shooting. We got them all, we had too. Now that Shane had released them, they were too much of a danger to everyone. Hershel's surviving family cried, one of them was screaming. When it was done, Shane looked around with this beefed-up pride. Like he'd done the right thing. But the silence we were met with didn't feel good. Didn't feel right.

And then, from the bowels of the barn, we heard another Walker coming towards the light.

I raised my gun.

And then I had to lower it.

She were just a little girl.

Sophia.

Almost unrecognisable but Carol knew right away. I heard her scream. The only sound was her feet on the ground running towards her, and Sophia's growls as she reached towards us. I caught Carol as she came past me.

She fought me, tooth and nail to get to her kid, but I held on so tight we both fell as she tried to get away. Shane didn't look so big now, he'd kinda deflated. He looked like one lost, sorry prick.

Sophia kept walking, stepping over the other dead Walkers. Carol kept struggling against me. Until Rick stepped forward and raised his gun. Took a shot.

They both crumpled to the ground. The Walker that was once Sophia

From that day on, two things were clear;

A rose is just a rose.

And when you lose someone, they ain't coming back.

Chapter 13: Another Kind of Family

Summary:

Naomi's group runs into trouble on a run, and have to find somewhere new as winter closes in.

Daryl's part covers events at the prison from just after lil AssKicker is born to losing Merle.

Naomi

Scavenging used to feel like breaking and entering, or at the very least intruding. But the more run-down places got, the more they started to look like bizarre museums. Once all the useful shit has been taken, you're really only left with old photographs and gadgets you can't switch on anymore. I wondered if one day we'd take kids to tour round them and tell them about blenders and electric razors.

The first few places we tried had nothing but a few kitchen knives. Frankie found a toolbox, held it up for us to look at, "Think we could use these?"

"Yeah, these are great," William said enthusiastically. "Alf will love these. He's got big plans, y'know."

"Yeah?" Frankie said, knowing full well that Alf sometimes fed William fake construction terms for his own amusement. "Like what?"

"A Galax to keep the rain off and a Feste for the Eastern side, I think," William said matter-of-factly, holding up a screwdriver to inspect it like he knew shit about tools. "This'll do."

"Ain't a Galax a wildflower?" Jack whispered. I nodded.

"And a Feste?" Dee asked.

"Shakespeare character," I said.

"Idiot," Frankie muttered fondly, rolling her eyes at the back of William's head. "Alright, c'mon, let's hit some of the bigger places."

The best houses were the ones that were the most protected. High-risk because there could still be someone living inside. But, being harder to get in to meant fewer people had tried, so there was a chance of finding something decent.

We hit up a three-story house. Eggshell blue with white around the windows and surrounded by a high iron fence. It had probably had a real pretty garden in its day. Now it were getting overgrown, and at some point, someone had fixed 'KEEP OUT' signs to the fence in soggy cardboard. Probably to keep living people away, the dead weren't known as avid readers.

As we climbed the fence, no shots were fired. Seemed like a good sign. There had once been a weather vane on the roof, which was now hanging, half-broken from the top. It swung in the wind, hitting the side of the house just often enough to get real annoying if you were living there. I liked to think that if anyone was living there, they would have fixed it or ripped it down. The ground floor windows were all locked from the inside. Looking up, the rest were closed, although they might not have been secured, the climb weren't worth the risk.

"All yours, Jack," I said. He grinned.

"Great," he said. We followed him around the side of the house. His chosen window looked older than the others, less taken care off. Frosted over like it were a bathroom. Jack pulled a crowbar out of his backpack. It was covered in dried blood and brains, perfect for cracking open skulls as well as windows. We kept a lookout as he forced it open. It took him a few tries.

When the latch eventually broke, Jack opened the window and pulled himself inside. He held it open as the rest of us climbed in. It was a bathroom, just like I thought.

"You think the shower still works?" Blanca said. "Can't remember the last time I washed my hair."

"Maybe," I shrugged. "We can try once we've checked the rest of the place out."

The bathroom door was shut, but the room weren't that big, and it was starting to get cramped with so many of us inside it. I squeezed past Jack and Blanca to try the handle as Dee scrambled up from outside. I thought it weren't going to open, that it were somehow locked from the other side. But then I felt it budge and pulled a little harder. It either hadn't been opened in a while, or it were just stiff.

The air in the hallway I stepped into was stale, like none of these locked windows had been open in months, and the house had been left to cook in the Georgia sun. I listened. The sound of my friends climbing in the window behind me, the banging of the old weather vane outside and the creaking of an old house was all I could hear. No yelling. No guns cocked and pointed at us. The place seemed undefended.

Clouds of dust rose up from the carpet when I stepped on it. I sneezed and listened again, in case that had drawn anything out of the shadows.

Nothing.

Dee followed me into the dim hallway. "Shame to see places like this falling into ruin," she said. She spoke in a whisper. Even when you were sure you were the only folks around, it took a little while to build up the courage to speak at full volume. Jack peered over her shoulder.

"Ah, it wasn't that great to begin with. Probably only has four - maybe five - bedrooms," Jack shrugged, revealing himself to be a pre-end-of-the-world rich bitch. Dee and I glanced at each other and tried not to laugh as Jack walked towards the front door. I went the opposite way, figuring that the kitchen was probably at the back of the house. Dee came with me.

"Think the towns are safe enough now for us to move here?" she asked. "Even if it ain't enough for his Lordship, five bedrooms sounds big enough for all of us."

"Maybe," I said reluctantly. A proper roof over our heads and the potential of running water was nothing to be sniffed at. The towns might be safer now everyone had cleared out of them. Unease held me back from joining Dee in her enthusiasm. There was something about the forest that felt like home to me, but I knew it weren't a kind of comfort anyone else could understand.

"Stinks in here," Frankie joined us the kitchen. It was definitely coming from the fridge, where a bunch of fresh food had probably been left to go off.

"Let's not open that," I said, pointing at it. Frankie nodded in agreement. The cupboards were fuller than I expected. Some of the tinned stuff might have been past its sell-by date but not enough for us to turn our noses up at it.

"Can't believe someone left all of this," Frankie said. "There's even some booze."

"Pack it up!" Jack called from the hallway. "We're celebrating tonight!"

The others whooped and cheered. I smiled, but when they weren't looking put a few of the smaller bottles of liquor in my bag. I don't think any of them had thought about how, in a pinch, alcohol could be used to disinfect wounds. Our already limited medical supplies wouldn't last forever.

I glanced at the back door, our best exit strategy if we had to escape any time soon, knowing it was locked from our attempts to get in I was relieved to see the keys still hanging on the inside. Easy to get to if we needed them.

"What is that noise?" Frankie said. I listened. Couldn't hear anything new. Thought it must've been our collective paranoia letting her imagine sounds that weren't there.

"The banging?" I asked. She nodded. "Think it's just that weather vane outside. Windy today."

She nodded again but didn't look so convinced. "It's loud."

"Super annoying," Dee agreed. "Shall we pack this food up?"

"Guys," Jack called from down the hall, clearly well past the point of giving a shit about anyone hearing. "We've hit the jackpot."

"Yeah, I know," I said. "I ain't seen this much food in a long time."

"What? That's not what I'm talking about," he said and then his eyes lit up. "Guns."

"Guns?" I repeated. He nodded and backed into one of the rooms at the front of the house, beckoning for us to follow. We filed in after him. It was a living room; sofas and a flat-screen. There were some half-empty bottles on the coffee table, sleeping bags on each sofa and some piled up blankets and pillows on the floor. Each window had some kind of gun on the sill, set up to be pointing out at the garden. Open boxes of ammo sat next to them, it were hard to say how full they were from my position by the door.

"Seems like they were protecting the house from in here," I said. "You think some of the other rooms are protected like this?"

I glanced back at the others, who were crowded in the doorway.

"Doesn't make sense if they weren't," Will said, turning around to check another room. The rest of the group scattered to do the same. Jack was beaming at me, but I couldn't shake the unease around me.

"More in here," Frankie called from the room opposite the one we were in.

"And here!" Will said from deeper inside the house.

"They set up the same?" I asked. "Facing the windows and all?"

There was a chorus of, "Yes."

"Hey, Naomi!" Blanca called. I popped my head out into the hallway to look at her. "This one's a library."

"No way!" I went to take a look, feeling like a kid on Christmas, my nerves were momentarily forgotten. It had been a while since I'd seen so many books in one place. They were covered in dust, some shelves stood in disarray, but there weren't much left in this world that wasn't in disarray.

"Think people were sleeping in here at some point," Blanca said.

"What?"

She nodded at the floor. Comforters and blankets and pillows were laid out in the familiar form of a makeshift camp. I picked my way over them to the bookshelves, peered through the dust at the titles. A box of matches lay on one of the shelves, next to two half-melted candles. I picked it up and opened it. Two had been used and put back, but there was a whole bundle in there that still looked useful. I put them in my pocket along with the dusty candles and turned my attention back to the books.

"Good selection," I said. "Lotta choices."

I felt like I were back in the public library as a kid, unable to decide between two stacks of books as I couldn't possibly carry them both on my own until Daryl got so annoyed he'd pick up one of the piles and take it out for me.

"You brought a book?" Dee asked, standing next to Blanca in the doorway and watching me bring one out of my bag. "You think we'd have a lot of down-time on this trip?"

"No," I said. "I'm just done reading it."

I had a system. Every time I went on a run, I'd leave whatever book I'd just finished and find a new one. That way, I got to keep reading without having to carry my own personal bookshop around with me. I'd read fast before, but it was even easier to do that now there was fuck all else to do. I lingered at the bookshelf, quickly skimming the rest of the titles there to make sure there weren't any better ones. I secretly hoped we'd have a reason to come back here next time we went on a run.

"I'm going to check the upstairs windows for guns too," Frankie said. "We should start a pile of them in the hall."

"I'll come with you!" I heard William reply.

"Me too!" Blanca said.

I glanced at Dee, who was still loitering in the doorway. She gave me a small smile. There were guns in the library window too.

"Guess I should grab these," I said, stepping over the remains of someone's bed to get to them. I took a closer look at the assortment of shit in the library, trying to find clues in the chaos. There were no rhyme or reason to any of it. It looked like they'd all just thrown back their covers and left. A hunk of mouldy bread sat on a tabletop, like it was waiting for someone to come back and finish it.

"Hey, Jack," I yelled, hoping he'd hear me through the walls. "How many bedrooms did you say this place had?"

"Four or five," he replied. I checked the guns were safe, scooped them up and took them out into the hall where everyone had started lining up a small armoury. Jack watched me put them down, "Why?"

"It's just weird," I said. "So, let's say there's four with at least two in each of those rooms. Six in the library. At least four in that room... Why were so many people sleeping here?"

"Where'd they go?" Dee asked the question we'd all been avoiding. Jack and I fell quiet. The house creaked. The weather vane continued its relentless banging, and our silence made it sound louder.

"Any signs of life up there?" Jack called up the stairs. There was a heart-stopping moment of silence where none of our friends responded. And then William stuck his head over railings of the second-floor landing.

"Nope," he said. "Just the same as down there."

"Any clues as to why they left?" I asked.

"No," he said. "Maybe they've all gone on a run?"

"If they did, it were months ago," I said, thinking about the amount of mould on the bread in the library. "Look at the state of this place. The dust. Mouldy food."

"So they're gone? That's good, right?"

"Yeah, but why are they gone?" I said. "They didn't pack anything. This place was well stocked, well-defended..."

"Yeah, why run out the back door and leave it all?" Jack asked, slowly reaching the same realisation.

"What makes you think they left out the back?" I said.

"Front door still has keys in it," he shrugged. "Windows were locked from the inside, so it must've been the back."

I looked behind him, to check the keys were where he said.

"Back door's locked from the inside too," I said. There was an icy cold silence as the implications of this sank through to our bones.

"They're still here?" his voice dropped to a whisper. I looked around at everyone. From the state of this place, how untouched everything was. There was no way anyone living could still be here

"Where's Frankie?" I asked, looking back up at William. "Blanca?"

"Third floor," he said and glanced behind them. "I think they found an attic."

"Get them back," Jack said, immediately springing into action and taking the stairs two at a time. Dee and I were right behind him. "Frankie! Blanca!"

We tore through the second level of the house, calling for our friends.

"What is it?" Blanca yelled back, sounding panicked by our screaming. As we came to the top of the second flight of stairs, she almost crashed into us. "What's going on?"

"Where's Frankie?" Jack asked.

"I'm here," she called, but she sounded far away. "All of you need to shut upright now."

We did.

We listened.

I took a few steps up until I could see Frankie at the end of a long landing. Her eyes were wide. When they met mine, she raised a finger to her lips.

From the third floor, you could hear more. What I'd thought were the creaks of an old house came from directly above us, along with the unmistakable shuffling of undead footsteps. The sounds we'd chalked up to being an old weather vane swinging in the wind was the banging of the hatch to the attic. It was louder than it had been, frantic. We'd made so much noise that the dormant dead upstairs now knew we were trespassing here. Each bang sent a cloud of dust to the ground. Cracks were running from it through the ceiling. I didn't know how long it would hold up, and it was right between Frankie and us.

"Get away from there," I whispered to Frankie, reaching out a hand towards her. "What the hell are you doing?"

"There's something written on the hatch," she whispered back, taking small and quiet steps towards us. "I wanted to see what it said."

"What does it say?"

"We all turn," she said. She was finally within reaching distance. "What do you think that means?"

"They all got infected somehow and shut themselves away in that attic, so they didn't infect anyone else," William suggested.

"Let's get moving," Jack said, now that Frankie was safely back with us. The ceiling above us gave an ominous groan.

"Why didn't they just shoot themselves in the head? Why leave an attic full of dead dumbasses to clear up?" I said, annoyed by how weirdly attached some people were to the thought of their own corpse. I knew I'd prefer to go out on my own terms than have some dead lookalike wandering around traumatising anyone who knew me, passing on the disease. That ain't no legacy.

Nobody spoke again until we were a safe distance from the attic.

"That ceiling isn't going to hold much longer," Frankie said. "They started moving more when they heard us... you know how the dead are always more active when they know we're nearby."

"We should get out," I said.

"Eh... We've got a bit of time," Frankie said.

"Are you crazy?" I asked. "You were standing under than thing, you know it's about to burst."

"Staying here is a risk," William agreed.

"We stick to the lower floors, we'll be fine," Frankie said.

"There is a lot of good shit here," Jack said, looking pointedly down at the pile of guns we'd left on the floor.

"Food too..." Blanca said. I glanced at Dee, who looked uncertain but weren't saying anything, and then at William. He shook his head at me, but we were outnumbered.

"Fine," I sighed. "But we start piling things up in the yard, and if we hear anything from up there, we run. Right?"

Everyone nodded.

"Agreed," Frankie said. "And let's be as quiet as we can. There's a chance that if we're quiet enough, they'll slow down again."

I doubted it. The dead could be real persistent, and the ones upstairs probably hadn't eaten in a very long time. I didn't know if that would weaken them or make them stronger.

Dee and I moved to the kitchen, bagging up every piece of unspoiled food that we could and piling them up near the fence outside. The others frantically searched for weapons and did the same. Felt like a gang of thieves racing to grab as much as we could before the cops showed up. When all of the decent food was out, I turned to take stock of it all.

"Right," I said, "We can't carry much more than this, let's go."

"Alright," William said, sweat on his brow from all of the running in and out he'd been doing. "I'll get the others."

"Where are they?" I asked.

"Getting shit from upstairs, I think," he said. I was about to curse them for being such dumbasses, maybe I did, I don't remember. All I remember is a crash from deep inside the house and a scream that still rings in my ears if I think about it.

I picked up a gun and ran towards the house. William followed.

The walls were shaking, and I could feel the vibrations passing through the floor. The smell and the sound of the dead was strong, as they cascaded down the stairs. The ceiling had finally broken, and now they were falling over each other to get down the stairs. Tumbling like a waterfall over the steps.

I caught sight of Dee, still in the kitchen, cut off from us by a growing pile of walkers that continued to try and get to us on limbs that had broken from the fall.

"Get out the back!" I yelled at her as I started shooting. She disappeared from view, I looked around for the others, heard some shooting from the floor above us and then Blanca and Jack appeared at the top of the stairs.

"Shit!" Jack shouted, shooting wildly into the growing number of dead at the bottom.

"Behind you!" I yelled. He turned to start shooting at the three that had made it down from the third floor to try and grab them. Dee joined us in the doorway, having made it out the back and run around to pick up a gun of her own. Together, we cleared enough at the bottom. There were more to come, I could hear them thumping and snarling their way down, but it were enough of a window for Jack to leap to safety. He cleared the bodies at the bottom of the stairs. Blanca weren't so lucky, her foot went right through a ribcage. Got lodged there. She looked like she might hurl. I reached out for her

"Frankie?" I asked.

Blanca shook her head. "They... they just tore her apart."

I grabbed her arm and hauled her free of the corpse she was stuck in.

"Let's move!" I yelled as another wave of the dead started raining down on us.

We backed out into the yard, Jack firing off a few more shots for good measure. The noise we were making had got the attention of more dead assholes. They were making their slow death march towards the fence.

"We gotta go," Jack said. "Grab what you can."

There was a scramble to pick up weapons as more bodies flooded out into the yard. We ran for the fence. I saw Dee struggling to climb it, and stopped to give her a leg up. Jack shot at some of the dead that were close to where she was at the gate. William had already cleared it, did his best to cover us from the other side of the fence, shooting at the dead still spilling out of the house behind us. Blanca made it over too and then Jack and I scrambled up.

Hitting the ground again sent a sharp pain shooting through my ankle. I looked down at my foot, cursed myself for not bending my knees properly. It made my next few steps really shaky, slowed me down.

"NAOMI!" I heard someone yell, I think it was Jack. "Come on!"

I looked up again. There were now far more dead coming towards the fence we'd just cleared. A line of them cut me off from my friends. I looked behind me, to a clearer path somewhere safe.

I couldn't see them all, I could just see the occasional friendly face and flash of a kife as they took out any immediate danger. A gunshot in a crowd like this was a death sentence. We were lucky that they were still heading towards the house, where we'd made most of our noise, but we only had seconds before they smelt us. I caught Jack's eye.

"Run," I mouthed. "I'll catch up."

I backed away from them, drawing a knife and taking out any of the dead who came too close. I turned and ran down a side street, ducking behind some bins in the hope that their rancid smell would be enough to disguise me. Being on my own turned out to be an advantage. Majority of the dead would smell the group before me.

That thought didn't bring me much comfort or relief, it filled me with fear that I'd lose them like we'd lost Frankie. How could I go home and face everyone if I was the only one coming back?

There's gotta be something I can do.

I stood up. I could hear the crowd getting louder, which either meant it was getting bigger or that they were feasting on someone. I took a deep breath, held it, and lifted the lid of the dumpster next to me as quietly as I could. It were hard not to throw up at the amount of mouldy and rotten shit in there. I did a quick scan of everything that had been chucked out when there were still garbage men to come and collect it.

Please have chucked out some useful shit.

I grabbed for a broken wire hanger, covered in green fungus from something that had probably once been edible. I picked up the wooden handle of a mop and used to move aside a few rotting rats that had climbed in there to die. A piece of garden twine stuck up from the bottom. I sent out a silent prayer and pulled. It was wrapped around something damp and foul-smelling, took a few tugs to get it free. When it came loose I was so relieved I let the dumpster lid close with a bang. A snarl at the end of the alleyway told me it had not gone unnoticed.

I swore under my breath and looked around for an escape or, more specifically, a way up. A fence at the other end of the alley looked strong enough to hold my weight, and from there, I might be able to reach a fire escape on the other side.

I ran, ignoring the snarling behind me and the sound of other feet dragging in my direction. Throwing the mop up to the fire escape first, I scrambled up the fence after it, my hands sore from all the damn climbing I was doing. I balanced on the top, it was thinner than it looked from the ground, hard to balance on. I inched closer to the fire escape and tried not to look at how big the gap was, or think about how much it would hurt.

The fence started to shake under me as the first dead one reached it. It was now or never. I jumped. Reached out. My already throbbing hands slammed into one of the metal railings of the fire escape. The rust grazed my hands as I swung there. I pulled myself up. Took a lot of effort. My upper-body strength had never been great, but all of the climbing I'd done in the last few months had helped. Only feeling better when my feet touched solid metal, I took a break standing on the wrong side of the rails. My arms were burning, and I was out of breath.

I climbed over the handrail to the safety of the stairs. Legs shaking from the shock of being on solid ground again, I pushed on, running up to the roof. From there, I did my best to see where my friends might have run to. I couldn't see any of them and hoped that meant they were taking shelter somewhere and not already dead.

My only clue as to where they might be was a big group of dead idiots who were too focused on one building in particular. A door could keep one dead bastard out. But a whole group? I'd seen them get frantic enough to break it.

I bent the wire in the hanger and tied the piece of twine around each end real tight. I tested it a few times, making sure that when I pulled on the twine, it would snap back into place. Standing on one end of the mop handle and pulling on the other, I managed to snap a piece off. Got a goddamn splinter in the process. I ripped one of the sleeves off my shirt, soaked it in one of the small bottles of alcohol and wrapped it around the top. I loaded it into my homemade slingshot of hanger and twine and left it on the ledge of the roof while I rooted around in my pocket for the matches.

My fingers closed around the box when I pulled them out again they were shaking. Could have been the strain of getting me up here, but the sick knot in my stomach told me it was nerves. I hadn't used anything like this since...

Well, it weren't usually me who used it, anyway. Daryl had always been the better shot.

I struck a match. Held it to the alcohol-soaked cloth. Wondered if he'd have been proud of my crude attempt at a crossbow.

Probably would've laughed and called you a goddamn nerd.

The thought of it was weirdly comforting, and when the cloth caught fire and I picked up the flaming coat hanger crossbow, my hands had stopped shaking.

Find your target.

It was like he was there, teaching me to fire his dad's crossbow all over again.

Steady hand, girl.

I trained it on an abandoned car near the horde.

Close one eye. You get better aim that way.

I closed my right eye. Weirdly, my left always felt strongest. Maybe I needed glasses. I'd meant to book an eye test before the world ended.

Concentrate, dumbass.

I readjusted slightly, using just my left eye to aim.

Whenever you're ready.

I pulled back as far as I dared without snapping the damn thing. The car looked too far away, the piece of wood felt too heavy to make it.

You can do this.

I let go. My makeshift arrow soared through the air with such force it smashed through the window of the car. I leapt up and down with joy, although I knew I were celebrating alone.

The fire grew inside the car. Wouldn't be long before it was enough to create a big enough distraction for my friends to get themselves safe. Once it hit any remaining gas, I hoped the explosion would be big enough to take a few of them out.

I climbed down the fire escape on the opposite side of the building, in case the dead ones that had tried to chase me up were still there. When I got to the bottom, I heard the car explode. I made my way round to the back of the building I assumed my friend's had been hiding out in. There were doors there that were already open. I tried to guess where they might have run, wished I were a better tracker, but I'd always had someone else to cover it.

Then I saw Jack, out looking for me.

"Naomi..." he said it so quietly that from so far away, it were almost like he'd mouthed it. I could tell by the way Jack looked at me that something had gone wrong. Heart sinking down to the tips of my toes, I half-walked half-ran towards him.

"What is it?" I asked when I was close enough not to have to yell it. He took a deep breath. "Blanca..." he whispered, and then he couldn't really say anything else. We all knew by then what saying someone else's name in that tone meant. He looked to his right, through the door of an independent coffee shop that had managed to survive the Starbucks-takeover only to sit abandoned now. Still alive, but leaning against the counter in a pool of her own blood, sat Blanca. She looked at me with nothing but fear and despair. Dee watched over her, barely holding it together.

"You're okay," I said immediately, rushing in to take a look at her wounds. Dee took a step back. From the amount of blood around Blanca, I knew she weren't okay, but I felt like it if I just said it enough times, I could make it real. She nodded, but neither of us believed it. "I'll bandage you up."

I ripped off my other sleeve and tied it around her arm as tight as I could to stop the fast flow of blood streaming from the open wound on her wrist. Looked like the whole thing had been ripped out by Groundling teeth. It had severed something pretty major.

"I got bit..." she said like it weren't visible.

"Yeah," I said. "But maybe if we cut off the infected bit, it won't spread... and you'll be alright."

I had no idea if what I was saying was right, but it felt better than doing nothing. For a second, I felt less hopeless.

"Not just there," she said, using her non-bit hand to pull the collar of her shirt to one side. "Here too."

There was a bite just above her collar bone. It weren't bleeding half as much, but there was no cutting it out without killing her faster. Defeat rose up to overwhelm me. I sat back, my brain working overtime to get us out of this.

"We can get you to the CDC," I said. "They might have a cure there."

Blanca shook her head. "It's too far," she said, her voice was getting weaker. "Too dangerous. I won't ask any of you to risk that."

"You ain't gotta ask," I said. I couldn't believe she'd accepted this fate so calmly. In her position, I'd have absolutely lost my shit. "I'll take you. We can make it there and back, just you and me."

"No," she said. "Mia needs you. My kids need you."

"They'll be fine until we get back," I said. "Jack and Dee will look after them. Won't you guys?"

They didn't answer me right away, so I turned to them. Jack looked at me and nodded. Dee just swallowed back a sob. Seeing them both slowly accept what was happening made me well up too.

"Naomi," Blanca said. "It's too late. Even if there was a cure, I'd bleed out before we got there."

"No," I said. I bent down to retie the tourniquet I'd made. "I can stop it... I can stop it."

Even as my fingers grappled with undoing the knot, I knew it was pointless. Blood had already turned it a damp crimson. It was slower. But not enough.

"You can't stop it," she said. This time, when I looked at her, she had started to cry. My hands shook, my vision blurred. I sat back on my heels, wiping my eyes and nose on the back of my hand. I took a deep breath, now weren't the time to dissolve. Whatever pain this was giving me, it were nothing compared to what Blanca must have been going through.

"We'll carry you back to camp," I said. I glanced back at Jack and Dee again to see if they were willing to help. Jack gave a small nod and stepped forward. "You should be with Josè and Perla. You should be with your family."

"I am with family," she reached out to touch my arm. "And I do not want my kids to see this."

"Blanca... " I didn't know what else to say. I couldn't argue. If the roles were reversed, I wouldn't want Mia to see me dying.

"We'll stay with you," Jack said with a loud sniff. "We'll stay."

"Thank you," Blanca let go of me and took his shaking hand. I felt Dee kneel down behind me too. "My kids...?"

Her voice was almost a whisper. She were too weak to finish her sentence.

"We'll take care of them," I said. "We'll protect them. I promise they'll be okay."

She couldn't say much. She could only nod. A few minutes after that, she passed out from the blood loss. When she stopped responding, I started measuring her pulse as it got weaker and weaker.

"What do we do?" Dee asked.

"Nothing we can do," I said. "You heard her."

"No, I mean... what do we do when she turns?"

I glanced at Jack, who looked away from me.

"We deal with it," I said. "Like she's any other Groundling."

Saying it felt like a betrayal. Dee shook her head. "I don't think... I don't think I can."

I looked at Jack again. He weren't looking too sure either.

"It's fine," I said because I had no other choice. We couldn't leave Blanca to roam around and infect others just because we loved her. If she'd been conscious and overheard us, she'd have begged us to do the right thing. "I'll do it. Before she turns."

She didn't regain consciousness, she didn't ask me to shoot her or leave her to turn. Her breathing changed, a death rattle as her body struggled to take in more oxygen. The sound made us all flinch. When she was silent, I checked for a pulse. Couldn't find one. I checked again and again until I was sure.

"Is she gone?" Dee whispered, I looked back at her and nodded. She stepped closer to me. My hand shook, but something about having her near helped me step back from Blanca's body and raise my gun. Something about having people to protect makes you a hell of a lot stronger. Dee stayed with me but looked away, her head turned to look at the back of mine.

I want to say that Blanca looked peaceful, but she didn't. I think most folks only look peaceful at the end if they get to go all drugged up in a nursing home or some shit. It's fucking awful for everyone these days. They go kicking and screaming.

My finger tensed on the trigger. "I'm so sorry," I whispered to Blanca before I pulled it. Brain matter hit the wall. The force of the shot made her body slump further down.

The gun rattled my hands were shaking so much. Then I felt Dee put her arms around me. "Thank you," she whispered again. Jack walked up behind us and wrapped his arms around us both. I was grateful for them both. Everything I'd thought until now, that no matter how long Mia and I were with them it would always be us first and them second, was wrong. People who can watch you kill one your own and still accept you like that, still want to comfort you once you've done it, those folks are family.

"We need to find William," I said before I started crying so hard I wouldn't be able to stop. "... that shot was too loud."

"William ran back to the house," Jack said, letting go of us and walking towards the door farthest from Blanca's body. None of us could bear to look back at it. "To see if he could salvage anything."

Dee held me at arm's length, "You good?"

"Yeah," I said, but my voice cracked a little, it had been a while since anyone had asked me that. "Let's go."

The day had been so shitty that I half-expected not to find William. Or for his corpse to greet us instead. But he was fine and waiting for us by the high fences of the big house.

"Good car bomb," he said.

"Thanks," I said but couldn't muster a smile.

"I got what I could," he gestured to the pile of stuff he'd managed to gather up. He looked at the three of us. "Blanca?"

None of us spoke, he read the truth in our faces.

We walked home in silence, but we'd never walked so close together.

"They're here!" I heard Mia call when we were in sight of the camp. A ladder tumbled down from the trees. Usually, conversation waited until the returning party had safely climbed back up, but this time Izzy climbed down to meet us.

"Only four of you?" she said, peering behind us like Blanca and Frankie might just be dawdling. That spark of hope was extinguished as she reached the bottom. I watched her run to Jack. He sped up to meet her.

"They didn't make it," I heard him say as they embraced. Izzy pulled back and looked at him, and at that moment, I got it. All the fighting they did, all the bickering, it was worth it to have someone hold you like that when everything was falling apart. I looked away from them, up at the trees.

Mia peered down. I saw Josè and Perla next to her, already looking worried that their Momma weren't with us. I was so overwhelmed I had to stop walking.

"You okay?" Dee asked quietly.

I swallowed. "I gotta tell the kids."

"Let me do it," she said.

It was a kind enough offer to almost tempt me into accepting. "Nah," I said. "I'm the one who did it, it should be me."

"Then let me come with you," she offered. I looked at her, to see if she were offering to be polite or if she meant it. "Please?"

I nodded.

Each rung of the ladder I climbed up, I could feel my stomach sink right back down again. Dee was right behind me. The kids were waiting for us at the top.

"Naomi!" Mia instantly threw her arms around my neck. "You were gone so long, it's almost dark, you've got blood all over you, and-"

"Slow down, kid," I said. "I missed you too. Just give me a sec."

It was great to see her after such a shitty day, but the bad parts weren't over yet. I moved her to the side slightly and looked at where Josè and Perla were still looking anxiously at the forest underneath us. But I think they knew. They were already sad.

"Mama...?" Perla asked me but weren't able to say any more before her eyes filled with tears. Josè wouldn't even look at me like he could smell my guilt.

"I'm sorry," I said. "I'm so sorry, but she didn't make it."

Perla reached for her brother. Josè stared at the ground and took her hand. He didn't cry, didn't even blink, just stared at his shoes and said, "How'd it happen?"

The question I'd been dreading.

"She got bit," I said. "There were a whole bunch of Groundlings... we got separated... we-"

"Did she turn?" Josè asked. I couldn't stop thinking about Blanca. Her pained face, the sounds of her last breaths.

"We took care of it before she did," Dee said, and I felt her hand on my arm.

There was a long silence. Josè looked up at me. "You took care of it."

It was a statement more than a question, but I still said, "Yes."

He nodded. Didn't say anything else for a little while and then, "I want to help. Next time people go out, I want to be there too. I'm old enough."

"Okay," I said. Didn't feel like it should be my decision but Blanca weren't here to make it any more. He should learn, we needed everyone.

"I should have been there to help," he said. "What you did... It should have been me. Should have been family."

No.

"It ain't your job," I said. I was so choked up that it came out as a whisper. Kids in the new world weren't just growing up fast, they were growing up with a warped sense of what's right. We're all family now, kid. If today taught me anything, that's it."

"No," he glared at me. "She was our mother."

It stung.

"I know," I said. "I didn't mean-"

"We all loved Blanca," Dee stepped in. "Obviously none of more than you two. But she was surrounded by people who cared about her. "

José turned on his heels and walked away from us, dragging Perla behind him. Dee looked at me. "Went as well as it could," she said. I nodded, but I still felt like shit.

The whole camp were silent that night. Perla moved her sleeping bag to be next to Mia. In the night, I woke up to the sound of Mia comforting her friend in whispers, and I was so proud it lifted my sadness for a moment.

The next day, Alf carved a tribute to Frankie and Blanca into the trees. It took a long time to recover, camp was quite for while. We trained the kids on how to use knives and guns as well as how to use things that weren't traditionally thought of as weapons to protect themselves if they were in a tight spot. We took at least one of them on most runs. They needed to get better at this, we all did.

The weather started to turn, the nights got gradually longer, the days colder. We were so used to staying alive from one moment to the next that I'd forgotten about winter, but it was rolling in. Hadn't thought about how we'd all freeze to death up here if it snowed. Guess there's a reason birds migrate.

We put it off for as long as possible, all of us too afraid to spend too long in town. It was only when the kids went from shivering and sneezing to prolonged coughing fits that we decided it was time to move. Finding somewhere inside to shelter for winter was the only way to survive it. Food was already getting scarce.

Mia and Perla were sick. It weren't too bad, just seemed like a regular cold or flu, but there were no medicines around to make them feel better. We needed somewhere warmer, drier. Somewhere they could properly fight off a winter cold. So, with a heavy heart and a lot of apprehensions, we packed up our stuff and returned to solid ground.

"We can always come back in the summer," Alf said with a cheerfulness that I think was meant to distract us from how sad he was about leaving his building project. We all agreed. I think some of us even believed it.

We spent a few days moving from place to place, too nervous about settling in one place for too long. We walked from one town to the next until the cold got too much. Eventually, we took shelter in an old school. There was a fence around it to keep us safe, and we could take out the gym mats and sleep on the floor. We made a fire pit in the middle that filled the gym hall with smoke. Not great for our lungs, but it was better than freezing to death.

Within a few days, it seemed like the kids were getting better. I could feel a dry tickle at the back of my throat like I might be coming down with it too. But I were too glad that Mia was recovering to complain.

Old scraps of paper from around the school came in useful to block out the windows, so none of the dead were attracted to the light. All of us got a little bit sick, a little feverish. Mine lasted about three days before it broke and I could get up and help out again. I could hear Alf coughing like he was about to bring up one of his lungs.

"You okay, Alf?" I asked him.

"Shouldn't have skipped my last flu shot," he said with a smile. But he looked like shit. All sweaty and feverish.

"Rest, and it'll pass," I said. "Go and lie by the fire and I'll bring you some water."

He nodded and went to lie down.

"We need more blankets," I said to Dee as I went to pick up a water bottle for him. "Alf's getting sick now."

"Was only a matter of time," she said.

"Given his age, it'll hit him harder," Lucas said.

"William and I are heading out soon. I'll see what we can do," Dee assured him.

Lucas still looked worried. Alf had looked after him when his back was still healing, I could see he was anxious to repay that debt.

"Want to come and get some more firewood with me?" I asked.

"Yes," he said, glad of something to do. We climbed the fence to look at the nearby forest. I showed him what we were looking for, which pieces were useful as they were and which would need to be dried out. He was a quick learner and had been eager to help since we'd taken him in.

We carried it all back to camp as it started to get dark. Dee and Will were back already.

"Got a quilt," Will said. "It's a little mouldy but better than nothing."

"Great work," I said, looking over at where Alf was lying under as many blankets as we could spare. The fire was lit, Perla and Mia were playing some kind of game with a bean bag they'd found in one of the cupboards. We gathered around the fire to cook up a little of our rations.

"Should we take some over to Alf?" Lucas asked.

"Nah, he's sound asleep," Dee said. "Didn't even stir when we put more blankets on him. Save him some."

We portioned some off and set it aside. Mia brought over a book from one of the classrooms, she and Perla sat next to me while I read it to them. Most of the reading materials we'd found here were obviously kids books, but we were so starved for entertainment that I knew the adults were listening to me too.

"Look who's finally up and about," Jack interrupted, with a smile. "You're just in time to hear Mary get into the Secret Garden for the first time."

I glanced over at Alf. There was a soft thud as blankets hit the floor. He stood up in that weak and unsteady way you get up from a nap when you're ill.

"Alf?" Lucas called over to him. "You up, buddy? You need some more water?"

Alf didn't answer, just kept walking towards us. And then we heard it. The sound the dead make. We all stood up, looking around in the hope that our worst fear weren't coming true. But there was no escaping it, that sound was coming from Alf. I pulled out my pistol.

"He's turned?" José sounded panicked. "How'd that happen? Did he get bit?"

I looked at him, and Mia and Perla.

"Get in the cupboard," I said. "Now."

Felt like my veins were on fire with the urgency of it all. Mia and Perla ran immediately. José stared me down.

"You too," I said to him.

"No," he said.

"NOW."

"You can't tell me what to do," he said. "Not now. Not ever."

"I promised Blanca..." I started to say. I could already hear his counterpoint that no matter what I'd said to his Momma, I would never have the same authority that she did. But then Alf stepped closer to the fire, and the light caught his face. I saw the determination in Josè's eyes change. It's different. When the corpse walking at you is someone you knew, it ain't the same as taking out some stranger. Josè backed away from me, defeated, and joined Mia and his little sister in safety.

The rest of the group were looking at me in shock, I knew they were waiting for me to take that shot. My pistol felt heavy, my fingers like they were made of lead. Alf stumbled towards us. Maybe it was because it was so dark, and I was used to Alf being unsteady on his feet. Alf just looked like Alf. Only the growling gave away that he'd turned. I raised my pistol, hand shaking with the effort of it.

I waited for him to get closer. I don't know why, it might have made it worse, but part of me just wanted to see his face. It would have helped me stop seeing him as Alf our friend, architect of our fallen treetop community, and see him as another dead bastard.

A gunshot rang out.

Alf fell to the ground.

By my fingers hadn't moved to the trigger.

Surprised, I looked around at everyone. Most looked back at me just the same. Only Lucas stared straight ahead, gun raised and trained on the space where what had once been Alf had stood. Dee and Izzy moved to take care of the body. I went to stand beside Lucas. I put a hand on his outstretched arm and helped him lower his gun.

"Thank you," I said quietly. Lucas looked at me, his eyes heavy with the weight of what he'd just had to do.

"It shouldn't have to be you," he whispered. "Not after Blanca."

"Thank you," I said again. I lead him by the elbow to the other room, where the kids were waiting. Even if they hadn't been trying to listen, they'd have heard that gunshot.

"Is it over?" Mia asked. I nodded. She glanced at Lucas, who looked like he were about to chuck his guts up. "Did he...?"

I nodded again. Mia's eyebrows went up like she were slightly impressed.

"Can you get him some water?" I asked, guiding him to a chair to sit down.

"Yeah," Mia nodded and ran to get some. Perla, forever her shadow, went with her. José moved to the door.

"Can I help?" he asked. I wondered if he was still mad at me for shoving him in the 'kids room'. "Can I help bury the body?"

"Yes," I said. "That would be much appreciated."

He nodded. He didn't say so, but I think we were alright now, maybe we'd even be friends again when the sun came up.

 

 

Daryl

Babies have this way of looking at you that reminds you you're all they got. Someone coughed. I looked up to see Beth standing in the cell door. It was kind of weird, being in a prison. Reminded me of when I'd visited Merle in juvie. I wondered if any of these cells looked like ones he'd been banged up in.

"Didn't see you there," I said, wondering how long she'd been staring at me staring at Rick's little girl.

"Rick's asked me to look after the baby," she said, awkwardly. Beth and I didn't talk much. She was young, and she'd been lucky in life. Didn't seem like we'd have much in common.

"Yeah?" I stood up to leave.

"Thing is..." she said, looking at little Asskicker like she might grow an extra head. "I don't know shit about babies."

"You'll pick it up," I said. "It ain't that hard. Hell, your dad should know, he can show you."

"He's a veterinarian, not a midwife."

"He had you and your sister, dummy," I said. "Must've picked up at least a few things."

"Maybe," she said. "I just... I dunno what to do if she cries. What if she gets hungry?"

"Glenn and your sister will be back before she gets hungry," I said. They'd been gone a while. Since Maggie and Glenn had started hooking up, their runs had been getting longer. The threat of a starving baby should have been enough to stop them from screwing around this time. "You know how to hold her?"

"No," she said.

"Here, I'll show you," I said. The baby looked up at me in that way newborns do when they ain't really seeing anything. I reached down and picked her up. It's easy to forget how small they are until you're holding one again. "Support the head, that's the most important part."

"I... always thought I'd be good with kids," Beth said. "Always wanted to be a Momma when I grow up. But... she's so tiny. I'm scared I'll break her."

"We all gotta look after this little girl," I reminded her. "That means you too."

It had been days since Lori died and the weight of it still hung around the prison. Hung around Rick most of all.

"Hold your arms out like I've got mine now, and I'll pass her to you," I said.

"Okay..." Beth mimicked the way I was holding the baby. When she stopped looking terrified, I passed her over. She got it easy enough.

"Ain't so hard, is it?" I said.

"How'd you get to know so much about this?" she asked.

"Surprised?"

"Well... yeah," she looked embarrassed. "You don't much seem like a kid-friendly guy is all."

"That so?"

"Didn't mean it in a bad way," she said, clearly worried she'd offended me. "Just... you don't talk much and you ain't... I mean you're... on your own a lot, I just..."

"It's okay," I said, letting her off the hook. "I know what you mean. I ain't no Mr Rodgers."

She looked relieved.

"So... where' you learn it?" she asked. When I didn't answer right away, she panicked again. "Shit, you weren't a dad before this, were ya?"

"Nah," I said and laughed at how ridiculousthatidea was. "I had a... friend growing up. Her little sister was born when we were only a couple of years younger than you are now. I used to look after her sometimes."

I made it sound so much smaller than it was, or at least how it had felt at the time.

"Like babysitting?" Beth asked.

"Kinda," I said, and then because that weren't a great explanation, I said, "My friend's Momma weren't... she had a lot of problems. So, sometimes she'd disappear for a few days. We were all Mia had."

I felt a twinge of guilt, but the dead can't get mad at you for spilling their secrets.

"Mia," Beth said. "Was that her name?"

"Yeah," I said, and I had to stop looking at the baby because it hurt. Hadn't realised I'd let it slip. There's something about babies that get your guard down. Makes you say dumb shit. I think that's why baby talk is so popular.

"Maybe you could ask Rick to name this one Mia," Beth said. "Y'know, as, like, a tribute."

"Nah," I said and stood up, wanting to be far away from her and the baby. I knew she meant well, but I was suddenly mad as shit. I'd missed so much of Mia growing up, and now she were most likely dead. And for the sake of what? A dumb fight?

Beth called after me, but I hardly heard her. I was clouded by thoughts of Naomi and me and tiny baby Mia just after she'd been born. How, right then, I'd wanted nothing more than to get a place for the three of us, away from the shit we'd grown up with. That was what I'd wanted to save for when I'd started working for Merle. How had I lost sight of that?

I got what Beth were trying to do, with the tribute and all, but I didn't want that. The ghost of a future that would never come to pass already haunted me. I didn't need it walking and talking around me too.

There were Walkers at the fence. I beat as many of their brains in as I could. It helped. But not enough. I was mad about so much, and once the floodgates opened, it was hard to stop it. That little girl had to grow up without Lori. Lori would have been a great Momma, which is rare as shit, and now she was dead. Carol would've been great too. She'd have loved to see that little baby, but she was gone. Her and T-Dog, gone when some asshole had cut a hole in the fence and let Walkers in. We didn't even have their bodies to bury. Didn't have Andrea's body either, we'd lost her when a horde had driven us off of Hershel's farm.

I headed back inside, to be by myself for a bit so I wouldn't end up getting in a fight with anyone or yelling at them because I was mad. I sat down amongst a bunch of dead Walkers and just started stabbing my knife at the ground, trying to push everything I was feeling back down where it belonged.

There was a door banging not far off, some dead asshole we hadn't managed to clear.

I stood up to find it. The noise were damn annoying and doing nothing to improve my mood. The banging door wouldn't open the whole way because it kept hitting some dead bastard. I kicked him out of my way and raised my knife, ready for the Walker on the other side. I opened the door, saw nothing. Looked down.

Carol reached out for me, barely conscious.

My anger vanished. Everything I'd been angry about, everything that we'd lost... we'd just got something back.

A fucking miracle.

She passed out. Must've been days she'd been trapped in there without food or water. I picked her up, carried through to the main Cell Block and put her down on her bunk where she belonged. I fetched her some water, and when I came back, she was awake again.

"Hey," I said, unable to hide my smile. "You alright? Gave us a real fright there."

She smiled and tried to speak, but her voice was too hoarse.

"Drink this," I told her, handing her the cup of water. She took it from me, her hand shaking a little she was so weak. "Wait here, I'll get Hershel to come check on you."

I hadn't seen Hershel for a while, but he had to be around somewhere, hard to hide from people when you're cooped up in a prison with them. I heard a commotion coming from the common room and went to take a look. Hershel was in there with Rick and Carl. Rick had some chick I'd never seen before pinned to the ground. She was reaching for a sword, and there was blood on her leg, could've been a bite but it looked more like a gunshot.

"Rick?" I said. "What the hell is this?"

He glanced up at me but didn't answer right away. I didn't have time for whatever shit this was. Carol being safe and sound was way more important. "Y'all come on in here."

"Everything alright?" Rick asked.

"You're gonna wanna see this," I said. I kinda didn't want to spoil the surprise, also kinda wanted to put a pin in whatever the hell was going down here.

"Carl, get the bag," Rick nodded to a bag I hadn't clocked before. He looked back at the woman on the ground. "The doors are all locked. You'll be safe here, and we can treat that."

He pointed at her busted up leg.

"I didn't ask for your help," she yelled after us. At Rick's request, I locked her in, although I didn't look like she'd be able to run on that leg.

"What's in the bag?" Beth asked, looking down at us from the top of the main staircase, baby still in her arms.

"Formula," Rick replied.

I didn't get the implications of that at first. Just wondered why Rick was being an asshole to someone who'd gone to all this trouble to bring us something for his kid. Then I saw the worry on Beth's face, realised that Glenn and Maggie weren't back. If there were ever a time for good news, it was now.

"Bring that baby down here," I yelled up to Beth. I lead them to Carol's cell. She sat up when she saw everyone, arms out to embrace them.

"Poor thing fought her way into a cell, must've passed out, dehydrated," I said. When everyone had got a proper Carol-hug, Beth handed her the baby. They all looked truly happy for a moment. Then Carol looked around for Lori and found the truth in Rick's eyes.

"Rick," she said. "I'm so sorry."

He looked away from her.

"Carl, Beth," Hershel looked at the kids. "Go fetch some food for Carol."

They nodded and ran off. I wondered how much of it was a way of trying to distract them from the heaviness around them.

"I'm alright, really," Carol tried to assure us.

"Let me check you over," Hershel said. "Rick, will you take the baby?"

Rick hesitated. Looking at that kid must've been damn hard. Probably why the kid didn't have a name yet. Carol passed the baby over, and Hershel guided her back to her bunk. He checked her pulse, her reactions and asked her a few questions about how she was feeling.

"Honestly," she said. "I don't need this fuss."

"You need to rest," Hershel said. "Get some food and drink in you. Sleep if you can."

Carl and Beth ran back with some canned food. Rick put a hand on Carol's shoulder, "These two are gonna look after you, okay. You need to get your strength up."

I hoped his words didn't give away that there was a new threat at the prison. Didn't want Carol stressing out over that until she was ready.

Beth looked at Rick, "You need me to take the baby again?"

It was nice to see she were already more confident. Carol was the perfect person to help her, too. Having her back was more than a miracle, it was a blessing.

"It's good to have you back," Rick said to her, as Beth took the baby. Carol smiled at him as he stepped back out of the cell.

"I'll be back to check on you," Hershel said. "You rest up now."

"Thanks, Hershel," she said. I went to follow him into the main part of the prison, but Carol reached up and grabbed my arm. "And thankyou,Daryl. You saved me."

I could feel the others looking at me, the intensity of it burned my cheeks. Didn't want them to see me blush, so I looked away.

"You saved your self," I told her. "Staying alive in there... I just found you is all."

I was too uncomfortable to say anything else. I wanted to tell her how happy I was that she was back, that things without her had been shit. But I couldn't. So I left to join Rick and Hershel outside.

"You good, Daryl?" Rick asked me, amused by how much this was making me squirm. I wondered if this was how guys like him - guys who were proper heroes - felt most of the time, how they didn't die from the embarrassment of it all.

Desperate to change the subject, I said, "Who's the chick with the sword?"

"Don't know yet," he said. "You willing to come help me find out?"

"Sure," I said, "let me get my things."

I went back to my own cell to pick up my crossbow. In my experience, pointing it could make anyone more talkative. I met up with Rick and Hershel again just outside of the locked door.

"Ready?" Rick asked.

"Let's do this," I said and unlocked the door.

The woman sat up when she saw us coming, trying to look all tough. Rick crouched down to look her in the eye.

"We can tend to that wound for you. Give you a little food and water and send you on your way," Rick told her. "But you're gonna have to tell us how you found us, and why you're carrying formula."

She looked at him with deep, burning mistrust.

"Supplies were dropped by a young Asian guy and a pretty girl."

Glenn and Maggie.

Nobody else it could be. Whole room got tense.

"What happened?" Rick asked.

"They were taken," she said.

"Taken by who?" Rick pressed.

"The same son of a bitch who shot me," she snarled.

Damn unhelpful.

I pointed my crossbow at her. "You better start talking," I warned. "Or you're going to have a much bigger problem than a gunshot wound."

She glared at me. "Find them yourself."

Came real close to shooting her then, thought about shooting just past her to give her a good scare. But then Rick put a hand on my arm and made me lower it.

"You came here for a reason," he reminded her.

"There's a town," she said reluctantly. "Woodbury. About 75 survivors. That's where they were taken."

"A whole town?"

Sounded like a damn fairytale.

"Run by this guy, calls himself the Governor," Michonne name.

"He got muscle?" I asked.

"Paramilitary wannabees," she shrugged. "They have armed centuries on every wall."

"You know a way in?"

"Place is secure from Walkers," she said, "but we could slip through."

We all glanced at each other. Could be a trap, but it was also the only lead we had on Maggie and Glenn's location.

"How did you know how to get here?" Rick asked.

"They mentioned the prison," she said. "And which direction it was in. Said it was a straight shot."

"This is Hershel, father of the girl who was taken," Rick indicated to him. "He'll take care of your leg."

While Hershel was sewing her up, the rest of us talked about whether or not we should go after Maggie and Glenn. It weren't much of a discussion. No way we could just leave two of our own in the hands of some psycho. We packed up a car with as many weapons as we could, some smoke bombs too.

"Her name's Michonne," Hershel told us when he'd finished patching her u. "I think she'll take you where you need to go."

Hershel trusted her. Or maybe he was just desperate. Michonne didn't look like she trusted us, though, and the feeling was mutual. We couldn't be sure that she weren't leading us to our deaths, which that made the car ride awkward, to say the least.

We drove a few miles outside of where she said we'd find Woodbury, then we got out to walk through the woods. It was dark by the time we got to the parameters of the town. We scoped it out, crouched behind an old car, tried to get a good look at the assholes guarding the high metal walls.

True to her word, Michonne found us a way in. Seemed a little too easy. She took us to building in the town that she'd first been questioned in when she got there. Or, so she said.

No sign of Glenn or Maggie. No sign of anyone.

"Any idea where else they could be?" Rick asked.

"They could be in his apartment," Michonne said.

Smart move if she's trying to get us caught.

"What if they ain't?" I asked.

"Then we'll look somewhere else," she said. Before anyone could agree to anything, something changed outside. People were running past, yelling. Had someone seen us come in? Did they know we were here? Rick opened the door just a crack. There was gunfire too. Not far off.

Could it be Glenn and Maggie?

It was as good a lead as any.

We followed the sound to an old warehouse. It had stopped by the time we got there, but we could voices muffled by the metal walls. Couldn't make out what they was saying but someone were definitely barking orders. Two people were lead out of one of the rooms, bags over their heads. A man and a woman. Struggling.

It had to be them.

Rick threw one of our smoke grenades. It caught the little Woodbury miliary-wannabees off guard, and we managed to grab their hostages, get their hoods off. Glenn's face was real messed up. He was struggling to walk. Maggie was crying, but she stopped a little when she saw it was us. For the second time that day, I felt nothing but relief. We rushed them out as gunfire started up behind us.

We ran as far as we dared, then took cover in the nearest empty building. I ran to the back. All boarded up.

"Ain't no way out back here!" I told them.

"How bad are you hurt?" Rick asked Maggie and Glenn.

"We'll be alright," Glenn said. I weren't convinced. He looked over at me. "Daryl... this was Merle."

Merle?

Merle?

I stared at him, thinking I must've heard him wrong. I looked at all that blood, wanted to say sorry even though it weren't me.

"My brother's this Governor?" I asked.

"No," Maggie said. "He's somebody else. Your brother's his lieutenant or something."

Didn't sound much like Merle. Never known him to be a follower.

"Does he know I'm still with you?"

"He does now," Glenn said. "Rick, I'm sorry, we told him where the prison was. We couldn't hold out."

"No need to apologize," Rick said. "We have to get back. Can you walk? We got a car a few miles out."

"I'm good," Glenn said. Rick and Maggie helped him to his feet. I hesitated.

"If Merle's alive I need to see him!" I said.

"Not now, we're in hostile territory," Rick said.

"He's my brother," I said. "I ain't got-"

"Look what he did!" Rick said. Glenn looked at me through one heavily swollen eye. I wanted to apologize even though it weren't me who did it. "We gotta get out of here."

Rick didn't get it.

I should've known he wouldn't. He had the privilege of being related to people that the rest of the world can understand. But my brother was alive. Close. I needed to see him. He could be the key to ending all of this.

"I can talk to him," I said, "work something out."

"You're not thinking straight," Rick said. "Glenn can barely walk. How are we gonna make it out? I need you. Are you with me?"

I nodded, but my heart sank. That was still my brother. Out there somewhere. Once Glenn and Maggie were safe, maybe I could go find him. Or he could come see me now he knew where I was.

Rick threw another grenade. People were shooting at us from the walls, from various points along the streets. We managed to get to another shelter in the doorway, regroup. We were close to getting out.

"You guys go ahead," I said. "I'm going to lay down so cover fire."

"We need to stick together," Maggie yelled over the gunshots that were coming from all around us.

"It's too hairy," I said. "Don't worry, I'll be right behind you."

If they knew I was lying, there weren't time to argue. I set off one of the grenades, watched the smoke pour into the streets and just started firing. I watched them make it to a line of parked buses. I kept firing until I saw they were clear.

I hear someone yell my name.

I yelled back that they should go.

And then there was a sharp pain at the back of my head, and everything went black.

It was dark when I opened my eyes again. There was something over my face. I could tell I was back in the warehouse by how drafty it was, how the sounds echoed.

"You awake, asshole?" some guy pulled back the hood covering my face. I spat at him. "That'll be a yes."

He covered me up again.

"I wanna see Merle," I said. "He ain't gonna be happy you're treating his brother like this."

Someone punched me around the side of the head.

"You'll get your chance," he said. I heard someone walk out, caught some whispers but not the words they were saying.

They made me sit there for a while. I could hear things going on around me, plans being made but nothing I could make sense of. Then they hauled me to my feet. I struggled every step of the way.

It was dark and the hood smelt like shit. I thought about all them guys who'd been executed back in the day and wondered if this was the last sweaty, stuffy smell they'd ever smelt before some assholes hanged them. Was that what was about to happen?

I could feel dirt under my feet. Sounded like I was outside. I could feel a breeze on my arms that couldn't touch me through the damn hood. I could hear people, too, whispering.

"This is one of the terrorists," I heard a man say with so much authority that I could only assume he was the Governor.

Terrorist? What kind of bullshit...?

The hood was pulled off and the light around me was so blinding that for a moment, I couldn't see the crowd or the Governor. Could hear him though, "Merle's own brother."

Fuck.

No.

My eyes adjusted. And there he was. A shock passed from brother to brother.

It was him.

It was Merle.

My heart leapt in uneasy relief.

I looked past him, at the crowd who were all restless and nervous even though they weren't the ones that had been brought out here in chains.

And there was Andrea, too.

The hell was she doing here?

She looked damn sick.

Was she part of all this?

"What should we do with them, huh?" the Governor asked. I was happy to see a bloodsoaked patch over one of his eyes. Someone had managed to wound the son of a bitch.

The crowd hollered for us both to be killed. I looked at Merle, tryna get his attention, but he were staring at the back of the Governor's head. My hope dimmed. I didn't know which Merle I was gonna get. Loyal brother, or self-serving asshole?

The crowd's cheering got louder and louder. And then Andrea stepped up. Think she tried to put an end to it, but I couldn't hear her over all the yelling.

Someone let my hands go free. The Governor pointed at my brother, "I asked you where your loyalties lie, and you said here. Well, prove it. Prove it to us all. Brother against brother. The winner goes free. Fight! To the death."

The crowd went wild.

I looked at Merle.

"You know me," he said to the crowd. "I'm gonna do whatever I have to do to prove that my loyalty is to this town."

Motherfucker.

The first punch was familiar. That hurt more than the blow itself. I was on the ground he was kicking me. Yelling.

I waited till I felt him ease up a little, get too comfortable, and then I punched him back. It was enough to get him away for a bit and get me back on my feet.

They'd brought out Walkers on the end of long metal poles. I was so distracted by it that Merle got me on the ground again. I reached up to put my hands around his throat.

"You really think this asshole's gonna let you go?" I asked as I started choking him out.

"Just follow my lead, little brother," he said. I couldn't tell if the fire in his eyes was a plan or because I was choking him too hard. "We're getting out of this right now."

He pulled me to my feet. Back to back, we e tried to take out as many of their Walkers as we could. I tried to push them hard enough that they'd turn on the jeering audience. But it weren't looking good. At least me and Merle would go down fighting, that seemed right.

Then the noise of the crowd turned from cheers to screams. Loud gunshots. People ducked, threw themselves on the ground. This weren't friendly fire. A smoke grenade was thrown into the arena, and I knew it was them. Rick and the others. Come back to get me.

In the smoke and chaos, I yelled for Merle to follow me towards thems.

We ran.

Ran past a guy tryna use my own damn crossbow to fire at me. I grabbed it off him, Merle whacked him in the head.

I looked behind, saw the Governor walking towards us through the smoke as we all ran.

"They're all at the arena," Merle said, trying to get us to follow him one way. "This way!"

"You're not going anywhere with us!" Rick said.

"You really wanna do this now?" Merle asked him, which seemed like a fair enough question given the circumstances. He ran behind a line of parked buses, and we heard this loud ass banging as he took out a chunk of the metal wall. By the time the rest of us had run back there, Merle was already out and wailing on some Walker.

The noise from Woodbury had got a lot of the dead heading our way. We took out as many as we could. Merle looked back at the group, "We ain't got time for this."

He took off, running into the woods. I looked back at everyone else, saw them hesitate. "C'mon," I said. I'd already lost him once. I couldn't do it again. I ran after him, prayed they'd follow.

They did.

But it was a long night of walking through the woods to get back to the car. Nobody spoke. Not to me and not to Merle. Even Merle himself were pretty quiet.

As we got close to the car, Rick broke into a run, "Glenn!" he yelled. "Glenn!"

My heart sank. Glenn ran towards us through the trees. Rick tried to get ahead of it, but it were too late. Glenn had seen Merle. Pulled a gun on him. Michonne got her sword out. I tried to stand between Merle and everyone else.

"He helped us get outta there," I said. We might all have been caught if it weren't for him.

"Yeah right after he beat the shit out of you," Rick said, which was also, a fair point.

"Hey, we both took our licks man," Merle said, like anything that had happened in that arena was fair.

"Jackass," I muttered. I hadn't had to wait to see if Merle really did have a plan to get us out of there or if he'd have killed me to get back in the Governor's good graces.

"Enough!" Rick yelled, but everyone were still screaming. I was trying to get Merle to shut his damn mouth. Glenn was still pointing his goddamn gun at me because I was standing between him and Merle. I tried to push it out of his hands, "Get that thing outta my face!"

Merle started laughing. "Looks like you've gone native brother."

Fuck off, man.

"No more than you, hanging out with that psycho back there," I said.

"Oh yeah, he's a charmer I gotta tell you that," Merle said. "Been putting the wood to your girlfriend Andrea big time baby."

He was looking at Michonne.

How the hell does  she know Andrea?

She glared at him. Everything got a thousand times more tense which, up until Merle had opened his fat mouth, I didn't think were possible.

Michonne raised her sword again.

"I told you to drop that!" Rick said. She glared at him but did as she was told. "You know Andrea?"

"Yep, she does," Merle said. "Her and blondie spent all winter cuddling up in the forest."

"Shut up, bro!" I warned him, not knowing how long Rick could keep the samurai sword at bay.

"Hey, man," he said. "We snagged them out of the woods. Andrea was close to dying."

"There's no way she's with him," Maggie said.

"Snug as two little bugs," Merle told her, then turned his attention to Rick. "Man, look at this. Pathetic. All these guns and no bullets in me."

"You better shut up," I said. Sometimes it were like he wanted to die but was too damn arrogant to go through with it.

"Shut up yourselves you bunch of pussies," he said, squaring up to me this time. If he was about to try and give me another beating, I weren't in the mood to take it. I weren't feeling so charitable now that I'd spent enough time with him to remember that sometimes I preferred him gone. Then Rick smacked him over the head, and he crumpled to the floor.

There was blissful silence.

Glenn walked off towards the car. We followed him, left Merle lying there and Michonne hanging back.

"Merle's gotta come back with us," I said. "He's got nowhere else. We can keep him in the common room for a while until everyone gets used to the idea."

"It won't work," Rick said.

"It's gotta," I told him. I didn't see any other way. "The Governor's probably on the way to the prison right now. Merle knows how he thinks. We could use the muscle."

"I'm not having him at the prison," Maggie said.

"There's no way Merle's going to live with us without putting everyone at each other's throats," Rick said.

"So you're going to cut Merle lose and bring the last samurai home with us?" I said, pointing at where Michonne was leaning against the car.

"She's not in a state to be on her own," Maggie said.

"She did bring you guys to us..." Glenn said. Couldn't believe my damn earns. Nothing for Merle getting us out, but all the forgiveness in the world for her getting us in?

"At least let my dad stitch her up," Maggie said.

"She's too unpredictable," Rick said.

"That's right," I looked over at where she was leaning on the car, watching us talk. "We don't know who she is. Merle. Merle's blood."

"No," Glenn said. "Merle isyourblood. My blood, my family, is standing right here and waiting for us back at the prison."

"And your part of that family," Rick said to me. I weren't expecting it. A small, hard lump formed in my throat. "And he's not."

I could hear Merle groaning in the woods as he came round.

"Man, y'all don't know," I said. They didn't. They couldn't. The shit Merle and I had been through was so different from any of them. That bonds you to a person even if you don't like them. "Fine. We'll fend for ourselves."

"No," Glenn said. "That's not what I was saying."

"No him, no me," I said. Simple as that.

"Daryl, you don't have to do that," Maggie said.

"It was always Merle and me before this."

"You're just going to leave?" Glenn asked.

"You'd do the same thing," I told him. He shook his head like he didn't believe me, but I knew if this was one of his parents, he'd say goodbye to us too. Difference is, Glenn probably had the kind of parents you'd want in your group. Not like Merle. I walked away as fast as I could. Rick ran to catch up.

"We started something last night," he said. "You realise that?"

"No him, no me," I repeated. "That's all I can say. You take care of yourself. Take care of little Asskicker. Carl. He's one tough kid."

I waited to see if he'd say any more, change his mind maybe, but he didn't. So I walked to where Merle was waiting for me in the trees. He looked so smug it almost made me turn back around. But then he put one of his big, meaty arms on my shoulders. And I remembered it was him. My brother. We had a second chance.

I looked back once, and then we were gone.

We walked for a long time in no real direction. As aimless and pointless as we had been before all of this. Merle stopped to take a leak. I kept watch for Walkers.

"Man, there ain't nothing out here but mosquitoes and ants," I complained, I was starting to get hungry.

"Patience, little brother," he said. "Sooner or later a squirrel's bound to scurry across your path."

"Even so," I said. "That ain't much food."

"More than nothing," he said.

"Have better luck going to one of them houses we passed back on the turnoff," I said.

"Is that what your new friends taught you?" he said. "Hm? How to loot for booty? What happened the kid who covered our kitchen in blood tryna gut and cook his own turkey for God knows what reason?"

Supposed to a thank you for you, ungrateful jackass.

I remembered the feathers more than the blood. Only bit of blood I remembered was a smear on Naomi's chin and how she didn't notice until I reached out to wipe it off. The pain of how happy that memory made me struck me hard.

"Man, we've been out here for hours," I said. Anything to change the subject. "Why don't we find a stream, try our luck with some fish?"

"I think you're just trying to beat me back to that road, man," he said. "Get me over to that prison."

"It's got shelter," I pointed out. "Food. A pot to piss in might not be a bad idea."

"For you, maybe," he said. "Ain't gonna be no damn party for me."

If you just swallowed your damn pride and apologized it would.

"Everyone will get used to each other," I said.

"They're all dead, anyway," he said with a shrug.

"How can you be so sure?"

"Right about now, he's probably hosting a housewarming party," Merle said. "Where he's gonna bury what's left of your pals."

I should have gone with them. I should've tried harder. Maybe I could've protected them from the shit-for-brains Governor.

"Let's hook some fish," he said. "C'mon."

We started walking again. This time, we had a destination in mind. A goal. That were better than nothing.

I had a rough idea of which direction to head in. We walked for another hour or so, and then the smell of the forest changed, everything got a little bit damper. Water was nearby.

"Smells to me like the Swahatchee creek," Merle commented.

"We didn't go west enough," I said. "There's a river down there, it's got to be the Yellowjacket."

"You have a stroke, boy?" he asked. "We ain't never even come close to Yellowjacket."

"Well we didn't go west," I said again. "Just a little bit south is what I think."

"Know what I think? I may have lost my hand, but you lost your sense of direction."

"Yeah. We'll see."

"What, do you wanna bet?"

"I don't wanna bet nothing," I said. "Why does everything gotta be a competition with you?"

"Take it easy, little brother," he said. "Just trying to have a little fun here. No need to get your panties all in a bundle."

I stopped. Heard something that sounded like a baby crying. "You hear that?"

"Yeah," he said but didn't seem to care. "Wild animals getting wild."

"No, it's a baby," I said.

"Oh come on," he said. "Why don't you just piss in my ear and tell me it's raining too? That is the of a couple racoons making sweet, sweet love."

I ignored him and went to investigate. We were right by Yellowjacket river. It ran under a bridge. The crying was coming from one of the cars parked on it. A tonne of Walkers were heading towards it. I could see some guys trying to take them out from on top of some other cars, but it looked like they were in real trouble.

Ignoring Merle's shouts for me to slow down, I ran through the woods to get to the road. Reaching the bridge, I took out as many Walkers as I could. Two Mexican guys tried to say something to me, but I couldn't understand them. The baby was crying inside a car. A group of Walkers were outside trying to get in. I started shooting at them. One had managed to get in through the open trunk. I reached in and grabbed it by the jeans. He turned to get me with his cold, dead hands but I stabbed him right through the eye. Merle shot a few that were coming after me, did nothing to help anyone else.

When we were done, the family looked at me the way people sometimes look at Rick. Like they admire him or something. And then Merle opened the car door, started rooting through their stuff, and they looked at me different. Looked at me the same way people had looked at me my whole life. Like Merle and I were the same.

"Let them go," I said.

"Least they can do is give us an enchilada or something, huh?" Merle said. I could hear the baby crying, its Momma was crying too.

There was a familiar knot in my stomach. Cold. It came with watching Merle do shit I knew was wrong. So many times I'd had his back while he did some shady, harmful shit. The feeling in my stomach grew. It had been a while since I'd felt this crappy about myself.

I walked around the car to stand behind him. The family watched me do it, still looking at me like me and Merle were the same. Rick and the others had given me that look at the start too. But I'd changed it. And I could change it now.

I raised my crossbow, pointed it at Merle. The moment I did, some of the guilt left me. "Get out of the car," I said.

"I know you're not talking to me, brother," he said with a tone that instantly made my body tense, like right before a beating. I looked at the Mexican guy closest to me.

"Get in your car and get the hell out of here," I told him. "Go! Get in your car!"

I dunno if they understood, but they backed away. Merle slowly got out of the car, glaring at me all the time. I lowered my bow when the car was gone and walked away from him as fast as possible. I felt sick. My hands would've been shaking if I weren't holding my crossbow so hard. I'd never spoken to Merle like that, never defied him. I didn't know what came next.

I walked away from it all as fast as I could. Merle caught me up.

"What the shit you doing, pointing that thing at me?" he said.

"They was scared, man," I said.

"They were rude is what they were," he said. "They owed us a token of gratitude."

"Nah, they didn't owe us nothing."

"You helped them people out of the goodness of your heart, even though you might die doing it," he said. "That something your Sherrif Rick taught you?"

"There was a baby!"

"Oh, otherwise you would've just left them to the Biters, then?" he said sarcastically. He knew I were different. Took him a while, but he'd seen the change in me now. This anger he was holding against me and Rick... it were childish. Petty. More than that, it were hypocritical. How many times had he left me? He hadn't come back once.

"Man, I went back for you and you weren't there," I yelled. "I didn't cut off your hand neither. You did that."

Merle was smiling but not in a good way. With him, it's always a damn trap.

"You know what's funny to me? You and Sherriff Rick. Thick as thieves now. Right? I'll bet you a penny and a fiddle of gold that you never told him we were planning on robbing that camp blind."

Guilt twisted up my gut.

"It didn't happen," I said.

"Only because I wasn't there to help you."

"What? Like when we were kids" I yelled. "Who left who then?"

"What?" he roared. "I weren't there to hold your hand as a boy, is that why I lost mine?"

"You lost your hand because you're a simple-minded piece of shit."

"Yeah?" he lunged for me. I turned, trying to get as far away from him as I could. "You don't know-!"

I did.

I did know what he'd been running from. Because I'd had to put up with it too. I felt my shirt rip off my back as my knees hit the ground. Merle fell silent. I knew what he was looking at. My scars itched, sometimes it feels like they're burning when someone's looking at them when I didn't want them to.

"I.. I..." he stammered. "I didn't know he was..."

You really think it was just you?

"Yeah, he did," I scrambled to put my bag back on and cover them up. "He did the same to you. That's why you left first."

"I had to, man," he said. "I would've killed him otherwise."

Wish you would've.

I stood up, bag back on, my scars stopped feeling like they were on fire. A different fire were burning now, one deeper in me.

"Scars look like they healed up good," Merle said, like that somehow made any of it okay. "You must've done a good job patching them up like that."

I looked back over my shoulder at him. Think it was the first time Merle ever looked small to me. Just like that, the fire were gone. A feeling of peace washed over me and put it out as I said, "Naomi did it."

I walked away.

It was like I could still feel her hands on my back, how gently she'd cleaned me up, the way everything hurt less with her around. Listening to her breathing as I fell asleep was the first time I'd felt safe. When I'd reached for her hand in the dark and found her reaching back... It hadn't mattered then, that Merle hadn't been there for me. I'd had someone else. And I had other people now too.

"Where you going?" Merle yelled after me.

"Back where I belong."

"I can't go with you," he said. "I damn near killed that Chinese kid."

Dumbass.

"He's Korean," I corrected him.

"Whatever. Doesn't matter, man. I just can't go with you."

Your choice.

"You know, I may be the one walking away," I said. "But you're the one that's leaving. Again."

I kept walking. Merle was the one making things difficult for himself. I'd followed him down the wrong path once before and lost everything, I weren't about to do it again. Everyone at that prison were family now. Could be Merle's too if he'd let them. It ain't often you get another chance at that kind of thing.

It took him a while, but he eventually caught up to me. Walked reluctantly beside me the whole way back.

When we came in sight of the prison, it was under attack. One of the fences had fallen and Walkers had swarmed into one of the yards. I could see Rick fighting like hell against a whole group of them.

"What the hell?" I yelled, running to help him.

What happened here?

I saw a truck backing out real fast, realised it wasn't one of ours and that it had been used to ram right through it. Guns fired out from inside it as it drove away.

Cowards.

I raised my crossbow and shot as many Walkers near Rick as I could. Heard pistol shots behind me as Merle joined in. I knew he were only doing it to get on my good side, but it was a step. And that made me happy all the same.

When Rick was safe, he put an arm aross my shoulders, "Welcome back."

I felt a rush of warmth, tried to hide my smile.

We all ran for the gates, which were opened for us. What had happened was bad, but Merle warned us that it was a warm-up to the main event.

Nobody was happy to hear that, least of all from him.

We talked for a long time about whether or not to take Merle's advice and run. But, when all was said and done, Rick decided we should stay. So that's what we did.

Next time the alarm was raised, it was because Andrea was at the gates. Few days ago, that sight would've filled us with nothing but joy. Now, though, after the truck-through-the-fence trick, we weren't so sure. Andrea had been gone for a while. By all accounts, she was close with the Governor. Was he using her to lure us into a trap?

We ran out to open the gates for her. Rick searched her, checked she was alone. When he was satisfied she weren't an immediate threat, he brought her inside.

Carol rushed to hug her, the rest of us hung back.

"We thought you were dead..." Carol said as a half-apology, half explanation for why we'd left her behind.

"It's okay," she said and looked around at the rest of us. "Hershel... my God."

He glanced down at where the lower half of one of his legs used to be until we'd had to chop it off after he got bit. He was so quick on his crutches that I kinda forgot how recently it had happened and that the last time Andrea saw him, he'd had both legs. By now, she'd done a full headcount, noticed that Lori, Shane and T-Dog were all gone.

"You all live here?" she asked.

"Here and the Cell Block," Glenn said, with a nod through the door.

Andrea followed his gaze, "There? Can I go in?"

"I won't allow that," Rick said.

Andrea was taken aback. "I'm not an enemy, Rick."

"We had that field," he told her, "and that courtyard until your boyfriend tore down the fence with a truck and shot us up."

"He said you fired first!"

"He's lying."

"I didn't know anything about that," she said. It sounded sincere enough, but people are good liars these days. There was every chance she was mad at us for leaving her on the farm, and this was some kind of revenge. "As soon as I found out, I came. I didn't even know you were in Woodbury until after the shoot out."

"That was days ago," Glenn said.

"I don't get it, I left Atlanta with you people, and now I'm the odd man out?"

"He almost killed Michonne," Glenn said, "and he would've killed us."

"With his finger on the trigger," Andrea pointed at my brother. Merle smirked but didn't rise to catch the bait. "Isn't he the one who kidnapped you? Who beat you? Look... I cannot excuse or explain what Philip has done, but we have to work this out."

"There's nothing to work out," Rick said. "We're gonna kill him."

"We can settle this," Andrea pleaded. "There is room at Woodbury for all of you."

Merle laughed, "You know better than that."

"What makes you think this man wants to negotiate?" Hershel asked. "Did he say that?"

"No."

"Then why did you come here?" Rick asked.

"Because he's gearing up for war. The people are terrified, they see you as killers," Andrea said. "They're training to attack."

"I'll tell you what, " I told her. "Next time you see Phillip, you tell him I'm gonna take his other eye."

"We've taken too much shit for too long," Glenn agreed. "If he wants a war, he's got one."

"Rick?" she tried to reason with him instead. "If you don't sit down and try to work this out, I don't know what's gonna happen. He has a whole town. Look at you. You've lost so much already."

Dale. T-Dog. Lori. Shane. An ever-growing list of people.

"You wanna make this right," Rick said, "you get us inside."

"No."

"Then we got nothing to talk about," he shrugged and walked away from her.

"There are innocent people-" she yelled after him, but he didn't stop. She looked at the rest of us.

"You heard him," I shrugged and followed Rick into the Cell Block.

Andrea stayed around for a little bit. She got to meet the baby, I think she smoothed things over with Michonne. If nobody mentioned the Governor or Woodbury, things were almost normal. Then, it was time for her to go. Rick gave her one of our cars, and she tried again to persuade him into some kind of peace treaty. Something she said that time must've stuck because the next day he took Michonne and Carl on a run to get more guns and ammo, the day after that he and the Governor shut themselves away for a negotiation.

When he came back, he told us the Governor couldn't be reasoned with and that we should prepare for war. But something weren't right about it, and he took Hershel and me aside.

"He wants Michonne," Rick said. "If we hand her over, he'll back off."

I immediately felt uneasy about it, most of all because of how seriously Rick seemed to be considering the idea. "He'll kill her, you know that, right?"

"It's the only way," he said like his mind were already made up. "Noone else knows."

"You gonna tell them?" I asked.

"Not until after," he said. "We have to do it today. It has to be quiet."

"You got a plan?"

"You tell her we need to talk, away from the others."

I looked at Hershel. He avoided my gaze.

"It just ain't us, man," I said.

"No," Hershel agreed. "No, it isn't."

Too angry to stick around, he walked away from us.

"Do this, and we avoid a fight," Rick said. "Noone else dies."

Without Hershel to back me up, it was hard to say no. But I felt like I was following Merle down the wrong path all over again. It weren't supposed to feel like this with Rick.

"Got it," I nodded. But it felt all sorts of wrong.

"We need someone else," Rick said.

We both knew who he meant. I wondered if that was the only reason Rick had confided in me about all of this.

"I'll talk to him," I said.

"I'll do it," he said. "Just me."

I watched him go, feeling like the whole world were topsy turvy.

I walked around into another part of the yard and saw Glenn trying to fix up one of the weaker gates. With one fence down, every little helped. Things had been wierd between us since I'd brought Merle back. He'd been cold with me, kinda avoided me as much as possible. I got it. But it sucked. I went to help him, hoping that now it was just me and him, he'd stop giving me so much of the cold shoulder.

"He say he was sorry yet?" I asked. Glenn didn't reply, just stared blankly ahead of him not making eye contact with me. "Cause he is."

He kept ignoring me, walked away.

"He's gonna make it right," I said and then, because I knew that wouldn't carry much weight with Glenn, I added, "I'm gonna make him. There's got to be a way. Just needs to be a little... forgiveness is all."

He looked at me then, stepped a little closer. "He tied me to a chair, beat me, and threw a Walker in the room," he said. I closed my eyes for a sec, cursing Merle. "Maybe I could call it even. But he... he took Maggie to a man who terrorised her, humiliated her. I care more about her than I care about me."

I got it.

I knew that feeling.

I also knew anyone who'd put me in the same position would be a dead man walking. Even if it were Merle. I couldn't argue, couldn't defend him, just picked up my crossbow and left.

I went looking for Merle, found him in the generator room. Skulking around in the dark. I was immediately suspicious because I'd called for him a few times and he hadn't answered. When I rounded the corner and saw him, he fixed this big, guilty grin on his face.

"Hey, little brother!" he said. "I was just about to holler back at you."

I knew it was a lie.

"What you doing down here?"

"Just looking for a little uh, crystal meth," he a junkie, always a junkie."Yeah, I know. I shouldn't mess my life up when everything's going so sweet right?"

Crappy joke.

"You talked to Rick yet?"

"Yeah. I'm in," he said. "But he ain't got the stomach for it. He's gonna buckle, you know that right?"

"Yeah," I said, kinda hoping he would. "If he does, he does."

"You want him to?"

Merle was looking at me different, like he were tryna spot a change. I shrugged and said, "Whatever he says goes."

"Man! Do you even possess a pair of balls, little brother? You used to call people like that sheep," he said. "What happened to you?"

Called them sheep when I was blindly following you. Least now I've chosen who I stand behind.

"What happened with you and Glenn and Maggie-" I tried to keep my voice level.

"I've done worse," he cut across me. "You need to grow up. Things are different now. Y'all people look at me like I'm the devil. Grabbing up those lovebirds like that. Now y'all wanna do the same thing, snatch someone up and deliver them to the Governor. People do what they gotta do, or they die."

"Can't do things without people anymore, man," I said. I wasn't sure that you ever really could. Much as I thought of myself as not needing anyone, I'd only got through shit because of who was around me. Even at my worst, when I'd been following Merle like one of them damn sheep I claimed not to be, I'd only done it so I wouldn't be without my brother.

"Maybe these people need somebody like me around, huh? Do their dirty work," he said. Sounded kinda mad about it. "The bad guy. How does that hit ya?"

I put a hand on his arm. "I just want my brother back."

"I'm here, man," he said. But he weren't. Not really. I left him. Let him get back to hunting for drugs if that was what he needed to get through this.

I was sure that in time, he'd see. He'd see that being around good people was all you really needed. If I could change, he could too.

I went back outside to check the parameters, cleared a few Walkers. After a while, it just became like weeding a garden. It was okay to let a few of them hang out, but too many could become a real problem real fast.

Rick caught up with me. He looked stressed. "It's off," he said quietly. "We'll take our chances."

I felt a huge sense of relief.

"Not saying it was the wrong call," I told him. "But this is definitely the right one."

He still looked worried. "I can't find Merle or Michonne," he said. "They've gone."

Shit.

"C'mon," I said, and ran back to where I'd last seen Merle in the engine room. Rick followed. "He was in here. Said he was looking for drugs. Said a lot of things, actually."

"Like what?"

Called it how he saw it, like always.

"Said that you were going to change your mind. Here we go," I bent down, picked up a dirty pillowcase, saw some marks on the ground that indicated a struggle. "He took her here."

"Damnit," Rick said. "I'm going after her."

"You can't track for shit," I said.

"Well then the both of us."

It was a waste of time, both of us going. Merle weren't likely to listen to Rick about anything. I was the only one who had a chance of reasoning with him.

"Nah. Just me. When they come back here, you need to be ready," I hesitated, looked at him. "You're family too."

Then I left as fast as I could. I ain't so good at being corny, but I needed him to know that what he'd said on the road... it were mutual. Merle was a blood brother, Rick was a brother of another kind.

The trail was pretty easy to follow. Merle ain't good at cleaning up after himself and don't much care who knows where he's been.

Not too far from the prison, I spotted Michonne on the road, walking back in the direction of the camp. She put her sword through a Walker skull. I looked for Merle close by, maybe pissing in the bushes, but couldn't see him.

"Hey!" I called to her. "Where's my brother?" She looked up. Did not smile. "You kill him?"

She shook her head. "He let me go."

Then where the hell is he?

"Don't let anyone come after me," I told her, although I were pretty sure nobody would try. I ran in the direction she'd been coming from, to see if I could track the car.

I followed some tyre marks on the road, kept to the general direction of Woodbury. I didn't know where he'd head after letting Michonne go. Couldn't work out why he'd done it either. Would he try and make peace with the Governor? Would he sell us all down the river? Or were he trying to make things right in his own, fucked up way?

I came to an old food store. The place was in carnage. There were a few Walkers there, but most were too busy feeding to pay me any attention. Something bad had gone down here. And recently too. Lots of fresh meat around for all of those dead assholes. I checked the faces of the freshly dead, felt a tiny spark of relief for each one who wasn't Merle.

Then I saw his jacket. Bent over the body of a recently dead girl. I could hear him eating, smell the stench of death on him from a mile away.

Only it weren't him any more.

Not really.

The Walker looked up at me with my brother's eyes. Still chewing on its latest meal with my brother's teeth.

No.

He got to his feet. Eyes fixed on me. Seeing me without knowing me.

He stood up straight, stumbled towards me. I could see he'd taken a gunshot to the chest. It was like I could feel the same pain in my own.

Everything blurred. He got closer. I pushed him away.

Please, man. Please.

I'd never thought that Walkers had enough brains in them to recognize people, but I wanted more than anything for some tiny part of Merle to be surviving in there. For him to recognize his little brother. He didn't even have to say anything. He could just leave me alone, so I didn't have to kill him.

He's already dead.

He came at me. Again.

I shoved him. Again.

Again.

The fourth time, I drew my knife, pushed him back.

Why?

I jammed it into his skull.

Why?

I did it again.

Why? Why? Why?

I'd got him the first time but there was so much anger in me that it pushed my hand again and again. Just when I thought there was a chance for Merle. Just when I thought we were getting somewhere. He'd fucking left. Again. Always walking away.

My hands hurt, covered in the blood of my brother, I fell back onto the grass. Burning rage turned to sadness.

Why do you always leave me on my own?

Chapter 14: Sanctuaries Lost

Summary:

Winter hits, and Naomi and her group follow signs to a promising sanctuary.

Daryl finds some wild pigs near the prison and leads an urgent medical run.

Naomi

Winter was hard, I wasn't sure we were gonna make it.

It snowed. I used to love when it snowed, hearing it crunch under our feet in the woods while it made everything else so much quieter. We'd throw snowballs at each other until our fingers were so cold we couldn't feel them any more. In the evenings, if Momma had passed out or Daryl's dad were at the bar, we'd wrap ourselves up in the same comforter and watch movies until we'd warmed up again. If our parents were around, we'd find somewhere to light a fire outside. Daryl would make fun of me for bringing a book, but he'd shut up and listen when I read to him, and complain if I stopped too early. Sometimes he'd fall asleep listening to me, and I'd fold down a corner of the page so I'd know where to pick up again next time.

Winters like that made me miss Georgia when Mia and I were in DC. It weren't the same in the city without the peace of the woods.

I looked around at the group; tired and miserable. Mia and Perla were wrapped in blankets by the fire. They had been making up some kind of elaborate secret handshake with each other, but they'd got bored of that now and were staring listlessly at the centre of the fire. Jack was asleep, his arm around Izzy, she was staring blankly up at the ceiling. Jose sat a little apart from everyone else, reading a book he'd read before.

I got to my feet, walked over to where Lucas and Dee were taking stock of our remaining firewood.

"Will you two come with me for a sec?" I asked quietly.

"What?" Dee looked up. There were bags under her eyes, and she was wearing two pairs of gloves. "Why?"

I glanced over at Mia and Perla. "Just come with me, will ya?" I whispered.

They looked at one another, tired and suspicious, but the mystery of it was enough for them to follow me out of the gym hall and into the corridor.

"Fucking freezing here," Dee complained, folding her arms across her chest.

"Yeah, sorry," I said, pushing open the door to the cafeteria. "I just..."

"You want to do ration inventory again?" Lucas asked. I could tell he was holding back a sigh. "Because I did it last week and-"

"No," I said. "I mean, not really. It's just... it's Mia's Birthday."

"What, today?" Dee asked. "What date is it?"

"I don't know," I admitted. We'd all stopped counting long ago. "But I reckon it's gotta be at least early December. Which means Mia's Birthday is now-ish. Now-enough."

"You want to do something for it?" Lucas asked, his eyes were a little brighter already, thawing out of the bad mood we'd all been in for weeks.

"Yeah."

"Like what?" Dee asked, but she'd dropped her confrontational attitude and now just seemed kinda excited.

"I know we need to be careful with the rations we've got," I said. "But I'm sure there's flour and some condensed milk in there. I also think I saw powdered eggs, so..."

"You wanna make a cake?" Dee said.

"Yeah," I said. "It probably won't be much good, but it might cheer everyone up a bit."

"I'm down for it," Dee said.

"Me too," said Lucas. "Although... I'm not much of a baker."

"Me neither," I said. "I tried to make a cake for my friend's birthday one year. Totally forgot the flour. So it was just this weird, eggy, sugary... thing."

"Oh God," Lucas looked horrified.

"I iced it and everything," I said, enjoying how much this was amusing them.

"You didn't give it to anyone, though?" he asked, holding back a laugh.

"Sure did. Candles and all."

"Oh, God."

"Still ate it," I said with a shrug, "didn't do us any harm."

I neglected to mention that I hadn't found a food Daryl wouldn't eat. He was the one who'd discovered that worms could be an effective snack to tide you over when our traps were empty.

"Naomi, don't take this the wrong way," Dee said. "But that sounds godawful, and you are not in charge of this cake."

"Harsh," Lucas chuckled.

"I'm sure we all want Mia to have a good Birthday," Dee said sternly. "Not get food poisoning."

"Alright," I laughed. "Point taken. Would you do the honours?"

"Wouldn't have it any other way," Dee said and pushed open the door to the old school kitchen. When we'd first moved in, we'd had to clear a few undead dinner ladies out of it, and been lucky to find a decent amount of canned or long-life food. I guess school meals weren't as fresh as they claimed to be.

"Okay," Lucas said in a very business-like tone. "Everything we have is catalogued and itemized. We need to mark off what we use."

He tapped a sheet of paper that he'd stuck to the door, an organized list of the food items we'd managed to find and how much we had left. Lucas and I shared the same love of organizational lists. Discovering the school's stationery cupboard had made both of us an extremely excitable nightmare for everyone else.I headed over to get the flour.

"Where do you think you're going?" Dee snapped. I paused in the middle of the kitchen and looked back at her.

"Just... getting some flour," I said. She frowned. "That alright?"

"Yes," she said. "Just don't do anything with it until I say so."

"Yes, ma'am," I gave her a little salute. She narrowed her eyes at me, but she looked less mad.

Under Dee's careful instruction, Lucas and I helped mix together flour, powdered eggs, condensed milk and cocoa powder. There was a moment of high-stress from Dee when she couldn't find any of the bicarbonate of soda that was on Lucas's inventory. They had a little spat about how accurate his system was, while I found it at the back of a cupboard they hadn't looked in.

"There we go," I said, handing it carefully over to Dee. "No need to worry."

"Told you we had some," Lucas sulked.

"Well, it wasn't where you said it would be," Dee muttered. He glared at her, and we poured the mixture into the only baking tin we could find. There was a small amount of gas still connected to the oven. We'd been using it sparingly and only on the coldest nights. Dee and Lucas still not really speaking to each other, we set about clearing up while the cake baked.

"Something smells nice," Izzy said from the doorway. She looked around at us kinda suspiciously. "What are you doing in here?"

"We're making a Birthday cake for Mia," Lucas said.

"Well, we're trying to," Dee added hastily. "It might not turn out great, we've had to use dried ingredients, which I've never done before, and I don't have a recipe to follow, so-"

"Smells great," Izzy said. I caught her eye, and we both did our best not to laugh. Dee was taking this incredibly seriously. She was so flustered and frazzled by the whole thing, desperate for it to be absolutely perfect. It was kinda cute.

"I wonder if we could find any games around here," Lucas said. "School's got to have something for rainy days, right?"

"Maybe," Izzy nodded. She looked thoughtful. "There's an art classroom somewhere. I think I saw some paints. I could make a Birthday banner... if you like?"

"Really?" I said. "That would be great."

"I'll get Jack to help," she said, with a bright smile.

"Mia's going to notice we're all disappearing," Dee said. Then, she glanced at me. "I mean... if you were planning on this being a surprise."

I hadn't thought about it. I hadn't planned on this being anything until about a minute before I'd asked them to help me with the cake. And now, thanks to my friends, this was snowballing into a full surprise party. I looked at Izzy, who was hesitating in the doorway.

"Tell José to take her and Perla out for a bit," I said. "Tell them to build a snowman or have a snowball fight or something. That should buy us enough time to set up the hall with some games and stuff."

Izzy nodded and sprang into action. Lucas and I went to search the classroom for games. We found Twister, Clue, Monopoly and a bunch of jigsaws that might not have still had all of their pieces. William raided the cupboards in the gym hall and set up an obstacle course of his own design. Izzy and Jack came back with some homemade decorations. We were just finishing putting them up when Mia and Perla burst through the door. Their faces were flushed from the cold outside.

"Woah!" Mia said, looking around her in wonder, taking in the banner with her name on it. She ran over to where I was standing on a chair trying to fix some streamers to the wall. "Did you do this?"

"We all did," I said and then laughed as she hugged my legs.

"Thank you," she said. She looked shyly around at everyone else, "Thanks, everyone."

Mia and Perla ran William's obstacle course about four times to warm up from the cold they'd been in outside. They only took a break when Dee came through, nervously carrying her cake.

We all sang Happy Birthday and, although Dee kept apologizing for it "not being a proper cake", none of us had had real cake in so long that it wound up tasting like the best damn cake we'd ever got the fire going and played games well into the night. For once, the hall was full of laughter and relaxed chatter.

At the end of it all, we sat down, and I read Mia's favourite parts of A Christmas Carol. She made me do it in Muppet voices because that had been her favourite Christmas movie, and she just didn't think the book was as good without got tired and fell asleep halfway through. Other people started to turn in for the night, but Mia was so hyped from the day that I didn't think she'd ever get to came to sit down next to me. Tired and happy.

"Happy Birthday, kid," I said. "Sorry, it ain't much."

"I had the best day," she rested her head on my shoulder. "One of my best Birthdays."

"Really?" I said, seemed unbelievable, but sweet of her to say. "What about when the Winter Carnival came to town, and we ate nothing but candied apples and corndogs?"

"Ohh, yeah," she said. "And the hot chocolates!"

"Yeah, that hot chocolate was almost as big as you were," I said.

"Yeah, that was a good Birthday too," she said. "Although I didn't like the clowns."

"Nobody does," I said. "I don't know why they insist on having them."

"Probably too scared to fire them," Mia said.

I laughed. "Probably."

We sat by the fire for a while, which was starting to die down. Mia reached for another comforter and pulled it around us both.

"What was your best Birthday?" she asked. There was really only one that stuck out. I reached for my bag.

"I ever tell you how I got this?"

"No."

"A friend made it for me," I said.

"Really? Who?"

"You remember Daryl?"

"Of course."

"He made it," I looked down at the bag and smiled. The hall was getting, but the memory kept me warm.

"How old were you?"

"Sixteen," I said. "I'd kinda forgotten it was my Birthday."

"You forgot your Birthday?" Mia asked incredulously.

"Er... you forgot yours too," I pointed out.

"Yeah, but we don't have any clocks or calendars," she said. "And it's probably not my real Birthday. What was your excuse?"

"I knew it was soon," I laughed. "I was just too busy to realize it. Momma had been away for a long time. I had to pull all of these crazy shifts at the diner I was working at to make up for the rent we'd missed."

Mia looked surprised. "Where did she go?"

"No idea," I said. "Not sure Momma did either. She was real sick when she came back. I missed a lot of school trying to take care of her, lost track of the days."

"Sounds like a bad Birthday so far," Mia said.

"Yeah," I agreed. "I was in a crappy mood."

"And then what?"

"And then Daryl knocked on the door-."

"And he gave you the bag?" Mia asked, interrupting the story she was so damn eager to hear.

"Yeah, kind of. We walked up to the top of the hill first. You know, the one that looks towards Atlanta?"

"Where the log is?" Mia asked. I nodded. "Did you know your name's written on it?"

"Yeah, who do you think carved it there, dummy? We hung out up there a lot," I said. "So, he gave me my bag, and we sat there and ate a cake."

"A whole cake?" she asked.

"Yup," I said. "Felt pretty sick after."

Mia touched my bag and then, looking thoughtful, she reached over and picked up Kineival. "Did he make the bear too?"

"Nah," I said. "We found that little guy on the way home from school. Think Daryl must've welded him on there. Welded him good too, he ain't fallen off once in all these years."

Mia smiled at the little bear and then let him rest gently against the bag again. She looked at me out of the corner of her eye, "You think he's still out there?"

"Who? Daryl?"

"Yeah."

"Probably," I said. Might have been a nieve hope but it didn't feel that way. "He's tough as nails. If anyone can survive this, it's him."

She still had a sly little smile on her face, "Maybe you'll find him again."

"Maybe," I said. The thought of it twisted my stomach with horrible nerves. "Dunno if he'd want to see me again."

"Why? Because you had a big fight?"

"Yeah."

"He doesn't care about that."

She said it so matter-of-factly that it made me laugh, "How would you know? You haven't seen him since you was little."

"Yes I have!" she said, and I felt a whole mix of shit. I'd specifically told him to stay away from my family. I'd said it in anger. I'd said it to stop the Dixon brothers from selling shit to Momma and fucking things up for Mia. But a tiny part of me had also said it to hurt him. I knew he loved Mia like she were his blood too, but that didn't mean shit when it came to Merle trying to sell to Momma. I couldn't put Mia at risk. Daryl had to have known that, right? Would he really have gone behind my back like that?

Sadness and rage must have shown on my face. Mia looked concerned it was her I was mad at rather than a mix of Daryl and myself. She cleared her throat, "I saw him when we went to his dad's funeral."

"What?"

"He made me promise I wouldn't tell you," she said, looking a little bit guilty. "Because he knew you were looking for him and he didn't want you to find him-"

"Well, there you go then," I said, quickly. Her words stung, and I didn't want to get mad at her on her pretend Birthday. "He doesn't want to-"

"He missed you," she insisted. "I could tell."

She'd always been like this, always acted older and wiser than her years, but there was no way she could know how complicated the situation was. I shook my head. "No, you couldn't."

"He asked about you," she said. "Wanted to know you were doing okay. He was just as miserable as you are. I think you're both dumb for having that fight."

You and me both, kid.

"I'm not miserable," I said because it was the only point I could really argue with her about. Then, I looked around where we were, "I mean, things ain't great right now, but they won't always be so bad. And we've been so lucky to get through what we have-"

"That's not what I mean," Mia reached for her own bag. "I want you to be happy. And you were never really happy, not even in DC. He made you happy."

"You can't possibly remember that," I said. "You were so little when we fell out."

"I don't remember much," she admitted. "But I know you were never as happy as you are here."

She pulled a photograph out of a small, zipped compartment in her bag and handed it to me. There were three of us in it. Me, with cake all around my mouth and balancing baby-Mia on my hip. Daryl was standing next to me, holding a half-eaten slice of cake in his bare hand. We were grinning like idiots under the Happy 1st Birthday Mia sign we'd painted on an old bedsheet, not half as pretty as the one Izzy had just made. I had a vague memory of Momma taking the picture, but I'd never seen it. I'd just assumed she'd never bothered to get it developed and it had sat around in a pile of other shit she'd forgotten to do.

"Where'd you get this?" I asked.

"I've always had it," she shrugged. "Brought it when I moved in with you. It's my favourite picture of you. Actually, no, it's my second favourite. My favourite is the one we took at the beach, do you remember?"

"Where we had ice-cream moustaches?" I said. She nodded. "Yeah, I like that one too."

"But that one is on your phone, and I can't look at it anymore so now this one is my favourite."

"Why'd you never show me this?"

"Didn't want to make you sad," she shrugged, and then she looked worried she might be in trouble for it. "You can keep it if you like."

"Nah, that's okay," I passed it back to her. Looking at it too long had made my heart hurt. She put it carefully into her bag and sat back, resting her head on my shoulder.

"Love you, Naomi."

"Love you too," I said.

The good feelings from Mia's fake birthday lasted for maybe a week. Winter dragged on. Things got worse, colder. Our food supplies were getting low, and the hall was either full of smoke or absolutely freezing. I started giving half of my rations to Mia without her knowing. She was getting too skinny. I saw Jose doing the same for Perla.

William and Jack kept going on runs to find food in the houses around us. But they were coming back with less and less. One day they came back empty-handed but with huge smiles. I wondered if if the weeks of ice and snow and empty stomachs had proven too much and they'd finally cracked.

"Guys," William looked more hopeful than he had in months. Their sudden energy clashed against the downbeat mood of the hall. "We've found something by the railroad tracks."

"What?" Dee asked wearily.

"If it wasn't food or firewood, I'm not sure I care," Izzy said.

"Let him talk, will ya?" Jack snapped. She glared at him, but was too tired to snap back.

"No, it ain't food or firewood," William said. "But someone's put a sign there. Says there's a Sanctuary if we follow it."

I sat up straighter, even though my body was exhausted. "You think it's for real?"

"Could be a trap," Lucas said.

Jack looked sceptical, "A trap for what? Our minimal supply of old school dinners?"

"It does seem weird," Dee said. Nobody disagreed. Although nobody could come up with an explanation for what they'd be trapping us into either. "Did you see who left it there?"

"No," William said. "All I know is, it wasn't there two days ago. So it must be recent. Which means this place is probably close."

"Should we check it out?" José asked.

William shrugged, "What do we have to lose?"

Again, nobody disagreed.

"I don't know..." Lucas hesitated.

"I vote we go," I said. Staying here and waiting to starve to death was as much of a death sentence as walking into a trap. "We're almost out of everything here."

"Me too," Izzy said. "I can't look at these fucking walls anymore."

"I'm in," José said. Perla looked up at him, then back at the rest of us and nodded. Since Blanca had died, they'd been almost inseparable.

Dee and Lucas reluctantly agreed. We packed up as much as we could. The rest of our food supplies were laid out on the ground around us. With no idea how long we'd be walking for, we ate until we were full and packed the rest. We would all need as much of our strength as we could muster.

William led us to where he'd found the sign by the railway tracks. Sure enough, someone had written the words; 'Sanctuary for all. Community for all. Those who arrive survive.' I'd been out here before and couldn't remember seeing it, but as we all stared at it, I couldn't be sure it was new. Maybe it had always been there, and it was only now that we were starving for hope that we decided to pay it any attention.

"Ain't very descriptive, is it?" I said, already so cold that I was half thinking about turning back around. At least the empty school was a fraction warmer.

"I guess we just follow the tracks," William said. "There might be more signs along the way."

"Alright," said Lucas. "Let's do this."

We walked for a full day, carrying everything we owned on our backs. The only good thing about the cold was that it seemed to slow the dead down a little bit. Some of them had frozen to the ground itself, and we could walk right by without having to use any energy taking any of them it started to get dark, we took a break to eat something.

"Can we stop?" Perla asked quietly. "I'm tired. My toes are cold."

"I'm tired too," Mia said. Her face was so pale, except the tip of her nose which had turned bright red.

I'd stopped being able to feel my toes a few miles back. It was only going to get colder. But the flimsy tents we'd brought weren't much protection against that.

"We can't camp here," Jack said, just saying out loud what the rest of us already knew to be true. "We'll freeze to death."

"Agreed," Dee sighed, her breath coming out in clouds in front of her. Mia and Perla looked close to tears with exhaustion.

I looked at José. "We might have to carry them," I said. He nodded.

"Share the load out of your packs," Lucas said. "If we spread it around the group, it won't be too bad, and you can take the kids."

José and I unpacked almost everything, giving a few items to each of our friends to carry. I took Mia on my back, José took Perla on his, and we began the walk again.

Dee and Lucas walked behind us, keeping an eye out for any of the dead who might be following our trail. Jack and William took the front, hunting for more signs that pointed towards the supposed Sanctuary.

There were moments where I didn't think we were going to make it. Each step I took, I was sure that I was getting closer to my last. My whole body ached. I kept looking at José, who was struggling to hold Perla up as the night went on. It was a lot for sixteen-year-old to manage. I kept thinking about his mother, the promises I'd made her.

"Take a break," I said to him.

"We can't stop," he said. "If we stop moving, we'll freeze."

"Let Lucas take Perla for a while," I said. "Rest your back. You're no good to her if you're dead on your feet."

He looked like he wanted to argue with me but was too cold to do so. I beckoned Lucas over, and he gave José his backpack while he piggybacked Perla the rest of the way. Dawn came and went, it was almost midday by the time we came in sight of the train station. On the side of the building, in tall letters, was the word 'Terminus'. We stopped.

"Think this is it?" Lucas asked, setting Perla down on the ground. I put Mia down too. They stood next to each other, looking tired and scared.

"This has to be it," Dee said. "We've followed every sign. We've walked for so long."

"Only one way to find out, I guess," I said. Mia's hand slipped into mine as we made our way to what had once been the main door. I hesitated, knocked, and then we all took a giant step back. My hand automatically moved to the hilt of a knife I had slipped through my belt hook.

A middle-aged woman with light blonde hair and sharp blue eyes greeted us at the door. Worn out and exhausted, none of us knew what to say. I stepped in front of Mia and Perla as I saw her looking at them. She glanced up at me and smiled.

"Welcome to Terminus," she said. Her voice was calm and non-threatening. She looked at us with pity. "I'm Mary. You're all very brave to make this trip in such terrible conditions."

There was a hesitation from around me. I looked around at everyone, they all looked back at me.

"I'm Naomi," I said because that seemed to be what everyone was waiting for. "We saw y'all had some signs up along the railway tracks."

Mary gave us a broad and friendly smile. "Well, you're in the right place," she said. "Why don't you come in out of the cold? You look exhausted."

We were. But none of us took a step forward.

"You got room for all of us?" I asked. If this place was legit, it would be alright if she could only take the kids. I'd rather give Mia and Perla a future than have them die in the cold with us.

"More the merrier," she said. "Come on inside. You're just in time for lunch."

There weren't much else we could do or verify from where we were. The courtyard we were in was full of snow and ice, might've been full of people if it were summer but I guessed most of them were all inside now. I walked towards her, felt everyone else fall into step behind me. Mary stepped back from the doorway to let us in. I could smell something cooking. My stomach rumbled immediately.

"Smells good in here," I said. "You guys cooking something?"

"Soup," she said. "Not much meat here, but we managed to grow a good amount of veggies when the weather was still warm.."

"Naomi here is an A-grade hunter," Lucas said, patting me on the back. I felt myself go red. "I'm sure, come the warmer weather, she can get some meat in those soups too."

Mary chuckled. "That would be much appreciated."

Away from the icy winds and the snow that made it all strangely quiet, the inside of Terminus was bustling. Kids younger and older than Mia ran around the old benches of what had been a waiting room. There were toys and books. I could hear people chatting and laughing, the whole thing felt like a dream. It was warm too, enough of a contrast from the weather outside that my fingers started to hurt as they warmed up.

Mary's sons, Gareth and Alex, came to greet us. They showed us around, gave us some food and let us rest awhile. Everyone slept in the same large part of the station. There were old camping mats and mattresses laid down. It was the best sleep any of us had had in months.

I didn't count, but there must have been at least thirty survivors there. It felt like a Utopia. Like all of the luckiest people on Earth had come together under one roof.

It weren't long before the weather changed either, and Spring started to move in. Mary showed the kids how to plant stuff and tend to their old vegetable patches outside. I went hunting, took other people with me and showed them how to string up and bleed out bigger catches. Mia and Perla made friends. After a month or two, I stopped worrying about this place falling apart. Things felt genuinely stable for the first time in a long time.

"Hey, Naomi," someone called over to me. I looked up from the book I was reading.

"You alright, Gareth?" I asked.

"Yeah," he said. "I'm just about to go on a supply, would you mind taking over the broadcast today?"

"Not at all," I smiled. "Show me how it's done?"

He led me to the communications room, full of dusty old computers and a battery-operated radio. "We send out one broadcast every hour," he said. "Turn it off in between to save on battery. Everything you need to say is on this piece of paper. Got it?"

"Got it," I said.

"Thanks for doing this," he gave me a pat on the back and left me to it. For what sounds like a tedious job, it was actually pretty exciting to think of all the people I might be broadcasting to.

Every hour, on the dot, I'd turn it on and say, "Sanctuary can be found at the North Georgia Rail Terminus. Sanctuary for all. Community for all. Those who arrive survive."

I enjoyed it so much, I volunteered to do it again whenever I could. It meant I went to bed with a huge sense of peace. Even though we hadn't had anyone new show up here in a while, I thought about who might have heard me. People that would get some hope from our message, who'd follow it and finally find a safe place in all of this madness. I never thought, not in a million years, of the violence it would bring to our door.

They came in the dead of night.

I only woke up when Mia screamed.

I don't know if it was a reflex from waking up when she cried in the night as a baby, but I knew it was her before I even remembered where I was. It was still dark. I reached out to see if she was still lying where she should be, beside me. She weren't.

I sat up.

A hand clamped down over my mouth.

"Don't move," a man growled in my ear. I did not recognize his voice. "One wrong move and we'll hurt the kids. Got it?"

I nodded to show I understood.

Another guy towered over me. He was holding a struggling Mia in his arms, a meaty hand over her mouth. Her eyes met mine, and for a second, she was still.

The man behind me said, "You make a move or a noise, and we'll hurt her. And if she screams, we'll hurt you. Do you both understand?"

We both nodded. I could hear people creeping in the dark around us, kids being snatched up from their beds, threatening whispers as people woke up. The guy behind me took his hand away from my mouth and tired both of mine behind my back.

"This one yours?" the guy holding Mia asked, giving her a shake. I nodded. My hands now firmly tied, the guy behind me moved around and shone his torch in my face.

"Bit young to have a kid this old, aren't you," he said, sneering at me. "How old were you when you had this one, you little slut?"

"That's my sister!" Mia said defiantly. I froze. My heart grew cold with dread. Her voice had woken up some other people.

"I told you to shut the hell up," the guy holding her said. I thought he was going to kill her. But instead, the guy who'd tied my hands struck me across the mouth with his heavy, metal torch. I tasted blood. But I was just glad it was me and not her. The shock of it made Mia start weeping. But it was silent. I knew she was blaming herself for what had just happened.

They made all of the kids line up against one wall and tied the adults up on the opposite one.

Please just rob us and go, I thought. Please take what you want and leave us.

Without saying anything else, they started forcing the kids out of the room. I watched Mia struggle against a guy who was trying to get her to move. I watched them all looking at her and then each other, trying to decide whether she was too much trouble and if they should just kill her now.

"Mia!" I called to her. She stopped. Looked at me with tears streaming down her face. The whole room tensed up. We weren't supposed to speak. Everyone knew that. "It's okay. Just do what they say. You'll be alright."

"Best listen to her," the guy in front of me warned her. She stopped and fixed her sad, scared eyes on me. I did my best not to look scared. If she thought I were brave, maybe she would be too.

"It's going to be alright, Mia," I said again. I sounded so calm I almost believed it myself. The rest of the kids relaxed a bit too, and they were all lead off somewhere else.

I only let myself feel scared when she was actually gone. I looked up at the guy that seemed to be in charge.

"Please don't hurt them," I whispered.

He crouched down, got real close to my face. "That was real helpful, little lady, thank you," he said. There was something cold and dead about his eyes. I'd rather have been staring at one of the dead. He stood up and looked at the adults he had lined up. "If anyone steps out of line, we'll kill the kids. You got that?"

I stared at the ground, an icy knot of dread in the pit of my stomach. Nobody said anything, too scared that if we did they'd hurt the children. I could hear people sobbing around me.

We were taken out of the building, to where old train cars that used to transport goods now sat empty and unused. The split us up, arbitrarily forcing us into one of three. Nobody fought. Nobody struggled. Nobody could see any of our kids.

The container they shoved me in to was dark and cold. I caught sight of Dee, huddled in a corner. Neither of us dared move until the door shut. I ran to her, threw my arms around her.

"What do we do, Naomi?" she sobbed into my shoulder. "What do we do."

"Nothing we can do," I whispered. "We have to protect the kids."

She closed her eyes for a moment, like that might somehow shut out the reality of it all.

The door opened again, and a bright torchlight swept over us.

"Everyone sit down, with your backs against the walls," the voice of the ringleader shouted. Dee started to shake, but I had to let go of her. We walked close together and sat down with our backs against the container walls. They were cold. Nobody looked at each other. The torchlight swept over us again. Blinding. It stopped on me. Someone walked over, a looming shadow being.

"Since you were such a help to us before," he said. "I think I'll start with you."

He dragged me out by my hair.

Daryl

A family of pigs were living out in the woods near the prison, must've got off a farm somewhere. I spotted them one day when I were out on a hunt. A Momma and six piglets.

I knew if I went for one of the piglets, I faced coming back to a real aggressive Momma, but if I could trap her first then the babies would be a lot easier. I headed back to the prison to get some supplies.

I still liked to hunt alone. The prison were going good, but it was getting busy in there. We'd chased off the Governor and taken in survivors from Woodbury. That meant more mouths to feed, but also more people to clear the fences when Walkers built up there. More people to come on runs with us. More people to manage the fields and help plant things.

More people asking to join me on a hunt.

I'd said yes a couple of times but they'd all been so damn noisy. Or just wanted to chat absolute shit. Some people didn't know that hunting weren't a social activity. So, when I could, I did it on my own.

"Hey, Carl," I said, as he opened the prison gates to let me back in. "Go get your dad, will ya? Tell him I'll be in the generator room."

Carl nodded and ran off. There was a lot of junk in the generator room. Surely, some of it would be good for building a trap. I wished I was better at that kind of thing, but I'd always had someone else to do it for me. If Naomi had been here, she'd have made a real clever one that worked way better than any of the ones you can buy. I ain't as good as that, but I did the best I could.

"Hey, Daryl," Rick said from the doorway. There was a little sweat on his brow, like he'd been out working in the yard all day. Carl stood behind him. "What you looking for?"

"Family of pigs out there," I said. "Thought if we can catch 'em, we could bring 'em in. Fatten them up."

"That's a great idea, Daryl," he said. "You need some help?"

"Yeah."

"I'll ask Hershel and Glenn to build them a pen," he said.

"Can I come?" Carl asked. He were still so little, but he'd been trying to do a lot more to help out. Rick looked at me like it was me he needed permission from. Perhaps I'd been a bit too firm about this hunting alone thing in the past. Didn't object to Carl coming, he was a good kid.

"Sure thing," I said. "In fact, will you go get some food? We need some bait."

"Yeah," Carl said, then he hesitated. "What kind of food do they like?"

"Pigs'll eat anything," I said. "Never heard the phrase 'eat like a pig'? It's 'cause they ain't fussy."

"Eat anything," Rick laughed. "Bit like you then, huh?"

"Pigs are smart," I shrugged. "It ain't our fault you're not on our level.

Carl ran off to get some food and Rick went to talk to Glenn and Hershel while I loaded some creates into one of the cars. We drove close to where I'd seen them, but not too close. Closed the car doors real quiet too, so they wouldn't hear us and get scared off. I opened up the trunk and picked up the pile of crates and food Carl had stuffed in there.

"Just up here," I whispered, motioning in the direction of the pigs. "Nice and quiet."

Carl looked at me and nodded. Rick fell into step beside me. I could hear them squealing up ahead, a good sign they didn't know we were there.

When we got close enough, I set up a box trap with a little bit of the food underneath. It weren't very sophisticated but I hoped it would do the trick. Carl and I used the rest of the food to lay a little trail.

"Now what?" he whispered.

"We wait, while your dad drives them close to our trail," I said. "Hopefully she'll take the bait."

"It's a she?" Carl asked.

"Yup," I said. "It's a Momma and her kids."

"Cool!"

Carl and I went to sit just out of sight of the box trap. Rick had crept around to the other side of the clearing and made a sudden noise. When Naomi and I had done this, we'd take it in turns to make the dumbest noises we could to try and make the other one laugh. Rick clapped his hands and I didn't realize until he did it how much I'd just been expecting to hear Naomi's dumb chicken squawk. Did its job though, pigs got startled and scurried through the bushes towards us. The Momma took her time but eventually she sniffed out the trail of food we'd left.

I watched as Carl leant forward to stare at her, with wide-eyed anticipation and she got closer and closer to the upturned crate.

"Ready?" I whispered to him. He nodded.

The Momma found the food under the trap. Her nose hit the stick keeping it up and the crate fell on her. She let out an alarmed squeal that sent her piglets into a panicked frenzy. Rick leapt out of the bushes and tackled one of them.

"Go!" I yelled at Carl as I did the same. It wriggled and tried to break free. They're small but they're strong. Carl held up the second empty crate for us to put them in when we caught them. Rick managed to grab two. I chucked in the one I was holding and then there was only three left. Rick and I grabbed one each. Five in the crate. One running around. Rick yelled as he lunged for it. It ran further into the undergrowth. I watched as Rick scrambled after it.

A Walker lunged for him.

The noise the piglets were making was drawing them out.

"Rick!" I yelled. "Watch out!"

He looked up just in time to see it and get out of the way. Piglet wasn't so lucky, was too busy trying to avoid Rick and ran right into it.

"Go!" Rick said, while the Walker was distracted eating the piglet alive. "Go!"

Carl ran back to the car. Rick and I ran to pick up the momma pig, grabbing her before she could make an escape. Together we managed to get her in the car with her babies and drive back to prison before too many Walkers came out of the woods.

Back at the prison there was a lot of noise about the piglets. A whole bunch of people came up to talk to us about it. Thank us like we'd done something superhuman. Kids crowded around a squealed about how cute they were, which made me worry about the conversations their parents would have to have when the time came to slaughter the first one. I excused myself as fast as I could. All that fuss always made me want to run away.

I felt good, though, happy. We still lost people, runs could be tricky, but this was the best things had been in a long time.

I made my way to the bridge to be on my own for a little bit. From there I could see Glenn and Hershel trying to wrangle the little piglets into the pen they'd made. Could smell someone else barbequing a deer I'd brought back somewhere else. A shadow fell over me. For a second, I was annoyed that my peace had already been disturbed, but when I looked up, it was just Carol. Didn't mind that.

"So what's her name?" Carol asked, sitting down next to me.

"Who?"

It weren't like Carol to forget a name. It weren't like me to remember them, either. Lots of new faces to avoid.

"Whoever it is stopping you from looking twice at any of the women fawning over you about those piglets," she said. I rolled my eyes. Woodbury folk were soft. Overly grateful for everything, it were embarrassing. Carol hesitated for a sec and then followed with. "Or any of the guys, for that matter..."

I almost told her to piss off.

I almost said 'nobody'.

But I didn't. I dunno why. I liked Carol. I'd liked Sophia, too. Always felt like we'd let her down. Maybe it was seeing her share that loss with me that made me want to share my own. Maybe it was just that, without Merle around, I was the only one who'd known she existed and having someone else know her name would make her feel less… gone. Whatever the reason, I said, "Naomi."

It had been so long since I'd heard her name. It still hurt to say. Still didn't sit right in my mouth. I looked at my feet, feeling like I'd said too much and not enough all at once.

"Naomi," she repeated with a smile. It felt weird to hear Carol say it. "Is she dead?"

"Think so," I said, remembering the flames. The smoke. The way her name had burned in my throat. I shrugged. "Gotta assume so, right?"

"You weren't with her when all this happened?"

"Nah." My throat was dry, like there was still smoke in it. I coughed. "Her Momma got sick, and she was looking after her."

"Was her Momma bit?"

"I think so," I shrugged again. "I dunno. But… something must've happened because I… I tried to go get her but… her whole house were in flames. I couldn't get in."

My throat closed up, and I couldn't say any more, although I could tell that Carol wanted me too.

Sorry.

That was all I wanted to say. For so many things. But I didn't because Carol wasn't who I wanted to say it too. And dead girls ain't listening.

"What was she like?"

"Huh?"

"Naomi. What was she like?" Carol asked again. I didn't answer right away, so she said, "She pretty?"

I could tell she were teasing me, trying to lift me out of the mood I was slipping into. It kinda worked.

"Beautiful," I said. "But that ain't it. She had this way of seeing things that were… just so different. Even when we were kids. It were like she could see how shitty things wer, but instead of giving up she were always looking for ways to fight it, to fix it, to be more than what people thought of us."

"You grew up together?" Carol sounded surprised.

"Yeah," I said. "Learnt to hunt together too. My Momma was dead, her Momma was a shit. My dad was a shit. Merle weren't around much."

"So it was just you two?"

"Yeah, for the most part," I said. It was weird. Talking about her like this, with someone who'd never known her, was kinda nice. Like it brought a part of her closer. I didn't even notice that Carol wasn't prompting me to talk about her any more, I just kept going. "Smartest person I ever met, reads like crazy. She really made something of herself to... went to college and everything."

"That's great," Carol said. I nodded in agreement.

"Most stubborn person I ever met too," I said. "Don't think she'd have made it out of Georgia if she weren't."

"More stubborn than you?" Carol laughed.

"She's who I learned it from. Never gives up on anything," I said, and I was kinda laughing too. "Not even me. Only person who ever thought I could make something of myself."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah, she's always had my back." I smiled. "She had all these crazy plans for me like I was gonna take over the world or something. Got real angry when I dropped outta school but then she bounced right back with this binder full of things I could do with my life and a damn twelve-step plan on how I could do each of 'em. She loves a binder. Loves a list. Loves a spreadsheet or whatever."

"Sounds like she just really loved you," Carol said, with a smile and a shrug. It stung more than I think she meant it to. I'd never thought of it like that. All of her worrying, her list-making, her stupid binders…

"Maybe," I shrugged.

"So, you don't know if she got outta the fire?" Carol asked.

"Nah," I said. "Merle... he held me back. Dragged me off. I'll never know what happened."

"Then there's always hope," she said. "Merle survived longer than the rest of us thought, went out on his own terms. She could be out there somewhere, your Naomi."

My stomach twisted because she weren't mine, never had been.

"Dumb to hope, ain't it?" I said, surprised that she of all people would think that hoping for someone to still be alive in all this mess was a smart thing to do, after everything that had happened with Sophia.

She shrugged, "I think hope's built in our nature."

"Nah."

"Well, you're still hoping," she said. "I know that at least."

"Nah. I ain't."

"You are," she said. "You know how I can tell? You said she reads like crazy. She loves a binder.' If you really thought she was dead, you'd talk about her like she was. You still hope."

"Nah," I said, but it sounded flimsy when I did. There was a little spark of something light in my chest that betrayed me.

"If you didn't have hope, you wouldn't still be waiting for her," she said.

"I ain't waiting."

"Okay," Carol said, in that way she does when she doesn't believe a word I'm saying. "Well all I'm saying is, you ain't fooling around with anyone either. I'm sure if you did find her again, she wouldn't hold it against you for starting something casual."

"Nah. It ain't like that for me," I said. "I can't just… y' know…."

I stopped. Even I didn't know what I was trying to say and it was making me so uncomfortable I wanted to start yelling at her for prying into my personal shit.

"What? Move on?" she said, and I shrugged because it felt like a half-truth. Carol gave me a playful nudge on my arm. "Who knew you were such a softie?"

"Shut up," I said, but it made me smile.

"I'm serious," she laughed. "You remind me of this grizzly old bear Sophia used to love seeing at the zoo. He was all scratched up, had an eye missing because he'd rescued from some horrible circus. But Sophia was crying because she dropped a doll into his enclosure. He just picked it up and handed it right back."

"Bullshit," I laughed.

"Cross my heart and hope to die," Carol said, which was a dangerous thing to say in these times. "He was probably just doing some old circus trick he'd been taught but still… it was sweet. Pookie I think they called him."

"Dumbass name," I said. Carol laughed and ruffled my hair as she stood up again.

"They'll be some food ready soon," she said. "You should come down."

"Yeah, I'll see you down there," I said, waving her off.

Things were good for a while. Maybe even great. And then people got sick. A whole Cell Block mostly full of Woodbury survivors got hit the worst. A kid died and turned in the night. A whole host of people who hadn't locked or closed their cell doors while they were sleeping got bit or eaten. It was chaos. We lost a lot of people. The sound of our gunfire putting down the ones who'd turned drew more Walkers out of the woods. They put a strain on one of the fences and it damn near collapsed.

We had to give them the pigs. They were all sick too, so we probably couldn't have eaten them anyway. They might've been what got some of us sick in the first place. The dead pigs distracted the Walkers long enough for us to re-enforce the fence. It wouldn't last forever, but it would do while we tried to sort out everything else. We thought the sickness might've started with the pigs, and that killing them and burning up their pen would stop it spreading, but it was too late. More people were infected, and we had to quarantine them in Cell Block A.

Two infected people were killed by one of our own, their bodies burned up. It weren't enough. The infection still spread.

Hershel said it weren't the sickness that was killing them, it was the symptoms. We needed antibiotics.

I lead a group on a run to get some from a nearby veterinary school. Hershel was confident it would have what we needed and was less likely to have been ransacked by other people, like the hospitals and pharmacies nearby. By now, Glenn had bee infected and couldn't come with us, even though he's one of the best at this kinda thing. Dead quiet on his feet. Skinny enough to fit through most gaps. So I took Michonne, Tyreese and Bob. Rick stayed to keep a handle on things.

We drove part of the way, until I heard something on the radio,

"Sanctuary...Sanctuary...survive..."

There was something about the voice that made my heart leap into my throat. Might've just been the shock of hearing someone trying to communicate with us after so long. But it felt like more than that. There were something about the voice that was... familiar?

I lost control of the car, felt it ploughing into something, but my eyes were on the radio. I stopped driving, was kind of aware of people yelling around me.

"Shut UP, will ya!" I yelled back at them, turning the radio dial desperately back and forth to see if I could get that voice again. Clearer this time. I'd know more if I could hear her.

Nothing but static.

The car cut out.

More damn yelling from the people around me.

"DARYL!" Michonne grabbed my arm. I looked up at her, ready to tell her to piss off, and then I saw just how many Walkers I'd ploughed into. We were surrounded. And the car wouldn't start again.

Fuck.

I grabbed up my bag and my crossbow. If we didn't fight our way out now, we wouldn't get out at all. We'd never get the antibiotics. I'd never find that voice again. There was an old radio back at the prison that I might be able to fix up. Maybe then I'd be able to hear the whole message.

We had to make it the rest of the way to the veterinary college on foot. We found Walkers there that had died of the same sickness people at the prison had. You could tell by the dried blood that ran from their eyes. There were antibiotics there too though, thank God. I just prayed there were enough for everyone who was sick.

On the way back we found a minivan that we had to hotwire since I'd written off the car on the way here.

"You mind driving, man?" I asked Tyreese. The guy was having a pretty shit time and I hoped the task would distract him from the fact his sister was sick and his girlfriend was on of the people who had been shot and set on fire.

"Sure," he said. Looked kinda surprised at the question. I rode shotgun. Second the car started I reached for the radio and turned it on.

"What you doing, Daryl?" Michonne asked from the back seat as I flicked through the channels. I shushed her in case she talked over what I was looking for. Every weird sound in the static made my heart leap.

"Daryl…" Michonne said again. Frustrated, I whipped round to look at her.

"I'm tryna find that broadcast we heard before," I said.

"You mean before you totaled our car?" she said.

"Yeah," I didn't have the time to argue about it. "None of the rest of y'all think it was weird or wanna know what it was?"

"I guess," Bob said. "But we got more important things to worry about right now."

"We're on our way," I said, annoyed that nobody else seemed bothered about this. "Can't heal anyone from the car, man. Might as well try."

I desperately wanted to hear it again, though I weren't reall sure why. I knew the buzz of the static were annoying everyone but they let me sit and do it anyway. It had been a damn long run, I'm sure they knew shutting up was easier than arguing with me.

I didn't find it. We arrived at the prison gates to find more Walkers swarmed around them. Had to fight our way through to get back home. Seed like we got back not a second too soon. A doctor from Woodbury was dead and Hershel had gone in there in his place. Maggie was so worried about Glenn in quarantine that she was damn near breaking in there herself. We gave them the drugs and then it was just a matter of waiting to see who came out alive.

I've never been good at sitting around waiting on shit like that. Hunting or fishing? I can wait days for something like that. But waiting on other people? It's bullshit.

"Hey, Rick," I said. He looked nervous, like I was about to yell at him for something. I didn't think anything of it except that everyone was a little tense right now.

"Yeah?"

"There's gotta be a radio round here somewhere, right?" I asked.

"Er… yeah," Rick said. "There's one in the old Comms room. Doesn't work, though."

"Can I take a look at it?" I asked.

"Sure," he said and lead me through the communal prison area. "Mind if I ask what you're hoping to find?"

"I heard this… this voice on the radio today," I said. "Saying something about a Sanctuary."

"We got a sanctuary right here, man."

"Yeah, I know," I said, and I was annoyed because I couldn't shake the feeling that hearing that voice had given me. Like it was the most important thing in the world that I find it again. Like things would make sense if I did. Couldn't explain that to Rick, though. He'd have thought I were mad. So, instead I said, "Just… y'know, other survivors man. That's big."

"I guess," he said with a smile that showed he didn't really get it. "Don't get your hopes up though, radio is pretty shot."

I nodded to show I understood, but my heart were hammering loudly in my head. Rick left me to it. I'd found an old tool kit in a supply closet. I unscrewed the back. There was an old battery pack in there. I'd found another one in a drawer in the same room. I couldn't know if it was actually a new one or if whoever had changed the last one just couldn't be bothered to throw it away so had shoved it in the drawer. I swapped them.

Nothing happened.

I checked a few of the wires. Spent hours tweaking them.

Nothing.

No voice. No message about any sanctuary.

Fuck. Fuck fuck fuck.

I was there all night. When morning came I was so mad I couldn't get it to work that I nearly punched the damn thing until it was nothing but a pile of useless metal. But then I'd never get it working.

I took off. Went for a walk to clear my head.

Quarantine was starting to empty out. Hershel was back. Glenn looked like shit but he was alive at least.

There were bodies coming out of there too, people who hadn't made it. Hershel and I buried them. I hadn't seen Carol since we got back. I was scared she was one of the sick but she weren't in the pile of bodies coming out of Cell Block A. She weren't in the recovered people who were coming out either. I asked Hershel where she was. He gave me a look I didn't like and then told me I should ask Rick.

Found him in the garden Carl. Didn't want to yell at him right off the bat, especially not I'm front of his kid and without knowing what he had or hadn't done. So, I just asked where she was. He looked pretty serious and sent Carl away.

It was Carol who'd killed Tyreese's sick girlfriend and set the body on fire. She'd done it to protect us and Rick had sent her away for it. He tried to say it was to protect her from what Tyreese would do if he found out but that felt like a weak excuse.

I was about to get mad. About to test how mad Tyreese would get if he knew what happened. But I didn't get a chance. The prison walls started shaking as the Governor launched his final attack, bringing our sanctuary to its knees.

Chapter 15: Terminus

Summary:

(Quick trigger warning: mentions of/allusions to rape and sexual assault. Nothing graphic, but I'm putting a warning here just in case.)

 

Naomi

The door opened, and everyone flinched. After weeks of living like this, it still struck fear into our hearts. Never knowing which one of us they were coming for made the whole place tremble as everyone prayed for it not to be their turn. Afterwards, if it weren't you, you just felt guilty for being so relieved. We cowered away from the light. Sometimes it seemed they came in with you in mind, sometimes you were just unlucky enough to be seen first.

Dee stumbled in on bare feet. The door closed again, and there was a brief feeling of relief in the room. I stood up and ran to catch her as she sank to her knees, sobbing. I didn't ask if she was okay. We all knew that the answer to that was 'no'. Instead, I asked, "Are you bleeding?"

She shook her head, trembling arms wrapping around me. I hugged her back. "You're okay," I whispered. "You're safe now."

I repeated it until she stopped shaking. When she was ready, I took her further away from the door, into the shadows of one corner where she might feel safer.

She sat down, hugged her knees to her chest. I sat down beside her.

"I don't know how you can stand it," she said. Glared at me a little. I didn't react because I knew it wasn't really me she wanted to be glaring at. "You're so calm. Even when they bring you back... it's like it doesn't affect you. You just put up with it."

It took a lot for me not to answer immediately. I knew I'd yell at her if I did. So, I took a deep breath. It wasn't Dee's fault, we were all trapped in hell, but it was new for her. Living in constant fear, not of the risen dead, but of people around you was how I'd grown up. It was like I had this switch deep inside me that I could just flip off, and it made me numb. I'd learned long ago that crying didn't work, begging didn't work. Sometimes all you could do was wait for it to be over. The only way to find peace was in the other people who were trapped in hell with you.

"I am angry. All the time," I told her. She looked surprised, but I felt like I'd been born angry. "If I let myself feel even a little bit of it, I will lose my mind."

"Noami, I'm sorry. I didn't mean-"

"It's okay," I told her because she had nothing to apologize for. The rage, pain and shame all of us were feeling was immense. There was nowhere to put it or direct it to. It would be too easy to turn it against one another, let it tear us all apart. "If we fight, we have to be smart about it. We need to know where they're keeping the kids, and how they're being guarded. We need to communicate with everyone else. Coordinate an attack that they don't see coming."

Dee nodded, calm and determined for the first time in weeks.

"How would we communicate with the others?" Mary asked in a whisper. I jumped because I didn't know how close she was, or that she'd been listening, and any unexpected noise sent my heart racing now. Incase it was Them. Back for more.

I turned around to tell her that I didn't know, that I hadn't thought much further than finding out where the hell they were keeping Mia, Perla and José. But Dee spoke before I could.

"I saw Lucas today," she said, sitting up a little straighter like she'd only just remembered it.

"You did?" I asked. "Where?"

"When they were bringing me back," she said. "They were bringing him back from somewhere else. He didn't look so good."

"Poor Lucas," I said. Occasionally, they'd take the guys out and beat them so that they didn't get any ideas about trying to protect the rest of us.

"He's in the train car that way," Dee said, pointing to the one on the left of us. "They brought us both out at the same time. Stood next to him while they opened the door to the courtyard."

"They've done the same thing with me before," Mary said. "Easier to get us all in and out at once, I guess."

"You think you'd be able to talk to them?" I asked. "If it happened again?"

"No," Dee shook her head. "They'd hear us... might be able to pass them something, though."

"Like a note?" Mary said. Dee nodded. "Maybe."

"Shame we don't have any paper," she said and frowned like she was trying to remember where we'd kept any of the useful shit in Terminus.

From the other side of the container, Gareth stood up. His hurried whisper cut across the room. "You guys hear that?"

We stopped talking and listened. Yelling. Gunshots. People crowded around the few places that light could get in, gaps in the door or holes in the walls that let you see a tiny sliver of the world outside.

"Can't see anything," Alex said, but there was a crowd around him who all wanted to take a look too, each hoping to be the one who saw something.

"Sounds like a fight," Gareth said, ear pressed to the wall.

"Think one of the other groups got free?" Mary looked so hopeful. She'd been close to breaking for a while now.

"Maybe some newcomers turned up," I suggested, thinking about the signs that we'd put up along the railway tracks. What horrors they would be walking into now, thinking that they'd finally found somewhere safe.

The yelling outside was too far away to catch any words. Or hear who it was. It lasted for about fifteen minutes. There was a lot of gunfire. And then silence.

The silence went on for hours. Nobody spoke. Nobody dared ask if this meant our captors had all been killed in whatever had gone on out there. We all hoped.

Footsteps outside. And the door opened again, and we all ran to sit with our backs against the walls. Reminded me of going into the kitchen at night when I was kid, turning on the light and watching roaches scatter into the shadows. I felt small and disgusting.

The leader of the men who'd taken over walked in, flanked by two of his men. They were covered in blood. Some of it looked like it might even be their own. Nobody spoke. Nobody moved. He scanned us all, and then his eyes met mine.

"You," he pointed at me, and my heart sank.

Not again.

I still hurt from the last time. I never stopped hurting. Dee grabbed my hand as I stood up. I looked down at her. She whispered, "Don't."

Fighting was worse. Fighting was much more painful. I gave her hand a squeeze before I took a step forward and let go. You can feel everyone's eyes on you when you leave. Their pity, their relief that it's not them. There was something else there this time too, a curiosity. Nervous anticipation that we might get some answers to what it was we'd just heard.

I took one last look back at Dee before they closed the door behind me.

On the surface, everything looked the same, but something was different. Quieter. Less relaxed than usual. When I looked at them, they didn't sneer back at me. They looked angry. I thought that would make them more frightening, but it didn't. Usually, they laughed while they hurt us. They took their time. They were in control of everything; of us, our bodies, our kids, our lives and future. This time, they hurried me inside. Didn't take me to the usual place, either. We were in the comms room, where the radio was. I wondered if I'd be able to grab it and send out a distress call before they shot me. Would there be anyone out there to hear it?

"Take a seat," the leader said. I hesitated. This weren't normal either. Maybe this was part of their game, changing things up just when I'd come to know what to expect.

"You know you're my favourite, right?" he said. I felt sick. Said nothing. He sat down opposite me and grinned, "Even if you do have those horrible scars all over what would otherwise have been great legs."

I felt old cigarette burns itch through my jeans. I squeezed my legs tightly shut, the way I always did whenever something made me think about the marks my childhood had left on my body. He took a swig from a bottle of water which he then held out to me. "Want some?"

I shook my head, although I was parched. They gave us enough food and water to keep us alive, but never enough to satisfy us.

"Suit yourself," he said, putting the bottle back on the ground. "You got a name?"

It wasn't until he asked that I realized we didn't know any of their names, and they didn't know ours. It was just Us and Them. I wondered if that made it easier for them to treat us the way they did.

"Naomi," I said. It was the first time I'd spoken to them since the night they'd arrived. I'd screamed, I'd cried. But never spoken.

"Naomi," he repeated, and I hated the way it sounded in his mouth. Made me want to rip out his horrible tongue and set it on fire. Hated the way he smiled when he said it. I wished I'd lied, given him a fake name so it felt less like I'd willingly given a part of myself to him after he'd taken what he wanted for so long.

"Do you want to know why you're my favourite, Naomi?" he reached his bloodstained hand across the gap between us. I tried not to flinch as he touched my hair. I could smell blood and dirt, the dried mixture of both was rough on my skin as he ran his fingers down my cheek to my chin where he forced my head up to look him in the eyes. "You put up enough fight to make it fun but not so much it pisses me off."

I wanted to cry. Or scream. Or throw up. But I didn't, I tried to flip that switch, make myself numb to it. I find it harder with words.

"You also have this look in your eye," he said. "Like you're just biding your time. Waiting. And if I slip up, you'll be the first one with a knife at my throat. I like that. I like the danger."

I wanted to peel my own skin off. That I could do anything, even accidentally, that this man liked… made me want to turn myself inside out until I became someone else. He laughed, his warm breath in my face. The stench of it made me flinch. It was always the same. I felt like I could smell him on me for hours after he was done. My hands were shaking. I balled them into fists in my lap so that he wouldn't see and braced myself for what usually came next. But to my surprise, he sat back and sighed.

"It's been a fucking long day, Naomi." He sounded weary, and I felt that little bit of hope again. Something had gone wrong for him today. That could only be good news for us, right?

"Why are you so well behaved?" he asked. "Why don't you talk back like some of your friends… the things they threaten me with."

He laughed again like it was a fond memory for him.

"You have my sister," I reminded him.

"Do we?" he said. "Ah, one of the brats upstairs, I presume? Funny, that's actually what I got you out here to talk about."

Upstairs.

My heart leapt. They'd finally given something away about where they were keeping Mia and the others. I tried not to let any hope show on my face, I wanted to keep him talking, so I said, "I don't want to say anything that'll get my sister hurt."

"Makes sense," he said. "Although I'll tell you right now none of us actually know which kid belongs to which of ya."

"What?"

"The threat is enough to keep you all in line," he said with a shrug. I was relieved for a second.

"Why are you telling me this?" I asked. It seemed dumb to arm me with this kind of information. Now I knew I could do anything and they wouldn't hurt Mia specifically. I guess it meant they'd pick a kid at random; Perla or José or any of the Terminus kids. I didn't want that either.

"Seems we weren't hard enough on the kids," he said. "Haven't been disciplining them like we have you guys. They tried to stage a little uprising."

"No," I sat up straight. My mouth felt dry. The fact he was here and they weren't meant they must have failed. He laughed again, but it was bitter.

"Yup," he said. "They didn't like the sound of what we were doing to all of their mommies and daddies. So they tried to stop us. I lost two guys before we got them under control."

My heart was beating so loud I could hardly hear him talk.

"What do you mean 'got them under control'?" I asked.

He grinned.

"We got their ringleader," he said. "Got the guy who orchestrated the whole thing. I thought you might be able to help us deal with him."

"Me?" I said. "Why me?"

"I remember you being very helpful with the kids before," he said. "And, if you do what I tell you, I'll let you see your sister."

It sounded like a trap. Like it was too good to be true. "You don't know who my sister is," I said.

"Doesn't matter," he shrugged. "I'll show you where they all are."

"I can see all of them?" I asked. Bringing news of the kids back to everyone would lift their spirits. Maybe even go some way to cheering them up.

"They're all in the same room so you might as well," he said. "We got a deal?"

"Yes."

He beckoned over to someone standing at the door. I heard the sounds of a struggle, feet scuffing against the floor and someone trying to protest through a gag. I knew it was José before I saw him. My heart sank.

"José!" I called as he was dragged to stand in front of me. He stopped struggling at the sound of my voice.

"You know this kid?"

"Yes."

"Well shit, this might be hard for you," he said. The guy holding José took off the blindfold and moved the gag from his mouth. Our eyes met, and I could not look away from him. Hands still tied behind his back, they forced José to his knees.

"It's okay," I said. That phrase, it was becoming a reflex. "You'll be alright, José."

"Actually, no. He won't."

They made me stand up in front of him. He still wouldn't say anything. He just looked up at me, strangely calm.

"Shoot him," they told me and pushed a gun into my hands. I was so shocked that it took me a second to realize what I was holding.

"I can't."

The leader came to stand behind me. His horrible breath on my neck, his meaty hands took hold of my wrist, raised the gun to aim at José's head.

"You can either shoot him now," he told me, removing the gag from his mouth. "Or we'll kill him in front of you. And it'll be slow."

"No," I said. The gun shook in my hand.

I had a fucking weapon.

I could turn it on him now.

I probably wouldn't get very far before one of his buddies shot me. They'd shoot José too, probably, but maybe that was better. Go down fighting.

"Naomi," José looked up at me. "It's okay."

"No. It isn't," I told him.

"Don't fight, don't let them kill you too," he said, looking pointedly at the gun in my hand. Guess he knew what I'd been thinking. Guess everyone in that room would've known the second they gave me the damn thing.

"Clever boy," there was a horrible laugh from behind me. "Shame, you learned that lesson too late. Could've made a great addition to our group if you'd got to grow up."

"José…" I felt more like I was pleading with him than our captors. He saw me look from the gun in my hand to the guy holding him. He knew I was still trying to work out how many shots I could get in before they took us down.

"Mia and Perla," he said. "They need you. I need you to look after them."

It was so much like the promise his mother had made me make. The weight of my own failure crushed me. "I'm supposed to be looking after all of you."

"You are," he said. How could he be so calm?

"Naomi," our captors were getting impatient. "He's dying one way or another. If you don't do it soon, we're going to do it ourselves."

Maybe that would be easier, better than having his blood on my hands.

"Too slow," one of them stepped forward, held up a knife to José's throat. José flinched, but they did not slit it. Instead, he ducked behind José, who let out an almighty scream before his captor held up one of José's bloodied fingers, severed from his hand. He waved it at me. "I'm going to keep cutting bits off him until he dies of the blood loss or you do the decent thing and shoot him in the head."

José screamed again as they took off another one.

"Please," I begged them. "Please stop. You can kill me instead."

Their leader walked over to me then, put a hand under my chin. "Couldn't let something so pretty go to waste," he said. "You still not going to do it?"

I looked behind him, to where José was bleeding and grimacing in pain.

"Please," he looked up at me, and I saw a strange mix of peace and determination in his eyes. He said, "It should be family."

I saw them move the knife, started to slice into his arm, just below the elbow. They were going to take that next. Could I really watch him bleed out because I didn't have the guts to pull a trigger?

"Close your eyes," I whispered to him. His eyes shut. I did my best to remember the words Blanca had said to him and his sister all those nights we'd lived up in the safety of the trees. "Te Quiero."

I think I saw him smile. And then I pulled the trigger. A clean shot through his head. Painless and too quick for him to know it was coming. Or, so I hoped. I guess you can never really know unless you're the one being shot.

I heard someone behind me start to clap as grief ripped through me. I turned on him, squeezed the trigger as many times as I could. It clicked. But never went off.

"Didn't think we'd give you more than one bullet, did you?" he said. I threw the gun to the floor and dropped to my knees. I threw up, which only made them laugh more.

I felt heavy arms around my shoulders. I knew from the smell that it was him. I twisted in his grasp, my fists slamming against soft flesh. Though my vision was blurry, his face swam into view. My back hit the floor, and he pinned one of my arms beneath me. My free hand thrashed out at him.

All I could think of was José.

Feet away from us.

His Momma and the promise I'd made her. Now broken, lying in blood.

I felt my nails scrape down flesh. He roared and stumbled backwards, clutching the side of his face. There was a brief second where I was free. I lunged for him again. Felt hands grab me, holding me back.

"Fuck you!" I screamed at him. "Fuck you!"

There was blood on his face, from three scratch marks I'd left behind. I struggled against the guys holding me. He recovered and sprang towards me. His foot slammed into my stomach. I doubled over, the wind knocked out of me. He spat in my face.

"Get her out," he said. They started to drag me towards the door. There was so much pain in my stomach I couldn't walk.

"Do we put her back?" they asked, stopping in the doorway.

I glared up at him.

"No," he said. "Take her to the kids' room. Deals a deal."

Feeling sick from the kick in the stomach, I half-stumbled and was half-dragged along with them. I was aware of being hauled up a set of stairs. There were some offices at the top of Terminus, I looked up to see the tops of the kid's heads standing around the outskirts of the room. A door was unlocked, and I was thrown in. I knew from the smell that something was horribly wrong. I thought they'd come in with me, but the door slammed shut.

The room was almost quiet, apart from the horrible and unmistakable sound of the dead.

Dead.

All of them.

Chained to the walls and straining to get to me.

No. No, no, no, no, no.

I sank back against the wall. I wanted to scream, but I couldn't make a sound. I could hear laughter in the hallway outside, knew they were watching me through the glass. Small dead hands reached out to grab me. Faces I'd seen playing around Terminus not that long ago now stared at me with their cold, unseeing eyes. Their jaws snapped. The chains holding them to the walls rattled with the force that they tried to break free and get to me.

I had to close my eyes for a moment. It was too much to bear all at once. All of our kids. Dead.

If Mia's here, I thought to myself, I will let her bite me. I will end this fo myself.

I opened my eyes again.

Scanned all of their faces. Each one hurt a little bit more than the last.

No Mia. No Perla.

I checked again, looking at each little dead face for as long as I could stomach it. They weren't there. I thought back to how calm Jose had seemed, how willingly he'd met his fate. Did he know they were safe somewhere? Did he manage to get them out? Or were they just killed in the fight they tried to start?

I backed to the safest corner of the room and sank down to the ground. Standing was hard. Breathing was hard. It felt wrong that I should be able to do any of those things when the children we had failed to protect were all dead.

They watched me through the glass as I sat and sobbed in front of the corpses of innocent children. It felt like they left me in there for hours, but it might not have been. Time stopped in that room. Stopped, but couldn't go back and fix anything. Eventually, the door opened. The scratched-up face of the bandit leader peered in at me. "Seen enough?"

I didn't move. Couldn't move. I wanted to, but I felt like everything inside me had been torn to shreds. He entered the room and grabbed me by the arm. "Let's go, Naomi."

He pulled me out. I heard them lock it up again.

"Why are you keeping them like that?" I asked him. "Why not let them rest?"

"Need somewhere to put you guys when you misbehave," he said. "Also it's kinda cute, huh? Didn't you find you dead little sister adorable?"

He laughed again. Kept laughing while I said nothing. He really thought my sister was in there, which meant that he definitely didn't know who she was. Or that she and her friend might have gotten away. I didn't want to say anything that would make him think otherwise.

Back down the stairs, I turned towards what I knew was the way back out to the train cars they were keeping us in. He grabbed me by the arm. Pulled me real close.

"You didn't think I was done with you, did you?" he said. I froze. My whole body tensed up. "You have me a good scratch back there. Drew blood. You gotta pay for that."

I didn't care. I really didn't. There was nothing he could do now that was worse than what he'd already put me through. He didn't know how much physical pain I could endure without flinching. I flipped that switch, let him tire himself out. He tried hitting me to get a reaction, but part of me was just… gone. Like I checked out of my own body. Knew what was happening, but had disconnected enough not to feel it. As close to being dead as I could get. I just wanted it to be over.

When he was, finally, done with me, he threw me back in with my friends. I was bleeding. It hurt to stand up. My face felt bruised. But all of that was nothing compared to the weight I was carrying in my soul. I sank to the ground.

"Oh my God," I heard Dee before I felt her arms around me. "Oh my God, what did they do to you? Help me!"

She was calling to someone else. I knew I was crying and bleeding all over her, but I still couldn't feel much. Another pair of arms wrapped around me and helped me move away from the door. Mary and Dee propped me up. Someone tried to wash the blood from my face, but I held my hand up to stop them. No point in wasting the little supplies we had on vanity. We would need every ounce of strength we could get for what was coming. I couldn't focus on any of them, just stared at the ground. Everyone sat in silence around me. Felt like I was sitting at my own wake.

"Naomi," Dee gently brushed some hair from my face. "You're okay. You're safe now."

I shook my head. Looked up at her, at all of them.

"They killed the children," I said, and something inside me snapped. Like a dam breaking, flooding me with all of the anger I'd been holding back. My whole body trembled with the force of it. I heard the shock pass through the room, and people started to sob. "They're keeping the bodies chained up like dogs."

"Why?" Mary asked. I'd expected her to cry, I knew she'd had grandkids there. Knew she'd taken in orphans who'd arrived in our Sanctuary and loved them like she'd loved her own sons. But something inside her had snapped too, and she was looking at me with the same fire I could feel burning deep inside.

I told them all about how the kids had tried to fight our captors, taken it upon themselves to try and save us all. How they'd been killed for it.

When the door opened again, sooner than any of us would've wanted, Mary stood up. She walked towards the light while the rest of us cowered from it. I thought she might try and fight them right there and then, braced myself for having to watch them kill her in front of us, but she went with them pretty calmly.

"The hell was that?" Dee asked when the door closed again.

"She's had enough," Gareth said, looking hopeful for the first time in weeks. "She's going to end this."

"She says we're either the butcher, or we are the cattle," Alex said. "And I think she's done being cattle."

Mary came back bleeding and battered but smiling all the same. The fight she'd put up had distracted them from the things she'd managed to steal. Nobody knew Terminus better than Mary, not even the people running it now. She'd managed to grab scraps of paper small enough to conceal in her fists and a pen she slipped down the front of her shirt. It weren't much. But it was enough.

Even the worst kinds of people had a routine. They got us out together, and they put us back together because that way, they only had to make one trip. We spent the night making weapons out of anything we could. People made nooses from their belts. I took the laces out of my boots. We broke off anything from inside the container that we could, leaving us with pieces of jagged and sharp metal.

Morning came, and instead of cowering from the door Gareth, Alex and I stood close to either side of it. The door opened. I held one of my bootlaces tightly between both hands and did my best not to make a sound.

"Fuck you," Mary yelled at them from where she sat opposite the door. "Child killers!"

The rest of them began to shout too, hurling insults they'd been holding in for weeks.

"Settle down!" their leader yelled, raising his gun at them. "Or we'll-"

He didn't get to finish. While he'd been distracted, I'd snuck up behind him and wrapped the bootlace around his neck. I started pulling it tight. His gun went off accidentally but didn't hit anyone. The sound of the shot echoing around the metal container was deafening. Our friends rose as one, charging at our guards.

Dee grabbed the gun of the guy in front of me, who was now gasping for air. His meaty fingers reached up to try and pull it away from his neck. He sank to his knees, looked up at me. I saw the shock in his eyes and. I think he tried to say my name like he didn't expect it to be me who was choking the last of his horrible breaths out of him.

Gareth and Alex had two other bandits in a similar position. There was a rush of people storming forward to take their guns from them and then ran out of the doors. I could hear yelling and gunshots from all around. People being held in the other containers were rising up too.

I pulled tighter on the bootstring. He was heavy. When he passed out, he almost brought me down with him. I waited to be sure he wasn't faking it and then loosened the string. A red line ran around his neck. I kicked him over, used the lace to tie his hands behind his back and used the other one to tie his feet. If he weren't dead, I didn't want him waking up and causing trouble. I saw a knife sticking out of his belt loop and grabbed it. It wasn't the best weapon in the world, but other folks had taken his guns, so it was all I had.

I stood up, could still hear the sounds of fighting outside. I ran to join in. Saw Dee lying in a pool of her own blood, eyes open and staring at the sky without seeing it. She'd only made it a few steps out of the door before being shot in the head. I screamed when I saw her. It was anger more than anything else. Someone fired at me and I charged towards them, not caring at that moment if I got hit or not. I think the shock of my recklessness gave me the upper hand. I'd grabbed him before he could take another shot.

I slashed and sliced at his face until he crumbled to the ground, clutching the bleeding sockets where his eyes used to be. I stuck the knife in his throat, took his gun, and left him to bleed there.

By now, the fight had mostly moved inside as the bandits retreated deeper into Terminus. They were losing ground pretty fast. Some of them tried to flee and were shot before they could climb the fence. Some of them might have made it.

I found almost everyone in the main hall of Terminus. A group of bandits had surrendered. The rest lay dead around the room. I saw William, Jack and Izzy there too. I walked around to check that everyone who'd died had been taken care of so that they wouldn't rise up again. I shot any of the bodies that hadn't already been shot in the head. When I got to my friends, I paused for a moment. I closed Jack's eyes, which till looking at where Izzy lay. When I went to check on her, she groaned.

Still alive.

"Izzy!" I said. Her eyes fluttered open and then closed again. I think she tried to call for Jack. "Izzy, can you hear me?"

She raised a weak and shaking hand.

"She still alive?" I looked up to see Lucas standing over me, a deep scar ran down his left cheek. It looked a few days old.

"I think so," I said. "Help me move her?"

I slipped my arms under her shoulders, Lucas took her legs, and we carried her into the old ticket office. Gareth ran in with medical supplies and told us to get out of the way. He'd been training as a nurse before all of this. We watched him try to stop Izzy's bleeding. Outside, the bandits who'd surrendered were being rounded up and taken outside. I looked at Lucas, who tried to smile, but winced as it hurt his scar.

"You okay?" I asked.

"I'm free," he shrugged. Which was the best any of us could have said. "Is it over?"

I desperately wanted to say yes.

"Almost," I said, and with a heavy heart, I left the room to climb the stairs.

"Naomi," Lucas called after me. I turned just before them. "Where are you going?"

"Someone's gotta take care of the kids," I said. "I've already seen it, but there's no need for all of these other folks to traumatize themselves."

"Okay," he said and picked up his pace to join me.

"What are you doing?"

"You don't have to do these things alone," he said. "It's bad enough… what they made you do to José."

His name sent a stab of guilt through my gut. I shook my head. "I should have refused," I said. "Maybe he'd still be here."

"They'd have killed him," Lucas said. "You know that. And they'd probably have chained him up here with the rest."

"Maybe," I said, but we had no way of knowing. And the speculation did nothing to alleviate my guilt. We reached the top of the stairs. I could still see the tops of the kid's heads, moving around like they were still alive. I turned to Lucas, "You sure you want to see this?"

"No," he said. "But I don't want you to bear this burden alone."

The door was locked. The key was probably still on one of our former captors, who were either dead or in the middle of being thrown in the containers they'd kept us in. I gave it a few hard kicks. The sound of it drove the dead kids inside berserk trying to get at us. The door burst open. I strode in and just started firing, Lucas followed. The kids fell, one by one. And it was horrible, but it also felt like the first good thing I'd been able to do for them since Terminus had been taken over.

When the last one was at rest, Lucas turned to me. His eyes were heavy with the weight of what we'd just done. I felt better, though, knowing that the kids weren't being kept like they had been.

"Mia's not here," he said.

"I know," I said. "Perla ain't here either."

"Do you know what happened to them?"

"No," I said. "Maybe they were both killed when they tried to fight. If they were shot in the head, they wouldn't have come back as these… things. Or, maybe they got away."

"Think that's possible?"

I shrugged. "José seemed so calm… didn't fight at all. If he knew his sister was okay…"

"Then he would've been able to face what was happening to him," Lucas finished for me. "That makes sense. So, what now?"

"I gotta go look for them," I said. "Hopefully they stayed close by. Mia might've left me some visible tracks."

"It'll be dark soon," he said. "Can you wait until tomorrow?"

I wanted to say no. But my body ached from the fight, and there was so much to clear up here, I knew I'd be more productive the next day.

We cleared the bodies from around us, and we buried those of our friends. We buried the kids. A memorial room was set up for us to remember everyone we'd lost. Mary got out every candle we had and some black paint from a supply closet. When I went in, the room was silent, sombre. But the candlelight gave it a warm glow and having so many survivors all grouped together like this made me feel calmer than I had in a long time. Lucas was painting William's name on the wall. He gave me a small smile when I walked in. I picked up a paintbrush, my hand felt heavy with guilt as I wrote José's name there.

"I'm sorry," I whispered to him.

I started to paint Dee's name underneath. I had to stop a few times because my hand was shaking so much. It just felt so important that I got it right, so that anyone who came through here would be able to read it, and know that she was here. I could feel Lucas watching me. He cleared his throat.

"You want to write Mia's name on here?" he asked.

"No," I said. "Don't think I could, it would be like admitting she's dead. And I don't know that for sure. Feels like giving up."

"Okay," he nodded. "Sorry, I didn't mean-"

"It's okay," I shrugged. Didn't have the energy to fight anyone anymore, not even verbally. "I know it's probably dumb to hope."

"No, it's not," he said. "I just thought you might want some kind of tribute to her, that's all."

"Sweet idea," I told him. "And you can write her and Perla up there if you like. I just can't do it myself."

"I feel weird about me doing it," he said. "I'm not related to either of them."

"We're all family," I said, and I took hold of his hand. "There's no guarantee that either of them is alive, or that they'll come back here. If their names on that wall will help you keep going after all we've been through, you have my full blessing to put Mia on there."

"Thanks, Naomi," he squeezed my hand and then I let go to finish painting the rest of Dee's name.

When the memorial was done, we all lit candles and sat in the room with their names telling stories about the people we'd lost. Terminus was quiet without the sound of children playing.

The next day, I started my search for Mia and Perla. I took one of the old maps and divided it up into grids. I'd heard that was how cops did it when they were looking for missing children.

Mary, Lucas and everyone else who was well enough spent days clearing up the blood and debris from Terminus while I was out looking for Mia and Perla. Each day I searched a different place. Each day I found nothing. On the third day, I came back to the smell of barbecuing meat and everyone sitting down in the memorial room to eat.

"What's this?" I asked, staring down at the slab of meat in front of me. It didn't smell like anything I recognized. We were all starving, most of our food supplies had been used up and eaten by the bandits before we'd broken free.

"It's meat," Mary said, taking a big bite of her own dinner. "Eat up."

"I can see it's meat," I said. "But what kind? Did someone go hunting? I haven't seen much out there."

"Just eat," Mary told me. I sliced off a chunk, held it up to inspect it on the end of my fork. The look on the faces of those around me made me stop. Lucas cleared his throat, something he usually only did when he was holding back from saying something. I looked at him.

"What?"

"She should know," Lucas said. "Before she eats any of it. It's only fair."

"She wasn't here for the discussion," Mary said, glaring at me. "She shouldn't get a say."

"I was looking for my sister," I said.

"Your sister is dead," Mary said. "Like the rest of them. When will you fucking grow up and realize that?"

I put my fork down to argue with her. Lucas put a hand on my shoulder.

"It's one of the bandits," he said, which didn't make any sense to me.

"What?" I asked. "Did one of them say something about Mia? Or Perla?"

I knew Mary was keeping a few of them locked up somewhere, maybe she'd got them talking, and they'd said something about what happened to the girls. But that wasn't it at all.

"The meat," Lucas said. "It's one of the bandits."

I stared at the plate, felt the room spinning.

"No," I said. Mary was instantly angry.

"I told you she wouldn't see sense," she muttered, she glared at me some more. "While you were out on your wild goose chase. We strung one of them up and bled him out. Felt good to hear him scream, Naomi. You should try it."

"Have you lost your minds?" I looked around at them all. Only Lucas and Mary would look me in the eye. Mary looked cold and distant, Lucas was silently pleading with me. But for what, I couldn't tell.

"We are starving," he said.

I shook my head. "Not an excuse to fucking eat people."

"They're not people," Mary said. "They're monsters."

"They're not," I said. "They are people. Calling them monsters is just a way to forget that regular human beings are capable of the worst things. Which is exactly what we'd be doing if we go through with this bullshit!"

"You think we should let them out?" Gareth said. "To live amongst us?"

"I'm not saying that," I said. "Keep them locked up. Execute them if you have to. But butchering them like cattle is just cruel."

"We have to eat," Alex said. "And they deserve to die."

"So execute them all," I said. "And I'll go on a hunt tomorrow if you really need some meat. Stop with this shit."

"Have you forgotten what they did to us?" Mary asked.

"Of course not," I said. "They brought nothing but fear and violence to this place. But the only way to stop a cycle of violence is to choose to break it. This is just continuing what they started."

"We are not like them," Mary yelled.

"Not yet," I yelled back. "But you're well on your way. When other people follow the signs to get here, what are they going to think of you all? Huh?"

"From now on everyone who steps foot in here is either with us or against us," she said.

"Really?" I said. "So it's ain't just the people who did us wrong that you're going to do this to?"

"Everyone gets a choice," she said. "With us or against us. That includes you."

"It ain't right," I said.

"Then I guess you're against us," Mary said.

"Damn straight," I said. "What are you going to do about it? Lock me up? Cook me and eat me too?"

I'd not meant it to be serious. But the look in her eye told me that was exactly what she thought should be done with me. Lucas stood up. I was grateful for a second, someone was coming back to reality.

"Let's not be too hasty," he said, holding up a hand to stop Mary from coming any closer to me. "Some of us were resistant to it at first, too."

"I should damn well hope you're still-" I started to say, but Lucas shouted over the top of me.

"Let's go for a walk, clear your head a little bit," he said. He grabbed me by the shoulders and propelled me towards the door.

"I'll want her answer when you get back," Mary called after us.

"My answer is still going to be the same you crazy old bag," I yelled back. The door closed behind us, so I missed whatever she yelled back.

"Naomi," Lucas groaned. "Please don't make this harder than it has to be."

"Lucas!" I said. "There is no way in hell that I would ever-"

"I know," he said. We came to a stop. "Which is why we have to get you out of here as soon as possible."

The urgency in his voice made my heart start racing. "I can't leave. What if Mia comes back?"

"If you want to stay, you have to live by her rules," he said.

"Her rules are bullshit," I said.

"She might change her mind," he said. "When all of the bandits are dead, she might be less angry."

"She has fully lost it," I said. He looked pained.

"Then you need to go," he said. He took me by the arm to where our belongings had been laid out in one room for us to sort through. "Take what you need and be quick before she comes looking for you."

I grabbed my bag and a few choice weapons. I paused when I saw Mia's bag lying there too. If she'd escaped, she didn't stop to pick it up. Should I take it in case I found her? Or should I leave it for her in case she came back?

When I opened it, I found it was empty anyway. A little bit of me was disappointed that there was no trace of her anywhere. And then I remembered the small zipped compartment. I opened it. Found the picture of me, her and Daryl still tucked inside. I took it out and slipped it into my own bag, putting it inside a book I was carrying to keep it flat and safe.

"Okay, I'm ready," I said. Lucas grabbed a pair of wire cutters from the pile of tools.

"Let's go," he said, but he looked glum as he said it. I felt sad too.

It was dark out. Which was probably good for me, would make it hard for anyone to follow. Also meant it was more dangerous, the dead would be more active. Lucas cut a hole in the fence just big enough for a person to slip through. Then, he turned around to face me.

"Punch me," he said.

"What? No."

"It needs to look like you overpowered me and escaped," he said. "Which you could absolutely do, but it would really help if it looked like you'd beaten me up."

"But I don't want to," I said.

"I appreciate that," he smiled. "But Mary can't know I helped you."

I looked at him in the semi-dark, holding up the wire cutters he'd used to help me escape. There were old cuts and bruises on his face, that jagged and painful-looking scar, leftover from times he'd been beaten while we were all in captivity. It probably wouldn't be hard to make him look like I'd fought to escape on my own. But I really didn't want to. All we'd been through, I couldn't stand the thought of hurting him. Behind him, the woods I was about to walk into looked dark and lonely.

"Come with me?" I blurted out. Hated how desperate I sounded. "We have some time before they know we're gone."

"I can't," he said.

"You don't agree with any of this, do you?"

"Of course not," he said. "But I'm not like you. I don't stand a chance out there on my own. I need people. A group."

"You wouldn't be on your own," I said. "You'd be with me."

"Why? So you can do all of the hunting and kill all of the dead while I just do my best not to die? You don't need me slowing you down."

"You wouldn't," I said. I could feel my hands start to shake. I'd never been good at losing people, but I'd never known what to say to get them to stick around either. No matter what I said or how I said it, everyone always left. "How can you slow me down if I don't even know where I'm going?"

"Naomi..."

"What if Mary still thinks you helped me?" I said. "It might be safer to leave."

He shook his head. "You saved my life when you found me in that clearing. I owe you for that-"

"You don't owe me shit."

"I do," he said. "But I can't come with you. I'm tired of running all the time. If we get separated, I'm screwed, and if we don't, I'm a burden to you. Plus, someone should stay and take care of Izzy."

He sounded so sure, and I kind of got it. It would be easier to stay with him, with all of them. Even if I couldn't buy into Mary's twisted way of thinking, maybe I could pretend I did. Just suppress it until I stopped thinking about it altogether.

Even entertaining the idea felt wrong. I'd never been great at biting my tongue. I signed, resigned to what was about to happen.

"If you change your mind," I said. "I'm heading North. Mia and I always said we'd try and get back to DC. If she got out, it might be where she's heading. If she and Perla come back here-"

"I'll let them know," he said. "And I'll keep them safe. Now, punch me."

I hit him a couple of times. It wasn't that hard, but it was enough to reopen some of his old wounds, so they started bleeding again.

"I'm not doing any more," I said. "I refuse."

"Fine," he said. "I can always stab myself in the leg or something when you're gone."

"Find me if you change your mind," I said, pulling him close to me. Hugged him tight. He wrapped his arms around me, and I whispered, "Please change your mind."

"Goodbye, Naomi," he said and let go. I climbed through the hole he'd made in the fence. Crouched down on the other side and pulled it behind me so that you couldn't see it had been cut unless you looked real close. Lucas crouched down on the other side and helped. Gave me a sad little smile, "Go. I'll tell them you left out the front."

I smiled back but felt too sad to say anything. I turned around and walked into the woods. I walked as fast as I could, wanting to put as much distance between Terminus and me as possible. I didn't know how long Lucas would wait before heading back in.

Surrounded by nothing but trees and the dark, the loneliness crushed me. I almost turned around. I almost went back. I knew I was doing the right thing, but I was getting sick of the way that doing the right thing always seemed to leave me walking alone.

Daryl

"What you got against Peach Schnapps?" Beth asked me. She'd been quiet for a while. It was midday, and the sun was at its hottest. Walking around in this heat was shit. Even worse when you're hungover.

"What?"

Beth and I had been on the road for a long time. Without the prison for shelter, and without knowing if our friends were still alive, we'd had to go back to scavenging to survive. In the middle of all of this, Beth announced that she wanted to try her first drink, which was how we'd wound up off our faces and yelling at each other on Moonshine. Seemed like we were friends again now, but we were left to walk to the next place with a killer headache.

"Back at the old club, you smashed that bottle pretty quick," she said. On our quest to find her some alcohol we'd found a bottle of Peach Schnapps in some old clubhouse for rich folk. I hadn't been surprised that it was the only thing nobody had drunk, but I weren't exactly happy to see it. When I didn't answer right away, Beth said, "You get sick drinking it one time or something?"

"Something like that," I said. She looked at me, expecting more, so I said, "Just turned me into a real asshole. If you thought I was bad last night, you should've seen me on Peach Schnapps."

She laughed, but not in a mean way. "You get in a fight or something?"

"Yup," I said. "Huge one. With my best friend. Worst night of my life."

"You had a best friend?" she said like it was the most shocking thing she'd ever heard me say.

"Yeah," I said. "'Course I did. I told you about her... she had a little sister?"

"Mia," Beth said. "I remember. Didn't mention it was your best friend."

"Does that matter?"

"Yes," she said. "Never imagined you with a best friend, especially not a girl one. So, you had a fight. Do you mean…"

She was on the verge of looking at me like I were nothing but redneck dirt. I wondered if I'd ever escape that look.

"I didn't hit her, if that's what you were going to ask," I said, but then because it was kind of a lie, I added. "Not on purpose, anyway."

She gasped. "What happened?"

"I got mad," I said. "Threw this bottle at the wall. I was drunk. My aim was off. It smashed and a bit of glass ended up in her hand."

I looked away from her, didn't want to see if she were judging me for it. The memory was making me feel sick anyway.

"Oh," Beth said, didn't sound as disgusted by me as she should. "So, it was an accident?"

"Yeah," I said.

"That doesn't sound so bad," she said. "I'm sure she forgave you."

"We said some horrible shit to each other," I said.

"But you apologized?" she asked.

"Nah," I said. "Never saw her again."

"Wow," Beth said. "Maggie and I used to fight all the time, but none of them were that bad."

"Well, y'all lived together," I pointed out. "Easier to make up then."

"True," she said. I wondered if, now that we had no idea if Maggie were still alive, she regretted time wasted on fights.

"What did you guys fight about?" I asked.

"Dumb stuff," she shrugged. "I'd steal her clothes and her makeup. She'd yell at me for copying her. I'd pretend I wasn't."

"Why not just wear your own stuff?" I asked, thinking about how many times Naomi had changed her hair when she went off to college, her new clothes that weren't good for hunting in. "Why be somebody you ain't?"

"Didn't really know who I was yet," Beth shrugged. "There's all this pressure that comes with being a girl. Makes it so confusing."

"Oh yeah?"

"Yeah. We're supposed to look a certain way, act a certain way. Nobody actually tells you the rules, they just make fun of you if you get them wrong." she said.

"That so?" I said. I hadn't thought about things that way before. How had Naomi's patched-up clothes and muddy hunting boots compared to the people at her school? I doubted any one of those other assholes would've had the same shit.

"All I knew," Beth said, "was that Maggie was the coolest, and if I could be like her, then other people would think I was cool too."

"I guess that makes sense," I said. "Kinda like me following Merle and his friends around because I thought they knew shit about life just because they were older than me."

"That's one thing I don't miss about the way things used to be," Beth said. "That pressure to be perfect all the time, it's exhausting."

"Sounds shit," I said.

"It was," Beth agreed. "People just being mean to anyone a little bit different to them because they need a break from hating themselves for a while."

I wondered if Naomi had felt that pressure too. I'd always seen her as this confident smartass, but maybe that were just with me. What about when she'd moved? Been around other people? People who, unlike me, didn't understand the kind of person she was and already think she was perfect?

I remembered how quiet she'd been the night I called her, how sad she'd sounded. I wished I could go back in time and just tell her she didn't need anybody else. She'd always been hard on herself, without me around to keep that in check, how bad had it got?

"How old would Mia be now?" Beth asked, distracting me from all of that regret. "If she's still out there?"

"Er..." I tried to do the maths in my head. "Thirteen, I think. Bout the same age as Carl."

It was a weird thought. Last time I'd seen her, she'd been about eight.

That night, we stopped over at an old funeral home. Which, turned out to be a surprisingly good place to hide from the dead for a while. There was some food there. We ate well and had somewhere almost comfortable to sleep. I mean, I slept in a coffin, but it were still better than those damn prison bunks. We heard a dog outside, yelping in pain. I told Beth to stay back and went to look. Second I opened the door, a Walker lunged right for me. Must've been drawn to the lights we had on.

I yelled for Beth to get out the back door and make a run for it. The house was overrun in seconds. We were low on bullets, and I had to make use of anything I could get my hands on to fight my way out.

When I made it out of there, there was no sign of Beth. Just her bag on the ground, and a black car with a white cross on the back screeching off into the distance.

She'd been taken.

Worst of all, it was my fault for not keeping her safe. Her dad was dead because I hadn't managed to kill the Governor when I had the chance. And now someone had kidnapped her.

I yelled her name, started to run after the car. I followed the headlights in the dark until they were too far away. After that, I just followed the road. I ran until I couldn't run anymore. Then I walked until I couldn't do that anymore either.

I sank down onto the road, too tired to go any further. The muscles in my legs burned. Felt like throwing up.

"Excuse me," I looked up. A nervous-looking little girl was standing in front of me. Couldn't have been older than fourteen. Her dark eyes darted around to the trees behind me like she expected something terrible to emerge from it, which I guess were sensible. Lots of terrible things around, both dead and alive.

"The hell did you come from?" I ask her. It hurt to speak, my lungs still on fire from all the running. She glanced at the woods behind her.

"Over there," she said. "I saw you running."

"Alright," I said. "Ain't you with anybody? Who's looking after you?"

"I was with my friend," she said, sitting down cross-legged on the road in front of me. "But somebody took her."

"Yeah?" I said. "Me too. You see which way they went?"

For a second, I felt a flash of hope in my chest that this girl had seen more. Whoever was running around snatching up young girls needed to be stopped.

"No. But I think I know who it was," she said. "We escaped from this... place. Used to be a sanctuary, but these men came. Took it over."

She shuddered, didn't seem able to go on anymore, but if these were the people who'd taken Beth, I needed to know what we were up against.

"They hurt you?" I asked.

She nodded, and then kind of shrugged. "They hurt other people more. We tried to fight... but it all went wrong. We didn't have any weapons, they had guns..."

"But you escaped?" I said. "You and your friend?"

"Yeah... my brother... he made sure we got out. Told us to go and find help," she said. There was a long pause. "I don't know if he's still alive."

I didn't know what to say to her. I couldn't promise her that her brother were still alive. Didn't want to offer her false hope. So I tried to focus on where we could go from here.

"You think the people you escaped from came looking for you?" I asked.

"Yes," she said.

"Were they in a car?" I asked.

"Yes."

"Did it have a white cross on the back?"

"I don't know," she said. "I was hiding. I couldn't see them from where I was."

It wasn't much, but it was my only real lead on who might've taken Beth.

"What's your name?"

"Perla."

"Perla," I repeated. "I'm Daryl. You think you can get us back to where you and your friend were being kept? I think they have my friend too."

"Yes," she said, but she looked terrified at the thought.

I stood up, even though my legs were still hurting. "Let's go then."

She stood up too. We took a path through the woods. Didn't want to take the road in case any of the people driving around snatching up little girls saw us. Probably wouldn't have mistaken me for a little girl but Perla was still at risk.

We walked through the woods until Perla said that we were close. We slowed down, were really careful on the approach. It was an old train station. I could see the disused tracks running into it. The word 'Terminus' has been painted on to the side of the building.

We hung back a bit and observed the parameters. The closer you got, the more you could smell some kind of cooking meat. Reminded me I was hungry.

"Hey," Perla muttered to herself, looking real confused. "That's Mary…"

She was staring at a woman who'd just come out to check on some kind of barbeque.

"You know her?"

"Yeah, she was the leader of this place before it got taken over," Perla looked confused. "They must've all got out. They must all be okay."

She looked so hopeful that for a second I didn't want to take that away from her, but then I saw her gearing up to run down there, or shout something that might give away our location. I put a hand on her shoulder to stop her. "Don't move too soon," I told her. "Not until we've figured out what's happened here, and we know it's really safe."

Disappointed, but understanding where I was coming from, she nodded.

Behind us, I heard some people moving through the woods. I pulled Perla deeper in, tried to hide us better in case someone had seen us from the compound and sent someone out to go get us. We ducked out of sight as best we could.

Rick, Michonne and Carl walked wearily into view. They all looked like shit. Covered in blood. Exhausted. But I was so happy to see them that I forgot to be quiet.

"Hey!" I said, standing up from our hiding place. Rick and Carl immediately had their guns on me. Michonne's sword was ready to slice me in half. I raised my arms above my head. "Just me."

"Daryl!" Carl ran towards me. I scooped him up in a big hug.

"Glad to see you, man," Rick said when I hugged him too. "Didn't know if you'd got away."

"Back at ya," I told him. Michonne finally put her damn sword away, and I hugged her too.

"Who's this?" Rick asked, nodding at Perla who was still standing where we'd been hiding.

"'C'mere, kid," I motioned her over. "This is Perla. She and her friend were held captive here for a while."

"Captive?" Michonne repeated. "Place says it's a Sanctuary."

"It used to be," Perla said. "But these men came and took it over."

Rick and Michonne glanced at one another and then back at me. "So, we don't go in?" Rick asked.

"Well," I said. "Perla and her friend escaped, but she thinks they sent someone after them. They took her friend, bundled her up in a car. Same thing happened to Beth."

"Beth was with you?" Rick said.

"Yeah," I said. We all looked through the trees at where Terminus stood.

"And they might both be in there?" Rick asked.

"They might be," I said. "We've been watching this place for a couple of hours. Perla says she recognizes one of the women from back when this place was safe. So, maybe it's legit again."

I was glad Rick was here. I could already see him trying to get together as much information as he could and formulate a plan.

"Maybe," he said. "But let's play it safe. There a way in here?"

He looked at Perla, who was startled to be asked. "Um…" she said. "Most folks come in the front. All the other entrances are blocked off."

"Look," Michonne said, pointing down to a part of the fence. "Think there's a gap in the fence there."

"Surely not," Rick said. But she was right, it looked like a part of the fence was slightly coming away from the rest. "Okay, let's hide some weapons out here, we can come back and get them if we need to."

We dug a shallow hole and hid some of our weapons in a bag. Took the rest with us to check out the gap in the fence.

"Hey, someone cut this," I said, pulling it open. It was too neat and precise for it to just be damage to the fence. They would've had to use wire cutters. Whether it was to get in or out of the place, I couldn't tell. It was just big enough to fit one person through at a time.

We were quiet. Didn't see anyone out patrolling the parameters. Perla took us to the nearest way in.

It was a big room, high ceilings that would be cold in winter. A woman was sitting with headphones on and a radio in front of her. She kept saying, "Sanctuary for all. Community for all. Those who arrive survive."

I knew those words. I'd been trying to find them for so long. It was a woman talking. But it weren't the one I'd heard before. I was sure of it. Don't know how, but I was. A small part of me was disappointed.

Before any of us could do or say anything, Perla stepped forward.

"Lucas!" she said. She sounded so happy. One of the guys who was bent over a table, writing something on a map looked up. The joy on his face twisted up a long scar on his left cheek.

He dropped his pen, ran to her. "Perla!" he said. "Where have you been? Is Mia with you?"

We watched them hug each other, but I could feel the eyes of everyone else in the room turn on us. She'd blown our cover. Now, I just had to hope she hadn't lied to me about anything, that she weren't deliberately leading people here with some bullshit story about a kidnapped friend. Another man stepped forward.

"Well, I bet Albert is on perimeter watch," he said, surprised, and a little annoyed, that we'd got in without them knowing. He introduced himself as Gareth and the place we were standing in as Terminus. Rick introduced himself and then the rest of us.

"They brought Perla home," the one called Lucas said. He said it real pointedly, but if there was any meaning behind it, only Gareth understood.

"Of course," he smiled. "Thank you for that. Mary will be so pleased. Come this way."

Mary was the one that Perla had mentioned before. From the sounds of things, whatever had gone down here while Perla had been hiding out in the woods, Mary was back in charge. They lead us out of the room to this courtyard where someone was cooking meat. My stomach rumbled, and I think I was too hungry to be able to tell what kind of meat it was. I was usually pretty good at that.

Something weren't right. Folks in the courtyard stopped what they were doing to look at us, which I guess was fair enough. Newcomers to any community should always be treated as a little bit suspicious. But that weren't all that was wrong. None of the faces around me were familiar. But some of their stuff was.

One of them had an orange backpack that looked a lot like one we'd had at the prison, not suspicious on its own but someone else had prison riot gear, another guy had a poncho identical to one I used to have. Hershel's pocket watch. I glanced at Rick, knew he'd seen it too.

He grabbed a gun off one of the guys who'd lead us out here and took another one hostage, demanding to know how these people had come by our shit. They tried to claim that they'd just happened to find them. But their story didn't add up.

A shot rang through the air. The guy Rick was pointing a gun at collapsed. I could tell by the shock on Rick's face that the bullet hadn't come from him. More shots were fired, we tried to fire back, but we were massively outnumbered.

We fled, running down a few alleyways between buildings. Seemed like everywhere we went, they were ready for us. We almost made it to the back fence, where we'd be able to get out the small hole we'd come in and get back to the weapons we'd buried. But there were more armed Terminus folks at the fence. Snipers on the roof.

"Lower your weapons," Gareth said. We were surrounded. Fighting would be certain death. But what was the alternative? I saw Rick look at Carl and then lower his gun. I put my crossbow down. Gareth made us line up outside one of the old train cars. One by one, we were forced inside.

The door shut behind us. There was nothing but dark and silence while our eyes adjusted. And then, in the dark, someone said, "Rick?"

It was Glenn. Next to him, was Maggie, Sasha and Bob. Alive a well. Or, as well as you can be when some psychos have locked you in a train car.

Nobody seemed to know what the hell was going on, or why they were holding us here. If they just wanted our stuff, why not shoot and take us?

We built weapons out of anything we could. When I tried to break off pieces of metal inside the car, I saw that there were already chunks missing. Was this just an old car, or had other people tried this before us?

The door opened without warning, and a canister rolled in, spewing out gas into the car. It was like they knew not to come in. Like they knew we were lying in wait for them with homemade weapons. My eyes immediately stung, and I couldn't stop coughing. Tear gas.

I felt dizzy.

Someone grabbed me, hauled me out of there. I could hear other people struggling too, but my eyes were burning. I couldn't breathe right. Felt someone tying my hands and feet, a gag in my mouth.

They dragged me away. It took a while in the fresh air before I could see properly again. When I did, I saw a weird trough. Like you'd used to feel animals. Another room with high ceilings. The hell was this place?

I saw Rick, Glenn and Bob. Along with some other guys from the train car that I didn't know. They made us kneel in front of the trough. My head was still woozy from the gas they'd used on us, but I was aware enough to realize that whatever the hell this was, it weren't good. I thought they might try to talk to us, try and negotiate with us about whatever the hell it was that they wanted from us. But they just hit the first guy on the head, pulled it back while he was all dazed and confused, and then slit his throat.

I knew at once what was happening. This is how you bleed out animals.

I started trying to break free of the ties binding my hands. They were talking and joking with each other while they did it. Whoever these guys were, this weren't their first time bleeding out humans.

They were just about to kill Glenn when they were stopped by a whole commotion outside. Gunshots. An explosion. I looked at Rick, while Glenn shut his eyes in relief. Did that mean some of our own had broken free to start fighting? Rick was struggling with something her hidden in his sock, trying to get his hand free on a sharpened stick.

A door opened, and Perla ran in. Her wide eyes took in the blood, the men who'd had their throats slit. She looked at me with a kind of horror that told me she'd had no idea this was happening when she came back here.

"I'm sorry," she said to me. "I'm so sorry."

"Hey, you're not supposed to be in here, kid," Gareth said. He looked at the guy with the scar, who'd run in after Perla. "Get her out of here, will ya?"

He never had a chance to respond because suddenly Rick was on his feet. He stabbed one of the butchers through the neck with the sharpened stick he'd used to cut himself free. Perla ran towards me, cut the binds tying my hands together with a small knife. I saw Lucas run to free Glenn.

"I'm sorry," Perla said again. "I'm so, so sorry."

"Ain't your fault, kid," I said, standing up to join the fight. "Mind if I borrow your knife?"

She handed it over. I slashed at another one of the butchers while Glenn was freed.

"This way," Lucas said, beckoning to another door. Perla ran towards him while I glanced at Rick, who looked as sceptical as I felt. We didn't know this guy. Could easily be leading us back into a trap.

"We ain't going anywhere with you," I said. "You're one of them."

"It doesn't matter anymore," he said. "This whole place is about to go up in smoke. A horde of the dead are coming, please… just follow me."

Outside sounded like chaos. There was screaming and gunfire, and I could definitely smell smoke. Reluctantly, we ran towards Lucas. Ran past half-skinned human bodies hanging from hooks in the ceiling.

Then, he took us through a room filled with candles. Perla stopped running. I stopped too.

"You okay?" I asked her. She stared around in shock. Names had been painted all over the walls, along with the words 'first always', 'never again' and 'never trust'.

"The hell is this?"

"I think it's a memorial," she said. "Everyone those men killed... most of them are children. Mia and I are the only ones who got out."

What the hell had happened in this place? Rick and I glanced at each other and then back at Perla as she scanned the names on the wall. I wondered if she was looking for her brother. I stepped forward, was about to tell her that we had to move. And then a name caught my eye.

Mia Payton.

I stopped. Blinked at it a couple of times. It didn't change.

Underneath was the name, Perla Rocha.

"Hey," I tapped it. "This you?"

She nodded.

I pointed to Mia's name, "That your friend?"

She nodded again. My mouth felt dry, my heart were beating a million miles an hour. Just the name Mia I could chalk up to coincidence. But Mia Payton? It had to be her.

I looked at her name on the wall, and there were only two things I could be sure of. First and most obvious, Perla weren't dead. Someone must've presumed they were after their escape. Maybe Mia hadn't been brought back here after all. No sign of Beth either. No weird cars with white crosses. They must both be someplace else. They could both still be alive.

Second thing, the handwriting of both girls' names was the same, but it weren't Naomi's. I'd recognize her so-neat-it-looks-typed handwriting anywhere. This weren't it.

"Was Mia on her own?" I asked. Perla still couldn't really talk, I did my best to keep my voice level, so I didn't frighten her. "Did she come to this place on her own?"

"No," she said, wiping away some tears on the back of her sleeve. "We came here together. A whole group of us. My brother…"

She started sobbing again and moved to stand in front of another name on the wall.

José Rocha.

Next to it; Nadia "Dee" Mills.

Both of them so neat they could've been stencilled on there. I reached out and touched the name next to Perla's brother. The hairs on my arm stood on end. Had she written this? Had she stood where I was standing now?

I did one last, desperate sweep of everything around me. No Naomi Payton on the memorial wall. No hint of her in any of the shit lying around me. No way she'd have stood by while this place became what it did, that much I was sure of. If she hadn't written Mia's name, it was because she didn't think she was dead. She would be out there somewhere, looking for her. Naomi never gave up on anyone, wouldn't stop looking until she found her sister or the search killed her. That was assuming Naomi made it out of that fire. Mia could have made it this far on her own.

But the handwriting.

The goddamn handwriting.

"Daryl!" Rick yelled. The walls shook with the force of another explosion, and I knew it was time to go, we didn't have long before this place went up in smoke.

We fought our way out to the train cars. Terminus had caught fire, the fences were down. Walkers flooded the place. Some of them were on fire too. Cries for help came from inside the carriages. We busted them out and ran for the hole in the fence.

Terminus residents were still shooting, but their targets were torn between the Walkers and us. We were low on weapons and low on bullets, so headed for the stash of weapons that we'd buried. By the time we'd dug them up, most of Terminus was on fire, and the gunshots from its former residents had stopped. They were either dead or fleeing.

I heard someone approaching through the woods. Looked up to see Carol.

She was back.

Felt like I was looking at a ghost. A giant rush of happiness and I ran to her. Hugged her tight. Our little family hadn't felt right since she'd left.

"Did you do that?" Rick asked her, with a nod to the mostly destroyed Terminus. Carol nodded. The two of them hugged each other, whatever bad blood had come between them when he'd sent her away was clearly now water under the bridge.

"I believe these are yours," Carol said, handing me back my crossbow and giving a watch back to Rick. "Tyreese and Judith are waiting for you all."

"Judith?" Rick repeated, overjoyed that he was going to get to see his little girl again. Carol nodded.

"Before we go, we should make sure everyone from Terminus is dead, so they don't come after us," Rick said. He took his pistol out and turned it on Lucas. "That includes you."

Lucas raised his hands in surrender, automatically got down on his knees.

"No," Perla said, trying to stand between Rick's gun and Lucas.

"Hey," Lucas said as calmly as he could. "I got you all out of there..."

"Don't matter," Rick told him. "Place was already going up in smoke. And what you all were doing in there... it's sick."

"You don't know what it was like..." he stopped himself, looked away from us. "Terminus was a Sanctuary once."

"Enough," Rick's gun clicked as he switched the safety off. Perla turned her pleading gaze on me. She must've seen the hesitation on my face.

"Wait," I said and stepped forward. I couldn't let it happen without knowing how Naomi fitted into all of this, one way or the other. I looked at Perla.

"Your friend, Mia," I said. "Was she with anyone? Family?"

Perla nodded, and it felt for a second like my heart stopped beating. The kid took a few deep breaths to calm herself and then said, "Her sister."

"Naomi?" Shock coursed through me. Felt like I'd been struck by lightning.

She's alive.

At the mention of her name, Lucas looked up at me. I took Rick's place in front of him, crouched down to look him in the eye. I wanted to be able to tell if he was lying.

"What about you?" I asked him. "You know Naomi?"

"She saved my life," he said. I felt a sharp pang in my chest. "We're friends."

"She in there?" I gestured back towards the burning Terminus building, ready to run into the flames if he said yes. I'd been held back once, wouldn't let that happen again.

He shook his head.

"She left," he said. "How do you-"

"Where'd she go?" I asked.

"North," he replied. "She was heading for DC, looking for Perla and her sister. She and Mia always planned to head back there, so she thought it was a good place to start."

I stood up, looked at Rick.

"Don't shoot him," I said. I didn't really care what happened to him, but he was the last person to see her alive, he knew what she'd been thinking. I glanced down at him. "Get up."

He scrambled to his feet. I grabbed him by the arm, starting walking as fast as I could.

"Daryl," Rick called. "Where you going?"

"North," I said, without stopping.

"Will you slow down, man?" he said, I heard him break into a run to catch me up. "We should talk about this."

"If y'all ain't coming with me, I ain't got nothing to say to you," I said.

"Daryl, that's not what I'm saying," he said. "But we need some kind of plan, we can't just go wandering off into the woods."

"I think North is a sensible plan," one of the guys we'd escaped with said. "Put as much distance between us and this place as we can, head towards DC, where I wholeheartedly believe things will be safer. I think this is the best way to fully maximize our chances of survival."

"See," I glanced back at him. "This weirdo agrees with me."

"Affirmative." The weirdo with the mullet gave me a nod. I turned my attention back to Lucas.

"What happened to her?" I asked.

"You sure you want to know?" he said. I wasn't, but now that I had something else to focus on, a direction to walk in, I thought maybe I could stomach it.

"Yeah."

"They separated us from the kids," he said. I tried not to think about Naomi and Mia being torn apart. Everything Naomi had ever done had been for that kid. "Said if we stepped out of line, they'd kill them. They locked us in the same containers we put you guys in. They beat the men. They did worse to the women."

He didn't say anything else, he didn't need to. I knew what that meant. A deep pain twisted in my gut like I was being ripped slowly in two. I had to find her. Just walking North weren't enough. I needed something else, tracks to follow that guaranteed the path I was on would lead to her.

"Did she get out of Terminus the same way we just did?" I asked. He nodded. "How long ago? And how big was the group she was with? I might still be able to pick up their tracks."

"A while ago," he said. "And it was just her."

I stopped walking. Heard everyone who'd been following us stop too. Felt like everything inside me turned to ice in an instant. I pushed him up against the nearest tree. Held a knife to his throat. Everything he'd told me so far had made me nothing but angry.

"She's on her own?"

The one thing I could blame him for. Lucas looked more scared of me now than he had of Rick when he was pointing his pistol at him.

"She wasn't happy with... what we were doing, what Mary was doing," he said. "When she found out, she tried to change things. Got in a big fight with Mary about it."

'Course she did.

I shut my eyes for a second. That sounded exactly like the Naomi I knew. I felt like the world was spinning too fast. She'd been here. She'd fucking been here, in that place and in these woods, and now she was gone. Felt like I'd spent my whole life just a few steps behind her.

When I opened my eyes again, Lucas was looking at me pleadingly. "If she hadn't left, Mary would've killed her."

"You should have gone with her," I yelled at him. "Sending her off on her own... after all she's been through...!"

I didn't want to think about it, but I also couldn't stop. Lucas had his arms raised again. "She was the strongest of all of us," he said. "I didn't want to slow her down."

I felt a hand on my back, Carol looking from me to Lucas and back again.

"I'm sure we'll find her," she said gently. "But we need to go get Tyreese and Judith. Then we can start."

"Fine," I said, though I could feel every wasted second like a stab in the heart. I looked back at Lucas. "That's a damn weak excuse. You shouldn't have left her."

He nodded, knew it was best to keep his mouth shut. I let go of him and started walking again. Wanted to scream her name into the trees until she answered, but I knew she'd be too far away for that.

Truth was, it wasn't just Lucas I was angry with. It wasn't just the men who'd hurt her. I was mad at myself too. If I hadn't run from her the night that we'd fought in her dorm, if I'd only gone back and apologized... If I hadn't let Merle drag me away from her burning house... I could have saved her from all of this.

I'll find you, Naomi.

A silent promise, an apology all rolled into one. I couldn't believe she'd been alive all this time and I hadn't been looking for her every damn day. She'd made it out, she'd gotten out of that fire. But where the hell was she now?

Chapter 16: New Places, Old Faces

Naomi

Alone in the woods, just me and the dead, I started to feel like one of them. Less substantial, maybe. More like a ghost.

I passed through the world without leaving a mark on it. If one of the dead bit me or tore me apart, who would know? Who would care? I'd just be another person who disappeared like smoke, like Mia and Perla. Except there was nobody out there looking for me.

There was so no trace of the girls anywhere. I don't know what I expected to find on my own in the woods with no direction to head in, days after they'd left Terminus. All I had was a vague hope that if they were still alive, Mia would make them go North.

The further I got from Terminus, the more I thought about going back. Even if Mia never returned to it, there were people there. Shelter. Food. Then I'd remember the kind of food it was, and it would keep me walking away.

I was always hungry. It was hard to hunt when it was just me I was hunting for. I was used to having other mouths to feed. But, when it was just me, it felt like far too much effort. Hard to get up the motivation to do it.

Lack of sleep made it difficult too. I'd come across an old tent. The previous owner had been reduced to nothing but bone after the dead got in. I was back to sleeping in the trees again and wasn't about to make the same mistake as that poor bastard, but I took the waterproof outer layer of the tent. Just in case it rained.

It was hard to find somewhere secure enough to rest my eyes. Balancing on branches wasn't comfortable either, but I don't think I'd have been able to sleep in a real bed either. Every time I closed my eyes, I'd see the face of that man. The one from Terminus. With his horrible breath, his unwanted hands. Every dream I had, no matter how it started, turned into a nightmare. Although I knew I'd left him tied up in an old train car, every noise I'm the woods felt like him coming to get me.

I wondered if Mary had cooked him up yet. The thought didn't make me feel much better.

Days turned to weeks. And weeks might have turned to more, but I'd lost track. The forest felt never-ending. It was quiet, I'd always liked the woods for exactly that reason. It was calming, reminded me of better times in my life. If I did die out here, whether of starvation or being killed by something else, it would be a fitting end. I'd grown up roaming the woods, might as well die in them too.

Silence turned from comforting to lonely. Made the thoughts in my head louder than I ever wanted them to be. There was nothing to distract me from the guilt that followed me everywhere.

José was dead because of me.

Perla and Mia were missing because I hadn't looked after them.

I'd had dark days before all of this, when I'd struggled to make enough money to support myself and Mia, felt like I would never achieve the things I wanted. I'd had days where Momma had called me to remind me I was a selfish piece of shit for moving out of Georgia and leaving her on her own. Days where I thought no matter how hard I worked, I'd never be able to give Mia the life she deserved. Days where I'd felt nothing but guilt over not trying harder to get Daryl away from Merle. Every time I heard a story about some drug bust gone wrong, I'd think of them both. And all of the things I could have done but didn't. On days like those, death hovered around me as a quiet last resort, a silent escape from that noise in my head. On those days, I'd told myself I had to stay here for Mia. I had to keep going so that she would be safe and happy and loved. But now, surrounded by the overwhelming possibility that she was dead and it was my fault, I couldn't find a single reason that I deserved to be here.

I sat down and put the barrel of my gun in my mouth. I'd heard that was the most effective way of doing it. If you just put the gun to the side of your head, some people flinch at the last second, and the bullet doesn't hit right. I didn't want to spend my last hours bleeding out. I also didn't want to do anything that would leave enough of my brain intact that I'd end up just another undead dickhead. I could taste metal and something bitter.

I didn't think it would be easy. But it was still harder than I thought. Every time my finger brushed against the trigger, I thought or Mia. The small chance that she was out there. Trying to make it on her own. How could I leave her here without knowing for sure what had happened to her?

Coward. I'm such a goddamn coward.

Mia felt like a convenient excuse. Deep down, there was a part of me that couldn't pull the trigger because I was scared to. Because something in me wouldn't let me. Survival was hardwired into me. Had been before all of this. Since I was a kid. I'd grown up with hunger and pain. Grown up fighting every day just to be okay. Turning that instinct off, after so long, was impossible.

Fuck you, Momma.

I took the gun out of my mouth, threw it to the ground. I think I would have cried if I hadn't been so dehydrated.

I'd failed Mia, hadn't been brave enough to fight for her. I'd told her to go, calmly, with those awful men. Because I was a fucking coward who didn't even have the guts to pull the trigger on herself when she had nothing to live for.

I could get up. I could keep walking. But, if I sat here long enough, death would catch up with me. Whether by starvation or dehydration or a horde of the dead come to tear me apart, it could only be a matter of time.

I knew I couldn't walk much further. My legs were weak, and I was always tired. I'd gone from feeling hungry all the time to nauseous because my stomach was so empty to absolutely nothing. Maybe a break for a few days would do me some good. A chance to rest, a chance to stay in one place for long enough to hunt something. I could re-evaluate my situation from there, draw up some kind of plan.

I dragged myself to my feet. I didn't have enough energy to hunt, but I could probably build a fairly decent trap. I found a ditch in the woods, used the biggest branch I could find to make it deeper. I found and sharpened as many pieces of wood as I could, and stuck them at the bottom of the pit I'd dug. I covered it with the outer layer of the tent I'd found and piled leaves on top of it to hide it from any unsuspecting deer.

I hoped it would catch something I could eat. But every morning t was full of skewered dead assholes who'd passed by in the night. It was dumb luck the brought the squirrel close enough to me for me to catch it. It didn't expect to climb a tree and find me in it. Didn't expect me to be so quick with my knife either. I threw it in my bag as a treat for after I cleaned out the pit and claimed down from the tree.

There were three of them in there, all of them stuck on something sharp and all of them still moving. I stabbed them each through the head before hauling their carcasses off. It's heavy work when it's just you, and you haven't eaten in three days.

When I was done, I sat down, back against a nearby tree. Every muscle in my body ached, and I wondered if I'd started digesting them. I vaguely remembered that was part of what happened when your body went into starvation.

A noise beside me made me reach for my knife. Thought it might be one of the dead, but it was a black cat. Just fur and bones. I could see its ribs. Couldn't remember if they were meant to be lucky or unlucky. Supposed it didn't matter now.

"Hey, Cat," I said, too tired to come up with a more original name. "You hungry?"

It meowed at me and licked one of my fingers with its sandpaper tongue. Trying to see if there was any food there.

"Yeah," I sighed, "You and me both."

It sat down beside me, looking up at me with these big, hungry green eyes. I knew the sensible thing would be to eat it. But it looked as pathetic as I felt.

"Fine," I said. I took the squirrel out of my bag and chopped it in half. I threw one half to the cat, ate the rest myself. Uncooked squirrel is not good, but it was the only thing I'd had to eat in days.

It was disgusting, but it helped. A few hours of shooting pains in my stomach while it got over the shock of having something to digest. I managed to sleep for a few hours before a nightmare woke me. But when I did wake, I felt a little stronger.

I also felt like I was being watched.

The dead all move in the same way. You get used to the sound of them moving between the trees. You get to learn when they're too close, and you need to take them out, and when they're far enough away to walk right by if you stay still. The living are less predictable. More deliberate in where they're going.

So, when I went to find water and heard a few twigs snap behind me, the hairs on my arm stood on end. Footsteps. Without the moans that the dead make.

Someone from Terminus? Had Mary sent someone after me? If so, why hadn't they killed me already?

I felt sick but tried to stay calm. Tried to continue my hunt for water as if nothing was wrong. Clutched a knife in my hand the whole time in case someone grabbed me. I was so damn sick of being grabbed. They followed me for a while. I found nothing to drink, I probably would've if I hadn't been so distracted by the sounds behind me. They left before it got dark. I think.

Maybe I was cracking up.

Maybe my grief and my guilt had driven me to imagine a phantom following me through the trees. Was this how it felt to be hunted and realize it? I thought of the deers I'd stalked that had seen me coming seconds before I'd shot them. I'd prefer to be shot without knowing it was coming.

The next day. More of the same. Always gone by dark.

The day after that, I got up before it got light and cleared away all of the dead things that had fallen into the pit I'd dug. I took out all of the sharpened sticks and covered it up again. When I heard the familiar quiet footsteps, I walked as fast as I could. I knew this would give me a good headstart. You can't rush too much when you're following someone, or you might make a mistake that gives yourself away.

When I got close to the pit and was pretty sure he couldn't see me, I pulled myself up onto a low branch. I sat there, still as I could, and waited.

It wasn't long before I heard him approach, watched him pass by underneath me. It was definitely a man following me. Not my imagination or a weird manifestation of my guilt. A real, living, man. Flesh and bone.

I watched him sneak through the trees underneath me. It was hard to tell from far away, but he didn't look like anyone from Terminus. His backpack and his clothes were in good condition, if he wasn't from Terminus, he must be holed up somewhere pretty nice. So why was he spending his days following me around?

From where I was perched, the outline of my pit was pretty visible. I wondered for a second if he'd be smart enough to spot it. But then I heard him yelp as he fell straight in.

I dropped down from the branch and walked towards him. He was scrambling wildly inside the pit, trying to work out what had just happened. And then he saw me approach.

It had been a very long time since I'd seen another living soul. I'd begun to think it might be just me and Cat and the dead left in the world. It was weird to look at one who could look back at me. I hadn't seen even seen myself in weeks, but I didn't need a mirror to tell me that I looked like shit. My lips were dry and cracked from lack of water, and my own blood was still matted in my hair from beatings I'd taken at Terminus. I wondered if there were still bruises on my face. My hands were covered in mud and dried squirrel blood. He saw the gun in them and raised his arms above his head. There was a clear plastic water bottle in one of them

"What do you want?" I asked.

"To give you this," he said, shaking the bottle at me. I reached down and took it off him. I held it up to the light; the water inside looked clear enough. I took a sip, let it sit on my tongue a while, didn't taste anything funny. I swallowed. "Why? Is it poisoned?"

"No," he looked horrified that I'd thought him capable of it. "Why would you drink it if you thought it was?"

"Don't much care if it is," I said, with a shrug. "But shooting me is faster if you're looking to take my shit."

"I'm not," he said. "I just thought you looked like you needed some water."

"Thanks," I said, and took another, longer drink. He watched me do it.

"What's this?" he asked, gesturing to the pit around him.

"It's a pit," I said. "Usually, it catches the dead and stops them from getting to me. If I'm lucky, it might catch an animal I can eat."

"And does that work?" he asked. "As a defence, I mean, how do you clear it of the dead ones that fall in here?"

"Usually there's a lot of sharp shit for them to impale themselves on," I said. He looked alarmed. "But I took it out so you wouldn't die when you fell in."

There was a moment of silence where he looked at me like he wasn't sure whether to believe me or not.

"Thank you," he said, his eyes were a little wide.

"So," I sat down at the edge of the pit. "Why were you following me?"

"I wanted to help you."

"Don't need it," I said, but he didn't look like he believed me, and I felt like I'd told a lie.

"How long have you been alone for?" he asked. I felt like I was the one who was in the damn pit.

"A while," I said, swallowing down a lump of loneliness in my throat. It sat in my stomach.

"There's a community not far from here," he said. "It's safe, you should join us."

"There are no safe places anymore," I told him. He looked at me like he pitied me. Usually, I'd have hated that, but I was too tired to care.

"It's a real sanctuary," he said. "You have my word on that."

"I don't know you," I said. "Your word don't mean shit."

"Fair enough," he said. "I have pictures... if you'd like to see those?"

"Sure," I said. He reached slowly into his bag, let me see what he was doing the whole time. Seemed he was taking the possibility of me shooting him much more seriously than I was. He reached up and handed over a stack of polaroids. I set them on my knee and flicked through them, with my empty gun still pointed lazily in his direction. The pictures were all of fancy houses, solar panels and big community walls. They looked too good to be true like he might've got them out of an old property sales catalogue.

"Ain't any people in these pictures," I said. "You could've got these from anywhere."

"Another fair point," he said. "I could be lying to you. But why would I?"

I laughed, couldn't tell if he was lying or just nieve.

"The world ain't what it was," I said. "People ain't what they were either. I've had a sanctuary before. It didn't last. Nothing lasts these days."

"You've lasted," he said. "And so have I. And so has Alexandria."

"Yeah, but for how long?" I said. "If you keep shouting about Alexandria to everyone who traps you in a pit, it won't be long before another group come and take it over. Destroy everything."

"To be fair," he said. "You're the only person so far who's trapped me in a pit. And I don't tell just anyone. That's why I followed you for so long. To see what kind of person you were."

I narrowed my eyes. "And what makes you think I'm the kind of person who wouldn't come and take over your so-called safe place?"

"Well," he said. "Firstly, there's only one of you. And there's many more of us."

"How many?" I asked. "None, if those pictures are anything to go by."

"A lot," he said. "In fact, I have someone nearby, who'll come looking for me if I take too long."

I smiled, wondered if he felt threatened or if he was the one making the threat. I put my gun down, ready to end this dumb charade.

"I ain't going to hurt you," I said, holding out a hand to help him up. "I just got tired of being followed."

"You knew I was following you?"

"Yeah," I said. "You ain't as quiet as you think you are."

He took hold of my arm and pulled himself up to sit next to me. We both started down into the empty pit.

"Second reason I don't think you'll wage war on Alexandria," he said. "Is that you fed that starving cat half of the food you had on you. People might be a bit different now, but they're still mostly good."

I felt my face get hot. "Didn't know you'd seen that. Maybe you are quieter than I thought."

"Maybe," he gave me a little smile. "Or maybe you were just more distracted than you thought. Will you reconsider?"

I didn't answer right away. Instead, I asked, "You found a lot of survivors out here?"

"Not as many as I'd like," he said. "But we found a teenage girl out here a few days ago. Now, you-"

My heart jumped.

"Just one? What was her name?" I asked.

"Enid."

It sank again, crushed with disappointment.

"Oh."

He looked curiously at me. "Were you hoping for someone else?"

"My sister," I said. "Mia. Her friend Perla. I'm trying to find them."

A part of me hoped that I'd say their names and he'd know them, that they'd reached his so-called sanctuary before me, but he just looked at me with a massive amount of sympathy.

"How long have they been gone?"

"A while," I said. Didn't want to tell him that time had stopped for me out here. Or that I hadn't actually seen Mia or Perla since Terminus had been taken over. I didn't really know how long they'd been missing. Didn't want to hear him politely ask if it was possible that they'd died in Terminus and my search was all for nothing. I'd had enough of those thoughts unprompted.

"Okay," he nodded. "I don't want to tell you how to conduct your search. But maybe having a safe base to search from is a good idea?"

A good point. If he was telling the truth.

I hesitated.

"I guess..."

"Well, then, the third reason I think you should come back to Alexandria is that it's is a great place to bring them back to. The other kids would love two new friends."

"You have other kids with you?" I asked. The thought of Mia and Perla playing with a new group of kids overwhelmed me for a moment. They'd been so happy at Terminus because of the friends they'd made. Friends who were all now dead.

"We do," he said. He took a breath. "And we have plenty of food. We have water. A safe bed to sleep in. If you don't mind me saying so, it seems like you might need some of those things. Build your strength back up."

"Strong enough to trap you," I pointed out.

"True," he said, with a small smile. "But all I've seen you eat in the last few days is half a dead squirrel. And you had to eat that raw. Looking for your sister would be much easier if you're also looking after yourself."

It was his best point yet.

"Okay," I said. "But I get to keep my weapons on me. If you turn out to be a psycho, I will use them."

He smiled like he was genuinely pleased I'd said yes.

"You can keep your weapons for now," he said. "But you might have to renegotiate if you decide you want to stay in Alexandria. Other residents might be a little nervous if you're walking around fully armed."

I nervous about the thought of these people walking around without being fully armed, but I didn't know this guy well enough to tell him that, so I held my tongue. I grabbed up what little stuff I had on me, and we started walking.

"What's your name?" he asked me.

"Naomi," I said. "Sorry, I should've introduced myself. It's been a while since I've seen someone else living."

"I'm Aaron," he said because I'd forgotten to ask him in return. "You need me to carry anything?"

"No," I said. "I'm okay, thanks."

Truthfully, I wasn't okay. I was still incredibly weak, and my whole body ached. I'd lost count of the number of blisters on my feet. But I wasn't about to just hand my shit over to this suspiciously friendly stranger.

"Okay," he said. We'd known each other all of five minutes, but he already seemed to understand that it was best not to argue with me. "The road's not far up ahead."

"You're taking the road?" I asked. "Little dangerous, isn't it?"

I'd found it was easier for the dead to form a horde on roads, the route was smoother, and there were fewer obstacles for any of them to get stuck behind. I hoped if Mia was out there, she'd stayed away from the roads.

"Er, yeah," he said. "But it's also the best place to drive a car."

"You have a car?"

"Yes."

"And it works?"

"Yes."

"Well, shit."

I could tell he was trying not to laugh, but my question had only been half-serious.

There was a car parked on the empty road. A guy with a shotgun stood guard over it. He straightened up when he saw Aaron approaching. He looked from me to him and back again. "Is this Squirrel Girl?"

"God, here's hoping that name doesn't stick," I said. He blinked at me a couple of times like he hadn't expected me to talk. I caught sight of myself in the car window, the first time I'd seen my reflection in weeks. Covered in mud and blood and God knows what else, it wasn't all that surprising he might have expected me to have lost my mind and ability to communicate. "I'm Naomi."

"Hi," he said. "I'm Eric."

"Nice to meet you, Eric."

"Are you hungry?" he asked, walking around to open up the trunk of the car. "I packed some snacks."

The way he said it made him sound like a dad taking his kid on some kind of road trip. I started laughing. "I'm starving."

"She means that literally," Aaron said. "So give her something small. If you eat too much at once, you could die."

Eric looked alarmed. I was disappointed not to be allowed as many snacks as I wanted. Eric handed me a granola bar. I could see more in his bag. He saw me eyeing them and zipped it shut.

"We should take her right to Pete," he said.

"Agreed," Aaron opened the back door for me.

It was weird to sit in a car again. I'd kind of forgotten how smooth they were, how fast they made everything go by. It was so clean in there too. Knowing how muddy I was, I felt bad for sitting on such clean seats. I ate the granola bar Eric had given me and sat back.

Stach pains hit me a few minutes into the journey. I did my best to keep quiet.

"You okay back there?" Aaron said.

"Eh... yeah," I said. "Just a few stomach cramps is all."

"Pass her some more water," he said to Eric. Eric passed another water bottle to where I was sitting. I took a few sips, felt a bit better.

"How'd you know I was hurting?" I asked. I thought I'd managed to keep it fairly quiet.

"Could see you grimacing in my rearview mirror," he said. "Figured something was up."

"That's very attentive of you," I said.

"Yes, well, he's very caring," Eric said, looking at Aaron with such love and admiration that it distracted me from the pains in my stomach.

"Did you two get together before all of this?" I asked. "Or did you meet in Alexandria?"

"Before," Eric said, with the kind of soft smile that people in relationships get when they talk about the early days.

The car was warm, and my aching body was sitting somewhere comfortable for the first time in ages. My eyes felt heavy. I had enough time to wonder if they really had put something in the water before I fell asleep.

A hand on my knee shocked me awake. I grabbed it by the wrist. Thought I was back in Terminus. My free hand reached for my knife before I remembered where I was, and heard the hum of an engine.

"Woah," Eric's shocked eyes met mine. They flickered down to the knife I was holding and back up again. "Just me… We're almost here."

"Sorry," I let go of him as fast as I could. My heart was still racing, it was difficult to breathe. "I'm so sorry."

"It's okay," he assured me. In the rearview mirror, I saw Aaron look back at me, worried. I sat back in my seat, tried to calm my breathing.

When we came in sight of the high walls of Alexandria, they were instantly recognizable from some of the pictures. Aaron stopped the car outside a secure gate and wanted for someone inside to open it up. How Alexandria had managed to stand for so long became a little bit clearer. Their walls were big and relatively strong. Scalable, though, if anyone was looking to break in. I wondered how big a horde would be needed to knock them down.

Every house looked straight out of a brochure, right down to the neat and perfectly mowed gardens. The people walking around were unarmed, their clothes were clean, and many of the guys looked freshly shaven. They stared at me as I got out of the car. I probably looked at terrifying to them as one of the dead.

"What the fuck is this place?" I muttered. I was now entirely sure that I had lost my mind. That this was some fantasy constructed by my starving, dying brain to comfort me in my final moments.

Aaron chuckled and knocked on the door we'd stopped in front of. I hoped whoever he was looking for would hurry up and answer, I was getting tired of being stared at. "Pete must be out," he said.

"I'll go and get him," Eric said. And ran off in one direction. I hugged my arms across my chest and avoided looking at anyone. I wondered if I'd made a mistake in coming here. Aaron watched me with quiet concern.

"You okay?" he asked.

"Yeah," I said. "Just not a huge fan of Doctors."

They always made me nervous. The exams they did, the questions they asked, how much they might cost. When I was a kid, Momma had only taken me when I'd really needed it. Had to lie about most things.

Eric came back with a man I assumed was Pete. He unlocked the door and led me into a makeshift doctors office. They had a hospital bed and everything. Aaron and Eric hovered in the doorway while I followed Pete in. They muttered to each other for a moment, then Eric nodded and ran off. Aaron looked back at me and gave me an encouraging smile.

"Take a seat for me, Naomi," Pete said. I must've looked nervous because he followed it with. "I'm just going to check you over and ask you a few questions."

"Okay, sure," I said and tried to smile. I still worried about the scars on my thighs, out of habit more than anything else. But Pete just checked over the ones he could see.

"A lot of these cuts and bruises look old," he said. "Any of them still bleeding, do they feel infected at all?"

"No," I said. Most of my wounds from Terminus were at the gross but painless scab phase of healing.

"That's good," he said and leant over me to take a look at one on my head. Pete had been drinking. I could smell it on him immediately. I was so surprised that I flinched a little when he came too close.

"Sorry," he said, with an apologetic smile. "Didn't know I'd be working today."

His grip on my wrist as he turned it over was tight. For someone who'd been drinking, he was skilled at hiding it. Only the smell gave him away. His smile was, on the surface, charming but something about his eyes warned me away from telling anyone. I knew that look. Every functioning alcoholic I'd ever known had given it to me at one time or another. I fixed a smile on my face.

"No problem," I said. "Sorry for all the dirt, didn't know I'd be seeing a doctor today."

His grip on my wrist relaxed, he took my pulse.

"It's a little weak," he said. "But nothing to worry about."

He asked me a few questions about how much I'd had to eat in the last few weeks, how much sleep I'd managed to get, how much water I'd drunk. All of my answers were surprisingly short, even to me. He took my temperature and tested some of my reactions.

"We'll need to reintroduce food slowly," he said. "And you should rest for at least a week. You've put your body through quite a lot, it needs time to recover."

"Okay," I said. The thought of resting for any amount of time felt bizarre. This whole place was weird. "Thanks. Sorry for disturbing your day off."

"Don't really get days off anymore," he said, with a slightly bitter laugh. "I'm the only doctor here."

I wondered if it was meant as a joke or a thinly veiled threat to stop me from telling anyone he'd been drinking on the job. Either way, I gave him a smile I hoped would placate him and said, "Well, thanks anyway!"

Aaron stepped forward. "She good to go?"

"Yeah," Pete said. I couldn't get up from the chair fast enough. It gave me a head rush.

"Take it easy," Aaron reminded me. I felt his hand on my back as he guided me out of there. It made me jumpy. He probably meant well, but he was still a stranger, and ever since Terminus, I found it difficult to be too close to people.

"Come and clean yourself up," he said. "And then we'll take you to Deanna's."

I wondered how much of that was for my benefit and how much of it was concern that Deanna would take one look at my muddy, bloody face and chuck me out of here again.

He took me to the house he shared with Eric. I was amazed to find they had a fully functioning shower. Stepping into it felt like stepping back into the past. I watched the water turn red and brown as all of the shit washed off me. Stayed in there for longer than I needed to, feeling equal parts bad about using so much water and astounded that I could shower in the first place.

I got out and wrapped myself in a towel, found that Aaron had laid out one for my hair too. The luxury in this place was too much to handle all at once.

The mirror was all fogged up. I wiped some of it away and peered at my face. Cuts and bruises were still there, but now the dirt and dried blood were gone I felt more like a normal human being, and less like a wild wan who'd been raised in the woods by a pack of wolves. I hoped the residents of Alexandria would stop staring at me now.

Someone knocked on the bathroom door. The sudden noise made me jump.

"Hello?" I called.

"Found you some clothes that might fit," Eric said. "I've put them on the bed next door whenever you're ready."

"Thanks!" I yelled back. I waited until I heard him walk away and then I opened the bathroom door and hurried into the next room. A pair of jeans and a shirt were laid out. It was odd to wear a stranger's clothes.

"How you feeling?" Aaron asked when I walked back out into the hallway.

"Incredible," I said as I towel-dried my hair. "Haven't seen a working shower since… well, I don't remember."

"No offence," Eric said. "But that much was obvious."

Aaron sighed and tried to hide an amused smile while I laughed. It was unsettlingly normal to be around them. Their spirits were still up. They still had enough hope to joke around with each other, and me, even though I was a stranger to them.

Aaron took me to see Deanna. She was not what I expected. She was older for a start. More like the kind of high-powered businesswoman that I was used to seeing in DC. It was unsettling to be around in this new world. The leadership skills of the past didn't fit right in such a brutal present. It was hard to see how someone with such little Before we started talking, she turned on a camera that was set up on a tripod.

"Er… I looked from it to her and back again. "Is that necessary?"

"Oh, just ignore it," she said, with a smile I didn't trust. "I'm just keeping records."

"You like watching them back or something?" I asked.

"We're living in historic times," she said. "I believe they deserve to be documented."

"But for who?" I said. "Everyone else is dead."

"Do you really believe that?"

"You guys have been unbelievably lucky here," I told her. She smiled like what I'd said was a compliment. It hadn't been intended that way. "It's bad out there."

"Why don't you tell me about how bad it is?" she said. I hesitated. How sheltered were these people?

"The dead have risen up," I said. "They're killing people. Almost everyone is gone. The ones who ain't…"

I stopped, didn't want to think about it.

"Aren't what?" she prompted.

"Things are hard," I said. "And it's made most people do shitty things."

"Has it made you do shitty things?"

I thought of José, lying in his own blood.

Deanna saw something in my face change, leant forward to study me. I narrowed my eyes, studied her back. "You some kinda psychiatrist before all this or something?"

"No," she laughed.

"Politician, then?" I said. One two types of people I could think of who was this keen to get so deep into people's heads when they'd just met them. She stopped laughing.

"Congresswoman," she said. "Ohio."

"Shit," I said, wondering how I could have got so lost. "Did I walk to Ohio?"

"No," she smiled. "You're in Virginia."

I breathed a huge sigh of relief.

"What did you do before all of this?" she asked me.

"Journalist," I said. "Washington, DC. That's where I was heading."

"I see," she said. "And Aaron tells me you were out there looking for someone?"

I nodded. Hadn't been aware that Aaron had talked about me to other people. It was a sharp reminder that no matter how friendly he seemed, I was still an outsider. He was a stranger. She asked me what happened to me at Terminus. What I had done.

So, I told her.

About the abuse we'd all suffered there. And about what the kids had done to get us out, what had happened to them because of it. What all of this had turned the people I was with into.

I thought she'd stop there. But she didn't.

She asked me what I had done personally. What had been done to me.

So, I told her.

About José.

About Mia and Perla.

About everything I'd been through.

By the time I was done, I felt like she'd surgically sliced me open, peeled back my skin and left all of my insides exposed to the world.

At the end of it all, she said, "Do you want to stay in Alexandria?"

I said, "Yes."

Although, the truth was, I wasn't sure. Maybe I'd been out in the real world for too long, but this place felt like a bizarre dream. Deanna might have been the kind of leader I'd have voted for back when democracy still existed, and there was a place for her specific kind of psychological warfare and big picture thinking. But now? Alexandria's luck would have to run out one of these days. And when the walls came down, none of Deanna's anti-gun policies and neat little roles for her community would do her any good. These people were soft.

"Why do you want to stay in Alexandria?" she asked.

"I want to find the people I lost," I said. There was no point in lying to her. She knew my story.

"And in return?"

"What?"

"If we give you a safe place to search for your sister and her friend, how will you contribute?"

"I know how to hunt," I said. "And I'm probably one of the few people here who knows what it's really like outside of these walls."

She waved at someone through the glass panel in the door. As Aaron came in, I wiped the tears from my face and prayed the tape she'd just made never saw the light of day.

"Show Naomi to one of our houses, will you?" she said. "I think she has a bright future here."

I looked up at Aaron. The thought of sleeping in a big house, alone with my nightmares, was not very appealing. Every creak in the dark would send me into a panic.

"Stay at ours if you like," Aaron said, with a glance at Deanna. "We have a spare room?"

Even if they were a weird cult planning to murder me in my sleep, that sounded preferable to letting my own thoughts drive me slowly insane.

"Would that be alright?" I asked. "I don't want to intrude or anything."

"No, that's fine," he assured me. "And if you decide you want your own place once you've settled in a bit, that's fine too."

"Thank you," I said. "Both of you."

"Get some rest," Deanna said with a smile. "I'll speak to you again soon."

Aaron hovered around me like a nervous father for the first few days, bringing me some small and frequent snacks according to Pete's specifications on what he thought my body could handle. It was almost enough to make me want to move right back out again. But Eric and Aaron had a lot of books, and that was enough to make me stay almost anywhere. After a few days, I could eat without getting stomach cramps.

"Think we could try you on a full meal today," Aaron said. I nearly cried with relief.

"Thank God," I said. "Can I at least help cook it?"

"Maybe," Aaron hesitated.

"Just let her," Eric called from further down the hallway. I heard him get louder as he approached. "She must be going crazy in there with you hovering around all the time."

"Bless you, Eric," I said. He popped his head around the doorframe.

He looked at Aaron, "Have you asked her yet?"

"No," he said. "I was going to wait until she's well enough."

"I'm not dying!" I said. "What did you want to ask?"

"We're going to start going out looking for more recruits soon," he said. "Alexandria still has a couple of empty houses."

"That's good," I said, wondering why he was telling me this. "This place could do with some fresh blood."

We both knew that by that I meant 'people who'd had bigger issues than not having a pasta maker'.

"When you have your strength back," Aaron said. "Do you want to come with us? I think we could use your skills out there."

"Oh," I hesitated. It wasn't what I'd expected to be asked. Things were good here, I liked Eric and Aaron, but it felt like too much of an inclusion. Like saying yes would turn me as weak as the rest of them. "I should really keep looking for my sister and her friend."

"Seems to me like we could do both," he said. "We can go out looking for them, and if we find some other people, you can stop me from getting trapped in a pit."

I smiled. It was still so strange to meet two people who'd remained kind in a cruel world. But, I also knew part of the reason they could stay so kind was that these walls had sheltered Alexandria from the worst of it when the world had fallen apart. They hadn't seen much of the new world, hadn't had a chance to lose faith in it. If they ran into the wrong people, how would they know? If they ran into a horde of the dead, would they know enough to get themselves out?

"Sure," I said. "I'll come with you guys. You wanna go soon?"

"Naomi..." Eric rolled his eyes.

"I feel fine!"

"Maybe next week," Aaron laughed. "Pete says you should be resting."

"Pete's an asshole," I said. "And I'm not sure he knows what he's talking about."

"Pete is a fully trained surgeon," Aaron reminded me. "He went to medical school."

I sighed.

"He is an asshole, though," Eric agreed from the doorway.

"Amen," I raised my glass of water like I was toasting him.

Aaron looked at us both and sighed in exasperation. "Next week," he said. "We'll get back out there and see if we can find anyone else."

Daryl

We'd not been at the church for long before I saw the car again. The one that took Beth, and might have taken Mia. Carol and I took off after it. Jump started our own car and hightailed it out of there. Didn't even have time to tell Rick and the others we were going. We just went.

The car led us back to the City. Or, what was left of it anyway. We broke down before we could see where it was headed, had to find somewhere safe for the night.

Next day we got ambushed by some guy - a kid really - who took our weapons. Don't think he had many of his own, and seemed to be out there alone.

Took a day before we found him again, by chance, and while he was about to be overrun by Walkers. Told us his name was Noah, and he'd been at Grady Memorial Hospital. He knew Beth. Said she was okay. Told us about Dawn, the woman running Grady, and the people she'd recruited as security around the place. It sounded like we'd need more guns, more people.

The small victory we'd just got in meeting this guy and getting information out of him was short-lived. One of the patrol cars hit Carol. Didn't have a chance to see her move before they bundled her into the back of it, just like they had with Beth.

I took Noah back to the church where everyone else was staying. Rescuing them was going to take a group effort. I wanted Maggie to be the first to know, thought it might go some way to making up for losing Beth in the first place. But she wasn't there. Some of the group had split off to try and get to DC early, Eugine reckoned he had a way of fixing this all. I didn't much care about that. All I cared about was getting everyone safely back where they belonged. Fewer Walkers would help with that, I guess.

I introduced everyone to Noah, explained what had gone down in Atlanta.

"So, now they got Beth and Carol?" Rick asked.

"Yeah," I nodded. I knew it didn't sound good, but we'd come back from worse odds than this. "Noah here says they got people and guns, so we'll need as many of our numbers as we can spare."

Rick nodded, let Noah and me into the church.

"Whose blood is this?" I asked, glancing down at the stains on the floor that I was sure hadn't been there when we'd left.

"Terminus," Rick said. "Some of them found us, but we took care of it."

"Terminus?" I repeated. The word lit my already short fuse. I grabbed Lucas by the collar, pushed him up against the wall. "You lead them here?"

"No," he said.

"You been spying on us for them?"

"No," he said again. "I swear. I haven't... Why would I want them to find us?"

He looked too scared to be lying. I glanced at Rick, who shook his head and reluctantly said, "He lured them in here, helped us kill them."

I let go. Knew I was just looking for an excuse to punch him in the face. I channelled my frustration into fortifying the church, for everyone who was staying behind. The City was still dangerous and full of Walkers. Carl, Judith and Perla would be safer here. Michonne would stay with them, along with Father Gabriel, who was upset and ungrateful about what we were doing?

"Any word on Mia?" Lucas asked, hammering a nail in beside me. "Or Naomi?"

"Nah," I said. "But if I can just get in there, I'm sure I'll find them... Mia, at least."

"You really think she's in there?" Lucas asked. "Because I was talking to Noah and he said-"

"She's gotta be," I said. "Car took her, just like Beth. And Beth's there for sure."

"But Noah doesn't seem to know Mia," Lucas said.

"It's a big place," I shrugged. "Might just not have crossed paths."

He didn't look convinced. I didn't much care. "Well," he said. "I guess we'll see when we get there."

"Guess we will," I said. The thought of travelling there with Lucas and his talk about them not being there made my head hurt. "Sure you don't want to sit this one out?"

"No," he said, quiet but a little sulky. "I want to find them too."

"Yeah?" I snapped. "Where was that attitude when you sent her packing on her own, huh?"

I hammered a nail so hard the wood split. I cursed at it.

"I told you, I-"

"You 'didn't want to slow her down', yeah I heard," I said. "Got no problem slowing the search for her down now, do ya?"

"Daryl," Rick called over to me. "Cool it."

I glared at them both but walked away to get a new nail, didn't want to see either of their dumb faces. Wondered what had happened in the fight against Terminus that had made them best buds all of a sudden.

When the church was as safe as we could make it, we left Michonne, Father Gabriel and the kids, and set off for Atlanta. Noah helped us get into the City without any of the patrol cars spotting us. We stopped at an old warehouse. Rick started making plans for ways we could surround them or draw them out. Each idea sounded like a lot of gunfire, a lot of danger to the people we were trying to get out. Then Tyreese suggested we take some of them hostage and arrange a kind of swap.

We got three of them. Two guys and a girl. By luck more than anything else. I was relieved, the perfect number for the number of people we were looking for. That had to be a good sign, right? I should've known it was too good to be true. One of them escaped. Rick went after him.

Came back without him.

"He wouldn't stop," Rick said, which I took to mean that the guy was dead.

"This change things?" I asked. I really needed this to work.

"It might," he said. I felt agitated.

"We really needed three," I said. "Clean swap. Three of ours for three of theirs."

"I know that, man," Rick sighed. "Can we go in with just the two of them? Bluff about the other?"

"As long as we get three out," I said. "I don't give a shit how we go in. You say the word and I'm ready to shoot."

He looked like he was considering it for a sec. And then the female cop we were keeping prisoner piped up, "He was attacked by Rotters. I saw it go down."

We walked over to her, looked down. Was she really offering to lie for us, or was she playing us to save her own skin?

"You're a damn good liar," Rick told her. "We're hanging by a thread here."

"We were attacked by Rotters, that's the story," she said, more confident this time.

"You said the trade was a bad idea," I reminded her. "What changed?"

"Lamson was our shot," she said. "So it's this, or you go in guns blazing, right? You don't want that."

"If this is some bullshit you're spinning-" I warned her.

"I know that place," she interrupted. "I know the good ones from the bad. Let us help you."

"What about you?" Rick asked the guy. "You wanna live? How much?"

There was a second where I thought he wasn't going to talk. Then he said, "Dawn's afraid she'll look weak in front of us. Thinks it'll tip things against her. Hell, it will. She'll see this trade as a rip-off if she thinks you took out one of our guys. So it's a good thing Lamson got aced by Rotters."

I think all of us were relieved to hear him say it.

From a vantage point on one of the nearby roofs, we kept watch as Rick handed himself over to two of Grady's other cops. He negotiated a meeting with Dawn. Couldn't hear what he was saying from so high up.

When he came back up, he took me aside. "They don't have Mia," he said. "Neither of them knew the name."

"No," I said. "That can't be right. They gotta be lying."

"I don't know what to tell you, man," he shrugged. "They knew Beth, and they knew Carol. But they ain't heard of Mia."

I shook my head. "No. She's gotta be here. Perla said a car took her, just like they took Beth."

"Could she have given them a different name?" Rick asked.

"I don't know," I said. "Maybe..."

None of it made sense.

"We might be able to tell more when we're in there," Rick said, but I knew he was just saying it to calm me down. Beth and Carol were his priority. Mia was nobody to him, she wasn't family like she was to me.

"Let's go in," I said, knowing I wouldn't get more out of him. I was going to have to just get in there and do the best I could. Search every room in every ward if I had to. I could always take another prisoner while I was in there.

Rick just gave me a nod.

We made sure that we were all armed and ready before we went in. Hospitals are weird places when they're mostly empty. They were ready for us too, of course. Four armed officers all in uniform. I assumed one of them was Dawn. Behind them, a doctor in a white coat.

And Beth.

She looked at us in shock. She had a cut on her head, and her arm was in a cast, but otherwise, she seemed fine. Carol was in a wheelchair just beside her. The relief I felt at seeing them both alive took some of the tension out of the situation. I knew I could get through this. I had to, for them.

Our guns were ready to fire, but lowered. Beth pushed Carol forwards.

"Where's Lamson?" Dawn asked, immediately noticing we only had two of her guards and not three.

"Got taken down by Rotters," said our male prisoner. "Saw it go down."

I wondered if she believed the lie, or if we should've told a different one. Should we have pretended that he was still alive, told her she'd only get him if we got everyone we were looking for?

"I'm sorry to hear that," she said. It was impossible to tell if she believed us or not. "One of yours for one of mine."

"Alright," Rick said. He gave me a nod, and I shoved the guy we had prison forward. One of Dawn's people handed over Carol. I took her back to the group, where she belonged.

Dawn walked Beth forward next. Rick went to get her.

"Now, I just need Noah," Dawn said. "And then you can leave."

"That wasn't part of the deal," Rick was angry. Noah looked scared. But all I could see was a horrible opportunity.

"Noah was my ward," she said. "Beth took his place, and I'm losing her, so I need him back."

"Tell you what," I stepped forward. Rick looked surprised. Wasn't like me to speak up in these kinds of negotiations, I usually let Rick take the reigns. But for the first time, our interests were slightly different. "You go get Mia, and we can talk about letting you take Noah."

Noah looked at me, uncertain. My brain was racing a million miles an hour to find a way to keep them both. I didn't need Dawn to hand Mia over right away, just bring her out and show me where she was. As soon as I knew she was safe, I could lie or shoot our way out of here.

Then we could both head North, find her sister.

"Who?"

My heart dropped to my stomach.

"Mia," I said again, said it louder in case she was trying to trick me. Maybe Mia would hear it and come running. I called again. Twice. When I was met with silence, I wondered if she'd given them a fake name. "You guys took another little girl... few weeks before you took Beth."

She stared blankly at me. "No, we didn't," she said. "We wouldn't take a kid unless they were injured. Was she?"

"Don't think so," I said. Hated that I didn't know. But nothing Perla had said suggested that she was.

"I'm sorry," Dawn said. "But I don't think we have a Mia here."

Rick glanced back at me, "I tried to tell you..."

"If you don't give me Noah," Dawn said. "Then I can't let you leave."

"The boy wants to go home," Rick told her. "You have no claim on him."

"Then we don't have a deal," she said.

"The deal is done," Rick reminded her.

"It's okay," Noah limped forward.

"No. It's not," Rick tried to keep him back.

"I got to do it," he said, beginning a slow walk down the corridor.

"Wait!" Beth called. She ran forwards, gave him a hug. It was comforting to see that even though I'd let her down, not been there while she was taken away, she'd still found a friend in all of this. And Noah seemed like a good kid too. She let go and faced Dawn. I didn't hear what she said next, barely had time to register the scissors in her hand or the blood that sprayed out from them as the pierced Dawn's flesh. All I knew was a bang echoing around us.

A gunshot.

Loud in the confined space of the hospital corridor. The back of Beth's head turned red. Crimson-soaked blonde. Splatters of it on the walls and floor too.

Took me a second to realize what had happened.

Dawn looked shocked, think she tried to say something to us. I pulled the trigger and watched her fall. It didn't help.

Beth stayed dead. No undoing that.

Everyone's guns were raised and pointed at each other. I wanted to shoot every last one of them, but Carol got up out of her chair and stopped me.

I picked her up and carried her out of there, felt like the least I could do for her. This was on me. She'd been taken here while under my care. Hadn't even had her covered when she'd been shot. If I'd reacted quicker, realized what was happening, I could've taken Dawn out first.

Rick opened Grady's front door. Maggie, Glenn and the others were out there. Must've heard that Beth was here and alive, arrived too late to see it for themselves. Maggie screamed when she saw her sister, fell to her knees. It was hard to look at either of them. One day, I'd pluck up the courage to tell Maggie I was sorry, to take responsibility for what I'd done.

We buried her at the Church. Seemed like as good a place as any. I was glad, in a way, that we could at least put her to rest somewhere nice. A proper grave. Not everyone gets that. Beth's one of the ones who deserved it.

She was gone too young, even for this world. Not much more than a kid, and she'd managed to stay kind and good. Takes a real strong person to do that when the world is so shitty.

Maggie hardly said a word. Couldn't look at her for all of my guilt. When it was too much, I'd stand by Beth's grave. Like apologizing to the Earth would make a damn bit of difference.

Sorry I failed you, Beth.

I heard someone come to stand beside me. I looked up, expecting it to be Maggi, but it was Lucas. I didn't react. Too numb to be annoyed by him.

"What now?" he asked.

"North," I said. Because it was all I had. When the group had started to heal a little, I'd move on, leave the Church and start walking. I didn't much care who followed.

Beth was dead. Mia was still missing. Naomi was…out there somewhere. Alone. I knew that thought was enough to keep me searching for the rest of my life.

But, how likely was it that I'd find them? I'd been too late to help them at Terminus. I'd been too late to save Beth.

I'd failed all of them.

Chapter 17: From a Friend

Naomi

"You sure you're okay to come with us?" Aaron asked.

"Yes," I sighed. "For the last time, yes. I've already wasted so much time in bed, not looking for my sister. I can't sit still anymore. Pete says, I'm fine."

He looked at me like a disapproving teacher. "He only said that because you bullied him into it."

"He said it of his own free will!" I said. "You can't bully that asshole into anything."

"Aaron," Eric said, coming into the hallway from the kitchen. "You're fighting a losing battle."

"Fine," Aaron sighed. "But if you feel faint or weak or..."

"I'll let you know," I promised. But this was the best that I'd felt since I'd got here. Partly because I'd rested, but it was also down to being allowed out for the first time in over a week. I was full of renewed energy. Finding Mia felt a damn sight more achievable than it had when I was wandering the woods on my own. Deanna even had maps. I'd spend my time confined to bed tracing different routes that she might've gone, following every train track that went North. I had a list of places I wanted to hit. It made me giddy to think about the amount of ground we could cover in a car, rather than on foot.

"Okay," Aaron said. "Ground rules before we go. If we find anyone, we do not approach them."

"We watch them from a distance, I know," I said. "I was the last person you did that to, remember?"

"And we watch them until we decide that they are safe to bring back here," he said, ignoring my previous point. "We'll need your judgement on that."

I nodded.

"And if we approach, we do it carefully," Eric said. "No weapons on show, an offering of food or water to show that we come in peace… try not to let them trap you in a pit."

He grinned at me.

"Alright, I'll not make that mistake again," Aaron said, with a slight eye roll. "You good to go?"

Eric and I nodded.

We packed up a car with supplies that we could give to anyone we found out there; mostly bottled water and a little bit of food. I sat in the back, pouring over one of the maps I'd marked up with routes I thought that Mia might have travelled, towns with train tracks running through them. We'd drive slow and keep a lookout for anyone on the roads or in the forest that might need help. Sometimes, we'd park up somewhere. Aaron and I would leave Eric to guard the car while we searched an entire area.

My initial optimism was misplaced. Two and half weeks of searching turned up nothing. Not even any strangers. Occasionally, we'd think we'd found someone, only for it to turn out that they were freshly dead enough to still look alive from a distance. I tried not to let it get to me. I told myself that Mia was out there somewhere, just waiting for me to find her.

"Hey, you see that?" Aaron said quietly. He stopped walking, squinted at something. We'd been walking for a while, having left Eric with the car about an hour before. According to my map, we were about to come up to another road. So far, we'd found nothing but corpses.

"What?" I asked.

"Over there," he pointed through the forest. Between the distant trees, towards another road, I could see a group of people moving incredibly slowly. "You see them?"

"Yeah," I said, watching their heads move slowly in and out of sight between tree trunks. "Shit, that's a big group. You think they're alive?"

It was hard to tell from so far away, their glacial pace meant it could be a horde of the dead.

"Impossible to know until we get closer," Aaron said. "You ready?"

"Yes," I said, and a little thrill ran up my spine. After so long without finding anyone, this was a big moment.

We kept our distance from them, moving closer to the road but staying ahead of them, which wasn't hard because of how slowly they were moving.

"I don't think they're dead," I said quietly. "They're moving too independently, I think some of them are talking to each other too."

They were too far away to know for sure, I worried that my hope we'd found more survivors was clouding my judgement. We couldn't see any details in their faces, and they weren't close enough to tell if they smelt dead yet.

"I agree," Aaron said. Another jolt of excitement burst through me at the thought that I wasn't alone in hoping they were alive. "They don't look like they're in such good shape."

"Should we help them?" I asked. It was a lot of people to help. It was also a lot of people to be overrun by if they decided they wanted to take Alexandria for themselves. "A group that big could-"

I stopped talking. All of my words, all of my thoughts came to an abrupt halt.

I saw him.

I knew it was him from the way he walked, I'd have known that walk anywhere. Slightly apart from the others, head down, crossbow slung over one shoulder. Every hair on my body stood on end. I stood up before I realized I'd done it. Opened my mouth to yell his name. Aaron grabbed my arm and pulled me back down.

"Naomi!" he hissed. "What the hell are you doing?"

"I... I know him..." I said. I could feel my heartbeat in the back of my throat, knew I'd be looking at Aaron like a wide-eyed madwoman.

"Who?" he looked back at the faraway group. "One of them?"

I nodded.

"How can you tell? They're so far away," he squinted at them. I tried to think of a way to explain it that wouldn't make me sound crazy. But how do you describe knowing someone else so well you'd recognize them before you'd know your own reflection? Or the overwhelming feeling that part of your soul had been ripped from you and was now returning?

"Hey," Aaron said softly, turning back to me. "Hey, you okay?"

I hadn't realized there were tears in my eyes until he asked. I wiped them away. He saw my hands were shaking and took hold of both of them to steady me.

"Yeah," I said. "Yeah, I just... I didn't think I'd ever see him again... I..."

I couldn't carry on. While I'd never thought Daryl was dead, I'd never in a million years expected our paths to cross.

"Okay," Aaron said, trying to keep me calm. "I assume this is someone you're happy to see and not…?"

He trailed off. Took me a second to realize he was checking that this wasn't someone from Terminus.

"Yes," I said quickly. "Yes, he's an old friend. From before."

"Okay, good," he looked relieved.

"I can't believe he's here," I said, more to myself than him. I stood up again, ready to run to him.

"Stop," Aaron pulled me back down again. "We still have to observe them."

"But I know him," I protested. "We don't have to do any of that wait-to-introduce-ourselves bullshit. I can just-"

"No, it's too dangerous," he said. "We stick to protocol."

I could feel my blood starting to boil. "Alexandria would be lucky to have someone like Daryl-"

"Keep your voice down, Naomi," he hissed. It was hard. Felt like I was losing my damn mind. I could see Daryl, he was within shouting distance, but some asshole I'd only known a few weeks was stopping me from running to him. It was hard to keep my cool. Aaron took a deep breath, looking at me like I was a bomb about to go off, which was fair enough because it was exactly how I felt. "I'm sure he'd be great for Alexandria. But if you come running out of the bushes yelling, how do you think the people he's with will react? They could shoot you dead before he even knows it's you."

It was a fair point.

I sat back a little, felt myself deflate.

"So what do we do?" I asked. I didn't know how long I could wait. Felt like there was a fire burning in the pit of my stomach.

"We stick to the plan," he said. "Observe them for a little while and then make our approach."

"But-"

"We don't even have enough car space to take them all back if they want to come," he said.

"We can do it in shifts," I said. "Just take a few at a time."

"There are two spaces in the car," he said. "I doubt they're going to want to be split up into twos with three complete strangers. Look, I understand how infuriating this must be for you. Finding an old friend still alive when the world's turned upside down… it's big. But you're not thinking straight."

"Fine," I said. "So, what next?"

"Head back to Alexandria," he said. "Get some more supplies for them, a vehicle big enough to transport them all."

It was both exactly what I'd expected him to say and the last thing I wanted to hear. White-hot frustration rose up inside me. I looked back at Daryl walking on the road, could feel him slipping away from me again.

"I'm not leaving," I said. How could I?

"Naomi…" Aaron sighed. "You know the drill."

"What if we lose them?" I said. "What if they don't keep following the road? They could turn off into the woods at any point."

"We won't. They've clearly been following this road for some time," he said. He took hold of the map and opened it out. "At the pace they're going, I think we could make it to Alexandria and back before they reach this bend in the road here. We'll leave them out some water and take it from there."

He pointed to the place on the map he was talking about. I wanted to scream, considered it for a moment because then at least our cover would be blown, and he wouldn't be able to hold me back anymore. But, the rational side of my brain was still functioning, and it knew that he was right. If I'd been part of that group, and some crazed woman I didn't know had come running towards us, I'd have shot first and asked questions later. Aaron's plan was the most sensible.

"If I could just get him on his own," I said. "I know he'd-"

"Naomi, you need to be careful," he warned me. "You said it yourself, people are different now. He might not be the person you remember."

It felt like an absurd idea.

"Not Daryl," I said. "The rest of the group, I get your point. But not Daryl."

He sighed. I knew he meant well, but he had no idea what he was talking about. The only thing I'd ever been able to depend on, the one thing I had always known to be true, was that Daryl would never intentionally hurt me. Whatever had happened to him in the time we'd been apart, however he'd changed, I couldn't imagine a world where that was no longer true.

"Promise me," Aaron said. "Promise me you will not go running out there, and you will not approach him unless he is on his own."

"I promise," I said.

"Okay," he said. "Come on, we won't be long."

I took one last look back at Daryl. And we left.

Daryl

The walk was long. Hardly anyone said anything. Not about Grady, not about Beth, not about Tyreese when we lost him. I think not having a destination we knew we were heading to made everyone tense. The cars breaking down didn't help. Walking took a lot out of everyone. All our energy. No food or water.

We let a group of Walkers build up behind us. They were slower than us, it wasn't worth wasting our energy taking them out one at a time. We waited until we got to a bridge, took them all out at once. In the middle of it all, Perla cut her leg. It bled for a while, but we managed to stop it. Two days later, it looked a little infected. Day three, she had a fever. She slowed down, Lucas offered to carry her at the back of the group. We all hoped her body would find a way to fight the infection on its own, but she only got worse. If we didn't find a pharmacy soon, I wasn't sure she'd make it.

I kept thinking that we must be getting close to somewhere, else why would there be a road? Why build a road if it just kept leading you nowhere?

We turned a bend in the road. The people walking in front of me stopped. I stopped too, looked up. A few yards ahead there was a small cluster of water bottles. Just sitting there. Nobody around them, nothing to guard them. They looked full too, not like someone else who'd been walking on this endless fucking road had just dropped them because they were done. There were so many. Probably enough for one each, though I was too tired to count them. They were too perfectly placed to have fallen from a vehicle if someone had been driving them somewhere.

Rick walked forwards and picked something up. A piece of paper was lying on top. He read it and then held it up for us to see. Just three little words on it:

'From a Friend.'

Neat. Like someone had printed it on there.

I stared at it. Felt like time stood still around me. I was aware that the others were arguing about whether or not to drink it, but I could hardly hear them.

"I think it's okay," I said, looking around at the trees. I grabbed the piece of paper off Rick. "I think Naomi wrote this."

They all looked at me with this patronizing mix of worry and pity, like I'd lost my mind and was the last to know it.

"Daryl, I know you want to find her," Rick said gently. "But there's no way you could know that."

"Nah," I said. "There is. That's her handwriting, I know it."

"Listen, man…" he said. I could predict the lecture that was coming. I knew he was about to spout some cop bullshit about handwriting analysis not being reliable evidence even when it was some kind of expert looking at it. But I knew her writing. Didn't need no damn expert to tell me how close a match it was. I'd spent years reading her essays, testing her on notes that she'd made, binders full of whatever shit was important to her at the time, received years of Birthday and Christmas cards. I'd forget how to write myself before I forgot the way her words looked on a page.

"Look, give me one," I said, reaching for a bottle. "I'll drink it, and then you'll see."

Eugine picked up a bottle and tried to hand it to me. Rick slapped it out of his hands. Water, poisoned or not, went everywhere.

Fuck this.

"Naomi!" I yelled at the trees. Heard something rustle. Could have been the wind, could've been a whisper but Rick spoke over it.

"Shut up," he said. "You don't want to bring more Walkers out here, do you?"

"Shh," I held up a hand, trying to listen to where that rustling might've come from. "I think I heard something."

"It's just the wind, man," Rick said. I shook my head. Kept listening. He sighed, "I am not putting our lives at risk because you're running around chasing a damn ghost."

I could've punched him. I wanted to. There was so much white-hot rage in me that I was ready for a fight, but I swallowed it down again. We were all hurting, starving and desperate. That mix can turn even the best of us into assholes. So, I just said, "Fuck you, man."

But he saw my clenched up fists, the anger in my eyes, assumed I was about to lash out and got real close to me.

"Walk it off, Daryl," he told me. "Walk it off."

I turned away from him, from the others and walked into the woods. I used to like how quiet it was there, how it reminded me of times in my life I was actually kind of happy. It didn't work this time. Too much had gone wrong, I'd lost too much.

I wanted to yell, scream, punch something until my fists were bloody. Why were there never any goddamn Walkers to tear into when you really needed them? But I was trying to cope with things differently now. Anger; punching things, throwing things, yelling at people I cared about... none of them had done me any good.

I pulled out a smoke. Not a healthy substitute for anger either, but at least this one only hurt me. I sat down by a tree, lit up and inhaled. Did nothing for me. No relief. No joy. The emptiness inside me just grew. I stared at the lit end, red and glowing.

The smell reminded me of Naomi's house. Her Momma's off-brand cigarettes burning in an ashtray somewhere while she tried to stop herself from smoking something else. Made my eyes sting.

I'd failed.

I'd fucking failed and now I everything reminded me of it. Even these damn smokes.

Rick was probably right; that water was poisoned, and I'd almost killed everyone because I was desperate for any kind of sign that the path I was searching was taking me in the right direction. Anything that said she was still alive. But seeing that sign, pretending it might be from her, had given me the same hope as seeing that hospital car.

And look how that had ended up.

Beth was dead.

If we hadn't gone looking for her, maybe she wouldn't be.

Everything I did only seemed to make things worse. If Naomi had survived this long without me, maybe she didn't need me at all. Maybe me tracking her down would only end the same way as Beth. Maybe I'd just wind up causing her death too. After all, Naomi's life had been so much better without me in it. The things she'd done - graduating college, getting out of Georgia, her career in Washington, taking care of Mia - it had all been without me. She'd never needed me the way I'd needed her. Why did I think it would be different now? The fuck would she want with someone who constantly let down everyone who gave a shit about him?

I pushed the lit cigarette into the skin on the back of my hand. Felt it burn. A painful, welcome distraction from the pain of everything else.

"Don't do that, dumbass," I thought I heard her say. Like my burning need to see her had called her ghost out of the woods. "It'll scar."

It sounded so real, so much like her. Was Rick right? Was I losing it?

I stopped, threw the cigarette to the ground. Saw an unfamiliar boot stomp it out. Hardly dared look up in case I really was losing my damn mind. A bag swung into view. A familiar teddy bear keychain swung with it. Knievel. That dumbass bear. I had to be imagining this, right? No way, after all this time, that she'd be carrying that bag around. Or, that he'd still be attached. But he was grubbier than I remembered, missing half of his shades.

I looked up.

Her eyes, bright and blue, met mine.

I couldn't speak. Couldn't breathe in case it blew this dream away. She looked nervous, staring at me like I might be the one to disappear. Her lips opened like she wanted to say something, but couldn't. I think mine did the same. And then she gave me that smile. That perfect, just-for-me smile that I could never get right when I pictured her.

"Naomi?" I said, and my voice cracked.

"Hey," she said, her breath was a little shaky. I got to my feet. She did not disappear.

Had she really done this? Had she really managed to find me, at the end of the world, in the middle of fucking nowhere, right when I needed her the most?

"Hey," I said, it sounded so small and stupid for such a big moment. I'd thought so much about finding her, I'd never thought about what I'd actually say. Or do. Heart beating so loud, I took a step towards her. She reached out for me.

"Back up!"

Rick.

I heard his footsteps, saw her look to something just behind me and raise her arms above her head. I wiped my damp eyes on my sleeve and turned to look at him. Gun raised. Pointed right at Naomi.

No.

I stepped between them, "Put the gun away."

"This Naomi?" he asked me.

"Yes," I said, too worried about him pointing his damn gun at her to feel smug about being right. "Put the gun down."

It was hard to stay calm. I wanted to yell at him but didn't want to make the situation worse. He looked around me, at where she was standing. He held up one of the bottles of water.

"Was this you?" he asked her.

"Yes."

"There anything in it?"

"No, sir," she said, all polite and calm. "Just water."

"Yeah?" He threw it at her. She caught it, looked surprised. "Drink it."

"Rick, she ain't gotta-"

"It's okay, Daryl," she said. Hearing my name in her voice again sent a shiver up my spine. I looked back at her. She opened the top, took a few big gulps. Held it up to show Rick.

"All of it," he demanded.

"Rick!"

"It's okay," she said again like she'd expected it. Planned for it. She started drinking the rest of it. I glared at Rick, who would not look at me. When she was done, she held up the empty bottle. "It's safe."

"You alone?" he asked her.

"No," she said. I knew the rest of the group would feel on-edge about this, but I was relieved to hear her say it. "My friend Aaron is back by the road. We have someone else waiting with the cars."

"Three of you?" he said. "That's all?"

"That's all," she said. "But we have a community, not far from here. There are more of us there. Plenty of food, water and shelter for all of you too. If… if you'll come."

She glanced at me. I hoped she knew I'd go wherever she was.

"We're not going anywhere," Rick said. I turned back to him.

"Rick, man! I know her, you ain't gotta do this-"

"No, Daryl," he said. "You don't know her. You knew her. Things are different now. People are different now. The person you think she was, might be gone."

It shocked me into silence. All I could feel was the panic rising in my chest. Had she found me just so I could lose her all over again? I couldn't see someone else I cared about get shot right in front of me.

"Put the goddamn gun down, man. I won't ask again."

Rick looked from her to me and back again. My hand moved to my crossbow, slung across my shoulders. I saw a flicker of shock in his face. If this was what was needed to keep her safe, I'd deal with the consequences later.

"Wait!" Naomi said before things could escalate any further. "How about I just hand over my weapons? Then we can all just... relax."

She kept her eyes on Rick, slowly laying down two small knives. I watched her take out a pistol and set that down too. She raised her arms again.

"And the bag?" Rick asked. She opened it and tipped the contents towards him so that he could see it for himself.

"Just a book and some snacks," she said. I almost wept again. Despite anything Rick might think, this was the girl I'd always known.

"Okay," he said. He looked at me. "Get her weapons."

While I was distracted bending down to pick them up, Rick side-stepped me and grabbed her by the arm.

"This friend of yours," he said, dragging her ahead of me. "Get him out here."

"Let her go!" I yelled, but they were already heading back towards the road.

The fear of seeing Rick's gun pointed at her was turning back to anger, and I didn't know how long I could keep a lid on it. I heard her call for someone up ahead. She still sounded so damn calm. I started running. Yelled for Rick, he ignored me. When I got to the road, a guy had stepped out. His hands were raised above his head. Now Rick's gun was on him, not Naomi. I didn't dare to relax.

"This is Aaron," she said.

Before Aaron could say anything, someone called from behind us.

"Naomi?"

It was Lucas, he'd stepped away from Perla to see what was going on. I watched her turn to him. Saw her face light up. "Lucas!"

She ran towards him. I saw Rick turn to keep an eye on her, but as she was unarmed, kept his gun on Aaron. As she hugged Lucas, I looked away, hoping that would stop the sharp twist in my stomach.

"What's going on?" Lucas asked.

"We've come to offer help," Naomi said. "There's a whole community not far from here. Space for all of you."

He heaved a huge sigh of relief. He'd helped us out back at the church, but given his links to Terminus, Lucas still wasn't anyone's favourite person.

"Not so fast," Rick said. "Nobody's going anywhere until we know we can trust you."

"We can trust her," I said. Rick glared at me. I glared right back.

"Do you have antibiotics?" Lucas asked, ignoring Rick and me.

"Yes," she said. "We have a doctor. Is one of you hurt?"

She glanced at me again, like I was her first concern. My heart hurt.

"It's Perla," Lucas said. She looked back at him, I saw the hope in her eyes. Knew it was about to be crushed.

"Perla's with you?" Naomi looked behind him, where a weak Perla was sitting on the road. "Is-"

"No," Lucas said quickly. "She's... it's just her."

"Oh," she said, and the light in her eyes dimmed a little. But then, because it was impossible to keep her down for long, she turned back to Rick, "I know you haven't decided if you're coming with us yet, and that's fine. But please let me take Perla. We have a doctor, antibiotics. If she has an infected wound, it could save her life."

Rick hesitated.

"C'mon, man," I said. "Let her take the kid."

"She needs it, dad," Carl said quietly.

Rick sighed. "Fine."

"Thank you," Naomi smiled at him. Don't know how he could keep glaring at her after that. I watched her run to Perla, scoop her up.

"Quit being an asshole," I said to Rick. "You heard her. They got a place with food and water. Medicine. Let's go."

"Daryl," he sighed. "I get why you want to believe her, I really do. But we can't just take their word for it."

"I have pictures," Aaron interrupted. "Of Alexandria… if you'd like to see them."

Rick nodded. Aaron lowered his hands, reached back slowly to take his backpack off. He unzipped it and pulled out a stack of polaroids, handed them to Rick. I peered over his shoulder as he flicked through them.

"Ain't any people in these," I said. "Could've got these anywhere."

"Funny," Naomi's voice at my shoulder made me jump. She was closer than I expected. "I said the same thing. Told you we should've taken news ones."

She glanced at Aaron. Perla was clinging to her back, not looking so good.

"Tell Eric what's happened," Aaron said. "And take the smaller car."

"Will do," she said and started to walk away.

"Wait!" I said. She turned. I held out the gun and the knives she'd surrendered to Rick.

"Woah," Rick said. "What are you doing?"

"I ain't letting her wander off with a sick kid and no protection," I said. I could tell he wanted to argue with me, didn't want either of them armed in case he lost the upper hand. But he seemed to know better than to try and stop me. Naomi walked back, shifting the way she was carrying Perla on her back so that she could take them from me. Her fingertips brushed against mine.

"Thank you," she said as our eyes met. "I'll see you soon."

I nodded because it sounded like a promise.

And then she walked away.

She stepped off the road and into the bushes. And she was gone again. Way too soon.

It already felt like a dream.

"I'm going," I told Rick. I didn't need to see any more. "Can't stop me."

"You trust this guy?" he asked, nodding to Aaron.

"No," I said, looking off in the direction she'd gone. "But I trust her."

"Daryl, you don't know her anymore," he said. "You don't know what kind of person she is now. She could be leading us right to another Terminus."

"We could be walking into a trap," Glenn agreed.

"Naomi was in Terminus too," Lucas said. "She left because of the way things were there. If this place was anything like it, there's no way she'd be out here trying to convince us to join them."

It was a good argument. I wished I'd been calm enough to think of it myself. Nobody trusted Lucas, so having him vouch for her might not have been the best thing for her case.

"You said her sister was missing?" Rick asked me.

"Mia," I said. "Yeah. Why?"

"What if they've got her?" he said. "And they're using her to force Naomi into coming out here and leading us into a trap."

"Nah," I said. "That ain't it."

I knew Naomi would do anything for Mia. But I'd seen the hope that Mia was here die in her eyes. You can't fake that.

I wondered if Rick and I would stand here arguing about it until we died on this road, either from Walkers who came by without us noticing or starvation or thirst because he wouldn't let us drink out of those damn bottles. Then, Carol stepped forward and said, "I think we should go."

Thank God.

"You trust these folks?"

"I trust Daryl," she said. "I trust his judgement. If he thinks we should go, then we should go."

"If they have ample food and water, as they suggest, then I am inclined to agree," Eugine said, a few other people nodded. Carol stepping up had clearly made other people feel like they were free to disagree with Rick.

Rick was still shaking his head.

Carl adjusted his hat, looked his dad in the eye. "We'd be prepared for a trap this time," he said. "We should at least make sure that Perla is okay."

Now that Carl was on side, I knew it would be hard for Rick to keep arguing. He looked to Michonne, who shrugged. "It couldn't hurt to take a look."

Yes!

Too many people Rick trusted were on my side. He couldn't argue with that many of us. Our situation out here was pretty bleak. Even if other people were wary of Naomi, taking our chances with new people sounded worth it. Aaron led us through the woods. I hoped we might catch up with Naomi, but there was no sign of her. We reached another road. They'd parked a big RV just out of sight of us. There was another guy there, guarding it with a gun. Stood up when he saw Aaron.

"Are you okay?" he asked, looking at us all with the same suspicion most of us were probably looking at him with. "Naomi said there were a few… resistant members."

"All fine," Aaron said quickly. He looked at the rest of us. "This is Eric. Eric, this is Rick."

"Hi Rick," Eric said, without a smile.

Rick glowered at him and said nothing.

"This is Daryl," Aaron pointed at me.

"Oh, this is Daryl," Eric looked at me like it was a bit of a surprise. I felt myself getting embarrassed. I knew Naomi had probably told them a bunch of nice stuff about me that meant they'd have a picture of me in their heads that didn't match what they saw in front of them. "Nice to meet you."

I just nodded, pointed to the RV. "In here?"

"Yup."

I climbed in the back. Rick rode up front with Judith. The whole journey, I felt sick. Couldn't tell if it was travel or nerves.

We came to a stop. I looked out of the window, saw a big metal gate. Caught a glimpse of high walls. I heard the engine switch off and leapt up to open the door. Part of me expected her to be there when I opened it, but that was dumb. How would she even know we'd arrived? I stepped out of the RV, waited for everyone else to pile out after me.

I could hear people talking, the sound of kids playing beyond the walls. I looked back at Rick, could tell by the look on his face that he'd heard it too. The gates opened. We walked through.

It was just like the pictures Aaron had shown us, which somehow made it weirder. I'd assumed they'd been taken right at the start of all of this; before gardens got overgrown and houses fell apart. But this place was untouched.

The guy who'd opened the gates looked at all of us. "Before you go any further, I need you to hand over your weapons. If you want to stay, you hand them over."

"We don't know if we want to stay," Rick said, his Python in one hand and Judith balancing on his other arm. I looked around, kept expecting to see Naomi's face.

"Let them keep them," Aaron said. "Let them talk to Deanna first."

"Who's Deanna?" Abraham asked.

"She knows everything you'd want to know about this place," Aaron said. "Rick, why don't you start?"

Rick looked back at us all. Gave me a look that made it clear that if things were to go wrong, he'd be holding me personally responsible. He nodded to Aaron and followed him. We kept pace behind them, taking in the place as we walked. The houses were massive, suburban rich-folk homes where the curtains twitched as people looked at us walking past. Wasn't somewhere I'd have felt comfortable being even before the world ended.

I looked at the ground as we went, didn't want to make eye contact with any of them.

We stopped at the house Aaron said belonged to Deanna and Rick went in alone. I felt uneasy about. At least he was armed, but anything could happen to him in there. I'd felt so confident in this place when it was Naomi telling us about it, but now I wasn't so sure. What if Rick was right? What if they were using Mia to get to her?

"Where's Naomi?" I asked Aaron while we waited outside for Rick.

"She's probably with Perla," Aaron said. I could tell by the tone in his voice that he was trying to keep me calm. It wasn't working. I'd only feel better when I saw her again, knew she was safe and here of her own free will.

"I want to see her," I told him.

"You will," he said. "Once you've all spoken to Deanna."

"All of us?" I said. That could take hours. "Thought it was just Rick?"

"Don't worry," he gave me a reassuring smile. "I'll make sure you go next."

When Rick came back out, he told us all to hand over our weapons. Whatever Deanna had said in there must've convinced him. I didn't feel much better. Didn't like being unarmed and weak. Didn't like that they still wouldn't let me see Naomi.

Aaron took Rick and Carl away to show them the place we'd all be staying. And then it was my turn to go in and see Deanna. Her house was full of pointless shit. Paintings that must've cost a lot back when money still mattered. Decorative crap. Neat little cushions on all of her dumb furniture.

She had food out on her pointless coffee table, I liked that.

She had a camera out recording everything I said, I didn't like that.

"You're welcome to sit, Daryl," she told me. "I won't bite."

"Yeah, I'm alright," I told her. Didn't plan on being there for long. I couldn't sit still, just paced back and forth like my feet knew we had someplace else to be.

"Daryl, do you want to be here?" she asked.

Only if Naomi does.

Didn't much care where I was if she was there.

"The boy and the baby," I said. "They deserve a roof, I guess."

"Aaron told me that you requested to be in here next," she said. "Any reason for that?"

I looked at her. She didn't look dangerous, just looked like any other rich asshole. But those folks are good at getting other people to do ugly shit for them. If she knew there was a connection between Naomi and me, would she try and use it?

"Nope," I said, playing it safe. "Just wanted to get it over with."

"We all contribute here," she said. She talked to me like I was dumb. I thought I was done with people treating me that way. "Are you willing to contribute? Become part of our community?"

I shrugged, "If it's one worth becoming a part of."

"It is," she said with a smile. "I'll find a job for you. For all of you."

"Okay," I said. She stared at me, didn't say anything else. "Can I go now?"

"If you must," she said.

"Great," I headed for the door and didn't look back. Aaron had returned, without Rick and Carl, and was waiting for me. "What a waste of time that was."

"Sorry," he said. "Everyone who comes here has to talk to Deanna."

"Fine," I shrugged. Couldn't give a shit about Deanna or her damn rules "Can we go now?"

Didn't have to say anything else, he knew what I was asking.

"She is just finishing up with Perla," he said. "But she lives with us, so if you want to wait for her at ours, that would be fine. Or I can show you to the house we've got for you guys and you can-"

"I'll come wait," I said. There was no way in hell I was letting anyone sidetrack me with any more pointless shit. If Naomi had been forced into doing this somehow, if she was lying or in any kind of danger, I'd know when I saw her.

"Alright," Aaron nodded. "Let's go."

The more we walked, the more nervous I was. Everything Rick had said, about things being different now, about her being different, they really stuck in my head. What if it wasn't like before?

What if it is?

That was somehow worse. The though that things could be as good as they once were now that the whole world was so shit... it was a lot of happiness to lose if something went wrong.

We turned a corner, and there she was. At the other end of the street. Eyes down, looking at the road in front of her, she looked tired and worried. I stopped in my tracks.

What if she ain't forgiven me?

She'd seemed happy to see me, but... the blood, the glass. Could I ever be forgiven for any of that?

Aaron called her name. My heartbeat loud in my ears, and she looked up at him. Then looked at me. Stopped walking.

My Naomi.

I damn near fell down.

I took a few steps and then I started to run. Everything blurred, melted away, except her. I think I called out her name, but I can't be sure. I was so overwhelmed by her being here that she was all I could see, all I could think. Almost within reach. My feet pounded the pavement, my arms reached out towards her.

She started running too.

I could feel every moment behind us. Every laugh, everything we'd done to protect each other, every scar she'd helped heal, every dumb fight we'd ever had. Every day I'd got to spend with her had been a joy I'd let slip by, not realizing how good I had it until I'd lost her. The pain of losing her had never left me. I felt every moment; from when she'd sat down beside me to share her stolen gas station sandwich, to seeing her house go up in smoke, to her finding me in the middle of nowhere at the end of the world. We'd shared so much and been through so much together. But it wasn't enough. I needed a lifetime more of those moments.

She was in my arms again.

Real and solid. I hadn't dared to truly believe it until her arms were wrapped around me, the smell of her hair in my nose, her warm body against mine. So aware now, of everything I'd taken for granted the first time around, I wouldn't do that again. I had a second chance. This time, it would be different.

I felt it all; the pain of all that I'd lost, the overwhelming joy of holding her again. Through it all, I felt the burning desire to never let her go.

Chapter 18: The Space Between Us

Naomi

The space between us felt huge.

Sitting side by side on the bench on Eric and Aaron's back porch, there were only a few inches between him and me, but it felt like miles. The sun was starting to go down, the shadows of Alexandria's high walls getting longer and reaching towards us. I didn't know how long we had, how long he'd want to stay, before going back to his group. I'd never been so nervous in my life.

There was so much I wanted to say to him. I'd played over this moment so many times in my head; all the things I'd ever wanted to share with him, to tell him over the years. None of the ways I'd imagined this going involved this weird silence. An inability to talk to him.

I wanted to apologize for our dumb fight. Daryl had seemed so happy to see me. Running down the street towards him id felt like I was flying. He'd held me so tight I could still feel it in my ribs. But now, he could hardly look at me. What if he was still mad? What if bringing it up just made everything worse?

All I really wanted, was to tell him how much I'd missed him.

It all felt too much, too heavy for such a fragile moment. Like the porch we sat on was made of glass, and if I said the wrong thing it would break, and he'd go running. So, I swallowed it down. Baby steps.

"You hungry?" I asked. "We have food and stuff..."

I cringed when I heard myself. Small talk. Was this all that we were now?

"Nah, I'm fine," he said, so I knew he was feeling weird. I'd never known Daryl to turn down food. And he still wouldn't look at me. Spent the whole time staring at his shoes, while I felt like I couldn't stop staring at him. Without looking up, he asked, "How long you been here?"

"In Alexandria? About three weeks, " I said, trying to do the math. "Still not used to it, though."

"No?"

"Nah, it's crazy how untouched this place is. The people here... they're…"

"Soft?"

"Yeah."

He nodded like I'd confirmed something he'd been thinking all along.

"That Aaron guy…" he glanced at the house behind us like he didn't trust not to swallow us if we weren't looking. Still suspicious of anyone here who wasn't me. "He the one who found you?"

"Yup. I was out in the woods after-" I stopped. Didn't want to talk about Terminus. It was too heavy. Too much. Part of me was ashamed to admit to Daryl what a coward I'd been. I didn't want him to look at me that way. "Things are good here, but they need people like you... and your group. People who know what things are really like."

"My group are good people," he said, clearly worried they'd given off the wrong impression. "Sorry for all of the…"

He didn't know how to finish, but I knew he was talking about Rick's gun in my face.

"I'm sure they are," I said quickly. "I'm glad you found them."

He sat up, like he was about to look at me and then thought better of it. There was another silence while I scrambled for anything else to say, but it was Daryl who spoke first, "Met most of them just outside Atlanta. By the quarry, where we skimmed stones that time. You remember?"

"Yeah, I know it," I said. "Freshwater. Smart to head there."

I wished I'd thought of it, maybe we'd have met sooner and missed all of this time apart.

"You found a group?" he said it like he was a question, although he'd arrived with Perla and Lucas, so I knew he already knew the answer.

"Yeah," I said. I think he was looking for me to say more, but it was hard to think of them all, now that Perla and Lucas were the only ones left.

"That's good."

It was hard to breathe. So many emotions fought to get out that I felt like I was drowning in them. He felt so damn far away, I wanted to reach out. Instead, I looked away from him and out at the failing light as the sun set on Alexandria. It was the only way I could get out what I needed to tell him, even though he already knew.

"I lost her," I said. Felt something in the silence break. "Mia. She's gone."

I felt him shift in the seat beside me, but I didn't turn to look.

"You'll find her," he said, and then he took a breath. "We'll find her."

The way he said it was like a promise. So much like the Daryl I'd always known that something in my chest ached. I nodded, swallowed down a lump in my throat.

"I lost Merle too," he said. Of course, I'd noticed Merle wasn't with them. Knew what it implied but hadn't known how to ask. "Twice, actually. But the last time was for good. Had to… y'know…"

I closed my eyes for a second. Couldn't imagine how difficult it must've been for him to put his own brother down like that. When I'd been trapped in that room with all of the dead kids at Terminus, I knew I'd rather Mia bit me than have to shoot her in the head. Daryl and Merle's relationship had always been... complex. But they loved each other.

"God, I'm so sorry," I said, looking at him again. "Merle was..."

"An asshole?"

"Well, yeah," I admitted. Because he was, an unrelenting asshole to most of the world, but only because the world had treated him much the same. "But he weren't all bad. Deep down."

He nodded. "You and me are probably the only ones who knew that."

"I owe him," I said. "That time he let me stay with you… bet that saved me from a whole lot of shit."

Looking back on it, that week I'd lived like a wild animal with the Dixon boys - hunting and fishing and fighting - had been one of the best in my damn life. I'd never felt so free and so protected all at once.

"Mia must have almost grown up now," Daryl said, sounding kind of sad. "She'd be about thirteen, right?"

"Yeah," I said. "She's still a kid, though. We actually had a birthday party for her. In the winter. Probably not the right date because time is meaningless now, but we made a cake, played games. It was nice."

Remembering it made me ache. I felt another pang of regret at banning him from seeing Mia.

"She told me you guys talked," I said. "At your old man's funeral."

I worried it would be too heavy to bring up, or it would feel like I was accusing him of breaking a rule I'd only made in anger. But when I looked at him, the corners of his mouth twitched in a smile, and he said, "She snitched on me, huh?"

"She did. Although to be fair, she hid it until very recently."

"Surprised she remembered me," he said.

"Oh, she remembers you," I reached into my bag and pulled out the book that was in there. Daryl frowned at it, not understanding why any of it was relevant to the conversation. I could feel him fighting back the urge to call me a massive nerd and wished he wouldn't. Might make things feel a little more normal. I slipped out the photograph I'd kept in there since Terminus. "She carried this around with her all the time. Since she was little."

He took it from me, and I watched his face change. A soft kind of pain in his eyes. He didn't say anything, and I let him sit with it, remembering how overwhelming it had been to see that picture after so much time. When he did speak, his voice was gruff and a little choked up, "You give her this?"

"No," I said. "Didn't know she had it until a few months ago. She found it when she was living at Momma's. Brought it with her when she moved in with me. Carried it around ever since."

He passed it back to me. I smoothed it out on my knee but didn't put it away again. There was something about having in there that was comforting. Seeing us smiling, so happy even when things around us had been so shit, made me feel like we could get through this awkward patch. We had such a strong foundation, impossible to break. I thought about telling him what Mia had said, about me not being as happy as I was back then, but I didn't know how to word it.

"I was so happy when I heard you was looking after her," he said. "She like it in Washington?"

"Yeah," I said. "She really did. Good school, loads of friends."

"Wow," he said. "Nothing like you then."

"Nothing like us," I reminded him. "You weren't exactly Mr Popular either."

"Guess not," he said. He smiled. I smiled. Then he hesitated. I knew he wanted to say more, prayed he wouldn't shut down again. "Wouldn't have changed a thing, though."

"Nah. Me neither," I said, thinking about our childhood of late-night conversations looking over Atlanta, foraging in the woods for scraps to eat, long hours in the library with a silently bored, stubborn companion. Things that would normally have been shit but because I'd had him, they'd been the best. "What about you and Merle? What were you guys doing before all of this?"

He shrugged, looked away from me again. I could tell he didn't want to admit to anything. "Not much. Just drifting around… you know Merle."

I'd lost him again. Just when we were making progress.

I sighed. Thought about him drifting aimlessly with Merle. "I shouldn't have left Georgia."

I didn't really mean to say it out loud. My regret at not trying harder just kind of slipped out.

"You mad?" he stared at me like I'd insulted him.

"No. It weren't right. Leaving Momma," I hesitated. "Leaving you. I should've stuck around. Tried harder."

"Nah, fuck that," he said. "You did what was right by you."

"It was selfish."

"Nah, it weren't," he said. "Your Momma was always going to be that way. And me...? I wasn't your responsibility."

"That's not what I meant," I said, but I struggled to word how I was feeling. "I just got so wrapped up in my own shit, that I didn't-"

"No," he said. He sounded kind of angry with me but not for the reasons I'd thought he would be after all these years. "You can't think like that. You got that little girl away from your Momma so she didn't have to grow up like us. You got her through all of this shit, and soon, you'll get her back..."

"Okay," I said. "But I didn't have to move to do any of that. Didn't have to go off to college or work as much as I did."

He laughed. "That's who you are, Naomi. I dunno how you fit all them brains in that head of yours, but you wouldn't be you if you weren't working hard. Nobody works at things like you do. You was doing something good. Going places."

"Didn't matter in the end though, did it?" I said. "Where I was going... all that work... for what? Means fuck all now, doesn't it?"

"Don't say that," he said. "You made it. You actually made it out of that dump, and you were trying to give a voice to people who didn't feel like they had one. That means everything. Only reason folks knew about that kid on death row who got framed by that cop was because you wrote about it. And-"

"Wait," I interrupted him. "You read that?"

He started to go red, like he'd only just realized what he'd let slip. "Er... yeah."

"When were you in Washington?" I asked. I tried to remember roughly when I'd written it, and what might have been going on in Washington that he and Merle would have been at.

"I wasn't," he said. The red in his cheeks deepened. I tried to work out what this meant, but before I could ask, he sighed and said, "Got someone to send it down to me."

I couldn't wrap my head around it. "You got someone to..."

"Send me copies of the Post," he said.

It didn't make sense.

"But... why?"

"So I could read your stuff," he said. He was staring intently at the ground like he hoped it might swallow him up if he looked at it for long enough. I wanted to hug him, but everything he'd just admitted to was already too personal for him, I knew he was in danger of withdrawing.

"Daryl..." I said. It came out as just a whisper. He turned his head slightly away from me, and I heard him clear his throat.

"I'm damn proud of you, Naomi," he said. "Always have been. Didn't tell you that enough."

It meant so much to me it hurt. For a moment I couldn't say anything. Couldn't move. Couldn't breathe. Just sat there, overwhelmed by everything Daryl had said, and how little I felt I deserved it after how I'd treated him. I knew I was letting the silence go on too long after he'd been so vulnerable, but I was too choked up. For once, I was glad he wasn't looking at me, and couldn't see the tears I was failing to hold back.

When I did, eventually, manage to pull myself together enough to talk, all I could say was, "I'm so sorry."

"What?"

He turned to look at me, and I hurriedly wiped the tears from my cheeks, but they wouldn't stop coming.

"That fight we had," I said. Now that it was all coming out, my hands started to shake. "I'm so, so sorry."

"Hey," he said, he was properly looking at me again, none of this glancing away bullshit. "Naomi..."

"No," I held up a hand to try and get him to shut up. I didn't know if I'd be able to get it all out another time if I stopped now. I owed him so much. "I said some awful shit to you, and I didn't mean any of it. When you came to my dorm, I knew something was up. I should've made us both leave."

"That weren't on you," he said. "I'm the one who turned up unannounced, off my face, and all fired up."

"But something happened?" I asked. "To put you in that mood? You saw your dad, right?"

He looked like he didn't want to answer, even now, after all this time. But we'd come so far. He nodded. "I was moving my shit out of his and into Merle's and he just-"

He stopped, but I knew how it ended. Same way everything with Mr Dixon ended.

"If the bastard weren't already dead, I'd kill him again," I said, and my fists clenched automatically. I looked at Daryl and remembered how I'd almost compared the two of them that night. Unforgivable. It had weighed me down ever since, but maybe now I had a chance to fix it. "You're nothing like him, you know that, right?"

He flinched. Looked away again.

"Daryl," I said. My heart started racing. "I didn't mean any of it. I was just so mad. About the drugs. About all of it. I... I didn't mean to… I would never-"

"Naomi," he whispered, shaking his head. I closed my eyes, tried to reorder my thoughts so that words coming out of my mouth made any kind of sense.

"You ain't gotta forgive me, but I just need you to know that I'm sorry," I said. "For everything I said, for the way I treated you, for no-"

"Will you stop it," he snapped.

He stood up. My heart dropped to my stomach. I remembered the way he'd run out of my dorm room, how I'd looked up from my bleeding hand to find him just... gone. I stood up too, my whole body trembled. I couldn't go through that again, I wouldn't just watch him leave. Not after I'd just got him back.

 

 

Daryl

She looked at me like she was terrified. I hated that look. Hated that it was me she was scared of. Wanted to run but I forced myself to stand still. I was so angry I didn't want to be around anyone but I needed her to know it weren't her I was angry with, it was me. Maybe then she'd stop looking at me like that. I took a few deep breaths.

"You were right to be mad at me," I said. "You were right to say all them things. I was being an asshole. I should've... I just..."

It's hard to get out years of regret in one conversation.

"It's okay," she said immediately, which was annoying because it wasn't. Nothing that had happened that night had been okay.

"And I said some horrible shit to you too," I reminded her, although I really didn't want her to remember. "It weren't just you flinging insults around, I was looking for a fight."

"Nothing you said was wrong," she said, maddeningly level-headed about it. "I wasn't being myself. I was acting like an idiot."

"You were trying to fit in," I said. "I didn't see it. Didn't want to see it."

"But you were right," she said again. "And I needed to hear it. Most of those guys weren't really my friends. Sure didn't stay my friends after that-"

"Shit." My heart sank. "Fucked it all up for you, didn't I?"

I hoped she'd say no, but I got my answer from the look in her eyes.

"In the long term, no," she said, trying to dodge the question.

"What happened?"

"Abbie was weird about it so I found a new dorm. Stayed friends with one of the guys, actually, but the rest of them..." she shrugged like it was no big deal. I swallowed back the guilt of having ruined everything she'd taken months to build in one night. "But, in the end, you reminded me who I am, why I was there. Got me refocused."

She really didn't look angry, which didn't make any sense. I deserved anger. I deserved everything she'd said and more.

"Bullshit," I said. Because it had to be.

"You can say that all you want, Daryl," she said. "But truth is, I don't know what else would've got me back on track. You say you're proud of me, then you have to know that you helped me get there more than anyone."

"Shut up," I said. I was not taking any damn credit for all of her hard work.

"Excuse me?"

"You're being a dumbass," I told her.

"You're the one being a dumbass!" she snapped.

"I didn't do shit to help you. Didn't do shit to help anyone before all of this," I said. "You want to know what Merle and I were doing? Fuck all. We were shifting gear and getting drunk and getting into fights. That was it."

I hated telling it to her, hated admitting what a piece of shit I'd been to the only person who'd ever believed otherwise. But she needed to know that I wasn't a good guy, no matter what she'd always thought. I wondered how hard it was for her to swallow the truth. Her jaw clenched. Knew she only did that when she was biting back a retort.

"You and Merle had it rough," she said, eventually.

"So did you, and you still-"

"I got lucky," she said.

"Bullshit. You worked hard."

"Yes," she said. "But I also got lucky. And no matter what you say, or what you think, I will always feel lucky that I knew you."

"I ain't worth that," I said. "All I do is fuck things up and yell at you until you're scared of me."

"I ain't scared of you," she looked genuinely confused.

"Yeah?" I said. "Well, you look terrified."

She swallowed, her gaze softened. "I'm just scared you'll leave again."

It came out a tiny whisper, but it was big enough to get me to sit back down.

"I ain't going anywhere," I told her. "Unless you want me too."

"I don't," she said quietly and sat down next to me. Silence settled around us, but it didn't feel as bad as it had before. Daylight was almost gone. Lights were coming on in the houses around us. Proper, electric lights. This place didn't feel real. Was she real? She looked at me. "I guess we've both been dumbasses?"

She offered it as a truce, a way to move past everything.

"We sure have," I said and she smiled. Her whole body relaxed. Felt like I could breathe easy again. Like, for the first time in a long time, everything in my life might start to go right again.

Everything Rick had said, about me not really knowing who she was now, stuck in my head. She seemed just like I remembered. I wondered if she thought the same about me. I felt different to how I had back then, less dumb and immature. More people around me that I gave a shit about. But she'd always thought the best of me, so maybe she wouldn't see those little changes. Would I see hers? There was still so much that had happened we hadn't talked about yet. The places I'd been before I got here, the people we'd met and lost along the way. Still so many unanswered questions about her time too. Like what had happened to her at Terminus, and how the hell she'd got out of the fire.

"Where you when it happened?" I asked.

"I was at Momma's," she said. "She got bit, but of course I didn't know that at the time. Just thought she was sick. I went to look after her. She died. Turned. There'd been a power cut, so I had all of these candles. Dumb idea because she…"

She stopped, saw me nodding along.

"I know," I admitted, although I didn't really want to. "I was there."

"What?"

"Merle and me were clearing out Dad's old place. When I saw your house was on fire, I… I tried…" I stopped. I know I'd failed, but I at least wanted her to know that I'd tried. "Merle pulled me away again."

"You tried to save me?" she said, with a smile like that was exactly the kind of shit she expected from me. I nodded. Looked like something made sense to her. "I thought I heard you out there. Before I got out."

"How did you get out?"

"Had to take out Momma. Managed to get one of the windows open and climb out," she hesitated. "I looked for you. But I had to get to Mia."

"Makes sense," I said. "Where did you and Mia end up?"

"We got a group," she said. I knew that. A group she avoided talking about. Only ones I knew were Lucas and Perla. Where were the rest? I wondered if she'd open up about them now, stop avoiding them and the subject of Terminus. I wanted to check she was okay, but the look she got in her eyes when the conversation even got close was enough to tell me that she wasn't. "Built this big community in the trees."

"In the trees?" I repeated.

"Yeah."

"The goddamn trees?" I laughed.

"Look," she said, maybe starting to get annoyed again, maybe amused. It was hard to tell. "They can't climb. It's safe up there. Humans have always-"

"Yeah, I know, I know."

"Then what's so funny?"

I shook my head. "I thought you were dead, and all this time you been living in the trees like a goddamn squirrel."

She started to laugh too. This huge smile spread all over her face, and our eyes met.

It was kind of a mistake.

I'd forgotten what it was like, the way she looked at me. Like she really saw me, right through to my soul. The only person in the world who looked at me in a way that made me feel like I could do anything. My whole life, I should've been working to be worthy of that look. Instead, I'd thrown it all away.

Not this time.

All I could see was her eyes. All I could feel was her looking at me and a huge, dumb smile on my face. My stomach flipped over, that feeling you get after a drop on a rollercoaster. Like you're terrified but also completely safe.

My palms got kinda sweaty, and my heart was beating so loud I wondered if she could hear it. I hadn't held her, hadn't had any contact with her since we'd first met. I wanted to reach out, put my arms around her again. Close this shitty space between us, and check that she was real.

I blinked, realized we'd moved closer than I thought. Didn't know if it was me that had moved, or her. Maybe both of us.

I think she realized it too, she'd stopped laughing, but she didn't move away. That smile was still there. Close to me.

Not close enough.

Time stopped until something broke the silence, and then a voice from behind me said, "Hello."

Naomi jumped back from me, blinking like she was emerging from some kind of dream. I turned.

Aaron.

Could feel myself staring at him like an idiot. Naomi was doing the same. I wondered if my face was as red as it felt. He looked between the two of us. "Er… everything okay out here?"

"Yeah," Naomi said. Her voice was all weird and breathy, like she'd been caught stealing or something. "We're fine. You? You okay?"

"Yeah," he said, like he was trying not to laugh at us. "Just wanted to let you guys know that Eric and I are heading to bed. But don't let that stop you guys from catching up."

"Alright," Naomi said. "Thanks, Aaron."

"You guys hungry?" he asked. "There's some leftover chilli if you want any. Eric made enough for four because we weren't sure if you guys were... well we didn't know if..."

"Yeah, I'm starving," Naomi interrupted his waffle. I wondered if he'd heard us arguing. Then, she looked at me. "You want some?"

I'd already said no once, but was secretly also starving. I nodded and I dunno why, but it seemed to make her real happy. Aaron passed two bowls out to us.

"Okay, well. Night you two," he said with a smile.

"Night, Aaron," she said. It was nice that she was so comfortable with him. Made me less suspicious of this place. Didn't much like Deanna. But it made me think this guy seemed alright.

"Night," I said to him, although I already had a spoonful of food in my mouth. He smiled again and then the door closed. We ate in silence. I tried not to think about that weird moment we'd just had. What maybe, almost, could have happened.

I glanced at Naomi, wondered if she'd been thinking about it too or if it was all in my head. "Good food."

"Yeah," she agreed with her mouth full. "Eric is great at making something nice out of basically anything."

I had a few more spoonfuls, couldn't really remember the last time I ate. I thought about Rick and the others, wondered if they'd been fed too.

"You got any more of this?" I asked. "Maybe I should..."

"They'll have got rations at the house," she said, knowing what I was thinking in that weird way she sometimes did. "I can show you to the house later... if you like."

"Yeah, sure," I said, although I already knew it was only a few doors down. I'd caught sight of Michonne and Glenn making their way there after their interviews with Deanna. I didn't want to cut our time short, so having her walk me over there felt like a good way to make it last longer without seeming clingy.

"So, where were you guys?" she asked. "Before you came here."

Terminus.

I didn't want to lie to her. Not after we'd so recently made up. But she was finally happy again and now didn't seem the right time to make her think about it. That look she got in her eyes, it was like she was haunted.

"Prison," I said. Not a lie but not the whole truth.

Her eyebrows raised. "Prison? God, that must've been weird. Nice and safe though, I guess."

"Yeah."

"If you were on death row," she said. "What would your last meal be?"

I thought for a moment. "Pie."

"Good shout," she said. "God, I miss pie."

"Kind of pie would you pick?" I asked her, watched her think about it for a moment.

"Judy's Diner's world-famous pecan banoffee pie." We said it at the same time. She stared at me, bewildered.

"How did you…?"

"Same," I said with a shrug. It was the one she'd most often brought home from the diner for us to eat, the one that most reminded me of hanging out with her. "DC have any good pie?"

"Yeah…" she said in a non-committal kinda way. "Nothing beats that diner pie, though."

Her smile as she remembered it made me want to invent a time machine just to go get her a slice. The lights from the house behind us went off, plunging us into darkness. Didn't take as long for my eyes to adjust to it as it used to. Light from the moon and stars always looks brighter when it's all you got. Naomi was looking up at them. "Nice that you can see the stars now. Properly, I mean. So much light pollution in DC. Made me miss that Georgia sky."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah," she said.

I wondered if there was anything else she'd missed about Georgia. But, I didn't want to make it weird by asking, so instead I said, "Never seen another kind of sky."

She turned to look at me again. "Man, do I have news for you."

"What?"

"That," she pointed upwards. "Is a Virginia sky.

"No way?"

"Yes, sir," she said. "You ain't in Georgia anymore."

"Well, shit."

"How does it feel?" she asked.

I looked around the place, breathed deep. "Air don't seem as fresh," I said. "Now you mention it. They got peaches here?"

"Nope," she said. "Peaches only grow in Georgia, nowhere else."

"Ain't staying here then," I said. "Pack your shit, let's go.

I'd been joking, but saying it out loud, I wondered if she would up and leave this place with me. I didn't much care for being around fancy folks and if she wanted to go, I'd follow her in a heartbeat.

She laughed. I loved the way she laughed. Hadn't changed one bit. Made me think that Rick might be wrong, about us being different. Course, there was so much of her life I'd missed. We'd started filling in the blanks between the dead rising up and now. But I didn't know that much about before either, from when I'd run out of her dorm room to when I'd tried to run into that fire. A whole lot could've happened then. She could've done anything. Met anyone.

"You ever…" I didn't know how to phrase it. Felt like my insides turned to snakes that wouldn't stop moving around. "I dunno… get married? Kids?"

"No," she looked at me like it was the craziest idea in the world. "God, no. Mia was enough of a handful."

"Yeah," I felt relieved although I knew I had no right to be. "Course."

"Did you?" she blurted out like it had only just occurred to her.

"No," I heard myself laugh. "Course not."

The silence was weird. Or, at least, it was for me. Don't know what it was like for her. I looked down at where our bowls had sat empty for a while now. I kept looking at mine, hoping there'd be some I'd missed so that I'd have an excuse to stay longer.

"I should probably go," I said, but it made my heart heavy. Felt like I'd just got here, like we'd already not had enough time together.

"Sure," she said it with a smile but there was disappointment in her eyes. Maybe she also felt like it was too soon. Wasn't much I could do about it though, night had to end at some point. We stood up and walked to the top of the porch steps. A prolonged goodbye felt worse. Maybe it was best to get it over with. Rip off the band-aid. I turned.

"I know the way, actually," I said. "You don't gotta walk me. I'll see you tomorrow?"

"Oh," she said, surprised and maybe a little hurt but doing her best to hide it. "Yeah, I guess."

It should've made me happy. If someone had told me yesterday that I'd get to see her tomorrow, I'd have lost my mind with excitement. But the thought of leaving just bummed me out. Tomorrow already felt too far away.

Didn't know if I should hug her again or leave. Didn't know what she'd be okay with. We both stood on the back porch. She was right by the door, I was at the top of the stairs. I knew I couldn't linger much longer, but I the thought of being apart again so soon glued my feet to the floor. She was looking at me like she wanted to say something else but couldn't.

Probably trying to work out how to ask me to leave so I'd stop hanging around like a damn creep. She took a deep breath.

"You wanna stay tonight?" She sounded kinda nervous. I remembered her asking me the same thing when I'd dropped her off at college, the regret of saying no had followed me for years. She was looking at me in the same shy, hopeful way she had back then. This was my Naomi. She was back. The feeling of it took my breath away. I paused too long. She read too much into my hesitation and took a step back, dropped her gaze to my feet in embarrassment. "It's okay… your friends are here and you probably should go back to them. Sorry. I just-"

"No," I said quickly, taking a step forward. Couldn't bear for the space between us to get any bigger. "I'll stay. I want to stay."

She smiled and whispered, "Okay."

"Okay," I said. I could feel myself smiling back like an idiot.

The house was dark and quiet. It were weird to be standing in one that was still so… complete. I was so used to run-down, half-ransacked shitholes. This one was so clean. So tidy. It felt weird. Felt weirder to be following Naomi to her bedroom. Last time I'd been in her room, it was a college dorm, and I'd fucked everything up.

That why I'm so nervous now?

She climbed the stairs ahead of me. The lights were off, assumed that meant Aaron and Eric were asleep.

I'd have known it was her room even if she hadn't been the one leading me to it. Books were piled up against the walls.

"You opening a damn library in here?" I whispered, so I didn't wake anyone else up. She grinned at me.

"I had to stay in bed for about a week when I got here," she said. "These were all I had to keep myself sane."

"What? Why?"

"Doctor's orders," she said, cheerfully enough. "I weren't in great shape when I got here."

"You okay?"

"Yeah," she said. "Just hadn't eaten or drunk very much in a few weeks, think my body was close to shutting down. But I'm alright now."

Felt like my own body was about to shut down from shock. Then I got angry about it, about her being out there. Starving. Alone. Had nothing to do with the rage though, so it just sat there burning a hole in my chest.

"Top and tail like when we was little?" she asked, picking up one of the pillows. I nodded. She caught the look on my face. "You alright?"

"Just don't like thinking of you out there like that," I said.

She moved her pillow down at the foot of the bed, gave me a look like I was overreacting. "I'm fine, Daryl. Fully recovered."

"Still," I said. "Can't have been nice."

"Been through worse," she shrugged. I think she meant it to sound more casual and reassuring, but I caught the look on her face right after she said it. Haunted by something. I wanted to ask what but didn't wanna push her away. We'd come so far today. Figured when she was ready to talk about it, she would.

"As long as you're feeling okay," I said.

"I am," she replied, but I didn't really believe her smile. Before I could say anything about it, she climbed into bed. "Get the light, will you?"

I turned off the light and pulled back the comforter.

"Weird to be sleeping in a bed again," I said as I lay down. Didn't say anything about it being weirder to have Naomi's feet beside my head again. All the sleepovers we'd had as kids came flooding back. Telling ghost stories, talking shit about everyone else.

"Wait till you have a shower," she said. "Still think I'm dreaming."

"This anything like where you lived in DC?" I asked. I'd always liked thinking of her someplace like this. Safe.

"Nah," she said. "First place we lived in was a damp, mouldy one-bed apartment. Heating never worked, no air-con so we were always either too hot or too cold. Close to Mia's school, though. She had her friends round all the time."

"That's nice," I said. The place sounded like a shit hole but we'd grown up in shit holes and I knew if there was one person who could make it bearable, it was Naomi.

"Second place was huge," she said. "Had these big windows, fancy underfloor heating that I didn't know how to work. We had this fancy coffee machine that…"

She trailed off.

"You alright?"

"Yeah," she sounded distracted. "Just don't remember if I turned it off before I left."

"What? The coffee machine?"

"Yeah."

"Don't suppose that matters now." I tried not to laugh at her.

"No, guess not."

"Sounds nice, the second place."

"Yeah," she sounded unsure. "It was… just felt a bit big after the first one. Wasn't really a home, y'know?"

"Yeah," I said, although I didn't really know. I'd alway felt at home most places as long as she was there. Even here, in Alexandria, with its fancy houses and folks who stared at me like I was a wild dog. I could deal with it if she was beside me.

"Night, Daryl," she whispered, the same way she'd do when we were kids and she was checking to see if I'd fallen asleep or not. It made me smile.

"Night, Naomi."

In the silence and the dark, I listened to the sound of her breathing. Still couldn't quite believe it was her. It had been a long day, but I felt so awake. So aware of every sound she made. Every time she moved.

She sat up. The bed creaked and dipped beside me as she twisted around, setting her pillow down next to mine.

"You okay?" I sat up, immediately worried she'd been taken off bedrest too early. Wondered where I could find this dumbass doctor in the middle of the night if I needed to go get her help or smack him in the face. But she just lay down beside me and smiled.

"Yeah," she said. "Your feet are just stinkier than they used to be. Needed some fresh air."

"Shut up," I said. But I weren't even close to mad. How could I be mad at anything now? I could see her grinning at me in the dim light from the moon outside. She stuck her tongue out at me. I stuck mine out right back. Her eyes grew serious for a sec, "Truth is, I keep thinking you'll disappear."

"I'm here," I assured her. "Not so sure you are, though."

"I am." She turned her head to stare at the ceiling. "You really think we'll find her?"

Didn't need to ask who she meant.

"'Course we will," I said. "Found each other, didn't we?"

"Yeah," I watched her smile, felt my whole body tingle. "We did."

She closed her eyes. I looked up at the ceiling too, because it was easier than looking at her and feeling all of this.

I wondered if she was asleep. Then I heard one sharp intake of breath and I looked back her. Eyes still closed, but eyebrows knotted together like she was holding back tears.

"I missed you," even through her whisper, I heard her voice break. "Even before all of this. I missed you every day."

"Back at you," I reached for her hand in the dark, found her reaching back for me. Her fingers linked with mine and closed the space between us.

 

Chapter 19: The Party

Naomi

I woke up when sunlight came streaming through the gaps in my curtains. It was confusing at first, and I couldn't remember the last time it had happened. Usually, I woke up when I was still dark and then lay awake, waiting until I heard someone else get up. A soft snore beside me. I turned over, Daryl's face was turned towards me, hand still reaching out but we must have let go sometime in the night. There was a little smile on his face. He looked as relaxed as I felt. The novelty of seeing him still hadn't worn off, filled me with nothing but joy.

Would be weird to keep staring at him though, right? What if he woke up and I was just hovering over him like a creep?

I knew the grown-up thing to do was to let him sleep and go downstairs, wait for him to get up on his own. But that wasn't how we'd ever done things.

I picked up my pillow. Smacked him in the face.

"Hey! Hey!" he said, his voice heavy with sleep and confusion. He untangled one of his arms from the comforter and tried to fight off the pillow. His eyes opened, he squinted at it and then at me. I watched the memory of the previous day flood back to him. I wondered if he felt the same joy seeing me as I did when I looked at him. His frown disappeared, and he grinned. "Oh, hey."

"Morning," I said cheerfully.

"Morning," he rubbed his eyes, stretched and sat up. "Sleep okay?"

"Yeah," I said, not meaning to sound quite as surprised as I did, but it was how I felt, so I guess that was accurate. "You?"

He nodded, stretched back on my bed and yawned. It felt like we were in our own little bubble, just the two of us, but I could hear Aaron and Eric moving around downstairs. The bubble would have to burst at some point. The smell of whatever they were having for breakfast wafted up to us.

"You hungry?" I asked him, as my own stomach rumbled.

"Kinda," he shrugged. I knew he was, but he could hear Aaron and Eric down there too. Knew that would put him off staying. It had always taken a long time for Daryl to warm up to people, I could only imagine that it had gotten worse with the current state of the world where you never knew who could be trusted and who might kill you and take your shit.

I sat up and crossed my legs on the bed, feeling a light and happy rush in the pit of my stomach. Things felt good but surreal, and I didn't know what to do with myself. I wanted to keep us locked in my room forever, where nothing else could harm us again, but I knew that wasn't possible. There were other people out there who needed our help. Mia for starters. And I'd never find her by hanging out up here just because it felt safe.

"Should probably get up," I said, realizing that we'd just been staring at each other with stupid grins on our faces for a few minutes.

"Yeah," he said. "Probably should."

I got up and lingered by the door, heard the bed creak as he got out of the other side. I knew this would mean an end to the time we'd got to spend just the two of us. Didn't know when we'd get to do it again.

"Thanks for staying," I said quietly, not turning to look at him.

"S'alright," he said. Knew he'd be looking at the back of my head like I was a weirdo. There was no way he could've known how much it had meant to have him here.

When I opened the door, I could hear Eric and Aaron talking downstairs, too quietly for me to make out what they were saying. My footsteps at the top of the stairs made them shut up. I could feel them listening to me coming down, trying to guess how many pairs of feet were on the stairs.

"You're up late," Aaron commented as I neared the bottom.

"Late for what?" I countered. "Not like I got work to get to."

He looked up from where he was sitting at the dining table and smiled at me. "Morning."

"Morning."

"Late night?" Eric gave me a suggestive grin, and then Daryl appeared in the doorway behind me, and his eyes widened. "Oh... didn't know we had a guest."

He gave Aaron a distinct I-told-you-so kind of look. Aaron tried to look disapproving, but I could tell he was suppressing a smile. I attempted to shake my head at them both without Daryl noticing. Didn't want him getting embarrassed and scared off by those two.

"Er, sorry..." Daryl cleared his throat. "I can just-"

He gestured back towards the front door, took a step back like he was on the verge of running away.

"It's not a problem," Aaron said. "Stay as long as you like. I'll move these."

Aaron scooped up the maps that were spread all over the table. I stepped forward, hoped Daryl would follow and start to feel more at ease.

"What you looking at?" I asked.

"Just seeing where we haven't searched yet," he said. Then, he glanced at Daryl, clearly not wanting to exclude him from the conversation. "I'm trying to help Naomi find her sister."

"Oh, yeah?" It was only then that Daryl walked further into the room. "Can I help?"

"Of course."

"I'm going to talk to Perla some more today," I said. "She wasn't strong enough to tell me much yesterday, but hopefully the antibiotics have helped. Maybe after a good night's sleep, she'll-"

I could feel myself slipping into a panic until Daryl put a hand on my shoulder. "We'll find her."

He was so sure. Looking at him, I felt myself calm down. He had always been my solid ground when it felt like things were slipping away.

Aaron cleared his throat. "Take a seat," he told us.

"Nah, it's okay..." Daryl glanced at me. "I should get back."

"Okay," I said, trying to hide my disappointment. "I'll show you out."

"Er, thanks for... having me," he said to Eric and Aaron. "See you around, I guess."

"We sure hope so," Eric said.

"See you, Daryl," Aaron gave him a wave.

I walked him back toward our front door. I really didn't want him to go. But I got why he had to. He had a whole group to go and see, he'd already skipped out on their first night here and would want to check on them. I got that, I just didn't know what to say to him. Should I hug him? Was that too much now that we were going to be neighbors again? He didn't move from the doorway.

"You could... come with me," he suggested. "If you wanted?"

"Er...," I was surprised, I'd have thought he'd want some time alone with his friends. "You sure that's okay?"

"Yeah," he said, with a definite nod. I knew he wasn't just being polite. "Be good for you to meet everyone. Properly this time."

"Okay," I said, suddenly super nervous about the idea of it. "If you're sure?"

"Yeah," he said, with a shrug. "But only if you want."

I nodded and stepped out of the door with him. The house Deanna had set up for them was four doors down from where I was staying with Aaron. Something was comforting about that. Not quite next door, but close enough to run there if something happened. Just like when we were kids.

Daryl was smiling a little, in a way that made me think he was excited about me meeting everyone. I just hoped they liked me. He'd spent a lot of time on the road with them, clearly built a strong bond. It took a lot for someone like Daryl to do that. I didn't want to be the reason he was uncomfortable here.

Rick got to the door before we'd even made it to the top of the porch steps. He didn't look happy, glared at the pair of us like we'd come to burn the place down. I glanced at Daryl, who seemed as confused as I felt. I tried smiling at Rick, but he wasn't looking at me.

"How are you settling in?" I asked.

"Yeah, fine thanks," he said, still looking only at Daryl. "Will you give us a moment?"

"Yeah, sure," I said. "No problem."

Rick grabbed Daryl by the arm and hauled him inside. The door slammed shut in front of me.

"The hell have you been?"

Heard Daryl's voice but couldn't make out what he said. It had been a long time since I'd had to break up one of his fights.

"You have a responsibility to these people now," I heard Rick say, and I felt shitty. I hadn't meant to get him in any kind of trouble, I should've realized that they'd take a little while to adjust to life here. Turning down the voice in your head that tells you there's a threat around every corner is hard when it's been right for so long.

I was causing Daryl more problems than it was worth. It was a dumb idea to come over here, an even dumber idea to ask him to stay the night before. I turned to walk away. The argument didn't sound like it would die down any time soon, and I didn't want to make things worse for him when he came out. Maybe it was best if I left all of them alone for a little while. At least until they'd started trusting people again.

"Hey," a woman's voice behind me made me stop. I turned around. She was leaning on one side of the porch, short grey hair and a huge smile. I remembered seeing her walk with Daryl's group, and thought she looked tough. Now she was all cleaned up, she'd changed her clothes. In the blink of an eye, she blended right into Alexandria much quicker than I did. "Where you going?"

"Em..." I glanced back at the house where I could still hear yelling. Wondered if Daryl had punched a wall or broken anything yet, or if that was even something he still did when he was mad. "Not sure sticking around is the best thing right now."

"Nonsense," she said. "It's just an adjustment is all. Rick'll calm down."

"Don't worry, I get it," I said. "I was the same when I got here and to be honest, Alexandria still ain't stopped feeling like a dream."

"How long have you been here?" she was still smiling, but she had these bright, intelligent eyes. Like every answer I gave her was feeding into a bigger narrative. I'd interviewed enough people in my career to know when someone was trying to do it to me.

"About three weeks," I said. I wanted her to know that, as wary as she was about trusting people in Alexandria, I was different from them. Wasn't as used to their way of life. "Aaron pulled me out of the woods when I was pretty close to starving to death. Things felt too ordinary here to trust them. This ain't the kind of place I'm from either. The people are... so out of touch."

My answer seemed honest enough to win her round a little bit.

"You're Naomi, right?" she said.

"Yeah."

"I'm Carol."

"Nice to meet you, Carol," I said. The arguing inside seemed to have died down a little. I moved a little closer to the house again, stood opposite where she was standing on the porch.

"You too," she said. "Daryl's told me a lot about you."

"Really?"

That didn't sound much like him.

"Well..." she said with a sly smile, my surprise must have shown on my face. "He told me you exist. Which for Daryl, probably counts as a lot."

I laughed. "It sure does."

Felt weird that he'd talked about me to this stranger. Not bad, just odd. I wondered what he'd told her, felt self-conscious about what the answer might be. I glanced at Carol, who fixed that smile back on her face and turned to Rick.

"Alright?" she asked.

He glanced at me, did not smile, and then back at her. "Yup."

"Hey," I said, as non-confrontationally as I could. "I'm sorry for keeping Daryl from y'all, I didn't mean..."

"It's fine," he said in a way that made it clear it wasn't at all. In the silence, I waited for the ground to swallow me whole.

"Cut Daryl some slack," Carol said. "If it was you, and you'd found Lori..."

"Lori's dead."

"I know, but-" Carol said, the right amount of sympathy and sincerity in her voice. The door opened, and Daryl came out. His face was red, and he was glaring at the ground. Knew that meant he was close to losing it. She glanced at him. "But Daryl's found his wife after years of thinking she was dead. Surely, you can understand him not being here last night, Rick?"

I didn't think much of it. I was used to folks assuming we were a couple. We'd hit an age sometime in our teens where everyone had just expected that because we spent all of our time with someone of the opposite gender, we must be dating.

"Oh, we ain't..." I started to say. Then I glanced at Daryl so that we could share the eye roll we reserved for whenever this situation came up. But this time was different. This time he looked hurriedly away from me. Glared at Carol.

"Sorry," she said quickly. "My mistake."

She smiled at me, but she looked as confused as I felt, like she'd made a mistake that neither of us was aware of. Had Daryl said something when he was talking to her that made her think that?Had he just implied it? Accidentally? But if so, why wasn't he laughing about like we would've done before?

And why wouldn't he look at me?

There was a silence that felt longer than it probably was. I hoped Daryl would say something that would make sense of this.

"Deanna says we should go out and explore," Rick said, shooting me another glare. I jumped because I'd momentarily forgotten he was here. "Should probably do that."

"I can show you around if you like," I said. The look he gave me made my chest feel tight. I didn't know what this guy was capable of, guessed he'd done some pretty horrible shit to get this far. Especially as he seemed to be the leader of this group. Not that I was one to judge, I'd done the same. "Is Lucas here, I'd like to show him around too?"

I glanced at the house behind them, couldn't see any signs of him through any of their windows. Carol and Rick exchanged a look. I probably wasn't meant to see it, but I understood it immediately. They didn't trust Lucas.

"I think he's with Perla," Carol said eventually.

"That's good," I said. "I should check in on her."

Should've checked in on both of them by now. I'd been so selfish about all of this.

"You do that," Rick said. "I'd like to get to know this place on my own."

"Sure," I said. "No problem."

He walked off without another word to anyone.

"I wouldn't mind that tour," Carol said. "If the offer still stands?"

"Of course," I said.

The more of Alexandria we saw, the quieter Daryl got. I realized pretty quickly what a mistake this had been. The people here were nothing like Daryl and me. During my career, I'd spent a lot of time around the kind of people who could afford this place, and I knew how to blend in with them, how to talk to them and find common ground. But for him, these were the kinds of people who'd always looked down him, made snap judgements, had doors opened to them that were locked to him. Even now, the world had ended, and they'd found themselves in a little bubble of running water and solar power, while the rest of us had to fight tooth and nail to stay alive.

He withdrew more and more until it wasn't just me he wasn't looking at, it was everyone.

Carol asked questions, I was as honest with her as I could be about the way everything ran. Told her most of what I'd learned from my three weeks here. I took them to have a look at our supplies, knowing she'd be interested in the armoury and hoping it would be a good enough place to end the tour.

"Olivia," I called into the storage room. "You in here?"

"That you, Naomi?" I heard her call from round the back.

"Yup," I said. "Brought some new folks by to see you."

"Be out in a sec," she called.

Daryl took a look around at the parts of the pantry we could see, still fairly well stocked and rationed.

"Think I'm just gonna go hunt something," he said. He sounded real down.

"You want some company?" I asked, hoping that getting him on his own might help. I felt weirdly nervous. He shrugged me off.

"Nah."

"You sure, 'cause I don't-"

"Look," he cut me off way more abruptly than I think either of us expected. He lowered his voice, glanced around him like he didn't want to be seen getting too close to me. "It's not that I don't wanna hang out… just… don't want to give people the wrong idea, y'know?"

"Oh," I said. Was it just that he was horrifically embarrassed of even the thought of us being together? Felt like something deep in my chest painfully deflated. He grinned at me like it was a joke and he expected me to laugh. Maybe I should've, but I didn't much feel like it because he'd been so cold and weird. There was an odd feeling, like my lungs were too tight and my heart was speeding up so much it might burst. "See you around, then, I guess?"

"Yeah," he said. "See you soon."

Wouldn't even look me in the eye when he said it, just threw it over his shoulder as he walked off. In the silence that followed, Carol and I were left staring at each other. She gave me a small, embarrassed smile that felt more genuine than any of her others. I wondered if my face had gone red.

"I shouldn't have asked him to stay," I muttered, more to myself than her, but she heard it anyway.

"Don't be silly," she said. "And… I'm sorry. I didn't mean to assume anything, about the two of you. Like you say, Daryl doesn't give much away, so I filled in the gaps myself. It sounded like you'd been together a long time, so I thought…"

Together?

"Don't worry about it. I'm sure it's all a misunderstanding. We weren't… we never dated," I said. And it was fine until I caught the flicker of surprise in her eyes, although she did her best to hide it, like what I was saying didn't add up with whatever she'd heard. "Just friends… did he… did he tell you we had?"

It sounded absurd even asking it. Daryl wasn't a liar. I couldn't read her expression, she did a good job of smoothing it over. I could feel my heart hammering as I waited for her answer.

"Oh, no," she said brightly. "My mistake. Another silly assumption."

"Okay," I smiled back, tried not to give too much away. I couldn't work out why there was such a heavy feeling in my chest now.

"Sorry to keep you waiting," Olivia said.

"No problem," Carol said and then she turned to me. "I'm alright looking around here on my own if you want to go check on Perla."

"You sure?"

"Yeah, of course," she said. "I'm sure Olivia here can show me around."

I got the feeling she had ulterior motives for sending me away. Maybe so she could talk to Olivia one on one, get a sense of our supplies and security. If this was anyone else, I wouldn't have allowed it. I couldn't risk another group of people taking over my new home like back at Terminus. But these were Daryl's people. And if they'd earned his trust and respect, they must be worth something.

"Alright then," I said, taking a step back.

"Please, don't be a stranger around our place," she said. "Rick will cool off."

"Thanks," I said. "I'll pop by sometime. And I'm four doors away if you need me."

"I'll remember that," she said. "See you around."

I waved before I walked off.

My head was filled with so many questions. My heart and mind were racing. I walked fast, was glad to reach the medical center when I did just because it was a welcome distraction from whatever the hell had just gone on. I could see Lucas sitting on a chair by the bed where Perla was sleeping. No sign of Pete. I pushed the door open.

"Oh, hey," he stood up when I came in. Looked so happy to see a familiar face. I smiled at him.

"Hey," I said. "How's the patient?"

"She's okay," he said. "Sleeping at the moment but doing much better than yesterday."

"That's good," I said. We both stood over her in silence for a moment. I noticed a blanket draped over the chair Lucas had been sitting on. He looked tired, and not as well-rested as everyone else who'd just spent their first night in Alexandria. "Did you sleep here?"

He hesitated, like he wanted to lie to me but thought better of it, "Yeah. Didn't want her to be on her own."

I felt even worse about skipping out on both of them the night before.

"And how are you doing?" I asked him.

"Okay," he said, but his tone said otherwise.

"Sorry I didn't come and see you yesterday," I said. "I just got… caught up in other things."

"Don't worry about it," he said. "It's been hectic for all of us. Must've been nice to see Daryl again, though."

"Yeah," I said. "It was… How are they treating you… that group. Everything okay?"

"Yeah," he said, but again I didn't believe his tone. "It's hard for them, I think, to have me with them. After everything at Terminus."

"They making it hard for you, too?"

He shrugged. "Nothing I didn't earn. They've been very civil. All things considered."

It sounded pretty bleak, to be stuck in a house with a group of people who didn't like you or trust you much, who knew what you'd done in times of desperation.

"I'll talk to Deanna and see if there's anywhere else, you can stay," I said. "Maybe you and Perla could stay with other people. People who-"

"Who don't know I once ate other people to survive?" he finished for me.

"Well, I wasn't going to put it like that," I said, "but yeah."

"Thanks, Naomi."

I sat and talked with him for a while. He seemed to brighten and open up more. I wondered how long it had been since he'd had a conversation that had been more than 'civil'. When Perla woke up, she told me everything she could about the car that had taken Mia. They'd spoken to her first, hadn't just snatched her up. Perla had been too far away to hear what they'd said or get a good look at the car. She'd waited to see if they'd bring her back, but when it became apparent that they weren't going to, she'd gone to find help. And that's when she'd found Daryl.

Every plan I'd made, everywhere I'd searched so far would need to be scrapped. I'd never thought that a car would have taken her. It meant that she could be much further away than I thought. Instead of following railroad tracks, I'd have to switch to looking at roads and communities they might lead to. She was no longer lost, she was taken. I didn't know which was worse.

I left Lucas and Perla, went to talk to Deanna about their situation. When I knocked on her door, it wasn't Deanna who answered. One of the women from Daryl's group - short dark hair, intimidatingly pretty - looked out at me. I wanted to be nice, but I felt torn between hospitality and my loyalties to Lucas, given everything he'd tried to hide from me.

"Deanna in?" I asked.

"Yeah," she said. "We're about to have a meeting-"

"I won't take long," I promised, stepping forward.

"Okay," she said, opening the door enough to let me past.

"Naomi," Deanna looked at me from the end of her long hallway. "This is a surprise. I'm just about to step into a meeting."

"I'll be quick," I said. She looked at me, clearly weighing up whether it was worth having a short meeting with me now or a long argument to get me to come back later.

"Alright, come in," she said, glanced back at the woman behind me. "Sorry, Maggie, I'll just be a moment."

"Alright."

I stepped into her office, glanced at her video camera and wondered if that damn tape of me had been recorded over yet or if she kept them all forever.

"Would it be possible to move Lucas and Perla somewhere else?" I said.

"Aren't they happy in the houses we've provided them and the rest of their group?"

"Lucas isn't part of that group," I said. "Not really. The place I was in before this-"

"Terminus?"

I shuddered, couldn't help it.

"Yes," I said. "He was there too."

Her mouth dropped open. "He's not one of the men who-"

"No," I said, not wanting to hear the end of that question. "He was a prisoner like me. Broke out just like I did, but decided to stay there. I understand Rick and his group were held prisoners there… I think it's hard for them to trust him, hard for him to fit in."

"Understandable," Deanna said. "Why did Rick's group take him in? Why didn't they just kill him like everyone else when they broke out?"

"I… I don't know," I said. I hadn't really thought about it. "Maybe Perla stopped them?"

"You know the group quite well, don't you?"

"Lucas and Perla?" I said. "Yeah, we got out of Atlanta together-"

"No," she said. "I mean one of the others… Mr Dixon? Someone said you two are close?"

I immediately felt uneasy. Deanna was a shark, I still didn't know what her real motives for anything were.

"Yeah," I said, tried to downplay it in case she could use this information to her advantage in some way. Until I knew what her motives were in this, I didn't want to give too much away. "We knew each other a while back. Why?"

"It's just good to know," she said quietly. "That you have an in with these new people. If you were to overhear anything, or if he were to confide in you about-"

"I ain't spying on Daryl," I said loudly. "If that's what you're asking."

"No," she said, but she glanced at the door behind me like she was worried Maggie would have heard that. Changed the subject pretty damn fast. "I'll make sure your other friends have someplace else to stay. Thanks for bringing it to my attention."

"Thank you," I said. "I think it'll help them both settle in."

"Good," she said, with that politician-smile. "I'm hosting a welcome party for them all tomorrow. It would be good to have you there, as a bridge between the newcomers and us."

It was interesting that she included me in the 'us' category.

"Sure," I said. "See you there."

When I left, Maggie gave me a smile that felt more genuine than the one she'd given me on the way in.

Walking back home, I fought the urge to go and see if Daryl was back yet. Keeping my distance was the best thing to do. I didn't want Deanna getting any more ideas about exploiting my 'in' with the new group. I didn't want Rick or any of the others to think I was trying to get between them and Daryl either. And Daryl had been so damn weird today, I didn't want to put him under and more pressure. I'd just have to be patient. Which, after so long apart, was so difficult it hurt.

I tried to distract myself by sitting down on the sofa to read. Eric and Aaron were already there, but before I could even open my book, Eric snapped his shut and leapt out of his seat to sit down next to me.

"Tell me everything," he demanded, more wide-eyed and ready to listen than I had ever seen him.

"Er... what?"

"Leave the girl alone," Aaron said, not bothering to look up from his own book. He'd stopped reading though, I could tell that much.

"You know," Eric said. "About..."

He tilted his head in the direction of the newcomers' houses.

"Oh," I said. "Well, I didn't meet them all, but they seem nice. They've clearly spent a lot of time out there, which I think can only be good for Alex-"

"No," he interrupted me. "Not about that. Last night. The big reunion. How'd it go?"

"Oh," I said, feeling suddenly extremely uncomfortable. "Fine. It was nice to see him again..."

I trailed off.

"And...?" He was looking at me so intently like he was expecting something so much more.

"Ignore him if you like Naomi," Aaron said. "He's just bored."

"Nothing happens around here," Eric said. "It's been the same faces over and over again until Enid. And then you showed up. And now there's a whole new group of people, one of whom just happens to be your long-lost... I'm sorry, what is he to you again?"

"Friend," I said, not sure where he was going with all of this.

"No."

"What do you mean 'no'?" I laughed. "He's a friend."

"That can't be it," he said like I'd just told him the sky was green. "Friend?"

"Yeah," I said. "That's it. Sorry."

"But have you ever…"

"No."

"But do you want to?"

My stomach twisted. A question I hadn't given any thought to until today, only for Daryl to immediately shoot it down. I said, "No," and wondered if the crisis it was causing me was obvious.

"Does he?"

"I-"

"Eric, stop it!" Aaron said. I noticed he hadn't turned the page of his book once since we'd been talking. Eric sat back, rolled his eyes. "They've just met."

"You said they've known each other for-"

"I know," Aaron said. "But he could be different now. She doesn't know how he might have changed out there. Right, Naomi?"

"Well," I said. "I don't think he's-"

"Aha!" Eric leapt up, elated. "You see!"

Aaron sighed and put his book down on the table, giving up on it completely.

"Even if they were married for years before this," Aaron said. "Which, by the way, would be none of your business Eric, they don't know each other now. Namoi said it herself; people are different now."

It was the same point he'd made when we'd found them on the road. I'd never included Daryl in that group of people who might be different now, it felt impossible. Hanging out with him had felt the same. But, Aaron wasn't wrong, there was a lot we didn't know about each other now.

"You're such a buzzkill," Eric sighed and looked back at me. "Do you think he's changed?"

"No."

"All I'm saying is it seems like that group has been through a lot," Aaron said. "Getting used to normal life here is a big deal, and I don't think adding any relationship pressures is a good-"

"Life here ain't normal," I said. Aaron stopped trying to lecture Eric on the risks of prying into people's personal lives before they'd had a chance to settle into the community.

"Well, no, obviously the outbreak still-"

"It ain't that," I interrupted him. "Even with the dead roaming around outside the walls… this place is a hell of a lot nicer than anywhere Daryl and I ever lived. Only place that comes close to it was my last apartment in DC, and I'd just moved in there before all of this. Daryl didn't have any of it. Not even once."

Aaron was nodding in his usual understanding way. I felt myself getting all fired up about the injustices Daryl had faced in his life and it was kind of annoying that he was so empathetic. All of the pressure that had been building in my head all day needed somewhere to go. I could've done with someone to argue with just to make me feel sane again.

"You're saying there's a danger he'll feel like an outsider?" he asked.

"No, not a danger, he already does," I said. "Most of the folks who live here have no idea what life was like for him outside of these walls or before they were even built. He wouldn't have been welcome in a place like this under any other circumstances. He knows that. Sure most people who meet him know that, even if it's subconscious."

"Well…" Eric glanced at Aaron. "We know what that's like."

"'Course you do," I said, my urge to yell at them both was slowly disappearing. "But Daryl doesn't know that. Everyone here's the same privileged asshole to him until they prove themselves otherwise."

"Can you think of anything that will help?" Eric asked.

"I don't know," I said. I'd been asking myself the same thing over and over all day. He'd been fine when it was just him and me, but further isolating him from everyone else wouldn't do him any favours. I didn't want to get between him and his new friends, either.

"Deanna's throwing this big party tomorrow," Eric said. "Maybe you could-"

"No," I said immediately. "He'd hate that."

"Getting him to meet folks might let him warm up to them," Aaron said. "That way, he can see we're not all the same."

"Not in a big group like that," I said, remembering the absolute disaster that him meeting everyone I knew at college in one go had resulted in. "That ain't him. He's better in small groups or one-on-one… plus, imagine if he gets talking to Mrs Neudermeyer first."

"Oh, God," Eric groaned. "That would be a disaster. Two seconds of her talking about a damn pasta maker and I wouldn't blame him for leaving Alexandria immediately."

"Exactly," I said. "And everyone else will know to avoid her, so-"

"He'll definitely get stuck with her," Eric nodded.

"Okay, so not Deanna's party," Aaron said, trying to get us both back on track. He looked at me, "Any other ideas? You know him best."

Eric turned on him, eyes lighting up with triumph, "You said-"

"I mean," he interrupted him quickly. "She knows him better than the rest of us, but that still doesn't mean she should be jumping into bed with him anytime soon."

"Well, she's already done that," Eric pointed out. "They just didn't do anything… right?"

He looked suspiciously at me like I might have hidden a juicy tidbit of information from him in a technicality.

"Right," I said. He looked disappointed. I ignored him and looked at Aaron, "Show him your bikes."

"He into that?"

"Yeah," I said, couldn't help smiling at the thought of Daryl on a bike again. "And if any of 'em break, you'll finally have someone around who can fix them."

He was nodding, like he was taking mental notes to help him pass some kind of exam, "Okay, that's good, what are his other strengths?"

"Other strengths?" I repeated. "This some kind of job interview?"

I thought back to the cold, clinical way that Deanna had talked about Daryl and the rest of the new folks. Something about it echoed with the way Aaron was speaking now. For the first time since he'd brought me here, I looked at him with mistrust. He smiled, I knew it was more to calm me down than anything else.

"Not strictly speaking," he said. "But if he's going to contribute-"

I held up a hand. "Daryl will contribute when he damn well feels like it," I told him. Could feel anger rising in my veins. "And he's a damn sight more useful to this place than the rest of you assholes, so if you think-"

"Woah," he said. "Naomi. Calm down. I'm not saying we'll kick him out if he's not useful. I just think giving him something to do here might help him start to feel more at home."

"Oh," I said, tried to calm myself down. "Alright, then."

"Alright."

For a second, I wished I'd brought that binder I'd made when we were kids. One full of everything Daryl was good at and which jobs would suit him. But it would have been absurd for me to carry that thing around with me through all of this. And, anyway, I didn't need it. No matter what Aaron said or thought, I knew all of Daryl's good traits by heart.

"He's kind," I started. "Like, properly kind, because he cares about people, not because he wants other people to think he's doing the right thing. In fact, he'd kill me if he knew I was saying that about him because he doesn't want people to know how kind he is. I know he seems all stand-offish and hostile, but once he cares about someone... I think he loves harder than any of us."

I stopped. For some reason, this was making me way more emotional than I thought it would. This had been much easier when I'd been writing it down, closing it up in binders and putting it away on a shelf.

"Go on," Aaron encouraged me. I wasn't really focussing on him on Eric, they'd blurred into one. My eyes had misted over, my body was still there, but my mind had gone wherever Daryl was. "What else?"

"He's loyal. Once he's decided someone's worth trusting, he'll fight anyone who threatens that. Even if it's them. Even if they're the one being a dumbass and forgetting who they are. He'd never spill a secret, have your back against anyone, even if you're wrong. When he says he'd take a bullet for someone, it ain't just a phrase. He's the only person in the world who I think really means it."

"Sounds like he's brave, too."

"Yeah," I said. "He is. And smart. He doesn't believe it, but he is. Because he ain't really book smart, although he can be if he puts his mind to it, it's more of a useful kind of smart. He can fix stuff, build stuff. Even if it's real complicated, it never seems that hard to him."

"That's useful."

"Yeah," I said. "I think he'd be happier with something outdoors. He can hunt, too."

"Hunt? Like you?"

"No. Better than me," I said. "Much more patient, much quieter, much better at picking up tracks, too."

"We have enough food not to need someone to hunt full time right now," Aaron said.

"You'll run out," I warned him. "One of these days, and then you'll be wishing you-"

"I'm not saying that as a reason not to keep him here," Aaron said. "I'm just trying to find a reason for him to stick around in the meantime. He sounds great."

"He is."

"Is he a good people-person?"

I hesitated. "If he thinks the people are worth it… yes," I said. "So don't involve him in any of Deanna's political bullshit, he'd hate that. He's a good judge of character, though. I'd trust anyone he does."

"Maybe he'd be a good recruiter?" Aaron suggested. "He can get out of Alexandria for a bit, help people who are still stuck out there while making sure anyone we bring back won't be a threat to us."

I tried to find a flaw with it. Couldn't.

"It's worth a try," I said.

"Great," Aaron smiled. "Now, about the party tomorrow…"

"I really don't think he'll want to go."

"I know," he said. "But we should still make sure he knows he's invited, so he feels included. And if he doesn't want to, maybe you could bring him here for dinner?"

"That would be nice," I said. "If that's okay?"

We both looked at Eric, as the one who did most of the cooking around here.

"Fine by me," he said. "And, speaking of dinner, I should probably get started on tonight's."

"Thanks, Eric."

He stood up, looked back down at me over his shoulder. "You sure you're just friends?"

"Yes."

"Alright," he said like he didn't believe me, which was fair enough given what had just poured out of my mouth without me having to think about it. He walked towards the kitchen to start dinner. Aaron picked his book back up and sat back, looking at me.

"However you feel about him, or may have felt before," Aaron said quietly. "Whatever you do... just, tread carefully, Naomi. Get to know each other as adults."

"I will," I said.

I tried to read again but couldn't take in a word of it. I felt restless and distant all evening, wanting to see Daryl again but knowing keeping my distance was the best thing to do for now. Aaron's concerns echoed in my head too. Everything about being with Daryl felt normal. But it seemed everyone expected the worst. Maybe that felt wrong, but it was smart. I wasn't necessarily the girl he'd known back in Georgia, either.

But I couldn't stop thinking about it. How easy things had been with him. How it felt as if everything in the world was different now except us. His face when Carol implied there was something between us, how quick he'd been to shoot that notion down. It played over and over in my mind until I fell asleep.

That night, I woke up while it was still dark, covered in a cold sweat. The nightmare I'd burst out of melted back into shadows of my room. I put a hand to my chest and could feel my heart racing beneath my ribcage. It shouldn't have been a shock. Bad dreams had followed me since Terminus. I'd have them every night, except… I turned my head to the empty space beside me.

 

Daryl

Slept like shit.

Every time I drifted off, I woke right back up again. Too many people around, maybe. Couldn't get comfortable. Sleep in a real bed for one damn night, and suddenly the floor wasn't good enough for me anymore.

I got up and went to sit on the porch outside. Thought it might help me calm down. Even with our shit all over the place, the house still felt like a showhome you'd see if you flicked through a magazine. Everyone had been real impressed when they'd seen it. It wasn't just the running water or the electricity either, it was all the fancy shit too. Kitchen all decked out and them fancy carpets that you kinda sink down into when you step on them. When I came back from my hunt, they'd all been cooking up food supplies that the community had given us. Didn't know if they'd have any use for my squirrels or whatever now. Didn't know if they'd have any use for me.

They were all going back to who they'd been before all of this. Comfortable. Used to a good life. But what about me? I couldn't exactly go back to how I was before, they'd all kick me out. Places like this weren't built for people like me.

Rick came back up the steps. Felt like I'd stepped back in time, he was all dressed up in uniform. My heart sank. He stopped when he saw me.

"We good?" he asked.

"Yeah," I said. Didn't much like how hostile he'd been but I got why. Leaving them on the first night hadn't been the best move. Probably made them distrust Naomi more, which was the opposite of what I wanted. I wanted her to be part of this family too. Assumed they'd all welcome her in but should've realized it would take more time than that. "You a cop again?"

"I'm trying it on for size," he said. It was such a turn in attitude since he'd yelled at me that morning.

"So we're staying?" Carol asked, coming out from inside the house, having seen Rick and me talking outside. Even she had melted into this person I didn't really recognize. She was all clean shirts and bright smiles and cardigans. It was like the people I'd known had been a disguise they'd all been wearing to get through it and now they could take them off, go back to who they were underneath. But I'd never been more than… this. Didn't have a disguise to take off.

"I think we can start sleeping in our own homes. Settle in," Rick said, then he glanced back at me. "You can go back to Naomi's if you like."

I knew he didn't mean it as an insult and was probably trying to make up for yelling at me before, but it stung like one.

"If we get comfortable here," Carol said. "If we let our guard down. This place is gonna make us weak."

"It's not gonna happen," he said. "We won't get weak. That's not in us anymore. We'll make it work."

"And if they can't make it...?"

"Then we'll take this place," he said. And I felt better. Like I hadn't quite lost everyone yet.

If I sat in just the right place, I could see the lights from Naomi's place. Willed her to come out the door but it stayed shut. I looked up at the windows, saw that the one in her room wasn't on. Maybe she was already asleep. I thought about going over there, knew I'd left things in a real weird place but didn't know how to fix it. Maybe if I just pretended it hadn't happened, she'd forget about it, and things could be normal again.

Sitting there, somewhere I could see Naomi's house while keeping watch on my family inside the house, was the only place I could get any sleep. If anything kicked off at either place, I'd be able to get there and do something.

Woke up when it got too bright, a damn crick in my neck from the way I'd been sleeping. Could hear people inside making breakfast, glanced over at Naomi's house but there was no way of telling if they were up or not yet. The door opened, and Carol walked out.

"Time to punch the clock and make the casserole," she said, straightening out the weird little cardigan she'd managed to find God knows where.

"What?"

"Make dinner for the old people - moms who need a break, people who can't cook," she said. "Get to meet a lot of the neighbors that way."

Why the hell would you wanna do that?

"Alright," I laughed. Her expression changed a little.

"Have you taken a shower yet?" she asked, which was kinda polite because it was damn obvious that I hadn't.

"Mmm-hmmm," I said, in a non-committal way.

"Take a shower," she said. "Change your clothes. We need to keep up appearances, even you."

"Screw that," I said. She rolled her eyes like I was some kid having a tantrum.

"Deanna's hosting a party for us tonight," she said. " A kind of welcome to the neighborhood thing."

"Oh yeah?" My heart sank because I knew where this conversation was going.

"You should come," she said.

"Nah." I shrugged. "I'd rather boil my head in acid."

She sighed again.

"What happened yesterday, Daryl?" she asked. I really wanted her to piss off, had hoped if I just avoided everyone for long enough they'd all just let it go.

"What do you mean?" I asked, trying to play dumb. It didn't work.

"You and Naomi," she said. "You came back here all smiles. Haven't seen you that relaxed. Then you get in a fight with Rick, and suddenly you want nothing to do with her?"

Her read on what had happened sounded way harsher than I thought of it.

"It ain't like that," I said. Wondered if Naomi had thought about it the same way. I'd tried to be so casual about it, make a dumb joke, but my embarrassment had turned it into a bit of snap, and she hadn't been back to see me since. Guess I couldn't really blame her for that.

I hoped Carol would drop it, but she just kept staring at me. Eventually, it was like a light came on her head, and she said, "She has no idea, does she?"

Felt my mouth go dry, pretended not to know what she was on about. "What?"

"How you feel about her. You never told her?" It wasn't really a question, so I didn't really answer.

I just shrugged again, "Don't matter."

"Course it matters," she said. "You've got another chance now. Don't blow it."

She walked away, still looking nothing like herself and more like a weird housewife. When I'd thought about Naomi, and what might happen if we saw each other again, it had all felt real far away. But now she was here it felt too real. Rick had said a lot of shit. Most of it had just pissed me off. But only because it had been kind of true. Things felt right with Naomi. Like always. Like she was the home I'd been trying to get back to my whole life. But she'd been through some shit she wouldn't talk about. She used to tell me everything. So clearly some things had changed.

And all of that aside, what if she was the same but I fucked it up? What if I came on too strong? What if she just didn't feel the same about me as I did about her? I could lose her all over again.

Suddenly, I really didn't want her to come out of her house and see me. I got too nervous. And sick of staring at her house. I had to move. Felt like the walls of Alexandria were closing in on me. I picked up my crossbow and headed out into the woods. Just scaled the fence so I didn't have to talk to anyone about getting out.

I felt better outside. Quieter for a start. There wasn't anyone looking at me. Judging me like I was some thief who'd broken in. I remembered Rick and the others had looked at me like that once. Now they were all going back to who they used to be, I wondered how long it would take for those looks to come back.

I wondered if Naomi would pack up and leave with me if I asked her. But I'd asked her to go with me once before, back when we were kids, and she hadn't wanted that. She'd wanted to wait until she could afford someplace nice. Safe. She had that here. Why would she want to give it up? We'd grown up the same, but Naomi had turned out so different. She'd always been able to talk with these kinds of people about whatever the hell it was that they cared about. I didn't even know where to start. With her brains, her smile, the way she could listen to everyone in a way that made them feel like what they were saying really mattered even though most folks talk nothing but shit… who wouldn't want that around? Maybe she felt just fine here.

Heard something rustling in the bushes for quite a while. Footsteps. Too close to be safe. I waited until they got a little closer, raised my crossbow and yelled, "Get out here. Now!"

For the second time in almost as many days, Aaron stumbled out of the trees with his arms raised. What did this guy get from spying on people? My heart skipped a beat while I wondered if Naomi was about to come out after him, but he was on his own. I lowered my crossbow, glared at him.

"You can tell the difference between Walkers and humans by sound?" he said. I didn't answer. He raised his eyebrows. "Naomi wasn't exaggerating, you are good."

I looked at the ground. Why'd she always have to be so nice about me?

"Reckons that you can tell the difference between a good guy and a bad guy, that true?" he asked.

"Ain't much of a difference no more," I said.

"That how you feel about your people?" he asked. "About Naomi?"

Anger flared up inside me. What damn business of it was his how I felt about Naomi? About anyone I knew?

"Why you following me?" I snapped.

"Didn't know I was. I came out to hunt rabbits," Aaron said, looking innocent enough, although I noticed he hadn't caught no damn rabbits. "I know why you're out here. Mind if I join?"

He couldn't possibly know all of the reasons I was out here. I wondered which one he was talking about, or if any of the ones he thought were right. I turned and started walking.

"Keep up," I told him. "And keep quiet."

Aaron kept up, but he was not good at keeping quiet, which explained the lack of rabbits on him. He did fine until we spotted a horse in a clearing in the woods.

"I've been trying to catch him for months, bring him inside. His name's Buttons," he said. All unnecessary chatter. I looked at him. What the hell kind of name was that? "One of the kids saw him run by the gate a while back. Thought he looked like a Buttons."

It was as good a reason as any to name a horse you didn't know.

"Haven't seen him for a while," he said, pulling some rope out of a backpack he was carrying. "I was afraid it was too late. Every time Eric or I come close, he gets spooked."

If he did this much chatting around the horse, it was no wonder he ran off. I grabbed the rope off him.

"Have you done this before?" he asked.

"My group did," I said. "But they weren't out there that long. The longer they're out there, the more they become what they really are."

I'd thought that people might be the same. Hoped that Rick and the others would stay the kind of people they'd been on the road. But they'd all been tamed for too long. Easily domesticated again.

I walked slowly forward into the clearing, trying to make as little noise as possible, my rope at the ready and my eyes on the horse.

"I ain't gonna hurt ya," I told him when he saw me coming. He started eating some of the grass at his feet, having decided I weren't a threat. I kept moving slowly forwards, rope outstretched. "Alright? Come on, boy. Keep eating. You used to be somebody's, huh? Now you're just yours."

Maybe that was the best way to be now. On your own, so you didn't get weak.

Something spooked him. I was ready to be mad at Aaron, but when the horse whinnied and looked up, he looked right at a group of Walkers. Making their way towards us through the long grass. He bolted. I looked around for Aaron.

"Come on, they're coming!" I yelled at him. He took one of them out with a gun, started firing on the rest. I took a few out with a knife and then looked at him. "C'mon."

I knew if we were quick enough, we could still track the horse.

We walked through the woods for a bit, following the horse's trail weren't so hard. All of the tracks were so fresh, and he'd been running in a panic, leaving deep marks.

"You ride horses?" Aaron asked, forgetting my rule about staying quiet.

"I ride bikes."

"Take it you don't mean ten-speeds," he said. I didn't say anything for a moment. Wondered if he was really out here trying to hunt rabbits and catch horses when he was clearly so bad at both, or if it was me he'd come out here to domesticate.

"Naomi tell you that too?" I asked.

"She mentioned you could fix almost anything, bikes included," he said.

Fuck's sake, Naomi.

"Well, she's known to exaggerate," I said.

"Really?" he said. "I've never found that. Seems like quite a straight-shooter."

I didn't like that. Didn't like that Aaron was talking like he knew her better. Most of all, didn't like that he weren't wrong.

"Maybe just when it comes to me, then," I said.

"Maybe," he said, with a soft laugh like he didn't believe that at all. "I know you're feeling like an outsider. It's not your fault, you know. Eric and I, we're still looked at as outsiders in a lot of ways. We've heard our fair share of well-meaning, but hilariously offensive things from some otherwise really nice men and women. Naomi, too. She's an outsider like the rest of us."

"Seems like she's doing okay," I said, but it was more of a question. He'd probably been observing her the whole time she was here like he was doing to me now, would know better than I did how she was really getting on.

"She's doing better than she was," he said. "But she's still been through a lot. And I don't need to tell you that she didn't grow up like the rest of these people. That's why I wanted her to live with us when she got here. So she'd be with people who understood what it's like to be an outsider."

She seemed so good at pretending to me. How could they tell? Could rich folks just smell the poor on us? If they didn't accept someone like her in a place like this, what hope in hell did someone like me have?

"Someone giving her shit?" I asked. I watched him look at the way my fingers tensed on my crossbow and tried to stop it, so he wouldn't like I was some deranged psycho. But I couldn't help it. That need to protect her was built in like muscle memory.

"No," he said. "My point is, you're not alone in this. People are people. The more afraid they get, the more stupid they get. Fear shrinks the brain. They're scared of you and me for different reasons. They're less scared of me because they know me. It's less and less every day. Same for Naomi. So, let them get to know you. You should go to Deanna's party tonight."

Not this again.

"I got nothing to prove," I said. "I met a lot of bad people out here, doing a lot of bad shit. They weren't afraid of nothing."

"Yeah, they were," he said quietly.

By the time we found the horse again, Walkers were closing in. I took out a few, and Aaron got tripped up by one. I kicked its skull in, took out another. He scrambled to his feet and shot one that was coming up behind me. The horse was overrun. Walkers all around it. Only got there in time to see it taken down. We could still hear it's squeals of pain, saw it thrashing around as they tore into it. While the Walkers were distracted eating it, we took them all out. Aaron put the horse out of its misery with one shot to the head. Looked real cut up about it.

"He always ran," he said, looking at what was left of Buttons, blaming himself for trying to get the horse used to people again instead of letting it be scared of the living as well as the dead, or finding out if it could tell the difference. I turned away from the horse's corpse. Another reminder that if you live alone, you die alone out here. As much as I wanted to just up and leave, you need someone to watch your back.

"You were just trying to help him," I said.

He was finally quiet on the walk back. But it was a sad kind of quiet, not a nice one. I wished he'd talk again, thought about trying to start a conversation or tell him again that it wasn't his fault for trying to help the horse. But I didn't know what to say to him. Or how to say it. We parted ways on our street, I watched him head towards the house he shared with Naomi.

Carol was in the hallway when I got in. She looked surprised to see me.

"You're back?" she said.

"Yup," I shrugged. "Nothing out there, anyway."

She nodded. "Have you... Thought any more about the party?"

I rolled my eyes. "It ain't my thing."

"I know," she said. "But Naomi might be there."

I'd really hoped the subject wouldn't come up. Again."

"I'm sure she will be," I said like I didn't care either way, which of course was a lie.

She sighed. "It wouldn't hurt, you know. Making an effort with these folks."

"Nah, I'm alright," I said.

"She came here and made an effort with all of us," Carol said. "I'm sure she'd appreciate it if you did the same."

"She's only been here three weeks," I said. "Sure these folks ain't her friends."

"Well, it would be a good way to get to know each other again," she said. "Maybe having other people there, being more relaxed will take the pressure off."

"Maybe," I said. I wasn't convinced. Things had felt normal when it was just the two of us, it was my dumbass idea to bring her over here that had made things weird.

"Think about it," she said. I didn't give an answer, either way, just nodded and headed upstairs.

I sat on my own for a bit, heard people around me getting ready and then heading out. When the house was quiet, I walked into one of the bathrooms. I watched the shower run for a while, filling the room up with steam before I stepped into it. It was weird, showering again. I watched dirt circle the drain. Maybe Carol had a point. A shower wasn't such a bad idea.

When I got out, I wrapped myself in a towel and wiped the steam off the mirror. Stared at my own face. Not much I could do about that. Should I shave? Would that help?

There was shaving stuff lying out. I might as well try. It had been a while since I'd done it properly, was used to just trimming off what I had to with my knife. Shaving foam and a real razor was a whole new experience.

The door opened when I was halfway through. I looked over, razor halfway to my face. It was Rick, looking shocked to see me.

"Sorry," he said. "Didn't know you were in here."

"It's okay," I said. "Almost done."

"Take your time, there's another bathroom downstairs," he said and started to turn away, but then it was like he clocked what I was doing. "Are you… are you… coming to the party?"

The amount of surprise in his voice nearly made me say no.

"Thinking about it," I said. "You?"

"Yeah," he said. "Just on my way over now. I can wait for you if you want?"

"Nah, it's okay," I said. "You go ahead, I'll catch you up."

"Alright," he nodded. "There are clean clothes in the wardrobe. Deanna says we're welcome to them. If you… you know, want to change."

"Alright," I said, glancing down at where my clothes lay in a heap on the ground. "See you over there."

He gave me another nod and left. I picked up my vest from the ground. Gave it a sniff. It smelt like dirt and sweat and the outside, which I didn't mind, but I didn't think folks at Deanna's fancy party would appreciate. I went over and opened up one of the wardrobes. Felt lost, staring at a row of someone else's clothes. Tried to find something I even half liked. Pulled out a shirt and a pair of jeans that I didn't hate the look off.

They looked dumb on me though. When I put them on and stared at myself in the mirror, I felt like I was dressed up as someone else. But that's what Carol had done, and it seemed to help her. Maybe that was what she'd meant by 'making and effort'. Still felt like an idiot. A fake. I walked out, knew if I looked at myself too long, I'd end up chickening out.

On the walk over there, I stuck to the shadows. Didn't much want to bump into anyone. Didn't want anyone to see me in case I did decide not to go in.

I stood outside the door for ages, in the shadows just outside where I could get a good view. The lights were on. I could hear music I didn't much like, people laughing and chatting. I tried not to think about how many strangers were in there, the kind of questions they might ask. I already felt like an animal in a damn zoo here.

One of the curtains lifted up and there. I saw a room full of people. Drinks in their hand. I scanned them quickly in case the curtain dropped again. Then I saw her. Laughing at something. She looked so damn pretty. I think she glanced over at the window, but the curtain fell down again before I could be sure.

This was a mistake.

I felt like a dumbass, remembered how stupid I looked in the mirror. Cuffs felt too tight around my wrists. I unbuttoned them, pushed my sleeves up my arms and felt how sweaty my hands were. Felt a little better, but I bet I still looked really stupid.

I was about to run, but then the door opened as someone came out. I looked up. There she was.

"Hey," she smiled, letting the door close quietly behind her. I stopped fidgeting with my damn shirt.

"Hey," I said. My mouth felt dry. I swallowed, waited for my heart rate to return to normal.

"You look nice," she said.

"I feel like a dumbass," I admitted, but something about the way she was smiling at me relaxed me a little.

"It ain't you," she said. "But you're pulling it off."

"Thanks."

She held up a beer bottle.

"Saved you one of these," she said. "You want it?"

"Nah," I said. "I'm okay, thanks. Tryna drink less."

"Okay," she said and set the bottle down outside the door. I wondered if she was gonna make me come in, how I would say no to her. But she walked down the stairs and stood in front of me. "Wanna get out of here?"

I immediately felt this huge pressure lift. Back inside the house, I could hear people laughing. "What about the party?"

"I've done my time," she shrugged. "Said hello to some people. It's kind of lame in there anyway, I'm ready to leave."

"Yeah?" I said. I wondered if she was just saying it to stop me feeling guilty about making her miss the party.

"I only went to see if you'd come," she said and was so embarrassed about it that it had to be the truth. I smiled. I couldn't help it. "Aaron and Eric ain't there either. They're making dinner though, said I could invite you. You wanna come eat?"

It was all I wanted to do.

"Yeah," I said, relief at not having to go into or explain my absence from that stupid party flooded through me. "This ain't really my thing."

She nodded like she knew that. Because she did know that. She knew me better than anyone, knew me well enough to anticipate that I'd be lurking outside for ages trying to talk myself into going in there. We started walking together.

"For the record," she said. "It ain't really my thing either."

"Looked like you was having fun."

"It was okay," she said. "I'd rather just... hang out though."

I didn't know what to say. My chest felt tight.

"You look pretty, by the way," I blurted out. She looked at me, seemed surprised. "Earlier, you said I looked nice, and I didn't say anything back, so… er, you look pretty."

"Thanks," she said, and I think she blushed, but it was dark, so it was hard to tell. She was walking close to me, but I wanted to be closer. She glanced at me again. "You know the way to mine from here?"

"Yeah. Why?"

"Race you," she grinned and started running.

"Hey!" I yelled, taking off after her. "You had a head start, that ain't fair!"

But I wasn't mad about it, and she knew it. Her laugh floated back to me, and my nerves were left on the doorstep of the party I never went into.

Chapter 20: Dinner

Naomi

I slipped my shoes off at the front door. Most days I got home from looking for Mia too tired to do much more than eat, shower, and go to bed. Today was different. I'd still been out searching all day, but I didn't feel so exhausted. I had Daryl with me, and somehow that made me feel like I could move mountains. 

"That you, Naomi?" Eric called from the kitchen as the door shut behind Daryl. I could smell something good.

"Yup," I said, slipping my coat off and hanging it up by the door. They were both unusually quiet, I could feel them listening to every noise I made. I knew why, so I announced, "Daryl's here."

I could feel Daryl's nerves as if they were my own. Like they were radiating out from him and hitting me. I tried to absorb as much of it as I could. Meeting new people had never been something he'd been comfortable with. It takes him so long to warm up to them that a lot of folks just give up, write him off as rude, but that ain't it. He's protecting himself. People have a history of letting him down, and I was determined to change that.

"Ah, good," Aaron poked his head out into the hallway and smiled at Daryl. I was glad he'd shown his face first, it sounded like he'd made a bit of an impact when he'd run into him in the woods. And Eric's endless energy could be a little overwhelming at times. "We were hoping you'd join us."

Daryl smiled back but didn't say anything.

"Did I hear you say Daryl's here?" Eric yelled again from the kitchen.

"Yup," I hollered back, and then I wanted to change the subject so the focus wasn't on Daryl and he wouldn't feel like some weird zoo exhibit. "Smells good, Eric."

"Thanks!"

"I live for the day you two stop yelling through the walls at each other," Aaron said. "Whole conversations that the entire neighborhood is probably in on."

"Why does that matter? Ain't like we're talking about you," I pointed out.

"Is he complaining about us being too loud?" Eric called.

"Yes!" I yelled back.

"Why?" he shouted. "It's not like we're talking about him?"

"I kno-"

"For the love of God," Aaron marched towards me and, with one hand between my shoulder blades, propelled me towards the kitchen. He glanced back at Daryl, "Has she always been like this?"

"Yup," Daryl said, following us towards the dining table. "Only way to shut her up is to stick a book in front of her."

"Hey!" I said indignantly.

"Oh, yeah," Aaron said. "I've learnt that trick."

"Well, snacks work too," he offered as an alternative.

"Noted. Thanks," Aaron said. They shared a smile, and I felt like my heart might burst, even if their joke was at my expense. I wanted Daryl to feel as comfortable in this house as I did. I wanted him to be able to come and hang out here even if I was out someplace else. The thought of coming home to unexpectedly find him here made me stupidly happy. I guess the feeling of having him back in my life still hadn't worn off. Maybe it never would.

"Wine, anyone?" Eric carried two bottles into the room, and I realized how excited he was to be hosting this dinner party. Wine was hard to come by, and here he was using up two of their bottles.

"I'd love some," I said. I got the sense that Aaron and Eric had enjoyed entertaining in their previous life, but hardly ever got to do it here. There were few people in Alexandria that they felt comfortable enough with to invite over.

"Me too," Aaron said. I glanced at Daryl, suddenly worried that I should've said no so that he'd feel like he could turn it down if he wanted to. He'd refused a beer at the party, said he was trying to drink less, but didn't say he wasn't drinking at all. I knew his relationship with alcohol was… complicated, to say the least. I should've pushed him for more detail, but I'd been too caught up in the moment. Too distracted by how nervous he seemed, all cleaned up in a new shirt.

"Sure," he said after a slight pause. "I'll take a glass."

Eric gave him a huge, beaming smile and put both bottles down on the table.

"Dinner is basically ready, can someone give me a hand with the plates?" he said.

"Yeah, I will," I said, following him towards where a stack of plates and a family-sized bowl of pasta was sitting on the counter.

Eric started to dish some out onto the plates, leaving the rest in the bowl for people to help themselves to seconds. He leaned in very close to me and whispered, "He looks a lot cleaner than he did before. And I think that's a new shirt. Do you think that means anything?"

"That he had a shower and found a change of clothes?" I said, as quietly as I possibly could.

"But do you think that means anything?"

"Alright," I said loudly, balancing all four plates in a way that had become second nature to me. "Grub's up."

I carried the plates over, leaving Eric and his annoying ass questions to pick up the bowl with the leftovers. Daryl caught my eye and grinned. I put the first plate down in front of him. "Like being back at the diner."

Eric put the bowl down in the center of the table and opened up one of the bottles of wine.

"You used to work at a diner?" Aaron asked.

"Sure did," I said, setting his plate down in front of him. Then, as I moved on to Eric's place, I put on my best customer service voice and said, "Welcome to Eric's Diner, the special today is spaghetti bolognese, and the house wine is whatever the fuck Olivia had in the pantry."

"Was there a uniform?" Eric asked, filling up wine glasses

"You bet," I said, taking the seat next to Daryl. "This godawful blue dress with one of those dumb aprons, which - by the way - do nothing to keep you clean. Spilt more shit on the dress than anywhere else."

"I bet you looked adorable," Eric said, sitting down opposite me now that everyone had a full glass. He looked at Daryl like he was expecting him to say something.

I was about to change the subject when Daryl shrugged and said, "I liked the blue. Went with your eyes. You got any salt?"

As Aaron passed him the salt, I forgot anything I'd been about to say, just looked at him to see if he was taking the piss or not. He wasn't looking at me, he'd already started tucking into the food in front of him like what he'd said was no big deal. Maybe it wasn't. Maybe I was just letting Eric's dumb teasing get to me. I looked down at my own plate and started eating mine, hoping it would squash down the weird feeling in my stomach.

There were a few minutes where nobody spoke, and then Eric said, "Well..." and I looked up from my plate again to see him staring at us while we ate. "It's easy to see where Naomi gets her terrible table manners."

"Hey, they ain't that bad!" I protested, but then I looked at Daryl, caught him with three pieces of spaghetti hanging out of his mouth and sauce on his chin. When I touched my own face, there was sauce there too.

"You got a lil' sauce beard," Daryl told me through a mouthful of food and laughter.

"You got it too, dipshit," I said.

"Do I?" he wiped his face on the back of his sleeve and then stared at the stain. Clean-shirted Daryl had lasted all of half an hour. "Huh. Well, it's good grub. Thanks."

He glanced up at Eric before he started shovelling food back into his mouth. Eric caught my eye and did his best not to laugh.

"No problem," he said, and finally stopped gawping at us for long enough to start eating his own damn food.

"How was the party?" Aaron asked. Beside me, I was aware that Daryl slowed his eating down to listen to my answer. Probably still wondering if he should feel bad that I'd left with him. At that moment, there were few places on Earth I'd rather be than here.

"Exactly as expected," I said, with a shrug. "Good snacks, mediocre conversation, terrible music."

"You lasted longer than I thought you would," Eric said, with a glance at the one clock in the house that worked. Or, at least, we thought it worked. The time it showed seemed close enough to the level of light outside for all of us to just accept it.

"So, how'd you guys meet?" Daryl asked, waving his fork between the two of them.

"Work," Aaron said. Daryl nodded, and there was another silence.

"That's it?" Eric sighed. "That's all you're going to say? Just 'work'?"

"Well it's true, isn't it?" I could see Aaron trying to hide a smile behind his wine glass as Eric looked outraged. "And you just tell the story so much better."

"So, it was my first day on the job," Eric launched into the full story without any further prompting. "Just started at this tiny little NGO in DC. Hardly any funding, a whole team of us crammed in this one tiny little office space, and right on Day One, I nearly quit. Felt so out of my depth."

"You were late," Aaron reminded him.

Eric rolled his eyes.

"So you say," Eric said. "I don't remember that. All I remember is having no idea what I was doing and looking around and seeing everyone else had their shit together, and I was so panicked."

"You'd missed the morning brief," Aaron said. "So of course everyone else knew what they were doing."

"And this guy comes over to me," Eric said as if Aaron hadn't even spoken. "Cutest guy I'd ever seen in my life, so cute I could hardly listen to what he was saying. But he explained everything, totally saved my life."

"Bit of an exaggeration," Aaron said. "But you were floundering."

"I'd seen him carrying around a chai latte that first day," Eric said. "So to thank him, I brought one in for him the next day. And every Monday after that."

"It made you at least five minutes late every time," Aaron said, shaking his head slightly.

"But what I didn't know," Eric said. "Is that the first day, he'd actually just been holding on to it for one of the Directors, and absolutely hated them himself. Right?"

"Right," Aaron nodded.

"But..." Eric prompted. Aaron rolled his eyes, tried to resist whatever Eric was trying to get him to do.

"...But I drank it anyway," Aaron finished, embarrassed but grinning.

"He drank it anyway," Eric repeated like we might not have heard. "Took him six weeks to break it to me that he didn't like them."

"Think it might actually have been seven," Aaron said.

"Seven weeks to tell me you didn't like chai lattes and only five dates to tell me you loved me," Eric said, a little smug.

"When you know, you know," Aaron said like it was no big deal. But you could tell from the way he looked at Eric and smiled, and the way that Eric looked back at him like he was the single greatest person on earth, that it was a huge deal.

"Enough about us," Eric said, returning his attention to his dinner. "What's the shortest amount of time it's taken you to tell someone you loved them?"

He looked at me, and my mind went blank.

"I..." I could feel everyone at the dinner table looking at me. I took a few sips of wine to stall for time. "I ... don't think I have."

"What?" Eric almost choked on his wine. "Really? Never?"

I could feel my face getting hot, shifted uncomfortably in my chair. "Er, no..." I said. "Don't think so."

"How is that possible?" Eric asked. "Were you some kind of nun in DC?"

"No," I said. "I mean... I dated people. I just wasn't looking for anything long-term. I had Mia to worry about. Didn't want her getting attached to anyone I'd just end up breaking up with. My job was pretty full-on too, so..."

"Okay, so you're a commitment-phobe," he said, and then looked at Daryl. "What about you?"

Daryl shrugged, didn't look at anyone, "Better on my own."

Hearing him say it made me sad. It wasn't entirely unexpected, Daryl had always been a bit of a lone wolf, but did he really think he was better off that way?

Eric shook his head at both of us, "Unbelievable."

"Not everyone is a hopeless romantic like you, Eric," Aaron said. "Some people are fine by themselves."

"I just can't imagine going through this shit without you," Eric told him. "Sounds terrible."

The way he looked at Aaron made my chest ache. Aaron looked back at him, took his hand and gave it a squeeze.

"Ain't it hard?" Daryl asked. "Having to worry about someone else all the time?"

"I know Aaron can handle himself out there," Eric said. Aaron stayed quiet.

"Liar," I said with a grin, happy to finally have something to make him squirm for a change.

"What?" Eric said.

"That's bullshit," I said. "I've been there when you're fretting about him not coming back to the car. Damn near shot me the first time we met and I came out of the woods before him."

"To be fair," he said. "You looked half-dead and fully-disgusting."

"Rude."

"But you're right," he admitted. "I worry about him a little."

Aaron smiled again, but it wasn't as sincere. I knew Aaron worried about Eric a lot. He let go of Eric's hand and said, "More wine, anyone?"

I looked at my glass. It was emptier than I thought. "I'll take some," I said.

Aaron stood up to fill up my glass across the table. Eric held up his glass for more too. Daryl refused, still only halfway through his first.

"Help yourselves to more pasta," Eric reminded us, gesturing to the bowl in the middle of the table. Daryl immediately started heaping more onto his plate. I was impressed that he'd restrained himself for so long, took it to mean he was trying to make a good impression on them both.

"We're always telling Naomi she should start a paper here," Aaron said. It would have been an almost welcome change of subject if it hadn't been about me. "Give us all something decent to read."

"Yeah," I raised an eyebrow at him. "And what am I going to write about? 'Noodle Nightmare: Neudermeyer speaks out about the horrors of 500 days without fresh pasta'."

Eric laughed, "God, don't put her on the front page. That would go right to her head."

"Only you two idiots would read it," I said. "What's the point in printing it when we discuss it all to death over dinner anyway?"

"I'd read it," Daryl said with a shrug. I hadn't been expecting him to say anything at all, he'd been silent for a while.

"There you go," Aaron said triumphantly. "That's three. A growing readership."

I looked at Daryl, couldn't tell if he was taking the piss or not. "You'd read a whole newspaper story about one woman's complaints about being unable to make her own pasta from scratch?"

"If you wrote it, yeah," he said, then he looked back down at his plate, shoved another two forkfuls of pasta in his mouth at once. I could feel Eric staring at me across the table.

"Bullshit," I said.

"Her stuff's damn good. She'd make it good, whatever this pasta-maker shit was," Daryl glanced up at them. "Don't let her convince you otherwise."

I didn't know what to say. I drank some more wine just so I had something to do, but I knew it probably wasn't the best idea. I felt giddy all of a sudden, my head was light. It had been so long since I'd had any alcohol that my tolerance was the lowest it had ever been.

"Have you met Mrs Neudermyer yet?" Eric asked. Daryl shook his head. "Okay, well she's really looking for a pasta maker, and we're all really trying to get her to shut up about it. I mean, we have crates of dried pasta in here, so... if you see one on your travels-"

I cleared my throat. "Em... Eric..."

"You haven't asked him?" he looked between Aaron and me.

"No…" I said. "Not yet."

"Ask me what?" Daryl put his fork down and looked at me.

"Should we…?" Aaron nodded in the direction of the garage door.

"Yes," I stood up, looked at Daryl. "C'mon."

I lead him over to the garage, let him open the door. Aaron had laid all of the bike parts he'd collected out across a few workbenches. The bike itself was under a sheet. Daryl walked in, I watched him take it all, and my stomach turned over with nerves. I wanted so badly for him to like it, for this to interest him enough to keep him here. I hung back by the door, let Aaron step in there with him. I wanted it to be clear that this job offer was coming from him.

"When I got this place, there was that frame and some parts and equipment," Aaron said. "Whoever lived here built them."

"It's a lot of parts for one bike," Daryl said, picking one of them up and turning it over in his hands.

"Whenever I came across any parts out there, I brought them back," Aaron said. "I didn't know what I'd need. I always thought I'd learn how to do it, but from what Naomi says, you already know what do to with it. And the thing is, you're going to need a bike."

"Why?" I watched Daryl's face change. Instant suspicion. Did he think Aaron was going to tell him to get out?

"I told Deanna not to give you a job because I think I have one for you," Aaron said. Daryl said nothing. "I'd like you to be a recruiter for Alexandria. I don't want Eric risking his life anymore."

"You want me risking mine, right?"

"Yeah, because you know what you're doing," Aaron said. "You're good out there. But you don't belong out there. I know it's hard getting used to people getting used to you. And I understand right now you need to be out there sometimes. So do I, but the main reason why I want you to help with recruiting is because you know the difference between a good person and a bad person."

He glanced over at me. "You fill his head with this crap?"

"I may have pointed them in the right direction," I said. "But the recruiting thing was all his idea."

"That true?"

"Yeah," Aaron assured him. "She was too busy trying to argue with me."

"Sounds about right."

He looked away from us, back down at the bike. I could tell he was on the verge of saying yes. I wanted to say something else, but didn't want to push so hard he'd change his mind.

"I got nothing else to do," he said eventually. But he was happy about it, I could tell. Maybe even excited. He looked back at Aaron. "Thanks. I'll get you some rabbits."

"Great," Aaron laughed, probably not realizing that Daryl was dead serious.

I tried to hide my smile, but I couldn't. Watching Daryl examine the bike under the sheet made me want to jump around with joy. He'd had been aimless since he got here like he was just waiting for the first chance to run. I hoped Aaron was right, and giving him a purpose here would help him find a home. Every morning when I woke up, there was a tiny part of me that worried he'd have up and left in the night, having gotten sick of this place.

Aaron glanced up and me and gave me a subtle nod. I grinned back. He walked past me and back into the house, giving me a gentle pat on the shoulder on his way.

"What you grinning at, dummy?" Daryl asked when he was gone. I'd been too busy looking at Aaron to see him look up from the bike.

"Nothing," I said, trying and absolutely failing to wipe the smile from my face. "It's just nice to see you with a bike again."

"Had Merle's for a while," he said. "Lost that, though."

"Oh, shit," I said. That bike must've brought Daryl some comfort after he'd lost Merle. "That -"

I didn't get to finish. Eric pulled the garage door open so suddenly it made me jump. He looked around the place like he was a parent expecting to catch us getting up to something we shouldn't be. When he saw me by the door and Daryl by the bike, he looked a little disappointed.

"I should go," Daryl said. "It's getting late."

I wanted to disagree with him, but a yawn betrayed me. I was full of wine and pasta, the garage was cold, but the rest of the house had been warm. For the first time since I'd got here, and even though today hadn't been the day I'd found Mia, I was happy. It was a heady mix that made me very sleepy.

"You sure?" Eric asked him. "I'm sure we can dig some more wine out of somewhere..."

I shook my head at him and yawned again. The alcohol already doing just enough to make my brain fuzzy.

"Nah, it's okay," Daryl said. "Thanks, though."

"I'll walk you out," I said. Eric sighed and let us both back into the house. Aaron was sitting back at the dining table again.

"Thanks for having me," Daryl said to them both, and then pointed back to the garage door. "And thanks for…"

"Any time," Aaron said.

"Lovely to have you," Eric said. "Come back soon!"

Daryl didn't say anything else, just kind of nodded at them both and we walked to the front door. I tried not to stare too much at him, but I was trying to read his expression. See if we'd done enough. I opened the door, yawned again, "Thanks for coming."

He stepped outside, turning quickly to glance at the house behind me he pulled me out by my elbow.

"Hey," he said quietly, reached over to shut the door behind us. He looked serious. It worried me.

"You okay?" I asked.

"Yeah," he said, but he didn't smile. Out on the front porch, the only light came from the house we'd just left and the stars above it. His eyes were serious, looking at me in a way I wasn't quite used to. "Thank you."

"For what?"

"For what you did tonight," he said. "The job and…"

I started to protest. "Aaron told you that he-"

"Yeah, yeah, I know," he said. "But all that good stuff he saw. That's on you."

"No," I said. "Aaron saw all of it for himself when you were out there together. He told you that. And-"

"Will you close your damn mouth and let me finish for once?" he said. I closed my damn mouth. Out of shock more than anything else. He took a deep breath and looked back at me. "You always believed in me. Even when there was nothing there to believe in, you still saw something. And that made me think that maybe there was... something... good."

I wasn't sure he was done. I hated when he was down on himself, but didn't want to interrupt him again, so I waited until the pause was too much.

"Daryl," I said softly. "I didn't see anything that wasn't there. It's all you."

He shook his head. "I did some bad shit," he said. "With Merle... I wasn't always... after you left, I didn't..."

"I'm sorry," I said because he was struggling and I was sorry for leaving him behind in Georgia.

"Ain't your fault," he said. "Ain't what I'm trying to say either."

"It doesn't matter what you did with Merle," I said. "We've all done bad shit when we had to. God knows I have."

He looked at me like he didn't believe me. I almost cracked. Almost told him about Terminus, about killing José, and that it was nobody's fault but mine that Mia was gone. But I couldn't, I didn't have the strength to unpack all of that tonight. Couldn't deal with Daryl seeing me differently, not yet.

"I'm different now," he said. "Better. Or, at least I'm trying to be. I need you to know that."

"You ain't different," I said. It broke my heart that Daryl thought any part of him needed to change. For a moment, he looked crushed. "Whoever you think you are now... it's who you've always been. Just more people around to see it is all. I know you. Rick, Carol, everyone else you're here with clearly knows you too, else they wouldn't trust you so much. Give yourself some credit, man."

He was frustrated. "If you want me to accept that I had any part in the shit you did, you have to accept that you helped me too."

I sighed, hadn't thought of this working both ways. I knew how frustrating it had been when he wouldn't accept what I'd been trying to say. So I said, "Alright. Okay. I get it. Thanks, dumbass."

He breathed a sigh of relief.

"You happy here?" he asked. "With them?"

"Yeah," I said. "They're good people."

"Yeah, they seem it," he said with a nod. "Good."

He looked reassured like he'd been worrying about something he didn't have to any more. He turned to walk away, and I felt my stomach drop. What if the only reason he was sticking around was to check his friends, were happy here? What if Aaron and I hadn't done enough to make him feel at home here too? What if I woke up tomorrow and he was gone?

"Daryl!" I called for him before I'd even thought about it. He turned. I ran to the bottom of the steps. "If you ain't happy here… if you decide you wanna leave. I'd come with you."

"Really?"

"Yeah. I mean… not right now. This place gives me a good base to look for Mia, but...," I said. "In a little while, I could move on and search other places. I'd leave with you. If you wanted me to..."

I hadn't expected this to leave me feeling so vulnerable. I'd just blindly assumed that if Daryl left, he'd want me tagging along. But maybe he wouldn't. Maybe he really did believe he was better on his own.

"Yeah," he said. There was a light in his eyes now. Could have been from the wine but it felt new. "I get it."

It wasn't enough of a response to calm my fears.

"Just…" I sighed. "Don't leave without saying goodbye."

He looked surprised. "I wouldn't."

"Okay," I nodded. We looked at each other in the moonlight for a second. I felt better, less like he'd melt into the shadows and never come back out of them again. I reached out to hug him. Daryl and I had never been the type of people that hugged each other when we said goodbye. Usually, it had been reserved for if one of us was upset - if his dad had beaten him or my Momma burned me. Maybe it came from years of Merle teasing us about sleeping together, but there was an unspoken rule that we never got too close without good reason. Unless one or both of us had needed a hand to hold in the dark. I didn't have a reason this time, other than it was still so unbelievably good to have him near that I still couldn't fully believe he was real. Or maybe I'd just had too much wine.

He was surprised, but he hugged me back. Something about it felt different too, at least to me. Like he held on a little longer, a little tighter. Like his hands lingered on my hips when we pulled apart. Like the way he looked at me in that moment was different from the way it usually was.

I fought the urge to ask him to stay again, although the question was burning my tongue. Told myself it was because the only night I hadn't had nightmares was when he'd been in my bed. But that wasn't a good reason to take him away from his friends again. I wasn't a child, I should be able to deal with a few bad dreams on my own for fuck's sake. So, I said, "Night, Daryl."

"Night."

I turned and walked back up the porch steps, stopped by the door and watched his silhouette fade in and out of view under the streetlights. Before he went into his house, he turned back to me and waved. I lifted my hand and waved back. When I opened the front door, Eric practically fell over backwards in his attempt to get away from it without me smacking him in the head.

"Were you..." I looked from him to the door and back again. "Were you just standing there with your ear pressed against the damn door?"

"Well," he looked a little sheepish, but not enough. "If you two would just speak louder..."

"Then you wouldn't have to be almost knocked unconscious by someone coming through the door?"

"Yes, exactly."

Eric followed me back to the dining table. I picked up a few of the dirty plates that were still lying out and took them through to the kitchen where Aaron had already started washing up. I added the dirty dishes to the pile beside him and picked up a tea towel and started drying.

"He's nice," Aaron said. "I like him."

"Good. You should," I said. There was a moment of quiet, where I could feel Eric staring at the back of our heads, and when I glanced at Aaron, I could see he was doing his best not to laugh.

"Is that all you have to say?" Eric demanded. "He's nice? Were you not at the same dinner party I just was?"

"What?" Aaron laughed.

"The glances," he said, with an overdramatic demonstration. "The giggling… the blushing. I didn't know you could go that red, Naomi."

"I didn't!" I protested and flicked a tea towel at him. I looked at Aaron to back me up, but he didn't. "Did I?"

"You did a bit," he said gently.

"It's not just that. You light up when he's around," Eric said. "It's like… you're still you. But you're… more you... if that makes sense."

"Not at all," I said. But it was kind of a lie. I kind of knew what he meant. I felt more like myself when Daryl was around. I had a habit of getting self-conscious, of quietly adapting myself to whatever situation I was in. It came from years of trying not to stick out around people of a higher class than me. Like he made me comfortable enough to be myself, no matter what company we were in. I hadn't realized it was so obvious, even to people who hadn't known me that long.

"Will you stop it?" Aaron said, but he was amused.

Eric heaved a loud and overly dramatic sigh, "I wish I could. But this is the most exciting thing that's happened in Alexandria since we got here."

"Eric likes to think of himself as some kind of matchmaker," Aaron said. "But he's only been successful on… I think about three occasions?"

"Yes," Eric said.

"And one of them was the Joe and Hannah Frankish," Aaron reminded him. "Who lasted about two and a half years."

"Oh yeah," Eric sighed. "Six months of marriage and then the most bitter divorce I've ever witnessed… maybe you shouldn't listen to me."

 

Daryl

Most of the shit in the kitchen was meaningless to me, but the knife sharpener was at least useful. I sat at the dumb little breakfast bar and sharpened the knives I carried with me. Months of jamming them into goddamn Walker skulls had made a lot of them kind of blunt. There was a knock on our door. I didn't pay much attention to it until I heard Carol answer. Her surprised voice floated through the hall and into the kitchen.

"Oh, hello, Naomi," she said. My heart leapt into my mouth. "Come in, I'll get Daryl for you."

"Actually, I ain't here to see him," I heard Naomi reply. She sounded nervous, although I doubt anyone but me would've known that. Something was up. I put my knife down. "Are Rick and Michonne around?"

At the sound of his name, Rick stood up, shot me a puzzled glance to see if I knew anything. I shrugged.

"Sure," Carol said. "Come on through."

"In here," Rick called, wiping his hands on a tea towel.

"Hi," she looked nervous when she stepped in but maybe in a way that only I'd have noticed. She walked up to Rick and stuck out her hand like they were in a business meeting. "Thanks for seeing me."

"That's okay," he said, shaking her hand but wildly confused. "Everything alright?"

"Deanna says you and Michonne are our new police officers," Naomi said. "That right?"

"Yeah, that's right."

"And Daryl says you were a real cop… before all of this."

"That's true," he said, although she hadn't necessarily been looking for confirmation.

"My sister's missing," she said. "I know she weren't taken in Alexandria so there's nothing you can do about it. I'm not asking you to take it on as a case or anything. I just… I wondered if you had any advice? For finding her?"

There was so much hope in her voice, she looked at him like he might have all of the answers. I stood up, took an automatic step towards her. If this didn't go well, if he dismissed her, I wanted to be close. Rick's gaze flickered from her to me and back again.

"Sure," he said, and I watched her light up. "Can you walk me through what you've got so far?"

"Yes," she said and pulled a stack of papers out of her bag. Most of them were the maps I'd seen her and Aaron looking over at breakfast that first morning. In true Naomi-style, she'd made detailed lists and notes on every place she'd searched so far, and she'd written down every piece of information she could get from Perla. I'm sure if there'd been spare binder in the whole of Alexandria, she'd have filled it. I listened to her walk Rick through her findings. He occasionally interrupted her to ask a question or check something. She had a look on her face. One she always gets when she's focussed, like the only thing that exists is whatever she's working on. Whole room could catch fire and she wouldn't know.

Rick was calm and kind. It was like getting a glimpse of the old cop-Rick, who might've dealt with families of missing kids, without having to worry about hordes of Walkers. He gave her the best advice he could, told her to search places that it was likely communities would have sprung up. Told her to steak out any she found and get as much information on them as she could before she went in there. Safety first. She nodded along and took notes, but even as she did, so I couldn't imagine her staying that calm if she thought someone had Mia. I'd have to go with her. Stop her from going in, guns blazing, to the first place she found.

"If you find something that looks promising," Rick said. "Come back and tell us. We'll help."

She stared at him. "You serious?"

"Well, I sure will," he said. "Can tell Daryl will too."

"I'm in," Michonne said. "I wasn't a cop before this but… I'll help."

"Thank you," Naomi said. I could tell she was touched. "Thank you so much."

"I lost my little girl," Carol said suddenly. She'd been quiet for so long I'd almost forgotten she was there. It had been a long time since she'd said anything about Sophia. Felt like a lifetime ago that we'd lost her.

Naomi looked over her shoulder at her. "I'm so sorry."

"She would be about the same age as Mia now, I guess," Carol said. "She got scared. Wandered off…"

Naomi put down the piece of paper she'd been making notes on and moved towards Carol. "What was her name?"

"Sophia."

"Pretty name," she said. "I'm so sorry you lost her."

"Thank you," Carol said. "And I'm sorry for your loss too."

The way she said it made it sound like Mia was dead, not just missing.

"Mia's only my little sister," Naomi said. "I'm sure it ain't the same as losing a kid."

"Bullshit," I said. "You raised that girl. Better parent than her own Momma."

"A rock would've been a better parent than our Momma," Naomi said, turning red. She glanced at me, the first time in a while. "But thank you."

There was a short silence. Rick and Carol looked at me like they were expecting me to say something else, but I didn't know what. Naomi looked at the ground. I knew my praise would've embarrassed her, but I couldn't sit around and let her sell herself short.

"Losing a child is always tough," Carol said. "No matter how you're related. Daryl actually did a lot in trying to find my Sophia."

"I'll bet he did," Naomi said. She and Carol shared a smile, and it was my turn to look at the ground. "He was great with Mia when she was younger. Used to babysit her all the time."

"Explains why he's so good with Judith," Rick said.

"Who's Judith?" she asked.

"My daughter," Rick replied. "You wanna meet her?"

"Yeah," Naomi smiled, surprised that Rick was so welcoming compared to the last time he'd been here. "I'd love to."

"Carl," Rick called up the stairs. "Will you bring Judith down here for a sec?"

We all stood and listened to Carl's footsteps on the stairs. He appeared at the bottom, holding Judith in his arms. She looked around at us all with her big blue eyes.

"Hey," Naomi said to both of them. Carl looked at her from under the brim of his daddy's old hat.

"You're Perla's friend?" he said. She nodded.

"You're Carl, right?"

"Yeah, this is Judith," he said, with a nod to his little sister.

"May I?" Naomi asked, reaching out to her. Carl glanced at Rick, who nodded and then held her out for Naomi to take. She balanced her on her hip and smiled down at her like she used to do with Mia. "Hey there, Judith."

"How's Perla?" Carl asked.

"She's on the mend," Naomi said. "I'm sure she'll be up and about in no time."

Judith looked up at her, grabbed a lock of her hair.

"Sorry," Rick said. "She does that."

"It's alright," Naomi laughed. "Mia was the same at her age. Do you remember?"

She looked at me then, so suddenly it made my heart jump. She was still smiling, but her eyes had misted over remembering Mia at that age. I cleared my throat. "Yeah. I remember. She used to take my keys off me. Made it real difficult to go home."

"I might've encouraged that one," Naomi said with a cheeky grin. She peeled her own hair out of Judith's hands and held her out to Rick. "Thanks, Rick, I won't take up any more of your time."

"No problem," he said, taking Judith from her.

She started gathering up the maps and papers she'd brought with her. I moved to help. She looked alarmed, "I have a system. I put-"

"Yeah, I remember your damn system," I said. She relaxed when she saw I wasn't wrong. She'd had the same color coding system since she was nine years old. I could have packed her shit away in my sleep. When it was done, she glanced at Rick and Michonne, "Thank you for your time."

She said it all polite like they were teachers she'd annoyed by sticking around after class to ask too many questions. Rick looked amused.

"No problem," he said, then he stuck his hand out just like she'd done to him on the way in. "Sorry I was so hard on you," he said. "I should've trusted Daryl."

"That's okay," she said, shaking his hand. "I was just glad someone in this group had enough damn sense not to trust any old person stumbling out of the bushes. I'd have tried to shoot me too."

He chuckled, and I looked from one to the other. They weren't so dissimilar; Rick and Naomi. They could both get people to listen when it mattered, they could both see the bigger picture in most situations, they'd both go to the ends of the earth for the people they cared about. I was happy they were getting on. Don't know what I'd have done if they didn't. Before I followed Rick, I followed Merle, but before I followed Merle, I followed her.

On her way out, she stopped where Carol was standing by the kitchen door, her back to the hall. She held out a Tupperware box. "You want to take some with you?"

"You sure?" Naomi asked, but she was already reaching for them. It's hard for her to turn down snacks.

"Of course," Carol said.

"You're... you're the one who burned down Terminus, right?" Naomi said it real quiet, but Carol still looked behind her in case someone else had come into the house without her knowing.

"Yes," she admitted. "But I don't..."

Naomi rushed forward, threw her arms around her. Carol was shocked. Over her shoulder, I caught sight of Naomi's face reflected in one of the hallway mirrors. While she thought nobody could see her, I watched the way she quietly fell apart. Her eyes squeezed shut, her face crumpled with some kind of sadness.

"Thank you," she whispered and then she let go, her face smoothed over again. A smile like nothing had happened. Carol smiled back, and Naomi made her way towards the front door. I went to follow her, but Carol caught my arm.

"Be careful," she said quietly as the door closed behind Naomi. "With her."

I didn't like the way she said it, or anything it implied. I tried not to get mad. "Thought you liked Naomi?"

"I do," she said. "Which is why I don't want either of you getting your hopes up about finding her sister. You remember what happened with Sophia?"

"Of course I do," I said. "But this ain't the same."

"Really?"

"Mia was taken," I said. "Someone's got her."

"Doesn't mean she's still alive," Carol said. "Not knowing… that's the worst part."

"We'll find her," I said.

"You might not," Carol said. "She might be alive, she might be dead. But either way, she might never find out. Don't get her hopes up. Or your own for that matter."

"We'll find her," I repeated. We had to. I'd promised Naomi that we would. When we'd found each other again, nothing had felt impossible. But a part of me felt guilty about it now. I'd been confident we'd find Sophia too. Carol gave me a sympathetic pat on the shoulder. Like I'd already lost.

I picked up my crossbow and headed out to catch up with Naomi.

"Hey!" I called to her. "Wait up."

I heard the door slam behind me. Naomi stopped and turned, waited for me to catch her up. "You alright?"

"Yeah," I said. "Just thought I could come work on the bike. Y'know… so we can head out soon. Tomorrow, maybe?"

"Yeah," she said, with an excited little smile. "Sounds great."

She opened up the garage door for me. I pulled the sheet off the bike, and she cleared a space for herself on one of the workbenches, where she sat cross-legged and watched what I was doing.

"You just going to sit there?" I asked.

"Yeah."

"Ain't you got a book to read or something?"

"I do," she said. "I'll get it out in my own sweet time if I get bored, thank you."

I tried not to think about her watching me, tried not to let it pull my focus away from the bike. But it was difficult.

"So, what was all that about?" I asked, my eyes still on the bike so she wouldn't feel like I was putting too much pressure on her to answer if she didn't want to.

"What was all what about?" she asked. I wondered if she was playing dumb, but I was playing it cool so I couldn't look at her and check. I thought about just telling her I'd seen her reflection in the mirror, but it felt like an intrusion.

So instead, I just said, "With Carol? Thanking her?"

"Oh," she said. A slight pause and then, "Place deserved to burn is all. Glad she did it."

I wanted to push her for more details but didn't know how to ask. So, I worked in silence for a while. It wasn't bad, it was still comfortable.

"Hey, Lucas!" she called. I looked up from the bike to see him walking past the open garage door with Perla. They both waved and crossed the street to join us. I noticed Perla still looked both ways before she crossed, which was funny given there were never any cars around. The garage felt too small when there were four of us in it. I hoped they'd get out soon.

"You feeling better?" Naomi asked, and Perla nodded.

"Just taking her to see if Carl's in," Lucas said.

"He should be," Naomi said. "We were just over there. You guys want a cookie?"

She held out the box Carol had given her. He hesitated, put his hand out to stop Perla from reaching in.

"You didn't make these, did you?" he asked. Naomi laughed. I wondered if it was some kind of private joke.

"No," she said. "Carol made them. They're safe, I promise."

Perla took one. Lucas did too.

"What's wrong with Naomi making them?" I asked. She didn't seem offended but was he making fun of her? He looked warily at me, which given the number of times I'd threatened him, I guess was fair.

"Well," he said with a nervous smile. "Naomi told us about this one time she made a cake and forgot the flour, so it was just eggs and sugar and butter. And I think you even iced it, right?"

He looked at Naomi, who nodded. "Yup. And it was hard to stick the candles in it because it was more liquid than solid."

I knew the cake.

"Weren't it suppose to be like that?" I asked.

"Nope." She grinned from ear to ear.

I looked at Lucas and shrugged. "Still tasted good."

His mouth dropped open a little, "That's the friend you made it for?"

"Yup," she said. "And he comes with a steel stomach, so I wouldn't recommend anyone else eats my baking. Carol, on the other hand… must be some kind of wizard. These are good."

"The cake you made for Mia's was nice," Perla said. She'd been quiet since she got here and now she looked sad.

"It was," Naomi agreed and put an arm around her. "And we'll make another one for when she gets back, right?"

"Yeah," Perla nodded and smiled for the first time since they'd come in.

"You wanna go and see if Carl's around?" Naomi said. Perla nodded and ran out of the garage. When she was out of earshot, she looked back to Lucas, "She doing okay?"

"She's getting there," he said. Naomi nodded and looked thoughtful.

"What about you?" she asked. "How are you doing?"

"Got a job with Deanna," Lucas told her.

"Oh, yeah?" she said. "Good for you. What's she got you doing?"

"I'm part of Alexandria's Long-term Development and Survival Strategy Team," he said. "We're constructing another wall, taking inventory of our supplies and looking at the potential threats from outside the walls. Deanna wants a list of biggest threats and how likely they are."

Sounded like some bullshit for people with no real skills and too much time on their hands.

"And she thought New York's Top Risk Analyst was the man for the job?" Naomi said. I wondered if she was humouring him or if she thought that kind of thing was important. "Very good."

"Yeah," he laughed. "I should go, or I'll be late. Thanks for the cookie."

"No worries," she said. "Good to see you."

"You too," he said. "And… uh, good to see you too, Daryl."

"Uh-huh," I said, glancing up at him as he walked past. The garage felt less confined when it was just the two of us again. I could feel Naomi watching me again, but it was different, her eyes boring into me.

"You should give him a chance," Naomi said eventually.

"Dunno what you mean."

I didn't look at her because I knew she'd be giving me that one eyebrow-raised look that she always gave me when she thought I was talking shit. "He's a nice guy."

"A nice guy who eats people."

"Ate people," she corrected me.

"Would've eaten us," I pointed out.

"I thought he helped you escape?"

"Yeah," I said. "Probably only because Carol was blowing the place to shit."

"Nah," she said. "You brought Perla back, he'd have got you out either way."

She sounded so confident it was hard to argue with her, and there was no way of knowing what would've gone down if things had happened the other way. So I shrugged and said, "If we hadn't had Perla?"

She sighed.

"I know it was awful for you guys at Terminus," she said. "But you were there for a day. Lucas had weeks of it."

"Yeah, weeks of being the one eating people."

"Before that," she said, and I paused what I was doing. Realized that something about this was making her open up more than she thought. "The people who came and took over Terminus when it was a sanctuary… they put him through hell."

"Ain't an excuse."

"They broke all of us," she said. "He was just trying to survive."

"Didn't break you."

"Yeah," she said quietly. "They did."

I looked up at her then. Her eyes were bright with tears. I saw the muscles of her jaw clench like she was swallowing something back and she looked away from me. I put down the spanner I was holding. I wanted to hug her, do something to keep her together, but my hands were all covered in oil. "Naomi…"

I looked around for something to wipe my hands on.

"It's fine," she said and shook her head to snap herself out of it. "Sorry, I shouldn't have said anything."

"Nah fuck that," I said. "You can talk about this stuff… y'know… if you need to."

She looked at me like she was considering it, but then she sighed and said, "Just try not to be so hard on Lucas, okay?"

"Fine," I said and looked back at the bike. I wanted to push her to talk, but didn't want to wind up pushing her away.

She was quiet again for a little bit and then she said, "Want a cookie?"

"Can't," I said, and held up my oil covered hands.

"When's that ever stopped you?" she said. And then she threw it up high and towards me. I got at once what she was doing and leapt up to catch it in my mouth. A piece of it broke off when my jaw snapped shut, but I got the rest of it. She cheered.

"Thanks," I said when I'd swallowed down enough of it to be able to talk.

"Good to know you can still do that," she said. I grinned at her, felt the crumbs all around my mouth. She laughed, and it was good to see her smile again.

Work on the bike took about another hour. Naomi made herself a coffee and started reading. It felt like old times. Not needing to talk, but still enjoying being around each other. Silence was never so comfortable with anyone else. When I tried the bike for the first time and heard it start. Naomi started whooping like she might if she cared enough about sports to have had a favorite team. I lined it up with the garage door.

"You wanna take it for a test drive?" I asked. She looked surprised.

"Getting a little late, ain't it?" she said, but she'd already hopped down from the workbench.

"Maybe," I shrugged. "We ain't gotta go far. No harm in a quick ride."

"Alright," she said. "Can I drive?"

"No."

"Why?"

"Because you'll crash."

"Bullshit," she said. I climbed on the front real fast so she couldn't beat me to it.

"Just get on the back, will ya?"

"Fine. Next time, though."

"We'll see," I said.

"We'll see? Wouldn't even have this damn bike if it weren't for me!" she grumbled, climbing on behind me. "We'll see…"

I ignored her. Heard her sigh and waited for her to hold on. We hadn't done this kind of thing in a good long while. I waited for it to feel exactly the same, but she hesitated for a moment and then put her hands on my shoulders when she used to put them around my middle. She sat further back on the bike than she used to like she was scared to let herself get too close. I didn't say anything. Just started the bike.

We drove down to the gates and waited for them to be opened up for us. Once we'd cleared the parked cars outside it was just us and the open road. It felt good to leave Alexandria behind for a bit. Although she was still sitting behind me in a way that wasn't normal like I was a stranger she didn't want to get too close to, it was still good to have her on the back of my bike again. Alexandria still felt so busy, closed in. Being able to ride with nothing on the road and empty forest around us felt was freeing.

Naomi tapped my left shoulder twice, a signal we'd used long ago for when she wanted to say something but the bike was too loud. I slowed a little. "You alright?"

"Yeah," she yelled over the sound of the engine, the roar of the wind. "Set some traps near here. Wanna check them for rabbits?"

I nodded. I owed Aaron some rabbit, and it would be good to pay him back sooner rather than later. She directed me to where she wanted to go. We got off the bike and hid it in the woods, out of sight of the roads and covered in a few large branches, so nobody would stumble across it and steal it.

"This way," she said and led me deeper into the woods. "I haven't checked them in a while, so if I have got anything, it might not be so fresh."

Her first trap had caught nothing. There was a rabbit in the second. It was so well-hidden that she had to point it out to me. Captured and killed the rabbit without it suffering too much. I was impressed, as always.

"These are good, even by your usual standards," I said.

"Thanks," she said. "You get that one, there's another one over here."

I crouched down to untangle the dead rabbit, heard her walk off into another part of the forest. The wind picked up. I got the dead rabbit by its ears and caught the smell of death. But it weren't from the rabbit. It was much older, much stronger than that.

Walkers.

Then I heard them. Their slow walk through the undergrowth, the snarling they make when they think food is nearby.

"Naomi," I yelled, looking around for her. Why'd I let her get so far away! "Look out!"

There were three of them. Way too close to her. She was on her feet. A knife flashed in her hand as she took one of them out, she still clutched a dead rabbit in the other. I scrambled with my crossbow. I remember yelling her name just before the second Walker fell. She glanced back at me, her eyes wide. She kicked the last Walker away to buy herself some time and then drew her gun. What the hell was she doing? A gunshot in the woods was a huge risk.

She turned, and for a second it looked like she pointed her gun right at me. The shot came so close, I felt it ringing in my ear. Walker blood sprayed all over me and then I felt a cold body slam against mine, knocking me to the ground. I didn't see it coming.

Where the hell did that come from?

I pushed it off me. A second gunshot took out the Walker she'd kicked away and then Naomi was by my side, leading over me. "You okay?"

"Yeah," I said, feeling a little dazed.

"What the hell? I could've shot you!" she grabbed my shoulders. "Didn't you hear it? It was so close!"

I wiped some of the Walker-blood off the side of my face and shook my head. She was looking at me like she couldn't believe I'd missed something so obvious. I couldn't blame her. It had almost got me, and I hadn't even known it was there. My heart was racing. It was the most vulnerable I'd felt in a long time. Her hand reached out, I think to wipe some brains out of my hair, but I batted her away.

"I got this," I snapped, scrambling to my feet and pulling as many chunks of dead Walker off me as I could. I was angry now that the shock was fading. Didn't know why. Knew it was probably masking something else but I couldn't work out what and there was too much anger now for me to stop it. "We need to go. That damn gunshot is going to bring more of them out."

She wasn't listening to me. She stood up, took a few steps forward.

"Did you see that?" she said, staring off at something in the trees. Not looking at her surroundings. Not checking that it was safe. I felt my anger rise again and checked the rest of the trees around us for more Walkers.

"Nah," I said. "What was it?"

"Guy on a horse," she turned to me, all wide-eyes and pointing. "Over there."

"Didn't see him," I said, glancing quickly up in the direction she was looking. "We should go."

"Yeah," she agreed and started walking deeper into the forest, towards whatever she thought she'd seen. "We'll need to be quick if we're going to catch him."

"No."

"Hey!" she yelled as I grabbed her by the arm. "What the hell?"

"Shut up," I said, started marching us both back towards the bike. "You'll bring more Walkers out."

"But he might lead us to whoever took Mia!" she said.

"Whoever took Mia had a car," I said. "Not horses."

"Don't mean they ain't got both!" she said. "Come on."

"No," I said. "You heard what Rick says, we ain't supposed to just go up to them. We gotta keep watch on their community for a while."

"And how are we supposed to know where his community is if we don't follow him?" she asked.

"Ain't nobody there now," I said, looking back at the empty spaces between the trees.

"So?" she looked at me, confused and a little betrayed. "He was right there!"

"Move."

"Daryl, let go!" she tried to tug her arm away from me.

"No. We're going home."

"You're hurting me."

Shit.

I let go. She stopped, rubbed the part of her arm I'd been gripping on to.

"Sorry," I said, feeling damn awful. I didn't realize how hard I'd been holding on.

"It's okay," she said. She turned back around, to where she'd seen that guy. Or, at least, thought she had. "Look, I wanna go check that out. Before he's gone."

"No," I said. "It'll be dark soon. We should get going."

I started walking the rest of the way back to the bike, I could see it now. So close. Tucked away out of sight of the road. I heard her sigh behind me, and then run to catch up. "Daryl, wait! Even if he ain't got Mia, he might need help. You're supposed to be recruiting for Alexandria now!"

I got it now; why Aaron didn't want Eric out here.

"I didn't see the guy," I said. "You did. If he's got a horse, he's doing just fine."

"Daryl-"

I dragged the bike out of the bush. "Get on the bike."

"Daryl!"

"Get on the damn bike," I climbed on myself. "Or I'm going without you."

I was bluffing, of course, the only reason I wanted to get out of the damn woods was so I could get her back behind the safety of Alexandria's walls. But she didn't know that.

"But I saw him!" she pointed in the general direction. "Daryl, he was right over there-"

"He's gone now," I said. "And we ain't gonna catch him on foot. Get. On."

She glared at me. I could see her weighing up her options; get on the bike with me or run into the woods alone to chase a man who was travelling on horseback. Even if she started running now, she'd be hard pushed to catch him on foot. And that was if she knew where he was headed, but she didn't. She'd have to track him too. I saw her lose the fight with herself, her glare deepening before she climbed on the back. Didn't say a word. Just held onto the back of the bike instead of me, which didn't feel as safe but I didn't want to pick another damn fight. I sped away from the place. Riding usually made me feel better, especially now the roads were clear of other assholes, but not this time.

I couldn't get the image of that Walker out of my brain. It played itself over and over, felt like it was getting closer to her each time. I stopped the bike, cut the engine. She still didn't say anything, but I felt her sit up a little straighter, wondered if she was still glaring at the back of my neck. Felt like she was.

"Sorry," I said. "Just don't want you getting hurt."

I heard her sigh. Tried not to get mad about it because I knew how unreasonable this would seem to her.

"I've been doing fine on my own, Daryl," she said. I knew she was annoyed, thinking that I thought she was weak or something. "I can handle myself out there."

"I know," I said, staring at the empty road ahead of us. The wind in the trees on either side sounded like whispers reminding me that Naomi didn't need me. Had never really needed me. She'd never needed someone to follow, not like me. She'd never been scared to be on her own. "I know you can. I just…"

...love you.

I couldn't say it. Not now. Not like this. But the thought took me over, and I couldn't think about anything else.

"It's okay," she said eventually after I'd sat in silence like an idiot for what felt like hours. "I get it."

"You do?"

I doubted it.

"Yeah," she said. "When that Walker got close to you, and you were too busy yelling at me to notice… I almost lost it too. Do you know how I'd feel if you got killed because you were too busy worrying about me for no damn reason?"

I hadn't thought of it like that, but I could imagine the feeling. The pain. The rage. "Yeah."

"Don't know why you were being such a dumbass," she said. "But this is the world we live in now. I won't always be there to save your ass, but I trust you enough to save your own when I ain't."

"I know," I grumbled. "I trust you, too."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah. I just… freaked out."

"It'll take more than one lousy Walker to get rid of me," she said. I felt her arms wrap around my waist, knew everything was okay again. I smiled, even though she couldn't see me.

"True," I said. "Took me years to shake you off, and here you are again."

I felt her laugh more than I heard it, the feel of it shaking her body against my back. I put one hand over where hers were joined across my stomach and gave them a squeeze. Her chin rested on my shoulder, her skin smooth and warm against the side of my face. I looked down at her hand. Then I saw it. A crescent-moon shaped scar on the back of her hand.

I knew it was my fault, it was in the exact spot that shard of glass had lodged itself in.

It made me feel sick. I looked away from it, down at the road.

"You good?" she asked quietly.

"Yeah," I said, but my heart was heavy.

"Then let's get home, dumbass," she said. "It'll be dark soon."

I started up the bike again. Naomi's arms were still joined around me, and it felt more normal. More like it used to. I sped back to Alexandria, stopped outside her house.

She slid off the back of the bike and stood beside me.

"You coming in?" she asked. "Cook up these rabbits?"

I kept thinking about that scar on her hand. That Walker that had been too close to her. It all made me want to say no. To turn away from her and shut off everything I was feeling. But I'd told her I was trying to be better now. What good was telling her about it if I didn't actually do it?

"Yeah," I said. "That sounds nice."

The way she smiled made me realize she'd fully expected me to say no but was happy I didn't.

The house was empty when we got in. Eric and Aaron must've been out someplace else. We headed to the kitchen, and I watched her skin the first rabbit. She hadn't lost her touch.

"Still surprised you didn't become a surgeon or something," I said, as she made a neat little cut down its stomach.

"I keep telling you," she said. "Pulling all of the guts out at once ain't what surgeons do. Although, maybe I should've. Would have been a damn sight more useful now."

"You're doing great," I told her. "Look at this."

I held up a handful of guts she'd scooped out. She smiled. Now that we were back in the safety of Alexandria, I started to feel dumb for freaking out and bad for not letting her investigate. If she found the community that guy was from and it turned out they did have Mia, I'd find it hard to forgive myself. Wondered if she'd blame me too.

"We'll find Mia soon," I said, forgetting all about Carol's dumb warning. "I know it. If you wanna go back there and find that guy on the horse sometime, we can."

"Thanks," she said. She moved on to work on the second rabbit.

I knew I couldn't be able to stop her from going out there. The thought of her doing it alone because she didn't want me freaking out again was terrifying. But could I deal with seeing her in danger? I wished she was more like Eric, happy to stay here in this house while I went out. But that weren't her style. In so many ways, she'd made me stronger. Showed me that opening up to people weren't always bad. Encouraged parts of me that might've stayed dead and buried otherwise. Made me want to be smarter, just to keep up with her. But loving her also made me weak. I hadn't seen it like that before, but I couldn't deny it now.

My thoughts were interrupted by the sound of the front door closing and someone else coming into the kitchen.

"What in the holy hell is this?" Eric asked. I knew he'd be focused on the blood everywhere. That was always everyone's first concern.

We turned around to look at him. Naomi held up the half-skinned rabbit by its legs, hands covered in blood and a smear of it across her cheeks.

"Dinner," she said with a grin.

Chapter 21: Supply Runs and Food Trucks

Naomi

Glenn handed me a gun from the back of the truck. The look he gave me was kind of cold. He was still sizing me up, seeing if I was any different to the Alexandrians who saw these runs as a bit of fun. I hadn't shown any interest in supply runs before, I guess he was wondering why I'd opted into this one. Power cuts in Alexandria meant fuck all to me, so his suspicions were reasonable. But I had a few plans to find Mia that demanded supplies, and to get them, I needed an in with the group who went on supply runs. That used to mean Aiden and Nicholas, two absolute bozos that I generally avoided, but now it meant Glenn.

"That's it there?" Tara asked, running her eye over the building in front of us.

"That's the warehouse," Aiden nodded. He pointed at the side door. "I think that door's the fastest way in and out."

"We should know all the exits first," Glenn said. "So there's a plan if things go south."

"Already got one," Nicholas said, with a smirk like Glenn was being dumb. "We go out front."

"And if the front door's swarming with Walkers?" I asked him. "What then, dumbass?"

"Noah, heads up," Tara said, drawing his attention to a nearby Walker before Nicholas could say anything.

"Got it," Noah said, taking it out with a single shot.

"Glenn's right," Aiden said. "We should do a perimeter check. Know our exits just in case."

We split up, and took a walk around the outside of the building, taking out a few lone Walkers who were circling it. There were surprisingly few for such a big place. A chain-link fence blocked our way to the front door. Beyond it, in what had once been the car park in front of the store, was a whole horde of Walkers.

"Shit," Nicholas muttered.

"Ain't you glad we checked?" I said. He glowered at the group of the dead in front of us, then looked at me like he wished I was one of them but said nothing.

"Alright," Aiden said, trying to calm us down. "Now we know what's here, let's get in through the back, and leave through the back."

We gathered around the door behind Glenn. The sun was beating down so hard outside that it made it difficult to see into the dark of the warehouse. He put an arm out to stop Aiden from charging in there, looked back at us all with a finger to his lips. Then he banged the metal door with the end of his gun. We waited. Listened.

No Walkers came stumbling towards the sound.

That made me more nervous than if there had been loads. This door had been left slightly open, and the stockroom was massive. Why wasn't there at least one?

Glenn made some more noise, and we kept waiting in case they came out from right at the back of the warehouse. Still nothing. Glenn gave us all a nod, and we started slowly moving in.

It was dark and windowless. It took a while for my eyes to get used to the dark after the blaring sun from outside. Up high, way above us, was the kind of hanging fluorescent lights that give you a headache if you have to stand in them for too long. They were off now, of course, would probably never come back on again, but they made me think of the Walmart warehouse Daryl used to stock shelves in. I wished he was here. I always felt safest when he was near.

My torchlight swept rows of heavy boxes and chased away shadows big enough to hide Walkers. Still, there were none. And then we heard something rattle in the dark.

It was metal, not like the rattling breaths of the dead.

"Shh," Glenn said, and we came to a stop. Listened hard for wherever the noise was coming from. It didn't seem to be getting closer. But it was definitely accompanied by faint snarls. There were Walkers in here. Somewhere. Why weren't they trying to get to us? "They're stuck behind something."

"How do you know?" Aiden asked.

"I don't, but they aren't here," Glenn pointed out. "Alright, let's go."

We made our way cautiously towards the sound, all of our torches pointed ahead of us. Another chain-link fence portioned off a part of the warehouse. As we illuminated it, dead hands pushed against it, and unseeing eyes gleamed, drawn towards our lights.

"There could be more," Glenn said, his eyes moving to the dark shelves and the spaces below them, where anything could be crawling.

"Let's get to work," Aiden said.

"You're up," Tara shone her light on Eugene, who looked like he was about to shit himself. He nodded. His face as pale in the dark as those of the dead. We spread out to cover them as they moved through the shelves to get to whatever he needed to fix the generator. I stood with my back to them, sweeping the space in front of me for any signs of danger. Nearby, the cage kept rattling. I thought about how rusty it was, and wondered how long it was built to last, how much pressure it could withstand.

"Got it!" I heard Eugene say.

I barely had time to marvel at how easy this had been before I heard gunshots. I turned and saw the flash of gunfire between the shelves. Peering through, I saw Aiden backing away from a Walker dressed head to toe in protective army gear. It would be almost impossible to get a headshot while it had that helmet on. If I could sneak up behind it somehow and get the helmet off, maybe Aiden stood a chance.

I started to move, quietly as I could, to the other end of the warehouse.

"It's got armor, let it come closer," I heard Glenn say through the gap in the shelves he was standing behind.

"I got it," Aiden said, trying to sound calm. I heard him keep shooting.

I heard Glenn say, "Aiden, stop! Stop!"

I couldn't work out why, still moving towards the Walker, it was blocked from my view by the shelves in front of me. And then there was an explosion that I felt but didn't hear. I was thrown backward, slammed into one of the shelves, and then the ground. Things fell around me. I covered my head with my arms and squeezed my eyes tightly shut. A high-pitched ringing in my ears made me feel queasy. It felt like the room would never stop shaking. I could hear shelves toppling around me, boxes crashing to the floor.

And then silence as the ringing in my ears faded.

I took a breath. Dust and debris in the air around me made me choke. I sat up. Looked around.

"Everyone alright?" I called. I could hear Glenn calling for people too.

"Help!" I heard Eugene say. "Over here."

I got to my feet. My legs were shaking from the shock of it all. My torch had gone off. I shook it a few times, and it came back on. I saw Aiden. Impaled on something sharp. He wasn't moving. I looked away, searched for Eugene as the dust settled over the carnage.

He pointed to where Tara was lying, unconscious and trapped behind some fallen shelves. I tried to get a good look at her, but she was too far away.

"Is she breathing?" Glenn asked. The explosion had blown the cage open too, and now the Walkers who'd been trapped there had broken free. We'd need to get her out of here. Fast.

"I can't tell from here," Eugene said.

"They're getting closer," Nicholas warned as the snarling from the Walkers got louder.

"Get to that office," Glenn told Eugene. "I'll get Tara."

Eugene nodded and started running towards the warehouse office. I climbed over a fallen box to join Glenn. He looked at me, annoyed, like his order to Eugene had been meant for me too.

"I can help," I told him. "It looks like Tara's hit her head. We need to check that before we can move her."

"Alright," he said. We climbed over the rubble in front of her, slipping through the gap in one of the shelves. Its contents had now spilled out over Tara's body.

"You shift those," I told him, nodding to the boxes on her legs. "I'll see to this head wound."

It looked bad. There was blood soaking into her hair and spreading out on the ground. I moved her as gently as I could. Took her pulse, checked her breathing.

"Is she okay?" Glenn asked.

"She's alive," I said, taking off the hoodie I was wearing and tying it around her head in an effort to stop the bleeding. "But we need to get her to Pete as soon as possible."

"Alright," he said. "You ready to lift?"

"Yeah," I said. "If you can grab her feet, I'll make sure her head's okay."

He nodded and took hold of Tara's ankles as I slipped my arms under her shoulders, trying to keep her head as still as possible. We pulled her through the gap in the shelves and over the rubble. It was probably a small mercy that she was unconscious for it.

Noah opened the office door for us as we ran in and laid her out on the table. Glenn went back to block the door from any incoming Walkers as I readjusted the sweater I'd tied around her head.

"She's had serious head trauma," Eugene said, watching what I was doing. "She's losing blood fast."

"How do we stop it?" Noah asked.

"Med kit was in Aiden's pack," Nicholas said. "It got blown to hell."

"There's another one in the van," Glenn said.

"She's on her way out," Eugene said. "We need to-."

Before he could finish, he was interrupted by someone screaming for help. There was a split second where I thought someone else had broken into this damn warehouse, and then I realized with horror that it was Aiden.

"Oh, Jesus," Nicholas gasped. We all turned to look through the office window at Aiden was struggling to free himself from where he was impaled.

"He's alive?" Glenn said.

"I checked him," Nicholas said, visibly shaken. "I thought… I…"

"We've got to get him," Noah said.

"It's going to take all of us," Glenn said, with a desperate look towards Tara.

"We got that kind of time?" Noah asked.

"We pull Aiden off there, we could kill him," Nicholas said. I looked out of the window at Aiden. Nicholas wasn't wrong. The spikes of metal sticking through him could be the only things stopping the blood. If we pulled him off, he could bleed out in a matter of minutes. But if we left him there, he'd get eaten alive by the Walkers. I shuddered. I couldn't think of a worse way to go.

"So, you're saying we leave him?" Noah asked.

"Go," Eugene told us. "Save him. I know she would. I'll stay with her, I'll keep her safe, I assure you."

I was a risk. Eugene didn't do well under pressure. But there was a look in his eye that seemed to convince Glenn, at least.

"You still have that flare?" Glenn asked Nicholas.

"Yeah."

"You fire the flare over the shelves," Glenn said. "That'll draw some of them over. We're going to hit the rest hand-to-hand. You ready?"

We all gave him a nod. I raised my knife.

"One, two, three," Glenn bust the door open again. Nicholas fired a flare gun through the shelves and towards the back of the warehouse, away from Aiden. The Walkers by the door turned and started moving slowly towards the red light. When they were far enough away, we ran out.

Glenn and Nicholas reached Aiden first. Noah and I stood with our backs to them and eyes on the Walkers swarming around the dying light of the flare, shooting any that turned towards us. I could hear Aiden begging them for help, and Glenn calmly talking him through it, asking him not to scream. But he did. I don't think he could help it. I was surprised the pain wasn't enough to make him pass out. I glanced back at them.

"Flare's out," I told them. "We gotta move."

And then I saw Nicholas make a break for it, start running to the exit.

"Nicholas!" Glenn yelled after him.

I looked at Noah. "Can you hold them off?"

"I'll do what I can," he promised, shotgun raised. I ran to help Glenn.

"It's gonna be alright, Aiden," I told him. "Just stay quiet. On the count of three."

I could hear Noah firing shots in the background. Glenn looked at me. "One. Two. Three."

Aiden screamed out, his face twisted in pain, as we pulled him towards us. I watched more blood soaking through his clothes and knew he wouldn't last long even if we did manage to get him off. We needed something to cut through the spikes to free him until he could get real medical help. And the time to do it. Noah tapped each of us.

"We gotta go."

The sound of Walkers was loud behind us. A tsunami of them rushing forwards. Aiden looked at us, "No…, please… no."

Glenn and I looked at each other. There was no way out of this.

A dead hand touched my back, and I ran. Glenn just behind me. I could hear Aiden scream as the first one bit into him. I turned back as I ran and raised my pistol. I fired a single shot into Aiden's head and watched him go slack. It felt like the least I could do was make sure he didn't have to live through it.

Walkers close behind us, we burst out into the front of the shop. There were more of them in there too. I could see Nicholas's retreating back, and anger spurred me on.

"Hey! Slow down, you fucking coward!" I yelled. He reached the revolving door, tried to slip in without me, but I stopped it with my foot, and jumped into the compartment behind him. "What the hell was that? He was your friend, and he needed you-"

"Shut up!" he said. "You'll draw more of them."

I looked around. My anger had blinded me to the situation. Walkers from the front of the store were pressed up against the glass in front of us. The ones that had followed us out of the stock room were pressed up against the glass behind.

"Shit," I looked for Glenn and Noah, saw them trapped in the opposite compartment.

"Maybe we can shoot our way past them," Nicholas said. He looked at me, "How's that gun?"

I checked it. "I'm out of bullets. Used the last one on Aiden."

"You guys still have guns," he looked at Glenn and Noah. "We've gotta do something, man. We're gonna die in here."

"There has to be another way," Noah kept repeating, checking every damn glass wall around us. "There has to be another way."

In the distance, I heard the sound of an engine. And the godawful music that Nicholas and Aiden had made us listen to on the way over here. Eugene was yelling something. He'd made it out of the office and was using the van to draw Walkers away from us. I wanted to whoop and holler and cheer for him but stayed quiet as I knew that would defeat the purpose.

Now we just had to worry about the Walkers behind us. We couldn't turn the door anymore because releasing one compartment to the outside would leave the other one vulnerable to Walkers.

"I need you both to keep the door steady," Glenn called to us. "I'm gonna break the glass. When we get out, you push out. Alright?

"Alright," Nicholas said. I could see his hands shaking as we tried to keep our door steady. The Walkers on the other side tried hard to get to us. I heard Glenn bash the glass with the butt of Noah's rifle. It shook the whole frame of the revolving door. A dead hand almost slipped through to grab us.

"No! No! Stop!" Nicholas said, springing away from it and leaving me to hold it myself. I jammed the dead hand in the door, sliced it off at the wrist with my knife, and managed to keep the whole thing steady. "It's not safe! It's not going to break."

"It will," Noah said. "We can hold it."

"Trust me, alright…" Glenn said, his panicked eyes looked at me for help. I nodded, tried to swallow down my own fear. "Count of three. One. Two. Three."

I heard another thud as Glenn hit the glass again. And then I felt the door push against me, turning to let us out. I looked over my shoulder at where Nicholas was fighting against what I was doing, trying to push his way out.

"What the hell are you doing?" I asked him.

When he looked back at me, his eyes were wide, manic. "We can get out of here. Both of us. Help me."

"You are such a goddamn asshole," I said, I grabbed the back of his shirt and pulled him away. He swung round, his fist hitting the side of my face so hard it knocked my head into the glass behind me.

"Let go!" he yelled.

I hit him back. He wasn't the kind of guy who was used to getting hit. It stunned him enough for me to get him on the ground. I pinned him there. Punched him in the face so hard I felt his teeth graze my knuckles.

"Naomi!" Glenn yelled. "The door!"

I reached up to steady it as Nicholas tried to pick himself up. I kicked him.

"Bitch!" he grabbed my foot and pulled. I forced myself to keep my hands on the door even as I fell. My body slammed into the ground, my chin smashed against the bottom of the door with such force it knocked my head back. I tried to kick Nicholas again. It was a small space, there wasn't anywhere to hide.

I heard a smash as Glenn broke through the glass. I climbed to my knees. Nicholas was already pushing to open the door again. I let go, let him open it enough to run to safety, and then got to my feet. My knees were bleeding from where I'd hit the ground, and I could feel a cut on my chin that was bleeding too. By the time I stood up, Nicholas was already running towards the van. Glenn and Noah were waiting for me on the other side.

"Come on," Glenn said urgently. "We have to move!"

I slipped through the gap in the door.

"Are you okay?" Noah asked. I nodded, and we ran for the van. Eugene slowed to let us all jump in and then sped away.

At a safe distance, he stopped, turned the music off.

"Great work, Eugene," I told him. I could practically feel the adrenaline that had built up in his system sweating back out of his pores. "How's Tara?"

"Still breathing," he said. "Can't confirm anything other than that."

She was lying in the back of the van. I climbed over the seat to get to her. "Pass me the medical kit?"

Glenn handed it over and then hopped out of the van to run around to the front and drive, while Eugene climbed into the back with the rest of us. I opened it up, took a look at what we had to hand. "You ain't squeamish, are you?" I asked.

"Unfortunately, I am," he replied. "But… maybe I could..."

"I can do it," Noah said, which was ideal because there was no way in hell I was asking Nicholas, who was sniveling in a corner by himself somewhere. "I was at a hospital for a while before we got here. What do you need?"

"I need you to hold her head still, soak up as much of the blood as you can with these," I passed him a bunch of cotton bandages. "I'm going to try and stitch up what I can. It won't be good, but it might buy us some time until we can get her to Pete. Glenn, I need you to drive as smooth as you can, okay?"

"Okay," Glenn yelled from the front seat. "I'll do my best."

There were a needle and thread in there. Not medical, but thrown in for emergency stitching. A last resort, which is what we were down to. I threaded it. The car bounced on the roads, and it took me a few attempts.

"Ready?" I looked up at Noah, he was propping up Tara's head on his lap. He nodded. I untied my hoodie from around her head. Noah and I cleaned up as much of the blood as we could to find the wound. When it was as clean as I could get it in the back of a moving, dirty old van, I stuck the needle through one side of the wound and stitched it closed. I covered it with a fresh bandage, and Noah helped me wrap her head in gauze to keep it in place. I looked up at them all. "It's the best I can do for now."

"Anything in there for me?" Nicholas asked. I looked at him, was glad to see his face was bloody and bruising. I threw him the kit.

"Look for yourself."

The journey back felt long, but I think it was just because we were all aware of what little time we had to get Tara to safety. When we got to the gates, I told Glenn to drive straight to Pete's medical station. Eugene and Noah carried Tara inside.

"I guess I should go tell Deanna," Glenn said, glumly, jumping down from the driver's seat. "About her son."

"I'll come with you," I offered.

"No, it's okay," he assured me. "You've helped enough. Let me deal with this."

"Alright," I said. "If you're sure."

"Thanks for your help today."

"Thanks for yours," I said. He gave me a small smile before we parted.

When I was finally alone, exhaustion hit me. My body ached. My grazed knees hurt to bend, and my chin felt stiff with dried blood. I draped my bloodied hoodie over one arm and noticed the dried mud and blood on my knuckles too.

I pushed open the door to my house and thought I heard Daryl's voice. It was enough to make me forget for a second what a crappy day I'd had. I stopped. Aaron laughed, and it was hard to tell if i I had heard Daryl, or if it had just been wishful thinking.

"Hello?" I called, heard the chatter from the living room die down. Three people called back to me. One of them was definitely Daryl.

"That you, Daryl?" I called, could feel a huge smile on my face even though it made the cut on my chin, and a bruise forming on my cheek hurt more.

"Yeah."

"Didn't expect you to be here."

"Aaron and I just got back..." he said. "I wasn't waiting like a creep or anything..."

"No, it's okay," I said, rounding the corner to stand in the doorway and greet them all properly. "I love that you're here."

He was sitting down on the sofa, a half-drunk mug of something in front of him. Sure didn't look like he'd just got here. Daryl smiled, but I immediately regretted saying it due to a barely-suppressed squeal from Eric. Then they saw the state I was in, and the smile disappeared from Daryl's face. He stood up.

"You're bleeding," he said, his eyes all wide and scared like the earth was crumbling away from him. I looked down at myself. It was quite a lot of blood.

"Most of it ain't mine," I assured him.

"You run into some trouble out there?" Aaron asked.

"Yeah," I said. I took a breath. I didn't know how to break it to them. "We lost Aiden."

"Shit," Eric sat up straight. "As in…"

"He's dead."

"Does Deanna know?" Aaron asked.

"Glenn's over there telling her now."

"What happened?"

I told them about the Walker with the grenade we hadn't seen until it was too late, and how it had let even more of them out of where they'd been trapped. I left out the part about Nicholas being a coward, now didn't feel like the time.

"Tara got hurt in the explosion," I said. "She's with Pete now. Most of this blood is hers."

I put my sweater down, mostly to reassure Daryl that it really wasn't my blood. He was still looking at me like I could break at any second.

"And the rest of it?" he asked.

"I told you," I said. "There were a lot of Walkers, we had to fight our way out."

"They fight you back?" Aaron said, not buying my story either. "That's quite a bruise you got there, and that cut on your chin…"

"I fell," I said, which wasn't strictly a lie. I just didn't mention that it was Nicholas pulling my leg out from under me that had caused me to fall. Daryl looked down at my hands. Saw the marks on my knuckles. I saw how quickly his worry dissolved into anger. This was exactly what I'd been trying to avoid.

"Who did this to you, Naomi?" he asked.

"Nobody."

"Bullshit."

"What do you mean?" Aaron asked.

"Her knuckles," Daryl said. He reached out and took my hands, gently straightening out my fingers. They ached, but he was surprisingly gentle. I studied his face as he looked down at them. His concern for me stirred a quiet pain in my chest. "She's been fighting. Who was it?"

"It's dealt with," I said. "Don't worry about it."

"Naomi…" Aaron said. "Did you guys run into other people out there?"

It was a little naïve of Aaron to assume I'd been fighting with someone outside of these walls.

"No," I said, glancing at him. Caught the look on his face. More than his usual worry. "Why? Did you guys spot someone?"

"No," Aaron said. "We found a... fire. Some people burned beyond recognition. And these… Walkers. Someone had carved the letter W into their foreheads."

"What the fuck?" I stared at him, hoping he was messing with me. But that wasn't really Aaron's style.

"Yeah," he said. "It was bad. You were both right, there are some bad people out there. And I don't like how close they are to this place."

I felt myself shudder.

"I don't want you going out there again," Daryl said.

"Excuse me?"

"Not until Aaron and I know who these creeps are."

"And why can't I help with that?" I said, snatching my hands back from him. "Why have I just got to sit on my ass and do nothing?"

He didn't have an answer for me, looked away in an attempt to hide the anger in his eyes.

"So," Aaron said, trying to steer us into safer waters. "It wasn't anyone like that you were fighting. Was it someone from here?"

I looked at him, gave him a nod I knew Daryl wouldn't see and then said, "It doesn't matter who it was. It's dealt with now."

Eric said, "Deanna should know-"

"I'm sure she already does," I said. I was willing to bet Nicholas had gone running to her with some bullshit before the van's engine had even turned off.

"Who was it?" Daryl asked again.

"Don't matter," I said.

"Yes, it does. Tell me."

"No."

"I'll find out anyway."

"Fine," I shrugged. "But not from me. You think I want to be the one that gets you booted out of here for fighting some asshole who don't matter?"

"He hurt you," Daryl said through gritted teeth. "It matters."

"Well, I think I hurt him more, so we're good. Drop it," I said. Looked him in the eye. "Please."

He looked at me like he wanted to argue more. I held his gaze. Watched him lose that fight with himself. "Fine."

"You want some coffee, Naomi?" Aaron asked. "Eric's just made a pot."

"No," I said. "I'm fine. I should get myself cleaned up, and then I'm going to head over to Deanna's. Need her to know this weren't Glenn's fault."

I headed off to the bathroom and took a good look at myself. A few bruises were forming on my face, and the cut on my chin looked shit before I cleaned it up. I got why Daryl had been so concerned. But I knew he'd beat Nicholas's ass into the ground if I told him what happened, and Deanna would see that as a reason to remove him from Alexandria.

Rick was already on a warning after he'd been caught fighting Pete. Add to that Aiden's death while he was on a run with Glenn, and I was willing to bet the whole group was on thin ice. Deanna and some of the others might see them as having been out in the new world for too long to live here and be civilized, rather than seeing the group for what they really were; Alexandria's only hope if things got bad here. I couldn't add Daryl fighting Nicholas to Deanna's growing list of reasons not to trust them.

I looked down at my hands under the running water. Saw the blood circling the drain. I heard the front door close as Daryl left and flexed my fingers, remembering how gentle he'd been when he'd held them. That look in his eyes. He was the only person in the world who looked at me like that, who made me feel like I was protected. I just wished that he knew he didn't have to look, so that he'd start looking put for himself too. I couldn't let his group be kicked out of here, I couldn't watch him walk away again and I certainly wouldn't let anyone take him from me. Even if the whole of Alexandria turned on them, they'd all have to get through me first.

 

Daryl

"They haven't left yet," Carol told me, setting a box of food down on the kitchen counter. "Shouldn't you be getting ready to go yourself?"

"Huh?" I said. I was already too tightly wound to tell whether or not she was trying to wind me up even more. I stood by the window. "How do you know? Glenn left ages ago."

"He's still getting weapons from the armory," she said. "Tobin saw him."

I had no idea who Tobin was, and I wasn't about to start caring now. "Just Glenn?"

"He didn't specify," she sighed. "Y'know, I'm sure Glenn would be happy for you to go along on runs too. If you wanted to."

"Nah."

I moved the curtains, checked to see if there was anyone outside Naomi's house, while Carol muttered something under her breath about how I could've been out there doing something more productive than pacing around the house all day. I knew it must be annoying, but there wasn't much I could do about it. Naomi had been going on more and more runs lately. And every day that she did, a tight feeling sat in my chest all day until I knew she was home safe. The only thing that made it slightly better for a second was checking the window. I hoped that going back out there with Aaron today and trying to recruit some people would make it easier. At least it would give me something to do that wasn't just sitting around worrying about all the things that could go wrong on a supply run.

"They're not due to leave for a little while," Carol said. "I'm sure most of them are still at home."

"Uh-huh," I said, letting the curtain fall back into position. "Well, I'm supposed to be heading out with Aaron soon, so I should probably go over there and check if he's ready."

"Sure," Carol said like she didn't really believe that was the reason I was going over there. "Tell Naomi I say hi."

I didn't say anything else, just shut the door and walked fast. I wondered if I'd bump into her on her way out to meet the others or if she was already gone.

It was Aaron who answered the door.

"Oh, hey! You're early," he said. "I'm almost ready to go. Why don't you come in for a sec?"

I nodded and stepped into the house. Naomi's boots were by the door, which made me think she was still here.

"Hey," I'd been thinking about her so intensely that her voice made me jump. I looked up at where she was sitting at the top of the stairs. The tightness in my chest relaxed properly for the first time since I'd woken up. I wished she'd listen to me about not going out there.

"You going on that run today?" I asked, although I already knew she was. Glenn had told me. But I still hoped she might've changed her mind, taken some time to think about what I'd said over the last few days.

"Yup," she said, giving me that look she gives me when she's trying to warn me against fighting her on something. I held back. It wasn't like I wanted to fight with her, I just thought she was wrong. The bruise on her face from that asshole Nicholas was a few days old now and starting to heal. It was less purple and more yellow around the edges. Nicholas was lucky that I had no idea who the fuck he was. Maybe if I asked Glenn, he'd point the bastard out.

"Wanna come up here a sec?" she said. I glanced at Aaron, who nodded.

"You've got time," he said. "I still need to pack some stuff into the car."

"These runs are so much better since Glenn's taken over," she said, standing up as I walked up the stairs to join her. "He's really taken charge, which is exactly what those idiots needed. He's smart. I like him."

Something sharp twisted in my gut.

"He's married to Maggie," I said without thinking.

"Yeah, I know," she shot me a puzzled look. "What's that got to do with anything?"

"Just letting you know. In case you meant you... y'know... liked him," I said.

She rolled her eyes. "I'm sorry, are we twelve years old again?"

We stood in her room. I noticed she'd somehow managed to fit even more books in there since I'd last been in. "Have you been going out there to get more books, or are these ones having babies?"

"Most of these are from Alexandria," she said, and I was glad she wasn't going out there and risking her life for some damn books. "But, I do want to show you my haul."

"Have you been… keeping stuff from these runs?"

I knew Alexandria's policy was that everything was to be inventoried and shared. It wasn't like her not to share things, and she didn't look even a little bit guilty about it. I wondered if this was something Glenn new about, or if she'd been sneaky. The thought of ratting her out made me feel sick, so I only entertained it for a second, resigning myself to being banished from Alexandria with her if she was discovered, and that's what it came to.

"Yeah," she said. And then she caught the look on my face. "It ain't much. And if it gets to the point that people need it, I'll give it right back."

"Okay," I said. She pulled a tin of something out of her bag. I squinted at it. "Is that mac and cheese in a can?"

"Yeah," she grinned and waved it under my nose.

"Fancy sharing?" I asked.

"No," she said. She didn't say it like she was joking, and it really threw me. I couldn't think of a single other time she'd not shared food with me. Then she said, "It ain't for me. It's for Mia."

There was a long second where I thought she'd lost it, that grief had finally driven her mad. Then I worried she'd found Mia dead on that run and become one of those people who couldn't let the dead go. I didn't know what to do, or how to tell her that Walkers didn't eat tinned mac and cheese. She caught my panic, rolled her eyes.

"For when she comes back," she clarified. "I've been picking up some things. Things she might like. Favorites of hers... if I can find them. I'm keeping them here to give her when she gets back."

Of course. Naomi had always been a magpie for shit that she thought other people would like. She knelt down and pulled a box out from under her bed. It rattled. There were a few books in there. Some food. Something knitted. And on top of it all, that picture of the three of us. The tiny, little, baby Mia I'd known and underneath it all of her favorite things I had no idea about. I picked it up.

"So she likes mac and cheese, huh?"

"Yeah," Naomi said. "It was her favorite food in DC. I'm sure she'd prefer it if it weren't canned, but I'll take what I can get."

The Mia in the photograph would've been too young to ask for mac and cheese. I could remember holding her when she was that young. When she'd felt too small to be real, and I'd spent the whole time worrying that she'd break. When she'd grown enough to recognize me when I came into the room and demand that I pick her up even though she was getting heavier and it hurt my arms. For all Naomi said about her remembering me, I wondered if she'd recognize me now. Or if I'd recognize her. I used to know the baby food she liked best, the right face to pull that would make her laugh even if she'd just been screaming the place down. I'd have no idea how to make her laugh, or how to look after her now.

Naomi looked at me, and I knew at once she got what I was feeling. Always did. Like I was one of her damn books. While I could slip under the radar of most other folks by shutting my mouth, it was so much harder to hide my thoughts from her. She set the box down on her bed and sat down next to it.

"This was her favorite book when she was little," she said, holding up a battered copy of some book about a cat tricking six different families into giving it six different dinners. "She's way too old for it now, but I found it in Alexandria and thought she might get a kick out of seeing it again."

"It any good?" I asked.

"She made me read it to her so many times before she'd go to sleep. I honestly don't know if it's good anymore," she said. "I got so sick of the damn thing."

I thought of them both, tucked up and reading someplace far away from wherever I'd been at the time. I wished I'd been there. I should have been there. If I hadn't been busing being such a goddamn asshole, maybe I would've been. So much wasted time.

"I saw these gloves," she said, picking up and smoothing them out across her knees. "She had a hole in her last ones, and I think they got left behind at... I think she lost them. Plus, she likes this kind of yellow."

"What's this one?" I asked, picking up a book with no title.

"Ah," she said. "This is my best find yet."

I opened the cover and flicked through.

"It's blank."

"Yeah," she said. "It's for her to draw in."

"She like that?"

"Yeah," I said. "She's good at it, too."

"Huh," I said, and felt a weird sense of pride at thinking about that little girl growing up to have talents and hobbies. "Ain't that something."

"Sure is," Naomi said. Then she looked away from me, down at her feet.

"You okay?" I asked. She nodded, but this had taken an emotional toll on her. I thought about Carol's warning, the way she'd unraveled when we'd found Sophia in that barn. I didn't want that to happen to Naomi. "Sorry, I didn't mean to..."

"No, it's fine," she said, and she managed a smile. "It's nice. Talking about her. Makes her feel less... gone."

I nodded.

She packed the box away again. Aaron called for me from downstairs.

"I should go," I said, standing up. She nodded.

"Good luck out there," she said. "Hope you find someone."

"Thanks," I said. "Good luck on your run."

I headed down the stairs to meet Aaron, put my crossbow, and a few other weapons in the back of his car, and got on my bike. I rode up to the gates, Aaron following in the car behind. It was good to be free of the walls of Alexandria, but I couldn't stop thinking about Naomi back there with her little Mia-box. Was she losing it? Was Carol right? Was I letting her hope too much that Mia was still alive?

I don't know if I did it consciously or not, but I wound up riding to the spot where Naomi thought she saw that guy on a horse. I stopped there. Heard Aaron's car stop behind me.

I got off my bike and opened the passenger door to get my crossbow out, but something made me stop. That tight feeling in my chest that wouldn't go away pushed me down in the passenger seat. It was what had brought me here, to this spot. Because I thought if I checked it out for her, she might stay in Alexandria. Where she was safe. Aaron hesitated, his hand on the car door handle, clearly not sure why I'd taken a moment to sit down.

"How do you do it, man?" I asked him.

"Do what?"

"You and Eric... how does that work?"

"I... eh..." he looked alarmed. "You're going to have to be more specific, Daryl. What are you asking me?"

"You don't want him out here because he'll be in danger, right?"

"Right."

"But you can't keep him safe all the time."

"I know."

"So how do you do it? How do you... deal with that?"

Aaron thought for a moment.

"I'm lucky," he said. "Eric likes being in Alexandria. He's never been the most outdoorsy guy. Most days, I don't have to think about it."

"Right," I said. This hadn't been as helpful as I'd hoped. I wished I had some Walkers to fight just to channel that horrible feeling in my chest into something useful.

"I don't know what I'd do if he wasn't like that," Aaron said, after a pause. He talked a lot. But at least, unlike most people, he took the time to think about what he was saying. It wasn't just mindless crap. "Y'know... if he was more... Going on runs all the time. Or disappearing outside of the walls by himself. I'm sure I'd find that hard."

I nodded.

"And I'm sure if the day ever came that we had to be out here," he said, after another pause. "If Alexandria fell… I might be wishing I hadn't sheltered him so much. I might be wishing he'd been one of those people going out on runs, and surviving by themselves."

"Yeah," I said. "I guess."

It was a good point. At least I knew, if anything ever happened that separated us again, she knew how to take out a few Walkers and how to get her own supplies. There was another long silence.

"She's tough," Aaron said. "She'll be okay."

"What?" I tried to play dumb, but he'd caught me out, and we both knew it.

"Naomi," he said gently. "She was out there for weeks on her own before I found her. I followed her for a while, to see if she was someone I should bring back here. She knew."

"Knew what?"

"That she was being followed," he said. "She knows the difference between the living and the dead just by listening. She's like you."

"Huh," I said, not sure I trusted his opinion on it.

"You disagree?"

"She's better than me," I said.

"Funny. She'd say the same about you," Aaron smiled. I didn't know what to say to that. So I didn't say anything. Just stared at the road ahead of us. I knew she could handle herself. I just hated the thought of it. Aaron let me sit in silence for a while, then he said, "Did she tell you about when I found her?"

"No."

"So I'd been watching her for a while, and one day when I was following her, she suddenly picks up the pace," he said. "Running. Much faster than I thought she'd be able to given that she hadn't eaten anything but half a dead squirrel the whole time I'd been watching her."

"Why only half?"

"She gave the other half to a stray cat."

"Idiot," I said, but my heart almost burst. If there was a stray of any kind around to give half her food to, she always did.

"Anyway, she disappeared," he said. "I was right behind her, and then she was gone. So I kept going, trying to catch up with her, and the next thing I know, the ground I'm standing on just… isn't there anymore. And I'm in this pit. Naomi's standing over me with a gun pointed at my head, asking why the hell I've been following her."

I smiled. "Don't feel bad about that, man. Her traps are something else."

"Thanks," he smiled. "But my point is… Naomi? She knows what she's doing out here. And I get that it's hard. But you gotta trust her."

"I do…" I sighed. "I just…"

I hate it.

"I know," he said, and I think he meant it. "You know… Eric and I were friends for a while... before we dated."

"Oh yeah?"

"Yeah," he said. "He always skips that part of the story when he tells it. But it took us a while to go from coffee-colleagues to friends to… real dates."

"Didn't that make things… I dunno… weird?"

"A little. At first," he admitted. "It's not the same as going on a date with someone you don't really know. You both know what you're jumping into, but… I think the weirdest part was just before. When I didn't know how he felt. Or how I felt half the time. I was so worried about losing that friendship."

"How'd you get past that?" I asked.

"When I realized that everything I felt for him wasn't going away, I just… plucked up the courage and asked him to dinner," he said. "Once we actually started dating, it was the least weird thing in the world."

"Really?"

"Yeah. It just felt… right. Like it's what we should have been doing the whole time," he said. "On the first date, I knew he was right for me. I just... didn't tell him until the fifth because I didn't want to come off as too intense."

I nodded. I understood that problem all too well.

"So why'd we stop here?" Aaron asked, looking around.

"Somebody came through here a while ago," I told him, I opened up the car door again and stepped out. "Naomi said she saw a guy on a horse, and I weren't sure if it was true or if she were just…"

I stopped. Didn't want to accuse her of imagining things in her desperation to find anything that would lead to Mia.

"You think it was true?"

"Yeah."

"If we see them, we hang back," he said. "Set up the mike. Watch and listen. I need to know you agree to this because Naomi wasn't great at it."

"Fine. For how long?"

"Until we know. We have to know."

We walked for a while, in the general direction that she said she'd seen that guy in. It had been a few days now, and any horse's tracks were gone, but someone had been through here. Recently too.

I tracked them to a clearing. Spotted something red in the distance. Aaron peered through some binoculars at it. "It's a guy," he said. "You did it, Daryl."

He passed me the binoculars, and I took a look for myself. Sure enough, there was a man in a red poncho rubbing his face in the middle of the clearing. I felt weirdly proud. This was the first time we'd found someone out here, and it was my tracking that got us here. I wondered what Naomi would say about it when we told her or if we'd get to introduce her to the guy.

"What's he doing?" Aaron asked.

"Wild leeks," I told him. "Son of a bitch knows about how to keep mosquitos off of him. Come on."

The guy had started moving off. We followed him as best we could, but we had to keep our distance, and that meant moving slow. Son of a bitch was fast. We lost him. We kept searching the forest for a while, but eventually, we went back to our vehicles. Aaron got in the car, I got on my bike, and we drove around looking for him. No sign of him anywhere. After a while, Aaron honked the car horn and got me to pull over.

I got off the bike and walked towards him. We'd stopped outside a big warehouse. Ads for different kinds of food on the side. I saw the temptation in Aaron's eyes.

"We should find that guy," I reminded him.

"We checked the forest, we checked the roads," Aaron said. "We can't find him. Sometimes they slip away. It happens. But… you don't come across something like this every day."

"We do this now, it means we're giving up," I said. We'd definitely lose the guy in the poncho if we wasted time on this.

"Home is 50 miles back," Aaron said, and I found it weird he called it 'Home' and not 'Alexandria.' "It'll be dark soon. It's almost time to go. There's bad people out here."

"That's why we ought to keep looking for the good ones," I said.

"We need more people, and we'll find them," Aaron said. "But when we do, we'll need to feed them."

I kind of knew there wasn't any arguing with him on this. People in Alexandria were used to their fancy canned shit and dried pasta. But even I had to admit it wouldn't hurt to have more supplies for winter came around, and it was harder to hunt.

"Alright," I said. Tapped the metal fence with my knife to bring forward the Walkers who were wandering in the front yard. There weren't too many, and we managed to get them all through the gaps in the fence. When they'd been taken out, we got the gate open and walked toward where a line of food transit vans were parked up.

"Hey, listen," Aaron said. "I don't like giving up either, but the guy is in a red poncho. You can see him from a mile away. We've gone a lot of miles here, no sign of him. But… if we come away with a trailer full of cans, I'd say that's a good trip."

It was a good point. I nodded.

"Here we go," I said, and bent down to open one.

I knew from the smell that something wasn't right. It was more than just off food. It was corpses. All of them still moving and coming for us, the second the door slid open. I sprang back. Whatever we'd just done had opened the doors of all the other trucks too. More Walkers spilled out of them.

We took out as many as we could, fighting our way under one of the food trucks. It's a bit harder for them to get you down there. A Walker crawled towards us, a W carved into her forehead. Was this a trap by the same assholes who'd burned all of those people? Before I could point it out to Aaron, he'd yelled for me to follow him out from under the truck.

There was a car parked not too far away. We ran to it, managed to get in before Walkers swarmed around us. Unsurprisingly, it wouldn't start.

"Glass will hold for a while, right?" Aaron said

"Maybe," I said. "Maybe we can make it so they can't see us. In a couple of hours, something'll come by, and they'll follow it out. There's got to be something in here we can use to block the view. We could cut up the seats?"

I got my knife out and was about to get to work, but then I looked back at Aaron and saw he was holding up a piece of paper with a hastily scrawled note. It said: 'Bad people coming, don't stay.'

This was definitely a trap.

Walkers pressed themselves against the windows. The car shook. I thought about opening the window and taking them out one by one, but opening it even a crack would weaken it. And there were so many of them out there, it could definitely break under that pressure before I'd killed enough to make a difference.

"Came out here to not feel all closed up back there Even now… this still feels more like me than back in them houses," I said, looking at the Walkers outside the car. Pressed up against the window. I still felt freer here than in the damn house. "That's pretty messed up, huh?"

"You were trying," Aaron said.

"I had to."

"No, you didn't," Aaron said. "But I'm sure your group appreciates it."

"Maybe," I shrugged.

"Well, I know Naomi does."

I was trying not to think about her, now that there was a chance we wouldn't get out of this car.

"She said she'd leave with me," I said. He looked at me. "If I weren't happy in Alexandria."

"Well," Aaron said after a pause. "We'd miss you both."

"Dunno if she meant it," I said.

"Why wouldn't she?"

"She deserves them houses," I said. "And she knows how to be around those kinda people. I..."

"Just because you think she deserves those houses doesn't mean she wants them," Aaron said.

"What?"

"She's pretty messed up too, man," Aaron said.

"No, she ain't." I was angry he'd even suggest it.

"She has these… nightmares," Aaron said. "She doesn't know it, but we hear her at night sometimes. It's like… everything she's been through, she's reliving it again. And she used to go out every day looking for Mia. Sometimes with me, sometimes on her own. She'd be reckless about it too like she didn't care if she lived or not."

That tightness was back again. I tried to settle my breathing.

"What?"

"And then she found you again," he said. "And something changed… I know you worry about her on all these runs she's doing, but she's with a group, there's a point to them, she's being a lot safer than she was."

"I want her to be safe," I said. "Alexandria's safe."

"All I know is, she didn't start treating Alexandria like a home until you got here," he said. "So I don't doubt she'd leave if you wanted to. But, for the sake of the town, I hope neither of you do."

I looked at him. I appreciated him saying all of that, I really did. Appreciated him taking in Naomi, too. He was a good guy. Alexandria needed him. Eric needed him. And here I was, moping around, pining after someone who didn't even know I loved them.

He had Eric to go home to. What did I have? Naomi felt like mine. But she wasn't.

"I'll go," I told him. "I'll lead them out, you make a break for the fence."

"No, no, no. This was my fault."

"It wasn't a question," I said. "And this ain't your decision. It ain't nobody's fault. Just…"

"No," he said. "We fight. We go for the fence, we do it together. Alright? Whether we make it or not, we do it together. We have to. I'm not going back there and telling Naomi I left without you. Not sure I'd survive that experience. Okay?"

I thought about him telling her I was dead. How she might take it. The ways she might fall apart. Maybe part of protecting her included surviving. I nodded. He put his hand on the door. I did the same.

"Alright, you ready? We'll go on three. One, two…"

Before he could get to three, there was a loud squelch. Walker blood hit the window. I wondered what the hell had caused it. Didn't seem like a gun. A bullet would have broken the glass. More of them started to fall.

I wondered if this was part of the trap. If this was the 'bad people' who were coming.

Either way, this was our only chance to get out.

Aaron and I opened the doors. I had my knife ready, managed to clear myself a path out. When I looked over, Aaron was out too. A guy I'd never seen before, wielding a long wooden pole, was smashing in Walker heads around the car. The three of us fought our way back to the gate and managed to get it closed.

"That was," Aaron said, catching his breath. "That… thank you. I'm Aaron, this is Daryl."

"Morgan," the guy said, as he and Aaron shook hands.

Aaron took Morgan back in his car. No need to follow him around or spy on him, he'd clearly shown he was one of the good folks.

Alexandria was weirdly empty when we arrived. We drove almost all the way back to Aaron's house without seeing anyone except the people on the gates. I pulled up, and Aaron got out of his car.

"Is that someone on our porch?" Aaron squinted at a shape in the gloom. I looked too, saw someone sitting down, knees pulled up to her chin, and a book in her hands.

"Naomi," I said immediately. "She's reading."

"I hate interrupting that," Aaron said. "She gives me this look like...like…"

"Like you've just set her whole family on fire?" I finished for him. "Yeah, she does that to everyone. Doubt she knows she's doing it."

"Well, good to know it's not personal," he said. "I'm going to take Morgan to Deanna's. You coming?"

"Nah," I said, my eyes still on her. "Think I'll stay here for a bit."

"Okay," he gave me a little smile and a pat on the back that felt like 'good luck.'

I walked up to her porch, thought about how to get her attention. I used to do it by just chucking something at her. But ever since that bottle had smashed and cut her, I'd vowed never to throw anything in the same room as her. Not even something soft. Just in case.

"Hey, nerd!" I yelled. Her head moved slightly, like someone else's might if they'd just felt a fly buzz past. "Oi! Naomi!"

I probably yelled it loud enough for the whole of Alexandria to hear, but it did the trick. Got her out of that place she disappears to when she's reading. It's like she's getting physically pulled out of it. Every ounce of her resists. She tilts her head up first, like that might trick the person who's interrupting her into thinking she's listening. I know from experience that ain't true. You have to wait until she actually looks at you. And then it's a glare. Like you've done something terrible. And then she blinks, and she's back in the present.

"Oh, hey!" she smiled. "You're back early."

"Not really," I said. "It's dark."

"So it is," she looked around, surprised by how dark it was. Then, she looked back at me. "You staying, or…?"

When she has this little smile and a light in her eyes that heats up my soul, it's impossible to say no to her. Didn't want her knowing that, though. That kinda power would go straight to her head. So I shrugged and said, "Can stay for a bit. I guess."

I sat down next to her on the bench. Alexandria was so quiet. Peaceful. In that moment I almost didn't hate it.

"What are you doing out here?" I asked her.

"There was a town meeting," she said. "But I got kicked out."

"What was it about?"

"Rick."

Whatever I'd been expecting, it hadn't been that. "Rick?"

"Yeah," she said. "You know that fight he had with Pete?"

"The hell is Pete?" I asked.

"The doctor," she said. "He's the one I took Perla to see when you guys got here."

"Right," I shrugged. She could've pulled any old person off the street, told me it was Pete, and I'd have believed her. Same for Carol and whoever the fuck Tobin was. People were making connections pretty damn fast around here, and I didn't know why. I had my family. Didn't need anyone else. Except maybe Mia. If she was still out there.

"Well, he's an asshole," she said. "Point is, Rick found out that he's been beating his wife and kids. And they got into this big fight. Rick nearly killed him."

"Good," I said. "Asshole like that deserves to die."

"I know," she said. "But folks here, they don't… respond well to that kind of justice."

"Why?"

"Well, killing someone like that… in cold blood… it's not something they're used to," she said. "They're used to arrests and trails and judges."

"Do they know that sort of shit doesn't exist anymore?"

"Not really," she sighed. "And I don't think they realize how little it protected anyone when it did exist. But, that doesn't matter, the point is I don't think they'd be happy with their Sheriff murdering someone."

"It ain't murder," I said. "Not if the guy deserves it."

"I think it technically is still murder," she said. "And, unless Jesse's the one who kills him, it sure ain't in self-defense."

"So, you think we should just let it be?" I said.

"No! But there's got to be something between doing nothing and killing him."

I shook my head. "Men like him deserve it."

She sighed. "I just thought we could banish him or something. It's as good as killing someone these days, but it gives him a fighting chance."

"That what you said to Deanna?"

"I tried," she said. "Before she made me leave."

"Why'd she do that?"

"Called her some names I probably shouldn't have," she said. "Thought she was being unfair about Rick."

"You like him, huh?" I said. Felt that twist in my gut again. It was hard to make it go away, all of those sharp edges let it really burrow deep.

"He's a good guy," she said. "I've never met a cop who… did something, y'know?"

She looked at me. I nodded. All of the cops we'd met growing up, even the ones who'd been called out by concerned neighbors, hadn't done shit to help either of us.

"Mostly," she said. "I just like having your group here. I don't want them to make you all leave."

She looked really sad at the thought of it.

"Thought you were okay with leaving?"

"I am," she said. "If you want to go. But you got a whole group that might not want me tagging along."

"They wouldn't mind," I said. Who the hell would object? I thought about what Aaron had said, about her being messed up too. "You ain't gotta try so hard to keep me around. If you want to go, Naomi. I'd go too. You ain't gotta wait for me to say it."

"Thanks, Daryl."

In the silence, she gave me a small smile that didn't quite reach her eyes.

"So, how was the run today?" I asked her.

"Okay," she said. "Got some stuff for the town, but nothing for Mia."

Looking into her sad eyes, I knew that if grief was driving her mad, I would let it. If she needed to turn over every stone on this earth in search of her sister, I would be there right behind her, double-checking them all. And if she decided to stop, or if she unraveled like Carol, I would be there to put the pieces back together. These feelings weren't going anywhere. Neither was I.

Just ask her.

"Naomi?"

"Yeah?"

I looked at her, not ready for her to already be looking at me. My heart nearly spun right out of my chest. "What you reading?"

I tried to listen while she talked, but I couldn't focus. I'd asked something I knew would buy me some time while I thought about what to say, how to tell her. Who knew how long these feelings had been here? How deep they ran? How strong? Building quietly with every second we spent together, and I still couldn't fucking say anything.

I'd never been great with words, that was more her thing.

Maybe I should just do something.

I watched her smile, the way her lips moved when she talked. All excited and at a million miles an hour. The way the light out here softened her whole face. Even with her healing cuts and bruises, looking at her still made it hard to breathe.

Years of unspoken feelings filled my lungs.

My heart was beating like it was trying to rip itself from my chest and get to hers. My fingers flexed as I fought the urge to reach out and pull her body closer to mine in more than just a damn hug. I'd always known I wanted her back in my life, but now it was crystal fucking clear I wanted her. All of her.

That light in her eyes when she looked up at me made me feel like I could do anything.

Shit, she's looking at me.

And she's stopped talking.

My beating heart dropped all the way to my stomach.

"Daryl?" I'd meant to look away, but I caught the shape of her lips when she said it. My name in her mouth. That smile. Something rose inside me like a heat. I clenched my fists, forced myself to swallow it all back. "You alright?"

This had been a huge mistake. I looked away from her.

"Yeah," I said, unclenching my clammy hands and wiping them on my pants. "Why?"

"I dunno... You're just looking at me like..." she trailed off. I looked back at her, with the most neutral expression I could manage, terrified her weird ability to read my face would kick in. If there was anyone in the world who'd be able to tell what I'd just been thinking, it was, unfortunately, her. She frowned and shook her head like she was clearing out an impossible thought. I could feel my heart racing. "I dunno. You sure you're okay?"

"Yeah, I'm fine," I said, trying to sound casual and like she hadn't just caught me thinking about kissing her. It was so difficult to put everything I'd just dragged up back in its damn box.

"Okay, good," she said, but she said it like she didn't really believe me. Her hand moved over the battered cover of her book, trying to smooth out a crease in the top right corner.

I saw it again.

That scar on her hand.

She caught me looking at it. Turned her hand, so it was palm-up, but it was too late.

"Daryl…" she said softly. I looked away from her.

What made me any better than Pete?

The thought of hurting Naomi made me physically sick. But I'd still done it. Nobody could ignite the feelings in me that she could. The pull to be near her, the ache when we were apart. Everything I felt for Naomi, it ran right through to my core. Everything I was. Everything I wanted. It all led back to her.

The twist of jealousy I felt when other people got close to her. The way I lashed out at her when I got scared. I'd felt it all before. And when I'd lost control, she'd wound up with that scar.

Anger was the twin-flame of the heat that rose in me around Naomi. Never far away. Never quiet. Bright enough to light up the darkest parts of my soul. The ugly parts. Parts I wished weren't there. Uncontrollable. Unlovable.

I didn't know any other way. Love and violence had never not come wrapped around one another in my life. Until her. And I wasn't sure I knew how to untangle them.

Dixon men loved in anger and fists and blood. I couldn't risk loving Naomi like that.

Chapter 22: Hunted

Naomi

Something scraped across the table beside me. I smelt the coffee before the cup gently slid into view. I looked at it, momentarily surprised that it existed, and then up at Aaron. Eric was hovering behind him. Both of them looked at me with the same apprehension you'd give someone when staging an intervention. I put my pen down

"Sorry," he said. "Didn't mean to disturb you."

"It's fine," I sighed. I sat back in the chair and reached for the coffee. I blinked a few times, I'd been staring at the maps in front of me for so long that even when I wasn't looking at them, thin lines still ran across my vision.

"Thinking of heading out again?" Aaron asked.

"Yeah," I said, and the endless pit of guilt in my stomach widened. I used every supply run to look for Mia, went out on solo trips on days there weren't any runs to join, but I still hadn't come close to finding her. I was running out of nearby places to look. I was going to have to start leaving for longer than a day. Aaron sat down opposite me, gave me that concerned-teacher look he can do without trying.

"Do you have a plan?"

"Yeah, I think so," I said. "Every run I've gone on, I've taken a note of the places that it looks like other people are scavenging. I chart them here so I can look for potential hotspots, and that-."

"Gives you an idea of where other communities might be," Aaron finished, nodding. "That makes sense."

"You find anything?" Eric peered over my shoulder.

"A few places look promising," I said. "I just don't know where to start. This place over here… you see where the school is?"

I tapped it with my pen. Aaron leaned over to take a look. "Yeah…"

"All of these spots," I tapped again, where I'd circled them. "Looked like they'd been recently scavenged. But not by us. So, there have to be some other people somewhere in that area."

"That's… pretty close to us," Aaron said.

"I know," I grinned. "I could probably drive it in less than an hour, walk it in about four if I have to."

I thought he'd be as excited about it as I was, but he stared at the spot on the map with nothing but apprehension.

"I'm not sure you should," he said. "Until we know who set fire to those people, and left those Walkers..."

He trailed off. Since finding that burned campsite and those carved-up Walkers, he'd been tense and on-edge. Aaron wasn't really used to seeing that kind of thing or facing the horrible things human beings could inflict on one another when everything fell to shit.

"You sound like Daryl," I said, standing up and sending my chair scraping against the floor. Any other time in my life, I'd have meant that as the world's biggest compliment. But now, I said it because they were both annoying me. I was so damn sick of people telling me where I was and wasn't allowed to go.

"I'm just concerned."

"I know," I said. "And I wasn't planning on barging right into any communities I found. I wouldn't give up Alexandria's location, either. I know what it's like… when the wrong people find a safe place."

"I know you do."

"I was planning to go and observe anywhere I found for a while, spend a few days observing, making sure they ain't psychos before I go in there." I said. "Like you and Daryl do when you're out trying to recruit people. I wouldn't approach anywhere that didn't seem safe to do so."

Aaron nodded along as I spoke, seemingly reassured by the precautions I was taking. He took a drink from his own coffee cup.

"Have you spoken to Daryl about this?" he asked. There was a note in his voice that suggested his casual tone didn't exactly match how he felt. Even Eric seemed to catch it, shooting him a look too quick to decipher. He cleared his throat, tried to cover it up. "Were you thinking of taking him with you?"

"Dunno…" I said, sighing again. Even I was beginning to get sick of how much sighing I'd been doing lately. No wonder Aaron was concerned. I glanced at him, found him studying me intently, and wondered why he'd brought it up. "He's been real distant lately. You've probably seen more of him than I have. Why do you ask?"

"No reason," he gave an unconvincing shrug. "Just need to know if he won't be around for recruitment purposes."

"Oh," I said. It made sense, but I still got the feeling it wasn't why he'd asked.

"I think you should ask him," Aaron said. "He'd want to go."

"Maybe…" I said, wondering how Aaron's read on the situation could be so wildly different from my own. To me, it seemed like Daryl didn't much want me around these days. I wondered if he was freezing me out until I agreed to stop going on runs. He'd been so mad about it, and I thought we'd sorted it out, but maybe he'd just given up arguing with me. That thought was somehow more depressing than if he'd been straight-up angry. I knew how to deal with an angry Daryl. I had no idea how to deal with a Daryl who couldn't sit in the same room as me for more than thirty seconds unless there was someone else present.

"Didn't Deanna ask for these maps back?" Aaron said, looking at where I'd scribbled all over them.

"She did," I said. "But I've apologized now, so we're all good."

"You've apologized?" he said.

"No need to sound so surprised."

"I'm surprised that she accepted," Eric said. "What did you say?"

"Firstly that I was sorry her husband was dead," I said. "Because that seemed like the most important part."

"And secondly?"

"That I was sorry for calling her a prune-faced old bitch," I said. Eric started laughing before I was done talking. "Who's so far up her own ass she can play tonsil-tennis with herself."

"Did you apologize for calling her a calculating shark with a chewed-up moral compass?"

"I think she kind of took that one as a compliment," I said with a shrug. "Certainly didn't seem mad about it."

"Don't encourage her, Eric," Aaron said.

"Sorry, but you should've seen her face," Eric said.

"Okay," I stood up. "I'm going to get some supplies from Olivia, and then I'm heading out."

"Be careful," Aaron said.

"Will do," I did my best not to roll my eyes at how cautious he'd been lately. He stood in the door and watched me walk down the path. His face was still as tense and concerned as it had been at the dining table. I turned back.

"I'll be back for dinner," I said, and that seemed to chill him out a little.

"Alright. See you then," Aaron said and shut the door.

I took a few steps towards Daryl's house, could see Carl and Judith playing with Perla on the front porch. Carol waved at me from one of the windows. I waved back, but when she disappeared from view, I stopped. Thinking about being met with the cold stare and shrugs that Daryl had started communicating with me in was soul-crushing. So, I turned and headed toward Olivia's on my own.

It was busier than usual. There weren't any runs planned, and the construction crew was pretty much done fortifying one of our walls, so I guess a lot of people had picked this as the best day to collect their weekly rations. I stood in line and waited for Olivia to be done listening to Shelley Neudermyer's laments that there was only dried pasta available.

From further ahead in the queue, someone said, "Naomi?"

"Oh, hey Lucas," I said, as he peered around Spencer's wide shoulders at me. "What you doing here?"

"Just picking up our weekly rations," he said. "You?"

"If you want to chat," Spencer said tersely, "I suggest you move back."

Lucas hesitated. I pulled a face at the back of Spencer's stupid head, and then Lucas left his place in line to join me.

"What put a stick up his ass?" I muttered.

"What was that?" Spencer looked back at me.

"Nothing," I said, and waited for him to turn back around again. I guess even if Deanna had forgiven me, maybe her stuck-up son hadn't.

"So, what are you here for?" Lucas asked.

"Came to check out a few guns," I said.

"You going on another run?" he asked. "I didn't think there was one scheduled for today?"

"No." I could see his risk-analyst brain kicking into overdrive assessing the risks involved with an unscheduled run, and did my best not to laugh at him. "There are a few places I want to scout out for other communities. See if Mia might be with them."

"Oh," he said, and visibly relaxed. "That's great."

He and Daryl were the only ones who didn't look at me with some degree of pity when I brought her up. I was trying to stop bringing her up. A thought occurred to me that hadn't until I'd seen him. "Do you wanna come with me?"

He looked as surprised to be asked as I was to be asking him.

"Yeah," he said. "I would. I'd like to help look for Mia, and I haven't been outside of these walls since we got here. I should probably remind myself what it's like out there."

"Really?" I said. "Shit. Maybe you're too rusty to come with me. You remember the dead are walking around now, right?"

"Well, now you've said that," he said, with a slight eye roll. "I'm definitely staying put."

"What can I get you two today?" Olivia asked as we found ourselves suddenly at the front of the queue.

"Can we check some things out of the armory?" I asked.

"Are you heading out today? I didn't think there were any runs scheduled?" she asked. I hesitated. I'd been hoping to avoid this question, although I should've known that it would be asked. Then her gaze slipped across to Lucas, and she put the pieces together herself. "This about your sister?"

"Yeah," I said. With every passing day, it felt more and more like people were just humoring me when they asked about Mia. It was clear they all thought I should've given up by now. Even clearer from all the goddamn pity in her smile.

"Okay," she said brightly as if she was worried speaking at a standard pitch would bum me out too much, and I'd become a sobbing mess in her damn grocery queue. It reminded me of when I was little, and well-meaning nurses would come and tell me that my Momma was sick and had to sleep for a while like she had the flu or something. And I'd want to let them know that I'd seen her shoot up. Spent hours waiting for her to come out of it because I knew if I called them too early, she'd get mad, and I'd get burned. But I didn't tell them any of it because I think they already knew, and their tone was meant to make everyone else in the hospital more comfortable. So I'd look at my shoes and wait for the ground to swallow me up and count down the hours until I could go back outside and hunt something with Daryl.

I fixed a familiar smile on my face and said, "Thanks."

"Are you looking to take out much?" Olivia asked, letting us into the armory. "Will you need any food?"

"Nope," I said. "We'll only be a few hours, probably stay in the car so we should just need the minimum."

"Alright," she said and checked a few things off on a clipboard before she handed us a gun each, a few spare bullets, and let us pick up a couple of knives.

"Thanks, Olivia."

We got in one of the cars and drove up to the gate. I got ready to face more questions and smiles like Olivia's, but when someone tapped on the window, I looked up to see Eugene and breathed a sigh of relief. He didn't seem like a bullshit-sympathy kind of guy. Or the kinda guy who'd ask too many questions. I rolled the window down.

"Hey, how's Tara doing?"

"She's recovering," he said. "And she owes a lot of that to you, I'll bet."

"And you," I said. "You're the one who managed to get Tara out of that building."

He nodded, a little blush on his cheek. I could tell he was proud of himself for what he'd managed to do that day.

"You folks heading out?" he asked.

"Yeah."

"Alright," he said. I wondered if he'd ask where we were headed, but instead, he said, "Word on the grapevine is, you was heading to D.C. before all this?"

"I sure was," I said. "Lived there for a while and figured if anywhere has the kind of infrastructure to withstand this kind of disaster, it's probably D.C."

"I had the very same thought," he said. "But, I feel the need to tell you that we have tried to go that way and found the road to be impassable."

"Shit, really?"

Since finding out that Mia wasn't on her own, I'd stopped thinking about D.C. as an option. It had never really been my home in the same way it had been hers, but there were still people there that I'd cared about. Bryce and Andrew recently renovated their home to include a panic room, but that had been built with home-invasions in mind. I doubted it was well-stocked enough for them to have survived all of this in it, and I didn't know how well-equipped they were to live out in this new world. I thought about Marrianne and Hugh. Everyone at the paper might've had a slight advantage on the breaking news as it happened and been able to get someplace safe. I also knew some people would've stayed until the bitter end, trying to spread the word about what was going on until Walkers pried them from their desks.

Maybe, for once, Mia and I were lucky our Momma got so sick.

"Just thought I should let you know," Eugene said, pulling me back into the present. "In case you were thinking of heading there."

"No," I assured him. "Just a quick trip to scout out a few places. We'll be back soon."

"Alright then," he said, tapping the car. I rolled the window back up, and he let us out of the gates.

"You recognize the outside world?" I asked Lucas as we drove by all of the shut-up and abandoned houses just outside of Alexandria's walls.

"It's so easy to think everything's gone back to normal when you're in Alexandria," Lucas said.

"This is what's normal," I said, nodding at the abandoned cars and run-down buildings. "Alexandria's the anomaly."

"Do you really think that?" he asked.

"I do," I said. "We're lucky to have found it, but… you have to wonder how long it will last."

His silence told me that this might be the very first time he'd ever wondered that. I guess that was the difference between people who stayed in Alexandria and planned things with Deanna and those of us who went outside to execute their plans. They didn't have to face any of it anymore. Lucas took a deep breath that kind of turned to a shudder, "If anything ever happened here… that made it like Terminus…"

Terminus.

The word brought a chill into the car.

"It won't," I said. "We won't let it."

"But if it did," he said. "I'd rather die than live through any of that again."

"Yeah?" I tried to think of something uplifting or encouraging to say but couldn't. "Me too."

Admitting that, out loud, wasn't as depressing as I thought would be. It was like a weight lifted a little from my lungs. One I didn't know I'd been carrying until I said it. When I glanced at Lucas, there was a small smile on his face, like he understood. The cold in the car was gone again.

For the first time in days, I didn't feel like a dark cloud was following me around everywhere I went.

"You ever think about New York?" I asked. "The people you knew there?"

"All the time," he said. "At first, I just felt lucky that I wasn't there when it happened. Trying to flee from that place must've been…"

He broke off, shaking his head at even the idea of it.

"Yeah," I said. "I feel the same about D.C."

"And then I felt guilty for a while," he said. "That I hadn't been there. Didn't know why I should've been lucky enough to survive when it's very likely that my friends and family didn't. Then I stopped thinking about it altogether."

"And now?"

"Now, it doesn't feel real," he said. "Like a place with so many people living so many different lives could ever exist… it's like a dream."

"Urgh, what the hell is that?" I winced, rolling up the windows as an overpowering smell filled the forest around us. Smelt like Walkers, but I couldn't see any. I kept my eyes on the bend in the road in front of us. Just in case there was a horde coming, and we had to turn back. "Keep a lookout, will you?"

Lucas kept a close eye on the forest around us, checking for hordes moving between the trees.

"What do you miss most?" he asked. "About life before this? And I'm going to say it can't be anything soppy like a person. It has to be something dumb."

I knew he'd added that to stop me getting bummed out about Mia again, and I was thankful for it. I thought for a second. "I miss takeout food. Having to cook everything all the time is such bullshit."

"Doesn't Eric cook everything at your place?"

"Yeah, but I still have to hear him going on about it," I said. "What don't you miss?"

"The subway," he said immediately. "Used to have to get it two and from work every day, and it was never not terrible. Always stank."

"Good one," I said. "I don't miss traffic. Remember gridlock? That was shit."

"That was shit," he agreed, but he sounded distracted. I glanced at him. He'd leaned forward and was squinting at something in the trees through the windshield. I glanced up at it too. "There's something up there."

"Just a body," I said. "Some poor bastard that's hanged himself."

The hangings were always the weirdest ones to me. Not just because it seemed like such a horrible and potentially prolonged way out, but because it didn't do shit to destroy the brain. So at the end of it, all your Walker would be left dangling there, kicking out at passing survivors, until one of them was kind enough to shoot you.

"It's not just that," Lucas said. Something about the tone in his voice sent a chill right through me. When you're with someone who notices that something ain't right, but they don't want to say anything about it because they want to be wrong, it's so much worse than when they just scream something at you. "There's more of them."

I slowed the car down, leaned over to take a look at the forest. He was right. It wasn't just one body in the trees, there were dozens.

"What the fuck?" I breathed.

"Mass suicide?" Lucas suggested. There'd been lots of those at the beginning, but it felt bizarre option for people who'd made it this far.

"Maybe," I said. "But why now? And why out here? Why hanging?"

Lucas shrugged, kept staring at them. I slowed down some more. "I think…" he craned forwards more in his seat. "I think they've got something on their heads, like a symbol… do you see it? A mark? Maybe they were in some kind of cult."

"This is just creepy enough to be a cult," I said. I leaned further forward to see if I could see what was talking about. Too far away for me to get a good look. It could have just been a mark.

Or-

"Naomi! Look out!" Lucas yelled. He reached over me to grab the steering wheel from me, I think on instinct more than anything else. A truck was tearing down the road towards us at a million miles an hour. I turned the wheel so hard I felt it pull something in my arm. We span off the road in a blur of trees and truck and grass. My stomach lurched. And then we hit a tree.

A thud as a Walker from the tree hit the windshield. It cracked.

"You okay?" I asked Lucas. He nodded, looked uncomfortable, and afraid, but he wasn't bleeding or anything. I checked myself over. A few aches but nothing serious. The shock of it had been the worst thing. No warning. Not even the blare of a horn to warn us of an impending crash.

"What the hell was that?" Lucas said, rubbing the back of his neck like he might've got whiplash. "Didn't they see us? I know you don't expect anyone else on the roads anymore, but c'mon…They've stopped. Do you think they want to swap insurance details."

I knew he was joking, but there really was no need for them to stop. It was unlikely they were good Samaritans who wanted to see if their reckless driving had accidentally hurt someone.

I looked back at it in the rearview mirror.

Food truck.

The Walker that had fallen from the tree onto the windshield of the car looked back at me. A freshly carved 'W' right between its hungry, dead eyes. No way in hell was this a coincidence.

I tried to start the car. The engine sputtered and then died.

"Shit," he said. "Give it a few minutes and see if it'll start then."

In the rearview mirror, I could see the back of the food truck was starting to open up. I knew what was about to come out.

"Lucas, get out of the car," I said. He caught the urgency of the tone in my voice. Looked scared but couldn't yet understand why.

"What? Why?"

"This is a trap," I said, as calmly as possible. I unfastened my seatbelt. "Grab your gun, knives. Anything you can. We're going to get out on your side of the car. Stay low, there's a chance they won't see us."

I was worried he'd waste time asking for more explanation, but he didn't. He grabbed up his weapons, and opened the door slowly, to make as little noise as possible. The Walker on the windshield snarled and reached for him, but he ducked out of the way. I crawled across to his side of the car, keeping as low as possible. The sound and smell of Walkers was everywhere. The engine of the food truck was still running.

"What the hell?" Lucas was crouched by the passenger door, his eyes fixed on where more Walkers were stumbling out of the back of the food truck. I grabbed his arm.

"Let's go," I whispered.

We kept low and used the car as a cover as much as possible, ducking behind a nearby bush as soon as we could. The Walkers from the back of the truck had spilled out onto the road, heading right for the car. Right for us. The driver hung out of the window and watched. One of them climbed on to the roof to get a better view. Lucas whispered, "We can't stay here."

"I know," I said. I wished he'd shut up for a second, so I'd have a moment of peace to think this through. If we stayed where we were, the Walkers would get us. If we stood up and ran, the guys by the truck would see.

"If we head that way," Lucas pointed through the trees. "I think we can make it back to Alexandria."

I knew he longed for the safety of those walls, and for the protection of the snipers that patrolled them.

"We can't go back," I said. The color drained from Lucas's face. I knew it was the last thing he wanted to hear, it was the last thing I wanted to say. "If we do, we could lead them right to the others. We'd be putting everyone at risk."

I wondered if he'd fight me on it or raise the point that Alexandria had both more people and more weapons than these guys in the truck did. But he didn't. He knew the value of keeping a safe place a secret as much as I did. So he nodded and whispered, "What do we do?"

"They're using the Walkers to hunt us," I said. "Sniff us out. So first, we outsmart them. Then, we worry about the living."

"Okay," he nodded. "Let's do this."

 

 

Daryl

The sun was hardly up before someone was banging on the door. The whole mood of the house changed. From sleepy quiet, where only half of us were actually up and awake, to quiet that's alert. Listening. The kind of listening deer do when they think you're close by. I heard people scramble for weapons that we no longer had access to. I grabbed a knife from the kitchen.

"Daryl!" Someone yelled outside the house. More banging on the door. "Daryl! You in here?"

"The hell?" Rick appeared in the hallway, half-dressed and a toothbrush still in his hand. I shrugged to show him I had no idea what was going on and went to answer. It was Aaron. I hadn't recognized his voice because I'd never heard him so panicked before.

"Hey, man," I said. "Everything okay?"

I knew from his face that no, everything was not okay.

"Is Naomi here?" he asked. At the sound of her name and the fear in his eyes, my heart leaped.

"No," I said. It was way too early in the morning for her to visit. For anyone to visit. "Why? Did she say she was coming over here? Is Eric-"

"Eric's fine," he said, and then he hesitated. He didn't want to say it. But he'd already let too much slip. "Naomi didn't come home last night."

"What?"

I felt sick to my stomach, grabbed my shoes from where I'd chucked them down by the door.

"I thought she… I just assumed she'd be here…" he looked at the quietly gathering crowd behind me, with their panicked bleary eyes. Unless she'd snuck in to spend the night here without me knowing, I knew Naomi wouldn't be among them. He still looked at them all. We both did. Like he thought, this might be a bad dream. Sure felt like one.

"When did you last see her?" I asked him.

"Yesterday morning," he said. My stomach lurched. Almost twenty-four hours ago. "She was talking about going on another search for Mia."

"I opened the gate for her," Eugene suddenly piped up. I looked back at him.

"She say where she was going?"

"She did not," he said. "We talked about D.C. I told her not to go, due to the road being congested with the dead."

"And you didn't think to ask her where she was headed?"

"No, I did not," he said.

"Was she on her own?" Rick asked. It felt like a dumb question. Of course she was on her own. Who else would she be with? Aaron and I were both still here. But then I saw Eugene shake his head.

"She was with Lucas."

Lucas.

I could've punched Eugene. Could've punched any of them. Gawping at me like a bunch of useless pricks.

Burrowed deep in my gut, a sharp twist of something bitter. Why Lucas? Why ask him? Aaron glanced warily at me, I wondered if this was news to him too. Or if he'd already checked that she wasn't sleeping over wherever Lucas was staying.

I wanted to storm over there myself. Check that damn creep hadn't cooked her up and ate her. But what if I opened up the door and she was in his bed? In his arms?

I looked at Rick. "What do we do?"

"I told everyone we shouldn't be doing any more runs or recruitment missions," Rick said. "It might've led those people out there right to our door."

"Those people out there might have Naomi," I said. Now wasn't the time for him to get all righteous about shit. "Ain't this your job, man? Finding missing people?"

"She's an adult, she could-" he started to say in his old cop-voice. Then he looked at me, and something in his face changed. "Alright. I'll do my best. Did she take anything with her? Anything more than usual, anything that would suggest she was planning on staying away for longer than a day?"

"Er, I don't know," Aaron said, running a hand through his hair. "I didn't check."

"Alright," Rick said, still so calm. Like the world wasn't falling apart around us. But I guess his wasn't. It was just mine. Crumbling. "Let's go over there and have a look now."

"I'll go to Lucas's," Michonne said. I couldn't look at her. "And check she's not... crashing there."

I was out of the door before she'd finished talking, didn't want to hear it. Or have to think about what I'd do if they found her there. Could hear Rick running behind us. The door was already open, Eric stood in his pajamas. Tousled hair and sleepy, worried eyes.

"Did you find her?" he asked, the moment Aaron was close enough to hear him. Aaron shook his head, I saw Eric look from him to the rest of us, and the hope faded in his eyes.

"Can I take a look at her room?" Rick asked. "See if she took anything that indicates she was planning on being gone longer than she has."

It felt like a waste of time. And I didn't like the implication that Naomi had lied about how long she'd be gone. But we led him up there anyway. Stood in her empty room. Unmade bed. Too many books. Like she was just downstairs. It felt like an intrusion.

"Anything missing?" Rick asked us.

"I'm not sure," Aaron looked desperately around him as if it would be obvious.

"Her bag," I said. "It ain't hanging on the back of the door."

"Oh yeah," he said. "I think I remember her taking that."

I looked under the bed. Mia-box still there. I didn't think she'd have left for good without that.

"Did she leave anything behind?"

"The maps," Eric said suddenly. "She'd been pouring over them for days. Marked up everywhere she wanted to go."

"Maps? That's good. Are they still here?" Rick asked.

"Yeah," he said confidently. "Downstairs."

We trudged back down again. Every step, every tick of the clock passed painfully.

"She's not at Lucas's," Michonne said, coming in through the open front door. It didn't bring me as much relief as I thought it might. "He's missing too."

There were three different maps, all marked up differently. Pieces of paper with notes and lists, shorthand, and symbols. For the first time since Aaron had knocked on the door, my heartbeat slowed down. It felt like she'd drawn this map for me. Every color on here that looked random to everyone else wasn't random to her, so it wasn't random to me either.

"She talked about the school; maybe she's headed there?" Eric suggested.

"Nah," I said. "She's gone here."

I pointed to a place on the map that was on one of her lists. An old factory.

"Are you sure?" Rick asked.

"Yeah, see this?" I slid it across the table to him.

He picked it up, read it over. "The school's at the top?"

"Yeah, but the factory has a star next to it, not a bullet point, which means it's first on her list."

"How can you know for sure?" Eric asked.

Felt like I'd been training for this moment for years. It was like I'd stood over her while she put all of this together. I knew how she thought, how she planned. I could do this. I could find her.

"I just do."

"Alright," Aaron said. "If that's what Daryl thinks, I'm willing to head out there. You coming?"

We both looked at Rick. He shook his head. "Sounds like Daryl's got this. You good?"

I nodded. "Yeah."

"We'll be here for her if she gets back," he said.

I moved towards the door. I was done wasting time. "C'mon."

I heard Aaron scramble to pick up his shit and follow me back out into the street.

"You taking the bike?" he asked.

"We should take a car," I said. "And get one of them medical kits from Olivia just in case-"

I stopped. The world swam in and out of focus at the thought of it. They'd been gone so long. It seemed impossible that they'd both come back in one piece. I felt Aaron put a hand on my back.

"It's alright," he said. "I'm sure she's fine, but it's good to pick one up as a precaution."

Olivia's house was dark when we got there. I looked at the garage door, which I knew lead to the pantry and, in turn, the armory. Probably be quite easy to kick in if she didn't hurry the fuck up. I didn't stop knocking until I saw the lights go on.

She stared out at us, eyes a little wide and angry. "What's going on? It's so early, is everything alright?"

"Did Naomi come by here yesterday?"

"Yeah, she and Lucas took some weapons. They haven't returned them yet, actually, are they-"

"They're missing," Aaron interrupted her. "Did they give you an idea of how long they'd be?"

She shook her head, tried to speak through a yawn. "I offered them food, but they said they'd be back before it got dark."

"When it got dark, and they hadn't come back, you didn't think to say anything?" I said. "Didn't think to raise the alarm or nothing?"

"I… I…" she stared at me, mouth open wide.

"Do you know which car they took?" Aaron said.

"Em… yes," Olivia picked up the dumb clipboard that she used to keep track of shit. No keeping track of people. Nothing as useful as that, just shit that didn't matter. She pointed out the car they'd taken, gave us the make, model, and registration.

"We need a medical kit," Aaron said. "And some weapons of our own too."

She led us into the armory. I grabbed my crossbow. Anything else I could. Aaron grabbed one of the medical kids. Olivia followed us around. "Em… I just need to…"

"You can mark it off when we bring it back," I told her. "We ain't got time for this shit."

I walked past her through the pantry and opened the garage door from the inside. Olivia was slow and scared of me, I couldn't be waiting around for her to open up doors and make nervous small talk. Time was already running past us faster than I wanted it to. The sun was up now, all traces of the dawn were gone. I walked over to the nearest car.

"Let's go," I said, turning back to Aaron, who was being frustratingly slow now. Hanging back and giving Olivia all of these apologetic looks. Like I'd been the unreasonable one rather than her being unreasonably slow and stupid for not telling anyone that two damn people had gone missing.

Aaron got the car keys from her, opened the driver door but didn't get in. He offered me the keys, "Do you want to drive?"

"Nah," I said, sitting in the passenger seat. Appreciated him asking, though. I guess he thought I might feel better if I was doing something. Truth was, I didn't think I could drive. Not a car, not a bike. My palms felt too sweaty to steer anything safely, and my fingers hadn't stopped shaking since Aaron had come to our door.

The folks at the gates weren't ready for us to be leaving so early. If this had taught me anything, other than never letting Naomi out of my damn sight, it was that Alexandria was unprepared for emergencies. The people here were so damn slow. If any group tried to take over, would we have to form an orderly queue to get weapons from Olivia? A fight would be over before it had even begun.

I'd never felt car sick before. But driving down that road with Aaron, I thought I was going to hurl my guts out into the glovebox.

We'd hardly driven any distance at all before we saw it. Tied up against a tree. Still moving but not living. Looked like a woman. Dark hair.

"There!" I yelled, pointing at it.

I'd jumped out of the car before Aaron had slowed to a full stop. I heard him shout after me, but I didn't turn back. Just ran towards the tied-up dead woman.

Please don't be her. Please don't be her.

The Walker turned its head when it saw me coming.

Not Naomi.

Wrong hair. Wrong face. Been dead for longer than Naomi had been missing.

A wave of relief washed over me that was so strong it knocked me on my ass. I sat down. The snarling Walker was trying so hard to get to me that the ropes tying her cut into dead flesh. I didn't give a shit. The only thing I cared about right then was that it wasn't Naomi.

I heard the car stop.

"Daryl?" Aaron called. I took my head out of my hands. Looked up at him. He was nothing but a blur.

"It ain't her," I said. "It ain't her."

I hear his sigh of relief, his feet walking towards me on the road. He crouched down, drove his knife through the Walker's skull, and then looked at me in the sudden silence.

"You okay?" he asked. I wiped my face across the back of my arm, looked away from him.

"Yeah."

"We'll find her," he said and put a hand on my shoulder. "She's smart. She knows how to stay safe."

"Yeah," I said, trying to catch my breath. "Lucas is fucking useless, though. Why'd she take him?"

Having someone so useless and stupid tagging along with you could put you in more danger than being smart and on your own. Aaron shrugged. "Maybe she just wanted some company."

I nodded.

"She didn't ask me," I said. My voice sounded real quiet, even in the silence. I hadn't been looking for an answer. Didn't expect him to have one, but the look on his face suggested otherwise.

"She… mentioned that you'd been distant with her lately," Aaron said. "She didn't think you'd want to come."

"Oh."

Shit.

It felt like the trees were closing in on me. More confined even than the walls around Alexandria. I looked up at the sky, trying to force my breathing to be some kind of normal again. I felt like I'd just run a damn marathon.

"Have you?"

"Have I what?"

"Been distant with her lately?"

"I guess."

"Mind me asking why?"

I did mind.

I minded a lot.

I watched two birds fly by overhead. Looked like one of them was chasing the other. Couldn't tell if it was a hunt or a game. I cleared my throat. "It's just… hard to be around her sometimes."

I looked back down at him. Aaron nodded like he understood, but I really doubted it. Doubted he ever looked at Eric and worried that one day they'd have another fight so bad he'd wind up hurting him. Aaron wasn't that kind of guy. He was good. Kind. Knew how to love people right.

"Shall we keep going?"

I nodded. He stood up and reached out a hand to help me to my feet. I took it, let him pull me up. My legs felt weak.

We got back in the car. Kept driving.

"I don't like how close that was to Alexandria," Aaron said. "Closer than the campsite we found."

"Nah," I agreed. "Me neither."

I looked at things passing by the window. Searching the gaps between trees for any sign of Naomi.

"We'll find her," he said again as I swallowed down a lump in my throat. "She'll be alright."

The more he said it, the less likely it felt. But he was probably saying it to calm himself down too so I didn't stop him. I couldn't handle that kind of hope just to have it taken away again.

It was hard to be around her, but it was much harder not to have her around at all.

We came to a bend in the road, and something by the side of it caught my eye. A car. Or, it had been. Now it was just a burned-out shell, wrapped around a tree trunk. But it was the one they'd left in, no doubt about it.

"There," I pointed it at. "That's the car."

"Shit," Aaron whispered and slowed our car to a stop.

Smelt like death when we got out. Ashes and rotting flesh.

The passenger door was open. A whole bunch of burned up remains around it. Aaron looked at what was left. Charred flesh clinging to blackened bones. "Is… is that…?"

"This ain't them," I said. "These were Walkers. Been dead a while before they got burned."

I checked inside the car. Saw nothing that looked freshly dead. No burned weapons either. No sign of any of Naomi's things.

"They got out," I said. Felt confident enough saying it now I'd checked the car. "Nothing in here suggests either of them were in it when it caught fire."

"Okay," Aaron said, peering in there too through the driver's window. "Did they get in some kind of accident?"

"They swerved to avoid something, that's for sure," I said, pointing at some skid marks on the road. "Whatever it was is gone now."

When I looked at Aaron, he was looking up at the trees again. There were sounds around us, which I'd mistaken for wind in the trees, but now I focussed on it I realized that wasn't it. It was Walkers, with their soft, ragged breathing. I looked up at the trees. Saw them hanging there. Each one had a W carved on its forehead.

"This was some kind of trap," I said. "Same people from back at that food place."

Aaron nodded.

"But they got out, right?"

"They got out of the car," I said, looking back at it. "But maybe that's what whoever set the trap wanted them to do."

I looked at the ground around the passenger door, where two people had definitely crawled out. But did they crawl because they were injured? Or because they were trying not to be seen? I crouched down where they might have looked over at the skid marks on the road. From here, you wouldn't be seen by most people on the road.

"Can you track them?" Aaron asked, watching what I was doing.

"They moved over here," I started trying to trace their steps. A short distance to a nearby bush that would've sheltered them from anyone on the road. Aaron followed me. I looked back at the car, just a stone's throw away. The dead and burned Walkers around it. "I think it was them who torched the car."

My clever girl. 

"Shit," he said, "Really?"

"Yeah," I said. "Those Walkers must've been close to them. And they used the fire from the burning car to distract them so they could get away."

"That's good," he said. "Right?"

I nodded, looking down at footprints in the mud. They were further apart. Lighter. Running, not crouching any more.

"They were running from something," I said, following them to where they stopped behind a tree.

"From the Walkers?" Aaron suggested. "After they set the car on fire?"

"Maybe," I said, but his explanation didn't sit right with me. It was too easy. The story the marks on the ground were telling me was too complicated for that. "They climbed."

I looked up at the tree as if she'd be sitting on one of the branches waiting for me to find her. Then she'd jump down, maybe call me a dumbass for worrying about her and then we could both get in the car and go home. But she wasn't there anymore, although she had been at some point.

"Climbed?" Aaron repeated, looking up in the same way, like she'd be up there laughing at us. "Why?"

"Don't know," I said. People who weren't used to tracking seemed to think it was just following one clue after another in one straight line, rather than piecing together several things from all around the place to get an overall picture. Anything you could track, be it people or prey, rarely moved in neat, straight lines. Especially when they're scared.

Close by, what I thought were three Walkers lay shot in the head. I wondered if it had been her, from high up in the trees. I took a look a look at them, realized one was much more freshly dead than the others, and trapped underneath a Walker with a rope around its neck. I picked up the end of the rope, saw that it had been cut. Probably by a small knife in the hands of a clever girl.

"They waited in the trees. Cut them down when whoever was following them got too close," I said. "Landed on this guy. Then someone took out him and the Walker."

"Someone?"

"Don't think it was one of them," I said. I took a look at the dead man's footprints, leading back to the road. There was a second pair walking with him. "Think this guy had a friend. Probably who this poor bastard was meant to hit."

I kicked over a second Walker that was lying on the ground. Another cut rope around its neck.

"But the second guy survived," Aaron said, looking at the bullet wound in the Walker's skull. "Shot both Walkers and then his friend because he'd been bit?"

"Looks like it," I said. "Which probably gave Naomi and Lucas enough time to climb down and run away."

Aaron looked around at the scene in front of him, nodding like what we'd just put together made sense to him. Maybe he was starting to get the hang of tracking. "Any idea which way they went?"

I went back to the tree she'd climbed, saw the scuff marks from where she'd jumped down again. Probably landed on the balls of her feet, scraped her hands on the mud. I pointed, "This way."

"That's not the way home," Aaron said. "Are they lost?"

"I think she deliberately went the wrong way so that they wouldn't follow them back to Alexandria," I said. "Tryna protect everyone."

I had to close my eyes for a moment. It was so predictably Naomi, to think of everyone else rather than just keeping herself safe like I wanted her to.

"I think they might already know about Alexandria," Aaron said, his voice thick with dread.

"Why?" I asked. "Because of that Walker by the walls?"

"That, and…" He'd picked something square and flat up out of the mud next to the dead guy. He held it up to me, "These were in my bag. I lost it back when we got trapped by the Walkers in those food trucks. It has to be the same people.

Pictures of Alexandria. I could see Rick and Judith in one of them.

"Fuck."

Everything she'd done, all of the danger she'd put herself in, all for nothing. They already fucking knew.

It was away from the road, which made sense if they were trying to get away from being followed. But it was away from Alexandria too. I followed the places in the undergrowth that had been recently disturbed. Plants crushed under rushing feet, twigs snapped by hurried hands trying to push their way through hard-to-follow spots. They'd definitely been through here. But the guy who was following them had too, and I couldn't tell how much further behind he'd been.

I stopped. Couldn't go any further. None of the tracks made sense anymore.

Aaron stopped behind me, waiting for me to move again, but I couldn't. "What's wrong?"

I looked at the ground. "They stopped," I said. "The tracks split like five different ways."

"They split up?"

"No," I said. Searching desperately for something that would prove me wrong. A footprint. A snapped twig, a trampled flower. "She's covered her tracks. Created some false trails that don't go anywhere…. I don't know which way they went."

I was equal parts mad at her and proud of her. This was expertly done, but it meant I would struggle to find her.

"Should we check them all?" Aaron asked.

"The guy following them went this way," I said. He'd followed the most obvious tracks, which gave me some hope that he wasn't the sharpest and might not have got to them. "We should go that way first. Just in case."

He nodded and followed carefully behind me. I noticed that he made sure only to tread where he'd seen me step before. It was kind of him, to try and make it so that we left as few tracks of our own as possible, preserving the ones we were actually trying to follow. It wasn't too long before there was only one set of tracks ahead of us, presumably the asshole who'd been trying to trap Naomi. The further in I followed them, the better I felt.

"He turned here," I said, pointing at where his tracks veered off. "Probably headed back to the road to try and find them from there."

"So, you don't think he got them?"

"No," I said. There had been no signs of a struggle at any point along here, and I had to hope that no matter how useless Lucas was, the two of them should have been able to take out one guy. "Not here, anyway."

We walked back to where the tracks diverged into a confusing mess. I kept staring at them, hoping for some kind of sign. Looking at her maps, I'd known exactly what she was thinking, but looking at this… Anything Naomi knew about tracking, she'd learned from watching me. So everything she thought about throwing a tracker off… it was all based on shit I did.

Trying to track her had given me some direction. Something to think about other than how crappy I felt. But now that was slipping away from me, it all came rushing back. I could tell Aaron wanted to say something but couldn't find the words. I felt like I was sinking. Like there was nothing but darkness under my feet, and every step I took in the wrong direction just led me deeper into it.

I can do this.

I took a deep breath, tried to think like her. Tried to think about what she'd do in this kind of situation, where she might go. It felt like a test of how well I knew her. She would've been trying to think like me, so if I was trying to hide tracks from myself, what would I do? I kicked over a fallen branch in front of me.

Footprint.

"This way," I said. There were a few signs that weren't strong enough to be sure, some that could've been my own wishful thinking, but determination spurred me on. I stopped a few times, getting caught out by squirrels moving in the trees above us.

Further in, their tracks became a little more clear. Must've been when they were confident they weren't being followed anymore.

Something moved. Larger than a squirrel, more purposeful than a Walker.

"Shh," I said, even though Aaron wasn't talking. I threw my hand up to stop him from walking any further. It took him a second to get what I meant. I was so used to Naomi following me when I did this kind of thing, and she always knew what I meant even if I just glanced at her. The sound of his footsteps was throwing me off. He stopped. Stared at me while I listened.

Someone was moving through the trees ahead of us, I was sure of it. Naomi's name rose in my throat, and I had to choke it back. If it wasn't her, I shouldn't give our position away.

But what if it is?

I pointed in the direction I'd heard the noise, watched Aaron frown as he listened. Then he nodded. He heard it too. I motioned for him to take a step forward, and we walked slowly towards the sound. The noises stopped. Silence like the whole forest was listening, and I wondered if whoever it was had heard us too.

Then I saw him. A familiar douchebag ducked between the trees.

Lucas.

I looked at the space around him.

No Naomi.

Was she hurt? Had he hurt her?

There was a fire in my veins. I broke into a run.

"Oi!" I yelled. My voice tearing through the quiet of the forest made him jump, and he turned to look at me, eyes all wide like a rabbit who'd just realized he'd been caught.

"What did you do to her?" I yelled. "Where is-"

His stupid face. That bullshit innocent look about him. I think he opened his mouth to say my name, but he didn't get a chance.

Something swung down from one of the trees, knocked me to the floor. I closed my eyes as my back hit the ground, pushed all the wind right out of me. I felt the weight of someone pinning me underneath them, two hands pushed mine to the ground on either side of me and held them there. The body on mine smelt familiar.

Naomi.

I opened my eyes, and she looked back at me, as surprised and shocked as I felt.

"Daryl?" she said like she couldn't believe it. "What the hell are you doing?"

"What the hell are you doing?" I said. While this had the element of surprise, I could have dislodged her if I wanted to. Both hands trying to hold my wrists down meant she wouldn't be able to reach for a weapon without letting one of them go. And then I'd be free to grab her. Her face was close, it wouldn't take much to reach up and grab the back of her head. The weight of her body on mine wasn't heavy enough to hold me if I didn't wanna be under her. It was comfortable. Nice. I could've flipped her over. Pinned her to the ground instead... If I'd been someone that meant her harm, of course. "Get off me, weirdo."

She climbed off, stood up, and dusted off her knees. I hauled myself to my feet.

"Heard you coming and thought you was one of them," she said. "We were being followed yesterday, thought they might still be here."

"Yeah, we found your car," Aaron said, having finally caught up with me.

"Aaron!" she broke into a huge smile, ran over to him, and gave him a hug.

"How come he gets a hug, and I get knocked over?" I grumbled.

"Because he wasn't creeping around trying to attack us," she said. "Why'd you try and tackle Lucas like that?"

"Thought he might've murdered you."

"What?" Lucas looked disgusted. "Why would you think that?"

"Wouldn't be the first time you'd killed someone, would it?" I said. "I ain't ever eaten someone before, but maybe once you get a taste for human flesh, it's hard to shake. Maybe you just fancied a damn snack."

Lucas flinched. I didn't know if it was my words that hurt him or because I was yelling them. Either way, it made me feel a little bit better.

"Daryl," Naomi warned. "Cool it."

"Easy there, Daryl," Aaron chimed it. "We know Lucas is as much of a victim in this as she is."

"All I know is he ain't above throwing his lot in with murdering psychos when it suits him," I said.

"That's not fair," Lucas's face flushed a little first bit of fight I'd seen in him. "You don't know what it was-"

"Don't know?" I repeated, sick of him making vague excuses for the shit he'd done. Like none of the rest of us had been through some bad shit. Or had to make some tough choices in all of this. I felt a familiar rush of heat, a flash through my spine and down my arms right into my balled-up fists. Stared right into his stupid little face, "What the fuck don't I know, huh? Huh?"

"Hey! Hey," Naomi stepped between us. "We got ran off the road. You saw the car!"

"And how's that, huh?" I glowered at Lucas. "His shitty driving?"

He backed away from me as I took a step forward. Naomi forced herself between us, all fiery eyes and balled-up fists. "I was the one driving, Daryl. Me. They came out of nowhere."

"Who did?" Aaron asked. "Did you get a good look at them?"

"There were two of them," she said. "Too busy trying to get away to get a proper look at them, but I think we took one of them out."

"You did," Aaron said. "His body is back by the road."

"Is Rick with you?"

Rick, Rick, Rick. Why's she so obsessed with Rick all of a sudden?

The way my anger shifted was immediate. It didn't matter who it was, Rick or Lucas, I couldn't stand the thought of her being with anyone.

"No, he ain't," I said. "How come you two are best-buds now? He didn't even like you at first. Didn't give a shit that she was gone, neither."

I felt petty. Like a kid that had just snitched on his friend for stealing some candy.

"That's not strictly true," Aaron said like he was worried it would hurt Naomi's feelings or something. Although looking at her, she didn't look bothered by it. "He helped us-"

"I don't care about that," she interrupted him. "We just… found something he should know about."

She and Lucas shared a look. Like they had a secret. I hated it.

"What?" Aaron asked.

"There's a Quarry way back down there," she pointed in the direction they'd just come from. "I remembered seeing it on a map and thought we'd be able to cut through it to get back to Alexandria without being followed. But when we got there… the whole place was filled with Walkers."

"I guess that's-"

"No," she said. "I mean filled. Someone's parked some trucks across the entrance so they can't get out once they're in there. But they've really been building up. Biggest horde I ever seen. I think it's why Alexandria's been so untouched."

"Shit."

She wasn't wrong, Rick should know about this.

"The trucks ain't going to hold them back forever," she said. "We should have some kind of plan in place for when it breaks. Or… find a way to deal with it before it gets to that."

"That's pretty serious," Aaron said. "We should head back, let the others know as soon as possible."

He started moving back the way we'd come, an urgency in his step now there was a new threat facing Alexandria.

"Is the road clear?" Lucas asked him. "When we couldn't get through the Quarry, we doubled-back to here in case we got lost, but we weren't sure if they'd still be around."

"They're all gone," Aaron assured him. "We parked the car right by what's left of yours."

Naomi glanced at me and was started walking after them. "You didn't bring your bike?"

"Nah," I said. "Seemed more sensible to share a car."

Lucas and Aaron walked ahead of us, leading the way back to the car. Naomi fell into step beside me. "What were you guys doing out here, anyway?"

"Looking for you, dumbass."

"What? Why?"

"Because you were missing," I said.

"We're fine," she said. The amount of confusion in her voice about why I might've thought she wouldn't be really rubbed me up the wrong way. After spending all day going out of my damn mind, I was only now starting to feel like my world was putting itself back together again.

"I can see that," I snapped. "Why'd you go off like that?"

"Like what?"

"Running off without telling anyone," I said. "It's fucking dumb."

"Without telling you, you mean?" she said, her eyes narrowed as they fixed on me. I felt like I'd been busted for something but didn't know what.

"Nobody knew where you were."

"I told Aaron I was taking a trip," she said. "I told Olivia. I told Eugene. You're just pissed off because I didn't tell you."

For a moment, I stewed in my annoyance over the fact that she wasn't wrong. "Why'd you do it?"

Another flash of irritation in her eyes. "Do what?"

"Why'd you go?"

"I've found places I want to look for Mia," she said. I already knew that. She wasn't answering the question I really wanted to ask. "It was only meant to be a short trip, how could I have known that-"

"Take someone less useless with you next time, yeah?"

"Like you? That what you mean?" she said, seeing through my bullshit immediately. "That what you're mad about?"

She was looking at me like it was the dumbest, pettiest reason in the world, and I was the one being ridiculous. "Well, why not me, huh? I could've helped!"

"You ain't been around, Daryl! You won't spend five seconds alone with me! When the hell was I supposed to talk to you about any of this? Huh?"

At some point, tears had sprung into her eyes. I watched her fight them back. Felt myself calm down. Like they doused the fire in me. I hadn't realized she'd noticed me trying to keep my distance. Thought I'd hidden it well enough, but clearly not.

"Hey, I'm sorry," I said and tried to reach for her, but she shrugged me off.

She looked up at me, red-eyed and trying not to cry. "Did I… did I do something?"

Her voice was real quiet just then. It tugged at my heart. "No… No, of course not."

"Then… why?"

I knew I couldn't explain it to her. Not without telling her everything.

"I'm sorry. I just…" I didn't know how to finish. "I'm sorry."

We looked at each other. Her brow furrowed, studying me in that way only she could. "You got scared, huh?"

I nodded.

"'Course I did." I'd been scared of everything. Afraid of losing her. Terrified of loving her. "And you covered your tracks like a damn idiot, which didn't help. How was anyone supposed to find you?"

"That was the damn point. I was trying to make sure that these assholes didn't wind up in Alexandria," she said. "And you did find me, so it's fine."

"Almost didn't, though."

"Really?" her eyebrows shot up, a little smile twitched at the corners of her mouth.

"No need to look so smug."

"Listen, you're the best tracker in the whole wide world," she said. "And if you struggled to find us, then I must've done good. Right?"

"No, I ain't. But you did alright," I admitted, begrudgingly. There was an annoyingly satisfied silence. I looked at her again, tried not to get mad this time. "You disappeared, and I just... I... I-"

"Lost your damn mind?" she finished.

"Maybe," I admitted. It was hard to explain it to her. That fear that gripped me. The crushing weight of it. "We good?"

I thought she'd say yes. Maybe call me a dumbass. But she shrugged and said, "I dunno… are we?"

"Yeah," I said. "I mean... I am."

"I am too," she said with a shrug. "Just feels like you've been avoiding me is all."

"Nah," I lied. "Just... getting used to the new place, y'know. It's a lot."

"Yeah," she said, but she didn't sound convinced. "You sure I didn't do something wrong?"

"Other than giving me a heart attack today," I said. "No. You didn't."

At least that was the truth.

"Okay," she nodded. "If you say so."

We got back to the road. I opened the back door for her, and she moved the medical kit to the middle seat so that she could slip in. Lucas got in the other side, and I sat in the passenger seat next to Aaron again. I looked at Naomi's face in the rearview mirror as she stared out of the window on the journey back. Closer we got, the quieter she seemed to be. I thought about what Aaron had said about her being as messed up as me, and I think I saw a bit of it then. Like she only let it out when she thought nobody was paying attention. I wasn't sure anyone paid attention to her like I did.

But, what if I was wrong? Or, what if that changed? What if someone else turned her head? I couldn't risk being with her, but I also couldn't be sure I would be able to stand seeing her with anyone else. The anger I felt at the mere suggestion of it...it was shameful, really. What right did I have?

The whole car ride was quiet. Like we all knew that when it ended, we'd have to bring unexpectedly bad news to a group of people who were wholly unprepared to hear it. I knew Rick would come up with some kind of plan. And it would probably work.

But if it didn't... I was okay with that. As long as I had Naomi, as long as she was safe, I knew I could make anywhere home. And if one day someone came along who was good enough for her, I guess I'd just have to learn to live with that. 

Chapter 23: Asshole Brigade

Naomi

Daryl started his bike, looked back at me with a grin, "You ready?"

"Yeah…" I said, but I hesitated.

Since Lucas and I had run into the Wolves in the woods, Daryl hadn't been far from my side. I probably would've found it annoying if he hadn't spent the days before it doing the exact opposite. I couldn't think of much worse than when he'd been cold and distant. Having him hovering around wherever I went, haunting me like a sarcastically grunting ghost had been kind of nice. So I hadn't fought him on it when he'd told Rick that there was no way in hell I was doing anything other than getting on the back of his bike while he led the horde out of the Quarry. I'd thought I'd have time to come up with a way to suggest that it might not be the best use of manpower to have both of us on the same bike doing the same thing.

But here we were, having to put Rick's plan into action way faster than any of us had hoped because one of the trucks holding them in had fallen earlier than we'd expected. Daryl revved his engine. "What's up slowpoke, you got cold feet?"

"I just think I could be more useful elsewhere. Maybe…"

His smile dropped. He instantly knew what I was up to. "Get on the damn bike. We gotta lead these people outta here."

"Fine…" I didn't have time to argue with him, and we both knew it. I climbed on behind him.

"Hold on, girl," he said.

He was full of energy. Most I'd seen from him in a while. Having everyone out here, taking care of the new Walker problem, had given him a boost. He hadn't said anything, but I think being outside of Alexandria's walls, doing something productive with his group, made him feel like he had a purpose. A place with all of them again. He was happy enough for me to hold on to him without telling him off for calling me 'girl' because it was just so damn good to see him smiling like that.

He took us to where the truck had fallen, and a steady stream of Walkers was pouring out. He waited just long enough to make sure the ones at the front knew we were there and then kept a safe distance between them and us, leading them down a route we'd decided a few days before. I could tell Daryl was bored by how slow we had to go and wonder if that was the real reason he'd wanted some company on this thing.

It was such a comfortable speed that I could relax my grip on him, sit back on the bike a little. He glanced over his shoulder. "How you doing back there?"

"Good," I said. "Walker-stink is pretty bad in this heat, though, huh?"

"That what that is?" he said. "Thought that was you."

"Shut up," I said, pulling a face at his back. "You want any snacks?"

"You brought food?"

"You didn't?"

"This was supposed to be a dry run," he said. "We weren't meant to be out here that long."

"Well, it's a good job one of us came prepared then, huh?" I said and passed him a PowerBar out of my backpack.

"Thanks," he said, his mouth already full.

"Sasha and Abraham should be just over the next hill," I said. "Should I radio them?"

"Nah," he said, still seemed super relaxed. "Abraham talks too much, I like the quiet."

"Okay," I said and didn't point out that the Walkers behind us were still snarling away or that we'd been chatting the whole time.

Sasha's car was sitting close to the next turn in the road. It started up when we got close, and they drove along with us. We'd lined the route with these big barricades meant to stop any of them from getting off the path we wanted them on.

"Looks like those fences they used to put up when there was a marathon on," I commented. "Y'know the ones?"

"You ran a marathon?" Daryl asked.

"God, no," I said. "Just watched one once."

"Why?"

"Someone I'd been on a few dates with was running it," I said. "Kinda guilted me into going."

"Dumb thing to do," he grumbled. "Running for no reason."

"Agreed," I said. "Super boring to watch, too. You want any water?"

"Nah, I'm good," he said. A few miles down the road, we heard a car door open and close again. Daryl glanced back, "What was that?"

I turned around to see Abraham running out of the passenger side of Sasha's car. A few Walkers had wandered off into the woods.

"We lost a few of 'em," I said. "Abraham's just taking them out, maybe I should…"

I started to fiddle with the machine gun strapped to my back. "Don't you dare," Daryl barked.

"I just thought I could…"

"Get off this bike, and I'll feed you to the Walkers myself," he said.

Abraham was already on his way back to the car, so I let it go.

We drove for a few more miles, and then Sasha's voice crackled over the radio. "Alright."

I reached up to Daryl's shoulder, where our walkie was clipped and pressed it so he could talk, "That's 20?"

"It will be," Sasha said. "642 is a mile ahead. We've gotta put distance between us and them before the turnoff."

"So floor it," Abraham added.

"Alright," Daryl said. "Try to keep up."

"Daryl, have you looked at this car?" Sasha said. I felt Daryl laugh in my arms, and I smiled into his back. He was so relaxed. I let go of the walkie and turned around to wave at them in their rust-bucket of a car. Sasha waved back. Daryl turned his head slightly.

"You ready?" he said, so much anticipation and excitement in his voice that it caused a flutter in the pit of my own stomach.

"Yeah."

"You sure?" he said. "Might wanna hold a little tighter."

He sped up fast. My whole body automatically tensed, arms gripping him. I felt him laughing again, longer and harder than before. We turned a corner at full speed. I whooped in his ear, and he cursed at me for being too damn loud. The road we were on took us through the remains of somewhere that had probably once been an alright place to live. Nice houses. It could have been a little village. Or a suburb, maybe. Before I had the time to try and piece together where we were. A series of loud pops and bangs made me jump. I was so unprepared for them that for a second, I thought it might be Sasha and Abraham's car backfiring. But that wasn't it.

Gunshots. From nowhere.

Daryl swerved on the road.

"You okay?" he yelled back at me. I didn't answer right away, was too busy trying to see where they'd come from. I reached for the gun I had strapped to my back. "Naomi! Are you hit?"

"No, I'm fine," I told him. "You good?"

"Always."

Men shooting at us from the gaps between old houses blurred as Daryl tried to speed past them. I fired back, but it was damn hard from the back of a moving bike. Maybe Daryl's idea to have me on here with him wasn't so dumb after all. He wouldn't have been able to fire back if it weren't for me. Our small team wasn't alone on the roads anymore. Shots rang out from cars that were following Sasha and Abraham.

"The hell are these assholes?" I said, trying to get a good look at any of them. I wanted to see if they had marks on their foreheads like the Wolves Lucas and I had run into, but he was going too fast for me to see.

"I'm gonna have to drop the bike, Naomi," Daryl said over his shoulder. "Try and lose a few of them. You've gotta brace yourself, get ready to roll, yeah?"

"Daryl, it's fine," I tried to yell back. "If you keep steady, I think I can get some of them."

I kept shooting at them. A bullet grazed my arm, and I made the mistake of crying out. I felt Daryl react to it immediately.

"No. Fuck that," he said. "You ready? On three. One, two, three."

I felt his body tense, and the bike tipped, swinging toward the ground. I let myself let go of the bike, let it slip away from me as the ground rushed up to hit me in the back. I scraped along the concrete, felt the wind get pushed right out of me. Dazed, I stared at the sky for a moment.

"You alright?" Daryl called to me.

"Yeah," I said, although I'd hardly had time to check myself over. I sat up. Daryl was back on his feet again, back with his bike. I reached out to where my gun had fallen a few feet away from me.

"Stay here," he told me, and I realized with a flash of anger what his plan had been all along. "Stay low. I'll draw them off."

"Daryl!" I yelled after him, trying to scramble to my feet and get to the bike before he could take off without me. "Get back here!"

"Stay here. Stay safe," Daryl said, starting his bike up again. "I'll lead them away and then come back and find you."

"Daryl, don't you dare!" I yelled, but he was gone, roaring off with a cloud of dirt behind him and the car of assholes on his tail. I ducked down behind an abandoned car as they passed me by. I filled my lungs and screamed, "Asshole!" to the heavens, but I wasn't sure if it was aimed at Daryl or the people chasing him. If I'm brutally honest, it felt like both.

The sound of engines faded and eventually disappeared. The silence was awful. I felt it swallow me whole and spit me out the other side. The world had never felt so big, and I had never felt so small and angry. How could Daryl just leave me like this?

The anger burned me up pretty quick. And when it cleared, there was nothing but fear. Dark and bottomless, stretching out underneath me for every second he was away. Like the bottom of the world was dropping out under my feet. I moved to get a better view of the road he'd taken. Seconds dragged by like hours. No sign of Daryl.

I heard hushed voices behind me, and carefully treading footsteps in the mud. I pressed myself into the ground and peeked under the car at two approaching sets of boots. I heard the crackle of a radio. Sasha and Abraham, looking for us. I wondered what the hell had happened to their car. I got up so they could see me, half expecting bullets to come flying from nearby windows. Abraham caught the movement out of the corner of his eye and turned on me, gun raised and trigger finger poised. He stood down when he saw it was me.

"Over here," I called to them in the loudest whisper I dared. They hurried over and crouched down next to me.

"Where's Daryl?" Sasha asked.

"He went that way," I told them, pointing in the direction he'd gone in.

"He ditched you?" Abraham asked. The way he said it kind of stung.

"Yeah, said he wanted to draw them off," I said, still fuming about it. "You guys stay here in case he comes back, I'm going to find him. And if he does come back, you tell him from me that he's a dead man."

"Wait," Sasha grabbed me by the wrist, pulled me back down.

"Let me go," I warned her. I'd break her damn arms if she tried to hold me back any more.

"Not until we know what's going on," she said. "There aren't enough people around to just wait around for somebody to ambush. And they couldn't have just been watching us, not with what we were doing."

I hadn't given much thought to who these people were or why they'd done what they'd done. Truth was, I didn't much care. All I cared about was that Daryl had ridden off into a cloud of dust with them hot on his heels.

"Nah, they were looking to chew up someone in particular," Abraham agreed. "Whoever the hell they were."

Sasha pulled her walkie out of her back pocket, "Daryl, you copy?"

Nothing but static crackled back at her. Where the hell was he?

"Dollars to doughnuts he's on his way back to Alexandria now," Abraham said.

"He said he'd be back," I said, shaking my head. "And he ain't."

"He wouldn't leave us behind," Sasha agreed.

"He already did," Abraham said. I felt the hairs on the back of my neck rise like the hackles of an angry dog.

"Shut your damn mouth," I said. "If he said he'll be back, he will."

"You wanna go look for him?" he said like it was a dumb idea.

"The best way to find a tracker is to stay put," Sasha said. "Let him find you."

"Screw that," I said, standing up. "He could be hurt out there. What if they caught up with him?"

Sasha reached up and tugged me back down again. "Will you stay low?" she hissed.

"If she wants to go off on some damn suicide mission," Abraham said. "Let her. We can't just sit here."

"Alright," Sasha said. I could see her cracking under the stress of trying to come up with a plan that would keep both of us from ripping each other's throats out. She looked at me. "Daryl said he'd find you. So he will. Just give him time."

"Alright then," I said and sat down.

"But…" she said, with a glance at Abraham. "We gotta move someplace safer."

"No. Daryl said to wait here," I said. "So I will sit on this damn patch of road and wait until either he comes back or I'm dead. You're welcome to sit with me or not."

"We know he's looking for us," she said. "So we'll make sure we're easy to track. Alright?"

"No," I said, but she'd already stood up. She made a footprint in a patch of mud that pointed in the direction she was heading in. Abraham stood up and followed her. She looked back over her shoulder at me.

"Give him time," she said. "But we gotta stay safe too."

I looked around. The buildings were quiet, but this place was pretty exposed. The car hid me from the view of anyone coming on the road, but if the assholes who'd ambushed us looked out any of the windows, I'd be a sitting duck.

"If he ain't found us soon," I said, standing up. "I'm going after him."

"Fine," she said like she was giving in to the demands of an unreasonable child. "But please, come with us for now."

We walked a little way into town, covering every gap we could see in case the men with guns were still there. Lurking in the spaces between buildings. There was nothing. It was an eerily quiet contrast to the bursts of gunfire that had come before. If Daryl hadn't still been missing, I might've thought the whole thing had been a dream.

Sasha stopped by the door of an open building, took out a knife, and handed it to me. "We'll camp out here for a bit," she said. "Scratch his name on the door. I'm going to stop this idiot from leaving unwanted breadcrumbs."

She nodded to where Abraham was aiming his gun at a Walker stumbling down the street away from us. If the assholes with guns came back, we didn't want a trail of dead Walkers leading them right to our door. Sasha went to remind him of this, while I started to write 'Daryl' but only got as far as the 'D.' I suddenly worried that if this ambush had been meant for us, and those people had been watching everything we were doing, they might recognize his name. So I wrote 'Dumbass' and knew that he'd know it was from me. He'd be able to find us with even less than we'd given him, but that didn't stop my heart from racing or my hands from getting weirdly sweaty. Felt like a part of me was missing.

Sasha led us into the dark of the office building, and we swept the shadows for any Walkers. There was only one, already trapped behind the locked glass door of a conference room, eternally stuck in whatever his last meeting had been. Sure that we were safe, we spread out across the room. I went to the window and piled up a stack of old filing boxes, giving me somewhere to sit while I looked down at the street and listened for the sound of a distant bike. It had been too long. The sun was getting low in the sky, and the lengthening shadows sent a chill down my spine. What the hell was I doing just sitting on my ass?

"It's almost dark," I said. "I gotta go look for him."

"No," Sasha said immediately. "If he doesn't make it back in time, you know he'll find somewhere safe for the night and pick up our trail in the morning."

"Yeah, or he's already back in Alexandria all tucked up," Abraham said. I could've smacked him in his big, dumb, ginger face.

"I should've gone after him," I said. "Shouldn't have listened to you dumbasses."

"You wanna go out there and get yourself killed?" Abraham said. "Be my guest."

"Stop," Sasha said to both of us. "We are staying here. Do you want to stand watch or sleep? Your choice."

"I ain't sleeping," I said. How could I possibly relax enough to sleep with Daryl still out there? "You guys might as well get some shut-eye."

"Not so close to the window," Abraham warned me. "Someone might see."

That was the damn point. I wanted Daryl to see if he came by. I wanted to see him too. But I knew he wasn't the 'someone' Abraham was thinking about.

"Nobody but the dead out there now," I said, but I shut the blinds so I wouldn't be quite so obvious if they guys who'd been shooting at us came back. The Walker in the conference room banged on the glass door.

"You have no idea how much I want to release that thing from this plane of existence," Abraham said, glaring at it. "Is this our new home? Should we give him a name?"

"You got yourself into this," Sasha said. I was surprised by how calm she could stay with Abraham intent on picking a fight with every living and once-living thing he laid eyes on. "I was driving that car solo until you chose to come with."

That was news to me, I'd just assumed that Rick had assigned them to work together.

"Oh, I didn't have a choice there," he said.

"Tell me why."

"You going stag was not an option. And Dixon was too hell-bent on having this one on his damn bike for her to go with you."

I flipped him off, didn't have enough brain capacity for any kind of witty retort. I looked back out at the darkening street, my stomach twisting as I tried not to think about how long Daryl had been out there on his own, or why he hadn't made it back yet.

"Tell me why," Sasha repeated.

"You were out of control for a good while there," he said.

"I'm in control now," she said so calmly it had to be true.

"Me too."

I snorted with laughter. Abraham always seemed about two seconds from blowing his lid in any given situation.

"That's why you wanna kill that Walker?" Sasha said. "The one down the street? The guys in the car? 'Cause you're in control?"

"'Cause loose ends make my ass itch," he said. "If I have not gotten my psyche situated straight, it's because the shit's continually been hitting the fan without respite."

"Oh, there's been a respite," Sasha said. "There was a party."

"Oh, I remember that," he said with a tone like neither of them had enjoyed Deanna's dumb welcome party.

"You jump out of an airplane, you don't have choices after that," Sasha said. "Maybe you play some chicken with the ground, but you pull the ripcord, you live. But if you have a roof over your head, you have food, you have walls… you have choices. And without Walkers and bullets and shit hitting the fan, you're accountable for them. I mean, hell, you're always accountable. It's just with all that other noise, you know people won't notice. Stand watch or sleep?"

"The former," he said and stood up from where he'd been leaning on a nearby filing cabinet. "Straight through the night. We'll reassess in the morning."

"What do you mean?" Sasha asked, but he was already walking out of the room.

"What the hell we're doing here," he muttered. We heard him stomp off, further into the office building.

"You want the radio?" Sasha offered it to me. "In case Daryl gets in touch?"

I nodded and took it from her. Turned it over and over in my hands, just waiting to hear his voice again. After a while, holding it like that became too much. Made everything worse. So I pulled my knees up and balanced on the top of them. Switched between staring at it and staring out the window. I could feel Sasha watching me, but I was way too anxious to get self-conscious about it.

"You two really care about each other, huh?" she said. I nodded.

"It's always been that way," I said. "Since we was little. He was all I had."

He still was, I'd trade all of Alexandria to ensure his safety, but I didn't want to tell her that because I knew how reckless it would make me sound.

"My brother, Tyreese, he was all I had for a while," she said, her eyes kind of misted over, which was how I knew he was dead. And pretty recently too. "One of those big brothers that really tries to protect everyone, y'know? Even though he didn't always have the stomach for what needed to get done. He was a total pacifist, always trying to get to a peaceful resolution, even when it was clear there wasn't one to be had. It was frustrating. Always so… optimistic. Meant I had to be the realist, just to protect him."

"That must've been hard," I said. I could kind of relate. Shielding Mia from things sometimes meant taking on more shit.

"It was," she said. "But he was my brother. I did it because I had to. Drove me nuts, but I always kind of admired that he had the strength to stay who he was before all of this. I sure haven't."

"Yeah, that takes a special kind of person," I agreed, not wanting to point out that her ability to adapt was probably what had helped her get this far. "What happened to him?"

"He got bit," she said. "Nothing I could do about it. Just… happened."

"Sorry to hear that," I said.

"Thanks," she said and managed a small smile. "Tyreese was always kind of a hero to me. Even when he was annoying me. Followed him everywhere when we were little, copied everything he did. Probably what made it so easy to follow him when all of this started. I could just… trust that he'd do what's right."

I nodded, and thought about how Daryl had followed Merle around when they were kids, wished he'd had a brother more like Sasha's to follow around instead. And then I wondered how Mia felt about following me in all of this when I'd let her down so badly. At least following Merle had kept Daryl alive.

"He like a brother to you?" she asked, interrupting my train of thought. "Daryl? Or…?"

"Um… No." I felt my face getting a little warm. I'd never thought about it like that, or been asked so directly. Usually, people started with the 'Or…?', the other option, the one she'd trailed off at. And it was easier to answer that way round. No, Daryl and I were not together and never had been. It was so clear cut and simple. And people dropped it after that, made their own assumptions or whatever.

But was he like a brother to me? Also no.

Daryl had always just been… well, Daryl to me.

"But, you guys have never….?"

"No," I said. I thought I'd be happier to have something more straightforward and familiar to answer, but I wasn't. Sasha's questions had really thrown me into a weird tailspin. We'd always reserved physical affection for only when it was needed and unavoidable. But was that because the thought of being together in that way was repulsive and weird? Had we never crossed that line because we didn't want to? Or something else?

"I love my sister," I said. "And I took care of her because I had to. She's blood and I knew that if I didn't, nobody else would. But Daryl… he's a survivor. I know he can take care of himself."

Sasha gave me a little smile. "You can say that again."

"With Daryl, it's like… I need to know he's okay," I said. "And I need to know he ain't just surviving. I want him to have the best damn life he can because he's been through enough. Caring about him was never a choice I made. Or an obligation. It's just… what's right. Family can really fuck you up, and you don't get to choose 'em. Daryl's the family I chose a long time ago, and who I'll keep choosing. He makes me see things different. See myself different."

Ever since I could remember, there had been so many things about the world that I'd wanted to change. And I'd thought that working hard in school was the best way to go about it. To get people to listen to me about the cracks in the education system, the justice system, the care system. Churning out article after article about breaking cycles of violence or addiction. Every case of prison reform I'd investigated, every story I'd told about poor folks swept up in the drug trade in an attempt to humanize them. It had all stemmed from wanting to change his world, build him a safe one. One where he could be happy. Like I could somehow undo everything that had been done to him.

"So… whatever that means," I said, realizing I hadn't really answered her questions despite giving it more honest thought that I ever had. "That's what Daryl is to me."

Sasha was quiet for a moment. Then she said, "Few days before I lost Tyreese, I lost Bob."

"Bob?"

"He made me see the world different too," she said, and although she was sad, she had this brilliant smile on her face. "He could take any situation and find the positive. No matter how bad. And I… I was the hard opposite. I assumed everything that was happening would be the worst-case scenario."

"Easy done," I said. "Everything is often absolute shit."

"Agreed," she nodded. "And I thought I'd find it really annoying that Bob couldn't see, but I didn't. I liked hearing him find the good in the bad. Helped me find it too. It made me think that I'd always wanted to find it but just hadn't known how to look, y'know?"

"Was Bob a friend, or…?"

"Boyfriend, I guess," she said. "If that kind of thing still exists these days. It's not like we went on dates or met each other's parents, but… we loved each other."

I nodded, studied her face. She wasn't paying me much attention, her thoughts had taken her to some far off place. The only place that Bob or Tyreese existed now. "What Abraham said… about you being out of control. It because you lost them?"

"Yeah," she nodded. "But I'm okay now. It doesn't stop hurting, but the world keeps turning.

"Sure does," I said, although it seemed impossible. I wondered what I'd do if Mia and Daryl stayed missing forever… could I be as strong as she was about it? Talking about him had made me less angry that he was gone, but it had made me a thousand times sadder. Where the hell was he? Why wasn't he back yet?

I watched every hour of the night pass from that window, and I'd be willing to bet it was the longest night of my life. Sasha fell asleep just after it got properly dark. I curled up with the radio close to my chest, alone in the dark, occasionally testing the button. Sometimes I'd say his name quietly into the receiver. Sometimes I just wanted to check it still worked. "Daryl," I said, quietly enough that it wouldn't wake Sasha. "If you can hear me… if you're out there… if you're hurt… I'm coming for you, okay? Just stay safe."

When the first ray of sunshine hit the top of the building opposite us, I jumped down from my perch and woke up Sasha. My legs were stiff and sore from having been in the same position all night.

"It's morning," I told her. "I gotta find him."

"Please don't," she said, her voice still thick with sleep. She rubbed her eyes. "I don't want to be the one who has to tell him that we lost you."

"You won't have to," I said. "I'll find him, and I'll bring him back here. Just wait for us."

"Naomi…" she sighed, but I was already heading for the door. I turned to her, "I left you the walkie. Radio us if you get in trouble."

"Maybe you should…"

"Won't need it!" I said. "I'll have Daryl'."

I gave her a wave and heard her sigh as I bounded out of the door. I think something about the lack of sleep and sitting in the same position for what must have been about six straight hours, gave me this massive burst of energy now that I was finally able to get up and do something.

Stepping outside of the office building, the world had never felt so big.

I made my way back to where I'd last seen him riding off into the woods. I listened for the sound of cars, in case the ambushers came back. I listened harder for the sound of a bike. I walked the path he must have driven down. Every step I took, my heartbeat more violently in my chest.

What if he wasn't here?

What if I never found him?

What if he was dead?

My chest felt like it was filling with water. I stopped and forced myself to take a few deep breaths. I tried to remember everything Daryl had ever told me about tracking. I was dizzy and queasy. I looked down at the ground by the side of the road to steady myself and saw tire tracks in the mud. Very faint but running as if someone had ridden a bike from one side of the road to the other. I looked further down the road ahead of me. Saw a bend not far down. If you were trying to throw people off your trail, this would be a smart place to do it.

I can do this.

He'd hidden out and turned off into the woods, I was sure of it. But why hadn't he come back? This wasn't that far from where we'd been. I knew which way the tire tracks ran, Daryl had taught me how to read that. I could follow them. They lead me deeper into the woods. And then they changed. He'd gotten off and pushed it. I could see his footsteps. I looked down at them, did my best not to cry.

Where are you?

It looked like the ground had been scorched. I saw a body in leathers lying in the mud, and for a second, I felt like I was about to throw up. It moved a little. I heard a snarl, and my heart sank. Then I saw their helmet.

Not Daryl.

It was the first time in my life I'd been glad he wasn't wearing one. But there was an imprint of a body in the mud beside it. Big enough to be Daryl. Maybe. But he wasn't there now.

I kept walking. It felt like my legs were made of lead, all of my previous energy was eaten up by new despair. Nothing in the woods but the gentle snarl from the dead biker and birdsong in the trees.

And then a gunshot. Loud. Close. I ran towards it. Far as I could remember, Daryl didn't have a gun. Just his crossbow.

The silence in the forest was broken again by the deep rumble of a bike. It had to be Daryl. It just had to. I caught sight of it, moving in the distance and ran to head it off. It was his bike. But it wasn't him on it.

A man and a woman. They looked tired and dirty and scared. I didn't recognize them from any of the people that had shot at us before. I checked their foreheads, but neither of them had the dumb 'W' symbol there. So where the hell had they come from?

I stepped out in front of them. Watched them skid to a halt.

"Where'd you get that bike?" I nodded at it. The woman on the back hid her face in the guy's shoulders. Daryl's crossbow was slung over hers. "Where is he?"

I raised my pistol. When she saw it, the woman on the back of his bike lifted her own and pointed it at me. Her hands shook a little, and her eyes were afraid, I didn't think she'd had much practice in firing one. Certainly not to kill.

"Don't know what you're talking about," the man said. But he started up the bike again, a look in his eye that told me he was a damn shitty liar. I walked around to stand by the woman who was pointing her shaking pistol at me. I pressed mine right to the base of her skull and heard her whimper.

"He alive?" I asked, staring her down. She blinked a couple of times, and I thought she was about to burst into tears.

"We're sorry," she whispered.

"He's alive," the guy nodded. "Back there."

He pointed through the trees. I let his girl go, and he immediately sped off through the trees. "If you're lying, I'll find you!" I yelled after them, firing a few warning shots over their heads. I watched them duck. "I'll slice you open and gut you like fish. You're gonna wish you'd never-"

"Quit screaming," Daryl's voice behind me almost brought me to my knees. "You'll bring Walkers out."

The sound of the bike engine faded into the distance. I wondered if I'd imagined his voice and if everything I was feeling had pulled his ghost out of the woods. But no. There he was. Walking towards me through the trees. Bare arms and bleeding.

I yelled his name, despite what he'd just said. I couldn't help it. It just burst out of me like my throat was on fire, and his name was the only thing that could soothe it. My relief at seeing him alive turned to anger real fast. "What the fuck was that?"

"Some assholes took my bike, that's what," he said. "Took my crossbow too, so I hope you ain't wasted too many of them bullets firing damn warning shots."

"Not that," I said. "Why the hell did you chuck me off in the first place?"

"Keep you safe," he said, picking his way over some tree roots snaking down the verge in front of him.

"You thought flinging me off a damn bike was safer than staying together?" I stormed towards him.

"Safer than you getting shot at," he shrugged. "You're alive, ain't you?"

"You are too," I pointed out. "Could've stayed alive together."

"Ain't risking anything on a could've," he said. "What's your nose all bent out of shape about?"

"You can't fight with me about sitting on the back of your damn bike if you're just gonna throw me off at the first sign of trouble!" I said, glaring at him as we got closer to each other. He didn't respond, just kind of glowered darkly at me like he wanted to disagree but didn't have the guts. There was fire sitting in my chest, and it was making my lungs tight like they were all filled with smoke. "We used to be a team, Daryl. What happened to that?"

"What?" he said. "We are a team."

"You don't even trust me to sit on the back of your damn bike."

"Trust's got nothing to do with it," he snapped but didn't elaborate.

"I got your back, Daryl."

"I know you do," he said. "And that was fine back when it was just assholes at school. Now the assholes have guns, and some of them are dead and want to eat your damn flesh."

"You think I haven't noticed all that?" I said. "You think I survived long enough to get to Alexandria on pure dumb luck?"

"No…," he admitted reluctantly.

"You think I'm that stupid, huh?" I snapped.

"You're the smartest person I know," he said. "I just… I already lost you once, and I ain't doing that again."

"Well, I ain't losing you again, either," I told him. "You think trying to find you in these damn woods has been fun? You think I ain't been worried out of my damn mind about you?"

"Oh, you think I don't know what that's like?" he said. "When someone just takes off and goes missing in the damn woods? Yeah, I got no idea about that, Naomi!"

I stopped walking. A twist of guilt hit my stomach. I guess he did know what that was like. He knew very well what it was like. The frantic searching. The fear that every Walker you passed was them.

"I'm just trying to keep you safe for fuck's sake!" he said.

"I don't want that," I said. "I don't need you to decide what's best for me. You want me on your bike? You want me on your team? Fine. But you gotta let me fight. What's the point of having each other's backs if you're just gonna leave?"

"Fine," he snapped.

"Fine," I snapped back.

We stood opposite each other now, inches away and breathing hard. I still felt mad for someone who'd just reached an agreement. I felt a whole lot of things. I pulled him close. Felt the familiar comfort of his body against mine. His arms around me in a tight hug. After a moment, I felt him laugh at me too.

"What you laughing at?" I grumbled into his shoulder.

"You were really worried about me, huh?"

"'Course I was, dumbass." I took a small step back, moved my head so I could look at him without letting go of where my arms rested on his shoulders. "You ever take off on me like that again, and I swear you better not come back because I will rain holy hell down on you, do you hear me?"

He was still laughing at me a little, "Yes, ma'am."

"Okay, good." I let go of him.

"For what it's worth," he said. "Probably could've used your help with those assholes."

I stopped myself from saying I told you so because I didn't want him doubling back on what we'd just agreed.

"From now on," I said, looking him dead in the eye so he couldn't squirm out of it or lie to me. "Whatever we face, we face it together."

"Deal."

"Let me see your arms," I said now that our yelling match was over.

"It ain't so bad," he said, trying to dismiss me. He held up some bandages. "They left me with these, at least."

I reached for them, "Let me."

"Nah it's fine, I'll do 'em," he said, trying to brush me off.

"Like hell you will," I said and snatched them off him. Daryl cared about himself just enough to stay alive, but I didn't trust that it was enough to patch himself up right. "Stand still."

He put on his usual show of sighing and muttering. But he didn't bat me away again. He moved closer, so it was easier.

"Wish I had something better to clean these with," I lamented as I poured the contents of my water bottle onto his cuts.

"They're fine," he told me. "You best be saving that water for yourself."

"It's my water supply, I'll do what I want with it," I told him. He sighed. I could feel him looking at me, and it was distracting.

"You ever get tired of patching me up?" he asked.

"No," I said. It was second nature to me at this point. I knew how much pressure on a wound he could handle, and the face he involuntarily pulled when it was too much, but he didn't want me to know about. I'd always hoped that getting out of his dad's place would mean he'd end up with fewer scrapes and bruises, but that wasn't him. All I wanted in this world was to keep Daryl safe, but he wouldn't stop putting himself in harm's way for the people he cared about, that much was clear. I felt a familiar deep pain. Like my heart was as torn up as his arms.

Wherever he went, I would be there to keep him together.

"Who were they?" I asked, in an attempt to distract both of us from the blush I could already feel creeping into my cheeks.

"They were just… scared," he said. "They were running from somebody. Never really said who."

"Think they were who the ambush was meant for?" I asked.

"Probably," he shrugged. "These guys came into the woods this morning, looking for them in these big cars… we got away okay, though."

"Did you get a good look at any of them?" I asked.

"Yeah," he said, and then because he could so often tell what I was thinking, he answered a question I didn't have to ask. "None of them 'W's, though. Different group."

That was a huge relief. It had been a few days since Lucas and I had run into them, and they'd left their latest Walker uncomfortably close to Alexandria. He watched as I put a bandage over one of his worst wounds. I didn't have enough to cover all of them, so the more superficial ones would have to wait until we got back.

"I almost brought them back to Alexandria," he said.

"Really? Why?"

"There were three of them," he said. "The chick had a little sister. She needed insulin. They'd clearly been running with shitty people, just doing things because they was scared. And now they'd broken free and were trying to make it on their own. The sister died. I just… thought they might be alright in Alexandria. Might be able to rebuild themselves."

"What went wrong?"

"They pointed a gun at me and took my shit," he said. "So next time I see them, they're dead."

"I find those assholes I'm going to tear them apart with my teeth," I muttered. I'd thought my homicidal thoughts about Daryl's dad had just been because we were kids, and he was an adult who was supposed to love him. I looked up at him, caught him smiling, like what I'd said amused him, but I'd been dead serious. Looking at him now, I knew it wasn't just his dad. I'd kill anyone who meant him harm.

He smiled at me, and I felt a little rush of something in the pit of my stomach. Maybe it was relief at finding him alive, or how familiar that smile was. Maybe it was more than that. It felt like nerves. Like I was standing on the edge of something huge and trying not to fall.

I was overthinking everything, and now I stood in front of a stranger with a familiar face.

One I could not look away from.

Damn Sasha for opening this can of worms.

The way he held me in his gaze. He could look at me like nobody else in the world. When we were kids, I'd thought it was just because all we had was each other. But now he had a whole other family. And that look in his eyes was the same.

He wasn't a kid anymore, either. Neither of us were.

The future we'd spent so long talking about, planning for, this was it. We'd arrived. It looked nothing like either of us had imagined, but that felt okay. Because he was here with me. And that was infinitely better than any future where he wasn't.

And there it was. The reason I never let myself get too close to Daryl. It wasn't worth messing up what we already had by messing around with each other. He was too important.

"You alright?" he asked. "I got something on my face?"

"No," I said. I let go of him, took a few steps back. "I mean… yeah, you got some mud and blood on you, but when don't you?"

He wiped his grubby face with an even grubbier hand. It did nothing. I forced myself to look back down at his arms so I could fix on the last bandage he had. Had they always been this muscular? I could feel his eyes on me again, giving me that goddamn look.

"Okay," I took a quick step backward. Distance from him felt safe now. Let my heartbeat settle down. I hadn't even realized it had been racing. "You're done."

"Alright," he said. "Let's find a vehicle and get you home, weirdo."

We walked slowly back out of the woods. I thought he'd be more pissed off and antsy about having lost both his bike and crossbow in one fell swoop. But he seemed content, almost happy, to wander in the woods with me. Talking about nothing in particular. We walked so close to each other that the back of my hand brushed against his. I thought about what it would be like to just reach out and take it. To walk with him like that, without one of us needing to be in horrible pain or danger for it to feel acceptable.

And I didn't know how I felt about it, or what to say. So I didn't say anything.

 

 

Daryl

"Did you know Abraham was the one who insisted he get in the car with Sasha?" Naomi asked as she hopped up into the front of the fuel tank we'd found. I pushed some vines out of the way and climbed into the driver's seat. "Rick had her riding solo."

"Actually," I said. "Rick had her riding with you. But I said no."

"Why wasn't I asked?" she looked predictably indignant. Eyes narrowed at me like she was warning me not to lie to her.

"Didn't want to give you that choice, I thought you'd ditch me."

"Ah," she said. "So you could ditch me instead? Nice."

I'd walked right into that one. "I told you, I was try-"

"Trying to keep me safe," she finished like she was bored of hearing it. "I know."

She sat back, sunlight from the window streaming in and hitting her face. I noticed how tired she looked, and she stretched her shoulders out like it was the first time she'd relaxed them in a while. I thought about suggesting she get some shut-eye now, but knowing her deep aversion to being told what to do, I swallowed it back.

"Why do you think he did it?" she asked.

"Did what?"

"Insisted on going with Sasha?"

"Probably just looking out for her," I said, trying to get the car to start.

"Didn't realize they were close," she said, reaching over to help me fiddle with the wires.

"They ain't," I said, the engine coughed and then came back to life. Naomi sat back in her seat again. I looked around to try and work out the best way to navigate us out of the damn bush that had grown around it while it had been sitting here. "Think he's got a thing for her, though."

"Really? Thought he was with Rosita?"

"He is."

"Then how do you know…?"

"He wanted to be in that car to make sure she was safe," I said, too distracted by trying to reverse out of the damn weeds and branches to realize that I might be revealing more about myself more than Abraham. "You don't want to keep an eye on someone like that unless you really care. The respect he's got for her, the value he puts on what she says… the way he looks at her. It's different from how he is with Rosita."

I'd got us out onto the open road, and now I could feel her looking at me, studying me like she was seeing me in a whole new light.

"That's very astute of you, Daryl," she said. The way she said it was almost suspicious. "Didn't know you paid attention to that kind of thing."

"Got eyes, don't I?" I said, doing my very best to keep them on the road.

"I guess," she said.

"So, where am I going?" I asked.

"Back to where you threw me in the dirt," she said. I wondered if she'd ever stop holding it against me. "It ain't far from there, but I can direct you. We left you a few markers, actually. In case you were tracking us."

"So, you could've just waited for me to come and find you instead of coming all the way out here like a damn fool?"

"I tried waiting," she said. "Didn't like it."

Of course, you didn't.

There was a comfortable silence. Naomi rolled down the window on the passenger side, looking out at the passing trees.

"You think he should tell her?" I asked.

"Who?"

"Abraham," I said. "You think he should tell Sasha how he feels?"

"If that's how he feels, you mean," she said. Then she gave it some thought. "No."

"Why?" I asked. Felt my heart turn over. "Because it'll make their friendship weird if she don't feel the same?"

"No," she gave me a weird look. "Because he's still with Rosita. That ain't fair on her. Ain't fair on Sasha, either."

"Yeah, I guess." This really didn't help me gauge her opinion on whether or not one friend telling another that they had feelings for them was a good idea. "What if they broke up?"

"Then yeah, sure," she said, but she didn't sound super convinced. "Although, she told me about this guy, Bob-"

"Yeah, I knew Bob," I said. "How'd that come up?"

She looked away from me, out of the window. Something made her uncomfortable. "Don't remember. It just did."

I knew it was a lie, but I wasn't sure why she'd lie about it.

"Well, what did she say about him?"

"Just that they'd been together," she said with a shrug. "And that she'd really loved him. It sounded like she's had a hard time letting go. So… I don't know if she'd be ready to start something new."

"Maybe not," I said. This was now wildly out of the realm of anything I actually wanted to ask.

"Abraham should be so lucky to get a girl like Sasha. She's great, I like her. Hey, she ain't married to Maggie too, is she?"

She grinned at me, mocking me for the time I'd mildly freaked out about how quickly she'd taken a liking to Glenn. I rolled my eyes at her, "No, she ain't. So if Abraham bottles it, you can always ask her out instead."

"Great," she settled back into the seat, still smiling to herself. "Take a left here."

I'd known that, but I'd been distracted. I turned, passed the place where I'd left her on the road, and caught sight of what looked like two footprints in the mud close by. "Let me guess… that way?"

I pointed in the same direction they did. She nodded. "There's a building just up here…."

I noticed a metal door with the word 'Dumbass' had been scratched into it with some kind of blade. I pulled up and parked opposite it. The blinds on the second story were closed, but I saw them move like there might have been people looking out from behind them.

"That for me?" I asked, pointing at the word on the door.

"'Course it is," she said and opened up the passenger door to jump down. I climbed out the other side and went to stand next to her as we waited for the other two to come and join us.

The door opened, and Sasha and Abraham walked out, blinking in the sunlight.

"Looks like Abraham had time to do some shopping," I said, noticing his brand-new dress blues like he was some kind of marine. He also had a huge-ass bag slung over his shoulder that I was sure he hadn't been carrying before.

"Looks like a fucking dumbass," she muttered, raising her hand to shield her eyes from the sun as we watched them walk out of the office block.

"Not a fan of a guy in uniform?"

"Not particularly," she said. "Looks like Sasha might be, though…"

She raised her eyebrows with a less-than-subtle nod of her head to where they walked together. Sasha had a smile on her face that only seemed to get wider every time she glanced at him.

"Told you so," I said. Naomi stuck her tongue out at me but didn't say anything else because they were close enough to be in earshot.

"Found him then?" Abraham called over to her.

"Told you I would," she said, with a relaxed shrug. Like it had been no big deal. Like she hadn't been screaming like a banshee in the woods. Hadn't looked at me with a mix of rage and relief when she'd found me again. Hadn't held me tighter than I think she ever had before.

"Well, you'll never guess what we found," he said with a smug-ass grin.

"What?"

"Motherfucking RPGs," he said and held the bag he was carrying over his head like he'd won some kinda trophy.

"No way," I walked towards him, and he unzipped the bag so I could take a look. "They work?"

"Don't see why they wouldn't," he said.

"Alright, get them in the back," I said, taking him round to the back of the fuel truck and opening it up for him to stash them inside.

"You got fuel in here too?" Abraham said. "Shit, is this our lucky day or what?"

"Let's get this haul back," I said. His enthusiasm was infectious. We'd successfully lead a horde away from Alexandria, evaded an ambush, and were returning with weapons and fuel. It certainly felt like a damn good day.

It was cramped in the front with all of us, Naomi's thigh squished against mine and we had the windows down to stop it from getting too sweaty. I picked up the radio from the dashboard.

"Rick, you copy? Anybody?"

A garbled voice on the radio cut across the static.

"Say it again?"

"Help,"

"Who was that?" Abraham asked, sitting up straight.

"Weren't Rick," I said, and tried contacting them again. "Hello? Anyone out there?"

Nothing.

A bend in the road and I slowed down. A group of guys on bikes was blocking the way. Didn't look like no accident, either. They'd been waiting for us. How long had they been watching?

"Daryl?" Sasha sat up straighter.

"Yeah, I see it," I said, but there was fuck all I could do about it now.

"What in the holy shit?" Abraham asked.

I slowed to a stop in front of them. None of us got out of the vehicle.

"Why don't you come on out?" the guy at the front said. "Join us on the road? You know, if you wanna resist, try something… I mean, it's a choice, I guess. But we will end your asses, split you right in two, straight through to the sinuses. So, come on."

There were far more of them than there were of us. Even if we tried to turn and get away, I knew most of the bikes were faster than I could get this truck to go. And we'd left the damn RPGs in the back. I switched the engine off, fought the impulse to tell Naomi to stay put. Not just because I knew she wouldn't take kindly to it, but also because I wanted her close. So I could protect her if these assholes tried anything. She gave me a look like she was warning me against giving her any kind of orders.

From now on, whatever we face. We face it together.

I opened the doors, heard Abraham do the same on his side. I stepped out, waited for Naomi to slide across the seat, and held a hand out to help her down. She jumped without taking it.

"Yeah, that's great," the Commander of the Asshole Brigade said. "It's going well right out of the gate. Now step two, hand over your weapons."

"Why should we?" I asked.

"Well, they're not yours," he said, which I took to mean this asshole now thought they were his.

"What?" Abraham said.

"See… your weapons, your truck, the fuel in your truck, if you got mints in your glove compartment, if you got porn underneath the seats, change in the seats... Hell, the seats themselves, the floor mats, your maps, the little stash of emergency napkins you got there in the console, none of those things are yours anymore."

"Whose are they?" Sasha asked.

"Your property now belongs to Negan," he stepped forward with a long dramatic pause like that should mean shit to any of us." And if you can get your hands on a taker, you're people our person wants to know. So let's get those sidearms, shall we? Right now."

He walked up to me. I handed over the pistol from my back pocket. Then he wandered over to Naomi. I saw her glaring at him, prayed that she wasn't about to mouth off. She glanced at me, seemed to get what I was thinking, and I saw her swallow some kind of retort. Thank God. She handed her weapons over, and he moved on to Sasha, thanking them both for their surrender. Abraham stared him down.

"If you have to eat shit," King of the Assholes said, "best not to nibble. Bite, chew, swallow, repeat. It goes quicker."

Abraham handed his gun over, but I could feel like rage coming out of him like he was radioactive.

"Who are you people?" Sasha asked as he turned to walk back to his bike.

"I get the curiosity," he said, "but we have questions ourselves. And we'll be the ones asking them while we drive you back to wherever it is you call home. Take a gander at where you hang your hats."

Naomi stepped forward. I don't even think she meant to, it just sort of happened. There was a look on her face I hadn't seen before. This frozen kind of panic in her eyes, cold and hard as steel. I reached out, grabbed her by the wrist. Didn't want her stepping any closer to them. She stopped where she was.

"We ain't taking you anywhere," she said. Every muscle in her body was as tense as it had been when she'd been getting ready to drop off my bike.

"You're in no position to be negotiating," Commander Asshole said. "First, your shit. What have you got for us? "

"Yeah, you just took it," I told them.

"Come on," he said. "I mean, can we not, okay? There's more. There is always more. T… take my man to the back of the truck, start inside the back bumper, work your way to the front."

One of the big, burly assholes behind him got off his bike and walked towards me, giving me a shove toward the back of the truck.

"Who's Negan?" I heard Abraham ask.

Commander Asshole started going off on one about how they usually killed at least one person they met right off the bat, but I missed most of it because I was round the back of the truck with one of his goons. I made out like I was having trouble opening up the back. When the Goon bent closer to see what I was doing, I jabbed an elbow up into his dumb face. He was dazed for a moment, and I used that as a way to get behind him, one hand over his mouth to stop him from yelling anything. He tried to twist around and fling me off. Tried to get at me with a knife in his hand but couldn't see where I was, so it wound up just cutting my back. I felt it sting, felt warm blood run down it. One of my arms went around his neck, squeezing his air pipe closed.

"You don't have to do this…."I heard Sasha say. There was fear in her voice, so I guessed Commander Asshole had pulled a gun again, made some kind of threat.

Come on, fucking die already.

He choked out his last breath. I opened up the back, quiet as I could, and unzipped the bag of RPGs.

"Lemme get this straight," my heart sank as I heard Naomi pipe up, bold as brass. "You ain't Negan? You're just some little bitch collecting for a man who can't be bothered to come out here and collect for himself?"

"Shut up," I heard Abraham warn her, although I was willing to bet that the damage was done.

"Well, I guess you've made it easy picking for which one of you-"

Think again, asshole.

I fired the RPG. It was stronger than anything else I'd ever fired, damn near threw my shoulder out. The whole Asshole Brigade went up in smoke and flames, and my only regret was that they didn't die slow. When the smoke cleared, Sasha and Abraham picked themselves up and came, coughing round the side of the truck. Both of them grinning like fools. Looking at me like people look at Rick. Like I was some kind of hero.

"Son of a bitch was tougher than he looked," I said, nodding to the guy I'd just taken down.

"Did he cut you?" Sasha asked, noticing the blood soaking through my back.

"A little," I said. I glanced at Naomi, expecting her to have a reaction, but she was still staring at the burning mess in front of us like she couldn't hear any of us. Like she hadn't even registered that we were safe. "Will you give us a sec?"

Sasha nodded. "See you in there."

Naomi had her back to me. I reached out to put an arm around her, but when my hand brushed against her elbow, she flinched. Jumped like it was her that I'd set on fire. I pulled my arm back.

"You alright?" I asked.

"Yeah, I'm fine," she said, but it was a damn obvious lie. I could see her hands were still shaking, and she didn't want to get any closer. Not even to me. I thought about all the times when she clearly hadn't been as fine as she claimed, and I'd let it slip. Not anymore. If we were really going to do this, all of this, together, I couldn't have any more damn space between us.

"Nah, you ain't," I said, and I stepped in front of her. She looked at me then, and her eyes were sadder than I thought they'd be.

"I just… I couldn't let them take our home," she said. "Not again."

Again. I knew this was about Terminus, and whatever had happened to her there.

"They ain't taking anything," I said.

"Could be more of them out there," she said. "Whoever the hell Negan is, he's gotta have more guys, right? What if they come looking for these asswipes?"

"We'll be long gone by then," I said. "Ain't nobody gonna take your home, Naomi. Anyone who tries is going to end up like these sorry assholes. I promise you that."

She looked at me then, slowly coming back into the present. I thought she might warn me against making promises like that when none of us had any idea what was coming, but for once, she didn't fight me on it. Just looked at me with this total and complete trust in her eyes.

"I got a cut," I blurted out. Wouldn't usually have told her about it, but there was something in the way she was looking at me that made me want to.

"Where?" her eyes scanned my face like she was looking for it there.

"My back," I said. Where all of the other scars she'd patched up were. "Will you look at it when we get home?"

"Of course," she said, and she looked surprised that I'd asked. I guess I was too. I'd never tell her, but she had a way of making things hurt less.

"Home?" I asked.

"Home," she nodded and climbed up into the truck to sit next to Sasha.

We were all tired, and it was a long way back to Alexandria. Although the sun was setting, the car was warm and quiet. I felt something brush against my shoulder. Naomi had fallen asleep, her head tilted towards me. Another bump in the road and then she rested there properly. Sasha caught my eye.

"Want me to move her?" she whispered.

"Nah, let her be," I said. "I can still drive this thing, and it ain't far now."

"Okay," Sasha nodded. "Don't think she slept last night."

I wanted to ask why, but I already knew. I'd have been the same way.

"Neither did I," Abraham said. "And you don't see me snoozing now."

But he yawned and rested his forehead against the window next to him. I saw Sasha smiling to herself.

By the time we got back to Alexandria, it was dark. The windows were still down. We could hear gunshots. Screaming. The smell of Walkers wafted into the truck.

"What the hell is going on?" Naomi sat up, looking around like she'd just woken up inside one of her nightmares. I stopped by the gates. Nobody opened them for us, but through the gaps, I could see that Alexandria was overrun with Walkers.

"Get up on the roof," I told them. "See what's going on. Get this gate open."

Abraham opened his door and climbed up. Sasha followed and then Naomi slid across the seat to the open door. 

"Naomi," I reached to catch her arm, but she was further away than I thought, so I wound up grabbing her hand instead. She turned to me, a fiery warning in her eyes like she thought she knew what I was about to say. "Be careful out there."

She gave me a big and brilliant smile, "You too."

I let go. Heard her climb up to join Sasha and Abraham. A fresh round of yelling and gunfire from the top, and then the gates opened. Glenn ran out, made his way round to the side of the truck.

"What the hell happened?" I asked as he jumped in to join me.

"I don't know," he said. "I just got back. We can… we can lead some of them away, but they're scattered."

"No," I said. "We get 'em all together. Won't have to lead them away."

"How?"

"Get everyone off the roof," I told him. "We need to get to the lake."

Glenn leaned out of the window and yelled for everyone to get down. I could see Naomi ahead of me, already fighting her way through the gates. I resisted the urge to tell her to jump in where it was safer and resolved just to get this done as fast as I could, so she wouldn't need to fight for long. The living leaped out of the way as we sped through Alexandria, the dead did their damnedest to slow me down.

I backed the fuel truck up to the small artificial lake in the middle of the town. I jumped out and ran to the back while Glenn switched into the driver's seat. Pulling out the hose, I dumped as much fuel into the water as I could. Then I grabbed an RPG and climbed on top.

"Alright, that's it," I smacked the top of the truck to let Glenn know I was done. He drove forward a couple of feet and then stopped. I turned and fired the RPG at the water. The fuel caught immediately, sending a ball of fire right up into the sky. I watched it spread out across the top of the lake, bright light bathing all of the houses nearby.

The Walkers closest to it all turned, distracted, and started heading towards it. Right into the first. The ones who didn't were so few and far between that it was easy to take them out.

Naomi found me again when it was all done. Covered in blood and Walker guts, tired and breathing hard, she stood beside me. Watched them burn. The heat warmed us both as the flames rose high into the sky. Some higher than the damn houses.

"Hey, Daryl?" she said. I looked at her, flames reflected in her eyes, and it was much prettier to watch them burn that way. She said it real quiet and looked calm, but there was a small frown that creased her forehead, one she only gets when she's real deep in thought. It made me kinda nervous about what she might be about to say.

"Yeah?"

"I ain't gonna leave this place without telling you again," she said. "Not even for a quick run."

Relief lifted my tired heart.

"You ain't gotta do that," I said, although it was all I'd wanted to hear since I'd found that burned-out car on the side of the road.

"I want to," she said. She still wouldn't look at me, just kept staring at the flames. "When I thought… when I couldn't find you… Damn near lost my mind."

It's easy to forget when you're caught up in loving someone that they can care about you too. Even if it might not be in the way you want.

"Yeah, I know," I said. "Ain't ever seen you look like that."

"Just got me thinking," she said. "I don't ever want to make you feel that way again. So I can't promise I ain't going to go out there, but I promise to let you know when I do."

"Deal," I whispered, put an arm around her shoulders and pulled her closer to my side. She rested her head on me, and I felt her sigh. Tired now that the battle was done. So many people around us, but it still managed to feel like it was just us two. Caught in a fragile little bubble that could burst at any second when shit hit the fan or one of us got called away.

"I should take a look at that cut on your back," she said. "Don't want to leave it too long in case it gets infected."

"Okay," I said. The streets were clearing out. Most of the bodies littering the ground were Walkers that had been taken out. Everyone else was congregating in little pockets around Alexandria, checking on each other, trying to work out who'd been lost.

"I'm only seeing the most severely injured," Denise said when we approached her. Since Pete died, she'd taken over as our resident medic. She'd always been kind of nervous about it, and I could imagine the number of injured today was a real test of her skills. "I don't have time to…"

I felt dumb for letting Naomi drag me here when all I had was a scratch compared to some folks. I turned to tell her that, but she'd already squeezed past Deinse to get to the supplies.

"It's okay," Naomi assured her. "I can do it, and I know what I need. When I'm done, I'll bring it right back, and then I can help you out with some of your other patients."

"Alright," she said, too flustered to argue. I waited by the side of the house, and she emerged a few minutes later with some supplies.

"I think you'll need stitches," she said, "C'mon."

She led me back to my own house. It was quiet. I could hear people inside and hoped she wouldn't suggest going in. I didn't much want an audience for this. But she didn't, she got that. She just made me stand out on the porch, in a place where the light from inside helped her see what she was doing. From there, we could still see the dying flames across the lake. Alexandria was starting to fall quiet as people dealt with the aftermath of all it had been through that day. I lifted up my shirt, let her take a look.

"This'll sting," she warned me like she always did. It never felt as bad as she seemed to worry it would. She was always quick and gentle. The way she touched me was kind of soothing, too. Even as I felt her stitch me up after she'd cleaned the cut, it wasn't so bad. I still felt safe with her. Safe enough to let her see me like this. She was right; from now on, whatever we faced, we would face it together. It really felt like we could get through anything. Maybe that even included staying friends if she didn't feel the same about me. She cared about me more than anyone else in my life ever had. Maybe that was enough.

"Hey, uh… you wanna get dinner?" I asked, trying to sound like the thought had just occurred to me, rather than being one I'd been running over in my head for weeks.

She laughed. "Smell of cooking Walkers making you hungry?"

"Oh," I said. "Uh… Didn't mean right now."

"What?" she said, and I felt her pause, lifted her fingers slightly from my back. "Because I am pretty hungry actually, and I think Eric might-"

"I just, uh… thought we could get dinner sometime," I cleared my throat, tried to sound like this wasn't a big deal, and she could say no without worrying about it. "Maybe get a rabbit, some squirrel. Cook it up like we used to."

"Oka-ay," she said slowly like she didn't get why I was asking so formally to do something we'd done so many times before. She went back to wiping the blood off me now that the stitches were in.

"And… uh…" I cleared my throat again. "I thought it could maybe… just be us?"

"Oh," surprise softened her voice. I felt her pause again, waiting for me to follow up with some insult or name-calling. When I didn't, she said, "Yeah. That sounds nice. Like old times."

I think she was smiling. It sounded like she was smiling.

"Alright," I said, smiling too. Felt like a huge weight had been lifted from my chest. I knew Naomi hadn't understood what I'd just asked or where it had come from. That what I'd really meant had gotten lost under all of my hesitating and throat-clearing. But that didn't matter. I'd find the right time to make it clear to her. When the dust had settled on all of this, when the dead had been buried and the walls put back up around Alexandria, I'd make sure it was just the two of us. And far away from where anyone else could butt in or eavesdrop, maybe I'd stand a chance of getting it out.

Chapter 24: Googly Eyes

Naomi

My arms hurt. Muscles I hadn't used in a very long time burned in protest of how much I was using them now. The back of my neck had burned in the sun the day before. I'd made sure to cover up this time, but it hurt every time my hair brushed across it. I hoped it wasn't bad enough to start peeling. I looked up to see Abraham and Sasha on their regular patrol shift and prodded Daryl with the end of my shovel. Slightly annoyed, he looked up at me, squinting in the glare of the sun.

"You think that's happening yet?" I asked, nodding at where they walked together, heads bowed in conversation like they were the only two people who existed. It was damn cute, but I wasn't sure it made them the greatest lookouts.

"Far as I know, he's still with Rosita," Daryl shrugged. He seemed distracted and a lot less invested than he had before, which was weird given that he'd spent a whole car journey bombarding me with questions about it. Throwing his shovel on the ground, he sat down for a break, resting his arms resting on top of his bent knees. He'd been quieter than usual, and it felt like something was up.

I sat down next to him. There was an ache in my back from hunching over for so long. I lay down on the grass to stretch it out, the smell of dry earth all around me. After a moment, Daryl lay back too. I could hear other people digging around us, but staring up at the sky, it felt like it was just us. Like the world was big and we were small, and none of it mattered because we were next to each other.

"Feel like I've been put on one of them medieval stretching racks," I said, trying to find a cloud up there. Couldn't. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw him turn his head to look at me. I heard the too-dry grass crunch under his head.

"What?"

"You know the ones where they'd tie you up by your wrists and your ankles. and then they'd pull you up in all different directions until everything hurts?" I said. "That's how I feel."

"Tied up?"

"No. Everything hurts."

"You know you can just say that, right?" he said, and I turned my head to look at him. "You ain't gotta go into the whole medieval torture thing."

I held up one of my hands to show him my palm. Some of the skin was dry and cracked from where blisters had formed and burst again. New beads of fresh red blood ran through dark dried scabs. "Pretty gross, huh?"

"Jesus, Naomi!" He rolled over onto his side and propped himself up on his elbow. He took hold of my wrist with his own warm, rough hands. "How long you been digging out here?"

"Since we started."

"Every day?" he said. "You ain't taken a break or gone to help with the wall?"

Alexandria was only useful to me for as long as it provided a safe base to look for Mia. The sooner things were fixed, the sooner I could get back to searching.

"You know construction ain't my thing," I said. "I ain't good at building stuff like you. Digging just seemed easiest."

"You could've had a day off," he grumbled.

"There were so many graves to dig, didn't feel right," I said. "I'll have a day off when I'm dead."

"You ain't ever dying," Daryl said. "I won't allow it."

"Not sure you have that kinda power over the Almighty," I said. "If it's my time, it's my time."

"Nah, I'll have a word with Him," Daryl said darkly, like the Lord Himself would have to fight Daryl to get to me. I smiled. Couldn't help it. We'd lost a lot of people in one night, and death wasn't far from anyone's mind these days. It felt like a real possibility for any of us. The Wolves attack was the first truly awful thing to happen to Alexandria, and people were still reeling from it. It was mostly Rick, and the rest of his group, who'd rallied others to dig graves and fix the wall after those damn assholes had driven into it. It had been exactly the kind of disaster I was glad we'd taken them in for, I doubt this place would've stayed standing without them. Certainly not without Daryl.

"That where you went yesterday?" I asked. "To help with the wall?"

I'd gotten so used to seeing him out here, digging out in the sun, that it had been a real bummer to find he wasn't around. Days digging graves, and then, when the dead were buried, digging patches of farmland had been enjoyable up until then. He has this way of making shit things better.

"Nah," he said. He let go of my wrist and lay back, folding his arms across his chest, suddenly overwhelmingly interested in the open sky. "I was just busy."

"Busy?" I repeated. Such a vague answer for what should have been a pretty straight-forward question.

"Yeah," he said, something in his tone was cold and snappy. I recoiled. Looked up at the sky, too, because it was easier than looking at him while he blatantly lied to me. "Why? What's it to ya?"

"I was only askin'," I said, a tight ball of frustration sat in my chest. I let us both stew in the silence for a moment, could hear him sighing at whatever his inner monologue had him pissed off at this time. Usually, the silence was fine between Daryl and me. When you know there's nothing you can't talk about with someone, silence is as comfortable as a warm bath. But when that person is suddenly very clearly hiding something… it feels like you're cold and drowning. Was it me? Had I done something? I started to change the subject, but when I opened my mouth to say something, he'd started talking too. We both stopped and stared at each other like idiots, waiting for the other one to speak.

"Go ahead," Daryl said, it was weirdly formal, especially after his previous snarky remark. I wanted to laugh at him for it, but there was a tense nervousness in his eyes that made me feel jittery and nervous too.

"Nah, it's okay," I said. Because I hadn't really had anything important to say. I just didn't want to keep lying in that weird-ass silence. "What were you going to say?"

"Just, uh… That the wall's almost up. Expanded it to take in the Church, too."

I'd expected more than that, given how much build-up there seemed to be behind whatever he was thinking. Anyone with eyes could see that the wall was up and expanded. But he closed his mouth again, hesitated.

"Yeah," I said, and then because his nerves made me nervous, I started talking more than I needed to. "Thank God. Those morning patrols are way more stressful when Walkers can get in and out. Trying to work out who was dead and who was just out for a morning walk in their slippers..."

"So, it looks like things are getting back to normal around here, huh?" he spoke over me, but I didn't think he'd been listening, so wasn't sure he was even aware he'd interrupted.

"I guess," I said. Whatever this conversation was, wherever his mind was going, he wasn't doing a great job of taking me with him. That was so unlike us. I felt like something was broken, and it hurt to look at him. I looked back up at the sky, holding up a hand to shield my eyes from the glare of the sun. "If there is normal anymore."

"I just mean… now that this is all done, we could-"

A shadow fell over us, and Daryl stopped talking at once. I heard him exhale sharply through his nose. I dropped my hand and saw Eric standing over us.

"You two aren't slacking off, are you?" Eric said.

"No," I said, sitting up. "Just resting. Been at it all day."

"Check out her hands," Daryl said as I held them up to show Eric. "Ain't they gross?"

"God," Eric flinched away from them. "How did that happen?"

"Been too long since I did this much manual labor, my hands got soft," I said.

"Well, I brought you out some water," he said, holding out two water bottles. "Although I would've brought moisturizer if I'd known…"

I took hold of one of the bottles, and Daryl reached out for the other. I drank it so fast I felt sick. "Thanks."

"You guys should get moving," Eric said. "Memorial starts soon."

"Shit, forgot that was today," I glanced at how low the sun was getting in the sky and hauled myself to my feet. I looked back down at Daryl. No point in saying goodbye, I assumed he'd be at the memorial too, so I just said, "I should go clean up, wash this grime off me."

Daryl got to his feet, dusted down the front of his muddy pants, and said, "I'll walk y'all back."

Again, it felt weirdly formal of him to offer like that. Announce it and all. I was used to him just being around. Silently following, if that was what he wanted to do. Maybe it was just because Eric was here, or because of his damn weird mood before it. Whatever it was, I felt my stomach flip over when he said it, "You ain't gotta do that."

"It's on my way," he said, shrugging like I was the one being weird. Maybe I was. The new farming plot we were digging was on the other side of Alexandria to where we lived, and the natural route back took us past our house before it got to his. The only sound in the silence was our footfall on dry grass and my heart racing for no discernable reason.

"Haven't seen you around the house much lately," Eric commented as we started walking, looking pointedly at Daryl. A note in his voice told me he was snooping for something. I prayed Daryl didn't know him well enough to pick up on it.

"Well, most of us have been busy out here," I said, so Daryl didn't feel any pressure to answer. "In case slackers like you ain't noticed."

"Hey," Eric said. "I'm no slacker. My talents lie… elsewhere."

"Sure," I raised my eyebrows at him.

"Someone has to reorganize the way this town is run now that Deanna's gone," he pointed out.

"But does it need an entire committee to decide that Rick is absolutely the best choice of leader now?" I said. "Or are folks just looking for an excuse to stay home and avoid digging fields to plant crops?"

"Not everyone here is happy with Rick's… leadership style," Eric said, his gaze flickering warily to Daryl.

"Well then they oughta grow up," Daryl said. "They not learn anything from the Wolves attacking this place?"

"Rick's a great… wartime leader," Eric said, trying to be diplomatic. "But people here want peace now."

"Then people here are dumb," Daryl said. Eric looked to me for help. I shook my head.

"Daryl's right," I said. "Whole world's at war with itself now. Pretending like the Wolves were the only assholes out there is moronic."

"Do you want to come to these meetings and tell them that?" Eric asked.

"No," I said. "I ain't making the mistake of speaking up at one of those damn meetings again."

"I dunno," Daryl said thoughtfully. "You can be pretty persuasive. If anyone can convince people to do the right thing, it's you."

Not for the first time that day, my stomach flipped over, and I had no idea what to say to him. His flip-flopping from snapping at me to complimenting me was making my head spin. I looked at him, but he wasn't looking at me, so I stared at the ground in front of us.

"Heard you had a good run with Aaron yesterday," Eric said in an attempt to make casual conversation. It came crashing down around him.

"A run?" I repeated. Was that what he'd been busy with? Something about it didn't sit right with me. Least of all, because Aaron hadn't mentioned anything to me about it, hadn't asked if I wanted to come and look for Mia. And Daryl had clearly been hiding it. "You out looking for more people?"

It seemed a bit soon, with Alexandria only just starting to hold herself together again. We'd lost a lot, and we would need new recruits, but I couldn't imagine now was the best time to introduce new people. After a whole bunch of strangers knocking down one of the walls, gutting a bunch of residents like fish and letting in a horde of Walkers, concerns over Stranger Danger were at an all-time high. Some people had even started treating me with suspicion again.

"Nah," Daryl said. "Just getting some supplies."

That made even less sense.

"Why didn't Glenn go?" I asked. I knew he hadn't because I'd seen Glenn when I was obsessively looking out for Daryl. Had Glenn's role changed now that Deanna wasn't in charge? That also seemed dumb. He was absolutely the best person to lead groups on runs.

"Glenn ain't the only one who can get supplies, you know," Daryl was more annoyed than I expected him to be.

"Yeah, I know," I said. "He's just… I just wondered if there was a reason. Cool it."

"Nah, no reason," he said. I dropped it. Whatever he was trying to hide didn't feel worth arguing about. We came to a stop outside our house, and I fixed my eyes on the door. Now I could just go in and grill the truth out of Aaron.

"See you at the memorial?" I said. Daryl didn't say anything, just gave us both a nod and walked off in the direction of his house. I let out a breath, felt the tightness in my chest start to relax.

"God, I really feel like I put my foot in that," Eric muttered as we both stared at Daryl's retreating back.

"Same," I said. "Just wish I knew what it was we'd stuck our foot in."

Eric gave me a sympathetic smile and opened the door.

"You can invite him for dinner again, you know," he said, as we walked in. I was grateful he'd at least waited until Daryl was out of earshot before starting on this again. "Any time."

"Thanks," I said. Then, because I didn't want to give Eric any kind of false hope if he was only offering because of how much he'd enjoyed hosting dinner parties again, I added, "Actually… he mentioned having dinner again a little while ago, but said it should just be him and me so…"

"What?" Eric's head turned so fast I thought I heard his neck click. Had that offended him?

"I don't think he meant anything by it," I said quickly. "He had a great time with you and Aaron, I just think he-"

"He asked you to dinner?" Eric said. "Just the two of you?"

I couldn't miss the heavy implications in his voice.

"Well… not like that," I said, slipping my muddy shoes off and leaving them by the door. I turned and walked into the living room. "Aaron, you in here?"

"Kitchen!" I heard him call back. I headed towards him.

"Er, don't think you're done with this conversation," Eric said, following closely at my heels. I ignored him, fixed Aaron with a stare.

"Hey, Naomi," he said. "I was thinking-"

"What did you and Daryl go on a run for?" I asked. Watched him shrink him a little.

"Oh," he looked surprised. "He… he told you about that?"

"Not exactly."

"Think that might have been my fault," Eric admitted, looking a little bit guilty. I didn't miss the look Aaron gave him, like he wanted to cuss him out but knew he couldn't. "In my defense, I didn't know it was some big secret. Which begs the question… what were you out there for?"

Now Eric was suspicious too, which sent a little thrill of triumph right through me, and I felt less crazy for finding the whole thing bizarre. Aaron sighed, but there was a fear in his eyes like he felt cornered, "Just some supplies."

Supplies. It was precisely what Daryl had said, but it was so vague. Covered all manner of things. I could tell by the frown on Eric's face that he wasn't buying it either. "Why didn't Glenn go? Or someone else from his team?"

"It wasn't a big journey," Aaron said, very clearly trying to warn Eric away from asking any further questions, but it was too late, he'd dug himself far too large a hole. "Didn't need a whole team."

If either Aaron or Daryl had coughed up an example of what they'd been out there looking for. Just one thing, I would've believed them. What could possibly be so bad that Daryl would try and hide it? From me of all people?

"Oh my God, is Daryl sick?" I asked. Fear rose in my chest. It would be exactly like Daryl to get sick and not tell me about it due to some misguided attempt to protect me from feeling anything negative.

"No," Aaron said. "He's not sick. We just thought-"

"Are you sick?" Eric asked him, eyes narrowed.

"No," he said. "Everyone's fine. We went to look around a nearby town, found a few places that hadn't been scavenged. If you want to know anything else, I suggest you talk to Daryl about it."

"Already tried that," I sighed. "He was very evasive. Like you. Neither of you thought I might want to join? Check out the town for signs of my sister?"

"It wasn't anywhere you haven't already looked," he said. I narrowed my eyes. "I promise."

This was getting me nowhere.

"I should hit the shower, and then we'll head over to the Church?"

"Alright," Aaron nodded, relief plain on his face.

"Speaking of evasive," Eric said as I tried to walk away. "I hope you don't think this has distracted me from Daryl asking you out."

"That's not what happened," I said over my shoulder.

"So, he didn't ask you to dinner?"

I stopped and turned around again, clearly, I was not getting out of the conversation as quickly as I hoped.

"He just suggested getting food," I said. "Like we used to."

"But did he say food, or did he say dinner?" Eric asked. I thought about it for a moment, the memory was easy to find. I'd found myself playing it on repeat since that day.

"Dinner," I said. "Does that matter?"

"Yes," he said, and he seemed confident about it, but I couldn't really see the difference. "Dinner. Just the two of you. Anyone else would call that a date, Naomi."

"Eric," Aaron warned. "This is absolutely none of your business."

"It ain't a date," I said. "It's just me and Daryl catching squirrels and cooking them up like we used to."

"Yeah, okay," Eric said, sounding disproportionately disappointed for someone that this situation did not affect at all. "Maybe that doesn't sound like the most date-type activity."

"Well…" Aaron suddenly piped up, where I was so used to him biting his tongue.

"I'm sorry, are you on his side now?" I turned to him. Usually, I could count on him to back me up when Eric went off on one of his hopelessly romantic ramblings.

"My point is," Aaron said, looking back at Eric. "Just because it's not something you personally would enjoy on a date, Eric, doesn't mean it's not something Dar-... other people would enjoy."

Eric laughed and said something about how limited date activities were now that there weren't any cinemas or theaters or fancy restaurants around anymore, but I was hardly listening. I tried to step outside of myself and look at this objectively. If I was to plan anything for Daryl, would I have taken him to the cinema or the theatre or some kind of fancy restaurant even back when those things existed? Hell no. He'd have hated that. I'd have done something simple, something he was comfortable with, something just us two. Growing up never knowing where our next meal was coming from had meant food had always been a part of our friendship, so food would definitely be involved. Would hunting with him have been the perfect thing for both of us?

"You okay, Naomi?" Eric said. "You've gone very pale."

"Yeah, I'm fine," I said, but I felt breathless. And like my intestines had turned into a whole bunch of snakes. "I think he just wants to hang out like we used to, y'know? I gave him a pretty hard time for being all distant and weird with me for a bit. Maybe he just feels bad about it."

"Maybe," Eric said, nodding. I nodded back like a moron. Felt like I was trying to convince myself more than them. The floor felt like it was starting to tilt underneath me.

"Naomi," Aaron said gently. "We gotta go soon."

"Shit," I said. "Yeah. Yeah. Okay, gimme a sec."

I ran up the stairs like my heels were on fire. In the quiet of the shower, my heartbeat calmed down again. I'd let myself get too caught up in this and wished I'd never brought it up with Eric. It had been weeks since Daryl had even brought it up and hadn't mentioned it since. Surely, that was the best clue in the world that it had just been a casual, offhand comment. One I'd been holding onto like a weirdo for no reason. Unless… he was waiting for me to bring it up? But things in Alexandria had been so busy, there hadn't been time to. Why had this suddenly got so complicated? Things with Daryl used to be easy, even when nosey assholes like Eric and Sasha stuck their noses in. I switched the shower off and scrambled to get ready.

Dusk was falling. Stepping out of the house, Alexandria was the busiest I'd seen it in a long time. People were making their way out of their homes, chatting with each other as they went. It had been three weeks since Alexandria had been attacked. With the wall down, it hadn't been safe enough to congregate and mourn in a large group. Funerals had been quick, with those who weren't close to the dead missing it to guard the gap in Alexandria's defenses from any Walkers who came in. This had only added to the widening divide between the original Alexandrians and Daryl's group. If it got any bigger, I worried I'd slip through the cracks. But there was a shift now. The wall was back up. Peace was restored.

It had been years since I'd stepped inside a Church. The high walls and uncomfortable pews brought back even less comfortable memories. The shadows of the vaulted ceiling seemed to hold the whispers of my long-dead Momma, repenting for things she was doomed to repeat. I tried looking at the floor, but that was worse. My knees felt weak like they still held the memories of all the times I'd been forced to kneel beside her, praying for forgiveness for whatever it was I'd done that had driven Momma away and made her choose to get high over raising a family. The floor felt like it was sinking beneath me, and all the high ceilings in the world couldn't stop the walls from feeling like they were closing in on me.

And then I saw him. Just the back of his head, standing next to Rick and Michonne, the tip of his ear peeking out from under his mop of dark hair. It was enough to make me feel calm because I knew I was safe if Daryl was close.

Gabriel led us all in prayer. The names of the dead were read out one by one, stories were shared about each one. When night fell, we each silently held a lit candle, walking them from the Church down to the lake where the fight against the Walkers had ended. When this silent procession had first been suggested, I'd thought it sounded like a waste of resources. If the generator went down again, we'd need those candles. But emotions had been running high and, wishing to avoid another outburst at a town meeting, I'd held my tongue. I wound up being glad that I had.

Bathed in the light of a collection of individual candles, the factions that Alexandria had been slowly breaking into fell back together. Beside me, Eric leaned over and kissed Aaron on the cheek, their arms wrapped around one another. Further ahead of me in the crowd, I saw Carol lean her head on Tobin's shoulder. When they thought nobody else was looking, I caught Rick's fingers intertwine with Michonne's and the soft smile that played across her lips when it happened.

Daryl found me in the crowd. Stood next to me, his shoulder right up against mine. I looked at him, and he smiled. The light from his candle softened his eyes, and I felt such a rush of warmth that I was glad that this was a moment of silence because I don't know what I would have said to him otherwise. These small moments of peace were all any of us could hope for now. Shit could hit the fan tomorrow, but for now, we were safe, and we were healing.

 

 

Daryl

"Morning, Daryl," Rick said. "You hungry?"

He was chopping something up next to the sink. Michonne sat up at the breakfast bar, watching him. They'd glance at each other every now and then with these big, dumb smiles. Then they'd look away real fast like they thought none of the rest of us would notice. Whatever Rick was cooking smelt good, but I didn't much fancy sticking around while they acted like they were the only two people in the room. I dunno what had happened, or when exactly, but they couldn't take their eyes off each other. And it had been slowly getting more intense. I'd thought about bringing it up with Rick, but it seemed like they thought they were getting away with it, and I didn't want to burst that bubble just yet. They were both happier than I'd ever seen them. I didn't want to be the one to ruin it by drawing attention to it or putting any kind of pressure on them. More than anyone, I knew what that was like.

"Nah. I'm just, uh, heading out," I said. Rick and Michonne shared a smirk that they probably thought was a lot more subtle than it was.

"Tell Naomi we say hi," Rick said, picking up on Carol's dumb and embarrassingly long-running joke now that she wasn't here to do it herself. She was spending most nights at Tobin's these days.

"Tell her yourself," Glenn interrupted, coming in from the hallway. "She's here."

My heart almost stopped.

"Morning, all," Naomi said, following him in. She smiled around at everyone in that big, beaming way of hers.

"Morning," Michonne said. "You wanna stay for breakfast? Rick cooks the best eggs in Alexandria."

"Tried them all, have you?" Rick asked her with a grin. Then he looked at Naomi, "You're welcome to stay. I was just trying to convince Daryl to join us, and he's got no excuse now."

Another glance between Rick and Michonne that I'm sure they thought nobody noticed. Naomi glanced at me, trying to gauge what I might want to do. I shook my head as subtly as possible.

She smiled and said, "I've already eaten. Thanks, though."

"Glad you popped by," Glenn said to her, bending down to lace up his boots. "Been planning another run soon, and it would be good to have you on the team if you're up for it?"

"Love to," she said and seemed surprised that he'd thought of her. I was as proud as I was worried. I knew she'd made a good impression on him, but I hated her being out there, risking her life for some damn canned beans.

"I was planning on going on a short run today, actually," Rick said. "I was going to ask you to come, Daryl, but if you're…"

"Oh," Naomi looked mildly embarrassed. The tip of her nose went red. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to…If you guys have plans or whatever, this isn't urgent."

"I can always go with you," Michonne said like the thought had just occurred to her.

Rick pretended to look surprised, "If you're sure?"

Glenn caught my eye, and we both did our best not to laugh.

"I'm sure I'm no substitute for Daryl," Michonne said. "But I can always tag along with Rick if you want to…"

She looked at Naomi. Everyone did. Only now realizing that they'd all just assumed that whatever she'd come over to say would be something that kept me busy all day. She might well just have come over to borrow some damn sugar. With everyone now staring at her, her panicked eyes slid over to me. "I was actually going to… but you can… if you like…?"

Nothing she'd said had been a complete sentence, but I got what it was she was trying to say immediately. She'd come over to ask me something but wanted me to know it was okay for me to go on a run with Rick if that's what I wanted to do.

"Nah, I'm good," I assured her. "Let's go."

"Okay," she said, still a little confused. I put my hand on her back and propelled her out of the house as fast as I could. When the door closed behind us, she turned to me and breathed, "What the hell was that?"

"It's been like that for a while now."

"Those two are definitely banging," she said, glancing back at the house. "Right?"

"Rick and Michonne? Oh yeah," I said. "But they think nobody knows, so let's just keep it that way for now, yeah?"

"Fine by me," she shrugged. "God, first Carol and Tobin, now those two, and maybe Sasha and Abraham… what is up with everyone lately?"

"Must be something in the water," I said.

"You pour something other than gasoline in the lake?" she teased.

"You got me," I raised my hands in mock surrender. Naomi laughed in that way that made me feel warm no matter the weather. "So, it looks like things are getting back to normal around here, huh?"

"I guess," she said, shooting me a slightly puzzled look. Like I might have said that before. Maybe I had. It was getting difficult to know what I'd said out loud and what I'd just thought about saying when I'd rehearsed these conversations in my head. "I was actually thinking of heading out again, maybe trying to get to that school I was talking about?"

"Oh," I said. I wished it was as easy to predict what real-Naomi was going to say, the one in my head always shut up when I needed her to. "That what you come to tell me?"

I appreciated that she was keeping her promise.

"Yeah," she said, and then she looked a little nervous. "And also… wanted to see if you felt like coming with me?"

"Oh," I hadn't been expecting her to ask.

"It's not that far, we could get there and back within a day," she said, getting a little flushed. I'd hesitated for too long, and now she looked like she was already regretting it. "But if you'd rather go on that run with Rick, it's totally fine. Don't worry about it. I can always ask-"

"No, no," I said quickly. I didn't really want to hear who else she might ask to go with her. "I'll come… I want to come."

"Okay," she said. Another big smile broke out across her face. I felt my own face do something similar like hers was contagious.

We got a car from Olivia, and I packed some food into the back of it. It was still early, so if scouting out this school didn't take very long, maybe there'd be time to stop for dinner. Just us.

"I'll drive," Naomi said. "You're in charge of the map."

"Fine," I said, knowing which fights were best to pick with Naomi and which were best left alone. I slipped into the passenger seat, and she handed me a folded up map from her bag. I unfolded it and spread it across my knee. "Dunno how I'm supposed to read it with all your damn scribbles all over it, though."

"You can read my damn scribbles fine," she said, keeping her eyes on the gates opening up in front of us. "You've proved that enough times."

She'd caught me out, and we both knew it. I wasn't mad. Just sat in the silence of the car, feeling that lurch in my stomach every time I caught sight of her. The gates of Alexandria closed behind us, and it really was just the two of us. It had been a while since there had been no other people lurking around. Realizing that, I didn't even have to look at her for my stomach to turn over. I looked back down at the map, tried to focus on that instead of how close she was.

"So, how come you want to try for the school?" I asked, trying to distract myself. "Not the factory?"

"Last time I tried the factory, I got run off the road," she said like I needed any kind of reminder of it. "School just seemed safer."

"Even though all of them Wolves are dead now?"

"We think they're all dead," she said. "Who knows if that's true?"

"It's true," I told her. "They're gone. They ain't coming back."

She nodded like she wanted to believe me, but I knew it would be a while before she stopped worrying about people coming to take her home.

"Left here, yeah?" she asked. She probably had all the routes memorized, but I checked anyway.

"Yeah."

I looked at the route. Looked at all the other routes she'd marked up too. She was right; I knew how to read her damn scribbles. I looked at the other familiar places, ran my finger down from where we were to where Aaron and I had gone the day before. Where I'd found a place that I wanted her to see. Somewhere I thought she'd like enough to take her there just the two of us. It wasn't too far from the route we were on.

"Er…" I cleared my throat. "There might be a shortcut down here, we could check it out on the way back."

"Why would we check it out on the way back?" she asked. "If it's a shortcut, we should try it now."

"Nah, but it might not be," I said quickly. "So we shouldn't waste any time on it now, but if we're done early then…"

"Let me see it?" she cut across my rambling, clearly smelling my bullshit.

"Nah, it's fine," I folded the map over. "Forget I said anything. Just… keep driving."

"Alright…"

She looked so puzzled I worried it would distract her enough to run the car off the road. Again. So I changed the subject. "What's the plan if we find this place?"

"Keep watch over it," she said. "See if there are any signs of life."

"And if there are?"

"Play it by ear, I guess," she said. "See if it's safe to approach."

I wasn't sure she'd be able to be objective about that if she thought there was a chance her sister was in there. But I wasn't too worried, I'd be there to hold her back if she needed it.

"How are your hands?" I asked her.

"Glad to be getting a break," she said, stretching out her fingers across the steering wheel and giving them a wiggle. "It's good that the farm plot is almost done."

"Yeah, for sure."

"I'm worried that our food stores are a little low," she said. "Not sure we'll have started planting crops in time to feed everyone through winter."

"Rick's worried about that too," I told her. "Think that's probably why Glenn is so keen to get another run in soon."

She nodded. "I think Alexandria is damn lucky to have a resident who knows how to hunt."

It was only when she looked at me and smiled that I realized she meant me. I smiled back. "Make that two."

Her eyes were back on the road, but I thought I caught a little blush moving up the side of her face. "How are you finding things now?"

"In Alexandria?"

"Yeah."

There was a tension in the way she asked, like my answer was something she'd been worrying about.

"It's alright," I said. "I ain't mad about it, but... there are people there worth sticking around for."

"Yeah?" she said. "You not still thinking about leaving?"

"Not without telling you," I said, watching her shoulders visibly relaxed. "And... Carl and Judith deserve a place like Alexandria. I don't want to say goodbye to them. Or... Rick, Carol, Glenn, Maggie... they're all family. Couldn't leave them."

Or you.

"Good," she said. "That's good. I just want you to be happy there."

I looked at her; hands all messed up from too much digging, the small patch of sunburn on her neck. The sunlight streaming through the window made her eyes look lighter than usual, but just as determined, dead set on finding and protecting the people she cared about. I knew how lucky I was to be counted as one of them. "Yeah, I'm getting there."

The silence between us was comfortable. I followed our journey we were taking on the map and thought about the one we'd already been on. The one we'd survived together as kids, the one that had torn us apart, the one that had pulled us back together again. A new one stretched out ahead of us. Wherever it went, no matter how many forks in the road there were, there was no way I would let either of us walk alone again.

"Just round the next corner," I said. "We should park here and walk."

She pulled over to the side of the road and tucked the car out of sight behind some trees. If anyone passed by on the road, they wouldn't see it. We walked the rest of the way, moving quietly between the trees and listening for sounds of Walkers as much as sounds of living people. Over a grassy verge and we came across the school.

High fences hid most of it from view, but it wasn't what I expected. It looked like a whole cluster of different buildings, with a wealth of open space between rooftops.

"Some fancy-ass school," I said.

"You ain't wrong," she muttered. It was quiet. No signs or sounds of life. For a moment, I was relieved. If nobody was here, this could be quick. Naomi sat down, got herself comfortable on the ground. "You hungry?"

"Starving," I said, sitting down next to her. I had been since we'd left.

"Should've taken Rick up on his breakfast offer, then," she said.

"What, and sit around while he and Michonne make all googly eyes at each other? I'd rather starve," I said.

"Googly eyes?" she repeated, laughing way too loud for someone who was meant to be staking out a potential new community. I prayed she didn't ask for any kind of demonstration of what that meant, didn't want either of us realizing that I looked at her the same way Rick looked at Michonne.

"Plus, I knew I was coming out here with the Queen of Snacks, so I thought I'd be fine."

"Well, lucky for you," she said, reaching into her bag. "You were correct."

She pulled out two apples and handed one to me. I bit into it, watched her turn hers over in her hands, and knew she was thinking about saying something else.

"I didn't bring anything… substantial, though," Naomi said. Her eyes were fixed on the road in front of us. "So, we could always go hunt something later. Just us... if that's still something you wanna do...?"

My heart leaped. I hadn't been sure she'd remembered me asking her. I'd been waiting until things in Alexandria calmed down. The farming plot was almost done, the wall was up, and the dead were buried. I guess things were as calm as they were going to get.

"Yeah," I said. "Actually, there's this-"

And then a frown flashed across her face.

"Sshh," she said, holding up a hand. My words caught in my throat. I swallowed them down and forced myself to listen. The sound of hooves on the road. Naomi shifted to a crouching position, peered through the gaps in the hedge in front of us. "Knew I'd seen a guy on a horse. I knew I weren't crazy."

"You're still crazy," I muttered. "You just weren't wrong about this."

"Shut up," she said, nudging me with her foot. "These could be the same assholes you blew up with the RPG."

"Those guys were pretty dead last time I checked," I pointed out. She rolled her eyes. "But it could be the same group, I take your point."

"No bikes, though," she said. "Although I guess you might've blown all them up too."

She pulled a familiar-looking pair of binoculars out of her bag and peered through them at the guys on horseback. "Those are Aaron's."

"Yeah, I know."

"He know you've got them?"

"Yes," she said. "Aaron let me borrow them. Don't think I stole them, do ya?"

"Wouldn't put it past you," I said. Naomi stuck her tongue out and then passed them over to me.

"They're just over there," she pointed. I trained the binoculars in the right direction. There were two guys on horseback, pulling an empty cart behind them.

"Where do you think they're going?" I asked.

"Looks like they're heading towards the school," she said.

"Cart's empty," I said. "Think they're picking something up?"

"Could be," she muttered. "Sure ain't bringing anything back. They migh-"

"Shh," I said. It was my turn to hold up a hand to shut her up. She stopped. Listened. I knew she heard it too. Her hand flew to a knife tucked into her belt loop. Footsteps in the undergrowth around us. I turned. Too late.

"Hands above your heads," someone demanded. From the bushes around us, four people emerged. My gun was in my hand, but I wasn't fast enough. Too many guns around us. By the time I'd clicked the safety off, they'd have been able to shoot us both dead. Naomi raised her hands.

"We ain't looking for trouble," she said.

One of them eyed the crossbow I was holding, undercutting Naomi's assurance that we came in peace. "Weapons down."

I thought about shooting them, putting up a fight, but Naomi had already surrendered everything she had on her. I couldn't risk her like that. I put my gun on the ground, watched one of them pick it up, and raised my hands above my head.

"Get them up," one of them yelled. "Bring them to the King."

Hands bound behind our backs, they hauled us to our feet. Naomi looked at me, whispered, "Did they say, King?"

I nodded. Her eyebrows shot up. Two of them grabbed me by my wrists, forced my hands behind my back. I heard her struggle as they did the same to her. They pushed us both forward, out onto the road. Closer to the school, I could hear the sound of kids playing and people talking. I knew Naomi heard it too, knew she was hoping that Mia might be one of them.

They took us in the same way as the cart. There were another few guards on the other side of the gate, looked surprised to see us with them. The one behind me said, "Get the King."

Two of them ran off as we were dragged around the back of one of the buildings, out of sight of whoever else lived here. If this was the King's army, they didn't want any civilians seeing that they'd taken prisoners. We were pushed in through a side door, walked into a high-ceilinged room. To the left were rows of red velvet theatre seats stretching back to another door where more guards stood by. The seats faced a stage that was on our right. Something in the center of it that looked like a throne. And nearby was a big, empty cage.

Where the fuck were we?

"Kneel," the guy behind me said. "Wait here."

We knelt down in front of the empty throne. Naomi looked up at it, I saw her take in the cage too. Was that where we were about to end up?

"Listen, guys," she said, trying to reason with them again. "You ain't gotta-"

"Naomi?"

Someone spoke from the back of the hall, and I felt her whole body tense beside me. I looked at her out of the corner of my eye. Saw the relief break out across her face. She twisted where she was to get a good look. I heard the hurried footsteps of a guard rushing towards us from the door at the back of the hall.

"Don't shoot," he said. "I know her."

"Bryce!" she yelled.

I remembered the name.

My memory of that night was hazy in parts, but I remembered him. His annoyingly overly-concerned face butting in where it wasn't wanted. I remembered despising him more than I'd ever despised anyone before. I'd been drunk and too dumb to realize I was jealous.

Naomi got her feet. I'd thought after that horrible night in her dorm room, she'd stopped hanging out with those assholes. But here she was greeting him like an old friend.

"Naomi," I hissed. "Get down."

She glanced down at me and whispered, "It's okay. We're going to be just fine."

"Guns down," Bryce said, and this time they listened. I got to my feet as Naomi ducked past them and ran towards him.

A dark twist of shame in my gut. After I was gone and left everything broken, was it Bryce who'd helped her pick up the pieces? Had me leaving just opened the damn door for him? I watched him pick her up and spin her around, lifting her feet right off the goddamn floor. Had he always been this tall?

"It's so good to see you," she said. I could hear a wobble in her voice even though it was muffled by his shoulder. This wasn't some one-year college friendship. They'd clearly stayed in touch, had some kind of history. She looked back at me. "This is Dar-"

"Yeah, I remember Daryl," he said, and he smiled, but it wasn't a real smile. His eyes were cold. The shame of the first and only time I'd met him burned me up on the inside and stopped me from saying anything. Naomi looked nervously between the two of us. Bryce stuck his hand out to shake mine. "How are you?"

"Fine," I said, his grip was surprisingly firm. I tried to match it. He let go and looked back at Naomi.

Before he could say anything else, a loud and booming voice from the back of the room announced, "All kneel for King Ezekiel."

Naomi and I were forced back down onto our knees, turned toward the stage again. I could hear people walking behind us and what sounded like the rattle of a chain. They reached the stairs up to the stage. Beside me, I heard Naomi breathe, "Holy fuck!"

Her wide eyes tracked a tiger walking behind a man with greying dreads. A small cluster of people behind him, it was clear that this was the man who called himself King. I guess if you'd somehow tamed a tiger, why the fuck wouldn't you? I wondered if this was the guy that Dwight and Sherry had been running from when they took my shit. The guy they didn't want to kneel to anymore. I was damn sick of kneeling to him already.

He sat on the throne. The tiger paced beside him. She clearly smelled that we were new here and didn't know if she could trust our scent. The King looked at us both. "My soldiers tell me that you were caught trespassing on the outskirts of my Kingdom?"

"We didn't know it was your Kingdom, sir," Naomi said as politely as possible.

Bryce stepped forward. "I can vouch for them."

"Bryce," the King sounded pleasantly surprised. "You can vouch for their character?"

Bryce gave me a look. Like he had no idea about my character and didn't want to say out loud what kind of person he thought I was. But then he looked back at Naomi, and something changed.

"Yes," he said. I wished he hadn't. I wanted him to refuse to vouch for me so that I'd have a reason to turn to Naomi and tell her that this guy was a douchebag. But he didn't. He just said, "Yes, I can, Your Majesty."

"Pray, tell me how it is you are acquainted with these strangers?" the King asked.

"Naomi is an old friend," Bryce said with a warmth in his voice that made me want to set things on fire. "And Daryl is a friend of hers."

"Please, stand," the King told us. "It will not do to greet old friends in such a way."

"Thank you, Your Majesty," Bryce said. He sounded relieved. I got to my feet again, keeping my eyes on that damn tiger. Damn tiger was keeping her eyes on us too.

"It is a pleasure to meet you, Naomi and Daryl. I am King Ezekiel," said the King. "Welcome to the Kingdom."

"Er…" Naomi looked dazed and confused. "Thank you…? Your Majesty."

"You look not as if you have come in search of food or shelter. Pray tell, how is it that you came to find my Kingdom?" he asked. We glanced at one another.

"I'm looking for my sister," Naomi said.

"Mia?" Bryce said. I hated how familiar he was with her name. How hopeful he sounded when he said it. "She's alive?"

Who the hell was he to know our little Mia?

"She was," Naomi said. "Someone took her. I've been trying to track other communities to see if they have her. That's how we found this place."

"She's not here," Bryce said, and he sounded so sad about it. "I'm so sorry, Naomi."

"It's okay," she said and fixed a smile on her face. "I thought you'd have mentioned by now if she was."

"You came here in search of your sister?" the King asked, leaning forward. Naomi faltered. That smile couldn't hide the sadness in her eyes.

"She's just a kid," I said so that Naomi didn't have to do all of the talking anymore. He looked at me now. "We're out looking for her is all. If you give us our shit back, we'll get out of your hair."

I wanted to get us both out of here as fast as possible and then forget we'd ever found it.

"How old is the child?" the King asked.

"Thirteen," Bryce and I said it at the same time, then looked at each other with equal surprise. Clearly, he knew our little Mia very well.

"You know the child, too?" the King asked him.

"Yes."

"That is good," the King said and looked back at Naomi. "My men will keep a lookout for her, under Bryce's guidance."

"Thank you, Your Majesty."

"You both appear to be clean and well-fed," he said, surveying us both. "But perhaps you would like to stay awhile. Dine with us?"

"Nah, we're good," I said. Naomi looked at me like she wanted to disagree. "We should be getting back…"

I stopped myself from naming the place or giving any kind of clue about where we'd come from. The King was looking mighty interested, and that did not escape my notice.

"Of course," he said. "Is there a place nearby that you call home?"

We hesitated.

"Yes," Naomi said. "We have a… community."

"A community?" he repeated, there was a glint in his eye. "My Kingdom has a plentiful bounty of crops, but we sorely lack other commodities. Do either of you speak on behalf of your community?"

"No," Naomi said. "We don't."

"From which direction do you hail?" the Kind asked. "Perhaps some kind of accord could be struck between our two lands."

I almost told him to go to hell there and then, but didn't because I could see Naomi was building up to something.

"If you don't mind, Your Majesty," Naomi said, after a slight pause. "I'd rather we didn't reveal that. At least, not until we've spoken to our people about it. There was… an attack on our community recently. Our people are still recovering, I don't want to bring more strangers to our gates unless I have to."

"Very well," the King said after some thought. "Very wise. Another time perhaps?"

"We'll speak to them about it," she said. "See if they're interested in making any kind of deal with you."

She looked at me, and I knew she was thinking about our dwindling food resources.

"Well then Naomi and Daryl," the King said. "I will grant you your leave. Do you need to borrow our horses?"

"It's okay," she said. "We got a car parked not far off."

"Can I get my shit back?" I asked, staring at the guy who'd taken my gun from me. He glanced at the King, waiting for his orders. The King nodded.

"See to it that our esteemed guests have their effects returned to them," said the King. "And give them safe passage back to their vehicle."

"Thank you, Your Majesty," Naomi said as her weapons were handed back to her.

I took mine, "Thanks."

The King bid us an elaborate farewell, and then Bryce walked us back out of the building. When we were a safe enough distance away, Naomi turned to him.

"Dude," she said. "What the hell?"

"Yeah, I know," Bryce looked mildly embarrassed. "It's a lot to take in at first, but he is a good leader."

"He has a fucking tiger," she said, then she turned to me. "You saw that too, right, I'm not insane?"

I knew she was trying to bring me into their conversation but I wanted to disappear. "I saw it."

"Shiva is actually pretty chill," Bryce said. "Once she gets to know you."

"Shiva," Naomi repeated. "Great name. Maybe we should get a tiger."

She expected me to say something. I didn't. I couldn't. I felt like I was shrinking more with every step we took.

"You sure you don't want to stay?" Bryce asked as our car came into view. "There's so much we have to catch up on."

I didn't say anything. I could tell that Naomi wanted to say yes. She looked at me. I looked away from her, feeling a little guilty that my desire to run from her friend was so obvious. Then she said, "No, we should get back before it gets late. Don't want people worrying about us or sending people out here looking for us. It could end badly for all of us. Soon, though?"

She stepped forward to hug him. I hated the easy way his hands slipped around her waist, and looked away before I could see them join at her back. I fixed my gaze on the handle of the car, counting down until I could open it and climb in again.

"Come back anytime," he told her. "There will always be a place for you here."

He very noticeably left me out of the invite.

"I'll visit soon," she promised. They still hadn't let go of each other. I fixed my gaze on the handle of the car, counting down until I could open it and climb in. Shut Bryce out. "Maybe once we've spoken to our people about it… you could come to us?"

Us. Like that invitation was somehow from me too. I hoped Bryce turned up when I was on gate duty so I could close it in his face and lock it forever. I hoped Rick and the others banned her from coming back here.

"I'd like that," he said and reached out to hug her again. How many damn hugs did one guy need?

"We gotta go," I said loudly. "Be dark soon."

"Alright," Naomi let go of him, frowned at me, and then looked back at Bryce. "It's been so good to see you."

I got in the car and slammed the door shut, so I didn't have to listen to his reply. A painfully long time later, her door opened, and she got in. She was all happiness and light, not like the resentment I'd been stewing in.

"I can't believe he's still alive," she said, all giddy and breathless. She waved at him through the back of the car, and he watched us drive off. I wished I'd sat in the driver's seat so I could reverse back into Bryce and his dumb, tall face.

I couldn't stop picturing the familiar way he'd wrapped his arms around her. His hands on her waist. How well did he know that feeling? That curve down to her hips? Did he know it in ways I didn't? Did he know the taste of her? The feel of her skin on his?

"You fucking this guy or something? Why is he so up in your business?"

I could remember asking it the first time I'd met him, I also remembered that she hadn't given me an answer. What if she had been? Or worse, what if she wasn't and I'd pushed her into his arms the moment I'd stormed out?

"You wanna check out that short cut?" Naomi's voice cut across my spiralling thoughts. Jarringly warm and happy.

"No," I snapped and didn't say anything else. The drive back was silent and moody. I knew it was my fault. She tried to start several conversations, and I barely responded to any of them. The pit of anger in my stomach was too loud, and I worried if I said anything, it would come out as jagged and sharp as I was feeling. When we dropped the car back off, I got out and slammed the door. She looked at me then, and I knew she'd reached the end of her tether with me.

"What's up?" she sighed.

"Nothing."

"Daryl…"

"Thought you weren't friends with any of them assholes?" I said.

"What assholes?"

"Them ones from your school."

"That's what this is about?" she said incredulously. "Yeah, most of them bailed after… that night, but not Bryce. He stuck around. We had a lot of the same classes, too. We both moved to D.C after we graduated…"

She trailed off, catching some kind of look on my face that I hadn't been quick enough to hide. That picture in my head of her and Mia tucked up reading in some apartment somewhere suddenly had Bryce in it too. All tall and annoying. 

His boots next to hers by the door. Helping Mia with her homework. Bringing Naomi coffee when she was up working too late. Making her laugh when she got too stressed. Drying the dishes while she washed. Climbing into bed with her after a long day at work and knowing that she was what made it all worth it. His hands on her fucking waist. Living the life I should've been living. If I hadn't been so damn stupid.

"You move out there together?" Part of me didn't want to know, another part would die if I didn't. 

"No," she said. "I moved out there straight after school and got Mia the second I got a job. He came out about a year after."

"But you lived... together?"

"No," she wrinkled her nose. Something in me lifted, but not enough. "I couldn't afford the kinda rent Bryce could. He got a job editing this real boring politics journal, but it payed well."

"Ain't you gotta be smart for that kind of thing?" I said. She gave me a warning look like I was close to crossing some kind of line. But it was too late, I was way beyond that. "Didn't know they hired dumb jocks."

"Bryce ain't dumb," she said. It was somehow worse that he was smart. Like her. She narrowed her eyes at me. "What's going on?"

"Nothing."

"Then quit judging people you don't know," she snapped. "Bryce is my friend. And a good guy."

"So you say," I muttered.

"Yeah, so I say," she said. "He's my friend, so I would know."

"Sure."

There was a silence where I could feel her looking at me. Feel her annoyance radiating out from her. And then something changed. She took a breath. "Daryl. Are… are you jealous?"

"No," I said. But I was. And the white-hot flash of anger up my spine was just proof of it. I kicked a rock on the road and watched it bounce off a nearby tree, wishing it was Bryce's stupid, tall head.

"Daryl," she said. Suddenly so damn amused. I didn't want to look at her in case I started yelling even though I wanted to. I really wanted to. "You're being real silly about this."

"How's that?" I snapped.

"Bryce and I were close, but… you'll always be my best friend," she said like it was the most obvious thing in the whole world. It calmed and hurt me all at once. I wanted to be the closest person to her always, but I also wanted so much more than what we currently had. She nudged me, her elbow knocking into mine. I looked at her, and she looked back with a frown like she couldn't believe how dumb I was being. "You gotta know that by now, right?"

"I guess," I said.

"Anyways, Mia already vetoed Bryce being my best friend."

"How's that?"

She gave me a little half-smile "Bryce said something in his wedding vows-"

"Bryce is married?" I interrupted.

"Was," she corrected me. "Andrew didn't make it."

I felt like an ass.

"Sorry," I said immediately. The anger was quickly dissolving, and underneath, there was nothing but shame. I think she knew that.

"It's okay," she said quietly, but I could tell she was still trying to assess me. Work out what had caused me to be such an ass in the first place.

"Were you guys close?"

"Me and Andrew?" she said. I nodded. Her nose wrinkled while she thought about it. "Kind of… but only because he was so important to Bryce. He came from money, had a lot of it, too. It could be hard to find common ground with him sometimes, y'know?"

I nodded because I did know. I just didn't know she struggled with that too. She made it seem pretty effortless.

"Bryce's wedding vows were all about how happy he was to be marrying his best friend. So, Mia said that meant he couldn't be mine. She got it in her head that all grown-ups marry their best friends," she smiled like it was silly, but it was the first thing I'd heard anyone say about marriage that made sense to me. People leave all the time. Hurt you when they're supposed to love you. Why the hell would you promise yourself forever to someone unless you knew they were the kind of person who'd stick around? Even if you fight sometimes. Even if you'd been an ass. Someone who could look past all of that if you really needed it. Like coming to your dad's funeral even if you weren't talking anymore.

"Sounds like a good theory to me," I said, and I felt my ears get hot. I kept focusing on the ground.

"I dunno, man, she was about eight," she said. "She'd been to one wedding and then seen too many others on TV. Not sure she's the best person to be dishing out relationship advice."

There's a lot of shit I think kids get right before your brain gets fucked up with all the bullshit that comes with being an adult. This felt like one of them. When I was eight, I'd learned that Naomi was the kind of person who'd share a stolen sandwich with a boy she'd just met, even though it was all she had, and I'd decided that she was the kind of person I wanted to stick around with as long as she'd let me. That had never stopped being true. If anything, it had only gotten more true over time.

"How else are you supposed to know someone's the right one for you?"

"Think that's what dating is for," she shrugged. "Although I probably ain't the right person to be dishing out relationship advice either."

My stomach all twisted into knots. "Waste of time if that person ain't right for you, though."

"Do you think there's only one person out there for everyone?" she said.

"No," I said. "Not for everyone. But if you're going to spend your life with someone, it's gotta be someone you can trust. Someone who has your back. Someone who… gets you, you know?"

"I guess…" she said, and I knew by the tone in her voice that she'd have that little frown on her face. I wanted so badly to look at her, could feel her looking at me, but I knew I'd only gotten this far because I wasn't looking at her.

How the hell do people do this?

"Did you know Eric and Aaron were friends first?" I blurted out. "Before they… y'know. Dated."

"No," she said. "I didn't know that."

I forced myself to look at her. For the first time in a very long time, she was looking at me like she didn't know me. Like she couldn't predict what I was going to say next or where any of this was going. It scared her a little, but she didn't move away. This wasn't the date I'd had planned for her, wasn't the one Aaron had helped me set up, but maybe that could wait. This was as good a time as any.

"Naomi, I-"

"Daryl!" Rick's voice cut across me from the front porch of a house that wasn't ours. As far as I knew, it had been all but empty until Morgan had decided to build some kind of jail in it. "Been looking for you all day, man. Get over here."

What now?

I glanced at Naomi, started walking over there. She followed. "What's up, Rick?"

"We've got our first prisoner," he said. "Calls himself Jesus."

Naomi raised her eyebrows so high they almost disappeared into her hair. As we followed Rick into the jail cell, she looked at me and muttered, "If this is the start of some sorta cult, I'm out of here."

Chapter 25: The Hilltop

Naomi

The RV bumped along the road, throwing us all around inside it. I didn't mind much. The seats were comfortable enough, and there was something about being crammed in there with Daryl and his friends that made me feel like I was part of something. I hadn't felt that way for a while, maybe not since I'd lost most of my group at Terminus.

"What you smiling at?" Daryl asked me like it was some kind of crime to be smiling on the way to a negotiation with a potentially hostile new community.

"Didn't think you'd let me come," I said.

"Wasn't aware I had a choice," he said in a way that suggested that if he'd known he had any say in the matter, my ass would be sat at home right now.

"That's fair," I said. "You didn't."

He wanted to smile, too, I could tell. I caught his eye, but he looked away, out of the window. The RV came to a sudden stop. Wheels spun against nothing, churning up chunks of wet mud.

"Damn it," Rick said from the driver's seat. "A storm must've passed through. We're stuck."

Jesus sprang up from his seat and looked ahead of where the RV had stopped.

"No worries," he said. "We're here."

Aside from breaking out and waking up Rick and Michonne while they were sleeping, outing their relationship to anyone who didn't know, Jesus had been a pretty well-behaved prisoner. We'd saved a few of his people on the journey up here, and, despite our concerns that it might have been some kind of trap or ambush, everything had worked out fine. Now though, this new obstacle seemed suspiciously well-placed. What were the chances of us getting stuck in mud right outside his community? Felt more likely that they might have laid this as a trap.

I jumped down from the RV, felt the wet mud splash around my feet. It looked innocent, like it genuinely could've been caused by heavy rainfall. Not too far ahead of us, the road we'd been following led up to a wooden gate and a wall so high that it was impossible to see what lay beyond it.

"That's us," Jesus said. "That's the Hilltop."

He started walking towards it, the spring in his step of someone who was returning home after what had probably been a very long night. The rest of his people walked forward, too, relieved to be making it back safe. I kept a close eye on all of them. They hadn't caused us any trouble and seemed grateful enough to us for rescuing them, but you couldn't always tell what was an act.

"Stop right there," someone yelled from the gate. I craned my neck to look up. Two lookouts on either side of the gate started down at us with what looked like spears.

"You gonna make us?" Daryl yelled back. I raised my gun to cover him, so they didn't think about trying anything.

"Woah!" Jesus said, raising a hand to try and get us all to calm down.

"Jesus?" one of the lookouts said, finally spotting him. "What the hell is this?"

"Open the gates, Cal. Freddie's hurt," Jesus told him, bringing forward one of the guys we'd rescued on the way here. Jesus looked back at us. "Sorry about these guys. They get antsy standing up there all day doing nothing."

"They give up their weapons, then we'll open the gates," one of the lookouts called back.

"Why don't you come down here and get 'em?" Daryl retorted.

"Look, we vouch for these people, alright," a Doctor we'd saved stepped forward. "They saved us out there."

"Lower the spears," Jesus said.

Rick was getting uneasy. "I'm not taking any chances. Tell your guy Gregory to come out here."

"No. Don't you see what just happened? I'm letting you keep your guns. Look, we ran out of ammo months ago," Jesus said. It could have been a lie. But the bozos on the gates were holding spears and not guns, don't see how they could've planned it that way unless they did this kind of thing a lot. Plus, Jesus hadn't lied yet. Which either meant he was honest, or that he knew the best way to get away with a lie was to surround it with truths. "I like you people. I trust you. Trust us. Open the gates, Cal."

There was a moment where nothing happened, and then the gates in front of us squeaked open. A big, old house stood in front of us. The way probably had for years. There were makeshift wooden camps and a line of trailers. People were hanging out their washing, tending to crops. They had a lot of vegetable plots and old farming equipment. I saw one person feeding chickens. Cows were grazing in a little pen.

"There was a materials company for a power yard nearby. That's how we put the walls up," Jesus said, as we walked in. "A lot of people came from a FEMA camp. Trailers came with them."

"How did people find out about this place?" Michonne asked.

"That's called Barrington House," Jesus said, pointing to the old house in front of us. "The family that owned it gave it to the State in the '30s. Then it was turned into a living history museum. Every elementary school for 50 miles used to come here for field trips. The place was running a long time before the modern world built up around it. I think people came here because they figured it'd keep running after the modern world broke down. Those windows up there let us see for miles in every direction. It's perfect for security. Come on. I'll show you inside."

He walked us up to the big house. Until now, I'd naively assumed that Jesus was the leader of his own colony. His calming presence and way with people made him likable, even if he was your prisoner. But thinking about it now, it wouldn't have made sense for him to be out on his own to be captured by Rick and Michonne if he was the one in charge of a place.

The door opened on a grand entrance hall, a winding oak staircase led up to the other floors. I was surprised by how intact it all seemed. So used to places being run down and dusty, or at least rearranged to make room for beds. From the entrance, the museum looked like it was still open for business. Portraits hung on the walls, not a speck of dust in sight. I almost felt like we should pay an admission fee.

"Good gracious, Ignatius," Abraham said, looking around the place.

There was a small bookcase. I crouched down to take a look. Heard Daryl tut from behind me. "Can you not?"

"What?" I looked up at him.

"You're a damn magpie for them things," he said. There was a small smile in the corners of his mouth.

"I'm only looking," I grumbled, but I straightened up again because he had a point. We had other things to worry about right now.

"Most of the rooms have been converted to living spaces," Jesus said. "Even the ones that weren't bedrooms before."

"People live here and the trailers?" Rick asked.

"We plan to build," Jesus said. "Babies are being born."

One of the big wooden doors opened, an older man in a grey suit stepped out and looked around at us all. "Jesus," he said. "You're back… with guests."

He didn't look best pleased about it, although he tried to hide it with a smile. I could feel Daryl pacing around behind me, the way he did when he's uncomfortable in a place.

"Everyone, this is Gregory," Jesus said. "He keeps the trains running on time around here."

"I'm the boss," he said, with a glint in his eye.

"Well, I'm Rick," Rick tried to introduce himself. "We have a community-"

"Why don't y'all go get cleaned up, hmm?" Gregory interrupted him.

"We're fine," Rick tried to politely decline, although Gregory clearly disagreed.

"Jesus will show you where you can get washed up. Then come back down here when you're ready," he said. He stepped closer to Rick. "It's hard to keep this place clean."

I looked down at myself. Felt like there was a base level of mud and grime that just kinda stuck to me these days. But we had needed to clear some Walkers to save Jesus's people, so there was blood on me now too. Felt a bit rude of Gregory to make us clean up after we'd brought those people back safe and sound.

"Yeah," Rick said, eventually. "Sure."

"Follow me," Jesus said with a slightly apologetic smile. He showed us where the bathrooms were, and we split off into groups. Nobody spoke much, still trying to suss this place out, but it was agreed that Maggie would be the one to talk to Gregory. Since Deanna's death, Maggie was slowly stepping into her shoes.

I went in after her, washed as much of the grime off myself as I could, and then walked back out into the landing to wait for everyone else. Jesus was waiting there too.

"You got many kids here?" I asked him.

"A few," he said. "But not your sister."

He smiled at the shock on my face. For the briefest of seconds, I would've believed that this Jesus had the same kind of powers as the original. "How did you…?"

"He already asked," Jesus nodded through an open door, to where Daryl was standing by the window watching us talk. He gave me a little smile.

"Oh," I said. Maybe it was because I'd been expecting it, or maybe it was the comfort of having Daryl care enough to ask for me, but it didn't sting as much as it had to find out she wasn't in the Kingdom. "Thanks anyway."

"No problem," Jesus put a hand on my shoulder, gave it a squeeze. When he let go, I walked into the room that Daryl was in. I wanted to say something to him, but Abraham was sitting there too.

"Maggie talking to Gregory?" I asked. Daryl nodded. He'd stopped pacing so much. I could feel that he was still restless, but that fight or flight battle within him was starting to die down.

I stood by the window with him and looked out into the grounds below. From here, we could see some kids playing out in one of the fields. I couldn't believe he'd asked about Mia before I had. He was the only person in the world who could make losing her less shit. I wanted to say something to thank him for it, but everything felt so corny. And I knew with Abraham sitting there, anything too person would embarrass him. So instead, I said, "Looks like folks got lucky here. Got a whole damn farm."

"Yeah, them chickens would be good," he said.

"Cows too," I pointed. "Fresh milk. Plus, they're kinda cute."

"Cute?" he said, his nose all scrunched up like I'd said something weird. "Them cows?"

"Yeah," I said with a shrug. "I like cows. They got pretty eyes."

He was quiet for a moment. The sunlight through the window hit his already tanned arms.

"Caught some pigs," he said. "Momma and her babies. Back when our group was staying at that prison. They was just out living wild."

"Really?" I said, leaning my forehead up against the glass. I knew it would leave a mark, but the thought of the fit Gregory might have when he spotted it amused me. "How'd you catch 'em?"

"Built a trap," he glanced at me and then back out of the window again. "Did the job, but… weren't as good as one of yours."

"Well, clearly, I taught you well enough," I said, and we smiled at each other.

"How long do you think Rick and Michonne have been ugging bumplies?" Abraham asked abruptly. So abruptly, it made me jump. I'd forgotten he was in the room with us. I turned around to look at him.

"I dunno," Daryl said, more guarded about gossiping about it than he had been with me. I shrugged.

"You ever think about it?" Abraham asked us. My stomach flipped over. Was he really asking us that? He chuckled at my shock, "I mean, settling down?"

Oh. That.

He was talking to both of us, but a short, soft laugh from Daryl made us both look at him. More curious than I cared to admit, I waited to see what he would say. It was hard to imagine him settling with anyone, but he'd been a lot more pro-marriage than I thought he'd be when we'd been talking about Mia's crazy ideas. He said, "You think shit's settled?" which neatly avoided any kind of real answer.

Abraham raised his eyebrows, looked at me. "What about you?"

I mulled it over for a moment, "I think shit's as settled as it's gonna get."

"Y'know," Abraham nodded slowly. "I think you might be about right."

I caught Daryl's eye and realized my answer had been more of a response to his rather than to Abraham's initial question. My palms were weirdly sweaty. I looked back at Abraham. As bleak as it was to think that this was as good as things were gonna get, he didn't look as bummed as I thought he might. He looked like he was mulling something over.

"Maggie and Glenn's baby news got you broody, Abraham?" I asked.

"Got me thinking," he admitted. "That's for sure."

Sasha or Rosita? I wanted to ask but didn't. It looked like he was reaching some kind of decision all on his own.

"It's like Sasha said, right?" I said, trying to gauge his reaction. At the mention of her name, he sat up a little straighter, lifted his eyes from where they'd been staring at the floor. "We got a roof over our heads, we got food, we got walls… we got choices. Maggie and Glenn are choosing to build something. It's brave."

"It sure as shit is brave," he said.

"I think Maggie and Glenn got lucky."

"How'd you figure that?"

"They both found someone they want to build something with," I said. "Easier to be brave when you ain't doing it alone. When you got the right person to be brave with."

"Would you do it?" Abraham asked. "With the right person?"

I hadn't been expecting to be put on the spot like that. I'd been trying to suss out where he stood with Rosita and Sasha, but this conversation had gotten way more intense than I'd expected.

"I ain't given it much thought," I said, honestly. "On one hand, ain't that the point of all this? To build some kind of future? Can't have a future without kids, but… there's more than one way to build a family."

Abraham nodded, looked like he was about to say something else, but then there was a slight cough from where Rick stood in the doorway.

"You guys ready?" he asked. "Rest of us are heading down to wait for Maggie."

Abraham stood up from where he was sitting. Daryl and I walked away from the window. We followed Rick back down the stairs to where everyone had gathered outside Gregory's office. We stayed quiet, trying to see if we could hear what was going on, but the door was too thick.

Eventually, Maggie burst out of there. It was apparent from the look on her face that things hadn't gone well.

"Slimy old creep won't give us anything," she muttered. She looked at Rick, "I tried."

"You tell him we got weapons?" he asked. "Ammo?"

"Told him all that."

Even the air seemed to bristle as we looked at Jesus's. We hadn't come all this way, and rescued four of his friends in the process, just to leave with nothing but less gas in the RV than when we'd arrived.

"We want to generate tread. Gregory does," Jesus insisted. "But ammo isn't something we urgently need."

"How's that?" Rick asked. Living in a world without ammunition felt as impossible as it did stupid.

"The walls hold. We just brought in more medicine. Gregory wants the best deal possible."

"Yeah, well, we want things, too," Daryl said.

"We need food. We came all this way, we're gonna get it," Rick agreed.

"I will talk to him, and we will work this out," Jesus said, in his usual calm and measured way. "Circumstances change. We're doing well now, and you will next. I will make him understand that. Can you give me time?

"We can," Michonne said, and Rick agreed. Jesus looked relieved, and in the silence, he tried to calculate his next move. He didn't have long before the doors burst open, and one of the guards from the gate came rushing in.

Hearing the commotion, Gregory came out of his office, "What's wrong?"

"They're back," he said. Whatever that meant was enough for Jesus and Gregory to leave without offering any of us further explanation. We followed them back out of the house and into the grounds where three people were walking in. Two guys and a girl. All of them looked like they'd been through some shit. They were clean enough, but their faces were pale and haunted.

"Nathan, what happened to everybody else?" Gregory asked. "Where's Tim and Marsha?"

"They're dead," one of the guys said. He was the bigger of the two and had a long-ass beard.

"Negan?" Gregory said.

Negan.

That name again. That phantom. I looked at Daryl, knew he'd clocked it too.

"Yeah," Nathan said.

"We had a deal," Gregory lamented.

"He said it wasn't enough." There was something dangerous in Nathan's eyes when he looked back at Gregory. "Was the drop light?"

"No," Gregory insisted. Nobody looked like they trusted him to be telling the truth.

"They still have Craig," the woman told him.

"They said they'd keep him alive," Nathan said. "Return him to us, if I deliver a message to you."

It was a mark of Gregory's inexperience and naivety that on hearing this, he did not arm himself. He stepped forward and said, "So tell me."

"I'm sorry," Nathan said before he stabbed him in the gut. Gregory cried out. There were audible gasps from the people of the Hilltop, unused to violence like this. Rick and Michonne sprang forward, pulling the guy away from Gregory. We had a vested interest in keeping him alive. I ran to where Gregory was writhing on the ground in pain.

"It's agony," he reached towards me. His hand shaking like a damn leaf in the breeze.

I looked up at Glenn. "Go and get that Doctor."

"On it," he said and sprang to his feet, running towards the medical trailer.

"Let me take a look," I said. Gregory moved his hand, and I saw the blood pooling on his shirt. It was a lot, but not a life-threatening amount. I took off his suit jacket and bundled it up, pressing down hard on the wound. "You'll be fine, it ain't that deep. Don't think it's cut anything major."

"My jacket…" he said forlornly. "It'll stain."

"You can bill me for the dry-cleaning," I muttered, while Maggie rolled her eyes behind his back.

"You killed him!" I heard someone scream. Keeping pressure on Gregory's wound, I looked back around and saw the fight was over. Nathan lay dead on the ground. The woman he'd come back with was sobbing over him, and the other guy was lying face down but alive after coming facing off against both Daryl and Abraham. Unlucky guy.

"Everyone, this is over! It's over," Jesus said, standing between Rick's gun and angry Hilltop residents. "Nathan was our friend, but let's not pretend he was anything more than a coward who attacked us. He did this. And these people stopped him."

"What can I do?" Rick asked him.

"Put the gun away, you've done enough," Jesus said. "You need to know that things aren't as simple as they might seem. Just give me some time."

Glenn arrived back with Doctor Carson, and I helped them carry Gregory back into the house. We took him into one of the bedrooms, where he lay and complained about the pain he was in while Doctor Carson stitched him up. I stayed and mopped up the blood while he worked. Then he sent us both away and called for Jesus like he was a man on his death bed.

I found the rest of my group waiting in his study.

"How's Gregory?" Maggie asked when I walked in.

"Well enough to be a pain in the ass," I told her.

"Think he'll give us anything now?" Glenn asked.

"Saved his ass, didn't we?" Daryl said.

"We also killed one of them," Rick pointed out.

"Gregory seems more concerned about saving his own skin than avenging anyone else's," Maggie said.

"True," Rick agreed. "But how's it going to look to his people if we come in here, kill one of them and leave with their food?"

His question hung in the air for a moment, and then Jesus came back into the room.

"Doctor Carson was able to patch Gregory up," he said. "He's in pain, but he'll live."

"He's well enough to worry about his damn suit jacket," I grumbled.

"So, what happens now?" Glenn asked.

"Things like that don't usually happen here, but, uh, it's settled," Jesus said.

"We heard the name Negan," Rick said. "A while back, Daryl, Naomi, and Abraham had a run-in with his men. Who is he?"

"Negan's the head of a group of people he calls the Saviors," Jesus said. "As soon as the walls were built, the Saviours showed up. They met with Gregory on behalf of their boss. They made a lot of demands, even more threats, and he killed one of us - Rory. He was 16 years old. They beat him to death right in front of us. Said we need to understand right off the bat. Gregory's not exactly good at confrontation. He's not the leader I would have chosen, but he helped make this place what it is, and the people like him."

"He made the deal?" Maggie asked.

"Half of everything. Our supplies, our crops, our livestock, it goes to the Saviours."

"And what do you get in return?" Glenn asked.

"They don't attack this place. They don't kill us," Jesus said.

"Pretty lousy deal," I said. Ours had been way better. But I guess if Gregory was already handing over half of everything to those assholes, Maggie's price might have been too steep.

"Why not just kill them?" Daryl asked.

"Most of the people here don't even know how to fight, even if we had ammo," Jesus said. That had been pretty obvious from their reaction to everything that had gone down outside.

"Well, how many people does Negan have?" Rick asked.

"We don't know. We've seen groups as big as 20."

"Now, hold up," Daryl said. "So, they show up, they kill a kid, and you give them half of everything? These dicks just got a good story. The boogeyman, he ain't shit."

"Well, how do you know?" Jesus asked.

"A month ago, we took his guys out PDQ," Abraham said. "Left them in pieces and puddles."

"You know, we'll do it," Daryl said. "If we go get your man back, kill Negan, take out his boys, will you hook us up? We want food, medicine, and one of them cows."

He sounded so sure, so confident. There was a fire in his eyes. I hadn't seen him like that for a while. I was proud of him for speaking up but uneasy about how quick he was to put himself forward for confrontation. Everyone else seemed in agreement, I wondered if this was something they'd all talked about while I was out of the room helping Gregory.

"Confrontation's never been something we've had trouble with," Rick said. I felt uneasy about it, but I knew we had to present a united front in this negotiation, so I held my tongue.

"I'll take it to Gregory," Jesus said.

Gregory agreed to talk, but only to Maggie. She was in there for a lot less time than she had been the first time around, and this time when she emerged, we had a deal. Half of their food if we got their man Craig back and took out Negan and the Saviours. The deal was done before I could voice my concerns or suggest an alternative.

Rick spoke to one of the guys who dropped things off at the Savior's base and convinced him to come with us, talk us through the lay of the land. It would help to have a face the Saviors knew to persuade them to open the door to us. Jesus offered to come too.

We loaded shit into the RV. More fresh food than we'd seen in a while. Seeds to grow crops for ourselves too. Maggie and Glenn were missing from it all. When it was time to go, they came out of Doctor Carson's office with these huge smiles on their faces. Sitting down in the back of the RV, they took out a scan of their kid and showed it to Michonne. Her smile was almost as big as theirs. She hesitated, and then passed it across to Daryl.

He took it from her, and I watched his face as he looked at it. The little smile. The way his eyes softened. Something about it made my heart ache. Much as he might avoid the subject, family was all Daryl wanted. All he looked for in the people he let get close enough to him. He deserved a good one. One he chose, one that deserved someone like him. If he ever stopped fighting long enough to look for one… I hoped he'd find it. I was so lost in thought that I didn't expect him to turn and show it to me. The unexpected way his eyes met mine made my heart drop like he'd somehow be able to read when I was thinking into my face.

"Remember when Mia was this small?" he asked quietly. I know he didn't really want anyone else to overhear, but it was crowded, there was no way to talk without being overheard.

"I was so scared," I said. "Scared for her. Scared of her. Thought she was going to mess everything up."

I'd been so convinced that Mia's arrival would spell the end of my college dreams, and that I would have to give up everything I'd worked for to look after her, that I felt a little guilty about it now she was gone. But I'd gotten through it. Daryl had gotten me through it, he could get me through anything.

"She didn't, though," he said.

"Nah," I agreed. "She made everything so much better."

The scan blurred in front of me, and I blinked a few times. Daryl shifted in the seat beside me, and then I felt his arm across my shoulders, warm and comforting. The smell of him. Like home. I wanted so badly to lean into it, but I was acutely aware of the others around us.

"You okay?" Maggie asked. I couldn't think of anything more terrifying than being pregnant in all of this, but she had this glow about her. I'd always heard that pregnant women get it, but I hadn't seen it on my Momma. Maybe it only comes when it's a kid they really want. My opinion of my Momma might have been too clouded for me to see it on her. Whatever it was, Maggie looked happy. Glenn had it too.

"Yeah," I said, and I was. I really was. I handed the scan to Abraham and looked back at them both. "I'm just real excited to meet your kid."

"Yeah?" Glenn smiled and wound a lock of Maggie's hair around his finger as she curled up against him. "Us too."

I thought Daryl would move again, take his arm back, but he didn't. He kept it around me. Deep in thought about something, his fingers absentmindedly traced lines from my shoulder, down my arm and back up again in a way that sent shivers down my spine. Was he thinking about our past with Mia? Or his future? I thought about asking him but found I didn't want to. I didn't want to do anything that might jolt him out of whatever mood he was in. Didn't even want to breathe too hard in case he suddenly remembered where he was and let go of me.

It was easy to imagine him as a dad. I had a harder time picturing him with anyone. I was so used to him being on his own, what would it be like to see him in love with someone? Something new and surprising twisted up in my gut. Sharp and bitter. I didn't like it. I didn't like it at all. Nothing was more important to me than seeing Daryl happy. He was my best friend, my home. But if I was honest - truly honest with myself - there was a chance it was a damn sight more complicated than that.

 

Daryl

News of what had happened at the Hilltop spread quickly. Unpacking crates of food at Olivia's drew a small crowd. People poured over them, talking about all the shit they could make now that they had fresh food again. Olivia immediately started taking stock of it all. When people asked questions, Rick announced a meeting in the Church. He said a decision like this would need to be democratic, but we'd already taken the Hilltop's food. We'd made our promises to them. Felt like a done deal.

Not everyone came, but enough people gathered to listen to Rick go over the terms of the deal that Maggie had agreed with Gregory. By morning, everyone would know.

"We can work with the Hilltop," Rick told them. "Maggie hammered out a deal. We're getting food - eggs, butter, fresh vegetables. But they're not just giving it away. These Saviours, they almost killed Sasha, Daryl, Naomi, and Abraham on the road. This needs to be a group decision. If anybody objects, here's your chance to say your piece."

Naomi stood up from where she was sitting beside Aaron. Everyone turned to look at her, and I saw her face flush a little, the way it does when she's embarrassed. What the hell was she doing?

"Daryl and I found another place," she said. At the sound of my name, my heart leaped. If she was going to drag me into this, I would've appreciated the head's up. "The Kingdom. We spoke to their leader, and I think they'd be open to trade with us too. Maybe with an easier deal."

Rick was nodding as she spoke, but I knew his mind was already made up, and I think she did, too. "You got any kinda proof of that?"

"No," she said. "But they seemed like good people, seemed interested in our community. They wanted to open up communications with us."

"It's a risk," Rick said. "Could be a trap to learn more about us. But this deal with the Hilltop? It's certain. It's done. We've already got their downpayment of food."

"I know that," Naomi said. I could tell by the look in her eyes that she knew she was defeated. "I think the risk with the Kingdom might be worth it, to avoid this kind of fight."

"I know of the Kingdom," Jesus spoke up. "And they are good people, but they don't have as much to trade as we do."

"Sooner or later, the Saviors would've found us," Rick said. "Just like the Wolves did, just like Jesus did. They woulda killed someone or some of us. And then they would try to own us. And we would try to stop them. But by then we'd be low and food, and in any kind of fight, we could lose. At least here, we keep the element of surprise. You ain't gotta fight if you don't want to. None of you do."

"No," Naomi sat down again. "If this is happening, I wanna fight. I just wanted to put forward an alternative."

"I appreciate that," Rick said. "And I appreciate you fighting with us. We ain't got the time to shop around for other deals. This is the only way to be sure that we win. And we have to win. We do this not just for the Hilltop, it's how we keep this place. It's how we feed this place."

Someone at the back stood up. We all turned to look at Morgan.

"You're sure we can do it?" he said. "We can beat them?"

"What this group has done," Rick looked around at us all. "What we've learned, what we've become, all of us - yes, I'm sure."

I felt a fire in my veins. The camp by the quarry, the prison, Terminus, getting here… it felt like it had all been training for this. And we were ready. We were damn ready.

"Then all we have to do is just tell them that," Morgan said.

"They don't compromise," Rick said.

"This isn't a compromise. It's a choice you give them. It's a way out for them and for us."

"We try and talk to the Saviors, we give up our advantage, our safety," Rick said. "No, we have to come for them before they come for us. We can't leave them alive."

"Where there's life, there's possibility."

"Of them hitting us," Rick said.

"We're not trapped in this. None of you are trapped in this," Morgan looked around at all of us like he was begging us. I glanced at Naomi, hoping she wasn't tempted to stand up again.

"Morgan… they always come back," Rick said.

"Come back when they're dead, too."

"Yeah, we'll stop them. We have before."

"I'm not talking about the Walkers," Morgan said quietly.

"Morgan wants to talk to them first. I think that would be a mistake, but it's not up to me. I'll talk to people still at home. I'll discuss it with the people on guard now, too, but who else wants to approach the Saviours, speak to them first?

Aaron stood up. "What happened here, we won't let that happen again. I won't."

It looked as if he spoke on behalf of the rest of Alexandria. A few nods from the crowds. A few murmurs of agreement.

"Looks like it's settled. We know exactly what this is. We don't shy from it, we live. We kill them all," Rick started to head out of the Church. "We don't all have to kill. But if people are gonna stay here… they do have to accept it."

He walked out, barely looking at Morgan as he went.

I stood up as others started to make their way out of the Church. I looked for Naomi, wanted to know what the hell was up with her going against us like that. She was already heading out with Aaron and Eric. I pushed past a couple of people to get to her before she disappeared.

"Oi, Naomi!" I called. She turned. Smiled. "The hell was that?"

Her smile faltered, "The hell was what?"

"That," I said. "Back there."

"I think the Kingdom could help us," she said like it was that damn simple.

"If you had a problem with the deal we were making, you could've said it at the time," I said.

"No, I couldn't," she said. "I didn't want to undercut Maggie while we were still negotiating."

"So, you just waited to undercut Rick now, huh?" I said. "In front of everyone?"

"Daryl…" Rick's voice from behind me tried to warn me away from a fight I could already feel rising up.

"That wasn't my intention," she said, and then she looked behind me to where Rick was standing watching us fight. "I'm sorry if it came off that way."

"No, I get it," Rick said. "You made a good point. But we ain't got the time to open negotiations with the Kingdom, and Jesus says it might not be the best idea anyway."

"I get that," she said. "And I'm sor-"

Rick held up a hand and cut her off. "Don't worry, Naomi. We're good."

"Okay, thanks, Rick," she said. And just like that, it was over. Both of them were so calm. Rick didn't seem at all mad that she'd gone against our plan. She didn't look at all mad that he'd shot down her idea either. But I was. It took me a moment to realize that it wasn't actually on Rick's behalf. I'd come up with that deal. I'd helped make it. Didn't feel right that she didn't have my back on it. Felt like I'd slip without her there to catch me. She glanced at Aaron and Eric, "Well, we'll see you guys tomorrow, then."

"No," Rick said. "You guys come to ours. Tonight, we're celebrating."

"Celebrating what?" Naomi asked. "We ain't won yet."

"We've got food," Rick said. "Enough for everyone, and the promise of more. That's worth celebrating, don't you think?"

"Well, I am sure as shit ready to blow off some steam," Abraham said, looking around at the rest of us like he was challenging us to some shit. "Even if you goddamn pussies ain't."

Naomi was still hesitating, but I saw the way Eric brightened, "I could whip something up. Make it a little pot-luck dinner?"

"Sounds good to me," Rick nodded. "Head on over when you're ready."

While we waited, we gathered in one of the houses. One of the guys we'd brought with us from the Hilltop talked us through what he'd seen of the Saviors' base. It wasn't much. But we could make some pretty good guesses about where their armory was and decided to head for it the moment we got into the building. Rick was so sure and confident in this plan that there wasn't any room for anyone else to disagree. He was in a good mood. Tense about the upcoming fight. But positive that we were going to win it.

Other people started to arrive. I half-expected Naomi not to come, for Aaron and Eric to visit without her and with some kind of excuse. But when they pitched up, so did she. They brought food, though it was clearly Eric who'd made it, and she sat down at the other end of the table from me, next to Carol and Tobin. Carol had made something too. Tara and Denise brought cake. Everyone who came contributed something. There was beer and wine. More than I was expecting. I felt that slightly hazy buzz you get from being a little tipsy.

People talked and laughed and ate. There was nervous energy about the place. Like it was our last supper. People were giddy with the promise of the upcoming fight. There was a real feeling that any one of us could die tomorrow. But instead of bringing the mood down, it amped everyone one up. Nervous and excited, terrified, all at once.

Without Naomi next to me, I felt like I was watching it from outside a window. Like I could hear it and see it, but it didn't quite reach me. I felt bad for yelling at her. And wanted to talk to her about it, but she sat so far away. I wondered if it was deliberate and if she was mad. When the food was done, people spread out around the house, conversations spilling into other rooms.

Naomi ducked out, sneaking out in a way that I'm sure was only noticeable to me because I was so aware of every movement she made. I waited for her to come back in. When she didn't, I made some excuse and headed out there too. Rick had planned to recap the plan for everyone who'd missed it, and I didn't want her missing out. I wanted her to be as prepared as possible. Thought I might find her out there talking to someone, but she was alone, leaning on the same part of the porch I liked to stand on in the morning. She turned when she heard the door open, looked away again when she saw it was me.

"You okay?" I asked.

"Yeah," she said. "Drank a little too much. Needed some air to clear my head. Didn't know you could see my house from here."

She took a sip from a glass of water she'd been balancing on the porch rail.

"Oh," I pretended that was news to me. "Can ya?"

"Yeah," she said. Her eyes locked on where it was all shut up and dark because she and Aaron and Eric were over here. Something was up. I let the door close behind me and went to stand beside her. She didn't tell me to leave her alone or yell at me, she didn't say anything. It would've been easier if she had. Was she mad at me? She didn't seem mad. But I wasn't used to her being so quiet, she'd been talking my ear off during every silence lately. Most of it was nonsense. But I liked it. I liked it much better than whatever this silence was.

"Sorry," I said after a while. "I shouldn't have yelled at ya."

"It's okay," she said, and it really sounded like she meant it, but she still didn't look at me. "I didn't mean to undermine Rick… or you."

"Me?" I said, and I felt guilty because it must've been obvious why I'd been such an ass. She could almost always figure me out. Even when I didn't want her to.

"Yeah," she said. "You did good with the Hilltop. Food in exchange for protection, it's a good idea… I didn't mean to shit on it back there."

"You didn't," I said. She took a deep breath.

"I just… every fight we go into…" she looked down at the glass in front of her. "I keep thinking it's one where we could lose each other. I don't want that."

"I don't want that either," I said. "But you ain't gotta come."

"Oh, I'm coming," she told me. "Only thing worse than going is staying at home and fretting."

I couldn't argue, I knew that feeling. Was that what was up? Was she nervous about this fight?

"Rick's right about that group in there," I said, as laughter spilled out of the house behind us. "What we have done, what we can do …we're unstoppable. And with you on our team, too… these damn Saviours don't stand a chance."

"I hope you're right," she said.

"I am."

She nodded but didn't say anything else. The chatter and laughter through the door felt miles away. I wondered if I should leave her alone. She didn't ask me to, I didn't want to, either. Something was different. I usually couldn't get her to shut up. Now, I couldn't get her to look at me.

"I don't like it when we ain't on the same team," I told her.

"We're always on the same team," she said, with one of her little half-smiles. "Even if we ain't agreeing."

"Don't feel like it," I muttered. Naomi was standing so close to me but she felt so far away. "I don't wanna argue with you again."

"We ain't arguing," she said. "Just disagreeing. That weren't a fight. Not a real one."

"Guess we ain't had a real fight since…"

My eyes flickered down to that half-moon scar on her hand, it looked silver against her skin in the light from the real moon. Then I looked away again because it kind of hurt to look at. I expected her to cover it up. Hide it from me like she usually did, but she didn't.

"You gotta let that go, man," she said, finally looking at me to follow my gaze with her own. "One tiny slip-up doesn't deserve the amount of shit you've been giving yourself for it."

"It does," I told her. "It just does."

She shook her head.

"I got a lotta scars, Daryl," she said. I thought about the ones on her thighs. The ones she never talked about, and I'd never seen, but still knew were there. She lifted her hand a little. "This one's my favorite."

"Bullshit," I had a lot of scars too. Couldn't imagine calling a single one of them my favorite.

"Nah, it's true," she said. "It always felt lucky. Any time I had a job interview or an exam… anything I felt nervous about, it just made me feel better. Safe."

I watched her run a finger absentmindedly along it.

"Safe?" I repeated. How could some damage I'd caused in a rage make anyone feel safe?

"Yeah," she said. "Because it made me think of you. And you're the only one in the whole world who makes me feel that way. No matter what you did by mistake one time. You know that, right?"

I kind of did. But it was still nice to hear it.

I looked back down at her scar, and it didn't hurt so much to look at anymore. She held out her hand to me, and I took it. Hers on top of mine. We both looked down at where our fingers met and laced together.

"You're a dork," I told her because I had to say something to diffuse this giddy feeling in my chest like I was racing too fast on my bike down a bumpy road.

"Maybe," she half-laughed half-smiled. She put the glass she was holding back down on the railing in front of us and looked at it. I wished she'd look back at me. "You've always been the most important person in my life. Even when you weren't in it."

I wanted to tell her that it was the same for me. That I'd wasted years acting like it was me against the world, but I'd never really been fighting alone. Even when we were apart, she'd been there. Woven in the fabric of who I am. Every decision I'd made, in every good or bad moment, I'd thought of her. Imagined the things she might say to me, the things we'd talk about if we ever met again.

And here she was, holding my hand on a moonlit porch far from where we'd begun.

But it was so hard to put all of that into words. I moved closer, and she turned her head. If she was surprised to find me so close, she didn't show it. Didn't move back. Just looked at me.

"Daryl…" It was a whisper. Quiet as the breeze around us but way more powerful. Damn near knocked me down. Not a question. Just… my name on her lips. Her eyes caught the light, and something changed. She let go of my hand. I waited for her to take a step back, to call me a dumbass or something.

And then she kissed me.

Soft, gentle surprise. The taste of beer and wine and something else. Something sweet and fiery and new. Something so indescribably her. It stirred something deep inside me. A long-suppressed hunger.

Her hand on my chest. Could she feel my heart under her palm? Beating hard. It lurched as she pulled away from me again. Her eyes fluttered open, full and panicked, terrified she'd made a mistake. I reached out and grabbed her hips, pulled her toward me. There would be no damn gap between us. This was no mistake.

A flash of surprise in her eyes, and then I kissed her hard enough to draw a quiet moan from her lips as shock turned to pleasure. The sound of it made my whole body feel alive, so aware of her. The softness of her lips. The taste of her. The smell of her. The way her body molded to mine like it had been made to fit there.

It was like a dam bursting. Everything I'd felt for her up until now was just the start. A fraction of what had been hiding below the surface. I'd locked it away in some kinda cage deep inside me. Ignored it, starved it. Heard it banging against the bars and thought that meant I knew how to control it. But just she'd bust the door wide open, and I was lost to it. Consumed by it. Could she feel it? The animalistic hunger of my lips on hers. Or did she still think this was a mistake?

With one arm wrapped tightly around her, I cupped the side of her face in my free hand and gently pulled away. Her forehead against mine, we stared at each other, breathing hard. Only we existed in the heat between us.

You are mine, I wanted to tell her. Mine.

Could she see it in my eyes? Did it scare as much as it scared me? She didn't look away, didn't move back, didn't tell me to stop. It was like her eyes silently begged me for more. I leaned in to give her what she wanted.

A door opened behind us. Loud and unwelcome noise in this space where only we existed. We broke apart. Light from inside flooded the deck. She squinted into it. "Aaron?"

"Oh good, you're still here!" he said, relieved. "Rick's about to go over the plan for tomorrow. You should probably both… is everything okay?"

I don't know what we must've looked like to him, but it was enough to make him stop talking.

"Yeah," Naomi said, brightly. She smiled at him. I tried to do the same. "Everything's fine. We'll… be right in."

"Alright then," Aaron grinned back at her. He left the door open. She looked at it and then back at me.

"We should probably..." she trailed off, looking back at the open door. There were so many people in there waiting for us. We couldn't stay out here much longer. But walking away from this moment felt leaving it would let it fall apart.

"Yeah," I agreed, trying to sound casual. "We should."

She nodded but didn't move right away.

"Daryl! Naomi!" I heard Rick call. "Get in here!"

Fuck off. I already know your damn plan.

But Naomi and the others didn't. She took a reluctant step towards the house, and I followed, my knees weak from everything that had just happened. It already felt like a dream. But I knew from the way my heart was still racing that it wasn't. Every cell in my body felt electric. Crackling like static every time she got close.

Everything had changed. Everything was different now.

Hard as I tried, I couldn't catch my breath. That caged thing inside of me had been set free, and there was no way of putting it back. It pumped through my veins like adrenaline, powerful and destructive. I'd been an idiot to think I had any kind of control over it at all. The faint taste of her was still on my lips, and deep in my stomach sat a gnawing hunger for more.

Chapter 26: You and Me

Naomi

What have I done?

What the hell is wrong with me?

"Are you sick?" Eric asked as I pushed my food around my plate. My stomach already felt filled with a thousand tiny creatures burrowing into it and eating away at the lining. I couldn't swallow anything past the ball of shame and self-loathing that was lodged in my throat.

"No," I said, although I didn't feel well either.

Aaron leaned over me, mildly concerned, "You do look a bit pale. Did you sleep okay?"

"Not really," I said. I'd hardly slept a wink. I knew it was important to get some shut-eye before this fight, but everything felt colossally unimportant now. The longer I'd spent staring at the ceiling telling myself I had to go to sleep, the more annoyed at myself and awake I'd been.

"You worried about this fight?" Eric asked. He glanced at Aaron, "Because there's no shame in sitting it out. You can stay at home. You can both…"

"No, I'm going," I said. "I'm just not hungry."

"Okay, something is definitely wrong," Eric said. He leaned across the table, pressing the back of his hand to my forehead like he was checking my temperature.

"You'll need your strength," Aaron said. "Eat. Even if you're not hungry. And if we find a convincing enough Gregory head early on, you should come back and rest before we head out."

"I know," I grumbled, picking up my fork and forcing a forkful of scrambled Hilltop eggs into my mouth.

"Is it because you and Daryl had a fight?" Aaron asked. At the mention of his name, my heart did backflips. I froze, tensed up, worried that if I swallowed, the eggs would resurface again, twice as scrambled. I could not stop worrying about how he was feeling this morning.

Why did I do it?

"Oh no, when did you guys fight?" Eric asked.

"Last night," Aaron answered for me. Then he looked back at me, "Sorry, I didn't mean to pry. There was just a lot of... tension when I came to get you both."

"I'm sure it'll blow over," Eric said reassuringly, reaching across the table to give my hand a pat. "It always does with you two."

What if it doesn't?

Arguments blew over because they were dumb spats that didn't mean anything. But did this? How the hell would this blow over? What the hell did this mean? It felt overwhelmingly big, but there was every chance it was nothing. Daryl might not have thought twice about it. Or maybe he'd just make fun of me for it until the day we both died. In which case, I hoped that day came soon.

What if he's mad at me for this?

"We didn't fight," I said. I forced myself to swallow down my damn breakfast, "And I'm fine."

"Oh, okay," Aaron said. He and Eric shared a look like they didn't believe me, but I been a little snappy, and they clearly didn't want to push it any further.

I shoveled more food into my mouth, feeling relieved and guilty all at once. I knew they meant well, but my head was a mess. So many thoughts were piling up on top of one another that I couldn't focus on a single one of them. The pressure building in there felt like it was enough to bust my skull wide open and spray pieces of my brains all over Eric and Aaron's dining room. I couldn't take any external ones from them too. And it didn't seem fair to mention it to them, at least not until I'd spoken to Daryl and found out if he was as confused as I was. Or if this was no big deal to him and we could go back to giving each other shit.

A knock at the door.

Was it him?

My stomach dropped like it used to when an elevator moved too fast. I stood up and stared at it. Aaron put a hand on my shoulder, gave me a look of grave concern, and then went to answer the door. From down the hall, I heard him say, "Hey there, Rick."

Rick's voice carried into the house. After a few moments of conversation that I was too relieved to listen to, Aaron walked back into the room.

"Rick's here," he said. "You ready to go?"

"Yeah," I said and moved to pick up my shit. As I bent down to get my bag, I glanced at the front door. Rick waved at me. Just Rick.

Aaron stopped me in the doorway to the hall. "You… you taking the fork with you, or…?"

"Shit," I looked down at where I was still clutching it. "No. Sorry."

I put it down on my plate, which Eric then came over to scoop up. "You sure you're okay?" he asked, quietly enough that Rick wouldn't hear.

"Fine," I whispered back. "Just tired."

I went to stand by the front door as Aaron kissed Eric goodbye. I knew Eric was super worried about this particular plan. I'd heard them arguing at night but pretended I hadn't.

"How you doing, Naomi?" Rick asked. I listened for any hint that he was asking in a how-you-doing-after-making-out-with-Daryl-last-night kind of way, but he seemed normal, so I did my best to be normal too.

"Not bad, thanks," I said. "You?"

"Yeah, not too bad," he nodded. "Keen to get moving. It'll be a long day."

It already felt like it had been a long fucking day, and it was only breakfast.

Aaron joined us, and we made our way down to the gates where everyone else was waiting for us. I wondered if Rick knew what had happened and was just good at hiding it, or if Daryl would've asked him to split us up because he was so mortified about it. It wouldn't have surprised me if Daryl went back to being all cold and distant for a while. I'd been bracing myself for it all night, and I still wasn't ready. But then Rick turned to Aaron and me, "I've got you guys in a car with Daryl, Heath, and Glenn. All the cars are going to follow the RV out of here. That alright?"

"Yup," I said brightly. "Why wouldn't it be?"

"No reason…" Rick said. "I was just letting you know."

Gathered at the gates in the groups that Rick had split us off into, I waited for Glenn to bring the car around and fought every deep-seated urge I had to look for Daryl. Glenn pulled up, and we all climbed in. No sign of Daryl. Maybe he was off telling Rick that he wanted to swap cars, or maybe he'd bypassed Rick and decided to jump in the RV to avoid me altogether. Just as I was starting to relax, the door opened on my side. And there he was.

"Uh… hey," Daryl said. And I felt like he said it just to me even though there was a whole car full of people.

"Hey," I said, and I hated how breathy and weird my voice came out. I wasn't sure if he noticed or if it got lost in the chorus of other people saying hello back to him.

"Scooch up?" he asked. I tried not to look at the way his mouth moved, or think about how it had felt on mine.

"Sure," I unclipped my seatbelt and slid into the middle seat. He climbed in next to me. I tried not to look at his hands when he rested them on his knees, or think about how my whole body had come alive when those same hands had taken hold of my hips and held me to him like it was where I'd always belonged. Like this was what we'd been made for, what we always should have been doing. Glenn hit a bump in the road, and Daryl's arm brushed up against mine. Felt like he'd give me some kinda electric shock. I jumped.

"Sorry," he said immediately.

"It's fine," I said quickly, shifting closer to Aaron in my seat, trying to make sure I was taking up as little space as possible, so we didn't accidentally touch again. I looked out of the window next to Aaron and tried to think about something - anything - other than Daryl.

Pull yourself together, Naomi.

But I couldn't.

In the sweltering heat of the backseat of that car, the skin on my arms broke out in goosebumps. I remembered his stubble against my chin, his hungry lips on mine, and I shivered.

Our little convoy pulled up by the side of the road. A chorus of horns blared out for a solid minute. It was in such stark opposition to everything that we'd learned to do to stay safe from Walkers that it took everything in me not to stab Glenn in the head to get him to shut up. We climbed out of cars. Up ahead, I saw Rick and the others jump down from the RV. We peeled off along different sections of the road to look for Walkers that had been drawn to the sound.

The first wave came at us quickly. More than I expected. I pulled a knife out from my belt loop. The previously quiet forest filled up with the cracking of skulls and the squelch of brains. I took out a few in front of me, then stopped to catch my breath and take in the scene around me. I'd lost sight of Heath and Glenn already. Aaron and Daryl were closer by, but my fight had taken me a little further away from them. Being further from Aaron concerned gaze and Daryl's… well, everything… made me feel more relaxed than I had all morning. There were still Walkers coming at us, but that felt a whole lot more normal than dealing with anything else.

Not too far off to my left, I saw a small group of about three Walkers. They were heading for Daryl, but his back was turned to them. I was sure he'd get to them in time, but something drove me forward. I ran at them. They heard me coming and turned their attention to me. I dodged one, stabbed another. The third lunged at me, and I kicked him off, stabbing the first one while it stumbled back. I threw my knife at the only one left, got it right between the eyes. This was really helping. Adrenaline had been building inside me all night, and now I finally had something to take it out on.

Further away, another two moved into a clearing, drawn to the sounds of the other Walkers being taken down. I could hear gunshots cracking further away. I knew going to get them on my own would take me out of sight of the others. I knew I should wait for them to get closer so that someone knew where I was. But I couldn't hold back. The more I fought, the better I felt. I no longer felt like my brain was about to explode and rain chunks of skull and Greymatter down on anyone in a fifty-mile radius. I charged towards them.

When they were dead, I turned and found myself alone. Rick had been clear that we should all stay together, in twos or threes for safety. I had directly disobeyed him, but I finally felt free. After a night of a full house at Rick's and a morning of Aaron and Eric hovering around me, I felt like I could breathe again. If we hadn't just set off a bunch of horns to attract Walkers, I'd have screamed to let out some of the frustration building up inside of me. I walked forward, trying to focus on the task at hand.

I was alone for about a minute before I heard something move behind me. I knew it was him without turning to look. Like my body was tuned perfectly to his now. I felt myself slow down without thinking about it, straining for another sound. It wasn't cold, but goosebumps broke out across my arms again. I felt the way a deer must when they realize he's close by. Flighty. Trapped. And not at all ready for this. I came to a full stop.

"You tracking me?" I asked, turning to find him standing a few paces away.

"I'm keeping an eye on ya," he said.

"Shouldn't you be keeping an eye out for Walkers that look like Gregory?"

"Got two eyes, don't I?"

It was a lousy argument because he couldn't focus on me for more than a few seconds but couldn't seem to look away for too long, either. A Walker probably could have strolled up and taken the gun right out of his hands, and I'm not sure he'd have noticed. I got it, though, I also struggled to look at him. Every time I did, I felt sick with nerves. Like I was about to sit an exam or something.

"We should probably… talk?" I said, a pit of dread opening up in the pit of my stomach. It didn't seem like he was going to be the one to bring it up, I guessed it had to be me. I could hardly hear myself over the drumming of my own heart, so I wasn't sure what kinda conversation I'd be capable of.

"Yeah?" he said and raised an eyebrow. "What about?"

I rolled my eyes. "You know what."

"Okay," he took a few steps towards me, his boots crunching on some dead leaves under the tree. "You first."

"Why me?" I folded my arms across my chest.

"Well, you're the one who kissed me," he pointed out. There was a little smile on his face that I couldn't work out. Something cold clenched in my gut. Was this just going to be something else for him to tease me about? If he was letting me off the hook, why didn't that feel like a relief?

I closed my eyes, so I didn't have to look at him. "I'm sorry."

It felt like I owed him that at least, maybe if I just came out and said it, he'd back off, and we could go back to normal.

"Sorry for what?" he asked. Was he really going to make me say it?

"For kissing you," I said. I forced myself to look him in the eye. "I shouldn't have done it."

Now it was his turn to look at the ground. He kicked over a rock. "Why?"

"It's just… it's you and me, y'know?"

"Yeah," he said. "I do know."

There was something in his tone. Something flat and a little hostile.

"And we… don't do that," I said like he needed reminding.

"We ain't done it before," he said, which somehow felt like it was both agreeing and disagreeing with what I'd just said. It opened things up again. Left them too open. There was a silence that neither of us wanted to break. And it was probably a good thing because it was only then that I heard the unmistakable sounds of Walkers nearby.

"Shit," I muttered and pulled my knives out again. There were about five of them, stumbling towards us.

"We got this," Daryl said, pulling out his own weapons. "You ready?"

I nodded. "Let's do it."

Truth was, facing off against a bunch of Walkers was a welcome distraction from this damn conversation. It was so much easier to bash their heads in than it was to sort my own head out. Daryl took out two, I took out two and then there was just one left. I caught a look in his eye. Like a challenge. We raced towards it. He reached it first because he was closer, but the first swing of his knife didn't hit right. It sliced a neat line across the Walker's forehead. The skin of its face peeled down to reveal a gleaming white skull. One of its eyes popped out to land on the forest floor.

I jumped forward, jammed my knife up into its newly-empty eye socket. It crumpled.

"I nearly had that!" Daryl complained.

"Too slow," I shook my head. "Snooze ya lose."

"Snooze ya lose?" he repeated, with his own little head-shake. "This ain't no damn game."

"Says the loser," I said, looking around at the carnage we'd just left in our wake. I'd been too busy enjoying the catharsis of killing Walkers to remember to try and do so in a way that kept any potential look-a-likes intact.

"Shit," I said. "I forgot to check whether or not any of these looked like Gregory."

"They didn't," Daryl said, kicking one over onto it's back to double-check.

"Good," I said, and I stopped to wipe my knife clean. For a second, it was like everything was normal again. And then the quiet of the forest settled around us. I stole a glance at Daryl. That damn smile was back.

"You're really freaking out about this, huh?" he said. He didn't have to say what about.

"Well, yeah," I said. It felt like my heart had swollen up to twice its usual size and was now lodged behind my tonsils, beating so uncomfortably it made me feel sick. "Ain't you?"

"Pfft," he said, shaking his head. "No."

I knew it was a lie, I could tell by the mild panic in his eyes every time they met mine and the way his cheeks were kinda flushed. Something about noticing that made me calm down a little. This was weird, but at least it was weird for both of us.

"Really?" I tried to call him on his bullshit.

"Well, maybe a little," he admitted. Then he shrugged, "But... I ain't complaining. And you ain't gotta be sorry."

"Oh." I could feel my cheeks going a deep shade of red. "I just…"

I trailed off. I wished I had something to say to him. But nothing I'd been running over in my head felt… right. Knowing how he was feeling would've helped, but I knew it would be a cold day in hell before Daryl shared that willingly. I was usually good enough at reading him to take a good guess at how he felt. But not today. I didn't even know how I felt today. This was uncharted waters for us, and I was lost at sea.

"Just what?" he prompted.

"I didn't plan it," I said. It felt important that he knew that I hadn't meant to drive this massive wedge between us. There had been something in the way he'd been looking at me on that porch that had drawn me to him like a magnet, catching me so off-guard that I couldn't think straight. I'd felt dizzy, and his hand in mine had been the only solid thing in the world. I'd stood at the top of everything we were and peered over the edge at the unknowable chasm of everything we could be. And, without knowing if he'd catch me, I'd jumped. I'd just fucking jumped.

"You mean you didn't fill a binder with a pro-con list about it?" he said. I knew he meant it as a joke, but the moment he said it, my brain couldn't stop.

Pro: he's my best friend in the world, and there's nobody else on earth I care more about.

Con: he's my best friend in the world, and if this goes wrong, I could lose him forever.

"'Course not," I said. "I don't know why I did it. I just… wanted to."

It had been more of a need. Deep and burning and sudden. There was a short silence. Part of me wanted to look at him, and the other part wanted to run away. Then he said, real quiet, "Was it bad?"

"No," I said quickly. Maybe too quickly. "God, no."

Pro: it was the best fucking kiss of my life.

I glanced up at him to see how he'd taken it, caught his smile again. Truth was, I could still feel it. His surprise when our lips met. So gentle at first. Like he was afraid I'd disappear from under his kiss. And then there was a horrible, sinking feeling that he might not want this, that I was single-handedly ruining everything that mattered to me. I had that same feeling now.

Con: I have no idea how he feels about this.

"No?"

"It was...a good kiss," I said because saying anything closer to the truth would feel it lame as shit. I wondered how much he'd managed to read into my pause. "At least, for me, anyway."

"It was for me too," he said, and something in my heart felt like it was soaring back up from whatever I'd been sinking into. He scuffed his shoe on the ground again. "So, why are you sorry about it?"

"Well, because it's us, Daryl," I said. "It's you and me."

"Yeah, I know who I was kissing," he said, a little annoyed. "Why do you keep saying that?"

"Because I shouldn't have been so… impulsive," I said. "I didn't want to make things weird. Or make you feel weird, or-"

"You didn't."

"Er, it's been a little weird," I said, wondering if he'd just sat in the same car journey as I had.

"I guess," Daryl said. Then he sighed. "Look, we ain't gotta keep talking about this."

It did seem like we were going in circles, but was that it? There was, as far as I could tell, no resolution. Were we just brushing it off? Pretending it didn't happen? Would we just go back to normal, chalk it up to pre-fight anticipation, and a little too much wine? Trust Daryl to clam up and not want to talk to me while I was left to freakout in the dark.

"No?" I said. "Cause I really think we should at least… y'know…"

He was shaking his head. He reached out and took hold of my wrist. "C'mere."

He tugged me toward him so unexpectedly that I stumbled on a tree root in the undergrowth, stubbing my toe. "Ouch. Daryl, what-?"

"Just come here, will ya?"

I stood in front of him, a bundle of raw and exposed nerves.

"What are you doing?" I asked. It came out as a whisper because I knew exactly what he was doing. He had that same look in his eye. That same nervous intensity as he looked down at me, and behind it, that hunger I hadn't seen before. I felt it rise in me too. His fingers under my chin, I knew I should turn away. I put my hand on his, stopped him from tilting my face any closer. "Daryl... I don't think we should."

But my heart was racing just like it had before, and I had no real desire to turn away from him.

"Why?" he asked, and I was close enough to feel the burst of anger in him tense the muscles in his body. "'Cause you ain't planned it?"

"No," I said. "Because we ain't talked about."

"I don't wanna talk about it," he said, but he let go of me again and took a step back. "If we talk about it, you're gonna wind up talking yourself out of it."

"Why? Because it's a bad idea?"

"No," he said. "Because I know you, Naomi. You either spend months fretting about shit and making lists, or you do something on impulse and beat yourself up about it for even longer."

"No, I don't," I protested, but there was a flash of guilt in my gut like he might be right.

"Remember when you punched that guy in school because he was an asshole to me?"

"Yeah," I said. "I never regretted that, though."

"Maybe not, but you worried about it," he said, "worried it'd get you kicked outta school or show up on some kinda permanent record."

He had me there, and the worst part was he damn well knew it.

"This is different," I said. "This is very different."

He sighed. Let all that anger out in one long breath. He closed his eyes for a second like he was making a decision.

"It was good, though, right?" he looked at me again, kinda nervous, like I might've been lying to him before.

"Yes."

A small nod. I don't know if it was the way I said it or just that I said it at all, but it was enough for him. He took hold of me again, more purposefully than before, his hands firmly on my waist. "Then shut the hell up."

"But-"

He pulled me slowly to him, and my words caught in my throat. I could feel the spin of the world under my feet and held onto him to steady myself. It wasn't fair, the effect this had on me. How was I supposed to keep a level head with him looking at me like that? With his lips so close to mine?

"If you don't want this," he whispered. "Tell me to stop."

I tried to say it, I really did, because I knew it was the right thing to do. The sensible thing. This was Daryl. My Daryl. What if this fucked everything up? But the promise of the taste of him hung in the air between us. My body betrayed me, melting against his. I was back on that ledge between what we already were and what we could be. The anticipation of the drop was worse this time because I knew what was waiting on the other side of it.

His kiss silenced the noise in my head. I thought I'd be more prepared for it this time around, but I wasn't. The taste of him sparked a jolt right through me. A rush. A high. So much better than I'd remembered.

He kissed me like he was trying to tell me a secret, and this was the only way he knew how. Urgent and soft all at once. Just for me.

I kissed him back, instinctively. A deep-seated need buried within me. A thirst I'd never quenched. His hands on my body moved to the small of my back and sent a shiver up my spine. He was still so gentle. I needed more of him. I wrapped my arms around his neck to pull myself closer to the heat of his body. I kissed him harder and heard a low moan from deep in his throat. More like a growl and every nerve in my body came alive. His grip on me tightened. His lips parted mine, and I felt weak, not just at the knees, but for giving into this. Because this was so much easier than talking about it. Or trying to name the multitude of shit I was feeling right now. Because I didn't know what to say to him. Or to myself.

Close by, someone cleared their throat. We turned, one hand still clutching each other and the other hand on our weapons. It was instinctual, although it wasn't like Walkers to clear their throats before they tried to bite you.

"Just me," Aaron raised his hands, a head dangled from one of them. "Didn't mean to… interrupt. But we should all be heading back now."

Shit.

Shit, shit, shit.

I let go of Daryl and put my knife away. Daryl did the same. I couldn't look at him, we both just stared at Aaron.

"Sorry," I said when the silence got too much for me. "You weren't supposed to… we didn't mean…"

"It's fine," Aaron said, and I think he was trying not to laugh at how badly we were both handling this. "This is what I interrupted before, isn't it? Back at Rick's?"

"Yeah," I looked at the forest floor. "Sorry."

"Stop apologizing," Aaron said. "But, get moving."

We started walking back to the cars. Daryl and I walked a few feet apart from one another, terrified that if I got too close to him, I wouldn't be able to stop myself from reaching out to him. Taking his hand or wrapping my arms around him. The impulse was there, but… was I allowed to do that? Was that too... couple-y? Now someone else knew, that somehow made it whatever the fuck was happening between us more real. I think that was starting to sink in with Daryl too. He couldn't look at either of us.

Back by the cars, three potential Gregory lookalikes had been lined up for Rick to choose from. When he and Andy from the Hilltop had selected the best choice, Rick gathered up the rest of us behind the RV to go over his plan to take the Savior's base. We would leave at midnight, we had until then to go home and rest.

The car journey was just as weird and quiet as it was on the way there. Maybe even weirder because now Aaron was sitting in our secret too. Although, if anyone had to find us like that, I was glad it was him. I imagined it would've been a lot worse with anyone else. Daryl had fully withdrawn into himself, and I wondered if the magnitude of what had happened between us was finally hitting him. Glenn dropped Aaron and I off at home before driving the others back to their houses.

Aaron didn't say anything until we reached the door. Then he looked at me and said, "Well…"

"Don't," I pleaded, pushing the door open in an attempt to escape.

"How long has this been going on?" I knew he wasn't quiet enough for Eric's bat-like sonar hearing, so I was glad he wasn't being specific.

"Last night was the first time," I said. "That was the second."

"That's why you were acting so weird this morning," he said like everything suddenly made sense.

"What's why she was acting so weird?" Eric popped his head out into the hallway and watched us take our shoes off. My heart sank.

"No reason," I said quickly, which was probably the worst possible answer, but I was too tired to make up something believable.

"Why didn't you just tell us about it?" Aaron asked.

"I still don't know what it is," I said. "It was just so… sudden."

"Well, if it helps, I think you'd be the only person who's surprised by it," he said. "But if you wanted it to be a secret, you probably shouldn't have been so public about it."

"Oh my God," Eric said. "Public about what?"

"We weren't public about it," I said. "We were alone in the damn woods. You were the one sneaking around spying on folk."

"Oh, please," Aaron said. "When you two aren't so… distracted... you can hear a living person walking through the woods a mile away, and tell it's not a Walker."

He had me there. Under normal circumstances, there was no way that Aaron would've been able to sneak up on us like that.

"Will someone please tell me what is going on?" Eric demanded.

Aaron looked expectantly at me. I could feel my cheeks burning. I looked at the ceiling, sent up a silent prayer that the Lord might strike me down so that I didn't have to go through with any of these uncomfortable conversations and then, when he didn't I closed my eyes and said, "Daryl and I kissed."

"You what?" Eric rushed over to me and grabbed my arms, dragging me to the sofa with him. "Tell me everything."

"There's not much to tell," I said, "We kissed, that's it. End of story."

I hoped he wouldn't have any further comments or questions, but, of course, he did. "When did this happen?"

"The first time?"

"First time?" he repeated. "We'll start there, yeah."

"Last night, after dinner at Rick's."

"And who kissed who?"

"I kissed him," I said.

"Good for you," he gave me an excited nudge on the arm. "And he kissed you back, right?"

"Yes," I said.

"And how was it?"

"It was good," I said. The excitement in Eric's face made me smile even though I didn't want to. "It was really good."

"So, what happened? How did you leave things?" Eric leaned forward, I could tell the lack of detail I was giving him was incredibly frustrating for him.

"Aaron told us to come in and listen to Rick," I said. Eric gave Aaron a look like he'd betrayed him in the worst possible way.

"And you didn't get a chance to talk about it after?" he asked. I shook my head. "What about today?"

"We tried to," I said.

"Er… didn't look like that's what you were doing," Aaron muttered.

"We did," I said, and then I slumped down further onto the sofa. "At least, I did… I tried to say sorry for starting this whole mess. I tried to explain that I hadn't planned it or meant to make things weird. It just… happened."

"And what did he say?" Eric asked.

"That he didn't want to talk about it," I shrugged. "And that I'd just talk myself out of it if we did. So, now I have no idea how he's feeling about it. Or how I'm feeling about it. I thought talking to him might at least make things clearer, but… he just kissed me again. And that's when Aaron found us."

"You ruined it twice?" Eric turned to him. "I'll never forgive you."

Aaron ignored him and looked at me, "You know Daryl better than anyone, I'm sure you can take an educated guess at how he's feeling."

"I dunno, he's being very vague," Eric said. "Does he just want to make out with her or-?"

"Daryl ain't like that," I interrupted him. Aaron was right. Aaron was completely right, I did know Daryl better than anyone. I'd been so overwhelmed by the new territory we were in that I hadn't stopped to think about how it was the same Daryl I was navigating it with. "He don't do casual. It's… it's just not him."

Shit.

"Sounds like you know what he wants," Aaron said gently.

Daryl and I had never talked about it, or even anything close to it. But I knew him. I knew how long it took him to trust people enough to get attached. I knew why. I should've seen that he wouldn't have kissed me back unless it meant… something to him. But what? And how much? And was it worth risking everything for?

"Ohhhh," Eric sat bold upright. "I see what's going on here."

"You do?"

"Casual is all you do," Eric said. "Right?"

I nodded. And I did it for the same reasons that Daryl didn't. It stopped people from getting too close. It protected me from being hurt or let down, prevented them from ever properly getting to know me. When things got too real, I could just… leave. I couldn't do that with Daryl. He already knew me too well.

This was new, but we were who we'd always been; two broken people trying to love each other in the best way we could while neither of us felt like we deserved it.

Aaron was nodding, "And now you're freaking out because Daryl's already closer to you than you're comfortable with."

It felt like everything was crumbling around me.

"You should go over there," Eric said. "Explain things to him. See if he'd be willing to take things slow, so you don't bolt."

"I can't do that," I said, burying my face in my hands. At his core, Daryl assumed that nobody really wanted him around, no matter what they said. His expected people to leave, to let him down. How could I even word that in a way that he wouldn't see as me bailing on him?

"You're right," Eric said. "You should shower first, and, for the love of God, please brush your hair. Also, wear something... cute. But not too cute. You don't want to look like you're trying too hard."

I looked back up at him. "Eric, I-"

"You know what?" he held up a hand to shut me up. "Don't worry about it, I'll pick something out for you. Just... be clean."

"Isn't your advice in these situations usually to play it cool? Wait a few days?" Aaron asked.

"If these two wait any longer or play it any cooler, we'll all die of frostbite," Eric said. "They need to sort this out."

"What I need," I said, "is to get some sleep. My head's a mess, and I gotta fight the Saviors in a couple of hours, not get all dressed up for no reason."

"Oh, Naomi," Eric said sternly like I'd hugely let him down. "There is no reason you can't kick ass and look cute doing it."

I stood up. "I'm going to bed."

"Fine," Eric called after me as I walked out of the room. "But, I'm waking you up with enough time to shower."

"Bite me," I yelled back and heard him laugh.

It was still light outside my window. I could see the spot on Daryl's porch where I'd first kissed him. I closed the curtains against it and lay down on top of the bed. A few minutes later, the stairs creaked as Aaron climbed them to get some rest in another room.

I stared at the ceiling and told myself that once this fight with the Saviors was done, we could sort it out. I would make Daryl talk to me, even if he didn't want to. I repeated it until I felt calm enough to drift off to sleep.

It felt like I'd been asleep for about a minute before Eric woke me up, but it was dark outside, so it must have been more than that. My whole body ached for more rest, my thoughts felt like they were trying to move through quicksand. Napping might have made me feel worse than if I'd just powered through.

"You look like shit," Eric chirped. "But we can fix that."

"If it helps," I told him, rubbing the sleep out of my eyes. "I feel a thousand times worse."

I was too tired to fight both Eric and the Saviors, so I let him pick out whatever he wanted and then twisted my hair into a braid that would keep it out of my face but made Eric think I was putting in more effort than usual.

We rolled out bang on midnight and took our positions in the shadows around the Savior's base, watching as Andy from the Hilltop drove up with fake-Gregory's head in a bag. It seemed like the two Saviors guarding the door accepted our decoy. One of them went inside. Daryl snuck up behind the other and killed him before he even knew what was coming. We ran out to help move the body and hit again before the first Savior came out holding a prisoner, presumably Craig.

Before the remaining Saviour had a chance to notice that his friend was missing, his throat was slit. Daryl held the door open as we rushed in, guns ready and sweeping for any other guards that might be on patrol. The plan was to undertake a systematic sweep of every room until we got to the armory, taking out any Saviors we found sleeping along the way in the quietest way possible. Rick and Michonne went into one room, where some Saviors were sleeping, Glenn and Heath took another. I walked around a corner with Abraham and Sasha. Rosita and Aaron were just behind me. I turned to them and motioned that I was going to scout out ahead. The corridors here were short and winding, which meant there was no way to tell who was down the next one. It would be too easy to get caught off guard by someone rounding a corner before we heard them coming.

I turned a few corners. Just to check them. Just to make sure there weren't any regular patrols. And then the whole building came alive with the sound of an alarm. I did know who'd been caught, but we'd been rumbled, and our element of surprise was gone.

"Fuck," I breathed as doors opened around me. I managed to fire three shots before two people behind me knocked the gun from my hands. If I'd been less exhausted, it probably wouldn't have been so easy for them to grab me by the arms. My reactions were slower than usual. I kicked, hitting one of them in the shin. I heard them cry out. Sounded like a man. His grip on me loosened, and I twisted my arm free. I swung and landed a punch on his dumb nose.

A woman snatched my gun from where it had fallen on the ground and pointed it at me.

"Kill her," the guy said, holding his nose and looking at me like I was some kind of wild animal.

"No," the woman said. "We might need her."

"For what?" he asked. She didn't answer, but I knew.

She looked at me, "On your feet. Get walking."

I could hear gunshots moving down the maze of corridors. My friends were fighting their way out, and her friends were fighting back. How could I have been dumb enough to get caught out like this? The red-haired woman forced me to crawl out of one of the windows ahead of her. Outside, I got my bearings and little and went with them willingly in the direction she pointed me in because I knew if we kept going, we'd reach where Maggie and Carol were waiting at the parameters. Maybe there, I'd be able to turn the tides on this, and we could all get back to help the others. I was ready to fight, I just needed to pick my moment.

But then, as we got close, my heart sank again. I could hear Maggie and Carol's raised voices, arguing about something. It gave away their position. The woman gave me a shove. "There's more of you?"

"Carol! Maggie!" I yelled. "You gotta-"

The guy I'd punched smacked me across the side of the head. "Shut up."

I heard Maggie and Carol's footsteps as they ran towards us, guns raised. It was the opposite of what I wanted. I'd wanted them to run.

"Lower your weapons," the woman holding me called to them. "Or we'll shoot her."

She turned her gun on me. I locked eyes with Carol, knowing that if anyone had the strength to do what needed to be done, it was her.

"Let her shoot me," I told her. "Take 'em out. We can still end this."

I watched Carol hesitate. Her hand shook in a way I wasn't expecting. And then she lowered the gun. Another surprise. The fear in her eyes, the quietness of her voice when she spoke; none of it was what I expected from her. But I guess even the strongest people had breaking points. Maybe Carol had just reached hers. I thought it would freak me out, but a quiet calm washed over me. Daryl would find me; I knew it in my heart. And until then, it was up to me to keep Maggie and Carol safe.

 

 

 

Daryl

Where is she?

After the alarm went off, everything was chaos. Saviors came from nowhere, armed already. The fight got ugly and bloody and confusing. We thought we'd cleared the place, but it was hard to say for sure. We didn't know the layout. There were a lot of twists and turns in the corridors around us. Every door we opened felt like it could've had a bunch more Saviors on the other side of it. But it had been a while since we'd seen one alive and we'd all managed to fight our way to the same place.

Almost all of us.

Naomi was gone. She was just gone.

"You guys seen Naomi?" I asked. I tried not to panic. This had been chaos, and it would be easy to get lost here.

"She was just ahead of us," Rosita answered. "She probably made it out already."

I nodded, but I knew that it didn't sound like her. If Naomi had found a way out, she'd have come back to take us with her. Aaron looked at me, and I knew he was thinking the same thing. That alarm had been so damn loud, screaming from every wall around us that it would have drowned out any cries for help. Now that it was quiet, I turned to yell for her in case she was wandering the corridors looking for us. Rick caught me before I could.

"Hey, man," he said. "Don't. There could be more of them."

"She's missing."

"I'm sure she's fine," Rick said. "She's probably waiting out there for all of us. You ready?"

We all nodded, raised our guns, and he opened the door in front of us. It was light. Blinding compared to the dark of that damn base.

No shots fired.

No Naomi. She must still be in there.

I was about to head back in there when a bike burst out of one of the side doors. I could tell by the engine that it was the one that had been stolen from me. I looked over. Sure enough, there it was. It wasn't D that was on it, but that didn't matter.

"Son of a bitch!" I roared, running towards him. I started shooting. I think a few people behind me did too. The guy fell off the bike, slammed his back into the ground. Before he could get up, I tackled him. Started smacking him in the face.

"Where is she?"

"Who?" he stared back at me, his lip bleeding and his eyes wide.

"Where'd you get the bike?"

Rick came up behind me, his gun trained on the guy.

"Just do it," the man on the ground said to him. "Like you did to everyone else, right?"

There was a hopelessness in his eyes. Like he thought we were the bad guys in all this.

"Lower your gun, prick," a woman's voice crackled over the walkie he was wearing. Rick hesitated. "You, with the Colt Python. All of you, lower your weapons right now."

I stood up. She clearly had eyes on us, so she had to be close. Rick bent down and took the walkie.

"Come on out," Rick said. "Let's talk."

"We're not coming out, but we will talk," she replied. I knew what was coming before she said it. "We've got a Carol, a Naomi and a Maggie. I'm thinking that's something you want to chat about."

No.

No, no, no, no.

I scanned the parameter around us. If they were close enough to see Rick's gun, they were close enough to shoot dead.

"We're going to work this out right now, and it's going to go our way," the woman said.

"You can see we have one of yours," Rick replied. "We'll trade."

"I'm listening."

"First I want to talk to Maggie, Naomi and Carol, make sure they're alright."

There was a short silence, and then Carol's voice crackled over the radio.

"Rick, it's Carol…" she sounded scared out of her mind. "I'm fine, but…"

She was cut off. And then Maggie's voice crackled over too, "Rick, it's Maggie. We're all okay. We'll figure this-"

Cut off again.

"Rick, it's Naomi. Tell Daryl I'm-"

"Shut up," the woman said. No! Tell Daryl she's what? Hurt? Dying? FUCK! The woman kept going, "You have your proof. Let's talk."

That wasn't proof of shit. I reached to grab the walkie off Rick, but he saw me coming and turned away from me, so I missed.

"This is the deal right here," he said. "Let 'em go, you can have your guy back and live."

"Three for one, that's not much of a trade."

"You don't have another choice. Or you would've done something about it already," Rick said. There was a long silence where I thought he'd blown it. A long enough pause for them to have already started walking away. The only thing holding me together was that I hadn't heard any gunshots yet. Rick tried again, "Look, I know you're talking it over. It's a fair trade. Just come out, we do this, we all walk away. Do we have a deal?"

"I'll get back to you," she said. And she didn't say anything else.

"No," I looked at Rick. That couldn't be it. He couldn't be done.

"Daryl…"

"Gimme the walkie," I told him. He hesitated. I held out my hand for it. "Gimme it. Now."

He handed it over, this warning look on his eyes like he thought I was dumb and reckless. I was too mad at the bitch on the other end of the to care.

"Hey," I said into the receiver. "You listen to me, we're gonna find you. If there's so much as a scratch on any of 'em, we'll tear you apart. You give 'em back right now, and we'll let you live."

There was a little pause, and then she said. "Your threats don't scare us. They're a little… desperate. I said I'll get back to you, and I will."

"This ain't a threat," I told her. "It's a promise. You just signed your own death warrant."

I threw the walkie down on the ground. Not hard enough to damage it but hard enough to take out my frustration a little.

"Daryl, we'll find 'em," Rick said. I was getting a little tired of his platitudes. I wondered if he'd be so calm if they had Michonne.

"Damn straight, we will," I said, and then I turned to the rest of the group. "Alright, they can't be far. Everyone spread out and look for signs of where these sons of bitches might have been creeping on us from. You think you find one, you holler. Right?"

The assholes would be moving by now. They'd probably already been running when I was talking to them. The faster we acted, the better chance we had of finding them alive.

"You need us for this?" Tara asked.

"The hell else are you going to do?" I asked her, although she wasn't talking to me, she was talking to Rick.

"Heath and I are supposed to leave on a run from here," Tara said, looking a little guilty. "But we can-"

"Nah, you go," Rick said. "We got this, right, Daryl?"

"Right," I said, although again, I wondered whether or not he'd have sent manpower away if it was Michonne we were looking for. Or Carl. But arguing with him would waste more damn time, and I didn't have that. I knew I could find and get them all on my own if that was the only choice I had. I walked away from them while Rick sent them off. He stayed with our new hostage while the rest of us fanned out and checked the woods for any tracks.

"Hey, Daryl!" Glenn called. "Over here. Think I got something."

I followed the sound of his voice and found him pointing down at some footprints in the mud. Everyone else gathered around, and I tried to keep them from standing on anything that might lead us to them.

"Yeah, they were here," I said, pointing out the scuff marks on the ground to anyone who might be dumb enough to miss them. You could tell that there were people who'd moved off there deliberately and some who had been dragged. From here, they'd have had a good view of us coming out of the base. I was confident they'd all been here.

"Can you track them?" Glenn asked.

"Yeah," I said. The Saviors had been in too big a hurry to stop and cover their tracks. I followed them up a grassy verge and through the undergrowth. It ended on a dirt road.

"They had a car?" Glenn asked. I nodded.

"Went that way," I pointed down it. "Probably not far, depending on what kinda range they got on that walkie."

I just had to hope the guy we had was worth enough to them to keep up that end of the bargain. We headed back to the cars, I told Rick I knew what direction they'd gone in. I picked the bike up from where it was lying on the grass and wheeled it over to where the cars were parked. It took everything in me not to just take off there and then.

"Alright, I'm gonna try the radio again. To see if they're still in range," Rick said. The rest of us gathered around to listen. He pushed the button, "Have you thought about it? Talk to me."

"You weren't listening," the bitch replied. Still in range, but there was a lot of static. They'd moved further away since we'd last spoken to them. "I said I'd contact you."

"Would it make a difference if I said I was sorry about that?" Rick said. He gave me a look that made it clear he'd noticed the increase of static too.

"What do you think?" she asked.

"I think we're gonna make the trade," he said. "So, tell me where."

"We haven't agreed to that," she reminded him.

"You will," he said.

"You know what, I'm not so sure," she said. "We'd be taking most of the risk, not getting much in the way of a reward."

I looked down at the guy we'd taken prisoner to see whether or not he thought she was bluffing. He didn't flinch. Either because he was confident they'd save him, or because he'd already resigned himself to die for their cause. Whatever the fuck that was. Being the biggest assholes on the planet, maybe?

"The other option won't work out for you," Rick said.

"We'll take our chances."

Then the radio cut out again. Rick looked at me. "They've moved."

"No engines in the background, though," I said. "So they've stopped moving, they're holed up somewhere. Can't be far."

"Then let's find 'em," he said. He looked around at everyone else. "Alright, get ready to move out. Follow Daryl's lead. When we find a place that looks good, pull over someplace out of sight, and we'll scout the rest out on foot."

Basic safety precautions. But I longed for the day I'd be able to just storm into something like this and burn shit down. Fighting I was good at. This waiting around and planning shit? Not so much. Every fiber of my body wanted to destroy anything that got between me and what I wanted.

Hold on, Naomi. I'm coming.

I got on the bike. I looked back at them all. "Y'all keep up 'cause I ain't stopping for ya."

I started the bike as I heard the rush of doors slamming and engines starting. I drove fast to the road that I'd tracked them too and then slowed down. Not to let the others catch up but because I couldn't afford to miss anything. Any small clue could be vital. I heard the rumble of other engines following me down to where that dirt road turned into a proper on. I slowed by any turning that we came across, searching for signs that another vehicle had been down there.

Eventually, I spotted another dirt track. Looked like one that farm vehicles might have used back when there were big, industrial farms. Wide enough for tractors or livestock trucks. Something had turned it down recently. I slowed to a stop and signaled to the cars behind me that this was the place. Heard the engines cut out. Glenn got out of the car. "They come down this way?"

"Something did," I said. "Let's go on foot."

Glenn nodded and signaled to the others to get out of their cars. Rick forced the hostage we'd taken out of the back of one of them. We walked through the woods beside the road, so they wouldn't see us coming. It led us to a building. A few Walkers roamed around outside it. Not enough to be a threat, but enough to keep us at a distance.

"Looks like an old slaughterhouse," I said and tried not to overthink the implications of that. I walked back to where Rick stood with our hostage, "This a place you assholes use?"

He stared back at me, all ugly and defiant.

Glenn pointed his gun in his face. "Answer him."

"Shoot me," the guy said. He said it like a dare. "Just fucking shoot me."

The guy was damn lucky that at the moment, keeping him alive was the only bargaining chip we had. If the Saviors didn't use this place, I had to believe that he'd just come out and say it. His silence said more than he thought. I looked at Glenn. "It's gotta be here."

He nodded. But we both had a lot to lose, and wishful thinking was a hell of a drug. What if I was wrong?

I looked back at the building. We'd killed a lot of them back at their base, but there was no way of knowing how many Saviors had slipped out after the alarm went off, no way to tell how many of them were with Naomi, Carol, and Maggie. We could easily be outnumbered and not know it.

"Asshole, are you there?" the bitch's voice came over the radio. Hardly any static. Rick and I exchanged a look. They were close.

"I'm here," Rick said.

"We've thought about it. We want to make the trade."

"That's good."

"There's a large field with a sign that says 'God Is Dead,' about two miles down the I-66," she said. "Good visibility in all directions."

"We'll meet you there in ten minutes?" Rick said. I looked at him.

"Ten minutes," the bitch agreed, and then there was silence again.

"We ain't going there, are we?" I said.

"Nah," Rick agreed. "That was too easy. We'll stay here for a bit, keep an eye on the place."

Ten minutes came and went. Nobody came in or out of the slaughterhouse, and the radio didn't make another sound. Next to me, Glenn leaned forward.

"Is that smoke?" he asked. I followed where he was looking and nodded. Something in there was on fire, which meant that somebody was definitely home. Had it been set on purpose? Was it some kind of trap? I couldn't lose Naomi to the flames again. I couldn't lose her at all.

"I'm moving in," I said. The burning itch to do something, to fuck shit up, was too much. I couldn't wait and watch anymore.

"Alright," Rick said, and I was glad he wasn't trying to hold me back anymore. He pointed. "That door there. We clear the Walkers - quietly - and we get in through that door. Got it?"

We moved fast and kept low. The Saviors didn't appear to have any lookouts anywhere, but you couldn't be too careful. We took the Walkers out with knives so that gunshots wouldn't alert them to us. It was a slow process, trying to stay out of sight and get them all nice and quiet.

We got to the door, ready to storm the place. Rick started to say something, probably some kinda pep talk to get us ready, but then the door opened. I saw the guns first. Two of them. My finger tensed over the trigger of my own. Maggie and Carol looked back at us. Glenn rushed forward and wrapped his arms around the mother of his unborn child. I heard her sob as she leaned into him.

Carol looked at us, wide-eyed and pale.

"You start a fire?" I asked her. The smell of smoke and burning meat filled the halls.

"Yeah," she nodded. Her eyes were all spaced out like she was on some shit. My stomach twisted with worry as I turned her head to look me in the eye.

"Hey, you good?" I asked. It was hard to get her to look at me. To look at anything.

"No," she shook her head.

"C'mere," I said. I pulled her towards me in a hug. What the hell had happened to them here? What was so bad that it could make Carol of all people react like this? I looked over her shoulder at the empty corridor behind her. My stomach twisted again. "Where's Naomi?"

"Behind us," Carol said, which was too vague. She wasn't just behind them because I couldn't damn well see her. "She… We couldn't move her. I'm so sorry, Daryl."

"What?" I held her at arm's length. Now weren't the time for whatever kinda breakdown she was having. I needed her to get her shit together for long enough to tell me what the hell was going on.

"She's injured, Daryl," Maggie said, letting go of her husband. "We didn't wanna move her until we knew it was clear out here."

Then why the hell were we wasting all this time hugging?

I looked a Glenn, "Get one of the cars. Bring it around."

"On it," he said, and turned back around.

"Show me," I demanded. My heart was beating faster than I could move my legs. Maggie led me back into the corridor they'd just come from. There were bodies piled up and smoke in the air. Whole place smelt of death. Some of the corpses looked fresh, but there had definitely once been Walkers roaming the hallways too. We passed some that were stuck on spikes as some kinda sick barricade. They'd all been taken out though, probably by Maggie and Carol.

Maggie stopped at one of the doors and looked at me, "She's in here. We tried to keep her safe, Daryl. We-"

"Show me," I said again. Maggie pushed on the door. Naomi's body was slumped in one of the corners furthest from us. One half of her face was drenched in blood. Too much of it so see where it originated from. Crimson and freshly flowing. My own blood turned to ice. Without thinking, I yelled, "Fuck!"

Fuck, fuck, fuck.

For the longest second of my life, I thought she wasn't moving, but when she heard me, she looked up, "Daryl?"

She said it like I was the last person she expected to see or wasn't really sure it was me she was seeing. Her voice was groggy, and she kind of squinted at me like she was having trouble focussing.

"Hey," I rushed toward her, cupped her face in my hands. It was slick with blood. "Hey. Which one of them did this to you? Huh?"

"A dead one," she said. "Don't worry about it."

"What happened?"

"Nothing," she said.

"Bullshit. Let's get you up. Get you home," I slid an arm under Naomi's shoulders, tried to get my other one under her legs, but she stopped me. "Let me lift you."

"No, I'm fine," she said. "I can do it."

She put a hand on my shoulder and used it to pull herself to her feet. She stood for barely a second before what little color was left in her face drained from it real fast. Her hand gripped my shoulder like a vice. Her eyes rolled back so far that all I could see was the whites. She lurched forwards and threw up all over the floor. I caught her before she fell.

"Fuck," I said again. This time when she looked at me, she looked a little scared. I slipped my hands under her. "Naomi. I got you."

A gunshot. She froze. "What was that?"

"Probably just Rick," I said. "Don't worry about it. Let me do this. Let me get you out of here."

She nodded, didn't try to push me away a second time. Her arms looped around my neck, I picked her up. She looked paler than she had before. Trying to stand up had drained the blood from her face. Her eyes kept slipping in and out of focus, her arms around my neck got weaker and weaker. I worried she was about to slip into unconsciousness.

"Keep talking to me, Naomi," I told her. It was more for my sake than hers. This was too much like carrying Beth out of that damn hospital. She even had blood matting in her hair. I felt sick at the memory of it. What if I couldn't save her? What if this was it? What if she just slipped away in my arms right now?

Out in the corridor, Rick nodded at the newly dead guy on the ground. "That was Negan."

"We got him?" Naomi whispered, like that would somehow make any of this okay.

"We got him," Rick said.

I could not have cared less about Negan. Never wanted to hear the sorry prick's name again.

"Rick, we gotta go," I said, rushing past him. "Now."

"Shit, is she okay?" Aaron ran toward us.

"She look okay?" I snapped. I could see Glenn in one of the cars, speeding down the path toward us.

"I'm fine," Naomi tried to reassure both of us, but her voice was quiet. More blood had already run down into her left eye. She tried to look around, "Where's Carol? Is Carol okay?"

"She's fine," I said. "Worry about yourself."

"I'm so sorry, Naomi," Carol said, appearing by my elbow.

"What you sorry for?" I asked.

"You okay, Carol?" Naomi asked. She reached out a hand and took Carol's. "You did great in there."

Carol didn't say anything else. They just looked at each other. Glenn stopped the car stopped in front of us, and Maggie opened the door. She helped me slide Naomi into the back seat. I climbed in after her, cradled her head in my lap.

"I'll bring your bike back," Aaron told me. Like I gave a shit about that now.

"Thanks," I said because I knew I'd been rude to him before. And he as only trying to help.

"Just get her home," Aaron said before he shut the door.

"Hurry," I told Glenn as Maggie got into the passenger seat. He started driving, and she opened up the glove box.

"There's a medical kit in here," she said, opening it up and passing a bunch of bandages back to me. "If you can find where she's bleeding from, put some pressure on it."

I wiped it off her face as gently as I could, working my way up to the source of all the blood. I struggled to find it through her matted and twisted hair. "Why's your damn hair like this?"

"It's a braid. Eric made me do it," she said. "Think he was tryna make me pretty."

"That's dumb," I said. "You always look beautiful."

A little bit of color returned to her cheeks, she gave me a weak smile, "Shut up."

"Floor it," I said, looking up at Glenn. I could not lose her like this. I would not lose her like this.

"I'm going as fast as I can," Glenn said.

"Hey," Naomi looked up at me. "I'm gonna be fine, quit worrying."

But she was so pale. And there was so much blood. Clammy beads of sweat on her forehead. She was holding on to my hand, but not tight enough. It just felt like she was slipping away. She closed her eyes again.

"Naomi?" I said. "Talk to me."

"I'm fine," she murmured. "I just feel sick."

The car stopped, and I was about to lose my shit at Glenn when I realized that we were at the gates. Alexandria opened up, and we sped through, not stopping for the usual checks. When we came to a stop outside Denise's, I carried her out again, and Maggie ran ahead to warn her. Denise and Noah were both in there, told me to put her down on the hospital bed. Naomi opened her eyes again as they crowded around her, pushing me to the outskirts of the room. I'd been holding it together pretty well, but now it was up to other people to save her, the weight of it all caught up to me. She looked so small and so broken. She felt so far away.

"Daryl," I felt Maggie's hand on my shoulder. "Let's give them some space, yeah? Why don't we go get some air?"

I nodded, stumbled out of the medical center. I couldn't go further than the porch, I didn't want there to be more than a door between us. Maggie looked at me. "You okay?"

"Yeah," I said, but I wasn't. I sat down on the step because I wasn't sure how much longer my knees could hold me up. "What happened to her?"

"Carol was freaking out," Maggie said. "Naomi saw it, and she was worried about her. She was worried about me, too… 'cause of the baby… she just kinda snapped."

I closed my eyes. "Snapped how?"

But I could picture it. I knew what Naomi was like when she snapped. The things she would do to protect the people she cared about. Maggie took a deep breath, "She mouthed off a little, managed to get her hands free. Carol was hyperventilating, and they wouldn't do anything about it, so she… she got a few good punches in before they took her down."

"Carol was hyperventilating?" I repeated. "For real?"

"Not sure," Maggie said. "She was scared, that's for sure. But I think she was more scared of what she knew we were going to have to do to get out of there. 'Course, Naomi didn't know that. She just saw that she was scared, so she kept fighting."

"What did they do to her?"

"They split us all up after that," Maggie said. "Dragged her off someplace. After Carol and I broke out, we found her with that head wound."

I put my head in my hands. The world felt like it was spinning way too fast, and now I was the one who wanted to throw up. I should've kept a better eye on her when we were in the base, never should've left her side. I should've found her faster. I wished whoever had hurt her had still been alive when I got there so I could've made them pay for it. Chopped tiny pieces of them off while they were still alive until they were nothing but a head. I knew I didn't have the kind of self-control for that, though. I knew if I'd found them, I'd have shot them and kept shooting until I was out of bullets.

"Daryl?" Denise's voice from behind me. I hadn't even heard the door. I looked around, tried to read in her face whether or not she was bringing me bad news. "You can come back in now."

"She okay?" I asked. Denise nodded. The relief was so strong it made me shake.

"It's a mild concussion," Denise said. "She'll be fine."

"Told you," Naomi called from behind her. It was the first time it wasn't annoying to hear her be proved right.

I looked back at Maggie, who gave me an encouraging smile, "On you go. Give her my best."

"Mild?" I said to Denise as I followed her back in. "You sure? She tell you she threw up?"

Denise suppressed a smile, "Yes, she told me, don't worry."

"'Cause that seems pretty serious," I said. "I don't think-"

"Daryl!" Naomi said. "Other than a crushing headache, I'm fine."

But she didn't look fine. With her head all bandaged up, lying in that damn bed. She looked small. And like I could lose her at any moment.

"I'm just going to go and find you some painkillers," Denise said to her. "We're almost out, but we should have just enough."

"I'll tell Glenn," she said. "He was planning another run soon, I'm sure we can pick up some more."

"Oh, you ain't going anywhere for at least a week," I told her. I looked at Denise, "She shouldn't be doing anything strenuous, right?"

"Right," she said. "Although a week might be too much."

"I'd like to see you stop me," Naomi grumbled.

"I'll be right back," Denise said and left the room. In the silence, alone for the first time in a while, Naomi and I looked at each other.

"Why you gotta be like this?" I muttered. "Why can't you just stay safe?"

"They were assholes," she said. "Carol was freaking out… I had to do something."

"Carol was fine," I said. "She had a damn plan."

"Well, I know that now," she grumbled. "And I ain't convinced she's fine, Daryl. I'm worried about her. Shit got dark in there."

I wanted to ask what she meant, what had happened to them, to her while they were separated. But Naomi had always been so damn cagey about these things, I didn't think I'd get very far. I pulled up a chair and sat down beside the bed.

"Carol's tough," I said. "She'll pull through. Worry about yourself."

Naomi looked like she wanted to disagree. It was ridiculous for her to be worrying about Carol while she had that damn gash on the side of her head.

"Just because people are tough, don't mean they ain't got their limits," she said. I wondered if she was talking about herself or Carol. The shit I'd seen both of them do… they seemed limitless to me.

"I know that," I said.

"I know you do," she said quietly. If anyone was acutely aware of my limits - the fraying edges of my temper, my short fuse, my difficulty expressing anything other than anger - it was her. She sighed, "I just… I always felt like I owed Carol. For what she did at Terminus."

"That's dumb. You got yourself out of Terminus."

"Yeah, but she's the one who burned it down," she said. She looked up from where she'd been staring at her feet, poking out the end of the bed. "And she got you out. Got Perla out. Lucas… all y'all."

"Don't mean you owe her," I said. "Not enough to risk your damn life like that."

"You'd have done the same," she said. I sighed. I stood up and leaned over her, pushing the hair away from her face so I could see where Deinse had put the bandage. I so badly wanted to kiss her again, with her face so close to mine, but I wasn't sure what the rules on kissing concussed people were.

"I just need you to be okay," I whispered. Fear of losing her filled me up from the tips of my toes to the top of my head.

"I am okay," she said. "I promise."

The door opened, and Denise came back, a glass of water and a few pills in her hand, "This is all we can spare, but they should do the trick for today."

"Thanks," Naomi said, trying to prop herself up. "But I don't really need 'em if we're running low. I'll be fine. Save them for someone else."

I'm sure she'd have said the same even if her head was about to fall off.

"No. You should take them," Denise said, and I was glad it wasn't just down to me to convince her not to be such a damn fool. "They might make you a little drowsy."

"Drowsy?" I repeated. "Ain't that bad? Ain't folks with concussions always dying in their sleep? Should we keep her awake?"

"No," Denise said, looking a little bombarded by all my questions. "Sleep is good for her. It'll help her brain heal."

I fought the urge to ask Denise if I could see her damn medical degree, just to make sure she'd passed Concussion 101. Naomi was staring daggers at me. "Quit fussing, Daryl."

Denise smiled at both of us, passed her the pills and a glass of water.

"You shouldn't be alone for a while," Denise told her, which was fine because I hadn't planned on leaving her side, maybe ever. "In case things get worse, you should have someone check in on you."

"She can stay with me," I said immediately, while Naomi was busy swallowing the painkillers. "I'll make sure she's alright."

"Absolutely not," Naomi said. "You've been up all night, too. You need rest just as much as I do."

"You got a damn concussion," I said. "You need it more."

"I'll go home, and Eric can check in on me," she said. "He ain't been up all night like you and Aaron. Besides, I'm already feeling better."

She gave me a smile like that proved anything.

"You're welcome to stay here overnight," Denise offered.

"No," she started to say. "It's fine, I can…"

"You're staying here with a damn Doctor, or you're staying with me," I told her.

"Will that make you less of a psycho?" she asked. "If I stay here?"

"Yes."

"Fine," she sighed. Then she looked back at Denise, "If you're sure that's alright?"

"Of course," Denise said, she was already by the door. "Just get some rest."

"I'll come get you if she needs anything," I said. "I can stay, too, right? Keep an eye on her?"

"Are you serious?" Naomi snapped.

Denise gave us another smile. "If… if you want to."

Naomi waited until the door was closed, and then she rounded on me. "Daryl, for fuck's sake, get out of here."

"No." I sat down again.

"You need to sleep."

"I can sleep here."

"Sitting up in a damn chair?"

"Yeah," I said. "Slept in worse places."

"That ain't the point."

"Then what is the point?" I asked.

"You need rest," she said. "A proper, good rest."

"And I'll get one," I told her. "Right after you have."

"You're impossible," she sighed, and I felt a rush of triumph because that sounded like defeat. "Never met anyone so damn stubborn."

"Back at ya," I said. "Thought them pills were supposed to make you sleepy?"

"They ain't kicked in yet," she said. "So, I still got enough energy to kick you out."

"You move from that bed, I'll kill you," I told her, and she smiled. I knew she couldn't help herself. She closed her eyes, turned her head away from me, and I started worrying about concussed people dying in their sleep again. Her hand lay on top of the covers. The thought of her, slipping away from me like that was too much. Made me want to hold on to her even tighter. I took hold of her hand to check she was still there, to see if I could feel her pulse beating. She turned her head back again, looking down first at where our hands met and then at me.

"You can't sleep on that damn chair," she said. Why was she igniting this fight again?

"Watch me," I told her. "I ain't leaving."

"No," she said and let go of my hand, moving herself to the furthest side of the bed from where I was sitting. She patted the space beside her. "C'mon."

I sat up but didn't move out of the chair. "What?"

"Come on," she said. "I'm concussed, I ain't contagious."

I stood up. Still not sure what it was she was asking of me, I sat down in the space she'd made. "I don't think we can top and tail like this."

"You think I want your stinky feet kicking me in the head when I got a concussion?" she asked. "Lie down, dummy."

I lay down beside her, both our heads on the same pillow. Her shoulder pressed right up against mine, and the metal bars of the hospital bed dug into my other side. It wasn't built for two, and I could imagine the bars on the other side were giving her the same trouble.

"Hey, sit up a sec," I told her.

"What now?" she said, but she propped herself up a little. I slipped an arm underneath her, moved closer to the middle of the mattress. She frowned at me, "What are you…"

"Just lean on me, will ya?" I said.

"You sure?" she hesitated. "That doesn't sound comfortable for you."

"Better than these damn bars digging into me," I said. Naomi looked like she wanted to keep fighting me, but something made her stop. She lay back down again, her head resting just below my chin. I could feel she was tense, hardly moving. I felt the same, not wanting to breathe too much in case it disrupted her, and she tried to send me away again. I heard her yawn. "You comfy?"

"Yeah," she said. "Is it okay for you?"

It was more than okay.

"Yeah," I said, and I felt her relax into me. Now that I could feel the warmth of her body, the rise and fall of her chest against my side as she breathed, I felt like I could relax too. One of her arms wrapped hesitantly around my middle. I coiled my arm tightly around her, resting my hand in the curve between her hip and her ribs.

"Daryl?" she said sleepily.

"Yeah?"

"Thanks for being here."

I smiled into her hair. "Shut up and rest, dumbass. Heal that big brain of yours."

I felt her soft laugh in my arms. I'd thought that waiting until shit with the Saviors was over was the right thing to do, but I'd had my priorities all wrong. Today had proved that. I could've lost her. And for what? Taking out some asshole? Everything that mattered was already here, wrapped up in my arms.

I was just so glad to be holding her again, the sound of her breathing relaxed me like it always had, and I felt the adrenaline of the day start to ebb away. Her head on my chest felt so… right. Holding her, this close, felt like the only way to make sure that she was safe. I never wanted her to be more than an arm's length from me again.

"Feels right, don't it?" I whispered to her. "You and me?"

But she was already asleep. I kissed the top of her head, and tangled up in each other, we finally got some rest.

Chapter 27: Bedrest and Breakfast

Naomi

I woke up to the sound of a heartbeat, the rise and fall of steady breathing. Wrapped up in a safe pair of arms, and the last remnants of sleep, I never wanted to move again. It was light out and had been when I'd fallen asleep, so it was hard to know if I'd been like this for an hour or a week. My head didn't even hurt in those first few minutes, and I didn't remember why I was lying where I was. It was just warm and quiet and safe. I didn't even question it, it just felt… normal.

And then it all came back to me.

"Daryl?" I whispered. At the sound of my voice, he jumped a little, his hand squeezed my arm. His body shifted under mine as he tried to look down at me.

"Hey, you awake?" he whispered back. I lifted my head from his chest to look up at him. A huge smile broke out across his face. "How you feelin'?"

I couldn't stop smiling back at him. My head started to hurt again, but it was an echo of the headache it had been the day before. "So much better, but still kinda tired. How long was I out?"

"A while. There ain't a clock in here, but you slept through the night," he said. "Go back to sleep, if you want. Denise said it was good for you, helps your brain heal."

"Yeah, I know what Denise said, I was there when she said it," I reminded him. The desire to stay where I was, warm and safe forever, made going back to sleep very appealing. But I knew I'd fallen asleep curled up against him, which meant he must have been trapped under me all night and would want to get up, which took away a lot of the appeal. "How long have you been awake?"

"Couple of hours," he said. "Hard to know, like I said, there ain't a clock in here."

"Couple of hours?" I repeated. "You just been lying here, awake, for a couple of hours?"

"Yeah," he said. I saw his cheeks getting a little red, and he glanced away from me.

"Why didn't you get up?"

"Didn't want to wake you," he said. "Denise said-"

"I need rest," I finished for him. "Yeah, I know, but weren't you bored?"

"Nah," he said. "It was kinda nice. Quiet… until you woke up and started yapping."

"Well, sorry to ruin it for you," I said, but he was still smiling in a way that made it clear I hadn't. I'd spent enough time hunting in the woods with him to know that Daryl appreciated silence more than most, and never really minded being alone with his thoughts. He still didn't move, one of his hands absentmindedly stroked my hair. Hesitantly, I rested my head back down on his chest again. "Thanks for looking after me."

"It's what we do, ain't it?" he said. "Look out for each other?"

"Yeah," I said, and I was glad he couldn't see my face. Deep in my chest, the memory of all he'd done for me sat heavy as a paperweight. It was what we'd always done, and why the smell of him made me feel so safe. It was why, when his face had swum into view at the Savior's base, part of me had thought I might have dreamt him up as some kind of comfort while the rest of me was fading. And I'd been okay with it. Either he was with me, and I was safe, or death had come to me wearing Daryl's face, and in that case, it wasn't so scary. "But you were especially great yesterday."

His fingers brushed the hair from the side of my face. I felt his chin settle back down to rest on top of my head. "I ain't done yet."

"You carried me out of a burning building," I said. "You're done."

"Nah," he said. "You gotta take it easy today. Anything you need, I'm gonna get it. You just tell me what it is, and I'll go."

I was as touched by his offer as I was annoyed by it. "That's ridic-"

"Don't argue with me," he said.

"I ain't about to drop down dead," I told him. "I've rested enough, I'm fine. All I want is to go home and wash all this damn blood out my hair."

I could feel it, caked in there and hardened around the bandage that Denise had put in. It had clearly bled some more in the night. I hoped getting it out would also take the worried look out from behind Daryl's smile. Having it there as a giant, bloody, matted reminder of my injury, probably made everything look worse.

"You sure you don't want breakfast or nothing first?" he asked. "You should eat."

"I can get something when I get home," I said, hoping I was talking loud enough to cover up my stomach rumbling. I'd been fine until Daryl had mentioned food, and now I was starving. "Don't wanna put Denise out any more than I already have by taking her food too, y' know?"

I propped myself up on one arm. Daryl sat up too, looking horrified, "What the hell are you doing?"

"Getting up," I said. "Going home."

"No, you ain't."

"Daryl," I strapped myself in for an uphill battle. "I can't lie here all day. What if Denise needs to use this room to help someone else? At least let me go home."

I knew, when he was in this kind of stubborn mindset, I had to pick and choose what to fight him on. One small step at a time until I eventually got what I wanted. I could see him mulling it over.

"Not before Denise says it's okay," he said, swinging his legs over the side of the infirmary bed. "Lie down."

"Daryl…"

"Lie down," he said again, barking it like an order. "I'll go get Denise."

"I feel fine," I said, but I did lie back down again. Pillow wasn't as comfortable as he had been, but the bed was still warm and smelt like him.

"Let's let a Doctor judge that, yeah?" he said. I watched him scramble to put his shoes on like it was some kind of race, and if he didn't move fast enough, I'd leap out of bed and start running laps around him. "You said you felt fine before, and then you damn near collapsed."

"Well, I mean it this time," I said. "I promise."

"That don't mean shit," he said. "Not now I know you were talking out your ass before. Wait here."

I narrowed my eyes at him but didn't say anything else before he left the room. He was annoying the crap outta me, but it was also unbelievably sweet. I'd forgotten what he was like when he was trying to take care of me. I'd gotten so used to doing it for myself that it was hard to let him take the reins. I listened to the sound of his voice in another room, too far away to make out what he was saying. I thought about all of the times I'd been sick as a kid, and he'd brought me food every day because he didn't trust my Momma enough to look after me right. Our survival instincts were hard-wired into us, but at some point, those wires had got crossed and fused together. Like ensuring the other's survival was as much a part of who we were as securing our own.

"Morning, Naomi," Denise said, as the door opened again. I could see Daryl close behind her, peering over the top of her head to check that I hadn't moved. She didn't look too flustered, but I wondered what he'd pulled Denise away from for this nonsense. "How are you feeling?"

"Fine," I said. "I'm sorry this crazy man dragged you in here for no reason."

"Ain't no reason," he said. "She's gotta check you over, that's the damn reason."

"You ain't gotta do this," I told her. "I feel okay."

"I think it's best for both of us if we do," she said quietly, with a quick glance at where Daryl was pacing behind her. She checked my pulse and my reactions, took my temperature.

"Any idea how long I was asleep?" I asked.

"About fourteen hours," she said. I sat up a little straighter, thinking I'd misheard her.

"Fourteen?" I looked at Daryl. "Can't believe you let me sleep that long."

"Hey, you clearly needed it, sleepyhead."

"Any lingering headaches?" Denise asked.

"A little," I admitted. I saw Daryl stop pacing and look at me. "But it's extremely mild, a lot better than it was yesterday."

"She should sleep more, right?" Daryl said.

Denise looked at me, "Do you feel like you need more sleep?"

"No," I said. Mostly, I was just hungry. But I didn't want to say that in case it prompted Daryl to take all of Denise's food at gunpoint.

"Then I don't see why you can't go home," she said. "I'll just take a look at this cut on your head first. Did you get a look at what they hit you with?"

"Just this old pipe," I said. Daryl flinched like it was him who'd been hit.

"A pipe?" he repeated.

"Was it rusty?" Denise asked.

"A little," I said. "I don't really remember, I didn't get a good look."

"That bad?" Daryl asked.

"I'm sure it'll be fine," she said. "We just need to watch for infection. Have you had your tetanus shot?"

"Yes."

"You sure?" Daryl asked.

"Yes."

"Then just keep it clean," Denise said. "I'll give you a few new bandages to take home with you."

"Thanks."

I sat patiently and tried not to react while she peeled back the bandage on my head, but as she tugged on it, there was a fresh stab of pain through my scalp. Daryl's eyes bored into me, clearly trying to assess how much pain I was in. I clenched my jaw and tried to keep my reactions to a minimum. Everything Denise was doing was medically necessary, but I worried if I flinched too much, he'd explode at her. When she was done checking, she handed me a wad of fresh bandages.

"Try getting up slowly," she said. "See how you feel."

I swung my legs over the side of the bed and dangled there for a moment before I slid down. My head still hurt a little, but there was no change in how much it hurt. I didn't feel dizzy or sick or like I was about to blackout anymore. Maybe Daryl's nerves about this were contagious, but even I felt a little relieved about it. Denise smiled at me, "All good?"

"All good," I said. "Thank you so much."

"No problem. Just take it easy for a couple of days, and you'll be fine," Denise said. Then she looked at Daryl, "She'll be fine."

"Alright, climb back up," he said to me, patting the bed.

"What?" I stared at him. "Why? Denise said I can go home."

"Well, you ain't walking," Daryl said like walking was the equivalent of bouncing all the way home on my head. "It's easier for me to pick you up if you get back up here first. You want me to carry you like yesterday, or you want a piggyback?"

"Erm… neither," I said. I looked back at Denise, "I can walk, right?"

"You can walk," Denise agreed. Daryl looked dangerously close to disagreeing, and she kind of backed away from him a little bit. "It won't do her any harm."

I walked to the door before he could say anything else. "Thanks, Denies. C'mon, Daryl, let's go."

I knew if I kept walking, he'd follow, and that might save Denise from an earful of whatever Daryl was scowling about. That earful was wholly meant for me, and I didn't want him to direct it at anyone else. Sure enough, I heard his footsteps hurry to catch the door before it closed behind me. It was bright out. And there were already people up and moving around Alexandria.

"Naomi," Daryl snapped. He was following closer behind me than my own shadow, his arms tense and ready like he thought I was going to fall down at any second. "She said to go slow."

"Yeah, I heard her," I said. "I can't go any slower, else I'll start moving backward."

"Maybe you should," he muttered.

"Will you quit moaning?" I said. "Denise said it wouldn't do me any harm."

"Don't mean it'll do you good, though, does it?" he said. "What's your rush?"

"Been asleep for fourteen hours," I reminded him. "Or weren't you listening? Wasted so much of the day already."

When we got to my place, he opened the door for me. I felt his hand lightly press into the small of my back as he gently guided me inside, propelling me into the living room and toward the couch. The house was quiet, Eric and Aaron must've been out someplace.

"Sit," Daryl said. "You ain't moving from here."

"How long am I going to be under house arrest?" I asked. "Until Denise says it's okay or until you do?"

"Me. Don't know if Denise knows what she's talking about," Daryl said. "You hungry?"

"Starving."

"Why didn't you say that before?"

"I just wanted to go home," I said. "There's food here. Shame Eric ain't here."

"Why? Is Eric the only one who knows how to make some damn eggs?"

"How am I supposed to do it from the damn sofa?" I said, annoyed that he'd set so many rules that didn't allow me to move, and then berated me for being too lazy to make breakfast for myself.

"I wasn't talking about you," he said. It took me a second to get what he was saying. "I'll do it."

"You?" I said.

"Yeah," he said, defensively.

"Daryl, you can't do everything for me from now until you decide I'm better," I said.

"Watch me."

"Well, I need a shower, you gonna do that for me too?" I said, and then I froze up. It had just slipped out. I'd been so caught up in our little bickering match that I hadn't thought about how everything was different now. That we had been tentatively crossing that line, gently blurring the boundary between our friendship and something more.

"Pfft. No, 'course not," Daryl said, but he also didn't look like he opposed the idea of joining me in the shower, and I could feel my cheeks burning as I realized that I didn't either. We looked away from each other. I tried to think of something else to say. Daryl cleared his throat, "I'll… uh… go make some food."

"Sure," I said. "I'll just... get this blood out of my hair before we..."

"Sure," he said. "I'll be… down here."

"Okay," my voice was weirdly high and squeaky.

He was so flustered he forgot to yell at me for getting off the couch too fast. I heard him go into the kitchen as I climbed the stairs. I picked up my towel from my bedroom and headed for the shower.

I don't know if it was the pressure or the temperature or both, but I almost bit my tongue in half trying to stop myself from yelping as the water from the shower made the cut on my head sting. As it ran down towards my feet, it turned the color of rust. Chunks of dried blood circled the drain. A constant stream of whispered curse words flowed out of my mouth until the water ran clear, and I could stop. My head stung.

I got dressed and dried my hair off with the towel, gently patting the wound as dry as I could get it. I picked up one of the bandages Denise had given me. Swiping my arm across the fogged up glass of the mirror, I tried to get a good look at the cut, but it was too far back on my head. I tried to part my hair and feel my way with my fingers, but every time I got close, it hurt. I picked up one of Aaron's shaving mirrors and tried to hold it up so I could see the reflection of the back of my head, the way hairdressers used to. But then both of my hands were full, one with the bandage one with the mirror. Moving my hair became impossible.

Fucking fuck, how am I supposed to do this?

A knock on the door almost made me scream.

"Naomi?" Daryl called. "You still in there?"

"Er… yeah," I called back. "You okay?"

"Yeah," he said. "You've just been quiet for a while. Thought… thought maybe you'd fainted again."

I unlocked the door. Even though I'd been talking to him through it, I still saw the relief on his face when it opened. "I'm fine. I'm just tryna get this damn bandage on, but I can't see what I'm doing."

He took it from my hand. "Let me."

"You don't have to…"

"I know I don't have to," he snapped. "I want to. Sit down."

I backed away and sat on the edge of the bath, feeling the anger radiating off him like a heat. It was enough to shut me up for a moment. Sullen and annoyed, he came to stand beside me in the bathroom. I looked up at him. The bandage he'd taken from me was clenched tightly between his fingers, his eyes fixed on the top of my head, and I caught the fear in them. Under all of this running around and snapping at me, he was a little scared. He hadn't managed to shake the feelings he'd had back at the Savior's base, where I'd been unable to stand without help. That was still what he saw when he looked at me. And with Daryl, fear always came out as anger. I caught his wrist, and he looked down at me, the annoyance in his eyes flared into something more.

"Daryl," I said quietly. "I'm gonna be fine."

He blinked a couple of times, and I could see him suppressing the urge to argue with me, but the fight in his eyes was calming down. "You almost weren't, though."

"But I am," I said slowly, and I tightened my grip on his wrist just to prove it. "I'm right here."

He slipped an arm around my shoulder, pulled me closer to his side. "I should've…"

And there it was, the real reason he was running around like a damn fool. He felt like he should've stopped this from happening altogether.

"You didn't do anything wrong," I said. "I got myself caught. I got myself knocked in the head by mouthing off. You've done everything right. I don't mean to be ungrateful for all this."

"You ain't being ungrateful," he said. "You've always been the world's shittiest patient, that's all. Now, sit still."

I let go of his arm and turned my head so he could get a better look at it. I'd fixed him up enough times, worried about him enough times, to know what this was like when the roles were reversed. I looked at him in the mirror as he parted the hair around the wound on my head. I saw the way his face changed when he looked at it, and I knew the feeling, the same sick rage I'd had whenever someone had hurt him. Anger so intense it makes you feel queasy.

He tugged a little too hard on some of the hair close to the cut, and I winced.

"Sorry," he said. "I ain't as good at this as you. Rough hands, y' know."

"You're doing great," I told him, and it drew a small smile from the corners of his mouth. I wanted to say something more, something that would alleviate the heavy feeling in my chest. The mix of peace and confusion he stirred in me these days. The sense of home, the promise of something new. I'd started a thousand conversations with him in my head, trying to explain what he was to me. But even then, everything I'd thought had been inadequate. How do you put something like that into words when you can't name it yourself? Somehow, it was a little easier to think about it when I was looking at his reflection. The glass was enough of a barrier that I could survive looking at him long enough to get out how I felt. "Daryl?"

"Yeah?"

"Whatever this is… or isn't… between us," I said. His eyes met mine in the mirror, tense and nervous. It was almost enough to shut me up, but I still managed to get it out, "I ain't tryna talk myself out of it."

"No?"

"No," I said. "I just don't want things to get messed up.."

He nodded and was quiet for a moment. He gently fixed the bandage in place. "Me neither."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah," he said, and I was kind of relieved about it. "Already lost you once. I ain't tryna rush you. But we can talk about it if that'll stop you freaking out."

My heart dropped because I hadn't expected him to give into it so easy, "We can?"

"Yeah, but not today," he said. "Don't want your concussion talking for ya."

"Alright," I laughed. "That's fair."

I breathed a little easier. At least that gave me some time to work out what I wanted to say. To sift through all of the half-drafted letters to him in my head.

"Okay," he stepped back, let my hair fall back into place. "You ready to eat?"

"God, yes," I said. I stood up and watched him swallow back some kind of comment about moving too fast. I followed him back downstairs. Two plates had been set out on the table, eggs and toast on each one. There was an unfamiliar vase of flowers between them. I looked at it, trying to remember if they'd always been there. "Daryl did you…?"

"Shut up and eat," he said, pointing his fork at me. "Probably already got cold with all of your faffing around up there."

I had a few mouthfuls. Still warm and delicious. I looked up at him again. "Daryl, these are really good."

He didn't look up from his plate. "Ain't nothing special."

"Nah, I'm serious," I said. "Don't tell Eric, but I think I like these better."

"See, there's that concussion talking," he said, and what little I could see of his face that wasn't being hidden by his hair went a deep shade of red. He mumbled something too quiet for me to catch.

"What was that?" I asked.

"Maybe I could make them again for ya sometime," he said.

"You wanna make me breakfast again?" I asked. He wouldn't look at me, but I could see a little smile on his face.

"Yeah," he shrugged. "Sometime, maybe."

"I'd like that," I said, and I looked back down at my plate too. We ate in this warm and happy silence, neither of us knowing what to say or wanting to break it either.

"Found my bike in the garage while you were upstairs," Daryl said. "Aaron must've brought it back for me."

"Wait…" I said. "You got your bike back? Was that guy there? The one who took it from you?"

"Nah," he said. "Negan had it."

"Huh," I said. "Took out Negan. Got you your bike back. That's a pretty successful night. Worth a little bump on the head."

He stopped eating, looked up at me with such seriousness that his eyes looked a shade darker. "Don't say that. Don't even joke."

"Sorry," I said and finished off the last of my breakfast. When we were done, Daryl tried to convince me to take a nap. I reminded him how long I'd slept for, not that any of my other reminders had done anything to calm him down. I tried to get him to go home, he'd been by my side since we got back and I worried Rick and the others would be missing him, but he wasn't having any of it. Eventually, we reached a compromise; I'd stay on the couch and read, only getting up for bathroom breaks and emergencies, and he'd go fix up his bike in the garage, so he was close enough to hear me if I needed anything. My head was mostly fine, only the cut hurt anymore, but he seemed convinced I was moments from passing out again.

"I picked the most boring looking ones so they might make you go back to sleep," he said when he came back down from my room with a selection of books.

"These are great," I said as I took them from him. He looked annoyed. "I could always come and sit in the garage while you-"

"Stay on the damn couch," he said. "Ain't nowhere comfortable in there."

"You're impossible!" I yelled at him when he opened the door to the garage.

"Back at ya!" he yelled back before the door shut. I smiled, settling down to read. This had been kind of nice, although it had come from something terrible. I liked having him around so much. I didn't like seeing him worry so much, if I could only get him to dial that back a little, this could've been as nice a day for him as it had been for me. I felt a bit guilty for enjoying how much I'd liked him looking after me, and I hoped he knew that I'd do the same for him. Although, I prayed he'd never be in a position to need it.

I heard the front door open. I assumed it would either be Daryl coming in from the garage or Eric and Aaron back from wherever the hell they'd got to.

"Hello?" a woman's voice called into the house. It took me a second to place it.

"Carol?" I called back. "That you?"

I got up from the couch, heard her footsteps approaching, and damn near ran into her in the doorway.

"Hey!" I said, trying to mask my surprise. She smiled at me, but it wasn't a genuine one. I think Carol was so used to fixing on a smile that she could do it without thinking. There was so much fear and worry behind her eyes. Not like there had been when the Saviors had us, it was quieter and longer-lasting.

"Hope you don't mind me barging in," she said. "I saw Daryl on the way in, he said it would be fine. He also told me to give you hell if you were off the couch. So, if he asks, let's tell him that's what happened?"

"Or, we can just tell him I wasn't off the couch," I said. "I could do without another earful about resting."

"Deal," she said. "How are you, are you okay?"

"Oh, I'm fine," I said. "Mostly just bored as shit."

"Glad you're okay," she said. "And sorry about-"

"Oh, please," I waved her away. "None of it was your fault. Come, sit with me."

"Thanks," she said and sat down beside me. Her eyes were a little brighter than usual and she didn't seem like herself. I kind of knew what was coming. I'd seen her in there. The freakout she had might have been a misdirection, but the fear was real.

"You alright?" I asked.

"Not really," she admitted. "Everything I did back there…"

"You did what you had to," I assured her. "I'm sure Maggie and I owe you our lives for that."

"Maybe," she said, but she didn't sound at all sure.

"It was them or us," I told her. She looked away from me.

"I'm not so sure it was," she said. "They only got violent when we did."

"That wasn't on you," I said. "It was technically me that started it."

"You only did it because you thought you were protecting Maggie and me," she said. "Which is kind of what I wanted to talk to you about."

"Oh, yeah?"

"I love everyone here so much," she said. "But I'm scared of who I'd have to become to keep them all safe…"

"It ain't all on you, Carol," I said. "If there's ever another fight, you can sit out. Nobody would hold that against you. People here want to protect you as much as you want to protect them."

"I can't keep doing things like that again. I can't keep killing," she said, looking at me with such desperation it nearly broke my heart. "You get it, don't you?"

"Yeah," I said. "I've done some awful shit for the people I love. But, I can tell you for nothing that the alternative is worse."

"What do you mean?"

"I didn't fight back when Terminus first got taken over," saying it out loud was hard, "I thought compliance was the best way to keep everyone safe. I was so wrong. The only reason Mia ain't here with me now is because I didn't do shit when I should have."

"The only reason Sophia isn't here with me now is that I didn't keep her close, didn't protect her when the Walkers came by, or teach her how to defend herself," Carol said. "So, not fighting didn't work out for me, but fighting isn't working either."

"You weren't to know how it would play out," I said.

"Neither were you," Carol said, quietly. We sat next to each other in our shared guilt over two unrelated little girls. I'd heard Daryl talk about losing Sophia, and it all sounded like a run of accidents and misfortune, nothing had sounded like Carol's fault. Did she feel the same toward me when she heard about Mia? Why didn't that help the heavy guilt that had sat in my stomach since she'd been taken?

"You got a solution to all this?" I asked. I was surprised when she nodded.

"I'm thinking of leaving."

"Leaving?" I repeated. It was clear she didn't just mean on a run. "For how long?"

"A while," she said, in a way that made a while sound like forever. I sat up straight, searching her face for any sign that this was a weird joke.

"No," I said without thinking. "Where would you go?"

"It doesn't really matter," she said. "I think it would be easier for me to keep sane, and stop myself from becoming who I was back at the Savior's base if I didn't have anyone but myself to protect. Am I making sense?"

She was. Kind of. It would be a more comfortable life, cut off from caring about people, removing yourself from all of the violent bullshit that can spring up around negotiating with tough people in tough times. But being far away from people that you cared about didn't seem like much of a solution either. Not knowing what was happening to them, what they might be going through… that could be so much worse.

"Wouldn't you miss having people around?" I asked.

"Of course I would," she said. "But it's better, I think, for me to be alone. At least for a while. Until I know who I am again."

"You can work all that shit out right here," I said. "We can help. You can't just up and leave us. Do you know how much folks will worry about you?".

I liked Carol. I wanted her to stick around, but a very selfish part of me also wanted to stop it for Daryl's sake. She was one of the few people that Daryl seemed to trust enough to call a friend. This was the biggest group of people I'd ever seen him so connected to. He'd clearly come such a long way, but I didn't know how he'd cope with one of them just up and leaving. But then Carol's bottom lip started to tremble, and I realized it wasn't a case of her being close to breaking point, she'd already broken.

"I've killed so many people," she whispered. She wiped a tear away from her cheeks. "I really thought you'd understand."

"Me?"

"I saw the way you fought for Maggie and me in there," she said. "I really thought you'd get this."

I closed my eyes for a second, saw a flash of José's face right before he died. The blood I'd spilled at Terminus. All those dead kids I'd had to put down. The havoc the Wolves had wreaked on this place. The Saviors we'd slaughtered in their sleep. It was enough to make anyone retreat, and I had to ask myself if I hadn't found Daryl when I did, would I still want to be here?

"I get it," I said quietly. "But, please, give it a week to think it over. If you decide you still want to leave, I'll take you to the Kingdom."

"The Kingdom?" Carol said. "No. I don't want to be near anybody."

"And you don't have to be," I told her. "But I ain't letting you go without anyone knowing where you are. I've got a friend in the Kingdom, and I won't tell anyone else that's where you've gone. But I have to know that you're safe and that you're someplace you can come back to us when you've worked through… whatever it is you need to work through."

"I don't think-" she started to shake her head.

"You won't always feel this crappy."

"You really believe that?"

"I gotta believe it," I shrugged. I remembered when I'd been close to giving up too. It never really went away, but it did come and go in waves. Walking off on your own in this kind of world was a suicide mission, and I couldn't let it happen. Carol smiled then, it was small, but it was the first real once since she'd got here. I hugged her and hoped that when her week was up, she'd feel different. Things had to start looking up now. With Negan defeated, we'd have a regular supply of food from the Hilltop. If anyone like the Wolves ever came back to try and take Alexandria, they'd find us strong and able to defend ourselves.

 

Daryl

The garage felt like it was the farthest place I could stomach being from her. Any farther and I wouldn't be able to breathe right. From here, I'd hear if something went wrong or if she was in any kind of trouble again. I knew Naomi thought I was freaking out too much about this, but if I was honest, being around her was helping me hold it together. Everything felt out of whack. Like the world was tilting in the wrong direction, and everything would start slipping away from around me if I didn't hold on tight enough. Doing things to help her made me feel like less of a useless piece of shit. Even bickering with her took my mind away from that little voice in my head that told me I should've stopped it from happening.

I shouldn't have left her side.

I should've tracked them all faster.

I should've made everyone storm the place the second we found it.

But I didn't feel like I could tell Naomi any of this while she was supposed to be resting. Worrying about my dumb ass probably wasn't on the list of things that help fix concussions. Fixing up my bike made things a little easier and gave me something to focus on, something to do with my hands. I wanted to punch the shit out of Negan, and whichever one of his little cronies had tried to bash Naomi's brains in with a rusty pipe. But they were all dead. So now I had all this anger and nowhere to put it.

I wondered if having my bike back meant that Dwight was dead. Negan was clearly the guy they'd been running from and gone crawling back to kneel to, that's how he'd wound up with my damn bike. Maybe Dwight and his girl hadn't been forgiven for leaving. Which was weird because Negan hadn't seemed like that tough a guy, in the end, we'd taken him down pretty easy. But I guess sometimes, people rely on their reputation to scare people off, rather than living up to it. Second-hand stories can become tall tales pretty damn fast.

Merle had run with some guys like that. Guys who were whispered about like they were some kind of hardass but took a beating like a little bitch. I guess Negan's lot just got lucky that everyone at the Hilltop was so weak.

"Should've known you'd be over here," Carol's voice made me look up.

"Oh, hey," I said, kind of relieved to have something else to think about. "What are you doing here?"

"Thought I'd stop by and see how Naomi's doing," she said. "Is she home?"

"Yeah," I said, "but she should be resting. So, if you go in and she's not lying on that couch, give her hell from me."

"Will do," Carol laughed but didn't move. "How's she doing?"

"Better," I said. "She's got this big gash on her head from where they hit her. But she's been insisting on walking everywhere and she ain't collapsed again yet, so I guess that's a good sign."

"And, how are you doing?" she asked. "You didn't come home last night."

It took me a moment to figure out what she meant because last night had been the only time I'd felt like I had come home for the night. The house four doors down from this one, with its fancy kitchen and stuffy rooms, wasn't home. The girl reading on the couch; she was my home.

"How'd you know about that?" I asked. "Ain't you and Tobin joined at the hips these days?"

"Rick told me," she smiled.

"So, things with you and Tobin are good?"

"They are," she said, but it was non-committal. "He's great, and I really like him."

"But?" I said it felt like she'd trailed off just before she got to what she really wanted to say.

"Tobin doesn't know the real me. He knows who I used to be. Before all of this. Back when Ed was still charming, and our lives were... fun. Before he…y'know."

"Yeah," I nodded, so she'd didn't have to go into it.

"Guess I just missed being her," she said. "Tobin makes me feel like her again."

"I get that," I said. It was hard to imagine that version of Carol. The one who smiled and wore cardigans and baked shit all the time. "For the record, I like who you are now. The person you are now wouldn't go near a guy like Ed. Person you are now probably saved my girl in there, too."

"Oh, she's your girl now, is she?" Carol's smile widened.

Crap.

"Well, no… she ain't… I mean, she kinda..."

"Still haven't told her, huh?"

Only Aaron knew. Which I guessed meant he'd probably told if Eric. But as far as I knew, that was it. Did that make it okay to talk about it with Carol? I looked at her, "Actually…"

"What?" she said. Her eyebrows shot up. I could hear the excitement in her voice.

"Well, not exactly," I said. "Not yet, but…"

"But?"

"I dunno… things have been..." All this tiptoeing around it made it accidentally weirder than if I'd just said it outright, took a deep breath, and owned up to it, "We kissed."

"You did?"

"Uh-huh," I said and hoped that she wouldn't have any further questions.

"So, does that mean you're…?"

"We ain't talked about it yet," I said. "I don't want to spook her."

"Spook her?" Carol repeated, trying not to laugh. "You know she's not a horse, right?"

"Naomi ain't..." I started, not really knowing how to explain it to someone who didn't know her the way I did. "She can find it difficult to get close to people. Letting them in, y' know?"

"Jeeze, it's a wonder you two ever said a word to each other," Carol said. "You're not exactly an open book yourself."

"Nah, she's different than me," I said. "Friendlier."

"I'd noticed," Carol laughed.

"She can talk to anyone," I said, thinking of some of the absolute dipshits she'd made friends with at college without them actually knowing her at all. Until I'd rocked up and blown it for her. "But it doesn't mean she's letting them in. She's been let down so often that it's safer for her not to rely on anyone, so she ends up kinda keeping everyone at a distance."

All the times that her Momma had up and left her, she'd learned how to look after herself and act like everything was okay because she knew that if anyone got wind of it, she'd wind up being taken into care. Taken away from me.

"Not everyone, though," Carol said. "Not you?"

"Nah," I said, but it was kind of a lie. There were things she didn't even talk to me about.

"I kind of get it," Carol nodded. "After what I went through with Ed, I… I couldn't imagine anything long term. You think you know someone and then… they can change on a dime."

"That why you're different around Tobin?" I asked.

"It's maybe part of it," she said.

"You think that'll ever change?" I asked.

"I'd like to hope so," she said, but she didn't sound convinced. Then she was quiet for a moment. "I'm sorry Naomi got hurt. I did my best to… stop her from -"

"It's fine," I waved away the apology she was building to, knowing that Carol probably felt a little responsible for what had happened. "She's pretty unstoppable when she wants to be."

"She sure is," Carol gave me a small, sympathetic smile. "I'm gonna head in and see her, I hope you guys work things out."

"Thanks," I said, and although it wasn't a done deal yet, I couldn't help but smile. "Just walk in, so she doesn't have to get up, and if you'd mind, maybe not telling her…"

"I won't spook her," she said. "Don't worry."

She left me to get back to the bike. I listened carefully when she knocked, was glad to hear it was Aaron who answered and welcomed her in before the door closed. It was nice of Carol to drop by, but she had me worried about how Naomi would deal with whatever had happened to them all at the Savior's base. That wound on her head had looked pretty bad.

I remembered how she looked at me in the bathroom mirror while I was doing my best to fix it up without falling apart.

'Whatever this is… or isn't… between us, I ain't tryna talk myself out of it.'

I really wanted to believe her when she said it. It looked like she believed it herself. I knew she was scared, I was too. Almost losing her had just reminded me that I wasn't equipped to deal with it. What if we got together - properly together - and things didn't work out? Would our friendship survive a breakup? Was it better just to love her from a distance, and never have to find out?

Moving from what we had now to something that might not work… that was a big decision. Especially for someone like her. Once Naomi's decided she cares about someone, she has a real hard time letting go. Even if that person's a piece of shit. Even if they don't deserve her. Merle and I heard our dad was sick, and we celebrated. Naomi heard her Momma was sick, and she'd flown her and Mia home to take care of her. Naomi didn't give up on people once she'd committed to them. Even if they weren't worth it.

Like he was trying to prove my point, Lucas passed by. It looked like he was also heading for Naomi's door. That son of a bitch had eaten people, and she was still okay with him hanging around her like a bad smell.

"Where do you think you're going?" I snapped. He hadn't noticed me in the garage, and my voice made him jump like the dumb coward he was.

"Oh, hi, Daryl," he said, with a smile so bright it had to be fake. I'd never given this guy a reason to like me. "How you doing?"

"Where you going?" I asked again, suddenly not in the mood for any kind of pleasantries.

"Just… thought I'd stop by and visit Naomi," he said.

"Well, you can't," I told him. "She's resting."

"Really?" he said. "Because I thought I just saw Carol go in there."

"No," I said. He looked at me like he was expecting more detail, but I was done talking to that little weasel. I didn't like that he was here, sniffing around. I wanted him to step the hell away from me, and her, and the house. He was still giving me that dopey grin. Every second it was on his dumb face made me angrier.

"Look, I just heard about her accident," he said. "I wanted to see how she's doing."

"Weren't an accident," I said. "She was attacked."

"Yeah, I know," he said, that dumb smile faltered a little. "I just…"

"Attacked during a fight that you decided to sit out," I said.

He closed his stupid mouth. The smile finally faded. I watched as he took a second. "You've really found a way to blame me for this?"

"I'm just saying, if there'd been more people there, maybe them assholes wouldn't have been able to get the girls without us seeing."

I knew I was being at least a little bit unreasonable, but I really wanted him to back the hell off. I wanted him to turn around and walk away, keep walking until he was all the way out of Alexandria.

"Not all of us can fight," he said. "Some of us have to stay here and-"

"Stay here, and what?" I asked. "Plan the funerals of the ones brave enough to go out and get shit done for the rest of you dipshits?"

"Fighting is not the only thing it takes to keep a community running," Lucas said.

"You can keep telling yourself that," I said. "If it helps folks like you sleep at night."

"And what does that mean?" he said. "Folks like me?"

"I know your type."

"Yeah, and what's that?"

"A coward," I said. "Always finding excuses for not getting involved when the truth is you're scared of hard work. You think you're too good for it. Didn't see you out helping to dig them fields."

"I helped with the wall."

"Pfft," I said. "Sure."

I'd spent more time digging than I had at the wall, but hadn't seen him there when I had been. He seemed like the kind of guy who, before all of this, had things easy. He probably hadn't gone hungry until the world broke down, he'd probably always managed to hold down a job, probably paid enough to provide for himself. Probably could've provided for someone else too, back in the old world. He'd been stable. Lucky. And I hated him for it.

I bet he never felt this kind of anger. Bet he'd never punched a wall until both his knuckles were bleeding because he didn't know what else to do with all his rage. Bet he'd never had people cross the street to avoid him or look at him like he was a caged animal.

He was calm. Cool-headed. Safe. He was the kind of guy who could take people's taunts about him without getting violent. I'd been nothing but an asshole to him, and this was the closest he'd come to a confrontation. He was friendly. Nice to everyone, even if they weren't nice to him. Annoyingly likable, despite the shit he'd done.

No-one in the world was good enough for Naomi. But if I'd had to make a list of the kind of everything I'd want in someone who was with her; 'stable, lucky, calm, safe, nice' they'd all be on the list.

If Naomi was going to be with anyone, she deserved someone less fucked up than me.

The kind of guy good enough to step aside if someone better came along.

In short, not me.

"Stay the hell away from her," I said. "Quit sniffing around with all of your empty-ass condolences when you could've just been there to help in the first place."

I thought that might shut him up, that he wouldn't have the guts to talk any more shit to me. But he narrowed his eyes and took a step closer. "She doesn't need you telling her who she can and can't be friends with. If Naomi doesn't want me here, she can just say so."

I hated how he said her name. I hated that he knew it at all.

"Maybe she's too nice to tell you to get bent," I said.

We both knew that wasn't true and he quite rightly didn't buy it.

"I'm going inside," he told me.

"No," I dropped the spanner I was holding and took a step toward him. "Stay the hell away."

"You must not think very much of her," he stopped but didn't leave, "if you think she's too stupid to judge for herself who she wants to be friends with."

"Nah, that ain't it," I snapped. Naomi's judgment of people was dead on, it was her kindness that was the issue. Giving people the benefit of the doubt, looking for the best in them. Even me.

"No? Then what is it?"

"I don't want anyone I know hanging out with fucking Hannibal Lecter."

His face got real red. Embarrassed and angry all at once. His jaw clenched, and I felt a little spike of satisfaction. I was finally going to get an excuse to do what I'd wanted to since I'd met him and punch him in his goddamn face. He was usually so annoyingly calm. I liked this better.

"You don't know," he said, gritting his teeth, "what it was like for us there."

Us.

Him and Naomi.

Us.

"Yeah? You keep saying that," I said. "But you ain't ever tried to tell us what it was like, you just keep bitching and expect all of us to just forget what you did."

"You want to know what it was like? You really want to know?" he was all up in my face. My fists clenched automatically. I felt the fire that burns before a fight. Familiar. Welcome. "Alright, come on."

I wanted it to be him that threw the first punch. I knew I'd goaded him into it, but if he swung first, then at least people wouldn't see it as me getting reckless and violent. I knew what people's first assumptions of me had been, and I didn't want to do anything to prove them right. Not when I'd been working so hard for them to at least put up with me being here. But he didn't. He turned on his heels and started storming away from me. Then he glared over his shoulder like I was meant to be following him.

I broke into a run. Maybe he was just moving us out of the garage, an empty street was a better space for a fight, after all. But he kept walking.

"Hey!" I yelled after him. "Where you going? You running from me?"

"Keep up," he yelled back. "You want me to explain myself? Fine."

He marched up the path of one of the houses. It took me a second to realize it had once been Deanna's. I hadn't been in it since we'd first arrived. I knew folks like Maggie and Eric spent a lot of time hanging out here, making decisions about the town, but even looking at the outside of the place made me feel cooped up.

"What are we doing here?" I asked. I wondered if this was him being a coward again, running to the town committee to complain about me.

"You really want to know what happened at Terminus?" Lucas turned before the door. "Why I did what I did. Then get in here."

He pushed the door open and waited for me to make a decision. This wasn't what I wanted. But I followed him in. The house was as weird as I remembered it. I could hear voices talking something over in another room. Lucas burst into Deanna's old study, making a beeline for the line of videotapes behind her desk. He started pulling them out, littering the floor until he found the one he wanted. One labeled 'Terminus.'

"You really want to know what happened, you can fucking watch this and then I don't want to hear you say shit about it again."

He slammed the tape into the VCR so hard I thought it might break it.

"You fucking serious?" I asked him.

He didn't answer, just switched the screen on and pressed play.

"Shit," he said as Naomi stared at out at both of us. There was a little frown on her face. It was bruised too. Old bruises, but bruises nonetheless. She looked like she hadn't eaten in a while.

"Er..." her gaze flickered from us to someone behind the camera and back again. "Is that necessary?"

"Let me just skip this," Lucas said, as Deanna's voice answered Naomi behind the camera. "Should've realized it wouldn't just be me on this."

"Nah," I grabbed his arm, stopped it mid-air. "Let it play."

He looked at me like it was a terrible idea, and maybe it was, but it was also easy to talk myself into. I'd finally know what happened to her. I kind of knew, from things that Lucas had implied when I'd questioned him. But now I'd know for sure. And that could only be a good thing, right? Because this way, it meant she wouldn't have to tell me about it. This way, we wouldn't have to talk about it at all, but maybe I could still help her.

This didn't really count as snooping when I already knew most of it, right? Because how much else could she be hiding? How much worse could it be than what I already knew? Right?

Chapter 28: Infected

Naomi

Daryl up and left without saying goodbye or telling me that he was going. Carol had seen him on the way in to visit me, but when Aaron came home, and I'd casually mentioned Daryl was fixing up his bike, he'd looked at me like I was crazy. The garage was empty. I thought Daryl had only gone out for a moment, but as night drew in, it became clear he wasn't coming back. I worried something had happened to him, and got close to raising the alarm, but Eric mentioned in passing that he'd seen him at Deanna's. So, I guess the mystery was half-solved.

I tried not to read too much into it, but I worried I'd freaked him out. I shouldn't have said that thing about not trying to talk myself out of whatever was going on between us. It had been too much. What if he'd been thinking about backing out and then I'd gone and opened my big mouth? Why did I always have to overthink everything? Why couldn't I have just let it be… whatever it was?

Aaron and Eric gave me the same concerned looks that they'd given me after Daryl and I had first kissed. At least I had a concussion to blame it on this time. Although my head felt fine now and I hadn't felt dizzy in over twenty-four hours. It was just the cut on my scalp that was giving me a bit of trouble, easily itchy and irritated by my damn hair.

I was feeling a little queasy, and I couldn't eat much. I tried not to think about why Daryl had run off without saying goodbye or why he hadn't come back. Instead, I channeled my nervous energy into finding something productive to do. Having spent most of the day before doing not much of anything, I was keen to do something useful.

I stood up to clear the plates a little too fast and got a head rush. I waited a few seconds for it to pass while Eric, who had barely finished eating, feigned shock that I was so keen to do some housework. Usually, I had to be heavily persuaded into keeping up with his levels of cleanliness. I hoped scrubbing breakfast dishes would be enough of a distraction to stop my stomach churning and my mind from turning over the same questions over and over. But it just gave my hands something to do while my brain stressed out.

Why didn't he tell me he was leaving?

Why didn't he come back?

I'd never been someone who got caught up on this kind of shit. Never been the kind of person who obsessively checked my phone for texts from someone I'd been dating. Nobody I'd ever dated had made me feel like this. Pathetic and a little desperate. But, I guess I'd never tried dating Daryl before. If that was even what was going on.

Fuck. This.

I hated this obsessive and needy side of myself. I didn't recognize it. If I was going to nip it in the bud, I needed something to distract my mind. I marched back out of the kitchen and opened one of the cupboards around the dining table.

"Now what's she doing?" Eric asked.

"She's got a name," I said to him. "And she is getting her maps out."

"Why?" Aaron asked, with a mild amount of suspicion. Arms full of maps, I turned around to look at him.

"Denise said we're running low on meds," I said, spreading them out across the table. "I thought I'd have a look around for places that might be good to check out."

Aaron narrowed his eyes at me. "Do you really think it's the best idea for you to-"

"I'm not saying I'll go out scavenging today," I said. "If I find a place that looks good, I'll take them to Glenn, he can plan from there."

Aaron relaxed, "Need some help?"

"Yeah," I said, pushing one of the maps towards him. "Pull up a chair."

We started with the obvious; a nearby hospital and a few medical centers. Although it was unlikely they'd have anything that wouldn't have already been scavenged, we wanted to be thorough. Malls and big shopping centers offered other possibilities of finding a drug store but were as unlikely to be untouched. The rest was more laborious, finding clusters of shops that could include a pharmacy. Last-ditch efforts would have to involve combing through local houses and seeing what, if anything, people had left behind.

This task proved to be a much better distraction. The only problem was how hot it was in here. It made it hard to concentrate. I was boiling. A bead of sweat irritated my forehead.

"Hot today, huh?" I said, wiping it away.

"Eh, I guess," Aaron said. Then he paused what he was doing and studied my face. "You okay? You're very pale."

"Yeah, I'm fine," I said, as breezily as possible, but the queasy feeling in my stomach was just growing. Was it the thought of going over to talk to Glenn about this and running into Daryl after he'd flaked out on me? Was I really such a mess that the thought of one potentially uncomfortable conversation made me feel like I was on the verge of throwing up?

No. Not the verge.

I was going to throw up.

I stood up so fast it made my head spin. Dark shadows closed around the outer edges of my vision, and I felt like I was falling. I stumbled toward the bathroom as fast as I could, the sting of bile in my throat.

I flung the door open. My knees hit the tile. I barely had time to grab my hair away from my face before my body lurched forward, and the contents of my stomach hit the toilet bowl. I sank down onto the bathroom tile. They were surprisingly and refreshingly cool against my skin. The room felt like it was spinning, I closed my eyes to stop it. My stomach churned. The back of my throat burned. An involuntary shiver ran up my spine and through my limbs. Was it cold in here? Or was I too warm? My hands shook, and I could feel goosebumps breaking out across my arms. When I rubbed my hands across my face, I found a cold sweat there.

"Naomi?" I heard Aaron but still couldn't open my eyes.

"I don't feel so…" I started to say.

"Eric," Aaron yelled to him. "Run and get Denise."

I took a few deep breaths and waited until the spin of the room slowed enough to ease how queasy I was feeling. I opened my eyes. Aaron had crouched down to look at me.

"You okay?" he asked. I nodded. He pressed his hand to my face. "You're burning up. You think you can stand?"

"I think so," I said. My legs felt weak and shook when I tried to move. Aaron helped me up and to the couch. I wanted to tell him that I was fine, but even I knew I wasn't. Eric rushed in with Denise. They both looked sweaty and stressed.

"Eric says you might have a temperature?" Denise smiled in a way that I think was meant to be reassuring, but the look in her eyes was wide and panicked. "How are you feeling?"

"Er… not great," I admitted. Denise reached into a bag she'd brought with her and pulled something out. "A bit queasy."

"Alright, let's just take your temperature," she said, extending a thermometer toward me. I took it from her and held it under my tongue. When Denise told me to, I took it out and handed it back to her. She took a look at it and winced, "Yeah, that's far too high. Do you still feel sick?"

"A little," I admitted. Eric quietly pulled the mop bucket out of the cleaning cupboard and slid it toward me, clearly worried I'd throw up all over his carpets.

"I'm going to take a look at the wound on your head," Denise said in that calm and soothing way doctors do when they're about to put you in some amount of pain, and are trying to keep you calm. "I think you might have an infection."

I nodded and propped myself up while she peeled back the bandage on my forehead. I felt her fingers on my scalp. It hurt like hell. Eric winced and looked away while she cleaned out the wound again. We were all too distracted to hear the front door open.

"Naomi," Daryl's voice called for me in the hallway. "We gotta talk."

"Shit," I jerked my head away from Denise, knowing what kind of spiral this would send him into if he saw it. I looked at Aaron, "Don't let him in here, just -"

Too late. He'd heard my voice and knew where I was. The door opened.

"... I know you won't want to, but…" he stopped and looked around at everyone. His eyes fell on Denise. "What's going on?"

"It's nothing," I said, but it was one of the most obvious lies I'd ever told him. He'd probably have known even if I wasn't lying on the couch with Eric and Aaron hovering nervously around me. But the presence of Alexandria's only medical professional was the real tipping point. So I tried to explain, as calmly as possible, "It's just a little infection."

"Infection," he repeated.

"A little one," I assured him, but he held up a hand.

"Nah, I ain't listening to you," he said, looking back at Denise. "How bad is it?"

"She'll need antibiotics," Denise said.

"We got them?" he asked.

"We have one course of antibiotics left," Denise said. "They should last her a few days. I hope that'll do it."

No. I closed my eyes. Hope. I knew that word wouldn't be good enough for Daryl. He'd never really been one for sitting around and relying on something as flimsy as hope to get shit done.

"But, it might not?" Daryl said. I opened my eyes again, caught the way his eyes were boring into Denise. Like he was searching for a lie she wasn't telling, a reason to suspect this would be worse than she thought. "She might need more?"

"Maybe," Denise admitted. "It's impossible to know at this point."

Daryl gave a small nod that I don't think he's aware he does; it's only when he's made some kind of decision, agrees to something with himself.

"Alright," he said, then he turned on his heels and started to walk out of the room. "I'll go get some."

"Wait!" I called. He rounded on me, ready for some kind of fight. I knew he expected me to try and stop him from going out there.

"Naomi, I ain't-"

"We've got maps," I said before he could yell at me for trying to stop him from going. "Aaron and I marked up potential pharmacies earlier."

"I'll get you them," Aaron said, leading him out of the room. "You want anyone to come with you?"

"Nah," I heard Daryl say. "I got this."

I knew I couldn't stop him from going, but I wished he'd take someone with him. Doing something productive might make him feel better, but doing it alone was riskier than it had to be. The door slammed harder than Daryl probably meant it to, and Aaron came back into the room, giving me a look that showed he was as worried as I was.

"Alright," Denise said brightly as if nothing had happened. "Mind if I just…"

She got back to cleaning my infected wound with something that burned the rest of my scalp around it. When Eric looked like he was the one who was about to throw up, I nudged the empty mop bucket back toward him with my toe. Denise bandaged me up again and handed over the antibiotics. I felt immensely guilty already. They sat heavy in my hand. Alexandria's last.

"Take these three times a day until you've taken them all," Denise said. "And keep taking them even when you start to feel better. Hopefully, we've caught it before it becomes anything more serious."

We hadn't. I got worse real fast after that. I'd been considering holding back on taking the medication and waiting to see if I got better on my own. But there reached a point when even I realized I couldn't wait this out. Every muscle in my body was tired and sore. I could not stop shaking and sweating. Anything I tried to eat came right back up again.

I slept a lot but never felt rested. The light was different every time I opened my eyes, although it felt like I had only closed them for a few seconds. Sometimes I wore up alone. Other times, I was aware that Eric or Aaron was there with pills and a glass of water. All of it felt hazy and disjointed. Dreams seeped from my sleep to the room around me. My body ached and shivered so much it didn't feel like mine anymore.

I woke up alone, and it was dark. My throat was dry. My muscles hurt. I turned for my glass of water and found it empty.

Fuck.

I listened, in case there was someone still awake in the house, but everything was silent. The kind of dark and quiet that feels as if you're the only one in the world who's awake. I was too cold and too hot, all at once. I wrapped my comforter around my shoulders and stood up.

The ground was unsteady for a moment, and I took a lot of deep breaths. The house felt like it was sinking underneath me. My legs shook, my hands shook. A thin layer of sweat glistened permanently on my forehead. I didn't know if it was because I was still shivering or if it was just because I was so damn weak. I couldn't remember the last time I'd eaten anything that I'd actually managed to keep down.

I can do this.

I got to the door and managed to get it open. I reached for the railings around the stairs and held onto them tightly with one hand, my empty glass in the other. My palms were sweaty and slid along the wood of the banister. I took each step slowly, visions of myself tumbling down and landing in a broken, comforter-clad heap at the bottom for Eric and Aaron to wake up and find played over in my head. I reached the bottom and made my way to the kitchen.

A snore from the couch as I passed by the living room made me stop in my tracks. Eric? Aaron? Had they had a fight I'd managed to sleep through?

I shuffled into the room. There, sprawled on the couch, was Daryl.

This had to be a dream, right?

There was a big bowl of something beside him. Looked like berries, but they hadn't been touched. Real Daryl would never have left food uneaten, so this had to be a dream, right? A hallucination? But the snoring was so real…

I picked up a cushion from the other couch and threw it at him. He jolted awake and looked around at me, all tired and bleary-eyed. "Naomi?"

"Are you a dream?" I asked him suspiciously.

"No," he sat up, rubbing his eyes and looking a little cross. "What you doing up? You okay?"

"Needed some water," I said, holding up my empty glass. "Are you sure I'm not hallucinating?"

"Has it been that bad?" he asked. His tired eyes got all scared and crestfallen. "You been hallucinating?"

I had, occasionally, when vivid dreams had seeped into the time I'd been awake.

"I don't know," I said. "Are you really sleeping on my couch?"

"Yeah," he stood up. "You need some water? Sit down, I'll get you it."

"It's okay, I can-"

"Naomi!" he snapped. "Sit."

"I ain't a dog," I muttered. Daryl took the empty glass from my hand, but I didn't move. I was so exhausted that staying still felt like it took up less energy than moving to sit down. He fixed me with a stern glare, and I forced myself to sink, comforter and all, down onto the couch he'd been sleeping on. He gave me a little grunt of approval, and then he was gone. The brief sound of running water and his returning footsteps were the only things left to convince me this wasn't a dream. He held out a full glass of water to me.

"Didn't mean to yell," he said quietly as I took it from him. "But you gotta stop telling me you're fine when you ain't."

"I just don't want you worrying," I said.

"Yeah, I know why you do it," he said, slouching down into the seat beside me. "But, you gotta stop."

"Sorry," I said. "In my defense, I didn't think it was going to be this bad."

He hardly heard me, didn't react to what I'd said. This had clearly been running through his head for a while. He wouldn't stop until I got his point.

"Something happens to you, I wanna know about it," he said. "No matter how bad you think it is. No matter how much you think I won't wanna hear it. You can't just deal with shit by yourself all the time, it ain't fair."

"Daryl, I hear you," I said. "But I really thought I was gonna be fine. It was just a cut… until it wasn't. Fever came on so fast."

"I ain't just talking about now," he said. "I don't just mean when you get sick."

"Then what do you mean?"

He shifted uncomfortably in the seat next to me, his hand rubbed the back of his neck as he looked at his feet. I wondered if it was cricked from having slept on this damn couch.

"No matter what it is," he said again. "If something happens, I want to know."

I tried to sit up straighter, but it made my head spin. "Daryl, where's this coming from?"

He sighed. Loud and frustrated.

"It ain't fair on you to keep shit to yourself," he said. "Always helping everyone with their shit and not dealing with your own. But it ain't fair on me, neither. I want to be there for you. I never want you to feel like you ain't got nowhere to go… or… I just think you need to…especially if we're gonna-"

He stopped. Mid-rant.

"Gonna, what?" I prompted.

"Don't matter," he said.

But I'd got it.

Going to be together.

It hung in the air between us, unspoken. Heavy. I almost addressed it, but thinking about it gave me a headache even when I wasn't fighting off an infection, and he knew it, that's why he'd stopped. There was also still a small chance that all of this was a fever dream, so any conversation would be pointless.

"So… what are you doing sleeping here?" I asked.

"Nice to see you too," he grumbled.

I studied his face. I didn't realize it at first, but I was looking for signs of a fight. He had a habit of getting a little reckless when he felt scared and out of control, which was precisely how he'd looked last time I'd seen him. "Rick kick you out?"

"No, idiot," he said. I narrowed my eyes at him, and he finally realized I wasn't letting up. "I'm here for you. I brought you these."

He handed me the weird bowl of berries I'd noticed earlier. I looked down at them, expecting to find some kind of meaning in there and didn't.

"Thanks, Daryl, but I'm not hungry," I said. "Don't wanna gross you out, but I can barely keep anything down."

"No, dummy, they're for your fever," he said like that should've been obvious.

"What?"

"Elderberries," he said like that explained a damn thing.

"What?"

"Yeah, they help to…" he looked a little less sure of himself, "bring fevers down and shit."

"Really?" I said. I popped a few in my mouth, sharp and bitter. "How do you know that?"

"Back at the prison, a whole bunch of people got sick. We didn't have any medicine, but there was a doctor there that said elderberries were good for this kinda shit."

"Oh," I said. "Did it work?"

"Worked until we got enough antibiotics to treat them," he said. I nodded, ate a couple more.

"Who was the doctor?" I asked, realizing there wasn't anyone in their group now who fit that description. He looked away because he didn't want me to see that he was still sad about it, but I knew he would be. Daryl was the kind of person to carry that shit with him for life.

"Hershel," he said.

"Hershel," I repeated. "Unusual name."

He sat in silence for a moment. I could tell he wanted to say something else, so I waited.

"He was Maggie's dad," he said. Then he cleared his throat. "And, actually, he was a vet. We were staying on his farm before that. There were horses there. You'd have liked it."

"A farm's a pretty good place to be stuck in all this," I said. "What happened to it?"

"Overrun with Walkers," he said.

"Sorry, man, that's shit," I said. I closed my eyes, exhausted despite having done nothing for however long I'd been lying in bed. I'd reached the point of being ill where it's hard to remember what it ever felt like to be well. This was the first time in a while that I'd started to feel like my old self. However much of a struggle I'd found it to get out of bed and down the stairs, I was damn glad I had. "I missed you."

I didn't really mean to say it out loud, but I was weak, and my usual defenses were down. My exhausted body kept trying to pull me back to sleep while my mind fought to keep me awake, keep me with Daryl.

"You been asleep for two days," he said. "Ain't been awake long enough to miss me."

I smiled because, underneath all of that grump, I knew he was happy I'd said it, and that made me feel like less of an idiot.

"You can just say you missed me too, dumbass."

"I missed you too, dumbass," he said. I hadn't expected him to. I assumed he'd just tell me to shut up or call me a nerd or something. But his voice was all gruff. Maybe he was more worried about me than I'd realized. "Now, eat up."

"I'm eating as fast as I can," I said. "But there's a lot here. You leave any berries for anyone else?"

"There'll be more out there if you need 'em," he said. The way he said it was more of a threat than an offer. I kept quiet and swallowed down as many as I could. After going a while without eating, my stomach didn't really know how to react to food hitting it. I heard it rumble in a way that sounded more like a groan. Daryl pressed the back of his hand to my forehead, surprisingly cool. "Shit, Naomi, you're really hot."

"Keep it in your pants, mister," I gave him a weak smile. "I'm sick, doncha know?"

His face went a little red. "Not sick enough to stop telling crappy jokes."

I threw a berry at him, but he saw it coming and caught it in his mouth. He winced when he bit into it. "Shit, them things are sour."

"I kinda like sour," I said. Berries might do fuck all to help my fever, but they were clearly helping Daryl to feel better about it all. So I ate until I couldn't anymore. I set the bowl down again.

"Naomi…" Daryl said, a warning note in his voice.

"Please, I can't eat any more of those," I said. "You should just be happy they ain't come up again yet."

"Fine," he said. "But, you're eating the rest tomorrow."

"Deal," I said, and leaned into him. He put an arm around my shoulders. I stifled a yawn. "Can't believe you slept here."

"Didn't wanna leave," he said. "Didn't want to wake you up, neither. I went to almost all of them places on your map and couldn't find shit. Everywhere's been picked clean."

"Sorry."

"Ain't your fault."

"Sorry you wasted your time, then," I said. He was quiet for a while. I closed my eyes and, although I knew he was clearly thinking about something, I let the comfort of that silence wash over me.

"Sorry I weren't here for you," he said. "When you got sick."

"Don't matter," I said. I could feel myself drifting off. Being close to Daryl was just enough comfort for me to relax into the fatigue that seemed permanently embedded into my muscles. "You're here now."

I closed my eyes for what felt like a second and then something jolted me awake again. The ceiling was moving above me, and I could hear footsteps, but I knew I wasn't walking. Daryl had picked me up. I tried to raise my head to look around more. "What are you doing?"

"Getting you to bed," he said. I wanted to fight him on it and tell him I could walk up there for myself. But I knew that wasn't true. And he'd just asked me not to keep things from him anymore.

"Where did you go?" I asked.

"I went to look for meds," he said, sounding worried that I'd forgotten so fast.

That wasn't what I'd meant. I wanted to know where he'd been before all of that. Before he knew I was sick. Where he'd gone when he'd left the garage. Why he'd stayed away for almost a full day. But then I felt myself sink back down into the pillows on my bed. I looked for Daryl, and he was gone again like he'd melted into the dark. I thought it might be a sign that I'd dreamt him up after all, but then he was back, pressing a cold damp cloth to my forehead. I felt the bed dip as he sat down beside me. Sleep had come to claim me again, already weighing down my limbs and making my eyelids heavy. I felt him lie down beside me in the dark, and his hand took mine before I lost my grip on consciousness.

 

Daryl

I'd never seen someone shiver so damn much. All while heat radiated out of her like she was some kind of furnace. Her fever was too high for me to get close, I knew her body temperature needed to be lowered, and I didn't think adding my body heat to the mix would help. But all I wanted to do was hold her. Her sweaty hand had been limp in mine since she'd fallen asleep. Hair stuck to her paler-than-usual forehead. I pushed it back so I could turn over the damp cloth I'd put there to cool her down. The side that had been against her skin was worryingly warm already.

"Daryl?" Aaron's quiet voice from the doorway made me jump. I glanced at Naomi, saw she hadn't stirred, and moved as carefully as I could out of bed, so I didn't wake her.

"Hey, man," I said. "She got up for some water, I…"

"I just came to check on her," Aaron said, clearly not looking for an explanation as to why I was in here with her. "If you need a break, I can…"

"Nah," I said. "I got this. Go back to bed."

"I'll come and check on you both in the morning."

I nodded, and he started to turn away.

"Hey," I called quietly at his retreating back. He turned back. "Thanks for… taking care of her. While I was…"

I'd spent two days out of Alexandria looking for meds, not knowing that she'd been getting dramatically worse. It was clear Aaron and Eric had been taking care of her, making sure she took her antibiotics and trying to get her to eat when she was lucid enough to try.

"Happy to do it," he said, with a shrug like it was nothing. It wasn't. There was a small smile on his face like I was a weirdo for thanking him. As if it was normal for folks to take care of each other like this. But it wasn't, not for Naomi and me anyway, if she'd gotten this sick as a kid... Overwhelmed by how grateful I was to him and Eric, I gave Aaron a hug he wasn't expecting.

I had no idea she would get this sick.

"Hey, it's okay," he said. Surprised, he hugged me back. "We love her, too, man."

I didn't know what to say, I just patted him on the back and let go, turning away because I was feeling too much and knew it would be written all over my face.

Stepping back into her room, I tiptoed across the floor and opened all of the windows to let in the cold night air. Then I settled back down next to her, as close as I dared get without touching her.

"Fight, Naomi," I whispered to her. "Please, you gotta fight."

She was fast asleep, but they say sometimes you can take things in subconsciously, right? The amount her body was shaking and how warm she was, it was almost a blessing that she wasn't awake to suffer. I just wanted her to know, even subconsciously, that I was rooting for her while she fought it off. Thought that knowing someone was waiting for her on the other side might give her a bit of extra strength. And she was so strong already. So much stronger than even I had known.

It was hard to think about.

Those assholes putting their hands on her like that.

Taking Mia from her.

Weeks of pain shut up in a damn box living in fear that one wrong move would kill someone she loved.

The fight to break free.

Dead kids chained up and left undead to torment them.

The boy they'd made her kill.

And she was still standing, after all of that. Not sure I would've been. Corny to say it, but she was my goddamn hero.

I knew deep down, no matter how strong-willed she was, an infection could still snuff her out. The same strength that had helped her through that hell… None of that meant shit when it came to fighting an illness. Her body could still give out on her. That was the fear that kept me awake. Like if I wasn't there to listen to the sound of her breathing, she might just… stop.

I stayed awake to watch the room lighten around us. Heard the sounds of Alexandria waking up and listened for Aaron coming back. I gave her hand an absentminded squeeze, and she rolled over, opened her eyes. Gave me a weak smile.

"You're here?" she said. Her voice was so quiet. Her eyes were sleepy and didn't have their usual spark in them. I hated seeing them so dull. If I could've swapped places with her, I'd have done it in a heartbeat.

"'Course I am," I said. "Where else am I gonna be?"

She was quiet for a moment, and I thought she was about to drift off again, but then she tried to pull herself up into a sitting position. Her limbs were still weak. Naomi looked at me, studied my face, and mumbled, "Weird."

My heart started racing. Had I overstepped some kinda boundary by being in her room? She hadn't technically invited me, so maybe this wasn't okay. I should've thought about it, how she might feel waking up to someone in her room, rather than just doing what made me feel better. "Weird?"

"Yeah, I think you were in my dream," she said through a yawn. "You were making me eat all these berries…"

She pulled a face like she could still remember how sour they were. I relaxed. "No, that was real."

"Huh," she looked mildly surprised but didn't say anything else. Didn't ask me to leave or question why I was here.

"How are you feeling?"

"Better," she paused to think about it for a moment. "Hungry?"

She didn't sound so sure about that last one, but I took it as a good sign. From what Eric and Aaron had told me, she hadn't much felt like eating until now. I pressed the back of my hand to her forehead again. Warm. But not in a way that sent cold panic through me anymore. "Hey… I think your temperature is coming down."

It felt too good to be true, or even to say out loud.

"For real?" she said, opening her eyes a lot wider. She looked down at her own arms and legs like they were someone else's. "Hey, I think I've stopped shivering."

She had. My heart lifted. "Think you could eat?"

"More berries?" she asked, looking a little glum.

"You did promise you'd finish the ones downstairs," I reminded her, "but you can have something else if you think you ain't gonna spew it up again."

At this point, I'd have got her anything she asked for if it meant she was gonna eat.

"I'll do my best," she said, and then started to climb out of bed.

"Hey, where are you rushing off to?" I asked her.

"Food," she said.

"Nah, stay here," I told her. "I'll get you it."

I waited for her to push back and convince me that she was well enough to get up and about on her own. I saw her thinking about it. Maybe it was the look on my face, or perhaps even she realized that three days of fever had left her body too weak. Whatever it was, something changed her mind. Reluctantly, she pulled herself back to where she'd been sitting before. She locked eyes with me, and a moment of acceptance passed between us. I knew it must be killing her to give in like this, but it helped me breathe a little easier.

I made my way quietly to the kitchen downstairs. I popped some bread into the toaster and rummaged around for other quick and easy food. I didn't want to be away from her for too long. When I'd said I wanted to make her breakfast again, this hadn't been what I'd had in mind. I'd pictured her happier. Healthier.

I loaded up a plate for us to share, buttered the toast when it was done, and grabbed the leftover berries before heading back up. She was sitting exactly where I'd left her, waiting.

"That is way too much food for one person," she said, scrutinizing the plate in my hands.

"Ain't all for you, greedy guts," I said, picking up a piece of toast and biting into it. I passed over the plate and then settled down next to her.

"You're staying?" she asked, and there was this look on her face like she expected me to run off now she was awake.

"Yeah," I said, and then because I couldn't quite figure out the way she was looking at me, I said, "If you want me to?"

"Yeah," she said. "'Course I do."

We ate together in a comfortably familiar silence. She couldn't manage as much as me, or as much as I'd seen Naomi put away before, but that didn't matter. I was just happy to see her eating again.

It marked the start of a slow recovery. She still needed a lot of sleep. The fever had really weakened her. It came and went over the next few days, but never as high as it had been. Each day she got a little stronger, and the color returned to her face. Each day she could eat a little bit more, and her eyes got a little brighter.

I stopped staying over. Without the urgency of Naomi being a death's door, it felt like crossing a line. She never said so, but it would've been weird to keep living on her couch when she wasn't in danger of dying overnight. Eric and Aaron let me stop by whenever I wanted. Sick of answering the door to me all the time, they told me to just let myself in and didn't bat an eye when they'd come home and find me hanging out there.

I took the maps I'd been using to try and find medicines over to Denise. I knocked and peered through the glass door, noticing too late that Lucas was in there with her. I still didn't like him, but it was harder to truly despise him now that I knew what they'd been through. So I guess his damn tactic of showing me that Terminus tape had worked, in its own way. He hadn't let Naomi put down those dead kids' Walkers on her own. So I got it now, why she defended him so much, you don't go through something like that with someone without it bonding you.

I had a split second to decide whether to just turn around and come back later or go in before they spotted me through the window. Denise motioned for me to open the door.

"Hey," I said. It had been almost a week since Lucas and I had seen each other. Neither of us was happy about coming face to face again now. He used to look nervous when he saw me like he could see all the thoughts I had about punching him. Maybe he could, I wasn't too good at hiding that kind of shit. But he didn't look nervous anymore. Watching that damn tape had tied us together in shame, and he resented me for it. I deliberately avoided looking at him.

"Hey, Daryl," Denise said. "Everything alright?"

"Brought you these," I said, holding up the maps. "I've checked all the places that are marked up, but I thought you might spot something we missed."

"Thanks," Denise said. "Leave them on the table by the door, and I'll take a look."

I nodded and put them down, feeling a small glimmer of hope that I'd now be able to get out of here without saying a word to Lucas. But he decided to stick his nose into the conversation and asked, "Are we in need of more meds?"

"We're low on a few things," Denise said.

"Has anyone scheduled a run for some?" he asked. I wanted to through something at his dumb head. He was the kind of guy who'd spend so long scheduling and planning that everything would stand still for a week instead of just getting out there and getting shit done.

"Nowhere to take a run to," I told him. "I've been out there looking, and there ain't nowhere nearby that hasn't been picked apart by other scavengers."

"You've looked?" he asked. "On your own?"

"Didn't wanna just sit on my ass," I said. "Not when Naomi was so ill."

"Okay," Denise said over the top of me, trying to diffuse the situation. "I'll have a look at the maps and see if there's anything that jumps out, thanks for bringing them by."

"No problem," I said, my hand already on the doorknob. I was almost free.

"Hey, when you find one," Lucas said, I stopped the door half-open. "Let me know."

He was talking to Denise, but it felt aimed at me. I looked back at him.

"You want to come?"

"Yeah," he narrowed his eyes at me. "It's about time I stopped sitting out this kind of thing, don't you think?"

"Do what you want, man," I said, trying to act like I didn't care. I got out of the door and felt a brief sense of relief. I did think it was time he pulled his weight more, risked more. But I didn't want him coming on this damn run. Or any that I was on, I just wanted him to stay as far away from me as humanly possible. Just looking at his dumb face reminded me of all the shit I had to feel guilty about.

Sadly, he had the opposite idea. I heard Denise's door open, and then Lucas tried to call me back. I turned back around but didn't say anything. Lucas took a few more steps toward me and lowered his voice, "How's she doing?"

He didn't have to tell me who he was asking about.

"Better," I said.

"Did you tell her…" he asked. "What we did?"

Guilt, sharp and ugly, cut me up inside. It drove me to walk closer to him. If we were going to have this shit out, I didn't want anyone else overhearing.

"No," I said, thinking he'd be relieved about keeping my trap shut, but he looked at me like I was dirt. "Didn't wanna bring it up when she's tryna recover, y'know?"

"Sure," he said like he didn't really believe that was the only reason. Like he could smell how lame my excuse was. "But she's better now?"

"Yeah. Kind of."

"So, we should tell her."

"We?" I said. "Ain't no 'we'."

"We both watched it," he said. "We're both to -"

"Nah," I snapped. "If either of us tells her, it should be me. I'm the one who made you keep playing it. I'm the one who didn't know… any of that shit."

I'm the one who knows her best, I wanted to add but didn't.

"But-"

"No," I said, more firmly than before. "Trust me. She doesn't want to talk about this, and if we make her, she ain't gonna want an audience."

"Two people is hardly an audience," Lucas rolled his eyes.

"It will be to her," I said. She'd kept it private for a reason. Lucas had been there, yes, but he'd already known what they went through at Terminus. I was the one she'd kept it from. This was between her and me.

"Fine," he said eventually. "But if you don't do it soon, I will."

"That a threat?"

"No. She deserves to know what we saw."

"Think I don't know that?" I said.

"Just reminding you," he said.

"Don't need reminding," I snapped. "I tell her."

I turned away and walked away from him before that dumb look on his face could make me feel worse. I'd been meaning to tell Naomi about the tape, I really had, but the longer it went on, the easier it was to keep it a secret. It was easy to justify it to myself, too. I didn't want to bring it up when she was sick and put her under more stress. I wanted all of her energy focussed on getting better, not spent up dealing with past trauma. But even I had to admit that she was pretty much back to normal now.

I stood in front of her house for ages. Kept willing myself to walk up to the door and open it, but my feet were glued to the street outside. The place seemed taller than usual. Darker and not so welcoming. I couldn't open that door without a plan. I remembered bursting through it after a sleepless night of that damn tape playing over and over in my head. I'd been ready to talk about it then, it had felt so damn urgent and necessary. But all of that went out the window when I'd seen her lying there; pale and sick.

Now, it had been almost a week. The urgency was gone, but the need was still there, mixed in with the guilt of keeping it a secret. The shame of going behind her back. I couldn't just casually throw it into a conversation. Naomi was so sensitive to the slightest mention of Terminus, and I was damn sure she was going to be the one to bring it up. Not after she'd kept it from me for so long. How do you tell someone this kind of thing? When you've done something that you know is going to make them mad?

"Daryl?" her voice came from somewhere above me. I looked up, saw her leaning dangerously far out of one of the upstairs windows, an amused little smile on her face.

"Hey…" I called back up to her but didn't move any closed to the door.

"Is the door broken?" she asked. "You need me to let down my hair?"

"Nah," I said. "You can keep your hair to yourself, Repunzel."

"Alright," her smile widened. "Well, either come in or quit lurking outside like you're casing the joint."

She shut the window again. This was it.

I walked in her front door. She was coming down the stairs to meet me. She had this big, warm smile on her face that usually would've sent my heart racing, but today, it made it sink. I was sure I was about to give her news that would wipe it right off of there. She was in a good mood. Full of much more energy than I'd seen from her in a while. No more excuses, I had to tell her. But I didn't want to ruin this. She smiled at me, "You alright?"

"Yeah," I said, but I didn't feel alright. I felt sick. "You?"

"I'm good," she said. She looked it. "You're later than usual."

I knew she was teasing me for the extreme amount of time I'd been spending at hers lately, usually arriving shortly after the sun rose and leaving after it set.

"I was, uh, talking to Denise," I said, trying to find a natural way into the conversation I knew we needed to have. "Gave her your maps."

"What? Why?"

"Thought she might know about places the rest of us didn't," I said. "What with her being a medical professional and all. Also, it meant that looking for places didn't stop just because you're resting. Although I feel like I've searched everywhere, I'd be surprised if she can find anything."

Naom thought for a moment, "Maybe we could ask the Hilltop… or the Kingdom if they have any-"

"You think they'd give up their meds?" I asked.

"I'm not saying we'd get them for nothing," she said. "We'd have to come up with some other deal, but-"

"Nah. I'm done making deals," I said. The last one had almost cost me everything.

"But," she said louder than before, annoyed that I kept interrupting her, "It's worth it if we get some more antibiotics for this place. More painkillers too. Who knows how soon we'll need them again?"

I saw how serious she was about it, and then I got why. She'd needed the last of it, and she was the kind of person who'd feel guilty about it forever if the time came that someone else was in need, and we couldn't help them.

"We'll find some," I assured her. "Or… someone will. Think I might leave it to Glenn to go."

"Really?" she said. "Why?"

"Dunno," I shrugged. I didn't know how to describe it to her. How ill she'd been when I got back, how pale and shaky. I'd left when she had a mild infection, and when I'd come back, she'd been too sick to wake up. I was kind of done leaving when things could change so fast.

"We could go together?" she suggested, and there was a spark of hope in her eyes. "If Denise finds anything."

"Maybe," I shrugged. I didn't want to say no outright when I knew she was holding herself back from going out for my sake. If it was up to her, she'd have been back out there already. But she'd stayed home an extra few days for my piece of mind. And I appreciated that. If I was honest, the thought of being there when she went back out for the first time brought me some comfort. "You sure you're up for that?"

"I'm fine now," she said. "I feel miles better. Been feeling like myself since yesterday, and I'm almost done with these damn pills."

She took the nearly empty box out of her pocket and shook it at me.

"Uh-huh." It didn't make me feel a whole lot better. She'd looked me in the eye and told me she was gonna be fine before, and we'd both believed it.

"You ain't gotta worry anymore," she assured me. Her eyes got real serious. "I don't like seeing you worry."

"Can't help it," I said.

"I know."

It was especially hard now that I knew just how much she could keep hidden. A silence settled between us. There was a lot I wanted to say. A lot I'd put off saying. Every time I glanced at her, it looked like she was mulling something over. Was my guilt obvious from my face? Was she slowly piecing together that something other than her sickness had been behind my little outburst? Or, was she going to tell me about Terminus herself? Should I tell her I already knew? Act surprised? I tried not to freak out.

"Hey, Daryl?" she said eventually.

"Yeah?"

"I'm sorry." I waited for her to follow up with something that would clarify what she meant, but she didn't. She just fixed me with a gaze that were still lost in thought.

"... what for?"

"I've been thinking a lot about what you said…" she took a deep breath, and I wished she wouldn't. I'd said a lot of shit, I didn't want to react until I knew what specifically she was talking about. "About telling you that I'm fine when I ain't."

"Oh," I tried to hide that I was surprised. I wasn't sure she'd remember me saying that, she'd been so feverish at the time. "Yeah?"

"Yeah, and you're right. It ain't fair," she said. "I'd hate it if you did that to me."

She'd given this a lot more thought than I thought she would. Maybe I'd been more frantic at the time that I'd realized. I nodded. "It's okay. I get it."

She relaxed a little and sat down on the couch, but there was still something plaguing her. I sat down next to her, and she looked at me.

"Where'd you go?" she asked quietly. I wondered if she was back on the maps, back to thinking about all the places she might be able to replenish the med supply.

"All of them places you and Aaron marked up. I tried-"

"No, not then," she shook her head. "Before that. You were fixing up your bike, and then you were just…"

She trailed off and shrugged. Now was the time to come clean. She'd handed me the perfect opportunity. Almost a week to think of the perfect thing to say, and I still had squat.

"I'm sorry," I said, not sure how to continue, but an apology felt like the right kind of start. "I-"

"Was it me?" she blurted out.

"You?"

"Was it because I… did I say something, or…?"

"No," I said. "No. What the hell would you have said?"

"Dunno," she said, but the way she kind of shrank away from me made it clear she'd had something in mind.

"Tell me."

"Nah, it's fine."

"Naomi…"

"I thought when I said I… wasn't trying to talk myself out of… anything happening between us," she looked away from me. I saw her cheeks start to go red. "I thought maybe that… freaked you out, and that's why you took off."

"No," I said, too shocked to hide it. "God, no."

"Really?" she said. "Because I knew you didn't wanna talk about things, and then I brought it up…"

"It's okay," I told her, feeling like she was building to an apology she had no business making. She was so far off base with all this.

"Really?"

"Yeah," I said, she didn't look like she believed me. "As long as you meant it when you said it."

"Yeah," she said. "Of course, I did."

"Then, it's fine."

"But, I also meant it when I said I don't want things to get messed up," she said.

"Yeah," I said. "I know."

I didn't want that either. Seeing Naomi so ill and seeing that tape of everything she'd been through, had been a wake-up call. There were much worse things than not being with her. As long as she was alive and well, I had nothing to complain about.

"I'm not good at this kind of thing," she admitted. "It's just..."

"Relationships are hard for you," I finished for her.

"Yeah," she admitted, looking ashamed when she didn't need to.

"That's okay," I said.

"I'm not good at long term shit."

"Nothing wrong with not wanting anything long term," I told her. "You ain't gotta feel bad about that, if it ain't who you are."

"But it's who you are," she said. "Ain't it? Unless you got some kinda wild past that you ain't told me about."

"I don't." I waited to see if she'd make fun of me for being a prude like Merle used to when he'd been picking up chicks, but she didn't.

"It's not that I don't... want anything more serious," she said. "I mean, hypothetically, but it just never felt… right with anyone. Anytime they got too close, it's like a part of me just..."

"Bolts?"

"Yeah," she said. Her eyes were impossibly sad. "But this is you. You're already so close."

"I know," I said quietly because I did. It would have been easier to have fallen in love with someone else. Someone who hadn't already meant the world to me. But it hadn't felt like I had any kind of choice in it. Naomi could do the short-term casual thing, so maybe she was different from me. Maybe she'd have a choice. If she was able to opt-out, I couldn't blame her for not wanting to risk everything.

"I don't wanna fuck us up," she whispered. "I don't wanna reach that point with you. I don't…"

"I know," I said again. "You don't wanna hurt me."

It was hell, watching her torment herself like this. For someone who'd said she didn't want to talk herself out of anything, she was doing a damn good job of doing so. I just wished she'd do it quicker, so it might hurt less. If she didn't want to be with me, that was fine, as long as she stuck around. As long as she was still in my life.

"Look, it's okay," I told her. "If you don't wanna be with me, if you don't want to risk it, I get it."

It was a big gamble for her, and I knew I sure as hell wasn't worth it.

"Really?" she said. I tried to work out if she was relieved, but it was getting harder to look at her. Something in me was starting to break.

"We can call it a day if you want," I said. "Pretend none of it happened. No hard feelings."

She looked at me then, her eyes searching my face for something. I fought the urge to look away from her. I was so used to averting my gaze and hiding how I felt, but if this was the end of it, there was no point in dodging it anymore.

"Thing is," she said. "I don't think that is what I want."

"No?" My heart sped up. I kept thinking I must've heard her wrong.

"No," she said. When I didn't say anything, she faltered a little. "But, if you want to call it a day now, that's fine. Like you said, no hard feelings."

There was a moment of silence where we just looked at each other. Two heartbeats for me to make a decision, to get up the courage to tell her, "That's not what I want."

Another heartbeat of silence. It was crazy to me that she hadn't known that. I thought she'd had some understanding of my feelings about all this. She was usually so good at identifying them. But I guess she was too busy trying to define her own. I watched the realization of what we'd just agreed to hit her. I wondered if it would be too much already. Enough to make her bolt after all. There was a glimmer of disbelief in her eyes like she expected this to fall apart at any moment.

"We doing this?" she asked. "We starting something?"

I was glad she asked because I couldn't get my head around it either. I'd been so busy preparing myself for the exact opposite of this that it didn't feel real.

"Yeah," I said. "I think we are."

"Okay," she said. I could see the beginnings of a freakout threatening to rise up behind her eyes. "But we find it ain't working, we stop immediately. We don't let it get in the way of what we already got."

"Agreed," I said.

"And if you decide you don't feel anything for me," she said. "Or if your feelings change, you gotta tell me. None of your shutting down bullshit because you don't want to have a difficult conversation."

"Fine," I said, knowing they wouldn't. "But, you gotta do the same."

"Deal."

I couldn't look away from her. I felt like the second I did, she'd change her mind. Or I'd wake up.

"So, we take things slow?" I said.

She nodded. "We take it slow."

Neither of us said anything else. We sat in the unbroken silence of the decision we'd just made and let it wash over both of us. I realized I was smiling when she did too. It spread across her face with a warmth that reached her eyes. I couldn't stop.

"So…" she said. "What now? Do we... shake on it?"

"This ain't a business meeting," I laughed. She was really freaking out. But at the same time, I hadn't seen her look this happy in a long time.

"Right," she nodded. "So...?"

"I think we can probably just kiss like normal people would," I said. "I mean... if you want to."

Now that I knew everything she'd been through, rushing her into anything physical was the last thing I wanted to do. I'd waited a long time for this; I could wait longer.

"Yes," she said. I reached out for her and cupped her face in one of my hands, drinking in her smile. Those eyes. The way she whispered, "God, yes."

"Yeah?" I tilted her face up toward mine as she moved closer. I saw her nod and close her eyes before I kissed her. Again. Finally. That sweet, fiery taste I hadn't been able to shake. I'd longed for it. Dreamt about it. But that all had all been nothing compared to the real thing. I savored it. A slow and gentle kiss while I wrapped my arms around her body, finally able to hold her like I'd wanted to for so long. Her arms linked around my neck, pulled herself closer to me.

I tried to keep it gentle, wanted to stop it from getting too intense too fast, but she kissed me harder, and it was impossible to resist. The soft warmth of her body against mine, the feel of her wrapped up so completely in my arms, the taste of her. It all ignited that feeling in me. That burning, all-consuming need to let her know that she was mine.

Forcing myself to pull back, I looked at her. Her eyes fluttered open again, she fixed me with that big, beautiful smile and it took everything in me not to tell her I loved her right there and then. But this had been a big step. For both of us. And I wasn't about to undo it by coming on too strong too fast.

Chapter 29: Edison's Apothecary

Naomi

Daryl was waiting for me out on the front porch. It should have been the most normal thing in the world. I'd spent so much of my life either hanging around outside Daryl's waiting for him to get his ass out of bed or scrambling around my own place to get my shit together while he waited by the door. But I froze up in the hallway. Checked my reflection three times in the mirror. I even considered running to Eric for advice, but I hadn't come clean to him or Aaron about anything, and I knew I didn't have time to have that conversation. Or for Eric to fix everything that was wrong with me. Daryl was already waiting.

Plus, it wasn't like he didn't know what I looked like. He'd seen me looking much worse. He'd just spent time with my pale, sweaty, wound-infected ass, and that hadn't put him off, so maybe it was fine.

Chill, Naomi, I told myself, It's just Daryl.

I'd never been nervous about meeting him before. Hell, I'd never even been this anxious about going on a date before. And this wasn't a date, it was a damn drugs run, with several other people. That thought calmed me down enough to open the door. He was leaning on the rail at the top of the porch, arms folded across his chest. It was just Daryl, but also it was different. I opened my mouth, and nothing came out.

How did we greet each other now? Should I kiss him, or was that not taking things slow enough? I'd considered putting together some kind of list of agreed-upon rules, so we knew where we stood at all times. Like whether or not we were telling people, and if any public display of affection was alright. But I'd resisted, thinking that stopping to make him do relationship admin would've taken some of the romance out of us getting together. What should I say to him?

Just 'Hey' is probably fine, right?

He frowned at me. Probably because I was gawking at him like a weirdo. "What took you so long, slowpoke?"

There he is. There's the Daryl I know.

I closed the door behind me, "Hello to you, too."

"Taking your sweet time because you don't wanna do this run anymore?"

"You wish," I walked over to him. "You ain't still trying to talk me out of this, are ya?"

"Would that work?"

"God, no."

"Then, I ain't wasting my breath," he said reluctantly. We looked at each other, and I felt myself start to smile. I saw him trying to resist his own. Even though we were running a little late, neither of us moved. He nudged my hand with his like he wanted to take it but didn't know if he could. A small, hesitant smile twitched at the corners of his mouth, "Guess it might be kinda nice having you there."

"Yeah?" I felt my own dumb smile get a whole lot bigger.

"Yeah," he said. "But only so I can keep an eye on you."

"You'll feel better having me around to have your back," I said. "It's okay, you can admit it."

His smile grew, and there was this light in his eyes that I hadn't seen before. It made me feel lighter too. He straightened up, moving away from the railing. A quick glance around us to check that we were alone, and then he leaned in, his fingertips brushing my cheek as he moved his hand to the back of my head and drew my face to his. My nerves came flooding back. His eyes were all I could see. Fixed on me like there was nothing in the world but us, they flickered from my eyes to my lips and back again before he kissed me.

Every time he did, the doubts I'd had shrank a little more. I was painfully aware that this could still blow up in our faces. But faced with the prospect of ending it forever, I'd realized that whatever this was, I wasn't ready for it to end.

He pulled back too soon. Always too soon. Smiling down at me, he murmured, "Hey, Naomi."

"Hey," I said, trying to catch my breath. My heart lurched in my chest. The impulse to blow this whole run off and just hang out with him was intense. But we couldn't bail like that, not when it was me who'd used up the last of the meds, so I turned on my heels and said, "C'mon, let's do this."

He fell into step beside me. We walked close, like always, but it was different now. We were so aware of each other. Every time we caught each other's eye, I got this giddy, jittery feeling in the pit of my stomach. I wondered if he felt it too, and that's why the corners of his mouth turned up in a little smile every time he caught me looking at him. Was I looking at him too much? Or not enough?

His arm kept brushing up against mine. I wanted to take his hand, but I didn't know if he'd be okay with that. Daryl had always been fiercely private, I wasn't sure how he'd feel about rocking up to meet everyone hand-in-hand. It wasn't just him either, I wasn't sure I was comfortable with that just yet.

Denise was waiting with a truck by the gates. Rosita and Lucas stood with her. Lucas looked a little out of his depth, Rosita's face was set in deep-rooted anger. A dull look in her eyes like she'd forgotten how to smile.

"Oh, head's up," Daryl said quietly as if seeing he reminded him, "Abraham ended things with Rosita."

"He did?" I said. That explained why she looked ready to throw down with anyone who looked at her wrong. "So, are he and Sasha-?"

"Yup."

"And how did Rosita take it?" I asked as if it wasn't obvious.

"Not well. Don't bring it up."

"Ooof," I said. "Copy that."

We stopped talking about it when we got within earshot. Denise straightened up when she saw us coming. I raised my hand to greet them all.

"You're late," Rosita told us. Her voice was as tense with irritation as her face. I tried to keep my smile to a minimum.

I expected Daryl to make some kinda comment about how it was my fault we were late, but he didn't. He just looked at Denise and said, "You got the keys? I'll drive."

"I didn't realize so many people were coming," Denise said, throwing him the keys. She looked puzzled by how many of us there were. He shrugged. If she'd left coordinating this whole thing to him, then that was her mistake. As a natural loner who communicates primarily in grunts, organizing a group of people wasn't exactly a strength of his. "Maybe I should get a different truck."

I peered through the window. There was really only room for three people up there. Four if you all squished together real tight.

"Don't all have to come," Daryl said. "Sure someone can sit it out."

It sounded pointed. Directed at someone, but I couldn't work out who. Was it me? I thought he was done trying to talk me out of this.

"That's alright," I said. "We can sit in the back, right, Lucas?"

I gave Lucas a nudge and an encouraging smile. He looked nervously at the back of the truck, I could tell he was worried about a lack of seatbelts. "Er… yeah."

"See," I said brightly. "All fine."

Denise and Rosita nodded in agreement, Daryl looked like he had a thousand objections but didn't voice a single one of them. He gave Lucas a look I didn't understand. Neither of them said a word, then Lucas turned toward the back of the truck, and the moment was broken. Rosita opened the passenger door and stood back to let Denise in first.

"Hey," Daryl hissed, catching my arm. "Why you guys?"

He narrowed his eyes first at me, and then at Lucas like us sitting in the back together was a sign of some secret conspiracy. I frowned at him. "Denise ain't been out much, she should sit upfront with you. And I don't know Rosita well enough to get her out of that damn mood. Lucas and I will be fine back there."

"Huh," Daryl said like he didn't believe me. I saw the glare he shot Lucas's way. His mood had gone from good to crap in three seconds flat. Before I could ask him anything, he'd turned and pulled open the door. He slammed it so hard behind him that I thought the window might break. Not for the first time, I felt myself getting whiplash from how fast his attitude could change. It reminded me of the inexplicable sulk he'd gotten himself into after we'd found Bryce and the Kingdom. I climbed up into the back of the truck to sit beside Lucas before Daryl could decide to just drive off without me.

"So, uh," Lucas shifted uncomfortably next to me as the engine started. "How are you? You feeling better?"

"Yeah, I am," I said. "Thanks for asking. How've you been?"

"Yeah…" he said. "Fine."

He didn't say anything else. The gates opened up, and Daryl drove through. It was bumpy and uncomfortable. I heard the engine almost stall a couple of times and worried that this truck was almost on its last legs. Lucas didn't say anything else. He sat leaned back on the window between us and the front of the truck, his eyes fixed on the sky. Didn't look at me. Didn't smile. Daryl's lousy mood was clearly contagious. Or maybe it was Rosita's. Were Denise and I the only ones not stewing over something?

"Sorry, I ain't been around," I said. In case he was mad at me for not checking in lately.

"It's fine, you were ill," he said, though I hardly needed reminding. "And I don't usually do… this kind of thing."

That was true. Lucas, like Eric, took a more hands-off approach to the goings-on in Alexandria. More content with planning runs than going on them. I wasn't sure he'd been out of the gates since our failed attempt to reach that old factory and our subsequent run-in with the Wolves. It meant we didn't get to hang out much anymore.

"What made you decide to come on this run?" I asked, suddenly worried that he was rusty and no longer used to being outside of the walls. That could put him in real danger if we ran into trouble.

"It's been a while since I did something like this," he said. "I don't want to forget what it's like out here. Plus, meds are pretty important. I didn't want to sit it out if I could help."

There was something bitter in his tone. I nodded encouragingly like I hadn't noticed it. The car jolted on the road, throwing us around uncomfortably. I took hold of the side to steady myself.

"Sorry I didn't come and see you," he said. "When you were sick."

"That's fine," I said, surprised he'd even thought to do so. "I wouldn't have been much fun to hang out with, anyway."

The car jolted again. I heard the back of Lucas's head hit the window he was leaning on.

"Hey," I turned around to knock on it. "Mind driving better?"

"You hurt?" Daryl yelled back out of the driver's window.

"No."

"Then quit whining."

"I keep telling him I know how to drive stick," Denise joined in from where she sat between Daryl and Rosita. I heard her trying to convince him that she knew what she was talking about. The truck stalled again.

"For God's sake, will you just let Denise dive?"

"I got this," Daryl said. The engine jerked back into life, and we continued our bumpy, uncomfortable journey down the road.

"Idiot," I muttered to myself, but I could not get the smile off my face every time I thought about him. I looked at Lucas, who was rubbing the back of his head. "You okay?"

"Yeah, I'm fine," he said and shuffled forward a little so that he was in less danger of injuring himself next time the car bumped us around. He was immediately glad that he had, as we bounced across some old railway tracks.

"Actually…" Lucas said, throwing his hand out to steady himself. "I did try to visit you."

"Oh, yeah?" I said. I caught his wary glance through the front of the truck, and I understood it immediately. "Daryl said something, didn't he?"

Before Lucas could respond, the truck came to a stop that felt more deliberate than Daryl's shitty stick driving. Lucas and I turned around to look at what was going on ahead of us. Peering past the heads of Daryl, Denise, and Rosita, I could see a fallen tree lying across the road. I stood up and jumped down from the back of the truck as the doors on either side opened. Lucas jumped down after me. Leaving Denise in the relative safety of the truck, the four of us went to investigate in uneasy silence.

If someone was trying to set up a roadblock, they couldn't have hoped for a better place for a tree to fall. There was no moving it. I raised a gun and scanned the trees around us. I hadn't been on this road before, but if it was frequently used, this would be a good place to get people out of their cars to take their shit. A growl from underneath and a dead arm shot out to grab Rosita when she got too close. She stabbed the Walker quickly through the skull.

"This happened fast," she said. "Tree rotted out, it wasn't people."

I could tell by the look on Daryl's face that this explanation didn't fully satisfy him. He didn't say anything, just walked back to the car and opened the door, motioning for Denise to get out and join the rest of us on the road.

"Truck ain't gonna make it past this tree," Daryl said, grabbing the bags from the back. "C'mon, let's walk."

He started to walk around the fallen tree, to take the road we would've driven. I followed him.

"Hold up," Denise said, nose buried in the map she'd found the Apothecary on. "Looks like a straight shot if we follow the tracks."

She gestured back to the railway tracks we'd just driven over.

"Nah. No tracks," Daryl said firmly. "We'll take the road."

"That's twice as far," Rosita complained, looking at Denise's map over her shoulder. Daryl did not slow down.

"Go whichever way you like," he called back to us. "I ain't taking no tracks."

As he stomped off, I turned to look at them. "You guys coming? Probably best we don't split up too much."

"Nah," Rosita said. "Waste of time going that way. I'll meet you guys there."

She started to walk off. I glanced at Lucas and Denise.

"She shouldn't go on her own, right?" Denise said.

I started to walk back over to them. Lucas raised his hand to stop me.

"I'll go with her," he said. "You go with…"

He glanced darkly at where Daryl had stomped off. Taking his chances on the open railroad was clearly his preferred option to taking a road with Daryl. I nodded, and he dashed off to catch up with Rosita. I turned around to try and get back to Daryl. He was already pretty far ahead. I broke into a run.

"Hey!" I yelled after him. He stopped and turned. I saw him look behind me at where the fallen tree was obscuring the view of the truck, and of Denise trying to catch up with us both. "We should slow down-"

"Where's Lucas?" he interrupted like I hadn't said anything. I glanced behind me again. Denise was the only one I could see following us.

"Think he went with Rosita."

"Dumbass," he said.

"Did something happen?" I asked. "You and Lucas… did you fight?"

"No," he said, but there was a quickness to it that made it feel like a lie.

"Then why you in such a crappy mood all of a sudden?" I asked.

"Who says that's got anything to do with him?" he said.

"Please. You've been glaring at him since we got here," I said. "Think I wouldn't notice that?"

"Don't much like him," he said. "That ain't a secret."

"That why you stopped him from coming to see me?"

He was so taken aback that I knew about that, he almost stopped. I saw the guilt flash in his eyes as he finally looked at me, searching my face for what I might know. "He tell you that?"

"Didn't have to," I said.

He clammed up. Didn't say anything else. His jaw clenched like he was angry, but he had a look in his eye like he was scared of something. For the longest time, I'd thought Daryl's outright dislike of Lucas was down to everything he'd experienced at Terminus, and I couldn't really blame him for it. But now, I wasn't so sure. It was so close to the sullen, angry fit he'd thrown when I thought he'd been jealous of my friendship with Bryce. He had been jealous. It just might not have been for the reasons I thought.

How long had he been thinking this way… about me? About us?

I didn't know how to ask, and with him in such a weird funk, I didn't want to start a fight either by leaping to defend Lucas from his completely irrational jealousy.

"Daryl…" I took hold of his wrist in an attempt to get him to stop and look at me. It half-worked. He didn't slow down, but he looked me in the eye long enough for me to say, "Did I tell you how happy I am? That we're… doing this?"

"No." His whole face softened. He stopped. "You didn't."

I could feel my face getting hot and prayed it didn't show. "Well, I am."

"Oh," he started smiling again. The urge to kiss him was unreal, but Denise wasn't far behind us, and I still didn't know where we stood on this kind of thing. So I settled for just smiling back at him. Felt like the biggest, goofiest grin in the whole world, but I didn't care. Then a frown crossed Daryl's face. "Wait, you are talking about... you and me, right?"

"No, I'm happy we're doing the meds run," I rolled my eyes. "Of course, I mean you and me, dumbass."

"Okay, good," he looked relieved, and like he'd forgotten all about his former lousy mood. I let go of his wrist, but I wanted to take his hand. I had nothing against Denise, but at that moment, I wished she'd gone with Rosita and Lucas. I wished it was just us out here on the road. I wished we didn't have a dumb run to go on.

"Hey, guys," Denise caught us up. Her eyes were wide and wild, she was clutching a big-ass machete like she thought she was walking into some kind of ambush. "Thanks for waiting."

"Sorry it took a while to slow certain people down," I said, with a nod toward Daryl. "Seems like he's tryna beat the railroad walkers after all."

"Shut up," Daryl shook his head at me, but I could still see his smile as we kept walking down the road.

"So, what is your aversion to the tracks?" Denise asked.

"Don't trust 'em," Daryl said.

Denise looked confused. "The tracks…? Is it the trains ..? I don't think they're running anymore..."

"The tree," I said, trying to translate Daryl's way of thinking for her. "The way it fell perfectly blocking the road… if someone wanted to drive people onto the tracks, that's how you'd do it."

"Why would anyone want to do that?"

"Tacks are a pretty open space," I said. "Makes people easier to rob."

"Jeeze," Denise looked a little queasy. "So, you think the tree didn't fall on its own?"

"Might've done," Daryl shrugged. "Fell in a convenient place is all. Might've fallen on its own and been moved there. Could be a coincidence. Either way, I ain't risking it."

Denise listened with a thoughtful frown on her face like she would have to take an exam on everything she was learning. I looked back at the nervous way, she clutched her machete and asked, "When's the last time you were out here?"

"Long time ago," she admitted. "But… I want to do more. Learn more. Can't stay behind those walls forever."

"Can't be sure those walls will stay up forever," Daryl added, which I'm not sure helped with Denise's nerves.

"Can't be long until Tara's due back, right?" I said, as a way to change the subject. Denise brightened immediately and started talking about her countdown until Tara and Heath were due back from their run. While she talked about the things she'd planned for them when Tara got back, I wondered if she regretted not going with her. Although, for obvious reasons, I was glad our resident medic had been around for the last week.

Lucas and Rosita looked like they beat us to the Apothecary by quite a lot. They were sitting comfortably at the corner of the road opposite the strip mall we were looking for. Their heads were bowed in quiet conversation. Rosita nudged Lucas and got to her feet when she saw us coming.

"About time," she said, but she was smiling for the first time that day. Daryl ignored her, walked right past to the doors of the Apothecary across the road. He banged on the door a few times, and we all stopped to listen. Nothing knocked back, which suggested there were no Walkers trapped in there. At least, none that could reach the front of the shop.

"Alright, me and her are going to do this," Daryl said, nodding at me. "Rosita and Lucas; cover us. Denise, stay back. You got that?"

There was a general, quiet murmur of agreement, and Daryl pulled out a crowbar, jamming it between the locked doors. I raised my gun to cover him, fixed my attention on the resistant doors. It took him a few attempts, but eventually, one of the doors gave way. The smell of death and decay burst out as Daryl raised his own gun and used the end of it to nudge the door open properly. I scanned the shadows around him, listening for the sound of the dead as I waited for my eyes to adjust for the sudden dark. We moved in slowly. The smell hit Denise at the back of the group, and she started to gag.

"We gonna find out what you had for breakfast?" Daryl asked her as she doubled over at the entrance.

"Oatmeal," she told us. "Just so you know."

Something had definitely died in here, and if you weren't used to that smell, I could understand almost vomiting. If it was Walker, it must have been taken out already. Nothing was moving behind the sunglasses stand or glass cabinets of trinkets and shelves of souvenirs. Rails of clothes hung on one of the walls, and behind the counter was a wall of scarves. At first glance, it didn't look promising.

"Hey," Rosita called us over. She shone her torch over where the word 'Pharmacy' had been painted over a closed shutter. Daryl used the crowbar to break it open. He climbed over the counter and into the back room where the drugs were kept. Lucas, Rosita, and I followed. It was an untouched goldmine.

"If you set it on the counter," Denise said, from the other side of it. "I can tell you which…"

"Nah," Daryl said. "We're gonna take it all."

"Are you sure?" she said. "Because…"

"No, it's fine," Rosita said. We spread through the shelves systematically, each of us scooping everything we could into the bags we were holding. We'd only been moving around a few minutes before we heard a repetitive banging sound from somewhere in the building. Coupled with the smell of death that had hit us on the way in, it was clear there was a Walker somewhere, and breaking in here had disturbed it. We all stopped and listened.

"Sounds like it's just one," Rosita said. It didn't get any louder, any closer.

"It sounds like it's stuck," Daryl concluded. Denise looked nervous, I gave her an encouraging smile, and we all went back to what we were doing. It was hard to worry about one trapped Walker when we'd hit on such a jackpot. This was more meds in one place than I'd seen in a long time. My bag was already getting heavy. I could hear the rattle of other pillboxes around me as the others tried to fill their bags as quietly as possible. Getting my hands on some antibiotics, I immediately felt better about having used the last of Alexandria's. This supply should last the town a good long while.

"Hey," Daryl whispered to me from where he stood filling his bag from one of the shelves behind me. A quick glance over at where we Rosita and Lucas could be heard quietly rummaging through another set of meds. A second quick glance back at the shop behind us, and then he beckoned me over, "C' mere."

"You alright?" I asked, walking over to him. I scanned the shelves he was looking at to see why he might have called me over. "You find something?"

"Nah," he said and took hold of me by the waist. "Just... I'm happy, too. I didn't say that before."

"Yeah?" my breath caught in my throat. This side of him was so new to me. So surprising. I almost asked him to repeat himself because I couldn't believe I'd heard him right. But the way he pulled me to him and looked at me with this burning intensity, I knew I hadn't misheard. I was glad it was dark here so he couldn't see how red my face had probably gone.

"Yeah," he said. "Crazy happy."

I kissed him. We weren't alone, but I couldn't hold it back. It didn't feel like he wanted me to either, kissing me back so deeply I had to hold onto his arms to steady myself.

Glass shattered behind us. I whipped around, my hand springing to the hilt of my knife. Daryl's arm tensed around me, and he took a step forward, trying to get between me and whatever that noise was. In case that Walker had broken free from where it had been trapped. We glanced at each other.

"Denise?" I whispered. He shrugged, and we moved forward. Rosita and Lucas stopped what they were doing, and we all crept forward to take a look into the shop. Denise started back at us from where she'd knocked into a stand and sent the glass ornaments there smashing to the ground.

"What the hell are you doing?" Rosita asked.

"Nothing," she said. But her voice was shaking. A door was open that hadn't been before, and I wondered if she'd come face to face with our trapped Walker. She backed out of the shop and into the brightness outside.

Moment as broken as everything Denise had knocked over, we went back to packing up the pharmacy as quickly as possible. When we were done, we found her sitting on the sidewalk, back against the wall. She held a dusty keyring in her open hand that she must have grabbed from one of the souvenir stands inside.

"Hey," Daryl said to her. She looked up at us. It was clear that she'd been crying. "You did good finding this place."

She nodded, wiped her eyes with the back of her hands, and stood up.

"Tried to tell you that you weren't ready," Rosita said, but there was a little sympathy, and some of her former firmness had gone.

"I know," Denise said dejectedly. Rosita and Lucas started walking back toward the junction between the road we'd taken and the rail tracks that they had. I glanced at Daryl, and we both fell into step with Denise.

"Who's Dennis?" I asked, noticing she was still clutching the keyring in her hand.

"He was my brother," she said. "He's the one who taught me how to drive stick."

"Shame he ain't here to teach Daryl," I said. She gave me a small smile.

"Was he older or younger?" Daryl asked, ignoring my comment.

"Older," she said. "By six minutes. My parents came up with the Dennis/Denise thing on one of their benders. Hilarious, right? Nothing scared him. He was brave... he was angry too. Kind of a dangerous combination."

"Sounds like we had the same brother," Daryl said.

"Hey," Rosita called from the intersection between the railroad and the regular road, urging us to hurry up. Daryl looked down the tracks.

"This way's faster, right?" he said, pointing down it. In a visibly better mood than he had been on the way here, Daryl didn't seem as worried about the railway tracks as he had been before. Lucas and Rosita walked ahead of us. They'd managed to get here just fine. So, maybe it was fine to trust someone else's judgment for a while. Denise fell quiet and walked a little behind us. When I glanced back at her, she seemed to be taking in everything around her, recovering from whatever she'd faced in the Apothecary.

"That was nice," I said quietly to Daryl. "What you said to her back there."

"I like Denise," he shrugged. There was a little pause, "She helped you get better."

I looked at him. His head was lowered, eyes fixed on the tracks slightly ahead of us. I'd never met anyone who cared as much as Daryl. He wasn't always the best at showing it. It often came out as some form of anger: fighting and sniping. But once you'd won his loyalty, nobody in the world had your back like he did. I'd always known how unbelievably lucky I was to know him, but seeing how he'd tried to put Denise at ease after her first major run, I'd never felt luckier. A rush of warm affection, and I took his hand without thinking. He turned his head to look at where our hands joined.

"You okay with this?" I asked quietly, ready to let go.

"Yeah," he relaxed into a smile. "I'm okay with it. Didn't think you'd be, though."

"I'm okay with it," I said. He held on a little tighter. We looked away from each other. The shade from the trees on either side of the tracks didn't come close to covering us. The heat of the sun beat down on us. Cars, abandoned by people trying to avoid the roads, littered the edges of the tracks. There was other shit too, debris dumped by people who were probably long dead. It sounds grim, but it didn't feel that way. Rosita and Lucas were talking up ahead of us, but all I could hear was birdsong in the surrounding forest. It was quiet and warm; with Daryl's hand in mine, I hadn't felt this relaxed in a long time.

"Hey!" Denise called from much further behind than I thought she would. We all stopped and turned to look back at where she stood beside an abandoned car. She pointed to it, "There's a cooler in there. Might be something we can use inside."

"We got what we came for," Rosita said, indicating to the full bag slung over her shoulder.

"Nah," Daryl said. "Ain't worth the trouble, c'mon."

She ignored him and opened the door anyway. The moment she started screaming, we all ran to help her. A Walker sprang from the car, grabbing her with its decaying hands. She was so far away. By the time we reached her, she'd managed to pin it down. She looked up at where we had our guns raised.

"No, don't!" she pleaded as she scrambled to get hold of her machete. She stabbed it through the head. We all relaxed. She stood up on shaky legs, taking several loud and deep breaths. Then she doubled over and threw up. She wiped her mouth with the back of her hands and looked at all of us. "Oh, man. I threw up on my glasses."

"It's only oatmeal," I remind her, as she picked them up and shook off the vomit. "Sure it'll clean up fine."

Legs still shaky, she stumbled back toward the car and pulled out the cooler she'd been talking about. There was a pack of sodas in there. She held them up to show us. "Hot damn!"

"What the hell was that?" Daryl snapped. "You could've died right there, you know that?"

"Yeah, I do," she said nonchalantly.

Her blase attitude rattled Daryl even more. "Are you hearing me?"

"Who gives a shit? You could've died killing those Saviors, hell, she almost did," Denise pointed at me. I wished she wouldn't remind him about that. "But you didn't. You wanna live, you take chances. That's how it works. That's what I did."

"For a couple of damn sodas?" Daryl said.

"Nope. Just this one," she held up a specific can as she walked away from all of us.

Rosita, as enraged by how reckless she'd been as Daryl, followed her. "Are you seriously that stupid?"

"Are you? I mean it. Are you? Do you have any clue what that was to me, what this whole thing is to me? See, I have training in this shit. I'm not making it up as I go along like with the stitches and the surgery and the…" Denise trailed off, self-doubt creeping in. She stopped and looked at Daryl. "I asked you to come with me because you're brave like my brother, and sometimes you actually make me feel safe. Rosita, I wanted you here because you're alone. Probably for the first time in your life. And because you're stronger than you think you are, which gives me hope that maybe I can be, too. And Lucas, you've been an outsider since you got here. Even with the group you arrived in Alexandria with, but you don't deserve to be. And, Naomi, I wish I had your sense of right a wrong, your loyalty. I know you feel like you didn't deserve the last of those meds, but you did. Even if we hadn't found more today, you still would have deserved them."

I opened my mouth to disagree with her, but she wasn't done.

"I could've gone with Tara," she said. "I could've told her I loved her, but I didn't because I was afraid. That's what's stupid. Not coming out here. Not facing my shit. It makes me sick that you guys aren't even trying because you're strong and smart. And you're all really good people, and if you don't wake…"

"Hey!" Lucas sprang forward and shoved Denise back. Denise stumbled on the tracks and fell back. None of us realized could work out what was happening until Lucas crumbled to the ground, too, an arrow stuck through his shoulder. Blood soaked through his shirt.

"Lucas!" I yelled, running to his side, too focussed on the injury to worry about who might have caused it. I looked down at him. He'd gone into shock. "You're okay. You're gonna be okay."

I heard Rosita and Daryl's guns click, and I looked up at where a large group of armed men had emerged from the forest opposite us.

Shit.

I stood beside Lucas's wounded body and raised my own gun.

"You drop 'em now!" someone yelled. We hesitated. And then Eugine was pushed out of the forest too, held at gunpoint. Reluctantly, Daryl and Rosita lowered their weapons. Behind him, now horribly burned on one side of his face, was the guy who'd taken Daryl's bike and crossbow. Something in me snapped.

"You shot my friend, you goddamn asshole," I aimed my gun at him and got ready to shoot. I was too blinded by rage and worry over Lucas to think through the consequences of my actions. I'd let this asshole go once before, but now he'd hurt a friend. He just smirked and looked at Daryl.

"I suggest you keep your bitch on a leash," he said to him. "So, we don't have to put her down."

He raised Daryl's crossbow and pointed it at me. I was so fired up that it would've just come down to which one of us could fire fastest. But Daryl grabbed me by the arm and pulled me to his side.

"Naomi, please," he hissed. There was a desperate, pleading note in his voice that made me stop. Hearing Daryl beg wasn't something I was used to. I dropped my weapons next to his and Rosita's.

"You got something to say to me? You gonna clear the air? Step up on that high horse?" the asshole said to Daryl. He was still holding up the crossbow, taunting him with it. He swung it around to aim at me again, "Still getting the hang of her. Kicks like a bitch, but uh-"

"I should've done it," Daryl said.

"Oh, what's that?" he grinned. "Seriously, I didn't catch what you said."

"I should've killed you," Daryl said, louder this time.

"Yeah, you probably should've," he said. "I get that you'll just have to take my word for this, but… she wasn't even the one I was aiming for, and then I wound up hitting this guy. Doesn't even look like he's dead yet. Like I said, kicks like a bitch."

"Let me help him," Denise said, she'd managed to get to her feet again and raised her arms above her head. "He'll bleed out if I can't get a look at him soon."

"Guess that means you'll wanna speed things up, huh?" the asshole said. "Look, this isn't how we like to start new business arrangements, but, well, you pricks kind of set the tone, didn't you?"

What did that mean? Last time we'd seen this guy, we'd let him live? What the hell had happened to him between then and now?

"What do you want?" I asked.

"I'm sorry, darlin', I don't think I had a chance to catch your name," he said. "Which is a little rude, given how many times you shot at us when we met. I'm D, or Dwight. You can call me either."

It took everything in me not to call him anything worse.

"So?" he prompted. "What's your name?"

"Naomi," I said, eventually. "What do you want?"

"Well, Naomi… it's not what I want. It's what you guys are going to do for me," Dwight said. "You're going to let us into your little complex. And then you're going to let us take whatever and whoever we want. Or we blow Eugene's brains out. And then your friends, and then yours. And then Daryl's. I hope it doesn't come to that, really. Nobody has to die. So what's it gonna be? You tell me."

Not my home.

I felt myself start to shake, and I reached for Daryl's hand, the only thing I thought could steady me in all of this.

"You wanna kill someone, you start with our companion hiding over there behind the oil barrels," Eugene said, staring pointedly at a row of abandoned oil barrels. I stared too. Was he bluffing? Was there someone there? Going out alone didn't seem like something Eugene would have done, so what had happened to whoever he'd left Alexandria with? "He's a first-class a-hole, and he deserves it so much more than the rest of us."

There was a silence where we all looked at the barrels like

"Go check it out," Dwight ordered one of his men. The rest of them watched as the man-made his way toward the barrels, gun raised. Nothing moved behind them, and I began to think that Eugene was bluffing after all. And then I heard Dwight cry out in pain as Eugene bit him in the crotch. Shots rang out from the trees and hit a few of his men. They turned to fire on whoever it was, giving us all enough time to pick up our own weapons again.

I shot at Dwight and the men around him, backing away to take shelter behind a car. In the chaos, they tried to shoot back at us, but with someone firing from the trees, their attention was divided. We kept firing on them.

The noise of our fight drew a group of Walkers from the woods. They attacked us indiscriminately. As they spread out over the tracks, we tried to pick them off from where we'd all taken cover.

I saw Eugene get hit by a flying bullet.

Abraham emerged from the trees to help him.

"Fall back! Fall back!" Dwight yelled to his men, finally able to free himself from Eugene now that he'd been injured. They turned to flee back through the trees they'd ambushed us from. Daryl and I ran out from behind the car we'd been sheltering behind. I headed straight for Lucas. I hadn't seen him move in a while. When I got to him, his eyes were closed, his face was pale.

"Lucas," I called. He didn't stir, but I could feel a pulse. I looked around me for help. Abraham and Rosita were kneeling by Eugene. Denise was only just standing up from the car she had taken cover behind. Daryl had picked up his crossbow and was heading towards the trees to finish off Dwight.

"Daryl! Stop!" I called to him. He looked back at me. "Help me!"

Daryl

Nothing will make you feel worse about being hostile to a guy than when he winds up in a critical condition after taking a bolt for someone. We'd managed to get Eugene and Lucas to Alexandria in the back of the truck. Denise and Naomi sat back there with them, trying to stop them from losing too much blood. Naomi looked so distraught that it was enough to make me regret every bad word I'd ever said to the guy.

Eugene was doing alright. He'd stayed awake the whole time, and now he was recovering, talking to Rosita and Abraham. Lucas hadn't woken up, but Naomi was insistent she could feel a pulse. She was still in Denise's with him. Noah had been called in to help out. He liked to distance himself from Hospital work since his experience at Grady, but this was an emergency. I paced around outside. I'd tried waiting inside, but with the three of them rushing around trying to save him, I'd wound up just getting under everyone's feet. I didn't want to go too far from the room, though. Naomi was too upset, and she might need me. So, I stayed out there for hours. Waiting. Pacing. Hoping.

The door opened, and Naomi emerged from Denise's, her arms covered in blood. She stopped when she saw me, the door swinging shut behind her. I tried to read in her face whether or not he'd made it. For a moment, it looked like she was considering turning back around and heading in again. But then she clenched her jaw, like she does when she's mad, and walked down the stairs to where I was standing. I expected her to stop, but she walked right past me. She looked exhausted. Like she'd lived an extra week in the hours she'd been in there.

"How's he doing?" I asked, running to catch her up. She was walking damn fast.

"Awake," she said but didn't look at me. "Talking."

"That's gotta be a good sign, right?" I said, but there was a tightness in her voice that told me it wasn't necessarily a good thing.

She shrugged, her eyes grew impossibly sad. "Denise did her best, but I don't know if he'll make it."

Her jaw clenched again. For once, it felt like she was the one who was on the verge fighting the first thing that crossed her path. I knew the feeling. I knew what it was like to take every ounce of worry inside you and turn it to anger. I wondered if knowing that would be enough to help me talk her down from it. If anyone was equipped to deal with this, I had to believe it was me. She didn't say another word, just kept walking, glaring at the empty space in front of her. I doubt she even knew where she was walking to.

"Hey," I said gently. "I'm sorry."

"Yeah?" she folded her arms across her chest and threw me a glare that felt like she was accusing me of something. I was immediately uneasy. Maybe I'd been more openly hostile to Lucas than I'd realized, and she was resenting me for it now. I'd wanted to punch him a couple times, but that didn't mean I was happy about him bleeding out.

"Course I am," I said.

"What you sorry for?" she asked, and her voice was so cold that it damn near stopped me in my tracks. "You sorry my friend got shot, or are you sorry you went behind my back and invaded my privacy?"

Oh.

Crap.

"What?" We both knew I knew what she was talking about. I wasn't trying to lie or play dumb to cover it up. I was so shocked she knew that it just slipped out.

"That tape," she spat the word out like it was poison. "I know you watched it."

"Oh. Shit, Naomi…" I wanted her to slow down so we could talk about this properly, but it was like her anger lit a fire under her heels.

"That's why you were so shitty to him today, right?" she said. "You were worried he'd tell me?"

Her eyes pierced me right to my soul. Felt pointless to try and lie about things now.

"Might've been a part of it, yeah," I admitted. "But that doesn't mean I wanted… Any of this to... or… Will you slow down?"

"No," she said. "Back off, quit following me."

"Hey!" I yelled after her. "Talk to me."

"No."

"Naomi!"

She stopped then, rounded on me, eyes blazing with fury. "You wanna talk? Now? Really? Because from the sounds of things you've had a damn week to talk to me about this and you ain't said shit. So, why so chatty now, huh? 'Cause you been caught out?"

She was shaking with anger. I'd only seen her do that once before. And it hadn't ended well for either of this. My chest tightened as I tried to take deep breaths to calm myself. I couldn't let this happen again. Not again. I couldn't take any more time apart from her. Not when things were getting so damn good.

"You were so sick," I tried to explain myself. "I didn't want to…"

"I've been fine for days," she said, making it clear she didn't have time for any of this. "You've had days."

"I know," I said. "I'm sorry."

She waited. Staring at me to see if I'd say anything else. When I didn't, she shook her head like I was the biggest screw up she'd ever laid eyes on.

"I don't wanna talk about this right now, Daryl," she said, running a hand through her hair to push it out of her face. "Go home."

My lungs got tighter. Felt like the world was slipping from under me. "No."

"We can deal with this later," she said. Her voice was flat and emotionless. I could tell she was fighting to keep herself from yelling at me.

"You're mad at me," I said. "I can't walk away from that."

"Damn straight, I'm mad at you," she snapped. "But my friend might be dying back there. I can't have this conversation right now, it's too much."

"Then, when, huh?" I said. I could feel that tight worry dissolving into anger, and I knew I could only keep a reign on it for so long. "Because, yeah, I've had a week to come clean, but you've had months to tell me about it, and you ain't bothered."

I knew instantly it had been the wrong thing to say. I watched her expression change from fighting to keep her cool to unconcealed rage in a second. Worst part is, I kind of didn't care. Part of me was glad. I'd have said anything, done anything to keep her talking to me. Even if she was screaming at me in the middle of the street, at least she wasn't gone.

"It was never any of your fucking business," she said, and there was a tremble in her voice.

"I know," I said.

"I know," she repeated, with venom in her voice. "That all you gotta say to me?"

"I'm sorry."

"Yeah, you've said that, too," she looked away from me. "That it? Can I go now?"

"Please don't," I said. I'd run from one fight before, and I knew how hard it could be to come back. She looked back at me but didn't say anything else. She raised an eyebrow like it was up to me to fill the silence or she was walking. I could feel a lump forming in my throat. I swallowed and tried to talk around it. "I was scared of telling you. I didn't know how to bring it up."

"Why? Because you knew I'd be mad?"

"Yes, and… it was so much worse than I thought," I said. "And it hurt. I've never been so hurt. So angry. Hearing what you went through… I needed time to…"

"What I went through…" she interrupted. "It happened to me, Daryl. Me. Not you."

"I know."

"Do you? Because all that's come out your mouth is how it made you feel," she snapped. Something cold twisted in my gut. I had nothing to say to that. She was right. I was making this about me when it shouldn't have been.

"I'm sorry," I said, but things felt too broken to be fixed by something so simple. "That ain't what I meant."

I wanted to start over. The sharpness of the guilt in my stomach had cut open the vast, dark hole there. Felt like I was falling down into it.

"Why'd you do it?" she asked. I wondered if there was an answer on this Earth I could give that would justify it.

"I knew… something happened to you," I said. "And I know you're still dealing with it. I just… I wanted to help. To be there for you."

"If I wanted your help, I'd have asked for it."

"Bullshit," I said. "You never ask for help, Naomi. Never."

"Oh, and you do?"

"Not always," I admitted. "But I always get it. From you. You've always been there for me. Always have my back. I just wanted to do the same for you. I told you, if something happens to you, I want to know. Even this."

Her eyes flashed then, and she took a step toward me, "That why you said all that bullshit about wanting me to tell you shit? Because you'd already seen the tape? Because you already knew?"

"I've known something was wrong for a long time," I said. "I just didn't know what it was."

"So instead of waiting for me to tell you, you went behind my back to find out?" she said.

"I didn't see another way."

"How about you just butt out?" she said. "Terminus has nothing to do with you."

"Might seem that way to you, but you're… we're..." I stopped. Didn't know what to call her. There wasn't a word for how important she was to me. "I want to be there for you. I meant what I said."

"Bullshit."

"It ain't bullshit," I said. I heard my own voice start to crack with how much we were yelling at each other. "Stop saying that."

"If this was about me, you'd have waited for me to tell you," she said. "But this wasn't about me. This was about you feeling like you're entitled to know shit that I don't want you to."

"But why don't you want me to?"

"Because it's none of your damn business." I knew that wasn't it. Not the full truth, anyway. She was holding back on me like always. The thing about Naomi is, she often holds back on herself. She builds walls around her feelings so high that even she can't see over them. Sometimes it's like the only person more clueless about how she feels than me, is herself.

"Maybe not," I said. "But we… You are my damn business. Whether you like it or not, no matter how you feel about me, I give a shit about what happens to you. I know I went about it all wrong… I know I did, but you gotta believe I didn't want to hurt you."

She was quiet for a moment. "Well, you did."

It cut me deep in my chest. How did I always manage to do this? How did I always manage to wind up hurting the one person I swore not to?

"If you're hurting, I want to fix it," I said. "Someone hurts you. I want to make them pay. I thought you got that?"

"I do," she said reluctantly. "But it's not an excuse for…"

"I know," I said. "But can you honestly say you'd ever have told me? About any of it?"

"It's hard to talk about, Daryl," she said. "I don't much want to think about it, nevermind bring it up with you. Sometimes it's nice to just… be around a friend. Forget for a while."

Friend. I tried not to read too much into it, but it felt like we'd just taken several steps back.

"Okay, I get that," I said. She sniffed.

"And… I know you care. You care more than anyone. But… sometimes that makes it harder to tell you things," she said. "Because I know it'll hurt you too. And I don't want that, not if I can deal with it myself."

"It hurts more that you don't talk to me," I said. "It makes me feel like you don't trust me. That maybe we ain't as close as I think we are."

I saw her soften a little, a tiny amount of regret in her eyes, "We are. There's nobody I trust more than you."

"So, you didn't talk to me about it because you were worried I'd get upset."

It was heartbreakingly absurd to me that through all this, she'd even consider how it would make me feel.

"Yeah. And…" she took a few long, deep breaths. "I didn't want you thinking of me like that."

"What?" I said. Her eyes shone with fresh tears that sprang into her eyes. "You mean... what they did to you? That don't change how I see you, Naomi. I-"

"No," she said. "I didn't want you knowing I was a coward."

My anger died down a little, but I could feel this deep pain in my chest. My heart was breaking for her. "You kidding me? You ain't a coward."

"I am," she said like it was a fact.

"What they did to you, Naomi, that ain't your fault."

"I know," she said, but it didn't sound like she fully believed it. "But I didn't fight them when they got to Terminus. That's on me. I… complied with… so much of what they did. I…"

"This about the kids they killed?" I asked. She said nothing, but the way her bottom lip trembled was enough of an answer. "The one they made you kill?"

"I pulled that trigger," the words ripped right out of her, strong enough to cut me. Thought they'd tear her right in two. I reached out for her, desperate to hold her together. "I killed him."

"You can't blame yourself for that," I said, but I knew she did. I could feel her hurt buried deep within me like we were the same person. "That ain't on you."

"I killed a kid, Daryl," she said. Her voice was heavy with so much hatred, but I knew it was all aimed at herself. "Don't you dare try and make me feel better about that."

She looked away from me, and I saw her lose the battle she was having against the tears in her eyes. I took a step toward her, tried to get her to look at me.

"They threatened you," I said, desperate to make her see sense. I couldn't believe she'd been carrying this shit for so long. "It wasn't a choice."

"There's always a choice."

"And what was yours, huh? They were going to kill him. At least you did it quick and painless," I said. "If you'd refused, they might've done worse to him. To you. You might've died too."

"I wish I had," she said quietly, her voice crushed by the weight of a guilt she didn't need to be carrying. It was so heavy I felt it break me too.

"You don't mean that," I said, more to convince myself than her. She hadn't moved, but I felt in that moment that I'd lost her. "Naomi. No. You don't mean that."

She just shrugged and tried to wipe the tears from her face faster than they were flowing. The silence was worse than any amount of screaming. It almost swallowed her up. And then, a hushed whisper, "It's my fault I lost Mia."

"No," I tried to close the gap between us again, but she backed away and raised an arm to stop me from getting closer.

"I didn't fight," she said bitterly. "I should've fought."

"Naomi, you've been fighting your whole damn life," I said. "I don't believe for a second you made the wrong call."

"Daryl," she sighed. "I've been over it so many times in my head. If we'd fought them when they got to Terminus, she might be with us right now."

"Yeah, she might," I said. "Or you might both be dead at the hands of them assholes."

"You'd have fought," she said. "You always fight."

"Yeah, I do," I said. "And it ain't always worked out that best for me. You've always been better at thinking things through, keeping a level head. Your priority was keeping Mia alive. And you did that. Even if we don't know where she is right now, she's out there somewhere because you kept your cool."

I could see in her eyes that she didn't believe me. Didn't believe it wasn't her fault that Terminus had been taken, maybe even didn't believe Mia was out there anymore. She backed away from me.

"Go home, Daryl," she said, turning to walk towards her house. "Please."

"No," I followed her. "Not until we sort this."

"We ain't gonna sort this right now," she said. "I'm so tired. This day has been… so shitty, I just want to go home."

"Let me-"

"No," she said. "Daryl, please. Go."

It felt like something was ending, just as it had begun.

"I don't want to leave you," I said. "Not like this."

"I just need some space," she said. "Some time."

I couldn't even get her to look back at me. I felt like we'd been making progress and then hit a brick wall so hard that it sent us bouncing right back to square one. Frustration rose up inside me, did what it always did, and pulled something nasty and selfish out of me, "We couldn't even make it a damn day."

My words sat there. Cold enough to freeze the air between us. I wondered if she'd ever move again. Ever speak again. She turned. There was a fresh pain in her eyes.

"That's it?" she said flatly. "One fight, and you're done?"

"You're the one leaving."

"I said I need some space," she said. "That doesn't mean I'm just… done."

"Please, everyone knows that's just a polite way for people to walk away."

"I'm not walking away," she said. "It's been a really long day. Everything that happened back there with Dwight... him threatening to come here, to take it over like what happened a Terminus. And then finding out that you'd..."

She stopped. We both knew what I'd done, I was grateful she didn't bring it up again. She looked back at her house and then at me again.

"I need a day to cool down," she said. "To... process everything that's happened. At the very least I need a couple of hours to get Lucas's blood off me. Can you give me that?"

I looked at where her arms had been covered in her friend's blood for so long that it had started to dry. I took in her pale, tired face. The teartracks from her exhausted, sad eyes.

"A day?" I repeated.

"A day," she said again. "Tomorrow night, we can talk about all of it. I'll tell you everything if that's what you want. Can you give me a day?"

My gut was telling me not to agree to it, but I knew that holding on too hard was another surefire way to break everything between us. This whole thing had started because I'd put my need to know everything about her over her need to tell me things on her own terms.

"I promise I'm not leaving you," she said. "I promise I'll come back and see you tomorrow night."

Just hearing those words calmed my racing heart. I knew she meant it. I couldn't think of a single time that Naomi had ever broken a promise to me.

"Okay," I said.

She closed her eyes, I saw her relax. "Thank you."

She hesitated, teetering on the verge of turning and walking away from me, and something else. Then she took a step toward me, reached up and planted a quick kiss on my cheek. Surprising me so much that by the time I realized it had happened, she was already at her door. It lingered long after she was gone.

I fought the urge to run after her. She'd told me she needed space. I needed to learn to listen to that as much as she needed to learn to open up. I was used to people leaving, and there was a deep fear in me that I'd never see her again. But I wanted this to last. And trust is everything, right? I'd just have to trust that she'd come back to me.

Chapter 30: The Clearing

Naomi

"You wanna talk about it?" Carol asked.

"About what?"

"Whatever it is that's getting you down," she said. I looked at her. Was it that obvious? She gave me a sympathetic smile. "You've been… quieter than usual."

"Sorry," I said. "It's been a long night and... an even longer day before it."

All I'd wanted to do was rest, but when Carol had come to me in the evening and told me that she still wanted to leave Alexandria, I couldn't delay it any longer. She'd looked even more tired and desperate than I felt. She'd asked me for help once already, and waiting for her thoughts of leaving to pass clearly hadn't worked. Anyone could see that Carol was suffering. She'd been quiet and withdrawn, her eyes permanently red-rimmed like she was on the verge of crying. How could I say no to her again?

"Yeah, I heard about Lucas," Carol said. "Do you think he'll be alright?'

"I hope so," I said. Every time I thought about it, I felt sick. "It's hard to know."

"The man who shot him," she said. "It's the same one who took Daryl's bike, right?"

"Yeah," I said. "When Daryl got it back, I just assumed that Dwight was dead and hadn't been accepted back into Negan's group, but… I guess not."

"Do you think they attacked you in retaliation for us killing Negan?" Carol asked.

"Most likely," I said. "I know we got everyone at his base, but that doesn't mean that Negan didn't have more followers who were off-base at the time."

Carol nodded. "I think I heard them radioing to someone while we were… y' know. I guess it could've been Dwight. Or one of the others he was with."

"Probably," I shrugged. "Is the reappearance of Dwight what prompted this? Or did you just feel like a midnight walk through the woods?"

"It had something do to with it, yes," Carol said. "The thought of another fight like the one we just had... so soon. I just…"

"It's okay," I said. I could see her teetering on the edge of self-doubt. "We got this. Give yourself permission to sit this one out. It might not even come to anything."

"You think?"

"They ran off licking their wounds," I said. "There weren't that many of them, we have a whole town, and they've lost their element of surprise. It'll be a few days before they try anything again. If they try anything again, they'll find Alexandria well defended. Rick knows, and he's arming everyone. You ain't gotta worry about us. Focus on you."

"Thank you, Naomi," she said, giving me one of the saddest smiles I'd ever seen. "This has not been an easy decision to make."

"I know," I told her. "Leaving the others must be hard. You've been with some of those guys since the start. They'll miss the crap outta you."

I was thinking primarily of Daryl. But I knew it extended to Rick and the others too. They'd been through a lot together, losing Carol would hit them all. For the first time, I worried that Daryl would be mad at me for helping her do this. But it was too late to worry about that now, the Kingdom was real close.

"I'll miss you all too," Carol said. "But this feels right. It really does."

I believed it. Carol already looked more relaxed than she had when she left. Her shoulders were less tense, her eyes were brighter. She even managed a little smile when she looked at me.

"Just over this next verge," I told her. "Sorry about the walk. We'd have been quicker driving, but I think it's best to stay off the roads. In case Dwight and his band of merry creeps are still lurking somewhere."

"Oh, I don't mind," she said. "It was kind of nice. Quiet."

She was right. It had been kind of nice to walk through the woods so early in the morning. We'd encountered a few Walkers, always more active at night, but it was nothing that the two of us couldn't handle.

The school sprawled out ahead of us in the growing light. Carol and I tucked our weapons away and approached the gates with our hands raised above our heads to show them that we came in peace. It didn't take long before we were surrounded by tired-looking guards who were clearly nearing the end of their shifts. Just like when Daryl and I had been here before, they forced us to our knees, and we calmly handed over our weapons. We had been expecting this.

I asked for Bryce. They looked at me like they didn't trust me, so I asked for him again. Knowing him by name seemed to give them pause for thought. They looked at one another.

"Wait here," one of them told us. Like we had any damn choice in the matter; we'd surrendered everything we had, and were surrounded. Even though I knew everything was going to be okay, it's hard to fight that instinctual fear when someone is pointing a gun at you. I heard footsteps coming back from deeper inside the Kingdom. One of them broke into a run when they got closer.

"Naomi!" Bryce said brightly, coming up behind us. And then to the guards around us, he said, "Let them go. I know her, she's telling the truth."

The Kingdom's soldiers lowered their weapons. Before I'd even finished standing up, Bryce had scooped me up in a massive hug.

"Ooof," I said as he squeezed me just a little too tight. "Good morning."

"I wondered when the hell you'd be back," he said, letting me go. I could tell by the state of his hair that he'd been hauled out of bed for this.

"Sorry," I said. "I would've come sooner, but I got sick."

"Sick?"

"I'm fine now," I brushed it off.

His gaze flickered over to Carol and then back to me, "And you've brought…?"

"This is Carol," I told him. "We… uh… came to ask a favor."

"What kind of favor?" he asked.

"An audience with the King," I said, loud enough that the rest of the guards would hear and know I was familiar with the way things were run here in case any of them still had any doubts about us. "We'd like to secure a place in the Kingdom."

"For both of you?" Bryce asked, with so much hope in his eyes that it made me feel a little guilty.

"Eh, no," I said. "Just Carol. For now."

I saw that hope die in his eyes a little, but his smile stayed fixed in place. He nodded and turned his attention to Carol again, "Alright. Come with me."

He took us into the Kingdom a different way from when Daryl and I had been frogmarched through to meet the King the first time. We were allowed to come through the main gates and, although we walked with Bryce and a few other guards, it felt less like an armed escort. I watched Carol take it all in. The buildings that had once been a school now turned into homes. The vegetable plots that some people were already out tending to. Two kids ran from one building to another.

We entered the theatre through the front too. No dodgy back doors for us this time. The stage sprawled out in front of us, and we walked down the center aisle like we were about to go in and see a real play. Shiva was sleeping in her cage, which didn't help anything feel more real.

"Is… is that a tiger?" Carol asked, scrutinizing the big cat on stage.

"Yeah," I said, wondering how warning her that the King had a tiger could have slipped my mind. "Her name's Shiva, she seems pretty cool."

"Sure," Carol said, trying to take all of this in her stride, but I could see a little glimmer of concern in her eyes about what kind of place I'd brought her to. I wasn't sure that actually meeting the King would do anything to ease those concerns. He was... eccentric, to say the least. It didn't take long for him to enter. I wasn't sure he'd remember me, but his face broke into a smile when he saw me.

"Ah," he said. His booming voice echoed around the empty theatre. "Lady Naomi, you have returned."

"Well, shit, Lady is a bit much," I blurted out, feeling myself squirm at being addressed so formally. "Just Naomi is fine, Your Majesty."

The King was amused by my discomfort. I caught Carol's eye, and she gave me a look that said, plain as day, 'Where the hell have you brought me?' If this didn't work, and Carol didn't want to stay here, maybe the bizarro nature of the Kingdom would help her rethink how bad it would be to come back to Alexandria. If tigers and Kings weren't her thing, maybe home would look a little better.

"Just Naomi," the King repeated. "Who is this fair maiden you have brought with you today?"

"This is Carol, Your Majesty," I said, glancing at her to make sure it was alright that I was speaking for her.

"It pleases me to meet you, Carol," he said to her. "I am King Ezekiel. Welcome to the Kingdom."

Carol said nothing. From her cage, and at the sound of her master's voice, Shive sat up and gave an almighty yawn. The silence carried on.

"You have been addressed by the King, yet you remain silent," the King said. "Do I detect skepticism? Perhaps you think me mad. Tell me… what do you think of the Kingdom, Carol? What do you think of the King?"

I waited nervously for her answer. Her eyes were wide and bright.

"I… think you're amazing," she said. "It's amazing.."

Bryce tugged on my elbow, bent his head close to mine and said, "Come on, let's leave them to it."

He took me by the arm and led me away from the stage. I was nervous about leaving Carol here. Worried that she might decide not to stay after all if I wasn't there to have this conversation with her. How could I ever go back to Alexandria and face Daryl and Rick and the others if I failed to convince Carol to stay someplace safe? As we exited the theater, I turned to Bryce.

"Will you keep an eye on her for me?" I asked. "Carol. If she decides to stay, will you look out for her?"

"Of course," Bryce said. Always dependable. Always had room to look after someone else. "I'll make sure she settles in."

"Thank you."

"Do you want the grand tour?"

"Sure," I said.

He took me away from the theater and to where former classrooms had been turned into living quarters. He showed me the boiler room that still provided some places with hot water and the wells where they collected freshwater. We stopped by where some of the playing fields had been turned into farmland. I saw their pigs and held back questions about how the hell Shiva hadn't eaten all of their livestock by now. In a fruit garden, he picked a peach and handed it to me, taking one for himself.

"You happy here?" I asked him, taking a bite. He thought about it for a moment.

"I'm as happy as anyone can be now that the world's ended," he said. "The Kingdom is safe. There are kids here that can grow up sheltered from the worst of it."

"Good," I said. We'd come to a stop by another open, green space. Unlike everywhere else we'd gone, it wasn't immediately apparent what this one was for. "What's growing in this one?"

There was a wry smile on his face like the whole tour had been leading up to this on purpose. Bryce said, "Ezekiel has reserved this one for recreation and study."

"Study?"

"Yup," he said. "The King is big on education here. I teach Literature when I'm not on guard duty."

"You do?" I said. "To who? The kids?"

"Whoever wants to learn," Bryce shrugged. "Plenty of adults looking to keep themselves occupied. And… we could always do with more teachers."

It took me a second to get what he was saying and why he was looking so expectant. "Me?"

"Why not? You'd fit right in. You should stay," he said. I hesitated, not sure how to let him down again. The first time had been easier. "Stay with Carol. At least for a little while."

"No, Bryce, I can't."

"Come on," he said. "You'd like it here."

"I don't doubt that," I said. "But, I can't."

"Sure you can," he said. "Surely, your mystery community won't mind you staying away for a few days? One day?... A night?"

He knew I was holding back on him. He narrowed his eyes. I sighed, "I promised Daryl I'd be back by the evening."

"Ah," I saw the disapproval seeping into Bryce's eyes as the puzzle pieces fell into place. "Daryl."

I felt that little defensive streak in me flare up like it did every time Daryl came up in conversation with Bryce.

"I know what you think about him," I said. "But he's a really good guy."

"I'll have to take your word for that," Bryce said. I wished more than anything that Daryl had had a chance to make a better impression on him. But the first time Bryce had met him, he'd left behind a trashed my dorm room and a cut on my hand, the second time he'd been a jealous grump and made us leave early. "It's nice that you've found an old friend in all this, but - speaking as your friend - I'm just glad it's nothing more than that."

Oh, God.

"Actually…" I knew he could read into my face exactly what I was about to say. I felt like I was in a confessional. "I guess I have… news."

"Oh," he wasn't even trying to hide his disapproval. "Naomi, no."

"It's good news," I said. "It's… new news, but I'm happy about it."

"You are?"

"Yeah," I said, and then I borrowed a phrase from Daryl. "Crazy happy."

Bryce looked at me like I'd just told him something completely impossible. He scrutinized my face with more attention to detail than I'd ever seen him study anything else. I didn't know if he was looking for the truth or a lie. Or both. Eventually, he took a deep breath. "You really mean that, don't you?"

"Yeah," I said. It was the most embarrassingly easy answer in the world.

"I don't think I've seen you look like that when talking about someone since..." his brow furrowed as he tried to think back "… well, ever."

He didn't look super happy about it. I tried to put his mind at ease, "Bryce, you gotta trust my judgment on this, man."

He nodded reluctantly. "You understand why it makes me nervous, right?"

I did. If Bryce had introduced me to someone who'd thrown a bottle at him and spent the rest of the time being standoffish and rude, I probably wouldn't have been thrilled about them getting together either.

"Yes," I said. "From what you've seen of him, yeah. I get it. But you have him so wrong."

It was frustrating, just how wrong he'd got him.

"Really? Because it sounds like he's forbidding you from staying out and seeing other friends, and that's a huge red fla-"

"No, that ain't it," I said, cutting him off before he started accusing Daryl of being something he wasn't. "We got into this… dumb fight yesterday, and I didn't want to deal with it, so I asked for a day to cool off. And then Carol came to me and told me she wanted to leave, so I agreed to bring her here. But I can't stay."

"He can't wait another day?" Bryce asked skeptically.

"No," I said. "I made a promise."

I knew that wouldn't seem like such a big deal to Bryce, but he didn't know just how many people had let Daryl down. His Momma dying when he was little, his Dad swinging from passively neglectful to actively abusive and his brother bouncing from their home to jail to disappearing off on some shady shit for weeks. Daryl could be an angry and volatile kid, easy for people to write off as "troubled" and turn their backs on. He trusted almost nobody. I knew he was getting better at trusting people, but he'd lost a lot of them too. These days, you could lose someone to a stray bullet or an unseen Walker in the blink of an eye. Now, Carol had left and, although I hoped it would be temporary, I knew he'd take it badly. There was no way in hell I wouldn't come back to him. I'd made him a promise, and I would not be the last in a long line to break that kind of trust.

"What did you fight about?" Bryce asked. His face had this stony determination about it, looking at me like he'd keep me in the Kingdom permanently if my story wasn't good enough.

"It's dumb," I said. The more time passed, the less mad I was. "When I got to Alexandria -"

"Alexandria?"

"My community."

"Oh, it has a name?"

"Yeah, and it's less vague than the Kingdom."

"Touche. Carry on."

I told him about Deanna and the interviews she taped with everyone who came to Alexandria. I told him about Daryl watching mine behind my back, the way I'd blown up at him about it, and all of his complaints about how closed off I could be.

"Well," Bryce said when I was done. "I can see how that was a total invasion of your privacy."

"Yeah, I know," I said, hoping I'd told the story well enough to portray Daryl's side of things fairly. I didn't want to just give Bryce another reason to dislike him.

"But," he continued. "Trying to get anything out of you is like trying getting blood from a stone. So I can see what drove him to it. Easier to get a confession out of a -"

"Hey," I cut across him. "I'm not that bad, am I?"

"Oh, you're a living nightmare," he said with a stinging amount of conviction. "The only times I can ever remember you asking me for anything is when you needed someone to look after Mia. But when it comes to yourself… feels like you'd rather drown than ask someone to throw you a liferaft."

"Jeeze, don't hold back," I said. "I think I liked it better when you disapproved."

"I'm not saying I approve," Bryce said, sternly. "But he is not wrong about this."

I let that sink in. I'd known Daryl hadn't been all wrong, but hearing it from a second source made it even worse. Truth was, deep down, I wasn't that mad anymore. Sure, at first, it had felt like a total violation of trust. There had been this all-consuming shame that he knew all the worst things about me now. But the worst part of all of it was that he'd had to hear it from a dumb tape and not from me.

A commotion at the gate distracted both of us. I saw a familiar face trying to make a peaceful negotiation.

"Were you followed?" Bryce asked.

"No," I said, starting a quick walk over there. "He's one of ours, though."

"Lower your weapons!" Bryce called over to the guards by the gate. They looked at the pair of us.

"I know him," I told them, and then I looked past them. "Morgan! Is everything okay? Why are you here?"

"Carol," Morgan said. "She's with you?"

"Yes," I said, wondering why there was a slight panic in his eyes. "She's talking to the King. Didn't Tobin get her letter?"

"He did," Morgan said. "But she didn't say where she was going. Aaron had to give me one of your maps to get here. There was a little panic around Alexandria about you two."

"She's safe," I assured him. "Why did people worry? Didn't her letter say-"

"Aaron noticed you were gone before Tobin found Carol's note," Morgan said. My heart sank.

"Shit," I said.

"We thought you'd gone to find Dwight," Morgan said.

"Dwight?" I repeated. "Why the hell would I try and find that asshole?"

"Lucas…" he started and clearly didn't know how to finish. My heart leaped into my mouth. "He's not in good shape. There was some concern you might have gone after Dwight... as some kind of revenge."

Did that mean Lucas was dead? Or had he just gotten even sicker? I couldn't bring myself to ask, I didn't know how I'd find the energy for the journey home if the news was too bad.

"Now," Morgan continued, "Once we found Carol's letter, we figured you might have come here, but by that point…"

"Daryl had found out," I filled in the blanks for myself. "He's gone to find Dwight, hasn't he?"

"Yeah," Morgan nodded.

"Oh, God," I said. "Oh, God. I need to go."

I grabbed up my things and looked at Morgan. "Carol's staying here for now. Will you tell her I had to go and sort this out, but I'll be back soon?"

Morgan nodded.

"You'll be back soon…" Bryce said skeptically. "For real this time?"

"For real this time," I said, giving him a curt smile and the fastest hug I've ever given anyone. I took off out of the gates before either of them could say another word. I worried I was already out of time. Daryl was a much better tracker than I was, and Dwight had run from that railroad. If I didn't get to Daryl before he got back to the tracks, there was a good chance that he'd wind up finding Dwight. And he'd be outnumbered.

I had to stop myself from breaking into a run, knowing that if I used up all of my energy now, I'd be no use by the time I got there. I walked close to the roads, choosing to take the most direct route possible rather than wasting any more time being too cautious. Heading in the general direction of the railway tracks, I listened hard for the sound of Daryl's bike.

The roads were silent for hours. The forest was much the same.

Until it wasn't.

One sound broke the hours of tense silence I'd been walking in. A whistle. Loud and piercing. Distant, but not distant enough. I stopped. Listened for any kind of response. I played it over in my head, tried to pinpoint where it had come from, but the forest distorted it. The echo softened by the canopy of leaves above my head and disguised as it bounced from one tree to tree. The silence was crushing. Every creak of a branch in the breeze felt like a person drawing nearer. I felt isolated. But not alone out here.

"Daryl?" I called when I couldn't take the silence anymore. I knew it wasn't him. I knew it. I just wanted so badly to see him and feel safe that I couldn't stop myself from calling for him.

It was silent for so long that I started to believe I might have imagined it. I forced myself to pick up the pace. And then I hit a roadblock. A real one. Deliberate. No mistaking it. This wasn't a tree that had fallen over in some freak accident. Someone had built it here. I stopped.

Another whistle, in the same cadence as the first but from a different part of the forest.

Closer.

Behind me?

Shit.

 

Daryl

Almost everyone gets the same look on their face when they're about to tell me something they know I'm not going to like hearing. Aaron is no different. I looked up from my bike. Knew at once that this was going to be bad, so I put my tools down. He cleared his throat, "Uh, hey, man. Have you seen Naomi?"

I was surprised it was me he was asking. Thought maybe that meant he couldn't know about our fight, which was crazy because we'd been yelling at each other right outside his damn house. I thought the whole goddamn town would know by now. But either he hadn't heard, or Naomi hadn't told him. Because she never fucking told anyone anything. I shrugged like it was nothing and said, "Nah, sure she's around somewhere, though."

"Uh, sure," he said. That I-don't-want-to-tell-Daryl-something look on his face just intensified.

"What is it, man?" I asked. I was already in too crappy a mood to deal with him dancing around whatever this was. "Just spit it out."

"We think she left."

"What do you mean she left?"

"Denise stopped by earlier. I mean a lot earlier. Sun wasn't even up. Lucas had taken a turn for the worse and… she thought Naomi should know," Aaron said. "But when we checked her room, Naomi was gone."

I could tell he was trying to say it in a way that wouldn't make me freak out, but there is nobody on Earth who could say the words 'Naomi was gone' in a way that would make me calm. I'd already climbed on my bike. Without thinking, my feet had already started to move, the instinct to protect her overwrote any kind of thought. I knew she'd asked for space, I knew she'd asked me to leave her alone for a while, but I couldn't stop myself. This was too much space. This was too reckless a move for me not to have her back.

"I'll get her," I said to Aaron, but I was reassuring myself more than him. "I know where she's gone, I'll get her."

Before he could say anything else, I started my bike and tore through Alexandria to the gates. Rosita was standing by them. Abraham was standing up at the lookout point. Glenn, Maggie, and Michonne stood around a box of all of our weapons, getting ready to hand them out to everyone in Alexandria in case Dwight and his group of bastards came here.

"Where are you going?" Rosita asked. I didn't wait for her to open the gates, I stopped my bike, and leaped off to do it myself. No time to hang around and explain. Every second counted now.

"Out," I said, the gates had slid as open as I needed them to be.

"No shit," Abraham yelled down at me as I started my bike again. "You got specifics?"

I left them all in the dust. Didn't stop to close the gates behind me, I knew Rosita would get it.

Racing toward where I hoped she'd be was the only thing that slowed my heart to a normal pace. Shitty things only feel less shitty when you're doing something to fix it. Something that makes you feel like you have a bit of control over any of it. Maybe I should've stopped to get more information from Aaron. Like did she take a car or was she on foot? I guess if they hadn't worked out that she was gone, there must have been no cars missing. I had to believe that Aaron was smart enough to have checked whether or not she'd been by Olivia's. And every second spent asking dumb questions was one more second she was on her own out there.

Please be on foot. You'll be so much easier to catch on foot.

The road ahead of me was all clear. I got up to the place where the fallen tree lay across the road. I turned down the railroad tracks, rode as far as I dared before I worried about Dwight hearing the bike coming. Then I pulled up by the side of the road and did my best to hide it in some bushes. I walked the rest of the way.

I could picture her there, on the railroad tracks, right in the spot where Lucas had been shot so vividly that it shocked me when I saw she wasn't there. It hurt to see them empty like that. Just Lucas's blood staining the ground.

I should've killed him. I should've killed him out there in the burnt forest.

If I'd been smart, if I'd just done the right thing then, none of this would've happened. Lucas wouldn't have been shot. Naomi wouldn't have run off after Dwight to avenge him. It seemed so reckless of her. The kind of shit I would do. But she hadn't been in a great place the last time I saw her. She'd been so tired. So wounded by what I'd done. So broken up over Lucas. And Dwight had talked like he'd known Alexandria. Like he'd been near it. I'd seen the way she'd trembled when he threatened her home, I knew what kind of shit that would bring back for her. So, I got it. Why she'd cracked like this. Why she'd gone running after someone who'd hurt a friend and threatened everything else. Part of me even kind of supported it. I just wished I'd been less of a jackass, so she might've asked me to do this with her. Me and her, taking on the world, really felt like something we could do. But only together.

I started walking in the direction I'd last seen him go in, running off through the trees like a goddamn coward: him and his asshole friends.

They couldn't have gotten too far. Some of them had been injured. I knew they had because I shot them my damn self. Their hurried footprints were still in the mud. I'd be able to get a good amount of tracking done before I reached the point that they'd have gotten their shit together enough to even attempt covering their tracks. If they had knocked down that tree as a trap and had kept watch on us, they had to have some kinda camp nearby. I was so caught up in looking for signs of Dwight that I didn't even think to look for signs of Naomi. I just scoured every last patch of earth for any hint of that asshole.

And then I wasn't alone out here no more.

I could hear them. Moving through threes behind me. Assholes. I doubled back a little, turned, so I was hidden by a nearby tree and then fired my crossbow at them. The bolt stuck in a tree right by Rosita's head. I stepped out, so she knew who to direct her glare at.

"Watch the hell out, asshole," she snapped, pulling the bolt from the tree.

"Yeah, I did," I said. You'd be dead if I didn't. Michonne and Glenn were coming up behind her. Glenn looked worried, and Michonne had this firm determination about her like she wasn't about to take any shit. Sadly for her, neither was I. I looked at them all, "You shouldn't have come."

"You shouldn't have left," Michonne said. Behind her, Glenn stared at me with this pleading look not to lose my temper. Too damn late. I was already riled up that they were trying to slow me down like this. I didn't have the time to waste arguing with them, and they were out here making noise that might draw Dwight's attention from wherever he was holed up. Might make me lose my edge if I was close to finding him.

"When I split off from Shasha and Abraham, he was out there in the woods in that burned-out forest with them girls," I told them. "Put a gun to my head, tied me up. I even tried to help him."

"So, you think it's your fault?" Glenn said.

"Yeah, I know it is," I turned away from them all. If they were too nice to see it that way, it wasn't on me to explain it to them. "I'm gonna do what I should've done before."

I heard Glenn's footsteps run through the dirt to overtake me. His worried, anxious face darted in front of mine and stopped me in my tracks.

"Daryl… We need to get back there and figure this out from home. Our home. We need you, and everyone back there needs us right now. It's… it's gonna go wrong out here."

It going wrong out here was exactly what I was afraid of. Just not for me.

She might need me out here.

"We'll square it," Michonne said, with the kind of seriousness I could buy into. "I will. I promise you. But bringing the fight to them, on your own, it's not an option. Just come back."

"I can't," I said. "Naomi left."

Michonne nodded like she was finally starting to understand. "You think she's here? Trying to square things with Dwight?"

"If she knew how bad Lucas was," I said. "It's exactly what she would've done."

"You got any proof of that?" Glenn asked. "Because I'd have thought if she knew how bad Lucas was, she'd be there visiting him."

"Huh?" I said. "That so?"

But the moment he said it, I started to doubt myself. But what was the alternative? That she'd up and left Alexandria for some other reason? Where? Why? For how long?

Because of our fight?

"Yeah," Glenn said. "She might've gone off somewhere else. You don't know she's out here, man. It's not worth the risk."

He'd almost had me, but it was the wrong thing to say. There was no risk in the world I wouldn't take for her. "Yeah, to you, maybe."

I turned away from him, but then Glenn said, "Daryl…" like he was going to keep going, and I rounded on him.

"Man, I can't! That's my girl out there! You think I'd be out here tryna stop you if it was Maggie you was running after? Huh?" I said, staring him down. He said nothing, knew there was nothing he could say that wouldn't make him a hypocrite or a liar. "Yeah, I didn't think so."

I turned away from them all, kept walking through the woods. He did not try to call after me again. There were a few minutes where I didn't hear anything. And then more footsteps, but just one set this time. I looked around a saw Rosita was following me.

"What you doing?" I asked her. I couldn't see Glenn or Michonne, wondered if she was the only one left trying to talk me out of it or if something I said had got through to her.

"Don't sit right with me either," Rosita said. "The way they ambushed us like that. The way they were holding Eugene captive. Threats they made… Lucas didn't deserve to get shot like that either. You want to make those guys pay, I'm in."

"Alright," I shrugged. It never hurt to have someone watching your back. "Just keep quiet, and don't slow me down."

She didn't say anything, She just kinda glared at me like she might already regret her choice. I ignored it, turned my attention back to the ground. Forced myself to slow down, take in everything. Panicked footprints still heading in different directions, trampling shit left right and center. After a while, it was like they doubled back on themselves. I followed them, saw the burnt-out remains of an old campfire. Holes in the ground like something had been pitched there. They'd moved off.

But not far.

Walking a little further through the trees, we would up snaking back toward the railway tracks. And then I could smell smoke. Not like a forest fire, more deliberate and contained. A bonfire. There was an active camp nearby.

"Hey," I hissed, tapping Rosita on the arm. I pointed at faint smoke through the trees. She nodded to let me know that she'd seen it. We moved downwind so that the smoke would be carried towards us and hide us a little. I could hear voices. Relaxed chatter. And then my heart dropped. Glenn and Michonne were tied up to a nearby tree. I looked at Rosita, she'd seen them too.

No Naomi.

Maybe Glenn had been right after all. Maybe she was someplace else. Maybe thinking Naomi had come after Dwight had just given me an excuse to do what I'd always wanted to and go after him myself. So, where the hell had she gone? Would she ever come back? She'd made a promise.

I made eye contact with Glenn, raised a finger to my lips. Beside him, I saw Michonne notice us too. He struggled to sit up a little straighter. Both of their eyes widened. Glenn tried to yell over to us. What the hell had he not understood about me trying to keep him quiet? I raised my finger again. But he just tried to yell out some more. The guys close to him had to have heard it.

And then I heard the unmistakable click of safeties being switched off behind us. I glanced at Rosita, saw she was already lowering her gun.

"Hi, Daryl," Dwight's voice behind me. Glenn had slumped back again. He'd been trying to warn us.

I started to lower my crossbow, didn't hear his gun go off. I just felt it. Close range. Right into my arm and then there was nothing but darkness. I didn't even feel myself hit the floor.

When I came round, burning pain was the first thing I was aware of. Right across my arm. So hot, I could feel it making me sweat. And then light in the dark. It came through the cracks and bullet holes in the door in front of me. Then I heard my friends; Glenn and Michonne and Rosita. Ragged, scared breaths as we sat together in the back of an uncomfortable van. I tried to sit up and look for a way out of this, but when I moved, my bullet wound's burning pain got sharper. I groaned.

"Hey, Daryl," Glenn whispered. "You awake?"

"Yeah," I whispered back. "You know where we are?"

"We've been stopped for a while," Michonne said. "No idea where they've brought us."

Please, not Alexandria. Please, not Alexandria.

It was my fault that these three were here. If they hadn't come chasing after me, they wouldn't be in the back of this van. On the other side of the door, I could hear muffled voices but not the words they were saying. It sounded like there were more men now, but maybe they were just close. Or maybe I'd miscounted how many were with Dwight.

Dwight opened the door, and I squinted out. We weren't in Alexandria. We were somewhere else in the forest. A big clearing full of people and cars. It was pitch-black, but they had turned every headlight on, so the place was flooded with too much light.

"C'mon. Chop chop," Dwight reached in for me first. "You got people to meet."

I stumbled out, scanning the shadows for any kind of escape route.

Then I saw Rick. Kneeling on the ground, looking up at us as we piled out of the back of the van one after the other. Next to him, Maggie was shaking. Sweaty and pale. I wondered if they'd shot her too by I couldn't see any blood. She leaned against Abraham, who seemed to be the only thing keeping her upright. Sasha knelt on Rick's other side. Next to her, I saw Aaron looking at me with nothing but fear. And then Carl, trying to be brave in his Daddy's old cop hat. Eugene looked like he'd taken a beating, which was saying something because he'd taken a bullet the day before. No Carol. That was a small relief.

My family. Kneeling in the dark with nothing but each other. And I couldn't do shit.

What the hell happened?

Did those bastards manage to get to Alexandria after all?

But it was more than just Dwight. Much more. We were hugely outnumbered, and we'd underestimated just how many sorry pricks Dwight knew. He didn't even seem to be the one in charge here. There was this other guy, balding on top with this dumbass mustache. Looked at all of us like he'd conquered something when the truth was one of his bitches had shot me in the arm before I could even turn around. In a fair fight, I was sure I could beat his ass. I struggled against the guy holding me. If I could just get one of them. End one of them...

"On your knees!" Dwight said, and shoved me down. My arm ached, my knees hit the dirt. Rosita, Glenn, and Michonne followed. There was so much fear in that clearing I could almost taste it.

My whole family was out here. Lined up like we were waiting for some kind of firing squad. Facing this big-ass trailer. Or, it was almost my whole family.

At least Naomi wasn't in Alexandria. At least she's safe.

It was the only comfort I had. Even if they did plan to shoot us all in the head, at least I had that. At least she'd live on.

"Alright, we got a full boat," one of them said, coming to stand between us and the trailer.

"Not quite," Dwight said. "We got room for one more."

No.

Felt my stomach drop to my feet. If I hadn't already been sweating from the pain, I'd have broken out into another sweat. Dwight fixed me with this horrible smile that twisted up the burnt side of his face. Cold eyes. Like he was already enjoying this. He motioned to someone on the other side of the trailer. I heard the struggle of feet scuffing along on dirt.

No.

Two guys pulled her into the clearing, and I couldn't hear anything except my own heart beating in my ears.

No, no, no, no.

Naomi's eyes widened as she took us all in, scanning every face in front of her. Searching desperately until her eyes met mine. She saw the state of me. I must've looked like shit, all pale and sweaty and bleeding. It was only then that the fear in her eyes turned to terror, and I saw her fists clench like she was going to fight to get to me. Her mouth opened like she wanted to say something to me. I shook my head at her, didn't want her giving these assholes any reason to hurt her. Dwight swiftly forced her to her knees at the end of the line next to Glenn.

I wanted her beside me. Close enough to protect. Close enough to fight for. Fight with. Me and her, taking on the world, had just got a whole lot more real. These sorry pricks had no idea the hell I'd reign down on them if they hurt any of us.

Chapter 31: Negan

Naomi

Fear is loud in a quiet place. I'd felt okay until I'd been faced with everyone else. Even when I'd been surrounded by strangers, stripped of my weapons, and forced to move, I'd felt fine. Alone. But fine. Being alone and in danger is better than having people you care about in danger with you. Before they'd dragged me in here, I'd sat bound and alone in the back of a van and listened to them talk around me. I'd been driven from one place to another, tried to work out where I might be from the sounds around us. Now, I knelt down with them, facing a parked and dormant RV, and all I could hear was the ragged breathing of twelve frightened people. Twelve hearts beating the same terrified rhythm.

Beside me, Glenn stared desperately at an increasingly weakening Maggie. She was pale and sick and shaking. I worried for her and for the baby. Was she miscarrying? Had it been brought on by the stress of what was happening to us now? I stopped being scared, and I started getting angry. Who the hell did they think they were, putting her through something like this?

Across from me, I could see Carl, and I wanted to scream at these bastards to let him go, even if they killed the rest of us. He was a strong kid. But he was still just a kid. Whatever they were about to put us through, there was no need for him to witness it.

And then there was Daryl.

Every time I caught a glimpse of him, my stomach turned over. He'd been shot. Fresh blood on his arm. His uneven breathing as he tried to deal with the pain. I saw him shake every time he tried to move. It was hard to get a good look at him from where I was, but his injury had been obvious from the moment I'd laid eyes on him. The urge to run over there, to fix him up, had been so strong. I think he'd know it too, that little shake of his head. Like he was trying to tell me he was okay, that it wasn't as bad as it looked. But I knew he just wanted to stop me from trying anything that would get me higher up the radar of these assholes. He knew I'd let them shoot me as long as I got to fix him up first.

With Glenn and Rosita between us, all I could do was pray this would be over fast. That I'd be able to get him home soon.

"Alright," the man who'd captured me stepped forward. While he'd had me tied up, I'd done my best to listen in and get an idea of what they were planning. I hadn't been able to learn much, other than his men had called him Simon and, although he'd seemed in charge of them, he was working for someone else. I'd guessed it might be Dwight, but Dwight was here too now and had less authority than this guy. Simon knocked on the RV and said, "Let's meet the man."

Here goes nothing.

After hours of sitting around waiting for them to do whatever they planned to do to me, everything felt like it was moving way too fast. Simon stepped back, and the door swung open.

I heard his boots hit the top step, loud in the tense silence around us. They were sturdy and leather, beaten and worn in. He was taller than I was expecting, broad shoulders clad in a black leather jacket with a silver zipper and belt.

Classic asshole getup.

Jet black hair and eyes so dark that at this time of night, they appeared almost black. I'd never seen eyes so cold. There was a baseball bat in one of his hands, leaning casually over one shoulder. The top of it was wrapped in barbed wire. There was a moment when he didn't say anything. He just stared around at us all with this huge smile that felt sickeningly out of place against his cold eyes.

"Pissing our pants yet?" he asked. "Boy, do I have a feeling we're getting close. Yep. It's gonna be pee-pee pants city here real soon. Which one of you pricks is the leader?"

None of us said anything. I kept my eyes on him, didn't want to look at Rick, or do anything that would give him away as the leader of this group. If this guy was going to kill us, it was impossible to know if he'd start with our leader or just make him watch.

Simon pointed to Rick, "He's the guy."

The man with the bat strode forward, eyes fixed on Rick. Rick looked back at him, but he was still in full-blown panic mode. That calm, collected Rick that we had all gotten used to seeing in a crisis wasn't here yet. Couldn't blame him, either. None of us were prepared for this shit.

"Hi. You're Rick, right? I'm Negan."

Negan?

There was a collective intake of breath in the clearing as we all shared the same thought. We killed Negan.

But here he was. Alive and well. Taller and far more self-satisfied than the guy we'd killed at that base had been.

"I do not appreciate you killing my men," he said, clearly able to guess the reason for our shock. "Also, when I sent my people to kill your people for killing my people, you killed more of my people. Not cool. You have no idea how not cool that shit is. But I think you're gonna be up to speed shortly. Yeah. You are so gonna regret crossing me in a few minutes."

Shit.

So, this was revenge? We'd killed so many of his people if he was an eye-for-an-eye kind of guy we were fucked. He'd have to kill each of us twice to get the numbers close to even.

Negan paced in front of us and came to a stop in front of Rick again.

"You see, Rick, no matter what, you don't mess with the new world order. And the new world order is this, and it's really very simple, so, even if you're stupid, which you very may well be, you can understand it. Here goes. Pay attention," Negan pointed the barbed wire clad end of his baseball bat right at Rick's nose. I saw Michonne kneel up a little straighter, looked like she was ready to strike out if Negan got too close to Rick. "Give me your shit… or I will kill you. Today was career day. We invested a lot so you would know who I am and what I can do. You work for me now. That's your job. Now, I know that is a mighty big, nasty pill to swallow, but swallow it you most certainly will."

Rick still hadn't said anything. Through the dread that was filling up his eyes, I could see the fighter in Rick trying to pull through. Trying to find a way to get us all out of here safe and well. But we were trapped and unarmed, there was no changing that. Being out in the open made safety seemed tantalizingly close. I could smell it through the gaps in the trees. But their car lights flooded every inch of this place. There was no sneaking out without being seen. Negan's men formed a wall behind us, armed to the teeth. There was no way of outside help getting in. And besides, who could we rely on? Everyone I would have depended on was already here. Except for Carol, but she was tucked away someplace safe with no idea what was happening. No idea that we needed her.

"You ruled the roost," Negan said. "You built something. You thought you were safe. I get it. But the word is out. You are not safe. Not even close. In fact, you are pegged, more pegged if you don't do what I want. And what I want is half your shit. And if that's too much, you can make, find, or steal more, and it'll even out sooner or later. This is your way of life now. The more you fight back, the harder it will be. So, if someone knocks on your door… you let us in. We own that door. You try and stop us, and we will knock it down. You understand?"

I felt sick. The takeover at Terminus had been quiet, underhand, and in the dead of night. This one was different. Bolder. But the result was the same. My world was no longer safe. The people I loved were no longer safe. I would not make the same mistakes I'd made when I'd lost Mia.

"What, no answer?" Negan asked Rick. "You don't really think that you were gonna get through this without being punished, did you? I don't want to kill you people. I want you to work for me. You can't do that if you're dead now, can you? I'm not growing a garden. But you killed my people, a whole damn lot of them. More than I'm comfortable with. And for that, you're gonna pay. So, now… I'm gonna beat the holy hell outta one of you."

No.

There had to be a way around this. A way to negotiate with him. I would fight tooth and nail before I let someone I loved be taken from me again. Negan held his bat out so that we could all get a good look.

"This -This is Lucille," he said. The barbed wire glinted in the light from the cars as I wondered what kind of psycho you had to be to give your weapon and damn nickname. "And she is awesome. All this, all this is just so we can pick out which one of you gets the honor."

He walked up and down the line of us, slowly taking us all in like a predator weighing up his next meal.

"Huh," he looked down at Abraham, who sat up a little straighter. Like he was challenging him to do it there and then. Negan took in Abraham's bushy goatee, touched his own beard, "Urgh, I gotta shave this shit."

He walked further down the line, stopped at Carl. We all got a damn sight more tense. We knew they'd killed a kid at Hilltop. Would he really do the same now? My heart started beating so hard I thought it might break through my ribcage.

"Shit, kid, lighten up," he said, as Carl started back at him without even flinching. Tough kid. "At least cry a little."

Carl, ever like his dad, held Negan's gaze. Something about it made Negan laugh. He stood up, moved back down the line.

"Jesus," he winced when he looked at Maggie. "You look shitty. I should just put you out of your misery right now."

"No! No!" Glenn was out of line before any of us realized what was happening. He lunged at Negan, managed to grab hold of him for a split second before Dwight had him on the ground. I saw his elbow raise, heard the punches land on Glenn's face.

"Stop it!" Maggie begged them. She leaned forward like she was trying to reach for Glenn. Beads of sweat pooled on her forehead.

"Nope," Negan looked pissed. "Nope, get him back in line."

Dwight dragged Glenn back to the other side of me than where he'd sprung from.

"No. No," Glenn moaned. "Don't…"

I looked over at him, tried to whisper that things would be okay. I didn't know if Negan was the kind of dick who'd beat a pregnant woman, but I knew that Glenn putting himself in the firing line like that was dangerous. My whisper did not go unnoticed. Before I could finish saying Glenn's name, Dwight's hand came out of nowhere and slapped me across the jaw.

"Hey!" Daryl's yelp made it sound like he was the one who'd been struck. His arm pulled back automatically like he was about to swing for Dwight. In his anger, he forgot about his gunshot wound, and I saw the pain slow him down. Thank God. I locked eyes with him, silently begging him not to move. My jaw stung, but I didn't touch it in case it provoked Daryl into doing something stupid. I couldn't lose him in all of this. I wouldn't. Negan would have to pry him out of my cold, dead hands.

"Alright, listen," Negan said, loudly. "Don't any of you do that again. I will shut that shit down, no exceptions. First one's free. It's an emotional moment, I get it."

There was a tiny moment of quiet relief that Glenn wasn't going to be punished for what he'd done. Negan looked back at Rick.

"Sucks, don't it? The moment you realize you don't know shit. This is your kid, right?" he walked back over to Carl. Carl glared at him, and Negan chuckled. "This is definitely your kid."

"Just stop this!" Rick said. The shock was wearing off, and he'd finally found his voice. Having Negan and his stupid bat so close to his kid clearly rattled him out of the frightened trance we were all slipping into.

"Hey!" Negan snapped. "Do not make me kill the little future serial killer. Don't make it easy on me. I gotta pick somebody. Everybody's at the table waiting for me to order."

He whistled. The same tone I'd heard right before they caught me. His group all whistled back to him, filling the forest with a sinister kind of birdcall.

"I simply cannot decide. I got an idea. Eenie… meanie… money… mo..." he started pointing the bat at each one of us in turn, in no particular order. It was impossible to tell which way he was going to swing next. My fingertips frantically searched the ground by my knees for something - anything - that I could turn into a weapon. His sing-song voice carried out through the clearing. A rock. A stick. Anything sharp I could use to gouge out his eye. That was all I needed to get something done before one of his men shot me.

"My mother… told me... To pick… the very... Best one…" he was nearing the end of his sick little rhyme.

Just do it.

His eyes skimmed over me.

"And you…"

Just pick me.

"Are…"

Volunteer. Tell him you'll do it.

"It." He stopped right by Abraham.

No.

There was a defiance in Abraham's eyes when he looked back up at Negan. Maybe it wasn't too late for me to step up and stop this from happening. Negan moved his shoulders like an athlete warming up for something big.

"Anybody moves, anybody says anything, cut the boy's other eye out, and feed it to his father," Negan ordered his followers. My words froze in my throat. My hands, down by my feet, and ready to push myself up, stuck to the ground like cement. Fear froze me where I was. Negan picked up the bat with both hands and told us, "You can breathe, you can blink, you can cry. Hell, you're all gonna be doing that."

The crack of Abraham's skull split the quiet of the clearing like a gunshot. I wasn't even aware that Negan had swung, but I felt the impact of that blow. The sickening sound of splitting bone overpowered everything else, tore through our whole group: shared and bloody grief.

Abraham hit the ground face first. I thought that would be it. Thought he'd be dead with that one blow, but he wasn't. He sprang back up again, staring at Negan with the same defiance he'd had before. Blood poured from a wound at the top of his head, ran down into his eye.

Although the pain was almost too much for him to keep talking, he managed one final taunt, "Suck… my… nuts."

"Ho, ho!" Negan laughed, bringing Lucille down again. "Look at that. Taking it like a champ! Damn."

Another sickening crack filled the woods. The third time, Abraham did not get back up. He hit him so many times that soon, there wasn't enough of his skull left in one piece for it to make much of a sound. Negan didn't stop; let the forest fill up with the sound of eleven people in mourning. Proving that while fear is loud in a quiet place, grief is far louder.

 

 

Daryl

No way Abraham deserved to go out like that.

When he was finally done, Negan looked around at all of us. Didn't say a word, just watched as our group crumbled. Drinking in our reactions like they gave him strength.

"Oh my goodness, look at this!" He shook the damn bat at us, with Abraham's blood and brains all tangled up in the barbed wire. Rick flinched as some of it hit his face. Negan laughed, brought it over to where Rosita was sobbing beside me. "Sweetheart… lay your eyes on this. Oh, damn. Were you together? That sucks. But if you were, you should know there was a reason for all this. Red - and hell, he was, is, and forever will be red. He just took one or six or seven for the team! So take… a damn look. Take a damn look!"

She tried to look away, but he kept shaking it at her. The shock of what we'd just seen was wearing off me. Negan's smug, sick grin lit a fire in me that burned it up. Boiled my blood. He had to pay for what he'd just done. And for what he was still doing. My arm was already sore from when I'd tried to swing for Dwight, it slowed me down for a moment.

Negan stood up and started to back off, but I saw the way his attention turned to Sasha, and he clocked the look on her face too. I could not stand to see him do it again. I got to my feet, the pain and the bloodloss made the world around me feel like it was spinning too fast. I focused on Negan. Didn't matter if I passed out as long as I got to him first.

I swung forward, one of his men grabbed me, trying to hold me back. They must've moved damn fast. I lashed out at them. Felt my elbow connect with something soft. A yelp and they let go, dropped to the ground. Negan's attention was drawn back to me. I swung for him, but he saw me coming and ducked out of the way. I was coming at him with such a force that I stumbled forward, almost falling back down into the dirt. I was still losing blood. The effort of it made me dizzy.

"Hey, now," he said. This disapproving look on his face. "You ain't a wife beater, are you?"

What the hell was he-

I spun around to try and hit him again. And then I saw her. Naomi. Sprawled on the ground. She sat up and touched a quickly pooling crimson spot on her lip from where my elbow had smacked against it. All my fight left me in an instant, her dazed and wide eyes met mine, and there was nothing in me but cold, raw fear.

"Naomi…" It just slipped out. Don't think I even realized it said it until Negan looked away from me and down at her. I tried to reach for her, but there were hands on me now. Not hers. Negan's guys. For real this time.

"Hey! Lemme go!" I warned them, trying to rip my arms free. "Fucking let me go."

Side of my face smashed into the dirt. I struggled, heard their feet scuff on the soil as I almost slipped out. Then I was pinned there. I could just see Naomi's feet from where she was still lying near me. And the Dwight, leaning over me with my own damn crossbow.

"Do you want me to do it?" he asked Negan. "Right here?"

"No!" Naomi said before he could answer. Doubt she even meant to, but it made them both look over at her. I strained against the people holding me down, tried to see her face.

"No?" Negan was still looking at her.

"Please," I heard her cracked and broken whisper. "Please, no."

Negan shrugged, looked back at Dwight. "Lady says, no. Get him on his knees."

They pulled me up. I didn't resist too hard because at least now I could see her. Our eyes met, and for a split second, she looked calmer. I saw her take a deep breath, pulled her feet in so that she could pull herself to her knees too. Negan took a step toward her.

"Naomi," he said. She looked up at him. Like she'd forgotten for a moment that he was there. "That your name?"

She nodded, and the realization of what she'd just done, the danger she'd just put herself in, started to sink in. She was scared. I don't think I'd ever seen her that scared.

"Well, Naomi…" his voice was honey-sweet. Sickly.

"Hey!" I yelled at his back. "Get away from her!"

He swung that damn bat up into the air, and my heart jumped up too, right into the back of my throat. But he let the bat rest on his shoulder.

"Hey, shut up," Negan said over his other shoulder, continuing his slow and deliberate walk toward my girl. "Naomi, why-"

"I'm warning you," I told him. I pulled against the people holding me, trying to get to him before he could get to her. He stopped, walked back toward me. "If you-"

"Hey, shut up," Negan said again, waved that damned and bloodied bat in my direction. "I'm trying to get to know your lady friend here. Have some damn respect."

"Daryl, it's okay," Naomi said from behind him. She was trying to sound calm for my sake, but there was a shake to her voice. Her eyes pleaded with me. Negan looked between us and smiled like a kid at Christmas.

"You should listen to her, Daryl," he said. "Unless you wanna make a liar outta her. Unless you want things not to be okay."

"Stay the hell away from her," I told him. I managed to pull one of my arms free and tried swinging for him again. Someone kicked me in the back of the legs, and I hit the ground again. Knees in the dirt.

"Hey!" he walked over to me, bent down, so he could look me right in the eye. "You and I best start getting along. Because if you don't start playing nice, I'm going to introduce my girl Lucille to your girl over there. See if our ladies get along better than we do. You want that?"

It took everything in me to hold myself back from lashing out or spitting in his face. Worried that if I so much as breathed wrong, he'd hurt her. When he saw the anger shake every muscle, he got this look of real smug satisfaction. He stared me down until he was sure I wasn't going to try anything.

He straightened up, walked over to her.

Naomi's eyes didn't move from my face even when he got closer, "It's gonna be okay. I'm okay."

She kept her eyes on me while he circled her. Like she was worried that if she looked away or blinked, I'd do something reckless and dumb. Get myself hurt trying to get to her. It was a fair worry. There was so much anger pumping through me, I felt I had it in me to take down Negan and every Savior in this goddamn clearing. Negan had this grin on his face like a hungry wolf. That damn bat still swinging in his hands. Her hands balled into fists in her lap, she sat up tall and didn't so much as blink when he came near her. I would've been proud if I weren't so damn scared for her.

"Okay, get up," he told her. She hesitated. "C'mon now, you got my permission to stand."

She looked up at him then. I watched her take a deep breath while he gave her a smile. I think it was meant to be encouraging. With no real choice, she got to her feet. Stood in front of him.

"Now, that…" he said, gesturing at me. "The whole thing - not one bit of that shit flies here. It seems like you're the only one who got the memo, Naomi. How is that, huh? The rest of you deaf? I gotta speak up?"

He stopped and looked around at where our group was kneeling, helplessly watching him toy with the two of us. Rick looked at me, his eyes were bright and red. Shocked. But also like he was trying to apologize to me, her, and everyone else, for getting us into this.

"Now, I already told you people - first one's free, then - what'd I say? I said I would shut that shit down! No exceptions. Now, he didn't listen," Negan pointed at me, "but she… she stepped up. Did the right thing. Tried to shut that shit down for me. Seems like the only one who gets there's a new chain of command around here. The only one showing me some damn respect."

"I didn't do it for you," she muttered, and my heart sank to my feet. He turned and gave her this look like she'd said exactly what he wanted her to.

"What was that?" Negan asked. "You're gonna have to speak up, little lady. This is a big place."

She lifted her chin to look up at him. The light from the cars in front of her lit them up with some kind of fire.

"I didn't do it for you," she said. Her quiet and defiant voice filled the clearing.

"You didn't?" he said. "You mean to tell me you and I ain't becoming friends through all this?"

"No," she said. "We ain't."

"Yeah, I figured as much," he nodded. "So, why'd you do it?"

I saw her bottom lip tremble, her gaze slid over to me. He followed it.

"For him."

"For him?"

"Yes."

"Why?"

"I won't let you hurt him," she said. "Not so long as I'm breathing."

"Not so long as I'm breathing," he repeated. "Well, shit, Naomi, that is a bold ass claim. You think you can keep a promise like that?"

She shrugged, tried to look defiant, "I can try."

"You can. You can try, Naomi. I like a trier," he said. "But you have left me with quite a puzzle. See, you got between me and a punch. Normally, that's the kind of shit I would reward. Hell, that's the kind of shit I should encourage among my people."

"I told you, I didn't-"

"You didn't do it for me," he said. "Yeah, I heard. Don't really matter why you did it, the outcome is the same. But your boyfriend here, he stepped out of line, and I gotta punish that."

"No," she said, her gaze flickering to where I was still on my knees.

"No?" he repeated with a cold laugh. "You got a lotta demands for someone with very little say in what is going down here tonight. You can see how you've left me in quite a pickle. What to do with the two of you?"

Negan let the silence drag on, watching her squirm in it. I could see her starting to break. He looked back at her, "You stepped outta line, got yourself tied up in all this shit, put yourself in my firing line, for him, right?"

"Right."

"Sweet girl you got here, Daryl," he said. Looking at her like she was a piece of meat and he was a starving coyote. "Sweet piece of ass too, huh?"

He smiled again when I struggled to break free like it was exactly what he wanted me to do.

"Oh, he didn't like that one, did he?" Negan said, his eyes lingering on me, and he gave me this wide-ass smile. "No, sir, he did not."

She shivered, and I knew it wasn't because she was cold.

"Leave her alone," I warned him again. I knew I looked powerless now, but if I got out of this, he'd live to regret every word coming out of his mouth. Ever wrong look he was giving her. He ignored me, gaze still fixed on her.

"You love him, Naomi?"

The silence crushed down around us. The sounds of the forest, the whimpers of our friends, were drowned out by my heartbeat in my ears. She closed her mouth, swallowed hard like there was something in there she couldn't get out.

"Oh…" Negan's eyebrows raised. "You ain't said that to each other, yet? Alright, I can ask something a little easier… Would you die for him?"

I had to look away from both of them for a moment. Didn't want to hear Naomi's answer. Because the truth was, I already knew what was coming. I didn't need to hear it confirmed. Not like this.

"Yes," she said without hesitation, without flinching, without so much as a tremor in her voice.

"No," I said at the same time, didn't know if I was begging her or him. Could've been both, I just wanted to put a stop to all of this. I couldn't breathe right. "No. No."

Negan laughed again, walked back over to me, stuck the end of his damn bat down into the dirt in front of me. He crouched down, leaning on the handle as he stared down at me. "Your girl just offered to die for you, and you can't even muster up a thank you?"

"Fuck you," I snarled.

His eyes widened, and he looked back at her. "You sure he's worth it? Seriously. Is he worth it?"

"Yes," she said. Negan nodded, a look of fake disappointment on his face.

"Alright," he said. "Your choice, I guess. Get on your knees, Naomi."

"No!" I yelled it more at her than him. She was on her feet now, she could just run. Make a break for it. If I fought hard enough to distract everyone, maybe she could get away. "No!"

Naomi held Negan's gaze for a moment, and then, slowly, she knelt back down again. I fought hard, trying to twist myself away from the hands that were holding me down. More of Negan's men came forward. More hands on me. "No! No! Get off me! NO!"

"Am I gonna have to put a muzzle on you?" Negan asked me. He stood behind Naomi, bat raised and ready to strike.

"Don't watch," she said, eyes fixed on me, begging me. Her voice was surprisingly calm. "Daryl, please don't watch."

But how could I look away from her? How could I let her leave this earth without knowing that I was using every last breath in my body to keep her here?

"Don't hurt her," the words ripped right out of my throat with so much force it must've left me torn and bleeding.

"Daryl," she tried again, I knew she was hoping to get my attention away from Negan and stop me from saying anything that would get me hurt.

"Naomi…" I choked on her name. Could feel my whole heart breaking. And it wasn't a clean break either. Lots of little pieces. Crumbling to dust in a way that couldn't be fixed. "No… no…"

"Daryl, you're gonna be fine," she told me. "Please look away. Don't watch this. Please, please, please don't put yourself through this."

I choked on everything I wanted to say to her. Thought I would have a lifetime to figure this shit out. Negan brought the bat down. In that instant, as it whistled through the air toward her skull, I tried to tell her I loved her. That I would always love her. But the words got tangled in my throat with the horror of what was happening. So much pain inside me I couldn't speak. She didn't blink. Didn't flinch. Just waited for it to hit her. Then, it stopped, hovering an inch above her head. I didn't dare move. Didn't dare say anything in case Negan was changing his mind.

"Shit, I like you two," Negan said. He pulled the bat back, slung it over his shoulder again. He looked at Rick, "How much for the pair?"

The relief was so intense I almost collapsed. There was nothing but disbelief on Naomi's face when she looked up at Negan. She hadn't expected to live to take another breath.

"What?" Rick asked.

"Now, Daryl, he's mine," Negan said. "He's coming with me, and if you step outta line, I'll cut pieces off him, leave them on your doorstep. But I got room for one more, especially if it'll keep him in line."

Rick looked at me. I shook my head, "No."

I wanted Naomi as far away from this psycho as humanly possible.

"Shhh," Negan glared at me. "I ain't asking you. I'm asking Rick."

Rick looked back at him, "No. They all stay with me. All of 'em. Naomi and Daryl included."

"Rick," Negan tutted like he'd been sorely let down. "Did you learn nothing from what happened to poor old Red? You ain't calling the shots no more. You ain't in charge of shit."

Rick looked down at the ground for a moment. Thought he wasn't going to say anything, but then he looked back up, right into Negan's eyes. "I'm gonna kill you."

"What?" Negan leaned forward. He looked amused. "I didn't quite catch that, you're gonna have to speak up."

"Not today, not tomorrow," Rick said, "…but I'm going to kill you."

"Jesus…" Negan shook his head, "Simon, what did he have, a knife?"

"Uh, he had a hatchet," Simon replied.

"A hatchet?"

"He had an ax."

"Bring me his ax," Negan said. Someone stepped forward, handed it over. Negan took it and tucked it into his belt. He pulled Rick to his feet. "I'll be right back, maybe with Rick, and If not, we'll turn the rest of these folks inside out. Dwight… load him up."

Negan pointed at me. Dwight rushed forward again, crossbow trained on me. The guys behind me hauled me to my feet.

"No!" Naomi's voice rang out, loud and clear. When Negan turned his attention back to her, she didn't flinch.

"What was that?" he asked. "Did you just say 'no' to me? Again?"

I watched as her jaw clenched. I thought she'd be more afraid, but her fear had turned to something else. "Don't take him."

Negan let go of Rick, walked back over to where Naomi was still kneeling in the dirt.

"Tell you what, Naomi," he said slowly. "Since Rick doesn't get what's going on here, I'm gonna let this be ladies' choice. I think I know the answer to this, but do you want to take your chances and go home with your friends, or are you coming to my place with him?"

"Naomi', don't!" I called to her. I wanted her back safe in Alexandria. But I knew it was hopeless. I'd already seen the look in her eyes. And that little, confident, nod. There was no hope in hell of changing her mind.

"Alright," Negan motioned to another group of his guys. "Simon, load her up too."

He stood up and turned his attention back to Rick. Guys already had their hands on her. I saw her fear, her struggle as they pulled in the opposite direction from me. I struggled forward and managed to get one of my hands free. I swung wildly, trying to reach for Naomi. I grabbed the earth where she'd been kneeling before they gained control of me again. Cold, hard metal of the van floor slammed into my side when they threw me in. I scrambled to my feet, tried to look out at her. So many guns in my face. Dwight, with my damn crossbow.

"Daryl!" I heard her yell and managed to lock eyes with her one last time. "Daryl, I-"

The doors banged shut in my face. There was nothing but darkness. I moved forward.

"Naomi!" I slammed my fists against the metal doors. Didn't even feel the pain. Raw and bleeding knuckles didn't mean shit compared to how I felt inside. They banged back, told me to shut up but couldn't. If she didn't know I was there, if she couldn't hear that I was still fighting, she might assume they'd done something to me. And then there was no telling what she'd do. No guarantee she wouldn't get herself killed over it. I punched until my knuckles were shredded and bleeding. And I kept going until they got sick of it and drove the van a little further out of the clearing. I stopped then. Sat in the dark and silence, my hands throbbing. I whispered her name over and over like that could conjure her out of nothing. With no idea what had happened to Naomi, or anyone in that clearing, or where Negan had taken Rick, all I could do was wait for the doors to open.

Chapter 32: A Better Place

Naomi

The van came to an unceremonious stop. Not for the first time, I was flung against the hard metal walls. I could feel small bruises forming on my arms and legs from where I'd hit against the sides and floor on the drive. These assholes were either shitty drivers or took pleasure in knowing that I was being shaken around in the back of the damn thing. I'd never take seatbelts for granted again, that was for sure. I pulled my knees up to my chin, sat with my back against one of the walls, and listened. Other engines around this one came to a stop. Doors slammed as people got out, and I could hear them calling over to each other, laughing at something like they were colleagues winding down at the end of a long shift. I guess that's all Abraham's death was to these people, just another fucking day in the office.

The doors opened. After hours shut up in the dark, I flinched away from the light outside. It made my eyes ache. Simon's tall frame blurred against harsh sunlight as he reached in and grabbed my arm. He pulled me out so fast I didn't have time to stand. My knees dragged against the floor, and I stumbled out, struggling to get my balance when my feet hit the ground. I'd been curled up so long in the back of that van, my joints hurt. Simon didn't slow down as he pulled me toward a tall building.

The van they'd dragged Daryl into was parked in the shadow of it. The back doors were still hanging open like they'd taken him out recently enough that they hadn't had time to shut them.

Was he close? Would I get to see him?

Maybe I could catch up. I sped up, unable to take my eyes off that van - the last place I'd seen Daryl alive. I peered into it on the way past. Completely empty. The doors were dented, and there was blood on them. Like someone had hit it repeatedly. Nothing fatal, but… enough to bleed. My mouth went dry. Daryl had already been shot, I couldn't stand the thought of him in any more pain.

"Where is he?" I asked. I knew they would answer, but I couldn't hold it in any longer. It had been threatening to burst out of me since they'd opened those doors. I'd been quiet for so long that my voice didn't come out right. Simon just laughed at me again and pushed me into the building. I felt a gun press into my back. I kept my head down, scouring the ground for a drop of blood. A smear. Any clue as to where they'd taken Daryl. I listened hard. If they were hurting him, if he was screaming or yelling, I'd know it was him right away. Trouble was, I knew that Daryl could withstand a lot of pain without making a sound. They could be inflicting all kinds of shit on him behind any of the doors I was walking past, and I'd never know.

My heart raced, and the only thoughts in my head were, I have to find him. I have to get him out of here.

"Move," Simon demanded. The gun pressed hard against my back, forcing me toward a door. Simon opened it. A dark staircase with grimy windows on one side. They forced me up two levels and into another corridor that looked much like the one before it. Some of the doors had windows in them, I glanced through each one. No sign of Daryl. No sign of anyone.

"Stop," Simon grabbed hold of my shoulder. I stopped walking but kept searching the area around me. He unlocked one of the doors and shoved me inside. No Daryl.

The small fragment of hope that I'd held that they might lock us in the same place died immediately. I turned to Simon again and asked, "Where is he?"

"Negan?" Simon said although he knew damn well that wasn't who I was asking for. "He's a little busy right now, but he'll be with you when he can."

He shut the door before I could say anything else. I heard it lock, listened to his footsteps go back down the corridor. And then silence. Cold dread washed over me. Putting all of my energy into trying to work out where Daryl was had somehow kept me calm. Now I was trapped in one room with no chance of finding him, I could feel myself starting to crumble. Was there anything here I could make a weapon out of?

There was a bed pushed up against the far corner. It had a metal frame, hard to break a piece of. Maybe if they left me here long enough, I'd be able to work away at it, prize one of the thinner wires out from underneath. I could always strip the bed, make some kind of noose from the sheets, and hang Negan from the window. Next to the bed, there was a small cabinet. I opened all of the drawers and found nothing except some scraps of old clothing. Probably leftover from whoever had been locked up here before me. There was a bucket of water and a washcloth. In the other corner, another empty bucket. No toilet breaks for me, I guess.

A small mirror hung from a rusted nail on the wall. If I smashed it, I could forge some kind of weapon from the broken glass. Slit Negan's throat. Or Simon's… whichever one of them came in here first.

I crossed over to the window and looked down. It opened. But it was too high up for me to safely jump out of. Always an option if I needed to off myself, I guess.

Calm. Stay calm. Try to work out where we are.

The building looked like an old factory. It was hard to be sure without a map, but this could've been the one I'd been heading for with Lucas when the Wolves had run us off the road. What would've happened if I'd found this place then? Could I have got in and killed Negan before any of this had happened?

I heard footsteps in the corridor outside. They echoed in this soulless place. I'd spent the whole night listening, trying to piece together what was going on outside of the van, and now I couldn't switch off. Every new sound I heard felt magnified. It had been useless. I'd heard the occasional shout or cry. Never clear enough to make out the words. They could've killed Rick and everyone in that clearing without me knowing. They could've shot Daryl in the back of his van, and I wouldn't have known. I felt sick. Tired and sick. Trapped in a bad dream that I'd never wake up from.

I heard the rattle of keys, and the scratch of them in the lock. I could tell from the tall shape behind the frosted glass that it was Negan before he opened the door.

Shit. I hadn't had enough time to prepare anything. Or come up with any kind of plan. I could always untie my bootlaces, try and choke Negan out. But then what? I still had no idea where they were keeping Daryl.

"Hello, Naomi," Negan said. Sugar-sweet. Like we were friends. But there was a tone, a note underneath his words, that made everything feel like a threat even when his words weren't threatening. I said nothing. The door shut behind him, locked again. I took a few steps back. His smile widened and showed more of his teeth. His eyes roamed over me like he could see the fear I was trying to hide and drank it in. "C'mon now, don't be like that. What do you think I'm going to do to you, huh? If I wanted your brains bashed in, I'd have done it last night."

I took another step back, felt my back brush against the wall, and knew I couldn't go any further. There was plenty Negan could do - or threaten to do - in a locked room, and he damn well knew it. That's why he'd said it.

Something in my silence amused him. He was always so damn amused. I think that was the worst thing about this guy. If he'd been angry, screamed and yelled, it would've given me something to fight. But he didn't. He just inflicted all of this pain and violence with a damn smile on his face. At ease and enjoying it. He didn't come any closer, but it didn't make the way he was looking at me any less creepy. I could feel my heart racing like it wanted me to run. But there was nowhere to run to. My back was, literally, against the wall.

When he'd let my silence sit for just long enough for us both to be uncomfortable, he asked, "You settling in okay?"

Is this asshole really trying to make small talk?

I glared at him to let him know that shit wasn't going to fly with me. "Where is he?"

"We getting right down to business?" he asked, looking a little disappointed. "Alright, then. Straight-talking girl, I respect that."

"Where is he?" I repeated. I wasn't expecting him to give me a straight answer, but damn this guy loved the sound of his own voice. If he thought he was going to get anything out of me that wasn't about Daryl, he was sorely mistaken.

"He is…" Negan cast his eye over the room I was in. "In a much worse place."

I didn't know what to read into that. It was deliberately vague. Avoiding any small clue as to where in the building Daryl was, or if he was even in the building. It was ominous enough to let me know that no matter where he was - it wasn't good. I felt a lump rising in my throat and swallowed it down. Negan got a rise out of any kind of reaction, and I was determined not to give him one.

"But he's alive, right?"

"Yeah," he said, laughing a little. "He's alive."

Even though I knew it wasn't smart to trust a word coming out of his mouth, I still felt relieved hearing him say it. Unless something awful had happened on the journey here, I had to assume that if he wanted Daryl dead, he'd have killed him in that clearing.

"And the others?" I asked. "Our friends… are they…?"

"Rick and I had a little chat, reached an understanding," he said. "Rick works for me now. Everyone who follows him will work for me too, r they'll die pretty damn fast. Left him and the others in that clearing. I imagine they're back home by now. First day of their new job. Bet they're real nervous."

I wanted to believe him, to think of them all back home in Alexandria. Surely Rick would already be coming up with some kind of plan to beat these assholes. We might not have to wait things out here as long as it seemed. Negan studied my face while I processed this. If he was hoping for me to cry or scream at him, he would be sorely disappointed.

"Why take us?" I asked. "Why not just… kill us? Or let us go with the others?"

"Good question," he said like I'd genuinely impressed him rather than just asked him a simple question. It wasn't even one I expected a truthful answer to. "Moving on from trying to find him, huh? Takes most folks in your position a couple of days to get over being split up from folks they know. But look at you, not even shedding one little tear."

"Well, you ain't going to tell me where he is, are you?" I asked. "No matter what I say. You don't care if I beg or cry."

"You seem pretty sure about that," he said. It wasn't a question, but he kind of said it like one.

"You don't seem like an idiot," I shrugged. "If you tell me where he is now, I'll bust him out, and he'll kill you."

He laughed again like what I'd said was ridiculous. "You think he'd kill me?"

"Ain't that what you've got him trapped here for? Tryna kill you?"

"Well, lucky for me, I got you here to stop him from doing that."

"That was a one-time thing," I told him. "If he swings for you again, I ain't stopping him."

"Huh," Negan said, tilting his head to one side as he looked at me. Damn amused. Like every word out of my mouth was a surprise to him. It filled me with rage, and I wanted to fly at him, punching and kicking until I brought him down. But he still had his damn bat. It still glistened with drying blood. And I had nothing. Not even a shoelace or some damn bedsheets. He stopped leaning on the locked door behind him and stood up straighter. "Look, I just came in here to make sure there are no hard feelings."

"No hard feelings?" I repeated, narrowing my eyes at him. "You killed a friend. You tormented every-"

"Yeah, I don't care about that," he interrupted me. "I did what had to be done. I meant about getting you to kneel down like that. Making you think Lucille was about to… well, y' know."

"Well, I don't much care about that," I said. "Why apologize for something you chickened out of doing?"

He let my words hang there for a moment. Like he wanted me to worry that calling him a chicken would make him mad. I was too tired and angry to give a shit.

"Did you think I was going to kill you?"

"Yes," I said. No point in lying.

"Good. I needed you to believe it. Needed Daryl to believe it, too," he nodded. "I was never going to kill you, though. I want you to know that."

That was more surprising than if he'd told me he'd changed his mind again and was going to kill me right at that second. "You weren't?"

"Nah," he said. "And I am, truly, sorry for messing with you, but I had to know whether or not you would be useful to me. Seems like you got exactly the kind of power over Daryl that I need."

Just when I thought I'd found a way to be immune to his crap, something he said got under my skin.

"The hell is that supposed to mean?" I asked. I didn't like what he'd said. I didn't much like the way he'd said it either. The connection between Daryl and me had always felt like our biggest strength. Unbreakable. Bent out of shape sometimes but never broken.

"You know he'd do anything for you, right?" he said, with this smile that made me incredibly uncomfortable. I didn't answer him right away, didn't want to admit to anything. But I knew. Of course, I knew. Negan enjoyed my hesitation. Reveled in it. "That's gotta be some kick, having that kind of power over somebody, huh?"

Power. That word again. I felt myself bristle with how one-sided it sounded coming from Negan. Like Daryl was some idiot I was stringing along.

"It's mutual," I snarled.

"Yeah," he said. And I thought he might've even looked mildly impressed. "You sure proved that. Two people ready to die for each other… you know how rare that shit is? Now, I've had my eye on Daryl for a while. My boy Dwight has told me all about him. A guy like Daryl would do well working for me."

It was such an absurd idea that it drew a sharp and bitter laugh from my lips.

"Something funny about that, Naomi?"

"I dunno what your boy Dwight has been telling you about Daryl, but he clearly doesn't know shit," I said. "Running around terrorizing other communities…Beating unarmed people to death in the middle of the night like a goddamn coward… Daryl would never-"

"Ain't that exactly what he was doing for Rick?" Negan said. I stopped talking. "Sneaking into one of my outposts in the dead of night and killing my people while they slept like a… how'd you put it? A goddamn coward?"

"That was different."

"Was it?"

"You killed a kid at the Hilltop, forced them into giving you half of their shit," I said. "It ain't right. What you do… someone's gotta make you pay for it. You're damn lucky we got the wrong place."

"Well, shit. I am sorry you got such a bad impression of us, but that ain't what we do here," Negan said, looking at me like I was a goddamn moron. "See, we save people here. That's why they call us the Saviors."

Fucking arrogant name.

"That what you were doing when you killed Abraham?" I asked. "Saving him?"

"No," he admitted. "But, we were saving the rest of you."

"From what?" I asked. "We were doing fine until you showed up."

"Is that right?" Negan asked. "Because it seems to me like if you were doing fine, you wouldn't have needed to strike a backhanded deal with the Hilltop to get hold of half of their shit. If you were doing fine, you wouldn't have needed to break into my outpost in the middle of the night like a bunch of goddamn cowards."

Now he was getting angry, a little bit of spit flew from his mouth while he yelled. You'd have thought, given what he'd just put us through, that seeing him get mad would be scary. But there was something about cracking his overly-cool façade that was weirdly satisfying. Maybe I'd just had such a horrific night that I was numb to the idea of any more bad shit.

"This is some evangelical bullshit," I said. "You call yourselves the Saviors. Don't make it true."

He looked like he wanted to hit me. Like he was really considering it. I stared back at him, silently challenging him to just do it. Any excuse to hit him back. He looked me in the eye like he was sizing me up.

"Now, Daryl, I knew about. But you were a real surprise," he said. "I thought I was going to have a hard time breaking a guy like Daryl and then you…"

"Break him?" I took a step forward. Anger pushed me out of the corner I was backed in to. "The hell do you mean, break him?"

"Look, I want you on my team," he said. "I want you both on my team. You and Daryl. I know the only way that's gonna happen is-"

"Ain't gonna happen," I interrupted him.

"People are easier to break when they've got something they're scared to lose," Negan said. There was a gleam in his eye like he'd struck gold. "And I'm willing to bet he's mighty scared of losing you."

My blood turned cold. It was the first thing Negan had said that really made me worry that he'd get what he wanted, that following Daryl here had been the wrong call.

"He's stronger than that," I shook my head. Negan laughed. Loud and booming, too big for this small room.

"You really think if I bring him up here and start chopping pieces off you, he won't join my team just to make it stop?"

Up. I tried not to react. Negan had given something away. Wherever he was keeping Daryl, it wasn't on this floor. It was one of the ones below me. It was a tiny, almost insignificant clue. But it was still a clue.

"What's more," he continued. "Is that I'm willing to bet that this is… how'd you put it… mutual?"

It was. Of course, it was. I'd chew my own arm off if it got Daryl free.

"That your big plan?" I asked him. "Just cut bits off me until Daryl agrees to join your pack of bitches?"

"No," Negan said. "Well, not now, anyway. Gotta give you both some time to... get used to the way things are around here. If he's going to join me, he's gotta mean it. But, I'm willing to bet you can help me make him mean it."

My mouth went dry. Negan saw the flicker of doubt that passed through me. A moment of fear that I had doomed Daryl and me to a life of serving this asshole. But that thought of Daryl, all his strength, and the strength he gave me pushed the rest of it away. People had been underestimating us our whole lives. Negan was just the latest in a long line of assholes.

Nothing could keep us apart.

Not at school. Not work. Not Merle. Not our own dumb arguments. Not even the dead rising up and taking over the Earth. Certainly not this asshole. I felt myself relax.

"Maybe you ain't that smart after all."

His eyebrows raised. "How'd you figure that?"

"Keeping us both alive…" I said. "It's only a matter of time before one of us gets out and kills you."

"Oh," he started laughing like I'd just told him the best joke he'd ever heard. "Now, you're gonna be the one to kill me, Naomi?"

"Yes."

"I don't think you got the stomach for it, little lady."

Patronizing piece of shit.

"I'd cut out your tongue first. Stop you talking so much shit," I said. Negan's smile widened. Like in some kind of sick way, this was exactly what he wanted to hear. He leaned in closer. "And I'd hit you with that bat. Not hard enough to kill ya but enough to do some damage, y' know? Then I'll bleed you out. Real slow. Hang you up by your feet and drain you like a pig."

"Wow, Naomi, that is specific," he said. "I had no idea your fantasies about me would be so... detailed. I'm flattered."

"I can think of a thousand ways to send you to hell," I said. "I'm only sad I'll have to pick just one."

He laughed again.

"I gotta good feeling about you," he said with a wink that made my skin crawl. "You could have a bright future here, once you learn to start behaving yourself."

"Behaving myself?" I repeated, a fire igniting deep down in my soul. The look on his face told me I'd just taken bait he'd set out very deliberately.

"Once you start playing ball, you can get out of this room," he said. He knocked twice on the door behind him, and I heard it unlock. "We got a lot of nice shit here, Naomi, and you can have free reign over all of it. You can meet my people. Dine with my wives. Hell, I might even let you see Daryl. But only when I believe you and I are truly… friends."

Never going to happen.

He opened the door. Two guys appeared on either side of him, guns trained on me like they were worried I was about to rush them now that the door was open. Tempting as it was, I wasn't dumb enough to try. I just looked him in the eye and said, "Go to hell."

I could still hear his laugh after the door closed. Alone again, the fear sank back into my bones.

There were only three ways I could see this ending. I would walk out of here with Daryl. If he'd been killed, I'd walk out of here with Negan's head under my arm. Or I would die in this goddamn shithole.

 

 

Daryl

I was taken from one dark place to another. A brief moment in the morning sun while they dragged me a short distance from the back of the van to a tall, dark building. My eyes didn't have time to adjust. The ground blurred. I caught a glimpse of my bloody knuckles, which had started swelling from a night spent punching van doors. And then I was inside again.

They opened the door to a room even darker than the van and pushed me in so hard my knees hit the concrete floor. The room was small. No windows. Probably used to be some kind of supply closet. Smelt like shit. Real, actual shit. Some piss and vomit in there too. Probably whichever unlucky bastard had been in here before me. I expected a beating. Maybe even to be tied up. But the door shut and locked again before I could get back on my feet.

A small crack of light from the hallway came through under the door. Not enough to see by. I walked over to it, pressed my ear against the door, and listened for any sound of them bringing her in. Dragging feet. Yelling. Screaming. I heard doors slamming and people moving in and out, but nothing I could've said was definitely her. I wondered if I should kick the door and start shouting so she'd know where I was if they dragged her past. But what if I made so much noise I never heard her yelling back? What if she was in another place altogether? Negan could have any number of outposts we didn't know about. We hadn't known about this place.

They left me alone for much longer than I thought. Or maybe it just felt that way. Time stretched out in the dark, and it was made worse by how little I knew. Were Rick and the others okay? Had Negan let them go? Would I ever see any of them again? How could I protect Naomi from this damn cell?

The sound of the key in the lock made my fists clench. Bending my fingers hurt. Scabs that had just started form broke open again. Dried blood flaked onto the floor. I moved to stand in the light of the opening door. If she was out there, I wanted to see her. Dwight's ugly, fucked up face looked back at me from behind my own damn crossbow.

"Step back," he told me as my feet moved toward him. "Step back."

I liked to see that there was still fear in his eyes when he looked at me. Even though he was the one who had all the power here. A guy next to him shoved a gun in my face too, and I backed up. When my back hit the wall, Negan stepped in. Bat still in his hand. Still covered in blood. I looked hard at it, but I couldn't tell if it was more or less bloody than it had been last time. If he'd added to it. Someone else from the clearing. Or if he'd changed his mind and killed Naomi after all.

"Hey there, Daryl," Negan leaned against the doorway, stared in at where I stood in the dark. I was ready to fly at him again. Ready to land the punch I hadn't been able to last time. He must've been able to read it in my face. The rage. He enjoyed it. We both knew I wouldn't act on it. Not yet. Not until I knew they wouldn't harm her for it.

"Where is she?"

He smiled, rolled his eyes slightly like it was the most predictable shit in the world.

"She's…" he paused like he was mulling it over, but I knew he was just toying with me, leaving me to stew in my own worst thoughts. Then he looked up at me with this horrible grin. "In a better place."

Dead?

Felt like half of me had been ripped away, and all that was left was torn and bleeding. Before anyone could move, I was on him. My fist slammed into the side of his face. Hurt like a bitch, but it was the most satisfying second I'd had since I'd got here.

Pain erupted in the back of my head as Dwight smacked me with the end of my crossbow. My vision faded for a split second. Another punch hit the other side of my face. And then I felt a foot slam into my chest, kicking me hard enough for my back to hit the wall. I slid down it, feeling like I'd cracked a rib. I struggled to breathe for a moment. Couldn't tell if the pain in my chest had come from the kick or from losing Naomi.

I shook my head to clear it. The barrel of a gun swam in and out of view.

Shoot me.

Fucking shoot me. I don't care.

If she's dead, just beat me until I am too.

The pain in my chest from where I'd been kicked started to subside. I was ready to fight again. Now that I had nothing to lose, I didn't have to hold anything back. I'd go out, causing as much damage as I could. If there was a heaven, I'd see her. If there wasn't, at least I wouldn't be trapped in a world without her.

"Oh, I'm sorry," Negan bent over where I was sitting on the floor. "Did you think I meant she was dead? I can see why that might have been misleading."

Asshole.

I felt my breath starting to return to me, in slow and ragged pieces. I looked up at him.

"She ain't dead?" I asked. Just to check that I'd heard him right. That he wasn't messing with me.

"Nah, she's fine. She just… in a better place than this shit hole," Negan said, looking around the room that he'd chucked me in like it was my choice to be here. "Thought you might be glad about that. Thought you might even thank me for it."

Deep in my chest, I was hit with relief so intense it hurt. Like my heart was stitching itself back together with nothing but hope. Piece by piece. Sharp needles and threads I couldn't trust to hold together, invisible and flimsy. Nothing would mend until I saw her. His word was not enough.

"She's alive," I repeated it for my own sake, but he treated it like a question.

"Yeah, she's alive, fucking hell, how many times I gotta say it?"

"Prove it, asshole."

He laughed.

"Nah, I ain't making it that easy. I've actually just come from spending some time with her," Negan said, and my stomach dropped. I'd have done anything to wipe the sickening grin off his face. "And she is… quite something, your girl, ain't she?"

This glint in his eye sparked the fire that had been temporarily doused in relief. What did he mean? Had he put his hands on her? Beat her? Worse? I remembered the way he'd looked at her in that clearing. Like she was a piece of meat, and he hadn't eaten in weeks.

No.

Not Naomi.

Not again.

It felt like someone had set me on fire from the inside out. Like my soul was burning with rage and setting every nerve in my body alight. I was made of nothing but anger so strong I couldn't feel pain anymore. I pulled myself to my feet and ran at him. Dwight and his other guy grabbed my arms and shoulders, held me back. I fought against them. Got close to Negan's face while he laughed at me.

"If you laid a finger on her, I'm gonna break them off!" I yelled. "I'll tear you to pieces! You're gonna die so slow you'll wish you'd never been born. I'm gonna-"

Another fist slammed into my jaw so hard it twisted my whole head up to look at the ceiling. I tasted blood, felt a stinging in my tongue as it started to swell. A swift kick at the back of my legs, and I was on my knees again. Negan's hand tugged at the top of my hair, forcing me to keep looking up as he leaned over me. Everything stung, and the ground shifted underneath my knees like I was about to pass out.

"Hey, hey," Negan said like he was deeply insulted. "Look, I don't know what kind of shitshow you and your man Rick have been running, but that kind of shit does not fly around here. Ain't nobody putting their hands on your girl, don't you worry. Not unless she wants them to, of course."

It did nothing to make me feel better. Nothing. Negan could be lying about all of it. He could've killed Naomi hours ago, could've done all kinds of horrible shit. I knew that he could very well be telling me what he knew I wanted to hear - needed to hear - to keep me in line. I also knew that if I kicked off now, gave him a reason to kill me, or let me rot in here, I'd never know what happened to her.

"Better be the truth," I warned him. If there was one bruise on her body or a hair out of place, he was a dead man. He was a dead man, anyway. But if she was hurt, I'd make it last for months. Peel off tiny pieces of him until he was begging to die.

"Cross my heart and hope to die," Negan said. "I was just appreciating her, that's all. Nothing wrong with that, is there?"

Yes.

I didn't say anything, just glared up at him.

"See, I ain't going to kill your girl unless you give me a reason to," he said. "You step out of line. You throw another punch like that… and it won't just be you that gets a beating for it. Do you understand?"

My heart was beating so hard I could feel it hitting against my ribcage. I couldn't say anything. Couldn't do anything. Couldn't move. The fight to stop myself from trying to kill him was all-consuming. But in my head, I was tearing him apart with my bare hands. Negan waited, but my mouth stayed shut.

"I gotta hear you say it," he said. "I gotta hear you say that you understand the rules, man. I'll let this one slide, but you throw a punch like that again… I will slice off a piece of her, and I will watch you eat it. Do you understand?"

I felt sick. Gut-wrenching, painfully, ill.

"Yeah," I nodded.

"Good," Negan said, relaxing, stepping back. "Because it would be a real shame if I had to kill her. I like her, Daryl. I mean it. I'd be mad as hell if you did something that meant I wound up having to feed her to Lucille."

Not as mad as I would be.

He leaned back on the wall, a relaxed and easy smile like we were just two friends shooting the breeze.

"She's a lot like you, you know. She was making all kinds of threats about how she was gonna kill me. Slice me up and bleed me out," he laughed like it was a fond memory. "It was… adorable."

A tiny bit of pride flared up inside me. Despite the shit we were in, Naomi hadn't lost her fight. She was smart as hell. The only person in the world who'd have followed me to a shithole like this. Put herself in danger for me. If anyone could outsmart this asshole, it was her. New confidence rose up to meet that pride.

"You ain't gonna find it so adorable when she beats your ass," I told him. I was sure it would happen, just prayed I'd be around to see it. To help.

He bent down again, real close. I could feel his breath on my face.

"I'm gonna take everything from you," Negan said. "Your clothes, take your name, take your goddamn identity until you are as Negan as the rest of these sorry assholes. And then, I'm gonna take your girl."

I spat in his face. It was an instinctual, gut reaction. Most of it was blood. I watched how it ran down his chin and fantasized about it being his blood instead of mine. He shook his head, wiped it away. But he got this light in his eyes. Like he liked the fight. Like I was giving him everything he wanted.

Negan stepped back, let Dwight and his other men get a few hits in. It was worth it. They could've hit me another dozen times, and it still would've been worth it. I barely felt it, still riding high on the satisfaction of what I'd been able to do.

And then it hit me.

Naomi.

Would they punish her for this? For what I'd done? Was that enough to cost her something? Negan leaned in real close to my face. Like he was daring me to do it again. Or was about to spit back.

"The best part is, she's going to come to me willingly, Daryl," he put his meaty fingers under my chin and forced me to look up at him. My head was still spinning, the rest of the room was just a blur, but his face was crystal clear in front of me. "And you are going to thank me for taking such good care of her."

Never.

A cold twist in my gut made me clammy and queasy all at once.

He could take my clothes, he could try to take my name, my identity. But he could never take my girl. Not really. As much as she felt like mine, I wasn't dumb enough to think of Naomi as anyone's but her own. For whatever reason, she'd chosen me - and I was grateful as hell - but she would always be free to change her mind. If I wasn't good for her, didn't treat her right, or if she didn't feel the same way about me as I did about her, I'd want her to leave. To be happy. Even if it was someone else.

But this asshole?

No goddamn way.

"Don't believe me, huh? Honest to God, that's how it's going to be. Ain't that right, D?" he looked up at Dwight. A look passed between them that I did not understand. He said, "Yeah, that's right."

But I thought I saw the muscles in Dwight's jaw clench like he was holding something back. A flicker of resentment in his eyes. A thought that hadn't occurred to me before suddenly gripped me.

What the hell happened to Sherry?

I kind of didn't want to know the answer. There was too much dread that came with the threat of knowing. Like there was any chance that what had happened to them would happen to Naomi and me. Was there anything in the world that would turn me into this asshole?

No.

He could threaten to kill me as much as he liked; I'd never do his dirty work. I'd never bow to him like Dwight. And if he really did kill Naomi, I'd fight him until I killed him. Or he killed me. Didn't much matter.

Negan turned to leave, glanced at Dwight over his shoulder, "Knock some sense into him for me, will ya?"

Dwight and the other guy grabbed me under the arms and dragged me out into the hallway. There were more of Negan's guys waiting out there. Negan took a slow stroll down the hall and didn't even turn back when they started beating on me. Just whistled to himself like the sound of fists and shoes slamming into me was music to his ears. I got to my feet a couple of times, managed to hit some back. But there were always too many of them. I could never stay up for long.

From the ground, I tried to kick at them. Tried to trip up as many as I could, but two of them got my legs and pinned me down on my back. The bottom of Dwight's shoe crushed down on my nose. I struggled, but my arms were pinned under heavy boots. There wasn't a part of me that wasn't hit. Kicked me so hard in the stomach, I thought I was going to puke.

And then without warning, it lessened. They backed off. Someone could've given the order, but I didn't hear it because my ears were ringing. Their grips on me loosened, and I managed to twist myself away from a few of them. They pinned me again, my cheek pressed against the cold concrete. But the beatings stopped. For a moment.

"Hey! Hey!" Dwight called out. Sounded worried about something. I followed his boots as they ran away from me, toward a door I was sure hadn't been open before. I had a chance to take a breath, confirm that my ribs were bruised at the very least, some of them probably broken. I spat out blood that had been collecting in my mouth, threatening to drown me. Dwight stopped at the door, and I heard him say, "You know you're not supposed to be down here, sweetie."

Sweetie?

Is Sherry alive after all?

But the feet standing in the doorway were too small for an adult. I raised my head as Dwight tried to push a kid back out of the hallway. She resisted him, locking eyes with me.

Wide, horrified eyes that fixed on me. Knew me. She had her sister's nose.

Mia.

Chapter 33: Unlocked

Naomi

Every time the key turned in the lock, an involuntary shiver ran up my spine. Such a small sound was the only one I heard for long stretches of time, and I hated that it had such a big effect on me. With nobody to talk to and nothing going on around me, the silence was all there was. Until the door unlocked. Time was only broken by it being opened or shut. The light would change slowly, and I'd stare at the same four walls and think about how I was going to find Daryl, how I'd get us both out. I tried to steer clear of thinking about what might be happening to him. My mind went to all sorts of dark places, and I knew if I let it linger there, I'd lose it entirely.

I looked through the frosted glass in the door and tried to see how many people Negan had guarding me. If I could start building a schedule of when they changed shifts, I could look for a weak link somewhere. One of them who was more forgetful with the keys. Or a moment I was unguarded.

But it was hard to see anything through the glass. The only person I had any actual contact with was Simon. He'd open the door, throw in a chunk of stale bread, and leave again. Never said a word to me. No matter what I asked him, or said to him. Sometimes, it felt like he wanted to. Like he had to actively stop himself from beating on me. I could remember his smile at the clearing, the glee he'd taken in watching Abraham die. Felt like a guy like Simon could easily have been leading these people. What had Negan done to make him fall in line? Would he do the same to Rick?

No.

Rick was stronger than that. He wasn't a sadist either. I couldn't imagine him carrying out any of Negan's orders with the kind of pathological joy that Simon did. Rick and the others would be working on getting us back, and on bringing down Negan. I was sure of it, but it wasn't enough. Daryl and I had never relied on anyone before. I didn't want to start now.

As kids, we'd been powerless. I'd known what was happening to him, what his dad was doing, and I hadn't been able to do shit. But now I had a chance. I could save him, I could get him out. I just needed to fight a little harder.

Hold tight, Daryl. I'm coming for you.

It must've been days since I'd seen him. All I had was Negan's word that he was alive, and that was not good enough. I don't know what Negan's intention was in keeping me here, isolated and cut off from him, but the anger in me was only building the longer they let me stew in it. He would pay for this. They all would.

I unlaced one of my shoes. I arranged the bedsheets so that it looked, at first glance, like I was in them. And then I waited by the door for someone to come in.

I had done this at Terminus. I could do it again.

Of course, at Terminus, I'd had other people, I hadn't been alone. But I wasn't alone here either, Daryl was here. And he needed me. I couldn't just sit here and wait. I'd done that long enough, and it had got me fucking nowhere.

The door opened. This was it.

"For fuck's sake," Simon took his usual few steps into the room, his eyes on the lump in the bed that he thought was me. "Lazy piece of-"

I sprang forward. He was taller than me. I had to leap to wrap the shoelace around his neck. But I got it over his head with surprising ease. Tightened it, enjoyed the way his fingers automatically reached up to try and pull it off. I used both hands to pull it as tight as I could. Heard the satisfying sounds of him choking out. The flesh on his face started to turn red. I glanced down at the gun that was still in its holster. When he was weak enough, I'd be able to grab it. Then I could shoot my way out. Or use him as a hostage, negotiate for Daryl's release.

Pain erupted from the back of my head as something hard hit it. It was so strong that for a moment, I couldn't see anything. I felt my grip start to slide. Was that Lucille? Had Negan come in to find me choking out his right-hand man and decided to kill me after all?

Something hard hit me in the back. And then again on the side of the head. The ground rushed up to meet me before I even realized I'd let go. I landed awkwardly on one of my arms, felt a sharp pain shoot up it. I rolled over onto my back to try to get back on my feet as quickly as possible. Two of Simon's men were already leaning over me. The hard handles of their rifles hit me again and again.

"Stop," Simon said. His face was still red, but it was now flushed with anger instead of the lack of oxygen. He leaned down over me, pulled on the front of my shirt, so I was raised up a little off the ground. "This bitch is mine."

Tiny pieces of spit flew from his mouth and hit my face. He struck me with such force that my head smacked back against the floor. I felt something start to bleed. Two more hits to the face, and then he moved onto the rest of my body. His friends held me down as he beat my torso, stomped on my stomach, and then wrapped his hands around my throat. I tried to pull them away. He blurred in front of me as my eyes start to water. I clawed at his hands, and when that didn't work, I scratched his face. I'm sure it was hard enough to draw blood, but he did not let me go.

Someone took hold of my hands and pinned them down on the floor. I struggled to get any air into my lungs at all. They burned like I was breathing in fire. Simon's red, gleeful face swam in front of mine. Dark shadows began to creep into the corners of my vision. My oxygen-starved brain conjured Daryl out of those shadows. His voice. The smell of him. His kiss.

This was it.

This was how I died, and I hadn't even managed to save him.

I'm sorry, Daryl. I'm so, so, sorry.

Then, it stopped. Simon got off me. I rolled onto my side, gasping for air. The floor was slick with my blood. I coughed and spluttered, feeling like my neck would never be the same, and I'd never breathe right again. My fingers hurt when they brushed against the skin on my neck.

They took my shoes and left me lying there. I couldn't move. Couldn't get up. I watched the shadows get longer on the floor in front of me as time moved on, and I stayed still. I thought of Daryl, a painful tug deep in my chest. Like something in me was trying to reach out for him and couldn't.

All I'd ever wanted was for him to be safe. Happy. Now I didn't even know where the hell he was. I couldn't hold my tears back anymore, I missed him so damn much that it turned the physical pain into almost nothing.

Hours passed, and then the door opened again. I wondered if Simon had come back for Round Two and knew I didn't have the strength to take him on again. Especially if he'd brought back up.

But it was Negan's voice that rang out. Sharp and angry, "Oh, what the hell? Is she dead?"

"You wish," I told him. My voice didn't sound right. It hurt to talk.

"Oh, thank God." Surprisingly genuine sounding relief. I didn't move from where I was. I ached too much. I heard a creak as he sat down on the bed behind me. "I am truly sorry about this, Naomi. This should not have happened. I will deal with Simon, alright?"

"Yeah, right," I heaved a sigh that hurt my ribs. "Like you didn't order him to do it."

"I didn't. This is the opposite of what I ordered him to do." It was hard to know whether to believe him or not. I turned my head. My neck hurt. He looked down at me and laughed again, "Boy… you must've really pissed him off."

"Good."

"I'm curious," he said. "If you had gotten out of here. Where would you have gone? Do you know the way out?"

"No," I admitted. "But I wasn't looking for the door."

"Ah," he said. "Looking for Daryl?"

"Yeah."

"Yeah? What if I told you Daryl got out?" he said. I shifted where I was, forced my aching body to turn so I could see him. "Today. Someone left the door to his cage open, and he bolted. He's back home in Alexandria fetching sticks for Rick."

"Then I'd know you were an idiot and a liar," I told him. He gave me that grin again. Like I'd taken his bait exactly the way he wanted me to. "Daryl wouldn't leave without me. Not unless he knew for sure I was dead. And I mean for sure, he'd have to see my body to believe it, he wouldn't just take your word for it. I ain't dead, he ain't here, so he didn't get out. Not yet."

I was getting tired of explaining this kind of shit to him. He'd said Dwight had told him all about Daryl. And now he had us under lock and key, you'd have thought he'd have had a better idea of the kind of person Daryl was, have got the hint that he would never break. But Negan still didn't have a clue.

"The faith you two have in each other…" he said, shaking his head in mild disbelief. "Where do I get me some of that? I mean, don't get me wrong, it's dumb. It is really stopping both of you from getting the most out of this place. But it's sweet as hell."

"Try being less of an unrelenting asshole," I offered. "Maybe then someone would give a shit about you."

He laughed. "C'mon, let's get you to a doctor."

"You got one of those?" I asked.

"We sure do," he said. "We got a lot of shit here you might enjoy, y' know. If you let yourself."

"Let myself?" I repeated. "Door's been locked, or ain't you noticed?"

"Touchè," he said. "Alright, you wanna make a wager? If Daryl gets out and comes looking for you, you win, and I'll let you out of this box for a little while. If he doesn't, I win."

He didn't say what would happen if he won, and I didn't ask because I didn't want to know.

"When Daryl gets out, you ain't gonna have time for any dumb bets," I said. "You'll be a dead man."

"Sweet of you to worry about that," he said, while I rolled my eyes. "But you can let me handle Daryl. Now, get up. I want a doctor to check you over, okay?"

He helped me to my feet. I tried to do it myself, I didn't trust it not to turn into another beating, and I couldn't bring myself to take his hand. But it didn't. He just led me down the corridor and two flights of stairs to a room on the ground floor. I did what I'd done on the way up, spent every moment outside of that stupid room looking for places that Daryl might be.

Doctor Carson checked me over, fixed up what he could, but most of it was just bruises waiting to happen. Negan stayed the whole time. I didn't expect him to, and it seemed to make the doctor more nervous having him around. I almost asked him to piss off so the doctor could do his job, but I was tired and talking hurt too much. Doctor Carson gave me the all-clear, and then it was time to go back. No closer to finding Daryl.

A woman was waiting to get in there after me. It took me a moment to recognize her all cleaned up. Last time I'd seen her, she was covered in dirt, pointing a gun at me and riding away on the back of Daryl's bike.

"Hey," I said, so shocked to see her that I also blurted out, "thought you were dead."

She stared at my face, clearly struggling to place me in all of this. Negan stopped, turned on his heels, and walked back.

"Quite an accusation to be throwing around while you're out here looking like shit," he said. It was a fair point. I could feel parts of my face starting to swell, no wonder Sherry hadn't recognized me. "How do you know my wife?"

"Your wife?"

That didn't make any kind of sense. Dwight wasn't only still alive, he was here. What the hell was she doing now married to Negan?

"We don't know each other," Sherry was quick to say. I wondered if I should be offended by how quickly she told him that she wasn't associated with me. But, given my current standing in this place, maybe she was wise to distance herself. "We met once. In passing."

"In passing?" Negan said.

"I pointed a gun at her," I said. "Yelled a little."

"Yeah," Negan chuckled. "That checks out. Alright, c'mon."

As I passed her, Sherry gave me a small smile, and a look I couldn't quite work out. Negan opened the door to the staircase and led me back up to my room. It was almost a weird kind of relief to be back in there. The corridors were long and cold, and I knew being back here would mean that Negan would leave me alone soon.

"I'm gonna make sure Simon is taken off this job," Negan told me. "I can't have this happening again."

I didn't thank him. But the impulse to do so rose up in my throat and realizing that made me queasy. He'd sure made it sound like he was doing me a favor. He wasn't. He was still leading me to a damn cell where he'd keep me locked up, the same way he had for the last however long it had been. Just because it wasn't his hands that had choked me out, didn't mean it wasn't his fault.

I walked back into the room, where my blood was drying on the floor. I turned to Negan. "Can I get my shoes back?"

He laughed, "Not a chance, darlin'."

The door closed. Locked. I waited for the silence but it did not come. Not immediately.

"I told you," I could hear Negan's raised voice out in the corridor. He sounded genuinely and surprisingly angry. "Not to beat her like that."

"But she was-" Simon started to argue.

"I don't care what she was doing," Negan said. "I told you, no visible bruises. No damage that he can see. She ain't strong enough for what we need her for now. We're gonna have to delay the whole damn thing."

I turned and looked at myself in the mirror that was hanging on the wall. Parts of my face were, indeed, starting to swell. They might be gone by morning, but there were already marks on my neck. Deep, red lines where Simon's hands had wrapped around them and squeezed.

"She'll be fine," Simon said. "She's playing it up."

"Fucking asshole," I muttered to myself, still staring at the marks he'd left on me. Although Simon couldn't hear me, it was a little cathartic to cuss him out behind his back.

It made sense now, Negan's concern; it hadn't been for me. Not really. It had been because my injuries had thrown a spanner in the works of whatever he had planned. He didn't want Daryl to see any bruises on me. It was weirdly satisfying, to know that I'd been right not to get sucked in by his fake sympathy. And it gave me some amount of hope, that whatever he was going to throw at us next, we might at least get to face it together. I'd get to see that he was alright.

I sank down onto the bed, and for the first time since I'd got here, sleep came easy. I don't remember it happening, it just washed right over me.

When I opened my eyes again, it was dark, and my whole body ached. I'd been woken by the familiar sound of the key in the lock. Although I didn't want to give him the satisfaction, I couldn't suppress my shudder at the thought of seeing Simon again. But when the door opened, it wasn't him. It was Sherry. I sat up when I saw her.

"Where's Simon?" I asked.

"There's been… a change," Sherry said. "Negan's orders. I'm looking after you now."

'Looking after...' such an odd way to talk about what was happening here.

"Oh," I said. I was, genuinely, a little surprised. I'd assumed that Negan's talk about making Simon pay for what he'd done was bull, but, clearly, he'd be serious about not letting him in here with me again.

"Brought you some food," Sherry said. I noticed she'd put it on a plate, unlike Simon, who just threw it down. She was also talking to me, looking at me, didn't seem in a hurry to leave—the polar opposite of Simon. I wondered how genuine it was. Or if this was part of whatever Negan was planning too. Maybe she was in on it. To get me back for waving a gun in her face.

"Thanks," I said, but I didn't move to take it from her. She set it down on the floor but still didn't leave.

"And some water," she set down a glass of water beside it. "They never gave me enough when I was in here."

My parched and aching throat throbbed at the mere thought of drinking.

"You were in here?" I asked. Sherry glanced quickly at the door behind her and then back at me.

"I saw Daryl today," she said. It wasn't an answer to the question I'd asked, but I didn't care. I sat bolt upright.

"Where?" I said. "How is he? Did you talk to him? Is he okay?"

"He's… alive," Sherry said. "He was brought in to see the doctor just after me. It didn't look like he had any new injuries. Think they were just checking him over."

Relief brought tears to my eyes. The tightness in my chest relaxed a little. It made me think that Negan whatever Negan wanted him for, he wanted Daryl alive and fairly healthy. And Negan would make sure he stayed that way. At least for now.

He's alive. We got a shot.

She quietly watched my reaction, a look in her eyes like she genuinely felt sorry for me. It was pity. But it wasn't as patronizing as I usually found it. There was an understanding in there too, like she recognized where I was.

"Do you know where they're keeping him?" I asked. It was a long shot. But one I had to take.

"No," she said. "Not exactly. There are a few places he might be, but…"

She shrugged, and my heart sank a little. Still, I tried to focus on the fact that he was alive. That a doctor had at least looked at some of his injuries. Sherry turned to leave.

"You know Dwight's here, too, right?" I asked. It felt like a dumb question, but I couldn't see how you could go from being out there with someone, risking everything with them, to leaving them for a guy like Negan. Unless he was keeping them apart. Like Daryl and me. And she just didn't know.

Sherry gave me a sad smile, "Yeah, I do."

"Then, why is he… why are you…?" I didn't know how to word it, and I could feel this massive knot of dread forming in my stomach. It was something about the way she was looking at me. Like my shock and surprise were naive.

"I did the only thing I could do to save him," she said quietly. "If you're smart, you'll do the same for Daryl."

She didn't tell me what, exactly, it was that she'd done. But to me, it didn't look much like either of them was safe or free.

 

Daryl

Mia's alive. Mia's alive, and Naomi doesn't know.

I ran it over and over in my head until it became the only thing I could think. A life raft in the sea of shit we were all in. Both of them were here somewhere, and neither of them knew.

Naomi. Mia. Me.

All under the same roof.

So close to everything I wanted. We hadn't been in the same place for so long. I needed to see them. Needed to know they were alright and had each other.

Focusing on that need was what got me through all of it. Even when they stripped me, beat me, fed me nothing but dog food, I got through it. People treat you like an animal long enough, it's easy to forget the human parts of you, but I had them - my girls - to get me through. I could make the two of them a family again, and as long as I got to do that, I was at peace with dying in here.

It was easy to think that this would be where I died; there were times I felt close to it. They gave me new clothes, but they never let me sleep. Every time I started to drift off, they'd blast the same damn song through the room. Over and over. For hours. Until I felt like the tune was seared into my damn brain. Covering my ears didn't do much to block it out. Just muffled it a little.

Mia's alive. Mia's alive, and Naomi doesn't know.

I repeated that over and over. Tried to use it as a way of drowning out the damn song.

Then it would stop, and there'd be moments of silence where all I had were my own thoughts. That didn't make getting to sleep any easier, I kept expecting that song, and I'd be too on edge to properly fall asleep. So, I'd close my eyes and focus on Naomi and Mia. What it would be like when I got them both out of here.

I'd bring them both back to Alexandria. Rick would greet us at the gates. We'd go to one of the houses, any house would do, it would be us that would make it a home. Safe. Warm. Naomi and I could take Mia outside the walls and teach her to hunt and fish. We'd cook up what she caught. Aaron and Eric would come for dinner. Rick and Michonne too. Carol would bring cookies for dessert. We'd look after Glenn and Maggie's little one when they needed a break. Playdates with little Asskicker at our place. Mia and Carl would play out on the street like kids should. Like we had when we were little, but without being afraid to come home again. And at the end of the day, Naomi and I would curl up with each other. She'd have her damn books, and I'd fall asleep to the sound of her breathing in my arms.

But those thoughts were hard, too. If I drifted off in the middle of them, they turned bad. Mia would go missing again. Naomi would turn to me, but Negan would be right behind her. That bat would crack on her skull, and I'd wake up screaming.

During one of those long stretches of silence, I heard something outside the door. Braced myself for Dwight again. It seemed too soon for another dogfood sandwich, but time moved weird here. Long stretches of nothing broken only by Dwight's ugly face. And that damn song.

The door didn't open. I looked at the light coming under it and could tell from the shadow that there was someone outside. A scuff as they slid down the length of the door to sit on the ground.

"Daryl?" It was a whisper, small and scared, but I recognized it instantly. I scrambled closer. "Daryl, you in there?"

"Mia?"

It was hard to believe it was really her. I could've been imagining it. Lack of sleep, food, and any company but my own thoughts could've made me hallucinate that she was here.

"Hey," she said. There was so much worry in her voice. "I came as soon as I could. As soon as it was safe. Are you okay? Dwight… he was… those men..."

"Yeah, yeah, I'm fine," I told her. I wished she hadn't had to see me like that. "That was nothing, don't you worry about me. You gotta be careful down here. What if they catch you?"

"I got a few minutes," she said. "Dwight takes a cigarette break in the stairwell with Sherry sometimes. I'll get away before he sees me."

There was so much I wanted to say to her. Things I needed to learn about the girl she'd grown into, and I wanted to say how sorry I was that I'd missed out on so much of her life. But there was no time for any of that. The clock was ticking. Smokes only last so long.

"Naomi's here," I said. I hated that I had to tell her through a damn door. That I couldn't see her face or take her hand. I heard her sharp intake of breath.

"She's alive?" she said, her voice broke. I could feel the disbelief through the door. I reached out and put my hand on it, wishing I could see her. Just hug her while she processed all this.

"Yeah, she's alive," I said. I could feel myself getting choked up. A few of Mia's sobs floated under the door, and each of them hit me like a tiny punch in the heart. "She's somewhere in this place, and I'm gonna get her out. Get you both out. You hear me? She's gonna be fine. Both of you are gonna be fine."

"You found her?" Mia sniffed.

"Yeah. Well, actually, she found me," I said. "While she was out looking for you."

I heard her take a deep, shaky breath.

"I'm glad she found you," Mia said, her voice cracking again. "I'm glad she wasn't alone."

"We got a place," I said. "A whole community. You'll like it there. There's other kids. Perla's with us."

"Perla!" she gasped. "Thank God. I tried to…"

She stopped. Paused like she was listening. I listened too.

Far away, down a corridor, something moved.

"I think I gotta go," she said.

"Don't let them see you," I said. I would never forgive myself if Mia got hurt because of this. I heard her feet move against the floor, but she didn't run just yet.

"Hey, Daryl?" she whispered.

"Mia, go," I hissed. "Before they catch you."

The pause was so long I couldn't stand it. And then Mia said, "We missed you, Naomi and me, we missed you."

I felt a lump forming in my throat.

"I missed you guys too," I said before it could get too big for me to speak. Then I heard her feet echo on the floor as she ran. It faded to silence. I kept listening. Trying to make sure she got away safe. A door opened and closed. Feet on the floor. Bigger and heavier. Probably Dwight. Nobody called out or yelled.

Silence.

My whole body relaxed for the first time in a while.

Me. Naomi. Mia.

The silence didn't last so long this time. The door unlocked. Dwight again. I wondered if it would be another dog food sandwich. Or more clothes that weren't mine. Maybe he'd come to take the ones he'd just give me off me again. But he didn't. He forced me up onto my feet, pulled me out of the room by the collar of their dumb sweatshirt. I looked for signs of Mia as he dragged me away. I didn't see any. Didn't seem like he did either.

When I felt like she might've got away, I started looking for signs of Naomi. Peeking in every door that I could. Listening for any sound of her. Was Dwight taking me to her? Did Negan have something planned for the two of us?

He pushed me through a door. A doctor's office. Not at all what I expected.

"Carson...," Dwight started to say, then he stopped when he saw the woman already sitting on the exam chair. It was his girl, Sherry. I'd thought she might be dead, for Dwight to become this big of an asshole, but it looked like they'd both managed to make a nice life for themselves. Crawling back to serve Negan. Double-crossing me.

"We were just finishing up," the doctor said as Sherry hopped down.

"Hi, D," she said to Dwight. It was weird... like she hadn't seen him in a while. Maybe Negan had a thing about keeping couples apart.

"Hey," he said. Then he looked away from her. She glanced at the ground for a second, and then up at me. I saw the moment of confusion cross her face as she tried to place mine. Then I saw the realization hit her.

"Daryl, right?" she said. It looked like something was falling into place for her. And it wasn't anything good.

"Don't talk to him," Dwight said. He pushed toward the chair. Lying out on the table next to it was a pregnancy test. Dwight caught it too. He got this real weird look on his face like it was the worst thing he could've seen. Was that what there was such an odd atmosphere between them? One of them wanted a kid, and the other didn't?

"It's negative," Sherry said quietly. It wasn't something she looked too sad about.

"Well, maybe next time," Dwight shrugged. But it wasn't like he sounded hopeful either.

"Sorry, still getting used to being my own assistant," the doctor said, hurriedly clearing it away. Sherry was looking at Dwight, but he'd turned away from her.

"Whatever they say," she said to me. "Just do it."

"I said don't talk to him," Dwight snapped at her. Not the kind of way you should talk to your girl. They glared at each other for a moment, and then the doctor stepped between them. I heard the door shut behind her as she left. Dwight had his back to me.

"Okay, let's take a look," the doctor pulled down the back of my shirt and looked at the exit wound Dwight had made when he shot at me. Old scars got their familiar itch. I tried to pretend it was Naomi standing behind me with her gentle hands and soft words. I'd never missed anyone so much. "It'll get better if you let it. Negan will take care of you. Trust me."

Yeah, right.

He let go of me. Dwight grabbed me up again, dragged me back along a corridor. Again, I looked for signs of Naomi and Mia. Any clues to where they might be keeping other people. It was so dark and dingy in these corridors. Everything was quiet; every door was shut.

Negan came round the corner. Dwight shoved me hard, so I was crouching down. He kneeled behind me like Negan was some kind of King.

"Dwighty boy," he grinned at him, and at the sight of me being forced to kneel to him. "I need to talk to my associate for a minute. Go about your business, except for you. You stand right there."

One of the large, burly men stood guard over a chair. Dwight pulled on the back of my shirt collar again, forced me over to the chair. I sat down. The other guy pulled a gun and trained it on me in case I got any ideas about getting up. It was killing me, to think that Naomi might be close and I'd miss it. Dwight left to talk to Negan.

I looked at the room in front of me. I could see the edge of a bed, and a kitchen unit decked out with all kinds of crockery. Even a damn microwave. A fridge. No idea if you could use them or not, but they were wasting a lot of power blasting that damn song into my room all night, so I assumed they both worked. There was a beat-up but still comfy-looking armchair and, behind that, some bookshelves. Proper books on them too, and I felt this deep pang in my chest.

Wherever they were keeping Naomi, I hoped it was nice, like this place.

Dwight came back from whatever he was talking to Negan about, pulled me out of my chair. I thought we'd go back to the shithole he'd pulled me out of, but we didn't. We went outside. Compared to the dark I'd just spent days in, the light hurt.

He let go of me by the compound's chain-link fence. On the other side of it, guys dressed like me struggled against Walkers. Trying to catch them with their bare hands. Unarmed. Unprotected. Pushing them onto spikes as part of the compound's defense.

Dwight raised my crossbow, shot one of the Walkers before it could kill one of the guys out there.

"You know, I'm getting the hang of this thing," he said, lifting my crossbow almost to my damn nose to make sure I could see it. I couldn't wait for the day I got it back off him. I'd fire every bolt I had into his body, pull them all out slow and do it again until he bled out. He grabbed me by the back of the neck, pushed my face right up the fence, so some of the metal dug into me. "That's you, asshole. Unless you're smart. Your choice. You could be like them… or me. Or them."

I ain't gonna be a coward like you.

I said nothing.

As Dwight dragged me back to my cell, I tried to memorize the route out of here. And the places I'd been taken today. If I could start to build up an internal map of this place, I could find my girls, and I could get us out.

"Make it easy on yourself," Dwight said, throwing me back in. Almost sounded like he was actually worried about the choices I was making.

"I ain't ever gonna kneel," I told him.

"Yeah, I said that, too," Dwight said.

"Yeah, I know."

I was there when you said it, asshole.

"See…" he sighed, "that's the thing, man. You don't. But you're gonna."

The door closed. Locked.

That song again. I couldn't stand it for another second. I got to my feet and started kicking the door. Pounding on it. It didn't budge. Without shoes on, my kicks didn't do shit. But if I kept going, I thought I could weaken it. Days, weeks, however long I was trapped here, surely at some point, it would break. One of us had to. And it wasn't going to be me. I had people to find. To protect.

I kicked it for hours. Kicked until I couldn't anymore. And then I sat back, ran over the exit route in my mind. Over and over and over again.

When the door finally opened again, it wasn't Dwight. Just some other guy with my food. He said nothing. I took it from him. He watched me take a bite and then left.

The door closed. I did not hear it lock.

The song started up again. But no key turned in the lock. Had he forgot? Was it a trap? Where was Dwight?

I peeked at the gap under the door. No shadow. No feet on the tiny sliver of the floor that I could see. I tried the handle. It moved. The door opened, just a crack, but nobody yelled. Nobody slammed it shut again, nobody was out there. I pushed it open. My heart started racing. This was it, this was my shot.

I opened it just enough for me to get out and then shut it real quiet behind me.

I tried to look in each room I passed. I didn't think they were keeping Naomi close to me, but I couldn't run the risk of missing her based on a dumb assumption.

"Naomi," I called. Loud as I thought I could get away with. The corridor looked empty, but I didn't know if there was anyone else behind the other doors. Didn't know where in this place Negan spent most of his time. "Hey, Naomi! Mia? You in there?"

Nothing but silence.

I knew I had to move on, had to move fast. But locked doors were the hardest ones to move away from. What if they were sleeping and didn't hear me? What if I missed them?

I heard footsteps in the corridor behind me and had to keep moving. Maybe I could circle back. Maybe I could check another time. People walked down a nearby hallway. Talking. Laughing. From the shadows, I peered around at them. Trying to see if Naomi was with them. Or Mia.

Someone grabbed the back of my sweater. I turned, fist raised, and ready to strike. But it was Sherry. I thought for a moment, then I lowered it.

"Go back while you can," she warned me in a whisper. "You know I did. Whatever he's done to you, there's more. There's always more. You won't get away. And when you're back, it'll be worse."

She was wrong. She had to be. I was getting out of here, and so were Naomi and Mia. Today. Now. I started to walk away.

"If not for you, do it for her," Sherry hissed at my back. I stopped. "For Naomi. Go back."

I turned.

"You seen her?" I asked. My fist clenched, and I had to fight with myself not to raise it again. "You know where she is?"

"If you want to keep her safe," she said. "Turn back. Do what he says. Whatever he says."

No chance.

I didn't have time for this shit. Sherry was probably just trying to keep Dwight out of trouble. I'm sure when Negan found out we were all gone, he'd be in a world of pain.

Good.

I walked away from Sherry, moved up another floor. Checked the rooms that I could. Called Naomi's name as loud as I dared outside the ones I couldn't.

I turned a corner. A long, empty corridor stretched out in front of me. I took a step, and someone started to clap. Slow. Punctuating the air like calculated gunshots. A group of people emerged from the doors around me. Right in front of me, down the other end of the long corridor, was Negan. I stopped. Didn't matter much because he was already walking toward me. His men were closing in.

I got ready for a fight. Waiting to see where the first punch would come from. Negan stopped in front of me. His guys stopped too.

"Who are you?" Negan pointed his back at the guy who was supposed to have locked my door. Or, not, as it was kind of looking like.

"Negan," he said.

"Who are… you?" Negan asked again, this time pointing at the guy directly behind him.

"Negan," he said.

"Who are ya?" he asked the group.

"Negan," was the response - a chorus of assholes echoing in this corridor.

"You see that?" he chucked. "I am everywhere. And this was your shot to prove that that fundamental fact was sinking in, and you failed. Which sucks, because your life was about to get so much cooler. Am I right?"

"Damn right," one of his men replied.

Negan stepped forward, almost hitting my bare feet with his bat. He laughed when I tried to get out of the way.

"I don't think you get it yet," he said. "So, I'm gonna break it down for you. You get three choices. One, you wind up on the spike, and you work for me as a dead man. Two, you get out of your cell, you work for points, but you're gonna wish you were dead. Or three, you work for me. You get yourself a brand-new pair of shoes, and you live like a king! Choice seems pretty obvious. You should know, there is no door number four. This is it. This is the only way. Screw it."

He swung that bat at me.

Stopped about an inch from my head.

"Wow," his face was uncomfortably close to mine. I wanted to punch it. To end it with him now, but he had that damn bat, and I didn't have shit. "You don't scare easy. I love that. But I got a question. What you doing up here? So far from that hole that I stuck you in… The door out is on the other side of the building. Whole other floor. And I know you know that."

He was walking away from me, back up to the other end of the corridor. He stopped outside a door.

"You looking for something?" he asked. "Or someone?"

No.

The blood in my veins turned to ice when he raised an arm, motioned to someone on his left. I heard a struggle from a room I couldn't see.

Was it her?

My whole body came alive with the promise of seeing her. Finally. Nausea and nerves. I longed for her. But I wanted her safe more than I needed to see her.

She stumbled out into the hallway, pushed by someone behind her. Dazed, confused. Wide eyes and bare feet like mine. She saw Negan first, and then her head turned toward me. Our eyes met. For a second, everything was okay. We weren't apart anymore. I could see that she was still alive. Still moving and breathing, for a moment, that was enough.

She took a tentative step toward me. Clearly expecting someone to stop her, or for Negan to yell at her to stay back. But they didn't. Negan watched her take two more steps and then break into a run. His men moved to stop her, but he shook his head at them. Looked me dead in the eye. He wanted me to know that he was letting this happen. Permitting it. That anything good that happened to us from now on was because he allowed it. I knew it was probably a bad sign. That he was letting us have this moment so that whatever was coming next would hurt all the more. But her hands reached for me, and I didn't much care what was coming after. She was in my arms again, and I felt like myself for the first time in days.

Naomi, forever my light in the dark.

We'll get out of this. We still got each other.

I held her gently, in case she was as sore as I was. I breathed in the smell of her and tried to memorize the way she felt against me. If this was the last time I got to hold her, I wanted to remember it. My face buried in her hair, my lips by her ear, I whispered, "They've got Mia."

I felt her shock. Held her tighter, hid her face in my shoulder so that nobody would see her react.

Don't fall apart.

I got you.

Don't fall apart.

Footsteps on the ground towards us. Her hands gripped at the shirt on my back as they tried to tear us apart.

"What?" disbelief made her whisper tremble. Hands that weren't hers grabbed my shoulders and pulled. They got her too. I saw them grab her, knew it probably hurt, but did not look away from her face. Her eyes, wide and fixed on mine, searched my face for the truth. I nodded once to let her know she'd heard me right, she hadn't misunderstood. I watched the panic sink in and wished I could say something to make it easier, so she could be happy that we'd found Mia in all this. I wanted to tell her that Mia had looked okay. Healthy. Well-fed. Unharmed. But couldn't communicate any of that to Naomi without someone knowing. So she was left to worry about it, to imagine that Mia was being treated like us. Beaten and starved. I saw the fear of it all eating away at her.

"Looks like you were right, darlin'," he said to her. "He did come for you instead of trying to get himself out. Dumb move."

Naomi looked at the ground, but I could see the edges of something burning in her eyes. She was angry, and she was doing her best not to show it. I wondered if she was mad at me for trying to find her instead of getting myself out. But she should've known I wouldn't leave here without her. Now she knew that Mia was here, too, she should know that the only way out of this was as a group. A family.

Negan put a finger under her chin, forced her to tilt her head upwards to look at him. Her hair fell away from the side of her face. I caught sight of deep purple bruises around her neck. Anger made my own throat feel like it was closing up. Negan saw me notice it and laughed.

"Now, I told you," Negan said. "In no uncertain terms that if you stepped out of line, it wasn't just going to be you that paid the price. And here you are. Stepping out."

No.

No. No. No.

The hands on me tightened their grip as I struggled to get back to Naomi. A sharp whistle from Negan rang out across the hall. The first blow landed on the side of Naomi's face.

"Stop it," I yelled. "Stop!"

"It's okay," she yelled back to me. Something about it made Negan start laughing again. "Daryl, don't-"

She never got to finish. Someone kicked her in the back, and she went sprawling across the ground. Now her arms were free, I watched her try to fight back. But there were so many of them. And I could tell she was already weak. When they hit her, she yelled out like there were already bruises on parts of her that I couldn't see.

My eyes stung. My chest got tight.

"It was me," I yelled at Negan. "I'm the one who got out. Punish me. Not her. Stop it! Just STOP!"

"You're right," Negan said. "It was you. This is your fault. Don't forget it."

Someone punched her in the gut, and she puked. Another smack around her head and I saw her eyes roll backward before she shut them. They didn't open again. She hit the floor. At the next kick in her gut, there was no hint that she was still feeling any of it.

"You're killing her!" I screamed at Negan. At all of them. "Stop! Stop it! You gotta stop this."

Wake up, Naomi.

Please.

You gotta wake up.

"Alright, stop," Negan yelled over me. His men stopped at once. He waved his hands, made them move aside to where she was lying on the floor in a puddle of her own blood and vomit. Her eyes stayed closed. Negan bent over her, reached down, and grabbed the material at the front of her shirt. He looked almost annoyed that she'd passed out.

"Hands off her!" I yelled at him. He turned his head to look at me and then pulled on her shirt, lifting her off the ground a little. She was so limp. Her head lolled back, her arms dragged against the floor.

"I'm checking she's alive, asshole." Negan said to me, lowering her back down again. "Or don't you care?"

I ran at him. It was such a shock to the guys holding me that I slipped free. It wasn't for long. Someone's foot shot out of nowhere, tripped me up on the way. Sent me sprawling across the ground. My chin smacked against it.

I looked up at where she lay. Her face was turned toward me. Pale. Tired. Couldn't tell if she was still breathing. I reached for her hand as the first boot slammed into my back. My fingers grabbed hers and then slipped right out again. She was too far away. I crawled forward. More boots on my back. My ribs crushed into the floor.

I got close enough to take her hand, move my fingers down to her wrist, and feel for her pulse. Beating beneath her skin. Strong, like she was.

Thank God.

Not dead.

They grabbed my legs, dragged me back. I saw them move her. Saw them carry off her limp, unresponsive. Better be taking her to that doctor. Better be making sure she was alright. Now that I knew they hadn't killed her, it was time to make them pay for hurting her. I twisted around where I was, kicked out at one of them, and punched at another. I fought until I couldn't fight anymore. I prayed to black out like she did, so they might take us to the same place. But that never came, and they threw me back in that damn cell.

Chapter 34: Two Good Things

Naomi

Mia's here.

Mia's alive, and she's here.

It was my first thought. And it made the pain I woke up in bearable. Felt like I was bruised on the inside all the way down to my bones.

The room was dark, but I knew instantly that I wasn't alone. Someone else was here, they moved something across the room. I knew who I hoped it was. The last time I'd woken up feeling anywhere near this shitty, there'd been a safe pair of arms to hold me together. A shoulder to lean on when I felt weak. He'd grumbled at me for being a crappy patient, and neither of us had any kind of medical degree, but he was still the best doctor I'd ever had.

"Daryl?" I whispered before I opened my eyes. I knew it wouldn't be him. There was no way Negan would have allowed it, but that subconscious part of me, the one that stays up all night dreaming of him, was the first to wake up. My slowly-stirring mind flitted between this room and sleep.

"No," Sherry's soft voice was heavy with sympathy. "It's only me. How are you feeling?"

"Been better," I opened my eyes properly and struggled to sit up. "I've also been worse."

Sherry moved closer to me, waiting to see if I needed any help. I did, but I didn't want it to be from her. I didn't know her. Didn't know if I could trust her. A quick glance at the room around the room told me I was back in the doctor's office and had been sleeping on the patient's bed. I wondered how long it had been since Negan's guys had beaten the crap out of me, and probably Daryl.

No sign of him now.

"Is he okay?" I asked. Didn't have to tell her who I meant.

"He's back in his cell," she said, which wasn't much of an answer.

Not okay, then.

"Doctor Carson's sleeping," she said. "But I can go and get him if-"

"No," I interrupted her. I didn't give a shit about seeing Doctor Carson. These wounds would heal, but it was dark outside, and I figured even Negan had to sleep sometime. He was, for all the fear he struck into those around him, still human. I was out of my cell, and I knew that if there was ever a time I was going to find Mia, it was now.

"Are there kids here?" I asked. Sherry looked surprised by my question. Guess it would seem out of the blue to her. She hesitated, and I didn't have the patience for it. "This place, you take in kids here?"

"Yes," she said. "The Sanctuary-"

"Sanctuary," I repeated, with a laugh that caused a stab of pain right through my ribs. "Some Sanctuary this place is."

"I know," Sherry said with a sympathetic smile. "But, believe it or not, Negan does take people in. He gives them shelter, jobs, and community. There are whole parts of this place with people who have no idea what Negan's like. There are farmers, engineers who keep the lights on, people to keep this place running. Not everyone who works for Negan fights for him. Many people just live here, kids included."

Relief tugged at my heart so much it almost tore. If Mia was here, and I had no reason to believe that Daryl was wrong about that, then it sounded like she hadn't been treated like they were treating us. She might be okay. The question burned my lips. But trusting Sherry was a risk. I looked at her, weighing my options, trying to work out what kind of person she was.

"You had a sister, right?" I asked as gently as I could. I knew it would be painful, but I hoped that reminding her would stop her from ratting me out to Negan. "Daryl told me you lost her when you were out there with Dwight. After you escaped from this place."

"Tina," Sherry said. The muscles in her jaw tightened. "Her name was Tina."

"Tina," I repeated. I knew I had to tread carefully. "I'm real sorry you lost her. That you had to see that… I can't imagine how hard that must have been."

I stopped, not sure what else I could say. Getting out of this place only to lose your little sister on the run… I imagined it was the kind of pain you couldn't put into words. Or ever truly recover from. No wonder Sherry had done whatever it took to keep Dwight alive. He was probably all she had left, and now they couldn't even be together. She was fighting them back, but a few tears slipped down Sherry's cheeks. She wiped them hurriedly away. "Thanks."

I took a deep breath, gave her a moment to recover. Weighed up the risks of sharing my own story with her. It was obvious she had no love for Negan, her loyalty to him was based on fear more than anything else.

"I lost my sister, too," I said. Sherry looked at me, eyes full of questions. "She ain't dead, we just got separated, but… I think she might be here. Do you… do you know any of the kids?"

My question felt like it was made of glass. Like the wrong answer would break it, leave something inside me shattered and bleeding.

"Yes," she said. "I know most of them."

Here goes nothing.

"Her name's Mia," I said, heard my voice start shaking and tried to stay calm, but it was hard. "Mia Payton. She's thirteen. Her hair's light-"

"I know Mia," Sherry interrupted me. Something deep in my chest that had been tied in knots for months started to unwind. Painful relief. I finally knew where she was. After all this time. And she wasn't dead, wasn't some blankly staring Walker I had to put down. She was here, and she was alive.

I closed my eyes. Hot tears against my eyelids. Daryl whispering it to me while he held me close was one thing, believing it was another. Even now, it felt dangerous to hope. Tears spilled out. I couldn't stop them.

I heard Sherry take a step. "Mia's your sister?"

"Yes."

She's here. She's really fucking here.

My hands shook as I reached up to wipe my eyes. I looked back at Sherry, she'd moved closer to me. It looked like she wanted to reach out but didn't. I felt like a wounded animal, the kind that people avoid helping because they're worried it'll lash out.

"Can I see her?" I asked. I didn't expect the answer to be yes, but how could I stay sane if I didn't try? Sherry hesitated; I could see her mulling it over. My heart beat so hard in my chest I could feel it against my ribs.

"Negan can't know," she said eventually. "You can't let him find out she's your sister. The more connections you have in this place, the worse he can make things for you. He's already got Daryl, and if he knows he's got Mia to help keep you in line too…"

Sherry shuddered at the thought of it. A deep, gnawing worry ate away at my stomach. Would Negan really use a child like that? I'd seen the way he looked at Carl, the way he threatened him in that clearing. He hadn't actually hurt him, but… Even the thought of Mia in that situation was almost enough to make me vow to join the Saviors on the spot.

"I just want to see her," I said, my heart sank right down to my feet. "I just want to know she's okay."

It had been months since I'd seen her, and now I might just be able to walk down the hallway and talk to her? Hug her? Sherry was still hesitating. Clenching my fists hurt, but it was automatic. Negan had tried his hardest to beat it out of me, but there was still enough fire in my veins to burn this damn place to the ground. I had to hold myself back from punching Sherry or making any threats by reminding myself that this wasn't her fault and that I needed her on my side if I was ever going to see my sister again.

"Negan's sleeping," Sherry said. My heart sped up. She was clearly carefully considering what I'd asked her, weighing up the options and the risks. "I can probably bring her to you, but it can't be for long. Nobody can see her, nobody can know about this."

"That's fine," I said. Who the hell was I gonna tell? I'd settle for just a glimpse of her. We didn't have to talk, just a moment would do. All I needed was to see her little face, to know she was alive and doing okay. I'd do whatever it took to get that.

"She doesn't know what Negan's like," Sherry reminded me. "Not really. You're going to have to break a lot of bad news to her, and you won't have long."

"She can handle it," I assured her. Mia was smart, and kids are always more perceptive than folks give them credit for, I was sure she would already know that something wasn't right about this place. If she'd seen Daryl, she'd know for sure.

"Okay," Sherry said quietly. My heart lifted, but it felt so fragile. Like if something went wrong now, it would break beyond repair. "I'll go get her."

I'll go get her.

I'd been longing for someone to tell me that, and now it was happening, it felt like a dream. When the door closed behind her, I half expected Sherry not to come back. Or that I would wake up in some other room. Maybe back on the floor where I'd passed out. Finding Mia, in the middle of everything that was happening to us, made every beating I'd taken worth it. I'd have taken a thousand more just to see her one more time. To know she was okay.

She's alive.

She's here.

It hit me in waves. Large, painful ones. A deep sea of hope and fear that threatened to drown me. My lungs filled with it.

When I'd found out my Momma was pregnant again, it had felt like the end of the world. I'd seen two roads ahead of me, one where everything I was working towards went up in smoke because I had to look after her kid and another where I didn't, where I let this new baby grow up as neglected as me.

Then she'd arrived. So small and fragile. So sleepy. I'd been in the delivery room with Momma, and a nurse had handed her over to me. I didn't want to be there, was terrified I'd drop her. But the moment she looked up at me for the first time, started crying from the shock of finally being out in the world, it had all changed. I'd have laid down my life for her right there and then. It was my first memory of her.

The last memory I had of her was when she'd been taken from me. Her sad and scared eyes looking to me for guidance. And instead of telling her to fight like hell, I'd reassured her. Told her that everything would be alright as long as we just did what they said. Lied to her. She'd counted on me to protect her, and I'd failed. Left her alone in the world because I had been too scared to fight until it was too late. And now, somehow, she'd wound up in this shithole.

I'm sorry, Mia. I am so fucking sorry.

I heard footsteps coming back down the corridor and sat up, leaning forward to wait for them. If this was Negan, or Simon, or anyone but Mia and Sherry, I would lose my goddamn mind.

The door opened. I tried not to cry and to hold myself together for her. I knew I was bruised and bloody, which would frighten her enough without her having to see her big sister crying too. But the moment I saw her anxious little face in the doorway, the tsunami I'd been holding back burst out of me. She ran towards me. I leaped off the doctor's bed, barely registering the pains in my body. I reached for her, and she threw herself into my arms.

"Are you okay?" I asked as I squeezed her tight. I never wanted to let her go as long as I lived. "Are you hurt? Did they hurt you?"

I'll burn this place to the ground right now.

I'll peel off Negan's skin and throw him in a bath of acid.

"I'm okay," she said. "They haven't touched me, not once. But you… and Daryl… you both-"

"I'm fine," I tried to reassure her. "Daryl and I… our group had a run-in with Negan. But I'm fine."

"What kind of run-in?" she asked. Her eyes narrowed slightly. I wondered what her opinion of Negan was, her experience of him, and how a pill this would be for her to swallow.

"He killed one of our friends," I said. "I don't even know what he did to the others because he took Daryl and me prisoner, locked us up in the dark so we couldn't see what happened to them."

"Negan did that?"

"Yes," I said. "And he can't know that you're my sister, or that you know Daryl, okay? I don't know what he'd do if he found out, but I ain't risking it. I ain't risking you."

"I could ask him to help you," she said, her worried eyes were on my face. "He might stop-"

"Negan's the reason I've got these bruises," I said. For a moment, she looked shocked, and I thought about how Sherry had warned me about the innocent people here who had no idea what Negan was like. But it passed, and Mia started looking angry. It was an anger I recognized. One that you only get when someone hurts a person you care about. One that can make you do stupid shit. I quickly added. "Looks worse than it is. I'll be back on my feet in no time. I'm okay."

"You're hurt," she said. "That ain't okay."

I sat down on the infirmary bed, and she climbed up to sit next to me. I put my arms around her and just held her for a moment, needing a moment to take a breath. It all rose up inside me, everything since I'd lost her. Every futile search. I thought about how alone she'd been until now, stuck in a place like this. How do you even start apologizing for all of that?

A lump in my throat made it too hard to talk. The hole in my heart I'd been carrying around since she'd gone was starting to close, but even healing from it hurt. Parts of me that I thought might be dead were pulling themselves back all at once. Before I could say anything, Mia looked up at me.

"I'm sorry," she sniffed, wiping a few tears from her face. "I'm so, so sorry."

"You're sorry?" I pulled away from her a little so that I could look at her face. "What the hell have you got to be sorry about?"

"I left," she said like that was any kind of answer. "Perla and me. We tried to fight… all of you were trapped in those cars, and we tried to get you. We tried…"

"I know," I cut her off. I didn't want her to have to relive any of it. What those kids must have gone through trying to free us all, I never wanted her to have to think about it again. And I was going to make damn sure that getting out of here didn't require that kind of sacrifice. Not from her. If there was a price to pay, I was going to be the one paying it.

"They just started killing," she whispered, and it was like I could see the ghost of that moment reflected in her eyes. "José got us out. Told us to get help. We waited, but… he didn't come back."

I thought of José and how calm he'd been. How he'd died protecting his sister and mine. How I'd been the one to pull the trigger.

"He didn't make it," I told her, and she nodded like she'd been preparing herself for that. "But Perla did, and she found Daryl. She's okay, she's back home, and you can see her when we get out of here."

A heartbreaking mix of sadness and hope crossed her face. "Is she mad at me? For leaving her?"

"No," I said, stroking her hair. "Not at all. She was just worried about you, she didn't know where you'd gone."

"I saw the car coming down the road," Mia said. "We thought it might be those men… the ones from Terminus, so we tried to hide up in the trees. Like we did back in the beginning, y' know? But, it was hard to climb, so I gave Perla a leg up. She was going to pull me up from one of the branches, but by the time she got up there, the car was too close. I thought they'd see us. So… I tried to get someplace else to hide, but they saw me. They caught me and brought me out into the road."

"It was the Saviors?"

"Yeah," she said. "I didn't know if it was safe to go with them, so I told them I was out there on my own, that I'd lost my group. I didn't want to put Perla in danger too, not until I knew whether I could trust them or not."

"Mia..." I breathed. "Why didn't you run?"

"They had guns," she shrugged. "They weren't pointing them at me or anything, but they still had them. I thought if I went with them, if I found out that they were good people, they'd be able to help."

"Help?"

"José told us to find help, people who could take down Terminus," Mia said. "That's what I was doing."

"All by yourself?"

"If it wasn't safe, I didn't want to put Perla at risk," she said. "Because if we were both dead, there wouldn't be anyone to help the rest of you."

She said it so matter-of-factly, but I was stunned into silence for a moment. The weight of that decision seemed too big for her little shoulders. Feeling responsible not just for herself, but for Perla, and the rest of us who had still been trapped back there. I was as in awe as I was mad as hell that she'd put herself in danger like that.

"I was trying to be brave," she said, a little defensively when I didn't say anything right away. "I was trying to keep Perla safe. I just did what I thought you would do."

"You did?" My voice came out all small and quiet. She nodded.

"They brought me back here," she said. "To the Sanctuary. I waited until I knew that they weren't going to kill me and saw that this place had food and shelter, and then I told them that Perla had been with me. We went back out to find her, but… she was gone. I thought… I thought one of the dead ones got her. Or maybe she'd been found by-"

"She's safe," I reminded her, I could see Mia spiraling back into that old worry. One she'd clearly been gripping onto and turning over and over in her mind since the girls had been separated. "She's okay. She's still alive."

"When I knew that the Saviors had guns, and a lot of people who could fight, I told them about Terminus," she said. "They didn't listen at first, but eventually they did. I told them how many of you were trapped there, and... they agreed to help get you out. I think they wanted you all to work for them, but that sounded better than what was happening to you. So, I took them there, and everything was all burnt-out. Destroyed. I didn't know if you were all dead, or... if it was you that had done it."

"Daryl's friend Carol did that," I said. "It was after I left looking for you, but… she took the whole place down."

"Good," Mia said. "I'm glad it's gone."

You and me both, kid.

There was so much heavy shit in this room, in what should have been a happy moment, that it didn't feel right to bring it down further by telling her the rest. The fight we'd had, and the friends we'd lost. The dark turn the survivors had taken. We were together again, and sometimes the best thing to do is look forward.

"You'll like Carol," I said, and I leaned my head against Mia's. "She makes the best cookies."

I hoped by the time we got back to Alexandria, Carol would have returned so that Mia could meet her. Or I could take her to the Kingdom to meet her and see Bryce again. That thought filled me with a painful kind of happiness. There was so much good to come. So much ahead of us, if we could just get the hell out of this place.

"I'm going to get us out of here," I told her. The more I said it, repeated it, even just to myself, the more real it felt.

"Daryl too?"

"Of course," I said, I'd assumed that was obvious. "We ain't going anywhere without him. Me, you, Daryl. All of us. I'm going to get us all out of this place."

"That's exactly what Daryl said," Mia said, a small smile twitching the corners of her mouth. "I'm glad you found him. I didn't like thinking of you out there on your own."

"Mia…" I couldn't say much more than her name. "I love you so much, kid."

"Love you, too, Naomi," she said.

A quiet settled around us, and I forgot for a moment where we were. I forgot what was going on. Only Mia and I existed in a little bubble. One good thing in a sea of shit.

"I'm sorry," Sherry said quietly, but it was enough to burst our moment. "I need to take her back now. One of Negan's patrols will swing round to check on you soon. She shouldn't be here when that happens."

No.

We haven't had enough time.

I reminded myself that just moments ago, I'd have been happy with just seeing her through a window. And now we'd had a whole conversation. It was difficult to stop that crushing desperation from creeping into my heart.

This wasn't 'goodbye.' This was 'see you later.'

Mia jumped down from the bed. I could tell she was trying not to cry again, and I wondered if she was being brave for herself or for me. Sherry gave me a warning glance.

"Mia," I said, she looked back at me. "Remember, you can't tell anyone you know me, okay? Or Daryl. That has to stay a secret."

"I know," she said. "And I'll see you soon. Love you."

"Love you, too," I tried not to fall apart again as Sherry led her out of the room.

It's amazing what one good thing in a sea of shit can do for you. The fight it can give you. How it can sharpen the way you think, and remold that courage, so it's no longer directionless anger and fists. Fighting Simon had gotten us nowhere. If I was going to do this, if I was ever going to get them both out of here, or get close enough to Negan to kill him, I needed to be smarter. Needed him to think that I was falling in line.

Easier said than done, though. Negan's patrol did swing by not long after Sherry came back. And when they saw I was awake, they went to get him.

"Naomi, Naomi, Naomi," he said when he saw me like he was greeting an old friend. "What am I going to do with you, huh?"

His usual sick grin was plastered all over his face, I still wanted to punch his teeth out. I still wanted to tell him to go to hell every time he looked in my direction. But I didn't. And I tried to hide those thoughts from showing on my face. He walked around the bed and took in my injuries.

"Not so many on the face this time, that's good. Now, I'm going to have Sherry here take you back to your cell, but you gotta rest up," he told me. "Heal those wounds. Get your beauty sleep, I want you looking your best, okay?"

The way he was looking at me... it was so hard not to cuss this guy out. But I could swallow it. For Mia, and for Daryl, I could take almost anything.

"Because I think under these bruises and all this blood… you could be real pretty," Negan said, he reached out and brushed a piece of blood-matted hair out of my face. I wanted to vomit, but I didn't even flinch. "Maybe even beautiful. And I want Daryl to see that. I want him to see what he's missing out on, maybe remember why he fell in love with you in the first place."

I wonder how this will backfire when you realize he ain't in love with me.

"Hey," he said, his fingers under my chin held it in position in front of him, his eyes still roaming my face. Assessing it. Made me want to pull my own skin off. "You did well. I mean it. I am impressed. The beating you took… man, you should've seen the look on Daryl's face when we couldn't wake you up."

He laughed.

Smug bastard.

I didn't need to see that look. I'd seen the one right before it: Daryl's anger and his pain. I hated seeing him look like that. Hated even more that I was any part of causing it. It wasn't his fists or his feet slamming into me, but I saw in his eyes that he blamed himself for what was happening. I'd tried to tell him that it wasn't on him, to reassure him that I was fine, but the pain had been too much.

I would tell him, though, I would tell him when we got out of here. I'd hold him close, and I'd make sure he knew that nothing bad was his fault. That knowing him was, in all honesty, one of the best things that had ever happened to me. Even in the middle of a beating, I still felt lucky as hell that he was there. There was nobody I'd rather be stuck in this hell with. The anger that was in me started to fade. Even listening to Negan wasn't so bad.

Because I didn't just have one good thing. I had two. And that made me powerful as hell.

"You did good, Naomi," Negan said again. "You really toughed it out. What a champ. I am proud of you."

I swallowed all of it back. Raised my eyes from the floor to meet his. Then, though it brought all sorts of bile to the back of my throat, I said, "Thank you."

The surprise and delight in his eyes was difficult to stomach. I played out the day I'd finally get to kill this man in the back of my mind. When I'd be able to watch the light die in his eyes.

"What did you just say to me?" he asked.

Was he really going to make me repeat it? I wasn't sure that I could. I took a deep breath. "Thank you."

"Well, shit," he whispered. "You are full of surprises. That was polite as hell."

I smiled. There was a scab on my lip that stung a little when I did so, but it was nothing compared to the gnawing hatred in my stomach. But I could stomach it. For Mia, and for Daryl and for whatever was left of Alexandria. I would stomach it until I could gut Negan like a goddamn fish.

 

Daryl

Dwight pulled me out of my cell, back to the room he'd caught me looking in before - the one with the bed and the books and the fridge.

"Step in," he told me. Negan was sitting in that comfy looking chair, waiting for me with that goddamn grin. It widened when he saw me.

"Jesus. You look awful. Don't you worry, we'll have Carson fix you up. You thirsty?" he asked. I didn't answer. I was, couldn't remember the last time they'd given me water.

"Naomi!" Negan clicked his fingers like he was calling on a damn dog. Like assholes at the diner used to do when she was a kid. The spark of rage in me was so familiar. That deep-seated need to punch him in his stupid face.

Naomi stepped out of the shadows in the far corner of the room, and when I saw her, I could have cried.

There was no more blood on her. Her hair was clean, and someone had pinned little bits of it up on her head, letting the rest of her curls fall down around her pretty face. They'd put makeup on her. Given her a little black dress that hugged the gentle curve of her waist and skimmed over her hips. She looked like a goddamn Princess.

"Don't you think she looks pretty, Daryl?" Negan said. "Ain't you gonna tell her that?"

Not in front of you, asshole.

I'd never seen her in anything like it. But, there was a reason for that. It stopped mid-thigh, showed her legs, and the scars I'd always known were there but never actually seen. Cigarette burns from a Momma who didn't deserve a kid, nevermind one as good as her. I didn't mean to look. Didn't want to look. And when I realized I was staring, I looked away again. Not because they were ugly or anything, but because she hid them for a reason, and I'd never wanted to see them without her wanting me to. If she wanted me to. I'd always thought she'd open up when she was ready. When it was just the two of us, and she could take a breath, stop trying to take on the whole world for one small moment, and just be with me.

Now Negan had robbed her of that. Robbed us of it.

She held out a glass of water to me, and I looked at her face. Such sad eyes. I took it from her, and she reached a hand up towards me. I think she was going to brush the hair out of my face, take a good look at the damage that had been done, but I'll never know for sure, because Negan said, "Uh-uh. No touching."

She wanted to fight it, I could see it rising in her, but she dropped her hand. Didn't move from where she was standing. So close to me.

This room, and her looking the way she did, I knew Negan was trying to show me what he thought I wanted. What he thought my ideal life would look like. But it wasn't right. If he'd asked, I'd have told him that if he wanted to dangle my perfect life in front of me, we'd be outside. She'd have shoes so she could run and hunt, walk through the woods with me. The only marks on her would be the little smudges of dirt she gets from accidentally touching her face with muddy hands because she's so caught up in what we're doing she forgets her hands are messy. And she could wear whatever she damn well wanted as long as she was comfortable.

"Step away from him, Naomi," Negan said, he pointed to the bed in the room. "Sit."

Again, I saw that fight in her eyes, only for her to extinguish it herself and slowly do as she was told.

"Pretty crappy boyfriend you got," Negan said to her. She stared intensely at the ground. Her cheeks were red from what I knew was unwanted attention. Naomi had never been one for listening to compliments, especially from straight-up creeps like him. "Here you are looking smoking hot, and he ain't got the balls to tell you that he thinks you're beautiful."

She knows, though, right?

I must've told her.

Why was he doing this? Did he think I'd forget how pretty she was? That it would make me want to fight harder for her? I'd always thought she was beautiful, but it wasn't why I loved her. She didn't have to look a certain way for me to want to fight for her.

And this Naomi, sitting on some stranger's bed and staring at the floor, tugging at the bottom of her dress and trying desperately to hide those scars… This was not the life I wanted for her. For us.

"It is 'boyfriend,' right?" Negan asked us. "Not 'husband?' How long have you been together?"

Will this guy ever shut up?

I couldn't look away from her. Her eyes were still staring at the ground, but she seemed like a shell. A ghost of herself. I felt like if I looked away from her for even a second, she'd blow away like smoke. As my memories of her were all that was keeping her here.

Marks of captivity were everywhere on her. They'd done their best to cover bruises on her neck with that damn makeup, but I could still see them. Deep purple lines where some asshole's hands had tried to choke the life outta her. He might've dressed her up all pretty, but her feet were still bare so she couldn't run from him. And she didn't need that stuff on her face, either. She was beautiful no matter what, but right now, she wasn't comfortable. She wasn't her.

"Fuck me, you two are quiet," he said. "Ain't seen each other in a while, last time you did, you both took one hell of a beating, but now you ain't got shit to say? You always this quiet with each other? Or is your relationship not so much about the conversation?"

His horrible, grating laugh filled the room and made my skin itch.

"Not long," Naomi said suddenly. There was a tiredness to her voice that I didn't like. Negan stood up, took a few steps towards where she was sitting on the bed.

"Ah, there she is," he said, a sick kind of glee in his voice. "She's back in the room. What are you saying, Naomi?"

"You asked how long we've been together," she said, finally lifting her eyes from the floor. Looking at him, not me. "The answer is, not long."

She wasn't lying, but something about it stung. It made our relationship sound smaller than it felt, or at least how it felt to me. Maybe that's what she was trying to do, to throw him off a little. She was so quiet, and without her looking at me, I found it hard to get a read on what she was thinking.

"Well, shit," Negan said. "Could've fooled me. The way you two talk about each other… it's intense as shit. Thought for sure it had been a few years. You lying to me, Naomi?"

"Nope," she said. There was something so calm about her tone. Like she'd given up fighting. It terrified me. What had they done to her? What had been bad enough to make her fall in line? Surely not Naomi. Never her. "We only got together recently."

"Huh," Negan said. "Well, then maybe this won't be as hard for either of you as I thought. See Dwighty boy, here? He had a wife. A proper goddamn wife. He worked for points. Him and his super-hot wife and her super-hot sister."

I glanced over at Dwight. His face was stony, gave nothing away. I thought about Tina, how scared she'd been in that burned-out forest. How scared they'd all been.

"But see sis - she needed meds, and that shit is hard to scavenge, so it costs more. Sis fell behind on points, so I asked her to marry me," Negan said. "Told her I would take care of her in sickness and in health, blah blah blah, because I am a stand-up guy."

No fucking wonder she ran away.

"She tells me she's going to think about it. Next thing I know, I'm dealing with an orange situation. Dwighty boy here stole all the medication and took off with his super-hot wife, and my super-hot maybe soon-to-be fiancee," he continued. "So I had to send my guys after him. Because I can't let something like that stand. There… are… rules."

He'd raised his bat again, was waving it under my nose.

"Cost me an arm and a leg going after him. And you know what - Dwighty boy? He still got away," he shot Dwight a glare like he was still mad about it. Beside me, I felt Dwight tense like even he wasn't sure that Negan was over it. "But here's the thing. D, he saw the light. He manned up, he came back. He asked for my forgiveness. I like that. Made me… take notice. But Lucille… Well, you know how she is. She is a stickler for the rules."

Stop calling it 'she.' It's a damn bat, psycho.

"So, Dwight… he begged me not to kill Sherry, which I thought was kind of cute, so I was just gonna kill him. But then Sherry says that she will marry me if I let Dwight live, which, if you think about it, is a pretty screwed-up deal, 'cause I was gonna marry her sister until she wound up dead, but… Sherry is super-hot."

I don't like where this is going.

I glanced at Naomi. Her eyes were fixed on Dwight, they had been the whole time Negan was talking. A little frown creased her brow. The kind she only gets when she's thinking real hard about something real serious. She was plotting something, and this was feeding into it. For the first time since I'd walked in here, she looked like herself. Like she did when she was putting some dumb binder together, or making a pro-con list. Concentrated planning. No distractions.

I love you so much, you goddamn nerd.

"Anyways, it was a start. But it wasn't enough. So Dwight… he got the iron. And then I married his super-hot wife… ex-wife… And then, after all that, he still got on board. And now look at him. One of my top guys. And we are totally cool."

He put a hand on Dwight's shoulder. Looked at him like he owned him. There was a flicker, a tiny little flinch from Dwight that made me think they weren't totally cool.

"The point being, I think you can be that guy. I think you are ready to be that guy. You look around here. This? Well… it can all be yours," Negan said, finally getting around to what he'd been building to, what I'd been able to see him building too since I stepped in here and saw this place. Saw my girl, looking like a goddamn Princess. "All you gotta do is answer one simple question. Who are you?"

I said nothing. Stared at the floor. I wouldn't say it. He'd never get me to say it.

"What is it, cat got your tongue?" he said. "I'm gonna ask you one more time. Who are you?"

I looked up at him. Him and that damn bat.

I will kill you one day. Or she will. Don't matter.

"Daryl."

Another smug smile. I hated it. I'd rather he got mad. I'd rather he beat me again than stood there, giving me this satisfied look.

"This is the only-" Dwight started to say.

"Hey. Shh, shh, shh. It's cool, D. He made his choice. Ain't my problem if he made a dumbass choice," Negan said. He was so damn close to me; I could practically smell what he had for lunch. I thought that might be it. That we might be done now, but he swung back around to look at Naomi. "There is always another option. Naomi?"

She looked at him, surprised to be spoken to. It had caught her off-guard, mid-thought about something else. Negan didn't notice, didn't know her well enough to pick up on it.

"Have I mentioned how super hot you look today?" he said.

She got what he was implying right away. I saw the shock hit her all once. The dread. The fear that this would be another Terminus. That she'd end up forced into bed with some guy she hated while people she cared about suffered around her. It consumed her for a moment, and she couldn't hide it from anyone.

"Oh, don't look at me like that," he said, walking right up to her. His hand under her chin forced her face up to look at him. "I am not a bad guy. I take good care of my girls. And I don't do anything they don't say yes to. You can say no, Naomi. No hard feelings. But it is an option. One that can get you two out of a whole lotta shit. You and Daryl could live a nice life here. Just not, y' know, together."

I felt sick and watched Naomi's hands shake a little as she folded them into her lap to hide it from him. What Naomi went through should never have happened in the first place, and there was no way in hell I was letting it happen again. Not with a guy who didn't understand that saying yes because you want to ain't the same as saying yes because you don't have any other choice.

He would have to kill me first.

"Of course, she'd be mine," Negan continued, looking at me now. "But I'm a generous guy. I've been known to share my wives with my men when they've earned it. Ain't that right, Dwighty boy? As long as they have my permission, and my girls say yes, I am cool with that."

Share.

I couldn't do this anymore. My hands balled into fists. I tried to keep my breathing steady, but I couldn't. There was too much rage in me, filling my lungs. It would tear me apart if I didn't tear into him.

"Daryl," Naomi's voice called me back before I could even move towards him. I blinked a couple of times, tried to clear my head. "Don't."

She was considering his offer. I knew she would be. It had already been made painfully clear that Naomi would do anything for me. Even this. I'd never understand why. God knows, I ain't worth it. I'll never know what she saw in me, what made her stand by me like this. Usually, I just felt lucky as hell. But today? Today, I wished she'd cared less, been a little more selfish.

Her eyes met mine, and with a look, I knew what she was trying to say, what she would've said if we'd been free to talk to each other. "I'll do it for you. To keep you safe. I'll do anything for you, dumbass."

I shook my head at her. Didn't say anything, but it felt like I was begging. Pleading with her not to do this.

We will find another way out.

There's always another way.

She looked away from me, a flicker of annoyance crossed her face, and I knew she'd understood me.

"Look, it's a lot to process, I get that," Negan said. "You can have a little while to mull it over, and if you don't want to, that's fine by me. I think you could make a fine soldier, too. Damn fine. But take your time to think about it, and while you do, Daryl here will be working for points."

That was fine. That was something I could stomach. Getting out of that cell, dealing with Walkers instead of dealing with him, that sounded better than anything else he'd offered up so far. At least, for now, it kept Naomi away from him.

Dwight took me back to my cell, shoved me in there.

"You're gonna wind up in that room or hanging on the fence!" he said. He sounded genuinely angry that I hadn't taken the deal and that Naomi hadn't either. I got it. He'd caved when we hadn't. I looked up at him as he was about to shut the door.

"I get why you did it," I told him. He stopped. "Why you took it. You were thinking about someone else. That's why I can't."

When they'd been faced with the same deal, all they'd had left was each other. It wasn't the same for Naomi and me. Abraham's memory hung over both of us. The fate of everyone left in Alexandria hung over both of us. Taking that deal would mean fighting against them rather than with them. Betraying all of them. It was not an option. And, of course, Naomi's life felt like it hung in the balance too. She could do what she wanted, be with whoever she wanted. But I would die before I let anyone touch her without her consent.

Sitting in the dark, I felt calmer than I had in a while. Negan had shown his cards. Some of them, at least. He wanted me to be like Dwight, and her to be like Sherry. Or both of us to lose ourselves and each other, become another mindless drone who called themselves Negan. Knowing what he wanted, what all of this was for, would make it easier to fight it.

Dwight didn't let me sit there for long. A few hours later, he came to pull me back out again.

"Get up, asshole," he said. "You've got your first job."

I was mentally prepared to work the fence, fight Walkers, and stick them up on spikes. But that was not my first job. My first job was raiding Alexandria, my first job was taking things away from my friends and family. Destroying our home.

Standing outside the gates of Alexandria felt all sorts of wrong. Things were so different now, it felt like the gates should look different, too. Like when they rolled back, the whole place should've crumbled to dust. But it hadn't. It was still standing, and it looked much the same.

Rick looked different, though. There was something about his eyes that wasn't right. Sad and angry and nowhere to put it. But it wasn't just that. He was scared. He was genuinely scared when he looked at Negan and the hordes of men he'd brought with him. He tried to say something to me, but Negan wouldn't let him. I wanted to say something to him, too. I wanted to tell him that I was okay, although I knew it didn't look that way. I knew I looked like shit. But I didn't want to be just another worry on his mind.

They took all the guns. Ran through Olivia's damn inventory and found that two were missing. Negan told Rick to find them, or someone would die. Then he took me from place to place, made me take shit from my friends. There didn't seem to be much rhyme or reason to it. It was all just whatever the hell Negan wanted.

He stopped me outside a house, and my heart sank. It was Naomi's place. He couldn't have known that, of course, but I'd hoped I wouldn't have to be there when they went through her stuff. Eric was at the door. He tried to talk to me, I think he wanted to ask me about Naomi, but Negan shut it down.

We spread out through the house. They trashed whatever they felt like trashing, and then we got to her room.

"Damn, this is a lotta books," Negan said, looking around. "The hell is this place; a bedroom or a library?"

He swung his foot at one of the stacks of books, watched it topple over. It knocked over a second one. The books got all jumbled up. It was okay, I could fix it. I knew her system. We could both fix it when we got home.

"Shit, you just flinched," Negan said, looking both confused and amused. "Can't imagine a dumb ape like you having this many books."

I said nothing. Negan looked at Eric in the doorway. "Hey, you. Who's room is this?"

Eric glanced at me like he didn't want to tell the truth but didn't know what else to say. "It's… eh, Naomi's."

Even hearing her name caused a little pang in my heart. She should be here, in this room with me, and the rest of them should be gone.

"Ohhh," Negan said, his face lighting up as he looked around the room. "She some kind of brainiac? Boy, she is really slumming it with your dumb ass. And I gotta say, there ain't much of you in this room. You don't spend much time in here, do you?"

He got this glint in his eye. The same one he'd had when Naomi said we hadn't been together all that long. Like he'd spotted some kind of weakness. A way to tear us apart. A crack in our foundations. Like just because we hadn't slept together meant our relationship was nothing, that my feelings for her were nothing. It was such bullshit. She was everything to me.

"This Naomi's bed?" he asked, sitting down on it. He ran his hand over the covers. "This where the magic happens, Daryl?"

Fuck. You.

"I am definitely taking this," he patted the mattress. He stood up and grinned down at me, his eyes gleaming like he'd won some kind of prize from me. "I love the way it feels, and I want to make sure she feels at home on our wedding night."

I'm going to kill you.

I'm going to beat the living shit out of you.

I'm going to cut a small piece off of you every day and make you eat it to stay alive.

The muscles in my jaw clenched, holding it all back because I had no guarantee that I'd be the one who paid the price if I talked back. The thought of Naomi taking another beating like that - because of me - would've been enough to keep me silent for the rest of my days. I reminded myself that having her bed wasn't the same thing as having her. Negan motioned to his guys to join us in her room, and suddenly it felt too warm in there. Crowded. This was her space. Having strangers in it wasn't right. Having him in there wasn't right. Negan whistled to get my attention, "Don't just stand there, Daryl, get lifting."

I walked over to a corner of the bed, slipped my hands under the mattress, and tried not to think about when she'd been sick. When I'd taken care of her. Or the first night I'd spent in Alexandria seeing her again for the first time in years, holding her hand until we both fell asleep.

With everything else going on, I forgot about the box that Naomi was hiding under her bed. As we lifted the mattress, I saw it through the slats. Everything she'd scavenged for Mia. I wanted to kick it away, somewhere out of sight, but I couldn't. Trying to hide it now would only draw more attention to it.

"Hold up, put that down for a second," Negan said. He bent down, peering through the slats in the empty bed frame. "What's this?"

Shit.

The mattress balanced on its side in front of me. A barrier between Negan and me. Any other time, I'd have been glad of it, but now it just meant that I couldn't do shit as he bent down and slid the box out from under there. He stared down at what probably looked to him, like a box of random junk. He gave it a shake that moved everything around in there, and then he looked up at me.

"Your girlfriend been hoarding shit?" he asked. Then he looked back down at it. I thought for a moment that all he was going to do was tip it out and dump it on the floor. That would've been okay. I could pick it up. Put it back together and put the box where it belonged, to wait for Mia until we brought her home. He started to tip it, I heard the rattle of everything in there shifting around. And then his eyes lit up. "Oh, what is this?"

No.

No, no, no.

He reached in and pulled out a photograph, looked at it like he'd struck gold. I wanted to lean over there, snatch it right out of his hands, but it was too late. He turned it around to show me, although I didn't need to see it. I had it memorized.

"Is this you?" he asked. He moved his finger, so it was hovering over my face. My stupid, grinning face. "Because you look young as shit here. And that's Naomi next to you, ain't it? With a kid."

He moved his finger over her face. Grinning just as much and covered in cake. Negan stepped forward, got so close to me that it was really only the mattress between us. I knew how it looked, how he would see it. "Did she lie to me, Daryl?"

"No," I said immediately. His voice was low, dangerous.

"You sure about that?" he said. "Because it looks to me like you dumb hicks have been together a while. Looks to me like you got her knocked up and that she's been lying to me about how long you assholes have been together. And I do not like being lied to."

"She ain't lying," I said quickly. My heart was racing real fast. It was hard to think straight. Usually, when I felt like this, if someone had been threatening my girls, I'd have dealt with it with my fists. But I knew I couldn't do that now, that if I did, it would put Naomi at risk. I tried to explain. "Naomi and me… we've known each other since we were kids. But we ain't… we weren't together then. We only… We only just got together."

Please believe me. You gotta believe me.

"And the kid?"

"She is-" I caught myself, "was her sister."

"Was?" he repeated. "She dead?"

"Yes," I lied. It felt like the only way to keep Mia safe, keep her hidden right under his nose. Naomi was already too close to accepting his deal for my liking. I couldn't hand Negan the only ammunition he needed to take her from me completely.

"Huh," Negan said. It still wasn't clear whether or not he believed me. He turned the picture back around so that he could look at it, and then I watched as he slipped it into his pocket. "Well, I am keeping this. Alright, let's load this bad boy up and move out."

He tapped the mattress and walked out ahead of us. We carried it to the trucks by the gate. They were getting damn full now. This was more than their fair share of shit. Not that anything about any of this was fair.

The missing guns turned up somewhere. An extra one from Michonne, too. She must have taken it out hunting with her or something because she came back with it, and a dead deer slung across her shoulders. The gun she'd taken wasn't on the inventory. They could've hidden it. I watched the anger burning in Michonne's eyes as Rick handed it over anyway. The hell was he doing? Where was his fight?

"Now that you know we can follow your rules…" Rick said.

"Yes?" Negan turned back to him, and Rick looked at the ground for a second. I wondered if he was feeling that burning need to punch him, too. If he needed to look away to hide it.

"... I'd like to ask you if Daryl can stay," Rick said when he looked back up.

"Not happening," Negan said immediately. And then a little smile spread over his face, and he looked at me. "Actually, you know what? I don't know. Maybe Daryl can please his case. Maybe Daryl can sway me. Daryl?"

I kept my mouth tightly shut. I knew it was bullshit, I could smell it all over him. But on the off-chance that he wasn't lying, and he would let me come home, we both knew I wouldn't do it. Leaving Naomi where she was? With him? Not a chance in hell. Negan laughed because he knew I wasn't going any time soon.

"Now, you gotta try harder," Negan said to Rick like they hadn't already taken so much shit from this place. "Earn for me. Because we're coming back soon, and when we do, you better have something interesting for us. Or Lucille… she's going to have her way. And no more magic guns. Arat; grab that deer, it's getting late."

Michonne threw the deer carcass down from her shoulders as a woman moved to take it from her. Michonne walked away from it, walked away from him. Dwight started my bike. Rode it around by the gate, looking at me the whole time. He was even in my damn jacket.

"You can have it back," he told me. "Just say the word."

Go to hell.

"Nobody died, and you know what? I think you and I refined our understanding," Negan said. "Let me ask you something, Rick. Do you want me to go?

"I think that'd be good," Rick said.

"Then just say those two magical words."

He waited. Everyone waited. Felt like everyone from Alexandria was torn. Those of us who'd been in that clearing, we held our breath. Prayed for Rick to say something that wouldn't goad Negan into beating one of us into the ground again. Those of us who hadn't seemed to be praying for Rick to tell Negan to go to hell. Felt like Rick balanced between the two for way too long.

"Thank you," he said eventually.

"Don't be ridiculous," Negan said, satisfied. "Thank you. Let's move out!"

They shoved me toward the back of the van. Like I was another piece of his damn cargo. Rick stood at the open gates and watched me go. His eyes met mine, and I tried to silently thank him for trying to get me back. I don't know if he got it, but he stayed there, looking at me while we drove off. I watched as Rick, who was more of a brother to me than Merle had ever been, shrank into the distance with the place that had been our home.

Chapter 35: The Door Between Us

Naomi

"Good morning, Naomi!" Negan's booming voice burst into the room at the same time he flung the door open. I jolted awake from what had been, until that moment, quite a deep sleep. I propped myself up on my elbows and looked at him. It was barely light outside yet. Where did this asshole get off on waking me up so damn early? And how did he always have so much energy? His usual, terrible smile was still plastered all over his face as he said, "Rise and shine, gorgeous!"

He was in a good mood, which should've been my first indication that something was about to go at least a little bit wrong. But I was still half asleep, so I thought nothing of it beyond mild annoyance. I pulled myself up to sit on the bed, my muscles still heavy with sleep. I tried to wake myself up enough to deal with whatever fresh hell this was going to be. I yawned. "What the hell time is it?"

"Not a morning person, huh?" he laughed. He walked further into the room, hands behind his back. I didn't think much of it, imagined Lucille was hidden there because I didn't think I'd ever seen him without his bat.

Not a morning-in-captivity-person, actually.

Then I remembered that I was trying to play this whole thing smarter than I had before. So I rubbed the sleep out of my eyes and tried again. "Sorry. Good morning."

"That's more like it," he said. "And this is a good morning. Boy, do I have something to put you in a good mood? See, Daryl and I took a little trip to your old home yesterday. Checked in on how Rick and the gang were doing, and I brought you a little something back. A gift. Ain't you a lucky gal?"

Dread filled my stomach. I didn't like his tone, and I didn't like how much he enjoyed this. There was no way that something that was bringing him this much joy would be something that I would consider "lucky." I half expected him to be hiding one of our friends' heads behind his back, but when he took his hands out from behind him, he held a book. It felt like a trap, but I couldn't work out how. I stared at it.

"It's a book," I said, still searching for the trap.

"Well noticed, you are perceptive as shit," he replied, and I had to actively refrain from rolling my eyes. He held it out to me. I did not move to take it. He saw my reluctance and sighed. "It's not a bomb, you can touch it. Daryl told me how much of a goddamn bookworm you are, and I thought you might like a little something to read while you're in here."

I eyed the book in his hands. It looked real enough, and I wasn't sure what kind of horrors you could hide in a book. Didn't seem likely that there would be a weapon in there if he was so readily handing it over to me. I also couldn't imagine how or why Daryl would have offered up any information like that freely. I doubted he'd changed his opinion of Negan enough to chit chat about my interests. Had Negan beaten it out of him? Why? That was a lot of effort for what was effectively a worthless piece of information.

Maybe this was a genuine gesture, a sign that he genuinely believed I was putting all of my anger and rage behind me. I had to keep him thinking that. I reached out for the book, a slightly battered hardback copy of Wuthering Heights. He looked so pleased when I took it that I felt even more like I'd wandered into a trap or was being tested. Still not entirely trusting it, I turned the book over in my hands and pressed my thumb into the edges of the hardback cover. It was heavy. Probably heavy enough to beat him over the head with and do at least a little bit of damage. Was that the test? He was giving me this to see whether or not I'd attack him?

"Flip through," he encouraged me. "Pages are real, too."

I cracked it open and thumbed through the pages. Something flew out of it and landed on the floor in front of me. A photograph. Face-up. Upside down, but I knew it instantly. I froze. Daryl, Mia, and I grinned up at the ceiling of this miserable place. Negan delighted in my reaction.

"Oh, there it is," he said. I felt like my insides were slowly turning to ice. "A gift within a gift. Don't be shy, Naomi. Pick it up."

For a moment, I didn't think I could move at all like I was genuinely frozen where I sat. How did he get this? Did he know? Did he know about Mia? I realized, the longer I sat there staring helplessly at the ground, the worse this could be for me. I needed to find out what he knew as fast as I could without giving anything else away.

"Where did you get this?" I asked. The floor was cold against my bare feet as I slipped out of bed and walked the short distance to where the picture had fallen. "How did you-"

"I told you," he said as I picked it up. "Daryl and I, and a few more of my men, went on a little road trip. Visited our mutual friend Rick-the-prick and made sure we got our half of his shit."

"You went through my room," I said, putting the pieces together and trying to read into his bullshit. I didn't like the thought of him being in there, rifling through my stuff so thoroughly he could find one small photograph. What had he done to the others? Did they have anything left back home?

"Oh, Naomi," he sounded disappointed. "I went through our room. I own Rick, I own Alexandria and all the shit in there. And, despite what Daryl thinks, I own you too. Which means I own all your shit. I am just lending you that extremely personal photograph so that you can tell me who's in it."

I swallowed. This was it. This would tell me whether he knew about Mia or not. It was lucky that she was so young in this picture and not recognizable.

"It's me," I started. "And, Daryl."

"Uh-huh," Negan said, sounding on the verge of being angry. He knew I'd skipped Mia, still avoiding saying her name. It was painted on the banner behind us, but I hoped he'd missed that little detail.

"On my sister's birthday," I said. His eyebrows pricked up then like it was what he wanted to hear. I didn't know if that was a good or a bad thing.

"Your sister?" he repeated, studying my face so closely that I felt like I was in an exam. I nodded. I would not say her name. Not unless I had to. "The kid in the photograph is your sister?"

"Yes." I nodded and wondered why he's asked so intensely for clarification. If Daryl was with him when he found it, surely he'd asked the same questions? Was what I was saying not matching up with something he had? Why was he so damn interested?

"What happened to her?" Negan asked, moving even closer to me. My heart beat hard in my chest. I tried to think like Daryl, to guess what he would've said to keep Mia safe. Keep her hidden.

"She didn't make it," I said, and I dropped my eyes to the floor in case he could spot my lie in them. The photograph shook in my hands. I hoped he'd think it was out of grief, rather than fear that he already knew about Mia. That he already had her. I fought the urge to look out and check that Simon or some other asshole wasn't standing in the corridor with her.

Negan took a step back.

"Well, shit," he said. Every muscle in my body tensed. "Daryl was telling the truth. See, I thought you'd been lying to me about how long you guys had been together. Thought you had some secret little family before all of this. You might not have lied to me, Naomi, but you sure as shit didn't tell me the truth."

I felt a twist of guilt at being caught out, even though I hadn't lied. Not really. I'd just left out how much history there was between Daryl and me. Because it was convenient for me and useful to him. I knew it was both our biggest weakness and our biggest strength, and the more Negan knew about it, the more leverage he had. Or at least, thought he had.

"Why would that matter?" I asked. "What's it to you how long we've been together?"

"It doesn't really matter to me if you've been together a week, a month, or ten years," he said. "What matters to me is how much you're willing to do for each other because that directly relates to how useful you are to me. Now when I heard that 'we ain't been together long' crap, I knew something was up. But when I saw this-"

He reached over and plucked the photograph right out of my hand. I watched him slip it back into a pocket of his leather jacket.

"Can I-" I started to say automatically.

"Oh no, no, no," he said. "This is mine now. Just like you are. Just like Daryl is."

A stab of anger right in my heart. I did not react to it, I knew that was exactly what he wanted and why he'd paraded that photograph around in the first place. It was just a photograph, a material thing. It didn't matter if I got it back or not because I'd have the real people with me real soon.

"When I saw this," Negan continued, patting the pocket he'd slipped it into. "It all made a lot more sense. You kneeling down in front of me, ready to take on Lucille for the sake of some new piece of ass? Nah, I wasn't buying it. You were too damn quick. Too ready for it. You two are more used to fighting to survive than some of the rest of these sorry pricks, am I right?"

"Shit was tough," I shrugged, "but we got through it."

Just like we'll get through this.

"How old were you when you met Daryl?"

"Seven," I remembered that quiet, hungry, boy with messy hair who'd treated me and everyone else with nothing but suspicion. Small for his age. My heart ached. I wanted to reach back in time and pick him up, keep him safe. I hadn't been able to save him then, and I wasn't doing any better now. Frustration brought angry tears to my eyes.

"Well, ain't that cute?" he said, a small frown creasing his brow like he was deep in thought, and his dark eyes fixed on me in a way that made me feel like I couldn't move a goddamn muscle. As if he'd be able to find an answer to his unasked questions in the way I moved, a look in my eye, or a microexpression on my face.

Nothing about that time in our lives felt fucking cute. A world of intense, prolonged violence and long stretches of neglect. I'd never been able to stop Daryl's dad from beating him, I could only pick up the pieces when he was done. I'd carried a guilt with me for a long time about not being able to do anything, but Daryl hadn't been able to stop what was happening to me, either. And I'd never expected him to be able to because he'd been a goddamn kid. Knowing that he was close and always there for me, hadn't suddenly made everything okay. But it had given me something good to hold onto when things were bad. I'd never been alone.

Just like now.

"So, what was it, huh?" Negan asked. His voice was oddly gentle like he knew he was quietly pulling me back into the room. "You follow him around just waiting until the day that almost every other woman has died off, and he finally noticed you?"

I laughed. It was short and sharp and bitter, but I couldn't help it. The idea of Daryl as some teenage Lothario while I followed him around like a lovesick puppy was so far from the reality of it, I couldn't take it seriously. And as for Daryl' noticing' me? I'd never seen him notice anyone, not like that. I looked back at him and shook my head, "No."

"No?" he didn't look mad at me for laughing at him. Worryingly, it seemed to be exactly what he expected. I wondered if he'd gone so far in the opposite direction from the truth because he'd known it was so ridiculous I'd be forced to react. "That not how it went down? I'm just struggling to work out why it took you two so damn long to figure shit out."

You and me both, asshole.

I knew what he was fishing for, and I was happy to give it to him. Daryl and I had worked through our fight, and there were no lingering resentments there. I'd forgiven him years before he'd even apologized, and from the sounds of things, he'd done the same. Daryl and I were as solid as we had always been.

"We had a fight," I told him. I felt so calm. I hoped he saw that, and I hoped it scared him, let him know his plan wasn't going to work. "After I moved off to college. Didn't speak for years, not until we found each other again - in the middle of all this - and we're fine."

"You sound pretty damn sure about that."

"I am," I said confidently. "It was a dumb fight, and it's all in the past, there's nothing you can do or say that will change that. So, if you were planning on using that to turn us against each other or some shit-"

"Wouldn't dream of it," he said. "And I don't know if that is even possible. In fact, I'm counting on it. Having someone that can get you through tough shit, that is truly special. I can see why you're fighting like hell to hold on to that, I don't want to shut that down, I want to harness that fight. I want you to use all that fight for me."

It sounded impossible.

"You gotta wake up, Naomi," Negan said, again pulling me back from the edge of something. It felt deliberate. Like he knew the path he was leading me down and wanted to keep distracting me from whatever lay at the end of it until he was ready for me to see it. "You ain't kids anymore, running around whatever cesspool of piss and shit and human garbage you managed to crawl out of. I could drag Daryl in here and shoot him right in front of you. I could chop so many things off of him until whatever was left was alive, but unrecognizable. Do you know what it's like? To have someone that can get you through any kind of shit and then lose them? And I don't mean in some dumb fight, or having a few damn walls between you, I mean really, truly, lose them?"

No.

No, I didn't.

Even in the years we'd spent not talking, Daryl had been so much a part of me that I would've been dishonest to say he hadn't got me through it. Daryl and I had grown together, like two trees in a forest. Shared roots all tangled up so that even apart, we still grew together. Who he was had shaped who I became. I had seen who he had the potential to grow into clear as day from the first time I'd met him. If you could take our souls out and lay them side by side, they would be so indistinguishable from one another that even we wouldn't be able to tell the difference.

Cut us apart, and I didn't know if I could survive it.

"Let me ask you something, Naomi," he said and leaned in real close. "Do you love him?"

Yes.

The answer hit me like a goddamn freight train. First, there was the shock of it, lifting me up and out of myself until I could see it all laid before me, plain as day. Of course, I loved him. How could I not?

"Holy shit," Negan whispered, light filling his eyes. "You just realized it didn't you? You just realized you're in love with him—what a moment. And I got to be a part of it? I'm honored."

As the shock wore off, there was nothing but anger and fear. I wanted to throw a punch, and I didn't really care what at. The floor, the wall, his face, it didn't matter. Fighting Negan to the death honestly felt less terrifying than the realization that I was in love. A small part of me had worried that something inside me was too broken to be capable of it. But that wasn't it. I'd never said it, never felt for anyone else because I couldn't. Because I'd already been inescapably in love with him.

It had always been him.

It hurt. To know it so completely like this, while we were apart and I could do nothing about it. All of that wasted time stretched out behind me. The threat that it was the only time we'd get hung over me too. We could die in here, and he'd never know how I felt about him.

"Oof," Negan said like he had any idea what I was feeling. "I do not envy you. Loving someone in this is hard as shit. But, between you and me, loving someone who's dead? That is way worse."

It was a thinly veiled threat against Daryl's life. But it was more than that. A shadow passed across his face, something in the deepest recesses of his eyes told me that it was more than that. He knew. He was speaking from experience. Negan had not only lost somebody, more surprisingly, he'd loved somebody too.

He probably didn't know it, but he'd given me something to fight for and something I could use. I didn't know how, yet. But he had.

"Alright, I'm done with her," Negan said as he stepped out. "She can eat now."

Sherry stepped into the room with a small plate of food. She waited until the door closed behind her before she said, "Are you okay?"

I nodded, still numb.

"I have to get him out of here," I said. I knew, more clearly than ever, that I wouldn't be able to say no to anything Negan asked me if it risked Daryl's life or his safety. But I also knew, the only way to be sure that he was safe forever, was to get him out of here. No matter how long it took. No matter the sacrifice I had to make, he and Mia were getting out of this place.

"You can't," Sherry said quietly.

"You and Dwight managed it," I pointed out.

"We came back," she said like I needed reminding. "Because there's no other choice. Everything is Negan. Even out there."

"You're wrong," I told her. "You had a choice. You could've gone with Daryl in that burnt-out forest. You could've joined all of us in Alexandria."

"Alexandria works for Negan now, too," she said. "At most, it would've just bought us a little extra time."

"You're wrong," I said. "Alexandria ain't done. They'll fight back."

"You don't know that."

"I know Rick," I said. "And I know he won't take this lying down for long. They might be biding their time now, but they are going to fight back. One way or another, Negan's reign of terror will end. And you can help us end it. Just help us get home."

"I made my choice," she said.

"It was brave," I said. She looked at me in disbelief. "What you did. Marrying Negan to save Dwight, to keep him alive, it was brave. But don't act like it was your choice. It was the only thing you could do to save someone you loved. Dwight dying? That wasn't an option, not for you. Like Daryl dying, or spending the rest of his life serving Negan, it is not an option for me. You did what you had to. But you can always make another choice. A real one."

The silence between us felt like it was made of glass, transparent and fragile, a shard of it slowly cutting into each of us.

I know, I wanted to say to her, I know what it's like when someone forces you into something and makes it feel like it's your fault.

"If I do help you get out," she said, and my heart leaped at the thought she was even considering it. "He'll know. He'll kill me."

"So come with us," I said. "Come to Alexandria. Fight with us."

"You think your people will welcome me?" she said. "You think they'll open their gates to a Savior?"

"If you've got Daryl with you," I said. "They'll open the gates. Rick is a good man. If he knows you helped us get out, he'll let you stay. I know it."

I knew how much I was asking her to risk. Trusting me on all of this would be a lot. But I could also see that Sherry was slowly losing her will to live in this place. Following orders that she didn't believe in from a guy she hated. I'd never once caught the same glee in her eye that I'd occasionally found in Dwight's. She was quiet for a really long time.

"I can't let you see him," Sherry said eventually. "But you can talk."

It wasn't what I expected her to say, but it was so much better.

 

 

Daryl

"Daryl?"

Her voice was quiet, but I knew it right away. A shadow under the door, but I hadn't heard her walk up. Was I dreaming? She didn't say anything else.

"Naomi?" I moved as close to the door as I could as fast as I could. Something about her voice sounded off, I knew something was up. When she didn't say anything else, I got worried. "Naomi, that you? Are you-"

"I'm alone," she said quickly, although that hadn't been what I was about to ask. Maybe it should've been. Maybe Negan was out there with her, gun pressed to her head, and that's why she sounded so weird. "Sherry's distracting Dwight. I… I probably ain't got too long."

"Are you okay?" I asked, sitting down right by the door so I could hear her better. I didn't much care how she'd got here or how long we had. I just wanted to know that she was okay, and I didn't want to waste any of our limited time on anything else. It was the first time we'd really had to speak to one another since we'd left Alexandria. "Are you hurt?"

"I'm fine," she said, and I heard her sit down on the other side of the door. "Are you okay?"

"Right as rain," I said. I could still feel the bruises all over me, but I didn't want her to worry, and they didn't matter now that she was close.

"They treating you okay?" she asked. Something had really freaked out, I could tell by her voice, but I could imagine the wide eyes and shaky hands that went with it. I wondered if Negan had told her he'd done something to me, just to mess with her head, and she'd fought her way down here just to check. "You got food? Water? Do you have-"

"Naomi," I interrupted her. "I'm fine. Quit worrying about me."

Worry about yourself for one goddamn moment.

"I wish I knew how," she said, after a short silence.

"Yeah, I wish you did, too," I said. She'd been the first, and for a long while the only, person to give a crap about me. Even when she shouldn't. The weight of it sat heavy on my chest. It was fine, times like this when I knew she was okay, but when she was gone from my sight or I couldn't hear her, I could only imagine the worst. Knew that every second of pain she felt here was on me. "You shouldn't have followed me here. When Negan gave you a choice, you should've gone back to Alexandria with the rest of them."

"You know I couldn't," she said like I was being ridiculous. "I couldn't leave you here."

"You could," I argued. "You just wouldn't."

"If it had been me that he'd taken," she said, "if things had been the other way around, you'd have followed me here."

I couldn't argue with that, and she knew it.

"Yeah," I said. "I guess that sounds about right."

She was quiet for a moment, and then she said, "I… I saw Mia."

"For real?"

"Yeah," she said. "Even had a chance to talk to her. She's okay, Daryl. They haven't hurt her. She's okay."

"That's good," I said, trying to sound as calm as possible because she sure as shit wasn't sounding calm herself.

"Yeah. It is."

There was something so frantic about her voice that it sent my heart racing. There wasn't much that scared her. The whole time I'd known her, she'd always been the more level headed of the two of us. Not that it was hard to be calmer than me, but I'd only ever seen her blow a fuse when someone she cared about was in some kind of trouble. Usually me. I was used to her being cool, collected. Planning shit out. Negan must've done something, said something to her.

Was she thinking about taking his deal? To save me? I wished I could see her face, get to know what she was thinking. I knew there was only so long that I could stay calm to keep her calm.

"Daryl-"

"Promise me," I cut across her. Whatever she had to say could wait. I had to get it out before I lost it. "Promise me you won't marry him. No matter what he does, or says, or says he's going to do to me. Promise me you will not marry him."

She was quiet for so long that I thought she might've gone, but I hadn't heard her get whisked away. When I looked at the light under the door, her shadow was still there. Stubborn silence radiated from it. I could picture her face, that defiant little frown.

"Hey. Promise me," I said again.

Silence.

"Naomi," I called. I heard her sniff and realized she'd been so quiet because she was crying. I rested my forehead on the door between us and wished I could hold her together.

"It won't come to that," she said after a while. "I'm close to getting Sherry to help us get out of here. I think she-"

"That ain't what I asked," I interrupted her again. I wasn't going to let her get out of this so easy. Wasn't going to let her dance around it. I didn't want to hear her hair-brained schemes to get us out of here. I wanted her to take a moment and really think about the worst-case scenario. I needed to know that no matter what, she wouldn't do anything dumb for me.

Another pause. Another sniff.

"If he threatens to kill you, Daryl, I can't…"

"I am ready to die for you, Naomi," I said, and it didn't feel like a big revelation, it had always been true. Just statistically likely until now.

"No," she said immediately, sounding angry that I'd said it at all.

"I'd rather die than see you controlled by him," I said.

"Shut up," she said fiercely. "It ain't worth that, Daryl. It ain't worth your life."

"Yeah, it is."

"It ain't," she said. "I know it ain't, you know it ain't. If he tries to kill you, I'll kill him."

"Then, he'll take us both down."

"Fine."

I knew she wasn't thinking rationally, but I'd never more sure of what I was saying. It was like we'd switched places. I was so used to her being the one to talk me down from all of my emotional anger, I wasn't sure I knew how to do the same for her.

"If he does that, who's gonna look after Mia, huh?" I said. I knew it was unfair of me to bring it up, but she needed to hear it. To be reminded of what was really important in all of this.

"I can get you both out," she said like she really believed it.

"But if you don't," I said. "If he drags me out under that bat, if I get bit by one of them Walkers on the fence, if Dwight kicks me to death, I gotta know you won't say yes to him."

"We'd both have a better-"

"We wouldn't," I said, and I heard her sob. "We wouldn't have a better life. You wouldn't. You gotta stay free for you, and for Mia. And for me. Promise me."

"I can work the fence too, I can work for points, I can-" her voice was thick with tears. Damn near broke my heart. I almost let up, almost stopped asking. But this was important. I'd sleep better knowing she was done sacrificing herself for me.

"That ain't what I'm asking," I said again. "Promise me you won't give in to him, you won't marry him, even if he says he'll kill me."

Silence. And then, very quietly, my ear pressed right against the door, I heard her whisper, "I promise."

She didn't say anything else. I could still hear her softly crying out there. Knew how she'd look when she was. When those eyes filled with tears, I felt like the world was ending, and it was down to me to do what it took to stop it.

I loved her so much, always had. If dying for her in here was how I was meant to go out, that was fine by me. My only regret would be going out without her knowing what she meant to me.

"Hey, Naomi…" I said.

"Yeah?"

I took a deep breath. No way I could just jump right into this, I needed to build myself up. "You know I think you're pretty, right?"

"What?" she sounded shocked enough that I think she'd stopped crying.

"I just…" I started and didn't know how to finish. "... don't know if I ever said that before."

"Daryl," she sniffed again. "You ain't gotta say shit like that. I don't…"

"I know I don't have to. I want to," I said. "Should've said it a long time ago, too. You're beautiful, Naomi."

"Shut up, dumbass."

"I'm serious."

She sighed, "Don't let him get to you."

"What?"

"Negan. The shit he said to us up there. Don't let it get to you," she said. "It don't matter what you say. Or what you don't say. You show up, you got my back more than anyone. That's what matters."

I agreed with her a little. But that didn't mean I shouldn't tell her these things. Maybe if I had we'd have got together sooner, had more time together before all of this shit kicked off. I'd thought I'd had my whole life, but this could be the end of it.

"He ain't wrong, though," I said. "I don't… say shit when I should. I ain't good at this soppy crap, but you deserve…"

"Daryl," she snapped. "Stop."

"No, Naomi. I… The way I feel about you. It ain't…"

"I know."

"You don't."

"I do."

"Nah. You don't," I said. "Because I ain't ever told you, not really. Sure as hell ain't shown it enough."

"I know how much you care about me Daryl, I do," she said. There was a begging, pleading note in her voice. "Just stop. Please. Stop talking."

"Why?"

"It feels like you're trying to say goodbye," she said, and her voice cracked. But it was stronger, angrier than it had been before. I could hear that typical Naomi-determination starting to flare up. I smiled in the dark. Even in such a desperate situation, she felt like an unstoppable force of nature. "Like you think we ain't gonna see each other again but we are. This ain't goodbye. It ain't."

"I know," I said, although I didn't. Neither of us could know.

"I'm gonna get you out. Me. You. Mia. We can go home. Be a family. The three of us."

"The three of us?" I repeated, just to make sure that's what she'd really said.

"Yeah. Of course. If… if that's something you want."

"Yeah. Course it is."

It's all I've ever wanted.

"Okay," she said, and she sounded calmer. "Then stop tryna say goodbye to me. Anything we gotta say to each other, we can say it when we get out. Deal?"

Something about the way she said it reminded me of when we were kids. That grubby girl with the sad, kind eyes who'd spit in her hand and shake with me over something that seemed life or death at the time but was just some dumb kid shit. I smiled in the dark.

"Deal."

Someone said something to her, too far away for me to hear it but I knew what it would be. I heard her move against the door and she said, "Daryl, I have to go."

"Okay," I said. I knew it was coming but my heart still sank.

"I'm getting you out of here. I promise," she said urgently. "Just be ready, okay? Be ready to run."

"Okay, Naomi," I said.

"See you soon," she said. "Real soon."

"Yeah," I said. "See you soon."

I didn't know if I believed it or not anymore. Seemed like we'd see each other whenever Negan said we could. I knew he wasn't done torturing us yet but the beatings were starting to ease off a little, for me at least. From the state of Naomi, and the last time I'd seen her face to face, it seemed like he'd moved on to trying to break our minds over our bodies.

So, I was ready for him when the door opened and he was standing there with Dwight. Dwight hauled me out and pushed me along the corridor to start working for points at the Sanctuary fence.

"Just came to check in with my workforce," Negan said. "See how our newest team member is getting on."

I said nothing, kept my eyes ahead of me and focused on just taking things one step at time. Dwight looked warily at me, like he thought my silence was going to provoke some kind of outburst.

Good. I hope it does.

My hands felt free for the first time in a while. My injuries were slowly healing. I could do with landing one more punch on Negan's stupid face.

"Giving me the silent treatment, huh?" he said. "That's fine. Thought you might want to hear about this real interesting chat I had with your old lady this morning. Or, should I say, my new lady?"

I stopped then, looked him dead in the eye, "She ain't ever gonna be yours."

He gave me that wide sickeningly satisfied smile. "What did you just say to me?"

"She ain't ever gonna be yours," I repeated, louder than before, and started walking again. It was easy to say because I believed it more than I had ever believed in anything. No matter how sad she'd looked when I'd seen her, how frantic she'd sounded, I knew that nothing on Earth would make Naomi break a promise to me. Nothing before this ever had. That girl, in the photograph he'd so gleefully kept his sweaty hands on, it was the same one he had locked up. The one who'd always had my back, always fought for me and for what she thought was right, always kept a promise.

"Oh yeah?" he said.

"Yeah," I said. "It ain't gonna work."

"You'd be surprised how many times it's worked before," he said. "Got most of my wives I got in this exact same way."

"Then you gotta work on your game, man."

"That how you got her in the first place, huh?" he laughed. "Your game?"

I said nothing. Felt a flare of annoyance but it was nothing like the white hot rage I'd felt the other times he'd tried to goad me into a fight. I wondered how obvious it was, if it was written all over me that I wasn't any kind of smooth-talking many-wives kinda guy. I was more of a fall in love with your best friend and keep it to yourself for years kinda guy.

"Lemme ask you something, Daryl," Negan said. "Do you really think, if all this hadn't happened and the whole world hadn't gone to hell in a handbasket, that she would be with you? Or even with a guy remotely like you?"

No.

"Because from what I heard," he continued. "Before all this, you weren't even talking."

How does he know that?

Why would she tell him?

I stopped walking again. The same ice cold knot of guilt formed in my stomach every time I thought about that fight, or who I'd been before this. Negan grinned again, knew he'd got a reaction from me.

"She was off at college, making something of herself and you were...," he trailed off, like he expected me to finish the sentence. "Doing what? College? Humanitarian work? Volunteering some place? You think she'd be with a lowlife like you if the world hadn't ended?"

It hurt. But I reminded myself that Naomi had always seen something in me. God knows how, but she'd believed in me right from the start. My silence annoyed him again.

"Tell me this then, Romeo. You really think she won't agree to be mine if she thinks it'll get you out of your current hole… If she thinks it'll save your life?" he asked. I said nothing but for once, I felt like the smug asshole in this conversation.

"You don't get it," I told him. "Even if she does marry you. Even if she does agree to this shit, she still ain't gonna be yours."

"How's that?" he said. His face was getting a little red. A little flushed with anger. It was satisfying. "Because you think even with me, she'll always secretly be yours? You should know, Daryl, if one of my wives cheats on me-"

"Nah, that ain't it," I didn't need to hear it. I didn't need to hear what he'd do to her in that situation because it was never going to happen. "You can't own her, man. She is something else. Even if hell freezes it over and she somehow agrees to this? She ain't anyone's but her own. And if she agrees to this shit, you're gonna have to sleep with one eye open because she will come for you."

He laughed.

"Oh, I'm sure she will," he grinned like a wolf. "In fact, I'm counting on her coming for me all night long, don't you worry about that. I told you, I take good care of my girls."

It was so much easier to stomach now that I had her promise. I looked away from him again.

"You don't get it."

"No, you don't get it," he said, jabbing his damn bat in my face. I stared at it, and then back at him. He leaned in and asked, "Do you love her, Daryl?"

Of course I do.

I shut my mouth and kept it shut. But he smiled like he already knew.

"If you were in her shoes, wouldn't you do damn near anything to make sure she was okay?" he said. "Ain't that why you're down her work for points for me? She'll fall in line, Daryl. Both of you will."

"You're wrong," I told him. He nodded to Dwight who shoved me out of one of the doors and into the bright sun. I could still hear him laughing when the door closed. It was good, in a way, that he'd frustrated me like this. That little extra bit of aggression would make getting Walkers on the fence that little bit easier. And he could be as smug as he damn well pleased. He was still wrong. Naomi had made a promise to me that she had no reason to break. I guess it was the one time in my life that I was glad she wasn't in love with me.

Chapter 36: Go Now

Naomi

Daryl ducked out of the way as the cold, dead hands of a Walker lunged for his neck. From this distance, it was hard to tell how close it got. Years of built-up grime on the windows distorted the picture, which didn't make it any easier. I could feel my heart beating in the back of my throat so hard I thought I'd puke it out of my chest. The Walker stumbled past Daryl, and he tripped it, sent it flying. Then he came up behind it and pushed, impaling it on one of the spikes around the Sanctuary fence. The tightness in my chest lifted momentarily.

"Ohh, and he's got it! One point to the rednecks!" Negan cheered like he was some goddamn sports commentator. He leaned against the window we were looking out of and watched me watch Daryl, drinking in my fear like it was lemonade on a hot day. "Enjoying the view? Told you it was beautiful from up here. Is it everything you thought it would be, darlin'?"

"Yeah, actually," I said. When Negan had come bounding into my room bragging about some great view, I'd known it would be something shitty. "You're getting predictable."

He laughed. I was getting sick of the sound of his laugh.

"Look at us," he said, nudging me on the arm. My skin prickled with annoyance. "You're out here stretching your legs, and you ain't thrown even one little punch at anyone. I've got Simon cleaning out your cell, so you have somewhere nice to go back to, and as a punishment for that almighty beating he gave you. But you and me? I think we are finally getting along. You haven't threatened to kill me in days."

Doesn't mean I haven't been thinking about it.

I was thinking about it right then, imaging all the different ways you could skin a human being, but he didn't need to know that. As long as he thought I was falling in line, I would be able to get a step ahead of him. Or, at least, not be as far behind as I had been until now.

"In fact," he said. "We're getting on so well that I think I'm going to let you out of your box a bit more. Let you roam around the place free range. Get a good look at everything we have to offer so you can make an informed decision about joining my team."

It felt like another trap. I had come to learn that most of what Negan said was true, but there was always a twist. And I wasn't about to fall for it again. Not after that damn photograph. "You're going to let me out?"

It seemed like an unspeakably dumb move.

"Well, not on your own," he said with a laugh. "Sherry's gonna keep an eye on you. Your very own chaperone to show you all of our beautiful sights. Like this one. Sure she remembers them from when it was Dwight out there."

Sherry was standing behind us, arms folded across her chest and saying nothing. I could see Dwight supervising Daryl while he worked for points. I squinted at him, he was even wearing Daryl's damn vest. Those angel wings looked wrong on someone else's back. The sight of it froze the anxiety pooling in the pit of my stomach and shattered it, sending shards of sharp anger through my bloodstream.

Daryl was fighting for his life every goddamn moment he was out there, and for what? Setting up defenses for a place he wanted to see fall? I didn't want to watch, but looking away felt like abandoning him. If he had to go through it, the least I could do was bear witness to it.

"I want you to see every shitty moment he has in here," Negan said. He was real close to my ear. I could feel his breath on the back of my neck, and it made every muscle in my body clench. "I want you to watch him get these Walkers, I want you to watch him clean up piss and shit, and know that every second of his miserable existence is on you. He gets bit out there, he gets sick or starves to death from not getting enough points? All of that's on you, sweetheart. But you can change things, just like Sherry did."

I felt sick. What was I doing standing up here watching when I could make it stop? It was almost enough to make me crack. Almost.

You promised.

I kept reminding myself of it, how serious he'd sounded through that door. How he hadn't cared what happened to him as long as I didn't take Negan's offer. No matter what he said, it wasn't worth his life. Nothing was. I'd known, even when I made that stupid promise, that if I so much as saw Negan holding Lucille in the same room as Daryl, I'd take his offer in a heartbeat. But now, I wasn't even sure I could stomach seeing him out there working for points. Saving him was worth everything.

I could live with him being mad at me for it. Hating me. I'd done it before. As long as he was alive, maybe being married to Negan wouldn't be so bad. In a bit of time, I might be able to see Mia, too. Make sure she stayed safe. Build some kind of life for her. I tore my gaze away from Daryl and looked back at Sherry, teetering on the edge of a decision Daryl would hate me for.

Hate is fine. Dead is worse.

Dead people can't hate.

Negan was watching me closely, like always. I opened my mouth to tell him I gave in, but something in Sherry's eyes stopped me. I was used to her looking sad; a long-lasting, long-suffering kind of pain haunted her. But this was different. Something had hardened. A deep hatred and a determination had set in. She gave me the tiniest shake of her head, and I closed my mouth again. I looked at Negan, who was too focussed on me to notice the look Sherry had just given me.

"You're thinking about it, aren't you, darlin'?" Negan said with that trademark smugness. "You better think fast because I don't know how long he can last out there. Tough, ain't it? Loving someone and just… waiting around for the moment they might die. That shit sits with you, huh?"

He kept going, but I tuned him out. I watched Sherry glance at the floor while he talked, unable to stand even looking at the man she served. Negan ruled through fear and hatred. Usually, that was a recipe for mutiny. But he could keep people like Sherry in line because he knew how to take something good and twist it.

He might be an asshole, but he knew something about love. He had to know what it was like, how powerful it was to fear losing someone like this. It was what gave him the confidence to repeat this whole process again and again with different people. I thought about how he'd talked about it before, that shadow that had crossed his face when he'd talked about loving someone dead.

Lucille.

What were the chances that was a name he'd just pulled out his ass? He was still running his mouth, but I didn't care. Same shit, different day.

"Who was Lucille?" I asked. And there it was, a flicker of something that he tried to hide too quickly with a smile. He raised the bat, but it didn't scare me. For once, I felt like the power was mine.

"You forgotten about Lucille already?" he asked. "You need a little reminder of how she bashed old Red's head-"

"No," I interrupted him. The sounds of Abraham's skull cracking would haunt me forever. Negan wasn't going to deflect my attention so quickly. "I didn't ask who Lucille is. I asked who she was. Before you picked up a filthy bat, named it after her, and used it to crack skulls. Did she-"

His fist connected with the underside of my jaw in a way that both shut me up and told me that I'd done it. I'd found the right path. I'd found a weakness, a crack in his armor. And he was fucking livid.

"Negan, stop!" Sherry yelled as he hit me again. I looked at him. There was a desperate fury in his eyes. He'd lost it. But I didn't care. I still felt powerful, and for the first time since we'd got here, he looked weak to me. Small. He could've killed me at that moment, probably would have too, if it hadn't been for the burst of gunfire that rang out from somewhere outside the Sanctuary.

My ears were ringing from how hard he'd hit me, but even I heard it. And I felt the atmosphere in the whole building change. Like its very foundations knew something was going wrong for them. The wind shook loose window panes.

"What the shit?" Negan stopped hitting me and looked back out of the window. "Oh, hell."

Sherry and I glanced at each other, as he started to bolt from the room.

"Take her back to her cell," Negan said.

"I can't," Sherry said. "You gave Simon the key."

"Then take her to your place," Negan said. "Show her what her life could look like if she plays her cards right."

Fuck off.

The door closed behind him, and Sherry straightened up from where she'd been leaning. She looked reluctantly at me, "Come on, let's go."

I knew the order wasn't coming from her, but I still resented her for giving it. I looked out of the window again. I couldn't see Daryl anymore, a truck with half-unloaded supplies blocked my view. Dead bodies lay around it, too freshly dead to have turned yet. What the hell had just happened?

"Come on, Naomi," Sherry said again, and I did what she said in case refusing her would give Negan a reason to beat her in the same way he did me. I wouldn't be responsible for that.

She took me to a room that was full of women like her. When the door opened, a hush fell over everyone, and the air bristled until they saw it wasn't Negan. Most of them were clustered around a blonde girl with red-rimmed eyes who was trying not to cry. All of them had the same, resigned look in their eyes. Dressed in the same kind of dresses that they'd stuck me in a few days before. Was this what Negan had been trying me out for? Some twisted audition for a role I did not want? It made me want to set myself on fire.

"What is this place?" I asked Sherry as the other women, realizing there was no danger here, started talking to one another again.

"This is where Negan keeps us," she said, talking about herself like she was some kind of pet. "His wives."

She said the word 'wives' like it was poison, and holding it in her mouth for too long would kill her. No wonder everyone here looked so broken. The girl who'd clearly been crying looked up at Sherry. Her bottom lip trembled.

"Amber?" Sherry took a good look at her. How often did women cry here that it took Sherry so long to notice? She stepped towards her, and some of the others moved aside so that she could sit next to Amber. "What's happened?"

Amber looked away from her and down at the ground like she was ashamed of something.

"Negan knows," someone else said, "about her and Mark."

A sob escaped Amber's mouth, and Sherry put an arm around her.

"It's okay," Sherry said quietly. "It's going to be okay."

Sherry's words were comforting, but the atmosphere in the room told another story. Shared glances between other women behind Amber's back suggested that things were far from okay, and far from over. It's hard to witness that helplessness and not be able to do anything. I didn't even know what Negan had found out, or what punishment Amber was so afraid of. Was it Lucille? Would Negan bash her head in for whatever it was she and Mark had done? I cast my eye around the room for a knife or anything sharp I could use if Negan came here and tried to take her away.

Before I could do anything, the door opened, and the room froze again. This time, it really was Negan. I watched Amber shrink and do her best not to look guilty. I tried to think through my options, how I could stop whatever was about to unfold. And then I saw who was following Negan into the room.

A kid in his daddy's old cop hat, his missing eye wrapped up in a bandage. My heart almost stopped.

Carl.

Shit.

I felt sick, my hands started shaking. What the hell was he doing here? Had something happened in Alexandria? I saw a glimmer of horror in his eye when he looked at me and guessed there was at least one mark on my face from my run-in with Negan moments before.

"Can I talk to you for a minute, dear wife?" he said to Sherry, then he glanced back at Carl. "Make yourself comfortable, kid."

While Negan was distracted with Sherry, I risked taking a few steps closer to Carl. I whispered, "Are you okay?"

"Yeah," he said. "I tried to… I thought I could…"

"The gunfire," I said. "That was you?"

He nodded. Then, he looked at me again. "Are you and Daryl okay? I saw him outside and… your face…"

"We're okay," I said. There was no need for him to worry about us when he'd got himself stuck here too. "Is… is everyone in Alexandria okay?"

Carl nodded again, but I couldn't tell if it was true, or he didn't want to tell me anything while Negan was in earshot. Things couldn't be right at home if he was here. Why would he risk coming here? Where was Rick?

Negan finished his quiet conversation with Sherry and pushed a bottle of beer into Carl's hand as he passed by. Carl took it but did not drink it, heading over to where Amber was still doing her best not to cry. She began visibly shaking the closer he got. He sat down opposite her and looked back at me like this was something I should be paying attention to.

"Amber, baby," he said to her. She looked fearfully up at him, "You know I don't want anyone here that doesn't want to be here, right?"

"Mmm-hmm," Amber nodded, too scared to form a coherent sentence. I wasn't sure what kind of point he was trying to prove, but she didn't look to me like the picture of a willing wife.

"So, if you wanna leave and go back to Mark, you can," he said. His voice was soft and gentle, but there was a darker undercurrent that turned every syllable into a threat. "But what can't you do?"

"Cheat on you," Amber's voice was so quiet, I hardly heard it from where I stood.

"That is exactly right. You can't cheat on me. There's plenty of other gals who would love to take your place," Negan said. "And there are a few job openings that I can think of. You wanna go back to Mark and your Mom? Hell, I'll put you all on the same job."

"No. I'll stay," she said immediately and couldn't hold the tears back anymore. Whatever job he had in mind was clearly one she didn't want her loved ones doing. "I'm sorry."

"You know what that means, right?"

"Yes," Amber said, her sad and desperate eyes fixed on Negan. "I love you, Negan."

I wanted to throw up. My eyes scanned the room for something sharp again—anything I could use to gut him like a fish and get this poor girl away.

"Of course, you do, darlin'," he said, putting his fingers under her chin. I saw her actively resisting the urge to flinch. "I don't know why you're crying, it's all going to work out aces for you."

He glanced over at Carl and me with this big grin. Then, he turned back to Amber and planted a kiss on her forehead. I saw her fists clench, her shoulders shudder. Sherry looked away. Negan walked back over to her, they had another quiet conversation, and then he kissed her on the lips. Sherry closed her eyes, resigned herself to it, and I looked away. Everything and everyone in this room felt so helpless. But there were more of us than there were of him. How was it that this asshole had all the goddamn power?

The door opened again, and Dwight walked in. I did not miss the look in his eyes. A split second of rage and hurt when he saw Negan and Sherry, and then it was gone again. Daryl was with him, his eyes fixed on Carl for a moment, and I saw the worry tense his shoulders. His grip tightened on a tray of food he held out in front of him; chopped up fruit skewered on cocktail sticks. Then, his gaze searched the room and found my face.

Daryl.

My Daryl.

I don't know how it was for him, but those few moments that our eyes were allowed to meet were one of the few moments of genuine peace in this place.

Negan pulled away from Sherry and looked over at the door. He grinned when he saw Dwight watching them. Dwight dropped his gaze to the floor by Negan's feet. Negan walked over and picked up one of the skewers from Daryl's tray.

"Carl, will you grab this tray for me?" Negan said, making a move like he was about to leave.

"Why you got him here?" Daryl asked, as fierce and protective as if Carl was his own.

"Woah!" Negan snapped. I took a step forward, fists at my side. It was automatic. "Do not make me put this toothpick through the only eye he has. You go with Dwight. He'll get you a mop. Dwighty boy, fire up that furnace. I'll be down in a few. Time for a little deja vu."

He directed his grin at Sherry and Dwight before he left with Carl. When he was gone, Sherry let out a breath that carried all the tension she'd been holding since he'd arrived. I saw the way she looked at Dwight, and the way he looked back at her. They knew something terrible was coming. Was something about to happen to Carl?

I could feel all of Daryl's anxieties radiating off him. Without looking at him, I reached out for his hand. My love for him and the pain of not being able to speak to him rose in my throat. My eyes stung. Our fingers brushed together. I felt him jump at the sudden contact, and then our little fingers looped together. Held there for a moment like a pinkie swear.

I swear I'm getting you out of here.

"Hey," Dwight snapped when he noticed, grabbing the back of Daryl's sweater and hauling him out of the room. Daryl kept his eyes on me, right up until the door shut. Stolen moments were all we had now.

"Come on," Sherry grabbed my arm. I wasn't ready for it, still a little too emotionally raw to deal with this. I looked at her, wondering what the urgency was. She bowed her head closer to mine and whispered, "I'll help you. I'll help you get him out."

I started walking with her immediately, hardly daring to believe what she'd said. Dwight and Daryl were already gone when we entered the corridor. Sherry looked around her, checking there was nobody around to see us.

"Are we going now?" I asked, alarmed at the speed she was suddenly moving. She'd spent so long on the fence, I wasn't sure she was ever going to get off and now she was walking with a determination I hadn't seen before.

"No," she said. "We'll all need to gather on the factory floor soon. You know how much Negan likes an audience when he's dishing out punishment."

She said it so bitterly, her teeth clenched. She pushed open the door to the stairwell I knew she and Dwight smoked in sometimes with such a force it hit the stone wall on the other side.

"Punishment?" I repeated as we reached the top of the stairs. She was leading me down. My heart jumped. "If it's Carl, we can't let it happen. We gotta-"

"It's not Carl," she cut me off. "Negan is not a good guy, but he's not known for hurting kids. If he wanted Carl dead, he'd have done it by now. He wouldn't draw it out like this."

It was a surprise. Negan's cruelty didn't seem like it had limits. The Hilltop had told us that the kid Negan killed there was only 16, but maybe he hadn't known. Maybe he'd looked older. Mia told me she hadn't been hurt the whole time she'd been here. Sherry had been here much longer than either of us, seen a lot of shit. If Negan hurt kids, I had to believe she'd know about it.

"Daryl and I ain't leaving here without Mia and Carl," I told her, running down the stairs to keep up with her. "We can't."

"You won't have to," she said. "Negan will take Carl home when he's done toying with him."

"How can you be sure?" I said. I didn't know how to make her see that Daryl and I wouldn't leave the kids here. We'd die before that happened.

"Think about it this way, Carl's more use to him alive as leverage over Rick," she said, and when she put it like that, it didn't make sense for Negan to kill Carl. "When he does take Carl back, it's our best window to get out."

"Our?" I repeated. "You're coming with us?"

She paused at the bottom of the stairs, her hand poised over the railing, and looked back at me over her shoulder.

"I can't stay here," she said. "I don't know if I'll… join you. But I can't stay here."

"What about Dwight?" I asked. I was willing to bring him too if that's what it took, but I wasn't sure I could convince Daryl not to kill Dwight the second we got out of here.

"I don't know who Dwight is anymore," she said. "He's lost himself. That man in there, and what he's about to do, he's not the man I used to know. I thought I was saving him, but… we should've fought. We should've been more like you and Daryl."

I could see the regret etched into her face. I took hold of her arm.

"Hey," I said gently. "You're fighting now. Don't beat yourself up about something you're trying to change. We can do this. We got this."

It was the first time since coming into this place that I had more than blind hope to back it up. I had someone on my side who knew how this place ran. She nodded like she believed me. Believed in me. There was no time for me to question whether or not she was right. We had to act now. Sherry stepped off the final step and led me to the ground floor. The same level they were keeping Daryl on.

I knew he wouldn't be locked in that cell anymore, we'd literally just seen him, but it didn't stop me looking out for him at every turn. Sherry stopped outside a door that was closed but not locked. She opened it and peered inside. A dimly-lit but empty storeroom.

"Bike keys," Sherry whispered when she saw my quizzical look. "This is where they keep them. Stand watch?"

I nodded, and stood with my back to the door, scanning the corridor and listening for anyone coming down them.

"Okay," Sherry emerged from the room again, and we started walking hurriedly away so that nobody would catch us. "I could only find one. The rest must've been checked out already. Either we wait until those guys get back, or Mia and I will have to go on foot and meet you-"

"No," I shook my head. "Mia goes with Daryl."

"What?" Sherry looked at me in disbelief. "You don't want her with you?"

"I want her where she'll be safe," I said. "Daryl's getting the bike, so he's getting Mia too. You and I are much more likely to be caught on foot."

"You could take the bike?" she suggested. "I'll lead Daryl out…"

"No," I said. "Daryl getting caught isn't an option. He'll keep Mia safe. There's nobody I trust more with her life than Daryl."

Sherry swallowed back any doubts she had and nodded, "Okay. Whatever you think."

"How do we get them out?" I asked.

"Mia's easy," Sherry said. "She can move around the Sanctuary, and nobody will be too hard on her if she's found somewhere she's not meant to be. As for Daryl… I can get the key to his room."

"You sure?"

"Yeah, I know where Dwight keeps that, leave it to me," she said. "You just make sure Mia knows what to do."

We walked out onto the front steps of Sanctuary. The half-unloaded food truck was still there. The men out there were a little too busy to notice two women slip past them to walk around the parameters, looking for a good place for us to slip away.

"Thanks to Carl," Sherry nodded to where the bodies of the people he'd shot were being hung up on spikes outside the fence. "There aren't as many guards out here. Negan will take more when he leaves for Alexandria, which should give us a few places we can leave without being seen. Where we go after that is on you."

"Hilltop or the Kingdom," I said, trying to work out which was the better option and most likely to take us in.

"Not Alexandria?"

"It's the first place he'll look," I said. On one hand, I had friends at the Kingdom - Bryce and Carol - who'd be able to shelter us. On the other hand, I had no idea if Negan was aware of the Kingdom, and I didn't want to bring him to their door if he wasn't. Hilltop, at least, were already mixed up in this.

"You okay?" Sherry asked.

"Yeah," I said. "Just thinking it through."

"We need to head back in soon," Sherry said. "If Negan notices we're missing from Mark's punishment, he'll get suspicious."

"But the minute he leaves with Carl, we get Daryl and Mia, and we go?" I asked.

"That's right," Sherry said. "If you really-"

"Naomi!" someone hissed. A hurried, urgent whisper. A man's voice for sure. Sherry and I both jumped. The immediate and instinctual fear that it was Negan filled us both up. But when I turned and saw who it was, I felt myself relax. The last piece of the puzzle had just presented itself.

"Hello, Jesus," I smiled.

We're getting out of here.

 

Daryl

Dwight handed me a broom. I took the handle and thought about whether it was enough to take out Negan and get all of us somewhere safe. Now Carl was here too. It felt like every moment I sat about doing nothing, the number of people in trouble grew. I should have paid more attention to Morgan and his damn stick when he was trying to teach us about it in Alexandria. He might've known how to weaponize this.

"The hell am I supposed to mop?" I asked.

"Shut up," Dwight snapped. "You'll see."

I looked at the crowd gathering on the factory floor like they knew what was about to happen. Dwight lit a furnace and strung up an iron over the flames. It started glowing red with heat. I watched how he flinched away from it. He didn't want to, but it was automatic. I looked at those new burns on his face and was willing to bet that I was about to find out how he got them.

A man was dragged in and tied to a chair that was waiting for him by the furnace. He was shaking, crying.

Negan stepped out onto a walkway above the factory floor, Carl still in tow. When they saw Negan, everyone in the room dropped to one knee. Like he was a goddamn King. Negan looked out over everyone. Carl glared at the back of his head.

A door opened on the factory floor. I glanced at it and saw Naomi and Sherry sneak quietly into the room. It hadn't escaped my notice that parts of Noami's face had been red when I'd seen her earlier. Some of those parts were now darkening, fresh bruises under her jaw.

Despite this, there was a light in her eyes that I hadn't seen for a long time. Was she up to something? Or was she finally starting to cave into this place? Seeing her in that room filled with Negan's wives had made my heart drop right down to my stomach. But, I figured if she was going to break her promise to me, Negan would make her do it right in front of me to watch me unravel. I hated being so far from her. Being able to see her but not know what she was going through, it was hell.

"Hold that for me," Negan said to Carl, holding out Lucille. Carl's hesitation was uncomfortably long, but eventually, he took it. Negan looked at the rest of us, "You know the deal. What's about to happen is gonna be hard to watch. I don't want to do it. I wish I could just ignore the rules and let it slide, but I can't. Why?"

"The rules keep us alive," the chorus belated out of a bunch of brainwashed sheep.

"That is right. We survive. We provide security to others. We bring civilization back to this world. We are the Saviors," he said. I hated that fucking name. "But we can't do that without rules. Rules are what make it all work. I know it's not easy. But there's always work, there is always a cost. If you try to skirt it, or if you try to cut the corner… then it is the iron for you."

The iron?

I looked at Dwight again, his burns. How could he go through it and then stand by watching it happen to someone else?

Negan led Carl down to the factory floor. The whole crowd waited with bated breath, too afraid to talk. For a moment, the only sounds you could hear were soft sobs from one of Negan's wives and the shaky, unsteady breathing of the guy in the chair. Negan walked over to Dwight and reached out a hand. Dwight lifted the iron out of the fire and passed it to him.

"Mark... I'm sorry," Negan said to the guy in the chair, not sounding sorry. "But it is what it is."

Without any further hesitation, he pressed the burning side of the iron to Mark's face. Mark screamed, and the room quickly filled up with the smell of cooking meat. Smelt like Terminus. The skin on Mark's face started blistering and peeling around the edges of the iron, and I had to look away. Most folks couldn't look. Just stood there and listened until his screams suddenly ended. I glanced over again and saw he'd passed out.

Negan pulled the iron away from Mark's face, bits of flesh still clung to the bottom of it. Negan looked at me and grinned. He didn't say anything, but his meaning was clear. This is what happened to anyone who went behind his back with one of his wives.

Don't matter. She ain't ever going to be yours.

"Ah, that wasn't so bad now, was it?" Negan said to the silent crowd. Then his eyes fixed on me again, and he walked over. I felt everything in me tense as he came up behind me and said, "He pissed himself. Clean that up."

The mop that had been in my hand before Mark was even put in the chair suddenly made sense. How often did this happen, for them to know that it would be needed? I started mopping up the wet patch on the floor. The smell of piss mixed with the heavy scent of burning flesh. Negan stepped aside to let the Doctor take a look at Mark.

"Well, the pussy passed out. But it's settled, we're square. Everything is cool. Let Mark's face be a daily reminder to him and to everyone else that the rules matter. I hope that we all learned something today because I don't ever want to have to do that again," he told the crowd. Then, he looked at Carl. "Some crazy shit, huh? Come on, Let's go figure out what to do with you."

I watched him take Carl away again. He looked back at me before he melted into the crowd. I wanted to follow him, make sure Negan wasn't about to do something terrible to him. But I worried that following him would have consequences, and not for me. For Carl. Ever since they'd beat Naomi unconscious, the thought of stepping out of line and getting someone else hurt like that turned my stomach.

I looked around for Naomi, but she and Sherry were already gone.

The crowd trickled away as Dwight and I cleaned up. When we were done, he took me back out into the yard to face the Walkers out there again. The van Carl had arrived in was empty now, but there was a whole team of people milling around it. Armed. Like they were preparing it for another journey. I looked up. Tried not to react when I saw Jesus on top of it. He mouthed the words, "Be ready."

I looked away again, not wanting to draw any attention to him, but this must have had something to do with Naomi's change in mood. That new light in her eyes. Something was changing, and she was the one changing it.

Negan yelled for me from the front of the van. I walked up, saw that Carl was sitting in there too. He gave me a look like he wanted to apologize for something. Negan said, "You seem worried, so I'm taking the kid home."

You better be.

"If you do anything to him-" I said.

"Dwight!" Negan yelled, not breaking eye contact with me. "Daryl needs a time out. Put him back in his box for a while."

Fuck. You.

As the truck drove off, Negan flipped me the bird out of the window. When I looked at the roof again, Jesus was gone like he'd never even been there. Dwight grabbed the back of my shirt and dragged me into the building again. I shook him off, walked ahead of him. I knew where I was going, I didn't need his damn hands on me.

I sat in the dark. Alone. I wondered if I'd gotten myself in enough trouble to ruin whatever plan Naomi was working on.

I heard a door down the corridor open, and footsteps approach. I hoped it was her. I hoped she'd speak to me through the door again just so I could tell her to leave without me. To take Mia and run and let me rot here. If this was her only chance to get out, I wanted her to take it.

I heard the door unlock, but it didn't open. And then a note slid quietly under it. The footsteps ran away without a word. If it was Naomi, she'd have said something, right? The note sat on the floor for a minute before I picked it up. Just the words 'Go Now' scrawled on it. I knew it wasn't her handwriting. It wasn't neat enough for Naomi. Even if she was in a rush, she didn't write this way.

So, who was it?

There was something stuck to the back. I turned it over and found a key. Looked like a motorbike key, but it felt too good to be true. This could be another trap. Whoever wrote this note, whoever slid it under the door, wasn't Naomi. Did Dwight or Negan want me to think it was? Were they testing to see if I'd run again?

I thought about seeing Jesus, that new light in Naomi's eyes, and it all felt very flimsy. Like I'd imagined all of it because I wanted it to be true.

But what if it is her?

I stood up and opened the door. Nobody said anything, nobody yelled. But nobody had the first time, either. The corridor was empty, so I took my chances and slipped out. The one benefit of bare feet was how quiet I could be sneaking around the place. It meant when I heard some Saviors arguing through a door and about to come out into the corridor, I could duck into a different room before I got caught.

I paused and listened to them through the door. Didn't sound like they were coming my way, so I took a look around. The room was messy like someone was living in it. Clothes piled up, a few jars of food. I grabbed a jar of peanut butter and started eating right out of it. My empty stomach rumbled, it had been a long time since it had been full.

Then I grabbed one of the shirts that were lying around and changed out of the sweater they'd given me. If I was spotted, I didn't want anyone to immediately identify me as one of their prisoners.

I caught sight of some carved figures on a table, and it hit me. This was Dwight's room. These were his damn clothes. What were the chances? I didn't want anything to do with him. My hatred of that guy was almost enough for me to take them off again. I didn't want to be like him, look like him.

Fuck you, Dwight.

I pulled one of his checked shirts over the Tshirt and ate some more of his food, waiting for the noise in the hall to die down. The note hadn't said anything about where to go. It had just told me to go. The bike key was the only real clue. If this was Naomi's doing, I had to hope she'd be waiting out there for me.

The voices in the hall faded and died out. I stood up, grabbed Dwight's hat to hide my face, knocking his damn figurines to the ground as I went. I opened the door, checked the corridor, and started moving when I knew it was safe. I headed to where I knew they kept the bikes. Nothing was going to stop me from getting out now. Nothing.

I turned a few corners, snuck passed an open doorway where some Saviors were gambling on some shit. I grabbed an old pipe that was leaning up against the wall, and then I was out of there.

I really thought she'd be there. Just standing by the bikes waiting for me, and she'd call me a dumbass for being so worried about her. But the whole courtyard looked empty.

"Naomi!" I called as I ran over to the bikes, trying to work out which one the key was for. Maybe she was hiding or wasn't out yet. Either way, I wasn't going any further than this without her. No damn way.

"What the hell?" A Savior turned the corner.

No. Not again.

They tricked me again.

It was just one guy, but it felt like the whole world was closing in. Pure adrenaline shot through my veins. I thought Negan had only been pretending to leave with Carl and was about to step out with Naomi. Beat her again. Beat Carl, too.

No.

Fuck.

No.

This can't happen again.

The Savior was trying to say something to me, but I couldn't hear it over the roar of blood pounding in my ears. What if she had been hiding out here? What if this guy had got her? I hit him with the pipe. He dropped to the ground, but I kept going. To make sure. I expected to hear Negan's damn whistle again. For him to come sauntering out with Naomi and tell me this had all been part of his plan.

I can't keep living like this.

Where the hell was she?

I looked down and saw Rick's python sticking out of the guys pocket. I took it. Took his walkie too, in case anything came over the radio about them catching Naomi.

"Daryl?" a voice whispered, but it still made me jump. It wasn't hers. I turned towards it, pipe raised, and Mia slipped out of hiding.

"Mia," I said. Relief almost knocked me backward. She ran toward me, and I scooped her up in a big hug that lifted her off her feet. I didn't even think about it, I was just so happy to see her and hug her after all this time. "You okay? Were you hiding out here this whole time?"

"Yeah," she said, as I set her back down on her feet again. "Naomi told me to wait out here for you, but I saw Joey coming, so I stayed where I was, and then… well…"

She looked down at the bloody mess that used to be Joey.

Shit. She shouldn't have seen that.

"We gotta go," I said, shifting her focus away from it. "Where's your sister?"

I looked at the space behind her like Naomi was about to step out from there too.

"They could only get one bike key," Mia said. "She and Sherry are getting out on foot, with Jesus. Naomi said she will meet us at the Hilltop. She said you'd know where that was."

"Nah," I said. Leaving without Naomi didn't feel right at all. "We'll get her. We'll find her another key."

I started moving back toward the building.

"No," I felt Mia's hand on my arm and looked down at her, she was both defiant and terrified. "Naomi told me I couldn't let you do that. She said we had to go right away."

Goddamn it, Naomi.

Of course, she'd known I wouldn't want to. Of course, she'd prepared Mia for that. Trying to argue with someone who knows you inside out when they're not even there, is maddening. Mia took another nervous step towards me.

"She made me promise I wouldn't let you go back in," Mia said. She looked fearfully around us like she was just waiting for us to get caught, reminding me that the clock was against us. The longer we remained here, the more likely it was someone else would stumble across us. Or they'd notice I wasn't where I was meant to be. "She'll be at the Hilltop. We have to go."

She was so determined, stubborn. Something else she'd got from her sister. Naomi had trusted me to get Mia out, I couldn't let her down. I couldn't let my damn hot-headedness be the reason that Mia and I didn't escape. I turned back to the bikes, found the one I had the key to, and rolled it out.

"Alright," I said to her, "C'mon."

Mia climbed up on the back, and I worried that she didn't have a helmet. I told her to hold on tight as she could and didn't start the bike until I knew she was. We sped out of there. Faster than was safe, but I didn't slow until I put enough distance between us and that place.

We didn't speak until we got in sight of the Hilltop's walls.

"You okay back there?" I yelled back to her.

"Yeah," she called back.

"That's the Hilltop," I told her. "We're almost there."

She didn't say anything else, but I felt her fingers dig in a little tighter.

I expected an argument when we got to the gates like there had been the first time we'd come. Without Jesus, I wasn't sure how I'd negotiate with Gregory to let us in. To my surprise, the gates opened up when we got close, and I could ride right through. I stopped just inside, and they shut behind me.

"Daryl!" someone called over as Mia slid down from the back of the bike. I nudged the kickstand down with my foot and let the bike rest as I looked around.

"Maggie!" I yelled as she ran toward me from the house. She looked a damn sight better than she had in the clearing. No longer pale and sweaty, enough energy to close the gap between us and give me a huge hug. And right behind her, begging her to slow down, was Glenn.

"You okay?" I asked them both when Maggie let me go. I pulled Glenn into a hug, too. "Once they put us in those vans, I couldn't… we couldn't…"

"We're okay," he assured me. I looked over his shoulder at Maggie, who nodded too, and then I let Glenn go.

"And the baby?" I asked her. "It's all…?"

"All good," she said with a big smile and put one hand on her stomach. Glenn put an arm around her shoulders.

"Maggie and the baby are doing great," he said. "I just wish she'd slow down a little."

Maggie rolled her eyes and ignored him. "How are you, Daryl? Are you okay? There's a medical trailer-"

"I'm fine," I interrupted her. I had a few scrapes and bruises, but nothing worth bothering a doctor about. Turning to where Mia was trying her best to hide behind me, I said, "This is Mia."

"Naomi's sister?" Maggie asked, looking from me to her and back again. I nodded. "You found her?"

Mia stuck out her hand to shake with Maggie and Glenn as they introduced themselves, all formal like her sister would've done. My heart ached.

Hurry up, Naomi.

"Naomi…" Glenn hesitated. "Is she okay?"

"She's fine," I told him quickly. Didn't want Mia ever thinking otherwise. "She got out with Jesus."

"She's meeting us here," Mia said, without any doubt that it would happen.

"They'll both be back here soon," I backed her up. "It'll take them a few hours to walk if they don't find a car, they might not be here until sunset."

"Well," Maggie said brightly like she was trying to keep us both from worrying. "Let's show you around while we wait for her, huh?"

Mia nodded and followed Maggie toward one of the animal pens, telling her all about the pigs and cows they had. Mia listened carefully, asked a few questions about farming and the way things worked at Hilltop. I felt a weird amount of pride at how smart she was, even though it was nothing to do with me.

"Just you two here?" I asked Glenn.

"And Sasha," he said, and his eyes grew sad. "Abraham's body is…I can show you later."

I nodded.

"Sasha okay?"

Glenn shook his head, and I didn't ask anymore. It was hard to imagine the kind of pain she must be in.

Mia's wide eyes took in all of Hilltop. She smiled and said hello to people, but something about her seemed to shrink the longer we were here. That initial confidence and curiosity wavered. She didn't come inside the trailer when Maggie and Glenn invited us in for dinner, she just sat down on the step outside while Glenn cooked for us. I stood at the doorway, keeping an eye on her.

"You okay out here?" I asked her.

"Yeah," she said, not taking her eyes off the gates. The light was starting to fade, the sun would set soon. "I'm just waiting."

"Mind if I wait with ya?" I asked. She shook her head, and I sat down beside her.

"You want some food?" Maggie asked us. "We've got food."

Mia looked up at Maggie. "Can we wait until my sister gets here?"

"Sure," Maggie smiled. "We'll save her a plate."

Mia nodded and turned back around to watch the gates. Time dragged on, the light gradually fading. If Naomi didn't make it back today, if it took longer than I thought or they got held up on the road and had to hole up somewhere overnight, I wondered how I'd have that conversation with Mia. Or how either of us could sleep knowing that she wasn't back yet.

This is bullshit.

I glanced up at the sky and tried to guess how many hours of daylight were left. My feet and legs were restless. I was only going to give it a few minutes before I got my bike and went back out looking for them. But then Mia leaped to her feet, pointed at where the gates were opening up.

Finally.

Thank God.

Mia started running, and I took off after her. The gates rolled in, and I could see Jesus standing on the other side. I searched the space around him, but the opening gates blocked my sightline. I couldn't believe I was going to get to hold her again, without any fear. Without Negan stopping it.

Me. Naomi. Mia. Safe, finally.

Sherry came into view just behind him. I couldn't stand it any longer.

"Naomi!" I yelled for her, my feet pounding the ground. And then Mia stopped dead in her tracks. Sherry and Jesus walked through the gates, and they started slowly closing behind them.

Just them.

I could tell by their faces that something had gone wrong. It was like my veins caught fire.

No.

I kept running, kept looking at the closing gap. I yelled Naomi's name again like that would undo the fact she wasn't here, and if I just yelled loud enough, she'd come running. I needed to see her. And she always came when I needed her. Always.

"Hey, open them gates!" I yelled up at the guards when I reached them. They didn't move. Nobody moved. "Hey! Open them up! There's someone else coming."

"Daryl-" Sherry started to say. She was looking at me the same way folks looked at me after Merle died. Like they thought they could understand even a fraction of what I was feeling. She stopped trying to talk, covered her mouth with her hand like she was trying to stop herself from crying, and it made me mad as shit. This was on her.

"Where is she?" I asked, fighting to keep my voice level. Sherry didn't say anything, just shook her head.

"Daryl," Jesus said quietly. "It's just us. She's not coming."

"No," I said as if that could do shit to change the facts. As if just refusing to believe it would mean it wasn't true anymore. They blurred in front of me as I blinked back tears. "No."

And then I felt a hand in mine. Small. Mia's. I looked down at her.

"Where is she?" she asked me. I didn't have an answer for her. I looked back at Sherry and Jesus.

"Answer her," I told them. Sherry took a deep breath.

"Simon got her," she said. "He… took her away. Locked her up again."

No.

No, no, no.

"And you left her there?" I yelled. She flinched like she thought I was about to hit her. I could've. I wanted to. "Ain't you the one with the damn key?"

"Simon had it," Sherry's voice shook. I couldn't breathe. My throat felt like it was closing up, choking the life outta me. They'd left her there. They'd fucking left her.

"He was about to catch all of us," Jesus said. "Sherry was getting the key to your door, and he would've found all three of us she hadn't…"

"Nah," I said to nobody in particular. I didn't want to hear any more. Didn't want to listen to him credit her for saving them when she should've been saving herself. Sherry had been there by choice; they didn't even know Jesus had been in that truck. What right did they have to make it out without her? "I gotta go."

I started to walk back to my bike.

"Daryl, no!" Sherry ran to catch up with me. "You can't go back there."

"If you're coming, grab a gun," I told her. "If not, get the hell out of my way."

"They'll know you're gone by now," Jesus said, trying to get between me and the bike. "Going back there now? It's a suicide mission."

I don't care.

I ignored them both and kept walking. Sherry grabbed my arm and pulled hard, bringing me to a temporary stop. I couldn't look at her, I knew if I did, I'd smack her in her goddamn face.

"Negan will be back by now," she said. "He'll know what's happened. Naomi… she's probably-"

"Nah," I cut across her. I knew what she'd been about to say. Naomi's probably dead already. I couldn't hear it. "Fuck all y'all, I'm going to get her."

I pulled myself away from her and kept walking, heard someone start to run after me, and I turned to tell Sherry or Jesus or whoever it was to fuck off. But, Mia was the one looking back at me. She was crying but trying not to. I'd been too wrapped up in my own pain to notice hers.

"I'm coming with you," she said.

"No." It was dangerous, out of the question.

"Yes!"

"Mia, no!" I said. I turned away from her again. "Stay here."

"Why?"

Because it's a goddamn suicide mission.

"Because I damn told you to, that's why," I grabbed my bike and got on it.

"That's not an answer."

"Mia!"

"She's my sister!" Mia yelled. "Naomi told me I had to stick with you. She told me that I had to stay with you no matter what because you would keep me safe. So, if you're going, I'm coming too."

She sat up behind me on the bike, but I didn't move. Not to start it, not to get her off it. My feet stayed stuck to the ground, my hands on the handlebars like I was about to go. Just ride over to the Sanctuary and get Naomi or die trying to blow the place to hell if she was dead already.

But I couldn't.

I had Mia now.

Naomi had trusted me with her life. Might've been the last thing she'd ever done. I couldn't just throw that away. Sherry was right, they'd know I was gone by now, and they'd be looking for me. I didn't care if I never came back from this, but where would that leave Mia? In an unfamiliar place with people she didn't know? Unprotected. Alone.

"Daryl," Jesus stood in front of my bike. "We can work this out. If she's still alive, we can get a plan together. You run in there now, and we'll lose both of you. That means they win."

I still didn't want to move. It felt like giving up on someone who'd never once given up on me. The world was too loud. People yelling at me to stop, every thought in my head screaming at me to go on. But it didn't matter how I felt. What mattered was Mia.

"Get off," I told her. She looked panicked.

"No! I'm-"

"We ain't going," I said. "I ain't going. Jesus is right, they'll be expecting us. We need more guns, more people. We gotta get her out safe."

Mia looked away from me. She nodded, but these big tears were falling thick and fast from her eyes, and she couldn't stop them. I could see her trying to. Trying to be brave. She got off the bike and walked away without another word. I took a deep breath. My feet felt like lead, but I got off the bike and ran after her.

"Mia," I caught her by the shoulder. "I'm going to get her back, Mia. I swear to you, I will. I will bring her back from that place."

"I'm gonna help," she said. There was such defiance burning in her eyes that I had to look away from her for a moment. It was too much like how Naomi looked when she was mad. I didn't have the heart to say no. Not yet. That was a fight for another day, we'd lost too much already.

I reached out for her but didn't hug her. Didn't know what to do. When she'd cried, as a baby, I'd always known what face to pull to make her laugh again. But how did I help her now? There was no quick fix for this. "I'll get her back. She ain't gone. I'll get her back."

I said it for me just as much as her. Maybe even more so. I knew this could be Naomi's last night on Earth, and it killed me that I wasn't there fighting for her the way she'd always fought for me. If I let myself think she was dead, I knew I wouldn't be able to go on or take care of Mia. My heart was shattered, my lungs filled with shards of glass that cut me deeper with every breath. Drowning me in blood and pain.

I'll get you back, Naomi. I'll get you back.

Chapter 37: Time

Naomi

Fuck.

I'm fucked.

Absolutely fucked.

There was no getting out of this. For the first time, I was alone, truly alone, in Sanctuary. Time moved slow, but I'd never been more aware of it passing. It sank around me, drowning me in the suffocating silence between ticks of the clock. A slow, unstoppable march away from the people I loved, and towards the unknown. The unknown was what made it all so suffocating.

What if Simon had doubled-back and found Sherry?

What if she couldn't get the key to Daryl?

What if she did, and he and Mia were still caught?

I couldn't sit still. Couldn't stop pacing up and down the floor of my cell, a knot forming in my stomach that was so tight and heavy it made me queasy. The tightness spread to my chest, restricting every breath I took. This was how I imagined inmates on death row felt. An agonizing wait for the end. Moments elongated by dread. Knowing that something terrible was coming made me want things to move faster, just to get it over with, even if it meant an end to everything. Or at least an end to me. I wasn't dumb enough to think Negan would let me live after this.

Heavy footsteps reverberated in the corridor, Negan's high-pitched whistle echoed toward me. The same dread that had lengthened the seconds now made me wish for more time, or that I could turn it back and find another way out. Find time to fight and make sure everyone was safe. But the time for that had passed.

The window in the door rattled as Negan tapped on it with Lucille. I didn't respond, sinking down onto the bed, my eyes fixed on his fuzzy form behind frosted glass.

Time to face the music. Time to face Lucille.

"Naomi, Naomi, Naomi," Negan sighed. He sounded disappointed as if I'd genuinely hurt him. "Just when I thought we were getting along… did you pull this shit?"

My heart doubled in size and lodged itself somewhere behind my tonsils, beating like a military drum. It made it hard to speak. Hard to breathe. Negan rested Lucille against the glass like she was waiting for me.

"What shit?" I called back, trying to sound calm. The key turned, the metallic click of the bolt tightened something in my stomach. The door swung forward, and Negan stepped in. For once, there was no smile on his face.

"Don't play dumb with me, Naomi," he said. "I am not in the mood. Not today."

I swallowed. Playing dumb felt like my only option when I didn't know what Negan knew. Or what had happened. It was the single small sliver of survival I had, my only chance to find a new way out of here and get back to the people I love.

"Whatever shit you're trying to pin on me," I said. "I've been locked in here for hours, just ask Simon-"

"Oh, Simon and I have had a chat," Negan said. "He told me he caught you lurking around the ground floor. Do you wanna tell me what you were doing there when I specifically told you that you weren't allowed out without a chaperone?"

"I was looking for Sherry," I answered quickly and hoped it wasn't too quick. My thoughts were racing so fast I'd forgotten what normal conversation sounded like.

"Sherry, huh?" he said. "Did sweet Sherry let you out of her sight? Did you run off on her?"

"No."

"No? Alright then, did you fight her like you fought Simon? Are we gonna find her beaten up in a closet somewhere?"

"No…" I said, trying not to give anything away, but the dread was fading, eaten away by growing hope. If they didn't know where Sherry was, she must've gotten out. Negan hadn't mentioned Daryl or Mia, but he might not know they were gone yet. He was looking at me, still expecting some kind of answer. "I ain't seen Sherry since you burned that poor bastard's face. The crowd was big, and we got separated as we were leaving. I waited around for a bit, but she never came."

"That's what you were doing when Simon found you?" Negan was testing me, leaning on parts of my story to find the weaknesses. Find where he could crack it open and dig out the truth. "Waiting around?"

"Yes."

For a second, it seemed like he was on his way to believing me. He swung Lucille out in front him, bounced the smooth wood of her handle against the palm of his free hand like he was deep in thought.

"So it's just a coincidence that Simon found you in the same corridor as Dwight's room, huh?"

Shit.

I prayed the cold flame of fear that had shot through me had not shown anywhere on my face. "How the hell would I know where Dwight's room is?"

Negan walked closer, his dark eyes fixed on me.

"See, at first I thought you were covering for her while she was running around with Dwight," he said. "I mean, you'd think after just seeing what happened to Mark, they'd remember to keep their hands off each other, but maybe it got them in the mood. I haven't seen someone get the iron twice but, hell, I don't know what they're into."

"Dwight's missing, too?" I asked. My curiosity was genuine this time. I wondered if Sherry had managed to convince him to leave with her and if Daryl had torn him to pieces yet.

"I so badly want to believe you, Naomi," Negan said, shaking his head. "I really do."

"Look, I'm sorry you're having trouble keeping track of your people, but it has nothing to do with me," I said. "Have you thought about not permanently scarring the people around you? Maybe then they'd-"

"Hey!" he snapped. A piece of spit flew from his mouth. "I'd be very careful how you talk to me right now."

My mouth went dry. I hadn't been this scared of Negan killing me since he'd first introduced himself. Every conversation since then, he'd seemed amused enough by my anger or pain to keep me alive. A plaything to wind up when he was bored. But now he was the angry one. He was the tightly wound string about to snap.

"We found Dwight exactly where he was meant to be. And he's playing it as dumb as you, sweetheart," Negan said. "But one of you has got to be lying."

"Why do you think it's me?" I said. "I ain't got enough power around here to get someone out, and if I did, do you really think it would be Sherry?"

"Funny you should say that," he said. He crouched down in front of the bed I was sitting on, looked me squarely in the eye. "Because your boyfriend's gone AWOL, too. You know anything about that?"

Something in my chest unclenched. I breathed easy for the first time in a long time. The relief that flooded me was so strong it made my hands shake.

They did it. They're safe.

The realization hit me so hard it brought tears to my eyes.

"Daryl's gone?" I said, my voice came out weird. Higher-pitched than normal. I was fighting back tears, and I hated that Negan could see it. His face gave nothing away, but he continued to study mine intensely.

"You think I'm lying?" he asked. I shook my head. For once, I prayed he wasn't. "You think I'm an idiot?"

"No," I said truthfully. He was an asshole, but he wasn't an idiot. It would be easier to escape from him if he was.

"You see him up here, tryna get to you?"

"No," my voice faltered. It felt like a trap.

"Are you dead?" Negan asked.

"What?"

"You're not the first damn dead bastard to learn how to talk, are you?"

"No…"

"That's interesting, don't you think?" he said. "Because it wasn't so long ago that you were telling me with absolute certainty that Daryl wouldn't leave here unless you were with him, or he knew for sure that you were dead. So if you're still breathing, why the hell is he gone?"

Shit.

I swallowed hard. I had no response to that. "Guess I was wrong…"

"I don't buy it," Negan said, he knew he'd let me talk myself into a corner. "He fought so damn hard to get to you last time he got out. What would make him give up and take off with one of my wives? Damn, did he fall out of love so fast? Men are assholes, huh? That it?"

I said nothing, but the weight that had been drowning me was starting to lift. I'd never once doubted that Daryl would do right by Mia and that leaving her in his care was her best chance. He would save her at any cost. But now, I was especially glad. Looking after her would've stopped Daryl from doing something dumb like coming back for me. Mia would save him, too.

"Y'know the part that really fucks with my brain?" Negan said, leaning in real close. "There's a kid missing, too... Sherry, Daryl, and some kid all disappear on the same day. What are the chances of that, huh?"

"I dunno," I said, folding my hands into my lap to hide the fact that they were shaking. "Kids run away all the time, right? Was Sherry close to her?"

"Didn't say it was a girl," Negan said. My stomach dropped. "But it is. And you'll never guess her name."

Shit.

"Because it was damn familiar to me. And I couldn't for the life of me think about where I'd heard it before," he said. I raced through the memory of every conversation we'd had about Mia, couldn't remember saying her name. I'd been careful not to. But the way he was toying with me made it clear that he knew. "And then it came to me. I hadn't heard it. I'd read it. On this."

He pulled out the photograph from his pocket. The 'Happy Birthday, Mia' sign in big, treacherous letters behind our heads. My eyes stung.

"Mia," her name tumbled out of my mouth in a sob. For a moment, that photograph was all I could see. My brilliant little sister. I might never see her again. And then, because I knew my only chance of getting out of this was to keep playing dumb, I added, "She's alive?"

There were genuine tears in my eyes and a tremor in my voice. I hoped it looked like shock, but it was fear. Now that Negan knew about her, I was terrified she'd face the consequences if he found them. I was so caught up in that fear that I didn't realize Negan had raised his fists until the first punch had already landed. My jaw stung.

"Sherry, Daryl, Mia," he said, landing a punch for each name. My face. My ribcage. My stomach. "You know what they have in common? The only thing that links them? You."

I hurt everywhere. I looked up at him.

"If Daryl knew Mia was here," I said. "He'd leave without me. He loves her like she's his blood. He'd keep her safe. Keep her away from you."

It was maybe the first honest thing I'd said in this whole conversation.

"No, no, no," Negan shook his head with each syllable, his voice so soft it was almost a whisper. A stark contrast to the hard hit that landed on my face. I tasted metal, spat out blood. "Don't lie to me, Naomi."

"I ain't."

He grabbed the front of my shirt and hauled me to my feet.

"Do you know where they are?" His hand closed around my throat.

"No."

"Do you know where they'd go to hide out?" He tightened his grip.

"No," I choked out.

"Take a guess," he tightened it again. I clenched my jaw. Glared defiantly back at him. There was no way in hell I'd give them up. I wasn't sending him to Hilltop, but I wasn't sending him to the other communities, either. My legs lifted off the ground. Darkness bloomed in the corners of my vision. I struggled for air, blood rushed in my ears.

Kill me.

Kill me, you fucker. I already got what I need.

He was choking me too hard to say any of it out loud, but I hoped he could read it in my face. There was peace in my heart. If he killed me now, I'd still die feeling like I'd won. Daryl and Mia were safe.

"The only reason I am letting you live," Negan said, his face so close to mine that I could feel the warmth of his breath as I struggled to take one of my own. "Is because I want him to watch you die. I want all of your friends to watch you die in the slowest way. I want him to see you suffer and know that it's on him. Baby, when I'm done with you, he will be begging me to kill you."

I tried to say something back. To spit in his face, tell him to go to hell, but his grip on my neck was too tight. I couldn't get a word out. My vision flitted between him and the ceiling and back again as my eyes rolled back in my head. I fought it. He let go, and I dropped to the floor. Negan barked orders at someone. For a few short, shallow rasps, my breathing was all I could focus on.

Two men grabbed my arms and forced me to my feet. They pulled me from the room and along the corridor to the stairwell. I didn't resist. I knew I couldn't fight my way out of this one, not yet. Negan walked ahead of us, taking the stairs two at a time. He took me down to a familiar corridor and a familiar door.

Daryl's door.

"Until I work out what's gone wrong here today," Negan said, "you can both have the privilege of rotting in this cell."

Both?

I was pushed into the room. I caught sight of Dwight huddled in a corner, covered in blood and clutching what looked like a dislocated shoulder. The door slammed and shut out the light. The room smelled of piss and shit and vomit. Nothing to sit or sleep on. Not even a window. When Daryl had told me he was doing fine in here, it had been a damn lie. I was angry. Not at him, I got why he'd lied about it, I'd have done the same. I was mad a place like this existed and that he'd been kept in it for so long.

He's out now.

He's safe.

I had to keep reminding myself, or I'd explode.

I was glad Dwight was here, getting a taste of what he'd inflicted on Daryl. I stepped away from Dwight until my back hit a wall. I wanted to be as far from him as possible. He'd shot Lucas, and I knew what he'd done to Daryl, I could've killed him for it. Like he could feel my hatred for him radiating off me in the small space, Dwight cleared his throat. "You're Daryl's girl, right?"

"Keep his name out of your fucking mouth," I snapped. Dwight fell silent. "I got my own damn name."

"Sorry," he said. "My memory ain't so good."

Are you fucking serious?

He'd asked for my name while Lucas lay bleeding out on the railway tracks. Had he forgotten that moment already? Or was he pretending because he knew it would make me think about it? I should've shot him there and then.

"You're an asshole," I muttered, leaning my head against the stone wall, staring up at a darkness so thick it hid the ceiling. I wanted it to swallow me, take me away from this place.

"Yeah," he said in a quiet, self-pitying way. "That much, I remember."

Oh, fuck off.

I was glad he'd been beaten already. If I attacked him, nobody would notice extra bruises. I couldn't kill him, I didn't have anything on me to fight off a Walker if he was left here long enough to turn. Was that why Negan had locked us up together, so we'd kill each other?

"How bad are you hurt?" I asked.

"Do you care?"

"No. But I don't wanna get stuck in here with your damn corpse tryna chew on me, so if you're bleeding out, I want to know."

"Nah," he said. "It's just my shoulder."

Good.

Hope it hurts.

"Are you hurt?" he asked, presumably for the same reason.

"A little," I said. "Nothing life-threatening."

We were silent again, and I got ready to settle into it for however long Negan would leave us here. My thoughts were already back with Daryl and Mia and what they might be doing. I knew they'd be upset, but I didn't want to think about that. I pictured them a few months or weeks from now, whenever I finally got out of here. Daryl and I could take her hunting, Mia and I could tell him about our time in DC so he wouldn't feel like he'd missed out on it anymore. I knew that bugged him.

Dwight interrupted, "Sherry said that you-"

"We ain't gotta talk," I snapped. He fell silent again, but I knew it wouldn't be for long. His frustrated and barely-suppressed sigh made my skin crawl.

"I just…" he said tentatively, clearly expecting me to bite his head off. "Did… did she have a part in this?"

"I ain't telling you shit."

"Why? You think I'm going to report back to Negan?"

"Why else would he put us both in here?"

"You think I'd be this badly beaten up if he put me in here to spy on you?"

"Yes," I said. "Negan burned half of your face off, and you did everything for him. You put a bolt in my friend. Kept Daryl locked up in here like a fucking animal. Think I didn't see the bruises on him? Think I don't know that it was you that-"

Anger had propelled my feet forward, forced my fists to clench so hard my nails dug into my palm. It's harder to throw punches in the dark when you can hear your target scramble away from you but not see where he's running off to. I stopped myself.

You can't kill him, he'll turn.

I repeated it as many times as I needed to calm myself down, to feel my fingers relax again. I backed off.

"Yeah," I said. "I don't think a bit of blood will stop you from being a goddamn rat."

There was another short silence. His breathing sounded heavier. I couldn't tell if it was fear or anger or pain from his injuries. Then he said, "I'm sorry for what I did, you gotta know I didn't do any of it for Negan."

I already knew that. "For Sherry?"

"Yeah."

I got it. Negan could've burned my face and beaten me to a pulp, but if he'd had Daryl or Mia as leverage, I'd have done anything he asked. It didn't make it okay, but I understood. If I had killed Dwight on the railway tracks, it would've been some other asshole in here torturing Daryl. Negan was the enemy here, anyone else could be dealt with once he was gone. I hesitated, and then said, "Sherry's safe. If they got away from here, she's safe. She's with good people."

His sigh of response felt tinged with the same relief I'd had when I'd found out they'd escaped. He whispered, "Thank you."

I expected more follow up questions, for him to dig deeper about how it had gone down, but he didn't. So far, Dwight was unrecognizable for the man I'd met before. It was as if the shadow of the man he'd once been, the one Sherry had known, had followed him while he did awful shit, and now that he was stuck in the dark, it was all he had left.

Two Dwights existed, one who'd risked it all to get his wife and sister-in-law out of this place, and one who'd shot my friend and tortured the man I loved. The question was, which version was I talking to now, or were both of them listening?

"If you were doing all of this for Sherry-"

"I was," he said before I could finish.

"What are you going to do now she's gone?" I asked. "Now that you don't have her as an excuse."

"If Negan doesn't kill me, you mean?"

"Yeah," I said. "Will you leave, too?"

"I don't know," his words were weak and got lost in the dark. Dwight was drifting. I couldn't tell if it was toward his old self or back to the guy he'd become for Negan. He'd probably gotten comfortable with being Negan's pet. "I got nowhere to go."

I couldn't offer him a place with us like I had with Sherry. I knew it would be the best way to get his help in taking Negan down, but he'd done too much damage. I couldn't look past it, nor would many others, and Daryl would shoot him on sight. So, I shifted the subject and hoped whatever was left of his relationship with Sherry would be enough.

"I think Sherry left," I said. "Because she didn't want you to be under his control anymore. After everything that Negan's done to you two… I think she wanted to take some of that power away from him. So that you could be who you were before all of this."

"Yeah?" he said. "I'm not sure I remember that guy."

"Sherry does," I said, hoping that would be enough to coax the best version of Dwight out into the light.

"You mad a Daryl for leaving you here?" he asked me.

"God, no," it was such a ridiculous question, it made me smile despite everything else I was feeling. "I wanted him to."

"I get that," Dwight said. "I'm glad Sherry left, too."

I still couldn't tell if his attempts to form some kind of connection were genuine or if he was trying to play me so he could feed something back to Negan and save his own skin. I started to wonder if I cared either way. Negan already knew I had the biggest connection to his escapees, and the most to gain from them getting out of here. I guess the only thing stopping him from being certain was that I hadn't disappeared with them.

"You think he'll come back for you?" Dwight asked.

"Nah," I said, and hoped it was true. "He's got my sister to look out for. I'll find my own way out."

"That's who the kid was?" Dwight said, like something suddenly made sense to him.

"Yeah."

"You think that's enough to stop him from coming back here?"

"It better be," I said, but I instantly doubted it. Having Mia would have stopped him from turning around immediately, but would it stop him in the long run? If she settled in someplace safe, with Bryce in the Kingdom or Aaron in Alexandria, would Daryl try and come back for me? Would things be better for both of them if I was dead?

"You really think your people are working to bring Negan down?" Dwight asked.

"Yeah," I said. "You can't keep a guy like Rick down for long."

"If you got the chance, would you kill him yourself?"

"Negan?"

"Yeah."

"If I had any kind of weapon, I'd have done it already," I muttered. "I'd do it with my bare hands if he didn't always have some damn entourage following him around."

Dwight was quiet for a moment, he understood the sentiment. I wondered if it was how he'd felt when he and Sherry had come back here before she'd made the deal to save his life. We didn't speak again for a while, but every now and then, he'd let out a strained exhale, probably because of his shoulder pain.

"Stand up," I told him. "I can help."

"What?"

In the dark, I heard his feet scuff against the ground as he tried to get away from me. He expected me to hurt him, which was fair enough because I wanted to.

"Your shoulder," I said. "I can help, stay still."

Dwight stopped moving then, quit trying to find a place to hide from me in a damn broom closet, but he didn't move back to me, and his voice was heavy with suspicion, "You'd help me? After everything I did?"

"Yeah," I said, although I was still a little undecided, and he was tipping me back towards 'no.'

"Why?"

"It'll fix your shoulder," I said. "But it's gonna hurt like a bitch. So, it'll make us both feel better."

I moved slowly toward him in the dark, my hands stretched out in front of me until they bumped into him. I stood behind him and put one hand on his back, feeling my way towards the affected shoulder blade. I put my other hand on his arm.

"You sure you know what you're doing?" he asked nervously.

"Yeah," I said. "Had to do it for Daryl once."

I cared a lot less about doing it correctly or gently for Dwight, and when his shoulder popped back into place, the pain made him scream. It was as satisfying as I thought it would be. He breathed heavily through his teeth for a moment, waiting for the pain to subside.

"Thanks," he said. "And... that hurt like a bitch, so…"

"Good." I was about to let go of him, and then I felt the leather on his back.

Daryl's vest.

I closed my eyes. My fingertips brushed against the leather until I felt the material change. The outline of those wings. I was used to missing Daryl, but this was different. Final. The longer I stayed alive here, the more likely it was that Daryl would try to come back for me. Dying might be the only way to make sure he stayed away for good. Stayed alive. Stayed with Mia.

I was okay with it. My only regret was that he'd never know I'd loved him.

I should've told him. I shouldn't have waited.

This is bullshit.

"You okay back there?" Dwight asked. His voice was more gentle than I expected.

"Yeah," I let go of him. My voice was heavy with a new kind of grief that was weighing me down. "If you need to throw someone under the bus for this, if you need to give someone up to Negan, it's okay if it's me."

"Why?" he said, surprised.

"I did it," I shrugged. "Ain't fair for someone else to go down for it."

"He'll string you up on the fence for all your friends to see," Dwight said. "You know that, right?"

"Yeah," I said. "But it'll take away any leverage Negan has for getting Daryl back. Daryl can focus on taking Negan down with Rick and the others, rather than worrying about me."

Dwight was quiet for a moment like he didn't believe what I was saying.

"Can't live without him, huh?"

"Nah," I said. "Just okay with dying for him."

I sank down to the floor, with my back against the door. The same door Daryl had whispered the same sentiments through. I rested my head against it like I could reach back through time and lean on him instead.

I should've told him.

By the time Negan opened the door again, my eyes had gotten so used to the dark that the light made me flinch. He looked down at me.

"You ain't killed him, huh? I'm impressed," he said. I didn't say anything. His gaze slid over to Dwight, "Alright, Dwighty boy, you're up."

Dwight got to his feet and shuffled past me. He gave me a look on the way past. Could've been a smile, but whether it was malice or compassion, I couldn't tell. Don't suppose it mattered. Either way, my time was up.

 

Daryl

Mia sat silently in Maggie and Glenn's trailer, her blank stare fixed on one spot in front of her. She didn't say anything. Didn't look at any of us, didn't cry or yell. I couldn't tell what she was thinking, and I didn't know what she needed. She was right in front of me, but it still felt like she was lost. Did she think I was giving up? It felt like I was giving up. Everything in me still wanted to get on my bike and go. I was mad at myself for staying put, and wouldn't blame her for being mad at me too. Even though she was the reason that I was staying put.

It would've understood it more if she'd cried. If she yelled at me. Thrown something. At least then, I'd have something to respond to. A place to start. But she was quiet, and that was somehow worse.

I felt lost too, like the whole world was slipping from under my feet, and I had to stop it. I had to make it right. For myself and for this little girl.

"She okay?" Maggie asked quietly. I didn't realize she'd come up behind me until she spoke. News of Sherry and Jesus's arrival had spread around Hilltop, and I couldn't stand listening to any of it. All of Sherry's damn excuses, all of the speculation about whether or not Naomi was still alive. I shook my head. Maggie touched my arm, and the sudden contact made me jump. I looked away from Mia. "Are you okay?"

I shook my head again. Maggie nodded like she understood. Maybe she did. She'd lost a lot of people, too. Some of them had been my fault, just like this. I looked away from her again.

"I shouldn't have gone without her," I said. "Not without knowing she was safe."

No wonder Mia couldn't look at me.

"You did the right thing," Maggie said, but it wasn't true. It was a lie she told me to try and make me feel better.

"I don't know what I'll do if I don't get her back," I whispered, and immediately wished that I hadn't. It opened up that dark pit inside me that made me feel like I was falling, and I couldn't stop. Dread. Fear. All of it almost swallowed me up. I needed something to hold on to. Some kind of hope. "Whatever Rick's planning, he better do it quick because I ain't-"

"Rick's not planning anything," Maggie said. I looked at her again, couldn't believe what I was hearing. Her eyes widened slightly, like some of my rising anger was showing on my face. Like she was trying to soften the blow, she added, "As far as we know."

"What?" The pit in my stomach grew.

"He's… out there finding stuff for Negan. I think he's too scared to move against him," Maggie said, folding her arms across her chest. "He doesn't want to lose anyone else, he wants to protect his kids. If he's planning anything, he isn't sharing it with the rest of us."

No.

This ain't right.

But I knew she was telling the truth, I'd seen a glimpse of it for myself when I'd gone back to Alexandria with Negan, but I'd never thought it was the full story. I thought Rick would have something, anything, up his sleeve. Submitting to the Saviors without a fight? That wasn't the Rick I knew, wasn't the one I'd been following all this time. And it wasn't one I could keep following if it meant losing Naomi.

I thought at least we'd be coming back to a group of people who wanted to fight. Maybe not quite an army yet, but a group on their way to becoming one. Would I have to build one from scratch? I didn't have time for that. I couldn't wait around. It felt bitterly unfair when Naomi would've been the first to pick up arms to defend anyone here that nobody was waiting and willing to fight for her now that she was the one who needed it.

No one except me.

"Does that sit right with other folks?" I asked.

"No," Maggie said. "Sasha ain't alright with that. Can't imagine Rosita is either. Some others in Alexandria want to fight, too. Or, so I've heard."

"What about you and Glenn?" I asked. "What about the rest of Hilltop?"

"Doesn't sit right with Glenn and me, either," Maggie said. "We've got your back if you're thinking about starting something."

"Negan's the one who started it," I said. "I'm just gonna end it is all."

"Some people at Hilltop are starting to get restless," Maggie said. "Some of them are scared, but Gregory's the real problem. He's right in Negan's pocket, and won't make another move against the Saviors in case they retaliate."

Goddamn weasel.

"I'll talk to him tomorrow," I said. "Get the word out to anyone here who wants to fight these guys. In a day or two, we're gonna take the Sanctuary. I'm gonna force them to give her back to me."

Maggie's eyes filled with that look people give you when they think you're being optimistic and don't want to burst that bubble. I knew that look. People gave me it when I was the only dumbass who still thought Sophia was out there. "And if Naomi isn't… if she's-"

"Then we'll force them to give Negan up," I said before she could finish. I couldn't hear the words 'Naomi' and 'dead' in the same sentence, I'd lose my shit. "And I'll kill him. Real fucking slow in front of everybody."

I didn't know what I'd do after that, what would be left for me or what would be left of me. I'd go back for Mia if she still wanted me around. If I couldn't get Naomi back, maybe avenging her would be enough for Mia to be able to look me in the eye again.

"You're really serious about this, aren't you?" Maggie asked, her voice full of concern.

"Damn straight," I said. "If I gotta do it on my own, I will. I can't wait around for Rick to get his head out his ass."

"What about Mia?" Maggie lowered her voice so she wouldn't hear. I didn't think Mia was taking anything in. Guilt twisted in my gut, knowing what Naomi would say if I left Mia on her own. But she'd also be mad that I was going back for her at all. I'm sure if she got her way, she'd have me leave her to rot in there forever, so I couldn't pay attention to what I thought Naomi would say. I had a different plan.

Maggie asked, "You aren't really going to let her come with you, are you?"

"'Course not," I said. "I'll take her to the Kingdom. She and Naomi have a friend there, someone who knows her from back before all of this. He'll take care of her until Naomi and I get back."

I knew I'd been kind of an asshole last time I'd seen him, but it seemed like Bryce really cared for Mia, and I didn't think he'd use my lousy attitude as a reason to refuse taking her in. Probably be delighted to get her away from me. Maggie nodded, her lips formed one thin line like she was fighting the urge to remind me that I might not be returning with Naomi.

"Mia's welcome to stay with us," she offered. "I don't mind keeping an eye on her."

"Nah," I said. "Mia should be with someone she knows, and if the Saviors come back here, I don't want Gregory giving her up. Thanks, though."

"Alright," Maggie said. "Whatever you think is best."

It was a lot of pressure to make these kinds of decisions for someone too young to make them for herself. Especially when you knew they were going to hate you for it. Mia wanted to be there when I got her sister, but it was too much of a risk.

"Once I've been to the Kingdom, I'll go to Alexandria, try and knock some sense into Rick," I said. "If he ain't gonna listen, I'll grab whoever I can, anyone who wants to fight, and then we'll win this thing."

I knew it was a pretty vague plan. Maggie was looking at me like I was losing it, but planning something made me feel better, less hopeless.

I could fight. I was good at it, used to it. But what could I do about Mia? How could I get her through this when I wasn't sure I'd make it through myself? I was crap at dealing with my own shit, slightly better at dealing with other peoples', but I'd never had to do both at once.

I looked back at Mia. She was right in front of me, but she felt as far away as she had when we'd been separated in Sanctuary. Like there were still doors and walls between is.

I'd been there for Carl after his Mom died, but he'd also had his dad and a whole group of other people. I was all that Mia had. I had no idea what to say to her or how to make her feel better. It was such a huge thing to be totally responsible for someone. To be all they had, to have to put them first always. The weight of it damn near crushed me.

How did Naomi do this on her own for so long?

I'd wanted to be closer to Mia again. I'd wanted to be part of her life, be there for her when she needed me like she needed me now. But I never imagined I'd be thrown headfirst into it like this. Alone. Without Naomi. I never thought I'd have to do anything without Naomi again.

I got mad at myself for standing there, not knowing what to say to Mia, just staring at her like she was a zoo animal. Naomi had trusted me to look after her, and I was already failing. Standing around like a jackass, not knowing what to do, not knowing her.

You got time now. Time to fix that.

This was a second chance. It wasn't the way I'd wanted it, but it was better than nothing. All I had to do was shut down the damn pity party I was throwing for myself and talk to the damn kid. And it wasn't like I was starting from nothing. I knew more about her now than I had before this, Naomi had talked about her. I had small things to build on. I turned to Maggie.

"Hey," I said. "You got any cheese? Pasta?"

"Um… yeah," she said, puzzled by my sudden change of subject. "But we've got some leftover-"

"Nah," I said. "I wanna make something."

"Okay," Maggie said, I thought she looked mildly concerned that the guy she'd seen eating raw worms and squirrels had a sudden interest in cooking something. But she brought me what I asked for anyway, and I did my best with what little we had.

When I was done, I dragged a table across the floor and put it in front of the couch Mia was sitting on. I filled up two bowls and put one down in front of her. She frowned at it.

"What's this?"

"Mac and cheese," I said. Then, because it didn't look like any kind of mac and cheese any human being had seen before, I added, "Except they ain't got macaroni, so I broke up some lasagna sheets. And they only just started making cheese here, so I don't know if it's any good, but… your sister said it was your favorite, so…"

It sounded so lame, saying it out loud, and I wished I hadn't made it at all. I should've just taken Maggie's offer of leftovers, given her something normal instead of trying to make something else.

"It is my favorite," she said and picked up the bowl. "Thank you."

This was a terrible idea.

What if it's gross? Or I accidentally poison her?

I sat down next to her and ate out of my own bowl. Tasted fine to me, but I've eaten a lot of weird shit, so I'm not sure many people would take my food recommendations too seriously. I watched Mia out of the corner of my eye as she ate a mouthful. She didn't grimace or throw up, so I guessed that was a good sign.

"Sorry," I blurted out. She looked at me, kind of confused. "I know it ain't good but-"

"It's good," she said quickly. Too quickly, probably being polite. She hesitated and then added, "I mean… it's different, but I like it. Anyway, I survived Naomi's cooking all these years, so this is basically gourmet."

I laughed. Didn't expect to, but she brought back a whole load of memories of Naomi's terrible baking. Things that managed to be burned and undercooked at the same time.

"Yeah," I said. "She can pluck a turkey faster than anyone and gut a fish in under a minute, but anything that isn't meat…?"

I stopped, the laughter had faded and turned to an intense, acute kind of pain. One that sat deep in my chest and radiated out to every part of me. I missed her so goddamn much. Mia had been smiling, too, but it faltered now as we both realized we'd give anything to risk food poisoning from one of her charred, raw-in-the-middle meals.

"I, um… I told Naomi we talked at your dad's funeral," Mia said like she was confessing some big secret.

"Yeah, I know," I said. She looked at me, a little guilty. "Naomi told me."

"Are you mad at me?"

"Nah," I said. "Shouldn't have told you to keep it from her, I was a dumbass. Didn't expect her to be there, sure didn't expect to see you. Didn't think you'd remember me, neither."

"I did." Mia looked down at her half-eaten food again, pushed it around the bowl a little, but didn't eat anything else. She took a deep breath. "She never talked about you, I think it made her too sad, but that somehow made it more obvious that you weren't there. I dunno if that makes sense…"

"Kinda," I said. When I'd been drifting around with Merle, I hadn't talked about Naomi, but I'd carried her with me in the space around me. All the places she should have been. Every silent argument with my conscience had sounded like her trying to get me back on a better path. I'd been too mad and too damn stupid to listen.

Now the empty space around me was filled with her absence again. Mia had another few mouthfuls of food, her brow furrowed like she was still thinking, then she said, "It wasn't just that. It was her stuff, too."

"Her stuff?"

"She had a lamp by her bed," Mia said, and my stomach dropped. I thought I knew the one she meant. "She had these bookends... and a birdhouse. No matter where we moved, or what we left behind, she always took those things with us."

"Yeah?" my throat felt dry.

"Yeah," she said. "Even though we never had a garden or anything for the birdhouse, she'd still put it out on a windowsill. I never got why, but then I looked under it, and I saw your name written on it. Same with the bookends and the lamp."

I could hardly believe that she'd kept that shit... for all of those years.

Goddamn, Naomi.

"I made 'em in school," I said, my voice a little choked up. It was hard to get the words out.

"I thought so," Mia said. "Did you make them for her?"

"Kinda," I said. "They were assignments, but who else would I give them bookends to? She used to read by a damn candle, and I was worried she'd burn the place down, so I gave her the lamp. I was gonna throw the birdhouse in the trash, but she caught me and insisted on keeping it. She was always so damn… proud of everything I did."

I could feel myself turning red at just the memory Naomi yelling compliments at me until I gave in and let her have whatever it was that she was praising me for. To shut her up. And because I'd do anything to make her give me that big, beaming smile.

"Yeah," Mia smiled for the first time since getting out of Sanctuary. "She's like that."

The way she smiled made it feel like she knew from experience what I was talking about. I wondered how many things she'd made when she was little that Naomi had stubbornly kept and put up in their home.

"She told me you like to draw," I said. "Says you're really good at it, too."

"Oh," she said, and now it was her turn to look embarrassed and roll her eyes. "Yeah, I'm okay, I guess. I wouldn't take Naomi's word for it, though."

She gave a nervous and slightly embarrassed laugh.

"Maybe I can judge that for myself sometime," I said.

"Maybe," she said, with a noncommittal shrug. She looked back down at the bowl in front of her, I was happy to see it was almost empty. "Anyway, that stuff she kept made it feel like you weren't gone. Like you'd just stepped out for a bit, and she was… I dunno... waiting for you to come home."

I knew she meant it to sound comforting, reassuring me that I hadn't been forgotten when we'd been apart. But it hurt. I wasn't worth remembering like that now. Certainly hadn't been worth it back then. I wished I could turn back the clock and tell my younger self to get his shit together.

"I'm sorry I missed so much," I said. "I'm sorry I wasn't there for you guys when you were growing up. But I'm here now, and I'll be here as long as you both want me around."

Mia nodded and glanced at one of the windows. We could hear people talking outside in the failing light, but it felt far away from us both. Mia said quietly, "I'm sorry I stopped you from going back for her."

"What?"

"At the Sanctuary, you wanted to go back in," Mia's eyes were brimming with tears that she was trying to fight. "But I stopped you, I told you we had to leave right away."

"Hey," I said. A tear slipped down her cheek, and I put my bowl down on the table. "You were right to do that."

"No," Mia shook her head. "She was in trouble, she needed-"

"No, she made you promise we'd leave," I reminded her.

"If she's dead, it's my fault," Mia said, and then nothing could stop the flood of tears that came streaming down her face.

"Hey," I wrapped her up in a hug. "No. This ain't on you. She ain't dead, and this ain't your fault. Mia, you hear me? It ain't."

She took a few deep, shaky breaths and said, "Sherry thinks she's dead already, doesn't she?"

"Sherry's a goddamn moron, don't you listen to Sherry," I said, and I was glad Sherry was nowhere to be fucking seen because I'd have peeled her skin off with my fingernails. "Don't you listen to anyone who thinks she's gone, they don't know your sister like we do."

"Yeah," Mia said, her voice a little stronger. "She's tough."

"She is tough," I said firmly. "And she's smart as hell. She's going to be just fine. All she has to do is sit tight until I go and get her. You hear me?"

"Yeah," Mia said, the tremor was gone from her voice.

"I'm going to make this right, Mia," I said it like a promise. Because it was one. To her, to me, to Naomi. "I'm going to her back."

Mia sat up and looked at me, wiping the tears from her eyes. "I know you will."

She sounded so sure when she said it. it was like Naomi had passed down all the confidence she had in me to her sister.

When it was time to turn in for the night, Maggie handed us some pillows and blankets. Mia curled up on the couch. I lay down on the floor nearby. Maggie had offered me a different place to sleep, but being apart from Mia didn't feel right. Not tonight. Nothing felt right.

I didn't sleep much, but when I did, I dreamed Naomi was in my arms. She wasn't moving. Wasn't breathing. When I rolled her over, she was smiling, but it wasn't real. Like a doll. Her eyes were glassy, couldn't see me.

Come back, I begged her. Come back to me.

I wondered if she'd turn, if I'd have to put her down. But she didn't, and there was still color in her face like she was living. Her body was warm but unresponsive. Alive but not living, dead but not a Walker.

Negan's whistle announced his arrival. At the sound of it, she moved like she was following a command, stood to greet him with her doll-like smile. Her movements were stiff like strings were pulling her feet toward him and more of them were tied around her wrist. Her arm lifted from her side and slipped around Negan's waist. He grinned at me. And then he kissed her.

I woke up with a fire in me that could've burned Hilltop to the ground in an instant. I knew I could've burned down the whole damn world if I didn't get her back. I carried it with me all morning, feeling like I'd explode at the first person I saw.

Mia hadn't slept much in the night but finally seemed to pass out as the sun came up. I didn't wake her. I sat outside near Sasha. The only person in this place, other than Mia, who felt as angry and crappy as me. We didn't talk much, but neither of us needed to.

"Daryl?" Jesus said quietly. I glared up at him, still hadn't decided how much of this was his fault. "There's someone here I think you should see."

Naomi.

Did she bust out already?

"Um… no," Jesus said, my hope must've shown on my face. "Not her."

I pushed past him and walked over to take a look outside. Maggie and Glenn were standing by the gates, which were slowly closing behind a group of people. Maggie was hugging one of them

Rick.

Michonne, Carl, Rosita, and Tara all stood behind him. Rick saw me and let go of Maggie, staring at me like he couldn't believe what he was seeing. He walked over, eyes all full of apologies he didn't need to make. It wasn't his fault I was in there. Wasn't his fault he couldn't get me out, either.

There was something else in his eyes too. This wasn't the same Rick I'd seen when I was last in Alexandria, who'd handed over a gun to Negan and thanked him for visiting. This one was ready to fight now. Finally.

"Are you…?"

"Fine," I told him.

"Naomi?"

I looked away from him. Couldn't bear to see someone else give me that look. That pity. That smile that says 'sorry the love of your life is dead.' I just shook my head at the ground. I was so happy to see them all. My family. But that happiness still felt wrong, selfish, when Naomi wasn't here to be part of it. It tore me up, turned me inside out.

Rick pulled me toward him in a hug. Brother to brother. He knew this feeling, this sense of loss, and he was here for me. He didn't have to say it.

I pulled away from him and looked at Tara. She hugged me, too. Before I could even catch my breath, Michonne was hugging me. We all turned toward the big house, to face Gregory together. The despair I'd been sinking into started to fall away. I was lifted out of it by the hope these people had given me.

This group of people could do anything. We'd already got through so much. Survived hell. Survived the loss of one home after another. Negan was just one other asshole in a long line. I could do this. With my family behind me, I could do anything. I wasn't alone anymore.

Time's up,  Negan. This is war.

 

Chapter 38: Politicians and Kings

Naomi

I'd heard Negan's boots in the corridor so many times that I knew it was him from sound alone. He'd walked past a few times without stopping, and each time he did, I braced myself for this to be the final one. For him to haul me out and string me up to the fence. I wondered if he'd kill me immediately or leave me to bleed out there. If he'd gather up a crowd like he had when he'd punished Mark. Whatever it was, I was sure it would be painful and humiliating, but at least it would be an end to all of this. I got frustrated that it was taking him so long, but the waiting was probably part of it. Maybe he was giving Daryl a few days to come back for me. Then he could get us both. Two for the price of one.

When Negan did eventually opened the door, his smile was back and as smug as ever. It made my heart sink down to my knees. He didn't say anything for a moment, just stood in the open doorway while my eyes got used to the sudden light. He'd left me in the dark for a day or two. I think. Without a window, it was impossible to know.

Dwight hadn't been thrown back in here with me. I'd started to think he was dead, but as my eyes adjusted, I saw him. Back by Negan's side. His injuries looked to be healing, and I couldn't see any fresh ones. Things were looking up for him, which could only mean they were looking down for me.

Sold me out then, did you?

"Alright," Negan said. "Out you come."

Something felt off. This wasn't anything like how I'd imagined this going down. Negan wasn't holding Lucille, and the only other person with him was Dwight. Disobeying him and not stepping out of my cell when he told me to didn't make him angry either; he laughed when I didn't move.

"What's wrong?" he asked. "Forty-eight hours in solitary, and you've forgotten how to talk?"

"No," I said, but it had been so long since I'd said anything to another human being that my voice didn't sound right. Gruff, like I'd just woken up, although I'd hardly slept in there.

"Then what's the matter, huh?" Negan said like he was talking to a kid who didn't want to go to school and not a grown woman who wanted to rip his throat out. Then his eyes lit up like he'd had an epiphany, although I'm sure he knew why I was reluctant to step out into the corridor with him. "Oh, you think I'm here to kill you, huh? Nah. I'm not going to do that. Not today, anyway."

"You're not?"

"Nah," he said. "I know you didn't let them out. We're good."

You do?

Behind him, I could see Dwight. His eyes were fixed on me. What the hell had he done? And why? I took a few hesitant steps forward. Trusting anything in a place like this wasn't wise. I knew that. I knew better than to believe what was being said to me. I scanned Dwight's face. His eyes were wide, desperation tucked into the corners of them. His mouth formed one thin line like he was willing me to keep my mouth shut by sealing his own.

"Come on," Negan stomped his foot on the ground with gleeful impatience. "You've earned a stay of execution, Naomi. That's gotta be worth celebrating. Come on out and see me, sweetheart."

With no real choice, I stepped out into the light and stood in front of him. Almost toe-to-toe. He didn't move back to make room for me. Standing so close that I'd have felt more comfortable back in my cell. This was what he wanted. Negan liked it best when things were uncomfortable. I hated the way his fucking smile could twist up so much loathing in my gut, and how it always made it feel like he was winning.

"There she is," he said like I was a pet who'd come in from the cold. I didn't say anything, and my stony glare made his smile wider. Back to his usual, awful, self. "C'mon, I got something for ya."

Well, this can't be good.

He took hold of my arm and pulled me along the corridor. I followed, reluctantly, trying to yank my arm out of his grasp so that I could walk with some semblance of dignity, but he held on tight. Dwight walked behind us, still in Daryl's vest, and holding his crossbow. He trained it on me, but his finger was nowhere near the trigger. I looked over my shoulder at him as I stumbled along the corridor beside Negan. He shook his head slightly and pressed his fingers to his lips.

"Where are we going?" I asked, looking back at Negan. Dwight wasn't giving me anything, and even if he did, I wasn't sure I could trust it. Negan should be about to kill me; Dwight should have turned me in.

"I'm not telling ya," Negan said, his smile only growing. "That would ruin the surprise, darlin'."

Oh, fuck. What now?

"Oh, don't give me that look," he rolled his eyes, but I knew he enjoyed the suspense. Otherwise, he'd have just come out and told me what it was. "We went looking for your boyfriend in Alexandria and brought a little something back. Thought you might appreciate seeing a familiar face."

No.

My stomach dropped right down to my feet, leaving a cold and dread-filled space where it had been. Had Daryl gone back to Alexandria already? Would he really be so reckless?

I felt sick. I could imagine him flying off the handle when Jesus and Sherry turned up at the Hilltop without me. That lost, wild look he gets in his eye when he's hurting, and there's nothing he can do but get mad. I wasn't angry with him; I knew if our positions had been switched, and I'd gotten out of her without him, I would've felt exactly the same. I would've torn a world apart to get to him. I'd just hoped he'd be able to wait a few days before he started his crusade against Negan and the Saviors.

Negan took me to a room he'd taken me to before, back when he'd been trying to convince Daryl to join him by showing him the life we could have here together. One that looked free but wasn't. One that would leave Daryl as much of a broken shell as Dwight was.

Did this mean he'd caught him? That he'd put him back in this room? Was that why Negan wasn't killing me just yet?

No.

I couldn't do this again. I couldn't see Daryl cooped up in here, couldn't see him tortured and beaten. I looked at Dwight. His grip on the crossbow looked loose. I could get it off him, I could shoot our way out. Negan opened the door.

There was a man in there, but it wasn't Daryl. It was maybe the last person I'd expected to see.

"Eugene?" I gasped. He looked as shocked and frightened as I felt. Despite all of the creature comforts in the room, he looked like a lost puppy at the pound. He'd jumped at the sound of the door opening. He looked at Negan like he was here to put him down.

Negan let go of my arm. I knew he wanted to see what I would do, to see how much Eugene and I meant to one another and if that was useful to him. But I didn't much care. Truth was, we weren't close, but he was the first glimpse of home I'd had in a long time—a connection to Alexandria that I hadn't had since we left that awful clearing. I ran forward and threw my arms around him.

"Are you okay? Are you hurt? Did they-"

"No, he's just fine," Negan spoke for him while Eugine remained silent. I thought I could feel him shake a little. "In fact, he is the man of the hour."

I let go of Eugine and looked at him. Whatever Negan meant by that, it couldn't be good. Eugene still didn't say anything. There was fear in his eyes, and something else too, but I didn't know him well enough to name it.

"You okay?" I asked him again, doing my damnedest to shut Negan out. Eugene gave me a small, hurried nod, but I could see a tremor in his hands.

"I already told you, he's doing fine," Negan said, refusing to be ignored. "Doctor Smartypants has got a new job working for me. He's my new bullet maker."

Shit.

This was bad. Ammunition was getting harder and harder to come by. Hilltop barely had any; their primary weapons were spears and bows and arrows. Things that could kill Walkers quietly, but not easily fight off any kind of human threat. The Kingdom had looked like they were in the same boat, although I hadn't really stuck around long enough to ask. Part of what gave the Saviors their power was how well armed they were compared to other communities, and with Eugene on board, that power could be here to stay.

How had this happened?

Negan was so damn smug. Eugene looked down at his feet. He'd only recently become outwardly brave, and that had been when he was pushed to it or backed into some kind of corner. I wondered how this experience would shape his newly-found courage, or if it would extinguish it entirely.

"You might have noticed my girl Lucille is absent today," Negan said. Eugene flinched at the name. "She is on medical leave, on account of being shot by one Rosita Espinosa."

No.

I kept my eyes on Eugene, trying to work out if his short and sharp breaths were down to fear or grief. He and Rosita had been on the road together long before they'd met the rest of our group; if she was dead, he'd be hurting. His eyes were still fixed on his own shoes. I put a hand on his arm. I was aware of Negan laughing, but I was getting really good at tuning him out. If I was allowed to see Eugene on his own, I'd have to teach him how to do it.

"Is she dead?"

I thought Eugene shook his head, but his head was so far bowed as he looked at his feet, it was hard to tell the difference between that and when he'd nodded.

"Nah," Negan said. "I don't like killing pretty little badasses, not when they got guts."

My jaw clenched automatically as I held back my response. Negan laughed again.

"You can disapprove all you like, but it's what's kept you alive," he smirked. "I let Arat choose who should die for Rosita's sins, and she killed... what's her name? Nervous thing with a big appetite and access to all your food. What was her name?"

He clicked his fingers at Eugene, the same way asshole customers used to do to me in the diner. Eugene finally looked up again, his eyes were red.

"Olivia," he said, more to me than Negan. Eugene's hands shook, and his lip trembled. It was like a punch in the gut. Another person dead because of him. An innocent one, too. Olivia hadn't done anything to him.

Negan was harder to predict than most other folks, but I thought I was starting to catch on. Rosita had taken a shot at him. Many people would've killed her for that, but Negan got more out breaking people than killing them. He knew Rosita was ready to die for making a move against him; she wouldn't have tried it if she wasn't. So killing her wouldn't have been as much of a punishment as making her feel responsible for an innocent person's death.

Now, Rosita had to live with that. Negan could sit back and watch her either unravel or get stronger under pressure.

"Olivia," Negan repeated with her name with deep satisfaction. I closed my eyes for a second. "That's right. We killed Olivia, and now I'm sure your friends in Alexandria are about to find that their food rations go way up. No way is she dealing it out fair and square, huh? So, how about a thank you?"

"You're an ass," I snapped. I couldn't hold it in anymore. Olivia had always been honest, always kept meticulous records of the supplies coming in and out of Alexandria. She'd been soft, but she'd also been one of the good ones.

"Not a fan of that, huh?" he said. "Well, how about a thank you for saving your old pal Rick by taking out a spineless, gutless turd who wanted him dead?"

That doesn't make any goddamn sense.

"Olivia wouldn't-" I started, but Negan cut me off.

"Oh, I'm not talking about Olivia," he said. "I'm talking about that slimy son of a bitch who tried to butter me up behind Rick's back. A real clean-cut asshole who probably should've died when all this first started but was privileged enough to hide out someplace that was already safe, letting other people do the heavy lifting. Waiting until an opportunity came along for him to slither out of his hole. God, what was his name again?"

I was lost. The only other person Negan had killed that I knew of was Abraham, and he was none of those things. Eugene looked at me and said, "Spencer."

"Shit," I muttered.

"Spencer," Negan said, with the same amount of satisfaction he'd had over Olivia's death. "God, that guy was a slimy, self-serving ass, huh? Can't tell me you liked him?"

"Doesn't mean I think he deserves to die," I said, trying to avoid admitting that I had also found Spencer an annoying and self-serving asshole. But there were people in Alexandria who had seen Spencer as an extension of Deanna. Other, sheltered, people who didn't know how bad things could get and thought Rick was too ruthless and unpredictable. Would his death be seen as Rick's fault, in the same way that Negan hoped Rosita would be blamed for Olivia's?

"Well, I think that's enough chit chat for one day, huh?" Negan said, with that big, beaming smile that made me want to pull each of his teeth out one by one. As if Eugene and I had been chatting about the weather, and not which of our friends were dead. Negan told hold of my arm again and tugged me back toward the door. I caught the panic in Eugene's eyes as he did it and wondered if it was concern for himself or for me.

"Eugene," I called out to him. "You're gonna be fine."

I had nothing to back this up, no more escape plans. I was sure security around me was about to be tightened after my fellow prisoners had escaped, but I couldn't leave him with nothing. I couldn't let him stew in his own fear; Negan preyed on that kind of shit.

"C'mon," Negan said. "Time to go."

Eugene gave me one last, desperate look before the door closed between us. His dread seeped through the gap underneath it and hit me too. I'd worried about Daryl in here, I'd fretted over how he was being treated and how hurt he might be, but I'd never really thought that Negan could break him. Eugene was a whole other kind of worry. He wouldn't be able to withstand the physical pain that Daryl could. If Negan got the materials Eugene needed to start making bullets, would he really do it for him? Or, would he refuse and die?

We couldn't take another loss like that. Two more of our people had died, what state would that leave Alexandria in? Would it terrorize them all into further submission, or would it fuel resentment toward Negan and the Saviors?

But, we wouldn't survive a fight if Eugene got a damn bullet factory up and running, either. There was a limited amount of time that Rick could make a move against Negan and the Saviors and have a chance of most of us walking away from it still alive. That was assuming Rick was planning something, or that any plans he'd had wouldn't have been ruined by losing our only bullet-maker.

No matter what was going on with Rich, I knew it was only a matter of time before Daryl tried something. As much I'd have preferred it if he just forgot about me, I had to be realistic about what he'd do. Daryl wouldn't leave me here. He wouldn't move on from this unless he knew I was dead. I knew it because I would have been the same in his shoes. He'd be planning something by now, even if he was planning it alone. Something full of his reckless fire that could wind up getting him killed. Especially if he came back when Negan was well-stocked with bullets. There was a tiny window of time for anyone to act. And it was closing.

He has to die.

I have to kill him.

I looked back at Negan. He was watching me like always. He'd seen the dread take hold of me; he knew the calculations I'd be doing to work out whether my friends could still win. He was smiling. Always fucking smiling. He licked his lips, savoring my reaction to everything he threw at me like it was a goddamn ice cream sundae.

My hands were fists that I didn't remember making. I heard my foot scuff the ground before I even realized that I'd tried to take a step forward. Dwight caught my arm and tugged me back. Negan didn't even flinch.

"Woah, easy girl," Negan said like he was trying to tame some kinda wild horse. "Watch how you approach me, or Daryl's going to wake up to find your head nailed to Alexandria's gates."

All of his bullshit, all of the ways he messed with me, and the others would be his downfall. Even if he did slice off my head and give it to Daryl on a platter, his arrogant mind games would catch up with him. Whether it by my hand or someone else's.

"This worked out real well for you two, huh?" Negan said, waving a finger at Dwight and I. I glanced at Dwight and saw a flicker of nerves in his eyes. Neither of us was sure what he meant by that. "I got a prisoner without a guard and a guard without a prisoner. Dwight, you'll be keeping an eye on her from now on, you got that?"

"Yes, Sir," Dwight nodded. His face gave nothing away. He looked at Negan with the least amount of emotion I'd ever seen from him. A genuinely blank face. Negan liked that, maybe because he could read whatever he wanted into it, or because he knew Dwight better than I did and could tell that he'd broken him down.

"Good," Negan said, still grinning at us both. "Now, get her out of my sight."

He let go of my arm with a little shove that pushed me toward Dwight. Dwight's hand grabbed my arm in the same way, but his grip was a little looser. Negan grinned like a proud dad and then walked away from us both. I expected Dwight to lead me back to that dark and windowless cell where he'd been keeping Daryl, but he nodded his head toward the stairwell door and let me walk over there myself. He didn't say anything, kept glancing around at Negan's retreating back.

I waited until we were alone in the stairwell before asking, "What did you do?"

Dwight didn't answer right away; he pushed me toward the stairs and peered up at the higher floors between the banister, listening for anyone else who might be up there.

"I dealt with it," he said, once he knew the stairwell was clear. He glanced at the closed door to the corridor we'd just been in like he expected Negan to double back at any minute. Or be loitering around the corner listening to us.

"How?"

Even two days spent in dark isolation, where every moment that passed on the clock was painfully obvious, didn't make it seem like enough time had passed to explain Negan's sudden change in mood. It didn't explain why I was still breathing.

"He thinks it was Carson," Dwight said, which was possibly the last thing I'd expected him to say.

"Carson?" I struggled for a moment to place the name in context. "The Doctor?"

"Yeah," Dwight said, but he was being deliberately tight-lipped and still wouldn't say anything beyond that.

"And Negan bought that?" I asked. It didn't sound right. Why would he suddenly believe it was someone with almost no connection to the people who'd escaped? The change of direction was enough to give me whiplash.

"For now," Dwight said. I could tell he was hoping I would drop it, but how could I? I couldn't just trust that this was over. Especially not when it was coming from Dwight who, up until a few days ago, had looked like he was getting a real kick out of torturing us. Then, he sighed and added, "Negan found a note from Sherry in Carson's things. He put the pieces together from there."

"Yeah, pieces that don't exist," I said. I knew by the way Dwight wasn't looking me in the eye that he'd planted the 'note' from Sherry, but it still didn't sit right with me that Negan had just accepted Dwight's story. It was bull. "Carson and Sherry being in on this together doesn't make sense. Negan's not an idiot. This could all be some kind of test."

"It could," Dwight said. "But Carson confessed so, for now, we're off the hook."

"But…" I shook my head. It felt too flimsy to stake my freedom on. "He's innocent. Why would he confess? What if he takes it back?"

"Can't take it back, he's dead," Dwight said bluntly. My heart dropped. "Negan already executed him. So, don't worry about it. We're in the clear."

I stared at him in silence for a moment. Dwight had let an innocent man die. Negan had killed a man, a doctor, instead of me. Nothing about it felt as simple as Dwight wanted me to believe. But maybe it was a convenient lie for Negan too. He had someone to punish, which would put enough fear into his followers to stop any further disobedience, while still keeping me alive to use as leverage against my friends. It was a convenient lie for Negan to buy into, but it didn't mean that he believed it. Just that whatever he was planning to do with me was worse.

"Why do all of this?" I asked. "It would've been easier to turn me in."

Dwight and I weren't friends. A few hours locked in a room together hadn't changed that. Dwight's jaw clenched, and something in his eyes hardened as he fixed them on me.

"I wanna help you kill Negan," Dwight said. He said it quiet, but there was a gritty determination that punched every syllable. "You seemed pretty serious about that."

"I am."

"Okay," Dwight said like he was the one who needed reassuring. "Good."

I so badly wanted to believe him. Having someone close to Negan on my side could change everything, but you couldn't trust anything in here, especially if Negan was involved in any way. He and Dwight could've come up with this little plan together, as a way to get me to trust him, to get information out of me about Alexandria or my friends.

"I don't really care if Negan believes Carson did it," Dwight said. "As long as he at least pretends to believe it for long enough for you to kill him."

We reached a landing, and he opened the door to a familiar hallway. This was the way back to my first room here. The nicer one. It didn't make me feel any better. It just made all of this feel like even more of a trap.

"Why?"

"I want him dead," Dwight said simply. It felt too simple. But what did I have to lose? I was already living on borrowed time.

He opened the door to my old cell. I didn't step in, he didn't make me.

"If you're doing this because you want to join one of our communities, and be with Sherry again, I can't promise you that," I said. I didn't want to lie to him or give him any false hope. If he was serious about this, he should know what he was getting himself into. "I don't know how the others will react to you. Daryl, especially…"

"That's okay," Dwight said. "I'll take my chances. I want to make things right, I want to make sure he's dead. After that, I'll leave all of you alone. You won't hear from me again."

He looked serious enough that I voluntarily walked into that cell. I heard the keys jingle in his hand. I turned back to him just before he shut the door.

"Alright, then," I said. "Let's do it. Let's kill Negan."

 

Daryl

Gregory paced up and down in front of his big, dumb desk. I was glad he was at the other end of the room because if he'd been any closer to me, he'd have found himself walking into my damn fists. Every time Rick spoke, he shook his head, like the thought of taking on the Saviors again was too crazy for him to even let in his ear holes. I wanted to rip them off the sides of his head.

"Gregory, we already started this," Rick tried to remind him.

"You started it," Gregory replied.

Alright, well, fuck this guy.

"We did," Rick said, firmly, refusing to let Gregory weasel out of his part. "And we're gonna win."

"They're killers!"

Yeah, no shit.

"Is this how you wanna live?" Rick said. "Under their thumb, killing your people?"

"Sometimes, you don't get to choose what your life looks like," Gregory said. "Sometimes, Ricky, you have to count the blessings you have."

"How many people can we spare?" Maggie asked, "How many people here can fight?

"'We'? I don't even know how many people we have, Margret," Gregory said, making it clear he didn't think she had any right to call herself part of the Hilltop. Although, if you ask me, Maggie was a damn sight better suited to lead a group of people than he was. "And does it even matter? I mean... What are you going to do? Start a platoon of sorghum farmers? Cause that's what we got. They grow things. They're not going to want to fight."

"You're wrong," Tara said. "When people have the chance to do the right thing, they usually step up. I mean, people just-."

"Let me stop you before you break into song, okay?" Gregory said. "And by the way, who would train all this cannon fodder?"

Sasha and Rosita volunteered immediately. The way his face got all red with a mix of anger and embarrassment was the first moment that I felt like this meeting hadn't been a total waste of time. Watching assholes like Gregory squirm was always time well spent.

"Rhetorical!" he was annoyed that we had an answer. "Okay? I don't want to know. I never want to hear another word about any of it, ever."

Fuck this guy.

"Would we be better off without the Saviors, yes or no?" Rick asked, trying to word it in a way that he couldn't wriggle out of like a politician trying to dodge a question about an affair there was already proof of.

"Yeah. Okay. Yes," Gregory admitted.

"So, what will you do to fix the problem?" Michonne asked, taking a step toward him and fixing him with her calm but stern gaze. He shrank back a little, from her, and from the responsibility she was trying to show him already belonged to him.

"I didn't say we had a problem," Gregory said. "You did. And what happened outside of my purview is outside of my purview."

"What the hell, man?" I snapped. "You're either with us or you ain't. You're sitting over there talking out of both sides of your mouth!"

He gave me a look like I was scum. I used to believe that look, but people show you more of who they are these days. Before, if a guy like Gregory had given me that look, I'd have thought he was some do-gooder asshole who had the right to look at me like that because he was better than me. Now, I knew he was a goddamn coward. He was scum.

"Well, I think I've made my position very clear," Gregory said. "And I want to thank all of you for not being here today and not having this meeting with me, or being seen on your way out. In other words, go out the back."

I glared at him in the silence, willing everyone to tell him to go to hell. To take over this damn place and force them to stop, but nobody said anything. A heavy, resentful reluctance took hold of the room and infected everyone except me. Gregory had turned his back on us all, and people started to file out, but I couldn't move.

Last time I'd stood in this room, Naomi had been here too. I'd been so confident we could win this fight without losing too much. When we'd gone home that night, she'd kissed me for the first time. I'd felt like I was on the verge of having everything I'd ever wanted and everything we all needed to get shit settled in this new world.

Now, she was gone. Now, there was hardly anyone willing to fight for what was right.

I wanted to say something, do something, smash something maybe. Burn Gregory's office to the ground and justify the goddamn look he'd given me. He thought I was dangerous? He didn't know the half of it.

I was out of Sanctuary now, and I'd gotten past what I was sure would be the worst of it for me, but losing Naomi had lit a fire under my feet that refused to let me stay still. If I stopped moving, stopped working towards getting her back, I felt like I'd die.

This wasn't over. I had the same group of people with me I'd believed in when we started this. This was the same fight; we were just closer to the beginning of it than any of us had realized. It wasn't over, and that was a good thing. It meant I still had a chance to get her back. With or without the help of a goddamn weasel like Gregory.

Fuck. This. Guy.

I stepped out of the room, slammed the door real hard behind me. The others looked nervously at me like they thought I was about to destroy some shit. "We don't need him anyway."

"Yeah, that's right," Rick said, couldn't tell if he was just reassuring me or everyone else. "'Cause we have Maggie, Glenn, Sasha, and Jesus here."

"And… Enid," Maggie reminded us as Enid came through the door.

"Hey, um-" she hesitated, looking around at all of us with a kind of excitement that felt out of place after we failed to convince Gregory to do what was right.

"What's wrong?" Sasha asked.

"Nothing…" she said. "Just… come outside."

We followed her out of Gregory's dumb, big house to where a group of people had gathered at the bottom of the steps.

"What's going on?" Maggie asked. A woman at the front of the group stepped forward. She looked warily at the rest of us before her eyes fixed on Maggie.

"Hey… so if you don't remember me, I'm Bertie," she said, growing in confidence the more she spoke. "And I owe my life to you all, twice over. A bunch of us do. Enid says that you want Gregory to get us to fight the Saviors with you. Is that true?"

"Yes," Maggie said.

"Do you think we can win?" Bertie asked her.

"I do."

"Well, Enid says you could show us the way," she said. "I'm ready."

There was a chorus of agreement from the group behind her. I felt something heavy in my chest start to lift. We didn't need Gregory, and it looked like his own people didn't need him either. We'd be able to train them, and it would be pretty easy to do without Gregory getting suspicious. From what I'd seen since he got here, he didn't do much more than sit in that damn office and say no to shit.

"It's a start," Michonne said as we walked away, but it didn't much sound like she was confident it was a strong start.

"We'll get more," Sasha said.

"It still won't be enough," Michonne said, glancing around at the rest of the people who lived at the Hilltop. Even if all of them agreed, we'd still be outnumbered.

"No, it won't," Rosita agreed.

"I'm going to the Kingdom," I told them. They all stopped and looked at me. "I'm taking Mia there. Saviors don't know about it, so she'll be safe. I'll talk to the King. You ain't gotta come, but they got the kind of numbers we need."

"Do you think the King will listen?" Rick asked. "Involve his people in a fight they're not invested in?"

"Well…" Jesus hesitated for a moment. Everyone's attention turned to him. He looked at me, "Actually, the Saviors do know about the Kingdom. Ezekiel might be more invested than you think."

"These assholes are getting shit from the Kingdom, too?" I asked. No wonder the Sanctuary was filled with such goddamn luxury. They had enough to hoard damn cans of dog food to feed to prisoners and nice-ass food for themselves. I wondered if Dwight was feeding that shit to Naomi now while he chowed down on fresh produce from the Kingdom, washed it down with a glass of Hilltop milk. I looked at Rick, "They gotta be stopped, man."

"They will be," he said and put a hand on my shoulder. "We'll stop them."

"To the Kingdom?" Jesus asked. I nodded.

"Let me get Mia first," I said, "I'll meet y'all by the gates."

Rick nodded, and I made my way back to the trailer I'd left Mia sleeping in. She was awake again. Seemed like she'd got about as little sleep as I had.

"Hey," she said when she saw me. She looked pale, and her voice was quiet. Tired, sad eyes, but they didn't fill me with the same dread and guilt that I'd felt before. I had something to tell her, something we could actually do to get Naomi back. A weight in my chest was lifting a little, and I knew it would be the same for Mia. We could both stop feeling so useless and guilty all the time. And we had a team backing us that was filled with some of the only people I'd ever trusted other than her sister.

"C'mon, we're heading out," I said, unsure how to start explaining things to her. I just knew we had to go.

"We're leaving?" she stood up right away. Her wild and panicked eyes looked at the door behind me. Her voice dropped to a whisper, "Are they here? The Saviors?"

"Oh. No," I said quickly. "Nothing like that. My group are here, and we're heading to another community to see if they'll help us fight. It's, uh... actually one I wanted to take you to, anyway."

I wasn't sure how much Naomi had managed to tell her. It didn't feel like it was my place to break this news and take a reunion away from Naomi that I'm sure she was looking forward to being part of.

"One of your sister's friends is there," I said. That familiar bite of jealousy threatened to rise up and cut my words. But, it wasn't Bryce's fault that I'd been such a dumbass. It wasn't his fault that Mia might know him better. It would actually work in my favor if she liked him enough to stay with him while I got the more dangerous shit done. "Bryce… uh, I don't actually know his last name, but-"

"Bryce is alive?"

"Yeah," I said. Mia immediately looked lighter, happier. I hoped knowing Bryce was alive had given her the same strength that seeing Rick and the others had given me. She was already walking toward the door, a little frown on her face that made her look as determined as I felt. It was a breath of fresh air to talk to the only other person who refused to just write Naomi off as dead right away. The only other person who'd refuse to give up on her. The only one who didn't look at me like I was living in denial.

The rest of the group was waiting for us by the gate. Mia slowed down a little when she saw them all. I glanced at her to check she was alright and watched her size them all up as we approached them.

"This is your group?" she asked me.

"Yeah."

"Is Carol here?" Mia asked, scanning their faces. I was shocked for a moment that she even knew that name. Then she looked at me and shrugged. "Naomi said she made good cookies."

"Nah," I said, only mildly surprised that Naomi had managed to weave in conversation about snacks in the middle of an escape attempt. "She ain't."

Mia couldn't have known it, but now that she'd drawn attention to it, it was weird that Carol wasn't here. Maybe Rick had left her at home to keep an eye on things and protect the place.

"This is Mia," I said to them all as we got closer, remembering how she'd almost hid behind me the first time she'd met Maggie and Glenn. But there was none of that shyness now. She was a girl on a mission to save her sister.

When Rick stepped forward to introduce himself, she looked him dead in the eye and said, "You're gonna help get my sister back?"

Rick looked at me in a moment of panic. He didn't want to give this kid any false hope, and he was looking for me to back him up, but I wouldn't. That hope wasn't false. Carl stepped up beside him and said, "Yeah, we'll get Naomi back."

Mia relaxed, and Jesus arrived with a people carrier for all of us. I let Mia climb in ahead of me, and then I turned to Rick, "Hey, where's Carol?"

He hesitated again, the same way he'd hesitated when Mia had spoken to him. The Rick I knew, the fighter I was following to take Negan down, was still here, but these pauses were the ghosts of the guy who'd almost submitted.

"We don't know," he said. My heart dropped down to my stomach, and I could tell Rick had been hoping that this wouldn't come up. "We think she might be in the Kingdom. She and Naomi left before… well, before all this. But Negan didn't bring them both into that clearing that night, so we assumed Carol got away… Morgan went looking for both of them, but we haven't seen him since, so… Naomi didn't tell you anything about it?"

"Nah," I said. A deeply buried flame of anger and resentment flared up. "We didn't exactly have time to catch up in there between all the beatings."

Rick flinched. I knew I'd been harsher than he deserved, but something about this struck a nerve. Carol disappearing without saying goodbye, Naomi helping her without telling me. Why wouldn't either of them have talked to me about it? Given me any kind of warning?

I got in the car beside Mia and slammed the door. She was silent. I felt a twist of guilt and wondered if she'd heard what I'd said out there. I wanted to say something to her, take it back, or leave her with a better thought than her sister getting beaten.

I should've kept my cool.

I should've kept my damn voice down.

Now, it was all I could think about. The bruises on Naomi's face. Them ones around her neck. I couldn't let myself think about what Negan might have done to her after we'd got out, but once the thought was in my head, it stuck there.

The car couldn't come to a stop fast enough. When it did, Rick and Glenn got out, shut the doors behind them. The rest of us sat in the silence of the car.

"What if the King doesn't want to help us?" Glenn muttered as we watched Rick and Jesus chat outside of the car.

"Well, we find the right stuff, then maybe we don't need the numbers," I said, remembering taking out a whole bunch of them with the RPG. "Blow 'em up, burn 'em to the ground."

I honestly did not care. All I really needed was an in. If I could make a hole in the Sanctuary wall, I could get in there, and I could get her out. I didn't need an army to do that.

"You said that there weren't just soldiers with the Saviors," Tara said. "That there were workers there. People who didn't have a choice?"

There's always a choice.

"We gotta win," I said, and then because I couldn't stand sitting around anymore, I leaned out of the car. Every second we spent talking to people we didn't need to be talking to was a second wasted. It was about damn time folks started realizing that. "Hey! What the hell we waiting on?"

Jesus turned back to look at one of the roads ahead of us. Not far off, I could hear the sounds of horse's hooves beating the tarmac. "Waiting for them."

Two guards on horseback approached us from the direction of the Kingdom. I didn't recognize either of them from the last time we'd been here.

"Who dares to trespass on the sovereign land of the -" one of them started in that bullshit old-timey speak that their King was so fond of Kingdom, and then kind of did a double-take. "Oh shit, Jesus, is that you?"

Jesus waved at them both. They relaxed a little but still looked unsure about the rest of us.

"Who are all these people, Paul?" the other one asked.

"Hi, Richard. Nice to see you," Jesus said.

"It's good to see you, too," Richard said, but his tone made it clear he didn't have time for any pleasantries. "Your friends, who are they?"

"This is Rick Grimes," Jesus said. Rick gave them a solemn nod. "He's the leader of a like-minded community. These are some of his people. We would like to request an audience with King Ezekiel."

"Get out of the car," Richard said, getting down from his horse and turning his scrutiny on the rest of us. "You say they're a like-minded community. Like-minded how?

"We live, we trade, we fight the dead," Jesus said. "Sometimes others."

"Line up," Richard said.

Nope.

We ain't got time for this.

"This is a waste of time," I said. "Go get the King or Bry-"

"The King is a busy man," Richard interrupted me. "And it's a dangerous world. We don't usually allow a pack of strangers to waltz right through our door."

"I ain't a stranger, I've been here before!"

"We want to make the world less dangerous," Michonne said, taking a step forward before Richard and I could come to blows. "And we are all here to show the King how serious we are about that."

Richard's gaze slid from me to Michonne, taking in her much more measured response. I knew she was handling it better. But she didn't feel like I did. Each passing second wasn't cutting her like a knife.

"The car stays outside," Richard said. "You gotta hand over your guns."

"We only have two," Rick said as he and Carl handed them over. The weight of that sank in. I hadn't given much thought to how few weapons we'd been left with. Even if we got the numbers, would we be able to take the Sanctuary?

It don't matter. I'll take it apart brick by brick with my bare hands if I have to.

"Follow me," Richard said, and he led us all toward the Kingdom. He took us a different route than the last time I'd been here, through big gates at the front of the school that opened up to reveal the old school buildings and vast grounds. We could see people growing crops, some were training with spears in their hands, and others in the same uniform as the other guards were jogging around the parameters.

"Morgan?" Tara's voice drew my attention to where Morgan was rushing toward her, a big smile on his face. I glanced around for Carol but couldn't see her in the crowds. He greeted the rest of us, and then Richard told us the King was ready to see us. The group started to slowly file in, Rick and I hung back to talk to Morgan.

"Did you find Carol?" Rick asked.

"I did," Morgan said and, annoyingly, didn't follow up with anything else.

"Where is she? Is she okay?"

"Naomi brought her here," Morgan confirmed, "and then she left. You know, Carol wasn't too happy I'd followed them here. She wanted to get away from us, from everyone. So, Carol was here, but now she's gone, too."

Gone?

How could she just be gone? This was Carol, for fuck's sake. She'd been with us from the start; she was our family. She had a right to know what was going on. Before I could blow my lid, Rick put a hand on my shoulder, "We'll find her. We'll get her back. One thing at a time, yeah?"

He nodded toward the door everyone else had started filing through. Nothing about this sat right with me. But he wasn't wrong. We had to deal with one thing at a time. We'd get the King's help, and then we'd shake down Morgan for more information on where Carol had gone. Reluctantly, I moved off to join the others.

"Head's up," I said to them all as the doors to the theater opened. "Dude's got a tiger."

I'm not sure any of them believed me right off the bat, but that changed real fast. Shiva stood up beside the King as we entered and roared. The King sat on his throne in the middle of the stage. Guards stood to the side of him. More stood at the doors, Bryce was one of them.

I was about to point him out to Mia, but an old, residual anger bit the back of my throat, and I had to swallow it back. I couldn't say anything, and I hated myself for it. Mine was the first face he picked out from our group, and something in his eyes hardened when he saw me. Then he checked the space around me, the way everyone always did, expecting to see Naomi because she belongs beside me. Then, he saw Mia, and his eyes lit up. He left his post and immediately started running. "Mia!"

"Bryce!"

She ran down the aisle toward him. I watched the way he bent down to scoop her up and spin her around. Her feet flew out behind her. It was probably how he'd greeted her when she was little, and it didn't matter that she'd grown a lot in the two years that had passed since they'd last seen each other. I saw the way both their eyes got a little brighter. I heard the amazement in Bryce's voice when he said, "God, you've grown so much!"

I tried to memorize all of it. Naomi would've wanted to be here for this. She should've been here for this. The least I could do was remember everything, so I could tell her about it when I saw her again.

Bryce set Mia back down on her feet again, and she glanced at the rest of us, suddenly mildly embarrassed by what we'd just seen. He was still looking, searching for Naomi in all of the spaces she should be. Before I could say anything to him, the King spoke.

"Daryl!" his booming voice cut across the auditorium. "Is this the missing child, returned safe and well?"

I nodded. Mia shrank back a little.

"Your Majesty-" Jesus walked ahead of us.

"Jesus!" the King's beaming smile felt so out of place, given the reason for our visit. "It pleases me to see you, old friend!"

"It pleases him indeed!" an overly-cheerful aide by his side beamed down at all of us.

"Jerry…" the King gently reprimanded him for his enthusiasm. "Tell me, what news have you and Daryl brought good King Ezekiel? Are these new allies you've brought me?"

"Indeed they are, your Majesty," Jesus said. "This is Rick Grimes, the leader of Alexandria, and these are some of his people."

"I welcome you all to the Kingdom, good travelers," the King said, smiling down at Rick. "What brings you to our fair land? Why do you seek an audience with the King?"

"Ezekiel… King Ezekiel," Rick corrected himself. I remembered how batshit everything had felt when Naomi and I had knelt in front of the King for the first time. "Alexandria, the Hilltop and the Kingdom… all three of our communities have something in common. We all serve the Saviors. Alexandria already fought them once, and we won. We thought we took out the threat, but we didn't know then what we know now. We only beat one outpost. We've been told you have a deal with them, that you know them. Then you know they rule through violence and fear."

At the mention of the Saviors, the atmosphere in the room shifted. Got colder. Ezekiel shot a glare at Jesus.

"Your Majesty," he said hastily. "I only told them of the-"

"Our deal with the Saviors is not known among my people," the King was angry. "For good cause. We made you a party to that secret when you told us of the Hilltop's own travails, but we did not expect you to share-"

"We can help each other!" Jesus protested.

"Don't interrupt the King!" Jerry snapped, all of his previous cheerfulness was gone.

"We brought you into our confidence," the King said. "Why did you break it?"

"Because I want you to hear Rick's plans."

"And what plans have you, Rick Grimes of Alexandria?" the King turned that glare back toward Rick.

"We came to ask the Kingdom, to ask you to join us in fighting the Saviors, fighting for freedom for all of us."

Our request was falling on already hostile ears. My heart sank as the King said, "What you are asking is very serious."

"Several of our people, good people, were killed by the Saviors," Michonne said. "Brutally."

"Who?" Morgan asked.

"Abraham," Rosita told him. Her voice shook. "Spencer, Olivia. Eugene was taken. They took Daryl and Naomi. He escaped, but every second Daryl's out here, he's a target."

I wasn't ready for it. To hear her name in this room, hear someone else say out loud what had happened to her. It made things too real, and there was a moment where I couldn't take anything else in. Blood rushed in my ears and drowned it all out. Felt like the world titled under my feet.

"They took Naomi?" Bryce looked at me. I nodded.

Mia looked up at him, and I heard her whisper, "It's okay, Daryl's going to get her back."

Bryce didn't say anything, but I could tell he couldn't believe it as readily as Mia did.

"I want to be honest about what we're asking," Rick said. "My people are strong, but there's not enough of us. We don't have guns, not enough at least. Not a lot of weapons, period."

"We have people," Richard said. He turned his head toward the King and spoke for our side with way more conviction than I expected. "And weapons. If we strike first, together, we can beat them. No more waiting for things to get worse, beyond what we can handle. We set things right. The time is now."

The King didn't look so sure. He looked away from Richard, and his eyes fell on where Morgan stood just a little bit apart from the rest of us.

"Morgan, what say you?"

"Me?" Morgan was surprised to be asked.

"Speak."

"People will die. A lot of people, and not just the Saviors," he said. "It… If we can find another way we have to. Maybe it's just about Negan, just capturing him, holding him. Maybe… I-"

No.

We ain't got time for that.

"The hour grows late," the King said, getting to his feet as Morgan trailed off. "Rick Grimes of Alexandria, you have given the King much to ponder."

I could feel this meeting slipping to an uncertain close before I was ready.

"Nah," I'm not even sure I meant to say it out loud; it just kind of happened. I felt people turn to look at me. Rick usually dealt with this shit, but my fuse was getting short, and I couldn't listen to someone else tell us no. I couldn't have wasted all this time coming here if it wasn't going to get us anywhere when I could've spent that time getting back to the Sanctuary. "We ain't got time for pondering. Those assholes are hurting people now. The longer you sit your fancy-ass throne doing nothing, the more people are gonna get hurt. At some point, that's on you, man."

There was another heavy silence, where I thought the King might get mad. Might set his damn tiger on me. I didn't really care if this made him say no. At least that would be a decision, at least there wouldn't be any more wasted time. But he didn't say anything, just looked at me. There was a conflict in his eyes.

"I invite you all to sup with us," he said eventually, "and stay till the morrow."

"No," I said again.

"Yeah, we need to get back home," Rick said. He gave me a look like he was trying to calm me down, but I was well past the point where that was possible.

"I shall deliver my decree in the morn," the King said and banged his staff on the stage like that was the end of things.

Tomorrow? Are you fucking kidding me?

As the King left the stage, he gestured to Bryce. Bryce nodded back and then approached us.

"I'll show you all where you can stay," he said, "and then I'll take you all to get some food."

We followed him, reluctantly, out of the theater. He took us over to one of the buildings converted into accommodation. He sent the word around the inhabitants of the Kingdom that more pillows and blankets were needed. As the rest of them filed in, I hung back by the door. I caught Bryce's eye and beckoned him over.

"Everything okay?" he asked with a tight and forced friendliness in his voice.

"You'll look after Mia, right?" I said. His eyebrows shot up.

"What do you mean?" Bryce dropped his voice, glanced behind him to make sure that Mia wouldn't overhear. "Are you leaving her here?"

"I'll be back for her," I said. "I just can't have her with me right now."

Anger flashed in Bryce's eyes. "She just lost her sister, the last thing she needs is people up and leaving on her."

"That's not what I'm doing."

"It sure sounds like it-"

"Look, I know what you think of me," I interrupted him. "I know… I know how bad I hurt Naomi-"

"Do you?" he said. There was something cold in his tone. "Because I'm the one who had to take her hospital once you left so she could get stitches in her hand."

I looked away from him for a moment, from the hatred that was in his eyes. I had enough self-hatred without having to add anyone else's to it. It cut me deep enough that I felt like I needed stitches of my own. If we'd had this same conversation back when I'd first done it, I'd have turned all of the self-hatred I was holding into something I could throw at him. An insult. A punch. But that kinda shit was what had ruined everything the first time around. It was what had led to those damn stitches in her hand. I couldn't be like that anymore. I didn't want to be like that. I wanted to be the kind of guy who deserved a girl like Naomi, and who could take care of Mia, too.

I took a deep breath and looked back at Bryce.

"Thanks," I said, and he looked surprised. "For looking after her that night. For helping out with Mia in D.C., Naomi said you did a lot for them. That's the only reason I came here. I'm going to get Naomi back. Mia wants to come with me, but I can't let that happen. It's too dangerous. I need to leave her where I know she'll be safe."

"You really think you can get her back?"

"Negan won't have a choice. I ain't gonna ask him nice," I said. "The only reason I came here was to make sure Mia was safe with you. I don't give a shit what your King has to say, I'm going now."

"What?" Rick overheard and doubled back towards the door.

"I ain't staying," I shrugged. I saw the flare of annoyance in his eyes.

"Daryl," Rick sighed. "You gotta be smart about this. You can't just-"

"What I can't do is leave Naomi in there for another night. What I can't do is just sit here and wait!" I yelled. I didn't mean to. It drew a few stares from people in the Kingdom. Bryce's head whipped round in another frantic check that Mia wasn't listening.

"Cool it," Rick held up a hand, and it took everything in me not to smack it away from my face. I wanted to throw punches. Not at anything specific. I just needed to let it out. "You can't get in there on your own. We need these people."

That feeling was back. Like there was a fire under my feet, and I'd burn up if I stopped moving.

"Nah," I said. "With the right shit, I could get in there. Blow a hole in the place, drive a truck through their walls… Hell, I'll dig a damn tunnel if I have to. I don't care. I'm getting in."

"We have nothing," Rick said. "No explosives. No weapons. Even if you did get in there, how will you face-down all the guns they've got? You'd die before you could get her out."

"Fine," I snapped. Rick looked close to snapping too.

"This is going to take time, Daryl," he said. "We rushed it last time, at that outpost, and look what happened. We've gotta do it right this time. Co-ordinated. As many guns and people as we can get. You burst in there now, and you'll die or get taken prisoner again. Negan will know we're coming for him, and he'll kill you both. He'll start something before we're ready to fight back. It would be a massacre, do you get that?"

My jaw was clenched so tight I couldn't agree or disagree with him. I hated that I was the only one so fired up about all of this. I hated how calm and methodical Rick was being, and I hated most of all that it made everything so goddamn slow. He waited, didn't let the question go, just kept looking at me.

"I don't like it," I said after an angry silence. Rick softened a little.

"None of us like it, Daryl," he said. "The last thing I want to do is leave any of our people with Negan. But, if we do this right, if we do this when we're ready, we've got a better chance of our people, our family, getting out of it alive."

I nodded. I still found it too hard to speak. Rick backed away again, left me to cool off, and went to join the others. I was left standing outside, breathing hard, trying to exhale every piece of anger in me, so I didn't go in there and start a fight. Bryce stood beside me. I wondered if he was still judging me and if my outburst had just confirmed every bad thing he thought about me.

"You ain't gotta like me," I told him through gritted teeth. "But I love them girls."

"Yeah," Bryce said. There was no hostility in his eyes anymore. "I can see that."

He had the same look in his eye that Richard had. He was ready for a fight. That helped. Maybe it would be like it was back at the Hilltop. Even if the leaders of these places failed us, there would be people willing to fight with us. I could raise an army without the permission of politicians and Kings. Bryce put a hand on my shoulder and gestured to the door. "Come on in, Daryl."

Chapter 39: You Just Got a Good Story

Naomi

I don't know how Daryl stomached this.

The sun had been beating down on me for hours, and it wasn't even midday yet. My head pounded. I couldn't remember the last time I'd had something to drink.

The heat made the smell from all of those dead assholes so much worse, too. They lunged at me with their rotting hands, their putrid jaws snapping at the air. I ducked out of their way, pushed them back onto the spikes that had been lined up around the Sanctuary walls where they'd keep reaching for me. It went against everything I learned not to take them out with a headshot. As time wore on, it got harder. Too many of the spikes were taken up by the dead and finding one that was clear meant having to herd them in specific directions. Letting them get close enough to follow me but not so close they'd get me. It was hard, repetitive.

And I was so fucking tired.

I'd been hauling my sweat-drenched body from one end of the Sanctuary to the other since sunrise. Exactly the same as I had the day before, and the day before that too. My muscles ached with fatigue, and I felt sick. I couldn't tell if it was because of the smell or because it had been more than a day since I'd been allowed anything to eat, and my empty stomach was turning on itself. I was getting slow. Exhaustion meant I was dragging my weary feet across the ground like I was one of the dead myself.

Dwight watched from the other side of the fence. If I collapsed, I wondered if he'd do anything or just let me die. Nobody knew about our temporary and uncertain alliance. If I died, he'd lose nothing. He could go back to being Negan's lapdog without anyone knowing what he'd agreed with me.

That was assuming he'd even meant what he'd said. It had been days, and there was still no weapon in my hand.

And here I am behaving myself like an idiot so that he doesn't get in trouble.

I think I'd have thrown up if my stomach hadn't been so damn empty. My hand shook as I raised it to wipe the sweat off my brow.

"Hey," Dwight yelled over. I turned and looked at him. He beckoned me over with a nod, and I dragged myself to the fence. My feet were still bare, and they'd been bleeding for a while, but it had reached a point that I couldn't feel anything anymore. Dwight opened up the gate and grabbed me by the back of the sweater they made me wear in the blistering heat. He wasn't holding too hard. Felt like he was doing it to keep up appearances, and I could've pulled myself free if I really wanted to. But maybe feeling like that was what stopped me from doing it.

"What you doing there, Dwight?" Simon asked as Dwight marched me toward the side door.

"Bathroom break," Dwight said shortly. When Simon looked like he was about to challenge it, Dwight shrugged like he didn't care either way and said, "Negan allowed it, but…"

"Nah, go ahead," Simon said. Then he begrudgingly added, "She's got more points than the rest of them anyway."

Damn right, I do, you mustached prick.

Dwight nodded and gave me a hard shove toward the open door. It was so unexpected, and I was exhausted from working the fence over the last few days that it made me stumble. Dwight's hand tugged the back of my sweatshirt again, but this time it felt me like he was trying to stop me from falling on my face. The door shut behind us. The corridor in the Sanctuary felt cool in comparison to the heat we were coming in from. It was almost a relief to be back in the building.

Never thought I'd feel that.

I had no idea where Dwight was taking me or what his plan was, and I was too tired to take a guess. We wound up back in his room. Dwight checked there was nobody around and then opened the door to let me in.

It was messy, full of stuff that had been carelessly littered around the place. The only things Dwight seemed to take any pride in were a collection of carved wooden figurines set up on a table. They seemed very out of place in a room filled with what was otherwise practical but uncared for shit.

There was a sink in the far corner. Dwight was running the tap. He shut it off and handed me a full glass of water. I drank it all without taking a breath and felt my headache start to subside.

"You hungry?" he asked, and my stomach rumbled at the mere mention of food. "Don't remember when I was last allowed to give you something."

"Uh, yeah," I said, noticing that he looked a little guilty about it. "I am."

Dwight nodded and made his way over to a stack of shelves, where a few jars and tins of food were lazily stacked up.

"Someone ate most of it," he said apologetically, handing over a jar of peanut butter and spoon. "But here, take this while I get you something else."

I was in no position to complain. I scraped as much of the peanut butter out of the jar as I could while Dwight emptied a tin of beans into a bowl and stuck them in a microwave. He needn't have bothered; I'd have eaten them cold.

"Thanks," I said, after a few mouthfuls. The microwave hummed in the background, and my mouth felt sticky with peanut butter.

"It's okay," Dwight said, perching on the armrest of a nearby armchair. "I know how much that job can take out of you."

I nodded. Dwight looked down at his feet. There was tension in his shoulders that made me think he hadn't just brought me here to give me some much-needed food. Something was worrying him. I took a deep breath and asked, "What's up?"

In the silence that was left hanging there, the microwave pinged. Dwight stood up and opened it. The bowl was hot to the touch when he handed it over to me. I sat down on the armchair to eat. Dwight leaned on the countertop behind him, the microwave door still open.

"It's Eugene," he said eventually. My heart sank. I felt like I already knew where this was going. "Rumour is he's agreed to Negan's plan. A bullet factory will take him a while to get up and running, but once he has…"

Dwight trailed off. He didn't need to finish his sentence; I knew where it was going.

Once he has, your friends are dead.

Alexandria had no weapons to their name. How many would they be able to scavenge before Negan had enough bullets to make taking this place down impossible? I scowled at the ground and spooned food into my mouth while I tried not to let despair eat me up. My stomach was so unused to feeling full that it had started to hurt. Felt like it might burst.

"Do you think Eugene would really do that?" Dwight asked. "Betray your group like that?"

"I don't know," I said. The uncertainty of it made me feel queasy. I forced down another spoonful of food all the same. I didn't know when I'd next be allowed to eat. "He wasn't the bravest of us… at first. But it really seemed like he'd… can't you do something to find out? Check on him and see if it's legit or if he's just buying time for Rick and the others?"

"I can try," Dwight said. "But it would mean I couldn't look out for you. I know Simon's been dying to get back-"

"I can handle Simon," I assured him. "If you've got a way of keeping an eye on Eugene, you should do that. Or, get me a weapon."

"It ain't as easy as all that."

"Give me Daryl's crossbow, and I'll do it now," I said.

"We don't know where in the building Negan is right now," Dwight said, and he dropped his voice a little like he thought Negan might be hiding in his closet. "Anyone sees you marching around this place with a crossbow, and they'll shoot you dead."

"Next time we're all in the same room then," I said. "Just hand it over."

Dwight's jaw clenched in annoyance. "Depends who else is there. Too many of Negan's men and they'll shoot you before you can take from me."

His concerns kind of made sense. Negan couldn't see it coming, and it would have to be just the three of us for it to work. I was about to suggest that Dwight let me out while Negan was sleeping so I could do it then, but he changed the subject.

"Do you think Daryl and Rick are planning something?" Dwight asked. "Making a move against this place?"

"I don't know Rick as well as I know Daryl," I said, and it felt like a stupid thing to say because I didn't know anyone as well as I knew Daryl. Not even myself. "But from what I do know, Negan won't be able to keep him down for long. And as for Daryl… If Rick wasn't doing something, if there wasn't some kind of plan in place… I think he'd have tried to come back already."

A lump in my throat stopped me from swallowing any more food. I felt nothing but a deep well of gratitude that Daryl was surrounded by people who'd be able to stop him from doing something stupid.

Dwight nodded. "Guess we gotta act soon then, huh?"

"Yeah," I said.

"Okay," Dwight seemed settled on something. "I'm gonna keep an eye on Eugene for the next few days. If it seems like he's really joining Negan, we'll end this. We will. Now, eat up."

Dwight was getting restless. There was no telling how long we could be here before Simon got suspicious and came looking for us. He'd had it in for me since I'd almost killed him, and if we were absent too long, it would definitely be noticed.

"Okay," I said when there was truly nothing else I could scrape out of my bowl. "We can go back now. Thanks for the food."

Dwight looked half-apologetic and half-relieved that I was so compliant. I was complying with a lot these days. I often found myself wondering if I trusted Dwight or if I just didn't have much fight left in me now that Mia and Daryl were out of danger. Dwight checked that the corridor was clear before he led me back out of the building.

"I'll be back as soon as I know anything," he said quietly as he shoved me back through the other side of the fence to work for points again. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw him talk to Simon and then disappear back through the door into the Sanctuary.

As the food he'd given me settled in my stomach, I found my strength starting to return. All of it got a tiny little bit better. I didn't even care that Simon was watching me from the safe side of the fence, jeering when I came too close. I ignored him, shut him out. I didn't pay attention to anything until someone started yelling. "Hey! Back up! Back up!"

I looked over at one of the guards who was beckoning at me, and everyone else who was working for points, to stop and come back inside the fence. I looked around for Dwight, but he was still gone. A distant rumble of engines approaching made the hairs on my arms stand on end. Judging by the reaction of the Saviors, it wasn't one of their trucks or anyone they were expecting.

Is this it?

Has Alexandria come to wage war already?

Part of me didn't want it to be them. Not unless they'd found some serious weapons and an army to bring down on this place. Hope filled me up anyway. I retreated back toward the fence, and through the gate, they'd opened for us. I kept my eyes fixed on the road. Two garbage trucks came into view.

Simon grabbed my shoulder.

"Didn't know you guys had a sanitation department," I said, enjoying how mad he looked.

"We don't," he snapped. "You know anything about this?"

"No."

Like I'd tell you if I did.

He let go of me and strode toward the fence. There was a tense silence around the Sanctuary; someone ran in to alert Negan. The garbage trucks came to a stop right by the gates. The engines shut off, and then one of the doors opened, a woman stepped out.

"You're trespassing," Simon said. His gun was raised and pointed directly at the woman, his finger lingered over the trigger. She didn't flinch. Didn't even really react to him. But she probably didn't know trigger-happy Simon was. More people emerged, pouring out of the garbage trucks like roaches. There were more of them than I thought there'd be, but I'd never imagined they'd be crammed in the back like that.

I knew it wasn't them, but I still found myself checking all of their faces for anyone I knew.

"You're trespassing," Simon said again, seemingly unnerved by the fact none of them had spoken. "You better have a good reason for being here."

"Here for Negan," the woman said. "We trade."

"You wanna trade with Negan?" Simon scoffed, sneering at their vehicles. "You got anything worth having?"

A small and wry smile crossed her face.

"Talk to Negan," she said. "No other."

Simons's smile faltered. The woman's did not. The people she was with stayed still and silent, surrounding her and sizing up the rest of us.

The Sanctuary doors were thrown open. Negan stood at the top of the steps, Lucille was back balancing on his leather-clad shoulder. He drank in the strangeness of the situation in front of him and took it all in his stride. "What the shit is all this?"

Simon looked over his shoulder at him as he made his way down the steps, "Says she'll only talk to you."

"Is that right?" Negan asked the stranger.

"Talk to Negan," she said again. "No other."

I saw the bemused look on his face, and then Negan looked over at me. "Oi! You know these garbage assholes?"

I shook my head. I didn't recognize a single face. The way she spoke was disjointed and odd, but it was nothing like the old-timey, almost Shakespearean prose that the King adopted. None of them wore the Kingdom's uniform either, and I didn't think there were even this many people residing at the Hilltop. I was as baffled as everyone else here.

Negan looked back at them. "Well? The hell do you people want?"

"We trade," the woman said.

"Trade what?" Negan asked. "Garbage? I got enough of that."

"Information," she said.

"Information?" Negan laughed. "And what would you want in exchange for this information, huh?"

"People."

"No can do," Negan shook his head firmly. "People are a resource. What the hell could you assholes possibly know that's worth that kinda trade? What night we're supposed to take the trash out?"

He laughed at his own lame joke. Some of his men, presumably the ones that were most afraid of him, laughed too. The woman's face didn't change.

"We talk," she said. "Then, you see."

"I don't think so," Negan said. "Not unless you can prove you've got something worth knowing."

"We know Rick Grimes."

Fuck.

How the hell did she know that name? My palms felt as clammy as the dead while my heart raced like a hummingbird's. Without thinking, I took a few steps closer to the fence. Negan's ears pricked up too. His smile changed from one of mild amusement to sheer delight. I felt sick again.

"Is that so?" Negan said.

"We talk," she said.

"Hell yeah, we can talk," Negan said. "Get those gates opened up."

His men scrambled to open the gates while he stood and watched, the smugness oozing off him was so strong I could almost smell it. When the gates were opened, the woman and a few of her people walked silently through. They didn't say a word to each other but moved in complete synchronicity.

Shit.

Who the hell are these Trashbags?

Negan welcomed them into the Sanctuary, walking them through the doors he'd just come out of. Simon continued his face-off with those left outside the gate.

Negan's negotiations lasted all of about fifteen minutes, but it was a tense fifteen minutes. The Saviors stood with their guns raised and trained on the strangers, while the strangers stood stock still and seemingly unarmed. Compared to the newcomers' quiet confidence, the tension of the Saviors made them like the weaker ones, even with all of their guns. I studied their faces again, looking for a single one that I recognized. I hoped against all the odds that this was somehow part of whatever Rick was planning. He could've sent them to feed Negan incorrect information, to lead them into some kind of trap. But there wasn't one face in the crowd that I recognized. If Rick was making some kind of play, surely he'd have sent along someone he trusted to make sure it all went down okay.

The doors opened again, and Negan strode out with the Trash Queen herself. He looked fucking delighted.

"Alright, show's over," Simon said. "Back to work."

He shoved me back out to face the dead as Negan showed the newcomers out. Their engines started running again, and the trucks drove away.

I felt tiny. Helpless.

How did these people know Rick? And what did they tell Negan?

I thought about running. Could I run back to Alexandria and warn them before Negan got there? Could I get them all out before his men and their guns showed up?

No.

But it was nice to dream.

I imagined running towards those gates. Whoever was on the lookout post would see me coming, they'd tell Daryl and Mia. And when the gates opened, they'd be on the other side waiting for me. I'd run to them. Hold them both so damn tight. And then we'd all get out of there — a mass migration of everyone in Alexandria. We'd pack up and leave Negan and the Saviors behind. Find someplace new and start over.

Maybe I should've run when Dwight was the only one watching me. If he was really on my side, perhaps he wouldn't have shot me. Maybe he'd have let me go. But, now that it was Simon, I knew he'd be looking for the first excuse to put a bullet in me.

Someone whistled. Like they were trying to call a dog. I recognized the whistle, and I knew it would be for me. I looked up.

"Working hard or hardly working, huh, Naomi?" Negan grinned at me through the fence. I couldn't even fake a smile. I wanted him to drop down dead right in front of me. "C'mon out of there for a while. You and I have got a lot to discuss."

Well, this is never good.

I didn't say anything. I just waited for the gate to open again so I could walk back into the Sanctuary grounds. Negan slung an arm around my shoulder like we were buddies. I flinched but said nothing as he steered me back into the building. He was worryingly upbeat. Whatever information the Trashbags had given him was clearly something he was pleased with.

"You know, you look like shit in those clothes," Negan told me. "And, holy hell, when was the last time you took a shower?"

"If you gotta problem with that, you can change it," I said. "You're the one choosing to treat prisoners like this."

"You're the one choosing to be my prisoner," he said like that was any kind of counterpoint.

"Like hell I am," I said, fighting hard not to roll my eyes. Negan enjoyed a certain amount of back-talk, but too much would earn you a beating. Walking the line between amusing him and pissing him off was something I was getting good at.

"Aren't you going to ask what that nice lady had to tell me about your friends?" Negan asked.

"Would you tell me if I did?"

"Why don't you ask and find out?" he said. I sighed. I hated playing Negan's little games but I did want to know. I was drowning in here, and any news from home was a breath of air.

"What did she say to you?" The moment I asked, his smile was enough to make me wish I hadn't.

"Wouldn't you like to know?" he said. I had to physically bite my tongue to stop myself from running my mouth. I was trying to avoid another beating, but I was mostly trying to avoid being flung in that solitary cell again. I couldn't help anyone if I was shut in there. Negan laughed again, "I'm only messing with ya. Sounds like your pal Rick is up to no good. Trying to rally support against me, which is a massive bummer because I thought we were making real progress, and now I'm going to have to teach him another lesson."

My heart sank. The small sliver of hope I'd had that these people had been sent by Rick to help him win this thing was getting slimmer and slimmer. Was Negan arrogant enough to fall for something like that?

"Why are you telling me this?" I asked. He had the lazy, amused smile of a playground bully.

"Who are you gonna tell?" he laughed. "You ain't getting out of here, darlin'. Not until I want you too."

He was right; I couldn't leave this place and warn them.

But Dwight could.

"Nah," Negan said. "The real reason I'm telling you is because I want you to know how serious this shit is getting. I don't want there to be a war, but it sounds like Rick's got other ideas, and I gotta protect my people."

"Okay," I said. "I still don't see what this has to do with me."

"Well, shit, what if I told you I just like talking to you?" he said. "You're smart, fun to wind up, put up a good fight."

"Then I'd say you should go make some friends, man," I said.

He laughed like we were joking with one another, and in his weird twisted brain, we were already friends. I shivered.

"Look, I just want you to start making smart and informed choices," he said. "I told you at the start of all this- you got choices. You chose to follow your boyfriend here. You chose to let him work for points out here instead of taking a pretty decent deal like Sherry and Dwight. You've always had choices, darlin'. And you've still got 'em. Even now."

"What choices do I have?" I asked. Here I was, stuck in clothes that weren't mine, following a man I despised down a corridor to God-knows-where.

"Well, now that Sherry's gone, I am down one wife," he said like he'd misplaced a spare pair of glasses. "We could get you cleaned up, get you back in a nice little dress, and it'll be like none of this nasty shit ever happened. I'll tell ya, they got a lot of nice shit up there… well, you know that. You've seen the place. You've seen the snacks."

I was extra glad Dwight had given me food, or the mention of snacks could've been enough to distract me into agreeing to something dumb.

"No, thanks," I said. I couldn't entertain the idea any longer than that. There was nothing to consider or think over. It was not a choice.

"Alright, fine," he said. "No hard feelings. You still got choices."

Doesn't feel like it.

Negan pushed open the door to a part of the Sanctuary I hadn't been in before. It smelled like burning metal. I could hear what sounded like something being hammered. And a raised voice from deep within the room. Yelling at workers to work harder and faster on some kind of time-sensitive project.

It was Eugene.

He turned at the sound of the door slamming shut behind us. Stopped talking the moment our eyes met. Something flickered in there that could've been guilt. Maybe that was wishful thinking. Maybe not. I expected him to look away from me, but he didn't.

Dwight was there too. He stepped out of one of the corners when he saw me come in. His eyes were wide and panicked like he thought I'd attacked Simon again and made my own way here. Then, he saw Negan was the one who'd brought me here, and he took a step back.

Help, I tried to tell him with my eyes. I need your help.

I didn't know how to get the message across to him that he needed to stop shadowing Eugene immediately. He needed to get to Alexandria.

Negan walked over to Eugene and slapped a hand on his back. Eugene didn't flinch. This was a stark contrast to the way I'd seen him just a few days before. Negan looked at him, "Who are you?"

"I'm Negan," Eugene's answer was instant and decisive. I shook my head in disbelief. Couldn't believe what I was hearing. How could he have turned his back on our community so quickly?

"Now, see, Eugene here gets it," Negan said. "He has been making a lot of smart choices, and I'm hoping he can help you do the same."

"It's the right thing to do, Naomi," Eugene said gently.

"No, it ain't." I took a step back, away from them both. Negan sighed.

"So stubborn," he said like I was a kid refusing to eat a damn vegetable. "You'd make a fine soldier, y' know. You can clearly fight. You're loyal as hell. You got guts."

"No, thanks," I said. Again, it was not a choice.

Negan sighed. "Won't even consider it, huh?"

"It ain't you that I'm loyal to," I reminded him. "And having a soldier that's fighting for the other side ain't in your interests either."

"It doesn't have to be like that," he said. "You can be just like Eugene. You can join my side, be loyal to me, and we'll forget all of this past unpleasantness."

He said it like the past unpleasantness was my fault. Like I was the one who'd forced him to bash in Abraham's skull, to take Daryl and me as prisoners, to loot people's possessions in Alexandria, to murder Spencer and Olivia. Something in me snapped.

"That ain't loyalty," I said. "That's just sucking up to the biggest bully in the schoolyard to save yourself from getting hit. Folks that can be so easily bought ain't loyal to anyone but themselves. It's just a coward's way of saving their own skin. When the next big asshole comes along and beats you, they'll switch sides and sell you down the river the second you look weak."

I glared at Eugene, who looked away from me then. Negan took a step toward me, folded his arms across his chest. "And you think Rick's gonna be the next big asshole?"

"I hope so," I said. "But if it ain't Rick, it'll be someone else. You can't build an empire on fear and expect it to last. People are stronger than that. Smarter, too."

"Yeah?" he said. All of this reminded me of something Daryl had said back at the start of all this, back when Negan was just a name, and we thought the Saviors only had one outpost.

"Spreading fear around the communities by butchering one of 'em… You just got a good story," I said. And it felt like Daryl was in the room with me. Like we were standing shoulder to shoulder. I raised my chin and looked Negan in the eye. "But the boogeyman, he ain't shit. Sooner or later, people are going to see that. And there's a hell of a lot more of them than there is of you."

He stepped up real close to me. He was pissed off as hell, but I liked that so much more than when he was happy about something.

"There's a war coming, Naomi," he said. So close to me that his horrible breath moved the hair on my face. "Now, I don't want there to be, but your friend Rick isn't leaving me with much choice. I'm hoping I can end it with as few casualties as possible, but you will have to choose a side. Sooner rather than later."

"Have I not been clear from the start?" I said. "If you need me to repeat it, to get it through your thick skull, I will. I ain't on your side. I ain't gonna be. Not now, not ever."

"I really tried to let you live," he said. "I want you to remember that. When you're dying a painful and pointless death, I want you to remember that I gave you every chance to change that. I want you to remember that I didn't want things to play out this way."

"Yeah?" I refused to lean away from him, refused to flinch, although my skin felt like it was crawling with a thousand invisible insects. "Well, when you're dying a painful and pointless death, I'm gonna be there. Reminding you, it's exactly what I want."

 

Daryl

I woke up before the sun rose. I hadn't slept for long, but it had been deep and dreamless. A blessing and a curse. No nightmares. But dreams were the only way I saw Naomi's face anymore.

I got up and sat outside. When you're on a life or death kind of deadline, you can feel every passing second. But it's like nobody around you is aware of it. They just keep going about their day like there's no reason to rush. No urgency. I watched people milling around the Kingdom as the sun came up. People got up to start farming. A line of kids rushed off to some makeshift school. People shared breakfasts. Soldiers began to train. Joking and laughing with one another like Hell on Earth wasn't just down the road.

These people don't know.

They don't know whose thumb they're under.

This whole place was a lie. People acting like they had it good when half of the shit they were farming wouldn't end up feeding their own people. Like they were happy when if they made one wrong move, Negan would destroy that. Tear apart this whole place if he wanted to.

I wanted to tell them all. To yell it. Stand up and scream it from the top of my lungs, so loud it would shatter this damn bubble they'd built around themselves. Spread it all around the Kingdom until nobody could hide from it anymore. Pull back the curtain that their King was hiding the truth behind and get them all to fight, no matter what their leader said, just like the people at the Hilltop had.

But I didn't.

Because of Mia.

This illusion stopped the Saviors from entering the Kingdom. And as long as it stayed in place, that would keep her safe while I was out fighting.

When the others woke up, Bryce took us to get some food. Barely tasted it. Nothing felt real. My mind was on what was coming next, what the King's answer would be, and if it would've been worth wasting a whole night here.

The King gathered us outside his usual building. He looked around at his people, a small smile on his face as he took in how peaceful it was. Compared to what I'd just come from, it did look like a damn utopia. But he was one of the only people who knew this wasn't real, and that one visit from the Saviors, one wrong word to Negan, could make it all go up in smoke.

"This is life here," he said. "And I wanted more of this. I wanted to expand, to create more places like this. Men and women lost their limbs. Children lost their parents because I sent them into battle against the Wasted when I did not need to."

"This is different," Rick said.

"It isn't."

"It is. The dead don't rule us," Rick said. "The world doesn't look like this outside your walls. People don't have it as good. Some people don't have it good at all."

"I have to think about my own people," the King said like his hands were tied in this.

Selfish prick.

You and your people only have this as long as someone else allows you to.

"You call yourself a damn King," I snapped. "You sure as hell don't act like one."

"All of this came at a cost. It was lives, arms, legs," Ezekiel said. "The peace we have with the Saviors is uneasy, but it is peace. I have to hold on to it. I have to try."

"But…" Mia's voice was small but strong. "My sister… she needs your help."

The King's eyes got sad, like this was some tragedy that was out of his hands. It did nothing but make me angry. "I am very sorry to hear of the plight of dear Naomi-"

"Ain't gotta be sorry if you do something about it," I said. "You got the men. You got the weapons. She stood in front of you in that damn theatre, and you told her you wanted our communities to come together. Make some kinda deal. Help each other out. Now you got the chance to do that, you're turning your back on her. You ain't a King. You just got a good story."

Rick had been looking at me the whole time, this warning in his eyes like I was turning a passive ally into an active enemy. But to me, there's no such thing as a passive ally. You were either fighting with us. Or you were on the other team.

"Please," Mia said when the King continued to say nothing. "Please help us."

"I cannot grant you the aid you desire, my child, but the King is sympathetic to your plight," he said. "I offer you and Daryl asylum, for as long as you require it. You will be safe here. The Saviors do not set foot inside our walls."

He smiled at me like I was supposed to be grateful or some shit.

"How long do you think that's gonna last?" I said, and I turned on my heels, making my way toward the gate. We'd wasted enough damn time here. The others scrambled to catch up, but I didn't stop, didn't slow down. I was so blinded by my anger that I forgot for a moment that I wanted to leave Mia here.

"Alright, open it up," I called to the people by the gates. "We're going."

"You're not," Rick told me. The others filed past me, all sympathetic smiles like they'd known this was coming.

"I ain't staying here."

"You have to," he shook his head. He had that same, exasperated look in his eyes that he'd had the night before. "It's the smartest play, you know it is. Try to talk to Ezekiel. Or stare him into submission. Whatever it takes. We'll be back soon."

"I can't-"

"You got your reason to fight," Rick said. "Try and help Ezekiel find his."

He walked away from me. I didn't want to stay put, but my feet didn't move. Mia came to stand beside me as the gates closed. Rick turned and looked back at me, apologetic but firm. His meaning was clear. He wanted me to stay.

"What do we do?" Mia asked.

"We stay here," I said. The gates closed and shut us off from the others. She looked at me. "For now. If the King don't see sense, I can still do this. There's gotta be others here who see this deal with the Saviors for what it is."

"Bryce will help us," Mia said. "Maybe he can talk to the King."

"Yeah," I said. "And that other guard… Richard, he was ready to fight with us. Maybe if we can get enough of his men on board, the King will see sense."

"I'll talk to Bryce," Mia said. "You handle Richard."

She turned to me and stuck out her hand like we were making some kind of business deal. There was a determined little frown on her face. Mia was a girl on a mission.

"Deal," I said. We shook on it and went our separate ways.

Richard wasn't hard to convince. Barely had to get any words out before the relief crossed his face, and he told me he already had a plan to get the King to change his mind. We left the Kingdom through a back route. Not the main gates. He was careful to keep us out of the way of anyone who might see us. It was easier than I thought it would be. For such a busy place, there were lots of secret ways in and out. Probably what made it so easy for Ezekiel to keep his dealings with the Saviors a secret.

Unfortunately for him, it also made it easier for Richard to keep a stash of weapons holed up in some RV. I wondered if the King even knew he had them.

"We need something to move Ezekiel," Richard said, handing me a gun. "This is it. Alexandria, the Hilltop, and the Kingdom hitting first, hitting hard. Then we wipe the Saviors from the Earth. Keeping people - dozens and dozens and dozens of good people… keeping them safe."

I wanted to tell him he was preaching to the converted, but after the blow of the King turning his back on us, it was just nice to hear someone talking some damn sense.

When he was done mixing up a batch of Molotov cocktails, we walked to a road, and Richard headed toward a line of long-abandoned trucks. We stopped behind them, hidden from view of the road. He'd moved so fast and had it all ready to go. How long had he been planning this before we'd showed up?

"They ride this road," he said. "If we see cars, it's the Saviors. They've been coming in packs of two or three lately. That's why I need you. I can't take them out alone. We're going to hit them with the guns first, then the Molotovs. Then back to the guns until they're dead."

"Why the fire?" I asked. The Molotov cocktails were cool and all, but it seemed like overkill, given that we were taking out a few of them on the road. Could've just used the guns for that. When he'd been mixing them, I'd hoped it had been to use against the Sanctuary itself. If they were strong enough, I could blow a hole in the wall and get to Naomi.

"Needs to look bad," he said. "The Saviors who discover what's left… we want them to be angry. I left a trail from here to the weapons cache I planted, and then to the cabin of someone Ezekiel cares about."

"Who's that?" I asked, thinking that surely everyone Ezekiel cared about was in the Kingdom.

"It's just some loner he met," Richard said with a careless shrug. "Sometimes he brings food that way."

Dim alarm bells started ringing. "Why don't they live in the Kingdom?"

"I don't know," Richard said. "She lives out there, she'll die out there."

Shit.

She?

"It's a woman?"

"What does that matter?" he asked. "She got more balls than you and me."

There's only one person that could be.

I prayed I was wrong. That there was some other lone person who'd approached the King so that Richard and I could keep going with his plan. But I knew, deep down, that this was the end of it.

"She's gonna die either way," Richard continued when he saw me back down. "When the Saviors come and find their buddies dead, if they know their elbow from their asshole and can follow an obvious spoor, they're gonna go to the weapons cache and then to the cabin. They're gonna attack this woman."

"What's her name?"

"Maybe they kill her, maybe they don't," he said, not answering my damn question. "But it's gonna show Ezekiel what he needs to do."

"Her name," I repeated. "What is it?"

"She's tough. Maybe she'll live."

She fucking better.

"Say her damn name!"

There was a silence and a heavy sigh. An answer I both did and didn't want to hear.

"Carol," Richard said eventually. My heart turned to ice. Heavy in my chest, it sank down again. All of the hope I'd built up in this plan and in him was gone. "I hoped you didn't know her. But I didn't think you'd care, 'cause you know what needs to happen."

No.

Not this.

It was strange to feel such a strong mix of shit. I was happy that Carol was okay, that Ezekiel was looking out for her, and I'd found her again. I was relieved that she hadn't strayed too far from the Kingdom after everything Naomi had risked to get her here. But it was crushing to know that everything we'd worked for this afternoon was for nothing, and we'd need a new plan.

I turned away from him, started to gather up all of the shit we'd brought with us.

"Look, this… this is how-" Richard tried to get me to stop. "This is how this could happen. This is how we could get rid of the Saviors. How we can all have a future. She's living out there on her own, just waiting to die."

"Nah."

I knew that wasn't Carol. He could think of her as some suicidal maniac all he wanted, but I refused to believe that it was true, and that was why she'd gone off on her own. If Naomi thought Carol wished to die, she wouldn't have left her here. She'd have stayed by her side until Carol was okay again.

"If we don't do anything, a hell of a lot more people are gonna die," Richard said. "People who wanna live."

Carol wants to live too, asshole.

"You stay the hell away from Carol, you hear me?"

Before I could say anything else, there was the sound of cars in the distance. Getting louder. Saviors. It had to be if what Richard had said about this road was true.

"It's them," Richard said. There was a desperate, pleading look in his eyes. "Look, we can wait for things to go bad, we can lose people… or we can do the hard thing… and choose our fate for ourselves."

"No."

"Sorry," he said and turned to raise his gun at the oncoming cars. I dropped my gun and grabbed him by the back of his jacket, throwing him to the ground. His back slammed against it, pushing the wind out of him and giving me a chance to get on top of him, pinning him there. He looked up at me as the engines got louder, that dazed, winded look starting to fade. He was about to fight back. I punched him a couple of times before he could. I got a few good hits in before he managed to get one back and knock me off. I scrambled for a weapon. Richard did the same, and then we were both on our feet, pointing them at each other.

The cars passed us by. Neither of us took a shot at the other. It would have given up our hiding place.

"There'll be more," Richard said. "Or, they're gonna ride back this way later. But we're running out of time. If you and your people want to move against the Saviors… you need to do it soon, and you need the Kingdom. What we have to do requires sacrifice one way or another. Guys like us… we've already lost so much."

Ain't no way in hell I'm losing anyone else.

"You don't know me."

"I know that Carol, living on her own like that… she might as well be dead right now," he said. He was wrong. He had to be.

"She gets hurt, she dies, if she catches a fever, if she's taken out by a Walker…" I said. "If she gets hit by lightning - anything - anything happens to her, I'll kill you."

I stared at him until he lowered his gun, so he knew how damn serious I was.

"I would die for the Kingdom," he said.

Sounds good to me.

"Why don't you?" I asked before I walked away from him.

Now that I knew she was out here, and roughly where she was, it didn't take me long to find Carol's house. The trail Richard had set for the Saviors was easy to follow. Led right to a row of houses. And then I just had to wait until I saw movement in one of them.

On the doorstep, I hesitated. Naomi had brought her here for a reason. Carol wanted to come here for a reason. And neither of them had shared it with me.

She left.

I was used to people leaving. It never got easier. I felt that familiar echo of self-hatred, that gnawing feeling that the reason so many people in my life left was that I wasn't worth sticking around for. I almost turned and walked away again, but it had been so long since I'd seen Carol, and we'd all be through so much since then that I couldn't turn away either.

I knocked. Took a few minutes, but the door opened. She looked annoyed like she was about to yell at someone. And then she saw it was me.

She didn't cuss me out or tell me to go. Guilt and fear fought in her eyes, and then she drew me in for a hug. It was so good to see her again. A missing piece of our family had been found. For now.

"Okay," I patted her on the back so she'd let go of me. There were tears in her eyes and on her face, but she still tried to smile. Same old Carol.

"Did Naomi tell you I was here?" she asked. I shook my head. I hadn't expected Carol to bring her up so early, and I was already struggling not to tell her the truth.

"Jesus took us to the Kingdom. Morgan said you just left. I was out here. I saw you," I said, trying to keep any discussion of Naomi out of it. Carol nodded.

Everything Richard said about her wanting to die out here filled my head. I knew it couldn't be right. Even now, seeing how sad and broken she looked, I refused to believe it. But something was definitely wrong. For Carol to have walked away from us, from her family like this. She had to have a reason.

"Why'd you go?" I asked. I'd never had the guts to ask anyone that before. Merle had come in and out of my life; I'd never asked why. Our dad had disappeared off on benders for days at a time, and I'd never asked. I'd always thought, deep down, both of them would've stayed if I'd been different. If I'd been more like my dad. If I did all the dumb, destructive shit Merle wanted me to. Maybe they'd have stuck with me. But this was Carol, she wasn't selfish like either of them, and things didn't have to be like they were. She'd be honest with me. She wouldn't try and hurt me.

Carol shook her head, unable to talk for a moment. "I had to."

It was all she could say for now, but there was nothing in the way she said it or the way she looked at me that made it feel like it was because of me. Or that I could've done anything to stop it. She stepped back and invited me into the house with a nod.

Inside was cozy and quiet. She had books and a fireplace. Enough food to last her for more than a week. Carol closed the door behind me.

"You hungry?" she asked. "I was just about to make something. They give me more food here than I know what to do with."

She gestured to a crate of fresh supplies; fruits and vegetables, some cuts of meat wrapped up in cloth. There was also a dish with something in it that looked like a cobbler. I recognized it from the food they'd served in the Kingdom.

"I could eat," I said. Truth was, I was pretty hungry. I'd had breakfast before everyone else because I'd gotten up so early, and the sun was starting to set now. I'd wasted so much of the day on Richard's dumb plan.

Carol lit the fire and emptied some of the cobbler into a pot, which she then put over the flames to heat up. I sat at the table. Neither of us spoke for a while. I didn't know what to say to her. I was happy to be near family again, but it was hard to hold the truth in. Carol had single-handedly gotten us all out of Terminus. In a fight against the Saviors, they wouldn't stand a chance against her. But how could I ask her to join us without knowing why she'd left in the first place?

The truth of everything that had happened balanced on my tongue. Carol stoked the fire and stared into the flames. Eventually, she spoke again.

"I couldn't lose anyone. I couldn't lose any of them. I couldn't lose you," Carol said. "I couldn't kill the Saviors… well, I could. I would. If they hurt any of our people - any more of them - it's what I would do. And there wouldn't be anything left of me after that."

I remembered the way she'd looked after that first fight with the Saviors. How tired and sad she'd been. Scared of herself. Of the things she was capable of.

I got it. Kind of.

"The Saviors, did they come?" she asked. And there it was. The question I'd been dreading most.

"Yeah."

I didn't know how much I could tell her, or how much I should lie.

"Did anyone get hurt? Is everybody okay? Did the Saviors…" Carol started to cry again, and I realized this worry had been eating away at her since she'd left us. She hadn't gone because she didn't care. "Is everybody back home okay? Daryl…"

"They came. We got them all," I lied. "Made a deal with the rest of them, like Ezekiel. Everyone's all right. Everyone's all right."

The lie didn't sit right, not with any part of me, not even when I repeated it. The truth burned me up inside, and it felt like a betrayal. Like I was betraying Naomi for Carol's sake.

This is what Naomi wanted, I had to keep reminding myself because I knew Naomi wouldn't see it the way I did. This is why she brought Carol here.

To her, it would be a bigger betrayal to let Carol know and to take her out of this little bubble she'd built for herself before she was ready. The moment I saw it, I got why Naomi had brought her here. She'd wanted to give Carol a way out that wasn't permanent. She'd wanted to make sure Carol could always come home to us.

I cleared my throat. I couldn't keep wallowing in this, or I'd undo the lie I just told. "We gonna eat or… or I got to be a King or something to get some food around here?"

"Shut up," Carol said, but she was smiling again. She turned her attention back to the food and took the pot out of the fire. She served the cobbler up into two bowls, and we ate in silence for a moment. I wondered if Ezekiel had dropped it off like Richard said he liked to do.

Maybe he's an alright King after all.

"Ezekiel," I looked at Carol out of the corner of my eye. "Is he okay?"

"Yeah," she said, and there was something in her smile that suggested she thought he was more than okay. "I think he is."

I nodded and went back to eating.

"You need a place to stay tonight?" Carol asked. "The sofa's not much, but it's… there if you want it."

It was tempting. It was nice to be there and shut out everything going on in the real world outside. But I'd been here long enough, and I had a difficult conversation with Mia ahead of me. Couldn't avoid that forever.

"Nah," I said. Carol looked surprised, and maybe a little hurt. "I can't. I told… I should get back."

"Back to what? You got some other friends here I don't know about?" she asked with a smile.

"No," I said, but I said it too fast, and her teasing fell flat. I should've laughed it off, joined in. Trouble was, I didn't feel much like laughing these days. Not sure I remembered how to. Or how it felt to find something funny.

"Daryl…" she frowned, knowing immediately that something was wrong. My stomach started to twist up with all of the secrets I was keeping from her. "What's happened?"

"Mia's here," I said. I could still tell her the good news, right? There was still room for that. No matter how it had happened, it was still worth celebrating that she was here. "I left her with someone in the Kingdom that she knows from way back, but… I should get back. Make sure she's alright."

I shrugged another apology that I couldn't stay any longer than this. It had been nice to be away from the fight for a while. I got why she'd come here.

"Mia?" Carol repeated; I could see her racking her brain for how she knew that name. I waited, I wasn't sure I could repeat Naomi's name without crying, and I didn't know how to remind Carol of who she was without saying it. Carol's eyebrows shot up. "Naomi's sister? You found her?"

"Yeah," I said, but I didn't say any more than that. I couldn't. Even when Carol broke out into this big smile, I couldn't tell her. Couldn't celebrate with her. Just sat in this terrible silence, the truth of what we'd been through eating away at my gut.

"Why the hell didn't Naomi come here with you? She knows she's welcome here, and I've been expecting her to visit. She took off before I could thank her for-" Carol stopped. Saw the look on my face. Some kinds of misery are impossible to hide, especially from people who know you too well.

"Nah. She ain't here," I said, and I looked away from Carol to hide more of the look she's already seen on my face. A horrible silence hung in the air. I hoped that would be the end of it, that Carol would assume Naomi had stayed in Alexandria, and Mia and I had come here alone. But Carol ain't dumb. She knew it would be years before Naomi would feel okay letting Mia out of her sight again. I'm sure she'd have been the same if we'd managed to get Sophia back.

"Where is she?" Carol asked. There was fear in her voice, but there was anger there too. Carol stood up, and I saw the warrior she was trying to keep hidden rise up within her. "Daryl. Tell me the truth."

"The Saviors took her," I said. Carol's fists clenched against the table.

"You said they didn't hurt anyone, that they didn't-"

"She's alive," I said quickly. "I think. I just gotta get her back is all."

I left out the rest of it. Abraham. Olivia. Spencer. The fact that they'd taken me too. I didn't tell her any of that.

"You need my help?" she asked. She asked it like she didn't want to but already knew I did. I desperately wanted to say yes, so that me and her could go and burn the place to the ground and get it all over with. But I didn't. She looked better than she had done before, but she still needed time to heal. Even I could see that.

"Nah," I said. "Rick and I are on it. We'll be fine. You stay here and look after yourself."

"Daryl, I can't-"

"If you wanna help," I said, standing up to clear the plates from the table. "Try and convince that King of yours to help Rick and me. I hear he's got a soft spot for ya."

"Oh, nonsense," Carol said, but even in the growing darkness, I thought I saw her blush a little. "If you need my help, Daryl-"

"Keep an eye on Mia for me," I said. "I'm heading out tomorrow, and she doesn't know a lot of people here. Try and convince the King to do the right thing. Other than that, I'm good. I got this. I'll have Naomi back in no time. Besides, if she finds out I disturbed you out here, she'll kill me when she gets out."

Carol hesitated like she wanted to argue with me. But there was a part of her that still didn't want to do any fighting. "If you change your mind. If things get bad…"

"Then I know where to find you," I finished for her. "I should get going now, though."

If I didn't leave soon, I knew I'd break down. I was glad Carol didn't stop me or protest when I moved toward the front door. She opened it for me. I gave her one last hug and then headed back to the Kingdom.

When I got back to Bryce's place, it was late, but he and Mia were waiting up for me. Bryce looked relieved when I walked in the door, like part of him had been worrying I'd gone off without saying goodbye to Mia. Mia was filled with nervous energy.

I'd have to go in the morning. I knew I couldn't stay. Not for a third night. I felt kind of sick. Not just because I knew we were going to have a tough conversation, and she was going to be mad, but because I didn't want to leave her behind. We hadn't had enough time together, I knew Bryce would take care of her, but I didn't like letting her out of my sight. Not knowing how either of my girls were doing was going to be hell.

"Did you talk to Richard?" she asked. I nodded.

"Found my friend Carol too," I said.

"The one with the cookies?" Mia asked. "The one who blew up Terminus?"

"Yeah."

"Good," Mia said. "Maybe she can blow up other places too."

"Maybe," I said. It was the same thought I'd had, and I didn't have the heart to tell her the whole story right away. Not with everything else I had to say. "Look, I'm heading out tomorrow."

"Okay," Mia said. "Will you be long? Are you and Richard going to talk to the King?"

"Nah, I'm heading back to the Hilltop," I told her. She looked surprised, and I knew it was only going to get worse from here. "To get ready for the fight, and help train the ones who volunteered. The King ain't gonna help us, so I gotta try something else."

"Okay," she said again and got to her feet. "I'll pack my things."

"Nah." I stood in the doorway and took up as much space as I could, refusing to let her past. "I need you to stay here with Bryce."

She looked back at Bryce like I'd just asked her to look after him and not the other way round. "Bryce can come too, can't he?"

"It ain't that, Mia," I said. "I need you to stay here where it's safe."

"No."

"I ain't giving you a choice," I said.

"I can fight," she said. "Naomi taught me-"

"Naomi wouldn't want you putting yourself in danger," I said. I could feel my temper rising along with my voice. That she would even try and use her sister's name to convince me was a dumb move. Naomi would kill me if she got out and found out I'd let Mia die trying to save her.

"You don't know that," Mia snapped.

"Yeah. I do," I said. "She doesn't want her kid sister going into a battle."

"I bet Carl's fighting," she said. "And Enid. I'm the same age they are, why can't I?"

"What Carl does ain't up to me," I said. "But your sister wanted me to look after you. Not Carl. Not Enid. Not Perla. You. So that's what I'm doing."

"What? By taking off and leaving me here?" Mia said. Her eyes flashed with anger, she folded her arms across her chest and glared at me. She meant to make me feel guilty, and it worked. For a second, I couldn't say anything, and she took a step forward, "What happened to you promising to be here as long we want you around, huh? Was that just bullshit?"

"Mia," Bryce said gently, trying to bring us both down from the fight this was escalating into. "Daryl's right, it's too dangerous-"

"No!" she yelled, looking between the two of us like we'd betrayed her worse than anyone else in her life.

"It wasn't bullshit," I said. I tried to be calm like Bryce, but I was hurting. Mia was hurting too, and that was on me. "I'm gonna be there for you, and Naomi, for as long as you want. I just gotta go get her back."

"You said you wouldn't leave again," she threw the accusation at me, and it cut me. Sharp as a knife.

"I'm not."

"You are," she said, and I saw something in her break. A moment where all of the anger in her eyes burned out and all that was left was sadness. It was so much worse than when she was yelling at me. "And I'm asking you to stay. Please, Daryl."

"I can't."

"Then let me come with you," she said. Her voice broke, her bottom lip trembled, and the tears she was fighting back spilled over.

"No," I said. I was fighting back tears of my own. "I'll be back, Mia, I promise."

"You can't promise that," she said. "You have as much of a chance of dying out there as I do. You might never come back."

"I will," I said. "And I'll have Naomi with me. We'll be a family, I'll -"

"Naomi might be dead." The words ripped themselves from Mia like she didn't really want to say them but couldn't hold them back. As fast as she was wiping the tears from her cheeks, more were pouring down them. "And if you die too, then I…"

She stopped, couldn't go on.

"Don't say that," I said. I could hardly speak. "Don't even think it. Naomi's fine. I'll be fine. I'll get her back."

She looked at me like I was lying to her on purpose. But I wasn't. I had to believe Naomi's heart was still beating out there somewhere, or mine would stop too. Mia took a few steps back, away from me.

"Just go," she said. "If that's what you want to do. Go now, why wait until the morning?"

"Mia-"

"Go!"

She turned her back and ran through an open door, slamming it behind her. I heard the sound of her footsteps breaking into a run. Another door slammed somewhere else in the building. Bryce and I stayed in the angry silence she'd left behind. I felt like garbage. Like I was walking away from a kid who needed me.

It ain't for long.

I'll be back.

I looked at Bryce. I thought he'd be looking at me the same way Mia had like I was a piece of shit for walking out on them. But he wasn't. There was a lot of sympathy in the way he was looking at me.

"You're doing the right thing," he said, and I wondered how obvious my guilt was. Must have been written all over me. I nodded, but I still couldn't speak. "We'll keep working on the King. It'll give Mia something to do, and she'll understand more how difficult this is. How big this fight could be."

"Just… will you… tell her…"

"She'll come round," Bryce said. "She's just scared. But she'll cool down, and she'll understand why you're leaving sooner than you think."

I kept staring at the closed door and willing it to open back up, for her to get to reach that point sooner rather than later.

"I'll look after her," Bryce said, he put a hand on my shoulder. "Just... get Naomi back, yeah?"

I nodded again. It didn't feel right to leave everything like this. But we were short on time. Richard's plan had been all wrong, but he'd been right about one thing. We needed to move against the Saviors soon. Before things went bad.

So, the next morning I went back to the Hilltop alone. Mia did not come to say goodbye.

I helped train people. I helped recruit others. I helped Sasha and Rosita draw up a floorplan of the Sanctuary. And all the time, I had this ever-widening pit in my stomach. This darkness that kept threatening to swallow me. My thoughts flitted from Naomi to Mia. Guilt about telling Carol crept in there too. And a gnawing dread that Mia was right, that I'd go through all of this and find out Naomi was dead.

It was so noisy inside my head that I couldn't talk to anyone. Maggie and Glenn tried to pull me out of it, but I was slipping too far and too fast. My thoughts were so heavy that they weighed down my tongue. It only got lighter when Rick came back to the Hilltop, bringing with him Tara and the news that they'd found a place with a shitload of guns.

Chapter 40: All I saw was red

Naomi

A twist in my gut shocked me awake, pulling me out of my sleep so sharply it left me queasy. The room spun in the dark. The sound of my rapidly beating heart filled my ears, and sweat-soaked goosebumps covered my arms. My bleary eyes searched the darkness for what had woken me.

My heart was racing so fast I was sure there had to be something in the room with me, but I looked around at the same four walls I'd been staring at for God knows how long. I was on full alert, but my mind hadn't caught up yet. All I could feel was a deep, primal urge to run and no idea what I should be running from. Or to.

And then it started: a series of loud bangs. Distant, but getting closer. Echoing in a corridor not too far from me.

Gunshots.

That was the sound that had woken me. Pulled me into silence as they reloaded to shoot again. I scrambled to my feet so fast the blankets got caught up around my ankles. Gunshots were not an unusual sound in a world where the dead refused to stay that way, but I'd hardly heard them while I'd been in the Sanctuary. If Negan was going to punish someone for something, he preferred Lucile, or the iron, to a gun. Even outside gunshots were rare. Those of us who worked the fence kept Walkers away; the Saviors preferred to use them rather than kill them, so shots were only fired if there was no other option.

So, what the hell was going on now?

The screaming started, and I knew that this had nothing to do with the Saviors. This was not friendly fire.

Is this it?

Is it them?

I pressed my ear to the door, probably the only person in the building who wanted to get closer to whoever was shooting. I could hear people running, yelling at one another across corridors. Maybe Rick had sent those people in their garbage trucks to mislead Negan after all, lull them into a false sense of security while they launched an attack in the dead of night.

Sleep and wishful thinking let me hope for a moment, but I heard pauses between shots as I listened. Too long to be a group unless they were exceptionally well coordinated. There was only one shooter.

Daryl?

Shit.

There was a second where I felt the world drop out from under my feet, tipping like a ship in a storm. Anticipation and dread swelled within me. I'd been too late, too slow to stop Daryl from doing something he shouldn't. He'd never make it all the way here without getting caught or shot dead. And if by some miracle he did, the two of us would never make it out alive. Had he really gotten so desperate so fast?

The shooting stopped. I could hear people running. Yelling. Then that stopped too, and I couldn't hear anything at all.

I tried to tell myself that this could've been one of Negan's men, who'd finally opened their eyes to his bullshit and decided to take matters into their own hands. But I couldn't shake my fear that it was Daryl. That he'd finally snapped out there and gone rogue. I should've asked Dwight to find him and tell him I was still alive. Should've found some way to send him a sign that I was still alive. Daryl had always been so quick to anger, but I'd usually found a way to calm him down. I'd always seen it in bursts. Small, intense flames that I knew how to put out. But I didn't know what happened if there was no one around who knew how to deal with it. I didn't know how those flames might grow beyond anyone's control.

I thought about how I'd be if it was him who was trapped in here. Would I be driven to storming this place alone in the middle of the night to get him back? Maybe. If I was desperate enough. If all of my hope were gone and I had nothing left.

After an agonizingly long time, the silence finally broke. More footsteps. Just one set this time, getting louder. Someone was coming toward me or running past. I tensed as they got louder still, waiting to see if they'd come to a stop outside or go right past. They stopped. The corridor beyond the frosted glass was dark, and all I could see was a hazy outline. I thought it was a man, but it was hard to see much through the dark and frosted glass.

"Daryl?"

His name slipped out without me realizing it. The pang of longing that accompanied it was strong enough to knock the wind out of me. I knew it wasn't him from the hesitation that came from the other side of the door. And the fact that whoever was on the other side wasn't actively trying to break it down. A small cough, and then he answered, "It's Dwight."

Even he sounded sad to be saying it like he wanted to bring me better news. I'd known it was a long shot, but I felt the fragile hope I'd built inside me shatter all the same. I'd been resigned to dying here, but I hadn't realized until that moment just how badly I wanted to see Daryl one last time. Just talk to him. Even if it could only be through a damn door.

It's better this way, I told myself. We'd never have made it out of here alive.

"Someone broke in," Dwight said. He sounded out of breath, had clearly run quite a distance to bring me this news, but there was an element of shock underpinning it too. The Saviors weren't used to interruptions like this. This was the first time I'd seen him alone since the Trashpeople had arrived claiming they knew Rick, but I was too disorientated from waking up to the sound of warfare to think clearly about that yet. Dwight mistook my silence for something else and added, "Not Daryl… someone else...I don't know her… I don't know her name, but she was in that clearing with you."

She...

Michonne? Rosita? Sasha? Maggie?

Dwight hadn't given me enough to go on, and I doubted he knew them well enough to tell me one way or the other. My head was too much of a mess to work out who was most likely to do this.

"I spotted Rosita by the fence," Dwight said. He wasn't done dropping bombshells.

"Is she okay?" I asked.

"I think she got away," he said. "I don't think anyone else saw her."

"Did you see anyone else?" I asked. I didn't ask specifically if he'd seen Daryl, but I wanted to. Now the thought was in my head; I couldn't lock it away again. A small hope that this was just the start of Rick's move against Negan wouldn't leave me alone, although I couldn't see how they'd have managed to get enough guns together to pull off something like this.

"No," he said. "Negan's got people out searching around Sanctuary for any others, but... there's no sign of anyone else. I'm sorry."

He sounded it, too. Like my desperation to see Daryl was leaking through the door.

"Don't be," I said. My desire to see Daryl, and fear of what Negan would do if he caught him, nearly tore me in two, but it was good that he wasn't here. It was good that he was safe. But how much longer could he stay that way if Negan really had gotten some information about whatever Rick was planning?

Sending some random woman to appear like they were betraying Alexandria and letting one of our own get captured didn't seem like much of a plan. Not one I could make sense of anyway. I was getting tired of sitting on my ass and taking guesses at what Rick's plan was. If there even was one. Even if any of this was part of it, none of it was worth the risk that Negan posed to Alexandria and everyone in it. They needed to know. In case someone really had betrayed them, all of them needed to be warned. I wasn't getting out of here any time soon. But Dwight could come and go as he pleased, and this was the first time I'd had any kind of chance to talk to him since he'd started shadowing Eugene.

"Dwight, you have to-"

"Someone's coming," Dwight said urgently, trying to shut me up. The thought, the small niggling fear that he'd never really been on my side, that Negan had just planted him here to get close to me, and I'd been so desperate for any kind of ally that I'd been dumb enough to fall for it reared its ugly head. It stoked a fire that was already burning in me.

"No!" My fists clenched. I wondered how many punches that frosted glass could take before it shattered. I slammed my hand against the wood of the door. I was angry and terrified, and it felt good just to hit something. "Listen to me, you gotta warn-!"

"It's him," Dwight said, in a harsh whisper, sounding so distracted that I wasn't sure he'd been listening. The way he said 'him' made it clear he meant Negan. I heard the scuff of Dwight's feet on the floor as he backed away from me, panicking and trying to put some distance between us, so Negan didn't catch us conspiring.

Too damn late.

"Dwight?" I could hear Negan's voice through the door. He wasn't exactly trying to keep quiet, but after the silence that had followed those final gunshots and the hushed tones of Dwight through the door, he sounded even louder than usual. "The hell are you doing up here?"

"I, uh…" Dwight's silence felt agonizingly long, but I wasn't sure if that was knowing what he was hiding that just made it feel longer than it was. "Wanted to make sure there was no one else up here. Y'know… breaking this one out."

"Well," Negan said. Again, his pause felt longer than it probably was as I waited to hear whether or not he believed Dwight's lie. "Ain't that smart as hell? Checking Redneck Romeo ain't come to get his Trailer Park Princess, huh?"

Fuck you.

"Yeah," I heard Dwight laugh along and wondered how genuine it was.

"She awake?" Negan asked. Was it a test? Would he glean something from Dwight's answer about what we'd really been up to?

"Not sure," Dwight said. "Just got here."

"Huh," Negan said. "Well, let's find out together, then, shall we?"

Shit.

I'd been so busy eavesdropping, I hadn't thought about how suspicious it would be if Negan opened the door and found me with my ear pressed against it. Keys jangled as he took them out of his pocket, and I backed hurriedly away. He sauntered in with a quiet chuckle. I knew what I'd look like, all wild-eyed and desperate.

"Still awake, Naomi?" he asked with that big, dumb grin. "I had no idea you were such a night owl."

"Cut the crap," I said. Negan's eyebrows shot up, but that smile didn't budge. I was too angry to be afraid. Too desperate to care what happened to me. "Who've you got down there?"

"How'd you know about that?" he said, his eyes narrowed. Behind him, Dwight's eyes widened in a panic that transferred to me as we both realized I might be seconds away from undoing Dwight's lies.

"I heard gunshots," I said. "Unless your people have suddenly woken up to how much of an asshole you are, it's gotta be one of mine, right? So, who is it?"

Negan didn't answer. I saw his head start to turn toward Dwight like he didn't believe I'd worked it out for myself, and his suspicions as to why Dwight had been so close to my room in the first place were starting to rear up again. Dwight's panic was rising, and I knew one look at him would confirm any doubts Negan had. I took a hurried step forward and asked, "Is it him?"

Negan looked back toward me. I didn't have to clarify who I meant, and Negan's laugh told me I'd fooled him. For now, at least.

"Nah, it ain't Daryl," he said. "Sorry, sweetheart. Looks like he still doesn't give a shit that you're in here."

I looked away from him, down at the ground, hoping it would look like disappointment but truthfully, I was trying to hide my anger. I usually had a pretty tight rein on it, but I could feel it slipping. I'd been in here too long. I'd been keeping calm too long - a simmering pot seconds from boiling over.

"Who have you got down there?" I asked him again. "Who was it?"

"You familiar with Sasha?" he said, with a smile like he already knew I was. "She came in here all guns blazing, trying to kill me. Can you believe that?"

He chuckled.

"Yeah," I said. "Somehow, I can."

"I'm always coming in here giving you good news," he said, "and all you give me is this attitude."

He shook his head like a disappointed father dealing with a rebellious teenager, rather than an asshole who'd been keeping someone prisoner for almost two weeks now. And for what? All he'd done so far was take sadistic pleasure in seeing just how miserable he could make me and offer me things I would never say yes to. Other than the pleasure he took in causing other people pain, I couldn't see what he was getting out of all of this. Surely he'd get bored of messing with me soon. But what would he do with me when he did?

"Good news?" I repeated. "How the hell is telling me that you've killed Sasha good news?"

"Didn't say I'd killed her," he said. "Now you're just putting words in my mouth."

"But you will, won't you?" I said.

"Now, why would I do that?" he asked. "I keep telling you, Naomi, people are a resource, and Sasha is a valuable one. So, no, I'm not going to kill her. Not tonight. Now, if she chooses to kill herself… well, that has nothing to do with me, and I don't want you holding it against me, alright?"

"She wouldn't make that choice if you didn't have her locked up here."

"I wouldn't have her locked up here if she hadn't come in here trying to kill me," he said.

She wouldn't be trying to kill you if you hadn't killed Abraham.

I stopped myself from saying it because I knew we'd just wind up going in circles, but he could see it etched into my face. He could see my jaw clench as I bit it back.

"Y'know what?" he said like something had just occurred to him. "That wasn't even the piece of good news that I came in here to share with you. That was just a bonus."

He stopped talking, and I felt a familiar sinking in my chest. Negan loved the sound of his own voice so much that he only stopped talking when he knew his silence could be filled with more terrible things than he had the time to list off. Whenever he gave me anything that he considered good news, there was always some twist to it. Something that turned it into a nightmare. So, what was it this time?

Sasha wasn't going to die tonight, but I was?

I kept my mouth firmly, stubbornly shut, and glanced at Lucille balanced on his shoulder. I didn't want to give him the satisfaction of asking him what he'd come in here to tell me. But his continued silence made my pulse race, and my mouth felt dry. I needed to know so I could start planning how to fight it. I needed Negan to get out of here so I could tell Dwight to warn the others that they'd been betrayed.

Negan sauntered further into the room and sat down on the bed. Getting comfortable. Like he thought he was going to be in here a while.

Get the fuck out.

When my silence continued, and he realized I wasn't going to ask him, that infuriating smirk spread across his face, and he said, "Not in a chatty mood, huh? Alright then, I came to tell you that you get to go home tomorrow. So, you wanna say thank you?"

I knew he wasn't being straightforward about this. He couldn't be. There was no way that after keeping me here all this time, he was going to let me walk out, not unless he knew I'd be walking into something worse.

Had he found Daryl and Mia? Killed them? Strung them up on the fence for me to see on my way out?

"Not even a goddamn thank you?" Negan said like I'd offended him. He tilted his head to one side as he looked at me. "I gotta say, I thought you'd be jumping for joy at this news. Damn, do you not want to go home? You getting attached to this place, darlin'? Because you're still welcome to join us, you just gotta say the word."

Go to Hell.

I found my voice. I didn't know how long I could keep my temper, but I didn't know how long I could keep up my silence without Negan losing his temper, either. "You're letting me walk out of here?"

He laughed. "I didn't say that."

"So, what is it?" I asked. "You take me back to Alexandria so you can show me you've burned it to the ground, and there's nothing left but ash?"

"You're a real Drama Queen; anyone ever told you that?" he said, but there was a glint in his eye like burning Alexandria to the ground was exactly what he wanted to do. "Now, Sasha hasn't told me yet whether or not her little trip here was something Rick put her up to, but either way, there has clearly been a breakdown in communications between this place and Alexandria. You and Sasha are gonna help me set it straight. Get things back on track."

"No, we ain't."

He laughed again. "Oh, you speak for Sasha now, huh?"

I couldn't imagine a world in which Sasha ever took the side of the guy who murdered Abraham in cold blood. Negan was good at talking people into things, at getting people to do shit they didn't want to do because he'd created a worse alternative. But, Sasha had already lost so much. What could he possibly offer her that was worse?

"Sasha won't do shit for you," I said. "Not after what you did. If you were dumb enough to give her something to kill herself with, you best hope it's not something she can use on you."

"Why don't you let me worry about Sasha, huh?" Negan said. "What I'm trying to tell you is, tomorrow, we're all taking a little trip to your beloved Alexandria. Lucille is going to choose a couple of people and make an example out of them. How many people she gets to pick depends on how much your friends resist us. That's where you come in. You and Sasha are going to help me make sure that Lucille here doesn't demand too many heads."

"I ain't doing it."

"I haven't even told you what it is yet."

"I ain't doing it," I said again. "I don't care what it is. I ain't doing it."

"Will you calm down and just listen to me for a minute?" he said. But I couldn't. Felt like the walls were closing in on me. "I'm not asking you to pick up any weapons against your friends. I'm not asking you to kill nobody. All you gotta do is sit in a car while we drive you there. Now, if Lucille decides that you or Daryl or that little sister of yours are the ones she needs to take to keep order in Alexandria… Well, that ain't on me, either."

Something snapped. I closed my eyes for a moment.

"No," I said. Everything was slipping away. Negan had told me I had choices here so many times. All this was doing was prove that he'd been bullshitting from the start. Desperation rose in me. One last chance. "Please."

"Oh, now. Don't cry," Negan said. His tone was gentle, but I knew he'd be relishing in this. He thought my eyes were shut to hold back tears. Something was burning behind my eyelids, but it wasn't tears. "Things don't have to go that way. There's a very good chance most of you will survive if things go smoothly for me. And that is up to you, little lady."

I felt his fingers brush against the side of my face. Like he was trying to comfort me. Brush away tears that he was sure I was soon to shed, but he'd gravely misunderstood what was happening here. I wasn't begging for me, or even for them. It was for him. Because he was right.

This was up to me.

When my eyes opened again, they fixed on him and nothing else. All I saw was red. And him. I lunged at him. So fast, he didn't see it coming. My fist slammed into the side of his jaw in a way I knew would hurt tomorrow if I lived to see it. I heard the shock in the way he yelped. Pain, too. If I'd been able to feel anything but rage, there would have been a flash of satisfaction.

I grabbed a fistful of his hair. He swung for me, and I used his own momentum against him to pull him to the ground. I heard the wind leave his lungs, forced out by the way he hit the floor. There was a second thud as Lucille flew out of his hands and hit the ground beside him, rolling away from his outstretched hands.

My knees pinned his arms to his sides, and he desperately reached for Lucille. I think he was yelling at it. Like she was a real person who could hear him and help, but she lay too far outside his reach. Both of us unarmed, it was more of a level playing field. Dwight hadn't got me a weapon in time, so I would use my fists. I got in a few good punches before he stopped trying to get his damn bat and turned his attention to me.

Unable to use his arms, he twisted under me. He was taller, heavier than me, and all of his wriggling around on the floor dislodged me for a second, and he threw me off. I felt my knees skid against the ground. I threw my hands out to balance myself. If I got to my feet before he did, I might still stand a chance.

And then I saw another option. Right in front me. Closer to me than him.

Lucille.

I made a desperate play to get to her, scrambling across the dusty floor on my hands and knees. A dull ache in my hands from where I'd been hitting him. There was blood on my knuckles - his or mine, I wasn't sure yet. I focussed on where Lucille lay waiting for me.

"GET AWAY FROM HER!" Negan roared. His hand closed around one of my ankles, and he pulled hard, sending me crashing back down to the ground. I threw out a hand. My fingertips brushed against the wood of Lucille's handle. And then she slipped away, shrinking from view as Negan dragged me back. I kicked out at him, twisted round to throw my hands up just in time to block one of his punches.

"Keep. Your. Hands. Off. Her." Negan loomed over me, landing a punch for every word. The metallic sting of blood filled my mouth. But I hardly felt a damn thing. I reached up and took a swipe at him, my fingernails leaving jagged scratches across his jaw. My foot connected with the bottom of his ribcage, and he stumbled away from me for a second. I got to my feet, and without wasting a second to catch my breath, I ran at him again.

"Dwight!" Flecks of blood flew from Negan's mouth as he yelled. "The hell are you just standing there for?"

Dwight had been standing in the doorway this whole time. The shock and fear on his face were impossible to hide. He moved hesitantly forward, torn between letting me do this and keeping up appearances with Negan. The answer lay in how successful I was likely to be. I saw him raise his gun, but his fingers were nowhere near the trigger. He gripped it like he was thinking about throwing it to me.

Negan's arm flew out and struck my chest, knocking me back but only just. Only slightly. Not far enough. Then he whistled, short and sharp and loud. In the distance, I heard footsteps running toward us. He'd sent out a distress call. More Saviors would be here in moments. Dwight made a decision; he grabbed me by the back of the jumper and pulled me back before I could get to Negan again. An apology in his eyes, and then he punched me. Hard but not too hard. Enough to cause a reaction from me without leaving any lasting damage. I grabbed him like I was trying to push him away, but I used the struggle to get as close as I could to him and whisper, "Alexandria. Warn them."

I pushed him away again. Thought I saw him nod like he'd heard me. Like he'd understood and would do what I asked him to.

I looked back at Negan. The footsteps were getting louder. My window to do anything to save my friends was closing. Now that he thought Dwight was dealing with me, Negan had gone to pick up Lucille. His back was to me. I ran at him again.

I knew I should stop. I knew everything would be worse for me if I didn't. Whoever coming to save Negan could run in and shoot me dead. But I couldn't stop. My fists, my rage, and my love wouldn't let me. He'd made a direct threat against Daryl and Mia. Against the home I'd spent time building.

I ran at Negan's back, jumping up and gripping onto his neck with my arms. I squeezed tight, trying to cut off his air supply. He dropped Lucielle again as his hands grabbed my arms and tried to pull them away. My nails dug into the flesh at the base of his skull while my other hand gripped his chin. With one twist, I could snap his neck. If I was strong enough. Angry enough.

And then something hit the side of my head so hard it made the room spin. A grey blur of the floor and the ceiling, and then I saw a horrible mustache, gleaming eyes that had wanted to see me hurt like this for a long time.

Simon.

Dwight flinched when Simon hit me, but I don't think I did. Before I could get my bearings or find my balance, his foot slammed into the middle of my chest. The ground left my feet, and I flew backward. A split second of suspension, and then my back slammed hard into the wall. The ground rushed back up to meet me. My hands and knees smashed into it, and I felt something fall with me. Hit across my back.

Shattering.

Glass rained down like glitter. I covered my head with my arms to shield my eyes and face. I could hear larger shards skidding across the floor. The shock of it was enough to grind everything to a halt, just for a moment. I took a breath, suppressed the pain, and looked up. The mirror hanging on the wall was gone, fractured into a thousand tiny knives around me. Too small to be useful.

A shard of glass about the size of my hand lay under the small cabinet by the bed. I could see it glinting from the shadows.

A little too far away from me, but I could weaponize it. If I could get there in time. It wasn't much, but it was more than I'd had until now. The Saviors in the room had backed away from the mirror as it smashed across my back. They were further away than they had been, and their shock would make them slow.

I moved. Heard someone yell, but I blocked it out as I crawled over the sea of broken glass. I could hear it crunching under someone's books. And then those boots kicked me down. Held me there.

"The hell are you trying to get to now?" Simon asked, as his foot on my back pressed me down into the floor and broken glass. I turned my face to the side so I could still see that shard of glass - my one piece of hope. Smaller fragments of glass dug into my cheek. Another pair of boots walked over to stand in front of me and blocked my view. I knew they were Negan's; I didn't have to look. But he crouched down anyway. To get a good look at my face or make sure I got one of his, I couldn't tell.

"This could've been so easy," he said. He sounded almost mournful. "You could have had everything."

"You want me to kill her?" Simon asked.

I looked up at Negan. He wiped his bloodied mouth with the back of his hand and glared at me. His glare said yes. He did want me dead. I glared right back; at least I'd die knowing I did everything I could.

"Goddamn, Naomi," he whispered. "I was rooting for you. I really was."

I spat at his feet.

"Make her sorry for what just happened here," Negan said. I could practically feel Simon's glee radiating off of him. He'd just gotten the permission to give me the beating he'd always wanted to. "Then lock her up. If Daryl survives what's coming next, I want him to see it."

Not even sure Simon was listening to that last part, his beating had already started. Another Savior held my hands behind my back. I looked for Dwight, but he was gone. I hoped he'd gone to do what I asked. To save my friends. To make sure that when Negan arrived the next day, they wouldn't be sitting ducks.

I looked back at Negan, and I did not look away. He didn't look away from me, either. That smug fucking smile had finally been wiped from his face. Whatever it was that had amused him when I'd talked back to him before, when I'd shown a little bit of fight, was gone now that he'd seen the full force of it. He sat on the bed and watched, cradling Lucille in his arms like she was protecting him. Protecting him from me. Even though I was the one taking a beating, I was the one feeling smug now.

I'd almost killed him.

I would have, too, if his men hadn't saved his ass.

Without his cronies, without Lucille, I'd have killed him and he fucking knew it. I could see it in his eyes. A small glimmer of fear that only seemed to brighten the longer I kept my eyes fixed on his. It made the beating hurt less, seeing that fear in him. It kept me from crying out until I passed out and couldn't feel anything anymore.

 

Daryl

Didn't feel good about what we did at Oceanside.

But I was damn glad we'd done it.

The women and kids there, they'd all lost people to the Saviors. Every male over the age of ten had been murdered as a punishment for standing up to the Saviors. Now Oceanside were in hiding. Living in fear and trying to protect their survivors. They'd refused to join us, and we'd had to take their weapons by force. Can't say I blame them for not wanting to risk what they had left. Didn't think they could blame us for wanting to fight, either.

The journey back was quiet, even though we'd won. A small victory in a much bigger war. A successful battle against people we had no issue with. It was hard to sit right on that journey back. Didn't sit right with any of us. When I'd heard their story, the fear around it felt like it could have been contagious. To spread to people in Alexandria who were hesitating to fight Negan for what was ours. People who might think that submitting and living with the consequences would be better than running the risk of the same thing happening to us. Seemed like it had the opposite effect, though. It shone a light on the boogeyman under the bed and showed the cruelty we were facing. Nobody wanted to give Negan the power over our community that he'd had at Oceanside. Most of us were decided; he had to be stopped.

That was what we told ourselves, to make what we'd done to Oceanside seem okay.

The women and girls there might not have been fighting with us, but I don't think they were too far from our minds after we left them. Nobody had said so, but we could return their guns to them after we won. We could take the Saviors weapons for Alexandria and give Oceanside's back, so they wouldn't be left unprotected for too long. Until then, they had enough in place to deal with Walkers, and they were well hidden. Negan wouldn't find them, even if he worked out where we'd got our new weapons cache.

We had a hell of a lot of guns now. Maybe even more than we'd had before. After leaving me at Hilltop, they'd found explosives on the roads. Enough to blow Negan to more pieces than any of us could count. With everyone we were training at the Hilltop too, we were almost ready for this fight.

Fuck the Kingdom, and fuck the King. We didn't need them.

Victory felt close. I'm sure it felt different for everyone, but for me, it felt like Naomi's hand in mine in the middle of the night.

The truck we were in, all loaded up with guns, stopped at the gates. I knew something was up from the way Rick muttered to himself. Didn't catch what he said, but I knew. Uneasy glances were fired around where we all sat. If Negan had popped by unannounced again and caught us with all of this shit, everything we'd just fought for and the danger we'd put Oceanside in was for nothing.

Wasn't him, though. It was Rosita.

She didn't smile when she saw us. She hadn't been doing a whole lot of smiling before now, but she looked even more miserable than usual. Maybe the haul of guns we were bringing in could change that.

"Are you okay?" Enid rushed toward her. The rest of us hung back a little, not sure what she was doing away from the Hilltop.

"Where's Sasha?" Jesus asked. We hadn't been able to find either of them at the Hilltop before we left. Thought they might have been training people outside of the walls, away from where Gregory might see them, but it didn't seem like that had been right. Rosita looked at all of us, her face still set in misery.

"There's someone here," she said, not answering either question. The way she said it made it clear it wasn't good news. It wasn't someone we wanted here.

She brought us to the jail cell Morgan had built. Someone was sitting in the shadows. He stood up when we came in. Stepped into the moonlight that was coming through the little cell window. More of a window than I'd been allowed in his damn cell. The shadows of his scars deepened in the half-light. It made his eyes look every more sunken than usual.

Dwight.

I will fucking kill you.

I ran at him. Felt the others try to hold me back. I didn't understand why. I couldn't. They knew him; they knew who he worked for and what he'd done. Some of it, at least.

Rick stood between him and me. Arms raised and ready to push back on my chest every time I got too close. Like he was trying to break up a damn bar brawl. Me, on the other hand, I couldn't understand why this asshole was still breathing. Why hadn't Rosita shot him dead instead of locking him up here?

"He says he wants to help us," Rosita said.

Like Hell he does.

I stopped trying to get to him. I'd let this play out, whatever the hell it was, and then when they were all done acting like some damn jury, I'd be Dwight's executioner.

"That true?" Rick turned to him. "You want to help?"

"I do," Dwight said. Rick pulled out his gun and pointed it at Dwight's head.

"Get on your knees," Rick told him. Dwight knelt down. Rick was the one pointing the gun, but it was me Dwight looked at. If he was looking for mercy, he was looking at the wrong damn person. Rick knew I'd be close to losing it again, so he said, "Look at me. Why?"

Dwight looked back at Rick.

"'Cause I want it stopped. I want Negan dead," Dwight said, then his gaze slid over to me again. "And so does Naomi. She's-"

At the mention of her name, something snapped. I rushed him, dragging him back to his feet and pushing him up against the cell wall.

"You keep her name out of your damn mouth," I yelled, holding him there. My knife was real close to his face, and I was ready to start chopping chunks outta him. He started shaking a little then, I could feel it against my knuckles. He and I were the only two people in that room who knew what he'd done to me. What he was capable of. He took a few deep breaths.

"You wanna end it this way…" he said. "You go ahead. I'm sorry. I am. I know you want to."

"He could just be here to see if you were here," Rick said. "We can't trust him."

"She's alive," Dwight said, looking right at me like he was pleading with me to believe him. He avoided saying her name again, but he didn't need to. I knew. Everyone in that room knew. They could probably all see that tiny window of hope opening up for me.

"He's got no way to prove that. He could just be telling you what he knows you want to hear," Rick warned me like it wasn't something I didn't already know.

"We're working together," he said.

"Nah," I said. The small piece of hope snapped shut. Naomi wouldn't work with a guy like him. "You're lying."

"She wants to kill Negan," Dwight said, quickly. "She wants to protect all of you, to stop this before it becomes a full-blown war. We both do."

"So why don't you kill him?" Rick challenged. It was a good point. He was perfectly placed to do it as Negan's lapdog. He could turn around and rip his throat out any time he damn well pleased. Bet he had a hundred opportunities a day to do it. Why would he need a prisoner to help? She had nothing in there. No one.

"Can't just be me," he said, and then he looked back at me. "They're all Negan. Now, N… Naomi, she's so dead-set about just getting him that I don't think she's thought past that point."

He'd hesitated to say her name since I'd almost killed him the last time he had, but he knew it was his best shot at getting me to listen. I was so hungry for any news of her that I'd eat it up even if it came from him. His eyes were fixed on me. Desperation poured outta him like sweat.

"Nah," I said again. "She's smart, she wouldn't do something so-"

"She's desperate," Dwight interrupted me. I wasn't sure what I'd been going to say. Reckless? Dumb? Killing Negan no matter the consequences sounded like something I'd do in a fit of rage, not something my binder-filling, list-making, color-coding Naomi would do. She planned things. She did them right.

"She's been asking me to get her a weapon," Dwight said. "So she can kill him to stop this war. She wants to protect everyone here. Protect you."

No.

I didn't want to believe him.

"He's got no proof," Rick said, but something in what Dwight was saying rang true. Naomi would do anything to protect this place and the people in it. She's lost one home, and I wasn't sure she could stomach losing a second.

I knew that, but could Dwight? He could've come here with this lie while her corpse rotted and writhed on one of them damn sticks outside the Sanctuary walls.

The knife in my hand was burning a hole in it, begging me to kill this son of a bitch. I could've done it. I wanted to. After everything he'd done to me, and everything he might have done to Naomi, I should have done it. But he was giving me the one thing I hadn't been able to get, the one thing I'd wanted since I'd gotten out of there, proof that Naomi was alive. It was the first thing I'd had to go on that wasn't built on nothing but my own damn hope. He saw my hesitation, and he used it.

"If she fails, he'll kill her. But even if she succeeds, then Simon or Gavin or one of those other assholes will kill her for it. Either way, she ends up dead," he said. I felt sick. I'd felt good about all of the weapons we'd just got, but now every moment we'd spent getting them felt wasted. I should've been at the Sanctuary. I should've been getting her out.

I pulled Dwight away from the wall only to smash him back into it again.

"You best stop that from happening," I told him. "If Negan or Simon or Gavin or anyone in that shithole lays a finger on her, I'll fucking kill you."

He swallowed something back. A flicker of something in his eyes. Could have been deception, could have been fear.

"They'll kill me if I protect her," he said. My knife pressed as hard to his skin as it could go without breaking it and drawing blood. "But it doesn't need to come to that. Negan trusts me. We can work together, me and you, we can stop him. You knew me then, and you know me now. You know I'm not lying. I'm not."

I wanted Negan dead. Probably even more than Rick did. I wanted him to suffer for everything he'd done. To me. To Naomi. To Alexandria. But, if it came down to a choice between letting him live and saving Naomi, I'd choose her every time.

I lowered my knife. Let go of Dwight and stepped back.

"They have Sasha, too," Rosita said. "If she's even alive."

"Why didn't you say something?" Jesus said. "He could be our only chance to get her back!"

"Because I don't trust him," Rosita said, shooting Dwight a glare. "But, I trust Daryl."

"Negan's coming soon," Dwight said. "Tomorrow. Three trucks, probably. Twenty Saviors and him. I can slow them down, bring some trees down in the road, buy a little time for you guys to get ready. If you can take them out, that's where we start. You kill them, I'll radio back to the Sanctuary and say everything is okay. You drive the trucks back, and I can lead you right inside, and with the right plan, we can wipe out the rest. Check to see if your friend is still alive. Get Naomi. Then, we get the workers on our side, build our numbers up, and go from outpost to outpost until we end this."

It was a tempting plan. Having someone on the inside, so close to Negan's inner circle was a huge advantage. But, of course, Negan knew that too. And having one of his inner circle come to mislead us would be a huge advantage to him. And he knew the only way I'd accept Dwight as anything other than dead was if came with the promise of keeping Naomi alive.

I knew all of this. Rick knew it, too. But what choice did we have? If Negan was really coming here tomorrow, we'd need to be prepared. So, we let him talk. We agreed on things, and we didn't tell him everything. We held as much back from him as we could. But even with all that, when negotiations ended, it felt crazy that we were just letting him walk off. Opening up the gates for him after everything he'd done, everything he could be about to do.

"Hey," I stood real close to him, staring him down. He was looking so scrawny I felt like I had enough rage in me to snap him like a twig right now. He was the one link of communication I had to Naomi. Even if it wasn't a reliable one. "You go back there, and you tell her not to make a move against Negan. Tell her to sit tight. Tell her we're coming for her."

He opened his mouth like he was about to say something, admit to something else, but he stopped. The jaw muscles under his scar tissue moved again, and then he nodded. "I'll tell her."

He turned, and we watched him walk back through those gates.

"We just started it," Rick said, as we watched Dwight slink back into the shadows he'd come from. "The whole thing."

"If he's lyin', I'm gonna kill him real slow," I said. "When this is done, I don't give a damn if he's sorry. I will kill that son of a bitch."

"If he's lying," Rick said. "This is already over."

"He's not," Rosita said. I looked back at her, and she folded her arms across her chest. Her face was stony. "He's not lying. Not about Naomi, at least. The other stuff..."

She trailed off with an infuriating shrug, her face giving nothing away. I took a few steps toward her without realizing it. I got that she was in a crappy mood, but it sure seemed like she'd been holding back a lot of important information tonight.

"You know she's alive?" I asked. She nodded. "How? How can you know that?"

I didn't think she was going to answer me right away. Another stony silence. Whatever she and Sasha had been through tonight had taken everything from her but anger. I knew how she felt. I didn't have much left in me but rage either, and it was exhausting. Too exhausting for me to deal with anyone else's shitty mood.

"How do you know?" I asked again.

"Sasha and I were scouting out the Sanctuary for a while," she said. "Trying to see if we could take a shot at Negan while he was outside. But, he rarely came outside. Naomi did, though."

"She was outside?" I asked. Could hardly hear myself over my own stammering heart, the way it seemed to have risen in my throat to get tangled up in everything I wanted to say. I'd thought she'd have been locked up in that one-room, windowless cell like I had been. "You saw her?"

"Yeah," Rosita nodded. Clammed up again.

"Was she… did you… did you talk to her?"

"No," Rosita said. A little reluctance had crept into her voice. "There were too many Saviors around with guns. She was fighting Walkers. Not killing them, just stringing them up to these posts all around the fence."

I closed my eyes for a second.

"Yeah," I said through gritted teeth. "They had me doing that, too."

I knew exactly what that job was like. How dangerous it was. How frustrating it was to risk everything to protect a place you hated. How they never let you eat or drink anything until you were close to dropping down as dead as one of those damn Walkers. Being shot by the Saviors at the fence looked like a better option, the longer you were out there. And it would've been Dwight on the other side of that fence. Pointing my own damn crossbow at my girl. I glared back into the shadows he'd disappeared into and thought about running after him. If I'd known what he was making her do, I'd have put that knife right through his eye, and I wouldn't have stopped until I hit his brain.

He'd said she was alive, and that had been enough for me. But I should've asked more. Was she hurt? Had he hurt her?

He could've got her out. He could've brought her here with him tonight.

Then again, so could Rosita. She'd been there; she'd got Dwight easily enough.

"Why didn't you tell me you were going?" I rounded on Rosita. I knew my anger wasn't really meant for her, but I had nowhere else to put it. "You and Sasha had no business doing that on your own."

"Abraham is dead," she said, her eyes flashed with anger. "That made it our business. You might be content to sit around here and wait on Rick to do something. But we weren't."

"I could've come with you," I said. "Maybe with three of us, Sasha wouldn't be in that place now. That is if she ain't dead!"

"You were going to Oceanside," Rosita said. Another damn shrug. Like it didn't matter where I was, or that going with them meant I could've got her out. "We thought we'd get it done. We thought it would be easier."

"Easier?" I repeated. My anger hit up against the emotionless wall that Rosita had thrown up and bounced back on myself twice as strong. "Just you two dumbasses storming the place? No wonder she got caught! What did you think was gonna happen? Huh?"

Rosita's brow furrowed a little, a small glare creeping into the corners of her eyes. I'd struck on something strong enough to crack that wall.

"We didn't go there expecting to make it back," she said. The weight of what she'd said made the air feel heavier. "Neither of us did. But then we got to the gates and Sasha, she just…"

Rosita trailed off and looked away from all of us. I didn't know what to say. I was mad as hell that they'd gone there without telling me and that there had been an opportunity for me to go get my girl, and I'd missed it. But not caring if you came back from a fight, going into it expecting to die? Wanting it? I got that.

"Hey," Rick stepped between us, focused on Rosita. "We're all glad you made it back here. We'll get Sasha back. Naomi, too."

He looked at me, warning me not to take this any further. Not with everything Rosita had been through tonight.

"We knew you'd have wanted to come with us. See if you could get Naomi out of there. But… that wasn't the plan for us. We didn't have an exit strategy," Rosita said. I nodded, and I was about ready to drop the whole thing when she added, "Maybe it's better she's in there."

"The hell did you just say?"

She'd muttered it, but I'd heard her. Clear as a damn bell. Rick tensed ago, ready to step between us.

"Dwight says she's going to kill Negan," Rosita said. "I say we let her."

Another damn shrug, and then she walked off. Didn't even know I was trying to follow her until I felt Rick's hand on my chest again, pushing me back.

"Don't. She's been through enough tonight," Rick said quietly. "We've all been through enough. We can't start turning against each other now. Not with everything we've got ahead of us."

After our victory this morning, the road ahead still felt long and steep, like climbing a mountain. And if Dwight was telling the truth, we'd have to do it all tomorrow. I know that made other people nervous. Unease crackled around Alexandria. People hurried to get ready, set up our traps and weapons, stole moments of sleep when they could. Messengers were sent to the Hilltop and the Kingdom, a call to arms or a cry for help. There was no knowing if they'd answer it in time. If they'd get here before Negan did.

Rick sent word to a group of people he said he'd found living in some landfill somewhere. Not sure I thought he was really serious about that until The Scavengers arrived not long after the sun came up, and they all drove in on garbage trucks. We posted lookouts along the route the Saviors would come. We blocked the road as much as we could and set a trap close to the gates.

Then, it was just a matter of waiting. Waiting so long, it made me ache in all kinds of ways. I just wanted this done. I wanted it to go the way Dwight said it would. Maybe we could be back at the Sanctuary by sundown. Maybe I'd have her by my side at nightfall.

A call rang out between the Scavengers letting us know they were close. It was time. The aching faded, melted away by the adrenaline that burns you up before a fight. We all took up our stations. Preparation time was over. This was it.

"Rosita. Get into position," Rick said to her. "I'll signal you. And the wall's gonna hold?"

"It'll hold," she said, but I'm not sure she cared either way. I looked at Rick. He looked at me and nodded as if to say we got this. I nodded back.

The engines came within earshot of Alexandria. Quiet rumbles that slowly got louder. And then the first one came into view. Someone was standing on the back, their voice booming out of a megaphone.

"All points are covered. Every contingency is already met. I come armed with two barrels of the truth." You would think that Negan would be the first to talk to us, but he didn't show his face. Not at first. It was Eugene. "A test is upon you, and I'm giving out the cheat sheet."

Why had they brought him? Why was he the one talking to us? Was Negan even here? I looked for him and for Dwight, but it was just Eugene. Rick shot an uneasy look at me. Eugene's truck came to a stop right where wanted them to, right by the trucks that we'd filled with explosives, but if we detonated them now, it would blow Eugene to hell. Waste of resources if Negan wasn't even here.

"H-Hello," Eugene said. He sounded more nervous now that he'd stopped. Maybe he'd expected a warmer welcome than this silence. "I come salved with the hope that it is my dropped knowledge that you heed. Options are zero to none. Bottom-lining it - you may thrive, or you may die. I sincerely wish for the former for everyone's sake. The jig is up and in full effect. Will you comply, Rick?"

He was speaking like himself, but Negan had put those words in his mouth, right? Eugene had been in that clearing. Abraham had been one of his closest friends; it would take some severe brainwashing for him to forget that and turn his back on us. Unless Negan had broken his spirit already and made him think there was no resisting him.

Either way, Negan was a goddamn coward for sending one of our own to deliver this message.

"Where's Negan?" Rick asked.

"I'm Negan," Eugene said.

Fuck. You.

Might as well have signed his own death warrant there and then. His words hit us all in different ways. The same betrayal but to different degrees. Tara, who'd been the first and sometimes only person to see any real bravery in Eugene, whispered a soft, "No!"

Rosita, maybe the only person still alive who knew Eugene best of all, looked disgusted and wounded beyond belief. They'd both started this whole thing with Abraham. They'd both watched him die. But now Eugene had chosen a side. Rick turned to her. Nodded.

No.

It was instinctual. Even I didn't get it at first, but I was suddenly gripped with a fear of those explosives going off. It wasn't because we had no real idea if the wall would hold when they did, or even because it would almost definitely kill Eugene.

It was one thought that told hold of me, scared me right to my core.

If he's brought Eugene here, who else has he got?

I scanned the trucks I could see for any sign of her. Any small hint that Negan had her tied up in the front of any of those trucks. I didn't see anything, but I only had seconds to look. I turned to Rosita to ask her not to do it. Not yet. Not until we knew who was in the rest of them damn trucks.

Too late. Rosita's thumb pushed down on the button, and I braced myself, waiting for the ground to shake, for the deafeningly loud boom that was supposed to follow that press of a button.

But there was nothing.

Silence.

And then a flurry of movement as the Scavengers pulled out their weapons and pointed them at all of us. One of them opens the gates. Then there was the sound of car doors opening and closing as Negan, Dwight, and some of his other men got out of their trucks.

It all happened so fast that it took us a second to realize we'd been crossed. The Saviors gathered up the explosives we'd hidden while the Scavengers kept us all in place. They'd sold us down the river. I looked at Dwight as he walked to where Eugene was standing. Had he known this was going to happen? Was he part of it?

I was so caught up with how this could've happened that I didn't even think to look at Negan until he said, "You ever hear the one about the stupid prick named Rick who thought he knew shit but didn't know shit and got everyone that he gave a shit about killed? It's about you. You're all gonna wanna put your guns down now."

"No one drops anything," Rick said to us, but I don't think he needed to. There was no chance I was surrendering this fast. They'd have to pry this gun outta the hands of my damn Walker. RIck looked at Jadis, "We had a deal."

"Made a better deal," Jadis said with a cold shrug.

"You push me, and you push me. And you push me, Rick," Negan said. It was only then that I noticed cuts and bruises all over his face. At least it looked like Sasha had managed to do some damage when she bust in there, even if she hadn't been able to kill him. Good for her. "You just tried to blow us up, right? I mean, I get me, my people. But Eugene? He's one of yours. And after what he did - he stepped up. You people… are animals. The universe gives you a sign, and you just shove your finger right up its ass."

He laughed at all of us. Flipped us off. Then he looked at his right-hand guys.

"Dwight, Simon," he said. "Chop-chop."

They moved toward something at the back of the truck, undid the chains holding it there, and pulled off the sheet covering it. I could tell what it was before they swung it around.

A goddamn coffin.

Whose coffin is that?

They pulled it until it was standing upright so we could get a good look at it. Negan let the silence sit for a moment, let the fear seep into all of us.

Who's in the fucking box!?

"So, you don't like Eugene anymore," Negan said. "You guys gotta like Sasha."

Sasha.

Was that who was the box? Had he killed her after she'd tried to kill him, left all of those bruises on his face?

"I do, too," Negan said, tapping the coffin with Lucille. "Got her right here packaged for your convenience, alive and well. Now, I brought her so I wouldn't have to kill all of you, and not killing all of you could get complicated. See, I know there's a lot of firepower left in there, Rick. So I'm gonna make this simple. I want all the guns you've managed to scrape up. Yep, I know about those, too. I want every last grain of lemonade you got left. I want a person of your own choosing… for Lucille."

Rick didn't say anything, but I think we were all thinking the same thing; if Sasha was really alive, why bring the damn coffin?

Negan's cold little eyes fell on me.

"Daryl… Ooh, I gotta get me my Daryl back. I see you," he said with his hungry-wolf smile. Yeah, I see you too, asshole. I glared back at him. My gun felt heavier in my hand. One well-taken shot and he'd be dead. Like he knew I was thinking about it and was challenging me just to try, Negan took a step forward, eyes still fixed on me. "I am in desperate need of something to keep your bitch in line."

She's alive.

I know he was only bringing her up because he thought it would hurt me. But for a second, it did the opposite. Rosita was right; Dwight hadn't been lying. At least not about Naomi. I knew if she was dead, Negan would have brought a piece of her here to prove it. To fuck with me. To watch me collapse. This fight would've been over before it began, for me, at least. But now he'd refreshed why I was doing this. Fighting to save someone is so much better than fighting to avenge them.

"This was her, by the way," Negan said, pointing at the injuries on his face. Cuts and bruises. My heart dropped. That little bit of comfort he'd just handed me turned to ice. "She did not like the thought of coming back here. Guess she doesn't miss you guys too much, huh?"

I took a better look at those bruises on his face. The same ones that had given me some silent satisfaction now made me feel sick. His bruises were dark, fresh, but it couldn't have been more than a day since she'd made them. Those little cuts on his jaw looked like scratches, and I tried not to imagine what he'd been doing to her when she made them. Tried not to imagine Naomi's hand making them.

"She with you?" I asked. "You got her locked in some other damn box?"

He didn't answer. Just laughed. I searched the windows of every truck I could see. Was she in a coffin of her own? Would he drag her out of a truck so I could watch her die like Abraham?

"Naomi!" I yelled. If she was here, if she was shut up in the truck of some car or locked in some fucking box, I wanted her to know I was close. That I was coming for her. That all she had to do was sit tight and wait for me.

"I am going to have to kill her, Daryl, you get that, right?" Negan said. "You want a piece of her when I'm done? Little keepsake?"

I shot at him. Rick yelled at me from his post, but I hadn't even thought about it. All I saw was red. And him.

"Woah now!" Negan ducked out of the way. The men around him raised his guns and pointed them at me, but Negan held up a hand to stop them. One of the Scavengers kicked me in the back of the legs, and I fell to my knees. Negan looked back at Rick. "You best keep your dog on a leash and give me what I'm asking for now, or Sasha dies. And then all of you. Probably. C'mon, Rick. Just because I brought her in a casket doesn't mean she has to leave in it."

I was ready to fight. Ready to blow Negan's head off even if it meant the damn Scavenger behind me blew mine off right after. But with Sasha's life now hanging in the balance, I didn't know how many others would feel the same. I didn't know how Rick would choose to play this one out.

If he stood down, I wasn't sure I could stand by him. Not after Negan had made such a direct threat against Naomi's life.

"Let me see her," Rick said.

"Oh. All right. Just give me a second. I might have to get her up to speed. You can't hear shit inside this thing," Negan said, turning to face the coffin. He tapped it with Lucille again. "Sash. You're not gonna believe this crap."

He opened up the front of the coffin. I saw her arms first. Reaching for him. Heard his little yelp of surprise as she lunged forward. I thought, for a second, that she'd just decided to fight him now she was here, but then that smell hit us. That unmistakable rot of Walker-flesh and I heard the snarl that only the dead make. Whether Negan knew it or not, Sasha had been dead for a while. And now she was giving all of us a chance to live.

Negan fell off the truck, landing somewhere out of our sight. Sasha fell after him. I could hear yelling, hoping she was tearing his flesh right off the bone. In the shock and chaos that followed, it was Carl who moved first. He shot at one of the Scavengers behind him, and that one shot was enough to push the rest of us into action. I turned and fired at the Scavenger who'd knocked me down, and then I turned my gun and shot through the gate.

I saw Negan get up and duck down behind some cars I kept shooting. Saviors started pushing through the open gates while I was trying to get out of them. Not because I was abandoning Alexandria, I still wanted to get out there and check every vehicle Negan had brought with him. He hadn't answered me. She might be here. In all of this mess.

Too many Saviors were storming the gates, and I had to fall back. We were outnumbered and, probably, outgunned now that we'd shared the weapons we'd managed to get our hands on with some goddamn traitors.

It wasn't looking good. Bodies were starting to pile up, and my gun was getting light, empty. I took out a Scavenger with my last bullets and pulled the gun from her hands before she hit the ground.

I fought my way closer to the center of town. I'd seen Rick get hit but get back up again. Hadn't seen him since. Hadn't seen Negan, either. The Saviors and their friends had started rounding people up. Three of them cornered me, firing so close a bullet grazed by my shoulder. I pulled the trigger, but my gun didn't go off. It was jammed. Or maybe out of ammo again. I needed another one, fast.

I dove out of the way of the next bullet and took shelter behind a car. The approaching Savior's guns got louder as they kept firing, getting closer and closer. I checked my gun. Out of ammo. I looked around for another body with a weapon I could take. Nothing

Could I run for it? I sure as hell wasn't surrendering.

A round of fire went off real close to me, and two of the Saviors dropped to the ground. The third ran. I looked up. A big gun in a small and shaking hand.

"Mia?"

I couldn't believe it was her. The fight we'd had when I'd left her at the Kingdom forgotten, I stood up, ran to her, and pulled her into a hug. She felt real enough, but how could she be here? I thought I might have been shot after all, and this was either some death-hallucination or that Mia had died without me knowing, and this was her greeting me wherever we end up after this place. But nothing else around me had changed. No Pearly Gates, just the ones to Alexandria.

Then I heard hooves on the road, and when I looked toward them, I saw the King. Bryce was just behind him, his face all flooded with panic until he saw that Mia was alright. The King looked down at me.

"Change your mind?" I asked him.

"I was… persuaded," he said, and I caught a smile on his face even though he tried to hide it. Morgan and Carol were not far behind. I saw the same badly-hidden smile on Carol's face too.

"You need this?" she asked, handing out a spare gun.

I took it from her. "What the hell took ya'll so long?"

Maggie, Glenn, and a small army of people from the Hilltop charged in moments later, and the tables turned fast after that. Saviors scrambled to get out of the gates. Scavengers let off smoke bombs and melted away into them. Any of them that were well enough to run, we chaced back to the gates.

By the time I got there, the gates were closing, shutting out anyone who might think of launching a second attack, but I didn't think there was much chance of that. The Saviors were fleeing like rats from a sinking shit. I threw down my gun and climbed up the side of a truck to look over the walls, and jump on the roof of one of them trucks if they were parked close enough. Jesus had managed to get into Sanctuary that way, no reason I couldn't.

They were gone already, and the road was empty.

No.

I swung my leg over the top of the wall. I could climb down from here without wasting time getting the gates opened up again.

"Daryl!" Rick yelled. I paused and looked down at him; he was clutching a wound on his side. Bleeding, but able to move. "Where are you going?"

"I'm getting in one of them cars, and I'm going after them," I said.

I was about to swing my other leg down before he could stop me, but then he said, "Without your gun?"

I stopped again. Looked at where my gun lay discarded on the ground. As it currently stood, I had nothing but my fists to get me in there, and I wasn't planning on knocking. I climbed back down into Alexandria. If I'd been looking at Rick, I might have caught the nod he gave to Aaron and Glenn. But I was too focused on the gun.

Before I could reach it, they grabbed me by the arms.

"Hey, what the hell?" I asked, trying to pull myself free of them. I was so shocked they were doing it that at first, I didn't struggle too hard. These were my friends; we'd been through a lot today. The last thing I wanted was to give any of them a black eye. "What are you doing?"

"I'm sorry, Daryl," Rick said. "I can't let you chase after them."

"I gotta go, Rick," I said. "They're gonna kill her."

Maybe he's forgotten what's at stake for me here. Maybe it slipped his mind.

Rick had a lot on his plate, and a lot had gone down here today. I could forgive him for momentarily forgetting why I was doing this and thinking I was so jumped up from the fight that I was chasing more. But that wasn't what was happening here. And I could tell from his eyes that he knew it. They dragged me away from the gates.

"The hell are you taking me?" I yelled. I struggled against them. Harder now that I knew they weren't messing around. I wasn't, either. It wasn't just them I was fighting. Every second that passed was a second lost. "He's going to kill her."

They didn't respond, not right away. Rick was dragging me too, now, and took all three of them to get me to where they wanted me to go. Took me a second, but I realized too late that we were in the jail Morgan had built. They pushed me in. I spun around and ran back at them, but they slammed the door shut before I could do shit about it.

I wrapped my hands around the bars of the door and shook them. They held fast. "The hell is this?"

"Stay in here," Rick said, locking it quickly. "Just until you've cooled down."

"You fucking serious?"

"I can't have you chasing them down," Rick said. "We dealt them a big blow today. We started something. That's what we wanted."

"It's what you wanted. I wanted my girl back!" I yelled. "And they still got her!"

"We got lucky today," Rick said like I hadn't even spoken. "With the Kingdom and Hilltop arriving when they did. There's more of them at the Sanctuary. More guns and more soldiers. We lost people today, and a lot more got hurt. We gotta regroup, hit them strategically when we're stronger."

Fuck you.

"I ain't asking for an army," I said.

"I know," he said. "But I still can't let you go."

"I ain't asking for your permission, either," I snapped. "Let. Me. Go."

"I can't do that, Daryl," Rick said. His eyes and his voice were heavy with sadness, which just made me madder. Acting like this was all out of his control when he was the one with the goddamn keys. "Getting in there by yourself… it's a suicide mission. I can't let what happened to Sasha happen to anyone else. Especially not you, Daryl. You're my brother."

Don't give me that shit.

I pressed my face against the bars and glared out at him.

"If it was Michonne they had in there," I said. "If it was Carl. Or Judith. You'd be there. You'd have broken down those doors by now. Guess some lives aren't worth as much to you as others. Guess hers ain't worth shit to you, huh?"

Rick backed away. His eyes were bright and red.

"I'm sorry, Daryl."

You will be.

"You're killing her, Rick," I said. "If you don't let me go, you're killing her as much as he is."

Rick didn't say anything else. They locked the door behind them when they went so that if I bust out of this cage, I'd have another lock to get through. I screamed curses at them until my lungs hurt. Even when I knew they were too far away to hear me. I kicked the door until it shook on its hinges, but it would not move. I punched the walls until my knuckles bled, although I knew it would take me a thousand years to wear it down enough to get out. I didn't feel the pain because my anger was so much stronger than any of that. A fire that burned bright, white-hot.

And when there was no rage left in me, something broke. I felt it happen. Like a string snapping after being pulled too tight. I wondered if it was that bond between us. Whatever it was that tied Naomi and me together, that tug I felt deep in my chest when I missed her, that feeling that no matter how far I drifted, I was always tethered to someone. Someone who gave a shit. Was that what had snapped in me? Now limp and lifeless because there was no one on the other end of it. Nothing I was tethered to.

When the rage left, there was nothing but pain underneath, and I felt it all at once. It took over every part of me. Seized up my muscles so I couldn't move from where I was curled up on the floor. Shattered my heart and let the pieces fill up my lungs.

When we were kids, she used to say that she'd haunt me if she died first.

I used to think there was no way in hell I'd let that happen.

Now I wondered, if she'd died tonight, did she die mad that I hadn't come for her? Or was she sitting next to me right now calling me a dumbass?

"I'm sorry," I whispered to the dark. "I'm so, so sorry."

When there were no more tears left in me, I was empty. I watched the sun come up again, and even when the sunlight reached me, I didn't feel warm. Just numb. Like there was barely any of me left to feel it. Which was fine. If my better half was gone, I didn't want the rest of me.

I heard the door unlock, and footsteps come in, but I didn't look up. Didn't see the fucking point.

"You alright?" Rick's voice was tentative, nervous like I was going to start yelling again. I wasn't sure I could take a deep enough breath to shout. I didn't answer him. Didn't look at him.

"This came for you," Rick said, and then something small and wooden rolled onto the floor in front of me. "Think it's from Dwight."

It was. It was one of the figurines that Dwight had in his room. I reached out and picked it up, surprised that any part of me still worked. The words 'She's alive' had been scrawled on one side of it. I stared at them and felt nothing.

"You expect me to believe this?" I finally looked up at Rick. "Dwight's a lying son of a bitch."

"We have no reason to believe he knew the Scavengers had crossed us," Rick said calmly. "Everything else he told us checked out. There's nothing to say he's lying about this."

"No reason to say he's telling the truth, either," I said. How long did people expect me to just go on believing Naomi was okay without any damn proof?

"I know it was hard for you to be in here last night," Rick sighed like I'd had any choice in being here. Like he hadn't caged me like a fucking animal. "But she's alive, and that means we got a shot of getting her back. If I'd have let you go last night, we'd have lost both of you. You gotta see that, man."

I shrugged. Didn't know how to tell Rick that Naomi's death would mean losing so much of myself that it would be like we were both gone anyway.

"With the Hilltop and the Kingdom, we got the numbers now," Rick said. "The Saviors are hurting. When our people have recovered enough, we'll take an army there. We'll demand Negan's surrender, and we'll demand they give her back. You just gotta wait a few days. Can you do that for me, Daryl?"

I stared at him. He'd unlocked the cell door, and he was giving me that look. That pleading look he gives people when he's trying to seem reasonable. Rational. I still hadn't heard an apology come out of his mouth. I still hadn't heard him admit that this would all have been a different story if Michonne or Carl was stuck in Sanctuary. Overnight, I'd imagined all the shit I'd say to him. The punches I might throw if he opened up that door again.

I stood up and walked toward him. He stood his ground, but his eyes were wary. I should've hit him. Should've told him and his plan to go to hell. But I didn't.

Because he'd handed me a tiny piece of hope.

I closed my fist around the figurine.

"Where's Mia?" I asked, pushing past Rick.

"We took her to Aaron's," Rick said. "We thought she might want to sleep in-"

I didn't need to hear the end of that sentence. I walked out of the jail cell, out of the building, and back to Aaron's place. I could hear Rick's footsteps following me at a distance like he was worried I'd bolt again.

I didn't knock. Aaron, Eric, and Bryce were all sitting around the table. No sign of Mia. Aaron stood up when I came in, his face all pale and guilty.

"Daryl, I'm sorry, I-"

"Mia here?" I asked. Couldn't even bring myself to look him in the eye in case I punched him for what he'd done.

"Upstairs," Aaron said. I nodded and headed for the stairs. I knew where she'd be, and she stood up when I came in. Her eyes were all wide and anxious, she teared up when she saw it was me.

We didn't speak, just hugged each other, standing amongst piles of books that would've looked messy to anyone who didn't know how the system worked. There were probably only three people in the world who knew how to read the order into this kind of chaos, and two of them were standing in this room. The other was probably dead. The only reason I had to think otherwise were two words scrawled on something carved by a man I didn't trust.

Hope is a fucking poison. But it's also a hell of a drug.

Chapter 41: Sit Tight

Naomi

"Sasha's dead."

The news came to me in the dark. I'd been in the dark for a long time. First, it had been unconscious nothingness, and then painful awakening into a darkness where everything hurt. I knew by the smell that I was back in the windowless cell deep inside Sanctuary.

There had been nobody at my door for what felt like days. Not to feed me. Not even to beat me. It had given me a small hope that Negan was dead, which had now been swiftly crushed.

Dwight's was the first voice I'd heard in a long while. Until now, there had been a very real chance that I'd died and gone to Hell, which had shaped itself to be specific to me. Sealing me forever in a place where time didn't move, keeping me suspended in the agony of not knowing what had happened to the people I love.

"How'd it happen?" I asked. I'd been desperate to know what had happened to all of them, but now that Dwight was here, I was scared of the answers I might be about to get.

"On the way to Alexandria," Dwight said. "Either she ran out of air or killed herself on the way."

It was worse than a kick in the gut, and I'd taken enough of those lately to know. This was sharper, more acute, like a knife.

Shit.

They've been.

Dwight was here, and he wasn't letting me out, which suggested Negan had lived. Every question I had rose in my throat at once and got stuck there behind a barrage of tears. For however long I'd been in here, grief and rage had hit me, one storm after another. Waves of sorrow a thousand feet high had battered against me and swept me away, turning me inside out before spitting me out again. And then, in the silences between storms, there was nothing. I drifted without direction, trying to catch my breath before the next one.

"Did you warn them?" I asked. It was the easier question to ask, and it meant I'd have someone to be mad at if the worst had happened.

"Yes," he said. "They fought. They had time to get a message to the Kingdom and the Hilltop. They fought with them. Negan had to retreat."

Retreat.

I rested my head on the wall behind me and stared up at the dark. My tears were tinged with relief now. A retreat was a victory of sorts. Not a full one. But it was a start.

"Was anyone hurt?" I asked, wiping my eyes. "Are they okay?"

"Most of them lived. Daryl's okay. And Rick. Carl, too. Michonne's injured, a few others probably, but I don't know their names… I don't… I'm sorry."

"Mia?" I could barely say her name.

He said the Kingdom had fought; did that mean she had fought with them? Or had Daryl kept her with him? I couldn't imagine Daryl putting her in any kind of fight deliberately, but I couldn't imagine him leaving her on her own, either. Whatever decision had been made would've been hard, but I trusted him to make the right one.

"I don't know, I'm sorry," Dwight said. "I couldn't let the Saviors catch me talking to anyone."

"Can you find out?"

"I'll do my best."

"Thanks."

There was a moment of silence. Dwight didn't leave, so I knew there was more.

"I gotta move you now," Dwight said. He sounded apologetic about it and maybe a little scared. "Negan's planning something… I don't know what. I'm not even sure he does."

"Okay," I said, because what else could I say? Whatever was about to happen was going to happen whether we consented to it or not. Until now, I'd only really seen Negan on a winning streak. I didn't know what to expect now he was losing.

Dwight unlocked the door. He flinched when he saw me; I guessed I looked worse than I thought. I'd done my best to dig out all of the tiny pieces of glass that had embedded themselves in my skin, but they'd left behind a myriad of small cuts. I could feel bruising almost everywhere but didn't know the extent of it.

"Looks worse than it feels," I said. Dwight nodded but didn't look like he believed me. I got to my feet. It hurt to stand up, I hadn't done it in a few days, and the scabs on my knees felt like they were cracking. Dwight gave me a moment to stretch my legs, and I was glad that it was him Negan had sent. I couldn't imagine Simon treating me the same way.

When I stepped out into the hallway, Dwight raised a gun and pointed it at me. Nothing about it felt threatening, especially given the faint look of concern still etched on his face, but I went along with it anyway. If anyone turned the corner, we couldn't be caught chit-chatting.

Dwight took me to a room I hadn't been in before a few floors up from where they were keeping me. Negan was sitting at the head of a long table. Simon, Gavin, and Regina sat with him.

"What took you so long?" Negan asked.

"She resisted," Dwight said. I couldn't blame him for it; it was the most believable lie he could've told.

Negan's gaze slid over to me. I expected his usual grin, for him to at least tell me I looked like shit. But he didn't. He looked away from me again, and I wondered if he was trying to hide that little bit of fear I'd seen in his eyes before.

Negan was quiet, sullen. A big kid in a big sulk. It was rare to see him like this. I'd had a glimpse of it when Daryl and Mia had got out, but this was different. His bravado had been peeled away, and without it, he was all edges. Which was fine, because at this point, so was I.

Dwight sat down. I hesitated, hovering behind an empty seat near him.

"You stay standing," Negan said to me. "There could have been a seat at this table for you. Hell, I wanted there to be, but not now."

"If you thought I would ever-" I started, but he didn't let me finish.

"Uh-uh," Negan raised a hand. "Not a fucking word from you unless you're spoken to. I'm serious, one more word outta your mouth, and I'm gonna let Lucille do what she's been itching to do since you got here."

I closed my mouth, held my lips tightly shut, and kept my eyes on him. If he'd let me talk, I'd have told him that killing me was his best chance of survival. The longer he kept me alive, the more I healed and the stronger I got. He could beat me and starve me all he liked, but I would not break. Not when I had so much more to lose outside these walls than I did inside them.

But he didn't. So I stared back at him and didn't flinch.

"All due respect, I don't get why she's still here," Simon said, looking at me like I was some kind of annoying poltergeist that refused to be exorcised. "Alive, I mean."

"Well," Negan said. "That's exactly what we're all here to decide."

"Kill her," Simon said. "With all the shit she's pulled, she deserves it. She's attacked me. She's attacked you. She let her friends escape..."

"Actually," Dwight interrupted. "It was Sherry who-"

"What the hell does that matter who it was that let them out?" Simon asked. Dwight hesitated.

"You on her side or something?" Regina narrowed her eyes across the table at him. "You aren't going soft on her, are you?"

"No," Dwight said, glancing down at the table. "Just setting the record straight. If there's going to be a trial, it should at least be for things she's actually done."

"This isn't no trial," Simon said. "She's gotta die; it's just a question of setting the execution date, right?"

He looked at Negan for confirmation. Everyone did, including me. Negan set Lucille down on the table in front of him. "I'm still thinking about that."

"How can you still be thinking about it?" Simon said. "Kill her, stick her head on the fence for Rick to see if he tries to get near this place. What's the hold-up? I don't get it."

"I wouldn't expect you to get it," Negan said, glancing up at Simon. "But people are a resource."

"The bitch is feral. Put her down," Simon said like that should be the last word on the subject.

"We don't know Rick's going to come here," Dwight said. "They might all hole up in Alexandria and wait for us to come back."

"Why the hell would we go back there?" Gavin said. "So they can set more traps, try and blow us up again? Only this time, we won't have Jadis to warn us before we get there."

"At least if we stay here, we've got the home turf advantage," Regina agreed.

"So it's agreed," Simon said, "we kill her, and then we put her body right out front to greet Rick when he gets here. And then we blow the rest of them to hell."

There was a murmur of general agreement around the table.

"We haven't agreed on shit," Negan snapped. They all looked at him. He leaned back in his seat and propped his feet up on the table next to Lucille. "Alexandria, the Kingdom, and Hilltop all still owe us their regular deliveries. How's it going to look to them if we just sit here waiting for their next move? It's going to make me look weak."

"Okay, so, we kill her, package up her body and send it to Rick as a message," Simon said.

"Nah, that ain't right either," Negan said, shaking his head like he was puzzling over something. It was only then that I realized he genuinely had no idea what to do with me or how to punish me for what I'd done. I'd thought this was part of his usual showmanship, that he'd dragged me in here to taunt me before inflicting something horrible. But he was genuinely at a loss over what to do with me.

"It wouldn't be a message for Rick," Dwight said. He hadn't spoken for a while, and everyone looked at him. It got Negan's attention much more than anything Simon had said.

"What do you mean?" Negan pressed.

"If she dies-"

"She's going to," Simon interrupted.

"Alright, when she dies," Dwight corrected himself. "It's not Rick who's going to be hit by it. It's Daryl."

The truth of that made me feel weaker than anything the Saviors had done to me since I'd tried to kill their leader. Negan nodded as Dwight spoke and looked over at me. He watched the fear set right into my bones. I didn't want to think about what Daryl would do if Negan sent him my head in a box.

"Finally, someone's thinking about this in the right way," Negan said. He took his feet off the table, sat up, and leaned forward on his elbows. "Carry on, Dwight."

Dwight hesitated. Sent one glance in my direction, but it wasn't long enough for me to read anything into it or work out if he was still on my side. I had to remind myself that it really seemed like he had sent a message to Rick and the others, or we probably wouldn't be in this room. The fight would've been over. Negan would either have walked back in and bashed my brains out, or he'd have dumped me back in whatever was left of Alexandria so that grief could eat me alive.

"If we kill her now and send the body to Alexandria, it'll hurt Daryl. It'll either make him angry enough to launch something big against this place or reckless enough to get caught again," he said. "But, for Rick, who's probably trying to rally support for the next part of the fight, it'll fuel the fire he's trying to start. Might even give people in the Kingdom and Hilltop who sat out the last fight a reason to pick up arms and turn against us. She'll be a martyr. A reason for them to fight."

Negan looked at me. "You think Rick cares about you?"

"I'm sure he cares about all of his people."

"But some more than others, right?" he said. I didn't like the way he said it. Not because it wasn't true, but because it seemed to be getting his mind working. Turning different options over and over. "Don't think he'd have let me keep Carl here this long. I mean, Rick's gotta have a tight grip on your boyfriend's leash to stop him from howling outside the door every night, huh?"

Negan straightened up. A little glint was back in his eye. He still didn't have his usual sickening grin plastered all over his face, but it was ever so slightly like talking to his old self.

"Answer honestly," Negan said. "If it came down to it, would Rick risk everyone in Alexandria to save you?"

"No," I said without hesitation. Rick was a good man. A great leader and part of that was knowing that the best outcome was the greatest number of survivors. I knew it. Rick knew it.

"I wonder how Daryl would feel about that…" Negan said. And there it was. His fucking grin. Back in full force.

"Who cares?" Simon said. "You want to end this, let's just go over there and end it. Kill them all."

"I am trying to minimize loss of life here, Simon," Negan snapped. "Not just of our own people, but those people who are fighting against us will make good workers when this is over. Maybe even soldiers. In time. That's what we need. People are what keeps places like this running. How many times do I gotta tell you that?"

"Surely, these people have gotta be an exception," Simon shook his head and then pointed his finger at me. "She sure is. She hasn't been any damn use since she got here."

"I really gotta spell this out for you?" Negan said. "If we take her out at the right moment, we turn Rick's right-hand man against him. No more Daryl to do his dirty work. If we take her out at the wrong moment, we're handing them all another reason to fight. God knows we don't need another one of those."

"Whatever you say, boss," Simon sighed in a way that clearly said if it was up to him, I'd have been dead weeks ago.

"Alright," Negan glanced at Dwight. "Get her outta my sight."

Dwight stood up and grabbed me by the arm, dragging me out of the room and into the corridor, only easing up when we were out of sight and earshot of Negan's meeting room.

"I think we did good in there," Dwight said. I couldn't tell if he was trying to reassure himself or me. "Certainly won Negan round."

"Yeah," I said. "Maybe a little too good."

"Would you rather we did things Simon's way?"

"No," I admitted reluctantly. Nothing Dwight said had technically been wrong. I just didn't like that he'd handed Negan a semi-decent plan.

"This buys Daryl and the others more time," he said. "They're coming soon."

"How do you know?" I asked.

"We're communicating," Dwight said. He cleared his throat and followed up with, "Daryl, uh... told me to tell you not to make another move against Negan, to sit tight and wait for them. They're coming for you."

I didn't see how I could get to Negan again. He'd locked me away in one room and refused to deal with me. But, if the chance came up for me to end this, I couldn't say I wouldn't try it again. "No promises."

"Yeah," Dwight nodded like that was the response he expected. "I'm not telling him you said that."

"That's wise," I said, as he opened the door to my cell, ready to return me to the dark. That apologetic look was back on his face. I walked in of my own accord, so he didn't have to feel bad about forcing me in there. There was a small pile of bloodied glass by the door. I'd tried to stack all of the pieces I'd pulled out of myself in one place so I wouldn't stand on them and hurt myself all over again. I looked at them in the light. None were big enough to use as a knife. Throwing them in Negan's eyes could do some damage if he was ever brave enough to come close again.

"I'll try and sneak you some food," Dwight said quietly.

"Thanks."

He closed the door, and I was back in that dark place where time stood still. What felt like a few hours passed, and Dwight opened the door just wide enough to throw in a chunk of bread. It was stale and possibly moldy, but I wasn't in a position to be fussy. It was the only thing I could remember being given to eat since I'd been locked in here.

From that point on, my days in the dark were punctuated only by brief flashes of light when Dwight opened the door just wide enough to throw in whatever small morsel of food he'd managed to scrounge for me. Things that other people would overlook, scraps they'd already thrown out. It wasn't much, and it wasn't good. But it kept me alive, and it kept me stronger than I would've been without it.

Tell her to sit tight. Tell her we're coming for her. I could almost hear Daryl saying it. I knew the exact way his jaw set when he was fixed on something like this. I knew that look he got in his eye. I thought about it over and over until that voice in my head that sounded so much like him, wound up saying, 'Sit tight. I'm coming for ya'.

I knew it wasn't real, but I clung to it.

Maybe that was Negan's real plan all along; let me drive myself mad in solitary confinement for so long that if anyone did get me out of here, I'd be an unrecognizable shell of who I'd been.

No.

I would not break. I couldn't.

Daryl and Mia were out there. Aaron and Rick and Michonne and Eric and everyone else in Alexandria were out there risking their lives. If the Kingdom had joined the fight, Bryce would be there too. Would Carol? Had she stayed after I'd taken her there? All of that felt like a lifetime ago. I whispered their names to myself over and over. A mantra of sorts. A reminder of what was at stake out there and why all of this suffering was worth it.

"Tomorrow," Dwight's voice came through the dark again. It was such a shock to hear a voice that wasn't my own, and one that spoke above a whisper that I jumped. "They're coming tomorrow."

I had no way of knowing how far away 'tomorrow' was; I hadn't the foggiest idea of what the time was when he said it. His footsteps left again, and I felt the small amount of food in my stomach threaten to rise up. This was what I'd been waiting in the dark for but had secretly hoped would never come. If they were going to take a stand, many of them could die. And there wasn't a thing I could do about it.

I curled up by the door and pressed my ear to it. Nothing changed for a very long time. Footsteps passed by occasionally, doors opened and closed from time to time. But nothing that signaled there was anything to be concerned about.

And then, all at once, a series of loud and echoing bangs. It sounded like it was coming from outside. Co-ordinated. My stomach flipped over, and I got to my feet.

This was it.

They were here.

I pressed my ear to the door but couldn't hear a thing. No more bangs. No gunfire. Just silence. And then, a door slammed. Hurried footsteps down the corridor to my room. Others heading elsewhere.

The door opened, but it wasn't Dwight. It wasn't even Simon. Some Savior I'd never seen before, armed to the teeth, stood over me.

"Looks like it's your time to shine," he said, reaching in to grab me by the scruff of the neck, dragging me down the hallway. "Negan needs you. You ready for this?"

I didn't bother struggling. Partly because I knew it was pointless but partly because I was conserving my energy. I didn't have much, but if my friends were here to fight, chances were I'd need a whole lot of it real soon.

He took me to the Sanctuary doors. They were open. Light was streaming through them, and on the other side, I could hear a voice. I knew at once that it was Rick's. Couldn't make out what he was saying, but I knew it was him.

They're really here.

After so much waiting and so many false starts, I couldn't believe my ears. The Savior who'd taken me from my cell pushed me up against a nearby wall and hissed, "You wait here until Negan needs you, alright?"

I was about to tell him that I didn't give a shit what Negan needed when I noticed a man cowering next to me. He looked at me and then hurriedly away.

"Gregory?" I whispered. "Are you okay? Did they hurt you?"

You'd have thought a friendly face in this place would've been a welcome sight. But Gregory backed away from me like I was poisonous. He didn't look hurt, but how had they got him here?

"You have no idea the shit that's about to go down," Negan was saying. "Let me ask you something, Rick. You think you have the numbers for this fight?"

There was a pause where I felt my heart swell and rise, beating in the back of my throat. How many of them were out there? Had the Saviors taken out the Hilltop? Is that why Gregory was here?

"You don't," Negan warned him. "Simon."

Simon walked into the hallway. He shot me a horrible grin before he grabbed Gregory and hauled him outside.

"What do you have to say to Rick and the piss patrol, Gregory?" Negan's gleeful voice boomed out.

"The Hilltop stands with Negan and the Saviors," Gregory said.

Son of a bitch.

No wonder he couldn't look me in the eye.

"Any resident of the Hilltop who takes up arms, or who supports this ultimatum against the Sanctuary or any of the Saviors, will no longer be welcome at the colony," Gregory finished.

"And?" Negan prompted.

"Their families will be thrown out and left to fend for themselves," he added.

"And?" Negan prompted again. There was a slight pause.

"Go home now," Gregory said firmly. "Or you won't have a home to go back to."

I waited. I listened. Were people leaving? I couldn't hear any weapons being laid down.

"You heard the man," Negan said. "Get back to separating wheat and shit or whatever the hell it is you people do."

"Doesn't look like anyone's going, does it?" I heard Maggie's voice yell back, and my heart soared. They were really doing this.

"The Hilltop stands with-" Gregory started to say.

"The Hilltop stands with Maggie!" someone yelled back. His voice was recognizable, but I was too busy celebrating to figure it out.

"I feel like I invested a lot in you," Simon yelled. "And I am very, very disappointed."

I heard Gregory stammer something. And then a series of loud crashes, screams, and then the screaming stopped.

Is he dead?

Do I care?

Before the silence could settle too long, something exploded in the distance.

"Sounds like shit is going down, Rick," Negan said. He snapped his fingers. Simon was back in the doorway, and this time his eyes were fixed on me with more than just a passing glance.

"You lieutenants, you're gonna have to make up your minds," Rick said. There was a note of urgency in his voice. Like that explosion meant something to him. Simon grabbed my arm and started pulling me toward the door.

"Maybe we could take a time out here?" someone close to the door said.

"No," Rick said. "This has to happen now. This is the only way."

Simon shoved me out of the door ahead of him. I stumbled forward into the kind of daylight I hadn't seen for days. It was blinding for a moment. Searing pain in my eyes and I turned away from it.

"And here she is," Negan bellowed, throwing his arm out toward me like he was a ringleader introducing some kind of circus act. "Surely, you guys haven't forgotten about the lovely Naomi?"

I couldn't look at any of them. I focussed on the ground, trying to get used to being in the light again. My head hurt. There was a breeze on my skin for the first time in more than a week, and I shivered even though it wasn't a cold day. After the silence of my cell, everything seemed so loud. It wasn't just Negan and Rick yelling at each other; something metal rattled slightly in the wind. Walkers that I'd once spent time fixing around the parameters snarled. Birds circled up above us. The sky was vast, expansive. Big enough to swallow me.

"Shit, you don't look so good. What's the matter, darlin'?" Negan asked. He came real close, put a hand under my chin, and forced my eyes up. "Not enjoying this little reunion?"

Beyond the Sanctuary fence was a fleet of makeshift armored vehicles. I squinted at them, searching for the faces I could see in the gaps. I found Rick.

"I'm curious, Rick," Negan said. "Do your little plans take her into account?"

"I already told you," Rick said. "Everyone in there can survive this. Except you. All they gotta do is surrender, and hand her over."

"Well, now," Negan said, with a little glance at his men. "Doesn't look like anyone's going, does it?"

"I'm serious…" Rick said.

"No, I'm serious," Negan said. "' Cause I've got an offer for you, Rick. You can take Naomi back, all in one piece, right now. And all you have to do is march your little piss patrol back to Alexandria, and we'll pretend none of this shit ever happened."

I fixed my eyes on Rick and shook my head so he'd know that this wasn't what I wanted, that I understood a bigger victory would require small sacrifices.

"That's not gonna happen," Rick said.

"Oh, that's it, huh?" Negan said. "You just decided that for everyone? Doesn't our boy Daryl have something to say about it?"

In the silence that followed, I could feel my heart beating hard in my chest. Waiting for an answer I already knew was coming. The fact that there was a silence, or that the conversation reached this point at all, meant that Daryl wasn't here. But where was he?

"Looks like he doesn't give a shit about you, darlin'," Negan said to me and then turned back to Rick. "What's his problem? He too busy to be here today? Was that him?"

Negan used Lucille to point at the pillar of smoke rising in the distance. I focussed on it for a moment. Rick neither confirmed or denied it, but some small part of me latched on to the idea that he was here. Close. But not close enough to be hurt by whatever was about to go down. Negan's plan to use me to drive a wedge between Daryl and Rick wouldn't work, and that was what mattered.

"Hand her over," Rick said. "Nobody has to get hurt."

"Finally, we agree on something," Negan said. "See, you come here threatening my people, and I am gracious enough to offer you the opportunity to take back one of yours, only for you to pass it up? Is that how little your people mean to you? Is our little pissing match worth her life?"

He pointed at me again, this time with Lucille.

"Don't listen to him!" I yelled. I knew Rick would get it. I knew Rick would see the bigger picture in all of this. "This ain't about me. This is about all of us. Don't-"

A swift kick to the back of my legs from Simon brought me to my knees. I threw my hands out in front of me to stop myself from toppling over. I looked up at Negan. He strode over to me, Lucille raised.

"You don't want to do this," Rick warned him.

"I know," Negan said. "I don't want to do this. Shit. I really liked this girl, she's scrappy as shit, but you're leaving me no choice, Rick. Either you pack up your shit and toddle on home with Naomi, never to darken my door again. Or I kill her right now. It's up to you."

He let the silence sit with all of them. With me. I looked up and found Rick's face again.

"Don't listen to him," I called out. Simon's fist slammed into the side of my face. I wobbled on my knees but pushed through the pain. "This is what he wants! He's the one choosing this. He wants you-"

Negan grabbed me by the hair and pulled, hard enough to force my head up and around to look at him.

"Look at you," he said. His eyes were sad in a way I didn't expect. "Loyal to the end."

"It ain't gonna work," I said to him. "Daryl ain't here. It won't work."

"Oh, darlin'," Negan said, his voice heavy with pity. "You really think he won't hear about this?"

Before I could say anything else, Simon kicked me in the stomach. Negan let go of my hair as I doubled over. If my stomach hadn't been so empty, I would've thrown up. I knew what Negan was doing. I knew the more of a spectacle he made out of this, the more it looked like Rick was doing nothing to stop it, the more chance Negan had of turning his allies against him. Turning Daryl against him.

"You make me sick, Rick, y' know that?" Negan said. He sounded genuinely angry on my behalf, like he really thought Rick was the cause of all this. As if he couldn't just let me go now. Or stop Simon from hitting me if he wanted to. "She has been nothing but loyal while she's been in here. She could've made something of herself in this place, she could've been Royalty around here, but she passed it all up for you people. This is how you repay her? Standing by while she dies up here like a damn dog? This is the leader you all choose to follow?"

I spat blood out onto the walkway and looked up at the few faces I could see looking back at me. I found Aaron. His distress was enough to make me twice as glad that Daryl wasn't here to witness this. I looked back at Rick. "Don't t-"

Negan's foot hit my jaw and knocked me backward.

"NOW!" Rick yelled, and a barrage of gunfire came over the tops of their vehicles. I could hear glass smashing all around me. Negan and his men took cover and started firing back. From where I was lying, I was more or less safe from the bullets. I crawled a little distance away to take shelter by the steps and calculate my next move.

I didn't have a weapon.

But I was free.

For the first time since I'd been shoved in the back of that damn van, I had choices. Real, legitimate choices. As far as I could see, I had two options. Run into the onslaught of bullets and pray that one of my friends didn't accidentally hit me. Or shelter deeper, and help them from within.

I saw my chance, and I took it.

 

Daryl

I was flying.

The whole time I'd been leading a herd of Walkers to Sanctuary, my bike had felt like it was made of air. All of the planning, all of the sitting around and talking, it was over. This was it. Today, we'd end this. We'd kill Negan. I'd get Naomi back. Every bullet that I fired into the oil barrels we'd lined up was a weight off me. Every tower of smoke that rose from them felt like I was sending up a message from me to her.

I'm coming for you.

I'll see you soon.

Of course, I couldn't know if she'd be able to see them from wherever she was, and I knew that even if she did, there was no way to know I was the one making them. But it sure felt like they were bringing us closer. I heard the distant gunfire of the others shooting up the front of Sanctuary, and to me, it sounded like a damn parade.

They've got her.

Rick wouldn't fire if they didn't. He'd have radioed to tell me to stop if she wasn't safe yet, and if he wasn't ready for this herd to get there. I wanted to whoop and holler, but I held back. The Walkers were going where I wanted them to, and I couldn't risk pulling them off track to celebrate.

When I got to our agreed-upon meeting place, I threw my bike down. My whole body felt electric. Anticipation coursing through me with every heartbeat. We were winning this thing. I'd have Naomi home real soon. Me, her, and Mia. The Saviors would be gone, Negan would be dead, and we'd finally have the chance to be a real family.

I was used to fighting; I was good at it. I felt good doing it because I had something to fight for. There was a time when I'd have given anything to get out of sleepy Alexandria, where people looked at me like I was a stray dog and blow some shit up. But all I wanted right then was a moment of peace, a sleepy morning with Naomi, and a quiet afternoon hunting in the woods.

The armored cars were already parked up and waiting. People around them were checking in with one another, reloading weapons, and waiting for any stragglers. I searched all of them, looking for her in the crowd. I wondered if she'd be looking for me too, or if she even knew that part of the plan was for me to meet them here. I thought about sneaking and surprising her, but I didn't have the patience for any of that. I had to see her now.

"Naomi!" I yelled, and I looked for her head, turning to look at me. That big smile of hers. I looked for her running toward me. A few people did turn and look, but I didn't pay attention to them. Maybe if I had, I'd have noticed the looks on their faces. The pity in their eyes.

"Daryl," Rick approached me like I was a bomb about to go off. I didn't think much of it, maybe just that he could see the excitement coming off me. I hugged him, but I barely looked at him. I was too busy looking over his shoulder, scanning the faces around us. Maybe she just hadn't heard me. Maybe I should yell for her again.

"Hey, you good?" I asked. He nodded and took a breath to say something else, but I was too excited to let him finish. "Where is she?"

Rick looked at me for a moment with an expression I was too stubborn and stupid to read. A heavy sigh, something heavier hidden in his eyes. "We didn't see her, Daryl. I'm sorry."

"What do you mean you didn't see her?" I asked. "Negan was supposed to hand her over. That was the deal."

Had they made a new deal? Was Dwight bringing her to some other location? Had they already moved her out of Sanctuary, and that was why Rick couldn't get her?

"Negan isn't giving up yet," Rick said. I'd already known that. It was why those Walkers were all around Sanctuary, but I hadn't thought that meant Negan hadn't given her up. Rick put a hand on my arm. "I'm sorry."

"Why do you keep saying that? You're sorry?" I asked. The high I'd been riding all the way here was sharply wearing off. "You let me lead all them Walkers to Sanctuary, knowing she's still in there, that what you're sorry for?"

"This is all part of it," Rick said with the same calming voice he'd been using on me a lot these days and had never once worked. "We surround them, we force them to surrender. They were never gonna give up right away."

I was falling now, down off that high I'd been on. Down into something dark and filled with hellfire. "She weren't supposed to be in there when this went down."

"You didn't believe they were just going to surrender like that, did you?" Rick said. "Or that Negan would just hand her over because we came knocking?

"Damn right, that's what I believed because that's how you made it sound."

"I'm sorry if I mislead you," Rick said, sounding more and more like a damn politician the longer he was running his mouth. "But this is about more than just about getting Naomi back."

"What's it about then, huh?" I yelled. Rick flinched. He'd known it was the wrong thing to say the second it came out of his mouth, but he couldn't un-say it now. I couldn't un-hear it either. "Your pissing match with Negan?"

"It's not like that, you know it's not. This is for all of us. For Sasha and Abraham. For everyone who's been living under the Savior's rule. For the future of Alexandria. Our future. So that kids like Carl and Mia don't grow up living under Negan's rule," Rick said. It was a dirty trick, bringing Mia into it like that. How could I say no now? Rick continued, "This is for all of us. And that was just the beginning. Once we've taken out their outposts, given them nowhere else to turn, they'll surrender. They'll hand her over. You know they will."

Do I?

He was giving me that look he gives people when he's trying to persuade them into seeing things his way. I'd seen him do it to so many people; Deanna, the Governor, my own damn brother. Never thought I'd see him giving me that look.

"We gotta move out," Rick said. "C'mon."

He didn't move until I did, watching me like I was a pot about to boil over. That was how I felt, too. Like there was so much pressure building in my head that my skull might blow off. But, eventually, I nodded, and we started to move out. It felt wrong to be walking away from the place I was supposed to be reuniting with her. But what else could we do now except push forward? There was no getting into Sanctuary while it was surrounded. All I could do was stick to the plan and make sure the rest of it went as smoothly as possible so that the Saviors surrendered quickly.

I silently vowed to be there the next time Rick went to negotiate. And I wouldn't leave until they'd surrendered or at least let me see her, even if it was just through a window. All I had to go on was Dwight's word that she was still alive, and the longer this went on, the harder it was to believe it.

But heading back to Sanctuary wasn't in the next steps of the plan. Dwight had told us where all Negan's major Outposts were and where the armories were in each one. If even one Outpost managed to get back to Sanctuary with their guns, they'd be able to shoot through the Walkers surrounding it and undo everything we'd just done. Meaning there wouldn't be a reason for Negan to surrender anymore.

Rick and I took a team of Alexandrians to Outpost the Saviors had set up in some old business park. While most of our team worked on taking out Saviors who were working in the courtyard outside, Rick and I moved to search the building Dwight said the weapons would be in. I wished he'd been more specific. A sweep of the first floor turned up nothing.

The door to the stairwell was locked. I tried kicking it down, but it wouldn't budge, so in the end, we wound up climbing the old elevator shaft to the next floor, sweeping that and climbing again. With each floor that didn't turn up any weapons, I felt myself deflating a little more. A lot was riding on this.

"Last floor," Rick said, as I helped him up out the elevator shaft. "Guns gotta be up here."

"He said they'd be here," I said, but I had more than a flicker of doubt about it now. Floors of fuck all had made me start to think that Dwight had lied. And if he'd lied about this, what else had he lied about?

"Everything else he passed to you is checking out," Rick tried to remind me.

"That guy's a piece of shit," I said. If he'd really wanted to prove anything to me, he could've let me see Naomi. Just brought her to the fence when I took a message to him. Even a window. Something that showed me she was still alive in there. Had I been a dumbass to just take him at his word?

"Those guns get to the Sanctuary; they could cut through those Walkers and free up an exit," Rick said, reminding me why we had to keep pushing forward with this. Every time my mind wandered to thoughts of going back to Sanctuary, Rick had something to say to pull me back. To remind me about the bigger picture of all this. "We'll go faster if we split up. I find the M2s, you find 'em, we use them, hit the courtyard right then and there. End this quick."

I nodded and turned to move down in the opposite direction from him. I could still hear faint gunfire from the courtyard. The Saviors must be putting up a pretty good fight.

Every room I checked was clear of people, but it was clear of weapons too. I checked every cupboard and around every corner. This whole thing was starting to feel like a set-up. If the guns were here, why was there nobody here guarding them? There had been two guards standing outside, but that was it. Hadn't seen anyone since. Were the Saviors really dumb enough to leave all of their weapons protected by only two guys while the rest of them dicked around outside?

I opened a cupboard. Stopped in my tracks.

Empty handcuffs hung down from a rusty pipe: a half-eaten shit sandwich and stain on the floor that was probably blood. No windows.

They'd kept someone chained up here. Pretty recently, too. It was almost exactly like where they'd held me in Sanctuary. Where they might be keeping Naomi. Did they torture anyone they came across, try and break them so they became as brainwashed as everyone else? Where was that prisoner now? Had they killed them, or had they only been keeping them here until they could be moved to Sanctuary?

Or, had they been moving a prisoner out of Sanctuary.

What if it was her?

Once the thought took hold of me, I couldn't shake it. It made sense. That was why Rick hadn't seen her there, why Negan hadn't brought her out or handed her over. Maybe he'd got wind of what was coming and moved her someplace else. Somewhere he could use her against us.

I gotta go.

I could feel that pull again. That one that wanted me to turn back to Sanctuary and find a way in there no matter what. But, now, I wasn't sure that Sanctuary was even where I should be heading. What if she'd been moved someplace else? What if she was at one of them other Outposts? What if she'd been here and I'd come too late?

I pushed on much faster than before. I tried to turn that deep urge to run into a drive to keep going. The faster we went, the sooner this would be over.

Once I knew for sure that my half of the top floor was clear, I headed back to find Rick. I thought he might be done after I'd gotten held up looking at that damn cell, but he wasn't waiting at the half-way point for me. I kept moving down the hall. I didn't call out for him.

About a third of the way down, I heard voices, and I moved in closer to the wall. I wasn't close enough to hear who was talking or what they were saying, but unless Rick had started talking to himself, at least one of them had to be a Savior. I listened hard and moved forward slowly. I didn't want anyone to hear me coming. I followed the voices. The rooms I passed through were different from the ones I'd searched, set up more like living quarters.

I was getting close. One of the people talking was definitely Rick. I still couldn't make out what they were saying. I got closer, took a quick look around the door to assess the situation before ducking out of sight again. It was just one guy. He was holding a gun up to Rick's head. Looked like Rick had been in a fight, but his hands were raised now in a gesture of peace. He was trying to talk the other guy down.

"You can say all the words you want. Lori. Shane. Andrea…" It took me a second, but I recognized the second voice. It was Morales, from back at our first camp outside Atlanta. "They're all dead, and somewhere along the way, Officer Friendly died right along with them. That's what I know, Rick."

Well, I know it's time for you to die too, asshole.

I stepped out. Rick saw me, and his eyes widened. "Wait, no!"

He was too late. I'd already shot him dead. I wouldn't have listened to him even if I'd had the time. I looked at Rick and asked, "You good?"

"That…" Rick stared at the still-warm body. "T-that was…"

"I know who it was. It don't matter. Not one little bit," I said, pulling the bolt out of Morales. This was war. Some guy I'd barely known didn't matter much, not when my family and my home were at stake. "You find them guns?"

Rick hesitated. He still looked shocked by what I'd done, but I couldn't see why. I'd chosen my family; Morales had chosen to leave it. And after that, he'd chosen to join the Saviors. Anyone who made that kind of choice had what was coming to them.

"They aren't here," Rick said.

"What?" I felt my heart start racing. Fear in my veins.

If Dwight lied about this, what else did he lie about?

I kept thinking about that other cell. Those handcuffs hanging from a pipe. I tried not to imagine Naomi chained up, shackled like a damn criminal, but the thought wouldn't leave me alone. Rosita said she'd seen her working the fence like I'd done. Did that mean they were keeping her locked up in the same way they'd done to me? What about after she'd tried to kill Negan? I couldn't imagine her being treated well after that.

"He called the Saviors back from the courtyard," Rick said just as I was starting to feel sick with worry. "We gotta get out before-"

He didn't even get the chance to finish his sentence before a door not too far from us was thrown open. We could hear yelling. They were here already. Morales hadn't hesitated to call his Savior buddies, old friends or not, why couldn't Rick see that he'd chosen his side?

Fuck you, Morales.

Rick and I took off as fast as possible, trying to get out before we got ambushed. It was hard to know how many Saviors were here, but at least they seemed too dumb to keep quiet. We caught where they were just in time. We took cover in doorways opposite each other and shot down the hall. It looked like there were about six of them. I think we took out two before they started shooting back. There was a rapid exchange of fire after that, and it became hard to tell how many were left. All of us ducking in and out of the places we'd sheltered, trying to hit them before they hit us. A demented game of Whack-A-Mole.

I squeezed the trigger, and nothing happened.

"Hey! Hey!" I yelled over the gunfire. It took two attempts for Rick to hear me. He looked over. "I'm out!"

Rick nodded to show that he'd heard me. I could see him thinking. We'd been firing for so long that he had to be close to running out too. Without me to cover him with crossfire, it would be harder for him to take out those Saviors, especially if they realized I was out. Rick signaled that two of them were left and gestured to a fire extinguisher on the wall opposite him. I nodded.

He shot one more bullet right into the fire extinguisher. White gas poured out of it, filling the hallway and hiding us from view as we ran at the remaining Saviors. I struggled with one while Rick fought the other, and we pushed them both down the empty elevator shaft we'd climbed up. When the last one stopped screaming, we sank down by the door and tried to catch our breath. Everything from the climb up the elevator shaft to fighting the Saviors that had made it up here had been fucking exhausting.

"Teams of four, sweep the offices," Aaron's voice came to us from somewhere lower in the building.

"Aaron!" Rick called to him.

"Rick!" Aaron yelled back.

"We're by the elevator."

It was a relief to hear their voices. When some of the Saviors had answered Morales's call, part of me had been worried that things had gone wrong in the courtyard, and our people might not have made it. If they'd moved on to sweeping this place, the yard must be clear.

Once I'd caught my breath, I stood up and helped Rick to his feet. We started moving down the building toward the sound of Aaron and the others. I turned a corner and spotted them down the other end of the corridor.

"Aaron!" I yelled to get his attention. He rushed toward us but he wasn't smiling. I pulled him in for a hug, slapped him on the back. "You two alright?"

"Yeah," Rick said as Aaron moved to hug him too.

"No guns, though," I said.

"You think Dwight was lying?" Aaron asked.

Yes.

"Can't know that for sure yet," Rick said. Felt deluded to me because what was the alternative? That the weapons he'd promised would be here had got up and walked out just before we arrived? Before I could say anything else, Rick said, "What about you? Things okay out there?"

"They..." Aaron stopped. He didn't really have the words. "...they put up a hell of a fight. We won, but... we lost a lot... Eric, he-"

Aaron stopped and looked down at the floor. He cleared his throat. I could see he was choking back tears. I got this horrible sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach. I put a hand on Aaron's shoulder, trying to pull him back from whatever he was on the brink of.

"He's hurt," Aaron managed to finish his sentence. I breathed in a tiny amount of relief. Hurt wasn't dead. Injury, we could work with. Aaron's hands shook a little when he raised them to wipe his eyes. "I couldn't do anything. I had to... I had to just get him somewhere safe and leave him. I couldn't-"

"Hey, that's okay, man," I said. "We'll find him. We'll get him help."

Aaron nodded, doing his best to hold himself together.

"I'll help you find him," Rick said. He glanced up at me. "Daryl, help with clean-up?"

"Sure thing," I said, and then I looked back at Aaron. "You just holler if you need anything, you hear me?"

"Yeah," Aaron nodded again. "Thanks, Daryl."

Outside of the office building, the place was a mess. It was a pile of bodies. Most were Saviors, but more than I'd have liked were ours. I walked around, checking them all for survivors. Didn't find a single one. I put a knife through the skull of anyone who hadn't been taken out by a headshot. We had another herd coming here soon, but we couldn't deal with any of these people turning early and attacking our survivors.

We covered the bodies of those we cared about. We dragged the Saviors off to rot somewhere else.

"Hey," I looked up to see Rick standing over me. I pulled my knife out of the skull of some Savior asshole. It was easier to stab those corpses -even a little therapeutic. I could pretend each one was Negan since that was what they all called themselves anyway.

"Hey," I said. I could tell he had bad news. It was written all over his face.

"Eric didn't make it."

Fuck.

I felt the sting of it. Eric was one of the first people in Alexandria to be any kind of decent to me. He'd taken in Mia and Naomi no problem, too. I wasn't as close to him as Aaron, but Eric was one of the good ones. Funny. Warm. He had this easy kind of charm with everyone that made him almost impossible not to like.

"Where's Aaron?" I asked. They'd been in this from the start, together for even longer. I couldn't imagine the kind of pain he was in. I looked for him behind Rick but couldn't see him.

"He's taking a minute," Rick said. "He'll join us again soon."

I nodded. Aaron could take more than a minute if he needed it. Hell, he could take the whole day after that kind of loss. I couldn't imagine how he was still standing.

"We need to move out," Rick said. "Herd'll be here soon. I'm gonna sweep the rest of these buildings, check there aren't any Saviors hiding out somewhere, see if I can find those guns."

I nodded again, but I was starting to think that Dwight was a lying son of a bitch. I'd never really thought otherwise, but now I was pretty damn sure.

I finished clearing up the dead. People were standing to head home -clustering in groups ready to depart. Rick came out of one of the buildings with a tiny bundle in his arms. A baby girl.

"She was inside?" Tobin asked.

"She was," Rick said. "I have a stop to make, and Daryl's got his bike… Maybe she can go back with you or Scott…"

"She can go with me," a voice from behind us said. It was Aaron. His voice was shaky but determined. "I can, uh, take her to the Hilltop. She'll be safe there."

"Aaron," Rick's voice was brimming with concern. "You sure?"

"Eric and I were gonna go up," Aaron said. What he didn't say was that he and Eric had been talking about raising kids together. About taking one in if they found them. I felt a pang of something deep inside me. It was so unfair that a kid would come along like this on the day Eric died. Aaron reached out to take the bundle from Rick's arms. "We were gonna go there after and update Maggie. So… That's what I'm gonna do. Please. I have to."

His eyes were desperately sad, but he still reached out for this tiny kid like she was the only thing in the world that could make any of this okay.

"Yeah," Rick said, passing her over. "Her name's Gracie."

Aaron looked down at her. I put an arm around his shoulder.

"I'm sorry, man," I said quietly. "You know I'm here, right?"

Aaron couldn't speak, but that was okay. He'd talk when he was ready to. Ain't no sense in pushing someone before that.

Rick signaled that it was time for us all to move on to the next part of the plan. I gave Aaron one last hug before he got in the car with little Gracie. Tobin and the others headed back to Alexandria. The last two to leave, I went to get my bike, and Rick headed for the car.

"See you back home. Sure you wanna talk to them assholes alone?" I asked. I didn't see much point in trying to appeal to the Scavengers, not after they'd betrayed us. But Rick was adamant about it.

"Yeah," he said. "That's how it gets done."

"Alright. If you're gone too long, I'm gonna come lookin' for you," I said. I didn't trust Jadis not to shoot him and dump his body in with all of her beloved garbage.

Before Rick could say anything else, two shots came cracking out of a small cluster of trees. We ducked out of the way on instinct and took cover where we could. I trained my gun on where I thought the bullets had come from, but there were no more shots.

"Hey! You're alone. You got to be. There's not enough room for two of you behind that tree, "Rick yelled to them. "And there's a herd coming. I'm just sayin'."

More silence. Like we'd imagined the gunshots.

"Hey, I tell you what…" Rick tried again. "We'll make you a deal. You drop your gun and come on out - you tell us what we need to know. You do that, you can take the car. You go. You live. How about it?"

I looked back at where he was sheltering behind a car. Was he serious? This guy had just shot at us! Or was he just trying to get him to come out?

"Why should I trust you?" the Savior called back.

"Because I'm giving you my word," Rick said. "There's not a lot that's worth much these days… but a man's word. That's got to mean something, right?"

"Okay," the Savior replied after a slight hesitation. He came out from behind the tree with his arms raised in surrender. He looked at the two of us, his hands shaking a little. "What do you want to know?"

"You ever have any M2 Browning .50-caliber guns here?" Rick asked.

"We did. For a while."

"What happened to 'em?" I asked.

"They got sent to another outpost yesterday," he replied.

"Which one?" Rick asked.

"It was Gavin's - it's west of here," he said, nodding his head in the general direction. "Can I, uh… Can I go?"

No.

I shot him in the head. Doubt he even knew it was coming. I looked back at Rick, "Which team's a Gavin's?"

He didn't answer right away. Just looked at me like I'd done something wrong. It was the same look he'd given me after I'd shot Morales.

"What?" I said. "I didn't give him my word."

Rick shook his head. I could tell he was battling with himself about whether or not to tell me off. But eventually, he said. "The King's at Gavin's."

Shit.

That meant Carol was there too.

Rick turned away from me and got in the car without saying another word. I got on my bike and followed him West.

I knew he was mad, but I was starting to get a little annoyed myself. Rick didn't get it. He hadn't been there. All of these brainless twerps called themselves Negan and did everything that he told them to. They were as guilty in all of this as he was. They knew what they signed on for. They'd known it during this fight. They'd known it when they locked me up and when they beat Naomi unconscious. They'd known it out in that clearing where Abraham died. Might not have been these exact people, but they'd have all done the same.

Just before we got to Gavin's Outpost, a car pulled out onto the road in front of us. That ain't a usual sight these days, so we took off after it. They were Saviors for sure; they had to be.

Without saying a word to each other, we gave chase. I overtook Rick and started shooting one of them who was sitting in the back of the truck. He opened it up. They'd mounted a machine gun onto some kind of tripod. I swerved to dodge a round of rapid-fire. My bike skidded on the ground, and I lost control. I felt the whole thing shift beneath me and braced myself for a fall. I aimed for the grass, skidding across it with my arms up to protect my head.

The sound of engines faded as the Saviors kept going, with Rick in pursuit. I lifted my head from the ground, stretched out each of my arms and legs to check that everything was where it was supposed to be before I got up and got back on my bike.

I could go faster than they could; it didn't take me long to catch up. I kept close behind Rick, so they wouldn't see me coming. He swerved out of the way so that I could take a good shot at the asshole with his mounted machine gun. Took a few tries, but I got him.

Rick had pulled his car up alongside the truck. Real close to it. Before I realized what he was doing, he was hanging out of the side of his vehicle and reaching into the Savior's truck. I saw him jump in, and then I had to slow down to dodge out of the way of the car Rick had abandoned, which was veering out of the way and coming to a stop. The Savior's car disappeared around a bend in the road.

When I turned the same bend, the road ahead was empty. They'd been going fast, but not fast enough to be out of my sight yet. I slowed down a little, scanned the roads and grassy verges around me. I came up on a body, couldn't tell if it was alive or not, but it wasn't Rick. A little farther along, there was a big dent in the undergrowth. Fresh tire tracks too. I stopped, peering into the ditch, where the car we'd been chasing lay upturned.

"Hey," Rick called up to me. I looked down. He was climbing back up the verge. Sweaty and out of breath. Some blood drying on his clothes that probably wasn't his. I held out a hand to help him up. He took it, and I pulled him back onto the road. "We got the guns."

"You look like shit," I told him. But I guess this whole thing had been worth it now that we had what we came for.

"Let's go see if this asshole's alive," Rick nodded at the body I'd passed before. We walked back up the road to where he was lying. Heard him groan as we got close, and I think he was trying to move somewhere, but there was no getting up. Not for him. He had a big wound right in his stomach. Rick pointed his pistol at him.

"Your people back in the chemical plant… did you win?" Rick asked. We hadn't been able to check on Carol and Kingdom fighters before chasing these assholes.

"No one did," the Savior replied.

"The hell's that supposed to mean?" I asked. The Savior coughed a lot; there was probably blood in his lungs. I took my gun and pointed it right in his face. I asked again, "The hell's that supposed to mean?"

"Everyone's dead," he said.

"Bullshit." I refused to believe it. Not Carol. She couldn't be.

"There's no one else," Rick said. "You're the only one?"

"Me. The King. The Axe Man. And that short-haired psycho lady," he responded.

Thank fuck.

I walked away. This guy was close to dying, and I had no interest in what else he had to say. Carol was safe, which was the most important part, but it sounded like we'd lost a lot of people. We'd already lost so many. We needed those weapons down there; we needed to end this.

I left Rick to deal with the Savior and headed back to the car, scrambling down the steep hill. The truck was on its side, which was better than it being all the way flipped over, but the boxes had been thrown around the back, and they were hard to get out. I grabbed one at random and pulled. It was heavy. Stuck.

Rick came up behind me. I heard his footsteps in the grass and glanced over at him. He was still looking pissed off, but maybe it was the news about the hit our Kingdom fighters had taken. "Hey. Give me a hand with this."

He reached in and grabbed the other end of the box I was trying to get. Together, we managed to get it out of the top of the car and lay it down on the grass. I opened it up to see what kind of shit they'd been carrying. Rows of explosives looked back at me.

Jackpot.

"We can use these now," I said, grabbing as many as I could and filling my backpack with them.

"What?"

"Well, think about it," I said. I knew Rick would take a little convincing, but we couldn't keep losing people like this. We couldn't risk the Saviors finding a way out of Sanctuary before they surrendered. "There ain't no Kingdom no more."

"Yeah…?" Rick said, clearly not following. Maybe he hadn't done the math yet. Maybe he didn't realize that if it came to a fight, we'd lost our numbers.

"We know what we got to do," I said. "We blow open the Sanctuary, let the Walkers flood in. They'll surrender. It'll be done. Hell, we could end this by sundown."

The thought of all of this being over by sundown made me feel lighter again. Since finding out Naomi wasn't back with us, I'd been carrying this huge weight around. It had only been getting heavier the more people we'd lost.

"They have workers in there, right? Families, too," Rick said. I didn't answer right away. So he prompted me, "Are there?"

"We'll hit the south side of the main building," I said. An easy fix to a problem I didn't much care about. "The workers live on the north side. They'll be up the stairs before the Walkers even get in."

"What if they don't? There are people in there who aren't fighters. Doing this could change that," Rick said. "Make them pick up guns and stand by the Saviors. And if the Saviors don't surrender, maybe everyone fights us. And we don't have the Kingdom anymore. We're not doing this."

Anyone who picked up guns to stand by the Saviors deserved what was coming to them. He looked at me like he was warning me off going against him. But I was done with all this shit. I was done with these tiny victories while the Saviors just kept taking from us. From me.

I was getting in there. And I was taking back what was mine.

"Nah," I said. "You ain't doing this."

I turned to walk away, but Rick grabbed my shoulder.

"There's a plan, and everyone's sticking to it," he said.

"Not everyone," I said. "There's a lot of our people that are dead, Rick. Things change, man. Negan and that other group, this is on them. If people die, it's their fault, not ours."

"Daryl, we can't do this."

"Man, we got our own people to look after," I said. It seemed like he'd lost sight of that lately. Trying to get Saviors on our side while those that had been loyal to us died. That Savior he'd tried to talk to back at the Office Outpost could've been the one who'd killed Eric for all we knew.

"We're not doing this," Rick said. I turned away. I was done listening to his shit. "Hey. I'm not letting you do this."

He grabbed my shoulder again. I rounded on him. I swear I was only going to yell at him. But then he said, "Naomi wouldn't want you to do this," and my fist hit his face before I knew what was happening.

He hit the ground. I was immediately sorry but too angry to say so.

"This ain't your choice," I told him. "You don't speak for her. You don't speak about her, you hear me?"

I turned away again. Rick got to his feet and tackled me to the ground.

"Daryl, listen to me," he said, trying to pin me down and get my backpack off me. "I saw her."

"Whaddya mean you saw her?" I pushed him off him. He wasn't fighting as hard anymore, so I managed to pin him down.

"I lied to you. She was at the Sanctuary. Negan brought her out when we-"

I couldn't hear it. I threw another punch. Rick was ready for it this time and moved his head swiftly out of the way. I punched the earth next to it. Hurt like a bitch.

Rick shoved me off and grabbed the backpack before I could do a thing about it. He threw it back toward the car.

I was so angry I'd stopped caring about it. I grabbed Rick, got him in a chokehold. He'd lied to me. Or maybe he was lying now to distract me. He grabbed my arm, trying to pull it away from around his neck. Then he reached up and grabbed my head. I didn't get what he was trying to do at first until he turned it, forcing me to look back at the car.

Smoke was rising from it. I could see flames. And he'd just thrown a bunch of explosives into it.

"Get up!" I yelled at him, grabbing him by the arm and dragging him to his feet. We ran as the flames grew higher. An explosion knocked us to our feet. Secondary, smaller explosions went off as the fire reached other weapons in there.

Rick got his breath back. We sat side by side in silence and watched the car burn, all the weapons we could've had going up in smoke before our eyes. And all I could feel was this empty rage gnawing at my stomach.

"Why'd you lie?" I asked. Staring into the flames felt like the only place I could look. I was too mad to look at Rick, and the fire was the only thing that was nearly as strong as my anger.

"I thought if you knew, it would jeopardize the plan," he said. "That you'd try to find a way in there or get the Walkers away. But she was okay with it, Daryl. She told me it was okay to-"

"Don't," I warned him. "Don't tell me any of that shit."

I knew what she'd have told him. I knew she'd be more worried about all of them than they were about her. I didn't want to be mad at her, but I needed her to be more selfish for once. To put her survival first. But she wasn't wired that way.

"She's alive in there?" I asked.

"She was," Rick said. He sounded uncertain, and it made me sick to my stomach.

"The hell do you mean was?"

"Negan brought her out," Rick said. His voice was solemn, serious. "He beat her. It looked... bad."

"Did he use Lucille on her?" I asked. All of this beating around the bush was making things worse. If he knew that she was dead, I wished he'd just come out and say it.

"No," Rick said. "He never got a chance to. We opened fire before he could."

It took me a second to get what he meant. He phrased it like that was saving her somehow, but I knew it wasn't.

"You shot at her?" I was ready to punch him again.

"We shot at Negan and his men," Rick said.

"But she was there? With them?"

"Yes," he admitted. I was speechless. Struck dumb with anger and betrayal. "I didn't see what happened to her after that. She might have taken cover somewhere, found one of our group... I don't know."

Or she might've gotten shot. She might have been torn apart by Walkers I brought there.

"If she got out, Rick," I said. I really had to fight to keep my voice level. "Then where is she? Why ain't someone radioed to say they found her? Why hasn't she?"

"I don't know," Rick said.

But I knew.

I knew my girl. I knew if she got out, she'd find some way to let me know. She'd have gone back to Alexandria or the Hilltop or wherever she thought Mia would be, and she'd have made them radio me. I knew it. I knew her.

She's dead.

Once I'd thought it, I couldn't stop.

"You're my brother, Rick," I said to him, but I stared at the ground. I didn't think I'd be able to get the words out if I knew someone was looking at me. "But she's my whole world, man. Always has been."

In the silence, I heard him sigh.

"I know," Rick said. He paused. I wondered if he was about to try and tell me again that this was what Naomi had wanted. That I was the only asshole not looking at the bigger picture in all this. I knew I'd punch him in the mouth again if he did. But he didn't. He just said, "I'm sorry things have to be this way."

They don't, though.

I stood up.

"If she's dead, I won't forgive you for it."

That 'if' was looking more and more likely.

"I know."

"Nah," I said. "You don't."

At that moment, it felt like the world was divided in the way it had been before. Split into guys like Rick, who got to have their girl, their family... love. And guys like me who didn't. I knew Rick had lost a lot in all of this. He'd lost Lori, but he'd found a second chance with Michonne. Two kids who thought he was the goddamn hero. And what did I have? The only girl I'd ever loved was dead because I hadn't done enough.

Because I'd listened to him.

I started walking back to where I'd dumped my bike. Everything hurt in new ways. Deep in my pocket, I could feel the figurine Dwight had carved. The one I'd been carrying around since I'd got it, ready to pull out whenever I needed a reminder of why I was doing all this. The one that said, 'She's alive.'

Felt like a lie now.

Only it hadn't been Dwight who'd lied to me; it was Rick. I had to know, one way or the other. I needed the truth; I needed to get in there. And I didn't need no damn dynamite to do it.

Chapter 42: Done Waiting

Naomi

I tied to get out. I really did, but the onslaught of bullets from our side was too much, too dangerous. If I died in a blaze of friendly fire, it wouldn't just be Negan and Sanctuary that Daryl would seek revenge on. When Sanctuary was rubble, he'd turn all that fire on our friends.

Inside Sanctuary, everything was chaos. News of what was going on outside had thrown everyone into a state of panic. It worked well for me, meant I could slip by unnoticed. I knew I had a limited amount of time before the Saviors got their shit together, but, with any luck, they'd think I'd either died out there or made a break for it.

I made a quick stop-off in Dwight's room. I was still in the sweater they'd made me wear when I was working the fence, and if the Saviors stopped losing their shit for long enough, they'd notice immediately. It would get me killed or thrown back in that cell.

Dwight's room was a goddamn mess, so I had to root around to find anything. I grabbed a flannel shirt hanging on the back of his door and found a pair of pants with a belt that kept them up. I looked everywhere I could think of for some kind of weapon, but there was nothing there. Dwight must have taken everything he had with him.

Gunfire was still roaring outside, but it sounded like it was fading. I had to find something I could use to fight when my friends got in here. I took a baseball cap from one of the cluttered countertops and pulled it down low over my face. The corridors echoed with not too distant voices, panicked and loud, Saviors scrambling for some kind of plan. I kept my head low and my eyes on the ground. I'd been able to wash some of the new blood from my face in Dwight's small sink, but I knew there were still bruises and cuts there. Only a few people passed me, and they were in too much of a hurry to take a closer look.

I was in the stairwell when something exploded outside. It was close enough that I could feel the vibrations of it through the floor. The metal of the staircase railing shook under my hand. Was it my friends trying to get in or Negan's line of defense trying to blow them back?

I remembered the distant explosion I'd seen before. The pillar of smoke rising in the distance that Negan had automatically attributed to Daryl. Rick hadn't denied it. It felt true; I can't explain it any better than that. Daryl would only have been somewhere else if he was doing something. Fighting something. Negotiating wasn't something he liked or really saw the point in. Blowing something up, though? That felt much more like him.

I flew up the last few stairs. That explosion had been so damn close, they must be almost in.

I wondered how much resistance the Saviors would put up, or if any of them had taken up Rick's offer of peaceful surrender. It would take longer than this to get his lieutenants and army of brainwashed soldiers on side. But what about the workers? Sherry had told me there were families here, non-violent members of the Saviors who may have no idea what their leader was really like. What would it take to open their eyes? Would they have even heard Rick's message of peace?

I reached the room I'd been kept in before my attempted-murder of Negan had left me rotting in their other cell indefinitely. It had been half-heartedly cleaned up since I'd last been there. Most of the glass had been swept away. There were still tiny pieces glittering around the edges and a sizeable rusty-brown stain on the floor where my blood had pooled and then dried out. I knelt down by the bed and looked under the little cabinet beside it.

There it was.

That shard of glass large enough to be used as a knife, the one I'd desperately reached for before Simon had hauled me back and beaten me until I passed out. I slipped my hand under the cabinet and gently pulled it out. It felt like a win. A small one, but I'd been on such a losing streak lately that holding that piece of glass while my friends fought from outside felt like a turning point. I ripped a chunk of cloth off the bottom of the shirt and used it to carefully wrap the glass before sliding it into my pocket. It would do as a weapon until I could get my hands on something else.

I left quickly. There wasn't a good reason for anyone to be in that room; getting caught in there would be a huge red flag. I knew Dwight's room was the safest place for me to hide out, but I needed to know what was going on out there. I headed to Negan's wives' room, figuring that nobody would really be watching them right now, and most of them hated Negan's guts as much as I did, so they'd be unlikely to turn me in.

Their room was near the top of the building and would have a good view of the fight. When I got there, they were all crowded around the windows, all talking at once in nervous whispers.

"Amber," I approached her quietly, but her head whipped around to look at me so fast I was worried she'd get whiplash. They were all so on-edge, and I guess they had every right to be. They had no idea this was coming. Her eyes were wide and a little scared. It took her a moment to realize who I was, and then she turned toward me.

"Oh my God," she said, rushing over to me. "That was your people out there, wasn't it?"

"Yeah," I said, and I felt this huge surge of pride. That was my people out there. And they were about to set these people free from the violence, coercion, and manipulation they'd been living under. "Don't worry, Rick only wants Negan. Nobody else is going to be hurt. Once they get in here-"

The look on Amber's face stopped me from talking. She frowned. "You don't know what's happening out there, do you?"

My stomach dropped. Rick had been in such a good position when I'd been out there; what had changed? How could the tables have turned so fast? Amber led me over to the window. The closer I got, the more aware I became of a whole new sound. The gunfire was gone, but the snarl of Walkers was loud. Much louder than it had been when I'd actually been outside, which shouldn't have been possible, given that I was now higher up and indoors.

Outside of the window, I expected to see those DIY armored cars and maybe Daryl on his bike. But beneath us was a herd of Walkers. The biggest I'd seen since we cleared one from the quarry near Alexandria. We were surrounded by rows and rows of them, all pushing against one another, trying to get in. Rick and the others were long gone. I doubted that Daryl had even been here. It hit me hard for a second, the primal fear of being faced with so many Walkers and the hopeless realization that I might have missed my one chance of getting out of here by not running into the hail of incoming bullets.

I looked away from the herd as my stomach filled with ice and looked up at the sky. It felt too big again, and I felt small and far away. I took a few deep breaths to calm the nerves in my stomach and reminded myself who it was that put those Walkers there and what they'd come here hoping to achieve. Daryl wasn't out there waiting for me, but he was still somewhere under that same sky. I looked back at Amber and the rest of Negan's wives, who were all filled with the same hopelessness I'd just rid myself of.

"It's alright," I said, and saying it out loud made me believe it more. "They want Negan and the rest of the Saviors in here to surrender. This is how they get it done."

"What, by trapping us all in here to die?" Amber said.

"No," I said. "By cutting this place off from outside help. To stop supplies getting in so that Negan has no other choice."

"Who's to say he won't let us all die?" another one of his wives asked. "Just so he doesn't have to give in to Rick?"

"Or that he won't just keep all the supplies for himself?" someone else muttered. "Let the rest of us starve until he thinks his way out of this?"

"He won't," I said. I was as sure of that as I was any other part of all this. They all looked at me then. I shrugged and said, "People are a resource. Negan won't let his people die… Not all of them anyway. If this goes on for long enough, he will surrender. We just gotta sit tight."

Sit tight. I'm coming for ya.

Maybe that's what Daryl had meant. He hadn't just meant 'sit tight until we get there.' He'd wanted me to keep waiting after they had, to wait for Negan's surrender.

Trouble was, I'd never been very good at waiting. Daryl should've known that.

"Face it," Amber said. "Your friends have left you here to starve to death or be torn apart, just like the rest of us."

"No," I said. "They haven't."

I didn't have my Momma's faith in God or even Daryl's faith in Rick.

But I had faith in him.

The blow I'd felt from realizing I wasn't getting out of here today was starting to fade. Things had been set in motion now; there was no stopping them even if I wanted to. But I could speed things up. That shard of glass weighed heavy in my pocket for a moment. I straightened up, "You guys know where Negan is?"

"Nobody's seen him since this started," Amber replied with a shrug.

That made sense, he'd probably be busy trying to think his way out of this for a few hours. That was good. It gave me time.

"Where's his room?" I asked.

"Two doors down from here," Amber replied with a frown. I turned back toward the door. "On the left. Why?"

"I'm going to kill him," I said. I'd said it, thought it so many times, but each time it felt a little more real and damn sight more possible. "Next time he lets his guard down, I'll be there. All of you sit tight until Rick comes back."

"You don't know he's coming back!" Amber yelled after me. And she was right; I didn't know that Rick would come back. But I knew Daryl would. I felt it deep down in my bones, and that made me sure the rest of them would be back too. Daryl wouldn't have agreed to it otherwise. When they arrived, I wanted them to find Negan gone and a building of people ready to surrender and join us.

I took a look at the room Amber had said was Negan's. Under normal circumstances, it might have been guarded when he was in it, but, as he and the Savior's attention was currently elsewhere, the door had been left ajar. I pushed it open just enough for me to slip inside. It was dark in there. Heavy curtains hung over the windows. A large bed in the center of the room, a large closet, a few cabinets with bottles of something I assumed was booze. Every luxury that could be made or scavenged these days seemed to have been stuffed into this one room.

Selfish asshole.

There was so much crammed in here that there were plenty of spaces to hide. I thought about getting into one of them now and lying in wait until Negan got back, but I'd prefer to get my hands on a more reliable weapon than the piece of glass in my pocket. Something that wouldn't break if I sat on it wrong. So, I headed back to Dwight's room to think through my next moves.

The chaos inside Sanctuary was calming down now that there was no active gunfire outside. Focus had shifted to the herd. I sat in Dwight's room and tried not to think about where my friends had gone and what they might have to do now. I hated that I didn't know. I hated that I couldn't be out there with them. I'd made the wrong choice. If I'd known this was what was coming next, I'd have taken my chances with the bullets.

I heard a set of footsteps getting real close and slipped into a hiding space I'd made for myself in Dwight's cupboard in case it wasn't him. Seconds later, the door creaked open and shut again. I peered through the crack between the cupboard door and the wall. A weary Dwight sank down onto an armchair.

Now, I felt a little stuck. I didn't want to leap out at him and give him a heart attack, so I cleared my throat. The effect was more or less the same. He leaped out of his chair and raised a gun, his eyes darting wildly around the room.

"Who's there?" he snapped.

"Hey, Dwight. It's me," I tried to say it in the quietest and least-threatening way possible. I pushed the door open very slowly, but all that did was give his gun and his wild eyes something to fixate on. Who was he so afraid was in here? I realized my introduction might have been a little vague, so I added, "It's Naomi."

"Fucking hell," he lowered his gun, and I stepped out of the cupboard. He was still looking at me like I was a ghost, so I gave him a moment to recover. "I thought you were gone."

He didn't specify whether he meant 'gone' as in left or 'gone' as in dead.

"I couldn't get out," I said. "It was too risky, too many bullets. But it's fine, while we're all stuck in here, I'm gonna kill Negan."

Dwight closed his eyes for a moment, lowered his head, and sighed.

"Not this again," he muttered, looking back up at me. "Didn't you hear Rick out there? He's getting them all to surrender."

"That'll go a lot faster if Negan's not around to say no," I pointed out.

"Look, I know you want this over with, but that's what we're doing," Dwight said. "Right now, every major Outpost that the Saviors have is being taken out by your people. Any weapons they could use to get Negan out of this building will be seized. Every escape point, every supply chain will be cut off. He'll have to surrender. And all we have to do is-"

"Sit tight?" I finished for him. "Yeah, I'm done doing that. This will all be over much faster if I just-"

Before I could finish, there was a knock at the door. We both froze. Dwight turned to me and whispered, "Hide."

I nodded and quietly backed into the cupboard I'd been in before. I heard Dwight open the door. Part of me expected to hear Negan. My fingers found the edge of my cloth-wrapped shard of glass in anticipation.

"I'd like to express my sincere thanks for your support at the recent conflab," Eugene's voice reached me through the cupboard door. "I was doing my level best to stay fully on the DL, but sometimes the mouth-brain neuronal connection experience is a misfire, and foot met mouth at an unavoidable velocity."

Before all this, I'd found Eugene's way of talking almost endearing, but now that every note in his voice was tinged with the hint of unforgivable betrayal, listening to him made my fist want to meet his mouth at unavoidable velocity.

"You were right in there," Dwight said. "If you didn't say it, I would have."

"As a token of my appreciation, I brought you some primo cukes from my private stash," Eugene said. "I'd like you to accept these as a sign of my faith that we will, in fact, find a way out of this pickle. Pun intended."

Dwight didn't laugh. I could almost feel his stress bouncing off the walls. I heard Eugene move further into the room, and I held my breath. I knew it wouldn't help. Eugene didn't have superhuman hearing, and if he was going to open up this cupboard, he'd do it whether or not I was mid-suffocating myself. But it was almost instinctual and kind of comforting, like when you'd hide under your covers as a kid thinking if you stayed still and quiet enough, then whatever monster you'd dreamed up wouldn't get you.

"Hold up, it's… it's still wet," I heard Dwight say and guessed that they were over by his figurines. Or the chess pieces he was carving. I prayed that Eugene wouldn't ask to stay for a game. My leg was already cramping up.

"My apologies," Eugene said. "You DIY'd these?"

"That's right."

I heard the soft click of Eugene putting down whatever it was he'd picked up. He moved in the room again, but I couldn't tell in which direction. "I fully understand the reasoning behind yours truly being the prime suspect in pretty much any Benedict Arnold type situation. And in light of that, I'm doubly grateful to have you watching my six."

"You were right back there," Dwight said. "I didn't say anything more than that."

I heard the door close. I waited, Dwight waited too and then said, "Alright, I think you can come out now."

"What was that about?" I asked as I emerged from his cupboard for the second time that day. Dwight hesitated.

"Negan's missing," he said. "Maybe even dead."

I waited for it to sink in. If it was true, it was the best news I'd heard since finding Mia alive. But part of me wouldn't believe it until I'd seen it for myself. Negan was so loud and brash, always putting on some kind of twisted show, that it felt his death would be so quiet and unobserved. The only thing that felt right about it was the uncertainty. That even if he was dead, people would continue to whisper about the possibility of him being alive until his Walker was found. I hoped I'd be the one to take it out. Or at least stamp on his head a couple of times after.

"Simon's the one we have to worry about. He's making a play to be Top Dog without Negan around," Dwight said. "He called a meeting of all of Negan's advisors as soon as he realized. Started asking us for a plan as if he'd been put in charge by Negan himself."

Dwight glowered at the floor.

"What did y'all come up with?" I asked, trying to get the conservation back on track. I didn't give a hoot who was in charge as long as the plan they'd come up with was ineffective.

"Regina wanted to use the workers as bait so that we could sneak a team past the Walkers and get to the Fat Lady."

"Who the hell is the Fat Lady?" I asked, not even a little surprised that Negan had nick-named someone that. I'd met Fat Joey.

"Not a person." A little smile creased the scars on Dwight's cheek. "We've got a whole bunch of portable speakers stashed at a warehouse to draw big groups of the dead away if we need to."

"Is that one of the Outposts Rick's hitting?" I asked.

"Nah," Dwight said. "We keep it for emergencies. There won't be anyone around to get to it when Rick's done with the Outposts."

It didn't put me at ease. The thought of something useful to the Saviors sitting out there for anyone who escaped the Outposts to bring here felt like too big a risk.

Dwight saw the look on my face and tried to reassure me, "I know it's hard to sit here and wait, but everything's in motion now, and it's going to work. I convinced Simon and the other Outpost heads that Regina's plan was dumb, so they aren't going for it."

"How'd you manage that?"

"Eugene pointed out that using the workers like that would turn them against us," Dwight said. Then he shrugged. "I just backed him up."

"It would be good to turn the workers against them, wouldn't it?" I asked. "They might pick up weapons and join us."

"Yeah, it would," he said. "But Regina's plan might work if we let it happen. And I already know which of the workers are restless, who'll be able to stir up more discontent down there without risking anyone getting out and bringing the Fat Lady here. I've got some weapons for them. So they're ready when they need to be."

I nodded. It was a good plan. One that gave me some kind of hope that this would be over and won in a few days.

"Why ain't you handing them out now?"

"Simon and the others think there's a rat in Sanctuary," Dwight said, and it took me a second to realize that he meant a snitch and not a rodent. Because there were plenty of those. I'd heard them squeaking through the walls when I'd been locked up. "They don't know for sure, but the attack happening while all of the Outposts heads are here has got them suspicious. For now, they suspect Eugene, but…"

He shrugged and let his sentence trail off, making it clear that they were all so riled up that suspicion could turn to anyone at any moment. Including him.

"Let me go and hand the weapons out," I said. I said it a little too brightly, but I was just so damn glad I'd thought of something to do rather than more sitting around and waiting for things to play out.

"No," Dwight said immediately. "You're not safe outside of this room."

"You're not safe if you get caught down there," I countered. "And you're way more recognizable than I am. The only person who'd give a shit about catching me is Simon, and I'm willing to bet he won't be down there."

"I don't know, Naomi," Dwight said, but he was thinking about it. "It's risky."

"I know it is," I said. "But it's a lot riskier for you than for me. The workers don't know who I am. Why would they?"

Negan had been good at keeping them away from the nastier side of Sanctuary, which was a slight worry when it came to how easy it would be to turn them against him. Did they really see him as their savior? It might be easier to turn them against Simon and the others, who were more openly cruel.

"Are you sure about this?"

"Yes," I said. "If I get caught, they'll kill me, and that's… well, that ain't ideal, but if they catch you… Rick loses his inside man. You're far more valuable to taking down the Saviors than I am."

He wanted to fight me on it, I could tell. And I knew what his points would be. That it would be harder for him to keep Rick's trust if I died here. That Daryl wouldn't let him live to take another breath once he'd delivered the news.

But none of that mattered if we didn't win this. I put a hand on Dwight's shoulder, "Just tell me what needs to be done, and I'll do it."

Dwight told me who to ask for, who to talk to. He handed me a bag flecked with paint from the chess pieces he'd been carving and filled with guns. He gave me strict instructions on who to pass them to and a quiet warning about how many they were expecting. His meaning was clear: he knew how many there were, and he'd know if I took one for myself.

When I got down there, the workers were uneasy. If I'd thought the Walkers sounded loud from up in Negan's wives' room, it was nothing compared to how loud they were from the former factory floor. The doors rattled under the pressure of hundreds of dead bodies pushing against them. People were scared, and it was easy to see why. If I hadn't known that this was planned by someone asking and fighting for peace, I'd have been scared too.

I relayed Rick's message to the workers that Dwight had told me to find before I handed their guns over. Those who were unconvinced still looked skeptical. They'd heard that Rick wasn't to be trusted either and that he left one of his own for dead in this place. I couldn't tell them that I was the one he'd supposedly left behind or that I'd chosen to come back so that I could get to Negan, in case one of them ratted me out. So instead, I spread a rumor. I told them that I'd heard some higher-ups talking about Regina's plan to use them as bait.

It spread like wildfire.

Within fifteen minutes, it was all anyone on the former factory floor was talking about. Their fear started to turn to anger. Their unease about how close they were to the horde outside was bubbling over, and they decided it was time to move upstairs, where it was safe. To demand answers from those who lorded over them, demanding sacrifice while shielding themselves. I couldn't move up with them. I couldn't risk being spotted by Simon, who I had no doubt would take great delight in shooting me dead, so I took the first opportunity to slink back to Dwight's room.

When I got there, I saw he'd cleared out the bottom of his cupboard and filled the space with a pillow and a blanket. He wasn't there to say so, but I assumed it was for me. It was weirdly sweet of him, and the first time I'd felt good about anything since Daryl and Mia left. I sat in there in case anyone came in and waited for Dwight.

I'd done so much waiting around lately, but this was the first time I'd been able to do so somewhere with a window, with any sense of time passing. I could see the light change. I could get up and move around. Dwight even had a couple of books I could read. I was such a change from waiting in that dark hole they'd been keeping that it was almost enough of a distraction to keep me from me worrying about what was going on elsewhere. Almost. .

When Dwight came back, he looked more than a little tired. He closed the door behind him and heaved a sigh. His eyes fell on where I was. He hesitated, "Well, it worked."

He didn't seem all that pleased about it. I wondered what the catch was.

"Yeah?" I sat up and straightened out one of my legs, which was close to falling asleep.

"Oh, yeah," he said, throwing down his gun. "You hungry?"

"Yes," I said, but I could tell he was trying to distract me from something. "What's happening out there?"

"The workers came up from the factory floor, demanding space on upper levels in case the doors don't hold and the Walkers get in," Dwight said. "They were mad. Simon and the others didn't handle it well."

"So… how did they resolve it?" I asked. I knew if there was any kind of uprising underway, Dwight wouldn't be here to fill me in on it.

"They're back downstairs for now," he said with a shrug. "But don't worry, I'm sure they'll be eager to fight again by tomorrow. We just have to stick to the plan."

I was tired of sticking to plans I knew nothing about, of waiting around.

What's more, I got the sense Dwight was hiding something from me. He made us both some food, sharing whatever rations he'd been given. The Saviors were already cutting down and conserving supplies, so it wasn't much, but it was better than nothing. Dwight was quiet and evasive, no matter how hard I pushed him. It grew dark outside, and I wondered how the fight had gone at the Outposts. Surely, they'd be over by now?

"You can, uh…" Dwight gestured to the cupboard.

"Yeah, I saw," I said. "Thanks."

"Bit cramped," he said apologetically. "Sorry."

"Don't be," I said. Cramped and uncomfortable had been my default sleeping position for so long now that I doubted I'd notice the difference. "Do you know how long it's been since I last had a pillow?"

I looked up, and my smile faltered. Dwight knew exactly how long it had been since I'd slept anywhere comfortable because he'd been the one enforcing it. I was so used to Dwight being on my side, to secretly working with him, that I occasionally forgot he had technically been the one with the keys to my jail cell.

"Sorry," he said again, and I knew that this time it wasn't just about the lack of space he'd given me to sleep in.

"It's okay," I said. Any anger I had toward Dwight was tied up in the way he'd treated Daryl. And we could settle that outside of these walls.

Sleep came easier than expected. I was exhausted from spending a few restless hours drifting in and out of sleep the night before, anticipating the arrival of my friends. Now that they had, and things were in motion, it was easier to catch a little shut-eye.

When I woke up, Dwight wasn't in the room. I crept to the door and listened for any sounds, any clues of what was going on. Sanctuary was quieter today than it had been yesterday. I climbed up on Dwight's countertop to look out a small and high-up window in his room, worried that something had drawn the Walkers away, and that's why everyone was so calm. But they were still there, pushing against the walls. I had to believe that meant the attacks on the Outposts had gone well, too. Nobody had come to save the Saviors.

The door burst open behind me, and I scrambled down. No time to hide. But it was only Dwight again, another bag of guns in his hands. He looked annoyed. I wondered for a moment that it was because I'd come out of hiding, and if anyone other than him had come in just now, I'd be dead. He shut the door behind him and looked at me. His jaw clenched.

"Where were you?" I asked.

"Another meeting," he said. "We've got a problem. Negan's back."

I think he expected me to be shocked, but I wasn't. I had questions, sure, but I wasn't surprised that it had happened. There was a twisted kind of sense to it. Had anyone really expected Negan to do the decent thing and die quietly?

"When did he get back?" I asked. "How did he get in?"

"He covered himself in Walker guts so they couldn't smell him," Dwight said. "He was with one of yours, actually. The priest?"

"Gabriel."

"Right, yeah," Dwight said. "Gabriel. He's now in your old cell and Negan's… elsewhere."

"So, they were just hiding out somewhere together all night?" I asked. Dwight hesitated, got that look on his face when he was trying to avoid saying something. For someone who was currently working as a double-agent, he really needed to work on that.

"Not exactly," he said. "They actually got back late yesterday."

"Yesterday?" I repeated. "They've been here all night, and you kept it from me?"

"I didn't want you doing anything rash," he said. "But I think you're right. I think we might need to speed things up here. Negan's asked Eugene to work on getting the Walkers away from Sanctuary."

Shit.

If there was one person in this dump smart enough to work something out, it was probably Eugene.

"You've gotta stop him," I said.

"I know," Dwight said. "I will."

"And Negan?"

"Take this," he said, handing over a pistol. It was the smallest one in the bag, but that would make it easy to conceal. "Do what you gotta do."

"You serious?" I asked, but I'd already taken it from him in case he changed his mind.

"Things are changing," he said. "I gotta stop Eugene, and if they work out that I'm the rat, you'll be on your own. You should be able to protect yourself."

"Thank you," I said. Dwight nodded. There was a steely determination about him now. An urgency in his eyes. He turned back to the door and paused, his hand on the handle.

"I hope you make it out of here," he said, and it sounded sincere.

"You too," I said quietly, and then he was gone, out into the hallway.

I hid the small pistol he'd given me in the sleeve of his flannel shirt. I felt the cool of the metal against my skin, and my hands started to shake. It wasn't fear, not really. It was the same kind of steely anticipation I'd seen in Dwight's eyes as he realized that it was his time to play a part. To do something for the good of everyone fighting that might get him killed. After all this time unarmed, all the threats I'd thrown at Negan, it was finally time to make good on them.

I'm done waiting.

I took the baseball cap from the back of the door and pulled it low over my face again before I left Dwight's room for the final time. I knew where I was heading, and I wasn't sure I'd be coming back from it. I walked fast, and with purpose, my head bowed low again. I found Negan's door shut but unlocked and unguarded.

Is he already in there?

I glanced behind me to check that I wouldn't be caught going in, and then I turned the handle real slow, not wanting to make a sound. The door opened, just a crack, and I paused. Listened. Didn't hear him call from inside or make a move to see who had opened his door, so I opened it a little wider.

The room was dark. Even darker than it had been last time I'd looked in. I glanced behind me again, one last check that I wasn't being watched, and then I snuck inside, closing the door quietly behind me. The darkness in the room enveloped me for a moment, and it occurred to me that Negan might already be in here. Sleeping. Or waiting for something like this. I could hear my heartbeat and my own shallow, nervous breaths as I waited for my eyes to adjust to the dark. I scanned every shadow for a sign of him or any of his men.

There was nobody in here but me.

A shiver ran up my spine. Keeping an ear out for any movement on the other side of the door, I weighed up my options. There was no guarantee Negan would be the first one to come in here. I didn't want to end up shooting one of Negan's wives or whichever poor bastard he had cleaning up after him. So, where to hide?

The closet seemed too risky. Negan might open it to hang up his dumb leather jacket and find me before I was good and ready. His smaller cupboards were too full for me to make a space big enough without it being obvious that someone had tampered with his shit. Behind the curtains felt too easy to spot. Which only left under the bed. Even if he just came back to sleep here, I could get him then. Plus, what kind of grown man checks for monsters under his bed?

I crawled underneath and lay down on the dusty floor. After all of the endless waiting around I'd been doing, I was ready to wait some more. Like this was what all of that had been training me for, but I wasn't waiting long. I heard the unmistakable sound of Negan's voice echoing down the corridor, and my whole body froze up.

He got louder. Closer. The door opened and flooded the room with light. I could see Negan's boots facing away from me and out toward whoever he was talking to. I could get up right now and shoot him in the back of the head. It would be done. Only, he was talking to people - four other sets of boots. I didn't know if I'd have enough bullets to take them out too. Or, if I'd be able to get a good enough shot at Negan before they got me.

Why didn't I check how many bullets I had?

I couldn't do it now, it would make way too much noise, and they were all far too close. The gun felt heavier in my hand. And then I heard Negan say, "Alright then, that's all for now. You assholes are dismissed."

I watched his boots turn and face into the room while the others walked away. Negan shut the door, and I tracked his boots as they walked across the floor. Closer to where I was hiding. And then, in the middle of the room, he stopped.

"You can come on out now, Naomi," Negan said. At the sound of my name, a jolt of dread shot right through to my stomach. Ice cold. "It's just you and me, sweetheart."

Shit.

How did he know?

My rapidly beating heart lodged itself in my throat, and I tried to remind myself that I was the one with the gun. I crawled out from where I was, gun raised and trained on Negan, so he didn't get any ideas about using Lucille. He grinned. Negan didn't seem bothered by the gun, and he hadn't even raised Lucille from where she hung by his side. He had that glint in his eye. That one that made me feel like I was seconds away from walking into some kind of trap.

"Don't want to call for back-up this time?" I asked. I'd almost beaten him before; I could do it again.

"You here to kill me, are you?" he asked. I scanned the shadows of his room. I'd checked it thoroughly when I'd come in, but he was so calm and collected it was making me doubt myself. Why wasn't he defending himself? Maybe this was part of it; maybe he thought I wouldn't shoot an unarmed man. Ordinarily, he'd be right, but for him, I could make an exception.

"It didn't have to be this way," I told him. "You could've left us alone. You could've kept this empire, but you got greedy. Now Rick's going to take everything, and you'll be dead and forgotten."

Negan nodded like he was taking in my points, but he still had that dumb smile plastered all over his face.

"That why you're doing this, huh?" he said. "For Rick? The guy that left you here to die?"

"That ain't how it went down," I said. "And this ain't just about Rick. This is for Abraham and Sasha. For Olivia and Spencer. For Dwight and Sherry, this is for Amber and Mark, and any other poor bastard that got the iron. Any of the women you've coerced into that bed."

"Is that so?" he said. Still fucking grinning. It made me so mad that he was so amused by all of this. "Well, before you shoot me, let me ask you something. If things had been different, if I'd plucked you out of the road like we did when you saved your sister, you think things would've been different? Think you'd have been on my team, or were we always gonna dance this dance?"

I thought about it for a moment, all the while keeping an eye on him so he didn't try and make any sudden moves.

"I'd have worked out who you are eventually," I said. "Probably would've just left, though. You brought this part on yourself. Sealed it in stone the minute you hurt Daryl."

"I didn't lay a finger on Daryl," he said. "I believe it was Dwight who did that, maybe some of my men. But, me? I didn't do any of that, darlin'."

No.

This wasn't going to happen. I wasn't about to let him talk his way out of it. Or direct my anger elsewhere.

"Y'know, I had a dream like this once, minus the gun, of course," Negan said. Then he smirked and ran his eyes over my clothes. "Minus a lot of things, actually."

Asshole.

I pulled the trigger. The anticipation of the gunshot caused an involuntary flinch to course through my body. The gun clicked in my hand. But it did not go off.

No bang, no bullet.

No!

No, no, no!

Negan started to laugh.

I pulled the trigger again. And again. Still nothing.

"Get that gun for Dwighty boy, did ya?" he asked. My heart started to sink, a sick dread rising up from my stomach to replace it. Negan straightened to his full height and swung Lucille up to rest on his shoulder. He took a step toward me. I took one back.

"Y'know, there was a moment back there where I thought damn this girl has had no contact with the outside world, no way of communicating anything to them. Yet, somehow she's managed to orchestrate an attack on this place when all of my Outpost heads just happen to be here; she's got some kind of telepathic warning to Alexandria that I was on my way," he said. "Not only that, but she's been in that hole with no food and water for a week, and she's still alive. There was a moment where I'll admit I thought you were gonna beat me by sheer force of will. Even though I knew you were locked up."

"We're still gonna beat you," I told him. Even if this had failed, I knew that much.

"Is that so?" he asked with a smile like he didn't believe me. "Once I figured out someone in here was helping you, feeding you and keeping you alive, it was pretty clear who it was. So, I made sure none of those guns I gave him today had anything in them. I am curious, though. How'd you turn Dwighty-boy against me?"

"You did that to yourself," I said. "There's only so long people will put up with being treated like crap."

"That's not true," he said. "I am good to my people for as long as they follow my rules. I've been running this place in the same way for a long time."

"Yeah, and how's that working out for you?"

"Fine until you and Rick and his piss patrol showed up," he said. "And now you're gonna die, and I'm gonna crush every last one of them. Starting with your little sister. In fact, I'm gonna make Daryl do that one himself. How does that sound?"

Over my dead body.

I flipped the gun around in my hand so that I was holding the barrel. I flew at him, smacking him across the jaw with the handle. The gun might not work as intended, but it hit his face with a satisfying crack. He pushed me back, blood pooling in the corner of his mouth.

"Alright then, enough chit-chat," he said. "I've had a hell of a day, and I'm not in the mood to make it any longer. Goodbye, Naomi. It's been a painful kind of pleasure."

Shit.

He swung Lucille at me. I think he was expecting me to duck, so he swung lower than he needed to. I leaped out of the way. She hit me, but only on the arm. Hurt like a bitch, a sharp sting of barbed wire cutting into me through the material of Dwight's shirt, but my brains were still where they were supposed to be. I'd survived to fight on.

Negan cursed under his breath and swung for me again. This time, I ducked and ran toward him, landing two punches before he knocked me to the ground. It pushed the wind out of me, and I couldn't move for a second. It was long enough for Negan to get on top of me, pin me down.

I felt something sharp digging into me from the floor. And then I realized what it was. That shard of glass I'd so carefully wrapped up and slipped into my back pocket. I struggled underneath Negan, feeling for it with the hand he'd pinned under me. My fingertips brushed the edges of the cloth it was wrapped in.

Negan grabbed me by the throat with one hand, raised Lucille with the other. I tugged on that piece of cloth as hard as I could, my fingers scrambling to get hold of the glass nestled inside it.

The building shook from its very foundations. It was so strong that for a moment, I thought I was feeling the impact of Lucille hitting my head in a near-fatal blow. But I looked up and realized Negan hadn't hit me yet. Objects had fallen around us under the impact of whatever it was. Another explosion? Had something hit the building?

Whatever it was, it was big enough to disrupt even this, just for a moment. And a moment was all I needed.

Screaming started from deep within the bowels of the Sanctuary, and Negan paused. Something was wrong.

"The hell...?" Negan muttered. He thought he had me beat, that he could take the time to listen to whatever was happening out there. I felt the end of the glass come loose from the rag I'd wrapped it in. I grabbed it tight, I knew I only had one shot at this, and I couldn't risk dropping it. The end of it cut so deep into my hand that I screamed in pain. But I had it!

Negan's turned back to look at me. I made one last, desperate, swipe at him.

He was shocked. We both were. His eyes widened with it when he realized he couldn't breathe. And then Lucille clattered to the ground, his hand let go of my neck as he reached up to try and stop the blood that was pouring from a deep gash in his throat. Flowing thick and fast, streaming on to me, and soaking through my borrowed shirt. It was all red.

Negan tried and failed to take another breath. His body was heavy now, and he could hardly hold himself above me. I pushed him off. And just as I got to my feet, the door opened.

 

Daryl

I thought I'd feel something more when I got to Sanctuary. I even half-expected to cry. Maybe having Michonne and Rosita there too stopped me. Maybe seeing surrounded by the dead and knowing that Naomi was most likely dead as well made the whole place feel lifeless. Like a tomb.

I was still angry. But I'd been angry for so long now that even the rage felt normal. It had set into my bones, taken control of every muscle, and that's what had brought me here. I was already filled with it. I couldn't feel anymore; there wasn't space without me exploding.

I passed the rifle scope I'd been using to look at the building over to Michonne. She took a look through it. We'd parked the truck at a good vantage point, one I was pretty sure the Saviors wouldn't be able to spot from where they were. Even if they did, who the fuck cared? And what the Hell could they do about it? I was coming for them no matter what.

Rosita leaned up against the truck while Michonne and I scouted out the place.

"Our people are gonna be at the Sanctuary soon, asking for their surrender," she said." We're almost there."

"That's why we do it," I said. "We make it happen."

"So we cover you with crossfire from the upper windows," Michonne repeated my plan out loud. I couldn't tell if she was doubting it or checking she'd got the details right. "You crash the truck into the Walkers and into the building."

I nodded and hoped she didn't follow up with any questions about what my plan would've been if they hadn't been there to cover me with crossfire. Because I didn't have any answers to that. Nor did I really care if anyone had my back as long as it got done.

"You know the workers will make it away," Rosita asked, "up the stairs?

"They're on the other side of the building," I said. "They should make it."

"You sure?" Rosita prompted.

No.

And I don't give a damn, either.

"After we do this, their only choice is to give up," I said.

"It's risky," Michonne said. "They could see the truck coming."

Maybe.

I also don't give a damn about that.

"We work with what we got."

"You got me," Morgan approached us. He must've seen us from his position in the buildings around Sanctuary and overheard the plan. "Other snipers, too. Saviors see you coming; we've got your covered, whatever it takes. I want it done. I want them done."

I felt another small surge of relief. Although, I'd felt the same when Michonne and Rosita had joined me. Now that they were dragging their feet about the whole thing, I wished I'd stuck with coming alone. I could've made them turn back to Alexandria after I'd run into them trying to take out one of the Savior's trucks, but they'd both been so set on coming here and seeing it for themselves. Michonne had barely recovered from her injuries in the first fight; she'd had to sit the second one out.

"Good," I said, nodding to Morgan. "So, we doin' this or what?"

"Why don't we just wait it out like we planned?" Rosita said. "Michonne's right; what you're talking about is risky. Things could go bad."

Fuck that.

I am done waiting.

"It almost did go bad. Damn truck with the speakers almost took those Walkers away," I pointed out as if they needed any reminding of what they'd been fighting when I ran into them. "I ain't waiting around to see what else they got up their sleeves. We don't got the Kingdom fighters no more. If the Saviors want to put up a fight, we don't got the numbers to make 'em surrender."

"That's why Rick's talking to the Scavengers," Rosita pointed out. I felt a small hit of guilt at how I'd left things with Rick, but there was still enough anger there to smother it right away.

"They lied to us. You believe 'em now?"

"I believe in Rick Grimes," she replied.

Well, that makes fucking one of us.

I almost told her about how he'd lied to me. About how he'd let one of our own get beaten - maybe to death - while he just looked on. But I kept my mouth shut. I didn't want them to know why I was really doing this. I didn't want anyone stopping me or holding me back.

"I'm doing this," I told her. "With or without you."

"Then it's without me," Rosita said. "I'm out."

"We got some cars parked near the East-side lookout," Morgan told her. "You can take one and go home."

Rosita nodded and then looked at Michonne. "You staying? You good with all this?"

"I helped get this started," she replied, but she was looking less sure by the second. "Got to see it through."

"You think it's easier to come out here and risk than to stay back there and wait. And I get it - I used to believe that, too," Rosita said. "Thing is sometimes you just have to wait. Sometimes you don't get to know. I just wish it didn't take seeing Sasha walk out of that coffin to realize it."

She walked away from all of us. Michonne and Morgan watched her go, but I watched them, trying to see if anything she'd said had an impact on whether or not they were willing to do this. I didn't mind if they bowed out. I just couldn't have anyone trying to stop me. Didn't much appreciate all of this standing around debating it either.

"C'mon," I said, "Let's go."

I climbed into the truck and waited for Michonne to follow, if she decided to. After another couple of seconds' hesitation, Michonne climbed in beside me. She still didn't look sure. Her nerves filled up the front of the truck. It was jarring to be around because I didn't have any. I was so burned up with rage that I was hollow now.

In the wing mirror, I saw Morgan heading back through the door to his sniper post. I started the engine. We drove closer to Sanctuary in solemn silence. I kept looking at Michonne, expecting her to say she was out. But she stayed quiet.

"Hey, cut that engine. Any closer, and you'll draw Walkers from the yard," Morgan's voice crackled over the walkie. I brought the truck to a stop. "If they fire from the windows, we fire back."

This was the point of no return. I sat back in the seat and looked at Michonne. She'd been looking less and less sure the closer we'd got to Sanctuary. But now she looked like she was about to spew.

"You up for this?" I asked her.

"I came here 'cause I wanted to see things for myself. I wanted to know that things were gonna work," she said. "But you know what? I don't get to know that. None of us do. What I do know is that things are working now. So maybe… we just need to trust that things are gonna keep working because this… what we're about to do… it's not worth risking us."

I nodded because I got it, not because I agreed. Michonne hadn't been here before; she hadn't seen how many Walkers we'd got around this place. Now that she had, she could see how dangerous this all was and that if it went wrong, neither of us would come back from it. I wasn't planning to. But I didn't want her taking that risk if she didn't feel the same.

"It is for me," I said quietly. "Just is."

She looked at me for a moment. I knew she wanted to talk me out of it. She wanted to stop me from this potential suicide mission. But there was an understanding there too. If Rick had been in there, she'd have been exactly where I was. And I'd have been the one in the passenger seat. Eventually, she said, "I hope it works. I really, really do, but I… I can't do it. I just can't."

"Then you shouldn't," I said.

I was good with this. I was at peace with it. I didn't want anyone coming along who wasn't. I still had the snipers around me. They had my back, but even if they didn't, I'd still be doing this. Michonne got out of the truck.

I drove into position and listened to Morgan and the other snipers confirm one by one that they were ready over the walkie. I thought I'd be scared going into this, but I wasn't. I was still empty, hollow of anything but anger.

I pulled out the walkie and yelled, "Now!"

I slammed my foot on the accelerator. The truck was big and heavy, the kind of weight I needed to break down the Sanctuary walls, but it took a while to get it up to full speed. What if it wasn't enough? What if all this did was flatten a couple of Walkers?

I broke through the gate in the chain-link fence and into the Sanctuary yard. Everything moved real fast after that. I aimed for a set of doors, knowing they'd be weaker than the wall. I ducked down and pulled up a brick, dropping it down on the accelerator so that it wouldn't lose any momentum. Then I opened the door, saw the ground racing underneath me. Heard the Walkers I was about to crash into.

I braced myself and dropped out of the truck. I tucked up as tight as I could, the ground rushing to meet me, and I slammed into it. The world was a blur of sky and concrete, wind and Walker snarls rushed in my ears. I came to a stop. I mentally scanned my whole body for injuries and found I'd probably have a few bruises later, but nothing felt broken. I felt the truck hitting the door. So hard, a tremor ran through the ground I was sitting on. I turned around to take a look.

Yes!

The truck had burst through with enough force to create gaps on either side of it. The Walkers started pushing their way in as screams from inside poured out. I got to my feet real fast and picked up my gun.

"Daryl, you're clear to the South," Morgan told me over the radio. "You should head home."

I had no intention of heading home. What was done was done, and there was nothing any of them could do about it. None of them could come in and pull me back now. Not only was it too dangerous for them to try, by the time Morgan came back down from his lookout point, I'd be in there. Or, so I hoped. The yard was filled with Walkers, and more were getting drawn in from the other sides. I took cover by an abandoned car nearby and watched them through the scope of my rifle.

"Daryl, what the Hell are you doing? Get out of there!" Morgan's voice crackled over the radio on my shoulder, but I didn't budge. I wanted to rip it off and throw it away, but I didn't. I knew I might need it if I made it back out of Sanctuary. Getting out wasn't the goal, though. I was coming out with her body, or I wasn't coming out at all.

All I needed was a way in, and I'd made one. For the Walkers and for me. This was win-win. I was done waiting for Negan's surrender. Now that I knew they'd most likely only be returning Naomi's body to bury, I wasn't interested in making this peaceful. I wanted every last one of them to suffer. There were even more Walkers than I'd bargained for, though. If I got too close, I risked distracting them away from the building. I shot at one of them. Took it out with a single bullet to the brain.

"Daryl, what the hell is going on down there?" Morgan yelled over the radio. He sounded out of breath like he might have been running to come and stop me. I ignored him again and darted out from where I was shielded from the Walkers. I grabbed the one I'd shot by the feet and started to drag it back to where I'd been so that I could cut it open and cover myself in its guts. Get in there with the Walkers without them smelling me.

I was about halfway back when something rolled and scraped against the ground under the truck. The glint of metal around it was what caught my eye. I thought maybe part of the truck had got broken in the crash and had now come loose under the pressure of the Walkers crushing against it, shaking it as they passed by. But then something rolled out from underneath.

Lucille.

All I could do was stare at it. Where the Hell had it come from? Was I imagining it?

Something shifted beneath the truck, and I saw a shadow moving there. Bigger than a bat and struggling more than an engine piece. It was a person crawling out of there.

Negan?

Had driving a truck into the side of this place accomplished nothing but giving him a way out? I'd never forgive myself if he lived. Not after everything he'd done. Everything he'd taken from us. I raised my gun. I would not let him live long enough to see the other side of the Sanctuary. The moment his head came out from under there I'd shoot. Execution style. Seemed too good for a guy like him, and I'd wanted to look him in the eye when I made him pay for what he'd taken from me. A single bullet was too quick and painless, but I had to take that shot. I needed this.

A hand shot out from underneath. I should have realized right there and then that the hand was too small to be Negan's, but I didn't. I was too blinded by my own rage, my hatred. I wanted that son of a bitch dead, and it felt so close.

"Hey, Morgan, you see that?" I yelled into my radio.

"See what?" Morgan replied. Still sounded like he was running. "Daryl, what the hell are you doing out there?"

"It's Negan," I told him. "I think I got him."

Walkers around the back of the truck had noticed that someone was trying to get out. A few of them started to turn to where the hand was clawing desperately at the ground, probably in search of Lucille. Their shuffling feet blocked my view of where the top of a head was emerging. I thought about taking out the Walkers, clearing them so I'd have a straight shot at his head, but I didn't. Seeing him get torn to pieces by them wouldn't be so bad either. I hoped they ate him slow. Saved all the vital organs until last.

A second hand came out from under the truck, and I moved closer, ready to take my shot if the Walkers around him didn't do what they were supposed to. In moving around to take a shot, I got a better look at that second hand.

And the crescent moon scar that was on it.

Naomi.

For two heartbeats, everything stopped. My whole body froze up. My finger still on the trigger. Shock and disbelief seized me. After all this time, existing on nothing but other people's word that she was alive. After being so sure that Negan had killed her when we'd lead Walkers to this place. Could that really be her hand? Or was I imagining that scar, dreaming it up out of nothing but hope?

And then she pulled herself out, her head and shoulders reaching for Negan's bat as the Walkers closest to her broke away from the ones that were streaming into the Sanctuary. Their dead hands reached for her, and mine sprang back to life. I shot at the ones who'd turned toward her. When I looked back at her, she was on her feet, Lucille gripped tight in one hand.

The scream that came out of her as she swung that bat, I'd never heard a sound like it. Scream ain't even the right word for it. It was more like a battle cry. It was all the pain and rage that had built in her in this place. It tore out of her. Sounded strong enough to rip her in half.

More Walkers turned her way, drawn to that scream. She was ready for them. Like the fight was now such a part of who she was that it had become all she was. There was so much anger in her eyes. So much more fire than I'd ever seen in her. A dangerous amount. Could burn her right up from the inside out if no one put a stop to it. She'd been fighting alone for so long, I didn't think she knew how to stop.

My girl, she's made of fire and steel.

I tried to call out to her, to reach her in that dark place, but I was so choked up at the sight of her that her name got caught in my throat. I kept shooting as she fought her way further from the truck. There were so many of them, but I had her back. I would always have her back.

I took a shot, and the last Walker that was a threat to her dropped to the ground. She looked around for more, ready for them, but she was far enough away now that the rest of them were more interested in getting into Sanctuary than getting her. Naomi looked back at the one I'd shot for a moment like she'd only just realized some of the Walkers around her were dropping without her fighting them and thought they were falling of their own accord. And then she slowly put the pieces together and looked up. Looked at me.

All of the anger and pain on her face dissolved for a moment, and she stared at me like she couldn't believe what she was seeing. Like it was a miracle that I was here, not that she'd just crawled her way out of Hell.

There was so much blood on her. The front of her shirt was stained with it. It soaked through the sleeve over one of her arms. It all looked fresh, but there was no way she could've lost that much blood and still be standing, still be fighting. Right? New bruises covered old ones. Tiny half-healed cuts marked up one side of her face.

The Hell have they put her through in here?

How could I let this go on for so long?

"Naomi," I said. It was all I could say. All I could think, feel. The sound of my voice seemed to snap her out of her shock, and she ran at me.

I opened my arms just in time for her to fly into them. I held her tight. Her arms wrapped around my shoulders, and it was like once I was holding her, she let some of the anger in her go. She let someone else hold her up after weeks of doing it alone.

There was so much I wanted to say to her, but I couldn't get it out. That hollow emptiness inside of me was filling up fast, and it hurt. Relief, joy, hope, love... things I thought I wouldn't feel again flooded back all at once. I closed my eyes for a moment, knew I'd break down if I didn't, and I concentrated on how she felt in my arms again. The smell of her hair. The way she fit so perfectly against me. In the middle of a goddamn courtyard of Walkers, I was home. She held me together, like always.

She pulled back so she could look at my face. Her hands brushed the hair from it while her eyes searched every inch of it like she expected it to be some kind of trick. Then her eyes met mine in that way that feels like she can see into my soul. I used to hide from that kind of look. Look away from her because I didn't know what kind of man she'd see in me.

"It's really you," she said, a tremor in her voice. She was close to tears. I knew that if she started crying, I would too, and we might never make it out of here. "You're really here."

Fuck.

Oh, fuck.

I should've come here a hell of a lot sooner.

For a moment, my arms around her were all that kept her standing, and I would've stayed that way forever. Or at least, for as long as she needed me to hold her up. But the longer we stayed here, the more Walkers at the back of the crowd would turn our way. The more danger we were in of getting shot at from the windows.

We had to move.

"Are you hurt?" I asked her. I didn't mind carrying her away from this place if I had to. I still didn't know why there was blood all over her. If it came from her or someone else. "Can you run?"

She just nodded. Didn't make it clear which question she was answering, but I guessed both were true. I didn't know which parts of her hurt, so I put a gentle hand on her back as we started to run, lightly steering her to where Morgan had said it was clear. Back to where the cars were, that would take us both home.

Bullets cracked above our heads. Didn't know if it was our snipers keeping us safe from Walkers we were running into the path of or if it was Negan's guys. It was too hard to tell.

Our feet pounded the pavement, and I could not stop looking over at her. Felt like if I took my eyes off her for too long, she'd disappear. She had this wild, lost look in her eye that scared me. Guilt snapped at my heels as we ran. Whatever she'd been through in there, whatever it was that had got this look on her face, it was on me. I should have come back sooner. I never should have left her in the first place.

I wanted to stop everything, go back to that moment where it was just her and me so that I could apologize to her, but we were coming up on the spare cars, and I could see Michonne and Rosita up ahead. They hadn't left yet, both leaning up against the hood of one of the cars. Maybe they were still debating whether or not they'd done the right thing. Maybe they were waiting for me. Either way, they straightened up when they saw me coming, and their mouths dropped open when they saw who was running with me.

"Hey!" I yelled over to them. "You got a first-aid kit?"

Rosita dove into the trunk of one of the cars while Michonne ran toward us. Morgan burst out of the door of one of the buildings. Michonne reached us and pulled Naomi in for a hug while she looked at me with more disbelief than I'd ever seen.

"You did it," she said to me. Then she pulled back and looked at Naomi. "Hey, you alright?"

Naomi didn't answer. I'm not even sure she heard. She was breathing hard, her face was pale, and she looked like she was about to fall down.

"Course she ain't alright, you seen all that blood on her?" I snapped. I knew I'd said it too loud as it was coming out, but I couldn't stop myself. I was terrified. I looked for Rosita, "The hell's that first-aid kit?"

"Here!" Rosita yelled back. She was moving fast, but I wasn't sure it was fast enough. She opened up the medkit, started pulling bandages out as she ran.

"That ain't Negan," Morgan said with a smile as he reached us.

Michonne stepped aside so Rosita could take a look at Naomi, "Okay, what hurts?"

Naomi held out her hand. She'd been holding it in a loose fist, and when she uncurled her fingers, it opened up a deep but thin cut across her palm. Like she'd been slashed with something. Felt like I'd been slashed with something when I looked at it.

"Who did that to you?" I asked. I wanted a whole list of names. Anyone who'd laid a finger on her in there was getting skinned alive and dipped in acid.

"Daryl," Morgan said calmly, putting a hand on my shoulder. "Now isn't the time for-"

I rounded on him. "It'll tell you what now's the time for-"

"It's okay," Rosita shouted, shutting both of us up. "I can bandage this, and it'll be fine until Denise can take a look back in Alexandria. Are you hurt anywhere else?"

Naomi didn't answer right away. It looked to me like she was hurt just about everywhere. Every time I looked at her, I saw something new. Some new cut or bruise that she'd probably got days ago. Days that I'd been sitting around doing nothing when I could've been here getting her out.

Naomi was looking at that cut on her hand like she couldn't even feel it. Rosita glanced up at me. She was worried. So was I.

Rosita finished bandaging her hand, and then Naomi used it to move the collar of her flannel shirt down and over her shoulder. There were a whole bunch of cuts there, and they all looked uniform like they'd been made by the same thing. The same small knife? But who would do something like that? Sab someone over and over in the same place with the same small object?

How could someone do that to her? It was sadistic even by the Savior's standards. And there was almost a pattern to it too; most of them looked evenly spaced. What left marks like that?

And then it dawned on me: Lucille.

It was marks left from barbed wire being pressed into her skin. I ain't squeamish, but I could've thrown up right there and then. Negan had done this to her, beaten and abused her. I couldn't breathe, couldn't stomach it.

Had he caught her on the way out? Tried to stop her? Or was this just the last of what she'd been subjected to while I sat on my ass?

Rosita covered her arm with another bandage, and Naomi pulled her shirt back up, but it didn't make me feel any better. So much blood all over her. Why wasn't she screaming or crying or saying something?

"Okay," Rosita took a step back. "That's all I can do, for now. We should get going."

"That can't be it," I said. "You can't be done."

"I am."

"Nah," I said. "All that blood didn't come from just them places."

"Maybe not," Rosita said. "But she's not bleeding anywhere else."

How could she be sure? Naomi hadn't said anything, and it would be just like her to have been stabbed in the gut and not tell anyone because she didn't want to worry them. Worry me.

"Check her over," I snapped at Rosita. I wasn't taking any chances.

"Daryl," Rosita snapped back. "I am doing my best, but I don't see any other cuts. Will you calm down for half a second?"

"I ain't-"

"She's in shock," Rosita said firmly. "I need you to calm down. She needs it."

Shock.

From what?

I glared at Rosita, breathing hard. I couldn't take any of it. The blood. The silence. I knew Rosita wasn't wrong, but my heart was still beating as hard as it had been when I'd been running. I still didn't feel like we were out of danger. Naomi was right in front of me, but it still felt like I was losing her.

I looked at her, and her eyes met mine. She saw something in them, saw that I needed her, and it pulled her back.

"Negan's," Naomi said. She said it quietly, but it was enough to stop all of us in our tracks. "It's Negan's blood."

Suddenly her calmness made sense. There was a storm all around us, and she was the eye of it. Things started to fall into place. I couldn't believe that it had taken so long to question why she was the one holding that damn bat in her uninjured hand. I'd been so glad to see her alive that I hadn't questioned any of it.

Naomi swallowed hard. Around us, I felt Michonne, Rosita, and Morgan exchange a look that was filled with hope and dread all at once. But I didn't take my eyes off Naomi.

"Did you say Negan's?" Michonne asked very calmly, to make sure we'd got it crystal-clear. Naomi looked at her and nodded. Michonne took a few deep breaths, "What happened in there?"

"I made it back into Sanctuary when you guys left," she said. "When I saw all the Walkers, I knew I wouldn't be able to get out, so I waited for Negan. I thought if I killed him, they'd surrender faster. Dwight gave me a gun, but… it was out of bullets."

"That son of a bitch," I fumed. "When I get my hands on him-"

"He didn't know," Naomi said quickly. "Negan tricked him. We fought."

"You and Negan?" Morgan asked to check again that she wasn't talking about Dwight. She nodded.

"He swung Lucille at me, I dodged it, but she got my arm," she said. She gestured down at her arm like any of us needed any reminding of the cuts she had there. "I hit him a couple of times, but he... uh... he got me on the floor. Pinned me there. He was about to use Lucille, but then... the building shook when Daryl..."

She looked up at me, and the end of her sentence trailed off into nothing.

"When Daryl drove the truck into the building," Michonne finished for her. She nodded.

"Negan was distracted," she said. "I had this piece of glass in my pocket. A piece of a mirror he'd thrown me into-"

"He fucking what?"

"Daryl!" Rosita shushed me.

"I got it out of my pocket. I grabbed it," Naomi said, holding up her bandaged hand to show that this was where she'd injured it. "He was leaning over me, and I just... swiped at him. I slit his throat."

Holy shit.

A silence settled over all of us. I didn't know what to say to her. Or how to say it. I didn't know what she needed. Nobody else seemed to know what to say to her, either. She looked at me then, like I was the only thing holding her in this world. "I think I killed him."

I took a few steps towards her. She flinched a little like she wasn't expecting it and didn't want it, so I stopped.

"What do you mean, you think?" Rosita asked.

"I don't know for sure," she said. "He was bleeding. A lot. I shoved him off me. I was going to finish it with Lucille, but then Dwight came in... to tell me you were..."

Again, she looked at me. And again, she trailed off. I remembered that look of disbelief on her face when she'd seen me. Even though she apparently knew I was out there. She looked away from me again and shook her head like she was annoyed at herself.

"I should've stayed to check," she said. "I should've made sure. I'm sorry, I knew I only had a minute or two before there were too many Walkers coming in for me to get out under that truck, so I just... left. I shouldn't have... I just wanted to come home."

"You did the right thing," I said. There was something so desperately sad in her eyes. I wanted her to look at me so I could fix it. "Hey. You don't gotta be sorry for this. If the son of a bitch survived somehow, we'll get him. You did the right thing coming home."

"You did," Michonne agreed. "But we need to get moving. We need to get home. This changes things."

"I'll get the car," Rosita said, turning to head back to the one she'd got the medical kit out of.

Michonne looked at Morgan, "You heard from Rick?"

"Not today," he said. "But I'll get the word out, see if I can get him on the radio. I listen in to any Savior channels I can find too, see if I get any news from them."

"Keep us updated," she said, turning to follow Rosita back to the car. Morgan hesitated, looking and where Naomi and I stood like our feet were stuck to the concrete. They'd all sprung back into action so quick, but I could tell Naomi needed more time. I wanted to give it to her. I wanted to give her the world.

"You good?" I asked her quietly, taking another few steps toward her. She nodded. I pulled her towards me again, let her rest her head on my chest. This time when I held her, I was sure to be gentle with her. I didn't know how badly bruised she was everywhere else.

"Let's go home, please," she mumbled into my shoulder.

I'm already there.

"Let's go," I said. We walked over to the car and sat together in the back seat.

The drive was long and quiet. Hardly anyone spoke. I'm sure Michonne and Rosita were trying to process Negan's death and what this might mean for the future of our war, but I was hardly thinking about that. I kept glancing and Naomi, playing everything she'd said over and over in my head until it was all bent out of shape. She was withdrawing, and I'd never known how to reach her when she did that.

Last time, I'd gone behind her back and tried to find things out for myself. I couldn't do that this time; I wouldn't make the same mistake again. I had to try. For her, and for us.

She barely looked at me. Anytime she did, she looked on the verge of saying something, and then she changed her mind. I was so preoccupied with it all, I didn't even realize when we got close to Alexandria.

"We'll park up here and walk the rest," Michonne said. She looked back at both of us. "That alright with you?"

There were still cars and blockages up on the way into Alexandria. Parking and walking the rest of the way was the easiest thing by far. Naomi nodded, so I nodded too.

"She okay?" Rosita asked quietly as we all piled out.

I wish I knew.

"You two go up ahead and get Denise," I told them. "I want her checked over before we deal with anything else, you understand?"

"We'll look after her, Daryl," Michonne said with a smile like I was overreacting, but they both walked ahead like I asked.

Naomi and I walked in silence for a moment. My heart was a drum deep in my chest. She still wouldn't look at me. It as like she couldn't. I had to make this right, whatever it was. If she was going to open up to me, I needed to take that first step.

"C'mon," I turned to her and held out my hand for her to take. She stared at it like she had no idea what I was doing. I thought for a second that I'd offered her the wrong one and she was hesitating because she didn't want to take it with her injured hand. But I hadn't.

"What?" I said, trying to take the pressure off. "You can slit a guy's throat, but you can't hold hands with your own damn boyfriend?"

"Boyfriend, huh?" she repeated. I felt my ears start to get warm and knew they'd turned red. But there was a smile on her face for the first time that day, so I didn't mind.

"Well… we ain't gotta label it if you don't want to," I said, and I could feel every beat of my heart. "But… I think we're past all that, don't you?"

I sure as shit knew I was. After all this, I was done trying to play it cool. My outstretched hand hung in the air between us. Naomi looked at it but still didn't take it. Felt like my ears were on fire.

"I really thought I was gonna die in there," she said quietly. No hint in her voice that she was mad at me or holding a grudge over it. It was a small but mighty punch in the gut all the same. Was she rethinking this... us?

While I'd been out here missing her like Hell, had she been in there realizing she didn't want to be with me? Had leaving her there so long made her think I didn't care? That I wasn't good enough?

She wasn't wrong. I didn't disagree, but it hurt all the same. I was losing her again. In a much bigger way.

"I'm sorry," I said. I'd meant to think of some better way of saying it, but during that whole car ride I hadn't come up with anything. 'Sorry' felt too small, too meaningless. You say sorry when you accidentally stand on someone's foot, not when you leave them to be beaten and tortured. "I shouldn't have left you there. I should've turned around and found you the moment I realized you weren't with us."

"You took care of Mia," she said, shaking her head. "You did what I asked. That's all I needed."

"Alright, I should've come back for you then," I said. "Sooner, I mean. The next day, I should've been there. I should've been there when Rick showed up. I… could've stopped it. I could've…"

"You did all the right things," she said. "I knew you would."

Then why does it feel like it wasn't enough?

Why does it feel like you're breaking up with me over it?

"I should've done more," I said. I needed her to know she could count on me. To protect her as well as Mia. That even if she walked away from me now, she'd never be rid of me.

Please don't walk away.

"I'll make it right. I promise," I said. I didn't know how I'd keep that promise, not when there were so many things I'd done wrong, but desperation pulled the words from my heart to my mouth. "I'll make it right, Naomi, I swear. I'll make it up to you. Every day for the rest of my life, I'll..."

I stopped. I couldn't get anything else out, I was so overwhelmed by the whole thing, and I don't think she was taking in a damn word of it. She took a deep breath like she was about to speak.

No.

This is it.

Fuck.

"Naomi, please don't-" I started.

"Daryl, I love you," she said.

Wait, what?

I stopped trying to talk. Felt like everything stopped, that I must have blacked out for a moment. I was sure I'd misheard. That I'd talked over the end of what she'd really said.

Did she say she loves me like a brother?

Was that it?

Because I don't think I can hear that, not today.

Had my stress caused some kind of denial-based hallucination as I struggled to accept what was happening here? I must've got it wrong somehow. She looked too calm to have said what I thought she had. Didn't think Naomi could have said anything like that without freaking out.

"You ain't gotta say anything or feel any kind of way about it," she said quickly. "I know it's a lot to take in. Hell, it's a lot for me to take in, but… I thought I'd die in there without ever getting to tell you. And I kept thinking that it was such bullshit that I've been in love with you forever, and you didn't know it because I'd been too young and dumb to realize."

In love with me?

That was twice now. She'd said it two different ways.

Is this for real?

Is this really happening?

Wait, why am I not saying anything back?

"What I did," she said. "Killing Negan... It's going to require an answer. The Saviors will come back. Maybe today, maybe next week. Hell, even if they don't, a Walker could get either one of us at any point. There's always some shit going down, someone else to fight. I just... don't want to die without you knowing. And now, you know."

And then she shrugged.

A goddamn shrug.

Like this was the most normal conversation in the whole wide world, and not the most life-changing words I'd ever heard.

'Daryl, I love you.'

'I've been in love with you forever.'

That was what she'd said, right? I couldn't wrap my head around it. She lingered for a moment, and then she started to walk away from me. I heard the squeak of Alexandria's gates opening up.

No.

I'm not ready yet.

I grabbed her arm. I wasn't ready to let her go or be surrounded by other people. This moment had been just us, and I was letting it slip right by. She turned back to me. I think she was about to say something, but she never got the chance. I caught a second of confusion on her face before I kissed her.

I caught her off guard, and her hands took hold of my shoulders to steady herself. I wrapped her up in my arms and pulled her to me as she kissed me back. I wanted her to feel that she was mine. That I'd never let her go again as long as I lived.

Feeling her lips on mine, the taste of her, I'd never get used to it. It opened up that hunger in me I'd never felt before. It made everything else shrink away. It was her and me and this kiss, and nothing else existed. I kissed her harder, deeper, tried to pour all of the things I couldn't say into that one kiss.

I love you, too.

I could say it, right? God knows I'd tried to enough times. I could just come out and say it.

"Naomi!" someone yelled. Probably the only person in the world who could've interrupted this without me being mad at them.

Naomi pulled away from me, and the world came crashing back down around us. The gates to Alexandria were open, and Mia was running full speed out of them, calling Naomi's name over and over. I watched the smile break out across Naomi's face, and it was so beautiful it made my heart soar.

She's mine. This girl is mine.

Naomi let go of me raced to her sister. I watched them meet in the middle and wrap each other up in a hug so big it sent them both toppling to the ground. My girls. Back together.

I walked toward them both, my lips still tingling from that kiss. My heart still racing a million miles an hour. I felt light-headed. Light all over. As I got closer to them, I couldn't tell if my girls were crying or laughing or a bit of both, but when I looked at them my heart felt full for the first time in my life.

This was it. This was what I'd been fighting for. And Naomi was right. Any of us could die at any point. This might be all we got, but this moment right here, that was what it had all been about. I would lay down my life for the pair of them.

I was going to leave them to it, walk away from them and give them some privacy. Didn't want to intrude on this reunion. But then Mia mumbled something into her hair, and Naomi turned and said, "Yeah, he's right there."

They both looked back at me, through teary, happy eyes.

"Hey," Mia said.

"Hey." I didn't know what to do, what to say. If they both thought I was weird for standing around looking at them. They sure seemed amused by something.

Then Naomi held out an arm and beckoned me over. "Get in here, dumbass."

I knelt down on the ground beside them and wrapped my arms around them both.

Chapter 43: Dumbass

Notes:

This is a pretty slow chapter. Sorry if that's not your thing, I just felt like they deserved a break after everything that's happened hahah.

Naomi 

Warm water hit my head and back. Tension flowed out of my shoulders as I watched the water at my feet turn a dark reddish-brown. I bit back the urge to scream as it hit cuts that hadn't healed yet and braced myself for adding the sting of soap.

Some of Negan's blood had soaked right through Dwight's shirt and onto my skin.

Watching it all swirl down the drain and mix with mine was the first time I fully realized how much blood I was caked in. It was a miracle nobody had shot me thinking I was a Walker. It was a wonder Mia hadn't run away from me in terror. It was a wonder all of them hadn't.

It might not have been the best idea to tell someone you love them in this state.

It felt like my stomach was sinking down the drain now. There was probably a fair amount of that mess that was dirt too, I couldn't remember the last shower I'd had. Probably smelt like a Walker.

No wonder Daryl didn't say it back.

No, stop it, that's not why you said it. 

I'd felt so calm when I said it, told myself that it was all about just getting it out. It was all I'd been able to think every time I looked at Daryl anyway. I'd sat in the car and tried to think of ways to avoid saying it, but it all felt so pointless. If the Saviors came for me and one of us died, I'd regret keeping my mouth shut. I thought if I got it over with and said it, I’d be able to go back to functioning like a normal human being around him. Hang out like we used to. But, here I was, hiding in the shower to avoid dealing with any of it. 

After what I'd done at Sanctuary, there were questions to be answered and plans to put in place. Shit to get done. I knew this, and yet all I could think about was Daryl and whether or not I'd totally freaked him out. I'd have to face him alone again at some point. Maybe we could both pretend it hadn't happened, and things would be fine. 

But that kiss… holy shit . 

That. Kiss. 

That kiss was so good it had messed me up. Turned me from calm and collected, sure of myself and my decision, to this obsessive mess who couldn’t get out of the shower and face the real world. 

Goddamn, Daryl.

I closed my eyes and shivered even under the warm water. He'd been treating me like I was made of glass right up until that moment. Every time he touched me, it was so gentle, so hesitant, it drove me crazy. Then he’d grabbed me, pulled me to him. I'd caught a fire burning in his eyes and felt that same heat on his lips seconds later. 

I'd be lying if I said I didn't lose myself a little bit. For a moment, all I knew was Daryl. His lips. His tongue. His hands running across my back, my hips. Sure, he’d hit on a couple of bruises, but the small amount of pain that had caused was nothing compared to how damn good it felt to have him hold me like that. It was dizzying.

No wonder I couldn’t think about anything but him. 

A soft knock at the door pulled me sharply back to reality. My eyes snapped open to a room filled with steam. The water by my feet had probably been running clear for a while. 

"Hey, you okay in there?" Daryl's voice floated through the door. He sounded worried. 

"Yeah," I called back. "Out in a sec."

My heart was beating so hard it made me feel sick. I had no idea how long I'd been in there. I shut the shower off, grabbed my towel, and wrapped it around myself.

When I opened the door, Daryl was gone. Like I might have imagined his voice in the first place. As if the memory of that kiss was enough for me to daydream so hard I thought I was actually hearing him. 

I could hear voices downstairs and wondered where the hell Eric and Aaron had gotten to. I hadn't seen either of them since I'd got back. I crossed the hallway to my old room. I assumed it was still mine, nobody had told me otherwise, and there’d be some fresh, non-bloodied clothes in there. 

I stopped in the doorway. Daryl was in my room, and I wasn't expecting it. My heart skipped a beat. 

“Oh. Hey," I said. He looked up at me for a split second and then swiftly away again. 

Oh, God, I can’t do this. 

"Shit, sorry," he said and hurriedly turned around, so he had his back to me. "I was just, uh, laying some clothes out for you. I didn't mean to… uh, I'll... leave you to it."

He didn’t move, kept his back to me. Clean clothes had been folded across the railing at the foot of the bed.

“Okay, thanks,” I said from the doorway, expecting him to turn and walk past me. He still didn’t move.

“I really did just come to check on you,” he said, sounding weirdly nervous. “You’d been a while. Thought you might have fainted or something, and then I didn’t know you’d come out of there so fast, so I was tryna help-”

“I know, Daryl,” I said, taking a few steps into the room and trying to be as casual as possible. “It’s fine. Really.” 

The second I moved away from the door, he moved too, inching toward it and doing his damnedest not to look at me. 

"What's up with you?" I said, trying to lighten the mood. "You can drive a truck through a wall, but you can't look at your own girlfriend in a towel?"

The tips of his ears poking out from his dark hair turned a deep shade of red.

Please don’t make this weird. 

Call me a dumbass, an idiot. Anything that will make this normal again.

"Nah," he said, but his voice came out all gruff, and then he cleared his throat. "Just don’t want you thinking I’m some kind of creep, is all."

“I don’t,” I said, and I wanted to laugh, but now that we’d drawn attention to it, I felt a little exposed in more ways than one. I tugged the towel tighter around me. 

Is this his way of telling me I came on too strong, and he wants to dial it back?

Or stop altogether?

"Naomi, I-" Daryl stopped in the doorway, still with his back to me. I waited for as long as I could, but the silence stretched everything on, and each passing moment tightened the knot in my stomach.

"Yeah?" I said when I couldn't stand it anymore. 

"Don't be too long, alright?" he said. I thought I saw him steal a glance over his shoulder, and his ears started to flush again. "Don't like it when you ain't around."

The way he said it made something in my chest ache. I wanted to say something back, but before I could get my head straight, he'd closed the door softly behind him. I heard the creak of his feet on the stairs.

What the hell was that?

I went to sink down onto the bed to collect myself and then realized there wasn't a mattress there anymore. Negan's doing, no doubt. Still finding ways to fuck with me even after I'd killed him. 

Maybe killed him, I reminded myself. 

It was weird to be back in my old room. Stranger still that I hadn't seen Aaron or Eric yet. The whole time I'd been in Sanctuary, I'd been thinking about the moment I'd get to go home again, and every time I'd pictured home, it had been the same as when I'd left. But things had changed here, and they were still changing. 

I dried myself off and got dressed. I'd just started toweling off my hair as someone knocked on the door again. My whole body froze up. Was it Daryl? Back for more excruciating weirdness? I wasn’t sure I could cope. 

"Uh… yeah, come in," I called. The door opened, and Mia popped her head around it. I let out an audible sigh of relief. 

“Daryl sent me up to check on you,” she said with a small, apologetic smile. “Think he was worried you’d tripped on a trouser leg, hit your head, and died.”

“Nope,” I said. “Just drying my hair. I can't have been more than five minutes, though, right? Are we in some kinda hurry I don't know about?"

"He just worries," Mia said, barely suppressing a laugh. Her grin was only widening. "And he's not wrong; you should let Denise check you over. Your hand is bleeding again."

I looked down at it. I'd been doing my best not to move it, but she was right. 

"Shit," I muttered and took the towel I'd just been using on my hair to mop up the beads of blood that were rolling down my wrist. I glanced up at Mia. I'd known I would have to tell her about Daryl and me at some point, but I had no idea how to bring it up. We'd never had to have this kind of talk before. I concentrated really hard on wrapping my hand in that towel and tried to be as casual as I could about it, “So, er… while we're on the subject. Daryl and I are… sort of… well, we-"

"Are madly in love? Yeah, I know."

"Mia!" I said. I didn't really mean to, but even the word 'love' made my heart leap like I was on some kind of roller coaster.

"Alright, well, dating then. Is that what you want to call it?" she said. "Will that freak you out less?"

"Yeah," I said. "I guess that's more… accurate. How did you know?"

"Oh, c'mon," she rolled her eyes. "Do you really think I missed you guys making out outside the gates? Even the Walkers were waiting for y'all to get a room."

"Oh, God," I muttered, willing the ground to swallow me whole. 

"And even if I somehow missed that," she continued. "I already kinda knew."

"Did Daryl say something to you?" I asked. Before the shit hit the fan, we hadn't really told anyone anything. We'd been too busy trying to muddle through something so new and yet so familiar. And it was still new, even if I'd had these feelings for longer than I'd known, acting on them was still proving… complicated. 

"No, but I was there when Sherry and Jesus came back without you," she said. "I saw how cut-up he was about it. How hard he's been fighting to bring you back. I've heard how he talks about you, the way he looks at you… And before that, I watched you miss him for years . He's been missing you just the same. He's crazy about you. You have to see that, don't you?"

"You don't know that," I said. "You don't know Daryl like I do. He's... one of a kind. He doesn't get close to many people, but when he does, he cares more than anyone. It's intense, but it doesn't mean that he… that things will work out between us. And if they don't…"

"They will."

" If they don't, " I talked over her. "I need you to know he'll still be there for you, and he'll want to be part of your life, even if he's not in mine. But if any part of this makes you uncomfortable, if even the idea of Daryl and I-"

“Don’t you dare,” she said. 

“What?” I asked.

“Don’t you dare put that on me,” she said. “I know you spent a lot of time hiding relationships and not committing to anyone when I was little because you were worried about me. And I put up with it because I always thought you were secretly just waiting until you and Daryl made up. But I'm grown-up now, and I want you to be happy. Really happy.”

I stared at her for a moment, and she stared right back like she was challenging me to disagree with her. I wanted to tell her that thirteen wasn't as grown up as she thought it was, but I knew it wasn't what she meant. She was old enough to take on Walkers, to fight in this war. She was mature enough to understand these things. Above all, she had inadvertently reminded me that it was okay if Daryl never loved me back. He'd still always care about me the same way he did now, and it would hurt, but I could live with that.

"When did you get so grown up?" I asked her.

She shrugged. 

"Hey!" Daryl yelled up the stairs. "The hell's taking so long? She okay up there?" 

Mia grinned and wiggled her eyebrows at me in a way that said I told you so. Then she turned and yelled, "Be down in a sec," over her shoulder. Daryl grumbled something neither of us caught and stomped off toward the kitchen again. 

"Alright, let's go before he blows a fuse," I said. 

"Yeah, you should get down there," Mia said. "Not just because Daryl's climbing the walls. You've got a visitor."

"A visitor?"

"Yeah," she grinned again. "Come see."

I followed her down the stairs, expecting Eric or Aaron, although I couldn't work out why Mia would call them 'visitors,' given that this was their house. But it was Bryce, leaning against one of the kitchen surfaces while Daryl paced around by the back door. 

"Jesus, finally, " Daryl muttered when we reached the bottom of the stairs. I ignored his complaints and focused on Bryce. 

"Hello, stranger," I said. He straightened up. A big grin broke out on his face. "Long time no see. Sorry I didn’t come visit. I got a little tied up."

"What are we going to do with you?" he said, pulling me in for a hug. "Do you think you can go five minutes without getting in some kind of trouble and giving the rest of us a heart attack, please?" 

"No promises," I said, hugging him back. "What the hell are you doing in Alexandria? Did the King kick you out?"

"I brought Mia here," he said, but there was an odd pause before he said it. Like I’d accidentally stepped on something I shouldn’t. Something sensitive. "I stayed to fight with the militia here, which… I guess probably saved my-"

"Alright, let's break this up," Daryl cut him off and immediately set off a thousand alarm bells. "We got places to be, c'mon."

I stepped away from Bryce and glanced between the two of them. The last time they'd been in the same room together, Daryl had looked like he wanted to rip Bryce's throat out for no reason. That hostility didn't seem to be there anymore, but I didn't miss the look that passed between them. Something was up. Something had happened, and they weren’t telling me.

"He's right," Bryce said before I could grill either of them about it. "Let's get you checked over, yeah?" 

Daryl had the door open faster than I could blink. Impatience was radiating off him. He turned and gave me a look that bordered on a glare before he realized I was doing as he asked and moving toward him. 

Carl was out on the porch, heading up the steps. He tipped his dad's old cop hat to us as we came out. I greeted him, glad to see that he was alright after his own ordeal at the Sanctuary. 

He smiled back. "Good to have you home. I was just stopping by to-"

"It can wait," Daryl told him. He put a hand between my shoulder blades and gently propelled me forward so I couldn't stop and talk.

"I heard what happened at the Sanctuary," Carl said. "We need to talk about it. About our next steps. My dad's not back yet, but if you wait a minute, Michonne's going to-"

"No. No more people," Daryl said flatly. "It's like a damn parade up in here as it is." 

"Thought he'd be in a better mood once you got back," Carl muttered as Daryl hurried me past him. I turned and mouthed, 'Sorry.' I'd been prepared for this freakout. He'd been the same when I'd been injured at the first Savior Outpost. Once Denise had given me the all-clear, I was sure he'd calm down. 

"You can ask her your damn questions later," Daryl said. "Right now, she's got a doctor's appointment, and y'all are keeping her from it."

He marched me over there faster than anyone else could keep up. Rosita was waiting outside the front door. 

“Denise is away at the moment,” she said. “But if you head in, there’s a new-”

"The hell is she?" Daryl interrupted her. 

"She has other patients. A lot of people got hurt in-"

"Go get her," Daryl did not let Rosita finish.

“I can wait, I’m fine,” I tried to assure him and back Rosita up. I knew she was facing an uphill battle.

“If you’d just listen to me-”

“Go get her,” Daryl said again. She started to say something in protest, but I never caught it because Daryl turned to me and said, "Wait inside, yeah?" 

I wanted to argue, to push back and tell him that we had time to go over a few things with Carl while we waited for Denise. This wasn't any kind of emergency. I wasn't about to drop down dead. But I could see the fear in his eyes, quietly hiding behind his surly anger. I knew if the roles were reversed, I'd be just as afraid, so I held back every impulse to talk back and stepped into Denise's office. Daryl stood outside with his back to it like he was some kind of bodyguard. His argument with Rosita continued beyond the door. 

Someone cleared their throat from inside the infirmary room, and I almost screamed. I whipped around and found a man standing by the infirmary bed. I didn't know him, and the sudden realization that I was unarmed almost sent me into a tailspin. I backed away from him. Every muscle in my body tensed up, nothing about this guy was threatening, but I was so used to fighting that it was impossible not to slip into that mode. Fists clenched and ready. Daryl's name rose in my throat, and I was so damn glad he was only on the other side of the door.  

"Sorry," the man said immediately, raising his hands to show that he was unarmed. "I didn't mean to startle you."

"Who are you?" I asked. 

"My name is Siddiq," he said. "I'm new here. I have some medical training, and I just… want to help."

Another change I hadn't prepared for, but now that I was calming down, it felt like a good one. Even in wartime, we could take in new people and grow our community. I forced a smile, but my heart was racing. Maybe I wasn't adjusting to being home quite as fast as I thought.

"Sorry… it's been… I've been. Well, I've had a… weird day," I said, realizing that it was far too long a story to bore this stranger with. "I'm Naomi." 

"Rosita said you'd be here," Siddiq said, relaxing slightly. "You're the one who was taken by those people, right? The ones your people are fighting?" 

"Uh… yeah," I said. I wondered if that's what I'd be to everyone from now on. 

"How are you feeling?" he asked. He had kind eyes, and it seemed like a genuine question, but the truth was I still wasn't sure. 

Well, I killed a man and told another man I'd been in love with him since childhood, so…

"Overwhelmed," I said, honestly. Didn't much feel like bearing my soul to this stranger no matter how kind his eyes were. His eyebrows shot up a little. 

"Oh, I meant your hand," he said, pointing to my towel-clad hand. "And Rosita said something about your shoulder, too?"

"Oh, right. That ." I said, feeling like a bit of an idiot. I started to unwrap the towel from around my hand. Siddiq took a step forward. "Yeah, it hurts, but it's not so-"

Before I could finish, the door burst open, and Daryl stormed in, gun raised and yelling, "Step away asshole!"

Siddiq jumped back, raised his arms again so Daryl could see he was unarmed. 

"Daryl, it's okay," I said. 

"The hell are you doing?" he snapped at me. "You don't know this guy. He could be working for Negan."

"I think if Negan was going to come and get me, he'd send more than one very polite man," I said. 

"Yeah, that's what he'd want you to think," Daryl said. He gestured to Siddiq with his gun. "Get on your knees."

Rosita rushed in after him. “Daryl, stop!”

"My name is Siddiq," Siddiq said, very calmly dropping to his knees. "I just arrived here. I have medical training."

"Just arrived, huh?" Daryl said. "That's damn convenient. How'd you find us?"

“Daryl, I told you,” Rosita sighed. “He-”

“I ain’t asking you,” he snapped, his eyes still on Siddiq.

"Your little girl," Siddiq said. His voice was level, calm. "Mia. She helped bring me here. Carl, too, you guys know him?"

"Mia!" Daryl called, not taking his eyes off Siddiq. "Get in here."

"Why, what's…? Oh, my God," Mia stepped through the doorway, her wide eyes flickering between Siddiq and Daryl's gun. 

"Stay by the door," Daryl barked at her so loudly she jumped. "You know this clown?"

"Carl met him when he was out with Rick. I helped bring him back here," Mia said. When Daryl didn't say anything, didn't lower his weapon, she turned and looked over her shoulder. "Ain't that right, Carl?"

Carl joined her in the doorway, "Yeah. You tagged along, I guess."

" Tagged along ?" Mia repeated. "That Walker would've got your ass if it weren't for me."

"I had it under control," Carl said, while Mia shook her head behind his back. 

"I just want to help," Siddiq said. "I have medical training. I can help Naomi."

"Alright, fine," Daryl said. He glanced back at Rosita, Mia, and Carl. "Y’all get out."

Mia looked like she wanted to argue with him but didn't dare. Her first real taste of what it was like to have Daryl care about you and scream in your face at the same time. She looked at me, and I wiggled my eyebrows in an imitation of her ' I told you so ' look. She and Carl ducked out of the door. 

"Can I… get up now?" Siddiq asked, glancing from Daryl to me and back again.

"Yes," I said quickly before Daryl could start interrogating him again. Siddiq got to his feet. Daryl lowered his gun but did not put it away and did not leave the room.

Siddiq looked at me, "Are you okay with him being in here?"

"We don't know you. I ain't leaving," Daryl said. He was itching to raise his gun again, I could tell. A little tension in his jaw, a slight flex in his arm like if he couldn't shoot the gun, he might throw a punch.

Poor Siddiq was still trying to hold up his end of a semi-professional conversation. "It's just doctor-patient confident-"

"It's fine," I said, trying to diffuse this before it could blow up in our faces. "Honestly, he can stay. It's fine."

Siddiq checked me over while Daryl stood, arms crossed and glaring at him from the corner of the room. I could see Siddiq trying to ignore it, but it was difficult. I did my best to put him at ease and hold back even the tiniest hint that anything he did hurt me. Even when he cleaned out my cuts with something that stung more than the soap in the shower. Even when he put stitches in my palm. I gritted my teeth and smiled through all of it. 

"There," I said when he was done, "good as new."

Daryl looked skeptical, glanced at Siddiq. "You sure there's nothing else wrong with her? Don't need to keep her in here for a while?"

"No," Siddiq said, "She's all ready to go."

"Thanks, Siddiq," I said. 

"It was… erm, nice to meet you both," he said. 

"You too," I said over Daryl's noncommittal grunt. 

I pushed the infirmary door open with my good hand, desperate to get out of there before Daryl could demand we wait for Denise and a second opinion. Carl and Michonne were outside. 

Daryl came out right behind me, instantly annoyed. "Slow news day 'round here, huh?"

"We have to talk about the Saviors," Carl said firmly. "And what we do next. My dad's still not come home-"

"Saviors are trapped in there," Daryl said. I felt his hand on my back again. "They ain't getting out. You're dad's fine… go home. Both of ya."

I didn’t budge. I looked at him. "We should talk about it. We should make some kind of plan."

"Not you," he said. "You gotta rest." 

"Siddiq never said anything about that," I said. I looked back at the others. "Any word from the snipers around Sanctuary?"

"Nothing," Michonne said.

"See," Daryl said. "Everything's fine."

"And Rick?" I asked, ignoring him. "Where did he go?"

"To ask the Scavengers for help," Michonne said. "But he's been gone almost a day." 

I could see the worry in her eyes, hear the way she tried to suppress it in her voice. For Carl's sake. Maybe a little for her own too.

"Sure he's fine," Daryl said. He tried to tug me away again. "C'mon."

What's gotten into him?

His other freakout, I got. But not wanting to help Rick? Seemingly not caring whether or not he was okay? That wasn't like him. I looked at Michonne. "You know where they are? If you're worried, we could head out there."

"No," Daryl said. There was anger in his eyes. More than the irritability he'd had before, more than the protective fire he'd turned on Siddiq. This was new. "Rick wants to talk to them assholes. That's his business."

I was too dumbfounded to say anything. Where the hell had all this come from?

"I know you don't want to deal with this," Michonne said. I wondered how the hell she managed to keep a level head with the way Daryl was talking. If Rick had talked about Daryl like that, I'd have smacked him in the mouth. "But we need a plan. "

"Fine," Daryl said. "But you're keeping her out of it."

He gestured at me. I raised an eyebrow, "Like hell you are."

"Hey. You gotta rest," Daryl said to me. "We'll handle it."

"I'm fine!" I said. "I think I got a lot to contribute to this, too. I had the misfortune of getting to know a few of those assholes Negan calls right-hand men. I know how some of them think. You're right; things might be fine, and everything might go to plan, but we need to prepare for the worst if they don't. If Negan's alive-"

"He ain't. You killed him."

"I think I killed him," I said. "If I didn't, and he gets out, he'll be coming for blood. Mine, specifically."

"You don't know that-"

"I took Lucille ," I said. Just saying the name of that damn bat was enough to make me shudder. It was enough to shut Daryl up, even for a moment. "If Negan's alive, he'll want me to answer for that. And if he's dead, and they still get out, it'll be Simon who comes here. And he's… he might be worse."

"She's right, Daryl. We could use her insight on this. She knows these people better than-"

"No," Daryl stepped between Michonne and me. "Back the hell off. Keep her out of your damn plans."

Where the hell was all this coming from?

This wasn't like him, either. Or, maybe it was, but an older version of him. One who didn't trust people, didn't let anyone get close, and pushed away those who tried. I felt my heart sink as he brushed past her and stomped down the steps ahead of him. Michonne started after him, frustrated. 

"I got this," I said to her. "I'll talk him down. We'll find Rick. We'll figure something out."

"We'll be at Deanna's old place when you're done," Michonne said. I nodded and chased Daryl down the steps. 

Michonne had relaxed a little when I'd said I'd handle it, but the truth was I had no idea how to talk him down from this. It was worse than I'd expected.

I'd been expecting him to be tense and erratic. Overprotective and angry. But there was more to it than that. Felt like he was as ready to fight our friends as he was our enemies. Why didn't he give a shit about Rick? This wasn't like him. 

"Daryl," I called. He glanced over his shoulder at me but kept walking. 

"C'mon," he called back. He didn't slow, but it felt like he was leading me somewhere in a hurry. 

"Slow down, will ya?" I said. He slowed and let me catch up. Daryl's jaw was set like he was ready for an argument. I could see that fight in his eyes. I tried to understand, be as gentle as possible. He'd been through a lot, too. Not just everything at Sanctuary but every fight afterward. I tried to keep my cool. 

"You good?" I asked him. He lowered his gaze. This wasn't what he'd been expecting me to start with. I waited for him to respond. 

"Nah," he said. "Not really. Sick of losing people."

"Yeah," I said. "Me too."

I could see the fight he'd been gearing up for leaving him, little by little. His arms unfolded. His shoulders were less tense. Was it fear? Was he too worried about Rick to even entertain the idea he was in trouble?

"Hey, look," I tried to sound calm. "I'm sure Rick's fine, probably just held up somewhere, but we can go-"

"Rick ain't my problem," Daryl snapped, his anger flaring up again immediately. I'd thought maybe offering to go with him would've taken the fear out of what he might find. "And he sure as shit ain't yours."

What the hell?

I stopped because Daryl had stopped at the top of a flight of stairs. Determination had set in his eyes, "I got a plan. C'mon." 

He walked down the steps, and it took me half a second to realize where we were. This was the jail cell that Morgan had built. Did Daryl have someone down here? Why hadn't he wanted to tell Michonne? I half-expected to see he'd caught a Scavenger, someone we could trade for Rick's safe return. But there was nobody in there except us. Daryl closed the main door behind me. 

"What are we doing here?" I asked, still searching the room for any clues. "And how does this help Rick?"

"Will you stop thinking about Rick for one damn moment?" Daryl crossed the floor, opened the cell door, and gestured to it, "Get in."

I stared at him. "Excuse me?"

"Get in the damn cell."

"Why the hell would I do that?"

"The Saviors wanna come get you, or anyone from Alexandria wants to hand you over and save themselves, they ain't getting to you," he said. "Not on my watch. I'm gonna be right outside that door, and anyone comes for you - Savior or otherwise - I'll kill 'em."

Crap. 

I thought I'd been calming him down, but he'd lost it. He'd fully lost it. I didn't know how to handle this.

"Get in," he said again when I'd been silent for too long. 

"No."

"Naomi!" his eyes flashed with anger. "I ain't asking."

"I ain't doing it!" I said. "You want to stop the Saviors from getting to me, let me fight them. What good is locking me up gonna do?" 

"Stop you from leaving, that's what."

"I'm not going to leave," I said, wondering where the hell he'd gotten that idea. "I ain't running from this." 

"I know you ain't," he said. "I wish you would."

"What?"

"C'mon, Naomi. I know you," he said. He looked sad to be saying it. "If Negan or Simon or any of them assholes pitch up here and tell you that they'll leave the rest of us alone if you hand yourself over, you'd do it. Wouldn't you? To save the rest of us."

"You don't know that's what's going to happen," I said, but I was avoiding the truth, and we both knew it. 

"You said to be prepared for the worst, so that's what I'm doing. Get in."

When I didn't move, he put his hands on my shoulders and steered me in there himself. I didn't fight him, didn't push back. 

"Daryl, this ain't right."

"You're staying here, where you're safe."

"No, Daryl. I'm not," I said. "Bad shit happens all the time. You can't just lock me up and hide me from the rest of the world to keep me safe. What kind of life is that?"

"Can't lock up the rest of the world. I ain't got a cage big enough," Daryl said, but I thought he was starting to see how unreasonable he was being. "I need to know that you're done throwing yourself into dangerous shit to protect everyone else. People who didn't lift a damn finger to help you while you were in that place." 

"You know I can't promise that," I said. "Someone threatens you, or Mia, or-"

"Stop," he said.

"You'd do the same thing," I said. "To save me, or Mia, or anyone else here. I know you would. I know you , but you don't see me locking you up about it."

"Ain't the same."

"Why not?" 

He didn't say anything. 

"I get why you're freaked," I said. "But don't you think throwing me in jail is a little much? If the Saviors come, we've got a whole town of people here to help us fight." 

"Nah," he said. "I'm done trusting other people to protect my girl." 

My girl.  

I tried not to fixate on it or get derailed by it. I'd never liked the thought of being anyone's anything, but there was something in the way he said it, and that it was Daryl saying it, that almost brought an inappropriate smile to my lips. I knew I couldn't let it show. He was still too mad.

"It ain't their job to look out for me," I said. "Especially not if it risks everyone else. Ain't your job either."

"I need you to stay here."

"Why?" 

"Because I love you, dumbass! And if I lost you, I don't..."

He stopped as he realized what he'd just said. We both did. I hardly dared breathe. I was only just about recovering from the whole 'my girl' fiasco, and now this? I tried to make it sink in but couldn't. Nothing about me was sinking. Felt like I was flying. 

"Shit," he muttered and sank down onto the bench. He closed his eyes and rested his head on the brick of the cell wall behind him. "I'm sorry… I didn't…"

Shit.

Didn't what? 

Didn't mean it?

Didn't mean it in that way?

The silence dragged on. I could've thrown up. The ground felt like it was shifting underneath me, slipping away from me. Tilting like a ship in a storm, I didn't know how much longer I could hold on or if anyone would be there to catch me if I slipped. 

"Daryl, please say something," I whispered. His eyes opened again, fixed on a spot on the floor in front of him. 

"Weren't supposed to tell you like that, not in the middle of a big, dumb fight," he said. He sounded genuinely annoyed with himself. I could feel my hands shaking a little. I held them by my sides as steady as I could. There was still a big, dumb lump in my throat thanks to this big, dumb fight, and I was finding it hard to say anything at all. I knew I had to find my voice, Daryl was on the verge of closing up again, and I couldn't let that happen. 

"What?" I asked. It was pretty much the only word I could get out. I had a million questions and absolutely no ability to ask any of them.

"Had it all planned out," he sighed.

"Had what all planned out?"

I had to be sure. Had to hear it again. He looked up at me.

"I found a… place I thought you'd like," he said. "I was gonna take you there. Bring some food for us. Thought I'd ask Eric to show me how to cook it up nice. I was gonna tell you then."

"Tell me…?"

"I love you," he said again. Deliberately this time. "Always have."

I couldn't stop the smile spreading across my face, but Daryl was still all caught up in being annoyed at himself. 

"I wanted to do it right," he said. He cast his eye around the jail cell that he'd been trying to convince me to let him lock me in. It was too much to process all at once. 

"Not like this. Not…"

"In the middle of a jail cell?" 

"Yeah," he said. "And… wasn't planning on calling you a dumbass right after, either." 

"I don't care about that, dumbass," I said. He smiled a little then. 

"I wanted it to be perfect. You deserve that," he said. "Like a real date, y'know?"

"A date ?" I repeated, shocked that the word had come out of his mouth, nevermind that he'd thought about it in relation to us. Every time I thought I was just about getting to grips with the last unexpected thing he'd said, he threw in something else.

"Yeah," he said, his ears turned red again. "Guess that's kinda corny, huh?"

"No, it's... you're..." I was at a loss for words. Didn't want to say anything that would make him more uncomfortable than he already was, but I had to find some way of letting him know how much this all meant. "I don't need anything like that. I don't need… anything but you. But… that's the sweetest damn thing I've ever heard, Daryl. I'm sure I'd have loved it."

"Yeah?" he looked at me with a quiet kind of hope, and I got in that one moment, how much his unfulfilled plan had meant to him.  

"Yeah."

"Maybe we could still go some time," he said, and he shrugged like it was no big deal, but he was scrutinizing my face out of the corner of his eye. I could see all the nervous hope he still held there. "Y'know. When all this is done. If… if you want to."

"I'd like that."

"Yeah?"

" Yes, " I said. Daryl's smile was so contagious it spread to me. "I'd love to."

He nodded as an odd kind of silence settled down on us. Both of us more nervous than either of us had any business being talking to someone we knew so damn well.

I should kiss him, right? 

I can do that now. 

I knew we had other shit to talk about, things still unresolved, the root of his freakout was still a little out of reach, but I forgot about all of it. The way he was looking at me made it impossible to think of anything but him. It had been so long since anything had gone right for us, I'd forgotten how good it was to see him happy. I stood over where he sat on the bench and cupped his face in my hands, drinking it all in.

He reached up to touch my face, traced a line down from my temples. The skin on his fingers was a little rough, but his touch was as gentle as always. We looked at each other for a moment. I knew his face better than I knew my own, but it was different, being able to name that look in his eyes I'd seen so many times and never realized was love. It was new to be able to show it so openly myself too. 

"Can't lose you again, Naomi. I won't," he said, his eyes growing serious. "I'll fight anyone who gets in the way of that, even if it means fighting you."

We faced so much uncertainty. But that was how things were now. I'd spent my whole life worrying and planning for a future that wound up being fucked up by something nobody could have seen coming. I was done doing that. Here we were in the middle of a war in the middle of a goddamn apocalypse. Nothing was certain. All that was guaranteed, all anyone could promise us was right now. 

And right now, all I wanted was him. 

I bent to kiss him, and he leaned up to meet me halfway. Soft lips, rough stubble. Warm hands ran through my hair, pushing it back from my face as he kissed me deeper. His lips parted mine to make way for his tongue, and I could taste love on the tip of it. Something I'd never felt before fluttered in the pit of my stomach. Sparks in my veins. 

You'd think I'd have gotten used to it by now. Or at least have been prepared, but every kiss was electric. Surprised shivers with every light touch across my skin. 

I was so aware of him. Sometimes, in the breath between kisses, I'd steal a glance at him. Because I still couldn't really believe it was him. Daryl. My Daryl. I knew him so well. But not like this. 

I knew the smell of him, but not like this. Not so close. 

I knew the feel of his hand on my back, but not like this. Not both of them. Running slowly down like his fingers were committing the shape of my body to muscle memory. They ran across my hips, joining at the small of my back and trying to pull me closer to the heat of his body. It was impossible to get any closer while leaning over where he sat on the bench.

I thought I knew every sound he made, had prided myself on being fluent in the grunts he sometimes slipped into communicating in. But the moan in the back of his throat when I climbed onto his lap? I'd never heard that before. 

I thought I knew what it was like to be held by him; I'd hugged him enough times but not like this. His arms wrapped entirely around me, my chest pressed to him, his legs under my thighs. I wanted to get to know his body as well as I knew the rest of him. 

The muscles in his arms tensed around me, gripping me tighter. He moved underneath me like he was about to stand up. I grabbed his shoulders, wrapped my legs around his waist as he lifted us both off that bench, and laid me down on the floor. 

Daryl

Don't rush this. 

Don't fuck it up. 

I knew I should slow things down, but it was hard to stop. Naomi felt as good underneath me as she had on top. My hips between her thighs, her arms around my shoulders.

I'd thought it might have been hard for her to cross that line from friends to this. Thought she might need some time to go from thinking about me as her dumb, goofy best friend to being attracted to me in any kind of way. If she ever even could be. 

But her kiss felt as hungry as mine, her hands running across my back and shoulders like she felt the same burning need that I did. To be closer to her, to get to know every inch of her. Couldn't think straight while she was kissing me like this, but I did not want to rush into anything. Couldn't push her into something she wasn't ready for and leave some sweaty, awkward mess. What if, after everything we'd been through, I messed it up enough for her feelings to fizzle out and this to fade to nothing but a fling?

I needed to think about this. Clearly.

I tried to stop kissing her, I swear I did, but the moment my lips left hers, I found them on her neck. She tilted her head back, whispered my name like it was a goddamn prayer. I wanted to answer it. I really did. I wanted to hear it again and again.

When she said my name like that , it sent a lightning bolt through me. A flash of raw heat right to my core, and those light kisses on her neck turned into something else. The taste of her skin between my lips, on my tongue. I felt the rise and fall of her chest as her breathing quickened. Her hands in my hair again, and she whimpered.  

Goddamn, Naomi.

You are making it so damn hard to stop.

That flash of heat rose in me again. Every sound she made, every small intake of breath, something buried deep inside me got hungrier. Something I'd starved for a very long time, and now every little taste left me needing more. More of her. 

Don't rush this.

Don't blow it.

I stopped for a moment, looked back at her face. I'd had every intention of slowing this down, but then her eyes fluttered open, and she looked up at me. When you're this crazy about someone, you have to hope that they'll stay sane. But it didn't seem like she would, and how could I resist those lips, those eyes?

She leaned up, caught my lips with hers in a kiss as fierce as she was, and I knew I was a goner. Didn't have a damn chance resisting her. The heat between us melted away any ounce of cool-headedness I had left, and that hunger rose up. Consuming me so I could devour her.

The material of her shirt got caught up in my fingers, hiding the curve down to her waist. I wanted to rip it off, to tear anything between us to scraps with my bare hands, my teeth, whatever I had to do to get closer to her. 

Not yet. 

Don't rush this.

My hand slipped under her shirt. Smooth, warm skin against my palm as I followed that curve back up her body. And then she flinched under my touch, a sharp intake of breath. Not the good kind. It wasn’t pleasure, it was pain. 

I sprang away instantly, looked at where my hand was hovering above a deep purple bruise at the bottom of her ribcage. There were others, smaller and less severe, that I'd probably hit on, but this one was fresh. And I'd hurt her. 

"Shit," I muttered. This was exactly what I'd wanted to avoid. Exactly why I'd told myself to stop.

Fuck. 

"It's okay," she said quickly, tugging down the bottom of her shirt to cover it up again. Trying to hide it from me like that would suddenly make me forget it was there. "Honestly, I'm fine." 

"Don't look fine," I said. Now the shock was wearing off, the realization that the bruise looked like a bootprint started to sink in. Felt like my damn heart was bruised. All that passion in me quickly turned to anger. Not with Naomi, but I knew I'd have to keep it in check to stop myself from lashing out. 

Shit.

“Sorry, I know it ain’t pretty,” she said and looked away from me. 

“Nah, it ain’t that,” I said. I didn’t care that she was bruised because of how it looked; I only cared that she’d been hurt, and the people who’d hurt her hadn’t paid for it yet. “It’s just… You're still hurting."

"I'm fine," she said like she always did, with a little smile like I was overreacting. Maybe if she'd quit underreacting, I wouldn't have to make up for it by going overboard. Her smile faded when I didn't smile back, and she said, "I'm not as fragile as you think I am."

"The hell you talking about?" I said. 'Fragile' was about the last word I'd use to describe Naomi, especially after everything she'd just done.

“Daryl, c’mon,” she said. “You’ve been shutting down Michonne and Carl all day, trying to keep me out of any kind of planning. You haven’t said a word about how any of those Outposts attacks went. I know that can’t have been easy for any of you, but I gotta know what I missed while I was away. I can handle it."

'Away'... like she'd been on some damn vacation. I shook my head, "We can handle it, Naomi. You ain't gotta worry about shit." 

"And don’t think I’ve missed whatever’s going on with Rick,” she said like I hadn't even spoken. 

“You know what's going on with Rick. He went to talk to the Scavengers,” I said. “Michonne told you that.”

She fixed me with that look that told me she knew I was bullshitting her. “Why don’t you care that he’s missing?”

The way she said it made my gut twist up with guilt. I did care. Of course, I cared, but I was still too mad at him to do anything about it. He'd lied to me, used me, that shit doesn't just go away. 

“Rick made his choice,” I said. “I’m done cleaning up his messes, and I’m done with him making choices for me, too.”

“See that. That's what I'm talking about," she said. " What does that mean? Rick's like a brother to you.” 

“He lied to me," I said, and looking at her, I immediately felt guilty for falling for it. I should never have left her life in anyone’s hands but mine. I shouldn't have taken anyone's word that she was okay. I should've waited to see it for myself. "Rick told me he'd get you out of there before we surrounded it with Walkers. Told me he hadn't seen you there at all. If I'd known… if I'd known he was going to open fire while you were standing there… I- I-"

I’m so sorry.

She deserved so much better from everyone here who'd left her in there, but mostly from me. I should've fought harder for her sooner and not been blinded by Rick's lies.

“Hey, it’s okay,” she turned toward me. Felt her hand on my cheek, gently guiding my face to look at her. “It doesn’t matter."

"It matters," I said. I knew Naomi wouldn't see it the way I did. I knew she'd have forgiven me before I even apologized. I wished, just once, she'd get mad about shit she should get mad about. Even if it meant being angry with me. 

"I survived it; I'm here," she said, resting her forehead against mine. For a moment, all I could see was her eyes. She was here. She was really here, holding my hand in the dark again like she was always supposed to be. 

But it almost wasn't. 

I pulled away from her.

"It ain't just that he lied to me. It's that he's been lying to me for weeks. About you ," I said. "I thought things were different now the world was different, but it ain't. People like Rick, all them assholes out there, they still don't give a shit about folks like you and me."

"Hey, no. You know that ain't true," Naomi looked worried, but I couldn't work out why. "These people are our friends. C'mon, it's Rick you're talking about."

"I know who I'm talking about," I said. It was her who didn't have a damn clue, but how could she? She hadn't been here, hadn't heard the things he'd said. "When Negan came here with Sasha in that box, he had all these cuts and bruises on him. Said you'd done it. I thought for sure he'd kill you when he got back."

"I thought for sure he would too," she said quietly like she still couldn't believe he hadn't. "But he still thought I could be useful to him."

"He was still trying that?" I asked. It was crazy to me that with all the time he'd kept her, Negan has still managed to underestimate her so badly. "You'd never fight for a guy like him."

I thought she'd laugh at the idea too, or at least smile at how absurd the idea was, but she didn't. She shook her head. 

"He didn't mean it like that," she said. "He thought he'd be able to use me to get between you and Rick. Tell me that asshole wasn't right."

The look she fixed me with was filled with dread, and my heart sank. Because, yeah, it had kind of worked. But had it worked because Negan was a manipulative asshole or because he knew Rick was? I didn't want to let her down; I had to make her see things my way so she'd understand why things had to be the way they were now.

"When I saw Negan escape from the fight here," I said. "And I thought he was gonna get back to Sanctuary and hurt you - kill you - I lost it."

"Shit, Daryl," she said. Didn't look disappointed, but that little worried crease between her eyebrows deepened. "What did you do?"

Nothing. 

That's the problem.

"I wanted to bust right back in there and get you before he could lay a finger on you. I wanted to burn the place to the goddamn ground if I was too late to do anything. Who knows, I could've had you outta there a long time ago," I sighed, wondering how many of those bruises Naomi was covered in wouldn't exist if I'd just done the right thing from the start. "But I couldn't do anything because Rick locked me up in this damn place."

I glared around at the walls I'd spent a night punching, the bars I'd shaken, the door I'd kicked at. How I'd sat up against this same wall and wished she was with me. Now she was, holding my hand in the dark and giving me a little half-smile.

"Ah. So that's what gave you this bright idea," she said. 

"Can't you be on my side for once?" 

"I'm always on your side, dumbass," she said. "If Rick lays a finger on you, if he upsets you again, I'll give him hell."

"Yeah?"

"You bet," she said. "I'll smack that beard right off of him. But part of being on your side is reminding you how many other people you got in your corner. Rick is a good person, trying to do right by a lot of people, and he cares a hell of a lot about you. He did a shitty thing, but I'm sure he did it to stop you from doing something reckless. To keep you safe. And I can never hate him for that."

"You should. Should hate him for-"

"It doesn't matter to me if he's not thinking about me or if he don't-"

"Quit saying that," I snapped. "Course it matters."

"It doesn't," she said stubbornly. "Because I got you, don't I?"

"Of course you do."

"Then I don't need anyone else looking out for me," she said. "I got the only person I need."

"Pfft, you don't need anyone," I said, but her words had warmed my soul in a way I hadn't felt for a while. That angry flicker was doused immediately. "You got your damn self out of there.”

“ You got me out,” she said. “I’d be dead in that place if you hadn’t crashed that truck through the walls.”

“Don’t say that.”

“It’s true," she said. "And you can be as mad at Rick for lying to you as you gotta be. I'm sure it hurt, but it's still Rick, and he cares about you. It doesn't matter what he does, or what anyone else does, as long as we've got each other, we're golden."

I loved her so fucking much that for a moment, it left me breathless. 

"I am so damn sick of the world trying to tear us apart," I said.

"Yeah. Me too," Naomi said. "This whole time we've been fighting things apart, but when the Saviors get here-"

"They ain't getting here."

"Alright, if the Saviors get here," she said like she still thought it was a massive inevitability that they would. "Y'know what they're gonna find? Me and you. Facing them together. Fighting them together ."

It was contagious, her faith in us. Her determination. I felt myself smile again, "They ain't gonna know what's hit them."

"Exactly," she said, smiling back. "Course that only works if I'm not banged up in some jail cell."

"Guess I can let you out," I said. "Y'know, for good behavior."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah."

"C'mon then, dumbass," she said. Not letting go of my hand, she pulled her feet under her to stand up. "Let's find the others."

She was in a good mood again, with no idea of the situation she was walking into. She was right. She'd missed a lot. There was a lot of bad news and heartbreak waiting for her on the other side of that door. I'd been dumb to think I could shield her from it.

"Wait," I said. I didn't move. Naomi hesitated, read the expression on my face before she sat back down. "You're right. A lot's happened since you've been in that place. You should probably know before we head back out there."

She looked expectantly at me. It was so much that I didn't even know where to start. Eric was the most important, but it felt too heavy. Too horrible. They'd been close. She'd already been looking for him and Aaron. 

"Something went wrong at one of the Outposts," I said and watched her face flood with concern. "We lost a lot of people. Most of the Kingdom. Their fighters, at least." 

"No," she whispered. Some of the color drained from her cheeks. I knew it was a difficult thing to come to terms with. Such a significant loss, all at once, was kind of hard to wrap your head around. “How bad was it?” 

"It was a damn massacre," I said honestly. 

"God," she said. "Poor Bryce, he must be just…"

"It was lucky he came here with Mia, fought with the rest of us," I said. "But, yeah, can't be easy for him."

I let her sit with it for a moment, let it sink in. Sometimes I think I watch her close enough; I can see her thoughts moving behind her eyes. Too fast for me to keep up with, but I try all the same. I saw the shock and pain that came with this kind of news. And then blind panic.

"Carol?" she asked, looking at me like she was terrified I'd fall apart like she was the one waiting to hold me together. "Did she fight?" 

"She's fine," I assured her. She breathed a sigh of relief. "And so's the King. A couple of others, I think. But we lost a lot. If the Saviors get out, we might not have the numbers to beat them anymore. That's why Rick's gone to talk to the Scavengers."

"Makes sense," she nodded. "Anything else I should know?"

I knew she could tell by my face that I was still holding back on her. I didn't want to tell her. I wanted to keep anything like that - anything bad - from ever touching her again. Now I had to be the one to bring her this grief. It wasn't fair. Nothing about it was fair. 

"Eric," I said, and got so choked up saying it, I wasn't sure I could say much more. But just his name was enough. I watched it hit her, saw her heartbreak in her eyes. 

"No," she said, but her tears were already falling thick and fast. She believed me; she just didn't want it to be true. So I pulled her close, and I let her cry as long as she needed. Her body shaking in my arms, her face and hidden in my chest, the grief that washed over her was so intense I felt it too. Or maybe it just let mine bubble up. Gave me permission to feel it all over again. 

This is love, I thought as I held her while we both fell apart a little. It wasn't about keeping all of the bad shit away from each other forever. It was about getting through it together when we couldn't. This is what it's about.

I'd have sat there forever if she needed it, but eventually, it passed enough for her to sit up and wipe her eyes. She took a few deep and shaky breaths to soothe her subsiding sobs. 

"Aaron?" she asked. Her hands were shaking, terrified that I was about to give her more bad news. "Is he-"

"He's safe," I said quickly. It would've been a lie to say he was okay, given what he'd lost. "He's at the Hilltop."

"I want to see him."

"Yeah. I do, too," I told her. "We'll go as soon as it's safe."

"Okay," she whispered. 

"You good?"

She nodded, wiped her red-rimmed eyes again, and took a few more deep breaths. 

"Why didn't you tell me?" she asked. "You should've told me before we even got in the car to get back here. I hugged Bryce and joked around with him, while all the time he was dealing with this horrible..." 

She trailed off, unable to put it into words. If she'd seen herself, drenched in blood and soaked in shock, she'd have understood why I didn’t tell her anything right away. Although it wasn’t why I’d tried to keep them from her now. Not really. 

"Trust me, getting you back has been a breath of fresh air in this whole shit storm," I said. "For all of us. But, I'm sure Bryce especially was glad to have a moment of just being… normal again."

"It's nice you ain't trying to bite his head off anymore."

"Yeah, he seems like a good guy," I said, relieved that I could finally stop feeling like a jealous weirdo. Around Bryce, at least, I wasn’t sure how I’d cope if some other asshole cropped up.

"He is," she said. She fell quiet again, still reeling from everything she’d learned. I hated that this was how her first day back home was playing out. This should have been something happy. 

"I didn't keep this from you because I thought you couldn't handle it,” I said. I didn’t want her thinking otherwise. Didn’t like that she’d thought that was why I was doing it in the first place. “Or because I think you're weak or any of that."

"No?"

"Nah. You're the strongest person I know."

"C'mon-" she rolled her eyes slightly, immediately dismissing that title.

"Nah, I'm serious," I said. "I know what you’ve been through. I didn't tell you because you were happy. Being back here, being back with Mia. I thought I could give you one day. One damn day where you don't have to fight or grieve , or any of that bullshit."

"You don't get to decide that," she said. "None of us do. We could still be right in the middle of this thing. Can't just take a break."

"I know," I said. “But you ain’t gotta do everything by yourself anymore. You can let me handle some shit. Let Michonne and Carl and everyone else deal with things too.”

“I know that,” she said. 

“Do you?” I asked her seriously. “Because you've been fighting on your own for so long, I'm not sure you know how to stop. How to let anyone else take care of you, fight for you."

How to let me fight for you.

"I wasn't in Sanctuary that long."

"I mean before all of this. When we was little, when you moved away, you've never needed anyone. Not even raising Mia,” I said. All the guilt I felt from how I turned my back on them both, picked drifting around with Merle over swallowing my pride and fixing things with Naomi, bubbled up. It would probably never go away, but at least now I had the chance to make up for it. “She's perfect, by the way. Mia. She’s smart, brave, wasn't afraid to give me hell when I deserved it, saved my life too when I was out of bullets."

"I can't take any credit for that,” Naomi tried to brush it off with a casual smile. “She was born that way."

"No, she wasn't," I said firmly. I remembered the small and perfect bundle of blankets that had been Mia at a few days old, but there was a lot that had gone into making sure that she grew up to be the kick-ass little girl she was now. "She was born to a drug-addled Momma in a place that gives up on kids like her. Kids like us. Kids who don't have shit. But she had you , and you pulled her out of there, just like you pulled yourself out, just like you tried to pull me out. You did all of that on your own." 

"She had us , Daryl," she said. "Don't think I've forgotten how much you watched her when she was tiny. How you looked out for her when I was at college. The good in her is as much you as it is me."

"Bullshit."

"I can only be as strong as I am because of you," she said. "You always believed in me, trusted me. That was enough to make me feel like I could do anything. "

"That’s dumb,” I said. “I only believe that because it's true."

"Every time I doubt myself, it's your voice that I hear telling me I can do it. Telling me that I'm a dumbass for thinking I can't. That's what kept me going- in Sanctuary, in DC, through the world ending. You are such a part of me that even when I’m by myself, I never really feel alone," she said. And then she looked at me. "I know that probably sounds crazy."

"Nah,” I said. “Not to me." 

"Good."

We sat in a comfortable and comforting silence for a moment. Back together, the way we should be. She was right; things weren’t settled yet. But maybe one day there would be. Maybe one day we’d get more of this. Just me and her; no grief, no fighting, no bullshit. One day, but not today.

"We should probably head back to the others, huh?" I said. I didn’t want to say it. I wanted to keep her to myself a little while longer, but I knew I couldn’t. Even holding her from Mia for this long felt selfish. 

"Yeah," she nodded.  

"C'mon then, dumbass," I said. Naomi smiled.

I stood up off the floor, waited for Naomi to get to her feet. She took a moment to rub her eyes again, make sure that nobody but the two of us would know she'd been crying. She pulled her hair away from her face, and I caught sight of a red mark on the side of her neck. New. It hadn't been there before. About the size of a kiss. 

Shit. 

Did I do that?

She caught me staring at her. "You okay?"

"Yeah… I think I... you just… uh, got a mark right here," I said and pointed at the same spot on my own neck. 

Her frown deepened, and one of her hands reached up to touch it. Her fingers found it almost immediately, and her eyes widened as she realized what it was. "Daryl Dixon, did you give me a hickey?" 

"Think I might have done, yeah," I said, feeling my face turn red. "Sorry."

"Not a complaint," she shrugged, a small smile tugged at the corner of her mouth. "Just good to know."

She brushed her hair over her shoulders with her fingers, obscuring it from view a little, but I still knew it was there. Could see it if I looked for it. I'd always sworn I'd never leave a mark on her, that if my temper ever got the better of me, I'd leave her before I hurt her. I expected the sight of that little red mark to fill me with self-loathing, but it didn't. All I felt when I looked at that was the thrill of the certainty that she was mine. 

"Didn't hurt you, did I?" I asked, just to check. I needed to know this weird pride I got from seeing it was okay. 

"No," she said, and a little shyness crept into that smile. It wasn't like Naomi to be shy, not with me. "It felt… good, actually."

Goddamn, I wish you hadn't said that. Now I want to do it again. 

Her eyes met mine again, and that shy little smile spread from ear to ear. Spread to me. It was like time stopped for a moment, or maybe we stopped, and it kept moving without touching us. A frozen moment. Me and her, smiling at each other like goddamn fools. 

"C'mon," I took her hand again. I knew if I didn't, I'd kiss her again, and who knew how much time we'd lose then? How swept up I'd get? 

We walked hand in hand out of the jail cell and back through Alexandria. 

“I, uh, told Mia,” she said as we walked, “about us. Is that okay?”

“I ain’t hiding anything,” I shrugged. I was too far gone to play it cool, too happy to keep it quiet. Could’ve yelled it from the rooftops. Naomi didn’t look at me, but I caught her smile, and she squeezed my hand. 

Michonne and the others were at Deanna’s old house. Carl was turning a walkie over in his hands, so I knew there’d been no word from Rick. Naomi let go of my hand and walked over to Bryce. I tried not to eavesdrop on her hushed condolences. Michonne scrutinized me with narrowed eyes, trying to see if I was about to fly off the handle again. I gave her a small, apologetic smile, and she relaxed. 

We agreed to give Rick a little more time before we went looking for him. After his car had been busted during our roadside fight with the Saviors, he’d be on foot, and unless he managed to find another vehicle, he could be a while. The sun was about to set; if he was out there, it probably wouldn’t be long before he found somewhere to shelter for the night. We’d start searching for him in the morning. When we found him, we’d carry out the final attack on Sanctuary. They’d surrender, I was sure of it. 

Michonne had drawn up plans to up the security around Alexandria. Just in case the Saviors got out. In case they came here again. She increased the number of lookouts and lookout spots. Naomi tried to volunteer for one of the first shifts but stopped when she saw the look on my face. This time, when I demanded that she get some damn rest, Bryce and Mia backed me up immediately. Michonne assured her that it was okay for her to sit this one out and that there would always be more shifts when she’d had a chance to get some shut-eye. 

I could tell Naomi was worried about it all. About what might happen to Alexandria if she let herself take a break for one night. So, I took the shift she’d volunteered for instead, and she finally agreed to go get some damn rest. 

I stood at the lookout post by the gate and watched the sunset. As the light faded, the events of the day really had a chance to dawn on me. I’d started out in that truck, not sure what I’d find when I burst into Sanctuary but fully expecting the worst. That she was not only alive but that she was home made the whole thing feel like a dream. I almost wanted to go and check on her. Check she was still really there. Still breathing. 

Still in love with me.

She loves me.  

It was the least believable part of the whole thing but thinking about it made me smile like an idiot in the dark. I was so damn distracted that I didn’t notice the figure walking toward the gates, not at first. When I did, I passed it off as a Walker until I saw that it was walking at a decent enough speed. Wasn’t stumbling around either. I immediately scanned the dark road behind them for any sign that whoever it was wasn’t alone. Nobody had radioed to say that the Saviors had got out. But maybe that was because there was nobody left in the buildings around Sanctuary to tell us. 

Whoever it was walked alone. I raised my rifle and peered through the scope. They were too far away to catch any detail on their face, but I recognized him from the way he walked. 

Rick.  

He was alive after all. Despite everything we’d said to each other, I felt the relief deep down in my chest. I radioed over to Michonne. Watched from the lookout as she and Carl ran out of their house and straight to the gates. I wanted to join them, but the bitterness of how we’d left things kept my feet glued where I was standing. If Rick came looking for any kind of apology, he wouldn’t find one from me. 

I turned my attention back to the road. Empty, save for a few aimless Walkers. I’d take them out if they became a problem. Metal rattled behind me as someone climbed the ladder. Knew it would be Rick without turning around, so I didn’t. I wasn’t sure if he’d come to punch me or hug me. I wasn’t sure which I’d do to him, either. 

After a long silence, he came to stand beside me and said, "Heard you got Naomi back."

"Yup."

No thanks to you. 

Was this his segway into telling me off for what I’d done. For daring to disobey Rick Grimes?

“Heard she might have killed Negan, too,” he said. 

“Yup,” I said. Felt the air around me prickle. I was on high-alert for any suggestion that he was thinking about using Naomi as any kind of bargaining chip when we went to carry out the next part of the plan. Did he know something I didn’t? Had anyone else managed to take the same route out of Sanctuary as Naomi? I glanced at him. “You heard anything from the Sanctuary?”

“Nope,” he said. “They’re all still where they’re supposed to be.”

Good.

“And the Scavengers?”

“They’re back on side,” he said. Didn’t say how he’d managed it, but he looked like shit, so I couldn’t imagine it had been easy. Couldn’t imagine it was worth it, either. They’d betrayed us before. 

“You believe ‘em?”

“For now,” he shrugged. He seemed quietly confident about it, but I wasn’t sure how he could be.  

“Hey, I guess as long as we’re winning, they’re-”

"Daryl, what are you doing up here?" Ric asked, cutting across me. I looked at him, not understanding the point of his question. He had a weird little grin on his face. "Go be with your girl."

Even the suggestion of it made my heart beat faster. 

“I’m on lookout,” I said like it wasn’t damn obvious what I was doing up on this lookout post. “Michonne not tell you? We’ve upped the-”

“Yeah, she told me,” Rick said with a soft laugh. “But you don’t need to be up here. Plenty of other people who can take over.”

“You should rest, man,” I said, realizing what he was offering. “You just got back too.”

“Not me,” he said and nodded behind him. “Carl can take over here. We’ll get you both up if anything happens.”

I hesitated. I didn’t know if this was Rick’s way of testing me or apologizing. 

“You just got her, man,” Rick said when I didn’t move or say anything. “You should be with her. We can handle things without you for one night.”

I couldn’t think of a single reason not to go and be with her. Or, maybe I could if I thought hard enough, but I didn’t want to.

“Alright,” I said eventually. I leaned the gun I was holding against the wall, ready for Carl when he got up here and turned around to climb back down the ladder. At the top of it, I hesitated, “Glad you’re back, man.”

“Yeah,” Rick said. “Me too.” 

I climbed down the ladder and found Carl waiting at the bottom of it. He tipped his hat to me. 

“Night, Daryl,” he said.

“Night, Carl,” I said on my way past. 

Alexandria was quiet. I didn’t meet anyone else on my way to Naomi’s place. When I got there, I stood outside. The lights were all off, the curtains drawn across the windows. 

Maybe this is a bad idea. 

After kicking up such a fuss, I didn’t want to be the one to disturb her rest. Didn’t want to wake her. I thought about heading to the houses Deanna had given our group when we’d arrived and seeing if there was a bed there for me. I could always see her in the morning. But that thought made me uneasy. At least when I’d been at the lookout post, we’d been apart, but I was doing something that could protect her. If shit kicked off tonight and I was in a whole other house, who knew what could go wrong?

I opened the door as quietly as I could. The house was as dark inside as it had looked from the outside. Deathly quiet. I slipped my shoes off so they wouldn’t make a sound on the wooden floors and glanced into the living room. I thought maybe I’d be able to sleep on one of the sofas, so I’d be near enough to Naomi to protect her if something went down without disturbing her now. When I peeked around the door, I saw that both sofas were occupied. Bryce and Mia were fast asleep opposite one another. So, I headed for the stairs. 

I moved up them as quietly as I could. At the top of the landing, Naomi’s door stood ajar. That didn’t feel right to me, but I tried not to freak out. I pushed on it. A small squeak as it swung forward and revealed piles of books and an empty bed. 

No Naomi. 

Fear seized my heart for a second. Images of her climbing the walls to search for Rick, going behind my back to get a job from Michonne, or heading back to Sanctuary to try and end this thing on her own flooded my head. And then my eyes adjusted to the low light, and I saw that the bed wasn’t just empty of her. There was no mattress there either. Negan had taken it, but he’d left Aaron’s, so maybe she’d be in there. 

I turned around and tiptoed to the other bedroom. The door was shut. I turned the handle real slow so that it wouldn’t make a sound. I could slip in and sleep on the floor. Be close to her without waking her. I pushed the door slowly open. 

Another empty bed. The covers were thrown back like someone had left it in a hurry.

No. 

Before I could move or say or do anything, someone leaped out of the shadows behind the door I’d just opened and grabbed me. A knife pressed against my throat. 

“ Woah! ” I yelled. 

“Daryl!?” Naomi gasped like I was the last person she expected to see. 

Crap. This was a mistake. 

“Yeah, it’s me,” I said. I heard her breathing hard and heavy behind me. She let go of me and stood in front of me, her wide eyes scanning me like she couldn’t be sure it was really me. She was holding a kitchen knife, and her hand was shaking a little. I looked pointedly at it, “Can you put the knife down now, please?”

“Shit!” She looked at the knife in her hand like she’d only just realized she was holding it. She threw it to the floor. “Sorry.” 

“The hell are you doing?” I asked. It wasn’t really what I meant to ask. Or what I should’ve asked. I should’ve asked if she was okay, but there was still so much adrenaline flowing through me from having a damn knife at my throat that it came out way sharper than I meant it to. 

“What the hell are you doing?” she countered. “Why didn’t you… I dunno, knock ? Or… at least holler when you came in, so I knew it was you and not-”

She stopped. Didn’t finish who she thought might be creeping up on her in the dark. Who she’d taken that knife to bed to protect herself against. 

“Didn’t want to wake you,” I said. “You’re supposed to be asleep.”

“Can’t sleep,” she closed her eyes and shook her head. A pang of worry deep in my chest made me glad I’d come here, although I had no idea how to help. She looked at me again. Looked lost, like she might just float away. “Every time I close my eyes, I… think I’ll be back there when I open them again. That this will all be gone.”

I took hold of her shoulders. “Hey, no. This is real. You’re home. You ain’t going anywhere.”

She nodded, but I got why it would be so hard for her to believe. I could hardly believe it myself. When I squeezed her shoulders, I wasn’t sure if it was to reassure her or me. Naomi glanced around the room. “I know, it’s just… doesn’t help sleeping in a strange room. Makes it feel less… I dunno.”

I got it. Sleeping in this room, surrounded by Eric and Aaron’s things, would be a constant reminder of Eric’s death. A room she was semi-familiar with but wasn’t her space. She might feel safer, surrounded by her own things—less like she needed a damn knife under her pillow. I let go of her and walked to the edge of the bed. 

“C’mon,” I said, tugging on one end of the mattress. 

“What are you doing?”

“We’re moving it to your room,” I said. 

“But Aaron-”

“Can get it back when he comes home,” I said. “We’ll probably have yours back by then.”

“You think?” she asked, but she’d already moved to take the other end, and together we hauled it off the bed frame. 

“Yeah. I’ll make sure it’s the first thing we ask the Saviors to surrender.”

She smiled at me. It was tired, but a smile’s a smile. We heaved the mattress out of the door and pushed it across the hall floor. From the bottom of the stairs, there was a small cough. Mia looked up at both of us. 

“Do I want to know?” she asked, arms folded across her chest. 

“Just borrowing this,” Naomi indicated to the mattress. “Get some sleep, please.”

“You first,” Mia said, then she looked at me. “If you can stop her from pacing around and muttering to herself like she’s been doing all night, that would be great.”

“I’ll do my best,” I said while Naomi pulled a face at her. 

“Go to bed, Mia,” she said. “Love you.”

“Love you too,” Mia turned away again. “Night, Daryl.”

“Night.”

We pushed the mattress across the hallway floor and into her room. After we’d maneuvered it over all the damn piles of books in there, she scampered back across the hall to pick up the comforter and pillows we’d dropped while I straightened out the mattress on her bed frame.

“Thank you,” she said when she came back in, pillows and comforter all bundled up in her arms. She looked more relaxed already, but that might have been the lack of a weapon in her hand. Naomi shook out the comforter, so it settled on the bed and then threw the pillows down at the head of it. 

“It’s okay,” I said. “You good now?”

“Yeah,” she said, sitting down on the newly-made bed. “Are you… staying? Shouldn’t you be by the gates?”

“Carl took over my spot, so I got the night off,” I said. “Wanted to make sure you were at least trying to sleep.” 

“I was,” she said. “I swear.”

“I can go if you like,” I said. Didn’t want to make her uncomfortable or feel any less safe than I already had. I felt dumb for coming here, for not leaving her to it. “I didn’t mean to freak you out.”

“No, it’s fine. I’m glad you came,” she said and looked like she meant it. “It’s just… back in the jail cell… things got… well, they got…”

“Yeah,” I cleared my throat. Was glad it was so dark because it meant there was a chance she couldn’t see how red my ears were getting. I wondered how obvious it had been to her that I’d had to severely restrain myself from tearing at her clothes. If she’d be able to feel the intensity of my desire for her in my kiss. “They did.”

“Thing is,” she said. Still so tense and nervous. “I’m not sure I’m in the mood to-”

“That ain’t why I came,” I said, quickly. “I wasn’t… expecting anything. Well, I was expecting you to be asleep, but I mean, I wasn’t expecting… y’know… that. I can just go, I don’t want to-”

“No, you don’t have to go,” she said hurriedly. Felt my heart leap in my chest. “I just didn’t want to mislead you about what might happen if you stay. But… I want you to stay.”

I nodded. I knew what Naomi was saying. Or at least what she was trying to say. I hadn’t expected to have this conversation so soon; thought I might have to build up to it more. Let her open up to me. But she was sort of doing that now, in her own way. 

“Negan,” I said and watched her tense at the sound of his name. “His guys. Did they… did they put their hands on you?”

I didn't need to be told they'd beaten her; the evidence was written in black and blue across her skin. That wasn't what I'd meant, and we both knew it. 

"No," she said. "They didn't, not like that. Not once."

A deep-seated fear I'd been holding onto for a while relaxed in my chest.

"But, them guys at Terminus," I said. Even the word made her flinch again. "They did?"

"Yeah," she said. "They did."

"I don't wanna do anything you ain't ready for,” I said. “I don't wanna rush things or make you feel under any kinda pressure. I want… this. I want you. But if you ain’t ever ready, that’s okay with me. I’ll still wanna be with you, in whatever way I can. I need you to know that.”

“Thanks, Daryl,” she said. Her eyes glistened in the dark like she might cry. “For the record, I want this. I want you, too. I just need a little time.”

"Take all the time you need," I said, just glad that she was finally acknowledging she needed time to heal. In more ways than one. And I'd be there for her, every step of the way. I didn't need anything from her but for her to be okay. Anything else was just gravy. 

"Will you still stay?" she asked. "I mean, only if you want to. Think it might help me sleep, if you’re… you don’t have to, though. I’ll be-”

“I’ll stay,” I said before she could tell me she’d be fine when it was obvious she wouldn’t be. "As long as you keep that knife away from me."

"Deal," she said with a grin and settled down under the covers. I climbed in, and we lay side by side in the dark like we’d done so many times. Our hands automatically reached for one another, and I heard her exhale beside me. 

I knew she was still struggling to sleep. After a while, she shifted onto her side and let go of my hand. I rolled onto my side, too, facing her back. I reached out to put an arm around her. She jumped as I laid a hand on her hip. She hadn’t been expecting it; I should’ve thought about it. I stopped immediately. 

"Sorry,” I whispered, ready to withdraw my hand if she wasn’t comfortable with this. “Is this okay?" 

“Yeah,” she said, reaching over to take my hand again and pull my arm tighter around her. “It’s nice.”

“Yeah. It is,” I said. Her back was against my chest, my body curled around hers. She fit perfectly against me—the warmth of her body, the smell of her hair. I shut my eyes, let it all sink in, and listened to the sound of her breathing. This was the only way I wanted to fall asleep from now on. 

I thought, for a moment, she'd actually fallen asleep, but then she said, “So… this date we’re going on…”

“Don’t start," I said, feeling a reluctant smile tugging at the corners of my mouth while nerves fluttered in my stomach. Thought she might have forgotten about all that. "I ain’t telling you anything.” 

“Not even a hint?”

“Nope. You’re way too smart for hints.”

I opened my eyes again and saw her half-smile in the half-light. Her eyes were shut, but she looked happy. 

“How did you have time to think of anything like that?” she asked. “You forget we’re at war?” 

"Oh. It was before all this," I said. I’d been incredibly thankful that her eyes were shut, but now they snapped open, and her head turned to look back at me in disbelief. "Before Negan, before the Wolves, before all of it... Before you even kissed me." 

"You've known for that long ?”

“Yeah. Think I've always known," I said with a shrug. It was a huge thing to admit. I couldn’t tell right away if this would freak her out, but there didn’t seem much point in lying about it. "Never thought I'd have a snowball's chance in hell, though."

"Daryl…" she said like I'd said something dumb instead of something true. She turned in my arms so that we were face to face. Chest to chest. "I love you." 

I kissed her again. I had to. 

"I love you too," I said. "Now, go to sleep, dumbass."

She smiled and closed her eyes again. I felt her relax in my arms, finally able to let her guard down enough to get some rest. 

Chapter 44: Some Damn Eggs

Naomi

Fear stabbed me right in the gut. It was the first and, for a moment, the only thing I knew. It spread, radiating the wrong way through my veins until it reached my heart and set it beating hard in my ears. The sound of it only made things worse. I was desperately trying to listen, although I didn't know why. Familiar fight or flight instincts were rising in my veins, screaming at me to get up now, wake up now, be ready for Negan's boots on the floor, Dwight's keys in the lock, or-.

None of that.

Small pieces of reality started to break through my semi-conscious terror. My chest was tight, but underneath my short, sharp breaths, I heard the steady breathing of someone else. I wasn't alone. A warm back rested up against mine - shared body heat cocooned beneath the covers. I took a few deep breaths and caught the indescribable scent of home - of Daryl - and I knew I was safe.

I rolled over slowly so as not to wake him. The covers were pulled up over his shoulders, and all I could see was a mop of dark hair with the tip of his ear poking through. I thought about how red they turned when he said something he thought was corny, and the warmth it filled me with was strong enough to melt the fear away.

This is the only way I want to wake up for the rest of my life.

I'd never felt so damn lucky. I wanted to put an arm around Daryl, lean closer to the warmth of his back. But the moment the impulse struck me, nerves held me where I was. I told myself it was because fight or flight was as hardwired into Daryl as it was to me, and startling him awake might earn me a punch to the face before he woke up enough to realize it was me. But the truth was, I didn't know how to do… this.

Is Daryl… cuddly?

If someone had asked me this even a month ago, I'd have said no. And then I'd have laughed so hard I cried. I almost laughed then, just thinking about it, but I didn't want Daryl to wake up and see the giddy fear that was sneaking up on me. So I held my breath and prayed my nervous laughter didn't bubble up.

Good God, Naomi, pull yourself together. It's Daryl.

I'd never wrap my head around how someone I knew inside out could have this kind of effect on me. I'd known this dumbass longer than I'd known anyone. Woken up with him a million times. Before we'd got together, I'd have smacked him with a pillow until he woke up and hit me back. This desire to reach out to him was new, and it was powerful. And I was scared of it.

I knew how to be his best friend, but his girlfriend? That was a whole other ball game. I'd never seen myself as anyone's girlfriend... or anyone's anything.

What if I'm bad at it?

For so long, I'd preferred things that way. The idea of belonging to someone left me with this deep and cold unease. But now I wished I'd tried it on for size, had a practice-run before diving into a love I'd already been so deep in that I hadn't been able to see it.

I could never have been anyone's anything because I'd always, unknowingly, been Daryl's. Now that I knew that, I thought the unease would leave me alone, but it still sat heavy as a rock in my stomach. I rolled over again, turned the other way, feeling like that rock was heavy enough to sink me.

Help.

Underneath the reasons that I'd always given for avoiding any kind of long-term relationship - needing to put Mia first, put my education first, put my career first - there was a deep fear. I could cover it with those surface reasons, but it still tugged at my toes, a riptide that threatened to pull me under if I stayed still. So, the second I felt it, I'd keep moving. Never looking back, never looking down. Desperately trying to escape the truth lurking in those depths. I could feel it lapping at my heels again now, and with it, that familiar urge to run.

No.

I don't want to run from this.

But my feet were touching the floor. I didn't remember doing it, but I'd swung my legs out of bed. My chest felt tight again.

I'm not running.

I just need some air.

I stood up as quietly as I could. Maybe Bryce or Mia would be up, and I could distract myself from feeling like I was drowning. I could wait for this pass, push it all back down again where it belonged.

'He deserves better,' the first intrusive thought slipped out. I'd let myself linger on this for longer than usual, and the walls I'd built around this were starting to crack. 'You think you're good enough to give it to him?'

The trouble with trying to fight your own worst thoughts is that they're demons born from a place deep inside you, where the worst things you've ever done dwell alongside the flaws you'd do anything to keep hidden. Arguing against them is really damn hard.

'You are too fucked up to make him happy.'

I hated the thought of Daryl being with anyone else, but I wanted better for him than me. I wanted him to be with the kind of person who didn't drive him crazy with worry like I did. Someone who'd stay out of fights when he asked them to, someone who didn't have my talent for pissing off dangerous people. Someone less mouthy, less stubborn. Someone who could build him the kind of home he'd never got to have before, cook a damn meal without burning it - some crazy lucky person who knew how to date an incredible guy like Daryl without having a minor breakdown. Someone who didn't flinch at the smallest unexpected touch.

Someone less...damaged.

'You couldn't even protect Mia when it counted. If you lose this war, she'd have been better off with Negan.'

The room dipped under my feet like a ship in a storm. That was a whole new punch in the gut. Had I pulled Mia from somewhere she was safe right into a war? Had I made that war worse? Put a target on her back because she was my sister? If the Saviors managed to get out of Sanctuary, I had undoubtedly made this whole situation worse. Negan, if he was still alive, would demand vengeance.

'You fucked up.'

If Negan was dead, Simon would be next in line, and he'd enact his own kind of cruelty under the pretense that it was in Negan's name.

'You put everyone Daryl cares about in danger, you can't protect them, and once he sees that he'll leave,' the punch in that thought didn't land as hard because of its predictability. People leaving was something I expected from most folks who came into my life, but for once, that demon was quieter. Worrying about letting someone in didn't make sense when that person was Daryl. He knew me better than anyone, and he'd still wanted to start this. He loved me.

'Everyone leaves.'

I stopped with my hand on the door handle and closed my eyes for a moment. I was winning this battle with myself. I could think all kinds of horrible shit about myself, but I wouldn't entertain a bad word against Daryl, not even from my own doom spiral. Because yeah, sure, some people were unreliable assholes, but not him. Not everyone would up and leave. Not the most loyal person I knew, not Daryl.

'He left you before.'

That nasty, intrusive little thought stung way more than any of the rest. Powerful enough to knock me back to the memory of a slamming dorm room door on one of the worst nights of my life. It was the unexpectedness of it, I think. I hadn't given any thought to that dumb fight for a long time. It paled in comparison to everything else we'd been through. I got why he'd stormed out that night; I'd said some horrible shit. So why couldn't I shake this?

I'd forgiven him years before we'd met again and never blamed him for walking out. But maybe, a tiny part of me still hurt from him never walking back in. The slam of that door had echoed through every other relationship I'd had. It carried with it a reverberating and inescapable truth:

'If Daryl can't stick with me, nobody ever will.'

The thought alone was enough for that cold, sinking feeling to take over my body and fill my lungs. Close to paralyzing me. I finally turned the handle, hoping I'd be able to breathe easier on the other side of the door.

"The hell are you going?" Daryl's voice was gruff with sleep. I turned back to look at him. He hadn't moved, hadn't stirred. I froze again, thinking if I gave it long enough, he'd fall back asleep. But after a moment, Daryl opened one eye and squinted at me in the gloom, "Ain't skipping out on me already, are ya?"

He said it like he meant it as a joke, but there was a glimmer in his eyes that betrayed the not-so-casual worry underpinning it. A dead Momma, a deadbeat Daddy, and a brother who only knew how to love him selfishly had left Daryl with demons too. Maybe we even shared a few, like the one that told us we deserved the abandonment we spent our whole lives fearing.

"No," I said immediately. "'Course not."

I'd just needed some air. Some space to calm down, but now that Daryl was awake and looking at me with those blue eyes of his, I could feel myself relaxing.

"Then, where you going?" he asked, glancing at where my hand still rested on the door handle. I let go.

"I was..." I struggled to know how to word it to him. The more I calmed down, the dumber my freakout felt. And I didn't want him taking it personally. "I was just going to check Mia and Bryce were alright."

He didn't look like he fully believed me, and it was only a half-truth. I had been going to seek out Mia and Bryce, but I was the one who hadn't been alright.

"They'll probably be better if they ain't woken up by a crazy lady staring at them."

"They might already be awake."

"Doubt it. It's the middle of the night."

"It's morning."

"No, it ain't."

"It's light out," I said. Daryl turned his head back to look at the window.

"Pfft," he immediately dismissed the small amount of light behind the curtains and turned back to me. "Barely. Come back to bed."

Daryl lifted up the covers on his side of the bed, and I was frozen where I was for a whole other reason. I had a vague memory of him taking his pants off before bed, but he must've gotten too warm in the night and taken his shirt off as well. Daryl was in nothing but his boxers.

Oh.

My.

God.

My first instinct was to look away, that it was somehow wrong for me to see him like this. For years, I'd put up a subconscious barrier that blocked those kinds of thoughts about Daryl before they could make our friendship weird. That barrier, which had been weakened every time we kissed, had just been well and truly kicked down forever. I could not tear my gaze away from his broad chest, from the muscles I'd only ever felt through his shirt, faded scars, and chest hair that I never could have known were there.

Daryl had always been off-limits, forbidden.

Except, now he wasn't.

Help.

"Er, ...you okay?" Daryl asked.

No.

I don't think I'd taken a breath since he'd lifted those covers, and I was feeling light-headed. Dazed, I looked back at his face. I realized my mouth was hanging open and could feel my heart beating in the back of my throat. The tips of his ears had turned red again, and his cheeks started to flush. He'd clearly forgotten he was half-naked and was getting self-conscious about it. My staring wasn't helping either of us.

"Uh-huh," I said, trying to play it cool while knowing full well that I was not capable of stringing a sentence together.

"C'mon then, girl," he said, nodding to the empty space on the mattress between him and the bed. "I'm getting cold."

How could I say no? How could anyone?

Still feeling dizzy and kind of like I was having an out-of-body experience, I slipped in beside him. He wrapped me up in his arms as well as the blanket, and I did my best not to freak out at the warmth of his bare chest against my body.

Stop thinking about it.

I tensed up, trying not to lean too much into him. I had no idea what to do with my hands, so I kept them close to my chest in case he didn't want me touching his. I wanted to, though. I really did. I felt weirdly guilty about how much I wanted to.

"Hey, you sure you're okay?" he asked, looking down at me in his arms.

"Yeah," I said because I had not yet pulled myself together enough to say anything else, nevermind describing the rollercoaster of emotions I'd gone through since I'd woken up.

"When you were standing by the door, you looked..." he hesitated. "I dunno... scared, or something."

I didn't want to lie to him, not even by omission. Admitting out loud what had happened to me at Terminus had been hard as hell, but it had helped. A mixed effect of making me feel small and scared like I had when it happened, but also lighter. Like someone else was sharing the weight of it. But I'd uncorked something that had been safely bottled up with everything else I'd repressed, and it was impossible to stop other things leaking out. Healing is its own kind of pain, and nobody prepares you for it.

"I was scared," I admitted.

"If anything had happened, they'd have come to get us," Daryl said, immediately assuming my fears were about the Saviors. "I made Rick promise that he'd wake us up if anything changed."

"No, that ain't what I-" I stopped as I realized what he'd said. "Wait, Rick's back?"

"Yeah." Daryl looked like he wanted to kick himself for letting it slip.

"Since when?"

"He got back last night," he said. "Before I came here."

"Why didn't you tell me?"

"Thought you'd want to rush out there and start planning shit with him," Daryl said. "And I..."

"Wanted me to get some rest," I finished for him. "Yeah, I know."

"Yeah," he said. "Plus, it was hard to tell you anything while you were waving a knife at me."

"Oh yeah, sorry about that."

I thought he was done talking, but then I saw the redness in his cheeks that had only been beginning to die down start to rise again. He said, "But it weren't just that."

"No?"

"Nah," he said reluctantly, although nobody was making him talk but himself. "I only just got you back, and I know we got shit to deal with. I know this thing with the Saviors ain't done, but I wanted you to myself for a bit. I know it's selfish, but..."

"No," I said. "It ain't. It's lovely."

"Yeah?"

I'd surprised him, although I didn't know how. Who in their right mind wouldn't want this?

"Yeah."

Something in what I'd said gave him enough confidence to keep going. One of his hands brushed stray strands of hair from my face, "Waking up with you… talking like this… this is all I wanted."

"Really?" I said, my stomach filled with butterflies, and I could not keep the smile from my lips. Seemed like Daryl couldn't stop his shy smile either.

"Yeah. You think we could… er, keep it going?"

"What do you mean?"

"Y'know... pretend for a little while that all this other shit ain't going on. That it's just us. If Alexandria needs us, we'll go, but you think until then we could just have a normal morning?" he said. I didn't know how to respond. I wasn't even sure what a 'normal morning' was anymore. Luckily, Daryl had an answer for that, "I can make some breakfast for us, for Mia and Bryce too, if they're around-"

"You hungry?" I interrupted.

"I didn't mean right this second, dumbass. It's basically midnight."

"It's light out."

"Don't know how many times I gotta tell you: no, it ain't."

"I can see light behind that curtain," I said. "Sun's up."

"Probably just an overexcited star," Daryl said. "It ain't morning."

"The sun is a star, dummy."

"Alright, smartass," he grumbled. "Well, I was kinda hoping we could stay here awhile. Maybe even have a damn lie in. That too much to ask?"

"No," I said, still smiling. "That sounds kinda nice, actually."

"Good," he said, pulling me closer. He closed his eyes again but winced when one of my toes accidentally brushed against his bare leg. "How are your feet so damn cold already? There ice on that floor or something?"

"Sorry," I said, pulling my feet away from him.

"Nah, it's fine," he said, and I felt one of his legs wrap around mine, pulling them back toward him. "Warm 'em on me."

Our legs wrapped around each other - my freezing cold feet against the warmth of his calves. I was doing my best not to be overly touchy, but Daryl's arms tightened around me again, refusing to let me go even a little bit.

So Daryl is kinda cuddly.

Surprising, but… noted.

Daryl opened one eye again and saw me looking up at him.

"What you smiling about?" he asked, but he'd started smiling again too.

"You," I said honestly, and I could tell he didn't know what to say back, so he started kissing me.

Slow, sleepy kisses.

They lingered, each one melting into the next. Savoring each other and this rare, quiet moment together. No rush. No urgency. Just pure love and the heat of his body.

I couldn't resist it much longer. My hands trembled as I uncurled my fingers. I was nothing but a raw bundle of nerves as I reached out to put a hand on Daryl's chest. His collarbone under my fingertips, chest hair against my palm, and I felt him tense up. I stopped kissing him at once and felt awful that I might have crossed a line.

"Sorry," I whispered, withdrawing my hand.

"No, it's fine," he said quickly. "Just wasn't expecting it is all. You been clammed up since you lay down here, figured you might not be comfortable with..."

"No, I am," I said quickly, although 'comfortable' wasn't exactly the word I'd use. The heady mix of desire, anxiety, and anticipation swirling in my stomach was far from comfortable. But that didn't mean I didn't like it. Or that I wanted it to end.

"'Cause I just overheated," Daryl continued. "I wasn't trying to... y'know. I didn't think that you... would, er,... you ain't gotta... erm,..."

"I don't. I'm not..." I said. It was hard to reassure him about whatever was worrying him because he was too flustered to say what he meant. Didn't help that I was too tongue-tied as well. "I didn't want to make you feel uncomfortable by... y'know… and I'm sorry I gawped at you, but you're..."

I glanced down at him, which did nothing to help me find my words again. Everything I wanted to say was both too corny and not strong enough, and any time I looked at him, it was like a part of my brain shut down. Stammering into silence did nothing to help him feel less self-conscious, and I could feel my cheeks burning.

"What?" Daryl prompted, a hint of worry in his voice.

"...perfect."

"Pfft… shut up," he tried to brush it off, uncomfortable with any kind of compliment. I was about to protest, but then he kissed me again, and it was a relief to have something to do with my mouth other than talk.

Daryl took my wrist and placed my hand back on his chest, and nerves twisted my stomach up in knots. There was still a part of me that couldn't get over that it was Daryl.

My Daryl.

The feeling that Daryl was off-limits was so deeply ingrained that it was hard to shake. It still felt like I was breaking some kind of rule, that giving in to my deeply buried desire was a weakness that would drive him away from me. But it was Daryl who'd put my hand on his chest, Daryl who moved his hand to the small of my back and pulled my hips tight against his. It was as if he wanted me just as much as I wanted him. And it was impossible not to crave more of that feeling.

I finally got up the courage to move my hand from where he'd placed it and commit the feel of his skin to memory - the hair and muscles on his chest, his arms, his waist, shoulder blades, the slight dip at the small of his back. If I touched him lightly enough, he'd shiver against me and kiss me deeper.

It didn't take long before my fingers met a ridge on his skin. It took me a second to realize I'd hit on one of the scars on his back. They'd healed a long time ago, but I touched them as gently as he'd been with the fresh wounds on my body. My oldest scars bother me the most, and I figured it might be the same for him.

Feeling them created a deep ache in me. It pulled me back to patching him up in my Momma's grimy old bathroom. The first time I'd truly realized I'd move Heaven and Earth to protect him, a certainty had only grown with time. With his lips on mine and his arms around me, I slowly understood why I lost my ability to speak around him. Why he was the only person in the world that I'd ever been this nervous around.

If I fuck this up, I won't recover from it.

The realization made me hold on a little tighter, kiss him a little harder, surrender more of myself to him. I felt the top of his hip bone against my hand, the waistband of his boxers hiding the rest. Daryl felt me stop as I hit the material, and he pulled back.

We looked at each other for a moment, and there were a thousand things I wished I could put into words.

"We should stop now," he said, although a little reluctantly and a little out of breath, "Or you'll get me going."

I didn't want to stop, I wanted to get him going, but I didn't want to ruin this with a panic attack by pushing myself too far too fast. So, I nodded, and Daryl settled back down into the pillow under our heads. I rested mine against his chest again and tried to calm the heat that had been rising in me.

Daryl was quiet, like he might be getting ready to drift back to sleep. Normally, I'd have let it happen, relieved that he'd made his own assumptions about what I was freaking out about so that I wouldn't have to tell him the truth. But I didn't want to this time.

"Hey, Daryl?" My heart was beating hard against my ribs, and I knew I had to speak now before losing my nerve.

"Yeah?"

"That stuff about the Saviors... that... wasn't what I was scared of. Or, what I am scared of." I said it quietly, but his eyes opened again, immediately worried.

"No?"

"Nah. I..." I wished I'd thought further ahead about how to word this. "I... I just don't want to fuck this up."

"Fuck what up?" he asked, although I thought it had been obvious.

"Fuck us up."

"Naomi," he shook his head like he was dealing with an utter moron. "Quit being a dumbass."

It was hard not to get a little annoyed by that when I'd spent so much time psyching myself up for it. I knew it would be me who fucked this up. Daryl had been… well, he'd been goddamn perfect. He knew what to do, what to say. He'd taken everything in his stride. He'd planned a damn date, and I'd freaked up about waking up next to him?

"I mean it, Daryl," I said. I could see him fighting the urge to roll his eyes.

"I love you, Naomi," he said. "That's forever. There's nothing you could do to change that. You can't fuck this up. It's impossible."

It's easy to say those kinds of things, to make those promises when things are good. It's harder to keep loving someone when you're mad at them, or when they're being an asshole, or when they make a mistake, and I knew there were moods I could get in that made me extremely difficult to love. So, I press on.

"It ain't," I said. "Next time we have a fight-"

"We ain't gonna fight," he said, offended that I'd even suggested it.

"We will," I said. "Everyone fights."

"Not us."

"We're fighting right now."

"This ain't a fight; it's a disagreement."

"Okay, well, if we ever have another real fight, you can walk out," I said. I didn't want to get caught up in semantics, or I'd never be able to make my point. Daryl frowned, maybe at the idea of him walking out or maybe dropping the bickering so fast had shown him how serious I was about this. "You can take your time. Stay away if you gotta calm down... but you gotta promise me that once you have, you'll come back."

"'Course I will."

"No matter what we've said to each other," I pressed. "No matter what hot-headed bullshit we've both been yelling, you can always walk it back, and I will always be sorry. For whatever it is I've done."

"Naomi, that ain't gonna happen. You ain't got nothing to worry about," he said, pulling me close to his chest again.

"Promise me," I mumbled into his neck.

"I promise," he said. I knew he didn't fully get it. But hearing him say it helped.

The truth is, I was broken. We both were. And we had been long before the dead started walking. But that didn't mean that we didn't deserve this. Or that we were incapable of holding on to something that felt so good. Part of holding onto that - part of loving and being loved - was facing the worst parts of yourself with someone who saw them too but loved you all the same.

We lay in silence for a while, legs and arms all tangled in each other. I listened to Daryl's heartbeat in his chest, to the steadying rise and fall of his breathing as he fell back asleep again. I filled up with the familiar certainty that I would do whatever it took to keep his heart beating, keep us together. Nobody would lay a finger on him or tear us apart again. Not Negan. Not Simon. Especially not my own damn insecurities.

I must have fallen asleep at some point because the next thing I knew, something soft hit me in the face.

"Hey!" I yelled, briefly opening my eyes to a room that was now flooded with sunlight before a pillow came down and hit me in the face again. I threw my hands up to push it off.

Daryl's face grinned down at me, "Hey there, sleepyhead."

I mumbled a curse under my breath and moved to snatch my own pillow from under my head. Too slow. Before I could lift it up and hit him back, Daryl grabbed my wrists and pinned them where they were. His body moved over mine, his legs on either side of me, and he leaned over to kiss me before I could yell at him. But I was not complaining.

These weren't the slow and careful kisses of earlier that morning. These were harder, more urgent like Daryl had been waiting a while. I wondered if he'd woken up before me, lain awake worrying about how to wake me up like I had with him. It was almost hard to kiss him back because of how much I was smiling. This had been the perfect wake-up call.

Without warning, he froze and pulled back.

"Shit," he let go of me, a concerned frown creased his brow. "Is this okay?"

It was sweet of him to worry like that. I wanted to reassure him that he hadn't crossed any lines, but I had bigger fish to fry. He'd been so caught up in kissing me that he'd dropped the pillow, and now it was right within my grasp. Rookie mistake.

"No," I said, trying to reach for it without him noticing. His face fell for a split second before I added, "You dropped your guard, dipshit."

Daryl opened his mouth to say 'what?' but couldn't get it out before I whacked him across the face with the pillow he'd so stupidly let go of.

"Hey!" He tried to grab it back from me, but I held on tight, pulled it free, and hit him again. Daryl was laughing too hard to protest. He grabbed it, wrenched it off me. I squealed as it smacked against my face and raised my arms to grab at it again. There'd be a few seconds where one of us would have a fleeting win and get a few hits in before the other one would grab it again. It was a mess of laughter and limbs as we tried to wrestle it off one another.

I'm not even sure which one of us started it, but pretty soon, the material was gone from under my fingers, and I barely noticed it happen because Daryl's lips were back on mine. Our dumb pillow fight dissolved into something else entirely. His hands were way too busy running all over me for him to get me back, and mine were busy pulling him closer to even think about starting it up again. All I could think about was him - the smell of him, the taste of him, the feel of his body between my legs.

Goddamn, Daryl.

Breathless for so many reasons, I pulled away. There was a heartbeat of silence where we just looked at one another, and then Daryl murmured, "I love you."

Despite all the laughter that had led up to this, the look in his eyes was so serious. I got it. The weight of everything that we were, everything that we had been, and the potential of everything we were about to be, sat between us.

"I love you, too," I said, brushing some of his hair away from his face. Neither of us moved. It had nothing to do with his body on mine, the weight of his hips between my thighs keeping me under him; I'm sure I could've moved him if I wanted to. I didn't want to. His arms were curled on either side of me as he propped himself up in his elbows above me. Every part of me was surrounded by him, and I'd never felt so safe.

It was the way he looked at me that kept me pinned there. It's a lot to take - when someone's looking at you like you're their whole damn world. It could be a lot of pressure if you let it. If it had been anyone other than Daryl, it could have been enough to send me running for the hills, but I knew I was looking back at him in the exact same way.

"Breakfast?" he asked eventually. I nodded reluctantly. He pushed himself up and off me, and I immediately missed the weight of his body on mine - the warmth of him.

As I stood up, my foot hit on the abandoned pillow, forgotten on the floor. I'm not sure which one of us threw it down there. Daryl pulled a shirt on, and I tried not to look too disappointed. Before he opened the bedroom door, he took my hand. Held it a little tighter than usual, like just walking out of here would bring our peaceful morning crashing to an end.

It didn't, Mia was still curled up on the sofa, but she was awake. There was a book in her hand, and she raised her head from the armrest when we came in. Morning sunlight flooded the room she was in, and it all looked so… normal. Maybe it was the stark contrast to my living conditions in Sanctuary, but things here felt so good that it was almost as if the world hadn't ended.

"Morning," I said.

"Morning!" she said, jumping to her feet. Mia seemed to be in as good a mood as we were.

"Where's Bryce?" I asked.

"He's taken a shift at the gates," Mia said. "He sends his love, though."

"You hungry?" Daryl asked her. He asked it a little too quickly like he was worried that talk of Bryce's shift at the gate would be enough for me to declare this morning of peace over. He needn't have worried. Daryl and Mia, safe and happy doing normal family shit - this was everything I'd fought my way back for.

Mia nodded, and we headed for the kitchen. While Daryl rooted around in various cupboards for food, Mia told me all about how he'd made her mac and cheese the first night they'd stayed at the Hilltop. Daryl kept his back to us the whole time, but I saw the tell-tale redness hit the tips of his ears, and my heart felt so full it kind of hurt. Like it might burst if it filled up anymore. I'd always known he'd take good care of her, but to hear her talk about it without having to ask anything meant the world to me. I was glad I'd made it out, but it was good to know they'd have looked after each other if Negan had killed me.

When Daryl didn't say anything, Mia sidled up to watch what he was doing with an assortment of eggs he'd found somewhere in the kitchen. They weren't all hen's eggs, but you get a lot less fussy about that kind of thing when there aren't many other choices.

"What are you making?" Mia asked, standing on her tiptoes to look.

"Just some scrambled eggs," Daryl said with a small shrug.

"Will you teach me?" Mia asked. Daryl paused.

"You don't know how to scramble eggs?"

"No."

He looked over at me. "You didn't teach her to scramble some damn eggs?"

"What makes you think I know how to scramble some damn eggs?" I said.

"You tried once," Mia reminded me. She looked back at Daryl. "Once she'd scooped it out of the sieve, it was okay. Kind of tasted like an eraser, though."

There was clearly too much in what Mia had said for Daryl to unpack it all at once. "What were you using a sieve for?"

"To drain them, obviously," I said.

"Drain them?"

"Yeah."

"Were they the runniest eggs in the world? Probably should've just cooked 'em longer."

"I don't think it was the eggs," I said. "I think it was the milk."

"How much did you put in?"

"I dunno… a carton?"

"A carton?"

"Yeah, the recipe said to add milk."

"Okay, but just like a splash, not every drop you got in the house."

"Well, the recipe should've said that."

Daryl sighed, lost for words for a moment, and then looked at Mia. "For a smartypants, your sister's a real dumbass."

Mia agreed, and I didn't care. Didn't even retort. I just leaned back on the kitchen counter and watched the love of my life teaching my little sister how to scramble some damn eggs. I loved how easy things were between them. With sunlight coming in through the window, the kitchen filling up with the smell of cooking breakfast, this was a truly perfect moment. When things got bad again, which I knew they would, this would be one of the moments I looked back on to get me through.

Daryl was just serving it up when the door opened. It was Bryce, his face was flushed, and he was out of breath. He'd clearly run here. While Mia approached him and asked if he was okay, Daryl and I looked at each other. We knew. We knew before he even said anything that whatever he'd rushed back to tell us was about to shatter our perfect, sleepy morning.

"They got out," Bryce said. "The Saviors got out. We just heard it over the radio. Rick's called a meeting."

 

Daryl

Shit was tense for all of us. But ain't nobody in that room felt it more than me. Rick was standing at the Church's pulpit when we walked in; the people of Alexandria were spread out in the pews. All of them looked tired. Many of them had been injured and had come back here to recover. Fighting was far from what any of them wanted. The news that the Saviors had got out made the atmosphere cold with a sick kind of dread.

It was so different from the morning we'd had that it made all the good stuff feel like a dream. I glanced at Naomi and hoped she didn't feel like it had been a waste of time. That she didn't just see it as a lie-in and some damn scrambled eggs, that she knew it meant a hell of a lot more to me than that. She'd seemed happy at the time. I hoped she wasn't just humoring me; I hoped she didn't regret letting me talk her into it.

More attention was on her than I knew she'd be comfortable with. I walked a little closer to her, scanned the faces of everyone there, looking for any sign that they blamed her for the Saviors getting out. Anyone who tried to pin it on her would find themselves torn to shreds pretty damn fast. Let them blame me if they gotta blame someone. Hell, I was the one who made the damn hole in the wall.

Shit.

Was it my fault?

I'd been fretting so much over Naomi, I hadn't stopped to think that I might be the reason they got out. I felt a small twist of guilt in my gut, but with Naomi at my side and Mia just behind us, I wouldn't have been able to look anyone in the eye and say I thought the risk hadn't been worth it. We could protect this place and the people in it, and we were a hell of a lot stronger for having Naomi back.

We were the last people to arrive, and Rick stepped forward when we walked in like it was us he'd been waiting for. He had a real nervous look about him, and I didn't much like it. Lately, that look had only meant he was about to betray me or that the deed was already done, and I was about to find out about it.

"They got out," Naomi broke the silence that had fallen over the Church. She said it more like a statement, but Rick answered her all the same.

"Yes."

"They heading here?"

"Can't say for sure, but I don't doubt it," Rick said, then he slipped into that cop-voice of his. The one that comes out when he's trying to calm a situation down before it can escalate into something else. I know that tone all too well. It's usually directed at me. When he does it preemptively, I feel my nerves spike, ready for whatever fight it is he's trying to stop. "Now, I know there's some concern that they'll come here and demand we turn over Naomi for what she did, but-"

"No," I said immediately. "Ain't happening."

"Daryl," Naomi said gently. "You don't know what he was going to say."

"Sure I do," I said. "He's going to let you die for his war. Just like he was gonna do when you were outside Sanctuary, and these assholes opened fire."

"If that's what it takes to win this thing," she said. "If it stops a bigger war. If it can save Alexandria…"

'If it can save you and Mia,' she didn't say it, but I could see that thought burning in her eyes. Couldn't really blame her for it, neither. I'd have handed myself over in a heartbeat for my girls, but it wasn't me they were after.

"No," I said again. I didn't have any kind of counter-argument or plan. All I knew was that if anything like that were to go down, it would be over my dead body.

"There are a lot of lives at stake here!" she said. "If it comes down to one person or every-"

"Yeah, there are a lotta lives at stake, but none of them would still be here if it weren't for you," I said and turned to look at them all sitting there in their damn pews, ready to hand over the best thing that had ever happened to Alexandria. "Think we'd have been ready for the first fight against Negan if she hadn't sent Dwight to warn us? Think we'd have had time to get reinforcements from the Hilltop and Kingdom? Think any of you sorry assholes would still be here if it weren't for her? She's done enough for this place. The least y'all can do is help me protect her."

"Dar-" Rick started to say my name, but I rounded on him.

"You wanna throw her to the wolves again, huh?" I got up in his face more than I meant to, but he needed to know I was done with his bullshit. I'd fight them both if I had to. "After she had the balls to do what you couldn't and take down Negan? Happy to let other people do your dirty work so long as it ain't your family in the firing line, huh?"

"Daryl!" Naomi snapped. "There might not be another way, if-"

She stopped. Rick had held up his hands to shut us up. "Let's all just take a few steps back, okay? A few deep breaths."

Even though I'd been screaming at him, he looked kind of amused, and that did nothing but fuel the fire in my belly.

"Whatever it is you've got to say," I said, "spit it out, Rick."

"Nobody is saying we should give Naomi up if they ask us to," he said. "I was raising it as a concern. I wasn't suggesting it as an option."

"If it's what it comes to, Rick-" Naomi started.

"Nope, we can't let you do that," he said firmly. I could hardly believe it. Neither, it seemed, could Naomi. We'd been so busy arguing with each other, we hadn't realized that Rick hadn't actually weighed in on this. He gave her a small smile, amused by how shocked she was. "Sorry, Naomi, I'm with Daryl on this one. You've done enough for this place. We can handle the Saviors."

I watched her closely as she digested this. She looked more worried now than she had when she thought Rick would parcel her up and deliver her to Negan. Her gaze drifted around the Church again, quietly scanning the worried faces of those gathered in the pews. She looked back at Rick, "We ain't got numbers for a fight."

"I know," he said solemnly.

My heart sank in my chest. Naomi wasn't wrong. There weren't many people in Alexandria, and many of them had been badly injured. Most, like Michonne, were barely recovered. There were kids here - Mia, Perla, and Carl - forced to grow up before their time. Putting them through another battle felt cruel, but what the alternative? Waiting here to beg Negan for mercy?

"We could head out to the Kingdom or the Hilltop?" I suggested. "We got a better chance of fighting them if we get all of the communities together."

"It's too dangerous," Rick said. "We can't risk them catching us on the roads like they did the first time. For all we know, they could be setting up blockades between the communities as we speak. They'll probably send groups to the Kingdom and the Hilltop, too."

All of us who'd been in the clearing that night couldn't help but think back on it. They'd snatched Naomi right off the road, used the roadblocks to steer the others into a trap. We couldn't let them have that advantage again but was it really better than sitting here and waiting? The more time we wasted talking about what to do, the longer the Saviors had to set up as many damn roadblocks as they wanted.

The question of whether or not it was my actions that had let them out rose up in the back of my throat, but I couldn't bring myself to ask it. So, instead, I asked, "You think they'll hit all them places?"

"I think they'll hit all three places at once," Rick said. "It's not just about what Noami did to Negan. They'll be looking for an answer for what we all did to the Sanctuary. That makes the Kingdom and the Hilltop a target just as much as Alexandria."

"Do the other communities know that the Saviors might be on their way?" Naomi asked.

"They got the same warning we did," Rick said. "Our lookouts had to move for their own safety once the Saviors got out, but it looked like they were arming themselves. I doubt they'll come here to surrender."

"So, we wait for 'em?" I snapped. I was already real tightly wound, and the lack of a proper plan was only making things worse. "You want me to go paint a damn target on the gates? Give them something to aim at?"

"I'm not saying that," Rick said.

"We gotta leave," Naomi said. The hint of desperation in her voice tugged at something deep in my heart. I knew she'd have looked around at all of these people and seen them as lives that needed saving, not potential soldiers. "Daryl's right; we can't just sit here."

"It's too dangerous to leave," Rick said again.

"It's dangerous to stay," Naomi countered. "One breach in the walls is all it would take. It'd be like when the Wolves attacked us. Worse, even."

"The sewers," Carl interrupted us, just blurting it right out like we were supposed to know what the hell that meant. Everyone turned to look at him. "We could hide out down there for a while. It's big enough to fit all of us, and they lead out of Alexandria if we do need to escape. I hid Siddiq down there for a while."

All attention now turned to Siddiq, who still hadn't entirely convinced me that he wasn't some kind of mole working for Negan. He cleared his throat, glancing nervously around at all of us like the wrong answer would get him shot. "Yeah. It's not comfortable, but it could easily fit all of us for a day or two if need be."

"It's possible," Rick said. "But if they break the gates down or scale the walls and search the place, it would only take one of them to find an entrance. They could have us surrounded before we knew we'd been discovered."

"Not if they think we've fled," Naomi said, and I knew from the light in her eyes that this was it. This was the plan. She believed in it, so I did too. I didn't need anything else to get on board. "They won't search so hard if they think we've made a break for it."

"If they find Alexandria empty, who's to say they'll assume we've fled?" Rick said. "They could tear the place apart anyway."

"That's why they have to see what they think is us making a break for it," she said.

"Like a decoy?" I asked. She had a habit of getting three steps ahead of herself, her thoughts moving so fast it was hard for her to go backward and explain. Thankfully I had a lifetime's worth of experience running to catch up.

"Yes!" her face lit up a little, and it felt incredible to be back on the same team. "A decoy."

"Bust out of the back with a few people in as many vehicles as possible," I said. "If any Saviors try to follow us, we can gun them down and get back into the sewers through one of the points outside Alexandria. Any other Saviors find the vehicles, it'll look like we killed their friends and hid out in the woods."

"It's a good plan," Rick said. "But they could still burn the place to the ground."

"They could," Naomi agreed, but she didn't much look like the thought bothered her. "They probably will."

"But our people will be safe," Carl said. "We can rebuild - here or someplace else, it doesn't matter. But we can only do that if there are people around to rebuild it."

"Sacrifice the town, save the people," Naomi agreed. I was surprised she was so relaxed about it. She'd been so scared of losing her home again before all this.

"Otherwise, what's the point in all this, Dad?" Carl asked. "When this war is over, there has to be something after."

"It's a good plan, Carl," Rick put a hand on his son's shoulder, a brightness in his eyes. Surprise at how smart his kid was, how fast he was growing up. It's easy to get so caught up in the aggression of a war that you focus more on taking down an enemy than keeping your people alive. I'd been on both sides of that. I wanted the Saviors to burn for everything they'd done and didn't much care how many of them died or how "innocent" they might have been in torturing my girl and me. Anyone who followed a guy like Negan deserved what was coming.

But my girl was here now.

Mia was here.

Carl and Judith were here.

The fear of a battle that hurt any of them was stronger than my hatred of the Saviors. If the Kingdom and the Hilltop survived whatever the Saviors were going to throw their way, we could regroup and have a second shot at this. It felt like a good plan, and most folks agreed.

We all started filing out of the Church, heading off to gather supplies. We'd have to store some of them down where we planned on hiding out, in case we had to be there a while, but we'd also have to load enough into the decoy vehicles so that if the Saviors searched them, it would look like we were making an honest break for it.

"Naomi!" someone yelled her name from the crowd of people. We stopped where we were on the Church lawn and turned to see Perla waving frantically at us from the doorway. Naomi called back to her, and then Perla disappeared into the crowd for a moment as she ran toward us. We waited for her, and then before I could even blink, Naomi had her wrapped up in this great big hug. Everyone was tense and on edge about what was coming next, but Perla looked almost as scared as she had when she'd found me out on the road. If Naomi was hoping for more of a reunion, the wide panic in Perla's eyes made it clear there wasn't time for any of that.

"We need to move Lucas," Perla said urgently, her gaze flickering between Naomi and Mia. "He won't be able to get to safety on his own."

Lucas. I could never hear that name without a familiar spike of jealousy. I'd done my damndest not to think about him, and I hadn't seen him fighting anywhere, so I'd quietly assumed that he'd succumbed to his injuries and hadn't asked any follow-up questions because I hadn't wanted to know either way. If he was dead and a part of me was relieved, I'd have felt guilty about that. Except now, I felt like even more of an asshole because, if what Naomi said was true, I'd never needed to worry about her feelings for him. She'd loved me all along.

It seemed like Naomi had made a similar assumption, given that I hadn't told her anything about him. The mention of his name caused a sharp intake of breath. She was shocked but happy about it. I tried not to read anything into it. Even I didn't have time to deal with myself being a jealous weirdo right now.

"Lucas is still…" she trailed off for a moment, clearly not wanting to say 'alive' while sounding so surprised. "...here?"

"He lost a lot of blood," Mia told her matter-of-factly. "One of the Saviors shot him with-"

"Yeah," Naomi said, clearly trying to move past this part. "I was there. It was right before Negan got me. Did he make it?"

I wondered if she'd cut Mia off because she didn't want to remember that day or because she didn't want to be reminded who it was that had put that bolt in her friend. Working with Dwight must've been a bitter pill to swallow. I still didn't understand everything that must've gone down in there, how he'd gone from shooting Lucas to bringing us secret messages to helping her break out of there. It was all just even more questions we didn't have time for.

"He was unconscious for a few days," Perla said, able to give more detail than Mia as she'd probably been at his side for the whole thing. "Denise didn't know if he'd pull through, but eventually, he woke up. He's still weak. He can't use his left arm. Denise doesn't know if he'll ever be able to."

"Where is he?" Naomi asked. "Why wasn't he at the meeting?"

"He can't move around much without getting sick," Perla said. The more she talked about it, the more she panicked and the faster she spoke. "It was hard for Denise to get his bleeding under control. His wound reopened sometimes… it got infected after a while, and… I think he's better but still not well. If we have to go into the sewers, I don't think he'll be able to-."

"Hey," Naomi interrupted her gently. She'd taken a beat to process all of this new information and now bent down to Perla's level to look her in the eye. "It's going to be okay, kid. We'll help him get down there, make sure he's safe and comfortable. We'll grab as many medical supplies as he needs. He'll be fine."

If any of the fear Perla had was affecting Naomi, she didn't let it show. She sounded so calm and reassuring that Perla had no choice but to believe that everything was going to be okay. I watched them have quieter conversations filled with plans on how best to support Lucas. Mia joined in, but I barely took in any of it. I just watched Naomi take two frightened kids and fill them with enough confidence to help out, and I couldn't help but think about how she'd make a great Momma. The minute the thought hit me, I did my best to squash it down again. Not only was now not the time for dwelling on shit like this, but we'd also gone from 'taking it slow' to 'I love you' faster than I could have dreamed. Jumping right to 'hey, do you want kids?' would be too much. It would probably send Naomi running so fast she'd leave a Naomi-shaped hole in the walls of Alexandria like a damn cartoon.

"Daryl?" Naomi's voice brought me back down to earth with a weirdly guilty jolt like she'd caught me out thinking something I shouldn't have been. She was looking at me expectantly. Mia and Perla had their backs to us, walking off in the direction of Lucas's place. Maybe she wanted to know why I hadn't told her her friend was still breathing.

"I didn't know he was still alive," I said before she could get too mad at me for not telling her. "I should've checked, but I was too focussed on getting you out of-"

"It's fine," she assured me. "I'm just checking in. You were all… staring off into the distance, and you had this look on your face like-"

"Just thinking about what might happen next," I said, which wasn't strictly a lie. I'd been thinking of a future of sorts, but I was happy to let Naomi assume that it was to do with the upcoming fight.

"You happy to help us with Lucas?" she asked tentatively. "I know you guys aren't exactly-"

"Yeah, I'll come help," I said. I didn't want to be reminded of how shitty I'd been to Lucas before he'd got injured. She took my hand as we started walking after the two girls.

"You sure you're okay with this plan?" I asked her. As we walked through Alexandria, it was hard not to think about how many of these buildings might be nothing but rubble by tomorrow. "That they might burn the place down?"

"Of course I am," she shrugged. I still couldn't believe how relaxed she was about it when she'd fought so hard to help me settle in here. The fear she'd have over losing this place to the Saviors when all we'd heard of them was the name 'Negan.'

"Thought this place was your home."

"Yeah," she said, but there was a non-committal note in her voice that I wasn't expecting. "It's been a good home, but they're just buildings. As long as I got you and Mia with me, anywhere we go from here can be home. Let it burn."

It meant so much to hear that I couldn't say anything back. I gave Naomi's hand a squeeze and hoped she understood. She glanced at me and smiled. I tried to think of something to say to describe how she made me feel, but nothing came close. All too soon, and before I had the chance to say anything, I heard someone yell our names.

It was Rick. I felt myself get tense again, mostly because it was Naomi he seemed fixed on.

"I am really sorry for the way things played out at Sanctuary," he said to her.

"It's okay," she said, brushing it off like an apology was a ridiculous thing for him to do after telling an army to open fire on the place she was standing. "I get why you did it, and I'm fine. I got out. We're good."

"I'm glad to hear that," Rick said. "And I meant what I said about not giving you up to the Saviors. You're family, and we'll look after you."

Naomi was as surprised by this as I was. Since she'd found us starving and dehydrated out on the road, I'd desperately wanted her to become as much a part of my group as I was. I'd wanted her to merge into that family, finally join the most important people in my life together. But things were different now. Rick had lied to me, withheld information so that I'd follow his orders instead of thinking for myself. Told me what I wanted to hear to keep me placated. What if that's all he was doing now?

Kids like Naomi and me don't grow up with the kind of family folks like Rick did. We can't count on anyone, but we look for that kind of security anywhere we can. Naomi and I got lucky when we found it in each other. I got lucky all over again when I found another family in a quarry outside of Atlanta. But Naomi's group had all been killed in Terminus. Before that, she had Momma who disappeared in a drug haze every few weeks, and a Daddy who never stuck around to know her name. She'd formed very few lasting connections to people. Hearing that Rick thought of her as part of our family would mean more to her than Rick could ever have understood, but I could see it written all over her face. The soft brightness in her eyes of barely held-back tears at the overwhelming feeling of belonging, of being included by someone.

So, if this was a trick to get her to follow Rick without questioning him, it was a dirty rotten one.

"Thanks, Rick," she said, a little choked up. My sinking heart steeled.

"We should go check on Lucas," I said. If he was manipulating her, I didn't want him to be able to get his claws any deeper. He better have meant what he said.

"Yes," she said, immediately snapping back into action. She looked at Rick, "We're going to try and get him down there, get him comfortable. I sent Mia and Perla ahead of us. I should go in and check they haven't talked his ear off. "

"Alright," Rick said with a half-smile.

"We're good, though," she assured him. "No hard feelings here."

"I appreciate that," Rick said. I caught his quick glance at me. Naomi followed it.

"You coming?" she asked me.

"You go on in," I told her. "I'll catch up in a moment."

She studied my face for the briefest of seconds. I did my best to look calm. I knew she was worried about the hit my friendship with Rick had taken while she'd been away. I wasn't looking to start a fight, but I wanted to make it crystal clear to Rick that shit was different now.

"Okay," she said, clearly satisfied that a brawl was unlikely. I waited until Luca's front door closed behind her.

"Are we good, Daryl?" Rick asked. He'd clearly been waiting for the door to close too.

"That depends," I said. "If what you said just now was some kind of trick-"

"It wasn't."

"If it was," I said like he hadn't even spoken. I didn't much care what he had to say for himself. I needed to know he'd heard me. "If you're going to use her or stab me in the back again-"

"I'm not."

"If anything happens to her and there's even a slight chance that you had some part in it, I'll kill you."

Rick nodded. He was quiet for a moment, thinking something through.

"I am truly sorry for how things went down before," he said. "But you are my brother, and she's your girl. That makes her family. I'm sorry I didn't see things that way before. You gotta trust I'm not gonna hand her over to Negan. I almost gave Michonne up to the Governor, and now I can't imagine my life without her. Even if she wasn't your girl, Naomi is strong. She's good, and we need people like here."

Maybe that was closer to the truth. Naomi had proved herself to him; she was useful, so Rick wouldn't toss her aside like garbage. I so badly wanted to trust him, but I would never let my guard down that way again. Not when it came to her.

"I'm sorry, Daryl," he said again. "Really, I am."

"Better be," I said and turned around to follow Naomi into the house. I loved Rick like I'd loved Merle, but I'd followed the wrong brother before. I wasn't going to be used like that again.

Inside the house, Lucas was sitting up on the couch, and Naomi was pulling away from what had probably been a long reunion hug. I was glad I'd missed it. I thought it would be easier to keep my cool now that Naomi was mine, but it's harder than you think to get rid of those kinds of feelings. Every time I looked at Lucas, all I saw was the kind of reliable, safe, well-adjusted guy that I'd have wanted for her in the old world. The type of guy she deserved.

Before I could spiral out of control, his gaze slid over to me, immediately wary. I don't like it when people look at me that way, but I can't deny he didn't have a good reason for it. The number of times I'd come close to punching him in the face over nothing…I was kinda surprised that he didn't ask me to leave the second I walked in.

She's yours, I reminded myself, as Naomi glanced between the two of us. For better or worse, she picked you.

"Hey, man," I said.

"Hey," he said, but that wary look was still there like he was just waiting for me to say something I shouldn't or run at him. To distract from the growing discomfort in the room, Naomi quickly launched into a summary of what we'd decided on in the Church. While she talked, I lowered my gaze to the floor and kept my distance. I didn't want Lucas to keep looking at me like I was some kind of threat. If she was going to keep being friends with this guy, I had to try my best to get along with him. I tried to reassure myself by remembering how much I liked Bryce the more I got to know him, but I couldn't deny that all of that had been made easier when she'd mentioned his former husband, and I'd realized they couldn't be together.

Lucas, on the other hand, was harder not to fret over. It was hard as well not to get paranoid about whether or not there'd been anything between them before Terminus. Or, if she'd never met me again - would anything have happened between them? Would she have been better off? Had I got in the way of something that could have been better for her?

Naomi had only wanted to fill him in and reassure him that he'd be taken care of, but Lucas insisted he wanted to help. Sensing a tough conversation ahead, Naomi distracted Mia and Perla by asking them to gather up the medical supplies Lucas needed and get them ready to move to the sewers. There were antibiotics for the infection that Denise was worried had moved to his bloodstream, antiseptic wipes for the deep wound on his shoulder that habitually reopened, bandages to dress it and tie up his immobile arm in a sling.

When the girls were distracted, Naomi tried to warn him against overexerting himself. I could see her getting distressed about it, so I stepped in and tried to warn him too, but that only made things worse. He seemed to take that as some kind of challenge. As we protested, he pulled himself out of his seat and what little color was left in his cheeks drained almost immediately.

Nothing we said made a lick of difference. Lucas carried as much as he could one-handed. Every trip back and forth caused him to sweat more and somehow get even paler until his skin was almost translucent. Everyone in Alexandria must've begged him to stop at least once, but he brushed them all off. I could see Naomi was worrying about it, so I kept a close eye on him. There was a growing dark patch from where an old wound had started bleeding again, seeping through his shirt. His breathing was so labored he sounded like a damn Walker.

There were no two ways about it; Lucas was in a bad way.

The day wore on with no sign of the Saviors, as we moved supplies from one place to another, set up blockades, and lined up our fleet of decoy vehicles. I think there was a growing hope amongst some people that they wouldn't show at all. But the rest of us knew better, and as the sun started to set, Rick stopped us and gathered us all by the gates.

"They're close," he said. Everyone gathered by the gates was tired and sweaty from a day filled with moving shit down into the sewers and loading them into the back of trucks. The light was failing, and we all had a long night ahead of us. "We gotta start finishing up and getting into positions."

There had been no discussion over what these positions would be, who would be in the decoy, and who would shelter in the sewers. Naomi stepped forward, and my heart sank a little.

"Depending on how they approach us, I think we should engage with them," she said. "So that they really think we're all waiting behind the walls and that we're fleeing.."

"You think they'll give us any warning?" I asked. "That they'll stop to chat?"

"Yes," she said. "I think they'll want to talk."

"Negan does love the sound of his own voice," Rick agreed. "Alright, I'll answer and try to keep him talking for as long as I can."

"That's dumb," I said. "You really think Negan's going to negotiate again after what we did? He'll probably blow your head off the minute he sees it at the top of them gates."

"He won't," Naomi said, and there was something in the confidence with which she said it that I didn't like. Like she knew him. "That ain't his MO, not as I understand it anyway."

"You think you understand Negan?" I asked. It came out sharper than I meant it to because of how uncomfortable I was about any amount of time they'd spent together. Every horrible insight she had into this was on me for not getting her out sooner.

"I know how he thinks," she said. She took a moment, thinking deeply about something. Looked like she was teetering right on the edge of a decision, and then she turned to everyone who was gathered there.

"Go on," Rick encouraged her, seeing she was on the verge of saying more.

"Negan doesn't want most people to die. He wants them to work for him," she said. "I think he'll want to talk, probably offer some kind of way out for us that suits him. If we refuse, he can attack, and the rest of the Saviors will think it's justified. When I was in there he-"

"Hey," I caught her arm, trying to get her attention. When she looked at me, I quietly said, "You ain't gotta tell these people shit. You don't owe 'em."

"It's fine," she said. "They should all know who we're up against."

I couldn't stop her, but I knew how difficult she found it to talk about things she'd been through, and it didn't feel worth upsetting herself over. She took another deep breath and addressed them all again.

"When I was in there, Negan kept telling me that I had choices, and I think he really truly believed that. But you know what they were?" she waited for a moment to check that people were really listening. There was no question about it; people hardly even moved. All hanging on her every word, but I couldn't tell if it was because they were paying attention to this warning or if they were nosy assholes prying for some gory details of what she'd been through. "It was; join him and have an easy life in Sanctuary."

It clearly wasn't the dramatic or gruesome answer people were looking for. There was another pause while she ordered the rest of her thoughts.

"Joining him would've meant fighting against all of you, killing some of you. That wasn't an option," Naomi said. "And that life in Sanctuary is only easy as long as you follow his orders to the letter. Negan takes whatever, or whoever he wants. There are half a dozen women in there who he calls his wives. None of them want to be there, but he would tell you that they are choosing to be with him."

A ripple of discomfort ran through the crowd.

"He ain't holding a gun to any of their heads," Naomi said, "but all of them have got someone they care about in that place. Some of them have husbands, boyfriends they met before coming to Sanctuary. You know what happens if they're caught with them again? Negan takes a hot iron and holds it to their boyfriend's face until the room smells like burning flesh, and they pass out from the pain."

While she talked about it, I could almost smell the stench that had filled the room when Negan had burned Mark's face. The piss I'd had to mop up after he'd passed out. Nobody listening to this could've known what that was like. But maybe the idea of it would be enough.

"So, if you don't comply with what he says, you might think you can take the punishment for it, but there's no guarantee you'll be the one who takes the beating," she said. A memory flooded me before I could shut it out. Naomi's pale and unconscious face pressed into the Sanctuary floor after my failed escape attempt. I felt queasy. "If he wants something from you, he'll find someone you care about, and he'll make life hell for them. Starve 'em. Keep 'em in a cell and only let them out to catch the Walkers outside the gates. Catch them, not kill them. Not defend themselves against them. They'll be in permanent danger, and he'll make you watch all of it because every bad thing that happens to them is on you. Because you said no to him."

She stole a glance at me. Her eyes were bright, like she was trying not to cry. Was that really what she thought? Had she seen me working the fence and blamed herself? I shook my head at her. Didn't want her beating herself up about it anymore. She'd kept her promise to me. I'd have taken a thousand Walker bites to the jugular to keep her out of Negan's arms.

"The only way to have an easy life in that place is to stop caring about everyone but Negan, and that's how he wants it. He will take what he wants, leave you with nothing and expect you to thank him for it. Unless you fight."

"I thought Negan was dead?" someone called from the crowd. "I thought you killed him."

"We don't know that for sure," Rick reminded everyone. He was quick to step in, a little too quick maybe.

"It doesn't matter if it's Negan or Simon or Gavin who shows up here. They are all Negan," Naomi said. "If he is dead, whoever has taken over from him will have to uphold the same ideas as Negan if they want to have any hope in hell of holding on to his power. At least for now, they need to be seen to be acting like Negan. Whoever comes here will make it sound like joining them is our only option for a good life. But I'm telling you now; it ain't no life."

When she was done talking, Rick smiled at her like he was proud, and I hated it. Was this what he'd wanted? Was this why he'd apologized, why he'd called her family? She was useful to him - someone smart and strong who'd suffered so much. A mouthpiece for his ideas, a martyr to his cause.

"Alright," Rick said when Naomi's story had settled deep into everyone's bones. "They'll be here soon, but we got this. I'll keep them talking. I need a few of you to-"

"I should be there," Naomi quietly interrupted him. She was very deliberately not looking at me.

"Hell no," I said. I either wanted her down in the sewers where it was safe or right next to me where I could protect her.

"It's the smartest play," she said. "No matter what happened to Negan, I'm the biggest distraction for them right now. I can buy us the most time."

"Okay," Rick said, and my blood boiled. No resistance. He looked at me, "Daryl, you lead the convoy out of the back-"

"No," I said.

"We don't have time to argue about this," Rick said. He was right; it would take centuries for me to talk Naomi out of this. All that was left was to support her.

"I ain't arguing," I said. "You're going to lead the decoy convoy, me and Naomi are going to be at the gates. That's how it's going to be."

Something hardened in Rick's eyes. He wasn't used to me taking charge like this. Hell, he wasn't used to anyone telling him what to do. Adrenaline spiked in my veins. I didn't know how he would react, but it felt good to step up like this. To back someone else running the show. Especially because I didn't like how he'd been running things lately.

"Me and her, we got this," I said, taking a step closer to Naomi, daring Rick to disagree. That girl could do anything; either he saw that and wouldn't disagree, or he didn't, and he'd been using her this whole time.

"Alright," Rick said, but I couldn't tell he wasn't happy about it. "I'll lead the convoy."

He selected a group of people to drive the other cars. There was a rush to get everything in place before the Saviors got to our gates. Things were going okay. It felt like we were almost ready. And then Lucas collapsed so hard I heard the sound of his body hit the ground from a few feet away. Mia yelled for me, but I was already running over there. I thought he might be unconscious when I got there, but he was barely holding on. His eyes rolled back in his head.

"Hey, you okay, man?" I said. The obvious answer was 'no', but he tried to push me away anyway. His hand slapped against my chest, but he was too weak to move me in any real way. I caught him under his arms. "Don't worry, I'll get you down. Lemme help you."

Reluctantly, he let me haul him to his feet. He leaned heavily on me. I called Naomi over, and she supported his other side. His breathing was heavy and strained. As we'd all feared, he'd pushed himself too hard, and now his body was suffering when he needed it the most. Mia and Perla watched on in nervous anticipation as we managed to help him to the top of the ladder down to the sewers. I glanced over at Naomi, "I'll go first, make sure he gets down okay."

Naomi and took his whole weight while I climbed down ahead of him. She helped him ease himself over the edge and get his feet on the first rungs of the ladder. His whole body was shaking like a leaf with the effort of it. His foot slipped, and he didn't have the strength to pull himself back up again. I grabbed his legs.

"It's okay," I yelled up to him. "I got you. Let go."

Lucas hesitated for a moment, hanging there and making a last-ditch attempt to do it himself. I felt for the guy. It's hard enough to be too sick to do something for yourself. It's even worse when you've gotta rely on someone you hate to help you out. He let go. I lowered him down and carried him further into the tunnel where he'd be safer. I laid him down as gently as I could. He rested his back up against the wall, gulping down air. His left arm was limp like a ragdoll.

"Thank you," he said, although there was a hint of bitterness there. Couldn't blame him, I'd have been frustrated if I'd been sick for this long, too. "I know you probably don't think I'm worth saving, especially now I'm sick, but I appreciate-"

"Hey, I'm sorry," I said as quickly as I could. It's easier to swallow your pride if you do it real fast. "For how I treated you before...it weren't right."

Lucas was quiet for a moment. I didn't know if he was waiting for me to say more or if he considered this to be too little too late. He glanced up at the dim light shining down from where the night was hitting Alexandria.

"Everything okay?" Naomi called down as if on cue.

"Yeah," I called back. "Be up in a minute."

I waited because it felt like Lucas had something else to say. Sure enough, after another second's thought, he said, "You love her, don't you?"

"Yeah." It was the easiest thing in the world to admit. He nodded.

"Yeah, I kinda figured that was why you were such an ass," he said with a heavy sigh.

"I am sorry," I said. For a moment, I thought he was going to keep grilling me, call me out for only apologizing now Naomi and I were dating.

"It's fine," he said with an air of the affable Lucas I was used to, and I felt a glimmer of light relief.

"Okay," I said, straightening up to leave. "Well, sit tight. We'll be down soon."

"Okay."

I started to head out, but something stopped me, nagging at the back of my mind. I knew if I didn't ask now, I never would. I paused with my hands in the rung of the ladder leading up.

"Hey, uh…" I cleared my throat. Weird how it always gets blocked up when I'm trying to say something I'd rather keep down. "Did you and Naomi ever… did you and she… er, y'know, before…"

"There was never anything between us," Lucas said with a tired smile. "If that's what you were trying to ask. She's a good friend, though, and she was a great leader for our group before… well, you know."

"Yeah," I said, knowing he meant Terminus, and I did feel like I had more of an idea about it since Naomi had opened up. Maybe, just maybe I'd been crazy to worry about Lucas being some kind of threat. Maybe instead of focussing on my own shit, I should've been grateful she had a friend to get her through it. "I'll, uh, take good care of her."

"I know you will," he said. There was another silence where it felt like he was going to say more, so I waited. "Naomi never seemed… available… romantically. I guess the best way I can describe it, it always kinda felt like she was taken. For a while, some of us thought she'd lost a spouse or something, but… she denied it. I never understood it, but I guess now I know why."

Me?

Does he mean because of me?

He gave me a small, tired smile like that was exactly what he meant, and I hightailed it out of there before I went so red I glowed in the dark. I climbed that ladder so fast I nearly crashed into Naomi at the top of it.

"Woah, slow down there," she laughed. I don't know if it was something in the way she laughed, or that big smile of hers, or that Lucas had just made the idea that she'd always been mine feel so real. Either way, the second I was up there, I took her face in both my hands and kissed her hard. I could taste her surprise.

"Woah," she said again, but it was a whole different kind of 'woah'. She looked back at me, all in a daze. "What was that for?"

"Felt like it," I shrugged, trying to play it cool, but she was grinning at me like crazy, and I knew I was doing the same back.

"You felt like it, huh?"

"Yeah."

"I should send you down into that sewer more often."

Before I could say anything else, a call rang out across Alexandria. Lights had been spotted on the roads, the Saviors were near. There was a scramble as those driving in the convoy headed to their assigned vehicles and everyone else scrambled to join Lucas in the sewers.

"Alright, this is it," Naomi instantly snapped back to her no-nonsense, getting-shit-done mode. She looked at her sister and nodded at the ladder I'd just climbed out of, "Get down there."

"No! I want to stay up here with you two," Mia said. No way in hell that was happening. I knew this would be something Naomi and I agreed on. Perla stood at the top of the ladder and looked down and then back up at Mia again. If we didn't deal with this fast, we ran the risk of both kids being above ground when the Saviors came.

"I know you do, kid, but I need you to look after Lucas," Naomi said, thinking fast. "He ain't well, and someone's gotta be there to make sure he's okay. I think it should be you two."

Perla nodded. Mia hesitated.

"Why can't-"

"I need you to do this for me, Mia," Naomi said. "I'm trusting you to look after him. Daryl and I will be right down as soon as we can."

"Okay," Mia finally gave in and leaned in to give Naomi a hug. "Please don't take too long."

"We'll be with you real soon," she said.

Mia hesitated and then hugged me too before climbing down to join her friend. Naomi slid the cover over the hole to shut it behind her. A hush fell over Alexandria. The houses stood dark and empty, maybe for the last time. Naomi straightened up and looked at me.

"You ready for this?" I asked her, holding out my hand for her to take.

"Ready as I'm ever going to be," she shrugged.

We walked, hand in hand, toward the gates. I could hear engines approaching, see a glowing light in the darkness beyond the gates as headlights grew closer. We stood just below the ladder up to the lookout post by the gates in complete silence. Alexandria was so dark and quiet that for a moment, it felt possible that the Saviors would think we'd already fled, turn around and leave us alone.

The engines came to a stop and then shut off. A heartbeat of pure silence and then car doors slammed in the night. I looked at Naomi, but she was staring at the gates, listening intently. Footsteps, too many to count, hit the ground. And then the gates shook as something hit against them.

"Anyone home?" someone called out from the dark. Naomi looked at me then, and she looked more frightened than I thought she would. I thought she'd be ready to go up to the lookout posts like we'd planned, but something had frozen her where she was.

"Don't sound like Negan," I whispered, mostly to reassure her, but it didn't seem to help. The gates shook again.

"That's Simon," she whispered back. "I think I might have made everything worse."

The fear in her eyes was so bright I almost missed the tears in the corner of them. I moved toward her on instinct. I didn't get it. If Negan wasn't here, that must mean he was dead, right? So, why was she so scared of Simon?

"Worse?" I said. "How'd you figure that?"

"Negan's an asshole, but Simon... he's something else," she said. Some of my confusion must've shown on my face because she took a deep breath and said, "Daryl, these bruises on me, they didn't come from Negan. Most of them came from Simon."

"On Negan's orders?" I said, but my blood was already boiling.

"Sometimes," she said. "Not always, not… so many."

She shivered like she was cold, but I knew that wasn't it. One of her hands absentmindedly shielded her stomach and that I thought about that bruise. That one that looked like a bootprint. Were the boots that had made it out there right now?

"Hey, assholes!" Simon yelled from beyond the gates. "Open up before I blow these damn gates down!"

Naomi moved when she heard that threat and started climbing the ladder up before I could ask her anything else. I followed right behind her. Whatever was coming next, two things were certain. First, we'd face it together. Second, after what she'd just told me, Simon was a dead man walking.

Chapter 45: Smoke and Swamps

Naomi

If Simon was surprised to see me, it didn't show. A broad and horrible smile spread across his face. The same kind of smile he'd had when Negan gave him permission to beat me, a starving hyena who'd spotted fresh meat. A fence and a gate stood between us, but I still tensed like I was getting ready for a fight, to hit and get hit. I wasn't used to holding a conversation with Simon for more than about ten seconds without him either beating me or threatening to.

From the lookout post by the gates, I scanned the faces around Simon. A large enough crowd, but not as many people as I'd expected. Dark had fallen now, and they were backlit by the headlights of their trucks, making it hard to get a good look at their faces. I recognized a few. Some of them were workers Dwight and I had tried to stir up rebellion in. Had they picked up guns by choice, or had the Saviors forced everyone who was able to fight us? If we'd turned them once, could we turn them again?

There were some faces I didn't think I'd seen before, but the way they stared up at us made it feel like they recognized me. Or at least knew who I was.

A gust of wind moved the leaves of the trees around Alexandria - the world taking the breath I was holding in as I scanned the faces, again and again, to confirm what I already knew but couldn't dare to believe.

Negan wasn't there. 

Given the state I'd left him in, it shouldn't have been a surprise, but Negan had dominated and controlled so much of my life for so long that I'd half-expected him to rise up. In a world where nothing really dies anymore, it was hard to believe that evil would be the exception. 

But no, I was getting ahead of myself. Another face was missing from the crowd. Dwight. 

Gavin and Arat were missing too, but if Rick was right and the Saviors planned on hitting every community simultaneously, there was a strong chance they were elsewhere. An equally strong possibility that Dwight would be with them, but somehow that didn't feel quite right. He'd been communicating with Alexandria; surely, he'd try and position himself here. He was still our ally, right?

If he's still alive. 

If Negan was dead, it would be easy for the rest of the Saviors to put the pieces together and assume I acted alone. Nobody would know that Dwight stood over Negan as he bled out and told me to run because Daryl had launched a goddamn truck into the Sanctuary walls. But if Negan had lived, well, there's no way he'd have let Dwight live too. 

So, where was he?

Where were they?

It was hard to imagine a reality in which both of them were still breathing. For Simon to be the one to show up in Alexandria meant that he was the one running the show, at least for now, but it was no guarantee that Negan was dead. 

"Well, well, well," Simon said. "Look who we've got here. Thought you'd be smarter than to show your face for a while. You got a lot to answer for, little lady."

"Where's Negan?" I asked. 

"I'm Negan."

The response was so achingly predictable that I almost rolled my eyes. "Cut the crap. Is he dead?"

"You better watch how you talk to me, you mouthy little bitch."

"You better watch how you talk to her, asshole," Daryl snapped back. "I got a bullet with your name on it."

The anger that came out of Daryl was so powerful it took even me by surprise. For the first time since we'd got up here, I looked over at him. Sometimes when Daryl gets mad, he fidgets and paces because he doesn't have a direction to channel all that rage. This wasn't one of those times. He was tense, the muscles in his jaw set, and his eyes focussed on Simon with the kind of stillness I was only used to seeing from him when he was hunting. If Simon didn't tread carefully, he ran the risk of Daryl blowing his head off, which I didn't have any major objections to but might throw a spanner in our plans. If we set off an exchange of gunfire too early, Rick might not be able to get the decoy convoy out safely.

I reached out to Daryl, my fingers brushing against his wrist, hidden from view by the top of the wall. I wanted to wrap my arms around him and calm him down, remind him that no matter what Simon had done to me, I was okay; I was home. But stopping a high-stakes negotiation for a quick cuddle with your boyfriend doesn't put you in a powerful position for that negotiation. So, I had to settle a brief of touch and monitoring Daryl out of the corner of my eye. A sharp exhalation through his nose, a gentle relaxing of his jaw.

I hoped it was enough and focussed on Simon, "Did you goons drive all this way just to stare at us, or do y'all want something?"

The anger and annoyance that Simon barely kept a lid on at the best of times flickered across his face. He glowered up at me. "Since you pricks destroyed our home, we're looking for a new one." 

"Can't help you with that," I said. "Alexandria's full."

Another flicker of rage, and I almost flinched. I remembered the way he'd looked at me after I'd tried to kill him during my first few days in Sanctuary. The rage. The way it melted into glee as he beat me into unconsciousness. 

"Is that right?" he said.

"Yup," I nodded. "Sorry you came all this way for nothing."

Simon bristled. The men around him stayed silent, but they all looked at him. If this was him throwing his hat in the ring to take over from Negan, he had a lot to prove. 

"You owe us a home," Simon said, swinging a machine gun down from where it had been slung over his shoulder and holding it in both hands. Beside me, Daryl's grip on his own gun tightened. He shifted closer, gaze still laser-focused on Simon. 

"We don't owe you shit," I said. 

"We don't see it that way."

"Well, I don’t see how that’s my problem," I said with a shrug.

“Then let me break it down for you,” Simon said. “You destroyed the place we live, so now you owe us-”

“I didn’t destroy shit,” I reminded him. "We both know where I was when all that went down. I was with all y'all, and I got out fine, so what’s your excuse?"

I knew instantly I’d pushed him too far. I'd gotten so used to facing off against Negan that the unpredictability of Simon put me on edge. Negan had a code of ethics - a fucked up code of ethics - but at least one I could figure out and workaround. I hadn’t yet figured out Simon’s deal well enough to toe the line between negotiating and antagonizing him. Seemed to me like Negan had a plan; Simon acted on impulse, which was harder to fight. 

"You got two options,” he snapped. “Either you all file out of here, and we can talk about who we can shoot and who's free to go and find a new place to live out the rest of their days."

They were getting ready to make a move against us - a steady ripple of activity amongst the Saviors. A few clicks of shut-off safety catches on loaded rifles. There hadn't been enough time for the decoy to get in place. I needed to walk this back a little.

What's taking so long, Rick? Hurry up. 

"C'mon, man, there are kids in here," I said. "Families. Surely we can talk about some other options."

"Tough shit. There are kids at Sanctuary. Families too,” Simon said. “You know that, you're more than familiar with the Sanctuary. You think about any of them before you flooded the place with meat puppets?" 

"Like I said. I didn't have anything to do with that."

"No,” he admitted, and then his horrible gaze slid over to Daryl. “Your boyfriend did, though.”

Shit. 

All attention now focussed on Daryl. Had the rest of the Saviors gathered here known that he was the one who'd let the Walkers in? I bit back the urge to tell Daryl to run. I wanted him to take shelter in the sewers with Mia and Perla, stay somewhere he was safe. But I knew he was as likely to agree to something like that as I was, so I hadn't wasted my breath trying to argue him down there. We'd promised to fight things together from now on, but it's hard to switch off that impulse to shield someone you love from everything.

"You gonna apologize for driving a truck through our walls?" Simon asked him, taking a step forward. "Or you gonna stay silent and let your bitch bark for you?"

"I already told you," Daryl snarled. " Watch your damn mouth. "

Simon laughed. It was a laugh I recognized. Cold amusement at finding a weak spot he could exploit. He knew if Daryl shot first, it would give them all permission to fire back, to storm Alexandria before we were ready. Every dig at me inched Daryl closer and closer to taking a shot. Everyone there could see it, and outing him as the one who’d let the Walkers in would only prime them to shooting back.

"Hey, asshole," I called, trying to take the heat off Daryl. "Sure we can't come to some kind of agreement over this?"

"I've already told you your options: fight us, and all of you will die, surrender, and only most of you will die."

"That don't seem fair."

"You and your boyfriend and the rest of your little buddies got shit to answer for with my people. So we'll be taking you in, and we will not show you the kind of hospitality you were lucky enough to get before. Everyone else is free to leave Alexandria, make their own way in the world. As long we don't see their faces around here again, they'll be just fine. We've got you surrounded, so you best decide fast."

Surrounded?

Shit.

Unless he was bluffing, that meant he had people stationed right where the convoy was supposed to bust out. How many of them? What were they armed with? I couldn't react too much, or else he'd know there was something amiss. 

"You'd kick all of these innocent people out?" I pressed on. Any surrounding Saviors would have to be more heavily armed or greater in numbers than the group at the gates to stop our convoy. They could still cause them trouble, though. "All of them? Even the kids?"

"They can find someplace else," Simon shrugged.

"Sending them out into the woods without a place to shelter from Walkers is as good as a death sentence,” I said. “You know that."

"Well, I don't see how that's my problem."

He was smug now. He thought he had me. The Saviors watching on looked like they agreed with him. None of them flinched at the thought of sending children out to fend for themselves in Walker-filled woods. "Is that what Negan wants?" 

"Yes."

"Or is it what you want, Simon?"

"I told you; I am Negan."

"Nah, you ain't," I said. "I don't think Negan would want this. Not at all. I seem to remember Negan wanting us to work for him."

"Well, that's changed, sweetheart. You changed that."

"Bullshit."

"Is that what you think?"

"Uh-huh. Negan knows that people are a resource. He might want me dead, want Daryl dead; Rick, Michonne, Maggie, Glenn, the King… Make examples of all of us; I could see that…” I said. “But  all  of the people here? All of those people that could grow crops for you, gather supplies for you… I find it hard to believe Negan would want them dead.”

“Why should I care what you believe?”

I heard the quiet rumble of engines starting in the distance, and I tried not to let my relief show. 

This is it. 

They’re ready. 

“Because I think you’re lying,” I said. I said it loud, partly to cover the sound of engines and because I wanted to make sure the rest of the Saviors could hear me. If Negan was dead and there was a power vacuum to be filled, I wanted to keep Simon out of that space. “And I don’t think it’s only me you’re lying to. I think you’re lying to your people, too.”

“You don’t know what you’re talking about. Best if you just shut up.”

“Negan’s dead,” I said. It was a bold swing, but I knew we only had a matter of minutes left before Rick and the others burst out of the back of Alexandria, and all Hell broke loose. I wanted to push an answer out of him before that happened. There was a crooked smile at the corner of Simon’s mouth. I didn’t know him well enough to know if it was because I’d guessed correctly or made a fool of myself. “This isn’t about us, or Alexandria, or even what happened to the Sanctuary."

"Is that right?" Simon laughed like I was deluded, but there was no genuine laughter in his eyes.  

"This is all about you trying to get your grubby hands on some of Negan’s power," I said. "But you ain’t him, and you don’t understand what it takes to  be  him, either. You  need  people to work for you."

"We don't need you."

"You need  people . You're right. I  am  more than familiar with the Sanctuary. I've seen enough to know your soil ain't shit. Sure as hell ain't gonna produce enough food for everyone you got there," I said. Simon shook his head, but the truth had hit all of them. I focused on those I recognized as workers. Farmers who knew everything I said was the truth. "When the food runs out, who are you going to trust to ration it out? Simon? You think he's going to feed your kids?"

"We don't need  Alexandria ," Simon said. He couldn't argue the point, so he was moving the goalposts. "We've got the Kingdom and the Hilltop for all that. Alexandria ain't worth the trouble."

"If you commit a massacre here and you'll turn every last one of us into martyrs. Wouldn't be surprised if it turned some of your own people against you."

"You think too highly of yourself."

"No, I just think better of people," I said. "What's more, so did Negan. He knows when to kill and when not to. He knows how to build, and all you know is how to destroy. He's smart, you ain't. I can see it. Sooner or later, the rest of these folks will see it too.”

“Alright, enough now,” Simon tried to shut me up, motioning to some of his men. They moved, but I thought I saw a slight hesitation, and that spurred me on. Simon didn't like what I was saying, so I must've been saying something right. 

“Negan knows the value of lives," I called out to them. "Even ours. Ain't that why you call yourselves 'Saviors'? You keep following this asshole down his destructive little path, and y'all are gonna wind up with nothing. You ain't gonna-"

I never got to finish. The steadily increasing roar of engines inside Alexandria that I had been shouting to cover-up reached a peak, and there was an almighty crash. They'd broken through the wall on the far side of Alexandria. 

It took me by surprise. I was so caught up in yelling at Simon that I was slow to react. 

Simon swore, yelled something to his men. I heard a smattering of gunfire before I realized what it was. A hand on my wrist pulled me down and out of the way. I almost hit the floor. I would have if a pair of arms hadn't caught my shoulders on the way down.  

"You okay?" Daryl's voice was low in my ear. I heard another boom, felt it shake something close by. The Saviors were firing something powerful over the wall. 

"Yeah," I said.

"We gotta move," Daryl nudged me toward the stairs. As I turned to climb the ladder, I caught sight of him firing over the top of the wall and ducking down again as the sound of return fire intensified.

"Daryl!" It was so loud I had to shout over the din. 

"Almost got the bastard," he grumbled, and I could see he was thinking about

"Time for that later," I reminded him. I had to yell over the burst of noise and gunfire. “C’mon.”

I didn’t start climbing down again until I saw him reluctantly move toward me, and then I went as fast as I could. I looked up, saw Daryl’s feet swing over the top. The ground shook again with several nearby explosions, and I slid down the last few rungs. The heat of the flames seared my skin, smoke rising up into the air and burning the inside of my nose as I waited for Daryl. His feet hit the ground, and his hand grabbed mine.

We ran. It would’ve been faster for us to split up. In fact, the plan had been to run through Alexandria and set off the smoke bombs we’d placed strategically around the town separately and meet back up in the sewers. But the Saviors were firing rapidly now. The sky lit up with balls of fire raining down on us. Houses exploded in smoke and flames every time they got hit, and there was no way of knowing which one was about to be hit next. 

Letting go of him and splitting up might have been faster, but it didn’t feel safer. And aside from all of that, I don’t think either of us wanted to.

We kept our heads low as we ran from one smoke bomb to another. Across Alexandria, people who’d been lying in wait for this moment set off even more. Somewhere behind us, the gate shook as they tried to break through it. Daryl and I looked at each other. There were a couple more to go, and by the sounds of things, we had seconds before the Saviors made it through. Their bombs were doing half our job for us. If they got in here, it would be hard for them to navigate their way through all of this smoke and flames. There’s no way they’d spot the last of us making it down to safety.

It was Daryl who made the final decision. “We gotta go,” he yelled over the almighty crash of the gates breaking open. I nodded, felt his hand tug me toward the nearest entrance to the sewers. He hauled the cover open and stepped back, motioning for me to get down first. I didn’t argue because there wasn’t time to, but we both knew I wanted to. 

It was dark down there in a way that really made me appreciate how light nighttime in Alexandria had been. After the brightness of the flames tearing through the houses, it was hard to pick out anything in the gloom. Daryl pulled the cover closed after himself, and there was a second where the darkness was too thick to see anything. I heard Daryl’s feet on the metal ladder, the booms and crashes from above. Then my eyes started to adjust, and I could see figures huddled together. 

“Naomi!” Mia’s frightened voice rose out of the dark, and then one of the people huddled on the floor stood up. She ran toward us. 

“Hey,” I reached out for her. Another figure she’d been beside, small enough to be Perla, stood up after her but didn’t come any closer. “We’ve gotta be quiet now. They’re in.” 

The message passed along the line of people there, radiating out from the ladder we’d climbed down and rippling through the sheltering Alexandrians. Mia let go of me and hugged Daryl while I tried to do a general headcount. It looked like Daryl and I were the last to make it back. Everyone else who’d been setting off smoke bombs was here. Now, all there was to do was wait. 

I hate waiting. It’s worse than fighting. We found a space near Perla and Lucas, and settled down. Nobody talked much as the sound of the Saviors yelling to one another passed by overhead. Getting caught down here, a whole town huddled together like this was a death sentence, and nobody wanted to take any chances of being heard. 

The longer we were down there, the more accustomed to the dark I became. I could make out faces, tense expressions. Lucas lay slumped on the wall opposite me, Perla sitting by his side. I tried to smile at him but noticed that his eyes were closed. He wasn’t reacting to any of the noises from above. He looked dead. 

“Perla, get over here,” I said quickly, grabbing her arm and pulling her over to our side of the tunnel. After so long without anyone speaking, I made her jump. 

“What? Why?” she panicked but did as she was told. I kept her and Mia behind me as I slowly approached Lucas. Pale skin. Sweat. 

“You okay?” Daryl whispered, noticing what I was doing. I nodded because I didn’t want to worry the girls, but all of my attention was on Lucas. If he died and turned down here without anyone noticing, it wouldn’t take the Saviors to massacre us. 

I got closer. Saw his chest rise and fall, and felt a tightness ease up in my own. I reached out, touched the clammy skin on his neck. Found a pulse. His eyes fluttered open.

“Is everything…?” he was groggy, confused. “Do we need to move yet?”

“No, no, it’s fine,” I whispered back. “Go back to sleep. Everything’s okay.”

He nodded and closed his eyes again. I crawled back to where I had been. Perla and Mia had been watching anxiously. 

“Is he going to be okay?” Perla asked.

“Yeah, yeah, he’ll be fine,” I said, putting an arm around her shoulders. “It’s good for him to get some rest.”

She nodded and believed me because she needed to. Perla rested her head on my left shoulder. To my right, I looked over Mia’s head to Daryl. Wordlessly, we exchanged the same worry about Lucas making it through the night. All we could do was keep an eye on him. Keep the kids at a distance if he got any worse. 

More terrible waiting. Explosions shook the walls. We listened to feet and voices overhead. 

An echo carried through the tunnels, and everyone reached for the weapons they had on them. Footsteps. The air in the tunnel felt heavier. It bristled, listening for a threat.

“It’s us,” Rick’s voice carried ahead of them. He was leading Michonne and Rosita and the others who’d been part of the convoy back to us. A collective sigh of relief and the group rounded the corner toward us. Nothing but shapes at first, and then they drew closer, and we could see their faces. We could see that it wasn’t  just  them. 

There was one extra face there, and it was the last one I expected to see. I got to my feet. “Dwight?”

Dwight was alive. What did this mean for the Saviors? He looked back at me with something that might have been relief. It shouldn't have been. I felt ready to punch him for what he'd done to Lucas.

“Aw, hell no,” Daryl pushed past me before the shock of it settled in. Rick took a tactical step in front of Dwight and raised his hands. It didn’t stop Daryl from getting up in his face instead. “The hell is he doing down here?”

Daryl’s anger bounced off the walls, echoed down the tunnels. I put a hand on his arm. 

“We can’t do this now,” I reminded him. “We gotta stay cool, stay quiet, so they don’t find us.” 

Daryl looked at me, and his jaw clenched. 

“What’s the point in staying quiet when this asshole’s down here?” he said, but he muttered it quietly. “Probably just waiting to slip off and tell them where we are.”

“He’s offered to help us, Daryl,” Rick said, close to losing his cool, too. 

“And you believe him?” Daryl’s tone made it clear he thought Dwight was a fucking idiot.

“Hey, hey,” I said, trying to keep them both calm. I was acutely aware that Mia and Perla were just behind us. That an unconscious Lucas might be seconds away from waking up to find he was trapped in the same confined space as his attacker. “Let’s move this away a bit, yeah?”

I herded them back down the tunnel in the direction they’d come from and around the corner. 

“Naomi, you know me,” Dwight said, a little desperately and not daring to look at Daryl. “You know I ain’t gonna cross you.”

I didn't have time for this and wasn't about to vouch for him. I was so conflicted over how I felt about him. There were more urgent questions to deal with, “What happened to Negan?” 

“He’s alive. But, barely.”

“Then… how are you…?”

“He can’t talk,” Dwight said. “Not sure if he’ll ever be able to talk again. He’s been in and out of consciousness, so he ain’t had time to point the finger at me.”

“So, Simon’s acting on his own?”

“Negan had talked about his plan if we got out, so he can’t deviate too much from that, but he wants to. Any excuse to annihilate Alexandria or the Hilltop or the Kingdom… he’ll take it.”

“He’s in charge?”

“For now. And, to be honest, I don’t think Simon wants Negan to make it. He wants to run the place, and I wouldn’t be surprised if he finished what you started, made it look like an accident.”

“Why didn’t  you  finish it?” Daryl asked, eyes narrowed and fixed on Dwight. “Sounds like you had the chance to finish him off. You were the only other one in that room except for Naomi.”

“Not for long enough,” Dwight said. “It wasn’t long after she left that more Saviors arrived. He was bleeding out, already unconscious. I didn’t think there was much to lose from letting them in. Didn’t want to direct them away in case they got Naomi before she got out. I’m real glad you got okay, by the way. I wasn’t sure-”

He looked right at me then. It seemed sincere.

“Don’t look at her,” Daryl snapped. “Don’t talk to her.”

“Daryl,” I warned him quietly. “Now ain’t the time.”

He looked at me like he wanted to argue back, but thankfully Rosita stepped forward and tried to get the conversation back on track. “Dwight said that the Hilltop’s safe. They won’t attack there, right?”

“Yeah,” Dwight nodded, dropping his eyes to the floor as Daryl continued to stare daggers at him. 

“We need to get everybody there,” Rosita said as more bombs fell overhead, shaking the walls. It was a sensible suggestion. Everything here felt confined and unstable. 

“If they think all of you got away in the woods,” Dwight said. “Then they’re out there looking.”

“They saw us go West,” Rosita countered. “So we won’t go West.”

“Your best chance is to stay here until they’re gone.” 

“Nah,” Daryl said. “They find us here; we’re dead.”

“They’re almost gone. They gotta be,” Dwight said. “It wasn’t about destroying the place. They don’t have the ammo for that.  After  they let up,  after  they’re gone, that’s when we go.”

The air bristled again, and I wondered if anyone was about to object to Dwight’s use of ‘we.’ Rosita glossed over it, “Okay. We wait.”

“We wait,” Rick agreed. Something in his voice made Daryl’s anger flare up again. He glared at Dwight. 

“How’d they get out?” he asked. “Was it what I did?”

I hadn’t thought about it that way. I’d managed to get out because of what he’d done. Had the Saviors managed to find a way out that way too? There’d been so many Walkers streaming in that it felt like there was only a tiny window before escape became impossible. But maybe not.

“Eugene,” Dwight answered but didn't expand. Didn’t explain any further. I heard Rosita’s sigh of bitter disappointment and betrayal. “I can still help you. I want you to win. I want Negan to  die.  We can settle up after.”

“You want Negan dead; you should have finished it,” Daryl said. He reached out before any of us could react. I thought he was about to punch him in the face, but he grabbed the vest on Dwight’s shoulders, the one Dwight had stolen from him in the first place, and yanked it off him. He pulled it over his own shoulders and turned his back on Dwight. It was good to see him back in those angel wings again. I remembered being trapped in a dark cell with Dwight, feeling that vest and longing just to be back with Daryl. As Daryl brushed past Rick, he muttered, “You’re a fucking dumbass for bringing him here.” 

Daryl stalked off back down the tunnel. I saw Rick flinch. I hated this; I hated that there was such a divide between Daryl and someone he loved. Rosita and Dwight followed shortly after, but I hung back. 

"He'll come round," I said quietly. Rick looked up at me, surprised either by my words or that I was still here. 

"You think?" he said. "He's still pretty mad at me."

"He only holds a grudge this long with people he really cares about."

"You saying I should take it as a compliment?"

"No. Just… I know he can say a lot of dumb shit when he's mad, but he'll cool off," I said. "You mean a lot to him."

"Well, I appreciate having you on my side," Rick said. "Feel like that might help speed the whole thing up."

"I'll see what I can do, but no promises."

"Alright,” Rick smiled and started to make his way back around the corner.

"Hey, Rick?" I called him back quietly.

"Yeah?" he turned. 

"I'm really glad he found you guys. You see him for who he is… who he really is. Not a lot of folks get that. I'm real glad it was you he met out here. I can't tell you what it means that he found a family in all this."

"He's a good guy."

"He's the best of us."

I almost reminded him that if he hurt Daryl again, he'd have both of us to reckon with, but that felt like too threatening a note to leave the conversation on. Daryl's family was important to him, and this rift with Rick needed mending. Daryl needed it.  

I walked back to where Daryl had sat down opposite Lucas again. Mia and Perla were sitting further away with Carl and Judith. They were trying to distract themselves from what was going on. Mia braided Judith’s hair, and Perla was trying to convince Carl to let her braid his, too. Daryl caught my eye, and he did not smile. 

The din above us was dying down. There were still people up there, but it seemed like Dwight was right, and they were easing their attack. If they thought we’d gone, empty houses weren’t worth wasting ammunition on. 

“Are you sure going to Hilltop is the best plan?” Dwight asked. 

“You got a better one?” Rosita snapped. 

“All of you in one place, together…” Dwight was looking around at all of us, a little worried. I knew what he’d see - frightened people huddled together. Kids. Injured and tired fighters. He didn’t see the family that we all saw. People that we’d kill for, die for. Our strength came from one another. 

“All of us. Together,” Daryl said. There was such strength in his voice, and as his gaze shifted over to me, it only seemed to grow. “We’ll be their worst damn nightmare.”

 

Daryl

We knew they’d try to destroy the place, but the ruins of Alexandria were still hard to take in the cold light of day. 

Fires had died down but were still burning, flames clinging to the timbre skeletons of what had once been houses. Naomi came to a stop beside me. Neither of us had spoken since we’d climbed out of the sewers to search for any lingering Saviors. I hadn’t wanted her up here with me in case they were still here and had just gone quiet, but the moment I’d offered to go check, she’d gotten to her feet. I didn’t argue with her, partly because I knew it was pointless but also because I was getting used to getting through tough shit together. I didn’t like her being in danger, but I loved having her by my side.

We’d done a complete circuit of Alexandria and taken in the damage. We hadn’t seen or heard any Saviors. The gates were broken open, and the road was clear of their vehicles.

“Looks like they’re gone,” she said. 

“Yeah,” I agreed. I couldn’t really see it as a victory, not with the ashes around us, the smoke in the air, and so far still to go. “You okay?” 

She’d said she’d been okay with Alexandria burning. Saying it’s one thing, seeing it is another. Naomi nodded, “Yeah.”

It had been a long damn night. There was a long day ahead of us. Standing here with her, in the quiet, wasn’t exactly nice, but it was peaceful. Fresh air in a claustrophobic twenty-four hours. We’d need to head back down soon, but any moment I could take with just the two of us gave me what I needed to keep going until the next one. 

I wanted to get moving, get everyone to the Hilltop, but I didn’t want to go back down there yet. Not with Dwight’s damn face lurking in the shadows. I didn’t like him. Didn’t like that he’d acted like he knew my girl like they were friends or some shit. I knew what that son of a bitch was capable of. What he’d done to me. What he’d probably done to her, too.

“You really okay with Dwight being here?” I asked her. 

“He’s got nowhere else to go,” she said, which didn’t really answer my question. I knew I’d need to be more direct. 

“Those bruises on ya,” I said. Naomi turned her head to look at me then. I felt terrible for bringing it up, but I needed to know, or I wouldn’t be able to go down there again. “Any of them come from Dwight?”

“He saved my life,” she said. 

“That ain’t what I asked.”

She sighed. I wanted to sigh right back but didn’t want to start a fight, so I resisted. There was a lot I took issue with when it came to her notion that Dwight had saved her life. She was the one who’d fought her way out of there; he’d just pointed her in the right direction. Yet she seemed to have this overriding feeling that she owed him something for it, which was bull. Nobody owed that son of a bitch anything.

“I attacked Negan. Dwight had to hit me a couple of times to keep up pretenses,” she said, although she didn’t want to because I didn’t care about the reasons he’d done it, and she knew it. “But never otherwise, and he didn’t hit hard. I know what he did to you in there, Daryl. Don’t think I’ve forgiven him for that because I haven’t. I won’t. And as for what he did to Lucas…”

She trailed off again for a moment, a flash of anger in her eyes that threatened to overcome her. Lucas was in a bad way and only seemed to be getting worse. Naomi swallowed it back. 

“Dwight has a lot to answer for,” she said. “Like he says, we can settle up later. We gotta win first. For now, we need him.”

I nodded. I got what she was saying, but I knew that part of Naomi that wanted to see good in people. It was why she wasn’t mad at Rick for leaving her to die. Dwight could easily exploit that part of her too. 

“Are you okay?” she asked me. I wasn’t sure, and then I felt her take my hand. 

“Yeah,” I said. Dwight would pay for everything later. Even if he managed to manipulate Naomi into some false sense of owing him something, it didn’t matter. She had me to protect her from that, to be mad at everyone that she had every right to be angry at. “We should go.”

“We should,” she agreed, and we walked back together through the ruins of what had once been our home. “Think we should lead people out the back? To stop them from seeing this shit?”

“Yeah,” I said. “That’s probably for the best.”

The kids had been holding up pretty well down there, but there was no telling how they’d react to seeing the results of every explosion we’d heard down there. They were frightened enough. 

Back down the sewers, Michonne was waiting anxiously to see if we'd make it back. One hand was on the hilt of her katana; she relaxed when she saw it was us. 

"They're gone," Naomi said.

"Place looks like shit," I added, and the smile of relief that had been forming on Michonne's face quickly faded. "We'll take everyone out the back."

Michonne nodded and led the way back to the others. We'd taken an exit further away from the others so that if the Saviors saw us come out, it would give our people a head start. Rick heard us coming and walked over. 

“The Saviors are gone,” Michonne told him. “We can get everyone to Hilltop.”

I knew by the way Rick hesitated that he had some other bullshit on his mind. Sure enough, instead of getting everyone up and ready to go, he said, “I need to talk to Jadis.” 

“What?” Michonne asked, as confused by it as I was. 

“They have weapons and people,” he said. “We can’t just give that up.”

“Why now?” Michonne asked. Another fair question. We were deep in the middle of some shit. After they’d crossed us, I could not understand why Rick was still giving them the time of day. Especially now, when we had bigger shit to worry about.

“They went with me to the Sanctuary,” Rick said. “The Saviors saw us there. They’re gonna be a target, too.”

“That ain’t our problem, man,” I said. “If they’re going to go around stabbing people in the back, then they gotta deal with the consequences.”

“We still need them,” he said. 

“Bullshit,” I said. “We got everyone we need.”

Why couldn’t he just look around him and see that? See that his kids were here? Michonne was here. We were heading to the Hilltop to see Maggie and Glenn, to join with Carol and the Kingdom. Everyone who mattered would be there. Why was he always looking for more?

“We need the numbers for this fight,” Rick said. I was close to losing it.

“We got them.”

“Let’s say we do,” he said. “I’d like to tip the odds a little more in our favor.”

“It’s a waste of time, man,” I said. “We gotta get to the Hilltop.”

“You lead everyone there,” he told me. “I’ll catch up.”

“I’ll come with you,” Michonne said. Whether she agreed with what he was doing or not, she didn’t want to be separated from him. That, I could understand. 

“I need you to take Judith to the Hilltop,” Rick said. 

“I can do it,” Carl stood up. Judith was already balanced on his hip. “I can take her.”

Rick hesitated again. 

“I’ll make sure they get there alright,” I said. Rick could go on whatever wild goose chase he liked. Carl and Judith would always be safe with me. “When you snap out of it, you know where to find me. C’mon.”

I gestured to everyone else, who was still just sitting around. I didn’t have Rick’s talent for getting people up and moving and motivated. Thankfully, after I startled them all by yelling, Naomi stepped in and calmly got people moving towards me. She was so reassuring and at ease that even I relaxed for a moment.

I didn’t say goodbye to Rick. I just led people the back way out of the sewers. It was better than walking through what was left of Alexandria, but even from outside the walls, it was clear what kind of damage lay on the other side of them. 

Everyone took a pause on the outskirts of Alexandria. Pillars of smoke rose high above the walls. A solemn and shocked silence fell over everyone when they saw it. Lucas was up and able to move by himself, but he was slow, and we were all worried about the toll a long journey like this might take on him. Naomi and Mia were the last to leave the sewers. I watched the worry set into Mia’s features and shared a glance with Naomi. 

At least they haven’t seen the rest of it. 

“I can rebuild it,” Noah said. He said it quietly, but since nobody else was talking, it felt loud. Most folks turned to look at him. “Reg and Deanna showed me the original plans for this place. He was teaching me how to build more, expand, before he… well, you know. I think I remember enough to… I can do it.”

Before anyone could respond or feel that little bit of hope that Noah was trying to give us all, Lucas’s eyes fell on Dwight. His face clouded over, “What the  hell  is he doing here?”

Shit. 

We’d done a good job of keeping them apart. Until now. With everyone out of the dark and in one place, it was impossible to hide Dwight. 

“He’s helping us,” Naomi said, but Lucas was too angry to listen. “He-”

“Give me a gun,” Lucas demanded. My hand moved to my own gun. I knew his anger was at Dwight, but I didn’t like how threatening he sounded or how close he was to my girl. “I’ll shoot him myself.”

“I can’t do that,” she said. I took a few steps closer.

“Naomi!” he said incredulously. “This is the bastard who-”

“I know, I know,” she tried to assure him. “I know what he did to you, but we need him right now. To keep us all safe.”

“That’s bullshit.”

“I’m sorry,” Dwight said before Lucas could say anything else. Lucas turned slowly to fix him with a glare strong enough to kill. “I’m sorry for what I did… if it helps.”

“It doesn’t,” Lucas spat back at him. He looked back at Naomi. “He should be dead.”

“I know, but…” Naomi’s eyes were a little desperate, torn between her loyalties to her friend and knowing how valuable Dwight could be. She was almost swayed into killing him now, and although I wanted him dead, I didn’t like her making this call out of anger and desperation. Acting rash like that, that wasn’t her. That was like something I’d do. 

“Once this is won, you can take the shot yourself,” Dwight promised Lucas. “No arguments from me.”

“Fuck you,” Lucas snapped before he walked away into the woods. It wasn’t clear who he’d directed it at, and I saw Naomi deflate as his words hit her. 

“I’m sorry,” Dwight said again, although this time it wasn’t to Lucas. Naomi shook her head, her eyes brightening. 

“It’s okay,” I touched her arm. She looked at me, lost. “It’ll be okay.”

“We should get going,” she said, changing the subject, and I knew she didn’t believe me. “This could take all day.”

“Yeah, you’re right,” I said. If getting started on this journey would make her feel better, I was happy to do it. I turned to everyone else and shouted, “Alright, let’s get moving!”

It was clear from some of the blank faces staring back at me that most of them didn’t know which direction to head in. How long had we been doing this without GPS, and some of them still couldn’t tell their ass from their elbow? I tried not to get frustrated. We had a long way to go; best not to start off that way. 

“I’ll catch you up,” Naomi said quietly as people started to follow my lead. “I need to make sure Lucas doesn’t get left behind.”

I choked back my first reaction, which was to say,  “Like Hell you are, stay close,”  because I knew this meant a lot to her, and so far, this whole trusting each other to get shit done thing had worked out really well. 

“Alright,” I said. Lucas had stormed off in the right general direction, but he didn’t much strike me as someone who knew how to navigate through the woods for long without getting lost.

We stayed close to the roads and paths without actually walking on them. There was no knowing how far the Saviors had gone or what routes they’d taken. 

We hadn’t been walking long before one of the Saviors’ cars was spotted parked on an overpass. I signaled for everyone to shut the hell up and stay low. I looked back at the line of people taking shelter, couldn’t see Naomi, and tried not to freak out. 

We waited, listening to them talk and radio over to other patrols. They were still out looking for us from the sounds of things, and this was just one of many patrol cars. Felt like we were waiting for ages, but eventually, they packed up and moved on. I motioned for everyone to get up. 

“Best to stay off the roads. Head into the woods right there,” I said, ushering people in the right direction. They were all exhausted and sluggish, but we had to move fast. Who knew when the next patrol car would swing by, or if that last one would double back on itself. “C’mon. Go. Go!”

I relaxed when I saw Naomi steering people from the back. Lucas was walking ahead of her, and they were both too far away for me to tell whether or not they’d made up. 

We walked on. Or rather, I walked on, and everyone else followed. I’m not used to people following me. I ain’t Rick. So, I don’t really know how to handle it, and I think it made me walk faster than I usually would have. But, I was one of the only people who knew where I was going, so they all looked to me to lead them to the Hilltop. With Naomi at the back making sure people weren’t left behind, I couldn’t pass that responsibility to anyone else. 

The sun was getting high above us when Rosita stopped me and asked if we could take a break. It felt like a waste of time. We had a long way to go, and every second we were out here was giving the Saviors more time to find us, but I looked back at everyone. Tired faces. People who hadn’t slept in twenty-four hours. Lucas was looking pasty again, leaning up against a tree while Denise talked to him in hushed tones. Naomi hung back behind him, watching them both, and the fear in her eyes was enough to make me agree to a break. 

While everyone else took a breather, I doubled back a little and tried to cover our tracks. It’s easy to hide the signs of one or two peoples’ movements, but a whole group… it’s almost impossible. The hopelessness of it made me all the more determined to get people moving when I got back. 

“We can’t just keep walking through the woods,” Tobin stood up when he saw me coming. “We need a plan.”

“I know where I’m going,” I said. “That’s our plan.”

“At some point, we’re going to have to join up with one of the main routes,” Rosita said. “It’s probably good to think through which one might be free of Saviors.”

“How we going to do that?” I said. “You got the roads memorized?”

“It’s okay,” Naomi stepped in between us before things could get heated and swung her bag down off her shoulders. “I got this.” 

Amongst the food and supplies she’d packed in there, she pulled out a map.  

“You brought a map?” I asked.

“Duh.”

“When did you have the time?”

“Grabbed it before we left the house,” she shrugged. “Thought it would be useful, and it is, so you’re welcome.”

I took it from her and laid it out on the ground to get a good look at it. “If they’re smart, they’ll cover all these passes between here and Hilltop.” 

I pointed out all of the possible routes. Finding a way to get to the Hilltop without crossing any of them, at least for a moment, would be almost impossible. 

“We have to keep moving,” Rosita said. “We’ll just have to risk it.”

“Maybe you don’t have to,” Dwight said. Nobody asked for his opinion, and there was a collective intake of breath when he gave it to us anyway. “Negan won’t send his people down into this stretch of swamp, not if he doesn’t have to.”

“Yeah?” Tara asked. “How do you know that?”

“Negan wanted to map the best routes with cover from the Sanctuary to the Hilltop. He decided the swamp was too dangerous,” Dwight said. “Didn’t think it was worth the risk.”

“And Simon?” Naomi asked. “What did he think?”

“Well… I doubt he’d care as much,” Dwight said. “But every Savior knows that route ain’t safe. If he wants them to go that way, it’s going to take some convincing.”

“You aren’t seriously going to listen to him?” Lucas said, glaring at Dwight from where he was still leaning up against a tree and breathing hard. 

“It’s too dangerous for the Saviors, so you’re going to send us?” Tara joined in. “Are you kidding me?”

“They have us boxed in,” Rosita reminded her. 

“Why should we trust him?” Tobin asked, gesturing at Dwight. “He could turn on us like he turned on his own people.”

“I didn’t just turn on them,” Dwight said. “I killed them. Rosita saw it. Tara saw it. But one of them got away. So, if they find me, Simon puts my head on a pike. If Negan recovers enough to tell the others what really went down, they’ll string me up on the fence. I’m not working for them, and I’m not going back to them. I chose my side. This is it. I’m here to help you beat them. After that… well, I know how it ends.”

He looked at Lucas like he was ready for that bullet. Lucas glared back like he was ready too. I looked at Naomi, who, for better or worse, knew Dwight better than the rest of us. “What do you think?”

“I think the roads are more dangerous than the swamp right now,” she said. “If Dwight says the Saviors aren’t likely to go there, we should use that route.”

“All right,” I said. That was good enough for me. “We try the swamps.”

Naomi folded up the map again, all neat lines so it would slip right back into her bag. We pushed on toward the swap. People did seem to be moving faster now they’d had a rest; maybe it hadn’t been such a big waste of time after all. Dwight walked a few paces behind me. 

“If this works, it won’t change shit,” I warned him. 

“Everything I did, it was for Sherry,” he said. “That doesn’t make it right or something that should be forgiven, but it’s the truth. Only one I got left. She’s the one who let you out. Then she ran.”

“Yeah, I know she’s the one who let me out,” I said. Dwight was surprised by this. I guess he had no way of knowing what Sherry had done after she ran. “She was supposed to run with Naomi, but she was the only one who made it to the Hilltop.”

The implication of what I’d said hit Dwight so hard he had to stop moving for a second. “She… she went to the Hilltop?”

“Yup,” I said. I studied his face for any sign of dread or horror. If he’d been lying about the Hilltop being safe or was walking us into a trap, Sherry was the way to get the truth out of him.

“Is she still there?” he asked in barely more than a whisper. 

“Dunno,” I shrugged. “Guess we’ll find out. If we make it there.”

I kept walking. Dwight didn’t say anything else. I hadn’t kept track of Sherry’s whereabouts in all of this. I wanted Naomi back, and she’d failed to get her out safe. But now Dwight, whether he’d been lying before or not, had some real motivation to get us there.

After a few more hours of walking, we reached the swamp. It looked clear from where we were standing, but the waters were dark and muddy. So much could be hidden in those murky depths. I stopped everyone and took a few cautious steps across the water. It only took a couple of seconds before one of the dead raised its ugly head from where it had been hidden underwater. I shot it down, but I knew there’d be more.

“We have to be careful,” Rosita said from behind me. “But we can do this.”

“A group of us can push through,” I said. “Clear a path for the others.”

“I’ll go,” Dwight volunteered. “If I can have the crossbow-”

“You can’t,” I said immediately. “You’ll stay right there.”

Dwight wanted to disagree, I could tell. Naomi, Rosita, Tobin, and I spread out across the waters. It drew a lot of Walkers who’d been lying dormant out of the swamp. We took them all out one by one. It was lucky that the swamp slowed them a little, we were all tired, and our reflexes were slow. 

When we turned back to the others, Dwight was gone. Lucas and Tara were gone, too. 

Shit. 

Only Lucas and Tara came back, emerging from the woods seconds before we could run off after them. Lucas was shaking, his steps slow and weak. He should’ve been resting. 

“What happened?” Naomi asked. Tara glanced at Lucas, who looked away from all of us.

“Lucas chased Dwight into the woods,” Tara said. “I followed. A group of Saviors was close by. Dwight distracted them. He’s gone.”

“What the hell?” I was still filled with adrenaline from taking out Walkers, and now it spiked into anger. “For all we know, he could be telling them everything. Simon could be on his way here right now.”

“He isn’t. He won’t. He led them away,” Lucas said. “They were coming right for us, and he saved us.” 

“He’s right. He did,” Tara said. “I saw it.”

“I don’t give a damn what he did,” I yelled. “He can stick with them, he can come back - hell, he can run. When I find that son of bitch, I’m gonna-”

I stopped. Carl was covering Judith’s ears, and she was looking at me with big, wide eyes. 

Shit. 

Shit, I scared her. 

I looked for Mia and Perla. They huddled a little behind Naomi. Naomi’s eyes met mine, and I felt calmer.  It’s okay,  she seemed to say without saying anything at all.  We got this.

“Alright, c’mon,” I said. Everyone who wasn’t already on their feet stood up. It was a tense few moments as the first of them stepped across the swamp. Those of us who’d cleared it kept scanning the area for more, for any that we’d missed. The first of our group reached the opposite side without incident, and we started to relax. 

And then there was an almighty splash. I whipped around to look at the swamp. Before I could do a quick headcount, Naomi screamed, “Lucas!” I realized he was missing. He’d disappeared beneath the waters. Naomi, who’d already made it to safety, immediately waded back into the swamp to help him. 

“Wait!” I called to her. It wasn’t clear whether he’d fallen or if something else had dragged him down. She didn’t stop, didn’t slow down, just kept moving towards the ripple in the water where Lucas had stood. 

Shit. 

“Keep moving, keep moving!” I yelled to everyone else who’d stopped, frozen with fear. I raised my crossbow and headed to the same spot as Naomi. I trained it on the water. If anything other than Lucas was about to rise out of there, I was ready. She reached down into the depths, and I wanted to scream at her. If she got bit right now, she’d lose her arm. Or worse. She hauled a body out of the water. Lucas. Completely unconscious. She had to take his whole weight and swayed under the effort of it. I scanned the waters again; nothing was following him up. I lowered the crossbow and grabbed hold of Lucas. 

“Is he bit?” I asked as we started dragging him to shore. 

“I don’t think so,” she said. “I don’t see any Walkers.” 

I nodded, but the swamp was too murky to know what could be trapped down there. We got Lucas to the shore and laid him out. Denise checked him over. Still breathing. No bite marks. Seemed like this journey had been too much for him, and he’d passed out. Naomi looked up at me, “What do we do?”

I could see her heart sinking in her eyes. Before I could say anything, Tobin cleared his throat. “If he doesn’t wake up, we might have to…”

“No,” Naomi said before anyone could even utter the words  ‘leave him behind.’  Perla had started to cry, and the sound of it had lit a fire in Naomi. “I can carry him. I can do this.” 

“Not on-”

“Daryl,” Naomi cut across me, her eyes flashed with anger. She was expecting me to side with Tobin, and I couldn’t really blame her for making that assumption. She hadn’t been down in the sewers when I’d said sorry for all of it. All she knew was me yelling at Lucas over nothing and almost come to blows with him over even less. I raised my hands in peace. 

“Not on your own,” I said. “That’s all I was gonna say. Not on your own. I’ll help.”

She didn’t say anything; I think she was too upset to talk. Naomi nodded, and together we propped Lucas up and started walking again. 

It slowed our progress down a lot, and the sun was almost setting by the time we got to Hilltop. Naomi and I hadn’t said a word to each other, conserving our energy for carrying Lucas’s unconscious body. The gates opened up. Carol and Enid came running out to meet us all. Maggie and Glenn were just behind them. 

“Y’all got a medic?” I yelled to them. Maggie took in the unconscious body we were supporting, and her eyes got wide. 

“Is he bit?”

“No,” Naomi said. 

“Saviors took our medic, but we got supplies,” Maggie said, pointing to one of the trailers. 

“Great,” Denise stepped up, looked at both of us to reassure us, “I can do this.”

“I can help,” Siddiq said, appearing at my side. “I can take him.”

Naomi refused to let go, so Siddiq took my place. Denise ran ahead to get the medic trailer prepared while Naomi and Siddiq carried Lucas over. Now that the weight of him had been taken off me, my muscles were burning. I hadn’t realized how tired I was. 

“Hey, you okay?” Carol asked. I was too out of breath to give her an honest answer, so I nodded and hugged her. 

“Glad you made it,” Glenn said as I hugged him too. “Where’s Rick?”

“He and Michonne went back to talk to Jadis.”

“Why?” Maggie asked, as baffled as I was. 

“Beats me,” I shrugged. It was good to see them all, but I was only partly involved in this conversation. The rest of me was looking at the medical trailer. The door had closed, and Naomi had not come back out of it. Mia and Perla were staring at it too. Both of them had been crying but were now either cried out or too tired to keep going. 

“We brought some supplies,” I said, gesturing at our backpacks. “You think we could all stop for a bite?”

“Of course,” Maggie said. “Come on in.” 

We started to move toward the big house. Mia and Perla didn’t budge. They looked like they wanted to go over and join Lucas and Naomi, but if he was dying in there, I didn’t want them to see it. I crossed over to them. 

“Naomi’s got this,” I told them. “Best leave her to it and get some food.”

“What if she needs help?” Mia asked. 

“The best thing you can do for both of them is get some food and some rest,” I said. “So Naomi doesn’t have to worry about that, too.” 

They agreed, reluctantly. I got the girls inside, got them to eat something. They perked up a little once they had some food in them, and Mia started telling Perla all about the first time we’d stayed at the Hilltop and all of the animals they had here. I almost reminded her that they were for eating, and Hilltop wasn’t a petting zoo, but this had been such a long, hard day that now didn’t feel like the time. It was nice to hear them chat about something ordinary. 

Maggie helped me set up a room for them to sleep in, and I stayed until their whispers behind the door had stopped, and I was sure they’d fallen asleep. I headed back to everyone else, saw Noah and Denise but no Naomi. I grabbed a plate of food to take to her. 

I thought she’d still be in the medical trailer, but she was sitting outside it, staring at nothing. She was exhausted, and it was more than just physical strain. It was already dark out. 

“Hey,” I said gently, sitting down beside her. She was a million miles away.

“Oh,” she was surprised to see me. “Hey. Sorry, I was just…” 

She stopped because I don’t think she had any idea what she was doing. 

“It’s alright,” I said, holding out the plate of food to her. “Brought you this. You should eat something.” 

“Thanks, Daryl,” she took it from me, had a few mouthfuls without taking in what she was eating. Then a thought struck her with a jolt, and she started to get to her feet, “The girls, I should-"

"It's okay," I said. "They're fine. They’ve eaten. They're sleeping."

"You sure?"

"Yeah," I said. "I just left 'em."

"Oh," her gaze lingered in the house for a moment. I waited for the realization that she didn't have to do all of this alone now, that she had me to take care of her and anyone else she needed more to, to sink in. It seemed to. She looked at me and settled down again. "Thanks, Daryl."

"Ain't gotta thank me, happy to do it," I told her. She nodded. I could tell she was resisting the urge to thank me again. She rested her back up against the wall again. "How's he doing?"

"You really want to know?"

"Yeah. I do,” I said. Naomi didn’t look like she fully believed it, so I carried on. “Lucas and I, we… I apologized for the way I was before." 

She didn't even try to hide her surprise, her eyebrows shot up, and she scrutinized me like she expected me to take it back at any second. When I didn’t, her face softened a little, and there was something in her eyes that could have been pride. 

"He's… not good, Daryl. I'm worried he won't make it."

"I'm sorry."

She nodded, still looking at me like she was waiting for me to get all jealous and weird as usual. When I didn’t, she said, “Did I ever tell you how I met Lucas?"

"No. Don't think so,” I said. She’d barely told me anything about her time between getting out of her Momma’s burning trailer and reaching Terminus. Most of what I’d known about that time had come from Lucas himself, and I’d been so busy trying to find her again, I hadn’t pushed him for much. “He told me you saved his life, though."

"He said that?" I couldn’t tell if she was surprised by what he’d said or that there’s ever been a time that I wasn’t at his throat for long enough to have that conversation.

"Yeah,” I said. “When we got out of Terminus, and I figured out he knew you. That’s what he said."

"It was Mia and Perla who saved him really," she said. "It was early days, and they went to get water on their own. We’d been training them to fight Walkers, and letting them travel a short distance to see how they’d get on was important, but… terrifying, y’know? They found Lucas injured and lying in the woods. They started  screaming  for help. Blanca and I were so-"

"Blanca?" I asked. She’d been so caught up in telling me this story, she’d forgotten that I had no idea how many people she’d made of out of Atlanta with.

"Perla's Momma,” she clarified. “José's Momma."

The heaviness in her voice was a reminder that he was the kid those assholes at Terminus had made her shoot. "Oh."

"José was with the girls, too,” she continued. “We'd given him a gun, but it was still early in all of this, we were trying to teach the kids, but we were all still learning ourselves. Blanca and I were mad as hell that they were yelling. Thought every Walker in a ten-mile radius would come and get them. But they'd found Lucas, and he was hurt, so they were trying to get help."

"What was wrong with him?"

"He'd fallen trying to climb up to one of our water reserves in the trees,” she said. “He'd lost his group a few weeks before that. He was on his own. He'd busted his leg and thrown his back out."

"Ouch."

"Yeah,” she agreed. “But, man, he would  not  stop complaining about it."

"Really?" Seemed so different from the Lucas, who'd refused to take a break from loading supplies, and who'd tried to walk here by himself until he physically couldn't take another step. 

"Yeah. The way he was talking, I thought he'd broken his back and his leg,” she shook her head at the memory of it. “I thought there was no way a guy like that could make it for long with the world the way it is now. Blanca took the kids back to safety, and I got him on his feet. Brought him to our camp."

"The one in the trees?"

"Yeah," she said. I thought she might be done with the story now, but there was a faraway and kind of misty look in her eye that made me wait for more. She took a deep breath. "Guy called Alf helped us build it. He'd worked construction, he was too old to build much, but he could tell us what to do. Always checked himself that the platforms we built were safe before he let the kids on them."

"Sounds like a good guy,” I said, and I wondered where he was now. She’d never mentioned Alf, or Blanca, or any of the group she’d been with before this. I’d assumed most had died at Terminus, but for all I knew, they could still be out there somewhere.

"Yeah. Grumpy as hell, but… yeah, he was,” Naomi said and even managed a small smile at the memory of him. "There were twelve of us then, including Lucas."

"Twelve?" I repeated. It surprised me, but she’d told me so little that any number would have surprised me.

"Yeah,” she said and started listing them off. “Me, Mia, Lucas, Perla, José, Blanca, Alf… Frankie, who led a lot of runs back in those early days.”

“That’s brave,” I said, and I thought about Glenn. Those early days I’d avoided the city. It didn’t seem worth the risk when I could hunt enough to keep myself and Merle alive. But Glenn weren’t like that. Wasn't so selfish. He’d led people in and out of the city whenever we needed it. Maggie and Glenn had been at Hilltop for a while, and I hadn’t realized how much I missed having our whole group together. 

“It was,” Naomi agreed. “Frankie was separated from her husband right at the start, and I think every trip into town was an excuse to look for him.”

“Shit," I said. I knew that pain of separation all too well. "She ever find him?”

“No.”

We both took a moment. I wondered if she, like me, was thinking about how things might've gone if we hadn't found each other again.

“Izzy and Jack had just got married,” Naomi said. “They bickered more than anyone I’ve ever met, but they loved each other  so  much.”

“Really? Did they bicker more than us?”

“Okay, maybe not,” she conceded with a smile. “William, he was barely more than a kid himself, and he was so eager to learn and to help. Managed to stay cheerful throughout the worst of it.”

“Dee,” she said, and when she did, her voice broke. “She was… just so kind and funny, and… she helped make that Birthday cake for Mia. The only reason it wasn’t a complete disaster was because of her.” 

“That’s nice.”

“Yeah, it was.” Her voice grew heavy again. "Day after we found Lucas, we went on a run. We lost two people that day. Frankie got torn apart by Walkers trapped in a house… and Blanca. She got bit."

"Were the kids there?"

"No. Thank God. I had to… shoot her before she turned."

"God."

"I'd taken out Walkers before, but… she was the first one since Momma that I'd actually known, and it's different, y'know?"

Yeah, I knew. Merle. Andrea and Amy. 

"Yeah. It's rough."

"It is," she agreed. “Took us a long time to get over that. Winter came around. A few of us got sick.”

My heart sank. I thought about when people had gotten sick at the prison. How we’d almost built a whole community before illness had torn through it. 

“How bad was it?”

“Just the flu,” she said. “Any other year, it would've been fine, but it was hard to keep to warm. We had to move inside. There was so much snow and ice… Alf got sick. Must’ve died in his sleep, and we didn’t know then… that everyone turns.”

“He died?”

“Yeah. He was walking toward us, and nobody could work out how it had happened,” she said. “It was just the flu, y’know? It weren’t supposed to… Anyway, I raised my gun. I thought I’d have to take the shot, and all I could think about was Blanca. And how I didn’t know how to keep putting down people I loved… I…”

“It’s okay," I said. "We’ve all had to do it, and it doesn't get easier.”

“I didn't have to," she said. "Lucas stepped up. He took the shot.”

"Good man," I said, and I didn't even have to fake it. That shit is hard, and if I couldn't be there looking out for her, I was glad someone else had been. 

“Yeah,” she agreed. “When Terminus got taken over, Dee and I were kept in the same place. After they killed the kids, after they made me shoot José, we managed to get notes out to coordinate an uprising. Dee got one to Lucas. He got the word to everyone else. When the guards came to get us, we got them. I attacked one of them while the others ran out to help win the place back from them. By the time I got out, Dee was...”She stopped, too choked up to carry on, and wiped the tears from her face. I put an arm around her, rubbed her shoulders. 

“Hey, it’s okay,” I whispered. She didn’t have to carry on if she didn’t want to, but I’d wait all night for her to finish if she needed to talk this out. She gulped down a few more deep breaths and pulled herself together enough to carry on. 

“She was gone,” she finished. “By the time it was all over, we’d lost William and Jack, too. Izzy was barely hanging on. Lucas said she lasted a couple more days after I left, but she just kind of… gave up once she learned Jack had died. Perla and Mia were missing, but all the other kids who’d died were still chained to the walls. Or, their Walkers were, y’know. Someone had to put them down.”

“You had to do that?” 

“Me and Lucas,” she said. “He said I shouldn’t have to do it alone.”

“He was damn right.”

“He’s different. From how he was at the start. I mean, we all are, but some more than most.”

She was right, and I found myself telling her all about Merle and how he’d set Michonne free before he died. About Hershel searching for some kind of cure for his loved ones who’d turned, how he’d saved so many people who got sick at the prison. I told her about the shot I could’ve taken that might have saved his life. I told her about Beth and how she’d managed to keep hope alive in such a dark world. I told her that I hadn’t been able to save her at the Hospital.

Naomi held my hand through all of it, and when she told me that it wasn’t my fault, a tiny part of me actually believed her. The weight of their deaths was a little lighter, maybe even bearable to carry with me now.

When I was done, she kissed my forehead and looked into my eyes. 

"I know you’ve lost people, too,” she said, wiping away tears that I hadn’t realized were on my cheeks. “But those people I left Atlanta with… only Lucas, Perla, and Mia are left.” 

“That ain’t on you,” I said. 

“I could’ve done things differently,” she said. “And I’m still making mistakes. Lucas is  so  angry with me about Dwight, and… now Dwight’s gone… what was it all for?”

“He led Saviors away,” I said. “Trust your gut on this one.”

“If Lucas doesn’t make it, he’ll die mad at me, and I’ll have to live with that. So, just…" she took a deep breath, wiped the tears from her eyes. "Go easy on Rick, okay? You ain't gotta forget or forgive, but you never know when it's going to be too late."

"Okay," I said because she was clearly worried about it, and I'd have done anything to make her feel even a little bit better. She leaned into me, head on my shoulder, and told me she loved me.

When I saw Rick again, things would be different. If I could be mad at him on her behalf, then I could forgive him for her, too.

Chapter 46: Rest

Summary:

Content warning for some trauma discussion at the end of this chapter. Nothing bad or surprising, just talking about past and childhood trauma, but putting a warning here in case any of you need it.

Naomi

"This is…"

"Smart?" Daryl finished for me.

"Yeah," I said because taking prisoners of war instead of killing everyone was smart, but that wasn't all it was. "Well, I was gonna say batshit, but yes."

"You recognize any of them?" Daryl asked. He asked it all casual like it was nothing, but his arms folded across his chest, and the steely glare in his eyes betrayed him. I took a moment to scan the faces of the Saviors Maggie had penned in like cattle, and I wondered if Daryl was making a list. Crossing off anyone he deemed responsible for the bruises on me.

"Nah," I shook my head. Daryl looked like he didn't believe me, and he might just start shooting anyway. With them all crammed in one place, it must've been tempting. "These guys all came from an Outpost, remember? They weren't in Sanctuary."

Daryl conceded with a mildly disappointed grunt. He was tired. He hadn't slept well, which meant neither had I.

There weren't many beds left at the Hilltop. Once the kids and those still recovering from injuries had a place to sleep, the rest was floor space. Nobody complained; we'd all slept in worse places. Daryl especially, I'd seen him sleeping on floors, bolt upright in a classroom chair, and out in the dirt when neither of us felt like home was a safe place. That wasn't what had kept him up.

We'd spent so long outside talking that most folks were asleep by the time we got back. Maggie and Glenn distributed pillows and blankets. When they'd run out of those, they'd brought anything that could be used as a pillow or blanket. Daryl and I ended up huddled together under an old coat outside the room where Mia and Perla slept. Each time Daryl jolted awake or rolled over, it pulled me out of my sleep, and each time it happened, I got crankier. But we'd probably woken people up when we'd come in late, so I didn't feel like I could cause a fuss.

And then, at some point in the dead of night, it dawned on me exactly why he was struggling to sleep - too many people. Too much noise. He'd never been a fan of crowds. Or the indoors, come to think of it. I'd rolled over, hugged him tight. His nose in my hair as his face nuzzled my neck, I felt him breathe deep, and I think he slept alright after that.

"What you daydreaming about?" Daryl nudged me back to the present.

You.

"Nothing," I said. "Sorry, I just didn't sleep so good."

I studied him out of the corner of my eye to see if he'd react or even remember his turbulent night, but he just kind of looked at the ground and said, "Oh."

"Hey! Assholes!" a lanky Savior with long, greasy hair yelled at us through the fence penning them in. "Did you just come to gawp at us, or did you bring some food?"

"Hey, shut up!" Daryl yelled back.

"Why don't you open that gate and make me?" he retorted, grabbing the wire fence and shaking it. He glared at Daryl like he was challenging him. Daryl stood up a little straighter. I wondered if this scrawny punk would've been so brave if there hadn't been a fence between them and very little chance of Daryl risking anything by opening the gate. Or, maybe he was bored enough not to care either way.

"You wanna say that again?" Daryl took a step forward. A curly-haired Savior, who'd been keeping a close eye on the situation, stepped forward. I stuck myself to Daryl's side in case he was the Grease Ball's backup.

"I'm sorry about him," Curly said quickly, raising his hands. The earnest way he said it seemed genuine, and the way that Grease Ball rolled his eyes made it clear that he and Curly were not friends. "He doesn't speak for all of us."

"Who does then?" Daryl asked. "You?"

"Hell no," Grease Ball said. "This asslicker does not speak for me."

"I don't claim to," Curly said. "But you're not helping any of us."

"There's no helping us," Grease Ball snarled. "The sooner you realize that and stop trying to suck up to them, the better."

"They kept us alive," Curly was doing a remarkably good job of staying calm. "They brought us here, communicating-"

"Communicating did fuck all to help Neil," Grease Ball said. "That bitch still killed him, shoved him in a box, and sent it to Negan. What makes you think this bitch will be any different?"

He gestured to the big house, so I assumed 'that bitch' was Maggie. Daryl had dissolved into a stream of curse words, so I assumed 'this bitch' was me. I ignored both and took a step closer to the pen.

"She did what?" I asked, but Grease Ball was too far into his rant to clear anything up.

"Now you lot are dead," he said to me. "She's pissed off Negan, and he's coming for you. He won't stand for this. You're all living on borrowed time."

"Negan's not going anywhere," I said.

"Don't lie. We already know they got out of Sanctuary," Grease Ball said, proving that you don't have to be smart to be smug. "It's just a matter of time until he's at those gates, and then you lot are fucked."

"Negan ain't coming for ya," Daryl said.

"I slit his throat," I said. Even I was surprised by how calmly I said it.

"Liar," Grease Ball said, but there was a flicker of fear in his eyes now. A stillness fell over the Saviors, even the ones who'd been pretending not to eavesdrop.

"I think he's alive, but… he ain't coming for you," I said. "He ain't going anywhere for a while."

"Fuck," Grease Ball kicked the fence penning them in. I didn't mention Simon, but I wondered if they'd already made the connection to him as Negan's next in line and if any of them felt good about their chances now. Daryl and I started to turn away from them, but Curly called us back.

"Hey!" he said. I glanced back at him, expecting him to say something else about Negan. Reveal his loyalties, or press for more information. But instead, he said, "We could do with some food. He wasn't wrong about that."

His pleading gaze flickered from Daryl to me and back again. I said, "I'll see what I can do."

"I appreciate that," Curly said. Beside me, Daryl exhaled sharply through his nose. "That's all we can ask."

I nodded and turned away from them. I'd have to raise it with Maggie, as she seemed to be the one in charge here. I knew supplies were low, and with the increased numbers from both Alexandria and the Kingdom, the Saviors would be at the bottom of the food chain. Maybe Glenn and I could head out on another run.

"Did Maggie really kill one of them and send the body to Sanctuary?" I asked Daryl in a whisper as we walked away from the pen. It was too uncomfortable to stick around looking at the prisoners. It's like if you went to the zoo and the lions asked why you were there and if they could have a bite of your corn dog.

"I think so," Daryl shrugged. "Someone came here and made threats against these people. She was just responding, letting 'em know we've got some of their guys might make them stand down."

I was uneasy about this response. Would Simon stand down? Or step up? Before we could reach the big house, I heard the rumble of the gates opening up. I turned my head to see who was coming or going.

"Hey, look," I nudged Daryl as Rick and Michonne stepped through the gates. Judith squealed as Carl swung her onto his back and raced toward them.

"Ain't got the Scavengers with 'em," he said, as the gates closed behind them and them alone.

"Sure looks that way," I nodded. Had they turned on us again or been scared into hiding now the Saviors were out?

Daryl was silent for a moment, then he said. "I'm going to, uh…"

I assumed the grunt his sentence trailed off into was Daryl-speak for 'patch things up,' so I nodded and gave him a quick kiss before he headed back down the path toward Rick. I continued up to the big house in search of Maggie. There were so many people milling around in the big hallway and on the staircase. I ducked into the office we'd first met Greggory in. I expected to see Maggie behind the desk. But Aaron was in there, peering over a crip. His attention was so focused on the baby inside that he didn't even react to the door opening. For one crazy second, I thought Maggie had gone from barely showing to having already given birth overnight. But then I remembered Daryl telling me about the baby they'd found at one of the Outposts, the same one Eric had died at. Aaron was so wrapped up in that little girl's face that I almost didn't want to disturb him. I didn't want to be the one who took him out of this moment to offer my condolences about Eric, refresh that pain for him.

But I'd missed him. And I would miss Eric forever.

"Hey," I said quietly from the doorway, in case the baby was sleeping.

"Oh my God," he straightened up. Stared at me like I was some kind of ghost. "You're back!"

"Sure am," I took a few steps toward him, arms held out for a hug. Aaron closed the gap.

"Are you okay?" he asked.

"Yeah," I said because, despite everything I'd been through, I was doing pretty well. I hadn't faced the kind of loss he had, and that made me incredibly lucky. "I'm fine, and I'm so… Is that Gracie?"

I nodded at the crib. I couldn't bring myself to say Eric's name yet. I needed a few more breaths that weren't all filled up with grief.

"Yeah," Aaron smiled. "Did Daryl tell you?"

"Yeah."

"Come meet her," he beckoned me over and proudly lifted the bundle of blankets out of the crib. I knew someone so small could make a hell of a lot of noise, but for now, she was all big blue eyes and smiles. Aaron held her out for me.

"Hey there, Gracie," I said, taking her. Gracie kept smiling like she had no idea of the sadness that was hanging over the room. I looked back up at Aaron, "She's a cutie,"

"She's the best," he said, and I couldn't avoid it any longer.

"Are you okay?" I asked. "Daryl told me about…"

I stopped. Asking if he was okay was dumb; of course, he wasn't. How could he be? I couldn't even bring myself to say Eric's name. It still didn't feel real. It felt like he should be at Hilltop with his boyfriend and their daughter. Being back in a room with Aaron for the first time in a while, I half-expected to hear Eric shout something to both of us from another room. I even caught myself listening out for him. I held Gracie a little tighter, and the reason Aaron was still standing felt clearer.

"I'm so sorry, Aaron," I said. "I don't know what to say."

"It's okay," he said, but nothing about this was okay. "Neither do I."

"Eric was…" I stopped again. I'd managed to get his name out, but it was hard to think about him, to sum him up. He and Aaron had been my first friends in Alexandria, and it hadn't taken all that long to think of them as family. "I'm so glad I got to know him."

"Yeah," Aaron's voice broke, his lower lip trembled. "Me too."

"I'm sorry I wasn't there," I said. "Fighting with the rest of you. I'm sorry I couldn't-"

"Don't be silly," Aaron said. But it didn't feel silly. I was still mad about how many people had fought and died while I'd been stuck waiting around and playing involuntary mind games with Negan.

"You both did so much for me," I said. "No way I'd be here without either of you. Sure as shit wouldn't have stuck around if it hadn't been for you two taking me in. He'll never be forgotten, Aaron."

"I know," Aaron said. The silence around us was heavy, claustrophobic.

I turned my attention back to the only thing in the room that seemed to be able to bring him any amount of joy. "This little one is going to know all about her other Daddy. We'll make sure of it."

"Yeah," Aaron said, instantly a little brighter. Now the silence was kind of comforting. Gracie was happy and calm in my arms. "Is it weird to say she kind of looks like Eric?"

"No, I know what you mean," Aaron said, and he even managed another smile. "It's the eyes."

"It is the eyes," I agreed. Gracie giggled as if she agreed too.

"Is Mia here?" Aaron asked. I was kind of surprised to hear him ask it, although I shouldn't have been. She'd been in their house.

"Yeah," I said. "You met her?"

"Yeah. She stayed in your room for a bit while you were away," Aaron said. "It'll be nice to get to know her now you're back and she's not…"

"Yeah," I said. I didn't want to think about what Mia must have been through, what she'd have felt while I was gone. Not for the first time, I thanked my lucky stars that Daryl had been with her throughout it. "I'm sure she'll like that. And you can bet Gracie's got a babysitter for-"

"Oh, hey," Daryl interrupted from the doorway. Aaron and I turned to look at him. "Sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt anything. I was looking for ya."

"I was just meeting Gracie," I said.

"Ain't she an angel?" Daryl said, and I smiled. I constantly forgot how soft he was around kids, babies especially. Whenever something reminded me, I thought about the night he'd first come over to meet Mia. How he'd held her like she was made of glass.

"Yeah, she's pretty great," I agreed, and Aaron radiated pride. "You speak to Rick?"

"Yeah," Daryl didn't offer anymore. He didn't look mad, or like he'd punched anyone, so I was hopeful it had been less hostile than their interactions had been since I got back.

"How is he?"

"Scavengers are dead," Daryl said, which wasn't an answer to my question at all.

"All of them?"

"All but one," he shrugged. Felt like there was a lot more information missing.

"What happened to them?"

"Simon."

"Fucking hell," I said, a hard pit forming in my stomach. Simon was brutal. Now that he was off Negan's leash, I didn't want to imagine what might be in store for the rest of us.

"Rick's going to join the patrols looking for signs that the Saviors are on the move," Daryl said. "He reckons we don't have enough eyes out there, so I said I'd join him."

"I'll come too," I said. Aaron positioned himself to take Gracie back, and I handed her over. I needed something to do to stop myself obsessing over whether Simon's cruelty was my fault and if the Scavengers would still have been alive if Negan was in charge.

"Alright," Daryl said. There'd been a slight pause, and I wondered if he'd had to quash his usual instinct to try and talk me out of doing anything. "Plan is to get as many people as we can, split up to cover as much ground as possible."

"Sounds sensible," I said. Daryl nodded. "I'll let the girls know we're heading out."

Aaron told us he'd seen them recently with Bryce and the other Kingdom survivors. I thanked him. Daryl and I said goodbye to him and Gracie before heading back out into the crowded entrance hall. Daryl was immediately less comfortable around so many people.

"I'll bring my bike around and meet you by the gates. We can set off from there, yeah?"

"We?" I repeated. "I thought you said Rick said we should split up? Cover more ground?"

"Yeah, he did," Daryl said. "Not us, though. We don't do that no more."

"Do what? Split up?"

"Yeah."

He waited. I knew he was waiting for me to challenge him about it, to remind him that the smart thing to do was have as many eyes on the road as possible. But the shadow of Eric's death hung over this conversation. Looking at Daryl now, an echo of what Aaron must have been feeling hit me, and it was strong enough to knock the wind out of me. We knew what it was like to lose each other over and over again. The pain of not knowing if we'd find our way back to each other had been so intense that I knew if that loss became permanent, it would destroy me. I'd feel better if I was out there to have his back. So, I didn't argue for the sensible thing to do, and I let my heart win out over my head for once.

"Okay," I said, and I caught his surprise, his release of the argument he was expecting. "I'll let the girls know. See you out front."

He darted through the crowd to the freedom of outside. I made my way to where the Kingdom survivors were holed up. Mia and Perla were where Aaron said they'd be. Bryce and Carol promised to keep an eye on them for me while we were away. I didn't say anything to her about it, but it didn't escape my notice that the King didn't stray far from Carol's side. If I'd walked into this room and not known anything about the people in it, I'd have assumed she was the one in charge.

Daryl was waiting on his bike by the gates. I climbed on the back, and we rode to a predetermined spot, where we had a good view down onto one of the routes to Hilltop. We stood side by side, looking out for any signs of movement on the road. It was a comfortable, warm silence that had nothing to do with the heat of the day and everything to do with how happy we were just to be in each other's presence again.

"You never answered my question," I said after a while. "Don't think I didn't notice."

"What question?"

"How's Rick?" I asked again. Now that we were away from Aaron, I was expecting more than he'd given before.

"Fine," Daryl said, which was barely an answer.

"You guys good?"

"Good-ish," Daryl shrugged. "Good enough."

"Good," I said. I knew it would take a while to heal those wounds. Daryl's slow to trust, and breaking that trust would cut him deep.

"Did you mean what you said to that Savior?" he asked.

"What?"

"About getting them food," he said, eyebrows knitting together. "Maggie says supplies are low, and we need all the food we got for our people. They come first."

"I know," I said. "But we gotta keep them alive, or we'll have nothing to bargain with."

"I ain't bargaining shit, let 'em starve," he said. I didn't want to start a fight, so I bit back my initial responses. Silence didn't satisfy Daryl either. "You said it yourself; if it was Negan, he might want his people back. You think Simon gives a shit what we do with them?"

"No," I admitted. "But starving them ain't going to help anyone."

"They feed you right when you were in there?" he asked, anger bubbled behind each word.

"It ain't about that," I said.

"They sure as shit didn't feed me right," he said. I took his hand.

"I know," I said. "But we gotta be better than them."

"Why?"

"You said it yourself; we ain't got the numbers for this fight," I said. "If we can show those guys that we're better than the Saviors, that we're people worth fighting for, we can change that."

"You think they're capable of changing?"

"Of course."

He sighed. I could tell he was turning over his response in his mind. I waited. "You ever get tired of looking for good things in shitty people?"

"I'd be tired if I didn't," I said. I wasn't sure how to live in a world where bad people were just evil, and there was no room for change. But I knew Daryl did see things that way, that he sometimes thought I was naive. "When I was in Sanctuary, Dwight and I tried to find Saviors who might turn against Negan. Stir up rebellion in case we needed to fight from within. We tried to spread the message that Rick was the one worth following. More of them were open to it than you'd think. I ain't basing this on nothing."

"You ever think that maybe you're the one worth following?"

I was so shocked that I took my eyes off the road to look at him and found he was already staring at me. I felt my cheeks get warm as I realized he'd probably been staring at me for a while.

"Eyes on the road, mister," I said, but I could barely hide my smile. "There's Saviors out there."

"You first," he said, smiling back. His arm slipped around my waist, and I didn't have the willpower to look away from him anymore. Not with that smile. He was getting closer, turned his body toward mine, and his hands joined around me.

"You never answered my question," he said. "Don't think I didn't notice."

"Shut up," I said. And he did, but only because he was busy kissing me.

The sound of a horn broke us up fast. Daryl scrambled to grab the airhorn while I furiously scanned the roads for something we'd been too busy kissing to spot. If I'd opened my eyes to find us surrounded, I don't think I'd have been too surprised. There was nothing there. Wherever the Saviors had been seen, it was on a different route.

We sped back to Hilltop, knowing they wouldn't be far behind us. Over the walkies, Maggie dictated a plan to us all. When we got to the gates, the sun had set. It was typical of the Saviors to attack in the dark, but they'd lost any element of surprise, and we had home turf advantage. Daryl stopped outside the gates, where weapons had been left out for us along with a long metal strip of spikes. I took one end, and Daryl took the other. We stretched it out across the road and started fixing it in place, but another warning ran out before we finished.

The Saviors were here. Seconds away. Close enough to hear their engines. And Daryl and I were out in the open.

Shit shit shit.

"Naomi!" Daryl yelled. I glanced from him to the oncoming Saviors and back again. They could be on us at any moment, and if I ran out now to get to Daryl, I risked running right across their line of vision. I'd blow Maggie's whole plan.

"Go!" I yelled back. "Stick to the plan!"

I could hear him yelling at me again, but I turned to run for cover. I took shelter behind one of the trees by the road. Seconds later, I heard Daryl's bike start-up and retreat into the darkness to where the rest of the lookouts were lying in wait. I knew he'd be mad we'd split up, but this was truly the smartest play. If they saw any of us too soon, the whole thing would be blown wide open.

The rumble of engines turned to a roar. I shrank myself as much as possible, thanking any God who was listening that it was so dark. All I could see was the tires. I pressed myself into the dirt as they rolled by. Gasoline stung the insides of my nose. I looked away, shielding my eyes from dust rising from the road. Tires popped as the first line of their convoy hit up against our roadblock. Engines crawled to a stop. Doors banged shut, and footsteps crunched on the ground. Although I knew it wouldn't help any, I found myself holding my breath.

I looked back at their feet. I didn't like how close their headlights were to my hiding place. It was lucky that their attention was on Hilltop's gate.

"I want to talk to Negan," Maggie's voice crackled over the walkie.

"You are speaking to Negan," Simon replied. "But my birth certificate says 'Simon.' With whom do I have the distinct displeasure of speaking?"

"Maggie. Maggie Rhee."

"Well then, Maggie Rhee. Let me tell you how sorry I am for what's about to go down here tonight. In case it's not already plain as Hilltop potatoes, yours truly is speaking on behalf of Negan this go-round," Simon said. "I got your little care package. The bill's come due, and you and your people are gonna have to pay. Quite dearly, I'm afraid."

"Your 38 people are alive and breathing," Maggie said. "Turn around and leave us be, and they stay that way. If you don't, I have 38 bullets, and I will personally fire into all 38."

There was a slight pause, and then the walkie crackled again before one of the Saviors spoke. I wasn't sure, but it sounded like Curly. "It's too nice a night to spend it dyin' slow, don't you think, Simon?"

I heard Simon heave a sigh. Annoyed, not concerned, and then Maggie said. "So, how's this gonna go?"

"Well, Maggie Rhee, this is highly regrettable, but the way I see it, the Saviors you're in possession of are damaged goods," Simon said. "You know, they've got themselves into their own pickle, and this organization prizes those who a - avoid capture and b - figure out their own shit. Which, in the end, is my way of saying screw them."

No reply came from the walkie. Not from Maggie, not from Curly, not from any prisoners who'd been holding on to the genuine hope that the Saviors might actually save them.

"Alright, people," Simon said to the Saviors he did not see as 'damaged goods. "Let's get this party started. Remember, the plan has changed. Our goal is conclusion. We are doing away with these people. All of 'em."

Fuck.

Doors opened and closed again. Slowly, so as not to draw attention to myself, I reached for my own gun lying beside me in the dirt.

"This isn't what he'd want," I was surprised to hear Dwight speak up. Even more surprised that nobody had worked out he'd helped us back in Alexandria. He was talking loudly enough for other Saviors to hear him. Saviors who'd just heard that Simon would consider them not worth saving if they were taken prisoner. "You know that, right? He could still wake up. You sure you wanna face that with him if he does?"

It was bold, given what Dwight would also be facing if Negan made any kind of recovery. But, if this moment helped plant doubt in more Saviors' heads, maybe we stood a chance of this not being a total bloodbath.

"Better to beg forgiveness than ask permission, D," Simon said. "Future problems."

Before Dwight could say anything back, I heard Daryl's bike roaring out of the shadows. In the dark, I saw the flash of the machine gun he'd mounted to the front of it. Saviors scrambled to take cover in their cars and find weapons to fire back. I leaped to my feet and started running, firing as I went and trying to give Daryl the best cover possible. He yelled my name and sped toward me. My feet pounded the ground, but there was no way I could run faster than the bike or the cars that were starting to give chase. Getting up might have been a mistake.

Daryl's bike was almost on me, and then he slowed, coming up parallel to where I was running. He yelled my name. I grabbed his shoulders and swung myself onto the back, barely catching my balance before he sped up, racing through the gates. I turned around, fired behind us.

Seconds after we'd crossed its path, one of the school buses from the Kingdom shot out behind us. I heard the crunch of metal as the Saviors' car that had been on our tail smashed into it, causing a pile-up behind it.

Daryl severed to a stop by some parked cars we could take cover behind. I climbed down, trying to catch my breath before the next round of fighting. My lungs were burning from how fast I'd been trying to run. Daryl threw his bike to the ground and turned to me, grabbed my face in his hands. I thought he was going to yell at me for what I'd done, could see in his eyes that he wanted to, but maybe he realized there wasn't time. So, he kissed me. Hard and angry and thankful all at once. It did nothing to help me catch my breath.

I heard Maggie yell, "Now!" from the porch of the big house, and gunfire started up all around us again. Daryl and I took shelter behind the car he'd stopped at and fired on the Saviors trying to make it through the gates.

Arrows flew in from outside the walls, raining down on us. We were forced to take cover, Maggie called for us to pull back, and at that moment, more Saviors pushed forward into the grounds of Hilltop. Gunfire became more sporadic as they spread out.

With only the light from the Saviors' headlights to see by, we moved through the grounds. I picked out two or three shadows in the dark. Dwight and Simon. Maybe someone else.

I looked at Daryl. His gun was up, his feet moving slowly and quietly forward like he was stalking prey. I wondered which one of them he had it in for. Dwight, for everything he'd done to him, or Simon, for everything he'd done to me?

They hadn't seen us, but they were walking like Daryl. Like they had someone in their sights. And then we saw her, too. Tara. She hadn't seen them. I raised my gun, scanning the rest of our surroundings for other Saviors who'd have Simon's back.

As Simon raised a hatchet, Daryl yelled out a warning. A Savior close to us tried to get him, but Daryl took him out. When I next looked over a Tara, there was an arrow stuck in her arm. Daryl was focused on Simon, I'd lost sight of Dwight, but I didn't think he would fire on me. So, I ran for Tara. She'd fallen by the side of a car, but she was conscious when I got to her.

"Hey," I said quietly, not wanting to give away our position to anyone else who might be lurking in the dark. "You okay?"

"It's just my arm," Tara said, but she was breathing hard like it hurt, and she was trying not to scream. I glanced back across the lot of parked cars to Daryl. Michonne was behind him, trying to get him away. Maggie must have signaled to move to the next part of the plan. He hesitated. I waved him away.

"You should go with them," Tara said, but she looked pale. I didn't know if it was the pain of knowing what was coming next and how hard it would be for her to keep herself safe. "I'll be fine."

"I got you," I told her, slipping an arm under her to support her. "It's about to get real dark. Denise ain't so far away. We can do this."

"Denise…" Tara said for the comfort of saying it. Her grip on my arm tightened, and as one last round of gunfire took out every headlight on the Saviors' cars, I got her to her feet.

Everything was plunged into darkness. The silence that followed all of it was unsettling, even though I knew it was coming. Tara's breathing came out in short, sharp bursts as she held her breath through the worst of the pain. Any sound from us now would give away our positions. Most - if not all - of our backup would be in the house by now.

A moment's pause, and then Saviors started moving in the dark, swarming toward the house. Tara and I moved from one hiding place to another, resting behind trailers, tents, and cars, before checking the coast was clear to move to the next one.

We were a few paces away from Denise's medical trailer. There was no way to get her attention or get the door open without drawing attention to it. Tara was breathing through clenched teeth. Even in the dark, I could see her sleeve was wet with blood. The arrow was still sticking out of it; I hadn't wanted to take it out without something to quell the blood flow.

Come on, come on.

Hilltop was flooded with light from cars parked around the house, blinding the Saviors and giving us the distraction we needed to get through Denise's door.

"Oh my God," Denise ran forward the second she saw us. I say 'us', but I don't think she saw much past Tara. Outside the door, rapid gunfire from the windows of Hilltop forced the Saviors to fall back.

"I'm alright, I'm alright," Tara said with a weak smile. "It's just my arm."

Denise wouldn't hear a word of Tara's insistence that she was okay. She was at her side and forcing her into a chair, ignoring every joke Tara made to try and put her at ease. Denise yelled for me to help her. She handed me bundles of blankets and bandages to press against the wound while she removed the arrow. Despite all of my best efforts, blood still spurted from it. Tara closed her eyes and looked like she might throw up.

Denise cleaned the wound and stitched it up. The second burst of gunfire let us know that the Saviors had retreated right into crossfire from our lookouts, who were waiting at the gates for them.

Only when it was done did Denise relax enough to let herself feel the worry that had seeped into her. She held onto Tara tight, kissed her fiercely, and I took that as my cue to leave. As I opened the door, I came face to face with Siddiq, who was helped a gravely injured Tobin up the stairs.

Denise immediately focussed again, ready to help. This was the first patient of what would probably be many tonight. As Siddiq and Denise tended to Tobin, I glanced out at the battlefield. It was quiet now.

I wanted to run out and check on everyone, but it didn't seem fair to leave Denise and Siddiq in the middle of it all. I looked back at them. "Y'all need some help? I ain't trained or anything, but I...got experience."

They were too busy to query what I meant, which was that when you grow up in violence, you learn how to patch people up on the fly. Denise shot me a kind smile, "It's okay, we've got this covered. Get some rest."

"You sure?"

"Yes," she came real close, so Tara wouldn't hear her and said, "Thank you for bringing Tara back to me."

"It's alright," I whispered back. And then, louder, I said, "Holler, if you need any extra hands."

They promised they would, and I headed back to see what damage had been done. Daryl, Mia, and Perla were waiting for me at the house. Now that things were calming down, Daryl was mad. I hugged Mia and Perla close, and then, because I knew Daryl was about to blow his lid, I said, "Hey girls, can you go and check on Lucas for me?"

They nodded. I've found that they can get caught up in being scared unless you give them things to do, to distract them and let them feel like they're helping. When they ran off, I straightened up to face the music.

"The hell was that?" he snapped. Shifting from foot to foot, which meant he was real mad. "You ran off on me? Twice?"

"There was no way I could've got to you in time," I said. "Running across that road would've got us both spotted."

He wanted to argue against it but knew he couldn't. He just shook his head.

"Tara needed help," I said. "You'd have done the same if you'd gotten to her first."

"We're supposed to do this shit together now," he said.

"We did," I said. "As much as we could. It wasn't safe for me to get to you and the bike. We'd both be dead, and this whole thing could've gone sideways."

"I guess," he muttered, and he didn't yell anymore, but he spent the next few hours looking surly, and I knew I'd have to try and make it up to him. His mood probably wasn't helped by a shitty night's sleep the night before, but we couldn't talk about it much more.

We carried out a search for anyone injured or any lurking Saviors. We took out anyone who'd died so that they couldn't turn in the night. We secured the gates. The noise would've drawn Walkers out of the woods. As things started to wind down, I got the girls to bed and found Maggie in the entrance hall, trying to work out where best to set up all of the injured people for the night.

"Hey," I said.

"Hey," she said with a tired smile. "You might need to wait while we find space for you and Daryl. We need the space for-"

"Actually," I interrupted her. I already knew the problems. Injured people needed more space to lie out in comfort. Space to call for help if they needed it. Enough space between them for medics to visit. "That's exactly what I've come to talk to you about."

 

Daryl

I was tired in a way that I hadn't been for a long time. Any energy in me was broken, shattered. I wanted some damn rest, but that was almost impossible with the number of people there were in this place. Too many people near me, and I can't relax. It's like when my subconscious takes over in sleep, my body stays alert to attack. Even if it's friends surrounding me. I hoped I was exhausted enough for the presence of other people not to bother me and for me to finally get some shut-eye.

Naomi was still up and alert. She was talking to Maggie, probably looking for some way to make herself useful. I was too tired to fight the annoyance that bubbled up in my chest. Why did she have to be so crappy at resting, at letting other people get on with shit?

"You okay, man?" Glenn took a seat next to me, sounding as weary from the fight as I felt. I wasn't really in the mood for a chat, but I like Glenn too much to ask him to piss off.

"Yeah," I said, although he could probably tell I was sulking about something. It's hard to tell someone that the reason you're grumpy is that your girlfriend is too helpful, though. Makes you sound unreasonable. "How are you?"

"Tired," Glenn said. "Kinda hoped all this would be over by now."

"You and me both," I nodded in agreement. There was a comfortable silence while our attention was drawn to where our girls talked not far off. Too far away to hear what was being said. Or if it would be over soon. "Any idea what that's about?"

"Your guess is as good as mine," Glenn said, shaking his head slightly. "Maggie never stops. She's been working flat out for this place since they backed her instead of Gregory."

"You think you guys will stay here when this is all done?" I asked. I'd assumed when the war was over, we'd return to Alexandria and be just like we had been before. But now that Alexandria had been mostly destroyed, we might all need somewhere new. It didn't matter where as long as we didn't all get split up, I'd hate that.

"Maybe," Glenn said like he hadn't given it much thought. Then he shrugged, "I'll go wherever Maggie and baby are."

No wonder Glenn was so tired, having to worry about a pregnant wife and an unborn kid in all of this…actually, it was a wonder he hadn't lost his damn mind.

"Thought pregnant ladies were supposed to rest?" I said. Maggie looked far from resting.

"Yeah, you try telling her that," Glenn said with a tired but proud smile.

"Not slowing down, huh?"

"Not one bit," he said. "I can't get her to stop. This better all be over by the time the baby comes, or she'll be giving birth and firing bullets at the same time."

"Got my sympathies, man," I said. "I have no doubt Naomi will be exactly the same."

"Oh," Glenn's eyebrows shot up, and he immediately looked back at Naomi. "Is she…? Already? Wow! You guys really went from zero to a hundred, huh? Or have you been-"

"Oh, no. No, no," I said quickly. My heart spun over when I realized what he thought I'd meant. "She's not. We're not… we haven't… but, y'know, if she ever was… and I ain't saying with me because, y'know… we ain't been together long… I just meant if she ever were with anyone and she'd got…but no. She's not. No. No."

"So, not pregnant, then?" Glenn said, and I could tell he was trying his hardest not to laugh at me.

"Nah," I said. My cheeks felt like they were on fire, and I couldn't look him in the eye anymore. Glenn lost his battle with himself and started laughing. I wanted the ground to swallow me whole. If only you could summon up sinkholes.

"It's cool, man," he said, patting me on the shoulder. "Sometimes, you just know who you want to spend your life with. No shame in that."

Really?

I sighed with the relief of knowing that I wasn't the only weirdo who could see my life unfolding in someone else's eyes. Maybe it's the same for everyone, but I hadn't heard anyone talk about it before. Guys I knew before this, back when I was running with Merle, just talked about the tail they got or how they'd been forced to cheat on someone because it turned out she was actually a crazy bitch. Closest it came to something positive was when someone would get punched out for looking at someone else's girl too long. Which I guess wasn't so nice, actually, looking back at it. I cleared my throat, tried to push past the corniness of it by reminding myself that Glenn knew this feeling too.

"Did you know right away?" I asked. "With Maggie?"

"Didn't so much know, as… hoped," Glenn said. "I knew I'd stick around as long as she wanted me and been praying every day ever since that she won't change her mind."

"Yeah, I know that feeling." It was such a relief to hear that I'd just blurted out. Glenn laughed again, and I was about ready for that sinkhole to open up again. "Shut up."

"It's nice," Glenn said, nudging my arm. "It's good to see you happy."

"Thanks," I said. I cut him off. It felt like he has more to say, but I felt like I'd collapse in on myself with embarrassment if he did. My heart leaped again when I saw Naomi was making her way back over to us. She had a rucksack on her back that I was sure she hadn't been carrying before. "Er, if you wouldn't mind-"

"I'll keep it to myself. You got my word," Glenn said, getting to his feet as Naomi got closer. He raised a hand to greet her. "Hey, Naomi."

"Hey," Naomi said. There was a tiredness in her smile, and I hoped that meant she was ready to wrap it up for the day. "You guys good?"

"Yeah," Glenn said. "Does Maggie seem like she's almost ready to call it a night?"

"Yeah, I think so," Naomi said, but it wasn't super convincing.

"Alright, well, I'm going to go check on her," Glenn said. "Goodnight, you two."

"Night, Glenn," Naomi said. I raised a hand, too tired to say more than I had to. When he was far enough away, she glanced at me and said, "What were you guys talking about?"

"Nothing much," I said, hoping it didn't come off too defensive. "Why?"

"You looked…" Her gaze drifted momentarily to my ears. I wondered if they were still red and tried not to react. "... never mind."

"What were you and Maggie talking about?"

"Ah," she said, her smile back on her face. "C'mere."

She took me by the hand and led me out of the big house and toward the dark grounds of Hilltop. My heart sank. It was looking like we weren't close to wrapping shit up. For the first time, it occurred to me that I didn't have to wait around for her; she hadn't asked me to. Maybe she didn't want me to after I'd yelled at her. I could've got some shut-eye the moment I felt tired. I could turn around now, leave her to get on with whatever shit she was up to now. But I didn't. I followed her because I'd follow her anywhere.

"Where we going?" I asked. There was barely anyone out here, it was dark and quiet, and I couldn't see the urgency.

"Just c'mon," she said. My temper started fraying around the edges.

She led me over to the stables, and I wondered if I was meant to know why the hell we were here. The stables were empty. "The hell are we doing in here? We really gotta muck out the stables at this time of night?"

"What?" Naomi looked at me like she thought I was crazy. "No. We're sleeping here."

"What?"

"Sleeping," she repeated it louder like it was my hearing that was the issue. Then she looked around the place at all the straw. "Well, not down here… up there."

She pointed at a wooden ladder up to a platform above the stables. I looked up there as if there'd be an answer to all this waiting in the rafters. "Why?"

"Seemed like the house was too crowded for ya," she said like it was nothing.

She noticed that?

This was what she'd been talking to Maggie about?

Now that I knew she hadn't roped me into helping out with something in the middle of the night, I took a moment to notice how quiet it was in here. How still. How shut off from everyone, and I felt terrible that I'd almost yelled at her. With everything else that had been going on, it was crazy that I'd been anywhere close to the top of her priorities. I didn't know what to say for a moment, but when I looked back at her, her smile was faltering.

"I'm sure there's floor space back inside," she said. "If you don't want to…I just…I thought-"

"You really did this for me?" I interrupted her.

"Well, yeah," she said like it was a no-brainer. "But, like I said, we can head back to the house if I've totally misread this, I-"

"No," I said. "You haven't, I just-"

I stopped. I still didn't know what to say. It's hard to get used to someone thinking about you, putting you first, when you've never really had it before. What had I ever done to deserve any of it?

"You'd really sleep in a barn with me?"

Girl like her deserves a damn palace, not a barn. The hell is she doing with a guy like me?

"I'd sleep anywhere with you," she said with a little shrug like it was nothing, but something in the way she said it made my heart do backflips. She turned and started to climb the ladder up. I watched her go, still kind of floored that she'd figured me out like this.

How did I get this lucky?

I tried to snap myself out of it and climbed up after her. By the time I got to the top, she had pulled a blanket out of her backpack and was rooting around for something else.

"Managed to grab these from Maggie. Got some food too. Nothing much, 'cause there ain't much to go around, but I didn't think you had much of a chance to eat before, so I thought you might-" she stopped, looking up at me with an apple in one hand. There was a little pile of snacks she'd started piling up on the blanket beside her, and for some reason, this was what pushed me over the edge. My heart was so full it hurt.

"Is this okay, Daryl?" she said in a way that betrayed my silence had made her more than a little self-conscious. "Be honest. We can head back if you don't-"

"No," I said quickly. I hadn't meant to move closer to her, but I couldn't stop it any more than I could stop the words from tumbling out of my mouth, "I can't believe you did this for me."

There's always been something about her I couldn't stay away from, something that makes me tell her shit I'd normally keep to myself. Now that I was actually with her, those walls were crumbling even more.

"Well, to be completely honest," she said, a slight smile spreading across her face. "It wasn't just for you."

"No?" My hands joined around her waist.

"No," she said, her hands on my arm, running up to my shoulders. "There was only so much longer I could take all your damn tossing and turning."

"Oh yeah?" I said. Her smile was so damn infectious. I love the way she looks up at me when I'm just about to kiss her. "Could always sleep someplace else without me."

"No, thank you," she said, all polite.

"No?" I closed the gap between us, and she had time to shake her head a little before I kissed her.

Moments ago, I'd been tired, exhausted, seconds from falling asleep, but one kiss from her was enough to wake me right up again. Every part of me was alert to every part of her; every breath between kisses, every touch, every movement of her body against mine. I still couldn't believe it was happening. If I'd woken up right there and then to find that she'd never kissed me at all and was off with someone else, it would've made more sense to me.

I'd thought the surprise of it might've passed by now, that I wouldn't get the same giddy feeling in my chest at the taste of her. That holding her wouldn't give me the same kind of thrill. That I'd somehow be used to running my hands across her back, touching her waist, her chest against mine. But every time was as heart-racing as the first.

Naomi's hands tugged at the bottom of my shirt. It took me a second to realize she was trying to pull it up. Pull it off.

As I broke our kiss to help her pull my shirt over my head and I caught a look in her eye. One she'd tried to hide from me before but couldn't at that moment. I hadn't realized what it was until I saw it properly - desire. Enough heat to burn away any chance I had of feeling self-conscious about how I looked. One look in her eyes, and it was clear that she wanted me just like I wanted her. And she was all I had ever wanted.

I can't properly explain what it did to me, the feeling it gave me, to see that look in her eye.

I don't know what I did; all I knew was I had to be closer to her, and this wasn't good enough. Somehow, we were on the floor, and my tongue was in her mouth, and her hands were on my bare back, and it wasn't enough. And then she was on her back, and I rested in the warmth between her thighs, and still, it wasn't enough.

The material of her shirt under my fingers as I pulled it up just a little. Just enough to kiss the bruises under her rib cage like I could make them disappear. Or at least make her feel good enough to forget about them. Her hand in my hair, her skin under my lips, the smell of her. Everything about her drove me crazy. I pushed her shirt further up as I moved up, damn near ready to tear it off her.

And then her whole body went rigid underneath me.

Shit.

Her hands gripped my wrists like a vice, stopping them where they were and then pushing them away. I stopped kissing her, looked at her face. The fear in her eyes made my heart drop down to be eaten up by my stomach acid.

Shit, shit, shit.

She was looking right at me, but it wasn't me she was seeing.

I sprang back immediately, pulling my arms free of her grip.

Shit.

What have I done?

Did I hurt her?

Naomi's breathing sounded like it hurt like some invisible python wrapped itself around her and made each breath shorter and more constricted than the last. But she wasn't bleeding. She didn't seem to be holding any part of herself like it hurt. Now that I'd moved away from her, she was barely taking me in. Her eyes searched the dark so intensely that I turned to see if there was a danger I'd missed. The fear in her face hadn't faded, strong enough to fill me with dread just looking at it. She trembled, shaking like a pack of Walkers she couldn't escape from was about to descend on the two of us. It was enough to make me look around, too, to check there wasn't something I'd missed. Walkers, Saviors, Negan himself. But there was nothing. We were alone.

It took me a few racing heartbeats to realize I hadn't hurt her, not physically at least, and nothing was coming for us. This was what a panic attack looked like from the outside. The danger she was feeling, seeing in every shadow, was an echo of one she'd faced before. My heart ached for her.

I called her name a few times. The fifth time, I got through, and she turned her head to look at me. Her hand on her heart, I could only imagine how fast it was beating.

"You're okay, Naomi," I said quietly. It took everything in me not to reach out and wrap my arms around her. I wanted to hold her together, but it was a touch that had set her off, so I didn't think getting too close to her would help right now. She needed to know she was safe, that she had space if she needed it. She was in control of the area around her. I sat near her and just kept repeating, "You're safe, darlin'. I'm here. I love you. You're safe."

I had no idea if I was helping or if she could even hear me. Naomi's eyes were wide, but out of focus, she was someplace else. Someplace horrible. But I kept saying it over and over again, hoping some of it would get through to her.

Naomi reached out, took my hand. I sat as close as I could without crowding her, squeezed her hand tight. She was coming back to me. Her breathing evening out but still way too fast, teetering on an edge she could quickly spiral down into again.

"Hey, you see the beams up there?" I asked, pointing to the slope of the stable ceiling. There was a moment where I still wasn't sure she could hear me, but then she looked up, nodded. "How many?"

"What?" Naomi frowned, not sure why or maybe even what I was asking.

"How many beams up there?" I asked again, feeling a surge of hope that she'd been able to say anything at all. She was quiet again. I waited, holding my breath.

"Ten," she said eventually.

"You sure?"

"Yeah."

"Count them again."

Naomi got the same little crinkle in her nose she used to get when I was quizzing her for something at school, and she got it wrong, had to try again. I could've cried, seeing that look again. She concentrated harder, answered faster this time, "Ten."

"Count them out loud this time."

"One, two, three, four…" I watched her eyes moved down each one as she counted, baffled that she could've got it wrong the first two times. "Ten. Still ten."

"Yeah," I said, although I hadn't actually bothered to count them myself. That wasn't the point. The point was she was breathing easy enough to talk, and her mind had broken that spiral. She turned and looked at me, all stubborn like she was about to yell at me for tricking her until I said, "Better?"

She took a deep, shaky breath. Like she couldn't quite believe there was air in her lungs again. "Yeah."

"Good."

She looked away from me for a moment. Her hand squeezed mine, her voice just a whisper, "Sorry, Daryl. That was-"

"Hey, no," I said immediately. Instinctually, I reached out with my other hand to touch her shoulder and had to pull it back before we made contact. "It ain't your fault."

Naomi let go of me, and her hands shook as she wiped under her eyes. Her face still turned away from me, but it was a dead giveaway that she'd started to cry, "Don't know what else to say."

"You ain't gotta say anything."

She was quiet for a moment, then she said, "Don't want you thinking it's your fault."

"It wouldn't have happened if I hadn't been so…caught up."

"We both got caught up," she said.

I shook my head. No way I was going to let her take any of the responsibility for this. "I shouldn't have pushed it. I should've thought more…"

"No."

"I should've been more careful," I said.

"There's nothing you could've done differently. If anything, I wanted more," she said. "But, I wanted more of you, but suddenly it was like… like, it wasn't you anymore. And I just..."

She shivered, a frown clouding her face again. Jaw clenched like she couldn't go on. That was okay; I appreciated how much she'd shared already, if that was as far as she could go, she was already a hero to me.

"Hey, it's okay," I said.

"I don't know how else to explain it," Naomi said, drawing her knees up to her chest and hugging them there. "It's like.. I knew in my head and in my heart that it was your hands on me. Hell, felt like that was all I could think about, but then… it's like my body remembered… something different - different hands on me - and… even though I know it's you, and I know I'm safe...my body feels like it needs to get ready to fight again."

Fight?

Jesus…

For a second, I really didn't know what to say to her. I was so angry, I couldn't speak. I could've torn someone apart with my bare hands. I could've burned whole cities to the ground without flinching. But I couldn't find the words for it right away, and this wasn't the time for this kind of anger. This wasn't about me and how I felt about the assholes who'd made her feel this way. This was about her.

"Maybe that makes me sound crazy," Naomi said, and I realized I'd been quiet too long, made her feel like she'd overshared.

"You fought 'em?" I said. It maybe wasn't the right thing to say, but it was all I could think.

"Er, yeah…" she said. "I mean, not enough to stop them, obviously, but… I tried. A little."

"Weren't on you to stop them," I said. "It was on them not to put their hands on you."

She nodded but didn't say much. Didn't look at me either. She fixed her gaze on the ground, and I couldn't tell if she was recovering, or avoiding eye contact with me because she didn't want me to see the blame she held for herself there. I didn't want to end this here. I'd made her think about something horrible, made her share more than she usually did, but I didn't want to make anything worse by saying the wrong thing again.

"I ever tell you about the time one of Merle's asshole friends pulled a gun on me?" I said. It tumbled right out of me.

"No!" Naomi looked at me then. And she looked mad like she was about to hop back in time and punch Merle's asshole friend in the face. "Daryl, what the fuck?"

"He was just some tweaker we were hanging out with," I said. "Got into a fight with Merle, so of course I take Merel's side. We're all yelling at each other, and then he pulls a gun on me. I thought for sure he was gonna pull the trigger, and I didn't fight. Just sat there thinking about how my life didn't mean shit, and how I'd let the best thing that ever happened to me slip right by."

"What was that?"

"You, dipshit."

"Daryl…"

"Even when my dad was beating on me, I didn't do shit," I said. "Just kinda froze there. Waiting for it to be over."

Naomi's eyes widened a little, surprised I'd brought it up. I guess I was a little surprised, too. Another set of memories that tumbled right out. It turns out that the walls that I'd thought were only crumbling around her were actually basically dust at this point.

"You were a kid, Daryl," she said. She looked sad, but it wasn't out of pity, it was love. "It wasn't on you to stop it. It was on him not to beat on a kid."

"I wasn't always so little," I said. "Could've fought back earlier than I did."

"Bullshit."

"Nah," I said. "I'd be wailing on some asshole at school, and I'd think 'hey, this is easy. This guy is younger and in better shape than my old man, why ain't it this easy for me to hit him back? But I never could. Never had the guts."

"It ain't the same thing," she said. "He was your dad, he should've been the one protecting you from pain, not dishing it out. He had years to get in your head, make you feel all sorts of ways about yourself so he'd always be the one in control. It ain't as simple as a schoolyard fight."

It was nice of her to say, and hearing it choked me up a little. All those years I thought she might've seen me as weak when I was big enough and strong enough to fight my Dad instead of running to her to patch me up again. But, this wasn't about me. I shook my head, trying to get back to what I wanted to tell her, "Point is, you're brave as shit for fighting back, Naomi."

"It ain't that simple, you know that."

"How'd you mean?"

"I could've fought more. Or, I could've fought less," she said. "It might have made things easier."

"Bullshit."

"Nah, the guy in Terminus… the one in charge…" she paused, and I didn't think she'd be able to carry on. But she did. Because my girl is strong as hell. "He told me once that I was his favorite because I fought back. 'Enough to make it fun but not enough to piss me off."

As she quoted him, she shuddered again, and I felt that rage rise in me, "He said that to you?"

"Yeah," she said. "There was always a point where I stopped fighting. It was like… part of me left my body to deal with it, so I couldn't feel it as much. I don't know if that makes sense…"

"God, I wanna kill him," I was still so blinded by rage I couldn't move past it.

"Hey, maybe you did," she shrugged.

"Wish I knew for sure," I said. "Wish I'd come across him before he got to you, cut him open and pulled his guts out while he watched."

"C'mon, you know that's impossible."

"Yeah," I sighed. "I hate that I can't undo it for ya."

"I ain't telling you this because I want you to undo it," she said. "My point is, it don't matter if you freeze, or how much you fight, people like him and like your Daddy will find a way to keep going. It's on them to stop."

I nodded. I came close to bringing up her Momma, and those scars on her legs. But, if this conversation had taught me anything, it was that she had to offer this in her own time. So, I thought about her as a kid, and how I'd never once thought she should fight back when her Momma hurt her. I'd never thought she was weak. I pictured myself beside her, some punk kid who thought he was hopelessly broken when all along he'd been hopelessly in love. It wasn't his fault either.

Then Naomi said, "I wanted to kill your dad, too, for what it's worth."

"What?" I thought I must've misheard her. Teacher's Pet Naomi Payton having murder fantasies? It didn't seem right.

"Thought about it so many times," she said. "Going over there when he was passed out drunk and slitting his throat. Packing up and leaving with you in the dead of night."

"You serious?"

"As a heart attack," she said solemnly. "Which, as it happens, I also prayed he'd have every night."

"Makes two of us," I said, and she managed a small smile. "You shouldn't have had to think like that; we were kids."

"Yeah. We were," she said pointedly, fixing me with a stare. Her meaning was clear; if I thought she'd been too young for such dark thoughts, then maybe I was too.

"Yeah, I guess," I sighed. "So what now?"

"Huh?" She didn't get my meaning.

"All them assholes are long dead," I said. "Why does it still feel so…"

"Shit?" she finished for me.

"Yeah."

"Hurt yourself bad enough it leaves a scar," she said. "Makes sense being hurt in other ways would leave other kinds of scars."

"Ain't fair we gotta live with it when they don't."

"Agreed," she said. "All we can do is take it day by day, work through it. Which, you really helped me do tonight. Thank you, Daryl."

"You ain't gotta thank me," I said. Didn't seem fair for her to thank me or even think about it when I'd gotten so much out of this conversation, too. "I'm always gonna be here when you need me. Always."

I really meant it. When I said it, I couldn't think of anything that could separate us again.

"Hey, how'd you know that counting thing would work?" Naomi asked.

"I didn't," I said. "It just…helped me sometimes, so I thought maybe it would help you, too."

"When did it help you?"

"Sometimes, when my dad was… when he beat me, it was like you said, like a part of me slipped out of my body for a while so I couldn't feel it as much," I said. "When it was over, I couldn't move sometimes. Pain would come back piece by piece. I'd count shit to take my mind off it until I could move again."

"And then what?" she asked. I knew she was looking for a way to move past the empty, exhausted feeling she was probably having now. The same one I used to get after something like this. Sadly, I didn't have a quick fix.

"Then I'd come to your place," I said. "And I was alright again."

The feeling would return to my feet first, spread up from there. And my feet would know to carry me to her place, and by the time I got there, my hands would be able to move enough to knock. I always knew if I could get to that point, I'd live. Because the door would open, and there she'd be, looking at me with the same eyes that were fixed on me now.

"I love you," she said, and I could tell she didn't know what else to say, which was fine because it was really what mattered most to me. I put an arm around her, and she rested her head on my shoulder. After all these years, all the shit we'd been through, she was still what got me through it.

Chapter 47: Pop Tarts

Naomi

"Oi!" I yelled, about ready to scramble up the ladder to the Hilltop lookout and shake whoever was up there until they couldn't ignore me anymore. 

"Yeah, yeah," he called back down, barely looking over his shoulder at me. "I'll get them open in a minute."

Asshole.

I bit back a few curses. Most folks were cranky, and foul moods had spread from person to person as fast as the flu. Food had gone from running low to running out, and the only thing hunger feeds is rage. We'd foiled one Savior attack, but nobody was dumb enough to think they'd given up, and the threat of a second hung in the air. I couldn't wait to get the hell out of there, even if it was only for a few hours. 

Finally, I heard the creak of the gates. The way they scraped against the dirt, the slight breeze generated by the movement of them opening up. I felt better already. Less cooped up like a battery hen.

I looked around for Glenn, who had gotten us a car for the journey and was now caught up in trying to navigate it around the packed grounds of Hilltop. It was surprising how quickly people had forgotten to act around cars, leaping out of the way until the last second. Glenn’s strained face peered over the wheel. Tara sat in the passenger seat, peeking out between the gaps in her fingers.

Watching them gave me so much second-hand stress that I chose to look away from it entirely. There could be Walkers or Saviors on the other side of the gates, but watching them open up was better than witnessing the Hilltop-wide game of Chicken that Glenn had got caught up in. As it happened, there weren't any Saviors or Walkers on the other side of the gates. 

It was Daryl, crossbow slung over his shoulder. His shirt was bunched up in his fist, a bolt in his other hand twisted through the material of it, cleaning something off. Presumably blood, hopefully of the Walker variety. He was looking down at it and hadn’t seen me. If I backed away now, he might never know I’d been there. My heart was already pounding like I was running a marathon; I might as well actually run. 

I wanted to bound across the last few paces between us so that I could wrap my arms around him, kiss him deep, and tell him I’d missed him like crazy even though he’d only been gone a few hours. But in the last couple of days, he’d turned every kiss into a polite peck and held me like I was made of glass. The lightest touch, always a little bit of distance between us, his hands never deviating from my shoulders. And that sterile nothingness we’d become overnight made me want to turn and run the other way. 

Daryl looked up before I could take off, and the decision was made. His eyes widened, and I wondered if he was feeling the same tightening in his chest.

“Oh,” he said.

“Oh,” I said back, and then neither of us knew what to say. A deep and dramatic sigh from his side reminded me Rosita was there too. She looked glum, and the absence of Eugene told me everything I needed to know. “No luck?”

“He’s dead to us,” Rosita said. Even the air around her felt angry and jagged as she stormed past me, muttering, “And next time I see him, he’ll be dead for real.”

Her threat hung in the air for a while after she’d gone. Then, it would dissipate, spreading through Hilltop and making everyone else’s shitty moods even shittier. 

“Yeah, he’s full Negan,” Daryl said, not moving from the shadow of the gates. Not trying to get past me, but not coming any closer either. He shrugged, but I could tell he was deflated. Guys as loyal as Daryl don't handle betrayal well. “We got him out of there, couldn’t convince him to stay. He ran back.”

“Shit.” I was surprised by how hard it hit me. I’d heard Eugene’s declarations of loyalty to Negan with my own two ears, but I guess I’d been harboring some hope. 

Behind me, the crunch of tires rolling across the dirt interrupted anything Daryl was about to say or any condolences I could offer. Glenn came to a slow stop right alongside us. His gaze flickered from me to Daryl and back again.

“You still coming, Naomi?” he asked. 

“Yeah, ‘course,” I said. The promise of getting out of here and escaping this new awkwardness with Daryl made everything feel less heavy. 

And then Glenn said, “You coming too, Daryl?”

“No,” I answered for him, to save him from having to come up with some kind of excuse. I moved toward the backdoor of the car. 

“Where you going?” Daryl asked. I heard the crunch of his feet as he walked forward, finally stepping into the Hilltop now that he knew I was leaving it.

“On that food run I’ve been pushing for,” I said, trying to keep my tone as neutral as possible. “We’re almost out of everything.” 

I opened the car door, praying that was the end of it. I'd pushed for a run that would feed the Saviors as well as our own people, Daryl disagreed. There were only so many times I could tell him why I thought letting prisoners of war starve was inhumane, and there were only so many times I could hear him telling me that Saviors got what was coming to them. I was about to climb into the backseat before Daryl said, “Okay, yeah. I’ll come with you.”

“Yeah?” I asked, unable to mask my surprise.

“Yeah,” he said. Another shrug, even less convincing than his shrug over Eugene’s betrayal.

“You don’t have to,” I said. It blurted right out of me, and I couldn’t work out why it felt so important to me that Daryl didn’t come with us, but I was already making up excuses for him. “You only just got back, and I know you don’t really think we should be-”

“Nah, it’s fine,” Daryl said and then hesitated again. “Unless you need someone to keep an eye on the girls?”

“They’re helping Maggie take inventory of the crop we got left,” I said. “But if you want to see them, I’m sure-”

“Can we make a decision sometime today?” Glenn stuck his head out of the driver’s side window. “This was supposed to be a quick run.”

“Yeah. Yeah, I’ll come,” Daryl said. I stood back from the open car door and gestured for Daryl to get in ahead of me. When he was in, I climbed in beside him. I'd barely closed the door before Glenn started driving. The car felt small. The air was heavy and too warm. I sat back and tried to get comfortable, but there had been a cold knot of nerves growing in my stomach for the last few days. Now it sat, heavy as a paperweight and pinning down my enthusiasm for this run. 

“So how’d Naomi rope y’all into this?” Daryl asked. 

"Didn't have to, really," Glenn shrugged, picking up speed as we hit the open road. "It seemed like the right thing to do."

I caught his eye in the rearview mirror and flashed him a grateful smile. I'd taken a lot of shit from people about wanting to do this; it was nice to have someone like Glenn on my side. 

“Maggie happy about it?” Daryl asked. The question grated on my nerves. Was he trying to find a reason to make Glenn turn around again? Had he come just to sabotage us?

"Not really," Glenn admitted. "But she doesn't want to kill them either, so…someone had to do something. Naomi made some compelling points; it might as well be us."

"Yeah," Daryl nodded. I couldn't pick up any hint in his voice that he was trying to stir up trouble and convince us all to turn around. I shot him a look, but he didn't notice; he'd turned his attention to Tara. “And you?”

“Well, I think Naomi saved my ass,” Tara said, and then she turned in her seat to smile at me. “Which means I pretty much have to do whatever she says from now on."

"Careful," Daryl said. "Never know what she'll rope you into next."

"I didn't do shit," I said. There was an edge to my voice that I didn't like but couldn't stop. "Y'all can hop out any time."

"I came because it seemed like the right thing to do," Tara added, looking right at me like she knew I was about to blow my fuse. I’d pinned too much hope on this run, desperate to get out of the claustrophobic atmosphere of the Hilltop and actually do something useful, but it didn’t take long for the car to become a microcosm of Hilltop itself. Too hot, too crowded, and all conversation eventually turned to the Saviors and what might come next. And Daryl. Close, but never touching me.

I stared resolutely out of the window and tried to drown it all out. If I had to spend another second thinking about Negan, or Simon, or the Sanctuary, I was going to lose my damn mind. So when Glenn brought the car to a stop and parked up in the nearby town we’d come to scout out, I’d unclipped my seatbelt and opened the door before he’d shut the engine off.

“Woah,” Glenn laughed, “Easy there!"

"Please keep your arms and legs inside the vehicle until it has come to a full and complete stop,” Tara said like she was making an announcement before a rollercoaster ride.

I didn't shut the door, but I did wait until the engine cut out before I stood up and got out. 

"Now Daryl's here, we could split up," Glenn said. "You guys head to the office block, and we'll check out the school.”

“Yeah, sounds good to me,” Daryl said. I looked sideways at him. Did it sound good to him?

I nodded, not wanting to drag this out any longer. Tara handed us a walkie and kept one for her and Glenn. If we found anything, we’d contact each other. Otherwise, we’d meet back at the car in an hour. 

Daryl and I walked over to the office block I'd spotted on a map. Rather than get distracted by the silence between us that made every footstep deafening, I channeled my attention to the glass building rising up in front of us. It was a big complex, far enough away from the center of town and all of its amenities that I thought it might have a canteen or dining hall. 

It was a building made almost entirely of windows. All of them were grimy. Some of them were broken. Still, it wasn't hard to imagine it had been impressive when it was functional. A clean glass box mirroring the sky and surrounded by a moat of neatly parked cars in the parking lot.

When we neared the doors, Daryl looked back at me as if to say, you ready ? I nodded in return. Game face on. If there were Walkers in here, we'd need to clear them. If people were living here, that could be a whole other set of problems. Glass all around like that - they'd have seen us coming miles away. They'd be ready. 

The doors were locked. We scouted the perimeter but found no visible entrance. Daryl smashed one of the glass panels with the end of his gun, and the noise brought out Walkers. We stayed where we were, shooting at them through the break in the glass until we were sure the last of them had shuffled out. There were surprisingly few, although given how hard this place had been to get into, maybe it shouldn't have been all that surprising.  

Our footsteps echoed in the vastness of the entrance hall as we made our way cautiously into the building. The air was stuffy and warm; there hadn't been a breeze through here in a long time. Whole place smelled of death.

In the center of every floor above us, there was a perfectly oval hole running a clear column right up to the glass ceiling. It gave the impression this whole place was open plan, letting in more natural light than would otherwise have reached the first floor. I craned my neck to look up. From the top floors, you'd have a birds-eye view of any movement on the ground floor. Perfect place for a sniper if people were living here. 

Daryl clocked it too. We stayed close to the edge of the room, but nobody shot at us.

The sun beat down through the glass ceiling. This place must've had a pretty fancy AC in its day, or the workers would've melted. Unlucky for us, it obviously no longer worked, and the whole place felt like a greenhouse in this damn heat. I was sweating already.

We followed signs for the dining hall. I tried not to get my hopes up, but sure enough, this place had a large and open-plan dining hall. The door marked 'kitchen' was easy to find. I pushed on it, gun raised and was instantly hit by a smell so strong I almost barfed.

"Stinks," I warned Daryl, covering my nose with my sleeve and trying to breathe through my mouth. "Could be a Walker." 

We moved cautiously inside. Listening, watching for any sign of the dead coming to get us. 

"Something died in here, alright," Daryl nudged an open bin with his toe. "Ain't no Walker, though."

Food, which had been rotting for years at this point, was piled high. And right on top of the heap was a dead rat. Might have been dumb enough to try eating the moldy food, it might have just keeled over and died at the smell. Daryl found the lid and put it on top. 

It didn't do much. 

Live rats, possibly relatives of the dead garbage rat, scurried out of the way as we searched the rest of the place. There were a few bags of flour, a few tinned goods. Some of it was out of date but only slightly. Not enough for us to be fussy about. It wasn't enough to feed everyone at Hilltop for long. There were so many of us now. 

“This was a good call,” Daryl said, breaking a silence that had lasted since we'd come in here. “You were right to make it.”

“Yeah?” I said, wondering if this was a peace offering after he’d been so unsupportive of it before. Or, maybe the real fight would come when we tried to give some of it to Maggie’s prisoners of war. 

“Yeah,” he said. “You wanna call Glenn and Tara, or should I?”

"We should check out the rest of the building first," I said. “So we know what we’ve got.”

"You think there’s more?"

"Not as much as there is here, but there's probably little mini kitchens on each floor for people to make teas and coffees, maybe more. It’s a big place. Might find the odd snack drawer at a desk or two,” I said. “I had a whole drawer full of snacks when I was in an office like this.”

I’d said it as an afterthought, and more to myself than him, but something about it made Daryl laugh, "'Course you did."

“Didn’t clean it out before all of this,” I said. I was rambling, but something made Daryl laugh. Seeing him relaxed and smiling made me keep going. “It’s probably a drawer full of ants now.”

“Nice of you to give ‘em a home,” he shrugged, and the silence came back. 

We left the kitchen and headed for the nearest staircase. Given how much food had been left to rot, I was confident that it was unlikely people were living here. Walkers were still a concern, but we’d already taken out the ones on the ground floor, and the only way to reach the upper levels was via an out-of-service elevator and stairs at either end of the building, which were shut off by doors. Opening doors and fixing elevators - two things I was sure Walkers weren’t good at. 

The first floor had a small kitchen space, just as I thought it might. There wasn’t much in there worth taking, other than a jar of freeze-dried coffee and a box of teabags, but it made me hopeful. The rest of that floor was rows of empty desks and blank computer monitors. Daryl and I spent some time looking through drawers. A layer of dust coated everything. Personal items left behind, no doubt by people who thought they’d be returning for them at some point, were scattered around the place. The odd cardigan slung over the back of a chair, photographs of families and pets pinned to noticeboards and the walls of office cubicles. I didn’t linger on any of them and didn't like thinking about how few of the people in those pictures were still alive. 

Desk plants were dotted around the place, brown and shriveled. Yet, sporadically throughout the office were bursts of green from larger plants. I couldn’t work out how these ones were thriving without a drop of water, and then I reached out and touched one. Plastic. It would sit here and look as pristine as it did the day the doors had shut as the building decayed around it. 

“This anything like where you used to work?” Daryl asked. I was surprised by the question as much as I was that he’d actually said something. I cast my eye around the place and tried to think back to a time where I’d been in an office bustling with people. It was almost unimaginable now. 

“A little, I guess,” I shrugged. “Lotta offices are the same - rows of computers, phones that won’t stop ringing, wars breaking out in the kitchen over who stole who’s mug.”

I thought that might be the end of it, but he paused for a second and then said, "Did you have your own mug?" 

"Er…” I only hesitated because I was so thrown by him being interested in something so dull. “Yeah, I did."

"What was it like?"

"First, I had this one with the periodic table on it, y'know, like in chemistry... except instead of all the elements, it had different font names.”

“ Fonts? ”

“Er, yeah,” I said. I could feel my cheeks getting red, knowing the explanation was just as dumb as the mug itself. “Bryce and I were on the school paper back in college. For the Halloween edition, he wanted to use this font called Scurd and print the whole thing in red, so it looked like it had been written in dripping blood. I was worried the drip effect would make it illegible, and red ink would’ve been way more expensive to print in. Biggest fight we ever had. The mug was a peace offering.”

“You’re such a dork,” he said, but he said it with so much affection in his smile it made my cheeks heat up even more. “What was the other one?”

“What?”

“Well, you said that was the first mug you had, so were there more?”

“Yeah,” I said. Hadn’t realized he’d been paying such close attention. “Mia gave me one. Her school took her on a trip to this place where they could all paint their own mugs. It said ‘ Best Naomi ’ on it, with a picture of a squirrel.”

“What?” Daryl laughed.

“She was obsessed with squirrels. It was all she drew for a while,” I said. “And they were making these mugs for Mother’s Day. Most of the other kids were writing things like ‘Best Mom’, and I think she got confused.”

“Well, she ain’t wrong,” he said. “Best Naomi I ever met.”

“Probably the only Naomi you’ve ever met,” I said, knowing how little Daryl liked to socialize.

“Yeah,” he said. “Didn’t need to waste my time meeting the others, knew they’d be crap.”

“Oh, shut up,” I said, with the same amount of affection he’d used to call me a dork, and he grinned at me. 

We went back to rifling through long-abandoned desk drawers. I wondered what his sudden, excruciating interest in something so mundane had been. So many questions after days of nothing. I was about to turn and ask, but then he muttered, "Jackpot." 

"What you got?" I glanced over at him.

"Pop-tarts," he said, holding up the open box and shaking it to show there was still some left. “Can’t pop ‘em, of course, ain’t got no toaster.”

“Does that make them regular tarts then?”

“Yeah, I guess," he said, digging into the box with one hand. He pulled out the shining silver foil of a packet. "Want one?”

I talked over the rumbling of my stomach, “We should save them. Everything we find here’s gotta come back to Hilltop with us.”

“I know you’ve been skimming rations, giving some of yours to the girls. Don’t think I ain’t seen it.”

I heard the disapproval in his voice. Didn't appreciate it and was quick to point out his hypocrisy. I snapped back, “Don’t think I ain’t seen you doing the same.”

“Alright," he said, holding his hands up in surrender. "We’ll both have one. How’s that?”

It didn't feel right, finding something and not sharing it. But I worried about Daryl cutting his rations, and I got why he'd feel the same about me. “Fine.”

A triumphant grin spread across Daryl's face, and he tore open the pop tarts, handing one to me and keeping one for himself. He gave his a sniff while I turned mine over in my hand, checking for mold. Daryl took a tentative bite of one corner.  

“Bit stale," he concluded, chomping off a massive bite of the rest and talking with his mouth full, "but still good.”

I took a bite of mine, was shocked by how sweet it tasted. I couldn't remember the last time I'd had sugar like this, the frosting on top melting on my tongue. The strawberry filling was a little congealed but tasty enough that I barely noticed the slight stale edge to the pastry. We ate in silence, lost in the novelty of a pop tart. Something about it reminded me of sharing the last slice of diner pie as kids. Huddled around a disposable container, a fork each, making it last as long as we could because we’d never know where our next bit of food was coming from. Back then, one of us didn’t get a treat without sharing it with the other. 

As I wiped the crumbs from around my mouth, I glanced at Daryl. The longer we'd been out here, the more relaxed he'd seemed. Laughing and joking, but still not coming close to me if he could help it. Stepping around me like I was a bomb about to go off.

"Hey," I said. "Uh, Daryl?"

"Yeah?"

"Is everything...okay?" 

"Yeah," he said, not catching my meaning at all. "Well… Eugene betrayed us, so that ain't great, but we don't need that asshole. We're gonna-"

"No," I interrupted him. Couldn't listen to another word of hypothetical war plans. "I mean with us."

" Us ?" Daryl's eyes got really wide and panicked, and I immediately regretted saying anything. "Yeah. Why? Are you… you ain't...?"

"I love you. I ain't going anywhere."

"Right, well," he breathed a sigh of relief. "Yeah, we're fine. What are you stressing your head off about?" 

"My head's fine."

"You sure? It's looking a bit wobbly from over here."

"Maybe…" I could feel my heart beating hard in the back of my throat, trying to shut me up. The old impulse to shut down almost won out.

"C'mon," Daryl said. "What's up?"

He was looking expectantly at me. If I couldn't be open with him, I didn't have a hope in hell of making anything work with anyone. So I dropped my gaze, tried to make it easier to get the words unstuck. 

"We've barely touched since…." I almost stopped again but pushed through. "Y'know, that night in the barn… You’ve been distant, and … and I know I freaked out, and that must've been weird for you, but I'm fine."

"Weren't weird for me," Daryl said, quick as anything. So sure, so certain. I looked back up at him. His eyes were burning into me with an intensity I wanted to shrink away from. "But you ain't fine."

I held his gaze, although it took everything in me not to look away. "It ain't-"

He shut me up with a look, took a step closer. "You really think you're fine?"

"Well, not fine -fine," I admitted. I couldn't lie to him, not with those eyes. "But fine- ish . Fine-enough."

"Ain't no fine-enough. You're either fine, or you ain't," he said. I shook my head. Typical Daryl. For him, things were always one thing or another; he held very little room for things that came in-between. Which was a pity because all I felt was in-between these days, balancing precariously between 'fine' and 'complete mess’. 

Daryl looked down, ran his finger absentmindedly through the dust on one of the desks. His face was turned slightly away from me, but I knew that look. He was building up to saying something. I waited. Without looking up, he admitted, "I have been thinking about that night, though."

"You have?" 

"Yeah. Quite a lot, actually," he said. I worried I wouldn't be able to hear what came next over my heart pounding in my ears. "Trying to think about how we can…do this without making you feel...like that again."

"Can't guarantee that," I said, and my heart sank at the truth of it. "It's always going to be a risk."

"I know that," Daryl said, and he said it so gently it almost made me cry. He just accepted it, and the way I was. It should've been nice, but it made me feel trapped. Like he thought I'd be this way forever and had given up on me getting better. 

"I know seeing me like that must've been shitty for you, and God knows it ain't the sexiest thing in the world," I said. "But If I'm going to get better, I can't ignore it."

"I ain't saying we should ignore it," Daryl said. "But I think there's gotta be a way of making it easier for you."

"Well, if you have any bright ideas, I'm all ears," I said. I wasn't expecting an answer. I'd turned the question over and over in my mind since things with Daryl had started heating up. 

"I do, actually," he said. 

"Oh. Yeah?" 

"Yeah," he nodded. "I think, for now, you gotta ask.”

He was looking at his shoes, a slight flush creeping up the side of his neck. I waited for the end of a sentence that never came. “Ask what?”

“You want me to do anything more than hold your hand, you gotta ask.”

" Ask ?" I repeated, something twisted up in my gut.

"Yeah. Something wrong with that?"

"No," I said because there wasn't anything inherently wrong with it, but just the thought of it set my cheeks on fire. "Sounds a bit... awkward is all."

I could barely get this conversation out. What chance did I have of asking for what I want? I didn't even know where to begin with that. 

"I ain't saying it's a long-term thing or that we've gotta do it that way forever," Daryl said. "But if it helps you work through shit, helps you feel in control of what's happening to you, that’s a good thing, right?”

“I guess,” I said. Everything he'd said made sense, but my nerves didn't shift, and they must've shown. Daryl sighed. 

"Look, if it helps, it ain't just for you."

"No?" 

"No," he took a deep breath before he continued. "I know you've been with a lot more people than me, so… y'know...you got a lot more experience than I do, so I don't want-"

“Daryl, no,” I interrupted him, stepping around the desk between us in an attempt to get him to look at me. If this bothered him, I wanted to get ahead of it before any kind of insecurity could take root. “That ain’t something worth worrying about. It's a lot of pressure to put on yourself. And on us.”

“Maybe,” he shrugged but still wouldn’t look at me, looked so damn nervous it almost broke my heart. "I don't want our first time to… y'know, suck."

“It won’t.” I was sure of it, but I didn’t know how to put my certainty into words. 

"You don’t know that,” he muttered. "But I know I ain't... I haven't… And you’ve been with-”

"Okay,” I interrupted, wondering if I should be offended by what Daryl was implying. “I ain't been with that many people, and none of the guys or girls I've been with….” 

I stopped. There was a pause. A moment passed between us where we both realized what I'd just let slip. A terrifying heartbeat where, no matter how well you know a person, you're not sure how they'll take it. Then Daryl nodded like something about my bisexuality made sense to him, and I caught back enough breath to carry on. "None of them have been like this. I haven't felt the same way about anybody as I do about you. That’s how I know. It can’t suck."

He nodded, letting my words sink in for a moment. I knew Daryl would have a hard time believing me. He'd never known his worth. People hadn't treated him right, and he'd put the blame for that in all the wrong places. I reached across the gap between us and took his hand. Daryl was quiet for a moment, but it was a kind of quiet I knew well. He was deciding whether or not to share something, and waiting here, holding his hand, was the best way to encourage him to do it without pressuring him.

“It wasn’t like I didn't try to be more… like you , more normal, but…" he trailed off for a moment, his stare fixed on his own shoes, but his grip on my hand tightened. I waited, gripping back. "It didn't take much fooling around with a girl I didn't know and feeling nothing , and then thinking about you and feeling everything to realize I ain't wired that way. I dunno, maybe something in my brain's broken."

"No,” I said, too alarmed by his use of the words 'normal' and ‘broken’ to let myself be overwhelmed by what he'd said. “There's plenty of folks wired like you."

He looked up at me then, finally. Probably to check I wasn’t lying or making fun of him, but it felt good to have him look at me again. I couldn’t imagine how hard it must have been for him to muddle through this shit with Merle and his dumbass friends, who collected hookups like some folks collect baseball cards. Not being like them and not understanding why couldn’t have been fun. 

"You think so?" he asked, testing me.

"I know so,” I said, and he looked close to believing me. “Some people need an emotional connection to feel a physical one. Others don't. It's completely normal; ain't nothing wrong with it."

"You sure?" he asked, but he already looked a little relieved.

"Positive,” I said firmly. Daryl took longer than most to connect to people; I didn't like to think about how long he'd been carrying these worries around. “There's nothing broken in you."

Daryl’s shoulders visibly relaxed. "And you don't think I'm some kinda prude?"

"God, no,” I said. “And you don't think I'm some kinda slut?"

"No," he said. "Didn't mean to imply that, either."

“Good,” I said. We held each other's gaze for a moment, comfortable for the first time in a few days. 

“Probably didn’t need to tell you all that,” Daryl said. "I guess I wanted you to know that you ain't gotta work through this if you don't want to. If it hurts too much, if we’ve already gone as far as we can go, I'll love you all the same. The physical stuff ain't all it's about for me."

It hit me in all kinds of ways. Daryl's selfless patience, the disbelief that I could be enough for someone all by myself, and the crushing injustice that a dead man could still take so much from me. 

“I’m glad you told me," I said.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah," I said, and suddenly it was easy to believe he could accept me as I was because I took him just the same. "It is something I want to work through. And you were so good the other night. Having you at my side really helped, but I get that it must be hard for you, too. It's okay if you need to take a step back."

"I ain't stepping anywhere," Daryl said firmly. I didn't realize until he said it how much it meant to me.

"And if the physical stuff ain't for you at all, that’s fine, too. Lots of people feel that way,” I told him, in case it was something he hadn’t heard before. His eyebrows shot up in surprise. “It’s completely normal, and I’ll love you all the same.” 

"That ain’t what I meant,” Daryl said. “I just didn't want you thinkin' the only reason I’d been coming up with ways to make things easier for you is just because I wanna fuck you."

"Woah, okay ," I said, knowing I'd need more than a minute to recover from that sentence. 

Daryl seemingly hadn't noticed what he'd said or the way it made my head spin. He carried straight on, “I don't care what happened before us or who you were with. If it happens with us, I just don't want it to…”

“Suck?”

“Yeah.”

“It won’t.”

“Knowing what you like. What you don't like. That'll help."

"Help what?" I asked, playing dumb.

"Help me to… well… y'know…" he trailed off, making it clear the first time had been a total slip of the tongue. 

"Fuck me?"

Daryl turned a deep shade of beetroot. "Well, I weren't gonna phrase it like that."

"Think you already did,” I pointed out. I watched the realization wash over him and tugged on his hand to pull him closer. 

“I… uh… I didn’t… I mean…” he muttered.

“You wanna kiss me now, maybe?" I asked, putting him out of his misery. 

"Yeah,” he sighed with relief, a slight smile breaking through. “That sounds good."

He was still smiling when our lips met. Both of us were. It was hard not to. After days of quiet pecks on the cheeks or lips, it felt good to have him kiss me like this again. Deep and earnest. To taste his tongue on mine again, this time with a slight hint of strawberry pop tarts.

I reached for the bottom of his shirt, tugged at it. It was almost second nature now, trying to get that shirt off him. I didn’t give it a moment’s thought until he suddenly stopped kissing me and pulled back. This was usually the point where he’d help me get it up over his head, but not this time.

“Something you want, Naomi?” he asked, amusement dancing in his eyes. 

“Yeah,” I said, my stomach twisted with nerves again. I’d half-forgotten his ‘ask me’ plan.

“Yeah?”

Was he really going to make me say it?

“C’mon, Daryl, I ain’t exactly being subtle about it.”

“Don’t hear you asking,” he shrugged.

“You said I only had to ask if I wanted you to do something,” I said, trying to get around it on a technicality. 

“Is there something you want, Naomi?” he repeated, more firmly this time. Sounding stern but unable to wipe the smile from his face. It was spreading to me, too, a mix of awkwardness and general awareness of how ridiculous I was being.

"Can I take your damn shirt off?" I asked eventually. It made him smile wider. 

"Yeah,” he said. “You can take my damn shirt off.”

This time, when I tugged on it, he helped me lift it off. And things quickly stopped being so amusing. At least for me. I don’t think I’d ever fully recovered from the first time I’d seen Daryl shirtless, and every time since that still took my breath away for a moment. I took a second. Drinking him in. “You are…”

“Shut up,” he said before I could compliment him and sealed my silence with another kiss.

“Can I…?” My hands hovered near him, unsure of what it was I wanted to ask. Desire was clouding everything. 

“Yeah,” he said. “You can.”

I was relieved he hadn’t made me put it into words this time. I kissed him again, melting into his bare chest and feeling my way across his shoulders and down his back. I wanted something. Wanted more. But it was hard to think exactly what it was while he was still kissing me. I broke away again. “Daryl…”

“What is it?” he asked. He wasn’t teasing me anymore, at least not in the same way. His eyes were serious, intense. Fixed on me like I was about to tell him the most important thing in the world. “What do you want?”

“Um...you know when you kiss my neck?”

“Yeah,” he said. “You like that?” 

“Yeah. I do.” 

Part of me hated that he made me admit it out loud, but I couldn’t ignore the little jolt of anticipation that shot through me the second the words left my mouth. And the way Daryl smiled when I said it, the pleasure he got from hearing it, made it more than worth it. Not amused anymore; it was satisfaction.

“Good,” he murmured, moving closer and brushing the hair away from one side of my neck. He kissed a spot just below my ear, and even though I knew it was coming, had asked for it, I still made an involuntary sound somewhere between a sigh and a whisper.

“Shit,” Darly whispered, his lips right by my ear. “You really do like that, huh?”

“Mm-hmm,” I managed to say as his next kiss landed slightly lower on my neck. I looked down at the way his arms wrapped around me before turning my face in toward his shoulder. His hair brushed against my cheek. I tiled my head sightly, elongating my neck as he kissed his way down to my collar bone. 

I glanced down at where my hands moved across his scarred and muscular back, slightly curved as he leaned over me. The heat of his body against mine wasn’t enough. How much better it would be if there was less between us. Skin on skin. 

I took his hands and guided them to the bottom of my shirt. I hoped that would be enough, that he’d be too caught up in this to make me say anything. But the moment he stopped kissing me, I knew. I knew he was waiting. His hands stayed roughly where I guided them to, his fingertips touching me so lightly it sent ripples of goosebumps across the rest of my skin.

“What do you want, Naomi?” he asked, his voice low by my ear. I pulled back a little. The way he was looking at me made it clear he knew damn well what I wanted but wasn't about to do it unless I asked.

Is he really going to make me say it?

He thumbed the bottom of my shirt, looking at me. Expectant. Waiting. The words formed and dissolved on my tongue so many times. Self-consciousness swallowed them back. Daryl kissed my neck again, and I melted into him, the words finally finding their way out. “Take it off.”

Daryl pulled back. His eyes scanned every detail of my face. Without his lips, my neck felt cold, and my pulse was racing so hard I was sure he'd have tasted it under my skin. 

“You sure?” he asked. I knew he was teasing me, but my head felt like it was about to explode.

“Yes," I said, and before he could toy with me anymore, I added, "Please, Daryl.”

Something flashed in his eyes, and I didn't need to ask again. He'd liked that. He'd liked knowing that I wanted him. He pulled my shirt up over my head. I watched him as his eyes fixed on me, the slight darkening around his pupils, the way his jaw clenched like maybe he was the speechless one this time. Then, when I couldn’t stand just being looked at anymore, I took his wrists and moved his hands to my sides.

"Touch me," I whispered. And then again, just to test it. "Please."

That something flashed in his eyes again. Close to a kind of hunger. I worried my fading bruises and scars might put him off again, but he barely seemed to notice them now. His hands slid around my waist, followed the curve of my hips, and then he moved across the small of my back. He bent to kiss my neck again, fingers tracing patterns across my back that made my spine shiver. 

Daryl’s lips reached the base of my neck, and I leaned back so he could kiss across my collarbone. His hands slid around to my front. He cupped my breasts over my bra, and I heard his deep exhale, felt the heat of his breath against my neck. They ran back down across my stomach and hit the waistband of my jeans. He hadn’t even tried to take them off, but my hands still flew to his and stopped them. It was automatic. A reflex. Stupid and superficial, but so deeply ingrained in me that I couldn’t shake it. He pulled back, deep concern in his eyes, “You okay?” 

I took a breath to clear my head, to check that this was my usual freakout and not something deeper. Then I nodded, “Yeah.”

Daryl didn’t look convinced. “We should-”

"No,” I said quickly as I felt him pulling away from me. I caught his wrist, and he stopped. “It’s not that.”

“No?”

“No. It’s my… I know you know… hell, you probably saw 'em back at Sanctuary when Negan made me wear that dumb dress, but… well, it's not like it's a secret or anything, and I know you know, but-"

"This about your scars?" he asked, cutting across my babbling. I was glad he did because I could feel myself starting to go in circles.

"Yeah. All this, " I gestured to the bruises on my torso that had made him recoil a little when he'd first seen them, "is already fading, but my legs…they've always…they won't ever be…."

"I know," he said with a slight shrug, "like my back."

"Yeah," I said with an intense flush of relief. Of course , he got this. 

"You ain't gotta show me. Not if you don't want to."

"It's okay," I said before I could change my mind. "I want to. But you should know, they don't...they aren't...nice..." 

Daryl kept his eyes on me the whole time he undressed me, unfastening the button at the front of my jeans, unzipping them, and sliding them off my hips while checking for any sign I wanted him to stop. I didn't.

I sat up on the table and stretched my legs out so he could pull them off my feet. I heard my jeans hit the floor, and Daryl looked back up at me again. I watched him as he looked at me, his gazing traveling slowly up my body in a way that made me shiver. When he reached my thighs, my breath got stuck behind my racing heart, and I waited for the wince, the recoil like when he'd lifted my shirt the first time and seen Simon's handiwork. It never came. 

"You're a dumbass if you think these make you any less beautiful," he said when his eyes finally met mine. And then he bent his head to the scar closest to my knee and kissed it. The heat of his lips on my skin traveled back up my thighs in lightning rods. It was such a shock, I let out a short, shallow breath. When Daryl heard it, he looked up, 

"Shit," he muttered, a flash of regret in his eyes. "Sorry... I didn't ask…I should've...was that okay?"

"Yes," I said, although it was difficult to speak around my heart thumping in the back of my throat. “I liked it.”

“Yeah?” His crooked smile was back, a glint of satisfaction in his eyes.

“Yes,” I said. Scared that he was about to pull away, I whispered, “Please don't stop."

That hunger flashed in his eyes again. A muscle in his jaw clenched, and he exhaled through his nose. Warm lips on scar tissue. That tingle of surprise coursed through me again. His hands took hold of the backs of my thighs, gently pushing them further apart as his kisses moved up. 

I leaned back on the desk behind me, balancing myself on my elbows. Part of me wanted to close my eyes, relax into it. But I could not take my eyes off him. His head between my thighs, lips lingering on every scar long enough for me to ache at the anticipation of the next one. It was hard to think straight. I knew I was making those little whimpers again, but I was too far gone to care. It’s intoxicating - being loved like this. I’d never let anyone this close. Not like this. It could only ever have been him.

Daryl kissed a spot at the top of my innermost right thigh. The last one. He paused. 

Both of us were breathing hard, the heat between us evaporating our breath. I couldn’t speak, could only hold his gaze and wait, almost shaking, for him to say, Tell me what you want, Naomi.

I wanted to hear him say it, the way he’d murmured it right by my ear. His mouth opened slightly like he was about to speak. Somewhere, in the tiny part of my brain that wasn’t yet entirely clouded by desire, I knew that this could be a mistake. But I was overwhelmingly aware of his hands at my hips, his fingertips skirting the waistband of my panties. If he asked what I wanted now, I didn't know what I'd say. Or if I'd be able to say anything at all.

Tell me what you want.

But he didn't say it. Daryl looked up from between my legs, blue eyes fixed on me, and licked his lips. 

I sat up, pulled his face to mine with my hands, and kissed him, stretching out my legs to wrap around him and pull his body closer to mine. He froze for a second, backed away, so there was a little distance between us, but not before I felt it. Through his pants, his erection against my thigh. 

I stopped kissing him. My hands on his hips, I looked deep into his eyes. It’s okay, I wanted to say. I want this, I want you, I’ve never wanted anyone more. You ain’t gotta hide this. 

I couldn't say any of it. Desire burned up all of my language, leaving only his name. "Daryl."

He nodded like he got it. Kissed me hard and deep, letting his hips move back toward mine when I pulled them there. I felt him again, hard against me. My hands moved to unfasten his pants, but I stopped just before and looked up at him.

“Can I?” I whispered. “Please?”

Daryl nodded. Not sure he could’ve said anything even if he wanted to. I unclasped the button, moved to the zipper, and felt him freeze again. 

“You hear that?”

I shook my head. The only sound I’d heard, the only thing I’d been focussed on, was his zipper. But I listened. Footsteps echoed from the floor below us. 

“Daryl? Naomi?” Glenn’s voice called out. 

“Shit,” I muttered. I'd forgotten Glenn even existed. Forgotten why we were here, why I was pinned to a desk by an almost naked Daryl. I'd been too caught up in the almost naked Daryl part to remember anything else. Daryl sprang away from me, and I scrambled to find the shirt Daryl had thrown to the floor.

“You guys in here?”

“Shit, shit, shit,” I muttered, pulling my shirt over my head. I ran to the center of the room, where there was a railing built around the hole between floors. I hoped it would hide the fact that I was pantless. Behind me, I could hear Daryl laughing.

I leaned over the railing and peered down through the empty central column of the building. Glenn and Tara were standing near the reception desk like they were two years too late for a meeting.

“We’re up here!” I called back. They both looked up.“Down in a sec.”

“We’ll come up to you guys,” Tara said. "No rush."

“No!” I practically screamed it at them. “There’s a kitchen just over there. Some of the foods still good. We’ll meet you down there.”

I pointed wildly in the direction of the kitchen and didn't stop until they'd started moving toward it. As I whipped around in a desperate search for my jeans, I caught sight of Daryl behind me. Bent double with laughter. I scooped up my jeans and stuffed one leg in. 

“Stop it,” I hissed, but then I caught sight of myself in the reflection of one of the blank computer monitors. Hopping around with my jeans-half on and I started giggling too. 

“Calm yourself, crazy pants,” Daryl said. “I’ll go see ‘em. Take your time.”

"Uh… you might want to hang out here for a sec," I said, wiggling my hips around in an attempt to get the waistband of my jeans over my ass as fast as possible.

"I’ve got my shit together a little better than you, you-”

“Nah, it ain’t that,” I said, finally sliding my jeans over my hips and fastening them. “You might need a couple more secs to cool down.”

“Cool down?” he said. 

“Yeah, you’re still….” I let my gaze flicker pointedly down to his crotch and the tenting of his pants. Diminishing but still painfully visible. 

“Oh shit,” Daryl turned beet red. 

“Yeah,” I said, but I was grinning from ear to ear, and so was he when he looked back up at me. 

“Get outta here,” he grumbled. “You ain’t helping.”

I stuck my tongue out at him and turned, and raced down the stairs. I was on such a high, it felt like I was flying down them. When I burst into the kitchen, my heart was racing from more than my mad dash down there. Tara and Glenn looked startled by the way I flung the door open without thinking. I felt giddy, like I was a kid who’d been caught doing something they shouldn’t.

“Hey!” I said. I talked fast, thinking the more information I distracted them with, the less they’d notice. Talked them through the food we’d found here and the idea to check other floors. I missed out the part where heavy making out had distracted us from actually checking more than one floor. 

“Glad you found stuff. The school was a dud,” was all Tara said when I was done. 

Daryl emerged a few moments later, looking a little disheveled. Luckily for us, ‘disheveled’ is kind of Daryl’s go-to look. If Glenn and Tara suspected anything, they said nothing. Maybe putting out almost deliriously good moods down to actually finding some food. Glenn drove the car into the empty office parking lot, and we loaded as much as we could into the trailer he’d fixed to it. 

"Think we got away with it," I muttered as the last of the salvageable food items was packed away, and we were getting ready to leave. Daryl and I were waiting in the backseat. Tara had just loaded the last of the food, and Glenn was making sure the trailer was secure.  

"Yeah... maybe…" Daryl said, but he sounded doubtful. I looked at him. Had Glenn known? Had he said something? 

Daryl reached across the empty middle seat between us. With a small but growing smile on his face, his fingers brushed against my side, and he looked up at me. His gaze held mine with an echo of the intensity in they'd when he'd looked up at me from between my thighs. My stomach twisted again for a whole other reason.

I barely moved. All I could feel was the slightest pressure of his fingertips at my waist. 

Between his thumb and forefinger, he took hold of a label that was sticking out of a seam. He pinched it between his thumb and forefinger and then looked up at me. 

"You put your shirt back on inside out, dummy."

"Shit."

As Glenn and Tara opened the doors in front of us, Daryl withdrew his hand and sat back, using it to try and cover the smirk that was spreading across his face. A giggle bubbled up in me too, and I had to look away from him. 

Whether or not they’d worked out what caused it, our good mood infected Glenn and Tara, too. By the time we got back, the whole car was singing dumb songs like kids on a school bus. I hoped it would follow us out of the car, cure the malaise around Hilltop.

 

Daryl

Naomi walked so close to me our hands kept brushing up against one another. I wanted to grab it and hold on tight. Wanted to walk hand and hand in the sunshine like we were just a regular couple out for a walk in the country with our friends. Course, I got no idea if that's what regular couples even did but it sounded kinda right. 

Didn't matter anyway because that wasn't what we were. We were a small army heading over the hills to kick some Savior ass. Ain’t no place for hand holding at a time like that. 

Still, though, every now and then I'd feel the soft skin on the back of her hand against mine for just a second. My thoughts would turn to how the rest of her had felt under my hands, under my lips, and she’d glance over at me and smile like she might be thinking the same thing. A whole new smile just for me. A little shy, a little cheeky. I’d feel myself smiling back, even though we were at war, and even though I knew my smile ain’t nearly as good as hers. Because you can’t help but return a smile that pretty. 

Around us, other people drifted in and out of conversation. Spirits were high. There'd been a long stretch of doing nothing, and then a note from Dwight that promised a plan to end all of this. Nobody has questioned it, his intel had been reliable until now. So here we were, certain that today would be one we looked back on as the end of the Saviors. 

If I hadn’t been looking over at Naomi all the time, trying to catch that smile, I might not have seen them. But I did. And I stopped. Down the hill we were walking across, toward a valley, was the biggest horde of Walkers I’d ever seen. Far enough in the distance not to pose any threat, but big enough to stop me in my tracks for a second. Naomi stopped, too. Didn’t take long for everyone else to follow. 

“Oh, Jesus,” Rosita muttered. 

“Holy damn,” said Jerry. “You ever seen one that big?”

“No. Things are changing," said Rick solemnly. It was weird how Walkers stuck together like that. Their group growing as they hunted for living snacks. Our walls wouldn't last long against the force of a group that big. With everything that had gone on between us and the Savors, it was easy to forget the other threats out there. Ones that couldn't be negotiated with. One that didn't know how to surrender. Rick sighed, "Let’s go.”

We moved on. The sight of all them Walkers had been enough to bring me back down to Earth a little. Enough to make me feel uneasy. Enough to remind me what was at stake. When we could go back to only worrying about Walkers, things would be easier. 

“How much further?” I asked.

“We grow closer. Yonder, over the ridge,” the King replied, and even though he spoke like an asshole, he wasn’t wrong. A few more paces and I thought I could see the place we were aiming for. The place Dwight’s message had told us the Saviors would all be sitting ducks. The thought of being so close to ending this thing spurred us all on. Nobody spoke now, any chatter we'd had previously died away as we mentally prepared for what was to come. It could be a hard fight. They would be ambushed, caught of guard, which should help our small army take them down. But that didn't mean we wouldn't suffer loses.

We passed through a sparsely wooded area on the side of the hill. The slope was getting steeper now. I fought the urge to look over at Naomi again. I needed to get my game face on, no distractions. This was it. The final battle. One last push and then I’d have all the time in the world to spend with her. 

We could get back to…

Well… Shouldn't be thinking about that now. 

A whistle rang out amongst the trees.

All too familiar, the kind of whistle that turned my blood to ice.

Others joined it.

The sound of it made my stomach turn like I was about to hurl, thought I might break out in a cold sweat. Last time I’d last heard it I thought I was about to escape Sanctuary. Escape Diwght's torture. And then that fucking whistle and Negan had ambushed me on my way to save Naomi. Made her take a beating for what I’d done. Did this mean Negan was back?

“Get behind me,” I barked at Naomi. My gun already raised by my cheek. Naomi didn’t move from my side, her gun was up and ready too. She shouldn't be here. I shouldn't have let her come, not while she had a target on her back. All at once, our army felt too small. Why hadn't we brought more people? There were so many able fighters left behind at Hilltop. 

This was meant to be a quick fight. An easy win. Over before the Saviors knew what hit them. 

But they knew. 

They were waiting. 

I scanned the top of the ridge we'd been heading toward for any sign of them. Anywhere to shoot. Nothing. Just that damn whistling. 

“Well, would you look at this,” Simon’s voice came over one of the walkies we'd stolen from them. It seemed to echo around the hills, amplified in the valley. Prayed it wasn't loud enough to draw the attention of that big old horde. “You’re on your merry way to ambush us and here I am ambushing your little ambush with an even bigger ambush.”

Dwight. 

That piece of shit lead us into a trap.

Why hadn't I questioned his note, doubted him more? I'd done it in the past and been wrong every time, but now he'd finally done it. Made us trust his intel so he could pull this kind of shit. He'd fooled even me. 

“How about you step out and face us?” Rick yelled into the air, with no way of knowing which way Simon might emerge from. 

“Oh, I am everywhere, Rick. Pick a direction to run, see how you do,” Simon said. 

“Get behind me,” I muttered to Naomi again. Again, she didn't move. 

“Why? So I can watch you die first?” she muttered without looking at me. Her eyes were scanning our surroundings like everyone else. “No thank you.”

Felt like the world was closing in me. 

“I brought you some of your old friends,” Simon said. “You remember your good buddy Eugene? Well, he is the person that made today possible. And Dwight…”

Son of a bitch.

I’ll kill him. 

I steadied my finger on the trigger. If so much as one hair on Dwight’s head blew out of whatever rathole he was hiding it, I was going to blast it to pieces. If I had time to pull him apart piece by piece I would, but as long as he wound up dead, I didn’t much care how it went down.

“In case you were wondering, he didn’t rat you out on purpose,” Simon said. “He might have had Negan fooled but he wasn’t smart enough to sneak that shit past me. And now he gets to stand up here and watch you all die, right before he dies. And Gabriel? Well, he’s gotta go too. I’m finally going to do what Negan should’ve done a long time ago, Rick. I am cleaning house today. So...here we go. Three...two…”

No. 

No, no, no, no, no.

I stepped in front of Naomi, try sheild her body with mine as best I could until I knew which direction the Saviors were going to come in. But then the Saviors emerged over the top of the ridgeway we’d been heading for. A whole line of them filled the horizon. So many guns raised and pointed at us, every one of them fully loaded with bullets Eugene had made. 

Fuck.

No.

Too many Saviors. Too many bullets

We were cornered. 

How could I save Naomi from this?

I glanced back at her. Our eyes met. I'd take a thousand bullets for her but I knew realistically, there was only so many I could sheild her from. And then what? When I dropped down dead, she'd been next. 

I hated the resignation in her eyes. Like she was ready to die.

I’m sorry I failed you, I opened my mouth to say it, but she was already speaking. 

“The girls are safe,” was all she said, and I realised it wasn’t resignation in her eyes. It was determination. There was nothing we could do to change the outcome of this fight, but we would fight. And no matter what, Mia and Perla were at Hilltop, there was a plan in place for what would happen if the Saviors went there. They would live, and that was enough for her. 

I nodded, and right before the Saviors pulled their triggers, right before the guns went off I didn't feel scared. I didn't feel angry. I regretted not holding her hand on the way here. Not pulling her in for kiss even though we had been unwittingly marching to our deaths. If this was how it ended, if there was nothing I could do to stop it and it had to go down this way, I regretted every second I'd spent away from her.

Simon finished his countdown. The sound of gunfire and screaming erupted around us, echoing off the hills and the valley. I shot back, bracing myself for the hail of bullets that were coming but had someone miraculously missed me so far. I waited for pain that never came, wondered briefly how I’d managed to be the luckiest son of bitch around and then realised everyone around me was still standing too. The row of Saviors in front of us folded like dominoes. Every shot was a misfire, hitting them instead of us. 

Eugene. 

You clever bastard. 

“Now!” Rick yelled as the shock that we were all still breathing started to wear off. We ran up the hill. The Saviors who’d survived their guns misfiring took off. We pushed them back up toward where they’d parked their vehicles and lain in wait for us. Some of them still tried to shoot at us. Others fought with knives and axes, but they couldn’t do much damage at a distance. Our guns took them out before we got close.

More Saviors fell. And then we caught up to the ones who’d retreated. They laid down their weapons, faced us. I didn’t lower mine.

“Don’t shoot, please,” one of them said, her arms raised in peace. “We’re done.”

You’re about to be.

They’d been about to shoot us when we were helpless. Why should we show them any kind of mercy? End the Saviors, that was the point of all of this. But nobody around me was shooting, either.

The Saviors knelt down in the grass, hands raised above their heads. You could see some of them were bleeding, missing fingers from the misfiring guns. Still, nobody on our side moved. Didn’t lower our guns, but didn’t shoot them either. I wanted to. I wanted them all to pay for what they’d done. To Abraham. To me. To Naomi. To all of us. 

“It’s over, Simon!” Dwight’s shout pulled my attention away from the surrendering Saviors. Simon was the only one who hadn’t yet put down his weapon. Naomi was holding him at gunpoint, Dwight stood beside her. I thought about shooting him on the spot. 

Simon glared at the Saviors kneeling down in front of us. “Fucking cowards. Get up and fight. We are Negan. ”

“No,” the woman who’d first surrendered said quietly. “You’re not.”

“Give it up,” Dwight said, a warning tone in his voice. I wanted Naomi to shoot them both. After what they’d done to her, they deserved it. Simon most of all. I was done with him running his mouth. I was done with him breathing.

Simon’s eyes were burning, darting around like a cornered animal. But slowly he knelt down, hands behind his back. Seething with rage. Jerry and the King stood behind him, guns trained on the back of his head. 

“See,” Naomi said, lowering her own gun now that Jerry and the King were in position. “Weren’t so hard, was it?”

Shoot him. 

Even though he’s surrendered, shoot him. It’s fine.

Silence fell on the hillside. I couldn't believe this was it. It looked over, but it sure as shit didn't feel over. Now what? What if their surrender was another trap? What if we let them live only for them to come back stronger. 

“Alright,” Rick called to all of us. “Looks like we got some more occupants for those cages. Hope you’ve got space Maggie.”

“We’ll make do,” Maggie said, unsmiling.

“We will be fair to you,” Rick started to tell the Saviors. He’d spent the best part of a week trying to think about how best to keep any surving Saviors in line. How to make sure they were punished, but stayed loyal. My suggestion that there shouldn't be any surving Saviors fell on deaf ears. 

Our people started to relax as we listened to Rick. Even I lowered my gun a little. “Our communities have a lot of work to do. Rebuilding. We have to come together and-”

Naomi turned to make her way over to me. The second she did, the second her eyes weren’t on Simon anymore he moved. Before I could shoot or breathe or call out a warning, he rose up and grabbed her hair. Right as she was walking away from him.

Fucking coward.

I didn't hear if she screamed or not when he dragged her to the ground. The wind was already rushing in my ears as I ran toward them. Either Jerry or the King had tried to shoot Simon as he got up and missed, too distracted by Rick’s speech and the false promise that this was all over.

“Don’t shoot!” I yelled at them as I ran. Simon had her pinned to the ground, any shot taken at him now could wind up killing her. I watched her twist underneath him, trying to get out. Saw Simon’s fists in the air rising and falling. He was yelling all sorts of shit at her. 

And then he was the one on the ground. I'd run at him, slammed my body into is with all my might and sent him sprawling onto his back. And then I was on him. Landed the first few blows before he even knew what had happened. 

But I knew. 

I heard the crack of his nose. Watched the blood pour out of him. It wasn’t enough. Not for what he’d done. My fists moved on their own, it wasn’t really even Simon I was seeing. 

It was her. 

The dark purple boot print on her stomach. His boot print. 

My hands wrapped around Simon’s throat.

He’d done this to her, too, hadn’t he? Tried to choke her out. She’d told me. I remembered those bruises around her neck at Sanctuary. That was him.

I remembered her passed out on the Sanctuary floor after taking a beating for me. 

Couldn't protect her then. Couldn't stop it. Couldn't do shit.

I’d failed her. 

I always fucking failed her. 

Simon wasn’t Simon anymore. He was every person I’d failed to protect her against.

Negan.

I remembered her ready to die for me under Lucille because I hadn’t been able to keep my damn temper.

Couldn't protect her then. Couldn't stop it. Couldn't do shit.

Terminus.

The way she’d flinched when I touched her without warning. The panic attack. The sheer terror in her eyes. 

Couldn't protect her. Couldn't stop it. Couldn't do shit.

Her Momma. 

Her fucking Momma . That one burned me up most of all.

"Daryl," her voice cut through the noise like it always did. 

Made me stop.

Take a breath.

The world was a blur - red and brown - shifting beneath my feet. Her hand on my shoulder, I turned toward her voice. Calm eyes that made the world stand still again. 

"It's over," she said quietly. "He's dead. You can stop now. You ain't gotta fight no more."

I looked back at Simon... or what was left of him. Blood and grass all merged together. 

My fists have been clenched so tight it hurt to open them again. I held them out in front of me. They shook. Until Naomi took hold of them, turned my attention back to her again. Helped me get to my feet. Wordlessly, she pulled me close and held me until my breathing steadied again. People moved around us, Rick gave another speech. None of it touched me. 

I don’t know how she did it, but Naomi got me sitting down in the back of an open truck. Don’t even remember moving there, but she was holding my hands out. I looked down at them, noticing for the first time how covered in blood they were and wondering how much of it was mine. How much was Simon's? 

Naomi took them gently in hers. Inspected them. Turned them over, looking for anywhere I might be hurt. I didn’t feel hurt. I felt numb, watching her do it. Always there when I needed her. Even though I’d never been able to do the same for her. 

“Ain’t noone gonna hurt you again, Naomi,” I told her. “I ain’t gonna let ‘em.”

I was dead serious when I said it, wanted her to know, but she barely looked up from my hands. She straightened out my fingers and lifted up a bandage soaked in something - probably some kind of alcohol or disinfectant. 

“This’ll sting,” she said, like she always did. But it never did. Not as much as she seemed to worry it would, anyway. Being near her had this way of taking any kinda pain away, always had. There were some things I could only feel around her, and some things I never could. Pain, hurt, anger… all of that she numbed. 

I watched her clean the blood off my hands, uncovering cuts I’d made on my knuckles while beating Simon to a pulp. I didn’t think about that though. I kept watched her. The care she took, how gentle she was. The way she took her time like what she was doing was the most important thing in the world. Nobody ever took care of me like that. 

“Ain’t noone gonna hurt you again, Naomi,” I said. I couldn’t remember if I’d already said it or if I’d only thought it, but it felt important that she knew. “Anyone lays a hand on you again, I’ll-”

“I know,” she said, laying a hand on my cheek. She did know. The way her eyes met mine, I knew she knew. I nodded. She rested her forehead against mine for a moment. Let there be a silence, let us just exist in a moment of quiet together. 

Naomi drove us both back to Hilltop in a truck I didn’t recognize and took me far too long to realize had been taken from the Saviors. By the time we left the battlefield, most people had gone on ahead of us. She let me be silent for a while, let me slowly come back into myself after everything that had happened. Everything I’d done. Let the numbness wear off in my own time.

“Dwight still here?” I asked, suddenly realising I hadn’t seen what had happened to him. If I’d shot him like I wanted to, I couldn’t remember doing it. But I’d flown into a blind rage. I knew I’d killed Simon. Couldn’t remember it to save my life. 

“Yeah,” she glanced over at me. I could tell from the little frown on her face that she was trying to assess how I was doing. If I’d come out of shock yet. “He’s with the rest of the Saviors, I think. On his way to Hilltop.”

“What do you think we should do with him?” I asked. He might not have betrayed us, but to me, it was obvious that he didn’t deserve to live after all he’d done.

“He saved my life,” she said with a sigh and after a moment’s pause. “Not sure I can be the one to kill him. Or make that decision, but Rick’s declared victory, he says it’s peacetime now, killing him might not even be on the cards.”

“Yeah,” I stared at the road ahead of us.

“But, also, he beat you,” she said, her eyes clouding over. “He nearly killed Lucas. There has to be an answer for that. I hate that he did that. The way he kept you caged up like an animal.”

I watched that darkness swirl in her eyes and made a decision. “Let me deal with him.”

“On your own?”

“Yeah.”

“Why?”

“Ain’t a decision you should have to make.”

“Ain’t one you should have to make either.”

“I got this,” I said. I knew she didn’t look sure, didn’t want me to do anything hard by myself, but I could do anything if it was for her. “You think Rick’s right? This is peacetime now?”

“I don’t know,” she said, pulling into Hilltop and coming to a stop behind a jumble of cars that had assembled there. She sat back for a second. I knew she was thinking about Negan, she gets this real specific look on her face when she does and I hate it. I knew she was thinking that he was still out there. Somewhere. Maybe waiting for us at Sanctuary, making Rick’s declaration of victory way too premature. 

My eyes fell on Dwight, huddled by the surviving Saviors. I unfastened my seatbelt, eyes fixed on him. “I’ll see you in a bit.”

“Daryl-”

“Check on the girls,” I told her. “I’ll deal with Dwight, I got this.”

“Okay,” she said, but she still looked worried. I knew it was a bit of a dirty trick to distract her with Mia and Perla, but this was something I had to do. And Naomi would be desperate to see that they were okay.

I left the truck, strode right over to Dwight. Rick, Michonne and Maggie were there, trying to sort through the Saviors and find places to keep them all. A shallow grave seemed appropriate but it didn’t look like they were leaning in that direction.

“Come with me,” I told Dwight. His eyes were bright with fear, he glanced at Rick and the others like he was waiting for them to intervene and help him. They all stayed silent, they knew this was my fight and my decision to make. Dwight followed me reluctantly back to the truck and climbed into the passenger side. 

We didn’t speak as I drove us back out of the Hilltop. He sat there with the air of a condemned man while I took him deep into the woods. The same man who’d fed me dogfood sandwiches, who hadn’t let me sleep, who’d taunted and beat me. Now silent. Small. A piece of human garbage on the passenger seat. 

I didn’t really have a place in mind, but when we’d driven far enough in, I stopped. I shut off the engine. In the silence that followed all I could hear was Dwight’s shaky breath, steaming up the window. 

"Get out," I said.

Dwight did as he was told. Didn’t look at me, but he was resigned to whatever was coming next. He’d seen me kill Simon with my bare hands. Knew that could be coming to him next. I got out of the truck too. Stood in front of him with my weapon trained on him. 

“I know why I’m here,” Dwight said, still unable to meet my gaze. “I know what I did to Lucas. To you. To Naomi.”

Something flared up in me. 

“Get her name out of your mouth,” I snapped. 

“To...other people,” he said. “And it doesn’t matter why. I knew I’d have to face it… to pay, and I should. I’m ready. I got to see Negan taken down and that’s enough. Nao… your girl… she was incredible, Daryl. You should’ve seen her. The way she took him on, she’s made of stronger stuff than I am.”

Made of stronger stuff than any of us. 

I remembered her crawling out of Sanctuary all soaked in Negan’s blood.

Telling me not to watch while Negan was about to bash her head in with Lucille so I wouldn’t have to watch her die.

Running through the streets of Alexandria and straight into my arms. 

I thought of her, in the times I hadn’t been there. 

Surviving to protect Mia and Perla in Terminus. 

Getting them somewhere safe when the world fell apart. 

Getting Mia away from their fucking Momma. 

“Me? I’m a piece of shit,” Dwight said. “There’s no going back to how things were.”

He knelt down in front of me. As ready for death as any man could ever be. I barely saw him. 

I saw her. 

Her boots in front of me when she’d found me burning myself with a cigarette before she brought us to Alexandria.

Waiting for me at the school gates when I got detention. 

Carrying a pile of books around that was almost taller than she was. 

Opening her door to me whenever I needed it. Patching me up.

I could’ve lost her so many times. If Dwight hadn’t found her when I’d come to get her out of Sanctuary, Negan might be dead for sure but Naomi would be too. The only good thing this piece of human garbage had done. Was it enough?

“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry,” Dwight sobbed in front of me. “Please. Please.”

I don’t even know what he was pleading for. It could’ve been for his life, it could have been for me to pull the trigger fast and give him a quick death. Get it over with. I didn’t much care. I cared about being the kind of guy Naomi deserved. A hero. A guy like Rick. And guys like that don’t shoot unarmed men in cold blood. Not even assholes like Dwight.

Despite what he’d put her through at Sanctuary, Naomi had grown to trust him. Even when it had seemed like he’d betrayed us, he hadn’t. Not really. I’d never trust him, but I would always trust her.

“Shut up,” I told him, throwing the keys to the truck down at his knees. “You go and you keep going. Don’t you ever come back here again. If I ever see your face around here again, I’ll kill ya.”

I started to walk away before I could change my mind, before violence and vengeance could win out. 

“Why?” he called after me. 

“You saved my girl,” I said, without turning back. “Find yours. Make it right.”

It took me the rest of the walk back to cool down, to make peace with my decision. When I got back to the Hilltop, Maggie directed me to the trailer Naomi and the girls were staying in. It was dark out, and the lights in the windows were dim but still on. I opened the door real quiet in case they were all asleep. Naomi was sitting up on one of the sofas. Mia’s head was lolling on her shoulder, legs curled underneath her and eyes closed. 

"She asleep?" I whispered. Naomi nodded. 

"Help me move her?" she whispered. Together, we lifted Mia enough for Naomi to slip out and lowered Mia gently back down again to sleep on the couch. She stirred a little but didn’t wake. Naomi covered her with a blanket and tucked her in in a way that made me think she’d done it a thousand times before. She looked back at me, "Thanks. My arm was getting numb."

“She okay?” 

Naomi nodded, but she looked exhausted. “She kept telling me all about how the Saviors came and they had to get out and how Oceanside came to save the day.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah,” Naomi looked down at her little sister. “It was close, today. We almost lost everything.”

“Yeah. I know,” I said, looking down at Mia and thinking about how sure we’d been that we were about to die. How the only way Naomi had been able to face it was thinking that Mia would be alright. I put an arm around her shoulders. “It’s over now.”

She nodded, but the tension didn’t leave her eyes. "What did you do...with Dwight?"

"Did what I thought was right," I said. 

"Okay,” she said. No follow-up questions, just complete faith in me and my judgement. Naomi looked away from Mia for the first time in a while. “You good?”

“Yeah,” I said, because I was now. 

Naomi held out her hand for me to take. “Bed?”

“Yes," I said, exhaustion had set deep into my bones. The adrenaline from the day was wearing off. She led me to a small room, barely big enough for the mattress that had been shoved in there. 

“All the other rooms are taken,” she said, as a half-apology. Her continued whispering made it clear that other people were sleeping behind the other closed doors that we passed. 

“This is fine,” I shrugged as we crawled in to bed beside each other. I was too tired to care much about the sleeping arrangements, but as I lay next to Naomi in the dark I couldn’t help letting my mind wander. 

She deserved better than this. A place of our own, maybe. We hadn’t yet seen the damage in Alexandria but it didn’t have to be there. I could build us someplace else. Out in the woods, maybe. Somewhere between all of the communities so we could see our friends when we wanted to and be together the rest of the time. 

I started to drift off, visions of it flickering in my head. A place in the woods built for me and her. A spiked fence to keep the Walkers out. A garden to grow our own food. Mia would have a room of her own. Naomi’s books would need a room of their own, too. 

“Hey, Daryl,” Naomi’s whisper interrupted my half-dream. 

“Yeah?”

“Why you gotta be so far away?” 

In the darkness, I smiled. I always wanted Naomi to feel safe, didn’t want her to panic if I touched her unexpectedly so I’d started sleeping close to her, but without making any kind of contact. I’d had no idea she’d even noticed, nevermind didn’t like it enough to keep her awake. 

“You want me to be closer?” I asked, turning over onto my side. 

“Yes,” she said. I felt her body move right up against mine, her back against my chest. “You can hug me, y’know.”

I felt a smile tug at the coroner of my mouth. I wrapped an arm around her waist, holding her body close to mine. 

“Like this?” I asked her. 

She didn’t say yes, she said, "Please." 

I buried my face into her neck. Did she know the effect that had on me? Had she said it deliberately? My eyes already closed, all I could think about was the way she'd looked at me in that office. Eyes fixed on me like I was all she could see. Like she was mine. Asking me to kiss her, touch her. Almost begging, like I was the only one who could satisfy a need in her.

Like she was mine. 

Through the fog of drowsiness, I felt something stir deep inside me. If sleep hadn't been coming to claim me, I might have claimed her. Started kissing her neck in that way she likes. That way that makes her moan a little, tremble against me. 

But there was time for all that. Later. No use rushing it. So I squeezed her close to me again and murmured, “You’re mine, Naomi.”

Her hand rested on mine in the dark. "I know."

 

Chapter 48: Sanctuary's Ghost

Naomi

I hadn't given much thought to what it would be like to see the Sanctuary again. Truthfully, I had tried to avoid thinking about the place at all, so I guess it shouldn't have been a shock that my heart dropped when we came in sight of it. Cracked, shot-out windows. Only some of them had been boarded up. Most materials had been diverted to plugging the hole where a garbage truck had been lodged. 

It had always been tall and cold, but it looked different now. Beaten, but not yet dead. Waiting like an injured animal to strike out at those who'd wounded it. I scanned the shattered windows and almost expected to see Negan there. 

Wounded, but not yet dead.

Waiting. 

"You good?" Daryl asked, quiet enough that the others wouldn't hear. 

"Yeah," I said, glad for an excuse to tear my gaze away from the building. "You?"

"Better when that place is nothing but rubble," he said with a shrug.

"You bring the gasoline; I'll bring the matches," I said with a half-hearted laugh. I was pretty sure that wasn't in the plan. Rick was looking to build something, not destroy it, and as much as I hated that place with every fiber of my being, I knew he was right. Daryl, on the other hand, might take some convincing.

Sanctuary was probably a cold and soulless place before the Saviors called it home, but I don't know if the people who came to work here back when it was a factory had quite the same sense of dread walking up to the doors as I did. So long spent planning and fighting and dreaming of getting out. And now I was walking back voluntarily. Letting Daryl walk back in, too, after fighting to get him out. It had occurred to me, more than once, that the Savior's surrender might have been a lie. Maybe the real ambush was letting us think we'd won, leading us here where Negan could launch the final attack. 

The people left behind were ready for us. But not to fight. The workers, farmers, and kids who'd lived at Sanctuary without once picking up a weapon were waiting for us. Arat had let them all know over one of the walkies that the battle was over, and they had lost. So they all gathered on the main factory floor to watch us come in. They must have seen us coming, marching over the hill toward them. Their eyes followed us as we came in, but they said nothing. Stony silence. I knew from my time here that some of them had wanted this, had almost been willing to pick up arms against Negan. But it certainly hadn't been all of them, and that was before Daryl had flooded their home with Walkers. The hole in the wall might have been boarded up, but the damage was still visible. 

Some of the group split off from the rest of us, searching the Saviors for concealed weapons. Daryl hesitated beside me, clearly worried that something was about to go down, but my feet carried me forward. The thought of stopping made me feel sick.

The corridors that snaked away from the main factory floor were empty. Silent. That was somehow worse. I wished the workers had been moving around them instead of gathering on the old factory floor to stare at us as we walked in.

Without any noise, without people bustling around, Negan's absence filled the silence. Every shadow took his shape for a moment before sinking back into itself. In my mind, he stood behind every closed door. I wanted to open them, to reassure myself that the prickle on the back of my neck wasn't because I was being watched; it was all in my head. But I didn't stop. I think I sped up.

My feet hitting the ground, even as I was followed by a group of our own people, didn't seem to make even half the impact that Negan's boots had. The way they'd echoed in these corridors. How many times had that been the noise that had woken me up, the one I fell asleep in fear of hearing? Now I was the one marching to find him, but I didn't feel like much of a hunter. I still felt like prey. 

Occasionally, the wind would blow through one of the bullet holes in the windows we'd shot out, and it would sound like the start of that whistle. 

That Negan -whistle. 

That fucking whistle had pierced these halls so deeply the building itself knew it.  

I didn't know who was still following me and who'd peeled off from the group to do other things around Sanctuary. I had one mission, and every part of me was focused on it. 

My stomach lurched as I reached the door. I think Daryl offered - or more likely demanded - that he go first, but I wouldn't let him. I had to face whatever was behind that door. Whatever state Negan was in, if he was lying in wait or barely alive, it was my mess to clean up. And I'd make sure I finished the job this time.

The infirmary was empty. 

The bed was in the middle of the room. Neatly made, sheets pulled taught like it was waiting for its next patient. I swung around on my heels, desperately searching every dark corner of the room and every space large enough to hide a human. I expected Negan to leap out of one of them, lunging at me with something. 

Daryl, Rick, and Michone stared back at me. There were others in the corridor behind them, but there was no one else in the room. 

"This is where Dwight said he'd be?" Daryl asked. I could barely hear him over my blood rushing in my ears and my pulse pounding in my head.

"This is the infirmary, right?" Rick asked me. I could only nod. My mouth was completely dry. Rick shrugged, "Then, yeah, this is where he said he'd be." 

I couldn't understand why Rick was so calm. Felt like the ground was tipping and moving under my feet, turning to quicksand. 

Daryl's eyes met mine, and I knew he felt the same as I did. He'd spent enough time in this hell-hole, been drawn into enough of Negan's mind games, to learn not to let his guard down just because things looked safe. That was often when they were at their most dangerous.

"Where is he?" I hated that my voice shook when I asked, but it stirred something in Daryl. He sprang forward. Warm hands on either side of me stopped me from sinking down into the earth.

"We'll find him," he said, like a promise. "He ain't gonna getaway. We'll tear this place apart, and we'll find him. And then I'll kill him."

He's always been so good at that - calming me down. Didn't matter what the issue was; whenever I felt that overwhelming riptide tugging at my toes and the waves rising up too high, he could pull me out of it. He does it so well that I didn't even argue with him about which of us would kill Negan when we found him. I just nodded, and it was enough to give me the strength to push forward.

I left the infirmary and made a beeline for Negan's room a few floors above us. If he'd recovered enough to be moved from the infirmary since the last time Dwight had seen him, this was where he'd be. The others followed, running to catch up. The clatter of so many feet in the corridor would've warned Negan we were coming, but I didn't care. Let him cower in fear of my footsteps this time. 

I burst in there. It was dark. The heavy curtains had been drawn across the windows, and the room was as messy as I remembered. Filled with hiding spaces, too, a closet, boxes of stolen luxury goods, cupboards. 

I crouched down, lifted up one of the sheets, and peered into the dark under the bed. The ghost of my past self lying in wait for Negan was all the shadows held. By the time I straightened up, the others had joined me in the room, and we're looking in every other place that might conceivably hide a human being. I marched to the curtains and threw them open. He wasn't behind them, but it flooded the room with a light that might chase him out. 

Nothing moved. Negan still wasn't in here. But, in the newfound light, I saw small dark stains on the bedsheets. It took me a moment to realize it was blood, dried so long ago it was almost black against the white.

He'd been here. 

But how long ago?

The bedsheets were crumpled and in complete disarray. Like someone had left in a hurry.

The Saviors had seen us coming with enough warning to gather in one place. All it would take was one person who was still loyal enough to Negan to run in here and tell him. He'd have had enough time to flee. Or be moved to safety. 

Or find a better place to lie in wait.

On the floor near the bed was a stain the color of rust. More dried blood, badly mopped up. I felt a little sick when I saw there was a little space in the bloodstain where my body had lain for a moment, pinned underneath Negan as he drenched us both. 

Naomi: 1, Negan: 0.

"The hell is this place?" Rick asked, holding up a bottle of whiskey to the light so he could see how much was left.

"Negan's bedroom," I said, already heading toward the door. 

"What? How'd you know that?" Daryl asked, but I was already back in the corridor. 

"Hold up!" Rick called after me. I stopped, turned. "If we're going to search this place, we need a plan. A system. Different groups sweeping different floors."

I agreed, if only because I knew arguing would waste even more time, and I had no real plan in mind. Negan could be anywhere. 

I'd only seen a small part of Sanctuary when I'd been here. So searching the place for him became a short tour of everything I'd already witnessed and the areas that had been kept hidden from me. The living quarters of Sanctuary workers I'd never been privy to, the meeting room that Negan had gathered his Outpost heads in to decide if I should live or if they should cut off my head and send it to Rick. A kitchen, Eugene's ammunition factory. The Savior's dining area, a room I'd never forget.

My breath caught in my throat.

A bed with a metal bed frame pushed up against the far corner. Two buckets - one for washing, one for shitting. A nail on the wall where a mirror had once hung before it smashed across my back. Another rust-colored bloodstain on the floor.

Negan 1, Naomi: 1. 

Now what, asshole? 

This room felt colder than the others. I folded my arms and did my best to suppress a shiver. Couldn't look away from that stain.

"You found something?" Daryl asked, never far behind me. 

"No," I said, but there was a moment where I couldn't take my eyes off that stain. Felt like it was growing, seeping deeper into the concrete. Daryl stood beside me, stared down too. 

"What's that?"

"Blood."

"Reckon it's Negan's?"

"No. It's mine."

Before either of us could say anything else, our group had to move on to check the next room. But something in me knew Negan wouldn't be there. We scoured every inch of Sanctuary and couldn't find any sign of Negan. Not his leather jacket. Not his boots. Not his shit-eating grin.

"Maybe he's dead," Rick said when we all met up again. I could tell people around us had started thinking it the more rooms we'd searched that turned up empty. Now Rick had finally said what they'd been thinking out loud, they nodded. 

"Dwight said he was alive," I reminded him.

"Maybe he died after Dwight last saw him," Rick said. "Or maybe Dwight lied, and you really did take him out."

Usually, I had a lot of respect for Rick, but I found it hard to bite back the urge to call him an idiot. I hoped it didn't show on my face, but I didn't have much hope for that either. 

"Every piece of intel Dwight passed to us was correct," I said. "Right up until Simon tricked him. Why would he lie about this?"

"I don't know," Rick admitted, and it became clear in "But we've searched every inch of this place. The Saviors have surrendered, the war is over, and Negan's lost. Probably fled the place."

It made more sense than Dwight lying, but Negan had a lot of pride. He'd walked around this place with so much arrogant swagger, a real cock of the walk. But he'd been winning then. Maybe when the chips were down, he really was a coward.

"Maybe Simon killed him," Rick offered his best explanation yet. "To stop him coming back and trying to regain his power, might not even have told Dwight that he'd done it. Especially if he was already onto the fact that Dwight was working for us."

There wasn't much in that theory that I could argue with off the bat. Simon was power-hungry and violent. He'd been getting tired of the way Negan was dealing with Rick… but, when you thought about the loyalty that Negan's cult of personality had bred amongst so many, the holes in Rick's theory started to show. Simon would have to make Negan's death look natural. If anyone knew he'd killed Negan in a weakened state, he'd never have won the respect of Negan's most loyal followers. The Saviors would've fractured, warred with themselves. 

By the time I'd thought of all of this, Rick had already moved on. I tried to settle myself with the idea that Negan was the kind who'd run. Always thought he'd die before he let Rick take this place. Thought Rick would die before he gave up the hunt for him, too. But here he was, gathering everyone on the factory floor and declaring victory for us. Telling the Saviors how things were going be from now on, how we'd rebuild the communities that had until yesterday been at war with each other. Sounded impossible. Looking around at the way some of them were glaring at Rick, it really felt impossible too. His speech might have been good, might have convinced a few of them, but I barely listened. I stood on the walkway above them and looked down, feeling like I was floating out of myself. 

Right when I needed it, Daryl's hand on the small of my back and a quiet, "Hey," grounded me again. I wasn't alone. It's easy to forget that sometimes, ain't something I'm used to. 

"I just don't see Dwight lying about this," I whispered to him, even though Daryl hadn't asked.

"He might have wanted to make you feel better," Daryl said, and I looked at him. His eyes were still fixed on Rick and the group below us, so I couldn't tell if he believed that bullshit. "Y'know, in case you regretted it."

I felt like I'd fallen into an episode of the Twilight Zone. Dwight wanted Negan dead; we'd plotted how we'd do it so many times. He knew I wanted it too, and he didn't strike me as the kind of guy who'd feel the need to shield me from anything. "Why the hell would he want to do that?"

"Probably sweet on you," Daryl muttered, which was as typical as it was ridiculous. I'm sure he thought he said it was under his breath, but I still caught it. I didn't dignify it with an answer, I shot him a look, and he got all defensive, "What? Never liked the way he looked at you."

"You don't like the way anyone looks at me," I said. And he couldn't argue much. Rick, Glenn, Bryce, Lucas - half the men in this room he'd freaked out about for no reason at one time or another. 

"I'm the only one who should be looking at you in any kind of way," Daryl grumbled.

"You are, " I said. "Everyone else is just making occasional polite eye contact. Can't stop them from having eyes." 

Daryl muttered something which could've been, "Wanna bet?" But it was genuinely under his breath this time, so I can't be sure. Michonne glanced up at us with the same look teachers used to give us when we talked too much at the back of a classroom, and we fell silent, not wanting to undermine whatever Rick was saying. I was sure it was all the right things, but I was too jittery to listen. Instead, I spent the time scanning the Saviors for anyone who might have been loyal enough to Negan to help him escape. To hide him. 

Every now and then, a few of them would look up and stare at me. Fold their arms. Shift from foot to foot. At first, I thought it was because they recognized me from all the times I'd been working the fence or from my long stints in their windowless cell. But then it dawned on me that was only part of it. Some, if not all of them, must know it was me who'd slit Negan's throat. 

Was this why Daryl was so paranoid about who was and wasn't looking my way?

They stared at me, and I stared right back. Didn't feel a lick of fear about it. Did that make me brave or an idiot? 

Then I caught a glimpse of Daryl beside me. Feet planted firmly on the ground, shoulders broad, and chest puffed out. He didn't move a muscle, but he glared around at every one of those Saviors like he was daring them to see what happened if they tried something. If they said something. Looked at me wrong.

You can't feel unsafe when you have backup that good. 

You are the absolute best, I wanted to say to him, but I didn't want to risk another cutting glare from Michonne, so instead, I leaned into him a little. Moved my hand real close to his until our little fingers touched and entwined like we were making a pinky swear.

I swear, no matter what comes next, we'll get through this together.

Rick set up patrols and lookouts all around the parameter of Sanctuary, but I wasn't convinced it would be enough. Negan had lived and breathed this place for so long. If there were secret ways in and out, if there were places you could lie in wait, he'd know about them. He'd be there. If he wanted to launch something while we were all asleep, he could. At least Mia and Perla were safe back at the Hilltop and due to meet us at Alexandria with another group the next day. 

I knew I wouldn't sleep here, just like I knew that even if Negan never showed his face again, I'd search for it in every Walker I came across until I was old and grey. 

Sleep didn't seem like it was on the agenda for anyone. The Saviors were led away to somewhere we could easily keep an eye on them, make sure nobody came or went without us knowing about it. Once they were gone, everyone else relaxed. Rick even brought out a few whiskey bottles from Negan's room and started passing them around like this was some kind of celebration. There was chatter and laughter and talk of what came next. Negan's name wasn't mentioned again. 

After a while, I had to take a step away from it all. Found myself wandering the corridors until I ended up in the room we were keeping the Saviors in before the trip back to Alexandria tomorrow. The effort to rebuild the community would take as many people as we could get, and the Saviors were going to help repair the damage they'd made whether they liked it or not. Most of them were very clearly on the 'not' side of things. You could still hear the sound of laughter from the main hall, but this was the only room that felt as gloomy and apprehensive as I did. I knew they'd resent me being in there, but it was better than pretending I was at ease out there. 

"What you doing in here?" one of them asked me. "Shouldn't you be living it up with the rest of them?"

"Don't think we got much to celebrate," I said, and I could tell that surprised him a little. "We still lost a lot of people, and all of our shit got destroyed."

"What about us?" the Savior asked, glaring at me with steely blue eyes. "We lost a lot of people, all our shit got destroyed, and now you're taking our home too?"

"We ain't taking your home," I said. "We just need some help rebuilding Alexandria. You can come back to this shithole when we're done."

"What, so we can work ourselves to the bone for Rick the prick?" he said. "I'd rather you fucking shot me now."

"It ain't gonna be like that," I said. "Rick's trying to build something that works for all of the communities. He ain't a selfish asshole like Negan. Ya'll will be fine."

He stood up tall then like he was the one I'd called an asshole and not Negan. "The fuck do you know about Negan?"

A damn sight more than you.

"Justin," Amber said, a slight warning note in her voice. "Leave it. She's the one who took him out."

"That was you? " his eyebrows shot up so far they nearly joined with his long, greasy, brown hair. "Surprised you had the balls to come back here."

I couldn't tell if that was a threat or if he was impressed. Amber was clearly glad to be rid of Negan. She and Mark had been wrapped around each other since we'd arrived. Even now, as she'd stepped forward to stick up for me, her hand was still clasped in his. Mark's face was still hearing from the iron. His scars were red raw but no longer bleeding or blistering. When I looked at him, he offered me a twisted smile that reminded me of Dwight.

I caught myself wishing Daryl hadn't sent Dwight away. He hadn't said it, but I was pretty sure that was what he'd done. They had a lot of bad blood between them; I doubted Daryl would be able to deal with seeing his face every day. But, after all that he'd done, killing him didn't feel like the right choice either, and I knew Daryl. I knew he'd do the right thing.

Plus, there was a whole-ass truck missing, which was a pretty big clue. 

"I can stay with my daughter? We will… get our things back?" an older woman standing next to Amber asked timidly in broken English. She had an accent I couldn't quite place, other than it was maybe eastern-European. It took me a second to realize that it must be Amber's mother. 

"Yes," I said. "Of course you will. This move is just temporary. Did Rick not tell you that?"

"He did," Amber said. "But we don't know Rick, or if he can be believed."

"Rick's a good man," I said. "A fair leader."

"We all thought the same about Negan once," Amber said. There was a ripple of something around the room, an intake of breath that seemed to say ' some of us still do'. I looked back at Amber's mom, whose biggest concern was not being separated from her family again and getting back the few personal possessions she owned in this world. Most people in Sanctuary were probably just like her. 

Even if Negan was out there plotting his return, all we had to do was prove that our way was better than his, and he'd have no support left in these walls.

"Negan had some things right," I said. That seems to shock them into paying attention to the rest of what I had to say, even if they weren't before. "People are a resource. But he exploited that resource - exploited all of you. And we're not going to do that. None of you will be split up from your loved ones. Food will be shared equally. Punishments will be fair and painless. Rick is a leader, but he ain't a tyrant like Negan."

I'm not sure how much of it Amber's mom understood, but she looked less apprehensive than she had a few minutes ago.

"You expect us to believe, after everything, that you're going to give us all an equal share of things?" Justin sneered at me.

"Why should I give a rat's ass what you believe?" I said. "It's gonna happen whether you believe in it or not, and you'll feel like a damn fool for having this conversation."

Justin looked at me like I'd slapped him, but somewhere in the room, I heard a few Saviors chuckle. It was the first time I'd felt positive about anything since we'd got here. The best way to stamp out Negan, and his legacy, was to show the Saviors that there was a better way. That we weren't going to treat them the way they would've treated us if the war had gone the other way.

"Are y'all hungry?" I asked. They stared at me like it was a trick question. "Thirsty?"

Nobody answered. I looked directly at Amber, the only one here I'd had much to do with when I was a prisoner myself. She hesitated and then said, "Nobody's given us anything, but we could do with a bit…."

She trailed off. Others around her were clearing their throats like they wanted her to shut up. Like admitting they were hungry was a weakness, or they expect me to bring them the same dog food sandwiches they'd made Daryl eat. It was tempting but would undermine any progress I was looking to make here. I nodded, "Give me a sec."

I ducked back out of the room, past Jerry and Morgan, who'd been guarding the doors, letting them know I'd be back. I followed the sound of laughter and chatter back to the main room and tapped Rick on the shoulder.

"Hey," Rick said, sounding surprised to see me. His eyes were a little bright, like he might have had one swig too many of Negan's whiskey. 

"We gonna feed those assholes or what?" I said. 

"Who? The Saviors?" Rick asked. 

"Yeah. They gotta eat," I said. "Gotta give them some water too. It's a long way to Alexandria tomorrow. If we don't want them starting a fight or making a break for it mid-journey, we need to make sure their basic needs are met."

"The hell do you care if they make a break for it?" Daryl asked. 

"We need them," I said, and then seeing him bristle, I rephrased it. "We need people to rebuild everything we've lost."

"Everything they destroyed," Rosita snapped. 

"Most of the people in that room are farmers," I said. "Workers here. Non-violent. They didn't have anything to do with the destruction of Alexandria. God knows we need people who can build and know how to produce food. Hilltop can't sustain us all forever."

"She's right," Maggie said. I could tell she hated saying it, but she was speaking on behalf of the Hilltop now. Their food resources could sustain those who lived there with a little bit leftover, but there'd come the point where she'd have to prioritize her people and cut others off. "We need every farmer and every piece of farmland we can get."

"Alright," Rick said. "Good point. I'm sure there's some stuff we can spare."

We were in the process of going through the Savior's supplies and packing up anything that we could take with us to Alexandria. We'd moved a lot of it when we fled, and judging by the flames we'd seen, there wouldn't be much left of anything we'd left behind. 

We took a pile of food that would be hard to transport through to the Saviors. Things that were fresh now would spoil in a few days, and anything half-opened might spill. We filled some of the water barrels they had set up in the dining hall and took them through too. The Saviors looked at the food with suspicion as we laid it out, but soon even guys like Justin had started picking up pieces and nibbling on it. 

As for our side, not everybody helped. Rosita and Eugene hung back, and I got why. If I'd lost Daryl the same way Rosita lost Abraham, I doubt I'd have been able to stand this place without burning it down. Eugene was the reason many Saviors were dead; I could see why he'd want to limit contact. 

Rick, Michonne, Maggie, Glenn, Carol, and the King helped me sort food and take it through. Daryl carried the water, his arm muscles bulging under its weight in an extremely distracting way. 

I was so distracted by it, in fact, that I didn't notice the King approach me. I jumped when he started speaking and felt my cheeks turn red at being caught drooling over my own boyfriend.

"This is both a charitable and an intelligent endeavor," the King said, and I could tell by how uncomfortable it made me that it was a compliment. "Kindness will erode remaining loyalty to Negan far faster than cruelty."

"That's what I'm hoping," I said quietly, watching the Saviors pass food amongst themselves and start to eat. It was easy to tell this way, who was a family (biological or found) and who wasn't. People shared with those they cared most about, and watching them made it easy to pick out smaller groups among the mass of them all.

"You know the Kingdom was once a school?"

"Yes..." I said, unsure of the relevance.

"I have great ambitions to return it to a place of learning when Alexandria has been restored, and all of this has found quiet."

"Oh. Yeah?" I glanced at King Ezekiel. I didn't know him all that well and couldn't for the life of me work out why he was telling me his plans. But he was beaming just thinking about the educational paradise he planned to build.  

"Bryce has told me all about your own academic prowess," the King said. Another compliment. This was my worst nightmare, and I'd need to have a word with Bryce about what he was and wasn't allowed to tell people about me.

"Yeah, I did okay in school," I tried to shrug it off and prayed for the end of this conversation. 

"Better than okay is the impression Bryce has given," the King said. "And clearly, you have patience for difficult people and an ability to see the wider view of things. These are all qualities I think should be taught to the next generation. They are our future, after all. This is all to say that there would be a place in the Kingdom for a mind such as yours."

"Are you offering me a job?" I asked. With all the compliments and the King's archaic way of speaking, my head was starting to spin. He smiled slightly at the word 'job', which of course, wasn't quite right. It's not like we were about to sit down and negotiate a salary and benefits. Holiday days and insurance.

"I merely think our outlook and goals are aligned," he said. "And wish to extend an invitation for you to join us. Take your time, mull it over."

"Thank you," I said. I didn't know what else to say. I'd always pictured us in Alexandria when this was over, and it was rebuilt, but there was no real reason we had to settle there. Getting Mia back into some kind of education felt like an impossible dream. She'd like to be close to Bryce, too. But… My gaze slid over to Daryl, who'd just put down the last of the water barrels and was already looking for me.  

"Yes," the King said with a deep and throaty laugh, answering my unasked question. "You can bring him, too. I dare say our children would benefit from his wild wisdom."

"Yeah," I said, filling with so much pride and affection for Daryl that I couldn't keep it off my face. Hunting, fighting, tracking… these were all things kids would need to know now, and there wasn't anyone better at those things than him. Plus, Daryl was great with kids.

Daryl made his way over to us, frowning because both of us were smiling at him. 

Daryl

Naomi had been quiet for a while, but she kept taking these big deep breaths like she was about to talk, holding them for a moment and then letting them out in a long sigh. I know her well enough to know that meant she was building up to saying something and didn't know how. So, I waited. Rushing her could make it worse.

"So, I was talking to the King…." Naomi said. She didn't look up from where she was kneeling on the ground, concentrating on lining up the bricks up just right. But the way her voice rose at the end, I could tell this was something she'd been building up to saying. Probably rehearsed it a lot in her head. 

"Oh, yeah?" I said. I've found it's best to say as little as possible until she's got out whatever it is she needs to say. Otherwise, I can accidentally get my lines wrong from the script she's rehearsed in her head, and she can get real cross. 

"Yeah, a while ago, actually," she said. "Back when we were in Sanctuary. Anyway, he kind of suggested that maybe he'd like us to go and live in the Kingdom when all this is done."

"That's...nice of him," I said, but I'd be lying if I said I was fully following this conversation. As far as I knew, Naomi and the King liked each other but weren't exactly joined at the hip. I'd thought she might want to stay here when all this was done. 

"Yes. Well. He weren't just being nice," Naomi said. She was getting kinda flustered, which meant that even that small response had deviated from the way she'd had this playing out in her head. I looked down at the bucket of cement and pretended I was concentrating real hard on spreading it evenly across the top it the line of bricks so I wouldn't laugh at her as she continued. "He wants to turn the Kingdom back into a kind of school, and he's looking for people to help teach the kids. Things they'd have to have known before this, but also things they'll have to know now. How to protect themselves, how to build things…."

"How to dig limestone outta that quarry and turn it to cement?" I offered another example, one we'd only recently learned ourselves.

"Yeah," she said. "Thank God for Eugene. I'd have had no idea how to get this done otherwise." 

"You wanna do it?"

"Make cement?"

"No, dummy, teach at the Kingdom," I said. Although I was only asking to be polite. It was a great job for her, those kids would be damn lucky to know what she knew, and she'd finally have an excuse to get her nose back in a book. 

"I dunno," she said, and I thought she was kidding. But she stopped what she was doing and stood up, wiped her dusty hands on her pants. I stopped what I was doing too and straightened up, waited for her to go on. My back ached from a day hunched over, and the break was welcome. Naomi didn't say anything, eyebrows knitted together. She looked genuinely worried.

"I'm sure if you don't want to do it, the King will understand," I said, unable to figure out what she was getting so worked up about. 

"Well, on one hand, it could be great, y'know," she said. "The kids can get back to school, back to learning things. And we've got a real chance here to teach them things that'll help them survive in this world but also build a better one. It's fucked up now, but it's not like the old world was any less shitty. Kids like Mia, Perla, Carl, and Enid. Judith. Little Gracie. They're the future, and they can make something way better than the way things are now. Better than how we had it." 

Her eyes had started shining at just the thought of it. I'd seen that look before, back when we were younger, when she talked about us getting out of our crappy situations. When she spoke of all the changes that needed to be made to stop other kids growing up like us. 

"You about to announce you're running for President or taking a teaching job?" I teased her.

"Shut up," she rolled her eyes, but she was still kind of smiling. 

"So what's on the other hand?"

"What?"

"What's the problem?"

"Oh," she said, and that smile faded to be replaced by that same worried look. "Well, I dunno what your plans are… and I know we shouldn't… I mean, we don't have to be in the same place, but…."

"Only plan I got is to be wherever you and Mia are," I said, baffled that this was something she even had to ask.

"Really? You'll come with us?"

"Course I will, dummy." 

"You sure?" she said. "I don't want you to have to be somewhere you ain't gonna be happy. But, the King and I were also talking about how someone's going to have to teach the kids how to track and hunt and stay safe, and I think you'd be great at that. It ain't that far from Rick and Michonne here or Glenn and Maggie at Hilltop. And, given the eyes Carol and the King have been making at each other, I would be surprised if she'll be there too. So, it's not just-"

"You ain't gotta sell it to me," I said. Naomi was talking faster and faster, and although it was nice she'd put so much thought into it, she didn't need to. "Deal's done. I'll go anywhere you want."

"Anywhere?" she took a little step toward me, a smile playing on her lips like she was about to lean in and kiss me.

"Yeah."

"Alright then, Caribbean cruise?" she grinned. Her arms slipped around my shoulders and linked behind my neck.

"I'll build the boat, and you get the compass," I said, and she laughed like I was joking, but if she asked me to build her a boat, I would. I moved to take her waist, waited until she nodded, and then wrapped my arms around her, hands resting on the small of her back.

"I ain't told her yet, but I think Mia will like it. It ain't too far from Lucas and Perla, and she'll get to be near Bryce again too," Naomi was on the verge of looking worried again. "I know he ain't your favorite, but -"

"I like Bryce," I said, wondering how many times I'd have to say it and then remembering how close I'd come to punching his lights out the first time I met him and thought there was even the tiniest chance he was sleeping with Naomi. I could see why she might take some convincing.

"Really?"

"I mean, we ain't braiding each other's hair or anything, but I'd like to get to know him better," I said.

"Your hair is getting about long enough to braid," she said and ran her hands through it. I loved how comfortable she was with shit like this now. She still smiled when she did it like she couldn't quite believe it was me she was touching or kissing, but that was fine because neither could I. 

When we'd been starting things, she'd been real hesitant, but now she took my hand or put an arm around me or ran her fingers through my hair without pausing first. At night, when I'd crawl into bed next to her, muscles aching with exhaustion and sure I couldn't stay awake another second longer, she'd roll over and kiss me. Pull my arms tight around her. And I suddenly had all the energy in the world. 

I loved it. I loved everything about it, this life with her.

"Think I should cut it?" I asked her. 

"Nah," she said, and I almost couldn't handle the way she was looking at me. Sometimes her smiles are too pretty, and I feel like I can't look directly at her, or she'll blind me like the sun. "I like it wild."

She said it right before she kissed me. Even in the heat, we wanted to be closer to each other. She pressed herself against me at the same time I tried to pull her closer, and my hands slipped from the small of her back. I grabbed her ass. Accidentally, I swear, but she kissed me deeper like she liked it, and I didn't move my hands. 

"Oi, lovebirds!" someone yelled. "Hope you two aren't slacking off!"

Fuck's sake. 

Embarrassment ripped us apart, and we turned to find Rick and Michonne grinning at us like a pair of damn hyenas. 

"What, we can't take a damn break?" I said. 

"A break, huh," Rick repeated, still grinning from ear to ear. "Is that what you call that?"

"Well, what are ya'll slacking off for?" I asked. "Ain't you got a wall to repair?"

"We've finished ours," Michonne said. "What's taking you so long?"

"I bet I can take a guess," Rick said. 

"That's a shoddy-looking wall, Rick," Naomi said. "You brick it up with your eyes closed?"

Rick laughed, enjoying the fighting talk, "We'll just have to see which one stays standing the longest."

"Fine," Noami shrugged. "First gust of wind, and that wall's coming down. This one'll outlive you."

"Will it even be up before I'm in the ground?"

"We're taking our time with it, so it don't end up as weak as yours."

"Well, if there's anything you two are experts in, it's taking your time," Rick said. "If that's what makes a good wall, that'll be the finest in Alexandria."

"Damn straight."

"Alright," Michonne held her hands up to stop both of them. "We actually came over to let you know that Noah's fixed the power and the water."

"No way!" Naomi gasped. We'd gone so long without power and water, we'd kind of forgotten Alexandria had any to begin with. 

"Yup, should be back on by tonight," Rick said. He and Michonne moved on to keep spreading the word, and Naomi and got back to repairing the wall. A little more red-faced and giggly than she had been before. 

Rick was right; we were taking longer doing this than they had. Most of that was down to Naomi. Everything she does is perfect, and that perfectionism makes her take her damn time. Sometimes it bugged me when it was schoolwork, and I wanted to do something more fun. But most of the time, it was something I really loved about her. A lot of folks rush things, ignore the little things. 

By the time we were done, Alexandria was getting dark. I don't know if someone had arranged it or if it was impromptu, but people started gathering in the center of town. All of the chatter was about the lights and water. 

When the lights all around Alexandria flickered on, a cheer rang up through the crowd like we'd all just seen the most incredible firework display of our lives. This was a big step in getting Alexandria back up and running. Most of the houses that could be repaired and salvaged had been fixed up by now. Some would take more time, others that needed to be rebuilt entirely, but we'd reached a point that a large enough community could live here. 

Once the Kingdom and the Hilltop communities left, there would be a lot more space. I still wasn't clear what Rick's plans for the Saviors was, maybe he'd keep them here to finish the rebuild, but it really felt like things were winding down. After weeks of backbreaking work clearing the rubble of Alexandria, mining the nearby quarry for materials, and repairing houses with the sun beating down on us all day, people were relieved.

I got why some folks would be glad it was ending, but I didn't mind the work. It was physically exhausting all day, but seeing something you'd built at the end of it felt good. Especially given how long we'd just spent destroying things. And I got to do it all with Naomi at my side. Talking and laughing with her made the time go real fast.

My only problem with the last few weeks had been how damn busy it had all been. Alexandria, the Kingdom, the Hilltop, and the Saviours all in one place. It was cramped. There was no damn privacy. It wasn't just shit like Rick and Michonne catching us kissing; Naomi and I never had a moment alone. At night, everyone was crammed into the few houses left standing. So even when Naomi rolled over to kiss me in the dark and shot that lightning bolt of energy back through me, I couldn't do anything about it. 

Kisses stolen in pauses in work or quietly in the dark before sleep. Her hand taking mine sometimes under a table when we ate together. That was all we had. Or moments like this, when the lights came one and everything came to a stop so we could marvel at it, and I could put an arm around her, and she could lean her head on my shoulder and murmur, "Nice to see it all it up again, huh?" 

"Yeah."

"And the water… I am going to have so many showers," Naomi said. "Gonna be in there for a week, coming out all wrinkled like a raisin." 

"A whole week?" I laughed. "Don't know what I'd do with you gone that long."

"You could always join me," she said. She said it quietly so people around us wouldn't hear, but it was so quiet I thought for a second I'd imagined it. I glanced at her, caught a little glimmer in her eye, and knew I hadn't. 

Naomi and me. Alone together. In a room with a lock on the door. Heaven.

Before I could respond to her to tell her that she'd always been a smartypants, but this was her best idea ever, I felt a tap on my shoulder. Rick. He wasn't grinning this time. He looked pretty serious. "Hey, Daryl, you got a sec?"

"Yeah, sure," I said, but I was immediately a little uneasy. I kissed Naomi on the forehead and said, "Be right back." 

I followed Rick away from the people gathered in the center of town. On the way, we passed Mia, Perla, and Carl, who were goofing around at the back of the crowd like teenagers should. When she saw me, Mia jumped up and down and waved. I waved back and found that I might have caught a little bit of Naomi's optimism. This could be the start of us building a world that did right by these kids. 

Rick and I walked for a bit in silence, stopping by his old porch on the first house we'd stayed in here. I wondered if this would become his house again. We sat down on the step, and I waited for him to talk.

"We're almost done here," Rick said. "Well… we've done enough to start getting a lot of these folks out of here."

"Can't believe how fast everything's gone up," I said. Felt like time had flown by here. 

"I know," Rick said but barely took a moment to celebrate what an achievement that was. Whatever this conversation was, it was serious. "So, the King will be taking people back to the Kingdom in a week or so. Maggie and Glenn will lead the Hilltop back around the same time."

"Okay," I said when he paused. All of this seemed pretty obvious so far.

"I think, moving forward, it's really important that all of these communities work together. Share what we have so people aren't desperate enough to go back to fighting," Rick looked at his feet. "And to do that, I need some of my people in each place."

"Okay," I said again. It sounded like he was sorted. Should I tell him Naomi and I were heading to the Kingdom too, so he wouldn't have to worry about only having one person there?

"Kingdom and the Hilltop are covered. So, that just leaves Sanctuary..." Rick trailed off. Looked in my direction. 

"Let it rot," I said. I wasn't sure why this was a problem. Certainly not one that required a private conversation. 

"The Saviors need a place to live," Rick said. 

"Do they?"

"Yes."

"Maggie's cages ain't big enough?"

"No. And we want these people to work with us now," he said. "They've helped rebuild Alexandria; there's been little sign of trouble. We can't lock them up now. This is peacetime."

"So, you're sending them back to the Sanctuary?"

"Yes," he said. "And for it to work, I'm gonna need someone there to run things. Someone I can really trust."

It took me a second of Rick staring directly at me to get what he meant. 

"Me?" I looked for a sign that this was the worst-told joke in the world. 

"I can't think of anyone I trust more," Rick said. 

"Nah," I said. I almost stood up and left right there and then. 

"I'll be there for the first few weeks, make sure things are set up, and we've got ways to keep them in line," he said like we were negotiating something. "But after that, I'd like to pass it off to-"

"Are you deaf? I said no."

I couldn't believe that he was asking me to go back there. To live and work in a place where my girl's blood was soaked into the concrete. 

"Daryl, think about it," he said. "Please. Carol's going to the Kingdom, Maggie and Glenn are already set up at the Hilltop -"

"So ask Michonne."

"I need Michonne here with me," Rick said. 

Fucking hypocrite.

I'd known that would be his answer before he said it. But I wanted him to say it. 

"So you get to stay with your girl, but you don't mind sending me away from mine?" 

"I thought you could take her with you, Daryl," Rick said like I was a damn idiot for not thinking of it. "You make a great team."

I know he meant it as a compliment, and it wasn't untrue, but Rick didn't get our team. Not really. Our team was, before anything else, formed to protect each other. And that meant keeping Naomi out of Sanctuary.

"I know it's a big ask, but I can't think of anyone better for the job."

"Can't ask her to go back there, Rick," I said. "I won't."

"Daryl, I'm sure she'd-" 

"I won't ," I said again. "She was in that place way longer than I was."

"That could be a good thing," he said. I almost smacked him. "Naomi knows them better than the rest of us; she saw how that palace was run. You saw how good she was with the Saviors when we got there. Calmed them down, helped get them to cooperate. She'd be a real asset out there."

I think it was the word asset that made me snap.

"They beat her, Rick," I said. Could hear my voice shaking, but I didn't much care. All I could think about were those damn purple marks all over her when she got back, and I felt like I was bruised. "And not just once. Not twice. A lot. Starved her. Kept her locked in a damn supply closet. I ain't taking her back to a place like that just because you think she'll be useful to the people who did it to her."

"It'll be different this time," Rick said. "You'll be the ones in charge."

I shook my head. He didn't get it - the ghosts that can follow you when you've been through something like that in a place like Sanctuary. 

"You saw her face when we didn't find Negan," I said. "You think she's gonna be able to let that go if we're living in the damn place?" 

"Negan is probably dead," Rick said. "When he doesn't show up again, she'll see that. She'll relax."

I almost laughed. Throw the word 'probably' into a sentence, and Naomi would never relax. She'd always been a worrier, to put it mildly. And I hadn't seen that kind of fear in her eyes before. Life or death, like if Negan was out there, he was going to kill her for sure. And as much as Rick clearly thought that was crazy, she was right. If Negan was out there, he'd definitely try. 

He would fail because he'd have to get through me. 

But he'd try. 

It had take days after leaving Sanctuary for Naomi to feel like herself again. I wasn't taking her back into that. 

"Naomi's tough," Rick said, trying another tactic. 

"You think I don't know she's tough ?" I snapped. 

"You might think you know it, but you don't act like it," he said.

"You don't get it."

"Yeah, I do," he said. "You think I don't worry about Michonne out there? God, when I heard her screaming that day Negan and his army came here… when I saw her all…."

"Yeah," I said quietly. "I remember." 

It was hard to forget the way her eyes had almost swollen shut. The bruises on most of her body. Michonne had been lucky to survive. 

"And then she took herself off bedrest to go back to Sanctuary with you and your damn plan to drive a truck through a wall…." Rick said, shaking his head a little. "I was worried sick when she told me she'd done it. I thought she'd made a terrible choice. But, at the end of the day, it was her choice to make. And I respected that because I respect her."

"I respect Naomi, too," I said, not much liking what he was implying. Even worse was the sharp twist in my gut that could have been guilt. Did Naomi think I didn't?

"I know you do," Rick said. "But sometimes your...worry about her... overtakes that a little."

"Maybe," I admitted. I could tell Rick was choosing his words really carefully. 

"Also, I think you're underestimating how much say you're going to have in all this once you tell her," Rick said like I'd already agreed to go. It was then I realized that he wasn't giving me much choice. Saying no to this would let down more than just Rick. It would fuck up his whole plan of rebuilding our communities and bringing them together. And wasn't that what Naomi wanted most of all? Building something better than we both had? I got it. I supported it. I'd just never seen myself as an important part of making it happen. But Rick did. 

"You ain't gonna drop this, are you?"

"No," Rick said. "Sorry. I need you there, Daryl. I know it's a hard job, but you're the only one I can think of who's tough enough for it. Who won't be afraid to punish the Saviors if they step out of line. Sanctuary will be hard work, I know that. That's why I need my right-hand guy there."

I appreciated what he was saying, but I could feel my heart sinking because I knew I couldn't say no.

"You really can't think of anyone else who can do this?" I asked. 

"No," Rick said. "But look, we can try it for a few months, and if there's no trouble from the Saviors and you're really not happy there, we can talk about moving someone else in."

"A few months," I repeated. 

"A few months, that's all I'm asking," Rick said.

I tried to tell myself it wasn't that long, in the grand scheme of things, but already I was picturing someone new coming along. Some amazing person at the Kingdom would swoop in and steal Naomi away from me. Could you fall out of love in a few months?

There was no way in Hell she was coming with me. I'd seen the excitement in her eyes when she talked about what she could do at the Kingdom, the raw hope. I wasn't going to let her throw that away and watch her lose her mind searching for Negan's ghost at Sanctuary. 

No way. 

I'd thought this was the end of us being apart. Thought now the damn war was won, we'd have time to be a proper family. Me, her, and Mia. Without any other bullshit getting in the way.

Looked like I'd have to wait a bit longer.

I'm taking her on that damn date before I go if it's the last thing I do. 

"If I'm doing this, you gotta help me with something," I said. 

"Sure, Daryl," Rick said, a little apprehensive. Maybe because I was still glaring at him. "What is it?"

I looked away from him, didn't want to see his face when I asked. "I wanna bake something."

"You wanna what?" Rick asked like there was no way in Hell he'd heard me right. I rolled my eyes and repeated myself. Rick threw his head back and laughed. 

Chapter 49: Goddamn

Naomi

Mia skipped up the stairs ahead of me, all long limbs and elbows. She'd gone through a real growth spurt lately, caught somewhere between girl and teenager. My whole life, she'd grown too fast. Always felt I was just getting used to her at one stage before she was off to the next. One day she was a baby, entirely dependent on us for everything, and then I blinked, and she was sitting up and saying her first word. Blinked again, and she was off to school. Another blink, and she told me that I didn't need to hold her hand when we crossed the street anymore; she could do it by herself thank you very much. Another blink, and the world ended, and she was brave enough to keep running, keep living. 

Now here she was, older than she should be in many ways because of the things she'd seen in this violent world, but still a goofy and awkward thirteen-year-old most of the time. She was fighting wars and still finding time to make up a secret language that only she and Perla knew. 

"Bryce!" she yelled the moment she got in the door. I tried to remind her to use her indoor voice, but her excitement was too much to hold in. Bryce and Aaron were sitting around a makeshift table, built from the remnants of something wooden that had been blown out of recognition by the Savior's attack. The wood was twisted and charred, and I couldn't help but think that some fancy-ass interior designer would've paid megabucks for it back in the Before Times. 

"Oh, hey, Mia," Bryce said, only mildly alarmed by the frantic energy she was barrelling in with. 

"Guess what!" she beamed at him. 

'Act surprised,' I mouthed behind her back.

"What?" 

"When we're finished here, we're all going to come and live with you in the Kingdom!"

" All? " Bryce repeated, doing a fantastic job of pretending he hadn't heard this news from me while I mulled over how to ask Daryl and stressed about whether he'd say yes or not. Bryce had been right; of course, Daryl hadn't even hesitated when I'd told him. I hoped Bryce wouldn't be too smug about being right, but he was too preoccupied playing dumb for Mia for now. "That's a lot of people. I'm not sure I have enough couch space back at the Kingdom for all of Alexandria."

"No," Mia rolled her eyes. "Me, Naomi, and Daryl."

"Oh! That's great!" Bryce said with a genuine smile, then he glanced up at me. "Daryl, too, huh?"

I just nodded.

"Well, where else is he gonna go?" Mia said. 

"Where else, indeed?" Aaron grinned at me while Bryce slightly raised his right eyebrow in a way that said I told you so. I glared at them both. 

"And maybe Perla will come, too…" Mia said, with the same tone in her voice that she used to use when she dropped not-so-subtle hints that she wanted one of her friends to come for a slumber party.

"That's up to her and Lucas," I said, glad that decision had absolutely nothing to do with me so that if they didn't end up joining us, I wouldn't be the bad guy. Mia nodded, but I saw a resolute little twinkle in her eye that I knew I'd have to warn Lucas about. Once Mia gets an idea in her head, she can be real stubborn about letting it go. No idea where she gets it from.

"The Kingdom has horses, doesn't it?" Mia asked. 

"Sure does," Bryce said. 

"Will you teach me how to ride one?" Mia asked. 

It took me a second to realize she was looking at me and not Bryce. "What makes you think I know how to ride one?" 

"Didn't you and Daryl do all this kind of… wild stuff?" she asked. "When you were little? Hunting and fishing, and y'know… outdoor stuff."

"Yeah, but we didn't have horses," I said. "You know how expensive those are? Or,..used to be. I guess they're free now so long as you find it and tame it."

"I know how to ride," Bryce said. "I can teach both of you." 

"You learn at the Kingdom?" I asked. 

"Nah, I knew before. I used to do dressage," he tried to say it all casual, like that was a regular thing to say. 

"You did what? " I said. 

"What's dressage?" Mia asked. 

"It's the one where you make the horse do a little dance, right?"

Bryce looked at me like I'd said something unforgivable. This was the one time in our friendship it felt like he'd seen me for the uncouth street urchin I'd always been. He said, kind of snooty, "It is a sport, y'know."

"Yeah, for the horse maybe," I said, then I shook my head a little. I thought I knew Bryce pretty well, but this had totally blindsided me. Maybe he'd grown up fancier than I thought. "Never knew you had a horse!"

"I didn't. I had a share of a horse," Bryce said. "With a few other kids. It was kept at a stable, and we all mucked in, but I got to use it for competitions."

"Dressage competitions?" I asked, just to make him admit it again. 

"Yes," I could see him trying to restrain his eye roll. 

"Can't believe you never told me this before." 

"You never asked!"

"Not the sorta thing I'm in the habit of asking," I said, wondering if my first question to any and every new person I met from here on out should be 'Nice to meet you, have you ever done dressage?' . As good an icebreaker as any, really. 

"Well," Aaron placed his palms flat on the table and stood up, "I have to go and take Gracie to see Dr. Carson."

"She okay?" I asked. 

"You remember she had that terrible cough last week?" Aaron said, forehead creasing with worry. 

"Oh, yeah," I said, although, by all accounts, she'd coughed about twice, and Aaron had spent four days convincing himself she had tuberculosis, and he'd failed as a father. Nothing anyone could say would convince him otherwise, not even Dr. Carson. It was as sweet as it was infuriating. "Ain't got worse, has it?"

"No," he said. "I think it's cleared up. It's just a check-up, to be sure."

"Right," I nodded, knowing full well that Aaron had been the one to schedule this appointment and not Dr. Carson.

"I'm at a loose end. Do you want some company?" Bryce asked. The offer made me pause, not because Bryce was making it. He's always been thoughtful in that way, and never hesitated to put himself out to help others. But, there was a note in his voice when he asked, like some small part of him would be crushed if Aaron said no. 

Oh my God.

The boy has a crush.

I got butterflies on his behalf and found myself staring intently at Aaron for his reaction. He hesitated, and then something in his face softened. "Sure. That sounds nice. I'll go get her."

I waited until Aaron left the room before I looked at Mia and said, "Hey, why don't you go and see if Aaron needs any help with Gracie."

"Okay," she said, with a hint of teenage annoyance at being told what to do, but she loved Gracie so didn't put up a fuss. The second she was gone, I turned to Bryce, who was doing his damndest not to look at me. 

"So," I said. "How long has that been going on?"

"Nothing's going on," he said, a flash of annoyance in his eyes.  

"But you like him, right?"

"How come it took you three seconds to work that out but three hundred years to work out your own crush on Daryl?"

"So you do like him," I said triumphantly, ignoring his dig at me.

"He's cute," Bryce admitted. Something heavy hung over it. "But… you know." 

He shrugged one shoulder and let the rest of his sentence hang in the air. Eric. Aaron had only just lost him. There was no way he'd be anywhere near ready for anything new.

"Yeah," I said. 

"And it's not just that," he said, eyes fixed on the table but not seeing it. "Andy and I. We made vows. It feels...wrong to even think about someone else that way. Even though I know that he's gone." 

I didn't know what to say. I put a hand on Bryce's shoulder, and he looked up at me. His eyes were real sad. The kind of pain buried so deep you can never really dig it out. I bent down and hugged him, arms around his shoulders.  

"I'm sorry, Bryce," I said. I tried to think about what it might feel like to lose Daryl and find someone else, how confusing that might be, and what I'd want someone to say to me in that situation. But I couldn't get past the thought of losing Daryl without the pain of it almost splitting me in two.

"It's fine," he said. "It doesn't have to be anything. I just… like his company. So I'm fine with being his friend if that's all it can ever be."

"Well, you have excellent taste in friends," I said quietly, straightening up as I heard footsteps on the stairs. 

Mia bounded back into the room ahead of Aaron, who'd strapped Gracie to his chest with a makeshift baby carrier. He glanced at Bryce, "You good to go?" 

"Yeah," Bryce stood up. "Back in a bit. Will you be here?"

"I'm not sure, I gotta-" I said. 

"I won't," Mia piped up. This was news to me. "I said I'd help Carl babysit Judith while Rick and Michonne are busy. I should probably head over there now, actually."

"Will you be at Rick's place?" I asked. Mia had a good head on her shoulders, but I still liked to know there'd be other adults around if something kicked off. Rick's house was set up as a sort of hub throughout the day. Noah was there 24/7, pouring over the original plans for Alexandria and drawing up new ones.

"Yes," she said. "I think we'll mostly stick around there."

"Don't stray farther than that," I said. "Don't leave Alexandria. Be back at the house before dark."

"Okay," Mia was already heading toward the door. 

"I mean it, Mia," I said. "If I hear you've set one foot outside these walls, you won't be leaving my sight again for the next twenty years."

"Yeah, I know. I love you too," Mia yelled over her shoulder as she pulled the door shut behind her.

"That girl's got a better social life than I do," I muttered, trying to make a joke to cover my worry. No matter how big Mia got, my fears about her would never shrink.

"That's how it should be," Aaron said. "It's been nice to see the kids relax around here. Feels like things are finally getting back to normal."

Bryce agreed with him, and I nodded in a way I hoped looked convincing. But Negan rose in my mind. I wasn't sure what 'normal' looked like after everything he'd put us through. In Alexandria, I could push him to the back of my mind, but I couldn't banish him completely. Inside the walls, building and repairing things with Daryl, I felt safe. But there was a lot of woodland surrounding us, a lot of places to hide. 

Aaron and Bryce headed off to take Grace to see Doctor Carson, and it was the first time in a long time that I'd been anywhere quiet. But, silence was less comfortable than I remembered. Bryce and Aaron's grief weighed on me. Every time I thought about Eric or Andrew, I felt a pang of loss as strong as when I'd first heard about their deaths. Walking around Alexandria, I still sometimes caught myself expecting to see Eric at planning meetings. 

But I knew that the way I felt was nothing compared to the pain Aaron and Bryce had to live with. Would always live with. I didn't know how either of them was still standing. I wanted to know what to say to them, how to help. But, I couldn't put myself in their shoes. Losing Daryl was so incomprehensible that my brain shut down any thoughts of it immediately. 

I'd survive it because I had Mia to look after, but I would be forever changed. 

I can't dwell on this.

Felt like I was sinking, and I had a meeting with the King set up later that day. I'd be way too early if I went now, but maybe deciphering what Ezekiel was saying would take my mind off things it was spiraling into. Perhaps I had enough time to find Daryl and help him with whatever he was up to. I probably had enough time to swing by Rick's house and chat to Noah, so I could check Mia was where she said she'd be.

Before I could move toward the door, it opened, and there was Daryl. Seeing him gave me such a rush. More than usual. That thought of losing him someday sparked something in me, and I'd started walking towards him before the door had shut behind him. 

"Hey," he said. "Bumped into Aaron and Bryce, they said you'd be here and...look, I'm glad I caught you, I wanted t-"

I barely listened to him. Kissed him as soon as I got close enough, catching his lips while he was still mid-word. I knew I'd taken him by surprise because he grabbed me without his usual hesitation until I let him know it was okay. But it was more than okay. All I wanted was his hands on me and for us to be as close as possible. My back was up against the wall before he realized what he was doing and stopped kissing me back. He still held me where I was, pinned between him and the wall, looking at me a little dazed and out of breath. 

"Hey," he said again like he'd forgotten he'd already greeted me. 

"Hey," I couldn't stop smiling, the taste of him still tingling on my lips. 

"What was that for?"

"I missed you," I said because it felt like the simplest way of wording it. Because saying, 'I've decided that when it's time for one of us to die, I demand to go first,' would only make his brow crease in that worried little frown. I'd seen too much of that lately. Every second he wasn't close, a part of me was looking for him. So now that he was here, I had no plans to let him go until I absolutely had to. 

"I saw you this morning, weirdo," he said, but he was already pulling my hips closer to his again like he was getting ready for another kiss. "Woke up right next to ya."

"I know," I said, my hand on the back of his neck. "But do you hear that?"

I watched him pause for a moment and listen. "I don't hear shit."

"Exactly," I said. "When was the last time you didn't hear shit?" 

Daryl didn't respond, but I could see the answer and its implications in a glimmer in his eye. I leaned in and kissed him again. I couldn't hold myself back, thought my kiss might come on too strong, but he met me where I was. His lips were hard on mine, his tongue hungry, eager for a taste of mine, and so familiar. I loved how familiar this felt. 

When I reached to take his shirt off, he was already a beat ahead of me, pulling it up over his head. It hadn't even hit the floor before he took hold of the bottom of mine. I raised my hands above my head, ready for him to undress me. I hoped that would be permission enough that I wouldn't have to ask him to, but he still stopped.

"You can take it off," I told him. 

"Naomi…" he paused, closed his eyes for a second, and exhaled slowly through his mouth. His breath moved the hair around my face.

"It's okay," I said, although I knew that wasn't why he was hesitating this time. "I want you to."

"This is crazy," he said, but he was already lifting it off. 

"Maybe a little," I said. He kissed my neck, his warm hands brushing against my waist. My shirt fell next to his at the bottom of the stairs. The wall was cold on my back. Over his shoulder, I saw the unlocked front door that led directly to the outside and everyone else. 

"You ain't thinking straight," he told me. 

But his kisses weren't slowing down. His body pressed closer. The heat of his skin on mine. The hypocrisy of it made me smile, "And you are?"

"I'm trying, but...," he stopped and looked at me. Fingers under my chin tilted my face toward him. "Can't think of anything else when you're around. Can't stop thinking about you when you ain't here, either."

"Back at you," I said. Daryl leaned in for another kiss, but I stopped him. A flicker of disappointment in his eyes, and he started nodding like he was agreeing we should stop. But that wasn't what I was thinking at all. I glanced at the stairs right beside us and then back at him. "Upstairs?"

He nodded, took my hand, and we bolted up the stairs with an urgency like something was chasing us. I veered off into one of the rooms, Daryl's hand still clasped tightly in mine. He kicked the door shut behind him as I pulled him toward the mattress in the middle of the room. He was kissing me again, hands on either side of my face, and I heard the door slam so hard it shook the walls. Like he'd thought the harder he kicked it, the longer the outside world would take to get back in. 

We sank down together, into the mattress and the silence and each other. This quiet was filled with deep kisses and gentle caresses. This quiet I could live in forever. Daryl's body over mine. My hands on his bare chest and back. I rolled us over until I was on top. I took a beat, just to look at him stretched out beneath me. Daryl's scarred, tattooed, perfect body. I kissed my way up from the waistband of his pants, up that deep V across his hips, over his stomach and muscular chest, until I reached his lips. There wasn't an inch of him I didn't want to taste. He was breathing hard. A deep moan escaped him as I took his hands and moved them to where the clasp of my bra joined at my back. He stopped kissing me, and I leaned closer to him, my lips at his neck this time. Daryl's breathing became more erratic, his fingers skirting around the band of my bra but not actually taking it off. 

He's going to make me ask, isn't he?

He wanted to. I could feel how much he wanted to, but he was still holding back.

"Look at me," he said, and he waited until he had my full attention. "Tell me that you want it." 

I got why he was doing it, and it was working. With my full attention on him always there wasn't room for anything else to creep in. And although it still drove me crazy, there was also something about it, something in the way he looked at me while he waited for me to say what we both knew I would, that drove me crazy in a whole other way. 

"I want you," I said, "to take it off, Daryl. Please."

"Wasn't so hard," he said, in a way that made me want to either kiss him or tell him to fuck off. But I kept my mouth shut as I felt the clasp of my bra tighten and release. Daryl's lips twitched in a little smile as he peeled it off me, "Was it?"

The urge to kiss him won out. I pulled him closer. My hands all over him, his all over me. Or, almost , all over me. He touched my back, my stomach, the light caresses on my sides that made me shiver. Daryl's hands skirted around my chest, coming close but not allowing himself to actually touch me there. He was holding back. Waiting for me to ask, but he wanted it. Maybe even more badly than I did. His kiss got hungrier each time he got close, a low moan deep in the back of his throat.

I pulled away from him. Straddling his waist, I sat up, and Daryl rose too, his hands on my thighs wrapped around him. I took his face in my hands. Saw that hunger in his eyes. That heat. I'm still not used to that look. Or the feelings it stirs in me. I tried to hide them when I looked at him.

"Something you want, Daryl?" I asked innocently, but he knew immediately what I was doing. He gives me a delicious kind of smile. "You just gotta ask." 

Not so easy, is it?

I thought for a moment that I had him, that after all he'd done to toy with me, he wouldn't be able to handle it the other way around. He leaned closer like he was going to kiss me to shut me up, but he didn't. Instead, he said, "All I want is to make you feel good."

"Wanna make me feel good," I repeated, "you can just give me a backrub for that. Or ain't that what you meant?"

I wondered how long I'd leave him hanging in this. I could see the blush at the edge of his smile, and I didn't know if he'd be able to say it. He'd always been a man of very few words. When he bent and kissed my neck again, I thought that was him giving in, but I was wrong. 

"That noise you make," he said, "when I kiss you like this."

Goddamn.

Another kiss, and I was acutely aware of exactly what noise had left my lips. 

"That's what I want," he said, kissing me a few more times, just to prove his point. I want you to show me what else will make you moan like that. What'll make you scream."

I swallowed hard. I had no idea what to say to that. 

Goddamn.

But he wasn't done. 

"The way you shiver when I touch you right here…." He ever so lightly traced a line close to my spine, and I shivered in a way that I could not control. Daryl watched it travel through my body with a smile that made it clear how much he was enjoying it. I tried to hold it back, I really thought I'd managed to get the upper hand here, but I'd turned into putty in his. "I want to know where else you like to be touched like that." 

He did it again. Just to prove that he could.

"The way you're looking at me right now...," he said, and I felt a heat creep up the side of my face. I had no idea how I was looking at him right now. All I knew was I couldn't look away from him. "...like I'm all you can see. I wanna keep it that way. I want to make it so the only thing you know is my damn name."

Goddamn. 

How could I resist that? Why the hell would anyone want to?

Without looking away from him, I took his hands and lifted them to my chest. "Touch me. Right here."

"Show me," he kissed my neck as his warm hands cupped my breasts. "Teach me how to make you feel good, Naomi." 

His voice was thick with need, a kind of desire in his eyes I'd never seen before. For me? It felt impossible. 

But as I showed him how I liked to be touched, and his thumbs brushed lightly against my hardened nipples, sending little jolts of pleasure shooting through my body, I could feel how much he wanted it. The tightening in his jaw every time he made me whimper, the bulge in his pants growing with his confidence as he took control. 

"So sensitive," he whispered. "You like this, huh?"

I could only nod. 

Daryl kept his eyes on me, drinking in my reactions and using them to adjust what he was doing. Listening to the moans and whimpers, I couldn't hold in with every brush against my hard nipples. I had to close my eyes for a moment. I wasn't used to this. To being so vulnerable, so open with someone who loved me so completely that their sole focus was my pleasure. 

As I threw my head back for a moment, a short respite from the way Daryl was looking at me, I felt his lips join his hands. I whispered his name. I didn't mean to. It just slipped out. But a grunt of response in the back of his throat told me he'd heard me. 

And then something clicked. Not with us; I wasn't sure how we could've clicked anymore than we already had. Something in the empty house. Something that could've been the front door opening. 

No. 

Not again. 

I tried to ignore it, tell myself it was nothing, but Daryl paused, a look on his face like he was listening too.

"Did you hear…?"

"No," I said, but I was already scrambling off him.   

It had been way too long since Daryl, and I had got to be alone together. And while I was all for rebuilding Alexandria, it was starting to get to me. From the intensity of his kiss, I knew it was getting to him, too. Without waiting to see if there really was someone coming or if it was our paranoia from having been interrupted so many times, I scurried over to the bathroom that joined this room. 

"C'mon," I said, motioning for him to join me. Daryl's eyebrows shot up. 

"Boy, you weren't kidding about that shower, huh?" 

"You coming in or not?" I said. I would've said something smarter, but I didn't have time for his teasing right now. Neither of us did. And if he said no I was going in any way because I'd need a cold shower to get my head straight.

"Hell yeah," he muttered. I backed away as he came in, switching the shower on so whoever was downstairs might hear it and leave this room alone. 

Daryl lingered by the door for a moment after he'd locked it. He paused, then grabbed the handle and tugged to see if it would open, as if sneaking up on it would help. The door didn't budge and Daryl's shoulders visibly relaxed. 

"Don't trust the lock?" I asked. 

"Don't trust our luck," he muttered. 

I wrapped my arms around him, kissed the scars across his back and shoulders. Until I did it, I hadn't realized how long I'd been waiting to kiss those wounds. Since the day he got them, I expect. 

"This okay?" I murmured into his back. 

"Yes," he said, and I kissed each one again like I could heal them. 

He turned around and caught my lips with his. Kissed me hard and deep as steam from the shower started filling the room and enveloping us both. His bare chest against mine. It was just the two of us again, wrapped up in each other. The noise of the shower drowned out the outside world. 

"Now what?" he asked, his voice low. 

"Take 'em off," I gestured to his pants.

"You sure?" he asked, but he was already unfastening them and slipping out of his shoes.

"Yeah," I said. I still hesitated when I started unfastening my own jeans. That habit would be hard to kick. But all I had to do was think about the way Daryl had looked at me when I'd shown him my scars. When he'd kissed every last one. The same way he was looking at me now. 

"We can stop any time," he reminded me.

"I know," I said, but I wasn't slowing down. The tiles were cool against my feet as my jeans and underwear crumpled around my ankles. I stepped out of them. 

"Woah." Daryl breathed, eyes wide. 

"What?" I said. He didn't answer right away, his breath got stuck somewhere in his throat, but it was me he was staring at. I glanced down at myself, praying it was nothing embarrassing. Then I realized he probably hadn't seen me without a shirt since my bruises healed. 

"Oh, right, yeah, I know. Healed up pretty good, huh? You can't even really-"

"No, that's not what I meant," he said. "You're…"

Oh. 

Shit. 

He's never seen me  fully naked before. 

"Don't," I warned him, not sure I'd be able to deal with any kind of compliment from him right now without melting into a puddle on the bathroom floor. 

"Alright, I won't," Daryl said, the look in his eye not changing one bit. "But you are."

"Shut up." 

"You can give me another spin if you like."

"Shut up, " I said again. Daryl grinned and started pulling down his boxers.

Oh.

Shit. 

I've never seen him fully naked before. 

I tried not to stare, I really did, but… damn.

My gut reaction was to look away, even though he was the better half of my own soul, we didn't know each other like this. But, I couldn't take my eyes off him. 

"You're…" I started to say. I wasn't sure how I was going to finish that sentence. The hottest man I've ever seen? A God? 

"Don't."

"Alright. But you are," I said. He shook his head, shaking off my unuttered compliment. 

"Now what?" 

"We get in," I gestured to where the shower flowed into a bathtub. I hadn't really had a game plan when I brought us in here. I'd seen a room with a lock that other people were unlikely to barge into, and I'd seized the opportunity. It wasn't like there was another bed or mattress in here, but I found that didn't put me off. 

I stepped into the tub and looked back at Daryl. Tried not to let my eye line drift too far down, I didn't want to make him self-conscious. 

"You gotta ask," he reminded me.

Goddamn.

"Daryl," I sighed. "Please, will you get in the damn shower with me?" 

"Yes, ma'am," he said. He got in the damn shower with me, coming up behind me as I turned away to adjust the temperature so it wouldn't scold us. I reached behind and pulled his arms around me. He hugged me from behind for a moment, both of us enjoying the novelty of our warm, naked bodies pressed together. I shut my eyes at the feeling of his erection against my lower back. Then his hands started to drift back up to continue what he'd started before, and he whispered, "You like this, huh?" 

It wasn't really a question, but I still said, "Yes," because I didn't want him to stop. 

"Good," he said, and I felt his breath on the back of my neck. "Because I do too. Them little noises you're makin' for me, sweetheart...goddamn."

It was his turn to kiss across my back, my shoulders, I reached up and swept my hair to one side, and he didn't need more of an invitation than that to kiss me there too. All the time Daryl never stopped what he was doing with his hands. Never stopped sending those jolts of pleasure speeding through me, to build and gather in my core.

Daryl was moving slow, taking his time with me. And it wasn't what I was used to, wasn't something I knew I liked, but with him, it was different. He got so much out of it that I got caught up in it too. Too wrapped up in him to feel self-conscious or get in my head about anything. Every shiver, every moan, every whimper, I held none of it back. Because I knew he liked it. And I liked that he liked it. 

Even so, there was only so much I could take before my body was screaming for more. I knew he wouldn't do it if I didn't ask. And I had to ask. The heat that was building me was pressure so intense I thought I'd burst.

"Daryl."

"Mmm?" he murmured into my back, not stopping his slow exploration of my skin. 

"I want you to touch me," I said, taking one of his hands and moving it further down my body, "down here."

He stopped then, raised his head to rest his chin on my shoulder. "You sure?"

"Yes," I said, I could feel myself shaking with anticipation. "I'm really sure. I need you."

"Fuck," he breathed. His lips grazed my ear. "Show me. Show me what you need."

"Right here," I guided his hand to where I needed him between my thighs. Forgetting his own strength, he used a little too much pressure, and I gasped, "Not so hard. Not at first."

"Sorry." His touch immediately lightened, and the contrast made me gasp again. "Better?" 

"Mmm-hmm," I said. It was about all I could get out. But he knew. How could he not? The way my body buckled against his at the lightest stroke. I'd always known Daryl was good with his hands, but I hadn't expected it would translate to this.

"It feels good...," he murmured into my neck before he kissed it. "Touchin' ya like this."

His hand still lightly stroking my clit. They were rough, but he was gentle, and something about the mix of the two made it feel even sweeter. 

"You feel good," I said, my breath hitching in my throat, and I felt him smile against my neck.

I needed more of him. I pushed my hips down harder against his hand, my body begging for some release. Daryl groaned as he felt me do it, "Fuck... I love how much you're enjoying this, Naomi." 

I bit my lip at the way he said my name.

"I need you deeper," I said, reaching down to take control of his hand again. "Is that okay?"

"Hell yeah. Show me what you need, sweetheart, and I'll give it to ya."

"Just-"

"Wait," he said. I paused. Felt a flicker of deep disappointment as he pulled his hand away. "Turn around. I wanna look at ya."

I didn't know if I could bear to have his eyes on me in the way he'd looked at me before. Not like this. The thought of it left me feeling too vulnerable, like something about it was too intimate, although all that was really changing was I'd be aware of him looking at me. But I did turn toward him. Because the thought that he might stop was worse. When I did finally turn, all my worry evaporated under the heat of his gaze.

"There she is," he whispered and I lost every part of me that disliked myself in how much he loved me. Maybe he saw my nerves, or maybe he just wanted to, but either way, Daryl kissed me again. "You ready for me?"

I nodded. One of his hands ran down to the back of my thigh and pulled my leg to his side. I hooked it around his hip and reached down to guide his hand again. "Right here." 

 As he slipped two fingers inside me, I whimpered and Daryl's jaw clenched. "Fuck, you're so pretty when you moan for me..."

I wanted to tell him to shut up but the self-consciousness dissolved in the heat on my tongue. All that came out was a light moan as I let myself adjust to having his fingers inside me, let him explore, let him know when he hit on particular sweet spots. His free hand held me around the waist. The tiles on the wall were freezing cold against the heat of my shoulders as I leaned back against them and surrendered. 

It was easy to do. 

After all my hesitation about turning to face him, I found I couldn't take my eyes off him. The pleasure that flickered across his face every time he created it in me. The fire in his eyes that wouldn't go out, wouldn't be satisfied until I was. 

Daryl paid close attention to every slight change in my body, reading me like a damn book. Doing more of what I liked until I was close and he knew it. The moment he saw it, he eased off. Keeping me on the edge but not allowing me to go over. 

What are you doing? 

I couldn't ask. I was beyond words at this point. The question must have formed and dissolved on my lips a hundred times, but Daryl read it in my eyes. "You're close ain't ya?"

I nodded. Daryl's jaw clenched.

"Will you say my name for me, darlin'?" he asked, his voice thick with desire. "I wanna hear you say it when you cum." 

I nodded again, although I wasn't sure it was a promise I could keep. If I couldn't form a simple question or answer him with a 'yes' I wasn't sure I could make any coherent sound at all. But I nodded because he couldn't keep me here, on the edge like this. Not in this exquisite torture. It wasn't fair.

Daryl stopped holding out on me. Watched me intently, like he was getting as much pleasure out of it as I was. I gripped his shoulder tight as a wave of pleasure built up inside me again. I couldn't let it break. Not without giving him what he wanted, too. I focussed on him, and it almost made things worse. He consumed me, the thought of him became tangled in the feeling inside me, and I knew I'd never be able to feel this way again without thinking about him.

" Daryl ." I managed to say it, and the moment I did, it was like the word itself gave me permission. The pressure finally broke, leaving me in toe-curling, fingernail-digging, screaming pleasure. 

I couldn't see straight. Couldn't hear anything. My knee buckled underneath me, and Daryl caught me, pulled me to him and whispered, "That's it. That's it. I got you."

This is how it is. 

To belong to someone.

As it faded, I sank into him, my head on his chest. Hearing his heartbeat, I wondered if mine would ever return to normal. If my head would ever stop spinning. His arms wrapped tightly around me, and he held me to him while I caught my breath. The warm water from the shower washed over both of us. 

"Lemme get you a towel," he said, gently like I was recovering from something. Which, I guess I kind of was. He reached for one, and I caught his wrist, raised my head from his chest again in time to see him look back at me in confusion. 

"We ain't done," I told him with a smile. It was cute that he thought we were. 

"But I thought you…." For a second, he looked mortified. "Did you not…?"

"I did," I said. He looked confused for a second. It was only when I dropped to my knees in front of him that he caught my meaning.  

"Oh," he said. "You ain't gotta…."

"I know," I assured him. "I want to." 

If he thought I was letting him get out of this shower without showing him the same attention and devotion he'd just given to me, then he didn't know me as well as he thought he did. 

If he wanted that, of course. 

"Can I?" I asked, wrapping a hand around the thick shaft of his cock and looking up at him. "Please? " 

He throbbed in my hand. I saw that jaw tighten again before he let himself say, "Yes."

"Good," I smiled as I kissed the tip and I ran my hand along the length of it, getting used to the feel of him. He watched me do it, desire burning in his eyes. When I wrapped my lips around his cock and took him, dripping, into my mouth, he closed his eyes and titled his head back. Whispered my name like he was praying even though I was the one on my knees. 

I took my time with Daryl. It was only partly revenge for the way he'd left me hanging a few moments ago; it was mostly because I liked it. I enjoyed watching the way his muscles tensed as I slowly took him deeper, my tongue teasing the swollen head. The sounds he couldn't stop himself from making. Looking up at him as droplets of water glistened across his body, and his breathing became erratic. 

Then Daryl looked down at me again, and it was like he couldn't look away. His face slightly flushed he reached down and pushed back some of the wet hair that was sticking to my face so he could get a better look at me. 

"Fuck," he whispered. "You are fucking beautiful. "

And I knew that was what he'd been trying to tell me all day, every time I'd shut him up. But I didn't mind hearing it now. It was the way it slipped right out of him. I don't think he knew he'd said it; it was a thought that had escaped because he was letting that guard down. He was giving in to me in the same way I had to him. 

There was something about him that was still tentative and gentle, a slight strain in his eyes like he was holding something back. His hands kept coming up to my hair, his hips bucking himself ever so slightly deeper into my mouth, and then something caught up with him and he eased of. His hands pressed back against the shower wall, fighting to keep himself from pushing any further. Even now, he was worried about hurting me. I kept my eyes fixed on his as I worked to take every inch of him so that he could see that it was okay. That I was okay. That I wanted this, and I wanted him. He hit the back of my throat and I was rewarded with a, "Fuck, Naomi, that's so good."

I sped up. Choked a little. My hands worked the rest of his cock when my mouth couldn't. Never taking my eyes off him, showing him that I enjoyed it just as much as he did. I knew he wasn't used to being wanted like this, and I wasn't used to wanting someone like this either. I need him for more than my own pleasure. Pleasure was all I wanted to give him and I'd have done anything to give it to him.

He warned me when he was close, but I already knew. I could see it in his eyes, feel it in the way he throbbed in my mouth. I don't know if he was expected me to pull back, but all it did was spur me on to try harder. My name slipped from his lips again, and his whole body shook with the force of it. 

This is how it is. 

When someone belongs to you.  

He sank down to join me on his knees. Kissed me before he'd even caught his breath. Kissed me with such force, it sent me toppling backward, pulling him down on top of me. A tangle of exhausted limbs in the tub. 

"I love you," he said, his breathing still labored. 

"I love you, too," I said, pushing his wet hair away from his face. "Even if we gotta sneak around like a pair of damn teenagers for me to show you how much."

"Think we had more privacy when we were teenagers," he said, and I laughed. "Nobody gave a damn where we were then." 

I wondered, if we hadn't been stuck in survival mode back then, if this would have been how we'd spent our teenage years. As much as I wished we'd done this sooner, I found I was glad that we'd started this at a time we were old enough to appreciate just how damn special our relationship was. How rare it was to find a love like this.

"Did I do okay?" he mumbled into my shoulder. 

"Okay?" I repeated in disbelief, my body was still singing. "You did more than okay, you were perfect."

His face turned beet red but he smiled brighter than the sun and kissed me. 

Neither of us was ready to get out and get back to the real world. So we stayed where we were, coming up for breath between tired, tender kisses. I held him, and was proud of myself for keeping flashbacks at bay and even more proud of him for helping me get there. 

This was how it was meant to be. For me, for him… for us.

"Showers as good as you remember?" he asked. 

"They're way dirtier than I remember," I said. He laughed and leaned against me, his head on my chest, wet hair under my chin. I kissed the top of his head, wrapped my arms and legs around him, and couldn't think of a single moment in my life that had been happier than this one. Even with the cold sides of the tub pressed against me and one of the taps digging into my shoulder, I wouldn't have changed where I was for all the world. 

Daryl

I paced the length of the kitchen, kept glancing at the clock and the door and fretting that the wrong person was going to walk in. I'd told Aaron a thousand times that once she was done talking to the King, he had to keep Naomi busy and far away from this house. It would be just like her to stumble in any way. I'd tried to get the place ready, but I didn't know what we'd need, so I'd wound up taking every damn pot and pan and laying them out on the kitchen countertop. Looked messier and less helpful than when I started. 

Goddamn, I'm already messing this up.

When the door did eventually open, and my stomach lurched in fear, it was only Rick.

"Hey," I said, relieved he'd finally shown up. 

"I brought reinforcements," Rick said, as more voices followed him into the house. My chest felt tight all of a sudden. Carol and Glenn waved at me over his shoulder. All of them grinning like a bunch of fools.

"Aw, hell," I grumbled at him. "What did you have to drag all them into this for?"

"I don't know what you think of me, Daryl," Rick said. "But I don't know how to bake shit. Didn't know before all this, back when we could pick things up from grocery stores, and I sure as hell don't know how to make anything with the things we've got lying around now. Carol, on the other hand, knows what she's doing."

"Yes, I do, and I am happy to help," Carol said brightly, putting a wicker basket of supplies down on the table. She gave me a sarcastic little smile, "And it's good to see you, too, Daryl."

I was still too mad at Rick to feel bad about it. I pointed at Glenn, "And him?"

"Glenn's here to help, too."

"You get good at cooking at Hilltop or something?" I asked. Glenn was good at leading runs and hot-wiring cars, but as far as I knew, he couldn't cook for shit.

"No," he said, "but I am getting pretty good at dating in the apocalypse, so I thought I might be able to help out more in that department."

"You told them what this was about?!" I yelled at Rick. 

"I had to tell them something ," Rick said. "They wouldn't have believed me if I'd just said, ' hey, Daryl's in the mood to do some baking, wanna help?'"

"I still almost didn't believe it," Carol said. "But when Rick said it was for Naomi, it-"

"Alright, get out," I said. At the mention of Naomi's name and the sing-song way Carol had said it, I felt like I'd been stung. Adrenaline shot through me, made my heart beat so hard I thought it might actually explode. "All y'all, get out. I'm calling this whole thing off." 

"Daryl, no," Carol said softly. "Come on, you don't mean that."

"We're only trying to help, man," Rick said. 

"You can help by clearing off," I told him. "Didn't need you getting half of Alexandria up in my damn business."

"Two other people is hardly half of Alexandria," Rick said. I glared at him.

"Well, I did tell Maggie," Glenn admitted. "But it's not like she's going to tell anyone."

"And I might have mentioned it to Zeke," Carol said. "But it's not like he's going to tell anyone."

"She's with Ezekiel right now !" I was about ready to flip a table.

"Oh, he won't tell her," Carol rolled her eyes, her tone like I was some kid throwing a temper tantrum. 

"Out," I told them all, pointing at the door they'd just come in.

"We just want to help, man," Rick said. 

"Yeah," Glenn nodded earnestly. "We're really happy for you, and we want to make sure it goes well. You deserve this."

"Nah," I said. "Get out."

I turned my back to all of them. If they weren't about to get out, then I'd leave. Felt like I was suffocating in that room with all of their stupid dopey grins. 

" Naomi deserves this," Carol said. I stopped by the door, could feel them all pause behind me like they were holding their breath. 

Shit. 

She does. 

I turned on my heels and looked at Carol. "Rick tell you what we're making?"

"Pie, right?" 

"Right," I said. "Banoffee pecan pie."

"There's no way we can do that," Carol said.

"We have to. That's her favorite."

"When was the last time you saw a banana, Daryl?" Rick asked.

"What've bananas got to do with it?"

"That's the 'ban' in 'banoffee'," Carol said. "And there might be some pecan trees out here somewhere, but they are few and far between, so good luck finding them."

"So what's left? 'Offie pie? Ain't ever heard of it."

"Toffee," Carol said, filling in the blank for me. "And no, we can't make that either."

"Then what the hell's the point in all this?" 

"To make something nice for your girlfriend," Carol said. Her tone hadn't changed the whole time. Still bright and calm and cheerful. Still damn annoying. She started laying out the things in her basket. "Isn't that what you want?"

"I want to make her favorite food," I said. "Not… whatever the hell this is for!"

"Peach and apple cobbler," Carol said. 

" Cobbler? You mean it ain't even a goddamn pie?" I yelled although I'd be damned if I'd be able to tell you the difference between the two, and I hoped Carol wouldn't call me out on it. I was just mad that everything I had planned in my head was already falling to shit. Made me want to call the whole thing off. 

"Come on," Carol said, patting the worktop beside her like I hadn't just yelled. "Start cutting these apples for me."

I did it. But only because cutting things up with a big sharp knife released some of the tension building in my brain. Carol got Rick to chip in too, and we worked in the stony silence I'd created.

"You nervous?" Carol asked, when my rage had turned down to a simmer. 

"Pfft, no," I said, but under all the anger I was hurling at them, my stomach was doing summersaults. "Maybe a little."

"That's why I'm here," Glenn said, settling down on a chair and watching the rest of us move around the kitchen. Carol hadn't given him a job to do, and seeing him sit around on his ass while we chopped and boiled and peeled and mixed things was annoying.

"Yeah, and what are you going to do?" I asked. "Tell me to 'just be myself'? I've been 'being myself' the whole time I've known her. Can't hide any of the bad shit away now. She's already seen it."

"Dating's different," Glenn started to say, but Rick interrupted him. He'd been frowning and thinking something so hard he hadn't listened at all. 

"How come Naomi's meeting with the King?" he asked. 

"Talking about Kingdom stuff," I shrugged, although I knew what he was really getting at. "Plans for the future, y'know."

"So, she agreed to your stupid plan already? I have to say, I thought she'd put up more of a fight," Rick said. I didn't say anything right away, but I guess my silence answered for me. "You haven't told her?"

"Nah," I said with a shrug like it was no big deal. "Not yet."

"Told her what?" Glenn asked.

"That he's moving to Sanctuary," Rick replied.

"Temporarily," I reminded him. Couldn't face being in that place forever. 

" Temporarily," Rick agreed, in that reassuring cop-voice. "But still, you gotta tell her, man. She's off making plans with the King."

"I know," I said. "That's exactly what she should be doing."

"We'll be really sorry not to have you guys with us," Carol said, rolling something out under a rolling pin.

"You'll have Naomi and Mia," I said. "You just won't have me. Temporarily."

I didn't know how many ways I could say it before they got it in their damn heads. Even now, Carol raised her eyebrows and smiled a little. "Yeah. Right." 

"You think she won't want to go with you?" Glenn asked.

"I ain't letting her go with me," I said. 

"Not sure that's your choice, Daryl," Carol said. She still hadn't looked up from what she was doing, but there was something cold in her tone now. 

"Sure as hell is my choice," I said. "That place ain't good for her."

"She's a grown woman, and she can decide that for herself," Carol said, and she looked at me this time. That frost in her voice had carried over into her eyes. It shut me up. 

"I thought you went to tell her this morning?" Rick said, still stuck on the same damn topic but saving me from any more of Carol's glare.

"Yeah, I did," I said, and then I avoided his eyes too when I remembered why I hadn't been able to tell Naomi that morning. When she'd flown into my arms and kissed me like that… everything else had flown right out of my head. 

"What happened?" Rick asked. "Couldn't find her?"

"Just… wasn't the right time," I said because I was too flustered to think of a good enough lie.

"Bullshit."

"Something came up, okay?" I said, praying he'd drop it.

"What?" 

"Just… stuff," I snapped.

"Oh. Oh," Glenn's eyes brightened as he was the first to realize. "I know what that means."

"Shut up," I warned him. 

"Which reminds me…." Glenn said as if I hadn't spoken. "I don't know if you guys have your own supply, but I brought you these."

He held up a plastic carrier bag and passed it to me. It was lighter than I expected. I opened it up and took a peek at the foil wrappers glinting inside. Took me a beat to work out what they were. Condoms. I threw the bag back at him like it had bit me. "What the hell?!"

"What?" Glenn jumped when the bag came swinging back at him. "Maggie's already pregnant, so we don't really need them right now, I thought-"

"That ain't none of your damn business," I snapped. 

"Hey, I'm sorry, man," Glenn raised his hands in peace. "I was only trying to help." 

"Well, no one asked you, so butt out, " I yelled. 

"Okay, sorry," Glenn said. He shrank away from me.

"Alright, we're ready," Carol said, holding up the raw cobbler in its tin. "You wanna open up the oven for me, Daryl?"

"Sure," I said, feeling terrible about the sour mood I'd created. I opened the oven door, Carol slid the cobbler in, and then I let it shut. The door slammed more than I meant it to. 

I didn't know how to fix things. Glenn was staring miserably at the table. Rick wouldn't look at me. Carol had busied herself tidying things away. They'd been trying to help me, but all I'd done was yell at them.

I cleared my throat. "Naomi and I… we haven't actually…not the whole way... yet."

It was fragments of nothing, but Glenn got my meaning from it anyway and lifted his eyes to look at me. "Really?"

I could see his surprise in his eyes, and feel it from the rest of them, too. Something about the way we were always swearing and yelling and getting in fights made people think that would translate into us going at it like rabbits all the time from the second we'd first kissed. They had no idea how long we'd been waiting. 

How long I'd been waiting. 

Worth it, though. 

Wouldn't have changed a damn thing.  

"I don't wanna rush her," I said. "I just wanted to do something nice for her. Spend time with her. I don't want her thinking that's what all of this is for, because it ain't like that." 

"I get it, man," Glenn said. "I didn't mean to assume anything." 

"I freaked, and I'm sorry I yelled," I said. "I just want this to be perfect."

"It will be," Glenn said, always the first to forgive. "You'd be amazed what just some time away from the group will do."

I thought about Naomi in the shower that morning, and he was right, I was still amazed by it. Rick cleared his throat. I braced myself for another awkward question, but when I looked at him he had this soft, far-off look in his eyes. 

"When Michonne and I went on a run, just the two of us," he said. "Spent a few days out there scavenging different places for food… Even though we were in the middle of a fight with the Saviors, even though we were facing Walkers out there, and knew people would starve if we didn't get enough… Being out there, just me and her… was the best romantic getaway I've ever been on."

"Oh, yeah?" I said, but I wasn't convinced. 

In my head, the people Naomi had dated before me had been able to take her on all these crazy good dates. I don't even mean just the best restaurants or fancy plays or theater trips. I mean helicopter rides over the city, and spa trips, and buying her jewelry pretty enough for a Princess. Because that's how anyone lucky enough to date her should've treated her. And how could I compete with that? 

It was all fine and well for Rick to say his trip with Michonne had been the best romantic break he'd ever been on, but he'd been able to take Lori on them before the dead started walking. Even before all of this, I'd never have been able to offer Naomi much more than I could now. 

I sank down onto a chair, head in my hands. The smell of cooking cobbler filled the kitchen, but even that didn't cheer me up. It should be her favorite. It should be perfect. 

"So banoffee pecan pie, huh?" Rick said. "That's a pretty specific favorite." 

"She worked in this diner when we were kids," I said. "They served it there. If there were leftovers, she'd always bring us a slice."

"One slice?" Glenn asked. "For both of you." 

"Sometimes that's all there was left," I said. "Sometimes we'd get lucky, and there'd be two pieces of pie - sometimes different flavors, sometimes the same. Sometimes we'd get a whole meal if something got burnt or they accidentally made too much. But that pie was always her favorite. If she was working and I went in to see her, she'd stop by my table and give me a running update on how much was left before closing. Next day, she'd carry it to school like she'd won some kinda prize, no matter how small the leftover piece was."

"She brought it to school?" Rick asked. "Didn't eat it when she got in from her shift?"

"No," I said. 

"And she'd always share it with you?" Glenn asked. "No matter how small the leftover piece was?"

"Yeah," I said, feeling a little defensive and wondering if it was because they clearly hadn't been listening to a damn word I'd said. "That's how we did things back then. We didn't have a lot, didn't always know where our next meal was coming from. If she was working and I went to see her, she could sometimes get away with slipping me some free food, and I brought her half of anything I hunted. We shared." 

"But still," Carol said. "Any time she got the tiniest piece of her favorite dessert, she'd save it until you could eat half?"

"Yeah."

"Sounds like what she liked most was spending time with you," Carol said. "If the pie was that important to her, she'd have kept it to herself." 

"Your date's gonna be fine, man," Rick said, a hand on my shoulder and laughter in his eyes. And for the first time that day, I believed it. 

 

Chapter 50: It's a date, dummy

Naomi

Aaron was waiting for me at the gates. I was surprised to see him there with a car already; I'd thought I was going to be early. He smiled when he saw me coming, a little wider than he usually did. He said something into a walkie, but I didn't think much of it other than he was probably letting whoever was on the gates know we were coming.

Jeez, he must be real excited for this run.

"You ready to go?" he asked as I approached.

"Yeah," I shrugged. It felt like a dumb question. I had a gun and my knives. What the hell else was he expecting me to bring? The way Aaron was scrutinizing me, with a slight frown on his face made me panic that I'd forgotten something.

"You don't want to run a brush through your hair first?" he asked, which was the dumbest question I'd heard and should have been my first clue that this run wasn't all it appeared to be.

"Think the Walkers are gonna mind if my hair's messed up?" I said, making my way toward the car. Aaron hesitated like he was on the brink of telling me something. I stared at him. Given that he'd been so early, you'd have thought he'd have been eager to get going. "C'mon, let's go."

"Alright," he said, a slight note of hesitation in his voice, "but I'm driving."

"Yeah," I said, wondering if Aaron was feeling alright. "You're the only one who knows where we're going."

"Right, yeah, of course," Aaron said, looking like he'd only just thought of it.

"You okay, weirdo?" I asked, climbing into the passenger seat.

"Yeah, I'm fine," Aaron said, with a genuinely convincing smile. He shut the door behind him and started driving.

Eugene was at the gates. Aaron leaned out of the window to get his attention, and Eugene opened them up to let us through. I wondered what had happened in the time between Aaron radioing and us arriving that had made him forget we were coming. Because Eugene was acting like he had no idea why we were there.

Unless that wasn't who he was talking to.

I glanced over at Aaron, who was staring at the road ahead. Now, while that is what you want from someone driving the car you're in, something about the intensity of it made things feel...off. It was the way someone fixates on something when they're doing their best to ignore you.

No, that's crazy.

To shake the feeling, I turned my own attention to the windshield. The first thing I noticed was how the sun had dipped into the lower third of the sky. It almost touched the top of the forest and had faded from the bright white of afternoon to the orange-tint of the evening.

"You sure it ain't a bit late to be going on a run?" I asked. I'd been so busy all day, it hadn't struck me how weird it was to be leaving at this time. "It'll be dark soon."

"No," Aaron said and didn't offer much more of a counterargument than that. He still wouldn't look at me. I squinted at the low-hanging sun again. It couldn't be that far from sunset.

"You sure?" I pressed. "We can go tomorrow. It ain't urgent, right?"

"No," he said again. There was a slight edge to his voice now. "This is the right time to go."

"Okay," I said, but a pit of worry was opening up in my gut. If this had been anyone other than Aaron, I might've leaped from the moving car.

"So, this pharmacy…," I said.

"Yeah?" Aaron kept his eyes on the road but shifted uncomfortably in his seat.

"Where is it exactly?" I pressed for more information, trying and failing to sound casual as I did so.

"Another part of town," he said. "Not sure you'd know it."

"But the pharmacy doesn't show up on any of our maps?" I said. After using the last of the antibiotics when our first fight with the Saviors left me with an infection, I'd been desperate to find any pharmacy within traveling distance of Alexandria. So how had I missed one that was so close?

"No," Aaron said like he wanted that to be the end of it. He chanced a glance at me, saw the hesitant look on my face, shrugged, and said, "Maybe it was new. Built after the maps were made."

"Maybe," I said. "But-"

Those maps were new too.

Most of them had Alexandria on them, which hadn't even finished being built before the world ended. Aaron sighed, shook his head as he looked back at the road, and muttered, "You're making this so difficult."

My heart fluttered at the first sign of confirmation that I was right. Something was up. "Making what difficult?"

"You trust me, right?" Aaron said, which was not a comforting answer.

"Aaron," I said, fighting to keep my voice level. "Are you kidnapping me?"

"Do you trust me?" he asked again. Again, it was not reassuring.

"Yes…?" I said, but it came out as more of a question than an answer.

"Then close your mouth and turn your brain off," he said. "Please."

Unfortunately for both of us, turning my brain off wasn't something I had ever been able to do. I gripped the seat underneath me, digging my nails into it to stop myself from following through on jumping out of the car. Now I was the one staring resolutely out of the window, memorizing the route he was taking so I'd be able to make my way back if it turned out that Aaron had lost it. Still, he said nothing.

Is he mad at me?

Did I do something wrong?

I turned over every conversation we'd had recently. Everything I might have said that could've pissed Aaron off. By the time we got close to a town I knew, I'd convinced myself that I had accidentally said something unforgivable, and he was driving me out into the middle of nowhere to yell at me for it.

I knew the town we were close to but Aaron took an exit I hadn't been down before. As we drove through, I took a close look at every building we passed. I didn't recognize any of them. At least Aaron hadn't been lying about that.

"Hey, you were right; I don't think I have been to this part of town before," I said, although sometimes it was hard to know which buildings were unfamiliar and which had just gotten overgrown since you'd last seen them. "Where's this pharmacy?"

Aaron didn't say anything. At first, I thought he was pausing because he'd forgotten the way. But an answer never came. As he turned the car down another street, I looked at him, searching his face for any sign of why he was acting so weird. Finally, Aaron brought the car to a stop. When he shifted in his seat to look at me, his eyes were a little brighter than usual.

"I wish Eric was here to see this," he said, more to himself than me.

"What?" I turned right around in my seat to face him. Is that what this was about? Some kind of grief-induced breakdown?

"I packed you some things," Aaron said, reaching into the backseat to pull up a backpack that had been tucked between the seat and floor. I didn't take it, but it was heavy when he dropped it into my lap. Why would I need a bag of supplies if we were meant to be heading back to Alexandria together? Was he leaving me here?

"Are you banishing me from Alexandria?" My worst-case scenario fell out of my mouth before I could screen it. Before I could think about how he couldn't banish me without separating me from Mia and anyone who tried to do that was a dead man walking. "Have I done something? Said something? Aaron, I'm so sorry."

"What?" Aaron laughed. "No. I'm not banishing you from Alexandria."

"Then... what?" I felt relaxed enough to peek into the bag and saw a bottle of what looked like some of the wine he and Eric used to save for special occasions. "Is this wine? Wait… did you make a Molotov cocktail or something? Because I don't think we should be throwing that into a pharmacy."

"You deserve this," Aaron said before I could take a look at whatever else he'd put in that bag. He said it nicely, but while I was still panicking about being abandoned somewhere I didn't recognize, it sounded very ominous.

"Aaron," I said firmly, trying to snap him out of whatever the hell this was. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah," he smiled at me and then nodded to the window behind me. "Look."

I turned around and saw a figure leaning up against a wall outside the car. Hands behind his back. Blue eyes staring intensely through the window.

"Is that Daryl?" I said, hardly believing my eyes. Maybe I was the one having some kind of breakdown. I hadn't been able to find him all day, and now we bumped into each other all the way out here? What were the chances of that? I opened the door and climbed out, expecting Aaron to follow and be as surprised as I was. "The Hell are you doing out here? Aaron and I were going to-"

The engine rumbled back into life behind me. Tires crunched.

What the fuck is going on?

I turned in time to see Aaron take off, leaving me standing there with only the bag he'd handed me.

He is leaving me here.

"What the hell?" I yelled after him, waving to try and get his attention. "Aaron, wait! What the fuck?"

I was about ready to start chasing him down, but Daryl put a hand on my arm. "Naomi. It's fine."

"No, Daryl, it ain't," I said, "he's been acting real weird on the way over here, and now he's driven off? For fuck's sake, he's my ride home!"

I knew Daryl wouldn't leave me stranded out here, but that wasn't really the point.

"It's fine," Daryl said again. "I asked him to."

"What?" I dropped my arm and looked at him. Noticed for the first time that he looked a little… different. There was a tension in his eyes and his half-clenched jaw. Was he scared of something? I tried to make light of it because anything that had Daryl scared should have terrified anyone. "Did you ask Aaron to kidnap me?"

"Something like that," he said, and he managed a small smile, but the moment I smiled back, he looked away and down at his toes. It was only then that I noticed how pink the tips of his ears were. Nervous. He was nervous.

"Daryl, what's going on?" I demanded. My own nerves were too fried to deal with this shit.

"It's a date, dummy," he said with a shrug of his shoulder. My heart thumped so loud I was sure I'd missed the end of his sentence.

"It's a…?"

"Here," he pulled his other hand out from behind his back, the stems of a bunch of wildflowers clutched in a tight fist.

"What am I supposed to do with…?" I only realized as my own hand closed around them that I wasn't supposed to do anything with them; they were just for me. He'd picked them for me, and suddenly they were the prettiest bunch of flowers I'd ever seen in my entire life. My breath caught in my throat. "Oh. Thank you, Daryl."

"S'okay," he shrugged and looked away from me. I didn't know what else to say. Couldn't remember ever having been given flowers before, so I had no idea how to react. It was so sweet that it made my heart ache, but Daryl's difficult to compliment. Even harder to thank.

"C'mon," he said and started walking up the street. Still reeling, I followed him. He was walking fast and saying nothing. I had to rush to keep up, and piece a lot together for myself.

We seemed to be heading for a row of buildings. It could have been some old storefronts. Daryl's bike was parked up outside one of them. Attached to it was a makeshift sidecar we usually used if we were going on a supply run. A set of sharpened poles was set up as a defensive perimeter around the building, marking it as different from the others on the street left to fend for themselves. It was also the only one whose windows had been covered with old newspaper to stop Walkers from being attracted to any light or movement inside. Was there someone living there? Or was this where Daryl was taking me? Then my eye caught a sign above the door.

"Oh my God," I said, stopping where I was and grabbing Daryl by the arm so that he had to stop too. "Is that… is that bookstore?"

"Yup."

"Holy shit, no way!" I said. "Do you think there's anything left?"

"Hasn't been touched," Daryl said, with a confidence that made it clear that he'd been in there. He'd been the one to block the windows.

"Are you serious?" I asked, picking up the pace to get in there as quickly as possible. "Nobody's raided it yet? How's that even possible?"

Daryl shook his head and muttered, "Ain't nobody but you looking to raid a bookstore in the apocalypse."

I nudged his arm, my stomach fluttered. "You taking me on a bookstore date?"

"Sure am," he said. And for the first time, his smile wasn't so nervous. "And you can pick out whatever you want. My treat."

"Daryl…" For the second time in as many minutes, I didn't know what to say. What had I done to deserve someone so sweet? So thoughtful?

"Obviously, I don't mean buying them," Daryl said quickly, and I realized I'd been quiet for too long. Nerves and doubts were creeping back into him, but I was still trying to catch my breath. "I just mean as many as you can fit in the sidecar. I dunno why I said it was my treat. That was dumb. I just-"

"I got ya," I tried to reassure him, but he was still powering ahead. He pulled open the bookstore door and held it so I could walk in ahead of him.

He was right, the place had been completely untouched, with full shelves and neatly arranged displays like the owners would be back to open up any second. Plumped-up bean bag chairs in the kids' section set up like there was about to be some kind of storytime. It was almost like stepping back in time, and that's how I could tell it hadn't been untouched. Daryl had been here and secured the place from Walkers. Cobwebs, which should have been cordoning off every aisle between bookcases, were nowhere to be seen, and flowers like the ones he'd given me lay across some of the shelves. On others, candles sat in little glass jars so we'd be able to move around here when the sun set.

It was so damn pretty.

This must've taken him ages.

I had to stop to take it all in. I set the bag Aaron had given me down on the countertop next to the old cash register. This was hands down the sweetest thing anyone had ever done for me. I couldn't wrap my head around it. Someone being this good to me, it didn't make sense. The fluttering in my stomach had turned into a gentle ache in my chest. If I didn't get my shit together, I knew it would overwhelm me. I tried to focus on something else. Found myself staring at the books around me without taking in a single title.

"Go on," Daryl encouraged me. "Take a look around."

He let me browse the shelves for a bit, but I couldn't really relax into it. I must've dragged him around bookstores more times than either of us could count, and I'd never found it this stressful. Because this time, it was a date, and what the hell could he be getting out of this?

This wasn't really his thing, and I couldn't stop thinking about how boring this must be for him. He kept flitting in and out of my peripheral vision. Disappearing and reappearing like he was checking in on me. It made me jump every time. Even when I couldn't see him, I felt like he was watching and on-edge about whether or not I was having a good time.

I was so busy trying to look like I was having a good time that I couldn't tell whether or not that was true. I should be. It had been so long since I'd seen shelves like these. Been surrounded by the smell of books and… something else. My stomach rumbled.

I looked up. Caught Daryl loitering at the end of the aisle that I was halfway down. "What's that smell?"

"Venison," he said. "Caught a deer for dinner. Aaron's taken the rest of it back for everyone else."

"Dinner here?" I said. "What about-"

"The girls?" Daryl pre-empted me. "Glenn and Maggie are taking care of 'em. Think they want the practice before their little one comes… although, it'll be a while before they have a teenager."

Holy shit, he's thought of everything.

"So, we're staying…?"

"Yeah, if you want to," he said. "No pressure, though, if you wanna go back."

"No, that sounds nice."

"I thought we could eat up on the roof. There's a kinda garden area up there, so I took a table up from down here," Daryl said, and I had to shut my eyes for a moment. I could feel myself welling up. "'Course it's all overgrown and shit, and I ain't no gardener, but I tried-"

I couldn't hear anything else. I felt like my heart was close to bursting. "Daryl, can you slow down a minute?"

"Er, yeah. You okay?"

No?

Yes?

I looked down at the flowers still clutched in one of my hands. "I should probably put these in water, right?"

"Is that what people do?" Daryl asked, outing himself as someone who'd never given anyone else flowers before.

"Think so," I shrugged, outing myself as someone who'd never been given them.

"Right," he said and disappeared again. This time, I followed him back into the main part of the shop in time to see him vault over the counter and open a door right behind it that I hadn't noticed.

Aaron's backpack was still sitting on the counter, and I remembered there was wine in there. Maybe this would get easier if we were a little less… sober.

Can't believe Aaron let me fret myself silly in the car, and he was in on this the whole time.

"Hey, while you're in there…." I called to Daryl, opening up the backpack. I almost laughed out loud when the first thing I saw in there was a hairbrush.

"Yeah?"

"Aaron sent us some wine," I said, pulling the bottle out of the bag and setting it down on the counter. "If...y'know. You wanna…"

"Right," he called back.

I peeked at what else was in the backpack. There was a change of clothes and some kind of box tucked at the bottom. I pulled it out, and shock almost made it fly out of my hands again. Condoms.

Fuck's sake, Aaron.

The door swung open, and Daryl's head peeked around the side. I stuffed the box back into the backpack and hoped the expression on my face resembled normal.

"Only got mugs," Daryl said, clutching three of them. "That okay?"

"Fine by me," I shrugged. He slid one across the counter to me, and I could see that it was half-filled with water.

"Here," he said. "For the… y'know."

Oh. The flowers.

Thanks to Aaron, I'd already forgotten I was even holding them. I dropped the stems into the mug. It was a little shallow, but it would keep them alive until I found something else. I was already worried about the day they wilted, and I'd have to throw them out. I wondered if there were any books here heavy enough for me to press the flowers between and preserve them forever.

Daryl gave me a nervous, tight smile, "You hungry?"

"Yeah," I said, although I was too nervous to know if that was true.

"C'mon," he said, motioning for me to join him on the other side of the counter. I climbed over it, picking up the bottle of wine and my mug of flowers when I reached the other side. Daryl carried the empty mugs over to a window, which he slid open to reveal a fire escape. He climbed up without another word. I watched his shoes disappear up the black metal staircase before I stuck my head out of the window and looked up after him. I wasn't sure how much more of this I could take. I swung my legs over the windowsill and followed him up. The smell of cooking meat got stronger.

The rooftop was covered in green. An overgrown garden cleared just enough to make room for a table and two chairs. At the center of the roof, there was a crackle and a gentle orange glow. A fire in a barrel with a makeshift grill set over the top of it. Daryl was already there, turning the meat with a set of tongs.

From here, you could see over the rooftops of what had once been a town, and in the distance was the dense forest that led back to Alexandria. It would be sunset soon, and everything would be awash in orange and red. And then it would fade, but we'd have the stars and the light from the fire pit.

I couldn't hold it together anymore. I squeezed my eyes tight shut against the wave of tears threatening to spill over.

"Shit," I heard the clatter of Daryl dropping something. "Are you crying? Shit. I'm really fucking this up."

"No. No," I said, quickly opening my eyes again, but when I did, everything was blurry.

"Shit," Daryl said again. "What did I do?"

"It's just so nice." I hated how small and squeaky my voice came out.

Nice.

It wasn't nearly the right word for how much this meant to me. But my brain was scrambled, and I couldn't find another one.

"You're crying because it's nice?"

"I'm trying not to cry because it's nice."

"That don't make sense."

"I know." I set the mug of flowers down on the table and tried to think of something better to say than 'It's just so nice.' But that meant thinking about exactly how perfect this was, which made me well up all over again. So neither of us said anything else, and Daryl returned to the grill. I sat down while he plated things up. Venison steak and veggies from the gardens we'd been planting in Alexandria.

"Eat," he dropped a plate down in front of me before throwing himself down into the seat opposite me. My heart sank. Monosyllabic. That was where we were at now. This was bad. When Daryl's nervous, hell when he feels anything he doesn't want to feel, he shuts down and says nothing. My crying, or almost-crying, had pushed him from tight-lipped to silent.

I pushed food around my plate and tried to think of something to say. Anything to make this better. I took a breath. "Hey, Daryl?"

"Yeah?" he glanced up from his food.

"I'm kinda nervous," I said, and the moment I said it out loud, I felt better. Daryl stopped, fork halfway to his mouth. Looked at me like I was trying to trick him.

"For real?"

"Yeah."

"Me too," he said, and I saw the same tension leave him when he admitted it.

No shit.

"You wanna take a minute?" I asked. Daryl didn't say anything, but he did set his fork back down. Stared at it on his plate and didn't look at me for a moment. I watched him, my heart beating in the back of my throat.

"Think it's a bad thing?" he asked eventually.

"What?"

"That it's so...weird," he said. Then, a quick glance up at me and then back down.

"No," I said.

"No?" he said. "Don't think it should be easier… y'know, if it's meant to be, then we would be more…."

"No," I cut across him. I'd never been one for fate or thinking anything was meant to be. I shuddered, thinking about how much potential had been squandered by people waiting for Fate to get its shit together. "I think we're on a first date, and it's totally normal to be nervous on a first date."

"Yeah, I guess," he said but frowned like he wasn't totally buying it. "But it ain't like we don't know each other. Known you pretty much my whole life. You've already seen the worst of me. Already kissed you. Already told you I love you."

"We ain't gone on a date with each other before, though," I said. "It's different."

"Yeah," Daryl let out a heavy sigh. "I guess we kinda did everything backward, huh?"

"A little," I said. "But it ain't a bad thing."

"No?"

"No," I said. "First dates are always awkward and weird. You try to hide all the bad bits of yourself. But, like you said, it ain't like we don't know each other. We already know the absolute worst things about each other, and we still wanna do this, so….that should take the pressure off."

"Yeah," he agreed. "That's what I'm saying."

So why does it feel worse?

I hated this silence between us. Didn't think it would ever break, and then Daryl said, "Thought it would be easier for you at least. You've done this kinda thing before. I gotta compete with all the fancy dinners and the aquariums and the helicopters."

"Helicopters?" I repeated. Just when I thought we were getting on the same page, it looked like Daryl was reading from a whole different book.

"Yeah, you know those ones that take you sightseeing over a city," he said. "Don't people do that kinda thing?"

"Millionaires, maybe," I said.

"You ain't dated none of those?"

"No, funnily enough, I ain't."

"Should've," he muttered, stabbing angrily at his steak again. At least he was eating again. I watched him, with no idea how to walk this evening back to something that resembled normal. Daryl had clearly wound himself up all day about this, and now he was a coiled spring. "Just think this would be easier to do if I cared less. If you weren't already the most important person in my life, y'know."

Don't cry again, don't cry again.

"If you cared less, we wouldn't be here," I said because I couldn't focus on the nice thing he'd said. All I could do was remind him why casual dating wasn't his thing, so he'd stop fretting about this being wrong.

Then he sat back and said, "You really think you'd have ended up with a guy like me if the world hadn't ended?"

There was a real heaviness in his eyes that weighed on me when I saw it. I leaned forward, took his hand across the table. "No. I wouldn't have ended up with a guy like you. I'd have ended up with you, dumbass."

"You really think that?"

"Don't you?"

"I think you should've been with a prince or one of them Nobel Prize-winning scientists guys or something."

"That's dumb."

"No dumber than you being with me."

"Daryl, I loved you before I even knew what love was, and I know I wasn't the quickest when it came to realizing that," I said, "but even if we were eighty and sitting next to each other in rocking chairs on some porch somewhere, I gotta believe I'd have worked it out sometime."

Daryl smiled at that. It was small, but it was something. "That sounds kinda nice, actually."

"Yeah. It does," I said. I could see it, the two of us growing old together. I thought it would scare me, but it didn't. What frightened me at this moment was Daryl withdrawing again. I couldn't let that happen. I stood up. "You wanna know what a real first date's like?"

"What?" he said, which wasn't a 'yes,' but I was too caught up in the idea to slow down. "Wait here."

"Where you going?"

"I'm going to go away and come back again like we don't really know each other, but we got mutual friends who set us up on a date. Okay?"

"Are you serious?"

"As a heart attack."

"This is dumb, Naomi," he said, but he was already so distracted by how idiotic he thought my idea was that he'd stopped looking so nervous. This would work. I knew it.

"You better change that attitude, mister," I warned him. "Or you'll wind up making a terrible first impression."

I backed away until I was out of sight in the overgrown jungle of this former rooftop garden. I took a few deep breaths, trying to get the nerves out of my system before going back out there. All I wanted was for Daryl to have a good time. He deserved it. He deserved the whole damn world.

I stepped back out again and could see him shaking his head at me. But there was a smile on his face and light back in his eyes.

"Hi, it's Daryl, right?" I said, and sticking my hand out to shake his like I would've for anyone I was meeting for the first time. He looked like he was seconds from laughing or calling me a dumbass. But he still stood up and shook my hand. His palms were sweaty, nerves still seeping through. When he didn't say anything else, I added. "I'm Naomi."

"Uh, yeah," he cleared his throat. "I know."

We sat down again. I let it be silent for a minute, let the awkwardness settle right into both of us, for an extra layer of realism. It also gave me the chance to take my first bite of food. I had to actively fight myself, so I didn't start babbling about how well he'd cooked it.

"Nice place," I said.

"Oh. Yeah," Daryl agreed. He'd never been great at small talk. Never liked it.

"So, Daryl," I said, taking a sip of wine. "Tell me about yourself. Where'd you grow up?"

"Right next to you, dumbass," he muttered. I raised my eyebrows disapprovingly and fixed him with a stern stare. I didn't say anything, just waited until he was uncomfortable enough to play along. He rolled his eyes, leaned forward on his elbows, and said, "Small place outside Atlanta."

"Oh, really? Same here." I said. Daryl raised his eyebrows like he wanted to say No shit, but he held it back. As a reward, I didn't let the silence sit anymore. "I moved around a lot when I was little, actually. But we settled in a little place close to Atlanta when I was about seven."

"Why'd you settle there?" Daryl asked, and I couldn't tell if he was playing along or if he was asking because it had never occurred to him before.

"I don't really know," I said, honestly. "I think for a while, I kept expecting us to move, and then when we didn't, I was so happy to be staying in one place that I didn't want to ask. In case it reminded Momma that we had to go."

"And you didn't want to?"

"No," I said. "By that point, I had friends."

"Friends, huh?" Daryl narrowed his eyes, and I knew it was the plural he was questioning.

"Yup," I nodded.

"So you're straight-up lying on first dates?"

"Only a little," I said. "Think I want some stranger knowing I had one friend I'd spend all day trapping squirrels with? No. I'm trying to appear normal."

"But you ain't normal."

"But you don't know that," I reminded him. "You're a stranger right now."

"You're the strange one," he muttered. But this was working. His shoulders were relaxed, he was back to speaking in complete sentences, and he could look at me without immediately looking away again.

"What about you," I said like the last few seconds of conversation hadn't happened, "you move around at all?"

"Georgia born and raised," he said. "Stayed in pretty much the same place my whole life until I moved to Atlanta with my brother."

Brother.

It threw me for a moment. I hadn't expected Daryl to bring up Merle. At least, unlike on an actual first date, I knew Merle was gone and was less likely to say something that would put my foot in it. Maybe that's why he'd brought up Merle, to test how committed I was to keeping up this charade. For a moment, I almost faltered, but then I thought about how reluctant he always was to talk about his time with Merle, and I started seeing it as an opportunity to ask something I otherwise might not have been able to.

"Were you happy living with your brother?"

Daryl rolled his eyes, "C'mon, you know we were drifting around selling gear."

"Okay, see, that ain't the kind of thing you should be saying," I wiggled my fork disapprovingly at him.

"What? That I lived with my brother?"

"No," I said. "About shifting gear for him. I've known you for five minutes, and you wanna bring that up? Big red flag, I'm walking outta here and leaving you with the check."

"Alright," he said, admitting defeat. "Then I was… working for my brother's business."

"Now you're getting it," I grinned at him. He rolled his eyes again, but that playful little smile was back. I gave it a moment and then said, "Stressful working with family?"

"Hell yeah… I mean…" Daryl cleared his throat. Sat up straighter. "Yes, it had its moments."

A guarded yet straightforward answer. He was getting the hang of this. I took another bite before I asked again, "But, overall, were you happy?"

He genuinely considered it this time. "I was happy to spend time with my brother. He weren't always around when I was a kid. But, I missed my home."

Home.

He held my gaze for a moment, and I knew he didn't mean his Daddy's house. He meant me. I nodded to show him I understood. To cover that I had no idea how to respond to that, I took another bite. I was about ready to drop the act, for real this time. But then Daryl leaned back in his chair, and I could tell he was about to say something else. So, I waited.

"Where'd you go to school?"

"Georgia State."

"Were you happy there?"

Ah.

So that's where he was going with this.

"Most of the time," I said, after some consideration. "But, I missed home."

Again, I didn't mean my Momma's place. And Daryl nodded to let me know he got what I meant. It made me feel nervous all over again, and I realized I'd started leaning toward him again. Had he done that deliberately? Sneaking hidden meanings in what was meant to be small talk wasn't part of the game and felt like cheating. And I wasn't about to let him off the hook so easy.

"What else can you tell me about yourself, Daryl?" I asked, shifting back into stranger-mode.

"What else do you wanna know?"

"Hobbies? Interests?"

"Er… hunting, I guess? Fishing?" Daryl looked worried for a moment. "God, I don't do much."

"Favorite movie? Color?"

"Favorite color?" Daryl almost spat his food back out at me. "People really give a shit about that?"

"Sometimes," I shrugged. "Guess it's just something to fill the silence when you don't know someone."

"Aw hell," he muttered and trailed off like he was thinking about it. Eyebrows all knotted together like choosing a favorite color was the most difficult thing he'd ever been asked. Then he looked down at my plate and got distracted by something. "Hey, why are you eating like that?"

"Like what?"

"Slow," he said. "And cutting it up all neat. I ain't ever seen you eat like that. You don't like it or something?"

"No, it's delicious," I said. "But I don't want you to see me stuffing my face like a damn pig. It's called table manners."

"That's dumb."

"That's a first date," I said with a shrug.

"Okay, okay, you win. This is terrible. It's better that I already know ya," Daryl said. "Wouldn't change it for nothing."

"Good," I said. "Hey, we can call this our one-thousandth date if that helps. Probably hung out with each other more times than that."

"It does a bit," Daryl said. This time, when the silence settled down around us, it was the comfortable one I was used to. Daryl looked a hell of a lot more relaxed now than he had at the start of the night. He smiled at me across the table, and I smiled back.

"Hey, for real, what is your favorite color?" I asked. "Don't think I know."

"Shut up," he said and chucked a bean at me from his plate. It bounced off my forehead and landed on the table. I picked it up and threw it back at him. He caught it in his mouth, and I cheered like he'd scored a touchdown at the Superbowl. Daryl gave a modest little half-bow. "So, how'd I do? Fake first date-wise?"

"Let's just say you're lucky you're so handsome."

Handsome.

The word floated in the air between us, lifting a smile from Daryl's mouth. "Handsome, huh?"

"Yup," I said. My cheeks were getting a little red, but I didn't care because I could feel my own smile covering it. I leaned over and topped up both of our mugs with more of Aaron's wine.

"I'm sorry I was weird," he said. "Hope I didn't mess it up too bad."

"You didn't," I said. My plate was clear, so I sat back in my chair, cradling the mug and looking out at the setting sun. "This is beautiful. Sorry I made it weird by almost crying. This is the sweetest thing anyone has ever done for me, and I don't know what I did to get this lucky."

"I just wanna give you the kinda night you deserve," he said quietly.

"You more than succeeded," I said. "This is way more than I deserve. Way more than anyone deserves."

"Nah, it ain't even close," he said. I heard the creak of his chair as he leaned forward, and I looked back to find him reaching across the table for me. I took his hands but knew immediately that it wasn't enough. Now that we were done eating, it felt dumb that there was a whole table between us.

I moved over to his side of the table so I could kiss him properly. He pulled me onto his lap and wrapped me up tight in his arms. I could taste the wine on his tongue, smell the woodsmoke he'd been cooking over on his clothes. I knew I'd never find words strong enough to tell him how much I loved him for doing this or how much I loved him altogether. So I tried to put it all in a kiss and hoped he'd feel it.

We looked at each other for a moment. The orangey glow of sunset softened his features. His hands brushed against the side of my face. "You want some dessert?"

"Daryl!" I gasped, my gut twisting at the shock of him using such a crude euphemism. He shook his head like he was disappointed in me.

"Get your mind outta the gutter! I don't mean it like that," he said. "I mean a real dessert. I made cobbler."

"You made cobbler?"

"Apple and peach," he nodded.

"Fuck off, no you didn't!"

"Did too," he said. "Get off a sec."

"Fine." I reluctantly slid off. I didn't want to leave the warmth of his lap. Especially if this was some kind of weird joke and I wasn't going to get any cobbler at the end of it.

"Wait here," Daryl said, and he disappeared back down the fire escape again. When he came back up, he was carrying a wicker basket. I was pretty sure I recognized it as Carol's, and now the cobbler started to make a hell of a lot more sense. Daryl put the whole basket down in front of me. That nervous energy was bubbling back.

"Go on," he said. "Take a look."

I lifted the lid. Sure enough, a cobbler that looked good enough to be store-bought was sitting inside.

"Holy shit, Daryl," I breathed. "I can't believe you did this."

"Told ya," he said. I reached in to get it out. A glint at the bottom of the basket caught my eye like something shiny was lining it. I handed the cobbler to Daryl and glanced back down at the empty basket. The glint was still there, and without the cobbler blocking it, it only took me a moment to work out what it was. I laughed out loud. More condoms.

Aaron's really covering all his bases.

How'd he get them in here?

"Hey, Daryl," I picked one of the packets up and turned to where he was heating the cobbler over the fire pit. "You sure this was the only kinda dessert you had in mind?"

Daryl frowned at it for a second before he realized what it was. His face turned beet red.

"Aw hell," he snatched it from my hand. "Shit. That must've been Glenn."

"Glenn?"

"I'm so sorry, I didn't know he'd slipped 'em in there." Daryl was too mad to hear me. "Well, we had a good run, but I'll kill him when we get back."

"It's fine," I started laughing. "Aaron packed me some too."

"What?"

"They're in the backpack he gave me," I said. "Along with the wine. "

"Fuck," he snapped so loud I kinda jumped. I'd misjudged this.

"Daryl," I said. "It's not a big deal."

"What we do with each other ain't nobody's damn business," he said with a glare. I put a hand on his arm, trying not to let him slip into a bad mood. Of course he was taking it this way. Daryl was so intensely private he'd hate anything he saw as meddling. Might even put him off the whole idea of sex, which would be a real bummer for me.

"I don't think they mean anything by it," I said gently. "Look at it this way, we got friends who care about us and clearly want us to be very safe."

"Nosy-ass friends," Daryl muttered darkly.

"C'mon, dummy," I kissed him on the cheek. "Let's eat."

He heaved a sigh and went back over to the makeshift grill, where he'd been heating up two portions of cobbler. I prayed that when he came back, he wouldn't be in the same weird funk he'd been in at the start of the night because I wasn't sure I had it in me to play Fake First Date again.

Daryl put a bowl down in front of me. It wasn't accompanied by a gruff instruction to 'Eat' this time, so I couldn't gauge where his mood was at. I decided to carry on like nothing had happened and hoped he'd join me.

"You really made this?" I asked once I'd tried a spoonful.

"Yeah," he said. I expected a little more, but he didn't offer any. Did he really not see how unlikely a baker he was?

"And Carol had nothing to do with it?" I pressed. He paused for a second.

"She might have helped," he said. I raised an eyebrow. "Okay, she told me what to do, but I chopped and mixed shit myself."

"Good mixing and shit," I said, making a mental note to hug the living shit out of Carol the next time I saw her. "Tastes amazing."

"Yeah, I guess," he said, but he looked disappointed. Maybe my compliment hadn't been enthusiastic enough. He took another bite, sighed through his nose.

"What are you sighing at now?"

"I wanted to make pecan banoffee pie, but apparently that was too hard."

"Course it was," I said. "When was the last time you saw a banana?"

"Yeah, that's what Rick said."

"Rick helped?"

"Yeah. And Glenn. Hence the…" he trailed off, started glaring at nothing again, but I filled with this deep warmth.

Rick. Glenn. Carol. Aaron. They'd all taken time out of their day to help him do this. And I wasn't conceited enough to think it was all for my benefit. They cared about him. They really cared about him. He finally had the kind of people around him that he'd always deserved, and I knew right then I'd have taken a bullet for any single one of them.

"You ever think weirdos like us would have friends like them?" I said.

"You were the weirdo," Daryl muttered. I ignored him.

"The kinda friends who'd help you pull off something like this?"

He paused for a second. I wondered if that same warmth was hitting him.

"No," he said. "I guess not."

"We're pretty lucky to have such nosy-ass friends, huh?" I said.

"Shut up and eat," Daryl said, but the way he smiled told me he meant 'yes,' and I figured we'd managed to side-step the contraception issue.

When dessert was done, we stayed out on the roof and watched the stars come out. We talked about what amounted to nothing, but it felt like everything. To have this uninterrupted time with him, and not have to fill it with battle plans and talk about the Saviors. Filling it with chatter and laughter was a blessing.

At what must have been the small hours of the morning, we climbed back down into the bookstore and lit some of the candles he'd set out down there.

"I can take you back," he said. "If you want. I didn't mean for it to get so late before I said something. It's just…."

"Time got away from ya?"

"Yeah," Daryl said with a small, shy smile that made my heart flutter. Given how tense and nervous he'd started, seeing him having too much fun to keep track of the time made my heart sing.

"Yeah, it got away from me too," I said, so he'd know he wasn't the only one feeling that way. Part of me was sad it was so late and that this would have to end.

"I, uh, packed blankets and shit," he said. "In case you did wanna stay over, but we don't have to."

"I'd like that," I said. Another smile tugged at Daryl's mouth.

"Yeah?" he asked. I nodded, and I could tell that he was trying and failing to stop himself from smiling. He pulled a bag of soft things out of the breakroom. When he opened it, I moved to help take out the pillows and blankets in there.

"Think you brought enough to make a blanket fort?" I said.

"I brought them to sleep with, but we can make one if you want," he said, and I must have looked at him with too much surprise because he added, "You big dork."

I whacked him with a pillow, and he laughed.

"Just because we're sleeping over doesn't mean I'm… y'know, expecting anything," he said, laying out one of the blankets on the floor.

Well, you damn well should be.

"No, I know," I said, trying to play it cool. Trying not to give away that I was already thinking about him stripping down to sleep. "But it's dark out. And the Walkers are always more active at night. So, we should stay… y'know… for safety."

Daryl saw right through me. Of course he did. His hands nudged my hips closer to his, and I didn't resist. "For safety, huh?"

"Yeah," I said, keeping it up although we were already moving to kiss each other. "Safety. And what's safer than a fort?"

"Such a dork," he muttered again, but I didn't mind. He says that kind of thing with a look in his eye that adds, 'and I would die for you,' so it's hard to feel anything but loved.

We were both still smiling when our lips met. I wrapped my arms around his shoulders, the pillow I'd been holding dropped to the floor.

His kiss was slow and deliberate, and I wished I had his control. Every taste he gave me left me a little hungrier. Every touch left a trail of heat on my skin beneath his fingers. I'd never felt this kind of longing before, as if I was only real where he touched me. Drawn closer to the warmth of his body, I held him against me. Melted into his arms, his smell, and his kiss.

The pressure of his lips on mine increased, parting them slightly until I could taste his tongue. I lifted up the bottom of his shirt and paused to look at him, "Can I?"

He lifted it off himself, peeling it up to reveal the lines of his hips, his stomach, his muscular chest. I felt a twist of desire right down to my core that should have been familiar by now but never failed to make me catch my breath. Made me thank whoever I'd been a past life for being good enough that Daryl was my reward. This whole evening felt like a dream.

I am so damn lucky.

"Thank you for doing this for me," I said.

"Wasn't that hard," he shrugged, throwing his shirt to one side. "I just pulled it over my head."

I knew he was teasing me, but I rolled my eyes all the same. "I meant the date, dummy."

"Yeah. I know," Daryl said. And his hands skirted around the bottom of my shirt, lifting it just enough for me to feel his fingertips against my skin. Anticipation fluttered through me as he nudged it up my body. The question his hands were asking burned in his eyes. I nodded. "You had a good time?"

I waited until he'd taken my shirt off before I said, "It's been perfect."

Daryl didn't kiss me again right away; he just looked at me. His eyes drank me in, and nerves I hadn't expected fluttered in my stomach. I'd probably never get used to him looking at me this way, and I wasn't sure I wanted to. There was something sad about the thought of getting used to something so special. He touched my hips so lightly it made me shiver. He moved up the curve of my waist like he was memorizing the shape of my body.

"Daryl?" I said quietly. This moment held so much fragile intimacy that raising my voice above a whisper felt like it could break it. He raised his eyes to meet mine. I saw his desire fighting against the shyness that was tucked in the corners of his smile. "You know you can ask for stuff too, right? It ain't just me. If you want something, you can ask. I'll say no if I ain't into it."

I held my breath for a moment while he considered it. I thought about telling him that I was so into him that I'd likely be into it no matter what he said, but I didn't want to freak him out.

"I've been thinking about the other day," he said eventually. "Y'know… in the shower."

"Oh, yeah?" I felt my heart flutter again. He nodded.

"Honestly, I ain't stopped thinking about it," he admitted, his blush deepening. "And… uh… how I'd like to return the favor."

"Oh," I don't know what I'd expected him to say, but it wasn't that.

"Only if you'd… y'know… like that, of course," he said quickly.

I could see he might already be regretting asking. Might already be trying to think of ways to walk it back. I scrambled to get over my initial shock. "Yeah… yeah, I'd like that."

"Yeah?" Daryl couldn't hide his smile.

"Yes," I said.

Daryl licked his lips, and I shivered.

"Alright, c'mere," he said, cupping my face in his hand. Nerves fluttered in my stomach all over again. I tried to ease them.

"To be clear, this ain't usually a first date thing," I said. "Y'know, unless I'm really drunk."

"Shut up and get your damn clothes off," he said. Something in the way he said it turned all of my nerves to desire. He wanted this so bad it was almost a need, and that made me want it too. I pulled my underwear off with my jeans, and before they'd even hit the ground, Daryl had lifted me up. I squealed and clung to his shoulders, wrapping my legs around him. He kissed me deeply and lowered me down to lay me out on the blanket.

Pausing for a moment to look down at me, he drank in my face the same way he'd looked at my body. The same way some people look at a work of art or a pretty sunset. I always freeze up under that look, like if I moved too much, he'd realize I'm neither of these things.

He kissed me once more before his lips moved to my neck, down to my chest, where he paused to unhook my bra. His warm lips at my breasts sent pleasure shooting through me. He liked that. Took his time there. Teased me until I was close to begging him for more. Daryl seemed to sense it and kissed his way down my stomach, across my hips, my legs. Each one made my skin tingle with delight.

It was only when he'd kissed me in every kissable place that I finally felt his mouth between my thighs. His tongue nudged my clit and I gasped. He looked up, "'That alright?"

"Yeah. That felt good..." I nodded, and caught the relief in his eyes. He was nervous. "Please do that again."

"Like this?" The gentle flicks of his tongue sent a hot flame of euphoria through me. My back arched against the floor.

"Shit. Yes," I gasped. "Just like that."

He got a little bolder, encouraged by my reactions. He'd remembered what I liked. A lot of what he'd learned with his hands, he was now translating to his tongue. It wasn't long until he made my knees weak, but that didn't matter because they were hooked over his shoulders. I looked down at him and found he was already looking up at me. Watching every slight reaction. Every wave of pleasure that shuddered through me. Listening for every moan. When fixated on me like this, he got a look in his eye that's not dissimilar to one he gets when he's hunting. So focused, tunnel vision on one specific prize. This time, it was me. His whole world dissolved to one singular goal, and he won't stop until he gets there.

My hands tangled in his hair. His hands joined his tongue between my legs, he moved two fingers inside me. It felt like he was deliberately withholding, keeping me on the edge again. But, at least this time I knew why. I knew what he needed.

"Daryl," I said. It came out nothing more than a whimper, quietly begging for release. Under any other circumstance, I'd have hated how pleading I sounded, but I caught a glimmer of satisfaction in his eyes, and I knew he was almost about to let me have what I want. Almost.

"Somethin' you want, Naomi?" he murmured. I caught a little smirk on his lips right before he kissed the heat between my thighs.

"Please..." I whispered. "I'm so close, Daryl..."

A deep grunt of satisfaction from the back of Daryl's throat told me he'd heard me. The pressure of his tongue against me increased, his fingers curled ever so slightly inside me. My hands fisted in his hair. Pleasure washed over me, pulsing through me with every heartbeat. And I couldn't take my eyes off him. His blue eyes locked on mine, a hint of satisfaction still there. But mostly, it was love. Sheer, unbridled love and joy that he could do this for me. 

Holy Hell. 

I collapsed back down onto the ground, breathing hard. Blood rushing in my ears, letting the rest of my senses slowly return to me.

"Holy fuck, Daryl, that was good," I said when I'd caught my breath enough to say anything at all. In response, he kissed me on the hip and then just below my navel. With each small kiss, my still-recovering body trembled as Daryl made his way back up my body until his head was above mine again.

"Good, huh?" he was so proud of himself that he was bordering on smug.

"Mm-hmm," I nodded, reaching up to wrap my arms around his shoulders as he held himself above me.

"Good," he said. "I could do that all day."

I felt myself blush. "That would hurt your jaw, dummy."

"Don't care," he said. "You look so damn beautiful when you cum for me."

Holy shit.

I had no response to that other than kissing him deeply and pulling him close. I felt something hard press against my stomach, just for a moment, but before I could register it, Daryl flinched and pulled his hips away from me.

"You okay?" I asked. I sat up. Daryl did too.

"Yeah," he said, turning a deep shade of red. "I just… I…"

I kissed him again, once.

"We can stop," I said, knowing that it wasn't just me this would be a big moment for. Didn't want him to feel any pressure if he wasn't ready. "If you want to."

"No," he said quickly. "I mean, yes, we can. I didn't think we'd go any further tonight. Don't want you thinkin' otherwise just because I'm..."

Hard as a rock?

He'd stopped looking me in the eye, clearly worried I'd feel some kind of pressure to do something I didn't want to.

"What if I wanted to?" I said.

"Do you?" he looked back at me.

"Do you?" I asked.

"I asked first."

Damn, he's got me there.

"Yeah. I reckon I do."

"You reckon?" he repeated. An eyebrow raised, and his hand ran up to that spot on my back that he knows sends shivers right through me. I was still recovering, but it worked. "That ain't good enough."

"What?"

"You gotta be sure," he said and left a slow, lingering kiss under my jaw. My whole body lit up again under his touch.

"I am sure."

"Don't sound it," he said. The back of his hand brushed ever so slightly against one of my nipples in a way that could have been a mistake or could have been him toying with me. Either way, it had the same effect. The same whimper escaped me.

"I'm sure," I said again.

Never been more sure of anything in my goddamn life.

"If you want it," he said, his thumb grazed my nipple again in a way that I knew was not a mistake. "Make me believe it."

I reached down and put my hand over the bulge he'd been trying to hide from me. At the slightest touch, he exhaled sharply through his nose. I leaned in to kiss him again. It was slow and lingering, like the way he'd kissed my neck. But every stroke of his dick through his boxers made that kiss a little harder. Finally, right when I thought he was as ready for it as I was, I pulled my hand back and said, "I want it."

He smiled, and for a second, I thought I'd won, but then he said, "Don't believe you."

Are you fucking kidding me?

I pushed him over until I was the one on top. Straddling his waist, I leaned over him and kissed him hard on the lips. Again, I moved my hips on his, and this time it was Daryl's turn to let out a moan. Satisfaction flickered through me, and I stopped kissing him so that I could look at him as I did it again. His hands took a tight hold of my hips, and I watched his body tense in pleasure under mine.

"Fuck me, Daryl," I said. A tell-tale smile twitched at the corners of his mouth. His eyes almost seemed to darken.

"What was that?" he said.

You heard me.

I ground down a little harder on him and heard him groan again. "Please, Daryl. Fuck me."

It was the 'please' that did it. Daryl smiled and said, "All you had to do was ask, girl."

Finally.

"Shut up," I said, but I was already on my feet, grabbing a condom from the backpack on the counter. The longer I was away from him, the more nerves had a chance to sneak back up on me.

What if I was moving too fast?

What if I freaked out again?

By the time I got back, Daryl had slid out of his boxers and was sitting up waiting for me. My heart raced, desire clenched in my gut. I knelt beside him as I unwrapped the condom. He caught my wrist. As usual, he was more attuned to my feelings than I was. "You sure about this?"

"Yes."

"Hey, I know I was messing with you earlier, but just because you were sure before don't mean you gotta be sure now," he said.

I gave myself a moment to be sure I was sure. But all it took was looking at Daryl, sitting in front of me. Hard and ready. The candlelight casting a soft golden glow across his naked body. I knew. I knew I wanted him more than I'd ever wanted anyone else. More than that, I knew I trusted him more than anyone else. He'd never hurt me; he'd stop if I asked. There was nobody I was safer with.

"I'm sure," I told him, "are you?"

"I'm damn sure, Naomi," he said, although I could still see some nerves in his eyes. "But you know this is... You know I ain't... before..."

"I know," I said quietly, keeping my eyes locked on his. "And we don't have to just because I want to."

"I want to."

"We'll take it slow, okay?"

"Okay."

"And we can stop any time." I said, but neither of us were slowing down. His hands lightly traced my naked body, his cheeks flushed and his eyes met mine with mutual hunger. 

"Damn straight."

"Can I go on top?"

"Whatever you need, darlin'," he murmured, stroking my cheek with the back of his hand. When his fingers came level with my lips, I turned my head and kissed them. He smiled and said, "I love you."

"I love you too," I kissed him on the lips as I took hold of the base of his cock and rolled the condom over him. I kissed him again as I straddled his waist. His warm hands held my hips. Nerves still sat in my stomach, but they were different. A first-time kind of nervous. An I-hope-he-likes-this kind of nervous. As I slowly slid down onto him his fingers dug deep into my hips, he threw his head back, and he whispered a quiet, "Fuck, Naomi...you feel like a dream."

I leaned in and kissed his neck, giving us both a moment to adjust before I drove my hips further down. I gasped as he filled me. I breathed deep his smell. The scent of home, and love, and safety. His hand under my chin guided my face back to his. I thought he'd kiss me again, but he wanted to look at me. "You okay?"

"Yeah," I started slowly moving my hips. "You feel real good."

He liked that. A smile lit up his face. He'd always had this incredible smile, but seeing him light up like that what he was inside me... it was almost the end of me. He kept his eyes fixed on mine as we started a slow and gentle fuck. I got why. Watching him back, I saw every flicker of pleasure that crossed his face and knew I hadn't seen anything more beautiful than that.

"God..." he said, his hands running up my body as he leaned back slightly to look at me. "...can't tell ya how long I've wanted you like this."

I could feel it, even if he couldn't say it, in the way he looked at me, the smile on his lips and this burning need in his eyes. I could feel it in the way his hands roamed my body like he had to reassure himself that I was really here. There were years of yearning behind this. I could feel that same want tugging at me too, even as he filled me I wanted more of him. It quickly became clear that there had been no reason for either of us to be nervous. Daryl was made to be inside me, and we had been built to love each other. The way we could read every little micro-expression on each other's faces made it easy to know when to speed up and slow down again. When to kiss. It was what made it easy for me to see that there was something he was holding back. A certain restraint in his eyes like he thought if he let go, he'd break me.

"You okay?" I asked.

He nodded but asked, "You mind if I take a turn on top?"

I didn't mind at all. As far as I was concerned, he could do whatever the hell he wanted with me. Without pulling out, without stopping, or even really slowing down, he rolled us over. I wrapped my legs around his back. Daryl's lips at my neck, I relinquished control of my body to him. He was much better with it anyway.

As he fucked me harder, I gripped his shoulders tight, unable to stop the moans that slipped from my mouth. "Fuck, that's good."

I closed my eyes for a moment, so consumed by him that I thought I'd lose myself completely. I was torn between I can't believe we're doing this, and I can't believe we haven't been doing this for longer. This was how it was meant to be; the natural conclusion of the connection we had. Had always had. Maybe it was fine to lose myself in him, he'd keep every part of me safe.

"Look at me," Daryl whispered, and I opened my eyes again. He was getting close, I could tell. Maybe that was what he was holding back. His eyes searched mine like he needed something from me. "I wanna make you cum again, Naomi. Can you do that for me, darlin'?" 

Suddenly, just by hearing him say it, I was a hell of a lot closer. I nodded and took hold of one of his hands, guiding it between my thighs. He understood immediately. "I need you right here, Daryl."

"Like this, sweetheart?" I felt his thumb against my clit as he deepened his strokes inside me and my body came alive in a way I'd never experienced. His eyes widened at my reaction, locked on mine with the same intensity he gets when hunting. He drove harder into me, his thumb making circles. "Shit you like that, don't ya?"

I nodded. I could barely form words, but that didn't seem to matter. We'd always been able to give each other what we needed, always been willing to do anything for one another. This was no different. His eyes burned with a need to make me come undone again, and my body burned with the need to give him everything. 

"I love them little moans you're making, Naomi," he said, his cock stroking against a spot deep inside me that made me arch my back off the floor. "But when you cum for me, darlin', you best say my name."

Seconds later, his name burned on my lips. Daryl buckled a little above me when he heard it, letting out a deep groan. I felt him throb inside me as his hungry lips found mine again.

Arms and legs wrapped around him; I pulled him close until he collapsed on top of me. He kissed me a few more times before he rolled off. Spent, we lay in sweaty silence, catching our breath.

My head felt light. The tingling in my body faded but didn't leave. Daryl let out a sigh. I glanced over at him. "You good?"

He grinned for a moment and then lifted his arm, where the empty condom wrapper had stuck itself. The silver foil winked before he flicked it at me.

"I hate that they were right," he said, still out of breath.

"God bless good friends," I said, rolling back toward him so I could kiss him again. I pushed some of the sweaty hair out of his face and looked down at him, thankful that he'd been such a good friend and grateful we'd become so much more.

"You wanna build that fort?" he asked. "While I… uh… clean up?"

I nodded. Daryl ducked into a tiny bathroom just off the breakroom. I used two display tables to help set up a blanket fort that wasn't so different from one we might've built as kids. I checked the store, blowing out every candle except the two closest to us. Daryl was already in the fort when I got back and, sadly, back in his boxers. Slightly self-conscious, I picked my own underwear off the floor and stepped into it. I hesitated before I put Daryl's shirt on, too. If he noticed, he didn't say anything, so I figured it was fine.

"You wanna read something to me?" he asked. He was already looking a little sleepy, so I knew it was more for my benefit than his. I picked a book off the shelves, and we cuddled up together under the blankets, his head in my lap. I don't know when it happened, but at some point, I looked down at him and saw he'd fallen asleep. My heart melted a little. Putting my book quietly to one side, I bent over him and kissed his forehead.

 

Daryl

Somewhere between awake and asleep, I reached for her. For weeks, I'd been used to her sleeping by my side and being there when I woke up. So when my hands found nothing but air and an empty floor, my heart jolted the rest of me awake. I turned to the other side, disoriented. She wasn't there either.

Heart racing, my eyes snapped open. For a moment, the number of damn books around me made me think I was still dreaming. But this wasn't the kind of dream I usually had. This was the kind I imagined Naomi might have.

Naomi.

Shit, where is she?

Limbs still heavy with sleep, I forced myself to get up. That had been the best night's sleep I'd had in… maybe ever. But I couldn't feel good about it because some creep had clearly come in while I was sleeping and kidnapped my girl while she lay half-naked in my arms. So now, I wouldn't sleep again until I'd killed him.

Before my sleep-soaked fears could get out of hand, I found her curled up on one of the beanbags with an open book in her hand, lost to the world. There's something so peaceful about her when she's like that. I don't like disturbing her. It's also one of the few times I can look at her without her noticing. Not to be a creep or anything. It used to be because I could look at her for a while without worrying she'd notice the way I was looking at her.

Guess I ain't gotta worry about that so much anymore. Now she knows.

How many times had I seen her this way? Curled up with some damn book.

But I'd never seen her this way before. The way her hair was all messed up at the back from last night shot a thrill right through me. My heart skipped a beat when I noticed she was wearing my shirt and not much else. She stretched one bare leg out onto the floor in front of her, and I remembered how nervous she'd been to show me them at first. How even in the shower, she'd hesitated before she took her pants off. And now here she was, in nothing but my shirt and her underwear. Scars out for all the world to see, because in this place, all the world was me.

Only time in my life I'd ever wished I had a camera.

If only I hadn't told Aaron we were here. If only nobody else in the world knew about this place, we could stay longer. Long enough that I wouldn't have to go to stupid Sanctuary.

I'd meant to tell her. I swear. I'd thought I'd do it over dinner, but I couldn't get the words out. Every time I tried to think about what to say and how to say it, I choked. I could feel it happening again now as I looked at her. I thought having a nice time together would make saying goodbye easier. It didn't.

I bent over her, kissed her forehead. She looked up at me and blinked a few times like she was coming out of a dream. Then, a huge, dopey smile spread over her face. "Hey."

"Mornin'," I said. "You been reading all night?"

"No," she said. "You slept a while, though. Must've tired you out."

She gave me a grin so cheeky I could feel my own cheeks heat up. Before I could say anything else, she'd stood up to kiss me. My arms wrapped around her, Naomi's body pressed close to mine. She tried to pull me back down onto the beanbag with her. I could tell from the urgency of her kiss that she was looking for more. It would be so easy to keep this going. We were already wearing so little.

Nope.

I can't get distracted by this again.

I broke our kiss, holding her by the hips and taking a small step back, trying to keep temptation at arm's length. When I hadn't managed to tell her at dinner, I'd thought I'd be able to get it out afterward. But once she'd sat on my lap and kissed me, I was a goner. Couldn't think straight. Could only think about her smile and the way she made me feel. I knew if I got too close, I'd lose myself again. She's just so good to get lost in.

It was then that I noticed all the books piled up to the other side of her. "The hell is this?"

"Oh, I started sorting through books while you were sleeping, then I got distracted," she said. "Not sure we're gonna have enough room in that sidecar, though."

"You serious?"

"Can't decide which ones I want for me and which ones I should bring with me to the Kingdom," she said. "I should've checked with Carol what they had already. Spent ages with her yesterday going over lesson plans and shit. Honestly, we put together enough to last months, which at the time I thought was super prepared, but now I think you might have asked her to keep me busy?"

Uh-oh, busted.

"Something like that," I said. Although I had asked Carol to keep Naomi busy, something about how she described it made me suspicious. I wouldn't have been all that surprised if Carol had made her do all that prep because she thought Naomi shouldn't be coming with them to the Kingdom at all and wanted to get enough teaching stuff ready until we were both free to move there.

"Suppose it ain't that big a deal," she said. "We can always come back for more now we know it's here. It's not too far from the Kingdom, after all."

Shit.

I can't put this off any longer.

"I'm glad we got to do this," I said and cringed at how formal I sounded.

"Yeah, me too," she said. If she thought there was anything odd in what I'd said or how I'd said it, she was too distracted by her piles of books to react. She'd picked up one from the top of the closest pile and was leafing through it.

"Especially because I'll be going away for a while," I said.

Naomi smiled but still didn't look up from the book. "Oh yeah, you got a business trip coming up?"

"Well, kinda," I said because it wasn't exactly untrue. It might not come with a pension plan, but Rick asking me to take over Sanctuary was the closest thing I'd had to a legit job for years.

"Wait…" she stopped then, put down the book she was holding, and looked at me for a sign that I was joking around. "What?"

"Rick's asked me to take over at Sanctuary for a bit," I said. "Once it's all up and running."

There, I said it.

Finally.

"What?"

"It's only temporary," I said quickly. "But it could be a few months. Maybe more."

"A few months," she repeated, and the way she said months made it sound like it was the longest amount of time she'd ever heard of. I don't know how I expected her to react, but it took longer to sink in than I thought it might. Or maybe I was so nervous it felt like time was slowing down. "Okay. That's not so long. I'm sure the King won't mind."

"Sure he won't," I shrugged. She was taking this a lot better than I thought she would. "That offer was more for me than you, anyway.

"Oh," her eyes widened. "Oh. You meant… you meant you'd go to Sanctuary on your own?"

There it is.

"Yeah," I said. "Rick asked me to go. Otherwise, I'd… well, I wouldn't…."

I wished I had something else to say, but my sentence trailed off to nothing.

"Wouldn't be going to Sanctuary?" she finished for me. "On your own?"

"Exactly," I said. Relief started to sneak up on me, but I didn't trust it. I'd thought she'd be more upset than this, which is why I'd put off telling her for so long. Thought she'd at least yell a little. Was it a bad sign that she wasn't? Maybe this whole thing had been too intense for her, and she needed a break from me anyway.

"Any reason Rick said you had to go alone?"

"Well, I won't be alone," I said. "Think a few others from Alexandria will be coming, but he's putting me in charge."

"Right," she said, her voice was surprisingly level. Almost completely flat. "But has he got a reason why Mia and I can't be there?"

"No," I said. "Actually, I think when he asked, Rick assumed you'd be coming with me, but I told him you had that whole thing with the King set up."

"I'm sure I can talk to the King," she said. "If it's only a few months, I…."

"No," I said, but she wasn't listening.

"Carol and I did enough prep yesterday to-"

"No," I said again. Louder this time. This time Naomi heard me. She fixed me with a stare so cold it froze anything else I could have said.

"Why not?" Naomi still sounded calm, but when mixed with that icy stare, it turned that small glimmer of relief right around.

"You ain't coming."

"Did Rick say he needs me someplace else?"

She already knew the answer to that, but I still said, "No."

"Then what's the problem?"

"You ain't coming," I said again. My voice raised a little, firmer than before. I didn't want Naomi getting it in her head that there was any changing my mind on this.

"That ain't what I asked," she said, and her voice had raised too. I saw a familiar fire in her eyes and knew I hadn't been fast enough to nip this in the bud.

"That place ain't good for you," I said.

"Ain't good for you, either," she said. "We were both locked up there. Why should you have to go back there on your own? That ain't fair."

"Rick asked me to."

"Right," she said through gritted teeth. "But he also thought I'd be going with you."

"Well, he thought wrong."

"Why?"

"He doesn't get it. He doesn't know what you went through in there."

"What we went through," she corrected me. "We were both prisoners in that place. You probably had it worse than I did. You don't have to face this on your own! It ain't right, it ain't -"

"I'm not the one who slit Negan's throat," I yelled at her, and she looked like she'd been stung. I didn't mean to. A flicker of frustration made its way from my gut up to my spine, and it just came out that way. She was so damn stubborn sometimes it drove me crazy. "You can't live with the Saviors after that."

"If they wanted to get me, they've had plenty of time to do it in Alexandria," she yelled back. "Been sleeping next to them for weeks, and they ain't so much as looked at me wrong."

"Bullshit," I said. Plenty of them had looked at her in a way I didn't like.

"No," she said. "What's bullshit is you using that as some kind of excuse to stop me from going to Sanctuary."

"If Negan's still out there-"

"If Negan's still out there and he wants to hunt me down, you really think me not being in Sanctuary is going to stop him?" she looked at me like I was a damn idiot. "I took Lucille. If he's coming for me, where I am ain't slowing him down."

"Doesn't mean we've gotta make it easy for him."

"That's fucking stupid," I snapped.

"It's not," she said. "At least we'll have our guard up at Sanctuary. At least we'll be on the lookout. You think the Hilltop are going to keep an eye out for him? They don't even believe he's still alive."

"Don't matter," I said. "Because you won't be at Hilltop, you'll be at the goddamn Kingdom."

"I'll be wherever the fuck I want to be!"

"Like Hell you will!"

"I'll be fine at Sanctuary."

"You ain't coming."

"I'm not scared of that place."

"You should be."

"Well, I'm not. And I don't have a problem with going there," she said. "So If Rick ain't the problem, and the King ain't the problem, and I ain't the problem, then what is it?"

The way she was glaring at me made it damn clear she knew the problem was me. Stubbornness kept my mouth firmly shut, and my silence only seemed to make her madder.

"C'mon, Daryl, say it," Naomi said. "Spit it out."

I shook my head. The rage bubbling inside me was so intense I had to ball my hands into fists to stop them from shaking. "I don't want you there."

It was like I'd slapped her. She physically recoiled from me and looked away from me. I think she was trying to hide the tears in the corners of her eyes, but I could see them. They turned the whites of her eyes all bloodshot. Naomi's jaw clenched but not enough to stop her bottom lip from trembling.

"Shit," she said. So quiet now. And she shut her eyes like she'd just remembered something. "When you were saying all that stuff last night about 'maybe it ain't meant to be' and 'this would be easier if we didn't know each other'... Were you... trying to break up with me?"

Even the words 'break up' made my heart lurch right out of my chest. "God, no."

Naomi's eyes were open again, and she was so angry I wasn't even sure she'd heard me. "'Cause if you were, you were doing all of this just to dump me, you probably shouldn't have fucked me first."

"No, it ain't like that!"

"Ain't it?" she said. "Because from where I'm sitting, you just told me you're leaving me indefinitely."

"That ain't my choice."

"No. But you're choosing not to take me with you."

"I thought… I mean… maybe we…," My heart hurt so much I couldn't keep going. I'd hoped she'd wait for me and that she'd want me to wait for her. But I couldn't get the words out, and after a moment, something in Naomi snapped. I saw it.

"Fuck this," she pushed past me and picked the radio up from the countertop. Feeling like the whole world was slipping through my fingers, I followed her.

"What are you doing?"

"Calling Aaron to come pick me up," she said, striding toward the door and pausing only to scoop up her jeans from the floor. She didn't even stop to put them on.

"Don't!" I said. I couldn't stand the thought that I'd ruined everything in the space of ten minutes.

"You don't get to decide what's best for me, Daryl," she whipped around just long enough to yell at me again. "If you don't want to be with me, you can't use that as some kinda excuse."

She reached for the door and hauled it open.

"Stop!" I yelled at her, lunging for the door too. It slammed so hard it shook in its frame. When Naomi turned to look at me, pinned between me and the door, I thought she start yelling again. Cuss me out. Thought that usual fire would still be burning in her eyes. But it had been all swallowed up by fear.

Absolute terror. Cold enough to put out the rage in me.

Shit.

Shit, shit, shit.

Is this how it starts? The Dixon anger. One minute you're terrified of your girl leaving and slamming a door shut before she can get out, next you're putting your hands on her? I always thought my dad was an asshole from the start but maybe not. Maybe it started small. Like this. Slamming doors turned to slamming fists.

I felt sick.

The way she was looking at me. So small and scared. Like she was a little girl again. I was about to back away, tell her to run. She should run; she had every right to. Run to something far better than me. Then she reached up and clamped a hand over my mouth.

"Listen," she whispered, and another sound broke through the noise in my head.

Walkers.

A lot of them.

Fuck.

I knew I'd secured the place pretty well, but even the best defenses can be broken down by enough of them. If anything was going to bring a horde of Walkers to the door, it would be two rednecks screaming at each other. I stepped away from Naomi and slowly peeled back a part of the paper covering the windows. Every sharpened stick I'd put around the parameter of the place had a Walker skewered on it. More pushed against them from the back. If there were too many, the sticks would break, and we'd be sitting ducks.

Fuck.

We both backed away from the door, quietly gathering up as many of our things as we could. Enough of them had been drawn to the sound, and that would only cause more of them to swarm the building, but it still felt like being quiet would keep us safer. Or maybe we just didn't want to talk to each other.

We sat under the countertop so we'd be out of sight if the defenses broke without warning and laid out every weapon we'd brought with us. It wouldn't be enough if they got in here. I looked over at Naomi, her knees tucked up under her chin, staring blankly at her gun on the floor in front of her. She didn't even look scared anymore; she just looked hurt.

Of course, we're gonna die mad at each other.

I reached for a book that had fallen on the floor. Opened it to the first page and grabbed a pen from a pot near the cash register. Naomi watched like she thought I might have figured a way out of this. I hadn't. But if this went sideways, I didn't want her to die thinking the wrong things about me. I wrote 'I'm sorry,' on the book's title page and slid it across the floor between us so she could see it. She didn't react. I pulled the book back and added, 'and I love you.'

Something in her face softened, and she gestured for me to pass her the pen. 'I love you too,' she wrote and showed it to me. A tightness in my chest immediately eased up. She paused and added, 'and I'm sorry.' Then she got to her feet. I could tell from a new light in her eyes that she had some kind of plan. She picked up the matches I'd brought to light the candles around the place and then pointed at my crossbow.

I picked it up. Naomi stood up and reached into Aaron's backpack on the counter. She pulled out something made of cloth. It was all bunched up in her hand, so I couldn't see what it was. She walked toward the window that led to the fire escape, not checking to see if I was following. When she slid the window up, the sound of the Walkers outside got louder.

Was she looking for an escape route? There were definitely Walkers on that side of the building, too. Not as many, but even if we cleared them, the alley out back led to the main street where the horde would be waiting. This window was raised off the ground, but dead arms reached in, trying to get her. I almost yelled out. But she stood on the sill and reached up for a higher level of the fire escape. She swung herself up and out of harm's way. I watched her bare feet lit out of view.

I followed her, balancing on the sill and pulling myself up to the second level of the fire escape. Naomi was waiting at the top, peering anxiously down until she saw I was safe. I climbed up to join her on the roof.

The table we'd eaten dinner at was as we'd left it. Mugs of half-drunk wine and all. Naomi picked one up, ripping a piece of cloth from whatever was bunched in her hand and dipping it into the unfinished wine. She beckoned me over and took a bolt from me.

The hell are you doing?

I didn't want to risk asking out loud. It was our noise that had brought the Walkers here in the first place. I watched her wrap the wine-soaked cloth around the top of the bolt. When she looked up at me again, she saw the question in my eyes. She lifted up the box of matches, and I got it. Or, I at least partly got it.

We moved to look over at the front of the building. The crowd of Walkers was about five rows deep, and more would join them if they didn't have a reason to go someplace else. Naomi handed the blot to me and then pointed at a far-off car. I nodded to let her know I'd seen it and understood. I loaded my crossbow. She lit a match and held it to the cloth until it caught. She took a step back as I took aim. Harder to do when you're firing something that's already on fire. I peered through the smoke and shot at the car.

It landed, fire growing on the roof. We watched it take hold, sparks falling until the seats inside caught too. The bigger it got, the more Walkers it drew toward it and away from us. But neither of us breathed easy until it reached the gas inside. An explosion took out the Walkers closest to it and distracted the ones closest to us. Now, all we had to do was wait until most of them had moved on, and we could take out the rest.

"How'd you know to do that?" I asked. The sound from the burning car made me feel safe enough to talk. So long as we didn't start yelling again.

"Done it before," Naomi shrugged and wouldn't meet my gaze. I turned around and sat down, back against the low wall that ran around the roof.

"Have I ruined this?"

"No," she said. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to make it this one fight so all or nothing. Everything you did for me was so… perfect. And then you say you're leaving and don't want me anywhere near you, I just… it gave me a little whiplash."

"Didn't mean it that way."

"Didn't mean to fly off the handle."

"We were both pretty far off the handle at that point," I said as a sort of truce.

Naomi nodded. I could tell she was thinking of how to word something difficult, so I waited. She took a deep breath in. "You know you're not the only one who worries about messing this up, right? Or thinks they're not good enough for this, and one day you'll wake up and realize that I'm not worth it and you'll leave?"

No. No. I didn't know that.

"Nothing you could do could ever mess this up," I said. "I'd never want to leave you."

"But you don't want me with you," she said miserably. "And ain't that the same thing?"

"No," I said, my heart cracked a little. "It ain't the same thing at all."

"Feels the same," she said. "Feels like I gotta beg my own boyfriend to be with me. Do you know how shitty that feels? It's kinda humiliating."

"I'm sorry," I said. Being with her was my single greatest dream, I hated that I couldn't treat her in a way that made that clear. "That's the last thing I'd want you to feel."

"It's okay," she said. "I overreacted about it for sure. And if you need to go to Sanctuary alone because you need space, or some time apart, or a break or something, that's fine too. I get it."

"You get it?" My heart dropped into my stomach. Had I accidentally made her think that us going on a break was a good idea? Sounded like my worst nightmare. I'd never get anything done at Sanctuary if I was spending all of my time worrying about who else she might meet while we were 'on a break'. Fuck breaks. 

"I hate it, but I get it," she said. "Just ain't used to it being someone else who wants to slow things down."

"I don't want that," I said. Slow was the opposite of what I wanted. I was all in. "All I want is to protect you."

"Yeah?" she said with a slight smile. "How are you gonna do that from miles away?"

"Sanctuary ain't safe," I said. "With the Saviors and everything."

"Nowhere's safe," she said. She had a point. I'd thought about how much I'd worry about her in Sanctuary. I hadn't thought about what might go wrong anywhere else that she was. There could be another horde. Another group like the Wolves. The whole Kingdom could be wiped out, including her, and how long would it take me to find out?

"Only thing that makes me feel safe is you," she said with an off-hand shrug that made it clear she had no idea what those words meant to me. I felt myself choking up. "Being apart from you… I don't know if I can do that again. We were apart for so long."

She looked at me then; I could see the hurt in her eyes.

"I know," I said. All the times we'd been separated by things outside of our control. I felt like an asshole for choosing it. Would it be too hard to walk back that decision now? "You were so excited about the Kingdom. About starting to build a future for the kids. I didn't want to take that away from you, either."

"Whether we like it or not, building a safe future for all of us means repairing things with former Saviors," she said. "And, sure, it's the harder job, but when have I ever been afraid to get my hands dirty?"

"You shouldn't have to," I said. "You spent so long fighting to get out of that place; no way you should have to go back."

"I spent so long fighting to get back to you and Mia," she said, and my heart hurt. "I didn't much care where that was, so long as you were both there and safe. I think that's part of it too. Do you think I like the idea of you being there on your own? Think I'll sleep easy knowing Negan's out there and close to you?"

"I can handle it."

"Good for you, but I can't," she said. "I'll worry myself sick. I've always thought we were stronger together."

"We are." I took her hand.

"You know what I was most excited about, though? With the whole Kingdom plan?" she asked, but I could tell it wasn't a question that was meant to be answered, so I waited. "Building a future with you. Being in the same place for once. Finding out how good this can be when we ain't at war or pining for each other someplace shitty."

"Naomi…"

"Don't you wanna build a life with me, Daryl?" she asked, and her voice cracked when she said my name. A tear or two slid down her cheeks. I took her face in my hands and wiped them away.

"Of course I do," I said. It was crazy that she even had to ask when it was all I had wanted since the first day I knew her.

"I felt like we were just getting started, and now… now you're leaving?" Her lip trembled again.

"I don't have much choice in that," I said. I paused for a moment because I knew once I'd said what I was about to, I wouldn't be able to un-say it. "But maybe you're right. Maybe I shouldn't be choosing to shut you out of it."

Even though I'd thrown in two maybes to show I still wasn't entirely sure about any of this, Naomi perked up. "Are you really thinking about it?"

"World's always going to be a mess, ain't it?" I said. Even though the thought of Naomi setting foot in Sanctuary made me feel sick, I could feel I was talking myself into it. The only thing worse was the thought that she'd be in danger and I wouldn't know.

"World's always been a mess," she said. "If you're waiting for the perfect time, you'll be waiting till we're both dead."

Timing had always been my issue. Waiting to tell her how I felt, waiting to kiss her. If she'd hadn't kissed me on that porch, would we even be here? If I'd followed her lead, stayed on the straight and narrow back in Georgia, would I have had a better life? Would I have had a life with her? I'd always needed her to push me out of what felt comfortable.

"You still wanna come with me?" I asked, fully aware she could turn around and say no now that I'd made her feel so crappy. "Even though I've been an asshole?"

"I still wanna come with you," she nodded. "Even though you're the world's biggest dumbass."

"Okay," I said. "But if I get wind that one of the Saviors is even thinking about coming after you, you're gone."

"You'll have to carry me out," she warned.

"Deal," I said because that sounded kind of nice, actually. "So… you don't wanna break up?"

"'Course not, dummy," she said. "Do you?"

"No, and I'm sorry I made you think that."

"It's fine," she rested her head on my shoulder. "I was just mad. Think it'll take a hell of a lot more than that to break us up."

I couldn't help but agree with her. I wrapped my arms around her as we sat and listened to the fading sounds of Walkers. Once the worst of them had moved on, traveled further into town, we'd go down together and take out the ones trapped on the spikes outside. It was only now, sitting here on the roof with her and navigating our way out of near-death, that I realized the thought of doing it together was what mattered.

Chapter 51: Right?

Naomi

I turned an old pocketknife knife over in my hand. Rust bloomed on the handle, rough as coral. The blade, clouded with grime, reflected my own eye back at me, slightly distorted.

"You know what's weird?"

Daryl looked up at me from behind a pile of winter coats. His gaze flickered to the window directly behind me, and he said, "That you're still hauling those damn flowers around like they ain't ten minutes from dying?"

"No," I said, putting a protective hand over the wine bottle sitting on the sill where the flowers he'd given me were crowded in the top. A little droopy, maybe, but I wasn't ready to let them go. "That ain't weird."

"Ain't normal," Daryl said, but I hadn't missed the smile on his face when he'd seen me sitting with my makeshift wine-vase of his flowers in my lap on the journey from Alexandria. "You know there are flowers outside, right? Grow right out of the ground."

"No."

"Yeah, they do."

"No, what's weird is," I said, trying to ignore the way he was grinning at me and my cheeks were heating up, "that we've been searching through all of this shit the Saviors took from other people. Shit they've hoarded. We've found almost everything from Alexandria. But, you know what we ain't found?"

Daryl thought for a second, looking at me like it might be some kind of trick. "What?"

"Anything of mine," I said.

"You missing something?"

"The bag you made me, with Kinieval on it," I said. "The clothes I came here in when they took us from that clearing. That picture of Mia and us that Negan stole from my room. None of it's turned up."

I didn't mention that Negan had carried that picture around to mess with me and that whether he was alive or dead or something in between, it was probably still with him.

"Sure it'll be here somewhere," Daryl said. "Could've ended up at one of the Outposts. Saviors were moving stuff around all the time. We'll keep looking."

"Yeah," I nodded, but there was an unease in my stomach that didn't let up. Before I could put it into words, there was a soft knock at the already ajar door, and Michonne's head peeked through the gap.

"You guys almost done here?"

"Yeah, almost," I said.

"Rick and I were thinking of heading for some food soon," she said. "We were hoping you'd join us, as it's our last night."

"That sounds lovely," I said, ignoring the stony silence radiating from Daryl.

"Ten minutes?" Michonne asked with a smile.

"Perfect."

"Great," she said. "I'll get the kids and see you both there."

I waited until Michonne's footsteps had faded down the corridor before I turned back to Daryl. "You're going to have to forgive him some time, and it might as well be tonight. Who knows when we'll next see them?"

"I ain't mad."

"You've been grouchy as hell the whole time we've been here," I sighed. "Those first few nights were tough. I really thought some of the Saviors were going to try something, and Rick and Michonne have been great at keeping them in line."

Daryl couldn't argue with the rest of it, so he scowled and said, "Ain't grouchy."

"Are too," I said. Daryl sighed.

"They get to leave this place," he said. "Don't matter how great they are at yelling at Saviors, it ain't Rick and Michonne who's gotta live with them after."

"They'll be easier to live with now that Rick and Michonne have made it clear what kinda shit won't fly anymore."

"You shouldn't be living with them at all."

"I chose to come," I said. "If you're gonna be mad at anyone for that, be mad at me, not Rick."

"Maybe I am mad at you," he said like he was offended that I hadn't considered it.

"Are you?" I asked. If he was, he was doing a terrible job of showing it. He'd barely left my side since we went on our date, and he sure as shit wasn't keeping his hands to himself when we were alone. I pushed the blade of the pocket knife back into the handle and slipped it into my pocket, all the while studying Dary's face to see if he was serious.

"Tryna be," he said. "But it's hard to stay mad when you get all…."

"All what?" I put a hand on his arm. If he was mad at me, I wanted him to feel like he could talk to me without it being some big fight. Even if it turned into one, a blow-out argument was better than him bottling up his feelings and resenting me until it drove us apart.

"All… like this," he said, waving vaguely at the closing space between us.

"What?" I asked. "Close to you?"

"Yeah."

"So, you're only mad at me from afar?"

"Yeah," he said, and he looked at me like he always did - as if it was the first time he'd been allowed to look at me in the way he wanted to. "It's too confusing when you're close."

"That ain't incentive for me to go away then, is it?" I said, and Daryl smiled. He couldn't help it.

"C'mere you," he said like he was giving into something he shouldn't. He still got that nervous glint in his eye when I got close. I wondered if I got it too. Probably. The flutter in my stomach every time I realized he was about to kiss me sure as shit hadn't gone anywhere. The feel of his lips when they first met mine still made my head spin. His kiss was slow and deep, and I knew he was trying to distract me from where we were supposed to be, but it was a distraction that was extremely hard to get mad about. Extremely effective, too.

"Let's go," I said when I eventually managed, through a Herculean force of will, to pull myself away from him.

"Let's stay," he said.

"We just told Michonne we'd be there."

"You told her that. I didn't say shit."

Gotta be a good friend. I reminded myself. Gotta make sure Rick and Daryl aren't parting on bad terms.

I started listing off the reasons, for my benefit as much as his, "It's their last night; we might not get a chance to see them for a while."

"Sure they won't mind if we skip it," Daryl said with a shrug that said he didn't care if we skipped it. "Sure they'd understand if we wanted some time by ourselves."

His hand skimmed the curve between my waist and my hip. That formerly nervous glint in his eye was replaced by a far more suggestive one. Temptation tugged at my heart.

"We're about to have nothing but time by ourselves," I said. "Plus, if we go now, we've got the best chance of getting the good food before it's gone…."

"Eugene's cooking tonight, so it'll all taste like shit no matter what time we go."

"I'm hungry," I said, my stomach rumbling in agreement. "Ain't you hungry?"

We'd been working all day, sorting through boxes of pilfered shit. Lifting supplies that were to be returned to the communities they'd been taken from into waiting vehicles. I thought he'd give in then, maybe take a few steps back, but Daryl didn't budge.

"Can think of something else I'd rather eat," he said, and my heart nearly fell clean out of my chest.

"Stop," I gasped like someone might have overheard him. Daryl's smile widened.

"Stop what?" His words were innocent; the look in his eye was anything but.

"You're not the only one who gets all…," I tried to take a step back, but the pull toward him was too strong. "Confused when you're…."

"What?" he murmured, inching closer. "Close to ya?"

"Yes." I resented the way my body melted into his when I was trying to be annoyed with him. But, even more, I resented the way I didn't feel annoyed. Not even a bit.

"That ain't exactly… how'd you say it? ... Incentive to go away?"

"Come on," I said, my hand running down his arm to take hold of his. I forced myself to take a step back, although my feet felt like they were moving through syrup.

Gotta be a good friend.

Daryl didn't put up much more of a fight, but he walked real slow. Dragging his feet like a kid who didn't want to go to the dentist. His hand gripped mine so tight I had to choose between letting go or slowing down, so I wound up walking at a glacial pace too. Walking the corridors of Sanctuary wasn't as eerie as it had been when we arrived. People were moving around and doing things, and there was noise to drown out the ghosts.

At mealtimes, the din was concentrated in one room. We'd turned what had been the place that Saviors had once received their rations based on rank into a communal dining hall. Everyone got the same, regardless of whether they were a former Savior or from one of the communities they'd terrorized. The idea behind it was to show them that Negan's former hierarchy was over, but the tensions between us were far from gone. Saviors would walk past and stare at our plates, ensuring we didn't have anything more or better than they did. I'd heard whispers that we had our own stash of food somewhere that Saviors weren't privy to. I'd suggested to Rick that we put one of the Saviors on the kitchen team so they'd see for themselves that nothing was up, but my idea had been shot down by everyone else who'd said they didn't want Saviors spitting in their food. Or anywhere near knives.

The rattle of plates and indistinct chatter, along with having to drag Daryl in there, reminded me of our old school canteen. I stopped outside the door, and Daryl took advantage of my pause to tug me back toward him. "Last chance to turn around."

I best be winning Friend of the Year for making this kinda sacrifice.

"We're going in," I said, already cursing myself for saying it. "Play nice."

Daryl sighed as I pushed the door open. The tables set out in the hall were mostly filled. Rick waved us over when he saw us come in; standing behind one of the tables at the far end of the room, Judith balanced on one hip. Michonne stood up from her chair. Carl and Mia were sitting at the same table, their heads bowed in some kind of intense conversation. Nobody had yet got any food; they'd clearly been waiting for us. I'd thought Michonne's suggestion that we eat together had been a casual, friendly thing, but a part of me was suddenly very glad I hadn't let Daryl talk me into standing them up.

Michonne's eyes fixed on me with an intensity I wasn't expecting. She moved around the table before we could get to them and grabbed me by the elbow. "Come help me fix some plates for us?"

"You want me to help?" Daryl said a little too quickly.

"No, no, you take a seat," Michonne said, even quicker. Her other hand, which wasn't gripping my elbow like a vice, gave Daryl a push toward the table.

Rick smiled at me and then fixed that smile on Daryl, "Hello, Daryl."

Daryl grunted back. Something that could have been mistaken for a greeting or him clearing his throat, depending on how you wanted to read it. Rick's smile didn't falter. He'd been relentlessly cheerful, no matter how grumpy Daryl had been. I don't know how Rick kept it up. If it were me, I'd have yelled at him days ago.

Michonne turned to the kids. "Carl, Mia, you wanna come help?"

They glanced over at us, chairs scraping reluctantly against the floor as they stood up to join us. I thought they might protest. Hell, I thought I might protest about why we had to be the ones fetching food for men who were sitting on their asses. But, it was so unlike Michonne, and there was this determined look in her eye above her fixed-on smile that kept my mouth shut.

Sure enough, when we were away from the table, Michonne leaned closer to me and said, "So, you and I are on the same page, right? This coldness between Daryl and Rick's got to end."

""Definitely," I said as we took our places in the line to get food. "I'm sure Daryl will get over it eventually, it's…."

"It's a big thing Rick asked him to do," Michonne said. It was the first time I got an inkling that she disagreed with Rick about it. They were usually such a united front. "I knew it was the minute he suggested putting you and Daryl here. Daryl's got every right to be pissed. So do you."

Michonne looked at me with such sincere, kind eyes that I couldn't respond for a moment. In the silence, Mia tapped my arm. She was holding two empty plates.

"Can I get Daryl's for him?" she asked, and I was flooded with the kind of warmth you get when the people you care about most show how much they care for each other.

"'Course you can," I said, and then I looked back at Michonne. "As long as I've got Mia and Daryl with me, I'm golden. It ain't the place that makes a home; it's the people you got with you."

"We really did run through every option," Michonne said. "But there's nobody else cut out for a job like this."

"I'm fine. Really," I assured her, but I could still see the guilt in her eyes. We moved to the head of the queue.

Jerry's big, beaming smile could feel a little out of place here, but it was always a welcome sight. If anything was going to wear down some of the more stubborn Saviors, being served food by a guy like Jerry every day may very well be it. We greeted him, and he said, "Pasta ala Eugene," kind of apologetically as he spooned food onto our plates.

"Are those sardines?" I asked, squinting at the plate he'd handed me.

"Yeah," Jerry said. "Eugene swears by this recipe, and he's been begging me to trust him all week. Finally gave in."

"Had any complaints?" Michonne asked.

"Not yet," Jerry said, with a wary glance around the canteen. "But I got this on just in case."

He tapped the protective vest hugging his torso. I moved out of the way, letting Mia step up to the front of the queue. She brightened for a moment, "Are we having mac and cheese?"

"Lower your expectations, Mia," Jerry said gently, and Mia went quiet.

We made our way back to the table, plates in hand. Daryl was staring at his hands, absorbed in picking at the dirt under his fingernails. Rick sat opposite him in a silence that I could feel across the other side of the room.

"If it was Merle, I'd know what to do," I said to Michonne. "Let them punch it out until they got tired and hungry enough to forget about it. But Rick ain't Merle."

"No. He isn't," Michonne said with a light laugh. The familiarity in her voice surprised me for a moment.

"Shit, I keep forgetting you knew Merle," I said.

"Well,… I met Merle," Michonne said, which made sense - meeting Merle and knowing Merle were two wholly different experiences. "And I owe him my life, but I can't say I knew him. Not really."

"Not even sure I can say that," I said. My feelings about Merle had always been complicated. Daryl's love for him meant I could never hate him. But my love for Daryl meant I couldn't see how many times he'd been let down by his big brother and not resent Merle for it.

"What you two talking about?" Daryl asked. Something about the look on my face made him curious enough to break his silent and moody staring at nothing.

"Merle, actually," I said.

"Merle?" Daryl's eyebrows shot up.

Mia held out one of the two plates she was carrying to him and looked kind of nervous, "I got your food. It kinda looks like mac and cheese, but Jerry says it's not as good. Hope it's okay!"

I watched the way Daryl softened as he took the plate from her. "Looks good enough for a King."

He'd have said the same if Mia had handed him a plate of rocks and dirt. Mia beamed at him, relieved. I felt that warmth again, and my belief in what I'd said to Michonne solidified. There was no place I'd rather be than right here in Sanctuary with these two. Mia and Carl sat back down in the seats they'd been in before. Judith reached over from where she was perched on Rick's knee and tried to grab something from Carl's plate.

"You kids have a good day?" I asked, sitting in the empty seat between them and Daryl.

"Yeah," Mia said, but there was something in the way she said it - a little too light and breezy - that made it feel like she was trying to hide something. I glanced at Carl, wondering if the two of them might've had some kind of argument, but he was busy defending his plate from his baby sister.

Mia stared intently at her plate, trying not to catch my eye. Now wasn't the time to ask her anything too personal. So, before anyone else could pick up on it, I glanced back at Daryl, "Michonne and I were talking about when Merle saved her life by not handing her over to that guy. What was his name…? The Captain?"

I was playing dumb. Daryl had told me his name, and I remembered it just fine. Remembered the guilt he felt over not shooting him before he killed Maggie's father.

"The Governor," Rick and Daryl said in unison. Then they looked at each other. Michonne glanced between the two like she was waiting for a serve at a tennis match.

"That's right," I said when the conversation stalled again. "What was his deal?"

"He was a damn psycho," Daryl said, stabbing furiously at his plate with a fork. "That's all you gotta know."

In the abrupt silence, I glanced across the table at Michonne. She glanced back, sharing my worry.

"Actually, I think Merle gave me a warmer welcome to the prison than you did, Daryl," Michonne said, managing to sound light-hearted and casual. "Seem to remember you threatening to shoot me with that crossbow of yours."

I watched Daryl's sheepish grin spread across his face. He swallowed a mouthful of food and said, "Shit, yeah, sorry about that. Couldn't be too careful back then."

Can't be too careful now.

"I forgot that happened," Rick shook his head like it was a lifetime ago. He waved the end of his fork at Daryl, "Not sure if I should be mad at you. Threatening Michonne like that."

"No worse than you holding my girl at gunpoint when you first met her," Daryl was quick to retort. My stomach dropped at the thought all progress had been lost in one sentence.

"Yeah, you're not going to win this one," Michonne said to Rick.

"Alright," Rick raised his hands and glanced at me. "Well, apologies again, Naomi."

"No hard feelings," I said. "Sounds like Michonne had it worse."

It was almost impossible to imagine now. Michonne had Daryl's unwavering respect, and the way Rick looked at her… it was like he hadn't seen sunlight until he saw her face. Once you get close to people, it's easy to forget how you started out.

"Sure did," Michonne agreed.

"Either of them ever apologize for that?" I asked her. Michonne pretended to think about it for a moment while Rick and Daryl shifted uncomfortably in their seats.

"Y'know, I don't think they did," she said.

"Hey, I just said I was sorry," Daryl protested. Then, he nodded to Rick, "What's your excuse?"

"I really gotta say it?" Rick asked. "Haven't I done enough to make up for yet?"

"I don't know," Michonne said. "Without me, you never would've known what happened to Maggie and Glenn. Never would've got that baby formula for Judith, either."

"Governor would've killed you when he destroyed the prison," Daryl said, "if Michonne hadn't been there to save your ass."

"Alright, alright," Rick raised his hands in surrender. "I'm sorry. Alright?"

Michonne wrinkled her nose like she was thinking it over but remained unconvinced. "Well, it's a start."

"We are all forever in your debt," Rick said with a grin. "Is that better?"

"It's a good start," Michonne amended. Rick took her hand, raised it to his lips, and gave it a kiss. Everyone else in the room vanished for them as they shared a smile. Seeing moments like that used to make me ache in a way I hadn't understood at the time. Rick and Michonne, Aaron and Eric, Bryce and Andrew, couples I didn't even know… it didn't matter who it was, witnessing those small moments of love used to make me feel like something deep inside me was missing. Not anymore.

I glanced at Daryl. He was already looking at me, and when our eyes met, he gave me a small smile. It was half-apologetic like he thought I might be looking at this moment of public affection between Rick and Michonne with sadness that we weren't like that. I smiled back in a way that I hoped reassured him. Daryl had always been intensely private, and that was fine with me. I didn't need big public displays from him. As long as he was by my side, that deep longing in my chest was gone.

"You good?" Daryl asked, leaning in until his breath tickled my ear.

"Yeah," I said. I couldn't think of another time that Daryl and I had ever been around a table filled with this much love. "I really am."

Daryl nodded. Under the table, he put a warm hand on my thigh and gave it a gentle squeeze. "Good."

It took everything in me not to climb on top of him right there and then.

"After that fight with the Governor," I turned my attention back to the rest of the table. "You took in some of the Woodbury residents at the prison, right?"

"Yeah. Lost pretty much all of them to an illness," Daryl said in a way that told me he still carried that with him.

"I remember," I said quietly. "But, before that, how long did it take them to settle into living with you after they'd spent so long fighting y'all?"

"They didn't have a lot of choices," Rick said. "Woodbury wasn't as safe as the prison, and by then, the Governor had turned on all of them. Opened fire on his own people. It was pretty easy to get them to join us."

"Shit."

"Told you he was a psycho," Daryl said.

"You were hoping there'd be another answer?" Rick asked me.

"Yeah, I was hoping there'd be something you did there that could help turn people around here," I said. "But it doesn't sound like it was the same."

"Nah, not really." Rick agreed. Negan was far from a saint, but he'd never fire on his own people. He had a way of making those loyal to him feel valued; that was a lot harder to stamp out.

"Alright," I shrugged, changing tactics and returning to the root of the conversation. I glanced between Rick and Michonne. "How long did it take for y'all to trust each other after your rocky start at the prison?"

"Carl helped with that," Rick said. At the mention of his name, Carl looked up at us, away from whatever teenage nonsense he and Mia had been whispering about at the other end of the table. "She's always treated him like an equal, even when I found it hard to see how capable he was. Always looked out for him."

"We look out for each other," Carl protested.

"Right," Rick agreed. "Once they were friends, I didn't have much choice. On top of all that, Michonne more than proved herself."

"Yeah, I only started talking to you because of Carl, too," Michonne said. "I thought you couldn't be all bad if you managed to have a kid that cool."

"That right?" Rick laughed.

"Half-right," she admitted. "When I saw you take in all of those people from Woodbury, that's when I was sure you weren't going to be another asshole like the Governor. You were willing to put all of that aside to make sure innocent people were safe."

Michonne looked at him with an admiration that Rick didn't know what to do with. I think it was the first time I'd seen him blush. He looked down at his plate, head shaking slightly as if he felt undeserving of it. Then, I remembered Daryl telling me that Merle had taken Michonne to the Governor because Rick had been on the verge of doing it himself, something that clearly still weighed on him. Michonne's hand brushed against his forearm like she'd picked up on this too and wanted him to know it was alright.

"And you?" I promoted Daryl, thinking Rick might appreciate a shift in focus. "Once Rick trusted her, you trusted her?"

"Something like that," he shrugged, still too stubborn to give Rick credit for anything. "Also thought if she was someone Merle gave up his life for, she's gotta be worth something."

"Shit, Daryl," Michonne was as taken aback by his honesty as I was. "I hope I lived up to it."

"Yeah. You did," Daryl said. "You wouldn't quit looking for the Governor because you wanted to protect everyone at the prison and risked everything to come on that meds run when folks got sick, you more than lived up to it."

Now it was Michonne who didn't know what to say. She sat back in her chair, stunned, while Rick leaned forward, eyes fixed on Daryl. "And when did you decide I was someone worth trusting?"

Michonne and I glanced at each other again. Neither of us dared say anything or even breathe too hard. It was a bold move and risked reminding Daryl that Rick had left his brother to die on a rooftop, thereby adding to his reasons to sulk with him. But maybe that was the point. If they could get over something that big, this current disagreement was nothing.

"Took me a while at first," Daryl said, which came as a shock to exactly nobody. Daryl's trust was a slow-won prize. "In the early days, I only followed you because I didn't much care where I went. But… I guess it was when we found Sophia. When she came out of that barn, and it was clear she'd been dead most of the time that we'd been looking for her. You were the one who took the shot, so Carol didn't have to see her kid like that. That was when I knew you were someone worth following."

"Yeah," Rick nodded slowly. Daryl wasn't looking at him, but what he'd said had been sincere. "Sophia disappearing was right around when I knew you were someone I could count on, too. You should've seen the way he refused to give up the search for her. Right until the last moment."

Rick looked at me, but I was hardly surprised, "I can believe it. He's-"

"Don't," Daryl warned, sensing I was about to start gushing about him.

"Even when he got shot in the process," Rick continued. "Hardly slowed him down."

"He fucking what?" I turned to Daryl like I half-expected to see an open wound. Bleeding again now that I knew about it.

"Just a graze, don't worry about it," Daryl brushed it off as if he wouldn't have been the same if the tables were turned.

"Don't think you two are getting out of this," Michonne said. "When did you two start trusting each other?"

Neither Daryl nor I said anything for a moment. I'd trusted Daryl for so long it was a part of me. Couldn't remember a time when I hadn't. It was like trying to remember when I'd first learned the sky was blue. He'd always been there when I needed him, even if he didn't say much. But then, a memory hit me like a freight train.

"A month or two after we moved in, our place was broken into. We didn't have much, but my Momma had pissed off her dealer, so it wasn't really about money. It was a kinda warning, y'know," I said. Michonne nodded, but there was a vast and quiet horror in her eyes. "They took everything, right down to my toothbrush, and we couldn't afford to replace it all right away. So, on the way home from school, I made Daryl stop at a gas station with me, and I stole a pack of gum because my teeth felt like they'd grown fur, and I couldn't stand it. I put it in my pocket, and when I looked up, Daryl was looking right at me."

"Yeah," Daryl laughed. "You weren't as slick as you thought you were."

"You didn't snitch on me, though," I said. "I thought you might, but you didn't. And then two days later, there was a new toothbrush and a half-full tube of toothpaste wrapped in a bag on my doorstep."

"How'd you know that was from me?" Daryl asked.

"Ain't no one else leaving a Spiderman toothbrush all wrapped up at my door," I said. "And I could hear your Daddy yelling about missing toothpaste from my place. But, you never said anything about it, so I didn't say anything either."

"We had a spare, didn't need it," Daryl shrugged. "Ain't no big deal."

"Was to me," I said, knowing that he already knew that, and that was exactly why neither of us had spoken about it at the time. "And I guess if there was one moment where I knew for sure I could trust you, that was it."

"So, you've been a softie from the start, huh?" Rick said with a grin. Daryl rolled his eyes, tried to puff himself up a little.

"Usually, I couldn't get her to shut up, but that week I could barely get her to open her mouth," Daryl said. "I was bored, that's all."

"I thought if I spoke, my breath would be all green, and you'd faint like in a cartoon," I said. Rick and Michonne laughed, but I'd been half-serious. I'd had dreams about those animated green stink lines following me around.

"What about you, Daryl?" Michonne asked, and my heart flipped in my chest. "Was there a moment for you?"

Daryl had just lifted a spoonful of food to his mouth, and there was an excruciating moment where he couldn't say anything at all. Michonne's question hung in the air, and Daryl's gaze slid over to me, watching me squirm under it. He chewed on it.

"She gave me half her sandwich," Daryl said eventually, with a shrug and through a mouthful of Pasta Ala Eugene. Rick and Michonne burst into laughter while I scrambled to think what the hell he was talking about. "Nobody had ever given me shit before that."

"You mean the day we met?" I asked him.

"Yeah," he said. "I mean, it took a bit longer to be sure, but it was a solid start."

"To think, after everything we went through to get him to open up, we could've just given him a meatball sub," Rick said. I tried to shit out his laughter.

"The day we met?" I repeated, to be sure.

"When you know, you know," Daryl said with another shrug.

"Not even a full meatball sub," Michonne giggled.

"That's right," Rick agreed. "Half would've done it."

I ignored them and glanced at Daryl, "Sorry it took me so long to catch up."

"It's fine," he said. "I'm used to you being slower than me."

"You wish!" I said. "I'd beat your ass in a race right now. Let's go."

"Woah, easy girl," Daryl said. "Don't want you spewing your guts out 'cause you can't handle that I knew you had my back when you were still thinking I was some kinda snake."

"I never thought that," I said. Guilt started gnawing at my gut. Momma and I had moved around so much, friendships lasted anything from months to a few days, and I'd got used to goodbyes. So when I'd met Daryl, I'd had no way of knowing we'd stick around or that he'd change my whole life. "And just 'cause it took me longer, it doesn't mean… I don't… I ain't…."

"I know, baby," he laughed. "I'm only messing."

Baby.

I immediately wanted to make fun of him, but then my heart did a stupid little flutter that made me want to giggle. Not laugh at him, giggle like some kinda idiot, and I didn't know what to do with that. Daryl froze like he'd just heard himself say it and wanted the ground to swallow him up. Eyes still fixed on the plate in front of him. Nobody around us had noticed, Mia and Carl were whispering about something again, and Michonne and Rick were busy deciding which kind of sandwich would win Daryl round the fastest.

Daryl looked up at me really slowly. Waiting to see if I'd noticed. Our eyes met, and he gave me a look that said Please don't give me shit for this. I shot him one back that said, I'm gonna give you so much shit for this. But not now. Not while I was in danger of giggling like a schoolgirl.

"Well," Rick said in a way that was designed to draw the group's fractured attention back together. Daryl and I were glad for an excuse to look away from each other. "Interesting as this was, I'm not sure any of it helps with our Savior problem."

"Sure it does," Michonne said. "Compassion, forgiveness, and small acts of kindness with no expectation of anything in return… that's what all of those stories had in common. That's what builds trust, and that's what'll win these folks round in the end."

Daryl sighed. "You ain't got anything that'll work faster than that?"

"Nope," Michonne said. "Afraid not."

"Does that include Negan?" Carl asked. There was a collective intake of breath at the mention of that name, and it felt like the whole room got quiet. My skin prickled like we were being listened to. Maybe we were.

"Negan's dead," Rick said, and as he said it, he glanced at me. He knew I disagreed with him on this, but the meaning of his look was unmistakable. I was to shut my damn mouth about it. "You don't need to worry about him."

"But if he's not," Carl pressed. "Will you forgive him like Michonne says, let him live with us in peace like everyone else? Or is he the exception?"

"If Negan's alive, he's a dead man walking," Daryl said, which earned him a similar look from Rick to the one he'd given me.

"Well, he's not," Rick said firmly. "So, there's no need to worry about it."

"Naomi thinks he is," Mia piped up. Everyone looked at me expectantly, and I wanted to sink down through the floor. But, if I couldn't keep quiet, I knew what Rick would want me to say. He'd like me to agree with him, to lie and say that Negan was dead. And maybe Rick was only saying it to stop Carl from fearing Negan would come back. That, I got.

But I couldn't outright lie. Not to Mia. I also didn't want her or Carl to be scared, but I wanted her to be prepared. I wouldn't let us be caught unawares. Not again. "I… uh, I definitely think it's a possibility."

I avoided looking at Rick, but I could feel his disapproval.

"He's not going to hurt you, Carl," Rick said. "He's not going to hurt any of us again."

"That's not the point," Carl said. He didn't look scared; he looked a little angry. "We took in all the people from Woodbury after that fight was over, kind of like we've done with the Saviors. I don't think Negan should be any different."

"Didn't take in the Governor," Daryl pointed out.

"Maybe we should've," Carl said. "Maybe then he wouldn't have come back and attacked us the second time."

Rick, Michonne, and Daryl all flinched. They'd lost a lot to the Governor; a safe home, friends, and for a while each other. Mia shrank back from the table like she wanted to be far from the heaviness Carl had brought thudding down on the table. Carl's eyes were angry, but it was starting to falter as if he regretted saying anything at all.

"If Negan's out there," I said, focussing my attention on Carl because I couldn't bear to look at the guilt that was swallowing the others. "What happens to him next is on him. If he attacks the place and tries to regain control, we'll have to defend ourselves. You get that, right?"

"Yes," Carl nodded. "But we're not at war anymore. Wouldn't killing him without reason be murder? What if he's alone out there?"

"You think he'd give a shit if the tables were turned?" Daryl asked.

"Probably not," Carl admitted. "Isn't that exactly why taking him in would be the best way to show the Saviors that we aren't like him?"

At that moment, he looked so much like his dad that it took me aback. Even though they might be disagreeing, Carl was willing to stand by what he saw as right no matter what the rest of us thought. They got the same light look in their eye when they were trying to win people round to their way of seeing things.

Mia cleared her throat, a quick glance at Carl, and then she seemed confident enough to speak. "What if we kill him, and it makes him a martyr? The Saviors might be more likely to fight with us again. And that would be worse than if he came back on his own."

Who taught these kids to be so damn clever?

It was a thought that hadn't occurred to me before. I'd been so trapped in the fear Negan had instilled in me. But if he was out there, starving and injured, and we killed him in cold blood… it wouldn't reflect well on us.

"If he comes to us in peace, if he's genuinely willing to work with us, we ain't gotta kill him," I said. Daryl tensed beside me, an involuntary and immediate disagreement. "But he still has to answer for what he's done - the people he's killed and tortured, the things he's taken from communities - he has to pay for that."

"I know," Mia said.

"How?" Carl asked.

"I don't know, and I ain't saying the price is his life," I said. "It's probably something the communities would have to decide together, right?"

"Yes," Michonne leaned forward, her soft gaze fixed on Carl. "If there's a problem with anyone, it'll be dealt with by all of the communities. There will be a set of laws and punishments we all agree on..., or at least, the majority of us agree on."

Carl nodded again, and Mia looked more reassured. Michonne had been talking about the documents and agreements she wanted to draw up for all of the communities the whole time we'd been here. In her spare moments, she'd poured over old law books. Her excitement about it was infections. The thought of building a new foundation for the generations to come, one that could be less flawed and steeped in prejudice than systems in the old world, was as exhilarating as it was daunting.

In the evenings, Michonne would pass books over to me too, so she could get through them faster. We'd huddle over them, read bits out to each other, highlighting parts we thought were useful. She was even entirely on board with my color-coding system when we took notes. In short, Michonne was the study buddy I'd always dreamed of. If they'd been in a better mood with each other, Rick and Daryl might have enjoyed making fun of us. But, lucky for us, they'd just scowled and left us in peace.

The tension around the table slowly dissipated. It seemed that between us, we'd come up with an answer that satisfied the kids and calmed their fears, even if what we'd said hadn't been true. If Negan turned up here, I knew Daryl would shoot him on sight. But I doubted that if Negan came back here, he'd be coming in peace.

For a moment, it looked like everything was going to be okay again, and then Rick leaned back in his chair, pushed his empty plate away, and said, "We should probably head up. Early start tomorrow."

Michonne nodded in agreement, but Carl straightened up. "What's happening tomorrow?"

"We're heading home," Rick said. "You know that."

"I thought we had another day," Carl said, and nobody missed his frantic glance at Mia.

"Nope," Rick said. "Heading off at first light tomorrow."

"Can't we wait?" he asked. "Just…"

"No," Rick said firmly. Carl and Mia sat back and stared at their plates like they'd both just been handed a death sentence. Rick stood up, lifting Judith up too. "We better get this little one to bed."

He was trying to gloss over Carl's unhappiness that they were leaving so soon, and the rest of us took his lead on it. We left the table and headed toward our sleeping quarters, stopping outside the Grimes's door to make plans to wave them off the next day. I don't know exactly what it was that distracted me from what Rick was saying and tune into the kids' conversation. Mia might have said my name, but she wasn't talking to me. Instead, she and Carl were standing a little further apart from us, talking in hushed voices to each other in the same way they had all night. Not wanting us to hear. I hadn't thought much of it before; what kids want their parents and guardians eavesdropping on them? But now, it looked like whatever they'd been talking about all night had turned into a heated debate.

"I can't…," Mia said, followed by something I didn't catch, and then, "...not on my own."

"Sometimes kids need to show adults the way," Carl said. "They don't-"

"But-" Mia stopped abruptly, realizing the adult conversation had slowed, and they were being listened to. I'd been rumbled.

"You guys okay?" I asked.

"Fine," Mia snapped, but her face was stormy as thunder. "I'm going to bed. Goodnight, everyone."

Rick and Michonne wished her goodnight, but she barely responded, brushing past me as she stomped toward her room. Michonne smiled brightly like we were all supposed to be oblivious to the argument we'd interrupted. Carl was panicking, not for a second believing that Rick and Michonne weren't about to interrogate him the second the door closed behind them.

"Well, I think Mia has the right idea," Michonne said. "See you guys tomorrow?"

"See you then," I agreed. Rick put a hand between Carl's shoulders and nudged him toward the door. It was a fatherly gesture, but the look on his face might've been the same as if he'd been marching a perp to jail.

Daryl and I walked away from them and didn't speak until we heard their door close. He looked at me. "The hell was that about?"

"No idea," I said. "But I should, eh…."

I gestured in the direction Mia had stormed off in.

"Yeah, of course," Daryl said. "You want me to come with you?"

"No," I said quickly. This wasn't something he had to deal with. "I got this."

He looked like he wanted to say something else, but after a second, he just nodded. "Alright. Holler if you need me."

I stood outside Mia's door and waited until Daryl had disappeared into our room across the hallway. I tried the handle, and it didn't budge. Her door could be locked from the inside. Back in the old world, there's no way I'd have let her have a lock on her door at thirteen, but after the takeover at Terminus, I wanted her to be able to lock the world out while she slept. If something happened here, I needed to know nobody could get to her.

"Hey, Mia," I tapped lightly on the door. "Open up."

Silence.

"Mia, are you in there?" I called for her again. Still nothing. "If you don't answer, I'm going to have to kick this door down. Don't think I won't."

"Leave me alone!" she yelled back. She sounded mad, but at least she was saying something.

"No," I said. "Mia, let me in."

"No!"

"You gotta talk to me."

"No, I don't."

"Then I guess I'm gonna stand out here and yell all night," I yelled louder to prove my point.

"Stop!"

"Not until you open this door!"

Mia let out a scream of frustration, one of those ones that really rips its way through your throat, and the door unlocked. She folded her arms and backed away to the other side of the room like she wanted to be as far away from me as possible. It was clear she'd been crying but was trying to cover it with a scowl on her face.

I remembered what it was like to be her age, how everything that happened felt like the most important thing in the world. Every fight was a bile-fueled screaming match, every inside joke was worth its own stand-up special, and everything that went wrong was earth-shattering. Hell, sometimes I still felt that way.

I knew all of this, but it still stung to have one of my favorite people in the world glaring at me like I was the cause of all of her misery. It stung so much it took my breath away.

I gave myself a moment to shut the door quietly behind me, to take a few deep breaths and steady my own emotions before trying to deal with hers. The silence in that room was horrible, Mia's anger emanating from her like she was radioactive.

"I can't help if I don't know what's wrong, kid," I said.

"I'm not a kid," she snapped.

Yes, you are.

I bit back the urge to say it. To me, Mia still looked like the little girl who needed help tying her shoelaces, the little girl who thought the animals at the zoo worked there and cried when she found out they weren't allowed to leave to 'go to their own homes.' But, I knew she was different. She'd grown so much. Changed a lot. Helped organize an uprising at Terminus and watched other children die right in front of her. So, whether I liked it or not, she wasn't a kid. At least, not in the way she used to be.

"I'm sorry," I said. Mia glanced over at me, and I could tell she hadn't been expecting an apology so fast. She'd been geared for a fight. Maybe even wanted one. "You wanna talk about it?"

"About what?"

"About whatever's got you in this mood."

She sighed. That huge, loud kind of sigh that's meant to stop you from crying but never really works.

"I didn't know Carl was leaving today," she said eventually. It didn't feel like the whole truth. It felt like she was echoing the same sentiment Carl had objected to at dinner.

"Oh. I'm sorry, k…," I stopped myself. "I'm sorry, Mia. I thought we told you both."

"Maybe," she shrugged.

"I'd love for them to stay, but they've got to go back to Alexandria," I said. "They're needed there."

"I know," she said. "But I don't understand why we can't go with them."

"We're needed here," I said. Another sigh. Like the whole world was on her shoulders, and only an exhale big enough could dislodge it.

"I hate it here," she said, and she was trying so hard not to cry that she could only manage a whisper. My heart sank.

"We won't be here forever," I said. "It's temporary. Just until things are settled and set up to run on their own."

"Yeah, everyone keeps saying that," she said. "But nobody can say how long that'll be. Weeks? Months? Years?"

"It won't be years," I said, that much I was sure of.

"I was here for months, and I thought everything was fine. I thought they saved people. I thought they saved me," she said. "And then I saw Daryl…. And they were beating him…. And then you… you were…."

She trailed off. I heard a little break in her voice and hated that she'd had to see me and Daryl like that, beaten and almost broken while she could do nothing. Couldn't even tell anyone she knew us.

"I know," I said quietly.

"You told me this place was bad, and I had to leave it with Daryl, even when it meant leaving you behind," she said. "Now we have to stay? Why? Why can't we go to the Kingdom?"

"Our plans had to change," I said. "I told you that."

"You didn't tell me why," she said. "Why us? Why here?"

"We know this place better than anyone else," I said. "We saw how it ran before; we can stop the bad things that happened here from happening again."

"Anyone could run this place," she said. "You just can't stand the thought that Negan will come back, and you won't be the one to fix it."

"That's not true," I said. I didn't want Mia to know how terrified I was of Negan showing up here again, but I didn't know how she could have got it this badly wrong.

"It is," she said. "You never let anyone else take care of things. It always has to be you. You tried to kill him before, and you think you failed, so you have to be the one to do it if he comes back."

"I promise you, that's not what I want," I said. Sometimes, when I shut my eyes, I still saw the river of blood that had washed over me from the slit on Negan's neck. The shock in his eyes. I didn't want to tell Mia any of that. The fearless image she had of me would help her feel safe in a crisis. But it wasn't true. I was terrified.

"Yeah, right," Mia muttered.

"When things are better here, we can still go to the Kingdom," I said. "There's a place for us. I've talked to the King about it; it's all set up."

"We could be there now," she yelled. "If you weren't so selfish and it wasn't always about you and what you want. But instead, you had to drag Daryl and me here too."

I knew I was the grown-up here, and I had to keep my head, but it hurt. She was wrong about why we were here, but she might not be wrong about the root cause being my selfishness. I'd always sworn to put her first, but the unavoidable truth was that I'd dragged both of us here because I couldn't bear the thought of being apart from Daryl.

"That's not why we're here, Mia," I said, and there was a moment where she looked at me, expecting an honest answer. I struggled to give her one.

"Bullshit," Mia said through gritted teeth. Shock and anger twisted through me.

"Mia!" I snapped so loud she jumped. She knew she'd crossed a line. Her arms were still folded across her chest, but she shrank away from me. An apology in her eyes that stubbornness wouldn't let out of her mouth. We glared at one another.

I hadn't told her that Rick had appointed Daryl as the new leader of this place. I'd wanted her to think it was a decision we'd made as a family. I'd lied to her. I'd hated doing it, but I could hardly tell her the truth now. All the resentment she had about being here would turn on Daryl, and that would break my heart. I needed them to get on like they always had. So, I'd absorb it all until she got over it or we got out of here. Whichever came first.

"As soon as we can get out of here," I said, "I promise you we'll all be in the Kingdom with Bryce. But until then, you're going to have to grow up and make sacrifices. If you don't want to be treated like a kid anymore, you can't keep acting like one."

Mia nodded, but her face was still set in misery. I waited for her to say something. I wanted to put my arms around her and hug her, but I knew I was only just getting her to calm down, and that might only make things worse.

"I miss Perla," Mia suddenly blurted out. Her eyes filled with tears that her anger had been holding back. She was still trying to fight it, and then her sadness won out. She sobbed and covered her face with her hands.

There it is.

That's what this is about.

"Of course you do," I said, kicking myself for not seeing it before. Since we'd met Perla, the girls had only been separated once, and it had been the last time she was here. I reached out and wrapped my arms around Mia's shoulders. She didn't lean into my hug, but she didn't push me away either.

"Now that Carl's leaving, I don't have anyone," she mumbled into her hands. I wanted to tell her that she'd always have Daryl and me, but I knew that wasn't the same. "The kids I knew from back… when I lived here…, they were my friends before I left, but…."

"Are they giving you shit?" I asked. Anger flared up inside me. "Because if they are, I can-"

"No, please don't say anything," she begged through her tears, anger springing back at the thought of me interfering. "Please don't make everything worse."

"Alright, I won't say anything," I said, trying to calm her down again. I hadn't decided whether or not that was true. "But, are they giving you shit?"

"No," she said. "Not exactly. But… when they found out I ran away with Daryl, they knew I wasn't really one of them. That I was part of the group that's taken over their home. And they don't say anything mean, but… they don't really say anything to me at all."

I'll kill them.

"They'll come around," I said, although I knew I had no business making those kinds of promises. The kids of Sanctuary were adopting their parent's attitudes. The sooner the divide between the two communities was mended, the better it would be for all of us. "This new way of doing things is going to take people some time to get used to. There's going to be a bit of time to adjust, but it will get better."

"Sure," Mia muttered. She didn't believe me. And why should she? I was already lying to her, but she'd had this problem before.

"You remember when you came to live with me?"

"Yeah?"

"You remember how you had to move schools?"

"Of course."

"Did you like that school?"

"Yes," she said, annoyed by my line of questioning because she didn't see the relevance.

"Do you remember what you said when you came back from your first day there?"

Mia thought for a moment and frowned. "No."

"You said it was the worst school you'd ever been to; all of the kids were stuck-up and all of the teachers were posh poopheads."

"I didn't call them poopheads," she said, mildly embarrassed.

"Yes, you did," I said. "You also said you'd never go there again, and you were packing a bag to get the bus back to your old school."

"Oh," Mia looked a little guilty. She'd had no idea, at the time, the fight I'd had to put up to get her living with me and proving I was capable of being her legal guardian. Only now she was older had she started to piece it together.

"Took about a month for you to get settled, and then I couldn't believe how fast you made friends. Or how many you made," I added. "When I was your age, all I had was Daryl."

"I know."

"My point is, you're a great…," I swallowed back the word 'kid' again. "You're a great girl. Anyone can see that. And all of these Sanctuary brats would be damn lucky for a friend like you. They'll come round."

"Maybe," she said. She'd stopped crying, but she still looked glum. I couldn't blame her. I knew the kids here were no substitute for her other friends. Especially Perla. Those girls had been through a hell of a lot together. If someone had tried to separate Daryl and me at her age, I'd have made it my personal mission to destroy anything they held dear. Hell, I'd do that if someone tried to separate us now.

"We can visit Alexandria," I said. Mia perked up. "Can't promise any kind of schedule now, but I'll take you as regularly as I can. And I'll talk to Lucas about bringing Perla here, too. How's that sound?"

"Yeah," Mia wiped her eyes on the back of her hand. This time, when I put my arms around her, she leaned into the hug. "That sounds good."

"Good," I said. The relief was almost overwhelming. I knew it was a bandaid on an issue that would only get worse the longer we were here and the longer Mia was away from her friends, but it felt like a step in the right direction. Maybe by the time she was fed up with visiting, the kids here would have opened up to her, or Rick would've given us an end date to all of this.

"We good?" I asked her.

"Yeah."

"Then get some sleep, okay?" I said, letting go of her and resisting the urge to kiss the top of her head like I would've done when she was younger. "You'll feel better about all this in the morning."

"Okay," she said. She still looked sad, but her anger was gone, at least for now. "Goodnight."

"Night," I said, opening the door again. "Love you, Mia."

I wasn't expecting her to say it back, not after the mood she'd been in, but it still hurt when she didn't. I closed the door and waited outside until I heard it lock again.

'If you weren't so selfish and if it wasn't always about you and what you want….'

I leaned against Mia's door for a moment and stared at the one opposite it, her words echoing in my head. Had I really dragged her to somewhere she hated for a boyfriend?

I felt as guilty for thinking it as I did about

Daryl would probably already be in there. Waiting for me. Wondering what the hell had gotten into Mia. I'd tell him she was sad Carl was leaving and that we were allowed to call her 'kid' anymore. But I wouldn't tell him she hated being here. Daryl was beating himself up about us being here too much as it was.

We can be happy here, I told myself. This is all just teething problems.

Right?

Daryl

I dreamed Naomi was bloody and beaten, cowering in the corner of my old bedroom. The one I had as a kid. Hiding in the same place I had when my old man was in a rage. I looked for him, knowing when I found him I'd kill him for laying his hands on her. But, when I stepped towards her, she begged me to stay back. Begged me to stop. I'd never seen her look so scared. And when I looked down at my hands, my knuckles were bloody.

I did this.

A bucket of ice-cold dread dumped out all over me, and I woke up gasping for air. Naomi's face was the first thing I saw, turned toward me and sleeping peacefully. Not a mark on it, not even a scratch, but the guilt was still enough to make me sick. I sat bolt upright, my chest tight.

Naomi stirred. I stayed real still, hoping she'd turn over and carry on sleeping, but I felt the mattress shift again, and she whispered, "Hey."

"Go back to sleep," I told her, but of course, she didn't. She sat up beside me.

"You okay?"

I couldn't look at her.

"Yeah," I said. Hoped my voice sounded normal. "Didn't mean to wake you. Sorry."

"It's okay," she said. "Did you hear something?"

I shook my head. I knew why her mind had jumped there. It had only been a week since Rick and Michonne left us in this shithole. Every night we went to bed knowing there was a chance the Saviors might start something. I knew Naomi waited outside Mia's door every night until she heard it lock in case something kicked off. I hated that we had to live like this. My girls deserved a home where they didn't have to sleep with one eye open.

"It was just a bad dream," I said, hoping that would be the end of it, but then I felt her hands on my back. Real soothing. Calming. Touching me with a kindness that I didn't deserve.

"You wanna talk about it?" she asked.

"No," I said. A stab of guilt pulled the word right out of me before I had the chance to think about it. "It's fine. It was... it's nothing."

It wasn't nothing. It wasn't fine. But how could I tell Naomi about a dream like that?

She'd run for the hills.

Maybe she should.

Maybe she'd be better off.

"It's alright," Naomi said so softly it cushioned some of that jagged shame inside me. For a minute, I almost believed her. "I get 'em too. I bet most folks do these days."

"Oh, yeah?" I said, my chest clenching up again.

I bet yours ain't about beating the love of your life.

She had no idea what she was talking me down from. If she knew the truth, would she still be so nice to me?

"Yeah," she tried to reassure me. "I don't get 'em as much as I used to… but, they're still there."

Naomi let the silence stretch on for a bit. I knew she was giving me room to talk if I wanted to. I tried a couple of times.

I dreamed I'd beat the shit out of you.

The words lodged in my lungs, trapped behind my fear of losing her. Now that she was mine, I didn't know how I could ever let her go.

"Can we go back to sleep?" I asked. The thought of it - of being without her - was too much to sit with. I wanted to escape it in any way I could, and it couldn't touch me if I was unconscious.

"Yeah," she said. "'Course we can."

I lay back down, fixed my eyes on the blackness of the ceiling. Felt like it was staring back, like it knew, like it saw me for the piece of shit I was. Naomi's arm slipped around my waist. I felt her body start to snuggle up to me, the warmth of her skin against mine. The flash of guilt in my gut was so strong, I jolted back like she'd burned me.

I didn't deserve to be held that way. Not by her. Not tonight. Beside me, Naomi froze and then quietly withdrew. That fire I'd pulled away from had spread through me anyway, hollowing out my chest cavity leaving space for nothing but the dark.

"Sorry, I'm not in a…," I trailed off, couldn't work out how to word it. Could hardly speak. "I don't wanna…."

"That's okay," she said. The dark on the ceiling grew. A different kind of dark gnawed away at me.

Was she lying there resenting me? Did she have that worried look on her face? I didn't know which was worse. The thought of lying side by side like this until the sun came up made me want to jump out the damn window.

Then Naomi whispered, "Hand?" and something about it, how familiar it was, sent a breath of relief through me.

"Yeah," I said, reaching for where I already knew her hand would be waiting for mine. "Hand's fine."

The warmth of her hand in mine spread through me, loosening the knot in my stomach. It was crazy that no matter how shitty I felt, holding her hand in the dark always made things a little better. Naomi squeezed my hand in a way that said, 'I love you,' and I wondered if that was what we'd always been trying to say to each other on nights like this. Nights where we had nothing to hold on to but a hand in the dark.

I squeezed right back.

I listened to her breathing change and relax. Something about the familiar sound of her drifting off to sleep calmed me, and I wasn't far behind her.

When I woke, she was wrapped up tight in my arms with her head just below my chin. No matter how I'd felt when I'd fallen asleep, how I'd wanted to stay a safe distance from her, here she was pressed against me again. Asleep or awake, I couldn't stay away.

One of her thighs was wedged between mine. A hand on my chest and the other arm wrapped around my waist. I wiggled the fingers of the arm that was trapped under her shoulders to combat the numbness set into it. The fingers of my other hand rested against the warmth of her back, inches from a place that I knew could make her shiver with one touch.

I loved that I knew these things about her now and learned more every day that I was with her. I loved the way it felt, to make her tremble like that. To hear her whimper and whisper my name because all she could think about was me. For her to look at me like she needed something only I could give her.

Been waiting my whole life for her to look at me like that.

Used to be that to wake her up, I'd whack her with a pillow. Now, I could pull her real close. Kiss her forehead. Feel her stir against me. Wait for her to look up at me with this look I'll never get used to. A slow, sleepy smile, as if wherever she goes when she's dreaming, isn't half as good as waking up next to me. I can't last long under that look - a couple of seconds at most, and then I can't stop myself from kissing her. Can't stop my hands from mapping her body. The way she moves against me, the noises she makes… I can't control what awakens in me.

Not now. Not this time.

Last night's dream clings to me like morning fog. Sleep had thawed enough to let my anger with myself creep back in. Desire and self-loathing fought within me. Loathing wins out. There was an edge to that desire. My hunger for her has teeth, and no matter what, it is never satisfied. Maybe if I hadn't ignored it, starved it for so long, it wouldn't be this angry. But, as it is, it takes all of my self-control not to lose myself in her. I'm scared of what might happen if I do.

There was no way of moving without waking her. I turned my head so I wouldn't have to look at her smiling up at me like I was some kind of blessing. I slipped my arm out from under her as gently as I could, but I knew there was no way she'd sleep through it.

"Mornin'," she said. I could hear that damn smile in her voice. A tug deep inside me, back toward her, but I can't even look at her. Every time I so much as blink, I see her as she was in my dream - bloody and beaten. It makes me feel sick. I reach for my clothes before she wakes up enough to reach for me. Tempt me back.

"You in some kinda rush?" she asks as I pull them on. "Did we sleep in? Where's the fire?"

"Nah," I said. "It's early, actually. Get some more shuteye if you like. I told Eugene I'd help him with something this morning. Must've forgotten to tell you, sorry."

I didn't like how easy I was finding it to lie to her. I guess it was because I wasn't looking at her. Sometimes, when she fixes me with those beautiful eyes of hers, I feel like she can see right through to my soul. I couldn't let that happen now. I thought she might not like what she saw.

"Daryl, are you-"

A knock at our door interrupted her. Relief made me spring toward it, while guilt stopped me from looking back at her as I heard her scramble to put some clothes on. I waited until the scrambling quietened and opened the door a crack, so whoever was on the other side could see me but not her. Jerry looked back at me through the gap. He was, for maybe the first time ever, not smiling.

"Something wrong?" I asked although I knew the answer. I was already listening, straining for any sounds of a fight in the distance.

"There's something you should probably see," he said. Naomi was at my side in an instant, all anxious and alert, pulling sharply on the door until it had opened the rest of the way.

"Did something happen?" she asked. She glanced at Mia's door like she expected it to be kicked in.

"Nobody's hurt," Jerry said, quickly realizing he'd panicked us more than necessary. "There hasn't been a fight, nobody's seen Negan, it's… just some graffiti."

"Graffiti?" I repeated, and I'll admit that a part of me was relieved that this would distract Naomi enough that my weird behavior might be forgotten by lunch.

"Yeah," he said. "You should see it for yourselves, though. It's hard to explain."

Jerry took us downstairs to a corridor on the first floor near where the Saviors slept. At the other end of the hallway, a group was gathered around something, whispering. Mia stood at the back of the crowd, leaning up against one of the walls. She glanced back when she heard our footsteps and acknowledged us with a begrudging smile before quickly looking away again.

Naomi barely suppressed a sigh. She and Mia had been fighting a lot lately. I hated seeing it, but Naomi was trying to hide it from me, so I didn't know what I could do to help. Maybe this was normal new-teenage shit, but Mia had been sullen and sulky ever since the Grimes family left. Snapped at her sister a lot, which she'd never done before. Staying in her room as much as possible, which I guess was why it really stuck out to me that she was here. This was early for her to be up.

"It appeared overnight," Jerry said. "As far as we can tell. I checked with everyone on watch, and nobody saw anything, but why would they? We've been watching things outside of this place."

Despite all the whispering, our footsteps were the loudest thing in the hallway, and when we got close to the huddled group, they turned to look at us. Some of them looked a little scared, but there were smirks on a few of the Savior's faces. They parted when they saw us coming, and words painted in blue on the wall slowly came into view.

It said: Negan lives. We are Negan.

I heard Naomi's sharp intake of breath, and I wished she hadn't been here to see this. Because it wasn't just the words. There was something else, too. Something that made it personal.

Knievel was nailed to the center of the wall, smiling at us through a pair of broken shades. That dumb tiny teddy bear. The bag he'd once lived on was nowhere in sight.

"See, it's the bear I don't get," Jerry muttered. "What's that about?"

"It's mine," Naomi said. She'd been looking for her shit, and now something had been returned to her. I wished it had stayed gone. But, before I could tell if this had freaked her out or upset her, she'd flicked open a pocket knife.

Where the hell did she pull that from?

I wasn't the only one who was shocked. The crowd around us drew back, drew a breath, and the smirks dropped from the Savior's faces. It seemed a bit of an overreaction for such a small and non-threatening weapon. It wasn't like she'd pulled out a machete. But from the way they were staring, shifting uncomfortably, and glancing at one another, I realized it wasn't about the knife. It was about who was holding it.

I'd heard many whispered retellings of Naomi and Negan's final showdown. Some were close to the truth - he'd been about to kill her, and she'd cut him with a shard of glass. In others, she'd lain in wait in his room until he was asleep, or she'd slipped something into his food so he'd be too drowsy to fight back. In one, she'd slit his throat with her damn fingernails. The story had taken on a life of its own, grown legs and run amok amongst the Savors. It had worried me that they might resent her for what she'd done. That it would put a target on her back. But now, it dawned on me that they might actually be a little scared of her.

This is good.

This is better.

Right?

"You," Naomi snapped, eyes fixed on a long, greasy-haired Savior. He tensed up immediately. "Justin, right?"

"Yes?" he said, and I'll be damned if he wasn't fighting back the urge to add ma'am.

"Get a bucket of water and some sponges. You," she gestured to a guy on Justin's left. "Ronnie. Go with him and get the same. When you get back, y'all are cleaning this mess up."

When the hell did she learn all their names?

"I'm not cleaning shit," Justin said. Anger flashed in Naomi's eyes, and I took an involuntary step toward her. Justin's gaze flickered briefly to me, sizing me up. I knew I could take him, pity he didn't seem to realize that. "I didn't paint the damn thing."

"No?" Naomi didn't back down. Didn't even hesitate. "You know who did?"

"No," he said. Naomi said nothing. Just stared at him. Fixed him with a look that accused him of being a fucking liar and watched him squirm. She didn't let up, either. The icy silence spread through everyone there until it was more than Justin fidgeting under it. Still, Naomi didn't move, like to create a silence this cold she'd had to freeze herself. Eventually, Justin stammered, "I…. I could ask around… check a few things…."

"Uh-huh," Naomi said like a teacher who didn't believe that you'd left your perfectly completed homework at home. "Bucket. Sponges. Now."

"Fuck you," Justin muttered. But he and Ronnie did leave, backing away from her like they thought she'd put that knife in their backs if they turned them on her.

Naomi looked around at those who were left. "Anyone feel like fessing up?"

They scattered pretty sharpish after that. Probably just to get out from under that gaze.

Naomi stepped forward, folding her penknife until it was almost closed, with just enough of a gap to fit around the nail sticking out of Kineival's chest. Then, squeezing it between the blade and the handle, she managed to ease the nail free from the wall. She held Kineival in a cupped hand and stared down at him for a moment. There was a heaviness in her eyes.

"Dude," Jerry breathed. "You can be a little scary, you know that?"

Naomi looked up at him. Only now that everyone else had gone were her true feelings starting to creep through. That haunted look was sneaking back. "Sorry. Didn't want them to see that I was rattled."

"Think they'll wash it off?" Jerry asked.

"We'll see, I guess," she shrugged. She held Knievel up to me. Cotton-white stuffing plumed from the hole in his chest. "Poor little guy."

"Sure we can fix him," I said, without thinking about how ridiculous it was to fix a bear that was older than Mia. I glanced behind me, noticed that at some point during all of this she'd slipped away.

"You think?" Naomi asked, placing the bear in the middle of my palm with the kind of delicacy that she might have handed me a bird with a broken wing.

"Yeah," I said. "And we'll find whoever did this."

I gestured to the graffiti, but she looked at me like that was a crazier idea than performing emergency surgery on a damn stuffed bear. "I think it's pretty obvious who this was."

"Who?"

Naomi fixed me with a look like she couldn't believe I didn't already know. And, the truth was, I did know. Or, at least I knew who she thought it was. "Negan."

"We don't know that."

"Daryl, come on. Who the hell else would it be?"

"We ain't seen him," I said. "He's not been spotted here. Or in the woods. Or anywhere at all. It could be any one of these Savior assholes trying to mess with you."

"Why would they do that?"

"To get us out of here," I said.

"But how would they know this is ours?" she said, holding poor Kineival up to face me.

Ours.

I'd stuck that bear on a bag I made her when we were teenagers, but she still saw that dumb bear as something we shared. I wanted to scoop her up and carry her upstairs, away from all of this bullshit. It was hard not to get caught up in the drama here, the politics of all of this. But there were times it felt like a distraction from everything that was really important. Naomi and I were starting a life together…. How long had I wanted that?

As long as Mia had been alive, probably longer. I couldn't remember having any other dream or goal. I'd got into shit with Merle because he'd made me think it would be some kind of fast track to having enough money to build that life. After that, my only goal was to survive.

"We'll find whoever did this," I said again. "If it was Negan or someone else, we'll find them, and we'll deal with it."

It's moments like these that take me by surprise. How one moment Naomi goes from having this lost look in her eyes like everything's falling apart to sheer determination. Nodding like she believes me. I don't know if it's the way I say it or if I somehow find the right words at the right moment, but whatever it is, I pray I never lose it.

"Yeah," she said. "We will."

"Leave it to me," I said. It was a burden I wanted to take off her. This place had a horrible effect on Naomi, and I knew she'd lose herself in hunting down Negan if she was given half the chance. "I'll get to the bottom of it."

"What are you going to do?" she asked. "Interrogate them all?"

"Yup," I said. "Check all their hands for paint, too."

"Alright, good luck, Poirot," she said with a grin. I rolled my eyes and turned my back on her. She called after me, "Hey, Daryl?"

"Yeah?"

"Don't kill any of them," she said. "If you find out who did it, I mean."

"I'll do what I have to."

"Daryl…"

"If I find whoever's been messing with you…."

"You can't just go around beating everyone who messes with me to a pulp," she said. I thought of Simon and what had been left of him in the end. How I didn't regret it even a tiny bit.

"Wanna bet?"

"We ain't at war anymore."

"Fine," I sighed, but she needn't have worried; the Saviors didn't give up a damn thing. I questioned almost every one of them. At least one of them had to know something. Had to have seen something, even if the culprit wasn't going to 'fess up. It was so close to where they slept; someone had to know something. The only progress I made was finding the half-full paint cans ditched in a corridor on the second floor. But it wasn't like I could fingerprint them for evidence.

Every non-answer from their sorry mouths drove me a little crazier, and it got harder and harder to stick to Naomi's non-violence request. By the time I was through, the only people I hadn't questioned were the two bozos she'd told to clean down the wall and the Sanctuary kids. If it had just been the words on the wall, my first thought would've been that it was some bored teens. But, the bear made it personal. Targeted.

And the target was my girl.

I wanted to pull the whole wall down until the words didn't exist anymore. And why stop there? Might as well pull the whole damn building down while it was at it, make it like it had never existed. I'd never wanted it to stay standing at the end of our war. Never wanted us to stay here.

How had I gone from driving a truck through the wall to running this place? I wanted to smash something, punch a wall. But, the moment I clenched my fists, I thought about that damn dream and felt like I was the one who'd been hit. Right in the heart.

Can't keep lashing out when I'm angry.

Can't keep breaking shit.

But I gotta do something.

Deep in my pockets, my fingers closed around Knievel, and I remembered how sad Naomi had looked when she'd pulled him down from that wall. I remembered her squeal of joy when she'd pulled him out of the gutter on the way home from third grade. That stupid little bear had been with her for the years that I'd missed, and suddenly it didn't seem so little or stupid anymore. Naomi had never had much, but she'd always hoarded things from the people she loved. No matter what they were. She'd clung to those flowers I'd given her for as long as they'd clung to live. I couldn't bring myself to throw that bear out now.

I visited the sore rooms and dug through the 'repairs' boxes for an old sewing kit. I sat down in the food hall, knowing it was a while until the next mealtime so I was unlikely to be caught there. These kits were meant for mending clothes, not fixing things because your girlfriend was sad, but I knew it wouldn't take much. I could get it done before anyone knew the damn kit was missing. I cleared the stuffing that was sticking out of his back and closed the hole with three stitches. Couldn't find scissors, so I snapped the thread after tying it off. Snapped too hard, and the needle came flying off.

I turned the bear over. His dumb smiling face looked up at the ceiling. As I tried to rethread the needle, I realized how much less angry I felt now. I was so distracted by it that my finger slipped, and the needle stung the tip of my thumb.

"Fuck," I muttered. A small bead of blood pooled at the pin-prick.

"What are you doing?" Mia's voice made me jump. I was sure no one had been in here when I came in, but I hadn't heard her enter.

"Tryna patch up this little guy," I said, holding up Knievel and turning him around to face her.

"Oh," she said. "Need help threading the needle? I'm pretty good at it."

"Oh, yeah?" I asked. I was surprised she offered to help, given how sulky she'd been lately. She must have known I was doing this for Naomi. Mia knew how much that bear meant to her. She was probably one of the few people other than me who knew just how much it meant.

"Yeah."

"Alright then," I slid it over to her. "Let's see what you got."

Mia sat down and picked up the needle and thread. Her face crumpled in concentration. I didn't really know what to say to her. Or what kind of mood she might be in. She'd been so grumpy with Naomi lately, but Naomi hadn't told me why. And Mia was nice as pie to me.

"Done," she said brightly, passing it back.

"That was speedy," I said.

"Used to do it for Naomi all the time," she said. "Whenever she needed to mend our clothes."

It was the first time in a week that she'd said Naomi's name without a hint of resentment. In fact, she almost seemed to be in a good mood. That was surprising, given that she'd been up earlier than usual. I looked back at Knievel like I was caught up in mending him, but I thought about how I'd found the paint cans on the second floor. One floor up from where the message had been painted. Like whoever had done it had headed up the stairs before remembering to discard the cans.

"I'm gonna ask you something, and I'm only gonna ask it once," I said, my attention still on the bear. "So don't you dare lie to me. Okay?"

I heard her seat creak as she shifted uncomfortably. She was nervous about something. "Okay."

I held up Knievel again, the needle still stuck right through him. "Was this you?"

"Why would you think-"

"Wait. Before you answer," I said. Mia shut her mouth. "If you did this because you want to get you and your sister out of here, I get it. Hell, if that's your goal, I'll help you. But this ain't the way to go about it."

"You'd help?"

"Yeah."

"Why?" Mia narrowed her eyes like she suspected me of reporting anything she told me back to Naomi.

I shrugged. "This place sucks."

"Yeah it does."

"Been tryna keep her away from it since Rick suggested it," I said. "But, well… you know your sister."

"Yeah, I do," she sighed. I waited. Mia looked like she was thinking something over, I thought she might be about to confess to the graffiti, but she said, "I didn't know you didn't want to be here."

"Nobody in their right mind would choose to be here," I said.

"Then why are we here?" Mia said. "Why aren't we at the Kingdom, or even back in Alexandria? I thought Naomi would at least listen to you about it."

"Pfft. The hell makes you think she'd listen to me?"

"Well, y'know…." Mia shrugged, kinda awkwardly. "She loves you."

"She loves you, too, kid. That's a big part of why she's doing all this," I said, forgetting Naomi had told me we shouldn't call her 'kid" anymore. Thankfully, Mia was too busy thinking about what I'd said to notice. "She wants to build a safer world for you, and she thinks making peace with the Saviors will help all of that."

"Can't she let someone else do it?" Mia said.

"You know that ain't her," I said. "Trusting someone else to do something? Not sure she knows how. She ain't used to being able to count on other people."

Including me.

It was only in explaining it to Mia that I fully understood it myself. It was so obvious, I could've kicked myself. Naomi had always been this fiercely independent control freak who overthought every move she made. At school, many teachers had thought it was cute that she was such a serious mini-adult. But Naomi was only 'old for her age' because she had to grow up fast. She was only an 'old soul' because there weren't any grown-ups around to do things for her.

She'd had me, I guess, but I wasn't a grown-up either. I remembered the day she'd found out her Momma was pregnant, how Naomi's first thought had been that she'd need to drop out of school because she couldn't trust her Momma to look after a kid. I'd made all those promises to her about being there for both of them. And what had I done? Bolted after the first fight.

Left them both to figure shit out for themselves.

Guilt made me look away from Mia.

"She can count on us," Mia said.

"Yeah," I said. "And we gotta show her that. Gotta have her back. Make sure she's okay here. This place really… gets in her head."

"I know," Mia nodded. "That's why nailing Knievel to the wall wouldn't get her to leave. If she thinks it's Negan, that's only going to make her want to stay more. Finish what she started. Make sure everyone's safe."

I nodded, a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach. "So, it wasn't you then."

I pulled at the final stitch in Knievel's chest. It was only then that I realized I probably should have tried to match the thread to his fur a bit better. The neon blue I'd picked at random was really standing out.

"It wasn't me," Mia said. "I don't want to be here, but I know my sister."

"Yeah," I sighed. "You do."

I wouldn't have minded if this had been Mia acting out; maybe part of me hoped it was. But, now it was more likely Naomi was right. Usually, I don't mind that she's right about most things, but this was one issue I could do with her being wrong about.

"You'd really have helped me?" Mia asked. "If I was trying to get us out of here?"

"Yes," I said. "I'd miss you guys like crazy, but I'd understand if you wanted to get to the Kingdom."

"You mean you wouldn't come with us?"

"No," I said. "Rick's asked me to run this place for a while. I can't leave."

"Oh."

"Naomi didn't tell you that?"

"No, she didn't," Mia said. She thought for another minuet. "I wouldn't want us to go to the Kingdom without you."

"I'd wouldn't take it personally if you did," I assured her. 

"It wouldn't feel right to split up," Mia said. "Guess that's how Naomi felt too."

"Something like that. Go easy on her, okay?" I said, standing up. "She needs us to have her back."

"Alright," Mia said. She might even have looked a little guilty for the way she was behaving. I didn't know what else to do or say, so I patted her on the shoulder as I walked past in a way that I hoped was reassuring. I knew there was nothing Mia could say or do that Naomi wouldn't forgive her for.

I returned the sewing kit and found Naomi back in our room. She had her damn maps out again, just like back when we'd been looking for Mia. Only now, she was concentrating on the areas around Sanctuary. You didn't have to be a genius to work out that she was looking for any place Negan might be hiding.

I was too late to stop her from sliding down this slope. Unless I found the real culprit soon, she'd keep slipping. She was spooked. And she was dealing with it the only way she knew how - making charts and lists and taking shit into her own hands.

Deep down, was she still that kid too scared of being let down to let anyone else do something for her?

Not anymore.

If I couldn't get her to look elsewhere, I knew I'd follow her down this rabbit hole. Even if she wound up chasing shadows.

"Hey," I said.

"Hey," she didn't even lookup. Stretched her arms out over the map, and I saw a smear of blue paint under her wrist.

"Why are your arms so blue?"

"It's paint," she said.

No shit.

"Shit, the whole time I've been inspecting under Savior's fingernails, and it was you who painted it all along."

"I was cleaning it, dummy," she said, too tense to recognize a joke.

"Did Greasy and Numbskull not come back?" I asked.

"Justin and Ronnie," she corrected me, and I didn't point out that she'd clearly known which was which without me having to say. "Yeah, they did. I cleaned with them. They're alright guys, actually."

No. They ain't.

There was an instant and sharp twist of something horrible in my gut. Something that made me want to storm down to the Savior's quarters and wipe both of those assholes off the face of the Earth.

"They're the only two I haven't questioned yet," I said, hoping it sounded as casual as the way she'd mentioned that Justin and Ronnie were 'alright guys'.

Alright guys.

Fucking assholes.

Naomi looked up at me, "You really questioned everyone else?"

"Yup."

Even your sister.

"Well, I doubt it was either of them," she said.

"You buddies now?" I asked. I tried to sound like I was joking, but part of me was pissed off. She'd been staring daggers at these assholes, and now she liked them? In the space of what… a few hours?

"No," she said flatly. "But c'mon. We both know it was most likely Negan."

I did my best not to sigh or react in any way that might upset her. But, I ain't gonna lie, I was already worried about this. Of course, I couldn't have known how bad it would get, but even then, I knew her tunnel-vision focus on Negan might blinker her to other dangers. Like Justin's dangerously greasy hair.

"On his own?" I asked and watched something click in her eyes. "You think if it was him, he got in and out without inside help? Or anyone seeing him?"

"Shit, you're right," she said. I thought it would feel better to be right. To show her that there was no monster in the woods that she needed to be frightened of. But, all I'd accidentally done was show her the monster was already living here.

"Also, it… eh… it wasn't Mia," I said. She looked at me like I'd grown an extra head.

"Why the hell would you think it was Mia?"

"She hates this place," I said. "I thought she might think this was a way to get you out."

"She doesn't hate this-" Naomi said. I could see her trying to find a way of explaining how Mia felt without offending me.

"Yeah, she does," I said, cutting across her. "She told me she does."

"Oh." A slight flicker of worry in her eyes.

"And even if she hadn't," I said. "You really think I ain't noticed she's been off? How moody she's been?"

Naomi shrank back, a little guilty. Couldn't tell if it was because of how Mia was feeling or because she'd been trying to hide something from me. Maybe both.

"She'll settle in. Just might take her a while is all," she said, but she didn't sound like she believed it herself. I nodded like I believed it, too, gave us both a minute to think things over.

"Why didn't you talk to me about it?" I asked. I tried to say it as gently as I could, I wasn't accusing her of anything, but she still winced.

"You already beat yourself up enough about us being here," she said. "Didn't want to add to it."

"That also why you didn't tell Mia it's my fault you're both here?" I said. "You just let her blame you? No wonder you've been arguing all the time."

"It ain't on you."

"It's more on me than you."

"You gave me every chance to go to the Kingdom," she said. "And I refused. I brought us both here even though you didn't want it, even though Mia didn't want it… It's on me."

"I want you both with me," I said. "I just don't want you both in this place."

"I know," she said. "And maybe it was selfish of me to put what I want ahead of what you and Mia wanted."

"Nah, you were right," I said. "Not to split us up. Even Mia thinks so."

"She does?"

"Yeah. Once I told her that I wouldn't be coming to the Kingdom even if we somehow convinced you to leave, she said she wouldn't want to be there if it wasn't the three of us."

"She loves you."

"It's mutual," I said. "You and Mia are my whole world, and I'm going to be there for both of you. Forever."

"Yeah. I know."

"No, you don't. I know I made that promise before, and I didn't keep it," I said.

"Life got in the way," she interrupted. Always making some damn excuse for me. "You were a kid when you said that."

"I let it get in the way," I said. "And I'm not a kid anymore. I ain't making that mistake again."

"You don't need to tell me all this," she said. "I know how much you love that kid. It's why I wanted her with you when we broke out of here. If anything happened to me, you're the first person I'd want taking care of her."

"Something ain't gotta happen to you for me to take care of her," I said. "I want to do it now. With you. That's what I'm trying to say. I know she's long past midnight feeds and bedtime stories, but whatever the teenage version of that is, you ain't gotta do it by yourself."

"Seems to be mostly heavy sighing and slamming doors."

"Whatever it is, I'm in," I said. "I mean… you gotta do the homework and shit, no point Mia asking me about any of that. Y'know, times tables and shit, that's all you."

"She knows her times tables," Naomi said. Then she gave me a slightly disapproving eyebrow raise. "More to the point, so do you."

"She can tie her shoelaces, right?"

"Yeah. Been doing that since she was five," Naomi said.

"Can she swim?"

"Yeah," she said. Her worried little look softened to an amused smile. And then she glanced down at her feet. "I can't, though."

"What? Yes, you can," I said, so confident in my belief that Naomi could do anything that I outright rejected her own knowledge of herself.

"No," she glanced up at me. Kinda shy, cheeks all turning red. "Swimming lessons were expensive, so I never went. Hey, how come you learned?"

"Merle threw me in a lake once," I said. "Deep enough that I could stand, but he wouldn't let me get out until I could swim out."

"Course he did. That's batshit."

"Hey, it taught me, didn't it?"

"Just glad Mia already knows so you don't have to teach her that way."

"You don't," I reminded her, and she froze like I was about to pick her up and throw her in the nearest lake. I would've, but I didn't know where it was. "How about a bike? Can Mia ride a bike?"

"No. Actually," Naomi was surprised I'd stumbled on something. "Couldn't afford to buy her one for ages. Then I got that fancy job and a pay rise, but… never had the time."

"Alright," I said. "I'll start there."

"Best be talking about a bicycle and not one of your bikes."

"No? We gotta wait until she's fourteen for that, right?"

"Don't you dare."

"Alright, alright," I raised my hand in mock surrender. "Fifteen."

"Daryl!"

"Okay, okay," I said, loving the flash of joy in her eyes. The way her whole body had relaxed now. "But seriously, I'll help out with whatever. Not just the fun stuff. If she's hurt or upset or mad… I wanna help with that, too. Even if it's me that she's mad at."

"I know you do," Naomi said quietly, her eyes serious again. "And obviously, I want you around for everything in my life, but when it comes to Mia…."

"Look, I know it's always been the two of you," I said. "But it ain't like that now. It was always meant to be the three of us. I've thought that since the first time I held Mia when you'd brought her home. She was tiny, remember?"

"Yeah," Naomi's smile was softened by the memory of it. "I remember."

"It's okay if it takes you both a while to get used to having me around like that," I said. "I'm the one who wasn't there at the start. I get that. It might take Mia her whole life to get used to it, but I'm gonna keep showing up. Every day. No matter what. For both of you. And just for her if you wanted nothing more to do with me."

"Yeah?"

"Yes," I said. "Hell, if you had the paperwork to adopt her, I'd sign it right now."

"Daryl…" she said, and everything about her was soft. Her voice when she said my name, the way she looked at me. Even the way she was standing, the stress went from her body as she realized she wasn't dealing with this alone.

This is how I want to make you feel always.

"We're building a life together, you and me, and Mia's got to be one of the biggest parts of all that," I said. She wrapped her arms around my waist, leaned into my shoulder. "Why else are we doing all of this if not for her?"

"I know," she said. We were quiet for a moment. I let it settle before reaching into my pocket and pulling out Knievel.

I heard her gasp before I'd even said, "Fixed this for you."

"Look at him," she said, sounding so happy that it was worth the stolen sewing kid and stabbed thumb. I'd have used my thumb as a damn pin-cushion for a year if it made her happy. "He's good as new."

"Hardly," I said, feeling the same way I always did when she gushed over every little thing I did - embarrassed but also weirdly proud all at once.

And then she fixed me with a mischievous grin that immediately put me on edge. I was in for some kind of teasing; I just couldn't work out what. And then she said, "Thank you, baby."

Baby.

My stomach dropped to my knees in the same way it had when it had first slipped out of my mouth on Rick and Michonne's last night here. Again, I prayed for a sinkhole to open and claim me. Naomi was still grinning at me.

"Shit, I hoped you'd forgotten about that," I said.

"Nope," she said. "Took me a damn week to convince myself it had even happened, baby."

"Stop."

"Stop what, baby?" she asked, all fake-confused.

"I take it all back," I said. "It just slipped out. I don't know what I was thinking, I… it just…."

"Y'know, I didn't hate it," she admitted when she felt like I'd struggled enough.

"You didn't?" I asked. I'd been expecting some kind of quip about infantilizing her.

"No," she said. "I thought I would, and I'm not sure it's very… y'know... us, but… I still don't think I know how I felt about it."

"Well…" I said. Her admission made me feel brave enough to say something else, something I'd been running over in my head since the whole sorry thing had happened. "Ain't that what we're supposed to do?".

"What?"

"Pet names and shit."

"Ain't that what dummy and dumbass are for?"

"I guess," I said. "But shouldn't those kinda things be… I dunno… nicer?"

"Maybe," she shrugged like it didn't much matter. But it mattered to me. When I'd thought about the kind of guy who deserved to be with Naomi, I'd thought about the type of man who'd treat her like a damn Queen. I sure as shit wouldn't have put up with some other asshole calling her names like that. That ain't right. That ain't how you're supposed to treat a girl, right?

I didn't know how to say that to her. I didn't even know if I was right.

I didn't know what to do with a love like ours. I felt it so strong inside of me it almost hurt. Like I might burst. Like there wasn't enough space in there for all of my organs too. Every tiny thing felt huge. Every kiss was like the first. Every time I made her laugh, I felt ten feet tall. But every argument felt like my whole world was ending. And everyone who looked at her wrong felt worthy of death. I thought all of this would calm down if she was ever mine, but I might have gotten worse.

Until very recently, I'd never even seen a love like ours. Every example I'd ever been around had been filled with yelling and smashing shit and flying fists. But just because Merle and our Daddy had been that way didn't mean I had to be. It wasn't like that violence was in our DNA, right? That dream. That horrible, fucked up dream could have been a warning, not a premonition.

You can unlearn that kinda fucked up shit.

You can break those patterns.

Fight the destructive impulse.

Right?

Chapter 52: Storms and whistles

Naomi

I could feel him watching me. He hadn’t said a word, but I knew I’d find him leaning against the door behind me with his arms crossed in that way that makes the muscles in them swell. Eyes fixed on me like he sees me in a way that nobody else can, which I guess he does, and that's what makes it so damn effective. 

"Come to bed," Daryl said. I couldn’t decide what annoyed me the most - that he hadn’t asked or that something about him demanding it made it more appealing. 

"Can't. I’m on night watch,” I said, although it should have been obvious that I wasn’t standing around on the Sanctuary roof for fun.

"Another night?" he asked. I heard him move. Step closer. "That's four this week."

"Manny's kid's sick," I said.

"So?"

"So, it ain't fair to make him do night shifts when he's got a feverish toddler," I said. Daryl still found it hard to give a shit about ex-Saviors, but he'd never had any resentment towards the kids. "Someone's gotta step in."

"And that someone's gotta be you?"

"I offered. Didn’t see anyone else stepping up," I shrugged like it was no big deal, and I hadn't jumped at the chance to watch the forest for any sign of Negan's return. As if I wouldn't have found a way to be up here even if Manny's kid hadn't caught a cold. Daryl wrapped his arms around me from behind. He’d been standing so close that it wasn't a surprise. My body relaxed into his.

"Y'know, I am in charge of this place," he said, his low voice right by my ear. "I could get someone to cover for you. A perk of being the boss and all."

Before I could answer, I felt his lips on my neck. I fought the urge to close my eyes and melt further into him. If Negan snuck out of the woods and I missed it because Daryl was too damn irresistible, I'd never forgive us.

"Can't be seen to be giving me special treatment."

"Sure I can," he said, barely taking a break from the slow trail of kisses he was leaving on my neck and shoulder. "You're my girl."

My girl. 

Would hearing him say that about me ever not make my stomach flip in a way I hated myself for just a little bit?

Goddamn it, Naomi, get it together.

"It's one night. I'll be fine," I said and cursed myself for doing so. All I wanted was to take his hand and go to bed with him. Beneath me, the wind sighed through the trees like the forest was mad at me for turning this down too.

"Ain't there supposed to be more than one person at each post?" Daryl asked, and I bristled because I knew damn well he knew the answer to that.

“Yup.” I tried to keep the confrontation out of my voice, but I could feel it rising in us. 

“So, how come you’re out here on your own?”

“Technically, I’m not,” I said, trying to keep it light. “You’re out here, too.”

“But I ain’t supposed to be,” he said. My heart sank. “You give Manny’s buddy the night off, too?”

"No,” I said, keeping my tone neutral. “I’m sure Justin will be along any minute." 

Daryl tensed at the mention of his name. He let go of me and took a step back. Cold rushed into the spaces where his arms had been. 

"Justin, huh?" He wanted to yell at me. Part of me wanted him to yell at me, too.

"Yup,” I said. Daryl paused, waiting for me to say something else, but I didn't react. I didn’t bring up that I knew he already knew this because it would have been run by him by someone. And he must have seen the changes, or he wouldn’t have known he could find me up here. 

“He’s late,” Daryl said when I didn’t rise to anything else.  

"I’m sure he'll be along any minute,” I said again. The cool in my voice was noticeably artificial, even to me. Daryl stewed in the silence. I stole a glance over my shoulder at him. His jaw was clenched tight, his eyes glaring out into the darkness like the night itself had just insulted him. He didn’t like any of the Saviors, but something about Justin especially rubbed him the wrong way. 

"You tell Jerry that you can't make patrol tomorrow, then?" 

"No," I said, irritated that he was asking questions he knew the answer to, skirting around a fight he wouldn’t actually start. "I'll be there. I can do both."

"And then what? Back out here tomorrow night?" There was a definite snap in his tone.

Here we go. 

"Depends on how Manny's kid's doing," I shrugged, although I knew if Manny's kid was fighting fit, I'd still find a way to be out here watching the parameter for Negan. Daryl probably knew it too.

“Naomi!” Daryl said my name with a growing sharpness. He was losing his battle to stay calm, but something about it opened a slight relief in me where I thought it would fill me with dread. "That ain't enough time to sleep."

This is it. 

This is the fight that’s been brewing for days.

"I'll be fine," I said. "I can catch some shuteye after this, but before we head out."

"That's what… two hours of sleep?"

"Three if I skip breakfast," I said without thinking. Daryl knew me too well to not be concerned by me voluntarily skipping a meal.

"You skipped breakfast this morning," he said. "Didn't see you at dinner, either."

"I ate. Quit worrying about me," I said. Something sharp and uncomfortable sat in my gut. My lungs tightened, and I had to look up at the vast expanse of the sky to stop feeling that the world was closing in. I didn’t know he’d been watching so closely. Taking note of my every move when he should have been paying attention to this place. 

"Pfft. Worrying about you is my full-time job," Daryl said. "Running this place is a breeze in comparison."

"Real nice." 

It was the closest we’d come to arguing, yet it still didn’t boil over into anything more. Instead, it dissolved into tense silence that we both refused to break. I could hear Daryl breathing hard through his nose, suppressing something. I’d have preferred it if he yelled at me. 

"You're gonna make yourself sick living like this," he said eventually. "I can't stand by and watch it happen."

Goddamn it. 

The concern that crept into his voice was enough to make me meet his gaze. 

"It's only while Manny's kid's sick," I said, and it was the first time I'd considered meaning it, although Daryl didn't look like he believed me. There was a second where I thought  this  was  it;  this was the moment he’d finally snap and let all of his anger out. I could feel my own retorts start to rise up in anticipation. Things that had been left to fester for days. His sulking, monitoring of my every move, the crushing weight of being the only person in this place who was taking the threat of Negan seriously. Daryl would tell me how irresponsible I was being, how I was an idiot for trying to get close to any of the Saviors, and that it was achieving nothing but putting me in danger. 

And then, when our voices hurt from yelling, we’d find an end. Either Daryl would come around, or I would, or we’d bend our iron wills just enough to meet halfway. That was our way, always had been.

But that wasn’t how it went down. 

Instead, Daryl took a breath so deep I could see his chest fill up with it, the things he wanted to say burning unspoken in his eyes. All he said was, “Fine.”

“Fine,” I heard myself say, all flat and emotionless like he had, but I was burning inside. Before either of us could say anything else, the rooftop door swung open, and Justin walked through with a steaming mug in each hand. Coffee - the luxuries Negan had managed to horde never failed to astound me. When we’d been returning ill-gotten food and supplies to the communities they’d been taken from, the Saviors had fought to keep the most bizarre shit. We were running low on necessities but still had shit like coffee, sugar, and cocoa beans. These people had it good for too long, had their basic needs met by the labor of other communities, and had forgotten the struggle of this new world. Come winter, they were in for a shock. Maybe Negan had been the only one among them with a brain cell. 

"You're late," Daryl said. Justin had no idea what he'd just walked into. If he did, he might have considered being a little later. Or not showing up at all. 

"Some of us got a long night ahead," Justin gave a smile and an answer I knew Daryl wouldn't like. "I thought I’d get some caffeine in for me and the boss-lady."

Justin held one of the mugs out to me. I took it without saying anything, trying to think of a way to warn Justin to keep his mouth shut and wipe the grin from his face. 

“You’re fucking  late, ” Daryl said, not backing down. 

“Didn't you hear I was getting some  fucking  coffee?” Justin retorted, either failing to read the room or not giving a shit. “For  your  girl, as well. Be grateful that  someone 's looking out for her, not staring at her all day, which is all you do.”

My stomach clenched with the cold dread of knowing I wasn’t the only one who’d noticed Daryl was preoccupied with keeping an eye on me. The Saviors had caught it too. And how would that look to them? I knew that Daryl might have wanted it that way, wanted them to see that I was protected. But what if it had the opposite effect? What if it made him look like he’d taken his eye off this place, and they’d be able to overthrow him?

Daryl’s rage was immediate; his fist flew through the air. Justin’s mug spun upwards, boiling hot coffee tipping toward him as he tried to leap out of the way. When he looked back up, Daryl was all up in his face. 

“She don’t need no fucking coffee,” he said. “She needs the asshole who’s supposed to be on watch with her to show up on time.”

“Well, it’s not like she was alone,” Justin said, not the kind of guy to back down. “Not with you lurking around all the time like her damn prison warden. Ain’t you got anything better to do than keep tabs on your lady?"

"I'm not-"

"What’s the matter? Feeling threatened?”

“What? By a greasy prick like you?” Daryl narrowed his eyes. I knew Daryl too well to judge whether or not this would sound convincing to Justin. The list of people I’d seen Daryl have some kind of jealous minor freakout over was as long as it was absurd. And that was before he’d had to worry about Negan’s most loyal men trying to kill me. 

“Don’t trust her then?”

“Trust  her  just fine,” Daryl said, his fists clenched by his side. I knew this time when he raised one, it would be more than a mug it smashed into. Justin looked ready to strike back. “But you…-”

“Stop,” I stepped between them, facing Daryl. He uncurled his fingers from the tight fist they’d formed and clenched them again. “Cool it. I’m sure Justin’s sorry for being a little late. Right, Justin?”

When Justin didn’t say anything, I shot him a look over my shoulder. Then, reluctantly, he said, “Yeah. Sorry for being late.”

It didn’t sound sincere, and it wasn’t directed at Daryl, but we both looked back at him, waiting to see if he’d accept. Daryl wasn’t looking at Justin; he was still looking at me. And he was still angry. 

Okay, now.

Now he’s going to fight with me because it looks like I took Justin’s side. 

But Daryl took another breath and said, “Fine.”

It sounded anything but fine. Didn’t feel fine, either. Daryl swallowed back whatever it was that he truly wanted to say and left through the rooftop door. I thought it would bring some relief, but it was the opposite. The knot that had been sitting in my stomach for a week tightened and grew heavier. It squeezed my guts as the door slammed behind Daryl. 

Justin let out a low whistle. “Your man’s a psycho.” 

I rounded on him, “You say anything like that about Daryl again, and I’ll boot you off this roof.”

He looked at me like he couldn’t decide whether or not I was joking. I held his gaze, unsmiling until it was crystal clear. He looked away from me, a flicker of annoyance in his eyes, muttering, "Alright, sorry.. fucking hell…."

I turned back to the forest, which didn't yield any of its secrets no matter how hard I scowled. The trees didn’t part in a neat and convenient path to wherever Negan was holed up. Maybe he wasn’t holed up in there anymore. He could have mounted a full-scale invasion while I’d been distracted with this bullshit. I put the mug of coffee down on the wall that ran around the top of Sanctuary's roof because if I didn't let go of it, I'd have thrown it off and listened to it shatter on the ground. 

Justin stood next to me and said nothing.

Your man's a psycho.

I wanted to listen to him shatter, too. 

There was a time when I’d have punched him straight in the mouth, but those times were behind us. Daryl was in charge of this place, and I had to have his back. Sometimes that would mean a fight, but right now, it meant keeping the peace. Peaceful Saviors kept us safe. Negan had ruled with fear; his cronies used violence to keep that fear in place. So if we were going to prove that we were different from Negan, we had to  be  different. Even if Daryl didn't see it that way yet.

I'm sure that was why he was so tense these days. And why he stuck by me like glue; he hated that I was cozying up to the Saviors, and he didn't see that I didn't like doing it.

"Thanks for the coffee," I said to Justin, although I could taste bile in the back of my throat. "Sorry that yours was… well, y'know."

"Yeah, I know," Justin looked at me like he was considering making another smartass comment about Daryl but thought better of it and looked away from me again. 

I could have screamed. Justin had been a tough nut to crack. I could never tell if he respected me for what I’d done to Negan or if he was about to pull a knife on me and avenge him. But, the last few days, when he’d been forced to spend time with me, it really felt like I’d been making progress. If I hadn't been in the middle of a non-argument with Daryl, Justin's offering of coffee would have been a huge win. It would have made my goddamn night.

Unless he’s poisoned it.

I slid the mug along the roof toward Justin. “Want it?”

"You don't?"

"I appreciate it, but I loaded up on caffeine before I came out," I said, and then swallowing back every ounce of resentment I was feeling, added, "Ain't your fault yours got ruined."

"No, it ain't," Justin said, with a hint of satisfaction that made me want to knock the second mug out of his hands. He drank and relaxed a little.

Not poisoned then. 

That was something, at least. The mood was still sour but less aggressively hostile than before. I couldn’t muster the energy to fix it, so I let it stay silent. Since Daryl had stormed out, the fight hadn’t left me, but it had deflated, sunk down into my bones, and the exhaustion that had been buried there reared up. It soaked into my muscles and made my whole body feel heavier. 

I yawned. I couldn’t help it. 

Daryl was right; I should’ve got more sleep. 

Fuck off. 

I couldn’t deny that the sleepless nights were starting to get to me. My eyes felt permanently dry, itchy, eyelids heavy. Inhaling too much sparked an instant yawn. But, whenever I tried to sleep, no matter how beat I was when I lay down, I’d wind up staring at the ceiling for hours. Wide awake. Waiting for a disaster that never came. And in the daylight, I’d hate myself for not being more rested in case today was the day something happened that I needed to be alert for. 

It didn't help that Daryl still had nightmares he wouldn't talk about. He thought I didn't know, but he'd wake with a jolt every night. I'd squeeze him tighter as he fell back asleep again, hoping that somehow it would seep into his sleep and keep him safe in his dreams. Maybe that was why his overprotectiveness grated on my nerves - its hypocrisy. He wasn’t resting, so why the hell should I? Sometimes Daryl’s protection felt like armor, but right now, it was a straightjacket. 

At some point in the small hours of a long, uncomfortable morning, Ronnie, stationed on the East side of the building with Eugene, brought around an old shoebox filled with homemade taffy. Ronnie hated us non-Saviors, so the gesture surprised me, but then I couldn’t imagine what kind of conversation he'd have with a guy like Eugene, so he probably needed a break. Even if it meant offering a sweet treat to a sworn enemy. It surprised me enough not to say anything about what a dumb use of our dwindling supplies this was. 

Justin and I still hadn’t spoken a word to each other since I’d given him my coffee, so I took a piece. A scrap of hope that the Saviors were warming to us or a sweetened cyanide pill to chew on, I was too tired to care. Justin declined. He and Ronnie chatted about a poker game I was pointedly not included in before Ronnie made his way over to the next group of lookouts. I waited until he was gone and then chewed the taffy in silence. 

Or, at least, I tried to. The first bite stuck my teeth together so firmly that I thought it would be the last bite I ever took. Then, a muffled, alarmed ‘ rrmphf?’  squeezed its way past the taffy and out of my mouth. Justin cackled like he knew that would happen. 

Caught between laughter and blind panic, I tried to unstick my jaw so that I could tell Justin to shut up. Taffy tugged at my teeth, stuck so fast I thought for sure they’d be pulled from my gums. I prodded it with my tongue, hoping to get some of the sugar to melt. The harder I tried, the more Justin laughed. And when I tried to speak, he almost bent double. 

Nice to know they don’t want to poison me; they just want to shut me up. 

When I thought it was safe enough to open my mouth without pulling out a tooth, I said, “This taffy is lethal.”

“Yeah, why’d you think I didn’t take any?” he laughed.

“How’d you know?” 

“I share a room with that guy,” he said. “I’ve made that mistake before. Trust me, you’ll be pulling it out of your teeth for a month.”

“Fucking hell, I believe you,” I said, still too worried to shut my mouth entirely in case I never got it open again. 

Justin eventually stopped laughing at me, and when he did, it became clear that this debacle had been enough to bring us both out of our shitty moods and return to being, well, not friendly, but… amicable. Which, given we'd been shooting at each other a few months ago, was fine by me. 

I tried not to think about how long it had been. One day at a time was the key to surviving life in this place, but winter would be here before we knew it. It was still swelteringly hot in the middle of the day, but the nights were getting noticeably colder. The leaves were starting to change, which was a problem that couldn't be ignored. We’d wasted almost an entire summer at War, and our winter supplies would suffer for it. Hilltop could only share so much without starving itself. 

On the furthest part of the horizon, where the treetops blurred into the night sky, a dark set of clouds unfolded toward us. 

"Storm's coming," I said. 

"You sure?" Justin asked, squinting at the dark mass in the distance that I'd nodded to. "Might be rain clouds."

I shook my head. "It's a storm." 

Justin didn't say so, but I knew he was skeptical. So it was somewhat satisfying when there was a flash on the horizon no less than ten minutes later.

“Shit, you were right.”

I tried not to look too smug, but I had no doubts. There's a change in the air when storm clouds are near. A charge. A promise of a break in the building humidity. 

Whenever there was a storm back home, back when we were kids, Daryl and I would sit up on the top of our little hill and watch it spread over Atlanta. Thunderclaps above the fancy parts of town, where the sound of rain on their windows probably made them feel warmer and safer on their sofas. Where they probably closed the blinds and missed the way lightning forked across their heads. We'd stay there even as the light rain grew heavier, counting the miles between us and the storm. Then, we'd run and take shelter when the heavier rain turned into an angry downpour so thick and fast that part of you worried it might pierce your skin. If his Dad was out boozing, we'd go to his. If my Momma was working, we'd head to mine. Lights off, curtains open, and windows wide, we'd wait for it to pass overhead. 

If we didn't have anywhere we could go, we'd move to the bottom of the hill and lie flat against the grass. Rain beating down on our faces, lightning searing the landscape for a fraction of a second, thunder rumbling so close I thought I felt the whole earth shake. It had felt a little like how I imagined the world would end before it really did, but it hadn't scared me. Not with Daryl lying right next to me. 

I ached for him, and I wished he hadn't left, that he was here to see this. I wished we didn't have work to do. It was ridiculous to miss someone who was downstairs. 

"Think it'll be here before sunrise?" Justin asked. I almost laughed, wondering if it was optimism or an inability to read the weather. 

"It'll be on us in the hour," I said. 

"No way,” he said, but I don't think he doubted me anymore. Justin had finally relaxed again, and this was a peace offering. “Gotta be at least three. Wanna bet on it?"

"Sure. I'll bet you the rest of Ronnie's taffy," I said, pulling the remaining half out of my pocket.

"Hard pass."

The first few spots of rain hit us not long after the first flash. Something about it washed away the resentment that had been clinging to me for days. Then, another slightly louder but distant rumble stirred something close to excitement in my stomach. An echo of the same feeling I used to get when I was a kid. 

"So, who were you?" I asked Justin to distract myself from thinking about Daryl. "Before all this?"

"A guy with a lot more say around here,” he said. I thought I caught a wisp of annoyance and maybe something wistful in how he said it. “Nobody would have knocked my damn coffee out of my hands back then.”

"I mean before that,” I said, long enough had passed that I didn’t feel the need to rise to his dig, but I couldn’t resist adding, “Before you were an asshole." 

Justin laughed a little at that. I thought for a minute that he was trying to think up another smart-ass answer, but then he seemed to think better of it and said, “Army.”

I couldn’t tell whether or not he was telling the truth. Most of the time, Justin seemed angry and full of bile, bad at taking any order Daryl had given him. On the other hand, he’d been good at taking them from Negan, so maybe he was only a poor soldier under certain leaders. Maybe his background was what made him particularly hostile to a takeover. I played it safe and said, “With that hair?” which earned me another smile. 

“I’d grow it real long when I was on leave, have it cut short right before I was deployed again,” he said. "I was on leave when all this happened. They tried to call us back when the cities were being evacuated, but I lost contact before they could give me my orders.” 

I  think  he started to tell me about where he’d been headed before the roads became impassable. But I can't be sure. I'd stopped listening. Something else had made my ears prick up. Goosebumps rose on my arms and up the back of my neck. I'm sure my heart was hammering a thousand miles an hour, but I couldn't hear it beating in my ears. I'd shut out every other noise and distraction before fully registering what I'd heard. 

A whistle in the dark. 

Not just any whistle. 

That  whistle.

The darkness hid everything. The wind in the trees covered any other noise. The forest looked no different from earlier in the night, but it  was  different.  He  was out there. And he was close. I couldn't tear my eyes away to glance at Justin as I whispered, "Did you hear that?"

"Could… be the wind?”" Justin said, but his voice faltered, unsteady. 

I wanted to disagree, but I couldn't make a sound in case it happened again and I missed it. I stared into the darkness of the forest, searching for any sign of movement. Anything that wasn't a Walker. Any sound that wasn't the rain battering trees or the oncoming storm. Thunder rumbled, forks of lightning on the horizon, trees bent as the wind picked up - yet I remained suspended, caught between what I thought I’d heard and the anticipation of what I might hear again. It felt like seconds; it felt like years. 

And then he whistled again. Unmistakable. Close.

It lit a fire in me, and I’d started running before the last, cold note had faded to nothing. I never thought I’d run toward that sound.

“Wait!” Justin yelled after me. "Wait!"

Fuck that.

I left him to raise the alarm and was at the top of the fire escape before he could say anything else. The rusting metal staircase shook against the building with the sheer force of my feet pounding against each rain-slicked step. In the distance, thunder rumbled, but the storm had quickly become the least of my worries. There were guards at the gates, who’d clearly been goofing around a little and straightened up when I came charging toward them, hollering at them. 

I didn't stop to explain. They'd catch up. When Justin radioed for backup and woke more of the men, they'd all catch up. Waiting would give Negan time to melt into the darkness again. I sprinted the first few paces into the forest and slowed to get my bearings. My breath was heavy and shaky in my chest. Another roll of thunder shook the heavens, and I was annoyed by how close it sounded. 

“Hey, Negan!” I yelled at the trees. “Show your face, asshole!”

A figure passed between two trees and stopped at the sound of my voice. Turned. From the way it listed slightly to the right, I thought it was probably a Walker. But I held off from moving against it. Who knows how injured Negan might be? Seconds later, a flash of lightning illuminated the forest with such force that I could see every fallen leaf, gnarled tree root, and rotten piece of flesh peeling from the Walker's face. 

Damn it. 

I pulled out a knife and took it out. If I hadn’t been preoccupied with more pressing dangers, I might have been interested in how the sounds of the storm would distract Walkers. Confuse them, maybe. Usually drawn toward loud noises, would they end up following the storm? Or would it move too fast for the dead and leave them staring at the empty heavens? 

I waited for the roll of the thunder that followed the lightning to pass before I called out again.

"C'mon out, Negan," I said. "We can end this now. Just you and me." 

I knew there would only be a short window of time before that stopped being true. By now, Justin must have raised the alarm. He'd had time to radio the other lookouts, wake up our fighters. Daryl would be on his way. 

Unless Justin did nothing.

A cold, hard pit of dread formed in my stomach. The adrenaline searing through my veins froze too. I'd trusted Justin to call for backup, but what if he didn't? What if he was in on this? What if he wanted to make sure I was on that roof to hear a whistle and run into the woods in the dead of night?

Like a fucking idiot. 

I swallowed and tried not to let any fear show in my voice. I kept moving forward. If Negan was out here, watching me, I couldn't let him see that I was rattled. 

"Rick wants us to bring you in alive. The War is over. We won. Ain't no sense in killing you and making you a martyr," I said. "You hand yourself in, and you can get a nice cozy cell in Alexandria. A roof over your head. Food. Can't be easy surviving out here alone."

Where the fuck is everyone?

Another Walker stumbled out in front of me, almost falling as it did. It could have tripped on a tree root, heading for me because I'd made too much noise. Or someone could've pushed it into my path to slow me down. 

This was dumb. 

I raised my knife, ducked when swiped for me, and leaped up to plant the blade in its skull. When I pulled out the knife, it fell to the floor in a second death. I barely noticed how heavy the rain was now, but it stuck my hair to my face and dripped into my eyes, blurring my vision. I stepped over the corpse.

This was really fucking dumb.

"It's a good deal, Negan," I called. I took my pistol out of its holster for the first time that night. "You know you ain't got the numbers for a fight."

Another burst of lightning lit up my surroundings for a fraction of a second. I thought I saw a figure not too far ahead of me dart behind a tree. Between us, there was what seemed to be a small clearing. When I was plunged into darkness, I couldn't see any shapes moving in the gloom. I headed toward it anyway. 

“You turn yourself in peacefully, and all is forgiven.” 

Another peal of thunder sounded closer than before. And then, in the silence that followed it, I finally heard something else. Not another whistle. A word breathed between the rustling branches, in the heartbeat between lightning and thunder. 

Just one word. 

And it sounded like ‘Lucille'. 

My gun was heavy in my hands, a weighty reminder of Carl’s point that Negan might be out here alone and unarmed. He might have managed to scrounge a knife or two, but a gun? Bullets? Those were in short supply outside of Sanctuary; Negan himself had ensured that. 

I held out my gun like a sacrificial offering, lowering it to rest on the forest floor. I threw my knife down beside it. 

"There," I said. "Now we've both got nothing. So come out here and talk. Just me and you."  

For a long moment, there was nothing but relentless rain. Branches creaked in the canopy above me, and there was a continuous but ever-changing whisper that could have been the wind or oncoming Wallers. And then something different. Something that broke through the rest of it. The snap of a twig. As if someone might be about to step forward and take me up on my offer.

"Naomi!" The wind swept my name through the trees, but I knew it wasn't Negan. It was too angry and urgent. I glanced over my shoulder, back in the direction it had come from, and tried to gauge how long I had before the team from Sanctuary descended on us. 

So Justin didn't set me up after all. 

I wondered why I didn't feel more relieved about it. Torchlights pushing in from the edge of the forest sent the darkness retreating, and I couldn't shake the sinking feeling that Negan would make a silent retreat with them. I turned desperately back to the dark, searching the spot I thought I'd heard him. 

"Negan, please," I said. "End this."

"The fuck is going on?" Daryl burst into the clearing behind me, ahead of the pack.  

They'd had to wake him up. I could only tell by the way his hair was even more ruffled than usual. And he hadn't had time to grab a shirt; he'd just pulled his vest over his bare arms and chest. However, there wasn't a trace of sluggishness in how he moved. Any tiredness had been burned off as he raced over here. As he looked from me to my abandoned gun and back again, I couldn't see a hint of sleep in his eyes either.

He was mad as hell.

"The hell is your gun doing on the floor?" he snapped. 

"He's here, Daryl," I whispered. "I know it."

I knew Daryl was the one person I could say that to who'd trust me implicitly. Who wouldn't make me feel as crazy as I probably sounded. He nodded; his angry eyes quit glaring at me and focussed on the dark. Shifting like a hunter who knows prey is nearby. I'd seen him get this way so many times before, unbreakable tunnel vision until he caught what he was looking for. I could feel the chances of bringing Negan in peacefully dwindling to almost zero. 

"Pick it up," Daryl snarled.

"What?" I was so shocked that I couldn't think what he was talking about. I'd never seen his concentration slip before. Usually, he barely spoke when he was like this. 

 "The gun, Naomi!" his words were venom and fire. "Pick it  up. " 

Yup. That's it. Zero chance Negan's making it out unscathed.

I bent down. It might have been stupid to put it down, but the cool of the metal against my palms again felt like a mistake. Undoing any progress that I might have been making. It wasn't until I'd straightened up again, gun in hand, that Daryl looked away from me.

"Did you see him?" Daryl's focus was back. 

"No. But I heard him."

"The whistle?"

"Yes."

"Anything else?"

"It happened twice."

"Yeah, I've been filled in," he snapped. "Anything since then?"

"I thought…" I hesitated. Now that Daryl was here, I doubted what I'd heard.

"What, Naomi?" he snapped. 

"I thought I heard him ask for Lucille." 

Daryl was silent for a moment, calculating. Well-trained eyes scanned the dark over and over again. My ears strained for any sound of Negan, but the footsteps flooding from Sanctuary into the woods covered any sound of him. Within a few moments, we were surrounded by people looking to Daryl for guidance. 

"Alright. Spread out, move forward," he told them. "We think Negan might be close. You find him…."

He hesitated for just a moment. I knew he wanted to give the order to kill on sight. He glanced over at me, and I shook my head. Daryl sighed, nostrils flaring in frustration. 

"If you find him, bring him in," he said. And then, because he couldn't help himself, added, "If he attacks, shoot to kill." 

I raised my gun again and took a step toward where I thought I’d heard a twig snap underfoot. I didn’t get far. Daryl’s arm flew out of the dark and stopped me in my tracks. 

“What?” I froze. Had he spotted Negan already? Had I been about to step into some kind of trap? 

"Not you," Daryl snapped at me. My heart damn near dropped out of my chest.

"What?" 

"Go back to Sanctuary," he said. "You're done here." 

No. 

NO. 

Not when we're so close.

I didn't move. Neither of us did. Daryl stared me down, waiting for me to blow up at him. I could feel it burning in my lungs, clawing at my ribcage. But I could also sense everyone around us slowing too. They were waiting to see how this played out. We had our allies here, but most of these folks were ex-Saviors. How would it look if the new guy in charge of them couldn’t get those closest to him to listen? If I ignored him, why the hell should any of them listen?

I turned, and although everything in me was screaming not to go, I went without a second glance. More people poured in from Sanctuary, streaming past me.  

He won’t show himself to anyone else. 

It was a completely irrational thought, and I had nothing to back it but a gut feeling that the more people we sent into these woods, the further back Negan would withdraw. One on one, I felt like I could have got him to come in. Or at least goaded him into showing his fucking face. 

"Hey, you were right," Justin said as he passed me. My heart dropped. Right about what? Had he seen Negan? Or did he already know he was out there because he'd been working with him?

"What?"

"The storm," he glanced up at the swirling clouds above us, rolling shades of black that blotted out the stars. "It's almost right over us." 

I wanted to believe it was nothing more than that. But when Justin smiled, it was all teeth. My jaw was clenched too tight to say anything back. Justin kept running, and I arrived back to find Sanctuary eerily quiet. 

What if he’s already here?

Now everyone's attention was on the woods Negan could have walked through the front door as easily as I'd just done. Still smarting from my showdown with Daryl, I headed up to our room, where I'd be able to get a good view of the forest beneath us. 

I went slow, listening for anything that didn't sound right, looking for anything out of place. In the corridor to our room, something clicked softly in the silence. Mia’s door creaked open, just a crack. One eye peered tentatively through it. When she saw me, she opened the door wider.

“What’s happening?” she asked. Sanctuary was quiet now, but I could imagine the commotion when someone had come to wake Daryl. Mia shouldn’t have opened the door. She should have stayed locked in there until Daryl and I came to get her. She knew that. We'd been over it a million times. 

I felt a flicker of hot rage and wanted to yell at her. But I knew most of the anger burning in my chest wasn’t because of her. It wouldn’t be fair to take it out on her. And she looked so scared. Her fear took the same shape as mine; Terminus had taught us that there was no such thing as a safe bed. All of that noise and then nothing but silence. I couldn’t blame her for opening the door. 

“It’s nothing,” I said. “We thought we saw something in the woods, but it was a false alarm.”

“Really?” Mia didn’t look like she believed me.

“Would I be here if it wasn’t?” I said. 

“I guess not,” she admitted. She studied my face a little longer, “Are you okay?”

“Yeah,” I said. “Just tired.”

It wasn’t a lie. Exhaustion had settled so deeply into my bones I didn’t know if I’d ever be able to get it out again. It was etched so firmly in the bags under my eyes that Mia accepted it as an excuse for why I might seem off tonight. 

“You have been working a lot,” she said, and a moment of worry flickered across her face. For a second, she looked younger. She looked like the little kid who’d get out of bed for a glass of water and then hover nervously by my laptop when she realized I'd been working the whole time she’d been in bed.  

"I know," I said. I pulled her into a hug. "It's not for long. Just until this place is up and running." 

I'd said it so many times I'd lost count. The more I said it, the more it sounded like a lie, but tonight she nodded. Tonight, we both needed to believe it. I squeezed her tighter than usual. 

All I want is to give you a good life. 

She squeezed me back like she knew. 

“Don’t open the door again unless you know it’s one of us,” I told her. 

"I knew it was you," Mia said indignantly. 

"No, you didn't."

"Did too! I know the way you walk."

It wasn't a robust enough verification process for my liking, "Well, next time, don't open it unless you hear our voices. Okay?"

"Okay."

"I know the storm's loud, but it'll pass soon, so try and get some sleep," I let go of her; although a part of me didn't want to, I knew she was reaching the threshold of embarrassing-sister hugs. 

"You need it more than I do," she muttered and then shot me a nervously cheeky grin, hoping I wasn't about to yell at her. I smiled to let her know we were good, and she shut the door. I waited until I heard the lock. I waited some more and gently pushed my shoulder against it, ensuring it wouldn’t budge. 

When I opened the door to my bedroom, I half expected Negan to be in there already. Stepping out from somewhere with his shit-eating grin and a comment about how he could pack everything he owned into the bags under my eyes. But the room was dark and empty. I didn't bother turning on the lights. Instead, I crossed to the window and watched pinpricks of light flickering in and out between the trees.

There was a reason Mia had given me the same look she had when I’d worked too much in the old days. Back then, when I found a story I thought could really  be  something, one that kept me up all night and consumed every waking thought, people hadn’t always listened. My editors brushed off some stories as unimportant or told me there was nothing there, so I’d worked them alone alongside my other assignments. I’d followed every lead, tracked down people who’d held secrets for years and convinced them to trust me. I’d submitted countless freedom of information acts to get documents declassified and run every tiny detail past fact-checkers and lawyers until I had something that proved my bosses wrong.

The same gnawing gut instinct told me that Negan was out in the woods, watching us. Waiting for us to fail. And Rick might have brushed it off, but I knew it in a way I couldn’t explain, so I took every nightshift I could. I went on every scavenging mission, every patrol of the woods, searching for any sign of life in a world of the living dead. I needed people to respect me enough not to kill me for maiming their previous leader, to trust me enough that they might confide in me if they knew where Negan was. But, Negan wasn't a story. He was flesh and bone and out for blood. I couldn’t cover every inch of ground alone. It wasn't the same work; it needed a different approach. 

I rested my head against the window. It was raining so hard that water came down the pane in a river, distorting everything beyond it. Blurred figures ran out of the forest and toward Sanctuary. I knew they hadn’t found him. The storm had closed in, and it wasn’t safe to be out there. Daryl had sent them all back, and we were out of time.  

I counted the seconds after the next lightning flash, waiting for the thunder to boom above me and cover the scream of frustration that tore right out of me when I let it. “ Fuck!”

When it was safe, I knew we’d go back out there, and Negan would be back in the hideout he’d used to evade us for months. Moments later, Daryl was heading back to our room. I knew it was him. I knew by the way he walked. I looked out into the hall to see him storming down the corridor. Anger flashed in his eyes again when he saw me. 

"Before you start," he muttered. "I had to turn them all back. That storm could've brought a tree down on 'em. I had to-"

"Yeah, I know how storms work," I said. It annoyed me more than it should that Daryl had forgotten that everything he knew about storms, we’d learned right next to each other. 

“Didn’t find him,” he said. He wasn’t slowing. I backed away from the door as he got closer. 

“Yeah, I guessed,” I said. “But Negan’s out there, I know it.”

"I don't give a shit what you know," Daryl said. His shadow loomed in the doorway. Behind me, a flash of lightning lit up the room. “What the  fuck  was that?" 

Daryl slammed the door behind him so hard it shook on its hinges, so hard I wouldn't have been surprised if he'd sealed us in. The boom echoed in the hallway. And in my head. I tried to ignore it. 

“What the fuck was what?”

“You run off into the night by yourself, don’t wait for any  fucking  backup, and when I find you, you’ve got your gun  on the goddamn ground?! ” He yelled so loud I felt like the walls were shaking. So loud I think I missed the next thunderclap, or maybe he was just so damn mad that it didn’t dare interrupt him. 

"I was trying to… I thought if Negan saw that I wasn't going to… that I didn't…." I'd been so sure of my decision when I'd made it, when I thought I could get Negan to come out if we were facing each other with nothing but our fists. But now that Daryl was demanding answers, that certainty shrank inside me. I shrank too. Or maybe Daryl grew, swelling in his anger. 

"Fucking what, Naomi?" he yelled, frustrated that I couldn't even form a damn sentence in my own defense. I'd been waiting for this moment, where we'd finally have it out with each other, but now that it was here, I couldn't make a sound. Couldn't move. Daryl, on the other hand, couldn't seem to stop moving. Pacing. He raised his fists to the wall but never let himself strike. 

"That was so stupid.  Running off like that…." Daryl shook his head. In disbelief or anger, I couldn't tell. "You ain't that dumb. You ain't. But one whistle from him,  and you go running?"

My heart had doubled in size and was now lodged in my throat, blocking my windpipe. My eyes stung. 

"I know," I said, my voice sounding small in the shadow of all of his anger and the rage of the storm outside. "It was dumb. I didn't think…. I'm sorry."

Daryl wasn't expecting me to give in so quickly, and his rage went nowhere without anything to fight against. Damp hair stuck to his face, rainwater glistened on his arms as he raised them. His fists were clenched, and I knew he wanted to hit something. The last thing we needed was a fist-shaped hole in the wall, but I found it difficult to say anything. 

"You don't ever pull shit like that again. You hear me?" he said, teeth gritted, jaw clenched. I nodded. He reached for me like he was about to touch me but then pulled back like he'd realized I was poison. My heart ached.

Say something, damn it.

But I couldn't deny that what I'd done had been reckless. Couldn't defend anything. I couldn't say a damn word. The way he'd slammed the door echoed. Not in the hallway, but deep inside me, and it had rattled something loose. 

For a second, I wasn't really there. I was four years old and wondering if my Daddy knew I existed and, if he did, why he didn't want to know me. I was seven and sitting in a parking lot while my Momma shot up in the back of some guy's car. I was nine, and Momma told me I shouldn't have called an ambulance when she passed out because they might take me into care and nobody else could ever want me. I was eleven, and she left for four days without a note. I was sixteen, and she was gone for weeks. Then, I was nineteen again, standing in a dorm room after my only real friend in the world had stormed out. 

Does he look angrier than he was that night? 

Daryl paced back and forth; each step took him further away or made me smaller. Wind howled around the building, shaking the windows. I was hollow, empty, and it howled through me like a scream. There was only one thought in my head, the same one I'd had all those years ago. It echoed through the years to reach me now. Please don't go. 

I hadn't been thinking about kissing him; I'd just wanted him to stop. Stop yelling, stop moving, stop moving away.  But before I could do or say anything else, I could taste his lips on mine, the rage on his tongue. He could probably taste the desperation on mine, something I wasn’t used to feeling and didn’t much like myself for. I feared he'd be as repulsed by it as I was and push me away. But he didn't. He kissed me so hard it sent us both stumbling back against the wall.

Thunder cracked. Frustrated fingers tugged at my clothes, I heard my shirt tear before it came off. I didn't care. Everything I was melted for him; why should the clothes on my back be any different? I pushed his leather vest off his shoulders to the ground, he stopped kissing me, and I hated it.

He pinned me to the cold wall with the heat of his body, his hands, his stare. The burn of his anger. My own anger was gone, extinguished by fear. He was fire, and all that was left of me was smoke, only real because he was. "I am trying to protect you." 

"I know," I said because I did and because any argument I had about being able to protect myself didn't feel as important as the fact that he'd stopped kissing me. It seemed that way to him too. He tried to resist it, his lips inches from mine, looking like he had something else to say but couldn't get the words out. 

Please don't pull away from me.

Not now. 

Daryl caved, his kiss deeper than before, and my bra joined our growing pile of clothes on the floor. His usual hesitant gentleness had been burned away. He was raw power and heat, and every nerve in my body came alive for it. Kisses blazed across my skin in a haze of lips, tongue, and teeth toward my navel. A sharp tug on my pants took them and my underwear down in one go. He might have broken the zipper, but I couldn't care less. Right then, I was just glad to be rid of them. To be closer to him.

This man could destroy me . 

Sure, Negan might put a bullet in my head, maybe torture me a little, but Daryl…? He could tear my heart and soul to shreds with a few words. With the slam of a door. He could unravel me as quickly as he'd just undressed me. His belt buckle clinked as he unfastened it. I heard the soft thud of his pants falling around his ankles. One of Daryl’s hands ran slowly, lightly, down my body from my collarbone to my hip. The other one cupped my face, keeping my eyes on his. "Don't you dare do that to me again, ya hear me?"

I shivered, although my skin felt embarrassingly flushed with heat I nodded. 

"Daryl…." I whimpered. His hand skimmed across the back of my thigh. I wanted to wrap my leg around his hip. But I knew we couldn’t, not yet. My head was foggy, every thought was clouded by him. "I need you."

"Need me, huh?" Daryl pressed his body into mine again, his erection hot and hard against my stomach. "That why you're running off into the night without me? Huh? Running off to him?"

"I'm sorry." My voice felt so small compared to his, even the thunder outside wasn't as loud as he was. 

"Dammit, Naomi," he cursed before he kissed me again. It was such a goddamn relief. I shivered, but I couldn't tell if it was the cold of Sanctuary's wall pressed against my back or the heat of his body pressed hard against my front. 

I swallowed down the urge to be impulsive and reckless. Daryl didn’t move, leaving me to pull away from him and walk the short distance to where we’d stashed the condoms. Every step away from him felt like a betrayal of my own body, and I couldn't stand how far away he was, even when he was on the other side of the room. And then, as I reached into the box, I felt him behind me. His warmth at my back, hands on my hips running across my stomach and up to cup my breasts. As he kissed the back of my neck and across my shoulder blades, he whispered, "I can't lose you baby, I won't."

It was so distracting that I could barely get the wrapper open.

I turned back to Daryl. Naked in the moonlight, his back turned to the howling storm, tattooed, scarred, perfect. His eyes were on me. 

Always on me.

There's not a smile I can plaster on my face that he can't see right through to the truth of. Daryl was the only person here who'd look at my relentless hunt for Negan as something not borne out of revenge, fearlessness, or even guilt. He saw it for what it was; fear. Daryl saw me for who I was, and he still wanted me. He was already kissing me so deeply that it vanquished all thoughts of Negan and his bullshit back to the shadows where they belonged. I felt my back hit up against the wall again before I'd had a chance to slip the condom onto him. I fumbled with it a little and had to break our kiss so I could concentrate. Daryl was no help, leaving a hot trail of kisses on my neck. 

When I finally got it on him, I hooked one leg around his waist and guided him inside me with an urgency we both felt. I heard him groan and closed my eyes, wrapping my arms around his neck and breathing in his smell as he started fucking me against the wall. His arms held me tightly to him, his anger driving him harder inside me than usual. I felt his chest rise and fall in heavy breathing against mine as he surrounded me, filled me. His voice, dark and angry by my ear, "Don't you dare run off on me again, ya hear?"

"I'm sorry," I choked out. My hand fisted in his hair, the other trailed across his back and shoulders. I lingered over his scars. I’d been so caught up in my own fears of him leaving that I hadn’t thought about how this fight might have rattled him. How me running out into the dark on my own would shake him when people had left him too. How he might have felt to see me unarmed and on my own. After everything he'd lost, he was letting me into parts of himself he’d never shown to anyone, never explored himself. "I'm sorry."

The room lit up, lightning flooding through the rain-streaked window. A flame of pleasure lapped at my core, and my back arched against the wall involuntarily. I almost slipped. 

"I don't need you to be fuckin' sorry," he grunted, thrusting harder against me. "I need you safe."

I looked at him with an intensity he might not have understood, but I hoped he felt. “I love you.”

I’m not leaving you. 

I could never. 

I think he got it, and although he was surprised to hear that at that moment, I think he liked it. A deep grunt in the back of his throat, his jaw clenched just for a moment, his arms tightened around me. “I love you.”

Daryl took hold of the leg that wasn’t wrapped around him and lifted it off the floor. 

"I got you," he whispered as he lifted me up. “I got you. I ain't ever gonna let you go, baby."

I don’t know if he said it to reassure me when I slipped a little against the stone wall of Sanctuary before I squeezed both of my legs around his waist. Or because my fingers were digging into his back. Not because I didn’t trust him to hold me up, but because I didn’t think I could ever let him go. 

Steadying myself on his shoulders, I pressed my back against the wall. His hands moved to my ass, holding me up while he thrust relentlessly in and out of me. His eyes looked down at my body, at the place where we met and then he looked back up at my face. When our gaze met, I saw desire and anger burn in equal measure. It was a relief to see that hate wasn’t in there; it wasn’t anywhere close. 

"I'm sorry," I moaned again, my voice thick with pleasure and regret. "I'm sorry."

"Prove it to me, baby. Cum for me, darlin'."

"Oh, fuck," I felt the fire burning my veins. My vision turned white around the corners and I squeezed my eyes tightly shut. He kept pounding into me as I came down from my high, desperately seeking his own. I clenched around him and he groaned. His lips seared against mine again, his body almost buckled as I felt that tell-tale throb inside me. As my high faded, all I was left with was the low. My pleasure gone, regret swelling to take its place. 

I never meant to make him feel like that. 

"That's it, that's it," his arms were back around me again, lifting me away from the wall. I wrapped my arms around his shoulders, my face buried in his neck. 

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry," I choked out again. It was all I could think. Everything had blurred. My cheeks were wet. 

"It's okay, baby, it's okay," he said. His warm arms laid me down, soft mattress underneath me. I could feel his soothing hands on my hair. Soft kisses on my forehead, on my salty cheeks. Gentle hands held me close. Soft lips against my skin. "I forgive ya, sweetheart. It's okay. You're okay, darlin'."

 

Daryl

Naomi finally slept.

Wrapped in a blanket, mussed up curls spread over the pillow, she looked peaceful for the first time in far too long. The relief that hit me was harder than a physical blow. I wanted to crawl over to her, curl my body around hers and shield her from the approaching day until she was ready to face it. But instead, I slowly pulled the curtain across the window. Every time it squeaked against the rail, I turned to check she hadn't stirred. It was stupid to hope that the sun would come up before something else kicked off and woke her. But I had to try and force some distance between it and her. What kind of man would I be if I didn't?

Even with the curtains shut, and even though I’d only just managed to untangle my body from hers, I still felt that deep pull toward her when I turned around again. To wrap her up in my arms, bury my face in her hair and breathe her in. Another part of me wanted to pull the sheet back and kiss her neck, feel the fear and the stress flow right out of her.

If I'd known years ago that I could watch the tension ebb out of her body under my fingertips by running my hands across her back, her hips…. If I'd known that one kiss was enough to stop the constant whirring thoughts behind her eyes and replace them with a look that told me all she saw was  me …. You best believe I'd have made a move so much sooner.

I resisted because waking her up wasn't an option and dressed as quietly as possible. If she so much as stirred, she might start to remember what was going on. If she didn't, if she leaned into me and murmured softly in my ear that she loved me, that would be game over for me. I wouldn't be able to get up and get back out there and do what needed to be done for Naomi to always rest like this. I needed to take the temptation off the table, so I left as quietly as I could and waited for a few minutes after the door closed to make sure she wasn't about to come scrambling out of bed looking for something else to fight. 

Naomi's always been a tightly wound ball of anxiety about something of another. It crackles off her like electricity, so most people mistake it for drive or ambition or something, and maybe that's how it ends up, but it starts out as fear. The fear of failing and staying stuck where we'd started had been snapping at her heels for so long that she'd forgotten what it's like not to be running from something. She forced herself never to look back at it, and now she can't see she made it, that it's all so far behind her now. Every time she leaped over one hurdle, she replaced it with a new fear to keep herself running. Like she's a shark, she'll die if she stops moving. Or the people around her will. 

There was a window at the end of the corridor, looking out onto the forest. I walked over and looked out. The rain was starting to let up, fading to a non-intrusive patter on the glass. Even it knew my girl needed this moment of quiet. Storms always made me think of her and lying out in them - two kids who'd rather be electrocuted together than face going home alone.

She probably doesn't even remember that.

Probably saw better storms in DC from some penthouse apartment, high up and safe with the best view. 

I knew I should get a group out now that the storm was dying, but people down there would be looking at me for a plan. Instructions. Still wasn't used to people staring at me and expecting something. All those eyes were on me. Didn't feel right. Standing out in the hall felt right. With Naomi safe behind one door, Mia safe behind the other, and me in the middle: keeping it that way. 

Footsteps echoed at the other end of the hall; they sounded way too urgent. In the gloom, Jerry greeted me with his usual warm smile. The most cheerful thing about this fucking place. He started to say, "Are we-" 

"Keep your voice down," I hissed, nodding to Mia and Naomi's doors. "They're sleeping." 

"Shit, sorry," Jerry said, much quieter, but he still hurried toward me at a pace that made me want to hurl. "We heading back out there? The storm's passed, and I was due to take a group out this morning. No reason we can't make it earlier, especially given what's happened." 

"Yeah," I nodded. "I'll come with you."

"Shouldn't we…?" Jerry gestured toward the door Naomi was sleeping behind. I could still smell her sweat on my skin, the way it mixed with mine.

"You wake her up; I'll kill you." 

Jerry backed away. He smiled, and then it faltered a little when he couldn’t decide if my mild death threat was a joke or not. Not sure I could either.

You have no idea what I had to do in there to tire her out.

Thankfully, before we had to find out the lengths I was willing to go to for Naomi’s sleep and sanity, Jerry decided to play it safe. "Alright then."

I nodded, and we headed down the corridor, away from my girls, to get back out and search the woods. I didn’t like leaving with Naomi’s door unlocked, but I knew if I woke her up so that she could lock it, she wouldn’t go back to bed. She’d want to be out searching, and I wasn’t sure I had it in me to send her away again. It had been a miracle that she’d listened the first time. 

"Do you really think she heard him?" Jerry asked on the staircase. 

"She heard his whistle."

"Yeah, but do you think it was him?" Jerry asked. Every asshole in this place knew and could make that whistle. I could have stood out in the dark and made the same whistle, and I doubt she’d have known it wasn't him. 

"Maybe."

"You doubt her?" he asked. 

Never.

"Don't doubt what she heard, but… there's too many damn Saviors around here,” I said, although I wasn’t telling him anything he didn’t already know. I couldn't finish the thought. It made me too angry. Some asshole Saviors pulling this shit, laughing at Naomi while she slowly lost her mind. 

I never should've let her come to this place.

"Should we call Rick?" Jerry asked.

"Uh… maybe," I said. The thought hadn't occurred to me. "It can wait until it's at least daylight. Unless we actually see Negan, there ain't much to report." 

I couldn't work out the smartest play. Rick should probably know, but would running to him at the slightest sign of trouble make me look weak to the people I'd been told to keep in line? Like I couldn't handle it by myself? 

Maybe I can't. 

Jerry rounded up his group. A few of them glanced over in my direction, uneasy that I was tagging along. 

Good. 

There was still a light haze of rain in the air when we headed out. I doubted our sweep of the woods would turn up anything useful. The storm had given Negan time to slip away.  If  it was him. If it was someone else, some Saviors trying to drive us out, the chaos of the night would have given them the perfect cover to rejoin the group running back into Sanctuary for shelter. It had also obliterated any sign of either Negan or someone pretending to be him. Branches had come down, and any footprints would be flooded. Mud stuck our feet to the ground as we traipsed over it. It was difficult not to feel like this was pointless. Most of the people searching were Saviors; I didn’t know how many of them would turn Negan over even if he punched them in the face. And then, just when I thought we wouldn't find anything, a call rang out down the line. 

“Found something you should see,” Jerry approached me, unusually serious. 

"Is it him?" 

"No," he said, and part of me was relieved, part of me wasn’t. I hoped Negan was dead, but I wanted to find confirmation of that soon before not knowing drove Naomi crazy. I knew if we didn’t find out one way or the other, she’d never stop looking over her shoulder for him. Never stop thinking about him. 

I hated how much she thought about him. 

I know how crazy that sounds because it’s not like she’s thinking about him in any way I needed to worry about. But it still drove me crazy that he was in her head all the damn time when all I ever wanted to think about was her. 

Probably why I have no idea what I’m doing in this place.

Jerry beckoned me over, and I followed him deeper into the woods. The Saviors we passed turned to look at us as we walked, and I wondered how many of them knew what we were walking toward. Noticed that some of them didn’t seem to be looking so hard for anything at all. Finally, we reached a clearing smaller than the one Naomi had laid her gun down in. 

“What am I looking at?” I asked. It was a slightly dumb question because it was obvious that I was looking at a plate balanced on top of something on top of a tree stump.

Jerry pointed at the remnants of food on the plate - something that might once have been a mashed potato from Hilltop and the end of a Kingdom carrot.

“We served that two days ago,” Jerry said. 

“So… someone’s been bringing food out here?” 

“Looks like it.”

I didn’t ask why and Jerry didn’t offer up any explanation. Neither of us wanted to hear or say that someone in Sanctuary had been bringing things out here for Negan. I knew there had to be another explanation for it, a reason that someone from Sanctuary might not want to eat in the big hall with everyone else. Hell,  I  hated how busy and noisy that place was, and if I thought I could get away with sneaking out to eat in the woods on my own, I’d have been out there too. But that explanation didn’t hold a lot of weight. I thought the cold light of day might reveal everything that happened the night before to be less dire, but now this turned the shadows Naomi had been chasing solid. It was like looking under your bed for the boogeyman and finding claw marks on the floorboards. 

I didn't want to touch anything. It was all too neat, too carefully placed. I’d have expected a plate that had been out there for two days to have rainwater on it from the storm; the amount that had come down should’ve washed away any leftovers. But there wasn’t so much as a puddle. Didn’t look like any animals had been at it, either. Scraps of food would have attracted them. Cutlery laid neatly on the plate without being nudged by a passing Walker. Neat. Like someone would leave it at a fancy restaurant. Like they'd gone to take a leak and would be right back.

Fuck this.

It’s easy to feel like you’re being watched in the woods. There are a lot of eyes out there that  could  be looking at you. Including whichever psycho left this here, probably to mess with us. I picked up the plate and found there was a book underneath to help keep it level on the tree stump. Light blue hardback with ‘ Wuthering Heights’  in silver letters on the front. I hesitated and then picked it up, although it felt like a trick. It’s probably how a mouse feels when it reaches for the cheese before the trap snaps its neck.

We found this because someone wanted us to.

I looked at Jerry and knew he was thinking the same. I also knew he was looking to me for a plan. Other than starting to cut pieces off of Saviors who might know something, I was fresh out of ideas. It was tempting but not an option if Rick and Naomi had anything to do with it. 

What would Naomi do?

"Spread out and keep searching the area," I told Jerry. "I'm gonna take these back, see who might know anything about it.”

Jerry nodded and moved to pass the latest instructions to his group. He didn’t seem to question it, or me, or think it was a bad idea. Maybe Jerry was keeping his doubts to himself. Maybe he thought, just like I did, that it was dumb to search an area that someone so  clearly  wanted us to be looking at. Even if we looked in the right places, there were too many Saviors on the search team to trust the information that came back to us. If he was thinking any of that, he kept it to himself. Happy enough to follow my orders. Was that all there was to leading people? Acting like you know what you’re doing until they believe it?

I knew I’d have to wake Naomi. But I didn’t want to, and the whole walk back to Sanctuary, my feet felt like stone. 

I set what we’d found out in the hallway before opening the door. The room was still pretty dark when I entered. I half expected Naomi to wake up as the door opened. Usually, she’s a pretty light sleeper. Terminus had been overthrown while most everyone was in bed. Men had come in the night and taken everything from her. She'd clawed it back, but the shadow still stalked her. 

No wonder she ain't sleeping.

The door closed behind me without waking Naomi, and I still couldn’t muster the will to wake her myself. I stepped over where her shirt lay crumpled on the floor, and my heart flipped in my chest. Something about it looked wrong. I stooped to pick it up and found it torn, almost clean in two.  

Shit. Was that me?

I knew it was, although it looked like an animal had been at it. As I looked at it, felt the material in my hands, I could hear the rip that I’d ignored when it happened because I'd been so wrapped up in Naomi that I'd barely heard it. I looked at it and felt like something in me was torn, too. 

I'd been rougher than usual. I hadn't meant to be, hadn't known it at the time; something took hold of me. It had taken hold of me in those woods when I'd stumbled on her laying down her gun. I'd been so mad, mad enough to hit something, smash something. So angry I couldn't see straight. And then I tasted her on my lips, and whatever had a hold on me gripped tighter. Dug in. Hungry claws and teeth. And the only thing that would satisfy it was her. It turned me into something I didn't recognize. 

Naomi rolled over in her sleep, and my heart damn near stopped. The skin on her back was red; little grazes crisscrossed her shoulder blades. My stomach flipped and sank right down, leaving a dark, cold space where it had been. A creeping chill spread through me from it. My mind spun over, trying to find a reason she might have been marked in that way that had nothing to do with me. 

I couldn’t find one. Couldn’t remember seeing those marks on her when she'd had her back to me, didn’t remember tasting them when I kissed her shoulders. Maybe I'd been too caught up in how her body had reacted to mine. How she’d been so distracted that her fingers had fumbled at the edges of the condom wrapper. How when she turned to me at that moment, she’d been utterly and completely mine. 

And I hurt her. 

I couldn’t find another explanation for the new marks on her back. It must have been something I’d done. I’d struggled to keep my cool before she kissed me, and I hadn’t been able to control myself after that. Guilt threatened to overwhelm me, silence me. Soon it would sour and turn to anger at myself, which always came with the risk I’d take it out on someone else. I reached out and brushed the hair back from her face, leaned forward, and kissed her forehead to wake her up. 

She should run . 

Naomi always woke up the same way, no matter how our day started. Her whole body tensed, ready for anything. When she first opened her eyes, they darted around for the first sign of danger. It took a second or two for her to realize that she was safe, and then her eyes would land on me, and everything would change, soften. She’d smile at me in a way that made waking up worth it no matter where we were, and I’d pray for the day she could wake up without any fear.  

That morning was no different, but when she gave me that smile and a soft, “Hey," it hurt. I knew I didn’t deserve it. In a fair world, she’d be looking at someone else that way. Someone who matched up to that kind of love. 

“Hey,” I said, and she could immediately tell something was wrong. She sat up, hair falling around her shoulders. It’s unfair how pretty she is when she’s just woken up. How’s a guy supposed to think straight?

Naomi had no trouble focussing. “What’s happened? Is it him? Did you-”

“We haven’t found him,” I said. She opened her mouth to say something else, but I cut her off, pre-empting what she'd been about to say. "I got people out there. We're still looking."

“Okay,” she said and knew she wanted to go out and join them but was trying to play it cool as she got up and reached for some fresh clothes. 

“What happened last night….” I said. “It can’t happen again.” 

“I know it was dumb to put my weapon down, Daryl,” she said, shaking out a pair of jeans before pulling them on. “I can’t really explain it. I just…”

“Not that,” I said. I wished she’d slow down. “After that.”

She looked at me then, baffled. I didn’t know how else to say it. Guilt was eating me up, swallowing my words before I could get them out, leaving Naomi to guess as she plucked her bra off the floor, “You mean… arguing? I know... it made me feel… but arguments happen, and we can’t-.”

“No,” I said. “After.”

“ Oh, ” she said, eyes widening slightly. “You mean sex?”

When she looked around for a shirt, I noticed she skipped the one on the floor, and I wondered if she already knew I’d ripped it. If she'd been scared when I did. My throat dried up. I swallowed, “I mean sex…  like that. ”

“Oh,” Naomi looked slightly relieved. Although, when she worked out what had happened, how disgusting I was, she probably wouldn’t want to come within ten feet of me. “Okay. Sorry, I thought you were into it. I didn’t realize you were having a bad time.”

For God knows what reason, Naomi started looking like she had something to feel guilty for. Everything about it made me mad, “You thought I  liked  that? That’s what you think of me?”

Naomi leaned away a little, and I was too heated to tell whether she was taken back or because I repulsed her. I should. I repulsed myself. 

“It really wasn’t that…” she cast around for the right word, “... deviant. I know I might have… done a bit more… but against a wall isn’t so-” 

“I hurt you,” I said. “And you think I liked that?”

She looked at me like I was speaking a language she’d never heard of. "You didn't hurt me."

"I did."

“No,” she said. “You didn’t.”

“I did.” 

“I think I’d know if I was hurt.”

“Look,” I picked up a long mirror propped against the wall. Naomi had brought it in here when we’d decided this was where we would be sleeping, and I hadn’t understood it at first. She wasn’t exactly one for preening. But then I’d found a bunch of knives she’d hidden around the room in places you wouldn’t think to look in, and I remembered she’d taken Negan out with a shard of broken glass from a mirror he’d thrown her against, and I’d realized she was turning our room into an arsenal. Just in case. So focused on the monsters outside her door, she hadn’t stopped to think she might be sleeping with one. 

When I put the mirror down behind her, I knew she’d finally see it. She knelt down in front of it and looked over her shoulder at the reflection of her back. She frowned. Not the kind of frown I was expecting, not angry, more curious than that. She reached one arm across her shoulders and touched one of the marks on her back. Naomi didn’t flinch, but I felt like I was about to hurl. “Daryl, that’s from the wall. It’s not from you.”

“It’s because of me ,” I said, frustrated. Naomi ain’t dumb, and it was maddening she couldn’t see things my way. “I should’ve-”

“No,” she cut me off. 

“The bed was right there, and I-”

“No,” she cut across me again, pulling a shirt over her head so I couldn’t see it anymore. I still knew it was there, and it made the scars on my own back itch. “Hey, if you didn’t like it for your own reasons, that’s fine. But don’t ban something because you think I feel a certain way about it. It was intense, but... I don't think it was a bad way of working through our anger. I'd tell you if I wasn't okay, and I'd tell you if you were hurting me.”

“I didn’t check in with you. I didn’t ask to touch you… I just-”

“You’d have known,” she said. “If I was uncomfortable, you’d have known. Hell, I was the one who kissed you, I asked you to fuck me.”

“I should’ve-”

“Hell, most of the time, you know before I do if I’m not okay,” she said like I hadn’t even spoken. She was more than a little agitated. “Or if I’m about to be not okay. You’ve slowed things down, or stopped, so many times because you  know…  and I don’t how you know, but you  do,  and I… you  know  me.”

She said it like it was a bad thing and not the greatest honor of my life. Naomi fell quiet. She wouldn’t look at me, and I couldn’t tell if she was upset or mad. And I couldn’t tell if she was mad at herself or me. Sometimes, she’d get frustrated when we had to stop, even though it wasn't her fault and there wasn't anything wrong with it. I shouldn't have brought it up now, shouldn't have made her think about it. I knelt down next to her.

"Ain't nothing special,” I said. “Anyone would know that you weren’t..." 

"No, they wouldn't," she said, and I knew from how she said it that there was no convincing her otherwise. I thought about trying to explain the way her muscles froze up. The look in her eye that told me she was only half in the room. It seemed so obvious to me when that fear was about to try and take her under, but maybe she was right. I’d spent my whole life fighting off anything that might hurt her that I was extra vigilant of it. Naomi finally looked at me, “You ain’t him, you know.”

“Who?”

“Your Daddy. Merle. Whoever it is that’s got your head all messed up about this,” she shrugged. My heart dropped. Like she’d looked right into it and pulled out a secret without me noticing until it was sitting, bleeding, in her hands.

"I was so mad at you," I said, guilt swelling in my lungs.

"I know.”   

"I wanted to hit something. Throw something."

"Right," she said. "Something. Not me."

"'Course not," I said. "But I was so angry, and you were so close."

"You wouldn't put your hands on me. Not like that." Naomi sounded so damn confident, so sure of herself and of me. She took my hand in hers, and I saw that crescent moon scar from the last time I'd been too angry, and she's been too close. She caught me looking, “People haven’t loved you right, but you’re nothing like them. Nobody loves like you do. You couldn’t hurt me. Not physically, not on purpose. It’s not who you are.”

I almost told her right then about the nightmares I’d been having. Her all covered in blood because of me. But when I opened my mouth to say something, nothing came. Looking at her face, I couldn’t picture my life without it, and when I tried to tell her the truth, tried to warn her away, all that came out was, "I wanna treat you right."

“You do,” Naomi’s whole face softened again. She touched my face much more gently than I ever could have deserved. "And I just wanna love you right."

"You do," I told her. 

"Good." She rested her head on my shoulder. A moment of quiet that I knew I'd have to break soon but had no desire to. It was crazy she could doubt whether her love was enough. It was fierce and burned so bright it was impossible for anyone she loved to feel cold or alone while she was near. Always the first person in my corner. Never rushing me when words got tangled in my throat. She was perfect, just sitting with her was enough to calm me. I put off breaking the silence for so long that she ended up doing it for me, “Is that all that's got you in such a funk this morning?”

“That, and…” I didn’t want to keep going. I didn’t want to tell her something that I knew would break this moment and throw us back into the bullshit of the outside world. “We found something. In the woods.”

“Show me,” she said.  

“I brought it up. Knew you’d want to see it,” I said. The door felt heavier when I started to open it. I was half-hoping it wouldn’t be there anymore. That someone would have come along and taken it away, but it was still sitting there. I picked it up and turned back to her. "We think someone's been taking food out there. Jerry says we served this two days ago."

I didn't add that it might have been for Negan; she didn't need me to add that part. 

“No way that was sitting out there in the storm. It’s not even wet,” Naomi didn’t take a beat before she realized something was up with the whole scenario. “Was it covered by anything?”

“Nah. It was sitting out on an old tree stump,” I said. “Had a book under it to keep it straight."

I moved the plate so that she could see it and then wished I hadn’t. I watched the color drain from her face. She didn’t move, didn’t blink. I ain’t sure she even took a breath. It was like she froze in time. When she eventually moved, she said, " That  book or a book?"

"This one,” I said. Naomi's reaction made me sick with nerves, although I had no idea why. I tried to lighten it. “Why? You ain't got a copy in that library of yours?”

“Negan gave me that book,” she said. I hadn’t known what to expect, but somehow this was the worst answer she could have given. Like Negan had some secret way of communicating with her. A code I was shut out of. I didn’t like it. I was used to being the one who could tell her something with a look, a word, a shorthand nobody else understood.

“This exact one?”

“I think so.”

“When? Why? The hell’s he doing getting you gifts?”

“It wasn’t a gift,” she said. “It was a trap. A taunt.”

“A  book? ”

“Not the book,” she said, “what was in it.”

“Like… the plot?”

“No,” she reached out and took it from me like it would explode if she moved too fast. She turned the book over in her hands, looking for some tiny detail on the cover or spine that would tell her something. Something I couldn’t see. When she spoke, it was almost absentmindedly, “Although… Two childhood friends who fall in love. Lots of pining and moping. Shit, maybe he did mean that as a taunt, too.”

My heart twisted somewhere down by my stomach. I didn't like this; I didn't like any of it. Naomi opened the book, and immediately something fell to the floor. From the whoosh it made, I thought a page had fallen out. Or some kind of note from Negan to Naomi that he thought I'd never see because I was a dumb hick who'd never think to open a book. Even when it was laid out right in front of him.

But it wasn't a page. It was a photograph. The way the light was hitting it, I could only see Naomi's face grinning up at me, but I knew at once what picture it was.  

“Pack your shit,” Naomi said, her voice sharp as a knife. “I’ll get Mia’s. I want you both out of here within the hour.”

Everything was moving too fast. Spinning like I was trapped on a fairground ride. I was used to Naomi being a few steps ahead of me at most things, but now it felt like she was a few thousand steps ahead. She'd bolted, run so far that I could see what path she was on to join her there. 

Naomi bent to pick it up, and I caught a flash of something on the back. I tried to remember if either of us had ever written something on the back or if her Momma had labeled it. Then I saw Naomi flinch. One second where she let a wave of terror pass over her, and then her face was set in determination. I knew that look. That electricity that crackled off her. The fear deep down inside her. It makes her bold, and it makes her brave; it doesn't make her invincible. 

“Woah,” I said, holding up my hands to try and slow her down. "A little hasty, don't you think?"

I knew the mood she was in; I knew the panic that gripped her. I just didn't know why.

I bet Negan would know.

Naomi pushed the photograph into my hands. 

It wasn’t the light. Mia and I had been scratched off, leaving only Naomi intact. I flipped it over, reading the words scrawled on the back. 

‘I don’t need your forgiveness.

You need mine.’

It didn’t make sense to me, but I knew from how Naomi was flipping out that this meant something more to her. I took a beat, wondering why I wasn’t more freaked. Why I hadn't felt that wave of terror crash over me too. Maybe because it had hit her first, she'd absorbed all of it.

“It’s him," she said.

“Someone else could’ve written that,” I tried to reassure her, but the more this kind of shit went on, the flimsier it sounded.

“In the forest, I told him he could hand himself in, and all would be forgiven,” she said. “And now  this. ”

“Wait," I said. My stomach clenched. "Hold up. I thought you didn’t see him?” 

“I didn’t,” she said, a wild look creeping into her eye. “But I spoke to him. He didn’t speak back, but he was there. He was listening.”

My girl. She’s lost it. 

“Don’t,” she said quietly. “Don’t look at me like that.”

“Alright,” I said, just as quiet. Because something might be driving her crazy, Naomi might have lost her mind, but that didn’t mean she was wrong. She was looking more and more right by the second.

“Pack a bag,” she ordered me again. 

“Alright,” I said. If Naomi was surprised that I’d caved, she didn’t show it. She’d already moved on to the next part of her plan. 

“I’m going to radio Rick,” she said, and I wondered if it was a mistake that I hadn't done it sooner. 

"You don't think Rick coming in here will make it look like we can't handle shit ourselves?" I asked, not because I doubted her or thought she hadn't thought of it. I just wanted to know why I'd been wrong when I'd decided not to.

"Doesn't need to be Rick himself," she said. "All we need is more people we can trust to help us search. No use having the Saviors involved if they’re going to cover shit up.”

When she finally came around to seeing the Saviors for the jerks I knew them to be, I thought I'd be relieved. Figured I might say  I told you so . But when the moment finally came, I felt a twinge of sadness. She'd been working so hard, and Naomi's ability to see the best in people, her belief that most folks were good deep down, or at least had the potential to be, was frustrating as hell. It was also the only reason she'd ever seen anything in me. I didn’t like seeing it stamped out.

"We tell the Saviors people are coming to drop off more supplies," she said. "We're running low, and they're used to regular deliveries, so I doubt they'll question it. By the time they've worked out what's happening, we'll have a good head start."

I thought she was calming down now that she'd made a plan. So I asked, "You want me to call Rick while you get Mia ready?"

"No," her words were more than sharp. They were tight and compact. Bullets. "Pack." 

"Yes, ma'am," I said, hoping it might make her smile, but she was already gone. Out in the hallway, I heard her telling Mia to get ready for a trip to Alexandria. From the tone of Naomi's voice, you might not have known that anything was wrong, and Mia's excitement suggested she had no idea why she was really being told to pack.

After Naomi had gone, I thought I’d feel some of my calm disappear, but it stuck to me. I knew what had to be done and that Naomi wouldn't like it, but we'd agreed on the most important thing; we had to get Mia out. For now, that was all I needed. So I packed a bag and waited for her to come back. I could've gone to find her, I could've waited out by the cars, but I knew it was best to wait in private. Especially given that our last fight had ended… different.

When Naomi came back into the room, the wild look in her eyes had died down. The electricity still buzzed around her, but she’d grounded it now she had something to channel it into. I knew I was about to mess it up.

"Called Rick," she said. "He's going to get in touch with the other communities. They'll all send people and some food, so our cover story looks legit, probably for the best given how little we've got left."

"That's good." 

"You packed?"

"Yup."

"Okay, so is Mia," she said. “Jerry's bringing a car around. Let's go.”

“I’m not going,” I said.

“Daryl!” she flared up immediately. “I need you to get Mia-”

“You’re going,” I told her. “ You  take Mia.” 

"He threatened you and Mia," she said. "Not me. You gotta go. You gotta take her where it's safe."

"No," I said. "I left you here once. Ain't doing again. Not now I have a choice." 

"What makes you think you have a choice?"

“Rick put me in charge of this place,” I said. “How’s it gonna look if I up and leave at the first sign of trouble?”

“I don’t give a shit how it looks,” she said. 

“The only people who know about  this ,” I held up the damn book that had caused all of this. “Is me, you, and whoever put it out in those woods for us to find.”

“Negan,” she said. “Don’t know why you keep acting like you don’t know his name. It’s Negan.”

“Alright, Negan, sure,” I said. “But someone else has been taking food out to him, so maybe they know about it. Maybe they helped. What do you think they will tell everyone else when they see me running scared?” 

“You ain’t running scared,” she said. “We’ll tell them you’re taking Mia to visit-”

“It’s gonna sound a lot more believable if she’s going with you,” I said. “Rick appoints me leader, and suddenly I up and leave for a friendly visit to Alexandria? They’re immediately going to know something’s up.”

“You gotta go,” she said. 

“If  you  take Mia, it looks like a regularly scheduled trip just like Rick sending people will look like a planned supply drop,” I said. “Whoever knows about the damn book and the damn photograph doesn’t even know we’ve found it yet. But they'll be waiting for our reaction. So let's not give it to 'em. For all they know, we never opened the damn book.”

“No.”

“It’s the smartest play. You know that.” 

“No,” she said again. It was all she could say, and it took me a moment to realize it wasn’t that she disagreed with my points. She didn’t want to hear them because she knew I was right. In the fight between her head and heart, her heart was winning. My rational, pro-con list-making girl was willing to throw away the smart choice. For me. 

I took her hand and felt the slight shake of fear in it. "You trust me, right?"

"'Course I do.” 

“Then you gotta leave,” I said. I knew it was a big fucking ask. Naomi, who’d never been able to count on anyone but herself, who’d never walked away from something that needed to get done - could she let me take care of it?

"You've already packed," she said, with a flash of triumph in her eyes. Like she might be able to get out of this on a technicality. 

"Yeah. I packed your shit in that bag, dummy," I told her and watched that little flash die out. “And as much as I like your clothes, I doubt they’ll look as good on me.”

Naomi half-sobbed, half-laughed, and I took that moment to close the gap between us. Held her by the waist. She was spinning out, and I tried to keep her steady. 

“Trust me to do what needs to get done here,” I said. “I’ll find Negan if he’s out there.”

“He is.”

“Then I’ll find him, smoke out whoever’s helping him, and make it safe for you and Mia to come back,” I said. “I promise.”

“He didn’t threaten me,” she said. “It’s you and Mia that are all scratched out on that damn-”

“You really think that wasn’t a threat to you?” I said. “Negan knows you’d do anything for us. He’s playing mind games with you. He’s not even playing them with me; you’re his target.”

“All the more reason for me to be the one to stay,” she said. “It was a message to me. You and Mia can’t get caught up in this. I can’t risk it. It’s not on you; it’s on me.”

“You are mine to protect," I said. “‘Course it’s on me.”

It just slipped out. Naomi shook her head. I expected an earful about how people couldn't belong to anyone else, but instead, she said, "It goes both ways."

And she looked so desperately sad that I had to pull her closer and hide her face against my shoulder. I might have caved and told her it was okay if she stayed. All because I couldn't stand it when she was sad. I probably would have if it hadn't been for Mia. 

"I know," I assured her. "I know it does. But you gotta let me do this. Lemme take care of you."

Everything I’d ever told her about being there for her and Mia rose up in me again. I knew I could swear it all over again until I was blue in the face, and it wouldn't make a difference if she didn’t believe it. There was a big difference between hearing it and learning it, between someone telling you that they’re there for you and actually showing up. I wanted to show up and take care of this so that she didn’t have to, but I couldn’t do it unless she let me. I needed her to step aside so I could be the man she deserved to be with. 

“Okay,” she whispered, and I felt her cave. Her body shifted to lean into mine, she hid her face in my shoulder, and I heard her sniff. I knew this was hard for her, and it meant she had to leave, but I felt like I was flying. The trust she’d just placed in me meant the whole damn world. 

"When this is over, properly over, and this place can run itself, I'm going to get us someplace else," I said. I didn't realize how fragile a dream it was until I'd started saying it out loud. “Somewhere of our own. Safe. A room for Mia, of course. I’ll build it with my own two hands if we can’t find a good enough place.”

I stopped. Naomi hadn’t made a sound. That dream of us with a small place of our own had been in me since I was a kid. I could see it in my mind clear as day. A little house where nothing could reach us unless we wanted it to. I’d held on tight to that dream no matter what had been going on between us, unable to let it go. But I’d never really talked about it. It felt so far out of reach. Even now that Naomi and I were together, I wasn’t sure it could ever happen. Naomi, who'd always been looking to make something of herself, always believed there was something more out there for her if she just worked hard enough…. Would a quiet life with me be enough for her?

"Keep talking," Naomi said, and I found I had to talk past a lump in my throat. 

“High fence with Morgan’s spikes around it to keep the Walkers away. Somewhere close enough to the other communities that we can visit, but… quiet,” I said, so she’d know I wasn’t trying to shut her off from everyone or that I hadn’t thought about ways to keep us safe. “And they can visit us, too. Anytime. Glenn and Maggie can bring the baby. Rick and Michonne can bring Carl.”

“Don’t forget Carol,” Naomi said, but I hadn’t. I could see it all. All of them sitting around a table with us. Safe and happy and together.

“That goes without saying,” I said. “She and Bryce can bring some of the King’s horses and teach Mia to ride just like she wanted. And Mia can have her friends come and stay whenever she wants.”

I could see it all. 

“Yeah, I don’t think you’d keep her and Perla apart for too long,” Naomi said with a quiet laugh. But she wasn’t laughing at me or the idea of what our life together could be. 

“You think Perla will need her own room?” 

“Sleepovers ain’t much fun if you’re in different rooms,” Naomi said.

“Well, all your damn books will probably need a room of their own, too,” I said. “Could add a stable if Mia really wants.”

“Is this a palace you’re building?” she laughed. 

“If that’s what it takes,” I said. “All I’m trying to say is, people can come and visit whenever we want them to. But it’ll be a place for us. A proper home.”

When I looked at her, I saw it all. Not just our friends around the table. Not just Mia learning to ride a horse in the woods. Not just a room filled entirely with books stored in Naomi’s whack-a-doodle system. I saw a whole life, a whole future, with her. Coming home to each other at the end of the day, no matter what kind of day it had been. 

I could see it so clearly. Opening the door as the light failed outside and finding Naomi curled up reading by a fire. I could see that far-off look on her face when she was reading. I could see myself having to make a lot of noise for her to notice I’d come home. And then I could see her looking up, that big smile spreading across her face. I saw her standing up to greet me. A slight bump under her shirt, her stomach growing with a kid of our own.

It came into my mind fully formed, like a photograph of something that hadn't happened yet... 

Might never happen. 

… like a photograph of something that might never happen.

I couldn't say any of it out loud. I prayed Naomi wouldn't ask me to keep going. I wasn't sure how I could. Have you ever wanted something so bad it physically hurts? 

Thankfully, all she said was, “That sounds nice.”

I couldn’t tell if she was taking it seriously or if this was a joke to her, but something about the conversation had calmed her. When I handed her the bag I’d packed, she reluctantly took it without starting another fight. We walked out without saying another word to each other. Mia bounded out of her room to join us. If she noticed something was off, she didn't say anything. She was way too excited about seeing Perla and Alexandria again. 

Jerry had brought a car around to the front for them. I couldn’t stop my heart from sinking the moment I saw it. I wanted them to go and be somewhere safe, but I hated that it meant being away from me. It was for the best, but I still felt a deep stab in my heart.

Saviors gathered at the gates, watching with interest. 

“Car’s all ready for you, boss,” Jerry said. He glanced between Naomi and me. “So, are you both going, or…?”

Jerry sounded so uncertain. I didn’t imagine Naomi had the time to give him much information between getting Mia ready and radioing Alexandria. As far as Jerry knew, all three of us were fleeing like rats on a sinking ship. His confusion and worry seemed to be a wake-up call for Naomi, the perfect illustration of why I couldn’t be the one to leave. Not while I was the one in charge here.

“No,” she said, “just Mia and me.”

Mia paused for the first time since she’d bounced out of her room, “I thought Daryl was coming?" 

"Daryl needs to stay here," Naomi said. "But we'll see him soon."

The way she said it sounded like a threat, as if she was planning on just dropping Mia off in Alexandria and speeding right back here again.

"Real soon," I agreed. 

"Oh," Mia sounded a little disappointed, although she tried to shrug it off, "I guess that makes sense."

"Hop in the car," Naomi told her. "I'll be with you in a sec."

Mia gave me a blink-and-you'd-miss-it hug laden with teenage embarrassment before she got into the car's passenger side. Naomi turned to me like she wanted to say something and couldn’t. 

“See you soon,” I said again, and it sounded lame. The ache in me grew deeper by the second. She smiled, but her eyes betrayed her, even if only to me. I kissed her right in front of everyone, which would've betrayed how I was feeling. Even if only to her. 

The second she was out of my arms, everything felt wrong. Naomi walked to the passenger side. I saw a split second where she let herself feel scared and sad all at once. Then she smoothed it over with a smile like nothing was wrong before she opened the door and joined Mia in the car. I heard Mia giggle before the engine started. 

I watched the car shrink and felt that ache turn to a pull. Nothing was right when she wasn’t with me. 

“Where are they going?” I hadn’t noticed Justin sidle up to me until he spoke. I wanted to punch him. I didn't like that he'd come sniffing around the moment they'd left. I didn't trust his sudden interest in what was happening around here. There were a thousand ways I wanted to reply;

None of your fucking business. 

What the hell is it to you where they’re going?

Were you expecting something else? 

“When we came here, we promised Mia we’d take her back to visit her friends,” I said, as calm as could be. “Naomi’s taking her for a couple of days.”

“Cool,” Justin said like the answer didn’t really matter to him. He glanced back at the car shrinking on the road, his face smoothed of any thought or emotion. I scanned for a crack in his mask and found none. 

Whoever had left that book and that photograph for us to find had been trying to taunt Naomi. They must have known she’d try to get Mia and me out of here as fast as possible, but would they also realize there was no way I could leave? What if, instead of saving them both, I’d just delivered them to Negan?

I remembered all of those fallen trees that Negan had used to block off roads, to force Rick and the others into that clearing. After last night’s storm, you might not think twice about a fallen tree on the road. It wouldn’t be so out of place. It might take Naomi a beat too long to realize the danger and turn around again. 

No. She’s smarter than that.

I picked up a radio. Her car was now just a glint on the road where the sunlight reflected off the roof. 

"Rick?" I called into the static.

It took him a moment, and then, "Everything alright, Daryl?" 

"The girls have just left."

"I thought it was you and Mia who were coming." 

"Change of plans," I said. "I'm staying. They're heading to you now."

"Really?" Rick's low whistle crackled on the radio. "How'd you swing that one? Naomi sounded pretty set." 

"I'm in charge of this place," I said and wondered how many times I'd have to say it for it to feel real and not like some sick joke. "I can't leave. Naomi saw that. Eventually."

"Alright," Rick said. If he was curious about the change in plan, he didn't say anything. "I have a team on the way to you. They should be with you pretty soon."

"Good," I said but didn't sign off. 

"That all you called to say, Daryl?" 

"No," I said. "When… uh, when the girls reach you… call me and let me know, yeah?"

There was a slight pause on the other end that left me twisting. I felt needy for asking and when Rick spoke again, I could hear the damn grin in his voice. "You want me to get Naomi to call you herself?" 

Yes . 

The thought of hearing her voice again sounded like a dream. But Rick was already treating us like we were a couple of teenagers who couldn’t hang up the phone on each other. She'd only been gone for a few minutes, but I could feel the rest of our time apart stretching out ahead of us. The end was so far on the horizon that it was impossible to see from where I was now. 

This is dumb. 

You shouldn't miss someone this much when they only just left; it's pathetic.

"Nah," I said. "Just… let me know." 

“Will do.” 

I signed off. Naomi’s car was gone, but I kept my eyes fixed on the road for signs of our backup. If Negan was out there, I'd find him. If someone was in here messing with my girl, I'd find them. And I'd make them pay. 

Chapter 53: Panic and Fury

Naomi

I hadn't realized how much of my soul Sanctuary had drained until I felt some of it flood back. Rick waved to us from the top of Alexandria's walls as the gates swung open. His other hand held a walkie to his mouth. 

It wouldn't have been hard for anywhere to feel homey compared to the drab ex-factory with its hostile inhabitants, but Alexandria has always been special. This place had taken me in at my lowest; it was where I'd been reunited with Daryl. It was where I'd kissed him for the first time, told him I loved him, and heard him yell it back...

He should be here. 

Guilt carved a sharp edge to any feeling of homecoming I might have had, but I tried not to let it show. Excitement radiated from Mia. She'd grown restless the closer we'd gotten, and now she was craning forward in her seat to see as much as possible. Perla and Lucas were waiting for us on the other side of the gates. I'd barely stopped the car before Mia had unclipped her seatbelt. By the time I'd unfastened my own, she'd leaped out without bothering to close the door behind her or pick up her bag from the backseat. I stepped out of the car just as the girls started screaming and hugging each other. 

"How do they manage to reach decibels only dogs can hear?" Lucas winced as I hugged him hello. Oblivious to us or anyone else, the girls dissolved into giggles about something. After weeks of Mia's sulking, it was music to my ears.  

"Beats me," I shrugged. I remembered girls greeting their friends with the same high-pitched excitement at the school gates after summer, but I'd never been one of them. If I'd tried that with Daryl, he'd have turned around and gone home again. 

"Was your journey okay?" Lucas asked. 

"Yeah. We passed Aaron and the others on their way to Sanctuary." I said. They'd been more than halfway there when we'd driven past - windows rolled down, whooping and hollering at each other from the sheer novelty of passing a friendly car on empty roads. "They're probably there by now."

"Yeah, they arrived in one piece," Rick said from behind me. He'd climbed down from the lookout to join us. I felt a twinge of embarrassment about how frantic I'd been when I'd called him and barked orders at him like I was the one in charge. If he thought I'd stepped out of line, there wasn't a hint of animosity on his face. He didn't seem to have found my panic anything other than mildly amusing.

"Daryl's staying. I…" I trailed off, unsure how to explain the sudden change of plans. The further we were from Sanctuary, the flimsier my reasons for coming here seemed. Standing here now, with Mia safe and happy, they could've blown away on a breeze. 

"Yes, he told me," Rick said, tapping the walkie he'd been speaking into when we arrived. 

"That was Daryl?" I asked, annoyed at my heart for fluttering so much.

"He asked me to let him know when you got here," Rick said. There was a glint in his eye when he said, "You can call him back, tell him yourself if you like. I'm sure he's not gone far from the radio."

My fingertips tingled with the promise of reaching for the walkie and hearing his voice close in my ear. 

Pathetic. 

Get a grip, Naomi. 

There was no need for me to call and tell him something he already knew. He'd be baffled that I was calling for no reason, maybe even pissed that I was taking him away from important shit. And for what? Because I missed him? Already? He'd never let me live it down.

"Nah, it's fine," I said casually. That glint in Rick's eye didn't budge, forcing me to recognize that it was a reflection of something radiating from me - a flashing neon sign that told everyone I was now the kind of person who was clinically obsessed with her own boyfriend. 

Terrible.

Daryl, what the hell have you done to me?

As happy I was to be standing in Alexandria, I couldn't shake a deep pull back the way we'd come. The wind chilled the gaps between my fingers, and I couldn't remember being aware of the emptiness of my own hand before. I curled them into a loose fist that was no substitute for how Daryl's hand fitted in mine and kept them warm.

Rick put a hand on my back and firmly steered me away from the gates as if he could sense my urge to bolt. A few paces in, Lucas excused himself but wouldn't look me in the eye as he ducked away. Carl tipped his hat to us on his way to meet Mia and Perla. I hoped for his sake that they'd have calmed down when he reached them.

The smile on Rick's face didn't move, and he walked me through Alexandira, taking the time to point out the small changes since we'd last been here. A newcomer could be forgiven for not knowing that so much of it had recently been rubble and ash. It would never look the same. But in the future, when another group like the Saviours inevitably came along, they might look at our high walls and battle-scarred homes and think twice about testing us. 

When we reached Rick's, he asked about my run-in with Negan. Or rather, my alleged run-in. 

The questions Rick asked were, on the face of it, no different from the ones Daryl had asked. But it wasn't Daryl asking anymore. Daryl's frown was as unwavering as his belief in me; Rick's smile shone with doubt. Rick had this way of asking - a slight raise in his left eyebrow, a glint in his eye, a habit of repeating any word or phrase that sounded uncertain - that made me feel uneasy. It was an unease some people might have mistaken for uncertainty in their own story, but I held fast to mine. I knew. I knew it in my gut. 

As Rick was easing off, the front door clicked open. Lucas had returned with Michonne. When she grinned at me over a stack of books in her arms, I understood Mia's impulse to squeal. I wondered if Michonne felt it too. 

"I have so much to show you," she said. The table shook when she dropped the books down on it. Rick shot her a meaningful glance, and I watched her suppress a piece of her own enthusiasm. "But, first things first, I guess we should talk about Negan."

"I already told Rick," I said, calm as anything. "I didn't see him. But he was there."

"Oh," Michonne said. I caught her quick glance toward Rick, which was too fast to decipher. "Not that. I mean, what to do when we find him?"

"If," Rick said, quiet but firm. " If we find him."

"We will," Michonne said in much the same way, and relief sparked in my chest. Michonne didn't think I was losing my mind; she might have been the only one who genuinely believed me. 

It was hard to tell with Daryl. Even if he saw clear as day that I was marching down the path of insanity, I knew he'd be right there with me. Holding matching straight-jackets.

"We've thought about it a lot," Michonne said. "Talked about it with the other community leaders too, and with some exceptions, most agree it would be best if we can bring Negan in quietly. Keep him here until we can hold some kind of trial."

None of this came as a shock. They'd been drifting this way since Carl's outburst at Sanctuary, but this conversation formalized it. Telling me was the full stop on a sentence that had already been written. 

Making a martyr out of Negan could make an already frayed situation worse. I knew this, and yet my heart still sank. All I could think about was the picture of Daryl and Mia with their eyes scratched out. The snap of a twig underfoot. My certainty that he was out there somewhere with nothing to do but scheme.

"The cell Morgan built is ready for him," Rick said. "It's secure. So, if he shows up or Daryl finds him in the next few days, bring him here. We can deal with him together."

I'm sure it was meant to sound like Rick had our back, but given how skeptical he was that Negan was even out there, it felt like someone telling you to stop worrying mid-panic attack. Or recommending jogging when you're too depressed to move from the sofa for long enough to find the remote to change the channel, so you end up watching the same episode of Criminal Minds when it comes on at 3 and 8pm, and then again at 2am the following day. 

But I didn't say any of that. All I said was, "Doubt he'll come quietly." 

"I know," Michonne said. "But if he's out there on his own, he's got a long Winter ahead of him. Might just be enough to break him."

"Right," I said like I agreed, but I didn't believe it in a million years. The implication that Negan would face anything terrible enough to turn himself in was laughable. Negan would freeze to death before he knocked on our doors to ask for help. 

"Of course," Rick said. "If he threatens anyone, if he seems dangerous, we know you'll do what's necessary." 

"I know," I said, too tired to fight the inevitable. Especially when it was the right thing to do. Cleaving Negan's head from his shoulders would feel good in the moment, but if it made Sanctuary even less safe for Mia, it wasn't worth it. 

"Are you okay with this?" Rick pressed. Clearly, he'd been waiting for me to blow my top. "With all of your… history with Negan?"

"It's for the best," I said. "The last thing we need is to give the Saviours a reason to fight again. At least if there's some kind of trial, everyone can have their say."

I didn't add that this included whatever Negan had to say for himself. In a truly fair trial, he'd have the right to defend himself, and I didn't want to hear the shit that would come out of his mouth in his own slimy defense. Or the jokes he'd crack with himself as the target audience. I wanted him gone for good. 

"Good to know you're on board," Rick said. There was a point to it, laden with meaning. I'm not sure if he knew he'd given himself away or if he expected me to miss it, but I didn't. I bristled. 

"Why? Because Daryl ain't gonna be?" I said. Since Negan had tried to use our relationship to break us into submission, I'd been more acutely aware of other people using it as leverage. I would do unspeakable things for Daryl. There were very few lines I wouldn't cross to protect him, but this only remained a strength as long as we were the ones in control. 

"Yes," Rick admitted. "I know what he thinks about this, but I've got a feeling he'll listen to you."

I had a sudden but powerful urge to tell him to go to hell. Daryl had his own mind, and I didn't like it when people implied I could puppet him like a brainwashed idiot. 

"Who are the other exceptions?" I asked to distract myself. "You said some people didn't agree to keeping Negan alive?"

"Maggie, for one," Michonne said. "I think she's nervous because of the number of ex-Saviours Hilltop has taken on. She's also a little worried about Hilltop having to produce enough food for everyone."

"That makes two of us," I said. "Shit just doesn't grow at Sanctuary. And the stuff that does, it's… it ain't great."

"Give it time," Rick said soothingly. "It'll grow." 

I nodded. I knew it was early days, but there was something about the soil at Sanctuary that stunted everything. Things would take root and die. Anything that survived left the same bitter aftertaste. Rationally, I knew that whatever chemicals the factory had discarded in its day had seeped into the soil and spoiled it for generations to come. But it felt like a stain of Negan's legacy, his parting blow to us. 

"Scavenging is getting harder, too," I said. "I've been trying to push groups out to find something that can help us lessen the burden on Hilltop, but most places near us are picked clean."

"It's the same here," Rick said, surprisingly laid back about it. "We've been looking into… new areas."

"Really?" I said, struggling to think of any place on Alexandria's maps that had yet to be tried. "Where?"

"Your old haunt, actually," Rick said with a smile. My mind remained blank, which must have shown on my face because Rick had to add, "DC."

"We thought we might pick your brains about it," Michonne said. "See if we've missed any potential areas of interest."

I couldn't place what it was that hit so hard. It wasn't that much that my life in DC felt so far removed from my life now that it was difficult to picture what might have become of it. I'd never been overly attached to the place.

"I thought Eugene said the road was impassable?" I said, still unable to place my unease. 

"It was," Rick said. "But it looks like the Walkers have moved on."

Even the Walkers have moved on.

That was it. 

That was what stung. 

While we were treading water at Sanctuary, stuck in the not-distant-enough repercussions of war, everyone else was putting it behind them. Rick and Michonne had already learned to say Negan's name without any of the edge it held at Sanctuary. His grip on them was lessening with each passing day, and they could move on. Push forward. Expand. Every day at Sanctuary felt like a fight to stay in the same place, to stop it from slipping back to its old ways. And here was Alexandria - growing. 

"We're taking it slow, of course," Rick said when I couldn't say anything. "You never know how many other groups are out there. The last thing we need is another turf war. So we're sending small groups, pushing further North to get a feel for what's out there."

"Sounds sensible," I said. My mouth felt dry. I was caught between pride in everything our friends were building and fear that they would leave us behind.

"Maggie is desperate to come with us," Michonne said. "And see if she can pick up anything to aid food production at Hilltop. But she'll probably be too far along by the time we make any progress."

"How are she and the baby doing?" I asked. It felt like years since we'd last seen them. "She must be showing by now." 

"Both doing great," Michonne said. "I think the pregnancy is the least of her worries right now."

"Really?" I couldn't hide my disbelief. "Can't think of anything more terrifying."

"Than being pregnant?" Michonne said, a little amused. 

"Yeah."

"It's a fucked up world to bring a kid into, that's for sure," Michonne said. "But Maggie and Glenn have got this. They've got all of us, too. Their kid's going to be fine."

"Oh, I know. They'll be kickass parents," I said without hesitation. "Actually, I hadn't factored in the whole living-dead situation. But shit, that makes them twice as brave. Or twice as mad."

"Oh," Michonne gave a laugh of surprise. "You mean pregnancy terrified you before you had to think about fighting the undead or a bunch of psychopaths for the dwindling resources left in our dying civilization?"

"Yup," I said. "When my Momma was pregnant with Mia, I read every book about it I could get my hands on, and… the things I learned kept me up at night. Stephen King was a breeze in comparison."

"It's not so bad," Michonne said with a quiet knowing. My heart dropped.

"Shit." I didn't need to ask what had happened; nobody needed to ask anymore. The same thing happened to all of us in different shades of tragedy. "I'm so sorry. I had no idea. I can't imagine…."

"I had a son," Michonne said. "Before everything went to shit. And for a little while after." 

I tried to imagine it, and my throat closed up. There was always a feeling tucked in the back of my mind, reminding me how lucky I was that I'd kept Mia with me and found Daryl. But moments like this brought it right to the surface. 

"I'm so sorry," I said again. 

"It's okay," Michonne said. "I'm okay. I wasn't for a long while, it's a loss you carry forever, but eventually, you learn to make room for good things again." 

Michonne and Rick shared another glance, but I understood this one. It held the joy of their relationship, her friendship with Carl, and her love for Judith. All things that came after the worst moment of her life. Proof that life goes on. I didn't know how she was still here, how she could still smile. I didn't know how Carol kept going. They were much stronger women than I could ever hope to be. 

The thought of how many organs I'd have to rearrange to make room for that loss made my head spin. Unless I was lucky enough to die first, I'd lose Daryl one day. Even worse, if I was unluckier still, I'd live long enough to put Mia in the ground. 

At the end of the day, that was all it boiled down to - luck. Michonne was strong, smart, and brave, and still lost her kid. Carol was one of the most badass women I'd ever met, and she'd still had to watch her daughter turn into one of the undead. It didn't matter how carefully I planned or how well I fought; if luck decided to stop smiling down on me, I could lose them in a heartbeat.

Some grief is so enormous I think the impact can ripple back in time and touch you before you've even lost that person. I felt it then. An acute wave of pain from a future I dreaded.

I reached across the table and laid my hand on Michonne's, wishing there was a way of explaining how we ache for the pain of those we care about that was better than, 'I'm sorry.' 

"Losing him was awful. Pregnancy could be awful at times, too; you're not wrong about that," Michonne added with a light laugh. "But both were worth it for the time I got to be his Mom. When you have you're own, you'll see."

"Oh, I don't want -" I stopped myself. My knee-jerk reaction to the 'when-are-you-having-kids' conversation that inevitably reared its ugly head every few months when I hit my twenties was, 'I don't want children. Motherhood isn't something I see for myself.' In my mind, pregnancy and being a parent were the hardest things you could do. And God knows, not everyone was fit to do it. Not everyone deserved it.

Of course, this was the first time I'd faced this question when I'd been with someone I not only planned to spend the rest of my life with but actively couldn't imagine my life without. Until now, any time I'd pictured raising a kid, I'd had to do it alone. Like Momma. Because I didn't think anyone would stick around. 

"Sorry, I just assumed because Daryl's… well, you know…." Michonne laughed again, and I tried to laugh it off too, but it was hard because I did know. I knew it all too well. 

Incredible with kids. 

Exactly the kind of man you'd want to raise a family with.

Exactly the kind of man who wants a family.

I felt the room sway underneath me, like a ship pitching in a storm and throwing me into the cold realization that I might not be able to give Daryl the life he wanted. For all of our similarities, wasn't being on completely different pages when it came to big life goals what had kept us apart before? Daryl's dedication to his family and my need to be as far from mine as possible?

We'd shared roots entwined in the past and grown in different directions. What if the gap was too big?

I smiled and pushed the weight of it deep down. I couldn't start tearing up in front of Rick and Michonne; I wasn't sure they'd get it. I wasn't sure anyone would. 

The panic would grip me later; I was delaying the inevitable. I felt it stalking me as we talked through various places in DC that might be profitable to scavenge. It sat on my shoulder and peered over the legal documents Michonne had drafted as guidance for dealing with Negan and anyone else in our communities who broke the rules. At dinner with Lucas and the kids, it slithered down my throat and made my food taste like bile. Reminding me, with every mouthful and every laugh, that I was on borrowed time. 

It was only when I was alone, in bed with the light turned off, that it spread. Springing up from my gut and flowing, cold panic in my veins.

What if I can't give him what he wants? 

Every possible way a pregnancy could go wrong had been seared into my brain since I was sixteen. I knew the complications. The mortality rates - of both mother and baby, before and after modern medicine. I knew that now, more than ever, pregnancy could be a death sentence for some people. It spun round and round in my mind and made me feel... 

Queasy. 

Let me tell you, queasy is the exact opposite of how you want to feel when panicking about a hypothetical pregnancy. 

No, it's okay. We've been so careful.

Nothing is 100%.

I put my hand across my lower stomach, like that would be able to tell me anything, and felt my pulse beating in my palm like a kick. 

Stop.

It wasn't that I was squeamish about the process - I was squeamish about all it represented. All of this had felt so… far away. Something other people had to worry about. Long-term relationships weren't my thing, so marriage and babies probably weren't either. I was already raising Mia; she was enough family for me. I'd lived my whole life under that assumption.

And, now?

Picturing Daryl as a dad was easy as taking a breath. But picturing myself as a Mom? I'd never been in a serious enough relationship to do that kind of thought experiment. And now, I couldn't move past the ordeal of pregnancy and childbirth. 

Momma always said that I was a difficult pregnancy, and that's what got her hooked on painkillers. 

Can you be a good Mom if you never had a good one to learn from?

Having me destroyed her.

I got out of bed, convinced I was not only seconds from spewing but that the sickness was because I was already pregnant. I paced the bathroom for a few minutes, and nothing happened. I went downstairs quietly to not wake Lucas, who was asleep on the sofa. I drank two glasses of water without pausing for breath; I don't know why I thought it would help. Or how it could flush the anxiety out of me. I caught sight of my own face in the dark window. As pale and as translucent as I felt. 

What if I can't give him the life he wants?

I felt like I was about to tip backward, that some dark abyss had opened right behind my heels. In the dark of the kitchen, I didn't dare turn around to check. 

"You can put the lights on, you know," Lucas's voice was the most solid thing in the room. A rope for me to hold onto and pull myself up again.  

"I was trying not to wake you," I said, hoping I looked more emotionally stable than I felt. 

"Sounds like there's no danger of us getting any sleep until they do," Lucas said with a tired smile and a glance at the ceiling. It was only then that I heard Mia and Perla whispering in the way only girls at a sleepover can - somehow louder than if they'd spoken at normal volume.

"Right, yeah," I said, with a laugh that I hoped implied that I, too, had been kept awake by them and not my own brain going into overdrive about something that wasn't even happening. 

Every now and then, a giggle would burst through the ceiling. It was the kind of behavior I wouldn't have tolerated before, but now that the world had ended slumber parties and the nonsense that came with them, it felt too miraculous to get mad at. So I'd have to grin and bear it if Mia was cranky from lack of sleep tomorrow. 

"You okay?" Lucas asked, which was all I needed to tell me that I looked like shit. 

"Yeah," I said. I knew it wasn't convincing, but talking about anything personal felt like betraying Daryl, so I added, "Just... DC, huh?"

"Yeah, that must be weird for you," Lucas said. I'd spent so long living with someone who knew me inside out I'd forgotten how easy it can be to have a lie accepted at face value. "Can't even imagine what New York looks like now. I wonder if it's still standing. It must have been carnage when all of this broke out."

"Fancy a trip?"

"Weekend break, yeah?" Lucas grinned. 

"Yeah," I grinned back. "I've always wanted to see something on Broadway."

"I'm sure even this wasn't enough to shut down Phantom of the Opera ," Lucas said. "I'll tell the girls to get packed." 

I laughed. The sick feeling in my stomach was fading to background noise. Sometimes, all I needed was a distraction. Another burst of laughter erupted through the ceiling, followed by loud shushing. 

"I've got to say," Lucas said. "Mia's taking all of this extremely well."

"She doesn't know the extent of it," I said. "She thinks this is a social call."

"You haven't told her?"

"How do you tell a kid that she's been threatened by an exiled homicidal manic?" I said. "She's already been through so much. When she and Carl started advocating for us not to kill Negan, it was kind of nice... to see she hadn't become all fearful and jaded like the rest of us. I'll tell her if I have to But, until then..." 

Another burst of laughter made me smile. 

All I had ever wanted was to give her more than I'd had - a safe and stable home. If the time came when she needed to know so that she could be alert and protect herself, I'd tell her. Like I'd trained her to fight Walkers, I'd teach her to fight people. Kill if she had to. But until that day, I wanted her to enjoy what was left of her childhood as much as possible. 

I'd burn the whole place to the ground before I let Negan get near her. Then, I'd walk away from the ashes and let him send cryptic messages to silence.

"Right. I'm going to go read the riot act at those two," I said with a glance at the ceiling. "See if the four of us can actually manage some shut-eye tonight." 

I didn't mind it, but they were clearly keeping Lucas up. He looked appreciative of my offer to get them to quiet down. We said goodnight for the second time, and I climbed the stairs to pretend to be mad at the girls for being up so late. I faked it well enough, and after a few minutes of slightly more stifled whispering, they settled down. 

I felt more settled, too. The anxiety that had pulled me out of bed had dulled from a roar to a background hum. When I woke up with the mild abdominal cramps that announced the start of my period, I could have cried with relief.

 

Daryl

"Daryl!" he was in another room, but I knew from Glenn's tone that it was important. The kind of bluntness that breaks through everything else to sharpen your focus. Bryce and I stopped searching the backpack of one of the Savior's kids and headed back into the hallway. "We got something." 

Glenn stepped out of the room next to the one Bryce and I were searching through. I could tell what he was holding from the strap looping around his knuckles. Naomi's bag. He held it up, and I could see the little hole where Knievel had been fixed to the front before he'd been torn off and nailed to a wall. It made me want to punch holes in everything else. 

"Who's room is that?" I asked, nodding to the door he'd just come out of. I was sure I already knew the answer, but I needed confirmation.

"It's, eh…." Jerry hesitated. "Justin, Ron, Ala-"

I fucking knew it. 

"Get him."

"Get…?"

"Justin," his name tasted like fucking poison, sucked out of a wound, and spat at the ground. "Get him. Bring him here." 

I thought I'd feel like a smug asshole if something turned up in Justin's room. Thought I'd get to feel a little bit of an 'I told you so' high. But I didn't. I was terrified by every second Naomi had spent alone with that creep. Every smile he'd ever flashed her way, knowing full well he was tormenting her, lit some fuse in me. Had he gotten some kind of sick kick out of bringing her coffee and watching her drink it, knowing he was the real reason she couldn't sleep at night? 

When Jerry returned with him, and Justin looked around all wide-eyed and innocent, it took every little piece of my willpower not to deck him immediately. 

"The hell's going on?" Justin said, his eyes taking in the group of us in their quarters. "That's why you've got us all out there unloading the shittiest haul of supplies I've ever seen from these assholes? Distract us while you search our rooms?"

"Shut up," I warned him.

Justin's shit-eating grin started to spread across his face when he saw I was getting to him. "I'm just saying… I ate a lot better when Negan collected from you guys."

I pushed him until his back hit the wall and pinned him with Naomi's bag against his chest. I shook it. Shook him. "Wanna explain this?"

He looked down at it and frowned slightly. "It's a bag."

"I fucking know it's a bag. What are you doing with it?"

"That's not mine," he said. I said nothing, just looked at him, so he knew I could smell bullshit. He waited for me to talk. When I didn't, he glanced down at the bag and then back up at me again. "Ain't my style, chief, but I'm sure you'd look great with it."

"Don't be a smartass."

"I've never seen this bag before," he shook his head.

"What's it doing in your room, then?"

"I ain't the only one in this room, asshole," Justin said. "Some of us don't have the luxury of our room, y'know. We gotta share. Especially since Rick and his band of pricks took over."

"So it's someone else's?"

"All I know is it ain't mine."

"You expect me to believe that?"

"I don't give a shit what you believe."

I got real close. Real quiet. "You should."

I watched the panic cross his face. A tiny flicker of it in his eyes. 

"You fucking planted it here, didn't you?" Justin said. "You put this shit in my room because you can't stand me getting close to your missus."

I punched him. 

Turns out I ain't got that much willpower after all.

Justin hit the ground. I heard him groan and watched as he lifted a sleeve to blot the blood from his newly bust lip. 

"Round 'em up," I told Jerry.

"Round who up?" Jerry asked quietly. 

"Everyone from this room. Anyone close to 'em. Bring them to me."

Jerry nodded, but I caught the look he exchanged with Glenn before he left. Glenn didn't say anything but helped Justin to his feet. Aaron stepped close to his other side, and Bryce stood behind him, arms folded. Justin looked around, a little stunned to find himself surrounded. His shit-eating grin was gone for once, replaced by a look of confusion so strong that I almost fell for it.

"What the hell is going on?" he muttered. "It's just a bag." 

I looked down at it. Remembered making it after I'd watched Naomi struggle through the hallways with armfuls of books she'd kept dropping. I'd felt too sick to eat lunch right before I'd gone to give it to her. I'd thought she'd laugh at me or think I was a cheap piece of shit for making her something instead of buying it. Even when she told me how much she liked it, I felt she must've been lying. Or pretending. To be nice. 

But here it was. She'd carried it through to the end of the world.

I knew if I looked back at Justin, I'd punch him again, and nobody in this world would understand why. 

I could feel something in the bag, and I'd put off opening it. Still felt like opening a lady's purse was wrong, violating Naomi's privacy. But someone else had already done that. Someone else had been hanging onto this for months. Might've dumped out whatever she'd had inside it and eaten the snacks she'd undoubtedly packed for herself. So I opened the bag and looked inside. Didn't expect to find much, but there was something in there. It was dark, black maybe, and blended into the darkness inside the bag. I reached in and closed my fingers around something cool and rectangular.

A walkie. 

Something in the room shifted when I lifted it out. Hackles rose on both sides. I turned it over in my hands, confident that this wasn't something we knew about. Of course, all walkies look basically the same, but every walkie in Sanctuary had been inventoried and accounted for when we took over. If this one had been lying in Naomi's missing bag, there was no way we could have known about it. 

"Hey," Justin said, the way someone might try to calm a bear in the woods. "I didn't know anything about that. Whatever's going on here, I didn't know, man."

I ignored him and held it up to Aaron and Glenn. They both leaned forward and squinted at the frequency settings, "Do either of you recognize this?"

"Nope," Aaron shook his head. "That's not one any of our communities are using."

Glenn nodded in agreement. It was something I'd already known, but it was good to have it confirmed because I knew I was on the edge of losing it. Anger has fueled all of my biggest mistakes, and it's hard to keep a reign on it. 

Maybe Naomi'd had this walkie on her when Negan's cronies had snatched her up. Maybe it was left over from her Terminus days. It might have been tuned to some outdated frequency we'd all forgotten we'd once used. Perhaps it had been left alone so long that the battery was dead. I pushed a button. Heard the crackle. 

Still a live connection? 

I looked up at Justin. The color had drained from his face, and he was still shaking his head. Still muttering about how he'd had no idea this existed or how it had gotten into his room. But I had him. A cornered rat. Jerry and other guys from the Kingdom returned with the rest of the rat pack. Five guys in total. Some of them were worse at hiding their guilt than others. You could tell from the look in their eye that they knew why we were there.   

"Hey, what the fuck is this?" one snapped. 

"You going through our shit now?" asked another, trying to distract me from the guilt all over his face.

"Split them up," I said. I curled my fingers into fists and then stretched them out again. A warm-up. "We'll question them one at a time."

I ain't Rick. I ain't used to questioning anyone, and I haven't got his patience. I don't know what it's like to settle things calmly, not on my own. When Merle and I would fight, we would fight. Fists and blood until one of us gave out. It was what I knew. 

But I figured Rick knew all this when he put me in charge of this place. So no matter what he said about peacetime, tolerance, working together, and all that hippy shit, he'd have known I'd get my hands dirty if the situation called for it. He saw a use for the violence that made up part of my DNA, and if he'd wanted us to play nice, he'd have put himself in charge. 

At least, that's what I told myself when I went in there. 

But deep at the heart of it, deep down, I didn't care what Rick thought. Didn't care what he wanted or what he'd say about it when it was done. I only cared about the fear in Naomi's eyes when she'd seen that picture threatening Mia and me. The way she'd run out into the woods in a thunderstorm all because someone had whistled. The bruises on her body when Negan's most loyal men had beat the daylights out of her, and I hadn't been able to do shit to protect her. Although she'd never once admitted which of them had done it, I was willing to bet it was at least some of these assholes.

So, I didn't ask nice. Not even once. I just beat the answers right out of them, and part of me was sad when they gave them up because it meant I had to stop. 

Only Justin didn't break. Didn't tell me shit. Wouldn't admit to anything even when the others had. Even when I told them what they'd admitted to. He acted surprised and denied it all. 

I took a break and left the room we were holding Justin in. My arms hurt, my knuckles were numb, and the feeling spread. Anger can only burn so bright for so long, and the darkness it lets in when it fades is cold. Glenn, leaning against the wall in the hallway, keeping watch on the other closed doors, stood straight when he saw me. I wondered what he'd heard, what he thought of me after all this. 

"What are we going to do with them?" he asked. 

"Dunno yet," I said. Sank down with my back against the wall, head in my hands, looking to shut it all out for a moment. 

"You good, Daryl?" 

I shrugged. Glenn didn't say anything else; just let me sit with it. Stew in it. I liked that Glenn never pushed me unless I needed it; he always knew when I needed time.  

"Can't think straight," I said, staring hard at my shoes, so I didn't have to look at Glenn. "Not when it comes to her."

"I feel you, man," Glenn said, sitting on the dusty floor next to me like he was settling in for the long haul. I looked at him because there was no way he got it. He was too gentle, too good. Glenn fought when he had to, but deep down, he wasn't violent. He wasn't born into rage. He didn't have anger stitched into his soul. Not like me. 

"Yeah," I said so he wouldn't feel the need to keep saying things that weren't true to try and make me feel better.

"I mean it," he said. "If Maggie was being messed with by people who were trying to kill her not that long ago… I'd lose my shit."

Losing my shit felt a little tame for what I'd just done, but I appreciated him saying it all the same.

"I mean…" Glenn hesitated. "When Merle had us in that basement in Woodbury, I wasn't exactly…. understanding. Even after it was all over."

I laughed. I kinda had to. At the time, I'd been annoyed that Glenn had been so dead set against my brother joining us. But now? Now I thought he'd been polite. A damn saint. Now I knew what it was like to see the woman you loved hurt and not be able to hold the assholes who did it accountable… 

I wanted to skin them alive and paint the exposed flesh with vinegar. And I'd have felt that way even if it had been Merle.  

I wanted to go back in time and punch Merle again on Glenn's behalf. 

"Sorry, man," I said. "I should've understood more. About Merle."

"That's not why I brought it up," he said gently. And I knew he wasn't lying because Glenn doesn't hold a grudge like that. "I get it, is all. It's hard to let go of that anger even when trying to build peace."

Aaron and Bryce came out of one of the other doors. I think the one Ronnie was in, although it was a bloody blur. Aaron was holding a med kit, and Bryce had a blood-soaked rag in one hand. 

"You get what you needed?" Bryce asked. His voice was real neutral. Gave nothing away. Bryce and I were on okay terms these days, but I hadn't missed the disappointment in his eyes when he'd arrived with the guys from the Kingdom and seen me without Naomi. Couldn't blame him; I felt it too. 

What does he think of me now he's seen what I'm capable of when I get mad?

Would I want a guy like me with Naomi if I were him?

"Most of it," I said, avoiding looking at him. "Only thing they won't cop to is leaving out food. But I reckon that was Justin, can't get that asshole to admit to anything." 

"What do we do about them now?" Aaron asked. 

"We were just trying to work that out," Glenn said. And the sentence hung there. Usually, Rick would've stepped in and told us the plan. But in this place, I was in charge. I was supposed to be the one with the answers. But I had nothing; I was empty of everything. 

"What do you want to do, Daryl?" Bryce asked. 

"I want to kick them all out of here and leave them to the Walkers," I said. "I want to cut tiny pieces off them and feed them back to 'em. I want to listen to every bone in their body break and dig a pit for them that they can't crawl out of. But Rick probably wouldn't want me doing any of that." 

"Probably not, no," Glenn said quietly after a moment of silence from the others. I was too tired to work out what their silence meant, but I was sure they were all thinking the worst of me. Now they'd seen who I really was.

"Should probably update Rick, though," Aaron said, and I wondered if it was because it was a good idea or because he was too worried about what I'd do if I was left to my own devices.  

"Yup," I said and got to my feet. I couldn't stand to be around anyone for a second longer, not even these guys. "I'll call him now."

I could've done it right in front of them, but I needed to get away. They were all staring at me, waiting for me to do something I couldn't do, and it felt like the walls were closing in. I snatched up Naomi's bag and took it with me, hoping she'd be happy to see it back in our room when this hell was over. 

When I opened the door, it hit something. The copy of Negan's damn book was still lying where Naomi had left it. I let the door shut behind me and stared at it. I'd thought I was all out of rage, but something about that damn book made me fill back up again. 

Negan got her a book.

Like they were gonna bond or some shit.

I hadn't realized how much it bothered me until I saw it staring at me from the dusty floor. I could picture Negan picking it out for her and trying to talk about it with her. And then laughing at me because I was too dumb to get this shit, too dumb for her, and everyone around us could see it. I kicked the book across the floor and then felt bad because I could imagine the horror on Naomi's face if she'd seen me do it. 

It'd be much worse if she'd seen what else you'd done today.

A hot lick of shame finally caught up with me. I'd been staving it off, but thinking about Naomi seeing how violent I'd been tipped me over the edge. 

What would she think of me if she'd seen me like that? 

She'd think I was a psycho.  

The way I'd been following her around Sanctuary and taking stock of anyone who looked at her funny, she might already think that. In my ideal world, nobody would be allowed within fifty meters of her without me clearing them first. If she had to travel anywhere, it'd be with a security detail like a President. Drive around in one of them bulletproof cars like the Pope. 

Maybe I am a psycho. 

I fished the newly-found walkie out of Naomi's bag and turned it on. "You there, asshole?"

No answer came. 

"I found all your little rats, and if you come near this place again, I'm gonna find you too."

I waited a little longer. Nothing came back, but I felt like something was listening, just not for me. So I switched to another walkie and radioed Rick. 

"Everything alright, Daryl?"

"Yeah," I said. "We found the people who've been messing with shit around Sanctuary." 

"So, it wasn't Negan," Rick said. I didn't like the way he said it. It wasn't a question, and he sounded so satisfied. Like he'd been proved right about something... or proved Naomi wrong. 

"No. It wasn't," I said. "But they said he's alive."

"They did?"

"Yeah," I said. "Almost everyone one of those sons of bitches said Negan lives. Same shit they scrawled on the walls."

"Ah," Rick said, calm again. Like something made sense, and I was overreacting. 

"What?"

"Well, did they say where he is?" Rick asked. "Or did they just say Negan lives ?"

"They didn't give him up," I said. "But what's the difference?"

"They all consider themselves 'Negan,' remember?" Rick said. "So, them saying Negan lives doesn't mean the man's alive. Just means what he stood for won't die as long as they're around."

"I don't think that's it," I said. "We found a walkie with the rest of their shit. Can't get an answer, but it ain't tuned to any of the frequencies we use."

"Doesn't mean they've been in contact with Negan," Rick said, way too casual for what I'd been telling him. "They could've just been using it to talk to each other, though. Coordinate things."

"I guess." 

My head was starting to hurt. 

"I'll try again in the morning," I said. "But it's those guys for sure."

"Alrighty, thanks for letting us know, Daryl," Rick said. "You wanna talk to Naomi before you go?" 

"Why? Is she there? She ask for me?" Suddenly, the silence in the background became the most interesting thing about this call with Rick. My stomach tightened when I thought she might have heard that; how damn keen I was to hear her voice. She'd think I was such a loser. I'd never live it down.

"No, I think she's with Lucas and the girls," Rick said. Something in me sank. "I can get her for you, though."

"Nah, it's fine," I said because I could hear that damn smirk in Rick's voice again and because I wanted Naomi to enjoy her time away from this place. It consumed so many of her thoughts these days. She needed a break from that. A break from me hovering around her like a goddamn fly, too. 

I signed off and heard Rick chuckle before he did too. When I went to set the walkie down, I caught sight of the blood on the back of my knuckles. Most of it probably wasn't mine, but there were some scrapes from teeth. I hadn't thought to clean myself up because Naomi usually did it for me while she talked me down from spiraling into... whatever funk this was.

Aaron and Bryce still had the med kit, there'd be something to clean wounds in there, but I didn't want to go back down there again and face everybody. Water would have to do. I opened the door to go and look for the nearest bathroom but found Bryce standing outside. 

"Hey, Daryl," Bryce said. "Can I have a word?"

"Sure," I said. Felt like someone had wrapped a rubber band around my skull, and it was squeezing so tight it hurt my brain. Bryce hesitated like he was building to something, and I didn't have the time to let him. I already knew I was a piece of shit I was. "Look, before you… can I just tell you something?"

"Uh, yeah, go ahead," he said, a little apprehensive. His eyes flickered 

"When they held us here," I said. "Naomi and me. They left my door unlocked one day. Deliberately. And when I got out, I went looking for her, like they knew I would. They were waiting for me, and they already had her." 

I stopped for a second. I felt too sick to keep going. Bryce didn't say anything. Just looked at me with that same apprehension, like I was about to explode.

"So, they brought her out. Started beating her. I mean really beating her," I said. My mouth went dry, and my hands got sweaty at the memory of it. "Because of what I'd done, they kicked her so hard she threw up. Bruises on bruises. She passed out, and they still didn't stop."

"Jesus," Bryce muttered. His face looked pale.

"So, I know you probably think what I did to those guys makes me a monster, and what I want to do to them is even worse," I said. "And maybe you're right. But when I look at them, all I see is what they did to her." 

"Daryl-"

"And it might not have been those exact guys," I said. "I keep trying to remember the faces of the ones that were there, but I can't because all I really remember is the way Naomi screamed and how it felt that I couldn't do anything to help her. So, it don't matter to me. They're all Negan. They're all guilty."

Bryce nodded, taking a moment to see if I was done talking. 

"Actually, I wasn't going to say any of that," Bryce said. 

"No?" 

"No. I think you're in a deeply unenviable position here," he said. "It's clear that tensions are high. One wrong move in this place could cause a mutiny, and now you have to deal with a faction plotting against you? And that's without any of the horrors they put you guys through when the shoe was on the other foot… nah, for the record, I think you're doing a good job in a bad situation."  

"Oh." Something in me lifted.

"I was going to ask if you wouldn't mind me staying on a bit when we're done here?" he said. 

"You wanna stay here ?" I couldn't believe anyone in their right mind would see the state of this place, know what we were up against here, and choose to stay.

"Yeah," he said, looking a little uncomfortable again. "It's not that I'm not happy to see you, it's just… when we got the call, it sounded like…."

"Naomi would be the one here?" I finished for him. He nodded, clearly worried that he'd offended me somehow. "She wanted to stay, but I'm the one who's supposed to be in charge of this place, so I thought it would be better for her to go with Mia."

"And she listened to you?"

"Eventually," I shrugged. Bryce looked mildly impressed.

"Those Payton girls are hard to shake, huh?" I said. "You miss 'em?"

"Yeah."

"If it's alright with the King, it's alright with me," I said. "I know the girls would love having you here."

"Thanks, Daryl," Bryce said and started to leave. He hesitated, and looked back at me. "I can get you something for that."

He gestured down at my hand, which still didn't hurt but probably would by tomorrow. "Thanks, man."

I let the door shut behind him and listened to his footsteps fade into the hallway. When I turned around, that damn book was still staring at me from its new corner of the floor. I didn't kick it this time; I picked it up and flipped it open. If an idiot like Negan could get through it, I could too. 

Chapter 54: Angel

Naomi

“Negan threatened to kill me,” Mia said. So calm. So matter-of-fact. But the temperature in the room dropped. My heart twisted in my stomach. I knew I’d struggle to lie to her about it; the truth must’ve been all over my face. “Carl told me.”

Carl looked sheepishly at us from where they both stood in the doorway of Rick’s kitchen. Rick and I exchanged the frantic glances of two adults who knew they were about to engage in telepathy to deal with their kids as a united front. I hadn’t planned for this. I should have. But the thought of telling Mia that she was being targeted by a murderous lunatic sent me into a tailspin. It was too heavy a burden for a kid her age to carry. 

“I didn’t know she didn’t know,” Carl said quickly, eyes flitting nervously between us as he answered the question we hadn’t yet asked. He and Mia had planned this moment. They’d come in here together as the united front that Rick and I now had to improvise being. “I’m sorry.”

I glanced at Rick. He gave me a micro-nod; he’d deal with Carl. Mia was the more pressing issue. 

“You’re safe,” I said to her. “I won’t let him get to you.”

“I know,” she said, with a slight eye roll like she was bored of hearing it. "But that's why Daryl stayed behind, right? Instead of coming here with us? He's looking for Negan."

"Yes," I said. "And he'll find him."

“He’s already found the people we think are responsible for sending those threats,” Rick was quick to add. 

“And it wasn’t Negan?” Mia asked. 

“No,” Rick said. “It wasn’t.” 

Mia looked between the two of us like she was waiting for us to go on. When we didn’t, she said, “So… we can go back now, right?”

“Do you want to go back?” I couldn’t hide my surprise. She’d made her disdain for the place crystal clear.

“Well… that was the deal, wasn’t it?” she said. “We visit here sometimes, but we help to build Sanctuary into something good.”

"Yes. That was the deal." 

"So we can go back now?" 

"It's not that simple," I said, although I knew that wouldn’t be enough to make her drop it.

"Why?" 

“Someone’s been leaving food out for Negan,” I said. “None of the people that have been caught have owned up to it. So, until we know who it was, we can’t risk going back. Not until we’ve found Negan.”

I waited for Rick to add something about how we couldn't be sure that it was Negan, but he refrained, and I was grateful. Mia and Carl glanced at one another, communicating something not meant for Rick and me. Always a worrying sign with teenagers.

"Did Negan… talk to you himself?" Mia asked. "Or was it one of these other guys?"

"You don't need to worry about it," I said, although, of course, I couldn't blame her. In her shoes, I'd have obsessed over it too. Hell, I was obsessing over it, but I wanted to shut it down for her as quickly as possible. "It's being dealt with."

Mia shot another look at Carl, but this time he was staring pointedly at his feet. She looked back at me and said, “I don’t think it was Negan.” 

“It was.” 

“How do you know?”

I was getting so sick of this question and couldn't believe I was hearing it from my own damn sister. People were so quick to believe that just because we hadn’t seen anything bad for a while, that meant the bad things were gone. Finding those responsible for some of the weird goings-on at Sanctuary had only made it worse, made the real Negan seem like a boogeyman I’d conjured up out of guilt or fear. Now, someone had shone a torch under the bed and found out that the boogeyman was just some punks playing a practical joke. It felt like I was the only one still awake, begging someone to check the closet. 

 

“He sent me something," I said. Mia opened her mouth to say something, I held up a hand. "It doesn't matter what, but it was definitely from him."

Rick struggled not to contradict me. I wished I had a better way of explaining how I knew it was from Negan that went beyond a gut feeling. But Rick hadn’t known the very specific ways Negan would mess with me while I was his prisoner. Negan had been all bravado with Rick, shows of strength and dick-swinging contests, but he'd had quieter ways of getting in my head. Rick wouldn’t get it. He couldn’t.

“Can I see it?”  

“Mia… No.”

“Please.”

“Try to forget it,” I said. 

"What about Daryl?"

"He'll stay in Sanctuary." Even as I said it, I could feel my heart sinking like it had turned to lead in my chest. "We’re not going back until we know it's safe for you." 

Mia looked at me like she could see right through me, and she knew just talking about being apart from Daryl had caused a physical pang in my chest. Or maybe it was a heart attack, brought on by the shock of Mia finding all of this out.

I smiled back at her, but it felt forced. When she was little, she'd fall for it. I could tell her anything with a smile, and she’d buy that I wasn’t worried about paying rent on time or that I wasn’t eating because I didn’t feel hungry and not because we only had enough food for one of us to have dinner that night. Now she was getting older, it was wearing off. 

“It’s just the food, right?” she said. “Once you know who’s leaving food out, we can go back?”

"Maybe," I said. 

And at the same time, Rick said, "Yes." 

The unease settled so deep into me that I could feel it squeezing at my throat. I wouldn't be happy there until I knew Negan was gone. Rick, who didn’t believe in the boogeyman at all anymore, was fine with just his minions being caught. Mia cleared her throat. “If it’s about the food…” 

“Mia…” Carl straightened up and stopped staring at his shoes. There was something frantic in the way he looked at her that immediately sent my heart rate through the roof. 

“I have to,” she said to him. It sounded like an apology. Then she looked back at me and said the phrase that raises the hackles of anyone caring for a kid. “But first, you need to promise you won’t get mad.”

There was no way I was dumb enough to fall for that.  

"Mad about what?"

Mia said nothing, also not dumb enough to answer without an immunity agreement, and we stared at each other. Stalemate. 

Carl sighed and looked at his dad. “We need to tell you something." 

"You can tell us anything," Rick said. Everyone in that room knew it was a trap, but now they'd made us suspicious there was no way the kids were getting out without confessing to something. You can't walk back a 'we need to tell you something' or a 'promise you won't get mad'. 

"It was us. We left food out for Negan," Carl said it fast like he was ripping off a bandaid. It didn't dull the shock of it. 

"What?" The word tore out of Rick and me in unison. No telepathy needed. 

“You promised you wouldn’t get mad,” Mia said, her eyes immediately filling with tears. 

“I didn’t promise shit,” I said. I couldn’t remember a time that I’d been so angry with her. I don't think either of us could. 

“I’m sorry,” she said as quickly as she could, as if the faster she apologized the more likely we were to drop it.

"Why?" I asked. 

At the same time, Rick asked, "Did you see him?"

The kids looked at each other again.

"We heard him. His whistle… and he was talking to Lucille,” Carl said.

"I've got Lucille," I said. Or, at least, I had Lucille back at Sanctuary, where I checked twice a day that the damn bat was hidden where it should be. Daryl was the only other person in there who knew where it was. 

"Yeah, it wasn't really the bat-Lucille, it was… his wife, I guess?” Mia said. “Like…. A ghost.”

I felt that ghost in the room with us. It lived in the walls and ceilings of Sanctuary. The grief that had originally left Negan with enough loose screws that he'd become completely unhinged stained everything. 

"He just…. Didn't seem okay, Dad,” Carl said, his voice and eyes full of so much pity it split me in two. Part of me wanted to hug them for the compassion they'd show to a man that many of the rest of us would still shoot on sight. The other wanted to lock them both away for the rest of their lives for being such little idiots.

"So, I just…" Mia said. "I just… Dont think he'd actually hurt me. I think we can go home."

"When...when was this?"

"When we came to visit you," Carl said. "And we stayed for a while to help get things set up. Mia and I went out in the woods when we saw him by the creek.”

"And you," I looked at Mia who looked at the floor. "You've been leaving food out ever since?"

"Yes," it was so quiet it was almost a whisper. I'd always been so careful with Mia, never for a second wanting her to feel scared or unsafe with an angry adult. Never wanting her to feel like there was anything she couldn't come to me about. Never wanting her to feel like she couldn't make a mistake in her own home. But this? I was struggling to keep a lid on my anger.

"You know there's a food shortage at Sanctuary, right? You know how hard it is to grow things, and that we're having to rely on the goodwill of other communities to get by?" I said. Mia nodded, she looked like she was shrinking right in front of me. “And you’ve been taking some of that food and leaving it out?”

I let the sentence end there and didn’t mention who it was she’d been leaving it out for. Partly because I couldn’t bring myself to say it, and partly because I knew that not mentioning Negan would keep Rick and me on the same side. We could argue about whether or not Negan was out there later, the fact that Sanctuary didn’t have food to waste was undeniable. 

My hands started to shake. I could feel my anger giving way to overwhelming fear. Fear of every time Mia had snuck out of Sanctuary, putting herself in danger while my back was turned. Fear that my anger about it would leave her scared of me like I'd been of our Momma. I was numb to other people's anger, but anger never sat right in me. It always felt like a boulder lodged in a volcano. And I'd always been able to keep control of it. Until I couldn't, until I exploded. I'd never blown up at her before.

Rick put a hand on my back. 

“I need you to do something for me," he said.

"What?" I couldn't think of anything more important than what we were dealing with right now, but there was such an urgency in his voice.

"I need you to radio Sanctuary and update them," he said. "Right away, before they waste any more time looking for culprits who aren't there." 

I knew he was only saying it because he could see that I was about to crack, but he made it sound believable enough. 

"You sure?" I said. Rick held out the walkie that had been clipped to his belt. 

"This all sounds like it was my son's dumb idea," he said. "So, I will deal with the kids for now." 

"Alright," I said, I could already feel cooling relief in the pit of my stomach. I glanced at Mia. "This ain't over."

Mia dropped her gaze to the floor. I left through the back door. I couldn't walk past Mia and Carl and out into the hallway because I knew if I got too close I'd have to fight the urge to grab them both by the scruff of the neck and stuff them in Morgan's jail cell, where they couldn’t do any more dumb shit. With nowhere specific in mind, I found myself walking closer to Aaron's house, the first place to take me in and make me feel at home. 

I switched the walkie on, comforted by the crackle of the static. The tightness in my chest was already easing up. “Sanctuary, this is Alexandria. Come in.”

I waited, annoyed that I could already feel myself smiling. No matter who picked up this call, I was thirty seconds to a minute from hearing Daryl's voice, and that made every ounce of rage I’d been feeling start to ebb from my system. 

Static continued to crackle without an answer. In my rush to speak to Daryl, I mustn’t have done it right. I felt dumb and swore to take this mistake to my grave. He’d never let me live it down. 

“Sanctuary, this is Alexandria. Come in.”

Sure that I’d done it right this time, my stomach flipped over, my heart fluttering like a teenager waiting for her crush to pick up the phone. 

There was a gap in the static. I kept waiting for someone to talk, but no answer came. I fiddled with the volume and tried again."Sorry, Sanctuary, I missed that. Can you repeat?"

Another pause, but still, no answer. The hairs on the back of my neck started to rise. A twist in my gut. I checked the settings. Double checked. 

“Daryl, you there?”

Nothing.

My heart rate rose to my throat, and I stumbled back through Rick's door. The atmosphere was soured. He was clearly in the middle of a serious telling-off. What had felt so important moments before shrank to nothing right in front of me. 

“I can’t get an answer,” I said. I think I spoke right over him, but I can’t be sure. Blood was rushing in my ears, filling the silence where Daryl’s voice should have been. “Am I doing something wrong?”

Rick frowned and took the walkie from me, turning it over in his hands and checking everything that I had already double and triple-checked. Hope that this was my mistake vanished right in front of me. He passed the walkie back. “Looks fine to me. Try again.”

“Daryl?” It was hard to get his name around the lump in my throat.

This time, there was a break in the static. Silence. Undecipherable, distant thumps, and then someone cried out in pain. 

Daryl . 

I dropped the radio and was out of the house before it hit the ground. 

 

Daryl

Fuck .

Fuck. Fuck. Shit. Fuck .

Ties cut into my wrists. One of my eyes was swollen shut. The other tracked Ronnie as he paced the room. He still looked like shit from when I'd interrogated him, and now, so did I, which I guess made us even.

To my right, Glenn groaned where he was slumped over in a chair of his own. Behind me and out of my line of sight, Bryce, Aaron, and Jerry were tied up, too, with various degrees of injury. I hadn't heard any of them for a while, but I'd been the focus of most of the beatings, so I had faith that they were doing alright. 

The space that Naomi’s voice had left grew bigger the longer she went without answering. Ronnie kept glancing at it, confused. He held the walkie to my face again. "Speak."

No point .

Ronnie had tried to get me to respond to every little thing Naomi had said. If I hadn't been caught in the middle of an attempted ex-Savior uprising when her voice first came over the radio, my heart would've melted at how excited she sounded to talk to me. As it was, helplessly listening to that excitement fade to confusion, then worry, then fear was hell.

I wished anyone else had called. If it had been Rick or Michonne, I might have been able to say something to convince them to stay away and leave me to my fate as things played out here. I could have convinced someone else to keep this from Naomi until it was over.

But it had been her. 

And she'd heard me. 

So, Ronnie could try all he liked to get me to talk into that walkie-talkie, but I already knew she wasn't on the other end of it anymore. Sure enough, when a voice did come through again, it was Rick. “Who am I speaking to?”

Ronnie looked at me, still not understanding what he'd unleashed upon himself. “Guess your woman doesn’t give a shit about you.”

Wrong .

"Sanctuary?" Rick tried again. "Do you copy?" 

“We are Negan,” Ronnie said. If I could've rolled my eyes, I would have. But it hurt too much, so I didn't. "We're taking back Sanctuary."

"Our people," Rick said. "Are they safe? Have you hurt anyone?"

"They're alive," Ronnie said. "And if you want to keep it that way, you'll give us what we want." 

A slight pause before Rick asked, "Is Negan there, or are you speaking on his behalf?"

"We are Negan," Ronnie said again. I tried to laugh, but the first burst of air caused a twist of pain in my rib cage. He glared at me. 

"You ain't sick of saying that shit, man?" I asked. I'd been getting tired in the last few hours, but hearing Naomi's voice had set a new fire in my veins. Ronnie punched me around the mouth, and blood pooled on my tongue. 

"Right. This again," Rick sighed. "But is Negan himself there?"

"He'll only talk to Naomi," Ronnie said, which was news to me because I hadn't seen his face once during the whole sorry affair. "Is she there?”

"She's…" Rick hesitated. Ignoring the protest in my ribs, I sat up straighter to hear him confirm what I already knew. "...already on her way."

Ronnie looked at me, surprised. He wouldn't have been if he'd known who he was up against. Naomi might prefer months of deliberation over a pro-con list, but when the shit hits the fan, she gets reactive. Nuclear. Since we were little, the only thing faster than her feet was her mind.

The closest thing I've ever known to a guardian angel. 

I smiled at him through freshly bloodied teeth.

Y'all are fucked.

Before she’d called us, they’d spent hours trying to get me to call Alexandria and lure her here. Keeping her away had been my top priority and they didn’t understand that no matter how much they beat me, I would not break. Ain’t no way I was going to be bait in a trap for my girl.

But now that she was on her way? A calm washed over me. Failure was no longer an option.

“We have Daryl here,” Ronnie said, his voice faltering a little. They’d planned this whole thing around scaring and intimating Naomi, but she’d already shown him how few fucks she gave about what he had to say by not sticking around to hear it. “We have the rest of your leaders- Glenn, Bryce, Aaron, and Jerry - captive but alive. Your allies and any former Saviors loyal to you are being held safely. If you want them to stay that way, you’ll agree to our demands.”

"Mmhm," Rick said, distracted by the counter-attack he was probably already planning. I could picture it. Rick - somewhere in Alexandria, motioning to Michonne or Morgan or whoever was around him - talking in hurried whispers every time his finger wasn’t holding down the button to speak to Ronnie. “And what demands are those?”

"You’ll hand over Naomi. Right away.” 

“Right. Well, like I said, she’s on her way.”

“No backup,” Ronnie said quickly. “Or we’ll kill them.”

“Mmhm,” Rick said again in a noncommittal kind of way. The kind of way that told everyone, Ronnie included, that he wasn’t taking him or his demands all that seriously. 

Ronnie could claim Negan’s name all he wanted, but they weren’t the same. Negan knew how to threaten, how to put on a show. He understood leverage and how to use it. Ronnie might have done some ruthless shit under Negan’s orders, and he might be willing to kill everyone in the room if his boss told him to. But he wasn’t a leader, wasn’t cut out for more than grunt work. The more he ran his mouth, the more obvious it was. 

If Negan was behind this, God knows why he’d put this guy in charge. 

"Sanctuary belongs to us now," Ronnie said.

He said it confidently enough, but Rick still replied like he was negotiating with a toddler, 

"Alright. Well. We can discuss things at Sanctuary, sure. Best to do that face to face."

"No. I said no backup," Ronnie snapped. "Y'all ain't coming here."

Fucking idiot. How'd he think this was going to go?

"I'll need to come and check on my people. You understand that, right?" Rick said. "All we've got is your word that they're alive."

Ronnie's face reddened, and he held the radio to me again. "Fucking speak."

Bits of spit flew at me. I glared at him through my one good eye and said nothing. 

"FUCK!" he yelled before gesturing to one of his skeevy friends, Brett, to hit me again. Guess his own hands were getting tired.  

The next few blows landed worse than the ones I'd already taken. Maybe because there had been a break, there had been time for my body to ease out of the numbness it had slipped into. Took me a second to get it back. 

Between each one, Ronnie held the walkie to my mouth and tried to get me to say something to assure Rick we were all alive. Just like when he tried to get me to contact Naomi, I said nothing, but by the time it was done, I could barely keep my head up. 

"Alright," Ronnie paced the floor. His frantic eyes scanned the room. He knew Rick had been waiting too long for proof of life. I knew it, too. Cars would be loading up to file out of Alexandria. "One more time."

My vision was blurred, head aching like my skull was about to split in half. I tried to raise my head higher. I couldn't fight him, but I could face him down. 

"Stop!" someone yelled from behind me. It took me a moment to realize it was Bryce. The room slowly spun on its axis. "You're going to kill him."

Ronnie held up a hand to stop Brett. 

"What the fuck do we care if he dies?" Brett said, but he held off another blow. 

"She'll care," Bryce said. He didn't need to specify who he was talking about. Her impending arrival was making them jittery. “Whatever conversation Negan wants to have…. you lose all your leverage if Daryl dies now.”

"Alright. You then," Ronnie pointed at Bryce. 

Ah, shit. 

I couldn't let Bryce get beaten like me. For one, I'm pretty sure he wasn't as used to it as I was. He might not know how to zone out, so you can barely feel fists slamming into you anymore. It was a skill set I'd gained as a kid, I'm not sure how easy it is for adults to pick up. Second, while I appreciated him speaking up for me, Naomi would be lost if Bryce died, too. Or Aaron. Glenn. Jerry. Any of them dying on our watch would tear her apart.

More than that, I owed Bryce for the years he'd stepped up and looked after my girls when I was too chicken shit to be a good man. 

"Wait!" I said. There was so much blood in my mouth that I felt it dribble down my chin when I finally spoke. Ronnie looked over at me, a relieved smile twisting his face. So smug for someone so dumb. Beating someone else to get me to talk…. Negan would've caught onto that tactic hours ago. 

“We’re here, Rick,” I said into the radio. “We’re all here. All alive.” 

No answer, although I’m sure Rick heard. Ronnie had taken too long, and Alexandria was on their way. 

“You should let me go.” I looked up at Ronnie. My lip was busted, and my mouth was still filling with blood, so it didn’t sound right, but he got the jist.

“Shut up,” he said.

"Before she gets here," I said. "You should let me go. It'll help you stay alive."

Ronnie laughed in my face. “You still haven’t got it yet, have you? You're not the big dog anymore, and your bitch is being put down. You've lost."

He was the one who didn't get it. Naomi had lost one home to take over in the dead of night, and now it was in danger of happening again; she'd be a pressure cooker of fear and rage. Terminus would be playing on her mind over and over. If they reunited us all when she arrived, she'd probably walk away. 

But walking in on this - her friends beaten and bound?

He was a dead man. 

"Your funeral," I shrugged. Or, I did the best shrug you can do when you've been bound to a chair by murderous assholes. 

Time moved at the slowest pace since this whole thing started. It was the longest I’d gone without taking a beating since their uprising early hours of the morning. My blood dripped onto the floor like the tick of a clock. I thawed back into my body, an awareness of pain growing everywhere. 

It was lucky, really, that the journey from Alexandria to here would take a while. It gave me a good amount of time to work up some kind of plan. 

Ronnie stopped pacing and waited, head in his hands and a gun dangling by the trigger guard from one of his fingers. I kept my eyes on the ground and tried to loosen the ropes they'd tired me with. I worked my fingers along each snake of rope that lashed me to the chair I was on, twisting it around me until I found the knot.

 

One of them almost noticed what I was trying to do, but Glenn distracted him before he could bust me for it. I'd just got the knot loose when there was a commotion in the hallway. One of Ronnie's guys appeared in the doorway, “She's here.”

Damn it. 

I thought I'd have longer. 

She'd made the journey in record time. Thinking about the speeds she must've hit to get to us in that kinda time made me queasy. My chest clenched, my heart beating at the pace of her footsteps racing down the hall.

The Saviors bristled, but nobody stopped her from coming in. I hadn't expected it to be a problem; she was exactly where Negan wanted her. I was more worried about getting her out again. Ronnie blocked my view of the doorway. I heard her feet stop and knew she was taking it all in. Glenn, Jerry, Bryce, Aaron, and then…

"Where is he?" She was out of breath, a tremor in her voice. 

Ronnie stepped aside. 

I was a mess. Bloodied and swollen. Weak in a way that I never wanted her to see me. My instinct was to turn away from her, shield her from it. But where was there to turn when you’re tied to a chair? 

They were expecting her to cry, scream, plead with them, maybe. But she'd grown completely still. Eyes fixed on me like nothing else mattered. And when our eyes met, I watched something in her snap. 

Did they know, then, that they were fucked?

Did they know that when she was still, was when she was at her most dangerous?

Naomi took a few steps towards me. Her eyes hadn't left my face. Those beautiful eyes, so sad and worried. I just wanted to hold her. Ronnie blocked her again. 

“Let me see him,” she said. Real quiet, but it was crystal clear it wasn't a question. Ronnie was still too dumb and too cocky to pick up on the danger he was in. He took a step towards her. 

“You best get away from my girl,” I warned him. “You lay a finger on her, and it'll be the last thing you do.”

Ronnie looked back at me, “Oh now you wanna start talking? Where was all this when it actually could've saved you a few beatings, huh? Idiot.”

“Watch your mouth,” Naomi snapped, neatly sidestepping him while he was distracted. Her eyes were back on me. Mine on her. For now, that was enough. 

“When are you two going to get it in your dumb hick skulls that this is over?” he said, waving his gun around like a damn fool. If it had gone off, there's no telling who it would've hit. “Negan's got bigger plans for you than patching up your mute boyfriend.”

"Is Negan here?" she asked. "Or did you numbskulls orchestrate this yourselves?"

Ronnie picked up the walkie we’d found hidden inside Naomi’s missing bag and spoke into it. “She’s here, boss.”

Then he held it out to her, grinning. Naomi took it from his outstretched hand like it was a grenade. She didn't say anything, didn't confirm her presence. Just waited to see if she'd been right all this time. 

“How does my crown feel sweetheart?” Negan's voice cut through the silence. Naomi winced. He sounded different, his voice hoarser than before, but unmistakably the same asshole. “Of course, it’s not you that’s wearing it. Not officially, anyway. How’s Daryl holding up? Is he still alive?”

“You and I both know we’d be having a very different conversation if he wasn’t,” she said. Teeth gritted. Eyes fixed on me like I might drop dead if she looked away from me. I held her gaze. 

You got this, baby .

“You tried to slit my throat - you failed - but you tried. You ready to have that conversation?”

“Are you looking for an apology?” she said. Her knuckles turned white with how hard she was gripping the walkie. “It was kill or be killed that day. We both know that.”

“Only you didn't kill me. Did you, sweetheart?” he said. “And I didn’t kill you, either. So now we gotta deal with that.”

“You threatened my sister,” Naomi said. “Are you ready to have that conversation? She's a kid, Negan. I thought you didn't cross that line?”

“I had to get your attention somehow.”. 

“She is a child .”

Even Negan was silenced. Naomi let that silence hang for a moment.

“Not only that,” she continued, “but she's a kid who's been leaving food out for you… took pity on you. Helped you even though she knew how much trouble she'd be when I found out.”

That was Mia?  

I searched Naomi's face, and she nodded in response to my unasked question. 

“You needed to be reminded,” he said, “of what you've got to lose.”

“You think I don't know?” she said, seething.

“No. You don't,” Negan's anger finally matched hers.

“Right now, I could lose everything ." She looked right at me when she said it. Didn't even try to hide it. “I know that. But if you think that makes me weak, if you think you’re somehow stronger because you’ve got nothing to lose, you’re wrong. I-”

“No. No, you don't get it. You still have your family. You don't know-” Negan stopped abruptly. The pause was so long Naomi checked the walkie to make sure it was still working. "What the hell is this? I said no backup, Ronnie. Did you not secure that?”

Outside the walls, there was the faint sound of approaching engines. Ronnie's face paled. Naomi relaxed, just a fraction. This whole time, she’d been stalling, giving Rick time to mobilize the backup we all knew was coming. 

"I got this,” Naomi said quickly, calmly. She said it to both Ronnie and Negan, holding her hand out for the second walkie.

“You really think I'm gonna let you talk to your little friends?” 

“They'll storm the place if you don't,” she warned him. “You got the numbers for this kinda fight?” 

“Ronnie,” Negan's annoyed voice somehow managed to boom from the tiny walkie-talkie. “What's going on in there?”

“Let me talk to Rick,” Naomi said, answering on Ronnie's behalf. “If they don't hear from us, they'll be storming the halls before you've all had a chance to pull your fingers out your asses and reload your guns. You ain’t got the numbers for a fight.”

“Alright, Ronnie,” Negan said. “Let her do it.”

Ronnie passed her the walkie to talk to Rick and pressed his gun to the back of my head. “If anyone else sets foot in this building, I’ll pull the trigger.”

The barrel of the gun was cool against my skull, My eyes stayed fixed on Naomi, keeping her calm.

“Rick. I got this.”

Hell yeah, you do.

“Naomi?” Rick sounded worried. “Everything okay in there?”

“Yup. Just hang back, don't come any closer.”

"Naomi, we-" 

"We're fine," she said. "Stay where you are. Looks like it'll be a cold night, and I don’t know how long you’ll be here. Might wanna build yourselves a fire or something.”

It was, without question, an odd thing to say, given the situation. Negan's Dummies raised their eyebrows at it, but it wasn't enough to raise more than that. Negan himself might have read something into it, but he wasn't here and couldn't hear her.

“Send them away,” Ronnie ordered. Or…he tried to. 

“Keeping him at the gates is the best I can do,” Naomi said. She looked at Ronnie but held the button on the walkie down so that Negan could hear this part of the conversation. “You had to have known they’d come. You got Glenn here, so you best believe Maggie and the Hilltop are already on their way. Do you think the King’s going to let Jerry die? You know this ain’t gonna work. And you knew it from the start.”

“Catch up, Naomi. It’s already worked.”

“Nah. We ain't done. You ain't here,” she said. “You’ve left some shitstain lemmings to do all the hard work because when it all goes ass-up, which it will, it won’t be you in the firing line.”

“Isn’t that what Rick the Prick is doing to you?” Negan countered. “Leaving you and Daryl to run the most dangerous place in his little Empire. And if there’s some kind of uprising - like there was last night… oh well… it ain’t his family in the firing line, right?”

I hated it when Negan talked shit, but I hated it more when the shit made sense. How many times had I told Rick that he had no right to ask me and my girl to be here? 

Even Naomi faltered just a little. A flicker of fear as her eyes cast over me again. I knew she was thinking of Mia and how much worse this could've been if they hadn't been in Alexandria when this kicked off. A beat, and then she rallied. 

“What will it take?” she asked Negan. “For you to fuck off?”

"I'm not going anywhere," Negan said. "Sanctuary’s not yours anymore. Didn't Ronnie give you the memo?" 

"I don't see you here," she said, making a big deal of looking around even though he couldn't have seen her do it. Negan's cronies glanced at one another, and I realized it was for their benefit, not Negan's. My girl had a plan, as always. “And we both know you don’t want to be here.”

“Is that so?”

“You could save us all a lot of time and turn yourself in.”

"Not this again."

“So you heard me, huh?” she said, a flash of triumph in her eyes. He'd been out there in the storm, after all. “It was you out there.”

Negan’s cold laugh filled the room. Without being here, he still managed to have more of a presence than any of his henchmen. “That was real dumb coming by your lonesome. I almost had you.” 

I shuddered, thinking about how close he'd been to her and how things could've played out if I hadn't found her. 

“Come on, Negan,” she said. “You and I both know that you'd be here if you wanted to be. So, what is this? Are you feeling lonely? Because we've got a place for ya if you turn yourself in and-”

“Don't insult me with this shit. Again.”

“You bored, then? Because Alexandria’s got some good reading material, even from our jail cell you could learn -”

“Stop,” he said. “Ronnie - make her see sense.”

If Ronnie had been a smart man, capable of learning anything, he’d have realized the way to get Naomi to do something was to use me. I even braced myself for it, but the pressure of the barrel of Ronnie’s gun at the base of my skull disappeared as he walked closer to Naomi. The tension in me did not ease up. 

"Y’know, Daryl put up with a hell of a lot not to give you up," Ronnie brushed his hand down her cheek, gently caressing her jaw with his thumb, forcing her to look at him. She started him down, but behind her back, her hands started to shake.

“Get your hands off her," I warned him. The rope burned against my skin as I twisted my wrist against it. The ties around me were loose, but I hadn't had time to free my wrists. 

 "You must be a dynamite lay to be worth all of that." I would've rolled my eyes at the predictability of it. Like he'd taken the line right from Negan's mouth. But what he said next changed everything. Ronnie turned his head to look at me, “You wanna watch when I find out for myself?"

I broke out of the binds they had me in. Broke my hand too, but that was fine because my other one was free and clear for throwing punches. I was on Ronnie before any of them had time to react. 

"Don't. Fucking. Touch. Her." I punctuated each word with a punch to his fucking stupid face. Just to drive my point home.

Naomi was yelling at me to stop, but I feel like it goes without saying I didn't care if I killed him. I knew she was trying to negotiate or some shit, but after what he'd just threatened… he could rot. She'd been through enough. History would not repeat itself. Not here, not tonight, not ever again, not so long as I was breathing would anyone lay a hand on her without her consent.

Three of them pulled me off him. Kept me on my knees at gunpoint while Ronnie picked himself up. He was mad as hell. But before he could tell them to go ahead and shoot, Naomi put herself between us.

"Stop! Stop!" It was the second time Naomi's voice had shaken during this whole ordeal. "Negan can have what he wants."

"Naomi…" I said. Or, at least, I tried to say it. With the blood in my mouth and my lip busted and swollen, it came out slurred. She looked back at me and gave me a look as if to say, It's gonna be okay.

I wasn't so sure. 

"Negan?" she said into the walkie. 

"Yes, baby girl?”

I was ready to throw another punch. Naomi looked like she was too, but she gritted her teeth and said, “I'll give you what you want.”

"Caved so quickly, huh? Rick will be disappointed that I'm back to -"

"No, not Sanctuary. I'll give you what you want. What you really want." 

Ice in my stomach when I thought about all that she might be about to offer. This place? I didn't give a shit. Herself? Whole other problem.

"What I really, really want? What is this? A negotiation or Spice Girls karaoke?" Negan was the only one who laughed. "So, tell me, what do I want? What do I really, really want?"

"Lucille."

Naomi finally played her ace.

"You still got my girl?"

"I've got her."

"My guys couldn't find her."

"I hid her. She's fine. Your guys are dumb."

"You're lying."

"I can prove it. I'll bring her out the front, and you can see for yourself." There was another long pause. The whole room seemed to lean in while she added, "You knew when Rick showed up, so I assume you've got eyes on the place."

Silence hung in the air. Naomi's eyes found mine again. 

"Bring her outside," Negan said. 

"But, boss, you said not to -"

"Well, now I'm saying something different. Get her out here, and make sure she has my Lady Lucille."

The other men in the room all looked at Ronnie for instruction. He nodded and then gestured to me. "Bring him too. It'll keep the bitch in line."

“Watch your mouth,” I spat at him. 

Ronnie walked Naomi out of the room at gunpoint. New ties were wrapped around me. The other men dragged the rest of us outside - me, Bryce, Glenn, Jerry, and Aaron. 

It had gotten dark, but the place was lit up by the headlights from the cars amassed by the gates and the bonfire Naomi had asked for. There was a flurry of activity as we walked out. Looked like most of Alexandria had turned up, and half of Hilltop had arrived too. Beside me, Glenn strained against the rope binding him as he laid eyes on Maggie. 

Naomi had done it. She'd brought them to a place where they were outnumbered again. Where our friends had eyes on us and, more importantly, weapons. I didn't see how this could go Negan's way anymore. Surely his goons had to see that too. 

That morning it had felt like we were all about to die in a hostile takeover, but now? We had more than a fighting chance of getting out of a hostage situation. 

Naomi and Ronnie walked back out of Sanctuary. She dragged Lucille through the dirt behind her in a way that could only have been designed to aggravate Negan. Her bright, clever eyes took in the scene she was walking into. 

She walked right up to the fire and stopped, holding Lucile high above her head for everyone to see, she spoke into the walkie, "I told you. I told you I wasn't lying."

“Bring her to me.”

“Come down here and get her,” Naomi yelled into the walkie, looking around at the darkness around Sanctuary for the vantage point that Negan might be watching us all from.

“How dumb do you think I am?”

“No comment.”

“Gotta say, I'm disappointed in you, Naomi. I thought you were better than this. More than just some little foot soldier mindlessly parroting whatever Rick tells you to,” he said. “You gonna try and convince me to turn myself in again?”

At the gates, Rick was looking restless. It was clear he wanted to jump in but, while Naomi had managed to get us in a good position, this was still a hostage negotiation. They couldn't open fire on Negan's men without risking that they'd retaliate by killing one of us. 

Let my girl work . 

“Cut the shit, Negan,” she said. “You owe your guys the truth. These men were willing to follow you to the end, to throw away a secure life here to bring you back, but you don't wanna be here.”

“You don't know what you're talking about, bitch,” Ronnie snapped, advancing on my girl. 

“Oi! Stay away from her!” I tried to get to my feet. Ronnie turned on me and kicked me hard. I felt the blow on my jaw and then a second blow to the back of my head as it hit the ground. For a second everything was darker, blurrier. 

The first thing I became aware of was Naomi's voice calling my name. Her wide, terrified eyes. I forced myself to my knees, head spinning. She was seconds away from running to my side but I couldn't let Negan think he was gaining the upper hand, not when she'd already fought so hard to level the playing field. 

“I'm good, I'm good,” I told her, although the dizziness wasn't easing up. Could taste bile like I was about to vomit. Naomi didn't look like she believed me, she looked like she was ready to throw it all away just to make sure I was okay. She might've done it if Negan hadn't spoken again. 

"The shit he'll do for you," Negan tutted. "Never mind my crown. You could take Rick's. Do you ever think about that? One word to your attack dog there and he'd take him down. You could pull a real Lady Macbeth on this whole shit show."

"Yeah, 'cause that worked out real well for her."

"You're telling me that an ambitious little bitch like you doesn't wanna take a shot for Rick's empire?"

"All I want is a safe future for my family,” she said and my heart damn near burst knowing she was talking about me. The world was still spinning.

“Daryl ain't looking so good. Think he can survive another round with Ronnie?”

“Enough!” Naomi lowered Lucille, holding it over the fire. So close I was sure that damn bat would start smoldering. “Anything happens to Daryl, and Lucille is firewood.”

Negan's scream of rage filled the air and she didn't flinch. “He's fucking dead. I'm not bluffing.” 

“Neither am I.” She lowered the hand that held Lucille over the fire, so close to the flames that she must have been able to feel the heat on her skin. Close enough that the varnish on that damn bat was starting to peel in places, the wood blackening underneath. Flames were inches from licking at the bottom of her wrist. “You let these men risk their lives and for what? Wood and barbed wire?"

Beside me, Ronnie shifted nervously from foot to foot, unsure whether or not to call Naomi's bluff or follow Negan's suggestion to finish me off. Naomi was so still, so sure of herself, that I doubted he could tell how she was feeling. 

It was her other hand that gave her away. Nails dug so deep into her palms so hard that a drop of blood wound down her finger and dripped into the earth. If they'd known her like I did, if they'd known where to look, they'd have seen the cracks. 

But they didn't.

So she stood tall against the flames. 

She looked like a goddamn angel. The real kind. Not the corny ones from Christmas cards. The biblical ones that people feared because they held almighty wrath. The kind you could imagine, should she be cast from heaven, turning that wrath into hellfire. 

"Tell them, Negan. Or I drop her." She pushed the button on the walkie but she hurled her words at the trees, knowing he was out there somewhere, watching. "Let Daryl go. Let them all go. And then we can talk about Lucille.”

“Let them go,” Negan said. His men hesitated. “Let them go, damn it!”

I felt the ties around me loosen and then fall away. Bryce, Aaron, Glenn, and Jerry all stumbled towards Rick and the shadow of the Alexandrians who'd come to our aid. I got to my feet but stayed where I was. 

"Go," she said. I shook my head. "Go!”

I shook my head again. Glenn and the others had reached the safety of Rick's team. 

"What's happening here, Naomi?" Negan sounded ticked off. 

"Daryl, go." Her eyes, filled with firelight, fixed me with the kind of pleading gaze that could get me to do almost anything. Almost.

I held her gaze and shook my head. "'It's you 'n' me, angel."

It all flickered across her face - denial, anger, the urge to bargain with me or Negan, but finally she accepted it. "I guess Daryl's staying."

"Well, ain't that sweet? Dumb. But, sweet," Negan said. "That's kind of his deal, isn't it? Not a lotta smarts but sweet on you."

For some reason, this was the straw that broke the camel's back. Taunting her was fine but one wrong word against me and she was ready to throw fists. "You know what, Negan? Come down here and say that to my fucking face.”

I moved closer to her. Pain radiating all over my body. My steps were slow and strenuous. I reached for her with my non-broken hand. She reached back for me, our fingers intertwined. I could feel my strength slipping away, I was unsteady on my feet, but the need to be closer to her kept me going. “You this, baby, bring us home.”

“It's Lucille or Sanctuary, your choice,” Naomi told Negan. “Either way, we're both walking away from this.”

“You sure about that?” Negan retorted. “Daryl looks like he's having trouble standing, never mind walking.”

“Fine,” she said, jaw set. “Sanctuary it is. I don't want it, you can have it. Say goodbye to Lucille, though, she's the price of admission.”

Cold as ice, she made to throw Lucille into the fire. Negan bellowed, “STOP!”

It was as good as over. Still, Naomi held Lucille in the flames. I could smell melting varnish. “Tell. Them.”

“Stand down, Ronnie,” Negan said. “It's over.”

Ronnie grabbed the walkie from her. “But, boss! You said-” 

“It's over.”

True to her word, Naomi rescued Lucille from the fire. She looked at Ronnie, almost apologetically, “I tried to tell you he doesn't want to be here. Negan used you. All he wanted was -”

Naomi never got to finish. Chaos broke out. 

Shots fired across the air as the last remaining, now disillusioned Saviors started firing at Rick's side. It was either a final hail-mary to take the place by force without Negan, or they didn't have another way of taking out their anger after his betrayal.

Our friends returned fire. I pulled Naomi to the ground, covered her body with mine and she yelled at me the whole time for it. “Get off of me, Daryl! 

“Quit yellin' at me, woman!”

“Get off of me, you coulda been shot!”

“I'm tryna stop you from being shot, dummy!”

Even with the sounds of gunshots still ringing in my ears, even with her yelling at me, all I wanted to do was kiss her. I think she knew it, too. After a few seconds of fighting against me, she stopped. Smiled a little. 

A hand grabbed the back of my shirt and hauled me up. Ronnie. I tried to clench my fists, forgot that one of my hands was broken, and felt a blinding pain.

When Ronnie turned his knife on me, I wondered if he knew it was the last thing he'd ever do. The blade nicked my skin. Lucille swung out of the darkness and cracked into his skull. We went down at the same time, but I doubt he knew much after that.  

They get so focused on what I'd do to protect her that they forget - the shit she'd do for me? Biblical. 

I can't even begin to explain what loyalty like that means to a guy like me, who thought he'd never have it. 

I watched her, a shadow against the flames, pin Ronnie to the ground. She lifted her hand, wielding the knife he'd just used on me. It glinted in the firelight as she raised it again and again. I knew it wasn't just Ronnie she was seeing. She was seeing every Savior who'd beaten me in Sanctuary, everyone in Terminus who'd tried to kill us, everyone who'd ever hurt me, whether she knew about it or not. A long line of violence that stretched back to my old man. 

At that moment, Ronnie was all of them. And she was protecting me in the way she'd always wanted to. 

“Naomi!” I called out to her. At the sound of my voice, her head turned. The rage in her eyes vanished. The fear that replaced it wasn't much easier to stomach. 

I tried to get to her but my body was finally giving out. Naomi scrambled off Ronnie's corpse and flew towards me. Surrounded me. Her arms, her hair, her smell. Gentle fingers untying what was left of the ties around my wrists. She was always so gentle with me. My whole life, nobody ever touched me as fucking gently as she does.

"I got you," she whispered. Her voice, the sound of the only person I’ve ever trusted with all of me - mind, body, soul, and heart. “You’re with me. I got you.”

I finally lost consciousness, my body giving in to the darkness that had been chasing me all day because I knew, right down to my bones, that I was safe with her.

Chapter 55: Demon

Naomi

“What about internal bleeding? How would we know?” I couldn't stop pacing in circles even though I was already feeling queasy.

“We would know.” Dr Carson was doing an admirable job of staying level-headed in the face of what had been constant questioning from a certified nutcase. 

“But how?” I didn’t want vague platitudes; they sounded too close to a lie. I wanted answers, and I wanted them to be, ‘Daryl’s going to be just fine.’ Above all, I wanted them to come from Daryl himself.

Bryce took a tactical step between me and Dr Carson. “The doctor knows what he's talking about, let's just let him do his job okay? Take a breath.”

Deep breaths weren't helpful. Killing someone might be. 

“I knew I should've got a medical degree, what was I thinking fucking around in journalism?” If I could've reached back in time and shaken some sense into my past self I would have. 

“Naomi, sweetie,” Bryce said slowly. It was the same tone he used to use when we’d pulled an all-nighter and I was freaking out about getting an essay done on time. “Sit down.”

It didn’t work.

Sitting down, stopping even for a moment was death. I'd crack. Even now, as Bryce put his hands on my shoulders in an attempt to halt my frenzied pacing, I could feel myself unraveling. The bruises on his face and the dried blood on his shirt almost tipped me over the edge.

Aaron approached me slowly like I was a horse about to bolt, a steaming mug in his hand. “Drink this. It's…not good, but there's a tonne of sugar in it.”

The sweet tea did its job for a moment. But then I saw the bruises forming around Aaron's eyes and I wanted to smash it against the wall. “I'm so sorry you got hurt.”

“It's not as bad as it looks,” Aaron tried to wave me off. 

“You shouldn't have even been here,” my eyes flickered to Bryce. The guilt was a gut punch. “Either of you. You should have been safe, at home. You should… you could’ve… I should never have…”

Words got tangled in my throat.

“Woah, it's okay,” Aaron said, immediately worried when I started welling up. “We didn't take the brunt of it.”

Bryce cringed the moment the words left Aaron's mouth. I started pacing again. Every time I looked at Daryl, the rage I felt was so strong it made me nauseous. I wasn't sure it would ever pass.

As much as it hurt to see Bryce, Aaron, Glenn, and Jerry with their cuts and bruises, they were all still standing. They were all still walking around. They could talk. Daryl was the only one who'd passed out. And he still hadn't woken up. 

I stopped my pacing and looked at him lying on a mattress on the floor of Sanctuary's medical bay. A gaping hole opened up in my chest, and a bottomless pit in my stomach swallowed my heart. Dr Carson had given him some pretty strong painkillers that had been designed to keep him asleep for a while. I knew this, and I knew it was best for him, but I still kept staring at his chest to make sure he was breathing. The steady rise and fall of it beneath his bloodstained shirt brought me comfort and anguish in equal measure. 

Please wake up, Daryl. Please, please, please.

Bryce put a hand on my shoulder. “He's going to be okay, Naomi.”

“I know,” I said because there wasn't another option. I wouldn’t allow anything else.

Dr Carson gave me the look people give me when they're about to deliver news they know I'm not going to want to hear. “We've done all we can. We just need to let him rest.”

Bryce's grip on my shoulder tightened. The world pitched beneath me, spinning out of control. “Rest? That's it?”

“For now,” he said. “That's all we can do, yes. It's good that he's asleep.”

His tone was reassuring, and calming. It did nothing, but I swallowed my urge to scream and said, “Thank you.”

“I'll check him when he wakes up,” Dr Carson nodded on his way out. 

I willed Daryl to open his eyes. To tell me off for worrying about him. Call me a dumbass. Anything. The bruises on him were darkening. Red to deep purple. His hand, swollen and broken from trying to protect me, was wrapped tightly in white bandages. 

Helplessness had gripped me since I'd heard his cry of pain through the walkie-talkie. Now that I had nothing to do, its grip tightened. I had done nothing when Terminus was taken over, and even though this takeover had been foiled, the thought of doing nothing now was suffocating. 

“I'm stepping out for a sec,” I said to Bryce without taking my eyes off Daryl. “Watch Daryl. If he so much as rolls over, radio me.”

“Where are you going?” The worry in Bryce’s voice made it difficult to look him in the eye. 

“I’m ending this,” Before Bryce could say anything else, I turned to Aaron and said, “Ask Maggie and Michonne to meet me by the front door.”

I let the door swing shut behind me before either of them could respond. There was a fire under my heels, and I couldn't stop for anything. I would not explain myself or debate anyone. The time for that was over, nobody had believed me when I'd told them that Negan was still out there. Watching. Waiting to strike. Look where sitting around trying to convince people to listen to me had got us. Inaction felt like death. 

My family was not a price I was willing to pay, not for anything.

I grabbed two duffle bags from the commissary and filled one with supplies; some food, and warmer clothes. The second carried Lucille and something worse.

Daryl's crossbow was propped up in a corner by the tinned beans. It should have been in our room, or with him, so I assumed it had been taken from him during the now-failed uprising. I picked it up and slung it over my shoulder. It was almost as good as having his arm around me. Felt like he was with me. It gave me the strength to pick up that fucking walkie-talkie and contact Negan one last time.

“I'll keep my word,” I said. “You can have Lucille back. I'll bring her to the clearing Mia left your food in. Be there. Or don't. Either way, this is the end, Negan.”

I turned the walkie off completely. I couldn't bear to hear his smug voice again. If I never saw that damn walkie-talkie again after tonight, it would be too soon. 

Maggie and Michonne were waiting for me by the door. They eyed the duffle bags I was carrying with concern.

“You guys okay?” I asked them. If Maggie felt like punching me for the danger we'd got Glenn in, I wouldn't have blamed her. She was showing more than she had been the last time I'd seen her. The guilt of putting this kind of stress on a pregnant woman swallowed me whole. 

But she didn’t. She just nodded, “Yeah, are you-”

“Is Glenn okay?” I couldn't deal with someone asking me how I was. I was numb. But I was aware that beneath the surface I was spinning out. It was a survival thing. I couldn't break down until I knew it was safe to do so, and until then, I had to keep moving. I would feel it all later.

“Yeah. He’s a little banged up, but… nothing serious,” Maggie said. She took a deep breath.

“Daryl… is he-”

“He'll be fine,” I said. I needed it to be true. The more I said it, the more I felt like I could speak it into existence. “Dr Carson’s been with him for the last hour. He needs to sleep, but… he should…”

My voice trailed off, and my vision started to blur. I'd stayed still for too long.

“What can we do?” Michonne asked, noticing that I was wavering. I’d never appreciated her steadfast and calm presence more than at that moment. They knew I wouldn’t have asked them here, wouldn't have left Daryl's side unless I needed to be somewhere. 

“I need backup," I looked apologetically at them. "I didn't know who else to ask."

“For what?” 

“I'm going to give Lucille back,” I said. Another glance passed between them. “I know Rick might not like it, but Negan won't stop until he has his stupid bat. I need him to stop. I can't have this happen again.”

“Do you think that's the right move?” Maggie asked. “Giving him a weapon?”

“He’s been communicating with Saviors here for… God knows how long. Probably for as long as we've been here,” I said. “We know they had little caches of weapons and supplies around the area when they were running this place. There's no way he doesn't already have some kind of weapon on him. He wants Lucille back.”

“True…” Michonne said slowly. “But I'm still not sure it's a good idea. Shouldn't we bring him in, like we talked about?”

“You’re welcome to try, but he won't come willingly,” I took a deep breath to calm myself and felt the strap of Daryl’s crossbow hug me tight.

“I'm not asking you to go against Rick, but I need you there. To stop me from killing him.”

I knew if I met Negan alone, the chances of us both getting out alive were slim to none. And if I survived, it wouldn’t be for long because Daryl would kill me for going without backup. He’d want me to wait and do this with him, but I couldn’t hold out that long. I’d never sleep unless I knew I’d done everything in my power to stop this from happening again.

“Of course, we'll come with you,” Maggie said. 

"Are you sure?" I asked her. "I mean you should be... resting. You should -"

"I'm pregnant not dying," Maggie snapped, eyes blazing with rage. "They hurt my husband I want this over too."

It was enough to shut me up. Maggie was a damn powerhouse.

Michonne hesitated. “You think it'll work? You think that'll stop him?” 

“Yeah. I do,” I said. “Negan's a madman, but the madness ain't about Sanctuary. Not really, not anymore.”

Michonne’s concerned frown deepened, which wasn't surprising given I was talking about Negan's mindset as if I understood it. 

I did.

I had felt it tonight, a little bit of that madness. When I'd walked in and seen Daryl hurt like that… after what must have been hours of torture… I’d seen clear as day how you could lose one person and descend into becoming a homicidal maniac. Daryl was still alive, and my sanity was hanging by a thread.

“You don't have to come, but I ain't sitting around here waiting for Negan to launch another attack to get Lucille back,” I said. “If that’s all it takes for him to leave, he can have the damn thing.”

It was a small price to pay, I'd have paid with my life if it kept Daryl safe. 

“Have you contacted him?”

“Yes.”

“I'll come,” Michonne said, “but we offer him a deal first. The main objective is to bring him in.”

“I can live with that,” I said and started walking. Maggie and Michonne ran to catch up. 

“What's in the bags?” Maggie asked.

“A present for Negan.”

No further questions were asked. I could feel the tension radiating from the other two, but I truly felt nothing. The burning rage that had sustained me throughout the fight against Negan's men had been quickly frozen by the abject fear of seeing Daryl crumple to the ground like that. Now my heart was steel, fortified by the knowledge that the path I was walking now was the same one Mia had taken when she snuck food out of Sanctuary. For an asshole who threatened her life all the same.

When we reached the clearing, I dropped the bags on the forest floor and waited. 
We didn't have to wait long. A shadow moved through the trees. A tall shadow with a familiar swagger to his walk. Maggie and Michonne raised their guns at the same time I lifted Daryl's crossbow. Negan's laughter echoed through the trees ahead of him, and I heard the click of his own gun. 

Negan stepped into the clearing, the barrel of his gun trained on me. I could see at least two more hanging from holsters on his belt. He wasn’t short of weapons, but he didn't look as strong as he had before.

He was gaunt. Pale. Sallow skin and sunken cheekbones. A shadow of his former, formidable self. I could see why the kids had taken pity on him, and why he'd avoided coming to Sanctuary in person. 

He looked around at us all. "What's this? You starting a girl band? Pregnant Spice is a weird touch."

I didn't like the way he leered at Maggie but she didn't even flinch. "Didn't expect me to come without backup, did you?"

"It's hot, I dig it,” he shrugged. His shit-eating grin didn't quite have the same effect on such a thin face. Negan's eyes fixed on me, “How's Daryl? Last I saw him he looked like -”

“Naomi!” It was only when Michonne called my name that I realized how close I'd come to shooting him. My finger tensed on a loaded crossbow. Michonne put a hand on my arm and tried to get me to lower it. 

Negan laughed. Unfazed by death. Goading me into it. 

“Negan,” Michonne stepped in front of me, her gun still trained on Negan. He looked curiously at her, moving his gun to point at her instead of me as she spoke. “Our communities have met and agreed that while you have to answer for what you've done, this is peacetime. We won't kill you, but there will be justice. A trial.”

Negan rolled his eyes. He'd heard this all before, been given a thousand chances. I doubted he was going to take chance number one thousand and one. But Michonne had to try and I respected that. 

As she kept walking towards Negan, I drew closer too, making sure she was covered. Maggie slowly moved around the other side of Negan. His eyes darted back and forth between the three of us, dark circles underneath. 

“Hey back up now,” Negan's sudden outburst made us all jump. He'd always been quick to anger, but now the veil was paper thin. His eyes flashed, spittle flew from his mouth, his gun swung back around to me. “I ain't here to play nice.”

Michonne stopped. Maggie and I stopped, and it became clear that bringing Negan in by force wasn't an option. He would not hesitate to kill any one of us to get away. 

“Alright,” Michonne said calmly, raising her hands in a gesture of nonviolence. “We won't come any closer, but you can come back with us. You got a long winter ahead of you, you don't want to face that alone. I'm not saying a jail cell will be comfortable, but it's gotta be better than freezing to death out here.”

“No chance in hell.” It was death or Lucille, those were the only outcomes he'd accept. Negan’s eyes slid over to me. “Does she speak for you?”

I reached into one of the duffle bags, grabbed Ronnie’s severed head by his hair, and threw it at Negan’s feet. On either side of me, I heard Michonne and Maggie take a sharp breath. Negan crouched right down to look at Ronnie's unseeing eyes and his still-snapping undead jaw. 

“Rick's offer still stands. But not here,” I said. “You want mercy, you go to Alexandria. You come back here, you'll end up like Ronnie.”

Negan let out a slow whistle and slowly looked back up at me. "All my men could talk about how much of a brute Daryl was. But you're something worse, aren't ya?"

I could feel Michonne and Maggie's eyes on me. My skin prickled with shame. My friends were finally seeing the ugliest parts of me. The parts I'd spent a lifetime trying to hide. “Yes.”

Daryl was, and always had been, unapologetically himself. I was all apologies, diluting myself to be so palatable to other people’s tastes that I ended up bland as water reflecting back whatever I thought they wanted to see. I did my best to drown those ugly parts of me yet here they were, surviving.

“I could've made something special outta you. Instead, you're languishing in Rick's shadow.”

I threw the duffle bag full of supplies at him.

“There's clothes and some food in there, that's the last you're getting from Sanctuary,” I told him. “Now, I don't much care where you go, but if you're seen within three miles of this place, you're dead. There's a map in there too, outlining the radius in case you're too dumb to work it out yourself. Don't cross the creek and don't cross the freeway. We'll shoot you on sight.” 

“Alright. But if I see anyone on my turf, I won't hesitate to do the same, sweetheart.”

“Fine.”

“You got my girl?”

I pulled Lucille out of the second duffle bag and threw it to him. 

“Would you look at that…she's still got bits of Ronnie on her.” He inspected Lucille. “Pleasure doing business with you, Naomi.”

I turned away from him. “Eat shit.”

I couldn't stand the sight of him for a second longer. The trigger on Daryl's crossbow was looking mighty tempting. 

Michonne and Maggie made sure Negan left. I couldn't turn, couldn't help them. I'd have put a bolt in his back. 

We trudged back to Sanctuary in silence. I couldn't look at either of them. The forest floor in front of me was about all I could muster. 

“Sorry we couldn't bring him in,” I said. 

Michonne’s footsteps didn't falter beside me. “Thanks for not killing him.”

I nodded. 

The shame that had pricked my skin in the clearing spread to something worse. It sank into me until it was bone-deep. Sanctuary loomed ahead of us again. Of all of the fucked up things in that place, I was the worst. A demon in a mask, pretending I was human. A shit stain on the world, a liability around everyone I loved. 
I'd do it all again if I had to. 

“I need to report this to Rick,” Michonne said as we reached the front door again. 

“I know,” I said. “I'll be in the infirmary if he wants to come yell at me.”

I started to head back to the infirmary, taking a route through the corridor where I imagined this had all started. 

The doors of every cupboard that had been used as a makeshift cell while Daryl interrogated Ronnie and his friends were still open. Something about the sight of them, all standing ajar with darkness bleeding through, made me stop in my tracks.

I checked them all. And in the third I found Justin. He looked back at me and mirrored my surprise. “You’re back.”

“You didn’t leave.”

He looked around the cupboard he'd been shut in. “I didn’t leave.”

Justin looked as banged up as Ronnie and his conspirators had. But there hadn't been any sign of him when I'd arrived. Bryce and Aaron both reported he'd had nothing to do with it. 

“Why?”

“Wasn’t part of it. Didn’t want to be.” He still didn't move. 

“The door’s been unlocked all day.”

“I wasn’t sure that it was over.”

“It’s over.”

He nodded. “The other guys, are they….?”

“Ronnie’s dead,” I said, and wondered if Justin could see the truth of who I was in my face. “A few of the others are hurt. They’ll all be sent off to Hilltop when they’ve recovered. Come with me."

Justin got to his feet with the slow, careful movement of someone whose joints were aching from being crouched in a cupboard for two days. I took him back to the infirmary with me. 
Bryce's eyes widened when we walked in. No wonder. He'd seen me kill one man tonight and might have been worried he was about to witness a second. I wondered if he still saw me in the same way he had before tonight. I looked away from him as I searched for something to clean a wound on Justin's forehead that was starting to fester. 

“Has he woken up?” I asked. In the corner of my eye, I could see Daryl's immobile form. Chest still rising and falling. 

“No, he's been the same since you left,” Bryce tried to sound reassuring. 

“Jesus…” Justin muttered as he glanced at Daryl. Given I was currently patching up the wounds Daryl had left on him, it spoke a lot about just how hurt Daryl was that Justin could muster so much sympathy. 

“It's a good thing he's resting,” Bryce said

“Uh-huh,” I nodded, bandaging Justin's arm.  

“He needs rest,” Bryce said. 

“Uh-huh.”

“And so do you.”

I ignored him and looked at Justin. “You're all done. Bryce will take you through to Rick, but since you had no part in this I'm sure you'll be free to go.”

Justin nodded, but Bryce hesitated. “Do you want me to come back?” 

“No. I got it from here. You get some sleep.” 

“You get some sleep.” I couldn't stand how worried Bryce looked about me. Not after tonight. “I'll come and get you if anything-”

“I ain't gonna be able to sleep anywhere else but here.”

“I could stay with you?” he offered.

“No,” I shook my head. “That’s sweet, but no. I’ll be fine.”

I knew Daryl wouldn’t be comfortable with anyone watching over him but me. Bryce pulled me into a tight hug. “What you did tonight…it was very brave.”

It didn't feel brave, it felt barbaric. 

I felt myself starting to well up, but I fought it back. I whispered, “You shouldn't have been here.”

“I'm okay. We're all okay, including Daryl.” 

“Uh-huh.”

Bryce gave me a smile before he took Justin out of the infirmary to deliver him to Rick. I couldn't muster one in return. 

The silence in the room after they left crushed me. I sank on the floor beside Daryl's mattress. Alone with Daryl for the first time since I'd got back, the sight of him overwhelmed me. I hated how still he was. How quiet. His face was turned to me. Blood around his mouth. One eye swollen and purple. I pushed his hair back from his face. Kissed his forehead.

“Daryl,” I whispered to him, although I doubted he could hear me. “You're gonna be okay. You gotta be.”

Words got caught in my throat. There was so much I wanted to say to him, but every time I tried it sounded too much like a goodbye. 
I lay down on the floor beside him, feeling like I was bleeding out. I reached for his non-broken hand. It was the first time in my life I'd held his hand in the dark and hadn't felt him squeezing back.

Daryl

The room was dark when I woke up, but there was a faint grey glow that could have meant early morning. I knew I should be hurting more, but my head felt heavy in a way that told me I was on some heavy-duty painkillers. I'd woken up real slow, a gradual and groggy awareness that I was in Sanctuary's infirmary and I wasn't alone.

I turned my head, and there she was. Lying on the floor beside my mattress, curled tight with her face turned towards me. No pillows, no blanket, just an angel sleeping on a dusty floor. 

I wanna give you so much more than this…

I wanna give you the goddamn world. 

None of it was fair. I was supposed to protect her from everything, and here she was looking after me. I reached out, touched her shoulder as gently as I could. She gave a start the moment she saw me, scrambling to get up. Wild panic in her eyes.

“Hey, hey, hey,” I said quickly before she started spinning out. “I'm fine. I'm good.”

“I gotta get the doctor,” she turned away from me like she was about to call out. About to raise all hell until someone came to check me over.

“Nope,” I tightened my grip on her arm. “I'm all good, angel. Let the man sleep. I can see him in the morning.”

My throat was dry, my voice like gravel. Naomi frowned, “You should drink something’.”

I didn't want her to leave but it turned out she had water all prepared for me. I struggled to sit up while she brought it over. Aches and pains bloomed all over, but the meds took the edge off. Naomi knelt next to me with the water glass in hand and tried to help me sit up. If it had been somebody else, I'd have waved them off and done it myself, but I liked feeling her hand between my shoulder blades.

I hadn’t realized how parched I was until I started drinking. I finished the whole glass without coming up for air. Naomi looked at me, “You need some more?”

“Nah.” I shook my head.

“More painkillers?”

“Nah. Not at the moment.” I was in a small amount of pain, but I didn't want to take anything that might put me to sleep again. I just wanted to spend time with my girl.

She nodded and took the glass away. She had food all prepared for me too. “Eat.”

“Yes, ma'am.” That earned me a smile. It was so good to see her smile.

“I’m going to get the doctor.”
“No,” I said, sharply enough for her to stop in her tracks.

She looked back at me, glaring hard. “Your hand…”

“It's fine.”

“It's broken,” she said. “Dr Carson should-”

“What's he gonna do, bandage it twice?” I held up my injured hand. It had been so thoroughly wrapped up that it was about twice as heavy as it used to be. Felt like I was wearing half of our supply of bandages, and I knew from how over-the-top it was that Naomi had been hovering behind Dr Carson while he did it, demanding he do more.  

“Daryl!” she hissed, nostrils flaring with annoyance.

“Naomi!” I hissed back.

“Dr Carson -”
“Should be checking you over,” I said. “Maybe he can find some of the screws you got loose.”

“Your ribs-”

“They ain’t broken.”

“You don't know that, we can't x-ray here. There's no-”

“I’ve had broken ribs before, I know what they feel like. These are just bruised.”

“You need -”

“I need you, darlin’,” I said, which shut her up for a moment. She didn’t even give me shit for the times I'd called her ‘darlin’ or ‘angel’, which is how I knew I was in bad shape. Her face softened as she looked at me. I felt soft too, and I was starting not to care that she knew it. “Now, c’mere… whatcha doin’ sleeping on the floor?” 

“The hell else am I supposed to sleep?” She looked at me like I was nuts, but she did move away from the door and closer to me.

“We have a whole room upstairs,” I reminded her. “It’s got all our stuff in it and everything.”

“Yeah. But you ain't in it, dummy.” 

I couldn't hold back any longer. 

“C’mere,” I pulled her onto the mattress beside me. My arms ached, my ribs hurt every time I moved, and I could feel my heartbeat in my broken hand, but it was worth it to be close to her. She'd been away from me all of three days and I was craving her like it had been years since I last touched her. Last tasted her. 

Naomi slipped carefully into bed beside me. I wrapped an arm around her, resting my broken hand on her hip. She didn't get too close, resisting leaning on any part of me in case she hurt me. 

“If you start to feel sick, or sore, or anything…” she said. 

“Promise I'll let you know.”

“Okay,” she said, the panic starting to fade and something else creeping in. “You’re really okay?”

It came out as a whisper, small and lost. A killer combination with her big, sad eyes. It stirred something in me. “I'm really okay.”

“You almost weren't, though," she said. There were tears in her eyes that she was fighting to hold back, and a tremor in her bottom lip as she looked at me. Damn near broke my heart. “You're hurt. You're really, really hurt. You should’ve… you should have called me like they wanted you to not… not….”

She was losing the fight against the tears in her eyes. I got the sense it was a battle she'd been fighting for a while.

“Ain't so bad,” I said, because it really wasn't, not now she was back in my arms. I kissed her forehead and felt the stab of pain in my split lip. “And don’t go blaming yourself for it, neither.”

“It’s my fault your hand got broken,” she said. 

“It’s Ronnie’s fault my hand got broken,” I corrected her. “The shit he was sayin’... A guy like that shouldn't be breathing."

"Well. He's not anymore,” she reminded me. Her voice was flat, but I knew she was cut up about it. I didn't like the look in her eyes. She sighed. “I think maybe you were right. I think maybe I shouldn’t have come here with you.”

“Negan would’ve done the same thing if you were in the Kingdom,” I said. “He’d still have wanted Lucille, right?”

“Maybe,” she laid her head down on the pillow beside mine, still maintaining a careful, calculated distance from me. I didn’t care about my bruises, I wanted to feel her body on mine again but now wasn't the time. She was too sad.

“And he still would've used me to get to you if you had Lucille,” I stroked her cheek. I couldn't stop looking at her. “Sure, he might've had a harder time getting support if I hadn't been so…hard on his buddies for what they did to you, but-”

"If those guys hadn't beaten me the first time around if I hadn't been the target of all of their shit… you'd have kept your cool,” she interrupted with her big, sad eyes. My heart clenched at the sight of it. "You could lead this place if I got out of your way.”

Out of my way? You’re the one who makes any of this worth a damn.

I saw where this train of thought was going and I didn’t like it. "Maybe I'd have been able to keep my cool, keep my head down, keep to Rick's plan. But you know what else I'd have been?"

"What?"

"Fucking miserable."

"Daryl…" Her whole face softened in that way that made my heart do stupid flips. 

"Hey don't gimme that look. I ain't ever been happy, not like this. Not like what we got.”

Even now, even in the shitty situations we'd been in, being with her was beyond my wildest fucking dreams. Naomi kissed me, finally letting herself melt against me like I'd wanted her to since I'd laid eyes on her. As I kissed her back, her warm body relaxed, fitting so perfectly, the way it always did, against mine. The tears she’d been holding back started to fall. I held her tight as she buried her face in my neck. 

“C’mere, it’s okay,” I murmured into her hair, holding her body close to mine. I could feel her shaking in my arms. “You’re alright. Everything’s alright.”

“I almost lost you.” There was a tremor in her voice. The more she tried to hold it back, the more uncontrollable her sobs became. I held her tighter. 

“I’m alright, angel. It's alright. I'm right here.” My good hand rubbed her back, a lump forming in my own throat as I did my best to soothe her. I’d seen her cry before, but never like this. Never so scared. “Been holding all this in for a while, huh?”

I felt her nod against my chest. Her sobs were muffled by the front of my shirt. 

“Can’t stand seein’ you hurt like this.” She whispered so quietly I almost missed it. Her body shook against mine. I kissed the top of her head. 

“I know, I know,” I murmured. “But I'm okay, darlin'. I'm right here.”

In some ways, it broke my heart. But in other, more selfish ways, it healed parts of me that had been broken since I was a kid. Parts that never believed anyone could love me like this. So deeply, so fiercely. Like my life meant more to her than her own.

The way she'd dropped everything for me and come running. Fought tooth and nail. For me? Even now, crying in my arms, she was letting me see a side of her I knew she'd never let anyone else see.

It was selfish, I know, but I can't tell you what that kind of loyalty means to a guy like me. Never thought anyone could feel that way about me. 
For a moment, I couldn't say anything. Just held her, stroked her hair, rubbed her back until her tears subsided. I cleared my throat. "Naomi?”

"Yeah?"

"You're a fucking angel."

"Stop." She looked up at me and I wiped the tears from under her eyes with my thumb. “Stop callin’ me that.”

“Stop givin’ me reasons to.” Even with her red-rimmed eyes and tear tracks glistening on her cheeks, she was breathtakingly beautiful. 

“Well… that's easy.” Naomi braced herself for something. “You're about to be so mad at me.”
“I doubt that, darlin'.”

“You ain't gonna like it.” Naomi took a deep breath before she spoke again. “We saw Negan. I gave him Lucille.”

She was right. I didn't like it, but I didn't want that to turn into anger. I gave myself a beat before I reacted. Stroked her hair again, which soothed us both. “We?”

“I brought Maggie and Michonne…” she said.  “Y'know, as backup.”

The tightness in my chest eased up a little. I’d had visions of her charging into the woods by herself to face him alone. “Good choices.”

Naomi waited for me to say something. When I didn't she said, “You ain't mad?”

“I don't like it,” I couldn’t lie to her. Not with her red-rimmed eyes still looking up at me. “But I ain't mad. Not at you. I trust you. I know you'd have done what's right.”

“I told him if he wants mercy, he can go to Alexandria. Rick's offer still stands and we'll honor that. But if he's seen near here again, he's dead.” Naomi looked apprehensive like she still expected me to blow up at her any second. I hated that she felt like she had to walk on eggshells around me. “Sorry. I know that decision should have been yours to make. You're in charge, but…you were…and I couldn't sit around waiting for Negan's next move.”

“It's okay.” I could tell from the look in her eyes that she was close to spinning out again. I kissed her forehead. “Giving him the option is a damn sight kinder than I'd have been.”

Letting him live was a damn sight kinder than I'd have been, but I got that she was still trying to find a way to respect Rick's decision. She sighed,“ You don't feel like I've undermined you?”

“Hell no.” I'd always trusted her judgment more than my own. “Does Rick know?”

“By now? Probably. Michonne will have told him.”

“You ain't seen him?”

“Ain't seen anyone since I got back,” she said. She must have read the surprise on my face because she thought about it for a moment and added, “Except Bryce. He's been bringing me food and stuff. Swapping in to stay with you when I need a bathroom break.”

“That’s a whole damn operation you got here. How long have I been out?”

She bit her lip. “Almost twenty-four hours.” 

“I missed a day?!” 

“Yeah.” She looked like she was about to cry again. 

“Holy shit.” I let that sink in, along with the fact that while I'd been out cold Little Miss doesn't -sit-still-for-nothing Payton had sat vigil at my bedside. 

“C'mere,” I pulled her close again and felt her nestle against me. “I must've been a Pope or something in a past life to deserve being loved like this in this one.”

Naomi sniffed, and let out something somewhere between a sob and laugh. 

“Some of them Popes did shady shit,” she mumbled into my chest. “No way you were one of them.”

“Alright, not a Pope then,” I chuckled, even though it caused a stab of pain in my ribs. I rested my chin on the top of her head. It felt so damn good to have her back in my arms again. “But seriously, Naomi, I'm fine. You didn't need to camp out here.”

She raised an eyebrow. “You ain't fine.” 

“I ain't that bad to look at am I?” I hoped I didn't come off as needy as I felt. 

“Nah, don't worry, you're still hot,” she grinned. I hated that I could feel my ears turning red. “But…. C’mere a sec.” 

She got up and held out a hand to help me up off the mattress. I resisted at first, some stubborn part of me wanting to prove that she didn’t need to worry as much as she was. But the more I moved, the more pain shot through me. Naomi helped haul me to my feet and pointed me in the direction of the mirror hanging on the infirmary wall. 

Ah. Shit.

I was caked in dirt and blood. My face was all shades of bruised. Dried blood was soaked into the front of my shirt. If I'd seen her in that kinda state I'd have set fire to something.

No wonder she's losing her mind.

“Alright, maybe I should get myself cleaned up,” I admitted. 

“And see a doctor?” 

“Maybe. Once he's awake.”

“I can-”

“Let the man sleep.”

“Fine. But I'm runnin' you a bath and I'm changing that dressing on your shoulder,” she said, looking sternly back at me as she made her way towards the door. I followed, slower than I'd liked. My muscles hurt with every step. I tried not to let it show, but she must've caught a grimace on my face because she added, “And Dr Carson gave me more painkillers for ya. If you need ’em just ask.”

“They gonna knock me out again?”

“They’re not as strong as the previous ones but they might make you a little drowsy,” she said, worried eyes fixed on me as we walked away from the infirmary. “If you need something stronger or one of them sedatives I can get-”

“Naomi,” I shook my head, “if you mention waking that doctor one more time, I'm sedating you.”

She looked like she wanted to yell at me, but since most other people in Sanctuary were asleep she stopped herself. 

“You know you have a broken hand, right?” she said, pointing at it, “There's a bone in there that once was in one piece that ain't anymore.”

“Yeah, I know.”

“Do ya? 'cause you ain't acting like it.”

“I know it. Might not know the exact damn bone, but it’s in my hand, I can feel it’s broken.” 

“It's your fifth metacarpal,” she said. I stared at her. “Well… probably. Most likely. We don't have an x-ray, but… Dr Carson said that was the most likely based on how it happened.”

“Nerd.” I could feel the grin spreading across my face. Naomi rolled her eyes, but I could see the smile tugging at her lips as she pushed open a bathroom door.

“You need some painkillers or what?”

I wasn't ready to miss out on any more time with my girl. “Later's fine. I'm all good, really.” 

“Fine,” she sighed before she bent over the bath and started running the water. “Get them bloody clothes off.’

“Buy a guy a drink first, Jeeze.”

I heard her laugh despite herself. The sound of it made me feel warmer than any bath ever could. She was right, though, every time I looked down I was surprised by the amount of dried blood on my shirt. It had basically turned a whole other color, and soaked through to stick to me like a second skin. 

A shock of pain in my shoulder as I reached to undo the top button made me groan. It was the surprise of it more than the pain, but I felt the silence in the room intensify. I avoided looking at Naomi. Didn't need her worrying more than she already was, but it was difficult to unbutton anything with only one hand and a gash across the other shoulder. 

After a few minutes of silence, I glanced up at Naomi and found her sitting on the edge of the bath, steam rising behind her. I felt my cheeks heat up when I realized she'd probably been watching me the whole time. I hated looking weak in front of anyone, but especially her. 

“You got a buncha ones you're gonna start throwin' at me?” 

“For the slowest strip tease on Earth? I'd be broke before you were showin' any skin.” Naomi rolled her eyes and stood up. “C'mon, need some help? I got two workin’ hands.” 

“Nah, I’m good.” I tried to wave her off, she'd already done more than enough for me. 

"Daryl. Please," she fixed me with those big eyes of hers. It stirred something in me again, but I still shook my head. 

“I got this,” I said. But it was becoming clear even to me that I didn't. I struggled on a little longer, feeling her eyes on me as I tried to pull my sleeve down while my shoulder screamed at me. My cheeks burned. Naomi shut off the taps and moved closer.

“C'mon, Daryl. It's not like I ain't taken your clothes off before,” she softly, with this big, cheeky, heart-melting grin. My heart spun over and I couldn't help but smile back as she added a soft, “Please?”

I gave in. She could ask me for anything like that and I'd say yes. Her gentle hands brushed against my chest as she undid the button I'd been struggling with for five minutes. Her eyes stayed fixed on mine as she undid the rest. 

“Lemme know if I hurt you,” she said, her voice as gentle as the way she eased my shirt off my aching shoulder. The cut from Ronnie's knife had bled through the bandage on it. 

“You're doing jus’ fine,” I murmured. I couldn't take my eyes off of her as she undressed me. My heart thrummed, although I knew this wasn't supposed to be a heart-thrumming situation. I couldn't help it, the prettiest girl I'd ever known was unzipping my pants. Took a hell of a lot of focus to stop myself from getting hard. 

I remembered how nervous I'd been to take my clothes off in front of her at first. Never thought someone could look at me and want… well, anything. But Naomi looks at this broken, battle-scarred body of mine like it's some kind of miracle. Like she's never wanted anything more. And that makes me feel like a damn king. 

Even in this state, she didn't recoil from me. Didn't flinch at the blood-soaked bandage on my shoulder, or the dark purple bruises on my ribs. Or the red marks on my thighs and shins from where the rope had cut into me. Treated me like she always did, like I was her favorite damn work of art. I pulled her hips closer to mine with one hand. “Have I thanked you for taking care of me yet?”

“You can thank me by getting in the bath,” she said, but there was a whole smile lighting up her face. A sparkle in her eyes. “I ain't done taking care of you.”

“Yes, ma'am.”

The water was perfect. Warm around my legs as I stepped in. I sank into it, my muscles thankful for the warm water, relaxed for the first time in days. 

“How's it feeling?” she asked. I looked over at her. She had her back to me, folding a towel like she was trying to give me some semblance of privacy. Sweet gesture from a girl who'd just stripped me naked.  

“Pretty roomy.”

“What?”

“The bath, it's big enough for two I reckon.” 

Naomi suppressed a laugh and tried to stay serious. “I meant the temperature, dummy.”

I grinned. “Come in and test it for yourself.” 

Naomi turned to look at me. “Quit hitting on your nurse. You’re a shitty patient.”

“Well, your bedside manner needs some work,” I said. “Either get out or come closer, ‘’cause you hoverin' by the door is real off-putting. Feel like a monkey in a zoo.”

“Alright,” Naomi chuckled. I looked over at her, watched her think about leaving me to it, and prayed that she wouldn't. “Lemme see that shoulder.”

My heart jumped higher up in my throat the closer she got. By the time she crouched down so her head was level with mine it was doing flips by my tonsils. I lifted my hand out of the water and traced her jawline with a finger. Could've fallen into those eyes. I leaned in and kissed her. The taste of her on my lips again was enough to numb the pain in the rest of my body. Her lips, her tongue. The little noise she made when I nibbled on her bottom lip. I wrapped my arms around her damn near pulling her in there with me. Naomi steadied herself on the edge of the bath and pulled back. 

“Daryl, I swear to God…” she muttered, but she was still smiling.  

“Alright, alright. Do what you gotta do.” I conceded. Naomi leaned over and gently peeled the bandage from my shoulder. A heaviness crept into her eyes like it hurt her too. 

“It's clean,” she murmured, more to herself than to me but I could hear the relief in the warmth of her voice. Naomi dipped a cloth in the water and lifted it to the cut on my shoulder. She looked back up at my face and I knew what she was going to say before she said it, and a smile spread across my face. Caught off guard by it, she frowned. “Whatcha smiling at?” 

“You're about to tell me this might sting.”

“Well,” she shrugged. “It might.”

“You always say that.”

“If you're sick of hearing it stop givin’ me reason to,” she retorted. I watched the way she cleaned my cut. The care she took over it, how reluctant she was to do anything that would cause me any more pain. Naomi didn't pause the slow, methodical cleaning of my wound but she did look back at my face. The deep worry in her eyes hadn't eased up all day. “Does it hurt?”

“Nah, you're doin’ good,” I said. It wasn’t strictly true. The water stung a little, but her gentle hands soothed it immediately. Warm water and her soft hands made up for any pain. I closed my eyes, my body responding to her touch. “Feels nice.”

This is fucking heaven. 

I got a little lost in her touch. I used to think I hated being touched. I'd clam up at a handshake, a pat on the back made me want to crawl out of my skin. I'd walk a little distance away from people so our arms didn't brush up against each other by accident.  

Now, I didn't mind when Rick put an arm around my shoulder. Or when Glenn nudged me. Or Aaron patted me on the back. 

But being touched by her?

Rain after a drought.

Made me feel like a damn teenager… worse, maybe, because I'd spent my teenage years suppressing every intimate thought I had about her. It had felt wrong to think of Naomi like that. Bad. She was the only person who'd ever given me those kinda thoughts. I’d tried imaging anyone else, but it only ever stirred anything in me when my mind drifted to her eyes, her smile, the way her hand felt in mine. From there it was a slippery slope to how those hands would feel on my body, how soft other parts of her might feel. All of those thoughts had come laced with a heavy dose of guilt. 

She was perfect - an angel who'd somehow wound up dumped in the same part of hell as demons like me and Merle. I'd belonged there, never been fit for anything else, but her? Naomi was always going to rise out of there. She was too good, burned too bright to stay trapped with all of that darkness.

Who the fuck was I to think about her like that? 
When Melre and his friends had talked about the tail they'd gotten, who was I to wonder what it would be like to be with Naomi like that? To see her naked, on her knees. Bend her over. Make her scream. It'd made me feel like a damn creep. Some twisted fuck dreaming up things he should never think about someone who trusted him not to be a creep. 

And now? Her fingers trailed across my chest, feather-light, making my spine tingle. Her warm lips were on my neck. I smiled. “That feels good.”

“Mmm, I can tell.” There was mischief in her voice. I opened my eyes again and looked at her. There was mischief in her eyes too, always a worrying sign. A slight blush in her cheeks, but those goddamn eyes were sparkling. 

Oh shit. 

My cock twitched just looking at her and I realized how hard I was. I'd let my mind drift. My face felt like it was on fire. “You can, uh, ignore that.”

“Oh yeah?” She arched an eyebrow. “What if I don't wanna ignore it?”

“You, uh… you…” My head was swimming, I couldn't form a thought, never mind a sentence. Her hand moved lower down my abdomen, brushing across my hips under the water, stroking my inner thigh. Touching me everywhere except from exactly where I needed her to. 

Naomi fixed me with those big eyes of hers.“ Please, Daryl?”

Fuck yes. 

I wanted her so bad I could barely talk. I nodded. She smiled, her hand wrapped around the base of my cock. I groaned. 

"You really like when I say that, huh?" she said, stroking me slowly, deliberately. That damn cheeky sparkle in her eyes as she drank in even the smallest reaction from me.  

“What?” I tried to play dumb but my brain was too damn clouded to pull it off.  

“Please,” she said again, and my cock twitched in her hand like a goddamn snitch.

"Mmhmm,” I nodded, my head tilting back and my hips moving against her hand, “jus’ a big fan of manners."

"Bullshit." She leaned in like she was going to kiss me but didn't, and it was beautiful torture. I tried to close the gap but when I leaned towards her she moved a fraction out of the way. Toying with me until I told her the truth.

"I like hearing how much you want me. Drives me crazy."

Naomi bit her lip, and that drove me crazier.

“Drives you crazy like the time I took your bike without asking and you blamed Merle, or…?”

“No,” I smiled. “Drives me crazy like if I don’t feel your pretty lips on me soon, I’m gonna lose my mind.”

Her eyes widened along with that smile, but I'd finally won over her damn teasing. Her grip on my cock tightened, her hand working me faster. She leaned in, her lips catching mine. I could taste how much she wanted me. I’d spent so many years wanting her to want me while knowing all the time that she deserved more. Better. And if better had come along? I'd cut off the hand of anyone else who touched her the way I did.  

I kissed her hard, pulled myself up and out of the bath. Slipping out of there, we ended up a tangle of limbs on the tile.

“You good?” She checked in but her body shook with laughter against mine. Cutest fucking giggle in the world.

“Perfect,” I murmured into her neck, rolling onto my back so she was on top of me. 

“Woah, careful!” Naomi immediately pushed herself up on her arms above me so that none of her weight was on my bruises. 

So damn careful with me. 

Her hair, a little damp from my wet hands running through it, hung down between us. I reached up and tucked it behind her ears. “I'm feelin' better already, angel."

It wasn't a lie. With her looking at me in all sorts of ways, givin' me that sweet smile. She bent her head and started kissing the bruises on my collarbone and the pain was fucking nothing when her lips were on my skin. 

Naomi moved further down my chest, leaving my bruised skin ablaze with her kisses. Beautiful eyes glancing up at me as her lips sent shivers up my spine the further down my body she went. My hand in her soft hair as she knelt between my thighs. She looked up at me. “Daryl?”

“Yes, angel?”

“Can I suck your cock?” She kissed the tip. “Please?” 

Heat flashed through me. The need in her eyes, the way she asked so nice, almost begging for me… 

“Fuck yes.” The words spilled right out of me. Her tongue ran from the base to the tip and she looked up at me. My breath hitched in my throat. Her hot, wet mouth swallowed the first few inches, her hand moved to play with my balls. I was aching to cum already, a deep heat spreading through me. The sounds she drew from me as her head moved on me, taking me deeper. I was grunting like a damn animal. The hell was she doing giving me the time of day?

My perfect girl.

It wasn't just what she was doing, the way she was teasing me with her lips and tongue, it was that she was the one doing it. Naomi hadn't looked away from me, and there was such genuine joy in her eyes at the panting, rasping breaths I'd been reduced to.  

She fuckin' loves doin' this for me. 

I bit back the urge to tell her how damn pretty she looked with my cock in her mouth. I had to close my eyes. The sight of her like that was too damn good and I wanted to last. I wanted to tell her to take her damn panties off and sit on my face but I couldn't get a coherent sentence out. 
The heat in my body against the cold tiles at my back. Pleasure made even sweeter by the pain in my ribs every time she made me take a sharp breath in. Pain I deserved, right alongside the pleasure I didn't. 

“Daryl…?” her sweet voice cut through the fog in my brain. Her hand was back working my cock, now slick with her saliva.

“Mmhmm?” I looked down at her. What a mistake. My balls tightened.

“You ain't gotta hold back y'know.”

“What?”

“Whatever it is you fight so hard to stop yourself from doin'.” She gave me a knowing smile. Was I that obvious? Could she read me that well?  “You ain't gonna break me.”

Wanna bet?

I knew I shouldn't, but one hand was on her head and my hips were pushing up, thrusting deeper into her mouth. I didn't want to be rough with her. Or, more accurately, I didn't want to want to be rough with her. But there was something about her soft hair between my calloused fingers that made me want to hold on tighter.

“Fuuuuck…” The softness at the back of her throat made me feel like a brute, but she was still looking at me with those big, adoring eyes. Like I could push further. Like she could take more. “You take such good care of me, baby…”

Her eyes lit up. She was fucking glowing. I shouldn't have enjoyed it as much as I did. I shouldn't have been anywhere near her. I would never deserve this. The ache in my ribs with every ragged breath in, the stab of pain in my broken hand as it joined my other at the back of her head, the throbbing hurt in the muscles it took for me to push in and out of her throat like that… all of that I deserved.

But the girl nestled between my thighs, the trust she placed in me to do this to her, the fucking way she looked at me… like she'd been put on this earth to make me feel good.

That? I'd never deserve that.

Naomi's pretty eyes watered, and I felt her throat constrict around my length. Her watery eyes spilled over like tears. Heat flashed through me again.

“Shit, I'm ‘’bout to cum,” I warned her. What kind of sick fuck has that reaction to seeing tears in his girl's eyes? I'd wanted to hold off. Wanted to do more. But I'd gotten lost in her all over again. She pulled back, but kept up the same pace, both of her soft hands working my length. 

Her eyes fixed on me again, her voice soft and sweet as ever. “Cum for me, Daryl. Please.”

Fucking hell. 

I didn't stand a chance. Those words, the look in her tear-stained eyes, and the way her lips wrapped around the head of my cock again. Pressure that had been building in me since she first touched me spilled out and the whole world dissolved for a moment. Blinding white pleasure and her eyes. My body tensed and every fucked muscle screamed. My ribs hurt, my broken hand throbbed as my fingers clenched. Bit my lip so hard it started bleeding again. The pain had a sharp edge that made my orgasm even sweeter. 

I filled her sweet waiting mouth and lay back, panting as I watched her clean up some of it that had dribbled onto her chin. My spent cock softened in her hand. If I hadn't just so thoroughly emptied myself I might've cum twice at the sight of it.

“Are you alright?” I was afraid of the answer. 
She crawled up next to me as I tried to catch my breath. She wiped her eyes, which were still watering a little, and smiled. “Yeah. That was good.”

“Good?” I stroked her hair, and looked into her eyes to see if I could catch a lie. “It wasn't… I didn't… y'know… hurt you or nothin'?”

“No,” she smiled again. “You didn't.”

“C'mere,” I pulled her toward me and kissed her. Rougher than I should've, but what else is new? I wanted to give her everything she'd just given me. More, if she'd let me. My hungry fingers tugged at her pants.

“Woah, woah,” she said with a laugh. She wrapped a hand around my wrist, stopping me from going any further. I didn't push it, but I didn't pull back either. 

“Why?” There was probably a better question to ask but my brain was still buzzing from the high she'd brought me to. 

“You're hurt, Daryl…’’

“I can be gentle.” After what had just happened, did she think I couldn't?

"You broke your damn hand."

“This hand works just fine…" I wiggled my fingers to prove it. “My mouth does too.”

The bleeding lip might be a slight hiccup but I kissed her neck to prove it wasn't going to hold me back. She laughed a little like she couldn't believe the words were coming out of my mouth, but her hand didn't move from my wrist. “Let's not push it, yeah? You got a lot of recovering to do.” 

I tried not to let the disappointment show. “Okay. Yeah. Whatever you want darlin'.” 

“Thank you,” she nestled quietly against me for a moment. I tried to stop the worry that was blooming in my chest but it had already spread. A gnawing feeling she was hiding something from me. 

“You sure I didn't hurt you?” 

“You’d never hurt me, dummy.” She kissed my cheek. Before I could say anything else, she'd reached over and pulled a towel onto my lap.

“Are you okay?” 

“Yeah, yeah, I'm…” I kissed her again and couldn't find the right words. My head was a mess but I didn't want to let it show. “Yeah.”

“Good.”

I sat up and grabbed the towel from my crotch. She helped me to my feet and I wrapped it around my waist. I needed a second. “You, uh, you think you could get me some clean clothes?” 

“Of course,” she smiled. “Be right back.”

It was only when the door closed behind her and I had time alone with my thoughts that I realized what a toll this must've taken on her. This had almost been a repeat of Terminus. Reliving it… the shit that must've brought back to the surface…everything those animals had done to her after. No wonder she hadn't wanted to take things any further. 

Fuck. 

I'm such an asshole.

Shouldn't have done any of that. 

Shame ate me up from the inside out. Couldn't tell you where my fifth meta-whatever-the-fuck was, but I knew where it hurt. So I pressed down hard on it until I almost blacked out again. 

Chapter 56: Understand?

Naomi

The car carrying Mia back to us glinted in the sun. I stood at the gates and watched it grow closer. There were a thousand other things I could've been doing -  should  have been doing - but I couldn't focus on any of them. It should have been a celebration that Sanctuary was safe enough for her to return to, but the memory of how we'd left things and how mad I still was that she and Carl had taken food out to Negan marred my excitement.

Daryl's shadow joined mine as he stepped up beside me. They stretched out in front as the sun set behind us, side by side like always. I didn't need to look over to know it was him. I'd recognize the shape of him and the feeling of his quiet, steady presence in any situation. "How long's she grounded for?"

"Until she's eighty."

"That all?".

"You think it should be longer?"

"Yeah. I think we can let her out for good behaviour on her hundredth birthday, maybe," he said. I laughed, but most of my relief came from hearing him say 'we' like he'd be standing by my side no matter what for another ninety years.

I looked over at him. "You feelin' okay?"

"Yeah. Better." He shrugged. I knew that was as detailed a response as I would get. "You alright? You look sicker than I do."

"Gee, thanks," I muttered. Daryl nudged me with his foot. I sighed. "I hate having to be mad at Mia. I hardly ever have to do it 'cause she's such a good kid, but I hate yelling at her, I hate when she's upset, and it's even more shit when  I'm  the one who has to make her upset."

"I'm sure she hates upsetting you, too. The girl in that car'll be feelin' worse than you; I can promise you that," he looked over at me. "Letting  you  down? Ain't no worse feeling."

"For  you , maybe. But one of these days, Mia will realize she doesn't need to listen to me."

Daryl scrunched up his face like I was talking shit. "How'd you figure that?"

"'Big sister' don't really carry the same weight as 'Mom', does it?" I said. Ever since I'd taken custody of Mia, I'd feared the day she'd be angry enough to throw it in my face that I couldn't tell her what to do because I wasn't her parent. That day felt like it loomed closer than ever. "I ain't her Mom." 

"You are."

"I'm  not ."

"You are," he said again. "Might not've given birth to her, but in the ways that count… you are."

I couldn't say anything. I just nudged him with my shoulder. He nudged me back and then draped an arm around me. I leaned against him as carefully as I could, wary of his bruised ribs, and he kissed the top of my head. The dread in my stomach eased up. 

We stood that way until the car pulled up, and then he folded his arms across his chest. Mia exited the passenger side, refusing to look at me as she got her bag from the back seat. Rosita shot me a sympathetic look from behind the wheel. I was willing to bet the drive over had been fraught with nerves. 

Mia finally looked up and faltered when she saw Daryl. "Are you okay?" 

"I'm jus' fine," he said. "Looks worse than it is."

Mia nodded, but the concern didn't shift from her eyes. 

Daryl was looking a damn sight better than he had a few days ago. He'd regained sight in both eyes, his cut had stopped bleeding, and he was no longer moving in the same stilted way he had. But the bruises were still there, even if they were yellowing around the edges. His broken hand was bandaged tight, and he was under strict orders not to overuse it. 

The injuries wouldn't have worried me so much any more if he hadn't been so damn quiet for the last few days. Not his usual kind of quiet, where he was thinking about something. More evasive than that, like there was a conversation he didn't want to have.

Mia looked at me, "Hi."

"Hey." I wanted to hug her, but we remained in a stalemate. I looked over at Rosita as she got out of the car, "Thanks for bringing her."

"No problem," she said. "Things okay here now?"

"They're about to be," Daryl said, with a confidence I wasn't expecting and couldn't relate to. "We got it from here."

Before Rosita could reply, Eugene barreled down Sanctuary's steps to greet her. Mia shuffled her feet and started at the ground, unwilling to walk further from the car. Conflict was written all over her face. In Alexandria, she'd seemed eager to come back to see Daryl, but that was before we'd learned what she and Carl had done. Before she knew she was heading home with her tail between her legs. 

"Come on, Mia," I said gently. "Time to get inside."

Her feet didn't move, but she did look up. "Is it my fault Daryl got hurt?"

Her voice was so quiet, and she looked so small that she shrank right down to the same five-year-old who'd cried when she'd dropped her stuffed octopus in a puddle because she was worried it would make him miss the sea.

"No." I was surprised to hear Daryl speak at the same time as me and with the same conviction. 

"It's Negan's fault Daryl got hurt," I said. "And the men who acted on his orders. It's not because of what you and Carl did."

Mia nodded, but her bottom lip still trembled. "I'm sorry."

"I know you are," I sighed. "But I don't need you to be sorry. I need you to promise me you won't take any more risks like that. We might not always be here to protect you."

"You and Daryl? Yes, you will. You'll outlive all of us." Mia smiled, trying to lighten our mood.

"We might not," Daryl did not return her smile. "Ain't nothing promised these days, kid."

"And if anything happens to us, or if we all get separated again, I need to know I'm raising you to make good decisions," I said. "Ones that'll keep you alive even if we can't."

"I know," Mia hung her head sheepishly. "But I didn't think I was doing anything dangerous. Negan needed help. He needed people… like when we found Lucas. You were mad at me for trying to help him too, but now Lucas is -."

"Negan is different."

"Why?"

"Lucas was a stranger who needed our help. Negan's hurt too many people to be allowed back here without facing up to what he's done. That's why Rick wants to bring him in, peacefully, to stand trial," I said. "When you and Carl heard him out there, you should have come and told one of us."

"You wouldn't have listened," she muttered. "Or you'd have just gone and killed him anyway."

"Yeah? And?" Daryl said. Mia's eyes were red, and she was holding back tears. She was used to fighting with me, but being in trouble with Daryl? That was a whole new experience for her. "Ain't your call to make. Ain't Carl's call, either. You're kids. You might disagree, but everything I'm doin', everything your sister is doin' is because we want the world you and Carl grow up in to be safer than it is now."

Mia gulped.

"I know Negan took you in after Terminus, and your first meeting with him and the Saviors was real different to ours, but…" I stopped. Sometimes I could still hear the crack of Abraham's skill echoing in my head. "You gotta know it's not the same as when we took Lucas in. Or the same as when Daryl and Aaron go out looking for recruits for our communities. Daryl's injuries were on Negan's orders."

Mia looked at Daryl again. Her bottom lip started to shake, but reality was finally hitting her. "Did you find him?"

"Yes, I did," I said. Mia's eyes widened. "I gave him Lucille. Gave him some supplies for Winter, too."

At this, I felt Daryl tense. The supplies were (probably unwelcome) news to him.

"Why?"

"What you and Carl were trying to do was kind. I get it. I respect it. It's brave in a world like this one, and I guess I wanted to honor that, but you and Carl ain't ready to make those kinds of decisions," I said. "Those are the last things Negan will get from us or Sanctuary. He has his own territory now. He ain't allowed to set foot on ours, and we ain't gonna step foot in his either."

"If you hear him again, if you see him," Daryl said, "Don't engage with him. Get one of us. Do you understand?"

Neither of us mentioned the part about us shooting him on sight if he was seen here again. I didn't want her lying to us again.

"I understand," Mia said, and it sounded like she did. She looked at both of us. "I'm sorry."

"It's okay," I said. She'd been put through the wringer enough for one day.

"Love you, Naomi," Mia's tears finally spilled over.

"I love you too," I finally hugged her. "I don't want to be so hard on you, but this is life or death stuff. I can't lose you again." Mia nodded; regaining her composure, she let go and looked at Daryl. 

"I'm sorry, Daryl."

"S'alright, Mia," he said. 

Mia gave him a quick hug and a barely audible "Love you."

"Love you too, kid." Daryl couldn't hide the surprise on his face, which quickly melted into a smile before she let go and slipped off to her room to lick her wounds. Seeing the two of them like that made my heart ache.

I took a deep breath as we watched her go, "Thanks for that. It was nice to have backup."

"I got you, girl," Daryl's arm wrapped back around my shoulder. "You know that."

"I know, but…" I looked over at him, overwhelmed with gratitude. "It was nice all the same."

Being told you're not alone is very different to not feeling alone. He'd shown up for me. Backed me. Accepted my family as his. Daryl's gaze met mine, and I knew he got it. I knew it from his crooked smile, accepting another thank you I hadn't had to speak, and the unwavering warmth in his eyes. 

"C'mon," he said. "Rick wants to see ya before he goes."

"Wait.  Why?  Am  I  in trouble?" My heart jumped. Rick had yet to say much about how I'd dealt with Negan. Had he been holding off until now? I felt like I was being called into my boss's office to be fired.

Daryl laughed, "No, dummy."

Despite Daryl's assurances, I was still a bundle of nerves walking in there. Felt like they were rattling around with every step I took. Rick was waiting in the canteen. Between meal times, it was empty and had become an ad-hoc meeting and strategy room. He smiled when we walked in, but Rick had one of those unreadable cop-smiles.

"Mia back safe?" he asked.

"Yup." I couldn't say anything else.

"Good," he nodded. The following pause was far too long to be comfortable. "It seems like things are pretty settled now. Are you happy that we've found anyone who might still be loyal to Negan?"

"Yes," I said. Daryl said nothing. He was hanging back. Was this about Justin? Daryl had always hated him, but I was certain he'd had nothing to do with the attempted uprising.

"Good," Rick said again, in the same calm tone. "Maggie will be taking the group of prisoners up to the Hilltop today. The rest of us are planning on heading back to our respective communities, too. You comfortable with that?"

So far, none of this was news.

"Yes," I said. Still, Daryl said nothing. Surely, as the one in charge, this was his call.

"Alright," Rick said. "We've been talking about it, and I want you to take over operations here."

I blinked at him, sure I'd misheard. "You mean until Daryl's fully recovered?"

"No. I mean I'm putting you in charge of Sanctuary as the permanent leader," he smiled, but adrenaline shot through me.

"That ain't fair."

"Not fair-? "

"What happened here wasn't Daryl's fault! He shouldn't be punished for something he had no control over." The anger was all-consuming. That he could look at Daryl, with the injuries he had, and act like he didn't deserve his place here? I was ready to start throwing hands. I looked at Daryl for help. I couldn't believe he was staying so calm.  

"I'm not punishing him, we've–"

"You're taking him off this, after everything he went through to keep this place safe?!" I was aware I was yelling, but I didn't much care. "Are you fucking kidding me? That's not-"

Rick glanced at Daryl, "A little help here?"

"Naomi," Daryl stepped in front of me. From the smirk on his face, part of him was enjoying this. "This was my idea."

I stopped mid-rant. "It was?"

"Uh-huh," he nodded.

"… why?"

"You'll do it better," he shrugged. 

"Bullshit."

"I hate the guy, but Negan was right about one thing," Daryl said. "You should be running this place."

"That's not true."

"It is," he said. "You care about this place and these people. I'm still too… mad about everything that went down here to do right by them."

That was my fault. I felt all twisted up inside over it. My presence here was a constant reminder of the ways I'd been hurt within these walls by some of the same people we now had to share them with. When I'd told him I was the one holding him back, I'd meant it.

"But…"

Daryl could see me spiralling and held up a hand to stop it. "I got other things I wanna focus on, so really you'd be doing me a favor."

"Oh yeah, like what?" I scrutinized him and watched the tips of his ears start to redden. 

"Well, uh, our fuel supply is about to expire. Gas has been burning dirty for so long it's gotta be gumming up a lotta our vehicles," he said. 

"Shit." I felt dumb for not knowing that was something we had to worry about.  

"Honestly, it's a miracle our cars are still running," he said. 

"Shit," I said again. I glanced at Rick, who was remarkably calm. Our communities would be so isolated without our cars, trucks, and bikes. Trips that took us a few hours now could turn into a full day of trekking through Walker-infested woods.  

"Yeah. Shit." Daryl said. "But, we can take some of that corn from Hilltop, turn it into ethanol, and use that to run shit."

"That'll work?"

"Hell yeah that'll work," I could tell Daryl was getting a kick out of teaching me something. "Some of the vehicles might need a little modifying, but I can do that. Once it's all up and running, we can trade that fuel for other supplies. Make ourselves less of a charity case. Plus, it'll give folks something to do around here other than plan mutinies." 

I felt damn near close to bursting with pride. "You can really do all that?" 

"I mean, we're in a factory, right? Can't be that hard," he said with a modest little shrug. I wanted to run at him, throw my arms around him, kiss him all over his stupidly handsome face, and tell him how great he was. He knew it, could see it written all over me, and tried to get ahead of my bursting pride. "Don't."

"Daryl, that's-"

"Don't." His ears had gone from pink to red. 

"You're a genius."

"It ain't that hard, really."

"No. You're brilliant, Daryl. You're so-"

" Stop. " His face was heating up now, too. 

"No. You're fucking amazing. That's so smart. You're -"

"Oh my God, Naomi," Daryl tried to hide his beet-red face. "Stop. Shut  up ."

"No. Never. This is the best thing I've ever heard. You're saving our asses before we even knew they needed saving. That's real shit, Daryl. That means something."

"It ain't a big deal," he groaned but he hadn't stopped smiling this whole time. 

"It is! Ain't it, Rick?" 

"Aw, hell," Daryl muttered. 

Rick was struggling to hide his laughter behind his hand. He nodded and looked at Daryl. "It's real good, brother."

Daryl left the room. 

Rick burst into laughter and I grinned at him. It was always nice to celebrate Daryl, but having someone else to celebrate him with me? There was no sweeter feeling in the world.

"So you accept?" Rick asked when he eventually stopped laughing. 

"Yeah," I said. "I can babysit these assholes while Daryl gets the real shit done."

 

 

Daryl

I hid out in the workshop. I simultaneously wanted the ground to swallow me whole but also knew that if it opened up to do so, I would be flying too high to fall down. She was quite something, my girl. She was always the one cheering loudest for me, even if sometimes she was the only one. 

People trickled out of Sanctuary all day. The sun dipped lower in the sky and then set. It was midnight, or near enough when Naomi came looking for me.

"Hey, you," she said. I couldn't look at her, but I could hear her big, dumb, proud-of-me smile in her voice. "Workin' late, huh?"

"Naomi I swear to god," I squeezed my eyes tightly shut. It was like her faith in me was this bright light I couldn't look directly at without it burning my damn cheeks off. I couldn't even feel worried I'd fail at this. 

"C'mon, I barely said anything," she said, but her voice was all light and giddy and it made me feel giddy too. 

"And you better not start," I tried to sound stern. It didn't work. 

"Or what?" I felt her arms slip around my shoulders. I opened my eyes and took hold of her waist. She was still giving me that big, dopey smile. I couldn't answer, my mind blank of everything that wasn't her. She knew it, too, her smile widened. "C'mon… you can't let me be just a  teenie little  bit proud of my man?" 

Fucking hell.

The thought of being  her  anything made my heart swell. I tried to keep my cool. Didn't. My damn cheeks were starting to hurt from smiling. "Ain't a teenie little bit though is it? You're yellin' it from the roof."

"Haven't done that yet, actually," she grinned when I cringed at the word 'yet'. "Good idea, though, thanks."

"You're a damn nightmare," I said, pulling her close so she was looking up at me with that big smile of hers. Never felt like it took much to make her proud of me, but every time she gave me that damn look, I felt like I could fly. 

I kissed her, and I could feel her smiling through it. It was like I could taste her pride—sweet and warming to my core. 

"You're really okay with me taking over everything else here?" she asked when we broke apart. "I know you wanna work on your biofuel - and it's damn brilliant, so you should - but…you haven't exactly been thrilled whenever I've done stuff around here before."

"Well… before I had to worry about this place  and  you. Had to keep an eye on every damn asshole around you who was looking at you wrong."

"Well, they've all gone now," she said. Maggie had taken everyone involved in the failed uprising back to Hilltop with her.

"I'll be the judge of that," I said. I wanted to gouge out the eyes of anyone who looked at her too long, even if they were appreciating her. Maybe,  especially  if they were appreciating her. "I'm still gonna worry about ya, but the way things were… I was holding  you  back."

"No, you weren't."

"You've always been..."

"Stop."

"Brilliant," I finished, and I understood why she'd gotten so much joy out of yelling nice things at me while I told her to shut up. "Back in the day, I could've sworn you were gonna wind up President. Hell, I  still  think you would've if the world hadn't ended."

"Yeah, I remember that," she laughed lightly. "Not sure that's the kind of job you 'wind up' in. Sounds like a lot of campaigning for something I didn't want." 

"You're the kinda person who should've been doing it, though. You give a shit about the kind of people nobody else does and about making sure everyone gets what's fair," I said. "Plus, you got this way of seeing how things will play out. Like, with Negan… I would have killed him for sure. I wouldn't have been able to help myself. But, you? You put all that shit aside, gave him some supplies,  and  put some sanctions in place."

"That wasn't really  my  plan, that was -"

"No." I cut across her. " Rick's  plan is to lock him up. You met Negan where he's at. That takes a crazy amount of understanding. But you ain't soft either; you can do the hard shit. Ain't afraid to get your hands dirty when you need to."

The smile faded from her lips. Her eyes drifted away from mine, but not before I recognized the self-loathing that had crept into them. Everything she'd had to do to claw this place back from Negan's grasp, everything she'd done to save  me,  was weighing on her. I got it. Knowing that you'd kill for someone is one thing, but actually doing it is a whole other. 

"Hey," I put my hand under her chin to stop her from looking away. "It's a good thing. It's why you should be running the country, maybe the whole damn world. But in the meantime, I guess this place'll do. And I wanna be by your side while you do it."

"Daryl," she said my name all soft. I pushed some of the hair back from her face. 

"I mean it, sweetheart," I said. "I want to give you everything, help you do  anything  you want. Even if I think it's crazy, even if I think these folks ain't worth your time. I was going about it all wrong before. Tryna stop you from doing anything around here, like keeping locked up in a golden cage was gonna protect you."

"I didn't feel  caged ," she protested.

"Maybe not," I shrugged. "But I dunno what I expected you to do when you came here with me. Stay out of everything that was going on? Just sit your ass while I'm workin'? That ain't you."

"No. It ain't." I didn't like how sad she sounded when she said it, like she was apologizing for something. 

"And I  love  that about you. You weren't built for standing still. Me? I was fine dritin', but you always had a purpose. Has this  drive  and I…" I wasn't sure how to phrase it. Honestly, I hadn't expected to have this conversation now, but it seemed as good a time as any. "I respect the hell out of you. You know that, don't ya?"

She looked so taken aback by my question that for a heart-churning moment, I thought the answer might be 'no.' "Yeah, of course I do."

"Okay. Good." I wanted to say more but I didn't know how. "Because… I mean…when I…”

Naomi saw me floundering, "Daryl… what's eating ya?"  

"Can we… talk a minute?" 

Already off to a bad start, she immediately looked panicked. "Are you okay? Is it your hand? Do you need me to-"

"I need you to listen." 

"Okay."

"I wanna say I'm sorry. For… the way I treated you the other night. The night I… well, you… we… y'know, with the bath," I could feel the heat in my cheeks. I thought asking her to listen would help me get it out, but I was yammering and stammering like a damn fool. "The way I treated you… it was too… I didn't… I treated you like…"

I couldn't even get the word out. Naomi let the silence sit until it became clear I'd frozen up. "Like what?"

"I dunno, like a…" I took a deep breath. "Slut or somethin'."

Saying it out loud made me want to cut my tongue off. Honestly, I expected her to slap me, but she just frowned and tilted her head. "Is…that what you thought of me?"

"Hell no. But I was…rough with you. I didn't…"

"I asked you not to hold back," she said. I hated that she was trying to let me off the hook, making excuses for me. "Sometimes, when we're together, it feels like you're holding something back, and I don't want that."

The way she said it was so… normal. There was no judgment, no accusations, just a fact. She was looking at the worst of me like it was nothing at all. 

“That side of me… it's not… I'm not…” 

"Did you like it?"

"Yes," a flash of guilt in my gut when I admitted it out loud. "But…"

"But nothin'. I liked it too," she said firmly. "I've never been with anyone I could trust like that."

It took me a moment to understand. " It was about trust for you?"

"Yeah," she nodded. "I've never been with someone that I felt I could just… give control over me like that."

I forgot, sometimes, that she didn't know how to be loved anymore than I did. 

"I don't wanna control you," I said and was ashamed that I tasted the slightest hint of a lie. 

"Maybe control ain't the right word for it," she said. "But I know I can… let go with you, give all of me to you. I ain't worried about anything when we're together. I feel safe."

"Really?"

"Yeah," she nodded rapidly. "Did I… do something to make you think otherwise?"

"I dunno. I thought maybe you didn't want to keep... going... because I'd made you feel bad. Or used. Or somethin'.”

"No. You could never make me feel that way," she frowned. "And... I like making you feel good."

"Well,  that  you're damn good at," I said, and she smiled. "But I shouldn't have started anything at all that night. I should have realized that we shouldn't have done anything at all. That everything that had just happened would, y'know… bring back Terminus."

" Terminus? " she stared at me like I was growing an extra head right in front of her. "What the hell does this have to do with… oh. Shit."

It suddenly dawned on her. Her eyes widened.

"So, I'm sorry for that, at least. I should have realized you wouldn't be in the mood for anything. Not that you need a reason to say no, but y'know… I should've been more… well... I should've been a better boyfriend."

"Oh, no. That's not what happened or why I didn't want to keep going," she said, a blush creeping up her cheek. "I was, um… you know how once a month there's… y'know. I was on my period, and I just… I didn't wanna say anything and…" 

It was her turn to go red and start babbling, which made a nice change, but I finally understood. Relieved that I hadn't done something wrong, I shut my eyes for a moment. "Naomi. Baby. I know what a period is. We learned about 'em in the same damn health class, remember?"

"Yeah but you learned about 'em once.  I  get a monthly reminder."

"So, you weren't feeling good? That it?"

"No, I felt fine, I just… y'know…I thought you wouldn't want to…"

"You think a bit of blood is gonna scare me off?"

"Not scare you off, no. More like… turn you off."

"Impossible."

"Okay, well," Naomi said, like she thought I was saying it to be nice. "It's not come up before, and we hadn't discussed it, so I didn't know how you feel about those sorts of things. Didn't want to spring it on ya."

My little overthinker . 

"How I feel about  those sorts of things ?" I repeated. 

"Some guys get a little…" she shrugged, shifting a little uncomfortably. 

"I ain't some guy." It came out sharper than I meant it to. She blinked at me in surprise. 

"Well, I know you ain't squeamish or anything, but it's not…"

I shut her up with a kiss. Deep and hungry. The taste of a fucking angel; she was sweetness and fire. 

Her soft cheek cupped in my palm, my other hand pulling her hips closer to mine. How one person could feel like home and give me thrills all at once was beyond me. Her lips were so damn soft. The scent of her hair was more fucking intoxicating than any moonshine I'd ever cooked up back when I was fucking nothing and she was everything. She'd always been everything to me. That she'd even let me this close to her, let my tongue explore her delicate mouth, let me push her up against the workbench behind her until our bodies were pressed right up against each other, was a dream.

That she could ever think a bit of blood would put me off was a damn tragedy. I needed her to understand. 

"Nobody's ever made me feel the way you do. Nobody," I told her as I lifted her onto the workbench. Her arms wrapped around my shoulders, and she looked up at me with nothing but a bright kind of love that I could never deserve but couldn't live to see her give to anyone else. She leaned forward for another hungry kiss. Her legs parted and fixed around my hips, using them to pull me in closer to her.

My hands skimmed her sides, feeling the curve from her hips to her waist. The way her body molded to mine, the softness of her breasts against my chest sent a bolt of desire right through me. Gently sucking her bottom lip into my mouth caused her to moan in a way that almost drove me to tear her damn clothes off right then. But there was more I had to say, more I had to make her understand. 

Reluctantly, I pulled my lips from hers. "I wasn't sure I  could  feel this way…that I could ever…  want  someone this way. No amount of getting drunk and messing around with strangers, just tryna fit in with everyone else, ever made me feel a damn thing… but  you , Naomi… All I had to do was  think  about you." 

My lips were on her neck. She whimpered in response to her name. I grabbed her wrist and guided her hand to my crotch. "Ya feel that? Feel how hard I am for you without you takin' off a damn thing?"

She gulped so hard I could see it in her throat. She nodded. Bit her lip. Something in me threatened to go wild. I held it back. Even as her hands tugged eagerly at my straining pants, I held it back. 

"Uh-uh," I shook my head and moved her hand away again. I saw the flicker of disappointment in her eyes. "I need you to understand this is  all  about you, darlin'."

"Me?" Naomi's eyes were a little hazy when she looked up at me. It was so damn cute. 

I nodded. "Take your shirt off for me."

I didn't mean it to sound so demanding, but the way she responded didn't exactly make me regret it. Eyes locked on mine, she lifted her shirt over her head. Watching her undress for me sent another flash of heat through my core. 

I took hold of her waist again. Warm, bare skin under my hands. Soft. So soft it always made me worry about how rough my hands were, but if they were, she never complained. The way she sighed and shivered, the way goosebumps broke out across her skin, suggested she liked it. Maybe even loved it. 

I peppered her collarbone with kisses as my hands ran up her back to unclasp her bra. I threw it to the ground. Her nipples were hard in cool air. I rubbed one of them lightly with my thumb, watching the way her body trembled right in front of me. 

There was a time in my life, not that long ago, when I didn't even see the appeal of sex. All sweaty bodies with a stranger? Pass.

But seeing  Naomi  underneath me, her face all lit up with pleasure? I didn't understand why I bothered doing anything else. 

"Daryl…" I'd never tire of the way my name sounded when she whimpered like that. My cock throbbed in my pants. 

"Take your pants off." She didn't need to be asked twice. Wriggling out of her jeans until they slipped down enough to get stuck around her ankles. I bent to pull them the rest of the way off her feet, which dangled over the workshop floor. "Them panties too, girl."

She pulled her panties down past her knees and I slipped them off her ankles. I took a second to look at her perfect, naked form on my workbench and knew I'd never be able to stand in this room again without thinking of her like this, without seeing the small, pale, circular scars dotted across her thighs like constellations. I traced every one of them with my lips and tongue, her thighs quivering in response. Heard her breathing change as I moved higher up her legs. I could smell her sweet scent, and the urge to lose myself between her thighs was almost overwhelming. For now, at least, I wanted to savor her. It took every ounce of my self-control for me to hold back and skip up to kiss her hips. I couldn't tell if the moan she let out was one of pleasure or frustration, but I loved it either way. 

My lips moved up her body, back to the swell of her breasts. I took one of her nipples into my mouth, teased it with my tongue. One of my hands ran from her thigh, following the shape of her hips, her waist, and up to play with the other. She cried out. Not a coherent word or sentence, something between a gasp and a moan. My bandaged hand rested lightly on her back, holding her in place.

She tugged on my shirt, trying to get me to take it off. I pulled back a little. 

"Uh-uh," I said again, a little firmer than before. "I told ya. I need you to understand this is about  you.  Not me."

I needed to make her see, needed to make her understand that nothing in this world could change the way I felt about her. Nothing. Certainly not no damn period. More than that, I needed to remind her that for all of the hard shit she'd had to do lately, she was all softness and curves too. 

I finally moved my hand between her thighs and was surprised by how wet I found her, but I figured some of it might still be blood. "Are you still on…?"

"No," she shook her head. I loved how breathless she sounded. "Not anymore."

A thrill of satisfaction coursed through me as I started slowly teasing her with my fingers. "Already that wet for me, huh?"

Trembling at my touch, she nodded. My stomach did backflips. I couldn't take my eyes off her pretty face as I circled her clit with a finger. Widened eyes, slightly parted lips. The sounds she was making…  Goddamn. 

I kissed her neck, slipped two fingers slowly in and out of her until I honed in on that sweet spot. The one that makes her eyes roll and her moans rise a couple of pitches. Her hand under my chin, she pulled my face back towards hers so she could kiss me. Her kisses were so damn  needy,  sloppy too. We were all tongue and teeth. I could hear her moaning through them as I played with her. 

"Shit, Daryl, that's good…" she gasped as my mouth joined my hand between her thighs, my tongue lapping at her clit. Pride and arousal coursed through me all at once. Her hips lifted a little off the table as she ground down on me seeking the release I was deliberately holding her back from. Her hands were in my hair, holding my head in place. Her nails grazed my scalp, sending shivers down my spine.

"Fuck me, Daryl,  please. " The need in her voice drove me crazy. I looked up at her, resting on her elbows as she watched me. 

Holy hell. 

I hadn't been expecting that. I had been so in control until that moment. The heat that coursed through me now was white-hot; it took everything in me not to cave in. I straightened up again.

"You gotta learn," I told her, my lips real close to her ear. "There ain't nothin' in this world that's gonna turn me off you, ya hear me?"

"Please. " 

God I loved it when she begged for me. Those big, pleading eyes and that need in her voice... Knowing how bad my girl wanted me was almost enough to make me cave. 

"Understand?" I asked. She nodded. It wasn't enough. "Say it."

"Fuck,  yes,  I understand… Jesus Christ,  Daryl." Her hips ground harder against my hand. I wondered how long I could keep her like that. On the edge of absolute bliss. But then she looked at me with those beautiful eyes, all hazy with pleasure and she whimpered, "Daryl,  please."

"Alright," I smiled into her neck, putting a little extra pressure on that sweet spot inside her. Her response was an immediate gasp. "You can cum for me now."

Instantly, I felt the first flutters of it around my fingers.

"Fuck," she breathed. I pulled back a little so I could see her face. Eyes closed again, head tilted back. 

"Open your eyes," I told her. 

"... fuck fuck fuck…" Her eyelids fluttered open. Those pretty eyes clouded with desire, unfocused gaze on the ceiling. 

"That's it, baby, look at me."

When she turned her head to look at me, I realized it wasn't that I wanted to control her; I wanted to bring her a kind of pleasure she couldn't get from anyone else. The heat in her body, the hazy bliss in her eyes, the need for a release only I could give her. That, I liked being in control of.

Her gaze followed me as I moved down between her thighs again. Her slick, swollen clit against my tongue again as I sucked on it. I felt her body tense, felt her pulse around my fingers, and throb against my tongue. 

"Daryl…." My name fell from her mouth as she came undone right in front of me. From between her legs, I watched her orgasm wash right over her. I kissed her between her quivering thighs a few more times before I straightened up and pulled my fingers out of her. 

Naomi lay back, panting. She looked so damn beautiful it made me ache. 

I pulled my shirt over my head, watching Naomi catch her breath. Skin glowing with sweat. The smile on her face made my heart skip a beat. 

"You done?" I asked, unfastening my belt because I already knew what her answer was going to be. "Or can you take a little more?"

She had that look in her eye, that glint like I'd challenged her to something. "I ain't done."

"Good girl," I nudged her thighs apart again. "'Cause I ain't done with you."

Truly, I'd never be done with her. 

I took a condom out of my back pocket before I let my pants drop to the floor. Naomi smirked a little as I slipped it on. "Been carrying that around just in case, huh?" 

I grabbed her hips and pulled her closer to the edge of the bench. By now, I was so damn hard it hurt, but I knew her body needed a second to recover. "Never know when I'll need to take care of my girl."

Her hands cupped my face as she leaned in to kiss me again. I could feel the heat radiating off her as her tongue explored my mouth. I teased her clit with the head of my cock, testing how ready she was. She moaned into my mouth again. 

"Wait." Naomi slipped down from the bench. Our bodies almost touching, she turned around and bent over the work table in front of me.

"You sure about this?" My throat was dry, and the heat in my groin was unbearable. I wasn't sure how I felt about fucking her like this, but she looked so tempting bent over like that I'd already positioned myself behind her. "This is what you want?"

"Yes," she almost laughed. I hesitated, but then she looked back over her shoulder at me. Her curls fell over her naked back, and her eyes pleaded with me again. Her legs, her ass, her hips… she looked so fucking good from every angle. "Please, Daryl, I need to feel you inside me."

She placed her hands on the workbench to steady herself. I eased myself inside, and we both groaned. My good hand held onto her hip, my bandaged one resting on the small of her back, and I started slowly pushing in and out of her. She felt incredible like this, "You sure you like it like this, angel?"

"God, yes," she pressed back into me, rocking her hips to meet my thrusts. She looked back at me again, leaning on her elbows. "Now, will you quit being such a goddamn tease?"

I laughed a little, leaning down to kiss her back and slowing my pace to deep, torturous strokes. I wanted her to feel every inch I had to give her, to feel that every inch was hers. "What do you mean?"

"Harder," she pleaded, eyes shut tightly. "Please, Daryl."

"Needy little thing today, ain't ya?"  

"For you? Hell yes."

Fucking hell. 

"Good girl." I sped up, pushing myself deeper inside her with every stroke until I reached a steady rhythm. Naomi bucked back against me, her hot little moans filling the workshop again. She'd ruined this place forever for me. I'd never be able to concentrate on a damn thing here again. 

I bent over her, dragging my lips and teeth across her back. My hand moved up and gripped her shoulder tight, guiding her movements as well as mine. The tight control I'd managed to maintain over my own desires was quickly slipping. Naomi slipped, too. Her elbows slipped out from under her with the force I was thrusting into her. She gasped and said, "Yesss , Daryl. Fuck. That feels so good."

All hope I had of reigning myself in was gone. Head hazy with pleasure, I fucked her harder, in a way I couldn't ever remember having done before, but I was feeling too damn good to feel bad about it. My hand was gone from her shoulder, fisting in her hair now. Her back arched in response, allowing me to go even deeper. 

Shit. 

Am I hurting her?

I looked down at her face, turned to the side, cheek pressed against the hardwood of the worktop. She was smiling, she was fucking  smiling.  

"Fuck, Naomi…," I grunted. The feel of her, the smell of her, the sounds she was making... all of it was jamming every goddamn thought in my head. "Fuck… you're gonna make me cum…  goddamn it, angel. "

Her smile widened; she liked hearing that, driving her hips back more frantically against me. I wasn't gonna last. I let go of her hair, and she held herself steady again as I reached down to touch her clit. Naomi's continuous moans got louder. 

Thank God.

"That's it," I told her. "Cum for me again, angel. Come on." 

It took seconds this time. As if my permission was all she needed. I managed to hold off for just long enough. But feeling her pulsing around my cock as her body shuddered with the force of her orgasm was enough to tip me over the edge. I groaned as I finally felt my release, blinding pleasure washing over me. I collapsed into her, my arms wrapping around her middle to steady myself. 

When my head stopped spinning, I straightened up, pulling her warm, sweaty body against my chest as I did. It was nice to feel that she'd gone a little limp, too. I kissed her neck while we caught our breath. My spent cock slipped out of her, and I let go of her to roll the condom off quickly. She turned around to face me. I wrapped her up in my arms. Both of us, standing naked as the day we were born, holding each other in the dim light of a workshop that I would now forever associate with this night. Our clothes were strewn around the place, the smell of our sex in the air. 

"Coming to bed?" she asked. 

I nodded. "Round two?"

She grinned. "Maybe a midnight snack first. Y'know. To refuel."

That's my girl. 

 

Chapter 57: Family Game Night

Notes:

Did anyone order some fluff?

Naomi

The days were getting colder, but it was warm in the truck—not just because of the sunlight coming through the windshield, either. Daryl had been in the best mood I'd seen him in for months. He hummed lightly to himself, feet up on the dash as I drove. The stress that plagued him when he led Sanctuary had melted away now that I'd taken it over.

That was a big enough reward in and of itself, but it turned out that running the place wasn't so hard now that Daryl had started work on his biofuel. Previously, only the Sanctuary residents still working on growing crops had something to do. Now, Daryl had a team helping him turn Sanctuary's existing machinery into the tools he needed and a separate workshop to start adapting the cars and bikes to be ready for it. There were fewer idle hands and fewer fights. People felt like they had something to work for.

Daryl spent his days tinkering with cars and machinery, surrounded by people who saw his brilliance. This wasn't how I'd imagined it playing out, but it was everything I'd ever wanted for him back in that damn trailer park. Back then, I never could have predicted he would be spending his nights with me. Crawling into our bed smelling of engine oil and sweat and dirt. Tired but undeniably happy. Wrapping me up in his big arms, a dopey smile on his face. Setting my soul on fire with the kinds of kisses he left across my skin, giving me a side of himself I don't think he'd even known he had. I loved it. All of it.

The boy was goddamn flourishing, and every time I looked at him, I felt like my heart was about to burst.

This is it.

We've made it.

"What are you smiling about?" he asked when I looked over at him for what must have been the millionth time. It was hard to keep my eyes on the road.

"Nothin' really," I said. I didn't want to jinx it. Speaking it aloud felt like tempting fate to take it all back again. The universe might realize there'd been a cosmic mistake letting these two trailer trash kids finally find peace in the world and in each other.

"Nothin', huh?"

I resisted the urge to point out that he'd been all smiles all morning, too. Instead, I said, "It's kinda nice doin' this… like a road trip."

"Gotta have some music and better snacks to make it a road trip," he laughed, but I could tell he liked thinking about it that way. He had a point about the snacks, but Sanctuary's food supplies were too low for us to have taken anything.

"Well, we kinda had music," I said. He shot me a quizzical look. "You were humming."

"Was not!"

"Eh, yeah," Mia piped up from the back of the four-door pickup. "You were."

"Dammit, Mia," Daryl grumbled, but he was still all smiles. Mia's eyes met mine in the rearview mirror, and we shared a conspiratorial grin. She'd been all smiles for the whole drive, too. Which probably isn't how kids who are grounded until they're eighty are supposed to feel, but I wasn't about to tell her to stop.

"Told ya."

"Hey. Eyes on the road, lady," Daryl said, trying not to laugh. "You can drive a little faster, too, y'know. Would be nice to get to Hilltop sometime this week."

"I'm goin' the speed limit," I said, tapping the speedometer.

"Ain't no damn speed limit no more." Daryl spluttered with laughter. "You still indicating when you turn, too?"

"Well. Gotta be safe," I said, but put my foot on the accelerator.

"Such a dork." I didn't look over at him, but I could feel the love in Daryl's voice.

"Shut up," I said. "It's outta habit."

"Habits of a dork," he said. "Did you ever get a ticket?"

"No," I admitted and had to raise my voice over the sound of him laughing at me. I'm sure he and Merle had left a string of unpaid speeding tickets in their wake wherever they went. "But to be fair, I didn't have a car for most of the time."

"Why?"

"Couldn't afford one."

"How'd y'all get anywhere?"

"Bus. It ain't that hard to get around a city. Sometimes Bryce gave us a lift."

"Could've got a bike," he pointed out. "Merle and I had no money, but we could still somehow always get our hands on one for cheap."

"Oh yeah, and they weren't stolen?"

"Parts of 'em probably were, yeah," he shrugged. "That's what made 'em so cheap. But you know that trick. You never thought about getting one?"

"I did. But the looks I'd have gotten picking Mia up from her fancy ass school on one of those?" I shook my head. "PTA would've called social services. I had enough people staring at me for being about a decade years younger than every other parent there."

"Hm. Bet you did," he muttered darkly. "Fuckin' pervs."

"They weren't looking like that," I rolled my eyes. "Just bein' judgemental assholes."

"Naomi, you're so damn pretty," he grumbled. "' Course they were looking at you like that."

I could feel a heat on my face that had nothing to do with the warmth in the car. I wasn't sure I'd ever get used to him complimenting me like that. Even if he was cranky when he said it. "Nobody in the world thinkin' that but you, Daryl."

"Bull," he grumbled.

"Jess Burnett's Dad always said you were pretty," Mia piped up again.

"Told ya." Daryl looked smug. Triumphant.

"Dammit, Mia!" When I looked at her in the review again, she stuck her tongue out. "You're supposed to be on my side."

"Hey, I'm on the side of truth," Mia raised her hands. "And he did say that. It was really embarrassing."

"Is that why you always asked me to stand around the corner and wait for you when it was time to take you home?"

"Yup."

"Unbelievable," I muttered. Hilltop rose up in front of us. The lookouts had been prepared for our arrival. They waved at us on our approach, and the gates rolled open. Glenn was waiting on the other side. Maggie was coming down the steps of Hilltop's main house. In the weeks since we'd last seen her, her bump had grown even more. So had her smile.

"Daryl!" Glenn said with a welcoming smile, which only widened as Mia and I jumped down from the pickup. "Didn't know you were bringing the whole family."

Family.

It had always been a difficult word for us. For Daryl, it was bruises and broken whiskey bottles and self-destructive loyalty. For me, it was burned skin and discarded needles and responsibilities I wasn't ready for. For both of us, it was fear and disappointment and pain in an endless loop.

But that word about each other?

I'd always seen us that way. How many times had I thought of Daryl as the family I chose? How often had he told me he loved Mia like she was his blood? But to hear it from someone like Glenn - someone who'd had the kind of parents who'd tuck him in at night and read him bedtime stories. And Maggie - someone whose Daddy loved her enough not just to stick around and learn her name but to quit drinking the day she was born, who might've lost her Momma too young but still had space to love the big extended family that came after - didn't bat an eye at what he said either. These people knew more about healthy families than Daryl or I could ever dream of, so knowing that they saw us that way, too… it hit me in a way I wasn't expecting.

Daryl felt it, too. I could tell from the way he had to swallow something down but couldn't quash that glimmer of something in his eyes as he looked at Mia. And the way his hand came to rest on the small of my back like a confirmation - we ain't just playing house, we ain't just muddling through something we're too broken to grasp the real meaning of. This is something real.

"Is it okay that we tagged along?" I asked, trying to sound normal, but I could feel every aching beat of my heart. It was a good kind of ache, the nice kind—the kind that comes from feeling like you belong someplace after so many years standing on the outside looking in.

"Of course," Maggie said, pulling me in for a warm hug, "this is a lovely surprise."

"Sanctuary can live without us for a few hours," I shrugged. There was a time when it felt like we'd never reach that point. Maggie and Glenn walked us through Hilltop. It was busy. Bustling with people. A cage in the middle of the grounds held the former Saviors who'd staged an uprising. I did my best not to look at them. I fell into step beside Maggie. "How are you feeling?"

"The third trimester has been kinder than the first. Thank God," she said. "That morning sickness was somethin' awful."

"Well, you were fightin' a war and growin' a baby at the same time," I said. "Not sure anyone's written a pregnancy book on that."

Maggie laughed, "Maybe I'll be the first. What to Expect While You're Expecting a Hostile Takeover by an Asshole with a Bat, by Maggie Rhee."

I laughed with her, "An instant bestseller around these parts."

They led us to where they'd stacked crates of corn. There were a few mixed looks from passersby. Giving up a food source for what was, at this point, still an experimental new idea, had faced a few rumblings of protest. Thankfully, Glenn and Maggie had as much faith in Daryl as I did.

"This enough for you?" Glenn asked.

"It'll be a good start, yeah," Daryl nodded, with that electric energy he'd been carrying with him these last few weeks. I could feel it crackle around him. Contagious. How often did we get to do something new like this? Something positive?

There was a brief argument between me and Daryl about him not lifting heavy crates of corn into the back of a four-door pickup while his hand was still healing. An almost identical argument occurred simultaneously between Glenn and Maggie about her not doing it while seven months pregnant. Glenn and I both won in the end, but not without a lot of protesting from Daryl and Maggie. With a disgruntled sigh, Maggie disappeared back to the big house.

Glenn took one end of a crate, and I took the other. Between us, we lifted it back toward the truck where Mia had opened up the back. It was heavier than I thought it was going to be, but I tried not to let any strain show on my face. Daryl was itching to step in.

We lifted the first crate into the back, and headed back for the second while Mia and Daryl strapped the first one down to the floor of the pickup.

As we heaved the fourth crate of corn to the truck, my arms ached and I was extremely grateful it was the last. Glenn was starting to struggle too, neither of us saying anything until the last crate had slid onto the back of the truck.

"I can't believe Daryl worked all of this out," Glenn said, wiping the dirt from his hands on his trousers.

"Yeah, he's something special, ain't he?" I said without thinking and felt my cheeks heat up as Glenn looked at me.

"Yeah," Glenn said. I was grateful to him for not leaving me hanging, but I could've done without the grin that split his face from ear to ear. "He is."

Daryl appeared around the other side of the truck.

"Less yapping, more loading," he said. The mixture of the grump in his voice and the smile on the corners of his mouth made me wonder if he'd heard all that. "I could load faster than all y'all, and that's with one busted hand."

When the truck was loaded up, Maggie joined us again from the big house, "Y'all got time to stay for a bite?"

My stomach rumbled an immediate 'yes,' but I tried to talk over it in case the offer was out of nothing but politeness. "You got enough to spare?"

"Sure we do. You drove all this way. It only seems fair."

My worries that Maggie was just being polite were immediately quashed by the spread she'd laid out in the big house. There was a palace set for Daryl, Mia and I.

"Our latest crops," Maggie said. "Dig in."

"You used to live on a farm, right?" Mia asked tentatively. Asking people about their past was always a delicate matter, given how much of it we'd all lost.

"Yeah," Maggie nodded, a little taken aback by Mia's question but happy to answer it. She indicated to Glenn and Daryl. "That's where I met these two. Their group came to us after Carl… got into an accident."

"What kind of accident?"

"He was shot," Daryl said bluntly.

"Accidently," Maggie added, hastily when Mia's face flooded with alarm. "By one of my Daddy's farm hands who was out looking for deer."

"Wow. Ouch," Mia grimaced. "Carl never told me he'd been shot…."

There was a moment of silence, and then Glenn said, "I can't believe I have a child getting shot and almost bleeding out to thank for finding my wife. That's crazy."

Maggie smiled fondly at him, "Eat your lunch."

Mia looked between the two of them. "You guys weren't married before this? You didn't even know each other?"

"No," Maggie said. "We were total strangers."

"It's crazy who you get thrown together with when shit hits the fan," Glenn mused. Then he looked up at Daryl and I. "Or thrown back together with in your case, I guess."

Under the table, Daryl's hand squeezed my knee.

"Did you have a wedding?" Mia asked.

"Not anything official," Maggie said. "Glenn asked me when we were living in a prison and… I guess I've considered myself his wife ever since."

"I like weddings," Mia said. "They're fun."

"You've been to one," I said.

"They are fun," Glenn nodded. Again, his gaze slipped to Daryl and me. There was a glint in his eye that made me feel suddenly self-conscious, although I didn't know why. "Hey, if it hadn't happened at a time when our house was being blown to bits by the Governor of another town, maybe we would've had one."

"You ever miss those days?" Daryl asked, tearing a piece of bread in half with his hands. "Y'know, when we were all in one place…instead of all spread out like this."

Daryl looked down at his food, which meant he was feeling self-conscious about what he'd said. Glenn considered it for a moment. "Yeah, of course I do, man. But… it's good that we're building something new, isn't it?"

Daryl nodded, mopping up something on his plate with the piece of bread.

"I know this little one will appreciate everything we're doing when they're older," Maggie said with a hand on her belly.

"Yeah," Daryl agreed. The thought made him smile, but I knew he still missed being close to everyone. Even if we finished at Sanctuary one day and headed back to Alexandria, Glenn and Maggie seemed pretty settled here. Carol was getting real cozy at the Kingdom, too.

"Once you've fixed our fuel problem," I said, nudging his knee under the table with mine, "we should make this a more regular thing. We'd love to have you guys at Sanctuary some time. For dinner or somethin'. It's less… murder-y than it was last time ya'll were there, I promise."

Maggie grinned, "We'd love that."

"And once the baby's born," Glenn said. "We'll have you all back here for sure."

Daryl was visibly lighter. Seeing him feeling comfortable enough to be himself around people who weren't me never failed to make my heart sing.

If I'd died right then, I'd have died happy.

"What kind of farm was it?" Mia asked.

"Cattle, mostly."

"Did you have horses?"

Ah.

That's why she's so interested.

"Mia's always wanted to learn to ride," I said.

"I'll teach you sometime," Maggie said.

By the time we were ready to leave, it was later than planned to set off. The sun was getting low in the sky. After what had felt like an almost endless, violent summer, the arrival of fall and its earlier nights was still catching me off guard. I hugged Maggie and Glenn goodbye and then climbed back into the truck while Daryl double and tripled checked that the crates were secure.

"Scoot up," he said, opening the door. "I'm driving us back."

"You sure?" I asked, sliding down the seat to the passenger side. "What about your hand?"

"Doc says I should start doing more with it. Driving ain't that strenuous," he said. "Plus, I wanna get back before sundown. Slowpoke."

"I could drive," Mia said hopefully.

"No," Daryl said, at exactly the same time I said, "Over my dead body, Mia."

"I gotta learn sometime," she protested.

"Not at thirteenth."

"I'm almost fourteen," she muttered under her breath like a handful of months would make a damn bit of difference.

Daryl

As she waved us goodbye at the Hilltop gates, I saw the ring glinting on Maggie's left hand, and for the first time, I caught myself wondering how Glenn had managed to find one. I hadn't cared enough to pay attention at the time - I'd thought it was dumb, honestly. Who cares about a piece of jewelry in the apocalypse, right?

But now, looking over at Naomi with her feet up on the dash and sunlight in her hair, it didn't seem so dumb. Her hands rested on her lap, and I thought her left hand looked mighty bare—empty—like it was missing something that would let the world know she was mine.

She caught me looking at her, and my heart jumped into my mouth, although there was no way she could've known what I'd been thinking about.

"Eyes on the road, mister," she said with that soft smile that drives me nuts. All of her smiles drove me nuts.

"Fine," I grumbled, but I was glad to have the excuse to look away. I knew I was getting carried away with myself, and those eyes of hers had a way of looking at me like she could see right into my soul and read whatever was in there.

Slow down.

Don't rush this. Don't rush her; you'll ruin it.

Still, I reached over and squeezed her thigh. Couldn't help myself. And the way she turned her head to smile at me told me she didn't mind it. Mia cleared her throat in the backseat and I let go, but I caught her smirking.

"Alright," I said, turning to look at Mia. "Let's see how fast this thing can go when your slowpoke sister ain't being a law-abiding citizen."

Mia whooped.

"Are you trying to be a bad influence?" Naomi said, but she was smiling as she felt the car speed up. Windows down, the wind whipped through the car. Both of my girls started laughing and hollering. I drove fast, but not too fast. Fast enough to amuse them, but not so fast that I didn't feel in control.

Funny how things can change in an instant.

I took a corner. A crowd of people stretched out in front of us. I had a split-second panic where all I saw was a mass of bodies walking down the road, and instinct made me slam on the breaks. There were bodies there, but they weren't people. Not anymore. We hadn't seen a horde this big for a long time.

"Windows up!" Naomi yelled, her fingers mashing the buttons to put widows up again, a barrier against any dead fucks that might try to reach in. Now that we'd stopped, we could smell them. Even with the windows shut, we could hear the collective chorus of their rattling lungs and snapping jaws.

"Ah, fuck," I turned the key. The engine spluttered but did not come back to life. I tried again and again and again, all to the same result. "Fuck, fuck, fuck."

C'mon. Not now. Not now.

I did everything I could think of to get it moving again while Walkers started swarming around us. The heavy metallic thunk of them throwing their bodies at the side of the car to try and get at us grew steadily as their numbers increased. Like raindrops turning to an upcoming storm.

The truck spluttered to life, throwing us into reverse. I went with it, backing away from the horde, feeling the crunch of Walkers under the wheels as we sped into the ones that had crowded behind while we'd been stalled. The truck bumped over them. Skidded. Something popped with a bang so loud I thought it was a gunshot. The car pitched violently to one side, landing half in a ditch.

Naomi and I both immediately turned to look at Mia. Mia looked back at us, a little pale but unharmed, her voice was shaking, "I'm alright."

"Did you hit your head?" Naomi scanned her over.

"No," Mia shook her head and repeated, "I'm alright."

The color was starting to return to her face. Satisfied that she was okay, we looked at each other.

"You good?" she asked me, her worried eyes scanning me now as I did the same right back to her.

"Yeah. You good?"

"Yeah," Naomi said, turning to the window on her side of the truck. The reverse maneuver that had thrown us into a ditch had still put a little distance between us and the Walkers, but they weren't far behind. In a few moments, we'd be surrounded again. The majority of them would be pressing against Naomi's side of the car. "We gotta move."

"Isn't it safer to stay in the car?" Mia asked, her fear radiating from her.

"The truck's unstable like this," I said as calmly as I could. I didn't want to freak her out, but she needed to understand the gravity of what was happening and how fast we'd need to move now. "If too many of 'em crowd us, they could tip it. If that breaks a window, they might get in."

"We're getting out of here, Mia," Naomi said, her tone matching mine. She held her sister's gaze, steady and sure of herself. Of us. "You gotta do exactly what Daryl and I tell you, okay?"

Mia nodded, her frightened eyes flickering between us. I grabbed my crossbow from where it was next to her in the backseat, and fixed it over my shoulder. I drew my knife and kept my free hand on the door handle. The angle of the truck meant that the driver's side was furthest from the road and the Walkers.

"Alright," I said, real calmly as I moved to open the door. "Here's what's gonna happen. I'm gonna open this door, and get out and open your door. I need you to get out as soon as you can. I'll be right there, okay? Makin' sure nothing can get to ya. You understand?"

"Yes," Mia's voice was barely a whisper.

"And your sister's gonna be right behind me," I said, looking over my shoulder at her. Naomi nodded, already crouching in her seat to move into mine once I'd gotten out. Her knife clutched in one hand. "Then we're gonna run like hell into those woods, okay? We stay close to each other. We do not split up. You understand?"

"Yes," Mia nodded. Before she had a chance to start thinking about anything or freeze with fear, I opened my door and jumped out. Took out two Walkers right by Mia's door. When I opened it, she slipped out of the car, and I pushed her behind me. There were still only a few Walkers between us and the forest, but more were starting to stumble around the side of the truck.

"Stay behind me," I told Mia. I felt her grip the back of my jacket as I started moving forward, stabbing the Walkers in our way as they lunged at us. A few paces away, I glanced back over my shoulder and my heart damn near stopped.

Mia was out, but Naomi was not right behind me.

"Naomi!" I yelled.\Mia was fighting the urge to run back to the truck. I grabbed her arm, and could feel her shaking. Walking away from the car without Naomi out safe behind me betrayed everything in me, but letting Mia walk back would betray her and that was worse.

Then I heard the radio in the truck switch on. It was just static, but cranked to full volume. Seconds later, Naomi slid out of the driver's side and bolted toward us.

I wanted to scream at her for scaring me like that. But it was a smart move. The noise now blaring from the truck would confuse and distract them for long enough for us to put a good amount of distance between us and them.

All we could do was run.

Naomi and I flanked Mia, making sure nothing got to her. Racing through the woods with no destination in mind, just listening to the sounds of the Walkers swarming our abandoned truck.

We kept running.

The crash of the truck when they toppled it sent birds flying into the sky in panic.

Kept running.

The noise brought more of them out of the woods.

Running.

Knives into dead skulls that got too close.

Run.

Until there were no more Walkers ahead of us.

Slowed.

I looked back at the way we'd come. Couldn't see the truck. Or any other walkers.

We slowed.

My legs were burning, but we kept going. I looked at my girls, their faces flushed and tired. Flecks of old blood on Naomi's arms from the Walkers she'd killed.

Silence.

Except from the sounds of our breathing. Heavy and labored. Air was fire in my lungs. None of us could speak. Naomi nodded to something up ahead. We were coming up to another road. I nodded to let her know I'd seen it, too. By the time we reached the road, my lungs had cleared enough to talk, but I wasn't sure how many steps my legs had left in me. We all came to a natural halt in the middle of an empty road. Mia bent double, trying to catch her breath; Naomi rubbed her back and made sure she was okay. I looked around. We had no idea where we were. No truck. No plan. Nothing.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry," it tumbled right out of me. Shock made me numb.

"Hey. I'm okay, you okay?" Naomi asked, still breathless. This girl was half of me. All the good bits. What had I done bringing them out here like this?

I nodded. Physically, I was fine. But I could feel a pressure building in my skull. "I shouldn't have-"

"Mia's okay, too. We're all fine. That's all that matters." Naomi took my face in her hands, her gaze as unwavering as her faith. "Nobody could have seen that coming. You couldn't have known. It was an accident. And we all got out."

The calm in her eyes washed over me; they seemed to say Hey, it's okay. We got this.

"Where are we?" Mia asked, finally able to straighten up but clutching a stitch in her side. Her wide eyes looked around at the empty roads. "How do we get home?"

The sun was worryingly low in the sky. The forest on either side of us was starting to darken. I knew Naomi would have her goddamn maps in her bag, but it would take time to work out where the hell we were. By then, the Walkers we'd outrun might be on us again.

"I think we gotta find someplace else to stay for the night," Naomi said. "Get our bearings. Head home tomorrow."

She looked to me for confirmation or maybe for another idea, but I came up empty. Walkers were more active at night and harder to spot. Getting inside and somewhere safe was the priority.

"Head there," I pointed to a road sign in the distance. "Might give us a better idea of where we are and what's nearby."

The thought of having to move or walk any further made my calf muscles ache in protest. But we didn't have a choice. Standing still would make us Walker-chow. We walked in silence, too exhausted to keep talking. I saw a squirrel moving in the trees and shot it almost instinctively. We'd eaten well at Hilltop, but now we were on the road, not knowing where our next meal was coming from, I'd reverted to survival mode.

The sign pointed to the nearest town, a few miles away. It would be dark by the time we got there. I tried not to worry too much about the kind of trouble that might bring. We picked up the pace, but then, just as the sky was starting to turn orange, Naomi paused.

"I know where we're going," Naomi grinned and pointed ahead, "your old haunt."

A Walmart sign peeked out between the overgrown trees at the side of the road. "You ain't serious?"

"It's worth checking out, ain't it?" I couldn't argue with that. It was closer than any houses we were walking to. Naomi looked over at Mia. "Daryl used to work at one of those back in Georgia."

"Really?"

"Yeah," Naomi said. "He was Employee of the Month so many-"

"Naomi," I interrupted her. "I swear to god…"

"What?" she looked at me all innocent.

"That was so long ago. You can't still be bringing that up."

Mia gave me a sympathetic look. "She kept a binder of every certificate I ever got. Even the ones they gave you just for showing up."

"Damn straight," she said. "Kept it on a shelf right next to my Daryl-binder."

"Dork," I said, but my heart could've exploded.

We checked the building. It looked deserted from the outside, but we entered through the warehouse at the back. I pushed inside first, sweeping the rows and rows of largely empty floor-to-ceiling metal shelves. There were a few stray walkers inside, easy enough to take out. Mia followed right behind me. Naomi was closely behind her, making sure we weren't being followed or walking into an ambush. These days, you have to be prepared for Walkers and for people.

Once the warehouse was secure, we checked the main storefront. The place looked like it had been picked clean of anything useful. The thin layer of dust on everything suggested it had been months since the last people had been through. A few more Walkers had found their way in. They seemed slow and had maybe been here a while.

"See any food?" I asked Naomi, when we'd taken out the Walkers and finished our final sweep of the building.

"Nope. Picked clean."

"Squirrel it is then."

"Mm-hmm, a Daryl-special," she said with a little smile. "You mind getting things started while I radio Bryce and let him know what's happened?"

I nodded. "Call Maggie too, in case that horde is heading their way."

"Good shout."

While she stayed in the main store to radio our friends, I exited back through to the warehouse. It was windowless and dark, the safest place for us to sleep. As long as the doors to the store and the outside were blocked, no stray Walkers would be able to get in.

I built a small fire in an empty barrel, turning it into a makeshift fire pit to roast the squirrel over. Mia stayed close, half-watching what I was doing and half-drawing in the little sketchbook Naomi had scavenged for her while she was missing.

"Whatcha drawing?" I asked. Mia tensed, hesitated.

"Mia never lets anyone see anything until it's done," Naomi said, overhearing us as she came back into the warehouse. She was carrying some thin, flat boxes.

"Perfectionist, huh?"

"Kinda," Mia shrugged.

"You get that from her," I nodded to her sister. Mia smiled a little, and flipped back a few pages in her sketchbook.

"You can look at these ones if you want," she said, a little shyly as she held open her sketchbook to show me a pencil drawing of one of the Kingdom's horses. The page opposite had a crazy-well detailed picture of Perla and Carl.

"Woah," I leaned in for a better look. "Mia, these are amazing."

"They're okay, I guess," Mia mumbled.

"Told ya she was good," Naomi said with an amount of pride that made Mia look like she was regretting showing me anything at all.

"You have to say that, you're my sister," she rolled her eyes.

"Nah, she's right, Mia. You got talent."

"Well, you have to say that, you're my-" she stopped. A clunky silence where Mia's face went red and I think all of us had the crashing realization there wasn't really a word for it. Somehow, 'sister's boyfriend' didn't seem to cover everything that I hoped I was to Mia. After a moment she said, very quietly, "Family."

"Yeah. I am," I said it quickly. Partly because Mia was looking mighty vulnerable and partly because I knew if I stopped to think about it I'd end up bawling like a little kid. "I am your family, but I also got eyes and you got talent."

"Thanks," she said, but closed her sketchbook.

Eager to take some of the spotlight off Mia, I glanced at Naomi, "Bryce okay?"

"Yeah," Naomi said. "He can hold down the fort for a night. Sounds like it's quieter there without us."

"Hilltop?"

"They've sent some scouts down that road, but haven't seen much yet," she said. "Hopefully the horde will avoid 'em."

"Sorry I got us all stuck here," I said.

"C'mon now, it ain't such a bad place to be holed up for the night," she said. "You know what ain't been scavenged from here yet?"

"What?"

"Board games."

"You gotta be joking."

"Nope." Naomi shook the boxes she was carrying, I could hear the rattle of game pieces.

"Monopoly?" Mia said hopefully.

"Absolutely not," Naomi vetoed it immediately. "I wanna leave this place without any major fights."

"What you got then?" I asked.

"Scrabble?" she said, holding it up hopefully.

"Hell no, you know too many words."

In the end, Mia chose a version of Pictionary where she did all the drawing and we did the guessing. We ate roasted squirrel off paper plates Naomi swiped from the party section and played Yahtzee until Naomi threw the dice at me when she lost.

"Alright, we should get some shut eye," she said. "We probably got a long day ahead of us tomorrow."

I started to put out the last few embers that were burning in my makeshift fire pit, while Naomi went back out to her storefront to raid the bedding aisle for anything that would make us a little more comfortable.

"Was this what it was like when you guys were my age?" Mia asked me. "Hunting food and playin' games and stuff?"

"Kind of," I said. "Wasn't safe for us to go home then, either."

The smile vanished from Mia's face, and it took me a second to work out why. I hadn't thought about it much, but Naomi has that way of making shit things fun. I mean, not long ago we'd been running for our lives, but that had been almost all forgotten now we'd spent the night bickering and laughing over dumb games on a warehouse floor.

Naomi did such a good job of shielding Mia from bad shit that I'm not sure the kid knew how much of it there had been even before the dead started walking. Her memories of living with their Momma would be hazy at best, she'd been so young when Naomi got her out of there. Any stories she'd heard about me and her sister would've skipped the why we were out there in the first place. Brushed over the bruises and skipped over the burns.

"She always made it sound…" Mia trailed off.

"I didn't mean it like that," I said quickly. "All my best childhood memories have got your sister in 'em."

"Yeah. Me too."

I didn't doubt it. Most of her childhood, I was sure, was spent feeling safe and loved. I knew from how easily Naomi cut her own rations to make sure Mia had enough when times were lean that there would've been nights Mia had gone to bed with a full belly, and Naomi didn't. There's nothing Naomi wouldn't sacrifice for someone she loves. And she has a real sneaky way of doing it that means you don't notice unless you're paying attention—real close attention—the kind of attention I pay her.

The fire had died out, I left Mia for a moment to find Naomi hauling as many soft things as she could back toward the warehouse. She looked up when she heard me close the door between the two spaces. She smiled when she saw me and I felt like my heart was about to melt. "You gonna help me with some of this?"

"C'mere a sec," I said quietly, slowly pulling her toward me. I kissed her hard and deep. The things she'd been holding dropped to the floor.

"What was that for?" she looked up at me, a little dazed, a little confused but smiling a whole lot.

"Just because," I shrugged. The truth would've made her too uncomfortable, and she'd been so relaxed lately.

"Well…" she said, still with that dopey smile. "Ain't that lovely?"

You're lovely.

We cleared out some of the upper shelves in the warehouse, ones you needed a ladder to get up to, another precaution against any Walkers that might somehow get in while we were sleeping. Then we stuffed them full of the bedding supplies Naomi had grabbed from the homeware department.

"It's like bunk beds!" Mia said, climbing up to the top one. "I always wanted those."

"My brother and I had bunks when we were little," I said, climbing into the one underneath. "Fighting over the top one gets old real quick."

Mia stuck her head over the side and looked down at me in the bunk and her sister at the bottom of the ladder, "Guess that makes you two losers tonight, huh?"

"Let you win more like," I said. She stuck her tongue out at me.

"Go to sleep you two," Naomi said as she climbed up and slipped in to the bunk beside me. She was trying to sound stern but there was a big smile on her face.

"Okay, goodnight," Mia's head disappeared as she settled down to sleep above us.

"Night, Mia," I said.

Naomi snuggled up beside me, her head resting on my chest. I pulled her close to me and closed my eyes. Exhaustion from the day washed over me, sleep seeped into my bones but my mind started drifting. My thoughts turned back to that ring and the easy way Maggie called herself Maggie Rhee.

I'd never been proud to be a Dixon. Too many shitty people attached to it, too much trouble surrounding it, violence soaked right into it. But… putting Naomi in front of it?

Naomi Dixon.

Now that was a name I'd be proud of.

"You okay? Yer heart's goin' a mile a minute." Naomi's voice, soaked in sleep, gave me a jolting awareness of the tight longing in my chest. My heart was racing with it.

"I'm all good, angel," I said, pulling her closer so I could hide my smile in her hair.

Chapter 58: Roadkill's Cheaper than Broccoli

Naomi 

“You gotta stay quiet,” Daryl said in a faultless demonstration of what he meant. He’d perfected this low way of talking that didn’t disturb anything around him, as if his voice was as much a part of the woods as the rumble of a nearby stream. I hadn’t noticed it before; it was just how he spoke while we hunted. But now that he was explaining things to Mia, I saw it with fresh eyes. 

God, he’s fucking brilliant.

Mia nodded to show she was listening but didn’t dare speak. Daryl beckoned her over. “Move slow. Real slow. Soft feet.”

This time, Mia didn't even dare nod in case nodding was too much movement. She looked at us both with wide eyes and then moved towards Daryl, stepping carefully and quietly on the forest floor. He held out one side of some garden netting that we'd pilfered from Walmart. She took it and held it over one of the rabbit holes. Slowly and silently Daryl pinned it in place with one of his crossbow bolts. From my spot deeper into the forest, I watched my little family hunting together as they moved to secure more of the net over other rabbit holes and wondered how the human heart could be built to hold this much love. 

As he looked up at me, I caught the little smile on Daryl’s face. Usually so focused in moments like this, the joy of teaching Mia something put a little crack in his concentration. There was such a light in his eyes, and he kept looking at Mia and me with this glow about him. If there’d been a mirror around I’m sure I’d have seen it in myself too. It would have been sickening, probably, if it weren’t so damn nice.

His signal set my body in motion. How many times had we done this? How many afternoons had we spent just like this? Even with the mild distraction of having Mia with us, we moved like a machine so well-oiled we hadn’t rusted in all our time apart. 

Now that their nets were secure I started making a hell of a lot of noise, banging Walmart’s finest kitchen pans together to scare the rabbits away from this end of the warren and out into the nets at the other. The noise drew Walkers as effectively as it pushed the rabbits away. I was prepared for that, knowing it would happen, but it didn’t stop Daryl’s eager eyes from tracking me as closely as he’d track a rabbit. Bolts whizzed past me to take out Walkers that were, realistically, way too far away to be a threat but closer to me than Daryl was comfortable with. 

Thankfully, it didn’t take long for a few rabbits to get caught in the pinned nets. I stopped making noise and turned to deal with the last few Walkers as quietly as I could while Daryl took away the rabbits they’d caught to kill them out of sight. Not that Mia was unfamiliar with death these days or hadn’t seen her fair share of gore in this new world, but he'd liked how much she'd gotten from this, and I don’t think he wanted her to see that part.

Mia and I started gathering up all of the crossbow bolts we could find. Daryl could make more these days, but it took time and they were too precious to waste. 

“Now that technique is only when we ain’t got time for your sister to build one of her traps,” Daryl said, returning with three dead rabbits slung over his shoulder. He threw one of them over to me, “Skin this for me, will ya?”

I caught it and sat down on a nearby log, drawing a knife. Mia watched me with a mix of disgust and intrigue. It wasn’t something she was used to seeing. Even when I'd had to hunt for us both at the start of all of this, I’d done my best to keep the gore away from her. It had gotten easier to distract her from it once we’d found a group and she’d had Perla and José to hang around with.

Now, it was just the three of us in a clearing in the woods. Daryl had always deferred to me when it came to gutting and skinning stuff. Said I did it better, quicker, which was praise I’d never taken lightly. So, like old times, he built a fire and I got to skinning and gutting the rabbit for lunch. Only, unlike old times, Mia sat nearby watching us with morbid curiosity. 

Mia caught my eye with a little smirk. “Hard to believe you used to be a vegetarian.” 

Oh no. 

Daryl's head snapped up. “She was a what now?” 

“Nothing,” I said.

But there was mischief in Mia's eyes, and she repeated, “Vegetarian.”

Daryl set down the stick he’d been using to stoke the flames and gave me his full attention. Amusement tugged at the corners of his mouth as he looked pointedly at the way I was pulling out rabbit innards without flinching. “You stopped eatin' meat?”

“Reducing meat consumption is the single best thing you can do as an individual to cut your carbon emissions,” I said, my cheeks hotter than the flames that were starting to leap into the air.  

“So you gave up hot dogs for the Polar Bears?” he said.

“Something like that.”

“She lasted two weeks, and then she had a Big Mac,” Mia said.

“Bummer for the Polar Bears.”

“Hey, I said ‘reduce’ not ‘cut out’,” I said. I held up the freshly skinned rabbit for him. “You want this or not?”

Daryl took it from me and looked back at Mia, “See how easy she did that? How quick? How clean them cuts are?” 

“Yeah,” Mia said, trying not to look queasy as Daryl threaded the rabbit onto a spit across the flames.

“She never showed you how to do it?”

“No.”

"What about her traps, she ever show you one of those?”

“No.”

“No?” his head whipped around, and he stared at me in utter disbelief - like trapping things and skinning them were life skills every kid needed, not just the desperate ones.

“What would I have been trappin’ in DC, Daryl? Delivery drivers?”

“I dunno, you might’ve done some huntin’ on the weekends or somethin’.” He shrugged, but there was something a little vulnerable in his tone and the way he was looking away from both of us and down at his shoes. A little self-consciousness in his movements that I don’t think Mia would have picked up on, but to me, his micro-expressions were easier to understand than anyone else's regular expressions. Silence fell on the clearing, the smell of cooking rabbit starting to fill the air.  

“We didn’t really have time for huntin’ at the weekends,” I said, testing a building theory. He’d included Mia in something from our shared past, but it was more than that for him. I’d left this kind of life behind for a while and taken Mia with me. He’d kept living this way, and he was feeling the gap in our experiences. This had been the first few bricks in a bridge he was trying to build across the time he hadn’t known her. He looked up with an eagerness that made me want to keep talking.

“Mia had swimming lessons on Saturdays, which later turned into swim meets when she made the school team.”

“Oh, yeah. You did?” he looked at her, retroactively proud. “And you never thought to make your sister take lessons, too?”

“She was too busy. She’d bring her laptop to the pool so she could sit in the cafe and do some work while I was in there,” Mia said. “Unless it was a competition, then she’d be in the bleachers.”

“Cheering you on I bet,” Daryl gave me this look that made my cheeks heat up again.

Mia rolled her eyes; old embarrassment felt anew. “So loud I could hear her even under the water.”

“Hey, it’s not my fault your friend’s parents were so quiet,” I said. 

“Quiet or polite?” Mia asked with a cheeky grin. I pulled a face at her and she pulled one right back. 

“Did you like being on the team?” Daryl asked, all casual but I could see how much this all meant to him. Mia thought about it for a moment.

“Yeah, it was kinda fun, but the team always went for ice cream after,” Mia said, “and I think I liked that more than the actual swimming part.”

I nodded. “Sometimes reminding you about the ice cream was the only way to get you to go.”

“Yeah because it started at six in the morning!”

“Yeah, I don’t miss that,” I agreed. I glanced at Daryl again. “Saturday afternoons she had Art Club at one of the community centers.”

“Bet you were the best in the club,” he said. Mia looked embarrassed again and gave a little half-shrug.

“I was okay, but I liked going because they had all of these cool paints and supplies, so I could try things I couldn’t do with the stuff I had at home.” Mia didn’t say it with anything other than total enthusiasm, but I still felt a wistful twinge of guilt. I wished, as I had back then, that I’d had enough to buy her any art supply her little heart wanted. Without prompting, Mia kept going, “For dinner, we'd usually go to Naomi’s work and they’d order takeout for everyone.” 

Daryl shot me a quizzical look. “On a Saturday night?”

“News don’t sleep, Daryl,” I said.

I felt another pang of guilt over how much time Mia had to spend hanging around at my job before she said, “It was cool. I got to play games on the computer, and Mindy at reception always gave me candy.” 

“You played games? You were supposed to be doing your homework.”

“I did that, too!” she said quickly.

“You ever get to see your sister at work while you were there?”

“Yeah.” 

“How?” I said. “You weren't supposed to leave that room. Did Mindy not keep an eye on you?”

“Yeah, but she let me go to the bathroom and I could peek into the door in the window of the newsroom every time I went past,” she said as if to prove that she was telling the truth, she added, “Looked like you were usually arguing with someone.”

“Sounds about right,” I said. “Finalizing the layout for the Sunday paper could get a little…argumentative.”

“They didn’t just give you the front page?” Daryl looked incredulous.

“Nah you had to fight for it.”

“That was dumb of them.”

“On Sundays, the theater near us did screenings for kids,” I said, looking at Mia who nodded. “So we’d go there a lot. Or to the park when you were really little.”

“And then we usually saw Bryce and Andrew in the afternoon,” Mia said. “They had a big yard and a pool and we’d have barbecues in the summer.”

“So, you see we really had no time for huntin’,” I said. Daryl nodded, passing a paper plate of cooked meat to each of us. I took a bite, my stomach rumbling. There was a comforting familiarity in eating Daryl’s cooked rabbit. 

“Screw them Polar Bears now, huh?” he said, watching me tuck in with a smile. I doubted I’d ever live this down.  

“They might be alright now,” I said. “Ain’t as many people around to mess things up for ‘em. Hardly any cars on the roads, plants are growin’ wild again… maybe in a decade or two the world’ll stop heating up, and their homes will stop melting.”

“So this was good for them, huh?”

“Maybe,” I shrugged. “Dunno how much methane Walkers put out, though.”

“That's the kinda shit Eugene would know,” Daryl said with his mouth full. 

“True,” I turned the problem over in my mind. “I know decomposing bodies do produce a lot of-”

“Can we not talk about this while we’re eating, please?” Mia interrupted me.

“Hey, if you hadn’t snitched to Daryl about my brief time giving up meat we wouldn’t be having this conversation,” I reminded her.

“Yeah, but I wasn’t expecting it to get so… gross.”

She stuck her tongue out at me. I stuck mine out right back. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see Daryl’s smile as he looked at the two of us. He was so relaxed and at ease now. Comfortable. Happy. Himself.

When I was done eating, I pulled one of my trusty maps out of my back. It was getting a little worn, the paper weaker from being folded and re-folded over and over again. I laid it out in front of them and traced a route with my finger. “I think we gotta go this way.”

They both looked at it, and I saw them deflate a little. It was a long way to go. Daryl leaned closer, frowning.

“Ain't this quicker?” he pointed to an alternate route, cutting through a large section of the woods we'd otherwise have to walk around. 

“Can't go that way,” I shook my head. Daryl raised an eyebrow. I indicated a portion of the map. “It’s Negan territory. We gotta go round.”

“Ah.” he sighed.

“How sure are you that he stuck around?” Mia asked. “After you gave him supplies? Maybe he went somewhere else.”

“Mia,” I said with a warning note in my voice. “No.”

“He can't cover all of it at once,” she pointed out.

“Mia!”

“What? It would be three against one.”

“I'm not having you two get shot because you're too lazy to walk a little bit longer.”

“It's not a little bit, though, is it? It's a lot.” 

“Mia… No,” Daryl said. “Naomi’s right. We ain’t risking it.”

“Fine,” she sighed. 

“We should get going soon,” Daryl said, getting up to put the fire out. “Make sure we’re home in good time.”

I folded the map back up again and looked at Mia, “You mind filling up our water bottles?”

She nodded and gathered them from our bags. She took them to a nearby freshwater stream. It was within our eyeline, but out of earshot. 

“Daryl?” 

“Mm?” he prodded the dying embers of the fire with a stick. 

“You look happy.”

“I am, angel.” He looked up at me, frowning like I’d said something so obvious it was dumb. 

It was just nice to hear it confirmed out loud. Made me tingle right down to my toes. 

“She looks happy too, don't ya think?” I nodded to where Mia was crouched by the running water.

“I hope so,” he said sincerely.

“You’re so good with her,” I said, and I meant it. I wanted to say thank you, but I knew he wouldn’t accept it if I phrased it that way. He bowed his head a little, modestly. “Not just today. You were good with her yesterday, too, when she was scared.” 

“You didn’t mind me showin’ her how to net a rabbit?” he asked, his voice a little gruff. “Trappin’ is more your thing, but yours are more… complicated, so I thought it would be okay if I-”

“It was,” I said, quickly.

He nodded again and glanced back up at me. “I found some bikes at Sanctuary.”

It threw me for a second. “More motorbikes, I thought-”

“Nah, not motorbikes. The cycling kind,” he said. “You said Mia didn’t know how to ride one, and I thought maybe… if you’re cool with it, it might be a good way for her to get around. Can outrun a walker on one of them things.”

It took me a second to realize he was asking permission. “That’s a great idea.”

“Yeah? You think?” he looked at me. “I got a helmet an’ everything, but if you wanna be the one to show her-”

“No, you can teach her,” I said. “You ain’t gotta clear that kinda shit with me, Daryl. I trust ya.”

“Yeah?”

“‘Course I do,” I said. “I mean, I dunno when you’re gonna have time with all of the other shit you’ve got goin’ on.”

“I’ll make time,” he said, determined. I'd never had something so solid to hold onto, not when it came to raising Mia. “If you think she’d want to?”

“That’s up to her,” I said, although I was pretty sure the answer would be yes. “You’ll have to ask her yourself.”

“Don’t think I’ve forgotten that you ain’t ever learned to swim,” Daryl said like a threat. 

“What you gonna do about it, chuck me in that river?”

“Ain’t deep enough,” he said, which wasn’t enough of a promise not to throw me in any body of water for my liking. Before I could say anything to that effect, Mia came back, three full canisters of water in her arms. We each took one and packed it away. 

Although we had a long walk ahead of us, our spirits were pretty high, and full bellies were only part of it. We started down the route I'd planned, a long and abandoned highway stretched out into the distance but with both of them by my side, it didn't seem so insurmountable. It might even prove to be a little fun. 

Daryl’s arm slipped around my shoulder. A surprise, but a welcome one. He still wasn’t one for public displays of affection, but maybe Mia didn’t count, because she was his family too. Maybe he caught the way Mia smiled when she saw us like that. Whatever it was, I wasn’t complaining, I reached up and held the hand that was slung over my left shoulder. 

I could tell that he was building up the nerve to say something, and I squeezed his hand. 

“I, uh, found some bikes at Sanctuary,” he said eventually. I said nothing, and let the silence hang there for a moment until Mia looked at us both, unsure what this had to do with her and why he was addressing it to her instead of me. “Like… bicycle bikes, not… y’know.”

“Oh. I can’t actually….” Mia’s cheeks turned a little pink. It had been a sore spot for a while, that all her friends could ride bikes and she couldn’t.

“Yeah, I know,” Daryl said without a hint of judgment. “You wanna learn?”

“For real?” Her face lit up, Daryl’s did, too. 

“Yeah for real, I can show ya.” 

“Alright,” Mia said, there was a little spring in her step now. She was practically skipping alongside Daryl. I squeezed his hand tight in mine again and felt him squeezing right back. 

Daryl 

I didn’t even feel tired, not like I thought I would. Sure, my legs were kinda aching from walking for so many hours, but when I saw Sanctuary ahead of us, it still felt too soon. Bryce greeted us at the gates with nothing of note to report. Seemed like Sanctuary had run just fine without us and seeing that gave me a second boost of energy. The day I’d be able to get us all out of this place felt closer than ever. Naomi would whip it into such good shape that Rick would be able to put anyone in charge of it and it wouldn’t matter. I could take my girls somewhere better than this. Somewhere that didn’t hold any bad memories so that we could make nothin’ but good ones. 

Exhausted from the walk, Mia sank down to sit on Sanctuary’s steps the moment we got back. Naomi and I didn’t dare rest, debating whether or not to go back for the corn we’d left spilled across the road. Sitting down would make it harder to get up and keep going.

“We should go get it, right?” Naomi said, a little reluctantly. “It would be a treasure trove for any other survivor groups out there who came across it.”

“Longer we leave it out there, the more of a risk that’ll be,” I nodded in agreement, way less reluctant to head back out than she was. “Plus. I doubt Hilltop has any more to spare if we've lost it.”

“Let me know where it is, I can head out there if you need a rest,” Bryce offered. 

“It's ok, I don't mind going. Drive won't be so long,” I said, trying not to say it too quickly or sound ungrateful for his offer. I glanced at Naomi, and nudged her foot with mine, “You up for it? Another lil' roadtrip.”

The corners of her mouth twitched in a little smile. Before she could let herself say yes, she asked Bryce, “You alright to keep holding down the fort for another few hours?”

“Of course,” he nodded. “Been quiet around here today. I'm starting to think it's you three that make most of the noise.”

Mia looked up from where she was slumped on the steps. Her voice was as weary as her face, “Are we going out again?”

“Not you, sweetie. You stay here and help Bryce, we won't be long this time,” Naomi said. Mia was too tired to even complain when Naomi ruffled her hair. She leaned closer to Bryce, “Make sure she eats somethin', it's been nothing but rabbit and squirrel, and that was hours ago.”

Bryce nodded. “You guys need something for the road? Dinner will probably be over by the time you're back.”

“If we've got anything to spare,” Naomi nodded. 

“I'm sure we do,” he said. “I'll check with Eugene. You wanna come help me, Mia?”

Mia nodded and got slowly to her feet. Naomi watched them as they disappeared back into the building. “Maybe we should bring someone else with us.”

No.

“Why?”

“To help me load the corn back in,” she said. “We could ask Jerry, maybe? Eugene?”

“Nah,” I waved her off. “I can help ya. C'mon, let's get a truck.”

I was already halfway down the steps, hoping to cut off any arguments. I should've known better. She had to jog a little to catch me up. She followed, still protesting, “No, you can’t, your hand…”

I started hustling us both to another pickup, thinking that if I just got her moving quick enough we’d be back on the road again before she'd had time to herself out of it.

“My hand's fine. Quit stressin’.” 

An impossible task for her. “No.”

“C'mon. Promise I won't use it. I can help one-handed,” I said. She hesitated and I tried to seal the deal by opening the driver’s side for her. I held out my hand so she could use it to climb up, “I'll even let you drive this time.”

“Well, you did get us in a ditch last time,” she reminded me with a wry smile. I knew it meant I’d won. Her warm hand in mine and she stepped up into the truck, felt like I was helping a princess into a waiting carriage. I closed her door and walked around to the passenger side. She looked at me as she slipped into the seat next to her, “Think you can put up with my slow driving?”

“Sure. Gives me a chance to enjoy the scenery,” I said with a shrug but I couldn't hide the excitement buzzing through me. Someone knocked on the window beside me, I looked down at Mia and Bryce, who were holding up a bag of food for us to take on the road. I wound down the window.

“It's like a drive-through,” Mia said cheerfully as she reached up to pass the bag through.

“You sure we can spare all that?” Naomi called to Bryce who was standing behind Mia.

“Of course we can. None of you got your rations today or yesterday, so we've actually got more than we thought we'd have,” he said. It wouldn't stop Naomi from worrying about our looming food shortage, but it was a good point. Bryce tapped the side of the vehicle like it was a horse. “Try not to get run off the road this time.” 

“We'll do our best,” she smiled, starting the engine. “See you soon.”

“You better mean that this time,” he laughed. 

I waved at them both as we pulled out. Mia stood at the gates watching us drive off and kept waving. I stuck my head out of the passenger side and waved back until she'd shrunk into the distance, the old factory looming behind her. When I was sure she wouldn't be able to see me anymore, I sat back in my seat.  

“You're in a good mood for someone who's havin' to trek out to do a job we've already done,” Naomi said, glancing back at Sanctuary in the rearview mirror.  

“Mmhmm,” I nodded. “Jus' like gettin' a job well done.”

“Sure.” she sideyed me as she turned the first bend. I guess I should have been more annoyed about having to go out there and do something we'd already done, but it felt like such a small price for the day I'd had. It was selfish, but having Naomi and Mia all to myself for the last twenty-four hours had been as close to heaven as I could imagine a guy like me getting. I didn't want it to end. 

“Got snacks this time,” I said. “Now it's like a real road trip.”

“Oh yeah, you gonna start humming again?” She asked. 

“Pfft. No.” I said, but I could've. Could've burst into song like a damn Broadway show. Not that I'd seen any of those, but I'd heard about them and I got the jist. A lotta singing and sequins.

 Naomi didn't say anything else. Something about going back to Sanctuary had started to take the shine off the day. For her, not me. Nothing could dull the day I'd just had. Naomi was quieter and more tense. I let her drive in silence for a while before I asked, “What’s eatin’ ya?”

“Winter’s gonna come around fast,” she said with a glance skyward.

“We’ll get through it, angel.”

“Our food supply, it’s…” she glanced at the bag of food in my lap.

“I know. But we’ll get through it.”

“Hmm,” she made a non-committal kind of noise like she didn’t believe me. I didn’t know what to say, couldn’t explain why my faith was so strong. Maybe it was the sheer number of rough times we’d already gotten through together. What was one more? She’d figure something out; she always did. Me and her could do anything together. 

“I enjoyed playin’ hooky with you two,” I said, wanting both to be honest but also to distract her from slipping any deeper into her worries.

“We got stranded, I’d hardly call that playin’ hooky,” she said but couldn’t stop the smile spreading across her face. “But yeah… it was nice. We should do it again sometime.”

“Do it again?” I couldn't hide my surprise. My little workaholic had not only managed not to spiral into worry about what we were missing while we'd been away, but she wanted to do it again? 

She nodded. “Y'know, minus the part where we got run off the road by a pack of Walkers.”

“For real?”

“Yeah. Bryce is good at keeping things running; we trust him. I know he'd be happy to do it for us if we wanted the occasional day off.”

“And you'd be okay with that?” I thought I was going to have to fight her more on this.

“Yeah,” she said. “I worked too much, y’know, before… in DC. I don’t wanna be like that now, I don’t wanna miss out on you two. This. Us.”

“You’ll always have me.”

“I hope so,” she said like it was out of her hands, but I couldn’t imagine a world in which I wasn’t by her side. Not now I knew how good I had it being with her, I couldn't let that go. “But Mia grows so fast y’know. Before I know it, she’ll be grown and doin’ her own thing, and I’ll miss when she was this age, and we could take her places. I already miss when she was little. She’d say the cutest things; she was all… full of questions.”

We could have another little one. Add to the family. 

I had to physically stop myself from saying it, chewing on my bottom lip so that words didn’t just spill right out of me. 

One thing at a time, man, fucking hell. 

I looked down at my fingers, glad she had her eyes on the road because I wasn't sure I could take the heat of her gaze on me. I was quiet for too long, and that gaze shifted over all the same. “What's eating you?” 

“Nothin',” I couldn't even come up with a convincing lie. My head was too full of things I didn't dare say in case it sent her running for the hills. “I guess… yesterday was kinda a perfect day for me, y'know?”

“Seein' Glenn and Maggie?”

“Yeah, that was… yeah. But also… gettin' to spend time with my girls.”

“Your girls?” This time, I thought she was the one about to send us swerving into a ditch out of shock. She sat bolt upright in her seat, eyes off the road and fully on me. But there was this crazy warmth in her voice. So warm it made my cheeks catch fire. 

“Well, I know you're not… we're not… but I think of you like… both of you are…but we're not… I don't.”

“No, we are. Just never thought I'd hear you say something so…” she trailed off for a second, those eyes of hers still searching my face like she was finding something new in it after all these years. 

“Corny?”

“Yeah, but… good corny. Nice corny.”

“Hmm. Eyes on the road.” I said. It was so much easier to say things when she wasn't looking at me. She laughed a little, her head turning back to the road. I could still see that smile on her lips. I could feel my heart like a big lump in my throat. “If we left Sanctuary one day, and our lives were a little more… y'know, like yesterday…would it be enough for you?”

Although she wasn't looking at me anymore, I couldn't look at her when I asked. I stared out the passenger window so she couldn't see how red my face got when she said, “Of course it would.”

It seemed impossible. “I mean it ain’t swim meets and Art Club and -”

She cut across me. “I ain’t ever been as happy as I am right now, Daryl.” 

I wanted to look at her then, but it would be a moment before I could. It was too much. The smile was stuck on my face, maybe permanently. I tried to cover it with my hand as I leaned my elbow on the window. Naomi didn't say anything else, although I felt her little glance in my direction. She let me deal with it, let it sink in. Knowing, in the way she always did, exactly when to give me time and when not to push me. My silences were always alright with her. 

“Yeah. Me too.” I cleared my throat but my voice still came out a little gruff. Naomi reached over and squeezed my arm. Her cheeks were flushed a little pink. 

Although we hadn't known the exact spot where we'd run into trouble, it was very obvious once we'd found it. The Walkers we'd run into were nowhere to be seen, but ears of corn spilled out across the road. As expected, the truck was tipped over. Naomi stopped alongside it and we got out to take a look. The driver’s side window was completely smashed in, and the front windshield was covered in a spiderweb of cracks. If we’d stayed in there instead of running, there’s no way it would’ve held. 

“Ain’t worth savin’,” I said. “Unless we got an exact replacement for that windshield.”
“Damn it,” she sighed.

We assessed the rest of the damage. Most of the crates had stayed in place where I’d strapped them down at Hilltop. Only a few of them had come loose and sent their contents spilling out across the road. We started with the mostly intact ones, undoing the straps and hauling them out together so that we could secure them in the second pickup. 

Naomi’s worried little frown was back, she kept glancing at my busted hand and trying to take more than her share of the weight. I kept my bandaged hand held up like only half of me was getting arrested, so she’d know for sure I wasn’t using it. 

“I can take a little more, darlin’,” I told her. There was only so long I could deal with her taking the brunt of what we were doing. 

“I got it,” she said, determined but even her voice was strained. 

“Nah, look,” I said. I shifted the crete up slightly so that I could balance it on my forearm. My hand was nowhere near taking any of it. In the weeks since I’d broken it, it had been feeling better and better. If I had tried to use it, sure, it probably would've ached more for a few days, but Naomi would've stressed about it for months. 

“Hmm,” she said skeptically, narrowing her eyes and ducking under the crate to make sure I wasn't putting an ounce of weight on that hand. 

“See?”

“It's a good thing you got those nice strong arms I guess,” she muttered, which I took to mean I'd passed her little check. 

“Nice, huh?” I said, sliding the crate along the back of the pickup to join the others. 

“C'mon,” she rolled her eyes, trying to play it cool as a cucumber while she was red as a tomato. “You know they are.” 

Once the crates were strapped into their new home, we set about picking up the corn that had spilled out across the road, gathering up as much as we could and throwing it into the back. Little drops of rain started falling from the sky. I glanced up at a dark cloud. Naomi paused and called over to me. 

“Daryl, does this look… eaten to you?” Naomi held up an ear of corn with a sizable chunk taken out of it. 

“I guess…” I shrugged. “Probably an animal.”

“Maybe,” she said, although she didn’t look convinced. I wondered if she'd always be like this, a little bit haunted by Negan's ghosts in the woods. 

“What, do ya think a Walker ate it?”

“Well, no…that's ridiculous, but…” the more we stared at it, the more the size and shape of it made it look like one bite taken by a human mouth. 

“Vegetarian Walker seems more likely than you quittin’ meant, I guess,” I said. She sighed. “Hey, maybe they're worried about the Polar Bears too. Tryna offset those methane emissions or whatever.”

“Shut up.” It had worked in distracting her. She tossed the ear of corn aside.

“Here, look,” I held up another one. “This one’s picked clean. Probably a deer or somethin’. Raccoons, maybe. Lots of critters eat corn.”

“Yeah, I guess,” she said, but her eyes still scanned the forest on either side of us. 

I was on high alert too. It was hard not to be, after everything we'd been through at Sanctuary. We kept gathering up the rest of the corn, finding the occasional critter-gnawed piece as we went. About halfway through, the heavens opened. Those small drops turned into big ones and we started moving as fast as we could. It didn't much matter how speedy we were, we were both soaked right through in a matter of minutes. 

When we'd got as much as we could, I called it and secured the lids of the crates that had broken open before they could fill with too much water. We jumped back into the pickup.

“Fuckin' soaked,” Naomi grumbled, slamming the door so hard behind her it shook a little more rain off the roof. “Wearing wet jeans should be a registered form of torture."

“Hmm,” I ran my eye over the way her wet clothes stuck to her. “Well, it looks good on ya.”

“Easy mister,” she said, but she'd started smiling again. “Weather really turned out of nowhere, huh?”

“Sure did,” I agreed. I didn't want to say anything about the seasons changing, didn't want her to dwell too much on how hard that was going to make food production. So instead I said, “You ain’t started drivin’.”

“I know.”

“Why?”

“Happy where I am,” she shrugged like it was nothing but I'd never known that girl to be happy where she was. She'd always been moving towards something bigger, better. “You wanna go?”

Hell no.

“Nah, I'm good to warm up in here for a bit.” I also tried to shrug like it was nothing, but I didn't want to start driving, didn't want to head back, not yet. The sun was getting low but I was determined to eek as much out of this day as I could. I held up the bag of food Bryce had got for us, “Wanna eat before we head back?”

“Yeah, that sounds good.” 

I opened up the bag, “Now, there's some meat in here but I can eat all of that if you're worried about Polar -”

“If you don't hand it over, I'm eating you,” she grumbled while I laughed. “Mia's double-grounded for even tellin' you that.”

I passed her one of the sandwiches Bryce had packed for us. They had some kind of meat in them, probably the last deer I'd shot that we'd smoked to make it last a little longer.  I unwrapped the other one for myself. Rain beat down on the roof, running in rivers down the windshield. We ate in cozy silence for a moment and then I said, “It was ’cause vegetables are cheaper than meat, wasn't it?”

“What?” she tried to play dumb but I knew I had her. 

“Not eating meat.”

“Oh my God, you’re obsessed with this,” she shook her head before she finally conceded, “But, yes.”

I nodded. I'd had a hunch from the moment she'd said it, but hadn't wanted to say anything in front of Mia. Naomi had her reasons for hiding it from her. While it had been kind of fun winding her up about it, I knew it had been just another example of Naomi going without so that Mia wouldn't. 

“Weren't no deers around, huh?”

“In the middle of D.C? No. Can’t say there were.”

“Roadkill’s free. That's cheaper than broccoli.”

“City roadkill is 90% exhaust fumes. I'd have poisoned us both. Will you drop it?”

“Just can't get my head around it. Need to know you ain't gettin’ soft on me, Nai.” 

“Nai?” she repeated. Thought she was about to spit her food out in disbelief. 

Aw hell.

“Better than Nomes, though. Right?” I said. In hindsight, it was mighty hypocritical of me to have made fun of her terrible college roommate's terrible name for her when I was just gonna wind up calling her every nickname that tasted sweet as honey on my tongue.

“God, anything’s better than Nomes…” she agreed. 

I looked at my sweet girl. “Does Mia know how much you give up for her?”

“No. And nor should she. She’s a kid,” she looked at me a little sternly like I was going to be the one to tell her. I wasn't. I knew it wasn't my place to do that, but someone should be appreciating the things Naomi did. 

“She's damn lucky, I said. “We both are.” 

She smiled. “Now who's gettin' soft, Dar?”

“Shut it,” I groaned. 

“No? Not Dar? What about Dixon, you prefer that? Call ya by your last name like you're some kinda jock?”

Dixon. 

She was teasing me, but it didn't sound like a curse when it came from her lips. The way she said it, with that big smile and all that warmth, it sounded good. 

“Do you like it?”

It's yours if you want it. 

“Like what?” she tilted her head to one side, scrutinizing me in the way she does when she thinks I've said something weird. Suddenly, my heartbeat hit right up against my ribs. 

“Dixon?”

“Yeah. 'Course I do. Prefer calling you Daryl, though. If you don't mind,” she said. “I’m your girlfriend, not your soccer buddy.”

“Hmm,” I nodded like I agreed with her but what I wanted to say was that ‘girlfriend’ didn’t feel like a good enough word these days. Truthfully, I don’t think it had ever felt strong enough, but with each passing day, it got flimsier and flimsier. “I don’t make you think of… y’know, Merle and…”

“Your Dad?” her eyes widened in surprise. “Oh. No. God, no. Sorry, I didn’t think… when I called you that I never thought it would…” 

“No, it's fine,” I said as quickly as I could, but I could see the misplaced guilt had already sunk in. It wasn't why I'd asked, but there was no way she could've known that.

“I don’t think of you as havin’ anythin’ in common with him. Not even the name,” she said. It wasn’t what I cared about, but it was nice to hear all the same. “But, I should’ve realized that… I mean, the best thing about my name is that I share it with Mia,”

Shit, I hadn’t thought of that.

“At least you made somethin' of your name, though,” I said. Another reason she might never want to give it up. Naomi Payton had appeared in bylines on the front pages of newspapers. I’d seen them myself. If someone broke into my Dad’s old place, the last place I’d been before the world went to shit, they’d find a drawer full of articles with that name on it. Neatly folded up like I was some kind of weirdo stalker.

“What, you think I like Payton?” she wrinkled her nose like she'd smelled something gross. 

“You don't?” 

“It's fine, I guess,” she shrugged. “I mean, it's no Nai.”

“C'mon, I was just tryin' something,” I said. She was grinning at me. I knew she had no idea why I was suddenly so interested in her thoughts on our last names, but her light teasing still managed to stop the anxiety I was spiraling into. Stop me from blurting out a proposal right there and then. 

“Been tryin' a lot lately,” she said, that grin not letting up. “Nai, baby, sweetheart, darlin', angel…”

“What can I say, you bring it out of me,” I said, trying to play it cool but my cheeks got warmer and warmer the more she listed. Especially as it felt like the tip of the iceberg. The shit I held myself back from saying when we had sex… girl should take out a damn restraining order. “Do ya hate it?”

“No,” she admitted reluctantly, but her voice was all soft. “I don’t. I mean, if anyone else ever called me baby or angel or good girl, I’d kick them in the teeth, but… there’s something about you sayin’ it that’s different.”

If anyone else called you that, I’d kill ‘em.

“Different, huh?”

“Yeah,” she said, something a little shy in the way she was looking at me now. “When it’s you, I love it.”

Oh shit. 

“Really?”

“Yeah,” she admitted, that shyness creeping into her smile again. “Makes me feel like I'm… I dunno…yours or something. Not in a weird way, not like I'm somethin' you own, more like… you've got me no matter what.”

“I do.”

“I know,” she said, her voice all quiet. “ And I love that.”

So be mine.

Be my goddamn wife.

Fuckin’ marry me, angel.

The words burned in my heart, but I couldn’t say them. I might not know much about having a girl, but I knew that sitting in some rain-soaked truck with a smoked deer sandwich and no ring wasn’t the way to go about asking that question.

As much as it could’ve been good to have some experience of this kind of thing before somehow landing the girl of my dreams, there was no way I could’ve been this way around anyone else. The way she knew when to let me sit in silence and give me the space to talk, and when to make a joke to get me out of my own head… It could only ever have been her. I couldn’t have chosen anyone else. Her choosing me back was nothing short of a miracle.

Everything I’d started doing at Sanctuary, having something to work on that was mine - something that didn't require brute strength or violence - something that built on what we were doing… It was the first time I'd felt even a little bit close to being the kind of man who deserved her. Truth was I was stuck between knowing I wasn't good enough, and that I'd never be able to let her go if someone worthy came along. Stepping up was my only option.

I patted the space on the bench seat right beside me and said, “C’mere then, angel.” 

She slid down until she was sitting next to me and I could put my arm around her shoulders. I hadn’t realized how cold the rain had made me until I felt the heat of her body against mine through our damp clothes. 

My fingers under her chin, I tilted her head toward mine, “I’m gonna take such good care of you, baby.” 

“You already do, dummy,” she said before I kissed her. 

You got no idea, angel.

No fuckin’ idea.

Chapter 59: Split

Naomi

Cocooned in the warmth of our comforter, I heard the door open as Daryl snuck in. He'd been working late the last few nights, but this was by far the latest he'd come to bed. I'd tried to wait up for him but wound up drifting in and out of sleep. Not long ago, the sound of a door opening while I slept would have thrown me into a wild panic. Hell, footsteps in the hall would have had me reaching for a knife. 

But, the longer I'd slept in Daryl's bed, the grip those fears had on me lessened. I was safe here, in this room, in this bed - our room, our bed. 

I didn't even feel the paranoid urge to check. I knew it was him. I knew how he sighed as he eased his boots off at the end of the day, the clink of his belt unfastening, the gentle rustle of his clothes hitting the floor. I knew him even in the quiet dark. Something about his presence soothed me right down to my very soul. 

The mattress dipped right behind me as he slipped into bed, my skin tingled in anticipation of his warm arm coming to wrap around my waist. I smiled against the pillow, "You're real late tonight." 

"Sorry, sweetheart," he murmured. His voice was its own kind of homecoming. 

"Don't be," I put my hand over where his arm had finally hugged my middle. "It's nice seein' you like what you're doing so much."

His other hand stroked through my hair, brushing it away from my neck so that he could start kissing it. Rough stubble and warm lips made me shiver. 

"Were you sleepin'?" he whispered against my neck between kisses. His hand started to drift lightly across my waist. 

"Only a little," I said, not wanting him to stop, but I could hear the sleepiness in my voice. 

His fingers stroked up my bare thigh and nudged the shirt I was wearing up a little. He started making light circles against my naked hip. "Is this okay?"

"Mmmhmm." My tired body relaxed even further into his touch. "It's nice."

"Good." 

His fingertips continued grazing my skin so lightly it made me shiver. He kissed the spot where my neck met my jawline. 

"You have a good day?" I asked him.

"Yeah, it was alright," he said, sounding distracted. His fingers ran through my hair again. "Finished the first batch of fuel tonight."

My eyes shot open. "No way!"

"Mmm-hmm."

"Daryl, that's -" I turned my head, but he caught my lips in a deep kiss before I could finish trying to congratulate him. Heated and hungry, it burned away a little of my sleepiness. I kept trying to talk in the gap between kisses, but I could only get a few words out before his lips silenced them again. “You're so… that's incredible… Daryl, you're… Daryl…Daryl!"

"What?" he finally stopped. 

"Can you stop kissing me for a sec so we can talk about this?" 

"Nope." He kissed me again to prove it.

"But-" I started to say before I was muffled by his lips again. His tongue against my teeth. It took all of my willpower to stop kissing him back long enough to ask. "Did you test it yet?"

"Nah," he answered reluctantly, with a heavy sigh. "Gotta finish fixing up some of the cars before we can test it."

"Okay, good," I said. "I don't wanna miss seeing it working for the first time."

"You'll be the first to know, I swear," he said, cupping my cheek to keep my face turned toward him. "Can I kiss you now?"  

"Impatient man," I laughed, "Yes, you can." 

"Finally," he sighed, his breath tickled my face. "Been thinkin' 'bout ya all day."

I was glad it was dark, so he couldn't see how much I was blushing. Still spooning me, he took advantage of my stunned silence to kiss me again. Urgent and soft all at once, like the taste of me was something he'd been starved of for months. I slipped my tongue into his mouth and felt the vibrations of his moan through his broad chest pressed tight against my back. One hand took my hip, pulling my lower body flush against his. I felt his hard length pressing against my ass, making it clear exactly what kind of thoughts he'd been having all day. 

Oh. 

Holy shit.  

I broke the kiss again, out of shock more than anything else. The good kind. The kind that made my heart flutter like crazy. "All day?"

"Mmmhmm," he nodded against my shoulder before planting a kiss there. "Can't be in that damn workshop without thinkin' about fucking ya."

My heart fluttered again at his admission and at the memory of his mouth between my thighs. The same lips and tongue that had teased me into sweet oblivion were now trailing hot kisses on the back of my neck again. Each one was slow and deliberate. "Sounds… distracting." 

"Damn straight. And knowin' I'm coming home to ya at the end of the day? Finding you like this…all tucked up in bed in just your panties and shirt…" He thumbed the shirt I was wearing, "This is one of mine, too, ain't it?"

"Yes," I admitted and felt him smile against my neck. He slipped one arm underneath me, and the hand from that arm started sneaking up my body to touch me under his shirt. His warm palm on my stomach drifted slowly further up to cup my breast. His other hand rested on top of my hip.

"So damn cute when you do that," his voice was low by my ear. My breath hitched in my throat as his thumb brushed ever so lightly against one of my nipples. It immediately hardened under his touch; it was crazy how quickly my body responded to him. His thumb lightly traced it, circling, making me writhe against him. My hips ground back against his lower body, and his lips found their way to my neck again. "How's a guy supposed to think about anythin' else all day when he's got somethin' so sweet waiting for him at the end of it? Huh?"

"You want me to sleep somewhere else?" I asked, smiling because I already knew the answer. "Help you keep your focus?"

"Fuck no," he said. The hand resting on my hip grazed across it and dipped between my thighs. "But you're causing me no end of trouble. How am I supposed to be someplace else when all I really wanna be is right here ?"

Two of his thick fingers stroked me through my underwear. I bit my lip in a futile attempt to stifle a moan. I ground my hips against the sensation of his erection at my back and his fingers pushing against my clit.

"God, I love it when you squirm for me," he whispered, rolling my hard nipple between his fingers in a way that made my eyes roll back in my head. His hips moved, too, grinding his erection against me. "You're so fucking sexy, Naomi."

I couldn't believe my ears. He'd always found it easier to say what was on his mind when nobody was looking at him, having the lights off was letting him express things he usually held back. Since we'd started sleeping together, I'd learned there was a whole other side to him that was completely new to me. New to him too, I think. And coaxing it out of him was proving to be the single hottest use of my time on this earth. 

Who knew that after all this time I'd still find new things to learn about him, new ways to love him? 

"Tell me to stop, baby, if you wanna go back to sleep…." Hot breath against my neck as he barely moved his lips from my skin to speak, his voice was thick with need. "But I want you, angel. Right now." 

"Holy shit, Daryl." I reached behind me, slipping my hand between our bodies to stroke him through the fabric of his boxers. I could feel the heat of it even through the material. 

"Fuuuck," Daryl grunted, moving against my hand as I gripped the thick ridge in his boxers, "Is that a yes, darlin'?" 

"Yes, Daryl." I nodded even though he couldn't see me. His hand was still buried between my thighs, his fingers making deep, rhythmic strokes across the dampening cloth there. I moved my own hand, slipping down through the elastic of his boxers to touch the length of him. Hot, silky skin against my palm, I ran my hand from tip to base, cupped his balls, and stroked back up again.

"Fuck, baby," he breathed, curling his fingers harder against the material separating him from my clit. "Ya got the touch of an angel, I swear to God…"

I ran my hand down again, stopping at the base to wrap my fingers around it. Grip it tight. Daryl let out a long, low breath. I slid my hand back up. "You're so hard for me, Daryl. God, I want your cock in me."

Thrills ran up my spine when I felt his cock throb at my words. He nipped at my ear, tugging at his shirt on my body, "Can I take this damn thing off you now?" 

I sat up so he could lift it over my head. "I only put the damn thing on because it smells like you, and I missed ya." 

Not having his arms around me was starting to feel like some kind of crime. The second my shirt was off, Daryl flung it out into the dark of our room. I felt his lips across my back, his hands roaming the front of my body. He pushed me back down onto my side. "Missed me, huh? How much?"

"I'm so wet for you," I whispered. Touching me lightly across my stomach, the ridge of my hip bone, Daryl's hand found its way back between my thighs, this time dipping under the waistband of my panties to verify it for himself.

"Fuck, so you are." Daryl gave another grunt of satisfaction and then tugged my underwear down. I reached down to slide it past my knees as he freed his hard cock from his boxers. I felt it push in between my closed thighs. One arm underneath me crossed my upper body so that his fingers could keep lightly teasing my nipples. His other held my hips in place while he rolled his against mine, rubbing his hard cock against my slick slit. 

I almost begged him to put it in right there and then, but thankfully I had my wits about me enough not to. 

"Mmm, wait, Daryl, we should-"

"Yeah, I know," he sighed. "I got you, girl, don't move."

He shifted a little behind me, and I heard the rustle of a condom wrapper in the dark. I waited as he rolled it on, wondering if I should turn to face him even though he'd explicitly asked me not to. Well, he hadn't asked so much as demanded it, but somehow I didn't mind. Whatever part of me that melted when he gave me one of his crazy pet names also fluttered when he got a little bossy. 

I felt the heat of him at my back again, his legs behind mine, one of his hands slid over my thigh and then slipped between them again. His voice was gruff, "Open up for me, sweetheart."

I opened my leg a little, and he gripped my thigh in his warm hand, holding it up as he pressed the rubber-clad swollen head of his cock against my entrance. 

"I'll go slow, baby, I know you been sleepin'," he said. I was wide awake now, but there was something so quiet and tender in his voice and in the way he slowly pushed inside me that it drew a long moan from my lips. It was the tip, but the anticipation made me shiver. He kissed my neck again and whispered, "That's it, angel, jus' like that…"

"Oh, fuck," I gasped as he slowly rocked his hips back and forth, pulling back only to push a little more of himself in each time. 

"Nice an' slow," he breathed. I wasn't sure if it was to remind me or himself, but there was no way I could forget. I was blissfully aware of where he was filling me and the space aching for the rest of him. "There's my girl."

"Why you always gotta make me wait like this?" I groaned.

"You don't like it?" he asked. I felt his smile against my neck. "'Cause the way you're moaning suggests somethin' very different, Naomi."

"No, I like it," I said. It wasn't a complaint, not really. Everything he was doing was such sweet torture, but I felt like I was about to explode from the sheer need that was building inside me. "But fuck me, you're such a goddamn tease." 

"I like knowing my girl's ready for me," he said, continuing to rock slowly into me, giving me time not just to adjust to the size of him but also to start longing for more. "And that ya want me."

How the fuck could I want anything else?

Slowly, he stroked himself all the way inside of me. I cried out, feeling his hot length as deep inside me as he could get. "It's not a want, Daryl, it's a fuckin' need."

Daryl exhaled sharply through his nose, but my words earned me a slight increase in his pace. He slipped an arm underneath me again, using it to hold my body flush against his. Hitting a spot inside me that made me weak. My eyes rolled back in my head involuntarily, " Fuck , how do you do that?"

"Do what, angel?" He knew. I could tell from the smugness in his voice and how he angled himself so that he could hit the right spot even deeper this time that he knew.

"You always know right where to…" The words dissolved on my tongue, my head too foggy with desire, and the way he was making me clench around him as he pushed in and out. My hips rolled back against him, trying to coax him into going a little faster. "Fuck, Daryl…you really know how to fuck me…"

"Yeah… well, I wanna treat my girl right," he said, but some of his control was slipping. I could feel it in the way his fingers dug deep into my thigh and the increasing momentum of his thrusts.

"You always do," I said. I hooked my raised leg over him, freeing up his hand. Warm, rough skin across my stomach as he ran it up my body to cup my breast. Roll my nipple between his fingers and make me squirm again. "You know just how to touch me… Nobody's ever touched me like you do."

Daryl groaned. "You're gonna have to stop talkin' like that, girl, or I ain't gonna last." 

I smiled. 

"Nobody's ever fucked me like you do... or made me want them as bad as I want you, Daryl."

He exhaled sharply through his nose, the same way he does when he's annoyed I'm beating him at something. "What did I just tell ya?"

"You want me to shut up, Daryl? You're gonna have to make me."

"Listen, baby, I love those pretty little sounds you make," he said, fucking me harder and deeper. His hand had moved back down to grip my hip, and the one hooked underneath me pulled me tight against his chest, holding me right where he wanted me. Drilling his hard cock into me over and over. "But I'm damn lucky these lights are off. You look so fucking pretty taking my cock, do ya know that? Ain't no way I could handle you running your pretty little mouth like this if I could see ya too. My beautiful girl." 

Okay, yeah, that'll do it. 

God bless the dark for letting him say these things. And for hiding how damn red my face was flushing. It worked, too. I couldn't say a damn thing. I could feel my mouth hanging open, but all that was coming out were these high-pitched moans that sounded closer to sobs than anything else. It had taken me so long to convince him that it was okay to be a little rougher with me, that I was not going to break if he fucks me a little harder, and here I was, breaking in the most exquisite way. 

" Fucking hell, Naomi ," his fingernails dug deep into my hip. His other hand grabbed mine, our fingers as intertwined as we were. I tilted my head back and his lips caught mine again, hot and hungry. "God, you're so wet tonight, pretty girl."

"Daryl…" It was more of a whine than a moan as he pounded into me. 

"Somethin' you want, Naomi?" he asked.

"You're gonna make me cum," I managed to choke out the words.

"Oh yeah? You gonna cum for me, angel?" he said. "C'mon then, baby. Let me feel ya cum all over my cock. Cum for me, angel. 

I vaguely remember his name burning on my lips and then it seared through me in pulsing waves. Pleasure so strong I'm certain I'd have fallen apart if he hadn't been holding me so tightly to him. I'd never felt such a goddamn high.

"That's it, angel. That's my girl," he muttered soothingly in my ear. He'd slowed his strokes, which only served to prolong the waves of pleasure coursing through me. His hand moved back to hold up my trembling thigh. "Look at you, sweet thing, you're shaking."

"God, I love you so much," I said, trying to catch my breath. Trying to think straight again.

"Oh, fuck," his breathing got more erratic, his thrusts suddenly faster. Behind me, his body stiffened. Mine was so limp but so ready for him - like a goddamn ragdoll he could throw around. All I wanted was his pleasure. I didn't know if it was that he'd just taken me over the edge, or hearing that I loved him, or a mix of the two, but he was suddenly a hell of a lot closer himself. "Naomi, you're… you're…"  

"I'm all yours, Daryl," I murmured to him. 

Daryl let out a deep groan, a hint of amazement in his voice. "What did you just say?" 

"What, you think I didn't know? You think I don't know who I belong to? I'm yours, Daryl." Our hands gripped each other tight in the dark as I felt him twitch and throb inside me. I clenched around him again. "I love you so damn much."

He held me tight against him as he came, a deep guttural moan roaring out of him and a final few slow strokes of his cock inside me while he finished. Panting, his body relaxed. I sighed, satisfied. Wrapping his arms around me, he squeezed my naked body tight against his. His chin rested on my shoulder, cheek pressed against mine. "I love you too, baby, you have no idea."

We lay like that for a moment, catching our breath. It was the only sound in the now quiet dark. His cock still inside me, Daryl nuzzled against my neck. I reached back and stroked his hair. 

"You're incredible, Daryl," I said. My whole body was so tired, so satisfied. 

"Ain't nothin'," he mumbled, but he squeezed my body a little tighter. 

"Nah, I meant everything I said - about how you touch me, how you fuck me. Nobody could love me like you do."

I could feel him breathing against my back, his face nestled into me because even though it was dark, even though I had my back to him and couldn't see him even if the lights were on, he still had to hide to say, "You're everything to me. I can't lose ya. I won't ever be able to let you go."

"I don't want to go anywhere," I assured him. "I wanna be right wherever you are."

"Let's get you cleaned up, sweetheart," he said. The place where we joined was embarrassingly wet, but I tried not to feel too self-conscious about it because I knew he always got a kick out of knowing how much he turned me on. He pulled his softening cock out of me. "Gimme a sec, angel."

I felt him roll away and closed my eyes for a moment, still basking in how good I felt. 

"Um…what the fuck?" Daryl muttered to himself and then, slightly louder, "Oh… shit.

"You good?" I propped myself up on my elbow. That hadn't been a good 'oh shit'.

"Um… I think the condom broke."

Fuck.

Cold panic gripped me. I sat bolt upright, "What?"

Daryl flicked on a nearby lamp, and neither of us was left in any doubt that the damn thing had well and truly split. He gulped, "I thought something felt… different, but I never… I didn't think…" 

Before he could form a full sentence, I was on my feet and scrambling into any clothes I could get my hands on. I bolted to the nearest bathroom.

I cleaned myself up as best I could but it all felt futile. The damage, if there was any, would be hard to mitigate at this point. Head in my hands, heart racing, I sank down onto the toilet seat. 

What the fuck do I do?

What are the chances of finding non-expired Plan B in the apocalypse?

I'm betting it's zero. 

Mia and I had both been C-section babies. Momma had taken every opportunity she could find to remind me how difficult her pregnancy had been with me. Things neither of us would have survived without the intervention of modern medicine. How my birth had single-handedly ruined her life. 

I'd spent my life avoiding finding any similarities between me and my Momma, but they cropped up from time to time. The temper I had, the all-consuming rage that had driven me to kill Ronnie was the same anger she'd turned on me when she'd burned cigarettes into my skin. Now, I was forced to stand in front of the bathroom mirror and ask - Were we built the same? Were my hips narrow like hers? Did I look like her?

What if I end up just like her? 

What if I damage my kid like she broke me?

This had always been my deepest fear when the topic of kids came up. But it had never before come up in such a real, possible way. And that had all been before I had to think about keeping them alive in a world like this one. I knew if I started thinking about that I'd never leave the bathroom. So I forced myself back out into the hallway. 

I took a moment outside our bedroom door. Caught up in my own panic, I hadn't had time to think about how freaked he might be.

Shit. Poor guy.

I closed my eyes, took a deep calming breath and opened the door. He stood up when I came in, hands nervously fidgeting with his own fingers. 

"Hey," I said softly. "Sorry, I ran out on ya, I just had to…try and… deal with that."

"'S'okay," he said. "You okay?"

"Yeah," I forced my voice to sound as light as possible. "You?"

"Yeah," he nodded.

"It'll be okay," I said, unsure which of us I was trying to reassure. Nothing but a negative pregnancy test or the arrival of my period would calm me down, so I hoped I could keep the worry away from Daryl until we knew for sure we had something to worry about. I sank onto our bed. 

"I'm so sorry," he said quietly, sitting down next to me. "I didn't feel it happen or anything. Or maybe I did, but I didn't realize at the time… I never thought… I didn't..."

I put a hand on his arm. All the things he could have been stressed about right now, and the thing he was most worried about was that I was blaming him for it? 

Maybe reality hasn't set in yet. 

"It's okay," I said again, and this time I meant it. "Accidents happen, it's not on you. We're good." 

"Good," he looked relieved. I waited for the other panic to set in - the looming realization that one slip-up could thrust him into fatherhood. I tried to ease it before it hit him.

"Statistically, it's unlikely that y'know…." I couldn't even bring myself to say the word 'pregnant' in case I spoke it into being. "...from one time. Some people have to try for years before…"

"Yeah," he nodded. "I know."

"You're so… calm," I said, studying his face in the half-light for any sign that he was trying to hide it from me. "How are you so calm?"

"I mean… it ain't like we can know anything for sure right now," he said with a little shrug of his shoulders. He looked down at his fingers again. "So I guess we'll just…figure things out when we do, right?"

What the fuck does that mean?

"Yeah, I guess," I said. I lay down. My head was spinning. I was too exhausted to keep sitting upright. 

Daryl lay down next to me, and he put his arm around me. "It'll be alright, Naomi. No matter what. I got you."

"Mmhmm." I rested my head on his chest. My chances of a restful night's sleep were dwindling to zero, but I couldn't get my head around how calm he seemed now. Was he doing the same thing I was? Panicking and trying to play it cool so he didn't freak me out.

Maybe he actually wasn't scared yet. Maybe it hadn't sunk in, or maybe it was just because he hadn't spent his life fearing this moment the way I had. My pregnancy anxiety felt like a disease. If I started talking about pregnancy complications and mortality rates, he'd spin out. He barely held it together when I caught a fever or got a cut. Having to make plans about how he'd raise a baby alone if I died in childbirth wasn't a conversation I felt strong enough to have right now. Before I could broach it with him, I needed to make peace with it.

I heard him drop off to sleep, and tried to find the usual comfort I got from listening to his steady breathing. Most likely, he thought I was overreacting, being overly cautious. 

Maybe he was right.

It was one time, right? One little accident. Nothing was certain.

 

 

 

Daryl

I didn't want to be away from Naomi, but we'd promised Mia regular trips to Alexandria, and Rick had things he wanted to discuss with us. Apparently, you can't just put all of that on hold because there's a very, very small chance that the love of your life is carrying your child especially when you can't tell anyone that because you don't know for sure and won't know for a few torturous weeks. 

Naomi had asked me to take Mia this time. She'd said it was because Rick wanted an update on the fuel, and we had to arrange a way of getting Alexandria's vehicles to Sanctuary so I could modify them, but I couldn't help wondering if she was trying to keep me distracted. 

It didn't matter where I was; Naomi was all I could think about. That had always been true, but it felt even more pronounced now. Rick kept trying to talk to me about some run into D.C. he wanted to do when winter passed, but I couldn't take in much of what he was saying. Even though he was talking about getting old farming supplies from some museum, therefore lessening our reliance on the small amount of fuel Sanctuary would be able to produce, I couldn't listen for too long. My mind kept wandering. He didn't say it, but I could tell Rick wished Naomi had come instead of me because she'd have loved this kind of shit. I wasn't offended because I wished she was here, too. 

I've never been known as a patient man, but this was driving me out of my mind. Waiting for some test to tell me if our whole future was changing, I couldn't do it. I was itching to know. I wanted her to take the damn thing now.

Wait. 

Do we even have pregnancy tests?

It hadn't occurred to me to ask. Or check. I wouldn't be able to go on a run to get one until I'd got Mia back to Sanctuary, but the thought of having some small thing to do was tantalising, which is how I wound up sneaking into Alexandria's storage rooms and shuffling through their medical supplies. 

"Not stealing from us, are you?" Rick's cheerful voice made me want to run a mile. 

"No," I said quickly, but I sprang away from the shelves I'd been rummaging in before he could get too close a look at where I'd been looking. 

Too late. He frowned. "Are you not feeling well? If you're looking for something specific, I can get Denise, she's got a pretty good idea of how the meds are stocked."

It wasn't all that long ago that a cop catching a guy like me rooting through medical supplies would have arrested me on the spot. And he'd have been right; I'd most likely have been stealing gear for me and Merle. 

Fuck. Who in their right mind would wanna have a kid with a guy like me?

No wonder she freaked out.

"Nah, I'm fine."

Rick frowned, expecting me to say something and explain myself, but I couldn't think anything except Naomi might be pregnant. I hadn't been able to think of anything else all week. "Is it Mia? Is she feeling okay?"

"Mmhmm," I nodded. Again, no excuse came outta me. I didn't have any space in my brain to think of one. 

"Ok-ay," Rick said slowly, still giving me the space to pull an excuse out of my ass. When I didn't, he continued, "Well, I came looking for you because Michonne and I were hoping to go over some of our ideas about that D.C. trip."

"Yeah. Fine," I said. I knew I should walk away from the supply shelves and find some other time to come back, but my feet had grown roots. 

"First off, as a head's up, Carl is desperate to come with us to D.C.," he said. "Michonne and I haven't decided yet and probably won't until we are clearer on what the trip entails and how dangerous it might be."

"Right," I said. 

It seemed to have fuck all to do with me, and that thought must have shown on my face because Rick followed up with, "If we let Carl join us, I assume Mia will want to come too, and it might be harder for you guys to say no if we've already okayed Carl being on the team. Just wanted to raise that now so you're not caught off guard when she asks."

"Alright. Thanks."

"Also, they'll probably start asking early," he said. "And if Mia's anything like Carl, then she might  do that whole divide and conquer thing that kids sometimes do."

He said it like I was supposed to know what the Hell that meant. "Divide and conquer?"

"Yeah, you know, they ask for something, but they ask for it separately. That way if Mom says no but Dad says yes, they already have someone on side to convince the other one."

Something in my chest ached at the way he assumed Naomi and my mutual responsibility for Mia. I know Noami was coming close to seeing things that way, but I was sure it would take Mia a while, if ever, to put us in equal standing like that.

"Oh," I said. There was a lump in my throat. There'd been one there a lot over the last week. "Yeah, that divide and conquer. Sneaky. Thanks."

"Secondly, we don't wanna go until we know we have a good supply of fuel to make the trip there and back," he said. "And enough vehicles to carry back everything we're hoping to get. So if you could just quit creeping around in here and come back inside the house so that Michonne and I can talk through where we're at with all that..."

"Fine," I sighed, starting to move toward him in the doorway. I felt a deep pull back toward those shelves, like the answer to my life's biggest question was nestled right there between some aspirin and a band-aid.

"Sorry, Daryl, I gotta know," he said. "What the hell are you looking for in here?"

I fought the urge to tell him to go to Hell, but I knew that wouldn't have been fair. He had no way of knowing how badly he was prying into my business right now, or how personal this was. Plus, I was technically looting supplies from a community that wasn't my own anymore. He had every right to stick his nose in. 

"This stays between us?"

Rick's expression changed to one of deep concern. "Of course, Daryl. You're my brother, you can trust me. You know that."

I nodded, appreciating the sentiment, but so far this had just been something between Naomi and me. Nobody else. Bringing someone else in so early felt wrong, like a jinx. I took a deep breath. "You got any pregnancy tests?" 

The smile that broke out across Rick's face almost split it in half. He stepped up like he was about to hug me. " Woah , Daryl, are you guys trying? That's huge, man-"

"No," I backed away from him. "Not exactly, we…" 

I didn't even know how to say it. I already felt like I'd shared way too much, but I didn't want people gossiping. Setting the record straight with Rick would mean he knew not to run his mouth about it unless he got confirmation that we were actually expecting.

Thankfully, Rick got it. "Ah. A scare, huh?"

"Somethin' like that," I shrugged, but 'scare' didn't feel like the right word.

"Been there, man," Rick chuckled as he walked deeper into the storage room toward the shelves of Alexandria's spare medical equipment. 

"You have?"

"Yeah," Rick said, reaching up to slide a box off the top shelf. "Lori and I were so young when we met.  We were still at school - kinda like you guys, I guess." 

"Kinda," I said, although it didn't feel that similar to me at all. I couldn't imagine having the guts to make a move on her back then. I got a sudden flash of how Rick must've been at high school, all confident and popular. 

"Lori comes to me one day in our senior year all freaked out because her period was late," Rick said. "She was convinced she was pregnant and we were gonna have to go home and tell her parents."

"What did you do?"

"I did what I thought was right," he said. "I asked her to marry me. Boy, was that a mistake."

"A mistake ? " I repeated. How could that be true? She'd said yes , they'd had more than ten years together before the world ended. I knew he'd found something special with Michonne now, but was he really calling all of that a mistake ?

"Yeah, she turned me down," Rick said. "It really pissed her off, actually. She said that I was only proposing because she might be pregnant, not because I really wanted to marry her. In hindsight, I can see where she was coming from, I just panicked and blurted it all out. It wasn't like we'd talked about it before."

"So what happened?"

"Well, it turned out she wasn't pregnant, she was just late," Rick shrugged. "She eventually cooled down, and I made sure that when I asked her to marry me for real she was one hundred percent sure that it was because I wanted her. "

"But how did you and Lori know?" I asked. "When it was for real, I mean… with Carl?"

I sidestepped asking about Judith. I remembered that whole mess well enough. 

"Oh," his eyebrows raised a little as he thought back. "Well, we'd been trying for a kid since our wedding, so he wasn't much of a surprise. Lori was so excited she was basically taking a pregnancy test a week so we didn't have much time for her to notice any… changes."

"Right," I nodded, but suddenly the gulf of information about what those changes might be reared up in front of me. "Like… morning sickness and stuff?"

"Yeah," Rick nodded, studying me. "Lori got sick pretty bad at first. Wasn't always in the morning though, they don't always tell you that so we were not prepared."

"Did anything help her?"

"Has Naomi been…?"

"No. It would be way too early for that," I said quickly. He'd laugh if he knew how ahead of myself I was getting. "I just…wanna be prepared…and know what to look out for, y'know? So I can look after her if she ain't feeling good."

Rick gave me a look that made me wish I hadn't said anything. "Well ain't that-"

"Don't," I warned him.

"Alright, well, from what I remember, she was constantly drinking ginger tea, which she hated but it was the only thing that stopped her feeling nauseous. She only wanted to eat plain foods, which given how much you can't eat when you're pregnant was probably a blessing."

Oh no, Naomi loves snacks. 

"Shit, that's right," I said.

"Of course, some of that wouldn't be a problem now," Rick said. "It ain't like Naomi can go on a sushi run. But, she might have to be careful with some of that Hilltop cheese. Eggs can be risky too, I think. And make sure any meat she eat is cooked all the way through."

I nodded, wondering if I should be writing any of this down and hoping Naomi would be okay with me cooking her food so thoroughly it was basically charcoal. "Alright, what else?"

"Well, the obvious ones like alcohol and coffee," he said.

Shit, she loves coffee too.

"Right."

"Honestly, you'd be better off asking Michonne while you're here," Rick said. "Maggie's literally going through it right now, I'm sure she'd -"

"Nah," I cut him off real quick. "I shouldn't even have told you."

"Okay," he said. "When you know for sure, then."

"Yeah." 

"Until then," he pulled two small, flat boxes out of the bigger box he'd pulled down from the top shelf. He handed the pregnancy test to me, and I was surprised something so important could come in such a small box. "Good luck, man… for whichever outcome you want."

He smirked as he said it, because I'm pretty sure he could see it written on my face. Even though I was doing my best to hide it. Even though it had such a slim chance of happening. I knew that. I repeated it to myself over and over. So how was it I could already feel that baby in my arms? How could I already feel their little hand wrapped around my finger, looking up at me with a smile just like their Momma's - beautiful and all for me.

"Thanks," I said. I slipped them so carefully into my back pocket. Would they stop working if they got squished? I didn't think so, but now they felt like the most important things I'd ever held. "I'll just go and hide these in my bag, then I'll be right in and we can talk about D.C. or whatever."

"Alright," Rick was still grinning at me like an idiot. "See you in there."

"Yeah," I nodded, and left before I had to deal with any more of that shit-eating grin. 

I sped-walked back to Aaron's house where Mia and I were staying. Carl, Mia and Perla were sitting out on the same porch bench that Naomi and I had our first proper conversation on when we'd found each other again. 

"Daryl?" Mia stood up when she saw me coming.  

Shit. 

I tugged the back of my shirt over the two test boxes peeking out of it. We'd agreed nobody would know until we were certain, and that was doubly true for Mia. 

"You guys good?" I asked them, not stopping to chat as I climbed the steps up to the house. My new stash was burning a hole in my pocket. Carl and Perla kind of nodded, and I hoped Mia would get the message that I was busy. 

No such luck, Mia followed me into the house. "Are you going to talk to Rick about the D.C. trip?"

News travels fast, huh?

"Maybe," I said, turning into the living room where I'd set up camp on the sofa. "Why?"

"Can I go, Daryl? Please?"

It hit me for a second, that she was actually asking me. That she thought I had some kind of say over her life. Rick's advice echoed in my head, and I couldn't let the moment overwhelm me. "Maybe. I'll need to talk about it with Naomi."

"We could all go," she said. "Then Naomi and I could show you -"

"It ain't a tourist trip, Mia." I said, stopping her before she could try and tempt me with a tour of things that I'd desperately wanted to see before the world ended. "It's dangerous."

"But…" Mia said. "Carl's going…"

"That ain't been decided yet, actually," I said. She looked embarrassed that I'd caught her in a lie.

"Alright," she admitted. "But I do know my way around."

"So does your sister," I reminded her with a shrug. "Sure Bryce does too. I'm sure a lot of folks do."

"Fine," she sighed, admitting temporary defeat.

"We can talk about it closer to the time," I said. "When we've had a chance to scout out how dangerous it'll be. Alright?"

"Okay," she looked disappointed, and turned to leave. "Hey, kid… before ya go…”

"Yeah?" she spun on her heels in the doorway.

God, I don't know how to start this conversation.  

"You know I love your sister, right?"

"Ye-es," Mia said slowly, a little frown flickering across her face. "Where's this going?"

"Well, you're the only family she's got and I know usually you ask a dad this kind of shit but she's never-"

Mia made noise in a pitch higher than I'd ever heard another human being make. "Oh my god. Are you… are you going to propose?!"

"Keep your voice down."

"She's miles away, she can't hear us!"

"Yeah, I know, but…" I took a deep breath. "Look, I might not ask for a while. We ain't been… I don't wanna rush anything."

" Rush? You've known each other longer than I've been alive."

"I know, but we've only actually been a couple for…"

"No," Mia said. "Stop it. You know her. You make her happy. Like, actually properly happy. I've never seen her like that, you have to ask her."

My face felt like it was on fire. I'd shared way too much with way too many people today. "I want to, but I probably ain't gonna ask for a while. I just wanted to know if you'd be okay with it."

"Yes I'd be okay with that!! " Mia nodded , she had this big smile on her face and made that damn squealing noise again. "God, this is why you've been so weird lately. It all makes sense."

"I have not."

"You have. You've been all… quiet and distracted."

"I just… want it to be the right time, y'know?" I sighed. "So… don't tell anyone, okay?"

"I won't," she said. I thought she might run off to hang on with her friends again, but she didn't. She looked at me with this big smile spreading across her face. There was something kind of shy about it, "Hey, you know that means you'll be my brother, right? Like, officially, my brother-in-law."

That damn lump was back in my throat. I tried to clear it. "Yeah, I guess I would. You okay with that?"

Mia hugged me. "I think I'll like that."

"Yeah, I reckon I will too," I hugged her back. "...if she says yes."

"She will," Mia rolled her eyes and let go of me. 

"You think?" I asked as she walked back out of the room. 

"I know," she called back over her shoulder as she practically skipped out of the room to rejoin her friends. "Ask her."

God, I hope that kid can keep a secret. 

Finally alone, I took the pregnancy tests back out of my back pocket and knelt down by my backpack. I wrapped them up in a bandanna. Not sure why, maybe to hide them or maybe to keep them safe. I put the little bundle into my backpack, and gave myself a second to sit down on the sofa and catch my damn breath. 

I could hear Mia's voice outside, but not what they were talking about. I'd wanted her to know, wanted to make sure she was okay with me being a permanent part of her sister's life. But, now I was worried I'd asked too fast. I had no idea when I'd even ask Naomi herself. Now that we had something else going on, I didn't want her to think I was asking just because I'd knocked her up. On the other hand, what the fuck was I waiting for?

Chapter 60: Vitamins and Tests

Naomi

"We've just got to get through the winter," Bryce said. "When things start growing again, we'll be alright."

He meant it to sound reassuring, but winter felt long and too close. I nodded as if I agreed, but I couldn't help thinking back to last winter and how hard it had been on a much smaller group. 

How am I supposed to feed even more people?

How am I supposed to have a healthy baby if I can't even feed myself?

Not for the first time that week, I resisted a deep urge to put a hand over my stomach. It was still too early to know anything, but it was woven into my every thought. Sanctuary's looming food crisis had become incorporated into a list of reasons I was doomed to fail as a mother. The list was getting longer and more worrying by the day. Daryl and I had spent our childhoods scrounging for scraps, stealing, and hunting to stay alive. The thought of a child of ours facing the same fate made me want to scream. 

"I know," I took a deep breath, trying to squash the queasy worry deep inside me. I put my feet up on the desk between us and sighed. "But we can't just wait around for that. We need to build up our supplies as much as possible before winter hits and increase our hunting, too. We can smoke and salt the meat we get to make it last longer." 

Bryce nodded. "We should pickle the vegetables, too."

None of this sounded particularly appetizing. "At least Eugene will be happy."

Bryce grimaced, "Let's keep him out of the kitchen until spring." 

"I wonder if the King would let us borrow Carol for the winter," I said. "She can make something good out of absolutely nothing."

The memory of Eric's identical skills hit me like a sharp pang. I didn't say it out loud, but it snuck up on me in the way that only the memory of a lost loved one can - a sharp blade between the ribs when you least expect it. 

"I think she might be the one person we'd never be able to get Ezekiel to give up," Bryce chuckled. 

"You might be right about that," I said. It had been a while since we'd seen Carol or the King, but there'd been no escaping how close they'd gotten. Seeing her happy after she'd been struggling so much was nice, but I knew Daryl missed her and the times when their group had all been in the same place. Maggie and Glenn were happy at Hilltop, and Rick and Michonne had slipped seamlessly back into life in Alexandria. The more settled they all became in their separate places, the harder it was to imagine a near future where they'd all be together again. Daryl said Mia and I were enough for him, but how long would that remain true? They were his family, too.

Winter was likely to isolate us all even more. If the snow was anything like last year, there would be weeks, maybe even months, when the roads would be impossible to use.

I should get us all together soon. Do something before it's too late.

"Naomi?"

"Sorry," I shook my head to clear the tiredness that had caused my thoughts to drift. "I zoned out for a sec."

"You look tired."

"Gee, thanks." I pulled a face like I was offended. Bryce rolled his eyes. 

"I'm just saying. You're always awake these days. Can't be good for you."

"Neither is having no food," I said. Smoking extra meat and pickling the relatively small amount of vegetables we'd grown here didn't sound like enough. "Would it be crazy to try and scavenge more freezers?" 

Bryce thought about it for a moment. "Not sure we have the power for that."

"We could move some of the living quarters," I said, "It won't be popular, but it might free up one of the generators to support it."

"Can we do that?"

"I dunno, I'll ask Eugene," I rubbed my eyes like it would stop the headache that had seeped so deep into my brain that I knew only sleep would fix it. Immediately, I regretted doing it. Bryce knew the gesture well. 

"Get some sleep, Naomi," he said, standing up from the table to leave so that my choices were to go to bed or sit here talking to myself. "We're not going to solve this overnight."

"Yeah," I said, knowing when I was defeated. "I'll head off in a minute."

"Promise?"

"Pinky swear," I wiggled my little finger at him. He did the same back from the doorway and then left.

I folded my arms and rested my head on them. Truthfully, I was exhausted. But I hated sleeping in our room without Daryl. It was sickening how quickly I'd gotten used to it and how big the bed felt without his warmth pressed right up against me.

At some point, I must have drifted off with my forehead resting on my arms because the next thing I knew, a voice on the radio jolted me awake. 

"Alexandria to Sanctuary," Daryl's voice boomed out. "Come in." 

I picked up the receiver and glanced at the clock. It was damn late to be calling, and given everything that had gone down last time one of us had radioed the other from Alexandria, nerves clenched my stomach. I scrambled to grab the transmitter and pushed the button to talk. "Everything okay?"

"Naomi? That you?" The excitement in his voice turned my nerves to butterflies. He wouldn't sound so happy if something was wrong, right?

"Sure is," I started to relax. "You all good?" 

"Yeah."

"Is Mia okay?" The delay the radio caused to his response time was killing me. 

"Yeah, she's all good," he said. "Although she's been asking if she can go on this trip to DC that Rick's gearing up for."

"We don't even know if we're going."

"I know."

"What did you say?"

"That we'd have to talk about it, y'know, the three of us. Didn't want her to do that divide and conquer thing that kids do."

The silence hung in the air while I waited for him to explain. When he didn't, I radioed back, "The what?"

"Y'know, they ask one…person for something, so they've got back up if the other one tries to say no."

It was the first I'd heard of it, but I didn't know what to say, so I just said, "Oh, sneaky." 

"Yeah," he said, sounding a little puzzled. "She never done that before?"

"She's never had anyone else to ask before."

"Oh." My heart clenched at the way he said it. All soft. Through the radio, I heard him clear his throat again before he asked, "Is it okay that she asked?"

"Of course it is," I said. There was no use worrying about Mia getting attached; she was already there, and there was nobody more steadfast to attach yourself to than Daryl. I pushed the button to speak again. "Is that why you called? Feels like that could've waited until you're both home." 

There was a short, embarrassed silence, and his voice became quieter. "Nah. Just wanted to say hi."

I could almost hear that reluctant tug at the corners of his mouth.

"Well," I hated how much I was smiling like a lovesick teenager. "Hi."

"Hi." 

"Hey." A sudden burst of giddy energy pushed me up, away from the table. 

"You said that already."

"I know," I started speaking more quietly as I walked back to our room, not wanting to wake anyone at this hour. "You know you're coming back tomorrow, right? And you can say hi in person then."

"Yeah, I know," he said. "Just wanted to see how you were feeling, I guess." 

"How I'm… feeling?"

"Yeah, y'know…you ain't feeling sick or anything?"

Oh shit. That.

"Oh. No, I'm fine… no, um, changes," I said, pushing open the door to our bedroom. "Are you okay?"

Maybe it was finally hitting him, and he'd radioed because Mia asking him for something had caused a freakout about parenthood to come crashing down on him. I'd been expecting it daily. It had been so long that I'd started to believe it was never coming, that he'd think I was overreacting if he knew just how much my mind was spinning over this. 

"You already asked me that," he pointed out. It was an infuriating non-answer. If he'd been standing right in front of me, I'd have been able to see if there was any worry lingering in his eyes. I slipped my shoes off. 

"Yeah. But, are you?" 

"'Course I am." 

"You sure?" I tried to push him as I unfastened my jeans one-handed and wiggled out of them. "'Cause it's awful late to be callin' just to say hi."

"Were you in bed? Did I wake ya?"

"I'm about to be," I said, not wanting to admit I'd fallen asleep at the table because it was better than sleeping apart from him. The room didn't feel so empty now that Daryl's voice echoed through it. Even the bed didn't seem so lonely. 

"Well, while I've got ya…" Daryl cleared his throat. My heart lurched. Was this it? I waited for him to say more, but it faded to static. 

"Yeah?"

"The hell does Wuthering mean?"

"Withering?" I assumed I'd misheard, and my heart sank. My mind immediately jumped to the few measly plants we'd managed to grow. My headache started creeping back. I'd hoped, among other things, that going to Alexandria would give him a break from these problems.

"No. Wuthering," he said, "like in Wuthering Heights ."

You could have given me a thousand tries and I'd never have guessed that was what he was talking about. "Stormy. Windy. It's just the name of the house."

"Right," he said. "And why are there so many damn Catherines in this book?" 

"What book?" I pulled back the sheets and slipped into bed. 

It was still disappointingly cold, but it was easier to ignore when Daryl's voice was so close. "Withered whatever." 

" Wuthering Heights ?" 

"Yeah." 

"You're reading it?" I glanced around the room for the copy Negan had brought me with the now-destroyed picture of my family. I couldn't remember what I'd done with it, but it wasn't here.

"Yeah. I can read."

"I know you can read," I said, rolling my eyes even though he couldn't see me. "Just thought you'd be a bit busy for a Bronte." 

There was another slightly embarrassed pause. I settled down into the pillow and waited. Eventually, he said, "Got nothing to do at night. Don't remember what I used to do in the evenings before."

I couldn't resist. "Before you were doing me?"

"Shut up," he groaned. I knew his ears would be pink.

"Right. Well, Catherine Earnshaw and Catherine Linton are the same Catherine," I said. "Her name changes after she gets married, and then she names her daughter Catherine."

"She names her kid after herself?"

"Yeah. What's wrong with that? Men do it all the time."

"Yeah, it's weird when they do it, too," he said.

That's 'Naomi' and 'Daryl' firmly off the baby name list. 

I couldn't stop the thought, but I had to physically restrain myself from saying it out loud. He'd been so aggressively neutral about the whole thing. Either he had yet to sink in, or he was actively blocking it out. Whichever it was, I wanted to give him as much time as possible to deal with things in whatever way he had to before anything cemented itself into reality. He only had a few days left before he'd have to deal with it either way.

"Wait," he radioed back. "So she doesn't marry Heathcliff?"  

"No," I laughed. 

"Why?"

"She marries someone else."

"The Hell does she do that for?" He sounded so mad. I'd never known him to take something fictional so seriously. I wanted to tease him about it, but I couldn't bring myself to. Something was… not off but… odd. The breathlessness in the way he'd called, his fixation on something irrelevant that really shouldn't bother him, and weirdest of all was that Daryl - man of few words, many grunts - seemed reluctant to hang up. 

"I thought you were reading it?"

"I am."

"Ain't gonna spoil the ending for you then, am I? You'll have to finish the damn thing."

"Alright, alright, keep your panties on."

Again, I couldn't resist. "Who says I'm wearing any?"

There was another long pause, and then he said, "....are you not?"

"You'll have to come home and find out." 

He groaned, but I could tell he was smiling. "Damn tease." 

"I should probably go," I said, testing the waters a little. "It's late."

"Yeah." Another big sigh. He still didn't say goodbye.

"What you moping for?" I asked. My grin spread wide. "Are you missing me, Daryl Dixon?"

"Pfft," he said. "Just ain't used to the peace and quiet no more."

"That's not a no."

"Shut up, dumbass."

"You miss me."

"Bye, Naomi."

"See you tomorrow, dumbass."

There was another long pause where I thought I wouldn't hear back from him again, that he'd put the walkie down and gone to bed himself. I curled around the radio and closed my eyes just in time to hear him say, "Sleep tight, beautiful."

Goddamn it, Daryl. 

I wanted to say something back and keep talking to him until the sun came up. But it had been so comforting to hear him speak to me while my eyes were shut; it was almost like he was right there with me. Opening my eyes would break the illusion. Sleep soon reached out to claim me as thoroughly as Daryl usually did. 

Realistically, I knew they probably wouldn't be back until the evening, but that didn't stop me from hovering around the windows from the moment I woke up the next day and procrastinating on the million things I had to do that day. I searched the horizon for that tell-tale glint of a car in the horizon carrying my two favorite people back to me. 

"Hey, boss lady. Sorry to interrupt…" Justin said, glancing between me and the window, "...whatever it is you're doing, but… you got a sec?"

"Sure," I tore my eyes away from the road, hoping it wasn't obvious that all I'd been doing was pining. "What's up?"

It was a relief to have something else to focus on and someone there to force me to do it. Justin looked nervous, hovering by the door like he was expecting me to throw something at him. He tensed, "John and Marissa Davis are missing."

It took me a second to place the names. There were so many to learn around here, but I'd made a concerted effort. They were a couple of young farmers - quiet Sanctuary workers who hadn't fought against us or caused trouble like some of Justin's… associates had. 

"Missing?"

"Yeah. They told a few people they were heading out fishing yesterday," he said. "I think they were worried about how the crops were doing and wanted to find something else, but they didn't come back last night. Nobody's heard from them."

"I guess it's possible they got stuck somewhere and are still making their way back," I said. It had happened recently enough to us that I knew it was a possibility, but I was avoiding the most likely scenario. Walkers had got them. Or worse.

"Maybe," Justin said, but he was holding something back. "But, there weren't many other people here that were close to them. They kept to themselves a lot and were… quite worried about how the crops were doing."

The implication was clear, "They skipped out on us?" 

It made sense. A couple young enough that, if they wanted to, probably had a good shot of making it on their own if they lost faith in the people running their community. Especially if it was one they didn't feel particularly connected to. Leaving now would give them enough time to establish a safe base before winter hit in full force.

"Maybe," he said again.

"Is there something I'm missing?"

"They were pretty loyal to Negan," he said eventually, shifting uncomfortably. Everyone was still afraid when they came to deliver bad news as if they were expecting a disproportionately adverse reaction. They were rescue dogs waiting to be kicked. If given the chance, would some of them run back under the boot they were used to?

"Ah," I nodded. "You think they might have gone to join him? Taken their chances in the woods?"

"Maybe," Justin shrugged, shooting another tentative look in my direction as if he expected me to be angry about it. I wasn't. It felt like another small failure. We'd have to double our efforts in bridging the gap between our people and the former Saviors. I certainly wasn't mad about them leaving. We didn't know them; if their loyalties were still with Negan, I really couldn't blame them for hedging their bets. If I hadn't been so distracted, I might have taken it more seriously from the start. It could've prevented a hell of a lot. But you know what they say about hindsight. 

"We'll send some people out to look for them and see if we can track them down," I said. "If they don't turn up, or if we don't find them, I guess we'll have to assume they're… no longer with us."

"Right, yeah, that makes sense," Justin hesitated before cutting to the chase. "And if they don't come back. What do we do with their stuff?"

I laughed. "You want their stuff?"

He had the decency to look at least a little embarrassed. "John had a kick-ass machete."

"He left it behind?"

"Yeah."

That was weird. It might have stuck in my brain more if I'd had another second to ruminate about it. I might have realized that nobody who's planning to leave would go into a Walker-infested world without their prized weapon. As it was, Bryce stuck his head around the door frame and said, "They're here!" 

My feet were moving before he'd finished talking. I flew down the stairs so fast that it was a miracle I didn't fall. Mia had already reached the front door by the time I got there. She was always in a good mood after seeing her friends in Alexandria, but this time, she seemed especially excited about something. The moment she'd finished hugging me, she launched into a rapid-fire list of everything she'd done in the time we'd been apart. It was hard to keep up with, not because I wasn't listening, but because she was talking a million miles an hour. 

Daryl was quiet, although I knew better than to expect the same levels of insane squealing and jumping I'd get from Mia. He was quieter than usual and had a nervous energy about him. The moment Mia was distracted by talking to Bryce, Daryl pulled me aside and into a separate room, which immediately put me on edge. 

"Got ya somethin'," he said. He was so quiet and shifty that, for a moment, I genuinely worried about what he was about to pull out of his backpack. He produced a thin rectangle wrapped in one of his bandanas. His fingers shook a little when he unwrapped it just enough to see the corners of two boxes. I knew at once what they were. My heart dropped to my stomach. 

"Oh," I took the pregnancy tests from him like they were a bomb about to go off. "That's… um, thank you, Daryl. How did you…?"

He nodded, ears reddening and eyes on his shoes. "Picked 'em up in Alexandria. Didn't know if we had any, or…"

"No, that's great," I said quickly. Sanctuary was actually weirdly well-stocked in that department. Whether it was because Negan had been worried about having more mouths to feed or actively trying for an heir to his fucked up throne, I wasn't sure. I wasn't about to ask any of his "wives" either. They'd been traumatized enough. I didn't tell Daryl any of that. This was the most Daryl had acknowledged what was happening, and how seriously he was taking it was written all over his face. I didn't want to say the wrong thing and push him back into himself again. "Thank you."

Daryl reached out for me, pulled me close. "It'll be okay, Naomi. Whatever happens."

I couldn't say anything. I just nodded against his shoulder and prayed he was right. The trouble was that it always felt true like this. When he was holding me tight and telling me that things would work out, I could believe it. It was the rest of the time when reality seeped into our little bubble, that I was filled with absolute dread. All he had to do was let me go.

His hand under my chin turned my face to look at him. "I love you so much, angel."

I kissed him quickly so he wouldn't see how close to tears I was.

Fuck. 

Am I more emotional than usual, or am I just plain old losing it?

How one man could simultaneously soothe me and make me lose my mind was beyond me. As he kissed me back, I felt more solid and real than I had in weeks. I had something steady to hold on to. 

"Can you do something for me?" I asked as we broke apart. 

"Anything," he said, so intensely that I felt a little bad that all I was asking him to do was lead a team out looking for our missing couple, but if anyone could track them, it was him. He left under strict instructions not to follow if he found any evidence of them heading into Negan's territory. While he was busy, I snuck down to the medical storage rooms to replace the pregnancy tests I'd lined up before Daryl's little gift.

Amber was in there, and I felt like I'd been caught somewhere I shouldn't be. The weird, unsettling guilt in my stomach seemed so at odds with how her face lit up when she saw what I was holding. "You're pregnant?"

"I don't know yet," I said, fighting to keep my tone as neutral as possible. Then I saw the prenatal vitamins she was holding, "Wait… are you?"

"Yes," she said, her face nearly splitting in two with the joy of it. Something nasty twisted in my gut when she said it, but either I managed to hide it, or she was too happy to notice. "Mark and I found out a few weeks ago. I just came to get some more of these."

She shook the tub of vitamins like there was any way in hell I could have missed them. 

"Congratulations," I said, but the word rang hollow in my ears. She didn't even seem to have a little bit of the dread that was gnawing from my stomach to my womb. Neither did Maggie. My gut clenched. 

That's how real Moms should be. 

That's how someone who deserves to be a Mom should feel about having a kid.  

"God, the waiting is the worst, huh?" she said, squeezing my arm sympathetically. "But don't worry, you can always keep trying."

My stomach twisted again—the assumption of it all. I swallowed down everything I couldn't say and forced a smile. "Yeah."

Amber smiled back, and hers was full of genuine excitement. She was glowing with it. She gave my arm another squeeze as she passed by; I was too numb to tell whether it was sympathetic or encouraging. Before she stepped out into the hallway, she turned back with a big smile and said, "Hey, maybe our kids will be friends!" 

"Yeah, maybe," I tried to match her excitement that one day our kids would be having playdates together. She practically skipped out of the room.  

The door shut behind her, and shame swallowed me whole.

Daryl

I sat with my back up against the bathroom door. It would've raised a lot of questions if anyone walked past but I physically couldn't bear to be any further from Naomi than that. My heart had climbed up into the back of my throat. Hands were sweating like crazy, and I couldn't keep them still, no matter how hard I tried. Even resting them on my knees didn't help because they were jittery too.

It suddenly hit me that I had no idea how long I would have to wait out here, shaking like a damn leaf in the wind. I should have asked before Naomi went in there, but my mind had been too damn clouded. 

Why am I so fucking useless?

I was pretty sure that pregnancy tests weren't hour-long ordeals, but I could've been wrong about that. I'd never been in this position before, never been anywhere close. I couldn't damn well knock and ask now. I might not know much, but I knew you couldn't do that to a lady while she's pissing.

Mercifully, the door opened way quicker than I thought. After all this waiting, I couldn't believe we had an answer so damn fast. "Are you…?"

"I don't know yet. I only just peed on the damn thing." She looked down at me. Her face was as tense as I felt. "Do you wanna come in?"

"In there?"

"Yeah," she said, but something about my reaction made her look like she regretted asking. "I know it's weird, and you don't have to - no pressure if you don't want-"

"No, I'll come in," I said. I'd already scrambled to my feet.

"Okay," she nodded and stepped back to let me in. 

The bathroom looked the same. I don't know why I felt it should look different, but it was weird that something this big would happen in a place I almost never thought about. I didn't know where to sit or stand, and I still didn't know what to do with my hands. Naomi closed the door behind me. 

"How… uh," I cleared my throat. "How long's it take?"

"Box said three minutes."

"It ain't been three minutes already?" Felt like it had been three hours. 

"No. It ain't."

Time didn't move much faster after that. No matter how long it stretched on, I never worked out where to sit or what to do with my hands. I paced a little. Leaned on the locked door like I was worried someone was going to try and get in. Sat on the edge of the bath. Shoved my hands in and out of my pockets so many times I thought for sure Naomi would make fun of me for it. But it seemed like she couldn't think of anything to say either. 

She was still as hell. After she let me in, she leaned on the wall beside the sink and barely moved a muscle because they were too tense to move. The sink was the one place I couldn't get near. I could see the test balancing on it, and looking at it too early, even on accident, I felt like I would jinx the result. 

Naomi finally moved, reaching for the test. As she picked it up, I wished I knew the right thing to say and how to tell her it would be okay either way, but I couldn't get the words out. 

I watched the tension flow right out of her, and for a split second, my heart lifted. Then she closed her eyes and almost laughed with relief, "It's negative." 

I'd always known it was the most likely answer. I thought I'd managed not to get my hopes up, but given how hard they were shattering around me, they must have fallen from a damn great height. The number of times I'd told myself I'd be okay no matter what happened, I hadn't expected it to hit as hard as it did. I'd thought, whatever happened, Naomi and I would be on the same page about it - disappointed or happy together. But she was so damn relieved - like she'd dodged a bullet or had a stay of execution - I was alone in being crushed.

Can't blame her for feeling that way.

I ain't exactly a prize.

I didn't know what to do with that. I sank down and sat on the edge of the bath. All of the energy was gone from me now.

Naomi opened her eyes and looked up at me. The relief vanished from her eyes in an instant. They filled up with a new kind of worry. I looked away, trying to hide what she'd already seen. It was too late, though. 

"Oh… Daryl." I wasn't expecting her to say my name all soft like that. Somehow that made it hurt all the more.

"Would it have been so bad? Havin' a kid with me?" It slipped out. Quiet, but not quiet enough. I hated how it sounded, how needy I was being. How much this hurt, even though I'd always known this was the most likely outcome. 

"Oh, Daryl …" When I looked back at her, there was a kind of hopeless dread in her eyes that made me feel sick.

I need to shut my damn mouth.

Don't make more outta this than it already is.

Once I'd started, I couldn't stop. It all came tumbling out of me. "Because I'm different now. I ain't the man I was before, Naomi. God knows I ain't perfect, but I'm trying… I thought I was…"

My hands were shaking. I didn't realize it until Naomi took hold of them.

"God, it's not you," she said. I wanted to believe her but I knew 'it's not you, it's me' was sometimes something you say to someone when you don't want to tell them the truth. She crouched down in front of me. "Sometimes I look at the way you are with Mia or Carl… Judith, and I think…. God, if there was ever anyone born to be a father, it's you ."

I forced myself to look at her then because I wanted to believe her. She'd said a lot of nice shit about me over the years, but that was one of the ones that hit hardest. Her eyes were so sincere. “Then… why…?”

"I'm just… scared," she said. It wasn't the answer I was expecting. "Always have been."

"Always?"

"Since Mia," she said. "Since Momma… Both of 'em almost died when Momma went into labor, and they were in a hospital with a whole medical team and proper medical equipment. That was enough to make me… reconsider kids of my own. It can just be so… dangerous." 

Naomi shuddered a little like she couldn't go on. But she didn't have to. I knew because I'd seen it for myself, too. I'd been so focused on the start of Lori's first pregnancy and things I could do to help Naomi that I hadn't thought it all the way through. Lori's death had been one of the most brutal things to hit our group.

I don't know how Rick survived that.

I wouldn't.

"Shit," I said. My brain wouldn't even let me hold the idea of losing Naomi like that in my mind. Every time I tried to imagine a world without her, I almost blacked out. "I… hadn't thought about any of that."

I felt like a damn idiot. 

"I know it's probably kinda selfish," she said. "And it's definitely part of my…tendency to overthink every damn thing, but…"

"No," I said. Guilt twisted me up. I'd been the selfish one here. "You're right. You're right to worry about that. I just ain't had to think about any of that before."

If someone had come to me and said that I could have a family of my own, but it would cost me Naomi's life, I would have done more than tell them to fuck off. I'd have killed them for threatening it. I was usually so good at noticing all the ways she might get herself in danger. I couldn't believe I'd missed this.

"You'd be the world's best Daddy," she said, and it was nice to hear, but her voice broke a little when she said it. I looked at her. The burning regret in her eyes made something in my stomach turn to ice. "But… me? I don't know if I'm cut out for that. I don't know if I could be somebody's Momma."

"Naomi, that's crazy," I blurted out. I didn't mean to, knew the moment I said it that it wasn't the most understanding thing to say, but I couldn't wrap my head around the idea that Naomi thought she'd be bad at something she'd been doing so well since she was sixteen. She'd single-handedly brought up a smart, brave, and kind kid in a world fighting to turn everyone into monsters. "You and Mia-"

"Mia deserved a hell of a lot better than me," she cut across me. She didn't yell, but it was so raw it took the wind out of me. 

Ain't nobody better than you.

"You did everything for her."

"I did everything I could for her," Naomi shook her head. "But that first apartment we lived in had one bedroom and a hell of a lot of damp. I had to mend her clothes a thousand times before I could justify buying her new ones. Sure some of her friends had parents who were split up or single, but Mia… she just had me. Not a Mom. Not a Dad. Not even a step-parent. Just me."

I swallowed down a lump in my throat. "And she was damn lucky."

"No." Her bottom lip had started to tremble. Her eyes were bright.

Naomi had always been a perfectionist, but it was clearly killing her that she hadn't been able to give Mia a perfect childhood. Even though she'd barely been older than a kid herself. Even though she'd always had this way of making the absolute best out of anything bad.

Even though there was no such thing as a perfect childhood, or a perfect parent. 

Fuck I should've been there. 

Contributing.

Telling her what a damn good job she was doing. 

"She'd have ended up in care if you hadn't taken her in," I said. 

"Maybe," she said. "Maybe then she'd have wound up with the kind of family who could give her those things."

"Naomi, no," I said. "You know cases where that happens are one-in-a-million."

"Yeah, but she's a one-in-a-million kid," Naomi said fiercely. "People would've taken one look at her, and they'd have-"

"Woah, hey," I stood up, took hold of her. She was so far down this spiral that it was becoming clear it was one she'd been slipping into for far longer than this conversation. How had I missed it? "She is. She is one-in-a-million. But, baby, you know what the care system was really like. How many kids slipped through the cracks, no matter how brilliant they were."

How many times had she lived in fear of being taken away by CPS? How often had I sat and wondered if that would have been better for her than being with her Momma, knowing I wouldn't be able to deal with it if she'd left?

Naomi closed her eyes, but not before I saw how much guilt was in there. "I just… don't think people should have kids unless they really want 'em, and can really take care of them."

That, we could agree on. We both knew what it was like to be born to people who didn't want to look after their kids. She looked at me again, and I nodded. 

"So, you don't want 'em?" I tried to ask in the most neutral way I could. Because I wouldn't judge her either way. "That it?"

She didn't answer right away, conflict written all over her face.

"I don't know. I've never really known," she said. There was more she wanted to say; I could see it building in her eyes. "It's such a big change, having a kid."

"I know." I kept waiting; there was more. I wanted her to get out. There was such heaviness in her eyes that it felt important that she unburden some of it. I tried not to spin out in the silence. Naomi was still teetering on the edge of something, and I couldn't pull her back if I didn't know what it was. She took a deep breath.

"I don't just mean the pregnancy stuff, although… that really does scare the shit outta me," she said. "I mean, it can really change who you are, as a person, and some people they just aren't cut out for… they ain't meant to…"

She'd lost me again. It couldn't be about Mia; we'd been over that, and she'd already said it wasn't about me. So, unless she'd been lying about that, this felt different. I didn't like how different it felt. What could be worse than punching me in the gut with the idea that pregnancy could take her away from me? 

Naomi's gaze dropped to the ground; her voice dropped, too. So damn quiet, so damn sad, she said, "My Momma wasn't an addict before she had me."

It almost knocked me down. I straightened up against the force of it. This went a hell of a lot deeper than I thought. "That ain't on you."

"I was a difficult pregnancy," she said. "She had the same kinda problems with me that she had with Mia, but back then the painkillers they put her on weren't… they were… that's what got her hooked and she…. She could've…"

Naomi couldn't finish, but I understood. It was a well-known tale back home—someone went to the doctor for something and spent the rest of their lives chasing the high they never should have been given in the first place. 

"That ain't your fault, angel," I said, my heart was breaking for her. "You didn't prescribe the damn things."

She shook her head, tears starting to drop from her eyes that were still staring desperately at the ground. "Having me ruined her."

"No," I closed that damn gap between us, wrapped my arms around her, and slowly pulled her into me like that would do anything to shield her from it. I knew how to fight the external shit, but how could I stop something that had probably been with her so long it had sunk into her bone marrow? The moment I touched her, I felt her body start to shake.

"She could've been somebody, Daryl." It all started pouring out of her. "She could've had a life if she'd never…if I'd never-"

"No." I couldn't let her finish that damn sentence even though I knew she'd carried the thought around for so long it was hardwired in there.

"But she could've made something of herself, she could've done something great, she…she…"

Naomi's Momma had always been full of shit. The whole time I'd known her, she'd lie about all kinds of shit. The things she'd say to Naomi when she was coming down off a high made my blood boil… the way she'd spoken to her, the names she'd called her… It wouldn't have surprised me if it wasn't true, just something she'd said to hurt her daughter.

Truth or not, it didn't matter. Naomi's Momma was long dead and never would have admitted it anyway. What mattered was that it was true to Naomi. 

I took her face in my hands. "The best thing your shitstain of a Momma ever did was bring you into this world. You hear me?" 

It was true.

Even she'd been on some path to greatness before addiction derailed her. There was nothing on this Earth that her Momma could've gone on to do that was worth trading Naomi in for. Even if she'd been destined to be the one to cure whatever disease was making the dead rise, it wouldn't have been worth it. Not to me. 

Her big, sad eyes looked up at me, and for a second, she was that little girl in the trailer park with nowhere to go. Just like how seeing her fight tooth and nail to get back to me healed that little boy who'd thought there was something about him that was so terrible it made people abandon him, this was a deep wound. The kind that don't heal easy because you grew up ignoring it until it infected everything. 

The grown-up Naomi might have been standing right in front of me then, but that little girl was listening too. 

My heart ached for her. For both of them.

"It wasn't ever your fault, angel," I said, gently as I could, but it still made her cry twice as hard. "None of it. Your Momma made her choices because of who she was, not who you are."

"I never wanna be like her. I don't wanna make a kid feel like…" Naomi stopped, couldn't even bring herself to voice the ways her own mother had made her feel. 

"You wouldn't."

"You don't know that. She probably didn't think she'd be…"

"You ain't her, you could never be her," I said, but I understood her fear even better now. How many times had I worried I'd wind up like my Dad? How many years had I wondered what it was about me that had made him hate me so damn much?

"I get so mad sometimes… And… the shit I'm capable of, Daryl…" She shuddered, and I knew she was thinking of every violent and awful thing she'd had to do to survive in this world. I hugged her tighter, rubbed her back.

"I know, I know, but it's different, baby. It ain't the same. You ain't her," I said, as soothingly as I could. Naomi didn't argue back, but I wasn't dumb enough to think this would have magically fixed everything. I just held her. Let her cry it out. Eventually she stepped away from me to wipe her eyes, and blow her nose on some toilet paper. I sat down on the edge of the bath again and waited.

"I wish I knew either way," she said quietly, miserably throwing the test in the trash. "I wish I knew what I wanted. I'm sorry I don't have a clear answer on this."

"Don't be. I don't need one." I said. "It's okay."

She looked up at me again, her red-rimmed eyes on the verge of more tears. "It's not though, is it?"

"Of course it is," I frowned. "Not everybody's gotta want them."

"But you do."

Fuck.

She’s about to leave me.

My stomach dropped. "I don't wanna talk about this anymore." 

I could suddenly see the end of the conversation, speeding toward me so fast I hadn't seen it coming. Now, I worried it was too late. She sat down next to me on the edge of the bath. "Daryl. We have to talk about it."

"No."

"You can't-"

"Do you still love me?"

"Yes. Of course."

"Are you gonna lea-"

"No." How fast she said it brought me so much relief. Didn't even let me finish asking, which was a blessing because I wasn't sure I'd be able to get out the words 'leave me.' Not to her.

"But if this is something you know you want-."

"Stop. Don't finish that sentence."

I hated the way she was looking at me. Like she expected me to break her heart. "I would understand if you need to think-"

"Don't need to think," I said. "You, me, Mia – that's my family, that's all I need."

That had always been it for me, always been my end goal. I was now part of the family I'd always dreamed of calling mine. How could I have let myself get so greedy? Made her feel like they were some consolation prize I'd trade in for another kind of family? Who was I to think I could be her husband when I was already failing at being her boyfriend?

"I'd understand if you wanted-" 

"Stop. We ain't talking about this."

"We have to, Daryl. It's your future we're talking about."

If she leaves me over this, it's my own fucking fault.

I took her hand and clung it like she was a damn liferaft. It was pathetic. "You're my future."

The one person on this Earth who would never leave me or hurt me intentionally, but I knew her. If she saw herself as the one obstacle to me being happy, she'd remove herself. 

"But, what if I decide I don't want-"

"Then that's fine."

She sighed. 

"I always assumed I'd never have kids of my own, because it would always just be me and Mia." Her gaze softened when she looked at me. "I never thought I'd have.. someone."

"You could have anyone."

"Well, turns out I'll only settle for the best."

Even in the middle of this sad, hard, weird conversation, she could still make my ears heat up. I felt a smile tugging at the corners of my mouth, "Sorry I messed it up for ya." 

"You should be," she managed a small smile back. "It's very confusing."

Naomi rested her head on my shoulder. We let the silence settle around us, neither of us ready to face the outside world again just yet. 

"This was good, I think," she said after a while. "I'm proud of us."

"How'd you figure that?" I said. "I feel like shit."

"Yeah, me too," she said. "But we're both still in the room. That's gotta count for something, don't it?"

Something tightened in my chest. I looked down at where our hands joined, her fingers slotted so nicely between mine. Without letting go, I lifted my arm so I had enough room to put it around her shoulders. 

"Yeah, you're right," I said. There'd been tears but no yelling. I hadn't punched anything or thrown anything. Hadn't even wanted to. "It really is okay with me, you know."

I'd keep saying it to the end of time. Anything to keep her with me. 

"Yeah?" I wished I knew whether or not she believed me.

"I was just… caught up in the idea of fun stuff - us raising a kid together and being the kind of parents we never got to have. Really. It's not a big deal."

"Well. I hadn't thought about it like that ," she said quietly. I rested my head on top of hers. I didn't know how to make it clear that this was it for me. That no matter what shape our family took, it only mattered that it was me and her building it. The sinking, cold feeling in my chest reminded me of when she'd first moved away. Even though she was right beside me, I felt a distance I didn't like. Naomi was stuck in her own head, and I couldn't let those worries get so loud that she thought leaving was the only chance she had of making me happy. Back then, I'd noticed her drifting and done nothing, let life get between us. I couldn't let that happen again. This was the closest I’d felt to losing her, truly losing her, not because of some external force that I could fight, but something much deeper and harder to confront.

 

Notes:

Sorry no Dixon baby 😬

 

(...at this time 👀)

Chapter 61: Lessons

Naomi

The bike wobbled, and Mia wobbled with it. Daryl caught the handles before she could fall. Even through the grubby distortion of Sanctuary's windows, I could see how much they were smiling. Occasionally, a squeal from Mia or a laugh from Daryl was loud enough to pass through the glass and reach me. I swallowed down a lump in my throat.

God, he'd be such a good Dad.

I'd never known mine, but I knew enough to be sure of that. Bryce stepped up beside me to see what I was looking at, "You don't want to go out and join them?"

"No," I shook my head. I was barely holding it together now; I knew if I stepped outside to be with them, I'd start bawling. I cleared my throat. "It's kinda nice that this is something for just the two of them, y'know?"

"Look at you," he nudged me with his elbow. "All happy families."

"Yeah," I looked over at him, feeling my cheeks heating up. "Guess I am, huh?"

"Never thought I'd see the day," he said, beaming at me like a proud parent. My heart sank at the fragility of it.

"Honestly? Me neither."

And it's not going to last.

It was a suffocating thought that had been chasing me for days. It felt like the beginning of the end of something great, something perfect, something I'd never be able to say goodbye to. I turned away from the window and made an excuse to leave, some bullshit about asking Eugene something to do with our generators. I'd already asked him, and he'd already given me an incomprehensible answer I'd half-listened to. Right then, I just need some space to breathe. I was still so distracted. The initial relief I'd felt when that second line hadn't appeared on the test had been so short-lived. Now it was over, now we had an answer; I felt a little… empty.

He's going to leave me over this.

The certainty of it washed over me. Alone in the stairwell where Sherry and Dwight used to smoke together secretly, I sank onto one of the steps. I felt the preemptive tearing at my heart. I couldn't blame him for it, but, fuck, it was going to hurt. My eyes stung. I closed them, felt the tests hot on my cheeks, and tried to delude myself into believing that coming to terms with it now would mean I wouldn't fall apart when the time came.

I'd heard him when he'd said Mia and I were enough for him. Daryl wasn't a lair; he believed what he said when he said it. But there had been genuine heartbreak in his eyes when that test came back negative. I hated myself for putting it there, and I knew there was no way something that big would just disappear. The part of him that had been hoping for a different outcome had to be there still. It would stay there in the back of his mind and grow to resent me for it—just a little at first, but enough to slowly erode everything we'd built.

If I knew for sure I didn't want children, I could tell him that. Rip off the bandaid.

Having a kid to make someone else happy was a dumb idea; I knew that. But the thought of Daryl as a Dad filled me with nothing but absolute joy. That wasn't a good enough reason to bring a life into a world as fucked up as this one; it wouldn't balance out my abject terror about the whole thing and wouldn't do anything to stop me from being a crappy Mom.

I put a hand across my stomach and whispered, "I'm so sorry." I don't know who it was meant for - Daryl? Myself? Some kid who'd never existed in the first place?

The door to the outside opened. Light filled the stairwell so suddenly that it made me flinch. I turned away and wiped my eyes, standing up so that it might appear to whoever was coming in that I was on my way down to do something important, not that I'd been having a quiet crisis on the stairs.

Mia stood in front of me, her bike helmet dangling from one arm and backpack straps hugging her shoulders. Her smile faded when she saw my face, replaced by a concerned frown. "Are you okay?"

She let the door swing shut behind her. I nodded, forcing a smile, although I could still feel hastily wiped tear tracks drying on my cheeks. "It's nothing, Mia. I'm fine. Just…. Lots going on around here, y'know? The stress just got to me for a moment."

"Yeah," she said hesitantly, not quite believing me but unsure what to say. She'd never seen me like this. I'd always been good at keeping a lid on my emotions when she was around.

I tried to change the subject, "How was the bike lesson?"

"Good," she said. "Daryl says I'll be a pro by Christmas."

"I'm sure you will," I forced a smile, expecting Mia to run off to wherever she'd been headed when she came back in here, but she didn't. She lingered in the stairwell, looking worried. I sighed, "You know he'd still…be there for you even if he and I weren't…"

Mia looked at me in horror.

"Oh my God. Did you say no?" she said, a touch of anger creeping into the frown on her face. "That's what you're upset about. You said no? Naomi, that's so stupid! Daryl is perfect for you, and he's -"

She stopped talking and closed her mouth as she caught the confusion on my face. I stared at her, baffled. "Say no to what?"

Mia stared back, shrinking away from me a little. "Um…" The silence hung in the air. Mia looked deeply uncomfortable. With a sickening jolt, I panicked that she somehow knew.

"Did Daryl tell you he wanted us to have a baby?" My anger flared up so fast at the thought of Daryl letting our almost-secret slip to Mia that I didn't realize what I'd said myself until her face lit up.

"A BABY?" Mia squealed. "OhmyGod. You're pregnant?"

"No, no, no," I said quickly. Mia's face fell in a way that made my heart clench. Another person I'd managed to disappoint. "No. We thought maybe I might be, but… no."

"Oh. That sucks, I always wanted a younger si-" she stopped. Had she been about to say sister? Sibling? Her cheeks flushed a little, "I'd be a kick-ass Auntie, don't you think?"

"Yeah, you would be," I cleared my throat, really fighting against tears that I'd only just managed to stop. "You always wanted a… bigger family?"

"Well… yeah," Mia said. "I mean, I liked it when it was just the two of us, but I always wanted you to have… more."

"You were more than enough family for me, Mia," I said.

"I didn't mean it like that," she said. "But we had so much fun. It would've been cool to share it."

"You had fun? Living with me?"

"Yeah. You're a great…" she hesitated, "big sister. I always wanted to be like that for someone. Teach them things, play the games we used to play when I was little, make sure they're safe and happy."

You felt safe with me? Happy?

I so badly wanted to ask her. I wanted some kind of insight into how it had been for her—really—having just me around as her guardian when most of her friends had at least one biological parent in the picture. But it was too much to put on someone so young, and honestly, I don't think I was ready for the answer. So, instead, I said, "That's really sweet, Mia."

"I guess I thought when you had any actual kids, I'd get to babysit, like, all the time," she said. "And do all the things we used to do. I mean, pretty soon, I'll be able to teach them to ride a bike like Daryl's teaching me."

"That sounds nice."

"No wonder you're sad," she put an arm around my shoulders and leaned into my side. It reminded me so much of when she was little that I almost started crying again. "But it's okay, right? It's not like you only get one chance."

"Right," I said like I agreed with her. I couldn't tell her the truth. Firstly, it's way too much to share with your kid sister. But more importantly, I didn't want her to think that just because I didn't know if I wanted to be a Mom meant I had any regrets about taking her in.

"Daryl is not going to break up with you over this," Mia said.

"I know," I sounded confident, but my heart sank.

"Then quit talking like he's about to," she said. "I know that if anything bad happened with you and Daryl, he'd still want to be in my life. You've both told me that a thousand times. But I also know it's not going to. You're obsessed with each other."

Mia rolled her eyes, but she smiled at the same time. It was embarrassingly accurate. I wished I had her faith, but she didn't have my context. And she never would; I'd already said too much.

"So… if Daryl didn't tell you about…" I couldn't bring myself to repeat it. "What did you think I'd said no to?"

"Oh… uh," a flicker of panic crossed her face. She did her best to smooth it over. "Well, I thought maybe when we go to D.C.-"

"If we go to D.C.," I corrected her.

"Right. Yeah. Sure," she said. "Well, I thought it would be cool if we showed Daryl all the places we used to go, where we used to live, and stuff like that."

I frowned. "It ain't a tourist trip, Mia."

"Yeah, I know," she said. She looked a little deflated but nowhere near the anger she'd had when she'd been on the brink of yelling at me before. Maybe the truth of what Daryl and I were going through had thrown her strop into perspective. She looked up at me, "Can I show you something?"

"Of course," I said, trying to keep my tone as neutral as possible. The last time Mia had been secretive about something, it turned out that she had been leaving out rations for a deposed despot.

"I drew something," she said, pulling her sketchbook out of her backpack. I sat up straight; she was usually so private about her artwork. I was prepared to be as encouraging as possible; I was not prepared for what she was about to show me.

The pages of her sketchbook fluttered as she flipped through it, and then my breath caught in my throat. It was the three of us - me, her, and Daryl - gathered around a board game like we had been when we'd got stuck away from Sanctuary. The memory of that moment, how happy we'd all been, now immortalized forever, hit me like a freight train. I reached out to touch it. I couldn't help it. I couldn't believe she'd done something like this. The time and love that she'd poured into it was evident from every pencil stroke. I couldn't believe it was so heartfelt and genuine and real.

"Mia…" I heard my voice crack. "It's beautiful, sweetie. It's perfect…"

I didn't have the words to sum it up; they completely failed me. A shy but pleased smile crept onto Mia's face. "You guys were so upset when Negan destroyed that photo of us… I know it's not the same, but…"

"It's better. It's way better."

"I thought maybe I could give it to Daryl… y'know, to as a thank you for showing me how to ride a bike. But… I dunno if it's good enough."

"He'd love it," I said. I couldn't look at it for too long without tearing up again. My heart was aching at the thought of him seeing it.

"Really?"

"You have no idea."

"Okay," she nodded and closed her sketchbook. "If you're sure…?"

I hugged her. "He's gonna love it, Mia."

She nodded, hugging me back before we both stood up. There was a spring in her step as she skipped up the stairs in front of me. I was still reeling from her drawing, but I'd hidden out long enough. Mia skipped off to her room, and I returned to the office room where I'd left Bryce. It had almost accidentally become our meeting and planning place. Now, we naturally gravitated there whenever there was work to do.

Amber's Mom, Donna, was waiting at the door. It was unusual to see her up here. I smiled at her, "Are you alright, Mrs Watson?"

"My daughter," she said, the worry in her eyes telling me everything before she could say more. "Have you seen Amber? I don't think she and Mark came home last night."

My blood ran cold. I tried not to let the panic show on my face, wanting to keep Donna calm. Another missing couple in the space of a few days?

"Alright," I said as calmly as I could, taking a beat to calm myself before I tried to reassure her. "Okay. We can get some people out looking for them right now. Do you know where they were going?"

"Just for a walk," she said, her eyes wide and panicked. Her words tumbled out of her like the faster she spoke, the sooner her daughter would be home. "Amber was feeling unwell and wanted some fresh air. She wanted to go for a walk, and I begged her not to because it was close to getting dark, but Mark promised he'd go with her, and…"

She couldn't go on. I nodded, still trying to sound as calm as I could, but there was a deep unease in my gut. I put a hand on her arm, "Did they take anything with them? Any supplies? A radio? Anything to suggest they'd be gone for longer than a quick walk?"

"Um..n-no… I don't… I don't think so…" Donna stammered, her hands shaking. "I.. I don't remember… I'm sorry, I don't…"

"Hey, that's okay. We'll go out looking right now," I said. "Gather as many people as you can by the front door. I'll do the same. We'll get a search party together, alright? In the meantime, let us know if you remember anything, no matter how small."

"Yes, yes, I will," she nodded, already moving away to get people to help.

"Front door. Ten minutes," I called after her before pushing the door to the office room open.

Bryce and Daryl were already in there, whispering about something. If I hadn't been so distracted, I might have noticed how weird that was and how quickly they shut up when I came in. As it was, I was too caught up in telling them about Amber and Mark to pay it much thought.

"You think they could have run off to join Negan?" Bryce asked. This had been our leading theory on what had happened to our other missing couple—until now.

"Not Amber. She wouldn't."

"Amber and Mark had it bad under Negan," Daryl nodded in agreement. "No way they'd join him."

Also, she's pregnant.

I didn't say that. Not in front of Daryl. It all still felt too fresh. Neither of us had brought the topic up since it had happened. I was worried that the next time it came up would be the last, and he'd tell me he was leaving me for someone who could give him everything he wanted. So, instead, I said, "She wouldn't have left her Mom."

Bryce's nod was the final step in all of us accepting the gravity of the situation.

"It could be Negan," Daryl said. I looked at him, and he gave me a half-apologetic shrug. "He tried taking hostages before…"

I couldn't argue with it, especially not in front of two people who'd been one of Negan's previous hostages. Was he already walking back on our deal? Or, had some of our own wandered into his territory by mistake, and he'd kept his promise to shoot them dead on sight?

This time, I went out looking with the team Daryl put together to scour the woods. A large group of us used every moment of daylight to scour the land around Sanctuary. The search felt impossible before we'd even begun. The woods were unkempt and wild. Walkers roamed out there, disturbing anything that might otherwise have been valuable evidence.

I walked the borderlands between our territory and Negan's. If he'd killed them, I expected he'd make a show of it—tie their walkers up along the edge of his land like he used to do along Sanctuary's fence, stick their heads on spikes—something as dramatic as it was disturbing. But there was nothing there except the unsettling feeling I was being watched.

I glared at the silent woods until Daryl pulled me away.

It was getting dark. It was time to head in. Donna was distraught, and now the whole of Sanctuary was on edge. I gathered everyone in the cafeteria and reminded them of the boundaries between our land and Negan's. When I'd first announced it, there had been those who had brushed it off. But now that people were going missing, I didn't see a single eye roll in the crowd.

It weighed on all of us, but Daryl took it hard. The first search had been for a young couple with few connections here, who might have reasonably skipped out on us. But Amber and Mark? Something was wrong. If they didn't turn up in the next few days, they were most likely dead. Neither of us said it, but the whole of Sanctuary was thinking the same thing. An inevitable kind of pre-grief weighed down on everyone, a depressing reminder of how unsafe it was outside of these walls. If you weren't careful, a simple walk could end it all without a trace.

We got some leftover scraps from the cafeteria and ate them in our office room. Mia had already eaten but joined us when we returned from the search. I knew from how tense her shoulders were what was about to happen. I braced myself, wondering if I should have warned Daryl ahead of time. At least his mood was about to improve. Even as he saw her coming, I watched him squash down his worries so he didn't pass them on to her. Mia fidgeted nervously for a moment before she said, "Daryl?"

He looked up from his dinner, "Yeah?"

"I got you something." Mia held out a piece of paper. None of the edges were torn. She'd carefully cut the picture out of her sketchbook to keep it as neat as possible. I watched Daryl's slightly confused frown as he took it from her. Then I watched it soften and melt as he took in what he was looking at. His eyes brightened, jaw clenched as he fought not to cry in front of her. Mia watched him, too, with nerves so strong I could almost see them buzzing around her.

"Look at that," he said softly, covering his mouth for a second. We both looked down at Mia's family portrait. Daryl looked up at me to check I was seeing it, too. I could only nod as he pointed at it with a slightly shaking finger. "That's better than a damn photograph."

"You don't have to, like, hang it on the fridge or anything," Mia mumbled, as embarrassed as she was pleased. "I just wanted to say thank you."

Daryl tore his eyes away from her picture to look at her. "What the hell for?"

"For the bike stuff," she shrugged. "And y'know, just being a good… being here."

The semblance of composure Daryl was holding onto broke completely. When he spoke, his voice was thick with emotion, "You ain't gotta thank me for that."

Daryl pulled Mia in for a hug, and my heart suddenly felt too big for my chest. The way they loved each other, independent of me, was more than I could have dreamed of—for both me and Mia. I'd always worried about her getting attached to someone, and I never thought I'd be with someone I'd be able to trust fully with her. But Daryl would never hurt her, never leave her, never do anything but lift her up and protect her like I did.

When it ends, this will break me.

I'd savor it for as long as I could, make the most of every moment like this. I'd never felt so loved and so sure that someone was going to leave. Daryl deserved someone who could give him what he wanted, someone who was as sure as he was and would be as good at parenting as he would be. One day, he'd realize that.

Mia pulled away and made an excuse to go back to her room. It was as much emotion as one teenager could handle.

Daryl stared at the picture for a long time after she was gone, so caught up in it, I didn't want to disturb him. It felt too personal even for me to intrude on. I stayed, frozen where I was, until eventually, he looked up at me, "You tell her to do this?"

His eyes were still bright. I shook my head. "Nope. She did it all by herself."

He pursed his lips to prevent his bottom lip from trembling. One hand still held Mia's picture, the other resting on my hip as his arm slipped around me. "She's a helluva kid," he said.

"I know." I leaned into him.

An hour later, Mia's sketch was nailed to the wall of our bedroom, hanging in a Daryl-made frame.

 

Daryl

My heart stuttered with nerves as the engine shut off. Naomi looked over at me from the passenger seat, a curious little frown on her face. I could barely meet her gaze, and when I did, I felt my cheeks heating up.

God, she's so damn pretty.

"Why'd you stop here?" she asked.

"Nice place, ain't it?" I shrugged. She looked back out of the car windshield at the lake in front of us.

"Yeah, it's beautiful," she said. "But I thought you wanted to test the fuel?"

"Yeah…" I popped open the door and slipped out. "I might've lied about that."

"What?" Her face lit up with this mix of nervous anticipation and excitement. I grinned back at her and shut the door. Seconds later, she was scrambling out of the passenger side, and I was trying not to laugh at how fast her own nosiness made her haul ass outta there. "What?"

"Fuel works fine," I said with a shrug like it didn't matter, but I couldn't stop myself from smiling at the way she marched around the front of the car. "Known that for a couple of days now."

"Then what are we doing?"

"You're getting in there," I nodded at the lake. She looked at it and then looked back at me like I'd made some kinda mistake.

"Where?"

"The lake." I nodded to it again.

"No."

"Yes."

"I'm not getting in there," she said, her cheeks flushed a little. "I can't swim, remember?"

"What do you think we're doing here, sweetheart?" I said. "You're gonna learn."

"No way," she said, taking a big step back, her eyes widening. Her previously flushed face paled. I thought she might resist a little, but I was surprised by her flat-out refusal.

"You gotta learn."

"Why?"

"It's a life skill, Naomi! What if you fall in the ocean?"

"Fall in the ocean?" she repeated. "From where?"

"I dunno. A boat?"

"What the hell am I doing on a boat?"

I sighed. "Does it matter?"

Naomi looked at the lake in front of us like it was about to rise up and swallow her whole. "I'll just stay on land, thank you. Instead of getting on a boat for no reason."

"Didn't say it was no reason. Maybe you got a good reason."

"Like what?"

"To go someplace." I shrugged.

"Where?"

"I dunno. An island, maybe."

"You taking me to the Bahamas?" she asked with one of her heart-meltingly cheeky grins.

I'll take you anywhere you want, sweetheart.

I tried not to let it affect me, but I had to look away from her. "Quit messing. What if a boat comes to take us someplace without Walkers? Somewhere that somehow ain't been touched by all this. You ain't gonna get on that boat?"

"No," she conceded. "I'd get on the boat. I'd just stay away from the edges."

"What if it sinks?"

"They don't have life jackets on your boat?"

"You need more than that, Nai."

"Do I? Ain't that the point of them? To keep me alive until a different boat comes along?"

"What if there ain't another boat?" I said. "Or what if they ain't got enough life jackets for everyone, like on the Titanic?"

Naomi paused for a second. "If I was on a boat that sank about a century ago? Yeah, that would be a problem."

"I didn't say on the Titanic, I said like the Titanic, smartass."

"Well, in that very specific scenario, I guess I'd drown."

Not an option.

"Get in the damn water." I pointed to it.

"No."

"Don't make me throw you in there like Merle did with me."

"You wouldn't dare," she narrowed her eyes at me, but I could tell she wanted to back away from me just in case.

"Try me."

She tried to reason with me. "Daryl, it's November."

"So?"

"So it's cold!"

"You can't deal with a little cold water?"

"Er, that is a lot of cold water," she gestured to the lake in its entirety. "What if there's Walkers in there? Sometimes they get waterlogged and sink."

"There ain't," I felt a flash of triumph. She had no idea how prepared I was for this day. "I came here earlier and made sure of that."

I could almost see her inwardly cursing. Then, it was her turn to look a little triumphant. "I don't have any swimming stuff."

"You too good to swim in your underwear, Princess?"

"There are easier ways to get me naked, Daryl," she raised an eyebrow. "You truly don't have to work so hard."

"Shut it. Get them clothes off and get in the damn lake," I said. "We ain't got all day."

"Why? What else you got planned?"

Shit.

"Quit stalling," I said. "I packed you some dry clothes in the car."

"You did?" she glanced through the car windows.

"Yup. They're in the trunk. So, no excuses."

Naomi sighed, a big one, and I knew I had her. She looked at me as she undressed like she was expecting me to say 'sike' any second. I took off my jacket, checking the pockets a few dozen times before I folded it up real careful and laid it on the backseat of the car. I stripped down to my boxers, chucking the rest of my clothes on top of my jacket. Naomi's clothes made a neat little pile on the passenger seat.

When I was done, I looked up and found her waiting for me. I'd thought of a lot, but do you know what I hadn't thought about? How difficult it would be to keep things on track when she was half-naked in front of me. The little scowl on her face didn't even change how much seeing her made my heart race. It was kinda cute, actually.

I tried not to stare. I mean, I guess it's okay to stare a little bit when it's your girlfriend, but still…I couldn't afford to let my mind wander. Naomi was already stalling getting in the water. If I gave her any hint there was a way she could distract me from this whole thing, I knew she'd take it and run. Thankfully, she was too preoccupied to notice my wandering eye.

"If I drown today, I'll haunt you forever," she grumbled. "Nothing you own will ever be dry again."

"Oh yeah? How you gonna pull that one off?"

"With my ghost powers."

"Ghost powers? What kinda -" I stopped, realizing her game. I held up a hand in an attempt to shut her up - a physical barrier to stop me from getting sucked into some of the shit she was talking to put off doing this. "No. Stop it. Get in the lake."

Naomi didn't push it. She folded her arms. She shook a little, and I didn't think it was from the cold. "You sure it's okay for us to get in there?"

I felt my resolve softening immediately. Under all her bullshit and nonsense, she was a little scared of the water. I reached out for her, my hand running down the smooth, soft skin on her arms. "Naomi, baby. I ain't gonna let you drown. You trust me, don't ya?"

"Yes," she said, a little reluctantly.

"Then come on," I stood in front of her, took both hands, and started walking backward into the water. Naomi followed, letting me tug her along, her eyes betraying her nerves. She fixed them on me, letting out a small whimper when the water hit her ankles. She was right, it was fucking cold, but I tried not to let it show as we waded in. I couldn't suppress a grimace as the cold water hit my groin, but it soon passed. I led us a little deeper and stopped.

"Okay, see, you can stand here," I said, still holding both of her hands. "That ain't so bad, right?"

"I guess…" she shivered a little, looking at me with that lost little girl look that made my heart clench. "What now?"

"Lie back, take your feet off the ground."

"No."

"You'll float."

"What if I don't?"

"You'll float," I repeated. "Everyone floats."

"That's what that fucking clown said in It, and most of them wound up dead."

"Trust me, just lie back," I said, refusing to be drawn into another one of her pointless arguments. I moved around her and put my hands on her back. "My hands are right here, okay? I got you."

"You won't let me go?" She looked worried, but she was already leaning back against my hands. Something tugged at my heart. It wasn't often I got to teach her something. Last time we'd probably been kids, I'd shown her how to hunt so she didn't have to steal food anymore. She'd always been ahead of me at most things, smarter than me. I liked it when she needed me.

"No, angel, I'm gonna make sure you're okay. I promise," I said. I'd planned out the steps of teaching her this, but I'd somehow neglected to think about how it would feel to have her leaning on me like this. To have her trust me like this. She was so damn tense. I moved closer to her, my lips by her ear, "Relax, baby, I ain't going anywhere."

Naomi's back muscles relaxed immediately, and I can't deny the thrill that passed through me when I felt it. I helped lower her into the water until she was floating on her back. Her breathing was quick, and shallow. I tried not to watch the way it made her chest rise and fall. Or the way that seeing her stretched out like this gave me a perfect view of the smattering of freckles on her left hip. One of my hands was right up against her bra strap, the other supported the small of her back. Suddenly, the water wasn't cold enough to douse the heat rising in me.

Fucking hell, I should've made her do this fully clothed.

"Okay, this ain't so bad," she said. Her fingers spread out in the water like she was testing it, getting used to the feeling of it surrounding her.

"Oh yeah?" I lessened the pressure on her back, which was difficult to do because all I wanted to do was touch her more. "You feel how the water's kind of holding you up?"

"Yeah."

"So long as you stay relaxed," I said, slowly removing my hands from under her. "The water does most of the work for you."

"Really?" she considered it for a moment. There was a little smile on her face, much more relaxed and happy than I thought I'd get her so fast. "I thought swimming would be harder than this."

"This is not swimming."

"Well, it ain't drowning."

"It's floating. That's step one."

"Step one? How many are there?" she asked. "I could just float when the boat that's taking us to a mystery island with no Walkers starts to sink."

"You're impossible, angel." I sighed, but I couldn't help smiling at her and the way her hair fanned out in the water behind her like a real-life mermaid. She stuck her tongue out at me. I flicked the tiniest amount of water in her direction. A mistake.

"Daryl… where are your hands?" she said, staring at my hand in horror as she slowly realized I'd let go of her back without her noticing.

"You don't need 'em. That's what I'm tryna say, you -"

"Daryl?"

"-can float on your own, you don't need me to -"

"Daryl, what the fuck?!" She tensed up immediately, water splashing around us both as she panicked. Her body folded at the waist, dipping as she scrambled to get her feet on the ground. I grabbed her as she came dangerously close to going under.

"Okay, okay, I got you," I said, holding her tight as she gasped in shock of the cold water covering her up to her neck. "My hands are right here, baby, right here."

Naomi clung to me, and was nice even though she was grouchy about it. "Don't do that again."

"How else ya gonna learn?"

"Why do I have to learn?" she scowled, her arms around my shoulders. I knew I should have let go and let her try again, but I was enjoying her warmth in the cold water. Enjoying it a little too much, if I'm honest. I could feel myself hardening despite the cold. I tried to ignore it, but having her pressed up against me was too nice.

"You see how you only started to sink when you panicked and got all tense?" I said, avoiding her question. "If you ever find yourself in water like this, the first step is to relax. Let yourself float."

"Then what?"

"Well, hopefully, by then, you'll be swimming on your own."

"And if not?"

"I'll come and get ya," I said.

"What if you ain't there?"

"I will be."

I ain't letting you out of my damn sight.

Naomi laughed like I was joking, but I'd never been more serious about anything in my life. Before I could say anything, she pulled herself closer to me, giving me soft, gentle kisses as her legs wrapped around my waist. She was feather-light under the water.

"This ain't what we're supposed to be doing," I groaned against her lips, but my resolve had been tested for so long that I didn't exactly resist her. At some point when I'd been kissing her, my hands had slipped down to her ass, pulling her body tighter against my waist.

"You still ain't told me why this what we're doing," she said.

I sighed. I didn't want to tell her because I knew I'd sound crazy. I wasn't even sure how to describe this knot of dread in my stomach that formed every time I thought about the fact she couldn't swim. It was new, and it was strong. Ever since she'd brought up the dangers of pregnancy and childbirth, I'd been haunted but the same damn thought. Over and over.

What else haven't I thought of?

"Can't lose you, baby," I said, holding her a little tighter to me. Everything in me ached to be closer to her. Something tugged at my heart, a growing heat spread through my lower stomach. "Not to Walkers, not to a gunshot, not to drowning, not to a fire, not an illness, not an accident. Nothing."

"Daryl," her whole face softened. "You can't protect me from absolutely everything."

"Wanna bet?"

Naomi smiled. I knew she thought I was being ridiculous, shooting for the impossible, and the trouble was she was right. Rationally, I knew the day would come when both of us would breathe our last. But I also knew that there wasn't a single cell in my body that wouldn't stop fighting the inevitable. The idea that one day there'd be a world without her in it, no matter how far off that day was, sent me into a tailspin I couldn't get out of.

"We got it too good, sweetheart. I can't… I wouldn't be able to..." I held her closer to me, not wanting her to drift even slightly out of my arms. "Not now I know what's it like… how it feels to…this life with you... it's so..."

It was incoherent nonsense, but she did what she always did and translated it in her head so that she could understand me. Her hand, cold from the water, touched my cheek. "I know. We have it real good. Better than I ever thought it could be."

The way she looked at me threw me off a little. Her tone was light enough, but there was a seriousness in her eyes, like she was weighing something up. I rested my forehead against hers. I could've fallen into those eyes. "You're everything to me."

"You really mean that, don't you?" Her eyes were still searching mine for something. I didn't know what. All I could give her was the truth.

"'Course I do." That she even had to ask was a sign I'd failed somewhere at something.

"You're everything to me too, Daryl," she whispered. My lips found hers, although I knew I shouldn't. There was something sad in her pretty eyes. She was so damn irresistible. My biggest goddamn weakness in this life, and having her wrapped around me in the water like this was too much.

Fuck it.

"Goddamn it, Naomi," I picked her up out of the water, walking us both to the shore.

"What?" she asked, all innocent, her face buried in my neck.

"You know damn well what," I said, carrying her back to the car. "Who let you be half-naked like this, huh?

I felt her body shake with laughter against mine. "This was all your idea."

I opened up the back seat of the car and set her down. I hated having her out of my arms, but I loved how she looked when she lay back across the seat. Skin still glistening from the water, goosebumps rising on it. I started slowly kissing up her body as I crawled on top of her. Cramped and yet we didn't feel close enough. I murmured against her collarbone, "I need you, baby."

Naomi let out one of her beautiful whimpers as I reached her neck. Her hands were on my back, running up and down, pulling my body against hers. There was already so fucking little between us. A few thin pieces of material that were so wet they stuck to us like a second skin.

I knew we should stop to dry off, cool off, but I didn't want to and neither did she.

"Take 'em off, Daryl, please…"

"Take what off, baby?" I teased.

"All of it," she said with a neediness that made me smirk, made me want to explode. Made me want to hear it again. "Fucking all of it."

I unclasped her bra, pausing for a moment to nip at her hardened nipples before I moved to tug her panties off. I peeled my boxers off and looked back at her.

"Open up for me, sweetheart," I told her and she obliged immediately, her legs falling open. I couldn't stop staring at her, couldn't believe this angle walking among us was mine. My girl. "God, you're perfect."

My knees sank into the carseat, her soft thighs hugged my ears as I ducked down between them. My mouth watered before I'd even tasted her. Naomi whimpered again as I pressed my tongue against her clit. Her sweet heat against my mouth, my tongue exploring her again and again. God, she tasted like nothing else on this Earth. Heavenly. My favorite meal.

My fingers pushed inside her, seeking out that spot that I knew would turn those whimpers into something more. Something louder, more primal. Her hips bucked a little as I got close. So damn needy for me. I loved it. I didn't want to stop until she was a shaking, quivering mess. And then I wanted to do it all over again.

"Fuck, Daryl," she gasped. Her hands tugged my hair. "Wait."

I stopped, looked up at her, catching my breath. "You okay, angel?"

"Yeah…yeah…" she nodded breathlessly. "Just… I don't suppose your preparations for today included… um…"

I sat up, wiped my mouth. "What do you want, Naomi?"

"I want you inside me," she said. Just hearing it made me throb with need. "Is that… can we…?"

I nodded, reaching down to where my jeans had fallen on the floor of the car and pulling a condom out of my pocket. We'd been all hands and mouths since the condom split and that was fine. It still felt like a miracle I was allowed to touch her at all. But I couldn't deny that I'd missed being inside her.

"This what you want, baby?" I asked. She nodded. Still, I wanted to be sure. "Tell me. Tell me you want it."

"Fuck me, Daryl," she said, already reaching for the foil in my hands. "Please… I gotta feel your cock in me."

"Goddamn, angel, you're needy today." I sat back and let her roll it over me. I got ready to lay her down again, but before I could move she'd swung her leg over me and pulled herself onto my lap. I liked how close it made us, how her body was pressed up against mine, all softness and curves. She kissed me deeply, slowly, one hand reaching down to line up my hard cock with her slick entrance.

"I need you," she whispered between kisses, her tongue meeting mine. My heart throbbed in my chest, my cock throbbed in her hand.

"I need you too, baby," I groaned as she slowly slid down onto me. My fingers dug into her, my head tipped back. "You got no fucking idea how much."

Naomi's breath fanned across my neck as she leaned in to kiss it. I wrapped my arms around her, hugged her close as she started to roll her hips on me, fucking herself slowly on my cock. She gasped, "Fuck, Daryl."

"I know, baby, I know," I murmured in her ear. Because I did. The soft cushion of her chest against mine, the warmth of her body completely wrapped up in my arms, and her hot, tight, heat around my cock was almost too much to bear and yet it still didn't feel like enough. That dark promise, that looming threat that one day all of this would be over, meant I longed for her even when she was right there with me. Even when I was buried deep inside her, holding her tight in my arms, I wanted more of her.

"Oh my God…" Naomi's breath and lips on my neck, the movement of her hips faster and more urgent. Both of us shivering with cold, with need, with the promise of each other. Nothing had come easy for us except loving each other. But, as difficult as our lives had been, it would be nothing compared to how hard it would be to let each other go. Fingernails biting down on wet skin. Her face buried in my neck, I could feel her moaning against me, the sound vibrating through me as if they were my own. Hell, maybe they were.

"Lean back a little, baby. Lemme see ya," I told her. Naomi pulled back, fixing me with those beautiful eyes, all hazy with desire. "God you're so fucking pretty."

"Daryl…" she tried to look away from me. All cute and self-conscious. A curtain of hair fell across her face. I reached out to move it, tucked it behind her ear.

"C'mon now, darlin', let me see ya. Look at me, angel." I said. She looked back at me. Her face flushed, lips parted as her soft cries kept falling from them. "I love seein' you enjoying yourself like this. You're so fucking beautiful, Naomi."

I held her face as I kissed her, swallowing each of her pretty moans. It felt wrong, dirty almost, to have her in the back of a car like this. This girl who deserved palaces and four-poster beds and all the riches in the world was somehow slumming it with me in the back of a car. A better man would've given her up, let her find something actually good enough for her.

But fuck she felt so good.

"That's it, baby just like that," I held her hips, pressing my feet down firmly on the floor so I could meet her movements, driving up harder into her.

"Oh, fuck." Naomi's eyelashes fluttered, her eyes rolling back slightly. Heat and pride coursed through me at once.

"You're about to cum for me, ain't ya?" I said. She nodded. My grip on her hips tightened, I couldn't take my eyes off her face. I watched her orgasm building behind her eyes. "It's okay, beautiful, you can let go. Cum for me angel."

The way she said my name, the way it burned on her pretty lips as she came undone, the way she fluttered and clenched around me, the way her body tensed up in my arms… all of it sent me spiraling closer to the edge. As she came down from her high, she leaned forward. Her body was a little limp, but her lips were seeking out mine. A searing kiss, her tongue against mine, another one of her goddamn whimpers vibrating against me was enough to tip me over. I gripped her hips so tight I was sure I'd leave a mark, pushing deep inside her as I came. Her kisses swallowed the deep, guttural sounds that tried to escape me. They were hers. She was right to claim them.

Panting, I slumped down onto the backseat, pulling her with me. She lay on top of me for a moment while we caught our breath. Steamed up windows made it hard to see outside, but I was sure more time had passed than I'd have wanted. Still, I could've lain there with her for the rest of my life.

"You really derailed this whole thing," I mumbled into her hair. "This was not in the plan for today."

"You coulda said no," she retorted.

"Right. Like I could say no to you," I said, and felt her laughter against my chest.

"It ain't so bad if I don't learn to swim right this second. Surely we can come back in the summer when it's actually warm," she said. "I promise not to get on any boats before then."

"I'm gonna hold you to that." I stroked a hand through her still-damp hair. "We gotta start making tracks, though."

She looked up at me from where her head was resting on my chest. So damn cute and a little bit sleepy. "You wanna go home?"

"Nah, not yet," I said, reluctantly untangling myself from her. "There's something else I wanna do."

"I already know about stop, drop, and roll," she said, eyeing me suspiciously. "Y'know, in case your next life lesson involves setting me on fire."

"That ain't it," I chuckled, shaking my head at her. I opened the door and ducked around to the trunk. I passed her a towel and the dry clothes I'd packed before cleaning myself up and getting dressed again.

I picked up my jacket from where it had fallen on the floor in the back of the car, my fingers fumbling in the pockets before I put it on.

"You ready?" she asked me, opening up the passenger side door.

My fingers closed around the ring still nestled safely in there. I took a breath, "Ready as I'll ever be."

Chapter 62: And there you were

Naomi

I knew something was up because Daryl was weird and quiet, driving me somewhere with the determination of a kidnapper. If he'd been anyone else, I'd have been deeply unsettled. But, even if he planned to tie me up in some kind of basement, I wouldn't have minded. Daryl kept glancing at me, amused by how I kept looking out the window for clues about where we were. 

The mystery was killing me.

“Wait,” I sat up straighter in my seat, my nose practically pressed against the window. “Are we near Alexandria?”

“You recognize it?” It wasn’t a ‘yes,’ but he seemed pleased. 

“Yeah, I think so.” Many roads looked the same, especially as nature reclaimed them. Plantlife obscured signs, and abandoned cars rusted at more or less the same rate. The edges of the roads were blurring with overgrown vegetation. But something about this particular road was familiar.

“Alright,” Daryl nodded, drumming his fingers against the steering wheel. He was avoiding looking at me, leaning forward in his seat. Anticipation tensed his shoulders, but… anticipation of what?

“Are we… visiting?” I asked. I tried not to let it show but hoped we weren't. I'd spent the last week and a half secretly arranging for Daryl's nearest and dearest to come and surprise him at Sanctuary in a few days. As sickeningly adorable as other people might find it if we'd decided to surprise each other with the same thing, my competitive streak couldn’t handle him getting there first.

Daryl smiled a little and said, “Nah. It's just us today, angel.” 

That was a relief. And nice. It was lame to admit, but hanging out with him was still my favorite way of spending time. Even if he'd almost drowned me. Even if all we did today was drive around and test his freshly made biofuel. A special kind of relaxation comes with spending time with the one person who knows you best. There are no airs or graces to put on. You don’t always have to explain yourself in words; you don’t even have to talk if you don’t want to, which I knew Daryl appreciated even more than I did. 

He brought the car to a slow stop, glancing at me out of the corner of his eye. “You know where this is?”

I looked at the bend in the road and nodded slowly, unsure why we were back there. “This is where I left water out for you guys. Before Aaron and I recruited you all to Alexandria. Right?”

“Yup,” he nodded, and I felt a rush like I’d got something right on a test. “I knew it was you. Nobody believed me, but I knew that handwriting on the note…you could've at least signed it or something. Helped a guy out.”

“I wanted to, but Aaron wouldn't let me,” I said. “He had that stupid idea that you'd be…different somehow. Not the man I remembered. That we’d be… dangerous to each other.”

As I said it, my chest ached. We were dangerous together, in a way, but only because the lengths we’d go to for each other bordered on a level of unhinged previously unreached by other human beings. Dangerous only to each other because the end of this would be the end of me. Daryl was right, we had it too good. Losing it now would be the real end of the world.

“Yeah. Rick said something similar,” Daryl said. 

“Dummies.” It was easy to smile about now that we were all so close. The burning frustration I'd felt at being able to see Daryl physically and not run to him was a thing of the past. Now, he was usually close enough that I could reach out and touch him—no running or pining required. Daryl nodded and looked over at me and my stomach did a stupid little flip. 

“They just didn't know how we… are with each other,” Daryl said. There was something in his eyes when he said it that made me choke up. Our relationship was a little easier to explain now that we could admit we were in love, but it had always felt much deeper than an outsider could understand. Even now, ‘boyfriend’ didn't sum up everything he was to me. There probably wasn't a word for it.

“Think they get it now?”

“They're starting to,” he said with a smile and popped open his door. I watched him hop out of the car and shut the door behind him. He started walking toward the treeline at the edge of the road. Didn’t wait for me, knew I’d follow. Curiosity dragged me out, and I chased hot on his heels. The control freak, anxiety-driven part of me was threatening to spin out. The only thing stopping me was how safe Daryl made me feel, and the slightly amused smirk on his lips every time he glanced around to check that I was following. 

We’d only trodden this path once, but the memory of it was seared into me. Seeing him walk down it, away from his group, toward the small barn just visible beyond it, knowing we were moments away from speaking again, was etched into my soul. It would live there forever. What had already been an impossible moment now marked the beginning of something incredible. 

“Nobody believed me when I said it was you. Rick thought I was cracking up, which, looking back, was fair; we'd been through a lot,” he said. His gaze dropped to the ground for a moment as we walked side by side through the trees, down the same path he'd taken that had led him back to me. “We'd lost a lot.”

“I know,” I said quietly, taking his hand. He didn't need to tell me what they'd been through. Losing their first real home at the prison, losing Beth and Hershel, everything they’d suffered at Terminus… There were some deaths he’d carry with him forever.

“Rick told me to walk it off,” Daryl said, coming to a stop under a familiar tree. Dead leaves piled up on the patch of forest floor I'd found him sitting on, burning a lit cigarette against his skin. “I was sitting down right here, and honestly, angel, I was starting to think Rick was right. Losing so much was making me lose my mind. I wanted to find you so bad, but it just seemed like no matter what I did, someone I cared about wound up dead. Started thinking you’d be better off if I never found you.”

“No.” I couldn’t bear to hear him say that. Nothing had ever felt right without him. I remembered seeing him sitting there. How broken he’d looked, and how nothing, not even Aaron pulling a gun on me, could have stopped me from getting to him in that state. 

“It’s how it felt. Like nothing would ever go right again. I was at my fucking lowest…” Daryl shrugged, the toe of his boot scuffed against the dirt, a self-conscious tick. “…and then there you were.”

He looked up at me. His blue eyes caught me off guard. My heart clenched, “Daryl…”  

“Right when I needed you most. Like a goddamn miracle,” he said. I had no idea what was going on, why he'd brought me here, or what he was doing, but my heart started beating a million miles an hour. Like it knew something was coming—something it needed to prepare for. “You've always been that way. I don't know how you do it.” 

“Well, I wish I could say I planned it, but it was sheer dumb luck I found you.” 

“Nah. Feels like more than that.”

“What, you tryna say it was fate?” I said. It was meant to make him laugh. I thought he’d call me a dumbass, but he didn’t. He shrugged.

“I dunno. Maybe. I mean, even when we first met. My Mom had just died, and Dad was… gettin’ worse. Merle was in juvie. I had nobody. Nobody gave a shit where I was or what I was doing. I could have fallen off the face of the Earth and nobody would’ve given a damn,” he said. Daryl took both of my hands in his like he had when walking me into the lake earlier. I studied his face. He was so damn serious. “And then there you were.”

“Lucky me,” I said quietly. 

“Pfft, yeah.”

“Nah, I mean it,” I said. “You looked out for me. First thing you did was teach me to hunt so I wouldn't have to steal food anymore. Nobody had taken care of me before. I didn't know what that was like.”

“I wanna keep taking care of you,” he said. “Forever.” 

“Well, you're the best at it. When you care about someone, Daryl, you really care. I was lucky then and I'm lucky now,” I said. “You're so loyal and protective, and you make me feel so safe and loved. You're such a good man, I know you don't always think it, but you are.”

God, why am I getting so damn emotional? 

Daryl was too. “Shit, you’re better at this than me. I knew you would be.”

“Better at what ?”

Daryl shook his head and took a deep breath. He shoved a hand deep into his pocket. “Seeing you again, after I never thought I would, was the best thing that could've happened to me. I lost you once. I’ve tried living without you and I hated every second of it. I couldn't do it again. Not even for a day. So, I know that you ‘n’ me ain't been a couple that long, but you've always been my… I gotta ask… Naomi, will you -”

What the fuck was that?

Whatever Daryl was about to say was cut short. The forest had been so quiet it felt like we were the only two people in the world, a burst of loud popping sounds quickly shattered that illusion. 

Gunshots. 

Daryl grabbed me and dragged me down to the ground. His body shielded mine. I loved him for trying, but I'd never forgive myself if he went out this way. I gripped his clothes, pulling him with me as I tried to move back. Protecting each other was an instinct so deeply baked in that it would probably end up being our undoing. Annoyed but unable to argue with me, Daryl followed, and we slowly shifted until I felt roots under my shoulders. The forest was silent now. Backs up against that same tree I'd found him under, both of us scanned the forest for movement like we used to search for game. Daryl's hands touched my shoulder, drawing my attention back to him. 

“You good?” he asked in a low whisper. I nodded. His hand rubbed my arm, concerned eyes looking right into mine. “You hit?”

I shook my head. “Don't think they were shooting at us.”

He nodded in agreement. Daryl's arms wrapped around me, his face alert for danger. “Sounded close.” 

We kept listening, but there were no further gunshots. Now that everything had fallen quiet, it was hard to tell which direction it had come from, but it seemed to have been behind us and toward the road. I pointed in that direction, and Daryl nodded in agreement. 

“We should go look,” I whispered and felt him tense.

“Why?” he hissed back. 

Shooting at Walkers was a dumb move that would only bring more. It was a desperate, last resort. “They might need help.”

“Knew you'd say that,” Daryl muttered, his head shaking slightly. He pulled his gun and looked at me. “Follow. If it looks dangerous, fall back.”

“I got your back,” I said, drawing my knife and pistol. There was no way I’d leave his side if things looked dangerous, and he knew that. The warning glare he shot over his shoulder was meant to scare me off. It didn't. 

We moved like we used to when we were stalking deer—quiet, in unison, so in tune with each other, we didn't have to speak. Our ears tuned in to every light rustle of our surroundings. There are ways to tell the difference between wind and a deliberate step, especially at that time of year when the ground is littered with decaying leaves. The dead weren't smart enough to tread lightly. 

A few paces in, a new sound cut through the silence - an engine. Daryl looked at me. 

“ The car , ” I mouthed. We'd left it parked right in the middle of the road. It's not like there was traffic anymore, and we didn’t usually have to worry about other people on the roads. I couldn’t remember the last time we’d seen another moving vehicle. From the lack of disrepair and the outward signs of modifying it for Daryl's biofuel, it would be obvious to anyone passing by that it was one of the few functional cars left. Valuable in a world like this. Worth killing for.

“ Fuck, ” he breathed. As fun as it had been the first time, we couldn't afford another night stranded on the road. There was too much work to be done. We couldn't afford to lose a vehicle either, especially after all of the modifications Daryl had done to it. 

We broke into a run, closing the gap between us and the road. Judging by when we'd heard the engine start, we only had a few seconds before they took off. Knowing our luck we'd get to the road just in time to see some asshole driving away in our car. I could still hear the engine running. 

Daryl burst into the road ahead of me and came to such a sudden stop that I almost crashed into his back. “What the hell?”

Gun raised, he had it trained on the car. It was exactly where we'd left it in the middle of the road. The engine was running, the doors were open, and there wasn't another person in sight. Even the trunk had been popped. 

Daryl moved cautiously toward it. I stuck close by, but my attention was on the surrounding trees. We'd been drawn out here for a reason, and whoever had done it was nearby. They couldn’t have had time to go far. Daryl swept the car methodically. I covered his back, watching every movement in the treeline. The engine cut out as Daryl leaned in and removed the keys. 

“Car’s clear,” Daryl muttered after he’d checked that nobody was hiding under it. 

“They take anything?” I asked, although, as far as I knew, there wasn’t much to take, and a glance told me Daryl’s crossbow had been left in the backseat. He reached in to get it. Why would someone go to all of this trouble and not take a weapon that was sitting right there?

“Nope.” Daryl’s back pressed against mine as we covered both sides of the road. A movement drew my eye. Something was coming out of the forest, human-sized and shaped. Another one followed quickly behind. From the way they stumbled, I knew what they were. 

“I got two Walkers comin’,” I said, raising my knife. 

“I got a few, too,” I felt him turn to glance back at me and judge how far they were from me. “You good, baby?”
“Yeah, I got ‘em,” I said, looking over his shoulder at the three heading his way. They were about as close to him as mine were to me. We’d have to divide and conquer. Daryl clearly hated the idea, and I wasn’t much of a fan either. If someone was about to attack us, waiting until we were separated and distracted with something else before they struck would be a smart move. 

Ignoring every instinct yelling at me not to, I walked away from the comfort of Daryl's back. I moved quickly on the first Walker, all the time hyper-aware of anyone else moving in my peripheral. The first Walker reached for me, I dodged it and jammed my knife into the base of its skull. A bolt whizzed through the air and took out the second before I could get near it. I looked over my shoulder at Daryl, half expecting to see someone sneaking up on him while he was distracted by helping me. But it was just him. 

“C'mon,” he said urgently, gesturing for me to get back to him. There was a wild panic in his eyes. I walked back to the familiar comfort of Daryl's back up against mine. The forest around us was treacherously quiet. 

“Why would anyone… do this?” I whispered. 

“We’re going be jus’ fine, angel,” Daryl said quietly.

“I know,” I said. I didn’t need to be reassured of that. We were a formidable team, bound by the knowledge that we’d do anything for each other. “But why draw us out here? Why mess with the car without taking it? It’s like they're trying to distract us from something, but… there’s nothing else here.”

Daryl gave a start, “The barn!” 

“The barn ?” I repeated, chasing after him. “That ain’t ours.”

Daryl didn’t answer, running with a dogged determination that I didn’t understand. Anyone who’d been trying to distract us while they took it was welcome to it. We didn’t store anything there. It wasn’t ours. It was largely empty when Aaron and I had checked it out as a potential place to recruit Daryl’s group. That was a long time ago, and I couldn’t think why that would have changed. Now would have been the perfect time for us to make a quiet exit. I followed him anyway, leaving his side was not an option. I'd run into the mouth of hell before I let him go into danger alone. 

We ran back into the woods, past the tree we’d taken shelter under at the sound of gunshots. Slowing as we neared the barn, wanting to maintain the element of surprise, Daryl paused. He was right. Two men were emerging from the barn, carrying a whole skinned deer between them. There was a truck backed up to the front of the barn that hadn't been there a moment ago. 

Maybe this was all just a weird trick to distract us long enough for them to move their supplies. They might've thought that we would steal from them if we found their stash. This had all been a misunderstanding. I relaxed, assuming Daryl would too. We could back off now and leave them to it. But I looked at him; his jaw was clenched tight, and his eyes were fixed on the deer. He was pissed. 

“Sonofabitch,” Daryl muttered, striding forward with his crossbow pointed at them. 

“Wait!” I hissed. “Leave them! Why are you -?”

“Hey!” Daryl yelled, either not hearing me or ignoring me completely. “Drop the deer and go. Nobody needs to get hurt.” 

The two men paused for a moment, looked over at him, and then kept going. The bigger of the two, with a large graying beard, looked at Daryl, unfazed, “Deer's ours.”

That sounded fair. We had no stake in this, I wasn't even sure why we'd come back. Daryl tensed, I could feel his anger bristling around him but I didn’t understand it. “No, it ain't. It's ours.”

“You got proof of purchase?”

“I shot it.”

You did?

When?

I stared at Daryl. I didn't want to contradict him in front of these strangers, but… Things weren’t adding up. Why would he stash a kill here instead of bringing it back to Sanctuary?

“Can you prove that?” 

“It’s my fucking deer,” he said, finger tense on his loaded crossbow.

 “Woah, woah, woah,” I said, trying to cool him down. One deer wasn't worth dying over. He knew that. “It's fine. Let ‘em have it.”

 “Listen to your lady,” the bearded man said. There was a thud as they threw the deer into the back of their truck. “Ain’t no reason for this to go badly for anyone.”

“Give it back ,” Daryl snarled. The bearded man sighed and raised a gun at Daryl. Not just any gun, a goddamn machine gun.

“ Daryl, ” I hissed urgently. These guys were too well-armed to mess with.

“Are we going to have a problem?” the bearded man asked. His machine gun was unnervingly clean, the barrel glinting as Daryl glared down it.

“No. We’re good,” I said, fighting to keep my breathing neutral. “Ain’t we?”

The bearded man’s eyes slid back over to me. “You guys got a place near here?”

“Why?” I asked. “Do you need one?”

The offer was almost a reflex. It had been a while since we’d come across survivors in need and been able to offer shelter, there was a second where it felt like we might be able to do that again. They could bring the damn deer, and Daryl might stop losing his shit about it. I should have known it was too neat a solution.

“Naomi,” Daryl breathed my name as a warning. I paused, glanced at him, and noticed the way he was looking at the strangers. These people were clean and well-armed. Their clothes looked fresh, and dirt-free. They didn’t look like people who’d been on the road or in need of shelter. Even their truck looked factory-fresh.

“Do you? ” the man asked, still looking at me. I clammed up real fast.

“Hey. Don't talk to her. Talk to me,” Daryl snapped, stepping in front of me. 

“We’ve got a place,” the bearded man says as if Daryl hasn’t spoken. “It's safe. Secure. Family-friendly”

“We're good, thanks,” I said, but my blood had turned to ice. ‘Family-friendly’ was a weird turn of phrase. Had they seen us before? Did they know about Mia? I tugged on Daryl’s arm, “Leave it. Let’s go.”

The muscles in Daryl’s jaw tightened, but there was a little give in his arm. He was about to walk away with me and then a third man walked out of the barn, a green cap pulled down low over his head and a box of something in his hands. Daryl tensed again, we both did. We were outnumbered. Were there any more of them? 

“Nothing else worth taking in there, we should-” the third man stopped when he noticed us. “…what’s this?”

The bearded man didn’t take his eyes off Daryl, “This guy says the deer’s his.”

“Doesn’t look like it,” the man in the green cap said. He stared at Daryl, “That your car on the road? I suggest you get in and stop trying to claim what ain’t yours.”

“You first,” Daryl said through gritted teeth.

“Alright,” the man said with a shrug. They started backing toward the truck. “We'll get out of your hair.”

“What’s in the box?” Daryl said, stepping forward as they retreated.
“Daryl!” I hissed. “What the hell are you doing?”

He didn’t answer me. The guy in the green cap put the box in the back of the truck with the dead deer and hopped in there too. He picked up another machine gun and pointed it at us from the back of the truck while his friends got in the front. Daryl was so enraged that he looked like he might shoot. I knew he wouldn’t, not when there was a chance of them retaliating, but he really seemed close to it. 

“Hey, quick tip if that is your barn,” the guy in the green cap said, raising his voice over the sound of the engine switching on. “Shouldn't have so many candles in there. It ain't safe.” 

Candles? 

Daryl’s head whipped around as the truck took off. 

“ Fuck!” he yelled. “FUCK!” 

I didn’t take my eyes off the retreating truck, but my heart raced at how panicked he sounded. How angry. Daryl looked back at the truck, and I could tell he was tempted to shoot. Blow the tires out and run after them. He was breathing hard; his fingers gripped the gun so tightly that his knuckles turned white. But the guy in the back had a gun trained on us too. The stalemate wouldn’t end until they were far enough away that none of us could damage the other. 

Behind me, I could smell smoke. 

“Daryl…” I said, my voice shaking. “What’s that smell?”

“It’s the barn,” he said. “It’s the fucking barn, them assholes burned it.”

The truck was far enough away that I chanced a glance back. Smoke billowed from the barn doors. Flames lapped at the entrance. It was out of control, the place would be destroyed, but it shouldn’t upset him. It wasn’t our barn. When the truck was out of sight, Daryl turned toward the fire. It reflected in his eyes. 

“ Fuck!” he yelled again. He started pacing, agitated, looking at that barn like it was Alexandria burning. Like everything was falling apart around him and he didn't know how to stop it. “And they took our fucking dear… I can’t… we can’t… I’ll never be… FUCK!”

My heart sank. He was spinning out. Over a damn deer. Had I been putting too much pressure on him? Worrying so much about the food shortage that he’d tried to shoulder the sole responsibility for fixing it? I caught his arm to stop him pacing. “Daryl, it's alright. It's just a deer. We'll get another one.”

When he looked at me, there was such a desperate hopelessness in his eyes that it made my heart ache. “This was fucking dumb idea, I don’t know what I was thinking. I never should’ve…”

He stopped. I waited for him to go on, but he didn’t. The anger in his eyes was dying out, washed away by that deep hopelessness, which was so much worse. I hated seeing it and didn’t know how to pull him out of it because I didn’t understand where it was coming from. That scared me more than anything else had that day - more than getting in the water, more than someone fucking with our car, more than coming across strangers with guns. I touched his cheek and turned his face to look at me, “What’s going on?”

Indecision flickered across his face for a moment. I hated how sad he looked. He swallowed something down and sighed. 

“C’mon,” he said. “Let’s just go home.”

I nodded, and let him walk back to the car in silence. Sometimes he just needed time, needed space to process things before he found the words for them. We reached the road again, the road I’d seen him walking down after all those years. Daryl came to a stop, staring blankly at the car but not getting in. I hated that this was putting a damper on what had been such an otherwise perfect escape from our usual work at Sanctuary. I waited for him to open the driver’s side. When he didn’t, I moved to stand with him, wondering if I should offer to be the one to drive us both home. Daryl didn't seem in a fit state to get behind the wheel.

“C'mon, it ain't so bad,” I nudged him, trying to jolt him out of it. The sigh that came out of him could’ve knocked a house down. “I still had a good time today, didn’t you?”

“Yeah, but-” Daryl looked at me for a long time. So long I started to get nervous. Something in his eyes changed, and a decision clicked into place. He shoved his hands into his pockets. “Fuck it.” 

“Fuck what ?”

He sighed again. “I wanted to do this right. I need you to know that.” 

“Do what right?”

“I had whole fuckin’ plan, sweetheart,” he said, his frustration giving away to tense nervousness. It was putting me on edge. “And you deserve… well, you deserve a hell of a lot more than I could ever… but it all just went up in smoke, and I want you to be my wife, and I don’t wanna have to wait anymore, I just want-”  

Daryl froze when he realized what he’d let slip. I froze too. We stared at each other for a moment, hearts beating like crazy in the silence.                                                                             “ What did you just say?” I managed to ask, breathlessly. It probably wasn’t the right way to handle it or the right thing to say. If he’d blurted out something he didn’t mean I didn’t want to put him on the spot by drawing attention to it. But how was I supposed to think about anything else?

“Shit, that wasn't how I meant to… I mean, I should've…” Daryl dropped to one knee and my stomach dropped with him. Something glinted in his fingers, but I couldn’t focus on it because my vision was blurring. 

Is that…?

Is he about to…?

Holy fucking shit. 

My heart damn near stopped. It leaped up to the back of my throat; my hand flew to my mouth. Never, not in a million years, would I have seen this coming.

“Wait,” I said, but I could barely speak. Panic started setting into Daryl's eyes, and I tried to get the words out as fast as I could. “Before you… do what I think… you might be… are you sure ?” 

“Yes.” He sounded sure, but it was hard to see his face through newly formed tears.

“Cause, you can walk it back,” I said, my voice breaking with emotion. “No hard feelings, just… don't ask me unless you're sure. Okay?”

I couldn't say no to him. Even if it might be the right thing to do, even if I thought he deserved something better. I didn't have that kinda strength. I’d never in my life thought I'd be in this position but now that I was, I knew I'd never be able to hear that question from his lips and say no.

“I ain't ever been more sure of anything in my life.”

My cheeks were wet with tears. “But, what if I decide I don't want -”

“I don't care. You're my family, you're my future. Whatever that looks like, that's what I want.”

I nodded. Words momentarily escaped me. 

“Naomi,” he said, voice gruff. “Will you-”

 “Yes,” I said immediately. 

“I ain’t asked yet.”

“Sorry,” I said, half-laughing and half-crying, but I found I was kneeling too because I didn’t want to be any further from him than I had to be. 

His hands took mine, and even though I'd already given him my answer, he still took a deep and shaky breath, “Will you marry me?”

“Yes.” I reached for him, closing the gap between us to kiss him. Daryl’s arms wrapped around me, pulling me against him. He kissed me back, and he felt like the only solid thing in existence. It was difficult to stay upright because we were both crying a little.

I couldn't believe it. Neither could he, his lips still pressed against mine, he whispered, “For real?”

“ Yes.”

He pulled back and held me at arm's length for a moment to look at me. “Like…you'll be my wife?”

“ Yes, Daryl,” I laughed, wiping the tears from my cheeks. “Ain't that what you just asked me?”

“I know. But…gotta be sure you heard me right.” 

“Yes.” I laughed again. “Yes. Yes. A thousand times yes .” 

Daryl laughed too, his cheeks as damp as mine. He took my hand as he got to his feet, helping me up, too. When I was on my feet, he held onto my left hand and opened his palm. A ring glinted in the middle of it. “Can I…?”

“Yes,” I said again. My new favorite word. My hand shook in his. I wiped my eyes with the other hand, trying to hold myself together enough to take it all in. Real gently he slipped it onto the ring finger on my left hand. It glided on there, fit like a dream. The band looked like intricately twisted branches of a silver tree, cradling a stone in the middle. It was blue. Like his eyes. 

I couldn't speak. My silence made him anxious. “I know it ain't… I couldn’t find a diamond and I didn't want anything that, uh, stuck out too much, y'know, in case it got caught on anything and you couldn't -”

“Holy shit, it's so pretty,” I blurted out, tears threatening to well up again. Daryl's ears went pink as he tried to hide how much he was smiling. “It's beautiful. Where the hell did you find something like this?”

“Glad ya like it.” 

“I love it,” I said, on the verge of babbling again. “I love you. God, I can't believe… you… and me… I just…”

Daryl took my face in his hands, his thumbs brushing tear tracks from my cheeks. “I love you so much, angel.”

This time when we kissed, we were smiling through it so much it made my cheeks hurt. Daryl’s arms wrapped around me, holding me so tightly to his chest that after a while I struggled to breathe. I didn’t care. There was nothing in my life worth complaining about. 

“Let’s get you home, baby,” Daryl said, opening up the car door for me. His ears were still pink, his smile didn't budge. Excitement buzzed in the air around him. I’m sure it was around me too. I slipped into the car, still feeling like I was in a dream.

“I can't believe it fits so well,” I said, looking down at the ring again as Daryl got into the driver’s seat. I couldn't stop staring at it. 

“What?” Daryl said quietly. “You think I don't know what size your hands are?” 

“But you found one that's exactly… ” I caught the look in his eye right before he looked away from me “Hold up. Daryl, did you make this?”

The self-conscious pause before he answered told me everything I needed to know. 

“Well, I found one, but it didn't seem right or the right size, and like I said, I didn't want anything that could get caught if you need to get away from something fast, so I just…” he trailed off. His voice quieted, “Yeah, I guess I made it.”

I started crying again immediately.  

I had almost recovered by the time we reached Sanctuary. Thank God Daryl was driving, because now I was the one who was in no state to be behind the wheel. Mia and Bryce were waiting on the steps. They didn’t usually wait for us like this. Mia was grinning from ear to ear, shifting impatiently on the balls of her feet. I couldn't remember the last time I'd seen her looking excited. Christmas when she was little, maybe. But not for a long time. Bryce, who'd never once heard me voice a desire for marriage and, in fact, seen me roll my eyes many times at the idea that I'd end up someone's wife, looked nervous. A few things fell into place. I looked over at Daryl, “She knows, doesn’t she? They both do.”

“Yeah.”

We got out of the car. Mia sprang down the steps, the anticipation written all over her face. When neither of us said anything right away, she looked at Daryl, “Did you do it?”

I feared for Daryl’s safety if he’d said no. Even as a joke. No wonder he hadn’t wanted to get back into the car without saying anything.

“Yeah,” he said, his cheeks reddening. 

Mia looked at me, and even though I’m sure she could see the answer in both of our faces, she asked, “Did you say yes?”

A tiny part of me wanted to mess with her, but I couldn’t bring myself to even pretend I’d said no. I held up my left hand. Mia’s feet barely touched the ground as she ran at us.

 

Daryl

The workshop was dark and quiet but not empty. There was a stillness to everything that was fake as hell, like the air was being forced to be silent. I can’t explain it better than that. When you’ve spent a lot of time alone in the quiet, you learn that there are different kinds. I stopped with my hand on the door handle. People were there. People who didn't want to be heard. I couldn’t walk away, couldn’t ignore it. The safety of this place might rest on it.

I drew my knife and tried not to worry about the fact I hadn't seen my girls since the morning. If anything had happened to either of them, whoever was in here was about to breathe their last. I nudged the door open a fraction. Nothing stirred inside, but it did still.  

Waiting for my eyes to adjust to the gloom, I managed to pick out at least one person-shaped shadow. Whoever it was, I hoped they were important enough to the others in there to be a valuable hostage. In one swift move, I kicked the door open and lunged for them, hauling them to their feet. My arm clamped tightly around the guy's neck to stop him from struggling. 

“Woah, man, it's just me!” A familiar voice protested. 

“ Glenn? ” The lights came on. Glenn looked at me with as much surprise as I was looking at him. Naomi stepped in front of me. 

“Surprise…?” she said, almost apologetically. 

“What the hell?” I quickly let Glenn go. 

Naomi started laughing, “I should have known hiding was a bad idea.”

Rick slapped me on the back. I looked back at Naomi, “ Rick's here?”

“Yeah, man,” he chucked. “Naomi invited all of us.”

All of us?

Michonne appeared at Rick's other shoulder. Carol and Ezekiel emerged from behind one of the workbenches. Mia and Carl stepped out from behind the door. There was a low groan and then a heavily pregnant Maggie stood up, aided by Rosita. Aaron and Bryce waved at me from near where Aaron had turned on the lights. 

“Even Maggie's here?” I stared at her. “Shouldn’t you be resting?”

“That's what I said,” Glenn muttered under his breath. 

“You think I'm going to miss one last chance to see you all before the baby comes?” Maggie said. “No way.”

“We probably should have come to you,” Naomi said, eyeing Maggie’s bump as if she was about to pop right there and then.

“Nah I got a few weeks in me yet,” Maggie brushed her off.

Naomi's brow creased in that anxious little frown. “Okay, but if you feel any-”

“If I feel anything at all out of the ordinary, I'll let you know,” Maggie said in a way that made it obvious my sweet girl had been fretting over her since they'd arrived. 

When had they arrived? 

I'd been out most of the day. Naomi had asked me to go on a hunt, but I was now suspecting that it had been a trick to set this all up. I looked around at them all, my head spinning like I was hallucinating. I couldn't remember the last time we'd all been in one place without a war to fight or some kinda life or death problem to solve. 

“What the hell are you all doing here?” I asked. I knew how rude it sounded but I was in too much shock for manners. Not that I was great at them at the best of times. Rick laughed again. 

“It was all her, man,” Rick said, nudging me and nodding to Naomi. “She suggested we all come to drop the last lot of supplies before Winter at the same time, and invited us to stick around for the night after. One last hurrah before the snow hits.”

“You did?” I looked at her. Naomi went bright red. I wanted to scoop her up right then and there. 

“That's a good future wife you got yourself there, Daryl,” Michonne said with a grin. 

Naomi’s blush deepened but there was no way I could make fun of her for it because I was sure I'd gone even redder. “Oh you heard about that, huh?”

“Mia radioed Carl,” Michonne laughed. “I think it must have been about ten minutes after you guys left.” 

Mia held her hands up, pretending to be all innocent, “Hey, I was excited, I had to tell someone that I’m going to be a bridesmaid.” 

“Bridesmaid?” Naomi repeated with a flash of alarm that mirrored a twist in my gut. “Mia you know it ain't gonna be like how weddings were before all this, right?”

“Right,” Mia said slowly, nodding. “But you know that group celebrations are important in keeping a sense of community, even and especially when groups are separated by distance.”

She said it like she was quoting something, and the way Naomi looked like she wanted to start cursing suggested that she was hearing her own words parroted by her baby sister. It was her own damn fault for being so clever, and for raising a kid clever enough to challenge her.

“She's right,” Carol chimed in. “That is what you said to get us all here.”

“Well, I take it back,” Naomi said, trying not to laugh. “Y'all are welcome to mind your own business. That goes doubly for you, Mia.”

Mia stuck her tongue out at her. 

God, I love my girls. 

“Congrats, man,” Rick slapped me on the back again. 

Mercifully, the conversation moved on as Jerry and Eugene came in with trays of food. The smells wafting off them made my mouth water. I shot Naomi a puzzled look. “You been holding out on us? We had all that in the kitchen?”

“We all brought something, so as not to put a drain on your resources,” said Ezekiel. “We all need to be cautious with supplies in the run-up to winter, so it wouldn’t be as bountiful a feast as we had in the summer, but food tastes better in good company, wouldn’t you agree?” 

“It’s like a potluck!” Carol added cheerfully.

I shook my head, “Stop. I hate it when you get all Stepford Wives on us.”

Carol pretended to be offended. “Well, then you don’t have to eat anything of mine.”

“Em, he doesn’t speak for me,” Naomi said quickly, worried that she would also be cut off from whatever food Carol had brought with them from the Kingdom.

"You have can have whatever you want," she said. "And if you need a wedding caterer..."

"Stop," I said again. 

At the same time, Mia said, "Yes!"

Recovering from the shock of not being attacked, I greeted all of them in a blur of hugs and hellos. We all mucked in to set the table. It was damn good to see them all like this. We were used to catching up in tiny little fractions. A visit to Hilltop to get more corn for biofuel from Maggie and Glenn, or seeing Carol and the King when they came to drop off a few supplies. It reminded me a little of our early days at the prison. Everyone gathered in one place, sharing plates of food, talking over one another, and passing dishes around. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d seen them all so relaxed. There were noticeable absences, people who should have been at the table but hadn’t made it. But, having everyone else gathered here, with Glenn and Maggie on the verge of welcoming their little one, it felt like we’d come out the other side of a long, dark, tunnel. There was daylight, fresh air, and each other. 

Didn’t even feel like we were in Sanctuary anymore. All of that bullshit melted away. It was just the group. 

After Mia and Carl had been sent to bed, Naomi pulled out an unmarked glass bottle. 

“This is strong,” she warned as poured out a drink for everyone but Maggie. “So go easy on it.”

There was a curious little glint in her eye as she slid one of them over to me. I sniffed it, braced myself, and took a shot. There was something familiar about the burn in the back of my throat. I winced, “The hell kind of paint stripper is this?”

“Merle's recipe, actually,” she said, passing them out to everyone else. 

“ Merle’s? ” I was sure I must've heard her wrong.

“Yeah,” she said. “He showed me how to make it once. When I was staying with you guys.”

“Why?”

“He had a bunch of questions about how to copyright something - I think he meant trademark or patent because I think he wanted to sell it,” she said. “He was not sober at the time, so the conversation was hard to follow. I remember the recipe though. I think.”

“Well shit,” I looked around at everyone else. “Y'all better take it real slow. Merle's hooch ain't to be trifled with.”

It was kind of fun to watch their reactions as they took a drink. I thought Glenn was about to hurl the moment it passed his lips. Rick toughed it out, but I could see his eyes watering. Michonne took careful, measured sips instead of a shot. Rosita downed it like a champ. Aaron coughed for about three solid minutes afterward. Naomi knew better than anyone what to expect, but I still saw her brace herself before she drank. 

Seeing as everyone survived the first round, Naomi started pouring out a few more. Food portions had been small because every community was rationing on the run-up to winter; the drink was strong, and it wasn’t long before people were getting a little tipsy. 

“I take it she's not…?” Rick looked pointedly at the glass in her hand. 

“Nah,” I shook my head. I could feel Rick studying me for any sign of disappointment about it, but there wasn't any. All of that was long gone. “It's all good.” 

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

It was better than good. I didn't want to bring up Lori again, not when things had been so good tonight. But, I felt like maybe I owed him an apology for not thinking about how he’d lost her. I was about to have Naomi as mine forever until death did us part, which meant she’d literally have to be pried out of my cold, dead hands. No way I wanted to chance speeding that kind of ending along. I still couldn’t think about the possibility of losing it, not for anything. 

“Hey, uh, you and Michonne…,” I cleared my throat. Rick’s eyebrows shot up in a where’s-this-going kind of way. 

“Ye-es?” 

“I’m just glad you found her, y’know,” I said. I had to start staring at my shoes because I wanted the ground to swallow me up. “It’s nice to see you happy after… everything.”

Rick put an arm around my shoulder. “Thank you, brother.”

Shit, I should stop drinking.

I’m getting sappy.

It was too late. Knowing Merle’s concoction it had been too late since that first drink. My damn sappy heart kept getting pulled back to Naomi. I couldn’t stop looking over at her. No matter who I wound up talking to, I found myself drawn back to her again and again. 

She’d been sitting opposite me at the table, and at first that was kinda nice because I could look at her, catching her smile. The way she laughed. Seeing her so at ease with the people I'd come to think of as family while we'd been apart, people she'd invited here because I loved them. But after a couple of drinks, I started wishing she was next to me so I could reach over and touch her thigh under the table. A few more tasted like I needed her in my lap. 

Thankfully, I wasn’t the only one whose inhibitions were lowering. Michonne’s hand had settled in Rick’s some time ago and neither of them looked like they were letting go anytime soon. Carol rested her head on the King’s shoulder and I noticed she’s lost all of that tension she often carried in her shoulders. The way Eugene was looking at Rosita… he had my sympathies. It wasn’t that long ago that I’d been pining after the girl of my dreams. And now she was going to be my wife. 

How'd I get so lucky? 

It didn't feel real. 

The next time I found myself in her orbit, I put an arm around her waist and pulled her closer. It was nice to just stand like that for a moment. The chatter and laughter of our friends were a little muffled by the alcohol, making my head fuzzy. It made me feel warm in all kinds of ways. I leaned closer to my girl, “I can't believe you did this for me.”

“I mean, it's no proposal ,” she said, a smirk tugging at her lips. “But you miss them. They're family.”

Something tugged at my heart. She was all I could focus on. “ You're family.”

“Yes,” she agreed. “But so are they.” 

Couldn't argue with that. I wanted to kiss her. My hands found their way to her hips. From the smile that had now fully spread across her face, I knew she could tell what I was thinking. That alone was enough to almost make me cave. 

It's okay to kiss your future wife in front of people, right?

They weren't even paying much attention to us. Some of them had started drifting away to the rooms and beds Naomi had set up for them by now. Maggie and Glenn were first to head off. Not because heavily pregnant Maggie got too tired but because Glenn couldn't handle his drink. Aaron had turned in for an early night. Bryce had disappeared at a suspiciously similar time. 

The rest were taking their sweet time. 

I'd been so happy to see them, but now all I wanted was her. “Think we can duck out for a sec?”

“That wouldn't make us very good hosts now, would it?” Naomi said, but she was giving me that smile I've never seen her give to anyone else. 

I think I'd die if she did. 

I leaned in close to her, “C'mon, baby, just a minute. They won't notice we're gone.”

Naomi didn't say anything, but the smile didn't budge from her face. It made my heart beat right up against my rib cage. Her hand found mine, fingers interlocking, she walked backward and quietly pushed open an old fire exit behind her. Pulling me with her into the stairwell, I made sure the door shut real quiet behind me. Or, I tried to. I was drunk and clumsy so I probably wasn't as slick as I thought. 

In the stairwell, I could finally hold her like I wanted to. Her body against mine, the taste of her burning on my lips so much stronger than any liquor ever could. The small plates made the alcohol hit a little harder, but my head was spinning for other reasons. I'd thought one kiss would be enough. That I'd be able to go back to the party after one stolen moment with my girl. 

That was dumb. 

Alcohol ain't exactly known for calming flames down. I'd accidentally created an inferno. 

Through the door behind her, I could hear the rumble of our friends laughing and talking together. “You wanna go back in?” 

A pause, another little smile, and then she shook her head. 

Good. 

I kissed her again, my hands roaming her body, pulling her closer to me and away from the door. We both stumbled against the bottom step. I grabbed her tighter so she didn't fall, although I wasn't so steady on my feet either. Her laugh was the sweetest music, and I was surprised to hear my own join in. I wasn’t used to being a happy drunk, especially on Merle’s shit. Usually, there was an initial buzz that ended in a fight. I’d mouth off to the wrong person, or my thoughts would drift somewhere I didn’t want them to and put me in the kind of mood that made me want to smack the first person I caught looking at me wrong. 

But there had been no wrong people around the table. And every time my thoughts had drifted, they’d landed on Naomi. 

I picked her up, one arm under her legs and the other supporting her back.

“Whatcha doing?” she laughed, but I could feel her arms around my neck as I ran up the stairs with her. 

“Practicing.”

Her body was still shaking with laughter as I carried her bridal-style over the threshold of the stairwell into the hall, and then the second one into our room. I set her feet down on the floor. For maybe the first time in my life, I felt excited about the future. Not nervous, not anxious. Excited. I was giddy with it. Until now, my life had been an uphill battle, but I felt like I’d finally reached the top. And the view was so damn worth it. Even the really hard things I’d gone through looked less shit from up here. I looked into her eyes and tried to work out how to tell her all of that.

Naomi’s face, moonlit and beautiful, looked up at me. Her cheeks were flushed. My clumsy fingers pushed some of her hair out of her face, “Should've asked Gabriel to this thing so I could marry you right now.”

I heard it after I'd said it, and winced at how corny it was. For a second, my heart lurched as my brain caught up with my mouth. But before I could sink into regret over telling her that I was already completely ready to be her husband, damn any kind of engagement period, she said, “Maybe I should’ve.”

My heart flipped, my lips on hers again. I was too far gone. Drunk on her and just plain drunk I pushed her down onto the mattress. Eager hands pulled me down on top of her and tugged at my shirt. I laughed against her lips, “Patience, angel.”

“Fuck patience,” she said, head shaking, pulling harder on the material of my shirt. Couldn't stop smiling now. Not after seeing her like that - wanting me as much as I wanted her. I lifted my shirt off. Her hands against my skin - gentle but needy.

God, I love the way she touches me. 

Naomi’s hands tracked light lines across my skin. There was a look in her eyes that she usually tried to hide from me, but was too drunk to. Pure, naked lust as she looked at me, a sweet little sigh left her pretty mouth, “God, you’re hot.”

“It is warm, yeah.”

She looked back up at my face. Her eyes narrowed, “That ain’t what I meant and you know it.”

I kissed her again. She tasted as sweet as she looked. My hands slipped under her shirt, mapping the soft skin underneath. For all I was teasing her, I was as needy and impatient as she was. Dangerously close to ripping every scrap of fabric keeping her body from me. Under her shirt, I reached her bra strap and tried to unclip it with uncoordinated fingers. I ain't saying I'm the smoothest guy at the best of times, but this was the worst it had ever been. 

“Fuck's sake!” I grumbled, tearing my lips from hers so I could focus on it. “You gotta quit wearing these damn things, baby.” 

“I'll burn ‘em tomorrow,” she said, leaning her forehead against my shoulder and she laughed. It was contagious. She reached back to help me out, and together, we finally got the damn thing unclasped. I pulled it off with her shirt. 

“Finally.” I threw it to the ground with a drunk man’s resolve to go through with burning the damn thing in the morning in case she forgot. Might throw the rest of her clothes on the bonfire while I was at it. 

Naomi’s hands ran back down my chest, her fingers brushing against my lower abdomen in a way that sent shivers right through me. She looped her fingers around my belt, focusing on the buckle with an adorable degree of determination. I grinned. “Whatcha doin' there?”

“I ain’t got time for your damn teasing,” she grumbled, looking up at me as she unfastened it. “C'mon, Daryl. Please?” 

Damn, straight to ‘please’, huh? 

She ain't messing around tonight.

I caught her lips with mine again, heard the sound of my zipper, and felt the confinement of my pants loosen. Her kisses got a little fiercer as she pushed my pants and boxers off my hips. I groaned as her soft hands wrapped around my cock. 

Fuck patience. 

She was right. We were too drunk, too horny, too in love to wait. 

I pushed her down again. Rougher than I probably should have, but by the time my brain caught up with what I'd done, I'd already ripped the rest of her clothes off, too. A flash of guilt was all I had time for before her legs wrapped around me, pulling my hips down to hers. 

Our kisses were deep and fuckin’ sloppy, too. Too hungry for each other to care. Hands running all over each other’s bodies. I could barely hold it together. Neither could she.

“Come on, Daryl, please please, ” she whimpered. Her hand reached down, gripping my cock again as she guided me to her entrance.

“Look at me,” I said. She turned her face, and I watched it change as I slowly pushed inside her. The little gasp, the quiver of her eyebrows, the way her eyes started filling with pleasure so intense that, for a moment, she looked like she was about to start crying from it. Seeing that always stirs something in me - a warring urge to protect her and undo her all at once. I took it real fucking slow, drawing the moment out for as long as could. She shivered and whimpered. One of my hands brushed through her hair, “That’s it, baby, that’s it.”

She moaned as I slowly stroked my full length inside her. It felt like there was something important we'd forgotten, but she looked up at me and said, “I’m so in love with you,” in the softest way and any hope of thinking about anything else flew out the window. 

She really is . 

I knew it. 

I felt it. 

So unconditional. I always thought I’d be hard to love, but she has a way of making it seem easy.

 I'd move heaven and earth for her if she asked me to, but she never would. She was just happy having me around. Seeing me happy and making me the happiest man alive. 

I kissed her, my little miracle. That’s what she was to me. A fucking miracle. 

“Fuck you're so pretty,” Liquor loosened my lips way more than I'd have liked, but the way she smiled at me made my head spin twice as fast as any alcohol. “You look so fucking good taking my cock, angel.”

Felt damn good too, like she'd been built just for me, but I couldn’t focus on that or I’d bust too early. Naomi’s eyes were wide and misted over with pleasure. Fingernails biting down on my back. She bit her lip, trying to stop the sweet little sounds she was making. 

“Nah, c'mon angel,” I ran a finger over her lip, pulling it down away from the teeth pressing into it. “You make such pretty noises for me, I wanna hear ‘em. Lemme hear ya.”

Naomi's back arched away from the mattress, her body pressing into me. Her moans filled the room again. “You feel so good, Daryl. Don't stop… Please.”

Heady hazy with lust and booze, I couldn’t hold back any more. I’d already been hanging by a thread. One of my hands gripped her hip tight to anchor myself as I started fucking her harder, faster. My other hand stayed up in her hair, making sure she was looking at me. Making sure I caught every moan that fell from her mouth. 

“You’re so perfect, baby,” I said, watching a blush rise in her cheeks. 

That look was back on her face. That beautiful, pleading look that makes me wanna give her the world as long as she's mine, wanna make her come undone so I can be the one holding her together.

“Daryl, I'm so close,” she whimpered. 

“I know, baby. I know.” I could hear it in her voice, feel it in the way her pussy gripped me like a vice.  

My hand was holding the side of her neck. It must have slipped down there at some point. I could feel the pulse in her throat and worried for a moment I was holding on too tight. 

“Daryl, please…”

“Tell me your mine, angel,” I said, pounding her a little harder. “Then you can cum for me, alright?”

Naomi nodded, propped herself up on her elbows. Our foreheads pressed together for a moment. All I could see were her eyes. Those damn pretty eyes. “I'm yours, Daryl. Of course I'm all yours. I love you.” Her left hand touched my face, the cool of her engagement band against my cheek.

Fuck. 

She really is mine.

I buried my face in her neck as I felt her come apart. “Good girl,” I whispered to her over and over as I followed her over the edge. 

Slowing down and then finally stopping as we came down from our high, I stayed buried inside her, my face still in her neck. Breathing her in. Her hands traced light lines up and down my spine as I caught my breath. 

I rolled over, pulling her with me. My back sank into the mattress. I knew I should clean up but I didn't want to be apart from her. Even for a minute. 

Desire had kept exhaustion at bay, but now it was all burnt up I could feel the tiredness deep in my bones. We'd had every intention of going back to the others when we'd stepped out. I think. It was hard to remember anything beyond my desire for her. I looked down at her and cupped her face in one of my hands, “You wanna go back downstairs, sweetheart?” 

“Maybe,” she said, but she'd nestled down against me. “Five minutes?”

I wanted to laugh. Her eyes were already closing. There was no way she was getting out of this bed. No way she was getting out of my arms. 

I pulled her naked body tight against mine, closing my own eyes. It was probably the drink, but I felt like I could feel the way the world spun underneath us. A big dumb rock full of people just trying to get by. And somehow, the best person who'd ever existed on it was drifting off with her head on my chest. “Whatever you want, angel.” 

Chapter 63: Blood and Ice

Naomi

Hershel Rhee was born about a week after we saw them all at our place. Right at the end of November, as all the leaves were turning to mush underfoot, there was new life in the middle of bare trees. Maggie was recovering well. It was the good news we all needed as we barreled into Winter. That kid had no way of knowing how loved he was already, how he had a whole team of Aunties and Uncles across four communities ready to fight and die for him. 

The first frosts came in December, freezing the ground solid. We'd done a decent job of patching up all of the shot-out windows in Sanctuary, but at night, we could still see our breath forming in front of us. It was Perla and Lucas's turn to visit us. I kept thinking that we would have to cancel it and that the weather would be too bad for them to get to us by the time our usual visitation weekend rolled around. We'd had the first few sprinklings of snow but not storms yet. They were later than usual and felt overdue. Every time I tried to tactically float the idea that maybe we'd have to cancel, Mia reminded us that it was her birthday soon and, actually, it would be really nice if she could see her friend.

It was as if Mia had kept the storms away by sheer force of will, and now Lucas and Perla were here, right on schedule. Their car pulled up in front of Sanctuary's gates. 

"What's Aaron doing here?" Daryl asked as a third person emerged from the car. He'd even brought Gracie, suggesting he planned to stay longer than dropping off Lucas and Perla. 

I shot a look at Bryce, who'd gone a deep shade of red, "What is Aaron doing with them?"

Bryce did a lousy job of pretending not to hear us. 

"You know…" Mia started. From her tone, it was obvious that she was fishing for something. Daryl and I exchanged a look and braced ourselves. "...if you wanted another bridesmaid, Perla could -" 

I sighed loud enough to cut her off. "For the last time, it ain't gonna be like that." 

"But it would be fun!" Mia protested. 

"Well, if you ever decide to get married, you can have as many damn bridesmaids as you want." 

Mia rolled her eyes, but thankfully, Perla's arrival distracted her from the mission she'd been on for the past few weeks to force Daryl and me down the aisle in the most extravagant way imaginable. She bounded down the steps to see her. Bryce, still not looking at either of us, moved to help Aaron get Gracie out of the car. 

"She takes this wedding stuff seriously, huh?" Daryl let out a slightly nervous laugh.

"Don't worry," I shook my head. Mia's unbeatable enthusiasm was as annoying as it was adorable. "She's still thinking of weddings like how they used to be. Specifically, she's thinking about Bryce's wedding, the only one she's ever been to, and had even more than the usual… hoopla."

"Hoopla?" he raised an eyebrow.

"Y'know," I said. "The speeches and the vows, the fancy clothes and dancing in front of everyone you know… which… doesn't really sound like us, does it?"

I had a sudden vision of Daryl in a tux, as handsome as he was uncomfortable, climbing out of a window to avoid Mia forcing us into a first dance. I almost laughed.

"No," he agreed, but then he dropped his gaze and looked at his toes. "I'd do it, though. If it's what you wanted."

God, he's the best.  

"I know you would," I said quietly, touching his cheek and gently nudging him to look at me. "But it's not what I want."

Daryl was visibly relieved. I couldn't imagine him standing up before everyone we knew and bearing his soul. He'd only just got comfortable saying shit to me in private. "What if it had been before… y'know, if the world hadn't ended. Would you have wanted something more… Not that I could ever have afforded to-"

"No." I cut across him, immediately shutting down that weird place in his head that he went to sometimes. One that told him he wasn't good enough unless he could give me every fancy thing he could think of. It was sweet, but it was dumb. He'd always given me everything I needed, even when we'd had nothing. Now, he gave me safety, warmth, and a love I never thought I'd have. "I never, ever, thought I'd get married, but -." 

"Why?"

"I never wanted it with anyone." I shrugged. "So, I didn't see the point in signing my life away to someone in front of everyone I know and then having a big party to disguise the fact that we'd just tricked them into watching us do relationship admin."

"Oh," he looked a little crestfallen. "Should I not have -" 

"But with you, " I said quickly. "It's different. Even though there ain't even anyone to issue a marriage license anymore, it means way more to me than I ever thought it could. I really want you to be my husband." 

When the words left my mouth, I felt my heart do a sickening little flip. The smile spread across Daryl's face made it worth it, but it was all a little too vulnerable for both of us. We had to look away from each other to hide the big, dopey smiles plastered over our faces. I'd never known how embarrassing being in love was. Truthfully, I was ready to start calling him my husband right there and then, but I didn't say that because that felt like an insane thing to say to someone who'd only proposed a month ago. I didn't want to scare him off and make him change his mind. 

Aaron and Gracie reaching us at the top of the steps stopped the conversation from getting to genuinely sickening levels of lovey-dovey. Something about being newly engaged had turned us both into absolute dopes. If Aaron thought he was going to get away without us commenting on this unannounced arrival, he was damn wrong, "Didn't expect to see you today!"

"Gracie was missing Auntie Naomi and Uncle Daryl," Aaron said, avoiding my gaze. 

"Hmm," I said, reaching to take her from him. "Her Uncle Bryce, too, I bet."

I watched them both turn red and say nothing. Gracie wriggled in my arms. She was extremely grumpy but still such a little cutie.

Would one kid be so bad…?

Even when they're being a pain in the ass, they're so damn precious.

"She's a little fussy," Aaron said, with that worried-dad frown he had a lot. "I thought she'd sleep in the car, but she didn't."

"You wanna put her down for a nap?" I asked. We had a crib set up from when he'd been here for Daryl's surprise-turned-almost-murder party. 

"That would be great," he said, with such a huge amount of relief that it was clear she'd been fussy for most of the car journey. I turned back to the building to lead them all inside. Daryl's gaze flickered from me to Gracie and back again. I didn't miss the look in his eyes, and it almost made me blurt out something I shouldn't. 

Maybe one kid would be... good, actually.

"I'm, uh, gonna head out for a bit," Daryl said. My heart sank. "Thought I saw some deer tracks earlier. If I can find 'em, there's space in one of the freezers."

What could I do? There were too many other people around for me to bring up something so private. "Okay, but don't -"

"- go into Negan territory," he said, with a slight shake of his head. "Yeah, I know." 

I knew he was sick of hearing it. I was sick of saying it, but it was a reflex now. Especially now that some of our numbers were missing, I couldn't help the twist of worry every time someone left. How had I gone from fighting so hard to escape Sanctuary's walls to feeling like the only safe place was within them?

As Daryl ducked out, I carried Gracie up the stairs toward the room they'd had a month ago. We passed Donna on the way, her face lighting up as she saw the baby. It was the first time I'd seen her smile since her daughter went missing. She dashed off, and by the time I'd handed Gracie back to Aaron so he could lay her down for a nap, she was back in the room with us. Her arms were full of something knitted. 

"Oh, look at her!" Donna said, leaning over the crib to smile at Gracie, who'd become more interested in her toes than falling asleep. Donna turned to Aaron and held out the bundle of soft, knitted items. "Here. Take these for your little one."

Aaron hesitated and reached for them - a blanket, a little hat, a pair of tiny booties. 

"Are you sure?" Aaron asked, touched beyond words that a basic stranger was offering him so much. It was sweet until the realization of why she had all of this to spare hit me.

She knitted them for Amber's baby. 

Her grandchild. 

"Yes, yes," Donna nodded, her eyes a little bright. "She should be warm."

"Thank you." Aaron laid the blanket across Gracie, who was still refusing to sleep despite clearly needing to. 

I turned away from them. It felt like the final acknowledgment that Amber and Mark weren't coming back. Guilt gnawed at me. If I'd taken the first disappearances more seriously, could I have stopped whatever had happened to them? There was no police force to conduct organized searches and process forensics, no milk cartons to put their faces on, and no international news outlets to report on it. Nowadays, when you go missing, you either turn up a few days later or you are assumed dead.

Leaving Aaron to put his daughter down for a nap, I tried to distract myself by rejoining Mia and Perla. The presence of another adult might stop Lucas from getting a headache from their usual giggling and squealing. Before I could get there, I passed Bryce, who was sitting in the office. He looked as tense as I felt. I stuck my head around the door, "You alright?"

"Yeah," he said, but I was pretty sure it was a lie. He took a good look at me, "You feeling okay?" 

"Yeah, just tired."

Bryce narrowed his eyes, scrutinizing me, but didn't push it. He knew me well enough to know when stress was getting to me. And, man, was it getting to me. I couldn't remember the last time I'd felt this run-down. I was so tired that I half expected to wake up with the flu or a head cold every morning. 

I stepped into the room and changed the subject with all the tact and grace of a steamroller, "So... Aaron's here."

"Yeah," Bryce said. That tell-tale redness was back in his cheeks, but his eyes had no excitement. He was tense. "We kissed."

My jaw dropped. "When?"

"The night we surprised Daryl," he said. "I blame that god-awful drink you were passing around."

"Yeah, that would do it," I said, a twinge of guilt in my gut. The lowered inhibitions from drinking Merle's hooch were a feature of his recipe, not a bug. Merle had probably worked extra hard to get that in. Not that I'd planned for this to happen, but it was good to know I probably hadn't been the only one waking up the morning after that party with a patchy memory and a headache like my skull was cracking. Bryce sighed and ran both hands through his hair. I knew him well enough to know when the stress was getting to him. 

"I take it," I said slowly, sitting down next to him, unsure how to navigate this, "I take it you're not… happy about it?"

"Well," he sighed. "I don't know, it's so… I haven't… done anything with anyone since Andrew."

I put an arm around him. He leaned his head on my shoulder. It felt a bit like when we'd huddle in my dorm room after a party, and he'd be sad about some guy who didn't like him back, but this was so much worse. More grown-up in the worst ways. 

"I know he's gone," he said, his voice cracking. "But it still felt like a betrayal. We were married for six years. I thought that was it, you know? He was my person."

"I know," I hugged Bryce closer to me. 

"And Eric was… less than a year ago, so Aaron was also feeling…" Bryce shook his head.

"Oh, God," I said, my heart heavy for both of them. 

"I think we both cried."

"I ain't gonna pretend I can imagine what it's like. I said more to stop myself from trying than anything else. I found myself absentmindedly running my thumb along my engagement band, twisting it around my ring finger. I wished Daryl would come back. "But Aaron's a good man."

"I know."

"And so are you," I said. "Both of you. Two of my absolute favorite people, and you deserve to be happy."

"Thank you," Bryce said miserably. "But -"

"I know," I said quickly. "I know that ain't that simple, but I just needed you to hear that before I say what I'm about to."

"Okay."

"What you've both been through, what you've both lost, is more than anyone should have to in their lifetime," I said. "To lose the person you thought you'd grow old with when you're still so young would already be a lot to handle, but the way you both lost them… so sudden, so… brutal. It ain't fair. It just ain't."

Bryce nodded, and I saw him swallow a lump in his throat. "I just feel so… torn. Aaron's great, but… I don't want to push him into something he's not ready for. Especially because every time I think about it, I get hit with this huge guilt. And don't try to tell me Andy would've been okay with me moving on. "

"Oh, I wouldn't dream of it," I said. "Andy would have said he'd have expected you in full Victorian mourning attire for fifty years at least: veil and all. Although, for what it's worth, I doubt he'd have meant it. He'd want you to be happy… eventually."

I knew that was true because as much as the thought of Daryl being with anyone else made me want to pluck out my eyeballs so I never had to see it, the idea of him being alone again was worse.

"Maybe. Eventually," Bryce said. He sighed again. "But, maybe I'm also overthinking this. Maybe Aaron wants to forget the whole thing. Or maybe he's mad at me, and he wants to yell at me for it?"

"I don't think he'd have dragged himself and his infant daughter all the way here if that was the case," I said. "That's a lot of effort to yell at someone."

"Yeah, you're right," Bryce relaxed a little. He even managed a small smile. We were both chronic overthinkers; weirdly, it was part of what had bonded us so well in college. We rarely overthink the same scenario, so we knew how to talk each other down.

"It's okay if you don't know what you want. It's okay if you need more time to work out what you want or if you both want different things right now," I said. "There's no roadmap for dealing with something like this, no right or wrong way to do it. Whatever he's come here to say doesn't have to be an all-or-nothing kinda conversation."

"I guess," Bryce said, but he sounded less sure now. I got it. Open-endedness was an overthinker's worst nightmare.

"Daryl and I had our fair share of baggage before anything romantic happened between us. We managed to accumulate even more when we were apart, too," I said. "But, I think we needed that time on our own to become who we are. To be… ready to accept what we have now. Without Daryl meeting Rick's group and learning that people other than me can love him, I don't know if he'd ever fully accepted that I do." 

"What did you need?"

"I needed time away from my Momma to come to terms with… everything she did to me," I said. "Bringing up Mia, seeing how small and innocent she was, made me rethink everything I had to deal with at that age. Daryl knew what my Momma was like, of course, the same way I knew about his Daddy, but I don't think I could've opened up to him back then like I can now. I hadn't processed it. I wasn't ready. Neither was he."

"I'm glad you can talk about it," he said. "That's a big step for you."

"I know Daryl still struggles with stuff, we both do," I said. "But we're at a point where we've healed enough that we can help each other through it, and a lot of that is because we really, deeply, understand what the other's been through. In a way I wish we didn't. I wish he'd grown up with folks who knew how to love him right, but… it helps that our struggles are… similar." 

"Yeah, I'll bet," Bryce said. "And, if you don't mind me saying, it's been nice to see you let yourself be happy for once."

I looked over at him, "What do you mean?"

"I never thought I'd live to see the day you were engaged, " he almost laughed in disbelief. "I mean… every time we talked about it, you came up with a thousand reasons you didn't want the whole marriage and family thing, a million different ways that it was a bad idea. Some of them made total sense… I know the whole concept of 'family' is difficult for you, and for good reason, but… sometimes it felt like you were finding reasons to talk yourself out of wanting it because deep down you felt like you didn't deserve it."

I was winded by it, all of my breath was knocked right out of me as I stared at him for a moment. 

Is that what I do?

How much it hurt suggested it was true. "Well… Shit, Bryce."

"God. Sorry, I didn't mean to…" he looked mortified. "I just… you deserve to be happy, too, and I'm really happy you're letting yourself find it."

"Thanks," I wiped my eyes. Every beat of my heart ached just a little bit. I tried to shift the subject back to Bryce to stop myself from dissolving into a fountain of tears. "I didn't mean to make this about me and Daryl. I brought it up because what I meant to say is that Aaron will understand. No matter what he wants to say or how you end up feeling about it, you're both good men who care about each other. No matter how… messy things might feel, you'll both navigate it with the same kindness and compassion you give to everyone. Maybe even more so because you both know all of the hard shit the other is feeling. Even if you're at different stages of it and, sometimes, taking things slow is a good way to build something strong, whether that ends up being with Aaron or someone else. Or even if that's nobody at all. That's okay, too. You've always got a family with me and Mia."

"Thanks, Naomi," he said quietly.

"And Daryl's called you a good guy multiple times, which is honestly a knighthood in anyone else's book," I said. I felt him laugh a little at that and squeezed him tighter to my side. "Love you, Bry-Bry." 

"Love you too, Nomes."

I pulled a face. "Stop it."

"Oh, by the way, I feel like I should warn you that Mia's been hounding me to help her throw some kind of bachelorette party," he said.

"Oh God, " I said. 

Bryce laughed again. "I knew you'd hate it. I'll try and talk some sense into her."

"God bless you," I said, shaking my head. "I'm gonna go find her. You wanna come, or you wanna find Aaron?"

"I'll come with you," he said. "I should give Aaron some time to put Gracie to bed before I have a breakdown on him."

I gave his shoulder another squeeze. "It'll all be alright."

"I sure hope so," he sighed, but he looked more relaxed than he had when I'd walked in here. We stood up and followed the sound of laughter to where Perla and Mia huddled over some game. 

Daryl didn't return in time to join us for dinner. I tried not to let my worry over it show. I didn't want to freak Mia out, but I picked around my food, too queasy to finish much. I excused myself and called the radio I hoped he'd taken with him. Thankfully, he answered almost immediately, apologized for losing track of time, and said he'd head back soon. 

Night fell fast at this time of year. Daryl still wasn't back by the time we sent Mia and Perla to Mia's room. Not that they were likely to get a lot of sleep. I could still hear them whispering and giggling as I walked the corridor to our room. 

I sat up in bed, trying to read but mostly just spinning over the same things in my mind over and over again. When I finally heard Daryl's boots in the hall, relief flooded me. The door swung open.

"Thank God, " I said, although I'd planned to play it cool. Daryl smiled apologetically.

"Sorry, angel," he slipped off his jacket and vest. "Saw some deer tracks but couldn't get near the damn deer. Lost a lot of time out there, felt like I was gettin' close."

I nodded. I'd seen how he could get so caught up in hunting that he lost hours of the day without realizing how much time had passed. But I couldn't handle it these days. I needed to know he was safe. I needed him with me. All of that felt too needy to say, so instead, I asked, "Cold out?"

"Freezing," he said with a shiver. "Ain't that much better inside, either."

"Well, the bed's nice and warm for ya," I patted the space beside me. His side of the bed. I'd never had a side of the bed before. The mattress dipped as Daryl sat down to take his boots off. His gloves looked a little worn, so I made a mental note to patch them up.

"I think we should get Bryce a dog."

Daryl stopped in the middle of unlacing his boots and looked up at me. Sighed. "You think we should get Bryce a dog ?"

"Yes," I said. "He and Andrew used to have dogs and I think maybe it would help him, y'know... grieve." 

And distract him from the guilt of making out with Aaron. 

I didn't add that part. I trusted Daryl with my life, but it was Bryce's secret to tell, not mine. Daryl was giving me this real soft look I couldn't understand, so I kept going. "There are probably a lot of pets out there that were abandoned when this all happened, or their owners died, or-" 

"Woah, woah, woah," Daryl said, slightly alarmed. "We ain't got the space for this to be a damn animal Sanctuary too, alright?"

"It's one dog."

"It'll start with one dog," he said. "Next thing you know, you've got two of your own, Mia's asking for a horse, and Eugene's got a damn parrot who talks as much crap as he does."

"Fine," I sighed. "Maybe I can knit him something." 

"You can knit?"

"No, but I could learn!" I said. "I saw Donna today, and she'd knitted something, so maybe she could teach me."

"You saw Donna?"

"Yeah," I said. "Something about havin' little Gracie here brought her out of her shell again. She ain't been the same since Amber…"

I trailed off. I couldn't bring myself to finish the sentence. If I didn't, it was easier to think they were still out there somewhere safe.

"We did what we could," Daryl said. "If something happened to them out there, it ain't on you, baby."

"Yeah, I know," I said, but I still felt sick. That was nothing new. I felt sick almost all the time. The swirling anxiety of waiting for Winter to hit had plagued me for weeks. Adding worry over the people missing from Sanctuary didn't help. I couldn't get Amber out of my head. She'd been so happy the last time I'd seen her, full of this incredible hope for the future. It felt brutally unfair that she was just… gone.  

"And Bryce's grief ain't on you, either," Daryl said.

"I know. But I hate that I can't fix this for him." 

"'Course you do," he said quietly, reaching across to cup my face in one of his hands. His fingers were so cold against my cheek, but the warmth in his eyes more than made up for it. "It's enough that you're there for him. You ain't gotta have the solution to it."

"I guess," I said, although it didn't make me feel much better. I knew I was looking for a shortcut to something Bryce had to work through mostly by himself. 

"Plus, a dog ain't gonna make him forget he lost a husband," Daryl said. I tried not to get distracted by him slipping out of his pants.

"True. If you were…," I couldn't bring myself to say dead without feeling like I was about to hurl. "...gone, and someone gave me a dog to distract me; I'd probably be a little annoyed that they'd thought that would work." 

"Yeah?"

"Yeah. I'd keep the dog, though." 

"Would you name it after me?"

"Can't call a dog 'dumbass', that's animal cruelty."

Daryl rolled his eyes and finally slipped into bed beside me. He pulled the covers right up to his chin.  

"God, you are cold," I said. I was still sitting up, but I could feel it radiating off him, his cold body right where my thighs met the comforter. 

"Sorry."

"Nah, c'mere," I said, scooting closer to him.  Daryl hesitated, and then put his head in my lap. Warmth flooded through me. I loved seeing this side of him when he let himself do something so… soft. He'd get this nervous look on his face right before, like he was trying to talk himself out of it, or he was sure I would pull away. Make fun of him. Push him off. 

It made my heart swell. I let him settle for a moment, waited until his body relaxed and whatever voice in his head he'd had to fight against had finally shut up. Then I moved my hands, slowly so I didn't spook him, and started gently running my fingers through his hair. Even his hair was cold, and a little damp. He closed his eyes. Smiled. I smiled, too. 

"You know," I said after letting him relax a little. "You'd warm up faster if we were both naked."

Daryl's eyes opened at that. He smirked. "Bull."

"No, it's true," I said. "It's easier to share body heat if you don't have clothes on."

"You're so full of shit," he said, but he was grinning ear to ear now.

"I ain't. I read it in a book."

I didn't mention that the book was Twilight: Eclipse because I knew that would mean an absolute zero chance of him taking it seriously. 

"Oh, you did, did ya?" he said, eyebrows raising slightly. He lifted his head from my lap and brought that smile close enough to kiss me. 

"Mmm-hmm," I nodded. "It's science."

"Science, huh?" Daryl kissed me again. I wrapped my arms around him and pulled him closer. His hands moved down my body and slipped under my (technically his) shirt. Fingers so cold against my skin that I jumped at the sudden contact, and he pulled them away, "Shit, sorry."

"No. It's okay," I said, taking hold of his wrists and pulling them back to where they had been. "Warm 'em on me."

Daryl hesitated but kept his freezing-cold hands pressed against my stomach. "You sure?"

"Yeah," I smiled. "I've warmed my feet on you enough times."

"True," he said, his smile matching mine. "Coldest feet in the goddamn universe."

Not when it comes to us, though. 

I'd run from any chance of a real relationship before Daryl. But I was so sure about him, so ready for us to live the rest of our lives together. I ran my hand through his hair, stopping at the back of his neck. "I love you."

The intensity of it made him frown a little. I kissed him deeply before he could read too much into it. 

"God, you are warm," he murmured, his slowly warming hands running gently across my waist. 

"Mmmph," I mumbled against his lips as he kissed me. "Well. You're hot."

"Corny-ass little minx." I could feel his smile, his lips curving as they met mine again and again. His hands moved down my body, mine took hold of his shirt. 

"C'mon…" I said, tugging on it. "You'll get warmer, I swear." 

Still smiling, he sat back and lifted his shirt over his head. I took the opportunity to take mine off, too; when he leaned back over me, we were finally skin on skin. 

"Feels better, don't it?" I said, our bodies pressed together under the covers - mine warm, his heating up. 

"Heavenly, angel," he agreed. His lips were on my neck, his arms wrapped around me. "You miss me today?" 

"Mmm-hmm," I nodded as his lips continued their trail down my body. He'd been gone way too long. 

"C'mere then, princess, let me feel how much," he said, his hand brushing against the waistband of my panties. I opened my legs, let his hand move between them. "Oh, fuck you're wetter than I thought you'd be, angel . "

He pulled my underwear down over my legs, leaving me lying naked before him. His eyes roamed my body with a now familiar hunger before he moved back over me again. His hand trailing slowly up my thighs until it was back between them. A shiver ran through me at the unasked question in his eyes. I nodded, "I need you."

"I know, baby, I know," Daryl buried his head in my shoulder as he stroked me a few times before easing two fingers gently inside me. But he didn't know, not really. I was aching for him in more ways than one. The physical one was easier to express, I wasn't sure how to show him all the ways I needed him. How much he'd done for me just by loving me the way he did. 

My hips moved to meet the way his fingers moved in and out of me. His thumb joined in, circling my clit. I gasped, "Fuck, that's good."

Daryl let out a grunt of satisfaction, kissing my neck as his hand continued working its magic between my thighs. I bit my lip in a futile effort to stop the way he was making me moan. The heat and pleasure building in my was fucking unbearable. Every nerve in my body was on fire with it. I turned my head to look at him, and found his eyes already on my face. "You're so fucking good for me, angel, look at you. My pretty, pretty girl."

Fuck.

I needed all of him. 

"Fuck me, Daryl, please," I moaned.

"Uh-uh," he shook his head. "Not yet, angel. You're gonna cum for me this way first, alright?" 

"Daryl, please. "

"C'mon, sweetheart," his voice was low by my ear. His fingers curled slightly inside me. "You can be a good girl and cum for me, can't ya? Jus' for me, angel."

He propped himself up on his elbow, his face above mine looking down at me with so much satisfied anticipation, so much love . My back arched against the mattress. A smirk of satisfaction flickered across Daryl's face in the split second before I came. I think I said his name, but I can't be sure. My whole body was singing with the feeling of belonging to him. 

"That's it, that's it…" He murmured, kissing me lightly as my body trembled with it. "Good girl."

I collapsed back against the bed again. He withdrew his fingers and I closed my eyes for a moment, catching my breath. I heard the rustle of foil, and a slight pause as Daryl rolled a condom over himself. I opened my eyes again, leaning against my elbows to look over at him. He crawled back between my thighs. I sat up more, took his head in my hands and kissed him hard and deep. 

"You ready for more, angel?" he asked. I nodded. He grabbed my hips and flipped me over onto my stomach. My body was so limp from the orgasm he'd just given me, it barely seemed to take him any effort at all. Daryl's knees gently nudged my legs apart and then he settled between them. His hands ran down the length of my back before one hand took hold of my hip again and his cock pushed slowly inside me. I pressed my face against our mattress to quiet the moan that came out of me. Daryl moaned too, "There's my girl."

God, he's perfect.

He's fucking perfect. 

The sheets smelled of him, of us . This beautiful, perfect life we had together now. His lips peppered kisses across my back as he thrust slowly in and out of me. One of his hands grabbed mine and held it by my head on the pillow, our fingers entwined. He held it tight, like he always did. My whole life, nothing had ever made me feel as safe as his hand in mine. 

Was Bryce right? Had I denied myself this kind of happiness for years because I couldn't get out of my own head? Was I still doing it? Daryl himself had said something similar after I'd kissed him for the first time. 

"You either spend months fretting about shit and making lists, or you do something on impulse and beat yourself up about it for even longer."

I had first kissed him on impulse and look how that was going… I was getting my brains fucked out by my future husband. It wasn't exactly an argument for not listening to my gut.

"Oh, fuck ," I gasped as he thrust harder, his body pressed down against mine, pinning me to the mattress, the natural movement of our bodies as he fucked me creating delicious pressure and friction against my clit. I wondered if I was about to be the first person to die of pleasure, as I felt a second orgasm building in me. Daryl let out his own grunt of pleasure as his body responded. Harder. Faster. But it was more than sex, it always had been. The heat of his body against my back, his lips and teeth and tongue still marking the skin there. His hand was still tightly gripping mine as he filled me again and again. 

"That's my sweet girl," Daryl muttered against my back, increasing his pace just a fraction, just enough. "Let go, princess. I got you. I got you, angel." 

He really does.

He really fucking does. 

I screamed his name into the pillow as he tipped me over the edge. My body twitched and clenched uncontrollably around him. Daryl's hand squeezed mine again. I felt his body tense at my back, I knew he was close and suddenly it felt like such a goddamn waste.

That night I'd first kissed him, I'd looked at him, head so hazy with alcohol that any of my usual anxieties were dulled, slowed. They couldn't move fast enough to get in my way. I'd been struck by a moment of blinding clarity that this man, right in front of me, was everything to me, and I'd finally gotten out of my own way. 

Surrounded by him, filled by him, I had the same moment of clarity now. I looked back at him, "Take it off."

Daryl looked confused, he faltered for a moment. "Baby, we're both already naked what the hell do you-"

"The rubber. Take it off."

My head was hazy with desire, but this one burning need shone through.

He quickly pulled out. "Shit. Am I hurting you? Do you need to stop? I thought you were-"

"No, I-" I paused for a moment, words catching in my throat as I turned onto my back to look up at him. My heart beat hard in my chest. "I want you to cum inside me. I wanna have a baby with you."

I felt the shock ripple through him; his body tensed, his jaw clenched and he closed his eyes for a moment. 

"Fucking hell, Naomi." His head bowed for a moment, coming to rest in the crook of my neck. His warm breath fanned across my neck as he breathed, "Fuuuuuck."

I waited, both of us breathing hard in the silence. The sharp rise and fall of his chest against mine. My heart was beating right up against my ribcage like it was trying to get to his. I ran my hand along his bare back. "Daryl…?"

He finally lifted his head from my shoulder to look at me. "You… changed your mind?"

"Yes," I said. Even I was surprised by how easily the answer came to me. "Do you still… want that?"

“I mean… yes, I think… Yeah, but…" He shook his head, "Not… tonight. Not… like this. We should talk about it first. You gotta be sure, okay? Give yourself time to change your mind. Before we start… trying for anything, you gotta… I dunno, make a list. Hell, make twelve. Fill every binder you can find in this damn place, but…" he took a breath, "...you gotta be sure."

The more I looked at him. The more sure I was. But, I wasn't gonna push it. I knew he was right. Given how much I'd freaked out when one condom had split on us, it only made sense that it might take him a while to believe me.

"You're right," I said. He nodded again, relaxed slightly, shook his head like he couldn't believe it. "Sorry, did I… did I just totally kill the mood?"

"You kiddin' me? I think that's the hottest thing I've ever heard. I mean… damn. You got no idea how much I had to hold back just then, sweetheart," he shook his head again. "But…"

"Yeah, you're right," I said again. "We can talk about it later."

He nodded, and took a few deep breaths. "Are you… uh, okay to keep going?"

"Yes," I smiled. He kissed me as I wrapped my legs around him, guiding him back inside me. He was slow at first, slowly building back momentum, but he didn't take his eyes off me. 

"Naomi?" he said, jaw clenching a little in a way that told me he was holding back. 

"Yes?"

"Will you say it again for me, angel?"

"You sure?" I asked, knowing it might make things worse for him if I changed my mind back. But maybe that was part of it, maybe he wanted to hear it now in case he never got to hear it again. 

"Yeah, I'm sure," he said with a firm nod. 

I reached up, taking his face in my hands as he continued to pound into me. I looked into his eyes, "Cum inside me, Daryl. Please. "

It took seconds. 

"Oh, fuck. " I'd never heard him whimper like that. His lips crashed against mine as his body shuddered above me and then he collapsed, sinking down on top of me for a moment. I ran my fingers lightly up and down his back as he caught his breath before he pulled out and kissed me again. "I love you, baby."

"I love you, too."

Cleaned up and back under the cover with the lights off, his hand found mine like it always did and I wondered if he was thinking about it. I wanted to bring it up again. I wanted to stay up through the night convincing him that I wanted a family with him, because we were already a family, why not make it four? But, I knew now wasn't the time. I knew he was right to slam the breaks on when I'd seemingly very suddenly changed direction. 

Was I still absolutely terrified? Yes. But was I with the absolute best person in the world to support me through getting something I wanted even if it scared me? Also, yes. Because I did want it. With him. 

Daryl huffed in the dark. 

"What?"

"Now I'm too hot." 

 

Daryl

"I don't like the look of that sky," Lucas muttered, glancing up at the dark clouds rolling toward us. 

"We got a couple of hours before it hits. I told Naomi I'd take the girls out for a bit. That okay?" I asked as if the bike helmets dangling from my arms weren't enough of a clue. It was polite to ask, though, and given our history, I would have to be polite to Lucas until the end of my days. 

"Yeah," Lucas said. I think he was still a little afraid to disagree with me. "Although, I'd like to get going soon."

"No problem," I said. "Quick bike ride, and then y'all can hit the road."

"Sounds perfect," he said, smiling, even if it was a little forced. 

I wondered how long I'd have to be nice to him before he stopped tensing up whenever I asked him a direct question. I wouldn't usually care, but Naomi liked him. They'd been through shit together. And he was Mia's friend's sort of dad, so I knew he wouldn't be out of my life any time soon. 

Guess being a family man means hanging out with people you've once dreamed about punching in the face. 

"Can you keep an eye on her while we're out?"

"On Naomi?" Lucas looked surprised. It hadn't been all that long ago that I was warning him off spending any time with her at all. Even looking at her for too long might've earned him a glare. 

"She's working herself too hard," I said. "She's stressed… just… make sure she knows she's doing a good job, okay? I keep telling her, but I think it'll help hearing it from someone who ain't me."

"Okay," he said, unable to wipe the surprise from his face. Part of him probably worried I was setting some trap, but I meant what I was saying. It wasn't his fault that every time I looked at him, I felt like I was looking at the kind of man Naomi should be with. She was about to be my wife. Didn't get much more final than that. 

It was more than that, though. The way she loved me left no room for the doubts that had haunted me at the start. It didn't matter that I didn't think I was good enough; she had decided I was the one she wanted. And lucky for me, once Naomi's made up her mind, there ain't no changing it. 

Damn stubborn little angel. 

Lucas and I pushed the door to the office open. Naomi glanced up from whatever she was working on, maybe surprised to see us coming in together without a glare on my face. Aaron and Bryce were sitting at the table a respectable distance apart. They were good at that, always somehow being in the same room but never too close. Perla and Mia looked over from where they'd been playing with Gracie. They immediately exchanged a worried look. 

"Is it time to go?" Perla asked Lucas. 

"Almost," he said. "Daryl thought there might be time for one last bike ride before we head to Alexandria. How does that sound?"

"Yes!" Both girls jumped up immediately. The big smile on Mia's face every time I suggested a bike ride made the hours it had taken to teach her more than worth it. She was always so proud of herself. I was proud of her, too, thinking back to how nervous she'd been during that first lesson. 

"Alright," Lucas said. "I'll get our stuff packed up. We're leaving right when you get back, okay, Perla? No complaints."

"Alright," Perla agreed, although everyone in that room knew both of them would be asking for just a few more minutes when the time came for Perla to go home again. It was the same dance every time. Lucas left to get their things together.

"Are the bikes in your shop?" Mia asked. Mia had the one I'd found for her a while ago, and we'd managed to dig out another that was a good enough fit for Perla to borrow while she was here.

"I oiled the chain for ya. You wanna go get them?" I asked. Mia nodded, and she and Perla made to leave. I held up the bike helmets. "Helmet, Mia. You too, Perla." 

" You don't wear a helmet," Mia pointed out, but she took it from me all the same. "And your bike is way faster than ours."

"She's got a point, you know," Naomi muttered, looking up from whatever she was writing. "All three of you should be in helmets."

Mia looked smug. She and Naomi shared a conspiratorial smirk. I shook my head at both of them. "Go get the bikes, Mia. I'll see you guys out front."

Without the girls fussing over her, Gracie started crying. Naomi and I both looked at the crying infant, then at each other, and then quickly away again. I hadn't brought it up. There hadn't been a good time, and I thought it best to wait for her to be the one to do it. If she'd said something in the heat of a moment and then changed her mind, that was okay. I didn't want to push her into anything. Our life was already damn near perfect. 

Mercifully, Aaron stood up and picked up his kid. "I should probably put this little one down for a bit." 

"You want me to bring these?" Bryce asked, scooping up the blanket and the baby toys that were strewn across it. 

"Yeah, that would be great, thank you," Aaron nodded. Bryce picked up Gracie's things and followed him out of the room. 

"You looking for a helmet?" Naomi asked when they were gone. "I'm sure I've seen one somewhere…"

I sighed, moving behind her. She closed the binder that was open in front of her. My hands ran across her shoulder, trying to ease the tension from them. I rested my chin on her head. "You really gonna cramp my style like that?"

"You'll still look hot in a helmet," she said, tilting her head back to look up at me. I kissed her forehead. "I have a weird preference for men with intact skulls."

"Yeah, yeah," I grumbled, but I could feel the smile at the edges of my mouth. It was nice having someone worry about me. "You wanna come with us? Take a little break from all of this, maybe?"

"No," she said. "I got somethin' I wanna finish, and then I'm going to ask Donna if she can make something for Mia's birthday. It would be good if you could distract her, that girl's got sonar hearing when it comes to birthday presents."

She wasn't wrong. We'd already had to move the art supplies we'd scavenged for her twice already because of Mia's snooping. "Alright. As long as it ain't a puppy."

"Don't be silly. You gotta be fifteen for a puppy."

"And a motorcycle, right?"

"Don't you dare," she laughed, those pretty eyes of hers sparkling with amusement. I kissed her forehead again. "Maybe when Perla and Lucas are gone… after dinner, maybe we… we could…talk?" 

My stomach flipped, but I tried to stay cool. "Yeah. 'course we can."

I bent to kiss her lips, and then I went to find Mia and Perla before my mind could get too caught up in this. How fast she'd brought it up again made me think she hadn't meant it. Surely, she'd have to stress about it some more before she came to a decision. 

"Where are we gonna go?" Mia asked, rolling her bike out of my workshop alongside Perla. They were both bundled up in their winter jackets and hats and scarves.

"Not far; we ain't got long," I said, grabbing the keys for one of my bikes. "Thought we could check some of the traps on the road to Alexandria, see if we've caught any extra food."

"Alright," Mia said. "Hey, maybe we could cycle all the way to Alexandria, and Lucas could meet us there."

"Yeah, that would be fun," Perla agreed. It sounded rehearsed, like they'd already come up with this plan while they'd been getting their bikes. 

"Some other time, maybe," I said, knowing full well they were just trying to come up with excuses to spend more time together. "We wouldn't make it there and back on our bikes before the snow hits. Quick ride and then back to Sanctuary, you heard Lucas."

Reluctantly, they agreed. We rolled our bikes out to the front of Sanctuary. 

"Don't go too fast," I warned them, eyeing the ground in front of them. "It's a little icy."

Mia and Perla set off. I waited a few minutes, let them get ahead of me, and then started my motorbike. I'm sure they'd have preferred to go without me cramping their style, but it wasn't safe for them to get too far away from Sanctuary without an adult. I'd hoped that teaching Mia to ride would give her a fast way to get out of trouble, but she wasn't a confident enough rider for that yet. If they ran into a horde of Walkers or any dangerous survivors out there, I didn't know how easily she'd be able to get away. 

I moved at a snail's pace a safe distance behind them. Probably sounds boring, but it wasn't. Mia was, despite the state of the world, a happy kid. Sure, there were moments when everything we'd all been through weighed on her. The older kids - Mia, Perla, Carl, and Edith - sometimes had a darkness about them. Everything they'd seen and been through weighed on them from time to time, fighting with their memories of the world before all of this. But they always bounced back. So damn resilient. By the time the younger kids were old enough to really take in the world around them, we'd have made one that kept them safe. Judith and Hershe wouldn't have any memories of the old world either. It would all just be stories we told them.

Stories we'd tell our kids, too. 

If we have one.

I looked at Mia in front of me, laughing and joking around with her friend. 

It could be such a big risk. 

And for what?

We already have the best little girl in the whole wide world. 

We stopped occasionally to check the traps for any game that might have wandered in. They all came up empty, and Mia looked a little more deflated by it each time. 

I was about to call it a day and tell them both we needed to turn around so that Perla, Lucas, and Aaron could get back to Alexandria before nightfall. That dark storm cloud was moving closer; the wind was picking up. 

Mia's bike screeched to a sudden halt. Her wide eyes were on the treeline. I slowed and stopped, too. Perla noticed and doubled back. Mia pointed and whispered, "Deer!"

I kicked down my bike stand and slowly climbed down, my eyes scanning to see what she saw. Sure enough, a deer was trying to graze on frosted ground. I'd spent most of yesterday tracking these damn things, and now here it was. Perla laid her bike down too. "Do you think we can get it?"

"Daryl can," Mia said confidently. She looked at me again. "Can't you?"

I picked up my crossbow, shrugged my backpack off, and left it on the bike seat. I trained my crossbow on the deer. From here, it was an easy shot. The damn thing had fallen into our laps.

"Can I try?" Mia asked in a whisper. "Please?"

"I don't know," I said, wishing I'd discussed something like this with Naomi beforehand. "A crossbow is pretty powerful. It ain't a toy."

"You and Naomi used one when you were younger than me!" she said indignantly. She wanted to be like her sister. I knew the feeling. Partly from wanting Merle's approval and partly from spending my whole life in awe of Naomi. Mia changed tactics, "Plus, don't you think it's good to know how to shoot one? It's safer than a gun, quieter, so it wouldn't draw any Walkers."

Too damn smart for her own good.

"Alright," I said, swinging my crossbow off my shoulder. "But it ain't like shooting a gun, okay? There's a lot of kickback. I need you to be ready for it, or you could really hurt your shoulder."

"Okay," Mia said solemnly. She looked so damn serious. I handed her my crossbow and showed her how to hold it. She'd never listened more carefully to anything I'd ever said. I helped her line up the shot. 

"Whenever you're ready," I said. I kept my eyes on her as she pulled the trigger and sent the bolt whizzing through the air. Despite my warning, the kickback took her by surprise. "You alright? Did you hurt yourself?"

"No, I'm fine," she said, her eyes wide. "Did I get it?"

I looked at the space where the deer had been. It could've fallen down dead, or it could have run off. 

"Let's go take a look," I said, taking my crossbow back. My boots crunched on frozen ground. There were patches of frost and ice around the trees. Mia and Perla followed quietly behind. At the spot where the deer had been, there was a smear of blood. "You got it. It's injured. It probably won't get far. You wanna track it?"

Mia nodded enthusiastically. Perla nodded, too. I was glad they were up for it. It would be so good to bring it home and add it to our food supply. The more we could get, the longer our winter rations would stretch. 

The injured deer was fast but easy to track. Drops of blood in the ice. We tracked it to a creek just in time to see it stumble up a verge. I stopped. I was pretty sure this creek made up the boundary between our land and Negan's. Mia pointed as the deer tripped and collapsed at the top of the verge, "There it is!"

It was so close. It could feed so many of us. 

"Stay here," I told them. "Don't move. Any sign of trouble, you run home alright. Don't wait for me, just go."

"Why?" Perla asked, looking nervously across the creek.

"I think that's Negan's territory," I said. I should've brought Naomi's damn maps.

Mia scanned the woods without her friend's caution. "He has a big territory. He can't be watching it all at once. He's probably not even here anymore. It's so cold, he probably found somewhere inside."

"Maybe," I said. I couldn't argue much. It was the same logic I was using. The chances of Negan being on this specific patch of his designated land right before a snowstorm was likely to hit felt tiny. If I were him, out here alone, I'd have found shelter long ago. "But we don't know that for sure. So stay here. Alright?"

"Alright," Mia said. I could tell she was refraining from her usual eye roll. 

"And neither of you tell Naomi I was over there. We'd be the first couple to get divorced before we get married."

"Deal," Mia said. Perla nodded in agreement. 

I looked for a way across the creek. I didn't much like getting my feet wet in this weather. Some of the water was starting to freeze in parts. A little further up, some rocks were protruding from the stream. Not ideally placed, but I could use them to get across. 

"Stay here," I looked back at them before I took the first step. The rocks were slippery, coated in water and ice. I took it slowly, carefully, and then pulled myself up onto the verge. 

The deer had collapsed, bleeding out. I moved toward it. 

"Did I get it?" Mia yelled impatiently. 

"Yeah," I called back, slipping a quick knife into its skull to put it out of its misery. "You got it. Good job."

"Yes!" Mia cheered from the other side. I didn't like how close she sounded. Closer than before. I stood up. She already had one foot on one of the stepping stones I'd used. Perla was hovering behind her, with the nervous stress of someone watching their friend getting themselves in trouble.

"Dammit, Mia! I told you not to come over here," I said, holding up a hand in a futile effort to halt her progress. "Stay there, don't -"

But she wasn't listening. A big smile broke out across her face. "I got it! I got it! That's the biggest thing I've ever hunted!"

Mia hopped to the second rock, barely stopping before she leaped to the third. I ran to the side of the creek to force her back. She jumped to the rock closest to me.

She slipped. 

A moment of panic flickered across her face, but I reached out and caught her under the arms. I lifted her up and swung her around so that she could get her feet on solid ground.

Only, we never got there. 

I felt the bullet hit Mia before my brain registered the sound of the gunshot. 

A splatter of blood hit my face. 

Everything stood still. I only knew that time was passing from the red that bloomed on Mia's chest. The shock in her eyes. 

A heartbeat passed that felt like a lifetime, and then my instincts kicked in. I pulled Mia down behind the nearest tree, sheltering her from whoever the fuck had shot her. 

I knew. 

I knew before I even looked. 

Negan's pale face looked back at me from some distance, but it was unmistakably him. His mouth hung open. There was a shock in his eyes that had no right to be there. "I… I didn't see her… I… I thought it was just you."

When I looked back at Mia, her eyes were shut. 

"Mia?" I called to her. She didn't stir. "Mia…?"

My crossbow was back in my hand before I knew what was happening. Negan ran. I ran. If I slowed for a second, I'd feel too much to go on. For now, I needed to let the rage fuel me. Drive me forward. 

"Get back here!" I yelled at Negan's retreating back as he darted between the trees. "Face me like a fucking man!"

Negan fired a shot behind him. It hit a tree to my left, wood splintering like shrapnel. He fired a second, and my leg gave out underneath me. Tasted dirt as I hit the ground, and then I heard the gunshot ringing in my ears.

Coward.

Fucking coward.  

I would kill him. 

I would rip him apart with my bare hands. 

Tear his fucking throat out and watch the life leave his eyes.  

I didn't care how long it took. I would hunt him to the ends of the Earth, busted leg or not. I pushed myself up onto my forearms. There was no pain in my leg yet, but I knew it was shock. I probably would have forced myself to keep going after him if it wasn't for the noise behind me. Perla was screaming. Mia was crying.

She's not dead. 

She's not dead.

It was hard to stand. There still wasn't any pain, but I couldn't put much weight on my leg. Perla was crouching beside Mia, trying to help her. She'd tied a scarf around her to try and stop the bleeding.

"Get back to the road," I called to her. "My backpack. It's on my bike. There's a walkie. Call for help. Go!"

Perla didn't want to leave her friend, but she stood up, nodding. She'd feel better with something to do, and if she could get us help before I reached the road, Mia would have a better chance of survival. 

I reached Mia as Perla ran back the way we'd come. 

"Hey, hey," I said to her. Her wide and panicked eyes fixed on me. Her breathing was fast and shallow. She was pale. But she was here. She was alive. "You're gonna be okay, sweetie. Okay?"

I picked her up. Gritting my teeth as I carried her back toward the creek. She was trying to say something. To anyone else, it would've sounded like she was calling for her mom, but I knew she was trying to say Naomi. It all meant the same to her.

"Yeah, she's comin'," I said, trying to reassure her, trying to say anything to make her feel better. "Naomi's gonna be with you real soon, babygirl. Real soon."

I waded through the creek. Freezing water filled my boots. I didn't care. Wasn't worried about frostbite. I'd have given both of my legs to get her home. Mia's eyelids were drooping. 

"Mia, stay with me, sweetie, okay?" I said, desperately trying to get her eyes to stay open. "You're gonna be just fine, alright? We're gonna get you home."

Mia nodded, but her eyes closed and didn't open again. She was so pale. I reached the other side of the creek. 

I can't carry another dead girl back to her sister. 

I can't do it. 

Not my girls.

"C'mon, Mia, please, " I begged her. "Open your eyes, kid. You're gonna be okay, you gotta be okay."

Mia didn't stir. 

We were in sight of the road. My vision was narrowing to a point, fixed on our bikes. Pain was starting to spread up from my leg, radiating out from the bullet wound. My feet were ice. Trousers wet with blood and freezing water.

I slipped. Ice and blood mixing on the road. Perla was nearby. I could kind of hear that she was shouting, but I couldn't take it in. Blood was rushing in my ears. 

Naomi's on her way.

She'll be here.

I laid Mia down on the road and laid down right next to her. With the last of my strength, I reached over and pulled her discarded bike over so that it was shielding her. If Walkers came, they could eat me first, and the bike would slow them down until Naomi could get to her. Get her home. Keep her safe.

"Naomi's comin', don't you worry," I said. I couldn't move much anymore. Dark clouds were above my head, but my vision was darkening more around the edges. The pain in my leg was slipping away again, which meant I was, too. Mia hadn't moved, but I could see she was still breathing. I kept talking as long as I could, just in case she could hear me. "She'll be here real soon. She's comin' to get ya, Mia. Naomi's gonna be with ya soon."

Take me instead of Mia, I threw it out to any God that was listening. I'd take a deal with the devil to keep her alive. 

Take my soul.

Take my life.

I don't need it anymore. 

There was no way Naomi would forgive me for this. My life was already over. I closed my eyes. I couldn't fight the encroaching darkness anymore. 

Let my little girl live. 

Take me. 

Please.

Chapter 64: Snowstorm

Naomi

There was an annoying amount of blood on my hands.

It was my third nosebleed in a week, and I was really glad I didn’t have internet access anymore, so I couldn’t get on WebMD and convince myself it was a brain tumor. I tipped my head back and pinched the bridge of my nose. Bryce handed me a tissue. 

“Careful,” he said. “You’ll ruin all that Top Secret Work you’re doing.”

I flipped the binder shut. My Convince Daryl a Kid is Something I Want Actually List was none of his business. There was already a spot of blood on it from my damn nose, so I was probably going to have to rewrite it anyway. 

The radio crackled. Perla's voice came through, garbled in a way that made her words hard to hear, but her panic came through crystal clear. Lucas's face paled as he grabbed the radio. The whole room stilled.

“Perla? Calm down, honey. We can't hear you. Can you repeat that?” he said. My heart was already beating a million miles a minute. Stomach-churning dread deep down inside.

Something is wrong.

Something is very wrong. 

Perla’s voice came through again, and this time, it was obvious she was hard to hear because she was crying. “Negan…. Negan…he shot them… he…”

My stomach turned to ice. Perla was still trying to get the words out, her voice shaking, but I'd heard enough. So had Lucas. The stillness in the room shattered in an instant. Bryce was on his feet, Aaron ran to get Dr. Carson, but I couldn't wait for him. I couldn't wait for anyone. 

I’d never moved so fast in my life. 

I dropped everything I was doing and raced out of the building. I didn't slow for anyone, my body was on autopilot. My brain had all but shut down, my sole purpose was getting to Mia and Daryl.

Are they still alive?

I hadn't stopped to think about it. I'd just heard ‘Negan’ and ‘shot them.’ What if I was too late?

Lucas jumped in the passenger side; walkie still clutched tightly in one hand. “They took the road to Alexandria. I told Aaron. He'll follow with Dr Carson.”

“I got a med kit,” The back door flew open as I started the engine. Bryce slid in, slamming the door as I took off.

Perla was still screaming, Lucas was trying to calm her down so we could get as much information as possible. My mind was racing as fast as the car. I glanced at Lucas as he held the walkie up to my face. 

“Perla, you’re doing such a good job,” I said, trying to stop her from dissolving into hysteria. I needed information. I needed to know how to help them. “But can you put Daryl on? Or Mia?”

I desperately wanted to hear them. Either of them. 

“No, they’re… they’re unconscious. I can’t wake them up.”

Fuck.

Fuckfuckfuck. 

I took a deep breath. “Are they…are they breathin’?” 

There was a pause that was way too long, and then Perla said, “Yeah…I… I think so…” 

Think?

Fuck.

My heart twisted so hard that I swerved in the road. I gripped the steering wheel tight in my hands. I choked back a sob. There wasn't time to feel sad. I didn't have the luxury of crying right now. I needed to get to my family. I needed them to be okay.

“All right, Perla, you’re doing so well,” I fought to keep my voice level and calm. “If you can find where they’re bleeding from, put pressure on the wound, okay? Try and slow the bleeding.”

“Okay.”

“Are you safe, sweetie?” I asked. “Is Negan still around?”

“No. No. We’re on the road now. Negan ran away.”

Of course, he did. 

Fucking coward.

That son of a bitch went back on our deal.

Hunted my family.

Shot them in cold blood and can’t even stick around to face me. 

The rage would come later. Right now, I was too damn scared to feel anything else. It was good, I guess, that he wasn’t still there to threaten Perla, that he hadn’t returned to finish the job. Lucas moved the walkie again, reassuring Perla and talking her through things she could do to slow the bleeding. 

The first few flakes of snow hit the windshield. Perla’s voice came back, shaking with fear, “There’s Walkers… they’re coming… they must have heard the gunshot.”

“It’s okay,” Lucas said, although he was so tense. “You know what to do. You can do this. Are there a lot of them?”

“No,” she said, her voice had stopped trembling. “Not too many.” 

“All right,” Lucas said, his teeth gritted with the stress of hearing his surrogate child having to face down an unknown number of Walkers on her own. “You can do this, honey. You’ll be fine. Stay calm. Focus.”

It felt like those words were for me, too. 

Stay calm.

Focus. 

I'm going to throw up.

We took a bend in the road, and there they were. Two Walkers were stumbling toward a glinting motorbike and two discarded kids bikes. Two bumps in the road behind Perla made my stomach churn when I noticed them. Bodies. 

Perla started frantically waving us down like there was any chance we’d miss her. I slammed the car into the two dead assholes who were making their way toward Perla. I skidded to a halt.  

I’d done my best not to picture what we were running into. I’d never have been able to drive if I had, but it was so much worse than any intrusive image my brain had thrown up. Seeing the two people I loved most in this whole world lying motionless in a pool of their own blood was something that would haunt me forever, no matter how this turned out. 

No. 

No, no, no. 

Nonononono. 

Neither of them were moving. Daryl had pulled Mia’s bike so that it was balanced on the handle, a protective metal tent over her. I shoved it aside. Knelt down. Wished I could trade places with her. 

God, she's so small. 

She's just a kid. 

“Mia?” I called to her. She didn't move. Neither of them did. 

“I’ve got a pulse on Daryl,” Bryce said, his fingers on Daryl’s neck. I tried to find the same on Mia. 

I prayed she was cold because of the weather and not because we were too fucking late. I waited a few more heartbeats to be sure it wasn’t wishful thinking. “Mia’s got one too.”

Still alive.

Thank God.

I can keep her that way. 

I pressed down hard on Mia's wound to stop the bleeding. Perla’s scarf was soaked through. Most of the blood seemed to be coming from her side. It was hard to locate at first; her jumper was covered in red. I glanced up at where Bryce tied a tourniquet around Daryl’s leg. Lucas had moved Perla away slightly, she was sobbing uncontrollably. 

A second car screeched to a halt. Dr Carson rushed out with Aaron. He was at my side in seconds. I stepped back so he could look at Mia, although everything in me wanted to stay with her, stay connected to her in some way.

While he looked over Mia's injury, I panicked over Daryl's. His pants were darkened with blood below the knee. Aaron's tourniquet had slowed it for now. It seemed, to my completely untrained eye, less critical than Mia's. But what if I was wrong? There were some big arteries in there. 

I closed my eyes for a moment, suddenly certain I was about to throw up. 

This can't be happening.

This can't be real.

Now that Dr Carson was here to tend to them, I couldn't stop my mind from turning over and over. I should have come with them. Maybe I could have stopped Negan. Maybe he'd have gone for me instead and left them alone. 

This is my fault.

I never should've trusted him. 

I should've killed him when I had the chance. 

My fingers ran through Daryl's hair. It was enough to hold me together and ward off the guilt I knew would later consume me.  

“I'm so sorry,” I whispered to him, hoping some subconscious part of him could hear me. “You did so good keeping her safe until we got here. She's gonna be fine. You both are.” 

The alternative was too horrific.

“Daryl’s wound is a clean shot through the leg, but I can't find an exit wound on Mia,” Dr Carson said. I hated how anxious he looked. “I think the bullet might still be in there.”

“What…what does that mean?” I said. I didn't want a diagnosis, I wanted a plan. “Do we need to…how do we help her?”

“A surgery might get it out, but I’m not… I don’t know if I can…”

“Siddiq,” Aaron said quickly. “He has surgical training. You should get her to Alexandria.”

I glanced at Dr. Carson. He nodded, “It’s her best chance.”

I don’t like the wording of that.

“What about Daryl?”

“We'll take him back to Sanctuary,” he said. “I'll be able to cauterize the wound there. He'll be off his feet for a few days, but if we move fast, he should pull through.” 

I hated the thought of us being apart. I hated the idea that Daryl would be suffering somewhere I couldn't see him. When he woke up he'd be alone and desperate to know if Mia was alright. But what other option did we have? 

“I'll go back with him,” Aaron's hand landed on my shoulder. “If anything changes I will call Alexandria.” 

I nodded. Every fiber of my being wanted to fight it, but I couldn't. It was the best plan. They'd both get medical attention. They'd both have the highest chance of survival. It wasn't permanent. Once Mia was fixed up, we could come back, or Daryl could join us in Alexandria. I'd be able to take care of them both. 

I bent to kiss Daryl's forehead. He'd be mad if he knew I'd hesitated at all. 

Aaron and Dr Carson lifted Daryl away from me. It felt like they'd ripped off a limb and left me bleeding at the side of the road. I couldn't watch as they bundled him into the back of one of the cars. I focused on Mia, picking her up and trying not to remember all of the times she'd been much smaller than this and I'd had to carry her to her room after she'd fallen asleep on the sofa. Or when a grazed knee on the playground was the worst injury she'd ever had. 

Bryce got in the back of the car with me and helped put pressure on Mia's wound. I think he tried to talk to me but I couldn't take any of it in. Half of me was gone, in another car. The other half could only focus on Mia. Lucas drove like a madman. Perla, in the front passenger seat, kept glancing back.

Torn between willing her to wake up and talk to me, and wanting her to stay where she was free of pain, I kept checking Mia’s pulse. I wasn't sure mine would keep going if I couldn't find hers.

It was the longest drive of my fucking life.

Alexandria's gates were already open when we got there, and the streets cleared so we could drive right up to the infirmary. Bryce must have radioed ahead. I hadn't heard him. 

Siddiq pried Mia from my arms at the door of the infirmary. I tried to step in after him. 

“I need the room,” Siddiq said, there was a little wariness in his eyes when he glanced at me. But by the time I'd processed that he meant I couldn't go in with her, the door had already closed.

I wanted to be there with her. I wanted to be the one on the operating table instead of her. But that wasn't possible. I wanted her to have the best chance at living, even if that meant I couldn't go in. 

“Naomi, sweetie,” Bryce said gently. “She's in the best place for her. Come on, we could head to Aaron's, get out of the cold while we wait?”

I nodded but my feet didn't move. They couldn't. I couldn't step off the porch. They were already frozen. Bryce seemed to get it. He didn't go to Aaron's. Lucas tried to convince Perla to go home but she wouldn't move either. If I hadn't been being eaten alive from the soul out, I'd have tried to convince her too. She'd had to do a brave and horrible thing. But I couldn't be there for Perla right now, I could barely be there for myself. My mind kept spinning between Mia and Daryl. 

I need you. 

Both of you. 

I can't exist in this world without you. 

Rick and his family trudged through the snow toward us. Michonne wrapped a jacket around me, which was nice but the numbness in my body had nothing to do with the cold. Carl tried to look in the windows and then spent a long time telling me Mia would be okay. He'd been shot once. He was fine. The more he repeated it, the more it felt like it was for his sake as much as mine. It seemed to calm Perla down, too. 

It took an eternity for the doors to open again. When they did, Siddiq looked around at us all, surprised to see so many people huddled on his porch in a snowstorm. It was only in noticing his surprise that I realized how bad the snow had gotten. Thick, white flakes fell from the sky, silently piling up.

If I hadn’t already been losing my mind, I might have taken a moment to be grateful for this village Mia had to care for her. The snowy vigil outside her hospital room. But I was going insane, and I needed to see her. I could thank everyone else later.

“I've given her some painkillers,” Siddiq said. “And she’s a little groggy, so maybe just Mia’s Mom should come in for now? We don’t want to overwhelm her.”

I nodded and stepped forward. I couldn't shake that image of her, so still on the road. Not since the day she was born had she looked so fragile. Not since a doctor had come into the delivery waiting room and told teenage me that there'd been complications and Momma needed an emergency c-section had I been so scared medicine wouldn't save her. Not since Terminus had I been so terrified of losing her. 

But I stepped into the room. And there she was. Sitting up. Eyes open. 

“I’m sorry,” she said, she started sobbing the moment she saw me. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay, it’s okay,” I said. There was a chair next to the bed, but I ignored it, climbing onto the bed so I could be next to her. Hug her. “It's okay, sweetie, it wasn't your fault. I'm just glad you're here.”

There was a very good chance I’d never be mad at her for anything again. Daryl, too. If the two of them pulled through this I'd let them get away with murder. Mia's wide eyes, slightly hazy with the painkillers she'd been given, looked behind me. “Da… Daryl, he-” 

“Daryl was injured, but he's gonna be okay,” I said quickly, trying to rip the band-aid off. I still wasn't clear on exactly how things had unfolded or how much of it she'd been conscious for, but I didn't want her to freak out now. She needed to rest. Heal. “He's back in Sanctuary, but we'll see him soon.” 

I need that to be true. 

“It wasn't his fault,” she said. 

“I know, I know,” I said. I didn't want her to have to think about what had happened any more than she had to. I didn't want her dredging up traumatic memories until she was ready to talk about it. “Ain’t nobody’s fault but Negan’s, sweetie.”

And he'll pay for it.

Slowly, and one by one, the others from outside came in to see her. Carl and Perla were allowed in together. There were a lot of tears, even though Carl was trying not to let them show. I stepped back to give them a moment. Bryce was hovering by the door. 

“Any news?” 

He didn't have to ask who I meant. I didn't like the look on his face, or the nervous swallow before he spoke. “The snowstorm is pretty bad. Comms are down.” 

Fuck. 

Daryl

Slipping into unconsciousness had been gradual, coming back was brutal. I was ripped from oblivion, a deep and burning pain in my leg reminding me of everything that had happened. Everything I'd lost. 

“Mia…” I sat up in bed, trying to get my bearings, trying to look for her. Took me a moment to see that I wasn't lying on the road anymore. I was in Sanctuary’s medical bay. There wasn't another bed beside me. My prayers to die in her place were unanswered. Either that or the devil was listening and now I was in hell. 

No. 

Nononono. 

“Naomi took her to Alexandria,” Aaron said quickly, getting to his feet from a chair by my bed. “She needed surgery to get the bullet out, and Siddiq has surgical training, so we thought it was her best chance.”

Surgery?

Fuck.

“Have we… heard anything?” I asked. I wasn’t sure how long I’d been out, or how long they’d been gone.

“The snowstorm hit,” Aaron said. “It’s really bad out there, and it’s messed with the radio signals. I’ve been trying, but… I can’t get through.”

Fuck. 

The dread must have shown on my face.

“Dr. Carson was really positive about her chances,” Aaron said. “And Siddiq, he's… he's good at what he does.”

I nodded but it didn't help. Even if Siddiq had been the best surgeon at the fanciest damn hospital in the world, it wouldn't have helped. Only seeing Mia happy and healthy would make anything even close to okay. 

I’ll never be allowed to see her again… not after what I did. 

Knowing she's okay would be enough.

Dr Carson gave me a bunch of painkillers that make me drowsy but I couldn't sleep for more than a few hours without having the same dream. Lifting Mia. Gunshot. Blood on her shirt. Over and over. I knew the shot was coming this time, too, but there was never anything I could do to stop it. 

The hours crawled by, light changing outside the window. Still no news came. I was going out of my mind. I wanted to get out of the damn infirmary bed and hike to Alexandria through the snow. Dr Carson was getting me to put more weight on my busted leg and use it more little by little. But it wasn't the injury that was stopping me from getting out there in a snowstorm, it was Naomi. 

I wasn't ready to face her. Because I knew when I did, I would lose her. Nothing could make this right again. I'd already lost her, I suppose; she'd have hated me the moment she saw us lying on that road, but without seeing her, it didn't feel final. While she was gone, I could pretend a little longer. 

It took three days, and then, finally, we got word that Mia had pulled through. I felt like I could breathe easy for the first time since I’d seen that bullet hit her. Aaron gave me the message from Alexandria and I choked back the urge to ask if it was Naomi who'd called. I wasn't sure I could handle hearing her voice. Or what she'd have to say to me, although I knew I'd deserve every damn word of it. 

I was relieved enough to sleep. Dreamless for once, but when I opened my eyes, Naomi was at my bedside. 

Why the hell would she be back here? 

Is she here to kill me?

There wasn't a hint of anger in her face as she looked at me. A big, beautiful smile broke out across it when she saw I was awake. It looked like the first time she'd smiled in days. 

“Hey,” she said, voice full of soft relief. “How you feelin’?”

Her hands brushed through my hair, her pretty eyes so full of concern. My head was still hazy from just waking up, and maybe a little from the pain meds too. It made me a little uncertain that this wasn't a dream. My first good dream in a while.

“I'm…I'm fine, but Mia… Mia…?”

“She's okay,” Naomi said. Her hands were on my shoulders, gently trying to get me to lie down. I hadn't realized I was trying to get up. “She's okay. Siddiq got the bullet out. She'll need a lot of rest. And so do you. You were both so lucky.”

I lay back against the pillow, out of shock more than anything else.

Why aren't you tearing me apart for what I've done?

It didn't make sense. Maybe I was dead after all and this was some kind of vision of heaven- a world where it hadn't been my fault. Naomi was looking at me with the same painful worry she'd had after Ronnie's guys had beaten me. It didn't make any sense. I didn't deserve a damn moment of her concern. 

Maybe it's a test. 

To see if I'll own up to it. 

“Is she… here?” I asked. I couldn't see why Naomi would have left her side. 

“No, she's in Alexandria,” Naomi said, almost apologetically. “She insisted I come and see you before the next snow blocks the roads again. I brought Bryce back with me, but I've packed a car with some of Mia's stuff. She'll be bed-bound for a while, thought she could do with some home comforts.” 

“Take her birthday presents,” I said. “Might cheer her up.”

“I will,” Naomi nodded. “And Rick says when you're better, you can come and join us while she recovers.”

“You… you want me to?” It still felt like some kind of test. 

“Of course we do,” Naomi frowned. 

“You don't blame me for-” I started to say. It was hard to get out past the giant lump clogging up my throat. 

“Hey, it's not your fault,” she said softly, her touch as gentle as her words as she cupped my face. “Perla told us what happened.”  

“She did?”

Then how am I still breathin'?

“Yeah,” Naomi nodded. “She said Negan came out of nowhere when you were tracking a deer. She heard the gunshot and Mia…”

Naomi broke off. She couldn't even voice the moment where Mia had been shot.

She doesn't know. 

She doesn't know it was my fault. 

I thought about telling her, I swear I did. But a loud, strong, selfish part of me saw how easy it would be to let that be the official version of events. She already hated Negan. I could let her hate him a little more. After all, he was the one who pulled the trigger. 

“I'm so sorry, Daryl,” she said, her voice breaking. Her lip quivered. She was so close to breaking. It looked like she'd been that way for a while. The strain this must have been putting on her made my chest ache. 

“What the hell have you got to be sorry for?” 

“I never should've trusted Negan,” she said. She looked so damn guilty. It could see the heaviness of it in her eyes, weighing her down. “I should've killed him instead of giving him a chance. If I had…neither of you would be…” 

Oh shit. 

She blames herself.

“Naomi, no,” I said. “It ain't your fault.

“It is, ” she said miserably. “If I hadn't tried to… give him a second chance…if I'd just…”

No. 

This ain't right.

It had happened because she'd believed in the wrong person, because she'd chosen to see the best in someone when she shouldn't. But it wasn't Negan. 

The worst part is, under other circumstances, I would have let her believe the lie. If she hadn't been blaming herself for it, if she hadn't been beating herself up, I could've gone my whole life carrying that terrible secret. But the guilt would break her. It was too much for someone innocent in this. 

“It wasn't your fault, angel,” I said. It hurt, knowing this would likely be the last time she looked at me with love in her eyes. “Negan didn't break his promise. He didn't come onto our land.”

Naomi frowned, “So… he shot across the border? That's still-”

“No,” I said. I couldn't let her go on, spinning in circles trying to find a way to excuse me. “I…I was on his land. I tracked the deer to-” 

“No,” she said again, shaking her head like I had to be mistaken, but part of it was stinking in. I could see the tears starting to form. “You wouldn't do that.”

She sounded so confident, like I had to be the one who'd got it wrong because she knew me better than I knew myself. That had been true before, except for one glaring blind spot. I'd always known I was a piece of shit. And now she finally knew it too. 

“I didn't know for sure it was his territory,” I said. I had to go on. She deserved the truth even if it broke me. “But…I didn't check.” 

“No,” she said again. “You wouldn't do that. You wouldn't…take our little girl onto his land.” 

Our little girl?

It hit me like a sharp knife between the ribs. Made it hard to go on. “She wasn't supposed to… follow me… I told her not to.. I tried to…” 

God, I'm making it worse.

Blaming Mia for my mistake.

I was supposed to keep her safe.

Naomi stood up so abruptly it sent her chair toppling to the ground. She closed her eyes. Not fast enough to stop a few tears from escaping down her cheeks. I hated seeing it. She was breathing like her chest was tight, like she'd just had the one safety net she'd ever known pulled out from under her. I wanted to reach out and touch her. Hold her, talk her through it like I did when she had one of her panic attacks. But I couldn't fix this. Not when I was the one causing it. 

“Naomi, I…” 

Her eyes opened again and I couldn't speak anymore. Looking at them damn near killed me. 

Shoot me.

Kill me. 

It’d be kinder than letting me live without you.

“I…I can't do this right now,” she said. “I need to go. Mia needs me. I can't…be here.”

Breaking her trust was bad enough, but I'd broken her heart. I could see it in her eyes. And she was too good to do the same to me.

There was nothing I could say. My throat closed up with the hopelessness of it.

I wanted to plead with her, beg her to stay with me. I owed her a thousand apologies. But they wouldn't fix it. 

I can't breathe. 

I can't fucking breathe.

When she turned and walked away I wanted to chase her down. Follow her to the ends of the earth to get her to talk to me again. Tell her one last time how much I love her. 

But I didn't. 

She deserved better, and she finally knew it. 

It was worse than being shot. 

I hurt her. 

I really, really hurt her. 

I grabbed a handful of painkillers without counting them. They weren't meant for this kind of pain but they'd knock me out for a while. I couldn't think about what I'd just lost. It was too much. 

I swallowed down a few pills, gulped down some water and wished I had something stronger. Merle's hooch would've done it, blacked me out nice and good. 

Every time I closed my eyes I saw her face, broken hearted and betrayed. It made it hard to breathe right. I couldn't think about a future without her. 

What if they leave? Head off someplace else?

What if I never see either of them again?

“Naomi, are you ready to-?” Aaron looked around the room like she was expecting her to be at my side. Gracie was in his arms, and Bryce was right behind him. Bryce looked around the room in the same way, expecting to see Naomi beside me. 

Get used to it.

She ain’t ever gonna be near me again.

“You okay, Daryl?” Bryce asked. He looked worried. “You look…I can get Dr Carson if you need more painkillers.”

I knew how I looked - like a man who'd just lost everything. I shook my head. “I just took some.”

I could feel them starting to kick in. Numbing my body. Still felt like I'd been sliced in two, but at least I'd fall asleep soon. 

“She left,” I managed to say. Fuck knows how.

“Shit,” Aaron said, readjusting Gracie in his arms. “She was supposed to give us a ride back to Alexandria.”

Given how mad she was, it wasn’t surprising she’d forgotten.

“We could try calling her,” Bryce said. “She can’t have gotten far.”

“We should let her get back to Mia,” Aaron said. “She has enough to worry about. That is… if you don’t mind us staying a little longer. It’s started snowing again, so I don’t think we’ll have another window to get back for a while.”

His gaze flickered between me and Bryce. I shook my head. “Of course not.”

“It’s nice having you both here,” Bryce said. “Next time the snow clears, we can drop you off and visit Mia at the same time.”

“Yeah,” Aaron nodded, looking at me. “I think you'll be well enough by then to come with us.”

I nodded like I agreed with them because I couldn’t bring myself to tell them the truth. Saying it out loud would make it worse, make it real. 

I ain't ever gonna see them again.

What they'd heard when I'd said Naomi left was Naomi left to look after Mia. What I'd meant was;  Naomi left me.

Chapter 65: Crack

Naomi

Turns out I could still be mad at Daryl. 

I hadn't felt even a little bit of anger in the last few days. I'd been numb, my body so deeply entrenched in survival mode that it didn't leave room for anything else. Mia needed help doing basic things, she'd been in a lot of pain and that was hard to see. When she was asleep, I'd worried about Daryl and how he was doing, getting no sleep of my own. We'd been so cut off from him. I'd worried that when the storm finally stopped interfering with the radios it would bring me bad news from Sanctuary.

I'd barely slept and had trouble keeping down the little food I'd had time to eat when I wasn't caring for Mia. I sure as shit hadn't had time to break down over any of it. 

But this? Finding out Daryl had gone onto Negan’s land? It was one thing too many. I cracked under the weight of it all. I couldn't look at Daryl, couldn't be in the same room as him because I knew I'd very quickly wind up saying something I'd regret. Something I didn't mean. 

When the rage finally hit me it hit all once. It had been pent up inside for so long that the force nearly tore me apart. All of my cracked and frayed edges shattered at once. Anger took it's place, as blinding white as the road I was now tearing down at speeds way too fast to be safe in the snow.

I cracked.

I fully cracked.

It's my only excuse for what happened next. 

I passed three lumps of snow and knew at once what was underneath - one motorbike and two kid's bikes. Blood was probably frozen on the road there too. I tried to keep going.

This rage ain't meant for Daryl. 

It belongs to Negan.

I had to pull over. 

At the side of the road, with those three white lumps of snow in my rearview I let out a scream of frustration so loud they probably heard it back in Sanctuary. It felt good though. The way it kind of burned at my throat as it ripped its way out of me matched the burning in my chest.

Then, like a dam bursting, I finally cried. It poured out of me, pent up for so long that I didn't know how to stop it once it had started. Like a damn snowstorm, I just had to wait for it to pass. 

By the time I'd stopped, the snow landing on the windshield was sticking there, blocking my view. I would have to move soon, it was getting bad out there.

But when I closed my eyes, I saw Daryl the way I'd found him in Sanctuary; sleeping in his hospital bed. It hadn't looked restful, though. He'd looked haunted. I'd wanted to climb up into that bed with him, hold him until he felt better, but I'd known I didn't have time for that. 

God, I was so happy to see him. 

Why'd it have to end like that?

I was angry with him. I knew I probably would be for a long time, but… I knew him. I knew he'd never knowingly put Mia in danger. When he’d tried to tell me that she wasn't supposed to follow him over there, and he'd told her not to, I believed him.

Because I also knew her. 

How wilful and stubborn she could be. Her confidence had always been something I loved to see in her, but she was sometimes overly so. Brave, but…reckless with it. I mean… the girl had helped orchestrate an attempted uprising against a group of bandits at Terminus. She'd gone against everything we'd told her and left food out for Negan because she felt sorry for him. 

When she wanted to do something, she asked for forgiveness, not permission. 

Kids can be a beautiful, funny, terrifying nightmare. This was Daryl's first real brush with the sickening, sinking, dread of a kid you're solely responsible for doing something reckless. And she'd gotten hurt doing it. 

It wasn't like I hadn't made mistakes with her. The times she'd vanished in the grocery store when I'd looked away for one damn second. Terminus, where I never should've let us be separated. Kids are hard work. They rarely do what you ask them to, even when it's life or death. 

Even if I told him all of this, Daryl would hate himself forever for Mia getting hurt on his watch. He'd assume I hated him too. 

I have to go back. 

Storming out the way I had would've sent his thoughts to the worst possible places - if they hadn't been there already. I'd needed to cool down so I didn't say something I didn't mean, but that's not how he'd have seen it. ‘I can't do this right now’ would have filtered through his brain and come out as ‘I can't do this ever’.

Fuck.

I need to see him. 

There wasn't time to go back. The snow was falling thick and fast now. Visibility was shit. I was about halfway between Alexandria and Sanctuary. Turning around would mean I most likely wouldn't make it back to Mia. It could be days or weeks before the roads cleared enough.

I grabbed my bag from the passenger seat and switched on my walkie. It wasn't ideal, but it would have to do. “Sanctuary. Do you copy?”

Nothing but static and dead air. 

Double fuck.

I was getting so sick of that sound. Five minutes. That was all I needed. With all of the shit I'd just been through, it didn't feel like I was asking a lot from the universe for it to give me five damn minutes to tell my fiancé that, yes, I was mad as hell, but I wouldn't always be, and I love him. 

I don't even need five. Two will do. 

I got out of the car in one of those hopeless, usually futile, attempts to get technology to work better by walking to another place. My boots crunched deep into untouched snow. I didn't even close the door, I didn't plan on being long. 

Pulling my coat tight around me, I dug the walkie out of my bag again. The temperature had dropped since I'd left Sanctuary, or maybe it hadn't but I'd been too mad to notice how cold it was the first time.

“Sanctuary,” I tried again. “Do you copy?”

Nothing. 

I followed the road. The creek a little deeper in the forest that separated our land from Negan's was frozen over and almost invisible under the snow piling up. I only knew where it was because I knew where to look and could follow the faint outline of it under the snow. 

Cold bit into my fingers as I tried to call again. This time, I thought I heard something different in the static, but the wind was whipping so hard around me it was difficult to hear. It could've been my imagination.

“Aaron, is that you?” 

Aaron.

I forgot Aaron and Gracie.

Fuck’s sake. 

Two things to apologize for. I might need the full five minutes after all.

Nothing came back. I kept walking, to keep myself warm more than anything else. The trees opened up around a frozen lake, fed by the creek. I hoped the open space would help with the signal, but had no idea whether or not that was true. I was going to ask Eugene a shit tonne about radios the next time I saw him so that I didn't end up doing useless shit like this again on a hunch.

“C'mon, Sanctuary. Please. Please, please, please tell me if you can hear me.”

I stopped by the frozen lake and looked out over it. This was pointless. I had to go back to the car. The snow was bordering on a full-on blizzard. I closed my eyes and tried to shut it out.

“Aaron, if you can hear me, I'm sorry I forgot you and Gracie,” I said, yelling into the receiver over the sound of the wind. “And tell Daryl I'm sorry, too…tell him I said it'll be okay. That we're fine. Everything's going to be okay.”

I wanted to say more, but it was too much. I waited but nothing came back. 

I need to go.

When I opened my eyes again, movement caught my attention. A dark shape amongst the flurries of white. Between the trees across the frozen lake, someone was moving. The falling snow was so thick it was hard to make them out, but this wasn't the stumble of a Walker. They tended to slow down when it got cold, some of them almost got frozen in place. This was the hurried walk of someone who'd been caught outside in a snowstorm.

Negan?

My vision narrowed to a point. I started walking. I finally had something to do with all of my anger. Somewhere to put it instead of squashing it all down until the next time I could break down in a car at the side of the road. Someone to aim it at who deserved it. Because even if Daryl had been on his land, Negan still shot a kid. 

My kid. 

I put the walkie away and pulled out my gun. 

“Negan!” I yelled. I didn't care if he heard me, or if he saw me coming. I wanted him to. I wanted to see the fear in his eyes before the life left them. 

I didn't realize I'd stepped out onto the ice until one of my feet slipped a little. I paused and looked back. Then, I kept going. I'd already come quite far out, what was a few more paces to the other side? There was enough snow settling on the frozen water that it wasn't too slippery. I was getting close. It was hard to tell if he was walking toward me or away from me.

It was hard to tell for sure that it was Negan, 

But it had to be him. Who else would be out here, on this specific patch of land, days after Mia and Daryl were shot? 

Wait. 

Are there two of them?

I stopped where I was and squinted through the flurry of white at what now looked like two figures moving toward me. Had Negan convinced people to join him after all? I didn't want to end up shooting the wrong person. 

“Negan!” I yelled again. “Fucking face me, asshole!”

Crack. 

For a split second, I assumed it was a gunshot, that Negan was determined to go three for three on the Dixon family. 

Water closed over my head. Cold so shocking I tried to inhale. It was like a thousand tiny needles had pierced me at once. And I realized what had happened. 

No.

Please. No. 

Everything was so dark. A deep midnight blue as I sank. I looked up at a shiny ice-blue ceiling above me. So far above me. My lungs were already aching, shock had made me breathe in some of that painful cold. 

"If you ever find yourself in water like this, the first step is to relax,” Daryl's voice entered my thoughts like he was right there next to me. “Let yourself float."

It worked. Kind of. I tried to reach up. Tried to force my tense, cold, terrified body to relax. 

I couldn't get my limbs to work properly. They were so fucking heavy. And I didn't know what to do with them anyway. Instinct kind of took over, my hands above my head, straining toward the light. 

Relax.  

Daryl was right. I'd stopped sinking. The ceiling of ice above slowly drew near. The initial pain was ebbing from my body, which was a relief, but I didn't think the numbness replacing it was a good sign. 

My fingertips reached the hard ice above. Where was the hole I'd made when I fell through? I tried not to panic, but it felt like I'd already spent an eternity under the ice. I pushed up on the ice above me, which didn't budge but it did send me floating in a different direction. 

I kept going, scrambling against an unyielding sheet of ice. 

Come on.

Come on, come on. 

Please, please, please.

Yes!

My fingers hit nothing. No ice. Air that had felt cold when I was in it now felt almost warm. I tried to get my fingers to bend, to grip the jagged edges of the hole in the ice. They were slow and wouldn't work the way I wanted them to. It was like there was a delay between my brain and my body, thoughts frozen by the ice water I'd swallowed and inhaled. 

Finally, I gripped it and pulled myself up towards the surface. Air. I gulped in a painful breath and coughed out water a second later. I pulled myself up, forearms on the ice.

I couldn't get much further than that. 

I tried to crawl further, but something was tugging me down, stopping me from pulling myself out. For one heart-stopping second, I thought there might be some drowned dead asshole under me, trying to drag me down. Make me one of them. I looked down at my feet, suspended in that endless midnight blue.

I was alone. A blessing and a curse. 

It wasn't that I was being dragged, I was being weighed down. My bag. My coat. Waterlogged and heavy. I threw my bag up over the edge of the hole in the ice and tried to follow. But my coat was still too heavy. Taking it off would mean letting go of the ice shelf I'd been holding onto to keep my head above water. I was sinking again.

The numbness had turned into an almost warmth. I was so tired. I couldn't feel anything but exhaustion. The urge to sleep was overwhelming.

No. I need to get to Mia. She needs me. 

I didn't think about what I'd do when I got out. Or how the hell I would make it to Alexandria on my own before I froze to death. I existed in this one singular moment. My only goal was to survive to the next one. The next heartbeat. The next breath. And a breath was something I desperately needed. 

I twisted underwater, slipping out of my heavy coat and letting it float away. 

My lungs were burning something fierce. I felt myself start to rise again. 

Above me, and a little distance away, I thought I saw a shadow moving across the ice, but it could've been an extension of the darkness now encroaching on my vision. 

I forced my fingers closed around the edges of the ice again and pulled myself up. It was easier in some ways, without my coat weighing me down, but my arms were weaker than before. I managed to pull myself forward, my elbows and forearms on the ice, but the more of me that was out in the air, the more I started to shiver. I pulled. The water was now only up to my waist.

Every breath felt like inhaling shards of glass. I coughed up water on every exhale. 

I tried to pull myself forward again and get my lower half out of the frozen lake, but I was slipping backward. My fingernails dug into the ice, but it wasn't enough. 

I sank again, scrambling to get hold of anything.

No. 

No. 

Please no. 

The water closed over my head for the third time. Everything was fading. Everything but Daryl's voice. 

“Relax. Let yourself float.”

Then what?

"Well, hopefully, by then, you'll be swimming on your own."

And if not?

"I'll come and get ya.” 

I floated. The blue faded to black, although I was sure my eyes were still open. 

A pair of hands closed around my wrists. 

No fucking way. 

"I'll come and get ya.” 

Daryl?

Even if it was a near-death hallucination. Even if it was the final synapses of my brain trying to keep me calm as I hurtled toward meeting my maker, I was grateful. 

It was soothing. Painless for a moment. I felt like I was back in his arms, safe in our bed. Warm. God, so warm. Like none of this had ever happened. I'd wake and tell him I'd had a bad dream - about two bullets and a dip in the lake. 

The illusion shattered. My back scraped against something hard. Pain erupted in my lungs. They emptied of water. Everything was white until it faded again.

Darkness, back down deep. 

Something rumbled beneath me. Soft ground shaking. Was I safe? Was I going home? Had he found me? Chased after me when I'd stormed out on him? My skin felt like it was on fire. I could hear voices. 

“Is she dead?”

“Don't think so.”

“If she turns…”

“I'll deal with it.” He sounded annoyed, but…familiar?

I tried to open my eyes. Tried to call for him, “D…D….”

A hand landed on my shoulder. The steadiness of it made me realize how much I was shaking. I thought I heard my name. And then I heard nothing at all.

 

Daryl

“A few more steps,” Dr Carson said. I bit back the urge to tell him to go to hell. 

He was mad about the painkillers. He didn't say so, but I could tell. I played dumb, like I'd just forgotten how many I'd taken but I'm not sure he believed me. He'd probably heard enough junkies feed him that line in his professional life to believe it from me. I was sure all of this damn physiotherapy he was making me do was punishment for it. 

“All right, all right,” I said, gritting my teeth as I walked. 

“Use the stick,” he grumbled. Not for the first time. He held up a makeshift crutch for me. 

“Don't need the damn stick,” I said. Pain shot through my leg in disagreement. I clenched my jaw even tighter to stop myself from reacting to it.

“It'd be easier for you if you did,” he sighed. 

He was right, but I didn't care that the crutch would have made things easier. I didn't want things to be easy for me. I didn't deserve that.

“Daryl, maybe you should just try with the crutches?” Bryce interjected after it looked like Dr Carson was about to throw something at my head. I was surprised it had taken him a week to get to that point. I knew I was being an asshole. I was hurting in a way no amount of physiotherapy could fix and making that pain everyone else's problem. I knew I was doing it but I didn't care. I didn't care about anything anymore. Everything I cared about had been taken from me. Because I'd let it.

The pain was a welcome distraction from all that. 

“I don't need the damn crutches,” I snapped. I glared at Dr Carson. 

“All right,” Aaron interrupted loudly. “Why don't we all just take a break?"

“Fine,” Dr Carson's mouth formed a thin line. I glared at him. He held my gaze. “Come find me when you're ready.”

‘…ready to behave yourself’ was the unspoken end of that sentence. He was looking at me the way teachers used to when Naomi wasn't around to keep me in line. Dr Carson stepped out of the room, leaving that damn crutch leaning up against the wall next to the door. 

I sat down in one of the chairs. The small glimmer of satisfaction I got from staring him down faded and I found myself wishing he'd stayed longer. Yelled at me more. I needed somebody to fight.

“Sanctuary, do you copy?” 

A voice over the radio broke the silence we were all stewing in. The storm had passed a few hours ago, and this was our first communication from anyone outside of Sanctuary in a week. 

Turns out I could still care about something. Something twisted in my chest when I heard it was Rick. It's not like I was expecting Naomi to call, but the second snowstorm bought me more time. Aaron and Bryce had no idea what had happened. She hadn't seen anyone or spoken to anyone when she left. Radio silence from everyone made the radio silence from her less obvious. Another week where I could play pretend that we were still together. 

Now, Rick had called instead of her. My little make-believe world was slipping. 

“We hear you, Rick,” Aaron said, picking up. “Everything okay?” 

“Hi, Aaron. Anyone else with you?” Rick asked. There was a tension in his voice that made my heart sink. Bryce hovered nearby, clearly filled with the same worry that I was.

“Bryce and Daryl are here, too,” Aaron said. 

“Can you put Daryl on?”

Oh shit. 

What now? 

I took the walkie from Aaron. Tried to stop my hand from shaking.

 “All right, Rick?” I asked when all I wanted to say was Is Mia okay? I had this horrible, stinking feeling that something had gone wrong. An infection. Torn stitches. I felt sick, Naomi would be in pieces if she'd lost that little girl. 

“Yeah, she's fine. She misses you guys,” Rick said. Bryce and I relaxed a little. Whatever Rick was stressed about couldn't possibly be as bad as that. “But, uh, there's been…a development, I guess you could call it.”

“Spit it out, man.”

“Negan's here. In Alexandria. He turned himself in a few hours ago.”

I felt my blood start to boil. “Did you kill him?” 

“No.”

Good.

Naomi should get to do it. 

My silence must have gone on too long for Rick because he said, “He hasn't said why he's here or what he wants, but he'll only speak to Naomi.”

“How does he think that's gonna end for him?” I asked, wondering if this call was going to end with Rick telling me Naomi had already killed him. Or, maybe Rick was still trying to save Negan and had come to me for advice on how to handle my homicidal fiancée when he told her that. 

Ex-fiancée. 

Nothing was final. But I knew it was coming. I doubted she'd ever be able to look me in the eye again after this, she'd never marry me. But, I hadn't been able to bring myself to tell anyone that yet. Figured they'd all find out soon enough on their own. 

“I know. I don't know what he wants from her, but do you think she'd be willing to listen? Or…will she decapitate him on sight?” Rick asked. 

“Decapitation’s too quick. Too easy,” I said. “But, why are you asking me? Ask her yourself.”

“Right,” Rick sounded tense. “Is she listening? Can I talk to her?”

My stomach dropped. Bryce and I exchanged a look. 

“She ain't here, Rick. She's with you.” I said. It was like part of me knew already, goosebumps breaking out on my arms, but my brain couldn't accept it. 

Something's wrong.

“Oh, she left already?” Rick asked. “We thought she might have set off the moment the snow cleared, but I thought I'd call just in case. I guess I can just talk to her when she gets here.”

“No,” I said. There was a sinking dread in the pit of my stomach. Still, the reality of it wouldn't set in. It was too much, too terrifying. “No. She's… she's been with you for a week.” 

“No. She hasn't,” Rick said, the tense concern in his voice turning up a notch. “She left after the first storm to see you and pick up some things for Mia…Did she not make it to you?”

“No, she did,” I said. My skin was crawling with it now. The fear. “But she left to get back to Mia.”

There was another pause. Then Rick said what I already knew and couldn't stand to hear, “She didn't get here, Daryl.” 

Fuck. 

My chest felt tight. This had to be some kind of mistake. Naomi had got to Alexandria. She'd just been holed up in the infirmary with Mia for so long that Rick hadn't seen her. But, I knew that was bullshit. If she'd arrived, he'd have known about it. 

“Don't panic just yet, all right,” Rick said, trying to talk me down from a ledge I was already dangling off. “Maybe she's at one of the other communities.”

“Why would she be there?” I asked. “She was on her way to Mia. She wouldn't have left Mia.”

She'd have walked. 

Crossed snow and ice to get back to her. 

Bryce knew it too. 

“Maybe the road was worse than she thought and she had to turn back, find shelter somewhere else,” Rick said. It sounded flimsy even as he said it. It didn't make sense with the route she would have been on for her to go anywhere else if she'd had to turn back. A slim possibility that she'd had to turn around because of the weather and couldn't stand the thought of seeing me again was all that stopped me from cussing Rick out until he called off.

“I'll contact the Kingdom,” I said. “You call the Hilltop.”

“All right-.”

I didn't even wait for him to sign off before I switched radio channels. I had to try a few times before I got through. 

“Kingdom. You reading me?”

“Daryl!” Carol's warm voice did absolutely nothing to thaw my mood. “It's so good to hear from you. How are you all doing over there?”

I didn't have time for small talk or chit-chat. “Is Naomi with you?”

“No…” Carol's voice faltered, confused. “Is she…. supposed to be visiting? I don't think we knew that. What time is she meant to arrive?”

“No,” I said. I felt like I was on the verge of throwing up. Or punching something. Maybe both. I couldn't speak, couldn't bring myself to say it out loud. 

“Then…what…?”

Bryce took the walkie from my trembling hand and said the words I couldn't yet bring myself to utter, “She's missing. She left us to get back to Alexandria a week ago, but she didn't make it there.” 

She's missing.

She didn't make it.

I couldn't hear the end of their conversation. My heartbeat was thumping in my ears, my throat constricting. I wanted to dig my fingers into my ribcage and pull it apart just to get some air in there. 

Bryce called Rick back. 

“Is she at the Hilltop?” Bryce asked. 

“No,” Rick said. Fear gripped my heart. Squeezed it in ice-cold hands. “I take it that means she's not at the Kingdom?”

“No.”

It was all I needed to hear. I walked out, ignoring the pain in my leg. Almost welcoming it, it kept me focused. I needed to be focused right now, and it stopped me from slipping back into something worse. I ignored Aaron and Bryce yelling after me as I left. I wasn't stopping for anyone but her. 

The snow had stopped a while ago, but it was still piled up. My feet sank into it. I didn't let it slow me down. I reached the car closest to Sanctuary's gates and found it snowed in like the rest of them. 

There was a shovel in the trunk. I pulled it out, dug just enough to free the tires, and then got in the front seat. It took a few tries to get the engine going, but eventually, it spluttered to life. 

I knew the route she'd have been on. I'd drive it until I found her. I'd drive the same route a thousand times if I had to. She must've gotten into trouble on the road, but she was smart. She could find shelter and stay warm for a few days until she could get back or someone came to find her. 

I'll find you, baby. 

Bryce yanked open the driver's side door and adrenaline immediately spiked in my gut. If he thought he could stop me from going out there, he was a damn lunatic. 

“Piss off, man, I'm going!” I yelled at him. 

“I'm coming with you,” he yelled right back. Bryce, after all this time, had finally snapped at me. “Move. Your leg’s fucked. You're not driving.”

I got out of the car. Out of surprise more than anything else. I couldn't remember Bryce ever yelling at me before, not like that. Not even when we'd hated each other. Shut me right up. I sat down on the passenger side and shut the door as Bryce tried to start driving. The car lurched forward a little, and then the wheels spun against the snow. We stopped moving; the car rocked back to its starting point. 

“We might have to -” 

“Yeah, I know,” he snapped. I shut up. I got back out of the car and dug while Bryce kept rocking the car back and forth. Eventually, the tires got enough traction to bite down on the snow and lift the car out of the ditch it had been snowed into. 

Shovel back in the trunk, I hopped back into the passenger side. My fingers were numb, but the car was finally moving. Bryce noticed me rubbing my hands together and turned the heat up without saying anything. He was still glaring at the road ahead of us. I didn't say anything either. 

Bryce drove slow. If we'd had a destination in mind, it would've driven me insane, but it was good. Gave me a chance to check the woods on either side of us for any sign of movement. Walkers tended to freeze up this time of year, so anything moving was likely still alive. Or very recently dead, which I couldn't stomach thinking about right now. 

We drove in silence. Bryce was still simmering. 

“You're not the only one who loves her, you know,” he said after a while. 

“Yeah. I know.” I said. “I'm sorry. It's just…”

Been the worst week and a half of my life.

And it's slowly getting worse.

“Yeah,” Bryce said, gently accepting it and forgiving me in that quiet way he always did. “I know.” 

I kept looking away from him, out the window. It was surprising it had taken him this long to yell at me. I'd been snapping at everyone lately, but Bryce worst of all. I think it's because I knew what was coming. Naomi would leave, she'd take Mia, and Bryce would still get to be a big part of their lives while I was shut out. Again. I resented him for it more than I should have when it was my fault.

I'd thought that history repeating itself was the worst-case scenario. 

I was wrong. 

This was way worse. I swallowed a lump in my throat. “I'm sorry.”

“I know,” he said. “We're okay man. I know you could have done this on your own, too, but when she comes back I can't have your leg being worse than when she left. She'd kill me.” 

I know he said it to make me feel better but it didn't. She'd probably take my leg off herself if given half the chance.

We were approaching the place where it had happened. Our bikes were stuck under a mound of snow, but I knew they were there. I wanted to look away from them but forced myself to look over them instead. Into the trees. Willing her to walk out and flag us down. 

Oh no. 

About a mile up the road, a car had stopped. I was pretty sure it hadn't been there the first time around. I glanced at Bryce, who nodded. He'd seen it too. Because I'd been unconscious at the time, I kind of forgot that he and Dr Carson were the ones who'd brought me back from here. 

The closer we got, the worse it looked. The driver's door was wide open like someone had just stepped out.

Bryce sped up and then stopped right behind it. I got out. My feet felt like lead, a heavy weight sat in my stomach. Bryce crouched down to clear snow off the number plate as I checked inside.

There was snow in the car. That door had been open for a while. It was piled up over something lying across the backseat. 

What if that's her? 

The thought took hold of me. For a moment I couldn't bring myself to touch it. Had she crawled in here to shelter from the snow? Died curled up here in the back seat? Alone?

No. 

The door was open. 

People did weird shit in the late stages of hypothermia, didn't they? They’d get confused and think they're too warm. Hallucinated shit?

Please. Please don't be in here, angel. 

I dug into it, almost expecting to find a frozen limb. A hand. Her face. When my fingers hit something I almost sobbed. I was too cold to tell what it was. 

I dug at the snow with half-frozen fingers. It was a relief when all I uncovered was a box. A few bags.

“It's just stuff,” I said. “It ain't her. It ain't her. It's just stuff.”

I could've collapsed right there, lain down in the snow, and wept with relief. We hadn't found her, but she hadn't frozen to death alone in the backseat of her car, and that was something. I looked over at Bryce. My hands were shaking and not because of the cold. 

“It's her car. It's the one she came to Sanctuary in,” Bryce said grimly, straightening up from checking the license plate. He opened up the backseat door nearest to him and swept some of the snow off the stuff piled up there with his sleeve. It all tumbled into the foot well like a mini avalanche. “Those are her things, and the things she packed for Mia.”

Fuck. 

My relief died fast. I backed away from the car. The thing was a damn crime scene. Bryce backed away too, glancing from me to the car and back again. “What are we looking at here, Daryl?”

It took me a moment to realize he was asking, really asking. He thought I'd be able to track her from here. Any other time of year that might've been true, there'd have been some kind of story in the mud and on the road. I could have checked the dirt for footprints. Drag marks. It would have told me if she'd got out of the car voluntarily or if she'd been snatched. What direction she'd gone in when she got out. Even old snow could've given us tire tracks that would've told me if she'd stopped the car by choice or swerved to avoid something. 

Fresh snow wiped it all clean. A blank page. I couldn't read anything in it. I walked around to the back, braced myself, and popped the trunk. She wasn't there. 

“Negan. He did somethin' to her,” I said, pacing circles around the car hoping it would tell me something different each time I looked at it. Something. Anything. If she knew she was in danger she'd have left me a clue, right? Dropped something?

“You sure?” Bryce asked. 

“You got another explanation?” 

Bryce didn't say anything. Neither of us did. We kept staring at the car.

“Should we search the woods?”

“Nah,” I said. “We keep goin’ to Alexandria. Ask Negan some questions when we get there. He's got her. He has to.”

“We should take all this,” Bryce said, gesturing to the stuff in the abandoned car. “Mia still needs it.”

I nodded and helped dig it all out, loading it into the back of our car. I couldn't look too hard at any of it. Every glimpse of something of hers or Mia's made my chest ache. How has our family been reduced to this? A few boxes, the glue missing. 

The box of books, binders, and stationery almost tipped me over the edge. I had to take a binder out of it. I flipped through looking for a blank page. There were a few pages that had my name on ‘em, but I couldn't read then. Just seeing her handwriting was enough to make my vision blurry.

“Are you leaving a note?” Bryce asked as I took a blank page and started writing on it. 

“In case she's sheltering somewhere and comes back,” I said. “We should run regular patrols out here to check.”

Bryce nodded and continued loading the remaining bags into our car. I leant on the car and wrote;

‘Stay put, angel. I'll come get you.’

I stared at it for a moment, fighting the urge to add ‘I love you.’ Before, I never would have hesitated over any of it. But now? Now I wasn't sure for the same reason I was glad Bryce was driving. If it had been me on my own and I'd found her, would she have got in the car? If she knew I was the one looking for her, would she listen? Or did she still want nothing to do with me?

I ripped it off and stuffed it in my pocket. Tried to neutralize the second note;

‘Naomi,

Stay by the car. We'll send someone to get you. 

-Bryce.’

I left it on the dash before Bryce could get a look at it. Prayed she wouldn't recognize my handwriting.

We kept searching the treeline for any sign of her on the way to Alexandria. There was still a chance she was trying to make it there on foot. For most of it, I was annoyed I hadn't fought Bryce harder on who was driving. Seeing her car abandoned like that… was sending my thoughts down all kinds of dark roads. Most of them lead to Negan. A few even worse ones ended with a frozen corpse walking alone.

My leg seized up a little as it got used to the warmth in the car. That was fine. The pain made it easier to stop thinking of every worst-case scenario. 

Rick met us at the gates.

“She show up yet?” I asked, in case, by some miracle, my angel had gotten here before us. 

Rick shook his head, the same worried crease on his brow that he always gets when he thinks I'm about to lose it. 

Too late. 

I'm already too far gone. 

I would destroy something. Negan for sure. Myself, depending on how this turned out. I was set to self-destruct, and the only one with the code to disarm it was Naomi. 

“Do you want to see him?” Rick asked, tense.

“In a minute,” I nodded once, walking in the direction of the infirmary. “I got a stop to make first.”

Bryce followed. Inside Alexandria, the roads were pretty clear. They'd obviously been out shoveling snow for most of the day.

“Daryl!” Mia yelled when I stepped through the door. There was this moment where a big smile broke out on her face, and I ran to her bedside to scoop her up into a big hug, and for that split second, things were almost normal again. 

“I'm sorry I couldn't come sooner,” I said, squeezing her tight around the shoulders so I didn't put any pressure on her injury. “You doin' okay, sweetie?”

“Yeah. Mostly just bored,” she said. “Are you okay? Is your leg okay?”

“Right as rain,” I said. My leg throbbed with disagreement. I ignored it. 

When I pulled back, Mia's eyes did what everyone would probably continue to do for the rest of my life. She looked for Naomi beside me. Her smile faltered in a big way, fading completely. When she looked back at me, there was real darkness in her eyes, “Something happened to her, didn't it?”

We all knew who she meant. Bryce moved around to the other side of her bed and put an arm around her shoulder, “We don't know that.” 

“I do,” Mia seemed to shrink in the bed. “I knew it when I woke up and she wasn't here.” 

Bryce and I looked at each other. Everyone in this room knew Naomi would've walked barefoot in that snow to get here. Crawled if she had to. 

“We're doing everything we can to find her,” Bryce said. 

“I thought maybe she'd had to stay with you,” Mia looked at us. “Because of the snow, but…”

I shook my head. 

“Negan's here,” I said. “Turned himself in this morning. You're safe, Rick's keeping him in the jail cell.”

Mia swallowed. Her bottom lip shook a little. “Do you think he…hurt her?”

“I don't think he'd have come here if she was… in a bad way,” I said. Couldn't even bring myself to say ‘dead.’ Mia looked doubtful and I couldn't blame her. “If he'd seriously hurt her, he'd probably have brought her with him. You know how he likes to make a show outta everything.”

Even as I said it, part of me believed it. If he'd killed her outright, her Walker would've been chained to Sanctuary's gates for me to see. Or her head would've been on a pike somewhere between Sanctuary and Alexandria. But that didn't mean she wasn't bleeding out in whatever lair he'd been holed up in. Some kind of time limit on her life. 

“He's probably keeping her somewhere, maybe so he can try and use her to bargain for something, I dunno,” I said. “And I don't care. Whatever it is, I'll get it out of him. You hear me?”

Mia nodded. Bryce shot me a worried glance over her head. Like I was promising something I had no right to be. Like I was lying to her, but I wasn't. I needed the lie to be true. 

“I ain't saying he'll crack easy, but he had her locked up before and we got her out then,” I reminded her. “And that time he had a whole army. This time he's got nobody.”

Mia nodded again, more confidently than before. “Have you seen him?”

“Not yet,” I said, “but I'm gonna head there now. Just wanted to check on ya first.”

“I'm fine,” Mia said. But she wasn't. She was miserable, broken-hearted, and scared but trying to be brave. “Please find her.”

That was my sign to go. I couldn't even wait for Rick to get the keys to the cell, knowing it might take a little convincing for him to let me in there with Negan. I didn't need that yet. Right now, I wanted to look that bastard in the eyes and watch him squirm.

The door down to the basement was unlocked and I was glad because I didn't think my leg had the strength to kick it down. Compared to the brightness of the snow outside, the cellar was dark. Took my eyes a moment to adjust and take in the figure in the cell. He stood up when I came in. 

“Daryl!” his smug, stupid voice sang out of the darkness. The day I didn't have to hear it anymore couldn't come soon enough. “Didn't expect you. Did she send you down to be good cop to her bad cop, or are y'all switching it up these days?”

Hatred, sharp and deep, twisted in my gut. 

“Cut the shit, Negan. What did you do to her?”

I drew closer to the bars. A strip of light filtered through the window, hiding half of his face in shadow. That shit-eating grin faded a little. Naomi was right, he was looking like shit these days. Gaunt and pale. Hadn't shaved in a while.

“Look, I admit it. I'm sorry about Mia,” he said. “I meant what I said. I didn't see her. I thought -”

“Not Mia,” I snapped, walking right up to the bars. “I know damn well what you did to her.”

Sometimes, when I closed my eyes, I still felt that splatter of warm blood. 

Negan frowned. “Then…who?”

“Naomi. Where is she?”

“I came here looking for her, I wanted to-”

“Bullshit,” I slammed my hands against the bars so hard they shook. “You've got her somewhere, and if you don't start talking soon, it won't be long ‘til I'm takin’ fingers.”

“I don't know what you're talking about.” He almost looked sad. 

“You shot my little girl,” I said, getting real close to the bars. I didn't want him to miss a damn word. “And now my wife is missing. The only reason you're still breathin' is ‘cause I know you had somethin' to do with it.” 

“You better kill me now then,” he said. “Because I don't have her.”

Chapter 66: Lists and Letters

Naomi

Daryl,

You were probably kidding when you told me to make a list, but… well, you know me. Couldn't resist.

These things are all still true:

• I'm still scared of being pregnant and the absolute horror show that can be.
• I'm still scared something might happen to the baby, and we’ll have no control over it.
• I could die.
• I still worry I won’t be a good Mom.
• I'm afraid of all the times I'll get angry and lose my temper.
• I'm terrified of ending up anything like my own Momma.
• Raising kids is hard. They never listen; they get into all kinds of scrapes. They can break your heart in a completely unique way - the first fight you have when they tell you they hate you because you won't let them do something is a real punch in the heart. Even if they're four years old and don't mean it, and the thing they want to do is cut their own bangs with nail clippers.
  (Never tell her this, but the more into her teenage years Mia gets, the more I dread the day we get in a fight so big she pulls the ‘you’re not my Mom card.’)
• The world is fucked.
• I worried having a family might make Mia feel like she’s not important anymore or that she’s being pushed out because she isn't biologically mine.

However, these things are also true;

• Being scared isn’t a good reason not to do something when it's something you want. And it IS something I want. Besides, everything worth doing is a little scary, right?
• I can't remember when I wasn't afraid of turning into my Momma, and I've worked hard not to, especially around Mia. And I'll keep working on it forever.
• Raising kids is hard, but it’s also a beautiful mess. Seeing them grow into these funny, confident little people with their own thoughts, opinions, and interests makes the tricky bits less difficult.
• Mia was very excited when she found out about our little “scare,” so I guess I was worrying for nothing.
• The world is fucked, but when wasn't it? There were always dangers, even back in the old world. Having to hunt for survival and our physical safety was something you and I had to worry about before all of this. At least our kids would be safe in their own home, and have a family that actually looks out for them.

While all of these things on their own might not have been enough to convince me, there’s one big factor I hadn’t thought about before because it hadn’t been one;
You.
The list could have started and ended here. But you’d have hated that, so I had to write all of this other bullshit to trick you into reading this part.

• Daryl - you would be the world’s best father. I see it all the time - when I see how you are with Mia and every other kid in the communities. They have fun with you, but they also feel safe with you around. Protected.
• It's not just them you're good with. You always know exactly how to deal with my bullshit too, how to talk me down when I’m on the brink of something. You make me less scared of something I've been terrified of since when I was sixteen because I know you can calm any anxiety I have. Nobody else I’ve ever met could do that.
• You are so unlike the people who raised you. You are gentle, kind, and loyal as hell. You’ve never scared me or Mia, not even when you’re mad about something. We feel safe with you. Seeing how different you are from your parents makes me feel like I can do it, too. I don’t know what a good Mom looks like from experience, but you never knew what a good Dad looked like either, and you fill that role as naturally as breathing.
• We're a team. I know you'll have my back when things get hard. That’s always been our way.
• I like who I am with you. You make me feel like I can do anything—even this.
• It’s not just that Mia herself seemed excited for our family to get bigger; it’s the two of you and how you are with each other. You love each other so much in a way that has absolutely nothing to do with me, and it makes me so happy. I can tell she feels secure in her bond with you, and I know that no matter what, you’ll never break it. I trust you with her, and I never thought I’d be able to say that about anybody.
• I could die, and that's okay. (Don't argue with me, this is my list. Feel free to make your own.) Don’t get me wrong, I plan on sticking around and annoying you until we’re old and gray, but if the worst were to happen, I know I’d be leaving our kid in the best possible hands. Even if something happened to me, you would be there for them, raise them right, and love them twice as hard.

All it comes down to is this: I love you. I love our little family, and I want it to get bigger. Everything else, we’ll figure out along the way.

Daryl

The words blurred in front of me so many times, but I couldn't stop reading. It took me almost an hour to get to the end, and when I did, it felt like I'd been hollowed out, all of my vital organs scraped away by something blunt and rusted.

Why is there blood on it?

There was a lot that was overwhelming about the page in front of me, but the blood was the thing I kept coming back to. I wasn't ready to deal with the rest; I would fall apart if I let it hit me in full force.

I wasn't even completely sure it was blood. It was a dried smear, darkened reddish brown, but… what else could it be? When I'd first flicked to it, it caught my eye. Then I saw my name. Before I read it, I thought maybe she'd been so mad she'd pulled over to write some kind of break-up letter, so she'd never have to see me in person again, only for Negan to open the door and drag her out before she could finish.

I might have preferred a break-up letter.

This hurts more.

"This look like blood to you?" I pushed the binder towards Bryce. He frowned and leaned over it, studying it for a moment. His eyes widened.

"I… don't think I should be reading this," Bryce said, quickly averting his gaze. "But… the blood… she'd had a few nosebleeds lately. It could have come from that… it's hard to say when she wrote it."

I was sure I could narrow down the timeframe she'd written it in, but I didn't say that. Didn't much fancy going into the details of that night with Bryce.

"Nosebleeds?" I frowned. "Since when?"

"I dunno," he shrugged. "A week, maybe? I mean, a week before she went missing… "

"She never told me."

"They didn't last long," he said, trying to reassure me for the same reasons she probably hadn't told me in the first place - even the tiniest hint she was sick felt like a monumental, apocalyptic-level threat. "It didn't seem serious. It wasn't that many."

My jaw tightened. What if it had been serious? What if it was a warning that something was seriously wrong with her? If she'd had some kind of fit behind the wheel, a seizure or something, and stumbled out all disoriented…

Another fucking theory to add to the never-ending list.

Bryce had stopped working. His eyes were unfocused on some far-off place, but I knew where his thoughts were. They were with her. Wherever that was. I knew the feeling. I lost count of the times it had threatened to pull me under completely. "You all right?"

"Sorry, I just…" Bryce shook his head and glanced back at that list. "Never thought she'd be in a place where she'd be thinking about… a family of her own like that."

The lump in my throat was too big to swallow. I nodded.

I don't think she did, either.

Sitting in the middle of all her things felt wrong. Invasive. But what if there was some clue in the stuff she'd left behind?

Negan insisted he didn't have her, but I didn't believe him. I couldn't. Which meant I couldn't kill him either. If he'd put her somewhere, injured, it was a race against time to get to her before she succumbed to it. Even if he hadn't hurt her, had he left her enough food? Water? How long could she last? A week from now, when she was starved and dehydrated, he might reveal he knew where she was after all. Either way, I needed to break him.

Plus, there was always the possibility he wasn't working alone. While I still thought it was unlikely that Amber and Mark had joined them after everything he'd put them through, I hadn't ruled out the others - John and Marissa - two people I hadn't known the names of until they up and vanished. Maybe Negan technically didn't have her, but they did on his orders. It would be just like him to hang his defense on a technicality like that. Taunt me with a lie by omission. I'd been looking for every note she'd taken on them when I stumbled on that list. It knocked the wind right out of me.

She wanted to have a kid.

My kid.

Ours.

Every time I thought about it, I felt the weight of everything we'd almost had pulling me under. It was especially heavy because I knew that when we found her, it wasn't like everything would be forgiven. Or that we'd go back to how things were, the happiest I'd ever been. She'd still hate me. But she'd be home. Alive. It was all that mattered.

At some point, in the small hours, Bryce turned in and went to bed, gently suggesting I did the same. I hoped the noise I made in response sounded like I agreed. I didn't. I'd never be able to sleep tonight. I couldn't stop while Naomi was out there somewhere, cold and alone. Another night alone.

She's been gone for a week.

And we only just noticed.

That killed me. A whole week where the worst kinda shit could've happened to her. A whole week with nobody looking for her. I knew what that was like. Nine days alone in the woods as a kid with nobody looking for me. But at least it hadn't been winter. At least the temperature hadn't gotten so low it was deadly. At least I wasn't out there worrying about a family member who'd been badly hurt.

No matter where she was or what had happened, she'd be losing her mind over not making it back to Mia.

I kept going through all of her notes about Negan's possible accomplices. I needed something to do, and arming myself with anything useful for the next time I went to interrogate him stopped me from breaking down completely. I could feel it brewing, though, a shadow right behind me. Without something to do, I'd have climbed the gates and started tearing those damn woods apart. Rick had stationed more lookouts than usual around the place; he said it was in case Naomi made it here, but I knew it was to keep me inside, too.

The others arrived at daybreak. Rick had told me he was calling in reinforcements and arranging some kind of search party, but seeing them out in full force like that made me choke up.

At the gates, Carol and Ezekiel jumped down from their horses. It was one of the few times I'd seen Ezekiel, and he hadn't been smiling. He didn't even smile when he greeted Jerry, who'd arrived in the group from Sanctuary with Eugene and Aaron. Justin had turned up to help look for her and glared at me like it was all my fault. I didn't flinch because he wasn't wrong. Behind him was a bunch of other people I'd never bothered learning the names of but was willing to bet Naomi had.

Maggie and Glenn were here, too. Baby Hershel strapped across Maggie's chest meant they weren't in a position to lead. They'd only be able to do so much and look after their little guy. But the fact that they'd shown up at all meant the world. They had delegated leading the group from the Hilltop to Tara and Denise. Jesus gave me a sympathetic smile when he caught my eye.
Lucas and Perla were amongst the Alexandrians at the gate. I heard him tell Perla to go and sit with Mia. Mia had been desperate to help with the search, but there was no way she was well enough to be out of bed for that long yet. Especially not out in the woods for any length of time. Having a friend with her would help make sure she didn't bust out of there and reopen her stitches.

"You good?" Carol asked quietly from my left. I couldn't look her in the eye, or I'd have started bawling, but her quiet and steady presence was nice. As calming as it could be given the situation.

"It's just…" I cleared my throat. "A lot of people."
It was probably the first time in my life I'd been happy to say that.

"She's family, man," Rick said, stepping up on my other side. "We'll bring her home."

I couldn't speak, could only nod.

Come on home, baby. See how many people care about you.

Rick had asked if I wanted to say something or have any input on the groups we'd split people into, but I didn't. Talking to a bunch of people had never been a strength of mine or my idea of a good time. I couldn't understand the need for a pep-talk when the motivation for searching was so fucking clear to me. So, I let Rick give one of his speeches and explain the search parties and areas he'd divided everyone into. It was the same kind of grid system he'd tried to implement in the search for Sophia, but I tried not to think about that and how it had ended. I wondered if it was hard for Carol and was grateful as hell that she was out here looking for my girl after I'd failed at finding her little one.

My only request had been that Rick put me in the group that started by her car. He hadn't fought me on it, although I'm sure he'd wanted to. It was probably part of his cop-training that you keep a person's nearest and dearest away from where you might find a body. Sure he wanted me to sit on my ass and wait for news, but he knew me better than to ask me to do that.

Seeing the car again made me feel sick. I'd prayed that she'd have gotten the note and be waiting for all of us there with a smile and some crazy story about what had happened to her. But the car was right where we'd left it, the note on the dash from 'Bryce' untouched. No Naomi.

Bryce paled when he saw the car, too. I think both of us hoped the note would work. Summon her somehow. Rick put a hand on my back, "You good?"

No.

I could see him wrestling with the idea of sending me home. Making me wait in case they found something out here I wouldn't want to see. But he didn't. He knew it was pointless.

I stood by the still-open driver's door, the last place I knew for sure that she'd been. Made me feel like I could step into her footsteps, follow her right into wherever she was. We walked forward, away from the car, and into the woods. Rick made us go slow, scanning the ground for any little detail. I didn't want to do that. I wanted to run through the woods screaming her name until she answered me. But the tracker in me knew it was important to take my time. Anything could be buried in that snow. I didn't want to miss it, even if it ended up being her.

About an hour in, the walkie on Rick's shoulder crackled and I felt the static across my skin, making the hairs on my arms rise.

"Rick?"

Tara.

She didn't sound happy. I started feeling real sick. Rick glanced at me as he answered, dread in his eyes. We'd both heard the tone.

"You got something?" he asked. I almost wanted her to say no.

"Think we've found where Negan's been hiding."
I grabbed the walkie from Rick's hand. It shook in mine.

"Is she there? Is she there?" I asked, knowing full well that if she'd been found alive, Tara would have opened with that.

"No."

I pushed the walkie back towards Rick and started walking anyway. He probably tried to call me back. It probably wasn't what I was supposed to be doing, but how could I stay away from a potential lead this big?

I knew where they'd be; I had every one of those damn grids Rick had drawn up memorized. On the way, I passed two Walkers who stood frozen right next to each other. Only their eyes moved, tracking me hungrily. Neither of them was her, but I still had to check before I took them out. The thought of having to do this for every Walker I came across for the rest of my life made my stomach turn like I'd downed off milk.

It was easy to spot them once I got close. They were crowded around something on the ground. I broke into a sprint. Tara turned, saw me coming, and tried to slow me down. "Daryl, let us deal with this. You should go back to-"

I pushed past her and broke through the group to see what they were standing around. There was a square hole dug into the earth, about big enough to fit one person, its edges fortified with wood, hinged on one side. An equal-sized wooden trapdoor was lying open. Glenn was half-in, half-out, standing on a ladder that led down into the earth.

"Daryl…" he didn't smile when he saw me. Further away, back by the road, I could hear a baby crying.

"The hell am I lookin' at?" I asked.

"We think this is where Negan's been staying," Glenn said. "We knew the Saviors had caches of weapons and supplies around the place, but we didn't think to look for any underground ones. Maybe he knew we didn't' know about them, so he'd be safe here. Or, maybe he spent the summer building it with help from Ronnie and those guys. I dunno… but…"

"Move," I cut him off. I wasn't very interested in how this had gotten here. I mainly cared about what it had been used for in the last week.

"She's not down here," Glenn said. "And you probably don't wanna see it, it's a little… weird."

"Move," I said again. If she'd been kept here, if there was the smallest sign of her anywhere, I didn't trust anyone but me to pick up on it. He climbed up and let me climb down.

Maybe she was here

Maybe she got out.

The area around the bunker was a mess of snow churned up by boots. Tracking any specific set would be almost impossible.

The ladder was wooden and a little shoddy, definitely hand-made. It went down deeper than I expected and opened into a small room - if you could call it that.

So this is where the little rat's been hiding…

I'd been expecting some kinda villain's lair, but the truth of it was more pathetic than that. The ceiling wasn't much taller than I was. It was hard to imagine Negan stooped over in here. Crude shelves built into the walls held cans of food. Some were open. Some weren't. There was a bundle of clothes in the corner that could have counted as a bed if you were desperate. Dumped in the corner was a duffle bag I recognized as the one Naomi had given him supplies in.

The worst part of it was all the letters. Piles of them. Sheets of paper everywhere. All of them had her name on them, but not her writing. At first glance, I thought they were some kind of deranged ransom note. I almost hoped for it because it would be proof of life. Then everyone could stop looking at me like she was dead, and we could get to finding her.

But they weren't.

They were apology notes. Written over and over again. About how he'd never hurt a kid. How he'd never have gone back on their deal. How, if she took a minute to think about it, it was all my fault, actually. I stopped reading them. If I looked too hard, they started to look like love letters from a serial killer.

I'm going to kill him. Real soon.

Glenn shuffled down the ladder after me. Probably to check I was okay. Couldn't stand the way he was looking at me. Couldn't stand the way any of them were looking at me today.

"Was it open when you got here?" I asked before he could check in on how I was doing. The answer was fucking terrible.

"Yes. There's a bunch of dirt and stuff stuck to the outside of the hatch," Glenn said. "It would be pretty unnoticeable from the outside if you didn't know where to look. We only saw this one because he'd left it open."

With Glenn down here with me, I noticed how cramped it was. How difficult it would be for two people to live down here for a week. I couldn't stand the thought of her trapped nose-to-nose with him for that long.

"Maybe he's got others," I said. "Hidden around the place."

And maybe she's trapped in one. I couldn't say it, but I didn't need to. Glenn knew what I was implying.

"Yeah. Maybe," he agreed. Anything felt possible in the worst way. Avoiding eye contact with him and those damn letters, I climbed back out.

Feels dumb to say, but I thought I'd somehow know if she'd been kept down there. Like I'd feel it. Feel her presence somehow. But it was just a hole in the ground. Dirt. The only signs of life were from a deranged psychopath.

I studied the footprints around the bunker again. A mess. I widened the search, discounting any that came from the road the search team would have walked in on and eventually found a set distinct from the others. They were heading back the way I'd come, back in the direction of Alexandria. I left them to the rest of their search and followed them, knowing they'd take me back to the group by the creek.

The footprints were too big to be Naomi's. An educated guess told me they were Negan's, on his way to turn himself in. It hadn't snowed since then. Before I got to the others, his footprints veered off toward the road. I let them, and kept heading back the way I'd come to join up with Rick and the others.

They'd reached the lake.

Someone had found something. A crowd had formed around it, just like by the bunker, but they were right by the side of the lake. I called out to them. Rick threw a nervous glance over his shoulder. I was already walking toward them.

"Stay back, Daryl," he warned.

No fucking way.

I'd already seen Bryce wiping his eyes like he was crying. I sprinted toward them. Resigned to what was about to happen, Rick turned, something clutched in his hands.

It was her bag. I took it from him. Felt wrong that he was holding it at all.

That damn teddy bear smiled at me in his shades, and something broke inside me. I dropped to my knees.

I held that bag, the one I'd given her so nervously on her sixteenth birthday, in shaking hands. Kennival's smile felt like an insult. I remembered the day we'd found him. How she'd scooped him up off the side of the road and held him out to show me him sitting on her hand. The same hand I'd put a ring on all those years later.

Something had happened to her, and it had happened right here. She'd carried this damn bag through everything.

Unless she was so mad at me, she tossed it.

I looked up at them all, about to confess everything, to tell them that no, this didn't mean she was dead because she'd left hating me enough to throw this thing away. I didn't mean anything to her anymore, so this bag wouldn't either. But the look on their faces stopped me from saying another word.

They were still trying to hide something from me.

"What is it, Rick?" I asked. I could barely get the words out.

"Go back, Daryl," Rick said gently. He was crouching down next to me, which is how I knew it was bad. "Let us deal with this, all right?"

I looked past him, peering around him and through the legs of the people standing by the lake's edge, and felt my heart stop. Not far off, under the ice, there was a dark shape. About the size of a person. The same dark blue as the jacket she'd been wearing when she left me.

This is what a heart attack feels like.

It was about to give out on me. I was sure of it. I skidded forward on my knees across the ice. Felt the cold burn through my pants. I stopped on top of that shape.

"No. No, no, no." I clawed at the ice. I could hear people yelling at me to move, to get off the ice, but none of it mattered. I wanted it to break like I was breaking. Shatter and swallow me whole. I wanted to reach in and pull her out or sink down and be with her. I didn't care which. "C'mon, baby, please… not you… not like this."

I wiped the ice with my sleeve, trying to clear some of the remaining snow and make it less frosted. I was searching for something, anything, that would prove it wasn't her down there. But, from the depths of my mind, I kept imagining I was about to uncover her face, staring blankly up at me with frozen eyes.

Someone's hands grabbed my shoulders, and I got frantic.

They were trying to take me away from her.

"Naomi, please…Please, baby… come back to me. Come back." I slammed my palms against the ice between us like it was just a window. Like she'd be able to hear me and come back through. I screamed her name over and over. Don't know why. I knew if it were really her down there, she wouldn't be able to hear me or respond.

I think I just didn't want her to feel alone down there.

I fought, but they managed to pull me away, skidding and sliding back across the ice to the shore. I knelt there. It was hard to breathe. Felt like my own lungs were filling with ice water and suddenly I couldn't move. Couldn't see. Couldn't do nothing but sob.

"We don't… we don't know it's her," Bryce said. I caught the look Rick threw him, a warning not to feed my delusions, but it wouldn't change anything. Bryce hadn't said it to comfort me, if I was in denial, he was sitting right there with me.

"That could be anything under there. I mean… even if she went in, she could have got out, right? She'd have swum to the side and maybe… and maybe…."

My heart sank. I couldn't believe I was going to be the one to have to say this. "She couldn't swim, man."

"No, no," Bryce shook his head. "She took Mia swimming all the time, she… she…"

"Nah," I shook my head, "She never learned. Nobody ever taught her."

I was supposed to.

And what had I done? Let my desire for her win out over her safety.

I did this.

I killed her.

I couldn't stop thinking about how much she'd been shaking that day. The fear in her eyes. The way she'd trusted me to keep her safe.

God, she'd have been so scared.

So scared and so alone.

Neither of us was supposed to be alone ever again.

I couldn't take my eyes off that shape in the lake. Under the ice. Couldn't bring myself to think of it as her, but… also, I couldn't shake the possibility. Her name kept rising in my lungs but got stuck around my heart before it could get out.

"Daryl," Rick said. I could feel his hands on my shoulders again. He was talking to me real quiet, crouched down where I was sitting, numb, in the snow. "Come on now, let's go back."

"No," I said. I wasn't leaving her. I'd failed her so badly that the least I could do was guard her body until I could retrieve it. I felt sick. I still couldn't get used to the idea that it was her under there. That I was most likely fishing out a body, not rescuing my girl.

"I can't let you sit here," Rick said. "It's too cold out, you'll-"

He stopped himself, but I knew what he was going to say, 'you'll freeze to death'.

Like she did.

Let me.

He didn't get it, why I couldn't leave. Why I'd never move from this spot again.

"She's alone, Rick," I said. "She's on her own. I can't… I can't…"

"We'll come back," he said. "When it thaws, we'll come back and bring her home."

"Home?" I spat the word out like it was poison. "Ain't no home anymore, man."

It was gone forever, drowned beneath the ice.

' Angel' was just a nickname.

It wasn't supposed to come true.

Notes:

(next chapter coming asap because this feels mean even for me)

Chapter 67: Wounded Animal

Naomi

Nothing made sense, and everything hurt.

I swung between oblivion and pain with very little in between. Every time I came into consciousness, the searing pain in my lungs was the first thing I knew. It overwhelmed everything else. A hacking cough with every breath, never quite feeling like I could get enough air in before the next one. My head felt clouded, thoughts heavy. If someone had asked me my name, I'm not sure I'd have been able to tell them. The only thing I knew was the burning need to take another breath.

Am I dead?

Is this what it's like to become one of the undead?

It was hot. Too hot. A light came from somewhere, but I couldn't see a fire. Couldn't smell no smoke. Felt like it should be close. Felt like it was inches from my goddamn skin.

Momma was right: I'm burning in Hell.

Heaven's gates wouldn't open for a fuck-up like me.

I was a child again, so alone with my fears, and all I wanted to do was go to Daryl's house. Build a fort like we used to and crawl so deep inside it that nobody could find either of us. Even Merle didn't bother us there.

Wait.

Merle's dead too, ain't he?

If anyone can break us out of Hell, it's Merle Dixon.

I gotta find him.

A face loomed out of the shadows. Fuzzy around the edges. I jerked away from it, trying to focus, but my eyes were watering. My back slammed up against a wall. When I moved, I heard a soft thud as I shed layers of something soft that had been piled on top of me. Sitting up helped ease the coughing, but I could still hear my breath rattle in my lungs when I inhaled.

Something was weird about this place, but I couldn't focus on what because every time I thought I'd got my breathing under control, another coughing fit hit me.

Why does this hurt so much?

Water.

There had been water in my lungs, right? Water everywhere.

"Relax. You're fine. You're safe," someone said, but it wasn't Daryl's voice so I couldn't trust that was true.

I'm not.

I was a wounded animal, stripped back to nothing but survival. A strange voice in a strange, dark place did nothing to soothe me. I didn't know that face that loomed at me. Didn't trust it. I lashed out. The second I did, I felt hands on me, gripping hard on my arms.

Fuck, there's more of them.

More shapes moved in the corner of my eyes. I looked up at more faces looking down at me. Didn't recognize a single one of them. I tried to yell at them to stop, but all I felt was more pain in my lungs like I was inhaling shards of glass. Nothing came out. So, I did the only thing I could do - I fought. My addled brain still wasn't sure if I was fighting people or demons, but I gave as good as I could either way.

"Stay still. We're trying to help you," one of them said.

Fuck off.

"Can you hold her down?"

"...stronger than she looks."

"Fuck, she bit me!"

Did I?

Fuck you for getting close enough to get bit.

"We sure she ain't one of the Condemned?"

"Last I checked, she had a pulse."

Something scratched my arm. I tried to scratch them back, but they still held on tight. A few heartbeats thudded in my chest and everything started to get heavy. A sudden wave of exhaustion, and I couldn't move.

My eyes closed. Felt like I was being pulled somewhere, sinking.

Back to the down deep.

It was dark, and time didn't move right. I wasn't sleeping so much as… suspended. It was an unnatural kind of dark.

And then it wasn't. Bright lights were above me in long, thin strips. After all of that darkness, they burned my retinas. I squinted against them. A smooth, gray ceiling came into view behind the blinding white. There was a cold, hard surface at my back.

What the fuck is happening to me?

Alien abduction?

No, that's insane.

More insane than the dead rising?

…yes?

My whole body was numb; I could hardly feel it. The parts I was aware of still felt weighed down with sleep. My skin felt cold for once, but something was still touching me. Voices seeped through the fog in my brain.

"Are we sure it's still…y'know?"

"Yes. Look. Strong heartbeat."

"She's a lucky one."

Are they talking about me?

I turned my head. The flat, sterile gray ceiling continued down the walls. A countertop ran along it, about the same height as whatever I was lying on. A sink with one of those handwashing posters stuck to the wall above it. Closed cupboards were underneath, but medical supplies were on top of them.

Mia.

Fear passed through me in a jolt strong enough to wake me up.

I have to get back to Mia.

It was coming back to me in fragments. Before the water had rushed in, I'd been rushing out. Mia was hurt. Needed me. She should be the one in some kind of medical facility, not me.

I gotta go.

There were two people with their backs to me, who seemed to be gathered around some kind of screen. Couldn't remember the last time I'd seen a working screen. Any other time, I might have found that interesting. But not now. I had more important shit to worry about. The urge to cough crackled at the back of my throat. I held my breath in an attempt to keep it in. Didn't want to draw unnecessary attention to myself while they were distracted.

I could take on two people. That wasn't so hard, especially given that I had the element of surprise. There was usually all kinds of sharp shit in doctor's offices, right? I could grab a scalpel or something, arm myself for whatever I was about to face.

I tried to move my arm and found it strapped down to my side. I tried to move the other and found the same. My legs were strapped down, too.

Motherfuckers.

I let out a breath of frustration, which was a mistake. The cough I'd been holding back ripped its way out of me. Once I'd started, I couldn't stop; it was punishing me for trying to hold it back in the first place. My body convulsed with the force of it, and the straps tying me down cut into my skin. One of the strangers was immediately at my side. A woman this time. She smiled.

"It's Naomi, right?" she said.

How do you know that? I couldn't have confirmed or denied it even if I'd wanted to. I could not stop coughing. So, I just glared at her while it felt like my lung was trying to eject itself from my ribcage. My chest hurt.

It didn't put her off. That smile didn't even falter. "I'm Jocelyn."

No offense, lady, but I don't care.

Jocelyn started loosening the strap around one of my wrists. Another woman stepped up next to her, looking nervous. "Are you sure you should be doing that?"

"It'll ease her coughing if she can sit up a little," Jocelyn said patiently. The other woman took a big step away from me.

Yeah, that's wise.

With my ties loosened on one side, I could sit up a little. It eased the pressure in my lungs. I turned to one side, which helped even more. When the coughing fit finally subsided, I looked up at Jocelyn. "I need to go home."

"We can't let you do that," she said. "You're not well."

"I'm fine," I said, although I knew it wasn't true. I was still shivering. A cold sweat dampened my skin.

"You have pneumonia. You need to rest."

"I can rest at home," I said. "I'll be fine. Please. Please just let me go."

As long as I could get to Alexandria, I'd be fine. I could curl up next to Mia and recover at the same time she did. It would be like the Christmas when we both got the flu and spent two weeks huddled under the same blanket. Only this time, I wouldn't have to drag my aching body off the sofa to get us soup and medicine, Daryl could bring it for us. I bet he'd even enjoy taking care of both of us like that.

Daryl.

Oh, God, Daryl.

How many hours have I been here?

"I need to go home," I tugged at the restraints. It wasn't a request.

The nervous woman was looking nervous again, "She's getting agitated again."

'She' can fucking hear you.

I tried to sit up further, and the room spun underneath me. My stomach lurched as I felt off-balance. Jocelyn's hands took my shoulders. Her smile was still there, but her grip was like a goddamn vice. I couldn't stop shivering.

"Come on now," she said like I was a child refusing to go to bed. "Rest up, and then we can talk, all right?"

"No," I said. I tried to resist her, but my body was weak. Shaking. The nervous woman darted closer. I tried to reason with them, plead with them. "You don't understand… my kid… she got shot. I need to go home."

Did that bitch just scratch me?

I glared at the nervous one. Jocelyn looked at me, her voice soothing like she'd done this kind of thing before. "It's all right, Naomi. It's all going to be fine. Just relax for me."

"Please. I need to go home," I said. My thoughts were slowing down, my words slowing with them. "My kid… she needs me… and my husband… he… he'll be…"

He'll be losing his fucking mind.

I felt that familiar tug trying to pull me under. My limbs were like concrete. I tried to resist the darkness clawing at my back, but it pulled me down again. To the deep.

It looped like this: the dark places, the bright ones, a rotation of faces I didn't know.

Or maybe it didn't. Maybe it only happened once and then looped in my dreams while my brain tried to process it. Spinning me like a fairground ride gone on too long. Malfunctioning around me - dark, light, disembodied voices swirling stomach-churningly fast. Dark. Light. Unfamiliar faces twisting out of the shadows. Demons and their fire. Clawing at my arms. Momma. I wanted to get off. Go home. Build a fort.

Daryl.

And then it stopped.

I woke up alone. For a moment, I didn't move. Listening hard to check for movement or disembodied voices. It was blissfully silent. I still felt too hot, but no longer like I was on fire. My fever had broken. I was bundled up under something soft and warm.

Like a wounded animal testing a broken bone, I prodded gently at my memories. I clung to the few concrete things I had; Mia had been shot, I needed to get back to her, I fell through the ice, and someone pulled me out. Now, I was alone in a weird, dark somewhere.

Then, I tried to sift through the hazy middle; I thought I'd been in a car. I thought I'd recognized one of the voices in there with me. I probably wasn't in Hell. And those probably hadn't been demons holding me down. That was most likely the fever talking. But had the people been real? That weird medical room with the screen?

In an attempt to calm myself down, I reached for my ring finger. Empty.

No.

I lost my ring!

A horrible sinking feeling in my stomach as I imagined it slipping off my finger and sinking too, right down to the bottom of that damn lake. But it was so well made, I didn't see how that could've happened.

Did they steal it from me?

Something was off about how dark it was. I could barely tell that I'd opened my eyes. Wherever I was, I don't think it had a window. Light wasn't leaking in from anywhere. But there had to be a door, right? They had to have gotten me in here somehow.

I got up slowly. The ground was unnervingly soft underfoot. Cold and uneven. Something shifted between my toes.

Bastards took my shoes.

The rest of my clothes were gone, too. They'd put me in some kind of weird, long gown. But, given how sopping wet with ice-water my clothes had been, I guess it was to be expected. And it was nice of them to let me borrow a nightgown while my clothes dried off somewhere. At least, that's what I hoped was happening.

I reached out a hand in front of me. I couldn't see it. Slowly, I inched forward until I reached the wall. It was damp.

Is that blood?

I pulled my hand away sharpish. Some of it crumbled away with it, and I sprang back.

What the fuck is this place?

I took a few breaths to calm my spiking heart rate. Air still rattled a little in my lungs, but the urge to cough wasn't as all-consuming. As I breathed in, I finally noticed the smell of the place. Earthy.

Holy shit.

I'm underground.

My arms itched, but I stretched them out again. I needed to find an exit. I needed to stop thinking about the weight of the earth over my head and how many feet below I might be. What kind of people had built this place? A fair strategy, I had to hand it to them. I'd never seen a Walker digging, so, underground was a safe bet. But still, how structurally sound could a place like this be? How hurriedly had it been built?

I felt my way along the wall, hitting on tree roots and pieces of stone as I did. Slowly, methodically, I worked my way around what felt like a very small room until the surface evened out under my fingertips. Smoother than the earth, but about the roughness of sanded wood. I felt my way along it; the length of it, the height. A handle part of the way down.

Fuck yeah!

I'd found a door.I pressed my ear to it to see if I could hear anyone out there. They didn't know I was awake yet, and that was an advantage. If I could slip out without killing anyone, it would sure make the journey home a lot easier. They might not chase me if they weren't looking to avenge anyone. Hearing nothing, I tested the door, pushing on it gently. It didn't budge. Slowly, quietly, in case there was a silent guard out there, I tried the handle. Nothing.

I took another few deep breaths to keep myself calm. I'd check the rest of the room, and if nothing else presented itself, I'd kick the door down. Shoeless, it would hurt like a bitch, but that was okay. I could limp home. Hop if I had to.

The other walls yielded nothing. I reached up, spidering my fingers across the ceiling next. Again, the earth made way for smoother wood. A square this time, rather than the rectangular door. A trapdoor. Most likely, it led to the outside. The door probably led deeper into whatever hellscape bunker this was. The trapdoor felt like a safer bet, which was a discomforting notion in and of itself.

A dim light illuminated the edges of the door I'd just found.

Shit.

I'm out of time.

I pushed up hard on the trapdoor. There was a metal 'clunk' as something unlocked, and the door opened, scraping against the dirt floor. A familiar face, illuminated by an oil lamp, looked back at me.

"Dwight?"

I knew I'd heard him.

He didn't look surprised to see me awake, but he did breathe a huge sigh of relief. I almost hugged him.

"It was you that pulled me out, wasn't it?"

"Yes," he said. "What the hell were you doing out there in a snowstorm?"

"I was hunting down Negan," I said.

"Negan?" the way he said it and the look on his face told me it wasn't a name he'd thought about for months.

"He recovered. Resurfaced. We banished him for a while, then he shot Mia," I said, giving him a cliff notes version of everything he'd missed since his own banishment. Dwight's eyes widened. "She survived, but… I still want him dead. Take it that means he ain't here?"

"No. Sorry."

Damn.

"Well. Thanks for saving me all the same," I said. "How come this is the first I'm seeing of you, or…have you been here before? My memory's a little fuzzy."

"No. I don't usually work this area," he said. My eyebrow shot up. 'Work' sure was an interesting choice of word. Dwight clarified, "Security or healthcare."

I guess that made sense; if Jocelyn was real and to be believed, I had been extremely ill. And I would remain an extreme security risk unless they let me go real soon.

"They thought a familiar face might… calm you down," he said, stepping quickly into the room. He was holding a bowl of something that looked vaguely edible. My stomach rumbled. "You hungry?"

My stomach rumbled again. "Yes."

He passed me the bowl. Beans - canned - which was a novelty because most of our canned food had run out ages ago.

"We don't have long," he warned as I wolfed it down. I didn't like the way he said it, kinda hushed like he didn't want someone to overhear. I glanced at the still-open door.

"That's fine," I said, mouth full of beans. "I gotta leave anyway."

Dwight grimaced. "That…might not be so easy."

I set down the bowl and spoon. "How's it whenever I wind up someplace I don't wanna be, you always end up as my jailer?"

"I'm not your jailer, Naomi, not this time," he said but I didn't like the way he said it. It didn't sound like he meant it in a you-can-leave-anytime-way, it sounded more like a we're-both-trapped-here way.

"What's taking so long?" another voice asked, booming in from wherever was outside that door.

"I'm letting her eat," Dwight called back. "She's hungry."

I picked up the bowl again as the door pushed further open. I was hungry. Damn hungry. But my stomach was also starting to hurt. I knew, from all of the other times I'd been out of food, that I was eating too fast for an empty stomach.

Another man looked around at both of us. His face was vaguely familiar but I couldn't place it just yet. There was a scratch across one of his cheeks, but it looked pretty fresh so that didn't help me place him either. He glowered at me and then Dwight, "We gotta get moving. The Colonel's waiting for her."

Dwight gave a tight nod.

"Colonel?" I whispered as I followed Dwight toward the door. "Like the fried chicken guy?"

My stomach rumbled again. I regretted leaving the half-eaten bowl of beans on the ground.

"Stay calm," Dwight said quietly, glancing back over his shoulder. "As calm as you can, okay? It's your best shot."

At what?

The other man waited for us both to pass him. I stared at him as I walked past, trying to figure out where I'd seen him before. He stared back, unsmiling, his gaze unwavering. I turned to follow Dwight and heard the other guy close the door we'd come out of. He walked a little too close behind me.

What lay beyond was a long, narrow corridor carved into the dirt. The ceiling wasn't all that much taller than I was in places. Now and then we'd pass another crude wooden door. All of them closed.

Under other circumstances, I'd have found it interesting that Dwight was down here with this weird cult of mole-people. Might have asked a few questions or tried to explore a little. But as it was, all I was interested in was getting home.

The corridor widened. The walls slowly changed color and texture. It looked more like rock, which at first felt more comforting. Sturdy. And then I thought about how much the rock above our heads would weigh. How much would it take to cave in?

I glanced back, ignoring the half-familiar man behind us, and studied the path we'd walked. We'd been walking down a gentle slope, almost imperceptible unless you were looking for it. Descending deeper into the earth.

The tunnel continued dead straight for a while and then Dwight took a series of turns. Tunnels branching off the main one, if that's what it was, and then off each other. It was a goddamn labyrinth in here. I memorized them in reverse so that I'd be able to make my way back. If my hunch was correct and we were heading down, then there was a very good chance that the trapdoor I'd found was close to the surface. It could lead straight out.

The light from Dwight's oil lamp bounced back at us from something at the end of the tunnel. Silvery and reflective, for a horrible second I thought it was more goddamn ice. But, as we drew near I saw it was metal. A big, metal door in the middle of the rock. It looked so out of place, so wrong, I wanted to stop and walk in the other direction. But Familiar Asshole was still on my tail.

On the outside of it, there was a large wheel. Dwight turned it, paused, turned it the other way, paused again, and turned it back. The door opened.

Some kind of combination lock?

Fuck, how am going to learn that?

The door swung out toward us rather than in. Dwight had to back up a little to get it open. Light poured out into the tunnel. So bright I flinched. The space beyond the metal door was the same kind of sterile gray I'd seen during my visit to the medical room, which was looking increasingly less likely to have been a fever hallucination.

Maybe I'm still hallucinating.

Dwight stepped into the long, well-lit corridor. There was a smooth, gray wall opposite the door. It was a stark contrast to the rock tunnels we'd been moving down, like a spaceship had crash-landed in a series of catacombs. I didn't want to follow. I didn't want that heavy metal door with its mystery combination lock to shut behind me, seal me off further from the world above. From my family.

"Move," the guy behind me demanded.

Dwight looked back at me, his eyes pleading. "Come on. You'll be fine."

Liar.

I followed. Didn't have much choice. There was a step over the threshold into the corridor beyond. It was like stepping into a whole other world. We were now in a long, well-vaulted hallway. It curved away on either side of the door we came through, bending out of sight. There were wooden doors leading off it, but only running along one side. I reached out to touch the walls. Cold but not metallic. If I were to guess, it was probably reinforced concrete.

Preppers.

This is a doomsday bunker, built to survive the end of the world.

God, I bet they were smug when they were right.

I looked back at the man behind me, who was stepping through the door, which I now realized was a blast door, built to withstand explosions, maybe even nuclear fallout.

But not built to withstand me.

"Did you build this?" I asked. His scornful scoff was the only kind of 'no' I received. The metallic slam of the door shuddered down my spine. I heard it lock. It already felt like there was less air down here. Dwight had turned off his oil lamp. It was non longer needed.

Every part of this place was working to make you believe it was a normal building, but that somehow made it more off-putting. The perfectly smooth walls were taller than those tunnels we'd walked through to get here but felt more confining than the earth and rock. The bright lights in a strange yellowish hue were designed to make you forget that the sun couldn't reach you down here. All it did was make me remember. It was clean, especially compared to the dirt and mud I'd woken up in. My bare feet left wet footprints on the concrete floor. It was clean to the point of feeling sterile. Sure, you could survive down here, but live? There were no signs of that.

No noise, either. It was hard to gauge how big this place was. Had one paranoid person built it and taken in a few lucky friends and survivors? Or, was it bigger than that? The walls were thick, and although the doors that branched off this hallway were made to look like they were made of wood, I was willing to bet that was a superficial wrap over something much thicker. Something that kept any sound being made in those rooms from seeping out.

Dwight led me down the corridor that curved to the right. Most of the doors we passed were on the right-hand side. Dwight stopped at the first set that led to the left. It was different from the others, too. A double-door, metal, no pretenses of normality. Before Dwight could knock, a bearded man opened it and beckoned us inside. He also looked oddly familiar, but I didn't have time to get a good look at him as I walked past.

The room I entered was large and circular, with a domed ceiling high above us. It was some kind of central hub for this place, encircled by the corridor we'd just walked down. Dwight could have taken me in either direction, and we'd have ended up here.

A man sitting in one of the high-backed black chairs in the room, stood up as we entered. He didn't look the way I'd expected a prepper to look. He was clean-shaven, and his salt and pepper hair was neatly trimmed, cut close to his slightly square head.

Behind him, there was a series of monitors showing black-and-white images of what I assumed were other parts of the bunker. That was unnerving, but more what I'd expected. A man paranoid enough to build a bunker this big for the potential end of the world was definitely also paranoid enough to keep a close eye on its inhabitants. They'd probably watched me wake up, which explained how Dwight had managed to get there so fast.

Jocelyn was standing by his side, smiling.

So she was real…

Interesting.

"Are you feeling better?" he asked.

"Yes. Much better. Thank you." It was mostly true. I didn't feel good, but I didn't want to give them a reason to keep me here. "And I'm real grateful to you all for looking after me."

Beside me, Dwight relaxed. It seemed like a good start. I think he'd been expecting me to come out swinging like I would have if Negan had been in the room.

"You're welcome," the man said, there was a touch of surprise in his voice. I guessed all of those demons I thought I'd been fighting had snitched on me to their boss. "I'm the Colonel, and the building you are now in is our Stronghold. There are a few ground rules we need to go over before I welcome you in."

Why can these assholes never have a normal name?

"That's okay," I said, fighting the urge to back away. I forced a smile that I hoped looked vaguely placating and not at all panicked. "I can't stay. Thank you all for saving me. For looking after me. But, I have a family and a community who need me. I need to go."

"I'm afraid we can't let you do that," he said. Dwight's hand landed on my shoulder like he was ready to hold me back. The Colonel continued, "The survival of this place is dependent on its security, and the secrecy of its location."

"I have no idea where I am," I said, and tried not to let the magnitude of that sentence overwhelm me. "Just… let me go home. I won't tell anyone about you. Or come looking for you. I swear, you have my word."

The Colonel nodded as I talked, but there wasn't a flicker of emotion or understanding in his face. "We don't know you. We don't know if your word means much. Or how likely you are to keep it. The world out there has changed people, made them more desperate. Paranoid and violent."

Says the man with a doomsday bunker and a military title.

"I understand," I said, keeping my voice even. "But I wasn't conscious when you guys brought me down here. I don't remember the journey. If you blindfolded me and dropped me off by the lake you so kindly pulled me from, I'd never be able to find my way back here."

"So you say," he said. "But you could be lying. We could let you go only to find you've led your so-called community at our doors to loot from us or demand shelter."

"I wouldn't," I said. Dwight's hand tensed on my shoulder as he heard the desperation rise in my voice. "And… if this is about the resources and time I've taken from you guys while I've been here, I'm sure I can find a way to repay you. We have… supplies of our own. We could trade."

I felt sick, thinking about how much he might demand and how much Sanctuary was already struggling. But, I would go without. I would cut my own rations to nothing and starve to death so long as I could do it at home.

"A generous offer. We have more than enough to cover the two weeks you've been here," he said. My stomach dropped. I'd assumed a few days at most.

"Two weeks?" I repeated. It felt like I'd inhaled ice again.

They're going to think I'm dead.

Dwight squeezed my shoulder hard. A warning more than a comfort. I looked up at him, "I need to go home."

He shook his head, eyes widening in another warning. His earlier advice echoed in my head.

Jocelyn stepped forward with that sweet smile. "You've been unconscious for most of it, it's no wonder you don't remember."

"I need to go home," I said again. It was all I could say. All I could think.

"I can't let you do that," the Colonel said. "Not right now. Surely you remember the snowstorms?"

"I… I don't care," I said. I was slowly losing my grip on any composure I'd had walking in here. It was slipping out of my panic-clammy hands. "I… I can walk… I can…"

"We would never let a woman in your condition go out there," Jocelyn said. Beside me, Dwight tensed. A frown flickered across his face.

Okay. Maybe walking around in a snowstorm with pneumonia isn't the smartest idea.

But…  Two weeks?!

I need to go.

"Besides," the Colonel added. "The ground is frozen solid out there. We're snowed in. Nobody is getting in or out of here. Maybe when it thaws, we can talk again."

I swallowed. Snowed in? There wasn't much arguing with that.

"Do y'all have a radio… or something… I could try and call my family… let them know I'm not… that I'm okay?" I asked. It would be a long shot. I'd have to try every damn frequency out there to have a chance of getting in touch with anyone I knew. But it was better than sitting on my ass waiting for snow to melt.

"No," the Colonel said. But he didn't specify whether he was saying no to having a radio, or no to me using it.

Ain't no way a prepper this prepared doesn't have a radio.

My jaw clenched. "I had a bag with me… there was a radio in there. Did you…?"

I glanced over at Dwight, who shook his head. "We didn't pick it up."

Fuck.

The radio had likely been as fucked up by the cold water as I was, but still… a slim window of hope slammed shut. I had only one left, and it was mostly for my sanity. "I had a ring, too. I might have fallen off, but…"

"Yeah, we've got that all right," the man who'd come to collect me and Dwight said from behind me. He pointed to the scratch down his cheek. "You managed to do this with it."

Now that he was standing next to his bearded friend, I remembered him and where I knew them from. The non-bearded man wasn't wearing his hat, and that had thrown me off. Last I'd seen them both, they'd been driving away from an irate Daryl with a deer he'd shot just for me. I glowered at both of them. "Y'all stole my engagement dinner."

He grinned at me, but there was no warmth in it. "Guess we'll call it even, then."

"I'm sorry," I said, but I turned back to the Colonel and Jocelyn as I said it. It was clear who was calling the shots here and it wasn't Hatless Asshat. "I was… feverish… a little delirious, I think. I didn't know where I was… I was scared, and just trying to survive. Can I have it back? Please?"

The Commander considered me for a moment. I hardly dared breathe. "Yes. I don't see why not."

Jocelyn retrieved it. I felt a little better just by slipping it on. The snow would thaw. I would get out. I would never speak of this place again.

I almost got through the conversation without losing it. But then, as I looked down at my ring safely back where it should be, I caught sight of my arms. I turned my hand over, palm up. There were little red dots along the inside of my arm. Some of them were a little bruised around the edges. I knew what they were immediately.

Track marks.

They drugged me.

Repeatedly.

It felt so obvious now I could see the evidence, all of the unnatural slipping in and out of consciousness. The scratching sensation on my arms. But, it had been a bone-deep fear for so long that I'd blocked it out. Shut out the possibility. But, now there were track marks on my arms. My arms looked just like Momma's.

"What did you give me?" I asked. I couldn't stop myself from shaking.

"It was just to calm you down," Jocelyn said. "Just to help you get some rest."

"Is… is… is it addictive?" I asked, my voice stammering. There were already tears on my cheeks. My throat was closing up, my vision blurry.

Jocelyn was still fucking smiling, "We wouldn't give anything like that to a woman in your condition."

"She's getting agitated again, boss." Someone said from behind me.

"No!" I tried to get away from them. But where can you go when you're sealed underground? "Please! No!"

A scratch on the back of my neck. I was down again in seconds.

 

Daryl

"Daryl!" Mia's hurried whisper pulled me out of a sleep I didn't remember falling into. I jolted awake in the seat beside her hospital bed, something soft pressed against my cheek. Hadn't slept for that long in days. I couldn't remember the last time I'd slept through the night.

"You okay?" I said, immediately alert. "Are you hurtin'? Feelin' ill?"

I pressed my hand to her forehead to see if she had any fever. Siddiq said her gunshot wound was healing well, but I was worried about an infection getting in.

"No, I'm fine," she said, batting my hand away impatiently. She pointed to the window, "Look! The snow!"

Shit.

When I looked out of the window, there was very little snow on the sill. I crossed over to it and looked down. The sun was just coming up and there was very little snow on the ground either.

Shit. Shit. Shit.

I grabbed my boots from the corner of the room and sat back down to lace them up, cursing how much time I'd already lost. It wasn't supposed to go down this way. I was supposed to be there when the ice melted so I could pull that body out of the lake. One unusually warm night might have fucked it all. "Do you really think it's her in there?" Mia whispered. I paused as I was lacing up my boots. Her eyes were watering, her bottom lip trembling.

"I don't know," I said. Although the lump sitting in the top of my throat suggested otherwise. Every day I'd been out searching the woods, finding nothing, that shape in the lake had started looking more and more like it could be my girl.

"What if it is?" Mia asked. It was the first time I'd heard her entertain the possibility. Even when I'd told her what we'd found, her first reaction had been to flat-out reject the idea that it was Naomi. Now that we were about to get an answer, it seemed it was finally hitting her.

"Then at least she'll be home," I said. "Where she belongs."

It was the only thing I had. The only slight comfort. I knew it wasn't enough, but I couldn't lie to her.

Mia nodded but didn't say anything. I went back to tying my shoelaces, searching desperately for anything else I could say to make it right. I sat back in the chair for a moment. I needed to be out there, looking, but Mia was hurting so much it didn't feel right leaving her. My shoulder nudged against the soft fabric I'd woken up leaning on and it slipped down the chair. I pulled it up from behind me and froze.

A sweater. Didn't need to ask who it belonged to. It had probably been here since she'd fallen asleep in this chair too, looking over Mia. Still smelled like her.

No wonder I could sleep.

I stood up, draping the sweater over the back of the chair. Right where she left it. I hugged Mia goodbye. Neither of us said a word. What was there to say? Mia usually anxiously wished me luck when I went out looking, but not this time. It was the one time we didn't want to find her.

Feeling like a condemned man on his way to the electric chair, I headed toward the cars. Some of the original search party had gone back to their communities, but a lot of people had stuck around. A lot were still out there searching with me and I wasn't sure I'd ever have the words to thank them for it. Used to be that Naomi's Momma would up and disappear and nobody but me checked on Naomi. Now, I had a village out here looking for her.

Carol was at the gates when I drove up. I rolled down the window while I waited for them to open. She didn't ask where I was heading, she already knew. "You want some company?"

I shook my head. If I found what I thought I was about to, I doubted I'd ever want to be around anyone ever again. For their sake as well as mine.

"Can you go sit with Mia?" I asked instead.

"Of course," she said. The gates were open now, so I started to take off. She yelled after me, "Wait! Aren't you supposed to wait for Rick?"

"No time!" I called back through the open window. That had been the plan. Every day, Rick and I would check the lake. I was supposed to go and get him if it had thawed overnight like this, but now that it had happened I didn't want to.

I just wanted it to be me and her again. Nobody else. Even if she wasn't really there.

I should've camped by the damn lake.

The roads were almost clear, which was good because I could move faster than I had all week. But, I worried about the water having melted too much. I might get there and find her Walker had up and left. I wasn't sure how long it took them to thaw.

I parked my car right behind hers. Still couldn't stand the sight of it but couldn't bear to do anything with it either. It was like the more that changed, the longer it seemed she'd been away. I was fighting moving anything, especially something of hers. When I got out , I could hear the creek was running again. I raced into the woods.

The lake had partially thawed. That shape was still there but it had drifted to the shallows. It was almost a relief to see it because at least, even if it was her, I hadn't failed her again.

I waded out into the water. There were still shards and chunks of ice floating in it. My legs went numb pretty fast, but right before it was like they were being stabbed by thousands of ice-cold needles. It was fucking horrible.

What a way to die.

And I could've stopped it.

As I got closer, every beat of my heart hurt in my chest. It was definitely her coat. My knife was out and ready to use if her Walker made any sudden moves toward me, but my hand shook no matter how hard I gripped the handle. Did I have it in me to put a blade or a bullet in that big beautiful brain of hers?

It was suddenly real damn clear to me why Hershel had kept a barn full of Walkers, why the Governor had kept his dead daughter chained up. It felt like if anyone was strong enough to be able to hold onto a part of themselves through the process of turning, it would be her. If there was any bond strong enough to pull out the lingering humanity in a corpse, it was ours.

Remember me, baby.

Even if you're dead.

I grabbed her coat. Just her coat. It came clear out of the lake. Heavy, but only with water. Her body wasn't in there.

"Naomi!" I called. I knew, if she was dead, she wouldn't exactly be able to answer me. Didn't matter what I shouted, any Walker in earshot would come stumbling toward me. I think it was shock, and a tinge of hope, that pulled her name out of me, "Naomi! Naomi!"

I kept searching the water. She could've sunk. Got caught on something. Nothing moved beneath the surface.

Rick's car came screeching to a stop at the side of the lake. He flew out of it all wide-eyed and worried. Bryce hopped out of the passenger side, his face tense.

"Daryl, I told you not to come out here on your own," RIck yelled, running around to the side of the lake closest to me. "I told you we would-"

"It ain't her, man," I cut across him, holding her empty coat above my head for both of them to see. "It's just her coat."

"Get out of the water," Rick said. I couldn't even feel the cold anymore. Which probably wasn't a good thing, actually.

"It's okay. There ain't any Walkers in here," I said. I felt lightheaded. Dizzy with the knowledge that she hadn't been left frozen underwater for two weeks. "It ain't her. It's just her coat."

"It's freezing," Rick said, coming to a stop on the shore closest to where I was standing, still holding her coat above my head like a goddamn trophy. "Get out before you lose a leg to frostbite."

I walked toward him, still clutching her coat in fingers I couldn't feel anymore. Bryce reached out and took it from me as I climbed out of the water.

"It ain't her. It's just her coat," I said, as if it weren't obvious and I hadn't said it a million times already. But Bryce had the same look in his eye that I was sure I did, the same giddy hope that somehow, our girl had pulled off a fucking miracle.

"It is her coat," Bryce said, clutching it in his hands. His eyes scanned the water, like there was something I might have missed. Didn't take no offense to it. The more eyes on this, the better.

"Come on," Rick had his cop-voice on, herding me toward his car. I couldn't feel anything below the knee, my pants were soaked with ice water. He opened up the back door. "Get in."

I got in the back of Rick's car. He blasted the heating. Bryce took his seat on the passenger side again, Naomi's coat still clutched tightly in his hands. We sat in silence for a moment while the feeling returned, painfully, to my legs.

Fuck, this would be awful if it were all over ya.

Bryce looked out at the lake, his eyes still scanning the still water. I could see that initial hope fading in them. Eventually, he said, "I mean…she could still be in there, right? If she was…struggling…maybe the coat came off, but she…sank?"

He was looking at Rick. Asking his professional opinion. I looked away from both of them.

"It's possible," Rick said after a moment. "A body usually floats after a few days, but sometimes they get caught on things down there and don't surface. It's impossible to know for sure without dredging the lake.. which we can't do."

I knew that last part was for me. That was fine. I could keep going in there, especially when it started getting warmer.

I looked back at Bryce. He was staring at her coat. "And if she got out?"

After a moment, Rick cleared his throat. Looking at us with that concerned-dad look he gets, so I knew he was about to say something I wouldn't enjoy hearing. "If she got out, her core body temperature would have been dangerously low. She wouldn't have… she wouldn't have been able to get far. Not without help."

Right.

"Help."

The more heat returned to my legs and hands, the more that hope started to fade again. Warming up was making me realize how damn hard she'd have had it even if she had gotten out of the water. It hurt. I couldn't stop shivering as more feeling came back into my legs and fingers, and I hadn't been in there that long. Hadn't been submerged in it. Breathing it in.

"Might be time I pay Negan another visit," I said. There was a tightness in my chest, an anger rising.

Rick looked uncomfortable, but Bryce nodded. He got out of Rick's car to drive mine back to Alexandria. I don't think Rick much liked the idea of me driving before I'd warmed up again. It was fine. I wasn't in the mood to argue with him. Wasn't in the mood for anything.

The drive back was silent. When we arrived, I got out and asked Rick to meet me by Negan's cell with the keys. He didn't fight me on it. I went back to Aaron's, changed into dry clothes, grabbed Naomi's bag, and headed to see Mia.

Carol was sitting in the chair by Mia's bed. They both stopped talking the moment I came in. Mia's anxious eyes asked the question before she needed to speak at all.

"It was just her coat," I said, saving her the pain of actually asking. "We…didn't find her."

Mia relaxed a little. Carol flinched, and stood up. I knew she was worried about how long this was going on. She knew better than anyone that the longer you search, the harder it hits when it turns out you're too late.

"I'll give you both a minute," she said quietly, walking past me to the door. When she got closer to me, she said, too quietly for Mia to hear, "I'm sorry you didn't find her."

My stomach clenched. Carol thought she was dead. I nodded my thanks but couldn't say anything. That initial hope I'd felt, that warm glimmer, was fading fast. Only Bryce and Mia had taken the news in the same way I had, and I don't think any of us were able to think rationally about this.

How could I look that little girl in the eyes and tell her that at this stage, we were most likely looking at bringing home a body? Before I could say anything, Mia's bottom lip started to tremble.

"It's my fault," Mia said, the dam breaking. Tears flooded down her face. "I'm sorry, Daryl… I'm sorry, I…"

"No," I said, quickly, pulling her into a hug. "No, sweetie, it ain't. None of this is your fault."

"It is," she sobbed. I hugged her tighter."If I'd listened to you…if I'd stayed where you told me to… Negan never would have -"

"No," I said again. "He never should've shot you, Mia. What that asshole did is not your fault."

"But if he hadn't shot me, she never would've…she wouldn't have gone after him. I… I…" she dissolved into tears again.

"It's not your fault," I said again. "Negan was aiming for me, not you. It never should've happened in the first place."

I never should've had you out there.

I never should've gone after that deer.

None of this would have happened.

"You don't…blame me?"

"No. Not even for a second," I said, firmly. "And I don't want you blaming yourself, either. Whatever happened, however this all turns out, I promise you, it's not your fault."

It's mine.

I couldn't admit it. Not even to Mia. She was hurting too much. She needed me. At some point, maybe she'd work it out for herself. At some point, when the dust settled a little, she might see that I shouldn't have led her to Negan's doorstep and she'd be mad at me. Or Naomi would come home and tell her herself.

Mia's crying subsided enough for her to speak. I let go of her and crouched so our eyes were level. "It's not your fault, okay?"

Mia nodded, looking at me with bloodshot eyes. Her voice was basically a whisper. "Okay."

"I want to hear you say that it wasn't your fault."

Mia gulped, hesitated, looked like she was about to start crying again, and then she said, "It wasn't my fault."

"What was that?" I said like I hadn't heard her.

"It wasn't my fault," she said, louder.

"Damn straight," I agreed. She gave me a shaky smile. It didn't reach her eyes, and I wasn't sure she fully believed it, but for now it would have to do. I straightened up. "It was Negan's fault. And he's gonna pay for it."

Mia nodded. No more protests about forgiveness. Even Carl hadn't uttered anything about that since Mia had come back with a bullet in her.

Carol went back in to sit with Mia while I left to meet Rick for my long overdue meeting with Negan. Every time I saw Mia in that hospital bed, it ignited a new rage in me. My grip on Naomi's bag was knuckle-whitening tight.

I should've killed him already.

Rick was waiting for me at the top of the stairs, just like I asked him to. I couldn't tell from the look on his face whether he was going to let me down there again or if he was going to try and stop me. I steeled myself for either option.

"What are you gonna do?" Rick asked.

"What I have to," I said, standing up straighter. "That gonna be a problem?"

I was fine with doing jail time myself if I had to. If that's what it took.

"No," Rick said. "If it was Carl he'd shot, and Michonne who was missing, I'd be the same."

I nodded. Rick got the keys out of his pocket, but hesitated before handing them over.

"If he doesn't have her," he said, a heaviness in his eyes. "You know that most likely means…"

"Yeah," I said. I couldn't bear to hear him say it any more than he could bring himself to say it to me. "I do. But you know I ain't ever gonna stop searching for her, right? Not until I bring her home."

Rick nodded. He put a hand on my shoulder and gave it a squeeze, the other hand dropped the keys into mine. Nice gesture, but I was too far gone to feel anything but cold anger.

I descended the stairs, into the gloom of the jail cell. Negan was sitting against the opposite wall. There were still bruises on his face from the last time I'd been here. I wondered if he'd heard us out there. If he knew what was coming. He didn't move as I got closer, just stared at me with those beady eyes of his. "Still ain't found her huh?"

"Nope," I said. I held up her bag, dangled it right in front of the bars so he could see it. "But we did find this."

"That supposed to be some kinda gotcha?" Negan asked. "I sent that back a long time ago. I see y'all put that stupid bear back on."

Fuck you.

"Found it by the lake," I said. "Not that far from the rat's nest you've been hiding out in. You expect me to believe that's a coincidence?"

Negan shrugged. "Believe what you want. It's the truth."

"So what was it, huh?" I asked. "You lure her out there? Get her out on that lake?"

"I told you," he said. "I didn't see her."

"'Cause if you saved her," I said like he hadn't spoken. "If you have her somewhere safe and sound, we can forget this whole thing. Let you go again."

Negan frowned. "Even after…Mia?"

Rage and hope fought within me. Bringing up Mia was a dumb move on his part. But…was he about to admit to something? Something that would bring my girl back.

"All Mia wants is her sister to come home again," I said. "If you can make that happen, Naomi herself might even forgive you."

Negan didn't answer. He sat back against the wall again, the back of his head resting on the stone.

"That's what you want, ain't it?" I drew closer to the bars. "With all them creepy letters you were writing? She'd never have forgiven you, y'know."

"Look," he said, sounding weary. Bored of this. "I get it, Daryl, I do. Losing a wife…that'll change you forever. And Naomi, she was…"

I snapped.

Something about it. The sympathy in his eyes. Like he understood me. Like we were somehow the same. Her name in his mouth, after everything he'd put her through. After he'd shot her goddamn kid. Those fucking letters piled up in his lair.

I unlocked his cage. Stepped in there with him.

"Tell me what you did with her."

"Nothing," he started to scramble to his feet, but I was already on him. His shirt bunched in my fist as I pushed him back against the jail cell wall. Punched him so hard his head smacked against it.

Before he had a chance to recover, I pulled him away from the wall again and shoved him hard. He stumbled back to the other side of the cell. I knew letting him out of my grip like that would give him a chance to fight back, but that was fine. I welcomed it. Wanted it. I could've ended this quick and easy, but the fight was an escape. The physical pain was so much easier than everything else I was feeling. The guilt. The fear that my girl was never coming home.

Negan lunged at me, started hitting back.

Finally.

The blows numbed me like I knew they would. Pain radiated out from them, but my head was quieter now. Pain was all I deserved. The only home I had left.

"You shot my kid," I yelled, bringing him to the ground. That asshole might've been taller than me, but he didn't have my rage. My reason to fight.

"I was aiming for you!" Negan roared, spit and blood flew everywhere. I'd bust his lip. He'd busted my nose. He punched me around the head. It made it hard to hear the rest of it, "I'd never hurt a kid."

"Well you fucking did," I yelled back. "You shot her!"

He shoved me off, grabbing my arms and twisting so my back was now the one slammed against the ground. His elbow pressed down on my neck.

"Did Naomi see it the way I did?" Negan asked, putting pressure on my windpipe . "Did she see that it was your fault Mia got shot? Did she die hating your guts?"

Yes.

It hurt more than the punch that followed. Tipped me over from angry to something else. A wounded animal. Trapped. Cornered. I'd lost a limb. An organ. Half of my whole fucking self.

I twisted out from under him, bringing my knee sharply up to slam into him as I did. Right in the nuts. He groaned in pain and slipped off me, rolling to the side.

I was on him before he could get up again.

I finally pulled my knife, pressed it hard against the scar Naomi had left when she'd tried to kill him. It pierced the skin, blood trickling down his neck. He called out.

Behind me, back up the stairs, I could hear Rick yelling as he hauled the door open. Negan looked back at me. He seemed calm now it was all about to be over.

"Please," I begged him. Pleaded with him, even though he was the one who was about to die. "Please. Tell me you have her. Even if she's dead. Even if you killed her just… tell me where she is."

I need her to come home.

"I'm sorry, Daryl," he said. "I don't know what happened to her. But whatever it was, it's on you."

I pushed the blade the rest of the way into his neck and watched as the life left his eyes. All of the time I'd spent praying for this moment, and it felt fucking meaningless.

Negan was dead.

It didn't bring her back.

Chapter 68: It's you and me, kid

Naomi

I couldn't smell the earth when I woke up. I'd been hoping they'd throw me back in that dirt hole. At least then, I might have been able to pop open the trapdoor and hop on out of here before any of them caught on—no such luck. There was a mattress underneath me, and when I opened my eyes, there was enough dim light to see by. It was an otherwise very fortunate position, but I'd rather sleep in the mud with a chance of getting home than in a bed with little hope. 

Still, I reasoned, trying to calm myself down, the trapdoor probably wouldn't have opened if there's still a mountain of snow on it. Maybe that's why it didn't budge when I found it.

Aware that Colonel Creeper had cameras everywhere and could be watching, I opened my eyes but didn't move too much. I needed time to collect myself and gather my thoughts. Plan. If they knew I was awake, they probably wouldn't leave me be. I had a two-week-long reputation as a loose canon to undo.

My head was groggy, my body exhausted. I wasn't sure if the tiredness that felt baked into me was because of pneumonia or because of whatever drugs they'd pumped me full of. I stared at the marks on my arms until my eyes lost focus. 

I can't let that happen again. 

No matter what they threw at me, I had to keep my cool. I couldn't afford any more gaps in my memory. I'd been missing for two weeks, well past the time that the others could reasonably be expected to believe I was still alive. But I knew, with a certainty that broke my heart, that Daryl wouldn't give up without a body. That he'd be out there right now, searching. Ignoring everything else, putting it all on hold to bring me home. 

His leg. 

Oh god, his leg. 

He wouldn't be resting it. Wouldn't be taking care of that gunshot wound. I didn't want to think about the kind of state he might be in. Dread gnawed at my stomach. He'd be angry, probably most of all with himself. God knows how self-destructive he'd get. At least he'd have a goal, something to channel that into, and that would hopefully stop him from doing any serious damage. But… how long would that last? 

At least he'd be looking after Mia. That would keep him grounded.

Oh, God, Mia. 

My poor girl.

They'd been in different places. Would Daryl have been well enough to get to her? I tried to calm myself by thinking about all the other people Mia would have had around her: Lucas, Perla, Carl, Michonne, and Rick. Bryce would have gotten there as soon as possible, and I doubted Daryl would have let him go to Alexandria without him. But, if it was too snowy for me to leave this place, would the roads be clear enough for them to reach her?

She'd been so sick when I left. Recovering, but slowly. It helped a little to think of everyone else looking out for her, but there was an unshiftable heaviness in my chest. 

I didn't want her to think I'd abandoned her.

Chasing after Negan had been a petty, stupid thing to do. Selfish. I'd been so blinded by rage that it had stopped me from seeing what was important: getting back to Mia. Making things right with Daryl. 

Even though I was the one who was missing, I felt their absence as a physical loss. I'd been cut off from two pieces of my soul, and I could feel it like a deep pain in my chest. Much worse than the damn pneumonia.

The lights switched on without warning, a harsh but necessary interruption to the guilt I was wallowing in. I sat bolt upright. 

The room was small and compact, which made sense for a bunker - no unnecessary square footage. The single bed was attached to the wall on one side and took up most of the space, with a small amount of floor space to move around. A few inches from the foot of the bed, a table was attached to the wall at one side. It looked like they both might fold into the wall so the room could be repurposed at any time. Instead of the gray concrete I'd seen on the walls on the way in, the room was painted a light yellow. I'm sure it was a shade that had been chosen based on some kind of study about the human psyche and the best color to keep people from killing each other and/or themselves when trapped underground for an unknowable amount of time. But in my opinion, it wasn't much of an improvement. I was still borderline homicidal. Maybe I could ask them for a nice poster or something. I could use it to mask the tunnel I might have to dig out of here. They'd probably say no. They'd probably also seen The Great Escape.

There wasn't much else in the room, not even a lamp on the fold-away table. And I couldn't see a light switch, meaning they must have been controlled elsewhere. I didn't like that. It was one thing to take people away from the sun, but to control their light entirely? I felt like a zoo animal without the enclosure enrichment. 

Two doors were opposite the bed I lay on. They were painted the same color as the walls, so they almost blended in. One door might have been some kind of cupboard or closet, or it might have led to another room. I didn't want to try it yet. The main door was at the other end of the room, beyond the foot of the bed and the small table. Like a kid checking for monsters, I peered over the end of the mattress and looked under the bed. Two thin drawers were underneath, and then a big gap between me and the floor. 

Before I could investigate, there was a soft knock at the door. I didn't move, hoping that if I stayed put, they'd leave me alone. They knocked again, and I swung myself out of bed to open the door. I hoped it was Dwight. I hoped he had a plan to let me leave.

It wasn't, but at least it was someone I knew.

"Sherry!" I gasped. That ring-stealing, deer-swiping asshole glared back at me over her head, but any familiarity was so welcome here I didn't care. She smiled, but it was a tight, tense smile. 

"Brought you some breakfast," she said, holding up a tray of food. "And then you have a check-up with Jocelyn." 

I nodded. That was good. I could convince her I was in the best health of my life, so she'd let me leave the second the snow thawed. 

Sherry entered the room and put the food tray on the small table. The smell of warm, buttered toast made me feel so hungry; it was like my stomach was trying to eat itself. There were two clear plastic cups there, too. One was filled with something that could have been fruit juice, and the other had an assortment of pills.

Nope.

"What are the pills?" I asked.

"Vitamins," she said. 

Ain't no way I'm having damn mystery pills.

Nerves made me queasy. Were they going to stay here and make sure I ate every single one? 

"Your shower is in there," she said, indicating the first of the small doors I'd seen. "Toilet's in the other one. There are clean clothes in the drawer. Bart will be back to take you to Jocelyn in fifteen minutes."

I nodded. She moved back toward the door. I moved with her, not wanting her to leave just yet.

"Are you okay?" I asked her. "Did Dwight find you here, or did you both-"

"This isn't time for chit-chat," the ring-thief interrupted me. A muscle in Sherry's jaw tightened. I glanced at him; his glare was unwavering. I hoped he was the anonymous person I'd bitten when feverish. 

Sherry pulled me in for a hug. 

"If he'd known," she whispered. "Dwight never would have brought you here."

Known what? 

A shiver ran down my spine. There was no time to ask. Sherry let go of me. Ring-stealer barked an impatient, "Hurry up," and she scurried away. The door closed again. 

I picked up a piece of toast from the plate and sniffed it. My stomach groaned painfully, but I still hesitated. I wasn't touching those pills, but what if that was a decoy?

What if there's something in the drink?

Or the food? 

I put it down again. I could eat when I got home. 

I turned my back on it and showered in a room not much bigger than a small closet. The shower head was fixed to the ceiling and operated by a single button on the wall. The steam was good for my lungs. It made me cough a lot at first, but after that, they felt clearer. It ran for a short time at a pre-set temperature, and when it switched off, I couldn't get it to come back on again.

There was a towel in the drawer. I wrapped it around myself and sat on the bed, trying to collect my thoughts about my looming meeting with Jocelyn.

It was a good thing. I could work with it. I hadn't noticed anyone here being armed. I guess when you've shut people underground and locked them in, you don't need guards with guns strapped to them to keep them in line. If I could distract Jocelyn for long enough, I could find something to wield as a weapon. 

It would be difficult to hide it here, but I'd work it out. I'd have something to hand to help me fight my way out if they were reluctant to let me go when the ground thawed. I had to believe that they would. But it was always good to have a backup plan.

I changed into the clothes they'd provided. Sadly not my own, which annoyed me because they'd surely dried out in two goddamn weeks. It was another weird, long dress that made me feel like a pilgrim. Or one of the Amish. They still hadn't given me any shoes, but if they thought that would stop me from getting out, they were wrong. I'd lose all my toes to frostbite if they got me home before they turned black and fell off. 

Another knock at the door. This one was loud and booming, nothing like Sherry's. I stood up, already knowing who was behind it. 

"Psycho," he greeted me when I opened up. 

"Thief," I said, narrowing my eyes. 

I followed him down the corridor, looking out for the blast door we'd entered by. Of course, I hoped Jocelyn would take one look at me, declare me healthy, and send me on my way. But, given our last encounter, it seemed unlikely.

"Where's Sherry?" I asked as we walked. If I was getting out, I needed information about this place, and the easiest way to get it would be from someone I already trusted. 

"She works in the kitchens," he said. 

"And Dwight?" 

"He's elsewhere," he replied. 

Very helpful. 

Asshole.

We didn't pass anyone else on the way, but we also didn't travel far from the room I'd woken up in. A few doors down from mine, Brad stopped in front of a door with a metal plaque that read 'medical center' fixed to it.

"I feel like I could've found this place on my own," I said. 

"You can move around on your own when you can be trusted to move around on your own," he said before opening the door. He gestured for me to go in ahead of him, probably so I didn't try and bolt. 

Where would I bolt to? 

This place is nothing but identical corridors with identical doors covered by a hundred feet of dirt.

Jocelyn smiled as I came in. I recognized the room—kind of. The hazy glimpses I remembered, at least. The bed I'd been strapped to was in the middle of the room; the top half had been locked in a sitting position. She patted it, "Get comfortable."  

"Are you gonna strap me down again?" I asked, not moving any closer to it. The straps were still dangling off its edges. 

"No," she said. "Sorry about that. You were very delirious when you got here and had a very high fever. We couldn't take the chance that you wouldn't be a danger to yourself or others."

That's fair. I did think you were all demons.

I stepped closer to the bed but didn't sit down. Jocelyn didn't push it. However, she did look a little amused. 

"Now," she said. "How are you feeling?" 

"Much better," I lied through my smile. "Almost breathing normally again."

I was glad the steam from the shower had opened up my airways a little. It would make it look like I'd healed more than I probably had.

"Well, that's good," she said. 

"Yes," I agreed. "How's the weather looking? Has it cleared up? Because I think my lungs would be good enough to get me home if it has."

"That's good," she said encouragingly. "But I'm afraid it's still frozen solid out there. There's been another snowstorm, and I think more will come. You might be with us for a while."

Fuck.

I felt hope deflate in my chest and tried not to let it show. I tried not to let any emotion show. I didn't want to give her another reason to drug me. 

"But when it thaws," I said as neutrally as possible. "You'll tell the Colonel my pneumonia has cleared up enough to go home?"

"I didn't bring you here to talk about the pneumonia," she said like I wouldn't notice she was dodging the question. "This is a prenatal appointment."

Excuse me?

"For who?" 

I blinked at Jocelyn in utter confusion. I even checked behind me to see if someone else had come in behind me. 

"For you," Jocelyn blinked right back at me. "You're pregnant."

For a second, it was like my brain had shut down. My one overriding thought echoed in there over and over. 

I need to go home. 

I need to go home. 

I need to go home. 

"H-how…?" I stammered, which wasn't what I meant to ask. I was fully aware of how this had happened, but I couldn't work out when. What I wanted to ask, I think, was 'How far along am I?' or ' How many weeks pregnant?', but all that came out was, "How pregnant?"

Jocelyn laughed. "You know, I thought it might have been too early for you to know. I'd say you're about six to eight weeks."

I closed my eyes briefly, counted back, and then sifted through every possibility. One stuck out like a sore thumb. 

Merle's crazy juice. 

The night of Daryl's surprise party was hazy, but…What I remembered was all love, no glove. Despite everything, I couldn't help but think Merle would've gotten a real kick out of the part his dumb moonshine had played in this. 

"Are they… is… are they okay?" I asked, looking back at Jocelyn, terrified of the answer. I'd been so sick. "Even though I was… even though…"

I could not finish a goddamn sentence, but Jocelyn understood what I was asking. 

"Well, that's what we're here to see," she said. She patted the medical bed again, "You want to jump up here so I can check?"

I nodded, climbing up onto the bed without a second thought. My own safety and comfort be damned, I needed to know that kid was okay. That I hadn't already fucked up. Compliant as a doll, I sat still while she wiped cold gel on my stomach.

"How did you… how did you know?" I asked, partly out of genuine shock and partly to distract myself from the discomfort. It brought back vague and fragmented memories of my first time in this room.

"We ran some blood tests when you got here," she said. I felt something hard press against the places she'd put the gel. It moved around, searching beneath my skin. Invading parts of me that I'd never seen myself. I fought hard to relax. Jocelyn continued, "We wanted to check that it wasn't a bacterial infection causing your pneumonia. We also took the opportunity to test for a few other things."

"This is a real… thorough facility you've got here."

"Yes, well," she said. "The Colonel planned for everything."

I was too nervous to respond. The longer it took, the harder my heart beat in my chest. Flipping over in its cage, making me feel queasy.

"There we go," she said after a moment. My ears pricked up, trying to tune into any sign that she'd seen something she was worried about. Jocelyn was as unreadable as ever. 

"Are they okay?" I asked. 

"Yes. It all looks fine," she said. "You want to see your little one?" 

"Can I?" 

Jocelyn spun the monitor around to face me. "I wouldn't normally take a look this early, but given how sick you were when you got here, we should keep a close eye on this."

"But everything looks fine?" I asked, staring at the screen as she repositioned the ultrasound slightly. 

"Yes, look, right here," she said, pointing at a tiny area of the screen. No bigger than a pea. Just a little bean, really.

God, you're so small.

So vulnerable.

"Are you sure? I was having headaches," I said. I knew how risky these early weeks were. "And.. and nosebleeds… and…"

"All perfectly normal," she said soothingly. Part of me already knew that was true. I'd read about it a thousand times before Mia was born. But anxiety had me convinced that my headaches and my nosebleeds spelled certain doom.

"But they're really okay?" I asked again. "Even though I was so sick?" 

"Yes. Everything looks nice and healthy," she said. "That's a strong kid you've got in there."

Wait 'til you meet their father. 

I fiddled with my ring. 

I need to go home. 

The image on the screen blurred in front of me. Tears prickled the corners of my eyes. I couldn't stop thinking about him and how much he'd wanted this. How he should be right here with me, holding my hand, while Dr Carson did this kind of scan at the Hilltop. My hand gripped the flimsy sheet on the medical bed, searching for something stronger. Some one stronger.

"You'd be surprised how resilient children are," she said, mistaking my sudden tears for a continuation of my anxieties and not a sudden wave of homesickness. "Even before they're… well, even before they're children yet, I suppose. Don't worry, we'll keep checking in to ensure everything's developing as it should be."

"No, it ain't that," I said, wiping my eyes with the back of my hand. "It's just… my husband… he's gonna be so… so happy. "

I can't wait to tell him.

It was so much nicer to think of him like that - at some future moment - than suffering I knew he'd be going through right now. 

Sometime soon, I'd be able to go home and tell him that not only was I not dead, but I was bringing someone else home, too. That heartbreak over our first negative test would be undone. And this time, we'd both be on the same page about it. It was hard to imagine a kid more wanted than this one. 'Happy' wasn't even the word for it. It wasn't strong enough for how he'd take the news. Once he got over the initial panic about where I'd been for the last two weeks and freaked out about the lingering pneumonia, that was. His typical overprotectiveness would kick into overdrive, I was sure, he'd probably also lock me up somewhere to prevent me from doing anything else. Still, at least it would be somewhere I wanted to be. 

Shit. 

Shit, I really gotta start taking care of myself.

"I…skipped breakfast," I blurted out. "And I didn't eat those vitamins."

"Why?"

"I thought y'all might have put something in it."

"Put something in it?" she repeated like I'd accused her of the unthinkable. 

"You did drug me. A lot." My arms itched. 

"We sedated you," she said like that made it any better. "But, I take your point. Do you trust us now?"

No. 

"I trust you not to hurt my baby," I said. In my head, I added, "Because if you do, I'll turn this bunker into nothing more than a smoldering crater of ash in the ground. " But I didn't say that; I needed them to think I wasn't a threat to them if they were ever going to let me go. Instead, I said, "You seem pretty excited about it."

Even though we won't be staying. 

"Kids are the future. Bringing life into this world ruled by the dead is a blessing," she said. I hoped she was sincere. She put the ultrasound away. "I'll get you some food. And those vitamins are very important. Will you take them this time?"

"Yes," I said immediately. 

Jocely nodded her approval and left the room. 

The door locked behind her. Clearly, I still wasn't to be trusted. 

Only when I had a moment alone did Sherry's words come back to me, "If he'd known, Dwight never would have brought you here."

Was this what he'd known? Had Sherry known? I was willing to bet that Jocelyn had told the Colonel before I was fully conscious. Felt like everyone in the world knew before I did. 

Not everyone.

Daryl doesn't know. 

Mia doesn't know.

That wave of homesickness hit me again. I'd been here too long already. It didn't matter that I was bringing such good news home when they'd both be suffering so much now. I tried to think about the people they'd have around them; Bryce, I knew for sure, would do anything for them. But, if the snow was as bad as Jocelyn said, would anyone be able to be there with them? The thought of them, miserable and snowed in, maybe not even together, made me want to start screaming.

It was so overwhelming that it took me a moment to realize that Jocelyn had left me alone in the medical room. I could have slipped down off that medical bed and rummaged through all sorts of things before she got back. Found all kinds of implements designed to cut flesh. This had been exactly what I'd wanted on my way in, but something kept me rooted to that bed. What if they found it on me and started drugging me again? I needed to be alert and healthy, so they'd let me go.

I couldn't fight my way out of this one. I couldn't take the kind of hits I'd taken at Sanctuary. I had a kid to protect, and I'd already put them through too much.

"I'm sorry. I didn't know you were with me," I said real quietly, putting a hand over my abdomen. I whispered, "It's you and me now, kid. We'll get out." 

I was getting us out of this damn place whether they opened the doors for me or not. But I was going to have to be sneakier about it. It wasn't just that I had a family to get back to anymore. I had a family to unite . 

 

Daryl

There was sunlight on the dash, but it was cold in the truck. Silent. 

Mia sat in the backseat, staring blankly out of the window. Her expression had been so unreadable lately. She'd barely said two words to anyone. Neither had I. What was there to say?

I didn't tell her to hop up front and ride shotgun. She didn't ask to. We both knew who was meant to be in that passenger seat, feet on the dash, passing out snacks and giving me shit for humming. I didn't look over at it, but I could feel the emptiness radiating from it for the whole drive. 

Sanctuary was the same when we got there. Bigger. Emptier. Fucking meaningless. Neither of us moved when I pulled up. The reality that we were back here, without her, seeped into the stagnant air. The last time Mia and I had driven back from Alexandria, Naomi had been at the door before we could open it. Before I'd even finished getting our bags out of the trunk, she had scooped Mia up in a big hug.

I'll never see that smile again.

Now, those doors stayed shut as we stared at them. When they opened, after several minutes, it wasn't my girl's big, beautiful smile that greeted us. It was Rick, looking worried. He looked worried a lot these days, mostly in my direction.

Something about the doors opening pushed Mia and me out of the stupor we'd sunk into, probably both thinking the same thing, both waiting on the same ghost. She undid her seatbelt and lowered her gaze from those treacherous doors. 

I helped Mia out of the car. She still had to move slow. Take breaks. Sometimes, the pain made her wince, although I think she tried to hide that from me. This time, however, I was pretty sure the clenched jaw and fixed stare had nothing to do with the physical wound on her side. 

I wished I knew what to say to her. 

Wished I knew what to say to anybody. I couldn't even look them in the eye most of the time. The news that I'd killed Negan had traveled fast. Rick and Michonne were back at Sanctuary with us in case it caused more unrest with the Saviors. They probably thought I kept my eyes on the ground out of guilt, shame maybe, but that wasn't it. One wrong look from any of them, and my hands would be blood-soaked again. I couldn't stand seeing the pity in their eyes and I didn't want them to see the weakness in mine. 

Not that it helped. 

They could smell the broken on me. 

Rooms went silent when I walked into them. Could feel their eyes on me without needing to look. They didn't say her name around me, but I could feel it following me down every hallway and knew it was being whispered every time I left. 

I couldn't set foot in our room. I tried the first night that we got back, and I couldn't do more than stand there with my hand on the door handle. Must've been there for about an hour, trying to psyche myself up to go in. But I couldn't stand the thought of opening that door and not finding her in our bed. In my shirt. Reading her damn books. Waiting up for me with a smile and kiss that made a hard day go away in an instant. 

So, I walked away from it. Didn't know where else to go, so I went down to my workshop. Where that bottle of Merel's drink was waiting for me. It was strong enough that we'd barely dented it. I knew it wasn't good - drowning my sorrows in a batch of my dead brother's hooch mixed up by my dead almost-wife - but I couldn't stop myself. The burn was the first welcome thing I'd felt in a long time. It numbed everything enough that I could sleep under one of the work benches. 

Didn't ask Rick how long he was planning on staying this time. Sanctuary could rot for all I cared. I barely saw the place. It had snowed a little more, but nothing like the storms she'd vanished in. It meant I could be outside looking for her from dawn until dusk. I'd join them all for dinner, make sure Mia got to bed all right, and then drink enough to sleep without dreaming about Naomi. 

A week went by. I think Rick expected me to snap out of it at some point, like being back in that shithole would remind me I had a job to do, but it didn't. My duty was to my family, not this building. Not the assholes in it. Even producing biofuel meant nothing to me anymore. Not when she wasn't here with that dumb, proud-of-me smile.

Then, one day, I got back from searching, and they were all waiting for me in my workshop. They'd brought food from the cafeteria. The bottle of Merle's moonshine was in the middle of a table they'd pulled together. I felt everything in me tense when I saw it. Like a kid who'd been caught sneaking booze when they shouldn't. 

I looked at Rick. Waited for him to confront me. Part of me wanted the fight. 

But it wasn't about that. Michonne smiled at me and said, "There you are! Sit down, Daryl. Join us."

"You've been working so hard lately," Rick said, handing me a plate. "We thought we'd bring dinner to you."

Working, huh?

That what you're calling it?

I took the plate and said nothing. Sat down in the only empty seat, right between Bryce and Mia. I couldn't look at her either, but it was out of shame that time.

I was itching to reach for that bottle. I wanted to hide it from them, even though they'd already seen it. Sure as shit didn't want them drinking it because I didn't have a plan for what would happen when it ran out. I didn't have a plan for anything much beyond getting up, searching, going to bed. They didn't know how much of it I'd been putting away every night, assuming it was low because of when we'd all had some at the party. Rick silently poured a few drinks, passed them around, and held one up in a toast. 

"To Naomi," he said. 

I felt my hackles rise like a cornered dog. Slammed the drink back but didn't join the chorus of "To Naomi" that rippled around the table. I poured myself another without offering it to anyone else. I hoped that would be the last of Rick's Big Ideas, but it wasn't. He kept running his mouth. 

"I know she and I didn't get off to the best start," he said. I stared resolutely at the food in front of me and didn't take a bite. Seemed an unwise move of him to bring that up, to remind me he wanted to shoot her the first time they'd met. "But she very quickly became someone I could depend on. She was never afraid to disagree with me but was always one of the first to back me up once a decision was made. Supportive and always trying to find the best in people. The way that she managed to turn this place around is a testament to that."

My gaze flickered over to Mia, who was staring at a spot on the table in front of her like she didn't know where to look. How dare he talk about Naomi like that right in front of her?

Was. 

Was was was.

The fuck do you mean 'was'?

My hands were shaking. I wanted a fucking drink. 

"She was the first person I ever came out to," Bryce said quietly.

Not you, too. 

I poured myself another and looked at him out of the corner of my eye. Didn't even look like he knew he'd spoken until Rick gently encouraged him, "Is that so?"

"Yes," Bryce said. "Although I didn't really mean to do it. She caught me making out with this guy at a party. This truly awful jock who was as deep in the closet as I was. Maybe even more so because he ran away the second that Naomi opened the door. I thought for sure she'd tell everyone, but… she just looked at me and said, 'you could better, y'know' and shut the door again." 

On his other side, I heard Michonne let out a soft laugh. 

"She even came with me when I told my parents," Bryce said. I didn't look at him, but I could hear from the way his voice shook that he was either crying or on the verge of it. "We sat in the car outside their house for about an hour while I was trying to gather the courage to go inside. Eventually, she told me she'd beat them up if they didn't accept me the way I was, and the thought of that was somehow ridiculous enough to get me out of the car."

Bryce sniffed. There was another soft laugh from Michonne. Not amusement, sadder than that. Mournful.

I cleared my throat. 

"Something you wanna add, Daryl?" Rick asked. He asked it so quietly. So gentle. Like he was speaking to Judith or something shit.

Deep down, some reasonable part of me knew Rick was trying to do something nice, but that part was buried too deep to be in control. I couldn't fucking stand it. Felt too much like a goddamn wake. Like they'd given up on her. 

Part of me was aching for another fight. Killing Negan hadn't been enough. I needed more. I needed the kind of pain I could fix. 

I looked up at him. Couldn't remember the last time I'd looked someone in the eye, certainly not Rick. He flinched. He fucking flinched, his face dropped as he saw what a mistake he'd made. 

"When I was little, my Momma said I had to go to court," Mia said quietly before I could say anything. The whole table stilled. I sat up a little straighter. "She said Naomi was trying to take me away from her, and I shouldn't let her. She told me to say bad things about her that weren't true."

My heart clenched just when I thought it couldn't hurt any more than it already did. 

"I wasn't allowed in the courtroom while the proceedings were happening," Mia continued. "I had to sit with some case workers, but after an hour or so, Naomi was allowed to come and see me. She was dressed in this weird purple skirt suit I'd never seen before. I asked her why she'd dressed up as Daphne from Scooby-Doo. "

"That was my Mom's," Bryce said, with a half-laugh, half-sob. "I remember her borrowing it." 

"Naomi told me that some people were going to ask me questions about her and Momma, and I needed to be honest with them. She said that she'd love me forever, no matter what I said or what I chose. And then she had to go," Mia hadn't looked up from the spot on the table she was staring at. "When they asked me who I wanted to live with, I chose her."

A tear fell down her cheek, and it was the last fucking straw. It looked like she had more to say but couldn't bring herself to.

"The fuck are you playing at?" I snapped at Rick. 

Rick stared at me, open-mouthed, "Daryl…"

There it was. That fucking pity. 

Fight me, you prick.

"Mia. Go to bed," I told her. Felt like my blood was on fire. 

"But-"

"Go."

Bryce was quick on his feet, sensing what was coming before the rest of them did. Probably remembering all too well how things had ended the last time he'd seen me liquored up and mad about losing Naomi. He scooped up Judith and tapped Carl on the shoulder before turning to Mia, "Let's go."

I waited until they cleared the room, and then I rounded on Rick. Stood up so fast it sent my chair clattering to the ground. "The fuck are you tryna do here, Rick? Huh?"

Rick looked at me wide-eyed. He stood up slow. I was already pacing. Fists clenched. Everyone else around the table tensed, looking between the two of us, but my tunnel vision was on Rick. 

"I was trying to help."

"That right?"

"Yes," he said firmly. "You've hardly been here. You're not…present with us."

"Not working for you, you mean?" I snarled. "Not being a helpful little foot soldier to Rick Grimes. Now you gotta deal with your own messes for a change."

"It's not about that, Daryl," he said. "I'm happy to be here. Happy to help you keep running this place, but at some point-"

"Man, I don't give a fuck about this place. Never did," I said. "You know why I ain't here. You know what I'm out there doing."

"I know, but… you're not… You've hardly said a word since…" Rick trailed off under the glare I gave him. "I hoped talking about her might get you to-"

"Get me to what? " I yelled, interrupting even though he'd probably have told me if I'd just let him. I didn't want to let him. I wanted to fight him. Merle would've punched me by now. "Forget that she's fucking missing? 'Cause from where I'm sitting, it ain't me who needs to be reminded of that."

I turned my glare on all of them. If Rick wouldn't take the bait, I didn't care which one of them did. I wanted one of them to stand up to me. Hit me. Do anything except look at me with that fucking pity. "Y'all are sitting around here all kumbaya like she ain't out there all alone right now."

"We haven't forgotten," Rick said. So calm. So measured. "I thought it would be nice to remember some of the good things, too. That's all."

Fucking hit me, you fucking coward.

I stared at the ground, breathing hard.

"You really think that's okay? Talking about Naomi like y'all are saying goodbye? Like you've given up? Talking like that in front of Mia?"

Rick frowned. "Mia wanted to talk about her. It's important that she does. It's good for her."

"Good for her?! Sitting around talking about her Mom like she's fucking dead," I said. I was done pretending Naomi was anything else to that girl. If she was haunting my ass, I hope she heard me. "You think making her do that is fucking good for her?" 

"I didn't make her say anything." Rick's voice was finally starting to rise. 

Hearing it, Michonne stood up, "We all want you to find her, Daryl. And we'd never want to upset Mia."

I could hear it in her voice. That unspoken 'but'. 'We all want you to find her, but you probably won't' or 'but she's probably dead'. She was refraining from saying it for my sake, but it didn't matter. It wouldn't have mattered what any of them said, honestly. Nothing but seeing Naomi walk through the front door would have calmed me down. This had been building in me for a while. Three weeks and four days, to be exact. Ever since Naomi had walked out on me.

She walked out on me. 

"Did she die hating your guts? "  

Rick's hand was on my shoulder. I didn't even remember him moving. My whole body was shaking.

"Daryl," that softness was back. That understanding. That pity . "I know what it's like to lose your wife."

I hurled a plate at the wall. It smashed right by the door, sending chunks of food and ceramic shards flying back at me. Rick tensed like he was waiting for a blow he knew was coming, but I froze where I was. 

A small shadow moved away from the door, but not before I'd caught her looking. Wide eyes. Afraid.

I knew that look. I'd given that look. Hiding out behind a half-open door while a drunk asshole who's supposed to be looking out for you did nothing but destroy everything in his path.

My Dad had been an asshole for as long as I could remember, but it got worse after Mom died. Blinded by his own pain, like he was the only one who'd lost anything, he hadn't cared that Merle and I had been grieving too. 

'Even if something happened to me, you would be there for them, raise them right, and love them twice as hard.'

I'd already failed her. That list was wrong. 

"Daryl..," Rick said, a note of panicked warning in his voice as I picked up the bottle again. He held his hands out like he was trying to stop a bull from charging him. "Why don't you give that to me, alright? Just… hand it over."

I glared at him, walked over to a sink at the side of the workshop and dumped the whole thing out into it. Watched it swirl down the drain. Whatever codes Naomi had that stopped me from going nuclear, turns out she'd passed them down to Mia. 

A silence had fallen over the room. Nobody wanted to breathe too loud in case it set me off again. 

I wanted to throw the empty bottle, but I didn't. I set it down and looked back at Rick. "You ain't gotta worry 'bout me."

"Daryl," Rick shook his head in disagreement. “What you’ve lost… what you’re going through…”

"I've got Mia," I said. "I ain't sayin' I'll ever be okay. Or I'll ever stop looking, but… that little girl deserves better. She deserved me to be here. Properly."

Rick relaxed, but his eyes didn't get any less sad. I walked away from them.

Mia wasn't in the corridor anymore. I took a set of stairs I'd stopped trying to climb most nights to a corridor I avoided going down. Mia's door was shut, right opposite the bedroom I wasn't even attempting to sleep in anymore. 

Bryce was outside Mia's door. He hesitated when he saw me.

"She okay?" I asked. Dumb question. 

"She's… I don't know…not great," Bryce sighed. "I tried to get her to stay away, but she wanted to come back down."

"I appreciate that," I said. I forced myself to look at him. "I won't be like that again. Not ever. Especially not around her."

Bryce nodded. I thought for a moment he'd yell at me. Say something about how I'd made those kinds of promises before. Maybe he'd fight me, right I was calming down. But he didn't. He stepped up and hugged me. Very quietly, he said, "She loves you so much."

I didn't ask if he meant Naomi or Mia. I didn't want to know. 

I patted him on the back, unsure what to do with myself. I found myself saying, "You too."

I didn't know which one of them I meant, either, but it didn't matter because both were true. 

Bryce let me go with another pat on the back. I turned to Mia's door and waited for him to leave the hallway. I didn't look at it, but I could feel that other door across the hallway at my back. Like it was staring at me, willing me to make things right. A hard thing to do when the whole world felt wrong. 

Mia opened her door the second I knocked on it. Her eyes were all red around the edges, which made me feel even more like a piece of shit. Easiest apology I'd ever given in my life, "I'm so sorry. I'm sorry you had to see me like that." 

"It's okay," she said, all quiet.

"No," I said. I didn't want her growing up accepting that kind of behavior from anyone. Just because it was me, or because it could have been worse, didn't make it okay. "It ain't. But it won't happen again." 

"I wasn't trying to say goodbye to her," Mia said, her bottom lip trembling. My heart sank as I realized how much of my outburst she might have heard. I pulled her in for a hug. "I just…miss her. I can't believe I might never see her again."

My guts twisted up. We had an unspoken agreement that neither of us talked about it like she was dead for sure. Or, at least, that's how it felt on my part but maybe Rick had been right. Maybe it was better for Mia that I come back down to reality. 

I tried to think about what I needed when my Mom was gone. What Merle needed. 

"You can talk about her as much as you want to," I said. "I… I ain't ready to. But I'll listen to whatever you wanna tell me. I wanna hear anything you want to say about her. That sound okay?"

"Yeah," she said. I felt her nod.  "I just hate that she's alone. No matter where she is, or if she's…"

"Yeah," I said so she didn't have to say the word.

Mia sniffed. "She only just stopped being alone. She was always alone before you."

"No, she wasn't, she had you."

"You know what I mean."

I did. Because no matter how many people were around me now, there'd always be a part of me missing. It had been missing before but had grown so much since the last time it was gone. I knew fully what I'd lost this time. Being without her had been unbearable back then. I'd tried to drown it out. Mindlessly following Merle. Living without caring if I saw the next sunrise. Couldn't live like that now. I had a kid to protect.

"I'm gonna be here from now on," I promised her, letting go of that long hug to look at her and see if that sadness was any better. "Properly this time."

"I don't want you to stop looking," she said, worried. 

"I won't," I said, and I meant it, but I couldn't afford to lose myself doing it. I couldn't lose sight of Mia, either. "I ain't ever gonna stop looking for her, but you're my priority too, you know that, right?"

"Yeah," she said, but it wasn't as confident as I'd have liked. I'd have to earn it back.

"It's you and me now, kid," I said. "We'll get by."

Right now, it was a lie, but one we both needed.

 

Chapter 69: HAM and cookies

Naomi

They're lying to me.

I stared at the melting snow on the toe of Bart-the-deer-thief’s boots. A gleaming smear of the truth. He’d been outside. There was still snow on the ground, and he’d been in it. A cold passed through me like he’d dropped that snow down my back. I suppressed a shudder. Our eyes met, and he gave me an equally cold smile. He knew I’d seen it. 

I smiled back. 

No matter what happened, I would not give them a reason to inject me with anything else. Especially now. 

I lowered my gaze again, keeping my head slightly bowed. I didn’t want him to read anything in my expression. Hopefully, he’d think I hadn’t noticed or was too stupid to put it together. I kept moving, one foot in front of the other, pushing along the food-laden cart in front of me until I was out of his line of sight. 

They have trapped me here.

A part of me had always known, and been making plans based on that assumption, but the confirmation still chilled me. At least now, I could act accordingly.

I stopped at a door and knocked. A woman answered, her belly swollen and her feet as bare as mine. So close to giving birth I worried she might pop right in front of me. I stared at her for a second longer than I should have. I didn't mean to. It was a glimpse of a future I could not let come to pass. 

I will not have our baby here. I will not have our baby without him.

“Are you…here to deliver my food, or…?” the woman asked. I shook myself out of it. 

“Yes. Sorry,” I said, picking up a tray from the cart. “I'm new to this, to here, I'm still learning the ropes.”

I walked into the room, which was almost identical to mine, except the bed was a double. Her baby's father was probably down here with her. Must be nice. 

“You're the one they pulled out of that lake,” she gasped. 

“News travels here, huh?” 

“You try being trapped in a bunker with the same hundred people for two years and see if you don't get excited by a bit of gossip as good as a woman being pulled out of a lake,” she said with a light laugh. “We don't get a lot of new faces. The Colonel only recently started taking people in.”

A hundred people?

I set the food tray down on her table and tried not to let the size of that number overwhelm me. It was more than I thought. This whole place was proving to be more than I thought. I smiled back at her, “Glad I could provide some entertainment.”

I started to move back to the door and the waiting cart outside, but before I could get there, she blurted out, “I’m Callie, by the way.”

There was something a little desperate in the way she said it. When I looked back at her, the eagerness in her slightly self-conscious smile made me stop. There was a loneliness about her. Maybe she hadn't been able to get out and talk to many people this late in her pregnancy. Or maybe she was just sick of the other hundred people in here. 

“Naomi. Nice to meet you,” I said. A flicker of relief replaced her self-consciousness. “How long until your little one comes along?”

“Any day now,” she said, easing herself down to sit on the bed. One hand rested on top of her bump. “I can’t wait.”

“Can’t wait to meet ‘em, huh?”

“Well, yes, that,” she said and then let out a light laugh. “But also… I’m so uncomfortable. My back is killing me, my feet are so swollen...”

Could you run out of here if you had to? 

How many months do I have until escape becomes too difficult?

The closer I got to giving birth, the harder it was going to be for me to fight and run. And that post-birth recovery time was no picnic either. And with a newborn? I suppressed a shiver of panic. 

“Oi! What's taking so long?” a voice called from the hallway. 

Shit. 

Bart-the-deer-thief had doubled back on his rounds to check I wasn't slacking off. Or maybe I'd been in this room for so long he'd looped back around. I scampered out of Callie's room without a backward glance. 

“Sorry,” I said, eyes on the floor, trying to look as small as possible. I felt small. “It’s just nice to talk to another expectant Mom, y’know.”

I risked a glance up at him, trying to gauge the anger in his eyes and whether or not it would be enough to earn me another stint of memory loss at the end of a needle. My stomach twisted itself into knots. The fear of it kept me in line better than any of Negan's beatings ever had. 

If only he'd known. 

He might have won this whole thing if he'd had a syringe lying around. 

“Get a move on,” he said. “Or the rest of it will be cold by the time you're done yapping.”

I nodded, lowered my gaze, and moved on. I delivered food to the next few rooms along the corridor, not risking stopping to talk long with any of them, not even after Bart-the-deer-thief had stalked off again.

I’d asked the Colonel and Jocelyn, very politely, if I could work in the kitchens. I hoped it would give me a chance to talk to Sherry. And if I happened to take them all down with food poisoning thanks to my terrible cooking, well, that would just be a bonus. Maybe they could sense the culinary dyslexia in me because, for now, I’d been relegated to dishwashing and food delivery duties. I saw Sherry in small glimpses without much chance to talk. 

I didn’t mind. Delivering food to people in the bunker gave me a chance to look around largely unnoticed. Slowly, I was building a detailed mental map of this place. It was, unfortunately, a lot bigger than I’d first realized. There were levels to it. I’d entered what I still assumed was the first, the one with the central surveillance room from which the Colonel checked all his little rats were where they should be in his maze. But the bedroom I’d woken up in, the one now assigned to me, was two floors below that.  

It went deeper. I didn’t know how deep, but it did. 

I knocked on the last door of this floor, the only one left on my round. I was eager to get back to the kitchen and see if I could get a moment alone with Sherry. But when Amber opened the door, I stopped in my tracks. Her face broke into a smile so big it broke my heart.

“Naomi!” she gasped. I glanced behind me. The corridor was empty, but there was a camera on the wall. 

“Keep your voice down,” I muttered.

“I knew you’d find us,” she said. “I told Mark you’d come! John and Marissa didn’t believe me either.”

John and Marissa, too?

God, they’re poaching us.

Why? 

“Is Daryl here? Or is he waiting outside to-”

God, I wish.

I wish he were outside.

I wish I could talk to him.

I wish he knew I was alive.

I wish he knew we having a baby.

I pulled her into a quick hug. Partly because I was happy to see her alive when we’d all assumed the worst. But also because I needed to shut her up. I didn’t want Bart-the-deer-thief rounding the corner again and overhearing her. I couldn’t listen to any more of her listing things I wished were true.

“I’ll get us out of here,” I said quietly. “But… it might take a while.”

I let go. She looked at me, nodding, but I could see the same worry in her eyes that I felt growing more with every passing day. We were both under time pressure, and she was even further along. She already had that tell-tale bump. How much time did she have before her growing pregnancy became physically limiting? What if one of us developed some kind of complication and couldn't leave the medical bay?

“Whatever you need,” she whispered. “We’ll help.”

I nodded and passed her the last tray of food on my cart. “Do you know where John and Marissa are?”

“I don’t know their room,” she said. “But Marissa’s on the cleaning crew, and John scavenges with Mark and Dwight.” 

“Okay,” I said, trying to make these pieces fit together in a way that could get us out of here. “I’ll figure something out.”

Amber nodded so eagerly that I felt a twinge of guilt. I knew, deep down in my soul, that I’d leave them all in here if it meant I could go home.

I didn’t dare hang around much longer and returned to the kitchens with my now-empty cart. I’d been delivering lunch, but Nora had already started preparations for dinner. The hallway outside was as eerily quiet as always, but pushing on the door unleashed a torrent of noise: clanging pots, bubbling liquids, or something sizzling in a pot. It took a lot of getting used to.

The Colonel was the overlord of the bunker, but in the kitchens, Nora’s word was law. She took a huge amount of pride in it. Every little thing was accounted for, inventoried, and checked multiple times a day. Her greying brown hair was pulled back into a bun so tight it pulled most of the skin on her face unnaturally taught. Everything but the scowl, which was almost permanent. 

When I got back, the kitchen was full of a dozen other women and Nora was barking orders at Sherry to start gutting the pig she’d pulled from the deep freeze and left to thaw overnight. Sherry looked miserable at the prospect. 

“I hate this part,” she muttered grimly, taking hold of the knife.

“I can help!” I said and winced at how eager I’d sounded to be skinning and gutting something. Sherry hesitated and glanced over at Nora.

“You know what you’re doing?” Nora asked. 

“I’ve had a lot of practice,” I said, trying to sound apologetic about it. Trying to sound like the kind of person who'd had to learn this skill recently, and not like I'd been doing for about as long as I could read. 

Nora's face crumpled in a sympathetic frown. She tutted, shaking her head at my misfortune. “Of course you have… I forget how others have it out there.”

I nodded as if I agreed as if I was grateful to be here. For those of them who'd been here from the beginning, it probably was a godsend to have somewhere safe and well-stocked with provisions to hide in while the world went mad. But for those of us stuck here, with family on the outside, it was a hellhole.

“All right,” Nora said after a moment’s thought. “Let's see what you've got.”

She passed me a knife. It was nice to be holding something sharp again. Tempting. A thousand scenarios ran through my head; some ended with a code-locked blast door I didn't have the codes to. More of them ended with another scratch on my arm. 

I ran the blade down the flesh of the pig. It was very well preserved; it almost looked like a fresh kill. Their freezers and power supply must be extremely reliable—an underground fortress built to live off-grid. No wonder the Colonel was so paranoid. There were groups out there who'd kill for this kind of thing. But I wasn't one of them. As much as Sanctuary had its challenges, I’d rather be in that run-down old shithole than this weird and sterile place.

I wasn't a threat to them unless they turned me into one. 

How could I make them see that? 

Nora watched as I sliced a line down the pig and peeled back the flesh to reach its innards. Felt like I was sitting some kind of exam. I tried to block her out. Sherry hovered nervously beside me. A commotion at the vegetable station drew Nora’s attention away from me. 

“Dwight,” I said softly when Nora’s gaze shifted to whichever of her poor underlings was prepping the vegetables. It was easy to talk covertly, under all of the noise of a working kitchen. “He’s on the scavenging team. That means he can go outside, right?”

I knew it was true. He must have been allowed outside when he found me. Outside and not too far from my home. 

“Right,” Sherry whispered back. “But they’re always blindfolded until they get near to the location. Only the Colonel’s closest men are allowed to know the real location of the bunker. No newcomers. Dwight doesn’t know where we are any better than I do.”

“Right,” I said. A setback, but not a huge one. “But he’s been near Sanctuary? They go there sometimes?”

“When they found us,” she said, grimacing as she helped fold up the pig’s intestines into another bowl. “Dwight told them he could help gather other supplies. We thought we might be able to trade whatever was left at Sanctuary for a safe place to live, but once we realized you guys were still living there, he tried to keep them away. He’s never taken them to the actual building, just some of the underground supply caches Negan used to have.”

Underground? 

Fuck.

I bet that’s where he’s been. 

I shook it from my mind. Negan had slipped way down my list of priorities. I'd have plenty of time to hunt him down and kill him once I got out. “Do you think he could get some kind of message there?”

“I don’t know…” Sherry hesitated. “You really don’t want to bring the Colonel to their door. Especially if they’re not expecting it.”

“I know. I’m not saying he should go right there, but… nearby? Daryl will be… looking for me. Everywhere.” I tried not to cry. “If Dwight could leave something… close. He’d find it.”

“Maybe,” she said, still hesitant.

“It really wouldn’t take much,” I said. My chest felt tight with the truth of it. “Any small sign, any whisper that I’m alive… He’d come looking for me. And he wouldn’t stop. You know he wouldn’t.”

As much as I hated the idea of putting Daryl through all that, I needed him. And he needed hope. Sherry nodded. “I’ll ask.”

Nora loomed over us both. We shut up immediately. I put the knife down and stepped away so she could inspect my handiwork. A sudden surge of nerves hit my stomach. Daryl had always commented on how well he thought I did this kind of thing, but what if that wasn’t true? What if that had been his version of flirting? What if “You skin a rabbit better than anyone I know” was a Daryl pickup line?

“That’s very well done,” she said, reluctantly impressed. “Good work.”

“Thank you.” I breathed a sigh of relief that I didn't have to start questioning everything I knew about myself if it had originated in something Daryl had said. “Has all the lunch food gone out? I should probably start collecting up all of the finished trays.”

“Just the Colonel left,” Nora said. 

“Well, I don't mind taking it to him,” I offered, trying to sound casual and helpful. “It’s on my way. I was assigned to the top floor today anyway.”

She considered me for a moment. I was sure she’d say no. Only Nora was allowed to prepare the Colonel’s food. Nobody said it, but I suspected the paranoid coot was worried someone would poison him. 

A valid concern.

I would.

“He’s not on the first floor at the moment,” she said. I tried not to look too interested. “He’s in the communications room. You could take it there.”

Communications?

I kept my face frozen in a compliant little smile, but my heart was racing with the hope of it. Nora placed a cloche-covered plate down on another cart and gave me directions to the communications room. I replayed them over and over in my head as I walked there. Of all the locations on the mental map I was building, this felt like the most important. 

I reached the door and knocked. It opened in a matter of moments. Surprised to see me, the Colonel didn’t let me in. His eyes narrowed in suspicion. We hadn’t had much to do with each other since my arrival. “Nora sent you?”

“Yes, Sir,” I said. “It’s on my way.”

It was a small lie, but it felt better than telling him I’d impressed her with how fast I could skin and disembowel something. 

The Colonel still looked suspicious. I kept my eyes fixed on him, although all I wanted to do was look into the room behind him and see what he had in there. He pulled off the metal cloche and cut a small piece of everything off. He flipped the fork, turning the handle toward me. “After you…”

He thinks I've poisoned him. 

I took a small bite of everything without hesitation. I smiled. “Delicious.”

The Colonel watched me momentarily, checking I wasn’t about to spit it out or drop down dead. I had a small moment of panic when I realized that someone else might have poisoned it and I’d be about to die at their hand instead of my own. When nothing happened, we were both relieved. He took the tray from me but didn’t let me in. I thought he was about to close the door in my face again, but something made him hesitate.

“Maybe, when your baby’s here…” he said, testing the waters for something, “we can go and fetch their father…if you can direct us to where he is.”

The mere suggestion of it made my aching heart lift a little. But it sounded too good to be true, which meant it probably was. I couldn't give him directions to any of our communities; I didn't trust what he'd do with the information. Although I knew Daryl would follow me down into the Earth if this man told him I was there, I couldn't imagine him happy here. My wild man of the woods shouldn't be stuck underground. 

“I'd have to know where we are if I was going to direct you,” I said sweetly, my smile unwavering. 

“Hmm. I suppose,” he said, although something in his eyes hardened. I'd overplayed my hand. A door felt like it was closing. 

“I understand why you can't do that yet,” I said, trying to walk it back and regain the few inches of trust I’d managed to gain. “You barely know me, and this place is one of the few safe places left. I know your trust needs to be earned.”

He nodded, “And you understand why we have to keep you here? It's not safe out there for a woman in your condition.”

If one more person calls me that I'll scream.

But there it was. The truth, finally spoken out loud. They’d never had any real intention of letting me go home. I wondered if Bart had told him I’d clocked the snow on his boots or if I’d just been down here long enough that he assumed they’d broken me. I hadn’t bitten anyone in ages; maybe the truth was my reward. 

“Of course,” I said. “And I'm very grateful to you all. I can’t think of a better place to be. The medical facilities you have here are incredible. I can’t believe how prepared you were when the rest of the world fell to shit.”

Shit.

Maybe I shouldn’t have said ‘shit’.

The Colonel smiled, relaxed. Ego successfully stroked. I smiled back in a way that I hoped was equally as unassuming and hid what I was thinking, which was, ‘ There ain't a hole you can put me in deep enough that I won't claw my way out to get back to them.’

“We look forward to welcoming your little one,” he said with a nod. He turned away from me, signaling the end of the conversation. The door swung shut, but not before I'd taken a last, desperate look at the room behind him. I saw it; sitting up on the desk was a HAM radio. A link to the outside. To home. 

 

Daryl

The door flew open so fast I didn’t have time to think. I was all instinct, scrambling up from my makeshift bed under the workbench. By the time my brain woke up, my crossbow was already in my hand and trained on Bryce. He looked as disheveled as I felt. His eyes widened when he saw the weapon pointed at him, I quickly moved it away but didn’t drop it. He could be here to tell me there’d been another Savior uprising, a retaliation against me for killing Negan. Or maybe, now the weather was warming up, the Walkers had thawed enough to bring an unmanageable horde to our door. 

“Mia’s birthday,” he said. “We didn't do anything.”

Fuck.

Still, at least we weren’t under attack. 

I relaxed, put my crossbow down, and looked at him. Behind me, I tried to kick the pile of cloth I'd been sleeping under into something that hopefully resembled a jumble of work rags and not a makeshift grief bed. I coughed, trying to clear the sleep from my throat before I spoke. I needed to sound like I’d been up for hours, not like I’d been sleeping here.

“We got some presents and stuff,” I said, trying to block out the memory of how damn excited Naomi had been when we'd found each little thing. I still couldn't bring myself to say her name much, but Bryce knew who I meant. “Before… we could give them to her now?”

I felt shit even thinking about giving her any of it without Naomi, but I felt shittier that Mia's birthday had passed without me doing anything. Bryce nodded, still thinking. “Carl’s still here. We could call Lucas and see if he and Perla can make it here sometime soon?”

“Another party?”

“Something like that,” Bryce said. “I mean… we should probably keep it small. Mia might not be in the mood for something big.” 

I nodded. I sure as shit wasn’t in the mood for something big either. The more people around me, the more obvious it felt that one was missing. For a second, the pain in my chest was so acute I struggled to breathe. 

“I’ll ask Rick if they can all join us for dinner or something,” Bryce said. “And I'll see if Eugene and Jerry can't make us something a little special.”

“Mac and cheese would probably be a bit of a stretch, huh?’

“Probably,” he agreed with a smile. “Unless Hilltop has cheese to spare. I'll see what our kitchen says first.”

“All right,” I said. “I'll see if I can find a card or…some decorations or something…make this shithole a bit more festive.”

It sounded dumb the moment I said it. Like a buncha streamers would hide what was missing. But Bryce nodded brightly, ”Good idea.” 

Was it? 

I wasn't the best at arty crap. I'd got Mia to make things for my botched proposal to Naomi. But those had all either gone up in flames when the barn was torched or been stolen by whoever those assholes were who took my deer. Either way, I dug out the paper and scissors and paint and crap she'd used and tried to make something vaguely cheerful. 

Beside me, the radio crackled. A voice came through, too faint to hear much. I adjusted it on our end. “This is Sanctuary. Can you repeat?”

“That you, Daryl?” 

“Carol? You all right?”

“All good here,” she said. “How are you doing?” 

I’d known that question was coming. She was finding all kinds of excuses to check in with us these days. So was Glenn - always calling with some bullshit question about the corn for the biofuel. I held my breath, so I didn’t sigh, exhaling slowly through my nose. There was no honest way of answering when someone asked how I was doing. “Same as always.”

“Okay,” Carol said. I could tell by the tone that she wasn’t satisfied with that. It was the best I could do.  

“While I’ve got ya,” I said before she could roll out whatever bullshit pretense she’d been going to use for calling in the first place. “What's like a cake but not a cake?”

“Is this some kind of riddle?” she asked. She sounded half amused and half concerned I was losing it. 

“I ain't got time for this, woman, it's Mia's birthday, and we ain't done shit,” I said. “Bryce has got Jerry trying to work out what we can make with the food that’s left, but… he ain’t the best at it. And no way in hell I’m asking Eugene. Nobody wants birthday sardines.”

“Leave it with me,” she said. 

“What?” I didn’t have time for her to go away and consult her apocalypse recipe book, come back, and read it out to me while I burned something in Sanctuary’s kitchen. 

“Leave it with me,” she said. “I'll bring something.”

“It wasn’t an invite.”

“Well, we’re coming.”

“ We? ”

“Yes. Me, Zeke, and Henry.”

“Henry, huh?” I liked the kid, but I worried sometimes about Carol getting so close to him after everything that happened with Sophia. She was strong, but I wasn’t sure how much more loss she could take. If I lost Mia now, I’d be a goner for sure. My heart would give in with nothing else worth beating for. I was a little surprised it hadn’t happened already.

“Yes,” she said, all tense and in a way that told me she didn’t want my damn opinion. 

I sighed. “Bring the family, I guess, but we weren't really tryna make this a big thing.”

“All right, we look forward to seeing you too,” Carol said in that damn chipper, damn sarcastic way.

“Yeah, yeah,” I said. “See ya.”

I didn't want the radio distracting me any more so I moved away from it. There was only ever one voice I wanted to hear, anyway, and that wasn't going happen. I moved all the stuff down to my workshop. Biofuel production had slowed over the winter, we'd gone through most of the corn, so I could work in peace. Bryce found me after an hour or two. 

“What's this?” he asked, gesturing to the mountains of paper circles around me. 

“You ain't ever seen a paper chain before?”

“No, I have, but… not this many.” 

I looked at them. Guess I had gotten a little carried away. It had been nice, cathartic, to have something so repetitive to do with my hands. “You got ideas for something else?”

“Yes, actually,” he said. “Can I help?”

“Be my guest,” I gestured to the heaps of stuff I'd pulled out of the cupboards. It was lucky, really, that I had such an arty kid and we had all of this stuff lying around. Even if it meant she'd have been ten times better at this than me. 

“I’ve told Eugene that he’s to distract her if she leaves her room,” Bryce said, picking up a paintbrush. Mia still spent most of her time in her room these days, recovering.

“Distract her or bore her?”

“It’ll end up being both, I think.”

I nodded. “Asked Carol what we could do that wasn't a cake. She took it as an invite so now she's comin’ with the family, but at least she'll probably bring somethin’ nice.” 

“Oh,” Bryce said, a small flicker or alarm crossing his face.

“It’s alright though, right? Just another three.”

“Well, yes,” he said. “But also I radioed Glenn earlier, about the cheese situation, and I told him, so…”

“So him, Maggie, and the baby are coming?”

“And Enid. Also, Tara got wind of it so she and Denise are…”

“Oh shit,” I said. “That’s a full house.” 

“Sure is,” Bryce nodded.

“She’s one popular girl, huh?” I said, but something cold clenched in my stomach. Hadn’t seen most of them since the search, and I wasn’t sure I wanted to. Carol, I could deal with having around. She knew how it felt to search and find nothing. She knew when to let me be. But everyone else?

“I don’t think Mia is the only reason they want to come,” Bryce said, which didn't help. I didn't want their sympathetic looks or their quiet ‘how-you-holding-up’s. I wanted them to get back out there and find my girl. 

This ain't about me.

Ain't even about Naomi.

“You think Mia will even wanna do this?” I asked. It seemed a bit late to back out now, what with all of the shit we’d spent time making and the people on their way over. But there was one very important person missing, and marking the passing of a birthday without her might make her absence all the more obvious. 

“I don’t know,” he said after a moment of hesitation. “But, I think she should. I think it would be good for her.”

It's what Naomi would want. 

He didn't say it, but we were both thinking it. There's no way she'd want us moping around the way we had been. She'd be looking down on us right now, yelling at us to do somethin'.

I nodded. Decided to think of the rest of the day like that, like she was watching us somehow. 

Pretended she was watching as everyone arrived, sneaking into the cafeteria to help hand up the streamers and paper chains I'd made. It was probably too many, but it didn't look as dumb when they were all strung up from the roof. I pretended she was watching us all gather by the door as Eugene went to call her down for “dinner”. 

It still took her a little while to get places. Her injury still bothered her something fierce sometimes. It had made it easier to keep her in her room while we set all of this up, but it meant she was slow getting down to us. 

"She’s coming," Bryce whispered from the doorway when he heard her footsteps at the end of the hallway. There were so many more people here than we'd originally planned. The whole thing had snowballed out of control. But they all fell quiet as she approached. 

Mia stepped through the door, eyes going wide as she took everything in. I could tell she was trying to keep it together, but the way her mouth dropped open and her eyes started to glisten made my stomach lurch. I suddenly saw how this would look to her - me standing under a banner Bryce and I had made out of an old sheet. The hand-painted ‘ Happy Birthday Mia'. It was too close to the one we'd made when she was tiny, it would make her think about that now destroyed photo of the three of us. The only photograph that had ever existed of our perfect family.

Shit. 

This was a mistake. 

This was a huge mistake. 

I wanted to rip it all down. Tell everyone else to piss off home and never talk about this again. 

"Surprise!" Carol called out, a big grin on her face, pulling Mia into a hug before she even had a chance to say a word.

I watched Mia closely, trying to read her. She looked up at the banner, then back at me, still frozen. Felt my gut twist, but then she gave me this look—half a grin, half a sob—and my chest relaxed a little .

"Sorry it's a bit late," I said, keeping my voice low, hoping to make this easier on her. She bit her lip, eyes flickering around the room, taking in everyone who was here — Lucas and Perla, Aaron and Gracie, Maggie and Glenn with the baby, Enid, Tara and Denise. Carol's family. 

Mia sniffed, managing a laugh. "You…you all did this for me?"

Ezekiel stepped forward, nodding with that serious look of his. "Even in times of loss, we must find moments to celebrate what we still have," he said, giving her this gentle smile. "And that, my dear, includes you.”

Mia nodded, her wide eyes still taking in everyone and everything. “Thank you.”

“No need for that,” Carol said, giving her another squeeze. “Come on, we've got a birthday to celebrate.” 

I don't know how she did it, that cheerful everything's okay attitude she could adopt. Naomi could do it too. Must be a Mom thing. Either way, it worked. Mia smiled, the tension in the room lifted and chatter started to fill it. Jerry brought the food out, people started eating.

I kept close watch over her for any signs things were getting to be too much, but Bryce was right. This was good for her. Being around everybody like this, she smiled more than I'd seen her do in weeks. Sure, it didn't always reach her eyes and every now and then I saw her gaze drift off someplace else, but for the most part, she had a good time. 

I remembered everything Naomi had told me about Mia growing up, how she had so many friends and loved being around them. Whereas Naomi and I had enjoyed getting away from everybody and only hanging out with each other, Mia seemed the opposite. Spending time around other people gave her the kind of energy it drained from me.

She's a goddamn miracle. 

There were a few times I thought she might fall apart. Like when Carol presented us all with a box of cookies for dessert, Mia's eyes lit up. She took one, bit it clean in half and then stopped chewing after a few bites. I watched the happiness die in her eyes, fading real slow. 

“You okay?” Carol asked. Mia nodded. Swallowed down the bite she'd taken. 

“First thing Naomi told me about you was that you made the best cookies she'd ever eaten.”

I moved a little closer to her, ready to pick her up and whisk her out of here if it was suddenly too much. Like I was her bodyguard sheilding her from emotional shrapnel. Carol took it all in stride. Managed one of those smiles that’s sympathetic without being patronising.

“Well,” Carol said quietly. “That's a compliment I don't take lightly.”

Mia smiled again, but she didn't finish the rest of her birthday cookie. I watched her wrap it up in a paper napkin and slip it into a pocket when she thought nobody was looking. Like she was saving it for someone. My whole heart ached. Or, rather, my whole heart was missing, and the space where it had been ached.

I hoped Naomi was watching this, watching the people who’d turned out for our little girl's birthday. Watching the way even the ex-Saviors who came into the cafeteria to get their dinner stuck around after they’d finished eating. Mingling with the rest of us, even after the cookies were gone. If Naomi was looking down at us now, she'd be pissing off all the other angels with how loud she was cheering. 

Amber's mom, Donna approached me with something knitted bundled up in her hands.

“Your Naomi,” she said. “Asked me to make this for your little one. I thought after… well, maybe you wouldn't want it, but now…”

I took it from her, “Thanks. I'll make sure she gets it. That's real kind of ya.”

I looked over at where Mia, Carl, Perla and Enid were playing some kind of game in their own little break-out group. Too cool for the adults, I guess. I hovered nearby, unsure whether or not to interrupt. I’d spent all of this party hovering like a goddamn fly. She looked so happy, distracted. Carefree like a kid should be. And then Mia stopped, wincing, her hand on her side. I was there before I knew I’d moved. 

“You okay?” Carl asked quietly, moving to her other side as I ushered her a little away from the others.

“Yeah,” she said, although it was obvious she wasn't. Tryna put on a brave face for everyone, including me. “Sorry, it's just, sometimes my side still…y'know…hurts.”

“Nah, I get it,” Carl said. “It took me a long time to feel normal again, but don’t worry about it with me. Don't forget, we’re scar twins.”

At first, I thought it was sweet of him to reassure her like that. But then Carl lifted his shirt to show the scar from where he'd been shot on Hershel's farm, and I watched a blush spread across Mia's cheeks.

Oh God, that’s not going to be… a problem… is it?

I loved Carl like he was my blood, like a nephew, but if he ever did anything to hurt Mia… I tried to tell myself they were too young for anything like that, but I couldn’t ignore a little voice in my head reminding me that I’d been half their age when I'd known Naomi was the prettiest girl I’d ever seen. 

“Hey, Mia,” I said. Anything to divert her attention. She looked over at me. “You got a sec?”

“Sure,” she said. She didn't look too annoyed to be pulled away from Carl, so maybe the blush was a fluke. Or in my imagination. I still worried about it, though. What if she asked me something about relationships? Or boys? 

God, I don't know how to give her advice about that. 

Stay away from them?

Don't date until you're as old as I was when I finally got with your sister. 

Older, maybe. 

I resolved not to bring it up unless she did, and led her out of the cafeteria to a room nearby where I'd stashed her presents. I put the sweater down for now and picked up the box of things we'd scavenged for her. Even holding that box in my hands, seeing everything piled up in it, felt wrong. It said something to the level of delusion I was under that I felt guilty for not waiting to do this with Naomi. Half expected her to walk through the door and give me shit for not waiting for her. 

She just didn't feel gone. 

“We…” I braced myself. I still struggled to say her name sometimes, but I didn’t want any ambiguity around this. “Naomi and I… we… got ya some stuff. For your birthday. We’d been looking out for things you might like on runs, and savin’ them for…”

This. 

Only it wasn’t supposed to be like this.

“Oh,” Mia said. Her eyes were bright again, bottom lip shaking a little.

Shit.

This was too much.

“You ain’t gotta look at ‘em now,” I said. Maybe it felt as wrong to her that we were doing this without Naomi. “I mean… I ain’t even wrapped ‘em. I shoulda…”

“No, it’s okay,” Mia said, quickly, taking the box from me. She took a deep breath. One of them ones you take when you’re bracing yourself for something. I watched her take each little thing out of the box and inspect it. Paints, sketchbooks, fancy pencil sets, craft kits. Every time she picked one up I was hit by the memory of Naomi or me finding it. How excited she was about it. Mia cried a little. We both did. Then she put everything back in the box real neat. 

“Thank you,” she sniffed, wrapping her arms around my middle. I hugged her back, wondering how the hell that tiny baby was now big enough for me to rest my head on top of hers. "For everything."

“Ain’t nothin’,” I said. “Love you, Mia.”

“Love you too.”

She let go, stepped back and wiped her eyes. 

“Last one,” I said, picking up the knitted sweater. “And, I didn’t have anything to do with this one, actually. Naomi must’ve asked Donna to do it before…”

Before I got you shot.

Before she hated me forever.

Before she died in the snow.

I unfolded it. It looked a little big, probably so she'd grow into it and be able to wear it for more than one Winter. I held it up and watched the smile freeze on Mia's face. It changed to something else. Her eyes widened, and I could see the tears prickling at the corners of them again. She stared at something on the back of it. I turned it over. 

‘Dixon’ was knitted there in the kind of yellow that Naomi had said was one of Mia's favorite colors. 

She was going to take my name and wanted Mia to have it, too.

Neither of us said anything for a moment. It all felt too fragile. A future unraveling, slowly. Neither of us knew how to pick up the strands of it. Or what to do with them now. 

I looked back at Mia, “You ain't gotta wear it.”

I wasn't sure how I got the words out around the lump in my throat, but I was glad I did. With Naomi gone, I didn't want Mia to feel like she had to keep going down the path we'd been on. Especially since if Naomi hadn't… well, if she'd made it back to Alexandria, there's no way she'd have actually married me. Or wanted anything to do with me, never mind sharing a name. 

“I know,” Mia said. Then she looked up at me, something written on her face that looked close to hopeful. “But…can I?”

“Yeah. ‘Course you can.”

She put it on immediately, pulled it right over the sweater she was already wearing. 

“What do you think?” she asked, holding her arms out and spinning around a little. The sleeves were too long, falling down almost to her fingertips. The sweater stopped halfway down to her knees. But her eyes were sparkling the way a kid's eyes should on their birthday, and the ‘Dixon’ on the back... I'd never been prouder to see my name anywhere.

“I love it,” I said. “Suits ya.”

Mia smiled, and this time, it reached her eyes. I sent her back into that party with her big, genuine, smile and her too-big Dixon sweater. I glanced up, right past the ceiling and into Heaven. 

Hope you're proud of me, baby. 

 

Chapter 70: Paper Flowers

Naomi

“Marissa, please," I hated begging but I wasn't above it.

“No.”

I felt sick. And it wasn’t because of the baby. I’d experienced enough of that not-so-in-the-morning morning sickness to tell the difference now. This was queasiness caused by cold, anxious dread.

“I know it’s risky,” I said, taking a lot of deep breaths to calm myself down. “But I can get us all out of here if you-”

“I don’t want to get out of here,” she said. Her eyes were so cold, her mouth set in a firm, thin line. “It's safe here. They have food. Why would we give that up to go back out there?” 

My heart sank. I could see the same feeling echoing in Amber's eyes. We both had family we wanted to get back to, but John and Marissa didn't. If you didn’t have anyone waiting for you, I could see the appeal of a place like this. 

Marissa had been a crucial part of my plan to get out of here. Her role on the cleaning crew gave her access to the Communications room. It was one of her assigned rooms, and she was there alone every few days.  It was access I would kill for, although I hoped it wouldn’t come to that. 

Hilltop had a HAM radio. Barely used because we all stuck to the short-range walkies most of the time, but it was there. Contactable from the one in here. One conversation with Maggie wouldn’t free us, but it would lift the amount of pain Mia and Daryl were in.

Until Dwight could get a message to Daryl, this was all I had. 

I’d clung to the idea like a life raft, and now I felt it being snatched from under me in the water. 

“Please. They'll never know you helped us.”

“I’m not helping you,” Marissa's eyebrow arched scornfully. “The minute I heard you were in here I knew that you and your little group would try and find a way to ruin this place, too. That you’d find a way to destroy another sanctuary. I won’t let it happen. Not again.”

She glared at me, spun on her heels, and left the room. The door to Amber’s room slammed shut behind her. I flinched, less at the noise and more because of her rage. We’d made some good inroads with the former Saviors, but it was depressing to know that some of them would never forgive us for the way we’d changed things. 

“What now?” Amber whispered. 

“We find another way in,” I said. “And we wait until Mark or Dwight can get a message somewhere close to Sanctuary. We keep trying.”

What was the other option? Give up? Stay here? Resign myself to raising a child underground while their father thinks I’m dead? Never.

Amber nodded. Neither of us moved or said anything for a moment. Then, Amber sank onto her mattress, “What if Marissa tells the Colonel?”

“Deny everything,” I said. “Act like we don’t know each other outside of here. Keep working like we’ve been working.”

Amber nodded again, and I took that as my cue to leave her room. I wanted to stay and commiserate. To keep planning our escape. But, if Marissa ran to get the Colonel now, it wouldn’t help our case if he found us hanging out together. We had to continue like we were strangers. It was safer that way.

But, fuck, it was lonely.

I missed my family so much. The need to see them was stronger than any hunger or thirst or tiredness I’d ever experienced. Cut open and left to bleed out without the relief of death. I no longer feared Hell; I now knew it was a life without them.

I measured time in weeks, not days. A count up as much as a countdown. The weeks I’d been in here ticked up, and the weeks until our baby was due ticked down. 

I wrote messages for Daryl on scraps of paper passed to Sherry to give to Dwight when our time in the kitchen overlapped. Every time she told me he’d gone out scavenging with a team, my heart lifted. I thought about Daryl finding something of mine. Some definitive proof that I was alive. A shred of hope on scrap paper. And then the news came back that they hadn’t been near Sanctuary this time. 

The paper came from a storage room I snuck into before I clocked in for my shift in the kitchens. It was full of unsorted things that Dwight and the rest of the scavenging team had picked up and brought back during their time outside. Things that weren’t directly useful came here to be sorted and inventoried slowly. Unimportant enough that I hoped they wouldn’t notice things going missing, especially something as small as paper. There were also no cameras. Sherry, Amber, and I could meet there in short bursts to make plans without anyone getting suspicious.

By the time I entered my second trimester, we had our sneaking around down to an art. I slipped into the storage room as usual and reached into one of the boxes. I tried to switch up which ones I took from, just in case anyone was watching things closer than I thought. 

I pulled out something that felt papery against my fingertips. Folded. I looked at it. Someone had made an origami flower. Pretty enough that I considered putting it back and seeing if there was anything else in that box; Mia had tried to teach me how to make something like that once, and knowing how much effort must've gone into making it made me feel bad for unfolding it. But, no, that was crazy. If it had ended up here, whoever had made it probably did not need it anymore. So, I unfolded the paper, ready to write something that Dwight might be able to get to Daryl.

My breath caught in my throat. There was a drawing inside. A practice sketch. I knew it was a practice because I recognized the style. It was Mia’s.

I held it in my hand for a moment like it was a real flower that would die if I put it down. 

Is she here?

Did they get her?

The paper shook in my hand, the edges of it fluttering. I tried to think about where they might put her if they’d come across her somewhere. If she’d been out looking for me with Daryl and got too close, she might have ended up down here like Dwight and Sherry.

They wouldn’t know she was my kid, so they might just put her with the other…

Slow, creeping cold spread through my veins, starting with a fear that gripped me by the heart. My changing rota had taken me to many corners of this place, many different floors. I was confident that I had seen most of it, but there was something I’d never seen. Not in the six weeks I’d been conscious in here.

Children. 

I pulled the whole box off the shelf. There were so many paper flowers it was a damn botanical garden. I dug through them. There was every chance I was losing it, searching desperately for a sign of my family while trying to send one to them. It couldn't really be Mia's, could it? 

There were candles in here, too. A bunch of them. And paper chains with drawings on them that looked so much like Mia's it made my heart ache - hearts, flowers… rings. 

And then it clicked.

These were Mia’s, but she wasn’t here. It wasn't just the deer they'd stolen from us that day. There'd been a box of something else, too. This must have been it. Daryl had asked her to do it for him, for us, so she could be part of our engagement without him having an audience.

Heat prickled at the corners of my eyes. I squeezed them shut.

I need to go home.

I wanted to scream. I wanted to set so many fires that they had no choice but to open the doors. But I couldn’t. All I could do was whatever they told me to. An infraction of their rules, any sign that I was rebelling, would get me another needle in the arm.

So, I slipped a few pieces of origami into my pockets and put the box away like a good little captive. I breathed deep, stuffing the tears so deep down they wouldn't surface again until I was in bed. 

In the kitchen, I picked up my usual cart and started dropping off food at every place on my assigned list. It was hard to focus, and only half of my mind felt like it was present in any meaningful way. 

It didn't help that Bart was on patrol while I was doing it. Ever since he'd caught me slacking off and talking to someone, he kept a real close eye on me. Waiting. Itching to give Jocelyn a reason to sedate me again. 

“You again,” he grunted when he saw me coming. 

You stole Mia's art. 

I looked down, afraid I couldn't hide the anger in my eyes. I'd gotten well-practiced at keeping my cool, but this felt like the ultimate test. 

Head down, I started my usual round. Knocking on doors and passing out food, trying not to think about the delicately folded flowers in my pocket. One door had been scratched off my list. I paused outside of it. I knew whose room it was. And I hadn’t seen her in two weeks. I stopped. Checked my list. Checked it again. Definitely scratched out. 

“There a problem?” Art thief asked. 

“Where’s Callie?”

“Who?”

“The woman who lives here,” I said. “In this room.” 

“Who?” he asked again. He didn’t even blink, but there was something cold and gleaming in his eye. It was like he knew something horrible and wanted me to know it, too. 

“Never mind,” I lowered my gaze again. “My mistake.”

I carried on. When Bart wasn’t looking, I sent a silent apology to Mia and unfolded one of her flowers. I scribbled a hasty note to Amber, which I slipped onto her food tray under the plate. Neither of us said anything more than “Hello” when I passed it to her, but she would get it. She knew to look by now. 

I delivered the rest of the meals to my assigned rooms and returned to the kitchen. I put the cart away and walked past Sherry's workstation, close enough to mutter, “Storage room. As soon as you can get away.”

She gave the smallest nod to show that she’d heard me. I ducked out again as quickly as I could. Amber was already waiting there. She was pretending to look for something when I came in and dropped the pretense when she saw it was me. Her smile dropped, too, reading from my expression that I hadn’t called this meeting because I’d figured out some genius way to get out. 

“What’s wrong?” 

“When was the last time you saw Callie?”

Amber frowned in thought, “I think I saw her after one of my appointments with Jocelyn. She was going in after me, but that was maybe… Two weeks ago.”

I sighed, my heart sinking. “I haven’t seen her in two weeks either.”

Amber’s frown deepened. Before either of us could say anything else, the door opened, and Sherry slipped in. She glanced at us both, “You okay?”

“Have you heard anything about Callie recently?” I asked. 

“Last I heard, she was in labor,” Sherry said. Something tightened in my chest. “But that was probably…”

“Two weeks ago?” I finished for her.

Sherry hesitated. “Yeah… about then.”

“Have you heard how it went?” Amber asked, delicately tiptoeing around the idea that something had gone wrong during it and Callie was no longer with us.

“No. Nothing.”

I took a breath, not wanting to ask my next question but knowing I needed the truth no matter what it was. “Have either of you, in all of your time here, seen a single child? A baby? A toddler? A teenager? ” 

Cold silence settled into the room, a louder statement than any ‘no’ could have been. I watched Amber’s face pale. Sherry, on the other hand, seemed more resigned, like a suspicion had been cemented into fact. 

What the fuck?

I tried not to overthink the implications of all of this. But… that had never really been a strength of mine.

“When we first got here,” Sherry said. “The Colonel and Jocelyn were delighted they’d found a young couple to take in. During our induction, they put a lot of emphasis on how safe this place would be if we were looking to start a family.”

“Yeah, they said the same thing to us,” Amber said. “And when they found out I was pregnant, they were adamant this was the best place for us. Safe and family-friendly.”

‘Family-friendly’... That was the exact phrase one of those art-thieving, deer-stealing, engagement-ruining assholes had used when they’d offered Daryl and me a place here. 

If it’s so damn family-friendly, where are all the damn families?

“Maybe,” Amber said tentatively. “They just haven’t had any children since the outbreak, and that’s why they’re so… invested.”

A hundred people took shelter down here during the outbreak, and not one had a kid? A young family?

I didn’t say that. I didn’t want to snatch away any comfort she’d managed to give herself unnecessarily. Amber needed hope to keep herself going. She’d been the same when it was Negan that we were trying to escape. So, I tried to give her more, give her the energy to see this through.

“Maybe,” I agreed. “Or, maybe there’s a separate floor for families, one none of us had been to yet.”

Amber nodded, some of the color returning to her face. Sherry and I exchanged a glance over her head, silently agreeing that this explanation was deeply unlikely. 

“I have an appointment with Jocelyn today,” I said. “I’ll see if I can find out anything.”

I gave the notes I’d written for Daryl to Sherry to pass to Dwight, and then, one by one, we left the storage room. 

I kept one paper flower for myself. One of the small ones, hidden deep in my room like contraband in a prison. I couldn’t keep it out or display it like I wanted to because if anyone saw it, it might alert them to the other things I was stealing from them. It felt good to have a secret, a small piece of defiance. Felt even better that it was Mia’s; it made her seem less far away. 

It made me think about all of the real flowers that would be about to start growing above ground. It would be Spring soon. Hopefully, our work at Sanctuary would pay off, and the crops would grow.  

I missed most of Winter.

Mia’s birthday.

I tried not to think about everything I was missing. The good things were hard enough, but what about the unknown struggles? Anything could have happened to them while I’d been down here. Another uprising. Another storm.

Bart no longer collected me for my appointments with Jocelyn. I made my own way there. It was a good sign. They trusted me more, little by little. I needed that to keep growing. 

Jocelyn greeted me with her usual smile. I tried to read anything in her face, tiredness, or stress over having lost a patient. 

“Second trimester,” she said with a hint of excitement that now felt suspicious. “How are you feeling?”

“Less sick than I was,” I said, which at first had been a relief but now I was obviously stressed that it was a bad sign. 

“That’s good,” Jocelyn said. “A lot of people find the second trimester easier.”

“Good,” I smiled back. It would be easier to run away if I didn’t have to stop to throw up. I hopped up onto the bed while she got the ultrasound ready. 

“Do you want to know the sex?” she asked.

“No.”

I said it so fast it made her laugh, “You sound pretty sure about that.”  

“I like surprises,” I said. That had never been true. I was too anxious for that. But, if we were going to know ahead of time, I wanted Daryl and I to decide that together. I didn’t care either way. As long as the kid was growing all right and healthy in there, nothing else mattered.

“How is Callie doing?” I asked, keeping my tone light, but I could feel my heartbeat against my ribs. “She had her baby, right?”

“She had her baby, yes,” Jocelyn confirmed, her smile as fixed-on as a Barbie doll’s. 

“And everything was… okay?” I prompted.

“A very healthy baby girl,” she nodded. 

Still nothing about Callie.

She’s avoiding the question.

“That’s lovely,” I said, trying to work out a way of bringing the conversation back to the baby’s mother without looking like I was fishing for something. Or suspicious of anything. Before I could, the door opened, and Marissa walked in. 

She didn’t look at me. Hatred twisted deep in my gut at the sight of her face all the same. I couldn’t help it. She had access to everything I needed to get home and wouldn’t give it to me. At least she hadn’t told anyone about our conversation. Or maybe she had, and she was here with Jocelyn to confront me about it. I pulled my sleeves down over my arms. If they tried to get another needle in me, I’d fight like hell.

“Sorry to interrupt, Jocelyn,” Marissa said, still not deigning to give me any eye contact. “I left some supplies in here earlier. Also, the Colonel asked for you. He’s feeling unwell.”

“Right,” Jocelyn straightened up. There was a tension in her face. The Colonel’s health was paramount around here. Her eyes flickered to me, an apology in them, “Do you mind?”

“No, it’s fine,” I said. “I can wait.”

Jocelyn grabbed a medical kit and left. Not for the first time in this room, I looked around for something sharp. If Marissa wouldn’t help us voluntarily, maybe I could cut bits off her until she agreed. She moved closer to me, wiping down something on the surface of one of the countertops. 

“I’ll help you,” she said quietly, not looking up at me. It was so quiet that I thought for sure I’d imagined it. 

“You will?” I stared at the back of her head.

What if she's lying?

What if this is a trap?

“Don’t look up,” she hissed. “There are three cameras in this room. Look down so they can’t see we’re talking.”

I looked down and tried to keep my voice low. “Do you mean it? You’ll help us?”

“Yes,” she said.

“Why?”

“I found something when I was cleaning,” she hesitated. “It could be nothing. It might… be a failsafe for if something goes wrong, but…there are wires everywhere. Behind the scenes. In the walls. I thought it was for all of the cameras at first, but… there are too many for that.” 

Her hand was shaking as she wiped the countertop. Cleaning the same spot over and over again. 

“What is it?” I asked, staring at my hands in my lap.

“This place is rigged to blow,” she said. “The Colonel has a button. I saw it when I cleaned his office.”

“Fuck,” I breathed.

“Midnight,” she said, turning to leave. “That’s our window. Be ready.”

I nodded. 

My hands were shaking in my lap, my heart racing. I’d need to calm down before Jocelyn came back. Or find some way to explain away my giddiness. I put my hand across my stomach, and a bump so small I sometimes doubted it was there at all. Mostly, it just looked like it did when I'd eaten too much at Thanksgiving. 

We got this, kid. 

I wasn’t stupid enough to think I’d get through to them on the first try. My memory of the frequency the Hilltop radio was tuned to was hazy. The numbers could have been right, but I was even less confident about the order they came in. I was pretty sure it was one of three options, but… I could be wrong. There was also always the possibility that someone at Hilltop would change them, and I’d have to cycle through every damn frequency out there to reach them.

It also relied on someone being around to hear my call.

At midnight? 

It would be weeks, potentially longer. But one day, someone I knew would answer. Or Daryl would find something Dwight had left for him. They had to. This had to work.

 

Daryl

Mia didn't want to come on the DC run. After all that she'd done to try and convince us when I asked her if she wanted to, she just shook her head. I didn't need to ask why. Didn't push it either. Bryce bowed out, too, for the same reason. 

Couldn’t blame either of them. Not when I still couldn’t set foot in our damn bedroom. 

For them, DC held a lot of memories. For me, it had always been this overwhelming potential. I'd always felt drawn to DC and, if I'm honest, a little nervous about what I'd find. It had held this mythical status in my mind, but not for the same reasons most people think of our nation’s capital. The politics and the hot air that blew around here didn’t interest me much. I'd been too selfish and off my face for all of that back in the day. But when I'd heard that was where she'd moved to after college, I'd built my own version of it in the back of my mind. 

Good days, I'd thought about her and Mia tucked up somewhere nice. Safe. 

On bad days, I'd tortured myself thinking about the guys she'd meet. The fancy places they'd be able to take her. How they might make her laugh like I used to. 

Now, the city was decaying. Even the fancy places. In a city now ruled by the dead, she was Queen. Every building, every park, every sidewalk held the possibility that she’d been there once. Washing Post offices had to be around here somewhere, right? An apartment she'd lived in? I could be walking right past it and never know. 

The first time I’d lost her, she’d been here. 

Now she was gone again, and part of me kept hoping this would be the place she'd show up and I could finally bring her home. Dumb, I know. But I still studied every Walker I came across.

We found signs that people had been living in the museum at some point after the outbreak, but they weren’t here now. Or, maybe they were. Part of the few dozen Walkers trapped in the basement, visible through glass panels in the floor in front of the main staircase. We were quiet when we cleared the hallways, in case anyone was still around, but we didn't run into anyone living. 

We cleared everything except the basement walkers. There were a lot of them and unless it turned out something we needed was down there, it felt best to leave them be. We split up, we all had our lists of things to look for. I pulled mine out of my pocket and tried to find a map of the exhibits on the wall. 

Someone sniffed nearby. I looked up. Cyndie, one of the Oceanside survivors, was standing beside a canoe. 

“You need help with that?” I asked. She looked over at me. Her eyes were red like she'd been crying. 

“Uh, yeah,” she sniffed. “Uh, sure.”

I put the list back in my pocket and moved to help her. “You all right?”

“I was just, um… thinking about my brother,” she said. “We were fighting during a canoe ride at the county fair. It’s funny, you know, how certain things just bring up random memories like that. Does it happen to you?”

“Most of the memories I got of my brother, we were fighting,” I said. “But I had people that fought alongside me. They wanted to be here. They didn’t make it. So, yeah. It happens to me.”

More and more often lately. Don’t know why I thought a damn museum would be a distraction. Sweeping through hallways and old exhibits that I was sure my nerdy little bookworm would have loved to see. Would have already seen. 

I bet she loved this damn museum. 

Bet she took Mia here all the time.  

I could almost see ‘em both at every turn - hand in hand, Mia much smaller than she was now - pausing at every damn exhibit so Naomi could tell her everything she knew about it. Naomi lifting her onto her shoulders so she could see all the stuff that was high up. Bet Mia loved all of the art stuff. I couldn’t see their faces when I pictured them here. They had their backs to me. Always slightly out of reach, about to turn a corner. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t bring myself to imagine them turning around. Or walking beside me.

It's a lot, mourning a future you'll never have and a past you missed out on. I was haunted without the privilege of seeing an actual ghost.

I’d kill to see her face again.

Just one more time.

Even if it ain't real. 

I helped Cyndie bring the canoe downstairs. Kept my eyes between the canoe and the ground a few steps ahead of me. It was heavy, and I couldn’t afford to be distracted. 

When that was down, I got back to my list. Stayed as focussed on it as I could. The things we’d come here looking for started piling up by the exit. 

The wagon was the last thing we got. It was heavy and awkward to move despite the wheels it was on. We had to rig up a pulley system around ourselves and the pillars of the building to get it down from the upper floors. If we’d just let it roll down the staircase, we might have broken it beyond repair or smashed the glass on the floor, keeping the basement walkers from getting to us.  

We gently lowered the front of the wagon down the last few steps onto the glass floor. There was a crazy amount of creaking. Hard to tell if it was the wagon or the floor. Either way, it put us all on edge. We were so quiet we could hear the sounds of the walkers, muffled by that glass. 

“Let’s go,” Rick said from the front of the wagon, leading our way across it. We all started moving again. Something creaked. Louder this time. A squeak on the glass. Rick raised his hands to slow us. “Woah, woah, woah. One more step.”

We eased it down, gently as we could. I didn’t like how far out Rick was on that glass. Didn’t like the noises it was making either. Rick told us to hold. All of the wagon now down on the ground, he assessed the situation for a moment and then directed a turn. We rolled it, nice and slow, off to one side, trying to make sure it had the shortest route across that glass as possible. 

Cracks were already starting to appear. 

When the wagon was safely tucked toward the door, I helped Rick across that fragile glass so we could take the canoe over next. When we turned around, Carol and Ezekiel were lifting a plow across. I saw Rick tense ahead of me before I saw why.

“It’s gonna go!” he yelled nanoseconds before the glass broke under Ezekiel’s boots. I heard his cry before he vanished.

“Ezekiel! Ezekiel!” Carol screamed. “Hold on.”

She vanished for a moment, moving fast, fuelled by nothing but panic. I moved toward the hole in the glass. He’d been caught by the rope tied around his middle, but he was dangling over a crowd of them. Their dead hands reached for him. Jaws snapping in anticipation of a fresh meal. 

Rick and the others started pulling him up. I took out the walkers that got too close. Carol found something soft to line the broken glass. He rose slowly out of the hole. Scrambling out as soon as he could reach us. 

I looked away as he and Carol embraced each other. I was so glad he was okay. But, I couldn’t help thinking about how things would have turned out differently if we’d all been there when there’d been a hole in the ice. 

Trying not to dwell on it or let myself get bitter, I turned my attention to helping load our scavenged supplies into the wagons outside. It always helped to have something to do. Especially something physical that got me moving. If it hurt a little, that was a real bonus. I’d trade any amount of physical pain for the one in my head and in my heart. 

Once we were all packed up, we headed out of the city. 

Most of the others were on horseback. Rosita and I went ahead to check the routes were safe. Since Spring had moved in, the Walkers had been getting a lot more active again. Big herds of them drawn together and moving through our lands. They were getting destructive, too. Rosita reported that one of the bridges had been taken out by a herd that had merged with another and became heavy enough for the bridge to collapse under their weight. It had taken the walkie repeater with it, which meant our walkies would struggle to connect over long distances.

Every day, we all get a little further apart.

A few of the routes were blocked by herds that hadn’t cleared yet. Rick sent Gabriel and most of the Alexandrians back to Alexandria with some of their supplies. The rest of us pushed on down Route D to Hilltop and Sanctuary. It was too late in the day to find an alternative, safe route back to the Kingdom. But that was fine; they could stay with us. 

On the route home, one of the new wagons got stuck in the mud. The horses were getting tired, so we switched out and pulled it manually. We unloaded it first, trying to make it as light as possible. Hauling it out of there made my muscles burn and my hands ache, but I think I was the only one slightly disappointed when we managed to get it free.

A group of Walkers were approaching, not a full herd, but enough to be a concern. Michonne and I started taking them out while the others loaded things back into the wagon. More appeared from the woods, and I started worrying about how many more were coming. 

Rick gave the call to abandon the wagon and come back for it when the road cleared. We started running, and we probably would’ve got clear of it, but Ken, one of the boys from Hilltop, ran back to free one of the horses. He was the blacksmith’s son, knew all of the horses by name. 

It cost him his life. 

He was bit trying to cut the horse free. Kicked in the chest when the horse got spooked. We turned back to the Walkers, fighting off as many as we could in the hopes that Siddiq could save him, but the kid died before Siddiq could amputate his bitten arm. 

Maggie slipped a knife into the back of his head so she could take the body back to his parents. His death hung over us for the rest of the journey. 

Getting back to Sanctuary wasn’t much better. I hated seeing that goddamn place. It managed to be the place I’d spent some of the worst days of my life, and also some of the happiest. All of those memories were twisted together in the shadows. Things that had been painful at the time now made me angry. The happy ones all hurt. 

Rick and a few of the others came with us into Sanctuary. The usual whispers rippled around the place whenever anyone saw the great Rick Grimes. They were still whispering about me too, and what I'd done.

“Daryl!” Michonne called from one corner of the workshop. I looked over at her. She pointed to some graffiti on the wall that read: ‘Saviors save us! Negan will rise again.’ I looked back at Michonne, “Does this happen often?”

“More and more, since the crops been dyin’,” I said. I didn't add that Negan would have a hard time doing anything now his head was on a pike by the lake. “Eugene, Bryce, Jerry! You know who did this? You know who did that?”

Bryce shook his head. Jerry shrugged, “Dunno, man.”

“That would be a negative,” Eugene said. 

“Justin,” I looked over at him, lounging around with his feet on the desk. “Clean that up.”

Justin looked annoyed, “How?”

“What do you mean ‘how’? Paint over it.”

“We just used up all the paint.”

“Figure it out!”

We glared at each other, both of us knowing he’d have cleaned it immediately if Naomi had asked. Eventually, he sighed and got up. 

I’m so done with this shit.

“Where's Mia?”I asked Bryce. “Is she okay?”

Things like this always put me on edge. Couldn’t have another uprising with her in the building. 

“Haven’t seen her in a little while,” Bryce said. “Think she’s upstairs.”

I nodded. “Be right back. Gonna let her know I’m home.”

Bryce nodded his approval. Rick was giving one of his speeches about some shit. I was too tired to listen. Not just physically, either. My whole soul felt drained. More and more these days, I was losing the will to get up and keep doing the same shit. 

It only took me a few steps down the corridor to see something was wrong. 

Our bedroom door was open. My heart almost stopped when I saw it. I hadn't seen it like that in over two months. For a crazy second, I thought I might look around the doorframe and see her there. Sitting criss-cross applesauce with her nose in a book. Alive, by some fucking miracle, come home to tell us when I was out and gotten distracted by something. 

Even dead, she might have found her way home somehow. Felt how much I needed to see her deep down in whatever was left of her soul on this earth. 

But the graffiti. 

It was far more likely that whoever was in there wasn’t an angel who’d found her way home but was someone who wanted me dead. 

What if they already got Mia?

Her door was closed. If I checked it first, I risked drawing the attention of whoever was in my old room and losing the element of surprise. I stood against the wall, crossbow raised and ready. 

“Daryl?” a whisper at the other end of the hallway. I looked up. Pressed my finger to my lips as Carol, sensing something was wrong, raised her gun while she approached. I waited for her to get in the same position on the opposite side of the door, and gestured for her to cover me while I went in there 

Ready to shoot, I kicked the door open the rest of the way. 

“Mia?” I choked out in surprise. She spun around so fast that she sent one of Naomi's huge piles of books crashing to the ground. Something else fell with it. Lighter. Smaller. A cloud of it. Floating to the ground like confetti. 

“I'm sorry,” Mia said, eyes wide. She'd been holding one of Naomi's sweaters, which she dropped immediately. “I…I… I know you don't…want… but… I just missed her. I wanted…”

I should have sent this coming. Even though she'd chosen not to come, knowing where we were must still have been hard on her. 

“No, it's okay,” I lowered my crossbow. My heart was still beating like crazy. “I thought…I thought…”

I thought it was her. 

I thought it was someone who'd come to kill us both. 

“There's been more graffiti,” Carol said. She stepped into the room, closer to Mia. I couldn’t bring myself to take another step. “Downstairs. We're all a little on edge.” 

“Yeah, I saw it,” Mia said, her eyes lowered a little. They took in the mess of books she'd left. “Sorry, I'll… I'll clean this up.”

“No, it's okay,” I said quickly. "I got it.”

Mia straightened up from where she'd been about to start cleaning up the books and the small pieces of something papery that now littered the floor.

“You sure?”

“Yeah. Just…” I motioned for her to move. “Come on out of here, yeah?”

I'd realized what was all over the floor, what had tumbled down with those books. Flowers. Pressed between heavy books to preserve them forever. From that stupid bunch I'd given Naomi on our first real date. 

God, she loved me. 

She loved me so fucking much. 

Mia moved carefully around things, but I don't know if it was out of fear of knocking something else over or if it was because of the grief etched on my face. Now that I knew there was no danger, I couldn't move from this spot. Couldn't stop staring at those pressed flowers. 

“Give us a second, sweetie,” I heard Carol say quietly. Mia nodded and left the room. 

I crouched down, picked up one of those little flowers, felt the dry, papery petals between my finger and thumb.

“You don't come in here at all, do you?” Carol asked. I shook my head. Didn't look at her but I could feel the worry radiating off her.

“Can't.”

Carol sighed. “You shouldn't be here. Either of you.” 

“But…”

But what if she comes home?

"Talk to Rick,” she urged me. “Please.”

“All right.”

“You want me to tidy up in here?” she offered. 

“No," I said. I wasn't sure I'd be able to do it, but I couldn't stand the thought of it being someone else. 

A little numb, I headed back down the workshop. Rick was still talking. Whatever he said, whatever he promised them, earned him some kind of applause. Those assholes had never done that for me, not once. Not that I cared all that much. Wasn’t like I was giving speeches anyway. 

Rick looked over at me, and I beckoned him over. From how he suppressed a sigh, I could tell I was going to say something he probably wouldn’t want to hear. We walked up, out of earshot of everyone else to the walkway that looked down on the old factory floor. 

From here, I could see where the wall had been patched up from where I’d driven that truck through it. If only getting her back was as simple this time around. If only I could ram a truck through the pearly gates.

“What’s up?” he asked.

“I don’t wanna be the one leading these people anymore.” 

“Okay. Why?”

Are you dumb?

If I’d been honest, Rick probably would have understood. But there was so much I still struggled to say out loud. Couldn’t talk about Naomi in past tense. 

“Bein’ here behind these walls - it just don’t feel right, man. I’m better out there. I always have been.”

Rick looked over at me. He knew why I wanted to be out there. Why I wanted to give up every responsibility I’d been handed and spend my time in the woods. He knew, from all the times he’d had to pull me away from approaching herds, what I was looking for.

Rick sighed, “You kept this place together. You kept people in line here. We can’t just let the Sanctuary fail after everything that’s happened.”

“Man, it’s gonna fail anyway. Nothing grows here. It’s a damn factory, man,” I said. Naomi had been so stressed about it before she died she’d been giving herself headaches and nosebleeds. And she’d been completely right. “Look, when Negan was around, he needed people to provide for him. It’s still the same. Nothing’s changed.”

“It’s different now. We give what we give willingly.”

“How long’s that gonna last? Most of the bridges are out after the big storm. The highway’s done. We’ve scavenged every drop of gas for miles. And we can’t make enough corn fuel to run the cars or the trucks. Pretty soon, it’s gonna be more than a day’s ride from one spot to another.”

“Well, it’s on us to figure out how to make it work,” he said.

“Man, there ain’t no “us” anymore. Everyone’s everywhere,” I said. “That small group we had back in the beginning - we could do anything. That was right. That’s what I know.”

“Well, you wanna come home to Alexandria, then?”

“No,” I said. There were too many memories there, too. “I wanna go to Hilltop.”

“Well, you go, someone’s gotta take your place,” Rick said. “Rosita and Eugene are headed to Oceanside next. Maggie’s sending food, but not people, and Kingdom’s got its own problems rebuilding after losing its fighters. If Alexandria sends another person out, I could use the help back home.”

That ain’t my home.

My home is dead.

I glared at him so long he felt uncomfortable enough to start talking again, “We’re not together because things have changed.”

"Mm-hmm,” I said. “Thing is, you changed ‘em, Rick. But I get it. 

I walked away, left him standing there, and went outside for a smoke. I liked it better out there. It was quiet.

When I'd missed her before, I hadn't done that whole looking up at the sky and thinking about how at least we were under the same one thing. Seemed corny at the time but now I wished I had. Because now it wasn't true. 

Our struggling crops were bathed in moonlight in front of me. Felt like my fault that they were dying. Like whatever emptiness there was inside of me had spread to the plants. Call it a soul, call it a sprint, call it a heart, whatever that nameless thing inside you is that makes you who you are, mine was barely hanging on. Whatever it was, it was wilting and dying inside of me.

Footsteps echoed behind me. I glanced back and saw Carol approaching. I took another drag of my cigarette and then held it out for her to take one too. Carol took it from me. 

“These things will kill you,” she said, stomping it out under her boot. “Haven't seen you with one for a while. Thought you'd quit.”

“Nope,” I said, which was sort of true. I hadn't meant to give it up, but after I'd seen those scars on Naomi's legs… I couldn't bring myself to light one. Not around her. Even when she wasn't there, I didn't want to come home with the smell of those memories clinging to my clothes or my hair. Didn't want her kissing me and tasting her Momma's rage. Didn't want anything about me reminding her of that time in her life. 

So I gave it up accidentally and without her saying a word. It wasn't as hard as I thought, not when I could be tasting her instead. Getting a hit of that sweet smile was more effective than a nicotine patch. 

But now…didn't have a reason not to light one. Kill myself slow enough that Mia would be grown by the time it happened.

Looking for a change of subject, I asked, “Why aren’t you in bed?”

“Why aren’t you?” Carol countered. I said nothing. She knew damn well why. She sighed, “We don’t sleep. Ezekiel, on the other hand, sleeps like a baby. It’s annoying.”

“Does he snore fancy too?” I asked.

Carol laughed, “Stop it.”

“Nah, he’s all right,” I said. “He’s a bit corny, but…”

But being in love will do that to a guy.

“Glad I have Pookie’s approval,” Carol said. She let the silence sit for a moment and then added, “After what I went through with Ed, corny is really, really nice.”

I nodded. I got it. Corny could be nice when the right person was bringing it out of you.

“Nah, I’m happy for ya. If anybody deserves to be happy, it’s you,” I said. Didn't even taste bitter when I said it. Just because I'd lost the love of my life didn't mean I wanted everyone around me miserable. “I don’t like not seein’ you, though.”

Carol sighed again, “Daryl?”

“Hmm?”

“I want to take over here for a while, for you, and don’t argue,” she said, fixing me with a stern look. I thought about it, mostly because she told me not to, but I couldn't even pretend I wanted to stay. 

“You gonna bring Henry and the King with you?”

“I haven’t told him yet,” she said. That felt a little weird to me, but given what she'd just seen go down with me and Mia, I couldn't blame her for jumping right into concern. She still clearly had something else she wanted to say, so I waited. She sighed again, “He asked me to marry him.” 

“What?” I stared at her. She was kind of smiling, but…it wasn't anything like the giddiness I'd felt when Naomi said yes. 

“Yeah. And part of me wanted to just say “yes” right then,” she said. 

“Why didn’t ya?”

“I don’t know. I want to help out, take my time, you know?”

Kind of. Her last marriage had been so destructive, it made sense she wanted to take her time with this one. Ezekiel seemed like the kinda guy who'd wait for her. 

“You want me to stay here with you?” I offered. 

“No,” she said immediately. “This place isn’t good for you. It’s not good for Mia, either, living with a ghost like this. Hilltop sounds like a good plan. That’s like having you there, too, I think. Things are a little weird there at the moment.”

“Oh yeah? Weird how?” 

“Well, there’s all the shit Gregory’s trying to stir up. Losing Ken won’t have helped with that,” Carol said with a sigh. “And someone’s messing with that old HAM radio.”

“What do you mean messing with it?”

“Not sure,” Carol said. “Maggie and Glenn haven’t heard it for themselves. I think it was one of the older couples at Hilltop. They've been complaining that they can hear it some nights around midnight.” 

“So unplug it.” It seemed so damn simple.

“What if it's a distress call?” 

“So what if it is? Ignore it. We got enough people here.” 

“Somehow I knew you'd say that,” she said, with another tut and a shake of her head. Giving me that disapproving look like I was some cold-hearted bastard for not wanting to take more people in. How she could sit here in front of our dying crops and think that answering some random distress call was going to help us was beyond me. But it didn't matter. I didn't need to argue with her. When I got to Hilltop, I could unplug the damn thing myself. 

Chapter 71: A Sign

Naomi

Midnight came, and with it, Marissa's soft knock on my door. 

I waited for the sound of the wheels on Marissa's cleaning cart to fade before I opened the door. When I did, the hallway was empty. I walked quickly down it. If I got caught out of my room, the cover was that I wasn't feeling well and on my way to see Jocelyn. 

Marrissa was waiting for me in one of the camera's blind spots. Not daring to say hello or make any more noise than we had to, we nodded to each other. She lifted the corner of the long cloth covering the bottom of her cleaning cart. I ducked under it and sat with my knees pulled to my chin. She'd stripped it of every cleaning supply she could get away with not having with her, and there was just about enough space for me if I scrunched up really small.

Another thing that's going to get harder the more the baby grows…

The cloth dropped back down to cover me, and Marissa wheeled the trolley on her way. I rattled around against the metal bottom of the cart alongside industrial-sized bottles of bleach, floor cleaning fluid, and a box of wipes. One of the wheels was squeaky, and it always got squeakier when I was in there. 

I felt the cart come to a stop, heard a door unlock, and then Marissa wheeled us both into the communications room. The first few times she'd done it, I kept expecting the Colonel to be there and this to be some elaborate set-up as payback for the Savior war. But, so far, she hadn't double-crossed me.

"Clear," she said, lifting the edge of the cloth again so that I could climb out. 

The communications room was small. A long desk took up most of one wall. The HAM radio sat on top of it, and a black office chair was placed in front. There was a large cupboard full of spare parts for the radio and other equipment. They had their own short-range walkies on charging stands in there. The Colonel also had neat piles of files, folders, and notebooks. I hadn't looked at any of them. There was never time.

"Five minutes," Marissa reminded me. I nodded. She left, locking the door behind her. 

I made my usual round of calls. First, I called the three frequencies I thought Hilltop might be using. 

"If you receive this call, please answer."

Nothing.

"If you receive this call, please answer."

Nothing.

"If you receive this call, please answer."

Nothing.

Then, I filtered through a systematic range of random frequencies. At the start of this, I'd been hoping and praying that one of them would be picked up by someone I knew. Now, I longed for anyone to pick up. 

"If you receive this call, please answer."

Something came back in a language I didn't recognize. I should have switched to another frequency right away, but it was so nice to hear something from a world outside of this one, to have proof that something other than this bunker still existed. I listened until they stopped whatever they were trying to say.

"My name is Naomi Dixon," I said. "It's nice to hear from ya, even if you don't know what I'm saying."

There was another pause, and then they replied. I didn't understand a word, but it sounded friendly. Hopeful. Tears pricked at the corners of my eyes. 

"I hope you're okay," I said. I hope you're doing well wherever you are. I hope you find whoever you're looking for."

They said something in return, and it might have just been my overwhelming loneliness, but it felt like they were wishing me something similar. Could have been nothing, of course, but it felt like everything. 

"Good luck, friend." 

I switched frequencies and cycled through the next few. Nothing else came back. I was almost out of time. I ended like I always did, with another call to each of the three potential Hilltop frequencies. 

"If you receive this call, please answer."

Nothing.

"If you receive this call, please answer."

Nothing.

"If you receive this call, please answer."

Something crackled. An indistinct voice in the static, too quiet to make out any words. My heart leaped in my chest.

"Is someone there? Can you hear me?" I asked. My heart was beating hard in my throat, the way it always did when I thought I was about to get through to someone. "Hilltop, do you copy? Maggie, are you there?"

"How do you know that name?" A suspicious voice. Female. One I didn't recognize, but the accent was American and not too far from home.

I sat bolt upright, shivers running up and down my every nerve. Goosebumps rippled across my skin. "Which name? Maggie? Or Hilltop?"

There were probably many Maggies in the world, but how many communities called Hilltop would still be standing? How many Hilltops would know a Maggie? No answer came back. The seconds felt like they stretched on for hours. With every passing moment, I felt that voice slipping further away. Eventually, it came back, "Don't call here again."

"Wait! Wait! Please," I tried again, desperation making me louder than I probably should have been. "My name is Naomi Dixon. I'm trying to find my way home."

Silence. I kept trying, but I knew they'd switched it off. 

Fuck. 

I could've thrown the damn thing across the room. I wanted to scream but couldn't. If I was found in here, they'd probably never let me be conscious again. I took a few deep breaths and shoved it all as deep down inside as I could. 

Marissa knocked before she unlocked the door. It was our usual signal so that when I heard the key, I would know it was her and not the Colonel returning unexpectedly. There were very few hiding spots. I climbed back into the space under the cart. Marissa wheeled it back to our usual blind spot, and I made my way back to my room. 

This was usually the worst part - returning to bed knowing I'd have to wait another twenty-four hours to try again. And we couldn't go every night; Marrissa wasn't always on duty and couldn't sign out the keys we needed if she wasn't. 

I lay in bed and closed my eyes, playing the conversations I'd managed to have over and over in my mind. I told myself that whoever I'd spoken to hadn't been from Hilltop. Because if they were… we were fucked. I'd never get home. 

A siren cut through everything, even my growing despair. 

Loud.

The kind of shrill wail that cuts right to the part of your brain that runs on instinct. Gets you on your feet and running before you have time to assess the danger. For a crazy second, I thought it was a delayed alarm that Marissa and I must have set off, but the corridor was already full when I ran to the door. People seemed to know which direction to flow in. I moved with the current while I tried to determine what was going on and where the danger might be coming from. 

Is this it?

Is it about to blow?

The lights pulsated between the usual pale yellow and a deep red. Every two seconds, we were bathed in a blood-like red. I looked around, catching the eye of a few frightened and panicking people. Nobody spoke. We wouldn't be able to hear each other over the din.

The crowd surged toward one end of the hallway, meeting with another line coming around the corner. I looked up, trying to peer over the heads of those in front of me. 

No way.

The door was open. And the crowd was heading out of it.

Holy shit.

My heart started racing in a whole other way. Fear turned to hope so fast I could hardly breathe. Whatever was happening here no longer mattered. The chance of escape that had just landed in my lap was all I could think about. 

Bare feet back in the dirt. After so long in sterile air, the tunnels felt positively fresh. I inhaled, shaking. Could I remember the way back to the dirt room I'd woken up in? That trapdoor that might lead me out of here? It had been weeks, and I'd only made the journey once. But I'd prefer to take my chances wandering these underground catacombs than be sealed into that bunker again.

The crowd crushed against one another down narrow tunnels. They pushed me along, turning down bends in the tunnels. The sound of the sirens faded into the background. Turning and walking against them would be like trying to swim upstream. I needed to wait for an opportunity, an alcove to duck into and let them all pass, a turning I could take and leave them behind. Light flickered, bouncing off the rock; some were holding lanterns. Behind me, others had handheld flashlights, their beams stronger but more direct.

We turned again, stepping through an opening in the rock wall. It looked man-made. A perfect archway for one person to walk through at a time. It did nothing to prepare me for the vast space I was walking into - a wide, cavernous opening under the earth. The roof was so tall that it was mostly hidden in shadow. Looking up made me dizzy. Something dangled from the darkness. I squinted, waiting for some of the flickering light to hit it. When it did, I wished it hadn't.

Two chains hung from the ceiling. Rusted and snapped off at the bottom.

Nope.

Don't like that. 

I backed away. I'd stand by the entrance and wait for the stream to slow down to a trickle. And then I'd run. I might be lost here for a few days, but there had to be a way out, right?

Sherry grabbed my arm before I could get there. She pulled me over to where Dwight, Amber, and Mark were huddled by one of the cavern walls. 

If this had been a normal day in the bunker, I'd have thought it was too risky for us all to stand together like this, but everyone else was too preoccupied with whatever emergency was unfolding to care who we were talking to amongst ourselves. Which was for the best; Amber was doing a bad job of hiding her excitement. 

"I knew it," Amber said. "I knew this would work."

"This was you?" I asked. Amber nodded, smiling at Sherry.

"We figured there had to be some kind of evacuation plan," Sherry said, "for if something goes wrong in there - a fire or something."

Risky .

They might have blown us all up.

I hadn't told Sherry or Amber about the explosives yet. It didn't feel like helpful information. Living down here was hard enough without the knowledge that you could go up in smoke at any second. I'd certainly had trouble sleeping since I'd found out. 

"What did you do?"

"Gas leak," Sherry said. "In the kitchen. It'll look like an accident."

I looked at Dwight and Mark. "Do you know the way out from here?"

"I think so," Dwight said quietly with a small nod. 

"We can slip out," I said, equally as quietly. "Once everyone has filed in here, we can choose our moment and get out."

A nod ran through the group. I scanned the crowd and caught Marissa's eye. She and John were stuck on the other side of the crowd. I kept looking at the frightened faces of our bunkermates. It was the first time I'd seen a lot of them. And there were a lot of them. I wasn't used to seeing so many people in one space. There was still no sign of Callie. Still no sign of a single goddamn child. No babies were crying, even after the noise from those sirens, which could still be heard echoing down the tunnels. 

I couldn't see Jocelyn yet, but it was a big group of people, so there was every chance someone else blocked her from view. The Colonel was one of the last to enter. All eyes fell on him like he was their messiah. Before he'd said a word, I felt the atmosphere relax. He had the opposite effect on me. Goosebumps rose on my skin. I couldn't trust anyone who had this much control over their following.

"Don't worry," he told them. His voice boomed off the walls, a slight echo bouncing back to him. "It's just a small malfunction. A mistake. We'll be back home in no time."

Speak for yourself.

Applause rang out through the cavern. It took me a moment to join in, mostly because I didn't understand why we were clapping for nothing. He hadn't announced anything. Hadn't told us anything of substance. Had done anything for any of them. The Colonel smiled, basking in it, walking deeper into his crowd. They parted for him without him having to ask or demand it. While his back was to us, we moved closer to the entrance, inching along the wall.

We were the first to notice the sound in the tunnels. The first to hear them coming. Our ears were better tuned to it. Under the clapping, under the distant echoing sirens… the whisper of the dead.

"Stop!" Dwight yelled. "Stop clapping!"

The smile vanished from the Colonel's face, immediately replaced by a frown. "What-"

"Listen," Dwight urged him. 

I watched the realization hit him before his followers. These people had prepared themselves to take shelter in any kind of apocalypse - nuclear war, environmental disaster, pandemic - but their strategy for surviving the end of the world hinged on separating themselves from it. They had no idea how to live in it. Very, very few of them went outside. How many of them had faced a Walker before? How many people had died naturally and turned in the bunker? 

The Colonel knew what it was like out there, although I wasn't sure how much experience he had actually facing them. His team of scavengers, who'd been outside with Dwight, knew what it was like, and I could see the fear slowly creeping onto their faces. But the others still couldn't hear it. They still looked puzzled. They had, at least, shut the hell up.

I listened harder, trying to work out how many were coming. Hardly any of the people here were armed; the Colonel only let his most trusted followers carry weapons. Common sense would have told me to be more frightened than I was, but I only felt hope. If Walkers were getting in, there had to be a way out . 

Bart was walking toward the entrance, a gun raised. There was only one way in and out of here. With a small number of Walkers, that could be played to our advantage. They could only get in one at a time, so we could take them out before they could do too much damage. But, if all the noise down here had drawn a herd…it wouldn't take much to be overrun. 

I grabbed Bart's arm. "Not the gun!"

"Back up!" he yelled. He should have known better. He'd been outside. But he wasn't used to fighting them in enclosed spaces.

"Stop shouting," I hissed. "They can hear."

"She's right," Dwight stepped forward. He'd drawn a knife. "It's the noise that's attracting them."

"Right now, they'll be drawn toward the sirens in the bunker and heading that way," I said. "But if ya'll keep clapping and hollerin' they'll be here before you know it."

"The door is open." The Colonel's face paled, "We can't let them get in."

"Sir?" Bart stood to attention. "Orders?"

"Make sure the bunker is secure," he said. "And close the door. We need those working inside to fix the gas leak to be able to do so in peace."

Bart nodded. He motioned to a few others, including Dwight. Dwight nodded and moved forward, but not before I saw him pass a knife to Sherry. It flashed briefly in the dim light before she hid it up her sleeve. Mark passed one of his knives to Amber. 

Amber, Sherry, and I huddled near the entranceway, listening. Most other folks had backed away from it, terrified of what might stumble through. The Colonel turned to them all, tried to give them a quiet but comforting speech. All eyes were on him. His back was to us.

"This is it," I hissed under my breath. "This is our chance."

"Let me go first," Sherry muttered, brushing past me. I didn't argue. She, at least, had a knife. Sherry slipped through the archway in the rock and back into the darkness of the tunnel. 

Before I followed her, I glanced back to check to see if anybody was watching. The lights of the flashlights and oil lamps were turned toward the Colonel, illuminating him in the center of the cavern. 

I hope this is the last time I see any of you fuckers. 

I stepped out of the cavern. A few seconds later, Amber followed. The darkness was almost all-enveloping. The only light came from the cavern we'd just left. It shrank the more we moved, darkness growing around us. We had to feel our way along the walls, using the sounds to guide us. It felt so wrong to be walking toward the snarl of the dead. Went against every instinct we'd spent over two years building. 

The sirens stopped. Somebody must have shut them off. 

I kept expecting someone to come up behind us and drag us back to the Colonel in the cavern. I was grateful that Amber was taking up the rear. Kept imagining a hand on my back.

Progress was slow. Very slow. We had to feel for turnings, trying to remember the hurried route we'd taken here. The tunnels felt longer than before, stretching on in a neverending labyrinth. Every now and then we came across a body on the floor. Walkers, or so we hoped, Sherry would shout back to us when she came across one, and we'd have to feel our way around it, stepping over them. Praying not to put our bare feet through a ribcage.

We turned a corner. Not far off, a beam of light cut a horizontal line across the ground. Someone had dropped a flashlight. Sherry moved toward it. The small amount of light allowed us to move faster than we had before. A body lay on the ground just beside the flashlight. Behind me, I heard Amber gasp.

Neither of them needed to worry; it wasn't Dwight or Mark. Bart's unseeing eyes stared at us, and I wish I could say I felt even a little bit bad about it, but I didn't. I picked up his flashlight and stepped over him.

Moving faster now we had something to see by, we hurried toward the bunker in search of Dwight and Mark. Had they taken out Bart so it would be easier for us to escape? Or had a Walker got him? The sound of the dead was getting louder. There were other sounds mixed in, too. The crack of skulls and the occasional grunt of someone wielding a heavy weapon. 

We turned another corner, emerging into the tunnel that led back to the bunker door. They'd managed to close it. It gleamed at one end of the tunnel. Shadows moved ahead of us. Many of the Colonel's men were there, but I could make out Dwight too. The dead were easy to distinguish, with their uncoordinated but violent movements. There were so many more than I thought there'd be. I still struggled to feel anything other than hope.

I looked in the opposite direction from the door I didn't want to go back through. The dead were still filing down the tunnel away from it. I flipped the flashlight in my hand, testing the weight of the handle. I'd feel better if it were heavier, but it would have to do. 

Sherry darted out ahead of me, her knife taking out a Walker close to us. I ducked out of the grip of another, turning to smash it in the skull with the back of my flashlight. It didn't go down right away. I had to hit it again. Brains and blood scattered across the walls. 

I need a better weapon.

Or I just need to run. 

There was a gap in the oncoming trickle of Walkers. I saw my chance, and I took it. I ran. The beam of the flashlight swung around in front of me. I could hear footsteps behind me as others followed, but I didn't wait. I didn't slow down. I just wanted to leave. As I ran through the dark, barely seeing more than a few feet in front of me, I tried to remember the route I'd taken when I'd woken up here, ill and cold and shaking. I tried to play it backward. Ahead of me, there was a turn to the left. Slightly further on, the tunnel curved to the right. I could hear more just around the bend.

Is it left or right?

Shit.

Shit, shit, shit. 

I took the left. It was the wrong move, I knew it at once. Instead of more tunnels like I had expected, I was in another cavern. Not as big as the one the Colonel had evacuated us to, but still disorientingly big when you've spent so many weeks in enclosed spaces. I stopped to catch my breath, hearing the sound of Walkers getting closer. With any luck, they'd walk right past. I moved the beam of my flashlight around the cavern in search of anything that would serve as a better weapon. The beam landed on an unmovable shadow.

Someone stood with their back to me. I bit back a scream. They didn't move. Didn't even turn around. They were so still, I knew it couldn't be a Walker unless it was frozen.

"Hey," I called. "You alright? Are you hurt?"

They didn't turn at the sound of my voice. I swept the beam of my flashlight over it as I approached cautiously. It wasn't a person. It wasn't even a goddamn Walker stuck in something. 

It was a dummy. 

Faceless. Eyeless. Smooth plastic that would outlive us all. Even the Walkers would rot before it did. It was dressed in work clothes and a hardhat. A headlamp was strapped around it. 

Holy shit. 

The tunnels weren't just tunnels. This had been some kind of mine. Decommissioned long before society collapsed and turned into a goddamn mining museum. 

A laugh bubbled up inside me. When I got out, there'd be maps. Signposts. I could work out where I was and how to get home. I could bring them all something from the goddamn gift shop. 

I took the hard hat off the mannequin's head and put it on my own. I fiddled with the headlamp to see if I could get it on. It flickered into existence. The light was weak, but it still worked. A pickaxe was discarded in a pile of rocks at its feet. It looked rusty but usable, especially for taking out Walkers. Was it plastic too? 

I picked it up. It was real. But heavy. I'd need two hands to maintain control of it. I slipped the flashlight into the pocket of my dress, keeping it on but relying mostly on the weaker light from the headlamp to see by. 

Armed and ready, I headed back out to the tunnels. Walkers snarled at me from the gloom. I swung the pickaxe hard, piercing the skull of the Walker coming toward me with a crunch. When the corpse dropped, no longer reanimated, the pickaxe almost dropped from my hand, too. 

I'm out of practice. 

I swung at the next one, pushing forward down the tunnel, away from the fucking bunker. Someone was shouting behind me, but I didn't turn. I hoped it was Dwight, Sherry, Amber, and Mark, but I wasn't waiting to find out. I was getting out of here. 

I'm coming, Daryl. Hold on. 

Some crazy part of me hoped he'd feel it. Deep down, where he was probably hurting the most, he'd feel the same pull toward me that I was feeling toward him. It spurred me on and pushed me forward faster than ever. The pickaxe was heavy, but I hardly felt it. I'd feel it the next day; my muscles would ache, but it didn't matter. Maybe they'd be aching at home. 

I reached a tunnel that was more dirt than rock. There weren't any Walkers here, but there were wooden doors leading off. I counted them until I reached the one I was sure I'd woken up behind. 

Shoving on the door did nothing, so I took the pickaxe to it, smashing a hole big enough to climb through. This was it. This was the room I'd woken up in. The pile of blankets was gone, but the trapdoor was in the ceiling. 

I pushed up on it. It didn't budge like last time, but that didn't matter. I grabbed the pickaxe and swung it up again. Splinters of wood rained down on me. I looked up at the hole made by the end of the pickaxe. I froze. 

No. 

No, no, no.

There's a whole herd up there. 

I could hear them. Smell them. The noise I'd been making agitated them. Their frenzied hands clawed at the gap I'd made. 

Fuck.

This was not a safe exit. I backed away. I needed to find Dwight. He knew the way out. I climbed back through the hole I'd smashed in the door and started running back the way I'd come. The Walkers I'd taken out littered the route, serving as markers to guide me back. 

The shadow of a person moved toward me, rounding a corner before they did. I kept moving, raising the pickaxe in case it was another Walker.

When the Colonel rounded the corner, I wished it was. 

"There you are," the Colonel said. "Thank you for your work today. The tunnels are clear. It's safe to return home."

I wish that was true. 

I did not drop the pickaxe. My hands clenched around it, and I stared at him. Breathing hard. 

It would be so easy to take him out. To kill him and keep running. But where would I be running to? There was a flicker of fear in his eyes as he saw me weighing up the idea. He swallowed and raised his hands.

"This has been a trying day for all of us," he said. "I can see you're struggling with the violence that's happened here today. Do I need to call someone to get something to calm you down?"

No.

Not the drugs.

Not again. 

"No, I'm okay," I said, lowering the pickaxe. "It's just… it's been a while since I've seen any of those. I… I think I'm in shock."

"Understandable," he nodded. "Let's go."

 

Daryl

"Can I stay here and help Enid in the medical tent?" Mia tried to sound all casual, but I knew she was desperate for me to say yes. Being a year or two older made Enid the coolest girl on the planet in Mia's eyes—any excuse to be around here and follow what she was doing. I wanted to grab her shoulders, shake her, and tell her she was perfect and didn't need to try to be like anyone else. But I'd followed Merle's dumb friends just because they were older than me. At least Enid was a good kid.

"I dunno…" I said, glancing at Enid and Siddiq. The unease I felt had nothing to do with them and everything to do with the idea that Mia would be out of my sight while I was working on the bridge.

"We can always use the extra hands," Siddiq said. Mia looked at me with wide eyes as if the world would end all over again if I said no. 

"All right," I agreed reluctantly. "But any of them Saviors start kicking off, you come and find me, okay? Immediately."

"She'll be safe here, Daryl," Siddiq said, "Don't worry."

I ignored him. Kept looking at Mia. "You hear me?"

"Yes," she said quickly.

"Right," I nodded. I knew better than to keep arguing or hug Mia while she was trying to appear cool as a cucumber in front of Enid. So, I nodded again and left them to it. The tent flap fluttered closed behind me. 

"Sorry," Mia said, her voice carrying through the tent's thin walls. Sounding like the most embarrassed teenager on the entire planet. "My Dad's, like, weirdly overprotective."

Dad?

DAD?

My feet rooted themselves to the ground. A deep ache opened in my chest even as I tried to convince myself I must've misheard her. Such a big word couldn't fit me. I didn't measure up to all that.

"I've noticed," Siddiq chuckled like Mia had cracked a little joke and not uttered the most life-altering words I'd heard since Naomi agreed to marry me.

"You guys have been through a lot lately," Enid said sympathetically. "Makes sense. It's nice how much he cares."

"Yeah," Mia agreed. "It's been hard for him since we lost Mom."

Oh God. 

Oh God, I can't do this. 

I almost turned around and went back in, scooped her up into a hug she could never leave. But something stopped me. 

Did she mean it? 

I wanted her to. Every piece of my broken heart wanted her to, but…family was complicated. I knew that. Losing Naomi put her in a vulnerable place. She could have been latching onto anything she could for some stability. I was glad it was me. But, when her feet were back on solid ground, she might change her mind. 

Aaron's hand landed on my shoulder, pulling me out of it. "You ready?"

"Not so loud, man," I hissed, dragging him away from the medical tent. 

"Woah," Aaron looked over his shoulder like he was expecting Negan's ghosts to sneak up on us. "What's wrong?"

"Nothin'," I said, ushering him away as fast as possible. Rick had assigned us a job laying the new boards across the bridge the storm had taken out. Aaron followed. He didn't say anything, but I could feel him staring at me. Couldn't think of a reasonable explanation so I let him wonder.

I tried to focus on lifting planks of wood and carrying them to the end of the slowly mending bridge, laying them in place. Usually, having a job like this to do would be a godsend. But the planks weren't that heavy. Getting them lined up wasn't so hard. There was little strain and no pain, so my mind kept spinning. Mia's words echoed in there. 

It had been right not to let her know I'd heard, hadn't it? 

Whatever Mia was working through, she should do it on her terms, right?

She hadn't known I was listening, and it was so… personal. Could make her feel real vulnerable if it wasn't something she was ready to say to me. She could have been testing it out and trying it on for size. I didn't want her to feel pressured into sticking to it if she felt it wasn't a good fit. There must've been a reason she said it about me to someone else, instead of to my face. 

Unless she thinks I wouldn't be okay with it.

That I'd correct her. 

Reject her by saying something dumb like, 'You're a good kid, but I'm just your sister's ex-fiance, and I'm only looking after you out of guilt because it's my fault she's dead, and you're alone now.'

She knows it ain't like that, right?

Right???

I dropped the board I was carrying and looked at the medical tent. Aaron yelped in surprise. His side of the plank dropped on his foot.

"Sorry, man," I said, fighting the urge to straight up walk away from him. There were a lot of people out here on the worksite. It was even busier than when we'd arrived. Mia would be busy with Enid… Carl and Perla had arrived from Alexandria, so she'd probably be eager to spend some time working with them, too. Maybe this wasn't the best time to have a heavy conversation. 

Aaron glanced at me, "Okay, Daryl, I gotta know. What happened?"

I sighed, and picked up the end of the wooden board again. I couldn't look at him, so I focused real hard on getting one foot in front of the other as we carried it to the end of the bridge. "Mia called me her Dad."

There was a short silence, and then Aaron said. "... Is that the first time she's done that?"

"Yeah," I glanced up at him. Mostly just to see his reaction 'cause I couldn't gauge much from his voice. He didn't look that surprised. Or shocked. Or horrified. Something about that relaxed me a little. "She didn't say it to my face or anything. I overheard her talking to Siddiq and Enid, but… yeah, she ain't ever done that before."

I knelt down as we slid the board into place. 

"That's big, Daryl, but…" Aaron paused. "It makes sense."

"It does?"

Why?

Because she's got nobody else?

"Yeah," he shrugged. "Bryce is always talking about how close you guys are and how he's glad she has you. Especially now. It's given her a lot of stability at a really bad time."

I didn't know what else to say. There was too much tangled inside me. 

Aaron let us work in silence for a moment before he said, "You feeling weird about it?"

"No. Maybe. Just… I just… hope I'm what she needs, is all."

"You're a great Dad." 

I still couldn't wrap my head around it, so I changed the subject. "How's Gracie?"

"Perfect. Obviously," he said with a smile. "I can't wait for the first time she calls me Dad. Gets me through all the more... Interesting times we're having right now."

"Oh yeah?" 

"So, yesterday, I went in after her nap and picked her up, and the diaper just exploded all over me. 

"Sounds like good times."

"Oh, the best," Aaron laughed.

Before we had time to talk about anything else, a loud crash pulled our attention down to the other side of the bridge. I stood up from where I was crouched down and squinted against the glare of the sun and some kind of commotion involving Justin. He stood with his back to me, holding up the water container and drinking from it like it wasn't meant to be shared with the group. 

Henry, who was usually in charge of distributing water rations, glared daggers at him. Before anyone could move, he'd whacked Justin's knees with one of the sticks he and the other Kingdom kids carried for protection. It was meant for walkers, not assholes, but I guess it was effective for both. Justin dropped like a sack of potatoes. Laughter rose up around the bridge, but I didn't feel good about it. I started moving toward them as Justin got to his feet. 

Henry had picked up the water and started to walk away. He had his back to Justin, who was advancing on him in a way I didn't like. I grabbed him before he could get there. 

"Hey! Kid's just doing his job," I said. "Get back to work."

"I don't need your people telling me what to do," Justin glared. "You're not my babysitter anymore."

He turned his back on me again. I grabbed his arm. This time, when he turned back, he swung a punch at me. I dodged it. Punched him back. Justin grabbed a fistful of sawdust and threw it in my face. My eyes stung.

It was an all-out brawl in seconds.

Felt good to be fighting. Especially good that it was Justin I was punching. We had a lotta history. I'd always known he was an ass, always had a bad feeling about him, and never been able to prove it. The way he looked at me now… like everything that had gone wrong was my fault… the fact that he was right about that…

God, it felt good to hit him again. 

"Enough!" Rick pulled me off him. I tried to get to him again. "I said enough!"

Fuck you. 

I stormed off that bridge and into the tent Rick had set up as a meeting and planning room. Carol was already in there. Rick followed me in. He told me that Aaron and I would be reassigned to a different task, and Justin would stay working on the bridge. 

Couldn't believe the words coming out of his mouth. "So that asshole just gets a free pass? Is that it?"

"It's just a few more days. I don't like it either, but we're in a rush to get that work done," Rick said. "He's strong. The Saviors are over half the workforce, and we've had too many walk off already." 

"Yeah, 'cause that's who they are," I said. "Some of them ain't ever gonna fall in line just 'cause you say so."

"Daryl's right," Carol said. "These people have never had to live together. And we can't expect them to just forget what's happened."

"It hasn't been easy, I know," Rick said like that was any kind of consolation. "It won't be, not for a while, but it's not about forgetting. It's about moving ahead, all of us, together. We keep doing that; they'll see we're all on the same side."

"Are we, though?" I said. "Are we on the same side, Rick?"

"Well, you tell me."

"Thing is, man, I've been tryin' to," I said. "But you don't seem to wanna hear it."

I walked out of the tent again. I needed a minute. Rick called after me, but I didn't turn around. If he thought that I'd forgotten that Carol was the only reason Mia and I weren't still stuck in Sanctuary, he was damn wrong. 

Mia.

What am I supposed to do about Mia?

More than ever, I wished Naomi was here. She'd know what I should do, whether to let Mia come to me on her own or talk to her about it myself. 

My feet carried me away from the bridge and down to the river. I knew Rick would be mad if he saw me go, but I wasn't walking off. I just needed a minute. Quiet. We'd been living out of tents on this damn worksite for days, and there were so many people around all the time. I walked a little way down the riverbank. The sound of running water drowned out the noise of construction. Quiet except for the sounds of nature. This was what I needed. Well… almost.

"Havin' a weird day, angel," I said to nobody, hoping the right person could hear somehow. The sound of the river probably drowned it out, but I don't think that matters so much when you're talking to a ghost. "Mia called me her Dad today…. And she… she called you her Mom, and I don't know…"

The rest of it got stuck in a lump in my throat. My cheeks were wet. I wiped them, noticing my hands were shaking. 

"I need you," I said, my voice cracking. The rest of me cracked, too. It all spilled out of me. I was getting good at keeping a lid on it, but overhearing Mia callin' me her Dad had loosened that lid. "Tell me what to do. How to handle it."

The river kept running. The wind whispered through the trees.

"Please," I sank to my knees in the dirt like I was praying. "Please, baby. I need you. I need to see you… please… give me something. Fuckin' haunt me. Give me a sign. Anythin'."

I waited. Knowing it was dumb. Knowing there was likely nobody listening. Or even if she was, what could she do?

But it was hard to live with the kind of faith in someone we'd had in each other and have that disappear overnight. She'd always come through for me when I'd asked her. Now, I was asking, begging, and she couldn't respond. I still felt like she would. Like we were so connected, she'd feel the deep pain that was pouring out of me. That it would pull her toward me from wherever she was. I'd even have taken her Walker stumbling out of the woods, called toward me by some undying instinct telling her corpse I needed to see her. 

The forest stayed quiet. And suddenly, it was too quiet. I'd been on my own in the woods hundreds of times, but I'd never felt alone like this before.

I picked myself up and headed back to work. 

Everything was a mess inside me. For the first time since I'd made that promise to Mia, I had a strong urge to find a drink. I tried to channel it into the logs I was chopping, promising myself a smoke later. The swing of the axe. The heavy thud against the wood drowned out how cramped and noisy my head was. 

I almost didn't notice the horses getting spooked. A whiny was dangerously close by the time I looked up. Two Walkers were pretty damn close. There were even more behind them. 

"A herd's comin'!" I yelled a warning as I took out the two that were getting close. "Bug out, now!"

I took out a couple more Walkers, vaguely aware of some yelling behind me. It was a big herd. They were coming thick and fast now. How did this happen? There were meant to be alarms and defenses to stop this. 

I backed away, getting ready to run, but when I looked over at the pile of logs we'd been stacking, I saw everyone else wasn't running like I'd told them to; they were clustered around the logs we'd been piling up. A huge one had rolled off the top, and Aaron was trapped underneath.

Fuck.

Fuck.

No, no, no!

"Get them mules out of here," I yelled to one of them as I ran to Aaron's side. I looked at Jed, "You! Get over here right now!"

The horses ran free. Someone would have to round them up again if they survived the herd. Aaron's arm was trapped, crushed; he couldn't get up by himself. We tried to push the heavy log off him. 

"Go!" Aaron said, looking around at us and the herd about to overrun us. I was surprised he hadn't blacked out from the pain yet. "Get out of here! Go!"

Fuck no.

I can't lose anyone else.

"Keep on him!" I yelled at Jed, straightening up to take care of a few more of the oncoming Walkers and buy us more time to get Aaron out of there. There wasn't much time to feel scared or worried; I just carried on, knowing full well that I wasn't in a place to lose another friend.

I ran back and helped roll the giant log off Aaron's arm. It was broken in several places. Bloodied and mangled. Aaron screamed out in pain. 

"Come on. Get up. Get up," I told him, reaching to help him up. Rick and some of the others from the bridge rushed past. Walkers started dropping. Groaning, Aaron finally got to his feet. I slung his arm around me. I looked at him, "Come on. You're gonna be just fine."

"We've got this," Rick yelled to me. "Get him back to camp!"

"On it."

I raced as fast as Aaron could go. I kept expecting him to pass out. His arm was beyond fucked, but the shock must have kept him conscious. People saw us coming. Shouts ran out through the camp, and by the time we reached the medical tent, Mia was holding it open so I could rush him in. Her eyes widened as she saw Aaron. 

"Where's Siddiq?" I yelled when I got in there. Aaron was losing a lot of blood, I didn't have time to wait around for him if he was tending to some splinter on the bridge. 

"He's gone," Enid said, panicked. "It's just me." 

Oh shit. 

"It's just you then," I said, helping Aaron to the bed. Enid hadn't been training for all that long with Siddiq, but this would work. It had to. 

She took one look at the injury and said, "I have to amputate."

"What?!" Aaron's terrified eyes looked at us.

"There ain't no other way?" I asked.

Enid shook her head, "The only way to stop the bleeding is to amputate and cauterize the wound."

"What?!" Aaron said again. Maybe it would have been better for him if he had passed out.

Enid passed me a tourniquet, which I tied around his arm right above where the wound started. "You got something for the pain?" 

"It wouldn't kick in fast enough," Enid said. "We have to do this now."

I looked down at him, "Sorry, man."

"I need you to hold him down for me," Enid said. I nodded and took hold of one side of his shoulders. She looked to Mia and said, "Heat the iron in the fire. I'll need it to cauterize the wound once I've taken the arm off."

Mia nodded, glancing back at Aaron as she grabbed something metal and retreated from the tent. "You're gonna be okay. We're all right here for you. You'll be fine."

Enid hesitated, her blade hovering over Aaron's arm. Aaron nodded to her, "You can do it. Do it."

He passed out pretty soon after that. But the job was done. Enid cut through the twisted layers of bone, muscle, and flesh. Aaron's severed arm dropped to the ground with a thud. Enid sat back, shell-shocked. 

"Mia!" I yelled. The tourniquet was slowing the bleeding, but he'd need more than that. 

Mia ran back in, a red-hot iron in her hands. Before I could move or take it from her, she'd pressed it to the freshly amputated flesh on Aaron's arm. For a moment, it smelled like Terminus. 

Enid blinked, pulling through her shock. "That's enough. That should have stopped it."

Mia pulled the iron away from Aaron's arm. The bleeding had stopped. She dropped it and sent it clattering to the ground next to Aaron's severed limb. I checked Aaron's pulse. It was steady, but hopefully, he wouldn't wake up anytime soon. I let go of him and stood up. Mia was pale and shaky.

"Hey, you did so good," I said quietly, putting my hands on her shoulders. I glanced at Enid. "Both of ya."

"Is he going to be okay?" Mia was looking queasy.

"Yeah," I said. "I reckon he is. And it'll be because of the two of you."

Before I could say anything else, Bryce stumbled in. "I heard…is…is he…?"

"He's gonna be fine," I said. I stood up so that Bryce could sit down beside him. I had to look away from him. The look on his face reminded me too much of how he'd looked when we'd found Naomi's coat. I turned to the two girls. "Let's step out for a minute. Get some air."

Giving Bryce a moment alone with Aaron, I led Mia and Enid out of the tent. Camp was starting to fill up again, people heading back from taking out the herd. I hoped there weren't any more casualties. 

Rick was heading toward us. Carl and Perla weren't too far behind. Enid raised her hand in a wave as she saw them coming. They waved back. Enid looked over at me and Mia, "I'm gonna go say hi. You coming?"

Mia hesitated, looking at me. She looked so young right then; I couldn't believe what she'd done. How brave she'd been. But she didn't look ready to be around a group of people just yet.  

"Can you give us a second?" I asked Enid. I caught the relief on Mia's face. "Won't be a minute."

"Of course," Enid said. "Take as long as you need. You did great today, Mia."

A smile finally tugged at Mia's mouth. Enid smiled back and went to join Perla and Carl by the fire. Rick ducked into the medical tent. 

I waited until she was gone, Mia looked over at me. "Can we walk a little?"

I nodded, taking a few slow steps away from the medical tent. The fresh air seemed to be doing her some good. We walked a little bit away from camp. The noise of the returning people was too much, and she needed a little time to get her thoughts together after everything that had just happened. "You okay?"

She nodded. The breath she took was still a little shaky, but the color was returning to her cheeks. "Yeah. It was… horrible, but… it felt good to help him."

"You and Enid probably saved his life," I said. "You did such a good job in there… and I ain't just sayin' that, y'know… as your Dad." 

Shit.

No.

That was the wrong thing to say.

I cringed the moment I said it. I'd thought maybe saying it all casually like she had would help, but it didn't. Mia's face paled immediately, "Shit, you heard that?"

"Yeah," I cleared my throat. Now that I'd started this conversation, I didn't know how to handle it. It felt way too big for either of us while we were still so breakable. "I wasn't eavesdropping or anything; I just…overheard."

"I'm sorry," Mia was falling apart faster than I was. She had this guilty look on her face that really didn't need to be there. There was absolutely nothing she could ever say or do that would drive me away. "I mean, it's not even like I know what having a Dad is like. I never knew mine, so it doesn't have to mean anything. You don't need to-"

"Mia, Mia," I had to say it a couple of times before she stopped wigging out. She looked at me, terrified. "You're my kid. That's what you are to me. Don't matter what you call me. Ain't nothing gonna change that. Okay?"

I waited. Her bottom lip was trembling, and her eyes were so bright. She nodded, "Okay."

"Even if you said it and didn't mean it, that's okay with me. It don't change nothing," I said, trying to calm her down. I put my hands on her shoulders to try and get her to stop shaking like a leaf. "I never brought it up before because I wanted a decision like that to be all yours. Didn't want you feeling any kind pressure to change the way you thought about me, or what you call me just because I was marrying Nao- just because I was marryin' your Mom."

"Oh God, you heard that too?" Just as she'd looked like she was about to recover, Mia shrank again like she wanted to disappear entirely. 

"Yeah, and I agree with ya," I said firmly. "Look, for what it's worth, I don't know much about having a Dad either. I knew mine, but I wish I didn't. That gave me my own ideas on what a Dad should be. What I'd try to be if I ever got the chance. And bein' your Dad, Mia… well, that'd be an honor." 

Slowly, Mia leaned into me, like all of her strength was ebbing out of her and she needed someone to hold her up. I wrapped my arms around her. The indistinct chatter from the people gathered around the campfire made Mia's gentle sobs inaudible. I could feel them as I hugged her. She sniffed, "I love you."

"I love you, too."

We stood like that for a moment, hugging each other in the silence. It was the kind of healing that hurts a little while it's happening, but I was glad we'd had this talk. I was glad I'd overheard what I had. Never wanted her to feel insecure about the place she had in my heart. Eventually, Mia mumbled, "Do you think she'd be mad? That I called her 'Mom'?"

"The more into her teenage years Mia gets, the more I dread the day we get into a fight so big she pulls the 'you're not my Mom' card."

If only you'd known, baby.

If only you could hear her.

"Nah," I said, pulling back to see her face. "I think you made one hell of a happy angel up there."

Mia nodded, wiping her eyes on the back of her sleeves. We could see Enid sitting by the fire with Perla and Carl through the trees. She looked more relaxed too. Relieved. I hoped she was proud of what she'd done today, too.

"You wanna go see 'em?" I asked her.

"Yeah," she said. "If that's okay?"

"Of course," I said. We walked back closer to the campfire. I stopped a little distance away, not wanting to cramp her style. "Come find me if you need me, alright?"

"See you for dinner?" she asked. 

"Yeah. See you then." I agreed. It was nearing dark, and people were setting up around the campfire to get something cooking. 

I stopped next to some of the workers Maggie had sent from Hilltop and watched Mia run over to join her friends on their way to check on Aaron. I wasn't planning on talking much, not after everything that had gone down. I'd hoped for a moment to process it all, but one of the Hilltop workers leaned over and asked, "Dixon? What's that? Is it a brand or something?"

"No," I glanced at him. His eyes were on Mia's retreating back and the name across the back of her sweater. "It's her last name."

"That's your kid?"

I felt myself bristle at the interest he was taking. "Yeah. Why?"

He glanced at the woman next to him, who was listening intently. I stood up straighter, and he reluctantly continued. "Hate to ask this, but there's no chance she's been messing with the radios around Hilltop, is there? Y'know, as a prank or something."

"Hell no."

"Sorry. Just…those calls we've been getting on the Hilltop radio at crazy hours…those are from someone who says their last name is Dixon, too. So, I thought maybe it was…" 

"Well, it ain't Mia," I said firmly. But my heart had started racing. That shred of impossible hope flaring up. Hadn't felt it in months. Thought it was dead.

"Yeah, your kid sounds too young to be fair."

"Said her name was something different, too. Natalie or Nadia or something like that."

No.

No fucking way.

I could barely say it, could hardly get it out. They'd started looking worried, so I knew I was staring at them like some kind of madman. Somehow, I managed to ask, "Naomi?"

"Maybe." They exchanged a look. A shrug. It was almost nothing.

But it was enough.

Enough for that small ember of hope inside me to flare into some kind of inferno. It hurt. God, it hurt after so long feeling so cold. But it was also the most alive I'd felt in weeks. 

It can't be her. 

It can't be. 

Can it?

But even as I thought it, my feet were moving. Nothing felt real. Not the camp, not the bridge, not the forest, not even my own body. Felt like I was floating. Seeing it all from above as I ran into the medical tent.

I think I interrupted a heartfelt apology Rick was giving Aaron for getting hurt in this whole mess. Any other time, I'd have felt bad for bursting in like that, but there wasn't space in my head for any other thoughts.

"She's alive," I blurted out when they all stared at me. I couldn't calm down. Couldn't stop pacing. "Naomi. She's alive. She's the one who's been calling Hilltop at night… the radio…" My heart lurched. "Oh, God, the radio! We need to get it back on. Now."

I should have known.

I never should have let them... told them to...

"Woah, woah, woah," Rick stood up. "Daryl, how do you know?"

"Someone from Hilltop just said it."

"They said it was Naomi? Why didn't they tell us sooner?"

"Well, no," I said. Didn't like where this was headed. Hoped we wouldn't have to get into the details of it. Hoped he'd just believe me and get it back on as soon as possible. "But, they said it was a woman…with my last name…and…"

I knew how it sounded coming out of my mouth. Flimsier and flimsier with every word. They would have believed it even less if they'd known about the fight we had right before she went missing. How unlikely it was she'd be using my name. 

But fuck…

What if it's her?

That hope wouldn't die back down again. How could I explain it to them? How could I explain that even if she was dead, like they so clearly thought she was, if anyone could argue the Almighty into giving her one last call home, it was Naomi?

"Daryl, sit down," Rick said, trying to get me to stop pacing back and forth. "Let's talk this through." 

Nope. 

I ignored him, "I'm goin' to Hilltop and I'm turning that radio back on. Tonight."

I started to leave. Rick grabbed my arm. "Daryl, you won't make it there by nightfall."

"I don't care," I pulled my arm free. "The calls ain't comin' until late, I can be there by then."

"No," he shook his head like he could stop me. Like he had a hope in hell of holding me back. "You can't travel at night, it's not safe."

"Screw you, man. I'm gettin' Mia, and I'm goin'."

"Wait!" Bryce said.

I rounded on him. "Really? I'm gonna have to fight you on this one, too?"

"No. Not at all, but…" he hesitated. Probably because I was staring him down like I used to do to Merle. "I don't think we should tell Mia yet. If she thinks it's Naomi and it's not…"

Shit.

He's right.

Our little girl had only just started piecing herself back together again. If it wasn't Naomi's voice on the other end of that radio, she'd be crushed.  

"Right," I said, backing down a little. "You're right." 

I took a few deep breaths. Rick took a tentative step toward me. "Here's what we're gonna do..."

"Fuck you, I'm fucking going ." 

Rick raised a hand to try to get me to hear him out. "I'm gonna call Maggie and get her to turn the radio back on tonight. We'll have someone monitor it out there, and tomorrow, we'll head to Hilltop and see for ourselves." 

"We?"

"Yeah."

"You're comin'?"

"Yes."

"Why?" I narrowed my eyes. 

"I want to hear it, too." 

I stared at him for a second. There had to be more to it than that. But I didn't push it. I couldn't stand losing another second to arguing. I'd already lost so much time. If it really was her, she'd been out there, calling for me… for so fucking long. Why hadn't she been able to make her way home? Was she stuck? Trapped? Injured?

Fuck. 

Fuck. 

I need to go. 

Chapter 72: Unspeakable truth

Notes:

Sorry this too so long, December was crazy. Happy holidays, thanks for making my 2024 so nice 💕 Hope you all had a great end to the year!

Naomi

"That… that is not how you chop an onion," Sherry stared at me like I was some kinda alien. 

"It's smaller than when I started," I shrugged, looking down at it. My eyes were stingin' something fierce, so it was blurry, and I couldn't make out what I'd been doing. I tried to wipe them on my sleeve. "Plus, I think they're tryna blind me, so I'm doin' fine, all things considered."

"Some of the skin is still on it," Sherry tutted.

"Skin ain't poisonous."

"Well, no. But it's not...."

"Who cut this?" A sharp voice interrupted us. Sherry and I both froze where we were. Nora stepped up behind us, her disapproving gaze on the clumps of onion littering the cutting board. Even I had to admit it did look like someone had placed a tiny explosive at the center of an onion and detonated it to avoid cutting it. More efficient if you asked me.

"Er .. I did," I said. Nora stared at me for what felt like a full minute but couldn't have been more than a few seconds.

“Nobody ever taught you how to chop an onion? How to cook?”

I shook my head. The thought of my Momma teaching me to do anything other than lie to authority figures was laughable. Although, begrudgingly, I had to admit that the lying was coming in handy down here. 

"Come with me," Nora demanded. I glanced at Sherry, she looked back wide-eyed, but there wasn't anything either of us could do. Every scrap of goodwill and trust I’d earned in the kitchen might just be about to go down the drain. It was so much easier to talk to Sherry now that Nora had slowly started integrating me into her staff. But getting caught like this…might rip it all away again.

Not that it mattered. Our conversations mostly consisted of commiserating over my failure to contact anyone on the outside. It was starting to get to me. Some of the nausea I was dealing with was pregnancy-related, but the rest was homesickness. Waves of it, crashing over my head and threatening to pull me under.

At least she'd caught us talking about onions, not plotting our escape. That could have landed us in a whole lot more trouble than I was already in. 

Nora led me to the pantry. Like the rest of the bunker, there wasn’t a square foot wasted. High shelves lined the walls, full mostly of canned goods. The lower shelves were taken up with big wooden barrels. Nora nodded to one of them. 

“Get more,” she said. “You need to learn.” 

I opened it up, expecting it to be fuller than it was. I had to reach pretty far in to get it out. If we’d been playing hide and seek, I probably could have climbed in and hunkered down in there for a few hours. I had to almost bend double to grab a few of the papery onions at the bottom. I held them up, “This enough, or do you need more?”

“That's enough,” she said. “Come with me.”

I followed her back to the kitchen. Sherry looked up when we came in, the worry on her face plain as day, although she tried to hide it from Nora. I gave her the smallest nod I could manage. This didn’t feel like a punishment or a banishment from the kitchen. It felt like a lesson in the weirdest classroom in the world. 

Nora took me back over to one of the cutting stations and showed me how to peel and chop an onion. Every few seconds, she’d look up at me and say, “Watch. Watch!” even though I hadn’t taken my eyes off her, and her damn hands were moving so fast it was a wonder she didn’t slice off a finger. The stupid thing still hurt my eyes. I wasn’t even the one cutting it and I wanted to throw the whole thing in the trash.

Nora swept the onion skin into the compost and the uniformly chopped onion pieces into a plastic container. She set the knife down on the now empty cutting board and looked at me. “Your turn.”

An onion was placed in the center of the cutting board before she stepped away from it. She hovered by my shoulder as I stepped up to take her place. It felt like I was sitting an exam. That helped, weirdly. I took a deep breath, took it slow, and tried to remember how she’d done it - step by step. 

"Are they worth it?” I asked, my eyes started stinging again as the knife pierced the flesh by the roots. “I mean… would anyone notice if they weren't in somethin’? Is there any meal where the goddamn onion is the main event?”

“French onion soup.”

“...is that what we're making?”

“No.” Her scowl told me to change the subject. I peeled away all of its papery purple skin, blinking profusely to stop my eyes from stinging. Rubbing them didn’t help. I’d learned that the hard way. I sliced slowly until this onion ended up in smaller, more even chunks than my first. Pieces were still scattered all over the cutting board, but it was less of an explosion and more like a strong breeze had passed over it.

“Better,” she said when I was done. “But so slow. And messy. Again.”

She set another onion out in front of me. Either we had a lot of onions to spare, or she’d decided to make French onion soup after all. I cut into it. 

"Where do these come from?" I asked. "You got some kind of solar farm down here or something?"

"No, there are allotments outside," she said. "Well-protected and hidden of course.”

"Right, of course," I said, trying to keep my expression neutral. "That makes sense."

"Don't worry," she said. "We're not running out of food any time soon."

I returned her reassuring smile as if that was what had concerned me, but something else bugged me. A lot of things bugged me about this place, and it wasn't just that I was locked in here against my will. The bunker looked like it was built to last years, sealed off from the world. Scratch just a little, and some of the facade flaked off.

Outside scavenging teams were relied on to bring in supplies and were more active than I thought they'd be. Outside allotments were relied on for fresh food; did that mean there wasn't enough food already down here to feed everyone? Was the bunker only designed to help people weather a more short-term disaster? Had they had to move faster than they were ready for? Or had they taken in more than they planned because this was the kind of disaster you could technically go outside as long as you were prepared?

I could have brushed it off as any of these explanations if it wasn't for the explosives. The bunker had an outer shell of reinforced concrete. It looked indestructible, even in the event of nuclear war. But in reality, it was built to self-destruct.

Why?

And how long did I have to get the fuck out before I learned the answer?

"That's much better," Nora said approvingly, pulling me away from my dark thoughts. I looked down at the onions I'd been cutting. "I'll make a chef of you in no time. Even down here, we can learn something new every day.”

Yes. I thought. I have learned that I hate onions.

I didn’t say that. Instead, while we were on the subject of learning, I asked, “You guys got a school down here? Y’know, for the kids?”

The silence was deafening. I was expecting the question to take her a little by surprise, but I didn’t think it would make her freeze up in the way she did. The tension that flickered across her face, the tightening of her jaw, and the quick furrow of her brow - she wasn’t as good at hiding things as Jocelyn or the Colonel. 

“I used to teach,” I lied, covering her discomfort as well as mine. I forced a smile, but my heart was racing. “Thought I could be more useful there if cooking isn’t my calling.” 

Nora didn't give much away but her furrowed brow slightly relaxed. “The Colonel and Jocelyn have all that covered. Don’t worry about it.”

“Good,” I said brightly, hoping my smile hadn't wavered. “Well, the offer still stands if they need anyone else.”

Nora gave me a terse nod and then dismissed me. I scampered away with the distinct and uneasy feeling that I’d stumbled on something I didn’t understand. Again. 

That night, I got a knock from Marissa. 

The “gas leak” emergency drill had meant it had been a while since I'd had a chance to sneak into the communications room. Marissa reported that the Colonel had removed it from the cleaning rotas for a few days. Nobody knew why. If I hadn't been so distracted by my frustration at the news, it might have set off alarm bells. 

We slipped into our usual routine, and she dropped me inside the communications room as planned. Every time I sat down, a little piece of my hope was chipped away. Getting through this meant taking each day as it came, but sometimes, my mind slipped into despair, and I imagined doing this for months, years, even. Sitting on this same chair with a baby on my knee. A toddler. A child old enough to start asking for their Daddy all by themselves.

Bet they'll look just like him.

I tried to shake it off and moved the needle to the first of the potential Hilltop frequencies. "If you receive this call, please answer."

I waited. Nothing.

I moved to the second of the potential Hilltop frequencies. "If you receive this call, please answer."

I waited. Nothing. There was one left before I started dialing random frequencies and hoping someone would pick up. If not someone I knew, then ideally, someone who could get a message to them. Someone willing to go to all that trouble for a stranger's voice on the radio. For all they knew, I was someone trying to lure them into a trap. Just like Terminus had done.

Darkness threatened to swallow me whole.

Please, Daryl. Please, please, please.

I need you.

I turned to the third frequency. Someone had answered this once. They'd told me never to call again, but... I'd never been good at doing what I was told. I wasn't about to shut myself off from one of the only other voices I had heard from outside of this place. If they wanted me to shut up so badly, they could pick up and tell me again.

A key slid into the lock. No knock came before it. If Marissa had forgotten to give me our usual heads-up, this would be the first time. My mind went blank, every thought frozen completely still and every ounce of my energy rediverted into moving my body as fast as possible. I blinked and I was in the cabinet, knees pulled up to my chin and my fingers pulling the door shut behind me. Spare radio equipment dug into my back. My fingertips hooked around the hard metal lip on the inside of one of the doors, holding it firmly shut. A small crack of light came through the slight gap between them. 

Footsteps outside. Heavy, although I could barely hear them over the sound of my heartbeat in my ears. 

If it was Marissa, she’d have announced herself. Whoever was in here with me didn’t say anything. 

Please don’t open the cabinet. Please don’t open the cabinet.

A shadow passed over the tiny gap between the closed doors as someone walked over to the radio. Was it still set to the third Hilltop frequency or had I changed it back before I moved? I couldn’t remember anything between hearing the key in the lock and shutting myself in the dark of this cabinet. I was always so careful to make sure that before I left, I returned the radio to the settings I’d found it in so nobody would get suspicious.

The chair creaked as someone sat down. 

Was there a pause? Had they noticed the frequency wasn’t set the way they’d left it? Did I cover my tracks?

My grip on the door tightened. My hands were sweating, felt like the hard ridge of cold metal would slip from my fingertips at any moment. 

The radio crackled, and the Colonel’s voice carried through the door. “Commander, do you receive me? Over.”

There was a slight pause, and then a male voice came back. “Colonel. It’s been a while since you checked in. Do you have the results from Subject 2.0?”

“They didn’t survive. They succumbed to a bite from the undead.”

Is he talking about Bart dying in the tunnels?

Why give him such a weird nickname?

I knew, deep down, that it was something far more sinister than that, but my panic-addled brain couldn't process it. 

“Was there any difference between the way they reacted and the deaths of those born before the outbreak?”

“No. Certainly nothing measurable,” the Colonel said. He sounded stressed. “I think we might need to halt the experiments for a while. We’ve had some… security concerns. The gas leak I reported a few days ago looks like it might have been caused by someone tampering with the gas line.”

Fuck.

Fuck, fuck, fuck.

He's suspicious.

There was a silence on the end of the radio, and then the other voice said, “Get your house in order, Colonel. Continue the experiments.”

“But the evacuation sirens drew the attention of the subjects in the tunnels,” the Colonel said. It was the closest I’d come to hearing him sound whiny. “If they leave containment, they might find their way back here.”

Does he mean the Walkers?

They’d been drawn by the sound of the sirens, but we’d dealt with them all. And they’d never find their way back, Walkers didn’t act like that. They didn't have memory, or intentions beyond eating.

“If the species is to survive, the weakness of the past must be eradicated,” the Commander said. His voice was so damn cold. Or maybe the chill running through me made it sound that way. “Keep the subjects in the tunnels where they are. They are the future of humanity.”

The children. 

He means the children. That’s who they’re experimenting on. 

“I understand, Sir,” the Colonel said. “But we’re running out of subjects. Subject 2.0 is the first in months that was born after the outbreak, and wasn’t immune as we hoped.”

Was he… talking about Callie’s baby? I clenched my jaw hard to stop the sob that was threatening to break out of me. My chest was tight. Too tight to breathe. 

“Unfortunate,” the Commander said, void of emotion. “What about the older children? As expected?”

“Yes,” the Colonel said. “They adapt more the longer they’re in the tunnels. We haven’t lost one for a while. Training is going well. They are successful at keeping themselves alive when we release one of the undead into their containment area.”

“That’s good,” came the reply. “Perhaps we should think about testing them outside of such a controlled environment. When the last of the old world burns and they inherit what’s left, they won’t have it as easy as they do now.”

“Yes, Sir.”

“And we have more post-breakout subjects on the way?”

“Yes. Two newcomers are expecting.”

I pressed my free hand to my mouth to stop myself from screaming. Or breathing too loud. 

If he finds me now I'm fucked.

He’ll kill me for sure.

Or keep me somewhere just long enough to have this baby for his fucked up experiment. 

“Very good,” the Commander said. “Check-in next week.”

“Yes, Sir.”

The chair creaked again. A shadow fell across the gap in the door. Heavy footsteps. The slow hiss of air through my closed fingers felt like it would give me away. 

I'll never get home. 

They don't even know where to look for me. 

The shadow passed again. I heard the door open and close, but it took a while before I could prize my fingers away from holding the door closed. I still felt like I couldn’t breathe, couldn’t make a sound, but now that the danger had passed, tears started to slip down my cheeks. The unspeakable truth of this place had revealed itself, and with it a bleak future loomed in front of me. 

Daryl, please. I need you. Please, please, please. 

We need you.

I put a hand over my stomach, like that could do anything to protect our little one. I stayed that way - shaking - until Marissa found me again.

 

Daryl

The silence had stretched on for so long that I struggled to remember a time I hadn’t been sitting here, in front of this radio, with Rick. Waiting. My whole world had shrunk down to this one shed at Hilltop. People kept offering to take shifts and swap out with me, but I couldn’t imagine leaving it for anything longer than a toilet break. I was eating in here, sleeping in here. I would grow old in this damn shed if that’s what it took.

It had been three days. Felt like three lifetimes.

Rick, on the other hand, couldn’t keep his mind off the world outside of this one. He mostly came by at night at roughly the time the calls had reportedly come through. He’d put Michonne in charge of the bridge and spent most of the day checking in. If I were her, he’d be driving me nuts. 

“You can go, y’know,” I said, breaking the silence for the first time in what felt like hours. “Back to the bridge. I know you want to.”

“What I want is to be here with you.”

It was a nice answer. But, it felt designed to make me drop the subject. 

“Why?” I asked. Rick didn’t say anything. “Spit it out, man. What are you really doing here?”

“Back at the prison, after Lori…” he trailed off for a moment. “After she died I… I kept getting these phone calls. From…from her and other people we'd lost.”

I waited a moment to see if he’d elaborate, but he didn’t. Rick didn’t seem the sort to commune with the dead. Or even believe it was possible. “The hell do you mean you were getting phone calls?”

“They weren’t… real…” Rick said, a heaviness in his eyes. “But… I wanted them to be. I wanted them to be real so bad that for a while, I believed they were.”

I stared at him for a moment, unsure why he was telling me this but knowing it was a difficult thing for him to talk about. “That's… that's messed up, man. I'm sorry.”

“It messed with my head. For a long time,” Rick nodded. “Which is why I want to be here for this. I know what it’s like to want to hear from someone you’ve lost so badly that you start believing you have.”

In the blink of an eye, my sympathy was gone. He thought I was having some kind of psychotic break. “It ain't me that heard her, Rick! It was someone else.”

“They heard someone, Daryl,” Rick reminded me. “We don't know who.”

He thinks I won't know her voice.

That I'm desperate enough to latch onto anything.

“So you think it's a damn coincidence that-”

“Maybe,” he cut across me, clearly not wanting to hear my paper-thin theories on how the love of my life might somehow be alive. “Maybe not. But with everything that’s going on with the Saviors lately, we can't rule out that it's someone messing with us, trying to rattle you. Get you back for killing Negan. Or distract all of us while they sabotage something else - the bridge, maybe.”

Shut up about your damn bridge.

“What, so you think they’re prank-calling some random radio at Hilltop to get back at me for killing Negan even though I only just moved outta Sanctuary to come here?” I felt a flair of triumph that his theories were as whack-a-doodle as mine. “C’mon, man. They had every opportunity to slit my throat while I slept under the same roof as ‘em. Nah. Whatever this is. It ain’t about that.”

“All right,” Rick conceded. “But… I still want to be here when a call comes through. Let me talk to whoever it is.”

“I’ll know her damn voice, Rick.” 

“I know,” he said. All quiet and understanding. “But if it’s not her, will you be okay?”

“I’ll be the same as I am now.” 

So, no.

“I know it hurts right now, Daryl,” Rick said. “But it's not even been three months. After Lori, I never thought I’d find anyone… but then Michonne came along, and… It will get better, Daryl. Eventually.”

No.

No, it fucking won’t.

I didn’t want it to either. Felt like I’d be dishonoring her memory if it did. 

It took everything in me not to smack him. I knew he was trying to be nice, that he understood what I was going through, and that it came from a good place. But we were not the same. 

In Lori, he’d lost a childhood sweetheart, a first love, a wife. 

In Michonne, he’d found a second chance, a partner in all of this shit, a soulmate. 

Naomi was all of that for me, wrapped up in the prettiest damn package I'd ever seen. 

“Ain't like that,” I said. “Not for me.”

“But you never know what -”

“No,” I cut across him for his own safety more than anything else. “She was it for me. I ain't saying I believe in The One or all that crap but for me? For her? Ain't nobody else.”

“All right,” Rick said. I don’t know if he believed me or not. Didn’t care whether he did. Explaining that there had only ever, in my whole life, been one person who’d set my soul on fire the way she did felt pointless. Rick sighed, “It’s just… sometimes it feels like we lost you both that day.”

You did.

I looked at my shoes. It must be hard for them, having to deal with me like this. A shell of their friend, wearing his face, dead inside without the decency to become a Walker so they could take him out properly.

The silence came back. Punctuated by rain on the shed roof. Just a few drops at first, like the tick of a clock. But then more and more. The seconds piling up. Rivers of time ran down the windows, drowning me in the certainty that I was too late.

Even if it was her, she might never call back because I let them turn this fucking radio off. 

I'm never gonna see her again. 

The door opened. Maggie hurried in, hair damp and a little out of breath from running over. There was a thermos of something in one hand, two mugs clutched in the other. She held them up. “Thought you might need something warm.”

“Appreciate that,” Rick said as she set down the mugs and poured hot tea.

“Anything?” she asked, although it would have been obvious that I wouldn’t be sitting here if she’d called. I’d have been on my way to get her from wherever she was. I had a bag packed and ready to go. Food. Medical supplies. A book. Snacks. Anything she might need.

“Nah, not yet,” I said. Maggie nodded, giving me the kind of sympathetic smile I can’t stand. I changed the subject. “Mia okay today?”

“Yeah, she's good,” Maggie said, her smile changing to a more positive one. “Great, actually. You know how rare it is for someone to volunteer to muck out the stables?” 

Felt like my heart grew a size every time someone else noticed how great Mia was. I couldn’t hide my smile. “She's crazy about them horses.”

Maggie passed out the mugs. I took mine without any real intention of drinking it. It was good for warming my hands. Days were getting warmer, but the nights were still cold. I was itching to drink something stronger. I wouldn’t. I wasn’t going down that path ever again. But I wanted it.

“I’ve promised to let her in the saddle tomorrow,” Maggie said. “Mostly as a distraction from all of her questions about why it’s taking you so long to come back from the hunt she thinks you’ve been on.”

Guilt stung me. I didn’t like lying to Mia, but it felt necessary. 

“Appreciate that.”

“You want me to take over here for a while?” She offered it to us both, but we knew only one was likely to accept. 

Rick shook his head. “No, I’m good. Thanks, though.”

Her gaze slid over to Rick, and I watched her steel herself for the real reason she’d come out here in the rain. “We found out what happened to the missing Saviors. Oceanside’s been taking them out.”

Rick straightened up in his seat. Worry flickered across his face. “Oceanside?” 

Maggie nodded. “Anyone they see as responsible for what happened to them. They got Justin. Tara and I found them about to execute Arat.”

“Did you stop them?” Rick asked. 

“Yes,” Maggie said, the regret written all over her face. “But I wish I hadn't. What they did deserves an answer.”

Rick looked at the floor for a moment, weighing our options. 

“You know how long it's been going on for?” I asked. Maggie shook her head. 

“Not exactly,” she said. “Not long. Probably since we all came together to work on the bridge.” 

I shrugged but didn’t say anything else. They might have been responsible for the Saviors who’d left in the winter, too. Marissa and John might have played a part in slaughtering every male member of Oceanside, but I doubted Amber had. Negan wouldn't have had one of his so-called wives doing his dirty work like that. Maybe Mark had been there, and they'd decided Amber was guilty by association. 

“Do the Saviors know?” Rick asked.

“Not officially,” Maggie said, “but news travels fast. Especially in a camp that small. Carol’s keeping an eye on things.”

“Can’t expect Oceanside to work alongside the Saviors,” I said. “Not after everything.”

Rick sighed, head in his hands for a moment. After a beat, he looked up, “All right. Tell Carol to take them all back to Sanctuary. We’ll figure out what to do from there. Can you spare more people from here to work on the bridge?”

“A few,” she said, but she didn’t look happy about it.

“Ask the King, too,” Rick said. “Construction is almost done, so it shouldn’t take too much longer. Michonne says there’s-”

Whatever Michonne had told him earlier, I never got a chance to hear. Because right then, a voice cut through him. Cut through me. Cut through everything. 

“If you receive this, please answer.”

It's her.

Holy fuck. 

It's her!

Maggie grabbed my arm like Naomi’s ghost had walked right in here and tried to shake her hand. Rick stared at me, eyes wide with disbelief, as he picked up the receiver. “Naomi?”

“Rick?” I heard her voice crack, and it cracked something in me, too. There was so much disbelief in her voice. So much fragile hope. “Is that you, Rick? Did I actually do it?” 

Rick turned to me. Held out the receiver. I couldn’t speak. I couldn't move. Couldn't breathe. We were both frozen there for a moment. Rick snapped out of it faster than I did, “Yes. Yes. Naomi. Where are you?”

“Oh my god, I did it. I actually… Oh my God…,” her voice trembled through the airwaves. I knew she’d be shaking like a damn leaf, and I just wanted to hold her. “Mia and Daryl…did they make it? Are they okay?”

My heart clenched in my chest. It was her first contact with home in months, and we were the first thing she asked about. Her family. Rick beckoned me closer, but I couldn’t move my feet. 

“Rick? Are you there? Can you hear me? I don’t have long. I’ve only got a minute or so left.”

Why?

WHY?

“Yes. They’re both much better, healing just fine. Mia’s back on her feet, Daryl’s been looking after her,” Rick said. My stomach dropped. Suddenly, I got why I couldn’t move, and why I couldn't bring myself to take that receiver from Rick. I’d been looking after Mia on the assumption that it was what she would’ve wanted despite our fight. A dead girl couldn’t argue with me, couldn’t remind me that what had happened to Mia was all my fault. I’d been able to project my own selfish wants onto her ghost. But now here she was, able to tell me that it wasn’t. That she hated me. That I wasn’t allowed around either of them again. 

“Good. Good. Thank God,” she said. Sounded genuinely relieved about it, too. My heart clenched again. My shaking hand took the receiver from Rick. He’d paused too long, left too much silence. Naomi was already talking again, rushed and hurried. Panicked. “Listen, Rick, I’m sorry to rush this, but I’m basically out of time.” 

Out of time?

Why? Who’s stopping you from talking?

What are you so scared of? 

“I’m in a bunker - one of those doomsday ones that preppers built way before all of this. God knows how deep underground it is, and I don’t know where exactly I am. I can’t see outside, and they won’t let me go above ground.”

What the fuck?

Without pausing for Rick to say anything, Naomi carried on, talking fast. “From what I have managed to see outside of the actual bunker, I think it’s near or in an old mine. And it can’t be far from home because Dwight found me in the lake. I’d fallen through the ice hunting down someone I thought was Negan. Dwight knew I needed immediate medical attention and didn’t want to give away the location of any of our communities, so he took me back here. Which probably saved my life. I was in pretty bad shape for a while. I got pneumonia. I was delirious and kept tryna fight them, so they… injected me with somethin’. A… a drug. I….”

No.

No, no, no, no, no.

I'll kill them all. Every last one. 

My hand was shaking so much that I dropped the receiver. It swung on the coiled wire. Being injected with something against her will and without her consent would have been scary for anybody but for her… I felt sick at the thought of it. The torment she’d have gone through when she realized what was happening to her. 

Before now, I’d tried hard not to think about where she might be and what she might have gone through. I’d known it would have been bad to keep her from coming home to us, but… did it have to be this bad?

Rick picked up the dropped receiver and pressed it back into my hands. 

Naomi recovered slightly and kept going at the same breakneck speed, “I kept askin’ to leave, to go home, and at first I wasn’t well enough, but now… now they won’t let me… and I just… I just… Don't tell Daryl and Mia all of this when you speak to them. I don't want them to worry, but… tell them I tried, okay? I’ve really, really been trying to come home.”

“I’m right here, Naomi. I got you,” I said. My voice was so thick with emotion I was worried she wouldn’t recognize it. I was surprised I even got the words out, but the way her voice broke pulled them out of me. She needed me. Needed someone. I could hear it. I cradled that receiver as gently as I wanted to cradle her. 

“Oh,” she said. It was more of a sob than a word. “Hey.”

“Hey.”

Why was it that we never had the words for moments like this? Why, after months of praying for just one more conversation with her, couldn’t I say more than a single word?

“You heard all that?” she asked tearfully.

“Yeah,” I said. No use pretending I hadn't. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine… Well, I'm… Daryl, we're…We're gonna…I’m… I'm…” she trailed off for a moment, the kind of pause that made my heart race. “Yeah, I'm good. Healthy.” 

Fuck. 

Something's wrong. 

She's hiding something. 

What can be worse than what I already know? 

“They ain’t hurting me or anything,” she said, pre-empting all of the places my brain would go when I thought about what might be happening to her in there. “I just want to come home.”

“I’ll find you, Naomi. I swear,” I said. Some people might’ve thought I had no business promising something like that with the odds so stacked against us. But not me. I'd tear this world apart to get to her. “I ain't ever gonna stop looking, not till I bring you home. I'll find you. I will.”

“I know,” she said, and she sounded a little calmer. My failure to keep her safe from this or to find her sooner hadn’t been enough to shake her faith in me. “I know.”

What’s wrong?

“I’m sorry it took so long. I’m sorry you’ve been calling and calling, and I didn’t… I didn’t…”

“It’s okay,” she said softly. “I’m sorry, Daryl, but I have to go now. They can’t catch me here, or I won’t be able to call again. But tomorrow night. Same time. Do you think you and Mia could… Do you think I could talk to her?”

“We’ll be here.”

“Don’t pick up unless you know for sure that it’s me,” she said, a strong warning in her voice. I thought that might be it. That she’d be unable to say anything else before she had to go, pulled away by whatever mysterious threat she was trying to shield me from. But after another heartbeat of silence, she whispered a soft, “I love you.”

“I love you. I’ll find you, angel. I will.”

There was no response, only static. God, I hope she heard me. 

For a moment, there was nothing but silence. A void left behind by her voice. After taking so damn long to pick it up, I couldn’t let go of the receiver. Rick gently pried it from my hands. 

“Where… where is she?” I asked him as he set it down again. He shook his head. I knew he didn’t have any more information than I did, that we’d all heard the same things, but I couldn’t stop myself from saying it. “Where is she?”

What I really meant was, Tell me where to dig.

Now I knew she was out there, I’d never stop. I sure as hell couldn’t sleep, and nobody tried to make me. We sat up all night, pouring over all of Hilltop's maps for any mines. Turned up way too many for my liking, but at least we had some places to start. When we spoke to her again, we might be able to narrow it down. 

Day broke, and that was about as long as I could wait. I climbed the stairs of the big house to the room Mia was staying in next to Maggie and Glenn. I knocked, although it was early, and called through the door, “Mia! You awake?”

“Daryl! You're back!” her excited voice carried through the door. I could hear her scrambling around on the other side of it. “Guess what! I've been helping with the horses, and Maggie says that today she's gonna let me-”

The door opened. Mia, still in her pajamas, was beaming with excitement. It probably wasn’t too far from how she might have looked when she was a few years younger, opening her door on Christmas morning to see if Santa had been. The thought of it and the news I was about to bring her choked me up for a moment, and I couldn't speak. 

Mia took one look at me, and her smile fell. 

“Oh my God,” she said, preparing for the worst. There were already tears in her eyes. Her bottom lip started to tremble. “You found her, didn't you? That’s… that’s what you’ve been doing.”

I nodded. The way Mia’s face crumpled made it clear she thought I’d found the worst. The tears in my eyes probably didn’t help. 

“She's alive.” 

“What?”

“She's alive,” I said again. I might never stop saying it. “Naomi's alive.”

I watched it hit her. Felt like it hit me all over again. The pain it reawakened. The grief. Unraveled, but not fixed. Not until she was back with us for real.

Mia's eyes moved to look behind me like she was waiting for Naomi to step out and hug us both. Like I’d been hiding her as part of some big reveal. Fear started to overtake the shock. “Can…can I see her? Is she okay? Is she hurt? Where…where is she? Why isn’t she…?”

“She’s not here. Not yet,” I said. “But… she called the radio last night.”

“Why didn't you wake me up?” she said, frantic. 

“She didn't have long to talk,” I said. “But she’s going to call back tonight. She asked for ya. She can’t wait to talk to you.”

It did nothing to soothe her, nothing to calm her down. “You knew, didn't you? That's where you've been. You've not been hunting at all. You knew she was the one calling the radio at night and you've been waiting for her to call back.”

“Yes. We didn't know for sure that it was her. But…yeah. I hoped.”

“You should have told me!” Anger burst right out of her. 

“Mia-”

“It's not fair! It's not fair you got to talk to her and I didn't. I should have been there!” 

“I didn't know for sure.”

“I don’t care! You should have told me!” she yelled. I could hear people stirring in the house, drawn to the sound of an early morning argument. “That's so selfish, you had no right to decide that for me! You just wanted her all to yourself!”

I knew the blow wasn’t meant for me. Not really. She was processing. So I took it, absorbed it, let it go. Because that’s what Dads should do, they shouldn’t launch blows of their own. Mia was glaring at me, but I knew what was underneath it. I'd felt anger that bubbled like that too. I watched it build until she cracked, her face crumpling again. What broke out of her in the end was a sob. 

“It's okay,” I said as I hugged her. “It's all going to be fine.”

“Shit, I'm sorry,” she sobbed. Wasn't sure I'd heard her curse before. “I didn't mean to… I didn't mean… Dad, I'm so sorry.”

“It's okay,” I said, wondering if my heart would ever stop clenching like that when she called me ‘Dad’. “It's okay, sweetie.”

“I didn't mean-”

“I know. We're all good, Mia.” 

“Really?”

“Always.”

Mia could cuss me out until the cows came home and I'd still be here. She was shaking. I knew how she felt, but hated that I couldn't do anything about it. Naomi was alive. It was a fucking miracle. But, she was also so far from us. She'd been gone so long, and Mia knew what that implied better than anyone. I couldn't shield her from that unspeakable truth. 

“She’s in danger, isn’t she?” Mia asked quietly when her crying subsided. I knew it wouldn't take her long to voice what she'd known since I'd told her. “That’s why she isn't here…why we haven't heard from her until now.”

“Yeah,” I said. “But now we know, we can help her. We can get her back.”

Mia pulled back and looked up at me, eyes puffy from crying. She looked so young. Too breakable for a hope so heavy. “It’s really her? She's really alive?”

“She's alive,” I said. “And she's coming home. I promise.”

Chapter 73: He knows! (but not everything)

Naomi

He knows!

He knows I'm alive.

It felt like a dream. I had to grip the handle of the knife real hard to stop my hands from shaking. It wasn't nerves or fear that made me jittery anymore; it was the anticipation of getting out of here. Seeing my family again. I was going home! Sure, it might take them a while to find me. Might take even longer to actually get me out, but it would happen. 

As sure as I knew the sun was still rising and setting over the earth I was buried under, I knew Daryl would find me. Didn’t need to see it to know it was in motion. 

I couldn’t think about it for too long, or I’d never get anything done. Hope and joy bubbled up inside me and made me want to dance around this damn bunker to a beat only I could hear. But people would notice that. It would make them suspicious. Or they'd sedate me again. 

Cutting vegetables was a good enough distraction. It gave me an excuse to keep my head bowed to hide my smile. I'd graduated from onions (Thank God), and today, I'd been permitted to slice other things under Nora's tutelage. None of these vegetables were trying to blind or maim me in any way, so it was a huge improvement. 

“You’re getting much better at this,” she said. The teenage version of me, who still lived somewhere deep in my brain, craving the approval of any authority figure, punched the air. “We might be able to move you onto sauces one of these days.” 

“It don't come from a jar?” I asked, mostly as a wind-up. 

Nora sighed, but the ghost of a smile twitched at the corners of her mouth. “No. It doesn't.”

I grinned at her. To my surprise, she smiled back. My good mood was infectious.

“I had my doubts about you,” Nora said, wiggling her wooden spoon at me. “But you seem to be settling in now. Something has changed and I think it's being here and learning to cook.” 

‘Course you do.

Lots of things had changed. My smile was genuine now. There was a tension I'd been carrying as long as I'd been here that had melted away the second I'd heard Daryl's voice. I felt lighter than I had in months. I’d been humming in the damn kitchen.  

“Maybe I'm just glad to be away from those damn onions,” I said. 

“No,” she said, shaking her head. “It's the kitchen. You’re settling in. Nothing says ‘home’ like cooking a meal for people you care about.”

Home. 

I'm going home.

He knows!

A thrill ran up my spine every time I thought about it. Nora chuckled at the involuntary smile that spread across my face like she was right. Like dicing carrots had cured my borderline homicidal rage at being sealed in a bunker against my will with maniacs experimenting on children. 

“When did you learn to cook?” I asked to distract her from any more questions about my change in demeanour. And also to distract myself from thinking too hard about the horrors I'd uncovered here. 

“My Mom taught me. She started when I was very young. I'd help her make dinner. It was something we did together,” Nora said. “Her Mom taught her. I was teaching my son, before…”

She stopped. The same tone and misty eyes everyone got these days when they thought about the Before Times. It was the most personal information she’d ever shared with me. She was usually so stoic, stern, and closed off. 

“He's not…in here?” I asked. 

Nora shook her head. “He was out of state, visiting his father. But they're safe. They have a… similar setup to this one.”

I nodded as if that was a normal thing to say, and every family knew a network of preppers to hide with when a mysterious virus swept the world and made the dead walk. 

Was it the same place the Colonel was talking to on the radio…?

Nope. 

Not my business. 

My business is getting home. 

Instead of digging deeper, I said, “Glad he's safe.”

“When the Colonel gets word that the world is safe for us to return to, I'll see him again,” she said. “And when that time comes, I'll cook him his favorite meal. Nothing in this world beats the feeling of making good food you can share with the people you love most.”

“I'll take your word for it,” I said, but when I looked down at the cutting board, those silly little vegetables didn't look so silly. Not when I thought about plating them up with a steak and putting them down in front of Daryl. 

Daryl and I had always been fighting for scraps - roadkill, dumpster diving, and a sprinkle of shoplifting spiced our meals even when we were kids. It had never really been about how it tasted. Good food was saved for those who were doing more than just surviving. That was what I wanted for him - a life that was safe enough that our biggest worry when it came to food was how to season it. 

It was the kind of life I wanted for Mia, too. More than scraps. Good food to help her grow. 

Mia. 

I'm gonna get to speak to her. 

Tonight. 

I thought about Mia around that table, giving her a meal she'd pick the broccoli out of because she'd always hated it. I'd tell her off, but I wouldn't really mean it. Daryl would probably eat what she didn't want on the sly to cover for her and then confess it to me the moment she went to bed, and we were washing up. I ached for those small moments of family normality. 

Of course, when I got back, it wouldn't be the three of us around the family table anymore…

Well, shit.

… I guess Daryl doesn’t know everything.

“Naomi,” Sherry interrupted my thoughts. I glanced at a clock on the kitchen wall. I'd been expecting this interruption, but it had snuck up on me. “Can you take these back to the supply closet for me?”

“Sure,” I said, taking the box of unused canned sweetcorn from her. 

“I'm done here, for now, right? Prep is over?” I looked to Nora for permission. I couldn’t risk her saying no, but it felt smart to keep her on my good side.

“Of course,” Nora said. I hadn't seen her this relaxed before. It was crazy how talking about family can have that effect on someone. Softening them a little, letting them relax into the person they were before they lost them. “Good work today.”

It was the closest I’d come to a gold star since school, and boy, did I take it that way. I practically skipped out of the kitchen. Felt like I was walking on air all the way to the storage room. Dwight was already in there, waiting. I hurriedly closed the door behind me. 

“We did it!” It came out as a squeal. I wanted to shout it. Jump up and down. Dance around this bunker until they got so sick of me that they sent me outside, and I could sit and wait for Daryl to pick me up.

Dwight's eyes widened and flickered to the door, concerned we’d be overheard. In the kitchen, Sherry would deal with any requests to go to or from the storage room, but there was no guarantee how long we’d get in here before we were interrupted. I questioned Dwight on everything he knew about this place, every detail of his scavenging trips, the allotments they’d pick things up from, and anything he might have overheard from the people he traveled with. I went over everything so many times and from every conceivable angle that I could think of that he must’ve been so sick of my damn questions by the end. I needed to be thorough. The weakness of this place could lie in the smallest details.

When I’d gotten everything out of him that I thought I was going to, I headed back to my room and wrote down everything I could remember while it was still fresh. Then, it was just a case of waiting and acting normal. A hard thing to pull off when I was too excited to eat. 

Time slowed to a crawl. Yesterday had been easier. I’d had no idea it was the day I’d finally get through to them, but now I knew that when Marissa knocked, I’d not only get to hear Daryl’s voice again but Mia’s too… It felt like that knock took a week to come. 

When it finally did, I’d been waiting, pacing by the door for about half an hour. Curled up at the bottom of a cleaning cart didn’t feel cramped anymore. Felt like the best journey I’d ever taken. 

Instead of leaving me in the Comms room, Marissa stood guard outside. Now that we’d made contact, she was willing to put her neck on the line. Whatever time I could get to communicate with the outside was worth protecting. If the Colonel returned early, she'd stall him, warn me, and try to get him away again. 

I sat down in front of the radio. For the first time, I switched that thing on without any despair - just hope and the joy of doing something I'd been looking forward to all day. Not having to cycle through frequencies gave me another jolt of happiness. I hadn't realized how much I'd been clinging to my sanity by my fingernails until I had something solid to hold onto.

“Hilltop? Are you there? Can you hear me?”

They'd been waiting. The reply was immediate. “Naomi!”

Mia. 

She's okay. 

She's really okay!

I thought I'd been prepared to hear her voice again, but it choked me up immediately. While Daryl's voice had calmed me, and soothed me right down to my restless and homesick soul, Mia's was a burst of energy. She sounded so damn happy. I squeezed my eyes shut for a moment. Remembered when she'd shout my name like that while she ran toward me across the schoolyard. 

“Mia! Are you okay? How’s… how… how are feeling? You were so…ill when I left, are you doing okay, sweetie?” 

“Yes. I'm good!” she said. I listened for any hint of a lie but couldn't find one. She sounded good. Happy. The relief was so strong it hurt. The guilt that had been gnawing in my gut for weeks started clawing its way out of my windpipe. Damn near choked me. 

“I'm so sorry I left. I didn't mean to leave you…I never thought that I'd… I'd never have left you on purpose, you know that, right?” I said. “I love you so much. I never meant to leave you on your own.”

“You didn’t. I had Daryl” she said, and I stood no chance against the tears I'd been fighting back. The damn burst, my heart aching with guilt, and with the knowledge Daryl had been exactly the kind of man I'd always believed he would be. “I'm fine. I got a scar, but it's kinda cool, actually. And it doesn't hurt anymore.”

I furiously wiped the tears from my cheeks, taking a deep breath to push the rest of them down. Before I could compose myself, she blurted out, “I rode a horse today!”

Instead of a sob, a laugh burst out of me. It must have taken all of her mental energy to hold off telling me that right away and let me get the sappy stuff out of the way first. While I hoped that ‘sister coming back from the dead’ would beat ‘first horse ride’ for the biggest news of her week, I knew it would be a tight race. 

“You did?”

“Yeah… it was scarier than I thought,” she admitted quietly. Like she was confessing something at church. “It feels a lot higher off the ground than I thought it would. Maggie makes it look so easy.”

Maggie.

God bless her.

“Maggie’s teaching you? That's great!” I said, wondering how long they'd both been at Hilltop. “How is she? How’s baby Hershel?”

There was a slight pause, and then Maggie’s voice came through, “We’re all good here, Naomi. Let’s focus on getting you home, yeah?”

God bless her again for trying to keep us on track. I could have sat here talking about nothing with Mia until the Colonel came back, but Maggie was right. Mia could talk my ear off about her riding lessons when I got home. Maybe she'd even let me watch one if I promised not to cheer too loud on the sidelines. 

“Right. Yes. Of course,” I said. But then, because I couldn't resist, I added, “You there too, Daryl?”

“‘Course I am,” he said immediately. That voice of his sent a warmth right through me, and my stomach flipped. “You all right, Naomi?” 

Pregnant!!

I'm pregnant!!

The words had almost slipped out on that first call, and they threatened to do the same now. Looping like an alarm in my head every time I heard his voice. Not telling him felt like lying to him. But…this wasn’t a social call. We had shit to do. To plan. 

Telling him would derail everything.

So instead, I said, “Yeah. I'm all good.”

“All right,” he said, but there was something in his voice that sounded like he didn't believe me. Turns out I struggled to lie to him even when those blue eyes of his weren't piercing their way through to my soul. 

Shit.

Fuck it.

Do I just tell him?  

Mia was listening. Maggie, too. Rick was probably there. Without weirdly asking for some kind of roll call, I had no way of knowing how many people were listening in. I'd never broken news of this magnitude to him - to anyone - but I was pretty sure it wasn't the kind of thing he'd like hearing in front of other people. I knew he’d be over the moon, but the conversation would likely get emotional. Something he’d rather avoid with an audience.

It would be an extra layer of worry, too, on top of everything else he’d be fretting about.

“How long have you got, angel?” he asked, a note of panic in his voice. I’d been quiet for too long.

“I don’t know,” I said, trying to push all of the personal shit aside so that I could focus. “But not long. Listen, it ain’t just me and Dwight in here. Sherry, John, Marissa, Amber, and Mark are here, too. They all want out, and they’re all willing to help.”

“Woah, woah, really?” Daryl asked. “How many goddamn people have they got down there?”

“About a hundred,” I said. “Or so I've been told. Haven't seen everyone, but this place is huge, and there are cameras everywhere.”

“They armed?” Daryl's mind, predictably, was fixed on how many people he'd have to fight rather than any kind of awe over how someone had built a place like this.

God, I miss you. 

“Some of ‘em,” I said. “But not a lot. I think there's a way of getting us all out of here without any fighting. You'd be outnumbered, I don't want to risk anythin’.”

There was a silence, during which I could only assume Daryl was making some ominous and violent threats against anyone keeping me here. Risk be damned. Somebody must have subdued him because then Maggie spoke again, “Is Amber okay? Last time I talked to her she told me she was… expecting.”

It threw me for a loop. I wasn’t sure how many people had known about Amber’s pregnancy before she’d disappeared, but I guess it made sense that she’d talk to Maggie about it. Now that the topic of pregnancy had come up organically, I felt even weirder about keeping mine to myself.

“Yeah, she's good,” I said. “Baby’s growing well. Both of ‘em - healthy, but…depending on how long it takes to find us, it could make it difficult to get her out.”

“God,” Maggie said. “Must be hard for her.”

You have no idea. 

“She's doing okay,” I assured them. “Much better now we got a real chance of coming home.”

My voice cracked at the end, and I couldn’t get anything else out for a moment. I hadn't bargained on how hard it would be to talk to them all without breaking down. Hearing home without being able to get to it wasn’t as awful as being cut off from it, but it was still hard. It would be hard for them to hear, too. There was a pause, and then Mia spoke.

“Why won’t they let you leave?” Such an innocent question. Of course she had it. I'm sure they all did, but the adults knew not to ask it. 

I think they want my baby.

I’d avoided that thought as much as possible. Cold dread washed over me every time it snuck up from the deepest recesses of my mind. If I told Daryl that, I’d return to find the world as nothing but scorched earth, and everyone in this bunker would be strung up and bled out. 

“They’re very… secretive about this place,” I said, which wasn’t an outright lie; it just wasn’t the whole truth. “And I think they’re scared that if they let us go, we’ll bring an army to their doors to take what they’ve built.”

“That’s dumb,” Daryl said. “If they let you go, I’ll leave ‘em alone.”

“I tried tellin’ them that,” I said.

“Then I guess they made their choice,” he said. His conviction, his certainty, brought a smile to my lips. “So, what can you tell us? Is there a way to get in?”

“No,” I said. I could tell from his tone he was taking a mental inventory of the explosives at his disposal and how much he might need to bring with him. “This place is built from reinforced concrete and could probably survive most things except a direct hit from a nuclear weapon.”

There was a slight pause. “Eugene says we ain't got one of those, and he can't make one.”

“That's… for the best,” I said, trying not to laugh. “I don't think there's a way to get you in , but when you're near, I can get us out. ”

“How's that?”

“There was an evacuation drill recently, and they opened the doors. I tried to…get out, but…it's a real labyrinth down here, and I couldn’t find an exit,” I said. “But if you can find us, and find a route through the mines to the bunker, we can stage another emergency. It’ll open the doors; we can use the chaos to slip away, and you can lead us out.”

“You sure it’s a mine?” Daryl asked.

“Yes,” I said. “A decommissioned one.”

I described every detail I could remember from my brief escape attempt. I told them everything I could about the dirt room I’d woken up in with the trapdoor I’d tried to get back to. I tried my best to describe the route from there, through first the dirt and then the rock tunnels, to the shiny blast door that now sealed me here. Daryl asked a few questions, and then I moved on to tell them everything I’d learned from Dwight.

I gave them the details of every place he’d scavenged and any landmarks that might help them to place those locations on a map. I told them about the times they’d been near Sanctuary, and the visits they made to allotments where some of the food for the kitchen was grown. I couldn't give them any concrete directions. Dwight, John, and Mark were still outsiders, untrusted, and blindfolded on journeys out of the bunker, so they wouldn’t be able to give anyone directions back to it if they fled on their mission. Dwight estimated that their car journeys usually lasted around three hours, a detail that seemed to stick with Daryl. 

“Was it the same when they found you?” Daryl asked. “The same three hours?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “I was unconscious for most of it. But I can check with Dwight.”

There was a short silence. 

“Once we set off, I uh…” he cleared his throat. His discomfort at having to say whatever he was gearing up to say was palpable, even given how many miles I was from him. A three-hour drive, I guess. “I won’t be able to talk to you anymore. Can’t take the radio. We’ll have to… pass messages between us, y’know?”

Shit, that’s right.

Fuck, I should tell him now. Before the choice is taken from me.

If it took them too long to find this place, or if something got in the way, I risked him dropping dead of a heart attack if he found me walking out of here with a baby in my arms.

I’d paused for too long, indecision tying up my tongue. Daryl cleared his throat again and spoke quietly, “But ‘s’alright, ain’t it? ‘Cause I’ll see ya soon.”

There was something so needy in his voice it broke my heart a little. There was so much I wanted to say to him, and I was sure after so long apart, he’d be the same. But I couldn’t. Not with so many people listening in.

“Of course,” I said quickly. “Real soon.”

“We’ll find you,” he said. “I ain’t ever givin’ up.”

“I know,” I said. Marissa knocked on the door. It had been the longest time I’d had in here, but it was still too soon. “I gotta go. Don’t try to contact this place, and don’t answer unless you know it’s me. I love you.”

“Love you,” Daryl and Mia said in unison. I moved the dial back to the frequency it had been on when I’d sat down, cutting them off from me again. 

A heaviness settled over me. All the giddy lightness I’d felt earlier crashing down at once. I now had to survive another twenty-four hours before I could talk to them again. At least that gave me time to decide what kind of information I would pass on next time. I could ask for a minute alone with Daryl and tell him about the baby with nobody else listening, but… 

There was another reason, a far more selfish one, that was holding me back. The first time I’d held his hand, we’d been two scared kids, and his back was bleeding from his Daddy’s belt. The first time I’d kissed him, we’d been on the verge of war with the Saviors. The first time I’d told him I loved him, I’d been drenched in the blood of a man whose throat I’d slit. Was it too much to ask that when I told him we were having a baby, it wasn’t over a radio from a bunker I was trapped in?

I want to see his face. 

I wanna see that smile. 

Daryl

The sun had been up for about an hour before Rick knocked on the door. I called for him to come in while I finished pinning things to the wall of Maggie’s office. Thank God it wasn’t Greggory’s office anymore; he’d have thrown a fit about how we should be preserving the house. As if things would go back to normal any day now and kids would start coming back for field trips. 

“It's a lot of mines to search,” Rick said, holding a cup of coffee for me. “Thought we should get an early start on narrowing them down.”

“Way ahead of ya,” I said, stepping back from the maps I’d spent hours pouring over. “Appreciate another pair of eyes on this before everyone else gets here, though.” 

I felt the heat radiating through the cup as I took the cup from Rick. He walked further into the room, eyes widening as he stared around at the walls. I took a sip in the silence and then set it down on the desk. Didn't really need the caffeine. Adrenaline had been buzzing through me since I'd woken up. 

“Daryl, this is…” he faltered and I suddenly saw it through his eyes. The walls of Maggie’s formerly neat and tidy study were covered in papers and maps. My writing on scraps of paper was everywhere - repeating everything Naomi had told us, adding my thoughts, theories, and plans. My writing ain't all neat and pretty like Naomi's so it looked… deranged. 

“Yeah, I know it's a lot,” I said, feeling my ears heat up. 

“No, it's… thorough,” Rick said. Almost sounded like a compliment. Then worry creased his brow. “Did you sleep?”

“A little,” I said. I hadn't wanted to, but I knew I'd need to be rested for what was coming next. It was easier to sleep now, knowing that each night brought me closer to her. One day soon, I might even wake up right next to her again. 

“Walk me through it,” Rick said, trying to focus on my writing. 

 “There are clusters of mines all over the goddamn place, but everything in here ,” I swept my hand across a large area of the map I’d circled, “is within a three-hour drive of the lake. Only some of those mines are marked like they’re abandoned. And only some of them are close enough to a town or somethin’ that would have be likely to have tourists or-”

I was interrupted by another knock on the door. Mia opened it without waiting for an answer, a plate of food in one hand. 

“Maggie said you hadn't had breakfast yet, so I thought…” she stopped. Stared around at the crap all over the walls. “Woah… Dad, this is… woah.”

Rick's head turned to look at me so fast I thought I heard his neck click. Tried not to let it phase me, tried not to worry about whether or not people would think I was worthy of being called ‘Dad’ when they heard it. Mia thought I was. And that was all that mattered. 

Unless Naomi doesn't. 

Something clenched in my gut. I couldn't fight the feeling Naomi was hiding something from us. From me. Mia, too, probably. Knowing her, it would be something she didn’t want us worrying about, or something she was trying to handle on her own. But there was a small part of me that worried it was more… personal than that. 

She ain't forgiven me for what I did .

That small whispered ‘ I love you’ hadn't sounded like a lie. Hadn't felt like one. But maybe only because I wanted it to be true. Needed it to be true. But maybe that was the lie. Maybe she was afraid I wouldn't come for her if I didn't think she had forgiven me for getting Mia shot. 

It didn't matter.

I'll bring her home anyway. 

Mia passed me the plate and walked over to read the map on the walls. I watched her study it for a moment, shoving some Hilltop scrambled eggs into my mouth to try and push down the worry about what she might think of my frantic scribbles. My notes had felt so methodical and logical when I’d written them, but having other people’s eyes on them made them look like the ramblings of a lunatic.

“You think it’s one of these,” Mia tapped three points on the map. 

It wasn't a question, but I answered anyway, “Yeah.”

“You can read all that?” Rick raised an eyebrow.

“Of course I can,” she said like it was obvious. Because to her, it was. “Same shorthand Naomi uses, right?”

“Right.” I nodded.

Mia looked back at us, a tentative glimmer of excitement in her eyes. Felt the same as the small spark of hope that had been growing in me all morning. “It’s close to here.”

“Damn close,” I said. Neither of us could stop ourselves from smiling. 

Rick was more skeptical, which I couldn’t blame him for. It probably looked like I was basing all of this on a crazy hope that she wasn’t that far from home. “Why these ones?”

“For her to survive falling in that lake, they’d have needed to get her medical attention pretty damn fast,” I said, my finger hovering over that damn lake on the map. I would have to work out how to drain it when she got back. Or attach some kind of flotation device to her. I moved my finger to another spot not far from it. “The three assholes we ran into when I was tryna propose to her were here . They know this area. Naomi told us that some of Dwight’s scavenging missions take them near Sanctuary.”

“Dwight also said the scavenging journeys are around three hours by car,” Rick countered. “The mines you’ve picked out are too close for that. I’d say they’re less than an hour away, depending on the route.”

“I know,” I said. “But it’s weird, ain’t it? Everywhere they go is always exactly three hours away? Nah. I don’t buy it. Plus, Dwight is blindfolded for most of it . For all he knows, they’re driving in circles or going weird routes to throw him off, so he can’t rat out their location if he escapes. They’re close. The dickhead in charge just doesn’t want anyone he’s stolen from us to know that.”

That had been an early morning thought. One that had pulled me out of bed and started all of this scrawling and planning. It had felt so concrete in the small hours, but now I worried it could have been sleep deprivation. I waited for Rick to disagree, to come up with something I’d missed, but he didn’t. “So you wanna start with these three?”

“Yes,” I said. “And I could be wrong, but… something doesn’t feel right. Naomi said they were paranoid about being found. I think they’ve been trying to make Dwight think they’re further away than they are. I think we start here. Over the bridge.” 

“The bridge is out,” Rick said. “Michonne had to blow it. There was a herd heading out way big enough to be a danger to us all.”

It was a blow, but not a fatal one. A little delay wasn't going to stop me. I could wade across that damn river myself if I had to. Wasn’t that deep.

“I'm sorry, man,” I sighed. I knew how important that bridge had been to Rick. It had been his sole focus for weeks. We’d only just rebuilt the damn thing.

“We'll rebuild,” he said, and I wondered how much Michonne had needed to talk him down until he'd accepted it like this. “It's what we do.”

“What else have I missed?” I asked. My focus had been so consumed by mines and maps that I hadn’t checked in with anyone. 

“Anne and Gabriel are missing,” he said, immediately making me uneasy. “But I got people out looking for them.”

“Good.” I said. I didn't have space in my brain for any more missing people. Maybe the Colonel had taken them too. He seemed to have a thing for our people.

“We'll need to take an alternative route without the bridge,” Rick said, stepping closer to the map. “And we gotta be on the lookout for that herd. It’s a big one. I think two of the herds we’ve been tracking have merged. Again. I’m not sure how it’ll affect their movements, but we don’t wanna get caught in it.” 

I nodded. I so badly wanted to dismiss it, but I knew he was right. Herds were getting bigger and bigger these days. Keeping track of them and diverting them away from our communities was a real headache. We didn’t always get a lot of warning when one was approaching, despite the precautions we took. Their movements couldn’t exactly be predicted. They didn’t move like packs of animals. Didn’t migrate. They weren’t smart enough for that. But they were a damn sight more dangerous. 

Half an hour later, Rick gathered everyone stationed at Hilltop in the big house. More people had arrived since the news had spread. Carol perched up on a table, feet swinging in the air. Bryce had joined us, with news that Aaron was healing well. Maybe too well because it had taken Bryce a while to persuade him not to come with us. Now, Bryce was standing, arms folded, looking at the maps and notes on the walls. Made me warm to think that he probably understood Naomi’s systems too, so if he could read my shitty writing, he’d understand what it all meant.

Maggie stood by the door, a swaddled baby Hershel in her arms. She’d oversee things here while the rest of us were out there. Glenn was coming with him, and I’d be forever grateful to him for tearing himself away from his family to help mine out. Jesus, Lucas, Tara and Denise were huddled around a table, looking solemn but determined. Perla had made a beeline for Mia when they’d come in and hadn’t left her side since. I was so glad she’d have a friend by her side for all of this. Especially when I wasn’t planning on taking her with us. 

When they were all gathered, I explained it all again. I filled everyone in on what Naomi had managed to tell us and walked them through my thinking about where that meant she was. I showed them the route we'd need to take now that the bridge was out and echoed Rick’s warnings about looking out for the herds. 

“Mia,” I said. At the sound of her name, she straightened up. 

“I got a really important job for you. Are you up for it?”

“Yes,” she said. Dead serious. Like my little lieutenant. 

“Like I said to Naomi last night, we can't take the radio with us while we're out there,” I felt another horrible twist in my gut as I said it. Saw the same thing reflected in Mia's eyes. Being cut off from Naomi again was hard to stomach. It would be hardest for Naomi, stuck down there without any family. At least Mia and I had each other. “I want you to stay here and talk to her when she calls. Give her messages from us, and pass on what she says to me. Can you do that?”

I waited to see if she'd fight me on it, knowing she'd imagined being there for the moment we got Naomi back. Truth was, I didn't want to bring her with us. For everything Naomi had said about doing this without the need for a fight, I knew it might not be that easy. Something could go wrong. Couldn't have Mia caught up in it if it turned violent. If we ran into that herd, I wanted her to stay safe. I'd tried to think of the best way to do it, and this was it. But I didn't know if she'd buy into the reasons I gave her or if she'd see through it and notice my fear. 

“Yes,” she said, and then I saw a mild panic in her eyes. “I'll write everything down so I don't forget it.”

“Okay, good,” I said, realizing I might have overdone it, making her feel like she was being abandoned at Hilltop alone while the rest of us were relying on her intel. “Your Aunt Carol's gonna be there to help you and make sure neither of you miss anything.”

Carol looked up in mild surprise. Guess I should have checked with her first. I glanced at her quickly to make sure she was okay with it. She nodded. 

“I can help, too,” Perla said, and Mia relaxed even more. I nodded my thanks. 

“Alright, get anything you might need,” I told the group. “Unless there are any major objections, I’d like to head out as soon as possible.”

“You don't wanna wait until tomorrow?” Rick asked. “Let Naomi know the plan tonight?”

I hesitated. It was a decision I’d been torn between all day. Leaving now meant I wouldn’t get to say goodbye to her or hear her voice one last time before we went. The temptation to talk to her again was strong. The pull to see her was far stronger. 

Plus, I didn't want to say goodbye to her. Not ever again. 

“The sooner we head out, the sooner we can see her, right?” I said. “I don't wanna lose a whole day of searching.”

“If you're sure,” Rick said, nodding like he’d accept my decision either way. 

“I’m sure,” I said. “We got Lieutenant Mia to fill her in on the plan while we're already on our way.”

Mia beamed at me. 

While everyone scurried around packing their bags, I sat by the front door. I’d never really unpacked, so packing hadn’t taken long. I had a bag for me and a bag for Naomi. Before my thoughts could start spiraling out over what kind of state I might find her in, Carol sat beside me. 

She let the silence sit for a moment and then said, “ Aunt Carol, huh?” 

Damnit. 

I glanced at her out of the corner of my eye. “Shut up.”

“What? Am I Godmother too?” she asked. I didn't like the glint in her eye or the amused chuckle.

I tried to laugh along, but a thought struck me. “I mean…if somethin' did happen to us. Or… if I can't get her back. Something goes wrong out there, and neither of us make it back…” 

“She'd have a village,” Carol said. “Myself included. Although I might have to fight Bryce for custody.”

I laughed. “I’m sure he’d let you have weekends.”

Silence settled again. People started gathering by the door, bags and weapons ready. My nerves ate away at me. I had to keep telling myself this would take a while, that I wasn't going to see her today, but my mind kept skipping forward to when I’d see her pretty face—that smile. 

“You sure you don't want me out there with you?” Carol asked. 

“Nah.” I knew the toll this kind of thing could take on Carol. She was capable of so much. But the person she needed to be to do it almost almost broke her. “If we need backup, we'll call ya.” 

“I’ll be there,” she patted me on the back as she stood up again. “Go get her.” 

Carol moved off, and Mia came running out of the office, almost knocking Tara on her ass as she flew past, “Dad!”

Her eyes were wide, panicked, as she scanned the room for me. I stood up. “Woah, where's the fire?”

“Thought you might have left already.”

“Without saying goodbye? ‘Course not,” I said. I could still see the worry written all over her. “I’m sorry we gotta split up for a while, but pretty soon… we’ll have your Mom back.”

Mia winced at the word ‘Mom’ and I knew at once I’d made a mistake. She looked up at me, eyes brimming with nerves. “What if she… what if she doesn’t want me to… what if she thinks it's weird that I've been calling her that while she was…?”

She won't.

I got why she was worried. Same reason I was. The time for speaking for Naomi was over. Everything we'd assumed she would or wouldn't have wanted had been to make ourselves feel better. And now she could burst that bubble with the truth. 

Unlike me, Mia had no reason to worry about that. 

“Naomi loves you more than anything,” I said. “Whatever you wanna call her won’t matter.”

Mia chewed on her bottom lip. “You think so?”

“I know so,” I said. Mia’s anxiety didn’t waver. I didn’t know how to tell her about the ways Naomi had worried about the role she played in Mia’s life, not without betraying her trust. So, I pulled her in for a hug and said, “I promise you.”

Mia hugged me back. She was quiet for a moment, and then she said, “Hurry home.”

“As soon as I find her,” I promised. “I love you.”

“Love you too.”

Mia let go and stepped back. Her eyes were bright, and she tried not to cry. Despite it all, she managed a smile full of hope. 

You’re the best kid in the goddamn universe. 

Mia stood at the gates, waving as we drove off. She shrank to a speck in the bar-end mirrors of my bike, and I felt like I was leaving a limb behind. It was the right call, for sure, but we’d been each other’s rock for so long that it felt wrong to leave her.

We’d reached the first mine on my list before sundown. The entrance was a small hike up a hill. We set up a camp at the base and drew up a rota for those who’d take a night watch in case a herd or something else came near. 

As darkness fell, I sat by the fire, radio in hand, waiting for Mia to call. Denise sat down next to me. She didn’t say anything, which I appreciated. I looked over at her, “What do you know about pneumonia?”

It threw her for a moment. She frowned, “Do you have a cough?”

“Not me. Naomi. She got it after she fell in that damn lake. That's bad, right? Pneumonia. People die of it, don't they?”

“It can be deadly,” Denise said carefully. “But not usually for someone Naomi’s age. Did she sound okay? Was she coughing at all? Did her breathing sound labored?” 

“No,” I said, thinking back on both of those calls. She'd sounded fine. Happy. Excited. Emotional. 

But also…like she was hiding something. I didn't know how to say that, though. I had nothing concrete to go on except a lifetime of knowing her. A childhood of knowing how bad the other had it, even if we didn’t say it out loud. I could read her silences, her pauses as easily as her handwriting, but it wasn’t something I could explain to anyone else. 

“Sounds like she's right as rain,” Denise said. “But I'll check her over when we get out all the same.”

“Thank you,” I relaxed a little. “And, um, one of them’s pregnant. Amber - you know her?”

“One of Negan's former wives?”

“Yeah,” I said. “From what Naomi said, it sounds like everything's fine with the baby, but…probably good to keep an eye on her when we get them out. Right?”

“Not really my area of expertise,” she looked nervous. “We should get her straight back to Dr Carson.”

Mia called the radio after midnight and filled us in on everything Naomi had managed to tell her. Dwight had confirmed that the car journey to get her to safety after her dip in the lake had been significantly shorter than usual. He hadn’t realized it at the time and couldn’t give us a good estimate of how much shorter it had been, but he’d been distracted by saving her. I couldn’t feel even a bit of frustration that he hadn’t been looking at a clock.

Naomi had also sent a warning that there were cameras everywhere, watching them most of the time. That made me want to kick something until it broke - the thought of some creep watching her every move. But it was good for us to know, in case we were spotted on approach and lost any kind of element of surprise. I gave Mia a bunch of questions to ask her next time.

Routine settled in pretty fast. We spent the day mapping the mine up the hill. Moving slowly, making sure we always knew the way out again. At night, we waited for Mia’s call so we could pass messages to Naomi. If we had a question for her, it took at least a day to get an answer and vice versa. The first night that she didn’t call made us all uneasy. She’d warned us it happened sometimes, that Marissa couldn’t always get her to the Communications room, but it was still unnerving. I spent all day worried sick she’d been caught until Mia called that night and told us she’d heard from her. 

It took just over a week to fully map that first mine. It turned up nothing. 

We set up camp by the second one, only to find on Day Two that every tunnel ended in the same dead-end. Rubble piled up after some kind of cave-in. I tried every possible route three times to make sure I hadn’t missed anything. I wouldn’t put it past this Colonel guy to block them in with a bunch of rocks, making it look like a cave-in. 

Reluctantly, we moved on. Although I kept this place in the back of my mind if all of the other mines in a three-hour radius didn’t work out.

The next place immediately sent a prickle of anticipation down my spine. There were signs for it. Driving down the road toward the nearest town, the words ‘Cavern Mine Experience’ signposted as being a few miles out of town. Damn near fell off my bike when I saw it. 

We turned off into what had probably once been a carpark. Overgrown now, but you could see the roof of some kind of building nearby. Nobody dared say anything in case we jinxed it, but Glenn gave me an eager slap on the back. Tara’s jaw clenched to stop herself from smiling. 

I left my bike where it was and took a few tentative steps towards the other end of the car part, where a metal gate was padlocked between two high, mossy walls. 

“Well, they did tours,” Rick said, nodding to a poster stuck on one of the walls. It was a little weathered now, colors faded in the sun, but it was definitely advertising a tour of the mines. After the last two disappointments, I tried not to get my hopes up. Rick glanced up at the sky, “There aren’t enough daylight hours left to do a proper search. I suggest we find a place to set up camp and start looking for the entrance tomorrow.”

I nodded my agreement and gestured to the building. “Let’s check that place out.” 

The gate was an easy climb. I threw my bags over first and then dropped down in front of what had once been a welcome center and probably a gift shop. I waited for the others, listening for any sounds that didn’t come from us. 

One by one, they climbed over the gate and we swept the place in our usual way. Covering each others’ backs and on the lookout for signs of walkers or hostile survivors. There weren’t any signs of people living here. 

A window was smashed. Debris was strewn all over the place, but it didn’t look raided. Things were broken and out of place, but nothing had been taken. It wasn’t the kind of destruction that had come from being looted or scavenged. 

A herd had been through here recently. A big one.

They’d knocked over stands of souvenirs and sent them scattering across the floor. Keychains with little pickaxes and hardhats. Shelves of something that had probably once been novelty mugs were shattered. I kicked away a few ceramic shards. 

And then I froze. 

There was a trapdoor beneath my feet. 

Wood splintered around a hole in the center of it. Like someone had tried to smash their way out from underneath. I crouched down, the splintered wood beneath my fingertips. Every hair on my arm stood on end. 

Is this it?

Is she right under my goddamn feet?

“Over here,” I called, not taking my eyes off the trapdoor. I ran my fingers down the wood until I got to a large brass handle. “I think I got something.”

I heard them crowding around but didn’t look up at any of them. Their footsteps creaked on the wood. A set of them moved away again. I pulled on the padlock, testing it. It wouldn’t open easily. I could break it open, but that risked alerting anyone underneath. I bent closer and put my eye to the hole. Pitch-black nothing stared back at me. 

Glenn's boots walked back and he passed me a screwdriver. I unscrewed it at the hinges. Then I unscrewed the place the lock was fixed to the floor. Fuck the padlock. Glenn and Rick helped me lift the whole door off. I sat on the edge of the square hole, legs swinging into darkness. It was only when Tara shone a torch light down that we could see the bottom. It didn't look like there was anything in there. Or anyone. 

I gripped another torch between my teeth and dropped down into the dark. A dirt room. A wooden door right where she said it would be.

Is this it?

Is there where she woke up?

The thought of her, so alone and so sick in a place like this made me feel sick too. As Rick dropped down behind me, I tried the door.

It opened. 

I swung my torch around to illuminate my own arm. I'd written down what she'd thought the directions were between the room she'd woken up in and the door to the bunker. Beyond this door, she'd seen a dirt tunnel. 

Check... 

I walked out into it. Naomi's had been lined with doors. I walked a few paces further in. 

Check….

My spine tingled. More torchlight filled the tunnel as some of the others jumped down and joined Rick and I. 

“Is this it?” Bryce asked in a whisper. I didn't dare say ‘yes’. I couldn't face being wrong. 

I kept walking, reaching the point where the tunnel  widened and the walls turned from dirt to rock. 

After that, there were a series of turns. Naomi had been less sure of that, so we took it slow. Left someone at each turn so that we could find our way back, until it was just Bryce and I left. 

We turned one last corner, and the light from my torch bounced back at us so strongly it made us wince.

A metal door gleamed at the end of the tunnel.

I got you.

I know where you are.

Chapter 74: Expecting someone else?

Naomi

“He found you!” Mia yelled.

I damn near fell off the chair, “ What ?”

“He found you!” she repeated, although it should have been obvious I hadn't misheard. Volume wasn't her issue. The worms in the dirt above and outside this bunker had probably heard her. The news would have woken the whole of Hilltop. “He found the mine, the trapdoor, the tunnels, and the door!”

“And he's sure… he's sure? ” I said. It all felt too good to be true. I'd known he’d be out there searching like a bloodhound until he found me, but… Hell, he must not have slept since I’d last spoken to him.

“How many top-secret bunkers in mines can there be?” Mia laughed. 

More than you'd think. 

“There is more than one,” I said. “I have no idea where, but I heard the Colonel radioing someone else. Someone outside of here.”

“Really? There's more than one bunker?”

“Yes. One is definitely out of state,” I said, thinking of Nora and everything she’d told me about her son. “But… I don’t know for sure that it’s the same one the Colonel was in contact with. Just… make sure he knows that, okay?”

“Okay,” Mia said. “I'll tell him.”

Her excitement faded, and worry crept in. I hated hearing her deflate like that, but it was important that she knew and passed the information on to Daryl. He couldn’t move against the wrong place; if he did, he'd lose the element of surprise. A warning would spread here, and the Colonel would be on high alert. Getting in or out would be an even more insurmountable task.

“It's just a precaution. I'm sure he's right,” I said, trying to stop her from losing too much hope. “But he's gotta be certain, he's gotta be…safe.”

I knew how hotheaded Daryl could be. How rash. If he really had found the door, I was half surprised he hadn't already banged on it until the Colonel opened up. 

“Yeah. I know. I know,” Mia said, like she was trying to reassure me now. “Don’t worry, Dad’s gonna find you. He’s got a plan, and he’s-” 

I didn’t hear the rest. 

Did she just…?

Dad??

I felt my heart swell so big in my chest that it hurt. For a second, I couldn't take in anything else. She was still talking about Daryl and his plans and how he'd come up with them. I doubt she'd noticed what she'd said. She'd said it so… easily. 

Like she's said it before. 

Hold it together. Hold it together.

I fought to keep the emotion from my voice, not wanting to draw attention to it if Mia hadn’t noticed what she’d done. I didn’t want her feeling weird about it or like she had to explain herself. It was her choice and none of my business, but… it meant the world. 

I closed my eyes for a moment, tears prickling behind my eyelids. I couldn’t wait to hug her again. To hug both of them. 

“I'm gonna see you both real soon,” I said. It might not have made sense in the context of whatever she said, but I couldn't help it. My brain was too scrambled to think about anything else. “I can't believe how soon.”

“I still can't believe you're alive ,” Mia said quietly. It made my stomach twist. 

“I'm sorry.”

“Stop apologizing,” Mia said. “You haven't been holding yourself hostage in a weirdo’s bunker.” 

Marissa knocked.

Shit. 

It never felt like enough time.

“I gotta go. Pass the message on to…” I faltered. What was I supposed to say now? ‘ Your Dad?’ No, that would draw attention to it. “...to Daryl. I'll see you soon.” 

“Really soon,” Mia said, determined. “I love you.”

“I love you.” I switched the radio off. It was easier the quicker I did it fast. If I let myself think about it, I'd never be able to switch it off or move the dial back to where the Colonel had left it. He’d have walked in to find me sobbing over the controls, and it would be game over.

As it was, I managed to hold myself together long enough for Marissa to sneak me back to my room, where I could lie in bed, stare at the dark, and let the enormity of everything Mia had said wash over me.

Dad…

My whole life, it had been such a… big word. A void. A black hole I never looked into in case it swallowed me up. Who was he? Had he ever known I existed? If he did… would he want to know me? Would I have made him proud? Would he have saved me from Momma, or was he just as bad? After a few years, Daryl’s Daddy had been enough to put me off the idea of them as a whole. 

When Mia had come along, I knew she’d have had the same questions. Ones I’d never had answers for. I’d braced myself for her asking, but she never did. Maybe she’d asked Momma when she was really little, but she never asked me. It had almost made the absence more apparent, but I'd never known how to address it. I think we never talked about it because it shone a light on a difference that I otherwise never thought about. We had the same fucked up Momma but different absent Dads. Addressing that could have been a wedge in an already fragile family.

But now she'd found someone who made her feel safe, accepted, and loved enough to call such a big word… And he tied us closer together.

I closed my eyes and, for the first time in a long time, I let myself think about the world above this one. The possibility that Daryl was right there, somewhere above my head, and I might get to see him soon was almost too much to bear. But it did help me sleep —his protection seeping through the earth, strong enough to permeate these walls.

It was my first thought when I woke up, too. I tentatively passed on the news that Daryl thought he’d found us and that we should be ready to put our plan into motion. I spent the rest of the day trying to act as naturally as possible.

But that night, there was no knock from Marissa. We’d had a long run of being able to get into the communications room. Sometimes, she wasn’t on the rota and was given the night off. Sometimes, she was working on another floor, and she wouldn’t be able to get me there. It had happened a couple of times in the days since making contact with home, but it was frustrating now that freedom felt so close. 

I didn’t worry about it. 

Until it happened the next night, too. 

Long hours of darkness stretched around me, uninterrupted by the knock I’d come to expect. To depend on. I tried to tell myself that it was no big deal, that it was a coincidence that we hadn’t been able to get into the communications room two nights in a row. 

But I think I knew, deep down, that something had gone wrong. 

I carried a knot of anxiety in my stomach all day. It tightened when Sherry wasn’t in the kitchen, her absence not explained.

On the third night without contact, the sirens went off. The lights changed again. They cycled from red to pale yellow. I froze in my room. 

Is this it?

Is it happening?

Dread churned in my stomach. Setting off the alarms to cover our escape had been the plan, but… we hadn’t been able to coordinate it. I hadn’t seen Dwight in a while. Maybe he’d been outside and managed to find them. We were due a new delivery from the allotments in the next few days. Maybe Daryl had been out there and able to communicate with him.

It felt flimsy, and I couldn’t shake the deep feeling that something was wrong. But I’d definitely never get out by staying in my room. I waited for another moment, thinking it would be easier to slip away if I hid in a crowd. But when I opened my door, it opened into an empty hallway. 

Did I wait too long?

I looked both ways down the corridor for other stragglers, but I was the only one there. I started running toward the exit. I turned the corner, but the exit door wasn’t open. The Colonel was standing in front of it, and a panel in the wall was open beside him. When he saw me, he reached inside it and flicked a switch. The sirens cut off immediately, and the lights returned to normal.

“Expecting someone else?”

He knows.

“Shouldn’t… shouldn’t everyone be evacuating?” I asked, playing dumb even though we both knew what I’d been expecting. What else could I do? He clearly knew a lot more than I wanted him to, but I still didn’t want to give any more than he already had. The Colonel shook his head.

“Come with me.” It wasn’t a request. I followed him away from the door and back to the large, circular room I’d first been taken to meet him in. He pulled out one of the black, high-backed chairs, “Sit.”

Again, it wasn’t a request. 

All of the monitors in front of me showed the same image in grainy night vision. A dark room on the screen. Empty, and not one of the ones inside the bunker. The Colonel leaned over me and clicked a button. A rectangle of light opened up at the top seconds after he hit play. A pair of boots swung down into a room that I couldn’t call familiar but could piece together the location of. It was the dirt room I’d woken up in.

Daryl dropped down into the room, and my heart dropped with him. 

No.

No, no, no. 

I could feel the Colonel’s eyes on me as I watched Daryl look around. Was this a live feed? A recording? Rick dropped down after him. Bryce followed shortly after. Glenn. Tara. I felt myself start to choke up. 

So many of them came to help me.

Seeing the tears starting to prickle at the corners of my eyes, the Colonel pressed another button. The image changed to a video of their slow-moving progress down the corridor. I clenched my jaw, trying not to give anything away, but it was too late. The truth was written all over my face. The Colonel flicked through images of my loved ones exploring the tunnels outside of here, dropping off one by one until only Bryce and Daryl were left. He paused the video. 

“I assume,” he said, rage bubbling under his words, “one of them is Mr Dixon. ”

Bryce and Daryl stood frozen side by side, looking at where I knew the door to the bunker would be just off-screen. I didn’t say anything. I couldn’t, nor did I need to. He already knew who they were and that they were here for me.

How did you work that out?

Did he know about the others who helped me? Were they okay?

“How did they find you?” he asked while my anxious mind worried about the last time I’d seen Amber and Sherry.

“I don’t know,” I lied. “But if you let me go, they’ll leave you alone.”

The Colonel sneered, “You expect me to believe that?”

“We have our own community,” I said. “With no need for any of the shit you’ve got here. We won’t come back.”

“This is the single biggest breach of security we’ve had in the history of The Stronghold,” he said. “I cannot just let it slide.”

“It would be better for all of you if you did,” I said, shockingly calm. I knew Daryl wouldn’t rest until he’d got me back. I knew he’d stop at nothing. The Colonel should be the one who was afraid here, not me. 

“Don't move,” he told me, standing up and walking back to the door, “We're not done here.”

Where’s he going?

Does he have Daryl somewhere?

The moment the door closed behind him, I moved, immediately grabbing the mouse to click back through the videos. None of them were live. From what I could tell, the footage had been taken slightly before the last contact I'd had with Mia. 

The Colonel had known since then. 

Where are they now?

What has he done with them?

Feeling sick, I clicked around until I found how to switch over to a live feed. If the Colonel was keeping them somewhere I might be able to find them, break them out. There was no time for despair or guilt over the fact that if they were trapped here, it was all because of me. I cycled through as many as I could. So many empty underground tunnels. So many cavernous spaces. So far, nobody I knew. 

One image froze my finger on the mouse. 

It wasn’t them. 

It was worse. 

Children huddled together in the dark. Alone. Scared. Probably hungry, too. Although it looked like the small cave they were being kept in had been modified. A chute in one of the walls could have been used to deliver food. A closed door was presumably there to let people in, but it didn't look like they were getting out.

Stomach churning with rage and nauseous fear, I force myself to skip to the next feed. A stone room full of Walkers. Moving slow. Aimless. Trapped by a door that looked sickeningly familiar.

Is that…right next door to the kids?

A protective hand flew to my stomach. There was a noise outside of the room and I scrambled to get the paused videos back on screen. They popped back up just in time for me to turn around and face the Colonel, renewed hatred in my gut.

You’re a fucking monster.

Behind him, Dwight, Sherry, Amber, and Mark filed into the room. 

“They had nothing to do with it,” I said the moment I saw them. The Colonel didn’t look like he believed me, but it was technically true. Marissa and I had been responsible for most of it. But she wasn’t in the line-up. Dwight had a bruise forming around his left eye. Mark’s lip was bleeding. 

Some of the Colonel’s men followed them in, forcing them to their knees at gunpoint. John was with them. He gave nothing away. He’d either betrayed us all, or he’d escaped the Colonel’s suspicions. I hoped it was the latter and that Marissa was safe, too. Whatever Daryl was planning would be easier if someone was free to help from the inside.

After a signal from the Colonel, John strode over to me. His face set in blank determination. He grabbed my arm and forced me up from the chair.

“I didn’t know who those intruders were,” The Colonel paced in front of his kneeling captives as John dragged me over to join them. “I thought it might be chance. I thought some group might have accidentally stumbled across us while looking for shelter in the mines. So I went with a team to hunt them down.”

No.

NO!

John’s grip on my arm tightened. He leaned in close muttering under his breath, “They’re fine. Daryl’s coming for you.”

I gave a micro-nod to show him that I’d heard. He pushed me down next to Dwight. All we had to do was convince the Colonel to keep us alive long enough for Daryl to get us out.

“But then I caught Dwight talking to one of them, ” the Colonel said, kicking Dwight on the knee. “And once I’d seen that, it all made sense. He saved you because he knew you, and now you’ve both brought that community you were so desperate to get back to my door.”

“Dwight had nothing to do with it,” I said. I was pretty sure the Colonel wasn’t about to kill me. Not for another six months at least. But Dwight might not be so lucky. “They’re my people, but it wasn’t him.”

“So you do know how they did it,” the Colonel turned to me, eyes gleaming with triumph at my slip-up.

Shit.

“It was just me,” I said. Behind me, John breathed a soft sigh of relief. “I acted alone.”

There was a soft knock at the door. So soft it seemed out of place in the tense, angry room. After a pause, Jocelyn pushed the door open. There was a medical kit in her hands. Her eyes darted nervously around the room. The Colonel nodded, beckoning her further into the room. “Are you ready?”

“Yes,” Jocelyn nodded, although her hands shook as she unzipped the bag. Needles glinted in the light as she pulled them out and laid them on the table in front of the monitors. I tried not to react. But there was no world in which those didn't strike a deep fear in me. 

That was what he wanted. 

Maybe the Colonel hoped the fear of it would be enough to get me to talk. 

“How did you find us?” There was a frantic undertone to his anger. After years of keeping this place secret, outsiders had managed to locate it. When I didn’t answer, his anger rose. “It didn't have to come to this. I told you that once you’d given birth, we’d look into bringing the father here to join you.”

“You never had any intention of following through on that,” I said. “The moment I gave birth, I’d have ended up just like Callie.”

Joceyln shifted nervously on her feet, but my eyes remained trained on the Colonel. His jaw tightened. He hadn’t expected me to know that.

“It’s… it’s not like that,” Joceyln said, filling the silence where the Colonel said nothing.

“Then where is she? Where’s Callie?” I asked. I threw the question at the Colonel, but I wanted it to land with Jocelyn. I wanted everyone who blindly followed this man to stop and think about what they were a part of. “Where’s her baby?”

“They… they had to be moved to a different facility,” Jocelyn said. There wasn’t a hint of uncertainty or deception in her eyes - she believed it. “They weren't well.”

“Did he tell you that?” I asked, for a second her naivety threw me for a loop. But if you really didn’t know, why would you suspect? Especially when the truth was so awful it was almost hard to believe. “When your parents told you the old family dog went to live on a farm, did you swallow that lie as well?”

Jocelyn looked at the Colonel like she was expecting him to say something. Defend himself. I fixed my gaze, my rage on Jocelyn. 

“He gave Callie's baby to the dead,” I said. Further down the line, Amber had started to sob. “As a test.” 

Jocelyn stepped forward. Her eyes darted between me and the Colonel. She didn’t want to believe it. “A test? A test for what?”

“Immunity,” I said when the Colonel didn't say anything. I looked at him. “Right? You wanted to see if a baby born after the outbreak would be immune to a bite?”

“We don’t know anything about this… disease… this virus,” he protested. “We evolve and could develop an immunity to-”

“In one generation?” I cut across him with a glare that shut him up. “You didn’t really believe they would survive, did you?”

“We had to try!” 

“And Callie’s baby was Subject 2.0,” I said, keeping my eyes on the Colonel. “So it’s not the first child you’ve killed that way, is it?”

“How did you…?” his eyes widened. I saw something click as he realized what I'd overheard. “The radio. That's how you got your friends here. How did you get into that room?”

I stopped running my mouth for a moment. In my anger, I'd given away more than I wanted to.

“That’s not what happened,” Jocelyn said, but she didn’t sound sure. It sounded more like a question. And she looked close to falling apart. “The first baby born here got sick… it wasn’t… we didn’t…”

“Don’t be so naive, Jocelyn!” the Colonel snapped. She sprang back as if he’d struck her. “If the human race is to survive, the future generation needs to be stronger than we are.”

“Is that why you have your children locked in a cave?!” I yelled. I’d done a pretty good job keeping my cool until now, but the rage that built up in me was too much. Those kids. As helpless as the ones that had been taken from us at Terminus. As underfed and unloved as Daryl and I had been. It hurt. On so many levels, it hurt. I glared at Jocelyn, “Do you know what he’s doing to the other children? Are you part of that?”

“It’s… it’s for their own good…,” Jocelyn said, but her voice faltered as she said it. She couldn’t look me in the eye. “They will inherit…”

“Fuck you,” I spat at her. 

“It’s a controlled environment,” Jocelyn said. “We only let one of the undead in there with them when they’re ready. We haven’t lost one in months. They’re adapting. And one day… one day they’ll be able to live outside on their own.”

“While you cower in your bunker?” I asked. “Protected. With enough food and space for all of them.”

“We’re teaching them-”

“Teach them to hunt,” I said. “Teach them to fish. How to build a shelter. Which berries are poisonous, and which ones can cure a fever. That’s what they need to know. Protect them. Teach them to fight, sure, but not like that.”

The Colonel got so close to me I could feel the spit on my face while he roared at me, “We are teaching them how to live in a world of monsters. The world they will inherit.”

“ You are the fucking monsters,” I yelled back. For a split second, I thought he was going to kill me, baby be damned, but he didn't. He stepped back, nodding to the men behind me. 

“Hold her down,” he said. Before I could move, hands gripped my arms. I tried to struggle against them, but they'd moved too fast, and there were too many of them. The Colonel picked up a hammer. I heard another struggle to my left. Dwight was trying to get me. Someone punched him across the face as I was pushed down onto the ground. More hands grabbed my legs, pulling them out until I was lying down.

Jocelyn injected Dwight with something as the Colonel knelt down by my feet. 

“There are 26 bones in the human foot,” he said, forcefully grabbing my ankle with one hand. “I'm going to break every one of yours until you tell me what I need to know. Or, until I find and kill everyone who found this place looking for you… whichever comes first.”

Monitors glowed over the Colonel’s shoulder, Daryll frozen on the screen. The strength that man gave me… 

“You should let me go,” I said. “For your safety and the safety of everyone in here. Let me walk out of here and I can convince them all to turn around and forget this place exists.”

The Colonel let out a sharp bark of a laugh, pressing something hard and cold against my smallest toe. Against my better judgement I glanced down. The ridge of a small metal triangle was pressing into my toe. He raised the hammer. “Last chance.”

I glared at him bracing myself for what was coming. He was so calm when he did it. So collected. The times that Negan and his guys had beaten me, they'd been angry. Riled up. This man didn't even flinch when he brought the hammer down hard, smashing it against the metal on my toe. 

Bone cracked. 

I tried not to scream, but it tore out of me all the same. My whole body convulsed in pain, but the hands pinning me down stopped me from moving much. The Colonel sat back and watched the pain course through me. I wished I could have resisted it and not reacted, but the pain of a broken bone stripped everything down to instinct. After a few minutes, it lessened to a throb.

“Now,” the Colonel said, still calm as can be. “I don’t want to do that again, but if you don’t tell me how you contacted those people on the outside, you’ll leave me no choice.”

I said nothing. I looked up, picking a point on the ceiling to concentrate on. I focused on my breathing - deep and steady. I’d been in acute, inflicted pain before. I knew how to numb myself. 

The second bone to break, I managed not to scream. The Colonel asked again. Waited. And moved to another bone. He knew the exact amount of time to leave it between blows. Enough time for the last one to have started fading, numbed by the adrenaline flooding through me. Throughout it all, he stayed calm and unaffected. I wasn’t the first person he’d interrogated like this. 

I hoped at some point I'd black out from the pain, but I didn't get so lucky.

“Stop it! Stop it!” Amber screamed. “ Please! She’s fucking pregnant! Stop!”

She looked close to cracking. Close to admitting to something she didn't do just to get it to stop. Or naming Marissa as my accomplice. I held her gaze. Shook my head. I didn’t have to hold out forever, just until Daryl got us out.

Amber was sobbing. Sherry looked like she was about to throw up. Dwight was unconscious. Mark stared at the ground, shaking. 

“Deal with them,” the Colonel said. 

“They didn't….they didn't do anything… they…”  I started to say, trying to stop them from getting the same treatment.

“Relax,” the Colonel said. “I wouldn't hurt someone innocent.” 

“Just children, then?” I snarled. He put some pressure on my foot, and I screamed. 

One by one, Jocelyn sedated the others. When she was done, she looked over at me. Pity in her eyes. 

“Sir,” Jocelyn said. “Please. That's enough for today.”

“Fine,” he said. “Sedate her.”

Jocelyn knelt down beside me, a syringe in one hand. She whispered, “I'm sorry.”

I didn't have the energy to say anything back to her. But I stared her in the eye until I felt the sharp scratch of a needle in my arm. Drowsiness flooded my veins, turning them to lead. The pain started to fade. It was almost a relief until the Colonel crouched down beside me. 

“You will know nothing ,” he said. “And you will know pain. Until you tell me the truth.”

“He’ll kill you,” I said, and I meant it. Daryl would stop at nothing to get me out. I could have put an end to all of it with a word. The Colonel shook his head like he didn’t believe me and the drowsiness pulled me under. 

I don’t know how long I was out. Pain was the first thing I knew on waking. I could feel my heartbeat in my foot, aching. When I opened my eyes, the Colonel’s face swam toward me through the bleary drowsiness of my vision. My arms and legs were strapped down to the bed in the medical room. 

He asked if I was ready to talk. I ignored him, and he started the process all over again - small bones breaking one at a time. But I didn’t break. Because I knew it would end. 

At some point, when I opened my eyes, I wouldn't see the Colonel or Jocelyn or this terrible bunker. 

I'd open my eyes and see Daryl. 

Daryl

I’d noticed the cameras in the tunnels almost right away. Naomi had warned us about them. I should have been on a better lookout, but I was so caught up in the idea that she was close that I couldn't stop myself from pushing forward. By the time we found the door, it was too late. Bryce had probably thought he would have to peel me away from that door. Call in backup to stop me from trying to kick it down now that we'd found it. But I didn't because even I knew you couldn’t kick down a blast door with rage alone. 

I walked away. Hating it, but knowing it was for the best.

In her last call, Naomi warned that there was another bunker somewhere. So, we’d spent some time staking this one out to be sure we had the right place. The search for Sophia had failed because I’d been looking in all the wrong places. I wasn’t making that mistake again. 

Pretty soon, the Colonel came looking for us. I finally got a good look at the guy who’d been keeping my girl from me for three fucking months. God knows I could have ripped him apart right there and then. But it would have got me nowhere. One of his guys would’ve shot me, and Naomi would still be trapped, away from Mia.

So I’d tracked him as he searched the nearby town. He was looking for us, he must’ve seen on his CCTV by now. Dwight and John were with him, which confirmed we had the right place. 

That night, Mia called - frantic. No word from Naomi had come through. I’d reminded her, squashing the fear in my own voice, that there had been a few breaks in communication before. Naomi wasn’t always able to get to the bunker's radio. 

But I knew as I said it that it was a lie. It was too much of a coincidence. 

The second day, I dodged the Colonel and went with Tara and Denise who had been searching the area and trying to find other ways in and out of the tunnels. Or the bunker. They hadn’t found either, but what they had found was an allotment a few miles away. Hidden off the beaten path and with armed guards outside. We watched it from a distance. It looked like they were preparing some kind of delivery - loading vegetables into barrels that seemed too big to be carried down all those narrow, winding tunnels. 

They looked big enough to hide a person.

As night started to fall, most of them cleared away, piling into trucks similar to the one Naomi and I had seen during my botched proposal. They left two people out there to guard the place overnight. Overall, the people in the bunker outnumber us by a lot, but two people? We could take them out without breaking a sweat.

I followed the trucks from a distance, tracking them back through the town by the mines. They didn’t turn off near the entrance we’d found. Instead, they drove further up the hill. I had to slow; there were a lot of twists and turns on the way up, and I couldn’t risk running into them. Or risk them hearing my bike. I worried I’d lose them, there was no chance of that. They headed to a large compound, hidden down several winding roads obscured by gaint, overgrown trees. 

A heavy metal driveway gate was swinging closed behind the last truck by the time I arrived. High walls blocked whatever was inside from view. I brought my bike to a stop and hid it off-road. Swinging up into one of the nearby trees, I climbed to get a better look into the compound. The walls surrounded a low, flat building with no windows. The only way in or out seemed to be some heavily shuttered garage doors. They were closed when I saw them, but they didn’t open again, and the trucks weren’t anywhere else. I waited a while, but nobody came back out. 

There’s another way in.

There had to be a way down into the bunker from in there. And if we played this right, they’d open that door and carry us in themselves. 

Another night passed without word from Naomi. The only thing stopping me from losing it and making me able to talk Mia down was that they had no proof Naomi knew us. They didn’t know who we were here for. The Colonel must have tightened the security around the communications room, and that was why she couldn’t call the Hilltop again. She was lying low. Flying under the radar.

On the third day, we went back to tracking the Colonel's men, trying to stay one step ahead as they, in turn, hunted for us. It was like a game of cat and mouse. Except they were all fucking rats, and I was an exterminator.

I honed in on Dwight, following him for a while as he broke away from the rest into smaller and smaller groups. When it felt safe enough, I let him see me and then ducked away again behind the corner of a building. I radioed Rick, who was ready with a distraction that would let the Colonel and the rest of his men get close to finding us.

Dwight excused himself for a smoke, sidling up to the corner I was waiting behind.

“She alive?” I asked. 

“She’s alive,” Dwight glanced frantically over his shoulder like we were about to get caught. “He knows you’re here. We’re supposed to be looking for you.”

“Haven’t heard from her in a few days.”

“Comms room is on lockdown,” Dwight said. “Until he works out whether or not you have a link to any of us.”

I relaxed a little, let my eyes drift closed for a moment as a small amount of relief washed over me. They didn’t know it was Naomi who’d led us here. She was safe. This news would help Mia stop freaking out too. 

A noise nearby made us both freeze. My eyes snapped open and scanned the area. Dwight was on high alert, checking behind him. When he looked back, it was all business, trying to work out why I’d risk talking to him like this, “What’s the plan? Want me to come with you as a hostage? Set up a negotiation?”

“No,” I said. The negotiation to get Beth back had failed because we’d let it turn into a negotiation at all. We should’ve gotten her out without involving anyone else. I wasn’t making that mistake again. “I ain’t asking.”

Dwight had nodded, but I could tell it wasn’t what he’d wanted to hear. “It's… a difficult place to launch an attack on.”

“I ain’t doing that either. Not like that.” When I’d rammed that truck into the side of Sanctuary, I'd brought a shit load more problems to our doorstep. “When’s the next visit to the allotments?”

Dwight’s eyebrows had raised at that, something clicking into place. “Two days.”

“I think that could be our way in,” I said. “If we can make it work from out here, can you make sure nobody checks them barrels?”

“Yeah,” he said. “John and I volunteer for that one all the time. We’ll get you in.” 

“Getting out,” I said. “That gonna be an issue?”

“The Colonel gives out the key for the cargo door to people on the allotment run,” Dwight said. “I can make sure it’s me.”

I nodded. With any luck, we’d be in and out before they noticed a damn thing. A smattering of gunfire in the distance signaled the end of Rick’s distraction tactics. They were retreating. Dwight hurried back to his group, and I headed to the meeting point I’d agreed on with Rick. 

The two-day wait was agony. We used it to search the hill for more ways into the mine. We found a few more disused tunnels and cautiously mapped them to see if any led back to the door. The occasional appearance of a camera warned us when we were close and needed to make a quick retreat. I didn’t mind if they saw us down here; it would keep them looking in the wrong direction - alert for us in the tunnels when we were coming in another way. 

We arrived at the allotment early that morning, taking out the guards one at a time. We kept them alive, Tara and Denise held them at gunpoint and forced them to radio the bunker to let them know that the barrels were waiting for them but that they wouldn’t be there for the handover. They repeated the line we’d given them, that they’d seen a campfire from our group somewhere in the town and were going to check it out. Hearing it out of their mouths, it sounded like such an obvious lie, but the Colonel lapped it up. He even agreed to send backup to the decoy location. 

We dumped the contents of the barrels and creates out of sight and moved them back to the pickup point before we climbed in. 

“Good luck,” Tara whispered before she closed the lid over me.

Here goes nothing. 

So many clashes with other communities had gone wrong. A lot of it was on me. I couldn't fail this one, too. I wasn't leaving anything up to chance. Or luck.

I’m getting my girl

The right way. 

I would never have guessed that the right way involved hiding out in barrels that smelled faintly of onions. 

Cramped, with my knees up to my chin in the dark, I heard the vans arrive. I tensed, listening to their voices as they moved around us. Would they notice that anything was out of place?

Someone moved the barrel I was in, hoisting me into one of their vans. I held my breath, waiting. More thumps and thuds around me, but so far, nobody yelled. Nobody checked anything. I heard the swing of van doors and things got darker.

I felt the engine underneath me shudder to life. The wood of the barrel that caged me in shook with the vibrations of it as the van started to move. Rattling around in there I could feel every turn, every damn bump in the road. It was worth it - any amount of pain or discomfort was worth getting Naomi back - but I hoped the others were holding up okay. 

The barrel jolted as the van came to a sudden stop. I heard the muffled sound of someone groaning as we were flung against the side of our containers. I prayed none of the Colonel’s men were riding in the back of the van with us. It would only take one of us to be found and the whole plan would go up in smoke. 

A moment of silence stretched on and then I heard the van doors open up again. Voices, too muffled to pick up Dwight’s specifically, and the scrape of wood on the van’s floor as they started unloading what they thought were crates and barrels of supplies. 

Please don’t check. Please don’t check.

More waiting. It was dark, and I did my best not to make a sound. Footsteps came closer to me, and suddenly, I was on the move again. Out of the van. Every muscle in my body tensed as it lifted. I pressed my elbows hard into each side to keep myself steady. It was carried a short distance and then set down again. 

More waiting. More voices. I didn’t risk moving the lid to take a peek. 

An electronic whirring started, and my stomach dropped like I was on a damn rollercoaster. Judging by the slight vibrations underneath us, I think it was an elevator. It came to a stop. More waiting and then I braced myself as they carried me out again. Set down. More thuds around me. So far, nobody had looked in. So far, I hadn’t heard anyone yell in surprise as they uncovered Glenn or Bryce in what they thought was a barrel of apples or onions. 

Footsteps started to retreat. A door shut behind them. I waited for the voices to fade. I kept waiting long after I couldn’t hear anything. Listening. In case one of them had stayed behind quietly taking inventory or some shit. We were fucked if they had. When I couldn’t stand the wait any longer, I pushed up on the lid of the barrel. My knees ached as I stood up, complaining about being cramped for so long. I ignored it, letting my eyes adjust to the gloom of the storage room we were in.

Shelves ran from floor to ceiling. Stocked with rows of canned goods and boxes I couldn’t see in. The lid moved off the barrel next to me. Rick looked out cautiously. “We’re supposed to wait for Dwight.”

“Well, what’s taking him so long?” I asked. “He should’ve come back by now.”

I didn’t know if that was true. It wasn’t like I’d been able to check the time. But there’d been so much waiting around that my nerves were bubbling over. Adrenaline started to flow. We were so damn close. Naomi might have been in this room. Or next door. 

The door handle moved. I raised my knife, ready. Rick sprang up beside me, hand on his gun. John looked back at us, slipping quickly into the room and holding the door shut behind him. Seemed he was alone. 

“Where’s Dwight?” I asked. 

“Someone saw you talking to him,” he said. “They reported him to the Colonel.”

Shit.

My blood ran cold. I glanced at Rick. He looked as tense as I felt. “He rat us out?”

“No,” he said. “But… the Colonel figured out who you’re here for, seeing as it was Dwight who brought her in...”

“Where’s Naomi?” I asked at once, done playing. 

“He’s… got them all in the same place,” John said. “We’ll get them in a minute. We just need to wait.”

“For what? ”

“Marrissa’s going to take out the lights,” he said. “The backup generator will kick in, but it’ll get the Colonel away from the console and the cameras, and we’ll be able to get to them undetected.”

I can’t do any more waiting. 

But I had to. I wasn’t going to mess this up. So, I distracted myself helping the others out of their hiding places. Glenn unfolded himself from a wooden crate, a few beets spilling out with him. Bryce had a small graze on the top of his head from where he’d bumped it on the lid of his barrel. As he stood up there was an electronic whine, the sound of something shutting down. The room was plunged into total darkness for a second, and then a dim glow made its way under the door. 

“Come on,” he said, pulling the door open again. “We’ve got ten minutes.”

The corridor was lit by a strip of emergency lighting along the edges of the floor. Moving hurriedly down the corridor was the first time I really got a sense of the size of the place. Naomi had described it and warned us how many people there were, but it was nothing compared to actually seeing it. 

We moved fast, keeping our heads down. I followed John past one identical door. How the hell did anyone find their way around this place? Marrissa was waiting for us outside one of them. When she saw us coming, she unlocked the door and ushered us in. 

A small, dark room. Four beds with four people lying in them.

And there she was. In the bed furthest from the door.

My girl.

Naomi lay too still, her head turned toward the door like she'd fallen asleep waiting for me to come to bed. But she didn't react when the door opened. Didn't stir when I called her name. Didn't give me that slow, sleepy smile I’d missed so much.

“Naomi,” I said again, taking her hand. I squeezed it. She didn't squeeze back, but her hand was warm. Something glinted on her finger. 

She's still wearing her ring. 

It almost broke me; seeing the ring I’d been so nervous to give her that I’d almost bottled it a hundred times. So worried about making perfect for her that I’d had to keep taking breaks to psyche myself up to work on it again.

Is she still mine? Does she still want me?

Does she… forgive me?

Felt too good to be true. Swallowing a lump in my throat, I turned her hand over, feeling for the pulse point on her wrist. Found it. Beating strong.

Thank God. 

My gaze drifted further down. A trail of needle marks on her arm made my breath catch in my throat. It tore me up, seeing what they’d done to her. Her worst fear was right there on her arm.

What have they given her?

“She’s drugged?” Bryce said, standing beside me at Naomi’s bedside. I nodded, not taking my eyes off her for a moment. 

“They're alive,” Rick said, checking the pulse on Dwight's neck. “But they're going to be harder to get out of here. How long have we got?” 

“Not long,” John said, glancing at his watch. “We should move. Once the power’s been fixed, he’ll check on them.”

I pulled back the blankets around Naomi. 

“What the fuck…?” I breathed. Her right foot was swollen and wrapped in a bloodied bandage. Her other foot was completely bare. Both of them were tied to the metal bar at the bottom of the bed. Where were her shoes? Her clothes? They'd dressed her in some weird white gown. Worse still, it wasn’t just the ankle restraints, she was held down by a strap across her middle. A prisoner would’ve been treated better. She was being held like a damn rabid animal. Anger like I’d never known pulsed through me.

“The Colonel wanted information. On you guys, and who’d been helping her contact you,” he said. My brain still couldn’t comprehend what I was looking at. I stared at John, who swallowed like I was about to hold him responsible. “Her bones, he… broke them.”

Bones… plural.

I felt sick. 

Everything I’d held back for the last few days boiled inside me. Underneath it all - fear. What if they’d done something to her I couldn’t undo? What if it wasn’t just a sedative she was under? 

“Daryl…” Rick said again. 

“I need to kill him,” I said, “and I need it to hurt.”

“We need,” Rick said cautiously, “to get them out of here safely.”

Right.

Right.

That’s right. 

I turned back to Naomi. Rick was right; we had to get her and the others to safety before I found that piece of shit and chopped him into tiny pieces. Starting with his feet. I’d feed him his toes. Gently, although I doubted she could feel anything in her current state, I leaned over Naomi and undid the straps around her

“Get them up to the cargo door,” John said. 

I slipped my arms under her and picked her up. I tried not to think about how limp she was, how unresponsive. Instead, I tried to focus on the warmth of her in my arms again. The smell of her hair as I pulled her close. Nothing had smelled like home in so long.

That’s my girl. 

“You need a hand with her?” Bryce asked quietly.

“Nah, I got her,” I said, holding back on telling him that I never wanted anyone else touching her ever again. Bryce was a good guy; none of the rage bubbling below the surface was for him. Seeing the state that Naomi was in put me in a bad place and close to losing it at anyone who tried to take her from me.

Bryce nodded and moved to help Rick with Amber. She was also dressed in the same kind of white gown Naomi was. Except you could see a baby bump under Amber's. No shoes on her either. 

Who the fuck would drug a pregnant lady?

If I were Mark, I’d have lost my goddamn mind. Maybe that’s why they’d had to sedate him, too. 

We’d only risked sending in a small team. We hadn’t banked on having to carry them all out of here. Closest to the door, John opened it before helping Marissa carry Dwight out of the room. Glenn followed, carrying Sherry and keeping the door open with his foot until Bryce could catch it, helping Rick through with Amber. Naomi and I followed after.

You’re okay, angel. We’re going home.

Every step I took following John down that long corridor, I willed her to wake up. I could feel her breathing against me, feel the warmth of her. But I wouldn’t trust anything until she was looking at me, talking to me. 

John came to a stop by a set of big freight elevator doors. I assumed it was the same one that had been used to move us all down here after being unloaded from the trucks. John pushed a button. Nothing happened, not even a beep. Nothing whirred or rattled into motion. He pressed it again, harder this time.

“The elevator’s out,” John said, his hand still mashing the buttons helplessly. 

“Is it because of the power?” Rick asked. We could still make it out when the lights came back on.

“The backup generator should power it,” he said. 

Marissa’s face went white, “The Colonel must’ve shut it down manually.”

He's onto us?

Good.

I wanna look him in the eye while his life leaves it.

“Is there another way out?” Glenn asked. 

“There’s the door to the mines,” John said. “But I don’t have the access code.”

“I got this,” I said, setting Naomi down. I looked at Bryce. “Get her to the other exit. Get them all to the exit.”

“Where are you going?” Rick asked. 

“To get the access codes,” I said, not slowing down. “Get them to the door. Be ready.”

Knowing we were almost out of time by John’s estimate, I raced back to the room we’d just come from. If the Colonel was suspicious about the power going out, he’d be on the way to check his hostages. I got my knife ready before I pushed on the door in case he’d beaten me down here. 

The room was empty. I looked over at the bed where Noami had been lying. Alone. Hurt. Drugged . 

I cracked my knuckles. Ready. Itching for it. 

Footsteps moved down the corridor. Paused. And then the Colonel opened the door.

Before he could reach for the light switch, I’d rushed him, slamming his back into the wall. He gaped at me in surprise. 

“Expecting someone else?”

“ You... ” the color drained from his face. His voice came out raspy, winded. 

“You drugged my wife,” I said, pressing my arm harder against his throat. He struggled. “What did you give them?”

“Nothing… nothing that would… hurt the baby,” the Colonel spluttered. It wasn’t why I’d asked, but in my defense, Amber wasn’t my top priority. When we got back to Hilltop, Dr Carson could make sure she and her baby were unaffected. 

“Is it addictive?” I asked. “The shit you put in her?”

The Colonel’s eyes widened like it was something he’d never thought about. Or it coulda been the pressure I was putting on his windpipe making his eyes bulge, I guess. “No.”

My anxiety over it didn’t ease up. I don’t think it would until she was awake and talking to me again. Until I saw that smile. 

Recovering from his initial shock, the Colonel grabbed my arms, trying to move the pressure on his throat. He kneed me in the stomach, which dislodged me for a moment. He got a few hits in. I dodged another and then smashed my fish into his face while he was trying to reach for something in his pocket. 

His nose cracked under my fist. He yelped like a damn dog. 

“Days spent breaking my girl’s bones but can't handle it yourself, huh?” I snarled, backing him up against the wall again. “Give me the code to get out, and I might not kill ya.”

“I can’t let you leave,” he said.

“Then I can’t let you live,” I said, jamming my knife into his side. He yelled in pain. I pressed harder and watched the blood spill down his clothes. My forearm pushed harder into his neck. He tried to gasp in another gulp of air, and it sounded like it hurt.

Good. 

“We ain’t comin’ back here,” I said. “Think this place can survive without you? Fine. I’ll kill ya and ask the next sorry asshole who crosses my path for the code out.”

The Colonel struggled again, trying to dislodge me. Anger glued me where I was. After what he’d done, there was no way he was getting out of my grasp. I couldn’t stop thinking about how we’d found her. Broken bones and bound to a bed. 

“Did you put your hands on her?” I asked, pulling the blade to widen the cut. He screamed again. 

“What?”

“Did you touch my fucking wife?” I asked. 

“No…” he said. “Not… not like… no.”

 “Just breaking her bones, then?” I said, not easing up the slow pressure I was putting on the kife.

“2,7,8,1,” he said. 

“What?” I was so caught up in revenge that getting information from him had slipped to a secondary goal.

“The code…” he said, voice strained with pain. “It’s… it’s… 2,7..8,1. The keypad is in a panel by the door.”

Focus.

Pull it together.

Get her out. 

Don’t fuck this up.

I’d loosened my grip on him, and while I was distracted, he managed to pull something out of his pocket. I thought it might have been a weapon and braced myself for another round of fighting. But, it was a walkie. 

“Intruder…,” he wheezed into it. “...hostage… room.”

Shit. 

I pulled the blade out and plunged it back in again. He gasped, dropping his walkie, “You said…you said you wouldn't…”

“You kept my wife from me,” I said. “You drugged her. You broke her fucking bones . You really think I was gonna let you live? ” 

I let go of him, and he dropped. Even with help, he would probably bleed out slowly. But he’d still die faster than he deserved. I stepped over him as he gasped for air on the floor and hauled the door open. At the end of the corridor, a group was running to the Colonel’s aid. Shouts rang out when they spotted me. 

Shit. Shit.

I ran in the other direction. Rick was running toward me. He pulled his gun. 

“Move!” he yelled at me, I tucked into one side of the corridor as I ran. Rick fired on the people chasing me as he moved backward. I caught up to him, and we both turned and fled. Gunfire broke out behind us, but we’d already turned the corner. 

Our team was by the door into the tunnels. Naomi still hadn’t woken. None of them had. Bryce was by the door, he’d set Naomi down nearby. I ran to her side. 

“2,7,8,1,” I shouted to him. “Keypad’s in a panel by the door. 2,7,8,1!”

Bryce scrambled into action, sliding open a panel by the door as Rick, Glenn, and the others picked up our still-unconscious friends. The keypad beeped as Bryce punched in the numbers. Footsteps and shouts down the corridor were gaining on us. The keypad flashed green. 

Bryce pulled the door open, looking back at me to see if I needed help. 

“ Go ,” I yelled, Naomi safe in my arms again. “I got her.”

Bryce started running, leading the way as John and Marissa followed, carrying Dwight between them. Glenn and Sherry were close behind. Rick picked up Amber and ducked out ahead of me. I stepped into the tunnels and turned, pulling the door closed with one hand just as the Colonel’s men rounded the corner. I didn’t stop to see if they’d follow, but I did hear the door lock automatically when I shut it, which should slow them down a little. 

Bryce led the way, a single torch beam swinging in front of him as he ran. The rest of the tunnels were in total darkness. Legs burning, I held Naomi tight and concentrated on following that one light source down every twist and turn, trusting Bryce to get us out. He wasn’t going the way I expected him to. He was leading us to one of the other exits we’d found while scouting out the place, hoping it would confuse anyone who might try to follow us. The sound of our running footsteps echoed so much that I couldn’t tell if there were any more coming up behind us. 

Light grew up ahead. Daylight. A small exit into the side of the hill. Narrow. We’d have to pass one at a time. Bryce squeezed through, helping Marrisa and John with Dwight’s limp body when he’d got to the other side. 

I stopped running, breathing hard and trying to listen for any sound behind us. Glenn passed Sherry through to Bryce before slipping through the small exit. Just ahead of me, Rick started to squeeze through after them with Amber.  

BOOM.

I didn’t hear it, but I felt it as it passed through the Earth. The Earth shook. Inside the Earth, I shook with it, Naomi almost slipping out of my arms. 

I had seconds to react. Rocks around the entrance were already falling loose, tumbling down. I didn’t dare try to run through it. Setting Naomi down on the ground, I curled my body protectively around her in case the cave-in moved deeper in.  

The light vanished in a pile of falling rock, sealing us off from the outside. The dark was so complete I couldn’t see anything. Not the exit, not back the way we’d come. I couldn’t see Naomi right in front of me. 

When it seemed like the shaking had stopped for good, I straightened up a little, keeping a hand on Naomi at all times. If I let go and moved away, I didn’t know how I’d find my way back to her. 

A high-pitched ringing in my ears started to fade, and I heard someone shouting my name. Muffled by a wall of fallen rock. 

“You guys okay?” I yelled back. I hadn’t seen if Rick had cleared the exit with Amber before it caved in.

“Yes! Are you?”

“We’re fine,” I yelled back. “What the hell was that?”

“I don’t know, but hang tight, we’re gonna dig you out, okay?”

“All right,” I said. I sat down to wait for Rick and the others to clear the rubble, holding Naomi in my lap, her body so limp. I rested her head against my chest, feeling the rise and fall of her breathing against me. I wasn’t worried about getting back to the world outside right now. I was more worried about the one in my arms. 

“Please, please, please be okay. Come home to me,” I whispered to her. Of course, she didn’t answer, so I did what I always wanted to do when I was scared and alone in the dark. 

I held her hand.

Chapter 75: Just us

Naomi

He was holding my hand.

I knew it was him even before I was fully conscious. There wasn't a piece of him I wouldn't recognize. Even shrouded in a darkness like I'd never known. Even through a sedative-muddled head. Even as pain radiated up from the many broken bones in my foot and tried to overwhelm my other senses, I knew. 

His arms around me. The warmth of his chest against my side as he cradled me in his lap. His heartbeat against my ear. His hand holding mine.

I'm home. 

I'm home. 

"Daryl?" My voice croaked from lack of use. 

"Hey, hey," Relief cracked his voice. "Yeah, it's me, sweetheart. I'm right here."

I tried to look up at him, but I couldn't see anything. 

"Am…am I dead?" 

"No, baby, you're safe," he said softly, his hand stroking my hair. I believed it. I felt so, so safe with him even though I couldn't see a damn thing. The world wasn't just dark, it was black, void of light. I kept waiting for my eyes to adjust. 

"Did…did they do something to my eyes?" I was too scared to reach up and check. They didn't hurt, but part of me was still numb, and I was terrified I'd find nothing but gouged-out sockets.

"No, angel, you're alright," he said, hugging me tighter. "We're in the tunnels. Something… exploded. Or maybe there was a big cave-in. I dunno, but don't worry, okay? People are working on digging us out."

Shit.

Did the Colonel blow the bunker?

I didn't want to think about him yet. Or think about that place. I needed this moment with Daryl. Just us. Distantly, muffled by a wall of caved-in rock, I could hear voices. The scrape of metal on stone. 

"Are they all okay? Did everyone make it out?"

"They're fine. Are you okay?" he asked. 

"I'm home," I said and couldn't get much further than that. Once I'd acknowledged it out loud, the tears wouldn't stop flowing. I tried to say more, but the words wouldn't come. I think he tried to say something back but couldn't. So he held on tighter. 

I wrapped my arms around his shoulders, burying my face in his neck. Daryl squeezed me tight, fingers digging in like he was scared I'd melt into the darkness if he let go. I clung to him just the same. I didn't realize how heavy the weight of the last few months had been until it lifted in his arms. Stronger than the stone. 

He should know he's holding two of us.

"Daryl…" I choked out his name. 

"I'm right here, angel," he murmured. So soft it made something in me well up, more tears fell. He was so gentle with me. Holding me to him in a way that protected me without confining me. After being so alone, starved of him, it was overwhelming to be loved so deeply again. He'd always been gentle by nature, forced by nurture into being something else. 

"I can't believe you found me," I whispered.

"Sorry I took so long," he whispered back. 

We could have stayed that way forever, long after the others had managed to get in. Deep under the earth in a place that light couldn't touch, we could have stayed wrapped in each other for eons. We probably would have, too, if it hadn't been for another sound in the dark. 

I felt him freeze. He'd heard it, too. We weren't alone in this tunnel. Something dead was getting closer. 

Fuck. 

Daryl shifted, lifting me out of his lap. I instinctively tried to put my foot down to help him move me and yelped in pain. 

"Shit," Daryl whispered. "You okay?"

"Yeah," I let out a shaky breath as the stab of pain faded back to an ache. Daryl set me down on the cold stone, and then I lost him to the dark. I hated it. His footsteps slowly moved away from me and toward a danger I couldn't face with him. Some tiny, terrified part of me wanted to beg him to come back, but I squashed it down. 

Daryl grunted. The snarl of the dead became more frantic, the way they did when prey was close. I clenched my jaw to stop myself from making a sound. Daryl needed the silence. Felt like my heart was racing loud enough to ruin it for him. 

I held my breath as sounds of a struggle filled the tunnel. The snap of an undead jaw. The crack of a skull. Another grunt, but the dead had gone silent. Something heavy dropped to the ground. 

"Are you okay?" I asked when I couldn't stand not knowing anymore. 

"Yeah, it's down."

"You didn't get bit?"

"No, I didn't get bit. I'm all good." He wasn't lying to me. I didn't need to be able to see him to know that. The tightness in my chest eased up. His boots scuffed against the floor as he tried to find his way back to me. 

"You're close, I can hear ya," I reached out toward him, leaning out into the pitch-black. Daryl heard me moving.

"Don't you dare try to stand on that foot," he said. 

"Just a handstand, then?"

"Smartass." I could hear the smile tugging at the corners of his mouth. The affection in his eyes, even if he couldn't see me.

He brushed up against my outstretched hand, and then his hand found mine in the dark. As he crouched down next to me again, I squeezed it. He squeezed back. How many times had his hand in mine been a lifeline? Everything was fine and would always be fine as long as his hand was in mine.

Daryl sat down beside me, his leg pressed right up against mine. It wasn't close enough. His arms wrapped around my shoulders, mine around his, both of us pulling me closer to him. I slid into his lap again. Neither of us could relax until we were as close as physically possible. I curled up against his chest, his chin rested on top of my head.

"I…uh," he cleared his throat. "Noticed you still got that ring on." 

"Of course I do," I said, not understanding the heaviness in his voice. "Bastards tried to get it off me after I cut someone with it when I backhanded 'em, but… I got it back."

Daryl swallowed, something changed in the rise and fall of his breathing against me. Nerves. He was nervous. "I thought… I thought maybe you… Does that mean you ain't… mad at me?"

He sounded so small when he said it. Like when we were kids, and he'd accidentally broken something of mine. He'd looked so scared, as if I was about to get as mad at him as his Daddy would've. Or disappear on him, not want to be his friend anymore. That little boy had grown but he was still waiting for people to leave him.

"I ain't mad at you," I said, just like I'd said it back then. "It was an accident."

"But Mia, " he said, his voice breaking under the weight of his guilt. "It was my fault, I got her hurt… I didn't… I wasn't…"

"It's okay," I said, sitting up straighter so I could hug him. I wished he could see me, see that it really was okay.

"It's not, " he said, but as I pulled my arms tighter around him, he let his chin rest on my shoulder.

"What happened with Mia… that's every parent's worst nightmare," I said, "and yeah, I was mad, I needed some time, but when I walked away… I wasn't walking out on you. Or giving up on us."

"Really?" he said into my shoulder. "'Cause I'd understand if you never wanted me near her again. And if you wanted to leave me, I'd… I'd…"

It was a sentence he couldn't bring himself to finish.

"It wasn't your fault." Slowly, I moved back a little, letting one of my hands touch his face. His warm cheek against my palm, his hot tears slipping down my fingers. "It wasn't your fault." 

"'Cause I'd still have come for ya," he said. "Even if… even if you wanted nothing to do with me when I got you home. Even if you banned me from seeing Mia, I'd still have…"

"I know you would," I said, my heart aching with the truth of it. Daryl's loyalty was second to none. Merle had been awful to him, but Daryl had always dropped everything to help him out. "But I'd never… use you like that."

My heart broke a little that he thought I could. But I got why, and it was nothing to do with me. Or us. He didn't say anything, but I felt him nod. 

"I love you. I'll always love you," I said. A broken sob escaped him, but I felt him melt against me. His head sank down onto my shoulder. "And even if something really awful happened and you and I were over. Even if we were fighting like cats and dogs, I'd never keep your children from you."

"I love you, angel," he whispered. "I missed you so much, baby, you got no idea."

"I know, I know," I murmured, running a hand through his hair, same as he'd done to me when I'd been waking up. I hoped he found it as gentle, as comforting as I had. Because I did know how hard it had been when we were apart, but it would have been much harder on him. At least I'd known he was still alive. "I'd never want to leave you. You're everything to me, you know that right?"

For a moment he didn't say anything, but I knew he was digesting it. Fighting with that part of his brain that told him he wasn't worth sticking around for. He lifted his head from my shoulder, kissed my face. I think he was aiming for my forehead, but he couldn't see me so his lips landed beside my eye instead. 

"Yeah. Yeah I know," he said gruffly.

"Til death do us part, remember," I said. "And even after that, I'm gonna haunt you."

"Technically, you ain't married me yet," he said. But I knew he was smiling. 

"Like that'll stop me," I said and felt his huff of a laugh. I didn't tell him I'd already been referring to him as my husband or started using his name as mine. Maybe he wasn't ready for that yet. I'd have to rein myself in.

Daryl was quiet for a moment. Head on my shoulder. His face nuzzled against my neck and then he pulled back a little. "Child ren, huh?"

Ooops .

"Well, um…" My heart was suddenly in my throat, my mouth dry. "Yeah… I… I know last time we talked about it I was… we were… um…"

Oh shit. 

How do I do this?

"It's okay, angel. I know," he said quietly.

"You do?" My jaw dropped. Maybe that little bump wasn't as little as I thought. Maybe he'd felt it the moment he'd hugged me. Maybe someone had told him when he was getting us out. I'd assumed the others would still have been sedated like I was, but maybe not. 

"Yeah. I found your list."

List?

What…?

Oh.

"Oh…" It felt like three lifetimes since I'd sat down and drawn up a pro-con list about adding to our family. 

"I wasn't snooping or anything," Daryl said hurriedly. "I just… it was when you first went missing, and I thought I might find somethin' that would tell me where you went…where you were headed before…." 

"It's okay, I don't mind," I almost laughed at how much he was trying to excuse himself. Like he'd been caught reading my diary. "I was always planning on showing it to you."

"It was wrong, though," he said, "your list."

"It wasn't. I was very thorough."

Daryl took a deep breath. One of the ones he takes right before he has to say something he'd rather keep in. I waited, my nervous heart sinking into dread. I knew not to push him; he'd open up in his own time and in his own way. That didn't stop my mind from spinning out.

"You said that even if something happened to you, it'd be okay because I'd be there for our family…but it wasn't okay. I…fell apart… I couldn't-" I could hear the shame in his voice, stopping him from going any further. Even though I knew I hadn't caused him this level of pain deliberately, my heart still ached with it. "I didn't do right by Mia."

"I don't believe that for a second," I said. I didn't want to dismiss what he was feeling so easily, but every word Mia had said about him on the radio had been nothing but glowing.

She called you her Dad.

"When you first went missin' I was out looking for you every day," he said, which did nothing to ease my heartache. "I wasn't there for her, and… at night I couldn't sleep right. I couldn't… I started drinking. Merle's shit."

That hooch has so much to answer for.

"Oh, Daryl," I said softly, dread creeping in. I had a horrible feeling that I knew where this was going. I wished I could see him, but I knew the total darkness was helping him say what he needed to.

"Gets worse," he said with a heavy sigh. I squeezed his hand. "Everyone was round at Sanctuary one night; tryna help me even though I was being an ass. They started toasting you, talking about you like you were dead and gone."

"A fair assumption, given the evidence," I said gently, although my insides squirmed at the idea. There was an edge to his voice like he was still mad about it. 

"I sent Mia to her room and I…lost it," he said. He sounded so ashamed. My heart clenched. "I was yelling at Rick, tryna get him to fight me just so I had something to punch. I was throwing shit, and Mia… she hadn't left. She saw. She didn't get hurt or anything, but I… I scared her."

"You didn't," I said, because while I was sure it had spooked Mia to see him like that, I knew it wasn't the kind of fear he was talking about. His Daddy had been dangerous in that kind of state, Little Daryl would've feared for his life seeing Mr Dixon like that. Mia, I was sure, would have been scared for Daryl. Not of him.

"I did . You wouldn't be so nice about it if you'd seen her."

I took a beat, squeezed his hand. "What did you do after? When you realized she'd seen you. What did you do?"

Daryl swallowed. "I apologized to her. Swore it would never happen again." 

"And did it?"

"No. Of course not."

"You messed up, but you made it right," I said. "You didn't hurt her or make her feel bad. You didn't lash out at her. You ain't him ."

I didn't have to clarify who I meant. Daryl tensed all the same. "It was exactly like…"

"Your old man ever apologize to you?" I asked, knowing full well how that scene would have played out if Little Daryl had stumbled on a drunk and angry Mr Dixon. 

Daryl shifted like his back was bugging him. "No."

"Mia called you Dad," I said. "On the radio. Don't think she noticed, it just…happened." 

"Yeah, she's been…trying it out, I guess," he said. I knew he'd be beet red if I could have seen him. 

"If you'd scared her, she wouldn't be doing that," I said. "I know what that word means to her, and she wouldn't use it unless you made her feel safe. Loved."

Daryl was quiet for a moment. I hoped he was taking it in. I hoped he believed me, and knew he was deserving of it. Especially because someone else would be calling him Dad pretty soon. 

Shit.

What if he doesn't want this anymore?

I'd blindly assumed that Daryl would be over the moon about our baby, but he sounded so… 

"She, uh," Daryl hesitated, "started calling you Mom, too."

It knocked the wind right out of me. Daryl held me tighter as he felt the shock of it pass through me. For a full minute, I couldn't speak. I kept trying to, but only a sob would come out. 

"I know," he said quietly in my ear. "I know." 

“She…? She…?”

"She's a little worried about it now that you're not… now that you're back," Daryl said when it became clear I might never form another coherent sentence again. "I think she's scared you won't like it or you'll… y'know.."

"That's… that's…no. No… I'd never… I can't believe she…"

"I know," he murmured, his hand in my hair again. "I know."

"I love her so much," I said.

A loud rumble drowned out whatever Daryl said next. His arms tensed around me at the sound of cascading rocks. Fear gripped both of us as tightly as we held each other. Was it another cave-in? Aftershocks from whatever had caused the last one could have rattled a whole lot loose. 

A second later, daylight flooded in, burning bright after such darkness. It fell across Daryl's face. I'd missed that face, dreamed of that face night and day…and I still got butterflies when his eyes met mine. My heart still somersaulted into those baby blues.

God, did he somehow get even more handsome while I was away?

"There she is," Daryl whispered, his eyes scanning my face, his disbelief matching mine. His hands cupped my face, a thumb caressing my cheek, "There's my girl." 

Oh my god hurry up and kiss me already .

"You guys okay in there?" Bryce's voice shouted down to us. 

Reluctantly, I turned around to look at the gap in the wall of rock that our rescuers had managed to dig out. Not wanting to seem ungrateful about it by asking them all to give us a little while longer, I said, "All good. You okay?"

"Naomi!" he yelled "You're awake?!"

"God, I hope so," I said, looking back at Daryl. His ears went red when I smiled at him. Those eyes were shining with something that made my stomach flip. 

"Hold tight," Rick said. "We'll have you out in no time."

"We're all good," Daryl called back, his fingers under my chin gently tilting my head up toward his.

Tell him. 

This might be the last time we're alone for a while. 

It seemed like he'd had the same thought because before his name could form on my lips, he'd caught them with his. His kiss blew every thought right out of my head. 

We kissed like we'd been starved and then handed our favorite meal. Slow at first, savoring that first taste. Cautious, like someone might take it away again. And then the hunger took over and time stood still. 

Too soon, he pulled back. Dazed, I blinked at him. 

“Daryl…I’m…”

"C'mon," he said. "Lemme get you out of here."

"I can hop." I protested as he picked me up. 

"Like hell you can," he grumbled. I didn't fight him on it. Any excuse to be close to him, I'd take it.

My arms still wrapped around his neck, Daryl picked me up and carried me out into the light.

 

 

Daryl

I couldn't stop staring at her.

It was like everyone else had melted into the background. Even as they crowded around her, welcoming her home, she was all I could focus on. So long thinking she was dead, and now the others felt like ghosts. 

I kept my hand on the small of her back, even as a sobbing Bryce hugged her close. Told myself it was to keep her steady while she balanced on her one good leg. But really it was to keep myself steady. Reassuring myself she was actually there.

The other captives had started waking up, too - slow and groggy. We made sure Denise checked Amber over first. Part of me wanted to demand she looked at Naomi's foot, but given Amber's pregnancy, I understood the urgency. 

Naomi, predictably, was acting like her broken foot was nothing more than a minor inconvenience. Pretty quickly, she was sitting on the hillside, asking about the other ways into the mines that we'd found. 

"You want to go back ?" Bryce asked, incredulous, especially after what we'd just been through to get her out. He looked like he was about to tell Denise to treat her for Stockholm Syndrome.

"No," she said. "God, no. But they're keeping kids down there in one of the caves."

"The fuck for?" I asked. 

"They think raising them that way will help them be stronger," Naomi said, looking sick just talking about it. "They release Walkers in there with them as a kinda…survival of the fittest thing. It's…"

She shuddered. A cold passed through all of us. Rick was the first to pull himself together, "I'll head out with a group and check. If we can find them and get them out, we will. But, whatever triggered that cave-in was big. The mine will be unstable, I can't promise we'll find a way through."

"Yeah," she said, her voice heavy. "There might be nothing left to find. The whole bunker was rigged with explosives."

" What? " I wouldn't have minded if the whole thing had gone up in smoke, but the thought of her living under explosives for months made me think I'd let the Colonel off too lightly. " Why? "

"I don't know," she said. "There's another bunker somewhere. Maybe a whole network of them. Could be some way of protecting the other locations by destroying one so the others can't be found. Either that, or he was planning on killing them all once the kids had been deemed strong enough to survive on their own. He kept talking about the next generation 'inheriting'… like they'd be alone out here."

"Do you think that's what it was?" Rick asked. I regretted not killing the Colonel quicker. I'd wanted him to suffer, but had his last act been to take everyone else with him?

"Maybe. Or maybe he had other explosives around the exits," she said. "To seal them off properly if they were ever found. Keep us out."

Rick put a reassuring hand on his shoulder, "We'll see what we can do." 

He glanced at me. I think he was about to ask if I was coming with him, but one look at the way I was glued to Naomi's side and he decided against it. I caught the slight smirk on his face before he left us to see who he could rally to take another look at the mines. I watched him go, weighing up whether or not to go with him, even just to give Naomi a break from me hovering around her like a damn fly. Sure that it must be bugging her by now, I told myself to get a grip and step away. But then she turned her head and smiled at me, and I swear my heart stopped for a moment. 

God, did she somehow get even prettier down there?

She closed her eyes for a moment, still smiling, "God, I don't remember the last time I felt the wind."

"C'mon," I managed to say even though it felt like my tongue had grown twice the size out of nerves. Nerves. Over a girl I'd known since I was seven. I'd long since given up hope that she'd one day not have that effect on me. "Denise is finished with Sherry now. Let's get her to take a look at that foot." 

"All right," she nodded and started to stand. I slipped my arm around her for support. She leaned on me as we made our way to the makeshift medical clinic that Denise was operating from the back of one of our vehicles. She and Tara had driven over after Rick had radioed to let them know we were out and where we'd emerged from the mines. 

"Did Amber know all of that?" I asked. "About the kids?"

"I kept it from her for a while," she said. "But…she found out eventually."

"Can't imagine how scary that was for her," I said. "With her own little one on the way."

"Yeah," Naomi said, and for once, I didn't understand the look she gave me. A laugh that seemed out of place. "You got no idea."

Before I could decipher the look on her face, Denise had cleared a space for Naomi to sit up in the back of one of our pickup trucks with her injured foot stretched out in front of her.

"How's it feeling?" Denise asked as she slowly unwrapped the bandages around her foot.

"It's been worse," Naomi said, and I started wondering if she'd give more helpful answers if I backed away.

"Do you know which bone is broken?"

"Um, no," Naomi glanced over at me. "It's a few."

"Do you know how many?" she asked. Naomi gave me another nervous glance. I clenched my jaw, clenched my fists, clenched everything to stop myself from reacting so she didn't banish me. 

"I… lost track."

The last bandage peeled away from her foot. Swollen skin underneath was so dark purple in places it was almost black. I couldn't hold back, "Fucking Hell, Naomi."

"I know," Naomi said quietly, her hand reaching for mine again. "But I'm okay now."

"I'll see what painkillers we have," Denise said, also shooting a nervous glance in my direction. She stepped back, opening up the front of the truck to search one of the medical bags. I drew closer to Naomi. 

"You said they weren't hurting you down there." I tried not to make it sound like an accusation, but it came out as one all the same. 

"They weren't," she said. "... until they were."

"Because of us?"

"Because of them , " she said. "Because of him . The things they were doing down there…"

Naomi shook her head. I knew she was thinking about the kids again. 

"Can't save everyone, angel," I said. It seemed unlikely we'd find another way in. Even if we did, I was prepared to fight her if she tried to go back.

But all she said was, "I know." 

It sounded sad, but I was surprised by the lack of resistance she put up. The hand that wasn't holding mine fidgeted nervously in her lap, coming to rest on her stomach. The truck door closed again, and Denise came back, holding out a few white pills and a bottle of something. 

"I don't have a lot of painkillers," Denise said apologetically. "You might want to wash them down with this. It'll help numb you."

Naomi stared at the bottle of alcohol like Denise had handed her a bottle of bleach and told her to drink it. "It's really not so bad."

"Maybe not right now," Denise said. "But I'm going to try and strap it up, make sure the bones are set properly. It's going to hurt." 

Naomi didn't move. She froze up. Denise looked at me, her eyes begging me to help her out. 

"Drink," I told Naomi, "It'll help."

"I…I um…" she glanced at Denise and then at me. Something had got her rattled, extremely nervous. I took both of her hands in mine. 

"Is it…is it because of what they gave you in there?" I asked. "If it's anything other than what they said, we'll deal with it, okay? I got you."

I'd been trying to reassure her, but tears welled in her eyes. Denise stepped in to back me up. "Whatever sedative they gave you will be working its way out of your system. It shouldn't react with a small amount of alcohol."

"And if it ain't just a sedative they gave you," I said. Nice as Denise had been to reassure her, I knew she didn't know the depth of Naomi's fear around this kind of stuff. "It'll be okay. We know the signs. We know how to deal with it. Ain't gonna make you her ."

I didn't need to clarify who I meant.

"Daryl…" Naomi's face crumpled a little. Her eyes locked on mine. There was so much in the way she was looking at me. Whatever she was afraid of, whatever was coming, I'd hold her hand through all of it. Withdrawal, sickness, whatever. I'd be there.

"Daryl!" Rick called. 

Not now, man.

I turned to look over at him, making sure it wasn't some kind of disaster that would require us to make a quick exit out of here. He wasn't running. Nobody was following him. "Gimme a moment."

"It's okay," Naomi said when I looked back at her, taking a deep breath to collect herself. Whatever had been going on, she seemed to have steadied herself. "Go see what he wants. Denise has got me."

I hesitated. "You're gonna do what the Doctor says?"

"I'm gonna do what's best, medically," she said. "I promise."

"Alright," I said, but I couldn't shake the feeling she'd laid some kind of word trap I didn't understand. I looked over at Denise again. 

"I'll look after her," she said before I could say anything else. I nodded, gave Naomi's hands one last squeeze before I let go and walked over to Rick. 

Bryce was with him, but I couldn't see any of the others who'd gone to check for a way to help the kids. 

"You find a way in?" I asked them. 

"No," Rick said. "I've checked the east side and every entrance we'd mapped is blocked off. Glenn and Dwight are checking some others, but so far, it's been the same for them. No way in, and no way out that we can see."

"Think it's the same for all of them?"

"I think so," Rick nodded. "Either the bunker's gone in a blast big enough to take down most of the mine with it, or Naomi's right and they had some kind of failsafe in place to block all exits in the event they were found."

"She doing okay?" Bryce asked, his gaze moving to look behind me. I glanced back over my shoulder at where Denise was wrapping Naomi's foot again in some kind of makeshift splint. No more arguing over medication. 

Thank God. 

"Yeah," I said. "Sooner we can get her home the better."

"Think you can wait a day?" Rick said. "I think we should take alternate routes back, maybe stay somewhere else overnight, and make sure we're not followed."

"If you can't get in, they ain't getting out," I said. 

"Unless they use the overground entrance we went in via," Bryce said. "But we can't check that compound without them knowing. They'll be alert to it."

"If they are still in there, checking the overground entrance is a suicide mission," Rick agreed. "No way they'll let us near."

"Fine," I agreed with a nod. "We split up, check nobody's following us and meet back at Hilltop tomorrow?"

"We'll see if the others manage to find another way in there," Rick said. "But otherwise, yeah, that's the plan."

It wasn't ideal, but it made sense. As much as I wanted to see Mia and Naomi reunited, I wouldn't risk bringing those nutjobs anywhere near Mia. I headed back to Naomi, unsure how to break that news to her. Denise had just finished tightly re-bandaging her foot. Her toes bound to each other, the whole foot looked more difficult to move now. But that was probably best, making sure bones healed in the right places.

God, I want to kill that man all over again. 

"Best I can do until we get her back to Hilltop," Denise said before I could even ask. 

"Right," I said, ready to scrap everything I'd just agreed on with Rick. 

Naomi looked up at me; she was taking deep breaths; the pain must have been a lot, even with Denise's painkillers and alcohol. "What's the plan?"

"Need to make sure we ain't followed. We don't wanna risk anything, so we're not heading back straight away," I said. I saw the disappointment in Naomi's eyes, although she tried to hide it with a nod. I glanced back at Denise. "That okay?"

"Yes," she said, packing things back into her med kit. "She did great, but when you get to Hilltop, Dr Carson should see you."

"I know," Naomi said. I touched her shoulder, felt a jolt pass through me as I did. "You okay waiting another day to see Mia?"

"It sucks," she said. "But it's only one more day. And we can talk to her tonight, right?"

Part of her was still stuck in that bunker routine of only being able to talk to us at certain times. I unclipped my walkie from my belt and passed it to her. "Why wait? She'll be excited to hear an update. Even more so if it comes from you."

"Hilltop," Naomi said, a big smile already spreading over her face. "Do you read me?"

The noise that came back was more of an incoherent scream than anything else. And a lot of crying. From both of them. Naomi was better at translating Mia-squeals than I was because somehow she decoded it enough to say, "Yeah, it's me. I'm out. I'm alright. Are you okay, sweetie? I can't wait to see you."

More high-pitched babbling from Mia, Naomi looked over at me with a smile. "Yeah, he's good too. He's right here."

Mia said something shorter, mixed with a laugh that made Naomi's smile get even bigger.

"Yeah, he's the best," Naomi said, still grinning at me.

Nope.

I ducked away, let them catch up. Couldn't cope with overhearing anything else about myself.

The others returned. Even with Dwight's knowledge of a few other exits, they hadn't been able to find a single way in that wasn't now blocked. I wondered if that made it more or less likely that it was explosives around the exits that had blown rather than the whole bunker. I sat with Rick while we worked out what groups to split into and where to go for the night. 

Someone tapped me on the shoulder. Naomi. On the move. Tara had given her a shovel from the allotments, and she was using it as a crutch. She held the walkie out to me, "Mia wants to say hi."

"Hey, Mia," I took it from her, "Sorry you gotta wait another day." 

"It's okay, I'm just happy you got her," Mia said. It was the happiest I'd heard her sound in months. She paused for a moment and then laughed. "I'll see you both tomorrow. Bet she says I've grown." 

"Oh yeah? What you betting?"

"Um…" Mia thought about it for a second. "One Hilltop egg."

"You're on," I said. "See you tomorrow. Love you." 

"Love you, too," I said and switched the radio off. When I looked over at Naomi again, she was beaming at me. I tried to stop myself from going red, but echoes of everything she'd said in the tunnels rang in my ears. "We'll head off soon."

"Just us?" she asked. Something about it tugged hard at my heart. She asked it, so… hopeful. But, also, a little nervous. It made my stomach do backflips.

“I mean… it’ll be… a few of us probably, but… we’ll… y’know…” I said. She nodded even though what I'd said had amounted to nothing but a stuttering mess and even I wasn't sure what I'd been trying to say. 

Did she always make me this goddamn nervous?

Why is she so nervous?

Maybe it was because we hadn't had much time by ourselves yet. Other than a little time in the tunnels, we were surrounded by people. Good people. Nice, but not… 'just us'.

"Ready to go?" Bryce asked us. "It'll be dark in a few hours. Rick says we should head out soon."

I nodded, and took my bike keys out of my pocket. I passed them to him, "Take this for me, will ya?"

Bryce stared at me like I'd given him a kidney. His jaw dropped. "You… you want me to take your bike?"

"You mind?" I asked.

"No," he said, unable to wipe the surprise off his face. 

"Thanks, man," I said. 

I could feel Naomi staring at me too, but she was nice enough not to give me shit until Bryce had gone to get on my bike, "You ain't taking the bike?"

"Ain't getting you on the back of a bike with that busted foot," I said, my arm slipping around her waist. 

"I could try," she protested, a sly grin spreading over her face. "Or we could… travel separately."

"Not a chance," I said. She laughed. 

The car journey with Glenn, Tara, and Denise didn't give us any time to ourselves either. But it was enough to sit next to her. To be able to look over at her and see that smile. To reach out and touch her hand. 

Our group headed south for a while, and then we drove deep into the woods. Didn't seem like anyone was following us. Except Bryce on my bike. Driving real careful.

We found a clearing off the beaten track in the shadow of a small hill. It was getting dark by the time we pulled over. I shot a couple of squirrels for dinner while the tents were set up. Passed them to Tara when I got back because I thought Naomi would be pushing herself too hard on her busted foot trying to be helpful. But when I went looking for her, I found she wasn't with any of them. She was making her way up the hill on her makeshift crutch.

Take your eyes off the girl for one damn minute… 

Thankfully, she was pretty damn slow, and I caught up to her as she came to a stop at the top of the hill. She sat down in the grass, turning like she'd been waiting for me. 

"What the hell Naomi?"

"Mad I beat you up here?" she grinned, patting a patch of grass beside her.

"Pfft," I huffed. "Ain't a race if you don't tell the other person you're in one."

"C'mon now," she said. "I'm working at a disadvantage here, you can't let me have a little head start?"

She clearly had no intention of moving. I sighed and sat down next to her. 

"You ain't hungry?" I asked. "You should eat."

"I know," she said. That look was back in her eyes, those nerves. "I will. But… can we sit a minute?" 

"Sure," I said. Naomi leaned against me, her head on my shoulder, her hands fidgeting nervously in her lap. "You doin' okay?"

Why is she so nervous?

Maybe it was too much being out here after so long underground, mostly on her own. Too many people around, maybe? I mean, she'd almost lost it when she felt some damn wind. From here, you could see the firelight of our camp. Smell the squirrels cooking. Indistinct chatter and laughter. It was nice, quiet, but the kind of thing I usually enjoyed more than she did.

"Daryl?" she said, lifting her head from my shoulder to look at me. I looked back at her. Our eyes met, and something changed in hers. A steadiness. "I'm pregnant."

Two words changed the world under my feet.

I stared at her. Blinking like I hadn't heard right, but I knew I had. What else could it be?

"It's yours," she said, quickly, before my mind could jump to the worst things that could have happened to her in there. "I mean…obviously it's yours, I just… I was pregnant when I fell in that lake. I didn't know or anything. I… I wasn't keeping it from you."

My silence was making her talk a million miles an hour. I knew I should say something. Anything. But it was all so tangled up, and I couldn't catch my breath.

"I'm pretty sure it was that night I tried to surprise you by inviting everyone round and I'd made that… Merle's recipe for home-brew hooch and we… well, we got a little…" she was still talking, tripping over her words while I stared at her. I couldn't take in everything she was saying. I remembered the night. Kind of. Enough to not be surprised we'd forgotten something.

God, Merle would have gotten a kick out of all this.

I'd wanted this. So badly, I'd wanted a family to call my own. One that… wanted me as much as I did them. Spent so many years thinking it wasn't possible for a guy like me that I had squashed it deep down inside where it wouldn't bug me. Finding Naomi and her somehow falling in love with me, slowly building a family with her and Mia had been nothing short of a miracle.

But this…

THIS? 

My heart was racing faster than Naomi was talking. Spinning over and over in my chest like a singular thought - what if I'm not good enough for this? 

"I didn't know until they… tested me down there. And I was so sick and so scared it would make me lose the baby, but it didn't," she said. She'd started crying. Her hands were shaking. I tried to steady them, but mine were shaking too. "I didn't know how they survived all of that, but they did. I didn't… fuck it up. They're so strong, Daryl."

' Course they are. Look at their Momma.

And suddenly it was all right. The fear was still there, but…so was she. Didn't matter that I was worried about what kind of Dad I'd be. Or how we'd raise a baby in a world as fucked up as this one. 

Because look at their goddamn Momma.

"Daryl," she whispered, finally out of steam. "Please say something."

I looked at her, my girl, in the light of the moon and stars. At the top of a hill with me, far away from everyone else. Her hands in mine. A life growing inside her built from our love. 

"You're a fucking miracle, you know that?" I said. My cheeks felt damp. God knows when that had happened. "Both of ya."

Both of them. 

I couldn't take my eyes off her. Kept expecting something to change, or to notice something different about her now that I knew. But she was still her. My brilliant girl. Carrying my baby. 

Holyfuckingshit.

She let out something between a laugh and a sob. Wiped her eyes. Something like relief relaxed her shoulders, "Are you okay?"

"Are you? "

"Yes. Yes! I'm so excited about this, " she said. She meant it, too. It was radiating from her. Pretty eyes shining with it. I reached out toward her stomach and then stopped myself. Pregnant ladies didn't always like that, did they? I still couldn't believe it was Naomi I was thinking about as… pregnant. Couldn't wrap my head around it. 

She saw what I'd refrained from doing and grabbed my wrist, putting my hand on her stomach. On a little bump.

"Holy shit," I whispered. "We're… we're having a baby."

It didn't feel real.

"We're having a baby," she nodded, tears still shining in her eyes. 

"Ain't you scared?" I asked. I'd seen her list, but everything she'd said before about pregnancy and motherhood was still true. 

"Terrified," she said, and hearing her admit that calmed the last dregs of my own fear. "But… you got me right? You got us?"

Us.

Her and the baby. 

My baby.

"Always," I said. 

"And we got you," she said, hand covering mine across her stomach. "We're golden."

I looked down at where our hands met over the life that was growing inside her. Hers on top of mine. A scar on the back of it, made by a hotheaded dumbass who thought he was in love but had no fucking idea how deep he could fall. A ring on one of her fingers made by a man smart enough to know what he had. Neither of those versions of me knew how I'd managed to get this damn lucky. 

I looked back at her, and she was looking at me like she always had. Seeing something more in me than anyone else ever did. 

Mia had picked up that look too, that stubborn belief in me. 

And this baby... They would look at me just the same. 

I could be that man. For them, for my family, I could be anything. 

Chapter 76: Shotgun

Notes:

Thanks so much for reading! And for being so patient with how long it can take between chapters. I appreciate you all so much 🥰

Naomi 

“Hey, slow down, will ya?” Daryl grumbled from beside me in the backseat. “This ain't in a damn sports car.” 

Glenn stared at him through the rearview mirror. Everyone else in the car turned to look at him with the same question in their eyes - since when did Daryl Dixon care about speed limits?

“Did you see a speed camera back there, Daryl?” Glenn said in an effort to lighten Daryl’s grumpy backseat driving.

“Ain’t that,” Daryl muttered. “But take it easy on the corners, yeah? We’re bouncing around like pinballs back here.”

In the mirror, Glenn’s gaze slid over to me. He didn't have the full picture but had correctly pieced together that worry over me was the cause of Daryl's agitation. “Is your foot okay?”

“It's fine,” I said, squeezing Daryl’s hand. “Everything is fine.” 

Daryl muttered something under his breath, and Glenn looked close to crashing the car out of spite. He shot Daryl another annoyed look and said, “Next time we're coming back from a bunker full of nuts, you can drive.” 

Thankfully, we were getting close to Hilltop. My grip on Daryl's hand tightened from a comforting squeeze to a keeping-his-sass-in-line squeeze. He huffed a big sigh through his nose but kept his trap shut.

Mia was waiting outside the gates. I could tell it was her from a distance. Carol stood next to her. Bryce, still on Daryl's bike, was way ahead of us and would definitely beat us back, thanks to Daryl’s new job in Highway Patrol. Bryce slowed to talk to her. She started bouncing up and down with excitement and then ran away from the open gates toward the car. Sensing Daryl was close to blowing a fuse, Glenn slowed right down as she got nearer. 

“Do you want to hop out here?” Glenn asked when Mia was close enough that I could hear her shouting. Glenn paused slightly self-consciously and then said, “That wasn't a joke about your foot, I just…thought…maybe….”

“Yes, please,” I said, one hand already on the door handle. I waited for Daryl to protest, but he knew better than that. Glenn brought the car to a stop, and I opened the door. Mia started sprinting.

The image of her that lived in my head was always a few steps behind reality. Years passed in the blink of an eye. I wondered what age she’d be when I caught up. As it was, she constantly caught me off guard with how much she'd grown, and not just physically. How clever, thoughtful and strong she could be never failed to blow me away either. But as she ran toward me, all I could say was, “Oh my God, did she get taller?” 

For some reason, this made Daryl tut as he got out of the car behind me. He got the shovel I'd been using as a makeshift crutch out of the trunk. Glenn drove away very slowly, and then when he was too far away for Daryl to yell at him again, sped up.

Last time I'd seen Mia, she hadn't been able to run. She'd barely been able to move from her bed. Now, she threw herself so hard into my arms she almost knocked me over. I held on tight, kicking myself for ever letting go. I should have sewn her to me the day our Momma handed her to me as a tiny, screaming newborn.

“I'm sorry,” I sobbed into her hair. “I'm so for leavin’... being away so long…”

“It's okay, it's okay,” she said. “You're home!” 

One of these days, she’d be too old and too cool to hug me like this. Maybe she already was. Maybe I’d have to fake my death a couple of times a year to get another one of these. Or, just cherish this one like it was the last. 

The shovel scraped against the ground. Mia sniffed and looked up at Daryl.

“I owe you an egg,” he said. 

“Told you so.” Mia reached out a hand and grabbed his arm, pulling him toward us. He hugged us both, letting me lean into him as I balanced on my one good foot. Both of us relaxed. The final piece of our puzzle was here, and we had so much to tell her. 

I had no idea how I was going to handle the ‘Mom’ and ‘Dad’ of it all. From what Daryl had said, she was as nervous about it as I felt. It was such a big decision, and I didn’t want to push her into making it one way or the other. 

I immediately wanted to tell her about the baby, too, but I needed peace of mind from Doctor Carson that everything was still okay. My body had been through a lot in the last few days. I didn't want to give her this news only to have to rip it away again. 

For now, it was enough for the three of us just to be together.

“She's definitely taller,” I said to Daryl over the top of her head. I wouldn’t be able to say anything over the top of her head for much longer. I wondered if she’d wind up taller than me. 

“That’s two eggs,” Mia laughed, wiping tears from under her eyes.

“Damnit,” he sighed again and let go of us. He picked up the shovel from where he’d dropped it on the ground and passed it to me. “C’mon, let’s let a Doctor take a look at you, yeah?”

“All right,” I grumbled, fighting the urge to radio someone to bring Doctor Carson out here because I didn’t want to let go of either of them just yet.

I was getting pretty used to moving around on my makeshift crutch, but progress was still slow. Mia and Daryl slowed down to walk with me as if they were worried that if they got even one step ahead, they’d turn around and see that I’d fallen into another lake. They flanked me, marching me toward Hilltop like I'd broken out of house arrest. 

Carol was still waiting at the gates. She started walking toward us as we got nearer. Her familiar welcoming smile on her face. The kind you can't help but return.

“It’s so good to see you,” she said, holding her arms out for a hug. 

“You too,” I said as I squeezed her. “Thank you.” 

“What on Earth for?” she asked. I pulled back to look at her, she kept a hand on my shoulder. “I’m not the one who got you out of that place.”

“For everything else,” I said. I knew she’d have looked out for both of them while I was away. Nobody needed to say it. I knew it was true because I knew Carol. I’d been glad not to see her on the team getting me out, her capacity for violence took such a toll on her. Staying and keeping Mia safe and sane meant the world. Carol nodded, and her hand squeezed my shoulder. 

While Daryl was distracted by hugging Carol, I ducked away through the gates and up to the big house. Or, at least, I tried to, but I was too damn slow. I got a few paces before he caught me up.

“Where you going?” 

God, I had more privacy in the bunker.

The Colonel could have saved a lot of money on surveillance equipment if he'd had access to one Daryl who'd learned he was about to be a father. Security had never been tighter, and we were amongst friends.

“I need to pee.”

“Didn't you just…?” Daryl frowned. I'd made Glenn pull over for a pee break on the way. 

“Yes. I need to pee all the time now,” I said in hushed tones, glancing over my shoulder to make sure Mia couldn’t hear. She was talking to Carol, the gates squeaking shut behind them. “It's basically all I do now because someone is growing and putting a bunch of pressure on my bladder.”

“Oh. Right,” he said, a smile spreading across his face. I'd learned pretty quickly I could distract him from any level of grump with a new reminder of the baby. Every reference stopped him fretting for a few seconds while a big, dopey smile spread over his face. “Well, don't be long.”

“Yeah, yeah, I know,” I said, more than slightly relieved he didn't demand to accompany me to the bathroom. 

When I was done, both he and Mia were lurking suspiciously close to the bathroom door, pretending to be engrossed in something that had absolutely nothing to do with waiting for me. 

I will never have another moment alone for the rest of my life. 

“What you smiling about?” Daryl asked. 

“Enjoying the Barrington family tree?” I grinned. Daryl folded his arms across his chest and tried his best to look annoyed.

“Lotta old rich dead people married to other old rich dead people,” he said. Then he actually took a look at the family tree of Hilltop’s original owners. “Think some of ‘em might have been cousins.” 

“That’s rich folks for ya,” I said. 

Daryl grunted in agreement and then gestured toward the door. “C'mon, quit dawdling.” 

“Should I come too?” Mia asked.

“No,” I said. “I'm all good. Don't wanna crowd the man.” 

“Go see Perla,” Daryl said to her, his hand coming to rest on my back as I limped toward the door. I could see the restraint he was exerting to resist offering to carry me the rest of the way. “I'll holler if I need ya to keep the patient in line.”

“Alright,” Mia said. She looked pointedly at me, eyes narrowing, “I won't be far.”

“I'll be on my best behavior,” I promised. 

At the top of the steps down from the big house, I took a moment to breathe in being somewhere so familiar, with faces around me that I knew. Open air. Space enough to watch Mia run toward her friend, even if I wasn't in a fit state for running myself. It was good to be back. I wouldn't say back ‘home’ because I'd been there since the moment I'd woken up in Daryl's arms, but it was nice to be at Hilltop all the same.

Daryl looked close to yelling at me so I hauled ass down the stairs and over to Doctor Carson’s office. He was waiting for us, and had been prepped for our arrival at Hilltop. He took a look at my foot and re-wrapped part of it but mostly seemed to think Denise had done a good job. Daryl watched, arms folded, leaning on the wall by the door. I couldn't decide if he felt more like my bodyguard or prison officer. When Doctor Carson was done, I asked. “You still got sonogram stuff here?” 

It was still hard to keep track of what the Saviors had raided and what Hilltop had managed to claw back for themselves. 

“Yes,” a flicker of surprise on his face. “Are you…?”

“Yes,” I nodded. “Can we check everything's okay?” 

“Of course,” Doctor Carson said. If he was worried about the pregnancy after everything I'd been through, he didn't let it show. “Give me a moment to set things up.”

I looked over at Daryl. “You wanna see the baby?” 

Daryl's whole face lit up. He looked from me to Dr Carson and back again. “Is that… Can I?” 

Doctor Carson indicated to the now vacant seat he’d been perched on while fixing up my foot. “Take a seat, I won't be a moment.”

Daryl took a few hesitant steps toward the chair Doctor Carson had indicated to. Slowly, like he half expected someone to pull it out from under him, he sat down. Cleared his throat. His knee bounced up and down, he rubbed his hands against his pants. I reached over and took one of them. He looked over at me, his whole face was tense.

Please still be okay in there, little one. 

Please.

Your Daddy's right here now.

Doctor Carson asked me a few questions about how I was doing and how everything had progressed so far. I'd done this so much with Jocelyn - an amount that now flagged as suspicious given what they'd been up to - that I was able to give him some pretty in-depth answers. 

I lay back and lifted my shirt, unbuttoning the jeans Daryl had thoughtfully packed for me that had fit before I'd left, but were on the tight side now. The now familiar cool of the gel hit my lower abdomen and I froze up. 

Please be okay. Please be okay. 

Daryl's hand gripped mine like a vice, and I knew I was squeezing back just as hard. The hard press of the transducer against my stomach and a now familiar sight swam onto the screen. So much bigger than that initial little bean had appeared. Doctor Carson paused for a moment, assessing the scan, and I thought my heart was about to stop. He nodded, “Everything’s looking as it should.” 

I relaxed and looked over at Daryl. My breath caught in my throat. I’d almost forgotten how monumental the first time seeing that image on the screen had been. I’d been in shock to discover I was pregnant, overwhelmed in a strange place and deeply homesick. 

But this? 

Seeing Daryl lean so far forward in his seat to get his first glimpse of his growing baby he was perched on the edge. The way his misty eyes searched the screen like something he’d lost long ago was finally coming back to him. This was how that first time should have been.

He swallowed, his voice gruff, “That's our kid?”

“Yeah. That's them right here,” Doctor Carson indicated on the screen. A smile tugged at his mouth. Daryl was usually so stoic around anyone who wasn't in his inner circle, but this had melted all of that away. His awe and joy was written all over his face. I squeezed his hand and he squeezed back.

“You seein’ this angel?” Daryl asked, almost breathless. 

“Yes,” I said, but I couldn't take my eyes off his face. You could tell just by looking at him how much he already loved his kid. 

“God, Naomi,” he whispered, raising my hand to his lips and kissing it. 

“Do you want to know the sex?” Doctor Carson asked. 

“Do you already know?” Daryl asked without looking at me. “Did they tell you down there?”

“No,” I said. Jocelyn had offered, but I’d declined. Didn’t feel right knowing without him. “And I'm not sure I want to. I think the surprise might help me get through labor. You can find out if you want, though. As long as you don't tell me.”

“They doing okay, Doc?” Daryl asked.

“Yes,” Doctor Carson replied. “It's all looking healthy.” 

Daryl nodded, eyes shining. “I don't care. As long as they're doing good, that's all that matters.”

“They're doing really well,” Doctor Carson said, unable to hide the smile he'd been suppressing. 

“Really well,” Daryl repeated, finally turning to look at me. “You hear that, angel?”

“I hear it,” I nodded. He was so proud of his kid already, for just coming into existence. I couldn't imagine what he'd be like when they took their first step or said their first word. It would be unbearable. I couldn't wait.

Daryl looked back at the screen like he couldn't bear to look away for too long.

God, how many times can you fall in love with the same man?

I worried I'd have to sit here for six months until the kid was born. 

Maybe Doctor Carson had the same concern because he asked, “Would you like a copy of the scan?”

Daryl nodded enthusiastically enough for the both of us. As Doctor Carson printed it out, Daryl looked over at me. He tried to say something but couldn't get the words out. When he closed his mouth again, his bottom lip trembled a little.

Doctor Carson handed him the print-out and Daryl took it from him like it was the single most breakable, precious thing in existence. I sat up, pulling my shirt back down over my stomach, to look at it over his shoulder. The last time I'd seen Daryl holding one of those, it had been of Hershel - now happy and healthy with his parents at Hilltop. I’d kissed Daryl for the first time that night. The two hadn’t felt connected at the time, but maybe that was naive. Thinking about the future had pushed me, with the clarity only a tipsy person could have, into the arms of the only man I could ever picture it with. 

“I'll give you guys a moment,” Doctor Carson said. He hesitated by the door, “And I’ll try to find you a crutch that’s not a shovel.”

“Thank you,” I said. Doctor Carson gave a nod and stepped out.

“Holy shit, Naomi,” Daryl breathed as the door closed. He looked back down at the scan in his hands. “Holy shit.”

“I know,” I said. “Feels more real, don’t it?”

“Yeah,” he said. I watched it hit him again, a big wave of it washing over him. “You sure you’re okay with it all?”

Bit late if I’m not.

“Yes.”

“But…” he looked over at me. “All the… medical stuff. All of the shit that can go wrong… it’s…”

He was so scared. Of losing me. Of losing this kid he was already so devoted to. Of losing both of us. Was this what parenthood was - just swinging between fear and awe? 

I was stuck in the same cycle myself, and there had been times, especially alone, when my own anxieties felt overwhelming. My mind would slip to the worst case scenarios and I'd see them play out as strong as premonitions. Now, these old fears were tinged with guilt, because our kid was already on the way and it wasn’t their fault that I’d spent so many years being conflicted about it. 

Seeing Daryl struggling kicked in my instincts to protect him. Reassure him. It was an instinct so strong it didn't leave room for me to freak out too. I was pretty certain it would be the same for him when it was my turn to freak out. This was how we'd get each other through. I'd be strong when he faltered, and he'd be there when I needed him in return.

I swung my legs over the side of the medical bed and patted the space beside me, “C’mere.”

Daryl stood up from his chair and sat down beside me. He put an arm around me, his hand curled around my hip. In the other, he held the scan between us so we could both look at it.

“It’s scary,” I admitted. “Everything my body’s doing, and all the changes it’s going to keep going through… honestly, it makes my head spin just to think about it. But I'm past the 12 week point, which means this baby's got a damn good chance. And we can face whatever’s coming. We’re in good hands here. Do you know how lucky we are to have Doctor Carson to keep an eye on things?”

“Yeah, that’s true,” he seemed a little reassured by that. I’d seen, even in the last ten minutes, that he had enough love for this child for the two of us. But, I didn’t tell him that if there were complications and I didn’t survive childbirth, he’d be okay. Losing me was still too raw a thought. “Should we move here?”

“Here?” I looked around. 

“Well, not the medical room, dummy,” he said. “Doc’s probably got a lot of patients to see, but… Hilltop might not be a bad shout. Keep you near in case… somethin’ happens.”

He avoided eye contact, but I could still see the worry in them. Maybe it was easier for me to spot because I’d put it there when I spilled all of my fears about pregnancy and childbirth. Unburdening me had shifted some of that load onto him. 

“Do you want to live here?” I asked. During our conversations over the radio, Mia had filled in a lot of blanks on what had happened while I’d been away. I was sure there were a lot of little pieces I was missing, but the big ones - Daryl killing Negan, Carol taking over Sanctuary - I had those. 

“I dunno,” he said. “Mia loves them horses.”

“She does,” I laughed. “It’s pretty much all I heard about between bunker updates.”

Daryl gave a start like he’d remembered he left a stove on somewhere. “Shit, we should tell Mia.”

“Yeah? You want to?”

“You don't?”

“No, I do. Feels like I’m lying to her face,” I said. “But I’ve had a lot longer to get used to the idea that we're having a baby. It’s okay if you need more time where nobody else knows.”

Daryl took a moment to think about it. “Nah. Feels wrong that she doesn’t know.”

He stood up and went to the door to holler for Mia. She arrived in seconds, she couldn't have been more than a few paces away. Her face was flooded with worry as she looked in at me.

“Are you okay?” she stepped into the room.

“C’mere a moment,” I said. “We got news.”

Daryl sat back down where he’d been on the medical bed next to me. I think he meant for her to take the chair, but she was too apprehensive for that. She stood in front of us, not knowing which of us to look at. There was something kind of stern in the way her gaze flickered between us. 

“If you eloped without me, I'll never forgive you,” Mia said. She looked pointedly at Daryl, “Either of you.”

“I told ya that detour to Vegas was a mistake,” Daryl said, nudging me with a grin.

“How else were we gonna get Elvis to show?”

Mia rolled her eyes and gave us a very dry, sarcastic, “Haha. What is it really?”

Daryl looked over at me. Took my hand. The way he squeezed it told me he was leaving this bit to me. I gulped, “We… I'm…”

Shit. 

Why is this bit always so difficult to say out loud?

I looked at her. She’d been the first kid I’d ever seen on a sonogram. The reason I already knew how to put on a diaper. The first tiny little baby I’d ever seen Daryl hold and, it turned out, the first kid to ever call me ‘Mom.’ And just like that, I knew exactly how to tell her, “You're gonna be a big sister.”

I watched the words hit her. Two shocks jolted through her. 

“What?” she said, looking at both of us like we might still be messing with her. “What?!”

Daryl held out the sonogram. “Take a look. That's them right there”

Mia's fingers trembled as she took the picture from him. I tried to read her face. 

“Oh my God,” she said, her breathing as shaky as her hands. “Oh my God.”

“See how good they’re growin’?” Daryl said, peering at the picture while she looked at it too. That pride was back in his voice. Warmth spread through me just hearing it. Mia kept staring at it in disbelief. It felt like the longest amount of time I’d ever experienced her being quiet. 

It was hard to read anything past her shock. She’d once told me the idea of Daryl and I having a kid was, hypothetically, something she’d be excited about, but maybe that would change now that it was real. Now that she’d started thinking of us as our own little family, maybe she’d worry about a child that was biologically ours pushing her out. 

“You okay?” I asked her, unable to deal with her silence any longer.

Mia looked at me like she’d been broken out from under a spell. 

“This is the best news ever,” she hugged me so tight. Daryl carefully took the sonogram picture back so she didn’t crush it like she was in danger of crushing me. Silence finally broken, Mia couldn’t stop, “Is it a boy or a girl? Do you know yet? Do you want to know? We should do a supply run for baby things. We need a crib. And toys! And babygrows! Can I help choose them? When are you due? Can I paint the nursery? Wait. Where are we gonna-?”

“Mia,” I laughed, pulling back so I could hold her at arm’s length. “We got more than five months to work all of this stuff out. And most of that ain't for you to worry about. Me and your Dad will sort it all.”

As the word ‘Dad’ left my mouth, I heard a sharp inhale from Daryl. He turned his head to look at me as Mia threw her arms around him next. Our eyes met as Mia squealed, “I can't believe it! I can’t believe it!”

Daryl hugged her, still looking at me. The sense of family that had been tentatively growing, rooted deeper in this moment. A silent acknowledgement of it passed between us. This was family. This was it. 

Mia’s energy was bubbling over and she couldn’t stay still for too long. She left the room in a whirlwind of excitement. In the silence she left behind, there was nothing but relief and the quiet, steady kind of love that lasts through any kind of change.

“Where are we gonna live?” Daryl asked. There were so many things to decide, so much to prepare for.

“We’ll work it out,” I said, taking his hand in mine. “We ain’t gotta decide this minute.”

Daryl let out a long breath, and slipped the sonogram picture carefully into his pocket.

“How do we… tell everyone else?” he asked. “When do we…?”

“Y’know, I have a feeling we already have,” I said. Even through the walls of Doctor Carson’s office, I could hear some squealing, which was unmistakably Mia and Perla. 

Less than a minute later, Bryce pulled open the door and gawped at me like I was in a museum. “Pregnant, Miss Payton?!”

Behind him, I heard Glenn shout, “Maggie! Herschel’s got a friend on the way!”

“Damn,” Daryl whistled. “That girl moves fast.” 

 

Daryl

“Anne is missing,” Gabriel said. From the way he said it, and the look on Rick’s face, I knew there was more to it than that. I think everyone who’d crammed into Maggie’s office did. We waited. Gabriel cleared his throat, “Or, perhaps it would be more accurate for me to say… Anne left.”

Not sure we needed a whole-ass meeting for this announcement.

There was little reaction from the people in the room. Again, it was clear we weren’t done. Gabriel glanced at Rick again, like he wanted him to take over. Rick shook his head. Gabriel swallowed, and then said, “I have reason to believe she might have been trading people to…someone.”

Fuck this. 

Shock rippled through the crowd. 

“Hold up,” I was on my feet before I realised I'd moved. My back was up. This tight knot of anxiety formed deep in my stomach. “Trading folks? To who?”

Naomi's hand on my back tried to coax me out of blocking her view. I hadn’t deliberately stood in front of where she was sitting, but now I was there, my feet stayed rooted to the floor. I fought the urge to yell at Mia to get over here, too. I wanted them both close.

“I don’t know,” Gabriel said. “She was talking to someone on a walkie-”

Fuck.

“Was it a short-range walkie?” I asked. “Long-range?”

“I… I don’t know,” Gabriel said. “I followed her back to the Heaps a few nights ago and overheard her. She wouldn’t tell me who she was talking to, but she admitted she’d been trading people for supplies for her and the Scavengers. Now that she’s the only one left, it sounded like she was trying to leave and go wherever these other people are.”

“Did she say anything about where that might be?” Michonne asked. 

“No,” Gabriel said. “Just that there was another place, far from here, where we could have a life like I couldn’t imagine, so long as we fulfilled some kind of deal. I said no, and she… she knocked me out.”

“Any idea what that deal might have been?” Carol managed to sound calm even in the face of this absolute fuckery.

“When I woke up, I was tied up in the Heaps. Anne was about to feed me to a Walker. Somehow my death was the price she had to pay to get wherever it was she wanted to go. But she couldn’t do it. She knocked me out again and when I woke up she was just… gone.”

Rick let it sit with us for a moment in that way he does when he wants to be sure we’re all really taking it in. Then he stepped up a little closer to Gabriel. 

“Now, we don’t think she’s coming back-” Rick started to say, but Aaron interrupted him.

“How can you know that?”

“Since the Scavengers fell, Anne struggled to find a home here,” Rick said.

Too fuckin’ right. 

She betrayed us like five fucking times.

“She didn’t feel welcome, and I understand why many of you were resistant to her. There was a lot of baggage there,” Gabriel said. “But, it really sounded to me as if she wished to start fresh somewhere else.”

“What if she ain’t? What if Jadis has gone to get whoever the fuck she’s been selling people to?” I said. “Give ‘em the lot of us at once to save the hassle of having to kidnap us one at a time.” 

“Anne,” Gabriel corrected me. “Wouldn’t do that.” 

“Anne. Jadis. Whatever-the-fuck,” I said. I wasn’t about to start trusting her based on some priest’s little crush. “You wanna trust her? She can't even decide on her own fuckin’ name.” 

“It's okay, Daryl. We’re not just gonna ignore this,” Rick put on the tone he uses when he’s trying to stop me from flying off the handle. Naomi stood up, her arm around my middle now. I wanted to tell her to sit down and rest that foot, but when I looked at her that knot in my stomach tightened and all I could do was pull her closer to my side. Rick continued, “If anyone sees Anne out there, bring her in so we can talk to her.”

“That’s it? We just sit here and wait to see if they come?” I said. “Fuck that.” 

Rick looked at me. “You think we should go looking? Bring the fight to them?”

I got why his mind had jumped there. Back when I had nothing to lose, I wanted to fight everybody. Hell, I'd been the dumbass who suggested going after Negan. 

But that was before. Before I knew the love of my life loved me back. Before we'd found Mia and started growing into the kind of family I'd always wanted us to be. 

Now that I had so much to fight for, I didn’t want to risk anything. I’d lay down my life for my family, but I’d rather live it out with them. Watch them grow up while I grow old on a porch holding Naomi’s hand.  

“Nah, man,” I said. “Let’s just go.”

Naomi tensed against my side. I felt her turn to look at me. There was a pause. I think they thought I had more to say but I didn’t. 

“Go… where?” Rick asked eventually. 

I shrugged. “Don’t matter. Just somewhere she don’t know we’ve been.”

Another ripple of shock ran through everyone. For some reason this one felt bigger than after Gabriel’s initial announcement. Like what I’d said was somehow crazier. 

“We’re not leaving our communities,” Rick said, holding his hands up to try and calm everyone else. “If Anne comes back, if she brings whoever she’s been talking to, we’ll deal with it. Everything that we’ve built here, the safety we have, it will stand. We will stand together. Just like we did with the Saviors.”

I wanted to argue back. Tell him he was crazy for staying here when someone might have already sold our location to some unknown group, but Rick had calmed everyone. Everyone but me. 

“Anne didn’t appear to be out for any kind of vengeance or retribution,” Gabriel said, to back Rick up. “It seemed to me as if she wanted a way out, a way to leave and never come back.”

“And the price she had to pay?” Carol asked. 

“Maybe she found someone else to pay it,” Gabriel said. He had the decency to hang his head a little when he said it. We’d had a lot of people go missing. Especially Saviors. The communities were all getting so big now that it was hard to keep track of everyone. Hard to know who might have gotten into some kind of trouble and who might have just moved on someplace else. Without Naomi’s call, we’d never have known that Amber, Mark, Marissa and John hadn’t left of their own accord. As an outsider herself, Anne would probably know who to take without causing a fuss. 

Things were better when we had a smaller group.

When all I had to worry about was the people I trust.

With a few more reassuring words from Rick, everybody else calmed down. Happy enough to sit around and wait to see whether or not Anne betrayed us. Again. That sickening dread in my stomach only got worse. Everything I wanted to say - every thought, every worry - all melted into this big lump in my throat. 

I waited to see if it would go away. I followed everyone else out of the big house and into the grounds of Hilltop where the sun was dipping low in the sky. I stuck close to Naomi. If she drifted too far away, that lump grew so big I thought it would block my windpipe. 

A bonfire was lit to roast up some meat for everybody. I circled an arm around Naomi’s waist, hoping she’d lean more on me than her crutch. As her body slowly relaxed into mine, slotting in so perfectly where she belonged, I finally felt like I could talk again.

“We could still leave,” I said, hushed so nobody overheard. 

She looked at me. “Daryl… no.”

“Why?”

“This is our home. Our friends. Our family,” she said. “If Anne brings anyone back here, we’ll face it together. Like we always do.”

“But…” The words got all caught up again. She turned fully to face me, her eyes so full of worry. Not about the right shit. Not about whether or not someone was about to come and try and take her away from me. Again. She was too busy worrying about me. 

“It’ll be okay, Daryl,” she said, her hands cupping my face. “We’re safe here. We got food and shelter, and … who knows what the rest of the world is like out there? Leaving is probably a bigger risk than staying. There’s no telling how long it would take to find another place like this one.”

“I know,” I said. “But another fight? I can’t… You can’t…” 

My hands instinctively went to her hips, pulling her closer. Her stomach pressed against me and I was painfully aware of the kid growing in there. She couldn’t fight. Hell, how long did we even have until running wasn’t an option? Fear clenched around my heart.

“I’m not gonna do anything to risk this baby,” she said like she was reading my damn mind. “I know I can be a little… reckless, but you ain’t gotta worry about that. If there's a fight, I'll sit it out.” 

“I know,” I said, although it was reassuring to hear her say it out loud. “But…”

It’s not just that. 

I only just got you back.

Every time shit felt like it was close to being settled, something happened that made it bounce back up and hit the fan again. I'd had her back for, what, twenty four hours and there was already some other bullshit cropping up? I was so close to having everything I’d ever wanted in life. It felt right, inevitable, that no matter how many promises I made, the universe knew I wasn’t a good enough man to deserve this woman, the kid I loved like she was my blood or the one on the way who would be, and was going to take it all away from me.

Not without a fight.

“Marry me,” I said. The moment I said it, the heaviness started to lift. I hated that we'd had to wait this long as it was. 

“Daryl,” Naomi said my name all soft, the kind of smile on her face that made me go all soft, too. “I already said yes. Did you forget?” 

“No, I mean…” I looked around at the people gathered at Hilltop. Mia was laughing at something with Carl and the other kids. Baby Hershel was strapped to Glenn's chest, and Lucas was pouring out some water for him, Rosita, and Eugene. Bryce and Aaron were sitting by the fire, trying desperately not to give each other googly eyes. Carol and her family were sharing out a box of something she'd made. Maggie and Michonne were walking out of the big house to join us. I couldn't think of a single reason to delay it. “Gabriel's right here. Everyone's right here.”

“Oh, you mean right now?!”

Her shock made me doubt myself. “I know it ain’t… fancy or… we haven’t planned any kinda big…event, but…

“You know I don't want any of that,” she cut me off, shaking her head. Her smile changed a little. Shyness creeping in that told me whatever she was about to admit to was going to be cute as hell. “I don’t know if you heard, but… I was already using your name on the radio. I… I already think of you as my husband. We ain’t gotta do a big… thing. Honestly, I'd be happy with a pinky swear.”

God, you're the best.

But I want this to be as real as can be.  

I want everyone to know you’re mine.

“You wanna be the one to tell Mia we’re just gonna pinky swear and call it a day?”

Alarm flashed across her face, “God, no.”

There was a moment of quiet between us, then we both looked over at where Gabriel was standing by the fire, talking to Rick. So serious it made that knot tighten. We looked back at each other. Naomi gave me this giddy smile like we were crazy for even thinking about it. 

“This thing we have it's… it's way more than I ever thought it could be, and I ain't crazy about havin’ a bunch of people around, but they're family and…” I sighed. I could never say things the way I wanted to. “I don't wanna wait another second.”

Her smile changed again. Excitement radiating from her. “Me neither.”

The excitement was contagious. My stomach fluttered. “Yeah?” 

“Yeah.”

“Are we doing this?” My heart flipped. 

“Gabe!” she called over to where Gabriel was talking to Rick. “You got a minute?”

Wary, a frown crossed Gabriel’s face. Our grins must have looked so out of place with everything they'd been talking about, “Everything okay?”

 “Will you marry us?” she shouted back. We probably should have gone over there. Had a private conversation with him, but neither of us wanted to wait. We'd walked a long enough road to get here, I didn't want to take another step until she was officially Mrs Dixon.

“Wait! Wait!” Mia shrieked, racing around from the other side of the bonfire. “What?!?”

Naomi braced herself, “Look, I know you were probably wanting us to take a run into DC and see if the Cathedral’s still standing, but that ain’t us, sweetie, and we just… want to be married already.”

“Five minutes,” she said, already darting off. “Please. Just… give me five minutes.”

“Whatddya think?” Naomi looked at me. “Can wait another five minutes?”

I pretended to weigh it up. Mia looked like she was about to burst. “Been waiting for this longer than you’ve been on this earth and you wanna make me wait even more?”

“Pleeeease.”

“Alright,” I said. She'd already taken off before she could hear me say. “Five minutes.” 

Gabriel was still making his way over. The others had started gathering around us. I kept looking at Naomi, expecting her to tell me this was too crazy and we should think about it. Make a pro/con list. But she didn't. She just kept smiling this big, beautiful smile at me. Like this was the best day of her life.

What did I ever do to deserve you?

As she reached out to touch one of my cheeks, I realized I was giving her the exact same kinda smile. Bet I had the same damn sparkle in my eye too. 

Mia came racing back with a fistful of flowers.

“You gave me absolutely no time!” She shoved the flowers into Naomi's hand. She plucked one from the bunch and very carefully put it in Naomi's hair. “It was supposed to be… I wanted…”

“Mia,” Naomi caught her hand and made her slow down for a second. In that moment of stillness, Mia’s stress gave way to something else. What was really underneath it all bubbled to the surface.

“I just want it to be perfect for you guys,” she whispered. “It has to be perfect so… so it’s forever.”

She whispered the last part like a little kid making a wish. I touched her shoulder, gave it a comforting squeeze to let her know I wasn’t going anywhere. This was the only place I’d ever really, truly belonged.

“It’s our family,” Naomi said so gently it disarmed anything else Mia could have said. Naomi plucked another flower from the bunch and tucked it behind Mia's ear so they could match. “It's already perfect. It’s already forever.”

God, I wanna propose all over again.

Mia nodded. The pressure she was putting on this melting away so she could take in what really mattered in all of this.

“Okay,” she said, her lower lip trembled a little. “But I’m throwing you the biggest baby shower. That’s my little brother or sister in there, and I get to spoil them if I want.”

Naomi laughed, “Deal.”

I took a little leather pouch out of my pocket. I’d planned on keeping it on me until I needed it, but now I saw a better use for it. I passed it to Mia. “Hold onto this for me. Until it's time.”

“What’s…” Mia felt through the pouch. “Oh. Oh my God.”

Naomi shot me a puzzled look. 

“Rings,” I answered in a whisper. 

Naomi's eyes widened, her jaw dropped. “When did you have the time?” 

“Made them when I made this one,” I said, my thumb rubbing against her engagement ring. Naomi looked at me like she was about to start crying. I wanted to make fun of her for it but I felt a damn lump rising in my throat too. It would not go away. 

“Are you ready?” Gabriel asked.

We nodded and the people gathered around us stopped their whispered chatter. I heard a few sniffs, but didn’t turn to look at who’d they’d come from. For a moment, I could feel it - all those eyes looking at me - and I started to clam up. But then Naomi took my hands, and I focussed on her eyes looking at me. The rest of them faded away.

Repeating what Gabriel told me wasn’t hard. Because all he spoke was the truth.

Of course I took her to be my wife; she was the only person in the universe I’d ever wanted to have and to hold.

Of course I’d care for her in sickness and in health. I’d give my life for hers. Carry her if she was too weak to stand on her own. Wrap her up in blankets and ply her with honey and ginger tea when she caught a cold.

Of course I’d be with her for better or worse. I’d protect her from everything I could, and for the things I couldn’t, I’d still be there, holding her hand.

I’d never be rich, but I’d give her everything I had. As for poorer? I’d never have nothing as long as I had her. 

Loving her wasn't a choice, but I'd make damn sure I chose to keep showing her it every day. Cherishing her. Celebrating her. Making sure she never forgot how incredible she was. Everything she did amazed me. Everything she’d achieved and everything she’d been through had shaped this fierce, gentle, perfect person in front of me.

I’d never stray from her side as long as she wanted me there.

My life was hers, until the end of my days. And even then, if there was such a thing as an everlasting soul, if there was a life that came after this one, I would be hers there too.

That “I do,” was the easiest two words I'd ever said. The easiest promise I'd ever made.

Then it was Naomi's turn and hearing her say it back solidified everything I already knew. 

Hearing her agree to take me as her husband confirmed it was the only title I’d ever wanted.

Of course she’d be there for me in stickiness and in health. She’d always taken such good care of me no matter what part of me was broken. 

Of course she’d be with me for better or worse. She was the first person I’d ever been able to depend on. Already seen me at my worst and accepted the parts of me I thought nobody would be able to look at, nevermind love. She made the best moments in my life a million times better.

She'd always accepted me just the way I was. No matter how small the occasion might be, she’d find a reason to be proud of me. Saw somethin’ in me that made me proud of myself.

I knew how it felt to be loved because of her. I didn't understand it, but I trusted she'd stay with me.

“You have the rings?” Gabriel asked.

“Yes,” Mia said with a big sniff. I tore my eyes away from Naomi to look over at her. Her face was all blotchy, eyebrows quivering as she fought to hold back more tears. She stepped forward. Put the ring for Naomi in my outstretched hand and the one for me in Naomi's.

“Love you guys,” she whispered, giving both of our hands a tight squeeze before letting go and stepping back. 

I slipped Naomi’s ring onto her ring finger with a promise that I was hers forever. She slipped mine on and promised me the same. 

And just like that, my best friend became my wife. 

I was probably supposed to wait for Gabriel to tell us to kiss, but I couldn't. She was looking at me like she wanted me to, and who was I to make her wait? Who was I to deny her anything?

People around us started cheering and my ears got so hot I thought they'd fall off. We pulled apart. Naomi's face was as red as I felt but she couldn't stop smiling. Neither could I. Mia was in bits. Rick slapped me on the back a couple of times. Glenn did the same, leaping up and down like his team had just won the Superbowl. Carol hugged us both so tight I thought at least one of us would surface with a cracked rib. 

So many people came up to congratulate us but I could barely take any of it in. The whole evening became a blur. Food was passed around. Couldn't tell you what. What had started out a tense evening became anything but. When you live for survival, every celebration could be your last. And people really party like it might be. Some people started drinking but not me. Naomi couldn't have any and I was already on cloud nine. Add anything else to it and I might actually have started floating. 

I sat with my girl by the fire and watched the sunset over Hilltop while people celebrated around us. When things started winding down, Maggie showed us to one of the bedrooms, made some joke about it being the honeymoon suite.

I carried Naomi bridal-style over the threshold, only feeling a little bad about the kick I got out of doing it. I wasn't sure she'd have let me if her foot wasn’t busted. I kicked the door shut behind me so I could finally be alone with my girl.

“Honeymoon suite in a country manor,” I whistled, looking around at the inside of the room. The four-poster. The fancy writing desk. Portraits of someone who died so long ago they probably hadn't gotten up and started walking again. “Ever think kids like us would've ended up here?” 

“Not in a million years,” she said. “Although a shotgun wedding is probably exactly what people would have expected of kids like us.”

I looked at her in my arms. “Is it still a shotgun wedding if it took a lifetime to get to it?”

She grinned back at me, “Maybe not.”

I kissed her. It was impossible not to kiss that smile, and God, it was good to kiss her without a bunch of people whooping and hollering around us. I could feel her smiling against my lips. The way she melted against me told me she felt the same relief that we were finally alone.

I laid her down on the bed, still kissing her. It creaked as I crawled over her. Being careful not to do anything that might hurt her foot, I nudged her legs apart so I could slot between them. Her arms wrapped around me, her legs pulling me closer.

“Careful,” I warned her between kisses, worried she’d get too caught up and forget her injury. “Watch that foot, girl.”

“Quit fussin’,” she said, her mouth muffled by mine. “I’ll tell you if it hurts.”

There was a neediness in the way she kissed me and the way she was looking at me that made me doubt that she’d tell me if her damn foot fell off. Because she didn’t want me to stop kissing her. Stop touching her. 

I had to shut my eyes for a moment. Trying to hold it all back. I breathed her in, my face buried in the warm crook of her neck. 

“God, I missed you.” It spilled right out of me. Even just the smell of her hair was enough to bring it out in me. She was back, and I still ached for her. Still longed to be closer to her even though she was under me.

“I missed you, too,” she murmured, her hands tracing light circles across my back. I shivered. Feeling her hands on me again, touching me the way nobody else ever had made the time she'd been gone more obvious. So many parts of me that had died with her were coming slowly back to life. It hurt. I wasn't used to it anymore. That tenderness.

Before her, I hadn't known what it was like to be touched by someone who loved me. While she'd been gone, I'd retreated back to the kind of guy who flinched when someone got too close. Hated when a hug lasted too long. 

But then I'd know what I was missing out on. I'd craved it. Craved her. 

The gentle way she tugged on my clothes, eyes asking for my permission before she took anything off me. She had it. Of course she had it. 

My hands shook like a damn junkie when I undressed her. Couldn’t stand having my lips more than an inch from her skin. Kissing any part of her she’d let me. Clothes piled up on the floor. I pulled her panties free of her legs. An intense heat flashed through me. 

Easy…

Easy….

We got all night.

I wasn't in any kind of rush. The opposite, really, I planned on taking my time with her. It had been a whirlwind since she'd got back. Traveling back and sharing a tent with Glenn and Bryce hadn't exactly given us a lot of privacy. So many people wanted to see her when we got back. Then Gabriel had called his damn meeting and, well… I'd been starved of this kind of time with her for so long.We'd hardly had a chance to be alone. A moment in the caved-in mines. A moment on a hilltop where she told me she was pregnant. And now this. 

I'd been starved of this kind of time with her for so long.

Looking at her, completely naked in front of me was almost too much. Almost enough to make me take every promise I’d made myself about taking it slow and throw ‘em out the damn window. It wasn’t that I’d forgotten how beautiful she was, I’d just forgotten how it felt to be in the presence of all that perfection. 

“Daryl?” she asked softly, snapping me out of it. 

“Lie back, baby,” I told her, slowly kissing my way up her inner thigh. I could tell how wet she was for me and I had to try real hard not to think about it or I’d lose my mind. I paused between her thighs, “Can I?”

Naomi nodded. Her hands shook a little when she ran them through my hair. Anticipation. Neediness. I don’t know what it was but I liked seeing it. Liked it even more when she moaned at the slightest nudge of my tongue against her. The throb in my boxers was almost painful when I heard it. 

Slow.

Slow.

Ain’t no rush.

Her whimpers didn’t help much. I’d forgotten how she sounded, and how good it felt to be the one making her sound like that. Sweet Jesus, she was so fucking hot. 

“Daryl… please…” she writhed under my tongue. She wanted more. And my girl gets what she wants. I pulled her legs up to rest on my shoulders, angling her better. Opening her up to me like she needed. She ground herself against my face, I ground my hips against the mattress. It was too fucking much. I was fighting against myself.

My fingers joined my mouth, slipping inside her as sucked lightly on her clit. She was close and I had to get her there for my own sanity now as well as hers. Took me a second longer than usual to find that little spot inside her. She was right on the edge, and goddamn I was aware of that. An aching, throbbing awareness. 

Naomi gasped out a sound that was almost my name. As close as she could manage like this. Her body tensed, her thighs shook and her hips jerked. Fingernails in my scalp. She pulsed around my fingers.

I looked up at her while she caught her breath, my head resting on one of her thighs. Could still feel tremors running through it under my ear. She was perfect, and she was mine. 

Her hands tugged my hair again and I knew what she wanted, even if she couldn’t quite speak yet. Bed creaking, I knelt up and moved over her. I kissed her. Real gentle while she calmed down. But, gentle wasn’t what she wanted. She wanted me. All of me. 

“Daryl, please,” she said, her legs pulling my hips to hers so that I couldn’t mistake what she was asking for. She asked all the same, “I need you. Fuck me.”

I was impressed with myself for holding back for this long. I’d been in danger of busting several times over. But I couldn't wait much longer. Not with her getting so needy. 

Untangling myself from her legs, I forced myself away from her. Down onto the floor to root through the pockets of my jeans. I had the sinking feeling I’d forgotten something. 

“Whatcha doin’?” She propped herself up on her elbows to watch me. There was something amused in the way she said it but I was too damn flustered to put the pieces together.

“I ain't…I didn't bring…I haven't…” I rechecked my damn pockets as if I'd somehow have missed it the first time. 

“You, uh, looking for rubbers?” she asked. I finally caught the amusement and looked up to catch her little smirk. My face felt hot.

“I thought you wanted to… shit… is that not what you meant?” 

“You already knocked me up,” she reminded me with a laugh. “We’re good for the next few months.”

“Oh…. right,” I hated that I could feel how stupid my big dopey grin was. “Yeah… Damn.”

Her laugh drew me back to her. My knees sank into the creaking mattress. Her warm, soft skin under my hands. 

“This okay?” I asked as I paused on her stomach. I still couldn't believe that under my hands that little baby was growing. Our little baby.  

“Mmhmm,” she nodded, looking down at my hands as I mapped her skin. “I appreciate you askin’, but I don't think I'll ever mind you touchin’ me.”

“That kinda talk's what got you pregnant in the first place,” I said. 

“C’mere,” she said. I didn’t need to be asked twice. Back over her, back between her thighs I struggled to think of a single reason I was ever anywhere else. She kissed me, her hands caressing my back, my shoulders.

We both groaned as I pushed inside her. Slow. Giving her time to adjust to me again. Giving myself time to remember how damn good this felt. How much I loved being with her, showing her how I felt. 

I moved my hips and the bed moved with me, smacking against the wall. Naomi froze up a little. Another thrust and it happened again. She stopped kissing me, distracted. “That's… uh,... a little…”

“Annoying?” I said. I wasn’t even up to full speed and it was bugging me. 

“Yeah,” she said, but there was a nervous light in her eyes. A little frown on her face. “It’s an old bed, I guess. Super old…”

She didn't have to say it. I guessed first. I'd finally got her in the kind of bed she deserved and she was too nervous about destroying something that used to have historical importance to properly enjoy herself. 

“Such a nerd,” I said, lifting her up off the mattress. Laughter shook her body against mine. “You know there ain't gonna be any more field trips here, right? We can wreck a few fancy beds.”

“A few, huh?” she repeated. “That’s ambitious.”

“Well… it is our wedding night, ain’t it?” I grinned. She laughed again, but I didn't put up much of a fight. I didn't much fancy the Rhees walking in here and finding one of Hilltop's beds in bits either. We'd never live it down and then we'd definitely have to move. I set her down on the rug and then reached back onto the bed to grab a pillow. I slipped it behind her head. 

“My God, who knew I'd married such a gentleman?” she giggled. 

Fucking hell we're married. 

I looked at her, my wife, wearing nothing but a smile and the rings I’d made her. She was so goddamn beautiful my heart ached.

“Gotta take care of my girl,” I said, “my wife.”

Just saying it sent a shiver up my spine. My hand on the back of her shin lifted her leg. Close enough I could kiss the ankle of her broken foot. She watched me do it with such love in her eyes. 

“You do,” she said. I kissed my way up from her ankle, up her leg, across her stomach, her chest, her neck. Naomi's head tipped back against the pillow as I slowly slid back inside her. “God, you really do.”

“You’re so damn beautiful, angel.” I looked down at her, drinking in the way her mouth fell open. The soft moans that slipped out between those pretty lips. The pleasure that flickered across her face with every roll of my hips. I couldn’t believe I was the lucky son of bitch that got to have her for the rest of my life. 

Like she'd read my mind, she raised her left hand to my face. I let my eyes drift closed as she touched my cheek. Let the feeling of being with her wash over me.

Fuck, I missed you.

Build your home in a place and if it's destroyed, you can rebuild somewhere else.

Build your home in a person and you can't get it back when it's gone. 

I’d spent so many nights alone wishing I'd dream of her and now…here she was. I kissed her harder. I needed the taste of her burned on my tongue. Needed the heat of her body. I sped up. Harder. Needed more of her delicious moans. 

Needed to know she was real. That I wasn’t going to wake up alone in a Hilltop shed and face the reality that all of this had been a dream. There’d been no call. No bunker. No miracle.

Naomi yelped. My eyes snapped open and I looked down at where my fingers were digging hard into one of her hips. Too hard. Like I was tryna stop someone from dragging her away from me. And I was slamming into her. Head hazy and stomach lurching with guilt, I let go. Stopped. “Shit. I'm sorry”

I looked away from her, trying to catch my breath, catch my thoughts. I’d only been her husband for a few hours and I'd already hurt her. Shame threatened to swallow me whole.

“I'm here,” she said softly. Gentle hands coaxing my face back up to look at her. “I'm right here.”

Fuck.

“I'm sorry,” I said again. “I’m so sorry.”

“It’s okay,” she whispered. I don’t know how or when she did it, but she’d rolled us over so I was sitting bare-assed on the rug and she was in my lap. I was still inside her. Her eyes were all I could see. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah,” I swallowed. Her eyes. God, her eyes always managed to bring me back. Root me where I belonged.

“Where'd you go?” she asked, soft voice and soft hands somehow the most solid thing in this room. 

I didn't go anywhere 

You did. 

I was struggling to catch my breath. To say what I meant. “I lost you.”

“You found me,” she reminded me. Her hands slipped around my shoulders. She placed such gentle kisses on my face, my neck. I let myself hold her again. My hands rubbed her back, feeling the solid warmth of her. Reassuring myself this was real. Her sweet voice in my ear sent shivers down my spine, “I’m right here, Daryl. I ain’t going anywhere.”

“Yeah...” I said. My fingers squeezed her sides. Just a little. Just enough to feel the solidity of her ribcage under her skin. “Yeah.”

“You need to stop?” she asked. 

“No,” I said. It was the last thing I wanted. I wanted every piece of her she was willing to give. “I need you, angel. I need more of ya.”

My hands traced her curves, holding her body tight against mine as I started thrusting up into her again. Her hips moved to meet my movements. Her arms squeezed me back, her chest pressed against mine. So tight I could feel the way her moans vibrated through her. Her breath, her kisses on my neck. One hand tangled in her soft hair. 

“Baby, I…” I choked out, but I didn’t know what I was asking. 

Her head turned. “What do you need, Daryl?” 

You. 

“I need to see you,” I said. “I need… I need…”

Naomi leaned back. Close enough that I could still feel her body on me, all of that softness I didn’t deserve. That beauty that should be nowhere near me. 

“I love you,” she said, her gaze anchoring me to her again. I could see it in her eyes. How much she loved me. Needed me. Her body moved against mine, her hands brushing sweaty hair from my face. “I’m always gonna be yours, Daryl. Forever.”

It felt as good to hear as it felt to be fucking her again. I put a hand under her chin, holding her face where I could see it. See the way her eyes were getting hazy with pleasure. “You’re mine, ain’t ya?”

“Yes,” she murmured back. “God, yes.”

“Good girl,” I said and she shivered. Blushed. I loved making her blush like that. “You’re so pretty, baby. I can’t believe you’re all mine.”

I really couldn't', she'd always been my one and only dream girl. By some miracle that dream had come true and not only had she given me herself, but she was also giving me everything I'd ever dreamed of. Everything I'd never thought I have.

Family. 

Security.

Love.

My hand tangled in her hair as I pushed it back from her face. I wanted to see all of it. So goddamn beautiful and teetering on the edge for me again. There was a question in her eyes, a silent request for permission. I nodded. She let go. I watched her come undone and then I followed her over the edge.

Afterwards, we lay entwined on the rug and I tried to muster the strength to get up and back into the bed. Naomi seemed happy enough, nestled against me as we caught our breath. My hand stroked through her sweaty curls. I knew she’d fall asleep like that if I left it too long. I would too.

“Shit,” I said. “Is your foot okay?”

I’d been too caught in the maelstrom of shit inside me that I hadn’t thought about what a change of position would do to her foot. And I knew she’d put up with crazy amounts of pain to do something to help me. 

“Foot’s fine,” she said, to my relief. “Knees might have a little rug burn, though.”

I kissed the top of her head and with one final burst of energy, scooped her up and threw us both down onto that damn creaky bed. We scooted down under the covers. Naomi reached over and switched off a lamp. 

“Goodnight, Mr Dixon,” she said. There was a split second where I wondered why she was being so damn formal. Then it hit me. 

“Night, Mrs Dixon.”

Her hand found mine in the dark like always, but she didn't take it. I knew what she was doing even before her little finger entwined with mine. “I pinky swear I'll love you forever, even when I’m dead.”

I laughed but my heart ached with the innocence of it. Childish. But it meant the world. We'd only ever been safe to behave like kids with each other. 

“Pinky swear I'll love you even when I'm dead, too, angel.”

Whatever came next, at least one part of the future was set in stone; we’d love each other. We have loved every version of each other that we have ever known.