i hit a snag on jailbait!daryl and try as i did, all my brain spelled out was WRITE ABOUT DARYL AND MICHONNE SEDUCING RICK BUT MAKE IT MEANINGFUL AND SHIT, and. jesus. who are we to deny the world something like that?

this was supposed to be a neat 3000-word pwp but nooooo. it got away from me, reins, saddle and all. i'm just as helpless as the rest of youse.

titles modified from bright eyes.

Rick's POV

A month and five days after Lori files the divorce papers, you move in with your best friends.

You knock at the door of 3C and walk in once you hear the gruff yell of "it's open!" After having to stay in a motel room only ten feet wide, this apartment is a palace. You drop your duffel in the living room (and isn't it a marvel, thirteen years and one measly bag is all you have to show for what you've accumulated) and try not to feel too out of place amongst the canvases with the weird splotches of paint on it that's supposed to be art. You put your sheriff's hat on the couch, wondering what's taking so long for –

"Hey, man." Daryl walks out of one of the bedrooms drying his hair off with a towel, damp patches on his gray T-shirt and the top button of his pants still undone. "We weren't expectin ya til later."

"I can see that," you say, sweeping your eyes across the whole space again, from the dishes still in the sink to the pile of used clothes halfheartedly shoved under a side desk. Between Michonne's long hours and Daryl's aversion to manual labor that wasn't "manly," of course they'd be hopeless at housekeeping, and you grin.

Daryl starts trying to clean up, folding newspapers up the wrong way and edging throw pillows into what he thinks is probably a decorative manner. You chuckle, feeling lighter than you have in weeks. "You don't need to make such an effort, Daryl, it's just me."

He shrugs, scoops up the mess of clothes from the floor. "Yeah, but seein as you're used ta order an' shit. Y'know. Me and Mich are total slobs."

You think about your neat suburban house with the manicured front lawn, and Lori constantly pushing the furniture back into place after every party, and her arms going around your waist as she sighs, everything's so perfect.

"Slobbish behavior's perfectly fine," you say, and for the first time since you've walked into this apartment, Daryl smiles at you, and you smile back.

Michonne comes back from work in a blazer and dress pants and a flurry of righteous anger.

"Seriously? You started dinner without me?"

Daryl licks lumpia sauce off the side of his finger and waves from where he's sprawled on the couch. "Ain't our fault y'decided ta work overtime again. 'Sides, Rick was hungry."

She huffs but it looks like the trespass is forgiven, for now. She goes over to where you're hunched guiltily by the coffee table, runs her hand through your curls like you're a cat, nails scritching at your scalp. "And don't you look it. You haven't been taking care of yourself," she says, partly scolding, mostly concerned, and a rush of almost affection coalesces in your chest.

"Be glad I didn't steal your share too," you say, which earns you a light thwap on the shoulder from Michonne and in turn a bark of laughter from Daryl. She nudges his legs off the couch to eat, and you listen to their bickering for a while, contented with just taking this all in when you remember –

"Will I be sleeping on the couch?"

They grow abruptly silent, and you stumble over the words, "I'm completely okay with that, by the way. I was shocked you two even offered to let me stay the second I told you about. My situation."

Michonne and Daryl exchange these unreadable looks before Daryl says, "You're takin my room."

You blink, a bit taken aback. "You're moving out?"

"And into my room," Michonne clarifies and. Oh. You wonder why you're so surprised. For all their insistence that nothing would ever happen between them, you can see how Daryl's gently curving into Michonne, shoulders nudging each other with a degree of something more than familiarity, the helpless flush on his face and the wry smile on hers.

Because you remember catching Daryl off guard in the first few months of knowing each other, a hand on his shoulder and you got punched hard enough that your teeth tore the inside of your cheek. You remember him pawing frantically at your shoulders for forgiveness and having to spit out huge maroon globs into the gutter beside you, groaning it's okay it's okay.

You remember Michonne talking wistfully about her little boy Andre who has to stay with her parents, but never about the little boy's father; all the calls interrupting your night-outs that had her snarling "stop calling me" before shutting off her phone vehemently.

They're good together. You're happy for them. Aloud you say, "I still feel like I'll be imposing either way."

You're not sure what changes. Just a pause, the slightest shift in breathing, and both of them are looking at you strangely, open and warm but it's not acidic like pity. Daryl smirks. "You won't."

A year and a half before Lori files the divorce papers, you and Shane are called to a highway collision a little outside of the county limits, a chopper branging into a white pickup. The guy on the chopper has a nasty graze beneath his hairline and a new tear in his already ratty jeans, but he walks it off to yell at the woman driving the pickup. She's spitting back just as fiercely, dreadlocks flying when she gestures to her busted headlight. You only barely calm them down, and when Shane's gathered from witnesses that the guy had swerved to avoid running over a raccoon, chalking things up to a genuine accident, the woman throws her arms up in surrender. "Fine, I won't press charges."

To your utter bewilderment, the guy grins, blood down the side of his face and all. "Be glad I ain't pressin charges. Was a mean right hook ya tried t'give me earlier."

"Well, I'm an attorney, and you wouldn't win that case even if it stretched on for a year, buster."

You can't help the laugh that escapes you, and that's how you end up befriending an attorney named Michonne and a mechanic named Daryl.

Five weeks after Lori files the divorce papers, you call your son.

"Dad!" He's genuinely pleased to hear from you, and it pulls at the stitches on your heart. "Hey, Carl," you greet him, cellphone pinned between your ear and your shoulder as you put the last plate back in its place inside the cabinet.

"Did you move in with Michonne and Daryl yet? Is the crossbow there? When can I visit?"

Carl is all staticked bursts of excitement, and you snort. "You just want to see Daryl's crossbow more than you want to see your old man."

"Well, yeah." He at least seems sheepish enough. "But I miss you. This getting divorced idea sucks."

You have to lean against the kitchen counter, squeezing your eyes shut. "I know, buddy. But it has to happen."

"Don't you love Mom anymore?" he asks, thirteen years old and so serious, and you grip at your chest, wonder if your hand will be stained red once you pull it away. "She doesn't love me," you say, flat admission of fact.

"Oh." He's quiet, the soft hum of his breath audible. Then: "Shane comes by a lot."

You have to laugh, because it's a better option than kicking the shit out of the kitchen table. "Sure he does."

"If Mom marries him, I'm not changing my name. You're my dad."

Gravity's pull is suddenly too heavy and you sit in the closest chair, knuckles blanching against the wood. "Thank you," you say, sounding much too far away. Long after Carl's hung up you listen to the slicing dial tone, hoping that it'll singe everything else from your mind.

It turns out you won't have a problem with that.

Midnight comes and goes, and you're still awake despite the exhaustion and the shitty end to your day. Noise come trickling from Michonne's and Daryl's room, and maybe it's the lack of proper insulation but it's starting to become a problem. You think about rapping on the adjoining wall when –

"Oh fuck."

Daryl's voice actually cracks, and you start, not used to something like that coming from a man, your face heating up. This can't be happening.

"Don't ya fuckin make me beg."

A gently reverberating sound, Michonne's laughter. It is.

"Fuckin put it in me already!"

Wait. What?

When the pleas for – what are they even doing? – turn into something else, you only then think to jam up your ears with pillows, not that it changes anything, because you can still hear Daryl moaning curses, Michonne breathing out fast and high pitched.

You don't think about what the explanation could be, because there's only one possible option, and you have no idea if either of them would even enjoy that and.

No. You're not thinking about it. At all.

You actually come to believe that last night was some sort of elaborate prank until you see them kissing by the refrigerator, if kissing is about rubbing faces together and missing each other's mouths half the time. Neither of them seems to mind, smiling like little kids and you duck into the bathroom before they see you and the blood pooling in your cheeks.

Breakfast is a stilted affair. Daryl steals the marshmallows out of your Lucky Charms and you don't complain, too busy not staring at the fingerprint bruises peeking out of his tank top, next to the inked devils on his shoulder. Michonne has a bite mark snug against her clavicle, one she keeps touching absentmindedly as she sprays some canned cheese onto her toast.

"You look like shit," Daryl remarks conversationally, spoon fisted in his hand like he's five years old, leaning forward so he's sitting more on his thighs instead of his ass. He's still blinking at you, waiting for an answer, and you remember the mug in your grip, gulp down too much coffee and it stings your throat.

"Well, I would've gotten more rest if someone wasn't so loud," you say after that, and he goes abruptly pink, muttering sorry and all but shoveling the cereal into his mouth.

Michonne coughs, smiling a little embarrassed, a little…possessive. "We thought you were already asleep," she says by way of apology, low and smoky, like she's been at Daryl's menthol cigarettes. "I tried shutting him up once. Didn't work."

The kitchen table is suddenly much too small for your comfort; the two of them too close against your sides as they do what can only be qualified as sex faces at each other. "I'll just borrow earplugs from the firing range," you say, standing up with a clatter and bringing your dishes to the sink, ready to hightail it out of here and to work except.

"We'll stop. But only if you think we should."

Both of them are staring at you something terrible, catching at your edges and tugging low at your stomach, all your good intentions figure-eighting into hell.

Shane knocks on your cubicle wall and you don't bother meeting his eyes, pretending to be busy with paperwork when you're really scribbling at the corners of the Hamburglar coloring page a little girl had filled in while waiting for her mom to get out of intake.

"…And y'aren't even listening." Shane sighs. "Lori said you did this a lot."

"She must tell you a lot of things," you say, carefully neutral, and you look up just in time to see the expression that passes over your once best friend's face, like when you were both sixteen and he was all sneer and vicious retort, distorted as if by acid. You suffer a brief spike of rage, and you smooth a hand down the back of your head, reel yourself in.

You sit up straighter, rubbing at the bridge of your nose, hissing between your teeth. "Look, I think it's best if we stay away from each other a while, if you're gonna keep warming up to my wife. Give me that courtesy, at least."

He makes a sound that isn't much like a laugh, though that's must have been what he was going for. "Rick, I'm not doing shi –"

"Don't lie to me," you say, not quite a reprimand, your hand already resting on the butt of your Python. "Once I start hitting you, I might not be able to stop."

Shane smirks but the trepidation behind his eyes is palpable, and he leaves without another word. You feel like you've lost something, but also like there's now room in you deep down for something more.

Daryl's sitting on the coffee table when you get back, hand clamped around a half-empty bottle of scotch. His head raises slowly, hair obscuring his eyes but his lip's curled up, junkyard dog look about him that fits a little too well on his face.

"What happened?"

His words are mostly steady, only corroded by years of exhaustion. "Merle happened, s'what."

"Oh," is all you say, and he snorts, glaring at nothing in particular.

"Yeah. Oh."

You never knew Daryl had a brother until he showed up to a dinner date with a black eye from said brother. From what little you and Michonne coaxed out of him, Merle had followed him to Atlanta, demanded that he stop fraternizing with nigras and cops, and go back to drug running with him. "Obviously, he took mighty offense t'my reply," he said, his grin still a bit blood-stained.

He's not grinning now, and so you don't press the issue.

Daryl takes a pull from his scotch, the line of his throat working painfully slow. You should go and extricate the bottle from his grip, your fingers lacing with his. Guide him to the bed he shares with Michonne, lay him down. It's an unsettling thought, dark red and overheated, and you banish it almost completely. Almost.

"You gonna be okay?" It's a stupid question, but you have to ask.

"Who's gonna be okay?"

The door clicks shut and Michonne's frowning at the both of you, though it doesn't take long for her to piece things together herself. She sighs and sits beside Daryl, her hand gentle on his knee. "He better not have followed you here, or I'll kick his stalkerific ass."

He's careful exhaling, a small tired smile and a grumbled "use yer grownup words, woman," before he kisses her, deep with the brace of his thumb holding her jaw.

It's like all the air has left the room, your ribs crushed by the vacuum, your throat caved in. Michonne cups Daryl's face, tips his head forward and it's their little-kid kissing again, but this time it's not adorable. This time it's smothering you, dragging you down and you must've made a noise of some kind, because they're both looking at you again, and.

"You can watch if you want."

Michonne's positively leering, and though Daryl's more hesitant, chewing on his lip, his eyes are just. His goddamn eyes.

"So. You comin, Friendly? Only if you want."

youwantyouwantyouwant.

"Okay," you finally get out, almost a mortifying croak, and when they grin and disappear into their bedroom, you can do nothing but follow.

They're already undressing each other when you come in, an ungainly sprawl of twined limbs on the bed. Unsure of what to do, you sit in the chair beside the cluttered desk, your anxiety exacerbated by the fact that it's clear they're not just putting on a show for you.

No, it's much worse than that.

Because Michonne murmurs "okay?" when she tugs at the hem of Daryl's shirt, not going any further until he nods and lifts his arms for her. Because he unbuttons her clothes so gently, strokes her everywhere he can reach, printing the contours of her bones onto his palms. Because the groan she makes once she clambers up Daryl's chest and her cunt settles over his mouth has your half-hard cock raging fully in your pants.

Because the bright little bedside lamp perfectly illuminates the sinewy muscles in Michonne's back and ass with the rolling motion of her body, of Daryl's body underneath her, rising against empty air like he can't help it, any more than you can help the dense craving at the base of your spine that needs something, someone to grind against.

By the time Michonne stiffens and arches soundlessly, knots have formed in your arms from holding on so tight to your chair. You shift in position and it chafes your dick, relief and agony all at once, and you nearly bite through your tongue trying to keep your fingers away. You're terrified that if you do something, the spell will be broken and they'll shove you out. Or, even worse, you'll come in your shorts.

Daryl says something too soft for you to hear as Michonne rolls off him, and she snickers, pats the tenting in his jeans. He swears roughly, mouth falling open and you can see the wet shine on his lips, smearing along his cheek. You look away and suck in as much oxygen as your failing lungs can.

By the time you have the strength to look again, Daryl's struggling out of his jeans, his ruddy cock flat against his stomach. Michonne rolls a condom onto him, strokes him much too light and teasing, and pretty soon he's not the only one making noises from it. You don't know if you want to be the one benefitting from that clever hand, or the one causing the gorgeous blush staining Daryl's skin.

"Don't gotta butter me up like that, c'mon," he rumbles, hooking a leg around Michonne's thigh and. And. An altogether new wave of lust hits you so hard you nearly double over, Daryl's calf dragging along Michonne's hip doing unspeakable things to you.

"Patience," she says, her grin audible as she slots herself properly between his spread legs, and she slips on a glove, squirts lube onto her fingers and drags it down, and down.

You can't see anything but the curve of Michonne's back and breasts, Daryl's bent leg and his eager expression as he props himself up on his elbows, his sudden quake.

He moans, and it's nothing like hearing it through a wall, not when he's mere feet away and his ecstasy-wracked face is so visible. He tries to move against Michonne's fingers – that makes you tremble a bit, the staggering comprehension that Michonne's fingers aren't on him but inside him – and he scrabbles at the bed sheets, a litany of curses spilling from him. It's like something's been unlocked inside Daryl and he's trying to fill every silent, empty space in his life with this.

"Fuck, c'mon, been waitin all day for this," he gasps after a while, and Michonne lets out a small "okay," yanks the glove off and it lands with a splat to the floor. She pulls something wrapped in a towel from the nightstand, and it looks like a dildo save for the odd bulb at the end, and you don't know how they're going to use that without a harness until she slicks up the bulb and slides it inside herself, and the thing sits in its obnoxious bright blueness, looking like it belongs to her body.

Daryl grabs another condom and fumbles it onto the dildo, kissing her as he does it, and rolls over onto his hands and knees.

Michonne looks surprised. "You sure?" she asks, her hand delicate on his shoulder, where downwards dark welts litter his back. Your stomach tries to crawl up your throat at the thought of when and how he got them.

He nods, so much trust in that gesture, and smiles, the mood lightening instantly.

"Now c'mon, gimme that big dick."

"Daryl," she chokes out, and they're both shaking with laughter, and you can't help smiling yourself. "Jesus, you know what I said about the dirty talk –"

"Mm, no, I don't. But y'like when I ask for it." There's no amusement in his voice now, low as pitch and just as molten black. "So please fuck me?"

It takes you a moment to realize you're holding your breath as Michonne grips Daryl's ass, presses inside all the way to the hilt. He moans, head dipping down and his deltoids straining, and a frightening thought surfaces in you: i want to know what that feels like.

Daryl's arms give from under him, a different kind of mewl escaping his throat as he rasps, "fuck, too much, just gimme a sec."

"Do you need something to hold on to?" Michonne asks, tight like it's taking every ounce of her not to just rut into Daryl then and there, but still concerned. He nods and her next words are ice sliding under your collar, soaking you to the bone:

"Rick, come help."

You jerk up, terrified but that does nothing to curb your arousal. Daryl's gaping at you with eyes you've never seen before, and Michonne just looks. Hungry.

"Rick, help him up," she repeats, in what must be her courtroom voice, if her courtroom voice were as husky as that. You stand as if in a haze and sink down on the bed beside Daryl, let Michonne guide his arms around your neck and your hands to his waist.

He tightens his grip, staring at you with his pupils blown, the perpetual flush on his neck, and you think nonsensically, this is my best friend.

Daryl takes a stabilizing inhale, tells Michonne in a rush, "Y'can move now."

She rests her head between his shoulder blades, messy kisses against his tattoos as she thrusts, slow and deep and his nails are digging into you, but it's nothing compared to the puncture of his ragged whine against the tender skin of your neck.

"Okay?" Michonne asks, gradually picking up the pace and Daryl can only nod, his face pushed into your neck from the force of her movements. Terrified that he'll feel how rabid your pulse is, you bring a hand under his chin and tilt his chin up, and his eyes are dagger-sharp, more lucid than they'd been just seconds ago. You swear his swollen red mouth shapes your name, and you snap.

You kiss Daryl, and for some miraculous reason he kisses you back.

It's graceless, the angle not fit for it, but you never want it to end. You can taste something foreign in the corners of his lips, you taste Michonne, and it merely adds to the inferno that's become every inch of your soul. Michonne's next thrust knocks the two of you apart but you stay like that, sharing desperation, sharing breath. She's grinning far too smug at you over Daryl's head, and you haul him fully to his knees, kiss him so hard his nose digs into your cheek. And a good thing too, because once Michonne finally gets to wrapping a hand around him, he comes with a muffled shout, rapping his fists against your body almost in protest before slumping completely.

"Daryl," she moans after a heartbeat or two. "I have to –"

"Yeah, go on," he mumbles, and she just fucks him, all pretense gone, and you hold him as short, almost pained keens escape him with each thrust until she too is undone with a taut shiver a little later.

And they're looking at you all dazed and limp, a strange joy like wildfire spreading from their eyes and diffusing in your limbs. "You okay?" Daryl whispers, like he's not the one who just took a pounding, and you remember you're still disgustingly, maddeningly hard. You won't ever be able to look at the two of them again without going hard like you're back to being a hair-trigger teenager.

You don't know what pathetic excuse you come up with but you do know when you try to pull away, something's still bracing you down.

It's their hands, both of them, resting at the join of your hip and thigh and now creeping up to where you need it most, and a few synced rubs are all it takes. You come like you've been shoved off an airplane, crazy euphoric feeling of imminent death.

And Michonne leans across to kiss you, your lips the only things touching until she folds a hand around the nape of your neck, and she's smiling as she tells you, "Next time I'm fucking you."

As muffled and plainly stated as it is, your dick vigilantly tries to come to life again, but you're still spinning from your orgasm and the strange events of the whole day, and you can't even form coherent words. Daryl snickers from where he's settled beside the two of you.

"I think we broke him."

It's gentle, teasing, but it warps and curdles in your mind, Lori's perfectly formed sneer.

look at you. all broken and used up.

Your tongue finally unsticks itself from the roof of your mouth, and all that comes out is a stiff "goodnight."

They don't try to stop you after that.

You dread coming out of your room and having to face the day (to face them), but you know you can't keep avoiding every painful thing forever. And it turns out that when the struts of your world crumble underneath you again, it's quieter, deeper than how a river runs.

Every step Michonne takes toward you from the kitchen sink is full of intent, her brows a tight line and you expected everything but another kiss, her tongue snaking into your mouth despite your morning breath and all.

"Do you get it now?" she says, hands curving around the insides of your elbows, streaking you white with soap but you don't care. "This isn't just about the sex, it was never." She pauses, her throat working as she tries to explain, but it's there in the broken curl of her lips, there in her ineloquence, her tight-lipped mouth. It speaks volumes, always has, and you wonder why it took you so long to hear it.

You wonder why you're so afraid.

"I do. I'm sorry," you say, and she sighs, her breath pushing warm into your face. She turns her head, and you follow to see Daryl leaning against the doorframe, arms crossed and surveying the two of you, the edge of his mouth curved up into this impossibly sweet half-smile.

"Now that that's been cleared up," he drawls, pushing off the frame and coming to a rest behind you, a counterbalance to Michonne, who's smaller and slighter and just as unyielding. Your new home, you realize, as Daryl kisses your reedy pulse, is not the compact walls of this two bedroom apartment but this.

He murmurs, "Our offer still stands, y'know," and it burrs through you like an electrocution. You look from his pleased face to Michonne's laugh of boy's got a one-track mind, and you tell them, "I'll think about it," but not without kissing them, one after the other, and making them toast with cheese even if they've had breakfast already.

(and if you have to lock yourself in a bathroom stall during lunch break later that day to shove your hand down your shorts, teeth dug into your lower lip from recalling Michonne's dark fingers cradling the hollows of Daryl's hips, well, that's nobody's business.)

BY THE WAY. michonne uses a feeldoe. you gon'hafta google that shit to find out about it, okay?