Carol silently opened her eyes as she lay on the top bunk of the cell she shared with Lori, the place was quiet but something didn't feel quite right. It wasn't in the sense of the group were in impending danger from Walkers or any rogue survivors but she felt strangely uncomfortable.
And it wasn't the kind of discomfort she felt usually, nobody could ever feel happy living in a prison where murderers, rapists and other disgusting individuals who then became flesh-eating freaks were caged. She wasn't happy about having to sleep in a bed where these monsters lived but she much preferred a secure prison to trying their luck out there, in a tent, in the cold.
The prison was stuffy and the cells were claustrophobic, she had often found herself sat up late into the night just listening to the noises the creaky old prison made, the sound of Walker's roaming in the yard. But tonight was a particularly difficult night, it took quite some time for her to finally fall asleep and she kept periodically waking up, something was bothering her and she couldn't quite work it out.
Carol sat up on the bed and looked around the cell in the darkness. Very little light passed into these cells at night, the lights were no longer functioning so they had used their torches to light up the darkness. She moved on the bed and let her legs dangle over the edge, she gently rolled her shoulder again, the ache that Daryl had massaged away had returned. Daryl. What even was that?
Daryl had changed recently, whether he had meant to or not. She noticed it when Sophia had first gone missing that night she cried herself to sleep in the RV, he got up in the pitch dark to go and look for her daughter, he almost seemed to care.
He had tried to reassure Carol that they would find her missing daughter and even bought her back a flower, a Cherokee Rose. He told her the story, he showed her where the Roses grew in a way of apologising for calling her an unspeakable name.
When they found Sophia in that barn and she fell to the floor, Daryl held the woman to save her from herself, to save her from her hungry daughter. Even after Sophia had been... put down, he held her until she pushed him away.
When Hershel's farm had been over run by Walker's he waited on the road for her, he rescued her and whisked her away.
But recently it had been different, Daryl had been different. Carol had taken some food down to the overturned bus where he patrolling because she knew by the end of the night, there would have been nothing left for him. Daryl was more grouchy than usual if he didn't eat. She heard him mumble something that sounded like 'caviar' as he took a slice of meat and chewed on it, she didn't expect Daryl to take note of her shoulder pain and Carol most definitely didn't expect the man to massage her back and shoulder.
She was so used to Daryl being hostile and aggressive that this new side of him took her by surprise. Now the man was no longer leaving in the shadow of his racist, sexually orientated, insane older brother he had begun to come out of his shell. God, his hands were so incredibly talented, his skin had been toughened by all the work and his fine motor skills meant he was well suited for the task. Carol felt so wonderfully relaxed for the first time in months, that man's hands worked brilliantly and he seemed to realise that too. Which is why he changed the subject and decided they should go back to the rest of the group, he must have felt a little awkward but Carol knew how to fix that, flirt outrageously by making sex jokes.
She smiled in the darkness remembering how Daryl had choked for a moment and then he laughed accidentally making a sexual remark that Carol picked up on. He groaned and demanded she stopped in case somebody heard them, Carol had to laugh at how awkward he was. He was like a school boy at that moment, he was all talk but as soon as it came to action he'd clam up and change the subject. Even if it was a joke.
After that moment they hadn't really spoke to each other, as they passed each other they smiled but didn't speak.
"Carol...?" He heard Lori very quietly whisper. "...There's something wrong with one of the others, I can hear them... crying." Maybe that was what had woken Carol up, the sound of someone crying. If it had woken them both up there was a good chance the rest of the group had been woken up too, slowly and carefully Carol lowered herself down off the bed and reached for her torch then turned to Lori, Carol held out a hand to help the pregnant woman onto her feet as she used her free hand to hold the top bunk and pull herself up. Carol kept hold of Lori's hand and slowly wandered out of their room out to the balcony.
Outside on the balcony was Glenn and Maggie, Maggie looked absolutely exhausted as she stood wrapped in Glenn's arms, her head lying against his shoulder. She was tightly clutching the back of his t-shirt in her fists as she stared out on to the perch where Rick was knelt with T-Dog. Poor Maggie looked shattered and so much older than she really was, maybe that was because of the dark or the fact that she lived in a world filled with flesh-eating monsters that had taken a chunk from her father's leg, perhaps the amount of pressure caused by this kind of environment had finally got to her.
Glenn looked just as exhausted as his girlfriend, he scrubbed his eyes with one hand before putting it back around her shoulders as he gently kissed her forehead. He had discarded his cap in the cell he was sharing with Maggie at some point and had spent the night trying to comfort her, he had also been completely focused on the perch until he heard the two women step out from their cells.
He weakly smiled wanting nothing more than to just go back to bed and curl up with his girlfriend, to sleep until the morning so he could feel refreshed and not as low as they were all feeling at the moment. When Carol looked over the balcony to the cells below he spotted Carl lingering in the doorway looking tired and disheveled as well as Beth next to him, Carl seemed to have taken a shine to Beth in the recent weeks, whether his interests were reciprocated she didn't know but it was nice to see.
Carol looked around at everyone again, there was one person missing besides Hershel who for obvious reasons couldn't get out of bed. Lori, Maggie, Glenn, Rick, T-Dog, Carl, Beth, Hershel, so where was Daryl? And who was crying? From what she could see nobody who was stood looking was making the noise. "Glenn, w-where's Daryl?" She asked hearing the muffled cries again.
Glenn's eyes met Carol's and he seemed disheartened, gloomy even. He bit his bottom lip in a moment's hesitation before lifting his hand and pointing over to where Rick and T-Dog were knelt on the perch, something in Carol at that moment changed and she felt incredibly sick. Her palms felt clammy, thoughts were rushing through her mind at a million miles per second as her heart raced uncontrollably. She dropped Lori's hand and very slowly stepped away from the door of their cell holding the torch out in front of her, at an agonizingly slow pace she walked towards the two men knelt on the perch. As she got closer to them she could see the bed spread Daryl had been using to sleep on at their feet.
Carol couldn't bring herself to look over Rick's shoulder, she wasn't sure if she was going to like what she saw. Had Daryl been bitten or scratched at some point? Was he turning. She continued to look at Rick's feet unsure of what to do with herself, when she heard an awful choked sob coming from one of the three men. It made her heart-break, she could feel the pain, the agony just pouring off in waves and it made tears spring to her eyes.
"I-Is he hurt?" She whispered making Rick and T-Dog both snap their heads in her direction in surprise. Carol had prepared herself for the worst, to hear Rick say yes and that they'd have to end Daryl's life before the disease captured him.
"No." Rick said calmly. "I think... I think he's having a nightmare, we can't wake him up." She had not prepared herself for that, to hear that he was fine. He was well. The relief that suddenly flooded her veins was incredible, to hear that he was okay.
Carol nodded as T-Dog moved aside to let her take his place, the scene laid out before her was devastating. There lay the strongest, toughest, bravest man she knew whimpering and sobbing as he slept. He probably didn't even know he was doing it. Daryl had his fingers laced into his hair and was pulling on it until his knuckles were white with the pressure and with his other hand he clutched the poncho he'd been wearing a lot lately, he'd obviously grabbed it as he was thrashing around and had yet to release it. Daryl's jaw was clenched tight and his eyes jammed shut as he frowned, but even with his eyes closed, hot tears streaked his face. Carol didn't exactly know what to do, or how to make anything better so she turned to the leader of their group.
"I think you should probably both leave before he wakes up, he won't like you seeing him like this." She paused and looked back at Daryl as he cried out in obvious emotional pain, it made her want to lie down beside him and cry too. How could someone who was always so strong, so fearless become so... wrecked. Rick and T-Dog nodded patting Carol's shoulder as they both stood up and walked back to the cell's, Rick dismissed everyone who was looking out and sent them back to bed. For a moment Carol just sat and watched Daryl, every so often he would dig his heels into his bed roll as if he was trying to push something away and his hands clenched in his hair so tightly to the point it looked like it actually hurt. "Daryl?" Carol whispered hoping he would wake up but he only threw his head side-to-side. She sighed as she reached down and attempted to peel his hand from his hair, his fists were locked so tight she didn't think she would ever be able to help him.
Carol very carefully held his hand in hers and placed it in her lap, she allowed her free hand to rest against his cheek and used her thumb to gently wipe away the hot streams that trailed down his face. "Come on Daryl..." She sighed a little uncomfortably. "Daryl!" Carol gently squeezed his hand trying to help him wake up. But he just whimpered. "Wake up Daryl, come on please get up."
He stopped moving, his body seemed to relax as he lay there, his hand flexed in hers as she held him. His frown relaxed and the hand clenched around his poncho pulled away and tucked under his head. Daryl grumbled a little, he pulled his hand out of Carol's and wiped his face. He was no longer asleep but he couldn't bring himself to open his eyes.
"Are you okay?" Carol whispered placing her hands in her lap, he shrugged in reply, it was obvious by his tight jaw he was embarrassed and angry at himself. A Dixon does not cry, if Merle could see him now he would ridicule him and then probably beat the shit out of him. "Where you... having a nightmare?" She asked gently, not really knowing if he was going to be honest with her or shut her down in his typical aggressive manner.
Daryl opened his eyes letting Carol see them burn with an intensity that she had never seen before, it wasn't the same kind of anger he felt when they lost Merle or when he had called Carol a stupid bitch in Hershel's barn, it was a deep fury that he had buried in his past and only came out during times of real pain. Without answering her question he slowly sat up moving so his knees were bent and he could rest his arms against them.
"You know you can talk to me, don't you Daryl?" Carol shuffled so she could reflect the redneck's position and face him.
He grunted quietly as he ran his fingers through his hair. "Ain't got nothin' to say." Carol had expected that to come out a little harsher than it did, either Daryl was so exhausted and emotionally drained he couldn't even attempt to be mad or he hadn't intended to get mad at all. Carol and Daryl were now becoming quite close friends, and with that friendship came a change in Daryl's emotional barriers. He was smiling a lot more than usual, he didn't swear as often as he did when they first met and he very rarely used racial slurs to address Glenn. Those slurs were never aggressively aimed at Glenn but they sometimes seemed harsh and got to him, all it took was a quiet word from Carol to make it better.
Carol was glad to see the change in the man, she would never force somebody to change but the change was beautiful, she adored the way he smiled and the way they could flirt like crazy now unlike before. She wanted him to keep changing.
"You don't have to be strong all the time." She said locking their gaze, he had the most divine eyes. They were shades lighter than any she had ever seen before, if ice and steel could be smashed together to make a silvery-blue colour then that was how she would describe them. They were stunning but at the same time harsh and calculating, they were the windows to his contused and damaged soul. Carol watched Daryl bring his thumb to his mouth, he curled his fingers under his chin and began chewing and biting on the nail relentlessly. He'd be lucky if he had a nail left by the end of the night.
He scoffed at what she said, he always had to be strong especially now the rest of the group seemed to be losing their minds. Rick had killed his best friend for the group and was no longer talking to his heavily pregnant wife, Carl wouldn't talk to his mother. Glenn hadn't been the same since Dale had died, Maggie and Beth were pretty on edge since Hershel lost his leg so it was just him holding himself together. Carol has lost her daughter, she seemed pretty well but he wasn't exactly great at reading people so he didn't know if she was suffering or not. "I-I don't wanna' talk 'bout it."
Carol was surprised to hear Daryl's voice shaking, Daryl seemed surprised by it too and didn't know how to react so he stood himself up. His hand never left his mouth even as he got up and it made him look like a child, he seemed lost and almost afraid.
Carol stayed sat on the floor as he paced around the perch, if she was lower than him he wouldn't feel intimidated, it wasn't very often Daryl felt intimidated by someone else usually he would be the one scaring others but tonight was different. Whatever he had dreamed about had really rattled his cage, she had never seen the man even close to tears before much less actually crying.
She sighed and rubbed her eyes. "You just want to let this keep bothering you until you crack?" She replied making him turn so their eyes could meet. He was in turmoil. "I don't want you to end up losing your mind, like Shane!"
That ignited a fury in Daryl, he stormed over to where Carol was sat, knelt in front of her and glared into her eyes. "I'll never be like him. Do you fuckin' understand me?" He spat the words out fiercely, he hadn't spoken to her in that tone of voice in quite some time. Carol barely flinched as he got up close to her, even in his anger she found her heart racing, he smelt delicious. He had used the shower gel she had found in one of the houses they stopped in, originally the idea of giving it to him was a little scary she felt he would laugh or say she was ridiculous for even getting it but when she heard him grumble about losing the last of his soap, she called him into her cell while Lori was elsewhere and handed it to him. He had actually smiled and thanked her only making one joke about smelling like a fairy.
She didn't think he smelled like 'a fairy' she didn't exactly have a lot of choice when it came to grabbing the gel, so what ever fragrance it had he just had to deal with. Cucumber and mint, it wasn't every day a rough and tumble redneck would reek of those two substances, usually it was moonshine whiskey and diesel. But it was good. Real good.
Daryl steadily glared at Carol for a little while longer before he began to waver, he was thinking about it again. Slowly Carol lifted her hand to his face wiping away the remainder of the tears left on his face, as their skin made contact he sprang backwards on to his feet again.
"Talk to me Daryl."
He groaned in defeat and ran a hand through his hair again displaying his frustration. "You're not gonna give up are ya?" He asked quietly. Carol shook her head silently and watched him shift his weight from foot to foot, he was considering opening up, he knew he was never going to get away from her if he didn't tell her how he was feeling.
Carol quirked an eyebrow in surprise and confusion when Daryl began shrugging off his leather jacket and unbuttoning the shirt he wore underneath, he dropped them on his bed roll before dragging his thumb back to his mouth and slowly turning his back to her. Everything was silent besides the light snoring of one of the group and the sound of Daryl's nail snapping under his teeth. She considered asking him what he was doing when something in her mind clicked, she slowly reached down and picked up her torch. Carol rolled the torch in her hand before beaming the light at the man. What she saw made her heartbreak.
Carol quietly climbed to her feet and slowly walked towards him, she didn't want to move too fast and spook him. It looked like agony.
"Daryl..." She whispered feeling distraught. His back was crisscrossed in pink and white scars that varied in thickness, length and their depth, there were more small circular scars on his back than she could count. It was painful to look at and must have been painful to bear, emotionally and physically.
Countless times Carol has seen Daryl get up in the morning and he seemed stiff and hurting, if he bent down to pick something up first thing he'd grit his teeth and she could almost feel how hurt he was, the stiff pain only seemed to last for a few minutes every day before they were gone. Either it stopped after those few minutes or he was in constant pain and he just ignored it.
"How... how did this happen?" She said lifting her hands to run her fingers across one of the deepest scars running diagonally through the meat of his back, over his spine. His entire body tensed for a few seconds before relaxing again, she heard him let out a deep sigh and his head fell against the cold prison wall, the temperature of Carol's cold hands seemed to be relieving some of his pain. She could feel him rocking backwards and forwards ever so slightly, he seemed to be in more pain than he'd ever let on. "Does that floor make the pain better or worse?" Carol asked gently placing her hands on his shoulder blades and lightly rubbing circles into his skin.
"Worse. But 'm not sleepin' in a cage." He replied through grit teeth, Carol didn't stop doing the same thing he had down for her before, she returned the favor in the form of a back and shoulder massage. If that was what he needed then that was what he was going to get.
Carol tried to be as gentle as possible as she tried to held him but she found with him stood up, he would arch away if she touched a particularly painful spot, she knew it wasn't really his fault but if she was going to help him relax she needed to keep him still. "Stay here, I've got an idea." Daryl grunted and looked over his shoulder at her as she walked away, she headed into one of the empty cells and grabbed one of the flimsy but better-than-sleeping-on-the-floor mattresses of the bunk and dragged it out to where Daryl slept every night, she then went back to the cell and grabbed the second mattress from the top bunk and dropped it next to the first. Carol pushed the two together to act as a double mattress and then turned to all of his things and placed them on his bed roll. Carol looked at her handy work and smiled before looking over at Daryl who had been watching her the whole time and nodded for him to come over and lie down.
He didn't waste anytime making his way over to his new makeshift bed, why hadn't he thought of doing that before? It probably would have prevented his pain and nobody would've been any wiser of his condition. But that didn't matter now, Carol knew what was causing him so much pain, the rest of the group knew something had driven him to tears while he was sleeping so there was no escaping it.
Daryl carefully lay himself down on one of the mattresses and sighed feeling how soft it was, he had missed sleeping in a proper bed, not that he ever really slept in a bed before any of this. Sometimes Merle would be so high he wouldn't want to risk even being in the house when he came in, so he'd drive a little down the road and sleep inside his truck where it was a little safer.
He suddenly snapped from his thoughts when Carol placed her hands on his back again, lightly running her fingers against the damaged surface. Daryl closed his eyes feeling a little peaceful but at the same time bracing himself for the pain as she systematically worked to get rid of his pain.
She started at his neck, he didn't feel any pain there but he wasn't going to complain and just allowed Carol to rub circles against his neck with her thumbs, she giggled a little when he let out a moan. "Enjoying yourself?" Daryl grunted a reply and cracked an eye open slightly to look at the woman as he pulled his hand away from his mouth. "You're not gonna have any thumb left if you keep chewing on it like that." He grumbled something Carol didn't quite catch and placed his hands under his head to refrain from biting them. "You gonna tell me how you got these?" She asked sliding her hands down to the man's shoulders. He had strong shoulders, it felt great to be able to run her hands over them, to touch his skin.
"I was a shit son." He said bluntly rolling his shoulders a little to direct Carol's hands.
Carol didn't have a reply for that so she just kept working, digging her fingertips into the blades of his shoulder to try and help. Never in her life had she heard someone admit to being physically abused as a child like that, to hear him blame himself for the way he was treated by his father. Conversation ran dry for a while after that Carol wanted to ask through a morbid form of curiosity the kind of things his father had done to him, but she knew that was too far, he had enough trouble being honest and opening up as it was.
But Daryl knew. He just... knew. "Can hear yer mind goin', somethin' you wanna say?"
Carol felt a little guilty and unhappy asking Daryl about his suffering but it seemed he was willing to share, she slid her hands from his shoulders a little further down his back before saying anything. "What did he-" She was cut off by Daryl groaning in a mixture of pain and pleasure. "-What did he do to you?"
He was silent for a moment as if he was thinking about what to say, or choosing his best stories. "Since when he started smokin' I dunno, but he used ma back to put 'em out." The words came out whispered and strained but nonetheless they came out. "Liked the belt. Smashed ma arm wit' a piece a wood once, forced me t' drink 12 bottles of beer, one after the other when I wer' 9. Punched me in the head when I wer' sick." Carol could see Daryl was sparing her all the grizzly details, she was surprised she hadn't seen the scars before but then she remember that when she took Daryl's supper to him on Hershel's farm the day he was hurt, he had pulled the bed sheets up to cover his body. She thought he must've just been feeling a little vulnerable at the time but obviously not.
Carol sighed sadly and listened as Daryl listed more and more cruel, torturous things his father did to him or made him do to himself and suddenly she completely understood why he behaved the way he did. Daryl was cruel, rude and unbelievably harsh because he was protecting himself. He didn't want to get hurt again by someone he cared about, all love for his father eventually faded and he didn't want to be put through that kind of emotional pain again, he didn't want to be rejected again.
Daryl kept listing these agonising tortures until Carol reached his lower back, just above his waistband. As she ground her fingers into his tainted skin he cried out in pain, turning his face into the mattress so he didn't make too much noise. Carol didn't spend too long on that particular spot, she couldn't bear to hear him in anymore pain so she shuffled aside a little so he could roll over and face her.
"Don't cry." He whispered reaching up and wiping away a stray tear from her cheek. "It's not always bad, can cope most the time." Daryl seemed a little more at ease then he had before, some of his pain must have been lifted making him feel comfortable. He looked sleepy all of a sudden, like he was just going to nod off at any moment, the man was suddenly sluggish and exhausted.
Carol nodded, there were flashes of times where Ed had shown new levels of violence to her especially before the end of the world but he had never treated her the way Daryl had been treated. "I'm sorry, I was just thinking about Ed and how I used to think I had it hard."
Daryl shook his head. "Ya did 'ave it 'ard, I wer' just a kid, it made me tough. You wer' a woman, can't get tough when yer grown." That made a little sense to her but at the same time it seemed like a childish belief that Daryl carried with him all his life, it helped him when times were rough, if he was hurting then it was going to make him stronger. He kept his eye focused on Carol as she wiped away her tears and smiled at him, he automatically smiled back without even thinking about it. "Sorry, I woke ya up."
Carol shook her head and used her fingertips to brush the longer strands of his hair from his eyes, his closed his eyes at the contact to hide his embarrassment, her spontaneous displays of affection spooked him sometimes but he was getting used it. She was gentle and loving and he had never been exposed to that kind of behaviour. "It's alright, but you should have told somebody, I could've helped you before. Now everybody knows there's something up."
Daryl sighed and opened his eyes again focusing in one Carol's as her fingers slid down to the side of his face, she kept trailing her fingers up and down his skin. It was comforting and peaceful. "They can think wha' they want." He said a little roughly spitting out the words.
She found herself laughing at him again, it was almost as funny his 'little Shane' comment. His anger melted away again making him smile.
"Think you should probably get some sleep, no doubt Rick'll have you running around tomorrow." Carol said pulling her hand away as she leaned down and kissed his temple. Daryl nodded already missing the warmth of her skin. Carol slowly stood up and watched Daryl cover himself up with a bed sheet, within seconds his eyes began to feel heavy and the man was close to sleep. "See ya tomorrow."