A/N: Caryl fluff set in the latter half of season five.
The bed is too soft.
Carol has bunched up pillows and shifted and tossed, covering herself with the sheet, then sticking one leg out, until she gives up trying and kicks the sheet off herself. She flops onto her back, spreadeagled on the bed, and sighs.
"Everythin' okay?" Daryl drawls, his words laced with amusement.
Carol rolls onto her side, props herself up on an elbow, and looks at Daryl. He seems remarkably comfortable for someone whose bed is on the floor.
He'd told her to take the bed, muttering something about being a gentleman now that they were in civilisation. She'd accepted with a laugh, excited at the prospect of sleeping on a real bed again.
"You've ruined me, Mr Dixon," she declares, southern belle-like.
He snorts. "The hell?"
"All this time on the road. I can't sleep on a bed this soft."
"Hardly my fault."
"And then there's the matter of my pillow."
"What's wrong with your pillow? "
"It's on the floor."
Daryl sits and looks around. "Ain't no pillow on the floor."
Carol's mouth tilts up in a teasing smirk.
Daryl sighs. "Damn it, woman. Am I coming up or are you coming down?"
A heartbeat later, Carol is beside him on his makeshift mattress. "Thanks, Pookie."
She curls into him, her back to his chest. It has been a long time since they've slept like this. Not since the prison. Carol has kept her distance, fighting her ghosts, and he has been mourning another girl lost.
Daryl slips his arm over her, his hand covering hers. His breath tickles the back of her neck and she relaxes against him.
"We're probably the only people in Alexandria sleeping on the floor tonight," she says.
"Wouldn't be so sure of that."
"Do you think we can stay here? Make a home?"
"Dunno."
"It just never seems to end well."
He holds her tighter. "Don't matter where we go. As long as you're there. Can't lose you again."
She rolls over to face him, lays her hand on his cheek, smiles. "I'm right here."
And in that moment before he kisses her, Carol lets go of her ghosts.