Just something fluffy that I cooked up for the NineLives AU Prompt-A-Thon challenge : )

Ten million thank yous go out to Stephtron312 for beta'ing the two different versions I wrote of this story, and to LAH for helping us figure out which version to actually use. I can't thank you both enough for all of the last-minute back and forth (and for dealing with my *endless* questions). LOVE YOU GUYS TO BITS!

They had been drinking tonight. They had been drinking a lot.

It had started as a way to take the edge off after the day Carol had. She'd had to quit her job at the convenience store, where she'd been working for three years. It was the only job she could manage to get as quickly as she had after finally gathering up the courage to leave Ed with nothing to her name. No money, no education. The only thing she seemed to have in abundance was desperation.

But the owner's son had recently taken over, and his attention to her had quickly crossed the line from uncomfortable comments to unmistakable harassment.

She got her back up immediately after his hand had "accidentally" brushed against her backside once more, terrified to be vulnerable to a man ever again, and quit on the spot. She hadn't even given them two weeks – she simply left.

She'd called Daryl immediately from a pay phone around the corner and, with a shaky voice, had asked him to pick her up. She heard the roar of his bike's engine less than seven minutes later, and clambered on behind him before he'd even come to a full stop.

"Shit, you alright?" he shouted over the noise, but she only hastily strapped on her helmet and wrapped her arms around him.

"Just go," she shouted back, and he immediately dropped every question he had hanging on his lips.

He knew they couldn't go back to his place because of Merle, knowing full well his dickhead brother had his friends over and they were probably right in the middle of their third line of blow. They couldn't go to her place either, because her roommate was a gossip who made every bit of their friendship her own personal business and anyone else's who might listen.

So he made a pit-stop at the liquor store for a bottle of that spiced whiskey she liked, and saw her closing up the saddlebags on his bike as he made his way back outside.

"What'd you get?" he called to her from across the lot, assuming she'd just returned from the gas station next door.

"Sustenance," she replied with a smile as he approached. She eyed the paper bag he held loosely by the neck of the bottle that was inside and retuned the question. "What'd you get?"

"Sustenance," he smirked.

She grinned at his playfulness – at the knowledge and reassurance that he was simply here for her – as they climbed onto the bike and sped off once more.

He took her to the quarry where they'd go fishing sometimes, took out the blanket that she kept stashed in his bike for the times she just didn't feel like going home, and spread it out on the sand by the water.

He nudged her elbow with his own as they sank down onto the blanket, jerking his head towards one of the trees nearby.

"Reckon that poor son of a bitch is having a worse day than you," he mumbled, and she giggled as she noticed the lone shoe trapped on the branch, held hostage by its very own shoelaces. "'Least you still got both your shoes."

They sat crossed-legged facing one another before revealing their bounty.

She theatrically presented the big bag of peanut M&Ms and the other one of gummy bears. He even got to pick which they opened first.

But when he pulled out that bottle and her eyes landed on the familiar label, her face lit up and she had to force herself to hold back from taking hold of his face and kissing his mouth.

He hated spiced whiskey.

He unscrewed the cap and passed her bottle as though he were presenting her with a brick of gold.

"So, what happened tonight?" he asked, the attempt to make his tone casual wiped clean by the nervous hitch in his breath as he fiddled with his lighter, struggling to light the cigarette that was now hanging from his lips.

She took the first sip as he pulled open the M&Ms, pouring some out into his hand.

"You know what happened," she mumbled under her breath. She glanced up at him just long enough to see his jaw clench tightly.

"Did you quit?" he asked, his voice grainy as the smoke he exhaled filled the air between them.

She nodded and he nodded back at her, punctuating his satisfaction with a rumbling, "Good."

"I'm unemployed, Daryl," she stated wryly, wordlessly asking how this was indeed something good.

"We'll figure it out," was all he said, and the deep pull from his cigarette told her there was no room to argue, and so she simply took another sip of the tawny liquid.

She smiled ruefully as she took the smoke he then offered her – trading for the bottle – and she watched him sort through the candy colours, sliding the orange and brown ones back into the bag.

For her. Because those were her favourite M&M colours.

The smile faded from her mouth and she took a nervous drag of the cigarette as she felt the sudden change in herself – her stomach doing a thing and her mouth going dry. Or maybe it wasn't change – maybe it was just the sudden realization that the thing you've been searching for all over your house for the last twenty minutes was in your hand the entire time.

Maybe she was just ready for that now.

Because her ex-husband hadn't been a good man, and it had taken her a long time to understand that it wasn't her fault. He was who he was, and didn't really have a damn thing to do with her.

And Daryl had been there almost every step of the way.

She'd gotten drunk much quicker than he had, her tolerance having always been much lower. So she took a little break as he got caught up, laying back on the blanket before he inevitably joined her.

And then the giggles started.

"Remember when you used to come into the store at night?"

"Yeah," he grunted and raised an eyebrow in confusion, because he wasn't quite sure he saw the humour in it. It had been around the time she'd first started working there, when she'd have to close up by herself at midnight.

"Five minutes before we closed, Daryl. Every. Night."

"So, what's your point?" he scoffed, lifting himself slightly to peer down at her before falling back down in a heap.

"Well," she sighed. "At first I was annoyed as hell. I mean, you'd kind of just wander around and take your time, and I'd have to wait for you to be done so I could lock up. And then it kind of scared me a little because you kept coming back." She paused for a beat and he knew she wasn't finished.

"And then I kind of loved it," her voice trailed off a little as she remembered the stranger who'd very quickly became her closest friend not long after he'd started walking her the three blocks to her home.

"Ain't wanted you to walk back by yourself so late at night," he muttered, his fingers fiddling with the edge of the blanket.

They'd inevitably got to talking on those walks and quickly realized the kindred spirits they really were. The way they'd come from entirely different places but faced the same types of struggles within themselves. Battled the same types of people for a time in their lives – people they were supposed to trust.

She'd always hated thinking it – the idea being far too romanticized for the life she'd ended up with – but it was as though they were meant to meet that first time. Meant to be friends. Meant to be whatever it was that they'd become over the years.

Carol couldn't imagine a life without Daryl anymore. It wasn't anything she ever wanted to try.

"We can't drive back home now," she mused, letting her eyes focus and unfocus on the stars in the clear sky above them.

"Nah, we'll just stay out here tonight. Ain't like you got anywhere to be in the morning," he joked, earning her laughter and a gentle nudge to his calf with her foot.

"Works for me," she slurred, turning her head sloppily to grin up at him with hooded eyes.

He brought his hand up to wrap around her, and she immediately moved to tuck into his side. Her fingers danced over the buttons on his shirt, skimming just underneath the open flaps before finding the next button.

He practically ignored the hammering of his heart nowadays, the way her nearness gave him an odd sense of comfort. It used to bother him, being around her knowing he wanted more than she was ready to give. But soon enough the excitement and unease those feelings gave him had dulled to a comforting symptom of her presence.

Because the feelings they had for one another just were nowadays. And so it was now just something he'd come to accept as he waited for her to be ready for him.

They'd held hands sometimes, and they'd held each other. They'd been open about how deeply their feelings ran through their words and their ways. There was a trust between them that ran deeper than any experience of trust they'd ever had with anyone before. But Carol was still so reluctant to take that leap, even though they already belonged to one another in every other sense of the word.

I don't ever want to be without you, Daryl, she'd told him once.

And he'd replied, You ain't ever gotta.

We're it now. It's done.

"It's a beautiful night," she sighed, nuzzling deeper into his side as her mind swirled and twirled. "Let's go swimming."

"Let's get married."

"What?"

"What?"

They bolted upright and were both sitting up now.

"Um," Carol hummed awkwardly, attempting to replay what she thought was a conversation they'd just had. "Let's go…swimming?"

Daryl was frozen, unable to move as he contemplated whether or not she would still realize he was there if he didn't move or speak. Maybe she didn't hear him. Maybe he'd never said anything at all.

Her eyes narrowed as she slowly began to stand, barely making it to a crouch before she sat back down with a fumble and pointing loosely in his direction.

"Wait, did you just-"

"Nope."

"Ask me-"

"Nope, didn't say a thing."

He struggled then to take out another cigarette and then fumbled with his lighter in pursuit of a distraction – for himself and for her – from whatever embarrassment he'd just caused himself.

"You did," she huffed. "You asked me to marry you. Didn't you?" Her nose scrunched with confusion. Maybe he hadn't, she wasn't entirely sure. She never could really follow a whole conversation when she'd been drinking.

He took a long pull from his cigarette as he paused a moment and shifted his eyes to the sky, as though he was trying his very hardest to remember the proposal he'd blurted out less than a minute ago. A part of him tried to rationalize with himself that he could easily play it off as a joke. Except that he was dead serious and the damned spiced whiskey was clouding his judgement.

When he looked back at her, her jaw was slack, and she was gaping openly at him. He lost his train of thought then and instead began a new one, taking him to where the breeze blew her curls so gently across her face and neck, and he was instantly entranced by the sight of her crystal blue eyes glimmering in the moonlight. He blew the smoke out slowly, buying him some more time to simply watch her.

"You want to marry me?" she asked incredulously.

"Yeah," he sighed absently, still lost in the haze that the booze afforded them before he realized what he'd just openly admitted. "Wait-"

Carol gasped loudly, then. "Daryl," she hissed and leaned towards him, as though they were in the middle of a crowd and needed to be discreet.

"We can't just get married," she whispered frantically. "We don't even have rings."

He seemed to have instantly forgotten that he was supposed to be embarrassed when presented with this challenge, a corner of his mouth turning upwards with smugness.

"Oh, I'll get rings. You want rings?" he asked, pointing at her with the smoke he held loosely between his fingers.

She nodded as he stood abruptly, handing her the cigarette as he scanned the resources available for his new project.

"It's the only right way to do it," she called after him as he walked briskly towards the shoelace-tree.

He climbed it messily to a chorus of Carol's "What are you doings?!" and braced himself – however wobbly – as he set the shoe free before jumping back to the ground.

He weaved the lace out and tossed the shoe aside as he strode back to their blanket, taking out his pocket knife to make quick work of fashioning their rings.

She handed him his cigarette and peered forward as she sat cross-legged in front of him, watching with eager interest as he cut the lace into smaller lengths while the cigarette dangled precariously from his lips.

"Alright," he said with a serious tone, putting out the smoke in the sand beside them. "Give me your hand."

She lifted her right hand complacently before quickly switching it out for her left and he leveled her with a teasing smirk and a shake of his head.

He held the string taut just under her ring finger, pausing and quirking an eyebrow at her before proceeding with the makeshift ceremony.

"You ready?"

She nodded eagerly. "Ready!"

"Once this ring is on, that's it. We'll be married," he warned.

"Oh, I know," she assured him.

Carol grinned widely as she watched him tie the dirty shoelace around her finger, tiny fits of giggles intermittently passing through her lips at the intensity of what they were committing to.

When he was done, she held her hand up in front of her and admired her new ring. "I do," she declared.

"You do what?" Daryl asked absently, grabbing the piece of shoelace that would soon be his own wedding ring.

"Marry you," she told him with an eye roll. "Your turn."

He handed her the string and diligently held up his left hand for her to tie the lace around his ring finger. She rested his hand in her lap to steady it and peeked up at him with a smile with she felt him squeeze her there. When she was done, he smirked with satisfaction but remained silent, opening and closing his fist as though testing out the workability of his new accessory.

"Well, do you?" she prodded, poking him in the stomach.

"Do I what?"

"Marry me!"

"Hell yeah, I do. Fuckin' do it again tomorrow, too," he said, is tone almost challenging her to disagree.

Carol grinned widely as she raised up onto her knees in front of him, inching slowly closer.

He watched her approach with with a question in his eyes. She settled herself once her knees touched his crossed legs, and simply whispered, "You have to kiss your bride."

He didn't say a word, though there was a softness that appeared in his eyes. His gaze drifted to her smiling mouth as his own curved upwards just barely.

Carol took hold of his face then, her hands ever so gentle on his rough skin, and the entire world stopped. Her lips met his delicately, and he felt the whisper of her breath on his face as she sighed, deepening the kiss only the smallest bit more before it was over.

She brushed her nose against his and kept herself close, and his eyes fluttered open as he smiled.

"Carol," he breathed.

She grinned and bumped his nose once again before he closed the gap between them with another fluid kiss. It was longer than the first – deeper – their tongues dancing lazily with each soft brush of their lips.

When they pulled apart, he wrapped his arms around her and pulled her down onto the blanket, and they settled in for the night as she rooted into his side.

"Thank you for rescuing me tonight," she whispered.

"Always," he told her, and kissed her temple before they quickly fell asleep.

The morning came quickly and Carol rose with the sun. It had only taken her a quick moment to remember why she was outside. Why she was lying on top of Daryl on the ground.

She sat up slowly as she watched his face, being careful not to wake him. She sat facing the water, pulling her knees to her chest as she eyed the dingy shoelace on her ring finger with an easy smile on her face. Biting her bottom lip absently, she remembered the kisses they'd shared and felt elated that she hadn't been so drunk that she couldn't remember it.

Lost in her thoughts of the night before, she didn't hear him stirring, didn't hear the rustling of his jeans as he moved to sit up beside her.

He kissed her shoulder and held himself upright with a hand on the ground behind her back, and she sank into him as she fiddled once more with the lace on her finger. He brought up his own until it was just next to hers, and they simply looked at their left hands side by side, with the sun glistening on the water beyond them.

"So," he began, resting his chin on her shoulder. "Do you wanna break up?"

She turned her head to look at him, and shook her head. "Nope."

"Ain't got any regrets? I mean," he paused, taking her left hand with his and holding it up as evidence. "This is pretty intense," he joked.

Carol huffed out a laugh and nudged herself further into him, letting their fingers linger together as their hands came down to rest in his lap.

"I'm ready," she whispered.

"Like I'm ready?" he asked.

Because she knew he was – knew he had been for a while now. They didn't need to talk about it, but she knew he'd been waiting on her. Giving her time and space and support to get back to a good place again before she could ever be with another man.

She nodded and flashed him a sweet smile, feeling herself getting lighter and lighter as the sun rose higher into the sky.

And just like that, he carried her over her threshold and into the dawn of her brand new future.

Loosely based on Bruno Mars' "Marry You" because that song makes me fluffy and because I couldn't for the life of me put Caryl into that exact situation.

Thank you so much for reading!