A/N: Thank you to everyone who is continuing to follow/favorite/review this story! It really means a lot to me and gives me the push to keep writing!


The sound of the hospital room door squeaking on its hinges awoke Carol with a start. She pushed herself up quickly from where she was laying, her head against Daryl's chest as she leaned over the edge of the hospital bed. She turned to see Dr. Greene with one foot in the door, an amused smile on his face as he looked at the couple in front of him. "I can come back in a little bit if you'd like" he said quietly. Carol blushed furiously and shook her head. She hadn't meant to fall in asleep; in fact, she'd been quite determined to stay awake until the very minute that the results of Daryl's tests were in. But pure exhaustion had taken over after forty-five minutes of waiting in utter silence, and she'd laid her head against Daryl's chest with the idea of only closing her eyes for a few moments. But then the gentle rhythm of his breathing as his chest rose and fell had lulled her to sleep and she was out like a light.

"No, I wanna know now," Carol said determinedly. "Might as well go ahead and rip the Band-Aid off." Dr. Greene gave her a small nod and pulled the chair that Martinez had previously occupied to the foot of Daryl's bed so that he was seated directly in front of her. Carol sat back down in her seat, her foot tapping against the tile floor in a nervous pattern. She glanced back to Dr. Greene and saw him pull a small clipboard from the inside of the white coat he wore over his regular clothes – a blue woolen flannel and khakis.

He began flipping through the pages of test results, re-reading them silently to himself before he spoke.

"Before we begin, Dr. Greene," Carol started, addressing the man in front of her. "I want to – "

"Please, call me Herschel," the doctor said, cutting her off before she could finish the sentence. "Dr. Greene was my father."

Carol gave a small chuckle, noticing the slightly mischievous twinkle in the older man's eyes. The longer he sat in front of her, the more and more she started wondering how this man was even a doctor to begin with; if anything, he reminded her more of Santa Clause. Keeping that thought to herself, Carol looked up at the sound of Herschel sighing as he set the clipboard on the ground beside him. "I want to thank you," she finished. Herschel waved off her thanks. "I'm a doctor. Helping people is what I do dear."

With that, Herschel continued on to the matter at hand. "Well," he began, "when Daryl was brought in we were able to obviously treat any injuries he sustained during the fall. He's quite a lucky guy that the worst of it was just a couple of broken ribs and scrapes. With the fall he took, it could've been a lot worse."

Carol nodded and didn't speak. Her eyes weren't on Herschel as he spoke, but rather on Daryl, still sleeping peacefully beside her. If it weren't for the fact that they were in a hospital, she could almost imagine that they were in their bed at home, waiting for the sun to rise above the trees before she woke him.

When he was met with silence, Herschel continued. "We ran a few tests too. CAT scans and such since he was in and out of consciousness when your friend first brought him in." Carol's heart picked up its pace than as she waited for the rest. "He seems to have suffered a pretty severe concussion."

The ice trickled back into Carol's chest and she dug her fingernails into the palms of her hands to keep herself from breaking down right then and there. The tears that she was so sure would have run out by now welled up in her eyes again, but she would not – could not – let them fall. Not here, not in front of this man who was a perfect stranger. Not when she would make a fool of herself. Not when she needed to keep everything together for Daryl.

Choking back the emotion that she was sure was evident in her voice, Carol said quietly, "What does that mean? Is he going to wake up?" Herschel nodded vigorously; the certainty in his face was comforting. "I'm absolutely positive of that. When? My best guess would be within the week." For that moment Carol let herself breathe. She would have Daryl back soon, that much was certain. "However, there could be some side effects of the head injury," Herschel stated quickly, obviously not wanting Carol to get her hopes up too high. "But for right now, I don't want you worrying yourself with the 'what ifs'. We'll worry about those when he actually comes to."

The doctor stood up to leave, gathering his clipboard from the ground. Before he opened the door, he turned back to Carol and gave her a stern, almost fatherly glare. "And you need to get some rest missy. You look like you haven't slept in days." And with that, he was gone, leaving Carol alone to try and thaw the ice.

They were as far out from Atlanta as you could get, the bustle of mid-afternoon traffic barely audible in the air. "God Daryl, I'm really terrible at this!" Carol said, laughing as she reeled in the line of her fishing pole, yet another bite-less hook at the end. "No ya ain't. Takes more practice than one day of me tryin' to teach ya how to fish."

Carol shook her head, knowing that he was just trying to make her feel better. She was, in every sense of the word, terrible.

Growing up, she had never done outdoorsy types of things like this. And there was certainly no way in hell Ed would ever take her on one of his fishing trips. So when Daryl had invited her to go, she was more than delighted to take him up on his offer. The timing was perfect, considering Ed would be in the city until the next morning. To Daryl, this was his idea of a date.

Throwing out her line to give the fishing another go, Carol looked over her shoulder at Daryl. "So, who taught you how to fish?" He shifted slightly in the seat of the boat, looking more than a little uncomfortable. Figuring it best to drop it, Carol turned back to her fishing pole. But to her surprise, Daryl's answer came. "My dad did."

Carol turned completely around then, all thoughts of fishing gone. She was surprised Daryl had answered her; normally, every time she asked him anything about his family he shut down the conversation without so much as a word on the matter. Carol smiled to herself; this was progress in their relationship.

Wanting him to go on, Carol said quietly, "How old were you?" She knew the only way to get him to tell her the whole story was if she gave him a little push. Daryl sighed. "Guess I was about eight. Was one of the few times my daddy actually did somethin' with me." Carol took his hand, nudging him further into the memory. She had been yearning for so long to hear just a little piece of his past, to know why he was so skittish around her at the beginning, why he flinched when she tried to touch him more than his boundaries permitted; now that he felt more comfortable, she didn't want to pass up on the moment.

"It's probably one of my best memories of the bastard. He took me out on a real nice day, kinda like today. Sky was blue, not a cloud in sight. Man taught me everythin'. How to throw out the line, reel it in. Even how to be patient when it came to the fish bitin', which was real surprisin' comin' from my dad."

The image of a tiny Daryl came to Carol's mind, all shaggy brown hair and blue eyes. She could picture it perfectly, him sitting in the very boat they were in now as he waited on the edge of his seat for a fish to bite. "Had to have spent a good three hours out on the water that day. 'Course, my ol' man forgot to bring sunscreen so I got fried, but hell, if it wasn't worth it to have just that one day with him."

At the look of longing in Daryl's eyes, Carol wrapped her arms around him and pulled him close to her. Her actions thanked him quietly for sharing such a personal part of himself with her, one that she knew hadn't been easy to share. The man tensed for a moment, but soon after his arms came around her too. They sat like that in silence, giving each other the comfort that they both needed, like two pieces of a jigsaw puzzle.

At the sound of a groan coming from somewhere near her, Carol pulled herself from her reverie. She looked around the room, trying to gauge where the noise had come from. No one else was there, and while the TV was on the sound of the Channel 6 news could barely be heard above the hums and whirs of the monitors beside Daryl's bed. Daryl.

She whipped her head around and her heart jolted back to life when she saw blue eyes staring straight at her, a dazed expression on his face.

"Daryl! You're awake!" Carol burst from her chair, almost knocking it over in the process. She pulled Daryl close to her in an embrace she was almost sure was squeezing the air from her lungs, but God, she didn't care. He was awake, he was in her arms, and she could finally let herself breathe.

"Daryl, I was so worried," she said, sobs wracking her body as she pulled back to take a closer look at his face. "When Martinez called me – "She cut herself short at the puzzled expression on Daryl's face. "What's the matter?" she asked. "Where am I?" He looked around confusedly; the surrounding's not seeming to process in his brain. "You're in the hospital. You had an accident." Carol gave him the abbreviated version of the story, sure he would rather hear the rest when he was more well rested.

She expected the confusion to have disappeared from his face, but Daryl still looked unsure of himself as he turned back to face her. "Daryl, you're scaring me." Carol breathed out. A sense of dread took hold of her body then as she realized that this time, the confusion wasn't directed towards the surroundings, the situation, the injuries – but at her. "Please, tell me what's wrong!"

Daryl shook his head and looked away. "I – I don't know who you are."


A/N 2: Oooh, cliffhanger! Hope you guys enjoyed! Reviews are always appreciated!:)