AN: Hi everyone! Just a little chapter here. This one is sort of filler/character development to start putting some pieces into place for things that will be coming up. So, sorry, but nothing too exciting here.
Also, I wrote this on my mobile device today and I've tried to edit it, but there may be more typos than usual. My apologies for that!
I hope you enjoy! Let me know what you think!
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Daryl stepped into post and ran through the set up aisles quicker than anyone who actually intended to find anything.
As he rounded one of the metal shelves he saw Carol standing there, one of the red plastic baskets in hand, swaying on one foot and looking with some focus at the contents of the shelf in front of her.
He backed up quickly, fairly certain that he hadn't been noticed and took to looking blankly at a different shelf, not really even noticing what it might be that he appeared to be shopping for.
She managed to do it to him a lot...just by merit of her presence...and he wasn't even entirely sure what it was.
The catch in his chest was how it started, like the wind had been knocked out of him, and then the churning in his stomach where he wanted to say something to her, or rather he wanted to have something to say to her, but at the same time be feared speaking.
And he assumed that the reason that it got progressively worse was because there was so much that he always left unsaid that it built up and it built up until there wasn't a clear where or when to begin with.
So it was easier to avoid her and to avoid the painful small talk that he hated anyway but hated, most of all, with her.
Daryl abandoned his efforts to look through the slightly disorganized shelves of the converted store and glanced around toward the more open space crowded with clothing racks that held, except for just after runs, the cast off clothes that most people didn't even want when their choices were painfully limited.
He could barely recall what he'd come in here for. Soap, to kill some time, maybe something else...but it didn't matter now...he'd forgotten it.
Daryl went to the counter where a young girl...her name was Katie or Caitlin or something of the like...sat reading a book and waiting to ring up anyone who bought anything, oddly reminiscent of all the bored teenagers who had ever had retail jobs for the summer.
"Need soap," Daryl said, catching the girl's attention and wishing it was the ancient old man that often worked on post because he just got you what the hell you asked for without the added bonus of the pissed off facial expression for disturbing him.
"What kind of soap?" The girl who reminded him of Beth asked with the same attitude of someone not old enough to know where attitudes had their place.
Soap was soap, simple as that. Daryl thought about responding with an equal amount of attitude and saying that any soap to wash his dirty ass would suffice, but since he was in a decent mood, he decided to let the little snot slide for now.
He glanced around at the counter where some odds and ends were piled up and plucked a bar of soap out of the pile gathered there. He held it out to the kid.
"Soap," he declared. "Looks good as any...an' what the hell ya got in the way a' comic books or puzzle books?"
"What are you looking for?" The girl asked.
Daryl shrugged.
"Don't matter," he responded. "Surprise me..."
She huffed and turned to the shelf behind her, quickly tossing a book at him with some super hero on the front. It would do.
"That's it," he said, not certain if she knew he was done shopping.
"The soap was from her stuff," the girl said.
Daryl only realized then that the whole exhausting exchange had given Carol time to stop shopping and to be standing behind him, loaded basket in hand.
"It's ok, Katie," Carol responded. "I heard him and grabbed another bar."
Daryl didn't know how to respond so he nodded his head at Carol and waited for Katie to write down his purchase in her ledger before he picked both items up and stepped to the side to allow Carol to check out, not really sure why he lingered there and didn't just leave immediately and go about his business.
He chuckled after a moment, watching the girl tally up what Carol had and Carol pile it all into the canvas bag that she'd been offered.
"You got enough stuff?" Daryl asked. "End a' the world come a while ago."
Carol gave him a look and then a soft smile, packing what he was pretty sure were all the granola bars the place had to offer into her bag.
"I might have gotten carried away," Carol said. She didn't say anything else to him, but he listened as she asked the girl if she knew anything about the order of the list for houses yet to receive their working water, which the girl knew nothing about, and then she left, digging through her bag as she went.
Daryl followed her, hesitating to speak and tried to convince himself that he was just going to go back to his apartment.
But he almost ran into her when she stopped short outside the door and dug through her bag, coming up with one of the granola bars and ripping open what was now a snack for them but had many times constituted food for an entire day.
"Damn, couldn't even wait 'till you got home?" Daryl asked, stepping around her.
She looked at him and furrowed her brow.
"Do I know you?" She asked.
Daryl wasn't sure how to respond to that either and now he wished he'd never said anything at all.
"Because you look a lot like someone I used to know, but he doesn't speak to me anymore," Carol finished.
Daryl felt sheepish then, because he knew she wasn't entirely lying and her reaction wasn't entirely unjustified.
"Take care," he offered, starting to walk away since he had nothing else to say.
"Daryl," Carol called, getting his attention. He turned back to face her. "A comic book?" She asked, raising an eyebrow and offering something of a soft expression like an apology for what she'd said. Daryl shrugged and nodded his head.
"Lost a game a' checkers against Will," Daryl explained. "Told him I'd get him somethin' for it an' he likes readin' these."
He was sometimes suckered into a game of checkers by Will and he undoubtedly lost…it was a guarantee, but the first time they'd ever played it had been Daryl that had initiated it with the promise of some kind of "prize" that the loser had to buy the winner…not that the prizes were to be anything too grand. He'd lost and Will had liked the idea so damn much that he harassed Daryl now to play with him and Daryl did it simply because he didn't mind checkers too damn much and he had the hope that he'd watch Will play long enough that he'd figure out how he always managed to win.
He cleared his throat, though, a little embarrassed all the way around about the situation, but even more so when he saw the expression that ran over Carol's face.
"You was askin' 'bout the water project," Daryl said, trying to change the subject as quickly as possible, "Will'd be the one ta ask. He sets half that shit up an' if he feels like it he could prob'ly move ya up some."
Carol smiled.
"Will," she said with a nod of her head. "I forgot about him. Thanks."
"Yeah, no problem," Daryl responded, feeling the churn in his stomach where he was realizing that he was out of things to say and the only direction to go in now was in the direction of painful chatter or in the direction of heavier topics that might be even more painful to try to delve into. "Gotta go," he said quickly, redirecting his steps again toward the apartment buildings.
He heard Carol respond in some way…a goodbye of sorts…as he left.
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Carol got back to the house and unloaded her spoils, putting things away. Maybe she had gotten a little carried away…but Tyreese had told her to buy what she wanted or needed and she'd nearly cleaned out one of everything in the small drug section of post if she thought it might help at all.
For most of the things that anyone really wanted you needed some kind of "prescription", and that included even what had once been known as over the counter pain killers. Medicines of all kinds were hard to come by these days and they were only handed out for particular reasons. Needless to say, if you even had a headache you had to suffer through it or head down to the medical building to see if you could talk someone into getting you something for it.
The antacids were there though, and there were several varieties of what Carol assumed to be Pepto Bismol and its various knock off brands. No matter how expired they might be, she wasn't over giving them a try.
And she'd gotten, along with that, some snacks to have around the house that could keep her from going to any given meal if she didn't feel like going and she'd gotten a few things like soap and some lotion that smelled as nice as any of it smelled.
She was in a strangely good mood after the few minutes of odd conversation with Daryl.
At first she'd thought that she'd give him the same kind of treatment that he was good at giving her, but then seeing that he was making an effort but willing to walk away if she didn't want any part of it, she'd decided to at least try to engage him in some kind of conversation.
Maybe he was forgiving her after all…maybe there was some hope there for them to at least have something of the friendship that they'd once enjoyed.
Carol settled down on the couch with one of the books that she'd gotten from the library and cracked open the dusty old book.
Before she started reading, though, she ran through and retraced the quick conversation with Daryl. He'd mentioned that Will was working on the water project, which wasn't surprising since Will seemed to be involved in many of the carefully planned projects around the community.
And Will was the kind of person that could keep a secret.
He was talkative, in that he often offered you far more information than you wanted about any simple thing if you asked him a question, but he wasn't gossipy. The information that Will tended to hand out so freely was more facts that made him sound like a walking encyclopedia.
Carol thought, even if she didn't want the rest of the community to know anything about the baby, she might be able to share that information with Will, entrust it to him in confidence, and he might see a way of moving them up the list a little to getting running water…but she didn't have to talk to him right now and likely wouldn't find him if she looked for him.
She wouldn't ask him at dinner either, since she wouldn't want to be backed into saying anything in front of anyone else, but she could catch him alone here or there in the next few days and she could bring it up with him.
Satisfied with that and the earlier conversation, along with the fact that the promise of future running water made everything seem a little easier to deal with on the most basic levels, Carol settled in to read and kill a little time until she was expected to be at work, all smiles and enthusiasm for whatever meal it was they'd be serving this evening.