AN: This chapter is short, for me. I apologize for that. There were some parts that I deleted and I toyed with deleting the whole thing, but I've decided to leave it. Short or not, I'm trying to progress in the story and keep things moving. I hope to have more out soon, but this is what my feeble brain was able to come up with for this week. I'll blame it on it having been a long week.

I hope you enjoy it, though…let me know what you think!

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Daryl lie on the well-worn mattress in his tin can trailer and listened to the familiar sounds of his brother bumping around in the kitchen, having come in late from probably a long night down at the local bar chasing skirt. Merle could be accused of being a lot of things, but quiet sure as shit wasn't one of them.

Daryl wasn't sleeping anyway, though, and he hadn't been sleeping since he'd drug his ass home from the shop, showered, and collapsed into the bed in his room.

Daryl sighed and got up, deciding to give up the show for the moment. He shuffled down the hall and into the kitchen. He opened the fridge and took out one of the beers that was chilling in the vegetable drawer that had never actually been used for vegetables. Popping the top off of the glass bottle, he flicked it into the sink with a clank and sat at one of the mismatched chairs at the kitchen table.

Merle shuffled through a moment later, obviously having gone to relieve himself.

"Hell ya doin' still up?" Merle asked. He went to the fridge and helped himself to one of the beers, depositing the top on the counter. There was no damn wonder that the times…once or twice a year…that Daryl decided to clean the trailer he found damn beer tops all over the place.

"Couldn't sleep," Daryl responded, sucking on the beer. "Been down at the bar?"

Merle grunted.

Daryl didn't really need to ask the question. It was pretty evident that his brother was well on his way to being at least two sheets to the wind, if there was such a thing. Merle leaned back against the bright orange counter and looked like he was trying to focus extra hard on what Daryl could only imagine were the knobs on the stove.

"D'ja get'cha lil' girlfriend a car?" Merle asked.

Daryl grunted in response.

"Carol ain't my girlfriend…" he said for what was about the four thousandth time in the past few days. "Did find a car, though…was ya there when Wren called 'bout Sophia?"

"Mmmm…" Merle hummed. "Hell I don't know what Wren was doin'…weren't payin' the skinny fuck no damn attention."

"Sophia got suspended," Daryl said with a chuckle. "Broke a bitch's nose."

"Wait…who broke a bitch's nose?" Merle asked, draining the beer in his hand and moving to the fridge for another, the top clanking off somewhere on the floor to be found sometime in the future.

"Sophia," Daryl responded. "Wendy…"

Merle chuckled heartily this time.

"No she didn't?" Merle exclaimed, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. He chuckled and nodded his head. "Damn…figured her for a scrapper but Wren ain't said shit 'bout her breakin' no bitch's nose."

"Doubt Wren knew," Daryl responded. "He just got the call I reckon ta find Carol. Called down there where we was buyin' the car."

Merle was quiet for a moment and then moaned again, considering carefully the label on his bottle.

"Said ya got a fuckin' car?" Merle asked.

Daryl nodded and polished off his own beer, only somewhat surprised when another appeared in front of him. Merle, like most drunks, was a heavy handed and quick bartender when they suspected they might be going from drinking along to drinking accompanied.

"Yeah…had ta talk Rod down…his ass'll try ta fuck ya ever damn time," Daryl responded, popping the top off the beer Merle had handed him and taking aim with the cap, a little satisfied when it clinked and bounced in the metal sink just beside his brother. Merle looked at the source of the sound for a moment and then turned his heavy eyes back toward Daryl.

"Yeah…" Merle growled, licking his lips in a way that made Daryl unconsciously raise his. "I bet'cha stopped ole Rod from fuckin' her."

Merle smirked at Daryl and Daryl rolled his eyes.

"Ya fuck her yet?" Merle asked. "Mmm…lil' brothah get him a lil' thank ya piece for pickin' outta new car for the nice laaaddyy?"

"Shut up, Merle. I ain't fucked her an' ya know it," Daryl said.

Merle's face dropped a little and he sucked on the beer in his hand.

"Yeah…don't I know it. Ya fuckin' dick might as well fall off for all the damn good it's ever done ya," Merle said. "Got me a real sweet piece tonight…blue eyed, blonde was damn near suckin' ole Jose Cuervo's dick…ole Merle laid it to her real nice."

Daryl cringed, his face curling up at his brother. Merle laughed and sucked his teeth, satisfied with himself, before resting back again against the counter and sucking more of the beer down.

"Fucked her real good in the back seat a' her car. Shit's damn near like an art…but'cha wouldn't know nothin' 'bout that…" Merle continued.

"Who the fuck was it?" Daryl asked. He didn't care much about his brother's many conquests, but Merle would talk about them all the damn time. If he ever had a name to go with any of them then sometimes Daryl found it humorous to hold onto the name until he ran into the woman. Sooner or later any woman Merle fucked seemed to find her way up to the shop, and Daryl thought it was funny at least to see how different Merle's conquests were the night of and a few months later. Merle was a living tribute to beer goggles.

Merle shrugged.

"Fuck if I know," he said. He chuckled after a second. "Ashley, maybe? Fuckin' Alexandria? Hell…shit started with A, that's all the hell I know. Don't matter, though…ya can bet her ass is gonna 'member my name…"

Merle got another beer and Daryl watched him. He was surprised that his brother wasn't in the floor by now, but Merle had the ability to hold more alcohol than most people could water. Daryl supposed that his brother ought to have some talent in life since he sure as shit didn't possess much else.

Merle chuckled and took the mismatched chair across the table from Daryl, sitting down hard enough to elicit a light cracking sound from the chair. Daryl waited to see if it would break, but apparently it was made of better stuff than he gave it credit for.

"Glad the ho looked clean," Merle said. "Fuckin' condom broke…didn't tell her my last fuckin' name. She ain't gon' 'member no way, though."

Daryl shook his head and sighed.

"Well that's just fuckin' great, Merle," Daryl said. "Real smart. Fuckin' women ya don't even know with faulty ass condoms."

Merle chuckled.

"Hell brothah…if ya ever got'cha a piece a' ass in ya life ya'd prob'ly know that shit ain't never foolproof," Merle said.

"An' you a damn fool, alright," Daryl said.

Daryl sighed and got up from the table. He finished his beer quickly and set the bottle on the counter with the other bottles that were accumulating there.

"Goin' ta fuckin' bed," he announced.

"Derlina…" Merle said, stopping him for a moment. He hated when his brother called him that, but he'd long since stopped fighting it because fighting anything with Merle just made it worse. "Ya oughta lay it ta ya lil' girlfriend…put'cha fuckin' dick ta some use for it shrivels up."

Daryl walked by, smacking his brother in the head before reaching the hallway. Merle clucked behind him, laughing.

"Just 'member ta dust it off first," Merle called. "That shit gets wet an' it'll stick ta damn near everythin'!"

Daryl's only response to Merle at this point was to slam the bedroom door.

Once he was alone in his room, Daryl went straight into the little half bath. He'd won a poker game against Merle the first night they'd moved into the trailer…mostly owing to the fact that Merle was too fucked up on whatever he'd gotten his hands on to even play poker…and because of that he'd gotten the so called "master" bedroom of the sardine can sanctuary they shared.

It wasn't much of a master bedroom, but it did have a half bath that meant that Daryl got to spend less time wallowing around in the filth that Merle could turn anything into that he frequented regularly.

Daryl washed his face with cold water and dried it with one of the towels that he'd put in the bathroom, sniffing the towel as he did so and recognizing that sooner or later he was going to have to break down and do laundry.

Merle was a dick. Daryl had been thinking about Carol all damn day long and Merle talking about her that way wasn't helping the situation much.

The biggest problem that Daryl had right this minute was that he didn't know why he was thinking about her. He couldn't get her smile out of his mind, though…those big damn blue eyes. She was pretty when she smiled…and he couldn't get that shit out of his mind.

Daryl didn't give a damn about women. He wasn't like his brother. He didn't need to go out chasing skirt all the damn time. The couple of fucks he'd had weren't anything that left his mouth watering for more, and that's how the hell he liked it. He didn't have the time or the patience for that shit.

He'd seen some of the damn harpies that Merle got tangled up with. Some crazy bitches had shown up at their door…or found them in parking lots sometimes…and there was too much damn squawking and yelling that went on for Daryl's tastes. This one got her feelings hurt because Merle didn't call the next damn day…that one got her feelings hurt because her old man found out about that shit…a scare here or there, or just the sad and sorry fact, of the clap or some other grand prize in the treasure chest of VD.

Daryl didn't need that shit and so he'd made do his whole damn life with as little of it as possible. Women weren't anything but trouble, just like anyone else in the world really. And they thought that because they had pussies they were somehow special. They thought they could drag you around just because of a damn piece of their anatomy.

But Daryl didn't see the same kind of woman in Carol that he'd seen in so damn many of the women he'd come into contact with in his life. She was different…or there was something different about her.

And he didn't even know why he'd been thinking about her since he'd left her house from eating pizza, but she'd crept into his mind, somehow, when he was supposed to be working on that old coupe. The whole damn time he'd been working, he'd seen her face in his mind…heard her voice…and he'd caught himself wondering how things had gone with Sophia.

He was trying to keep himself, though, from letting his mind trail anywhere else that any of the assholes he worked with…or even his own damn brother for that matter…might suggest that it go. The last damn thing he needed in his life was to get tangled up with some woman and start thinking about her that way. He wasn't like Merle and he had absolutely no interest in running around after women and then having them show up, at all damn hours, jumping at him for one damn thing or another that had gone wrong in his life. Sex sure as shit wasn't worth all of that. He really didn't even need it. Hell, he hardly ever even thought about it.

And Carol wasn't that kind of woman. That much was clear. She was a mother, for crying out loud, of a girl that was half Daryl's age.

Still, his stupid head was playing tricks on him and he didn't know if it was something to do with Carol…something to do with the pull of the damn moon…or even if it was just because of all the shit that everyone around him had been suggesting to him over the past few days, but he just couldn't shake the image of her out of his head.

Daryl sighed, annoyed at himself and annoyed at the situation. He got back into bed, closing his eyes, tight, her face just beyond his eyelids. He hoped it would go away soon enough and he'd at least be able to get a good night's sleep…preferably not one filled with dreams if this was how his brain was going to act…so he could be ready to go the next damn day.

Despite his best efforts, though, when Daryl finally did start to drift off to sleep he was still thinking about the shy woman with the pretty blue eyes and the scrapper for a daughter who had invited him to dinner…if he ever wanted to take her up on such an offer.