Antsy.
That's the best word Daryl could think of to describe how he was feeling right about then as he paced his kitchen floor, the cool hard wood feeling slick underneath his bare feet as he pivoted on his heel and started what had to be his twentieth lap in the past five minutes.
A grumble emitted from low in the back of his throat as he was about to turn and begin on lap twenty-one. His stilled himself and paused as he stood in front of the edge of his kitchen table, glaring at the white door on the other end of his kitchen. The door that led to the hallway separating his side of the house from Carol's.
He found his thumb involuntarily wedged its way to the corner of his lip, his teeth raking at a loose flake of skin on his calloused, scarred thumb. He shifted back and forth on the balls of his before letting out an agitated growl and returning to his tedious trek. He was starting to think he'd end up wearing a hole in the damn floor before the night was over.
Ridiculous.
That what he was being. Down-right damn ridiculous.
Why couldn't he make up his damn mind what he wanted to do?
He grunted and shook his head.
Because he didn't know what the fuck to do. That's why.
When he and Carol had gotten home from their trip earlier, he'd helped her carry her bags back to her place. She'd told him what a good time she'd had with him and how glad she was that she'd gone, and how she was even happier that everything that happened between them had, indeed, happened. She'd been smiling, grinning from ear to ear, and he'd given her a goofy grin of his own.
But then she'd told him she had to get busy starting on lesson plans. That tomorrow was her first day of pre-planning at her new school, and that her principal wanted all of the teachers to have lesson plans for the first week in place and that she and all of the other English teachers would have to critique each other's plans and have them up to par by the time the kids started class. She said she probably should've been working on her plans long before now, but she'd been so caught up moving, getting settled, and going to doctor's appointments that she kept putting it off and just couldn't any longer.
Then, she'd asked him if he wanted to come over tomorrow around six and have dinner with her, of course he'd told her he'd be there. After that, they shared a kiss. One that was tentative and shy at first, but lingered and grew more passionate, leaving them both blushing and a bit breathless as they pulled away.
Daryl had gone back his side of the house, assuming he was long overdue for some alone time by this point seeing as he'd spent the entire weekend with her. Not that he didn't enjoy being around her and hadn't savored every minute of it, but he knew himself well enough. Knew he needed solitude, needed to be alone more often than most people. Even though he did feel slightly disappointed she had to go so quickly after they got home, he'd felt comfortable with it after the talk they'd had on the way home. After she assured him she liked him and that nothing was gonna change just because they were home.
He found himself believing her. Believing what she said. And that was huge for him. He didn't trust people easily, especially not someone he knew had the ability to let him down. And damn if she didn't have that ability. At this point, he was pretty sure she had the ability to flat out crush him.
Because not long after she'd gone back to her place and he'd been left to his own devices, he'd found himself feeling something entirely unexpected.
He missed her.
He'd been away from her for two hours and he already fucking missed her. And to top it off, she was within walking distance of him. He wasn't even out of their shared yard when that realization hit him. He'd been in his shop tinkering with his bike when he'd started thinking about her, wondering what she was doing, wanting to talk to her, thinking about kissing her again, thinking about everything that happened between them…and the one thing that didn't...
Soon enough the distraction became too much, because he kept contemplating walking over to her part of the house and seeing what she was up to. But he kept stopping himself. He didn't wanna disturb her when she was trying to work, and more importantly, he didn't want her to think he was some clingy ass pussy stalker guy. They'd literally spent an entire weekend together. She probably wanted some time away from him.
To try and get her off his mind off of going to see her and clear his own head from this frightening new need to be around her so much he'd decided to spend some time in the woods. That was usually the place he could go to not think about anything at all, to just find peace and complete solitude.
He'd stayed out there until right at dark when the harvest moon was starting to rise, large and round, resembling a giant orange ball of fire hanging the sky. On his way back, he'd stopped in front of the rickety old wooden fence that separated the edge of his property from the woods, the one he and Merle hadn't gotten around to replcing yet, pausing as the back of the brick house came into view. He fished his cigarettes out of his pocket and leaned against the dilapidated fence to light one. The flame on the end of cigarette illuminated the darkness around him, mimicking a miniature version of that giant rising harvest moon.
The menthol smoke filled his lungs and he felt himself briefly gain a bit of relaxation. That urge to see her and talk to her hadn't dissipated while he'd been in the woods, and upon noticing her kitchen light on when the house came into his line of sight he'd had to keep telling himself not to bother her. That he'd see tomorrow afternoon. He shouldn't be feeling like this. It wasn't normal, for someone to consume your thoughts like that, was it? To want to be around someone so much. To feel like you needed them. If she knew she'd probably think he was a creep. Wouldn't she?
Realizing how much he liked her, it was terrifying for him. He'd spent his whole life trying to avoid this feeling. Thinking he never wanted it. But somehow, slowly, without realizing it, he'd let her in the past month. Closer than he'd ever let anyone get to him, and in a way that he hadn't ever imagined letting someone get close to him.
As scary as it was, as much as he never thought he'd want it, it was also exciting, thrilling, and completely overwhelming, but it was something he didn't wanna let go of. Something he didn't wanna mess up.
So even after he finally got back to his place, he kept stopping himself from bothering her for fear of pushing her away or coming on too strong. And that's how he'd ended up pacing his floors, anxious and frustrated beyond belief.
But after ten more minutes or fighting with himself not to go over there, he found he finally couldn't take it anymore, and neither could his feet. He'd rubbed a damn quarter sized blister on the bottom of them by now.
Maybe he could just knock on her door and say hey? Nah, that would be weird. Ask to borrow something? That wouldn't seem weird, would it? People did stuff like that, didn't they?
With a frustrated huff, he finally decided to stop torturing himself and just go for it. He marched over to that white door and turned the handle in one swift motion, knowing if he hesitated he'd pussy out and go back to running around his kitchen for the rest of the night.
When he opened the door, he jumped back slightly. He hadn't expected the light in the hallway that separated their homes to be on and Carol to be at the exact opposite end where her door was, closing it just as he was opening his.
Carol seemed just as surprised to see him, her already large eyes growing even wider than normal. "Hey," she said, with a sheepish smile. Her eyes leveled with his briefly before dropping to the floor.
"Hey," Daryl muttered, with even less confidence than she was showing. His eyes kept flicking from her face to her feet as they stood in momentary silence. Both looking like their hands had been caught in the cookie jar, but neither wanting to admit it.
"What are you doing?" Carol finally asked, unable to take the thick silence.
Daryl shrugged, his top teeth scraping over his bottom lip. "Wanted to borrow…" Fuck, he couldn't think of anything he might need to borrow. "Uh, wanted to borrow, uh, some of that." He'd randomly pointed to the left without looking at what he was aiming for.
"My bra?" Carol giggled, her eyes landing where her dirty clothes hamper sat. Daryl seemed to be pointing directly at her light blue bra sitting very noticeably on top of it.
Daryl winced, but didn't respond directly, instead he tried to quickly change the subject. "What about you? About to wash clothes or something?" He mumbled. Assuming she'd just come in there to do some chore since it was where her laundry room was located.
She shook her head, her arms folding over the top of her protruding belly. The tension drained from her body and the previously sheepish look was replaced by a light, genuine smirk. She pointed to her clothes hamper. "Nah, I was gonna get that tomorrow." That got his attention and his eyes snapped open and met hers. "I finished my lesson plans," she continued casually. Tried to sleep but couldn't. Sophia's being a little acrobat tonight." That earned one of those small chuckles from Daryl the kind that were hard to distinguish from grunts but that she'd learned to decipher over the past month by the way one side of his lip would twitch up.
"Whatcha doing in here then?" Daryl responded with genuine curiosity.
Carol stepped away from her door and towards his, cautiously approaching and placing a hand on either side of his hip. She shrugged a single shoulder, grinned, then stood on tip toes and carefully placed a chaste kiss on his lips, she pulled away slightly, but kept her hands on his hips. "Figured I'd see if you were still up and wanted company."
"Yeah?" he replied, his voice coming out raspy.
She nodded. "Any chance you were maybe doing the same thing, or did you just wanna see how you looked in that?" She pointed to her bra again and grinned mischievously.
Daryl felt his cheeks burn and his eyes flitted down in embarrassment for being caught for a brief moment, but they quickly rose again when he realized she'd wanted to see him too. "Maybe," he confessed quietly. When her brows arched upwards he decided to stop being so coy and chuckled lowly. "Yeah…Yeah I might've been."
Carol's head fell forwards and she rested it on his chest, inhaling his scent. He smelled like pine needles, sweat, and menthol cigarettes. Early in her pregnancy such a smell probably would have left her hurling, but she found it strangely comforting now. She nuzzled her head against his cotton shirt and wrapped her arms around him, her body pressing flush against his. He embraced her back, though with some slight hesitance at first. Though it didn't take long at all for him to quickly relax into her touch. So, she was surprised when, only a moment later, she found he was pushing her forward slightly, breaking the contact between them.
Confusion etched her face, she was about to ask him if something was wrong but he started to explain for her.
He hummed and nodded towards her belly. "Sophia's kicking. 'Bout got me in the nuts."
Carol snorted and Daryl gave her a peeved look. "I'm sorry, it's not funny." She apologized, though she was still biting back a laugh.
His face softened and he snorted himself. "Is pretty damn funny." He agreed. "Kid ain't even born yet and she's already trying to bust my balls." They shared another quick laugh and then things got silent. This time, Daryl was the one to break it. "Is it, uh, it alright if I come over?" To his surprise, Carol shook her head no. His face fell and his heart dropped in his chest. "But I…You said…"
Before Daryl could finish freaking out, she interrupted him. "You ever taken a girl to your bedroom before?"
He slowly shook his head at her, still feeling very confused and a tab bit dejected.
With a sultry grin, she replied. "You want to tonight?"
Both of his brows shot up. "Hell yeah!" He cleared his throat instantly when he realized how eager that sounded. "I mean, ah, yeah. Yeah. I'd like for you to come over."
She linked his hand with hers and nodded towards his door. "Well, let's go then."
Hope you guys enjoyed. This chapter came easier to me than writing has in while and I hope it means I can get back to more regular updates. I'm very glad to know some of you are still into this after so long. I missed writing a lot.