Carol still didn't feel like she had before everything had happened with Ed, but she was trying to keep things to herself. She hated, more than anything, the feeling of being a burden, and she'd been feeling like nothing else since she left the hospital.
She was able to take care of herself, and she didn't need help really with doing anything unless it was just after she took the pain medication. Sometimes she had a short spell then of feeling light headed, but for the most part she was able to work around it by holding onto the wall or any other solid structure around her.
She was trying to wean herself off of the medication. She didn't like taking it and she skipped the doses as frequently as possible. Little by little the pain was getting better. It had been almost two weeks since the incident, though, and she was frustrated that things hadn't progressed any farther than they had.
Michonne kept her up to date on all the legalese of everything that was going on, but she didn't understand all of it. She was being granted her divorce, she knew that much, and she as getting a monetary settlement that sounded like a nice sum of money. She couldn't really say that the amount was fair, because she didn't know how to put a price tag on everything that Ed had done through the years, but it did sound like a whole lot of money and Michonne assured her that it was about the best that they could hope for.
The money wasn't hers yet, though. There was all kinds of filters and road blocks that it seemed to have to pass through before it became her money. She felt like it would never actually be hers. It was just an imaginary sum passing around from hand to hand out there in the world somewhere.
Ed himself was in a world of trouble, or so Michonne reported. He was undeniably going to prison, Carol had been assured of that, and apparently he was looking at about fifteen years of time. Carol didn't want to admit that she'd still been terrified even after hearing that. Fifteen years was a long time, but it wasn't all that long, and the thought of Ed coming back, even after fifteen years, kept her awake some hours at night.
For the two weeks since the incident, Carol had been living at Michonne's house. She hadn't even seen her tiny apartment in that time. If she needed anything, it magically appeared from her apartment in the form of some package dropped off by Andrea or Daryl brought it by when he came to visit.
Daryl had surprised her, perhaps, more than anything. Nearly every day he showed up on Michonne's doorstep after he got off of work. Most times he'd clearly gone home to shower and to pick up anything that Carol might have requested, but it seemed that was all he did besides working and spending time with her.
He would sit with her most of the time, keeping her company while they watched television. Sometimes he would talk to her, but she'd learned that he didn't like to carry on very long conversations, so they would taper off before too much had been said. Most of the time that he was around he was simply content to sit in silence while she did whatever she wanted to do to entertain herself.
Carol was afraid to care about Daryl the way that she was starting to care. She was afraid that everything she felt about him was just some kind of response to the trauma, some kind of trumped up emotion that wasn't real. He was being so nice to her…something she never expected from anyone really, and especially not from a man like Daryl.
To be a man that was as rough spoken as he could be at times, and as awkward as was humanly possible, he was gentle with her. Sometimes she felt like he treated her as though she were going to break. Even once Michonne had released her from her semi-bedridden state and allowed her free reign of the house without constant adult supervision, Daryl seemed nervous every time he saw her get up. If she went to the bathroom he would trail his eyes after her and he was almost always looking at the doorway when she'd pass back into the living room.
She'd thought, at first, that it was some kind of romantic thing, but part of her felt like it was something different, and she was afraid of believing that feeling as well. They were only alone, most of the time, in Michonne's living room and therefore their opportunities for anything were limited. It was like having your parents constantly nearby, or at least a prying older sister. Daryl hadn't tried anything, though. Carol couldn't remember him even trying to kiss her during the full two weeks. He'd kissed her forehead once or twice, and a few times he'd held her hand while sitting beside her on the couch and kissed her fingers, but he hadn't tried anything more than that.
Carol searched her mind, but she couldn't figure out what it was that made Daryl keep coming back day after day. He wasn't there for conversation, that much was clear, and it appeared that he wasn't there for any kind of physical gratification. He was simply there, or so it would seem, to sit on Michonne's couch for a few hours and watch her do whatever it was they were going to do. She wondered if even Daryl knew why he was there, or if he'd simply fallen into some kind of comfortable "pancake" habit of coming there.
Finally, though, Carol was ready to try to start getting her life back together. It had been two weeks and two weeks was enough. She appreciated all that Michonne had done for her, and she knew she owed the woman for her patience, especially at night when she couldn't control the dreams that sometimes woke her, Michonne, and even the girls up, but Carol knew that she had to get back out there on her own. She needed to make her way back to her apartment and she needed to get back to work.
Loretta and Lula, being as supportive as they were in her plight to outrun the damage that Ed had done to her life, had graciously told Carol that whenever she was ready to come back to work, her jobs were still there. She had to admit that though the jobs weren't much, she was looking forward to getting back to them, and she was looking forward to what she knew would be strange feeling of going to and from her places of employment without the worry that Ed was lurking in the shadows. She was still, admittedly, a little afraid of how she was going to feel the first night that she and Andrea left the Watering Hole together, but she was sure that she would pull through it.
And so the day finally came that Carol was ready to go back to her little apartment. Michonne drove her over, the trunk packed with everything that had been drug over a little at a time for the past fortnight.
When she unlocked the door and stepped into her little place, putting down the bag she was carrying and moving out of the way for Michonne to pass through with everything she had insisted on lugging up the steps, Carol was a little overwhelmed. It was just the same as she'd left it that day, when she'd slipped out of the apartment with Andrea and headed to work, not knowing that it would be two full weeks before she reopened that door.
Carol felt tears welling in her eyes and she did everything she could to push them back. She knew she cried too much these days and that the tears worried Michonne. She didn't want to worry her anymore for fear that the woman would insist she wasn't ready to do this.
"Thank you," Carol said, turning toward Michonne. "I think I'm fine now."
"What do you need?" Michonne asked. "I'm going to pick you up some groceries now. What do you want?"
Carol realized that she didn't have anything there and likely the refrigerator was full of disgusting food due to her absence. She walked open and reluctantly opened it, afraid of whatever mold monster might emerge. To her surprised, though, the fridge was empty. She turned and looked at Michonne.
"I had Andrea clean out anything that could go bad," Michonne said by way of explanation. "We didn't think you needed to come home to that."
Carol nodded.
"Thank you," she said. "I'll tell Andrea thank you when I see her."
"Doesn't look like you've got to wait too long," Michonne said. Carol looked at her and then glanced toward the door. Andrea was standing there silently, just peeking her head around the frame. Carol smiled at her. Andrea stepped in, then reaching out and hugging her to her.
"Welcome home," Andrea said. "Place hasn't been the same without you."
"Thank you for everything," Carol said. She hadn't actually seen Andrea much since the whole thing happened, but she knew she'd been behind the scenes a good deal.
"Hey…we do what we can, right?" Andrea said. "It's good to have you back here, and you know that if you need anything we're right across the hall."
Carol nodded.
"So, food, what do you want?" Michonne asked.
Carol felt overwhelmed by the thought. The moving back in, the emotions she was feeling, all of it was overwhelming.
"I don't know, Michonne," Carol said. "I mean just the basics until I can get settled again."
Michonne nodded.
"Fine. Andrea will help you get settled and I'm going to run to the A and P. I'll be back before you even know it," Michonne said.
Carol thanked her and Michonne ducked out of the apartment leaving her alone with Andrea.
"Want me to help you unpack?" Andrea asked, reaching for one of Carol's bags.
"I can do it," Carol said. "How have you been? What have I missed? I feel like I've been on Mars."
Andrea smiled. Carol noticed that just like her own bruises hadn't faded entirely, Andrea had a small mark of a bruise right at the corner of her eye that hadn't faded yet, though it was in the odd coloring stages of fading away.
"You haven't missed much," Andrea said. "Everything here's the same as it's always been. Daryl and Merle are the same, I'm the same, the apartments are the same. You could actually go to Mars and come back and it would all be the same."
"I've seen Daryl nearly every day," Carol said.
Andrea nodded. She ran her finger across the edge of Carol's countertop.
"And you'll see him today too, I'm sure," Andrea said. "He's still working. He and Merle both. I'm on at the Watering Hole tomorrow night."
"I'm back on the schedule," Carol said, "but I don't start until next week."
Andrea nodded, still dragging her finger along the ugly orange countertop.
"No need to jump into things right away. You need to get settled first," Andrea said.
"Andrea…" Carol started, "I'm so sorry that you got into things that night with Ed. I never would have wanted you to get caught up in that."
"Carol," Andrea said, "you don't have anything to apologize for to anybody, OK? I'm actually glad I was there. If I hadn't been there…" Andrea stopped and smiled at Carol. "It's OK, alright? We don't have to talk about it."
Carol nodded and took a deep breath, looking around.
She really was happy to be back in her apartment, at least as happy as she seemed to feel these days. She thought that maybe she needed to be alone for a bit. Maybe she needed to start readjusting to what it felt like not to have Michonne there the whole time to chase away any demons that bothered her. She was going to have to learn to chase them away herself, after all.
"Well," Carol said, "I guess I'm going to start unpacking. Try to get settled by the time that Michonne gets back."
Andrea smiled at her and reached out, touching her hair a second.
"Yeah," she said, "good idea. I'll see you this evening."
"What's happening this evening?" Carol asked.
Andrea looked surprised for a minute and then she smiled.
"Nothing, I just meant I'd see you later," Andrea said. "I'll have to come over, tell Daryl it's time to come home…you know."
Carol smiled at her and nodded slightly, not entirely sure she believed Andrea but feeling too tired to worry about it. Andrea turned, then and slipped out of the apartment, closing the door behind her and leaving Carol alone. Carol gathered up her bags and drug them to the bedroom so that she could start unpacking everything.
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Daryl wasn't always sure why he did the things he did. Especially these days. He felt like lately his entire life was run by three women, and they were three women that didn't always explain themselves, or didn't explain themselves well.
On the one hand, there was Carol. He didn't mind Carol in the slightest. She didn't demand much from him and in fact he'd had to force her to let him do almost anything for her during the two weeks that he'd spent passing his evening hours at Michonne's house. Carol seemed to think that it was too much to ask him for anything, and so he really didn't get to do much except sit with her and occasionally get her something to drink from the kitchen.
On the other hand, he had Andrea and Michonne. Both of them, it seemed, were always pushing him to do something. One was always whispering at him what he should do for Carol, even though he knew that she would try to stop him from doing it or insist that he didn't need to do it.
Merle gave Daryl hell about Carol every chance he got. He told him he was being a pussy. He said he wasn't even getting any from her anymore and she had him whipped. Daryl was beginning to worry that Merle was right, but Andrea told him Merle was an asshole, and he had to agree with that as well.
It wasn't that Daryl didn't want to have sex with Carol anymore, in fact he thought about it more than he thought he really should, but he hadn't exactly had the prime opportunity with her bossy big sister Michonne peeking around door frames every now again to check how much distance there was between them on the couch.
Daryl knew, at this point, that Andrea and Michonne wanted him to have sex with Carol as much as he wanted it apparently. Otherwise he didn't figure they'd be there every time he turned around telling him what to do to make her like him more. The thing was, though, that Michonne kept reminding him that he needed to be sure that Carol had sex with him because she wanted to and not because she felt like she had to or that it was just the nice thing to do.
And so Daryl had backed off as much as he could. He wanted to give Carol all the space she needed. He was trying not to even touch her if she didn't somehow request the touch. Merle called that being a pussy about it. Daryl just wanted to make sure that if they ever did get to have sex again she wasn't going to tell him that she didn't want to be with him anymore right after that.
Today, though, he was on yet another mission that he didn't fully understand. This mission had been set in place by Michonne, though Andrea was in on it just like with everything else. The two of them had set the whole thing up, he just had to go along with it.
Daryl pulled into the yard of the address that Michonne had given him. He got out the truck and stood there awkwardly a moment, checking the house number again to make sure that he didn't have the wrong address. While he was standing there, an old man in blue coveralls came out of the house's garage and waved at him.
"You must be the young feller that's here for the puppy?" The old man said.
Daryl nodded at him.
"I'm Daryl Dixon," Daryl said. The old man approached him and stuck his hand out. Daryl shook it.
"Well, come on then and let's go have a look at 'em," the old man said. "My name's Willard Jones, but you can call me Dick, most everyone else does."
Daryl thought about it and decided he'd rather not call the old man Dick. The old man led him toward the garage and as they got there a short legged hound dog bounded toward Daryl. He stood still for a moment and then lowered his hand down, letting the dog sniff him. He could tell from her teats that she was the mother of the puppy that he'd come to claim. A puppy, apparently, that Michonne had bought but he was supposed to take credit for. When the female dog bumped her head against his hand, Daryl scratched her behind her droopy ears.
"That there's Missy," Willard said. "Samsonite's out back. He's the proud papa. You can go and have a look at him if it suits you."
Daryl shook his head. The puppy in question was bought and paid for and he was sure that Michonne had already done all the looking that needed to be done. She was funny that way and paid attention to details he wouldn't normally think about.
Daryl followed the man into the back of the garage where there were about six of the short little droopy puppies running around in a fenced off area.
"There they are," Willard said, beaming at the puppies. Daryl looked at them all.
"Which one am I s'posed ta get?" Daryl asked.
Willard looked at him and smiled.
"The one you want," Willard said. "They was ready to go three days ago but the lady paid extra for you to get the pick of the litter."
Daryl looked at the dogs. He had no idea what the pick of the litter was supposed to look like. He thought that maybe Michonne gave him too much credit for knowing about dogs because he certainly didn't know much about them. Daryl scratched his head.
"Which one's the pick a' the litter?" Daryl asked.
Willard chuckled. He reached over into the little penned up area and picked up one of the pups, holding it out Daryl.
"This one here, she's a beauty," Willard said. Daryl took the little dog and she tried to lick his face. She almost wiggled out of his arms a time or two. "She's an excited little gal, but if you're lookin' to breed, she's about the best we got out of this litter."
Daryl held the puppy out and looked at her. She looked like all the other puppies as far as he could tell. He handed her back to Willard and Willard handed him another puppy that he'd scooped out of the pen.
"Now this one here, he's my wife's favorite. Got a lot of spunk, she says. He's a smart little feller too. He ain't got the best posture, though, so he might not make a great sire," the man said, passing the puppy to Daryl. It too seemed thrilled to find his arms and licked him straight up the neck, making him shiver a little.
"So which one should I take?" Daryl asked.
The man scratched his head, smiling.
"What do you want the dog for, son?" Willard asked.
"He's a present," Daryl said. "Carol's been kinda down an' Michonne said this'll cheer her up, so I come ta get it."
"A child?" Willard asked, wrinkling his brow.
Daryl shook his head. He didn't know what to call Carol exactly. He felt strange calling her his girlfriend, but he felt like she was more than a friend. He decided, since he didn't know what to say, to leave things in the simplest terms that he could.
"She's a grown up," Daryl said. The smile returned to Willard's face.
"Good," he said, scratching at his belly. "I don't like to know my pups are going to children. A lot of people buy pups for children and then they lose interest in them. I like to know the little guys are taken care of, even if they're breeders or hunting dogs."
Daryl nodded.
"She'll take care of it," Daryl said. "She likes furry things."
Willard smiled again.
"So you want one as a pet, huh?" He asked.
Daryl nodded. He couldn't see Carol breeding the floppy skinned things and he was pretty sure that she wasn't an avid hunter. The dog was likely going to be just that…simply a dog.
"Yeah, just a pet," Daryl said.
Williard regarded the pups again, including the one that was now trying to sleep in Daryl's arms.
"Then I'd say you've probably got your pick right there," Willard said. "He's a good dog. He'll make a good pet."
Daryl looked at the puppy. He didn't know if this would do the trick, but Michonne seemed confident that the puppy would perk Carol up and he was more than willing to give it a try.
"Alright then," Daryl said. "What I owe ya?"
Willard shook his head.
"You don't owe me a thing, son. The lady already took care of it. Just promise me that he's going to have a good home," Willard said.
Daryl nodded.
"I reckon he's goin' ta the best woman he can go to," Daryl said.
Willard smiled and reached his hands out.
"Do you mind if I say goodbye?" He asked.
Daryl shook his head and passed the puppy to the old man. The old man held the puppy up, who woke up almost immediately and cooed at it, letting the little dog lap at his face.
"You be a good boy, now? Ya hear me? Don't you go makin' trouble," Willard said. He nuzzled the pup a moment and Daryl was surprised because it looked as though the old man might cry. He passed the dog back to Daryl. "I wish we could keep all of them," he said. "I'm glad to know he's headed to happy home, though."
Daryl thanked the old man and Willard walked him to his truck. Daryl opened the door and put the dog in the seat, crawling in beside him.
"I hope he makes the lady feel better," Willard said.
"I reckon he's got as good a chance as any of us," Daryl said.
Willard said goodbye then and waved at Daryl as he started the truck. Daryl backed out of the drive and headed in the direction of home, the puppy curling into his lap as he drove. He hoped he'd done right in picking out the puppy, and he hoped that it was the magical gift that Michonne promised it would be.
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AN: So, I might try for one more chapter tonight. I'm not really sleepy just yet.
Carol's getting a puppy. I've known about him for a while now. :-)
If you haven't guessed, he's a Basset Hound. I love the breed, and I know that Melissa McBride has one (we all know Lincoln). I had one once as well, but her name was Anna Belle. They're great dogs.
So my question for you is: what do we name the puppy? I was considering borrowing MM's name because I really like the name Lincoln. I might consider something different though. Let me know your suggestions for our little fellow and I'll see about getting you another chapter out soon.
For the record, though, if I do borrow the name Lincoln, everything about the dog will be purely from my own imagination.