A/N: I forgot to mention, my novel "The Caterer's Husband" is also on a Kindle discount deal today (February 7) for just 99 cents. It's a humorous, literary romance. You can find it on Amazon under my penname of Molly Taggart.
[*]
Carol eased quietly into Rick's living room after the Council was assembled, and assumed her place beside Daryl at the mantle. Glenn was understandably absent, but the water engineer, Damien Hamilton, and the power engineer, Jake Wellington, were present to make a report.
"There's too much consumption," Damien told them. "We've been growing as a community. We've had less rain than usual, and we're going to need irrigation to grow crops in the summer and fall. We're on the verge of a serious shortage."
Carol felt suddenly guilty about her recent hot shower.
"The same is true for power," Jake told them. "We're about to have brown outs. We need more consumption restrictions, and we need to think about additional power sources. I want to build a windmill."
"And I want to try digging another well," Damien insisted.
The Council voted to enact a lights-off rule from seven in the evening until eight in the morning. Candles and oil lamps only. No plugged-in electronics. No cooking. Everyone should limit themselves to two showers a week, unless they were covered in blood or mud from some hunting or laboring job. No watering any non-food plants.
"And if it's yellow, let it mellow," Damien suggested.
Rick looked puzzled. "What?"
"He means if yer just takin' a piss, don't flush," Daryl said.
Michonne smirked. "Who would have guessed you were an environmentalist, Daryl?"
"I ain't. I'm a conservationist. Like everyone else who grew up poor as shit."
"When you go on that run tomorrow," Rick told Daryl and Michonne, "sheet metal and tools are a priority. Get a list of construction supplies from them." He pointed to the engineers.
[*]
"Turn on the water," Rick told Michonne from where he lay beneath the sink. Water splattered from the curve of the pipe onto his face. "Off! Off! Off!"
Michonne chuckled and smacked the faucet off. "Maybe we should get Damien to do this."
"He's a water engineer. Not a plumber."
"I think he could handle it."
"I can handle it," Rick insisted. The sounds of tinkering wafted through the kitchen, intermixed with mild curses. "Turn it on again." Rick let out an exultant, "Yes!" when the pipe did not leak. He slid out from beneath the sink and stood with a smile. "See. Told you so."
Michonne hooked a finger through his belt loop. "My sexy plumber. Want to come upstairs and fix my pipes?"
"Worst metaphor ever. But...yes."
She laughed and turned, and Rick chased her up the stairs. As the bedroom door slammed, Judith awoke from her afternoon nap and wailed. Rick sighed.
[*]
"Can I go see the baby?" Sofie asked as she plucked a ripe tomato. At least the greenhouse shouldn't lose power, warmed as it was by solar panels. And, now that it was spring, there was less threat of frost.
"Maybe in a day or two, when they've had a chance to get more used to him." Carol added a tomato to the bushel.
"That's not ripe," Sofie said.
"Well, that's how you make fried green tomatoes." She'd promised them to Daryl before he left for his run tomorrow. "Daryl loves them."
She was learning all the little things about him these days, and, in that way, their relationship was running in reverse. Usually a woman dated a man and, through small talk, learned the surface things - favorite food, favorite color, favorite movie. Then, only after they'd been together for a long while - maybe only after they were married - did she see the deeper things - his old wounds, secret fears, hidden hatreds, fond hopes...his true character. But Carol and Daryl had glimpsed into one another's souls long before she'd learned he loved fried green tomatoes, collard greens, and peach cobbler, that his favorite movie was Unforgiven, or that he'd had a terrible crush on his second grade teacher. Who knew? Maybe they'd go all the way back to the beginning, and one day he'd take her on a first date.
"I bet the baby's cute," Sofie said. "I always wanted a little brother." She turned a tomato over slowly in her hand. Carol could see she was holding back tears. "I mean, I loved having big brothers, too." She sniffled.
Carol put an arm around her. "Let it out if you have too."
"I don't want to be weak," she said.
"It's not weak to miss someone."
"You don't cry over all the people you miss," Sofie said.
"Not because I'm strong," Carol said. "Because I'm not strong enough. I'm afraid if I start crying, I'll never stop." But she had cried over Sophia last night, hadn't she? A single, cathartic tear. Just one. It felt good, and she had stopped. "I miss my daughter, too," she told her. She kissed the top of Sofie's head. "But I'm glad to have you."
Sofie turned and gave her a big, one-armed hug. "I'm glad I have you, too."
[*]
Carol settled in against Daryl's naked chest, still quivering from her orgasm. Candles flickered on Daryl's nightstand, bathing the bed in a faint glow, and Carol wondered why they hadn't done this before the power restrictions. She liked the romantic touch.
Daryl breathed in and out steadily as he tried to regain control. "Damn," he muttered finally. "Worth the wait."
She snorted. "What wait? It's only been two nights since we last had sex."
"Can't help it if I think 'bout ya all the time."
She kissed the warm flesh between his pectoral muscles. She liked being able to lie against him like this, on her side, one arm across his stomach, her leg wedged between his. She hadn't been able to do it when she was in the sling. "Be safe on your run tomorrow."
"Mhmh."
She raised her head and kissed his cheek. "If you bring me something nice from Victoria's Secret," she whispered, "maybe I'll finally give you a blow job when you get back." The progression usually went the other way around, she knew, but given the way Ed had sometimes demeaned her when it came to that, it required a great deal of trust and vulnerability to offer it to Daryl, even more than sex.
"Ya want to do that?"
"I think I do."
"Be sure," he told her, stroking her hair and looking into her eyes. "Don't need it."
"But you want it."
"Yeah," he admitted. "But what I don't want is you feelin'...obligated. If that's somethin' that pokes some old wound...I ain't got to have it. A'right?"
She kissed his shoulder. "I love you," she said. "I want to please you."
"Well, I got good news then. Ya do." He kissed her softly. "No rush. We'll get there. We got all the time in the world, girl."
"Is that how you feel?" Carol asked. "We used to live like death was just around the corner."
"Dunno where death is these days. But life...life's right here. With ya."
One of the candles sputtered, flickered, but then kept its flame, blazing strong.
[*]
The sound of feet pounding against the earth caused Daryl to slow to a stop. His knapsack slung on one shoulder and his bow on the other, he turned to find Glenn catching his breath. The new father extended him a handwritten list on a piece of notebook paper. "Some things Maggie needs when you're on the run."
Daryl reached out, grabbed the list, and looked it over. The cursive was pretty, in sweeping blue ink. "Hell is a baby bee-jorn?"
"It's one of those carriers, you know? For a baby. You can carry it on your back or the front."
"Can't she just turn a blanket into a sling?"
"I don't know, man, she wants a Baby Bjorn."
"Car seat?" Daryl asked. "Ain't takin' the baby out the gates."
"We might have to run or something. You know, if something like the Wolves ever happens again."
"Got better security now," Daryl said. "And if we have to run, ain't got time to latch the baby in no car seat. Hell, my folks just put me on the rear dash." Daryl ran his eyes farther down the list. "Hell is a bass-eye-net?"
"Bassinet. It's like, a little crib. Until the baby's, you know, bigger."
"Just put it in a damn dresser drawer to sleep! That's what my mama did with me."
"Yeah," Glenn replied. "I don't know that you want to use your upbringing as a textbook example."
"We ain't got space for all this shit, Glenn." Daryl continued to scan the list. "Nursing pads?"
"For like, putting in her bra. For when she leaks milk."
Daryl winced.
"Just give the list to Michonne."
Daryl folded the list. "A'right. But we got to prioritize."
"I get it. But I had to give you the whole list. Maggie...she's a basket case right now, to be honest. Guess it's the lack of sleep."
"Yer lookin' kind of tired yerself."
Glenn had black bags under his eyes. "Hershey only slept two hours last night."
"That what yer callin' him? Like the chocolate bar?"
"Hershel's so formal."
"She should let ya sleep while she's feeding it. Ain't no damn sense ya both not sleepin'."
"Maggie likes me to keep her company when she's nursing him," Glenn told him.
"She's got yer balls in a vice, Chinaman."
"I'm Korean."
"I know." Daryl smirked. "I was just shittin' ya. What's daddy in Korean?"
"Appa."
Daryl clapped Glenn on the shoulder. "Congratulations, Appa." He shoved the folded list in his pocket and strolled toward the gates.
[*]
The supply run team - Daryl, Michonne, and Stone - carpooled in two pick-ups and got the sheet metal and other construction materials first, from the same abandoned construction site from which Stone had dragged the port-a-potties to the mall garage. They didn't want to draw attention with gunshots, so Daryl stood guard and knocked off walkers with his crossbow as needed while the other two loaded up. He only had to kill a few; the teenagers had lead so many to the watery depths already.
Stone showed off for Michonne by trying to lift more than he should have, and she rolled her eyes. After they'd entirely filled the bed of the largest pick-up, they drove the trucks into the underground mall parking lot, locked the gates, went inside, and started collecting.
Stone unlocked and rolled up the gates of the untouched Children's Place. "I'm going to get Enid a necklace while you two pillage this place. You need anything, Michonne?"
"Jewelry gets in the way of my katana practice."
"Well, you need no adornment anyway."
Michonne chuckled and shook her head while Daryl frowned and dragged a dolly - with a large empty cardboard box - into the store. He looked around the racks and racks of 0-3 month and 3-6 month baby clothes as Michonne started flipping through them. "Don't get the point of all this," he said. "My folks just left me in my diaper and nothin' else the first six months." When his mama did start putting him in clothes, they were hand-me-downs from his cousins, or at best something she'd picked up from the Salvation Army.
"This is too cute!" Michonne exclaimed, holding up a little, short sleeved, frilly, pink onesie that said, Daddy's Little Girl.
"Baby's a boy!"
"I know," Michonne said, "but the stuff for girls is so much cuter. I'm taking it." She folded it and tossed it in the box. "Sasha might be having a girl. Or Nadia might have one someday. I bet Lawrence knocked her up already." She pulled a onesie off the rack. "What the fuck?" she yelled.
Daryl looked at the dark blue one-piece in her hand. On it, in white lettering, was written the words, Monster Snack, and there was a cartoon monster - not unlike a walker - coming out of the O.
Michonne grabbed hold of the metal rail of the rack and bent over. "I think I'm going to be sick."
Daryl ripped the shirt from her hand, balled it up, and flung it as far as he could.
Michonne dry heaved, coughed up a little liquid, and then stood up straight. She ripped a shirt off the rack, wiped her mouth with it, and dropped it on the spot where she'd coughed. "I buried that so deep." Her lower lip trembled. "I try so hard not to think about him, about my little Andre."
Daryl wished he knew what to say. He forced himself to make an attempt. "Want me to hug ya or somethin'? Need to talk?"
Michonne laughed. "No. But thank you. That was exactly the absurd distraction I needed. Daryl Dixon, psychologist extraordinaire."
His lip twitched.
"You're all right, you know," Michonne told him. "Think I'm going to see if there's any gift baskets with chocolate in Macy's. Can you do all the baby shopping?" She extended Glenn's list to him and he took it.
"Sure."
"And grab some 2T and 3T clothes for Judith. We should stock up."
"Tea clothes?"
"That's the size. It'll be on the tag or the inside back of the shirt. Just look in the toddler section."
He nodded. "Go get yer chocolate."
Alone in the Children's Place, he began packing clothes, with little attention to how they looked. He was putting random things in the box when he spied a tiny blue and white sailor's suit. He snorted at how ridiculously impractical it was. But then he slid it from the hanger, folded it, and threw it in the box. The women would go wild for it.
[*]
In the Books A Million, Daryl ran a flashlight over the titles and gathered a box full of books. He went to the tool section of the Sears next. The mall was eerie in its dark, underground, silent emptiness. Very little natural light made its way into this lair, and Daryl wondered how Stone's camp had lived here for so long without going insane. When Daryl had been in that CDC vault, even before they'd had to flee the explosion, he'd thought of how long he would stay before slipping out on his own. He knew he wouldn't be able to live there forever, without breathing the open air or feeling the sun on his face.
He was almost glad the CDC had been destroyed now, or Carol probably would have stayed and he would have eventually gone, and what would his life be like today? He supposed he wouldn't even know what he was missing. He wouldn't have become a man who could feel that loss. It was strange, how many ugly events had combined to weave the path that led him into Carol's arms.
After packing all of their loot in one of the pick-ups in the garage, the trio prepared to settle into the J.C. Penny mattress section to sleep for the night before heading back in the early morning. Michonne seemed to have gotten over her shock in the Children's Place, and she was back to rolling her eyes and smirking at Stone's lame attempts to compliment her. Daryl didn't know what that kid got out of flirting with a woman he knew he could never have.
Daryl excused himself to "take a piss" but instead made his way back to the Victoria Secret store, where he picked up a few things for Carol. She'd given him a list this time, with sizes. When he was on his way out, a flashlight shone straight in his face, and he instinctively held up a hand to block the beam.
"Busted," Michonne said with a grin.
"Uh...I was just..."
"Getting something for Carol?" Michonne chuckled. "I came to get something for Rick."
As she began to walk past him, and they were nearly shoulder to shoulder, he said, "Think Rick'd like the way Stone flirts with ya?"
She stood still and rolled the whites of her eyes languidly at him. "Stone's not serious. He's practicing. And Rick's not a jealous ape."
"It's a goddamn double standard, if ya ask me."
"I didn't ask you," she said. "But what's that mean?'
"What if Rick was lettin' some eighteen-year-old hot young thing flirt with him, ya'd think he was pervy as hell."
"Yeah, you're right," she said. "It's a complete double standard. But there's got to be some advantages to being a woman. Still, I'll take your perspective under advisement." She walked on, and, over her shoulder, shouted, "Kiss Stone goodnight for me."
Daryl glowered, and Michonne's laugh trailed behind her as she disappeared inside the store.
[*]
When they returned to Alexandria, Daryl walked around town with the cardboard box filled with books, as if he were the delivery man. At Rick's house, he found Carl repairing a loose plank on the porch. Judith was sitting on the porch swing, looking like she'd just woken up from a nap, and staring vacantly at her baby doll. He set the box on the deacon's bench and pulled out Sign Language for Dummies. "Got ya an instructional video too. And more batteries for the portable DVD player."
"Thanks," Carl said. "Leave it on the bench." He went back to nailing.
"Ya like the carpentry thing?"
"Yeah. And Tom's a good teacher. He doesn't yell at me when he's frustrated the way my dad does."
"Yer dad's a'right." Daryl pulled out What to Expect the Toddler Years and put it on the bench and then grabbed The Very Hungry Caterpillar. He sat next to Judith on the swing. "Hey little ass kicker, look at this," he said, and she scooted up next to him and lay her sleepy head on his shoulder. He opened the book, put his pinky through the hole in the leaf picture, and wiggled it. She giggled, set down her doll, and yanked the book from his hands.
"Bring me anymore Playboys?" Carl asked.
"Nah. That'd just distract you from learning that sign language." He stood, kissed Judith on the top of her head, picked up the box, and continued his deliveries. There was The Complete Book of Wild Boar Hunting for Ethan, A World History of Brewing for Brother William, and What to Expect the First Year for Maggie. There were other books, and he hit nearly every house before coming home.
He found Lawrence writing in the small study in the downstairs bedroom he shared with Nadia. The door was wide open, so Daryl walked in and tossed the Joy of Sex down next to the the typewriter. "Forgot to get ya a weddin' present."
Lawrence glanced at the cover and then glanced at Daryl. "Ha ha," he said. "Very funny." He opened a desk drawer, shoved the book inside, and closed it. "Nadia is fully satisfied, I assure you."
"Ain't no woman ever fully satisfied," Daryl said.
Lawrence chuckled. "Well, you do have a point there."
Daryl went to the kitchen next, where Carol was cooking something that smelled fantastic. He dumped the remaining eight books - all paperback novels - on the kitchen table. "Hope ya like 'em," he said. "They only had two on your list."
She turned down the burner, set her spoon on the spoon rest, and came over to the table and looked at the titles. "I was hoping for Romanced by the Redneck."
"Think that was one-of-a-kind."
"Aren't you going to kiss me hello?"
"Want me to?" he asked.
She smiled. "Assume I always want you to. It's how people greet each other when they're...a couple."
"So I'm not s'posed to assume ya want sex every time I crawl into bed with ya, but I am s'posed to assume you want to be kissed every time I walk into a room with ya?"
"Yes."
Daryl leaned in and kissed her. He pulled away smiling. "Maybe we should...uh...take this upstairs?"
She laughed. "Or maybe you should go wash up for lunch, because you obviously killed some walkers on your way home."
"Only get twoshowers a week now."
She glanced at the blood on his shirt and wrinkled her nose. "And this would be a good time for one."
"Wanna join me? Double up? Save water? Help the environment?"
She chuckled. "I think that would end up being a longer than usual shower. And I have to finish lunch. Come on. You know I'm worth the wait."
She said it like a joke. What had Lawrence once called that flippant tone of hers? Self-protection. Daryl put a hand on each of her hips and kissed her again. "Ya are, ya know," he said, and then he slipped away to wash off the filth of the road.
