AN: Here we are, another chapter on this one.

I hope you enjoy! Let me know what you think!

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Carol had always been something of a religious woman, though she'd often struggled to reconcile her beliefs and her feelings. She understood what had been taught to her all her life—God had a plan for her, just the same as for everyone else. Still, she had questioned, many times, why it was that her plan seemed to be one that involved so much hurt and suffering. She'd felt guilty for her questions, and her occasional anger, but she'd told herself that her God would forgive her for being imperfect and human—even if there was a great deal to forgive these days.

Of everything Carol had suffered in her life, losing Sophia was the hardest blow. Her heart still felt raw inside her chest. It was healed only enough to make it bearable that it should go on beating and loving. There wasn't a single morning that she woke without thinking of her baby girl—her first baby girl—and there wasn't a single night that she didn't remember her in her prayers.

Carol had spent more time being mad at God than was probably considered acceptable by most. She'd spent more time questioning this so-called plan than she knew she was supposed to do.

Still, Carol believed, now, that she was forgiven for all that—for everything. She believed that she had proof of her forgiveness all around her.

Carol smiled at the blue-eyed baby girl that lie on the bed in front of her and clearly enjoyed the little massage that Carol was giving her as she rubbed her freshly washed body down with the lotion she'd acquired from their storage.

"Oooh—that feels so good, doesn't it?" Carol cooed. Rose looked at her and smiled. She laughed, her high-pitched laugh, and she let the sound change into the almost growling babbles that she gave Carol and Daryl when she was laughing, but also anxious, it seemed, to talk back with them. "You got something to say to me? Well, just say it. Mama's listening," Carol teased back at the baby.

Rose didn't heal Carol's heart from the loss of Sophia. It wasn't some kind of absolute fix where the pain was suddenly just gone. Carol didn't believe that hearts worked that way at all. Rose didn't even lessen the pain of losing Sophia. If anything, she was sometimes a reminder of how long Sophia had been gone—Sophia, who hadn't known her mother was carrying her baby sister, but who would have been so excited to know of the baby's presence.

Carol didn't love Rose instead of, or in place of, Sophia. She loved her right along with Sophia.

Rose filled Carol's heart with love that helped to make the pain more bearable. She filled her arms to make them feel less empty. She filled her days and her nights to make the strange, cavernous loneliness—one that seemed untouchable by anyone or anything else—a little less prevalent.

Rose was growing, and she was beautiful, healthy, and strong. She was so very happy.

She loved time on her blanket, on the floor, and she pushed upward like she could crawl any day. She would hold onto fingers and, if you held her hips, she would do her best to balance on thighs. She could roll over in one direction without hesitation, though she hadn't fully mastered rolling in the other. And every time that Alice examined the little girl, she remarked about how strong she was and how wonderfully she was developing.

Carol's beautiful, blue-eyed baby girl took very strongly after mother and, though Carol wasn't vain in the least, she was happy to look back at her own baby features instead of seeing too many of Ed's features on Rose's face. She had been spared the lingering hurt of seeing numerous reminders of the man in the baby girl that he'd biologically helped to create. There were some reminders of Ed there and, Carol was sure that, as Rose grew, there would be more things that he had given her, but most of her appearance seemed to very strongly come from Carol.

Biological parentage aside, Rose was a Daddy's girl to the utmost definition of the title.

Rose howled with laughter at nearly every expression that Daryl made at her. He growled at her, and she growled back at him, and they laughed with each other over their silly antics like it was a secret language that only the two of them shared. Rose very clearly loved Daryl, and she liked to be snuggled by him at night. They had a routine where he dressed her in her pajamas—her favorite way to be dressed—and wrapped her very tightly in a blanket, just as she liked. Then, he would hold her against his chest and walk her around the house, dancing with her when he thought that Carol wasn't watching.

And Rose would close her eyes, even when she wasn't sleeping, and she would snuggle into him. When she grew tired, she would hum at him and make the little sounds that they called singing to go right along with his humming and singing.

More than once, Carol had excused herself away from them, claiming to give them time and space together, so that she could simply let her tears flow without the need for explanation.

More than once, she'd simply found herself unable to fathom doing anything else except to whisper a string of words, one right after the other, until it sounded almost like her own quiet litany.

"Thank you…thank you…thank you…thank you…"

In fact, these days, the strung together words of thanks had taken the place of the word that she'd so often muttered—and even screamed—before: "please."

Whereas she had feared to ever let her precious Sophia be alone with Ed for even a second, and whereas she had slept fitfully from the moment Sophia had been born because she feared what Ed might do to the little girl in some fit of hatefulness and anger, Carol now gladly left Rose with her Daddy. Carol slept soundly, secure in the fact that if Daryl woke to Rose's requests for attention before her, he would do nothing more than try to soothe the little one as he brought her, safe and sound, to Carol's arms. Carol took leisurely baths and even read a book, sometimes, while Daryl simply rolled around on the floor and spent time with his daughter.

The daughter that he never, ever, admitted wasn't his own flesh and blood. Sometimes, in fact, Carol forgot that Rose wasn't Daryl's biological child, and she would swear that she could see him in Rose's smile or in the particular way that she scrunched her eyes when she was very happy—and she was almost always very happy.

And, whereas, once upon a different life, Carol begged on her knees that the man she loved—a man who had never loved her, she believed now—would see the error of his ways and would change or, at the very least, would let her have some respite from the cruelty of his touch, now Carol knew what it was to know the tenderness of a man's affection.

Carol trembled under Daryl's fingertips from time to time, but her trembling wasn't brought on by fear, as it had been with Ed. Instead, it was brought on by the awe that he could love her so much, and that he could be so devoted to her body.

Daryl was not a delicate man—at least not always. He was, at times, nothing short of clumsy. He got excited, and he squeezed to hard, and he moved too fast, and he was rough. But every single time he touched Carol in any way, he did so with absolute love and good intention.

Carol knew what it was to feel pain. She knew what it was to absorb it and accept it. She knew what it was to keep her expression straight, and her voice calm, and to hide her discomfort. And she never minded doing that to help save Daryl's feelings over something accidental because, more than any accidentally placed elbow or overly rough touch, Carol felt the love in Daryl's hands.

His love was worth any accidental clumsiness she might have to endure. She loved him, and she loved his love. And she wouldn't change him for anything in the world.

Carol felt her forgiveness all around her because her blessings surrounded her like the blankets in which Rose like to be wrapped—warm and comforting.

Carol loved Daryl so much that she wanted him to have his happiness. She wanted him to know the way she felt. She wanted him to feel equally as warm and comforted.

For years, she had done everything she could to try to be a good and dutiful wife to Ed. She'd tried to do what she believed she should do, and she'd tried to give him everything. She'd tried to make his home a home, and she'd tried to fill it with everything he wanted or needed to be happy. She'd always been repaid for her efforts with pain and, eventually, she'd begun to resent every single expectation that society, or Ed, or even her own mind, had put on her about what it meant to be a good wife.

Now, Carol no longer felt resentment about the expectations of being a good wife. In fact, she didn't feel that those expectations were placed on her by anyone—maybe not even herself. Instead, she did what she did because she wanted to do it. She did what she did because she enjoyed bringing happiness to Daryl, and she benefitted greatly from his genuine appreciation and thanks.

He was easy to please.

Daryl liked when Carol cooked for him, so they skipped community meals on occasion, and Carol procured the ingredients to prepare the food herself, with an abundance of love because Daryl said that made it taste better. Daryl commented that he felt like a king when she served him his dinner, and Carol enjoyed hamming it up a bit and kissing him as she overdramatically tucked a napkin into his shirt collar or arranged it on his lap.

Carol made a pallet for Daryl on the floor beside Rose's pallet in the evenings, padding it for him as she would for the baby, so that he could be comfortable while he played with the little girl. Sometimes, as he relaxed on the blankets with Rose, Carol would rub his feet—a treat he often repaid to her when they went to bed and he worked the knots free from her shoulders.

Carol gave her body freely to Daryl.

At first, she'd been afraid that he wouldn't love her, and that he wouldn't find her body attractive. She'd been sure that he would find stretchmarks, loose skin, and every other physical piece of evidence of having carried and birthed two children and having lived a hard life that Carol wore, to all be disgusting. She'd imagined him pulling away from her with revulsion.

Instead, he treated her with awe and amazement. The things she most hated about her body, he practically worshipped. Her breasts weren't sagging, as she thought they were, under the weight of her milk. Instead, they were miraculous and supplying Rose with what she needed to grow big and strong—and Carol never denied Daryl a taste or two of the milk that he enjoyed, and she never told his secret.

The stretchmarks, he insisted, were soft under his fingertips like silk. As a man who was, in all ways, very tactile, he appreciated such softness. The skin dimpled with cellulite, and the loose skin around her belly, was soft, too. And her untoned belly was home for Rose—something he never seemed to forget—and he would often say, when Carol was snuggling with him in the quiet hours of the night, that if God was still handing out miracles, someday it would be home, again, to another little Dixon.

Carol was happy to give herself to Daryl, and she appreciated the time they spent together. He often had nothing more than to look at her—sometimes with almost puppy-dog type eyes that begged for her affection, sometimes with eyes that practically burned with an animalistic need, and other times with a sideways grin that spoke to a little devilish and playful side that he shared with her—and she would invite him to come to her and take what he wanted; all that he wanted.

Even thinking about how very blessed she was, while working Rose into her clothes as she tried her best to roll away and escape her mother—tired of her massage and ready for adventure—Carol felt herself nearly choking up at how grateful and thankful she was for the life that she had now.

Carol looked up at the quiet knocking at the bedroom door.

Daryl smiled at her when she smiled at him.

"You two 'bout ready?" He asked.

"How many layers do you think she needs?" Carol asked.

"That and her lil' pink suit oughta do it," Daryl said. "It's practically spring out there now."

Carol laughed quietly. The spring was coming. The winter hadn't left entirely, but it was leaving. Now, when they stepped outside to do their chores or to wander down and pick up food, they could hear the sounds of dripping all around them as the snow dropped off of branches and roofs where it had accumulated. Now, when they made their way from the cabin to the main part of the community, or even over to Merle and Andrea's house to check on the progress of the newest little Dixon who was set to make its debut very soon, Daryl walked in front of Carol and stomped his way through the snow that seemed almost always covered with a crunchy sheet of thin ice that came from the snow's attempt to melt every day and its consequent refreezing at night.

Carol, usually wearing Rose, though sometimes Daryl wore the baby, followed in Daryl's footsteps as he put in the energy necessary to clear a path that would it make easier for her to move through their thawing world.

In many ways, he did that, and in all ways, Carol was thankful.

"Can you put her suit on?" Carol asked. "She's ready to go—and I mean she's ready to go."

Carol held onto her daughter's leg. She was starting, perhaps in an effort to crawl or to find her own form of locomotion, to practice something that was very akin to the movements of a seal. It wouldn't be long before they had to chase her. For the moment, however, Carol's only concern was to keep her from somehow belly walking herself right off the bed.

Daryl scooped the little girl up before she could gather up too much momentum, and she squealed at him when he held her up to his face. He kissed her cheek, and she drooled all over hand as she gnawed at it and hummed in satisfaction with her Daddy's affection.

"I think she's starting to teethe," Carol commented, getting up from the bed and following after Daryl. In the living room, they would wrestle into boots and outerwear.

Instead of leading her directly to the living room, though, Daryl waited for her to get around the bed. He grabbed her and pulled her to him in a warm hug. A slobbery hand trailed drool across her face as Rose reached for her, happy to see her parents so close together. Daryl kissed Carol's forehead with affection, and then he pressed a kiss to her lips when she puckered at him.

He caught her face in his unoccupied hand as she broke the kiss.

"You a little damp-eyed," he said. "You been cryin'?"

"Not the bad kind," Carol said, reflexively reaching up to wipe at her barely damp lashes. He frowned at her.

"Promise?"

She smiled at him.

"I could tell you what—brought a tear to my eye," she said. "But—it's a secret."

He smiled and leaned his face toward her.

"You can whisper it to me," he teased. "I won't tell Rose."

Carol laughed to herself and placed her lips close to his ear.

"I was just thinking—how very blessed I am," Carol said. "And how—you're one of my greatest blessings."

Daryl looked pleased enough with the secret that wasn't really a secret. He smiled at her.

"Thank you," Carol added.

Daryl laughed quietly and shook his head.

"It's me that oughta thank you, woman," Daryl said. "Every damn blessin' I got? I got 'cause of you. It all comes through you."

Carol's face burned warm at the compliment.

"Come on," Carol said, wrapping her fingers around the upper part of Daryl's arm. "I want to get over there with enough time to really help Andrea with the nursery before Rose gets too grumpy."

"Don't you worry about Rose," Daryl offered with genuine amusement. "You just get Andrea comfortable enough to settle down and hatch my nephew without costin' Merle what's left of his damn mind. I'll handle lil' Miss Rosey Posey."